WIDOWED.
Phemie was not in the house two minutes before she knew her husband had
had a paralytic stroke. The doctor was still with him; but in such a
case, what can a doctor do? When the Almighty strikes—when the blow
falls, which no skill is able to avert—of what use are God’s
instruments?
From that day Phemie’s work was laid out for her. To nurse him, to tend
him, to take the man who had raised her from poverty to wealth, hither
and thither as the medical men advised, or as his own fancy dictated;
that was the employment of Mrs. Stondon’s life.
Mr. Aggland, now a widower, came and stayed at Marshlands; he it was who
propped the sick man up in bed—who read to him—who amused him—who
accompanied them from place to place—who thought that never a husband
had found so devoted a wife as Phemie—who made his head-quarters in
London, that he might be near his niece, and who, after Mr. Keller’s
death, made his head-quarters at Roundwood, Mrs. Keller not desiring to
continue her residence there.
Phemie was a great woman at last. An heiress in her own right—a person
who, without any Marshlands at all, could have taken a high place in
society; and yet the Phemie of those days was humbler, sweeter than the
Phemie who had dreamed dreams in the valley of Tordale—who had lingered
beside the waterfall, and sat beside Strammer Tarn.
How did her new dignity of heiress become her? many a reader may want to
know; and yet I think the reader who asks that can have read the
life-story of Phemie Keller to little purpose.
How does wealth affect those who have discovered the powerlessness of
wealth to confer happiness? How did wealth affect this woman who had not
found wealth do much for her?
It simply suggested to her one idea—that money had come too late; that
her life had been throughout one great mistake; that, as a rule, lives
were great mistakes.
The burden of the song was sorrow—the refrain of the song was work. And
her work, as I have said before, was laid out for her: she had from the
day she returned from London to attend to her husband, ceaselessly.
They went for the winter to Hastings. The doctor recommended it, and
Phemie went wherever the medical men desired.
Now the sea talked to her differently: all through those long, dreary,
interminable months she listened to the winds and the waves while they
mourned to her of Basil’s last resting-place—of the restless ocean, in
the midst of which he had lain him down to sleep.
In those days there was no one to come between her and her husband—no
one; friend—nor lover—nor relation—and accordingly Phemie was able to
devote herself to him heart and soul.
For a time he seemed to rally, but the constitution was too
enfeebled—the shock had been too severe. While they were at Hastings,
Captain Stondon had a second stroke; and though his doctor pooh-poohed
the calamity to Phemie, still she felt unsatisfied, and paid a visit to
a London physician on her own account.
“If a person have a second paralytic stroke,” she said—“remember I want
the simple truth—what is the usual consequence? Can the patient
recover?”
For a moment, the man of large experience hesitated, then he said,
“After a second stroke, as a rule, there can be but one thing more—a
third——”
“Which is——” Phemie suggested.
“Death.”
She turned away—she felt suffocating. Death! He had been her best friend
through the most trying period of her life; and she had loved—oh,
heavens! in spite of all faults and shortcomings, she _had_ loved him.
“I should like you to see my husband,” she faltered out. And then the
doctor was very sorry for his words; but he went down to Hastings to see
Captain Stondon notwithstanding.
She wanted to get him back to Marshlands; but the medical attendants
shook their heads. She would have given anything to be able to move him
to his own home; but the physicians said that unless a decided change
for the better occurred such a journey was not to be thought of.
“You would like to get back, dear,” she said to him, when the spring
buds were jutting out—when the primroses were springing in the
hedges—when the hyacinths in Fairlight Glen were showing for flower; and
the poor lips that could now answer in nothing save monosyllables,
framed the one word—“Yes.”
“Shall I try to move you there, darling?” she asked; and the dim eyes
lighted up with pleasure, and the wan fingers clasped hers tighter, and
over the white lips passed the monosyllable “Yes!” once more.
“You do not like this place,” she went on, fearful that her own
detestation of the sea—the cruel sea, might be leading her astray with
regard to his wishes; and he answered, “No!”
Then she resolved to move him. And she did it.
Before a fortnight was over he was lying in his own room at Marshlands,
listening to the song of the birds—to the cawing of the rooks—to the
sweet spring sounds—that never seem quite the same when heard away from
home.
In the years gone by he had wished a wish—he had prayed a prayer; and
now, when the dark days were come upon him—when his strength was turned
into weakness—his noon changed to night—when he lay unable to
speak—unable to move—the memory of that prayer came back to him.
“O God!” he said, when he stooped over the pool, and drank of the
waters, “when Thy good time comes, leave me not to die alone.”
Through the days that had passed since then, his soul went back. Tordale
was with him in the time of which I am now writing, as the days of his
boyhood were with him when he lay bruised and maimed at the foot of
Helbeck.
For ever he was turning round that rock which brought him within view of
the valley and the waterfall and the everlasting hills. Eternally the
dull plash of the stream as it fell over the rocks—the faint rustling of
the leaves—the mourning farewell of the rivulet—the trickling of the
water among the stones—sounded in his ear. Dead as he was to the scenes
of this beautiful world—powerless though he was to lift himself up and
look forth on God’s earth, which he had loved so dearly, still he could
remember many things, and amongst them Tordale, which he had once said
lightly he should never forget.
Never! for ever! There he had been happy—there he had met Phemie—there
he had heard that sweet girlish voice singing the old Covenanting
Hymn—there he had wooed and won her, and now the tale was told—the sands
were running out—the sun was near its setting—the end which comes sooner
or later to all human hopes and fears, troubles and pleasures, was
drawing nigh unto him; the wife who had never loved him as much as he
had loved her, still hung over his sick-bed, and anticipated his
lightest want.
“If she could but know.” And in those hours, had speech been vouchsafed
to him, he could have talked to her about their common trouble. “If God
would but give me power to talk once more, I would not remain silent as
I have done.” And with light from eternity streaming in upon the pages
of the past, he saw that his silence had been wrong, his forbearance
useless; he vaguely comprehended that if he had opened his heart to
Phemie in the days gone by, Basil need not have left for India, while
perfect confidence would have reigned between him and her.
“But she will understand it when I am gone,” he thought; “she will know
then how I loved her through all.”
That was the story the weary eyes tried to tell Phemie as they followed
her about the room; that was the assurance he tried to convey when he
clasped her soft hand—when by sign and gesture he kept the dear, pale,
changed face near to his own; when he looked at the white cheek, white
and worn; when he strove to return the remorseful kisses she laid upon
his lips.
Summer came—summer with its sunshine, its roses, its mirthful gladness,
its wealth of beauty and of perfume—summer came and shone down on the
sweet valley of Tordale once again.
Twelve years previously, Captain Stondon, seated in the church porch,
shaded from the mid-day sun, wearied with his walk from Grassenfel, had
speculated vaguely upon death; and now, lying in his bed at Marshlands,
with the windows flung wide to admit both air and sunshine, tired with
his long walk through life, he thought about death once more.
After all, when it comes to this with any person, no existence seems to
have lasted for years, and years, and years. There has been a sunrise
and a noontide and a sunset; the day is done, the night draws on, the
task is finished, the labourer hies him homeward from the last hour’s
work he shall ever be called upon to perform.
What more—what more! Oh, friends, the longest life ends with some work,
to our thinking, left unfinished—some seventh unresolved—some lesson
unlearnt; but who amongst us can tell the why and the wherefore of this
mystery? Who can explain the meaning of this universal law? We can write
the story up to a certain point, but there our knowledge ceases.
When mortal sickness comes to put a finish to the life-history, what can
any one say further? The man has lived, the man has died, the day is
ended, the night has closed in. Draw we the curtains, and leave the
room—there is nothing further to be written; sleep has come to the tired
eyelids—ease to the worn-out frame; there is great peace where there was
much suffering. The heat has been borne, the burden is laid aside; the
wayfarer has reached his long home; the unquiet heart is still; in the
shadows of evening man ceases from his work and from his labour, and
sinks to his long rest.
What more? Nothing, my readers; that is, nothing of the stranger whom we
met so long ago gazing in the summer sunshine upon Tordale. Captain
Stondon was dead, and Phemie—a widow! and there was no direct heir to
Marshlands.