A GOOD SAMARITAN
"Never! Never! I'd rather die right here in the woods!" cried Dorothy,
aghast. "Dead or alive that man shall never get me in his power again.
But I'm not afraid. God is good to orphan children--He will take care of
me--He will, He will!"
In some way she managed to get upon her knees and the next flash of
lightning showed her thus, with her face uplifted and her hands clasped,
while an agony of supplication was in her wide brown eyes.
Religion was an unknown thing to poor Jim Barlow, whose simple integrity
was of nature, not culture. His Sundays had been merely days on which to
toil a little harder against the morrow's market, nor had he ever been
inside a church. But something in the sight of this child kneeling
there in the night and the storm touched an unknown chord of his soul,
and before he knew it he was kneeling beside her. Not to pray, as she
did, but to hold her firmly, to comfort her by his human touch for this
fresh terror he did not understand.
After a moment she turned and sat down again and said just as firmly as
before, but quite calmly now:
"If you want to go back you may. I shall not. God will take care of me,
even if you leave me all alone. I've asked Him."
"Leave you alone? I hadn't thunk of it. What you mean?"
"You said we must go back. I shall not."
"_Pshaw!_" It was several seconds before honest Jim could say anything
more, but those five letters held a world of meaning. Finally, he was
able to add to them and to help her seat herself again on the ground,
and he is scarcely to be blamed if he did this with some force. From his
point of view Dorothy was stupid. She should have known that he never
gave up doing that to which he had set his hand. He had promised to get
her back to Baltimore, some way, and he would keep his promise. With
another, rather milder "Pshaw!" he explained:
"Go back an' try the road, silly! These cross-cuts are dreadful
onsartain. Full o' blackberry bushes an' thorny stuff would hurt a
tougher foot 'an yourn. More'n that: shoes made out o' rags an' paper
ain't much good in a rain storm. We'll get back to the road. Even that's
a long way off, but it's over open medders an' it's so dark nobody won't
see us er stop us. It ain't rainin' nigh so hard now. You eat a bite,
then we'll try agin."
"Oh! forgive me, Jim Barlow, for thinking you would be so mean. I'll
trust you now, no matter what happens, but I don't want to eat. I
can't--yet."
"Does your foot hurt bad?"
"Not--not--so very!"
"Well, hold on. I'll break that there sapling off an' make you a stick
to help walk on. 'Tother hand you can lean on my shoulder. Now, soon's
you say the word we'll go. Not the way we come, but another, slatin'er.
Try?"
They stood up: Dorothy with more pain than she would acknowledge, but
putting a brave face on the matter, and Jim more anxious than he had
ever been about anybody in his life. He didn't speculate as to why all
these strange things had come into his life, as Dorothy had done, but he
accepted them as simple facts of which he must make the best. The best
he could make of this present situation was to get this lamed girl to a
public highway as soon as he could. Even that might be deserted now, on
a rainy Saturday night, but he hoped for some help there.
"Now--come."
Dorothy made a valiant effort and managed to get ahead a few inches.
Then, half-laughing, half-crying, she explained:
"I can't manage it. I can't walk on one foot and drag the other.
I--Can't you hide me here, somewhere, and go on by yourself, then send
somebody back after me? Would it be safe, do you think?"
"No, 'twouldn't, an' I shan't. If you can't walk--then hop!"
So, resting one hand on his shoulder and the other upon the stick he had
broken, the girl--hopped! It was very awkward, very painful, and very
slow; but it was only the slowness that mattered. This was exasperating
to one whose blood was in a ferment of anxiety to be at her journey's
end. Even Jim lost patience after they had gone some distance and
stopped short, saying, with a sigh:
"This won't do. I'll have to haul you. You're limpin' worse all the
time, an' it'd take a month o' Sundays to travel a mile this gait. Now,
whilst I stoop down, you reach up an' put your arms 'round my neck. Make
yourself light's you can, an' we'll try it that way a spell. When I gin
out we'll wait an' rest. Now ketch hold!"
He took her staff in one hand, stooped his back like a bow, and Dorothy
clasped her arms about his shoulders. Then he straightened himself and
her feet swung clear of the ground. Fortunately, she was slight and he
strong, and for another little while they proceeded quite rapidly. Also,
he knew perfectly well the direction he ought to take, even in this
darkness of night; and he was accustomed to walking in the fields. Then,
suddenly, he had to stop.
"Guess we better rest a spell. 'Twon't do to get _all_ tuckered out
first off;" and with that he dumped her on the wet grass, very much as
he might a sack of meal. Then he sat down himself, while she merrily
cried:
"That's the first time I've been carried pick-a-back since I was ever so
little! How splendid and strong you are! Do you suppose we have come
half-way yet?"
"Half-way? Pshaw! We ain't got no furder 'an the first half-mile, if so
fur. My sake, girls are orful silly, ain't they?"
Dorothy's temper flamed. She felt she had been very brave, for her foot
had swollen rapidly and pained her greatly, yet she had suppressed every
groan and had made "herself as light as she could," according to Jim's
command. Now she would have none of his help. No matter what she
suffered she would go on by herself. Then some evil thing tempted her to
ask:
"Do you know where you're going, Jim Barlow, anyway?"
And he retorted with equal spirit:
"D' you s'pose I'd haul such a heavy creatur' 's you so fur on a wrong
road?"
After which little interchange of amenities, the pair crawled forward
again and came at last to a hedge of honeysuckle bordering a wide lane.
The fragrance brought back to Dorothy's memory her own one, carefully
tended vine in the little garden on Brown Street, and sent a desolate
feeling through her heart. Sent repentant tears, also, to her eyes and
made her reach her hand out toward her companion, with a fresh apology:
"Jim, I've got to say 'forgive me,' again and--I do say it--yet I hate
it. You've been so good and--Smell the honeysuckle! My darling father
John told me there were quantities of it growing wild all through
Maryland, but I never half-believed it before. It makes me cry!"
"Set down an' cry, then, if you want to. I just as lief's you would. I'm
tired."
This concession had the remarkable effect of banishing tears from
Dorothy's eyes. She had tottered along on one foot and the tips of the
toes of the other, till the injured one had become seriously strained
and pained her so that rest she must, whether he were willing or not. It
was comparatively dry on the further side the hedge, and the vines
themselves, so closely interwoven, made a comfortable support for their
tired backs. As she leaned against it, the girl's sense of humor made
her exclaim:
"That's the funniest thing! I felt I must cry my eyes out, yet when you
said 'go ahead and do it,' every tear dried up! But, I'm sleepy. Do you
suppose we dare go to sleep for a few minutes."
"Pshaw! I'm sleepy, too. An' I'm goin'--s'posin' er no s'posin'."
After that, there was a long silence under the honeysuckle hedge. A
second shower, longer and more violent than the first, arose, and dashed
its cool drops on the faces of these young sleepers, but they knew
nothing of that. The storm cleared and the late moon came out and shone
upon them, yet still they did not stir. It was not until the sun itself
sent its hot, summer rays across their closed lids that Jim awoke and
saw a man standing beside them in the lane and staring at Dorothy with
the keenest attention.
Instantly the lad's fear was alert. He had not spoken of it to Dorothy,
but he knew that many others besides himself must have seen that
wonderful advertisement in the daily paper; and though he was not wise
enough to also know that every wandering child would suggest to somebody
the chance of earning that five hundred, he had made up his mind that
nobody should earn it. Dorothy should be restored without price, and he
had promised her his should be the task. There was that about this
staring stranger which made him throw a protecting arm over the still
sleeping Dorothy and say:
"Well! Think you'll know us when you see us agin?"
"Come, come, boy! keep a civil tongue in your head. Who is that little
girl?"
"None o' your business."
"Hold on. I'll make it my business, and lively, too, if you don't look
out. Where'd you two come from?"
"Where we was last at."
"You scallawag! Your very impudence proves you're up to some mischief,
but I'll ask you once more, and don't you dare give me a lying answer:
Where did you two come from?"
"Norphan asylum," said Jim, patting Dorothy's hand to quiet her alarm;
for she had, also, waked and was frightened by the stranger, as well as
by that strange numbness all through her body and the terrible pain in
her foot.
"Girl, what's your name?"
Dorothy did not answer. She did not appear even to hear, but with a
stupid expression turned her head about on the honeysuckle branches and
again closed her eyes. Part of this dullness was real, part was feigned.
She felt very ill and, anyway, there was Jim. Let him do what talking
was necessary.
Again the stranger demanded:
"Who is that girl? Where did you get her? Is she deaf and dumb--or just
a plain everyday fool?"
"Dunno, stranger. Give it up," said Jim, at the same time managing to
nudge Dorothy unperceived, by way of hint that that suggested
deaf-and-dumbness might serve them well.
The man who was quizzing them so sharply had been riding a spirited
horse, which now began to prance about the lane in a dangerous way, and
for the moment distracted his attention from the children. Indeed, in
order to quiet the animal he had to mount and race it up and down for a
time, though he by no means intended to leave that place until he had
satisfied himself whether this were or were not the missing little girl,
of whose disappearance all the papers were now so full. If it were and
five hundred dollars depended on her rescue from that country
bumpkin--he was the man for the rescue! Being none other than a suburban
"constable" with a small salary, as well as a local horse jockey,
exercising a rich gentleman's new hunter--also for hire.
As he galloped past them, to and fro, Dorothy grew more and more
frightened and ill. Her long sleep in her water-soaked clothing, added
to the pain in her foot and her lack of food, affected her seriously;
and a bed with warm blankets and hot drinks was what she needed just
then. Finally, when to the thud of the racer's feet there also sounded
the rumble of approaching wheels, she felt that her doom was sealed and
let her tears stream freely over her wan, dirt-streaked cheeks.
Jim, also, felt a shiver of fear steal through his long limbs, and
instinctively drew his young charge closer to him, resolved to protect
her to the last. But, as the wheels drew nearer, there was mingled with
their rumble the notes of a good old hymn, and presently both wheels and
music came to an abrupt halt before the hedge and the forlorn pair
half-hidden in it.
"Why, bless my heart! Younkers, where'd you hail from? and why should a
pretty little girl be crying on the first Sunday morning in June? When
everything else in God's dear world is fairly laughing with joy! Why,
honey, little one--what--what--what!"
It was a tiny, very rickety gig from which the singer had leaped with
the agility of youth, though his head was almost white, and green
goggles covered his faded old eyes; and he had not finished speaking
before he had climbed upon the bank to the hedge and had put his
fatherly arms around the sobbing Dorothy.
She opened her own eyes long enough to see that benignant, grizzled
countenance close to her, and--in an instant her arms had clasped about
the stranger's neck! With the unerring instinct of childhood she knew a
friend at first glance, and she clung to this man as if she would never
let him go, while the astonished Jim looked on, fairly gasping for the
breath that he at last emitted in the one word: "P-S-H-A-W!!" Here was
another phase of that changeable creature--girl! To cry her eyes out at
sight of one stranger and to fling herself headlong into the arms of
another--not half so good looking!
Leaning back among the vines and coolly folding his arms, the farm-boy
resigned himself to whatever might come next. He had most carefully
planned all their trip "home" and not a single detail of it had followed
his plan. "Give it up!" he remarked for the second time, and was
immediately answered by the old man:
"No, you don't. Nobody decent ever does give up in this sunshiny world
of God's. That isn't what He put us in it for, but to keep right on
jogging along, shedding happiness, loving Him, being content. How did
this poor little darling ever hurt her tiny foot like that?"
Already the old fellow had Dorothy on his lap and was examining with
careful tenderness the angry-looking wound she had received, while her
curly head rested as contentedly against his breast as if it had been
that of father John himself.
She opened her lips to tell, but she was too tired. Indeed, if she had
felt equal to the labor of it she would have poured forth her whole
story then and there. But it is doubtful if he would have tarried to
hear it, for he rose at once, carrying the girl in his arms so gently,
so lovingly, that a great wave of happiness swept over her, and she
flashed her own old beautiful smile into his goggles:
"Oh! you good man. God sent you, didn't He?"
"Sure, sure! To you, one of His lambs! Come, son. We'll be going! This
poor little foot must be attended to right away, and this is my 'busy
day.' On my way to preach at an early service, for the poor colored folk
who can't come later. Then to another one for scattered white folks--the
rest of the day at the hospitals--Why, bless my heart! If my Sundays
were fifty times as long I could fill every minute of them with the
Master's work!"
More nimbly than Jim could have done, the happy old man scrambled back
into the gig, never once releasing his hold of Dorothy, gathered up his
reins, bade the lad "Hang on behind, some way!" chirruped to his sleepy
nag, and drove on singing out of the lane.
"Bringing in the sheaves! Bringing in the sheaves!
We will come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves!"
Once, in a pause of his song, Dorothy reached up and stroked his cheek,
saying:
"You're taking me home, aren't you!"
"Sure, sure! To my home, first, to your home next--if I can;--to your
heavenly home, when the Master wills."
His home came soon; a tiny, one-storied building with but two rooms, a
kitchen and bedroom; smaller, even, than the cottage of Miranda Stott,
but far neater and cozier. At its door the old minister sprang from the
gig and directed Jim to leave it where it stood.
"Old Nan won't move unless she's bid. I'll fix up this little one's
wound while you get breakfast. Happens I haven't had my own, yet, and I
know you haven't had yours. The coffee's in that canister on the shelf.
The fire's ready to the match--and the match right here! There's boiled
ham in that cupboard, potatoes to fry, in the ice-box in the shed, bread
and butter in the cellar, as well as a pail of milk. Show yourself a man
by setting the table, my boy. How glad I am to have company! I try to
have somebody most the time; but I don't often get them so easily as
I've gotten you two. Young folks, besides; you ought to eat lots! which
will give me extra appetite--not that I need it, oh no! A fine
digestion is another of my Father's good gifts to me; and do you know,
laddie, that I rarely have to buy the food to feed my guests? Always
comes in of its own accord, seem's if. Of the Lord's accord, more truly.
He's not the One to bid you feed the hungry and give drink to the
thirsty without providing the means. 'Old St. John's' is known as a free
'hotel' in all this countryside, and my children--In His Name I bid you
welcome to it this glorious Sunday morning!"
Dorothy was on the bed in the inner room, and all the time he was
talking her jolly host was also attending to her as well as to Jim. She
was better already, simply from the cheer of his speech, and that sense
of perfect security that had come to her so promptly. Such a well-stored
little house as that was! From somewhere, out came a bundle of bandages
already prepared, a box of soothing ointment, and a basin of soft warm
water to bathe the jagged wound.
"Learned to be a sort of doctor, too, you see. Never know when a body
may come limping up, needing care--just as you have. Tear my bandages
evenings when it rains. Never have to buy the muslin or linen--neighbors
all save it for me. Boy--what's your name?--just turn those potatoes
again. The secret of nice fried potatoes is to keep them stirred till
every bit is yellow-browned, even and tasty. It's a sin, the way some
people cook; spoiling the good gifts of the Lord by their own
carelessness. Put into everything you do--milking, plowing, cooking,
preaching, praying, the very best that's in you! That's the way to get
at the core of life, at its deepest-down happiness and content. That's
good! I reckon you're the right sort, only want a little training. The
way you slice that ham shows you're thorough. Now, watch me settle this
coffee and then--for all Thy Mercies, Lord, we humbly thank Thee."
Such a breakfast as that had never been spread before Jim Barlow.
Dorothy had enjoyed many fine ones in her own happy home, but even she
found this something out of common; and from the chair of state in which
she had been placed at the head of the little table, beamed satisfaction
on the others while she poured their coffee, as deftly as if she were,
indeed, the "little woman" the old man called her.
When the meal was over, said he:
"Lad, I'm a busy man, you seem to be an idle fellow. I'll leave you to
wash the dishes and put away the food. Carefully, as you found it,
against the need of the next comer. My name is Daniel St. John. My pride
it is to bear the name of that disciple Jesus loved. Good-bye. Tarry
here as long or as short a time as you will. I never lock the door.
Good-bye. If we do not meet again on earth, I shall look for you in
Heaven."
He was already passing out into the sunshine but Dorothy cried after
him:
"One moment, please. You have told us your name, but we haven't told you
ours. Yes, Jim, I shall tell! It's right and this dear man will help us,
not hinder. So you needn't hold up your finger that way. Mr. St. John, I
thank you, we both thank you, more than we can say. That boy's name is
James Barlow. He's an orphan. I'm an orphan, too. My name is----"
"Thank you for confidence. If my day didn't belong to the Master, not to
myself, I'd drive you home in the gig. If you stay here till to-morrow I
will do so, anyway. Now, I am late about His business, and must be off
at once!"
With that he jumped into his gig, shook the reins over old Nan's back,
who went ambling down the road to the music of "Throw out the life
line!" sung to the surrounding hills and dales as only old Daniel St.
John could sing it.
For some hours the two wanderers rested in that sunny little home, both
most reluctant to leave it, and Dorothy's own wish now being to remain
until the Monday when, as he said, their new acquaintance would be at
liberty to take them to the city. Jim was not so anxious to remain. It
was not until his companion's entreaties grew more persistent, that he
told her the truth:
"Dorothy, we _can't_ stay. We mustn't. I dassent. You was scared o' that
feller on horseback. Well, he's been ridin' by here two, three times,
an' he's fetched another feller along. Them men mean bad to us. I've
studied out 't they ain't sure the old man ain't to home. If they was
they wouldn't wait to ketch us long. The first man, he seen us come with
St. John. He must. He couldn't have rid so fur he didn't. Well, I feel's
if _he_ ketched us, 'twould be out the fryin'-pan into the fire. We
couldn't get shet o' him--till he got that five hundred dollars. We've
got to go on, someway, somewheres. An'--go _now_, whilst they've rid
back agin, out o' sight."