'TWAS WONDROUS PITIFUL
Othello, i. 3.
Poor Ashe got home more dead than alive. His passion had shaken him
like a delirium. He had been swept away by his emotion, and had thrown
to the winds past and future. He felt as the carriage drove away from
Mrs. Fenton's as if he had been swung up and down on some monstrous
wave and dashed, broken and bleeding, on a rough shore. He could not
think; and fortunately for him he was even too benumbed to feel greatly.
He reached the Hermans' in a sort of half-stupor, in which
indifference, keen joy, and bitter contrition were strangely mingled.
The contrition, however, seemed somehow to belong to the future; it was
what he must endure when the time should come for repentance; the joy
was a present blessing, tingling in his every fibre.
He met Mrs. Herman in the hall. She exclaimed when she saw him, and he
stood smiling at her, swaying as if he were intoxicated.
"What has happened?" she cried. "What have you done to your face?"
The room and his cousin swam before him in a golden mist. He felt that
he was grinning idiotically, yet he could not stop. He tried to speak,
but his lips seemed too swollen to form words. He put out his hand to
grasp a chair, and perceived that he could not reach it.
"I--fall!" he managed to ejaculate.
Mrs. Herman caught him, and supported him to a chair. He felt her arm
around him, and he wondered how he came to be thus embraced. He tried
to grope back into the dusk of his mind to tell what had happened, and
the fiery glow of the moment in which he had kissed the hand of Mrs.
Fenton came back to him. He sat suddenly erect.
"Cousin Helen," he said, with husky fervor, "I have been a wretch, and
I rejoice in it! I have found out how sweet it is to sin! I am lost,
lost, lost!"
He buried his face in his hands, almost hysterical. He felt his
cousin's hand on his shoulder.
"Philip," she said decisively, "you must stop this, and tell me what
has happened."
"I beg your pardon," he answered, dropping his hands. "Mrs. Fenton was
attacked by a drunken man in the North End, and I fought him. I am
afraid that I am pretty disreputable looking."
"Yes, you are. I hope that is the worst of it."
She took him by the arm and led him into the library, where she
established him in an easy-chair by the fire.
"I'll send for a doctor to look you over," she said, "and meanwhile you
are to take what I give you."
She left him, and Philip sat looking into the coals.
"Ah, if the glove had been off!" he murmured half aloud.
He flushed hotly, and struck his clenched hand against his breast,
rubbing it back and forth until the haircloth within stung and smarted.
"No, no," he said to himself fiercely. "I will not think about it!"
Helen came back with a tumbler of something hot and fragrant, which
made his eyes water as he drank. It sent a strange sensation of warmth
through him, and seemed to restore his energy. The doctor, who came in
soon after, found nothing serious the matter. Ashe was temporarily
disfigured, but had luckily escaped without worse injury. He was sent
to bed, and despite his expectation of passing the night in an agony of
remorse, he sank almost immediately into a dreamless sleep.
When Philip awoke his first sensation was that of stiffness and
soreness,--soreness such as he had felt once when he had slept on the
floor with his arms extended in the form of a cross. The thought of
penance performed gave him a thrill of happiness, but to this instantly
succeeded the remembrance of the events of yesterday, and his brief
satisfaction vanished.
His face was discolored, and as he set out after breakfast to seek his
spiritual adviser he felt a grim satisfaction in going abroad thus
marked. It was in the nature of a mortification and a penance. He
repeated prayers as he walked, his eyes cast down, his bosom pricked by
haircloth. He felt that he had already begun the expiation of the sin
of yesterday.
He found Father Frontford at home, but so occupied as to be unable to
listen to him. It would have been impossible for Philip to do as
Maurice had done, and go to a man like Strathmore; and indeed, he had
come to his Father Superior partly because of the sharpness with which
he felt that his offending would be judged. Where Maurice would
question, Philip would submit blindly and with ardent faith.
"Good-morning," the Father greeted Ashe kindly, holding out his left
hand, while the right held suspended the pen which had already produced
a heap of letters. "I am very glad to see you; but you find me
extremely busy. There are so many things to be thought of just now, and
so many letters to be written."
"Yes?" Philip responded absently.
"The election is so near at hand now," the other continued, "that we
cannot leave any stone unturned. I am writing to some of the country
clergy this morning. By the way, I wanted to speak to you about
Montfield."
Philip wondered at himself for the remoteness which the affairs of the
church had for him, so absorbed had he been in his own experiences.
"It seems to me," Father Frontford went on with fresh animation, "that
perhaps you can do something there. Can't you go down and talk with Mr.
Wentworth? He's inclined to support Mr. Strathmore. You should be able
to influence him; you are his spiritual son."
Mr. Wentworth was the rector in Philip's native town, and under him
both Ashe and Wynne had come from Congregationalism into the Church.
"It is possible," Philip said doubtfully. "Mr. Wentworth is, however,
rather inclined to disagree with me nowadays. He is completely carried
away by Mr. Strathmore."
A strange look came into the face of the old priest. He laid down his
pen, and pressed together the tips of his white fingers, thin with
fasting and self-denial.
"Did you not once tell me," he asked, "that Mr. Wentworth has hoped for
years that he might bring your mother also into the fold?"
"Yes."
"And you are her only child?"
"Yes."
Father Frontford cast down his eyes; then raised them to flash a glance
of vivid intelligence upon Ashe. Then again he looked down.
"I think that you had better run down and see your mother," he said.
"It is possible that she may be even now leaning toward the truth; and
in any case you might arouse Mr. Wentworth to fresh activity. It is of
much importance that the country clergy should be pledged not to
support Mr. Strathmore in the convention."
Philip went away confused and baffled. He said to himself that his
feeling was caused solely by his disappointment that he had found no
opportunity to talk with the Father Superior about his own affairs; but
it was impossible for him to put out of his mind the way in which his
mission to Montfield had been spoken of. He was willing to go down and
do what he could to arouse Mr. Wentworth to the gravity of the
situation, but he could neither forget nor endure the hint that he
should make of the hope of his mother's conversion to the church a
bribe. He could not think of this without being moved to blame Father
Frontford; and he set himself to argue his mind into the belief that
there was no harm in the suggestion. He walked along in a reverie as
deep as it was painful, trying to see that the occasion called for the
use of all lawful means, and that it was natural for the Father to
suppose that Mrs. Ashe might be influenced more readily if the rector
yielded to the wishes of her son in voting for Frontford.
"My dear Ashe, what have you been doing to yourself?" a strong voice
asked him.
He came with a start to the consciousness of where he was, and that he
had almost run into the Rev. De Lancy Candish. The thought flashed
through his mind that Father Frontford had been too deeply absorbed in
his plans to notice the bruised face of his deacon.
"How do you do?" he exclaimed impulsively. "Providence has sent you to
me. Can you spare me a little of your time?"
"Certainly," the other answered, with some appearance of surprise. "I'm
on my way home now."
They walked in silence toward the home of Mr. Candish, Ashe trying to
frame some form of words by which he could confess the sin of his heart
without betraying Mrs. Fenton. He wondered if Maurice Wynne could have
helped him, and reflected how they had been in the habit of confiding
everything to one another. Now he shrank from opening his heart to his
friend, and was almost seeking out a confidant in the highways and
hedges.
"You have not told me what sort of an accident you have had," Candish
observed, as he fitted the latch-key into the lock of his door.
"I was attacked by a man in the North End," Philip answered, obeying
the wave of the hand which invited him to enter. "He had insulted Mrs.
Fenton, and"--
"Mrs. Fenton!" echoed Candish.
The tone made Ashe turn quickly. Into his mind flashed the words of
Helen and of Mrs. Wilson connecting the name of Candish with that of
Mrs. Fenton. In his longing for comfort and advice he had seized upon
the rector of the Nativity without remembering that he was the last
person to whom he should come.
"Ah," he said, "it was true!"
Candish did not answer, and they went into the study in silence. The
host sat down in the well-worn chair by his writing-table, while Philip
took a seat facing him.
"What a foolish thing for me to say," Ashe broke out; then surprised at
the querulousness of his tone he stopped abruptly.
"Mr. Ashe," Candish said gravely, "if there is anything I can do for
you will you tell me what it is?"
Philip rose quickly, and took a step towards him, leaning down over the
thin, homely face.
"I have found you out!" he cried with exultation. "I came to confess my
sin to you, and I find that you love her too!"
"Don't be hysterical and melodramatic," was the cool response. "Sit
down, and let us talk rationally if we are to talk at all."
The manner of Candish recalled Philip to himself. He sat down heavily.
"I beg your pardon," he said. "Since that fight I have been half beside
myself. I am like a hysterical girl."
The other regarded him compassionately.
"Mr. Ashe," responded he, "there is no good in my pretending that I
didn't understand what you meant just now. You and I are both given to
the priesthood. If we both love a woman"--
"I love her," burst in Philip, half defiantly, half remorsefully, "and
I have told her so! I have condemned myself"--
"Stop," Candish interrupted. "First you have to think of her."
Philip stared in silence. It came over him how entirely he had been
thinking of himself, and how little he had considered Mrs. Fenton in
his reflections upon the events of the previous evening. Here was a man
who could love her so well as to think of her first and himself last.
"But I have given her up," Philip stammered.
"Was she yours to give up?"
There was nothing bitter or sneering in the words; they were said
simply and dispassionately.
"No," Philip answered, dropping his voice; "she was not mine."
The older man rose and walked to the fire, where he stood looking down
at the flaming coals.
"After all," he said, "we are pretty much in the same plight. I knew
her when her husband brought her here a bride, the loveliest creature
alive. Arthur Fenton was a clever, selfish, wholly irreligious man; and
I could not help seeing how completely he failed to understand or
appreciate his wife. She was kind to me, and when her trouble came she
turned to me for comfort and sympathy. It is my weakness that I love
her; but she will never know it."
"And does she love nobody?" demanded Ashe jealously.
Candish turned upon him a look of rebuke.
"What right have you or I to ask that question?" he retorted sternly.
"I do penance for loving her, and God is my witness how carefully I
have hidden it. It is not for me to question her right to love if she
please."
Philip rose, and went to the other, holding out his hand.
"Mr. Candish," said he earnestly, "you have taught me my lesson. I have
been a weak fool, and worse. I will pray for strength to lay my passion
on the altar and forget it."
The rector took the extended hand, looking into Philip's eyes with a
glance so wistful, so humble, and so tender that the remembrance went
with Ashe long.
"And forget it?" he repeated. "I do not know that I could do that!"
He dropped the hand of Ashe, and shook himself as if he would shake off
the mood which had taken possession of him.
"Come," he declared resolutely, "this will not do. This is not the sort
of mood that makes men. Let me give you a single piece of advice,--I am
older, you know; don't pity yourself, whatever else you do. In the
first place, that would be equivalent to saying that Providence doesn't
know what is best for you; and in the second, it spoils all one's sense
of values."
As Ashe that afternoon journeyed down to Montfield, he recalled all the
details of this interview. The more he considered the more he respected
Candish and the less satisfaction he found in his own conduct. Yet
perhaps the human mind cannot cease self-justification at any point
short of annihilation, and Philip still had in his secret thought a
deep feeling that the church should more absolutely settle the question
of the celibacy of its clergy, so that there might be no more doubts.
He honored the attitude of Candish, and he resolved to imitate it. He
who has never shaken hands with the devil, however, can have little
idea how hard it is to loose his grasp; and Philip groaned at the
thought of how far he was even from wishing to put his love out of its
high place in his heart.
His mind was calmer as he sat that evening talking with his mother.
Mrs. Ashe was a plain, sweet-faced woman, with gray hair brushed
smoothly under her cap of black lace. There was in her pale, faded face
little beauty of feature or coloring; yet the light of her kindly and
delicate spirit shone through. Maurice Wynne had once said that she was
like a sweet-pea,--born with wings, but tethered so that she might not
fly away. Philip, with his exquisite sensitiveness, found an
unspeakable comfort in her presence; a soothing sense of rest and peace
so blissful that it seemed almost wrong. There are even in this worldly
age many women who hide under the covering of uneventful, commonplace
lives existences full of spiritual richness,--women who find in
religion not the mechanical acceptance of form, not a mere superstition
which encrusts an outworn creed, but a vital, uplifting force; a power
which fills their souls with imaginative warmth and fervor. The worth
of an experience is to be estimated by the emotional fire which it
kindles; and to the lives of such women the dull, colorless round of
their daily existence gives no real clue. Theirs is the life of the
spirit, and for them the inner is the only true life. It is when the
sunken eye shines with a glow from deep within; when the thin cheeks
faintly warm with the ghost of a flush and the blue veins swell from
the throbbing of a heart stirred by a spiritual vision, that the
observer gets a hint of the realities of such a life.
Mrs. Ashe was a type of the saintly woman that the spirit of Puritanism
bred in rural New England. Such women are the living embodiment of the
power which has inspired whatever is best in the nation; the power
which has been a living force amid the worldliness, the materialism,
the crudity that have threatened to overwhelm the people of this yet
young land, so prematurely old. In her face was a look of high
unworldliness that marks the mystic, the inheritance from ancestors
bred in a faith impossible without mysticism in the very fibres of the
race. The heroic self-denial, the persistent belief, the noble fidelity
to the ideal which is the salvation of a nation, shine in such a
countenance, and make real the high deeds of a past generation the
narrowness of whose creeds too often blinds us to-day to the greatness
of their character.
She smiled a little on hearing the object of her son's visit.
"I am glad to see you on any terms," she observed, "but I cannot say
that I think your coming very wise."
"But, mother," he urged, "don't you see that it is a matter of so much
importance that we ought not to neglect any chance?"
"My dear boy," questioned she, "do you really think that it is of so
much importance who is bishop?"
"It is of the greatest possible importance," he returned earnestly. "Of
course you don't agree with me as to the importance of forms of
worship, but suppose that it were your own church, and the question
were of having a man put into a place so influential. Wouldn't you be
troubled if one were likely to be chosen who taught what you regarded
as heresy?"
She smiled on him still, but he saw the seriousness in her eyes.
"Yes," she said, "I suppose I should; but doesn't it ever occur to you,
Philip, that we are all too much inclined to feel that everything is
going wrong if Providence doesn't work in our way? We can't help, I
suppose, the habit of regarding our plans as somehow essential to the
proper management of the universe."
He laughed and shook his head.
"You always had a most effective way of taking down my conceit," he
responded. "I don't mean that it is necessary that Father Frontford
shall be bishop because I want him, but"--
"But because you believe in him," his mother interrupted with a little
twinkle in her eye. "Well, we cannot do better than to follow our
convictions, I suppose."
She ended with a sigh, and Philip knew that it was because into her
mind came the sadness she felt at his defection from the faith of his
fathers.
"Yes, you trained me from the cradle to do what I thought right without
considering the consequences."
They fell into more general talk after that; and after the news of the
family and the neighborhood had been pretty well exhausted, Mrs. Ashe
said:--
"I have asked Alice Singleton to make me a visit."
"Alice Singleton! Why, mother, I cannot think of a person I should have
supposed it less likely you would want to stay with you."
"I'm afraid that I don't want her very much; but she wrote me that she
was very lonely, that she hadn't any plans, and that Boston seemed to
her a very homesick place. Her mother was my nearest friend, you know;
and if Alice needs friendship it's very little for me to do for her."
"I didn't know she'd been in Boston," Philip commented thoughtfully.
"She never seemed to me honest, mother. I never could be charitable to
her at all."
The sweet face of his mother took on a curious expression of mingled
amusement and contrition.
"If I must confess it, Phil," she said, "neither could I; and I'm
afraid that there was more notion of doing penance in my asking her
than of real hospitality. She is after all not to blame for her manner,
and no doubt we do her wrong."
"If you have come to doing penance, mother, there's no knowing how soon
you will be with me."
"No, Phil," she answered softly, "do you remember what Monica told her
son? 'Not where he is, shalt thou be, but where thou art he shall be.'"
He shook his head, sighing.
"I ought not to have touched on that matter, mother. You know that I am
trying to follow my conscience."
"Yes, I cling to that. I should be miserable if I did not believe that
your way and my way will come together somewhere, on this side or the
other; and I bid you Godspeed on whatever way you go with prayerful
conviction."
A sudden impulse leaped up within him, and it was almost as if some
voice not his own spoke through his lips, so little was he conscious of
meaning to ask such a question.
"Even if the way led to Home?"
Mrs. Ashe grew paler, but her eyes steadfastly met those of her son.
"I trust you in the hands of God," she said.
Late that night Philip woke from a heavy sleep into which fatigue had
plunged him. He reached out his arm, and drew aside the curtain near
his bed, so that he might see the window of his mother's chamber. A
faint light was shining there; and he knew that the beams of the candle
fell on his mother on her knees.