ALL MATERIALISTS
When Graham returned to the library he found that the major had
tottered in, and was awaiting him with a look of intense anxiety.
"Graham, Graham!" he cried, "do you think there is any hope?"
"I do, sir. I think there is almost a certainty that your daughter will
live."
"Now God be praised! although I have little right to say it, for I've
put His name to a bad use all my life."
"I don't think any harm has been done," said Graham, smiling.
"Oh, I know, I know how wise you German students are. You can't find
God with a microscope or a telescope, and therefore there is none. But
I'm the last man to criticise. Grace has been my divinity since her
mother died; and if you can give a reasonable hope that she'll live to
close my eyes, I'll thank the God that my wife worshipped, in spite of
all your new-fangled philosophies."
"And I hope I shall never be so wanting in courtesy, to say the least,
as to show anything but respect for your convictions. You shall know
the whole truth about Grace; and I shall look to you also for aid in a
combined effort to rally and strengthen her forces of life. You know,
Major, that I have seen some service."
"Yes, yes; boy that you are, you are a hundred-fold more of a veteran
than I am. At the beginning of the war I felt very superior and
experienced. But the war that I saw was mere child's-play."
"Well, sir, the war that I've been through was child's play to me
compared with the battle begun to-night. I never feared death, except
as it might bring trouble to others, and for long years I coveted it;
but I fear the death of Grace Hilland beyond anything in this world or
any other. As her father, you now shall learn the whole truth;" and he
told his story from the evening of their first game of whist together.
"Strange, strange!" muttered the old man. "It's the story of Philip
Harkness over again. But, by the God who made me, she shall reward you
if she lives."
"No, Major St. John, no. She shall devote herself to you, and live the
life that her own feelings dictate. She understands this, and I _will_
it. I assure you that whatever else I lack it's not a will."
"You've proved that, Graham, if ever a man did. Well, well, well, your
coming has brought a strange and most welcome state of affairs. Somehow
you've given me a new lease of life and courage. Of late we've all felt
like hauling down the flag, and letting grim death do his worst. I
couldn't have survived Grace, and didn't want to. Only plucky Mrs.
Mayburn held on to your coming as a forlorn hope. You now make me feel
like nailing the flag to the staff, and opening again with every gun.
Grace is like her mother, if I do say it. Grace Brentford never lacked
for suitors, and she had the faculty of waking up _men_. Forgive an old
man's vanity. Phil Harkness was a little wild as a young fellow, but he
had grand mettle in him. He made more of a figure in the world than
I--was sent to Congress, owned a big plantation, and all that--but
sweet Grace Brentford always looked at me reproachfully when I rallied
her on the mistake she had made, and was contentment itself in my rough
soldier's quarters," and the old man took off his spectacles to wipe
his tear-dimmed eyes. "Grace is just like her. She, too, has waked up
men. Hilland was a grand fellow; and, Graham, you are a soldier every
inch of you, and that's the highest praise I can bestow. You are in
command in this battle, and God be with you. Your unbelief doesn't
affect _Him_ any more than a mole's."
Graham laughed--he could laugh in his present hopefulness--as he
replied, "I agree with you fully. If there is a personal Creator of the
universe, I certainly am a small object in it." "That's not what I've
been taught to believe either; nor is it according to my reason. An
infinite God could give as much attention to you as to the solar
system."
"From the present aspect of the world, a great deal would appear
neglected," Graham replied, with a shrug.
"Come, Colonel Graham," said the major, a little sharply, "you and I
have both heard the rank and file grumble over the tactics of their
general. It often turned out that the general knew more than the men.
But it's nice business for me to be talking religion to you or any one
else;" and the idea struck him as so comical that he laughed outright.
Mrs. Mayburn, who entered at that moment, said: "That's a welcome
sound. I can't remember, Major, when I've heard you laugh. Alford, you
are a magician. Grace is sleeping quietly."
"Little wonder! What have I had to laugh about?" said the major. "But
melancholy itself would laugh at my joke to-night. Would you believe
it, I've been talking religion to the colonel,--if I haven't!"
"I think it's time religion was talked to all of us."
"Oh, now, Mrs. Mayburn, don't you begin. You haven't any God any more
than Graham has. You have a jumble of old-fashioned theological
attributes, that are of no more practical use to you than the doctrines
of Aristotle. Please ring for Jinny, and tell her to bring us a bottle
of wine and some cake. I want to drink to Grace's health. If I could
see her smile again I'd fire a _feu de joie_ if I could find any
ordnance larger than a popgun. Don't laugh at me, friends," he added,
wiping the tears from his dim old eyes; "but the bare thought that
Grace will live to bless my last few days almost turns my head. Where
is Dr. Markham?"
"He had other patients to see, and said he would return by and by,"
Mrs. Mayburn replied.
"It's time we had a little relief," she continued, "whatever the future
may be. The slow, steady pressure of anxiety and fear was becoming
unendurable. I could scarcely have suffered more if Grace had been my
own child; and I feared for you, Alford, quite as much."
"And with good reason," he said, quietly.
She gave him a keen look, and then did as the major had requested.
"Come, friends," cried he, "let us give up this evening to hope and
cheer. Let what will come on the morrow, we'll have at least one more
gleam of wintry sunshine to-day."
Filling the glasses of all with his trembling hand, he added, when they
were alone: "Here's to my darling's health. May the good God spare her,
and spare us all, to see brighter days. Because I'm not good, is no
reason why He isn't."
"Amen!" cried the old lady, with Methodistic fervor.
"What are you saying amen to?--that I'm not good?"
"Oh, I imagine we all average about alike," was her grim reply--"the
more shame to us all!"
"Dear, conscience-stricken old aunty!" said Graham, smiling at her.
"Will nothing ever lay your theological ghosts?"
"No, Alford," she said, gravely. "Let us change the subject."
"I've told Major St. John everything from the day I first came here,"
Graham explained; "and now before we separate let it be understood that
he joins us as a powerful ally. His influence over Grace, after all, is
more potent than that of all the rest of us united. My words to-night
have acted more like a shock than anything else. I have placed before
her clearly and sharply the consequences of yielding passively, and of
drifting further toward darkness. We must possess ourselves with an
almost infinite patience and vigilance. She, after all, must bear the
brunt of this fight with death; but we must be ever on hand to give her
support, and it must be given also unobtrusively, with all the tact we
possess. We can let her see that we are more cheerful in our renewed
hope, but we must be profoundly sympathetic and considerate."
"Well, Graham, as I said before, you are captain. I learned to obey
orders long ago as well as to give them;" and the major summoned his
valet and bade them goodnight.
Graham, weary in the reaction from his intense feeling and excitement,
threw himself on the sofa, and his aunt came and sat beside him.
"Alford," she said, "what an immense change your coming has made!"
"The beginning of a change, I hope."
"It was time--it was time. A drearier household could scarcely be
imagined. Oh, how dreary life can become! Grace was dying. Every day I
expected tidings of your death. It's a miracle that you are alive after
all these bloody years. All zest in living had departed from the major.
We are all materialists, after our own fashion, wholly dependent on
earthly things, and earthly things were failing us. In losing Grace,
you and the major would have lost everything; so would I in losing you.
Alford, you have become a son to me. Would you break a mother's heart?
Can you not still promise to live and do your best?"
"Dear aunt, we shall all live and do our best."
"Is that the best you can say, Alford?"
"Aunty, there are limitations to the strength of every man. I have
reached the boundary of mine. From the time I began the struggle in the
Vermont woods, and all through my exile, I fought this passion. I
hesitated at no danger, and the wilder and more desolate the region,
the greater were its attractions to me. I sought to occupy my mind with
all that was new and strange; but such was my nature that this love
became an inseparable part of my being. I might just as well have said
I would forget my sad childhood, the studies that have interested me,
your kindness. I might as well have decreed that I should not look the
same and be the same--that all my habits of thought and traits of
character should not be my own. Imagine that a tree in your garden had
will and intelligence. Could it ignore the law of its being, all the
long years which had made it what it is, and decide to be some other
kind of tree, totally different? A man who from childhood has had many
interests, many affections, loses, no doubt, a sort of concentration
when the one supreme love of his life takes possession of him. If Grace
lives, and I can see that she has at last tranquilly and patiently
accepted her lot, you will find that I can be tranquil and patient. If
she dies, I feel that I shall break utterly. I can't look into the
abyss that her grave would open. Do not think that I would consciously
and deliberately become a vulgar suicide--I hope I long since passed
that point, and love and respect for you forbid the thought--but the
long strain that I have been under, and the dominating influence of my
life, would culminate. I should give way like a man before a cold,
deadly avalanche. I have been frank with you, for in my profound
gratitude for your love and kindness I would not have you misunderstand
me, or think for a moment that I proposed deliberately to forget you in
my own trouble. The truth is just this, aunt: I have not strength
enough to endure Grace Hilland's death. It would be such a lame,
dreary, impotent conclusion that I should sink under it, as truly as a
man who found himself in the sea weighted by a ton of lead. But don't
let us dwell on this thought. I truly believe that Grace will live, if
we give her all the aid she requires. If she honestly makes the effort
to live--as she will, I feel sure--she can scarcely help living when
the conditions of life are supplied."
"I think I understand you, Alford," said the old lady, musingly; "and
yet your attitude seems a strange one."
"It's not an unnatural one. I am what I have been growing to be all
these years. I can trace the sequence of cause and effect until this
moment."
"Well, then," said the old lady, grimly, "Grace must live, if it be in
the power of human will and effort to save her. Would that I had the
faith in God that I ought to have! But He is afar off, and He acts in
accordance with an infinite wisdom that I can't understand. The
happiness of His creatures seems a very secondary affair."
"Now, aunty, we are on ground where we differ theoretically, to say the
least; but I accord to you full right to think what you please, because
I know you will employ all the natural and rational expedients of a
skilful nurse."
"Yes, Alford; you and Grace only make me unhappy when you talk in that
way. I know you are wrong, just as certainly as the people who believed
the sun moved round the earth. The trouble is that I know it only with
the same cold mental conviction, and therefore can be of no help to
either of you. Pardon me for my bluntness: do you expect to marry
Grace, should she become strong and well?"
"No, I can scarcely say I have any such hope. It is a thought I do not
even entertain at present, nor does she. I am content to be her friend
through life, and am convinced that she could not think of marriage
again for years, if ever. That is a matter of secondary importance. All
that I ask is that she shall live."
"Well, compared with most men, a very little contents you," said his
aunt dryly. "We shall see, we shall see. But you have given me such an
incentive that, were it possible, I'd open my withered veins and give
her half of my poor blood."
"Dear aunty, how true and stanch your love is! I cannot believe it will
be disappointed."
"I must go back to my post now, nor shall I leave it very often."
"Here is Dr. Markham. He will see that you have it often enough to
maintain your own health, and I will too. I've been a soldier too long
to permit my chief of staff to be disabled. Pardon me, doctor, but it
seems to me that this is more of a case for nursing and nourishment
than for drugs."
"You are right, and yet a drug can also become a useful ally. In my
opinion, it is more a case for change than anything else. When Mrs.
Hilland is strong enough, you must take her from this atmosphere and
these associations. In a certain sense she must begin life over again,
and take root elsewhere."
"There may be truth in what you say;" and Graham was merged in deep
thought when he was left alone. The doctor, in passing out a few
moments later, assured him that all promised well.