herself to think favorably of life once more. Hysterics and “sinking
spells” grew less frequent. In less than a year she married
again--entirely on her son’s account, she told her friends. “A lone
widow woman couldn’t rightly bring up a boy.”
Mrs. Murdock’s feelings toward the family of her husband’s victim
were curious. For them she cared nothing, but for “Billy’s sake” she
cherished a strong desire, a feverish anxiety to do them some service.
Had she been of the Roman Catholic instead of the Methodist faith she
would have starved herself, if need be, to pay for masses for the
repose of his soul. As it was, ministers of the gospel--well-meaning
men--who had “labored and prayed” with Murdock before his execution,
told her that he had refused the means of grace. While admitting regret
for the crime committed, he had declared that he did not love God;
that he knew nothing about Him. “When yo’ talk, Elder, about lovin’,”
he would say, “I could sense yore meanin’ mighty well ef yo’ was a
p’intin’ at my woman an’ the little chickabiddy. Them’s all I’ve got
ary love fer in this hyer world. I never knowed the Lord here, an’
ef it depends upon my believin’ in an’ lovin’ of Him now, I reckon
I shan’t know Him in the next place.” With which grim statement the
preachers were finally forced to silence.
Being taken thus in the blackness of his sins, unconverted, of course
he must pay the penalty hereafter, they told the grieving wife. The
penalty, she had always been taught and had undoubtedly believed, was
unspeakable torture forever and evermore.
Now, in her extremity, she did as we all do when a creed is too narrow
for our own special needs--she passed it by. Turning from that monument
of human wisdom, she groped for a gate where hope was not shut out.
“Billy must be punished, for he done a wicked thing, but he was not
bad, he was not bad. I knowed him so well. He was always kind, on’y his
temper quick--God must know that too, an’ surely, surely He can’t be
hard on him always ’cause he lost control over his self jest once. Ef
I could on’y do something for Mrs. Jillson, seems as if ’twould count
for Billy some way. Ef she would let me work for her I might see some
chance, but ’pears like she won’t let me come a-nigh.”
Having no one else, she whispered her thoughts, her wishes to the
little Nancy. Instead of tender songs and baby talk, the child was
lulled to sleep with stories of her father, with broken sobs and
prayers. Who knows how early she became aware of a shadow upon her
life? How soon she was conscious of a difference between herself and
other children whom she saw? Her presence was only tolerated by the
busy farmers’ wives because the mother could not leave her; no noisy
play, no mischievous pranks were permitted or excused.
The children of the poor and unfortunate learn self-control and
self-repression at an early age. When Nancy was ten years old she
was done with childhood. She could make herself useful in many ways
to the women who wanted “help.” She could “earn her own living,” and
talk gravely of a half day’s or a full day’s time. Her mother, perhaps
feeling that she could do no more for her daughter, and having no other
interest in life, let this world slip from her feeble hold, and went
out over the border into the unknown.
As she grew up, people were not often unkind to Nancy. On the contrary,
they were usually friendly in a somewhat condescending way--when she
did her work well. Had she been a timid, confiding creature, less
self-reliant and reserved, no doubt they would have shown her many a
favor that would have made her heart glad. As it was, the occasional
rude taunts of other children (what is more barbarous than a cruel
child?) and now and then rough allusions to her father’s death by
older people, raised in her nature the armor of silence and assumed
indifference. Withdrawing into herself, asking no help, she was allowed
to go her way alone as best she could. So she toiled and served until
she came to eighteen years of age. That time found her in the home of a
farmer, twenty miles from her birthplace.
Had you asked the girl if she were happy, she might have said yes.
The farmer and his wife, who had no children, were kind to her. There
was plenty of hard work, to be sure, but she had known nothing else.
Metaphysical questions had not troubled her; she had never asked
herself if life were worth living, had accepted fate without rebellion.
She had read no novels. Mr. Rhorer, the farmer, sometimes asked her
to read to him from The Weekly Reaper--“types were so much littler’n
they used to be, readin’ kind o’ made his head dizzy.” Nancy certainly
might absorb facts, but not romance, from the able dissertations she
spelled out upon the treatment of lambs, the weevil in wheat, or the
advertisements of patent churns. Even the household department of the
paper did not develop artistic tastes. She had no colored tissue papers
wherewith to construct lamp-mats. Why should she make elaborate frames
of walnut shells or crooked sticks, when she had no pictures to put in
them?
An ignorant, uninteresting serving-maid, you see--very different from
the æsthetic, cultured heroine, so popular nowadays. Yet this one was
a woman, “with the heart and the hopes of a woman.” Hardly conscious,
perhaps, that she had a heart, so long had it been starved. As in her
childish days, she still held aloof from the young people, though,
had she been so disposed, more than one young granger would have been
glad to become her “beau,” for Nancy was fair to see. They were not so
fastidious as to birth and family that her bright eyes might not have
won them.
The one small interest and excitement in Nancy’s life this summer was
watching the evening passenger train. It stopped for a few moments at a
water station not far below the house, and there she waited, when her
work was done, to catch a glimpse of the wonderful outside world, that
she could see in no other way. Day after day found her there, leaning
against the old gate under a wide beech tree. She liked to look at
the strange faces, and took deep interest in the variety of hats and
bonnets, the only articles of apparel visible from her point of view.
It puzzled her to guess where so many people could always be going. If
she should ever go traveling she would not look so tired and cross as
many of them did; she was sure she would feel sorry, too, for girls who
could only stand outside and see the cars go by. Once she saw a man
carefully fasten a wrap around his wife’s throat, and heard words of
tender anxiety for her comfort. She wondered vaguely if any one would
ever care for her in that way; it was not likely, she thought. Somehow
she did not wish to stay that night until the train started. She was
tired, and the hissing of the steam made her head ache.
One day she became conscious that the young man who stood smoking a
cigar on the back platform was the same one who was there yesterday,
perhaps the day before that. With eyes turned away she became aware,
too, that he was looking at her with bold admiration--the subtle
magnetism, conveyed no scientists quite explain how, made her cheeks
scarlet.
What was there in a trifle like that to make her sleep that night less
dreamless than before, in spite of sound health and weary young body?
The next evening she went to the usual place. A little shyness about
her now, but why should she stay away? She could not know that the
young man would be there again; but he was there, and this time lifted
his hat and smiled at her. If Nancy lived to be an old woman, and never
saw him again, he would stay in her memory for that one act. She looked
at it, not as an impertinence, but as a mark of respect. No man had
ever lifted his hat to her before. The rustic beaux had not attained
that touch of polish, and would have sneered had they seen him, yet
have envied him his style and city manners.
The refined, accomplished lady of whom we like to read would not have
been pleased with this young man. She would have seen a “person” of
twenty-one or twenty-two years of age with sandy hair and a jet black
moustache. A penetrating odor of hair oil and cinnamon essence diffused
itself about him. Wherever jewelry is admissible in masculine outfit
he had given it room--not expensive ornaments, perhaps, but large and
showy. A hat worn upon one side of his head, a cigar carried in the
opposite corner of his mouth, as if to balance the organ of brains,
were peculiarities of his style.
The thrill which filled poor Nancy with delight would have been a
shudder of disgust to our fastidious maiden.
Poor Nancy? No. Something had entered into her days which made labor
light and hours short. Only smiles and glances, but these may mean so
much. Once he threw a kiss at her when no one else could see; she tried
not to think of that except when by herself, for fear some one might
guess her thoughts.
One day her heart was set to fluttering, and her cheeks to burning when
Mr. Rohrer brought the young man--yes, there could be no mistake--the
same young man home to dinner with him. His name was Valentine Gipe.
“My stepfather’s name, did you say, Mrs. Rhorer? Yes, I’ve always
went by name of Gipe instead of ----.” (A door slammed and Nancy did
not catch that.) “Live up at Newburg, with maw an’ paw. Maw, she’s
that wropped up in me she won’t hardly let me out of her sight. Am
in business with Uncle Joe, down to the junction, an’ havin’ a free
pass, it’s just as cheap to board at home, so I go up and down on the
road every day. We’re dealin’ in stock right smart at present. Heard
Mr. Rhorer had some fat cattle to sell, an’ have took a run up to see.
Betcher boots I can’t be beat in jedgin’ the pints of a nanimal. Uncle
Joe, he knows it, too; has dead loads o’ confidence in me.”
It took a long time to buy those cattle. Mr. Gipe came and went, and
came again. When one purchase was made another was talked of, and the
summer was ended before the stock was sold.
Long before that time Nancy’s heart was gone. All the love that other
girls divide among friends and relatives was concentrated and lavished
upon a creature who did not know what treasure was laid at his feet. He
had nothing but empty words to give in return, was having a little fun,
a little flirtation, he said to himself--but upon these words of love
Nancy lived and was happy. The world took on a beauty she had never
seen before. She wondered, as she sang at her work, that she had not
noticed what a pretty blue was the sky, how bright were the sunsets;
nothing in heaven, she thought, could be fairer than the moonlit summer
nights.
The light of her passion brightened everything. Even the gray, heavy
face of her mistress was touched with a reflected glow. Hitherto the
girl had felt an unconscious pity for that worthy matron’s plainness.
With feminine faith in beauty, she had wondered, idly, how Mr. Rhorer,
himself no Adonis, could ever have married so unprepossessing a
creature. Now she could see that the good woman might not have been so
plain, after all, when young.
Mrs. Rhorer saw nothing of the play that went on before her face. Not a
whisper of the old, old story reached her dull ears. She had forgotten
that she was young once; she did not remember that the blood of youth
is riotous, its pulses swift and eager--not sluggish, as her own. The
girl was “only Nancy.” Her mistress did not see that she was fair, did
not dream that she had a want that was not supplied by herself. It
never occurred to her that Valentine’s frequent visits were for any
one but her husband, because she knew----.
A part of what Mrs. Rhorer knew Nancy learned one day. Summer had gone
then; the first bleak weather of fall had come, and sitting by the
kitchen fire, the prudent farmer’s wife began planning for the winter.
“I wish to goodness Dan’el an’ Val Gipe would finish up their trade
about that last lot o’ cattle. We don’t want to winter them steers
over. The young feller’s keen at a bargain, but powerful cautious. It’s
jest as well, though, I s’pose, fer him to go slow an’ take care of his
money, fer he’ll have a heap of it some day. His Uncle Joe’s an old
bachelor, an’ most likely’ll leave him all he’s got, an’ then his pap
left him right smart of a lump.”
“His pap dead? Why, child, didn’t I ever tell ye ’at Val’s pap was
murdered when he was a baby? Gipe’s on’y his stepfather--Jillson’s
rightly his name. The man was hung who did the killin’. ’Member me
and Dan’el was at the hangin’.----Why! Bless my soul! What ails the
critter, a whiskin’ out thataway an’ slammin’ of the door? Is she--why
lawsy, come to think, the man who was hung was her pap, and I clean
forgot it. Mighty touchy she is, to be sure, but I wouldn’t a’ said
anything if I’d a’ thought. Was going to tell her about Val’s wedding
that’s to come off next month. Wonder if we’ll get an invite.”
Nancy’s mind was in a whirl. One thought only was clear. Val was coming
that night. He would have “something particular” to tell her, he had
said, and she, in her innocence, had blushed and thought of but one
thing he could say. Now she must tell him this awful thing; of course
he did not know it, and what would he say? Quite likely he could not
marry her now, for his mother would never consent. But how could they
live apart?
With the simplicity of a woman who loves and knows nothing of coquetry
or flirtation, she had accepted Val’s tender words without misgiving.
That he had said nothing of marriage had not troubled her; so far
the love had been all-absorbing, without thought for the morrow. She
had not doubted that he knew her history--“everybody did”--and mixed
with her affection was a strong feeling of gratitude that he had not
held aloof. She would care for him just the same, she knew, if all
his relatives were thieves and murderers, but this was different. Her
early years had left a vivid impression on her mind of the relentless
hatred of Mrs. Jillson to her mother and herself. It could hardly be
hoped that time had made much change. If Val should ask his mother,
perhaps--it might be--
Like one dazed she went about her tasks. Would the day never end? How
gray and cold it was! The morning, she remembered, had been bright and
clear. After supper she was sent to the cross-roads grocery, a mile and
a half away, on some household errand. It grew dark early now, but she
was not afraid. What was there to fear? She must hurry, though, to be
back when Val came. It was nearer to go up the railroad than around by
the turnpike, so she started home that way. It was a lonely walk even
in the daylight, through dense woods and through deep cuts, but she
thought only of the man she was hastening to meet.
Suddenly in the darkest part of the road, where it made a short curve,
she came upon an obstruction. Partly with eyes accustomed now to the
darkness, partly by touch, she found logs and stones piled high across
the track.
How they came there she did not stop to consider. Like a flash came the
thought, “the evening express is due; it will be wrecked and Val is
on it.” One moment, then followed the thought and the deed for which
she had lived her eighteen years. “If I can reach the water station I
can warn the engineer; there is no other way. I shall save Val yet.”
Softly she crept over the logs; with swift feet she sped up the gloomy
road, and thought not of the darkness. Like an illumination around her
was the feeling “My Val shall not die, I will save him.” Swifter yet
she ran--it was a mile or more. Once she fell; with her ear upon the
ground she heard the vibrations of the coming train. Could she not go
faster? On and on, past the woods, through the cornfields now--the
stalks still standing breast-high after the western fashion. How the
dry leaves rustled! Her footsteps seemed to echo. Plainly now she heard
the throbbing of the engine; its fiery eye shone far up the road--there
was yet time, she was nearly there. Louder sounded the thunder of the
train, but above that and the beating of her heart she heard again the
echoing steps. Some one followed her, called to her to halt, threatened
her, but still she ran faster, faster. A pistol shot, another, but she
went on, staggering now. The train came thundering on, seeming in the
gloom, like a destroying monster, stopped impatiently at the station,
and Nancy dragged herself to the engineer’s cab. Her work was done.
The creatures who, for malice or plunder, had planned the wreck were
defeated, but had wreaked vengeance on her.
On board that train were lives worth more than the one for which
she had given her own--men for whom other women would have died, no
doubt; wives and children for whom hearts would have broken had they
come to their homes no more. She had saved these passengers from
destruction, but her thoughts were only for one. “Val! my Val!” was
her cry--maidenly shyness gone now in the solemn presence of death. To
her it was as though they two were alone in all the world. When they
carried her to the house the young man followed reluctantly.
“I did it for you, Val. I know’d you’d be on the train. Seemed as if
the Lord must let me get there in time. I kep’ askin’ Him over an’
over, an’ He did. I reckon it’s all up with me, though. This mornin’
I’d a been sorry, but it’s just as well. You couldn’t a married me,
Val, a-knowin’ who I be, an’ it don’t ’pear as if I could a-lived away
from you. You’re all I’ve got. Mother’ll be glad ’at I did this. Mebbe
it’ll count for father, as she always was sayin’. Mebbe yer ma’ll
forgive us all now.”
Valentine Jillson was selfish. Some woman had ministered to his
comfort, his vanity, all his life. This one, he thought, had only done
what was proper, everything considered. He was base, but with those
dying eyes upon his face he did not remind Nancy that he had never
spoken of marrying her. He could not tell the girl what he had come
that night to say--that their acquaintance must come to an end, because
he was to marry Squire Jones’s daughter, Juniata, next month.
And she, even with the prescience of death, could not read his
treachery. With his hand clasped tightly in her own she did not know
him false.
Swiftly her life ebbed away. She grew weaker, weaker. “I am--so--tired.
Kiss me--once more--Val. Say you--love me. My Val. I--love--love--. It
is--dark.”
With his words, his kiss (heaven would pardon this last deceit),
Nancy’s eyes closed to open no more on this earth. On the other side,
it may be, she took up the thread of existence that had lain in the
shadow here and carried it on into the eternal brightness--the glory
that is neither of sun nor of moon.
MRS. BROOKS’S CHANGE OF HEART
Mrs. Hannah Brooks, “Aunt Hannah,” as she was commonly known, had been
a consistent member of the Methodist Episcopal Church from the time
she was eleven years old, and she was now sixty-two. For over fifty
years she had walked in the strait and narrow path and had never failed
to observe the ordinances of the church, or to rebuke sin wherever
she detected it. Many people, even church members, felt that Mrs.
Brooks’s standard of behavior was a little too exacting and severe for
nineteenth century use. She was quite as austere in her views as if she
had been a direct descendant of a Puritan father and had lived all her
life on stony New England soil instead of having been born in Indiana
of parents who had come from the “old country.” The Puritan influence
affects all American character more or less, and it is a mistake to
suppose that the stern and rigid code of conduct commonly ascribed
to that influence is confined to one locality or is accepted only by
Americans whose family trees were planted in this soil before the
Revolution.
Mrs. Brooks had early been taught to believe that dancing was a device
of the enemy of mankind to ensnare the souls of youth. Card playing was
an abomination that none could tamper with without danger of missing
heaven; while as for the theater, that was simply an open door to the
place of everlasting torment. All through her life she had frequently
found it necessary to warn and reprove young people of her acquaintance
who showed an inclination to indulge in the two first-named
frivolities, but the theater evil was one she had encountered only
in recent years. Aunt Hannah had never lived in the city, her home
having been first upon a farm, and, later, and for many years now, in
the little town of Cicero, which has no opera house and whose dramas
are not played upon the stage. With increasing frequency the rumor
came to her that some young man or maiden had visited the theater in
Indianapolis to see a performance by graceless play-actors--a “show”
they called it--and if these erring young persons were in the church
she invariably took pains to make a personal remonstrance and to urge
them to turn again to the strait and narrow path.
Among themselves these young people, feeling a little guilty and
conscience-stricken over their conduct, nevertheless, said sometimes
that Aunt Hannah was hard and unsympathetic, and that she would not
talk so if she were not so old-fashioned and understood how harmless
theaters really were. But Mrs. Brooks was not unsympathetic. She
believed firmly that all these things were wicked. She had been taught
so, and had seen no reason to change her opinion. Believing thus, and
being very direct, outspoken and fearless in her methods, she hesitated
not to free her mind when occasion seemed to require.
She was an uncommonly intelligent and well-informed woman for one of
her limited opportunities, being a close reader of such literature as
came in her way--the range extending from the Bible and the life of
John Wesley to Roe’s novels and the weekly newspaper. But reading must
be supplemented by experience and observation before it gives breadth
of view and liberality of judgment. She realized vaguely that a change
of sentiment had taken place in recent years concerning card playing,
dancing and kindred amusements, but she felt that this was merely a
symptom of the degeneracy of the times and was strongly to be combated.
Even the ministry was being tainted with moral weakness, for had not
Presiding Elder Daniels--and he one of the most influential men in the
conference, too!--said to her one day when she was discoursing on this
subject--had he not used these almost incendiary words:
“People must have amusements, Sister Brooks, and perhaps it is better
to let them enjoy their pleasures under the sanction of the church. In
old times they danced before the Lord, you know.”
This was heresy that horrified the good lady, but she resolved, let
come what might, that she would abate not a jot or tittle of her
efforts against sin. Whatever others might do she would obey the
spirit of the rules and regulations laid down in the Methodist Book
of Discipline, and one of these rules charged that no entertainment
be entered into on which the blessing of the Lord could not be asked,
or words to that effect. And to the best of her ability she did. She
neglected none of the accepted means of grace. She was a regular
attendant at prayer-meeting, where her voice was frequently raised
in exhortation and prayer, as is the custom with devout and elderly
sisters in that fold. She was faithful at class-meeting, and there
confessed her shortcomings with such reservations as seemed expedient
in view of the fact that the listening ears were those of a dozen or
so neighbors instead of a single father confessor vowed to silence.
For instance, she saw no necessity for relating in detail that she
lost her temper and thought a dreadful thought, which if put in print
would have contained a dash, when her clothesline broke on Monday
and let her week’s “wash” into the mud. All she considered essential
was to acknowledge, in a general way, that she was a weak and sinful
creature, and to ask the prayers of her brethren and sisters that she
might overcome the old Adam and lay hold more firmly on divine grace.
If any of her friends and neighbors had dared to arise in the same
meeting and to speak of her as weak and sinful it would have been a
very different affair. But none of them did. They only sighed heavily,
looked dismal and said “Amen!” or “Lord bless!” after the relation of
each “experience.”