It was near the end of February,--rather late in the afternoon of a by
no means balmy day, in the course of which Dr. Harrison had arrived to
look after his repairs. But the workmen had stopped work and gone home
to supper, and the doctor and his late dinner sat together. Luxuriously
enough, on the doctor's part, for the dinner was good and well cooked,
the bottles of wine irreproachable (as wine) in their silver stands,
the little group of different coloured glasses shining in the
firelight. The doctor's fingerbowl and napkin stood at hand, (at this
stage of the proceeding) his half-pared apple was clearly worth the
trouble, and he himself--between the fire and his easy-chair--might be
said to be "in the lap of comfort." Comfort rarely did much for him but
take him on her lap, however--he seldom stayed there; and on the
present occasion the doctor's eyes were very wide open and his thoughts
at work. It might be presumed that neither process was cut short, when
the old black man opened the door and announced Mr. Linden.
But if Mr. Linden could have seen the doctor's face just before, he
might have supposed that his entrance had produced rather a sedative
effect. For the brow smoothed itself down, the eye took its light play
and the mouth its light smile, and the doctor's advance to meet his
friend was marked with all its graceful and easy unconcern. He did not
even seem energetic enough to be very glad; for grace and carelessness
still blended in his welcome and in his hospitable attentions, nothing
of which however was failing. He had presently made Mr. Linden as
comfortable as himself, so far as possible outward appliances could be
effectual; established him at a good side of the table; Burnished him
with fruit and pressed him with wine; and then sitting at ease at his
own corner, sipped his claret daintily, eyeing Mr. Linden good
humouredly between sips; but apparently too happily on good terms with
comfort to be in any wise eager or anxious as to what Mr. Linden's
business might be, or whether he had any.
"Has the news of my arrival flown over Pattaquasset already?" said he.
"I thought I had seen nothing but frieze jackets, and friezes of broken
plaster--and I have certainly felt so much of another kind of _freeze_
that I should hardly think even news could have stirred."
Mr. Linden's reception of the doctor's hospitality had been merely
nominal--except so far as face and voice had the receiving, and he
answered quietly--
"I don't know. I happened to want you, doctor, and so I found out that
you were here."
"Want me? I am very glad to be wanted by you--so that it be not _for_
you. What is it, my dear Linden?"
"No--you will not be glad," said Mr. Linden,--"though it is both for me
and not for me. I want you to go with me to see one of my little
scholars who is sick."
"Who is he?"
"One whom you have seen but will not remember,--Johnny Fax."
"Fax--" said the doctor--"I remember the name, but no particular owner
of it. What's the matter with him?"
"I want you to come and see."
"Now?"--
"As near that as may be."
"Now it shall be, then; though with such a February night on one side,
it takes all your power on the other to draw me out of this chair. You
don't look much like Comedy, and I am very little like the great
buskin-wearer--but I would as lieve Tragedy had me by the other
shoulder as February, when his fingers have been so very long away from
the fire. Did you ever read Thomson's 'Castle of Indolence,' Linden?"
"Not to much purpose--the name is all I remember."
"Stupid book,"--said the doctor;--"but a delightful place!"
The luxury of broadcloth and furs in which the doctor was presently
involved might have rendered him reasonably independent, one would
think, of February or any other of Jack Frost's band. Jerry was at the
door, and involving themselves still further in buffalo robes the two
gentle men drove to the somewhat distant farm settlement which called
Jonathan Fax master. Mr. Fax was a well-to-do member of the
Pattaquasset community, as far as means went; there was very little
knowledge in his house how to make use of means. Nor many people to
make use of the knowledge. The one feminine member of the family had
lately married and gone off to take care of her own concerns, and
Jonathan and his one other child lived on as best they might; the child
being dependant upon the maid of all work for his clothes and
breakfast, for his Sunday lessons upon Faith, for the weekday teaching
and comfort of his little life upon Mr. Linden. Living along in this
somewhat divided way, the child had suddenly taken sick--no one just
knew how; nor just what to do with him--except to send Mr. Linden word
by one of the other boys, which had been done that afternoon. And thus
it was, that Dr. Harrison had been looked for, found, and drawn out
into the February night with only the slight protection of furs and
broadcloth.
Thus it was that after a short and rather silent drive, the two
gentlemen went together into the last-century sort of a house, received
the angular welcome of Jonathan Fax, and stood side by side by the bed
where the sick child lay. Side by side--with what different faces! A
difference which Johnny was quick to recognize. He lay on the bed,
wrapped in a little old plaid cloak, and with cheeks which rivalled its
one remaining bright colour; and half unclosing his heavy eyes to see
the doctor, he stretched out his arms to Mr. Linden, clasping them
round his neck as his friend sat down on the bedside and gently lifted
him up, and receiving the kiss on his flushed cheek with a little
parting of the lips which said how glad he was. But then he lay quite
still in Mr. Linden's arms.
Whatever attractions the Castle of Indolence might have for Dr.
Harrison upon occasion, he never seemed so much as to look that way
when he was at his work. Now, it made no difference that _he_ was no
friend of Johnny's; he gave his attention thoroughly and with all his
skill to the condition and wants of his little patient.
"Is there nobody to take care of him?" he asked in French, for Jonathan
Fax with his square and by no means delicate and tender physiognomy
stood at the other side of the bed heavily looking on.
"I shall, to-night," said Mr. Linden. "You may give me your directions."
The doctor proceeded to do this; but added, "He wants care and good
nursing; and he'll suffer if he don't have it. He is a sick child."
"He shall have it," was all the answer; and when the doctor had
finished his work for the time, Mr. Linden laid the child on the bed
again, giving him a whispered promise to come back and stay with him
all night; upon the strength of which promise Johnny fell into a deep
sleep.
"Has the creature nobody to take care of him?" said the doctor as they
went out.
"Nobody at home."
"I shall be here a day or two, Linden--I'll see him early in the
morning again."
Mr. Linden's next move through the biting air was to drive home. At the
door of the sitting-room Faith met him.
"Endecott--how is he?"
"Less well than I expected to find him, dear Faith. I found Dr.
Harrison and took him there with me."
"And what did Dr. Harrison say of him?"
"That he wanted good care and nursing."
"And who is there to give it to him, Endy?" she said with a very
saddened and earnest face.
"Why I shall give it to him to-night, my child, and we'll see about
to-morrow. The doctor promised to go there again in the morning."
She stood a moment silent, and then said, "I'll go with you."
"Not to-night, dear--it is not needful. He will not want more than one
watcher."
"But he might want something else--something to be done that a woman
about the house might be wanted for--let me go too!--"
"No indeed! you must go to sleep. And he will hardly want anything but
what I can give him to-night. I know well what your little hands are in
a sick room," he said taking them in his own,--"I know well!--but they
are not made of iron--nor are you."
Faith looked ill satisfied.
"Well, you'll not hinder my taking your place by him to-morrow, Endy?"
"If I can," Mr. Linden said, "I shall come home to breakfast, and then
I may know what you had better do; but if I should be detained there,
and so not get here till midday, wait for me--I should not like to have
you go without seeing me again; and I can leave Reuben there for the
morning if need be."
"Oh Endecott!--" she said with a heart full; but she said no more and
ran away. She came back soon to call Mr. Linden to tea, which had
waited; and after tea when he was about going she put a basket in his
hand.
"I hope Mr. Fax has wood in his house, so that you can keep a
fire,--but you are not likely to find anything else there. You'll want
everything that is in this, Endy--please remember."
"I will not forget," he said, as he gave her his thanks. "But what did
that exclamation mean, before tea?"
"What exclamation?--Oh--" said Faith, smiling somewhat but looking
down, "I suppose it meant that I was disappointed."
"My dear little child--you must try not to feel disappointed, because I
am quite sure you ought not to go; and that must content both you and
me. So good night."--
Faith tried to be contented, but her little scholar lay on her heart.
And it lay on her heart too, that Mr. Linden would be watching all
night and teaching all day. He did not know how much he had
disappointed, for she had laid a fine plan to go by starlight in the
morning to take his place and send him home for a little rest before
breakfast and school. Faith studied only one book that night, and that
was her Bible.
It was a night of steady watching,--broken by many other things, but
not by sleep. There was constantly some little thing to do for the sick
child,--ranging from giving him a drink of water, to giving him "talk,"
or rocking and--it might be--singing him to sleep. But the restless
little requests never had to wait for their answer, and with the whole
house sunk in stillness or sleep, Mr. Linden played the part of a most
gentle and efficient nurse--and thought of Faith, and her
disappointment. And so the night wore away, and the morning star came
up, and then the red flushes of sunrise.
"Who turneth the night into day"--Mr. Linden thought, with a grave look
from the window to the little face beside him--and then the words
came,--
"In the morning, children, in the morning;
We'll all rise together in the morning!"
It was very early indeed, earlier even than usual, when Faith came down
and kindled her fire. And then leaving it to burn, she opened the
curtains of the window and looked out into the starlight. It was long
before the red flush of the morning; it was even before the time when
Faith would have gone to relieve the guard in that sick room; her
thoughts sped away to the distant watcher there and the sick child.
Faith could guess what sort of a watching it had been, and it was a
comfort to think that Johnny had it. But then as she looked out into
the clear still starlight, something brought up the question, what if
Johnny should die?--It was overwhelming to Faith for a minute; her
little scholar's loveliness had got fast hold of her heart; and she
loved him for deep and far-back associations too. She could not bear to
think that it might be. Yet she asked herself if this was a reasonable
feeling? Why should she be sorry--if it were so--that this little
blossom of Heaven should have an early transplanting thither? Ah, the
fragrance of such Heaven-flowers is too sweet to be missed, and Earth
wants them. As Faith looked sadly out into the night, watched the
eternal procession of bright stars, and heard the low sweep of the
wind, the words came to her,--separated from their context and from
everything else as it seemed,--"I, the Lord, do all these things." Her
mind as instantly gave a glad assent and rested itself in them. Not
seen by her or by mortal the place or fitting of any change or turn of
earthly things, in the great plan,--every one such turn and change had
its place, as sure as the post of each star in the sky--as true to its
commission as that wind, which came from no one knew where to go no one
knew whither. Faith looked and listened, and took the lesson deep down
in her heart.
Mr. Linden's little basket had stood him well in stead that long
night,--for Faith had said truth; nothing was for him in Mr. Fax's
house. Mr. Fax was well enough satisfied that Johnny's teacher should
take the trouble of nursing the child, had no idea that such trouble
would necessarily involve much loss of sleep, and still further no
notion of the fact that a watcher at night needs food as much as fire.
Fire Mr. Linden had, but he would have been worse off without the
stores he found in his basket. In truth the supply generally was
sufficient to have kept him from starving even if he had been obliged
to go without his breakfast; but Dr. Harrison concerned himself about
his little patient, and was better than Mr. Linden's hopes. He came,
though in the cold short February morning, a good while before eight
o'clock. He gave Mr. Linden a pleasant clasp of the hand; and then made
his observations in silence.
"Is this one of your favourites?" he said at length.
A grave "yes."
"I am sorry for it."
Mr. Linden was silent at first, looking down at the child with a sort
of expression the doctor had not often seen, and when he spoke it was
without raising his eyes.
"Tell me more particularly."
"I don't know myself,"--said the doctor with a frankness startling in
one of his profession; but Dr. Harrison's characteristic carelessness
nowhere made itself more apparent than in his words and about what
people might think of them.--"I don't say anything _certainly_--but I
do not like appearances."
"What is the matter?"
"It's an indefinite sort of attack--all the worse for that!--the root
of which is hid from me. All you can do is to watch and wait. Have you
been here through the night?"
"Yes," Mr. Linden answered--and put the further question, "Do you think
there is any danger of contagion?"
"O no!--the fever, what there is, comes from some inward cause--a
complicated one, I judge. I can guess, and that's all. Are there no
women about the house?"
"None that are good for much." And looking at his watch, Mr. Linden
laid the child--who had fallen asleep again--out of his arms among the
pillows, arranging them softly and dextrously as if he were used to the
business.
"Reuben Taylor will stay with him for the present," he said as he
turned to Dr. Harrison.
"I'll come again by and by," the doctor said. "Meanwhile all that can
be done is to let him have this, as I told you."
The directions were given to Reuben, the doctor drove off, and Mr.
Linden set out on his quick walk home; after the confinement of the
night, the cold morning air and exercise were rather resting than
otherwise. It was a very thoughtful half hour--very sorrowful at first;
but before he reached home, thought, and almost feeling, had got beyond
"the narrow bounds of time," and were resting peacefully--even
joyfully--"where bright celestial ages roll."
He entered the house with a light step, and went first upstairs to
change his dress; but when he came down and entered the sitting-room,
there was the tone of the whole walk upon his face still. Faith put her
question softly, as if she expected no glad answer. And yet it was
partly that, though given in very gentle, grave tones.
"There is more to fear than to hope, dear Faith,--and there is
everything to hope, and nothing to fear!"
She turned away to the breakfast-table; and said little more till the
meal was over. Then she rose when he did.
"I am going now, Endy!"--The tone was of very earnest determination,
that yet waited for sanction.
"Yes," he answered--"Dr. Harrison says the fever is not contagious, I
waited to know that. If I can I shall get free before midday, so I may
meet you there. And can you prepare and take with you two or three
things?"--he told her what.
Faith set about them; and when they were done, Mr. Skip had finished
his breakfast and got Jerry ready. Some other preparations Faith had
made beforehand; and with no delay now she was on her swift way to
little Johnny's bedside. She came in like a vision of comfort upon the
sick room, with all sorts of freshness about her; grasped Reuben's
hand, and throwing back her hood, stooped her lips to Johnny's cheek.
And Johnny gave her his usual little fair smile--and then his eyes went
off to the doorway, as if he half expected to see some one else behind
her. But it was from no want of love to _her_, as she knew from the way
the eyes came back to her face and rested there, and took a sort of
pleased survey of her hood and, her fur and her dress.
"Dear Johnny!--Can you speak to me?" said Faith tenderly touching her
cheek again to his.
"Oh yes, ma'am," he said, in a quiet voice and with the same bit of a
smile. That was what Faith wanted. Then she looked up.
"Are you going to school now, Reuben?"
"I didn't expect to this morning, Miss Faith," Reuben said with a sober
glance at his little comrade.
"Then you can wait here a bit for me."
Leaving Reuben once more in charge, Faith went on a rummaging
expedition over the house to find some woman inmate. Not too easily or
speedily she was found at last, the housekeeper and all-work woman deep
in _all work_ as she really seemed, and in an outer kitchen of remote
business, whither Faith had traced her by an exercise of determinate
patience and skill. Having got so fur, Faith was not balked in the
rest; and obtaining from her some of Johnny's clean linen which she
persuaded her to go in search of, she returned to the room where she
had left Reuben; and set about making the sick child as comfortable as
in his sickness he could be.
It was a day or two already since Johnny had lain there and had had
little effectual attention from anybody, till Mr. Linden came last
night. The child might well look at his new nurse, for her neat dress
and gentle face and soft movements were alone a balm for any sick
place. And in her quiet way, Faith set about changing the look of this
one. There was plenty of wood, and she made a glorious fire. Then
tenderly and dextrously she managed to get a fresh nightgown on Johnny
without disturbing him more than pleasantly with her soft
manipulations; and wrapping him in a nice little old doublegown which
she had brought with her and which had been a friend of her own
childish days, Faith gave him to Reuben to hold while she made up the
bed and changed the clothes, the means for which she had also won from
the housekeeper. Then having let down the chintz curtains to shield off
the intense glare of the sunny snow, Faith assumed Johnny into her own
arms. She had brought vinegar from home, and with it bathed the little
boy's face and hands and brushed his hair, till the refreshed little
head lay upon her breast in soothed rest and comfort.
"There, Johnny!"--she whispered as her lips touched his brow,--"Mr.
Linden may come as soon as he pleases--we are ready for him!"
The child half unclosed his eyes at the words, and then sunk again into
one of his fits of feverish sleep, the colour rising in his cheeks a
little, the breath coming quick. Reuben knelt down at Faith's side and
watched him.
"I used to wonder, Miss Faith," he said softly, "what would become of
him if Mr. Linden ever went away"--and the quiet pause told what
provision Reuben thought was fast coming for any such contingency.
"You can't think what Mr. Linden's been to Johnny, Miss Faith," he went
on in the same low voice,--"and to all of us," he added lower still.
"But he's taken such care of him, in school and out. It was only last
week Johnny told me he liked coming to school in the winter, because
then Mr. Linden always went home with him. And whenever he could get in
Mr. Linden's lap he was perfectly happy. And Mr. Linden would let him,
sometimes, even in school, because Johnny was so little and not very
strong,--and he'd let him sit in his lap and go to sleep for a little
while when he got tired, and then Johnny would go back to his lessons
as bright as a bee. That was the way he did the very first day school
was opened, for Johnny was frightened at first, and a mind to cry--he'd
never had anybody to take much care of him. And Mr. Linden just called
him and took him up and spoke to him--and Johnny laid his head right
down and went to sleep; and he's loved Mr. Linden with all his heart
ever since. I know we all laughed--and he smiled himself, but it made
all the rest of us love him too."
Reuben had gone on talking, softly, as if he felt sure of sympathy in
all he might say on the subject. But that "first day school was
opened!"--how Faith's thoughts sprang back there,--with what strange,
mixed memories the vision of it came up before her! That day and time
when so many new threads were introduced into her life, which were now
shewing their colours and working out their various patterns. It was
only a spring there and back again, however, that her thoughts took; or
rather the vision was a sort of background to Reuben's delineations,
and her eye was upon these; with what kind of sympathy she did not care
to let him see. Her cheek was bent down to the sick child's head and
Faith's face was half hidden. Until a moment later, when the door
opened and Johnny's father came in to see what was become of him; and
then Mr. Fax had no clue to the lustrous softness of the eyes that
looked up at him. He could make nothing of it.
"What!" said he. "Why who's Johnny got to look after him now?"
"I am his teacher, sir."
"His teacher, be you? Seems to me he's a lot of 'em. One teacher stayed
with him last night. How many has he got, among you?"
"Only two--" said Faith, rejoicing that she was _one_. "I am his Sunday
school teacher."
"Well what's your name, now?"
"Faith Derrick."
"_That's_ who you be!" said Mr. Fax in surprise. "Don't say! Well
Johnny's got into good hands, aint he? How's he gettin' along?"
Faith's eye went down to the little boy, and her hand passed slowly and
tenderly over his hair; she was at a loss how to answer, and Reuben
spoke for her.
"He's been sleeping a good deal this morning."
The father stooped towards the child, but his look went from him to
Faith, with a mixture of curiosity and uneasiness as he spoke.
"Sleepin', is he?--Then I guess he's gettin' along first-rate--aint he?"
Again Faith's look astonished the man, both because of its intent soft
beauty and the trembling set of her lip. But how to answer him she did
not know. Her head sunk over the child's brow as she exclaimed,
"His dear Master knows what to do with him!"
Jonathan Fax stood up straight and looked at Reuben.
"What does she mean!"
"She means that he is in God's hands, and that we don't know yet what
He will do," Reuben answered with clear simplicity.
Yet it was a strange view of the subject to Mr. Fax; and he stood stiff
and angular and square, looking down at Faith and her charge, feeling
startled and strange. Her face was bent so that he could not see that
quiver of her lip now; but he did see one or two drops fall from the
lowered eyelids on Johnny's hair. Perhaps he would have asked more
questions, but he did not; something kept them back. He stood fixed,
with gathering soberness growing over his features. Little he guessed
that those tears had been half wrung from Faith's eyes by the contrast
between his happy little child and him. It was with something like a
groan at last that he turned away, merely bidding Reuben Taylor to call
for anything that was wanted.
The morning wore on softly, for Johnny still slept. Reuben went quietly
about, giving attention where it was needed; to the fire, or to the
curtains--drawn back now as the sun got round--or bringing Faith a
footstool, or trying some other little thing for her comfort; and when
he was not wanted remaining in absolute stillness. As it neared midday,
however, he took his stand by the window, and after a short watch there
suddenly turned and left the room. And a moment after Mr. Linden came
in.
Faith met him with a look of grave, sweet quiet; in which was mingled a
certain joy at being where she was. She waited for him to speak. But
something in her face, or her office, moved him,--the gravity of his
own look deepened as he came forward--his words were not ready. He sat
down by her, resting his arm on the back of her chair and giving her
and Johnny the same salutation--the last too softly to rouse him.
"Has the doctor been here?" he said first.
"No."
He was silent again for a minute, but then Johnny suddenly started
up--waking perhaps out of some fever dream; for he seemed frightened
and bewildered, and almost ready to cry; turning his head uneasily away
from everything and everybody as it seemed, until his eyes were fairly
open, and then giving almost a spring out of Faith's arms into those of
Mr. Linden; holding him round the neck and breathing little sobbing
breaths on his shoulder, till the resting-place had done its
work,--till Mr. Linden's soft whispered words had given him comfort.
But it was a little wearily then that he said, "Sing."
Was it wearily that the song was given? Faith could not tell,--she
could not name those different notes in the voice, she could only feel
that the octave reached from earth to heaven.
"'How kind is Jesus, Lord of all!
To hear my little feeble call.
How kind is Jesus, thus to be
Physician, Saviour, all to me!
'How much he loves me he doth shew;
How much he loves I cannot know.
I'm glad my life is his to keep,
Then he will watch and I may sleep.
'Jesus on earth, while here I lie;
Jesus in heaven, if I die:
I'm safe and happy in his care,
His love will keep me, here or there.
'An angel he may send for me,
And then an angel I shall be.
Lord Jesus, through thy love divine,
Thy little child is ever thine.'"
Faith had drawn her chair a little back and with her head leaning on
the back of Mr. Linden's chair, listened--in a spirit not very
different from Johnny's own. She looked up then when it was done, with
almost as childlike a brow. It had quieted him, as with a charm, and
the little smile he gave Faith was almost wondering why she looked
grave.
"You've been here a good while," he said, as if the mere announcement
of the fact spoke his thanks.
"Has she?" Mr. Linden said. "What has Miss Faith done with you, Johnny,
if she has been here a good while?"
"All sorts of things," Johnny answered, with another comprehensive
expression of gratitude.
"I thought so!" said Mr. Linden. "I shouldn't wonder a bit if she had
dressed you up in something she used to wear herself."
"She wasn't ever so little," the child said softly.
Faith had been preparing for him a cup of some light nourishment which
he was to take from time to time, and now coming to Mr. Linden's side
kneeled down there before Johnny to give it to him. The child took the
delicate spoonfuls as she gave them, turning his fair eyes from her to
Mr. Linden as if he felt in a very sweet atmosphere of love and care;
and when she went away with the cup he said in his slow fashion,
"I love her very much."
And Faith heard the answer--
"And so do I."
Coming up behind Mr. Linden she laid her hand on his shoulder.
"Endecott--where are you going to take dinner and rest to-day?"
"O I will take rest by the way," he answered lightly, and with a smile
at her. "There is dinner enough in my supper basket--I have not much
time for it, neither."
"School again this afternoon?"
"Yes I must be there for awhile."
Faith moved away, remarking in a different tone, "Your supper basket is
at home, sir!"--and busied her energies about serving him as she had
just served Johnny. With something more substantial however. Faith had
brought a lunch basket, and in five minutes had made Mr. Linden a cup
of home tea.
"Now how shall we manage?" she said;--"for Johnny must have you every
minute while you are here--and there is no such thing as a little
table. I shall have to be table and dumb waiter for you--if you won't
mind."
And so Faith pulled up her chair again and sat down, with the basket
open on her lap and Mr. Linden's cup in her hand.
"I only hope," she said, "that Dr. Harrison will not choose this
particular minute to come in! If he does, catch the cup of tea,
Endecott!--for I won't answer for anything."
"I don't know whether I should be most sorry or proud, in case of such
event," said Mr. Linden,--"however, I do not wish the doctor anything
so disagreeable. But I will promise to catch the cup of tea--and
everything else, down to his displeasure. Only you must not be a _dumb_
waiter; for that will not suit me at all."
It was one of those pretty bits of sunshine that sometimes shew
themselves in the midst of a very unpromising day, the time when they
sat there with the lunch basket between them. The refreshment of talk
and of lunch (for lunch _is_ refreshing when it is needed) brightened
both faces and voices; and Mr. Linden's little charge, in one of his
turns of happy rest and ease, watched them--amused and interested--till
he fell asleep. By that time Mr. Linden's spare minutes were about
over. As he was laying Johnny gently down on the bed, Faith seized her
chance.
"You'll let me stay here to-night--won't you, Endecott?"
"It would not be good for you, dear child,--if you stay until night it
will be quite as much as you ought to do. But I will see you again by
that time."
"I am strong, Endecott."
"Yes, you are strong, little Sunbeam," he said, turning now to her and
taking both her hands,--"and yet it is a sort of strength I must guard.
Even sunbeams must not be always on duty. But we'll see about it when I
come back."
Mr. Linden went off to his other sphere of action, and soon after
Reuben came softly in, just to let Faith know that he was at hand if
she wanted anything, and to offer to take her place.
"Reuben!" said Faith suddenly, "have you had any dinner?"
"O yes, ma'am--enough," Reuben said with a smile. "I brought something
with me this morning."
Faith put her lunch basket into his hand, but her words were cut short;
for she saw Dr. Harrison just coming to the house. She moved away and
stood gravely by the fire.
The doctor came in pulling off his glove. He gave his hand to Faith
with evident pleasure, but with a frank free pleasure, that had nothing
embarrassing about the manner of it; except the indication of its
depth. After a few words given with as easy an intonation as if the
thermometer were not just a few degrees above zero outside where he had
come from, the doctor's eye went over to the other person in the room;
and then the doctor himself crossed over and offered his hand.
"I shall never see you, Reuben,"--said he with a very pleasant
recollective play of eye and lip,--"without thinking of a _friend_."
The doctor had a more full view of Reuben's eyes, thereupon, than he
had ever before been favoured with,--for one moment their clear, true,
earnest expression met his. But whatever the boy read--or tried to
read--or did not read, he answered simply, as he looked away again,
"You have been that to me, sir."
"I don't know--" said the doctor lightly. "I am afraid not according to
your friend. Mr. Linden's definition. But reckon me such a one as I
_can_ be, will you?"--He turned away without waiting for the answer and
went back to Faith.
"Do you know," he said, "I expected to find you here?"
"Very naturally," said Faith quietly.
"Yes--it is according to my experience. Now how is this child?"--
He turned to see, and so did Faith. He looked at the child, while
Faith's eye went from Johnny to him. Both faces were grave, but Faith's
grew more grave as she looked.
"How is this child?" she repeated.
"He is not worse," said the doctor; "except that not to be better is to
be worse. Are you particularly interested in him?"
Faith looked down at the sweet pure little face, and for a minute or
two was very still. She did not even think of answering the doctor, nor
dare speak words at all. Her first movement was to push away softly a
lock of hair from Johnny's forehead.
"What can I do for him, Dr. Harrison?"
"Not much just now--go on as you have been doing. I will be here
to-night again, and then perhaps I shall know more."
He gave her a new medicine for him however; and having said all that
was needful on that score, came back with her to the fire and stood a
little while talking--just so long as it would do for him to stay with
any chance of its being acceptable; talking in a tone that did not jar
with the place or the time, gravely and pleasantly, of some matters of
interest; and then he went. And Faith sat down by the bedside, and
forgot Dr. Harrison; and thought of the Sunday school in the woods that
evening in October, and the hymn, "I want to be an angel"; and looked
at Johnny with a very full heart.
Not a very long time had passed, when Faith heard sleigh bells again,
and a person very different from the doctor came softly in; even Mrs.
Derrick. She smiled at Reuben and Faith, and going close up to the bed
folded her hands quietly together and stood looking at the sick child;
the smile vanishing from her face, her lips taking a tender, pitiful
set--her eyes in their experience gravely reading the signs. She looked
for a few minutes in silence, then with a little sorrowful sigh she
turned to Faith.
"Pretty child," she said, "can't you take a little rest? I'll sit by
him now."
"O mother I'm not tired--much. I have not been very busy."
Mrs. Derrick however took the matter into her own hands, and did not
content herself till she had Faith on a low seat at her side, and
Faith's head on her lap; which was a rest, to mind and body both.
Reuben replenished the fire and went out, and the two sat alone.
"Faith," her mother said softly, "don't you think he'd be content with
me to-night? I can't bear to have Mr. Linden sit up."
"I want to stay myself, mother, if he would let me."
"I don't believe he'll do that, Faith--and I guess he's right But you
must make him go home to tea, child, and he might rest a little then;
and I'll stay till he comes back, at least."
There was not much more to be said then, for Johnny woke up and wanted
to be taken on Faith's lap, and talked to, and petted; answering all
her efforts with a sort of grateful little smile and way; but moving
himself about in her arms as if he felt restless and uneasy. It went to
her heart. Presently, in the low tones which were music of themselves,
she carried his thoughts off to the time when Jesus was a little child;
and began to give him, in the simplicity of very graphic detail, part
of the story of Christ's life upon earth. It was a name that Johnny
loved to hear; and Faith went from point to point of his words, and
wonders, and healing power and comforting love. Not dwelling too long,
but telling Johnny very much as if she had seen it, each gentle story
of the sick and the weary and the troubled, who came in their various
ways to ask pity of Jesus, and found it; and reporting to Johnny as if
she had heard them the words of promise and love that a little child
could understand. Mrs. Derrick listened; she had never heard just such
a talk in her life. The peculiarity of it was in the vivid faith and
love which took hold of the things as if Faith had had them by eyesight
and hearing, and in the simplicity of representation with which she
gave them, as a child to a child. And all the while she let Johnny
constantly be changing his position, as restlessness prompted; from
sitting to kneeling and lying in her arms; sometimes brushing his hair,
which once in a while he had a fancy for, and sometimes combing it off
from his forehead with her own fingers dipped in the vinegar and water
which he liked to smell. Nothing could be more winning--nothing more
skilful, in its way, than Faith's talk to the sick child that half hour
or more. And Johnny told its effect, in the way he would bid her
"talk," if she paused for a minute. So by degrees the restless fit
passed off for the time, and he lay still in her arms, with drooping
heavy eyelids now.
Everything was subsiding;--the sun sank down softly behind the wavy
horizon line, the clouds floated silently away to some other harbour,
and the blasts of wind came fainter and fainter, like the music of a
retreating army. Swiftly the daylight ebbed away, and still Faith
rocked softly back and forth, and her mother watched her. Once in a
while Reuben came silently in to bring wood or fresh water,--otherwise
they had no interruption. Then Mr. Linden came, and sitting down by
Faith as he had done before, asked about the child and about the doctor.
"He came very soon after you went away," said Faith. "He said that he
was no better, and that to be no better was to be worse." It was plain
that she thought more than she said. Faith had little experience, but
there is an intuitive skill in some eyes to know what they have never
known before.
Mr. Linden bent down over the child, laying cheek to cheek softly and
silently, until Johnny rousing up a little held up his lips to be
kissed,--and he did not raise his head then.
"Have you been asleep, Johnny?" he said.
"I don't know," the child said dreamily.
"Has Miss Faith taken care of you ever since I went?"
"Yes," Johnny said, with a little faint smile--"and we've had talk."
"I wish I had been here to hear it," said Mr. Linden. "What was it
about?--all sorts of sweet things?"
"Yes," Johnny said again, his face brightening--"out of the Bible."
"Well they are the sweetest things I know of," said Mr. Linden. "Now if
you will come on my lap, I am sure Miss Faith will get you something to
eat--she can do it a great deal better than I can."
Faith had soon done that, and brought the cup to Johnny, of something
that he liked, and fed him as she had done at noon. It seemed to
refresh him, for he fell into a quieter sleep than he had had for some
time, and was oftly laid on the bed.
"Now dear Faith," Mr. Linden said coming back to her, "it is time for
you to go home and rest."
"Do you mean to send me?" she said wistfully.
"Or take you--" he said, with a soft touch of his fingers on her hair.
"I don't know but I could be spared long enough for that."
It was arranged so, Mrs. Derrick undertaking to supply all deficiencies
so far as she could, until Mr. Linden should get back again. The fast
drive home through the still cold air was refreshing to both parties;
it was a still drive too. Then leaving Mr. Linden to get a little rest
on the sofa, Faith prepared tea. But Mr. Linden would not stay long
after that, for rest or anything.
"I am coming very early to-morrow, Endecott," Faith said then.
"You may, dear child--if you will promise to sleep to-night. But you
must not rouse yourself _too_ early. You know to-morrow is Saturday--so
I shall not be called off by other duties."
He went, and Mrs. Derrick came; but Faith, though weary enough
certainly, spent the evening in study.