‘Here brief is the sighing,And brief is the crying,For brief is the life!The life there is endless,The joy there is endless,And ended the strife.O country the fairest!Our country the dearest,We press toward thee!O Sion the golden!Our eyes are still holden,Thy light till we see.We know not, we know not,All human words show notThe joys we may reach.The mansions preparing,The joys for our sharing,The welcome for each.’
‘Here brief is the sighing,And brief is the crying,For brief is the life!The life there is endless,The joy there is endless,And ended the strife.O country the fairest!Our country the dearest,We press toward thee!O Sion the golden!Our eyes are still holden,Thy light till we see.We know not, we know not,All human words show notThe joys we may reach.The mansions preparing,The joys for our sharing,The welcome for each.’
‘Here brief is the sighing,And brief is the crying,For brief is the life!The life there is endless,The joy there is endless,And ended the strife.
O country the fairest!Our country the dearest,We press toward thee!O Sion the golden!Our eyes are still holden,Thy light till we see.
We know not, we know not,All human words show notThe joys we may reach.The mansions preparing,The joys for our sharing,The welcome for each.’
Then Belle opened the door softly and went in.
Pauline saw a large bay window opening into a tiny conservatory, which loving hands kept dowered with a profusion ofblooming plants. The room was large and dainty with delicate draperies, two or three fine pictures, and a beautiful representation in marble of the Angel of Patience, which stood on a buhl table, where the invalid’s eyes could always rest upon it.
Tryphosa turned her head to greet them from the low couch, which was the battle-ground where she had wrestled with the angel of pain during years of physical agony. Her eyes were lustrous with a radiance not of earth, and a wealth of silver hair fell in soft curling waves about her face; her mouth, sweet and tender, parted in a smile of welcome as she held out her hands to the girls.
Belle caught them in her own, and kissed them gently.
‘This is our cousin, my lady, Aunt Mildred’s only child.’
The thin hands drew Pauline’s face down, and she was kissed on cheek and brow.
‘Your mother was my friend, dear child, in the long ago.’ Then she added softly, with her hands on the silver cross at her throat, ‘Are you a princess? Do you belong to the King?’
Pauline shook her head, ‘No, my lady.’
‘I am very sorry.’
They sat down then beside her. She held Pauline’s strong hand between her wasted fingers.
‘Dear Mildred Davis! You have her eyes and brow, my child. It does me good to see you.’
‘That is just like papa,’ said Belle. ‘He says he can almost fancy himself back in the old home with Aunt Mildred getting him ready for school.’
Pauline coloured with pleasure. Noone spoke of her mother at Sleepy Hollow.
She looked through the French windows into the conservatory.
‘How beautiful the flowers are!’
‘You love them? Of course you must, to be your mother’s child. It is such a comfort to me to lie here and listen to them talk.’
‘Talk!’ exclaimed Pauline. ‘Do they do that, my lady?’
Tryphosa smiled.
‘Surely,’ she said gently. ‘“Every flower has its story, and every butterfly’s life is a poem.”’
Belle broke the silence.
‘We heard you singing, my lady; I do not think Pauline had thought you would have the heart to sing.’
A ripple of the sweetest laughter Pauline had ever heard fell through the quiet room, and Tryphosa’s eyes flashed merrily.
‘“The pilgrims kept on their journey, and as they journeyed they sang,”’ she said. ‘Do you think there is anything to cry about when we are on our way to a palace, dear child? But Sunday is always my resting time,’ she continued, ‘I do not sing as much through the week as I should. I am tired often, and busy.’
‘Busy,’ echoed Pauline involuntarily, with a glance at the frail body propped up among the cushions.
Tryphosa gave another soft, merry laugh, and drew forward a rosewood writing-table, which was fitted to her couch.
‘Here is where I do my work, when my hands are willing; and then there are my dear poor people, and my rich friends, and sometimes the latter need as much comforting as the former. Oh, thereis a great deal to do, dear child, for some have to be taught the way to the palace, and some have to be brought into audience with the King,’ her voice hushed itself into a reverent whisper.
‘And how about the pain, my lady?’ asked Belle. Pauline’s eyes were full of tears.
‘Just right,’ she answered brightly. ‘Some days are set in minor key, and the Lord calls me where the waves run high; but so long as I am sure it is the Lord, what does it matter? Not one good thing has failed of all that He has promised, and soldiers do not mind a few sword thrusts when they are marching to victory. “This day the noise of battle, the next the victor’s song.” She closed her eyes and a triumphant smile played about her mouth.
‘You seem so certain, my lady,’ said Belle wistfully.
‘Surely! “For we know that He hath prepared for us a city.”’
‘Now you mean heaven,’ said Pauline impetuously. ‘To me heaven is enveloped in fog.’
‘It will not be, dear child, when the mists have rolled away, and in the clear light of the Sun of Righteousness you look across to the other shore.’
‘Couldn’t you tell me what it is like, my lady? You seem to know. I can’t fathom it, and everything looks so dark.’
Tryphosa lifted a plain little book from a revolving bookcase of morocco-bound treasures, which stood within easy reach.
‘I believe I will let Miss Warner answer you. “Would you like a heaven so small, so human, that mortal words could line itout, and mortal wishes be its boundary? The things we look for are prepared by One whose thoughts are as far above our thoughts as the broad starlit heaven is above this little gaslit earth. And do you think that people are to be all massed in heaven, losing their various identities, their differing tastes, their separate natures? Going from this lower world so full of its adaptations, where colour and form take on a thousand changes, and life and pursuit can be varied almost at will, to a mere dead level of perfect felicity? To leave earth where no two things are alike, and go to heaven to find no two different! The Lord’s preparations mean more than that. We should learn better from this lower world. No one pair of black eyes is just like another, no two leaves upon the same tree. And not a yellow blossom can spring up by the wayside, without ared or a white one at hand for contrast. Are the clouds copies of each other? Are the shadows on the hills ever twice the same? Take for your comfort the full assurance that the very Tree of Life—which in Eden seems to have borne but one manner of fruit—in heaven shall bear twelve. But we cannot imagine it—in its fulness. We must look, not to see clear outlines and distinct colours, but only the flood of heavenly light. From point to point the promises pass on, with their golden touch; until the vacant places in our lives disappear, and the aches die out, and desire and longing are lost in ‘more than heart could wish.’”’
A pause fell then, and a stillness, broken only by the plashing of a little fountain, whose drops fell among the flowers.
As they rose to go, Tryphosa drewPauline’s face down until it touched her own.
‘Dear child, won’t you claim your birthright?’
‘I will, my lady.’
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Thesummer slipped away, and to Pauline it was a continual dream of pleasure. She adhered strictly to her habit of rising with the sun, and not the least enjoyable part of the morning was the three hours spent in the solitude of her uncle’s luxurious library, while the day was new. Her active mind awoke from its enforced lethargy, and plumed itself for flight with a delightful sense of freedom. The dream of her life was coming true at last, and she was to have a chance to learn. She had learned all that the Sleepy Hollow school could teach her long ago. She would take up chemistry, of course, andbiology, mathematics and physics, French and Latin, geology and botany, and—well, she would decide later upon the rest of her curriculum. Her father seemed to take it for granted she should stay in Boston, her uncle called her his own little daughter, and she was content. Her healthy nature enjoyed to the full the innumerable diversions and pleasures which Belle’s active brain was continually planning. Picnics and garden-parties, excursions to the beaches, where she was never tired of feasting her eyes on the glory of the waves; or a run into the city to hear some special attraction. Always brightness and fun and laughter, for Aunt Rutha’s hospitable house was a favourite resort with many of the Harvard students, and it was the glorious summer time, when all the world—their little world—was free to be gay. She,Pauline Harding, was like other girls at last!
Then she must learn to row and to ride, with Richard Everidge for her teacher. Belle taught her to swim, and Russell to play tennis, and Gwendolyn took her to some of the many meetings to which she devoted her life.
And then there was Tryphosa. She always made time for a visit there at least once every week. She was hungry to hear all she could about her mother. She began to understand how Richard Everidge, in the pride of his manly beauty, could find it in his heart to envy the woman who day and night kept close company with pain. Sometimes the shadows would lie purple under the brilliant eyes, and the thin fingers be tightly clenched in anguish, but the brave lips gave no sign. On such days Pauline could only sit beside her inmute sorrow, or sing softly some of the hymns she loved.
‘It is terrible to see you suffer so, my lady!’ she cried, one morning, when, in the fulness of her strength, she had gone from the laughing sunshine into the shadowed room, where every ray of light fell like a blow upon the invalid’s quivering nerves.
Tryphosa made answer with a smile.
‘Not one stroke too much, dear child. It is my Father’s hand upon thetribulum. He never makes mistakes.’
One day she slipped away directly after breakfast. She wanted to be sure of finding her alone.
It was one of the invalid’s good days, and she greeted her with a bright smile of welcome.
‘My lady,’ she began abruptly, ‘do you think I have forgotten all about mypromise? I could not. It has haunted me through everything, and—I gave myself to the King last night.’
Tryphosa’s eyes glowed deep with pleasure.
‘Thank God!’ she exclaimed softly. Then she closed her eyes, and Pauline knew from her moving lips that she was talking with the Lord.
She touched Pauline gently.
‘I had to talk a little about the good news with Jesus. He is my nearest neighbour, you know. And now, dear child, tell me all about it. What a wonderfully simple thing it is! People talk so much about being a Christian, when, after all, it is simply to be Christ’s. We open the door where He has knocked so long, and let Him in. We give ourselves away to Jesus henceforth to live in Him, with Him, by Him, and for Him for ever. Dear child,when you were giving, did you include your will?’
‘My will?’ echoed Pauline, startled.
‘Why surely. The Christian is not to direct his Master.’
‘But how do you mean, my lady?’
Tryphosa began to sing softly:—
‘O, little bird, lie stillIn thy low nest:Thy part, to love My will:My part—the rest.’
‘O, little bird, lie stillIn thy low nest:Thy part, to love My will:My part—the rest.’
‘O, little bird, lie stillIn thy low nest:Thy part, to love My will:My part—the rest.’
‘That is His message to me. Yours will be different, for no two of His children get the same training.’
‘I suppose now life will be all duty,’ said Pauline, with a sigh.
Tryphosa smiled.
‘That is not the way I read my Bible. Peter says we must “love the brethren,” and John, “This is Christ’s commandment,that we believe and love,” because “he who loveth knoweth God,” and Paul, “The love of Christ constraineth us.”’
‘Well, but I must do something, my lady.’
‘Don’t fall into that snare, little one. It is what we are, not what we do. The dear Christ wants us, not for what we do for Him, but what He does for us. Listen: “He that abideth in Me and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit, for without Me ye can do nothing.” “He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.” The first great thing for you now is to “get your meaning.”’
Pauline looked puzzled.
‘I do not understand, my lady.’
‘What are you going to stand for? How much better is the world to be for yourhaving lived in it? The day is long past when people were satisfied with a Sunday religion. True Christianity means a daily consecration of purpose. Look at the men who have made their mark in the world—reformers, inventors, discoverers, all men of a single purpose; and Paul says, “This one thing I do.” Michael Angelo said, “Nothing makes the soul so pure, so religious, as the endeavour to create something perfect, for God is perfection, and whoever strives for it, strives for something that is God-like.” And remember, “perfect has no clipped edges, no dreary blanks.” Little one, I want you to strive to be a perfect Christian.’
Pauline fell on her knees beside the couch, and buried her face in the cushions.
‘I am not worthy,’ she murmured.
Tryphosa laid her hand very tenderlyupon the bowed head, as she repeated in low, triumphant tones:—
‘“I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for He hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, He hath covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels.” “This is the will of God, even your sanctification.” “That ye may be holy and without blame before Him in love.” “Be ye perfect as My Father in heaven is perfect.” According to the measure of our capacity, that is the idea, just as the tiny cup may be as full as the ocean. But for this we must lay all upon the altar. There must be no closed doors, no reserved corners in our hearts. We must give Christ the key to every room, so that He shall be, not merely a guest in theguest-chamber, but the owner of the house. Are you ready for that, dear child?’
And Pauline answered humbly:—
‘I want the very best God has to give me.’
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Thebeautiful summer had slipped away and the glory of October was over the land. Pauline had crossed the borders and plunged, with all the zest of her thirsty soul, into the fair world of knowledge which lay stretched at her feet. Her three months of conscientious study had been of great service as a preparatory training, and already more than one of the professors had complimented her on her breadth of view, and the rapidity with which she was able to grasp an idea.
A subtle sense of power stole over her. Every part of her being seemed to expand In the congenial atmosphere. A brilliantfuture seemed opening before her enraptured gaze. The world should be the better for her life. God had endowed her with gifts. She would lay them at His feet. She would devote herself to the up-lifting of others. She would strive to lift them from the torpor of their common-place into a higher life. Life was magnificent! Poor Tryphosa, in her narrow sphere of pain, how could she be so happy!
Belle hurried along the hall and stopped at the door of the blue-draped chamber.
‘My dear Paul, do you know we are all waiting? What have you been doing? If I could only get a snapshot at you now I should call it “The Intoxication of Success.” You would make a splendid Jeanne d’Arc, with the light of high and holy purpose in her eyes; but as this is the last Saturday in the year that we shall have the chance of a ride to Forest Glenand home by moonlight, I move that we postpone our rhapsodies until a more convenient season. The boys are waiting below with the horses, and the servants started long ago with the hampers. Even Gwen has been wooed by the beauty of the morning to accompany us, though I think there are about a dozen meetings on her calendar. Here is a letter for you, but you have no time to read it now.’
‘Have I kept you? Oh, I am sorry!’ and catching up her silver-mounted riding whip Pauline threw her habit over her arm, and ran down to where Richard Everidge held the handsome bay mare which had been her uncle’s gift. The letter she had tossed lightly on the table. It was from her father, but it would keep. There was never any news at Sleepy Hollow.
Aunt Rutha watched the merry party as they cantered off.
‘How well Pauline looks in the saddle. We have been very fortunate in our adopted daughter, Robert.’
‘Yes, she is a sweet girl, and her passion for knowledge is just the incentive that our lazy little Belle needs. I only hope her father will never take it into his head to claim her again. She is a blessing in the house.’
On and on the riders travelled, through the exhilarating autumn air, until they stopped for lunch on the borders of a forest which Jack Frost had set ablaze, and which glowed in the sunshine with a dazzling splendour of crimson and bronze and gold. The hours flew by, and when they started homewards the sun was sinking in majestic glory, while on the opposite horizon the moon rose, silver clear. Pauline’s every nerve quivered with delight. It was a perfect ending to a perfect day.
When she went up to her room that night her eye fell on the forgotten letter. She opened it slowly with a smile on her lips. Suddenly the smile faded, and a cold chill crept into her heart.
‘It has been such a happy day,’ she had told Aunt Rutha, as, after the merry supper was over, she had stood by her side in the soft-lighted library. ‘Such a happy day, without a flaw!’ And now already it seemed to be fading into the dim, dim past! And yet it was only a few hours since Richard Everidge had climbed lightly up after the spray of brilliant leaves which she had admired, and she had pinned them against the dark background of her riding habit; even now they were before her on the table. She looked at them with a dull sense of pain.
‘Mother has had a stroke of some sort,’ Mr Harding wrote, ‘the doctor doesn’t seem to know rightly what. She is somewhat better, but she can’t leave her bed. The children are well, except Polly, who seems weakly. The doctor thinks her spine has been hurt. Mother had her in her arms when she fell.’
Pauline shivered. Was this God’s ‘best’ for her? The letter dropped from her hand, and she sat for hours motionless, her eyes taking in every detail of the pretty moonlit room, until it was indelibly engraved upon her memory.
When the morning came she took the letter to Tryphosa. She could not trust herself to tell the others yet.
The eyes that looked up at her from the open sheet were very tender.
‘Dear child, are you satisfied?’
‘With what, my lady?’
‘With Christ, and the life He has planned for you?’
She hesitated. If it had been this other life that she had been planning for herself only the day before, how gladly she would have answered: but, if it should be Sleepy Hollow, could she say yes?
With her keen intuition, which had been sharpened by pain, Tryphosa divined her thought.
‘I am going to give you a new beatitude,’ she said, brightly. ‘Blessed be drudgery, for it is the grey angel of success.’
‘That is a hard gospel, my lady.’
‘Perhaps, but ease and victory are for ever incompatible. The Father loved the Son, yet He surrendered Him to a life of toil, and Christ Himself gave His chosen ones the heritage of tribulation, crowned with the sweet, bright gift of peace. Itis the tried lives that ring the truest. The idea runs all through the Bible. “Silver purified seven times,” and “gold tried in the fire,” and “polished after the similitude of a palace.” Have you ever thought of the friction that involves? The finest diamonds bear the most cutting, and it is the mission of the diamond to reflect the light. If we would have our lives a success, we must seek not happiness but harmony.’
‘Harmony! With what, my lady?’
‘The will of God, dear child. We are out of tune when God finds us. He puts us in tune with our great keynote Jesus, and then we are like an Æolian harp. The west and the east winds make music through it, and the shrieking storm the sweetest music of all. But remember, little one, it is the “joy of the Lord” which is our strength. We must sit in the sunshine if we would reflect the rainbow.’
That night Pauline spent upon her knees.
‘It is ridiculous,’ exclaimed Mr Davis, when, the next morning, she announced her decision to the family. ‘I will send a nurse down by the early train, but it is not fit work for you, my child, and besides we cannot spare you.’
Her eyes filled.
‘It is so good of you to say that! But my Father has called me, and I must go.’
‘He does not say anything about your going in the letter,’ said Mr Davis, as he ran his eyes over the words.
‘I mean my heavenly Father, Uncle Robert.’ she said simply. ‘The message came last night.’
After that they could not shake her, although Belle hung about her tearfully. Russell and Gwen protested, Aunt Rutha looked at her with sorrowful eyes, and MrDavis repeated that the very idea was absurd, as he paced up and down with a strange huskiness in his throat.
‘I have come to say good-bye, my lady.’
Tryphosa looked wistfully at the brave, sweet face, which she knew she would see no more.
‘So soon, dear child?’
‘I have given Christ the key, as you said, and now I am under orders.’
‘Well, I knew it would come. It is only that we must travel by different roads. We shall meet at the end of the journey.’
‘But you never told me that my way to the kingdom lay through Sleepy Hollow!’
‘Surely not, dear child! It is not for me to do the work of the Holy Spirit. I knew you would hear His voice speaking to you from out the shadows by-and-by.’
Pauline sighed.
‘I have so longed for culture, my lady, and now I must put it by.’
‘I am going to quote again. “Blessed be drudgery, the secret of all culture.” Some one has said: “Latin and Greek, and music and art, and travel, are the decorations of life, but industry and perseverance, courage before difficulties, and cheer under straining burdens, self-control and self-denial are the indispensables. It is our daily task that mainly educates us, and the humblest woman may live splendidly.” And remember, dear child, a life like Christ’s is the grandest thing in the world. Angels may well envy us the opportunity of living it, for God Himself has lived it in Christ and rejoices to live it again in each of us. We should glory in the thought that our King allows us to be the mirror in which the world may see Jesus. May the Lord keep you as one ofHis “hidden ones,” my darling, and make you to realise that He who “holdeth the height of the hills,” spreads the hush of His presence over the valleys.’
Then she drew her close in a long, last farewell.
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‘Ifyou cannot realise your Ideal, you can at least idealise your Real.’
As the train slackened speed, Pauline lifted her eyes from the book which Richard Everidge had laid on the seat beside her, after giving her that last strong handshake, to see her father standing in front of the Sleepy Hollow Station. A great pity filled her heart—how worn and old he looked!
They had all wanted to accompany her part of the way, and Belle had pleaded to be allowed to go and help nurse, but she had said them nay. She knew the accommodations of Hickory Farm, and it waseasier to leave them where she had met them first, at the entrance of what would always be to her the city of delights.
Abraham Lincoln and the spring waggon! Had the whole beautiful summer been one delicious dream? Could it be only a week since she had stood entranced in that forest of flame? Here the leaves hung brown and shrivelled on the denuded branches, stray flakes of snow were in the air, and the early twilight fell chill and dreary.
‘I’m terrible glad to see you, Pauline, though I hated to spoil your visit,’ said Mr Harding, as he gave Abraham Lincoln a taste of the whip.
Pauline leaned towards him, and laid both hands upon his arm.
‘Poor father! I am so sorry for you! Now tell me all about it.’
And the tired man turned to the daughter who for his sake had left ease and beautyand friends, and shifted to her shoulders the burden which he found too heavy for his own.
The children crowded to meet her as she stumbled through the narrow hall-way into the kitchen. How dark it was! Her quick glance comprehended the whole scene, and the contrast between it and that other home-coming smote her with a keen sense of physical pain. She looked at the solitary lamp with its grotesquely hideous ornament of red flannel, at Susan’s expressionless, freckled face, at the boys in their copper-toed boots and overalls, at the good-natured, but hopelessly common-place Martha Spriggs, with her thin hair drawn tight into a knob the size of a bullet, and her bare arms akimbo. ‘Idealize her real!’ Would it be possible to idealize anything at Sleepy Hollow?
She got her welcome in various fashions.
‘It’s about time you were getting back!’ exclaimed Mrs Harding from the bed on which she was forced to lie, in bitterness of spirit, with Polly by her side. ‘I suppose nothing less than a stroke would have brought you. It beats me how people can be such sponges! I’m thankful I was never one to go trailin’ about the country after my relations. I never was away from home more than a day in my life till I was married, and it’s been nothing but work ever since, and now to be laid here like a useless log, with everything going hotfoot to destruction! It’s a good thing you’ve come at last, for the children are makin’ sawdust and splinters of every bit of crockery in the house, and that Martha Spriggs has no more management than a settin’ hen. I don’t suppose you’ll be much better, though. You never did hev much of a head, an’ now you’ve been up among theclouds so long, you’ll be more like to sugar the butter and salt the pies than before.’
Pauline lifted Polly from her uncomfortable position with a warm glow about her heart, which all the sick woman’s bitterness was powerless to quench. If she could see Richard Everidge, she would tell him that she did believe in altitudes now. It was possible even in the valleys to live above the clouds. ‘Do not seek happiness,’ Tryphosa had said, ‘but harmony with God’s will,’ and God’s will for her was Sleepy Hollow. ‘It is not what we do, but what we are, dear child,’ she seemed to hear her saying. She remembered reading that ‘the smallest roadside pool has its water from heaven, and its gleam from the sun, and can hold the stars in its bosom, as well as the great ocean.’ God could make a ‘perfect Christian’ even in Sleepy Hollow.
‘I’m powerful glad ye’ve cum, Pawliney,’ said Martha Spriggs, as she followed her into the dairy after the meal was over. ‘I’m that beset I dunno where I’m standin’, for Miss Hardin’s been as crooked as a snake fence, an’ as contrairy as a yearlin’ colt, an’ the childern dew train awful.’
‘Yer’ve got to tell me stories all night, miles of ‘em,’ said Lemuel, as he bestowed his small person on the floor, with his legs in the air.
‘No, no, Lemuel, you’re going right to bed, like a good little brother, so Polly can get to sleep. Poor Polly is so tired,’ and Pauline walked up and down the floor of her tiny room trying to soothe the weary child.
‘Hi! Poll’s no ‘count; she’s only a gurl. I ain’t goin’ ter sleep nuther. I’m goin’ ter stay up fer hours an’ hours, an’ if yer don’t keep right on tellin’ stories quick,I’ll holler, an’ that’ll make mar mad, an’ then she’ll send par up with a stick ter beat me. I don’t care, he don’t hit ez hard as she duz, anyhow.’
‘If you’ll get undressed right away, Lemuel, I’ll tell you about a little boy who lived with an’ old, old man, and one night he couldn’t sleep, but——’
‘Huh! that’s a Bible story. This ain’t Sunday. Par never reads the Bible ’cept Sunday. I want ‘em ‘bout lions an’ tigers, an’ men tumblin’ down mountains, and boys gettin’ eaten by bears.’
‘What did you do when I was away, Lemuel?’
His lower lip protruded ominously.
‘Ain’t had nuthin’. Martha Spriggs don’t hev any. She only knows “the cow that jumped over the moon,” an’ that’s no good: ‘tain’t true, nuther, fer our cows don’t do it.’
No time the next morning for the long hours of delightful study. It was churning day, and there was baking to be done, and the mending was behindhand, and the children needed clothes; besides the numerous ‘odd jobs’ which Mrs Harding had deferred, but which she was prompt to require done as soon as she had some one besides Martha to call on. Then her meals must be given to her, and nothing tasted right, and the children were so noisy, and the older boys so uncouth.
Wearily Pauline toiled up the narrow stairs with Polly as the clock struck nine. She laid the sleeping child on her bed softly, so as not to wake Lemuel, and knelt down by the window. Not a sound broke the stillness. Her thoughts flew to the blue-draped chamber, and the soft lighted library, where she could almost see UncleRobert and Aunt Rutha, and Belle and Richard, and Russell and Gwen. But they might not be there yet; they had set apart this night, she remembered, to run over for a look through the big telescope. Last week that was, before she had decided to come to Sleepy Hollow, and broken up all their happy plans. Only last week! Then she thought of Tryphosa, lying with closed eyes in her darkened room, waiting patiently for the sleep which so often refused to come, while the angel of pain brooded over her pillow. Then her eyes sought the stars.
‘You dear things!’ she whispered. ‘God put you in your places and told you to shine, and for all these hundreds of years you’ve just kept on shining. Oh! my lady, ask God to help me to make this dark place bright.’
She knelt on in the clear, cold moonlightuntil at last the hush of God’s peace crept into her heart, and there was a great calm.
The winter crept on steadily. Jack Frost threw photographs of fairyland upon the windows, and hung the roofs with fringes of crystal pendants, while the snowflakes piled themselves over the fences and made a shroud for the trees, and every day Pauline, with this strange peace in her heart, did her housework to the glory of God.
There were bright spots here and there, for the Boston letters came freely, and the magazines which she had liked best, and now and then a book, as Belle said, ‘to keep Mr Hallam company.’ They would not let her drop out of their life, these kind friends, and she took it all thankfully, though she could only glance at the magazines, and never opened thebooks. There would be time by-and-by, she said to herself cheerfully. There was so much waiting for her in the beautiful by-and-by.
‘It beats me,’ said Mrs Harding fretfully, as Pauline hushed Polly to sleep, ‘what you do to that child. I used to sing to her till my throat cracked, but you just smooth her hair awhile with those fingers of yours, and off she goes. I wish you’d come and smooth me off to sleep. I’m that tired lying here, I don’t know what to do. That new doctor’s no more good than his powders are. I don’t see what old Dr Ross had to die for, just before I was goin’ ter need him.’ And the sick woman groaned.
Pauline laid Polly in her cot with a smile. This grudging praise was very sweet to her. To make darkness light, that was Christ’s mission, and hers.She was putting her whole soul in the effort.
‘What makes P’liney so different?’ queried Leander of Stephen and John, as they rested from their daily task of cutting wood. ‘She used ter be as mad as hops if yer mussed up yer clothes, an’ now she only laughs an’ sez, “Never mind, if it’s a stain that soap will conquer.”’
‘An’ she’s always singin’ too,’ said John thoughtfully; ‘if mother didn’t scold so it would be real pleasant.’
‘I’d like to know why it is, though,’ repeated Leander thoughtfully.
‘Because she belongs to the King,’ said the clear, sweet voice of his step-sister from the doorway, ‘and she wants you all to belong to Him too.’
When she went back into the house, she found Lemuel brandishing a broomstick over the frightened Polly.
‘Why, Lemuel, what are you doing?’
‘I’ve casted the devils out of her,’ exclaimed that youth triumphantly, ‘an’ they’ve gone inter the pig pen, whole leguns of ‘em, an’ they’re kickin’ orful!’
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Sevenyears had gone by, and every day of each successive month had been full to overflowing of hard work for Pauline.
‘Dear Tryphosa,’ she whispered to herself with a smile, ‘you little thought, when you gave me that new beatitude, what constant friends the grey angel of Drudgery and I were to be.’
She climbed slowly up the narrow stairs to her room, and shaded the lamp that it might not disturb Polly’s troubled sleep,—poor Polly, who would be an invalid for life. Then she sat down with a sigh of relief to read Belle’s last letter. It had been a hard day, her step-mother had beenmore than usually restless, and the farm-work had been very heavy, for Martha Spriggs was home on a visit; every nerve in her body seemed to quiver with the strain.
‘My dearest Paul,’ Belle wrote, ‘I can hardly see for crying, but I promised her that you should know at once.
‘Tryphosa went away from us to “the other shore” last night. We were all there—her “inner circle” as she used to call us—all except you, and she seemed to miss you so. I never knew her to grow fond of any one in so short a time, but she took you right into her heart from the first. If I had not loved you so much I should have been jealous, but who could be jealous of you, you precious, brave saint?
‘I have heard of the gate of heaven, but last night we were there.
‘Dick was supporting her in his arms, poor Dick, he was so fond of her, and it was so hard for her to breathe—and we were all gathered round her, our hearts breaking to think it was the last time. She has suffered terribly lately, but at the last the pain left her, and she lay with the very rapture of heaven on her dear face, talking so brightly of how we should do after she had gone. It was just as if she were going on a pleasure trip, and we were to follow later. She turned to me with her lovely eyes all aglow with joy, and said:—
‘“Give my Bible to the dear child in the valley” (that was what she always called you), “and tell her ‘the miles to heaven are but short and few.’”
‘She had a message for us all, and then, suddenly, just as the dawn broke, a great light swept over her face and she turnedher head and whispered, “Jesus!” just as if He were close beside her, and then—she was gone.
‘I shall never forget it. I have always thought of Death as the King of Terrors, but last night it was the coming of the Bridegroom for His own.’
With a low cry Pauline’s head dropped. There could never be anyone just like ‘my lady,’ and she had gone away.
The hours passed silently, as she sat benumbed in the grasp of her great sorrow.
Suddenly she sprang up. Her father was calling her from the foot of the stairs.
‘Mother’s had a bad turn. Send Stephen for the doctor, and come, quick!’
She hurried down, and mechanically heated water, and did what she couldto help the stricken woman, but before the doctor could reach the house, the Angel of Death had swept over the threshold, and Pauline and her father were left alone.
‘Here’s a letter for yer, Pawliney. Don’t yer wish yer may git it?’ and Lemuel, the irrepressible, waved it at her tantalisingly from the top of the tall hickory, where he had perched himself, like the monkey that he was.
She saw the Boston post-mark, and stretched out her hands for it longingly.
‘Bring it down, there’s a dear boy.’
‘Not much! I bet Leander that I could make you mad, an’ he bet his new jack-knife that I couldn’t. I’m goin’ to chew it up. It’s orful thin, ’taint no good anyhow. You won’t miss it, P’liney,’ and crushing the letter into asmall wad he put it into his capacious mouth.
It was, as Lemuel said, ‘awful thin,’ not much like the volumes which Belle usually wrote. She had not been able to distinguish the writing, but, of course, it must be from Belle. The two cousins had grown very near to each other as the years rolled by, and a summer never passed without some of her uncle’s family spending a week or two in Sleepy Hollow. Those were Pauline’s red-letter days—the bright, scintillating points where she was brought into touch again with the world of thought and light and beauty.
‘Throw it down to me, Lemuel, dear.’
‘Can’t,’ said the boy coolly, ‘I’m goin’ ter tie it to Poll’s balloon, an’ let go of the string, an’ then it’ll go straight to heaven,’ and, with the letter reposing in his cheek, he began to sing vociferously:—