THE BROADER MEANING
It is surprising how quickly any situation can be assimilated. Be it
ever so pleasant or ever so painful, we get accustomed to its demands
surprisingly soon, and whether it is the fact that one has just gotten a
fortune, or just gotten the toothache, in either case it seems as if one
had had it always, before one has hardly had it at all.
Lassie learned this with great rapidity. Before three days had passed
by, she discovered that the deep and earnest joy in Alva's mind had
eradicated all the horror in her own. Alva's love ceased to seem
shocking--it seemed, instead, more like some beautiful, mysterious
wonder. Lassie came to hear her friend talk without any distress--only
with a sort of wistful ignorance--a longing to fathom depths not before
even apprehended.
"It doesn't strike me as it did at first at all," she said to Ingram one
night, as they went for the mail together. "All that I think of now is
how happy she looks. Did you ever see any one look as happy as she
does?"
"She's very happy, surely," said Ingram; "but what uses me up is that
she is looking forward so. Why, that man is dying--he may die any
day--and she thinks that he will come here. He can't ever come here,
not possibly!"
"Oh, can't he?" Lassie cried, in real distress, "are you sure of that?"
"Of course. He knows it, too."
"But she doesn't know it?"
"No."
"Don't you think that he ought to tell her, then?"
Ingram did not speak for a minute. "Perhaps some miracle may come to
pass, and he may live," he said then; "you see, he has lived three weeks
longer than any man in his circumstances ought to expect to live."
"Oh, then he hasn't got to die soon?"
Ingram knit his brows in the dark. "I can't explain myself clearly," he
said; "but it seems to me that he and Alva sort of rise above rules, so
to speak. Part of the time she's as she always was--just as we are--and
then again I feel as if she herself had gone and left me sitting with
just a figure of some sort.--" He paused. "I expect he's the same way,"
he added, after a second; "it's all beyond me."
"It's strange, isn't it?" Lassie spoke thoughtfully. "She's very sweet
and lovely, and dear with it all. But I know just what you mean; I've
seen it, too. She is talking, and then she stops and that white look
comes over her face, and I never speak then until she does. Do you
know," she said, almost timidly, "I keep thinking of things I've read in
books about the Middle Ages,--about saints; about 'ecstasy,' they called
it. We say 'ecstasies' about hats, or little dogs, or the flowers at
Easter; but when Alva has been talking about her life in that house and
stops to think, and I see her face, I feel as if I understood what the
word really and truly meant."
"I suppose there's no danger of her converting you," said Ingram; "it's
all very well for her, but I should hate to have you that way."
"Why?" asked the girl, in surprise.
"It isn't human, that's why," the man declared, energetically. "We're
past the Middle Ages," he added, with a little laugh, "far past now."
"You think that people can be too good?"
"Yes, I do. I wouldn't marry a woman like her for anything!"
"But you thought differently once," said Lassie, shyly.
"Yes," he said, easily, "I wanted to marry her once, but she wouldn't
have it at all. Droll--isn't it?"
"We're ever so far by the post-office; do you know it?" she said.
"So we are; I'd forgotten all about the mail."
They turned back.
"But I don't believe that Alva ever could make you see life in the way
that she does," Ingram said, tentatively; "does she ever try?"
"I don't think so," said Lassie; "she just talks to me of her
happiness."
"What would become of the world, I wonder, if every one adopted her
views," suggested the man.
They turned in at Mrs. Ray's gate just here. The mail was distributed,
and every one else had taken theirs and gone.
"Well, you're a little late," said Mrs. Ray, cheerfully. "Mary Cody run
up for the house letters when she saw you go by. Have a nice walk?"
"Yes, very," said Ingram.
"You're great walkers down your way. Mrs. Lathbun and her daughter walk
all day long, seems to me."
"They do walk a good deal," said Lassie.
Then she and Ingram went back to the hotel. They found Alva standing by
the dining-room door with her lamp and her letters in her hand. Mrs.
O'Neil stood close before her.
"I wouldn't worry," said Alva to Mrs. O'Neil; "I don't believe one word
of it."
"When they're out to-morrow I shall sweep the room _myself_," said Mrs.
O'Neil, decidedly; "you can learn a good deal about people by sweeping
their room." Then they all separated, Ingram going to his letters, their
hostess to her husband, and Alva and Lassie to their cosy nest
up-stairs.
"What was the matter?" Lassie asked, directly their doors were shut.
"Nothing especial," Alva said, laughing; "it was just that Mrs. Ray came
here this afternoon and rather upset Mrs. O'Neil by talking about Mrs.
Lathbun and her daughter."
"What did she say?"
"She didn't say anything in particular--she just talked."
"What did she talk, then?"
"She talked all sorts of things; she doesn't like them at all. She
doesn't consider them nice."
Lassie was silent. She was conscious of a painful lack of admiration for
either Mrs. Lathbun or her daughter, herself.
A freight train began to roll by and ended conversation for the time
being. Alva went to the window and stood there. After a while she spoke
musingly.
"Everything must have a purpose. Every action has to have a thought
behind it. If we could only see through the veil!"
The train, which had come to a standstill, now began to move again,
cracking and straining at first, then going on with a terrific roar.
"They serve their purpose surely--the freight trains," Alva said; "even
if they did nothing else, their noise accomplishes something. One might
forget life so easily in this corner of the world, if it were not for
them."
Lassie laughed. "But they serve a few more purposes than that."
"Yes, of course. I never deny the broader meaning in life--if the
world's view _is_ the broader one--but trains mean such a great deal
besides what they carry, in a little bit of a town. I used to think that
they came pretty close to being all the meaning that life had to the
people there, and I still wonder sometimes if it isn't so. I've lived
here well over one week now, and really it seems to me that the trains,
their comings and goings, and whether they do them on time or not, are
the only topics of conversation that are ever broached."
"Perhaps they talk about other things when we're not around," suggested
Lassie, wisely.
"I hadn't thought of that. Or perhaps they think the trains our only
mutual interest. You know, Lassie, there really is no one that is
stupid, unless you do your half towards being stupid, too. It's like the
crash in the wilderness, which doesn't mean sound unless there are ears
to hear it."
"I never thought of that," said Lassie; "isn't there really any sound in
the wilderness? What happens when the tigers roar?"
"But of course they do talk about other things here," Alva continued,
paying no attention to her friend's flippancy. "They talk about the dam,
and they talk about me."
"What do you suppose they say about you?" Lassie asked, curiously.
"I know exactly what they say," Alva replied, a real amusement curling
her lips; "they say that Ronald and I are going to be married and live
in that house while he builds the dam."
"Oh!"
"Yes, indeed."
"But I didn't know that the dam was decided on."
"It isn't, my dear, and I don't believe myself that there ever will be
any dam. I can't believe that this State, even in her grossest
materialism, will have the face to accept a royal gift and then turn
around and give it away in direct contradiction of the terms of its
acceptance."
"Is it as bad as that?"
"It's very bad. That dear old gentleman has made the preservation of
this wonder of nature the realized dream of his whole life. He's carried
through no end of other big philanthropic schemes, but he never for one
instant allowed anything to turn him aside from this one. He told me
himself how he had rewooded the banks--he has planted thousands and
thousands of trees--and now to have the whole threatened. It's shameful,
shameful!"
"Does every one know how you feel?"
"Yes, every one knows how I feel."
"What do they think themselves?"
"I believe the predominant sentiment in Ledge is that it will be
entertaining to see Ledgeville drowned for good and all."
Lassie laughed.
The freight train was all gone by now. Alva turned from the window and
came back to a seat beside her friend, sinking upon it with a little
sigh.
"All this goes very near with me, dear," she said, gently; "loving
Nature and fighting for the future has been _his_ life-work, you know."
"Yes," Lassie said, softly.
Suddenly the older one leaned close and put her arms about the young
girl. "It's so heaven-blessed to have you here,--it makes me so happy."
"I'm very happy, too," said Lassie. "I never had just the feeling before
in my life that I have with you these days--it's as if nothing could
ever come between us. Sort of as if we had been sealed to a compact."
Alva patted the brown waves of hair. "That's the understanding of true
friendship, dear," she said; "nothing ever can come between us. Once two
people realize mutual truth, how can anything come between them again?
All the trouble in the world arises out of falseness. Search in your
mind, and see if it isn't so?"
Lassie reflected. "You're putting so many new ideas into my head," she
said, "I suppose I'll go home with nothing of my old self left in me."
"Not quite that," said Alva. "Your old self wasn't so bad, Lassie, dear.
But the world has a way of hammering all its votaries into a certain set
of molds, and I'd like to see you casting, instead of cast,--do you
know the difference?"
"Alva," said Lassie, with sudden appealing earnestness, "you weren't
like this when I saw you last; what changed you?"
"I had the convictions then, but not the courage. Now I have the
courage, too."
"What gave you the courage?"
"Surely you can divine?"
"Love."
"Yes, dear, love. Love for him. All courage has its root in love of some
kind."
"Alva, you teach me more each day."
"Yes, and I'll teach you more and more and more yet, and so on and so on
until we part, and then I'll go on learning myself."
"Hasn't your lesson any end?"
"Love hasn't any end, dear, any more than it has any beginning. And so
my lesson hasn't any end, either."
"But--"
"I know what you are going to say, but that isn't real love. That which
can end has never been,--all the real things in existence are eternal."
"But they--the people that--well, you know, they thought that it was
love--didn't they?"
"Yes, dear, and little children think that there are bears in dark
closets, and ever so many people think that money buys happiness. The
world is full of lies, Lassie, but if one puts the test to them they all
fade away. You don't understand yet--but wait."
"I want to understand."
"But you are not ready to understand yet."
"But I am ready, I will learn to be ready."
"Yes, and I'm going to teach you. But I have to go slowly because I have
to hunt for the words. You are such a little thing--such a baby--to be
trusted with life; because you see most people never live--they just
exist. They are only a few steps up on the staircase, and when they are
dragged or pushed above the place that they are in by nature, they are
apt to be dizzy. I want to teach you life, Lassie; but I don't want to
make you dizzy." She paused, and a whimsical little smile danced across
her face; "and besides, dear, we must get undressed. It is after ten
o'clock."
"Just a minute more, Alva; it seems as if I cannot break off right here.
And I won't be dizzy. I know that whatever you think and do must be
right and best. I want to learn to think just as you do. I want to be
told how you learned. I always knew you were so very good, and truly,
dear, I wouldn't have been surprised if you'd chosen to marry a
missionary or to go to that island where the lepers are--not after the
first minute, you know; it would have been just like you."
"Oh, no, Lassie, it wouldn't have been like me at all. For ever so many
reasons. My first duty in life--the duty that comes before every
other--is to my father and mother. No claim could be strong enough to
justify my leaving them; and then, besides, I'm not a Christian, except
in the sense that I believe with Christ, and that isn't enough for any
mission or any leper nowadays."
There was a little pause; then Lassie said: "But you are going to leave
your father and mother now, aren't you?"
Alva smiled. "But for such a little while, dear," she said, gently;
"you forget how short the time is to be!" There was an instant's pause
and then she turned suddenly and her face had the bright color of deep
emotion flaming in it. "Lassie, Lassie," she exclaimed, with a strength
of feeling that startled the other into a sudden cry, "I'm trying to be
calm, I'm trying to talk to you quietly,--I don't want you to think me a
mad woman,--but I am so much closer to some other keener, sharper world
of soul and sensation than you or any one can realize, that I can hardly
curb myself to the dull, unknowing, unfeeling, throb, throb, of this
one. Don't you know, Lassie, that people are getting married every
day,"--she stopped and pressed her hands tightly together, her eyes
starring the pallor of her face with that curious radiance of which the
young girl had spoken to Ronald. "Oh," she went on, "to think that
people are getting married every day because they need cooks or because
they need care, or because the man has money or because the girl is
pretty, and they go forth un-understanding, and they live along somehow;
and the word that means their sort of companionship is all that I can
use to speak of the evening that I shall return here, his wife, and fall
on my knees beside him and realize that all my loneliness and waiting
and hoping has ended, and that at last--at last--we are to be together,
even if only for a few weeks, a few days, a few hours. A foretaste of
eternity! A memory of what was in the beginning of all things!"
Ceasing to speak, she clasped her hands more tightly yet, and her eyes
closed slowly. Lassie sat still and trembling. Her breath came unevenly,
but she saw that Alva's swept in and out of her bosom with a wide
evenness that belies unconquered emotion. After a minute the other
opened her eyes and laid her hand lightly upon the girl's head. "I
frighten you, I know that I frighten you," she said; "you think that I
am crazy after all."
"No, I don't, Alva; but I can't think what kind of a man the man can be
to make you feel that marrying him will be so different from marrying
any other man."
"You can't think, because you don't know what love can mean to
people--what it has meant to him or what it has meant to me."
Then she sprang up and began to undress herself rapidly.
"I don't see how you can bring yourself back to earth, Alva, after you
have felt like that."
Alva smiled. "But we must live on the earth, Lassie, and be of the
earth. We are made for the earth. God gave us our souls, and he gave us
our bodies, too. And he meant both to work together."
Lassie sat still and meditative. She had herself been carried out beyond
her depth and could not get back easily. She was, in truth, a little
dizzy.