"ALL GIRLS TOGETHER"
"I'm not going to lose my visit altogether," said Mrs. Bodine, when Mara
returned with an apology. "If the captain has only one leg, he can get out
and around better than I can. Indeed it is wonderful how he does get
around. He is the spryest man on crutches I ever saw, and you know, my
dear, I've seen a good many. In that dreadful war we were only too glad to
get our men back, what was left of them, and if an arm or a leg were
missing we welcomed them all the more, but we couldn't give much more than
a welcome. It was wreck and ruin on every side. If we had our own the
captain would be well off, as you and I would be, but he is poor; poorer
than most of us. In fact, he hasn't anything. He wasn't one of those
supple jointed men who could conform to the times, and he wasn't brought
up to make his living by thrifty ways. But he did his best, poor boy, he
did his best. Would you like to hear more about him?"
"Yes, indeed," Mara replied, "you can't know how deeply I am interested in
him and his daughter. He was my father's comrade in arms, his friend and
follower. You must pardon me for staying away so long, but when he began
talking of my father I felt as if I could listen forever, you know. I
honor him all the more because he is poor."
"Yes, my dear, I know. Most of us are learning the hard lessons of
poverty. I call him a boy because it seems only the other day he was a boy
and a handsome one, too. He used to visit us here, and was so full of fun
and frolic! But he has had enough to sober him, poor fellow. He was
scarcely more than a boy when the war began, but he was among the first to
enlist, and, like your father, he was a private soldier at first. He soon
received a commission in the same regiment of which your father became
colonel, and no doubt would have reached a much higher rank if he had not
lost his leg. He met with this loss before your brave father was killed,
but I suppose he told you."
"Yes," faltered Mara, "he told me why he was not with my father at the
last."
"Yes, if he could he would have been with him and died with him, and
sometimes I almost think he wishes that such had been his fate, he has
suffered so much. During the remainder of the war he had command of inland
positions which did not require marching, and he always made the record of
a brave, high-minded officer. After the war he married a lovely girl, and
tried to keep the old plantation: but his capital was gone, taxes were
high, the negroes wouldn't work, and I suppose he and his wife didn't know
how to practice close economy, and so the place had to be sold. It didn't
bring enough to pay the mortgages. It cut him to the quick to part with
the old plantation on which the family had lived for generations, but far
worse was soon to follow, for his wife died, and that nearly broke his
heart. Since that time he has lived in Georgia with his only child, Ella,
getting such occupation as he could--office work of various kinds, but I
suppose his reserved, gloomy ways rendered him unpopular; and even our own
people, when it comes to business, prefer an active man who has a ready
word for every one. I conjecture much of this, for he is not inclined to
talk about himself. Poor as I am, I'm glad they accepted my invitation,
and I mean to do all in my power to get him employment here. I have a
little influence yet with some people, and perhaps a place can be found or
made for him. He and his daughter don't require very much, and God knows
I'd share my last crust with them, and," she concluded with a little
apologetic laugh, "it _is_ almost like sharing a crust."
"Oh, he will get employment," cried Mara, enthusiastically; "his disabled
condition in itself will plead eloquently for him. How old is Ella?"
"She must be eighteen or thereabout."
"I wonder if she wouldn't like to help me?"
"Help you? She'd be delighted. But then, my dear, you must not be carried
away by your generous feeling. We're all proud of you because you have
struck out so bravely for yourself; but surely you have burdens enough
already."
"Perhaps Ella can lighten my burden, and I hers; but it is very homely,
humble work."
"You dear child!" exclaimed Mrs. Bodine, with her little chirruping laugh,
"you are not a very homely, humble doer of the work. I reckon there's no
prouder girl in town. But that's the way it is with the captain and all of
us, in fact. The poorer we are, the prouder we are. Well, well, our pride
is about all we can keep in these times. You need have no fear, however,
that Ella will hesitate in helping you, except as she may very naturally
think herself incompetent, or that you are wronging yourself in trying to
help her."
"We'll see about it," Mara remarked thoughtfully; "I will invite her to
spend a morning with me, and then she can obtain a practical idea of my
work. She might not like it at all, or she might like to do something else
much better, and so would be embarrassed if I asked her to help me,
disliking to refuse, and yet wishing to do so."
"Ah, well," said Mrs. Bodine, smiling; "we have some right to think
ourselves 'quality' still, as old Hannah calls us. We are just as
considerate of one another's feelings as if we were all Royal Highnesses.
Have it your own way, my dear, if you truly think Ella can be of service
to you. I reckon you need help, for you don't look as well as when I saw
you last."
"Yes," acquiesced Mara, "I think I do need help. Aun' Sheba's
granddaughter is assisting her, and a good deal more could be sold if it
were properly prepared. It would be a great happiness if my need opened
the way for Ella, for I feel it would please my father as much as it would
please me if I could be of service to his old friend and his daughter."
"I have heard, dear, that you are always trying to do what you thought
your father and mother would like."
"God forbid I should do otherwise," said the girl solemnly.
"Well, perhaps they know all about it," said the old lady, wiping a tear
from her eye. "How close our troubles bring us together. You are lonely
for your parents, and I am lonely for my husband and children."
"And yet you are braver and more cheerful than I," responded Mara; "I was
so sad and discouraged over the future this afternoon, that I came to you,
thinking that you might unconsciously teach me patience and courage. Truly
I was guided, for you face everything like a soldier. Then in meeting
Captain Bodine, I seem to have been brought nearer my father than ever
before. I can't hear about him without tears, yet I would turn from any
pleasure in the world to hear about him. What happiness if he had lived
and I could help him in some way!"
"Well, my dear, we all have our own way of bearing our burdens, and I
often wonder whether I have done more laughing or crying in my life. It
has been one or the other most of the time. I have always thanked the Lord
that when the pain or the trouble was not too severe, I could laugh, and
soon I know all tears will be wiped away. It's harder for you, my dear; it
is harder for you than me. My voyage has been long and stormy; husband,
sons, and the cause for which they died all lost; but I'm coming into the
harbor. You've got your voyage before you. But take courage. Who knows but
that your early days may be your darkest days? They can't always be dark
when you are so ready to brighten the lives of others. There, I hear
Ella's voice."
A moment later there was a knock at the door, and Ella Bodine entered. We
have all seen bright-hued flowers growing in shaded places, and among
cold, grim rocks. Such brightness had the young girl who now appears upon
the scene of our story. One speedily felt that its cause was not in
externals, but that it resulted from inherent qualities. As with Mara,
there had been much in her young life sad and hard to endure. She had not
surmounted her trouble by shallowness of soul or callousness, but rather
by a spiritual buoyancy which kept her above the dark waves, and enabled
her to enjoy all the sunshine vouchsafed. Yet, unlike her father and Mara,
she lived keenly in the present. She sympathized truly and honestly with
her father, and in a large measure intelligently recognized the nature of
the deep shadows projected across his life from the past, but it was her
disposition to keep as near to him as possible and yet remain just beyond
the shadows. She possessed a wholesome common-sense which taught her that
the shadows were not hers and that they were not good for her father; so
she was ever making inroads upon them, beguiling him into a smile,
surprising him into a laugh--in brief, preventing the shadows from
deepening into that gloom which is dangerous to bodily and spiritual
health. She made his small earnings go a great way, and banished from his
life the sordidness of poverty. God outlines an angel in many a woman's
heart, and often privations and sorrow, more surely than luxury, fill out
the divine sketch. In the instance of Ella Bodine the angelic was so
sweetly and inextricably interwoven with all that was human that to mortal
comprehension she was better than a wilderness of conventional angels. She
was depressed now under one of the few forms of adversity that could cast
her down. Her father was out of employment, their slender income had
ceased, and they were dependent. She felt this cruel position all the more
because Mrs. Bodine out of her poverty gave her hospitality so unstintedly
and ungrudgingly.
To the sensitive, fine-natured girl it was like feeding upon the life of
another, and that other a generous friend.
During her walk a score of schemes to earn money had presented themselves
to her inexperienced mind, but her hands had learned only how to eke out a
small salary and to minister to her father. She had come home resolute to
do something, but troubled because she knew not what to do.
She paused a moment on the threshold of Mrs. Bodine's apartment, and
looked questioningly at Mara, at the same time half divining who she was.
"Come along, Ella," cried Mrs. Bodine, with a little joyous laugh of
anticipation, "and kiss one of your best friends, although you never saw
her before."
"Is it Mara?"
Mara's smile and swift approach answered her question. In an instant the
two girls were in each other's arms, their warm Southern hearts touched by
the electric fire of sympathy and mutual understanding. Mrs. Bodine
clapped her little, thin hands and cried, "Oh, that's fine. Southern girls
have not died out yet. Why, even my old withered heart had one of the most
delicious thrills it ever experienced. Now, my dears, come and sit beside
me and get acquainted."
"Oh, I know you already, Mara Wallingford," said Ella with sparkling eyes.
"And I am learning to know you, Ella. I know you already well enough to
love you."
"Well," exclaimed Mrs. Bodine, raising her hands in a comic gesture, "I
reckon the ice is broken between you."
They all laughed at this sally, and Mara was so cheered, her nerves all
tingling with excitement, that she could scarcely believe herself to be
the half-despairing girl of a few hours before. "Now come," resumed Mrs.
Bodine, "let us all be girls together and have a good talk. At this rate
I'll soon be younger than either of you. I haven't had my share yet. Do
you believe it, Ella? Mara has been downstairs petting your father for an
hour."
"I wonder where he is. He wasn't in the parlor when I came in."
"I reckon he followed your good example and went out for a walk. I heard
the door shut. Well, you girls make a picture that it does my old eyes
good to look at. Here's Mara with her creamy white skin and eyes as
lustrous now as our Southern skies when full of stars, but sometimes, oh
so sad and dark. Dear child, I wish I could take the gloom all out of
them, for then I could think your heart was light. But I know how it is; I
know. Your mother gave you her sad heart when she gave you life, but you
have your father's strength and courage, my dear, and you will never give
up. And here is Ella with complexion of roses and snow and eyes like
violets with the morning dew still on them--forgive an old woman's flowery
speech, for that's the way we used to talk when I was young--yes, here is
Ella, a little peach blossom, yet brimming over with the wish to become a
big, luscious peach. Lor, Lor--oh, fie! Am I saying naughty words? But
then, my dears, you know my husband was a naval officer, and no man ever
swore more piously than he. Bad words never sounded bad to me when he
spoke them--he was such a good Christian! and he always treated me as he
expected to be treated when he was on deck. I reckon that I and the
Commodore are the only ones that ever ordered _him_ around," and the old
lady cried and laughed at the same time, while the faces of her young
companions were like flowers brightened by the sun while still wet with
dew.
"Let me see," continued the old lady, "where was I when I began to swear a
little; just a little, you know. It is a sort of tribute to my husband,
and so can't be very wicked. Oh, I remember, I was thinking what fun it
would have been to chaperon you two girls at one of our grand balls in the
good old times. I would sail around like a great ship of the line,
convoying two of the trimmest little crafts that ever floated, and all the
pirates, I mean gallant young men, my dears, would hover near, dying to
cut you out right under my guns, or nose, as land-lubbers would say. Well,
well, either of you could lead a score of them a chase before you signed
articles of unconditional surrender," and Mrs. Bodine leaned back in her
chair and laughed in her silvery little birdlike twitter. The girls
laughed with her, pleased in spite of themselves with visions that, both
in their nature and by tradition, accorded with the young romantic period
of life. But memory speedily began to restore gravity to Mara's face. Mrs.
Bodine recognized this, and her own face grew gentle and sorrowful. Laying
a hand on each of the girls heads she resumed, "Do not think I am a
frivolous old woman because I run on so. I do not forget the present any
more than Mara, I see, cannot. Dear children, the circumstances of your
lot render you as burdened and, in some ways, almost as old as I am. Ella
can forget easier than you, Mara, but that is because God has put
brightness into her heart. Let us all face the truth together. I am long
past being an elegant matron. I am only a poor old childless widow with
but a few more days of feebleness and suffering before me, yet I do not
sigh in a bitter, murmuring spirit. Old as I am, I am still God's little
child, and sometimes I think this truth makes me as mirthful as a child.
When the pain is hardest to bear, when the past, oh, the past--with all
its immeasurable losses, begins to crush my very soul, I turn my dim eyes
upward and repeat to myself, 'There _is_ a Heaven of eternal rest and
joy,' and so I grow serene in my waiting. I have always loved the bright,
pleasant things of this world--it was my nature to do so--but He who bears
the burdens and heartbreak of the whole world has gently lifted my love up
to Him. Didn't He have compassion on the widow of Nain, and say to her,
'Weep not'? My gallant husband, my brave boys and this poor little widow
are all in His hands, and I try to obey His gentle command not to weep
except sometimes when I can't help it and He knows I can't."
The two girls with their heads in her lap were crying softly from
sympathy. With light, caressing touches to each the old lady continued,
"Ella, my dear, you are like me in some respects. You, too, love the
bright pleasant things of this world, and you are so divinely blessed with
a buoyancy of heart that you will make what is hard and humdrum bright for
yourself and others. You will embroider life with sunshine if there is any
sunshine at all. Like myself, you will be able to smile and laugh whenever
the pain is not too severe, yet I fear it will be very hard sometimes.
Bat, as my husband would say, you are taut, trim and well ballasted, and
good for a long, safe voyage. You have obeyed the Fifth Commandment, and
its promise is yours.
"Mara, dear child my heart, for some reason, aches for you. I knew and
loved your grandfather and your father and mother. You were born into a
heritage of bitterness and sorrow, and I fear Mrs. Hunter, with all her
good qualities, was not so constituted as to be able to counteract
inherited tendencies. I wish I could have brought you up, for then we
could have cried or laughed together over what happened.
"But you have learned to repress and to brood--two dangerous habits. You
want to do some great thing, and alas! there is seldom a great thing which
we poor women can do. You are not impelled by ambition or a desire for
notoriety, but by a sort of passion for self-sacrifice.
"If you had lived twenty odd years ago no soldier of the South could have
been braver or more devoted. You are not satisfied with mere living and
making the best of life as it is. I don't know why, but I feel that there
are depths in your heart which no one understands. Be careful, dear child,
and be patient. Don't yield to some morbid idea of duty, or be involved in
some chimerical plan of an achievement.
"Learn Ella's philosophy, and be as content with sunshine and daily duty
as possible. Ella will do this unconsciously, my dear; you will have to do
it consciously, just as a sick man seeks health. But you will both have to
go forward and meet woman's lot. I was once a young girl, fancy free, like
you. How much has happened since! I now feel like an old hen that would
like to gather you both under her wing in shelter from all trouble," and
again her little laugh chimed out while she wiped away the tears which
sprang from her motherly heart.
The thump of Captain Bodine's crutches was heard on the stair. "Bring him
in," said Mrs. Bodine, mopping her eyes vigorously.
Ella ran to the door and admitted him, and then, with a pretty custom she
had, took away a crutch, and substituting one of her own round shoulders
supported him to a large armchair. The low western sun flooded the room
with light. He looked questioningly at the dewy eyes of the two girls and
at the evidences of emotion which Mrs. Bodine had not been fully able to
remove.
"Well," said he, "what part am I to have in this mournful occasion?"
Ella stood beside him with her arm about his neck, and was about to speak,
when Mrs. Bodine said quickly in her piquant way, "You are to be chief
mourner."
"A role for which I am peculiarly fitted," he replied sadly, not catching
her humor.
"Oh, papa, you don't understand," cried Ella, "we have been having just a
heavenly time."
He looked at Mara as she stood beside the old lady, and his very soul was
touched by the sympathy expressed for him in her beautiful eyes. Standing
there, enveloped in sunshine, it seemed to him that no angel of God could
regard him more kindly. It was not pity, but rather honor, affection and
that deep commiseration of which but few women are capable. He felt
instinctively that she knew all and that her woman's heart was suffering
vicariously with him and for him. The very air was electrical with deep
human feeling, and he, yielding to a strong impulse scarcely understood,
said earnestly, "God bless you, Mara Wallingford."
Sensible old Mrs. Bodine felt that it was time to come back to every-day
life, so she said promptly, "Yes, and He is going to bless her, and bless
us all. If there is any mourning to be done on this occasion you must do
it. We three girls have been having a good talk, and are the better for
it. That's the demmed total--oh, fie! there I am at it again. Well, Cousin
Hugh, to take you into our entire confidence, we have been facing things
and have arrived at several conclusions, one of which is--now, Ella, shut
your ears--that you have one of the best daughters in the world, and that
she and Mara have quite broken the ice between them and are going to be
very good friends, and I was saying how I would like to convoy two such
girls in one of our ballrooms in the good old times--oh, well, we have
just been having a long lingo as girls will when they get together."
Captain Bodine was gifted with tact and a quick appreciation. He
understood the old lady and her purpose.
"Cousin Sophy," he said, "you are just the same as when, a boy, I used to
visit you--tears and smiles close together. Well, I believe that Heaven
comes down very near when you three girls get together."
The old lady lay back in her chair and laughed heartily. "Oh, Ella, if you
only knew what a mischievous boy your father was once! But, there, we have
had enough of the past and the future for one day. Mara, my dear, you must
stay and banquet with us. No, no, no, I won't hear any excuse. When I once
get on quarter-deck every one must obey orders. Ella, direct Hannah to
spread the festive board. You and Mara can lend a hand, and you can put on
all we have in five minutes. To think that I should have eaten that
delicious jelly you brought, greedy old cormorant that I am!"
A few moments later Mara supported the old lady down to the dining-room,
and, though the viands were few and meagre, the banqueters, to say the
least, were not commonplace. Mara said nothing of her plan, but Ella was
invited to spend the following morning with her. In the late lingering
twilight Captain Bodine escorted the young girl home. On the way thither
they came plump upon Owen Clancy. He glanced keenly from one to the other
as he lifted his hat. Mara's only response was a slight bow.