_HAROLD AND META_
"The dear Lord's best interpreters
Are humble human souls;
The gospel of a life like hers
Is more than books or scrolls.
From scheme and creed the light goes out,
The saintly fact survives;
The blessed Master none can doubt
Revealed in holy lives."
--WHITIER.
The two women, sitting together in the little parlour behind the shop,
seemed to have been drawn to each other by some subtle influence which
neither could explain. When Mrs. Beaton proposed that Elsie should take
off her cloak and stay long enough to drink a cup of tea, the invitation
was accepted at once. And then Elsie told her name, and a little bit of
her own history, before she began to listen to the story of Meta.
"There is a resemblance between your life and hers," Mrs. Beaton said
thoughtfully. "I remember she once told me that she was alone in the
world; parents, brothers, and sisters had all passed away, and the few
relations who remained cared nothing about her. Some artist friend, who
had helped her to get on, recommended Mrs. Penn as a safe woman to live
with. Then, too, that top room was a suitable place to work in; there
was plenty of light and air. One day Mrs. Penn brought her here, and
asked my son to show her some of our art treasures, and that is how we
were acquainted with her first."
"Was she very clever?" Elsie asked.
"I don't know enough of art to answer you; but my son says that she was.
Andrew is a judge in such matters, and I have often heard him say that
Miss Neale had the true gift. But, although she had been well trained,
she lacked a good many of those advantages which help to make artists
successful. She could not afford to travel, and she was so poor that she
was forced to work below her powers. Still, she was rising steadily in
her calling, and increasing her earnings, when she first met Mr.
Waring."
"Mr. Waring? Ah, that was Harold," said Elsie.
"Yes, that was Harold. He was the junior curate at St. Lucy's Church in
a street close by. In that street there was a young girl dying of
consumption who was very lonely, and wanted a good deal of cheering and
visiting. I used to see her as often as I could; but when my rheumatism
cripples me I am helpless. I soon found out that Miss Neale knew how to
comfort the sick, and I asked her to go to the poor girl. She went, and
did more good than I had ever done. And it was in that sick-room that
Mr. Waring first spoke to her."
Elsie recalled the words in the manuscript, "What a new life came to me
all at once when I met Harold for the first time!"
"There are many kinds of love," continued the old woman in her quiet
voice, "and it was given to those two to know the best kind of all. They
gained strength from each other; they worked as one. In these crowded
streets they have left traces of their simple, earnest lives--lives of
self-sacrifice and devotion to humanity. They made no noise in the
world. Harold Waring was not eloquent; he was not a profound scholar; he
said very little about creeds. And yet all sorts of believers and
unbelievers trusted this man, and looked up to him, because he was
simply an interpreter of Divine love. Harold and Meta lived long enough
to reveal their Master's sweetness to the people. And the sweetness
lingers with us still."
Mrs. Beaton took off her spectacles and wiped her eyes. Then she looked
up at Elsie with a smile, and shook her head over her own weakness. "My
tears are for myself--not for them," she said. "I still miss them, and I
am too old to go amongst those who miss them even more than I do. I
shall never forget Mr. Waring's face when he came to tell me about the
legacy. He was tall and fair, with clear eyes that had the blue of
heaven in them."
"And Jamie's eyes are like his," interrupted Elsie.
"Yes; that's true. The boy was more like his uncle than his father. I
only saw Mr. James Waring once or twice, and I always distrusted him.
Well, as I was saying, Harold Waring's face was beautiful with hope and
happiness. 'We shall have a home, Mrs. Beaton,' he said; 'we shall have
a home!'"
"That hope was never realised!" sighed Elsie.
Mrs. Beaton's look was very bright.
"Don't you think that it is realised now?" she asked. "I have often
fancied that it is the want unanswered here which is most fully
satisfied hereafter. It makes the new life all the fresher and sweeter,
you see. They wanted a home; but home is not a place, it is a state.
There can be no home at all if there is not that mystical house, 'not
made with hands,' where spirits blend and dwell together for ever."
Just then the parlour-door opened quietly, and Andrew Beaton came into
the room. "Mother is giving you some of her notions," he said. "She says
that all the joys of heaven must first have had their beginnings in our
souls on earth."
"'To him that hath, shall be given,'" the old lady quoted. "Miss Kilner,
I'm afraid you find me very wearisome, my dear. You wanted to hear about
Meta Neale's life in this world, and I am trying to talk about her life
in the next. Forgive a foolish old woman, who sits and dreams over her
fire."
It was pleasant to see the look in Andrew's eyes when his mother called
herself a foolish old woman. His glance had flatly contradicted her
statement before Elsie spoke.
"Mrs. Beaton," she said earnestly, "I like to hear your notions. You
have done me good. I have been thinking a great deal too much lately
about the things that are temporal. There were no spiritual influences
in my Sussex home," she added, with a sigh.
"One ought to look up sometimes," said Andrew; "but one mustn't forget
the story of that great artist who was painting the ceiling of a chapel
for two years. He got into such a confirmed habit of looking up that it
cost him a mighty effort to look down at the common ground he had to
walk on."
Mrs. Beaton poured out tea for her son, and smiled at Elsie across the
table. It was a humble home at the back of a London shop, but Elsie
found here the thought and refinement which she had so often missed in
other houses. She remembered the prattle which usually accompanied the
clatter of afternoon teacups, and the bits of scandal handed round with
the cake.
"I don't think we will dwell too long on the end of Meta's earthly
love-story," said Mrs. Beaton, after a pause; "she has told you enough
in her manuscript. For nearly a year after Harold Waring died she was
living and working among us, and taking care of Jamie. It was in
December--just before Christmas--that Mrs. Penn found her by the child's
side in her last sleep."
There was another pause. Elsie felt that tears were gathering in her
eyes and could not speak. It was well that Andrew broke the silence.
"It is just a year and six months since Mrs. Penn and Jamie went away,"
he said. "She had grown tired of her house, I think, and the death of
Miss Neale preyed upon her mind. Some one came and took house and
furniture off her hands. My mother and I have been expecting a letter,
but no letter has come."
"I think we ought to bestir ourselves," the old lady remarked. "Mrs.
Penn was not quite the right person to have the care of a boy. If I
hadn't believed that we should be informed of her movements, I would not
have let Jamie go so easily. But the child clung to her very much after
Miss Neale's death; no one else could comfort him."
"Have you ever heard of Arnold Wayne?" Elsie suddenly asked.
"Never," replied both the Beatons at once. "Who was he? Had he anything
to do with Miss Neale?"
"I don't think she ever saw him," Elsie replied. "Her manuscript merely
says that he was Harold's college friend, and she must search Harold's
papers to find his address. It was evident that she felt her own end
approaching, and thought that Mr. Wayne might do something for Jamie."
Andrew Beaton caught at the idea at once. "We'll find him out!" he
cried. "Mr. Waring was a King's College man. It will be easy enough to
learn something about Arnold Wayne there. But we must find Jamie first
of all."
"Don't you know where Mrs. Penn went when she left Soho Square?"
inquired Elsie.
"Not exactly," Andrew admitted. "Mother, how could we have been so
neglectful? We ought to have insisted on having her address!"
"But she had no address to give us," Mrs. Beaton answered, with a
troubled look on her kind face. "She said she would go to stay with some
friends at Brighton for a month; the sea-air would be good for the boy
and herself. They had both fretted themselves quite ill. After leaving
Brighton she was thinking of settling at Lee, in Kent. Naturally, I
approved of the Brighton plan, as I knew that Jamie needed a change."
Elsie was thoughtful for a moment; then she looked up, with a sudden
hope shining in her eyes. "Perhaps we are worrying ourselves without a
cause," she said. "It may be that they have not left Brighton, and the
child is well and happy there."
"Who can tell?" The words came from Andrew as he rose from his chair and
went to a side-table. "I am going to write to Mrs. Penn through the
papers." His mother and Elsie watched him as he opened a blotting-book
and set about his task at once. There was something firm and
business-like in his way of doing things. In a few minutes the notice
was written, and he read it aloud to them:--"Mrs. Penn, formerly of --
Soho Square, is requested to communicate at once with Andrew Beaton, --
Wardour Street, W."
"That will do," said Mrs. Beaton approvingly.
Elsie, too, rose from her seat. The afternoon was wearing away, and Miss
Saxon would be getting uneasy at her absence.
"You will come again, my dear?" said the old lady, holding her hand in a
lingering clasp.
"I shall be very glad to come," Elsie answered. "It is so long since I
have talked with any one so motherly as you are." As she spoke her lips
quivered. They both knew that the loss of a mother leaves a void which
can only be filled up in heaven, and perhaps the first treasure restored
to us there will be the unspeakable gift of a mother's love.
"I have never had a daughter," said Mrs. Beaton, with a slight trembling
in her voice. "When Meta Neale came I sometimes caught a glimpse of what
a daughter might be."
The room was growing darker, but Elsie felt rather than saw the swift
look of pain which swept across Andrew's face. She felt in her mind,
magnetically, the feeling that was in his. It came to her all at
once--that sudden, strange intuition which reveals to us the deep places
in other people's lives.
He, too, had caught a glimpse of what a daughter might have been to his
mother. He had seen how lovely his life might have grown if he could
have won Meta. But that vision had been sternly put away from him;
neither in this life nor the next would she belong to him.
It was worse than a loss, Elsie thought. It was "the devotion to
something afar" from his own sphere--a longing for the light of a star
that had never shone into his world at all. He was not grieving for a
gift given and taken away, but for a treasure which had never for an
instant come within his reach. She went away in the gathering dusk with
a heart full of sympathy. Had the "vanished hand" guided her into the
path of his solitary life that she might shed a ray of brightness there?
Miss Saxon was waiting for her with an anxious face. Some people had
called and left cards--friends who had lived once near her old
neighbourhood. Elsie felt very little interest in them now; her mind was
full of new feelings; she did not care to talk over bygone days. "I
don't want to begin visiting," she said. "I am so busy, Miss Saxon! In
this life of mine there is so much to do--is there not?"