THE LOVE THAT NEVER FAILS
Go in peace, soul beautiful and blest!
Yet high above the limits of our seeing,
And folded far within the inmost heart,
And deep below the deeps of conscious being,
Thy splendor shineth! There O God! Thou art.
When John reached London it was in the gray misty dawning. The streets
were nearly deserted, and an air of melancholy hung over the long rows
of low dwellings. At Harlow House he saw at once that every window was
shrouded, and he turned heartsick with the fear that he was too late. A
porter, whose eyes were red with weeping, admitted him, and there was an
intolerable smell of drugs, the odor of which he recollected all the
days of his future life.
"She is still alive, sir--but very ill."
John could not answer, but his look was so urgent and so miserable the
man divined the hurry of heart and spirit that he was possessed by and
without another word led him to the room where the child lay dying. The
struggle was nearly over and John was spared the awful hours of slow
strangulation which had already done their work. She was not insensible.
She held tight the hand of her mother, kneeling by her side, and gazed
at John with eyes wearing a new, deep look as if a veil had been rent
and she with open face saw things sweet and wonderful. Her pale, mute
mouth smiled faintly and she tried to stretch out her arms to him. There
she lay, a smitten child, fallen after a bewildering struggle with a
merciless foe. John with a breaking heart lifted her in his arms and
carried her gently to-and-fro. The change and motion relieved her a
little and what words of comfort and love he said in that last communion
only God knows. But though he held her close in his strong arms, she
found a way to pass from him to God. Quivering all over like a wounded
bird, she gave John her last smile, and was not, for God took her. The
bud had opened to set free the rose--the breathing miracle into silence
passed. Weeping passionately, his tears washed her face. He was in an
agony of piteous feeling in which there was quite unconsciously a strain
of resentment.
"She is gone!" he cried, and the two physicians present bowed their
heads. Then Jane rose and took the body from the distracted father's
arms. She was white and worn out with suffering and watching, but she
would allow no one to make the child's last toilet but herself. For this
ceremony she needed no lace or satin, no gilt or mock jewelry. She
washed the little form free of all earth's stain, combed loose the
bright brown hair, matted with the sweat of suffering, and dressed her
for the last--the last time, in one of the pretty white linen nightgowns
she had made for her darling but a few weeks previously.
Oh, who dare inquire what passed in Jane's soul during that hour? The
God who wrote the child's name in His book before she was born, He only
knew. Of all that suffered in Martha's loss, Jane suffered incredibly
more than any other. She fell prostrate on the floor at the feet of the
Merciful Father when this duty was done--prostrate and speechless.
Prayer was beyond her power. She was dumb. God had done it and she
deserved it. She heard nothing John said to her. All that long, long day
she sat by her dead child, until in the darkening twilight some men came
into the room on tiptoe. They had a small white coffin in their care,
and placed it on a table near the bed. Then Jane stood up and if an
unhappy soul had risen from the grave, it could not have shocked them
more. She stood erect and looked at them. Her tall form, in its crushed
white gown, her deathly white face, her black eyes gleaming with the
lurid light of despair, her pale quivering lips, her air of hopeless
grief, shocked even these men, used to the daily sight of real or
pretended mourners. With a motion of her hand she prevented them coming
closer to the dead child, and then by an imperative utterance of the
word, "_Go_," sent them from the room. With her own hand she laid
Martha in her last bed and disposed its one garment about the rigid
little limbs. She neither spoke nor wept for Ah! in her sad soul she
knew that never day or night or man or God could bring her child back to
her. And she remembered that once she had said in an evil moment that
this dear, dead child was "one too many." Would God ever forgive her?
By a late train that night they left for Hatton Hall, reaching the
village about the time for the mill to open. No bell summoned its hands
to cheerful work. They were standing at various points, and when the
small white coffin went up the hill, they silently followed, softly
singing. At the great gates the weeping grandmother received them.
For one day the living and the dead dwelt together in hushed and
sorrowful mourning, nor did a word of comfort come to any soul. The
weight of that grief which hung like lead upon the rooms, the stairs,
the galleries where her step had lately been so light, was also on every
heart; and although we ought to be diviner for our dead, the strength of
this condition was not as yet realized. John had shut himself in his
room, and the grandmother went about her household duties silently
weeping and trying to put down the angry thoughts which would arise
whenever she remembered how stubbornly her daughter-in-law had refused
to leave Martha with her, and make her trip to London alone. She knew
it was "well with the child," but Oh the bitter strength of regrets
that strain and sicken,
Yearning for love that the veil of Death endears.
Jane sat silent, tearless, almost motionless beside her dead daughter.
Now and then John came and tried to comfort the wretched woman, but in
her deepest grief, there was a tender motherly strain which he had not
thought of and knew not how to answer. "Her little feet! Her little
feet, John! I never let them wander alone or stray even in Hatton
streets without a helper and guide. O John, what hand will lead them
upward and back to God? Those little feet!"
"Her angel would be with her and she would know the way through the
constellations. Together they would pass swift as thought from earth to
heaven. Martha loved God. They who love God will find their way back to
Him, dear Jane."
The next day there was no factory bell. Nearly the whole village was
massed in Hatton churchyard, and towards sunset the crowd made a little
lane for the small white coffin to the open grave waiting for it. None
of the women of the family were present. They had made their parting in
the familiar room that seemed, even at that distracting hour, full of
Martha's dear presence. But Jane, sitting afterwards at its open window,
heard the soft singing of those who went to the grave mouth with the
child, and when a little later John and Harry returned together, she
knew that _all had been_.
She did not go to meet them, but John came to her. "Let me help you,
dear one," he said tenderly. "One is here who will give you comfort."
"None can comfort me. Who is here?"
"The new curate. He said words at the graveside I shall never forget. He
filled them with such glory that I could not help taking comfort."
"O John, what did he say?"
"After the service was over, and the people dispersing, he stood talking
to Harry and myself, and then he walked up the hill with us. I asked him
for your sake."
"I will come down in half an hour, John."
"Then I will come and help you."
And in half an hour this craver after some hope and comfort went down,
and then John renewed the conversation which was on the apparent cruelty
of children being born to live a short time and then leave Earth by the
inscrutable gate of Death.
"It seems to be so needless, so useless," said Jane.
"Not so," the curate answered. "Let me repeat two verses of an ancient
Syrian hymn, written A.D. 90, and you will learn what the earliest
Fathers of the Church thought of the death of little children.
"The Just One saw that iniquity increased on earth,
And that sin had dominion over all men,
And He sent His Messengers, and removed
A multitude of fair little ones,
And called them to the pavilion of happiness.
"Like lilies taken from the wilderness,
Children are planted in Paradise;
And like pearls in diadems,
Children are inserted in the Kingdom;
And without ceasing, shall hymn forth his praise."
"Will you give me a copy of those verses?" asked Jane with great
emotion.
"I will. You see a little clearer now?"
"Yes."
"And the glory and the safety for the child? Do you understand?"
"I think I do."
"Then give thanks and not tears because the King desired your child, for
this message came forth from Him in whom we live and move and have our
being: 'Come up hither, and dwell in the House of the Lord forever. The
days of thy life have been sufficient. The bands of suffering are
loosed. Thy Redeemer hath brought thee a release.' So she went forth
unto her Maker. She attained unto the beginning of Peace. She departed
to the habitations of just men made perfect, to the communion of saints,
to the life everlasting."
In such conversation the evening passed and all present were somewhat
comforted, yet it was only alleviation; for comfort to be lasting, must
be in a great measure self-evolved, must spring from our own
convictions, our own assurance and sense of absolute love and justice.
However, every sorrow has its horizon and none are illimitable. The
factory bell rang clearly the next morning, and the powerful call of
duty made John answer it. God had given, and God had taken his only
child, but the children of hundreds of families looked to the factory
for their daily bread. Yea, and he did not forget the contract with God
and his father which bound him to the poor and needy and which any
neglect of business might imperil. He lifted his work willingly and
cheerfully, for work is the oldest gospel God gave to man. It is good
tidings that never fail. It is the surest earthly balm for every grief
and whatever John Hatton was in his home life and in his secret hours,
he was diligent in business, serving God with a fervent, cheerful
spirit. In the mill he never named his loss but once, and that was on
the morning of his return to business. Greenwood then made some remark
about the dead child, and John answered,
"I am very lonely, Greenwood. This world seems empty without her. Why
was she taken away from it?"
"Perhaps she was wanted in some other world, sir."
John lifted a startled face to the speaker, and the man added with an
air of happy triumph, as he walked away,
"A far better world, sir."
For a moment John rested his head on his hand, then he lifted his face
and with level brows fronted the grief he must learn to bear.
Jane's sorrow was a far more severe and constant one. Martha had been
part of all her employments. She could do nothing and go nowhere, but
the act and the place were steeped in memories of the child. All her
work, all her way, all her thoughts, began and ended with Martha. She
fell into a dangerous condition of self-immolation. She complained that
no one cared for her, that her suffering was uniquely great, and that
she alone was the only soul who remembered the dead and loved them.
Mrs. Stephen came from her retreat in Hatton Hall one day in order to
combat this illusion.
"Three mothers living in Hatton village hev buried children this week,
Jane," she said. "Two of them went back to the mill this morning."
"I think it was very wicked of them."
"They _hed_ to go back. They had living children to work for. When the
living cling to you, then you must put the dead aside for the living.
God cares for the dead and they hev all they want in His care. If you
feel that you must fret youself useless to either living or dead, try
the living. They'll mostly give you every reason for fretting."
"John has quite forgotten poor little Martha."
"He's done nothing of that sort, but I think thou hes forgotten John,
poor fellow! I'm sorry for John, I am that!"
"You have no cause to say such things, mother, and I will not listen to
them. John has become wrapped up in that dreadful mill, and when he
comes home at night, he will not talk of Martha."
"I am glad he won't and thou ought to be glad too. How can any man work
his brains all day in noise and worry and confusion and then come home
and fret his heart out all night about a child that is in Heavenly
keeping and a wife that doesn't know what is good either for herself or
anybody else. Listen to me! I am going to give thee a grain of solid
truthful sense. The best man in the world will cease giving sympathy
when he sees that it does no good and that he must give it over and over
every day. I wonder John gave it as long as he did! I do that. If I was
thee, I would try to forget myself a bit. I would let the sunshine into
these beautiful rooms. If thou doesn't, the moths will eat up thy fine
carpets and cushions, and thou will become one of those chronic,
disagreeable invalids that nobody on earth--and I wouldn't wonder if
nobody in heaven either--cares a button for."
Jane defended herself with an equal sincerity, and a good many truths
were made clear to her that had only hitherto been like a restless
movement of her consciousness. In fact the Lady of Hatton Hall left her
daughter-in-law penetrated with a new sense of her position. Nor was
this sense at all lightened or brightened by her parting remarks.
"I am thy true friend, Jane, that is something better than thy
mother-in-law. I want to see thee and John happy, and I assure thee it
will be easy now to take one step thou must never take if thou wants
another happy hour. John is Yorkshire, flesh and bone, heart and soul,
and thou ought to know that Yorkshiremen take no back steps. If John's
love wanes, though it be ever so little, it has waned for thee to the
end of thy life. Thou can never win it back. _Never!_ So, I advise thee
to mind thy ways, and thy words."
"Thank you, mother. I know you speak to me out of a sincere heart."
"To be sure I do. And out of a kind heart also. _Why-a!_ When John said
to me, 'Mother, I love Jane Harlow,' I answered, 'Thou art right to love
her. She is a fit and proper wife for thee,' and I made up my mind to
love thee, too--faults included."
"Then love me now, mother. John minds your lightest word. Tell him to be
patient with me."
"I will--but thou must do thy best to even things. Thou must be more
interested in John. Martha is with God. If she hed lived, thou would
varry soon be sending her off to some unlovelike, polite
boarding-school, and a few years later thou would make a grand feast,
and deck her in satin and lace and jewels and give her as a sacrifice to
some man thou knew little about--just as the old pagans used to dress
up the young heifers with flowers and ribbons before they offered them
in blood and flame to Jupiter or the like of him. Martha was God's child
and He took her, and I must say, thou gave her up to Him in a varry
grudging way."
"Mother, I am going to do better. Forgive me."
"Nay, my dear lass, seek thou God's forgiveness and all the rest will
come easy. It is against Him, and Him only, thou hast sinned; but He is
long-suffering, plenteous in mercy, and ready to forgive." And then
these two women, who had scarcely spoken for years, kissed each other
and were true friends ever after. So good are the faithful words of
those who dare to speak the truth in love and wisdom.
As it generally happens, however, things were all unfavorable to Jane's
resolve. John had been impeded all day by inefficient or careless
services; even Greenwood had misunderstood an order and made an
impossible appointment which had only been canceled with offense and
inconvenience. The whole day indeed had worked itself away to cross
purpose, and John came home weary with the aching brows that annoyance
and worry touch with a peculiar depressing neuralgia. It need not be
described; there are very few who are not familiar with its exhausting,
melancholy dejection.
John did his best to meet his wife's more cheerful mood, but the
strongest men are often very poor bearers of physical pain. Jane would
have suffered--and did often suffer--the same distress with far less
complaint. Women, too, soon learn to alleviate such a cruel sensation,
but John had a strong natural repugnance for drugs and liniments, and it
was only when he was weary of Jane's entreaties that he submitted to a
merciful medication which ended in a restorative sleep.
This incident did not discourage Jane in her new resolve. She told
herself at once that the first steps on a good or wise road were sure to
be both difficult and painful; and in the morning John's cheerful,
grateful words and his brave sunny face repaid her fully for the
oblivion to which she had consigned her own trials and the subjection
she had enforced upon her own personality.
This was the new battle-ground on which she now stood, and at first John
hardly comprehended the hard, self-denying conflict she was waging. One
day he was peculiarly struck with an act of self-denial which also
involved for Jane a slight humiliation, that he could not but wonder at
her submission. He looked at her in astonishment and he did not know
whether he admired her self-control and generosity or not. The
circumstance puzzled and troubled him. That afternoon he had to go to
Yoden to see his brother, and he came home by way of Hatton Hall.
As he anticipated, he found his mother pleasantly enjoying her cup of
afternoon tea, and she rose with a cry of love to welcome him.
"I was thinking of thee, John, and then I heard thy footsteps. I hev
the best pot of tea in Yorkshire at my right hand; I'm sure thou wilt
hev a cup."
"To be sure I will. It is one of the things I came for, and I want to
talk to you half an hour."
"Say all that is in thy heart, and there's nothing helps talk, like a
cup of good tea. Whatever does thou want to talk to me about?"
"I want to talk to you about Jane."
"Well then, be careful what thou says. No man's mother is a fair
counselor about his wife. They will both say more than they ought to
say, especially if she isn't present to explain; and when they don't
fully understand, how can they advise?"
"You could not be unjust to anyone, mother?"
"Well, then?"
"She is so much better than she has ever been since the child went
away."
"She is doing her best. Thou must help her with all thy heart and soul."
"All her love for me seems to have come back."
"It never left thee for a moment."
"But for weeks and months she has not seemed to care for anything but
her memory of Martha."
"That is the way men's big unsuspecting feet go blundering and crushing
through a woman's heart. In the first place, she was overwhelmed with
grief at Martha's sudden death and at her own apparent instrumentality
in it."
"I loved Martha as well, perhaps better, than Jane."
"Not thou! Thou never felt one thrill of a mother's love. Jane would
have died twice over to save her child. Thou said with all the
bitterness of death in thy soul, 'God's will be done.'"
"We will let that pass. Why has her grief been so long-continued?"
"Thou _hed_ to put thine aside. A thousand voices called on thee for
daily bread. Thou did not dare to indulge thy private sorrow at the risk
of neglecting the work God had given thee to do. Jane had nothing to
interest her. Her house was so well arranged it hardly needed oversight.
The charities that had occupied her heart and her hands were ended and
closed. In every room in your house, in every avenue of your garden and
park Martha had left her image. Many hours every day you were in a total
change of scene and saw a constant variety of men and women. Jane told
me that she saw Martha in every room. She saw and heard her running up
and down stairs. She saw her at her side, she saw her sleeping and
dreaming. Poor mother! Poor sorrowful Jane! It would be hard to be kind
enough and patient enough with her."
"Do you think she will always be in this sad condition?"
"Whatever can thou mean? God has appointed Time to console all loss and
all grief. Martha will go further and further away as the days wear on
and Jane will forget--we all do--we all _hev_ to forget."
"Some die of grief."
"Not they. They may induce some disease, to which they are disposed by
inordinate and sinful sorrow--and die of that--no one dies of grief, or
grief would be our most common cause of death. I think Jane will come
out of the Valley of the Shadow a finer and better woman--she was always
of a very superior kind."
"Mother, you allude to something that troubles me. I have seen Jane bear
and do things lately that a year ago she would have indignantly refused
to tolerate. Is not this a decadence in her superior nature?"
"Thou art speaking too fine for my understanding. If thou means by
'decadence' that Jane is growing worse instead of better, then thou art
far wrong--and if it were that way, I would not wonder if some of the
blame--maybe the main part of it--isn't thy fault. Men don't understand
women. How can they?"
"Why not?"
"Well, if the Bible is correct, women were made after men. They were the
Almighty's improvement on his first effort. There's very few men that I
know--or have ever known--that have yet learned to model themselves
after the improvement. It's easier for them to manifest the old Adam,
and so they go on living and dying and living and dying and remain only
men and never learn to understand a woman."
John laughed and asked, "Have you ever known an improved man, mother?"
"Now and then, John, I have come across one. There was your father, for
instance, he knew a woman's heart as well as he knew a loom or a sample
of cotton, and there's your brother Harry who is just as willing and
helpful as his wife Lucy, and I shall not be far wrong, if I say the
best improvement I have seen on the original Adam is a man called John
Hatton. He is nearly good enough for any woman."
Again John laughed as he answered, "Well, dear mother, this is as far as
we need to go. Tell me in plain Yorkshire what you mean by it."
"I mean, John, that in your heart you are hardly judging Jane fairly. I
notice in you, as well as in the general run of husbands, that if they
hev to suffer at all, they tell themselves that it is their wife's
fault, and they manage to believe it. It's queer but then it's a man's
way."
"You think I should be kinder to Jane?"
"Thou art kind enough in a way. A mother might nurse her baby as often
as it needed nursing, but if she never petted it and kissed it, never
gave it smiles and little hugs and simple foolish baby talk, it would be
a badly nursed and a very much robbed child. Do you understand?"
"You think I ought to give Jane more petting?"
Mrs. Hatton smiled and nodded. "She calls it _sympathy_, John, but that
is what she means. Hev a little patience, my dear lad. Listen! There is
a grand wife and a grand mother in Jane Hatton. If you do not develop
them, I, your mother, will say, 'somehow it is John's fault.'"
Now life will always be to a large extent what we make it. Jane was
trying with all her power to make her life lovable and fair, and the
beginning of all good is action, for in this warfare they who would win
must struggle. Hitherto, since Martha's death, she had found in nascent,
indolent self-pity the choicest of luxuries. Now she had abandoned this
position and with courage and resolve was devoting herself to her
husband and her house. Unfortunately, there were circumstances in John's
special business cares that gave an appearance of Duncan Grey's wooing
to all her efforts--when the lassie grew kind, Duncan grew cool. It was
truly only an appearance, but Jane was not familiar with changes in
Love's atmosphere. John's steadfast character had given her always fair
weather.
In reality the long strain of business cares and domestic sorrow had
begun to tell even upon John's perfect health and nervous system. Facing
absolute ruin in the war years and surrounded by pitiable famine and
death, he had kept his cheerful temper, his smiling face, his resolute,
confident spirit. Now, he was singularly prosperous. The mill was busy
nearly night and day, all his plans and hopes had been perfected; yet
he was often either silent or irritable. Jane seldom saw him smile and
never heard him sing and she feared that he often shirked her company.
One hot morning at the end of August she had a shock. He had taken his
breakfast before she came down and he had left her no note of greeting
or explanation. She ran to a window that overlooked the main avenue and
she could see him walking slowly towards the principal entrance. Her
first instinct was to follow him--to send the house man to delay him--to
bring him back by some or any means. Once she could and would have done
so, but she did not feel it wise or possible then. What had happened?
She went slowly back to her breakfast, but there was a little ball in
her throat--she could not swallow--the grief and fear in her heart was
surging upward and choking her.
All that her mother-in-law had said came back to her memory. Had John
taken that one step away? Would he never take it back to her? She was
overwhelmed with a climbing sorrow that would not down. Yet she asked
with assumed indifference,
"Was the Master well this morning?"
"It's likely, ma'am. He wasn't complaining. That isn't Master's way."
Then she thought of her own complaining, and was silent.
After breakfast she went through the house and found every room
impossible. She flooded them with fresh air and sunshine, but she could
not empty them of phantoms and memories and with a little half-uttered
cry she put on her hat and went out. Surely in the oak wood she would
find the complete solitude she must have. She passed rapidly through the
band of ash-trees that shielded the house on the north and was directly
in the soft, deep shadow of umbrageous oaks a century old. They
whispered among themselves at her coming, they fanned her with a little
cool wind from the encircling mountains, and she threw herself
gratefully down upon the soft, warm turf at their feet.
Then all the sorrow of the past months overwhelmed her. She wept as if
her heart would break and there was a great silence all around which the
tinkle of a little brook over its pebbly bed only seemed to intensify.
Presently she had no more tears left and she dried her eyes and sat
upright and was suddenly aware of a great interior light, pitiless and
clear beyond all dayshine. And in it she saw herself with a vision more
than mortal. It was an intolerable vision, but during it there was
formed in her soul the faculty of prayer.
Out of the depths of her shame and sorrow she called upon God and He
heard her. She told Him all her selfishness and sin and urged by some
strong spiritual necessity, begged God's forgiveness and help with the
conquering prayers that He himself gave her. "Cast me not from Thy
Presence," she cried. "Take not Thy holy spirit from me," and then
there flashed across her trembling soul the horror and blackness of
darkness in which souls "cast from God's presence" must dwell forever.
Prostrate in utter helplessness, she cast herself upon the Eternal
Father's mercy. If He would forgive her selfish rebellion against the
removal of Martha, if He would give her back the joy of the first years
of her espousal to her husband, if He would only forgive her, she could
do without all the rest--and then in a moment, in the twinkling of an
eye, she knew she was forgiven. An inexpressible glory filled her soul,
washed clean of sin. Love beyond words, peace and joy beyond expression,
surrounded her. She stood up and lifted her face and hands to heaven and
cried out like one in a swoon of triumph,
"Thou hast called me by my name! I am Thine!"
All doubt, all fear, all sorrow, all pain was gone. She knew as by
flashlight, her whole duty to her husband and her relatives and friends.
She was willing with all her heart to perform it. She went to the little
stream and bathed her face and she thought it said as it ran onward,
_"Happy woman! Happy woman!"_ The trees looked larger and greener, and
seemed to stand in a golden glow. The shepherd's rose and the stately
foxgloves were more full of color and scent. She heard the fine inner
tones of the birds' songs that Heaven only hears; and all nature was
glorified and rejoiced with her. She had a new heart and the old cares
and sorrows had gone away forever.
Such conversions are among the deepest, real facts in the history of the
soul of man. They have occurred in all ages, in all countries, and in
all conditions of life, for we know that they are the very truth, as we
have seen them translated into action. There is no use attempting to
explain by any human reason facts of such majesty and mystery, for how
can natural reason explain what is supernatural?
In a rapture of joy Jane walked swiftly home. She was not conscious of
her movements, the solid earth might have been a road of some buoyant
atmosphere. All the world looked grandly different, and she herself was
as one born again. Her servants looked at her in amazement and talked
about "the change in Missis," while the work of the household dropped
from their hands until old Adam Boothby, the gardener, came in for his
dinner.
"She passed me," he said, "as I was gathering berries. She came from the
oak wood, and O blind women that you be, couldn't you see she hed been
with God? The clear shining of His face was over her. She's in a new
world this afternoon, and the angels in heaven are rejoicing over her,
and I'm sure every man in Hatton will rejoice with her husband; he's hed
a middling bad time with her lately or I'm varry much mistaken."
Then these men and women, who had been privately unstinting in their
blame of Missis and her selfish way, held their peace. She had been with
God. About that communion they did not dare to comment.
As it neared five o'clock, Jane's maid came into the kitchen with
another note of surprise. "Missis hes dressed hersen in white from head
to foot," she cried. "She told me to put away her black things out of
sight. I doan't know what to think of such ways. It isn't half a year
yet since the child died."
"I'd think no wrong if I was thee, Lydia Swale. Thou hesn't any warrant
for thinking wrong but what thou gives thysen, and thou be neither judge
nor jury," said an old woman, making Devonshire cream.
"In white from top to toe," Lydia continued, "even her belt was of white
satin ribbon, and she put a white rose in her hair, too. It caps me.
It's a queer dooment."
"Brush the black frocks over thy arm and then go and smarten thysen up a
bit. It will be dinner-time before thou hes thy work done."
"Happen it may. I'm not caring and Missis isn't caring, either. She'll
never wear these frocks again--she might as well give them to me."
In the meantime Jane was looking at herself in the long cheval mirror.
The rapture in her heart was still reflected on her face, and the white
clothing transfigured her. "John must see that the great miracle of
life has happened to me, that I have really been born again. Oh, how
happy he will be!"
With this radiant thought she stepped lightly down to the long avenue by
which John always came home. About midway, there was a seat under a
large oak-tree and she saw John sitting on it. He was reading a letter
when Jane appeared, but when he understood that it really was Jane, he
was lost in amazement and the letter fell to the ground.
"John! John!" she cried in a soft, triumphant voice. "O John, do you
know what has happened to me?"
"A miracle, my darling! But how?" And he drew her to his side and kissed
her. "You are like yourself--you are as lovely as you were in the hour I
first saw you."
"John, I went to the oak-wood early this morning. I carried with me all
my sins and troubles, and as I thought of them my heart was nearly
broken and I wept till I could weep no longer. Then a passionate longing
to pray urged me to tell God everything, and He heard me and pitied and
forgave me. He called me by name and comforted me, and I was so happy! I
knew not whether I was in this world or in Paradise; every green thing
was lovelier, every blue thing was bluer, there was a golden glory in my
heart and over all the earth, and I knew not that I had walked home till
I was there. John, dear John! You understand?"
"My darling! You make me as happy as yourself."
"Happy! John, I shall always make you happy now. I shall never grieve or
sadden or disappoint you again. Never once again! O my love! O my dear
good husband! Love me as only you can love me. Forgive me, John, as God
has forgiven me! Make me happy in your love as God has made life
glorious to me with His love!"
And for some moments John could not speak. He kissed her rapturously and
drew her closer and closer to his side, and he sought her eyes with that
promise in his own which she knew instinctively would surround and
encompass and adore her with unfailing and undying affection as long as
life should last.
In a communion nigh unto heaven they spent the evening together. John
had left his letter lying on the ground where he met his white-robed
wife. He forgot it, though it was of importance, until he saw it on the
ground in the morning. He forgot everything but the miracle that had
changed all his water into wine. It seemed as if his house could not
contain the joy that had come to it. He threw off all his sadness, as he
would have cast away a garment that did not fit him, by a kind of
physical movement; and the years in which he had known disappointment
and loss of love dropped away from him. For Jane had buried in tenderest
words and hopes all the cruel words which had so bitterly wounded and
bereaved and impoverished his life. Jane had promised and God was her
surety. He had put into her memory a wondrous secret word. She had heard
His voice, and it could never again leave her heart;
And who could murmur or misdoubt,
When God's great sunshine finds them out?
* * * * *
SEQUENCES
There are few episodes in life which break off finally. Life is now so
variable, travel so easy, there are no continuing cities and no lasting
interests, and we ask ourselves involuntarily, "What will the sequence
be?" When I left Yorkshire, I was too young and too ignorant of the
ever-changing film of daily existence to think or to care much about
sequences; and the Hattons were a family of the soil; they appeared to
be as much a part of it as the mountains and elms, the blue bells and
the heather. I never expected to see them again and the absence of this
expectation made me neither sorry nor glad.
One day, however, a quarter of a century after the apparent close of my
story, I was in St. Andrews, the sacred, solemn-looking old city that is
the essence of all the antiquity of Scotland. But it was neither its
academic air nor its ecclesiastical forlornness, its famous links nor
venerable ruins of cloister and cathedral that attracted me at that
time. It was the promise of a sermon by Dean Stanley which detained me
on my southward journey. I had heard Dean Stanley once, and naturally I
could not but wish to hear him again.
He was to preach in the beautiful little chapel of St. Salvator's
College and I went with the crowd that followed the University faculty
there. One of the incidents of this walk was seeing an old woman in a
large white-linen cap, carrying an umbrella, innocently join the gowned
and hooded procession of the University faculty. I was told afterwards
that Stanley was greatly delighted at her intrusion. He wore a black
silk gown and bands, the Oxford D.D. hood, a broad scarf of what looked
like crêpe, and the order of the Bath, and his text was, "Ye have need
of patience." The singing was extraordinarily beautiful, beginning with
that grand canticle, "Lord of All Power and Might," as he entered the
pulpit. His beautiful beaming face and the singular way in which he
looked up with closed eyes was very attractive and must be well
remembered. But I did not notice it with the interest I might have done,
if other faces had not awakened in my memory a still keener interest.
For in a pew among those reserved for the professors and officials of
the city, I saw one in which there was certainly seated John Hatton and
his wife. There were some young men with them, who had a remarkable
resemblance to the couple, and I immediately began to speculate on the
probabilities which could have brought a Yorkshire spinner to the
ecclesiastical capital of Scotland.
After the service was over I found them at the Royal Hotel. Then I began
to learn the sequence. The landlord of the Royal introduced it by
informing me that Mr. and Mrs. John Hatton were _not_ there, but that
Sir John Hatton and Lady Hatton _were_ staying at the Royal. They were
delighted to see me again and for three days I was almost constantly in
Lady Hatton's company. During these days I learned in an easy
conversational way all that had followed "the peace that God made." No
trouble was in its sequence--only that blessing which maketh rich and
addeth no sorrow therewith.
"Yes," Lady Hatton answered to my question concerning the youths I had
seen in the church with them, "they were my boys. I have four sons. The
eldest, called John, is attending to his father's business while my
husband takes a little holiday. Stephen is studying law, and George is
preparing for the Navy; my youngest boy, Elbert, is still at Rugby."
"And your daughters?" I asked.
She smiled divinely. "Oh!" she replied. "They are such darlings! Alice
is married and Jane is married and Clara is staying with her
grandmother. She is only sixteen. She is very beautiful and Mrs. Hatton
will hardly let her leave the Hall."
"Then Mrs. Hatton is still alive?" I said.
"Yes, indeed, very much so. She will _live_ to her last moment, and
likely 'pass out of it,' as our people say, busy with heart and head and
hands."
"And what of Mrs. Harry?" I asked.
"Ah, she left us some years ago! Just faded away. For nearly two years
she knew she was dying, and was preparing her household for her loss,
yet joining as best she could in all the careless mirth of her children.
But she talked to me of what was approaching and said she often
whispered to herself, 'Another hour gone.' Dear Lucy, we all loved her.
Her children are doing well, the boys are all in Sir John's employ."
"And Mr. Harry? Does he still sing?"
"Not much since Lucy's death. But he looks after the land, and paints
and reads a great deal, and we are all very fond of Harry. His mother
must see him every day, and Sir John is nearly as foolish. Harry was
born to be loved and everyone loves him. He has gone lately to the
Church of England, but Sir John, though a member of Parliament, stands
loyally by the Methodist church."
"And you?"
"I go with Sir John in everything. I try to walk in his steps, and so
keep middling straight. Sir John lives four square, careless of outward
shows. It is years and years since I followed my own way. Sir John's
ways are wiser and better. He is always ready for the duty of the hour
and never restless as to what will come after it. Is not that a good
rule?"
"Are you on your way home now?" I asked.
"Oh, no! We are going as far as the Shetlands. John had a happy holiday
there before we were married. He is taking Stephen and George to see the
lonely isles."
"You have had a very happy life, Lady Hatton?"
"Yes," she answered. "The lines have fallen to me in pleasant places."
"And you have beautiful children."
"Thank God! His blessing and peace came to me from the cradle. One day I
found my Bible open at II Esdras, second chapter, and my eyes fell on
the fifteenth verse: 'Mother, embrace thy children and bring them up
with gladness.' I knew a poor woman who had ten children, and instead of
complaining, she was proud and happy because she said God must have
thought her a rare good mother to trust her with ten of His sons and
daughters."
"I have not seen much of Sir John."
"He is on the yacht with the boys most of the time. They are visiting
every day some one or other of the little storied towns of Fife.
Sometimes it is black night when they get back to St. Andrews. But they
have always had a good time even if it turned stormy. John finds, or
makes, good come from every event. Greenwood--you remember Greenwood?"
"Oh, yes!"
"He used to say Sir John Hatton is the full measure of a man. He was
very proud of Sir John's title, and never omitted, if it was possible to
get it in, the M.P. after it. Greenwood died a year ago as he was
sitting in his chair and picking out the hymns to be sung at his
funeral. They were all of a joyful character."
So we talked, and of course only the best in everyone came up for
discussion, but then in fine healthy natures the best _does_ generally
come to the top--and this was undoubtedly one reason that conversation
on any subject always drifted in some way or other to John Hatton. His
faith in God, his love for his fellowmen, his noble charity, his
inflexible justice, his domestic virtues, his confidence in himself, and
his ready-handed use of all the means at his command--yea, even his
beautiful manliness, what were they but the outcome of one thousand
years of Christian faith transmitted through a royally religious
ancestry?
When a good man is prosperous in all his ways they say in the North "God
smiled on him before he was born," and John Hatton gave to this blessing
a date beyond limitation, for a little illuminated roll hanging above
the desk in his private room bore the following golden-lettered
inscription:
...God smiled as He has always smiled,
Ere suns and moons could wax and wane,
God thought on me His child.
THE END