She took the name again, and with it, also, Margaret, feeling that Daisy
was far too girlish an appellation for one who clad herself in the
deepest mourning, and felt, when she stood at poor Tom's grave, more
wretched and desolate than many a wife has felt when her husband was
buried from sight.
Tom had meant to make her parents independent of her so that she need
not have them with her unless she chose to do so, for knowing Mr.
McDonald as he did, he thought she would be happier without him; but God
so ordered it that within three months after poor Tom's death, they made
another grave beside his, and Daisy and her mother were alone.
It was spring time, and the two desolate women bade adieu to their dead,
and made their way to England, and from there to Scotland, where among
the heather hills they passed the summer in the utmost seclusion.
Here Daisy had ample time for thought, which dwelt mostly upon the past
and the happiness she cast away when she consented to the sundering of
the tie which had bound her to Guy Thornton.
"Oh, how could I have been so foolish and so weak," she said, as with
intense contempt for herself, she read over the journal she had kept at
Elmwood during the first weeks of her married life.
Guy had said it would be pleasant for her to refer to its pages in after
years, little dreaming with what sore anguish of heart poor Daisy would
one day weep over the senseless things recorded there.
"Can it be I was ever that silly little fool?" she said bitterly, as she
finished her journal. "And how could Guy love me as he did. Oh, if I but
had the chance again, I would make him so happy. Oh, Guy, Guy,--my
husband still,--mine more than Julia's, if you could know how much I
love you now; nor can I feel it wrong to do so, even though I never hope
to see your face again, Guy, Guy, the world is so desolate, and I am
young, only twenty-three, and life is so long and dreary with nothing to
live for or to do. I wish almost that I were dead like Tom, only I dare
not think I should go to the Heaven where he has gone."
In her sorrow and loneliness, Daisy was fast sinking into an unhealthy
morbid state of mind from which nothing seemed to rouse her.
"Nothing to live for,--nothing to do," was her lament, until one golden
September day, when there came a turning point in her life, and she
found there was something to do.
There was no regular service that Sunday in the church where she usually
attended, and as the day was fine and she was far too restless to remain
at home, she proposed to her mother that they walk to a little chapel
about a mile away, where a young Presbyterian clergyman was to preach.
She had heard much of his eloquence, and as his name was McDonald, he
might possibly be some distant relative, inasmuch as her father was of
Scotch descent, and she felt a double interest in him, and with her
mother was among the first who entered the little humble building, and
took a seat upon one of the hard, uncomfortable benches near the pulpit.
The speaker was young,--about Tom's age,--and with a look on his florid
face and a sound in his voice so like that of the dead man that Daisy
half started to her feet when he first took his stand in front of her,
and announced the opening hymn. His text was, "Why stand ye here all the
day idle?" and so well did he handle it, and so forcible were his
gestures and eloquent his style of delivery, that Daisy listened to him
spell-bound, her eyes fixed intently upon his glowing face, and her ears
drinking in every word he uttered.
After dwelling a time upon the loiterers in God's vineyard, the idlers
from choice, who worked not for lack of an inclination to do so, he
spoke next of the class whose whole life was a weariness for want of
something to do, and to these he said, "Have you never read how, when
the disciples rebuked the grateful woman for wasting upon her Master's
head what might have been sold for three hundred pence, and given to the
poor, Jesus said unto them, 'The poor ye have with you always,' and is
it not so, my hearers? Are there no poor at your door to be fed, no
hungry little ones to be cared for out of the abundance which God has
only loaned for this purpose? Are there no wretched homes which you can
make happier, no aching hearts which a kind word would cheer? Remember
there is a blessing pronounced for even the cup of cold water, and how
much greater shall be the reward of those who, forgetting themselves,
seek the good of others and turn not away from the needy and the
desolate. See to it, then, you to whom God has given much. See to it
that you sit not down in idle ease, wasting upon yourself alone the
goods designed for others; for to whom much is given of him much shall
be required."
Attracted, perhaps, by the deep black of Daisy's attire, or the
something about her which marked her as different from the mass of his
hearers, the speaker seemed to address the last of his remarks directly
to her, and had the dead Tom risen from his grave and spoken with her
face to face, she could hardly have been more affected than she was. The
resemblance was so striking and the voice so like her cousin's, that she
felt as if she had received a message direct from him; or, if not from
him, she surely had from God, whose almoner she henceforth would be.
That day was the beginning of a new life to her. Thenceforth there must
be no more repining; no more idle, listless days, no more wishing for
something to do. There was work all around her, and she found it and did
it with a will,--first, from a sense of duty, and at last for the real
pleasure it afforded her to carry joy and gladness to the homes where
want and sorrow had been so long.
Hearing that there was sickness and destitution among the miners in
Peru, where her possessions were, she went there early in November, and
many a wretched heart rejoiced because of her, and many a lip blessed
the beautiful lady whose coming among them was productive of so much
good. Better dwellings, better wages, a church, a school-house followed
in her footsteps, and then, when everything seemed in good working
order, there came over her a longing for her native country, and the
next autumn found her in New York, where in a short space of time
everybody knew of the beautiful Miss McDonald, who was a millionaire and
who owned the fine house and grounds in the upper part of the city not
far from the Park.
Here society claimed her again, and Daisy, who had no morbid fancies
now, yielded in part to its claims, and became, if not a belle, at least
a favorite, whose praises were in every mouth. But chiefly was she known
and loved by the poor and the despised whom she daily visited, and to
whom her presence was like the presence of an angel.
"You do look lovely and sing so sweet; I know there's nothing nicer in
Heaven," said a little piece of deformity to her one day as it lay dying
in her arms. "I'se goin' to Heaven, which I shouldn't have done if
you'se hadn't gin me the nice bun and told me of Jesus. I loves Him now,
and I'll tell Him how you bringed me to Him."
Such was the testimony of one dying child, and it was dearer to Daisy
than all the words of flattery ever poured into her ear. As she had
brought that little child to God so she would bring others, and she made
her work among the children especially, finding there her best
encouragement and greatest success.
Once when Guy Thornton chanced to be in the city and driving in the
Park, he saw a singular sight--a pair of splendid bays arching their
graceful necks proudly, their silver-tipped harness flashing in the
sunlight, and their beautiful mistress radiant with happiness as she sat
in her open carriage, not with gayly-dressed friends, but amid a group
of poorly-clad pale-faced little ones, to whom the Park was paradise,
and she the presiding angel.
"Look,--that's Miss McDonald," Guy's friend said to him, "the greatest
heiress in New York, and I reckon the one who does the most good. Why,
she supports more old people and children and runs more ragged schools
than any half-dozen men in the city, and I don't suppose there's a den
in New York where she has not been, and never once, I'm told, was she
insulted, for the vilest of them stand between her and harm. Once a
miscreant on Avenue A knocked a boy down for accidently stepping in a
pool of water and spattering her white dress in passing. Friday nights
she has a reception for these people, and you ought to see how well they
behave. At first they were noisy and rough, and she had to have the
police, but now they are quiet and orderly as you please, Perhaps you'd
like to go to one. I know Miss McDonald, and will take you with me."
Guy said he should not be in town on Friday, as he must, return to
Cuylerville the next day, and with a feeling he could not quite analyze
he turned to look at the turnout which excited so much attention. But it
was not so much at the handsome bays and the bevy of queer-looking
children he gazed, as at the lady in their midst, clad in velvet and
ermine, with a long white feather falling among the curls of her bright
hair. When Daisy first entered upon her new life, she had affected a
nun-like garb as most appropriate, but after a little child said to her
once: "I don't like your black gown all the time. I likes sumptin'
bright and pretty," she changed her dress and gave freer scope to her
natural good taste and love of what was becoming. And the result showed
the wisdom of the change, for the children and inmates of the dens she
visited, accustomed only to the squallor and ugliness of their
surroundings, hailed her more rapturously than they had done before, and
were never weary of talking of the beautiful woman who was not afraid to
wear her pretty clothes into their wretched houses, which gradually grew
more clean and tidy for her sake.
"It wasn't for the likes of them gownds to trail through sich truck,"
Bridget O'Donohue said, and on the days when Daisy was expected, she
scrubbed the floor, which, until Daisy's advent had not known water for
years, and rubbed and polished the one wooden chair kept sacred for the
lady's use.
Other women, too, caught Biddy's spirit and scrubbed their floors and
their children's faces on the day when Miss McDonald was to call, and
when she came, she was watched narrowly, lest by some chance a speck of
dirt should fall upon her, and her becoming dress and handsome face were
commented on and remembered as some fine show which had been seen for
nothing. Especially did the children like her in her bright dress, and
the velvet and ermine in which she was clad when Guy met her in the Park
were worn more for their sakes, than for the gaze of those to whom such
things were no novelties. To Guy she looked more beautiful than he had
ever seen her before, and there was in his heart a feeling like a want
of something lost, as her carriage disappeared from, view and he lost
sight of the fair face and form which had once been his own.
The world was going well with Guy, for though Dick Trevylian had paid no
part of the one hundred thousand dollars, and he still lived in the
Brown Cottage on the hill, he was steadily working his way to
competency, if not to wealth. His profession as lawyer, which he had
resumed, yielded him a remunerative income, while his contributions to
different magazines were much sought after, so that to all human
appearance he was prosperous and happy. Prosperous in his business, and
happy in his wife and little ones, for there was now a second child, a
baby Guy of six weeks old, and when on his return from New York the
father bent over the cradle of his boy, and kissed his baby face, that
image seen in the Park seemed to fade away, and the caresses he gave to
Julia had in them no faithlessness or insincerity. She was a noble
woman, and had made him a good wife, and he loved her truly, though with
a different, less absorbing, less ecstatic love than he had given to
Daisy. But he did not tell her of Miss McDonald. Indeed, that name was
never spoken now, nor was any reference ever made to her except when the
little Daisy sometimes asked where was the lady for whom she was named,
and why she did not send her a doll.
"I hardly think she knows there is such a chit as you," Guy said to her
once, when sorely pressed on the subject; and then the child wondered
how that could be; and wished she was big enough to write her a letter
and ask her to come and see her.
Every day after that little Daisy played "make b'leve Miss Mack-Dolly"
was there, said Mack-Dolly being represented by a bundle of shawls tied
up to look like a figure and seated in a chair. At last there came to
the cottage a friend of Julia's, a young lady from New York, who knew
Miss McDonald, and who, while visiting in Cuylerville, accidentally
learned that she was the divorced wife, of whose existence she knew, but
of whom she had never spoken to Mrs. Thornton. Hearing the little one
talking one day to Miss Mack-Dolly, asking her why she never wrote, nor
sent a "sing" to her _sake-name_, the young lady said:
"Why don't you send Miss McDonald a letter? You tell me what to say and
I'll write it down for you, but don't let mamma know till you see if you
get anything."
The little girl's fancy was caught at once with the idea, and the
following letter was the result:
"_Brown Cottage_, 'Most Tissmas time.
"_Dear Miss Mac-Dolly_:--I'se an 'ittle dirl named for you, I is, Daisy
Thornton, an' my papa is Mr. Guy, an' mam-ma is Julia, and 'ittle
brother is Guy, too--only he's a baby, and vomits up his dinner and ties
awfully sometimes; an' I knows anoder 'ittle dirl named for somebody who
dives her 'sings,' a whole lot, an' why doesn't youse dive me some, when
I'se your sake-name, an' loves you ever so much, and why you never turn
here to see me? I wish you would. I ask papa is you pretty, an' he tell
me yes, bootiful, an' every night I pays for you and say God bress papa
an' mam-ma, an' auntie, and Miss Mac-Dolly, and 'ittle brodder, an' make
Daisy a dood dirl, and have Miss Mac-Dolly send her sumptin' for
Tissmas, for Christ's sake. An' I wants a turly headed doll that ties
and suts her eyes when she does to seep, and wears a shash and a
pairesol, and anodder big dolly to be her mam-ma and pank her when she's
naughty, an' I wants an' 'ittle fat-iran, an' a cook-stove, an'
washboard. I'se dot a tub. An' I wants some dishes an' a stenshun table,
an' 'ittle bedstead, an' yuffled seets, an' pillars, an' bue silk kilt,
an' ever many sings which papa cannot buy, cause he hasn't dot the
money. Vill you send them, Miss Mac-Dolly, pese, an' your likeness, too.
I wants to see how you looks. My mam-ma is pretty, with back hair an'
eyes, but she's awful old--I dess. How old is you? Papa's hair is some
dray, an' his viskers, too. My eyes is bue.
"Yours, respectfully, "_Daisy Thornton_."
----
Miss McDonald had been shopping since ten in the morning, and her
carriage had stood before dry goods stores, and toy shops, and candy
stores, while bundle after bundle had been deposited on the cushions and
others ordered to be sent. But she was nearly through now, and, just as
it was beginning to grow dark in the streets, she bade her coachman
drive home, where dinner was waiting for her in the dining-room, and her
mother was waiting in the parlor. Mrs. McDonald was not very well, and
had kept her room all day, but she was better that night, and came down
to dine with her daughter. The December wind was cold and raw, and a few
snowflakes fell on Daisy's hat and cloak as she ran up the steps and
entered the warm, bright room, which seemed so pleasant when contrasted
with the dreariness without.
"Oh, how nice this is, and how tired and cold I am!" she said, as she
bent over the blazing fire.
"Are you through with your shopping?" Mrs. McDonald asked, in a
half-querulous tone, as if she did not altogether approve of her
daughter's acts.
"Yes, all through, except a shawl for old Sarah Mackie, and a few more
toys for Biddy Warren's blind boy," Daisy said, and her mother replied:
"Well, I'm sure I shall be glad for your sake when it is over. You'll
make youself sick, and you are nearly worn out now, remembering everbody
in New York."
"Not quite everybody, mother," Daisy rejoined, cheerfully; "only those
whom everybody forgets,--the poor, whom we have with us always. Don't
you remember the text, and the little kirk where we heard it preached
from? But come,--dinner is ready, and I am hungry, I assure you."
She led the way to the handsome dining-room, and took her seat at the
table, looking, in her dark street dress, as her mother had said, pale
and worn, as if the shopping had been very hard upon her. And yet it was
not so much the fatigue of the day which affected her as the remembrance
of a past she did not often dare to recall.
It was at Christmas time years ago that she first met with Guy, and all
the day long, as she turned over piles of shawls, and delaines, and
flannels, or ordered packages of candy, and bonbons, and dollies by the
dozen, her thoughts had been with Guy and the time she met him at Leiter
and Field's and he walked home with her. It seemed to her years and
years ago, and the idea of having lived so long made her feel old and
tired and worn. But the nice dinner and the cheer of the room revived
her, and her face looked brighter and more rested when she returned to
the parlor, and began to show her mother her purchases.
Daisy did not receive many letters except on business, and, as these
usually came in the morning, she did not think to ask if the postman had
left her anything; and so it was not until her mother had retired and
she was about going to her own room, that she saw a letter lying on the
hall-stand. Miss Barker, who had instigated the letter, had never
written to her more than once or twice, and then only short notes, and
she did not recognize the handwriting at once. But she saw it was
post-marked Cuylerville, and a sick, faint sensation crept over her as
she wondered who had sent it, and if it contained news of Guy. It was
long since she had heard of him,--not, in fact, since poor Tom's death;
and she knew nothing of the little girl called for herself, and thus had
no suspicion of the terrible shock awaiting her, when at last she broke
the seal. Miss Barker had written a few explanatory lines, which were as
follows:
"_Cuylerville_, Dec., 18--.
"_Dear Miss McDonald_:--Since saying good-bye to you last June, and
going off to the mountains and seaside, while you, like a good
Samaritan, stayed in the hot city to look after 'your people,' I have
flitted hither and thither until at last I floated out to Cuylerville to
visit Mrs. Guy Thornton, who is a friend and former schoolmate of mine.
Here,--not in the house, but in town,--I have heard a story which
surprised me not a little, and I now better understand that sad look I
have so often seen on your face without at all suspecting the cause.
"Dear friend, pardon me, won't you, for the liberty I have taken since
knowing your secret? You would, I am sure, if you only knew what a dear,
darling little creature Mr. Thornton's eldest child is. Did you know he
had called her Daisy for you? He has, and with her blue eyes and bright
auburn hair, she might pass for your very own, with the exception of her
nose, which is decidedly _retrousse_. She is three years old, and the
most precocious little witch you ever saw. What think you of her making
up a bundle of shawls and aprons, and christening it _Miss Mac-Dolly_,
her name for you, and talking to it as if it were really the famous and
beautiful woman she fancies it to be? She is your 'sake-name,' she says,
and before I knew the facts of the case, I was greatly amused by her
talk to the bundle of shawls which she reproached for never having sent
her anything. When I asked Julia (that's Mrs. Thornton) who Miss
Mac-Dolly was, she merely answered, 'the lady for whom Daisy was named,'
and that was all I knew until the gossips enlightened me, when, without
a word to any one, I resolved upon a liberty which I thought I could
venture to take with you. I suggested the letter which I inclose, and
which I wrote exactly as the words came from the little lady's lips.
Neither Mr. Thornton, nor his wife, know aught of the letter, nor will
they unless you respond, for the child will keep her own counsel, I am
well assured.
"Again forgive me if I have done wrong, and believe me, as ever,
"Yours, sincerely, "_Ella Barker_."
----
Daisy's face was pale as ashes as she read Miss Barker's letter, and
then snatching up the other devoured its contents almost at a glance,
while her breath came in panting gasps, and her heart seemed trying to
burst through her throat. She could neither move nor cry out for a
moment, but sat like one turned to stone, with a sense of suffocation
oppressing her, and a horrible pain in her heart. She had thought the
grave was closed, the old wound healed by time and silence, and now a
little child had torn it open, and it was bleeding and throbbing again
with a pang such as she had never felt before, while there crept over
her such a feeling of desolation and loneliness, a want of something
unpossessed, as few have ever experienced.
But for her own foolishness that sweet little child might have been
hers, she thought, as her heart went after the little one with an
indescribable yearning which made her stretch out her arms as if to take
the baby to her bosom and hold it there forever. Guy had called it for
_her_, and that touched her more than anything else. He had not
forgotten her then. She had never supposed he had, but to be thus
assured of it was very sweet, and as she thought of it, and read again
little Daisy's letter, the tightness about her heart and the choking
sensation in her throat began to give way, and one after another the
great tears rolled down her cheeks, slowly at first, but gradually
faster and faster until they fell in torrents, and a tempest of sobs
shook her frame, as with her head bowed upon her dressing-table she gave
vent to her grief. It seemed to her she never could stop crying or grow
calm again, for as often as she thought of the touching words, "I pays
for you," there came a fresh burst of sobs and tears, until at last
nature was exhausted, and with a low moan Daisy sank upon her knees and
tried to pray, the words which first sprang to her lips framing
themselves into thanks that somewhere in the world there was one who
prayed for her and loved her too, even though the love might have for
its object merely dolls, and candies, and toys. And these the child
should have in abundance, and Miss McDonald found herself longing for
the morrow in which to begin again the shopping she had thought was
nearly ended.
It was in vain next day that her mother remonstrated against her going
out, pleading her white, haggard face and the rawness of the day. Daisy
was not to be detained at home, and before ten o'clock she was down on
Broadway, and the dolly with the "shash," and "pairesol," which she had
seen the day before under its glass case was hers for twenty-five
dollars, and the plainer bit of china, who was to be dollie's mother and
perform the parental duty of "panking her when she was naughty," was
also purchased, and the dishes, and the table, and stove, and bedstead,
with ruffled sheets, and pillow-cases, and blue satin spread, and the
washboard, and clothes-bars, and tiny wringer, and diverse other toys,
were bought with a disregard of expense which made Miss McDonald a
wonder to those who waited on her. Such a Christmas-box was seldom sent
to a child as that which Daisy packed in her room that night, with her
mother looking on and wondering what Sunday-school was to be the
recipient of all those costly presents, and suggesting that cheaper
articles would have answered just as well.
Everything the child had asked for was there except the picture. That
Daisy dared not send, lest it should look too much like thrusting
herself upon Guy's notice and wound Julia his wife.
Daisy was strangely pitiful in her thoughts of Julia, who would in her
turn have pitied her for her delusion, could she have known how sure she
was that but for the tardiness of that letter Guy would have chosen his
first love in preference to any other.
And it was well that each believed herself first in the affection of the
man to whom Daisy wanted so much to send something as a proof of her
unalterable love. They were living still in the brown cottage; they were
not able to buy Elmwood back. Oh, if she only dared to do it, how gladly
her Christmas gift should be the handsome place which they had been so
proud of. But that would hardly do; Guy might not like to be so much
indebted to her; he was proud and sensitive in many points, and so she
abandoned the plan for the present, thinking that by and by she would
purchase and hold it as a gift to her namesake on her bridal day. That
will be better, she said, as she put the last article in the box and saw
it leave her door, directed to Guy Thornton's care.
----
Great was the surprise at the Brown Cottage, when, on the very night
before Christmas the box arrived and was deposited in the dining-room,
where Guy and Julia, Miss Barker and Daisy, gathered eagerly around it,
the later exclaiming:
"I knows where it tum from, I do. My sake-name, Miss Mac-Dolly, send it,
see did. I writ and ask her would see, an' see hab."
"What!" Guy said, as, man-like, he began deliberately to untie every
knot in the string which his wife in her impatience would have cut at
once. "What does the child mean? Do you know, Julia?"
"I do. I'll explain," Miss Barker said, and in as few words as possible
she told what she had done, while Julia listened with a very grave face,
and Guy was pale to his lips as he went on untying the string and
opening the box.
There was a letter lying on the top which he handed to Julia, who
steadied her voice to read aloud:
"New York, December 22, 18--.
"Darling little _sake-name_ _Daisy_:--Your letter made Miss Mack-Dolly
very happy, and she is so glad to send you the doll with a _shash_, and
the other toys. Write to me again and tell me if they suit you. God
bless you, sweet little one, is the prayer of
"_Miss McDonald_."
After that the grave look left Julia's face, and Guy was not quite so
pale, as he took out, one after another, the articles, which little
Daisy hailed with rapturous shouts and exclamations of delight.
"Oh, isn't she dood, and don't you love her, papa?" she said, while Guy
replied:
"Yes, it was certainly very kind in her, and generous. No other little
girl in town will have such a box as this."
He was very white, and there was a strange look in his eyes, but his
voice was perfectly natural as he spoke, and one who knew nothing of his
former relations to Miss McDonald would never have suspected how his
whole soul was moved by this gift to his little daughter.
"You must write and thank her," he said to Julia, who, knowing that this
was proper, assented without a word, and when on the morning after
Christmas Miss McDonald opened with trembling hands the envelope bearing
the Cuylerville post-mark, she felt a keen pang of disappointment in
finding only a few lines from Julia, who expressed her own and little
Daisy's thanks for the beautiful Christmas box, and signed herself:
"Truly, _Mrs. Guy Thornton_."
Not Julia, but Mrs. Guy, and that hurt Daisy more than anything else.
"Mrs. Guy Thornton! Why need she thrust upon me the name I used to
bear?" she whispered, and her lip quivered a little, and the tears
sprang to her eyes as she remembered all that lay between the present
and the time when she had been Mrs. Guy Thornton.
She was Miss McDonald now, and Guy was another woman's husband, and with
a bitter pain in her heart, she put away Julia's letter, saying, as she
did so, "And that's the end of that."
The box business had not resulted just as she hoped it would. She had
thought Guy would write himself, and by some word or allusion assure her
of his remembrance, but instead, there had come to her a few perfectly
polite and well-expressed lines from Julia, who had the _impertinence_
to sign herself Mrs. Guy Thornton! It was rather hard and sorely
disappointing, and for many days Miss McDonald's face was very white and
sad, and both the old and young whom she visited as usual wondered what
had come over the beautiful lady, to make her "so pale and sorry."