THE NEW LESSON.
Eurie turned her pillow, thumped the scant feathers into little heaps,
and gave a dismal groan as she laid her head back on it.
"It is very queer," she said, "that as soon as ever I make up my mind to
be orthodox, and go to meeting every time the bell rings, I should be
dumped into a heap on this hard bed with the headache. I haven't had a
touch of it before."
"'The way of transgressors is hard,'" quoted Marion, going on calmly
with her writing. "If you hadn't taken that horrid tramp yesterday
instead of going to meeting like a Christian, you would have been all
right to-day."
"I believe you sit up nights to read your Bible, so as to have verses
to fling at people who are overtaken in any possible trial or
inconvenience. You always have them ready. Didn't you bring it with you,
and don't you prepare a list for each day's use?" This was Eurie's half
merry, half petulant reply to the Bible verse that had been "flung" at
her.
Marion carefully erased a word that seemed to her fastidious taste too
inexpressive before she answered:
"I don't own such an article as a Bible, my child; so your suspicions
are entirely unfounded. My early education was not defective in that
respect, however, and I confess that I find many verses that seem to
very aptly describe the ways of sinful mortals like yourself."
Eurie raised herself on one elbow, regardless of headache and the cloth
wet in vinegar that straightway fell off.
"You don't own a Bible!" she said, in utter surprise, and with a touch
of actual dismay in her voice.
"I am depraved to that degree, my dear little saint. I conclude that you
are more devoutly inclined, and have one of your own. Pray how many
chapters a day do you read in it?"
Eurie lay down again, and Flossy came with the vinegar cloth and bound
it securely on her forehead.
"I don't read in it very often, to be sure," Eurie murmured. "In fact I
suppose I may as well say that I never do. But then I own one, and
always have. I am not a heathen; and really and truly it seems almost
queer not to have a Bible of one's own. It is a sort of mark of
civilization, you know."
Marion laughed good-naturedly.
"I never make a great deal of pretense in that line," she said, gayly.
"As for being a heathen, that is only a relative term. According to Dr.
Calkins, they were more or less in advance of us. I am one of the
'advanced' sort. Ruth, your toilet ought to be nearly completed; I hear
that indefatigable bell."
"You are very foolish not to go this morning and let your writing wait.
We shall be certain to have something worth listening to; it is a
strange time to select for absence." This was Ruth's quiet answer, as
she pinned her lace ruffle with a gleaming little diamond.
"'Diligent in business.' There is another verse for you, my heathen,"
Marion said, with a merry glance toward Eurie. "When you get home and
get the dust of years swept off from your Bible, you take a look at it,
and see if I have not quoted correctly. And a good, sensible verse it
is. I have found it the only way in which to keep my head above water.
Ruthie, the trouble is not with me, it lies with those selfish and
obstinate newspaper men. If they would have the sense to let their
papers wait over another day I could go to the lecture this morning. As
it is, I am a victim to their indifference. If I miss a blessing the sin
will be at _their_ door, not mine."
Eurie opened her heavy eyes and looked at Flossy.
"Come," she said, "don't stand there mopping me in vinegar any longer.
Are you ready? I am really disappointed. I've always wanted to hear that
man. I want to tell Nel about him."
Flossy washed her hands, shook back the yellow curls with an indifferent
and preoccupied air, and went to the door to wait for Ruth. She had
taken no part in the war of words that had been passing between Marion
and Eurie, but she had heard. And like almost everything else that she
heard during these days, it had awakened a new thought and desire.
Flossy was growing amazed at herself. It seemed to her that she must
have spent her seventeen years of life taking long naps, and this
Chautauqua was a stiff breeze from the ocean that was going to shake her
awake. The special thought that had dashed itself at her this morning
was that she, too, had no Bible. Not that she did not own one, elegantly
done in velvet and clasped in gold, so effectually clasped that it had
been sealed to her all her life. She positively had no recollection of
having ever sat down deliberately to read the Bible. She had "looked
over" occasionally in school, but even this service of her eyes had been
fitful and indifferent; and as for her head paying any sort of attention
to the reading, it might as well have been done in Greek instead of
French, which language she but dimly comprehended even when she tried.
But now she ought to have a Bible. She ought not to wait for that velvet
covered one. A whole week in which to find what some of her orders
were, and no way in which to find them. Of course she could buy one, but
how queer it would seem to be going to the museum to make a purchase of
a Bible! "They will wonder why I did not bring my own," she murmured,
with that life-long deference that she had educated herself to pay to
the "they" who composed her world. And in another instance the new-born
feeling of respect and independence asserted itself. "I can't help
that," she said, positively, shaking her curls with a determined air;
"and it really makes no difference what anybody thinks. Of course I must
have a Bible, and I only wish I had it for this morning, I shall
certainly get one the first opportunity." Then she turned and said
"good-morning" to the pretty little lady who occupied the tent next
door, and between whom and herself a pleasant acquaintance was springing
up.
"Are you going to the lecture?" Flossy, asked and the small lady shook
her head, with a wistful air.
"Dear me, no! My young tyrant wouldn't consent to that. I meant to take
him down with me and try him, but he has gone to sleep; and it is just
as well, for he would have been certain to want to do all the talking.
He has no idea that there is any one in the country who knows quite as
much as he does." It was said in a half complaining tone, but underneath
it was the foundation of tender pride, that showed her to be the vain
mother of the handsome tyrant. Still it seemed to be Flossy's duty to
condole with her.
"You miss most of the meetings, do you not?"
"Three-fourths of them. You see it is inconvenient to have a husband who
is reporter for the press, and who must be there to hear. It is only
when he must write up his notes for publication that I can get a chance;
and even then, unless it is baby's sleepy time, it does me no good. I am
especially sorry this morning, for Dr. Cuyler used to be my pastor. He
married me one summer morning just like this, and I haven't laid eyes on
him since. I should like to hear his voice again, but it can't be done."
Now who would have imagined that, with all the powers that were
bestirring themselves to come to Flossy's education, it would have been
a rosy, crowing baby, in the unconsciousness of a morning nap, that
should have given her her first lesson in unselfishness? Yet he was the
very one. It flashed over Flossy in an instant from some source. Who was
so likely to have suggested it as the sweet angel who hovered over the
sleeping darling?
"Oh, Mrs. Adams, let me stay with baby, and you go to hear Cuyler. It is
a real pity that you should miss him, when he is associated with your
life in this way. I never saw him, and though, of course, I should like
to, yet I presume there will be opportunities enough. I will be as
careful of baby as if he were my grandson; and if he wakens I will charm
him out of his wits, so that it will never occur to him to cry."
Of course there was demurring, and profuse expressions of thanks and
declinatures all in a breath. But Flossy was so winning, so eager, so
thoroughly in earnest; and the little Mrs. Adams did so love her old
pastor, and did feel so anxious to see him again, that in a very short
time she was beguiled into going in all haste to her tent to make a
"go-to-meeting" toilet; and a blessed thing it was that that sentence
does not mean at Chautauqua what it does in Buffalo, or Albany, or a
few other places, else Dr. Cuyler might have slipped from them before
the necessary articles were all in array. It involved simply the
twitching off of a white apron, the settling of a pretty sun hat--for
the sun actually shone!--and the seizure of a waterproof, needed, if she
found a seat, to protect her from the damp boards--needed in any case,
because in five minutes it might rain--and she was ready.
Ruth came to the door.
"Come, Flossy," she said; "where in the world are you? We shall be
late." And said it precisely as though she had been waiting for that
young person for half an hour.
Flossy emerged from the adjoining tent.
"I am not going." she said. "I have turned nurse-girl, and have the
sweetest little baby in here that ever grew. Mrs. Adams is going in my
place. Mrs. Adams, Miss Erskine."
And as those two ladies walked away together Mrs. Adams might have been
heard to say:
"What a lovely, unselfish disposition your friend has! It was so
beautiful in her to take me so by storm this morning! I am afraid I was
very selfish; which is apt to be the case, I think, when one comes in
contact with actual unselfishness. It is one of the Christian graces
that is very hard to cultivate, anyway; don't you think so?"
Ruth was silent; not from discourtesy, but from astonishment. It was
such a strange experience to hear any one speak of Flossy Shipley as
"unselfish." In truth she had grown up under influences that had combined
to foster the most complete and tyrannical selfishness--exercised
in a pretty, winning sort of way, but rooted and grounded in her very
life. So indeed was Ruth's; but _she_, of course, did not know that,
though she had clear vision for the mote in Flossy's eyes.
Meantime Marion had staid her busy pen and was biting the end of it
thoughtfully. The two tents were such near neighbors that the latter
conversation and introduction had been distinctly heard. She glanced
around to the girl on the bed.
"Eurie," she said, "are you asleep, or are you enjoying Flossy's last
new departure?"
Eurie giggled.
"I heard," she said. "The lazy little mouse has slipped out of a
tedious hour, and has a chance to lounge and read a pleasant novel. I
dare say the mother is provided with them."
Then Marion, after another thoughtful pause:
"But, my child, how do you account for the necessity of going to the
neighbors and taking the supervision of a baby in order to do that?
Flossy need not have gone to church if she didn't choose."
"Yes she need. Don't you suppose the child can see that it is the
fashion of the place? She is afraid that it wouldn't look well to stay
in the tent and lounge, without an excuse for doing so. If that girl
could only go to a place where it was the fashion for all the people to
be good, she would be a saint, just because 'they' were."
"She would have to go to heaven," muttered Marion, going on with her
writing.
"And, according to you, there is no such place; so there is no hope for
her, after all. Oh, dear! I wonder if you are right, and nothing is of
any consequence, anyhow?" And the weary girl turned on her pillow and
tried not to think, an effort that was hard to accomplish after a week's
experience at Chautauqua.
Flossy sat herself down beside the sleeping darling, and cast about her
for something to amuse or interest, her eyes brightening into beauty as
she recognized a worn and torn copy of the Bible. Eurie would have been
surprised to see the eagerness with which she seized upon the book that
was to afford her entertainment. She turned the leaves tenderly, with a
new sense of possession about her. This Bible was a copy of letters that
had been written to her--words spoken, many of them, by Jesus himself.
Strange that she had so little idea what they were! Marion, with her
boasted infidel notions, knew much more about "The Book" than Flossy
with her nominal Christian education and belief. She had no idea where
to turn or what to look for to help her. Yet she turned the leaves
slowly, with a delicious sense of having found a prize a--book of
instructions, a guide book for her on this journey that she was just
beginning to realize that she was taking. Somewhere within it she would
find light and help. The book was one that had been much used, and had a
fashion of opening of itself at certain places that might have been
favorites with the little mother. At one of those places Flossy halted
and read: "'After this there was a feast of the Jews.' After what, I
wonder?" she said within herself. She knew nothing about it. "Never
mind, I will see pretty soon. This is about a feast where Jesus was. And
Jesus went up to Jerusalem." "Oh, how nice to have been there, wherever
that was." The ignorant little thing had not the least idea where
Jerusalem was, except that it was in that far away, misty Holy Land,
that had seemed as vague and indefinite to her as the grave or as
heaven. But there came suddenly to her heart a certain blessed analogy.
"If I were going to write an account of my recent experiences to some
dear friend that I wanted to tell it to," she said, talking still to
herself, or to the sleeping baby, "I would write it something like this:
'After this'--That would mean; let me see what it _would_ mean. Why,
after that party at home, when I danced all night and was sick. 'After
this there was a feast of the Christian people at Chautauqua, and Jesus
went there.' I could certainly write that, for I have seen him and heard
him speak in my very heart." Then she went on, through the second verse
to the third. "'In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of
blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water,'" and here a
great swell of tears literally blinded her eyes. It came to her so
suddenly, so forcibly. The great multitude here at Chautauqua--blind.
Yes, some of them. Was not she? How many more might there be? Many of
whom she knew, others that she did not know, but that Jesus did. Waiting
without knowing that they were waiting. With tears and smiles, and with
a new great happiness throbbing at her heart, she read through the
sweet, simple, wonderful story; how the poor man met Jesus; how he
questioned; how the man complained; and how Jesus was greater than his
infirmity. Through the whole of it, until suddenly she closed the book,
her tears dried, and a solemn, wondering, almost awe-struck look on her
face. She had got her lesson, her directions, her example. She could
bear no more, even of the Bible, just then. She said it over, that
startling verse that came to her with a whole volume of suggestion:
"'_And the man departed and told the Jews that it was Jesus which had
made him whole._'"