"NEARER MY GOD TO THEE."
"The heavier cross the easier dying.
Death is a friendlier face to see;
To life's decay one bids defying,
From life's distress one then is free!
Ah! happy he, with all his loss,
Whom God hath set beneath the cross."
To Captain Clendenon, who lay tossing on the bed of sickness his mother
had long foreboded, the news that Lulu's letter brought was cheering
in the highest degree. His clear judgment brought him to the same
conclusion as his sister, and had he been well he would have instantly
started for New York to take up the missing links in the old quest for
the lost child of Grace. But just as the fever epidemic had come to an
end, and the three jaded nurses were thinking of a return to Norfolk,
the weakness that had been growing on him for months culminated in an
attack of typhoid fever, that dire enemy of an enfeebled system. He
had lain for two weeks now consumed with fever, tortured with pain,
and inwardly chafing because the two patient women, who had thought
their labors for the sick ended for the season, were now indefatigably
devoted to the task of lightening, as far as mortal power could do, his
intense suffering.
Doctor Constant came and went with the last days of March, going out
always with a look that Mrs. Clendenon and Grace--who had learned to
read his countenance--felt almost hopeless at seeing. Weeks passed,
and the strange fever that seemed playing "fast and loose" with the
patient--that rises and falls, but never goes--kept its fiery hold
on its victim. His mother was always by his side, mixing medicines,
pouring cooling drinks, watching and noting every fluctuation of the
disease with the grave, sad patience we often note in elderly women
who have grown so used to affliction that they bear it with a fortitude
impossible to younger women like Grace, who fretted and chafed and
grieved at the slow disease that held her friend in its tenacious
grasp. Yet she was only second in her exertions for him to the
mother. It was her small, soft hand that bathed the burning forehead
in sprinkling ice-water and pungent perfume; her hand that fluttered
the grateful palm-leaf fan that kept such fresh and pure air around
the bedside; her hand that was always ready and willing to undertake
anything that promised relief, or even alleviation; her presence that
lent sunshine to the darkened chamber, where the angels of life and
death were striving for Willard Clendenon's soul.
Pretty Stella De Vere, hearing of his illness, called often to inquire
about him, and sent daily gifts of hot-house flowers and fruits to
tempt the delicate appetite, and in the solitude of her own soul knew
that a dear, dear hope was fading from her life forever.
Sometimes, when the hot, delirious fever fell, and reason held her
throne against the enemy, the young man's heart ached at the sight
of the pale, worn faces that always wore a cheerful smile for his
waking hours. In the contest that was waging he felt very sure which
would come off conqueror; but with the fortitude which had marked his
life, he kept his opinions to himself, unwilling to grieve his mother
and Grace, and unwilling to hasten Lulu's return on account of the
investigation she was pursuing, much as he longed to see her. One
unsatisfied wish troubled his feverish hours, and lent a wistful light
to his eyes that Grace could not bear to see. Had it pleased God to
restore his health, he would have liked to have gone to London and have
brought back her child to her, that he might have had the pleasure of
reviving hope in her desolate heart. Still it was a comfort to know
that it would almost certainly be brought back to her some time. With
this thought he must content himself, and he did as well as he was able.
"I am wearing you both out," he said, sadly, one day, to the two who
were trying to hide beneath cheerful smiles the heart-ache which a
recent visit from Doctor Constant had left, his grave face showing his
opinion too plainly. "This long illness, after all you have endured,
is unpardonable in me. Mother, why not have a nurse for me, and allow
yourself and Mrs. Winans some rest?"
The trembling hand of the gray-haired mother fluttered down like a
blessing on the burning brow of her eldest-born--the son who had always
been a blessing to her from the hour when his baby lips stirred the
mother-love into life within her breast until now, when the hand that
had smoothed her widowed path so gently, lay still and wasted on the
counterpane, never to take up life's burden again.
"Always unselfish," she answered, in faltering tones. "No, Willie, dear
boy, I cannot delegate to others the dear task of soothing your hours
of pain."
"Nor can I," supplemented Grace, laying an impulsive, clasping hand on
the thin one that rested outside the counterpane. "I have put myself
in Lulu's place, and it is as a sister that I claim the privilege of
waiting on you."
"Thanks," he answered, deeply moved, and Mrs. Clendenon, with an
irrepressible sob, went gliding from the room.
"Oh, about Lulu," she says, with assumed carelessness to hide her real
feelings. "Why is it you won't consent to have your mother send for her
to come on while you are so sick? Don't you want to see her?"
"Don't I?" a wistful pain in his dark eyes. "Dear little sister Lulu,
how I long to see her I cannot tell you! But why hasten her? She is
coming shortly anyhow. She may be in time to see me; if not, we still
shall meet again some time. She will come to me."
"Don't talk that way," she says, in distress and pain. "You will get
better as soon as this fever breaks."
"Or worse," he amends. "You know a crisis must come then, Mrs. Winans,
whether for better or worse, we cannot now tell. But we all know--you,
mother, and the doctor, though you try to hide it from me--that the
indications point to the worst. Yesterday, I had slight hemorrhage from
the lungs again."
"Don't talk so," she pleads again. "How can any of us--the doctor,
even--tell what will be the result of the crisis? We hope for the best.
Do you not remember how ill I was in Washington with brain fever, and
how Lulu would not let them shave off my long curls? No one thought I
would recover, yet I did. So, I trust, will you."
"Yes, if it so please God; but I think, Mrs. Winans, that He is going
to be very merciful, and take me to Himself."
"Going to be very merciful," she repeats, with a grave wonder in
her large eyes, as at something new and strange. She cannot at all
understand how this quiet heart that has always seemed to her so
untouched by any great joy or grief, can be so eagerly content in going
"home." "Why, you do not want to die so young. The world needs good
men like you so much that God will not take you yet! Why, what can you
mean?"
"Just this, Mrs. Winans," he lifts his honest gray eyes to her
fair face--his fever is falling, and he seems quite cool, though
earnest--"that God, when he puts a life-long sorrow on our hearts,
usually compensates for it by giving us a brief span in which to endure
it. Sorrow like yours, that may be turned into joys again, He lets us
live to bear. Crosses like mine, that may be blessing, but never joy,
He lets one lay down early at the foot of the Great White Throne."
Sweeping lashes shade her cheeks to hide her great surprise. She asks
nothing of Captain Clendenon's cross, though till now she has never
dreamed of its existence.
"Some lost love," she guesses, with ready sympathy in her heart, and
answers, sadly:
"Sorrows like mine can never turn into joys, _mon ami_."
"They can, they will," he cries, in glad excitement. "I know, I feel,
that one of your lost ones, at least, will be restored to you."
"Oh! what can you mean?"
In eager hope she rises, looking down at him with eyes that would fain
read the secret he had almost betrayed.
"Sit down," he answers, in calmer tones, "and forgive me for startling
you so. I only meant that I felt like this, dear friend; and I do feel
as if the shadows are passing from your life, and that, ere long, all
will be well with you. It is given sometimes, you know, to dying eyes
to see very clearly."
A flashing drop from her blue eyes falls down upon the hand that still
lies under the soft clasp of hers, and in low tones she answers:
"Hush, now, you had better not talk any more. I fear you will overtask
your strength. I am going to read some for you."
And closing his eyes he listens peacefully to the sweet, tremulous
voice that reads the fourteenth chapter of St. John, beginning:
"Let not your heart be troubled."
And thus the days pass by, each one stealing a hope from the watcher's
heart, and so many hours from Willard's life. Their patience does not
waver, nor does his quiet courage. He knows that the world is fair
outside, that the Southern sky is blue and bright--that flowers are
blossoming, that birds are singing--knows, too, that all "Creation's
deep musical chorus, unintermitting, goes up into Heaven," and is fain
to go with it. Very bravely and contentedly he breasts the dark waters,
knowing that a strong arm upholds him, even His who said to the ocean's
tumult:
"Peace, be still!"
Mrs. Clendenon has written to Lulu that he is ill, but ere that long
delayed letter reaches her his wasted frame may perchance "be out of
pain, his soul be out of prison;" for it is the last of March now, and
Doctor Constant and his consulting physicians think that the fever
is almost broken, and the crisis near at hand. What the result will
be they almost certainly know, but still whisper feeble hope to the
agonized heart of the mother, whose yearning prayer goes up to God that
He will spare her first-born.
He does not always answer such prayers in the way that seems good to
us. But all the same, He who is Maker of all things, Judge of all
things, judges best for us poor finite reasoners.
"Who knows the Inscrutable design?
Blessed be He who took and gave--
Why should your mother, Charles, not mine.
Be weeping o'er her darling's grave?"
"Why? ah, why?" The answer to such queries we shall find written
in letters of light, perchance, within the pearly gates of the new
Jerusalem.
Closer and closer yet grew the fond tie between mother and son as
the long days waned to the lovely Southern twilight. Many gentle
conversations blessed the absent sister from whom another letter came
on the third of April, to say that no letters from home had reached her
for a month; so she was still ignorant of that fatal illness her tender
heart had foreboded mouths before. One portion of the letter which
she specially desired her brother to read, he was too ill to see for
several days after its reception. Not until after that night at whose
eve Doctor Constant said sadly to his mother:
"The fever is gone. It will be decided to-night. We shall know in the
morning."
And the grave-yard twilight brightened into starry night--the softest,
balmiest Southern night--and three watched by the bedside, for Doctor
Constant came, too, to share that vigil, in the strong, friendly love
he felt for the man who had worked so bravely for the death-stricken in
that doomed city. Hand in hand Gracie and the mother watched, each torn
with the agony of dread, for Grace had taken him into her deep heart as
a dear and faithful brother, and felt that one more pleasure would be
buried for her in Willard Clendenon's early grave.
So the hours wore on; the mystic midnight came--passed--and in the
morning they _knew_.
"It is the will of God," Doctor Constant said, holding the weeping
mother's hand fast in his, and speaking in the strong assurance and
resignation of a Christian faith. "He is wise and just, and knows the
right better than you or I, dear friend. Be strong, for the end is
near; the angels will come for him at sunset."
* * * * *
"Willard, dear son, there is a letter from your sister that she wished
you to read. Are your eyes strong enough, or shall I read it for you?"
Lying back among his pillows, as white as they, very much wasted, with
the dark curls waving back from the high, pale brow, and a very quiet
peace in his grave, sweet eyes, Willard takes that letter, and reads
it, slowly and painfully through.
A dimness crosses his vision as he holds it more than once, and a
remembrance comes to him as he notes the clear, running chirography,
of how his own hand once guided the little fingers that traced these
lines in their first labored efforts to write. But the light of a very
sweet content irradiates his face as he turns its pages. If there is
aught that can heighten the content of these, his dying hours, it is
the story that is told in the pages of his sister's letter--the fair
and tenderly loved young sister whom he will see no more until, as
redeemed souls, they clasp each other on the sunny shores that are
laved by the surf rolling up from the shadowless river.
"We part forever?--o'er my soul is sadness,
No more the music of thy voice shall glide
Low with deep feeling till a passionate gladness
Thrilled to each tone, and in wild tears replied.
"'We meet in Paradise!' To hallowed duty
Here with a loyal, a heroic heart,
Bind we our lives--that so divinest beauty
May bless that heaven where naught our souls can part."