There was nothing to do but sit and enjoy the spectacleThere was nothing to do but sit and enjoy the spectacle
Cynthia did not reply to this but lit the candles and gave a last look about. Then theyreturned to the drawing-room. As there was nothing further to do but sit and enjoy the spectacle, the two girls cuddled down on a roomy old couch or sofa, and watched with all the fascination that one watches the soft illumination of a Christmas-tree. Sometimes they talked in low voices, commenting on the scene, then they would be silent for a long period, simply drinking it in and trying to photograph it forever on their memories. Joyce frankly and openly enjoyed it all,but Cynthia seemed nervous and restless. She began at length to wriggle about, got up twice and walked around restlessly, and looked at her watch again and again.
"I wonder how long these candles will last?" questioned Joyce, glancing at her own timepiece. "They aren't a third gone yet. Oh, I could sit here and look at this for hours! It's all so different from anything we've ever seen."
"What's that!" exclaimed Cynthia, suddenly and Joyce straightened up to listen more intently.
"I don't hear anything. Whatisthe matter with you to-day, Cynthia Sprague?"
"I don't know. I'm nervous, I guess!"
"There— Ididhear something!" It was Joyce who spoke. "The queerestclick! Good gracious, Cynthia! Just suppose somebody should take it into his head to get in here to-day! Ofalltimes! And find this going on!" But Cynthia was not listening to Joyce. She was straining her ears in another direction.
"There it is again! Somebody is at that front door!" cried Joyce. "Ibelieve they must have seen these lights through some chink in the boarding and are breaking in to find out what's the matter! Perhaps they think—"
Cr-r-r-rack!— Something gave with a long, resounding noise, and the two girls clasped each other in an agony of terror. It came from the front door, there was no shadow of doubt, and somebody had just succeeded in opening the little door in the boarding. There was still the big main door to pass.
"Come!—quick!—quick!" whispered Joyce. "It willneverdo for us to be found here. Wemight be arrested for trespassing! Let's slip down cellar and out through the window, and perhaps we can get away without being seen. Never mind the candles! They'll never know who put them there!— Hurry!" She clutched at Cynthia, expecting instant acquiescence. But, to her amazement, Cynthia stood firm, and boldly declared:
"No, Joyce, I'm not going to run away! Even if we got out without being seen, they'd be sure to discover us sooner or later. We've left enough of our things around for that. I'm going to meet whoever it is, and tell them we haven't done any real harm,—and so must you!"
All during this speech they could hear the rattle of some one working at the lock of the main door. And a second after Cynthia finished, it yielded with another loud crack. Next, footsteps were heard in the hall. By this time, Joyce was so paralyzed with fright that she could scarcely move a limb, and speech had entirely deserted her. They were caught as in a trap! There was no escape now. Itwas a horrible position. Cynthia, however, pulled her to her feet.
"Come!" she ordered. "We'd better meet them and face it out!" Joyce could only marvel at her astonishing coolness, who had always been the most timid and terror-ridden of mortals.
At this instant, the drawing-room door was pushed open!
To Joyce, the moment that the drawing-room door was pushed open will always seem, with perhaps one exception, the most intense of all her life. She fully expected to see a man stride in—more likely half a dozen!—and demand the meaning of the unwarrantable intrusion and illumination. Instead of that, the slight figure of a woman dressed all in black, and with a long heavy dark veil over her face, stepped into the room!
For a moment she paused, surprised, uncertain, almost trembling. Then, with a firm movement, she threw back her veil, and, in the soft light of the candles, stood revealed. Joyce gave a tiny gasp. In all her life she had never seen so beautiful an old lady. Masses of soft wavy white hair framed a face of singularcharm, despite its age, and the biggest, saddest brown eyes in all the world, looked out inquiringly on the two girls. There was complete silence. The three could hear each other breathe. Then the newcomer spoke:
"Which of you two friends was it, may I ask, who sent me the letter?" Her voice was sweet and low and soft, and as sad as her eyes. Joyce gave a start and opened her lips to speak, but Cynthia was before her.
"I did!" she announced calmly. The lady turned to her.
"That was very lovely of you,—and very thoughtful. I began planning to come soon after I received it, and tried to arrive at about the time you mentioned. But I do not quite understand all—all this!" She glanced toward the burning candles. "And I'm afraid I do not understand how you—how you came to be in here!"
"Oh," began Cynthia, stumblingly, "I— I couldn't quite explain it all in a letter—and I didn't even know you'd pay any attention to what I wrote, anyway. But we'll tell you allabout it right now, if you care to hear." A light was beginning to dawn on the bewildered Joyce. Suddenly she sprang forward and seized the lady's hand.
"Tell me—oh, please tell me," she cried, "areyou Mrs. Collingwood?"
"Yes, my dear!" said the lady.
And to the amazement of every one Joyce broke down and began to sob hysterically, exclaiming, "Oh, I'm so glad—so glad!" between every other sob.
"I think I'll sit down," said Mrs. Collingwood, when Joyce had regained control of herself. "I'm very tired—and very, very—bewildered!" She sat down on the sofa, and drew each of the girls down beside her.
"Now tell me," she said to Cynthia. "Explain it all, and then show me what you think will interest me so. You see, I have traveled many weary miles to hear this strange story."
So Cynthia began at the beginning and told how they had first found their way in, and had then become interested in unraveling the mystery of the old house. Mrs. Collingwood listenedwith deep attention; but when Cynthia reached the tale of the hidden stairway, she started in surprise.
"Why, I never dreamed there was such a thing in the house!" she exclaimed. "The rooms were re-papered once, but I was away when it was done. None of us knew!"
"No, we thought you didn't," continued Cynthia. "And so we went into the locked-up room. And there we found something,—oh!—Mrs. Collingwood! We felt sure you had never seen it, and that yououghtto! You see, we knew all the rest of the—the story, from Joyce's great-aunt, Lucia Kenway. And we felt yououghtto see it,—at leastIfelt that way, and so I wrote you the letter. I didn't even tell Joyce I'd done it, because—because I was afraid she'd think I wasmeddlingin what didn't concern me! But I couldn't help it. I couldn't sleep nights till I'd sent that letter, because it all haunted me so! I just sent it to Chesterton, South Carolina, because that was all the address I knew. I didn't even feel sure it would ever reach you.
"And I set a special date for you to get here on purpose, because—well, because I thought we ought to be here to receive you, and have the place look sort of—homelike. It would be terrible, seems to me, to come back to a dark, deserted house that you'd left so long ago, and nobody here to—to welcome you. Well, that's all, I guess. But Mrs. Collingwood, I'm so afraid we haven't done right,—that we meddled in what was no business of ours, and trespassed in a house we should never have entered! I only hope you can forgive us!" Thus ended Cynthia, brokenly, and Mrs. Collingwood put out her hands to take a hand of each girl in her clasp.
"You dear little meddlers!" she exclaimed. "This is all so astonishing to me; but I feel sure, nevertheless, that you have done nothing but good! And now will you—will you show me what you spoke of?"
Cynthia rose, handed her a lighted candle, and led her to the opening of the little stairway in the library. "It's up these stairs, in the room above—on the desk," she said. "Youwill find it all lit up there. And I think that—you would rather go—alone!" Mrs. Collingwood took the candle, and Cynthia helped her into the opening at the foot of the stairs. Then she went back to Joyce.
When they were alone, the two girls stood staring at one another and Cynthia's cheeks grew fiery red.
"I don't know what—what you must think of me, Joyce!" she stammered. "I ought never to have done this, I suppose, without telling you."
"Why didn't you tell me?" demanded Joyce.
"Why, I was so afraid you'd think me silly and—and meddling, and you mightn't approve of it. I was unhappy,—I—somehow felt as though I'd committed a crime, and the only way to right it was this!"
"How long ago did you send your letter?" asked Joyce, presently.
Cynthia considered. "I think I posted it a week ago Thursday."
"And you knew all the time, last night, thatthis was going to happen to-day?" asked Joyce incredulously.
"Well, I sort of expected it,—that is, I really didn't know whether she'd come or not. It made me dreadfully nervous, and that's the reason I was so cross to you, Joyce, I suppose. Will you forgive me, now that you know?"
"Why, of course!" said Joyce. Then, suddenly, "But, oh!— IwishI'd known this all at the time!"
"What for? What difference would it have made?" demanded Cynthia.
But Joyce only replied: "Hush! Is that Mrs. Collingwood coming down?"
Mrs. Collingwood remained a long time up-stairs,—so long, indeed, that the girls began to be rather uneasy, fearing that she had fainted, or perhaps was ill, or overcome—they knew not what.
"Do you think we ought to go up?" asked Cynthia, anxiously. "Perhaps she needs help."
"No, I think she just wants to be by herself. It was fine of you, Cynthia, to send her up alone! I really don't believe I'd have thought of it."
At length they heard her coming slowly down, and presently she reëntered the drawing-room. They could see that she was much moved, and had evidently been crying. She did not speak to them at once, but went andstood by the mantel, looking up long and earnestly at the portrait of the twins.
"My babies!" they heard her murmur unconsciously, aloud. At last, however, she came to them, and sat down once more between them on the sofa. They wondered nervously what she was going to say.
"My little girls—" she began, "forgive me!—you seem little and young to me, though. I suppose you consider yourselves almost young ladies; but you see, I am an old woman!— I was going to tell you a little about my life, but I suppose you already know most of the important things, thanks to Great-aunt Lucia!" She patted Joyce's hand.
"There are some things, however, that perhaps you do not know, and, after what you have done for me, you deserve to. I was married when I was a very young girl—only seventeen. I was a Southerner, but my husband came from the North, and brought me up North here to live. I always hated it—this Northern life—and, though I loved my husband dearly, I hated his devotion to it. Wenever agreed about those questions. When my twin babies were born, I secretly determined that they should be Southerners, in spirit, andonlySoutherners. I planned that when they were both old enough, they should marry in the South and live there—and my husband and I with them.
"But, in this life, things seldom turn out as we plan. My little girl died before she was three; and I had scarcely become reconciled to this grief when my husband was also taken from me. So I centered all my hopes on my son—on Fairfax. As he grew older, however, and as the Civil War came nearer, I noticed that he talked more and more in sympathy with the North, and this distressed me terribly. However, I thought it best not to say much about it to him, for he was a headstrong boy, and had always resented opposition. And I felt sure that he would see things differently when he was older.
"I wished to send him to a Southern college, but he begged me to send him to Harvard. As his heart was so set on it, I couldn't deny him,thinking that even this would make little difference in the end. Then came the crisis in the country's affairs, and the Confederacy was declared. I had already begun to correspond with Southern authorities, to arrange about raising a company for Fairfax. I never doubted that he would comply with my wishes. But I little knew him!
"I hardly need to tell you of the awful day that he came home. You are already acquainted with the history of it. That afternoon, shortly after he arrived, we had our interview. I have always possessed the most violent temper a mortal had to struggle with. And in those earlier years, when I got into a rage, it blinded me to everything else, to every other earthly consideration. And during that interview, well,—need I say it?—Fairfax was simply immovable,—gentle and loving always,—but I could no more impress him with my wishes than I could have moved the Rock of Gibraltar. The galling part to me was—that he kept insisting he was only doing what wasright! Right?— Howcouldhe be right whenit was all directly contrary— But never mind that now! I have learned differently, with the passing, sorrowful years.
"But, to go back,—I stood it as long as I could, and then,—I turned from him, disowned him, bade him leave the house at once and never see my face again, and informed him that I myself would abandon the place on the morrow, and return to the South. He left me, without another word, and went to his room. I immediately summoned the servants and dismissed them on the spot, giving them only time to get their things together and go. Then I locked myself in my room till—he was gone. He came several times, knocked at my door, and begged me to see him, but I would not. Heaven forgive me!— I would not! So he must have left me—that note!" She covered her eyes with her hand a moment. Then she went on:
"I never saw or knew of it till this day. If I had—" Just at this point, they were all startled by a loud knock, coming from the direction of the front door. So unexpected wasthe sound that they could only stare at each other inquiringly without stirring. In a moment it came again,—a thumping of the old knocker on the front inner door.
"I guess I'd better go," said Joyce. "Some one may have seen the little boarded-up door open—Didyou leave it open?" she asked, turning to Mrs. Collingwood.
"I think I did. I was too hurried and nervous, when I came in, to think of it."
"That's it, then. Some one has seen it open, and has stopped to inquire if everything is all right." She hurried away to the front door, and, after an effort, succeeded in pulling it open. A man—a complete stranger to her—stood outside. They regarded each other with mutual surprise.
"Pardon me!" he said. "But perhaps you can inform me—is any one living in this house at present?"
"Why, no!" replied Joyce, rather confusedly. "That is—no, the house is empty, except just—just to-day!"
"Oh! er— I see! The fact is," the strangerwent on, "I was passing here and noticed this outer door open, which seemed a little queer. I used to know the people who lived here—very well indeed—and I have been wondering whether the house was still in their possession. It seemed to be untenanted." At his mention of knowing the family, Joyce looked him over with considerably more interest. He was tall, straight and robust, though rather verging on the elderly. His iron-gray hair was crisply curly, and his dark eyes twinkled out from under bushy gray brows. His smile was captivating. Joyce decided at once that she liked him.
"Oh! did you know the family, the—the—"
"Collingwoods!" he supplemented, with his twinkling smile. "Yes, I knew them—quite intimately. Might I, perhaps, if it would not be intruding, come in just a moment to look once more at the old place? That is," he added hastily, seeing her hesitate, "only if it would be entirely convenient! I do not know, of course, why the house is open. Perhaps people are—are about to purchase it."
Joyce was, for a moment, tongue-tied with perplexity. She hated to refuse the simple wish of this pleasant stranger, yet how was she to comply with it, considering the presence of Mrs. Collingwood, and the almost unexplainable position of herself and Cynthia? What would he think of it all! While she was hesitating, an idea came to her.
"There is one of the family here to-day on—on business," she said, at last. "If you will give me your name, I will ask if—that person would like to see you."
"Oh, that is hardly worth while!" he said, hastily. "My name is Calthorpe,—but I'm sure they wouldn't remember me after all this time, and I do not wish to trouble them." But Joyce had excused herself and turned away, as soon as she heard the name, leaving him standing there. Mrs. Collingwood, however, shook her head when Joyce announced who was outside.
"I do not remember any one named Calthorpe, and I scarcely feel that I can see a stranger now. But we must not be inhospitable.Miss Cynthia and I will go and sit in the library, and you can bring him into the drawing-room a few moments. There is no other part of the house that can very well be shown." She took Cynthia's arm, walked into the library, and partly closed the door, while Joyce went out to admit the stranger.
"If you care to look around the drawing-room, you will be most welcome," she announced politely. He accepted the invitation gratefully, and entered with her. At the first glance, however, he started back slightly, as with a shock of surprise.
"Why, how strange—how very singular!" he murmured. "These candles—everything—everything just the same as though it were yesterday!"
"Did you often come here?" inquired Joyce. "You must be very well acquainted with the house!"
"Yes. I came often. I was almost like an inmate." He began to wander slowly about the room, examining the pictures. In front of the baby twins he paused a long time.
"Then you must have known young Mr. Fairfax very well," suggested Joyce. "That's he, on the right in the picture." The stranger eyed her curiously.
"Why, yes, I knew him well. But you, little lady, seem quite intimate with the Collingwood family history. Tell me, are you a—a relative?" This confused Joyce anew.
"Oh, no! Just a—just a friend!" she explained. "But I have been told a good deal about them."
"An unhappy family!" was his only comment, and he continued his tour around the room. In front of the old, square, open piano he paused again, and fingered the silk scarf that had, at some long ago date, been thrown carelessly upon it. Then he ran his fingers lightly over the yellow keys. The tones were unbelievably jangling and discordant, yet Joyce thought she caught the notes of a little tune. And in another moment he broke into the air, singing softly the opening line:—
"There never was a sweetheart like this mother fair of mine!—"
He had sung no more when the face of Mrs. Collingwood appeared in the doorway. Her eyes were wide and staring, her features almost gray in color.
"Who—whoareyou?" she demanded, in a voice scarcely louder than a whisper. The stranger gazed at her with a fixed look.
"Arthur— Arthur Calthorpe!" he faltered.
"No—you are not!"
They drew toward each other unconsciously, as though moving in a dream.
"No one—no one ever knew that song but—" Mrs. Collingwood came closer, and uttered a sudden low cry:
"My son!"
"Mother!"
The two girls, who had been watching this scene with amazement unutterable, saw the strange pair gaze, for one long moment, into each other's eyes. Then, with a beautiful gesture, the man held out his arms. And the woman, with a little gasp of happiness, walked into them!
"Joyce, will you just oblige me by pinching me—real hard! I'm perfectly certain I'm not awake!"
Joyce pinched, obligingly, and with vigor, thereby eliciting from her companion a muffled squeak. The two girls were sitting on the lower step of the staircase in the dark hallway. They had been sitting there for a long, long while.
It was Joyce who had pulled Cynthia away from staring, wide-eyed, at the spectacle of that marvelous reunion. And they had slipped out into the hall unobserved, in order that the two in the drawing-room might have this wonderful moment to themselves. Neither of them had yet sufficiently recovered from her amazement to be quite coherent.
"I can't make anything out of it!" began Cynthia, slowly, at last. "He's dead!"
"Evidently he isn't," replied Joyce, "or he wouldn't be here! But oh!—it's true, then! I hardly dared to hope it would be so! I'msoglad I did it!" Cynthia turned on her.
"Joyce Kenway!Whatare you talking about? It sounds as though you were going crazy!"
"Oh, of course you don't understand!" retorted Joyce. "And it's your own fault too. I'd have been glad enough to explain, and talk it over with you, only you were so hateful that I just went home instead, and thought it out myself."
"Well, I may be stupid," remarked Cynthia, "but for the life of me I can't make any sense out of what you're saying!"
"Listen, then," said Joyce, "and I'll explain it all. You remember last night how I sat reading the newspaper,—first, just to tease you, and afterward I really got interested in it? Well, I happened to be glancing over the news about people who had just landed herefrom abroad, when a little paragraph caught my eye. I can't remember the exact words but it was something like this,—that among the passengers just arrived in New York on theCampaniawas Mr.Fairfax Collingwood, who was interested in Western and Australian gold mines. He had not been here in the East for nearly forty years, and it said how astounded he was at the remarkable changes that had taken place during his long absence. Then it went on to say that he was staying at the Waldorf-Astoria for only a few days, as he was just here on some important business, and was then going to cross the continent, on his way back to Australia.
"Well, you'd better believe that I nearly jumped out of my skin at the name—Fairfax Collingwood. It's an unusual one, and it didn't seem possible that more than one person could have it, though of course it might be a distant connection of the same family. And then, too,ourFairfax Collingwood was dead. I didn't know what to think! I tried to get your attention, but you were still as mad asyou could be, so I made up my mind I'd go home and puzzle over it by myself, and I took the paper with me.
"After I got home, I sat and thought andthought! And all of a sudden it occurred to me that perhaps he wasn't killed in the war after all,—that there'd been some mistake. I've read that such things did happen; but if it were so, I couldn't imagine why he didn't go and make it up with his mother afterward. It seemed very strange. And then this explanation dawned on me,—he had left that note for his mother, and perhaps thought that if she really intended to forgive him, she'd have made some effort to get word to him in the year that elapsed before he was reported killed. Then, as she never did, he may have concluded that it was all useless and hopeless, and he'd better let the report stand, and he disappear and never come back. You see that article said he hadn't been East here for forty years.
"And when I'd thought this out, an idea popped into my head. If what I'd imaginedwas true, it didn't seemrightto let him go on thinking that, when I knew that his mother never saw that letter, and I decided I'd let him know it. So I sat right down and wrote a note that went something like this:
"Mr. Fairfax Collingwood:"If you are the same Mr. Fairfax Collingwood who, in 1861, parted from your mother after a disagreement, leaving a note for her which you hoped she would read, I want to tell you that she never saw that note.
"Mr. Fairfax Collingwood:
"If you are the same Mr. Fairfax Collingwood who, in 1861, parted from your mother after a disagreement, leaving a note for her which you hoped she would read, I want to tell you that she never saw that note.
"Joyce Kenway.
"I signed my name right out, because Father has always said that to write an anonymous letter was the most despicable thing any one could do. And if he ever discovered who I was, I wouldn't be ashamed to tell him what we had done, anyway. Of course, I ran the chance of his not being the right person, but I thought if that were so, he simply wouldn't pay any attention to the note, and the whole thing would end there. I addressed the letter to his hotel, and decided that it must be mailed that very night, for he might suddenly leave there and I'd never know where else to findhim. It was then nearly ten o'clock, and I didn't want Father or Mother to know about it, so I teased Anne into running out to the post-office with me. He must have received it this morning."
Cynthia had listened to this long explanation in astonished silence. "Isn't it the most remarkable thing," she exclaimed when Joyce had finished, "that each of us should write, I to the mother and you to the son, and neither of us even guess what the other was doing! And that they should meet here, just this afternoon! But there are a whole lot of things I can't understand at all. Why, for instance, did he give the name of Arthur Calthorpe when he came in, and pretend he was some one else?"
"That's been puzzling me too," replied Joyce, "and I can't think of any reason."
"But the thing that confuses me most of all," added Cynthia, "is this. Why, if you had written that note, and had an idea that he was alive, wereyouso tremendously astonished when he and his mother recognized each other?I should have thought you'd guess right away, when you saw him at the door, who he was!"
"That's just the queer part of it!" said Joyce. "In the first place, I never expected him to come out here at all,—at least, not right away. I never put the name of this town in the letter, nor mentioned this house. I supposed, of course, that he'd go piling right down to South Carolina to find his mother, or see whether she was alive. Then, later, when they'd made it all up (provided she was alive, which evenIdidn't know then), I thought they might come back here and open the house. That was one reason I wanted to have our illumination next week, on the chance of their arriving.
"So you see I was quite unprepared to see him rushing out here at once; and when he gave another name, that completely deceived me. And then, there's one thing more. Somehow, I had in my mind a picture of Fairfax Collingwood that was as different as could be from—well, from what he is! You see, I'd always thought of him as theboywhom Great-auntLucia described having seen. I pictured him as slim and young looking, smooth-faced, with golden curly hair, and big brown eyes. His eyes are the same but,—well, I somehow never counted on the change that all those forty years would make! You can't think how different my idea of him was, and naturally that helped all the more to throw me off the track."
"But why—" began Cynthia afresh.
"Oh, don't let's try to puzzle over it any more just now!" interrupted Joyce. "My head is simply in a whirl. I can't eventhinkstraight! I never had so many surprises all at once in my life. I think he will explain everything we don't understand. Let's just wait!"
There were faint sounds from the drawing-room, but they were indistinguishable,—low murmurings and half-hushed sobs. The two reunited ones within were bridging the gulf of forty years. And so the girls continued to wait outside, in the silence and in the dark.
At last the two on the staircase heard footsteps approaching the door, and a pleasant voice called out:
"Where are you both, little ladies? Will you not come and join us? I think we must have some things to be explained!" They came forward, a little timidly, and their latest visitor held out a hand to each.
"You wonderful two!" he exclaimed. "Do you realize that, had it not been for you, this would never have happened? My mother and I owe you a debt of gratitude beyond all expressing! Come and join us now, and we will solve the riddles which I'm sure are puzzling us all." He led them over to the sofa, and placed them beside his mother.
Never was a change more remarkable than that which had come upon Mrs. Collingwood.Her face, from being one of the saddest they had ever seen, had grown fairly radiant. She looked younger, too. Ten years seemed suddenly to have dropped from her shoulders. Her brown eyes flashed with something of their former fire, and she smiled down at them as only the Lovely Lady of the portrait had ever smiled. There was no difficulty now in identifying her with that picture.
"Oh, please—" began Joyce, breathlessly, "won't you tell us, Mr. Collingwood, how you come to be—not dead!—and why you gave another name at the door—and—and—" He laughed.
"I'll tell you all that," he interrupted, "if you'll tellmewho 'Joyce Kenway' is!"
"Why,Iam!" said Joyce in surprise. "Didn't you guess it?"
"How could I?" he answered. "I never supposed it was agirlwho sent me that note. I did not even feel sure that the name was not assumed to hide an identity. In fact, I did not know what to think. But I'll come to all that in its proper place. I'm sure you areall anxious to hear the strange story I have to tell.
"In the first place, as it's easy to guess, I wasn't killed at the battle of Shiloh at all,—but so very seriously wounded—that I came to be so reported. As I lay on the field with scores of others, after the battle, a poor fellow near me, who had been terribly hurt, was moaning and tossing. My own wound did not hamper me so much at the time, so I crawled over to him and tried to make him as comfortable as possible till a surgeon should arrive. Presently he began to shiver so, with some sort of a chill, that I took off my coat and wrapped it round him. The coat had some of my personal papers in it, but I did not think of that at the time.
"When the surgeons did arrive, we were removed to different army hospitals, and I never saw the man again. But he probably died very soon after, and evidently, finding my name on him, in the confusion it was reported thatIwas dead. Well, when I saw the notice of my own death in the paper, my first impulse was todeny it at once. But my second thought was to let it pass, after all. I believed that I had broken forever with my home. In the year that had elapsed, I had never ceased to hope that the note I left would soften my mother's feelings toward me, and that at least she would send me word that I was forgiven. But the word had never come, and hope was now quite dead. Perhaps it would be kinder to her to allow her to think I was no more, having died in the cause I thought right. The more I thought it over, the more I became convinced that this was the wisest course. Therefore I let the report stand. I was quite unknown where I was, and I decided, as soon as I was able, to make my way out West, and live out my life far from the scenes of so much unhappiness. My wound disqualified me from further army service and gave me a great deal of trouble, even after I was dismissed from the hospital.
"Nevertheless, I worked my way to the far West, partly on foot and partly in the slow stage-coaches of that period. Once in California,I became deeply interested in the gold mines, where I was certain, like many another deluded one, that I was shortly going to amass an enormous fortune! But, after several years of fruitless search and fruitless toil, I stood as poor as the day I had first come into the region. In the meantime, the fascination of the life had taken hold of me, and I could relinquish it for no other. I had always, from a small child, been passionately fond of adventure and yearned to see other regions and test my fortune in new and untried ways. I could have done so no more acceptably than in the very course I was now pursuing.
"At the end of those hard but interesting years in California, rumors drifted to me of golden possibilities in upper Canada, and I decided to try my luck in the new field. The region was, at that time, practically a trackless wilderness, and to brave it at all was considered the limit of folly. That, however, far from deterring me, attracted me only the more. I got together an outfit, and bade a long farewell to even the rough civilization of California.
"Those were strange years, marvelous years, that I spent in the mountain fastnesses of upper Canada. For month on month I would see no human being save the half-breed Indian guide who accompanied me, and most of the timeheseemed to me scarcely human. And all the while the search for gold went on, endlessly—endlessly. And the way led me farther and farther from the haunts of men. Then,—one day,—I found it! Found it in a mass, near the surface, and in such quantities that I actually had little else to do but shovel it out, wash it, and lay the precious nuggets aside, till at length the vein was exhausted. On weighing it up, I found such a quantity that there was really no object in pursuing the search any farther. I had enough. I was wealthy and to spare, and the longing came upon me to return to my own kind again. By this time, fifteen years had passed.
"You must not, however, think that in all these years and these absorbing interests, I had forgotten my mother. On the contrary, especially when I was in the wilderness, she wasconstantly in my thoughts. Before I left California for Canada (the war was then over some four or five years) I had contemplated writing to her, informing her of the mistake about my death, and begging her once more to forgive me. But, for several reasons, I did not do this. In the first place, I had heard of the exceeding bitterness of the South, increased tenfold by the period of reconstruction through which it was then passing. Old grudges, they told me, were cherished more deeply than ever, and members of the same family often regarded each other with hatred. Of what use for me then, I thought, to sue for a reconciliation at such a time.
"Beside that, my very pride was another barrier. I had not been successful. I was, in fact, practically penniless. Would it not appear as though I were anxious for a reconciliation because I did not wish to lose the property which would one day have been mine, had not my mother disinherited me? No, I could never allow even the hint of such a suspicion. I would wait.
"But, in the Canadian wilderness, I began to see matters in another light. So far from the haunts of humanity and the clash of human interests, one cannot help but look at all things more sanely. It occurred to me that perhaps my mother, far from cherishing any bitter feeling toward me, now that she thought me dead, might be suffering agonies of grief and remorse because we had not been reconciled before the end. If there were even a possibility of this, I must relieve it. So I sat down one day, and wrote her the most loving, penitent letter, begging anew for forgiveness, and giving her the history of my adventures and my whereabouts. This letter I sent off by my guide, to be mailed at the nearest trading-post.
"It took him a month to make the journey there and back. I waited three months more, in great impatience, then sent him back to the same post, to see if there might be a reply. He came back in due time, but bringing nothing for me, and I felt that my appeal had been in vain. Nevertheless, a few months later Iwrote again, with no better result. My guide returned empty-handed. And during the last year I was there, I made the third and final trial, and, when again no answer came, I felt that it was beyond all hope to expect forgiveness, since she could ignore three such urgent appeals.
"I have just learned from my mother that these letters were never received by her, which is a great surprise to me, but I think I know the explanation. My guide was not honest,—indeed, few of them are,—but, strangely enough, I never discovered any dishonesty in him, while he was with me. At that time, the postage on letters from that region was very high, sometimes as much as fifty or sixty cents, or even a dollar. This, of course, I always gave to the guide to use in sending the letter when he got to the trading-post. Now, though the sum seems small to us, it was large to him. And though I never suspected it at the time, I have no doubt that he pocketed the money and simply destroyed the letters. So that explains why my mother never received any of them.
"Well, I returned to California a rich man, able to indulge myself in any form of amusement or adventure that pleased me. I found that I still felt the lure of foreign countries, and the less explored or inhabited, the better. I shipped for a voyage to Japan and China, and spent several more years trying to penetrate the forbidden fastnesses of Tibet. From there, I worked down through India, found my way to the South Sea Islands, and landed at length in Australia with the intention of penetrating farther into that continent than any white man had yet set foot.
"I think by this time, I had pretty well lost all desire ever to return to America, especially to New York. But at intervals I still felt an inexpressible longing to see or hear from my mother. Ten or twelve added years had slipped by, and it did not seem human that she should continue to feel bitterly toward me. I had almost decided to write to her once more, when in Sydney, New South Wales, where I happened to be looking over the files of an old New York paper in the public library, Istumbled on the death-notice of a Mrs. Fairfax Collingwood of Chesterton, South Carolina. The paper was dated seven years before.
"The knowledge was like a knife-wound in my heart. There could be no doubt of the truth. I knew of no other of that name, and the town was the very one in which she lived. My mother now tells me that she knew of this mistake, an error of the New York paper in copying the item from a Southern journal. As a matter of fact, it was a very distant cousin of hers who had died, a Mrs. Fanshawe Collingwood, who also lived in the town. She was my mother's only living relative, and the paper mentioned this circumstance. But when the New York paper copied it, they left out all about the surviving cousin, and merely mentioned the name of the deceased as 'Mrs. Fairfax Collingwood.' My mother had this rectified in a later publication of the paper, but that, of course, I never saw.
"Well, I went into the heart of Australia under the impression that I was now reallymotherless, and under that impression I have lived ever since. I cannot now detail to you all my wanderings and adventures. I will only say that I became deeply interested in the Australian gold mines, bought up one finally, and have superintended its running ever since. Lately, it became necessary for me to make a business trip to New York in connection with this mine, and I decided to come by way of Europe, since I had never seen that portion of the globe. My business would not keep me in New York more than a week, and I intended to travel at once back to Australia across the continent, in order to see the changes that had taken place since I left.
"I had absolutely no idea of visiting this old home. Why, indeed, should I? My mother, as I supposed, was dead. Nothing else mattered. I had no interest in the property. For aught I knew it might have changed hands twenty times since we lived there. It might not even be in existence. At any rate, I had no wish to revive the bitterness of that memory. Then came the strange note this morning,which I believe you, Miss Joyce, are responsible for!
"To say that I was completely bewildered by it, would be putting it mildly. It made a statement that was new to me, indeed, and might account for many things. But what was I to do about it? Which way should I turn? No use to hurry down to South Carolina,—my mother being dead. Of whom should I make inquiries? The firm of New York lawyers that I remembered her as formerly retaining, I dreaded to consult, lest they think I had come to make a claim on the property. There seemed to be absolutely no clue.
"And then I happened to look at the envelope and saw that it was postmarked Rockridge, a region which I speedily ascertained was right in the vicinity of my old home. That decided me to come out here at once, this afternoon, hunt up the spot, and try to discover in this way whether there was any use of pursuing investigations further in this direction.
"As I have said, I naturally supposed that the property had changed hands many timesbefore this; and that all its old belongings had long since been sent to my mother or sold by her orders.
"When I arrived in this street and saw the old house still standing, forlorn, unkempt, apparently deserted, and quite unchanged since I knew it, I was still more astonished. But when I noticed the little door in the boarding standing open, I resolved to begin my investigations right there, and I boldly went up and knocked. Then Miss Joyce came out and announced that a member of the Collingwood family was here on business. That, too, seemed incredible, as I remembered no surviving member of the family. Discretion, however, seemed to me the better part of valor, and I decided to give the name that I had borne during my first years in California, till I could ascertain more definitely just what the situation was.
"So I came in—as Mr. Arthur Calthorpe—and the mystery deepened tenfold when I saw this old room all lit up precisely as I had remembered it so many years ago. It so carriedme back into my youth that, for a few moments, I quite lost track of the present. And when I came to the old piano, the impulse seized me to play a few bars and hum the lines of a little song I had once composed for my mother. I had at that time rather a gift for music, and this song was a sort of secret of ours— I never sang or played it for any one else. And she remembered it!
"Well, you know the rest!—" And he stopped abruptly. They all drew long breaths of relaxed tension.
"There's something that has puzzled me all along," began Joyce, at last. "I wonder if Mrs. Collingwood would object to my asking about it?"
"No, indeed, dear child," replied that lady. "Have no hesitation in asking what you wish."
"It's this, then. I have often and often wondered why you never came back to this beautiful old home, or at least sent for the books and pictures and lovely things that were going to ruin here. Did you never think of it?"
"I do not wonder that you ask," answered Mrs. Collingwood, "for it must have seemed very strange to an outsider. Of course, for the first few years, my anger had been so great, and my grief was still so terrible, that I felt I could never, never look upon the place or anything in it again. Then, as you have heard, I willed the house itself and the land to the Southern Society, as I had no one to whom I wished to leave it, and my means were sufficient, so that I did not need to sell it. As the years passed on, however, and my feelings altered, I did begin to think it a pity that the place should run to neglect and ruin.
"So strong did this conviction become, that I decided to come North myself, and personally superintend putting the house in order. I could not bear to leave this task to outsiders. I even thought that, if I found I could endure the memories, I would live in it a while, for the sake of the old happy years with my little boy. I even had my trunks packed and my ticket bought, when suddenly I came down with typhoid fever, so severe an attack that itwas thought I could not live. That ended all thoughts of my coming North for a long while, as I was miserably weak and helpless for months after, and in fact, have never quite recovered my strength. The years drifted on and with them came old age, and the reluctance to make the long journey and endure the strain of it all. Had it not been for Miss Cynthia's letter, I should never have come.
"But, to change the subject a trifle, my son is very anxious to know how you two young things have come to be concerned in all this, and I have not yet had time to tell him—fully. Will you not give him an account of it now? It is very wonderful."
And so they began, first Joyce and then Cynthia,—interrupting and supplementing each other. They were still rather anxious on the subject of meddling and trespassing, but they did not try to excuse themselves, recounting the adventures simply and hiding nothing. The older people listened intently, sometimes amused, sometimes touched, often more deeply moved than they cared to show.
"We began it at first just for fun,—we pretended to be detectives. But as it went on, we got more and more deeply interested, till at last this—this all seemed more important than our own lives," ended Joyce. "Only, I know we did wrong in the beginning ever to come in here at all. We are trespassers and meddlers, and I hope you can forgive us!"
"The dearest little meddlers in the world!" cried Mrs. Collingwood. "Can any forgiveness be necessary?" And she cuddled them both in her arms.
"There's just one thingI'dlike to ask, if you don't mind," said Cynthia, coming suddenly out of a brown study. "It's the one thing we never could account for. Why was that room up-stairs locked, and what has become of the key?" Mrs. Collingwood flushed.
"I locked the door and threw the key down the well—that night!" she answered slowly. "I don't suppose you can quite understand, if you are not afflicted with a passionate temper, as I was. When my son—when Fairfax here—had gone, and I was shutting up the houseand came to his room,—I wanted to go in,—oh, you cannot know how I wanted to go in! But I knew that if I once entered and stood among his dear belongings, I should relent— I should rush away to find him and beg him to come back to me. And I— I did notwantto relent! I stood there five minutes debating it. Then I suddenly locked the door on the outside, and before giving myself time for a second thought, I rushed down-stairs, out of doors, and threw the key into the old well,—where I could never get it again!
"Children, I am an old woman. I shall be seventy-five next birthday. Will you heed a lesson I have learned and paid for with the bitterest years of my life? If you are blessed with a calm, even, forgiving nature, thank God for it always. But if you are as I was, pray daily for help to curb that nature, before you have allowed it to work some desperate evil!" She hid her face in her hands.
"There, there, little Mother of mine!" murmured her son. "Let us forget all that now! What does anything matter so long as we aretogether again—for always?" He leaned over, pulled her hands from her face, and kissed her tenderly. The moment was an awkward one, and Cynthia wished madly that she had not been prompted to ask that unfortunate question. Suddenly, however, the tension was broken by Mrs. Collingwood exclaiming:
"Mercy me! See that enormouscatwalking in! Wherever did it come from?" They all turned toward the door.
"Oh, that's Goliath!" said Joyce, calmly. "He feels very much at home here, for he has come in with us often. He led the way that first day, if you remember. And he's beensucha help!— He's a better detective than any of us!"
"Blessings on Goliath then, say I!" laughed Mr. Fairfax Collingwood, and, approaching the huge feline with coaxing words, he gathered its unresisting form in his arms and deposited the warm, furry purring beast in his mother's lap.
And while they were all laughing over and petting Goliath, a queer thing happened. Thecandles, which had been burning now for several hours, had, unnoticed by all, been gradually guttering and spluttering out. At length only four or five flames remained, feebly wavering in their pools of melted wax. The occupants of the room had been too absorbed with their own affairs to notice the gradual dimming of the illumination. But now Joyce suddenly looked up and perceived what had happened.
"Why, look at the candles!" she cried. "There are only about three left, and they won't last more than a minute or two!" Even as she spoke, two of them flickered out. The remaining one struggled for another half-minute, and flared up in one last, desperate effort. The next instant, the room was in total darkness. So unexpected was the change, that they all sat very still. The sudden pall of darkness in this strange house of mystery was just a tiny bit awesome.
"Well! Thisisa predicament!" exclaimed Fairfax Collingwood who was first to recover from the surprise. "Fortunately I have a box of matches!"