THE LION’S DEN.
Susie Dykes was a little woman even among the rather diminutive. She
had pretty soft grey eyes, a slender, well-shaped waist, and a wealth of
light yellow hair. The pretty and simple way she arranged it the doctor
had often noticed. She combed it straight back, twisted a part of it
into a heavy coil, which she passed over the top of her round head,
carrying the end back, and braiding it in with the rest to form a knot,
fastened low with a comb. It was a very pretty, Quakerish coiffure, but
very becoming. Considering the low family from which she came, the quiet
and even distinguished air about her was marvelous. Mrs. Forest could
not understand it, and so she refused to admit its existence. The doctor
always spoke to Susie with great gentleness; but as the twins snubbed
her, and his wife’s dignified coldness oppressed her heavily, he forbore
to be as familiarly kind with her as he wished, lest the contrast should
make her dislike his wife and daughters. But he went as far as he
thought prudent. Once he told her that her ears were as pretty as
Clara’s; a compliment that little Susie never ceased to be proud of.
Lately, by the doctor’s influence, Mrs. Buzzell, now recovered from her
illness, had become quite interested in Susie, and had helped her about
her wardrobe, which showed want of means, though not of mending, for
Susie was naturally neat about everything. Mrs. Forest gave her due
credit for this, knowing that the instruction that she must have
received from Mrs. Dykes was none of the best.
Poor Susie’s child-life had been a sad one, like the lives of the
children of the poor generally; and she was happier now than she had
ever been, despite the cold, unsympathetic relation she bore to Mrs.
Forest, whom she longed to love like a daughter; for whatever belonged
to Dan, was precious in her eyes. She was naturally very bright, as the
doctor said, but what little education she had received in a neighboring
district school had been painfully gained through the persecutions of
more fortunate school-mates, who, with the savage cruelty of children,
made sport of her poverty, not knowing what they did.
It is a folly, doubtless, to dress up little children like popinjays,
that they may outshine their companions, and thus cultivate their own
vanity at the expense of nobler feelings; but certainly it is a vital
wrong to send a child among his fellows in a mean and untidy attire. For
not having the philosophy of maturer years to support him against the
ridicule he excites, he is either humiliated and degraded by it, or else
moved to revenge or hate; and these feelings, if long entertained, crush
out the finer possibilities of his nature, and so in both cases he is
robbed and wronged. The ridicule and persecution that Susie had endured
had the usual effect upon the sensitive of her sex. She was humiliated,
and answered only with tears. She had never dreamed that she had
elements of real loveliness in mind and person, and when Dan first began
to notice her—he a proud, handsome fellow, belonging to the best of
Oakdale’s choice society—she was transported with joyful gratitude, and
would have laid down her life for him without counting it much of a
sacrifice.
When Dan failed in his livery-stable enterprise, he went back to the
railroad, and soon rose to the position of conductor, where he seemed
really to have found his level. He liked the position, gave good
satisfaction to the company, and received a very fair salary for his
work. Susie, meanwhile, loved him more and more, and longed for, yet
dreaded, his bearish caresses. The opportunity to see her alone did not
occur often, for he was home only on Sundays, and then she went to
church with Mrs. Forest. This annoyed Dan; and the obstacles in the way
of passing an hour alone with Susie were many, and almost
insurmountable. The twins, either one or both, had still the most
remarkable talent for being just where they were not wanted. He used to
send them away from the garden or orchard when he chanced to find Susie
there; but they were apt to tell of this, which troubled Susie, and so
he desisted. The last time he had tried to get rid of Leila, endeavoring
to show her that she ought to go and practice her piano studies, he
received the pert answer, “Thank you; I don’t play secular music on
Sunday.” Dan answered with a long crescendo whistle, and abandoned
tactics in Leila’s case. But fate sometimes gave him a few minutes with
Susie. On one occasion she had gone at Dinah’s request to bring pears
from the orchard—Dinah having very possibly an ulterior motive, for Dan
had been very gracious to the old servant lately. He followed Susie
after a few minutes—a very few—leisurely smoking a cigar.
As a specimen of a fine animal, Dan was certainly handsome; and this is
hardly doing him justice, for it must be admitted that very good
women—aye, and very superior women—have adored just such fine animals.
There must be some justification, which severe moralists cannot
comprehend, for action and reaction are equal. Dan was tall, his back
finely curved, broad shoulders, and his head was right regally poised
thereon. He had bright dark eyes, curly brown hair, a light, youthful
moustache and slight side-whiskers, and what would be called a fine
mouth, though not of the nobler type to which Clara’s belonged. Hers
might be termed sensuous, his sensual; yet perhaps the term is too
severe. It was pleasant to look at Dan’s mouth when he talked, and it
must be confessed that his kisses were found distractingly sweet to some
others beside little Susie.
On entering the part of the orchard where Susie was, he leaned against
the trunk of an old fruit-tree and called her to him.
“I must not stay long,” she said, looking up lovingly into his face, as
she stood before him. “Dinah will be waiting for these;” and she blushed
and dropped her pretty eyes among the fruit.
“Let her wait,” he said. “You don’t mind keeping me waiting, I notice;”
and throwing away his cigar, he drew her into his arms and kissed her
rosy lips again and again, holding her like a vise. Susie wished to
remain there forever, though she kept denying him her lips, and hiding
her face on his breast. That was at least one feeling; another was a
strong impulse to run away, but she dared not show this for fear of
displeasing him. When, therefore, Leila came running down the path
bareheaded, her hair streaming out on the wind, it was a relief to
Susie, though an exasperation to Dan.
As time wore on from Sunday to Sunday—for Susie counted time only by the
slow recurrence of these days—she began to be troubled a little about
Dan’s regard for her. To be sure, he always told her he loved her
dearly, and that she was “sweeter than a rose;” but he seemed to talk
less of their future, and his new life out in the world had changed his
manner to her, which was not so respectful as in the olden time. Ah! the
olden time, when Susie had been so ashamed of Jim and his ways, so
impatient of her rude surroundings, until Dan appeared and gladdened all
her life as the sunshine gladdens the little wayside flower. She had
never been troubled about his demonstrations then, and she passed in
retrospection the old days when the boyish lover had scarcely dared to
press her hand. She recalled continually one particular evening when he
had found her alone—the first and last time they had ever been alone for
a whole evening. That was the time when he gave her his first kiss—a
quick little touch on the cheek, not like the burning kisses he insisted
upon now. Where had he learned so much about love-making? He knew little
enough about it then, when, blushing even like herself, he had made her
promise to be his forever, and sealed the betrothal by that indelible
record upon his arm. Clearly there was a change in Dan, but Susie’s
heart refused to recognize it as a vital change. It was, indeed, the
same old drama, played over and over again since the world began—the
woman at home, dependent, busied with her little routine of duties,
cherishing and nursing her one tender romance; the man mixing with the
broader world, yielding to its varied attractions, taking and giving
love, or the mockery of love, wherever he can find it, and so daily
unfitting himself more and more for the rôle in which the home-keeping
woman has cast him. Susie waited and trusted, but life during the week
was very dull; the few acquaintances of her former life attracted her
less and less, and she ceased altogether to visit them. This time
happened to be a season of revivals, and Oakdale received a large influx
of the “spirit.” The twins became “serious,” much to the joy of Mrs.
Forest and—it must be confessed—the disgust of the doctor, who
entertained very phrenological views upon the subject of sudden changes
of nature. But under the influence of this seriousness, Leila, who had
the most serious attack, became suddenly gracious to Susie, and would
insist upon her being saved also; so she dragged her to prayer-meetings
in season and out of season, the latter being on Sunday evenings, when
Dan was at home. Dan could scarcely believe his senses when he found
that there was in this world anything that could charm Susie away from
him, even for an hour; so she had the satisfaction of witnessing another
revival, that of Dan’s flickering affection for his first love. He did,
indeed, seem to treat her with more softness, though he distrusted the
value of her piety, since it caused her to hold more strict views on the
propriety of vehement kisses. The twins, after a few months, lost their
passion for prayer-meetings entirely, but Susie kept right on, with that
sincerity and singleness of heart that characterized all that she did.
She had found sympathy among certain people of the church, though of
rather a stiff and at-arms-length kind; but in her own sincere devotion,
and in the reading of religious books, she found much consolation. Not
that she could understand them or criticise them; but when she came to
anything that breathed the loving spirit of Christ, it sank into her
lonely heart, and blessed her with something like peace.
One perfect moonlit evening, about a year after the events just
narrated, and only a few months before Clara’s final return from
Stonybrook College, Susie, returning home from some evening “meeting,”
unexpectedly met Dan. He drew her hand caressingly over his arm, saying,
as he turned to walk home with her, “Susie does not care for me any
more.”
“O, Dan!” she exclaimed, in an imploring tone, for her little heart was
full of its best emotions, and this want of faith in her love pained
her.
“Fact. She has become a saint, and so cares nothing for my kisses.”
“O, you wrong Susie, Dan. She does love you dearly.”
“I know. She says she prays for me, and I don’t believe in prayers.
Kisses are ‘indicated,’ as doctors say, in my case.”
“You do wrong to speak so, Dan. Surely it is good to pray when one is
lonely and sad. I try to be good, but I am not, very. I fear I shall
never go to Heaven.” Dan, for reply, gave his crescendo whistle, and
then said, stopping short in the bright moonlight, and looking down into
her face, “The idea of a good child like you troubling your little head
about Heaven. The domestic economy of that institution must be very
shiftlessly managed if such as you are not in great demand.”
“O, you must not talk so, Dan! I do so wish you could see religion as it
really is.”
“Fiddlesticks!” said Dan. “If I must be a spoon, I prefer to be made so
by a live woman, not a morbid longing to twang a golden harp.”
“Your father does not talk like that,” replied Susie, who was always
timid before Dan’s outbursts of humor, but the belief that she was in
the right made her bold. “I know he will not go to church, but he is so
good! and he never says anything against others going, if they find
spiritual food in what he says are dry husks to him.”
“He’s a fine old chap, no mistake about that, and he forgets more every
day than most people ever know; but he’s soft in spots. If I had only
known him when he was a young man, I should have helped him to cut his
eye-teeth.”
“Ah!” said Susie, “what you call his ‘soft spots’ are his noblest
qualities. What can be more benevolent and sweet than his treatment of
poor old Mrs. Buzzell?”
“Is that a conundrum?” Dan asked, in his rollicking way.
“He is so good!” said Susie, taking no notice of Dan’s levity; “and I
often think if he would join the church it would influence you——”
“No, it wouldn’t,” interrupted Dan. “I’m only sensitive to your
influence. You could do anything with me if you loved me as you once
did.” They had just entered the gate and stopped a moment under the
lilacs by the path. Susie looked up into Dan’s face and said, with a
voice that trembled, “It is cruel for you to doubt me. I have not
changed, unless”—“to love you more,” she would have said, but her words
were checked by the depth of her emotion.
“You do not show it, then.”
“O Dan! I pray for you always. I think of you every moment. How can I
prove it better?” she asked, with despairing tenderness.
“O, much better you can prove it, Susie;” and under the fragrant lilacs,
under the dear, bright stars, a thought blacker than mortal night
entered Dan’s heart.
“How do I know you pray for me?” he asked, caressing her hand very
softly. “I do not hear you. Come to my room and pray for me there, and I
shall believe you.”
“Do you really wish me to?” she asked, with a look that would have
softened any heart but that of this sleek young tiger, whose white teeth
glistened in the moonlight.
“I will,” she said simply, mentally reproaching herself for a momentary
suspicion that had entered her mind.
When Susie entered Dan’s room on her pious mission, he at once closed
the door and locked it. Susie protested earnestly, but the only reply it
elicited was a long-continued fit of subdued laughter which Dan indulged
himself in, tilting back his chair and holding his fingers interlaced at
the back of his head. Then he insisted upon a kiss as a preliminary.
“No, no,” cried Susie. “Open the door and let me go. O Dan, you were not
serious, after all. I wish I had not believed you;” and the poor girl
covered her face and sobbed.
“Serious? Never was so serious in my life, as I can prove to you; but
what is the use of praying for me if my heart is not in the right mood,
and nothing can do that but a kiss, though a hundred would make it
surer. How Susie must love me. She cries because I ask for one.” * * * *
Susie never prayed for Dan that night. Her prayers were all for herself.
Alas! that they should have availed so little!