The voice was pure and full, and as clear as a bird's; but there was something deeper in it than mere beauty, some subtle, compelling quality that made the tears rise unbidden, and that forced the heart to join in the prayer it uttered.
No one moved until the last line rang out triumphantly.
"In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me!"
When she had finished, Gilbert spoke no word of admiration. It had been so much better than he had dreamed that words seemed inadequate.
She sang again and again; now the song was gay, now grave, and she ended with an ecstatic spring song that had in it the sparkle of the stream, the song of the robin, and all the glorious delight of earth's resurrection.
When she came out to them again and her audience expressed their pleasure, Gilbert looked at her with a sharp feeling of pity. They had enjoyed her singing, no doubt, but they had no idea how wonderful it was. And to be able to sing like that, and not be appreciated, was tragic.
"I suppose you are going back to Toronto to study, next autumn?" he said, when she was seated again on the veranda steps.
"No, I think not," she said, with what seemed to him shocking indifference. "Not for some years at least, if ever."
"Why—you—you are surely not going to give up studying music!" he cried bluntly. "You, with a voice like that!"
His tone was unconsciously flattering. The girl smiled gratefully. She looked at him very gravely, as though about to speak, when she caught her brother's eye upon her, and paused with an embarrassed air.
"That's just what we're all saying to her, doctor," he said. "She ought to go, but she won't."
"Oh, I may, some time," she said lightly, "but I have had enough lessons for a while. Now, Marjorie, aren't you going to play for us?"
Gilbert went home, wondering over this strange young woman, and feeling toward her a strong impatience. Either she did not know the magnitude of the talent she possessed, or she was wofully lacking in ambition. With that voice, and a little spirit, there was nothing she might not accomplish; while here she was, content to feed chickens, and carry eggs to the corner store, with the placid assurance that she "had had enough lessons for a while." If she had not been so stately, he felt he would like to shake her.
He did not meet her again for some time; for even when he found leisure to attend a social gathering, she was seldom present. But he was on the lookout for her. He determined that the next time he met her he would give her some much-needed advice. She ought to be stirred up. These country folk had no ambition.
Her brother seemed to have no lack of it, he discovered. He took young Malcolm with him to see a patient occasionally, and on one long drive the boy confided in him something of the struggle it had been to give them all an education. It was a lucky thing that Elsie didn't want to go on with her music, he said, for the expense of her training would be so great that both he and Jean would have to stay home for some years, and Jean was dying to go to the high school in the fall. Both Uncle Hughie and mother had declared that Elsie must have first chance, but Elsie didn't want to go, and it certainly was lucky, though they were all sorry, of course, that she wasn't going on.
Gilbert wondered a little over the lad's remarks, but forgot them until the next occasion when he met Miss Cameron.
He had been up to see a patient among the Glenoro hills, and was driving homeward. The road was a narrow, lonely one, winding here and there through the dense wood. On either side the trees and underbrush made a towering green wall. Through it the eye could catch occasional glimpses of the flower-spangled earth, or a vista of splendid trunks with the sunlight making golden splashes on their spreading boughs. Gilbert pulled up Speed and drove slowly. Her hoofs made but a smothered pad, pad in the soft leaf-mold. The air was cool, and laden with the delicious scents of moss and bracken and leaf-strewn earth. Far away in the green depths a whitethroat was sending forth his long, clear, silvery call, in endless praise of "Canada! Canada! Canada!" As Gilbert turned a curve in the road a figure appeared ahead, a figure that seemed to add the finishing touch to the almost perfect scene—a girl, her arms full of marigolds, walking along the flower-bordered pathway.
She wore a pale-green gown, her bronze hair was shaded by a big straw hat, and she seemed a harmonious part of the gold-and-green picture of the summer woods.
The young doctor drew up at her side. She was a little pale and weary-looking from her long, hot walk, and she gladly accepted his invitation to ride. Jim had needed another man for the haying, she said, and she was the only one who could be spared to go and seek one; she was very fortunate to get a ride home.
As Gilbert helped her into his buggy he looked at her wonderingly. Was she really content with her homely tasks, or could it be possible that she was making this sacrifice voluntarily?
"Can you be quite content to settle down here in Elmbrook, when you might be making fame for yourself in a big city?" he asked. "I don't believe you realize that you might some day move throngs with your voice."
She smiled, with a tinge of sadness. "Well, you see, I am quite sure of my work here," she said half playfully, "and one could never be certain of a steady supply of 'moved throngs.'"
"You could," he cried earnestly. "You are wasting your talents."
She shook her head. "It is better to waste one's talents than something better."
"What, for instance?"
"One's life."
"How could it be better employed, in your case, than by giving the world your voice? You need to be more ambitious," he added bluntly.
She turned upon him that steady, scrutinizing glance that, from the first, had made him conscious of inner unworthiness. Her eyes were bright, and had lost the tired look; the cool breeze had brought back the rose-leaf tints to her face, and had blown one bronze curl across her forehead.
"You ought to hear Uncle Hughie on that subject," she said, with apparent irrelevance. "He is always 'rastlin'' out some problem for other people. One cannot live with him and be in doubt of one's duty."
"And he has taught you that it is your duty to remain at home?"
"Perhaps," she said, looking away into the mass of greenery by the roadside. It was evident that she did not care to pursue the subject.
"Duty is generally the thing a fellow doesn't want to do," he remarked, by way of making the conversation less personal.
"It's Uncle Hughie's pet hobby. He lost the chance of a college education, and many other privileges, through adhering to it, and says he has never regretted his action for a moment."
Gilbert was silent. The unbelievable thing must be true, then. This girl was sacrificing her own chance of advancement for the sake of her brother and sister. He looked at her with a feeling of reverence. To give up so much was commendable, but to give it up quietly, without a murmur, without even the chance of commendation—that was splendid.
"'You are in line with the universe,'" he quoted.
She glanced at him as if in alarm, and quickly changed the subject. Gilbert understood; he was tacitly informed that her sacrifice was to remain a secret.
He stifled a sigh. He could not help remembering, just then, that he had acted quite a different part when duty had called to one path, and ambition and pleasure to another. He had merely postponed the duty, of course; that was not really shirking it, for he intended to perform it to the last jot. Nevertheless, he wished that it had been done years ago; and then he recalled the words of the dark watchman, and felt himself grow hot again.
They turned another curve, and came out of the cool, green silence into the hard, white, sunlit road that ran straight up to Elmbrook.
"I wonder if the telescope's on us!" cried the doctor, with a boyish desire to get away from his uncomfortable reflections. He checked himself, abashed, and glanced at his companion. Her stately gravity made him half afraid of her. He thought of Rosalie's irresistible gaiety, and longed for her radiant companionship. To his surprise, Miss Cameron's eyes twinkled. Apparently, she had a sense of humor, after all.
"That shows how thoroughly un-Elmbrooked you still remain. It's been resting in the northeast window ever since you drove away, and Granny Long has been wheeled in there to watch for your return." Gilbert felt vastly more at his ease.
"You make me feel as if I were a new constellation."
"Or a rising star—I hope you are."
"Thank you. When you get to be the second Albani——"
"And you the greatest consulting physician in Canada——"
"Of course I shall remember that you encouraged me."
"It isn't really a joke, you know," she said with sweet seriousness. "I don't think—I know you don't realize how important you are in the eyes of the people about you. It is an"—her eyes were very grave—"an exacting position, Dr. Allen."
They had reached her gate, and Gilbert was assisting her to alight. He understood. She was paying him a delicate compliment, and with it was the hint that he must line up to the Elmbrook ideal.
"I feel overcome with humiliation at the thought," he said, standing before her, hat in hand, "when I consider my shortcomings."
She shook her head. "You ought to be glad. One can scarcely help attaining to an ideal that is set before one so persistently every day."
Gilbert drove away humbled. This girl, with her splendid talent, had quietly laid aside her chance of a great career because the road to fame deviated from the path of duty. And she had done it without a word or hint of martyrdom. And he—what had he done? How much thought had he spent in the past ten years on the man who had given him his chance in life? Suppose he had been to him all that he should have been? Then he would have lost Rosalie and the two years abroad that had brought him nearer her social level. Gilbert saw that there had never been a moment when he had met the issue squarely. He had merely put it aside, saying "Next year, next year." Well, what did it matter, anyway? Martin was not in want. If he had needed the money it would have been quite different; and when the time came he was going to do something splendid for him. And he was doing so well now that the time was not far off. But Gilbert was honest with himself. He knew well that when the two years' work which he had laid out for himself in this little backward place were ended it was not the neglected duty he would consider, but a city practice, and a fine home worthy of Rosalie. For the first time in his life the prospect brought him no pleasure.
Off on de fiel' you foller de plough,Den w'en you're tire' you scare de cow,Sickin' de dog till dey jomp de wall,So de milk ain't good for not'ing at all—An you're only five an' a half dis fall,Little Bateese!—WILLIAM HENRY DRUMMOND.
In Elmbrook, parental discipline was simple and direct, and consisted of but one method of procedure: when the rising generation departed from the ways of its mothers it was promptly spanked back into the path of rectitude, and no more about it.
But when the Sawyers found themselves possessed of a large and lively family, all methods of discipline, whether sanctioned by long custom or invented on the spur of the moment, through the extreme urgency of the case, alike failed.
The orphans presented an entirely unique problem in the rearing of children. In the first place, the community was completely taken aback by their unexpected character. Not one of them at all conformed to the picture of a forsaken child, as conceived by the village. The Elmbrook ideal was the sort that languished on the front page of the Sunday-school library books. It was quiet and pensive and hungry, and gave all its meager earnings to a small invalid brother or drunken father. But the Sawyer orphans were neither pensive nor appealing. There was a defiant belligerency about them that stifled the avenues of pity and put one on the defensive. They were wild and gay, and uproarious, too, and with the exception of Tim, the eldest, they were strong and robust. He certainly looked as though he had been starved, body and soul; but his other unorphan-like qualities were so obtrusive that he was looked upon as the biggest counterfeit of the crowd.
During school hours the three eldest were kept in some sort of conformity to law and order by the strong hand of the Duke of Wellington; but at home and abroad they were a law unto themselves, and kept the whole community in a state of apprehension, like people living near the crater of an active volcano.
Their life had been largely spent in the slum district of a crowded city, and the change to the freedom of the Oro fields and woods was almost too much for the orphans. After school hours they all, with one consent, went mad, and ranged far and wide over hill and dale, until Granny Long's old hands grew weary readjusting the telescope. Then when she did catch sight of them it was only to be grossly insulted; for whenever the small scalawags guessed they were within range of the spyglass they would stand in line, and go through frightful contortions of the face and body, expressive of contempt for the instrument and everything behind it.
Wherever the orphans went, depredations of all sorts followed. They chased the neighbors' cows from the fields out to the road, and the pigs from the road into the fields. They climbed trees and stole birds' nests. They dammed the creek and flooded Cameron's pasture. They teased Sandy McQuarry's old ram until it was mad with rage, and butted the ex-elder all over the barnyard. They smashed windows, and broke down fences, and, in fact, were a caution, and no mistake.
But in spite of all, their foster-parents lived in happy unconsciousness of their imperfections. For they were so wonderfully clever that Jake and Hannah were lost in admiration.
Certainly they worked a reform in the slow-moving Sawyer household. They started with the garden, and even Mrs. Winters had to admit they made an improvement there. Jake and Hannah had long felt the humiliation of their scratched and scarred front yard, in such ugly contrast to its trim surroundings, but they had never been able to better matters. Hannah had received a present, some years before, of twelve new fowls, which, as was their pious custom, she and Jake presented with Bible names, calling them for the twelve sons of Israel. And now each, like its namesake, had many descendants that had multiplied upon the face of the garden, and turned that promising land into a desert. Every year Jake faithfully dug flower-beds, and Hannah as faithfully planted seeds; but, just as regularly, they were scratched up by the Twelve Tribes.
But when the orphans arrived the marauders were taught their true place. Though it was late in the season, the twins planted a half bushel of flower seeds, and dug and raked enough for a plantation. Then, the first time the Twelve Tribes emigrated from the back yard they were promptly shooed across the street and over into the doctor's garden. Davy Munn, indignant at this unsolicited presentation, as promptly shooed them back again, and war was declared. Tim had hitherto looked upon the gardening enterprise with contempt, but now he entered heartily into it, and the battle raged tumultuously. Each side was bombarded with sticks and stones and clods of dirt and hysterical hens, until Granny Long sent word to the doctor that if he didn't want to be buried alive he'd better do something to the orphans, and that right speedily. So the young man marched into the field, routed both sides, and chased the Twelve Tribes back to their own country. For a long time the eldest orphan felt the terrifying strength of the arm that had lifted him from the ground and shaken him till his teeth chattered. Thereafter he had such a profound admiration for the doctor that his viceroy, Davy Munn, was allowed to rule his own yard in peace.
But the hens had still to be conquered, so the orphans set to work and built around the back yard a lofty fence of wire and laths, borrowed from the sawmill when Sandy McQuarry was away. Inside this the Twelve Tribes were shut up in Egyptian bondage until the garden was in bloom. Even Isaac and Rebekah were permitted to promenade in the barnyard only, among the dogs, cats and rabbits with which that interesting place swarmed.
Within the house, too, the children accomplished a revolution. The girls did nearly all the work, Hannah declared, and did it so swiftly they left her in a state of dazed admiration. Of course, they were liable to drop an unfinished task and take a sudden excursion to field or wood, but, on the whole, even Mrs. Winters was forced to confess that they were a caution, and no mistake, and might be smart housekeepers some day, if Hannah would only make them behave.
Sometimes a doubt of their absolute perfection would darken, for a moment, their foster-mother's placid sky, but even then her blame was tempered with praise.
"Well! well! well!" she remarked one evening, "yous youngsters is awful smart, that's a fact; but I'm 'most scared you're too smart."
This confession was wrung from her by the black-haired twin's dexterity in catching a plate that the fair-haired one had let fall, and at the same instant administering a sharp slap to the delinquent's ear.
Hannah was preparing the evening meal, with spasmodic assistance from the family. She stood over the stove, frying pancakes, while the orphans darted about her like swallows. Tim, always the swiftest, in spite of his lameness, was rushing about in his usual capacity of superintendent, cramming more wood into the already red-hot stove, tasting the pancakes to see if they were just right, and rapping Joey over the head with the dripping batter-spoon when he attempted to follow his example. At brief intervals he would dart into the dining-room to settle a dispute between the belligerent twins.
The latter were setting the table with the best china teaset, a precious relic handed down from Jake's grandmother, and used only when there was distinguished company. No visitors were expected to-night, but the twins loved variety, and had arrayed the table in its best as a pleasant surprise for daddy. Joey was busiest of all. He had wailed loudly for a task, and Hannah had given him permission to fill the woodbox and the water-bucket. He was diligently carrying out her instructions, with one slight variation that showed him to be a true orphan. He filled the bucket with sticks, and then went paddling to and from the water-barrel, leaving a wet and muddy trail behind him, and gleefully deposited dipperfuls of water into the woodbox. He was finally discovered by his brother, promptly cuffed, and set to reverse the order of his going.
The arrival of Jake from the mill was the signal for a shrieking exodus in his direction, and soon afterward they were all seated around the table. The twins were placed opposite each other, to prevent hair-pulling—making faces did not cause much disturbance—and Jake and Hannah sat at either end, gazing at the array with much the same air as that with which a pair of good-tempered, puzzled hens might regard a swarm of agile ducklings.
After Jake had rapturously praised the fine appearance of the table, the orphans were, with some difficulty, prevailed upon to sit still while the blessing was being asked; and then the pancakes and the hot biscuits and the maple syrup began to disappear in an amazing manner.
"Well, an' how's daddy's little woodpecker?" asked Jake, passing his big hand fondly over Joey's red curls. "Been a good boy to-day?"
"Yep," answered the baby in muffled tones. He looked up at his foster-father cunningly. "You won't t'rash me w'en I been a good boy, will yeh?"
"Bless the baby's heart! Who'd talk o' thrashin' you?" roared the big man. "If any fellow lifts a finger to you, you let daddy know—an'—an'—he'll bash their heads in for them!" he added explosively.
The elder boy glanced up at the man with an admiring flash in his old, weary eyes. "Ole Mis' Cummins uster lambaste him when she came home at night," he said in a hard voice. "That's what's made them marks on his legs."
Jake Sawyer set his teeth and Hannah sighed and shook her head. Any mention of the old drunken woman with whom the children had lived, before the Home rescued them, the orphans well knew always stirred their foster-parents' tender hearts.
"Tim uster throw stones at her, an' stick pins into her when she was drunk!" cried the black-haired twin, in shrill triumph. "An' she uster pull my hair, too, an' Lennie's, an' we stole her scissors an' cut it off awful short. But it didn't do no good, 'cause she uster whack us over the heads with her walkin'-stick."
"Well, there ain't nobody goin' to whack any o' yous any more," said big Jake Sawyer grimly. "'Ceptin' it's me, when you're bad," he added warningly.
This awful threat was received with loud laughter, and Joey hammered the table with his spoon and shouted joyfully, knowing there must be a grand joke somewhere.
Hannah looked across the table and nodded to her husband; it was a good time to disclose an important secret.
"Now we want yous to be awful good kids to-night," said Jake, pushing back his plate, and taking Joey on his knee, "because the minister's comin' to see you."
"The minister! Why, he's been here already!" cried the black-haired twin indignantly. "What's he comin' again for?"
"That was jist a call," said Hannah. "This is different. It's a pastoral visitation this time," she added solemnly. The orphans looked at each other apprehensively.
"What's that?" demanded Tim.
"It's when he comes to hear you say your verses an' your catechism," explained Jake soothingly; "and you'll all show him how much you know; an' then he prays, and you must be awful good and quiet. Eh, little woodpecker?"
The black-haired twin looked across the table at the fair-haired twin, and each read aright the other's rebellious thought; one sharp glance from Tim, and the matter was settled. The minister might make his pastoral visitation, if he wanted to, but if he thought they were going to stay home to say verses, and be quiet, he was mistaken.
The Sawyer parents were dreading signs of rebellion, and Hannah now added enticingly: "We're goin' to pass 'round the gingerbread and the ras'berry vinegar, and Susan Winters said yous girls could dress up in your new plaid dresses."
The twins looked doubtful. Gingerbread and their new frocks! This gave the pastoral visitation a festive aspect. They slipped away from the table, and followed their elder brother out to the back yard.
"Whatter ye goin' to do, Tim?" asked the black-haired twin, divided between dread of what the pastoral visitation might bring forth and a natural curiosity to sound its unknown depths.
"Mammy says we can wear our Sunday dresses," said the fair-haired one weakly.
Tim was drifting slowly, but surely, toward a hole in the back fence.
"Yous can stay, if ye wanter, but you bet I don't!" He wagged his head ominously.
"Why, what'll he do?" The black-haired twin balanced herself miraculously on the edge of the water-barrel and stared.
"He'll ast ye"—Tim's voice was sepulchral—"he'll ast ye if ye're saved."
"If ye're what?" cried the twins, in alarm.
"If ye're saved. Preachers always does that. It means if ye're goin' to the bad place."
"Well, I ain't," said the black-headed twin stoutly.
"Me neither," promptly echoed her sister.
Their brother regarded them darkly. "You can't never tell," he answered ominously. "You'd better look out, when the minister's 'round. He ast Billy Winters if he'd got his soul saved."
"His sole?" The fair-haired twin looked down at the flapping and worn foundation of the shoes so lately purchased, and then at the family oracle.
"Aw, it ain't your boot-sole," he said disdainfully; "it's somethin' in your insides; an' if ye don't get it fixed up, an' saved, the minister'll send ye to the bad place, sure. He'll ast ye about it," he added threateningly.
This was too much for the courage of the twins. Even the charms of the gingerbread and their new plaid dresses could scarcely compensate for the terrors of that occult something concerning whose mysteries the minister would be sure to inquire.
Their brother was backing through the hole in the fence. "He'll tell ye ye've gotter to be awful good, too," he added, more explicitly.
That settled it. This was something one could understand, and was not to be tolerated for a moment. The twins made a dive after him, and the three did not stop running until they began to roll down the bank of the ravine. When they were safely hidden in the green depths Tim delivered his ultimatum. "Yous two kids ain't goin' to tag after me, mind ye that," and swaggered away.
The black-haired twin stood for a moment glaring after him, in dark rebellion. She opened her mouth to scream imprecations, but thought better of it. Tim had a long memory, and an uncomfortable way of exacting penalties for any such indignity. She soothed her outraged feelings somewhat by throwing a stone after the little, limping figure, her erratic aim saving her from discovery.
"Le's go an' play lady," said the fair-haired twin comfortingly. "I bar be Elsie Cameron."
"No, you don't!" cried her stronger-minded sister. "I'm goin' to be Elsie. You can be old Arabella Winters, an' you can have Rebekah for your parrot," she said derisively.
But the fair-haired twin, though of a yielding disposition, was subject to stubborn fits. "I won't play, then," she said, sitting down heavily upon a stone.
Her sister understood the sign, and compromised.
"Well, we'll say 'Eevery ivery,' an' see who's to be her," she suggested.
"All right." The answer was delivered in a weary tone and with a total lack of interest.
The black-haired one mounted a stone, and pointing her finger alternately at herself and at her sister, went through the incantation:
"Eevery, ivery, ickery Ann,Fillacy, fallacy, Nicholas Dan;Queevery, quavery,English navy,Come striddle, come straddle, come out!"
The last word was uttered as she pointed at her sister, and the fair-haired twin sprang up in triumph. "It's me!" she chanted, "it's me! I'm to be Elsie Cameron!"
Her sister succumbed to the inevitable as good-naturedly as possible. No one ever dreamed of calling into question the final decision of the mystic rhyme. They flew down the bank to a green bower which had been their playhouse ever since their arrival, and soon were amicably engaged in a charming drama, in which Lenora was Miss Cameron, and Lorena Dr. Allen, who, mounted upon a barrel-hoop, dashed gallantly up to the door to take the young lady for a drive.
Meantime, Tim was still hurrying up the ravine, fired with a new purpose. Ever since the day he had seen the strange, dark man of the Drowned Lands defy the minister, the eldest orphan had regarded the offender with worshiping interest. Among the other peculiarities of the child's queer, twisted nature, was a feeling of comradeship with the wicked and outcast. He had belonged to that class all his life, and as public opinion grew in strength against John McIntyre, in like proportion grew Tim's admiration.
To-night he was resolved to visit him. It was a fine opportunity, for he could let the man see that he, too, was frightfully wicked, and despised ministers—in fact, had left home that night because one was coming.
As he scrambled along beneath the bridge he heard footsteps and voices above him. He crouched down among the bracken. Billy Winters and the other fellows might be there, and he did not want them when he went to visit a man like John McIntyre. The voices passed, and he peeped out. It was only Dr. Allen and that Cameron girl who sang. Tim decided not to throw a stone, after all. The girl had come over and sung Joey to sleep when he was sick, and the doctor was an uncomfortable sort of person to hit with a rock.
He limped along the bank of the pond, dodging behind the willows, until his feet sank in the soft sawdust. Then he paused behind a heap of logs to reconnoiter.
Yes, there was the man sitting in the doorway of the engine-room, and looking as dark and wicked as he had done that night when he had thrilled Tim's heart by his shocking conduct. The boy drew slowly near, half fearful of his own daring. What if the dark man should not at first recognize him as a kindred spirit, and should leap at him with a hand-spike? John McIntyre looked up.
"What do you want?" he asked harshly. "You'd better go home."
This was not a propitious beginning, and the visitor squirmed around in embarrassment. His pride was rather hurt at the man's failure to recognize him, and he could scarcely announce, just at the outset, that he had run away from the minister and had come to him as a companion in iniquity. Suddenly he thought of a remark that had hitherto never failed to arouse the liveliest interest in a new acquaintance.
"I'm one o' the Sawyer orphants," he announced proudly.
The dark man looked no whit impressed. He made no reply, and Tim gained courage to sidle up closer, and finally seated himself, in an insinuating manner, on the extreme end of a piece of timber that lay before the door. He turned cautiously and peered with absorbed interest into the engine-room. The great black monster lay there, dimly outlined in the warm darkness, giving forth a hissing sound, like a giant breathing heavily in his sleep. The man arose and opened the furnace door. That was like the giant's mouth, and he was eating his supper of porridge, Tim thought, as the watchman shoveled in the sawdust. The red glow lit up the dark man's face and arms, and the boy's small, pinched countenance, and sent a red splash out on the surface of the pond. The door slammed, and again only one bright line beneath the damper showed against the darkness. The man came back, and in silence resumed his seat. Tim was vastly interested in all machinery, and Spectacle John, knowing the eldest orphan's peculiar propensity toward accidents, had ordered him, on pain of sudden death, not to show his face in the flour mill. Now, here was a chance to examine a far bigger engine than Spectacle John's. There was another charm besides his wickedness in this strange man. Tim became very ingratiating.
"Who made that engine?" he asked in a friendly tone.
There was no reply. The man seemed unaware of his presence.
"Must have been somebody awful smart," added the visitor insinuatingly.
Still no answer.
"Mebby God made it," he ventured, just to see what effect this pious remark would have on such a wicked unbeliever.
The man turned and looked at him. "You know better than that," he said sharply.
Tim felt ashamed. John McIntyre would think him young and innocent, like Billy Winters and Johnny McQuarry, who believed everything their Sunday-school teacher said.
"Huh! I bet God ain't smart enough to make an engine like that," he said profanely. He waited for the effect of this, but there was apparently none; so he proceeded to give forth some more of the unorthodox views that never failed to shock pretty Miss Marjorie Scott, his Sunday-school teacher. "I don't believe half folks tell about God, 'cause I'm a—I'm a——" He hesitated, rummaging through his memory for that terribly wicked name that Silas Long had given the new watchman. It came to light at last. "I'm a infiddle!" he burst forth proudly.
He waited, but even this tremendous disclosure called forth no remark. Probably the man had consorted with infidels and such like all his life, and thought nothing of them. Tim drew a deep breath. It gave one a feeling of ecstatic fear to be able to utter such statements unrebuked. He tried another.
"Miss Scott says—she's my Sunday-school teacher, only I don't go to Sunday-school much, you bet—she says God made everybody, but I told her if He made Spectacle John Cross He'd orter be ashamed. An' I bet the devil made ole Mis' Cummins. She was the woman that brought us up, an' I say, she was a corker!"
The man slowly turned his weary eyes and fixed them on the child's face. The reflected light from the glimmering pond lit up the small, wizened countenance, and for the first time he noted the signs it bore of cruel suffering and ill usage.
"Another," he said, half aloud.
"What?" asked Tim, glad to have elicited even one word.
The man did not repeat it. "Where do you live?" he asked.
"Up at Jake Sawyer's. I'm one o' the Sawyer orphants, I told you."
It was impossible for even John McIntyre, living a life apart, though he did, not to have heard something of the Sawyer orphans' fame. He nodded.
"Are they good to you?"
Tim hesitated. He would have liked to tell a tale of woe and terrible tortures, but his genuine regard for his foster-parents forbade. "Yes, course," he answered shortly. "Only they tried to make me stay home to-night 'cause the preacher was comin'. But I cut out, you bet; I can't stand preachers."
The man made no comment. His sudden interest seemed to have as suddenly vanished. He arose and took up his lantern.
"You must go home now," he said. "I have work to do."
He spoke in a voice that the child understood must be obeyed. Tim arose and moved away, slowly and reluctantly.
"I'm comin' another night," he called back, in a voice half appealing, half threatening. The man took no notice, and accepting this as permission, the boy limped away, whistling gaily.
Meanwhile, at home, dire events were pending for the orphans. When the minister arrived, and Jake and Hannah could produce only Joey as the sole representative of their large family, they were covered with humiliation. Never before, except in cases of severe illness, had it been known throughout the whole Elmbrook congregation that the family had failed to appear in full force at an official visit from the minister. The visitor himself did not treat the matter lightly. He hinted that Jake and Hannah had better keep a firm hand on their children, if they intended to do their duty by them, and that obedience must be exacted, at all costs. When he was gone the husband and wife sat despondently in the empty parlor, while Joey ate the remains of the gingerbread and drank all the raspberry vinegar, unnoticed. This was a serious problem. The orphans had really disgraced themselves this time, and something must be done.
"Let's go and ask Susan Winters; she'll know," suggested Hannah. "Mebby hers might 'a' run away once when the minister called."
Jake shook his head mournfully. He was quite sure such a thing could never have happened in the Winters' well-managed family. Nevertheless, he shouldered Joey, and they went down the street to consult the village oracle. The Duke of Wellington had dropped in for a chat, and the two vigorously took up the case of the absconded orphans. Mrs. Winters, backed up by the schoolmistress, declared that the family's only salvation lay in a thorough, all-around thrashing; and after much scolding, and dire prophecies of the gallows as the termini of the orphans' careers, Jake and Hannah, like two frightened children, were driven to make the desperate promise that as soon as the culprits returned they would administer to each a severe castigation.
When the stern parents returned home, and sat on the front step to consider what was before them, they were filled with dismay.
"If the little woodpecker'd been into it I wouldn't 'a' promised—no, not even for Susan Winters," announced Jake gloomily, as he watched Joey tumbling about the grass with Joshua, the dog. "Spankin' kids ain't a man's work, anyhow," he added, glancing meaningly at his wife.
"Oh, Jake!" she cried tremulously, "you wouldn't think o' makin' me do it? I—jist couldn't!"
"Well, somebody's got to," said Jake, setting his teeth, "'cordin' to Susan an' the Dook. What does an old maid like her know about bringin' up kids, anyhow?" he added rebelliously.
A scrambling noise, and the sound of smothered giggles, floated from the back yard.
"That's them!" cried Jake in a terrified voice. "You go and order them to come 'round here, Hannah," he added, with the air of one who is putting off the day of execution, "an' I'll get the gad."
Hannah arose and slowly passed out to the back door. The three truants were trying to make themselves invisible behind the pump.
"Come on 'round to the front, children!" called their foster-mother, in a voice that trembled. "You've been awful bad children, so you have!"
With this bold statement Hannah's courage vanished. She turned and fled indoors to find refuge with Jake. But, alas for the poor wife! In the most trying ordeal of her life her husband had basely deserted her. Neither Jake nor Joey was to be seen. The instrument of execution, a small, twig-like branch from the lilac bush, was lying upon the doorstep. Mrs. Sawyer took it up with a Spartan air. If Jake could so meanly fly from his duty then she must so much the more face hers.
"Yous youngsters has been awful bad," she reiterated, returning to the back door, and shaking the innocent-looking branch menacingly, "an' you've jist got to be—to be—whipped," she ended up faintly.
The orphans stared at her for a moment in open-mouthed amazement; then, with shrieks of hysterical laughter, the twins bounded off the veranda and scrambled up to the safe sanctuary of the woodpile.
Tim alone stood his ground. He surveyed the meager weapon in the woman's hand, contempt in his wise old eyes. "Ye kin lick me, if ye like, for the hull o' them," he said, with weary indifference. "I don't care. I'm used to it."
At this pathetic confession, Mrs. Sawyer threw down the disciplining rod and sank upon the doorstep. She buried her face in her apron and burst into sobs. At the sight of her grief, so inexplicable, so terrifying, the twins pitched themselves off the woodpile and flung themselves upon her. They wound their arms chokingly about her neck; they petted and caressed, and besought her not to cry; they bewailed their own shortcomings, and made unconditional promises of perfection in the future. And even Tim sidled up, and volunteered a vague hint concerning contemplated reformation.
So Hannah dried her tears, and lighting a lamp, fetched more gingerbread and raspberry vinegar from the cellar, and they all repaired to the parlor to celebrate the family reunion. They were in the midst of the feast when there came a stealthy movement at the back door, and Jake crept sheepishly in, leading Joey by the hand. He looked at his wife with an expression of mingled contrition and frightened inquiry. Hannah beamed back perfect forgiveness and assurance, and in his overwhelming relief Jake caught up the twins and swung them over his head. The whole family immediately gave itself up to riot, and when the Duke of Wellington and Mrs. Winters came over to see if the orphans had been properly subdued they found the undisciplined household, Hannah included, engaged in a glorious game of blind man's buff. Even while the two officers of the law were peeping through the kitchen window, Jake upset the water-pail, and the twins broke a glass pitcher, all unheeded.
Mrs. Winters and the Duke turned, and marched indignantly homeward.
"Well!" exclaimed the exasperated village manager, as she stumbled through the Sawyers' lumpy garden, "what we've got to do 'fore we can raise them orphants, is to raise them two old fools they've got for a father and mother, and I guess it's about fifty years too late!"
Not till the still unchastened orphans were in bed and asleep did Jake again broach the subject of corporal punishment. For some time he walked up and down the kitchen, scratching his head, as he always did when worrying out a mental problem.
At length he gave a sigh of satisfaction, and paused before the table where Hannah sat mending Tim's riven trousers.
"We ain't a-goin' to try that Winters dodge no more, Hannah," he announced firmly, "an' that's all about it."
Hannah looked up joyfully. "Oh, Jake, I'm awful glad! I couldn't do it—I jist couldn't!"
"Of course you couldn't," he cried sympathetically, "An', what's more, you don't have to try any more. We'll do our best by them kids other ways, an' the good Lord'll see they don't turn out bad. But there's one thing dead sure, an' you can tell Susan Winters, and the Dook, too—I ain't a-goin' to raise my hand to no motherless child; no, not if they burn down the mill; and may the Lord help me so to do!"
O wind of death, that darkly blowsEach separate ship of human woesFar out on a mysterious sea,I turn, I turn my face to thee.—ETHELWYN WETHERALD.
In spite of the excitement attendant upon the orphans' waywardness and the doctor's growing practice, Elmbrook did not lose sight of the new watchman in the mill.
Since the minister's rebuff, the village generally had ceased all advances; but they watched John McIntyre from a distance, with deep interest, not unmixed with fear. There was something in his whole conduct to arouse apprehension. Every evening at dusk he came stealing up the valley from the Drowned Lands, and every morning, in the gray dawn, he stole away again. Silent and morose, avoiding all contact with his fellow-men, he came and went with the darkness, until he seemed a creature of night and shadows. One or two of the more kindly souls of the village still made vain attempts to be friendly. Old Hughie Cameron visited the mill several evenings, and Silas Long carried his telescope down to the engine-room door, and strove to introduce the strange man to the joys of star-gazing. Even the minister, grieved at his former harshness, paid him a second visit. But all alike were repulsed. John McIntyre would accept kindness from no man, and one by one they were forced to leave him to himself. Some of the women, too, tried to pierce his reserve, with as little effect. The Longs lived near the mill-pond, and Mrs. Long had been in the habit of sending Jerry Coombs, the former watchman, a nightly lunch. So one evening she borrowed Davy Munn, and sent him down to the mill with a strawberry pie and a plate of cookies that would have tempted any living man. They were returned with dignified thanks, and Silas and his wife sat and exclaimed over the strange man's obstinacy, while Davy Munn and the eldest orphan despatched the despised viands. Mrs. Long told her story the next afternoon at Miss McQuarry's, where the village mothers had met to make a quilt for the Sawyer twins' bed. Every one agreed that John McIntyre certainly was a caution, and the hostess declared, with a sigh, that she was jist terrible feared he would bring retribution upon Sandy for his treatment of the minister.
Ella Anne Long remarked, between stitches, that his house was a sight to behold, and no mistake.
"Did you see into it with the spyglass?" inquired Mrs. Winters, from the other end of the quilt, glad to get a slap at the mischievous instrument.
"No, I didn't!" said Miss Long indignantly. "It was when Arabella and me were down there, pickin' strawberries in the old clearin'. You can ask Arabella, there, if you don't believe me."
Miss Arabella, with an apologetic glance at her sister-in-law, corroborated the statement. They had seen inside the door that day quite by accident, and the place was a dreary sight: a broken-down old table, and only a piece of a log for a seat, and a heap of rags and straw in an old bunk for a bed.
"Eh, poor man! poor buddy!" cried old lady Cameron pityingly. "An' him with such a fine Hielan' name, too!"
Mrs. Winters suggested that they make a raid upon the place some evening after he had left for the mill, and scrub and clean up. It was a disgrace to the village to have such conditions not a mile from your very door!
But old lady Cameron did not quite sanction such extreme measures. A man's home was his castle, her brother Hughie always said, and no one had any right to enter without his permission. So the quilting-bee ended in a great deal of talk, and John McIntyre's condition remained unbettered.
The Elmbrook Temperance League next took him up. Spectacle John Cross was president of the society, and was assured that it was drink that ailed John McIntyre. No one had ever seen him overcome with liquor, neither had he ever been known to go to Lakeview, where was the nearest point at which it could be obtained. But Spectacle John said you could never tell. He might run a private still in that old place away back in the swamp, and he just looked like the kind that could carry a gallon and yet walk steady. Spectacle John had met that sort often on his temperance campaigns.
So they sent invitations to John McIntyre to join their ranks, all of which he emphatically refused. Spectacle John received little encouragement from the milkstand. Old Hughie Cameron was of the opinion, having rastled it out one evening to the tune of "The Cameron Men," that to ask that poor buddy to join his bit of a society was like asking the folks at a funeral to come and play hop-scotch. Likely, the man never touched liquor; and, anyway, his trouble was a sad one, whatever it was, and needed a remedy that would go deeper.
While the village thus pondered over John McIntyre's case, there was one person who was slowly, but surely, piercing his armor of reserve. Ever since his first visit, the eldest orphan had felt the fascination of the wicked watchman growing, and gradually he fell into the habit of paying him a short visit every evening. He had various reasons for going. First, he really felt a strange affinity for this outcast. John McIntyre was very bad, he hated good people and law and order, and Tim was convinced that he also was the enemy of all such. Then, too, when the boys at school learned that he was McIntyre's intimate it threw an evil glamor over him. He added to it by dark hints of the plots he and the watchman were hatching; the breaking of the dam and the burning of the mill being among the smallest. Then there was that wonderful engine he was free to examine. And last of all, Tim noticed a strange and delightful circumstance that often attended his visits to McIntyre. When he had been spending an evening at the mill, old Hughie Cameron was often on the bridge as he came down the willow path; and he never failed to pat him on the head and slip a cent into his hand.
At first, Jake and Hannah were greatly exercised over the growing intimacy between their boy and the wicked man who had defied the minister. They even had horrible visions of resorting to Mrs. Winters' extreme measures once more to keep their eldest away from the mill; but old Hughie Cameron allayed their fears. John McIntyre would never harm a child, he declared firmly. So, much relieved, the Sawyers let the boy have his way.
At first the man merely tolerated the child's presence in silence; but as he grew accustomed to it he sometimes caught himself glancing down the willow-bordered path to see if the little, hobbling figure, in the scant trousers and the big straw hat, were yet in sight. All conversation remained, for a time, one-sided. It consisted chiefly of a string of questions on the boy's part, interspersed with reluctant answers from the man. Sometimes, weary of seeking information unsuccessfully, Tim would deliver it himself, and would talk all evening about his past hard life. After some of its sad disclosures he noticed that his companion was less taciturn, and he seized such opportunities for wringing from him something of his views on religion.
"Who made this pond?" he asked one night, when the water was a radiance of golden ripples.
"I don't know," answered his companion shortly.
"But who d'ye s'pose made it?"
"I suppose it was Sandy McQuarry, when he put the mill here."
"How did he do it?"
"He dammed the creek."
"Oh, and who made the crick?"
"It was always there."
"Yes, but who made it in the first place?"
No answer.
"Was it God?"
"I—I suppose so."
"Oh, ain't you dead sure? Who could it 'a' been, then?"
Still silence.
"Was it God?"
"Yes."
Tim looked surprised. "Miss Scott, she says God made everything, but she never knew ole Mother Cummins, or she'd never 'a' said that. She don't know much, though," he added, with a sigh for the narrow experience of his Sunday-school teacher. "You don't s'pose God would 'a' let anybody like ole Mother Cummins live if He bothered much about things, do you?"
The man flashed a look of sympathy into the child's old, pinched face. This boy's problem was his. How could the Almighty care, and yet permit such things to be? John McIntyre had answered that question for himself by saying that the Almighty—if there were an Almighty—did not care; but when he looked into the child's hungry, questioning eyes his unbelief seemed inadequate.
"D'ye think He would?" persisted the boy.
John McIntyre hesitated. For the first time he recoiled from expressing his contempt for God and humanity. "Most people are bad, but——" He paused. Then, to his own surprise, he added: "There's your new father and mother, you know."
"Yes, God must 'a' made them, all right," agreed Tim emphatically. "Mebby he couldn't help folks like ole Mis' Cummins an' Spectacle John. Ole Hughie Cameron said Spectacle John was a son of Belial, an' I bet that's right, 'cause he won't let us go near daddy's mill. Say"—he looked up, and put the question in an awed whisper—"are you a son o' Belial, too? Silas Long said you was."
There was no reply to this, and the boy sat regarding John McIntyre thoughtfully. He was beginning to fear he was not so gloriously wicked as the village believed.
"Say, you ain't a—a infiddle, after all, are you?" he added, in a disappointed tone. And John McIntyre did not deny the charge.
Little by little, the man was inveigled into conversation. At first, his few remarks were merely about the engine or the lumber, as the boy followed him on his rounds through the mill. But the field gradually widened, until one night he was led to speak of his past—those days of love and peace, now separated from him by years of bitter sorrow. It was a little bird that opened the door into those golden days. The two incongruous figures were sitting, as usual, in the wide, dark doorway. In front lay the shining water, in its feathery willow frame, and still rosy with the last faint radiance of the sunset. As the pond slowly paled to a mirror-like crystal, the moon, round and golden, rose up from the darkness of the Drowned Lands. It sent a silver shaft down into the shadowy ravine, and a gleam from the brook answered. Just as its light came stealing on through the willowy fringe to touch the waters of the pond there arose, from the dark grove opposite the mill, a rapturous song.
"What's that?" cried Tim, in startled joy.
"A catbird," answered John McIntyre.
"Oh, say! That's the little beggar that was meyowing jist now, ain't it?"
"Yes."
"Billy Winters always said it was a wildcat, and was scarder'n a rabbit. Hello! There he goes again! Say! ain't he a little corker, though? Did you ever hear him before?"
"Yes."
"Any other place than here?"
"Yes."
"Where?"
"Far away."
"Where you uster live 'fore you came here?"
"Yes."
"Were there Canada birds an' blue jays there, too?"
"Yes."
"Any other kinds?"
"Yes."
"What were they?"
The man's face betokened a deep pain and reluctance. He sat for a moment, staring ahead, and then answered in a hushed tone, "There was one they called the hermit thrush."
"The hermit thrush," repeated Tim. "I've never sawn him. What does he say?"
"He says," began the man dreamily, "he says—'Oh'——" He stopped, as though afraid of what he had done. "I—I forget what he said," he added confusedly.
"Do you?" The boy's tone was disappointed. "Mebby if you think hard you'll remember it," he added encouragingly. "What color was it?"
"Brown."
"Did it sing like a robin?"
"No."
"Can't you remember one little, teenty speck of it?" incredulously.
"No."
"Aw, think hard. That's what the Dook tells me in school, and then it comes to me. Ole Mother Cummins uster lambaste me with a stick when I forgot things, but she jist walloped it all out of me. The Dook gives me a whackin' sometimes, too, but she can't lick for sour apples 'longside o' ole Mother Cummins. What did ye say was the bird's name?"
"The hermit thrush."
"Doesn't it ever sing here?"
"I don't think so, I've never heard it."
"If you could mind what it sings like I could listen for it."
The remark was broadly insinuating, but elicited no response.
"Where did you hear it?"
"Far away from here."
"In another country?"
"I guess so—yes."
"In Nova Scotia?"
The man turned sharply. "What made you say that?" he cried.
"I—we came from there," whispered the boy; "but you won't tell, will you?"
"No."
"Only Daddy an' Mammy Sawyer knows. Our father he was a bad man, so we don't tell. The kids don't mind him, but I do. He wasn't bad to us, but he done somethin' awful, an' then he ran away, an' our mother died, an' he sent us miles an' miles away to a city, an' we lived with old Mother Cummins. But I mind the ocean—it smelt like—ok, it smelt awful good! Did you ever smell the ocean?"
The man was supporting his head on his hand; his face was turned away.
"Oh, say! it's bully! It's somethin' like the smell o' the crick, jist below the falls, on a hot day—only—only different. That's why I play hookey so often down in the holler, 'cause it smells like the ocean."
Tim made his statement proudly. It was a wonderful privilege to boast of how bad you were, and be sure you would be unreproved.
"We had good times when we lived there, but when ole Mother Cummins got us it was different. She wasn't so awful bad at first, 'cause our father uster send money; but he stopped. I guess he must 'a' died, or run away farther. An' after that, say! didn't our ole woman uster hammer us? She'd get drunk an' sleep on the floor, an' I uster pinch her black an' blue an' stick pins into her for poundin' Joey!" His small, withered face was fierce, his old eyes were cruel. "An' one day she cut Lorry's head open with her stick; so we all lit out. I carried Joey for miles an' miles, an' then some folks took us to the Home, an' then Daddy an' Mammy Sawyer came. Do you s'pose God sent them for us? Miss Scott said He did. Did He? Eh?"
"I—I suppose so."
"You ain't dead sure about anything God does, are you?" asked Tim sympathetically. "Ain't you remembered about the harmless thrush yet?"
John McIntyre did not answer. He sat still so long, with his face in his hands, that the boy grew weary, and rising, hobbled homeward.
The man's gray head sank lower. His thin hands, hard, and worn with heavy toil, were trembling violently. His stooped shoulders, in their poor, thread-bare covering, heaved convulsively. For the first time in years he had dared to look back into the blossom-strewn past, and the sight had been too much for his strength.
His misfortunes had come upon him in a way that, at first, had left him no time to reflect. His home had gone, and then his friend, just at the time when he needed his help. Then had come greater trials. Sickness stalked hand in hand with poverty. One by one his children were laid away in the earth; and then toil and want and grief had at last taken her, his best beloved, and in her grave John McIntyre had buried happiness and hope and faith.
What had he left in life? His home, his loved ones, were gone—even Martin must be dead, or he would have come to him long ago. Nothing remained but misery, and distrust of his fellow-men—and hatred—hatred of the man who had defrauded him, and who was now, no doubt, living in wealth and prosperity.
And what had he done to deserve it all? That had always been John McIntyre's cry. Why must he and his be singled out for such suffering? Why should his innocent loved ones be the victims of a villain's rapacity?
And how he had worked to save them from want! Oh, God! how he had toiled, until his back was bent and his health broken! And it had all been of no use—no use!
He clenched his shaking hands, striving to gain control of himself. In the early days of his misfortunes the necessity for straining every effort had kept him from brooding upon his losses, and finally a numbness of despair had seized him. But to-night the child's artless talk had brought back vividly the old home scene. He could see it now, as he had seen it so often in the light of a summer evening. The sparkling sea, with the tang of salt water wafted up over his fields; the rippling stream, winding like a thread of gold down to the Bay of Fundy; his cozy home peeping from its orchard nest, and Mary at the doorway, singing their baby's lullaby; Martin's gay voice passing down the road; and in the purpling woods the tender song of the hermit thrush:
"O hear all! O hear all! O holy, holy!"