"YOU MUST WAIT AND SEE."
"How can you leave Miss Martell?" asked Lottie, as Hemstead approached
propitiatingly with a large armful of the choicest evergreens.
"Well, I can," he replied with a smile.
"As yet, but the next time you will stay longer, and the next longer
still."
"That depends. I would not remain at her side, nor at any one's,
if I thought they were tiring of me a little."
"O, she got tired of you."
"Well, yes; a little, I think. She suddenly seemed to lose her
interest in the conversation. Still she was very good to talk to
me as long and as kindly as she did. She is a very superior woman.
It has never been my good fortune to meet just such a lady before."
"Make the most of your rare 'good fortune.'"
"I have."
"And now that she is tired of you, you come back to me as a dernier
ressort."
"Coming back to you, is like coming back home, for you have given
me the only home-like feeling that I have had during my visit."
The language of coquetry was to Lottie like her mother-tongue, and
she fell into it as naturally as she breathed. Only now, instead
of suggesting the false hope that he had been missed and she had
cared, it expressed her true feeling, for she did care.
De Forrest now returned from a momentary absence, and had it not
been for his garrulity the little group would have been a rather
silent one. Both young men sought to supply Lottie with the sprays
of green that she was twining. She took the evergreens chiefly from
De Forrest's hands, but gave her thoughts and eyes to Hemstead. He,
with man's usual penetration, thought De Forrest the favored one,
and was inclined to reverse his half-formed opinion that she was
destined to pathetic martyrdom, because bound by an engagement to
a man whom she could not love.
"He can't think much of me," thought Lottie, with a sigh, "or he
couldn't speak so frankly." She, too, was losing her wonted quick
discernment.
Only lynx-eyed Bel Parton partially surmised the truth, and suspected
that Lottie was developing a genuine, though of course a passing
interest, in the student whom at first she had purposed to beguile
in mere reckless sport.
During the remainder of the afternoon and evening, De Forrest was
Lottie's shadow, and she could escape him, and be with Hemstead, only
by remaining with all the others. She was longing for another of
their suggestive talks, when, without the restraint of the curious
and unsympathetic, they could continue the theme that De Forrest
had interrupted on Sunday afternoon.
She was thinking how to bring this about, when the old plan of
visiting Mrs. Dlimm occurred to her, and she adopted it at once.
Getting a moment aside with Hemstead, by being down to breakfast a
little before the others, she said, "After my naughty behavior in
regard to our visit to Mrs. Dlimm, will you still take me there?"
"I wish you would give me a chance," he answered eagerly.
"Well, I will, at ten this morning. But please say nothing about it.
Drive to the door in the cutter, and I will be ready. If the matter
is discussed, there may be half a dozen other projects started."
Hemstead ate but an indifferent breakfast, and there was also a
faint glow of expectant excitement in Lottie's face.
Hemstead promptly sought his aunt, and asked if he might have a
horse and the single sleigh.
"I hope another time will answer," said Mrs. Marchmont, carelessly.
"Addie wishes the horses this morning, but I believe proposes taking
you all out."
But Hemstead was not to be baffled, and acted with more energy than
prudence perhaps. Lottie from her window saw him posting with long
strides towards the village, and exultingly surmised his object.
At ten he drove up to the door with a neat little turnout from the
livery stable; and she tripped down and took a seat at his side,
and they were off before the rest of the household realized their
purpose.
They all looked at each other questioningly, as a few moments later
they gathered in the parlor for a general sleighride.
Mr. Dimmerly, who had quietly watched proceedings, broke out into
his cackling laugh, as he chuckled, "He shows his blood. A dozen
seminaries could not quench him utterly."
Mrs. Marchmont frowned. She rigidly applied the rules of propriety
to all save her own children, and she justly thought that both
Hemstead and Lottie had failed in courtesy to her and her guests,
by stealing away, as it were, without any explanations. But people
of one idea often fail in more than mere matters of courtesy; and
Hemstead and Lottie were emphatically becoming people of one idea.
And they both had misgivings and a sense of wrong-doing as they
drove away without a word of explanation.
Mrs. Marchmont was still more puzzled when Addie exclaimed petulantly,
"I thought the agreement was that Lottie should carry out the joke
when and where we could all enjoy it."
The lady was led to suspect that there was something on foot that
might need her investigation, and she quietly resolved to use her
eyes and ears judiciously. She well knew that her proud and fashionable
sister, Lottie's mother, would hold her to strict account if Lottie
did anything foolish.
Bel merely shrugged her shoulders cynically. She had a certain kind
of loyalty to her friend, and said all her harsh things to Lottie
herself, and not behind her back.
De Forrest had no other resource than to believe that Lottie was
carrying out the practical joke; but a sorry jest he found it that
morning, during which he scarcely spoke to any one.
They drove over to town for Harcourt, but he greatly provoked Addie
by pleading that his business would not permit absence. During
the rest of the drive they all might have formed part of a funeral
procession.
But the snow-crystals did not sparkle in the sunlight more brightly
than Lottie's eyes, as she turned to her companion, and said, "I
am so delighted that we are safely off on our drive."
"O, it's the 'drive' you are thinking of. That is better than I
hoped. I thought we were visiting Mrs. Dlimm."
"So we are, and I want to see her too," said Lottie, with a sudden
blush.
"Well, I'm glad you don't dread the long, intervening miles, with
no better company than mine."
"It's a good chance to learn patient endurance," she replied, with
a look delightfully arch. "So please drive slower."
The horse instantly came to a walk.
"That is the other extreme," she continued. "You always go to
extremes, as, for instance, your quixotic purpose to go out among
the border ruffians."
"Honestly, Miss Marsden," said Hemstead, his laughing face suddenly
becoming grave, "you do not now think, in your heart, my purpose
to be a home missionary 'quixotic'?"
"I don't know much about my heart, Mr. Hemstead, except that it
has always been very perverse. But I now wish I had a better one.
You have disturbed the equanimity with which I could do wrong most
wofully. I even feel a little guilty for leaving them all this
morning, with no explanations."
"It was hardly right, now I think of it," said Hemstead, reflectively.
"Have you just thought of it? How preoccupied you have been! What
have you been thinking about? Yes, it was wrong; but as it is the
first wicked thing I have caught you in I am quite comforted. I
have been hoping all along that you would do something just a little
bit encouragingly wicked."
"How little you understand me! My wickedness and consequent twinges
of conscience have been my chief sources of trouble thus far."
"O, well, your conscience is like Auntie Jane. A speck of dust gives
her the fidgets where other people would not see any dust at all.
If your conscience had to deal with my sins there would not be
ashes and hair-cloth enough for you."
"What good can ashes, hair-cloth, or any kind of self-punishment,
or even self-condemnation, do us?"
"Well, we ought to be sorry, at least."
"Certainly, but there must be more than that. Many a wrong-doer has
been sincerely sorry, but has been punished all the same. I cannot
tell you, Miss Marsden, how much good you did me on Sunday afternoon.
My mind had been dwelling on the attributes of God,--upon doctrines
as if they were things by themselves and complete in themselves.
I almost fear that I should have become, as I fear some are,
the disciple of a religious system, instead of a simple and loyal
follower of Christ. But you fixed my eyes on a living personality,
who has the right to say, 'I forgive you,' and I am forgiven; who
has the right to say, 'I will save you,' and I am saved. If He is
the Divine Son of God, as He claims to be, has He not the right?"
"Yes. He must be able to do just what is pleasing to Him," said
Lottie.
"Then look upon Him as you saw Him at the grave of Lazarus,--the
very embodiment of sympathy. Suppose that in sincere regret for
all the wrong you have ever done, and with the honest wish to be
better, you go to such a being and cry, 'Forgive.' Can you doubt
His natural, inevitable course towards you? If pardoning love
and mercy should encircle you at once, would it not be in perfect
keeping with His tears of sympathy?"
"And is that all I have to do to get rid of the old, dark record
against me? O, how black it looked last Saturday!"
"That is all. What more can you do? Who was it that said, 'Be of
good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee'?"
"Mr. Hemstead," said Lottie, in a low tone, "I have felt very
strangely--differently from any time before in all my life--since
last Sunday afternoon. I seemed to look upon Christ as if He were
before me, and I saw the tears in His eyes, as I saw them in yours
the evening you said such plain things to me, and I have felt a
peculiar lightness of heart ever since. That hymn we sang on Sunday
evening expressed so exactly what I felt that I was overpowered.
It appeared written for me alone. Do you think that I can be a
Christian?"
Hemstead's eyes glistened, and his heart bounded at the thought;
but he felt that he was in a grave and responsible position, and
after a moment's thought answered wisely: "I can base no safe and
positive answer on your feeling. I have already learned, from my own
experience and that of others, that religious feeling is something
that comes and goes, and cannot be depended upon. The test question
is, How will you treat this Jesus whom you have seen, and who has
proved Himself both worthy to win and keep your trust? A little
strong feeling and sentiment in regard to Him can not do you much
good. What practical relation do you intend to hold towards Him?
No doubt many that saw Him weep, and then raise Lazarus after he
had been four days dead, were profoundly moved, but the majority
went on in their old ways all the same. You abound in strong common
sense, and must see that more that even sincere, deep feeling is
necessary. What do you propose to DO? Are you willing to take up
your cross and become His faithful follower?"
"That involves a great deal," said Lottie, with a long breath.
"It does indeed," he replied earnestly. "I would give my life to
make you a Christian, and yet I would not seek to win you for Him
by false pretences, or hide any part of the rugged path of self-denial.
Count well the cost. But, believe me, Miss Marsden," he added, in
a tone that brought a sudden paleness to her cheek, "not following
Him involves far more that is sad and terrible."
Tears stood in Lottie's eyes. She was silent a few moments, and was
evidently thinking deeply. The young clergyman was desperately in
earnest, and fairly trembled in the eagerness of his expectation.
He hoped that Lottie would come to a solemn and half-heroic and
formal decision. But he was both puzzled and disappointed by the
sudden and brusque manner with which she turned upon him as she
said: "Where is the heavy cross that I must take up? Show it to
me, and I will think about it. Where is the rugged path? This one
that leads to Mrs. Dlimm is very pleasant. I don't see anything
very awful in being a Christian nowadays. Of course I shall have
to give up all my old nonsense and flirt--Well, I suppose I might
as well say it out. But there are no Inquisitions, with thumbscrews
and racks, any longer. Come, Mr. Hemstead, you are a Christian.
What heavy cross are you bearing? I hope you are not in the rugged
path of self-denial this morning, while taking me to Mrs. Dlimm's.
I don't know any one who appears to enjoy the good things of life
more than you. I don't know what answer to give to your solemn and
far-reaching questions. I haven't much confidence in what Lottie
Marsden will do. All I know is that I feel as I imagine one of
those children did whom Jesus took in his arms and blessed."
"But suppose," urged her anxious spiritual guide, who felt that
she was giving a reason for her faith that would hardly satisfy the
grave elders of the church,--"suppose that at some future time He
should impose a heavy cross, or ask of you painful self-denial,
would you shrink?"
She turned her dewy eyes upon him with a look of mingled archness
and earnestness that he never forgot, and said significantly, "I
do not remember the New Testament story very perfectly, but when
the last, dark days came, women stood by their Lord as faithfully
as the men,--didn't they?"
Hemstead bowed his head in sudden humility, and said: "You are
right. It was not woman who betrayed, nor did woman desert or deny
Him. Still I treasure the suggestion of your answer beyond all
words."
The tears stood thick in Lottie's eyes, and she was provoked that
they did. Her strong feelings were quick to find expression, and
Hemstead seemed to have the power, as no one else ever had, to evoke
them. But she had a morbid dislike of showing emotion or anything
verging toward sentiment; therefore she would persist in giving a
light and playful turn to his sombre earnestness.
"I did not mean," she said, "to be so hard upon the men, nor to
secure so rich a tribute to my sex. I imagine we all stand in need
of charity alike. Only do not expect too much of me. I dare not
promise anything. You must wait and see."
"Though you promise so little, you inspire me with more confidence
than many whom I have heard make great professions"; and the light
of a great joy and a great hope shone in his eyes.
"You look very happy, Mr. Hemstead," said Lottie, gratefully. "Would
you be very glad to have me become a Christian?"
He looked at her so earnestly that the rich blood mounted to her
very brow. After a moment, he replied, in a low, trembling tone:
"I scarcely dare trust myself to answer your question, and yet I
do not exaggerate when I assure you that if I could feel that you
were a Christian before I go away, it seems as if I could never
see a dark day again. O Miss Marsden, how I have hoped and prayed
that you might become one!"
Her head bowed low in guilty shame. She compared her purpose towards
him with his towards her. Before she thought, the words slipped
out, "And for all my wrong to you, you seek to give me heaven in
return."
He looked at her inquiringly, not understanding her remark; but
after a moment said, "It would be heaven to me on earth, even in
my lonely work in the West, if I could remember that, as a result
of our brief acquaintance, you had become a Christian."
"Well," she said emphatically, "our acquaintance does promise to
end differently from what I expected; and it is because you are
different. You are not the kind of a man that I expected you would
be."
"But I understood you from the first," remarked Hemstead, complacently.
"My first impression when you gave me your warm hand, and the only
true welcome I received, has been borne out. Though at times you
have puzzled me, still, the proof you gave--on the evening of my
arrival--of a true, generous, and womanly nature, has been confirmed
again and again. It has seemed to me that your faults were due
largely to circumstances, but that your good qualities were native."
Again Lottie turned away her burning cheeks in deep embarrassment.
Should she tell him all? She felt she could not. To lose his good
opinion and friendship now seemed terrible. But conscience demanded
that she should be perfectly frank and sincere with him, and her
fears whispered, "He may learn it from the others, and that would
be far worse than if I told him myself."
But her moral strength was not yet equal to the test. The old,
prevailing influences of her life again swayed her, and she guided
the conversation from the topic as a pilot would shun a dangerous
rock.
"I will tell him all about it at some future time," she thought;
"but not yet when the knowledge might drive him away in anger."
She seized upon one of his words, which, when spoken, had jarred
unpleasantly upon her feeling.
"Why do you speak of our acquaintance as brief? Are we to be
strangers again after this short visit is over?"
"I most positively assure you that you can never be a stranger to
me again," he said eagerly. "But in a few days you will go to New
York, and I thousands of miles in another direction. If I should
tell you how you will dwell in my thoughts like an inspiration,
I fear you would think me sentimental. But in your absorbing city
life I fear that I shall soon become as a stranger to you."
"Well," said Lottie, averting her face, "I don't think I'll promise
you anything this time either. You must wait and see. But is that
dreadful frontier life of yours a foregone conclusion?"
"Yes," he said, with quiet emphasis.
"There are plenty of heathen in New York, Mr. Hemstead. You found
one of them in me, and see how much good you have done; at least,
I hope you have."
"There are also plenty of Christians in New York to take care of
them. I commend some of the heathen to you."
"I fear that they will remain heathen for all that I can do."
"No, indeed, Miss Marsden. Please never think that. No one has a
right to say, 'I can do nothing,' and you least of all. Apart from
your other gifts, you abound in personal magnetism, and almost
instantly gain control of those around you."
"How mistaken you are! I have no control over you."
"More than you think, perhaps," he said, flushing deeply.
It was his heart that spoke then, and not his will, instructed by
deliberate reason.
She too blushed, but said laughingly, "What are words? Let me test
my power. Take a church in New York, instead of a thousand miles
out of the world."
"You are not in earnest," he said, a little sadly. "You would not
seek to dissuade me from what I regard as a sacred duty?"
"But is it 'a sacred duty'? There are plenty of others--less
cultivated, less capable of doing good--in the refined and critical
East."
"That is not the way a soldier reasons. Some one must go to the
front of the battle. And what excuse can such a vigorous young
fellow as I am have for hanging back?"
As he turned his glowing face upon her she caught his enthusiasm,
and said impulsively, "And in the front of the battle I would be,
if I were a man, as I often wish I were."
"The line of God's battle with evil is very long, Miss Marsden. I
think you can find the front in New York as truly as I in the West.
In this fight woman can often do as much as man. Won't you try?"
"I shall not promise you anything," she said. "You must wait and
see."
They were now before the parsonage in the hamlet of Scrub Oaks. The
sound of the bells brought Mrs. Dlimm's faded face to the window,
and on recognizing them she clapped her hands for joy, as one of
her own children might have done; and a moment later was smiling
upon the little porch, the very embodiment of welcome.