A GREAT DISCOVERY.
"Only two more nights till Christmas eve, two more nights, two more
nights," sang Joyce to Jules in a sort of chant. She was sitting beside
his bed with a box in her lap, full of little dolls, which she was
dressing. Every day since his accident she had been allowed to make him
two visits,--one in the morning, and one in the afternoon. They helped
wonderfully in shortening the long, tedious days for Jules. True, Madame
Gréville came often with broths and jellies, Cousin Kate made flying
visits to leave rare hothouse grapes and big bunches of violets;
Clotilde hung over him with motherly tenderness, and his uncle looked
into the room many times a day to see that he wanted nothing.
Jules's famished little heart drank in all this unusual kindness and
attention as greedily as the parched earth drinks in the rain. Still,
he would have passed many a long, restless hour, had it not been for
Joyce's visits.
She brought over a photograph of the house at home, with the family
seated in a group on the front porch. Jules held it close while she
introduced each one of them. By the time he had heard all about
Holland's getting lost the day the circus came to town, and Jack's
taking the prize in a skating contest, and Mary's setting her apron on
fire, and the baby's sweet little ways when he said his prayers, or
played peek-a-boo, he felt very well acquainted with the entire Ware
family. Afterward, when Joyce had gone, he felt his loneliness more than
ever. He lay there, trying to imagine how it must feel to have a mother
and sisters and brothers all as fond of each other as Joyce's were, and
to live in the midst of such good times as always went on in the little
brown house.
Monsieur Ciseaux, sitting by his fire with the door open between the two
rooms, listened to Joyce's merry chatter with almost as much interest as
Jules. He would have been ashamed to admit how eagerly he listened for
her step on the stairs every day, or what longings wakened in his
lonely old heart, when he sat by his loveless fireside after she had
gone home, and there was no more sound of children's voices in the
next room.
There had been good times in the old Ciseaux house also, once, and two
little brothers and a sister had played in that very room; but they had
grown up long ago, and the ogre of selfishness and misunderstanding had
stolen in and killed all their happiness. Ah, well, there was much that
the world would never know about that misunderstanding. There was much
to forgive and forget on both sides.
Joyce had a different story for each visit. To-day she had just finished
telling Jules the fairy tale of which he never tired, the tale of the
giant scissors.
"I never look at those scissors over the gate without thinking of you,"
said Jules, "and the night when you played that I was the Prince, and
you came to rescue me."
"I wish I could play scissors again, and rescue somebody else that I
know," answered Joyce. "I'd take poor old Number Thirty-one away from
the home of the Little Sisters of the Poor."
"What's Number Thirty-one?" asked Jules. "You never told me about that."
"Didn't I?" asked Joyce, in surprise. "She is a lonely old woman that
the sisters take care of. I have talked about her so often, and written
home so much, that I thought I had told everybody. I can hardly keep
from crying whenever I think of her. Marie and I stop every day we go
into town and take her flowers. I have been there four times since my
first visit with madame. Sometimes she tells me things that happened
when she was a little girl here in France, but she talks to me oftenest
in English about the time when she lived in America. I can hardly
imagine that she was ever as young as I am, and that she romped with her
brothers as I did with Jack."
"Tell some of the things that she told you," urged Jules; so Joyce began
repeating all that she knew about Number Thirty-one.
It was a pathetic little tale that brought tears to Jules's eyes, and a
dull pain to the heart of the old man who listened in the next room. "I
wish I were rich," exclaimed Joyce, impulsively, as she finished. "I
wish I had a beautiful big home, and I would adopt her for my
grandmother. She should have a great lovely room, where the sun shines
in all day long, and it should be furnished in rose-color like the one
that she had when she was a girl. I'd dress her in gray satin and soft
white lace. She has the prettiest silvery hair, and beautiful dark eyes.
She would make a lovely grandmother. And I would have a maid to wait on
her, and there'd be mignonette always growing in boxes on the
window-sill. Every time I came back from town, I'd bring her a present
just for a nice little surprise; and I'd read to her, and sing to her,
and make her feel that she belonged to somebody, so that she'd be happy
all the rest of her days.
"Yesterday while I was there she was holding a little cut glass
vinaigrette. It had a big D engraved on the silver top. She said that it
was the only thing that she had left except her wedding ring, and that
it was to be Sister Denisa's when she was gone. The D stands for both
their names. Hers is Désiré. She said the vinaigrette was too precious
to part with as long as she lives, because her oldest brother gave it
to her on her twelfth birthday, when she was exactly as old as I am.
Isn't Désiré a pretty name?"
"Mademoiselle," called Monsieur Ciseaux from the next room,
"mademoiselle, will you come--will you tell me--what name was that?
Désiré, did you say?"
There was something so strange in the way he called that name Désiré,
almost like a cry, that Joyce sprang up, startled, and ran into the next
room. She had never ventured inside before.
"Tell me again what you were telling Jules," said the old man.
"Seventy-three years, did you say? And how long has she been back
in France?"
Joyce began to answer his rapid questions, but stopped with a frightened
cry as her glance fell on a large portrait hanging over the mantel.
"There she is!" she cried, excitedly dancing up and down as she pointed
to the portrait. "There she is! That's Number Thirty-one, her very
own self."
"You are mistaken!" cried the old man, attempting to rise from his
chair, but trembling so that he could scarcely pull himself up on his
feet. "That is a picture of my mother, and Désiré is dead; long dead."
[Illustration: "'THAT'S NUMBER THIRTY-ONE.'"]
"But it is _exactly_ like Number Thirty-one,--I mean Madame Désiré,"
persisted Joyce.
Monsieur looked at her wildly from under his shaggy brows, and then,
turning away, began to pace up and down the room. "I had a sister once,"
he began. "She would have been seventy-three this month, and her name
was Désiré."
Joyce stood motionless in the middle of the room, wondering what was
coming next. Suddenly turning with a violence that made her start, he
cried, "No, I never can forgive! She has been dead to me nearly a
lifetime. Why did you tell me this, child? Out of my sight! What is it
to me if she is homeless and alone? Go! Go!"
He waved his hands so wildly in motioning her away, that Joyce ran out
of the room and banged the door behind her.
"What do you suppose is the matter with him?" asked Jules, in a
frightened whisper, as they listened to his heavy tread, back and forth,
back and forth, in the next room.
Joyce shook her head. "I don't know for sure," she answered,
hesitatingly, "but I believe that he is going crazy."
Jules's eyes opened so wide that Joyce wished she had not frightened
him. "Oh, you know that I didn't mean it," she said, reassuringly. The
heavy tread stopped, and the children looked at each other.
"What can he be doing now?" Jules asked, anxiously.
Joyce tiptoed across the room, and peeped through the keyhole. "He is
sitting down now, by the table, with his head on his arms. He looks as
if he might be crying about something."
"I wish he didn't feel bad," said Jules, with a swift rush of pity. "He
has been so good to me ever since he sent Brossard away. Sometimes I
think that he must feel as much alone in the world as I do, because all
his family are dead, too. Before I broke my leg I was making him a
little Christmas tree, so that he need not feel left out when we had the
big one. I was getting mistletoe for it when I fell. I can't finish it
now, but there's five pieces of candle on it, and I'll get Clotilde to
light them while the fête is going on, so that I'll not miss the big
tree so much. Oh, nobody knows how much I want to go to that fête!
Sometimes it seems more than I can bear to have to stay away."
"Where is your tree?" asked Joyce. "May I see it?"
Jules pointed to the closet. "It's in there," he said, proudly. "I
trimmed it with pieces that Marie swept up to burn. Oh, shut the door!
Quick!" he cried, excitedly, as a step was heard in the hall. "I don't
want anybody to see it before the time comes."
The step was Henri's. He had come to say that Marie was waiting to take
mademoiselle home. Joyce was glad of the interruption. She could not say
anything in praise of the poor little tree, and she knew that Jules
expected her to. She felt relieved that Henri's presence made it
impossible for her to express any opinion.
She bade Jules good-by gaily, but went home with such a sober little
face that Cousin Kate began to question her about her visit. Madame,
sitting by the window with her embroidery-frame, heard the account also.
Several times she looked significantly across at Cousin Kate, over the
child's head.
"Joyce," said Cousin Kate, "you have had so little outdoor exercise
since Jules's accident that it would be a good thing for you to run
around in the garden awhile before dark."
Joyce had not seen madame's glances, but she felt vaguely that Cousin
Kate was making an excuse to get rid of her. She was disappointed, for
she thought that her account of monsieur's queer actions and Jules's
little tree would have made a greater impression on her audience. She
went out obediently, walking up and down the paths with her hands in her
jacket pockets, and her red tam-o'shanter pulled down over her eyes. The
big white cat followed her, ran on ahead, and then stopped, arching its
back as if waiting for her to stroke it. Taking no notice of it, Joyce
turned aside to the pear-tree and climbed up among the highest branches.
The cat rubbed against the tree, mewing and purring by turns, then
sprang up in the tree after her. She took the warm, furry creature in
her arms and began talking to it.
"Oh, Solomon," she said, "what do you suppose is the matter over there?
My poor old lady must be monsieur's sister, or she couldn't have looked
exactly like that picture, and he would not have acted so queerly. What
do you suppose it is that he can never forgive? Why did he call me in
there and then drive me out in such a crazy way, and tramp around the
room, and put his head down on his arms as if he were crying?"
Solomon purred louder and closed his eyes.
"Oh, you dear, comfortable old thing," exclaimed Joyce, giving the cat a
shake. "Wake up and take some interest in what I am saying. I wish you
were as smart as Puss in Boots; then maybe you could find out what is
the matter. How I wish fairy tales could be true! I'd say 'Giant
scissors, right the wrong and open the gate that's been shut so long,'
There! Did you hear that, Solomon Gréville? I said a rhyme right off
without waiting to make it up. Then the scissors would leap down and
cut the misunderstanding or trouble or whatever it is, and the gate
would fly open, and there the brother and sister would meet each other.
All the unhappy years would be forgotten, and they'd take each other by
the hand, just as they did when they were little children, Martin and
Désiré, and go into the old home together,--on Christmas Day, in
the morning."
Joyce was half singing her words now, as she rocked the cat back and
forth in her arms. "And then the scissors would bring Jules a
magnificent big tree, and he'd never be afraid of his uncle any more.
Oh, they'd all have such a happy time on Christmas Day, in the morning!"
Joyce had fully expected to be homesick all during the holidays; but now
she was so absorbed in other people's troubles, and her day-dreams to
make everybody happy, that she forgot all about herself. She fairly
bubbled over with the peace and good-will of the approaching
Christmas-tide, and rocked the cat back and forth in the pear-tree to
the tune of a happy old-time carol.
A star or two twinkled out through the gloaming, and, looking up beyond
them through the infinite stretches of space, Joyce thought of a verse
that she and Jack had once learned together, one rainy Sunday at her
Grandmother Ware's, sitting on a little stool at the old lady's feet:
"Behold thou hast made the heaven and the earth by thy great power and
outstretched arm, and _there is nothing too hard for thee._" Her heart
gave a bound at the thought. Why should she be sitting there longing for
fairy tales to be true, when the great Hand that had set the stars to
swinging could bring anything to pass; could even open that long-closed
gate and bring the brother and sister together again, and send happiness
to little Jules?
Joyce lifted her eyes again and looked up, out past the stars. "Oh, if
you please, God," she whispered, "for the little Christ-child's sake."
When Joyce went back to the house, Cousin Kate sat in the drawing-room
alone. Madame had gone over to see Jules, and did not return until long
after dark. Berthé had been in three times to ask monsieur if dinner
should be served, before they heard her ring at the gate. When she
finally came, there was such an air of mystery about her that Joyce was
puzzled. All that next morning, too, the day before Christmas, it seemed
to Joyce as if something unusual were afloat. Everybody in the house was
acting strangely.
Madame and Cousin Kate did not come home to lunch. She had been told
that she must not go to see Jules until afternoon, and the doors of the
room where the Christmas tree was kept had all been carefully locked.
She thought that the morning never would pass. It was nearly three
o'clock when she started over to see Jules. To her great surprise, as
she ran lightly up the stairs to his room, she saw her Cousin Kate
hurrying across the upper hall, with a pile of rose-colored silk
curtains in her arms.
Jules tried to raise himself up in bed as Joyce entered, forgetting all
about his broken leg in his eagerness to tell the news. "Oh, what do you
think!" he cried. "They said that I might be the one to tell you. She
_is_ Uncle Martin's sister, the old woman you told about yesterday, and
he is going to bring her home to-morrow."
Joyce sank into a chair with a little gasp at the suddenness of his
news. She had not expected this beautiful ending of her day-dreams to be
brought about so soon, although she had hoped that it would be sometime.
"How did it all happen?" she cried, with a beaming face. "Tell me about
it! Quick!"
"Yesterday afternoon madame came over soon after you left. She gave me
my wine jelly, and then went into Uncle Martin's room, and talked and
talked for the longest time. After she had gone he did not eat any
dinner, and I think that he must have sat up all night, for I heard him
walking around every time that I waked up. Very early this morning,
madame came back again, and M. Gréville was with her. They drove with
Uncle Martin to the Little Sisters of the Poor. I don't know what
happened out there, only that Aunt Désiré is to be brought home
to-morrow.
"Your Cousin Kate was with them when they came back, and they had
brought all sorts of things with them from Tours. She is in there now,
making Aunt Désiré's room look like it did when she was a girl."
"Oh, isn't it lovely!" exclaimed Joyce. "It is better than all the
fairy tales that I have ever read or heard,--almost too good to be
true!" Just then Cousin Kate called her, and she ran across the hall.
Standing in the doorway, she looked all around the freshly furnished
room, that glowed with the same soft, warm pink that colors the heart
of a shell.
"How beautiful!" cried Joyce, glancing from the rose on the
dressing-table to the soft curtains of the windows, which all opened
towards the morning sun. "What a change it will be from that big bare
dormitory with its rows of narrow little cots." She tiptoed around the
room, admiring everything, and smiling over the happiness in store for
poor old Number Thirty-one, when she should find herself in the midst of
such loveliness.
Joyce's cup of pleasure was so full, that it brimmed over when they
turned to leave the room. Cousin Kate slipped an arm around her, and
kissed her softly on the forehead.
"You dear little fairy tale lover," she said. "Do you know that it is
because of you that this desert has blossomed? If you had never made all
those visits to the Little Sisters of the Poor, and had never won old
Madame Désiré's love and confidence by your sympathy, if you had never
told Jules the story of the giant scissors, and wished so loud that you
could fly to her rescue, old monsieur would never have known that his
sister is living. Even then, I doubt if he would have taken this step,
and brought her back home to live, if your stories of your mother and
the children had not brought his own childhood back to him. He said that
he used to sit there hour after hour, and hear you talk of your life at
home, until some of its warmth and love crept into his own frozen old
heart, and thawed out its selfishness and pride."
Joyce lifted her radiant face, and looked towards the half opened
window, as she caught the sound of chimes. Across the Loire came the
deep-toned voice of a cathedral bell, ringing for vespers.
"Listen!" she cried. "Peace on earth,--good-will--oh, Cousin Kate! It
really does seem to say it! My Christmas has begun the day before."