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The woman was so absorbed in reverie that she did not notice the steady tramp of her pursuer, but as the number of persons on the street gradually diminished, he prudently fell back, fearing lest her suspicion should be excited.
At a sudden bend in the crooked alley which she rapidly threaded, he lost sight of her, and, running a few yards, he turned the angle just in time to see the flutter of her dress and scarf, as she disappeared through a postern, that opened in a crumbling brick wall.
Above the gate a battered tin sign swung in the wind, and dim letters, almost effaced by elemental warfare, announced, “Adèle Aubin, Blanchisseuse.”
Dr. Grey passed through the postern, and found himself in a narrow, dark court, near a tall, dingy, dilapidated house, where a girl ten years of age sat playing with two ragged, untidy children.
It was a dreary, comfortless, uninviting place, and a greenish slime overspread the lower portions of the wall, and coated the uneven pavement.
From the girl, who chatted with genuine French volubility and freedom, Dr. Grey learned that her father was an attaché of a barber-shop, and her mother a washer and renovater of laces and embroideries. The latter was absent, and, in answer to his inquiries, the child informed him that an upper room in this cheerless building was occupied by a young female lodger, who held no intercourse with its other inmates.
Placing a five-franc piece in her hand, the visitor asked the name of the lodger, but the girl replied that she was known to them only as “La Dentellière,” and lived quite alone in the right-hand room at the top of the third flight of stairs.
The parley had already occupied twenty minutes, when Dr. Grey cut it short by mounting the narrow, winding steps. The atmosphere was close, and redolent of the fumes of dishes not so popular in America as in France, and he saw that the different doors of this old tenement were rented to lodgers who cooked, ate, and slept in the same apartment. At the top of the last dim flight of steps, Dr. Grey paused, almost out of452breath; and found himself on a narrow landing-place, fronting two attic rooms. The one on the right was closed, but as he softly took the bolt in his hand and turned it, there floated through the key-hole the low subdued sound of a sweet voice, humming “Infelice.”
It was not the deep, rich, melting voice, that had arrested his drive when first he heard it on the beach, but a plaintive, thrilling echo, full of pathos, yet lacking power; like the notes of birds when moulting-season ends, and the warblers essay their old strains. Cautiously he opened the door wide enough to permit him to observe what passed within.
The room was large, low, and irregularly shaped, with neither fire-place nor stove, and only one dormer window opening to the south, and upon a wide waste of tiled roofs and smoking chimneys. The floor was bare, except a strip of faded carpet stretched in front of a small single bedstead; and the additional furniture consisted of two chairs, a tall table where hung a mirror, and a washstand that held beside bowl and pitcher a candlestick and china cup. On the table were several books, a plate and knife, and a partially opened package disclosed a loaf of bread, some cheese, and an apple.
In front of the window a piece of plank had been rudely fastened, and here stood two wooden boxes containing a few violets, mignonette, and one very luxuriant rose-geranium.
The faded blue cambric curtain was twisted into a knot, and as it was now nearly noon, the sun shone in and made a patch of gold on the stained and dusky floor.
On the bed lay the straw hat, garlanded with roses that had lost their primitive tints, and before the window in a low chair sat the lonely lodger.
On her knees rested a cushion, across which was stretched a parchment pattern bristling with pins, and with bobbins she was swiftly knitting a piece of gossamer lace, by throwing the fine threads around the pins.
Over the floor floated her delicate lilac dress, and the sleeves were looped back to escape the forest of pins.
Dr. Grey had only a three-quarter view of the face that453bent over the cushion, and though it was sadly altered in every lineament,—was whiter and thinner than he had ever seen it,—yet it was impossible to mistake the emaciated features of Salome Owen.
The large, handsome head, had been shorn of its crown of glossy braids that once encircled it like a jet tiara, and the short locks clustered with childlike grace and beauty around the gleaming white brow and temples.
There was not a vestige of color in the whilom scarlet mouth, whose thin lines were now scarcely perceptible; and, in the finer oval of her cheeks, and along the polished chin, the purplish veins showed their delicate tracery. The hands were waxen and almost transparent, and the figure was wasted beyond the boundaries of symmetry.
In the knot of ribbon that fastened her narrow linen collar, she had arranged a sprig of mignonette, that now dropped upon the cushion as she bent over it. She paused, brushed it off, and for a few seconds her beautiful hazel eyes were fixed on the blue sky that bordered her window.
The whole expression of her countenance had changed, and the passionate defiance of other days had given place to a sad, patient hopelessness, touching indeed, when seen on her proud features. Slowly she threw her bobbins, and a fragment of “Infelice” seemed to drift across her trembling lips, that showed some lines of bitterness in their time-chiselling.
As Dr. Grey watched her, tears which he could not restrain trickled down his face, and he was starting forward, when she said, as if communing with her own desolate soul,—
“I wonder if I am growing superstitious. Last night I dreamed incessantly of Jessie and home, and to-day I cannot help thinking that something has happened there. Home! When people no longer have a home, how hard it is to forget that blessed home which sheltered them in the early years. Homeless! that is the dreariest word that human misery ever conjectured or human language clothed. Never mind, Salome Owen, when God snatched your voice from you, He became responsible; and your claims are like the ravens and sparrows, and He must provide. After all, it matters little where454we are housed here in the clay, and Hobbs was astute when he selected for the epitaph on his tombstone, ‘This is the true philosopher’s stone.’ Home! Ah, if I sadly missed my heart’s home, here in the flesh, I shall surely find it up yonder in the blessed land of blue.”
A tear glided down her cheek, glistened an instant on her chin, and fell on her pattern. She brushed it away, and smiled sorrowfully,—
“It is ill-omened to sprinkle bridal lace with tears. Some day this fine web will droop around a bride’s white shoulders and after a time it may serve to deck the cold limbs of some dead child. If I could only have my shroud now, I would not make lace adesideratum; serge or sackcloth would be welcome. Patience,—
...‘What if the bread
Be bitter in thine inn, and thou unshodTo meet the flints? At least it may be said,Because the way isshort, I thank thee, God!’”
She partially rose in her chair, and took from the table a volume of poems. After some search, she found the desired passage, and, rocking herself to and fro, she read it aloud in a low, measured tone,—
“O dreary life! we cry, ‘O dreary life!’And still the generations of the birdsSing through our sighing, and the flocks and herdsSerenely live, while we are keeping strifeWith heaven’s true purpose in us, as a knifeAgainst which we may struggle! Ocean girdsUnslackened the dry land, savannah-swardsUnweary sweep,—hills watch unworn; and rifeMeek leaves drop yearly from the forest-trees,To show above the unwasted stars that passIn their old glory. ‘O thou God of old,Grant me some smaller grace than comes to these!But even so much patience, as a blade of grassGrows by, contented through the heat and cold.’”
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The book slipped from her fingers and fell upon the floor, and with a sob the girl bowed her head in her hands.
Quickly the intruder glided unseen into the room, and stood at the back of her chair.
He knew she was praying, and almostbreathlesslywaited several minutes.
At last she raised her face, and while tears trembled on her lashes, she said meekly,—
“I ought not to complain and repine. I will be patient and trust God; for I can afford to suffer all through time, provided I may spend eternity with Christ and Dr. Grey.”
“Oh, Salome! Thank God, we shall be separated neither in time nor in eternity! Dear wanderer, come back to your brother!”
He stepped before her, and involuntarily held out his arms.
She neither screamed nor fainted, but sprang to her feet, and a rapture that beggars all description irradiated her worn, weary, pallid face.
“Is it really you? Oh! a thousand times I have dreamed that I saw you,—stood by you; but when I tried to touch you, there was nothing but empty air! Oh, Dr. Grey!—my Dr. Grey! Am I only dreaming, here in the sunshine, or is it you bodily? Did you care for me alittle? Did you come to findme?”
She grasped his arm, swept her hands up and down his sleeve, and then he saw her reel, and shut her eyes, and shudder.
“My poor child, I came to Paris solely to hunt for my wayward Salome, and, thank God! I have found her.”
He put his arm around her, and placed her head against his shoulder.
Ah, how his generous heart ached, as he noted the hungry delight with which her splendid eyes lingered on his features, and the convulsive tenacity with which she clung to him, trembling with excess of joy that brought back carmine to her wasted lips and carnation bloom to her blanched cheeks.
He heard her whispering, and knew it was a prayer of thanksgiving for the blessing of his presence.
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But very soon a change came over her sparkling, happy face, like an inky cloud across a noon sky, and he felt a shiver stealing through her form.
“Let me go! You said once, that when I came to Europe to enter on my professional career, you wished never to touch my hands again,—you would consider them polluted.”
“Dear Salome, I recant all those harsh, unjust words, which were uttered when I was not fully aware of the latent strength of your character. Since then, I have learned much from Professor V——, and from Gerard Granville, that assures me my noble friend is all I could desire her,—that she has grandly conquered her faults, and is worthy of the admiration, the perfect confidence, the earnest affection, which her adopted brother offers her. Your pure, true heart makes pure hands, and as such I reverently salute them.”
He took her hands, raised and kissed them respectfully, tenderly.
She hid her burning face on his bosom, and there was a short pause.
“Salome, sit down and let me talk to you of home,—your home. Have you no questions to ask about your pet sister and brother?”
He attempted to release himself, but she clung to him, and clasping her arms around his neck, said in a strained, husky tone,—
“Dr. Grey, did you bring your—your wife to Paris?”
“I have no wife.”
She uttered a thrilling cry of delight, threw her head back, and gazed steadily into his clear, calm, blue eyes.
“Oh, sir, they told me you had married Mrs. Gerome.”
He placed her in the chair, and kneeling down beside her, took her quivering face in his palms and touched her forehead softly with his lips.
“The only woman I ever wished to make my wife is bound for life to a worthless husband. Salome, I loved her before I knew this fact; and, since I learned (soon after your departure) that she was separated from the man whom she had wedded, I have not seen her, although she still resides at457‘Solitude.’ Salome, I shall never marry, and I ask you now to come back to Jessie and Stanley, who will soon require your care and guidance, for it is my intention to return to the position in the U.S. naval service, which only Janet’s feeble health induced me to resign. God bless you, dear child! I wish you were indeed my own sister, for I am growing very proud of my brave, honest friend,—my patient lace-weaver.”
The girl’s head sank lower and lower until it touched her knees, and sobs rendered her words scarcely audible.
“If you deem me worthy to be called your friend, it is because of your example, your influence. Oh, Dr. Grey,—but for you,—but for my hope of meeting you in the kingdom of Christ, I shudder to think what I might have been! Under all circumstances I have been guided by what I imagined would have been your wishes,—your advice; and my reward is rich indeed! Your confidence, your approbation! Earth holds no recompense half so precious.”
“Thank God! my prayers have been abundantly answered, my highest hopes of your future fully realized. Henceforth, let us with renewed energy labor faithfully in the vast, whitening fields of Him who declares, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.’”
“O human soul! as long as thou canst soSet up a mark of everlasting light,Above the howling senses’ ebb and flow,To cheer thee and to right thee if thou roam,Not with lost toil thou laborest through the night,Thou makest the heaven thou hopest indeed thy home.”
CHAPTER XXXIV.“SAD CASE OF MANIA A POTU.”
“Watchman McDonough reports that late last night, he picked up, on the sidewalk, the insensible body of Maurice Carlyle, who showed some signs of returning animation after458his removal to Station House No. ——. A physician was called in, and every effort made to save the unfortunate victim of intemperance; but medical skill was inadequate to arrest the work of many years of excess, and before daylight the wretched man expired in dreadful convulsions. Coroner Boutwell held an inquest on the body, and the verdict rendered was ‘Death frommania a potu.’ Mr. Carlyle was well known in this city, where for many years he was an ornament to society, and a general favorite in the fashionable and mercantile circle in which he moved. Of numbers who were once the recipients of his bounty and hospitality, none offered succor in the hour of adversity, and among all his former friends none were found to cheer or pity in the last ordeal to which flesh is subjected. The melancholy fate of Maurice Carlyle furnishes another illustration of the mournful truth that the wages of intemperance are destitution and desertion.”
Such was the startling announcement, which, under the head of “Police Report,” Dr. Grey read and re-read in a prominent New York paper that had accidentally remained for some days unopened on his desk, and was dated nearly a month previous. Locking the door of his office, he sat down to collect his bewildered thoughts, and to quiet the tumult in his throbbing heart.
During the two years that had drearily worn away since his last interview with Mrs. Carlyle, he had sternly forbidden his mind to dwell on its brief dream of happiness, and by a life of unusually active benevolence endeavored to forget the one episode which alone had power to disquiet and sadden him.
He had philosophically schooled himself to the calm, unmurmuring acceptance of his lonely destiny, and looked forward to a life solitary yet not unhappy, although uncheered by the love and companionship which every man indulges the instinctive hope will sooner or later crown his existence.
Now heart and conscience, so long at deadly feud, suddenly signalled a truce, clasped hands, embraced cordially. How radiant the world looked,—with what wondrous glory the459future had in the twinkling of an eye robed itself. The woman he had loved was stainless and free, and how could she long resist the pleadings of his famished heart?
He would win her from cynicism and isolation, would melt her frozen nature in the genial atmosphere of his pure and constant affection, and interweave her aimless, sombre life with the busy, silvery web of his own.
After forty years, God would grant him home, and wife, and hearthstone peace.
What a flush and sparkle stole to this grave man’s olive cheek, and calm, deep blue eyes!
Ah! how hungrily he longed for the touch of her hand, the sight of her face; and, snatching his hat, he put the paper in his pocket, and hurried towards “Solitude.”
In the holy hush of that hazy autumnal afternoon, nature—Magna Mater,—
“The altar-curtains of whose hillsAre sunset’s purple air,”“Who dips in the dim light of setting sunsThe spacious skirts of that vast robe of hersThat widens ever in the wondrous west,”
seemed slumbering and dreaming away the day.
The forests were gaudy in their painted shrouds of scarlet and yellow leaves, and long, feathery flakes of purple bloom nodded over crimson berries, emerald mosses, and golden-hearted asters.
Only a few weeks previous, Dr. Grey had driven along that road, and, while the echo of harvesthymnsrang on the hay-scented air, had asked himself how men and women could become so completely absorbed in temporal things, ignoring the solemn and indisputable fact of the brevity of human life and the restricted dominion of man,—
“Whose part in all the pomp that fillsThe circuit of the summer hillsIs, that his grave is green.”
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But to-day all sober-hued reflections were exorcised by the rapturousJubilatethat hope was singing through the sunlit chambers of his happy heart; and when he entered the grounds of “Solitude” they seemed bathed in that soft glamour, that witching “light that never was on sea or land.”
As he sprang from his buggy and opened the little gate leading into theparterre, Robert came slowly forward, bearing a basket filled with a portion of the crimson apples that flushed the orchard, just beyond the low hedge.
“You could not have chosen a better time to come, Dr. Grey; and if I were allowed to have my way you would have been here last night. Were you sent for at last, or was it a lucky chance that brought you?”
“Merely an accident, as I received no summons. Robert, how is your mistress?”
“God only knows, sir; I am sure I never can tell how she really is. She has not seemed well since she took that journey to the North, and for two weeks past she appears to have been slipping down by inches into her grave. She neither eats nor sleeps, and for the last three nights has not lain down,—so old Ruth, the housekeeper, tells me. Yesterday I begged my mistress to let me go for you, but she smiled that awful freezing smile that strikes to the very marrow of my bones, worse than December sleet,—and raised her finger so: and said, ‘At your peril, Robert. Mind your orchard, man, and I will take care of myself. I want neither doctors nor nurses, and only desire that you, and Ruth, and Anna, will attend to your respective duties and let me be quiet. All will soon be well with me.’ I killed a partridge, had it nicely broiled, and carried it to her; and she thanked me, and made a pretence of eating the wing, just to please me; but when the waiter was taken away to the kitchen, I found all the bird on the plate. This morning, just before daylight, I heard her playing a wild, mournful thing on the piano, that sounded like a dirge or a wail; and Ruth says when she went into the parlor to open the blinds, she found her praying, and thinks she was on her knees for an hour. Please God! sometimes I wish she461was in heaven with my mother, for she will never see any peace in this life.”
“What seems to be the disease?”
“Heart-ache.”
“You should have come and told me this long ago.”
“And pray to what purpose, Dr. Grey? She vowed she would allow no human being to cross her threshold, except the servants, and I would sooner undertake to curl a steel, or make ringlets out of a pair of tongs, than bend her will when once she takes a stand. Humph! My mistress is no willow wand, and is about as easily moved as the church-steeple, or the stone-tower of the lighthouse.”
“Has she recently received letters that contained tidings which excited or distressed her?”
“A letter came last week, but I know nothing of its contents. You need not go into the house if you wish to find her, for about an hour and a half ago I saw her come out into the grounds, and she never goes in till the lamps are lighted.”
An anxious look clouded for an instant Dr. Grey’s countenance, but undaunted hope sang on of the hours of hallowed communion that the future held, while in her invalid condition he assumed the care and guardianship of his beloved; and, turning into the lawn, he eagerly searched the winding walks for some trace of her, some flutter of her garments, some faint, subtle odor of orange-flowers or tube-roses.
Here and there clusters of purple, pink, and orange crysanthemums flecked the lawn with color; and a flower-stand, covered with china jars that held geraniums, seemed almost a pyramid of flame, from the profusion of scarlet blooms.
The sun had gone down behind a waving line of low hills, where,—
“Thinned to amber, rimmed with silver,Clouds in the distance dwell,Clouds that are cool, for all their color,Pure as a rose-lipped shell.Fleets of wool in the upper heavensGossamer wings unfurl;Sailing so high they seem but sleepingOver yon bar of pearl.”
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Still as crystal was the sapphire sea that mirrored that quiet, sapphire sky, and not a murmur, not a ripple, stirred the evening air or the yellow sands that stretched for miles along the winding coast.
When Dr. Grey had partially crossed the lawn, he glanced towards the marble temple that gleamed against the dark background of deodars, and saw a woman sitting on the steps of the tomb. Softly he approached and entered the mausoleum by an arch on the opposite side, but, notwithstanding his cautious tread, he startled a white pigeon that had perched on the altar, where fresh violets, heliotrope, and snowy sprigs of nutmeg-geranium were leaning over thescallopededge of the Venetian glasses, and distilling perfume in their delicate chalices.
Mrs. Carlyle had brought her floral tribute to the sepulchral urn, and, having carefully arranged her daily Arkja, had seated herself on the steps to rest.
From the two sentinel poplars that guarded the front, golden leaves were sifting down on the marble floor, and three or four had drifted upon the lap of the quiet figure, while one, bright and rich as autumn gilding could make it, rested like a crown on the silver waves that covered her head.
Down the shining steps trailed the folds of the white merino robe, and around her shoulders was wrapped the blue crape shawl, while a cluster of violets seemed to have slipped from her fingers, and strewed themselves at random on her dress.
Softly Dr. Grey drew near, and his voice was tremulously tender, as he said,—
“Mrs. Carlyle, no barrier divides us now.”
She did not speak, or turn her queenly head, and he laid his hand caressingly on the glistening gray hair.
“My darling, my first and only love—my brave, beautiful ‘Agla,’ may I not tell you, at last, what conscience once forbade my uttering?”
As motionless and silent as the sculptured poppies above her, she took no notice of his passionate pleading, and he sprang down one step directly in front of her.
The white face was turned to the sea, and the large, wide,463wonderfully lovely yet mournful gray eyes were gazing fixedly across the waste of water, at a filmy cloud as fine as lace, that like a silver netting caught the full October moon which was lifting itself in the pearly east.
The long black lashes did not droop, nor the steady eyes waver, and with a horrible foreboding Dr. Grey seized her hands. They were rigid and icy. He stooped, caught her to his bosom, and pressed his lips to hers, but they were colder than the marble column against which she leaned; for, one hour before, Vashti Carlyle had fronted her God.
Alone in the autumn evening, sitting there with the golden poplar leaves drifting over her, the desolate woman had held her last communion with the watching ocean that hushed its murmuring, to see her die; and, laying down the galling burden of her sunless, dreary life, she had joyfully andserenely“put on immortality” in that everlasting rest, where “there was no more sea, no more death, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away.”
Ah! beautiful and holy was—
“That peaceful face wherein all past distressHad melted into perfect loveliness.”
CHAPTER XXXV.
Since that October day when Ulpian Grey sat on the steps of the tomb, holding in his arms the beautiful white form, whom in life God had denied him the privilege of touching, six months had drifted slowly; yet time had not softened the blow, that, while almost crushing his tender, unselfish heart, had no power to shake the faith which was so securely anchored in Christ.
Among the papers found in Mrs. Carlyle’s desk was one containing the request that Dr. Grey would superintend the erection of a handsome monument over the remains of her husband,464whenever and wherever he chanced to die; and her will provided that her fortune should be appropriated as the nucleus of a relief fund for indigent painters.
Her own pictures, to which she had carefully affixed in delicate violet ciphers the name “Agla,” she directed placed on exhibition in a New York gallery, and ultimately sold for the benefit of the orphans of artists. To Robert she bequeathed a sum sufficient to maintain him in ease and comfort; and to Dr. Grey her escritoire, piano, books, and the sapphire ring she had always worn.
The latter was found in the silver casket, and had been folded in a sheet of paper containing these words,—
“According to the teachings of the Buddhists, ‘the sapphire produces equanimity and peace of mind, as well as affording protection against envy and treachery. It produces also prayer and reconciliation with the Godhead, and brings more peace than any other gem of necromancy;but he who would wear it must lead a pure and holy life.’ Finding my sapphire asp mockingly inefficacious in its traditional talismanic powers, I conclude that my melancholy career has been a violation of the stipulated condition, and therefore bequeath it to the only human being whom I deem worthy to wear it with any hope of success.”
While awaiting orders from the naval department, Dr. Grey purchased “Solitude,” whither he removed, with Muriel and Miss Dexter, and temporarily established himself, until the arrival of Mr. Granville.
Immediately after her return from Europe, Salome invested a portion of Mr. Minge’s legacy in the site of the old mill that had fallen to ruin. Here she built a small but tasteful cottageornéon the spot where her father had died, and here, with Jessie and Stanley, she proposed to spend her winters; while Mark and Joel were placed at the “Grassmere Farm,” a mile distant, and entrusted with its management until the younger children should attain their majority.
Too proud to accept the home which Dr. Grey had tendered her, Salome was earnestly endeavoring to imitate the noble example of self-abnegation that lifted him so far above all465others whom she had ever known; and the most precious hope of her life was to reach that exalted excellence which alone could compel his admiration and respect.
From the day of Mrs. Carlyle’s death, the orphan had been a comparatively happy woman, for jealousy could not invade or desecrate the grave and its harmless sleeper; and Salome fervently thanked God, that, since she was denied the blessing of Dr. Grey’s love, at least she had been spared the torture of seeing him the fond husband of another.
Time had deepened, but refined, purified, and consecrated her unconquerable affection for the only man who had ever commanded her reverence, and whose quiet influence had so happily remoulded her wayward, fiery nature.
There were seasons when the old element of innate perversity re-asserted itself, but the steady reproving gaze of his clear, true eyes, or the warning touch of his hand on her head, had sufficed to still the rising storm.
Conscientiously the passionate, exacting woman was striving to bring her heart and life into subjection to the law,—into conformity with the precepts of Christ; and though she was impulsive, proud Salome still,—the glaring blemishes in her character were gradually disappearing.
One bright balmy spring morning previous to the day appointed for Muriel’s marriage, and for her guardian’s departure for the fleet in Asiatic waters, where he had been assigned to duty, Dr. Grey drove up the avenue of elms and maples that led to Salome’s pretty villa; and as he ascended the steps, Jessie sprang into his arms, and almost smothered him with caresses.
“Oh, doctor! something so wonderful has happened,—you never could guess, and I am as happy as a bee in a woodbine. Sister will tell you.”
“Where is she?”
“In the parlor, waiting for you.”
The child ran off to join Stanley, who was trying a new pony in the yard, and Dr. Grey went into the cool fragrant room, which was fitted up with more taste than in earlier years he would have ascribed to its owner.
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Salome sat before the open piano, and at his entrance raised her face, which had been bowed almost to the ivory keys.
“Good morning, Dr. Grey. I am glad you have come to rejoice with me, and I was just thanking God for the unexpected restoration of my voice. Once when it seemed so necessary tome.He suddenly took it from me; and now, when it is a mere luxury to own it, He as unexpectedly gives it to me once more. Verily,—strange as it may appear, my voice is really better than when Professor V—— pronounced it the first contralto in Europe.”
She had risen to greet him, and as he retained her hand in his, she stood close to him, looking earnestly into his face.
There were tears hanging like tremulous dewdrops on the long jet under-lashes,—and the bright red in her polished cheeks, and the crimson curves of her parted lips made a picture pleasant to contemplate.
“My dear child, I do indeed cordially congratulate you. God saw that your voice might possibly prove a snare and a curse, by ministering to false pride and exaggerated vanity, and in mercy and wisdom He temporarily deprived you of an instrument that threatened you with danger. Now that you are stronger, more prudent, and patient, He trusts you again with one of the choicest blessings that can be conferred on a woman. You have deserved to recover it, and I joyfully unite my thanks with yours. Let me hear your voice once more.”
Trembling with excess of happiness, she sat down and sang feelingly, eloquently, her favorite “O mon Fernand;” and, as he listened, Dr. Grey looked almost wonderingly at the beautiful flashing face, that had never seemed half so radiant before. There was marvellous witchery in her rich round flexible tones, that wound into the holy-of-holies of the man’s great heart, and elevated his thoughts above the dross and dust of earth.
When she ended, he placed his soft palm tenderly on her head, and smoothed the glossy hair.
“I thank you inexpressibly. Sometimes when sad memories oppress me, how I shall long to have you charm them away by that magical spell that bears my thoughts from this467world to the next. There are some songs which you must learn for my sake.”
Ah! at that moment, as she stood there robed in a soft stainless white muslin, with a cluster of double pomegranate flowers glowing in her silky hair, the girl was very lovely, very attractive, so full of youthful grace, so winning in her beautiful enthusiasm,—yet Ulpian Grey’s heart did not wander for an instant from one who slept dreamlessly under the sculptured urn on the marble altar of the mausoleum.
“Why are the dead not dead? Who can undoWhat time hath done? Who can win back the wind?Beckon lost music from a broken lute?Renew the redness of a last year’s rose?Or dig the sunken sunset from the deep?”
“Dr. Grey, if my voice can chase away one vexing thought, one wearying care or melancholy memory, I shall feel that I have additional reason to thank God for the precious gift.”
“I have not seen you look so happy for three years. Indeed, my little sister, you have much for which to be grateful, and in the midst of your blessings try to recollect those grand words of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, ‘The soul is a God in exile.’ My child, look to it that your expatriation ends with the shores of time, for—
‘Yea, this is life; make this forenoon sublime,This afternoon a psalm, this night a prayer,And time is conquered, and thy crown is won.’”
For some seconds Salome did not speak, for the shadow on his countenance fell upon her heart, and looking reverently up at him, she thought of Richter’s mournfuldictum,—“Great souls attract sorrows, as mountains tempests.”
“Dr. Grey, want of patience is the cause of half my difficulties and defeats, and plunges me continually into the slough of distrust and rebellious questioning. I find it so hard468to stand still, and let God do his will, and work in his own way.”
“My dear Salome, patience is only practical faith, and the want of it causes two-thirds of the world’s woes. I often find it necessary to humble my own pride, and tame my restless spirit by recurring to the last words of Schiller, ‘Calmer and calmer! many difficult things are growing plain and clear to me. Let us be patient.’ Child, sing me one song more, and then come out and show me where you propose to place those grape-arbors we spoke of yesterday. This is the last opportunity I shall have to direct your workmen.”
An hour later Salome fastened a sprig of Grand Duke jasmine in the button-hole of his coat,—shook hands with him for the day, and though she smiled in recognition of his final bow as he drove down the avenue, her thoughts were busy with the dreaded separation that awaited her on the morrow and, while her lips were mute, the cry of her heart was,—
...“O Beloved, it is plain
I am not of thy worth, nor for thy place.And yet because I love thee, I obtainFrom that same love this vindicating grace,To live on still in love,—and yet in vain,—To bless thee, yet renounce thee to thyface.”
Dr. Grey spent the remainder of the day in visiting his patients, and as he rode from cottage to hovel, bidding adieu to those whose lives had so often been committed to his professional guardianship, he was received with tearful eyes, and trembling hands; and numerous benedictions were invoked upon his head.
Silver threads were beginning to weave an aureola in his chestnut hair, and the smooth white forehead showed incipient furrows, but the deep blue eyes were as tranquil and trusting as of yore, and full of tenderer light for the few he loved, for all in suffering and bereavement.
With a sublime and increasing faith in the overruling wisdom and mercy of God, he patiently and hopefully bore his469loneliness and grievous loss,—comforting himself with the assurance that, “the evening of life brings with it its lamp;” and looking eagle-eyed across the storm-drenched plain of the present to the gleaming jasper walls of the Eternal Beyond.
...“My wine has run
Indeed out of my cup, and there is noneTo gather up the bread of my repastScattered and trampled,—yet I find some goodIn earth’s green herbs, and streams that bubble up,Clear from the darkling ground,—content untilI sit with angels before better food.Dear Christ! when thy new vintage fills my cup,This hand shall shake no more, nor that wine spill.”
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