One fair morning, a good many years ago, a number of schoolgirls were
waiting at a little wayside station on the banks of the Connecticut
River. They had crossed the river in a ferry-boat and were waiting for
more of their number who were coming after them.
They were waiting patiently enough. It was a good place in which to
wait, for the scene around them was very lovely. They were standing at
the foot of Mount Tom, glorious in the morning sunshine, and looking
over on the shadows which still lingered on the face of Mount Holyoke.
From the far north flows the Connecticut River broadening on its way, as
Green Mountain and White send down on either hand, from melting
snow-drifts and hidden springs, their tribute to its waters. Through
forests and broken hill country, through meadows, sometimes broad and
sometimes narrow, past town and village and lonely farmhouse, it flows
before it makes a bend to pass between Mounts Tom and Holyoke, but in
all its course it flows through no fairer landscape than that which
spreads itself around the base of these two historic mountains.
Over all the land lay the promise of spring in the glory of cloudless
sunshine. Only the promise as yet. The mountains were still bare and
brown, with patches of snow lingering in hollow and crevice; and the
great elms that were everywhere--in the village streets, along the roads
that wound between the hills, and around the white farmhouses--showed no
tinge of green as yet, but their brown buds were ready and waiting to
burst; the meadows were growing green and the catkins were large and
full on the willows by the brooks that hastened through them to the
river. There was a soft tinge, half green, half golden, on earlier
trees growing in sheltered places; and the promise of the spring was
everywhere--more joyfully welcomed after a long winter than spring in
the full glory of leaf and blossom.
They were thinking and speaking of other things--these waiting
schoolgirls. Some of them walked about, softly speaking last words to
each other, and some of them were watching the coming of the boat over
the swollen waters of the river. But the beauty around them, the
sweetness of the spring morning, the restful quiet on mountain and
valley, were present with them all.
"Nellie Austin," said a voice from the group that watched the boat, "do
you see? Your `Faithful' is coming after all."
"My Faithful!"--and a young girl sprang forward as the boat touched the
bank.
A slender girl, very plainly dressed, stepped out first--a girl with
grave dark eyes and a firm mouth, which yet trembled a little as she
answered her companion's greeting.
"Faithful! my Faithful! you are coming home with me after all?"
"No, dear; I am going home to my Eunice. I thought I had better."
"Have you heard again? Is she not well?"
"I have not heard again; but she is not very well, I am afraid. I must
go and see."
"But you will come back again? You will never, never think of not
coming back!"
"Oh, yes, I hope so! I think so--unless she is really sick."
"Oh, she is not so very sick, or you would have heard! What should I
ever do without you? Now you must sit with me as far as I go. Here are
the cars!"
There was no time to lose. The "cars" had come which were to carry the
schoolgirls home for a fortnight's rest and holiday. From the windows a
good many people looked out with interest on the group of girls, and one
said to his friend--
"They are from the seminary over the river yonder. We saw it as we came
on."
"Schoolgirls? No; they don't look like schoolgirls. The greater part
of them must be out of their teens, I should say."
"Possibly, but all the same they are schoolgirls, though there may be a
teacher or two among them."
"Well, friend, after all that you have been telling me about your
wonderful common school system, I should have supposed that the
education of these sedate young persons might have been finished before
the age of twenty."
"Oh, I have no doubt that these young persons have had the benefit of
common school and high school too, before they aspired to a place in the
seminary over yonder; and the chances are that some of them since then
have earned, either with hands or head, the means to carry them further
on; and for these there can be no better place than the plain brick
seminary on the other side of the river!"
"Well," said his friend, "I can only repeat what I have said to you more
than once already--you are a curious people in some ways--with your boys
who are men, and your prim grave-faced young women who are schoolgirls.
I should like to put a question or two to some of them, if I might."
His friend shook his head.
"You may have a chance to do so before you leave the country, but not
to-day, I think. You have no grown-up schoolgirls in _Old_ England?
Out of _New_ England I don't suppose we have so very many even in this
country; and there are probably more in the seminary over there than in
schools generally among us. It was built by special means for a special
purpose. A woman built it--a woman who never owned a dollar that she
had not first earned--a great and good woman. She gave herself, body,
soul, and spirit, to the work of helping her countrywomen--her sisters,
she called them all--who were hungering and thirsting, as she herself in
her youth had hungered and thirsted, for knowledge."
"With a view to making learned ladies of them all?"
"Learned ladies? Well, yes, perhaps--as a means to an end. You may
think it strange, as others have thought; but this woman really believed
His word who said, `Ye are not your own. Ye are bought with a price.'
`None of us liveth to himself.'"
"In a way, we all believe them, I suppose."
"Yes, in a way. Well, she believed them in another way. She believed
them and lived them all her life long. Learned ladies! Yes; but the
keynote of all her teaching was this: `Not your own, but His who bought
you. His for service or for suffering, for watching or warfare, for
life or death.'"
"Well?" said his friend, as the speaker paused.
"Well, she is dead, and `her works do follow her.'"
There was no time for more. The train stopped, and several of the
"schoolgirls" rose to leave. The travellers heard one "Good-bye"
spoken.
"Oh, if you would come with me even yet, dear Faithful!"
"Another time I hope to go with you; but not this time."
"Well, good-bye, my Faithful, good-bye. No, I am not going to cry, but
I _will_ kiss you, whatever any one may think about it."
And then the speaker was gone. No one saw her companion's face for some
time after that. Nor did she see the receding mountains on which she
seemed to be gazing. Her eyes were dim with tears which must not be
allowed to fall.
"Fidelia Marsh," said her companion at last, "what are you thinking
about? Not little Nellie Austin all this time, surely?"
The young girl turned round. "I was trying to think how it would seem
if I were never to see her or any of you all again;" and then she turned
her face to the window, and sat silent till her turn had come to say
"Good-bye."
"Yes, this is my stopping-place."
She smiled and nodded to those who were not within reach of her hand,
and seemed to be cheerful enough in her good-bye, but she did not linger
near the window when she reached the platform, as Nellie Austin and her
friend had done.
It was a dreary little station, standing at the foot of a broken stony
slope, with only one unfurnished house in sight. One lank official
moved about at his leisure, and one embryo trader hastened to display
his boxes of lozenges, and his basket of unwholesome peanuts and last
year's apples. There were doubtless prosperous villages along the wide
road that crossed the railway, and pleasant farmhouses amid the high
pastures and moist meadow lands hid away among the hills beyond; but the
dingy house and the dull little station were all that could be seen from
the windows of the cars, and Fidelia's companions said to one another
that the place looked forlorn.
"And poor dear Fidelia! Does she not look forlorn as well?"
They had time to watch her as she went to claim her trunk, and they saw
her shake hands with the leisurely official, who was evidently an
acquaintance. But when she turned at last to the window she did not
look "forlorn." A beautiful face looked up from under a big bonnet--a
rarely beautiful face, delicate yet strong. There were slight hollows
and a darkened shade beneath the lovely grey eyes set wide apart under a
low broad forehead, and the pale rose-tint on her cheeks might have been
deeper with advantage. The look of delicacy was due to the hard work
she had been doing, but the strength was real, and she would last
through harder work than ever she was likely to have at school.
Forlorn? No. Her face was radiant! The solemn-looking station-master
had wrought the change.
"Well, Fidelia, you've got home, haven't you? Folks don't expect you,
do they?"
"I didn't write that I was coming. I was not sure till the last minute.
Are they all well about here?"
"Yes, I guess so. Eunice is well, any way. She was to meeting Sunday;
and seems to me Lucinda said she was at the sewing-circle at the
doctor's the other day. She'll be glad to see _you_, sick or well."
"I'm glad and thankful that she is well," said Fidelia softly. "I must
say good-bye to the girls."
She turned quickly towards the faces at the windows.
"Have you heard good news, Fidelia?" called some one.
There was no time for words, but the joy on the girl's upturned face was
better than any last words could have been, even though her lips
trembled and her eyes were dim with tears.
And then the train swept on among the hills, and she who had been called
"Faithful" turned her face toward her home, to get the first glimpse of
the work which awaited her there. Not the work which she had been
planning for herself during the last year, but her work all the same--
the work which God had appointed her to do.
Declining the station-master's invitation to "go in and see Lucinda and
wait for a chance to ride home," she went on her way with a cheerful
heart. She followed the wide road, leading westward, only a little way.
Then she went in at an open gate, and across a stony pasture, till she
came to a narrow road leading at first through a thicket of spruce and
cedar, where it was necessary carefully to pick her steps over the wet
moss and stones, and over the network of brown roots which the spring
freshets had laid bare. After a while the road began to ascend, and
then the cedars and spruces were left behind, and birch and poplar and
dogwood, but chiefly great maple trees, with branches high above all the
rest, covered the hillside. It was up hill and down again all the way
after that till the journey was done.
But she did not mind the hills or the roughness of the way. The fresh
air and the free movement were delightful to her in her new freedom, and
everything about her seemed beautiful. She caught sight of many a green
thing growing among the dead leaves; and more than once she paused and
stopped as if she would have liked to pick them. But her hands were
full, and the nearer she drew to her home the more eager she grew to
reach it. "I'll come again," she murmured. "Oh, I am so glad that
Eunice is well!"
She reached the top of a hill steeper and higher than the rest, at a
point from which could be seen a few miles of the railway, passing along
the valley. Her thoughts came back to her companions, and she sighed,
and all at once began to feel tired; and then she sat down to rest, and,
as she rested, she took a book from the bag which she had been carrying
in her hand.
"I am so glad that Eunice is well," she said to herself as she turned
over the leaves. "She was at meeting, he said, and at the
sewing-circle. Well, I am glad I came home all the same. And I can do
something at `The Evidences' while I am here."
She glanced on a page or two, and in her interest in them she might have
forgotten her haste, and lingered, had not the sound of approaching
wheels disturbed the silence a little. She rose in time to see the
leisurely approach of an old grey horse and an old-fashioned
weather-stained chaise. They were familiar objects to her, and some of
the pleasantest associations of her life were connected with them; but
her heart beat hard and her face grew pale as she watched their slow
approach.
"Dr Everett," said she, "are you going to see Eunice?"
"Is it you, Fidelia? Are you just come home? No, I am not going to see
Eunice. Is she not well? She'll be glad to see _you_, sick or well,"
added the doctor, as her other friend had done.
He was out of the chaise by this time, and offering his hand to help her
over the crooked fence. But, instead of taking it, she gave one glance
in the kind good face, and laid her own down on the rough bark of the
cedar rail and burst out crying.
"It was full time for you to come home, I think, if that is the best
greeting you have to give your friends. You've been overdoing, and have
got nervous, I guess," said the doctor, moving aside first one rail and
then another from the fence, to make it easier for her to get over.
"Oh, no, Dr Everett, it is not that! Nervous indeed! I don't know
what it means. Only I'm so glad to get home, and--so glad that Eunice
is well--"
If she had said another word she must have cried again.
"Well, never mind. Get into the chaise, and I'll drive you home; and
then I'll see about Eunice and you too."
It was ridiculous, Fidelia told herself. It had never happened in all
her life before. But it was more than she could do for awhile to
command her voice or stop her tears. The doctor made himself busy with
the harness for a little, and, having left his whip behind him, he cut a
switch from a hickory-tree beside the road; and by the time he was ready
to get into the chaise Fidelia was herself again.
"Have you been having a good time?" asked the doctor presently.
"Yes, indeed! I have enjoyed every minute of it. And I have been
perfectly well, Dr Everett. I have never lost one recitation."
"I suppose you have been at the head of the class and have got the
medal."
Fidelia laughed. "I'm not the best scholar by a good many. But I have
got on pretty well."
"Well, you have got up a step, I hear."
"I have been taking some of the studies of the second year. My Latin
helped me on, and--other things. And--I mean to graduate next year."
"Do in two years what other girls are expected to do in three or four,
and injure your health for life doing it? That would be a poor kind of
wisdom, little girl."
"Oh, I haven't been doing too much, and I don't mean to! But you know,
two years means more to Eunice and me than it does to most people. Oh,
it will be all easy enough! I was well prepared. You see Eunice knew
just what was needed."
"Yes, and Eunice is a good teacher."
"Isn't she?" said Fidelia eagerly. "I haven't seen one yet to compare
with her. Oh, if Eunice had only had my chance!"
"Softly, little girl! Your chance, indeed! Dear Eunice is far beyond
all that sort of thing. She has had better teaching."
"Yes; but Eunice would have liked it. You know she was at the seminary
one of its first years. And she would have gone on. She told me the
last night I was at home that it was years before she could quite give
up the hope of going there again. And I don't see why she shouldn't.
She is not thirty-two years old yet; and it was not just for young girls
that the seminary was built; and--"
"My dear, Eunice has got past the need of all that. It would be like
sending you and Susie back again to the old red schoolhouse, to send
Eunice there."
The doctor had cut his hickory stick, but he had not used it, and old
Grey had been moving on but slowly. There was still a long hill to
climb before they reached the spot where Fidelia could catch a first
glimpse of home. Old Grey moved slowly still, but neither of them spoke
another word till he stood still at the door.
It was a low wooden house, which had once been painted brown; but the
weather-stains on the walls, and the green moss and the lichens on the
roof, made its only colouring now. It had wide eaves, and many
small-paned windows, and a broad porch before the door. A wild vine
covered the porch and one of the windows, and the buds were beginning to
show green upon it. The house stood in a large garden, which might be a
pretty garden in the summer-time, but nothing had been done to it yet.
The sunshine was on it, however, and it was beautiful in Fidelia's eyes.
She had lived in this old brown house more than half of the eighteen
years of her life; she had been faithfully cared for and dearly loved;
and there were tears in her eyes, though her face was bright, as she
went in at the door.
"You are coming in, Dr Everett?" said she.
"Yes, I am coming in. Do you suppose Eunice has a glass of buttermilk
for me this morning?"
"If she has not, she has got cream for you, I am quite sure," said she,
laughing.
Then they went in, and, finding no one, they went through the house to
the garden beyond, where a woman with a large white sun-bonnet on her
head was stooping over some budding thing at her feet. She raised
herself up in a little, and came towards them, closely examining
something which she held in her hand. So she did not see them till she
came near the door where they stood. As she glanced up and saw them a
shadow seemed to pass over her face. The doctor saw it; but Fidelia
only saw the smile that chased it away.
"My little girl!" said Eunice softly.
Fidelia hid her face on her sister's shoulder, and no word was spoken
for a minute or two. Then they went into the house, and Fidelia said,
with a little laugh,--
"I got homesick at the last minute, dear, and so I came home."
"All right, dear. If you could spare the time, it was right to come. I
am very glad."
The doctor got his buttermilk and cream as well, but he sat still,
seeming in no hurry to go away. He listened, and put in a word now and
then, but listened chiefly. He lost no tone or movement of either; and
when Fidelia went, at her sister's bidding, to take off her bonnet and
shawl, he rose and took the elder sister's hand, putting his finger on
her pulse.
"Are you as well as usual these days, Eunice?" said he.
For an instant she seemed to shrink away from him, and would not meet
his eye. Then she said, speaking very slowly and gently,--
"I cannot say that I am quite as well as usual. I meant to see you in a
day or two. Now I will wait a little longer."
"Had you better wait?"
"Yes, I think so. I am not going to spoil Fidelia's pleasure, now that
she is at home for a few days, and I will wait. It won't really make
any difference."
"Eunice," said the doctor gravely, "are you afraid of--anything?"
A sudden wave of colour made her face for the moment beautiful. Tears
came into her eyes, but she smiled as she said,--
"No, not afraid; I hope I should not be afraid even if I should be going
to suffer all that I saw her suffer."
"Eunice, why have you not told me before? It was hardly friendly to be
silent with any such thought in your mind."
"Well, it is as I said. A little sooner or later could make no
difference."
"And because you did not like to make your friends unhappy you ran this
risk."
The doctor was standing with his face to the door at which Fidelia at
the moment entered, and his tone changed.
"Well, to-morrow you must send your little girl down to see my little
girls, unless they should hear of her home-coming, and be up here this
afternoon. No; they shall not come, nor any one else. You shall have
this day to yourselves. And mind one thing--there must be no
school-books about during vacation time. Miss Eunice, I will trust to
you to see to that."
And then he went away.