On the second morning after Old Lady Lloyd’s journey to town, Sylvia
Gray was walking blithely down the wood lane. It was a beautiful autumn
morning, clear and crisp and sunny; the frosted ferns, drenched and
battered with the rain of yesterday, gave out a delicious fragrance;
here and there in the woods a maple waved a gay crimson banner, or a
branch of birch showed pale golden against the dark, unchanging spruces.
The air was very pure and exhilarating. Sylvia walked with a joyous
lightness of step and uplift of brow.
At the beech in the hollow she paused for an expectant moment, but there
was nothing among the gray old roots for her. She was just turning
away when little Teddy Kimball, who lived next door to the manse,
came running down the slope from the direction of the old Lloyd place.
Teddy’s freckled face was very pale.
“Oh, Miss Gray!” he gasped. “I guess Old Lady Lloyd has gone clean crazy
at last. The minister’s wife asked me to run up to the Old Lady, with a
message about the Sewing Circle--and I knocked--and knocked--and nobody
came--so I thought I’d just step in and leave the letter on the
table. But when I opened the door, I heard an awful queer laugh in the
sitting-room, and next minute, the Old Lady came to the sitting-room
door. Oh, Miss Gray, she looked awful. Her face was red and her eyes
awful wild--and she was muttering and talking to herself and laughing
like mad. I was so scared I just turned and run.”
Sylvia, without stopping for reflection, caught Teddy’s hand and ran
up the slope. It did not occur to her to be frightened, although she
thought with Teddy that the poor, lonely, eccentric Old Lady had really
gone out of her mind at last.
The Old Lady was sitting on the kitchen sofa when Sylvia entered. Teddy,
too frightened to go in, lurked on the step outside. The Old Lady still
wore the damp black silk dress in which she had walked from the station.
Her face was flushed, her eyes wild, her voice hoarse. But she knew
Sylvia and cowered down.
“Don’t look at me,” she moaned. “Please go away--I can’t bear that YOU
should know how poor I am. You’re to go to Europe--Andrew Cameron is
going to send you--I asked him--he couldn’t refuse ME. But please go
away.”
Sylvia did not go away. At a glance she had seen that this was sickness
and delirium, not insanity. She sent Teddy off in hot haste for Mrs.
Spencer and when Mrs. Spencer came they induced the Old Lady to go to
bed, and sent for the doctor. By night everybody in Spencervale knew
that Old Lady Lloyd had pneumonia.
Mrs. Spencer announced that she meant to stay and nurse the Old
Lady. Several other women offered assistance. Everybody was kind and
thoughtful. But the Old Lady did not know it. She did not even know
Sylvia Gray, who came and sat by her every minute she could spare.
Sylvia Gray now knew all that she had suspected--the Old Lady was her
fairy godmother. The Old Lady babbled of Sylvia incessantly, revealing
all her love for her, betraying all the sacrifices she had made.
Sylvia’s heart ached with love and tenderness, and she prayed earnestly
that the Old Lady might recover.
“I want her to know that I give her love for love,” she murmured.
Everybody knew now how poor the Old Lady really was. She let slip all
the jealously guarded secrets of her existence, except her old love for
Leslie Gray. Even in delirium something sealed her lips as to that.
But all else came out--her anguish over her unfashionable attire,
her pitiful makeshifts and contrivances, her humiliation over wearing
unfashionable dresses and paying only five cents where every other
Sewing Circle member paid ten. The kindly women who waited on her
listened to her with tear-filled eyes, and repented of their harsh
judgments in the past.
“But who would have thought it?” said Mrs. Spencer to the minister’s
wife. “Nobody ever dreamed that her father had lost ALL his money,
though folks supposed he had lost some in that old affair of the silver
mine out west. It’s shocking to think of the way she has lived all these
years, often with not enough to eat--and going to bed in winter days to
save fuel. Though I suppose if we had known we couldn’t have done much
for her, she’s so desperate proud. But if she lives, and will let us
help her, things will be different after this. Crooked Jack says he’ll
never forgive himself for taking pay for the few little jobs he did for
her. He says, if she’ll only let him, he’ll do everything she wants done
for her after this for nothing. Ain’t it strange what a fancy she’s took
to Miss Gray? Think of her doing all those things for her all summer,
and selling the grape jug and all. Well, the Old Lady certainly isn’t
mean, but nobody made a mistake in calling her queer. It all does seem
desperate pitiful. Miss Gray’s taking it awful hard. She seems to think
about as much of the Old Lady as the Old Lady thinks of her. She’s so
worked up she don’t even seem to care about going to Europe next year.
She’s really going--she’s had word from Andrew Cameron. I’m awful glad,
for there never was a sweeter girl in the world; but she says it will
cost too much if the Old Lady’s life is to pay for it.”
Andrew Cameron heard of the Old Lady’s illness and came out to
Spencervale himself. He was not allowed to see the Old Lady, of course;
but he told all concerned that no expense or trouble was to be spared,
and the Spencervale doctor was instructed to send his bill to Andrew
Cameron and hold his peace about it. Moreover, when Andrew Cameron
went back home, he sent a trained nurse out to wait on the Old Lady, a
capable, kindly woman who contrived to take charge of the case without
offending Mrs. Spencer--than which no higher tribute could be paid to
her tact!
The Old Lady did not die--the Lloyd constitution brought her through.
One day, when Sylvia came in, the Old Lady smiled up at her, with a
weak, faint, sensible smile, and murmured her name, and the nurse said
that the crisis was past.
The Old Lady made a marvellously patient and tractable invalid. She did
just as she was told, and accepted the presence of the nurse as a matter
of course.
But one day, when she was strong enough to talk a little, she said to
Sylvia,
“I suppose Andrew Cameron sent Miss Hayes here, did he?” “Yes,” said
Sylvia, rather timidly.
The Old Lady noticed the timidity and smiled, with something of her old
humour and spirit in her black eyes.
“Time has been when I’d have packed off unceremoniously any person
Andrew Cameron sent here,” she said. “But, Sylvia, I have gone through
the Valley of the Shadow of Death, and I have left pride and resentment
behind me for ever, I hope. I no longer feel as I felt towards Andrew.
I can even accept a personal favour from him now. At last I can forgive
him for the wrong he did me and mine. Sylvia, I find that I have been
letting no ends of cats out of bags in my illness. Everybody knows now
how poor I am--but I don’t seem to mind it a bit. I’m only sorry that
I ever shut my neighbours out of my life because of my foolish pride.
Everyone has been so kind to me, Sylvia. In the future, if my life is
spared, it is going to be a very different sort of life. I’m going to
open it to all the kindness and companionship I can find in young and
old. I’m going to help them all I can and let them help me. I CAN help
people--I’ve learned that money isn’t the only power for helping people.
Anyone who has sympathy and understanding to give has a treasure that is
without money and without price. And oh, Sylvia, you’ve found out what I
never meant you to know. But I don’t mind that now, either.”
Sylvia took the Old Lady’s thin white hand and kissed it.
“I can never thank you enough for what you have done for me, dearest
Miss Lloyd,” she said earnestly. “And I am so glad that all mystery is
done away with between us, and I can love you as much and as openly as
I have longed to do. I am so glad and so thankful that you love me, dear
fairy godmother.”
“Do you know WHY I love you so?” said the Old Lady wistfully. “Did I let
THAT out in my raving, too?”
“No, but I think I know. It is because I am Leslie Gray’s daughter,
isn’t it? I know that father loved you--his brother, Uncle Willis, told
me all about it.”
“I spoiled my own life because of my wicked pride,” said the Old Lady
sadly. “But you will love me in spite of it all, won’t you, Sylvia? And
you will come to see me sometimes? And write me after you go away?”
“I am coming to see you every day,” said Sylvia. “I am going to stay
in Spencervale for a whole year yet, just to be near you. And next year
when I go to Europe--thanks to you, fairy godmother--I’ll write you
every day. We are going to be the best of chums, and we are going to
have a most beautiful year of comradeship!”
The Old Lady smiled contentedly. Out in the kitchen, the minister’s
wife, who had brought up a dish of jelly, was talking to Mrs. Spencer
about the Sewing Circle. Through the open window, where the red vines
hung, came the pungent, sun-warm October air. The sunshine fell over
Sylvia’s chestnut hair like a crown of glory and youth.
“I do feel so perfectly happy,” said the Old Lady, with a long,
rapturous breath.