"Emily Warren, why does thee bring Richard Morton back so soon?" asked Mr. Yocomb, suspending for a moment the sweep of his hand that was scattering grain.
"You are mistaken, sir," I said; "I brought Miss Warren back. I thought she would enjoy seeing you feed the poultry, the horses, and especially the cows."
"Thee's more self-denying than I'd a been," he resumed, With his humorous twinkle. "Don't tell mother, but I wouldn't mind taking a walk with Emily Warren myself on a June evening like this."
"I will take a walk with you whenever you wish," laughed Miss Warren; "but I'll surely tell Mrs. Yocomb."
"Oh! I know I'd get found out," said the old man, shaking his head ruefully; "I always do."
"I'm sure you would if Miss Warren were here," I added. "I'm at a loss to know how early in the day she found me out."
"Well, I guess thee's a pretty square sort of a man. If thee'd been stealing sheep Emily Warren wouldn't laugh at thee so approvingly. I'm finding out that she rather likes the people she laughs at. At least, I take that view, for she laughs at me a great deal. I knew from Emily Warren's laugh that thee hadn't anything very bad to tell mother."
"I admit that, at the time, I enjoyed being laughed at—a rather rare experience."
"You needn't, either of you, plume yourselves that you are irresistibly funny. I laugh easily. Mr. Yocomb, why do you feed the chickens so slowly? I have noticed it before. Now Reuben and Hiram, the man, throw the corn all down at once."
"They are in more of a hurry than I am. I don't like to do anything in a hurry, least of all to eat my dinner. Now, why should these chickens, turkeys and ducks gobble everything right down? The corn seems to taste good to them; so, after a handful, I wait till they have had a chance to think how good the last kernel was before they get another. You see I greatly prolong their pleasure."
"And in these intervals you meditate on Thanksgiving Day, I suppose," she said.
"Emily Warren, thee's a good Yankee. I admit that that young gobbler there did suggest a day on which I'm always very thankful, and with good reason. I had about concluded before thee came that, if we were both spared—i.e., that gobbler and I—till next November, I would probably survive him."
"How can you have the heart to plan against that poor creature's life so coolly? See how he turns his round, innocent eyes toward you, as if in gratitude. If he could know that the hand that feeds him would chop off his head, what a moral shock he would sustain! That upturned beak should be to you like a reproachful face."
"Emily Warren, we expect thee to eat thy Thanksgiving dinner with us; and that young gobbler will probably be on the table. Now what part of him will thee take on that occasion?"
"A piece of the breast, if you please."
"Richard Morton, is not Emily Warren as false and cruel as I am?"
"Just about."
"Is thee not afraid of her?"
"I would be if she were unfriendly."
"Oh, thee thinks everybody in this house is friendly. Emily Warren, thee must keep up our good name," he added, with a mischievous nod toward her.
"Mr. Yocomb, you are forgetting the chickens altogether. There are some staid and elderly hens that are going to bed in disgust, you have kept them waiting so long."
"See how quick they'll change their minds," he said, as he threw down a handful of corn. "Now isn't that just like a hen?" he added, as they hastened back.
"And just like a woman also, I'm sure you want to suggest," said MissWarren.
"I suppose thee never changes thy mind."
"I'm going to change the subject. Poultry with their feathers on don't interest me very much. The male birds remind me of a detestable class of conceited men, that one must see daily in the city, whose gallantry is all affectation, and who never for a moment lose sight of themselves or their own importance. That strutting gobbler there, Mr. Morton, reminds me of certain eminent statesmen whom your paper delights to honor, and I imagine that that ridiculous creature embodies their idea of the American eagle. Then the hens have such a simple, unthinking aspect. They act as if they expected to be crowed over as a matter of course; and thus typify the followers of these statesmen, who are so pre-eminent in their own estimation. Their exalted perches seem to be awarded unquestioningly."
"So you think, Miss Warren, that I have the simple, unthinking aspect typified by the physiognomy of these hens?"
"Mr. Morton, I was generalizing. We always except present company. Remember, I disagree with your paper, not you; but why you look up to these human species of the gobbler is something I can't understand, and being only awoman, that need not seem strange to you."
"Since I must tell you the truth on all occasions,nolens volens, you have hit on a subject wherein I differ from my paper. Human phases of the gobbler are not pleasant."
"But the turkey phaseis, very," said Mr. Yocomb, throwing a handful of corn down before his favorite, which, like certain eminent statesmen, immediately looked after his own interests.
"Mr. Yocomb, please, let me help you feed the horses," said Miss Warren, leading the way into the barn, where on one side were mows for hay and grain, and, on the other, stalls for several horses. The sleek and comfortable animals seemed to know the young girl, for they thrust out their black and brown noses toward her and projected their ears instead of laying them back viciously, as when I approached; and one old plow-horse that had been much neglected, until Miss Warren began to pet him, gave a loud ecstatic whinny.
"Oh, you big, honest old fellows!" she exclaimed, caressing one and another, "I'd rather teach you than half my pupils."
"In which half do you place me?" I asked.
"You? oh, I forgot; I was to teach you topography. I will assign you by and by, after you have had a few lessons."
"A man ought to do as well as a horse, so I hope to win your favor."
"I wish all men did as well as Mr. Yocomb's horses. They evidently feel they have the family name and respectability to keep up. Mr. Yocomb, what is it that smells so sweetly?"
"That is the red-top clover we cut last week."
"Oh, isn't it good? I wouldn't mind having some myself," and she snatched down a fragrant handful from the mow. "Here, Old Plod," she said, turning to the plow-horse, "the world has rather snubbed you, as it has honest worth before. Mr. Yocomb, you and Reuben are much too fond of gay horses."
"Shall I tell Reuben that thee'd rather ride after Old Plod, as thee calls him?"
"No, I thank you; I'll go on as I've begun. I'm not changeable."
"Now, Friend Morton, is not Emily Warren as bad as I am about gay horses?"
"I'm inclined to think she is about as bad as you are in all respects."
"Emily Warren, thee needn't put on any more airs. Richard Morton thinks thee isn't any better than I am, and there's nothing under the sun an editor doesn't know."
"I wish he were right this time," she said, with a laugh and sigh curiously blended. "It seems to me, Mr. Yocomb, that you have grown here in the country like your clover-hay, and are as good and wholesome. In New York it is so different, especially if one has no home life; you breathe a different atmosphere from us in more respects than one. This fragrant old barn appears to me more of a sanctuary than some churches in which I have tried to worship, and its dim evening light more religious." "According to your faith," I said, "no shrine has ever contained so precious a gift as a manger."
"According toourfaith, if you please, Mr. Morton."
By an instinct that ignored a custom of the Friends, but exemplified their spirit, the old man took off his hat as he said, "Yes, friend Morton, according toourfaith. The child that was cradled in a manger tends to make the world innocent."
"The old barn has indeed become a sanctuary," I thought, in the brief silence that followed. Miss Warren stepped to the door, and I saw a quick gesture of her hands to her eyes. Then she turned and said, in her piquant way:
"Mr. Yocomb, our talk reminds me of the long grace in Latin which the priests said before meals, and which the hungry people couldn't understand. The horses are hinting broadly that oats would be more edifying. If it were Monday, I'd wager you a plum that they would all leave your oats to eat clover-hay out of my hand."
"We'll arrange about the bet to-morrow, and now try the experiment," said Mr. Yocomb, relapsing into his genial humor at once.
I was learning, however, that a deep, earnest nature was hidden by this outward sheen and sparkle. Filling his four-quart measure from the cobwebbed bin, he soon gave each horse his allowance.
"Now, Richard Morton, thee watch her, and see that she doesn't coax too much, or come it over them with any unlawful witchery. Take the hay thyself, Emily, and we'll stand back."
I went to the further end of the barn, near Old Plod, and stood where I could see the maiden's profile against the light that streamed through the open door. Never shall I forget the picture I then saw. The tall, ample figure of the old Quaker stood in the background, and his smile was broad and genial enough to have lighted up a dungeon. Above him rose the odorous clover, a handful of which Miss Warren held out to the horse in the first stall. Her lips were parted, her eyes shining, and her face had the intent, eager interest of a child, while her attitudes and motions were full of unstudied and unconscious grace.
The first horse munched stolidly away at his oats. She put the tempting wisp against his nose, at which he laid back his ears and looked vicious. She turned to Mr. Yocomb, and the old barn echoed to a laugh that was music itself as she said:
"You have won your plum, if it is Sunday. I shall try all the other horses, however, and thus learn to value correctly the expressions of affection I have received from these long-nosed gentlemen."
One after another they munched on, regardless of the clover. Step by step she came nearer to me, smiling and frowning at her want of success. My heart thrilled at a beauty that was so unconventional and so utterly self-forgetful. The blooming clover, before it fell at a sweep of the scythe, was the fit emblem of her then, she looked so young, so fair, and sweet.
"They are as bad as men," she exclaimed, "who will forgive any wrong rather than an interruption at dinner."
She now stood at my side before Old Plod, that thus far, in his single-minded attention to his oats, had seemingly forgotten her presence; but, as he lifted his head from the manger and saw her, he took a step forward, and reached his great brown nose toward her, rather than for the clover. In brief, he said, in his poor dumb way:
"I like you better than hay or oats."
The horse's simple, undisguised affection, for some reason, touched the girl deeply; for she dropped the hay and threw her arm around the horse's head, leaning her face against his. I saw a tear in her eye as she murmured:
"You have more heart than all the rest put together. I don't believe any one was ever kind to you before, and you've been a bit lonely, like myself." Then she led the way hastily out of the barn, saying, "Old Plod and I are sworn friends from this time forth; and I shall take your advice, Old Plod."
I was soon at her side, and asked:
"What advice did Old Plod give you?"
For some inexplicable reason she colored deeply, then laughed as she said:
"It's rarely wise to think aloud; but impulsive people will do it sometimes. I suppose we all occasionally have questions to decide that to us are perplexing and important, though of little consequence to the world. Come; if we are to see the old garden, we must make the most of the fading light. After my interview with Old Plod, I can't descend to cows and pigs; so good-by, Mr. Yocomb."
"This is my first entrance into Eden," I said, as we passed through the rustic gate made of cedar branches and between posts green with American ivy.
"Like another man, you won't stay here long."
"Like Adam, I shall certainly go out when you do."
"That will be before very long, since I have promised Mr. Yocomb some music."
"Even though a Bohemian editor, as you may think, I am conscious of a profound gratitude to some beneficent power, for I never could have chosen so wisely myself. I might have been in Sodom and Gomorrah—for New York in contrast seems a union of both—receiving reports of the crimes and casualties of the day, but I am here with this garden in the foreground and music in the background."
"You don't know anything about the music, and you may yet wish it so far in the background as to be inaudible."
"I admit that I will be in a dilemma when we reach the music, for no matter how much I protest, you will know just what I think."
"Yes, you had better be honest."
"Come, open for me the treasures of your ripe experience. You have been a week in the country. I know you will give me a rosebud—a rare old-fashioned one, if you please, with a quaint, sweet meaning, for I see that such abound in this garden, and I am wholly out of humor with the latest mode in everything. Recalling your taste for homely, honest worth, as shown by your passion for Old Plod, I shall seek a blossom among the vegetables for you. Ah, here is one that is sweet, white, and pretty," and I plucked a cluster of flowers from a potato-hill. "By the way, what flower is this?" I asked demurely.
She looked at it blankly for a moment, then remarked, with a smile, "You have said that it was sweet, white, and pretty. Why inquire further?"
"Miss Warren, you have been a week in the country and don't know a potato-blossom."
"Our relations may be changed," she said, "and you become the teacher."
"Oh, here comes Zillah. We will settle the question according to Scripture. Does it not say, 'A little child shall lead them'? Who are you so glad to see, little one, Miss Warren or me?"
"I don't know thee very well yet," she said shyly.
"Do you know Miss Warren very well?"
"Oh, yes, indeed."
"How soon did you come to know her well?"
"The first day when she kissed me."
"I think that's a very nice way of getting acquainted. Won't you let me kiss you good-night when you get sleepy."
She looked at me with a doubtful smile, and said, "I'm afraid thy mustache will tickle me."
The birds were singing in the orchard near, but there was not a note that to my ear was more musical than Miss Warren's laugh. I stooped down before the little girl as I said:
"Suppose we see if a kiss tickles you now, and if it don't now, you won't mind it then, you know."
She came hesitatingly to me, and gave the coveted salute with a delicious mingling of maidenly shyness and childish innocence and frankness.
"Ah!" I exclaimed, "Eden itself contained nothing better than that. To think that I should have been so honored—I who have written the records of enough crimes to sink a world!"
"Perhaps if you had committed some of them she wouldn't have kissed you."
"If I had to live in a ninety-nine story tenement-house, as so many do, I think I would have committed them all. Well, I may come to it. Life is a risky battle to such as I, but I'm in heaven now."
"You do seem very happy," she said, looking at me wistfully.
"I am very happy. I have given myself up wholly to the influences of this day, letting them sway me, lead me whithersoever they will. If this is a day of destiny, no stupid mulishness of mine shall thwart the happy combination of the stars. That the Fates are propitious I have singular reason to hope. Yesterday I was a broken and dispirited man. This evening I feel the influence of all this glad June life. Good Mrs. Yocomb has taken me in hand. I'm to study topography with a teacher who has several other bumps besides that of locality, and Zillah is going to show us the garden of Eden."
"Is this like the garden of Eden?" the little girl asked, looking up at me in surprise.
"Well, I'm not sure that it's just like it, but I'm more than content with this garden. In one respect I think it's better—there are no snakes here. Now, Zillah, lead where you please, I'm in the following mood. Do you know where any of these birds live? Do you think any of them are at home on their nests? If so, we'll call and pay our respects. When I was a horrid boy I robbed a bird's nest, and I often have a twinge of remorse for it." "Do you want to see a robin's nest?" asked Zillah excitedly.
"Yes, indeed."
"Then come and walk softly when I do. There's one in that lilac-bush there. If we don't make a noise, perhaps we can see mother robin on the nest. Sh—, sh—, very softly; now lift me up as father did—there, don't you see her?"
I did for a moment, and then the bird flew away on a swift, silent wing, but from a neighboring tree the paternal robin clamored loudly against our intrusion. Nevertheless, Zillah and I peeped in.
"Oh, the queer little things!" she said, "they seem all mouth and swallow."
"Mrs. Robin undoubtedly thinks them lovely. Miss Warren, you are not quite tall enough, and since I can't hold you up like Zillah, I'll get a box from the tool-house. Isn't this the jolliest housekeeping you ever saw? A father, mother, and six children, with a house six inches across and open to the sky. Compare that with a Fifth Avenue mansion!"
"I think it compares very favorably with many mansions on the Avenue," she said, after I returned with a box and she had peered for a moment into the roofless home.
"I thought you always spoke the truth," I remarked, assuming a look of blank amazement.
"Well, prove that I don't."
"Do you mean to say that you think that a simple house, of which this nest is the type, compares favorably with a Fifth Avenue mansion?"
"I do."
"What do you know about such mansions?"
"I have pupils in some of the best of them."
"I hear the voices of many birds, but you are therara avisof them all," I said, looking very incredulous.
"Not at all; I am simply matter-of-fact. Which is worth the more, a furnished house or the growing children in it?"
"The children ought to be."
"Well, many a woman has so much house and furniture to look after that she has no time for her children. The little brown mother we have frightened away can give nearly all her time to her children; and, by the way, they may take cold unless we depart and let her shelter them again with her warm feathers. Besides, the protesting paterfamilias on the pear-tree there is not aware of our good-will toward him and his, and is naturally very anxious as to what we human monsters intend. The mother bird keeps quiet, but she is watching us from some leafy cover with tenfold his anxiety."
"You will admit, however, that the man bird is doing the best he can."
"Oh, yes, I have a broad charity for all of his kind."
"Well, I am one of his kind, and so shall take heart and bask in your general good-will. Stop your noise, old fellow, and go and tell your wife that she may come home to the children. I differ from you, Miss Warren, as I foresee I often shall. You are not matter-of-fact at all. You are unconventional, unique—" "Why not say queer, and give your meaning in good plain English?"
"Because that is not my meaning. I fear you are worse—that you are romantic. Moreover, I am told that girls who dote on love in a cottage all marry rich men if the chance comes." She bit her lip, colored, and seemed annoyed, but said, after a moment's hesitation, "Well, why shouldn't they, if the rich men are the right men?"
"Oh, I think such a course eminently proper and thrifty. I'm not finding fault with it in the least. They who do this are a little inconsistent, however, in shunning so carefully that ideal cottage, over which, as young ladies, they had mild and poetic raptures. Now, I can't associate this kind of thing with you. If you had 'drawings or leadings,' as Mrs. Yocomb would say, toward a Fifth Avenue mansion, you would say so in effect. I fear you are romantic, and are under the delusion that love in a cottage means happiness. You have a very honest face, and you looked into that nest as if you liked it."
"Mr. Morton," she said, frowning and laughing at the same time, "I'm not going to be argued out of self-consciousness. If we don't know what we know, we don't know anything. I insist upon it that I am utterly matter-of-fact in my opinions on this question. State the subject briefly in prose. Does a family exist for the sake of a home, or a home for the sake of a family? I know of many instances in which the former of these suppositions is true. The father toils and wears himself out, often gambles—speculating, some call it—and not unfrequently cheats and steals outright in order to keep up his establishment. The mother works and worries, smooths her wrinkled brow to curious visitors, burdens her soul with innumerable deceits, and enslaves herself that her house and its belongings may be as good or a little better than her neighbor's. The children soon catch the same spirit, and their souls become absorbed in wearing apparel. They are complacently ignorant concerning topics of general interest and essential culture, but would be mortified to death if suspected of being a little off on 'good form' and society's latest whims in mode. It is a dreary thraldom to mere things in which the soul becomes as material, narrow, and hard as the objects which absorb it. There is no time for that which gives ideality and breadth."
"Do you realize that your philosophy would stop half the industries of the world? Do you not believe in large and sumptuously furnished houses?"
"Yes, for those who have large incomes. One may live in a palace, and yet not be a slave to the palace. Our home should be as beautiful as our taste and means can make it; but, like the nest yonder, it should simply serve its purpose, leaving us the time and means to get all the good out of the world at large that we can."
A sudden cloud of sadness overcast her face as she continued, after a moment, half in soliloquy:
"The robins will soon take wing and leave the nest; so must we. How many have gone already!"
"But the robins follow the sun in their flight," I said gently, "and thus they find skies more genial than those they left."
She gave me a quick, appreciative smile as she said:
"That's a pleasant thought."
"Your home must be an ideal one," I remarked unthinkingly.
She colored slightly, and laughed as she answered:
"I'm something like a snail; I carry my home, if not my house, around with me. A music-teacher can afford neither a palace nor a cottage."
I looked at her with eager eyes as I said, "Pardon me if I am unduly frank; but on this day I'm inclined to follow every impulse, and say just what I think, regardless of the consequences. You make upon me a decided impression of what we men call comradeship. I feel as if I had known you weeks and months instead of hours. Could we not have been robins ourselves in some previous state of existence, and have flown on a journey together?"
"Mrs. Yocomb had better take you in hand, and teach you sobriety."
"Yes, this June air, laden with the odors of these sweet old-style roses and grape-blossoms, intoxicates me. These mountains lift me up. These birds set my nerves tingling like one of Beethoven's symphonies, played by Thomas's orchestra. In neither case do I know what the music means, but I recognize a divine harmony. Never before have I been conscious of such a rare and fine exhilaration. My mood is the product of an exceptional combination of causes, and they have culminated in this old garden. You know, too, that I am a creature of the night, and my faculties are always at their best as darkness comes on. I may seem to you obtuseness itself, but I feel as if I had been endowed with a spiritual and almost unerring discernment. In my sensitive and highly wrought condition, I know that the least incongruity or discord in sight or sound would jar painfully. Yes, laugh at me if you will, but nevertheless I'm going to speak my thoughts with no more restraint than these birds are under. I'm going back for a moment to the primitive condition of society, when there were no disguises. You are the mystery of this garden—you who come from New York, where you seem to have lived without the shelter of home life, to have obtained your livelihood among conventional and artificial people, and to whom the false, complicated world must be well known, and yet you make no more discord in this garden than the first woman would have made. You are in harmony with every leaf, with every flower, and every sound; with that child playing here and there; with the daisies in the orchard; with the little brown mother, whose children you feared might take cold. Hush!" I said, with a deprecatory gesture, "I will speak my mind. Never before in my life have I enjoyed the utter absence of concealment. In the city one must use words to hide thoughts more often than to express them, but here, in this old garden, I intend to reproduce for a brief moment one of the conditions of Eden, and to speak as frankly as the first man could have spoken. I am not jesting either, nor am I irreverent. I say, in all sincerity, you are the mystery of this garden—you who come from New York, and from a life in which your own true womanhood has been your protection; and yet if, as of old, God should walk in this garden in the cool of the day, it seems to me you would not be afraid. Such is the impression—given without reserve—that you make on me—you whom I have just seen, as it were!"
As she realized my sincerity she looked at me with an expression of strong perplexity and surprise.
"Truly, Mr. Morton," she said slowly, "you are in a strange, unnatural mood this evening."
"I seem so," I replied, "because absolutely true to nature. See how far astray from Eden we all are! I have merely for a moment spoken my thoughts without disguise, and you look as if you doubted my sanity."
"I must doubt your judgment," she said, turning away.
"Then why should such a clearly defined impression be made on me? For every effect there must be a cause."
She turned upon me suddenly, and her look was eager, searching, and almost imperious in its demand to know the truth.
"Are you as sincere as you are unconventional?" she asked.
I took off my hat, as I replied, with a smile, "A garden, Miss Warren, was the first sacred place of the world, and never were sincerer words spoken in that primal garden."
She looked at me a moment wistfully, and even tearfully. "I wish you were right," she said, slowly shaking her head; "your strange mood has infected me, I think; and I will admit that to be true is the struggle of my life, but the effort to be true is often hard, bitterly hard, in New York. I admit that for years truthfulness has been the goal of my ambition. Most young girls have a father and mother and brothers to protect them: I have had only the truth, and I cling to it with the instinct of self-preservation."
"You cling to it because you love it. Pardon me, you do not cling to it at all. Truth has become the warp and woof of your nature. Ah! here is your emblem, not growing in the garden, but leaning over the fence as if it would like to come in, and yet, among all the roses here, where is there one that excels this flower?" And I gathered for her two or three sprays of sweetbrier.
"I won't mar your bit of Eden by a trace of affectation," she said, looking directly into my eyes in a frank and friendly manner; "I'd rather be thought true than thought a genius, and I will make allowance for your extravagant language and estimate on the ground of your intoxication. You surely see double, and yet I am pleased that in your transcendental mood I do not seem to make discord in this old garden. This will seem to you a silly admission after you leave this place and recover your everyday senses. I'm sorry already I made it—but it was such an odd conceit of yours!" and her heightened color and glowing face proved how she relished it.
It was an exquisite moment to me. The woman showed her pleasure as frankly as a happy child. I had touched the keynote of her character as I had that of Adah Yocomb's a few hours before, and in her supreme individuality Emily Warren stood revealed before me in the garden.
She probably saw more admiration in my face than she liked, for her manner changed suddenly.
"Being honest doesn't mean being made of glass," she said brusquely; "you don't know anything about me, Mr. Morton. You have simply discovered that I have not a leaning toward prevarication. That's all your fine words amount to. Since I must keep up a reputation for telling the truth, I'm obliged to say that you don't remind me of Adam very much."
"No, I probably remind you of a night editor, ambitious to be smart in print."
She bit her lip, colored a little. "I wasn't thinking of you in that light just then," she said. "And—and Adam is not my ideal man."
"In what light did you see me?"
"It is growing dusky, and I won't be able to see you at all soon."
"That's evasion."
"Come, Mr. Morton, I hope you do not propose to keep up Eden customs indefinitely. It's time we returned to the world to which we belong."
"Zillah!" called Mrs. Yocomb, and we saw her coming down the garden walk.
"Bless me! where is the child!" I exclaimed.
"When you began to soar into the realms of melodrama and forget the garden you had asked her to show you, she sensibly tried to amuse herself. She is in the strawberry-bed, Mrs. Yocomb."
"Yes," I said, "I admit that I forgot the garden; I had good reason to do so."
"I think it is time we left the garden. You must remember that Mrs.Yocomb and I are not night editors, and cannot see in the dark."
"Mother," cried Zillah, coming forward, "see what I have found;" and her little hands were full of ripe strawberries. "If it wasn't getting so dark I could have found more, I'm sure," she added,
"What, giving them all to me?" Miss Warren exclaimed, as Zillah held out her hands to her favorite. "Wouldn't it be nicer if we all had some?"
"Who held you up to look into the robin's nest?" I asked reproachfully.
"Thee may give Richard Morton my share," said the little girl, trying to make amends.
I held out my hand, and Miss Warren gave me half of them.
"Now these are mine?" I said to Zillah. "Yes!"
"Then I'll do what I please with them."
I picked out the largest, and stooping down beside her, continued: "You must eat these or I won't eat any."
"Thee's very like Emily Warren," the little girl laughed; "thee gets around me before I know it."
"I'll give you all the strawberries for that compliment."
"No, thee must take half."
"Mrs. Yocomb, you and I will divide, too. Could there possibly be a more delicious combination!" and Miss Warren smacked her lips appreciatively.
"The strawberry was evolved by a chance combination of forces," I remarked.
"Undoubtedly," added Miss Warren, "so was my Geneva watch."
"I like to think of the strawberry in this way," said Mrs. Yocomb. "There are many things in the Scriptures hard to understand; so there are in Nature. But we all love the short text: 'God is love.' The strawberry is that text repeated in Nature."
"Mrs. Yocomb, you could convert infidels and pagans with a gospel of strawberries," I cried.
"There are many Christians who prefer tobacco," said Mrs. Yocomb, laughing.
"That reminds me," I exclaimed, "that I have not smoked to-day. I fearI shall fall from grace to-morrow, however."
"Yes, I imagine you will drop from the clouds by tomorrow," Miss Warren remarked.
"By the way, what a magnificent cloud that is rising above the horizon in the southwest. It appears like a solitary headland in an azure sea."
"Ah—h!" she said, in satirical accent.
"Mrs. Yocomb, Miss Warren has been laughing at me ever since I came. I may have to claim your protection."
"No! thee and father are big enough to take care of yourselves."
"Emily Warren, is thee and Richard Morton both lost?" called Mr. Yocomb from the piazza. "I can't find mother either. If somebody don't come soon I'll blow the fish-horn."
"We're all coming," answered Mrs. Yocomb, and she led the way toward the house.
"You have not given me a rose yet," I said to Miss Warren.
"Must you have one?"
"A man never uses the word 'must' in seeking favors from a lady."
"Adroit policy! Well, what kind of a one do you want?"
"I told you long ago."
"Oh, I remember. An old-fashioned one, with a pronounced meaning. Here is a York and Lancaster bud. That has a decided old-style meaning."
"It means war, does it not?"
"Yes."
"I won't take it. Yes I will, too," I said, a second later, and I took the bud from her hand. "You know the law of war," I added: "To the victor belong the spoils."
She gave me a quick glance, and after a moment said, a trifle coldly,
"That remark seems bright, but it does not mean anything."
"It often means a great deal. There, I'm out of the garden and in the ordinary world again. I wonder if I shall ever have another bit of Eden in my life."
"Oh, indeed you shall. I will ask Mr. Yocomb to give you a day's weeding and hoeing there."
"What will you do in the meantime?"
"Sit under the arbor and laugh at you."
"Agreed. But suppose it was hot and I grew very tired, what would you do?"
"I fear I would have to invite you under the arbor."
"You fear?"
"Well, I would invite you if you had been of real service in the garden."
"That would be Eden unalloyed."
"Since I am not intoxicated, I cannot agree with you."
"Mr. Yocomb," I said, as we mounted the piazza, "what is the cause of the smoke rising above yonder mountain to the east of us? I have noticed it several times this afternoon, and it seems increasing."
"That mountain was on fire on Saturday. I hoped the rain of last night would put it out, but it was a light shower, and the fire is under headway again. It now seems creeping up near the top of the mountain, for I think I see a faint light."
"I do distinctly; the mountain begins to remind me of a volcano."
"The moon will rise before very long, and you may be treated to a grand sight if the fire burns, as I fear it will."
"This is a day of fate," I said, laughing, "and almost any event that could possibly happen would not surprise me."
"It has seemed a very quiet day to me," said the old gentleman. "Neither mother nor any one on the high seat had a message for us this morning, and this afternoon I took a very long nap. If thee had not come and stirred us up a little, and Emily Warren had not laughed at us both, I would call it almost a dull day, as far as any peaceful day can be dull. Such days, however, are quite to my mind, and thee'll like 'em better when thee sees my age."
"I'm inclined to think," I replied, "that the great events of life would rarely make even an item in a newspaper."
Mrs. Yocomb looked as if she understood me, but Miss Warren remarked, with a mischievous glance:
"Personals are generally read."
"Editors gossip about others, not themselves."
"You admit they gossip."
"That one did little else seems your impression."
"News and gossip are different things; but I'm glad your conscience so troubles you that you exaggerate my words."
"Emily Warren, thee can squabble with Richard Morton all day to-morrow after thy amiable fashion, but I'm hankering after some of thy music."
"I will keep you waiting no longer, sir, and would have come before, but I did not wish you to see Mr. Morton while he was in a very lamentable condition."
"Why, what was the matter with him?" asked Adah, who had just joined us in the lighted hall; "he seems to have very queer complaints."
"He admits that he was intoxicated, and he certainly talked very strangely."
"Miss Adah, did I talk strangely or wildly this afternoon?"
"No, indeed, I think you talked very nicely; and I told Silas Jones that I never met a gentleman before who looked at things so exactly as I did."
This was dreadful. I saw that Miss Warren was full of suppressed merriment, and was glad that Mrs. Yocomb was in the parlor lighting the lamps.
"I suppose Mr. Jones was glad to hear what you said," I remarked, feeling that I must say something.
"He may have been, but he did not look so."
"Mr. Yocomb, you have your daughter's testimony that I was sober this afternoon, and since that time I have enjoyed nothing stronger than milk and the odor of your old-fashioned roses. If I was in a lamentable condition in the garden, Miss Warren was the cause, and so is wholly to blame."
"Emily Warren, does thee know that thy mother Eve made trouble in a garden?"
"I've not the least intention of taking Mr. Morton out of the garden. He may go back at once, and I have already suggested that you would give him plenty of hoeing and weeding there."
"I'm not so sure about that; I fear he'd make the same havoc in my garden that I'd make in his newspaper."
"Then you think an editor has no chance for Eden?"
"Thee had better talk to mother about that. If there's any chance for thee at all she'll give thee hope. Now, Emily Warren, we are all ready. Sing some hymns that will give us all hope—no, sing hymns of faith."
Adah took a seat on the sofa, and glanced encouragingly at me, but I found a solitary chair by an open window, where I could look out across the valley to the burning mountain, and watch the stars come out in the darkening sky. Within I faced Miss Warren's profile and the family group.
I had not exaggerated when I told Miss Warren that I was conscious of a fine exhilaration. Sleep and rest had banished all dragged and jaded feelings. For hours my mind had been free from a sense of hurry and responsibility, which made it little better than a driving machine. In the mental leisure and quiet which I now enjoyed I had grown receptive—highly sensitive indeed—to the culminating scenes of this memorable day. Even little things and common words had a significance that I would not have noted ordinarily, and the group before me was not ordinary. Each character took form with an individuality as sharply defined as their figures in the somewhat dimly lighted room, and when I looked without into the deepening June night it seemed an obscure and noble background, making the human life within more real and attractive.
Miss Warren sat before her piano quietly for a moment, and her face grew thoughtful and earnest. It was evident that she was not about to perform some music, but that she would unite with her sincere and simple friends, Mr. and Mrs. Yocomb, in giving expression to feelings and truths that were as real to her as to them.
"How perfectly true she is!" I thought, as I noted the sweet, childlike gravity of her face. Then, in a voice that proved to be a sympathetic, pure soprano, well trained, but not at all great, she sang:
"My faith looks up to Thee."
Their faith seemed very real and definite, and I could not help feeling that it would be a cruel and terrible thing if that pronoun "Thee" embodied no living and loving personality. The light in their faces, like that of a planet beaming on me through the open window, appeared but the inevitable reflection of a fuller, richer spiritual light that now shone full upon them.
One hymn followed another, and Reuben, who soon came in, seemed to have several favorites. Little Zillah had early asked for those she liked best, and then her head had dropped down into her mother's lap, and Miss Warren's sweet tones became her lullaby, her innocent, sleeping face making another element in a picture that was outlining itself deeply in my memory.
Adah, having found that she could not secure my attention, had fallen into something like a revery. Very possibly she was planning out the dress that she meant to "cut to suit herself," but in their repose her features became very beautiful again.
Her face to me, however, was now no more than a picture on the wall; but the face of the childlike woman that was so wise and gifted, and yet so simple and true, had for me a fascination that excited my wonder. I had seen scores of beautiful women—I lived in a city where they abounded—but I had never seen this type of face before. The truth that I had not was so vivid that it led to the thought that, like the first man, I had seen in the garden the one woman of the world, the mistress of my fate. A second later I was conscious of a sickening fear. To love such a woman, and yet not be able to win her—how could one thereafter go on with life! Beware, Richard Morton! On this quiet June evening, in this home of peace and the peaceful, and with hymns of love and faith breathed sweetly into your ears, you may be in the direst peril of your life. From this quiet hour may come the unrest of a lifetime. Then Hope whispered of better things. I said to myself, "I did not come to this place. I wandered hither, or was led hither; and to every influence of this day I shall yield myself. If some kindly Power has led me to this woman of crystal truth, I shall be the most egregious fool in the universe if I do not watch and wait for further possibilities of good."
How sweet and luminous her face seemed in contrast with the vague darkness without! More sweet and luminous would her faith be in the midst of the contradictions, obscurities, and evils of the world. The home that enshrined such a woman would be a refuge for a man's tempted soul, as well as a resting-place for his tired body.
"Sing 'Tell me the Old, Old Story,'" said Mr. Yocomb, in his warm, hearty way. Was I a profane wretch because the thought would come that if I could draw, in shy, hesitating admission, another story as old as the world it would be heavenly music?
Could it have been that it was my intent gaze and concentrated thought that made her turn suddenly to me after complying with Mr. Yocomb's request? She colored slightly as she met my eyes, but said quietly, "Mr. Morton, you have expressed no preference yet."
"I have enjoyed everything you have sung," I replied, and I quietly sustained her momentary and direct gaze.
She seemed satisfied, and smiled as she said, "Thank you, but you shall have your preference also."
"Miss Warren, you have sung some little time, and perhaps your voice is tired. Do you play Chopin's Twelfth Nocturne? That seems to me like a prayer."
"I'm glad you like that," she said, with a pleased, quick glance. "I play it every Sunday night when I am alone."
A few moments later and we were all under the spell of that exquisite melody which can fitly give expression to the deepest and tenderest feelings and most sacred aspirations of the heart.
Did I say all? I was mistaken. Adah's long lashes were drooping, her face was heavy with sleep, and it suggested flesh and blood, and flesh and blood only.
Miss Warren's eyes, in contrast, were moist, her mouth tremulous with feeling, and her face was a beautiful transparency, through which shone those traits which already made her, to me, pre-eminent among women.
I saw Mrs. Yocomb glance from one girl to the other, then close her eyes, while a strong expression of pain passed over her face. Her lips moved, and she undoubtedly was speaking to One near to her, though so far, seemingly, from most of us.
A little later there occurred one or two exquisite movements in the prayer harmony, and I turned to note their effect on Mrs. Yocomb, and was greatly struck by her appearance. She was looking fixedly into space, and her face had assumed a rapt, earnest, seeking aspect, as if she were trying to see something half hidden in the far distance. With a few rich chords the melody ceased. Mr. Yocomb glanced at his wife, then instantly folded his hands and assumed an attitude of reverent expectancy. Reuben did likewise. At the cessation of the music Adah opened her eyes, and by an instinct or habit seemed to know what to expect, for her face regained the quiet repose it had worn at the meeting-house in the morning.
Miss Warren turned toward Mrs. Yocomb, and sat with bowed head. For a few moments we remained in perfect silence. There was a faint flash of light, followed after an interval by a low, deep reverberation. The voices in nature seemed heavy and threatening. The sweet, gentle monotone of the woman's voice, as she began to speak, was divine in contrast. Slowly she enunciated the sentences:
"What I do, thou knowest not now: but thou shalt know hereafter."
After a pause she continued: "As the dear young friend was playing, these words were borne in upon my mind. They teach the necessity of faith. Thanks be to the God of heaven and earth, that He who spake these words is so worthy of the faith He requires! The disciple of old could not always understand his Lord; no more can we. We often shrink from that which is given in love, and grasp at that which would destroy. Though but little, weak, erring children, we would impose on the all-wise God our way, instead of meekly accepting His way. Surely, the One who speaks has a right to do what pleases His divine will. He is the sovereign One, the Lord of lords; and though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.
"But though it is a King that speaks, He does not speak as a king. He is talking to His friends; He is serving them with a humility and meekness that no sinful mortal has surpassed. He is proving, by the plain, simple teaching of actions, that we are not merely His subjects, but His brethren, His sisters; and that with Him we shall form one household of faith, one family in God. He is teaching the sin of arrogance and the folly of pride. He is proving, for all time, that serving—not being served—is God's patent of nobility. We should not despise the lowliest, for none can stoop so far as He stooped."
Every few moments her low, sweet voice had, as an accompaniment, distant peals of thunder, that after every interval rolled nearer and jarred heavier among the mountains. More than once I saw Miss Warren start nervously, and glance apprehensively at the open window where I sat, and through which the lightning gleamed with increasing vividness. Adah maintained the same utterly quiet, impassive face, and it seemed to me that she heard nothing and thought of nothing. Her eyes were open; her mind was asleep. She appeared an exquisite breathing combination of flesh and blood, and nothing more. Reuben looked at his mother with an expression of simple affection; but one felt that he did not realize very deeply what she was saying; but Mr. Yocomb's face glowed with an honest faith and strong approval.
"The Master said," continued Mrs. Yocomb, after one of the little pauses that intervened between her trains of thought, "'What I do, thou knowest not now.' There He might have stopped. Presuming is the subject that asks his king for the why and wherefore of all that he does. The king is the highest of all; and if he be a king in truth, he sees the furthest of all. It is folly for those beneath the throne to expect to see so far, or to understand why the king, in his far-reaching providence, acts in a way mysterious to them. Our King is kingly, and He sees the end from the beginning. His plans reach through eternities. Why should He ever be asked to explain to such as we? Nevertheless, to the fishermen of Galilee, and to us, He does say, 'Thou shalt know hereafter.'
"The world is full of evil. We meet its sad mysteries on every side, in every form. It often touches us very closely—" For a moment some deep emotion choked her utterance. Involuntarily, I glanced at Adah. Her eyes were drooping a little heavily again, and her bosom rose and fell in the long, quiet breath of complete repose. Miss Warren was regarding the suffering mother with the face of a pitying angel.
"And its evilsareevil," resumed the sad-hearted woman, in a tone that was full of suppressed anguish; "at least, they seem so, and I don't understand them—I can't understand them, nor why they are permitted; but He has promised that good shall come out of the evil, and has said, 'Thou shalt know hereafter.' Oh, blessed hereafter! when all clouds shall have rolled away, and in the brightness of my Lord's presence every mystery that now troubles me shall be made clear. Dear Lord, I await Thine own time. Do what seemeth good in Thine own eyes;" and she meekly folded her hands and bowed her head. For a moment or two there was the same impressive silence that fell upon us before she spoke. Then a louder and nearer peal of thunder awakened Zillah, who raised her head from her mother's lap and looked wonderingly around, as if some one had called her.
Never had I witnessed such a scene before, and I turned toward the darkness that I might hide the evidence of feelings that I could not control.
A second later I sprang to my feet, exclaiming, "Wonderful!"
Miss Warren came toward me with apprehension in her face, but I saw that she noted my moist eyes.
I hastened from the room, saying, "Come out on the lawn, all of you, for we may now witness a scene that is grand indeed."
I had been so interested in Mrs. Yocomb's words, their effect on the little group around her, and the whole sacred mystery of the scene, that I had ceased to watch the smoking mountain, with its increasingly lurid apex. In the meantime the fire had fully reached the summit, on which stood a large dry tree, and it had become a skeleton of flame. Through this lurid fire and smoke the full moon was rising, its silver disk discolored and partially obscured.
This scene alone, as we gathered on the piazza and lawn below it, might well have filled us with awe and wonder; but a more impressive combination was forming. Advancing from the southwest, up the star-lit sky, which the moon was brightening momentarily, was a cloud whose blackness and heaviness the vivid lightning made only the more apparent.
"I am an old man," said Mr. Yocomb, "but I never saw anything so grand as this before."
"Mother, mother," said little Zillah, "I'm afraid. Please take me upstairs and put me to bed." And the mother, to whom the scene in the heavens was a glorious manifestation of the God she loved rather than feared, denied herself of what was almost like a vision, for the sake of the child.
"It's awful," said Adah; "I won't look at it any longer. I don't see why we can't have nice quiet showers that one can go to sleep in;" and she disappeared within the house. Reuben sat down on the piazza, in his quiet, undemonstrative way. Miss Warren came down and stood close to Mr. Yocomb's side, as if she half unconsciously sought the good man's protection.
Incessant lightnings played from some portion of the cloud, zigzagging in fiery links and forkings, while, at brief intervals, there would be an exceptionally vivid flash, followed more and more closely by heavier and still heavier explosions. But not a leaf stirred around us: the chirp of a cricket was sharply distinct in the stillness. The stars shone serenely over our heads, and the moon, rising to the left out of the line of the smoke and fire, was assuming her silvery brightness, and at the same time rendering the burning mountain more lurid from contrast.
"Herbert, Herbert, now I know how brave you were," I heard Miss Warren exclaim, in a low, awed tone.
I saw by the frequent flashes that she was very pale, and that she was trembling.
"You mean your brother," I said gently.
With her eyes fixed on the threatening and advancing cloud as if fascinated by it, she continued in the same tone, that was full of indescribable dread: "Yes, yes, I never realized it so fully before, and yet I have lain awake whole nights, going, by an awful necessity, over every scene of that terrible day. He stood in his place in the line of battle on an open plain, and he watched battery after battery come down from the heights above and open fire. He stood there till he was slain, looking steadily at death. This cloud that is coming makes me understand the more awful storm of war that he faced. Oh, I wish this hadn't happened," and there was almost agony in her tone. "I'm not brave as he was, and every nearer peal of thunder shakes my very soul."
Mr. Yocomb put his hand tenderly on her shoulder as he said:
"My dear, foolish little child—as if thy Father in heaven would hurt thee!"
"Miss Warren," I said earnestly, "I have too little of Mr. and Mrs. Yocomb's faith; but it seems impossible that anything coming from heaven could harm you."
She drew closer to Mr. Yocomb's side, but still looked at the cloud with the same wide-eyed dread, as if spellbound by it.
"To me," she resumed in her former tone, that only became more hurried and full of fear as the tempest approached, "these awful storms are no part of heaven. They are wholly of earth, and seem the counterparts of those wild outbreaks of human passion from which I and so many poor women in the past have suffered;" and a low sob shook her frame. "I wish I had more of good Mr. Yocomb's spirit; for this appalling cloud seems to me the very incarnation of evil. WhydoesGod permit such things?"
With a front as calm and serene as that of any ancient prophet could have been, Mr. Yocomb began repeating the sublime words, "The voice of Thy thunder was in the heavens; the lightnings lightened the world."
"Oh, no, no!" cried the trembling girl, "the God I worship is not in the storm nor in the fire, but in the still small voice of love. You may think me very weak to be so moved, but truly I cannot help it. My whole nature shrinks from this." I took her hand as I said warmly, "I do understand you, Miss Warren. Unconsciously you have fully explained your mood and feeling. It's in truth your nature, your sensitive, delicate organism, that shrinks from this wild tumult that is coming. In the higher moral tests of courage, when the strongest man might falter and fail, you would be quietly steadfast."
She gave my hand a quick, strong pressure, and then withdrew it as she said, "I hope you are right; you interpret me so generously that I hope I may some day prove you right."
"I need no proof. I saw your very self in the garden."
"How strange—how strange it all is!" she resumed, with a manner that betokened a strong nervous excitability. "Can this be the same world—these the same scenes that were so full of peace and beauty an hour ago? How tremendous is the contrast between the serene, lovely June day and evening just passed and this coming tempest, whose sullen roar I already hear with increasing dread! Mr. Morton, you said in jest that this was a day of fate. Why did you use the expression? It haunts me, oppresses me. Possibly it is. I rarely give way to presentiments, but I dread the coming of this storm inexpressibly. Oh!" and she trembled violently as a heavier peal than we had yet heard filled the wide valley with awful echoes.
"Not even a sparrow shall fall to the ground without your Father. We are safe, my child. God will shield thee more lovingly than I;" and he drew her closer to him.
"I know what you say is true, and yet I cannot control this mortal fear and weakness."
"No, Miss Warren, you cannot," I said; "therefore do not blame yourself. You tremble as these trees and shrubs will be agitated in a few moments, because you cannot help it."
"You are not so moved."
"No, nor will that post be moved," I replied, with a reckless laugh. "I must admit that I am very much excited, however, for the air is full of electricity. I can't help thinking of the little robins in a home open to the sky."
Her only answer was a low sob, but not for a moment did she take her wide, terror-stricken gaze from the cloud whose slow, deliberate advance was more terrible than gusty violence would have been.
The phenomena had now become so awful that we did not speak again for some moments. The great inky mass was extending toward the eastward, and approaching the fire burning on the mountain-top, and the moon rising above and to the left of it; and from beneath its black shadow came a heavy, muffled sound that every moment deepened and intensified.
Suddenly, as if shaken by a giant's hands, the tree-tops above us swayed to and fro; then the shrubbery along the paths seemed full of wild terror and writhed in every direction.
Hitherto the moon had shone on the cloud with as serene a face as that with which Mr. Yocomb had watched its approach, but now a scud of vapor swept like a sudden pallor across her disk, giving one the odd impression that she had just realized her peril, and then an abyss of darkness swallowed her up. For a few moments longer the fire burned on, and then the cloud with its torrents settled down upon it, and the luridly luminous point became opaque.
The night now alternated between utter darkness and a glare in which every leaf and even the color of the tossing roses were distinct.
After the first swirl of wind passed, there fell upon nature round us a silence that was like breathless expectation, or the cowering from a blow that cannot be averted, and through the stillness the sound of the advancing tempest came with awful distinctness, while far back among the mountains the deep reverberations scarcely ceased a moment.
Broken masses of vapor, the wild skirmish line of the storm, passed over our heads, blotting out the stars. The trees and shrubbery were bending helplessly to the gust, and Miss Warren could scarcely stand before its violence. The great elm swayed its drooping branches over the house as if to protect it. The war and whirl of the tempest was all about us, the coming rain reminded one of the resounding footsteps of an innumerable host, and great drops fell here and there like scattering shots.
"Come in, my child," said Mr. Yocomb; "the storm will soon be passed, and thee and the robins shall yet have quiet sleep to-night. I've seen many such wild times among the mountains, and nothing worse than clearer skies and better grain followed. You will hear the robins singing—"
A blinding flash of lightning, followed by such a crash as I hope I may never hear again, prevented further reassuring words, and he had to half support her into the house.
I had never been in a battle, but I know that the excitement which mastered me must have been akin to the grand exaltation of conflict, wherein a man thinks and acts by moments as if they were hours and years. Well he may, when any moment, may end his life. But the thought of death scarcely entered my mind. I had no presentiment of harm to myself, but feared that the dwelling or outbuildings might be struck.
Almost with the swiftness of lightning came the calculation:
"Estimating distance and time, the next discharge of electricity will be directly over the house. If there's cause, which God forbid, may I have the nerve and power to serve those who have been so kind!"
As I thought, I ran to an open space which commanded a view of the farmhouse. Scarcely had I reached it before my eyes were blinded for a second by what seemed a ball of intense burning light shot vertically into the devoted home.
"O God!" I gasped, "it is the day of fate." For a moment I seemed paralyzed, but the igniting roof beside the chimney roused me at once.
"Reuben!" I shouted.
A flash of lightning revealed him still seated quietly on the piazza, as if he had heard nothing. I rushed forward, and shook him by the shoulder.
"Come, be a man; help me. Quick!" and I half dragged him to a neighboring cherry-tree, against which I had noticed that a ladder rested.
By this time he seemed to recover his senses, and in less than a moment we had the ladder against the house. Within another moment he had brought me a pail of water from the kitchen.
"Have two more pails ready," I cried, mounting the low, sloping roof.
The water I carried, and rain, which now began to fall in torrents, extinguished the external fire, but I justly feared that the woodwork had been ignited within. Hastening back at perilous speed, I said to Reuben, who stood ready: "Take one of the pails and lead the way to the attic and the rooms upstairs."
The house was strangely and awfully quiet as we rushed in.
I paused a second at the parlor door. Miss Warren lay motionless upon the floor, and Mr. Yocomb sat quietly in his great armchair.
A sickening fear almost overwhelmed me, but I exclaimed loudly, "Mr.Yocomb, rouse yourself; I smell fire; the house is burning!"
He did not move nor answer, and I followed Reuben, who was half-way up the stairs. It took but a few seconds to reach the large, old-fashioned garret, which already was filling with smoke.
"Lead the way to the chimney," I shouted to Reuben in my terrible excitement. "Do not waste a drop of water. Let me put it on when I find just where the fire is."
Through the smoke I now saw a lurid point. A stride brought me thither, and I threw part of the water in my pail up against it. The hissing and sputtering proved that we had hit on the right spot, while the torrents falling on the roof so dampened the shingles that further ignition from without was impossible.
"We must go down a moment to breathe," I gasped, for the smoke was choking us.
As we reached the story in which were the sleeping apartments, I cried:
"Great God! Why don't some of the family move or speak?"
Hitherto Reuben had realized only the peril of his home; but now he rushed into his mother's room, calling her in a tone that I shall never forget.
A second later he uttered my name in a strange, awed tone, and I entered hesitatingly. Little Zillah apparently lay sleeping in her crib, and Mrs. Yocomb was kneeling by her bedside.
"Mother!" said Reuben, in a loud whisper.
She did not answer.
He knelt beside her, put his arm around her, and said, close to her ear, "Mother! why don't you speak to me?" She made no response, and I saw that she leaned so heavily forward on the bed as to indicate utter unconsciousness.
The boy sprang up, and gazed at me with wild questioning in his eyes.
"Reuben!" I said quickly, "she's only stunned by the lightning. Will you prove yourself a man, and help me in what must be done? Life may depend upon it."
"Yes," eagerly.
"Then help me lift your mother on the bed; strong and gentle, now—that's it."
I put my hand over her heart.
"She is not dead," I exclaimed joyously; "only stunned. Let us go to the attic again, for we must keep shelter this wild night."
We found that the smoke had perceptibly lessened; I dashed the other pail of water on the spot that had been burning, then found that I could place my hand on it. We had been just in time, for there was light woodwork near that communicated with the floor, and the attic was full of dry lumber, and herbs hanging here and there, that would have burned like tinder. Had these been burning we could not have entered the garret, and as it was we breathed with great difficulty. The roof still resounded to the fall of such torrents that I felt that the dwelling was safe, unless it had become ignited in the lower stories, and it was obviously our next duty to see whether this was the case.