into view beyond the house she fell down on her knees and began to pray
aloud: "O Lord, save her; save the lamb! She don't know what's she is
doing, Lord. She's as simple as a baby. Oh, save her, out on that
roaring sea! Good Lord, good Lord, deliver her!" Fragments of prayers
she had heard in her prayer-meeting days came confusedly back into her
mind, and she repeated them all again and again, wringing her hands as
she saw the little craft tilt far over under its all too large sail, so
that several times, in the hollows of the waves, she thought it was
gone. The wind was blowing hard but steadily, and in a direction that
carried the boat straight toward the reef; no tacks were necessary, no
change of course; the black-robed little figure simply held the
sail-rope, and the paroquet drove on. The two clinging to the rock,
bruised, exhausted, with the waves rising and falling around them, did
not see the boat until it was close upon them.
"By the great heavens!" said Keith.
His face was pallid and rigid, and there was a ghastly cut across his
forehead, the work of the sharp-edged rock. The next moment he was on
board, brought the boat round just in time, and helped in Carrington,
whose right arm was injured.
"You have saved our lives, señora," he said abruptly.
"By Jove, yes," said Carrington. "We could not have stood it long, and
night was coming." Then they gave all their attention to the hazardous
start.
Sister St. Luke remained unconscious of the fact that she had done
anything remarkable. Her black gown was spoiled, which was a pity, and
she knew of a balm which was easily compounded and which would heal
their bruises. Did they think Melvyna had come back to the house yet?
And did they know that all her dishes were broken--yes, even the cups
with the red flowers on the border? Then she grew timorous again, and
hid her face from the sight of the waves.
Keith said not a word, but sailed the boat, and it was a wild and
dangerous voyage they made, tacking up and down in the gayly painted
little craft, that seemed like a toy on that angry water. Once
Carrington took the little Sister's hand in his, and pressed his lips
fervently upon it. She had never had her hand kissed before, and looked
at him, then at the place, with a vague surprise, which soon faded,
however, into the old fear of the wind. It was night when at last they
reached the lighthouse; but during the last two tacks they had a light
from the window to guide them; and when nearly in they saw the lantern
shining out from the shattered windows of the tower in a fitful,
surprised sort of way, for Melvyna had returned, and, with the true
spirit of a Yankee, had immediately gone to work at the ruins.
The only sign of emotion she gave was to Keith. "I saw it all," she
said. "That child went right out after you, in that terrible wind, as
natural and as quiet as if she was only going across the room. And she
so timid a fly could frighten her! Mark my words, Mr. Keith, the good
Lord helped her to do it! And I'll go to that new mission chapel over in
the town every Sunday after this, as sure's my name is Sawyer!" She
ceased abruptly, and, going into her kitchen, slammed the door behind
her. Emotion with Melvyna took the form of roughness.
Sister St. Luke went joyfully back to her convent the next day, for
Pedro, when he returned, brought the letter, written, as Keith had
directed, in the style of an affectionate invitation. The little nun
wept for happiness when she read it. "You see how they love me--love me
as I love them," she repeated with innocent triumph again and again.
"It is all we can do," said Keith. "She could not be happy anywhere
else, and with the money behind her she will not be neglected. Besides,
I really believe they do love her. The sending her up here was probably
the result of some outside dictation."
Carrington, however, was dissatisfied. "A pretty return we make for our
saved lives!" he said. "I hate ingratitude." For Carrington was half
disposed now to fall in love with his preserver.
But Keith stood firm.
"Addios," said the little Sister, as Pedro's boat received her. Her face
had lighted so with joy and glad anticipation that they hardly knew her.
"I wish you could to the convent go with me," she said earnestly to the
two young men. "I am sure you would like it." Then, as the boat turned
the point, "I am sure you would like it," she called back, crossing her
hands on her breast. "It is very heavenly there--very heavenly."
That was the last they saw of her.
Carrington sent down the next winter from New York a large silver
crucifix, superbly embossed and ornamented. It was placed on the high
altar of the convent, and much admired and reverenced by all the nuns.
Sister St. Luke admired it too. She spoke of the island occasionally,
but she did not tell the story of the rescue. She never thought of it.
Therefore, in the matter of the crucifix, the belief was that a special
grace had touched the young man's heart. And prayers were ordered for
him. Sister St. Luke tended her doves, and at the hour of meditation
paced to and fro between the lime-tree and the bush of white roses. When
she was thirty years old her cup was full, for then she was permitted to
take lessons and play a little upon the old organ.
Melvyna went every Sunday to the bare, struggling little Presbyterian
mission over in the town, and she remains to this day a Sawyer.
But Keith remembered. He bares his head silently in reverence to all
womanhood, and curbs his cynicism as best he can, for the sake of the
little Sister--the sweet little Sister St. Luke.
MISS ELISABETHA.
In yonder homestead, wreathed with bounteous vines,
A lonely woman dwells, whose wandering feet
Pause oft amid one chamber's calm retreat,
Where an old mirror from its quaint frame shines.
And here, soft wrought in memory's vague designs,
Dim semblances her wistful gaze will greet
Of lost ones that inthrall phantasmally sweet
The mirror's luminous quietude enshrines.
But unto her these dubious forms that pass
With shadowy majesty or dreamy grace,
Wear nothing of ghostliness in mien or guise.
The only ghost that haunts this glimmering glass
Carries the sad reality in its face
Of her own haggard cheeks and desolate eyes!
EDGAR FAWCETT.
Overlooking the tide-water river stands an old house, gleaming white in
the soft moonlight; the fragrance of tropic flowers floats out to sea on
the land-breeze, coming at sunset over the pine-barrens to take the
place of the ocean winds that have blown all day long, bringing in the
salt freshness to do battle with the hot shafts of the sun and conquer
them. The side of the house toward the river shows stone arches,
door-less, opening into a hall; beyond is a large room, lighted by two
candles placed on an old-fashioned piano; and full in their yellow
radiance sits Miss Elisabetha, playing, with clear, measured touch, an
old-time minuet. The light falls upon her face, with its sharp,
high-curved features, pale-blue eyes, and the three thin curls of blonde
hair on each side. She is not young, our Elisabetha: the tall, spare
form, stiffly erect, the little wisp of hair behind ceremoniously
braided and adorned with a high comb, the long, thin hands, with the
tell-tale wrist-bones prominent as she plays, and the fine network of
wrinkles over her pellucid, colorless cheeks, tell this. But the boy who
listens sees it not; to him she is a St. Cecilia, and the gates of
heaven open as she plays. He leans his head against the piano, and his
thoughts are lost in melody; they do not take the form of words, but
sway to and fro with the swell and the ebb of the music. If you should
ask him, he could not express what he feels, for his is no analytical
mind; attempt to explain it to him, and very likely he would fall asleep
before your eyes. Miss Elisabetha plays well--in a prim, old-fashioned
way, but yet well; the ancient piano has lost its strength, but its
tones are still sweet, and the mistress humors its failings. She tunes
it herself, protects its strings from the sea-damps, dusts it carefully,
and has embroidered for it a cover in cross-stitch, yellow tulips
growing in straight rows out of a blue ground--an heirloom pattern
brought from Holland. Yet entire happiness can not be ours in this
world, and Miss Elisabetha sometimes catches herself thinking how
delightful it would be to use E flat once more; but the piano's E flat
is hopelessly gone.
"Is not that enough for this evening, Theodore?" said Miss Elisabetha,
closing the manuscript music-book, whose delicate little pen-and-ink
notes were fading away with age.
"Oh, no, dear aunt; sing for me, please, 'The Proud Ladye.'"
And so the piano sounded forth again in a prim melody, and the thin
voice began the ballad of the knight, who, scorned by his lady-love,
went to the wars with her veil bound on his heart; he dies on the field,
but a dove bears back the veil to the Proud Ladye, who straightway falls
"a-weeping and a-weeping till she weeps her life away." The boy who
listens is a slender stripling, with brown eyes, and a mass of brown
curls tossed back from a broad, low forehead; he has the outlines of a
Greek, and a dark, silken fringe just borders his boyish mouth. He is
dressed in a simple suit of dark-blue cotton jacket and trousers, the
broad white collar turned down, revealing his round young throat; on his
slender feet he wears snowy stockings, knitted by Miss Elisabetha's own
hands, and over them a low slipper of untanned leather. His brown hands
are clasped over one knee, the taper fingers and almond-shaped nails
betraying the artistic temperament--a sign which is confirmed by the
unusually long, slender line of the eyebrows, curving down almost to the
cheeks.
"A-weeping and a-weeping till she weeps her life away," sang Miss
Elisabetha, her voice in soft _diminuendo_ to express the mournful end
of the Proud Ladye. Then, closing the piano carefully, and adjusting the
tulip-bordered cover, she extinguished the candles, and the two went out
under the open arches, where chairs stood ready for them nightly. The
tide-water river--the Warra--flowed by, the moon-path shining goldenly
across it; up in the north palmettos stood in little groups alongshore,
with the single feathery pine-trees of the barrens coming down to meet
them; in the south shone the long lagoon, with its low islands, while
opposite lay the slender point of the mainland, fifteen miles in length,
the Warra on one side, and on the other the ocean; its white sand-ridges
gleamed in the moonlight, and the two could hear the sound of the waves
on its outer beach.
"It is so beautiful," said the boy, his dreamy eyes following the silver
line of the lagoon.
"Yes," replied Miss Elisabetha, "but we have no time to waste, Theodore.
Bring your guitar and let me hear you sing that _romanza_ again;
remember the pauses--three beats to the measure."
Then sweetly sounded forth the soft tenor voice, singing an old French
_romanza_, full of little quavers, and falls, and turns, which the boy
involuntarily slurred into something like naturalness, or gave
_staccato_ as the mocking-bird throws out his shower of short, round
notes. But Miss Elisabetha allowed no such license: had she not learned
that very _romanza_ from Monsieur Vocard himself forty years before? and
had he not carefully taught her every one of those little turns and
quavers? Taking the guitar from Theodore's hand, she executed all the
flourishes slowly and precisely, making him follow her, note for note.
Then he must sing it all over again while she beat the time with her
long, slender foot, incased in a black-silk slipper of her own making.
The ladies of the Daarg family always wore slippers--the heavy-sounding
modern boot they considered a structure suitable only for persons of
plebeian origin. A lady should not even step perceptibly; she should
glide.
"Miss 'Lisabeet, de toas' is ready. Bress de chile, how sweet he sings
to-night! Mos' like de mock-bird's self, Mass' Doro."
So spoke old Viny, the one servant of the house, a broad-shouldered,
jet-black, comfortable creature, with her gray wool peeping from beneath
a gay turban. She had belonged to Doro's Spanish mother, but, when Miss
Elisabetha came South to take the house and care for the orphan-boy, she
had purchased the old woman, and set her free immediately.
"It don't make naw difference as I can see, Miss 'Lisabeet," said Viny,
when the new mistress carefully explained to her that she was a free
agent from that time forth. "'Pears harnsome in you to do it, but it
arn't likely I'll leabe my chile, my Doro-boy, long as I lib--is it,
now? When I die, he'll have ole Viny burred nice, wid de priests, an' de
candles, an' de singing, an' all."
"Replace your guitar, Theodore," said Miss Elisabetha, rising, "and then
walk to and fro between here and the gate ten times. Walk briskly, and
keep your mouth shut; after singing you should always guard against the
damps."
The boy obeyed in his dreamy way, pacing down the white path, made hard
with pounded oyster-shells, to the high stone wall. The old iron-clamped
gate, which once hung between the two pomegranate-topped pillars, was
gone; for years it had leaned tottering half across the entrance-way,
threatening to brain every comer, but Miss Elisabetha had ordered its
removal in the twinkling of her Northern eye, and in its place now hung
a neat, incongruous little wicket, whose latch was a standing bone of
contention between the mistress and the entire colored population of the
small village.
"Go back and latch the gate," was her constantly repeated order; "the
cows might enter and injure the garden."
"But th' arn't no cows, Miss 'Lisabeet."
"There should be, then," the ancient maiden would reply, severely.
"Grass would grow with a little care and labor; look at our pasture. You
are much too indolent, good people!"
Theodore stood leaning over the little gate, his eyes fixed on the white
sand-hills across the Warra; he was listening to the waves on the outer
beach.
"Theodore, Theodore!" called Miss Elisabetha's voice, "do not stand, but
pace to and fro; and be sure and keep your mouth closed."
Mechanically the boy obeyed, but his thoughts were following the sound
of the water. Following a sound? Yes. Sounds were to him a language, and
he held converse with the surf, the winds, the rustling marsh-grass, and
the sighing pines of the barrens. The tale of the steps completed, he
reëntered the house, and, following the light, went into a long, narrow
room, one of three which, built out behind the main body of the house,
formed with its back-wall a square, surrounding a little courtyard, in
whose center stood the well, a ruined fountain, rose- and myrtle-bushes,
and two ancient fig-trees, dwarfed and gnarled. Miss Elisabetha was
standing at the head of the table; before her was a plate containing
three small slices of dry toast, crisp and brown, and a decanter of
orange-wine, made by her own hands. One slice of the toast was for
herself, two were for the boy, who was still supposed to be growing; a
Northerner would have said that he was over twenty, but Spanish blood
hastens life, and Teodoro in years was actually not yet eighteen. In
mind he was still younger, thanks to Miss Elisabetha's care and strict
control. It had never even occurred to him that he need not so
absolutely obey her; and, to tell the truth, neither had it occurred to
her. Doro ate his simple supper standing--the Daarg family never sat
down gluttonously to supper, but browsed lightly on some delicate
fragments, moving about and chatting meanwhile as though half forgetting
they were eating at all. Then Miss Elisabetha refilled his little glass,
watched him drink the clear amber liquid to the last drop, and bade him
good night in her even voice. He turned at the door and made her a
formal bow, not without grace; she had carefully taught him this
salutation, and required it of him every night.
"I wish you a blessed rest, Theodore," she said, courtesying in reply;
"do not keep the light burning."
Half an hour later, when the ancient maiden glided out of her chamber,
clad in a long frilled wrapper, the three curls in papers on each side
of her head, she saw no gleam from under the low door of the little room
across the hall; she listened, but there was no sound, and, satisfied,
she retired to her high couch and closed the gayly flowered curtains
around her. But, out on the small balcony which hung like a cage from
his eastern window, Doro stood, leaning over the iron railing and
listening, listening to the far sound of the sea.
Such had been the life down in the old house for sixteen long,
winterless years, the only changes being more difficult music and more
toast, longer lessons in French, longer legs to the little blue
trousers, increased attention to sea-baths and deportment, and always
and ever a careful saving of every copper penny and battered shilling.
What became of these coins old Viny did not know; she only knew how
patiently they were collected, and how scrupulously saved. Miss
Elisabetha attended to the orange-grove in person; not one orange was
lost, and the annual waste of the other proprietors, an ancient and
matter-of-course waste, handed down from father to son, represented in
her purse not a few silver pieces. Pedro, the Minorcan, who brought her
fish and sea-food, she had drilled from boyhood in his own art by sheer
force of will, paying him by the day, and sending him into the town to
sell from door to door all she did not need herself, to the very last
clam. The lazy housewives soon grew into the habit of expecting Pedro
and his basket, and stood in their doorways chatting in the sun and
waiting for him, while the husbands let their black dugouts lie idle,
and lounged on the sea-wall, smoking and discussing the last alligator
they had shot, or the last ship, a coasting-schooner out of water, which
had sailed up their crooked harbor six months before. Miss Elisabetha
had learned also to braid palmetto, and her long fingers, once
accustomed to the work, accomplished as much in a week as Zanita Perez
and both her apprentices accomplished in two; she brought to the task
also original ideas, original at least in Beata, where the rude hats and
baskets were fac-similes of those braided there two hundred years before
by the Spanish women, who had learned the art from the Indians. Thus
Miss Elisabetha's wares found ready sale at increased prices, little
enough to Northern ideas--sixpence for a hat--one shilling for a basket;
but all down the coast, and inland toward the great river, there was a
demand for her work, and the lines hung in the garden were almost
constantly covered with the drying palmetto. Then she taught music. To
whom, do you ask? To the black-eyed daughters of the richer townspeople,
and to one or two demoiselles belonging to Spanish families down the
coast, sent up to Beata to be educated by the nuns. The good Sisters did
their best, but they knew little, poor things, and were glad to call in
Miss Elisabetha with her trills and quavers; so the wiry organ in the
little cathedral sounded out the ballads and _romanzas_ of Monsieur
Vocard, and the demoiselles learned to sing them in their broken French,
no doubt greatly to the satisfaction of the golden-skinned old fathers
and mothers on the plantations down the coast. The _padre_ in charge of
the parish had often importuned Miss Elisabetha to play this organ on
Sundays, as the decorous celebration of high-mass suffered sadly, not to
say ludicrously, from the blunders of poor Sister Paula. But Miss
Elisabetha briefly refused; she must draw a line somewhere, and a pagan
ceremonial she could not countenance. The Daarg family, while abhorring
greatly the Puritanism of the New England colonies, had yet held
themselves equally aloof from the image-worship of Rome; and they had
always considered it one of the inscrutable mysteries of Providence that
the French nation, so skilled in polite attitude, so versed in the
singing of _romanzas_, should yet have been allowed to remain so long in
ignorance of the correct religious mean.
The old house was managed with the nicest care. Its thick coquina-walls
remained solid still, and the weak spots in the roof were mended with a
thatch of palmetto and tar, applied monthly under the mistress's
superintendence by Viny, who never ceased to regard the performance as a
wonder of art, accustomed as she was to the Beata fashion of letting
roofs leak when they wanted to, the family never interfering, but
encamping on the far side of the flow with calm undisturbed. The few
pieces of furniture were dusted and rubbed daily, and the kitchen
department was under martial law; the three had enough to eat--indeed,
an abundance--oysters, fish, and clams, sweet potatoes from the garden,
and various Northern vegetables forced to grow under the vigilant
nursing they received, but hating it, and coming up as spindling as they
could. The one precious cow gave them milk and butter, the
well-conducted hens gave them eggs; flour and meal, coffee and tea,
hauled across the barrens from the great river, were paid for in
palmetto-work. Yes, Miss Elisabetha's household, in fact, lived well,
better perhaps than any in Beata; but so measured were her quantities,
so exact her reckonings, so long her look ahead, that sometimes, when
she was away, old Viny felt a sudden wild desire to toss up fritters in
the middle of the afternoon, to throw away yesterday's tea-leaves, to
hurl the soured milk into the road, or even to eat oranges without
counting them, according to the fashions of the easy old days when
Doro's Spanish grandmother held the reins, and everything went to ruin
comfortably. Every morning after breakfast Miss Elisabetha went the
rounds through the house and garden; then English and French with Doro
for two hours; next a sea-bath for him, and sailing or walking as he
pleased, when the sun was not too hot. Luncheon at noon, followed by a
_siesta_; then came a music-lesson, long and charming to both; and,
after that, he had his choice from among her few books. Dinner at five,
a stroll along the beach, music in the evenings--at first the piano in
the parlor, then the guitar under the arches; last of all, the light
supper, and good-night. Such was Doro's day. But Miss Elisabetha,
meanwhile, had a hundred other duties which she never neglected, in
spite of her attention to his welfare--first the boy, then his money,
for it was earned and destined for him. Thus the years had passed,
without change, without event, without misfortune; the orange-trees had
not failed, the palmetto-work had not waned, and the little store of
money grew apace. Doro, fully employed, indulged by Viny, amused with
his dogs, his parrot, his mocking-birds, and young owls, all the variety
of pets the tropical land afforded, even to young alligators
clandestinely kept in a sunken barrel up the marsh, knew no _ennui_.
But, most of all, the music filled his life, rounding out every empty
moment, and making an undercurrent, as it were, to all other
occupations; so that the French waltzed through his brain, the English
went to marches, the sailing made for itself _gondelieds_, and even his
plunges in the Warra were like crashes of fairy octaves, with
_arpeggios_ of pearly notes in showers coming after.
These were the _ante-bellum_ days, before the war had opened the
Southern country to winter visitors from the North; invalids a few,
tourists a few, came and went, but the great tide, which now sweeps
annually down the Atlantic coast to Florida, was then unknown. Beata,
lying by itself far down the peninsula, no more looked for winter
visitors than it looked for angels; but one day an angel arrived
unawares, and Doro saw her.
Too simple-hearted to conceal, excited, longing for sympathy, he poured
out his story to Miss Elisabetha, who sat copying from her music-book a
certain ballad for the Demoiselle Xantez.