THE DESOLATE MOTHER.
It was three months later. The Selbys' shrubbery had changed from the
vigorous greens of summer to russet, paling here into sulphur yellow,
there deepening to orange and crimson which outshone the less vivid
tints of the early chrysanthemums. The autumn flowers, nipped by early
frosts, lay black and ragged on their erewhile brilliant beds. The sun
was warm and the air sweet with the breath of leaves falling softly in
their brightness, one by one, peaceful, beautiful, fragrant, like the
ending of a well-spent life.
In the parlour the windows were open; and a fire burning in the grate
to temper the air in shady corners proclaimed the fall of the year.
Stretched on a sofa, thin and wan, with hair pushed back--hair which
three months before had been soft and glossy and of the loveliest
brown, now dry, rusty, grizzled, banded with locks of grey, and mixed
all through with threads of shining white--her fingers shrunk and
bloodless, clasping a baby's bells and coral, and her dim eyes wet
with silent tears, lay the desolate mother mourning for her child. She
had been very ill, and bodily weakness, unable to suffer more, was the
one consoler as yet to mitigate her grief, by benumbing the capacity
for pain. Her George had mingled tears with hers, tears drawn as much
by the sight of what she suffered as by its cause. He had tended and
watched her with more than a woman's tenderness, but after all he was
a man, with his day's work to perform whatever might befall, and the
doing it supported him by bringing distraction and thereby rest. True,
it jarred miserably on the overwrought nerves to keep up the routine
of music lessons, to watch the "fingering" of inattentive pupils and
have his senses pierced by their frequent discords; but it was easier
to find endurance for these physical ills than for the heartstrain he
had felt at home. The patience and fatigue of the outdoor toil brought
the calmness he needed so much in the presence of his stricken wife.
For her there was no break or respite to the rush of black and
miserable thought. If the child had died she could have borne it. It
would have been grief, but grief of the common kind, and for which
there is consolation in the pious certainties of another life. It
would have been agony to part with her treasure, but agony with a
hope. In time she would have learned to bear the bereavement with
sorrowful patience and resignation--to think of her blossom snatched
away, rather as one transplanted and someday to be recovered in
brighter bloom, growing in immortal gardens; just as she looked on the
other--brother of the lost one, born since her loss, and which had
never seen the light. Oh, if she could but have thought of the two as
with each other! But even the consolations of faith were denied her.
The child had vanished utterly, and she was left to wonder and surmise
whither it might have been carried. Surely if it had died there would
have been found some sign or vestige, and then her mother's heart
would have been at rest. She would have wept and there would have been
an end. She could have rested her thoughts on the armies of the Holy
Innocents, and in her dreams a cherub face would have come to her with
shining wings, whispering hope and consolation. But even this saddened
peace was not for her. She would not entertain the thought that her
baby was dead; it was away somewhere--where, oh where?--and perhaps it
needed her, and was crying for her, and she could not come to it; and
a restlessness seized her, a low dull fever of impotent longing, and
kept her pacing the chamber to and fro, till exhaustion numbed her
senses and she fell asleep. But oh, what sleep! It was more miserable
than waking. Fancy gave shape to her yearnings, and dreams revived
their wretchedness into more tangible shape. The baby's cry, as if in
pain, rang through them all, and sometimes she could see the arms
stretched out to her, but never the face. A shadow undefined came in
between, and bore her darling away into darkness. Sometimes her feet
would be heavy as lead, and scarcely could she drag herself after,
while the shadow fled out of sight, and the cries came to her
fitfully, and far away, borne on the wind. At other times she would be
able to pursue, but that brought little comfort. The shadow still fled
before her, and ah, by what dreary ways! Sometimes it would be dark,
and yet she could see them speeding on before; across a raging river,
where the waters tossed and tumbled about her, lifting her from her
feet, or overwhelming her in their depths; but still she hurried on
and clambered up the slippery rocks on the further shore, and up and
up where there was no foothold, and she felt herself falling through
depths and catching and clinging with her hands and drawing herself
upward and up and up among curling mists to dreary deserts far above
the clouds. And still the shadow sped on before, and she pursued
across the sandy wastes, where horrid reptiles hissed at her as she
went by, and clouds of dust arose and came between, obscuring and
impeding the way. And still she would pursue and seem to be
overtaking. The child's cry would become quite close, and she would
see the very dimples at the finger joints and the streaming hair, and
she would stretch her hand to lay it on the form, and her hand would
pass through it like a shadow and she would awake. It was all a dream,
her darling was gone from her and she was desolate.
On the day of the theft she had driven about the town in search of her
husband, sometimes hearing of him but never meeting; and then she had
gone to the police station herself, breathless with anxiety and haste,
and there they were so mechanical and full of formalities, and heard
her story with so aggravating an official calm that it wellnigh drove
her mad. The person she addressed on entering was sweltering on two
chairs, without coat or collar, and his boots pulled off. Before he
would listen to a lady he felt it due to himself to rectify his
appearance. The boots were tight and could not be quickly stepped
into; the coat was on a nail in another part of the office. Then the
book of complaints had to be found, and a pen, and so many flies had
drowned themselves in the ink that the stand must be refilled, and
Mary stood wringing her hands and swaying back and forth in agonized
impatience.
"Calm yourself, madame," he said, while he dipped in the ink his pen,
and then removed first a dead fly from the point, and next a hair. "I
shall now take down your complaints," and he bent over his book,
extending his left elbow and bending his head towards it, with the
eyes squinting across the page he was about to illustrate with his
caligraphy, while with an expert turn of the wrist he made a
preliminary flourish in waiting for this member of the public to begin
stating her grievance; "but stay one moment, madame; I believe I have
mislaid my glasses;" and he started up and laid his hand upon each of
his pockets in turn. "No! I believe I must have lef dem in ze ozer
desk beside ze journaux."
"Oh man! man!" cried Mary in desperation, "while you are putting off
time my baby is being carried further and further away; and we know
not where she may be or what they are doing to her!"
"Be tranquillisée madame! Ze occurrence--is of frequent--how you
say?--occurrence. Zere are tree--five!" and he held up his fingers to
show the number--"infants vich make disappearance all ze days, and zey
all turn zemselves up again before to-morrow. Ze leetle tings march in
ze streets voisines, and know not ze retour. Ze police arrest, and
bring here; and voilà!--l'enfant perdu ees on return to ze famille."
At this point the spectacles were discovered, and the speaker returned
to his book.
"My baby _could_ not run away. She cannot walk yet." Mary answered.
"My baby has been carried off, and you are wasting precious time in
talk."
"Ze publique ees so déraisonnable! And me. Behold me!"--and he spread
out all his fingers and shrugged his shoulders in philosophic and
forbearing remonstrance--"I attend madame's informations."
The "informations" were given, recorded and commented on, and the slow
machinery of justice set in motion at last, and the distracted mother
turned away to the grey nunnery where foundlings are received and
cared for. There she left a description of her child, and begged that
if any one resembling hers were presented, she might at once be
informed. Then she went home. What to her was the thunder storm and
lashing rain? A wilder tempest of doubt raged in her own aching heart.
Her husband had arrived before her, and in tears on his shoulder she
found the first momentary easement since her trouble began. The world
was so hard and callous, so busy, every one with his own affairs;
people accepted her desolation so calmly, told her not to fret, that
the child would soon be found. She could not have believed the
atrocious selfishness of mankind if she had not seen it. The street
children, playing after the rain, were as gleeful as ever, without a
thought of her distress; losing their balls across the fence and
coming over after them--breaking in on her very inclosure, sacred to
miserable anxiety, as if nothing were the matter. Her own servants
were no better, they were going on with their cooking and their
housework just as usual. There was the dinner bell! Who could think of
dinner on a day like this? And yet George--and she could not but own
that George had proper feeling, and was as anxious and distressed as a
_man_ well could be--even George seemed to have bodily appetite. He
was not cannibal enough to dine, but he did eat a slice of beef, and
drink a tumbler of wine and water. It seemed incomprehensible to her,
somehow, that even the round heavens should revolve as usual. But they
did. It was growing dark just the same as if nothing had befallen her
baby, and the long still night was before her. There were hours and
hours to wait before another day would arise, with its possibilities
of news or restoration, and how was she to spend them? She could not
sit still, far less lie down. She wondered about the house hour after
hour, and three several times her husband took a cab to the police
head-quarters in vain. There was no news.
The morrow brought no change; but weariness stilled the restlessness
of her misery. She could not eat or drink or sleep, or even wander to
and fro; she could but wait, seated in the porch and watching the gate
for coming news--for news which did not come. The chief of police
appeared, and questioned Lisette and went again. Another day, and
Lisette was sent for to see Indians taken upon suspicion, and in the
evening she returned having identified one. But still there was no
news of the child. The squaw arrested declared she knew nothing of it,
had not taken it, had not been in the city that day.
And now Mary's strength gave way. She fainted, and when revived it was
found that she was dangerously ill; and through long weeks her life
trembled on the verge of dissolution, flickering and waning till it
seemed scarce possible the spark should not go out. And then, too weak
to suffer, she began to mend, and in the vacuity of utter exhaustion,
her mind obtained that rest which no doubt saved her reason, sparing
her the weary waitings on for news which never came. In her illness a
son was born--was born and died--but only in her convalescence did she
become aware of her loss. That was a grief, but it was grief of the
more ordinary kind, and one to which the Church's consolations
effectively minister. The little one's earthly sojourn was
accomplished; it needed her care no longer, and the hopes of religion
were a soothing balm to mingle with her tears. But the other?--She was
so sure the little daughter needed her still. Sleeping or waking her
heart yearned to be with her, and often in the night when she awoke,
the baby voice would be ringing in her ears, calling her to come. That
was a dry aching feverish unassuageable grief, on which ordinary
consolation had no power. It might have killed her with its gnawing
carking care, but for the gentler sorrow of the other loss, which
vented itself naturally in tears, and the tears relieved the
over-burdened heart, easing it and strengthening it for the stronger
grief. Then, too, there was George to share her sorrow, and sorrows
are less crushing when they are not borne alone. And there were
friends who came to see her and strove to console. Utterly futile as
was all they could say, their presence and their sympathy were
grateful. It is so desolate after awhile to have to bear our
wretchedness all alone. An ear in which to pour our complaints, an eye
to look pitifully on our pain, soothes and strengthens, if it cannot
mitigate the anguish. And Mary had these. Her nephew Ralph Herkimer
and his wife were, as the servants said, most attentive; and the
sympathy of the wife at least was very genuine, while Ralph's was
equally well expressed. And after all, till men become able to read
each other's souls--a state of things which even the best of us would
not relish--it is the expression which is efficacious or otherwise,
not the prompting spirit. Consider it, oh ye of the hard shell, who
plume yourselves on your good hearts and sweet natures! How many a
cocoanut has been left to rot, because the eaters could not penetrate
the husk!
Mary's sisters, too, when they heard of her desolation, had relented;
and found they must forgive her having married against their wish.
Being human, even if peculiar, they could not but be sorry, only they
had said so many things in their heat that each felt awkward about
proposing to the other to relax the estrangement so far as to call on
the offender. Public opinion, however decided the matter. Mary's
distress was perfectly well known to every one, and when the ladies of
their acquaintance began to inquire for their sister and to express
sympathy, it was even more "awkward" to acknowledge the estrangement
than to bring it to an end.
Circumstances were kind to them in their attempt to make friends, and
let them down very gently. When they called the first time their
sister was far too ill to see any one, which spared them the
"awkwardness" of a meeting. They called every day afterwards, and so
had their bulletin ready for inquiring friends, and also had their own
feelings modulated gradually to a gentler frame. By-and-by they were
admitted to the sickroom. Mary was too feeble to talk; she welcomed
them with a faint smile, to which the only possible answer on their
part was a kiss, a kiss of reconciliation as well as sympathy, all the
more reconciling in that no words were possible on either side, for so
soon as it was given the nurse was ready to usher them out again
without parley.
On the late October day we have mentioned Mary lay with her thin
fingers twined about the baby's plaything, and tears stealing from her
eyes. As each movement of her chest stirred the little bells, their
ringing thrilled her senses like a pain.
It was the far-away cry of a departed joy, reminding her of its loss.
And yet she clasped the bauble but the tighter for each new sting it
inflicted on her heart; it brought the vanished past a little nearer,
and she almost coveted the pain as a relief from the leaden desolation
under which she lay. So, when a wound begins to heal, one will touch
and trifle with it, reviving the smart as an easement from the weary
numbness of the congested tissues. She was absorbed in her sorrowful
musings and did not note the entrance of her sisters, till, in their
sabled gowns, coming between her and the light, they bent over her.
Susan kissed her on the forehead, and Judith's tightened lips
delivered a peck upon her mouth. Then she opened her eyes with a wan
smile, and faintly bade them welcome, endeavouring to raise herself
the while.
"Keep still, Mary," said Susan. "Do not attempt to move. You will get
strong all the sooner for taking care now."
"I think," said Judith, observing the child's coral in her hands,
which she was at the moment slipping away among her coverings, "you
should put away those things. They can do no good, and can only revive
distressing thoughts."
Mary sighed, and asked if they had walked.
"Give it to me, Mary!" persisted Judith the energetic, "and let me put
it away and lock it up."
"Oh, no!" said Mary, clasping it with both hands to her breast, and
smiling sorrowfully. "It comforts me."
"Very wrong! Foolishly injudicious in Mr. Selby to allow it," and Miss
Judith stood up with a jerk, as though she would take the obnoxious
article by force. "Susan----"
"Judith! Better let alone," her sister interrupted, attempting to draw
her back to her chair.
Judith flushed hotly. Like other zealous reformers of their
neighbours, she was irritably intolerant of advice to herself;
because, of course, she must be right--she always was. So are the
others. She turned upon her sister with a frown, and there might have
been words; but at that moment the click of the gate-latch sounded.
The gate opened, and a clergyman appeared--a young clergyman. Judith
admired clergymen, and we all admire youth, at least all who have lost
their own.
By the time the Reverend Dionysius Bunce entered the room. Miss
Judith's angry flush had cooled down, and her tightened lips had
relaxed into a smile of virgin sweetness. She had a taste for
clergymen, just as some other ladies have a taste for horses, and
some for cats. People talk of "pigeon-fanciers." Miss Judith was a
parson-fancier, that is, she fancied the parsons but she could not
keep them, as the pigeon-fanciers keep _their_ pets; they always flew
away to fresher fields. Mr. Bunce was curate of St. Wittikind's, the
church where Selby was organist and choirmaster. It was a place of
worship which Miss Judith's pietistical scruples would not allow her
to attend. The people there were given to singing harmoniously words
which she held should be said discordantly, and to other practices
equally to be regretted. St. Wittikind's, in fact, was "high," and she
never mentioned it without drawing a long breath, and shaking her head
sadly. Still, if her mind was controversial it was also feminine, and
the curate's trim, ecclesiastical uniform attracted her much. The
linen was so white, so tight, and so starchy, while that of the
married curate of her own St. Silas' was yellow, limp, and even
slovenly, like the services in which he assisted. No doubt it was
right, from her standpoint, that the service should be bald and
unattractive, and she had very decided views about vestments _in_
church, but in vesture _out_ of church, she had a woman's preference
for neatness, and if she could win this young man from his
unevangelical vagaries, would it not be like plucking a brand from the
burning? She had long known him by sight, as indeed, she knew all the
clergy, but hitherto he had been one of the black sheep in her eyes.
Now, when she met him in a room, he was so neat and seemed so young
and inexperienced, that her heart yearned towards him with a mother's
interest--no! not a mother's interest precisely, but an interest of
the adaptable kind, which may change into any other sort as occasion
dictates.
In Miss Susan's eyes the curate appeared uninteresting enough. She
thought him stubby, commonplace, and scarcely a gentleman, save that
to a good churchwoman like herself, his orders, like the Queen's
commission in the army, made his position unassailable. But then, Miss
Susan had no enthusiasm, and was disposed to let the brands burn, each
in its own fashion. She would have liked to go now, when she saw the
clergyman sit down beside Mary's sofa, and pull out his book, and had
risen with that intention, when Judith, clasping her black gloves and
smiling with grave sweetness, as one may smile at a christening, asked
if it was absolutely needful that they should go away. "For herself,"
she said, "there was no portion of our beautiful liturgy in which she
so much delighted as in those sweet and improving passages which occur
in the 'visitation of the sick,' and if Mr. Bunce did not object, she
would feel it a privilege to be permitted to remain."
Poor Mr. Bunce could only acquiesce, and go on with his function,
resigning the hope of whatever satisfaction he might otherwise have
found in its performance, and a good deal disturbed by Miss Judith's
sighs of extreme interest in one place, and the fervency of her
responses in another. Susan, too, perforce sat down again, wondering
internally at the queerness of her sister's taste. For herself, she
felt perfectly well, and it only depressed her to listen to the
curate's words. She looked out of the window where the sun was
shining, and could not but think that it would have been far more
cheerful to be walking down the street.
Having finished, Mr. Bunce would have liked to remain a little for a
quiet chat with Mrs. Selby; but Miss Judith sat still and seemed bent
on taking on herself the entire duty of conversing with him. It might
be well intended, he thought, to save her sister fatigue, but it was
not very interesting, so he quickly rose to leave. Judith did so at
the same time, and when he reached the gate, the reverend man
discovered that fate had condemned him to accompany the two ladies
along more than a mile of suburban street, where he saw no hope of
breaking away.