My first impulse was to laugh at this absurd note, but it came over me
suddenly that there was no knowing what that child will do. Even now I
am bewildered. I cannot get it out of my mind that there is a good deal
of the theatrical in Kathie, but I may be all wrong. At any rate I
reflected how she has a way of acting so that apparently she can herself
take it for real.
I thought it over a while; then I got my hat and started down the
street, with the notion that at least it would do no harm to go down to
Davis Cove, and see if Kathie were there. As I walked on, recalling her
incomprehensible actions, a dreadful feeling grew in my mind that she
might have meant what she said, and she would be more likely to try to
drown herself because she had told me. A sort of panic seized me; and
just then the town clock struck three.
I had got down just opposite the Foot-bridge, and when I remembered that
three was the time when I was to have the note, I feared I should be too
late, and I began to run. Fortunately, there was nobody in sight, and as
I came to the bend in the street I saw George coming, leading Kathie by
the arm. She was dripping wet, and half staggering, although she kept
her feet. I hurried up to them, too much out of breath with haste and
excitement to be able to speak.
"Hullo!" George called out, as I came up to them, "see what a fish I've
caught."
"Why, Kathie," gasped I, with a stupidity that was lucky, for it kept
George from suspecting, "you've been in the water."
She gave me a queer look, but she said nothing.
"A little more and she'd have stayed there," George put in.
"You are wet too," I said, looking at him for the first time.
"Yes," he returned; "luckily I got off my coat and vest as I ran, so I
saved my watch, but everything else is wet fast enough."
"How did it happen?" I asked.
"She was trying to get sugar-pears from those trees by the water,"
George answered; "and I suppose she lost her balance. I was going along
the road and heard her scream."
"Along the road?" I echoed; for I knew Davis Cove is too far from the
road for him to have heard a cry.
"She fell in just by the old shipyard on the point," he said.
"The boys were in swimming in the cove," Kathie explained, in a way
which was of course unintelligible to George.
"Well," George commented, after a moment in which he seemed to clear up
her meaning, "the next time you want sugar-pears you'd better get them
when the boys are out of the way, so you needn't go in swimming
yourself."
We had been walking along the road as we talked, and by this time had
reached the Foot-bridge. I told George he must go home and get on dry
clothing, and I would see to Kathie. He demurred at first, but I
insisted, so he left us to cross the bridge alone. We walked in silence
almost across the bridge, and then I asked her what kept bumping against
me as I held her up.
"It's rocks in my pocket," she answered, quite in a matter-of-fact way.
"I put 'em there to sink me."
I could have shaken her on the spot, so uncharitable was my mood, but I
managed to answer her in a perfectly cool tone.
"Then you had better take them out," I said.
She got her hand into her pocket and fished out three or four pebbles,
which all together wouldn't have sunk a three-days-old-kitten; and when
these had been thrown over the bridge we proceeded on our drabbled way.
My doubts of the genuineness of the whole performance grew in spite of
me. I do not know exactly why I am coming so strongly to feel that
Kathie is not wholly ingenuous, but I cannot get rid of the idea.
"Kathie," I asked, "did you see Mr. Weston coming when you jumped in?"
She looked up at me with eyes so honest I was ashamed of myself, but
when she answered unhesitatingly that she had seen him, I went on
ruthlessly to ask if she did not know he would save her.
"I thought if he was coming I'd got to hurry," she returned, as simply
as possible.
I was more puzzled than ever, and I am puzzled still. Whether she really
meant to take her life, or whether she only thought she meant it, does
not, I suppose, make any great difference; but I confess I have been
trying to make out ever since I left her. I would like to discover
whether she is consciously trying to fool me or endeavoring as much to
cheat herself, or is honest in it all; but I see no way in which I am
ever likely to be satisfied.
I asked her to say nothing at home about how her ducking happened, and I
satisfied her mother by repeating what George had said. To-morrow I must
have it out with Mr. Thurston somehow or other; although I am still
completely in the dark what I shall say to him. I hope the old
fairy-tales are right when they say "the morning is wiser than the
evening."
August 21. The morning is wiser than the evening, for I got up to-day
with a clear idea in my mind what I had better do about Kathie. It is
always a great comfort to have a definite plan of action mapped out, and
I ate my breakfast in a cheerful frame of mind, intending to go directly
to see Mr. Thurston while I should be fairly sure of finding him. I
reckoned without Kathie, however, who presented herself at the
dining-room window before I had finished my coffee, and begged me to
come out.
"I can't come in without breaking my word," she said.
I could not argue with the absurd chit in that situation, so I went out
into the garden with her and sat down on the bench by the sun-dial. The
big red roses Father was so fond of are all in blossom, and in the
morning air were wonderfully sweet. It was an enchanting day, and the
dew was not entirely dried, so the garden had not lost the freshness it
has when it first wakes up. I was exhilarated by the smell of the roses
and the beauty of everything, and the clearness of the air. Rosa held
baby up to us at the nursery window above, and I waved my hand to her,
smiling from pure delight in everything. Kathie watched me with her
great eyes, and when I sat down on the bench she threw herself at full
length on the grass, and burst out sobbing.
"You do love her better than me!" she wailed. "I came to say how sorry I
was, but I'm sorry now that I didn't stay in the water."
I took her by the shoulder, and spoke to her so sternly that I startled
her.
"You are not to talk in that way anymore, Kathie," I said. "I am fond of
you and I am fond of baby; but if baby were big enough and talked this
silly way about you, do you suppose I would allow it? Sit up and stop
crying."
I have always been careful not to hurt her feelings; perhaps I have been
too careful. She sat up now, and then rose to her feet in a dazed sort
of way. I determined to see if anything was to be made out of her mood.
"Kathie," said I, "how much of that performance yesterday was real, and
how much was humbug? Tell me the truth."
She grew a little paler and her eyes dilated. I looked her straight in
the face, half minded to force her if need be to give me some guidance
in what I should do.
"I really meant to drown myself," she answered solemnly, "only when I
saw the water and thought of hell I was afraid."
She stopped, and I encouraged her to go on.
"I saw Mr. Weston, and I was scared of him and--and everything, and so I
jumped in."
I reflected that very likely the child was more of a puzzle to herself
than she was to me, and in any case I had more important ends to gain
than the satisfying of my curiosity, so I asked her as gently as I could
if she really believed she would be eternally lost if she killed
herself.
"Oh, yes, Miss Ruth!" she cried with feverish eagerness.
"Then why do you do it?" I went on. "How do you dare to do it?"
She looked at me with a growing wildness in her face that was certainly
genuine.
"I'm lost, anyway," she burst out. "I know I have been too wicked for
God to forgive me. I have committed murder in my heart, and I know I was
never meant to be saved."
"Stop!" I commanded her. "You are a little, foolish girl, too young even
to know what you are talking about. How dare you decide what God will
do?"
She regarded me with a look of stupefaction as if I were a stranger whom
she had never seen; and indeed I can well believe I seemed one. Then the
perversity of her mind came back to the constant idea.
"That's just it," she declared. "That's just my wickedness."
After this I refused to go into the subject any further. I got up and
asked her if I should find her father at home. She begged me not to go
to see him, and then said with an air of relief that he had gone out to
Connecticut Mills to visit a sick woman. I did not stay with her longer.
I said I must go into the house, and as she refused to come, I left her,
a forlorn little figure, there among the roses, and went in. It seemed
hard to do it, but I had made up my mind she had better not indulge in
any more talk this morning.
August 22. Cousin Mehitable, in a letter which came this morning, pities
me because of my colorless existence; but I begin to feel that life is
becoming too lurid. I have to-day bearded--no, Mr. Thurston hasn't any
beard; but I have had my interview with him, and I feel as if I had been
leading a cavalry charge up a hill in the face of a battery of whatever
kind of guns are most disconcertingly destructive.
I am somewhat confused about the beginning of our talk. I got so excited
later that the tame beginnings have slipped away; but I know I said I
had come to make a proposition about Kathie, and somehow I led up to the
child's mad performance the other day. I showed him the note and told
him the story, but not until I had made him promise not to mention the
matter to the child. When he had finished he was as pale as my
handkerchief, his thin, bloodless face positively withered with pain.
"I cannot keep silence about this," he said when I had finished. "I must
withdraw my promise, Miss Privet. My Kathie's soul is in danger."
I am sure that I am not ill-tempered, but over Kathie and her father I
find myself in a state of exasperation which threatens to destroy all my
claims to be considered a sane and temperate body. I had to struggle
mightily to keep myself in hand this morning, but at first, at least, I
succeeded.
"Mr. Thurston," I said, "I cannot release you. I should never have told
you except on your promise, and you cannot honestly break it. Now listen
to me. I have no right to dictate, but I cannot stand by and see dear
little Kathie going to ruin. I am sure I know what is good for her just
now better than you do. She is a good child, only she has gone nearly
wild brooding over theologic questions she should never have heard of
until she was old enough to judge them more reasonably."
He tried to interrupt me, but I put up my hand to stop him, and went on.
"You know how nervous and high-strung she is, and you cannot think her
capable of looking fairly at the awful mysteries with which a creed
deals."
"But I have only instructed her in those things on which her eternal
salvation depends," he broke in.
"Her eternal salvation does not depend on her being driven into a
madhouse or made to drown herself," I retorted, feeling as if I were
brutal, but that it couldn't be helped. "The truth is, Mr. Thurston, you
have been offering up Kathie as a sacrifice to your creed just as the
fathers and mothers of old made their children pass through the fires to
Moloch." He gasped, and some thin blood rushed to his face, but I did
not stop. "I have no doubt they were conscientious, just as you are; but
that didn't make it any better for the children. You have been entirely
conscientious in torturing Kathie, but you have been torturing her."
His face was positively gray, and there was a look of anguish in his
eyes which made me weak. It would have been so much easier to go on if
he had been angry.
"You don't understand," he said brokenly. "You think all religion is a
delusion, so of course you can't see. You think I don't love my child,
and that I am so wrapped up in my creed I can't see she suffers. You
won't believe it hurts me more than it does her."
"Do you think then," I asked him, doing my best to keep back the tears,
"that it can give any pleasure to a kind Heavenly Father? I do
understand. You have been so afraid of not doing your duty to Kathie you
have brought her almost to madness, almost"--
"Don't! Don't!" he interrupted, putting out his hand as if I had struck
him. "Oh, Miss Privet, if she had"--
I saw the real affection and feeling of the man as I have never realized
them. I had been hard, and perhaps cruel, but it was necessary to save
Kathie. I spoke now as gently as I could.
"No matter for the things that didn't happen, Mr. Thurston. She is safe
and sound."
"But she meant to do it," he returned in a tone so low I could hardly
catch the words.
"Meant?" I repeated. "She isn't in a condition to mean anything. She was
distraught by brooding over things that at her age she should never even
have heard of. I beg your pardon, Mr. Thurston, but doesn't what has
happened prove she is too high-strung to be troubled with theology yet?
I am not of your creed, but I respect your feeling about it. Only you
must see that to thrust these things on Kathie means madness and
despair"--
"But she might die," he broke in. "She might die without having made her
peace with her Maker, and be lost forever."
There was anguish in his face, and I know he meant it from the bottom of
his heart; but in his voice was the trace of conventional repetition of
phrases which made it possible for me to be overcome by exasperation. I
looked at him in that mingled fury of impatience and passionate
conviction of my ground which must have been the state of the prophets
of old when the spirit of prophecy descended upon them. I realize now
that to have the spirit of prophecy it is necessary to lose the temper
to a degree not altogether commendable in ordinary circumstances. I
blazed out on that poor, thin-blooded, dejected, weak-minded, loving
Methodist minister, and told him he insulted the God he worshiped; I
said he had better consider the text "I will have mercy and not
sacrifice;" I flung two or three other texts at him while he stood
dazed with astonishment; I flamed at him like a burning-bush become
feminine flesh; and fortunately he did not remember that even the Old
Nick is credited with being able to cite Scripture for his purposes. I
think the texts subdued him, so that it is well Father brought me up to
know the Bible. At least I reduced Mr. Thurston to a state where he was
as clay in the hands of the potter.
Then I presented to his consideration my scheme to send Kathie away to
boarding-school for a year. I told him he was at liberty to select the
school, if only it was one where she would not be too much troubled
about theology. Of course I knew it would be hopeless to think of her
going to a school entirely unsectarian, but I have already begun to make
inquiries about the relative reasonableness of Methodist schools, and I
think we may find something that will do. To put the child into
surroundings entirely new, where her mind will be taken away from
herself, and where a consciousness of the keenly discerning eyes of
girls of her own age will keep her theatrical tendencies in check,
should work wonders. I made Mr. Thurston give his consent, and before I
left the house I saw Mrs. Thurston. I told her not to trouble about
Kathie's outfit, and so I hope that bother is pretty well straightened
out for the present.
August 24. George has taken a violent cold from his ducking, and is
confined to the house. I hope that it is nothing serious. It is
especially awkward now, for Mr. Longworthy is coming over from Franklin
in a day or two to go over his accounts as trustee.
Kathie came over this morning while I was at breakfast, and tapped on
the dining-room window. She was positively shining with happiness. I
never saw a child so transformed.
"Oh, Miss Ruth," she cried out, as soon as I turned, "oh, won't you come
out here? I do so want to kiss you!"
I asked her to come inside, but she said she had promised not to, and
rather than to get into a discussion I went out to her. She ran dancing
up to me, fairly quivering with excitement.
"Oh, Miss Ruth," she said, "it is too good to be true! You are the most
loveliest lady that ever lived! Oh, I am so happy!"
I had to laugh at her demonstrativeness, but it was touching to see her.
She was no more like the morbid, hollow-eyed girl she had been than if
she had never had a trouble. It is wonderful that out of the family of a
Methodist parson should come a nature so exotic, but after all, the
spiritual raptures and excesses which have worn Mr. Thurston as thin as
a leaf in December must have their root in a temperament of keenly
emotional extremes.
"I always wanted to go to boarding-school," Kathie went on, possessing
herself of my hand, and covering it with kisses; "but Mother always said
we couldn't afford it. Now I am going. Oh, I shall have such a beautiful
time!"
I laughed at her enthusiasm, but I tried to moderate her extravagance a
little by telling her that at boarding-school she would have to work,
and to live by rule, so that she must give up her wild ways.
"Oh, I'll work," she responded, her ardor undampened. "I'll be the best
girl you ever heard of. I beg your pardon for everything I've done, and
I'll never do anything bad again."
This penitence seemed to me rather too general to amount to much, but
that she was so much pleased was after all the chief thing, so I made no
allusion to particular shortcomings, I did not even urge her to come
into the house, for I felt this was a point for her to work out in her
own mind. We walked in the dewy garden, discussing the preparations for
her leaving home, and it was droll and pathetic to find how poverty had
bred in her fantastic little pate a certain sort of shrewdness. She said
in the most matter-of-fact way that it would be nice for her father to
have one less mouth to fill, and that she supposed her smaller sisters
could have her old clothes. I confess she did not in talking exhibit any
great generosity of mind, but perhaps it was not to be expected of a
child dazzled by the prospect of having a dream come true, and of
actually being blessed with more than one new frock at a time. I am not
clear what the result of sending her among strangers will be, and I see
that a good deal of care will be necessary in choosing the school. I do
believe good must come of it, however; and at least we are doing the
best we can.
August 25. I went over to George's this morning to find out whether he
is able to see Mr. Longworthy. He was in bed, but insisted upon seeing
me. I have had a terrible day. I left him completely broken down with
his confession. O Mother! Mother!
August 26. Childishly I cried myself to sleep last night. It is so
terrible to feel that a friend has done wrong and proved himself
unworthy. I could not help shivering to think of George, and of how he
has had night after night to go to sleep with the knowledge of his
dishonesty. I settled in my own mind what I could do to cover his
defalcation, which fortunately is small enough for me to provide for by
going to Boston and selling some of the bonds Aunt Leah left me, and
which Mr. Longworthy has nothing to do with. Then I lay there in the
dark and sopped my pillow, until somehow, I found myself in the middle
of a comforting dream.
I dreamed that I was a little girl, and that I was broken-hearted about
some indefinite thing that had happened. I had in my dream, so far as I
can recall, no idea what the trouble was, but the grief was keen, and my
tears most copious. I was in the very thickest of my childish woe when
Father came behind me, picked me up like a feather, and set me down in
his lap. I had that ineffable sense of companionship which can be named
but never described, and I clung to him with a frantic clasp. He kissed
me, and wiped away my tears with soothing words, and then at last he
whispered in my ear as a precious secret something so infinitely
comforting that my sorrow vanished utterly. I broke into smiles, and
kissed him again and again, crying out that it was too good to be true,
and he had made me happy for my whole life. So keen was my joy that I
awoke, and lay in bed half dreaming still, saying over and over to
myself his enchanting words as if they would forever be a safeguard
against any pain which life might bring. Gradually I became sufficiently
wide awake to realize what this wonderful message of joy was, and found
myself ecstatically repeating: "Pigs have four feet and one tail!" Of
course I laughed at the absurdity, but the comfort stayed with me all
the same, and all day I have gone about with a peaceful mind, cheered by
the effect of this supernaturally precious fact of natural history.
I went to Boston and came back without seeing anybody but business men.
I saw George a moment on my way from the station, and now everything is
ready for Mr. Longworthy to-morrow. Both George and I may sleep to-night
in peace.
All the way to and from Boston I found myself going over my whole
acquaintance with George, questioning myself about what he has been and
what he is. To-night I have been reading over what I have written of him
in my diary, and the picture I find of him this year has gone to my
heart. I am afraid I have not been kind, perhaps have not been just; for
if what I have been writing is true George is--he is not a gentleman. It
does not startle me now to write this as it would have done two days
ago. I am afraid it will be years before I am able to get out of my
remembrance how he looked when he confessed. It seems almost as if I
should never be able to think of him again except as I saw him then, his
face almost as colorless as his pillow, and then red with shame. He
looked shrunken, morally as well as physically. I do not know whether I
blamed him more or less because he was so eager to throw the whole blame
on his wife's extravagance; I only know that it can hardly have been
more cruel for him to tell me of his dishonor than it was for me to
hear.
If he had asked me I would have lent him money, or given it to him, for
that matter, and done it gladly rather than to have him troubled. To
think how he must have been teased and bothered for this pitiful sum,
just two or three hundred dollars, before he could have made up his mind
to borrow it on my securities! He might have got it honestly, it was so
little; but he did not wish anybody to know he needed it. Pride, and
folly, and vanity,--I am so hurt that I begin to rail. I will put the
whole thing out of my mind, and never think of it again if I can help
it.