That night, Graeme slept the dreamless sleep of utter exhaustion, and
the next day, whenever her father or Mrs Snow stole in to look at her,
she slept or seemed to sleep still.
"She is weary," they said, in whispers. "Let her rest." Kind
neighbours came and went, with offers of help and sympathy, but nothing
was suffered to disturb the silence of the now darkened chamber. "Let
her rest," said all.
But when the next night passed, and the second day was drawing to a
close, Mrs Snow became anxious, and her visits were more frequent.
Graeme roused herself to drink the tea that she brought her, and to Mrs
Snow's question whether she felt rested, she said, "Oh! yes," but she
closed her eyes, and turned her face away again. Janet went out and
seated herself in the kitchen, with a picture of utter despondency.
Just then, her husband came in.
"Is anything the matter?" asked he, anxiously.
"No," said his wife, rousing herself. "Only, I dinna ken weel what to
do."
"Is Miss Graeme sick? or is she asleep?"
"I hope she's no' sick. I ken she's no sleeping. But she ought to be
roused, and when I think what she's to be roused to--. But, if she
wants to see her sister, it must be before--before she's laid in--"
A strong shudder passed over her.
"Oh! man! it's awful, the first sight of a dear face in the coffin--"
"Need she see her again?" asked Mr Snow.
"Oh! yes, I doubt she must. And the bairns too, and it will soon be
here, now."
"Her father," suggested Mr Snow.
"He has seen her. He was there for hours, both yesterday and to-day.
But he is asleep now, and he has need of rest. I canna disturb him."
"Couldn't you kind of make her think she was needed--to her father or
the little ones? She would rouse herself if they needed her."
"That's weel said," said Mrs Snow, gratefully. "Go you down the brae
for the bairns, and I'll go and speak to her again."
"Miss Graeme, my dear," said she, softly; "could you speak to me a
minute?"
Her manner was quite calm. It was so like the manner in which Graeme
had been hundreds of times summoned to discuss domestic matters, that
without seeming to realise that there was anything peculiar in the time
or circumstances, she opened her eyes and said, quietly,--
"Well, what is it, Janet?"
"My dear, it is the bairns. There is nothing the matter with them,"
added she hastily, as Graeme started. "They have been down the brae
with Emily all the day, but they are coming home now; and, my dear, they
havena been ben yonder, and I think they should see her before--before
she's moved, and I dinna like to disturb your father. My bairn, are you
able to rise and take Will and wee Rosie ben yonder."
Graeme raised herself slowly up.
"Janet, I have been forgetting the bairns."
Mrs Snow had much ado to keep back her tears; but she only said
cheerfully:
"My dear, you were weary, and they have had Emily."
She would not be tender with her, or even help her much in her
preparations; though her hands trembled, and she touched things in a
vague, uncertain way, as though she did not know what she was doing.
Janet could not trust herself to do what she would like to have done;
she could only watch her without appearing to do so, by no means sure
that she had done right in rousing her. She was ready at last.
"Are they come?" asked Graeme, faintly.
"No, dear. There's no haste. Rest yourself a wee while. My dear, are
you sure you are quite able for it?" added she, as Graeme rose.
"Yes, I think so. But I would like to go alone, first."
"My poor lamb! If I were but sure that I have been right," thought
Janet, as she sat down to wait.
An hour passed, and when the door opened, and Graeme came out again, the
fears of her faithful friend were set at rest.
"She hasna' been alone all this time, as I might have known," said Janet
to herself, with a great rush of hidden tears. "I'm faithless, and sore
beset myself whiles, but I needna fear for them. The worst is over
now."
And was the worst over? After that was the covering of the beloved
forever from their sight, and the return to the silent and empty home.
There was the gathering up of the broken threads of their changed life;
the falling back on their old cares and pleasures, all so much the same,
and yet so different. There was the vague unbelief in the reality of
their sorrow, the momentary forgetfulness, and then the pang of sudden
remembrance,--the nightly dreams of her, the daily waking to find her
gone.
By and by, came letters from the lads; those of Norman and Harry full of
bitter regrets, which to Graeme seemed almost like reproaches, that they
had not been sent for before the end; and the grief of those at home
came back strong and fresh again.
The coming of the "bonny spring days" for which Norman had so wished,
wakened "vain longings for the dead." The brooks rose high, and the
young leaves rustled on the elms; and all pleasant sounds spoke to them
with Menie's voice. The flowers which she had planted,--the May-flower
and the violets by the garden path, looked at them with Menie's eyes.
The odour of the lilacs, by the gate, and of the pine trees on the hill
came with that mysterious power to awaken old associations, bringing
back to Graeme the memory of the time when they first came to the house
on the hill, when they were all at home together, and Menie was a happy
child. All these things renewed their sorrow, but not sharply or
bitterly. It was the sorrow of chastened and resigned hearts, coming
back with hopeful patience to tread the old paths of their daily life,
missing the lost one, and always with a sense of waiting for the time
when they shall meet again, but quite content.
And Mrs Snow, watching both the minister and Graeme, "couldna be
thankful enough" for what she saw. But as the weeks passed on there
mingled with her thankfulness an anxiety which she herself was inclined
to resent. "As though the Lord wasna bringing them through their
troubles in a way that was just wonderful," she said to herself, many a
time. At last, when the days passed into weeks, bringing no colour to
the cheeks, and no elasticity to the step of Graeme, she could not help
letting her uneasiness be seen.
"It's her black dress that makes her look so pale, ain't it?" said Mr
Snow, but his face was grave, too.
"I dare say that makes a difference, and she is tired to-day, too. She
wearied herself taking the flowers and things over yonder," said Mrs
Snow, glancing towards the spot where the white grave-stones gleamed out
from the pale, green foliage of spring-time. "And no wonder. Even
Emily was over tired, and hasna looked like herself since. I dare say
I'm troubling myself when there is no need."
"The children, Will, and Rosie, don't worry her with their lessons, do
they?"
"I dinna ken. Sometimes I think they do. But she would weary far more
without them. We must have patience. It would never do to vex the
minister with fears for her."
"No, it won't do to alarm him," said Mr Snow, with emphasis; and he
looked very grave. In a little he opened his lips as if to say more,
but seemed to change his mind.
"It ain't worth while to worry her with it. I don't more than half
believe it myself. Doctors don't know everything. It seems as though
it couldn't be so--and if it is so, it's best to keep still about it--
for a spell, anyhow."
And Mr Snow vaguely wished that Doctor Chittenden had not overtaken him
that afternoon, or that they had not talked so long and so gravely
beneath the great elms.
"And the doctor ain't given to talking when he had ought to keep still.
Can't nothing be done for him? I'll have a talk with the squire,
anyhow."
That night Mr and Mrs Snow were startled by a message from Graeme.
Her father had been once or twice before sharply and suddenly seized
with illness. The doctor looked very grave this time, but seeing
Graeme's pale, anxious face, he could not find it in his heart to tell
her that this was something more than the indigestion which it had been
called--severe but not dangerous. The worst was over for this time, and
Graeme would be better able to bear a shock by and by.
The minister was better, but his recovery was very slow--so slow, that
for the first time during a ministry of thirty years he was two Sabbaths
in succession unable to appear in his accustomed place in the pulpit.
It was this which depressed him and made him grow so grave and silent,
Graeme thought, as they sat together in the study as it began to grow
dark. She roused herself to speak cheerfully, so as to win him from the
indulgence of his sad thoughts.
"Shall I read to you, papa? You have hardly looked at the book that Mr
Snow brought. I am sure you will like it. Shall I read awhile."
"Yes, if you like; by and by, when the lamp is lighted. There is no
haste. I have been thinking as I sat here, Graeme--and I shall find no
better time than this to speak of it to you--that--"
But what he had been thinking Graeme was not to hear that night, for a
hand was laid on the study-door, and in answer to Graeme's invitation,
Mr and Mrs Snow came in, "just to see how the folks were getting
along," said Mr Snow, as Graeme stirred the fire into a blaze. But
there was another and a better reason for the visit, as he announced
rather abruptly after a little.
"They've been talking things over, down there to the village, and
they've come to the conclusion that they'd better send you off--for a
spell--most anywhere--so that you come back rugged again. Some say to
the seaside, and some say to the mountains, but _I_ say to Canada. It's
all fixed. There's no trouble about ways and means. It's in gold, to
save the discount," added he, rising, and laying on the table something
that jingled. "For they do say they are pretty considerable careful in
looking at our bills, up there in Canada, and it is all the same to our
folks, gold or paper," and he sat down again, as though there was enough
said, and then he rose as if to go. Graeme was startled, and so was her
father.
"Sit down, deacon, and tell me more. No, I'm not going to thank you--
you need not run away. Tell me how it happened."
"They don't think papa so very ill?" said Graeme, alarmed.
"Well--he ain't so rugged as he might be--now is he?" said Mr Snow,
seating himself. "But he ain't so sick but that he can go away a spell,
with you to take care of him--I don't suppose he'd care about going by
himself. And Mis' Snow, and me--we'll take care of the children--"
"And what about this, deacon?" asked Mr Elliott, laying his hand on the
purse that Sampson had placed on the table.
But Mr Snow had little to say about it. If he knew where the idea of
the minister's holidays originated, he certainly did not succeed in
making it clear to the minister and Graeme.
"But that matters little, as long as it is to be," said Mrs Snow,
coming to the deacon's relief. "And it has all been done in a good
spirit, and in a proper and kindly manner, and from the best of
motives," added she, looking anxiously from Graeme to her father.
"You need not be afraid, my kind friends," said Mr Elliott, answering
her look, while his voice trembled. "The gift shall be accepted in the
spirit in which it is offered. It gives me great pleasure."
"And, Miss Graeme, my dear," continued Mrs Snow, earnestly, "you needna
look so grave about it. It is only what is right and just to your
father--and no favour--though it has been a great pleasure to all
concerned. And surely, if I'm satisfied, you may be."
Sampson gave a short laugh.
"She's changed her mind about us Merleville folks lately--"
"Whist, man! I did that long ago. And, Miss Graeme, my dear, think of
seeing your brothers, and their friends, and yon fine country, and the
grand river that Harry tells us of! It will be almost like seeing
Scotland again, to be in the Queen's dominions. My dear, you'll be
quite glad when you get time to think about it."
"Yes--but do they really think papa is so ill?"
She had risen to get a light, and Mrs Snow had followed her from the
room.
"Ill? my dear, if the doctor thought him ill would he send him from
home? But he needs a rest, and a change--and, my dear, you do that
yourself, and I think it's just providential. Not but that you could
have gone without their help, but this was done in love, and I would
fain have you take pleasure in it, as I do."
And Graeme did take pleasure in it, and said so, heartily, and "though
it wasna just the thing for the Sabbath night," as Janet said, they
lingered a little, speaking of the things that were to be done, or to be
left undone, in view of the preparations for the journey. They returned
to the study with the light just as Mr Elliott was saying,--
"And so, I thought, having the prospect of but few Sabbaths, I would
like to spend them all at home."
Janet's first impulse was to turn and see whether Graeme had heard her
father's words. She evidently had not, for she came in smiling, and set
the lamp on the table. There was nothing reassuring in the gravity of
her husband's face, Mrs Snow thought, but his words were cheerful.
"Well, yes, I vote for Canada. We ain't going to believe all the boys
say about it, but it will be a cool kind of place to go to in summer,
and it will be a change, to say nothing of the boys."
Graeme laughed softly. The boys would not have been the last on her
list of good reasons, for preferring Canada as the scene of their summer
wanderings. She did not join in the cheerful conversation that
followed, however, but sat thinking a little sadly, that the meeting
with the boys, in their distant home, would be sorrowful as well as
joyful.
If Mrs Snow had heard anything from her husband, with regard to the
true state of the minister's health, she said nothing of it to Graeme,
and she went about the preparations for their journey cheerfully though
very quietly. Indeed, if her preparations had been on a scale of much
greater magnificence, she needed not have troubled herself about them.
Ten pairs of hands were immediately placed at her disposal, where half
the number would have served. Her affairs were made a personal matter
by all her friends. Each vied with the others in efforts to help her
and save her trouble; and if the reputation of Merleville, for all
future time, had depended on the perfect fit of Graeme's one black silk,
or on the fashion of her grey travelling-dress, there could not, as Mrs
Snow rather sharply remarked, "have been more fuss made about it." And
she had a chance to know, for the deacon's house was the scene of their
labours of love. For Mrs Snow declared "she wouldna have the minister
and Miss Graeme fashed with nonsense, more than all their proposed jaunt
would do them good, and so what couldna be redone there needna be done
at all."
But Mrs Snow's interest and delight in all the preparations were too
real and manifest, to permit any of the willing helpers to be offended
at her sharpness. In her heart Mrs Snow was greatly pleased, and owned
as much in private, but in public, "saw no good in making a work about
it," and, on behalf of the minister and his daughter, accepted the
kindness of the people as their proper right and due. When Mrs Page
identified herself with their affairs, and made a journey to Rixford for
the purpose of procuring the latest Boston fashion for sleeves, before
Graeme's dress should be made, she preserved the distant civility of
manner, with which that lady's advances were always met; and listened
rather coldly to Graeme's embarrassed thanks, when the same lady
presented her with some pretty lawn handkerchiefs; but she was warm
enough in her thanks to Becky Pettimore--I beg her pardon, Mrs Eli
Stone--for the soft lamb's wool socks, spun and knitted for the minister
by her own hands, and her regrets that her baby's teeth would not permit
her to join the sewing parties, were far more graciously received than
were Mrs Page's profuse offers of assistance.
On the whole, it was manifest that Mrs Snow appreciated the kindness of
the people, though she was not quite impartial in her bestowment of
thanks; and, on the whole, the people were satisfied with the "deacon's
wife," and her appreciation of them and their favours. Nothing could be
more easily seen, than that the deacon's wife had greatly changed her
mind about many things, since the minister's Janet used "to speak her
mind to the Merleville folk," before they were so well known to her.
As for Graeme, her share in the business of preparation was by no means
arduous. She was mostly at home with the bairns, or sharing the visits
of her father to the people whom he wished to see before he went away.
It was some time before Will and Rosie could be persuaded that it was
right for Graeme to leave them, and that it would be altogether
delightful to live all the time at Mr Snow's, and go to school in the
village--to the fine new high-school, which was one of the evidences of
the increasing prosperity of Merleville. But they were entirely
persuaded of it at last, and promised to become so learned, that Graeme
should afterward have nothing to teach them. About the little ones, the
elder sister's heart was quite at rest. It was not the leaving them
alone, for they were to be in the keeping of the kind friend, who had
cared for them all their lives.
Graeme never ceased to remember those happy drives with her father, on
his gentle ministrations to the sick and sorrowful of his flock, in
those days. She never thought of the cottage at the foot of the hill,
but she seemed to see the suffering face of the widow Lovejoy, and her
father's voice repeating,--
"God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble." Long
afterwards, when the laughter of little children rose where the widow's
groans had risen, Graeme could shut her eyes and see again the suffering
face--the dooryard flowers, the gleaming of the sunlight on the pond--
the very shadows of the maples on the grass. Then it was her sorrowful
delight to recall those happy hours of quiet converse, the half sad,
half joyful memories which her father loved to dwell upon--the firm and
entire trust for the future, of which his words assured her.
Afterwards it came to her, that through all this pleasant time, her
father was looking at a possibility to which her eyes were shut. He had
spoke of her mother as he had seldom spoken even to Graeme, of the early
days of their married-life--of all she had been to him, of all she had
helped him to be and to do. And more than once he said,--
"You are like your mother, Graeme, in some things, but you have not her
hopeful nature. You must be more hopeful and courageous, my child."
He spoke of Marian, Graeme remembered afterward. Not as one speaks of
the dead, of those who are hidden from the sight, but as of one near at
hand, whom he was sure to meet again. Of the lads far-away, he always
spoke as "your brothers, Graeme." He spoke hopefully, but a little
anxiously, too.
"For many a gallant bark goes down when its voyage is well nigh over;
and there is but one safe place of anchorage, and I know not whether
they have all found it yet. Not that I am afraid of them. I believe it
will be well with them at last. But in all the changes that may be
before you, you will have need of patience. You must be patient with
your brothers, Graeme; and be faithful to them, love, and never let them
wander unchecked from what is right, for your mother's sake and mine."
He spoke of their leaving home, and very thankfully of the blessings
that had followed them since then; of the kindness of the people, and
his love to them; and of the health and happiness of all the bairns, "of
whom one has got home before me, safely and soon."
"We might have come here, love, had your mother lived. And yet, I do
not know. The ties of home and country are strong, and there was much
to keep us there. Her departure made all the rest easy for me, and I am
quite convinced our coming was for the best. There is only one thing
that I have wished, and I know it is a vain thing." He paused a moment.
"Of late I have sometimes thought--I mean the thought has sometimes come
to me unbidden--that I would like to rest beside her at last. But it is
only a fancy. I know it will make no difference in the end."
If Graeme grew pale and trembled as she listened, it was with no dread
that she could name. If it was forced upon her that the time must come
when her father must leave them, it lay in her thoughts, far-away. She
saw his grave dimly as a place of rest, when the labours of a long life
should be ended; she had no thought of change, or separation, or of the
blank that such a blessed departure must leave. The peace, which had
taken possession of his mind had its influence on hers, and she "feared
no evil."
Afterwards, when the thought of this time and of these words came back
she chid herself with impatience, and a strange wonder, that she should
not have seen and understood all that was in his thought--forgetting in
her first agony how much better was the blessed repose of these moments,
than the knowledge of her coming sorrow could have made them.
They all passed the rides and visits and the happy talks together. The
preparations for the journey were all made. The good-byes were said to
all except to Mrs Snow and Emily. The last night was come, and Graeme
went round just as she always did, to close the doors and windows before
she went to bed. She was tired, but not too tired to linger a little
while at the window, looking out upon the scene, now so familiar and so
dear. The shadows of the elms lay dark on the town, but the moonlight
gleamed bright on the pond, and on the white houses of the village, and
on the white stones in the grave-yard, grown precious to them all as
Menie's resting-place. How peaceful it looked! Graeme thought of her
sister's last days, and joyful hope, and wondered which of them all
should first be called to lie down by Menie's side. She thought of the
grave far-away on the other side of the sea, where they had laid her
mother with her baby on her breast; but her thoughts were not all
sorrowful. She thought of the many happy days that had come to them
since the time that earth had been left dark and desolate by their
mother's death, and realised for the moment how true it was, as her
father had said to her, that God suffers no sorrow to fall on those who
wait on Him, for which He does not also provide a balm.
"I will trust and not be afraid," she murmured.
She thought of her brothers and of the happy meeting that lay before
them, but beyond their pleasant holiday she did not try to look; but
mused on till her musings lost themselves in slumber, and changed to
dreams.
At least, she always thought she must have fallen asleep, and that it
was the sudden calling of her name, that awakened her with a start. She
did not hear it when she listened for it again. She did not think of
Rosie or Will, but went straight to her father's room. Through the
half-open door, she saw that the bed was undisturbed, and that her
father sat in the arm-chair by the window. The lamp burned dimly on the
table beside him, and on the floor lay an open book, as it had fallen
from his hand. The moonlight shone on his silver hair, and on his
tranquil face. There was a smile on his lips, and his eyes were closed,
as if in sleep; but even before she touched his cold hand, Graeme knew
that from that sleep her father would never waken more.