The next morning found Mrs. Travilla calm and peaceful, even cheerful,
ready for either life or death. She was up at her usual early hour, and
Rosie and Walter, coming in for their accustomed half hour of Bible
reading with mamma, found her at her writing-desk just finishing a note
to Violet.
"Dear mamma," exclaimed Walter, in a tone of delight, "you are looking
so much better and brighter this morning. I was really troubled about
you last night lest you were going to be ill; you were so pale, and
grandpa looked so worried."
"Grandpa is always easily frightened about mamma if she shows the
slightest indication of illness," said Rosie; "as indeed we all are,
because she is so dear and precious; our very greatest earthly treasure.
"Mamma dearest, I am so rejoiced that you are not really sick!" she
added, dropping on her knees beside her mother's chair, clasping her
arms about her, and kissing her again and again with ardent affection.
"I, too," Walter said, taking his station on her other side, putting an
arm round her neck, and pressing his lips to her cheek.
She returned their caresses with words of mother love, tears shining in
her eyes at the thought that this might prove almost her last
opportunity.
"What do you think, Rosie?" laughed Walter. "Mamma called me her baby
boy last night; me--a great fellow of eleven. I think you must be her
baby girl."
But Rosie made no reply. She was gazing earnestly into her mother's
face. "Mamma dear," she said anxiously, "you are not well! you are
suffering! Oh, what is it ails you?"
"I am in some pain, daughter," Elsie answered, in a cheerful tone; "but
Cousin Arthur hopes to be able to relieve it in a day or two."
"Oh, I am glad to hear that!" Rosie exclaimed, with a sigh of relief.
"Dearest mamma, I do not know how I could ever bear to have you very
ill."
"Should that trial ever come to you, daughter dear, look to God for
strength to endure it," her mother said in sweetly solemn accents, as
she gently smoothed Rosie's hair with her soft white hand and gazed
lovingly into her eyes. "Do not be troubled about the future, but trust
his gracious promise: 'As thy days, so shall thy strength be!' Many and
many a time has it been fulfilled to me and to all who have put their
trust in him?"
"Yes, mamma, I know you have had some hard trials, and yet you always
seem so happy."
"You look happy now, mamma; are you?" asked Walter, a little anxiously.
"Yes, my son, I am," she said, smiling affectionately upon him. "Now let
us have our reading," turning over the leaves of her Bible as she spoke.
"We will take the twenty-third psalm. It is short, and so very sweet and
comforting."
They did so, Elsie making a few brief remarks, especially on the fourth
verse, which neither Rosie nor Walter ever forgot.
She followed them with a short prayer, and just at its close her father
came in, and, sending the children away, spent alone with his daughter
the few minutes that remained before the ringing of the breakfast bell.
He obeyed the summons, but she remained in her own apartments, a servant
carrying her meal to her.
It was something very unusual for her, and, joined to an unusual silence
on the part of their grandfather, accompanied by a sad countenance and
occasional heavy sigh, and similar symptoms shown by both Grandma Rose
and Edward, excited surprise and apprehension on the part of the younger
members of the household.
Family worship, as was the rule followed immediately upon the conclusion
of the meal, and Mr. Dinsmore's feeling petition on behalf of the sick
one increased the alarm of Rosie and Zoe.
Both followed Edward out upon the veranda, asking anxiously what ailed
mamma.
At first he tried to parry their questions, but his own ill-concealed
distress only increased their alarm and rendered them the more
persistent.
"There is something serious ailing mamma," he said at length, "but
Cousin Arthur hopes soon to be able to relieve her. The cure is somewhat
doubtful, however, and that is what so distresses grandpa, grandma, and
me. Oh, let us all pray for her, pleading the Master's precious promise,
'If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall
ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.'
"Mamma has sent for my sisters Elsie and Violet. She wants as many of
her children and grandchildren near her as possible; but Harold and
Herbert have to be left out because, being so far away, there is not
time to summon them."
"O Ned," cried Rosie, in an agony of terror, "is--is mamma in immediate
danger? What--what is it Cousin Arthur is going to do?"
"A--surgical operation is, he says, the only--only thing that can
possibly save her life, and--he hopes it will."
"But he isn't certain? O mamma, mamma!" cried Rosie, bursting into an
uncontrollable fit of weeping.
Zoe was sobbing too, Edward holding her in his arms and scarce able to
refrain from joining with her, and at that moment the Fairview carriage
drove up, and Elsie Leland, alighting therefrom, quickly came in among
them, asking in alarm, as she saw their tear-stained, agitated faces,
"What is the matter? Oh, is mamma ill?"
Then Edward's story had to be repeated to her, and shortly after to
Violet, who, with her children, arrived a little later.
They too seemed almost overwhelmed with distress.
"Can we go to her?" Violet asked, and Mrs. Dinsmore, who had just joined
them, replied, "Not yet; your grandpa is with her, and wishes to have
her to himself for a while."
"Ob, I hope he will not keep us long away from her; our own, own dear
mother!" exclaimed Rosie, with a fresh burst of tears and sobs.
"I think not long, Rosie, dear," Mrs. Dinsmore replied soothingly,
putting an arm round the weeping girl as she spoke, and smoothing her
hair with gently caressing hand. "Your mamma will be asking for you all
presently. She has said that until the danger is past, she wants you all
near enough to be summoned to her side in a moment."
"And I--we all--know she is ready for any event," Elsie Leland said, in
trembling, tearful tones.
"Yes; and I believe God will spare her to us for years to come, in
answer to our prayers," remarked Mrs. Dinsmore in cheerful, hopeful
accents.
Walter had gone out into the grounds at the time the older ones repaired
to the veranda, and Grace, with Violet's little ones, had joined him
there on alighting from the carriage which had brought them from
Woodburn.
The four now came running in and Walter, noticing the looks of grief and
anxiety on the faces of the older people asked anxiously, "What's the
matter, folks?" then added quickly. "Oh, I hope mamma is not worse! Is
that it, grandma?" His query was not answered, for at that moment Dr.
Conly's carriage came driving up the avenue. All crowded about him as he
alighted and came up the steps into the veranda. That, however, was
nothing new for he was a great favorite, being not only their relative,
but their trusted and valued physician.
"You have come to see mamma?" Mrs. Leland said, half inquiringly. "Oh,
Cousin Arthur, do be frank with us! do tell us plainly what you think of
her case."
"It is a serious one, Cousin Elsie, I will not deny that," the doctor
replied, a very grave and concerned look on his face as he spoke, "and
yet I have strong hope of complete recovery; so do not any of you give
way to despair, but unite together in prayer for God's blessing on the
means used."
"Can I see her now, Aunt Rose?" he asked, turning to Mrs. Dinsmore. "I
think so," she replied, leading the way, the doctor following, while the
others remained where they were, waiting in almost silent suspense.
To them all it seemed a long, sad day. One at a time they were admitted
to a short interview with their mother, in which she spoke with each one
as though it might be her last opportunity, the burden of her talk being
always an earnest exhortation to a life hid with God in Christ; a life
of earnest, loving service to him who had died to redeem them from sin
and eternal death.
She was very cheerful and spoke hopefully of the result of the
operation, yet added that, as it might prove fatal, and in a way to
leave her neither time nor strength for these last words, she must speak
them now; but they need not despair of seeing her restored to health and
given many more years of sweet companionship with her loved ones.
Walter, as the youngest, took his turn last.
For many minutes he could do nothing but sob on his mother's breast.
"O mamma, mamma," he cried, "I cannot, cannot do without you!"
"Mother knows it will be hard for her baby boy at first," she said, low
and tenderly, holding him close to her heart; "but some day you will
come to mamma in that happy land where there is no parting, no death,
and where sorrow and sighing shall flee away; the land where 'the
inhabitant shall not say I am sick'; the land where there is no sin, no
suffering of any kind, and God shall wipe away all tears from our eyes.
"My darling, my little son, there is nothing else mother so desires for
you as that you may be a lamb of Christ's fold, and I have strong hopes
that you already are. You know that Jesus died to save sinners; that he
is able to save to the uttermost all that come unto God by him; that you
can do nothing to earn salvation, but must take it as God's free
unmerited gift: that Jesus says, 'Him that cometh to me I will in no
wise cast out.' All this you know, my son?"
"Yes, mamma dearest," he sobbed. "Oh, how good it was in him to die that
cruel death that we might live! Yes, I do love him, and he won't be
angry with me because I'm almost heartbroken at the thought of having to
do without my dear, dear mother, for many years. O mamma, mamma, how can
I live without you?"
"It may please the dear Lord Jesus to spare you that trial, my darling
boy," she said. "I know that he will, if in his infinite wisdom he sees
it to be for the best.
"And we must just trust him, remembering those sweet Bible words, 'We
know that all things work together for good to them that love God.'
Leave it all with him, my darling, feeling perfectly sure that whatever
he orders will be for the best; that though we may not be able to see it
so now, we shall at the last."
"But, mamma, I must pray that you may be cured and live with us for
many, many years. It will not be wrong to ask him for that?"
"No, not if you ask in submission to his will, remembering that no one
of us knows what is really for our highest good. Remember his own prayer
in his agony there in the garden of Gethsemane, 'Father, if thou be
willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless, not my will, but thine,
be done.'
"He is our example and we must strive to be equally submissive to the
Father's will. Remember what the dear Master said to Peter, 'What I do
thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know hereafter.'"
"Mamma, I will try to be perfectly submissive to his will, even if it is
to take you away from me; but oh, I must pray, pray, _pray_ as hard as I
can that it may please him to spare your dear life and let me keep my
mother at least till I am grown to be a man. It won't be wrong, mamma?"
"No, my darling boy, I think not--if with it all you can truly, from
your heart, say, 'thy will, not mine, be done.'"
When Captain Raymond followed his wife and little ones to Ion, he found
there a distressed household, anxious and sorely troubled over the
suffering and danger of the dearly beloved mother and mistress. Violet
met him on the veranda, her cheeks pale and showing traces of tears, her
eyes full of them.
"My darling!" he exclaimed in surprise and alarm, "what is the matter?"
He clasped her in his arms as he spoke, and dropping her head upon his
shoulder, she sobbed out the story of her mother's suffering and the
trial that awaited her on the morrow.
His grief and concern were scarcely less than her own, but he tried to
speak words of comfort to both her and the others to whom the loved
invalid was so inexpressibly dear. To the beloved invalid also when,
like the rest, he was accorded a short interview.
Yet he found to his admiring surprise that she seemed in small need of
such service--so calm, so peaceful, so entirely ready for any event was
she.
Finding his presence apparently a source of strength and consolation,
not only to his young wife, but to all the members of the stricken
household, he remained till after tea, but then returned home for the
night, principally for Lulu's sake; not being willing to leave the child
alone, or nearly so, in that great house.