SUNSHINE AND SHADOW
[Illustration]
THE next day was Sunday. As I came downstairs in the morning I saw
that Daisy was in her old place, on the lowest step of the staircase. My
salutation she returned with reserve, but presently I heard a gay,
“Mornin’, dear,” and turning around, saw that she was holding up her
face to Robertson for a kiss. Before they entered the dining room, she
made solicitous inquiries about his night’s rest. He laughed shortly. “I
haven’t slept so well for many a night,” he said. Her little face
brightened, and they went together to the table.
The church bells were ringing when we finished breakfast, and some one
laughingly asked Daisy where she was going to attend service. “You are
teasin’ me,” she said rebukingly; “you know I berry seldom go out.”
“Does no one take you for walks?” asked Robertson. The child shook her
head, and said that her mamma was always busy. The lad drew up his
stalwart frame, stifled some kind of an indignant exclamation, and
looked pityingly down at the pale, delicate figure of the child. Daisy
was watching him attentively. “Woland,” she said inquiringly, “Have you
any work dis mornin’?”
“No, Daisy.”
“Then can’t you dive me a walk?”
Her little hand stole confidingly in his. Her tone was coaxing in the
extreme. He laughed, and said: “Very well—go ask your mamma.”
In delighted surprise, she scampered to her mother’s end of the table.
“Mamma, may I go a-walkin’ wid Wo—wid Mithter Wobertson?” Mrs. Drummond
looked up, hastily ran her eyes over Daisy’s shabby frock, then over
Robertson’s handsome suit of clothes. “You have nothing fit to wear,
child.”
Daisy’s face became the picture of despair. “The child looks very well
as she is,” interposed Robertson dryly, as he walked toward them, “and
it is a warm day; she only wants a bonnet.” Daisy listened in delight,
then when her mother’s consent was gained, seized Robertson’s fingers
and pressed them to her lips. Not long after I had taken my seat in
church that morning, a tall young man with a child clinging to him, came
walking up the aisle to a seat in front of me. To my surprise, I saw
Robertson and Daisy. He, I fear, napped a little during the sermon. Not
a word was lost on Daisy. She sat bolt upright, her hands clasped in
front of her, her eyes fixed on the clergyman. At the close of the
service, we found ourselves near each other and walked home together. As
we passed through the hot, sunny streets, Robertson, as if to apologize
for being in church, said, “After we got outdoors this morning, Daisy
insisted upon going to church, to see the clergyman ‘wing de bells.’”
“The child is almost a heathen,” I answered, in a low voice; “I wish her
mother would send her to Sunday-school.”
Daisy’s sharp ears caught my remark. “Is dat where little chillens go
Sunday afternoons, wid pretty books under dere arms?”
“Yes,” I replied; “wouldn’t you like to go too?”
“May I, Woland?” eagerly. “I will be berry good.”
He laughed, and said that they must ask her mamma to give the subject
her consideration.
For the rest of the day, Daisy followed Robertson about the house like a
pet dog. Toward evening, some of his friends came in, and he shook
himself free from her, and went up to his room with them. After a time,
they all came trooping downstairs. The sound of their merry voices
floated to the room where I was sitting. But they were all hushed, when
a babyish voice asked, “Are you going out, Woland?”
Robertson resorted to artifice to prevent the recurrence of a scene.
“Daisy,” he said, “my friend here, Mr. Danforth”—laying his hand on the
shoulder of the youth nearest him—“is a great admirer of yellow cats.
Do you suppose that Pompey could be persuaded to walk upstairs and say
‘How-do-you-do’ to him?”
“Oh yes, dear boy,” said the child, trotting downstairs to fulfill her
favorite’s behest. When the sound of her footsteps died away, there was
subdued laughter, and some one said, “Who is that pretty child,
Robertson?” Then the door banged, and there was silence.
When I heard Daisy returning, I went to the door. She came hurrying
along, firmly holding the disconsolate-looking, yellow animal under her
arm. A blank look overspread her face when she saw that I was sole
occupant of the hall. “Where is Mithter Wobertson?” she inquired of me
in a dignified way.
“He has gone out,” I said, as gently as I could. “Won’t you come and
talk to me for a little while?” Disregarding the latter part of my
sentence, she said mournfully, “Do you weally fink so?”
I nodded my head. She let the cat slip to the floor, with a wrathful
“Get downstairs, you wetched beast,” and then went silently away. There
was a little, dark corner near a back staircase, to which she often
retreated in times of great trouble. There I think, she passed the next
hour. About nine o’clock she appeared and from that time until nearly
every one in the house had gone to bed, she wandered restlessly, but
quietly, about the parlors and halls. I knew what she was waiting
for—poor, little, lonely creature. Shortly after eleven, Mrs. Drummond
put her head in the room. “Why, Daisy,” fretfully, “aren’t you in bed
yet? Go right upstairs.”
The child silently obeyed, refusing, by a disdainful gesture, my offer
to carry her. That night I could not get to sleep. It seemed as if I too
was listening for a returning footstep. About one o’clock, there was a
sound on the staircase. I got up, opened my door, and seeing that the
night-light was burning in the hall, stepped out.
Robertson, with his hand on the railing, and a terribly red face, was
coming slowly upstairs. Just as he reached his door, a little,
white-robed figure stole into the hall. She ran up to him. “Oh my
darlin’, darlin’ boy,” with a curious catching of her breath, “I fought
you was lost, like de Babes in de Wood.”
He steadied himself against the wall, only half comprehending what she
said. Then he muttered thickly, “Go to bed, child.”
“Vewy well,” she murmured obediently, then standing on tip-toe, “Kiss me
good-night, Woland.”
With abashed eyes and shamed countenance, the young man looked down at
the innocent, baby face, shining out of its tangle of curls. He was not
fit to kiss her and he knew it. He turned his head from her, and in
tones harsher than he really meant said, “Go away, Daisy.”
The child still clung to him. She did not understand why the caress
should be denied her. Suddenly his mood changed. He uttered an oath,
pushed her violently from him, and staggered into his room.
The child fell, struck her head heavily against the floor, then lay
quite white and still. I hastened toward her, took her up in my arms,
and rapped at her mother’s door. Mrs. Drummond was still up, sitting
before a table, making entries in an account book. She started in
nervous surprise, then when I explained matters, looked toward the empty
crib, and said, “She must have slipped by me when my back was turned.
Has she fainted? She sometimes does. I don’t know why she should be such
a delicate child. Please put her in the crib. I will get some brandy.”
I glanced uneasily at the child’s pale face, then quitted the room.
Early the next morning, Mrs. Drummond knocked at my door. “I wish you
would come and look at Daisy,” she said querulously; “she has not slept
all night, and now she has fallen into a kind of stupor; I can’t get her
to speak to me.”
I hurried to the child’s cot, and bending over it said, “Daisy, don’t
you want some breakfast?”
She neither moved nor spoke, and after making other ineffectual attempts
to rouse her, I said, “The child is ill—you must call a doctor.”
“Suppose we get Mr. Robertson to speak to her,” she replied. “This may
be only temper.”
On going to his room I shook him vigorously. “Robertson, Robertson, wake
up.” After some difficulty, I roused him. He shuffled off the bed as I
told him my errand, and in a moment we were beside the sick child.
“Speak to her,” said Mrs. Drummond impatiently; “she is ill.”
He brushed his hand over his face, and leaning over her said, “Daisy,
won’t you speak to me?”
At the sound of his voice, the child opened her eyes, and looked up at
him dreamily. Then in a low voice, she repeated the terrible oath he had
uttered a few hours before. It sounded unspeakably dreadful coming from
her childish lips.
“Put on your coat,” I said, “and go for a doctor; the child’s mind is
wandering.”