It would have taken more conversational skill than Mrs. Derrick possessed, to give a summary answer to all this; but her simplicity answered as well, after all.
"I guess he'll like what you've been saying better than anything, Mrs.Davids; I'll tell him."
"Do," said Mrs. Davids. "I wisht you would. Husband would have said it completer. He thinks ma'am," (turning to Mrs. Somers again) "that Mr. Linden is a wonderful man! And I'm of the opinion he's handsome."
Faith had been sitting, quiet and demure, for some time past, hearing what was going on; but this last sentence drove her to the right about like lightning. She found something to do in another part of the room.
"Did you ever hear anybody say he wasn't?" said Mrs. Somers. "Mr.Somers, it's time we were going. Ah—there's Squire Stoutenburgh!Faith—come here!"
And Squire Stoutenburgh, appearing in the doorway like the worthy father of his stout son, bowed to the company.
"Well Mrs. Derrick—" he said,—"good day Mr. Somers—andMrs.Somers! I beg pardon—Well Miss Faith! I'm glad it is well, I'm sure.My dear, how do you do?"
"Why very well, sir!" said Faith.
"Why so it is!" said Squire Stoutenburgh taking hold of both her hands and looking at her. "Sam said you were as pale as a ghost when he carried you down to the spring—but Sam don't always see straight when he's excited. You needn't be frightened if I kiss you, my dear you know I always do, and always have—since you were a year old," said the Squire as he took his wonted privilege.
Faith gravely submitted, not letting the Squire however get any further than her cheek; which ought to have contented him.
"Sam was very good to me yesterday, sir," she answered.
"I think, Squire," said Mr. Somers, "your son was—a—in luck, as we say. A fortunate chance! What most people would have thought no—a—disagreeable office."
"Sam's a good boy—" said his father,—"a very good boy—always was. He does crow a little over Dr. Harrison, I must say. But what shall we do with the doctor, Mr. Somers?—what does he deserve for running away with our Pattaquasset roses and turning them into meadow lilies? Yes, yes, Miss Faith—you may look as pink as you please now—it won't help the matter. What shall we do with him, sir? My dear," said Squire Stoutenburgh seating Faith by his side and dropping his voice, "you're growing wonderfully like your father!"
A changed, sweet glance of Faith's eyes answered him.
"Yes!"—the Squire repeated meditatively and looking at her.—"Ah he was a fine man! I used to think he couldn't be better—but I s'pose he is now. My dear, you needn't wonder when I tell you that I thought more of your mother last night than I did of you. But you don't remember all about that. Well—I shall go home and tell Mrs. Stoutenburgh that you're as pretty as a posie, and then she won't care what else is the matter," he said, getting up again. "Mrs. Somers, I see the parson durstn't say a word about Dr. Harrison before you."
"I—I declare I don't think Dr. Harrison is very much to be blamed, Squire," said the parson thus called upon. "And Mrs. Somers is so well able to speak for herself—I have no doubt, Squire Stoutenburgh, if it wasn't for Mrs. Somers,—I dare say I might like to do as much as the doctor did, myself!"
"Bless my life!" said Squire Stoutenburgh, "I can't stay to be a party to confidences of that sort!—I must go!—" and he departed, laughing and followed by the two others.
But even as they went, Faith, who with her mother had accompanied them to the door, was electrified somewhat doubtfully at the vision of Miss Deacon just within the gate. Miss Cecilia came forward, also with some doubt upon her spirit, to judge by her air. But Faith's greeting of her was so pleasant and kind, though she could not prevent its being grave, that the young lady evidently took heart. Being reassured, she sat and talked at leisure, and at length, using her eyes as well as her tongue; thus making herself mistress of all the truth she could get at, and of some more. She was thorough in her investigations as to all the drama of the last seven days, and all and each of the actors therein; and at the close of her visit declared that "Sam had been a great fool to go away, and that she had told him so before"; and departed at last with her head full of Dr Harrison.
But detentions were not over. Miss Bezac came before Miss Deacon was quit of the parlour; and before Miss Bezac had been two minutes there, other members of the Pattaquasset community came pouring in. Everybody must see Faith, hear particulars, discuss realities and possibilities of the accident, and know how Mr. Linden was getting along. The hours of the afternoon waned away; but people came as people went; and it was not till long shadows and slant sunbeams began to give note of supper time, that the influx lessened and the friends gathered in Mrs. Derrick's parlour began to drop away without others stepping in to take their place.
"Faith," said her mother when they were at last alone, "I can't bear this any longer! I shall go crazy if I hear that story one other time to-night!" And she put her arms round Faith, and leaned her head wearily on her shoulder. "I'll sit up to tea," she went on presently, "and then if the rest of the town comes, you'll have to see 'em—for I can't!"
Faith gently put her into a chair and holding her in her arms stooped over her. "Mother"—the words were as soft as the kisses which came between,—"you mustn't mind it so much. Sit up to tea! Why I have made some of the best muffins that ever were seen."
"Child!" said her mother in a low voice, "I felt this morning as if I had been as near death as you had!"—and if the words needed any emphasis, they had it in the way Mrs. Derrick leaned her head against Faith and was silent. But not for long. She got up, and kissing Faith two or three times, said, "My pretty child!" in a tone that indeed told of possible heartbreak; and then half holding her, half held by her, drew her on into the tea-room.
It so happened that the first griddleful of muffins did not do credit to their raising—(or to their bringing up, elegant reader!)—therefore Mr. Linden's teatray waited for the second. Of course the other tea waited too. Mrs. Derrick walked out into the kitchen to seewhatwas the matter with the griddle; Faith discovered that one spoon on the tray looked dull, and went to the spoonbasket to change it. Thus occupied, and giving little reprehensive glances at the spoons generally, and mental admonitions to Cindy, with the open closet door half screening her from the rest of the room, she was startled—not by the opening of another door, but by these words,—
"Miss Faith, shall I carry this tray upstairs?"
To this day it is uncertain what sort of a spoon Faith brought back!—or indeed whether she brought any at all. There was one flash of gladness in her cheek and her eye, with the exclamation, "Mr. Linden!"—then she came from the closet just her old little self.
"Are you well enough to be down stairs, sir?"
"In whose estimation, ma'am?"
"Because if you are, Mr. Linden," she said with a face of laughing pleasure, "won't you please come into the other room?"
"I think not," he said, laughing a little too,—if the exertion of coming down had made him pale, the pleasure partly concealed it. "I will take a chair here, if you please. Am I alone, of all Pattaquasset, to be forbidden to pay my respects to you to-night? Miss Faith, how do you do?"
"I am very well. But Mr. Linden, if you will please come into the other room, there is an easy chair there. Please do! this room is cold, for the fire got down while we were seeing people."
She led the way as she spoke, without waiting for another denial; pushed the table and a great chair of state, or of ease, in the sitting-room, into closer neighbourhood; and renewed the brilliancy of the fire. Then lit up the lamp and cleared books away from the table; all done with quick alacrity.
"That will do almost as well as the couch, won't it?" she said; and then repeated in gentler tones her question, "Are you well enough to be down, Mr. Linden?"
"I don't know, Miss Faith!—I am well enough to want to be down. How can you let the charms of society divert your mind from your books for a whole afternoon? Have you been so studious for the last few days only because you had nothing else to do?"
She laughed at the question, and went off, leaving Mr. Linden in a region of comfort. More comfort came soon in the shape of the teatray, borne by Cindy; then Mrs. Derrick; and lastly Faith herself appeared—bearing a plate of the muffins, perfect this time, and delicate as they had need to be for a delicate appetite. Mr. Linden was presently served with one of these and a cup of smoking tea; and Faith thought, and her look half said it, that being down stairs would do him no harm. Certainly the surprise and pleasure of such company to tea did Mrs. Derrick good, whoever else missed it; though it is presumable no one did. The pleasant sighing of the wind round the house and in the chimney (it sighed alone for that evening) the sparkling of the fire, the singing of the maple or hickory sticks, the comfortable atmosphere of tea and muffins diffused, like the firelight, all through the room; gave as fair an assemblage of creature comforts as need be wished; and the atmosphere of talk was as bright, and savoury, and glowing too, in its way; though the way was quiet. Mr. Linden amused himself (and Faith) by giving her little lessons in the way she would have to talk in those French "noonspells" she had in prospect: making Mrs. Derrick laugh with the queer sounding words and sentences, and keeping Faith interested to that point, that if he had not attended to her tea as well, she would scarce have got any.
"I shall not be hard upon you at first," he said smiling,—"when I see you sitting in silent despair because you want something at my end of the table, I will help you out with a 'que voulez-vous, mademoiselle?' and perhaps with a 'voulez-vous?' this or that. But after a week or two, Miss Faith, if you go without any dinner, it will not move me in the least."
Faith looked as if she would gladly forego her dinner to escape the French asking for it, and yet not quite so neither. But this ordeal was more terrible to her by far than all the rest; she could face them, indeed, they had ceased to be anything but pleasure—or pleasure with a spice that enhanced it; but at this she trembled. To the above speech—or threat,—she simply answered,
"I shall be so glad to see you come home to tea, Mr. Linden!"
"And so glad to see me go away from dinner!"
"I didn't say that."
"You will—" said Mr. Linden,—"I can imagine you falling back in your chair and exclaiming, 'Ah, quand voulez-vous partir, monsieur!'—which of course will make it extremely difficult for me to remain a moment longer."
"I don't think you can imagine me doing it," said Faith laughing. "I can't imagine myself."
"That proves nothing. Only don't ever say to me, 'Monsieur! partez à l'instant!'—because—"
"Because what, Mr. Linden?" said Faith seriously.
"Because we might disagree upon that point," he said with rather a demure arch of his eyebrows. Faith's full silver rang out, softly.
"You see!" she said. "It's beginning already. I don't know in the least what you are talking about!"
"No—you do not," was the laughing reply. "But Miss Faith, if I am kept at home long enough, and society keeps at home too, instead of coming between us and our exercises, those conversations will seem less terrible by the time they begin. I should certainly get you a pocket dictionary, but I prefer to be that myself. How far can you ride on horseback at once?"
"On horseback?" said Faith, much as if those words had been alsoFrench, or an algebraical puzzle.
"That was what I said."
"I know that was what you said—I didn't know what you meant, Mr. Linden. I have never been really on horseback but a few times in my life—then I rode a few miles—I don't know exactly how many."
"I wonder people don't do it more"—said Mrs. Derrick. "When I was a girl that was the common way of getting about; and nobody ever got thrown, neither."
"Wouldn't that be the pleasantest way of getting to Mattabeeset?" saidMr. Linden.
An illumination answered him first; then "Oh, yes!"
"I want you to see what is to be seen over there," he said,—"shall we go some day, if I get well enough before cold weather?"
Faith's quiet words of agreeing to this proposal were declared to be a sham by her eyes, cheeks, lips and brow, every one of which was giving testimony after a different fashion.
At this moment the door opened. It happened that Dr. Harrison had encountered Cindy at the hall door, where she was either loitering to catch snatches of indoor conversation, or waiting to entrap Jem Waters. But there she was, and being asked for Mr. Linden replied that he was down stairs, and without more ceremony ushered the doctor in; and entering the whole view lay before him in its freshness. Mrs. Derrick, complacent and comfortable, sat behind the no-longer-wanted tea-tray, listening and playing with a spoon. Faith's face, though considering her unfinished muffin, was brilliant with rosy pleasure; while the fire which she had for some time forgotten to mend, lay in a state of powerful inaction, a mass of living coals and smoking brands. In the glow of that stood the easy chair, and therein Mr. Linden, although with the air and attitude of one wanting both rest and strength, was considering with rather unbent lips no less a subject than—One and Somewhat!—further the doctor's eyes could not read. The precise direction of those other eyes was shaded. The doctor came up and stood beside them.
"Did I order you to stay up stairs?" he said in soft, measured syllables, without having spoken to anybody else.
"Good evening, doctor!" said Mr. Linden offering his hand. "As I meet you half way, please excuse me for keeping my seat."
From that hand, the doctor passed to Faith's; which was taken and held, just enough to say all he wished to say; which, be it remarked in passing, was a good deal.
"May I approach Mrs. Derrick?" said he then, turning round to Mr. Linden with a cool, funny, careless, yet good-humoured, doubt upon his face.
"What is the present state of your nerves?"
"Depending upon your answer, of course!—which the ordinary rules of society forbid me to wait for. Madam!—are you in sufficient charity with me to give me a cup of tea?"
"Yes, doctor—if the tea's good enough," said Mrs. Derrick with her usual quietness. "And if it isn't I'll have some more." So saying she got up and went towards the kitchen to call Cindy. The doctor skilfully intercepted this movement, placing himself in her way.
"May I ask, where you are going?" he said with a sort of gentle kindliness he did not always put on.
"Why to get some tea that's fit to give you, doctor. I don't think this is."
"Will you give me something else?"
"I'll give you that first," said Mrs. Derrick—"I'll see about the rest." And passing out into the kitchen she gave her orders about the teapot, and a quiet little injunction to Faith to go in and sit down.
"Mother, you're tired," said Faith. "Let me see about the tea!"
"I guess I will!" said Mrs. Derrick. "I'm not going to have the house stand up on one end just because Dr. Harrison wants his tea. You go off, pretty child,—if you stay here he'll think you're baking muffins for him, and I don't choose he should."
"Why I would do it, mother," said Faith. She went off, however, into the other room and sat down gravely, quite the other side of the fireplace from the tea-table. Dr. Harrison was standing on the rug with his back to the fire, and followed her with his eye.
"How do you do?" he said in a softened voice, stepping a step nearer to her. She looked up and gave him a frank and kind "very well!"
Was it altogether professional, the way in which he took up her hand and held it an instant?
"Cool, and quiet," he said. "It's all right. I didn't frighten you out of your wits yesterday?"
The "no, sir," was in a different tone.
"Do you suppose," he said, "that your mother will ever bear the sight of me again?"
"Why I hope so, sir," said Faith smiling.
"I don't know!" he said. "I wonder if I have been so much more wicked than I knew of? I don't think I have. I couldn't have punished myself any more."
Mrs. Derrick came in, followed by teapot and muffins, and having with her usual politeness requested the doctor to take a seat at the table, she proceeded to pour him out a cup of tea, nor even stinted him in sugar.
"If I stay at home according to your orders," said Mr. Linden, "I shall have all the trustees after me."
"You aren't just the person they ought to be after," said the doctor. "Mrs. Derrick, I don't know why we never have anything at our house so good as this." The doctor was discussing a buttered muffin with satisfaction that was evidently unfeigned.
Mrs. Derrick knew why—but she wouldn't tell him, though exulting in her own knowledge. A low knock at the parlour door announced Reuben Taylor.
"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Derrick—" he said,—"but I went"—
"I am here, Reuben," said Mr. Linden.
The boy stayed not for more compliments then, but passing the ladies and the doctor with a collective bow, and "good evening, Miss Faith," went round with a quick step and a glad face to Mr. Linden. And kneeling down by him, with one hand on his shoulder, gave him the post despatches, and asked and answered questions not very loud but very earnestly. That was a phasis of Reuben Dr. Harrison had not seen before. He took good and broad note of it, though nothing interrupted the doctor's muffin—or muffins, for they were plural. Neither did he interrupt anything that was going on.
"Are you better, sir? are you really well enough to be down stairs?"—Dr. Harrison would hardly have known the voice. And the answering tone was of the gentlest and kindest, though the words failed to reach the doctor's ears. Some directions, or commissions, apparently, Mr. Linden gave for a few minutes, and then Reuben rose to his feet with a long breath that spoke a mind very much relieved. He paused for a moment on his way out, opposite Faith, as if he wanted a word in that quarter; but perhaps the doctor's presence forbade, for all the congratulation that Reuben gave her was in his face and bow. That did not satisfy Faith if it did him. She jumped up and gave him her hand, almost affectionately.
"You see I am safe and well, Reuben."
"I am so thankful, Miss Faith!" And the words said not half.
The doctor had finished his muffins and was standing before the fire again. "Have you found out yet, my man," he said in a somewhat amused voice,—"whose friend you are?"
The words jarred—and the colour on Reuben's face was of a different tint from that which had answered Faith. It was with his usual reserved manner, though nothing could be more civil, that he said, "No sir—no more than I knew before." But the respect was from Reuben as a boy to Dr. Harrison as a man. Faith's eye glanced from one to the other, and then she said, "What do you mean, Dr. Harrison?"
"Only a play of words," said the doctor lightly. "This young fellow is very cautious of making professions—as I have found."
"He has no need, sir," said Faith. She quitted as she spoke, the boy's hand which she had held until then, and came back to her seat. The words were spoken quietly enough and with as gentle a face, and yet with somewhat in the manner of both that met and fully answered all the bearing of the doctor's.
"You need not wait, Reuben," said his teacher—"I shall see you again by and by."
"Who is that?" said the doctor as Reuben went out.
"One of my body-guard," said Mr. Linden, with lips not yet at rest from their amused look.
"Are you waited upon by a Fehm-gericht? or may the members be known by the uninitiated?"
"I beg pardon!" said Mr. Linden,—"but as you seemed to know him, and as you really did know his name a week ago—That is Reuben Taylor, Dr. Harrison."
"So do I beg pardon! His name I do know, of course—as I have had occasion; but the essence of my enquiry remains in its integrity.HimI do not know. Where and to whom does he belong?"
"He is one of those of whom we spoke this morning," said Mr. Linden. "True servant of God is his title—to Him does Reuben belong. His home here is a little hut on the outskirts of Pattaquasset, his father a poor fisherman."
There was a minute's silence, all round.
"May I ask for a little enlightening, Miss Derrick?" said the doctor. "What do you mean, if you will be so good as to let me know,—by a person who 'does not need' to make professions."
Faith hesitated.
"Will you please say first, Dr. Harrison, just what you mean by 'professions?'" she said somewhat timidly.
"I shall shelter myself under your meaning," said he looking at her."Fact is, I am not good at definitions—I don't half the time know whatI'm saying myself."
Faith cast an involuntary glance for help towards Mr. Linden; but getting none she came back to the doctor and the question, blushing a good deal.
"I think," she said, "professions are telling people what you wish them to believe of you."
The doctor looked comical, also threw a glance in the direction of Mr.Linden, but put his next question seriously.
"Why do you say this Reuben Taylor does not need to make professions? according to this definition."
"Because those who know him know what he is, without them."
"But do you mean that there is no use in making professions? How are you to know what a man is?"
"Unless he tells you?" said Faith smiling.
The doctor stood, half smiling; evidently revolving more thoughts than of one kind. With a face from which every shadow was banished he suddenly took a seat by Mrs. Derrick.
"Do you know," he said with gentle pleasantness of manner and expression, "how much better man I should be if I should come here and get only one definition a day from your little daughter?"
"What one has she given you now?" said Mrs. Derrick, whose mind evidently stood in abeyance upon this speech.
"One you didn't hear, ma'am. It was a definition of me, to myself. It isn't the first," said the doctor gravely. "Mrs. Derrick, are you friends with me?"
"As much as I ever was," said Mrs. Derrick, smilingly. "I always thought you wanted putting in order."
"How did you know that?"
"Why, because you were out of order," said Mrs. Derrick, knitting away.The doctor uttered the lowest of whistles and looked down at his boot.
"It's because of that unlucky dog!" he muttered. "Linden—" (glancing up from under his eyebrows) "when I was a boy, I set my dog on Miss Faith's cat."
"Felt yourself called upon to uphold natural antipathies—"
"Miss Faith, have you a cat now?" said the doctor looking over to her.
"No, sir."
"And I have no dog!" said the doctor. "I have only horses. If I could manage to do without animals altogether,—Mrs. Derrick, have you forgiven me?" This last was in a changed tone.
"I don't want to talk about it, doctor," said Mrs. Derrick very soberly.
"About forgiving me?" he said as soberly.
"And I don't mean to."
"Nor I," said the doctor quietly; "but you are going to inflict more punishment on me than I deserve."
"What am I going to do?" said Mrs. Derrick. "If you know, I don't."
"Refuse to give me your hand, perhaps."
"I never did that to anybody, yet," she said pleasantly.
"Then you must let me do as we do in another country."
He bent his face to her hand as he spoke, and kissed it. There was no mockery in the action. Done by some people it would have been ridiculous. By Dr. Harrison, in the circumstances, it was in the highest degree graceful. It spoke sympathy, penitence, respect, manly confession, and submission, too simply not to be what it certainly was in some measure, a true expression of feeling. Mrs. Derrick on her part looked amused,—her old recollections of the boy constantly tinged her impressions of the man; and perhaps not without reason.
"You're as like yourself as ever you can be, doctor!" she said, smiling at him. "How you used to try to get round me!"
"I don't remember!" said the doctor. "I am sure I never succeeded, Mrs.Derrick?"
"I'm afraid you did, sometimes," she said, shaking her head. He smiled a little, and turned the other way.
"Linden, I've been considering the German question."
"Will it please you to state the result?"
"This!" said the doctor. "I have come to the conclusion,—that in order to be One and Somewhat, it is necessary to begin by being Nought and All—Thus ranging myself in security onbothsides of a great abyss of metaphysics. What do you think? Unphilosophical?"
"Unsafe—" said Mr. Linden. "And impossible."
"Humph?"—said the doctor. "Nothing is impossible in metaphysics—because you may be on both sides of an abyss, and in the bottom of it!—at once—and without knowing where you are. The angel that rode Milton's sunbeam, you know, was no time at all going from heaven to earth; and I suppose he went the other way as quick."
"I don't see the abyss in that case," said Mr. Linden,—"but
——'Uriel to his chargeReturned on that bright beam'—
so probably he did."
"Yes"—said the doctor.—"And my meaning skipped the abyss,—also on a sunbeam. It referred to the unsubstantial means of travelling in use among metaphysicians."
"And among angels."
"That reminds me," said the doctor. And quitting his stand on the rug, which he had taken again, he went over to Faith and sat down by her.
"Is the Nightingale flourishing on her rose-bush to-day?"
"What, sir?" said Faith, her eyes opening at him a little.
"I beg pardon!" said the doctor. "I have been living in a part of the world, Miss Derrick, where it is the fashion to call things not by their right names. I have got a foolish habit of it. Do you feel quite recovered?"
"Quite. I'm a little tired to-night, perhaps."
"I see you are, and I'll not detain you. Mrs. Custers wants to see you again." He had dropped all banter, and was speaking to her quietly, respectfully, kindly, as he should speak; in a lowered tone, but not so low as to be unheard by others than her.
"I will try to see her again soon—I will try to go very soon," she answered.
"Would you be afraid to go with my father's old stand-bys?—they are safe!"—
"I cannot do that, Dr. Harrison—but I will try to see her soon."
"Can you go without riding?"
"No," she said smiling; "but I must find some other way."
"I won't press that point," said the doctor. "I can't blame you. I must bear that. But—I want for my own sake to have the honour of a little talk with you—I want to explain to you one or two things. Shall you be at leisure to-morrow afternoon?"
"I am hardlyat leisureany time, Dr. Harrison. I do not suppose I shall be particularly busy then."
"Then will you take that time for a walk?"
Faith hesitated. "I have very little time, sir."
"But you take time to go out?"
"Not much."
"I will not ask much. A little will do; and so much you owe to skyey influences. You will not refuse me that?"
"I will go, Dr. Harrison," Faith answered after an instant a little soberly. He rose up then; proposed to attend upon Mr. Linden, and they went up stairs together.
Faith was half ready to wish the next day might be rainy; but it rose fair and bright. She must go to walk, probably; and visiters might come. The only thing to be done was to despatch her ordinary duties as quick as possible, prepare her French exercise, and go to her teacher early. Which she did.
She came in with a face as bright as the day, although a little less ready to look in everybody's eyes. There were enough things ready for her. Lessons were pressed rather more steadily than usual, perhaps because they had been neglected a little for the last two days—or hindered; and it was not till one book and another had done its work, till the exercise was copied and various figure puzzles disposed of, that Mr. Linden told her he thought a talking exercise ought to come next,—if she had one ready he should like to have the benefit of it.
"You are tired, Mr. Linden!" said Faith quickly.
"You may begin by giving me the grounds of that conclusion."
"I don't know," she said half laughing,—"I don't see it; but that don't make me know. I was afraid you were tired with this work."
"Very unsafe, Miss Faith, to build up such a superstructure upon grounds that you neither see nor know. I was immediately beginning to question the style of my own explanations this morning."
"Why, sir?"
"If I seem tired, said explanations may have seemed—tiresome."
She looked silently, with a smile, as if questioning the possibility of his thinking so; and her answer did not go to that point.
"You didn't seem tired, Mr. Linden—I had no reason for thinking so, I suppose. I was only afraid. I was going to ask you what Dr. Harrison meant last night by the angel riding upon a sunbeam? I saw you knew what he meant."
Mr. Linden got up and went for a book—then came back to his couch again.
"Precisely what Dr. Harrison meant, Miss Faith, I should not like to say. What he referred to, was a part of Paradise Lost, where the angels set to guard the earth have a messenger.
'Thither came Uriel, gliding through the evenOn a sunbeam, swift as a shooting star.'"
"Who is Uriel? an angel?"
"Yes. He is called,
'The archangel Uriel, one of the sevenWho in God's presence, nearest to his throne,Stand ready at his command, and are his eyes.That run through all the heavens, or down to the earth,Bear his swift errands over moist and dry,O'er sea and land.'"
Faith listened, evidently with a pleased ear.
"But I suppose the angel could come as well without the sunbeam as with it?"
"I suppose so!" he said smiling. "In my belief, angels go where the sunbeams do not. But Milton chose to name Uriel as the special regent of the sun, and so passing to and fro on its rays."
"What do you mean by 'regent,' Mr. Linden?"
"A regent is one appointed to rule in place of the king."
"But that don't seem to me true, Mr. Linden," said Faith after a little meditation.
"What, and why?"
Faith blushed at finding herself 'in for it,' but went on.
"I don't suppose the sun wants anybody to rule it or to take care of it, under its Maker?"
"Yet it may please him to have guardian spirits there as well as here,—about that we know not. In the Revelation, you know, an angel is spoken of as 'standing in the sun,' and from that Milton took his idea. Part of the description is very beautiful, at least;—
'So spake the false dissembler unperceived;For neither man nor angel can discernHypocrisy, the only evil that walksInvisible, except to God alone,By his permissive will, through heaven and earth.And oft though wisdom wake, suspicion sleepsAt wisdom's gate, and to simplicityResigns her charge, while goodness thinks no ill,Where no ill seems: which now for once beguiledUriel, though regent of the sun, and heldThe sharpest sighted spirit of all in heaven.'"
"Who is the person spoken of in the first line, Mr. Linden?"
"Satan—applying to Uriel for guidance to the new created earth and its inhabitants, on the same plea that Herod presented to the wise men."
"But that's a story?" said Faith.
"Yes. The Bible only tells the work done by him after he got here."
"Mr. Linden, will you read that over once more for me."
She listened with a face of absorbed intentness while it was read; then looked away from the book with an unconscious but very audible sigh.
"Well?" Mr. Linden said, smiling as he looked at her.
"I like it very much!" was Faith's answer.
"Is that what made you sigh?"
"Sigh!" she said starting a little and colouring. "No,—I didn't mean to sigh."
"The fact is more than the intention. Whence came that?"
"It was only—Please don't ask me, Mr. Linden. I can't tell you."
He made no answer to that, but turning over the leaves read to her here and there without much comment,—then asked her if she was tired of hearing about angels.
"I think I should never be tired!" said Faith. "But you must be, Mr. Linden. Please," she said putting her hand gently on the book,—"don't read for me any more. Is all the book like that?"
"Not quite all—I have given you some bits that I particularly like, but there is much more. You need not be uneasy about my being tired," he said smiling; "if I were, by your own shewing I can have rest. However, Miss Faith—lessons being the order of the day—will you read French to me?"
In her reading, Faith came to the description of the philosopher's perplexity in finding that the birds would not pick up the crumbs he threw to them on the roof as usual. He concluded the feathered things were not more reason able than mankind, and had taken fright for nothing.
"J'allais fermer ma fenêtre sur cette réflexion, quand j'aperçois tout à coup, dans l'espace lumineux qui s'étend à droite, l'ombre de deux oreilles qui se dressent, puis une griffe qui s'avance, puis la tête d'un chat tigré qui se montre à l'angle de la gouttière. Le drôle était là en embuscade, espérant que les aniettes lui amèneraient du gibier.
"Et moi qui accusais la couardise de mes hôtes! J'étais sûr qu'aucun danger ne les menaçait! je croyais avoir bien regardé partout! je n'avais oublié que le coin derrière moi!
"Dans la vie comme sur les toits, que de malheurs arrivent pour avoir oublié un seul coin!"
Faith closed the book then, very much amused with the philosopher's "chat tigré."
"But often one can't see round the corner," she remarked.
A little gesture of lips and brow, half asserted that if one could not,onecould: but Mr. Linden only said,
"Most true! Miss Faith. Nevertheless, the knowledge that therearecorners is not to be despised."
"I don't know. I shouldn't like to live always in fear of seeing the shadow of a cat's ears come in."
"Have you quite outgrown the love of cats?" said Mr. Linden smiling.
"No, but I was talking of the fear of corners," she said with an answering smile. "I don't think I want to remember the corners, Mr. Linden."
"I don't think I want you should. Philosophers and birds, you know, go through the world on different principles."
She laughed a little at that, gave the hearth a parting brush, and went off to dinner.
Business claimed its place after dinner, business of a less pleasant kind, quite up to the time when Faith must put on her bonnet to walk with Dr. Harrison.
Faith had no great mind to the walk, but she couldn't help finding it pleasant. The open air was very sweet and bracing; the exercise was inspiriting, and the threatened talk went well with both. There was nothing whatever formidable about it; the words and thoughts seemed to play, like the sunlight, on anything that came in their way. Dr. Harrison knew how to make a walk or a talk pleasant, even to Faith, it seemed. Whatever she had at any time seen in him that she did not like, was out of sight; pleasant, gentle, intelligent, grave, he was constantly supplying ear and mind with words and things that were worth the having. Probably he had discovered her eager thirst for knowledge; for he furnished her daintily with bits of many a kind, from his own stores which were large. She did not know there was any design in this; she knew only that the steps were taken very easily in that walk. So pleasant it was that Faith was in no haste to turn, in no mood to quicken her pace. But something else was on her mind,—and must come out.
"Dr. Harrison,"—she said when they were in a quiet part of the way, with nobody near, "may I speak to you about something?—that perhaps you won't like?"
"You can speak of nothing I should not like—to hear," he said with gentle assurance.
"Dr. Harrison—" said Faith, speaking as if the recollection touched her,—"when you and I were thrown out in that meadow the other day and came so near losing our lives—if thealmosthad beenquite, if we had both been killed,—Ishould have been safe and well, I believe.—How would it have been with you?"
Dr. Harrison looked at her.
"If I had gone in your company," he said, "I think it would hardly have been ill with me."
"Do you know so little as that?"—she said, in such a tone of sorrow and pity as might have suited one of the 'ministering spirits' she had been likened to.
"I don't think I am as good as you are," the doctor said with a face not unmoved.
"Good!" said Faith. "What do you mean by goodness, Dr. Harrison?"
"I shall have the worst of it if I try to go into definitions again," he said smiling. "I think you will find what I mean, in consulting your own thoughts."
"Goodness?" said Faith again. "Do you remember the silver scale-armour of that Lepisma, Dr. Harrison?Thatis perfection. That is what God means by goodness—not the outside things that every eye, or your own, can see;—but when the far-down, far-back thoughts and imaginations of your heart will bearsuchlooking at and be found faultless! Less than that, God will not take from you, if you are going to heaven by your own goodness."
He looked at her. They had changed sides; and as fearless now as he,shewas the speaker, and he had little to say.
"I don't know much about these things, Miss Faith," he answered soberly.
"I don't know much, Dr. Harrison," she said humbly. "But think what you were near the other day."
"I don't know!"—said he, as if making a clean breast of it. She paused.
"Dr. Harrison, will a wise man leave such a matter in uncertainty?"
"I am not wise," said he. "I am ignorant—in this."
"You know you need not remain so."
"That is not so certain! I have seen so much—of what you have seen so little, my dear Miss Derrick, that you can scarce understand how light the weight of most people's testimony is to me."
"But there is the testimony of one higher," said Faith. "There is God's own word?"
"I don't know it."
"Won'tyou know it, sir?"
"I will do anything you ask me in that voice," he said smiling at her."But after all one reads people and people'sprofessions, missFaith;—and they make the first impression."
"I dare say it is often not true," said Faith sadly.
"Youare true," said he; "and you may say to me what you will, on this subject or any other, and I will believe it."
They walked a little distance in silence.
"What are you thinking of?" said the doctor in a very gentle accent of inquiry.
"I am sorry—very sorry for you, Dr. Harrison."
"Why?" said he taking her hand.
"Because it seems to me you are not caring in earnest about this matter."
He kissed the hand, without asking permission. But it was done with a grateful warm expression of feeling.
"I will do whatever you tell me to do!" he said.
How Faith wished she could send him to another adviser! But that she could not.
"Tell me," he repeated. "I will do it." The look and tone were earnest, moved, and warm; she had hardly seen the like in Dr. Harrison before.
"Then, Dr. Harrison, I wish you would read the Bible, with the determination to do what you find there you ought."
"I will," he said smiling. "And if I get into difficulty you must help me."
The rest of the way was extremely pleasant, after that; only it seemed to Faith that they met all the world! First there was Cecilia Deacon, whose eyes took good note, she thought, of both the walkers from head to foot. Then they met at intervals every one of Faith's Sunday school scholars; for every one of whom she had a glad greeting and word which she must stop for, somewhat to the doctor's amused edification. Miss Bezac happened, of all people, to be going up street when they were going down; and her eyes looked rather with some wistful gravity upon the pair, for all her pleasant nods to both. Then Mrs. Somers.
"Well I think you areFaith!"—was her brisk remark,—"or faith_less_—which is it? Julius, I heard a remarkable story about you yesterday."
"Aunt Ellen—I like to hear remarkable stories. Especially about anything remarkable."
"Well this isn't one of that sort," said Mrs. Somers.
"I am sure you said—However, let's have it, of any sort."
"I heard you had your pocket picked of a good opportunity," said Mrs.Somers. "Does Mr. Linden expect to be out next week, Faith?"
"I believe Dr. Harrison will not let him, Mrs. Somers."
A little unverbalized sound answered that, and Mrs. Somers said good evening and walked on. Faith thought that was the end, as they were near her own door. But Dr. Harrison followed her in; and entering the sitting-room, Faith found that her meetings were not over. There was no less a person than Mrs. Stoutenburgh, and there also, regaling her eyes and ears, were Mrs. Derrick and Mr. Linden.
Mrs. Stoutenburgh was a fair, pretty, curly-haired woman, a good deal younger than the Squire, intensely devoted to her own family, and very partial to Mr. Linden—whom she had taken under her wing (figuratively) from his first coming to Pattaquasset. The first sound Faith heard as she opened the door was Mrs. Stoutenburgh's merry laugh at some remark of his—then the lady jumped up and came towards her.
"My dear Faith, how do you do?—Dr. Harrison—I half said I would never speak to you again! Faith, how can you trust yourself with him for one minute?"
"Mrs. Stoutenburgh," said the doctor,—"I half thought I would shoot myself!"
"I guess that's as near as you'll come to it, on purpose," said Mrs.Stoutenburgh. "You needn't think I shall forget it—whenever I wantFaith to come and see me I shall tell Mr. Linden to bring her. He'ssafe—or supposed to be," she added laughingly.
"I hope that's as near to it as I shall ever come on purpose, orotherwise, Mrs. Stoutenburgh!" said the doctor. "I think you should judge me safer than Mr. Linden,—as appearances go."
"Squire Deacon used to tell very hard stories of him when he first came," said the lady—"and Ihaveheard a report or two since. I do love to talk to him about it!—he always looks so grave, I think he likes it."
The laugh was mutual, whether the delight was or no.
"Who is Squire Deacon?" said the doctor. "I should like to make his acquaintance."
Faith took off her bonnet, and then pulled off her gloves, deliberately, and bestowed them on the table.
"O he's a Pattaquasseter," said Mrs. Stoutenburgh—"haven't you seen his sister? She admires you—more than I think she need," she added mischievously. "But the Squire's been away for awhile,—he just got home this afternoon."
Faith had recourse to the fire. The doctor came round, took the tongs from her and did the work; after which he took a somewhat succinct leave of the assembly.
"By the way, Linden," he said pausing by his chair a moment,—"I expect to be in Quilipeak for a few days—I am very sorry, but I must. You won't want me, I think. Limbre can do all that is necessary. I shall see you Monday or Tuesday again."
"Doctor!" said Mrs. Stoutenburgh—"I want you to take me home. Mr. Stoutenburgh always makes such a fuss if I'm out after dark and don't bring anybody home to tea, that I never dare do it."
"Will you trust yourself with me, Mrs. Stoutenburgh?" said the doctor standing in comical doubt.
"Just wait a minute," said Mrs. Stoutenburgh, as she went round with her pretty, free, womanly manner, and laid her hand on Mr. Linden's forehead and hands, just as if he had been one of her own boys. "I tell you what—I don't think you cure him up half fast enough among you. If I had him up at my house I'd take better care of him."
"No, Mrs. Stoutenburgh, even you could not do that," he said looking up at her. She stood still a moment.
"You shouldn't look at me so," she said,—"I shall go home and feel real bad for all the nonsense I've been talking. You know," she added, with the mischievous look coming back, "I never did believe one word of it—except—" and the sentence was finished softly. "Now I'm ready, doctor—O Faith, I had a message for you, but Mr. Linden will tell you. Good-bye. No, doctor—I'm not going to trust myself with you,—you're going to trust yourself with me."
Dr. Harrison was for once quiet, and went off without a repartee.
Other eyes looked with a different anxiety at Mr. Linden then, and another voice, more grave as well as more timid, asked, at his side, "Are you not so well to-night, Mr. Linden?"
He smiled, and gave her his hand by way of answer, before he spoke.
"I think I am, Miss Faith—you know Mrs. Stoutenburgh has not seen me before since I was quite well."
She brought both hands to test the feeling of his, for an instant, without speaking.
"Mr. Linden, I heard what Dr. Harrison said—Don't you think I can do instead of Dr. Limbre?"
"Yes, Miss Faith—if you will be so good," he answered without hesitation and with the simplest tone and manner. Her brow lightened immediately; and happy and quiet as usual, and that was very happy, she began to make her preparations for tea, clearing the table and rolling it to its last night's position. In which last operation she had assistance. Then she went off for her tea—and the lamp and the fire-light shone again presently on the pleasant scene of last night.
"Don't you want to hear your message, Miss Faith?" Mr. Linden said.
"Yes, but I wasn't in a hurry, Mr. Linden. I supposed it would come."
"It is in three parts. The first is nothing new; being merely that the birthday of the young heir of the house of Stoutenburgh occurs on the 29th of November. Whether the second part is new, I—being a stranger—cannot tell; but the day is to be graced with various suitable festivities."
"It's all new to me," said Faith laughing.
"Of the novelty of the third part you also must judge," said Mr. Linden with a smile. "The aforesaid young heir will consider the festivities entirely incomplete without your presence—nay, will perhaps refuse to have his birthday come at all, and wish that these 'happy returns' had never had a beginning."
Faith's laugh came with its full merry roll now, and she withal coloured a little.
"What must I do then, Mr. Linden?"
"I generally incline to the merciful side, Miss Faith—I believe I should advise you to go. Then I, not having such power in my hands, may not appreciate its fascinations."
"Such power? As what, Mr. Linden?"
"I ought in conscience to tell you—" he went on without answering her,—"it has been on my mind ever since, that the other night"—and the look was grave for a minute—"the trophy of a broken rosebud was picked up where you fell. And I had not the heart to reclaim it, Miss Faith," Mr. Linden said, with a submissive air of confession.
She looked at him with the prettiest look in the world, of grave, only half conscious enquiry; and then the lost rosebud was more than replaced in her cheeks.
"That is the state of the case," Mr. Linden said, as gravely as if both rosebuds had been out of sight and mind, "but your mother refuses to go. And it seems that I also am wanted on the 29th; so if you please, Miss Faith, I will try to see that you make the journey both ways in safety."
"I should like to go," said Faith quietly. "They are pleasant people."
The tea things were withdrawn, and Cindy was no more needed there, and Mrs. Derrick also had gone into the other part of the house to attend to some business. Faith stood before the fire looking meditatively into it.
"I wish," she said slowly and soberly,—"Dr. Harrison would please to talk to you instead of to me, Mr. Linden!"
"Talk to me?" Mr. Linden repeated, looking at her. "About professions?"
"No indeed!" said Faith, first astonished and then smiling,—"I mean very different things. About religion, and what he thinks of it?"
Rather soberly the words were received, and soberly answered, not at once.
"Do not let him say much to you on that last point, Miss Faith."
"How can I help it, Mr. Linden?" she said instantly.
"Forbid him, if need be. If he asks for information, and you choose to give it, that is one thing,—you are not obliged to hear all the skeptical views and arguments with which he is furnished. Your statement of the truth has nothing to do with the grounds of his unbelief."
"But—"
Faith got no further. She stood thinking of that afternoon's talk, and of the certain possible hindrances to her following such advice.
"I am talking a little in the dark, you know," Mr. Linden said,—"I am only supposing what he may say and ask you to say; and I do not think much of such conversation between any parties. Press home the truth—and like David's pebble it may do its work; but in a fencing match David might have found it harder to maintain his ground. And his overthrow would not have touched the truth of his cause, nor perhaps his own faith—yet the Philistine would have triumphed."
"Thank you, Mr. Linden," she said with a grateful smile. "That is just the truth. But, do you think Dr. Harrison is—exactly a Philistine?"
"Not in all respects," he said smiling. "What do you mean by aPhilistine?"
"I thought you put him in the place ofthatPhilistine," she said.
"Yes, for the illustration. But I do not know him to be strictly achampionof unbelief, although he avows himself on that side. His conversations with me have left me uncertain how far he would go."
Faith was silent and looked thoughtful.
"Have I touched any of your difficulties? May I hear any more?"
"No—" she said. "I believe you have said all you can say. And it is good for me."
"I have not said all Icouldsay, but it is not easy for me to talk to you about it at all. You see, Miss Faith," said Mr. Linden smiling, "there cannot be such an anomaly in nature as a philosophical bird—so what am I to do?"
Faith smiled a little and thought that as long as he gave her the benefit of his philosophy, it did not much matter. Which recondite view of the subject she did not put into words.
The days began to roll on smoothly once more, subsiding into their old uneventful flow. The flow of talk indeed had not quite subsided; but as nothing came to throw any light on the point of the unknown sportsman who chose his sport so strangely, curiosity took a modified, condensed form; and the whole matter was stowed away in people's minds as the one Pattaquasset mystery. Happy Pattaquasset!
Even Mr. Linden's protracted confinement to the house made little difference to most, he had been so little seen when he was able to be out: only the boys had had his daylight hours; and where he had spent those times of twilight and evening when he was not at home, no one knew but the poor unknown class who mourned his absence as they had blessed his presence, in secret. The boys were not silent,—but they had the indemnification of going to see him, and of watching—or sleeping—in his room at night, according to their various dispositions. There came all his scholars on Sunday,—met by Faith on her contrary way; there came the whole school by turns, and at all hours. Indeed when once the embargo upon visiters was taken off, the supply was great!—and without careful measures on the part of Mr. Linden, French exercises would have been put aside with a witness. But he made two or three rules, and carried them out. In the first place he would see nobody before dinner, except the doctor; nor anybody after tea, save the same privileged individual. In the second place, when he was able to be out of his room without too much fatigue, the lessons were carried on down stairs,—in the dining-room generally, as being more private. There could both parties come and go without observation; and often when Mrs. Derrick was entertaining a roomful, a sudden fall of the thin partition would have revealed the very people they were discussing, deep in some pretty point of information. Pretty those lessons were! Faith's steps,—arithmetical, geographical, or what other,—were swift, steady, and sure; herself indefatigable, her teacher no less. If Mr. Linden had not quite come to be in her eyes "an old school book," she was yet enough accustomed to his teaching and animadversions to merge the binding in the book; and as to him, she might have been one of his school boys, for the straightforward way in which he opened paths of knowledge and led her through. The leading was more careful of her strength, more respectful of her timidity,—was more strictlyleadingthanpushing,—that was all. Of course in two weeks, or even in four, the best of teachers and scholars could make but a beginning; but that was well made, and the work went steadily on from thence—despite "teaching all day," despite the various other calls for time and strength.
And Faith was as docile and obedient as Johnny Fax himself, and as far as those qualities went, very much in the same way. If the denial of Phil'sinformationand Mr. Linden's manner the day after her overturn, had raised a doubt as to the real abstractness of his regard for her, Faith's modesty and simplicity put the thought well into the background. She did not care to look at it or bring it up; in the full, happy, peaceful hours she was enjoying she had enough, for the present; and so Faith went on very much after her old fashion. A little quieter, perhaps, when not called out of it; a little shyer of even innocently putting herself forward; but in speech or action, speaking and acting with her wonted free simplicity.
The only breaks in these weeks were one or two visits to Mrs. Custers, and the doctor's comings and goings. He could not be shut out.
The Monday evening after the doctor's absence at Quilipeak, the little party were as usual in the sitting-room; and a pretty chapter of Physical Geography was in process of reading and talk, when the doctor's quick wheels at the door announced not only his return but his arrival. And Mr. Linden announced to his scholar, that it was needful now to return to the surface of the earth and attend to the flow of conversation—and to put the book in his pocket.
"Are you glad to see me back?" said the doctor as he took the hand of his patient. He looked rather glad himself.
"If I say yes, that will be to confess that I have reason. You perceive my dilemma," Mr. Linden said, but with a smile that was certainly as kind and trustworthy as any the doctor had seen since he went away.
"Do you mean—that you have no reason to be glad?" said Dr. Harrison slowly, eying the smile and giving it, to judge by his own, a trustful regard.
"Certainly not! It's a comfort to have somebody at hand who is ready to fight me at any moment," said Mr. Linden.
"What have you been doing since I went away?"
"Reading, writing, and considering the world generally."
"From this Pattaquasset centre!"
"Why not?—if lines meet and make it one."
"How do you get the ends of the lines in your hands!" said the doctor. "A centre, I feel it to be—but very like the centre of the earth—socially and politically. You see, I have just emerged to the surface, and come down again. Who has taken care of you?"
"I feel quite equal to the task of taking care of myself, thank you, doctor."
"You don't mean to say, man, you have dressed your arm yourself?"
"Whatdoyou suppose my powers are equal to?"
"That is a matter," said the doctor, "upon which I stand in doubt—which gives me an uncomfortable, troublesome sort of feeling when I am in your presence. It must be superstition. I suppose I shall get the better of it—or of you!—in time. Meanwhile, whohasdressed your arm for you?"
The answer was given very quietly, very simply, not very loud. "The lady whom you had the honour of instructing in the art, Dr. Harrison."
"Did you do it well?" said Dr. Harrison somewhat comically, wheeling round before Faith.
She was a contrast; as her face looked up at him, rather pleased, and her soft voice answered,—"I think I did, sir."
"I don't doubt you did! And I don't doubt you would do anything. Are you preparing to be another Portia? And am I to be Bellario?"
"I don't know what you mean, Dr. Harrison."
"Do you know the story of Portia?—in the Merchant of Venice?"
"I never read it."
"She was a dangerous character," said the doctor. "Portia, MissDerrick, wishing to save not the life but the character and happinessof a—But what a way this is to tell you the story! Is there aShakspeare here?"
"We haven't it," said Faith quietly.
"I'll bring the play the next time I come, if you will allow me," he said sitting down by her;—"and indoctrinate you in something more interesting than my first lesson. How shall I thank you for doing my work for me?"
"It became my work."
"I am in your debt nevertheless—more than you can know without being one of my profession. I have some thing that I wish to submit to your inspection, and to take your advice upon, too. It will be fit to be seen, I hope, by the day after to-morrow. If I could I would bring it here—but as that is not possible—Will you go to see it?"
"Where is it?"
"Not far; but it will cost you the taking of a few steps."
Faith declared she had hardly time to go to see anything; but was obliged finally to yield to persuasion, and Thursday was the day fixed. The thing, whatever it was, however, was not ready when the day came, and the exhibition was put off indefinitely.