Anna Prince's quick ear. She seemed to know that the young man and her
aunt were exchanging looks of surprise, and that they felt insecure
and uncertain. It was not the yielding maiden who had spoken to her
lover, but the girl who was his good comrade and cordial friend. The
elder woman shook her head doubtfully; she knew well what this
foreboded, and was impatient at the overthrow of her plans; yet she
had full confidence in the power of Love. She had seen apparent
self-reliance before, and she could not believe that her niece was
invincible. At any rate nothing could be more persuasive than a
twilight row upon the river, and for her part, she hoped more eagerly
than ever that Love would return chief in command of the boat's young
crew; and when the young man flushed a little, and looked at her
appealingly, as he turned to go down the street, his friend and
counselor could not resist giving him a hopeful nod. Nan was
singularly frank, and free from affectations, and she might have
already decided to lower her colors and yield the victory, and it
seemed for a moment that it would be much more like her to do so, than
to invite further contest when she was already won. Miss Prince was
very kind and sympathetic when this explanation had once forced itself
upon her mind; she gave the young girl a most affectionate kiss when
she appeared, but at this unmistakable suggestion of pleasure and
treasured hopes, Nan turned back suddenly into the shaded parlor,
though Mr. Gerry was waiting outside with his favorite oars, which he
kept carefully in a corner of the office.
"Dear Aunt Nancy," said the girl, with evident effort, "I am so sorry
to disappoint you. I wish for your sake that I had been another sort
of woman; but I shall never marry. I know you think I am wrong, but
there is something which always tells me I am right, and I must follow
another way. I should only wreck my life, and other people's. Most
girls have an instinct towards marrying, but mine is all against it,
and God knew best when He made me care more for another fashion of
life. Don't make me seem unkind! I dare say that I can put it all into
words better by and by, but I can never be more certain of it in my
own heart than now."
"Sit down a minute," said Miss Prince, slowly. "George can wait. But,
Anna, I believe that you are in love with him, and that you are doing
wrong to the poor lad, and to yourself, and to me. I lost the best
happiness of my life for a whim, and you wish to throw away yours for
a theory. I hope you will be guided by me. I have come to love you
very much, and it seems as if this would be so reasonable."
"It does make a difference to me that he loves me," confessed the
girl. "It is not easy to turn away from him," she said,--still
standing, and looking taller than ever, and even thin, with a curious
tenseness of her whole being. "It is something that I have found it
hard to fight against, but it is not my whole self longing for his
love and his companionship. If I heard he had gone to the other side
of the world for years and years, I should be glad now and not sorry.
I know that all the world's sympathy and all tradition fight on his
side; but I can look forward and see something a thousand times better
than being his wife, and living here in Dunport keeping his house, and
trying to forget all that nature fitted me to do. You don't
understand, Aunt Nancy. I wish you could! You see it all another way."
And the tears started to the eager young eyes. "Don't you know that
Cousin Walter said this very day that the wind which sets one vessel
on the right course may set another on the wrong?"
"Nonsense, my dear," said the mistress of the house. "I don't think
this is the proper time for you to explain yourself at any rate. I
dare say the fresh air will do you good and put everything right too.
You have worked yourself into a great excitement over nothing. Don't
go out looking so desperate to the poor fellow; he will think
strangely of it;" and the girl went out through the wide hall, and
wished she were far away from all this trouble.
Nan had felt a strange sense of weariness, which did not leave her
even when she was quieted by the fresh breeze of the river-shore, and
was contented to let her oars be stowed in the bottom of the boat, and
to take the comfortable seat in the stern. She pulled the tiller ropes
over her shoulders, and watched her lover's first strong strokes,
which had quickly sent them out into the stream, beyond the course of
a larger craft which was coming toward the wharf. She wished presently
that she had chosen to row, because they would not then be face to
face; but, strange to say, since this new experience had come to her,
she had not felt so sure of herself as now, and the fear of finding
herself too weak to oppose the new tendency of her life had lessened
since her first recognition of it the night before. But Nan had fought
a hard fight, and had grown a great deal older in those hours of the
day and night. She believed that time would make her even more certain
that she had done right than she could be now in the heat of the
battle, but she wished whatever George Gerry meant to say to her might
be soon over with.
They went slowly up the river, which was now quite familiar to the
girl who had come to it a stranger only a few weeks before. She liked
out-of-door life so well that this countryside of Dunport was already
more dear to her than to many who had seen it bloom and fade every
year since they could remember. At one moment it seemed but yesterday
that she had come to the old town, and at the next she felt as if she
had spent half a lifetime there, and as if Oldfields might have
changed unbearably since she came away.
Sometimes the young oarsman kept in the middle of the great stream,
and sometimes it seemed pleasanter to be near the shore. The midsummer
flowers were coming into blossom, and the grass and trees had long
since lost the brilliance of their greenness, and wore a look of
maturity and completion, as if they had already finished their growth.
There was a beautiful softness and harmony of color, a repose that one
never sees in a spring landscape. The tide was in, the sun was almost
down, and a great, cloudless, infinite sky arched itself from horizon
to horizon. It had sent all its brilliance to shine backward from the
sun,--the glowing sphere from which a single dazzling ray came across
the fields and the water to the boat. In a moment more it was gone,
and a shadow quickly fell like that of a tropical twilight; but the
west grew golden, and one light cloud, like a floating red feather,
faded away upward into the sky. A later bright glow touched some high
hills in the east, then they grew purple and gray, and so the evening
came that way slowly, and the ripple of the water plashed and sobbed
against the boat's side; and presently in the midst of the river's
inland bay, after a few last eager strokes, the young man drew in his
oars, letting them drop with a noise which startled Nan, who had
happened to be looking over her shoulder at the shore.
She knew well enough that he meant to put a grave question to her now,
and her heart beat faster and she twisted the tiller cords around her
hands unconsciously.
"I think I could break any bonds you might use to keep yourself away
from me," he said hurriedly, as he watched her. "I am not fit for you,
only that I love you. Somebody told me you meant to go away, and I
could not wait any longer before I asked you if you would give
yourself to me."
"No, no!" cried Nan, "dear friend, I must not do it; it would all be a
mistake. You must not think of it any more. I am so sorry, I ought to
have understood what was coming to us, and have gone away long ago."
"It would have made no difference," said the young man, almost
angrily. He could not bear delay enough even for speech at that
moment; he watched her face desperately for a look of assurance; he
leaned toward her and wondered why he had not risked everything, and
spoken the evening before when they stood watching the ship's mast,
and Nan's hands were close enough to be touched. But the miserable
knowledge crept over him that she was a great deal farther away from
him than half that small boat's length, and as she looked up at him
again, and shook her head gently, a great rage of love and shame at
his repulse urged him to plead again. "You are spoiling my life," he
cried. "You do not care for that, but without you I shall not care for
anything."
"I would rather spoil your life in this way than in a far worse
fashion," said Nan sadly. "I will always be your friend, but if I
married you I might seem by and by to be your enemy. Yes, you will
love somebody else some day, and be a great deal happier than I could
have made you, and I shall be so glad. It does not belong to me."
But this seemed too scornful and cold-hearted. "Oh, my love is only
worth that to you," the lover said. "You shall know better what it
means. I don't want you for my friend, but for my own to keep and to
have. It makes me laugh to think of your being a doctor and going back
to that country town to throw yourself away for the fancies and silly
theories of a man who has lived like a hermit. It means a true life
for both of us if you will only say you love me, or even let me ask
you again when you have thought of it more. Everybody will say I am in
the right."
"Yes, there are reasons enough for it, but there is a better reason
against it. If you love me you must help me do what is best," said
Nan. "I shall miss you and think of you more than you know when I am
away. I never shall forget all these pleasant days we have been
together. Oh George!" she cried, in a tone that thrilled him through
and through, "I hope you will be friends with me again by and by. You
will know then I have done right because it is right and will prove
itself. If it is wrong for me I couldn't really make you happy; and
over all this and beyond it something promises me and calls me for a
life that my marrying you would hinder and not help. It isn't that I
shouldn't be so happy that it is not easy to turn away even from the
thought of it; but I know that the days would come when I should see,
in a way that would make me long to die, that I had lost the true
direction of my life and had misled others beside myself. You don't
believe me, but I cannot break faith with my duty. There are many
reasons that have forbidden me to marry, and I have a certainty as
sure as the stars that the only right condition of life for me is to
follow the way that everything until now has pointed out. The great
gain and purpose of my being alive is there; and I must not mind the
blessings that I shall have to do without."
He made a gesture of impatience and tried to interrupt her, but she
said quickly, as if to prevent his speaking: "Listen to me. I can't
help speaking plainly. I would not have come with you this afternoon,
only I wished to make you understand me entirely. I have never since I
can remember thought of myself and my life in any way but
unmarried,--going on alone to the work I am fit to do. I do care for
you. I have been greatly surprised and shaken because I found how
strongly something in me has taken your part, and shown me the
possibility of happiness in a quiet life that should centre itself in
one man's love, and within the walls of his home. But something tells
me all the time that I could not marry the whole of myself as most
women can; there is a great share of my life which could not have its
way, and could only hide itself and be sorry. I know better and better
that most women are made for another sort of existence, but by and by
I must do my part in my own way to make many homes happy instead of
one; to free them from pain, and teach grown people and little
children to keep their bodies free from weakness and deformities. I
don't know why God should have made me a doctor, so many other things
have seemed fitter for women; but I see the blessedness of such a
useful life more and more every year, and I am very thankful for such
a trust. It is a splendid thing to have the use of any gift of God. It
isn't for us to choose again, or wonder and dispute, but just work in
our own places, and leave the rest to God."
The boat was being carried downward by the ebbing tide, and George
Gerry took the oars again, and rowed quietly and in silence. He took
his defeat unkindly and drearily; he was ashamed of himself once,
because some evil spirit told him that he was losing much that would
content him, in failing to gain this woman's love. It had all been so
fair a prospect of worldly success, and she had been the queen of it.
He thought of himself growing old in Mr. Sergeant's dusty office, and
that this was all that life could hold for him. Yet to be was better
than to have. Alas! if he had been more earnest in his growth, it
would have been a power which this girl of high ideals could have been
held and mastered by. No wonder that she would not give up her dreams
of duty and service, since she had found him less strong than such
ideals. The fancied dissatisfaction and piteousness of failure which
she would be sure to meet filled his heart with dismay; yet, at that
very next moment, resent it as he might, the certainty of his own
present defeat and powerlessness could not be misunderstood. Perhaps,
after all, she knew what was right; her face wore again the look he
had feared to disturb the night before, and his whole soul was filled
with homage in the midst of its sorrow, because this girl, who had
been his merry companion in the summer holidays, so sweet and familiar
and unforgetable in the midst of the simple festivals, stood nearer to
holier things than himself, and had listened to the call of God's
messengers to whom his own doors had been ignorantly shut. And Nan
that night was a soul's physician, though she had been made to sorely
hurt her patient before the new healthfulness could well begin.
They floated down the river and tried to talk once or twice, but there
were many spaces of silence, and as they walked along the paved
streets, they thought of many things. An east wind was blowing in from
the sea, and the elm branches were moving restlessly overhead. "It
will all be better to-morrow," said Nan, as they stood on the steps at
last. "You must come to see Aunt Nancy very often after I have gone,
for she will be lonely. And do come in the morning as if nothing had
been spoken. I am so sorry. Good-night, and God bless you," she
whispered; and when she stood inside the wide doorway, in the dark,
she listened to his footsteps as he went away down the street. They
were slower than usual, but she did not call him back.
XXI
AT HOME AGAIN
In Oldfields Dr. Leslie had outwardly lived the familiar life to which
his friends and patients had long since accustomed themselves; he had
seemed a little preoccupied, perhaps, but if that were observed, it
was easily explained by his having one or two difficult cases to think
about. A few persons suspected that he missed Nan, and was, perhaps, a
little anxious lest her father's people in Dunport should claim her
altogether. Among those who knew best the doctor and his ward there
had been an ardent championship of Nan's rights and dignity, and a
great curiosity to know the success of the visit. Dr. Leslie had
answered all questions with composure, and with a distressing
meagreness of details; but at length Mrs. Graham became sure that he
was not altogether free from anxiety, and set her own quick wits at
work to learn the cause. It seemed a time of great uncertainty, at any
rate. The doctor sometimes brought one of Nan's bright, affectionate
letters for his neighbor to read, and they agreed that this holiday
was an excellent thing for her, but there was a silent recognition of
the fact that this was a critical time in the young girl's history;
that it either meant a new direction of her life or an increased
activity in the old one. Mrs. Graham was less well than usual in these
days, and the doctor found time to make more frequent visits than
ever, telling himself that she missed Nan's pleasant companionship,
but really wishing as much to receive sympathy as to give it. The dear
old lady had laughingly disclaimed any desire to summon her children
or grandchildren, saying that she was neither ill enough to need them,
nor well enough to enjoy them; and so in the beautiful June weather
the two old friends became strangely dear to each other, and had many
a long talk which the cares of the world or their own reserve had made
them save until this favoring season.
The doctor was acknowledged to be an old man at last, though everybody
still insisted that he looked younger than his age, and could not
doubt that he had half a lifetime of usefulness before him yet. But it
makes a great difference when one's ambitions are transferred from
one's own life to that of a younger person's; and while Dr. Leslie
grew less careful for himself, trusting to the unconscious certainty
of his practiced skill, he pondered eagerly over Nan's future,
reminding himself of various hints and suggestions, which must be
added to her equipment. Sometimes he wished that she were beginning a
few years later, when her position could be better recognized and
respected, and she would not have to fight against so much of the
opposition and petty fault-finding that come from ignorance; and
sometimes he rejoiced that his little girl, as he fondly called her,
would be one of the earlier proofs and examples of a certain noble
advance and new vantage-ground of civilization. This has been
anticipated through all ages by the women who, sometimes honored and
sometimes persecuted, have been drawn away from home life by a
devotion to public and social usefulness. It must be recognized that
certain qualities are required for married, and even domestic life,
which all women do not possess; but instead of attributing this to the
disintegration of society, it must be acknowledged to belong to its
progress.
So long as the visit in Dunport seemed to fulfill its anticipated
purpose, and the happy guest was throwing aside her cares and enjoying
the merry holiday and the excitement of new friendships and of her
uncommon position, so long the doctor had been glad, and far from
impatient to have the visit end. But when he read the later and
shorter letters again and again in the vain hope of finding something
in their wording which should explain the vague unhappiness which had
come to him as he had read them first, he began to feel troubled and
dismayed. There was something which Nan had not explained; something
was going wrong. He was sure that if it were anything he could set
right, that she would have told him. She had always done so; but it
became evident through the strange sympathy which made him conscious
of the mood of others that she was bent upon fighting her way alone.
It was a matter of surprise, and almost of dismay to him early one
morning, when he received a brief note from her which told him only
that she should be at home late that afternoon. It seemed to the wise
old doctor a day of most distressing uncertainty. He tried to make up
his mind to accept with true philosophy whatever decision she was
bringing him. "Nan is a good girl," he told himself over and over
again; "she will try to do right." But she was so young and so
generous, and whether she had been implored to break the old ties of
home life and affection for her aunt's sake, or whether it was a newer
and stronger influence still which had prevailed, waited for
explanation. Alas, as was written once, it is often the higher nature
that yields, because it is the most generous. The doctor knew well
enough the young girl's character. He knew what promises of growth and
uncommon achievement were all ready to unfold themselves,--for what
great uses she was made. He could not bear the thought of her being
handicapped in the race she had been set to run. Yet no one recognized
more clearly than he the unseen, and too often unconsidered, factor
which is peculiar to each soul, which prevents any other intelligence
from putting itself exactly in that soul's place, so that our
decisions and aids and suggestions are never wholly sufficient or
available for those even whom we love most. He went over the question
again and again; he followed Nan in his thoughts as she had grown
up,--unprejudiced, unconstrained as is possible for any human being to
be. He remembered that her heroes were the great doctors, and that her
whole heart had been stirred and claimed by the noble duties and needs
of the great profession. She had been careless of the social
limitations, of the lack of sympathy, even of the ridicule of the
public. She had behaved as a bird would behave if it were assured by
beasts and fishes that to walk and to swim were the only proper and
respectable means of getting from place to place. She had shown such
rare insight into the principles of things; she had even seemed to
him, as he watched her, to have anticipated experience, and he could
not help believing that it was within her power to add much to the too
small fund of certainty, by the sure instinct and aim of her
experiment. It counted nothing whether God had put this soul into a
man's body or a woman's. He had known best, and He meant it to be the
teller of new truth, a revealer of laws, and an influence for good in
its capacity for teaching, as well as in its example of pure and
reasonable life.
But the old doctor sighed, and told himself that the girl was most
human, most affectionate; it was not impossible that, in spite of her
apparent absence of certain domestic instincts, they had only lain
dormant and were now awake. He could not bear that she should lose any
happiness which might be hers; and the tender memory of the blessed
companionship which had been withdrawn from his mortal sight only to
be given back to him more fully as he had lived closer and nearer to
spiritual things, made him shrink from forbidding the same sort of
fullness and completion of life to one so dear as Nan. He tried to
assure himself that while a man's life is strengthened by his domestic
happiness, a woman's must either surrender itself wholly, or
relinquish entirely the claims of such duties, if she would achieve
distinction or satisfaction elsewhere. The two cannot be taken
together in a woman's life as in a man's. One must be made of lesser
consequence, though the very natures of both domestic and professional
life need all the strength which can be brought to them. The decision
between them he knew to be a most grave responsibility, and one to be
governed by the gravest moral obligations, and the unmistakable
leadings of the personal instincts and ambitions. It was seldom, Dr.
Leslie was aware, that so typical and evident an example as this could
offer itself of the class of women who are a result of natural
progression and variation, not for better work, but for different
work, and who are designed for certain public and social duties. But
he believed this class to be one that must inevitably increase with
the higher developments of civilization, and in later years, which he
might never see, the love for humanity would be recognized and
employed more intelligently; while now almost every popular prejudice
was against his ward, then she would need no vindication. The wielder
of ideas has always a certain advantage over the depender upon facts;
and though the two classes of minds by no means inevitably belong, the
one to women, and the other to men, still women have not yet begun to
use the best resources of their natures, having been later developed,
and in many countries but recently freed from restraining and
hindering influences.
The preservation of the race is no longer the only important question;
the welfare of the individual will be considered more and more. The
simple fact that there is a majority of women in any centre of
civilization means that some are set apart by nature for other uses
and conditions than marriage. In ancient times men depended entirely
upon the women of their households to prepare their food and
clothing,--and almost every man in ordinary circumstances of life was
forced to marry for this reason; but already there is a great change.
The greater proportion of men and women everywhere will still
instinctively and gladly accept the high duties and helps of married
life; but as society becomes more intelligent it will recognize the
fitness of some persons, and the unfitness of others, making it
impossible for these to accept such responsibilities and obligations,
and so dignify and elevate home life instead of degrading it.