_ARTHUR ARRIVES AT MIDDLETHORPE._
Thank God, bless God, all ye who suffer not
More grief than ye can weep for.
Margaret Grey was sitting in her garden. It was a warm day. A faint
haze, born of the vapor, paled the deep blue of the sky; not a breath
of wind stirred the languid foliage of the trees; the flowers were
bathed in light and color; through a gap in the trees came the glimmer
of the sea, and faintly on the still air rose the murmur of lulling
waves--scarcely waves, perhaps only movement, stir, the manifestation
of ocean's ceaseless life. It was a day to rejoice in--a day when the
pulses quicken and the heart is glad with unconscious, unreasoning
gladness; when lovers look into one another's eyes and creep more
closely together; when children laugh and sing, and even the dumb
creatures seem to rejoice in being.
In _her_ face was no sense of gladness. She sat under the trees, a book
in her hand, a shawl wrapt closely round her shoulders.
Every particle of color had left her face, even her lips were pale.
The golden coronal of hair with which Nature had endowed her seemed
to throw a ghastly shade over her face. It looked unnatural, like
the glory of youth when its life and gladness have gone by. Only her
eyes retained their beauty, for through their mournful wistfulness,
their sometimes wild eagerness, the beautiful soul still shone, and in
the week of hope, of beauty, of life itself, that soul was learning,
slowly and painfully, it is true, but learning still, the lesson
that, consciously or unconsciously, all must learn,--submission to the
Supreme Will first and above all; not the mild sentimental "Thy will
be done" of which hymnists and sermon-coiners discourse so glibly, nor
even that "grace of patience" which her solicitor had recommended her
to seek as a panacea for all her ills, but a something far above and
beyond these--a something that, perhaps, only those who have suffered
keenly can ever know--the laying down of self-will altogether, the
recognition, through sorrows and contradictions manifold, of a Divine
Love
"Shaping the ends of life."
A book was in Margaret's hand, but she did not often look at it, at
least not for long. There seemed to be a disturbing cause at work that
prevented her from fixing her attention on anything but the absorbing
anxiety which held her.
It was toward the afternoon of the long day, and she had been sitting
there since early morning waiting and watching. From time to time she
would take out her watch and consult it, and once she pressed her hand
to her side, murmuring, "Patience, patience! My God, shall I ever learn
it?"
And the song-birds flitted backward and forward over her head, and the
sea smiled and the earth rejoiced. There was no answer to the cry of
the lonely heart. Patience; yes, patience, poor stricken one! for "when
night is darkest, then dawn is near." I wonder who thinks of it when
the black darkness is closing around them? Certainly Margaret did not.
She was sitting in the back part of the little garden; from her
position she could hear the door-bell and the click of the latch of the
front gate, but she could not see those who came in or went out, and
through that long day there had been no sound of outside life to break
in upon her solitude. It had begun to sicken her as she sat under the
trees looking out upon the sunshine.
There was a sound at last--the stopping of wheels at the garden-gate,
the latch pushed back with something of impatience, a ring at the
door-bell that echoed through the house.
Margaret leapt to her feet and tried to rush forward. It was surely
that for which she had been looking--a telegram to tell her something
had been done. He had promised to use all possible despatch.
Alas, poor Margaret! The "he" in question was at that moment exciting
himself very little about her or her concerns. He was not very far from
her. He could have been seen by any who had chosen to take the trouble
of looking for him, seated on a strong little black pony, jogging along
with great contentment--a conspicuous object on the yellow sands.
In moments of strong excitement physical power sometimes abandons us:
perhaps it is that the spirit would master the body, and forgetting its
bonds rush forward alone to meet the coming fate, and that then the
weakness of its natural home draws it back to its humanity.
It was something like this Margaret experienced. She rose, she would
have pressed forward. In an incredibly short time she would have had
the message in her hands, but her limbs refused to bear her. She
sank back on the garden-seat, compelled, whether she would or no, to
wait--to wait.
The delay was not long, but it seemed to her as if the moments were
ages, each laden with an agony of suspense, while she sat still in her
forced inaction.
Jane crossed the lawn at last with something in her hand, and Margaret
covered her face and moaned faintly. If this should be disappointment,
how could she bear it? It _was_ disappointment. The message turned out
to be a card which Jane put into her hands, explaining as she did so
that the young gentleman had come on important business, and wished
particularly to see her, if only for a few moments.
"A young gentleman--important business," said Margaret faintly; "then
it is not a telegram?"
"Who said it were?" asked Jane rather rudely. She knew very well that
speak as she might her mistress would take very little notice of her
now. "I said a young gentleman was in the parlor," she continued in a
higher key, as if Margaret had been deaf, "and I've too much to do to
be wasting _my_ time argufying. Everybody can't set doing nothing all
day like _some_ folk I could tell of. Are you going to see him or are
you not?"
"I will see him," replied Margaret quietly. "Ask him to wait a few
minutes."
She had wondered only a moment before how she could bear the
disappointment. It came, and she neither fainted nor wept, only there
fell a chiller shadow over her heart--the darkness of her lot on earth
seemed to deepen.
She watched with eyes from which all the light had gone out until
Jane had re-entered the house, then she rose again, and this time no
ultra-impetuousness delayed her. The name on the card puzzled her. She
had a vague notion she had seen it somewhere before, but in her trouble
her London remembrances were partially swamped. She scarcely knew even
why she had decided to grant this young man an interview. She was only
obeying a secret impulse: he might possibly be the bearer of a message.
She had not thought at the moment she left her seat that the
parlor-window looked out upon the little garden; but so it was, and as
languidly and with apparent pain she crossed the lawn its temporary
occupant was gazing upon her.
Her appearance shocked him terribly. He had been in no way prepared for
the change which that week of misery and loneliness had brought about.
She did not look the same. Then, indeed, she had been sad, but the
sadness had not absorbed her utterly--had not written on her face the
haggard, weary hopelessness which it now bore.
The young man's heart contracted painfully; a sudden dismay seized
him. He would have turned and fled. How could he bear to face this
suffering? In its presence he felt weak and helpless as a child.
But he looked at her again, the white patient face with its halo of
golden color, the weak languid steps, the beautiful outlines, the
never-failing, unconscious grace, and as he looked the love of his
heart surged in a great wave over his being. Unconsciously he clasped
his hands, his brows knit, his form dilated.
"God helping me," he said in a low impassioned voice that swept upward
from the innermost depths of his spirit--"God helping me, I will help
her!"
Scarcely was the vow made before the door opened and Margaret and he
were face to face. She looked at him for a moment, then held out her
hand, smiling her recognition. "Sit down," she said with the quiet
graciousness Arthur remembered so well, taking a seat herself at the
same time; then suddenly she caught sight of what he brought, for
Arthur had the scarf on his arm. Her quietness fled, she rose to her
feet, and seizing his arm pointed to it eagerly: "Where did you find
it? Whose is it? Why did you bring it here?"
She spoke and fell back on her chair, gasping for breath.