THE COVERT OF WINGS
"Oh, the faith of youth, the faith that reaches out to give itself,"
sighed father as he turned to his papers.
"Can faith give itself?" I asked, as I raised my eyes to the stars under
dull gold through which Gregory Goodloe was pouring a great smile down
into my depths.
"Sometimes--just sometimes I think that perhaps it can--it does," he
answered me slowly and took my hands in his and held them with their
palms together prayerwise, a thing he had done several times in the
weeks past. Then he turned and walked over to father's desk and stood
looking down at him.
"I want to dedicate the chapel on Sunday, Mr. Powers, as that is your
last Sunday before you go to Washington," he said, and as he spoke he
smiled first down into father's eyes raised to his and then into
mine--impersonally. I couldn't trust myself to speak but turned and went
up to my room to weep with a hurt that soon sent me to my knees, blind
for the comfort that came--that I knew always would come now, no matter
what the hurt.
"He knows it has come to me, and he's thankful--but he doesn't care," I
sobbed and then laughed at my own contradictions.
Martha found me kneeling beside my window seat when she came in with
Mother Spurlock and she shielded me until I could wipe away the tears
and be as glad to see them both as I really was.
They were full of the plans for the dedication, which it gave me another
stab to find they had been discussing with Mr. Goodloe for several days.
In the hard weeks that had passed I had been their confidant, adviser
and many times their helper in the reconstructing around the tragedies
in the Settlement, but in this matter I had not been consulted. In fact,
Mother Spurlock showed an embarrassed hesitation as she talked of it
that still further hurt me and made me unenthusiastic and cold to their
plans.
And why should I have been hurt that the surety in my heart had not
declared itself to them without words? So wonderful did it seem to me
that I thought it must be in my every word and deed and look and I was
confounded that as yet I was considered to be an outsider and not
entitled to plan for the ceremonial of the dedication of the material
fold for the Reverend Mr. Goodloe's flock. And then suddenly my hurt was
swept away by my sense of humor and I laughed to myself when I saw that
to Mother Spurlock, who had hungered and thirsted for my conversion, I
would have to prove it, tell it and repeat it.
"Instead of the festal ceremonies in the dedication Mr. Goodloe is going
to have the simplest dedication ritual and then immediately hold the
memorial services for our--our dead," said Mother Spurlock, as she took
Martha's hand in hers and stroked it. "We want everybody to be there and
I could use a few more of those trunks full of colored new clothes,
Charlotte. The people down in the Settlement can use and wear after a
dye pot when you can't, bless your sweet heart," and as she made her
ruling request, which was still strong in death, she stroked the fold of
dull black silk over my knee which was cut from the same material as
the straight black widow's gown which Martha wore.
"Make Martha buy you some things for some of them," I said lightly and
watched Martha as I spoke. She had never by word or deed showed that she
felt anything but adoringly dependent on me and my bounty, and had put
the check book I had given her from Mr. Cockrell away in my desk without
looking at it. I could see that my words both hurt and shocked her.
"No, Oh, no," she faltered and turned away toward the window.
"But, Martha," I was beginning to say, when an interruption burst into
the room. Young Charlotte stood before us and at her side the boy stood
his ground with the huge book still in what must have been very tired
arms. Their faces were belligerent and small James had upon his
countenance the alarm he always shows during Charlotte's most serious
and dangerous outbursts. Mikey was along, with his mischievous eyes
dancing with delight at the fray.
"Auntie Charlotte, I think somebody ought to whip Stranger for saying
that Minister said he had fairies in his stomach. It is a lie."
"I'll lick him fer you, Miss Charlotte," offered Mikey, with a pass at
the boy that I knew was only an affectionate threat.
"I'll knock a stuffing out of you if you touch him," answered Charlotte,
taking Mikey's offer with her usual literal directness. "When he's
whipped, nobody but Auntie Charlotte can do it. Are you going to do it
now, Auntie Charlotte? We don't want the devil to get him for badness."
And as she spoke she took the boy's hand and held it tightly as if
willing to defend him from the flesh, the devil and the world, only
excepting myself.
"But he did say that I had them here when I put my hand on it, didn't
he, Lady?" demanded the accused, with more courage than I would have
felt at meeting the accusation for him. I simply couldn't face the
explanation and I became craven.
"Mr. Goodloe is down in the library. Go ask him what he did say," I
suggested hopefully.
"We looked everywhere for him and that is the place we skipped. I felt
sure you wouldn't know anything at all about it, Auntie Charlotte, but
Stranger said you know just as much as Minister, which is another thing
I am going to ask him about. Come on, Stranger." And with her usual
lightning rapidity, Charlotte began to marshal her forces out of the
room.
"Please don't!" were the words I sent faltering after her determination
to question Mr. Goodloe about his and my relative erudition, but I felt
that they made no impression.
"Sonny thinks about you just as Charlotte does about Mr. Goodloe, and
he'll say so to everybody," said Martha, with a sad smile after the door
had closed with vigor enough to startle the household.
"He's a fine child," said Mother Spurlock, with a great tenderness in
her smile at Martha. "Did you ask Mrs. Todd if that big hulk of a Jones
boy could get into the coat that Dabney got me from the judge's closet?"
she said, continuing the subject in hand, which lasted her for another
hour. When she went she took Martha with her to carry half the bundles
down to the Little House, the roof of which was the first thing to be
patched in stricken Goodloets.
That night I felt the hands of the Stray on my face in the darkness and
his soft cheek cuddle to mine.
"_You_ say they _is_ fairies, Lady," he coaxed.
"There are fairies and there always will be for you," I answered, as I
drew him close and kissed the fragrant mouth so near mine. "Go back to
mother now," I added, as I felt the sleepy huddle of his little shoulder
against mine. He went and I promised myself that no matter how lonely I
was to be I would always send him back to his mother and not ever forget
that her claim was first. Tears were in my eyes as I turned my face into
the pillow, but suddenly the refrain of the song I had once heard in the
night, "Abide with me, fast falls the eventide," sung itself in my heart
until I again fell to sleep.
The dedication day for Goodloe Chapel arrived upon Goodloets just one
month from the day upon which the beast of storm had ravaged it, and as
that fateful morning dawned with an extraordinary grandeur, so that
Sunday in mid-October came up from behind Paradise Ridge with unusual
beauty, only with the difference of calmness instead of splendor and
peace instead of tumult. The sun was warm and benignant, with not a
cloud in the deep blue sky to obscure its blessing. A gentle breeze blew
in from the fields and meadows laden with rich harvest odors and every
shrub and flower and vine which had been hiding back a few late buds let
them burst forth in honor of the day, and in many instances they bloomed
from a new growth thrown over the scars in the sides of the old town. In
one short month most of the ruins had been reduced to orderly piles of
material to be used in rebuilding, and a great many of the deepest
gashes had been healed completely and covered with merciful vine and
blossom. And it had also been like that with most of the scars in the
lives of the bereaved; they ached, but they had been covered with a
courage to go on building again until the new structure could be
complete.
I think something of this feeling was in the minds of most of the people
as they began to assemble around Goodloe Chapel long before the time for
its opening. And as had happened once before, the procession from the
Town met the procession from the Settlement, only this time they were
not divided so completely from the right to the left. A tall mill woman,
whose husband had gone down in the crash at the saddlery, came and took
Nell's hand in hers and laid a strong arm around her shoulders, while
Harriet went over and took from the arms of the young father the little
motherless mite who had been rescued from the pillow floating on the
river. Billy shook hands with a young tanner in tight but wholly new
clothes, to whom Luella May Spain introduced him as her imminent
husband.
In times of stress women are apt to seize and cling to the arm of
masculine protection, and Luella May had chosen to forget the
fascination of Billy's hesitation and two-steps and secure for herself a
life of thorough normality. She would probably never forget those dances
with Billy, and they would lend a kind of reminiscent glow of pleasure
over her boiling cabbage pots, but it would be no worse than that.
Mr. Todd was shaven and habitated in the neat black coat he had thrown
off as he went at the ruin of the schoolhouse a month before, and with a
tender smile on his lean old face he came over and stood beside Martha,
as if to be watchful of her in the new order of her life.
And it was for quite a half hour that most of the inhabitants of
Goodloets stood around in the yard of the chapel and waited for the
formal opening of the doors. We all knew that the chapel would not hold
the half of us, for the small Presbyterian congregation had been
dismissed by Mr. Farraday to come over and join us in the dedication,
and after a short service the boy Baptist divine had brought his flock
to do honor to the opening of the new fold. In fact, by count almost
every citizen in Goodloets stood before the chapel doors and waited for
them to be thrown open. And in the crowd who waited there was this
difference from the last time we had been together: All the children
were with us and not separated from us by walls that crash. I think that
the second meeting of Town and Settlement would have been impossible if
each parent had not had the confidence inspired by the small hands in
theirs.
And for still more minutes we were patient while the delicious autumn
sun beamed upon us with Indian summer warmth and Old Harpeth looked down
on us from out on Paradise Ridge with its crown wreathed with purple and
gold and russet, all veiled in a tender haze.
Then as the old clock on the courthouse up on the square boomed the hour
of eleven, Dabney with ceremony opened wide the tall doors and stepped
back into the shadow, Jefferson bowing and smiling behind him. With one
accord the people started toward the door, and then everybody again
stood still and seemed to be waiting for something.
I knew for what they waited and I took Martha's hand in mine, with the
boy's in hers on the other side, and slowly we walked through the path
made for us between our friends and neighbors and in at the chapel door.
As I passed Harriet I motioned to her and she put her arm around Nell
and followed us, while Billy came behind them with father and the
children. And behind them walked all of those who had been bereaved by
the storm, and those who had been lamed and were suffering came with
them.
My entry into the chapel had been accomplished and I felt like a
storm-torn bird who finds its sanctuary among the green leaves of a
great tree, while with Martha and the boy I went up to the very chancel
rail itself.
Then I lifted my eyes and looked up into Gregory Goodloe's face, from
which the white light of a great joy tinged with a great sorrow, looked
down upon us. And as had been the case for all the long weeks stretched
out behind me there was in his eyes no glance to me of a personal
understanding; all the passion was that of a shepherd for his flock, and
in its greatness I humbly acquiesced as I fell upon my knees in the
front pew with Martha beside me, while he lifted his hands for the
opening prayer of his service.
And in his short prayer he made the dedication of the pile of stone and
mortar which had stood before the face of the wind as sturdily as old
Harpeth itself. His words held the simplicity of those of a great poet
and each was a separate jewel that could be imbedded in the hearts of
his people to last for the span of their lives. He made a grateful
acknowledgment of the safety of the chapel and of the spared lives of
those before him, and in a few ringing sentences he prayed that we all
be delivered from the blindness of the prosperity which was upon us when
the disaster had made us halt in our rush and give time for brother to
face and call upon brother in affliction. So ringing and vivid was the
self-accusation of heedlessness in the few sentences when he dealt with
the condition of all of us when sorrow had come upon us, that we all
held our breath with almost a groan of conviction, and his promise of
our humbled and contrite hearts was ratified with a breath of relief.
Then we rose from our knees and sat once more facing him while he stood
before us and began to read the memorial services for our dead. And
through the whole beautiful ritual he led us to the very words of
triumph:
"Then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written;
Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting?
O grave, where is thy victory?"
The warmth in his beautiful voice and the light upon his face poured
over us all with a healing that we knew would endure.
After the dedication prayer and the memorial service the old
Presbyterian minister, whom we had all known and loved since infancy,
talked tenderly and with great sympathy to us for a few minutes and the
stammering young Baptist divine gave us an insight into a heart of
youthful devoutness.
And then came my hour.
"And now that we have given to the Lord formally this sanctuary we have
builded for him, I want to open its spiritual doors to any of you who
feel in your hearts the desire to unite with us in our worship of Him,"
were the words of invitation that I suddenly felt beat themselves, in
the rich voice of the man in the pulpit, upon my heart. "I am going to
baptize the children, but are there any of you of 'riper years' who
desire to unite with us to 'constantly believe God's holy word, and
obediently keep his commandments'?" And as he spoke he came down from
the pulpit, stood at the chancel rail and stretched out his hands to all
of us. Without a second's delay I rose and went and knelt before him and
bowed my head in my hands. On my right knelt the young tanner and on my
left I felt rather than saw Clifton Gray.
"The Ministration of Baptism to such as are of Riper Years" is long and
full of holy austerity. Word for word, response for question, I followed
the rich voice leading me, but not until it asked concerning our faith
in the "life everlasting" did I raise my eyes to those glowing above me
as I made answer:
"All this I steadfastly believe."
There was an instant's hush in the church as I made my response and in
all humility I seemed to feel that it reverberated in some of the
others' depths until it waked a faint echo. They had seen me face my
humiliation and had watched how I took it and it had had its effect. It
was as if I publicly led them to the well-spring of my courage and
offered it to them. Luella May stole forward and crowded in between the
young tanner and me, and I saw great tears steal out of father's closed
eyes and roll down his cheeks, as he came and knelt just behind me, with
two mill hands and several women.
And then, after our blessing, while we rose and stood on the right and
the left of the chancel the parson asked that the children be brought
forward for baptism.
Without waiting for anybody to come with her, Charlotte rose, took a
hand of Sue on one side and one of Jimmy on the other, and came and
stood looking up into the beloved Minister's eyes with such a vision in
her young face that I caught my breath. Then Nell came and with her came
Harriet with the Suckling asleep in her arms. The bereaved young father
held his baby in his arms alone and Mrs. Burns went and stood beside
him with Mikey and Maudie and the other five toddlers in front of her.
Other children were brought forward by parents from the Town and the
Settlement and were ranged to the right and to the left, but still I saw
that Martha cowered in her pew holding the hand of the Stray in hers as
he knelt beside her. Then I knew what I must do and I went quietly and
lifted her and led her to the chancel to a place just beside where
Harriet stood with the Suckling in her arms. I held one of the Stray's
little hands in mine, and young Charlotte dropped Jimmy's hand and
reached out and took the other in hers. So we stood and waited while the
beloved voice read through the beautiful ceremony with which children
are taken into the arms of their faith before they are yet ready to
understand what it is some day to mean to them.
"It is your duty to teach him ... to obediently keep God's holy will and
commandments all of his life," were the closing words of the address
with which the parson looked us full in the eye and laid the vow upon
our souls. Then he reached out his hands, drew the Stray to him first,
encircled him with his strong arm, laid his hands on the bowed black
head, and looking me straight in the eye asked the question of his
ritual:
"Name this child."
For an instant I glanced at Martha and then at father standing beside
me, and as he nodded I slightly bent my head and into a deathly
stillness all over the chapel I let the name fall clear and distinct:
"Nickols Morris Powers."
A beautiful ray of light flooded from one of the tall windows over both
of us as he ratified the name with a few drops of water upon the boy's
brow, and then turned to Harriet and repeated his question while he took
the Suckling into his arms with the greatest tenderness. Then through
the group he went, naming his lambs as he held them against his heart or
within the circle of his strong arm. It was all so tender and so
beautiful that every eye in the chapel was wet with tears and sobs
echoed softly through his last prayer.
However, at one time in the ceremonial there was danger of a laugh from
the aggregate, overwrought nerves when Charlotte promptly named herself
without waiting for Nell's response which came late but in time to save
embarrassment.
Then it was all over and the whole congregation trooped but into the
sunshine. Father walked home with young Nickols on one side and
Charlotte on the other, Martha carrying the Suckling and walking beside
Harriet, who led Sue past the destruction of her white dress which every
mud puddle threatened. Cliff Gray came with me slowly up the street
after all the others had gone ahead and most of them had turned into the
gates of their respective homes.
"Is everything all right now, Cliff?" I questioned him, as we walked
slowly under the old elms of our ancestors' planting. "It is all right
now?" I asked again, while Cliff looked off into the distance.
"I have faith that I can make it that way now, Charlotte dear," he
answered, as I paused to turn in at my gate. We clasped hands for a
second and then he went on down the street toward the Cockrell gate; and
Letitia's material point of view on existence I knew would have a fair
chance at his hands.
I felt that I had never loved my friends as I did that wonderful
Sunday, and I hoped it would not bore them if I at times let some of it
overflow into their well ordered lives.
The rest of that long, hazy, dreamy, wonder day, in the morning of which
our hearts had been poured so full, we all of us spent with father, as
he was to leave us the next morning. Against the remonstrance of his
maternal parent, the worthless Jefferson had been chosen to go along in
the place of his father Dabney. The young negro's brisk packings filled
the house with a joy note that was delightful and Mammy admonished him
on subjects moral every time he came near the kitchen.
Late in the afternoon I left father down in the garden with young
Nickols, to whom he was confiding the care of some very choice hollyhock
seeds that would need gathering in the next few weeks.
"Your father got them from England," the judge said gravely, as he
showed the small paddies how to roll out the thin seed without crushing
them.
"Have I got any father but the Lady?" asked the youngster with all
seriousness, as he beamed up in my direction. Suddenly Martha turned
and went indoors and up to her room. I followed her and sat down beside
the bed on which she had flung herself.
"You'll have to make him understand it all; I can't," she said, after I
had tenderly hushed her weeping. "I give him to you. I--I won't be with
him long." As she spoke I noticed how the light shone through her pale
fingers as she held them up to clasp mine.
"We'll go away to Florida for a rest, Martha," I said, with the
reassurance I found I had constantly to use to her. There was a great
and beautiful tenderness in the soul of Martha, but she was completely
lacking in any of the worldly initiative that makes lives move on. She
seemed to be standing still.
"Yes, I'll go away," she answered softly, as she unclasped her hand from
mine, nestled her face in the pillow and shut her eyes.
I left her to sleep and a year from that hour I knew that I had not
understood the measure of her exhaustion. She faded like a flower and
drifted on into eternity like a gossamer thread in the breeze.
And it was with some of the depression that a kind of maternal brooding
over her gave me that I went out into the garden that night after all
the rest had gone to bed. A pale silver moon-crescent poised on the brow
of Old Harpeth and a tingling little breeze was coming down from the
north as if sent as a warning of the winter soon to be upon us. I went
down to the old graybeard poplars and their leaves seemed to hiss
together in the moonlight instead of rustling softly as they had been
all summer. A great many of them were drifted in dry waves on the grass
and their gold was turned to silver in the moonlight. Many of the tall
shrubs were naked ghosts of their former selves and gnashed their bones
drearily. I leaned against the tallest old poplar and looked out across
the valley with a kind of stillness in my heart that seemed to be
listening and then listening.
"Oh, I'm thankful, thankful that strength has been given me to endure it
all--life," I said to myself, almost under my breath. "And no matter
what comes I can never lose it. I can go out into life now alone
and--unafraid."
"'And whither thou goest I too will go, and thy--'" came the Gregorian
chant from close beside me, and I turned to find the Harpeth Jaguar
stalking me in the night.
Then for a long time we stood and looked at each other, he tearing away
the veil from his man's heart and I laying aside that in my woman's
breast.
"Oh, I've needed you so," I finally said, with a catch in my breath as I
put my hands in his which he put palm to palm, then raised to his lips.
"You were in God's hands and I had to wait His time," he answered me.
"And I would have waited until the stars burn dim. As near as loss came
I never doubted. I had asked Him for you."
"I didn't know I was going to join your church this morning," I
faltered. "I never intended to join your church. I was going to be
either a Baptist or a Presbyterian. I was afraid to mix--my faith
with--with you."
"Hasn't it been tried sufficiently to stand any test? I think so. Ah,
dear, come to me--it's been long for me, too." His arms entreated me,
but I held myself away with my praying hands pressed to his breast.
"Are you sure that I'm not mixing you and--your faith?" I asked, looking
him honestly in the face and giving voice to the thought that Nickols
had put into my mind and which had tortured me all the weary months
past.
"Did any thought of me make you bring Martha Ensley to Nickols' death
bed and take into your heart and home what the world calls dishonor?"
"No," I answered with honesty to myself.
"Have you once since you knew--_knew_--felt that you must turn to me for
comfort and help in one of your dire hours?"
"Not once," I answered again with honesty.
"Have you not learned to turn to Him?"
"I have!" I answered.
"That's God's love. Then you can give me the love that belongs to me in
your heart's kingdom, can't you?"
"I'm afraid--I'm going to love you too much--I feel it coming. What'll
you do with it? Stop me!" I said with both a sob and a laugh, as I began
to let myself be drawn into the strong, hungry arms.
"You great, big, splendid woman of God! You've got love enough in you to
feed a multitude and you'll do it. Give me a part of my share now. It's
mine. God sent you to me; I'm going to take you."
And he did. His lips pressed mine until I gave back a betrothal kiss
that was as complete as a great red flower. His arms held me so that
they were a circle of pain, but all the while I kept my hands prayerwise
between the clamor of our breasts.
"Say it--'the covert of thy wings'--all that David said," I whispered.
And he answered:
"'I will abide in thy tabernacle forever: I will trust in the covert of
thy wings.'"
JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD'S STORIES OF ADVENTURE
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