AFTER THE STORM.
All night long the rush and roar of heaving waters filled that old
farm-house. The two young girls, who were guests for the time, awoke now
and then with a thrill of remembrance, and clung to each other for a
while, then whispering that all was safe, dropped to sleep again.
Bertha scarcely closed her eyes. Her body was shaken in every nerve by
the peril she had escaped, in a miracle of bravery. Her soul also was in
tumults. The refusal with which she had so positively repulsed Fletcher
haunted her like a crime; when she thought of it a chill of
self-loathing swept through her. Why had she repulsed him so cruelly?
How had she dared to wound the man, who, an hour after her cold rebuff,
had plunged into the depths of that flood to save her life? Had she
parted with him ungratefully at last? Was it her fault that he went
away, dripping wet as he was, never once looking back as she sat
shuddering with cold on the door-step, giving more pity to the beast
that was hurled from under her into the flood than she had bestowed on
the man?
Notwithstanding those shoots of vivid sunshine that had heralded the
party on to its awful peril, the storm was not over, but raged deep into
the night. Little rain fell, but the wind was furious, and with that
came the dull hoarse roar of the mustering waters that grew louder and
louder as the stillness of night deepened, while the great trees that
sheltered that old house writhed and groaned, and beat their gnarled
limbs on the roof, as if denouncing her miserable ingratitude. Not a
moment of sleep softened the agony of that night’s loneliness. If the
storm seemed to hush itself, and give her a moment’s breathing time,
before her eyelids closed it would swoop down upon the old house again,
and shake it from stepping-stone to chimney, as if a troop of fiends
were trying to reach her, and battled furiously with the old trees for
guarding her so well. Daybreak found the girl pale as a drenched lily,
with all the redness quenched on her lips, and her large eyes looking
out from the dusky shadows that had crept around them in the night.
Is it strange that this young girl clasped her hands as the dull light
came through the windows, and that tears filled her eyes? True, the
storm was hushed, but the trees still moaned over the old house, and
blade clouds, broken away from the retreating storm, curtained her
windows with gloom.
Bertha slept a few minutes after this, but her sweet face was troubled
even in that brief slumber, and when the door opened and a little old
woman, in a dove-colored dress, and wearing a cap of soft lise without
frill or lace, came softly in, she seemed a little disturbed even by the
light footfall which fell like snow on the floor.
“Is thee awake, Bertha? Has sleep done thee good?”
Bertha awoke with a start, and held out her hands.
“Grandmother!”
“Thee trembles, child. Thy hands are cold.”
“Yes, grandmother, I am a little cold. I could not sleep. The storm
raged so and that gulf of waters seemed opening under me all night.”
“Yes, yes, that was enough to frighten thee, poor child; but it is over
now. Hear how the girls are laughing in their room.”
“They were not so near death,” said Bertha. “They have done nothing to
be sorry for.”
“Thee has done nothing, either,” said the old lady, kissing Bertha on
the forehead; “but thee is worn out and must have more sleep. I will
bring up some breakfast.”
“No, no, grandmother. I am well, nothing is the matter. Besides, I have
something which must be done.”
“Well, it is early yet. Sleep a little. By-and-by I will come again.”
There was something so soft and caressing in the old lady’s voice that
it almost induced sleep in itself. Bertha closed her eyes, and a faint
smile stole across her lips.
“Yes, grandmother, I will sleep.”
The old lady stole out of the room, and knocked softly at the chamber
door, through which pleasant laughter still came, and, with a finger on
her lips, said to the young girls who answered the knock,
“Bertha has not slept well. It is very early. Let her rest.”
After that the house was still as a deserted bird’s nest, for the old
people were in the far off kitchen, and the girls up-stairs talked in
whispers and laughed under their breath.
A thin partition only separated them from the room in which that
suffering mother slept; they knew that the old lady had gone in there,
and, with her gentle voice, was soothing the nervous wakefulness that
had risen almost to frenzy while the flood was roaring and the storm
raging around her.
After a while they heard Bertha come softly from her room and enter that
from which the grandmother had just withdrawn. Her voice was louder and
more cheerful than the soothing tones of the sweet old friend.
“Look up, mother,” she said, “all the danger is over. The old bridge has
gone, but what of that? They will soon build a new one. See how brightly
the sun is shining.”
A faint voice answered this cheery greeting; then Bertha spoke again:
“But the storm is over and the flood is going down. Grandmother has got
our breakfast ready. Will you not come? See how the rain drops twinkle
and gleam at the window. It shines like silver among the wet leaves.
See, I am filling your room with the sweet, fresh air. So you must join
us; besides, Clara Anderson is going away.”
Again the faint voice seemed to protest.
After a little, Bertha came out of her mother’s room, threw off her
forced cheerfulness, and turned to the girls, that were waiting for her,
with tears in her eyes.
“Poor mamma. The terror of this flood has nearly killed her,” she said.
“She does not seem to feel that we are all safe yet. She trembles like a
leaf, and will not even look out of doors.”
“Oh, this glorious day will soon bring her round,” said Mary Noel. “Come
now, let us see what havoc the tempest has made.”
Bertha met this proposal with cheerfulness, and went with her guests to
the front door.
Around the old homestead the storm had torn and swept away many dear,
familiar things that the girl’s heart yearned over. In the front yard a
peach tree, torn up by the roots, lay quivering in all its wet leaves
and tender twigs. Across the street a spring of crystalline waters,
gurgling through moss and whispering rushes only the day before, had
become a turbulent whirl of waters, pouring itself across the highway.
The dogwood trees that had sheltered it were twisted off at the stem.
Vines that had flung a torrent of foliage down the rock were swept away;
a few broken stems alone clung to the rock, where they had basked in the
sunshine and trembled in the wind.
Above all this, the storm-clouds rolled back in glorious embankments,
softer and more luminous than snow, and, underneath them, all this ruin
and waste grew beautiful as paradise.
“How grandly the old mill has withstood the flood!” said Clara Anderson,
pointing with her riding-whip to the stone fabric, from whose windows
and doors the water was pouring. “I almost feel as if it were human and
proud of its victory. Ah, here comes Mr. Fletcher, and I have my
breakfast to eat.”
Bertha’s heart gave a great leap as she followed the direction of
Clara’s hand, and saw the man who had saved her life approaching. She
had a vague knowledge that Clara Anderson had gone down the hall, and
that Mary Noel had followed, sending a little ripple of mischievous
laughter behind her as she escaped.
No matter what they did, she would remain to receive the man who had
saved her from that awful death. Her heart beat loudly, a glow of
grateful warmth, such as she had never felt before, pervaded her whole
being.
“Surely, surely, this is love,” she thought, with a strange thrill of
pleasure. “Yes, yes, this must be love.”
This thought gave bloom to her cheeks, and flooded her eyes with tender
light. She stood impatiently while Fletcher fastened his horse and came
through the gate. Then she left the door-stone and, with her hands
extended, met the young man half way.
A less sensitive man might have taken hope from this, but Fletcher
remembered her words, uttered with such earnestness the day before, and
refused to deceive himself. Still his hand trembled as it accepted hers,
and a grave, sweet smile stole over his mouth.
“I was almost afraid to come,” he said. “It seemed impossible that I
should find you able to see any one.”
“I must be ill indeed, not to see you,” said Bertha, with a soft tremor
of the voice. “Oh, Mr. Fletcher, how can I ever thank you enough!”
“Thank me for permitting you to run into such awful danger! Why, Miss
Canfield, I have spent the night praying God to forgive me for it.”
“And I have prayed him to bless you for it,” said Bertha. “Prayed him to
make me worthy of the words you said to me yesterday on the hill road.”
The girl trembled violently now, and intense feeling drove the color
from her face. He did not speak, but stood with his eyes bent on her
with a strange, wistful expression, while his grasp tightened nervously
on her hands.
“Mr. Fletcher,” she said, gratefully, and with gentle firmness that went
to his heart, “you have saved my life. It may not be worth much. Will
you accept it? Living or dying, I can never do enough to make myself
worthy of your love.”
The hands which held hers shook, and the thrill that stirred it reached
her heart. For one moment a glow of exquisite hope flooded his fine
eyes. Then he slowly dropped her hands and turned his head away.
“You have saved me—you love me!” Bertha exclaimed, clasping the hands he
had relinquished.
The young man turned his face full upon her. It was pale as marble.
“I love you better than my life—better than man ever loved woman! But,
Bertha Canfield, do you love me?”
His voice shook—she knew that he trembled all over.
“Not twenty-four hours ago,” he continued, more firmly, “you told me
that it was impossible.”
“Hours!” repeated Bertha. “It seems like years. That great gulf has been
passed since then.”
“Do hearts change so suddenly?”
Bertha cast down her eyes. The earnest question in his made her tremble.
“I see you are grateful for an act which simply proves that I am not
quite a coward. You would reward me with a hand that I would give my
life to possess a free gift, but will not take as a reward.”
A glow of light flashed over Bertha’s face, her eyes shone with tears.
She again laid her hand in the clasp which had dropped it with such
pain.
“Are such feelings as these to be rejected,” she said, “because they do
not answer the fulness of your desires? I did not know what love was
then—now, I could lay my life at your feet!”
“Do not tempt me so—in mercy, do not! It opens a glimpse of happiness
that I am almost craven enough to seize upon! But you have mistaken
thankfulness for a passion which must last forever, or become
worthless.”
Bertha allowed her hand to fall from his clasp a second time. How could
she tell, with all the inexperience of untried feelings, that he had not
read the emotions of her heart aright? She was only sure of one thing:
if that was gratitude, she would ask nothing better than thankfulness
all her life.
She said this with a sweet modesty that almost disarmed the man; but he
loved that young creature supremely, and, knowing it, would take nothing
less than her entire love in return.
“I must not stay here,” he said, with deep feeling. “It were dishonor to
accept happiness at the price of yours. Only tell me one thing: has any
other person—”
“Do not finish the question,” she replied, quickly; “I have already
answered it. No other person has ever spoken to me seriously of love.
Remember how recently I left school—how little I have seen.”
“I do remember, and this gives me a little honest hope. But you must not
be troubled by the presence of a man who will adore you through all his
life. To-night I shall leave this place.”
“You leave us to-night!” said Bertha, reproachfully.
“It is better so; out of your presence I can command myself. Left in
this sweet solitude, you will understand your own heart. By-and-by we
shall meet again; then I will take my fate. Till then, farewell!”
Before Bertha could answer, Clara Anderson came into the hall with the
bloom of fresh country air in her face, and the stately grace of a queen
in her bearing; for the long skirt of her habit trailing over the floor
gave her an air of courtly dignity that another dress might have lacked.
Bertha breathed quickly, and her face grew anxious.
“This is not a farewell,” she said; “I shall see you again.”
“After you have had time for thought, and I to make myself more worthy,”
was the low answer.
Then a single grasp of the hand followed; Clara had drawn close to them,
and Fletcher was to escort her home. Directly Mary Noel came from the
breakfast-room, and tenderly kissing Clara good-by, stood with Bertha on
the door-step till the young people rode away, taking their course down
the valley, toward a lower bridge which the flood had spared.
The two girls thus left upon the door-step stood there with clasped
hands like sisters that had just parted from a dear friend—which was
true; for these three had been intimate beyond all others in their
school-days, and fate had dealt hardly with Clara Anderson since then—so
hardly that those friends gazed after her, as she rode away, with tears
in their eyes.
As she disappeared beyond the old mill, Bertha turned to Mary Noel with
a sad smile.
“There she goes back to her toil—which will be all the harder after
these few days with us. I never felt so sorry for any one as I do for
her. It seems as if some new trouble were about to fall on her!”
Mary Noel was serious for once, as she answered:
“What greater evil than to work for her own living can come to a girl
like her? It is a hard, hard lot. I sometimes think it is a pity her
father lived to educate her so much above her chances in life.”
“He was a finely-educated man himself,” said Bertha, “and had every
prospect of improving her position. It was a great misfortune when he
died.”
Mary Noel shook her head.
“I remember it well. She seemed heart-broken when they took her away
from school; and well she might, for I am told that she absolutely works
with her own hands.”
The patrician young lady shuddered faintly as she spoke.
“At her home in the South she had a hundred slaves to anticipate her
wishes, and, in her estimation, work, which is the greatest blessing God
ever gave to mankind, was absolute disgrace.”
“She might have gone out as a governess,” answered Bertha, without
heeding the shudder; “or have kept school here in the country, but she
could not be persuaded to leave her grandmother; so, as you have heard,
works night and day with her own hands.”
“Why didn’t she accept that young student from her own town, who was so
wildly in love with her, I wonder?” said Mary.
Bertha shook her head.
“She will never marry him; if she wished it, Lane’s family would
interfere.”
“Proud, are they? Well, Clara can match them in that; for she was
haughty as a duchess at school. Poor girl! It is a cruel lot.”