"CRAZY DIMIS" AND THE TWILIGHT SCENE.
"What are you thinking about, Phebe? I have watched you ever since we
turned the corner down by the big pine tree, and not a muscle of your
face has moved, as far as I can discover. Tell Willie, won't you?"
Phebe, thus addressed, drew herself up with a long sigh, and passing her
hand mechanically across her forehead, replied, while her eyes remained
seemingly fixed on some far-off object:
"I do not know. See how the sunshine falls in golden patches on the pond
yonder, like what you read about this morning. Willie, I _don't_ want to
be _Phebe_--nothing but little Phebe. I--I want to _fly_! See that bird
going up, up. He will get away beyond the clouds--far above the top of
the mountain yonder. _I_ want to be like him, or something, I do not
know what; don't you, Willie?"
"Yes; though ambitions are not for one like me; but you will be
something besides 'little Phebe,' by and by. I see it in your beaming
face and deep dark eyes; while I must always be 'poor little Willie,'
nothing else. I have for a long time been watching you, and reading my
destiny of loneliness and utter dreariness in your strange, mysterious
words, and knew that they all came from a heart that would never be
satisfied with the plodding life where _I_ must remain. Two paths are
open to us, and I can even now see that they must branch off from each
other. O Phebe, hard as it is to be as I am, I would not hold you,
little bird, from your upward flight; but just think what a terrible
night my future will be without my little Phebe! Then I shall have no
sweet sister to comfort and cheer me when out of patience with myself
and cross because of my infirmity. And I shall not be your own Willie as
now. It is wrong, I know, to feel so, but I cannot help it! It is bitter
enough to know that I must lose you, but your love, little sister, how
can I live without that?"
Phebe was taking a seat beside him, where he had made room for her while
speaking. And, without answering his moan of anguish, she clasped her
arms about his neck and kissed his pale face over and over again.
"Love you?" she exclaimed. "I shall always love you. I do not believe at
all in those paths you have been telling about. What would I want to go
off in another for if you could not follow me? No, no, Willie, I would
not fly away up into the clouds without you; or be something that I so
long to be, for I always want to be your little Phebe--nothing else. I
was only thinking while I sat here and saw Rover draw you out of sight,
how _I_ wanted to go off somewhere! and then I thought of the
_waves_--how they used to talk to me--and just then, Willie, the patches
fell down on the water, and a strange feeling came over me; but it is
gone now, and I want to stay with you. Did not Mother give you to me and
say that I must never leave you? You are my own Willie, just as you
always will be." And with one more kiss she took the reins from his
hand and gave the order for Rover to proceed.
"Ha! ha! ha!" came to them from the thicket near where they had been
sitting, and at the same time two large, wild eyes peered through the
opening a pair of thin bony hands had made in the thick foliage.
"It is Crazy Dimis; don't be afraid," said Willie, as his companion gave
a startled look; "she has been at our house many times when I was a
little boy, and she will not hurt any one. She has escaped from her
imprisonment as she used often to do, but they know she is harmless."
The figure of a woman, tall and straight, but very plainly clad, now
stood before them.
"It is wonderful sweet to love, isn't it silly children? Kisses are like
honey--good on the lips; but they kill sometimes. Ha! ha! Waste them!
throw them away, silly children. They'll be bitter by and by. It's
coming--coming! Don't I know it? Kisses are like candy, mustn't eat too
much, little fools! Beware! the roses will fade and the thorns are
sharp! They'll prick you! Don't I know? Flowers are not for
everybody--plant cabbage! Ha! ha! Crazy, am I? _He_ said so, too. But it
was the adder's tongue that poisoned _my_ life. _His_ love--_his_ kiss.
Beware! Remember I tell you, _beware_!" and with a bound she darted
again into the thicket and was lost from sight.
Willie had taken the reins from his companion as this unwelcome
apparition appeared, but as she vanished Phebe exclaimed:
"What a horrid creature! What makes her talk so strangely? _Who_ is the
one she spoke of? Do you know her?"
"Mother said she was once the brightest, prettiest girl anywhere around;
but her husband disappointed her, and was unkind. It was this, I
believe, that made her what she is. There used to be much good sense in
what she said--shrewd, cunning, and not wholly gibberish. But let us
hurry home; Fanny may want you."
"Flowers are not for everybody. Did she mean me, Willie? Her words make
me shiver!"
While yet speaking they came round to the kitchen door, where Fanny met
them. Something had evidently gone wrong, for she was flushed, and her
step was quick and prophetic. She had many cares, and her temper had not
grown sweeter by their constant pressure.
"You might as well have staid out the rest of the morning, and let me do
everything," was her first exclamation. She was hurrying past, and did
not, therefore, wait for a reply.
"Never mind," said Willie, in a low voice, as he saw the flash of anger
dart up in his companion's eyes. "Take off Rover's harness and hasten
around to help her about the dinner, will you? I will go and read, and
perhaps think over what poor old Dimis said until you have got through.
But promise me," he continued, playfully; "don't you think of her or a
word she said, for it is not true."
"Perhaps we may better do as Fanny suggested, and go out for the rest of
the morning. I wish we could." Willie smiled and wheeled himself into
the house.
There were busy hands in the kitchen until after the dinner hour that
day, but no cheerful word or kindly act were thrown in to lessen its
tediousness or lighten the irksome burdens of the unwilling Phebe. The
face upon which she looked was cold and hard, and a sort of oppressive
bustle seemed to fill the very atmosphere. The knives were to be scoured
and the potatoes washed for the noon meal, and her old dislike of this
work had in no degree left her since she was the "good-for-nothing
child" away in the fisherman's cot by the sea. The departed mother had
often laughed at her aversion, and shielded her from its performance,
but not so with the thrifty Fanny. Indeed, Phebe imagined that these
were reserved for her for the reason that she "hated" to do them, and
this morning they seemed more distasteful than ever before. It was with
no very good grace, therefore, that she went about her task, and as she
stood by the window with the unpolished knives beside her, she thought
of her who was sleeping below the garden wall, and wondered if "she knew
what she was doing, of her impatience and anger." And then the crazy
woman's gibberings came back, "Flowers are not for everybody"; and "the
thorns are sharp, little fools."
"I hope you will get them done in time to set the table," were the
quick, sharp words that broke in upon her reverie, and brought in her
gaze from the far-off to the labor before her. The door was open into
the sitting room, where Willie was amusing himself with a book, and
Phebe called out, "I don't like to scour knives and wash potatoes, and I
_won't_, either. Do you remember it, Willie?" she laughed.
"Well, I guess you _will_," retorted Fanny. "I'd just like to know how
you expect to get a living if you are going to do nothing except what
you want to do. You are no better than I am, and I want you to do this
every day; so keep to work at it, and not be looking out of the window."
Phebe turned, but caught sight of Willie's uplifted hand of warning just
as a bitter retort darted to her lips, and for his sake she smothered
her rage and resumed her hated labor. She did not enjoy any kind of
work, and never hesitated to express her dislike for it. Perhaps, had
circumstances altogether different from those that had surrounded her
brightened up each compulsory service; or a word of love or praise been
dropped now and then over the little burdens, it would have been
otherwise. But she was a dreamer, a child with inborn fancies,
possessing a soul where poetry and beauty reigned as twin sisters,
growing and thriving upon each other's life, but she knew it not. She
was only sure that her heart bounded in the sunshine of genial
associations, and sank with equal velocity beneath the clouds of
depressing influences. A cold word, a frown, would fill her soul with
gloomy shadows for many hours, unless a warm sunbeam from some loving
heart came to drive it away. Kind and cheerful as our little heroine
usually was, there lay coiled up in her nature a demon of anger which
sprang forth at every provocation with the fury of ungoverned passion.
Poor child! It had goaded her long for one so young, and many times she
had struggled to resist its power, but it proved stronger than her will.
Love alone can subdue such natures, while opposition only feeds and
nourishes their faults.
"Get out of my way!" exclaimed Fanny, as Rover was leisurely crossing
her path, while a sudden movement of her substantial shoe gave a new
impetus to his velocity. Phebe saw it, and her heart bounded with
indignation. Dropping her work she darted forward, and throwing her arms
around the neck of the noble dog exclaimed vehemently: "Why didn't you
bite her, Rover? she shall not kick you!" A blow from the enraged Fanny,
and a command to return to her work silenced her for a moment, then with
the fierceness of a tiger she sprang upon her antagonist and dealt blow
after blow upon the astonished Fanny before she had time to recover from
her surprise, or to use her powers of defence. In a moment more, pale
with anger and fright, the child was torn from her position by superior
strength, and forced into her own little chamber with the command "not
to leave it until she received permission." Here was a new feature in
home affairs.
"This child, this _pauper_, shall go where she belongs! The poor-house
is good enough for such as she! At any rate I shall not have such a
wild-cat beneath _my_ roof a great while!"
Willie listened to the ravings of his sister, while his heart throbbed
with unconcealed emotion.
"Yes, and _you_ uphold her no doubt! You pity her and think she has been
greatly wronged--but it makes no difference!"
"I _do_ think, Sister, that had you sought for love you would have found
it, and love worketh no ill to his neighbor."
"Love! I _don't_ want her love or _her_ either! To confess the truth I
am worn out with her and she must leave--that is all!"
"I know very well that you do not like to have me advocate Phebe's
cause, but did you ever notice that her exhibitions of anger only
seemed to be the echo of your own? I have watched her, Sister, with the
most intense interest when laboring under personal difficulties and
perplexities, and I have seldom seen her lose her patience under any
trial. In all the years we have spent together she has never grieved me
by an ill-tempered word or gesture, because _I_ never gave her one."
"So it is all _me_, of course! I must of necessity stand sponsor for my
own sins and her's too!"
"No Fanny, but I would be plain. You _are_ too stern and cold, and at
times unjust! You forget that she is a child."
"I have heard _enough_--she must leave the house!" So saying the enraged
Fanny left the room, the door closing behind her with a prophetic
firmness which Willie well understood.
Phebe sat alone in her chamber until the golden twilight settled down
upon the waters of the little lake and tinted the tree tops that cast
their long shadows out over its bosom, and watched the "lights and
shades" which chased each other down the hillside and over the meadow
until they rested on _two_ graves just beyond the garden wall.
"My mother! O, my mother!" gushed up from the overflowing heart. "Would
that I were beside you! You did not hate me--you did not make me so
wicked!" Tears choked her utterance and blinded her vision. Hours passed
and then a gentle tap was heard on her door, but she did not move. There
had been no steps on the stairs and well did she know who was pleading
outside to share her sorrows.
"Phebe, may _I_ come in? It is your own Willie--come and open the door
if I may enter!" _That_ voice never pleaded in vain. Now it sank down
into the wildly throbbing heart as a soft lullaby, soothing every angry
passion and illuminating the dark chambers of her soul with the sweet
promises of peace.
The door was opened and Phebe returned to her low seat by the window
without a word. Willie was soon beside her, sitting, on account of his
infirmity, at her feet; his calm blue eyes swimming with tears were
fixed intently upon her face, but she apparently did not heed him.
"Will you not speak to me, Phebe? Let me look into your eyes--there is
no anger there for _me_! Nothing but love, I am sure of it! I have read
it there so many times, but let me read it there once more--may I not?"
The arms of the child were thrown about the suppliant's neck and her
tears fell fast as she kissed his pale cheek.
"I am so wicked, Willie! I wish I were good like you and loved
everybody. _You_ never make me angry, but Fanny always does. I can't
help it!"
"Phebe, I love you. What would my life be if you were away? Think how
long the days would be with no one to talk to and no one to say 'I am so
sorry' when sad. In a few years at most Willie will be out there by the
side of Mother, and until then I must creep about just as I always have
done; but I can bear it if I have you to cheer me," and clasping her to
his heart he was not ashamed that his tears mingled with hers.
"I am so sorry, Willie!" she sobbed at length. "I heard Fanny say that
'I should not stay here.' I did not care then, but O, I cannot leave
you. O--I will be very good! If Mother was only here I think I could do
anything--but I am so wicked!"
Darkness had settled down upon the occupants of that little chamber when
Fanny called: "Willie, _your_ supper is ready! Come down immediately and
let Phebe stay where she is!" The child darted to her feet and hastened
to open the door.
"Fanny," she said, with a slight hesitation; "I want to stay here, but
won't you let me ask you to forgive me? I know I am very wicked but I
will try to do better!" The stern, cold Fanny hesitated only a moment,
and then without a smile of encouragement or a cheering caress _agreed_
to the proposition and promised to let her remain for a while until she
had tried her once more. "Now come down to supper," she continued, "for
I am in a hurry to get my work done!" Was _this_ forgiveness? A balm to
heal the wounds of injury? Poor, sin-sick soul! Did thy heavenly friend
ever look so coldly upon thy penitence? When did He ever pour the "gall
of bitterness" into the wounds of a humiliated heart? Small would be the
reward of "human justice" if the intercessor did not continually stand
between us and our petition, "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive
them that trespass against us."
"You are a noble girl!" exclaimed Willie as Phebe returned to her seat
by the window. "I will leave you now; you may come or stay as you
choose--all will yet be right."
[Illustration]