CHAPTER XXVI.
HOPE'S FULL FRUITION AT LAST.
Daisy's convalescence was slow but sure. In a week she was regarded as out of danger, and Ray returned to his work at Easton. He at once wrote the mission board, informing them of his readiness to go at brief notice to any field the mission might suggest, though he should have to go alone. They immediately responded that no one had as yet been assigned to the vacancy he had expected to fill the October before, and in their judgment he was peculiarly qualified for that field; therefore they would suggest that he make every preparation to go out to that people the coming October, and possibly circumstances would be such at that time he could take a wife with him. No time need actually be wasted during the few months of waiting, as in a town not over twenty miles from him was a returned missionary familiar with the language and customs of the people among whom he would work. By visiting him, Ray could obtain such information and help as would enable him to make a most profitable use of the intervening months. Acting upon this suggestion, Ray, at as early a date as possible, called on the missionary, and under his instruction began the study of the language.
A week or two later he went down to Afton to spend a day with Daisy. She was able to occupy an invalid's chair, and had regained much of her old cheerfulness and vivacity. As he sat by her, he told her of the struggle through which he had passed when her condition had been most critical, and of the pledge he had then made to God.
"Hard as it is, my darling," he said, "to fulfill that pledge, I must do it. I dare not do otherwise. In fact, lest I should waver again in my resolve, I immediately wrote the mission board, and am now appointed to my old field, to sail the coming October. I have placed myself under the instruction of a returned missionary, and shall prepare myself, as far as possible, during the intervening months for my life work. I know that you, painful as our separation will be, will nevertheless approve of my decision. As you once said, I by God's grace can now say, 'Though I cannot understand, yet I can trust him.'"
The fair face was perhaps a trifle paler, but the voice that answered him was perfectly steady and almost triumphant in its tones: "It is all right, Ray. I knew of your struggle. These locks"—and she lightly brushed his hair—"have told the story of your anguish; but threaded as they are with gray they are infinitely more precious to me, for they tell of a victory won over self. Let me tell you too, Ray darling, I do not believe God has raised me from that sick bed for nothing. You may have to go out alone and for a time we may be separated. But I believe the Saviour has called me to that work, and sooner or later I shall toil by your side. It may seem unmaidenly, but I promise you that when duty at home is over, I shall hasten across the seas to you, and our union and our toil will perhaps be worth all the more because we have made even this our sacrifice for Jesus' sake."
"God bless you for those words, darling; they have given me a hope that will brighten my toil and make me more willing to undergo the sacrifice," he replied. And, rising, he bent down over her fair face and pressed kiss after kiss upon her lips.
"There, that will do, sir," she at length cried, with something of her old mirth, and struggling for breath; "nothing but the fact that you are so soon to leave me reconciles me to such prodigality on your part." Then, with tears coming into her eyes, "You will be with me as often as possible, Ray? Our long separation will come quickly, and I am selfish enough to want you with me every moment you can spare until then."
"I will come down as often as possible until September," he answered. "Then I will come here, and remain until the hour of my departure is at hand."
He went back to Easton the next morning happier, notwithstanding the approaching separation from Daisy, than he had been for months. He was in the line of duty again, and once more he was conscious of the Spirit's presence and power.
It was a Saturday, and on his arrival at Easton a press of work was upon him until a late hour that night. Quite exhausted, not far from midnight he threw himself upon his bed, and soon fell asleep. Philosophers tell us that our dreams are a continuation of our waking thoughts. Be this as it may, Ray soon had a vision or dream quite in keeping with his thoughts and feelings of the whole day before. He felt himself suddenly surrounded by an intense glory; an inexpressible happiness filled his soul; the brightness grew so vivid he could not keep his eyes open. But a moment later he felt a hand laid upon his head, and a voice, loving and tender, said: "God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good word and work." Thrice did the voice utter these words; and then the hand was removed, the brightness gradually faded away, but the happiness remained. It was a joy unlike any Ray had experienced before—deeper, richer, holier far. He felt that he had been baptized anew with the Holy Ghost.
He went to his pulpit the following morning with the power of that divine touch and commendation upon him. He preached with a freshness and vigor that moved the great audience before him; in the evening prayer meeting, souls inquired the way to Jesus. With the suddenness of a meteor's glare the power of the Spirit burst in mighty revival upon that church and congregation. For ten weeks Ray stood nightly in his pulpit and proclaimed the word of life; hundreds inquired: "What shall I do to be saved?" Then, from sheer exhaustion, Ray stopped. His church officers called on him, and said:
"Pastor, go off and rest. Stay one week or more, as you please. We will do what we can to continue these services; but you have earned, nay, your physical condition demands, absolute rest."
The next train took Ray to Afton. There was no place where he could rest as he could in the Lawton cottage. His extra labor had kept him too from Daisy; and he felt he now had earned the right to spend a few days by her side. He had not realized how exhausted he was until he got out at the Afton station, and started to walk up the avenue. From sheer weakness he was forced to call a carriage, and be driven around to the cottage door. It was now the middle of May, and the day was bright and sunny. So it happened Daisy was out on the veranda as the carriage stopped at the gate, and he alighted, and, with feeble step, advanced up the walk. She sprang to meet him, with a cry of alarm.
"Oh, Ray, what is it? Are you sick? Let me help you into the house. Fortunately, Edward is within."
She helped him up the steps, into the little sitting room; and, with a weary sigh, he sank down upon a sofa. "It is nothing but sheer exhaustion," he said to her, with a faint smile. "A few days' rest, and your nursing, will make a new man of me."
Just then Edward came hastily in, having heard Daisy's cry of alarm. He at once ordered Ray to his room, and to bed. "Not but what we shall pull you through all right, Ray," he said. "But there is no place like a bed for solid rest; and that you have got to take, with something to tone up your system. A day or two of quietness now may save you a long sickness."
Ray submitted to his directions, for his own good sense confirmed them; and a half hour later he was sleeping as soundly as a child. For three days Edward kept him in bed, while Daisy brought him the most appetizing and nourishing food, prepared by her own hands. His vigorous constitution reasserted itself; and on the fourth day he descended to the sitting room quite like himself. But Daisy would not permit him even yet to exert himself to any great extent, and insisted that he should frequently lie down upon the lounge she had brought into the sitting room, and upon which she had arranged a profusion of pillows.
He lay there in the afternoon, while she sat in a low rocker by his side, and he was telling her of the great harvest of souls that had been gathered in at Easton, when Edward drove up to the door in a light buggy, having with him Miss Sadye Greenough, the daughter of Mr. Greenough, principal of the Afton Graded School. Hitching the horse, he assisted Miss Sadye to alight, and the two came in where Ray and Daisy were.
The two girls greeted each other as old friends and schoolmates always do, and Edward placed another rocker for Miss Sadye beside Daisy's, while he sat down on the lounge at Ray's feet. Ray had risen to greet Miss Greenough, for she was an old school friend of his also; but, at the earnest solicitation of all, had resumed his position on the pillows.
"Ray," said Edward, laying his hand on his old chum's, "I have a little business with you and Daisy; and as Sadye is interested in it also, I brought her along with me. You have, I expect, had some idea that I was a little partial in my feelings toward Sadye; and a few weeks ago, as she may have written you, I found she cared a little something about me. She has even promised to become my wife next month. But she is blushing so, I shall have to stop all that talk, and come directly to the proposition we have to make. It is this: instead of setting up a separate establishment of our own, we will come here. Sadye will take the place of Daisy at the head of the household affairs, and in the care of mother. This will leave Daisy free. You can be married when we are, and in October she can go with you to the mission field. What do you say?"
Ray sat upright, and grasped Edward's hand. "God bless you, Ned," he exclaimed, "for thinking of this, even if it is not practicable." And he looked wistfully over at Daisy.
A sudden hope had come into her heart; her eyes danced with joy; but controlling herself she turned to Sadye, saying: "I have no right to ask this of you. It would put heavy burdens upon you, such as you have not been accustomed to, and it would be selfish of me to allow it."
"Why?" said Sadye, low and earnestly. "She will be my mother as well as yours. She has a good nurse, and there is a good girl in the house. My duties cannot be excessive, and I certainly will do all I can to fill your exact place. This is my own thought, not Edward's. It is doing by you as I would be done by; as I know you would do by me if our places were reversed. I shall love to do it. Then I too love Jesus; and may I not make the little sacrifice this involves to let you go with the one of your choice to those heathen lands? Thus while at home may I not, indirectly at least, help on the Master's work abroad?"
Daisy gave the generous and thoughtful girl a hearty kiss; then she said, tremulously: "We will think this over, and pray over it, and if God directs it, I will accept the sacrifice you offer, knowing you do it for the Master's sake, as well as for the love you have for Edward and myself. You were going with Edward, I believe, to see a patient. Why not come back here to tea, and spend the evening with us, and we will try and come to a decision. If we are to be married when you and Edward are, I shall have my hands full, and will need every moment of time between now and then."
Edward and Sadye went off on their ride, while Ray and Daisy talked and prayed over the offer Edward and his companion had so unexpectedly made.
"If I could only feel it was right to delegate my duty to another," Daisy said, "that would end the matter. But no one can care for a mother as a daughter can. I know Sadye would see that mother was comfortable in every way. That is not the chief trouble It is that mother will not see me, and I cannot bear to give her this pain; she has so little now to comfort her."
"Why not talk it over with her, and see what she says about it?" Ray asked. "You know at the very outset she was willing you should go. She is able to understand all you say, even if she cannot speak, and a look or a nod will give us some idea of how she feels. I would not for a moment want you to go, if she seems unwilling to part with you."
Daisy was silent for some little time. "Ray dear," she finally said, "now that you have suggested this I do believe that is what has troubled mother. When I told her how you had postponed your going for a while, I thought she tried to make me understand something, but what it was I could not tell. After my sickness I told her of your decision to go without me, and there has been a troubled look in her eyes ever since. It certainly, as you say, can do no harm to tell her of Sadye's proposition, and see how she feels."
At the supper table Daisy spoke to Edward and Sadye about Ray's suggestion to talk the matter over with the mother. Edward at once approved of the plan, and a little later the four went to the invalid's room. All greeted her with a kiss, and then Daisy slowly and distinctly told her frankly of the offer Sadye had made. She assured her that all desired the mother's will to be carried out, and that would make them the happiest which would give her the greatest joy. A great flash of intelligence passed over the invalid's face as Daisy spoke; and when Daisy had finished, she tried to lift one of her hands toward Ray. He saw the movement, and with a quick intuition of her meaning he stepped quickly to the bedside and took Daisy's hand into his own. Again that flash of intelligence passed over the face of the mother, and her lips seemed to be moving, though no sound escaped them. They watched her; and then, to the astonishment of all, those lips for the first time in many months gave forth an utterance. All heard clearly and distinctly the single word, "Go."
Edward hastened to his mother's side, and watching those lips requested the mother to speak again. In vain she tried, though her eyes fastened upon Ray and Daisy, with a look which showed plainly that none had misunderstood her desire.
On a soft balmy June day, therefore, three weeks later, a double marriage took place at the Lawton cottage. It was a quiet simple affair in all of its arrangements. The invalid mother was raised on pillows, so that her eyes could rest upon the two couples as Mr. Carleton spoke the words that joined each for life to the chosen one. Only the immediate families of the young people were present, and after the ceremony had been performed Edward and his bride departed for a brief bridal tour, while Ray and Daisy remained quietly at the cottage until their return. Then Daisy was to accompany Ray to Easton.
Ray had brought his books with him, and Daisy and he spent their leisure moments studying the language of the people to whom they were now so soon to go. On the Sunday that Edward was absent, Ray readily arranged with Mr. Carleton to go up to Easton for him, while he preached to the First Church people.
Just a week after the marriage, Edward and his wife returned, and it had been arranged that they and Daisy and Ray should spend the evening in the mother's room. Mrs. Lawton had been raised upon pillows to greet the returning couple, and Edward, sitting down by the bedside, gave her a most entertaining account of the places he and his bride had visited. The mother's face clearly manifested her joy at the happiness of her son and daughter, and she looked from one couple to the other with intense satisfaction beaming from her expressive eyes. After a time, lest they should weary the mother, all but Edward departed. He delayed a moment to assist the nurse in placing the invalid back in her accustomed position in bed. He had scarcely done this, however, when a cry escaped him that brought all the others back to the room. They had no need to ask what had alarmed him. The look on the mother's face told them the great change, long dreaded, had come. Her eyes were uplifted, her lips struggled to speak; for the second time, since her sudden affliction came upon her, she spoke. Softly she whispered the word "peace," and then she was at rest.
Ray closed his work at Easton, much to the regret of his people, on September first. That month he and Daisy spent at Afton with Edward and his wife. Early in October they sailed on the steamship Illyria, Captain Tom Branford, master, for Liverpool, intending there to take direct passage for their field of labor. As the steamer moved slowly down the harbor, Ray and Daisy stood on its deck, looking off toward the fast receding land. Ray's countenance indicated deep thought, but not until the land had vanished from sight did Daisy disturb him. Then she gently asked:
"What is it, Ray?"
He looked down into her upturned face with a bright smile.
"I was thinking of that passage in Isaiah," he answered, "that reads, 'And an highway shall be there and a way, and it shall be called the way of holiness.' I was reviewing my life since I became God's child, and that passage came to mind. It seemed to me I had, during these years that have gone, been slowly traveling up that highway. Sometimes I have thought the byways offered a safer footing, and I have ventured into them, only to find that the Lord's appointed way was the only one that offered peace and safety. I have had my valley of humiliation and self-surrender. I believe I am now willing to say, 'Thy will be done.'"
"The moment you reached that point, I was snatched from death's door, and the way was opened for me to walk with you directly on to what we believed to be our life work," said Daisy, thoughtfully. "What is the lesson we are to learn?"
"That we must hold all we have, even those we love best, subject to the will of God," Ray responded, promptly. "He will have nothing put before himself."
"It cost us a year of delay in our chosen work, nevertheless, to know that experience," added Daisy, with a sigh.
"And yet not a lost year," remarked Ray, with something like satisfaction in his tones. "Our labor on the field to which we go would not have been worth half what it will now be had we gone without this experience through which we have in twelve months passed. We have, I firmly believe, advanced much nearer to the Master; we have placed ourselves in sweeter and more tender relations with him; we can each hear him say, in loving accents, 'Thou art mine.' We have found more than redemption, more than intimacy—even complete identification with him. Those old words that my mother found so precious when dying, and which had such a fascination for me in the prayer room so many years ago, have now become words of absolute experience in our religious lives. We go with glad hearts to our appointed field, though the way is untried and the future unknown, because we can each hear the Saviour saying, with all the force of a divine promise, 'Fear not, for I have redeemed thee; I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine.'"
THE END.