"Pale as the corse o'er which she leaned,
As cold, with stifling breath,
Her spirit sunk before the might,
The majesty of death."
"A man severe he was, and stern to view,
I knew him well, and every truant knew--
Yet he was kind, or if severe in aught,
The love he bore for learning was in fault."
_Goldsmith._
The darkened room, the stilly tread, the muffled knocker and slowly
closing door, announced the presence of that kingly guest, who presides
over the empire of _terror_ and the grave. The long-expected hour was
arrived, and Mrs. Gleason lay supported by pillows, whose soft down
would never more sink under the pressure of her weary head. The wasting
fires of consumption had burned and burned, till nothing but the ashes
of life were left, save a few smouldering embers, from which flashed
occasionally a transient spark. Mr. Gleason sat at the bed's head, with
that grave, stern, yet bitter grief on his countenance which bids
defiance to tears. She had been a gentle and devoted wife, and her
quiet, home-born virtues, not always fully appreciated, rose before his
remembrance, like the angels in Jacob's dream, climbing up to Heaven.
Louis stood behind him, his head bowed upon his shoulder, sobbing as if
his heart would break. Helen was nestled in her father's arms, with the
most profound and unutterable expression of grief and awe and dread, on
her young face. She was told that her mother was dying, going away from
her, never to return, and the anguish this conviction imparted would
have found vent in shrieks, had not the awe with which she beheld the
cold, gray shadows of death, slowly, solemnly rolling over the face she
loved best on earth, the face which had always seemed to her the
perfection of mortal beauty, paralyzed her tongue, and frozen the
fountain of her tears. Mittie stood at the foot of the bed, looking at
her mother through the opening of the curtain, partly veiled by the
long, white fringe that hung heavily from the folds, and which the wind
blew to and fro, with something like the sweep of the willow. The
windows were all open to admit the air to the faintly heaving lungs of
the sufferer, and gradually one curtain after another was lifted, as the
struggle for breath and air increased, and the light of departing day
streamed in on the sunken and altered features it was never more to
illuminate. Mittie was awe struck, but she manifested no tenderness or
sensibility. It was astonishing how so young a child could see _anyone_
die, and above all a _mother_--a mother, so kind and affectionate, with
so little emotion. She was far more oppressed by the realization of her
own mortality, for the first time pressed home upon her, than by her
impending bereavement. What were the feelings of that speechless,
expiring, but fully conscious mother, as she gazed earnestly, wistfully,
thrillingly on the group that surrounded her? There was the husband,
whom she had so much loved, he, who often, when weary with business, and
perplexed with anxiety, had seemed careless and indifferent, but who, as
life waned away, had shown the tenderness of love's early day, and who
she knew would mourn her deeply and _long_. There was her noble,
handsome, warm-hearted, high-souled boy--the object of her pride, as
well as her affection--he, who had never willfully given her a moment's
pain--and though his irrepressive sighs and suffocating sobs she would
have hushed, at the expense of all that remained of life to her--there
was still a music in them to her dying ear, that told of love that would
not forget, that would twine in perennial garlands round her grave. Poor
little Helen, as she looked at her pale, agonized face, and saw the
_terror_ imprinted there, she remembered what she had once said to Miss
Thusa, of being after death an object of _terror_ to her child, and she
felt a sting that no language could express. She longed to stretch out
her feeble arms, to fold them round this child of her prayers and fears,
to carry her with her down the dark valley her feet were treading, to
save her from trials a nature like hers was so ill-fitted to sustain.
She looked from her to Mittie, the cold, insensible Mittie, whose large,
black eyes, serious, but not sad, were riveted upon her through the
white fringe of the curtain, and another sting sharper still went
through her heart.
"Oh! my child," she would have said, could her thoughts have found
utterance, "forget me if you will--mourn not for me, the mother who bore
you--but be kind, be loving to your little sister, more young and
helpless than yourself. You are strong and fearless--she is a timid,
trembling, clinging dove. Oh! be gentle to her, for my sake, gentle as I
have ever been to you. And you, too, my child, the time will come when
you will _feel_, when your heart will awake from its sleep--and if you
only feel for yourself, you will be wretched."
"Why art thou cast down, oh! my soul? and why art thou disquieted within
me?" were the meditations of the dying woman, when turning from earth,
she raised her soul on high. "I leave my children in the hands of a
heavenly Father, as well as a mighty God--in the care of Him who died
that man might live forevermore."
But there was one present at this scene, who seemed a priestess
presiding over some mystic rite. It was Miss Thusa. Notwithstanding the
real kindness of her heart, she felt a strange and intense delight in
witnessing the last struggle between vitality and death, in gazing on
the marble, soulless features, from which life had departed, and
composing the icy limbs for the garniture of the grave. She would have
averted suffering and death, if she could, from all, but since every son
and daughter of Adam were doomed to bear them, she wanted the privilege
of beholding the conflict, and gazing on the ruins. She would sit up
night after night, regardless of fatigue, to watch by the pillow of
sickness and pain, and yet she felt an unaccountable sensation of
disappointment when her cares were crowned with success, and the hour of
danger was over. She would have climbed mountains, if it were required,
to carry water to dash on a burning dwelling, yet wished at the same
time to see the flames grow redder and broader, and more destructive.
She would have liked to live near the smoke and fire of battle, so that
she might wander in contemplation among the unburied slain.
The sun went down, but the sun of life still lingered on the verge of
the horizon. The dimness of twilight mingled with the shadows of death.
"Take me out," cried Helen, struggling to be released from her father's
arms. "Oh! take me from here. It don't seem mother that I see."
"Hush--hush," said Mr. Gleason, sternly, "you disturb her last moments."
But Helen, whose feelings were wrought up to a pitch which made
stillness impossible, and restraint agonizing, darted from between her
father's knees and rushed into the passage. But how dim and lonely it
was! How melancholy the cat looked, waiting near the door, with its
calm, green eyes turned towards the chamber where its gentle mistress
lay! It rubbed its white, silky sides against Helen, purring solemnly
and musically, but Helen recollected many a frightful tale of cats,
related by Miss Thusa, and recoiled from the contact. She longed to
escape from herself, to escape from a world so dark and gloomy. Her
mother was going, and why should she stay behind? _Going!_ yet lying so
still and almost breathless there! She had been told that the angels
came down and carried away the souls of the good, but she looked in vain
for the track of their silvery wings. One streak of golden ruddiness
severed the gray of twilight, but it resembled more a fiery bar, closing
the gates of heaven, than a radiant opening to the spirit-land. While
she stood pale and trembling, with her hand on the latch of the door,
afraid to stay where she was, afraid to return and confront the mystery
of death, the gate opened, and Arthur Hazleton came up the steps. He had
been there a short time before, and went away for something which it was
thought might possibly administer relief. He held out his hand, and
Helen clung to it as if it had the power of salvation. He read what was
passing in the mind of the child, and pitied her. He did not try to
reason with her at that moment, for he saw it would be in vain, but
drawing her kindly towards him, he told her he was sorry for her. His
words, like "flaky snow in the day of the sun," melted as they fell and
sunk into her heart, and she began to weep. He knew that her mother
could not live long, and wishing to withdraw her from a scene which
might give a shock from which her nerves would long vibrate, he
committed her to the care of a neighbor, who took her to her own home.
Mrs. Gleason died at midnight, while Helen lay in a deep sleep,
unconscious of the deeper slumbers that wrapped the dead.
And now a terrible trial awaited her. She had never looked on the face
of death, and she shrunk from the thought with a dread which no language
can express. When her father, sad and silent, with knit brow and
quivering lip, led her to the chamber where her mother lay, she resisted
his guidance, and declared she would never, never go in _there_. It
would have been well to have yielded to her wild pleadings, her tears
and cries. It would have been well to have waited till reason was
stronger and more capable of grappling with terror, before forcing her
to read the first awful lesson of mortality. But Mr. Gleason thought it
his duty to require of her this act of filial reverence, an act he would
have deemed it sacrilegious to omit. He was astonished, grieved, angry
at her resistance, and in his excitement he used some harsh and bitter
words.
Finding persuasions and threats in vain, he summoned Miss Thusa, telling
her he gave into her charge an unnatural, rebellious child, with whose
strange temper he was then too weak to contend. It was a pity he
summoned such an assistant, for Miss Thusa thought it impious as well as
unnatural, and she had bound herself too by a sacred promise, that she
would not suffer Helen to _fear_ in death the mother whom in life she
had so dearly loved. Helen, when she looked into those still, commanding
eyes, felt that her doom was sealed, and that she need struggle no more.
In despair, rather than submission, she yielded, if it can be called
yielding, to suffer herself to be dragged into a room, which she never
entered afterwards without dread.
The first glance at the interior of the chamber, struck a chill through
her heart. It was so still, so chill, so dim, yet so white. The curtains
of white muslin fell in long, slumberous folds down to the floor, their
fringes resting lifelessly on the carpet. The tables and chairs were all
covered with white linen, and something shrouded in white was stretched
out on a table in the centre of the room. The sheet which covered it
flapped a moment as the door opened, and then hung motionless. The
outline of a human form beneath was visible, and when Miss Thusa lifted
her in her arms and carried her to the spot, Helen was conscious of an
awful curiosity growing up within her that was stronger than her
terrors. Her breath came quick and short, a film came over her eyes, and
cold drops of sweat stood upon her forehead, yet she would not now have
left the room without penetrating into the mystery of death. Miss Thusa
laid her hand upon the sheet and turned it back from the pale and
ghastly face, on whose brow the mysterious signet of everlasting rest
was set. Still, immovable, solemn, placid--it lay beneath the gaze, with
shrouded eye, and cheek like concave marble, and hueless, waxen lips.
What depth, what grandeur, what duration in that repose! What
inexpressible sadness, yet what sublime tranquillity! Helen held her
breath, bending slowly, lower and lower, as if drawn down by a mighty,
irresistible power, till her cheek almost touched the clay-cold cheek
over which she leaned. Then Miss Thusa folded back the sheet still
farther, and exposed the shrouded form, which she had so carefully
prepared for its last dread espousals. The fragrance of white roses and
geranium leaves profusely scattered over the body, mingled with the cold
odor of mortality, and filled the room with a deadly, sickening perfume.
White roses were placed in the still, white, emaciated hands, and lay
all wilted on the unbreathing bosom.
All at once a revulsion took place in the breast of Helen. It mocked
her--that silent, rigid, moveless form. She felt so cold, so deadly cold
in its presence, it seemed as if all the warmth of life went out within
her. She began to realize the desolation, the loneliness of the future.
The cry of orphanage came wailing up from the depths of her heart, and
bursting from her lips in a loud piercing shriek, she sprang forward and
fell perfectly insensible on the bosom of the dead.
"I wish I had not _forced_ her to go in," exclaimed the father, as he
hung with remorseful anguish over the child. "Great Heaven! must I lose
all I hold dear at once?"
"No, no," cried Miss Thusa, making use of the most powerful restoratives
as she spoke, "it will not hurt her. She is coming to already. It's a
lesson she must learn, and the sooner the better. She's got to be
hardened--and if we don't begin to do it the Lord Almighty will. I
remember the saying of an old lady, and she was a powerful wise woman,
that they who refused to look at a corpse, would see their own every
night in the glass."
"Repeat not such shocking sayings before the child," cried Mr. Gleason.
"I fear she has heard too many already."
Ah, yes! _she had heard too many_. The warning came too late.
She was restored to animation and--to memory. Her father, now trembling
for her health, and feeling his affection and tenderness increase in
consequence of a sensibility so remarkable, forbid every one to allude
to her mother before her, and kept out of her sight as far as possible
the mournful paraphernalia of the grave. But a _cold presence_ haunted
her, and long after the mother was laid in the bosom of earth, it would
come like a sudden cloud over the sun, chilling the warmth of childhood.
She had never yet been sent to school. Her extreme timidity had induced
her mother to teach her at home the rudiments of education. She had thus
been a kind of _amateur_ scholar, studying pictures more than any thing
else, and never confined to any particular hours or lessons. About six
months after her mother's death, her father thought it best she should
be placed under regular instruction, and she was sent with Mittie to the
village school. If she could only have gone with Louis--Louis, so brave,
yet tender, so manly, yet so gentle, how much happier she would have
been! But Louis went to the large academy, where he studied Greek and
Latin and Conic Sections, &c., where none but boys were admitted. The
teacher of the village school was a gentleman who had an equal number of
little boys and girls under his charge. In summer the institution was
under the jurisdiction of a lady--in autumn and winter the Salic law had
full sway, and man reigned supreme on the pedagogical throne. It was in
winter that Helen entered what was to her a new world.
The little, delicate, pensive looking child, clad in deep mourning,
attracted universal interest. The children gathered round her and
examined her as they would a wax doll. There was something about her so
different from themselves, so different from every body else they had
seen, that they looked upon her as a natural curiosity.
"What big eyes she's got!" cried a little creature, whose eyes were
scarcely larger than pin-holes, putting her round, fat face close to
Helen's pale one, and peering under her long lashes.
"Hush!" said another, whose nickname was Cherry-cheeks, so bright and
ruddy was her bloom. "She's a thousand times prettier than you, you
little no eyed thing! But what makes her so pale and thin? I wonder--and
what makes her look so scared?"
"It is because her mother is dead," said an orphan child, taking Helen's
hand in one of hers, passing the other softly over her smooth hair.
"Mittie has lost her mother too," replied Cherry-cheeks, "and she isn't
pale nor thin."
"Mittie don't care," exclaimed several voices at once, "only let her
have the head of the class, and she won't mind what becomes of the rest
of the world."
A scornful glance over her shoulder was all the notice Mittie deigned to
take of this acknowledgment of her eagle ambition. Conscious that she
was the favorite of the teacher, she disdained to cultivate the love and
good-will of her companions. With a keen, bright intelligence, and
remarkable retentiveness of memory, she mastered her studies with
surprising quickness, and distanced all her competitors. Had she been
amiable, her young classmates would have been proud of the honors she
acquired, for it is easy to yield the palm to one always in the
ascendant, but she looked down with contempt on those of inferior
attainments, and claimed as a right the homage they would have
spontaneously offered.
Mr. Hightower, or as he was called Master High-tower, was worthy of his
commanding name, for he was at least six feet and three inches in
height, and of proportional magnitude. It would have looked more in
keeping to see him at the head of an embattled host rather than
exercising dominion over the little rudiments of humanity arranged
around him. His hair was thick and bushy, and he had a habit of combing
it with his fingers very suddenly, and making it stand up like military
plumes all over his head. His features, though heavily moulded, had no
harsh lines. Their predominant expression was good nature, a kind of
elephantine docility, which neutralized the awe inspired by his immense
size. On his inauguration morning, when the children beheld him marching
slowly through the rows of benches on which they were seated, with a
long, black ruler under his arm, and enthrone himself behind a tall,
green-covered desk, they crouched together and trembled as the frogs did
when King Log plunged in their midst. Though his good-humored
countenance dispersed their terror, they found he was far from
possessing the inaction of the wooden monarch, and that no one could
resist his authority with impunity. He _could_ scold, and then his voice
thundered and reverberated in the ears of the pale delinquent in such a
storm-peal as was never heard before--and he _could_ chastise the
obstinate offender, when reason could not control, most tremendously.
That long, black ruler--what a wand it was! Whenever he was about to use
it as an instrument of punishment, he had a peculiar way of handling it,
which soon taught them to tremble. He would feel the whole length of it
very slowly and carefully as if it were the edge of a razor--then raise
it parallel with the eyes, and closing one, looked at it steadily with
the other. Then lifting it suddenly above his head, he would extend his
broad, left palm, and give himself a blow that would make them all start
from their seats. Of all crimes or vices, none excited his indignation
so much as laziness. It was with him the unpardonable sin. There was
toleration, forgiveness for every one but the _sluggard_. He said
Solomon's description of the slothful should be written in letters of
gold on the walls of the understanding. He explained it to them as a
metaphor, and made them to understand that the field of the sluggard,
overgrown with thorns and nettles, was only an image of the neglected
and uncultivated mind. He gave them Doctor Watts' versification of it to
commit to memory, and repeated it with them in concert. It is not
strange that Mittie, who never came to him with a neglected or imperfect
lesson, should be a great favorite with him, and that he should make her
the _star pupil_ of the school.
Mittie was not afraid of being eclipsed by Helen, in the new sphere on
which she had entered. At home the latter was more petted and caressed,
the object of deeper tenderness, but there she reigned supreme, and the
pet of the household would find herself nothing more than a cipher. She
was mistaken. It was impossible to look upon Helen without interest, and
Master Hightower seemed especially drawn towards her. He bent down till
he overshadowed her with his loftiness, then smiling at the quick
withdrawal of her soft, wild, shy glances, he took her up in his lap as
if she were a plaything, sent for his amusement.
Mittie was not pleased at this, for though she thought herself entirely
too much of a woman to be treated with such endearing familiarity, she
could not bear to see such caresses bestowed on another.
"I wonder," she said to herself, with a darkening countenance, "I wonder
what any one can see in such a little goose as Helen, _to take on_
about? Little simpleton! she's afraid of her own shadow! Never mind!
wait awhile! When he finds out how lazy she is, he'll put her on a
lower, harder seat than his lap."
It was true that Helen soon lost cast with the uncompromising enemy of
idleness. She had fallen into a habit of reverie, which made it
impossible for her to fix her mind on a given lesson. Her imagination
had acquired so much more strength than her other faculties, that she
could not convert the monarch into the vassal. She would try to memorize
the page before her, and resolutely set herself to the task, but the
wing of a snow-bird fluttering by the window, or the buzzing of a fly
round the warm stove, would distract her attention and call up trains of
thought as wild as irrelevant. Sometimes she would bend down her head,
and press both hands upon it, to keep it in an obedient position; but
all in vain!--her vagrant imagination would wander far away to the
confines of the spirit-land.
Master Hightower coaxed, reasoned with her, scolded, threatened, did
every thing but punish. He could not have the heart to apply the black
ruler to that little delicate hand. He could not give a blow to one who
looked up in his face with such soft, deprecating, fearful eyes--but he
grew vexed with the child, and feeling of the edge of his ruler
half-a-dozen times, declared he did not know what to do with her.
One night Mittie lingered behind the rest, and told him that if he would
shut up Helen somewhere alone, _in the dark_, he would have no more
trouble with her; that her father had said that it was the only way to
make her study. It was true that Mr. Gleason had remarked, in a jesting
way, when told of Helen's neglect of her lessons, that he must get Mr.
Hightower to have a dark closet made, and he would have no more trouble;
but he never intended such a cruelty to be inflicted on his child. This
Mittie well knew, but as she had no sympathy with her sister's fears,
she had no compassion for the sufferings they caused. She thought she
deserved punishment, and felt a malicious pleasure in anticipating its
infliction.
Master Hightower had no dark closet, but there was room enough in his
high, dark, capacious desk, for a larger body than the slender, delicate
Helen. He resolved to act upon Mittie's admirable hint, knowing it would
not hurt the child to enclose her awhile in a nice, warm, snug place,
with books and manuscripts for her companions.
Helen heard the threat without alarm, for she believed it uttered in
sport. The pleasant glance of the eye contradicted the severity of the
lips. But Master Hightower was anxious to try the experiment, since all
approved methods had failed, and when the little delinquent blushed and
hung her head, stammering a faint excuse for her slighted task, he said
nothing, but slowly lifting up the lid of his desk, he placed his black
ruler in a perpendicular position, letting the lid rest upon it, forming
an obtuse angle with the desk. Then he piled the books in the back part,
leaving a cavity in front, which looked something like a bower in a
greenwood, for it was lined with baize within and without.
"Come my little lady," said he, taking her up in his arms, "I am going
to try the effect of a little solitary confinement. They say you are not
very fond of the _dark_. Well, I am going to keep you here all night, if
you don't promise to study hereafter."
Helen writhed in his strong grasp, but the worm might as well attempt to
escape from under the giant's heel, as the child from the powerful hold
of the master. He laid her down in the green nest, as if she were a
downy feather, then putting a book between the lid and the desk, to
admit the fresh air, closed the lid and leaned his heavy elbow upon it.
The children laughed at the novelty of the punishment, all but the
orphan child; but when they heard suppressed sobs issuing from the
desk, they checked their mirth, and tears of sympathy stole down the
cheeks of the gentle orphan girl. Mittie's black eyes sparkled with
excitement; she was proud because the master had acted upon her
suggestion, and inflicted a punishment which, though it involved
humiliation, gave no real suffering.
Burning with shame, and shivering with apprehension, Helen lay in her
darkened nook, while the hum of recitation murmured in a dull roaring
sound around her. It was a cold winter's day and she was very warmly
clad, so that she soon experienced a glowing warmth in the confined air
she was breathing. This warmth, so oppressive, and the monotonous sound
stealing in through the aperture of the desk, caused an irresistible
drowsiness, and her eye-lids heavy with the weight of tears,
involuntarily closed. When the master, astonished at the perfect
stillness with which, after awhile, she endured the restraint, softly
peeped within, she was lying in a deep sleep, her head pillowed on her
arm, the tear-drops glittering on her cheeks. Cramped as she was, the
unconscious grace of childhood lent a charm to her position, and her
sable dress, contrasting with the pallor of her complexion, appealed for
compassion and sympathy. The teacher's heart smote him for the coercion
he had used.
"I will not disturb her now," thought he; "she is sleeping so sweetly. I
will take her out when school is dismissed. I think she will remember
this lesson."
Suffering the lid to fall noiselessly on the book, he resumed his tasks,
which were not closed till the last beams of the wintry sun glimmered on
the landscape. The days were now very short, and in his enthusiastic
devotion to his duties, the shades of twilight often gathered around him
unawares.
It was his custom to dismiss his scholars one by one, beginning with the
largest, and winding up with the smallest. It was one of his rules that
they should go directly home, without lingering to play round the door
of the school-house, and they knew the Mede and Persian character of his
laws too well to disobey them. When Mittie went out, making a demure
curtsey at the door, she lingered a little longer than usual, supposing
he would release Helen from her prison house; but Master Hightower was
one of the most absent men in the world, and he had forgotten the
little prisoner in her quiet nest.
"Well," thought Mittie, "I suppose he is going to keep her a while
longer, and she can go home very well without me. I am going to stay all
night with Cherry-cheeks, and if Miss Thusa makes a fuss about her
darling, I shall not be there to hear it."
Master Hightower generally lingered behind his pupils to see that all
was safe, the fire extinguished in the stove, the windows fastened down,
and the shutters next to the street closed. After attending deliberately
to these things, he took down his hat and cloak, drew on his warm woolen
gloves, went out, and locked the door. It was so late that lights were
beginning to gleam through the blinds of many a dwelling-house as he
walked along.
In the meantime, Helen slumbered, unconscious of the solitude in which
she was plunged. When she awoke, she found herself in utter darkness,
and in stillness so deep, it was more appalling than the darkness. She
knew not at first where she was. When she attempted to move, her limbs
ached from their long constraint, and the arm that supported her head
was fast asleep. At length, tossing up her right hand, she felt the
resisting lid, and remembered the punishment she had been enduring. She
tried to spring out, but fell back several times on her sleeping arm,
and it was long before she was able to accomplish her release in the
darkness. She knew not where she was jumping, and fell head first
against the master's high-backed chair. If she was hurt she did not know
it, she was so paralyzed by terror. She could not be alone! They would
not be so cruel as to leave her there the live-long winter's night. They
were only frightening her! Mittie must he hiding there, waiting for her.
_She_ was not afraid of the dark.
"Sister," she whispered. "Sister," she murmured, in a louder tone.
"Where are you? Come and take my hand."
The echo of her own voice sounded fearful, in those silent walls. She
dared not call again. Her eyes, accustomed to the gloom, began to
distinguish the outline of objects. She could see where the long rows of
benches stood, and the windows, all except those next the street, grew
whiter and whiter, for the ground was covered with snow, and some of it
had been drifted against the glass. All at once Helen remembered the
_room_, all dressed in white, and she felt the _cold presence_, which
had so often congealed her heart. Her dead mother seemed before her, in
the horror, yet grandeur, of her last repose. Unable to remain passive
in body, with such travail in her soul, she rushed towards the
door--finding the way with her groping hands. It was locked. She tried
the windows--they were fastened. She shrieked--but there was none to
hear. No! there was no escape--no hope. She must stay there the whole
long, dark night, if she lived, to see the morning's dawn. With the
conviction of the hopelessness of her situation, there arose a feeling,
partly despair and partly resignation. She was very cold, for the fire
had long been extinguished, and she could not find her cloak to cover
her.
She was sure she would freeze to death before morning, and Master
Hightower, when he came to open the school, would see her lying stiff
and frozen on the floor, and be sorry he had been so cruel. Yes! she
would freeze, and it was no matter, for no one cared for her; no one
thought of coming to look for her. Father, brother, Miss Thusa,
Mittie--all had deserted her. Had her mother lived, _she_ would have
remembered her little Helen. The young doctor, he who had been so kind
and good, who had come to her before in the hour of danger, perhaps he
would pity her, if he knew of her being locked up there in loneliness
and darkness.
Several times she heard sleighs driving along, the bells ringing merrily
and loud, and she thought they were going to stop--but they flew swiftly
by. She felt as the mariner feels on a desert island, when he spies a
distant sail, and tries in vain to arrest the vessel, that glides on,
unheeding his signal of distress.
"I will say my prayers," she said, "if I have no bed to lie down on. If
God ever heard me, He will listen now, for I've nobody but Him to go
to."
Kneeling down in the darkness, and folding her hands reverently, while
she lifted them upwards, she softly repeated the prayer her mother had
taught her, and, for the first time, the spirit of it entered her
understanding. When she came to the words--"Give us this day our daily
bread," she paused. "Thou hast given it," she added, "and oh! God, I
thank Thee." When she repeated--"Forgive my sins," she thought of the
sin, for which she was suffering so dreadful a punishment. She had
sinned in disobeying so kind a teacher. She ought to study, instead of
thinking of far-off things. She did not wonder the master was angry with
her. It was her own fault, for he had told her what he was going to do
with her; and if she had not been idle, she might have been at home by a
warm fire, safe in a father's sheltering arms. For the first time she
added something original and spontaneous to the ritual she had learned.
When she had finished the beautiful and sublime doxology, she bowed her
head still lower, and repeated, in accents trembling with penitence and
humility--
"Only take care of me to-night, our Father who art in heaven, and I will
try and sin no more."
Was she indeed left forgotten there, till morning's dawn?
When Master Hightower bent his steps homeward, he was solving a
peripatetic problem of Euclid. When he arrived at his lodgings, seated
himself by the blazing fire, and stretched out his massy limbs to meet
the genial heat, in the luxurious comfort he enjoyed, the cares, the
bustle, the events of the day were forgotten. A smoking supper made him
still more luxuriously comfortable, and a deeper oblivion stole over
him. It was not likely that the fragrant cigar he then lighted as the
crowning blessing of the evening, would recall to his mind the fireless,
supperless, comfortless culprit he had left in such "durance vile."
Combing his hair suddenly with the fingers of his left hand, and leaning
back in a floating position, he watched the smoke-rings, curling above
his head, and fell into a reverie on Natural Philosophy. He was
interrupted by the entrance of Arthur Hazleton, the young doctor.
"I called for the new work on Chemistry, which I lent you some time
since," said Arthur. "Is it perfectly convenient for you to let me have
it now?"
"I am very sorry," replied the master, "I left it in the school-room, in
my desk."
His desk! yes! and he had left something else there too.
"I will go and get it," he cried, starting up, suddenly, his face
reddening to his temples. "I will get it, and carry it over to you."
"No, give me the key of the school-house, and I will spare you the
trouble. It is on my homeward way."
"I _must_ go myself," he replied, cloaking himself with wonderful
celerity, and taking a lantern from the shelf. "You can wait here, till
I return."
"No such thing," said Arthur. "Why should I wait here, when I might be
so far on my way home?"
The master saw that it was in vain to conceal from him the incarceration
of little Helen, an act for which he felt sorry and ashamed; but
thinking she might still be asleep, and that he might abstract the book
without the young doctor being aware of her presence, he strode on in
silence, with a speed almost superhuman.
"You forget what tremendous long limbs you have," exclaimed the young
doctor, breathless, and laughing, "or you would have more mercy on your
less gifted brethren."
"Yes--yes--I do forget," cried his excited companion, unconsciously
betraying his secret, "as that poor little creature knows, to her cost."
"I may as well tell you all about it," he added, answering Arthur's look
of surprise and curiosity, seen by the lantern's gleam--"since I
couldn't keep it to myself."
He then related the punishment he had inflicted on Helen, and how he had
left her, forgotten and alone.
The benevolent heart of the young doctor was not only pained, but
alarmed by the recital. He feared for the effects of this long
imprisonment on a child so exquisitely sensitive and timid.
"You don't know the child," said he, hastening his pace, till even the
master's long strides did not sweep more rapidly over the snowy ground.
"You have made a fatal experiment. I should not be surprised if you made
her a maniac or an idiot."
"Heaven forbid!" cried the conscience-stricken teacher, and his huge
hand trembled on the lock of the door.
"Go in first," said he to Arthur, giving him the lantern. "She will be
less afraid of you than of me."
Arthur opened the door, and shading the lantern, so as to soften its
glare, he went in with cautious steps. A little black figure, with
white hands and white face, was kneeling between the desk and the stove.
The hands were clasped so tightly, they looked as if they had grown
together, and the face had a still, marble look--but life, intensely
burning life was in the large, wild eyes uplifted to his own.
"Helen, my child!" said he, setting the lantern on the stove, and
stooping till his hair, silvered with the night-frost, touched her
cheek.
With a faint but thrilling cry, she sprang forward, and threw her arms
round his neck; and there she clung, sobbing one moment, and laughing
the next, in an ecstasy of joy and gratitude.
"I thought you'd come, if you knew it," she cried.
This implicit confidence in his protection, touched the young man, and
he wrapped his arms more closely round her shivering frame.
"How cold you are!" he exclaimed. "Let me fold my cloak about you, and
put both your hands in mine, they are like pieces of ice."
"Helen, you poor little forlorn lamb," cried a rough, husky voice--and
the sudden eclipse of a great shadow passed over her. "Helen, I did not
mean to leave you here--on my soul I did not. I forgot all about you. As
I hope to be forgiven for my cruelty, it is true. I only meant to keep
you here till school was dismissed--and I have let you stay till you are
starved, and frozen, and almost dead."
"It was my fault," replied Helen, in a meek, subdued tone, "but I'll try
and study better, if you won't shut me up here any more."
"Bless the child!" exclaimed the master, "what a little angel of
goodness she is. You shall have all the sunshine of the broad earth,
after this, for all my shutting out one ray from your sweet face. That's
right--bring her along, doctor, under your cloak, and don't let the
frost bite her nose--I'll carry the lantern."
Wondering that the father had not sought for his lost child, Arthur
carried her home, while the master carefully lighted their slippery
path.
Great was the astonishment of Mr. Gleason, on seeing his little daughter
brought home in such a state, for he imagined her at the fireside of one
of her companions, in company with her sister. Her absence had
consequently created no alarm.
Not all the regret and compunction expressed by Master Hightower could
quell the rising surge of anger in the father's breast. His brow grew
dark, and Miss Thusa's darker still.
"To lock up a poor, little motherless thing, such a night as this!"
muttered she, putting her spectacles, the thermometer of her anger, on
the top of her head. "To leave her there to perish. Why, the wild beasts
themselves would be ashamed of such behaviour, let alone a man."
"Don't, Miss Thusa," whispered Helen, "he is sorry as he can be. I was
bad, too, for I didn't mind him."
"I do not wonder at your displeasure, sir," said the master, turning to
Mr. Gleason, with dignity; "I deserve to feel it, for my unpardonable
forgetfulness. But I must say in my defence, I never should have thought
of such a punishment, had it not been suggested by yourself."
"Suggested by me!" repeated Mr. Gleason, angrily; "I don't know what you
mean, sir!"
"Your eldest daughter brought me a message, to this effect--that you
desired me to try solitary confinement in the dark, as the most
effectual means to bring her to obedience; having no other dark place, I
shut her in my desk, and never having deposited a living bundle there
before, I really think I ought to be pardoned for forgetting her."
"Is it possible my daughter carried such a message to you from _me_,"
cried Mr. Gleason, "I never sent it."
"Just like Mittie," cried Miss Thusa, "she's always doing something to
spite Helen. I heard her say myself once, that she despised her, because
everybody took her part. Take her part--sure enough. The Lord Almighty
knows that a person has to be abused before we _can_ take their part."
"Hush!" exclaimed Mr. Gleason, mortified as this disclosure of Mittie's
unamiable disposition, and shocked at the instance first made known to
him. "This is not a proper time for such remarks; I don't wish to hear
them."
"You ought to hear them, whether you want to or not," continued the
indomitable spinster, "and I don't see any use in palavering the truth.
Master Hightower and Mr. Arthur knows it by this time, and there's no
harm in talking before them. Helen's an uncommon child. She's no more
like other children, than my fine linen thread is like twisted tow. She
won't bear hard pulling or rough handling. Mittie isn't good to her
sister. You ought to have heard Helen's mother talk about it before she
died. She was afraid of worrying you, she was so tender of your
feelings. 'But Miss Thusa,' says she, 'the only thing that keeps me from
being willing to die, is this child;' meaning Helen, to be sure. 'But,
oh, Miss Thusa,' says she, and her eyes filled up with tears, 'watch
over her, for my sake, and see that she is gently dealt by.'"
A long, deep sigh burst from the heart of the widower, sacred to the
memory of his buried wife. Another heaved the ample breast of the master
for the disclosure of his favorite pupil's unamiable traits.
The young doctor sighed, for the evils he saw by anticipation impending
over his little favorite's head. He thought of his gentle mother, his
lovely blind sister, of his sweet, quiet home, and wished that Helen
could be embosomed in its hallowed shades. Young as he was, he felt a
kind of fatherly interest in the child--she had been so often thrown
upon him for sympathy and protection. (His youth may be judged by the
epithet attached to his name. There were several young physicians in the
town, but he was universally known as _the_ young doctor.) From the
first, he was singularly drawn towards the child. He pitied her, for he
saw she had such deep capacities of suffering--he loved her for her
dependence and helplessness, her grateful and confiding disposition. He
wished she were placed in the midst of more genial elements. He feared
less the unnatural unkindness of Mittie, than the devotion and
tenderness of Miss Thusa--for the latter fed, as with burning gas, her
too inflammable imagination.
"The next time I visit home," said the young doctor to himself, "I will
speak to my mother of this interesting child."
When Mittie was brought face to face with her father; he upbraided her
sternly for her falsehood, and for making use of his name as a sanction
for her cruelty.
"You did say so, father!" said she, looking him boldly in the face,
though the color mounted to her brow. "You did say so--and I can prove
it."
"You know what I said was uttered in jest," replied the justly incensed
parent; "that it was never given as a message; that it was said to her,
not you."
"I didn't give it as a message," cried Mittie, undauntedly; "I said that
I had heard you say so--and so I did. Ask Master Hightower, if you don't
believe me."
There was something so insolent in her manner, so defying in her
countenance, that Mr. Gleason, who was naturally passionate, became so
exasperated that he lifted his hand with a threatening gesture, but the
pleading image of his gentle wife rose before him and arrested the
chastisement.
"I cannot punish the child whose mother lies in the grave," said he, in
an agitated tone, suffering his arm to fall relaxed by his side. "But
Mittie, you are making me very unhappy by your misconduct. Tell me why
you dislike your innocent little sister, and delight in giving her pain,
when she is meek and gentle as a lamb?"
"Because you all love her better than you do me," she answered, her
scornful under lip slightly quivering. "Brother Louis don't care for me;
he always gives every thing he has to Helen. Miss Thusa pets her all the
day long, just because she listens to her ugly old stories; and you--and
you, always take her part against me."
"Mittie, don't let me hear you make use of that ridiculous phrase again;
it means nothing, and has a low, vulgar sound. Come here, my daughter--I
thought you did not care about our love." He took her by the hand and
drew her in spite of her resistance, between his knees. Then stroking
back the black and shining hair from her high, bold brow, he added,
"You are mistaken, Mittie, if you do not think that we love you. I love
you with a father's tender affection; I have never given you reason to
doubt it. If I show more love for Helen, it is only because she is
younger, smaller, and winds herself more closely around me by her
loving, affectionate ways; she seems to love me better, to love us all
better. That is the secret, Mittie; it is love; cling to our hearts as
Helen does, and we will never cast you off."
"I can't do as Helen does, for I'm not like her," said Mittie, tossing
back her hair with her own peculiar motion, "and I don't want to be like
her; she's nothing but a coward, though she makes believe half the time,
to be petted, I know she does."
"Incorrigible child;" cried the father, pushing back his chair, rising
and walking the room back and forth, with a sad and clouded brow. He had
many misgivings for the future. The frank, convivial, generous spirit of
Louis would lead him into temptation, when exposed to the influence of
seducing companions. Mittie's jealous and unyielding temper would
embitter the peace of the household; while Helen's morbid sensibility,
like a keen-edged sword in a thin, frail scabbard, threatened to wear
away her young life. What firmness--yea, what gentleness--yea, what
wisdom, what holy Christian principles were requisite for the
responsibilities resting upon him.
"May God guide and sustain me," he cried, pausing and looking upward.
"May I go, sir?" asked Mittie, who had been watching her father's
varying countenance, and felt somewhat awed by the deep solemnity and
sadness that settled upon it. Her manner, if not affectionate was
respectful, and he dismissed her with a gleaming hope that the clue to
her heart's labyrinth--that labyrinth which seemed now closed with an
immovable rock, might yet be discovered.