"MAY SHE GO WITH ME?"
OF course she went. And of course, now that the truth was known, much
was done.
Dr. Everett was summoned. The wretched bed, with its distressing rags,
was turned out altogether, and a comfortable one took its place. Broths
and teas and jellies and physical comfort of every kind were furnished,
and the doctor did his best to battle with the disease that long years
of want and misery had fastened upon their victim. It was all too late,
of course. It was true what Mr. Roberts sadly said, that half of the
effort, expended years or even months before, might have saved the
poor, tortured life; but now!
How awful those "too lates" are! Isn't it a wonder that we ever take
the risk of having one ring in our ears for ever? There was one thing
over which some of these Christian workers shed tears of joy.
"'I' am too late," said Dr. Everett, "but my Master has as much power
to-day as ever. He can save her."
And he did. The poor, tired woman, who years before had remembered an
old story well enough to name her one daughter "Martha," in memory of
the one who "loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus," roused her dull
heart at the mention of His name, and listened while the wonderful
story was told her that he loved not only Martha and her sister, but
her own poor, sinful, wrecked self—loved her enough to reach after her,
and call and wait, and prepare for her a home in his glory.
Dear! Why has not some one come with the news before? Surely she would
have listened during those long, sad years. Well, they made the way
plain. Neither was it a difficult thing to do. The woman was weary, and
travel-stained, and afraid, and longed for nothing so much as a place
of refuge. She knew that she was a sinner; she knew that she was, and
had been for many a year, powerless to help herself. Why should she not
hail with joy the story of a great and willing Helper?
"Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden."
She opened her eyes with a gleam of eagerness to hear the words:
"Weary?" Yes, indeed! "Heavy laden?" Who more so? If the call was not
for her, whom could it mean? What else? Why, what but the glorious old
story,—
"I will give you rest."
What wonder that she closed her eyes and smiled. What wonder that the
first words after that were, "I'll come; show me how." And he showed
her how.
"Dirk," the sister said, when the mother had gone the last and only
restful journey of her life—"Dirk, she went to heaven, and I'm going.
I've been wanting to tell you for more than a week, but I didn't know
how. He asked me to, and I'm going. Now, you must. 'Cause we never
had a good time here, and she'll kind of expect it in heaven, and be
looking out for you;—she always looked out for you, Dirk."
Then did Dirk lose his half-sullen self-control, and great tears rolled
down his dark cheeks.
But the sister shed no tears. She had serious business to attend to.
Dirk must go to heaven now without fail.
One day there was an unusual scene in the alley. It was no uncommon
thing to see a coffin carried out from there, but on this day there
was a hearse, and a minister in Dr. Everett's carriage, and Dirk and
his sister, in neat apparel, came out together and were seated in Mr.
Roberts's carriage; and all the boys of the Monday evening class walked
arm in arm after the slow-moving carriages. And the children of the
alley stopped their playing and their fighting, and the women stood
silent in doorways, and took, most of them, their very first lesson in
the proprieties of life.
"She's got a ride in a carriage at last, poor soul!" said one, thinking
of the worn-out body in the coffin.
And another said, "I wonder what poor old Jock would think of all this."
But the scene made its impression and left its lesson. I think the
voices of some of them were lower during the rest of the day because of
it.
What next? It was the question that filled Mrs. Roberts's thoughts.
Something must be done for Dirk and Mart. That fearful alley was no
place for human beings—certainly not for these two. But what to do with
them was a question not easily answered.
Various plans were proposed. Sallie Calkins's two rooms were much
better than the cellar in which the Colson family had lived; and there
was a chance to rent a room next to Sallie's, with a closet opening
from it for Dirk. How would it do to have them board with Sallie? The
suggestion came first from Gracie Dennis, and sounded reasonable. Mrs.
Roberts was almost ashamed to dislike it as much as she did. Sallie's
neat rooms were home now. The father, for this length of time at least,
held to his pledge; and son and daughter were radiant over him. He
had gone to work, and already the two rooms were taking on an air of
greater comfort because of the little things that he proudly brought
home.
Sallie was doing her part wisely. The table was regularly laid now,
with a white cloth and knives and forks; and two new cups and plates
had been added to the dishes. Would it be wise to invade this home just
at this juncture and introduce boarders? Mrs. Roberts did not believe
that it would. It was not as though the father had an established
character, and stood ready to shield his children; they were still
acting the protective, and he had but too recently risen from the
depths where Dirk and Mart had laughed and jeered at him.
Besides, the rooms were located in that dreadful alley; and do what she
would, Mrs. Roberts could not feel that that dangerously-beautiful face
could find a safe abiding-place in that alley. Some other way must be
thought of.
Their immediate future was arranged through the intervention of a
house agent; for even that dreary and desolate cellar had its agent,
who was eager to secure his rent. He was unwise enough to undertake to
interview Mrs. Roberts as she descended from her carriage, not long
after it had followed Mart's mother to the grave.
He considered this effort of his, a special stroke of business energy.
He wanted to be patient with the poor, he said; there wasn't an agent
in the city who waited for them oftener than he did; but business was
business, and it stood to reason that he could not depend on a fellow
like Dirk. It had been bad enough when the mother was there, but he
couldn't think of such a thing as risking it now. What was he to
understand? Did she mean to rent the room for them, and for how long?
Because it was his duty to look out for the future.
What would be more natural than for Mrs. Roberts, with those two young
things looking on, to say that of course she would be responsible for
the rent as long as they lived in the room? Thus reasoned the house
agent.
Instead of which, Mrs. Roberts turned toward Dirk, her face flushed
over the hardness of a man who could stop a boy and girl on such
business on their way from their mother's grave, and said:
"If I were in your place, Mr. Colson, I should not rent these rooms at
all. They are not suited to your sister's needs. I am sure you can do
better."
The agent was disgusted. "Mr. Colson," indeed! The disreputable young
scamp whom nobody trusted. He would show this silly woman a fact or two.
"Business is business," he repeated doggedly. "Either they must take
the room, and pay the rent in advance, or else they must hustle out
this very night. I have waited now three days after time for decency's
sake, and more than that I couldn't and wouldn't do."
Dirk stood looking from one to the other, the red coming and going on
his swarthy face. Here was responsibility! He had not thought of it
before. The mother was not there to count out the hoarded rent with
trembling fingers, and save the wretched home to them for another
month. She would never be there again. He had nothing with which to pay
rent; he had nowhere to move. Yet "she" had called him Mr. Colson, and
seemed to expect him to act for himself and Mart.
It was she who answered the agent, but she spoke to Dirk:
"Very well. I suppose you are quite as willing to leave here to-night
as at any time. If I were you, I would leave immediately. Let your
sister come home with me for the night, and until you have time to make
other arrangements."
Mr. Roberts had been summoned to a bank meeting, and had sent Reid to
attend his wife. He came forward now from the carriage, where he had
stood waiting, and laid hand on Dirk's arm.
"And you come home with me to-night, Colson," he said in a cordial
tone, such as he might have used with any young friend; "then we shall
have a chance to talk things over and make plans."
"That is nice," Mrs. Roberts said quickly, rejoicing in her heart over
Reid's promptness to act. "Then you can get away from this wretched
place at once. Mr. Roberts will see to the removal of your goods,
whatever you need, and the agent can call on him in the morning. That
will be the simplest way to settle it all. May she go with me?"
A slight, caressing movement of a gloved hand on the girl's arm
accompanied this question.
Mart was silent with bewilderment. When had Dirk ever before been asked
what she might do, or might not do? At first she was half inclined to
scorn the suggestion. Then, suddenly, it came to her with a sense of
relief and protection: she was not alone; it was Dirk's business to
think of and care for her. Would he do it?
As for Dirk, no wonder that his face was deeply flushed. New thoughts
were struggling in his heart. He was to decide for Mart; he was the
head of the home now.
Mrs. Roberts waited anxiously. She longed exceedingly to rouse in
the boy, who was already grown to the stature of a man, a sense of
responsibility.
A moment more, and he had shaken himself free from the spell which
seemed to bind him.
"We'll do as you say." He spoke with the air of a man who had assumed
his proper place and taken up his duties. "Mart, you go along with her,
and I'll see about things to-morrow."
And Mart, for the first time in her life, received and obeyed in
silence a direction from her brother.
Possibly Mrs. Roberts may have been mistaken, but she thought that much
had been accomplished that day.
Yet none of them realized whereunto this thing would grow.
Mrs. Roberts, when she ushered Mart that evening into the pink room
again, and showed her how to manage the hot and cold water, and which
bell to ring if she needed anything, and in every imaginable way
treated her as a guest, whom it was pleasant to serve, had really no
plans just then—no hobby to ride—but simply acted out the dictates of
her heart.
You will remember that her Christian life had been always
unconventional. The very fact that during her early girlhood she had
been painfully trammelled by what "they" would say or think, seemed to
have had its influence over her later experiences. Since she had been
made free, she would be free indeed—that is, with the liberty with
which Christ makes us free. What would please "him" she resolved should
be the one thought to which she would give careful attention. Now,
it is perhaps worthy of mention that this closely following disciple
did not once stop to determine whether it would please him to give
such tender care to this stray child of his, or whether she would be
considered doing not just the thing, in his eyes, if she entertained
her in the pink room.
About what he would have her do next, she gave much thought. And it was
not for days, or rather weeks, that she caught the possibility of his
meaning that the pink room should really be the girl's own.
It was just this way. The weeks went by, and no plan for settling Mart
comfortably elsewhere met Mrs. Roberts's approval. There was constantly
some excellent reason why the one mentioned would not do.
Meantime they became, she and Gracie Dennis, more and more deeply
interested in Mart. In her wardrobe first.
"Wherever she lives, she should have respectable clothing; thus much is
easily settled."
So the matron decreed, and Gracie did not gainsay it. She became
absorbed in preparing it. Such fascinating work! So many things were
needed, and her skin was so delicate, and her eyes so blue, and
Gracie's choice of shades and textures fitted her so precisely.
Then when dressed, simple though her toilet was, her remarkable beauty
shone out so conspicuously as to alarm Mrs. Roberts, whenever she
thought of her in shop or in store.
Several times during the weeks she visited Sallie Calkins, and looked
about her with a thoughtful air, and came away feeling that it would
not do. There was Mark, growing into manhood; a good boy, hard-working,
respectable, proud of his good, homely sister, and of his reformed
father. The two rooms were taking on every sort of homely comfort that
Sallie's skill, helped by Mrs. Roberts's suggestions, could devise. It
was growing into a model little home in its way, but there was not a
corner in it where Mart would fit.
Then, as the days passed, a subtle, fascinating change began to come
over Mart. She slipped quietly into certain household duties. She
showed marvellous skill with her needle—such skill indeed, that Gracie
Dennis said more than once:
"I'll tell you, Flossy, what to do with her: put her in a good
establishment, and let her learn the dressmaking trade. She could make
her fortune in time."
And Mrs. Roberts smiled, and assented to the statement, but not to the
proposition. There was no dressmaking establishment known to her where
she was willing to place so young and pretty and ignorant a girl. But
she was quite willing that Mart should learn the looping of dresses,
and the fitting of sacks and collars and ruffles, and take many a
stitch for her, as well as for Gracie.
She was willing to have her do a dozen little nameless things the
ways of doing which she had caught up; until at last the touch of her
fingers began to be felt about the rooms, and Mrs. Roberts began to
notice that she should miss Mart when she went away. Still, from the
first time she said this, the thought came afterward with a smile of
satisfaction, and it was but a week afterward that she caught herself
phrasing it, that she should miss her "if" she went away.
What about Dirk? Young Reid could have told you more of him during
these days than anybody else. He still stayed at the boarding-house.
Mrs. Saunders, the mistress of it, was one who, if you had known her,
you would feel sure could interest herself heartily in such as he.
There was a bit of a room next to Reid's. To be sure, it had been used
for a clothes-press, and it took the busy housekeeper half-a-day to
plan how she could get along without it; but she planned, and offered
it to Reid for his protégé.
"Just for the present, you know, until he sees what he can do, poor
fellow," she said.
And Reid accepted the little room joyfully, and helped to fit it up.