REAPING THE WHIRLWIND.
"It is worse than death," sobbed Mrs. Brougham, and they all felt that
it was so.
They were gathered at home at last, in the small hours of the night,
for there was nothing more that they could do till morning came to
wake the world again--that wide desolate world of houses and roads, of
byways and slums; that world in which, _somewhere_, was their little
Maud.
Pale, wide-eyed and silent, they all tried to eat the supper which
Pattie, pale and wide-eyed too, set before them, for they thought of
the day that would soon dawn, when they would need their strength to
begin the search again, and though it seemed horrible to be seeking
rest in their comfortable beds while their little sister's fate was
unsolved, yet for that same reason, slowly and lingeringly they all
said good-night and crept upstairs.
For in vain they had searched for little Maud all the evening long.
Police, neighbours, friends, had all helped, but no trace, not even
the faintest clue, had come to light. Porters, booking-clerks, railway
officials, cabmen, had all been questioned to no purpose. Everybody
talked about the dog-fight, nobody had even seen a child, though a
porter averred that he had seen the empty chair long before the dogs
came on the scene, and a workman that there had been no chair there at
all when the up-train came in. He had stood on the very spot where the
chair was supposed to be, watching through the window for a friend,
with his bag of tools on the ground beside him. He had moved forward
to speak to his friend, and returning a few moments later when the
train had gone, to take up the tools, had then noticed the empty
chair.
What had become of the child was a complete mystery! Every house of
the Broughams' acquaintance was visited, in the forlorn hope that
someone had taken Maud home with them, but the answer was always the
same. Telegrams were sent to all the stations on the line, both up and
down, but the hour between five and six held the busiest trains of the
day, and in the rush of passengers, augmented by gangs of working men
returning to their homes, there was small chance of a ticket collector
having leisure to observe the children who passed through his gate.
No one at home said a word of blame to Gertrude. There was no need.
They had heard the whole story and they only pitied her, and her
grief was far greater than their own, they thought, for there was no
self-blame, no shadow of deception, no regret of wilfulness in their
sorrow. Even Conway felt unutterably tender towards this least dear
of his sisters, when he came in from a fruitless errand, and found the
proud, dark head resting on little Maud's high chair, while Gertrude's
whole frame shook with sobs.
"Don't cry so!" he said gently, and he found it hard to keep his own
voice steady. "Don't cry so, poor old girl. God knows where she is and
He'll take care of her. I keep on saying that to myself, for I know He
will."
"If only I had told them all about Cecil, it would not have been so
bad," sobbed Gertrude.
And Conway could not answer. He only patted her shoulder kindly and
went upstairs to find his mother.
The days dragged along their weary hours after that and no news came
of Maud.
The Broughams felt as if an earthquake had come into their lives,
leaving them all uprooted; as if nothing could let them settle down to
the old routine of life till Maud came back, and without even putting
it into words to each other, they all looked drearily forward into
days and weeks and months and years, and pictured Maud as never coming
back, but growing up somewhere, somehow, with somebody. Truly it was
worse than death.
Gladly would they have pulled down their blinds and darkened the house
and put on mourning.
When Jerry died, it had not been like this. They wept and sorrowed for
him, but they laid him to rest in sure and certain hope of a joyful
resurrection. He was safe. It was the uncertainty of Maud's fate,
her surroundings, her associates, the awful uncertainty of everything
concerning her, that made this trial so unbearable, that it seemed to
every one of them that they could not bear it for another day.
Yet God knew. The only comfort they had, came to them in that thought.
Their friends were kindness itself; every sort of sympathy, except
the sympathy of flowers, was offered them. Special prayer was made in
church for those who were "any ways afflicted or distressed," for
the story was in every one's mouth, and mothers with little children
guarded them jealously, and thought of what they would feel if one of
them was taken from them as Maud had been.
But outside of her own home no sympathy was shown to Gertrude.
The place rang with her name. Mrs. Parsons had gone about with her
story of the handsome young man in the down train, the meeting with
whom Gertrude had not even allowed her little sister to witness, and
the stories grew and grew on that foundation, till every picnic or
tennis party that Gertrude had attended that summer, was transformed
into a separate flirtation or supplied an anecdote to Gertrude's
disadvantage.
She had rejoiced at knowing everybody in Old Keston who was worth
knowing, but now she wished sadly that she was utterly unknown. She
felt that she was pointed at and whispered about, as "the girl that
lost her little sister."
Pauline Stacey gathered up all the stories and recounted them to
Gertrude with an apologetic air that meant nothing, but covered her
real enjoyment in the telling of the gossip, and Gertrude had not the
heart to stop her.
After all, what did it matter? Perhaps it was best to know the worst
that was being said. No one could blame her more than she blamed
herself; she _had_ lost little Maud through meeting Cecil Greyburne
and she had done it secretly. Only she hoped that all these other
false stories would not reach her home people's ears.
And not one friend of hers had offered her any sympathy. She felt it
keenly. Even Pauline only troubled to see her when she had some
fresh tale to relate. Cecil had written his sympathy to Denys and had
ignored Gertrude, not even sending her a message, for Gertrude had
seen the letter.
The rich American had not referred to it when he answered Pauline's
letter in which she told him all about Maud, unless his remark that
he should not be back in Old Keston after all, could be taken as a
reference. Nor had he written a line of condolence to Gertrude, as she
had half hoped he would.
And Reggie did not know anything about it. He had sent an immediate
and cheerful response to her belated birthday letter, but not having
written to him for so long in her sunny days of popularity, she was
too proud to do so now, when she was in sorrow.
Yet she watched for a letter from him, hoping that Charlie would write
to him and tell him of their trouble, and if he once heard of it,
Gertrude knew that a letter would come by return of post.
But none came. Charlie did not write to Reggie. How could he do so
without attaching blame to Gertrude?
These were days of darkness, but in them Pattie shone out like gold.
She waited on them all with love and patience, she kept the meals
regular and the rooms nicely dusted, and she attended to all the
little duties that no one seemed to think of now-a-days.
It was she who received Maud's empty chair from the station-clerk, and
hid it away that it might bring no fresh pang of sorrow to any heart.
It was she who unostentatiously and without fuss, quietly laid by the
child's toys and clothes, for she truly guessed that to Denys or
Mrs. Brougham, to do so would be like saying a long farewell to their
darling, and yet to see them lying here and there, was a constant
reminder of her loss.
Though the two things seemed to have no connection with one another,
after the day that Maud was lost, Pattie gave up going out with Sam
Willard.
She said, when he remonstrated with her, that she had no heart now for
palavering and he had better find someone who was free and happy. For
herself, she could think of nothing but how to find little Maud again.
"Then you'll be an old maid," said Sam crossly, "whoever's taken
the child has taken her a-purpose, and they won't run no risks in
returning her. You'll be an old maid if you throw away all your
chances like this."
"Very well!" answered Pattie firmly, "then I'll _be_ an old maid and a
good-tempered one too. I won't be like some cross-grained bachelors I
know, so there!"