David made what apology he could for his absence on the arrival of his
guests, and pondered in his heart who it could have been that they
referred to as “the maid,” until he suddenly remembered Miranda, and
inwardly blessed her for her kindliness. It was more than he would have
expected from any member of the Heath household. Miranda’s honest face
among the currant bushes when she had said, “You needn’t be afraid of me,
I’ll keep still,” came to mind. Miranda had evidently scented out the true
state of the case and filled in the breach, taking care not to divulge a
word. He blest her kindly heart and resolved to show his gratitude to her
in some way. Could poor Miranda, sitting supperless in the dark, have but
known his thought, her lonely heart would have fluttered happily. But she
did not, and virtue had to bring its own reward in a sense of duty done.
Then, too, there was a spice of adventure to Miranda’s monotonous life in
what she had done, and she was not altogether sad as she sat and let her
imagination revel in what the Spaffords had said and thought, when they
found the house lighted and supper ready. It was better than playing house
down behind the barn when she was a little girl.
Marcia was the most astonished when she slipped down from her hurried
toilet and found the table decked out in all the house afforded, fairly
groaning under its weight of pickles, preserves, doughnuts, and pie. In
fact, everything that Miranda had found she had put upon that table, and
it is safe to say that the result was not quite as it would have been had
the preparation of the supper been left to Marcia.
She stood before it and looked, and could not keep from laughing softly to
herself at the array of little dishes of things. Marcia thought at first
that one of the aunts must be here, in the parlor, probably entertaining
the guests, and that the supper was a reproof to her for being away when
she should have been at home attending to her duties, but still she was
puzzled. It scarcely seemed like the aunts to set a table in such a
peculiar manner. The best china was set out, it is true, but so many
little bits of things were in separate dishes. There was half a mould of
currant jelly in a large china plate, there was a fresh mould of quince
jelly quivering on a common dish. All over the table in every available
inch there was something. It would not do to call the guests out to a
table like that. What would David say? And yet, if one of the aunts had
set it and was going to stay to tea, would she be hurt? She tiptoed to the
door and listened, but heard no sound save of men’s voices. If an aunt had
been here she was surely gone now and would be none the wiser if a few
dishes were removed.
With swift fingers Marcia weeded out the things, and set straight those
that were to remain, and then made the tea. She was so quick about it
David had scarcely time to begin to worry because supper was not announced
before she stood in the parlor door, shy and sweet, with a brilliant color
in her cheeks. His little comrade, David felt her to be, and again it
struck him that she was beautiful as he arose to introduce her to the
guests. He saw their open admiration as they greeted her, and he found
himself wondering what they would have thought of Kate, wild-rose Kate
with her graceful witching ways. A tinge of sadness came into his face,
but something suggested to him the thought that Marcia was even more
beautiful than Kate, more like a half-blown bud of a thing. He wondered
that he had never noticed before how her eyes shone. He gave her a
pleasant smile as they passed into the hall, which set the color flaming
in her cheeks again. David seemed different somehow, and that lonely,
set-apart feeling that she had had ever since she came here to live was
gone. David was there and he understood, at least a little bit, and they
had something,—just something, even though it was but a few minutes in a
lonely woods and some gentle words of his,—to call their very own
together. At least that experience did not belong to Kate, never had been
hers, and could not have been borrowed from her. Marcia sighed a happy
sigh as she took her seat at the table.
The talk ran upon Andrew Jackson, and some utterances of his in his last
message to Congress. The elder of the two gentlemen expressed grave fears
that a mistake had been made in policy and that the country would suffer.
Governor Clinton was mentioned and his policy discussed. But all this talk
was familiar to Marcia. Her father had been interested in public affairs
always, and she had been brought up to listen to discussions deep and
long, and to think about such things for herself. When she was quite a
little girl her father had made her read the paper aloud to him, from one
end to the other, as he lay back in his big chair with his eyes closed and
his shaggy brows drawn thoughtfully into a frown. Sometimes as she read he
would burst forth with a tirade against this or that man or set of men who
were in opposition to his own pronounced views, and he would pour out a
lengthy reply to little Marcia as she sat patient, waiting for a chance to
go on with her reading. As she grew older she became proud of the
distinction of being her father’s _confidante_ politically, and she was
able to talk on such matters as intelligently and as well if not better
than most of the men who came to the house. It was a position which no one
disputed with her. Kate had been much too full of her own plans and Madam
Schuyler too busy with household affairs to bother with politics and
newspapers, so Marcia had always been the one called upon to read when her
father’s eyes were tired. As a consequence she was far beyond other girls
of her age in knowledge on public affairs. Well she knew what Andrew
Jackson thought about the tariff, and about the system of canals, and
about improvements in general. She knew which men in Congress were opposed
to and which in favor of certain bills. All through the struggle for
improvements in New York state she had been an eager observer. The
minutest detail of the Erie canal project had interested her, and she was
never without her own little private opinion in the matter, which,
however, seldom found voice except in her eager eyes, whose listening
lights would have been an inspiration to the most eloquent speaker.
Therefore, Marcia as she sat behind her sprigged china teacups and
demurely poured tea, was taking in all that had been said, and she drew
her breath quickly in a way she had when she was deeply excited, as at
last the conversation neared the one great subject of interest which to
her seemed of most importance in the country at the present day, the
project of a railroad run by steam.
Nothing was too great for Marcia to believe. Her father had been inclined
to be conservative in great improvements. He had favored the Erie canal,
though had feared it would be impossible to carry so great a project
through, and Marcia in her girlish mind had rejoiced with a joy that to
her was unspeakable when it had been completed and news had come that many
packets were travelling day and night upon the wonderful new water way.
There had been a kind of triumph in her heart to think that men who could
study out these big schemes and plan it all, had been able against so
great odds to carry out their project and prove to all unbelievers that it
was not only possible but practicable.
Marcia’s brain was throbbing with the desire for progress. If she were a
man with money and influence she felt she would so much like to go out
into the world and make stupid people do the things for the country that
ought to be done. Progress had been the keynote of her upbringing, and she
was teeming with energy which she had no hope could ever be used to help
along that for which she felt her ambitions rising. She wanted to see the
world alive, and busy, the great cities connected with one another. She
longed to have free access to cities, to great libraries, to pictures, to
wonderful music. She longed to meet great men and women, the men and women
who were making the history of the world, writing, speaking, and doing
things that were moulding public opinion. Reforms of all sorts were what
helped along and made possible her desires. Why did not the people want a
steam railroad? Why were they so ready to say it could never succeed, that
it would be an impossibility; that the roads could not be made strong
enough to bear so great weights and so constant wear and tear? Why did
they interpose objections to every suggestion made by inventors and
thinking men? Why did even her dear father who was so far in advance of
his times in many ways, why did even he too shake his head and say that he
feared it would never be in this country, at least not in his day, that it
was impracticable?
The talk was very interesting to Marcia. She ate bits of her biscuit
without knowing, and she left her tea untasted till it was cold. The
younger of the two guests was talking. His name was Jervis. Marcia thought
she had heard the name somewhere, but had not yet placed him in her mind:
“Yes,” said he, with an eager look on his face, “it is coming, it is
coming sooner than they think. Oliver Evans said, you know, that good
roads were all we could expect one generation to do. The next must make
canals, the next might build a railroad which should run by horse power,
and perhaps the next would run a railroad by steam. But we shall not have
to wait so long. We shall have steam moving railway carriages before
another year.”
“What!” said David, “you don’t mean it! Have you really any foundation for
such a statement?” He leaned forward, his eyes shining and his whole
attitude one of deep interest. Marcia watched him, and a great pride began
to glow within her that she belonged to him. She looked at the other men.
Their eyes were fixed upon David with heightening pleasure and pride.
The older man watched the little tableau a moment and then he explained:
“The Mohawk and Hudson Company have just made an engagement with Mr.
Jervis as chief engineer of their road. He expects to run that road by
steam!”
He finished his fruit cake and preserves under the spell of astonishment
he had cast upon his host and hostess.
David and Marcia turned simultaneously toward Mr. Jervis for a
confirmation of this statement. Mr. Jervis smiled in affirmation.
“But will it not be like all the rest, no funds?” asked David a trifle
sadly. “It may be years even yet before it is really started.”
But Mr. Jervis’ face was reassuring.
“The contract is let for the grading. In fact work has already begun. I
expect to begin laying the track by next Spring, perhaps sooner. As soon
as the track is laid we shall show them.”
David’s eyes shone and he reached out and grasped the hand of the man who
had the will and apparently the means of accomplishing this great thing
for the country.
“It will make a wonderful change in the whole land,” said David musingly.
He had forgotten to eat. His face was aglow and a side of his nature which
Marcia did not know was uppermost. Marcia saw the man, the thinker, the
writer, the former of public opinion, the idealist. Heretofore David had
been to her in the light of her sister’s lover, a young man of promise,
but that was all. Now she saw something more earnest, and at once it was
revealed to her what a man he was, a man like her father. David’s eyes
were suddenly drawn to meet hers. He looked on Marcia and seemed to be
sharing his thought with her, and smiled a smile of comradeship. He felt
all at once that she could and would understand his feelings about this
great new enterprise, and would be glad too. It pleased him to feel this.
It took a little of his loneliness away. Kate would never have been
interested in these things. He had never expected such sympathy from her.
She had been something beautiful and apart from his world, and as such he
had adored her. But it was pleasant to have some one who could understand
and feel as he did. Just then he was not thinking of his lost Kate. So he
smiled and Marcia felt the glow of warmth from his look and returned it,
and the two visitors knew that they were among friends who understood and
sympathized.
“Yes, it will make a change,” said the older man. “I hope I may live to
see at least a part of it.”
“If you succeed there will be many others to follow. The land will soon be
a network of railroads,” went on David, still musing.
“We shall succeed!” said Mr. Jervis, closing his lips firmly in a way that
made one sure he knew whereof he spoke.
“And now tell me about it,” said David, with his most engaging smile, as a
child will ask to have a story. David could be most fascinating when he
felt he was in a sympathetic company. At other times he was wont to be
grave, almost to severity. But those who knew him best and had seen him
thus melted into child-like enthusiasm, felt his lovableness as the others
never dreamed.
The table talk launched into a description of the proposed road, the road
bed, the manner of laying the rails, their thickness and width, and the
way of bolting them down to the heavy timbers that lay underneath. It was
all intensely fascinating to Marcia. Mr. Jervis took knives and forks to
illustrate and then showed by plates and spoons how they were fastened
down.
David asked a question now and then, took out his note book and wrote down
some things. The two guests were eager and plain in their answers. They
wanted David to write it up. They wanted the information to be accurate
and full.
“The other day I saw a question in a Baltimore paper, sent in by a
subscriber, ‘What is a railroad?’” said the old gentleman, “and the
editor’s reply was, ‘Can any of our readers answer this question and tell
us what is a railroad?’”
There was a hearty laugh over the unenlightened unbelievers who seemed to
be only too willing to remain in ignorance of the march of improvement.
David finally laid down his note book, feeling that he had gained all the
information he needed at present. “I have much faith in you and your
skill, but I do not quite see how you are going to overcome all the
obstacles. How, for instance, are you going to overcome the inequalities
in the road? Our country is not a flat even one like those abroad where
the railroad has been tried. There are sharp grades, and many curves will
be necessary,” said he.
Mr. Jervis had shoved his chair back from the table, but now he drew it up
again sharply and began to move the dishes back from his place, a look of
eagerness gleaming in his face.
Once again the dishes and cups were brought into requisition as the
engineer showed a crude model, in china and cutlery, of an engine he
proposed to have constructed, illustrating his own idea about a truck for
the forward wheels which should move separately from the back wheels and
enable the engine to conform to curves more readily.
Marcia sat with glowing cheeks watching the outline of history that was to
be, not knowing that the little model before her, made from her own
teacups and saucers, was to be the model for all the coming engines of the
many railroads of the future.
Finally the chairs were pushed back, and yet the talk went on. Marcia
slipped silently about conveying the dishes away. And still the guests sat
talking. She could hear all they said even when she was in the kitchen
washing the china, for she did it very softly and never a clink hid a
word. They talked of Governor Clinton again and of his attitude toward the
railroad. They spoke of Thurlow Weed and a number of others whose names
were familiar to Marcia in the papers she had read to her father. They
told how lately on the Baltimore and Ohio railroad Peter Cooper had
experimented with a little locomotive, and had beaten a gray horse
attached to another car.
Marcia smiled brightly as she listened, and laid the delicate china teapot
down with care lest she should lose a word. But ever with her interest in
the march of civilization, there were other thoughts mingling. Thoughts of
David and of how he would be connected with it all. He would write it up
and be identified with it. He was brave enough to face any new movement.
David’s paper was a temperance paper. There were not many temperance
papers in those days. David was brave. He had already faced a number of
unpleasant circumstances in consequence. He was not afraid of sneers or
sarcasms, nor of being called a fanatic. He had taken such a stand that
even those who were opposed had to respect him. Marcia felt the joy of a
great pride in David to-night.
She sang a happy little song at the bottom of her heart as she worked. The
new railroad was an assured thing, and David was her comrade, that was the
song, and the refrain was, “David, David, David!”
Later, after the guests had talked themselves out and taken their candles
to their rooms, David with another comrade’s smile, and a look in his eyes
that saw visions of the country’s future, and for this one night at least
promised not to dream of the past, bade her good night.
She went up to her white chamber and lay down upon the pillow, whose case
was fragrant of lavendar blossoms, dreaming with a smile of to-morrow. She
thought she was riding in a strange new railroad train with David’s arm
about her and Harry Temple running along at his very best pace to try to
catch them, but he could not.
Miranda, at her supperless window, watched the evening hours and thought
many thoughts. She wondered why they stayed in the dining room so late,
and why they did not go into the parlor and make Marcia play the “music
box” as she called it; and why there was a light so long in that back
chamber over the kitchen. Could it be they had put one of the guests
there? Surely not. Perhaps that was David’s study. Perhaps he was writing.
Ah! She had guessed aright. David was sitting up to write while the
inspiration was upon him.
But Miranda slept and ceased to wonder long before David’s light was
extinguished, and when he finally lay down it was with a body healthily
weary, and a mind for the time free from any intruding thought of himself
and his troubles.
He had written a most captivating article that would appear in his paper
in a few days, and which must convince many doubters that a railroad was
at last an established fact among them.
There were one or two points which he must ask the skilled engineer in the
morning, but as he reviewed what he had written he felt a sense of deep
satisfaction, and a true delight in his work. His soul thrilled with the
power of his gift. He loved it, exulted in it. It was pleasant to feel
that delight in his work once more. He had thought since his marriage that
it was gone forever, but perhaps by and by it would return to console him,
and he would be able to do greater things in the world because of his
suffering.
Just as he dropped to sleep there came a thought of Marcia, pleasantly, as
one remembers a flower. He felt that there was a comfort about Marcia, a
something helpful in her smile. There was more to her than he had
supposed. She was not merely a child. How her face had glowed as the men
talked of the projected railroad, and almost she seemed to understand as
they described the proposed engine with its movable trucks. She would be a
companion who would be interested in his pursuits. He had hoped to teach
Kate to understand his life work and perhaps help him some, but Kate was
by nature a butterfly, a bird of gay colors, always on the wing. He would
not have wanted her to be troubled with deep thoughts. Marcia seemed to
enjoy such things. What if he should take pains to teach her, read with
her, help cultivate her mind? It would at least be an occupation for
leisure hours, something to interest him and keep away the awful pall of
sadness.
How sweet she had looked as she lay asleep in the woods with the tears on
her cheek like the dew-drops upon a rose petal! She was a dear little girl
and he must take care of her and protect her. That scoundrel Temple! What
were such men made for? He must settle him to-morrow.
And so he fell asleep.