"Guilliam--You cannot know where I am. You cannot know what has

happened. You could not be such a fiend as to cast me off and send me

here to die--and die I shall. The edge of the grave seems crumbling

under me as I write. If you have a spark of love for me, come and see

me before I die. Oh, Guilliam, Guilliam! what a heaven of a home I

would have made you, if you had only married me! It would have been my

whole life to make you happy. I said bitter words to you--forgive

them. We both have sinned--can God forgive us? I will not believe you

know what has happened. You are grieving for me--looking for me. They

took me away while you were gone. Come and see me before I die. Good-by, I'm writing in the dark--I'm dying in the dark--my soul is in the

dark--I'm going away in the dark--where, O God, where?

"Your poor little Zell.

"Smallpox Hospital (I don't know date)."

Poor, poor Zell! As in the case of a tempest-tossed one of old, "sun,

moon, and stars" had long been hidden.

Almost fainting with weakness, she sealed and directed the letter,

drew off the ring, pressed it to her lips, and then turned her eyes,

unnaturally large and bright, on the woman waiting at her side, and

said:

"Look at me! Promise me you will see that this letter is delivered.

Remember, I am going to die. If you ever hope for an hour's peace,

promise!"

"I promise," said the woman solemnly, for she was as superstitious as

avaricious, and though she had no hesitancy in breaking the rules and

taking a bribe, she would not have dared for her life to have risked

treachery to a girl whom she believed dying.

Zell gave her the ring and the letter, and sank back for the time

unconscious.

The woman had her means of communication with the city, and before

many hours elapsed the letter was on its way.

Van Dam was in a state of nervous fear till the fourteen days passed,

and then he felt that he was safe. He had his rooms thoroughly

fumigated, and was reassured by his physicians saying daily: "There

was not much danger of her giving you the disease in its first stage.

She is probably dead by this time."

But the wheels of life seemed to grow heavier and more clogged every

day. He was fast getting down to the dregs, and now almost every

pleasure palled upon his jaded taste. At one time it seemed that Zell

might so infuse her vigorous young life and vivacity into his waning

years that his last days would be his best. And this might have been

the case, if he had reformed his evil life and dealt with her as a

true man. In her strong and exceptional love, considering their

difference in age, there were great possibilities of good for both.

But he had foully perverted the last best gift of his life, and even

his blunted moral sense was awakening to the truth.

"Curse it all," he muttered, late one morning, "perhaps I had better

have married her. I hoped so much from her, and she has been nothing

but a source of trouble and danger. I wonder if she is dead."

He had been out very late the night before, and had played heavily,

but not with his usual skill. He had kept muttering grim oaths against

his luck, and drinking deeper and deeper till a friend had half forced

him away. And now, much shaken by the night's debauch, depressed by

his heavy losses, conscience, that crouches like a tiger in every bad

man's soul, and waits to rush from its lair and rend, in the long

hours--the long _eternity_ of weakness and memory--already had its

fangs in his guilty heart.

Long and bitterly he thought, with a frown resting like night on his

heavy brow. The servant brought him a dainty breakfast, but he

sullenly motioned it away. He had wronged his digestive powers so

greatly the night before that even brandy was repugnant to him, and he

leaned heavily and wearily back in his chair, a prey to remorse.

He was in just the right physical condition to take a contagious

disease.

There was a knock at the door, and the servant entered, bringing him a

letter, saying, "This was just left here for ye, sir."

"A dun," thought he, languidly, and he laid it unopened on the stand

beside him.

It was; and from one whom he owed a reparation he could never make,

though he paid with his life.

With his eyes closed, he still leaned back in a dull, painful

lethargy. A faint, disagreeable odor gradually pervaded the room, and

at last attracted his attention. The luxurious sybarite could not help

the stings of conscience, the odor he might. He grew restless, and

looked around.

Zell's letter caught his attention. "Might as well see who it's from,"

he muttered. Weakness, pain, and emotion had so changed Zell's

familiar hand, that he did not recognize it.

But, as he opened and read, his eyes dilated with horror. It seemed

like a dead hand grasping him out of the darkness. But a dreadful

fascination compelled him to read every line, and re-read them, till

they seemed burned into his memory. At last, by a desperate effort, he

broke the strong spell her words had placed upon him, and, starting

up, exclaimed:

"Go to her, in that pest-house! I would see her dead a thousand times

first. I hope she is dead, for she is the torment of my life. What is

it that smells so queer?"

His eyes again rested on the letter. A suspicion crossed his mind. He

carried the letter to his nose, and then started violently, uttering

awful oaths.

"She has sent the contagion directly to me," he groaned, and he threw

poor Zell's appeal on the grate. It burned with a faint, sickly odor.

Then, as the day was raw and windy, a sudden gust down the chimney

blew it all out into the room, and scattered it in ashes, like Zell's

hopes, around his feet.

A superstitious horror that made his flesh creep and hair rise took

possession of him, and hastily gathering a few necessary things, he

rushed out into the chill air, and made his way to a large hotel. He

wanted to be in a crowd. He wanted the hard, material world's noise

and bustle around him. He wanted to hear men talking about gold and

stocks, and the gossip of the town-anything that would make living on

seem a natural, possible matter of course.

But men's voices sounded strange and unfamiliar, and the real world

seemed like that which mocks us in our dreams. Mingling with all he

saw and heard were Zell's despairing looks and Zell's despairing

words. He wrapped himself in his great coat, he drank frequent and

fiery potations, he hovered around the registers, but nothing could

take away the chill at his heart. He tossed feverishly all night. His

sudden exposure to the raw wind in his heated, excited condition

caused a severe cold. But he would not give up. He dared not stay

alone in his room, and so crept down to the public haunts of the

hotel. But his flushed cheeks and strange manner attracted attention.

As the days passed, he grew worse, and the proprietor of the house

said:

"You are ill, you must go to bed."

But he would not. There was nothing that he seemed to dread so much as

being alone. But the guests began to grow afraid of him. There was

general and widespread fear of the smallpox in the city, and for some

reason it began to be associated with his illness. As the suspicion

was whispered around, all shrank from him. The proprietor had him

examined at once by a physician. It was the fatal fourteenth day, and

the dreaded symptoms were apparent.

"Have you no friends, no home to which you can go?" he was asked.

"No," he groaned, while the thought pierced his soul. "She would have

made me one and taken care of me in it." But he pleaded, "For God's

sake, don't send me away."

"I must," said the proprietor, frightened himself. "The law requires

it, and your presence here would empty my house in an hour."

So, in the dusk, like poor Zell, he was smuggled down a back stairway,

and sent to the "pest-house" also, he groaning and crying with terror

all the way.

Zell did not die. Her vigorous constitution rallied, and she rapidly

regained strength. But with strength and power of thought came the

certainty to her mind of Van Barn's utter and final abandonment of

her. She felt that all the world would now be against her, and that

she would be driven from every safe and pleasant path. The thought of

taking her shame to her home was a horror to her, and she felt sure

that Edith would spurn her from the door. At first she wept bitterly

and despairingly, and wished she had died. But gradually she grew

hard, reckless, and cruel under her wrong, and her every thought of

Van Bam was a curse.

The woman who helped her to write the letter greatly startled her one

day by saying:

"There's a man in the men's ward who in his ravin' speaks of you."

"Could he, in just retribution, have been sent here also?" she

thought. Pleading relationship, she was admitted to see him. He

shuddered as he saw her advancing, with stony face and eyes in which

glared relentless hate.

"Curse you!" he muttered, feebly, with his parched lips. "Go away,

living or dead, I know not which you are; but I know it was through

you I came here!"

Her only answer was a mocking smile.

The doctor came and examined his symptoms.

"Will he get well?" she asked, following him away a short distance.

"No," said the physician. "He will die."

Her cheek blanched for a moment; but from her eyes glowed a deadly

gleam of satisfaction.

"What did he say?" whispered Van Dam.

"He says you will die," she answered, in a stony voice. "You see, I am

better than you were. You would not come to me for even one poor

moment. You left me to die alone; but I will stay and watch with you."

"Oh, go away!" groaned Van Dam.

"I couldn't be so heartless," she said, in a mocking tone. "You need

dying consolation, I want to tell you, Guilliam, what was in my mind

the night I left all for you. I did doubt you a little. That is where

I sinned; but I shall only suffer for that through all eternity," she

said, with a reckless laugh that chilled his soul. "But then, I hoped,

I felt almost sure, you would marry me; and, oh, what a heaven of a

home I purposed to make you! If you had only let even a magistrate

say, 'I pronounce you man and wife,' I would have been your patient

slave. I would have kissed away even your headaches, and had you ten

contagions, I would not have left you. I would have taken care of you

and nursed you back to life."

"Go away!" groaned Van Dam, with more energy.

"Guilliam," she said, taking his hand, which shuddered at her touch,

"we might have had a happy little home by this time. We might have

learned to live a good life in this world and have prepared for a

better one in the next. Little children might have put their soft arms

around your neck, and with their innocent kisses banished the memory

and the power of the evil past. Oh," she gasped, "how happy we might

have been, and mother, Edith, and Laura would have smiled upon us. But

what is now our condition?" she said, bitterly, her grip upon his hand

becoming hard and fierce. "You have made me a tigress. I must cower

and hide through life like a wild beast in a jungle. And you are dying

and going to hell," she hissed in his ear, "and by and by, when I get

to be an old ugly hag, I will come and torment you there forever and

forever."

"Curse you, go away," shrieked the terror-stricken man.

An attendant hastened to the spot; Zell was standing at the foot of

the cot, glaring at him.

"I thought you was a relation of his'n," said the man, roughly.

"So I am," said Zell, sternly. "As the one stung is related to the

viper that stung him," and with a withering look she passed away.

That night Van Dam died.

In process of time Zell was turned adrift in the city. She applied

vainly at stores and shops for a situation. She had no good clothes,

and appearances were against her. She had a very little money in her

portemonnaie when she was taken to the hospital. This was given to her

on leaving, and she made it go as far as possible. At last she went to

an intelligence office and sat among the others, who looked

suspiciously at her. They instinctively felt that she was not of their

sort.

"What can you do?" was the frequent question.

She did not know how to do a single thing, but thought that perhaps

the position of waitress would be the easiest.

"Where are your references?"

It was her one thought and effort to conceal all reference to the

past. At last the proprietor in pity sent her to a lady who had told

him to supply her with a waitress; the place was in Brooklyn, and Zell

was glad, for she had less fear there of seeing any one she knew.

The lady scolded bitterly about such an ignoramus being sent to her,

but Zell seemed so patient and willing that she decided to try her.

Zell gave her whole soul to the work, and though the place was a hard

one, would have eventually learned to fill it. The family were a

little surprised sometimes at her graceful movements, and the quick

gleams of intelligence in her large eyes as some remark was made

naturally beyond me in her sphere. One day they were trying to recall,

while at the table, the name of a famous singer at the opera. Before

she thought, the name was almost out of her lips. The poor girl tried

to disguise herself by assuming, as well as she could, the stolid,

stupid manner of those who usually blunder about our homes.

All might have gone well, and she have gained an honest livelihood,

had not an unforeseen circumstance revealed her past life. Those who

have done wrong are never safe. At the most unexpected time, and in

the most unexpected way, their sin may stand out before all and blast

them.

Zell's mistress had told her to make a little extra preparation for

she expected a gentleman to dine that evening. With some growing pride

and interest in her work, she had done her best, and even her mistress

said:

"Jane" (her assumed name), "you are improving," and a gleam of

something like hope and pleasure shot across the poor child's face. A

passionate sigh came up from her heart--

"Oh, I will try to do right if the world will let me."

But imagine her terror as she saw an old crony of Van Dam's enter the

room. The man recognized her in a moment, and she saw that he did. She

gave him an imploring glance, which he returned by one of cool

contempt. Zell could hardly get through the meal, and her manner

attracted attention. The cold-blooded fellow, whose soul was akin to

that of his dead friend, was considerate enough to his hostess not to

spoil her dinner or rob her of a waitress till it was over. But the

moment they returned to the parlor he told who Zell was, and how she

must have just come from the smallpox hospital.

The lady (?) was in a frenzy of rage and fear. She rushed down to

where Zell was panting with weakness and emotion, exclaiming:

"You shameful hussy, how dare you come into a respectable house, after

your loathsome life and loathsome disease?"

"Hear me," pleaded Zell; "the doctor said there was no danger, and I

want to do what is right."

"I don't believe a word you say. I wouldn't trust you a minute. How

much you have stolen now it will be hard to tell, and I shouldn't

wonder if we all had the smallpox. Leave the house instantly."

"Oh, please give me a chance," cried Zell, on her knees. "Indeed, I am

honest. I'll work for you for nothing, if you will let me stay."

"Leave instantly, or I will call for a policeman."

"Then pay me my week's wages," sobbed Zell.

"I won't pay you a cent, you brazen creature. You didn't know how to

do anything, and have been a torment ever since you came. I might have

known there was something wrong. Now go, take your old, pest-infected

rags out of my house, or I will have you sent to where you properly

belong. Thank Heaven, I have found you out."

A sudden change came over Zell. She sprang up, and a scowl black as

night darkened her face.

"What has Heaven to do with your sending a poor girl out into the

night, I would like to know?" she asked, in a harsh, grating voice; "I

wouldn't do it. Therefore, I am better than you are. Heaven has

nothing to do with either you or me;" and she looked so dark and

dangerous that her mistress was frightened, and ran up to the parlor,

exclaiming:

"She's an awful creature. I'm afraid of her."

Then that manly being, her husband, towered up in his wrath, saying,

majestically, "I guess I'm master in my own house yet."

He showed poor Zell the door. Her laugh rang out recklessly, as she

called--

"Good-by. May the pleasant thought that you have sent one more soul to

perdition lull you to sweet sleep."

But, for some reason, it did not. When they became cool enough to

think it over, they admitted that perhaps they had been a "little

hasty."

They had a daughter of about Zell's age. It would be a little hard if

any one should treat her so.

Zell had scarcely more than enough to pay her way to New York. It

seemed that people ought to stretch out their hands to shield her, but

they only jostled her in their haste. As she stood, with her bundle,

in the ferry entrance on the New York side, undecided where to go, a

man ran against her in his hurry.

"Get out of the way," he said, irritably.

She moved out one side into the darkness, and with a pallid face said:

"Yes, it has come to this. I must 'get out of the way' of all decent

people. There is the river on one side. There are the streets on the

other. Which shall it be?"

"Oh! it was pitiful,

Near a whole city full,"

that no hand was stretched to her aid.

She shuddered. "I can't, I dare not die yet. It must be a little

easier here than there, where he is."

Her face became like stone. She went straight to a liquor saloon, and

drank deep of that spirit that Shakespeare called "devil," in order to

drown thought, fear, memory--every vestige of the woman.

Then--the depths of the gulf that Laura shrank from with a dread

stronger than her love of life.

CHAPTER XXXII

EDITH BRINGS THE WANDERER HOME

Mrs. Lacey and Arden, at last, in the stress of their poverty, gave

their consent that Rose should go to the city and try to find

employment in a store as a shop-girl. Mrs. Glibe, her dressmaking

friend, went with her, and though they could obtain no situation the

first day, one of Mrs. Glibe's acquaintances directed Rose where she

could find a respectable boarding-house, from which, as her home, she

could continue her inquiries. Leaving her there, Mrs. Glibe returned.

Rose, with a hope and courage not easily dampened, continued her

search the next day, and for several days following. The fall trade

had not fairly commenced, and there seemed no demand for more help.

She had thirty dollars with which to start life, but a week of

idleness took seven of this.

At last her fine appearance and sprightly manner induced the

proprietor of a large establishment to put her in the place of a girl

discharged that day, with the wages of six dollars a week.

"We give but three or four, as a general thing, to beginners," he

said.

Rose was grateful for the place, and yet almost dismayed at the

prospect before her. How could she live on six dollars? The bright-colored dreams of city life were fast melting away before the hard,

and in some instances revolting, facts of her experience. She could

have obtained situations in two or three instances at better wages, if

she had assented to conditions that sent her hastily into the street

with burning blushes and indignant tears. She knew the great city was

full of wickedness, but this rude contact with it appalled her.

After finding what she had to live on, she exchanged her somewhat

comfortable room, where she could have a fire, for a cold, cheerless

attic closet in the same house. "As I learn the business, they will

give more," she thought, and the idea of going home penniless, to be

laughed at by Mrs. Glibe, Miss Klip, and others was almost as bitter a

prospect to her proud spirit as being a burden to her impoverished

family, and she resolved to submit to every hardship rather than do

it. By taking the attic room she reduced her board to five dollars a

week.

"You can't get it for less, unless you go to a very common sort of a

place," said her landlady. "My house is respectable, and people must

pay a little for that."

In view of this fact, Rose determined to stay, if possible, for she

was realizing more every day how unsheltered and tempted she was.

Her fresh blond face, her breezy manner, and her wind-shaken curls

made many turn to look after her. Like some others of her sex, perhaps

she had no dislike for admiration, but in Rose's position it was often

shown by looks, manner, and even words, that, however she resented

them, followed and persecuted her.

As she grew to know her fellow-workers better, her heart sickened in

disgust at the conversation and the evident life of many of them, and

they often laughed immoderately at her greenness.

Alas for the fancied superiority of these knowing girls! They laughed

at Rose because she was so much more like what God meant a woman

should be than they. A weak-minded, shallow girl would have succumbed

to their ridicule, and soon have become like them, but high-spirited

Rose only despised them, and gradually sought out and found some

companionship with those of the better sort in the large store. But

there seemed so much hollowness and falsehood on every side that she

hardly knew whom to trust.

Poor Rose was quite sick of making a career for herself alone in the

city, and her money was getting very low. Shop life was hard on

clothes, and she was compelled by the rules of the store to dress

well, and was only too fond of dress herself. So, instead of getting

money ahead, she at last was reduced to her wages as support, and

nothing was said of their being raised, and she was advised to say

nothing about any increase. Then she had a week's sickness, and this

brought her in debt to her landlady.

Several times during her evening walks home Rose noticed a dark face

and two vivid black eyes, that seemed watching her; but as soon as

observed, the face vanished. It haunted her with its suggestion of

some one seen before.

She went back to her work too soon after her illness, and had a

relapse. Her respectable landlady was a woman of system and rules.

From long experience, she foresaw that her poor lodger would grow only

more and more deeply in her debt. Perhaps we can hardly blame her. It

was by no easy effort that she made ends meet as it was. She had an

application for Rose's little room from one who gave more prospect of

being able to pay, so she quietly told the poor girl to vacate it.

Rose pleaded to stay, but the woman was inexorable. She had passed

through such scenes so often that they had become only one of the

disagreeable phases of her business.

"Why, child," she said, "if I did not live up to my rule in this

respect, I'd soon be out of house and home myself. You can leave your

things here till you find some other place."

So poor Rose, weak through her sickness, more weak through terror,

found herself out in the streets of the great city, utterly penniless.

She was so unfamiliar with it that she did not know where to go, or to

whom to apply. It was her purpose to find a cheaper boarding-house.

She went down toward the meaner and poorer part of the city, and

stopped at the low stoop of a house where there was a sign, "Rooms to

let."

She was about to enter, when a hand was laid sharply on her arm, and

some one said:

"Don't go there. Come with me, quick!"

"Who are you?" asked Rose, startled and trembling.

"One who can help you now, whatever I am," was the answer. "I know you

well, and all about you. You are Hose Lacey, and you did live in

Pushton. Come with me, quick, and I will take you to a Christian lady

whom you can trust. Come."

Rose, in her trouble and perplexity, concluded to follow her. They

soon made their way to quite a respectable street, and rang the bell

at the door of a plain, comfortable-appearing house.

A cheery, stout, middle-aged lady opened it. She looked at Rose's new

friend, and reproachfully shook her finger at her, saying:

"Naughty Zell, why did you leave the Home?"

"Because I am possessed by a restless devil," was the strange answer.

"Besides, I can do more good in the streets than there. I have just

saved her" (pointing to Rose, who at once surmised that this was Zell

Allen, though so changed that she would not have known her). "Now,"

continued Zell, thrusting some money into Rose's hand, "take this and

go home at once. Tell her, Mrs. Ranger, that this city is no place for

her."

"If you have friends and a home to go to, it's the very best thing you

can do," said the lady.

"But my friends are poor," sobbed Rose.

"No matter, go to them," said Zell, almost fiercely. "I tell you there

is no place for you here, unless you wish to go to perdition. Go home,

where you are known. Scrub, delve, do anything rather than stay here.

Your big brother can and will take care of you, though he does look so

cross."

"She is right, my child; you had better go at once," said the lady,

decidedly.

"Who are you?" asked Rose of the latter speaker, with some curiosity.

"I am a city missionary," answered the lady, quietly, "and it is my

business to help such poor girls as you are. I say to you from full

knowledge, and in all sincerity, to go home is the very best thing

that you can do."

"But why is there not a chance for a poor, well-meaning girl to earn

an honest living in this great city?"

"Thousands are earning such a living, but there is not one chance in a

hundred for you."

"Why?" asked Rose, hotly,

"Do you see all these houses? They are full of people," continued Mrs.

Ranger, "and some of them contain many families. In these families

there are thousands of girls who have a home, a shelter, and

protectors here in the city. They have society in relatives and

neighbors. They have no board to pay, and fathers and mothers,

brothers and sisters, helping support them. They put all their

earnings into a common fund, and it supports the family. Such girls

can afford, and will work for two, three, four, and five dollars a

week. All that they earn makes the burden so much less on the father,

who otherwise would have supported them in idleness. Now, a homeless

stranger in the city must pay board, and therefore they can't compete

with those who live here. Wages are kept too low. Not one in a

hundred, situated as you are, can earn enough to pay board and dress

as they are required to in the fashionable stores. Have you been

able?"

"No," groaned Rose. "I am in debt to my landlady now, and I had some

money to start with."

"There it is," said Mrs. Ranger, sadly; "the same old story."

"But these stores ought to pay more," said Rose, indignantly.

"They will only pay for labor, as for everything else, the market

price, and that averages but six dollars a week, and more are working

for from three to five than for six. As I told you, there are

thousands of girls living in the city glad to get a chance at any

price."

Rose gave a weary, discouraged sigh and said, "I fear you are right, I

must go home. Indeed, after what has happened I hardly dare stay."

"Go," said Zell, "as if you were leaving Sodom, and don't look back."

Then she asked, with a wistful, hungry look, "Have you see any of--?"

She stopped--she could not speak the names of her kindred.

"Yes," said Rose, gently. (Yesterday she would have stood coldly aloof

from Zell. To-day she was very grateful and full of sympathy.) "I know

they are well. They were all sick after--after you went away. But they

got well again, and (lowering her voice) Edith prays for you night and

day."

"Oh! oh!" sobbed Zell, "this is torment, this is to see the heaven I

cannot enter," and she dashed away.

"Poor child!" said Mrs. Ranger, "there's an angel in her yet if I only

knew how to bring it out. I may see her to-morrow, and I may not for

weeks. Take the money she left with you, and here is some more. It may

help her, to think that she helped you. And now, my dear, let me see

you safely on your way home."

That night the stage left Rose at the poor dilapidated little

farmhouse, and in her mother's close embrace she felt the blessedness

of the home shelter, however poor, and the protecting love of kindred,

however plain.

"Arden is away," said the quiet woman of few words. "He is home only

twice a month. He has a job of cutting and carting wood a good way

from here. We are so poor this winter he had to take this chance. Your

father is doing better. I hope for him, though with fear and

trembling."

Then Rose told her mother her experience and how she had been saved by

Zell, and the poor woman clasped her daughter to her breast again and

again, and with streaming eyes raised toward heaven, poured out her

gratitude to God.

"Rose," said she, with a shudder, "if I had not prayed so for you

night and day, perhaps you would not have found such friends in your

time of need. Oh! let us both pray for that poor lost one, that she

may be saved also."

From this day forth Rose began to pray the true prayer of pity, and

then the true prayer of a personal faith. The rude, evil world had

shown her her own and others' need, in a way that made her feel that

she wanted the Heavenly Father's care.

In other respects she took up her life for a time where she had left

it a few months before.

Edith was deeply moved at Rose's story, and Zell's wild, wayward steps

were followed by prayers, as by a throng of reclaiming angels.

"I would go and bring her home in a moment, if I only knew where to

find her," said Edith.

"Mrs. Ranger said she would write as soon as there was any chance of

your doing so," said Rose.

About the middle of January a letter came to Edith as follows:

"Miss Edith Allen--Your sister, Zell, is in Bellevue Hospital,

Ward --. Come quickly; she is very ill."

Edith took the earliest train, and was soon following an attendant,

with eager steps, down the long ward. They came to a dark-eyed girl

that was evidently dying, and Edith closed her eyes with a chill of

fear. A second glance showed that it was not Zell, and a little

further on she saw the face of her sister, but so changed! Oh! the

havoc that sin and wretchedness had made in that beautiful creature

during a few short months! She was in a state of unconscious,

muttering delirium, and Edith showered kisses on the poor, parched

lips; her tears fell like rain on the thin, flushed face. Zell

suddenly cried, with the girlish voice of old:

"Hurrah, hurrah! books to the shades; no more teachers and tyrants for

me."

She was living over the old life, with its old, fatal tendencies.

Edith sat down, and sobbed as if her heart would break. Unnoticed, a

stout, elderly lady was regarding her with eyes wet with sympathy. As

Edith's grief subsided somewhat she laid her hand on the poor girl's

shoulder, saying:

"My child, I feel very sorry for you. For some reason I can't pass on

and leave you alone in your sorrow, though we are total strangers.

Your trouble gives you a sacred claim upon me. What can I do for you?"

Edith looked up through her tears, and saw a kind, motherly face, with

a halo of gray curls around it. With woman's intuition she trusted her

instantly, and, with another rush of tears, said:

"This is--my--poor lost-sister. I've--just found her."

"Ah!" said the lady, significantly, "God pity you both."

"Were it not--for Him," sobbed Edith, with her hand upon her aching

heart, "I believe--I should die."

The lady sat down by her, and took her hand, saying, "I will stay with

you, dear, till you feel better."

Gradually and delicately she drew from Edith her story, and her large

heart yearned over the two girls in the sincerest sympathy.

"I was not personally acquainted with your father and mother, but I

know well who they were," she said. "And now, my child, you cannot

remain here much longer; where are you going to stay?"

"I haven't thought," said Edith, sadly.

"I have," replied the lady, heartily; "I am going to take you home

with me. We don't live very far away, and you can come and see your

sister as often as you choose, within the limits of the rules."

"Oh!" exclaimed Edith, deprecatingly, "I am not fit--I have no claim."

"My child," said the lady, gently, "don't you remember what our Master

said, 'I was a stranger and ye took me in'? Is He not fit to enter my

house? Has He no claim? In taking you home I am taking Him home, and

so I shall be happy and honored in your presence. Moreover, my dear,

from what I have seen and heard, I am sure I shall love you for your

own sake."

Edith looked at her through grateful tears, and said, "It has seemed

to me that Jesus has been comforting me all the time through your

lips. How beautiful Christianity is, when it is lived out. I will go

to your house as if it were His."

Then she turned and pressed a loving kiss on Zell's unconscious face,

but her wonder was past words when the lady stooped down also, and

kissed the "woman which was a sinner." She seized her hand with both

of hers and faltered:

"You don't despise and shrink from her, then?"

"Despise her! no," said the noble woman. "I have never been tempted as

this poor child has. God does not despise her. What am I?"

From that moment Edith could have kissed her feet, and feeling that

God had sent His angel to take care of her, she followed the lady from

the hospital. A plain but elegantly-liveried carriage was waiting, and

they were driven rapidly to one of the stateliest palaces on Fifth

Avenue. As they crossed the marble threshold, the lady turned and

said:

"Pardon me, my dear, my name is Mrs. Hart. This is your home now as

truly as mine while you are with us," and Edith was shown to a room

replete with luxurious comfort, and told to rest till the six o'clock

dinner.

With some timidity and fear she came down to meet the others. As she

entered she saw a portly man standing on the rug before the glowing

grate, with a shock of white hair, and a genial, kindly face.

"My husband," said Mrs. Hart, "this is our new friend, Miss Edith

Allen. You knew her father well in business, I am sure."

"Of course I did," said the old gentleman, taking Edith's hand in both

of his, "and a fine business man he was, too. You are welcome to our

home, Miss Edith. Look here, mother," he said, turning to his wife

with a quizzical look, and still keeping hold of Edith's hand, "you

didn't bring home an 'angel unawares' this time. I say, wife, you

won't be jealous if I take a kiss now, will you--a sort of scriptural

kiss, you know?" and he gave Edith a hearty smack that broke the ice

between them completely.

With a face like a peony, Edith said, earnestly, "I am sure the real

angels throng your home."

"Hope they do," said Mr. Hart, cheerily. "My old lady there is the

best one I have seen yet, but I am ready for all the rest. Here come

some of them," he added, as his daughters entered, and to each one he

gave a hearty kiss, counting, "one, two, three, four, five--now, 'all

present or accounted for?'"

"Yes," said his wife, laughing.

"Dinner, then," and after the young ladies had greeted Edith most

cordially, he gave her his arm, as if she had been a duchess, and

escorted her to the dining-room. After being seated, they bowed their

heads in quiet reverence, and the old man, with the voice and manner

of a child speaking to a father, thanked God for His mercies, and

invoked His blessing.

The table-talk was genial and wholesome, with now and then a sparkle

of wit, or a broad gleam of humor.

"My good wife there, Miss Edith," said Mr. Hart, with a twinkle in his

eye, "is a very sly old lady. If she does wear spectacles, she sees

with great discrimination, or else the world is growing so full of

interesting saints and sinners, that I am quite in hopes of it. Every

day she has a new story about some very good person, or some very bad

person becoming good. If you go on this way much longer, mother, the

millennium will commence before the doctors of divinity are ready for

it."

"My dear," said Mrs. Hart, with a comic aside to Edith, "my husband

has never got over being a boy. When he will become old enough to

sober down, I am sure I can't tell."

"What have I to sober me, with all these happy faces around, I should

like to know?" was the hearty retort. "I am having a better time every

day, and mean to go on so _ad infinitum_. You're a good one to talk

about sobering down, when you laugh more than any of these

youngsters."

"Well," said his wife, her substantial form quivering with merriment,

"it's because you make me."

During the meal Edith had time to observe the young ladies more

closely. They were fine-looking, and one or two of them really

beautiful. Two of them were in early girlhood yet, and there was not a

vestige of the vanity and affectation often seen in those of their

position. They evidently had wide diversities of character, and

faults, but there were the simplicity and sincerity about them which

make the difference between a chaste piece of marble and a painted

block of wood. She saw about her a house as rich and costly in its

appointments as her own old home had been, but it was not so crowded

or pronounced in its furnishing and decoration. There were fewer

pictures, but finer ones; and in all matters of art, French taste was

not prominent, as had been the case in her home.

The next day she sat by unconscious Zell as long as was permitted, and

wrote fully to Laura.

The dark-eyed girl that seemed dying the day before was gone.

"Did she die?" she asked of an attendant.

"Yes."

"What did they do with her?"

"Buried her in Potter's Field."

Edith shuddered. "It would have been Zell's end," she thought, "if I

hadn't found her, and she had died here alone."

That evening Mrs. Hart, as they all sat in her own private parlor,

said to her daughters:

"Girls, away with you. I can't move a step without stumbling over one

of you. You are always crowding into my sanctum, as if there was not

an inch of room for you anywhere else. Vanish. I want to talk to

Edith."

"It's your own fault that we crowd in here, mother," said the eldest.

"You are the loadstone that draws us."

"I'll get a lot of stones to throw at you and drive you out with,"

said the old lady, with mock severity.

The youngest daughter precipitated herself on her mother's neck,

exclaiming:

"Wouldn't that be fun, to see jolly old mother throwing stones at us.

She would wrap them in eider-down first."

"Scamper; the whole bevy of you," said the old lady, laughing; and

Edith, with a sigh, contrasted this "mother's room" with the one which

she and her sisters shunned as the place where their "teeth were set

on edge."

"My dear," said Mrs. Hart, her face becoming grave and troubled,

"there is one thing in my Christian work that discourages me. We

reclaim so few of the poor girls that have gone astray. I understand,

from Mrs. Ranger, that your sister was at the Home, but that she left

it. How can we accomplish more? We do everything we can for them."

"I don't think earthly remedies can meet their case," said Edith, in a

low tone.

"I agree with you," said Mrs. Hart, earnestly, "but we do give them

religious instruction."

"I don't think religious instruction is sufficient," Edith answered.

"They need a Saviour."

"But we do tell them about Jesus."

"Not always in a way that they understand, I fear," said Edith, sadly.

"I have heard people tell about Him as they would about Socrates, or

Moses, or Paul. We don't need facts about Him so much as Jesus

Himself. In olden times people did not go to their sick and troubled

friends and tell them that Jesus was in Capernaum, and that He was a

great deliverer. They brought the poor, helpless creatures right to

Him. They laid them right at the feet of a personal Saviour, and He

helped them. Do we do this? I have thought a great deal about it,"

continued Edith, "and it seems to me that more associate the ideas of

duty, restraint, and almost impossible effort with Him, than the ideas

of help and sympathy. It was so with me, I know, at first."

"Perhaps you are right," said Mrs. Hart thoughtfully. "The poor

creatures to whom I referred seemed more afraid of God than anything

else."

"And yet, of all that ever lived, Jesus was the most tender toward

them--the most ready to forgive and save. Believe me, Mrs. Hart, there

was more gospel in the kiss you gave my sister--there was more of

Jesus Christ in it, than in all the sermons ever written, and I am

sure that if she had been conscious, it would have saved her. They

must, as it were, _feel_ the hand of love and power that lifted

Peter out of the ingulfing waves. The idea of duty and sturdy self-restraint is perhaps too much emphasized, while they, poor things, are

weak as water. They are so 'lost' that He must just 'seek and save'

them, as He said--lift them up--keep them up almost in spite of

themselves. Saved--that is the word, as the limp, helpless form is

dragged out of danger. On account of my sister I have thought a good

deal about this subject, and there seems to me to be no remedy for

this class, save in the merciful, patient, personal Saviour. He had

wonderful power over them when He was on earth, and He would have the

same now, if His people could make them understand Him."

"I think few of us understand this personal Saviour ourselves as we

ought," said Mrs. Hart, somewhat unveiling her own experience. "The

Romish Church puts the Virgin, saints, penances, and I know not what,

between the sinner and Jesus, and we put catechisms, doctrines, and a

great mass of truth about them, between Him and us. I doubt whether

many of us, like the beloved disciple, have leaned our heads on His

heart of love, and felt its throbs. Too much of the time He seems in

Heaven to me, not here."

"I never had much religious instruction," said Edith, simply. "I found

Him in the New Testament, as people of old found Him in Palestine, and

I went to Him, just as I was, and He has been such a Friend and

Helper. He lets me sit at His feet like Mary, and the words He spoke

seem said directly to poor little me."

Wistful tears came into Mrs. Hart's eyes, and she kissed Edith,

saying:

"I have been a Christian forty years, my child, but you are nearer to

Him than I am. Stay close to His side. This talk has done me more good

than I imagined possible."

"If I seem nearer," said Edith, gently, "isn't it, perhaps, because I

am weaker than you are? His 'sheep follow' Him, but isn't there some

place in the Bible about his 'carrying the lambs in His bosom'? I

think we shall find at last that He was nearer to us all than we

thought, and that His arm of love was around us all the time."

In a sudden, strong impulse, Mrs. Hart embraced Edith, and, looking

upward, exclaimed:

"Truly 'Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast

revealed them unto babes.' As my husband said, I am entertaining a

good angel."

The physician gave Edith great encouragement about Zell, and told her

that in two weeks he thought she might be moved. The fever was taking

a light form.

One evening, after listening to some superb music from Annie, the

second daughter, between whom and Edith quite an affinity seemed to

develop itself, the latter said:

"How finely you play! I think you are wonderful for an amateur."

"I am not an amateur," replied Annie, laughing. "Music is my

profession."

"I don't understand," said Edith.

"Father has made me study music as a science," explained Annie.

"I could teach it to-morrow. All of us girls are to have a profession.

Ella, my eldest sister, is studying drawing and painting. Here is a

portfolio of her sketches."

Even Edith's unskilled eyes could see that she had made great

proficiency.

"Ella could teach drawing and coloring at once," continued Annie, "for

she has studied the rules and principles very carefully, and given

great attention to the rudiments of art, instead of having a teacher

help her paint a few show-pictures. But I know very little about it,

for I haven't much taste that way. Father has us educated according to

our tastes; that is, if we show a little talent for any one thing, he

has us try to perfect ourselves in that one thing. Julia is the

linguist, and can jabber French and German like natives. Father also

insisted on our being taught the common English branches very

thoroughly, and he says he could get us situations to teach within a

month, if it were necessary."

Edith sighed deeply as she thought how superficial their education had

been, but she said rather slyly to Annie, "But you are engaged. I

think your husband will veto the music-teaching."

"Oh, well," said Annie, laughing, "Walter may fail, or get sick, or

something may happen. So you see we shouldn't have to go to the poor-house. Besides, there's a sort of satisfaction in knowing one thing

pretty well. But the half is not told you, and I suppose you will

think father and mother queer people; indeed, most of our friends do.

For mother has had a milliner come to the house, and a dressmaker, and

a hair-dresser, and whatever we have any knack at she has made us

learn well, some one thing, and some another. Wouldn't I like to dress

your long hair!" continued the light-hearted girl. "I would make you

so bewitching that you would break a dozen hearts in one evening. Then

mother has taught us how to cook, and to make bread and cake and

preserves, and Ella and I have to take turns in keeping house, and

marketing, and keeping account of the living expenses. The rest of the

girls are at school yet. Mother says she is not going to palm off any

frauds in her daughters when they get married; and if we only turn out

half as good as she is, our husbands will be lucky men, if I do say

it; and if all of us don't get any, we can take care of ourselves.

Father has been holding you up as an example of what a girl can do, if

she has to make her own way in the world."

And the sprightly, but sensible, girl would have rattled on

indefinitely, had not Edith fled to her room in an uncontrollable rush

of sorrow over the sad, sad, "It might have been."

One afternoon Annie came into Edith's room, saying, "I am going to

dress your hair. Yes, I will--now don't say a word, I want to. We

expect two or three friends in--one you'll be glad to see. No, I

won't tell you who it is. It's a surprise." And she flew at Edith's

head, pulled out the hairpins, and went to work with a dexterity and

rapidity that did credit to her training. In a little while she had

crowned Edith with nature's most exquisite coronet.

A cloud of care seemed to rest on Mr. Hart's brow as they entered the

dining-room, but he banished it instantly, and with the quaint,

stately gallantry of the old school, pretended to be deeply smitten

with Edith's loveliness. And so lovely she appeared that their eyes

continually returned, and rested admiringly on her, till at last the

blushing girl remonstrated:

"You all keep looking at me so that I feel as if I were the dessert,

and you were going to eat me up pretty soon."

"I speak for the biggest bite," cried Mr. Hart, and they laughed at

her and petted her so that she said:

"I feel as if I had known you all ten years."

But ever and anon, Edith saw traces of the cloud of care that she had

noticed at first. And so did Mrs. Hart, for she said:

"You have been a little anxious about business lately. Is there

anything new?"

"No," said Mr. Hart, who, in contrast to Mr. Allen, talked business to

his family; "things are only growing a little worse. There have been

one or two bad failures today. The worst of it all is, there seems a

general lack of confidence. No one knows what is going to happen. One

feels as if in a thunder-shower. The lightning may strike him, and it

may fall somewhere else. But don't worry, good mother, I am as safe as

a man can be. I have a round million in my safe ready for an

emergency."

The wife knew just where her husband stood that night.

At nine o'clock, Edith was talking earnestly with Mrs. Ranger, whom

she had expressed a wish to see. There were a few other people present

of the very highest social standing, and intimate friends of the

family, for her kind entertainers would not expose her to any strange

and unsympathetic eyes. Annie was flitting about, the very spirit of

innocent mischief and match-making, gloating over the pleasure she

expected to give Edith. The bell rang, and a moment later she

marshalled in Gus Elliot, as handsome and exquisitely dressed as ever.

He was as much in the dark as to whom he should see as Edith. Some one

had told Annie of his former devotedness to Edith, and so she

innocently meant to do both a kindness. Having a slight acquaintance

with Elliot, as a general society man, she invited him this evening to

"meet an old friend." He gladly accepted, feeling it a great honor to

visit at the Harts'.

He saw Edith a moment before she observed him, and had time to note

her exquisite beauty. But he turned pale with fear and anxiety in

regard to his reception.

Then she raised her eyes and saw him. The blood rushed in a hot

torrent to her face, and then left it in extreme pallor. Gus advanced

with all the ease and grace that he could command under the

circumstances, and held out his hand. "She cannot refer to the past

here before them all," he thought.

But Edith rose slowly, and fixed her large eyes, that glowed like

coals of fire, sternly upon him, and put her hand behind her back.

All held their breath in awe-struck expectation. She seemed to see

only him and the past, and to forget all the rest.

"No, sir," she said, in a low, deep voice, that curdled Gus's blood,

"I cannot take your hand. I might in pity, if you were in the depths

of poverty and trouble, as I have been, but not here and thus. Do you

know where my sister is?"

"No," faltered Gus, his knees trembling under him.

"She is in Bellevue Hospital. A poor girl was carried thence to

Potter's Field a day or two since. She might have been if I had not

found her. And," continued Edith, with her face darkening like night,

and her tone deepening till it sent a thrill of dread to the hearts of

all present, "_in_ Potter's Field _I_ might now have been if I had

listened to you."

Gus trembled before her in a way that plainly confirmed her words.

With a grand dignity she turned to Mrs. Hart, saying, "Please excuse

my absence; I cannot breathe the same air with him," and she was about

to sweep from the parlor like an incensed goddess, when Mr. Hart

sprang up, his eyes blazing with anger, and putting his arm around

Edith, said, sternly:

"I would shield this dear girl as my own daughter. Leave this house,

and never cross my threshold again."

Gus slunk away without a word. As the guilty will be at last, he was

"speechless." So, in a moment, when least expecting it, he fell from

his heaven, which was society: for the news of his baseness spread

like wildfire, and within a week every respectable door was closed

against him.

Is it cynical to say that the well-known and widely-honored Mr. Hart,

in closing his door, had influence as well as Gus's sin, in leading

some to close theirs? Motives in society are a little mixed,

sometimes.

Mr. Hart went down town the next morning, a little anxious, it is

true, on general principles, but not in the least apprehensive of any

disaster. "I may have to pay out a few hundred thousand," he thought,

"but that won't trouble me."

But the bolt of financial suspicion was directed toward him; how, he

could not tell. Within half an hour after opening, checks for twelve

hundred thousand were presented at his counter. He telegraphed to his

wife, "A run upon me." Later, "Danger!" Then came the words to the

uptown palace, "Have suspended!" In the afternoon, "The storm will

sweep me bare, but courage, God, and our right hands, will make a

place and a way for us."

The business community sympathized deeply with Mr. Hart. Hard, cool

men of Wall Street came in, and, with eyes moist with sympathy, wrung

his hand. He stood up through the wild tumult, calm, dignified,

heroic, because conscious of rectitude.

"The shrinkage in securities will be great, I fear," he said, "but I

think my assets will cover all liabilities. We will give up

everything."

When he came up home in the evening, he looked worn, and much older

than in the morning, but his wife and daughters seemed to envelop him

in an atmosphere of love and sympathy. They were so strong, cheerful,

hopeful, that they infused their courage into him. Annie ran to the

piano, and played as if inspired, saying to her father:

"Let every note tell you that we can take care of ourselves, and you

and mother too, if necessary."

The words were prophetic. The strain had been too great on Mr. Hart.

That night he had a stroke of paralysis and became helpless. But he

had trained his daughters to be the very reverse of helpless, and they

did take care of him with the most devoted love and skilled practical

energy, making the weak, brief remnant of his life not a burden, but a

peaceful evening after a glorious day. They all, except the youngest,

soon found employment, for they brought superior skill and knowledge

to the labor market, and such are ever in demand. Annie soon married

happily, and her younger sisters eventually followed her example. But

Ella, the eldest, remained single; and, though she never became

eminent as an artist, did become a very useful and respected teacher

of art, as studied in our schools for its refining influence.

To return to Edith, she felt for her kind friends almost as much as if

she were one of the family.

"Do not feel that you must go away because of what has happened," said

Mrs. Hart. "I am glad to have you with us, for you do us all good.

Indeed, you seem one of us. Stay as long as you can, dear, and God

help us both to bear our burdens."

"Dear, 'heavy-laden' Mrs. Hart," said Edith, "Jesus will bear the

burdens for us, if we will let Him."

"Bless you, child, I am sure He sent you to me."

As Edith entered the ward that day, the attendant said, "She's

herself, miss, at last."

Edith stole noiselessly to Zell's cot. She was sleeping. Edith sat

down silently and watched for her waking. At last she opened her eyes

and glanced fearfully around. Then she saw Edith, and instantly shrank

and cowered as if expecting a blow.

"Zell," said Edith, taking the poor, thin hand, "Oh, Zell, don't you

know me?"

"What are you going to do with me?" asked Zell, in a voice full of

dread.

"Take you to my home--take you to my heart--take you deeper into my

love than ever before."

"Edith," said Zell, almost cowering before her words as if they hurt

her, "I am not fit to go home."

"Oh, Zell, darling," said Edith, tenderly, "God's love does not keep a

debit and credit account with us, neither should we with each other.

Can't you see that I love you?" and she showered kisses on her

sister's now pallid face.

But Zell acted as if they were a source of pain to her, and she

muttered, "You don't know, you can't know. Don't speak of God to me, I

fear Him unspeakably."

"I do know all," said Edith, earnestly, "and I love you more fondly

than ever I did before, and God knows and loves you more still."

"I tell you you don't know," said Zell, almost fiercely. "You can't

know. If you did, you would spit on me and leave me forever. God

knows, and He has doomed me to hell, Edith," she added, in a hoarse

whisper. "I killed him--you know whom. And I promised that after I got

old and ugly I would come and torment him forever. I must keep my

promise."

Edith wept bitterly. This was worse than delirium. She saw that her

sister's nature was so bruised and perverted, so warped, that she was

almost insane. She slowly rallied back into physical strength, but her

hectic cheek and slight cough indicated the commencement of

consumption. Her mind remained in the same unnatural condition, and

she kept saying to Edith, "You don't know anything about it at all.

You can't know." She would not see Mrs. Hart, and agreed to go home

with Edith only on condition that no one should see or speak with her

outside the family.

At last the day of departure came. Mrs. Hart said, "You shall take her

to the depot in my carriage. It will be among its last and best uses."

Edith kissed her kind friend good-by, saying, "God will send his

chariot for you some day, and though you must leave this, your

beautiful home, if you could only have a glimpse into the mansion

preparing for you up there, anticipation would almost banish all

thoughts of present loss."

"Well, dear," said Mrs. Hart, with a gleam of her old humor, "I hope

your 'mansion' will be next door, for I shall want to see you often

through all eternity."

Then Edith knelt before Mr. Hart's chair, and the old man's helpless

hands were lifted upon her head, and he looked to heaven for the

blessing he could not speak.

"Our ways diverge now, but they will all meet again. Home is near to

you," she whispered in his ear as she kissed him good-by.

The old glad light shone in his eyes, the old cheery smile flitted

across his lips, and thus she left him who had been the great, rich

banker, serene, happy, and rich in a faith that could not be lost in

any financial storm, or destroyed by disease, or enfeebled by age--she

left him waiting as a little child to go home.

CHAPTER XXXIII

EDITH'S GREAT TEMPTATION

Though even Mrs. Allen was tearful and kind in her greeting, and Laura

warm and affectionate in the extreme, old Hannibal's welcome, so

frank, genuine, and innocent, seemed to soften Zell more than any

one's else.

"You poor, heavenly-minded old fool," she said, with an unwonted tear

in her eye, "you don't know any better."

Then she seemed to settle down into a dreamy apathy; to sit moping

around in shadowy places. She had a horror of meeting any one, even

Mrs. Lacey and Rose, and would not go out till after night. Edith saw,

more and more clearly, that she was almost insane in her shame and

despair, and that she would be a terrible burden to them all if she

remained in such a condition; but her love and patience did not fail.

They would, had they not been daily fed from heavenly sources. "I must

try to show her Jesus' love through mine," she thought.

Poor Edith, the great temptation of her life was soon to assail her.

It was aimed at her weakest yet noblest side, her young enthusiasm and

spirit of self-sacrifice for others. And yet, it was but the natural

fruit of woman's helplessness and Mrs. Allen's policy of marrying

one's way out of poverty and difficulty.

Simon Crowl had ostensibly made a very fair transaction with Edith,

but Simon Crowl was a widower at the time, and on the lookout for a

wife. He was a pretty sharp business man, Crowl was, or he wouldn't

have become so rich in little Pushton, and he at once was satisfied

that Edith, so beautiful, so sensible, would answer. Through the

mortgage he might capture her, as it were, for even his vanity did not

promise him much success in the ordinary ways of love-making. So the

spider spun his web, and unconscious Edith was the poor little fly.

During the summer he watched her closely, but from a distance. During

the autumn and winter he commenced calling, ostensibly on Mrs. Allen,

whom he at once managed to impress with the fact that he was very

rich. Though he brushed up his best coat and manners, that delicate-nosed lady scented an air and manner very different from what she had

been accustomed to, but she was half-dead with _ennui_, and, after

all, there was something akin between worldly Mrs. Allen and worldly

Mr. Crowl. Then, he was very rich. This had covered a multitude of

sins on the avenue. But, in the miserable poverty of Pushton, it was a

golden mantle of light. Mrs. Allen chafed at privation and want of

delicacies with the increasing persistency of an utterly weak and

selfish nature. She had no faith in Edith's plans, and no faith in

woman's working, and the garden seemed the wildest dream of all. Her

hard, narrow logic, constantly dinned into Edith's ears, discouraged

her, and she began to doubt herself.

Mr. Crowl (timid lover) had in Edith's absence confirmed his previous

hints, thrown out to Mrs. Allen as feelers, by making a definite

proposition. In brief, he had offered to settle twenty-five thousand

dollars on Edith the day she married him, and to take care of the rest

of the family.

"I have made enough," he said majestically, "to live the rest of my

life like a gentleman, and this offer is princely, if I say it myself.

You can all ride in your carriage again." Then he added, with his

little black eyes growing hard and cunning, "If your daughter won't

accept my generosity, our relationship becomes merely one of business.

Of course I shall foreclose. Money is scarce here, and I shall

probably be able to buy in the place at half its worth. Seems to me,"

he concluded, looking at the case from his valuation of money, "there

is not much room for choice here."

And Mr. Crowl had been princely--for him. Mrs. Allen thought so, too,

and lent herself to the scheme with all the persistent energy that she

could show in these matters. But, to do her justice, she really

thought she was doing what was best for Edith and all of them. She was

acting in accordance with her lifelong principle of providing for her

family, in the one way she believed in and understood. But sincerity

and singleness of purpose made her all the more dangerous as a

tempter.

In one of Edith's most discouraged moods she broached the subject and

explained Mr. Crowl's offer, for he, prudent man, had left it to her.

Edith started violently, and the project was so revolting to her that

she fled from the room. But Mrs. Allen, with her small pertinacity,

kept recurring to it at every opportunity. Though it may seem a little

strange, her mother's action did not so shock Edith as some might

expect; nor did the proposition seem so impossible as it might to some

girls. She had all her life been accustomed, through her mother, to

the idea of marrying for money, and we can get used to almost

anything.

In March their money was very low. Going to Zell and taking care of

her had involved much additional expense. She found out that her

mother had already accepted and used in part a loan of fifty dollars

from Mr. Crowl. Laura, from the long confinement of the winter, and

from living on fare too coarse and lacking in nutrition for her

delicate organization, was growing very feeble. Zell seemed in the

first stages of consumption, and would soon be a sick, helpless

burden. The chill of dread grew stronger at Edith's heart.

"Oh, can it be possible that I shall be driven to it!" she often

groaned; and she now saw, as poor Laura said, "the black hand in the

dark pushing her down." To her surprise her thoughts kept reverting to

Arden Lacey.

"What will he think of me if I do this?" she thought, with intense

bitterness. "He will tell me I was not worthy of his friendship, much

less of his love--that I deceived him;" and the thought of Arden,

after all, perhaps, had the most weight in restraining her from the

fatal step. For then, to her perverted sense of duty, this marriage

began to seem like an heroic self-sacrifice.

She had seen little of Arden since her return. He was kind and

respectful as ever, outwardly, but she saw in his deep blue eyes that

she was the divinity that he still worshipped with unfaltering

devotion, and as she once smiled at the idea of being set up as an

idol in his heart, she now began unspeakably to dread falling from her

pedestal.

One dreary day, the last of March, when sleet and rain were pouring

steadily down, and Laura was sick in her bed, and Zell moping with her

hacking cough over the fire, with Hannibal in the kitchen, Mrs. Allen

turned suddenly to Edith, and said:

"On some such day we shall all be turned into the street. You could

save us, you could save yourself, by taking a kind, rich man for your

lawful husband; but you won't."

Then Satan, who is always on hand when we are weakest, quoted

Scripture to Edith as he had done once before. The words flashed into

her mind, "He saved others, himself he cannot save."

In a wild moment of mingled enthusiasm and desperation, she sprang up

before her mother, and said:

"If I can't pay the interest of the mortgage--if I can't take care of

you all by some kind of work, I will marry him. But if you have a

spark of love for me, save, economize, try to think of some other

way."

Mrs. Allen smiled triumphantly, and tried in her gratitude to embrace

her daughter, saying: "A kind husband will soon lift all burdens off

your shoulders." The burden on the heart Mrs. Allen did not

understand, but Edith fled from her to her own room.

In a little while her excitement and enthusiasm died away, and life

began to look gaunt and bare. Even her Saviour's face seemed hidden,

and she only saw an ugly spectre in the future--Simon Crowl.

In vain she repeated to herself, "He sacrificed Himself for others--so

will I." The nature that He had given her revolted at it all, and

though she could not understand it, she began to find a jarring

discord between herself and all things.

Mrs. Allen told Mr. Crowl of her success, and he looked upon things as

settled. He came to the house quite often, but did not stay long or

assume any familiarity with Edith. He was a wary old spider; and under

Mrs. Allen's hints, behaved and looked very respectably. He certainly

did the best he could not to appear hideous to Edith, and though she

was very cold, she compelled herself to treat him civilly.

Perhaps many might have considered Edith's chance a very good one; but

with an almost desperate energy she set her mind at work to find some

other way out of her painful straits. Everything, however, seemed

against her. Mr. McTrump was sick with inflammatory rheumatism. Mrs.

Groody was away, and would not be back till the last of May. On

account of Arden she could not speak to Mrs. Lacey. She tried in vain

to get work, but at that season there was nothing in Pushton which she

could do. Farmers were beginning to get out a little on their wet

lands, and various out-of-door activities to revive after the winter

stagnation. Moreover, money was very scarce at that season of the

year. She at last turned to the garden as her only resource. She

realized that she had scarcely money enough to carry them through May.

Could she get returns from her garden in time? Could it be made to

yield enough to support them? With an almost desperate energy she

worked in it whenever the weather permitted through April, and kept

Hannibal at it also. Indeed, she had little mercy on the old man, and

he wondered at her. One day he ventured:

"Miss Edie, you jes done kill us both," but his wonder increased as

she muttered:

"Perhaps it would be the best thing for us both," Then, seeing his

panic-stricken face, she added more kindly, "Hannibal, our money is

getting low, and the garden is our only chance."

After that he worked patiently without a word and without a thought of

sparing himself.

Edith insisted on the closest economy in the house, though she was too

sensible to stint herself in food in view of her constant toil. But

one day she detected Mrs. Allen, with her small cunning and her

determination to carry her point, practicing a little wastefulness.

Edith turned on her with such fierceness that she never dared to

repeat the act. Indeed, Edith was becoming very much what she was

before Zell ran away, only in addition there was something akin, at

times, to Zell's own hardness and recklessness, and one day she said

to Edith:

"What is the matter? You are becoming like me."

Edith fled to her room, and sobbed and cried and tried to pray till

her strength was gone. The sweet trust and peace she had once enjoyed

seemed like a past dream. She was learning by bitter experience that

it can never be right to do wrong; and that a first false step, like a

false premise, leads to sad conclusions.

She had insisted that her mother should not speak of the matter till

it became absolutely necessary, therefore Laura, Zell, and none of her

friends could understand her.

Arden was the most puzzled and pained of all, for she shrank from him

with increasing dread. He was now back at his farm work, though he

said to Edith one day despondently that he had no heart to work, for

the mortgage on their place would probably be foreclosed in the fall.

She longed to tell him how she was situated, but she saw he was unable

to help her, and she dreaded to see the scorn come into his trusting,

loving eyes; she could not endure his absolute confidence in her, and

in his presence her heart ached as if it would break, so she shunned

him till he grew very unhappy, and sighed:

"There's something wrong. She finds I am not congenial. I shall lose

her friendship," and his aching heart also admitted, as never before,

how dear it was to him.

Nature was awakening with the rapture of another spring; birds were

coming back to old haunts with ecstatic songs; flowers budding into

their brief but exquisite life, and the trees aglow with fragrant

prophecies of fruit; but a winter of fear and doubt was chilling these

two hearts into something far worse than nature's seeming death.

CHAPTER XXXIV

SAVED

Edith's efforts still to help Zell to better things were very

pathetic, considering how unhappy and tempted she was herself. She did

try, even when her own heart was breaking, to bring peace and hope to

the poor creature, but she was taught how vain her efforts were, in

her present mood, by Zell's saying, sharply:

"Physician, heal thyself."

Though Zell did not understand Edith, she saw that she was almost as

unhappy as herself, and she had lost hope in everybody and everything.

Though she had not admitted it, Edith's words and kindness at first

had excited her wonder, and, perhaps, a faint glimmer of hope; but, as

she saw her sister's face cloud with care, and darken with pain and

fear, she said, bitterly:

"Why did she talk with me so? It was all a delusion. What is God doing

for her any more than for me?"

But, in order to give Zell occupation, and something to think about

besides herself, Edith had induced her to take charge of the flowers

in the garden.

"They won't grow for me," Zell had said at first. "They will wither

when I look at them, and white blossoms will turn black as I bend over

them."

"Nonsense!" said Edith, with irritation; "won't you do anything to

help me?"

"Oh, certainly," wearily answered Zell. "I will do the work just as

you tell me. If they do die, it don't matter. We can eat or sell

them." So Zell began to take care of the flowers, doing the work in a

stealthy manner, and hiding when any one came.

The month of May was unusually warm, and Edith was glad, for it would

hasten things forward. That upon which she now bent almost agonized

effort and thought was the possibility of paying the interest on the

mortgage by the middle of June, when it was due. All hope concentrated

on her strawberries, as they would be the first crop worth mentioning

that she could depend on from her place. She gave the plants the most

careful attention. Not a weed was suffered to grow, and between the

rows she placed carefully, with her own hands, leaves she raked up in

the orchard, so that the ground might be kept moist and the fruit

clean. Almost every hour of the day her eyes sought the strawberry-bed, as the source of her hope. If that failed her, no bleeding human

sacrifice in all the cruel past could surpass in agony her fate.

The vines began to blossom with great promise, and at first she almost

counted them in her eager expectation. Then the long rows looked like

little banks of snow, and she exulted over the prospect. Laura was

once about to pick one of the blossoms, but she stopped her almost

fiercely. She would get up in the night, and stand gazing at the lines

of white, as she could trace them in the darkness across the garden.

So the days passed on till the last of May, and the blossoms grew

scattering, but there were multitudes of little green berries, from

the size of a pea to that of her thimble, and some of them began to

have a white look. She so minutely watched them develop that she could

have almost defined the progress day by day. Once Zell looked at her

wonderingly, and said:

"Edith, you are crazy over that strawberry-bed. I believe you worship

it."

For a time Edith's hopes daily rose higher as the vines gave finer

promise, but during the last week of May a new and terrible source of

danger revealed itself, a danger that she knew not how to cope with--drought.

It had not rained since the middle of May. She saw that many of her

young and tender vegetables were wilting, but the strawberries,

mulched with leaves, did not appear to mind it at first. Still she

knew they would suffer soon, unless there was rain. Most anxiously she

watched the skies. Their serenity mocked her when she was so clouded

with care. Wild storms would be better than these balmy, sunny days.

The first of June came, the second, third, and fourth, and here and

there a berry was turning red, but the vines were beginning to wilt.

The suspense became so great she could hardly endure it. Her faith in

God began to waver. Every breath almost was a prayer for rain, but the

sunny days passed like mocking smiles.

"Is there a God?" she queried desperately. "Can I have been deceived

in all my past happy experience?" She shuddered at the answer that the

tempter suggested, and yet, like a drowning man, she still clung to

her faith.

During the long evening, she and Hannibal sought to save the bed by

carrying water from the well, but they could do so little, it only

seemed to show them how utterly dependent they were on the natural

rain from heaven; but the skies seemed laughing at her pain and fear.

Moreover, she noticed that those they watered appeared injured rather

than helped, as is ever the case where it is insufficiently done, and

she saw that she must helplessly wait.

Arden Lacey had been away for a week, and, returning in the dusk of

the evening, saw her at work watering, before she had come to this

conclusion. His heart was hungry, even for the sight of her, and he

longed for her to let him stop for a little chat as of old. So he

said, timidly:

"Good-evening, Miss Allen, haven't you a word to welcome me back

with?"

"Oh!" cried Edith, not heeding his salutation, "why don't it rain! I

shall lose all my strawberries."

His voice jarred upon her heart, now too full, and she ran into the

house to hide her feelings, and left him. Even the thought of him now,

in her morbid state, began to pierce her like a sword.

"She thinks more of her paltry strawberry-bed than of me," muttered

Arden, and he stalked angrily homeward. "What is the matter with Miss

Allen?" he asked his mother abruptly. "I don't understand her."

"Nor I either," said Mrs. Lacey with a sigh.

The next morning was very warm, and Edith saw that the day would be

hotter than any that preceded. A dry wind sprang up and it seemed

worse than the sun. The vines began to wither early after the coolness

of the night, and those she had watered suffered the most, and seemed

to say to her mockingly:

"You can't do anything."

"Oh, heaven!" cried Edith, almost in despair, "there is a black hand

pushing me down."

In an excited, feverish manner she roamed restlessly around and could

settle down to nothing. She scanned the horizon for a cloud, as the

shipwrecked might for a sail.

"Edie, what is the matter?" said Laura, putting her arms about her

sister.

"It won't rain," said Edith, bursting into tears. "My home, my

happiness, everything depends on rain, and look at these skies."

"But won't He send it?" asked Laura, gently.

"Why don't He, then?" said Edith, almost in irritation. Then, in a

sudden passion of grief, she hid her face in her sister's lap, and

sobbed, "Oh, Laura, Laura, I feel I am losing my faith in Him. Why

does He treat me so?"

Here Laura's face grew troubled and fearful also. Her faith in Christ

was so blended with her faith in Edith that she could not separate

them in a moment. "I don't understand it, Edie," she faltered. "He

seems to have taken care of me, and has been very kind since that--that night But I don't understand your feeling so."

"Oh, oh, oh!" sobbed Edith, "I don't know what to think--what to

believe; and I fear I shall hurt your faith," and she shut herself up

in her room, and looked despairingly out to where the vines were

drooping in the fierce heat.

"If they don't get help to-day, my hopes will wither like their

leaves," she said, with pallid lips. As the sun declined in the west,

she went out and stood beside them, as one might by a dying friend.

Her fresh young face seemed almost growing aged and wrinkled under the

ordeal. She had prayed that afternoon, as never before in her life,

for help, and now, with a despairing gesture upward, she said:

"Look at that brazen sky!"

But the noise of the opening gate caused her to look thither, and

there was Arden entering, with a great barrel on wheels, which was

drawn by a horse. His heart, so weak toward her, had relented during

the day. "I vowed to serve her, and I will," he thought. "I will be

her slave, if she will permit."

Edith did not understand at first, and he came toward her so humbly,

as if to ask a great favor, that it would have been comic, had not his

sincerity made it pathetic.

"Miss Allen," he said, "I saw you trying to water your berries.

Perhaps I can do it better, as I have here the means of working on a

larger scale."

Edith seized his hand and said, with tears: "You are like an angel of

light; how can I thank you enough?"

Her manner puzzled him to-night quite as much as on the previous

occasion. "Why does she act as if her life depended on these few

berries?" he vainly asked himself. "They can't be so poor as to be in

utter want. I wish she would speak frankly to me."

In her case, as in thousands of others, it would have been so much

better if she had.

Then Edith said, a little dubiously, "I hurt the vines when I tried to

water them."

"I know enough about gardening to understand that," said Arden, with a

smile. "If the ground is not thoroughly soaked it does hurt them. But

see," and he poured the water around the vines till the dry leaves

swam in it. "That will last two days, and then I will water these

again. I can go over half the bed thoroughly one night, and the other

half the next night; and so we will keep them along till rain comes."

She looked at him as if he were a messenger come to release her from a

dungeon, and murmured, in a low, sweet voice:

"Mr. Lacey, you are as kind as a brother to me."

A warm flush of pleasure mantled his face and neck, and he turned away

to hide his feelings, but said:

"Miss Edith, this is nothing to what I would do for you."

She had it on her lips to tell him how she was situated, but he

hastened away to fill his barrel at a neighboring pond. She watched

him go to and fro in his rough, working garb, and he seemed to her the

very flower of chivalry.

Her eyes grew lustrous with admiration, gratitude, hope, and--yes,

love, for before the June twilight deepened into night it was revealed

in the depths of her heart that she loved Arden Lacey, and that was

the reason that she had kept away from him since she had made the

hateful promise. She had thought it only friendship, now she knew that

it was love, and that his scorn and anger would be the bitterest

ingredient of all in her self-immolation.

For two long hours he went to and fro unweariedly, and then startled

her by saying in the distance on his way home, "I will come again to-morrow evening," and was gone. He was afraid of himself, lest in his

strong feeling he might break his implied promise not even to suggest

his love, when she came to thank him, and so, in self-distrustfulness,

he was beginning to shun her also.

An unspeakable burden of fear was lifted from her heart, and hope,

sweet, warm, and rosy, kept her eyes waking, but rested her more than

sleep. In the morning she saw that the watering had greatly revived

one half of the bed, and that all through the hot day they did not

wilt, while the unwatered part looked very sick.

Old Crowl also had seen the proceeding in the June twilight, and did

not like it. "I must put a spoke in his wheel," he said. So the next

afternoon he met Arden in the village, and blustered up to him,

saying:

"Look here, young Lacey, what were you doing at the Allens' last

night?"

"None of your business."

"Yes, it is my business, too, as you may find out to your cost. I am

engaged to marry Miss Edith Allen, and guess it's my business who's

hanging around there. I warn you to keep away." Mr. Crowl had put the

case truly, and yet with characteristic cunning. He was positively

engaged to Edith, though she was only conditionally engaged to him.

"It's an accursed lie," thundered Arden, livid with rage, "and I warn

you to leave--you make me dangerous."

"Oh, ho; touches you close, does it? I am sorry for you, but it's

true, nevertheless."

Arden looked as if he would rend him, but by a great effort he

controlled himself, and in a low, meaning voice said:

"If you have lied to me this afternoon, woe be unto you," and he

turned on his heel and walked straight to Edith, where she stood at

work among her grapevines, breaking off some of the too thickly

budding branches. He was beside her before she heard him, and the

moment she looked into his white, stern face, she saw that something

had happened.

"Miss Allen," he said, abruptly, "I heard a report about you this

afternoon. I did not believe it; I could not; but it came so direct,

that I give you a chance to refute it. Your word will be sufficient

for me. It would be against all the world. Is there anything between

you and Simon Crowl?"

Her confusion was painful, and for a moment she could not speak, but

stood trembling before him.

In his passion, he seized her roughly by the arm and said, hoarsely,

"In a word, yes or no?"

His manner offended her proud spirit, and she looked him angrily in

the face and said, haughtily;

"Yes."

He recoiled from her as if he had been stung.

Her anger died away in a moment, and she leaned against the grape-trellis for support.

"Do you love him?" he faltered, his bronzed cheek blanching.

"No," she gasped.

The blood rushed furiously into his face, and he took an angry stride

toward her. She cowered before him, but almost wished that he would

strike her dead. In a voice hoarse with rage, he said:

"This, then, is the end of our friendship. This is the best that your

religion has taught you. If not your pitiful faith, then has not your

woman's nature told you that neither priest nor book can marry you to

that coarse lump of earth?" and he turned on his heel and strode away.

His mother was frightened as she saw his face. "What has happened?"

she said, starting up. He stared at her almost stupidly for a moment.

Then he said, in a stony voice:

"The worst that ever can happen to me in this or any world. If the

lightning had burned me to a cinder, I could not be more utterly

bereft of all that tends to make a good man. Edith Allen has sold

herself to old Crowl. Some priest is going through a farce they will

call a marriage, and all the good people will say, 'How well she has

done!' What a miserable delusion this religious business is! You had

better give it up, mother, as I do, here and now."

"Hush, my son," said Mrs. Lacey, solemnly. "You have only seen Edith

Allen. I have seen _Jesus Christ._

"There is some mystery about this," she added, after a moment's

painful thought. "I will go and see her at once."

He seized her hand, saying:

"Have I not been a good son to you?"

"Yes, Arden."

"Then by all I have ever been to you, and as you wish my love to

continue, go not near her again."

"But, Arden--"

"Promise me," he said, sternly.

"Well," said the poor woman, with a deep sigh, "not without your

permission."

From that time forth, Arden seemed as if made of stone.

After he was gone Edith walked with uncertain steps to the little

arbor, and sat down as if stunned. She lost all idea of time. After it

was dark, Hannibal called her in, and made her take a cup of tea. She

then went mechanically to her room, but not to sleep. Arden's dreadful

words kept repeating themselves over and over again.

"O God!" she exclaimed, in the darkness, "whither am I drifting? Must

I be driven to this awful fate in order to provide for those dependent

upon me? Cannot bountiful Nature feed us? Wilt Thou not, in mercy,

send one drop of rain? O Jesus, where is Thy mercy?"

The next morning the skies were still cloudless, and she scowled

darkly at the sunny dawn. Then, in sudden alternation of mood, she

stretched her bare, white arms toward the little farmhouse, and

sighed, in tones of tremulous pathos:

"Oh, Arden, Arden! I would rather die at your feet than live in a

palace with him."

She sent down word that she was ill, and that she would not come down.

Laura, Mrs. Allen, and even Zell, came to her, but she kissed them

wearily, and sent them away. She saw that there was deep anxiety on

all their faces. Pretty soon Hannibal came up with a cup of coffee.

"You must drink it, Miss Edie," he said, "'cause we'se all a-leanin'

on you."

Well-meaning words, but tending unconsciously to confirm her desperate

purpose to sacrifice herself for them.

She lay with her face buried in the pillow all day. She knew that

their money was almost gone, that provisions were scanty in the house,

and to her morbid mind bags of gold were piled up before her, and

Simon Crowl, as an ugly spectre, was beckoning her toward them.

As she lay in a dull lethargy of pain in the afternoon, a heavy jar of

thunder aroused her. She sprang up instantly, and ran out bare-headed

to the little rise of ground behind the house, and there, in the west,

was a great black cloud. The darker and nearer it grew, the more her

face brightened. It was a strange thing to see that fair young girl

looking toward the threatening storm with eager, glad expectancy, as

if it were her lover. The heavy and continued roll of the thunder,

like the approaching roar of battle, was sweeter to her than love's

whispers. She saw with dilating eyes the trees on the distant

mountain's brow toss and writhe in the tempest; she heard the fall of

rain-drops on the foliage of the mountain's side as if they were the

feet of an army coming to her rescue. A few large ones, mingled with

hail, fell around her like scattering shots, and she put out her hands

to catch them. The fierce gusts caught up her loosened hair and it

streamed away behind her. There was a blinding flash, and the branches

of a tall locust near came quivering down--she only smiled.

But dismay and trembling fear overwhelmed her as the shower passed on

to the north. She could see it raining hard a mile away, but the drops

ceased to fall around her. The deep reverberations rolled away in the

distance, and in the west there was a long line of light. As the

twilight deepened, the whole storm was below the horizon, only sending

up angry flashes as it thundered on to parts unknown. With clasped

hands and despairing eyes, Edith gazed after it, as the wrecked

floating on a raft might watch a ship sail away, and leave them to

perish on the wide ocean.

She walked slowly down to the little arbor, and leaned wearily back on

the rustic seat. She saw night come on in breathless peace. Not a leaf

stirred. She saw the moon rise over the eastern hills, as brightly and

serenely as if its rays would not fall on one sad face.

Hannibal called, but she did not answer, Then he came out to her, and

put the cup of tea to her lips, and made her drink it. She obeyed

mechanically.

"Poor chile, poor chile," he murmured, "I wish ole Hannibal could die

for you."

She lifted her face to him with such an expression that he hastened

away to hide his tears. But she sat still, as if in a dream, and yet

she felt that the crisis had come, and that before she left that place

she must come to some decision. Reason would be dethroned if she lived

much longer in such suspense and irresolution. And yet she sat still

in a dreamy stupor, the reaction of her strong excitement. It seemed,

in a certain sense, peaceful and painless, and she did not wish to

goad herself out of it.

"It may be like the last sleep before execution," she thought,

"therefore make the most of it," and her thoughts wandered at will.

A late robin came flying home to the arbor where the nest was, and

having twittered out a little vesper-song, put its head under its

wing, near his mate, which sat brooding in the nest over some little

eggs, and the thought stole into her heart, "Will God take care of

them and not me?" and she watched the peaceful sleep of the family

over her head as if it were an emblem of faith.

Then a sudden breeze swept a spray of roses against her face, and

their delicate perfume was like the "still small voice" of love, and

the thought passed dreamily across Edith's mind, "Will God do so much

for that little cluster of roses and yet do nothing for me?"

How near the Father was to His child! In this calm that followed her

long passionate struggle, His mighty but gentle Spirit could make

itself felt, and it stole into the poor girl's bruised heart with

heavenly suggestion and healing power. The happy days when she

followed Jesus and sat daily at His feet were recalled. Her sin was

shown to her, not in anger, but in the loving reproachfulness of the

Saviour's look upon faithless Peter, and a voice seemed to ask in her

soul, "How could you turn away your trust from Him to anything else?

How could you think it right to do so great a wrong? How could you so

trample upon the womanly nature that He gave you as to think of

marrying where neither love nor God would sanction?"

Jesus seemed to stand before her, and point up to the robins, saying,

"I feed them. I fed the five thousand. I feed the world. I can feed

you and yours. Trust me. Do right. In trying to save yourself you will

destroy yourself."

With a divine impulse, she threw herself on the floor of the arbor,

and cried:

"Jesus, I cast myself at Thy feet. I throw myself on Thy mercy. When I

look the world around, away from Thee, I see only fear and torment. If

I die, I will perish at Thy feet."

Was it the moonlight only that made the night luminous? No, for the

glory of the Lord shone around, and the peace that "passeth all

understanding" came flowing into her soul like a shining river. The

ugly phantoms that had haunted her vanished. The "black hand that

seemed pushing her down," became her Father's hand, shielding and

sustaining.

She rose as calm and serene as the summer evening and went straight to

Mrs. Allen's room and said: "Mother, I will never marry Simon Crowl."

Her mother began to cry, and say piteously:

"Then we shall all be turned into the street."

"What the future will be I can't tell," said Edith, gently but firmly.

"I will work for you, I will beg for you, I will starve with you, but

I will never marry Simon Crowl, nor any other man that I do not love."

And pressing a kiss on her mother's face, she went to her room, and

soon was lost in the first refreshing sleep that she had had for a

long time.

She was wakened toward morning by the sound of rain, and, starting up,

heard its steady, copious downfall. In a sudden ecstasy of gratitude

she sprang up, opened the blinds and looked out. The moon had gone

down, and through the darkness the rain was falling heavily; she felt

it upon her forehead, her bare neck and arms, and it seemed to her

Heaven's own baptism into a new and stronger faith and a happier life.

CHAPTER XXXV

CLOSING SCENES

The clouds were clearing away when Edith came down late the next

morning, and all saw that the clouds had passed from her brow.

"Bress de Lord, Miss Edie, you'se yoursef again!" said Hannibal,

joyfully. "I neber see a shower do such a heap ob good afore."

"No," said Edith, sadly; "I was myself. I lost my Divine Friend and

Helper, and I then became myself--poor, weak, faulty Edith Allen. But,

thanks to His mercy, I have found Him again, and so hope to be the

better self that He helped me to be before."

Zell looked at her with a sudden wonder, and went out and stayed among

her flowers all day.

Laura came and put her arms around her neck, and said,

"Oh, Edie, I am so glad! What you said set me to fearing and doubting;

but I am sure we can trust Him."

Mrs. Allen sighed drearily, and said, "I don't understand it at all."

But old Hannibal slapped his hands in true Methodist style,

exclaiming, "Dat's it! Trow away de ole heart! Get a new one! Bress de

Lord!"

Edith went out into the garden, and saw that there were a great many

berries ripe; then she hastened to the hotel, and said:

"Oh, Mrs. Groody, for Heaven's sake, won't you help me sell my

strawberries up here?"

"Yes, my dear," was the hearty response; "both for your sake and the

strawberries, too. We get them from the city, and would much rather

have fresh country ones."

Edith returned with her heart thrilling with hope, and set to work

picking as if every berry was a ruby, and in a few hours she had six

quarts of fragrant fruit. Malcom had lent her little baskets, and

Hannibal took them up to the hotel, for Arden would not even look

toward the little cottage any more. The old servant came back grinning

with delight, and gave Edith a dollar and a half.

The next day ten quarts brought two dollars and a half. Then they

began to ripen rapidly, the rain having greatly improved them, and

Edith, with considerable help from the others, picked twenty, thirty,

and fifty quarts a day. She employed a stout boy from the village, to

help her, and, through him, she soon had quite a village trade also.

He had a percentage on the sales, and, therefore, was very sharp in

disposing of them.

How Edith gloated over her money! how, with more than miserly eyes,

she counted it over every night, and pressed it to her lips!

In the complete absorption of the past few weeks Edith had not noticed

the change going on in Zell. The poor creature was surprised and

greatly pleased that the flowers grew so well for her. Every opening

blossom was a new revelation, and their sweet perfume stole into her

wounded heart like balm. The blue violets seemed like children's eyes

peeping timidly at her; and the pansies looked so bright and saucy

that she caught herself smiling back at them. The little black and

brown seeds she planted came up so promptly that it seemed as if they

wanted to see her as much as she did them.

"Isn't it queer," she said one day to herself, "that such pretty

things can come out of such ugly little things." Nothing in nature

seemed to turn away from her, any more than would nature's God. The

dumb life around began to speak to her in many and varied voices, and

she who fled from companionship with her own kind would sit and chirp

and talk to the birds, as if they understood her. And they did seem to

grow strangely familiar, and would almost eat crumbs out of her hand.

One day in June she said to Hannibal, who was working near, "Isn't it

strange the flowers grow so well for me?"

"Why shouldn't dey grow for you, Miss Zell?" asked he, straightening

his old back up.

"Good, innocent Hannibal, how indeed should you know anything about

it?"

"Yes, I does know all 'bout it," said he, earnestly, and he came to

her where she stood by a rosebush. "Does you see dis white rose?"

"Yes," said Zell, "it opened this morning. I've been watching it."

Poor Hannibal could not read print, but he seemed to understand this

exquisite passage in nature's open book, for he put his black finger

on the rose (which made it look whiter than before), and commenced

expounding it as a preacher might his text. "Now look at it sharp,

Miss Zell, 'cause it'll show you I does know all 'bout it. It's white,

isn't it?"

"Yes," said Zell, eagerly, for Hannibal held the attention of his

audience.

"Dat means pure, doesn't it?" continued he.

"Yes," said Zell, looking sadly down.

"And it's sweet, isn't it? Now dat means lub."

And Zell looked hopefully up.

"And now, dear chile," said he, giving her a little impressive nudge,

"see whar de white rose come from--right up out of de brack, ugly

ground."

Having concluded his argument and made his point, the simple orator

began his application, and Zell was leaning toward him in her

interest.

"De good Lord, he make it grow to show what He can do for us. Miss

Zell," he said, in an awed whisper, "my ole heart was as brack as dat

ground, but de blessed Jesus turn it as white as dis rose. Miss Edie,

Lor' bless her, telled me 'bout Him, and I'se found it all true. Now,

doesn't I know 'bout it? I knows dat de good Jesus can turn de

brackest heart in de world jes like dis rose, make it white and pure,

and fill it up wid de sweetness of lub. I knows all 'bout it."

He spoke with the power of absolute certainty and strong feeling,

therefore his hearer was deeply moved.

"Hannibal," she said, coming close to him, and putting her hand on his

shoulder, "do you think Jesus could turn my heart white?"

"Sartin, Miss Zell," answered he, stoutly. "Jes as easy as He make dis

white rose grow."

"Would you mind asking Him? It seems to me I would rather pray out

here among the flowers," she said, in low, tremulous tones.

So Hannibal concluded his simple, but most effective, service by

kneeling down by his pulpit, the rosebush, and praying:

"Bressed Jesus, guv dis dear chile a new heart, 'cause she wants it,

and you wants her to hab it. Make it pure and full of lub. You can do

it, dear Jesus. You knows you can. Now, jes please do it.

_Amen_."

Zell's responsive "Amen" was like a note from an AEolian harp.

"Hannibal," said she, looking wistfully at him, "I think I feel

better. I think I feel it growing white."

"Now jes look here, Miss Zell," said he, giving her a bit of pastoral

counsel before going back to his work, "don't you keep lookin' at your

heart, and seein' how it feels, or you'll get discouraged. See dis

rose agin? It don't look at itself. It jes looks up at de sun. So you

look straight at Jesus, and your heart grow whiter ebery day."

And Hannibal and the flower did gradually lead poor Zell to Him who

"taketh away the sins of the world," and He said to her as to one of

old, "Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace."

On the evening of the 14th of June, Edith had more than enough to pay

the interest due on the 15th, and she was most anxious to have it

settled. She was standing at the gate waiting for Hannibal to join her

as escort, when she saw Arden Lacey coming toward her. He had not

looked at her since that dreadful afternoon, and was now about to pass

her without notice, though from his manner she saw he was conscious of

her presence. He looked so worn and changed that her heart yearned

toward him. A sudden thought occurred to her, and she said:

"Mr. Lacey."

He kept right on, and paid no heed to her.

There was a mingling of indignation and pathos in her voice when she

spoke again.

"I appeal to you as a woman, and no matter what I am, if you are a

true man, you will listen."

There was that in her tone and manner that reminded him of the dark

rainy night when they first met.

He turned instantly, but he approached her with a cold, silent bow.

"I must go to the village to-night. I wish your protection," she said,

in a voice she tried vainly to render steady.

He again bowed silently, and they walked to the village together

without a word. Hannibal came out in time to see them disappear down

the road, one on one side of it, and one on the other.

"Well now, dey's both quar," he said, scratching his white head with

perplexity, "but one ting is mighty sartin, I'se glad my ole jints is

saved dat tramp."

Edith stopped at the door of Mr. Crowl's office, and Arden, for the

first time, spoke hastily:

"I can't go in there."

"I hope you are not afraid," said Edith, in a tone that made him step

forward quick enough.

Mr. Crowl looked as if he could not believe his eyes, but Edith gave

him no time to collect his wits, but by the following little speech

quite overwhelmed both him and Arden, though with different emotions.

"There, sir, is the interest due on the mortgage. There is a slight

explanation due you and also this gentleman here, who _was_ my friend.

There are four persons in our family dependent on me for support and

shelter. We were all so poor and helpless that it seemed impossible to

maintain ourselves in independence. You make a proposition through my

mother, never to me, that might be called generous if it had not been

coupled with certain threats of prompt foreclosure if not accepted. In

an hour of weakness and for the sake of the others, I said to my

mother, never to you, that if I could not pay the interest and could

not support the family, I would marry you. But I did very wrong, and I

became so unhappy and desperate in view of this partial promise, that

I thought I should lose my reason. But in the hour of my greatest

darkness, when I saw no way out of our difficulties, I was led to see

how wrongly I had acted, and to resolve that under no possible

circumstances would I marry you, nor any man to whom I could not give

a true wife's love. Since that time I have been able honestly to earn

the money there; and in a few days more I will pay you the fifty

dollars that my mother borrowed of you. So please give me my receipt."

"And remember henceforth," said Arden, sternly, "that this lady has a

protector."

Simon was sharp enough to see that he was beaten, so he signed the

receipt and gave it to Edith without a word. They left his office and

started homeward. When out of the village Arden said timidly:

"Can you forgive me, Miss Edith?"

"Can you forgive me?" answered she, even more humbly.

They stopped in the road and grasped each other's hands with a warmth

more expressive than all words. Then they went on silently again. At

the gate Edith said timidly:

"Won't you come in?"

"I dare not, Miss Allen," said Arden, gravely, and with a dash of

bitterness in his voice "I am a man of honor with all my faults, and I

would keep the promise I made you in the letter I wrote one year ago.

I must see very little of you," he continued, in a very heartsick

tone, "but let me serve you just the same."

Edith's face seemed to possess more than human loveliness as it grew

tender and gentle in the radiance of the full moon, and he looked at

it with the hunger of a famished heart.

"But you made the promise to me, did you not?" she asked in a low

tone.

"Certainly," said Arden.

"Then it seems to me that I have the right to absolve you from the

promise," she continued in a still lower tone, and a face like a

damask-rose in moonlight.

"Miss Allen--Edith--" said Arden, "oh, for Heaven's sake, be kind.

Don't trifle with me."

Edith had restrained her feelings so long that she was ready to either

laugh or cry, so with a peal of laughter, that rang out like a chime

of silver bells, she said:

"Like the fat abbot in the story, I give you full absolution and

plenary indulgence."

He seized her hand and carried it to his lips: "Edith," he pleaded, in

a low, tremulous voice, "will you let me be your slave?"

"Not a bit of it," said she, sturdily. She added, looking shyly up at

him, "What should I do with a slave?"

Arden was about to kneel at her feet, but she said:

"Nonsense! If you must get on your knees, come and kneel to my

strawberry-bed--you ought to thank that, I can tell you." And so the

matter-of-fact girl, who could not abide sentiment, got through a

scene that she greatly dreaded.

They could see the berries reddening among the green leaves, and the

night wind blowing across them was like a gale from Araby the Blest.

"Were it not for this strawberry-bed you would not have obtained

absolution to-night. But, Arden," she added, seriously, "here is your

way out of trouble, as well as mine. We are near good markets. Give up

your poor, slipshod farming (I'm plain, you see) and raise fruit. I

will supply you with vines. We will go into partnership. You show what

a man can do, and I will show what a girl can do."

He took her hand and looked at her so fondly that she hid her face on

his shoulder. He stroked her head and said, in a half-mirthful tone:

"Ah, Edie, Edie, woman once got man out of a garden, but you, I

perceive, are destined to lead me into one; and any garden where you

are will be Eden to me."

She looked up, with her face suddenly becoming grave and wistful, and

said:

"Arden, God will walk in my garden in the cool of the day. You won't

hide from Him, will you?"

"No," he answered, earnestly. "I now feel sure that, through my faith

in you, I shall learn to have faith in Him."

CHAPTER XXXVI

LAST WORDS

Edith did sustain the family on the products of her little place. And,

more than that, the yield from her vines and orchard was so abundant

that she aided Arden to meet the interest of the mortgage on the Lacey

place, so that Mr. Crowl could not foreclose that autumn, as he

intended. She so woke her dreamy lover up that he soon became a keen,

masterful man of business, and, at her suggestion, at once commenced

the culture of small fruits, she giving him a good start from her own

place.

Rose took the situation of nurse with Judge Clifford's married

daughter, having the care of two little children. She thus secured a

pleasant, sheltered home, where she was treated with great kindness.

Instead of running in debt, as in New York, she was able to save the

greater part of her wages, and in two years had enough ahead to take

time to learn the dressmakers' trade thoroughly, for which she had a

taste. But a sensible young mechanic, who had long been attentive, at

last persuaded her to make him a happy home.

Mrs. Lacey's prayers were effectual in the case of her husband, for,

to the astonishment of the whole neighborhood, he reformed. Laura

remained a pale home-blossom, sheltered by Edith's love.

With the blossoms she loved, Zell faded away in the autumn, but her

death was like that of the flowers, in the full hope of the glad

springtime of a new life. As her eyes closed and she breathed her last

sigh out on Edith's bosom, old Hannibal sobbed--

"She's--a white rose--now--sure 'nuff."

Arden and Edith were married the following year, on the 14th of June,

the anniversary of their engagement. Edith greatly shocked Mrs. Allen

by having the ceremony performed in the garden.

"Why not?" she said. "God once married a couple there."

Mrs. Groody, Mr. and Mrs. McTrump, Mrs. Ranger, Mrs. Hart and her

daughters, and quite a number of other friends were present.

Hannibal stood by the white rosebush, that was again in bloom, and

tears of joy, mingling with those of sorrow, bedewed the sweet

flowers.

And Malcom stood up, after the ceremony, and said, with a certain

dignity that for a moment hushed and impressed all present:

"Tho' I'm a little mon, I sometimes ha' great tho'ts, an' I have

learned to ken fra my gudewife there, an' this sweet blossom o' the

Lord's, that woman can bring a' the wourld to God if she will. That's

what she can do."

THE END