"I DON'T BLAME THEM."
IT was not a "pet" name. Poor Mart Colson would not have known what
to do with a pet name. Her life had not taught her how to use such
phrases. How she came to be named Martha, she did not know; but a
hollow-eyed, sad-voiced woman could have told her of a country home,
long ago, where there were daffodils blowing in the early spring,
almost under the snow; where, later, the earth was turned into sky,
or the stars came down and gleamed all over her father's fields, so
plentiful were the dandelions; and the breath of the clover came in at
all the open windows; and the cows—her father's cows—coming home from
pasture, and the tinkle of their bells, were sights and sounds familiar
to her ear. She sat there one summer evening, in the back door,
watching the glory and the peace, and studying, between times, her
Sabbath lessons. Often and often the words came back to her in future
years.
"Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus."
That was one of the verses. Was it a dim memory of the words, and a
sort of blind reaching out after their fulfilment, that led her to name
her poor little two-days-old baby Martha?
The old home had vanished; the sweet-scented meadows, the tinkling
bells, the peace and the plenty, were as utterly things of the past as
though they had not been. Mother and father and one brother were gone,
lying in grass-grown, neglected graves; and she—why the two-days-old
baby's father was drunk, and had been for three weeks! A hard,
hateful-sounding word—coarse, almost. Why don't I say intoxicated? Oh,
because I can't! I've no desire to find smooth-sounding words with
which to cover the sin of that baby's father.
But the mother named her Martha. She never told her why, if, indeed,
she herself fully knew; it was not a family name. Gradually, after the
fashion of the times, she sought to shorten the name; and because they
had not sweet, short words as "Pet," and "Dear," and "Sweet,"—all such
belong to happy homes—they grew to calling her Mart. And now, even she
herself hardly realized that she had ever owned to any other call.
Poor Mart! I find myself wanting to use the adjective over and over
again when I speak of her. Such a desolate, loveless life! Always a
drunken father—she had never known any other; always a sharp-toned,
weary-eyed, disheartened mother, who shut her tenderness for the child
within herself, as one who could not afford to show it. Then Dirk, the
one brother, going astray almost as soon as he was born. What wonder,
from such a home?
Yet Mart wondered and felt bitter over it. Why could not Dirk be
like some others of whom she knew—like Sallie Calkins's brother, for
instance, who worked day and night, and brought home often and often
an apple, or a herring, or sometimes even a picture paper for Sallie?
Mart was sharp-tongued; all her life had taught her to be so. She spoke
sharp words out of the bitterness of her heart at Dirk; and of late
rarely anything but sharp words; yet—and this was Mart's secret, hidden
away as if it were something of which to be ashamed—she loved Dirk,
loved him fiercely, with all the pent-up wealth of her young heart; and
often, because she loved him, she was harsh and bitter towards him,
though she did not herself understand why this should be.
As for Dirk, he walked rapidly but for a few blocks; his dinner had
been too insufficient to give him strength, after the first aimless
anger had subsided. Then came the question what to do with himself.
Why hadn't he gone with the fellows? More than likely some of them
had contrived a way to get a dinner. Why had he persisted in sullenly
leaving them all and going home?
He had not the least idea why he had been impelled to go home. Now that
he was fairly away from home again, he had no idea what to do with
himself. A place where he could warm his feet and his hands, where
he could get a bite to eat, possibly,—this last would be an immense
attraction, but was not a necessity, and he did not expect it,—but
warmth, at least, he felt that he must have. Where would he find it?
What place had been provided for such as he?
He ought by this time to have been earning his own living—to have had a
corner which he could call home, earned by himself, where some of the
decencies of life were gathered. Of course he ought; but the painful
fact to meet just now was that he had not done his duty. He had gone
astray, not so far but that there were plenty of chances to go further,
greater deeps to which he might yet reach, but far enough to all but
break any watchful mother's heart—only that his mother's heart was
broken before he was born.
The simple question waiting to be solved was this: Having done as
poorly for himself as under the circumstances he well could, what
was Dirk Colson to do next? He had no idea; neither, apparently, had
multitudes of Christian people engaged in praying that the Father's
will might be done on earth even as it was in heaven.
The young man walked six blocks down the respectable avenue, lined
with pleasant homes, where the people went to church, and read their
Bibles, and had family prayers, and kept holy the Sabbath day. Not a
door among them all opened and held out a winning signal to arrest his
heedless feet. Not so Satan. Is he ever caught idling at his post? Just
around the corner from the respectable avenue (and around the corner
Dirk presently turned, still uncertain what to do, where to find the
warmth he craved), then the winning invitations for such as he began
to present themselves. Saloons, and saloons, and saloons! How many of
them were there, far outnumbering the churches! Pleasant they looked,
too—opening doors, ever and anon, revealing brightness and warmth
within. They would like to see him inside. Of this Dirk was sure.
Not that he had money, but he had something that in such places often
served him well—a decided and dangerous talent for imitating any and
every peculiarity of voice or manner that had chanced to come under his
notice. He could make the fellows in these saloons roar with laughter.
If he did particularly well, they were willing to order for him a glass
of beer, or a fairly good cigar; in any case, he had a chance to get
warm. This was actually Dirk's only present source of income! Yet he
shrank from it; he could not have told you why, but on this particular
Sabbath, he was averse to earning his coveted warmth in this way. He
walked resolutely by two or three places where he had reason to think
he might be welcomed, wondering vaguely whether there wasn't something
else a fellow could do to keep himself from freezing.
Oddly enough there seemed to be something about the glimmer of sunshine
as he saw it in Mart's hair that kept him from halting before any of
the places open to him. What if she had come out with him to take a
walk? He could not have taken her into one of them! Then, poor fellow,
he set himself to wondering where the place was, open and warmed, to
which he could take Mart. There were places, several of them, in the
large city; but Dirk knew nothing about them, and he was acquainted
with the saloons. He thought of another thing: he had been invited to
call at a house in East Fifty-fifth Street. Suppose he should walk up
there this very afternoon and ring the bell, and say that he had come
to call! What would happen then? Whereupon he laughed aloud, the fancy
seemed to him so utterly preposterous. The idea of "his" making a call!
The utter improbability of his ever seeing the inside of one of the
East Fifty-fifth Street mansions!
Still remained that hopeless question, What should he do with himself?
The sun was quite gone now, and a cold wind was blowing up freshly from
the north. It blew directly through Dick's threadbare garments. He
turned suddenly and slipped inside one of the worst of the many saloons
which literally line this end of the street. He had refused to go with
the boys to Poke's, an hour or two before, and this was several grades
below Poke's in decency. But it was growing dark, and he was cold.
There was one young man who saw him dart down those cellar stairs,
who stood still and looked at him, his face darkening the while with
discouragement. This, then, was all the afternoon's Sabbath school
had accomplished for him. To be sure he was not disappointed at the
result—it was no more than he had expected; but it was so discouraging
to be an eye-witness to the degradation to which these young wretches
had fallen. Of course the young man was Alfred Reid; and he went home,
and was dreary over all sorts of failures in Christian work, mission
Sabbath schools especially, and their own more especially than any
other.
Among the early shoppers on Monday morning came Mrs. Evan Roberts.
Shopping, however, seemed to be a small part of her business. She came
directly to young Reid's counter, and addressed him very much as though
she had ceased talking with him but a moment before:—
"Mr. Reid, what can you and I do for those boys during the week?"
But Alfred was at his gloomiest.
"I don't see that we can do anything for them at any time," he said
dismally. "What is an hour on Sunday, set against all the rest of the
time? They go from the schoolroom to the rum saloons, and dawdle away
the rest of the day. Yesterday I met that young Colson going into one
of the worst saloons in Dey Street. They are not to blame, either."
This last in a fiercer tone, after a slight pause. "I don't blame them:
they have nowhere else to go and nothing to do; and it is cold on the
streets, and warm in the saloons."
If he expected the small lady, who was regarding him so steadily, to
take the other side of this question, he was disappointed.
She spoke quietly enough, but with the earnestness of conviction.
"Those are startling facts. I do not see how any one could be surprised
that the results are as they are; and the practical question forces
itself upon us,—What are we to do under the circumstances? Mr. Reid,
you have had your eyes open in regard to this subject for some time;
what have you thought out?"
Now was Mr. Alfred Reid embarrassed. It was true that his eyes had
been long open to the subject; it was true that he had given it a
great deal of what he had called thought. But with those alert eyes
fixed on his face, her whole manner indicating intense earnestness,
he suddenly realized that all his thought had been to no purpose, had
accomplished nothing, unless it had served to give him a feeling almost
of irritation against the boys, and their teachers who made failures,
and the people who folded their hands and let things go to ruin. Here
confronted him one whose hands were not folded, though they rested
quietly enough on the counter before him. He began to feel that there
might be latent power in them.
"I have nothing to say," and he said it at last with flushed face and
embarrassed voice; "I have thought out nothing. The whole thing seems
hopeless to me with my utter lack of resources. My sister had schemes,
many of them, and they seemed to me good ones, even then; they seem
better now, only I cannot carry them out."
She caught at the name.
"Your sister? Esther Reid? Good! Let us carry them out, you and I,
and as many more as we can get to help us. She is at work yet, don't
you see? What is that prophecy about her—that voice which the prophet
heard, you know?
"'And I heard a voice saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which
die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may
rest from their labours; and their works do follow them.'"
How strangely the words sounded, repeated in her low, clear voice,
amid the hum of business on every side! Alfred Reid felt singularly
moved. He had been a highly strung, imaginative child. He had been his
sister Esther's almost constant companion during those last months in
which she was slowly fading out of sight. While Julia held steadily to
her mother's side, and learned to do many helpful things, he had been
stationed chief nurse in Esther's room, to see that she lacked for no
tender care during the hours when others must be away from her. And
those hours she had tenderly improved.
He remembered to this day just how she looked, with a pink flush
all over her cheeks, and a bright light in her eyes, as she talked
to him of the things that she and Dr. Douglas had meant to do for
boys—neglected, homeless, friendless boys. Oh, the plans they had
carefully thought out, to reach after these forsaken ones! He
remembered that his own cheeks had grown hot while he listened, and the
blood had seemed to race like fire through his veins when she said:
"God wants 'me' for something else, Alfred: but you will do my work
when you get to be a man; you will find helpers, and carry it on as I
wanted to do."
He had made no audible answer, but he had told himself sturdily again
and again that he certainly would. Yet here he was, barely of age, and
almost soured by disappointments. Certain well-meant attempts having
proved failures, and having not found the helpers whom he had eagerly
expected, the magnitude of the work impressed itself upon him more
remorselessly each hour.
Yet now he seemed to feel again the thrill in his veins, and he felt
almost under the power of his sister's eye, while those words were in
his ears:
"'They may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them.'"
Might it possibly be that this was one of the "helpers" of whom Esther
used to talk—sent by God himself to take up her planned work, and
follow it out? Yet she was so utterly unlike his memory of Esther! She
had seemed to him a self-reliant, strong toned woman—Mrs. Roberts was
so small and frail-looking, and so fashionably dressed; and how those
boys had acted with her only yesterday! What could she possibly do?
Customers came just then, to change the current of his thoughts. They
wanted round collars, and deep collars, and fichus, and edges, and
a hundred little irritating things. Young Reid, usually so gracious
and patient, had much ado to keep from showing his annoyance over the
smallness of all their wishes.
Meantime Mrs. Roberts, who had taken a seat, entered apparently with
absorption into the relative merits of round or pointed collars with
a young lady acquaintance. She patiently measured to discover whether
the turned-down corner of one was a quarter of an inch deeper than
the other or not; she gave, with due deliberation, her opinion as
to whether the points were more becoming to the young lady's style
of beauty than the rolling fronts; and even went to the trouble of
unfastening her furs to show still another style that she liked better
than either, sending the disgusted Alfred to an entirely different box
in search of a like pattern.
As he went, his lip curled visibly. What a fool he had been to allow
himself to get momentarily excited over this doll! How preposterous in
him to mention his dead sister's name to her! She had already forgotten
the entire matter, and was deep in the merits of collars! His first
estimate of her had been the correct one. Her mind was just about as
deep, he believed, as the tiny collar she was measuring. What a farce
it was to talk to her about helping those poor fellers! She probably
thought a few soup-tickets, and a chance for a good Christmas dinner at
some of the public charity halls, was the way to reach and reform them.
"He" shouldn't help her; she mustn't expect it. Doubtless she did not.
Probably she had by this time forgotten that she had suggested it.
Why need she trouble herself about a few collars for a young lady in
her own circle to wear with her morning dresses? That was just it, he
told himself. It was because she "was" in her circle, and because the
collars were to be honoured by being worn by such as she, that they
became important, and the boys and their desperate needs sunk into
insignificance. Well, he wished they would both go and leave him to
himself—give him a chance to rally from his momentary excitement, of
which he was now ashamed.
At last the collars were bought, but not until the counter was strown
with different sorts; and the lady, with many bright little nothings
for last words, moved off to another part of the store, and Mrs.
Roberts whirled on her seat until her eyes were in full view again, and
said:—
"What were some of her plans, Mr. Reid?"