Two of the pretty crimson and brown chairs were drawn to the back parlor
grate; Sue had kindled a fire in the back parlor because she felt
"shivery," beside, it had rained all day; the wedding morning promised
to be chilly and rainy.
Early after tea Dr. Greyson had been called away; Dr. Lake had not
returned from a long drive, the latest Irish girl was singing lustily in
the kitchen; Sue and Tessa were alone together before the fire. The
white shades were down, the doors between the rooms closed, they were
altogether cozy and comfortable. Almost as comfortable, Tessa was
thinking, as if there were no dreaded to-morrow; but then she was the
only person in the world who could see any thing to be dreaded in the
to-morrow. Tessa's fingers were moving in and out among the white wool
that she was crocheting into a long comforter for her father; Sue sat
idly restless looking into Tessa's face or into the fire.
Now and then Tessa spoke, now and then Sue ejaculated or laughed or
sighed.
"Life is too queer for any thing," she said reflectively. "Don't you
know the minister said that Sunday that we helped to make our own lives?
I have often thought of that."
Tessa's wool was tangled, she unknotted it without replying.
The rain plashed against the windows, a coal fell through the grate and
dropped upon the fender.
"I wonder how Stacey feels," said Sue. "Perhaps he is taking out another
girl to-night. That ring was large, it will not fit a small hand;
perhaps he sold it, you can always get three quarters the worth of a
diamond, I have heard people say."
Tessa's lips were not encouraging, but Sue was not looking at her.
"Gerald has the wedding ring in his pocket; I tried it on this noon. I
wanted to wear it to get used to it, but he wouldn't let me. He is
sentimental like you. I expect that he is really enjoying carrying it
around in his pocket. S. G. L. is written in it."
The rain plashed and Tessa worked; suddenly the door-bell gave a sharp
clang, a moment later little Miss Jewett, in a waterproof, was ushered
in.
"I had to come, girls. I hope I don't intrude."
"Intrude!" Both of Sue's affectionate arms were around the wet figure.
"Tessa is thinking of glum things to say to me, do sit down and say
something funny."
The long waterproof was unbuttoned and hung upon the hat-stand in the
hall, the rubbers were placed upon the hearth to dry, and the plump
little woman pressed into Tessa's arm-chair. Moving an ottoman to her
side, Tessa sat with her arm upon the arm of her chair.
"I'm _so_ glad to see you," Sue cried, dropping into her own chair.
"What a long walk you have had in the rain just to give me some good
advice. Don't you wish that Tessa was going off, too?"
"Tessa will not go off till she is good and ready," replied Miss Jewett,
"and then she will go off to some purpose."
"Make a good match, do you mean?"
"If she can find her match," caressing the hand on the arm of the chair.
"Oh, Miss Jewett, tell us a story! A real love story! Humor me just this
once, this last time! I don't like advice and I do like love stories."
"Do you, too, Tessa?"
"Yes, I shall write one some day! They shall both be perfect and love
each other perfectly. It shall not be an earthly story, but a heavenly
one."
"That would be too tame," said Sue. "I should want it to be a little
wicked."
"That would be more like life--"
"And then get good in the end! That is like life, too," interrupted Sue.
"Now, go on, please."
"Very well. To-night is an event, I suppose I may as well celebrate it.
I will tell you about a present I had once, the most perfect gift I ever
received."
"But I wanted a love story."
"And you think that _my_ story can not be that? Sometimes I think that
unmarried people live the most perfect love stories."
Lifting the mass of white wool from Tessa's lap and taking the needle,
she worked half a minute before she spoke; Sue's curious, bright eyes
were on her face, Tessa's were on the wool she was playing with.
"Twenty-five years ago, when I was younger than I am now, and as intense
and as full of aspirations as Tessa here, and as full of fun, as _you_,
Sue Greyson, I boarded one winter with a widow. She was quite
middle-aged and lived alone with her chickens and cat, very comfortably
off, but she wanted a boarder or two for company. My store was a little
affair then, but I was a busy body; I used to study and sew evenings.
Ah, those evenings! I often think them over now as I sit alone. I shall
never forget that winter. I _grew_. The widow and I were not alone;
before I had been there a week a young man came, he was scarcely older
than I--"
Sue laughed and looked at Tessa.
"He was to sail away in the spring to some dreadful place,--that sounds
like you, Sue,--to be a missionary!"
"A _missionary!_" exclaimed Sue.
"Every evening he read aloud to us, usually poetry or the Bible. Poetry
meant something to me then--that sounds like you, Tessa. One evening he
read Esther, one evening Ruth, and when he read Nehemiah, oh, how
enthusiastic we were! He talked and talked and talked, and I listened
and listened and listened till all my heart went out to meet him."
"Ah," cried Sue, "to think of you being in love, Miss Jewett. I didn't
know that you were ever so naughty!"
"At last the time came that he must go--the very last evening. I thought
that those evenings could never end, but they did. I could hardly see my
stitches for tears; I was making over a black bombazine for the widow,
and the next evening I had to rip my work out! He read awhile,--he was
reading _Rasselas_ that night,--and then he dropped the book and talked
of his work and the life he expected to lead.
"'You ought to take a wife,' said the widow.
"'No woman will ever love me well enough to go to such a place with me,'
he said.
"Just then I dropped the scissors and had to bend down to pick them up.
The widow went out into the kitchen to set the sponge for her bread and
clear out the stove for morning, and we stayed alone and talked. We
talked about whether he would be homesick and seasick, and how glad he
would be of letters from home; not that he had many friends to write to
him, though; and I sewed on and on, and threaded my needle, and dropped
my scissors, and almost cried because all I cared for in the wide world
would sail away with him, and he would never know!
"'The best of friends must part,' he said when she brought in his candle
and lighted it for him.
"In the morning, we all arose early and took our last breakfast together
by lamplight. She shook hands with him twice, and wished him all sorts
of good wishes, and then he held out his hand to me and said, 'Good-by.'
I said, 'Good-by.' And then he said, 'You have given me a very pleasant
winter; I shall often think of it.' And I said, 'Thank you,' and ran
away up-stairs to cry by myself. That was five and twenty years
ago--before you were born, Sue, and before Tessa could creep; there were
wet eyes in the world, before you were born, girls, and there will be
wet eyes long after we are all dead; and always for the same
reason--because somebody loves somebody.
"He is a hard worker--I rejoice in his life. Five years ago he came home,
but not to Dunellen; he had no friends here; after resting awhile he
returned to his field of labor, and died before he reached it, but was
buried in the place he loved better than home.
"I thought of him and loved him and prayed for him through those twenty
years. I think of him and love him and give thanks for him now, and
shall till I die and afterwards!"
"Why didn't you go with him?" asked Sue.
"He did not ask me."
"Would you if he had?"
"I certainly should."
"Couldn't you bring him to the point? It would have been easy enough."
"The gentleman did the asking in those days," Sue laughed. "And wasn't
he ever married?"
"No."
"What a pity! I thought that every thing always went right for people
like you and Tessa. But I don't see where the perfect gift comes in, do
you, Tessa?"
"Yes, but I'm afraid that I don't want such a perfect gift. I couldn't
bear it--twenty years."
"Tell me--I can't guess. Did he give you something?"
"No, _he_ did not."
"Didn't he love _you?_"
"No, he did not love me."
"Where is the gift then?"
"My love for him was my perfect gift. It was given by One in whom there
is no shadow of turning."
"I am not strong enough to receive such a gift," said Tessa looking
troubled.
"Oh, dear me, I hope not. Oh, dear me, horrid! What a story to tell the
night before my wedding! All I care about is about _being loved!_ I
didn't know that the loving made any difference or did any good! That
story is too sorrowful. Gerald would like that."
The long ivory needle moved in and out; the fair face, half a century
old, was full of loveliness.
"That is for you to remember all your life, Sue."
"I sha'n't. I shall forget it. I only remember pleasant things."
"I wonder if Fredrika Bremer were as happy as you, Miss Jewett. She says
that a gentleman inspired her with a 'pure and warm feeling,' that it
was never responded to, and yet it had a powerful influence upon her
development."
"Was she _real?_" inquired Sue. "I thought that she only wrote books."
"It takes very real people to write," answered Tessa. "The more real you
are, the more you are called to write."
Slipping off the low chair, down to the rug, Sue laid her head in Miss
Jewett's lap, the white wool half concealing the braids and curls and
frizzes, the thin, excited face was turned toward the fire, the brown
eyes, wild and yet timid, were misty with tears.
Miss Jewett and Tessa Wadsworth were the only people in the world who
had ever seen this phase of Sue Greyson.
Dr. Lake had never seen her subdued or frightened. At this instant she
was both. There were some things that Sue could feel; there were not any
that she could understand.
"Sometimes," said Sue, in a hollow whisper, "I'm so afraid, I want to
run away; I was afraid I might run away and so I asked Tessa to come
to-night."
"My dear!" Miss Jewett's warm lips touched her forehead.
"Oh, it isn't any thing! I like Gerald; I adore him. I wouldn't marry
him if I didn't! I am always afraid of a leap into the dark, and I am
always jumping into dark places."
"It is a leap for _him_, too, Sue; you seem to forget that," suggested
Tessa.
"You always think of him, you never think of me."
"It is a pity for no one to think of him; if I were to be married
to-morrow, I should cry all night, out of pity for the hapless
bridegroom."
"Tessa, you ridiculous child," exclaimed Miss Jewett.
"In books," Sue went on, still with her face turned from them, "girls
choose the one they are to marry out of all the world. Why don't we?"
"We do," said Tessa.
"We don't. We take somebody because he asks us and nobody else asks."
"_I_ will not. I do not believe that God means it so. He chooses that we
shall satisfy the best and hungriest part of ourselves, and the best
part is the hungriest, and the hungriest the best; we may not have
opportunity in one year, or two years, or ten years, but if we wait He
will give us the things we most need! He did not give us any longing
simply to make us go crying through the universe; the longing is His
message making known to us that the good thing _is_. I will not be false
to myself, cheating myself by shutting my eyes and saying, 'Ah, _this_
is good! I have found my choice,' when my whole soul protests, knowing
that it is a lie. I can wait."
"Oh, Tessa!" laughed Sue. "Doesn't she talk like a book? I never half
know what she means when she goes into such hysterics. Do you expect to
get all your good things?"
"All _my_ good things! Yes, every single one; it is only a question of
time. God can not forget, nor can He die. I shall not be discouraged
until I am sure that He is dead."
"O, Tessa, you are wicked," cried Sue.
"You remind me of something," said Miss Jewett. "'Blessed are all they
that wait _for Him_.'"
"I can't wait for my blessings," said Sue; "I want to snatch them."
Gently pushing aside Sue's head, Tessa found her work and her needle;
she worked silently while Sue laughed and grumbled and Miss Jewett
talked, not over Sue's head as Tessa's habit was, but into her heart.
"Sue, I shall lose you in Bible class."
"I never answered any questions or studied any lesson, you will not care
for my empty place. Gerald is getting awfully good; he reads the Bible
and Prayer-book every night; every morning when I go in to fix up his
room, I find them on a little table by his bed; I suppose he reads in
bed nights. He used to be bad and talk dreadful things when he first
came; did you ever hear him, Tessa?"
"Yes."
"But he's awful good now; he thinks that people ought to go to church,
and say their prayers; I hope he will keep it up; _I_ will not hinder
him. I want to be good, too."
Tessa's needle moved in and out; she did not hear Sue's voice, or see
the kneeling, green figure; her eyes were looking upon the face she had
looked down into that evening in January, such a little time since; and
she was hearing her voice as she heard it in the night. Had she
forgotten so soon? Or was it the remembrance that gave her the unrest
to-night? Was she conscious without understanding? And had _her_ Ralph
Towne done this? After having withdrawn himself from Sue, was he keeping
her from seeing the good and the happiness of marriage with Dr. Lake?
Would the thought of him come between her and the contentment that she
might have had?
But no, she was putting herself into Sue's position; that would not do;
it was Sue's self and not her own self that she must analyze! If she
could tell Ralph Towne her fears to-night, his eyes would grow dark and
grave, and then he would toss the feeling away with his amused laugh and
say, "Sue is not deep enough for that! She did not care for me. Why must
you think a romance about her?"
Was she not deep enough for that? Who could tell that?
She listened to Sue's lively talk and tried to believe that his reply
would be just; the one most bitter thought of all was, that if she were
suffering it was through his selfishness or stupidity. Why must he be so
stupid about such things? Had he no heart himself?
Sue was laughing again. "Oh, dear! I must be happy; if I am not I shall
be unhappy! It would kill me to be unhappy! I never think of unpleasant
things five minutes."
The sound of wheels near the windows, and a call to "Jerry" in a loud,
quick voice, brought them all to a startling sense of the present.
"There he is," cried Sue, springing lightly to her feet.