Has she forgotten? On this very MayWe were to meet here, with the birds and bees,As on that Sabbath, underneath the treesWe strayed among the tombs, and stripped awayThe vines from these old granites, cold and gray—And yet, indeed, not grim enough were theyTo stay our kisses, smiles and ecstacies,Or closer voice-lost vows and rhapsodies.Has she forgotten—that the May has wonIts promise?—that the bird-songs from the treeAre sprayed above the grasses as the sunMight jar the dazzling dew down showeringly?Has she forgotten life—love—everyone—Has she forgotten me—forgotten me?
Low, low down in the violets I pressMy lips and whisper to her. Does she hear,And yet hold silence, though I call her dear,Just as of old, save for the tearfulnessOf the clenched eyes, and the soul's vast distress?Has she forgotten thus the old caressThat made our breath a quickened atmosphereThat failed nigh unto swooning with the sheerDelight? Mine arms clutch now this earthen heapSodden with tears that flow on ceaselesslyAs autumn rains the long, long, long nights weepIn memory of days that used to be,—Has she forgotten these? And, in her sleep,Has she forgotten me—forgotten me?
To-night, against my pillow, with shut eyes,I mean to weld our faces—through the denseIncalculable darkness make pretenseThat she has risen from her reveriesTo mate her dreams with mine in marriagesOf mellow palms, smooth faces, and tense easeOf every longing nerve of indolence,—Lift from the grave her quiet lips, and stunMy senses with her kisses—drawl the gleeOf her glad mouth, full blithe and tenderly,Across mine own, forgetful if is doneThe old love's awful dawn-time when said we,"To-day is ours!".... Ah, Heaven! can it beShe has forgotten me—forgotten me!
It's the curiousest thing in creation,Whenever I hear that old song,"Do They Miss Me at Home?" I'm so bothered,My life seems as short as it's long!—Far ever'thing 'pears like adzacklyIt 'peared, in the years past and gone,—When I started out sparkin', at twenty,And had my first neckercher on!Though I'm wrinkelder, older and grayerRight now than my parents was then,You strike up that song, "Do They Miss Me?"And I'm jest a youngster again!—I'm a-standin' back there in the furriesA-wishin' far evening to come,And a-whisperin' over and overThem words, "Do They Miss Me at Home?"You see, Marthy Ellen she sung itThe first time I heerd it; and so,As she was my very first sweetheart,It reminds of her, don't you know,—How her face ust to look, in the twilight,As I tuck her to spellin'; and sheKep' a-hummin' that song 'tel I ast her,Pine-blank, ef she ever missed me!I can shet my eyes now, as you sing it,And hear her low answerin' words,And then the glad chirp of the cricketsAs clear as the twitter of birds;And the dust in the road is like velvet,And the ragweed, and fennel, and grassIs as sweet as the scent of the liliesOf Eden of old, as we pass."Do They Miss Me at Home?" Sing it lower—And softer—and sweet as the breezeThat powdered our path with the snowyWhite bloom of the old locus'-trees!Let the whippoorwills he'p you to sing it,And the echoes 'way over the hill,'Tel the moon boolges out, in a chorusOf stars, and our voices is still.But, oh! "They's a chord in the musicThat's missed whenhervoice is away!"Though I listen from midnight 'tel morning,And dawn, 'tel the dusk of the day;And I grope through the dark, lookin' up'ardsAnd on through the heavenly dome,With my longin' soul singin' and sobbin'The words, "Do They Miss Me at Home?"
Alone they walked—their fingers knit together,And swaying listlessly as might a swingWherein Dan Cupid dangled in the weatherOf some sun-flooded afternoon of Spring.Within the clover-fields the tickled cricketLaughed lightly as they loitered down the lane,And from the covert of the hazel-thicketThe squirrel peeped and laughed at them again.The bumble-bee that tipped the lily-vasesAlong the road-side in the shadows dim,Went following the blossoms of their facesAs though their sweets must needs be shared with him.Between the pasture bars the wondering cattleStared wistfully, and from their mellow bellsShook out a welcoming whose dreamy rattleFell swooningly away in faint farewells.And though at last the gloom of night fell o'er them,And folded all the landscape from their eyes,They only know the dusky path before themWas leading safely on to Paradise.
"—And any little tiny kickshaws."—Shakespeare.
O the little tiny kickshaw that Mither sent tae me,'Tis sweeter than the sugar-plum that reepens on the tree,Wi' denty flavorin's o' spice an' musky rosemarie,The little tiny kickshaw that Mither sent tae me.'Tis luscious wi' the stalen tang o' fruits frae ower the sea,An' e'en its fragrance gars we laugh wi' langin' lip an' ee,Till a' its frazen sheen o' white maun melten hinnie be—Sae weel I luve the kickshaw that Mither sent tae me.O I luve the tiny kickshaw, an' I smack my lips wi' glee,Aye mickle do I luve the taste o' sic a luxourie,But maist I luve the luvein' han's that could the giftie gieO' the little tiny kickshaw that Mither sent tae me.
DEAD! my wayward boy—my own—Notthe Law's!butmine—the goodGod's free gift to me alone,Sanctified by motherhood."Bad," you say: Well, who is not?"Brutal"—"with a heart of stone"—And "red-handed."—Ah! the hotBlood upon your own!I come not, with downward eyes,To plead for him shamedly,—God did not apologizeWhen He gave the boy to me.Simply, I make ready nowForHisverdict.—Youprepare—You have killed us both—and howWill you face us There!
O heart of mine, we shouldn'tWorry so!What we've missed of calm we couldn'tHave, you know!What we've met of stormy pain,And of sorrow's driving rain,We can better meet again,If it blow!We have erred in that dark hourWe have known,When our tears fell with the shower,All alone!—Were not shine and shadow blentAs the gracious Master meant?—Let us temper our contentWith His own.For, we know, not every morrowCan be sad;So, forgetting all the sorrowWe have had,Let us fold away our fears,And put by our foolish tears,And through all the coming yearsJust be glad.
I got to thinkin' of her—both her parents dead and gone—And all her sisters married off, and none but her and JohnA-livin' all alone there in that lonesome sort o' way,And him a blame old bachelor, confirmder ev'ry day!I'd knowed 'em all from childern, and their daddy from the timeHe settled in the neighborhood, and had n't ary a dimeEr dollar, when he married, far to start housekeepin' on!—So I got to thinkin' of her—both her parents dead and gone!I got to thinkin' of her; and a-wundern what she doneThat all her sisters kep' a gittin' married, one by one,And her without no chances—and the best girl of the pack—An old maid, with her hands, you might say, tied behind her back!And Mother, too, afore she died, she ust to jes' take on,When none of 'em was left, you know, but Evaline and John,And jes' declare to goodness 'at the young men must be blineTo not see what a wife they 'd git if they got Evaline!I got to thinkin' of her; in my great affliction sheWas sich a comfert to us, and so kind and neighberly,—She 'd come, and leave her housework, far to be'p out little Jane,And talk ofher ownmother 'at she 'd never see again—Maybe sometimes cry together—though, far the most part sheWould have the child so riconciled and happy-like 'at weFelt lonesomer 'n ever when she 'd put her bonnet onAnd say she 'd railly haf to be a-gittin' back to John!I got to thinkin' of her, as I say,—and more and moreI'd think of her dependence, and the burdens 'at she bore,—Her parents both a-bein' dead, and all her sisters goneAnd married off, and her a-livin' there alone with John—You might say jes' a-toilin' and a-slavin' out her lifeFar a man 'at hadn't pride enough to git hisse'f a wife—'Less some one marriedEvaline, and packed her off some day!—So I got to thinkin' of her—and it happened thataway.
Heigh-ho! Babyhood! Tell me where you linger:Let's toddle home again, for we have gone astray;Take this eager hand of mine and lead me by the fingerBack to the Lotus lands of the far-away.Turn back the leaves of life; don't read the story,—Let's find thepictures, and fancy all the rest:—We can fill the written pages with a brighter gloryThan Old Time, the story-teller, at his very best!Turn to the brook, where the honeysuckle, tippingO'er its vase of perfume spills it on the breeze,And the bee and humming-bird in ecstacy are sippingFrom the fairy flagons of the blooming locust trees.Turn to the lane, where we used to "teeter-totter,"Printing little foot-palms in the mellow mold,Laughing at the lazy cattle wading in the waterWhere the ripples dimple round the buttercups of gold:Where the dusky turtle lies basking on the gravelOf the sunny sandbar in the middle-tide,And the ghostly dragonfly pauses in his travelTo rest like a blossom where the water-lily died.Heigh-ho! Babyhood! Tell me where you linger:Let's toddle home again, for we have gone astray;Take this eager hand of mine and lead me by the fingerBack to the Lotus lands of the far-away.
O the days gone by! O the days gone by!The apples in the orchard, and the pathway through the rye;The chirrup of the robin, and the whistle of the quailAs he piped across the meadows sweet as any nightingale;When the bloom was on the clover, and the blue was in the sky,And my happy heart brimmed over in the days gone by.In the days gone by, when my naked feet were trippedBy the honey-suckle's tangles where the water-lilies dipped,And the ripples of the river lipped the moss along the brinkWhere the placid-eyed and lazy-footed cattle came to drink,And the tilting snipe stood fearless of the truant's wayward cryAnd the splashing of the swimmer, in the days gone by.O the days gone by! O the days gone by!The music of the laughing lip, the luster of the eye;The childish faith in fairies, and Aladdin's magic ring—The simple, soul-reposing, glad belief in everything,—When life was like a story, holding neither sob nor sigh,In the golden olden glory of the days gone by.
John B. McKinney, Attorney and Counselor at Law, as his sign read, was, for many reasons, a fortunate man. For many other reasons he was not. He was chiefly fortunate in being, as certain opponents often strove to witheringly designate him, "the son of his father," since that sound old gentleman was the wealthiest farmer in that section, with but one son and heir to, in time, supplant him in the role of "county god," and haply perpetuate the prouder title of "the biggest tax-payer on the assessment list." And this fact, too, fortunate as it would seem, was doubtless the indirect occasion of a liberal percentage of all John's misfortunes. From his earliest school-days in the little town, up to his tardy graduation from a distant college, the influence of his father's wealth invited his procrastination, humored its results, encouraged the laxity of his ambition, "and even now," as John used, in bitter irony, to put it, "it is aiding and abetting me in the ostensible practice of my chosen profession, a listless, aimless undetermined man of forty, and a confirmed bachelor at that!" At the utterance of this self-depreciating statement, John generally jerked his legs down from the top of his desk; and, rising and kicking his chair back to the wall, he would stump around his littered office till the manilla carpet steamed with dust. Then he would wildly break away, seeking refuge either in the open street, or in his room at the old-time tavern, The Eagle House, "where," he would say, "I have lodged and boarded, I do solemnly asseverate, for a long, unbroken, middle-aged eternity of ten years, and can yet assert, in the words of the more fortunately-dying Webster, that 'I still live!'"
Extravagantly satirical as he was at times, John had always an indefinable drollery about him that made him agreeable company to his friends, at least; and such an admiring friend he had constantly at hand in the person of Bert Haines. Both were Bohemians in natural tendency, and, though John was far in Bert's advance in point of age, he found the young man "just the kind of a fellow to have around;" while Bert, in turn, held his senior in profound esteem—looked up to him, in fact, and in even his eccentricities strove to pattern after him. And so it was, when summer days were dull and tedious, these two could muse and doze the hours away together; and when the nights were long, and dark, and deep, and beautiful, they could drift out in the noon-light of the stars, and with "the soft complaining flute" and "warbling lute," "lay the pipes," as John would say, for their enduring popularity with the girls! And it was immediately subsequent to one of these romantic excursions, when the belated pair, at two o'clock in the morning, had skulked up a side stairway of the old hotel, and gained John's room, with nothing more serious happening than Bert falling over a trunk and smashing his guitar,—just after such a night of romance and adventure it was that, in the seclusion of John's room, Bert had something of especial import to communicate.
"Mack," he said, as that worthy anathematized a spiteful match, and then sucked his finger.
"Blast the all-fired old torch!" said John, wrestling with the lamp-flue, and turning on a welcome flame at last. "Well, you said 'Mack!' Why don't you go on? And don't bawl at the top of your lungs, either. You've already succeeded in waking every boarder in the house with that guitar, and you want to make amends now by letting them go to sleep again!"
"But my dear fellow," said Bert, with forced calmness, "you're the fellow that's making all the noise—and—"
"Why, you howling dervish!" interrupted John, with a feigned air of pleased surprise and admiration. "But let's drop controversy. Throw the fragments of your guitar in the wood-box there, and proceed with the opening proposition."
"What I was going to say was this," said Bert, with a half-desperate enunciation; "I'm getting tired of this way of living—clean, dead-tired, and fagged out, and sick of the whole artificial business!"
"Oh, yes!" exclaimed John, with a towering disdain, "you needn't go any further! I know just what malady is throttling you. It's reform—reform! You're going to 'turn over a new leaf,' and all that, and sign the pledge, and quit cigars, and go to work, and pay your debts, and gravitate back into Sunday-School, where you can make love to the preacher's daughter under the guise of religion, and desecrate the sanctity of the innermost pale of the church by confessions at Class of your 'thorough conversion!' Oh, you're going to—"
"No, but I'm going to do nothing of the sort," interrupted Bert, resentfully. "What I mean—if you'll let me finish—is, I'm getting too old to be eternally undignifying myself with this 'singing of midnight strains under Bonnybell's window panes,' and too old to be keeping myself in constant humiliation and expense by the borrowing and stringing up of old guitars, together with the breakage of the same, and the general wear-and-tear on a constitution that is slowly being sapped to its foundations by exposure in the night-air and the dew." "And while you receive no further compensation in return," said John, "than, perhaps, the coy turning up of a lamp at an upper casement where the jasmine climbs; or an exasperating patter of invisible palms; or a huge dank wedge of fruit-cake shoved at you by the old man, through a crack in the door."
"Yes, and I'm going to have my just reward, is what I mean," said Bert, "and exchange the lover's life for the benedict's. Going to hunt out a good, sensible girl and marry her." And as the young man concluded this desperate avowal he jerked the bow of his cravat into a hard knot, kicked his hat under the bed, and threw himself on the sofa like an old suit.
John stared at him with absolute compassion. "Poor devil," he said, half musingly, "I know just how he feels—
'Ring in the wind his wedding chimes,Smile, villagers, at every door;Old church-yards stuffed with buried crimes,Be clad in sunshine o'er and o'er.—'"
"Oh, here!" exclaimed the wretched Bert, jumping to his feet; "let up on that dismal recitative. It would make a dog howl to hear that!"
"Then you 'let up' on that suicidal talk of marrying," replied John, "and all that harangue of incoherency about your growing old. Why, my dear fellow, you're at least a dozen years my junior, and look at me!" and John glanced at himself in the glass with a feeble pride, noting the gray sparseness of his side-hair, and its plaintive dearth on top. "Of course I've got to admit," he continued, "that my hair is gradually evaporating; but for all that, I'm 'still in the ring,' don't you know; as young in society, for the matter of that, as yourself! And this is just the reason why I don't want you to blight every prospect in your life by marrying at your age—especially a woman—I mean the kind of woman you'd be sure to fancy at your age."
"Didn't I say 'a good, sensible girl' was the kind I had selected?" Bert remonstrated.
"Oh!" exclaimed John, "you've selected her, then?—and without one word to me!" he ended, rebukingly.
"Well, hang it all!" said Bert, impatiently; "I knew howyouwere, and just how you'd talk me out of it; and I made up my mind that for once, at least, I'd follow the dictations of a heart that—however capricious in youthful frivolties—should beat, in manhood, loyal to itself and loyal to its own affinity."
"Go it! Fire away! Farewell, vain world!" exclaimed the excited John.—"Trade your soul off for a pair of ear-bobs and a button-hook—a hank of jute hair and a box of lily-white! I've buried not less than ten old chums this way, and here's another nominated for the tomb."
"But you've got noreasonabout you," began Bert,—"I want to"—
"And so doI'want to,'" broke in John, finally,—"I want to get some sleep.—So 'register' and come to bed.—And lie up on edge, too, when youdocome—'cause this old catafalque-of-a-bed is just about as narrow as your views of single blessedness! Peace! Not another word! Pile in! Pile in! I'm three-parts sick, anyhow, and I want rest!" And very truly he spoke.
It was a bright morning when the slothful John was aroused by a long, vociferous pounding on the door. He started up in bed to find himself alone—the victim of his wrathful irony having evidently risen and fled away while his pitiless tormentor slept—"Doubtless to at once accomplish that nefarious intent as set forth by his unblushing confession of last night," mused the miserable John. And he ground his fingers in the corners of his swollen eyes, and leered grimly in the glass at the feverish orbs, blood-shotten, blurred and aching.
The pounding on the door continued. John looked at his watch; it was only 8 o'clock.
"Hi, there!" he called viciously. "What do you mean, anyhow?" he went on, elevating his voice again; "shaking a man out of bed when he's just dropping into his first sleep?"
"I mean that you're going to get up; that's what!" replied a firm female voice. "It's 8 o'clock, and I want to put your room in order; and I'm not going to wait all day about it, either! Get up and go down to your breakfast, and let me have the room!" And the clamor at the door was industriously renewed.
"Say!" called John, querulously, hurrying on his clothes, "Say! you!"
"There's no 'say' about it!" responded the determined voice: "I've heard about you and your ways around this house, and I'm not going to put up with it! You'll not lie in bed till high noon when I've got to keep your room in proper order!"
"Oh ho!" bawled John, intelligently: "reckon you're the new invasion here? Doubtless you're the girl that's been hanging up the new window-blinds that won't roll, and disguising the pillows with clean slips, and 'hennin' round among my books and papers on the table here, and ageing me generally till I don't know my own handwriting by the time I find it! Oh, yes! you're going to revolutionize things here; you're going to introduce promptness, and system, and order. See you've even filled the wash-pitcher and tucked two starched towels through the handle. Haven't got any tin towels, have you? I rather like this new soap, too! So solid and durable, you know; warranted not to raise a lather. Might as well wash one's hands with a door-knob!" And as John's voice grumbled away into the sullen silence again, the determined voice without responded: "Oh, you can growl away to your heart's content, Mr. McKinney, but I want you to distinctly understand that I'm not going to humor you in any of your old bachelor, sluggardly, slovenly ways, and whims and notions. And I want you to understand, too, that I'm not hired help in this house, nor a chambermaid, nor anything of the kind. I'm the landlady here; and I'll give you just ten minutes more to get down to your breakfast, or you'll not get any—that's all!" And as the reversed cuff John was in the act of buttoning slid from his wrist and rolled under the dresser, he heard a stiff rustling of starched muslin flouncing past the door, and the quick italicized patter of determined gaiters down the hall.
"Look here," said John to the bright-faced boy in the hotel office, a half hour later. "It seems the house here's been changing hands again."
"Yes, sir," said the boy, closing the cigar case, and handing him a lighted match. "Well, the new landlord, whoever he is," continued John, patronizingly, "is a good one. Leastwise, he knows what's good to eat, and how to serve it."
The boy laughed timidly,—"It aint a landlord,' though—it's a landlady; it's my mother."
"Ah," said John, dallying with the change the boy had pushed toward him. "Your mother, eh?" And where's your father?"
"He's dead," said the boy.
"And what's this for?" abruptly asked John, examining his change.
"That's your change," said the boy: "You got three for a quarter, and gave me a half."
"Well,youjust keep it," said John, sliding back the change. "It's for good luck, you know, my boy. Same as drinking your long life and prosperity. And, Oh yes, by the way, you may tell your mother I'll have a friend to dinner with me to-day."
"Yes, sir, and thank you, sir," said the beaming boy.
"Handsome boy!" mused John, as he walked down street. "Takes that from his father, though, I'll wager my existence!"
Upon his office desk John found a hastily written note. It was addressed in the well-known hand of his old chum. He eyed the missive apprehensively, and there was a positive pathos in his voice as he said aloud, "It's our divorce. I feel it!" The note, headed, "At the Office, 4 in Morning," ran like this:
"Dear Mack—I left you slumbering so soundly that, by noon,when you waken, I hope, in your refreshed state, you willlook more tolerantly on my intentions as partially confidedto you this night. I will not see you here again to saygood-bye. I wanted to, but was afraid to 'rouse the sleepinglion.' I will not close my eyes to-night—fact is, I haven'ttime. Our serenade at Josie's was a pre-arranged signal bywhich she is to be ready and at the station for the 5morning train. You may remember the lighting of threeconsecutive matches at her window before the igniting of herlamp. That meant, 'Thrice dearest one, I'll meet thee at thedepot at 4:30 sharp.' So, my dear Mack, this is to informyou that, even as you read, Josie and I have eloped. It isall the old man's fault, yet I forgive him. Hope he'llreturn the favor. Josie predicts he will, inside of aweek—or two weeks, anyhow. Good-bye, Mack, old boy; and leta fellow down as easy as you can.Affectionately,BERT."
"Heavens!" exclaimed John, stifling the note in his hand and stalking tragically around the room. "Can it be possible that I have nursed a frozen viper? An ingrate? A wolf in sheep's clothing? An orang-outang in gent's furnishings?"
"Was you callin' me, sir?" asked a voice at the door. It was the janitor.
"No!" thundered John; "Quit my sight! get out of my way! No, no, Thompson, I don't mean that," he called after him. "Here's a half dollar for you, and I want you to lock up the office, and tell anybody that wants to see me that I've been set upon, and sacked and assassinated in cold blood; and I've fled to my father's in the country, and am lying there in the convulsions of dissolution, babbling of green fields and running brooks, and thirsting for the life of every woman that comes in gunshot!" And then, more like a confirmed invalid than a man in the strength and pride of his prime, he crept down into the street again, and thence back to his hotel.
Dejectedly and painfully climbing to his room, he encountered, on the landing above, a little woman in a jaunty dusting-cap and a trim habit of crisp muslin. He tried to evade her, but in vain. She looked him squarely in the face—occasioning him the dubious impression of either needing shaving very badly, or having egg-stains on his chin.
"You're the gentleman in No. 11, I believe?" she said.
He nodded confusedly.
"Mr. McKinney is your name, I think?" she queried, with a pretty elevation of the eyebrows.
"Yes, ma'am," said John, rather abjectly. "You see, ma'am—But I beg pardon," he went on stammeringly, and with a very awkward bow—"I beg pardon, but I am addressing—ah—the—ah—the—"
"You are addressing the new landlady," she interpolated, pleasantly. "Mrs. Miller is my name. I think we should be friends, Mr. McKinney, since I hear that you are one of the oldest patrons of the house."
"Thank you—thank you!" said John, completely embarrassed. "Yes, indeed!—ha, ha. Oh, yes—yes—really, we must be quite old friends, I assure you, Mrs.—Mrs.—"
"Mrs. Miller," smilingly prompted the little woman.
"Yes, ah, yes,—Mrs. Miller. Lovely morning, Mrs. Miller," said John, edging past her and backing toward his room.
But as Mrs. Miller was laughing outright, for some mysterious reason, and gave no affirmation in response to his proposition as to the quality of the weather, John, utterly abashed and nonplussed, darted into his room and closed the door. "Deucedly extraordinary woman!" he thought; "wonder what's her idea!"
He remained locked in his room till the dinner-hour; and, when he promptly emerged for that occasion, there was a very noticeable improvement in his personal appearance, in point of dress, at least, though there still lingered about his smoothly-shaven features a certain haggard, care-worn, anxious look that would not out.
Next his own place at the table he found a chair tilted forward, as though in reservation for some honored guest. What did it mean? Oh, he remembered now. Told the boy to tell his mother he would have a friend to dine with him. Bert—and, blast the fellow! he was, doubtless, dining then with a far preferable companion—his wife—in a palace-car on the P., C. & St. L., a hundred miles away. The thought was maddening. Of course, now, the landlady would have material for a new assault. And how could he avert it? A despairing film blurred his sight for the moment—then the eyes flashed daringly. "I will meet it like a man!" he said, mentally—"like a State's Attorney,—I will invite it! Let her do her worst!"
He called a servant, directing some message in an undertone.
"Yes, sir," said the agreeable servant, "I'll go right away, sir," and left the room.
Five minutes elapsed, and then a voice at his shoulder startled him:
"Did you send for me, Mr. McKinney? What is it I can do?"
"You are very kind, Mrs.—Mrs.—"
"Mrs. Miller," said the lady, with a smile that he remembered.
"Now, please spare me even the mildest of rebukes. I deserve your censure, but I can't stand it—I can't positively!" and there was a pleading look in John's lifted eyes that changed the little woman's smile to an expression of real solicitude. "I have sent for you," continued John, "to ask of you three great favors. Please be seated while I enumerate them. First—I want you to forgive and forget that ill-natured, uncalled-for grumbling of mine this morning when you wakened me."
"Why, certainly," said the landlady, again smiling, though quite seriously.
"I thank you," said John, with dignity. "And, second," he continued—"I want your assurance that my extreme confusion and awkwardness on the occasion of our meeting later were rightly interpreted."
"Certainly—certainly," said the landlady, with the kindliest sympathy.
"I am grateful—utterly," said John, with newer dignity. "And then," he went on,—after informing you that it is impossible for the best friend I have in the world to be with me at this hour, as intended, I want you to do me the very great honor of dining with me. Will you?"
"Why, certainly," said the charming little landlady—"and a thousand thanks beside! But tell me something of your friend," she continued, as they were being served. "What is he like—and what is his name—and where is he?"
"Well," said John, warily,—"he's like all young fellows of his age. He's quite young, you know—not over thirty, I should say—a mere boy, in fact, but clever—talented—versatile."
"—Unmarried, of course," said the chatty little woman.
"Oh, yes!" said John, in a matter-of-course tone—but he caught himself abruptly—then stared intently at his napkin—glanced evasively at the side-face of his questioner, and said,—"Oh yes! Yes, indeed! He's unmarried.—Old bachelor like myself, you know. Ha! Ha!"
"So he's not like the young man here that distinguished himself last night?" said the little woman, archly.
The fork in John's hand, half-lifted to his lips, faltered and fell back toward his plate.
"Why, what's that?" said John, in a strange voice; "I hadn't heard anything about it—I mean I haven't heard anything about any young man. What was it?"
"Haven't heard anything about the elopement?" exclaimed the little woman, in astonishment.—"Why, it's been the talk of the town all morning. Elopement in high life—son of a grain-dealer, name of Hines, or Himes, or something, and a preacher's daughter—Josie somebody—didn't catch her last name. Wonder if you don't know the parties—Why, Mr. McKinney, are you ill?"
"Oh, no—not at all!" said John: "Don't mention it. Ha—ha! Just eating too rapidly, that's all. Go on with—you were saying that Bert and Josie had really eloped."
"What 'Bert'?" asked the little woman quickly.
"Why, did I say Bert?" said John, with a guilty look. "I meant Haines, of course, you know—Haines and Josie.—And did they really elope?"
"That's the report," answered the little woman, as though deliberating some important evidence; "and they say, too, that the plot of the runaway was quite ingenious. It seems the young lovers were assisted in their flight by some old fellow—friend of the young man's—Why, Mr. McKinney, youareill, surely?"
John's face was ashen.
"No—no!" he gasped, painfully: "Go on—go on! Tell me more about the—the—the old fellow—the old reprobate! And is he still at large?"
"Yes," said the little womon, anxiously regarding the strange demeanor of her companion. "They say, though, that the law can do nothing with him, and that this fact only intensifies the agony of the broken-hearted parents—for it seems they have, till now, regarded him both as a gentleman and family friend in whom"—
"I really am ill," moaned John, waveringly rising to his feet; "but I beg you not to be alarmed. Tell your little boy to come to my room, where I will retire at once, if you'll excuse me, and send for my physician. It is simply a nervous attack. I am often troubled so; and only perfect quiet and seclusion restores me. You have done me a great honor, Mrs."—("Mrs.—Miller," sighed the sympathetic little woman)—"Mrs. Miller,—and I thank you more than I have words to express." He bowed limply, turned through a side door opening on a stair, and tottered to his room.
During the three weeks' illness through which he passed, John had every attention—much more, indeed, than he had consciousness to appreciate. For the most part his mind wandered, and he talked of curious things, and laughed hysterically, and serenaded mermaids that dwelt in grassy seas of dew, and were bald-headed like himself. He played upon a fourteen-jointed flute of solid gold, with diamond holes, and keys carved out of thawless ice. His old father came at first to take him home; but he could not be moved, the doctor said.
Two weeks of John's illness had worn away, when a very serious looking young man, in a traveling duster, and a high hat, came up the stairs to see him. A handsome young lady was clinging to his arm. It was Bert and Josie. She had guessed the very date of their forgiveness. John wakened even clearer in mind than usual that afternoon. He recognized his old chum at a glance, and Josie—now Bert's wife. Yes, he comprehended that. He was holding a hand of each when another figure entered. His thin, white fingers loosened their clasp, and he held a hand toward the new comer. "Here," he said, "is my best friend in the world—Bert, you and Josie will love her, I know; for this is Mrs.—Mrs."—"Mrs. Miller," said the radiant little woman.—"Yes,—Mrs. Miller," said John, very proudly.
"'Scurious-like," said the tree-toad,"I've twittered far rain all day;And I got up soon,And I hollered till noon—But the sun, hit blazed away,Till I jest clumb down in a crawfish-hole,Weary at heart, and sick at soul!
"Dozed away far an hour,And I tackled the thing agin;And I sung, and sung,Till I knowed my lungWas jest about give in;And then, thinks I, ef hit don't rain now.There're nothin' in singin', anyhow!"Once in awhile someWould come a drivin' past;And he'd hear my cry,And stop and sigh—Till I jest laid back, at last,And I hollered rain till I thought my th'oatWould bust right open at ever' note!"ButI fetchedher! OI fetchedher!—'Cause a little while ago,As I kindo' set,With one eye shet,And a-singin' soft and low,A voice drapped down on my fevered brain,Sayin',—' Ef you'll jest hush I'll rain!'"
Welladay!Here I layYou at rest—all worn away,O my pencil, to the tipOf our old companionship!MemorySighs to seeWhat you are, and used to be,Looking backward to the timeWhen you wrote your earliest rhyme!—When I satFiling atYour first point, and dreaming thatYour initial song should beWorthy of posterity.With regretI forgetIf the song be living yet,Yet remember, vaguely now,It was honest, anyhow.You have broughtMe a thought—Truer yet was never taught,—That the silent song is best,And the unsung worthiest.So if I,When I die,May as uncomplaininglyDrop aside as now you do,Write of me, as I of you:—Here lies oneWho begunLife a-singing, heard of none;And he died, satisfied,With his dead songs by his side.