The "breaking down" predicted by Dr. Winters, took the form, not of
hysterical emotion, as he had anticipated, but of physical languor
and spiritual apathy, which were more alarming. Jessie moved, spoke,
and thought like one in a trance; acquiescing in every proposal made
by her sister and Roy; obeying every request without demur or
inquiry. If left to herself she asked nothing except to be allowed
to sit or lie passive for hours together; her great eyes closed or
blank; her countenance set in the gloomy weariness that had marked
it from the moment her hand left her dead father's forehead--a look
that said she had henceforward nothing to hope for or to fear.
Few husbands would have had tolerance with this excessive grief for
the loss of a parent, however beloved, and worthy of filial
attachment. One might search far and long without finding a man
whose sympathy with the demonstration of this would incite him to
warmer love and fonder care for her, who, for the time, overlooked
his claim to supreme regard in her devotion to a memory.
"You could not mourn more bitterly for _me_!" I once heard a man say
in impatient reproach, upon surprising his wife in tears within a
week after she had committed an indulgent parent to the grave.
He was a good man, and an affectionate husband, but he could not
endure the semblance of a divided allegiance.
Had Roy Fordham's love been of this sensitive and exclusive type, it
would have been chafed threadbare before the honeymoon was one-tenth
wasted. The new bond between them she ignored entirely--not, it was
evident, in wilfulness or shyness, but because it had no place in
her thoughts; was a matter of no moment in comparison with the event
that steeped her whole being in despondency. It was well that
neither he nor Eunice had any knowledge of the continuous warfare of
the summer, the fiercer struggle of that early September day, the
morrow of which had brought a fresh sorrow in her father's illness.
Had they comprehended all this, superadded to their fears that her
three weeks' watching and its _finale_ had seriously affected her
nervous system, they would have had small hope of the curative power
of Nature and of Love. She was, in reality, insane for the three
days immediately succeeding her marriage, if lack of feeling,
thought, and connected memory signify mental aberration. In after
years, this period was almost a blank in the retrospect, a confusing
dissolving view that defied her scrutiny. While it lasted it was a
nightmare from which she had not strength to awaken.
When she was led by Roy to take a last look at her father's face as
he lay in his coffin ready to be transported to the church, her
eyes were vacant and dry, her features emotionless.
"He looks very natural!" she said slowly, like one trying to recall
the conventional phrase in such circumstances.
When Eunice bent weepingly to kiss the frozen lips where still
lingered the smile of ineffable peace with which he had named his
wife, Jessie eyed her with a mixture of wonder and perplexity; and
remarking again, "Very natural! almost life-like!" turned away, with
the air of one who had said and done all that could be required of
her.
In an agony of alarm, Roy sought Dr. Winters, who had called to
inquire after the health of the family, and to see if he could be of
service in their affliction. Eunice had taken charge of her sister
at night, and reported that what little sleep had visited the latter
had been won by the use of anodynes. Had the physician--asked the
bridegroom--a sedative, potent enough to induce slumber for several
hours, the after effect of which would not be increased cerebral
excitement? Come what might, Jessie must not witness the obsequies
appointed for that forenoon. Her mind seemed, to him, to need but a
touch to complete its overthrow. While the two gentlemen held
counsel, Eunice entered with the welcome news that Jessie had, on
leaving the parlor where the remains lay, gone voluntarily to her
own room--she having shared her sister's since their common
bereavement--thrown herself upon the bed and fallen into a deep
sleep.
The church-bell was not tolled for the pastor's funeral, and a band
of trusty yeomen, stationed fifty yards up and down the road,
prevented vehicles from approaching the gate of Parsonage or
church-yard. The reason was quickly disseminated, and the value of
the precaution universally admitted. Mingled with the tears that
fell upon the bier of the faithful servant of GOD, were earnest
prayers for the restoration of health and reason to the
daughter--"the people's" pride and pet as she had been his--the
merry, popular "little Jessie," who was known to every household in
the parish. Many wistful eyes sought the closed blinds, behind which
she lay wrapped in death-like slumber.
"The only hope for life and brain!" Dr. Winters had pronounced, and
the dictum was repeated far and near with awed looks and subdued
breath.
Within the manse, all was hushed and dark. Eunice sat with the
sleeper while the services at the church went forward.
"Do not separate us this morning!" was her petition to Roy, who
would have taken the post himself. "I have nobody left but her!"
She interpreted correctly the meaning of the imperfect sounds that
penetrated her seclusion--the funeral psalm, the dull tramp of many
feet from the front to the back of the church; the awful pause--like
no other upon earth--that told the coffin was sinking to its
place--the voice of prayer--the brief, reverent utterances with
which the dear dust was committed to the keeping of the Lord of
Life, through all the coming ages of Time--then, the muffled tumult
of departure. She sat quiet until the end; restraining sob and sigh
that the beloved living should not be disturbed; staying her heart
upon the Father of the fatherless, the GOD whose goodness the
expiring saint had charged his children never to forget.
Roy relieved her as soon as the Services were over.
"Thank you," he said, kissing her with a brother's fond sympathy.
"Go now, and leave her to me. I will call you, should you be
needed."
Alternately, and in company, they watched her until Dr. Winters'
third visit that day brought hope that was confidence to their tried
souls.
"If she sleep, she shall do well!" said Dr. Baxter, when Roy carried
the glad tidings to him, that the stupor had changed to natural
slumber. He was sitting in the window of Mr. Kirke's study; for a
wonder, without book or paper before him, but absorbed in
contemplation of the mountain scenery.
"You are wearing yourself out," he added, observing that Roy's
complexion, tanned by the sea-voyage, was fast regaining its natural
hue, and that his eyes bore evidence of grief and anxiety. "Jessie
is safe in her sister's care, and while she sleeps cannot miss you.
Bide here a bit with me"--he often relapsed into the Scotch
dialect--"and refresh yourself by a survey of this picture. I must
quit you all to-morrow, and I would have a few words with you before
I go."
Jessie was alone when she awoke. Eunice had been called to the
parlor to see a parishioner from the other side of the mountain who
had not heard of Mr. Kirke's decease until that morning, had ridden
twenty miles to attend the funeral, and arrived too late. Eunice had
been too long the obedient servant of the congregation to hesitate
as to the course she should pursue in the dilemma. Jessie slept
soundly and peacefully, and Roy would be back soon. She closed the
door noiselessly, and obeyed the summons of her father's friend.
Summer zephyrs were coquetting with the sombre pine-branches;
summer-scents were stealing up to Jessie's windows from the garden.
To such wooing whispers and goodly odors had she awakened many
mornings during many years. She mistook the colored light visible
through the shutters for dawn; marvelled sleepily that her limbs
ached and her head was weary.
"It must be time to get up!" she meditated, 'twixt sleeping and
waking. "Yet I am not rested. I have not heard Eunice or Patsey go
downstairs."
In tossing her arm up to pillow her head for a second nap, she saw
her sleeve. How had she happened to fall asleep without undressing?
She sat upright, and tried to remember when and how she had gone to
bed overnight. How queerly her head felt!
"As if it had been dead and was coming to life again!" was her
simile.
She was at home, and in her own room; everything about her was in
its usual order. Yet something had happened. What was it? A Bible
lay on the stand by the bed. Between the leaves was a handkerchief.
She drew it out, and saw Eunice's name in the corner. How came it
there? Had Eunice sat with her, last evening? If so, why? Her feet
were oddly numb when she stood up; she was weak and dizzy as from
illness or fasting; but she walked to the door, opened it, and
hearkened for movements upon the lower floor. It was so quiet, she
heard the droning of a humming-bird moth which had come to look for
untimely blossoms in the honey-suckle draping the hall-window.
Another sound, almost as monotonous, blended with this--the steady
flow of a man's voice talking or reading in the study. Who was her
father's guest? And what hour of day was it? It must be morning,
since she had just awakened, yet looked, and felt like evening.
A draught from the open door she had left blew that opposite
slightly ajar. Surely, that was Dr. Baxter's voice! Had she dreamed
of his arrival! A fearful dream, the dim recollection of which made
her sick and faint? Sinking to a settee that stood outside the
study-door, seeking to stimulate her half-dead brain by rubbing her
temples hard, she endeavored to gather the meaning of what Dr.
Baxter was saying. He was in the middle of one of the monologues
which were sometimes a bore; sometimes a delight. A gleam of
amusement flitted over the wan, vacant visage of the eavesdropper as
she pictured to herself--still as if she were somebody else and not
Jessie Kirke--the knotted handkerchief she doubted not was on active
duty.
"Is it consistent with the Divine economy for an immortal being to
spend twenty-five, fifty, threescore and ten years, in the
acquisition of knowledge and experience for which he is to have no
use in the world to come? Believe me, they are in grievous error,
denying themselves the abundant consolations which the hope of a
continued and eternal existence should bring, who overlook the plain
teachings of the word and the almost divine intuitions of the human
soul on this question. The Future Life! What is it but the
stretching into regions yet unknown to us, into the Eternity of
which we have but imperfect conceptions, of the life which now is?
the Present, which is the journey toward the continuing City. Into
that state we shall, it is true, be born as spiritual babes. But not
idiots! As the instincts and actions of the babe prefigure the
disposition and appetites of the man, so the habits of thought and
feeling, the inclinations and aspirations of the newly disembodied
spirit will bear a certain relation to that which it will at length
become--the perfect man in Christ Jesus. As hereditary taints and
hereditary virtues are reproduced in the mortal babe, we shall find
definite traces of our earthly individuality in the heavenly
nurseling. And that the proportion which the loftiest attainments of
the profoundest philosopher will bear to the infancy of this
celestial creature will be less--far less than that which the mere
instincts of the earthly infant bear to the wisdom and strength of
the adult, I also believe. We shall have to begin with the rudiments
of infinite knowledge. But we shall have Eternity in which to
learn."
Jessie still chafed her forehead, where wrinkles of pained
perplexity gathered and deepened, as she tried to put word to word
and sentence to sentence. She lost what came next in vainly
attempting to get the sense of these last sentences. Perhaps she
should understand better when she was quite awake.
"Such proportion as the seed sustains to the mature plant, the ovum
to the living, moving creature, you will tell me--" Dr. Baxter was
saying, when she again lent attention to his dissertation. "I grant
it. But like produces like in vegetable and animal generation, and
why deny the spiritual analogy? What we call Death is but the
threshold--and a narrow one--separating the vestibule from the
temple. It is all one building--the Life which GOD has given. When I
cast off the cumbrous shell I have borne so long that I foolishly
fancy it is _myself_--a part of my being without which I should be
naked, shivering, and helpless; when it slips from my soul by
reason of its own weight and rottenness, I shall enter upon no new
existence. It will be _I_ still--not a different creation. For a
moment, perhaps, I may not know what has happened. Thus, I have seen
a butterfly trembling with the strangeness of his position, clinging
with damp, untried wings to the bough that supports the little
pendant coffin, now broken--from which he has just crept. A
delicious sense of liberty and space there may be as one breathes
more freely in leaving a close room for the outer air. I shall miss
the incubus of the body, and the fleshly desires I have sloughed off
with it. Then will dawn upon me gradually--as I have strength to
bear the revelation, that I have _passed_! Not been made over, mark
you! We are nowhere taught that regeneration is a posthumous
experience. 'He is gone!' some one will say. And perhaps
another--'He is dead!'
"Dead! I tell you, my friend, I shall be the _livest_ man in that
room! Not until that hour of glorious emancipation shall I know what
life is!"
There was an interval of stillness. Jessie had staggered to her
feet. Her eyes, no longer blank, were dilated with intensest and
eager inquiry. What did it signify--this talk of death and the life
to come? Who was the speaker's companion? Her father? Oh, why did he
not speak?
Another voice, deeper and sweeter, made reverent response:
"Thanks be to GOD, for His unspeakable gift!"
She flung the door widely open; faced the astonished man with the
demand, shrieked, rather than spoken:
"Where is he? He said _that_! my father! _Where is he now?_"
"Jessie, love!"
Roy caught her in his arms, but she pushed him from her.
"I will know! I am going mad! Where is my father?"
Dr. Baxter secured her fluttering hands; looked steadfastly, yet not
sternly, into her eyes.
"He may be _here_, my child! We cannot tell. Be sure he remembers
and loves you still, he, who, while in the flesh, held you so dear.
Believe this and be still under the mighty but loving hand of GOD!"
Her head sank upon his shoulder.
"_You_ would not deceive me! You are a good man, and speak the truth
always!" she sobbed, excitedly. "Is my father _really_ dead? Oh, I
remember it all now!"
With the resuscitation of the torpid intellect, came a flood of
tears, mingled with anguished exclamations--an hysterical attack
that only abated with her strength. By nine o'clock she was asleep,
exhausted, but free from fever and the nervous spasms that had made
the seizure alarming at first. The danger was tided over, for the
present, and ere the rest separated for the night, Dr. Baxter
returned thanks for "the signal deliverance," kneeling between the
husband and sister; besought comfort and peace for the smitten
household in fervent, affectionate words, which showed that however
his thought might stray from the subjects to which his acquaintances
would hold him, his heart was always in the right place.
"I cannot thank you as I should for all you have been to us--all you
have done for us!" said Eunice, as they talked of the morrow's
parting.
"Do not, my dear! The privilege and the gratitude have been and are
mine. GOD sent me to you. I bless Him for it!"
It was after sunrise when Jessie unclosed her eyes. Eunice's chair
was still by her pillow, but it was empty. Her mind was clear. She
had no difficulty in recalling how the gentle hands had laid her to
sleep; the mellow voice read to her from The Book--"A prayer of the
afflicted, when he poureth out his heart before GOD." Dear Eunice!
her love--tried as it had been by her perversity and reserve, her
late violent and selfish distress--was more precious than ever
before. She would arise and share, if she could not lighten, her
labors and her burdens. As she sat up in bed, she espied upon a
lounge near by, a gentleman's dressing-gown. The blood sprang to her
cheeks in a burning torrent, for the truth flashed instantly upon
her. Roy had asserted his right to the exclusive guardianship of his
wife; had sent the weary sister to take the rest she needed, and
himself kept watch over her through the night. There came to her no
softening thought of the anxious affection that had held his eyes
waking while others slept. She was only angry--desperately indignant
that he had dared sit there and watch her without her knowledge or
consent. The blind, mad moment passed, she stood, for many
more--white as death--thinking! Then she locked the door. Roy might
enter at any instant, or Eunice glide in to ask how she was, and she
must be alone while she thought it all out! No mortal eye witnessed
the fight of the next hour. The woman--torn and dashed by a legion
of passions verily believed, while they had the mastery, that she
would not survive it. She never told the tale of her hurts to her
dearest earthly friend. It was something she would not renew by
relating, even when time had almost worn away the scars.
She was made of sterner stuff than she knew. Ere she quitted her
chamber, her resolution was taken--every trace of the strife put out
of sight. She had "light enough to see the next step." If she were
bound for life against her will and conscience, Roy was basely
wronged--and through no fault he had committed against her. If her
course were to be joyless--a strait and rough path, his was no
smoother or more delightsome. Recompense him for what she had lost
for him, she could not, but she could and she would appear dutiful
and resigned.
Fordham coming in from the brisk walk in the early morning air by
which he had tried to make up for his vigil, found her in the
parlor, arranging the books upon bracket-shelves and dusting the
rare old china bowl and vases which the sisters let no one but
themselves handle. Her breakfast-toilette had been carefully made,
contrasting strikingly with yesterday's _neglige_. Her rich hair was
braided as she used to wear it, and banded with black ribbon; her
white cambric dress was belted with the same, and loops of narrower
hung from her mourning brooch. She comprehended all that had
happened within the week; accepted the expediencies and proprieties
of her position with its sorrows and duties, and he honored her for
it. Her attire showed that she consulted his taste, wished to be
fair in his eyes, and for this he loved her better than ever, if
that could be. He did not know it, but the woman he had wedded
never, in her previous or subsequent life, gave another equal proof
of strength of mind and purpose, as when, physically faint and
mentally distraught by the frightful ordeals she had already
sustained, she lifted this, the heaviest cross of all, and adjusted
it to her shoulders for a lifelong journey.
The greeting between them was affectionate on his side--grave upon
hers--very quiet on both, as befitted the circumstances of the
household.
"Ah, Jessie, darling! I am glad you are well enough to be down
stairs! But are you not exerting yourself too much?" he exclaimed at
his entrance.
And--"I am much better, thank you! entirely able to be about as
usual," was the reply, uttered without the flicker of a blush.
Then he kissed the cheek that was neither averted nor offered.
Dr. Baxter and Eunice appearing, a minute afterward, saw nothing
amiss. There may have been nothing, yet the young husband had looked
for a different reception--now that his Jessie was declared to be
"quite herself again."
He was a patient man and a considerate, and the secret
disappointment was condemned as soon as recognized. This was not the
time for love-making--or--this was clearly Jessie's feeling. To
oppose her scruple while her grief was so fresh and her nerves
unsettled, would be persecution. She deserved all grace and
indulgence at his hands, and she should have it. Their life--as
_theirs_ was all before them. He would be a help not an
embarrassment, to the orphans. Jessie loved him! Jessie was his
wife! That was enough!