SUNSHINE AND CLOUD.
"George," said Mrs. Marvel to her husband one night, when they were
alone in their room, "what has come over Mr. Kindred? He is quite
changed."
"I've noticed it too, mother," said Mr. Marvel, "but I haven't thought
of it much, because, to tell you the truth, I don't believe he is
quite right here"--touching his forehead.
Mrs. Marvel had not mentioned to any one--not even to her husband--how
Minnie had distressed her during Joshua's illness. The girl had not
asked her to keep silence upon the subject; indeed, no word had passed
between them about it; but Mrs. Marvel judged that it would be best
for Minnie's sake, and for Joshua's also, to let the matter rest.
Since the night when Mrs. Marvel had discovered Minnie lying asleep at
Joshua's door, the girl had given her no further cause for
displeasure. Mrs. Marvel's fears were dispelled; for Minnie showed
nothing more than a friendly interest in Joshua's recovery. But if the
good mother had been less openly observant of Minnie's every look and
action, her fears would have grown stronger. For after the interview
between Joshua and Minnie, when Joshua had thanked her and kissed her
her, Mrs. Marvel set herself the task of closely observing Minnie's
conduct towards Joshua. And Minnie discovered it, and so behaved
herself that Mrs. Marvel was thrown completely off her guard. Minnie
displayed a carelessness and an indifference concerning Joshua's
health, at which Mrs. Marvel at any other time would have been hurt;
but now she was silently grateful, in the belief that her fears were
groundless.
Joshua was better. With the exception of a scar upon his neck, where
the Lascar had stabbed him, he was as well and strong as ever he had
been. He had grown into a fine handsome man; and the affectionate
disposition which had characterized him as a boy seemed to have become
stronger with his strength. The affection that existed between him and
Dan was unchanged and unchangeable. He took as much delight in the
birds as ever he had done; and, notwithstanding that he and Dan were
men now, with deepened passions and stronger aspirations, their hearts
were as tender to each other as in the younger days of their
friendship, when they mingled their tears together over the death of
Golden Cloud.
Every thing was bright before them. Dan had not spoken to Minnie of
his love for her; but he was made happy by a gradual change in her
behavior towards him. She grew more and more affectionate, spoke
softly to him, looked kindly at him, and did not repulse the little
tender advances he dared to make to her now and then.
"When you are gone to sea, Jo," he said to Joshua in the course of a
conversation in which, in the fulness of his joy at Minnie's kindness,
he had unbosomed himself to his friend, "I shall speak to her, and
tell her I love her." He spoke very slowly, and his eyes were toward
the ground; it was so sacred a subject with him, that his voice
trembled when he spoke of it. "Once on a time, before I knew her, Jo,
you, and you alone, filled my heart; but I had no idea then of a man's
passions and a man's fears. I think I should have disbelieved any
person then who told me that you would have a rival in my heart. But
you have, Jo; although you are not less loved for all that."
"I understand you, Dan, and am content. I am proud of your love. If I
were to lose it, the sweetness would go out of life."
"So it would be with me, Jo; but you can never lose it--never, never.
I think you and I know what love is. In the midst of all our trouble
when you first went away--trouble that came upon us so suddenly that I
began to be frightened of it--I found consolation in thinking of our
love for each other. Misfortunes came. Never mind, I thought; Joshua
loves me. Mother died, father died; we were left penniless; and I
thought of you and was comforted. You had grown so in my heart--like
the roots of a tree, Jo--that if I had ceased to love you, my heart
would have ceased to beat. It is the same now; but Minnie is in my
heart side by side with you. I shall tell her, you know, by and by. By
and by," he repeated softly. "The thought of it is like heaven to me;
for I have begun to hope."
It was on that same afternoon that Ellen was sitting in her bedroom
looking at her face in the looking-glass. She was fair; and she knew
it, and was proud of it. But it was not vanity that caused her to sit,
with her chin upon her hands, looking into the glass. Of a very modest
type a womanhood was Ellen; not a heroine of the Joan-of-Arc order,
who, with all her false glitter about her, would have been a woman
after very few men's hearts. Ellen was of the quiet order of women, of
whom there are thousands growing up in happy English homes, thank
Heaven! and who are blessed and contented and happy, notwithstanding
their sisters' unwomanly cries about woman's rights. May English women
like Ellen, modest and constant and loving, increase and multiply with
every succeeding year! Ellen was thinking of herself a little, as she
looked into the glass, and of Joshua a great deal. He had not spoken
to her yet; but he would soon, she knew. And as she sat and saw her
pretty face looking at her, whose step but Joshua's should she hear
coming, up the stairs? He went into the adjoining room--Dan's room;
and she heard him moving about, and--yes; singing! Singing what? Why,
"Bread-and-Cheese and Kisses." The heroine's name in the song is Kate;
but Joshua sang,--
"I said to Nell, my darling wife,
In whom my whole life's bliss is,
'What have you got for dinner, Nell?'
'Why, bread-and-cheese and kisses!'"
He said to _Nell_, his darling wife! The happy tears ran down Ellen's
face; but they were soon dried; and Ellen kept very quiet, fearing
that Joshua might hear her move. But Joshua went down stairs singing;
and then Ellen smiled at herself in the glass, and peeped at herself
through her fingers; and it wasn't an ugly picture to look at, if any
one had been there to see.
It was all settled without a word passing between them. I don't
believe there ever was such another courtship. They were sitting in
Mrs. Marvel's kitchen only four of them--father, mother, Ellen, and
Joshua. It really looked like a conspiracy that no other person came
into the kitchen that night; but there they were, conspiracy or no
conspiracy. There was Mrs. Marvel, knitting a pair of stockings for
Joshua; not getting along very fast with them, it must be confessed:
for her spectacles required a great deal of rubbing. And there was Mr.
Marvel, smoking his pipe, throwing many a furtive look in the
direction of Joshua and Ellen, who were sitting next to each other,
happy and silent. There is no record of how long they sat thus without
speaking; but suddenly, although not abruptly, Joshua put his arm
round Ellen's waist, and drew her closer to him. It was only a look
that passed between them; and then Joshua kissed Ellen's lips, and she
laid her head upon his breast.
"Mother! father! look here!"
Mrs. Marvel rose, all of a tremble, and laid her hand upon Ellen's
head, and kissed the young lovers. But Mr. Marvel behaved quite
differently. He cast one quick satisfied look at the two youngsters;
and then turned from them, and continued smoking as if nothing unusual
had occurred.
"Well, father?" exclaimed Joshua, rather surprised at his father's
silence.
"Well, Josh!" replied Mr. Marvel.
"Do you see this?" asked Joshua, with his arm round Ellen's waist.
Ellen, blushing rosy red, looked shyly at Mr. Marvel; but he looked
stolidly at her in return.
"Yes; I see it, Josh," said Mr. Marvel, without any show of emotion.
"And what do you say to it?"
"What do I say to it, Josh?" replied Mr. Marvel with dignity. "Well, I
believe I'm your father; and, as such, I think you should ask me if I
was agreeable. I thought it proper to ask _my_ father, Josh. It isn't
because I'm a wood-turner"--
"No, no, father," interrupted Joshua; "I made a mistake. Ellen and I
thought"--
"Ellen and you thought," repeated Mr. Marvel.
"That if you were agreeable"--continued Joshua.
"That if I was agreeable," repeated Mr. Marvel.
"And if you would please to give your consent"--said Joshua, purposely
prolonging his preamble.
"And if I would be pleased to give my consent," repeated Mr. Marvel
with a slight chuckle of satisfaction.
"That as we love each other very much, we would like to get married."
"That's dutiful," said Mr. Marvel, laying down his pipe, oracularly.
"I'm only agreeable, Josh, because I am old, and because I am married.
As I said to mother the other night, when we was talking the matter
over--ah! you may stare; but we knew all about it long ago. Didn't we,
mother? Well, as I was saying to mother the other night, if I was a
young man, and mother wasn't in the way, I'd marry her myself and you
might go a-whistling. Shiver my timbers, my lass!" he cried, breaking
through the trammels of wood-turning, and becoming suddenly nautical,
"come and give me a kiss."
Which Ellen did; and so the little comedy ended happily. Joshua,
having a right now to sit with his arm round Ellen's waist, availed
himself of it, you may be sure. If Ellen went out of the room, he had
also a right to go and inquire where she was going; and this,
curiously enough, happened four or five times during the night. If any
thing could have added to the happiness of Mr. Marvel--except being
any thing but a wood-turner, which, at his age, was out of the
question--it was this proceeding of Joshua's. Every time Joshua
followed Ellen out of the room; Mr. Marvel looked at his wife with
pleasure beaming from his eyes.
"It puts me in mind of the time when I came a-courting you, mother,"
he said. "How the world spins round! It might have been last night
when you and me were saying good-by at the street-door."
Mrs. Marvel had not spoken to her husband without cause of the change
that had taken place in Basil Kindred. A very remarkable change had
indeed taken place in him. A mistrustful expression had settled itself
upon his face, accompanied by a keen hungry watchfulness of all that
occurred around him. He gave short answers, and was snappish and
morose. Yet not a look, not a word, not a gesture escape his notice.
He did not avoid his friends; he rather courted their society. He
repelled their advances, but he sat among them, watching. Every sense
was employed in that all-absorbing task. What was it that he was
trying to discover?
The change was so sudden. A few days ago he was as he had ever been
hitherto, frank and cheerful,--even gay sometimes. Now, all that was
gone. In place of frankness, mistrust; in place of cheerfulness,
gloom. Susan was the only one, with the exception of his daughter, to
whom he did not speak with a certain bitterness. His manner to all the
others was as though some sensitive chord in his nature had been
sorely wounded--as though all men were his foes--as though his faith
in what was good and noble in human nature had been violently
disturbed.
See him now. He and Minnie have been sitting together for hours. He
has been strangely stern and strangely tender to her in turns, but she
is used to his wayward moods. He has detained her by his side all the
morning, upon one and another idle pretext; and she, as if wishful to
please him, has humored him, and been wonderfully submissive and
obedient. But once she had fallen into a reverie--not a happy one--and
he had broken it by asking her in a harsh voice what she was dreaming
about. She replied only by a startled look, and resumed her work,
which had been lying idly in her lap. Repentant of his harshness, he
turned his head from her to hide the sudden spasm which passed into
his face.
"Are you ill?" she asked.
"No, dear child."
"In pain?"
"No, dear child."
Presently she put aside her work, and rose to leave the room.
"Where are you going?" he asked in a strangely anxious voice.
"To see Mrs. Marvel," was her answer.
"Sit you down," he cried sternly.
She hesitated and lingered by the door, beating the ground with her
foot irresolutely. Seeing that, he grasped her wrist firmly, and hurt
her without intending to do so. The muscles of her face quivered, but
not from the pain.
"O Minnie, my child!" he cried; then, releasing her, "have I hurt
you?"
"No," she answered in a hard voice. "Why do you not wish me to go to
Mrs. Marvel's house? You have forbidden me before."
"You trouble them too much."
"That is not your reason, father," she said in the same hard voice.
"You are hiding something from me."
"Are you not hiding something from me, Minnie?" he asked, looking
anxiously into her face.
"What should I hide from you?" she asked, in reply, coldly and
evasively. "I am not well, father. I can't stop in this room. I will
not go where you do not wish me."
He did not detain her, and she glided swiftly out of the room. He was
about to follow her, when a dizziness came upon him, and he sank into
a chair. It was only by a strong effort of will that he kept himself
from fainting.
"My strength is deserting me," he muttered, his breath coming thick
and fast; "scarcely a day passes but this weakness comes upon me." He
held up his hand; it trembled like a leaf. "Have I failed in my duty
to her? Is it my fault that she does not confide in me? Or is this a
wicked lie?" He took a letter from his pocket and read it, not once,
but many times. "No," he groaned; "it is true. I feel that it is
true." He rose to his feet and felt like one just risen from a sick
bed. He was as weak as a child; so weak, indeed, that the
consciousness of his weakness brought tears into his eyes; and he said
in a voice of anguish, "Now, when my child's happiness--her honor,
perhaps--depends upon my watchful care, I am helpless. If I had some
one that I could trust some one to help me!" He heard a step upon the
stairs. It was like an answer to his wish. "It is Susan," he muttered;
"the one being that I know in the world who would serve me faithfully,
Susan, Susan!"
She heard him, although his voice was faint and low, and entered the
room. Alarmed by the traces of illness in his face, she hastened to
his side.
"You are ill," she said, assisting him to a seat. "Can I do any thing
for you?"
"Yes," he answered. "You can do much. You can be my friend."
"Your friend!" she exclaimed. Had she not always been his friend? But
there was a deeper meaning in his voice than she had ever heard
before, and his appeal sent thrills of pleasure to her heart.
"I am ill," he continued; "but it is more from weakness than any thing
else. I am not in pain. A dizziness seizes me, as it seized me just
now, and I feel as if my senses were leaving me. I can scarcely stand;
and I have no one to trust to."
"Not Minnie?" she said softly and wonderingly.
"Hush! Minnie, of all others, must not be told of this. Can I trust
you?"
"I would work till I dropped to serve you."
A flush came into his face.
"To serve me and Minnie?" he said.
"Yes; to serve you and Minnie."
"Give me your sacred promise that what passes between us now will
never be divulged, will never be spoken of, by you, unless my tongue
is sealed, and the time comes when it may be necessary to speak."
"Does it concern you?" she asked with a natural hesitation; for there
was a feverishness in his manner that alarmed her.
"It concerns me and Minnie."
"I promise."
"Faithfully and sacredly?"
"Faithfully and sacredly."
He took her hand and pressed it, and then gave her the letter, and
asked her to read it. It contained but a few words, but they were
sufficient to cause a look of horror to start into her eyes.
"Can it be true?" she asked, more of herself than of him and her
trembling lips turned white and parched in an instant.
"Susan," said Basil Kindred, "I have lived long enough in the world to
know its falseness. In years gone by, men have smiled in my face and
shaken me by the hand, and I have learned afterwards, that while their
manner spoke me fair, there was treachery in their hearts. My life has
been a hard one, what with false friends and bitter poverty; but I
bore it all patiently, and lived--lived, when a hundred times voices
have whispered in my ear, 'Die, and be at peace!' I had an object to
live for--Minnie, my darling child! So I lived and suffered, rather
than die and leave her unprotected. It was a bitter, bitter life. You
can guess how hard a thing it was for me to find food for her, and how
often she had to go without it, before the day when you and that
boy--I cannot utter his name--came to our rescue. From that time until
this dark cloud"--he placed his hand on the letter--"fell upon me, I
have been happy. And now, when I need all my strength to fulfil my
duty as a father--when it seems to me a crime that I should allow her
to go from my side--this weakness strikes me down."
"Does she know?"
"She knows and must know, nothing. But she must be watched. If there
be no truth in this letter--and there may not be"--
"I pray not! Oh, I pray not!" cried Susan. "For others' sakes as well
as yours."
"I understand you; if there be no truth in it, no one need know of it
but you and I."
"What shall I do?"
"Watch her and him, without seeming to do so," said Basil Kindred. "If
she goes out, follow her if you can without letting her see you and
let me know all you see and hear. Mind, I say _all_; keep nothing from
me. You have promised sacredly."
"I will do what you bid me."
He raised her hand to his lips, and in the midst of her great sorrow
his action brought a happy feeling to her heart. When she was gone,
Basil Kindred unlocked a desk and took out a clasped book, in which he
wrote a few lines. "It is necessary," he sighed, "for my memory is
lost to me sometimes, and I cannot recall events; and it may save me
from doing an injustice." Then he replaced the book and locked the
desk.
That night, in her room, Susan sat upon her bed and bowed her head to
her knees, sobbing, "O my poor Dan! O my poor, poor Ellen! if; after
all these years, you should find him false!"