Barriers Burned Away Part 63

After a few moments' thought Christine said, decidedly: "All that nonsense about the Baroness Ludolph is past forever--burned up in the fire with many things of more value. I have been fed too long on the husks of human greatness and ambition to want any more of them. They never did satisfy me, and in the light and heat of the terrific ordeal through which I have just pa.s.sed they shrivelled into utter nothingness.

I want something that I cannot lose in a whiff of smoke and flame, and I think I have found it. Henceforth I claim no other character than that of a simple Christian girl." Then bowing her head on her friend's shoulder she added, in a whisper, "If I could climb to true greatness by Mr. Fleet's side, as he portrayed it in his picture, it seems to me heaven would begin at once."

The doctor, who had taken the professor aside, now joined them, and said: "Mrs. Leonard, you have only to take reasonable care of yourself, and you will soon recover from this shock and exposure. I wish all my patients were doing as well."

She replied with a smile, taking her husband's hand: "Since I have found my old Greek here, with his learned spectacles, I am quite myself, and I feel as if I were only playing invalid."

"You may have slept in a church before," said the doctor, with a twinkle in his eye, "and you must do so again. But no one will thunder at you from the pulpit this time, so I leave you in peace and security, and to-night will be within call."

Christine followed him to the lobby of the church, when the irrepressible joker could not forbear saying: "Now let me give you a little paternal advice. Don't be too grateful to that young Fleet. He only did his duty, and of course doesn't deserve any special--"

Christine, with flushing cheeks, interrupted him as if she had not heard: "Doctor, how good and kind you are! Here you are off without any rest to look after the sick and suffering, and you seem to bring health and hope wherever you go."

"Yes, yes; but I send my bill in too--mind that." (Some of his poorer patients never received any, and he, when twitted of the fact, would mutter, roughly, "Business oversight--can't attend to everything.")

Christine looked for a moment at the face so inspiring in its hearty benevolence, and with an impulse, so unlike the cold, haughty girl of old, sprang forward, threw her arms around his neck, and gave him a kiss which he declared afterward was like a mild stroke of lightning, and said, "And there is the first instalment of what I owe you."

The old gentleman looked as if he decidedly liked the currency, and with moistened eyes that he vainly tried to render humorous, he raised his finger impressively in parting, and said, "Don't you ever get out of debt to me."

CHAPTER XLIX

BILL CRONK'S TOAST

After all, it was a long day to Christine. Tears would start from her eyes at the thought of her father, but she realized that the only thing for her to do was to shroud his memory in a great, forgiving pity, and put it away forever. She could only turn from the mystery of his life and death--the mystery of evil--to Him who taketh away the sin of the world. There was no darkness in that direction. She busied herself with Mrs. Leonard, and the distribution of food to others, till six o'clock, and then she stood near the door to watch till her true knight should appear in his shirt-sleeves, with a shovel on his shoulder, and an old burned, tattered felt hat on his head, instead of jewelled crest and heron plume.

Dennis had gone to his work not very hopeful. He knew Christine would be his grateful friend while she lived, and would perhaps even regard him as a brother, but all this might be and still she be unable to respond to his deeper feelings. Moreover, he knew she was Baroness Ludolph, and might be heiress of such t.i.tles and estates in Germany as would require that she should go at once to secure them; and so she seemed clearly to pa.s.s beyond his sphere.

As he shovelled the hot bricks and cinders hour after hour among other laborers, the distance between himself and the Baroness Ludolph seemed to increase; and when, begrimed and weary, he sat down to eat his dinner of a single sandwich saved from breakfast (for as yet he had no money), the ruins around him were quite in keeping with his feelings.

He thought most regretfully of his two thousand dollars and burned picture. The brave, resolute spirit of the morning had deserted him.

He did not realize that few men have lived who could be brave and hopeful when weary and hungry, and fewer still, when, in addition, they doubted the favor of the lady of their love.

The work of the afternoon seemed desperately hard and long, but with dogged persistency Dennis held his own with the others till six, and in common with them received his two dollars. Whether Christine would accept the supper he brought or not, he determined to fulfil his promise and bring one. Wearily he trudged off to the west side, in order to find a store. No one who met him would have imagined that this plodding laborer was the artist who the week before had won the prize and t.i.tle of genius.

If he had been purchasing a supper for himself, he would doubtless have been sensible about it; but one that the Baroness Ludolph might share was a different matter. He bought some very rich cake, a can of peaches, a box of sardines, some fruit, and then his money gave out!

But, with these incongruous and indigestible articles made up into one large bundle, he started for the church. He had gone but a little way when some one rushed upon him, and little Ernst clasped him round the neck and fairly cried for joy. Sitting on the sidewalk near were the other little Bruders, looking as forlorn and dirty as three motherless children could. Dennis stopped and sat down beside them (for he was too tired to stand), while Ernst told his story--how their mother had left them, and how she had been found so burned that she was recognized only by a ring (which he had) and a bit of the picture preserved under her body. They had been looking ever since to find him, and had slept where they could.

As Ernst sobbingly told his story the other children cried in doleful chorus, and Dennis's tears fell fast too, as he realized how his humble friend had perished. He remembered her kindness to his mother and little sisters, and his heart acknowledged the claim of these poor little orphans. Prudence whispered, "You cannot afford to burden yourself with all these children," and pride added, "What a figure you will make in presenting yourself before the Baroness Ludolph with all these children at your heels!" But he put such thoughts resolutely aside, and spoke like a brother; and when one of the children sobbed, "We so hungry!" out came the Baroness Ludolph's fruit and cake, and nothing remained for Christine but the sardines and peaches, since these could not well be opened in the street. The little Bruders having devoured what seemed to them the ambrosia of the G.o.ds, he took the youngest in his arms, Ernst following with the others; and so they slowly made their way to the church where Christine was now anxiously waiting, with many surmises and forebodings at Dennis's delay.

At last, in the dusk, the little group appeared at the church-door, and she exclaimed, "What has kept you so, Mr. Fleet?"

He determined to put the best face on the situation, and indulge in no heroics, so he said, "You could not expect such a body of infantry as this to march rapidly."

"What!" she exclaimed, "have you brought all the lost children in the city back with you?"

"No, only those that fell properly to my care;" and in a few words he told their story.

"And do you, without a cent in the world, mean to a.s.sume the burden of these four children?" she asked, in accents of surprise.

He could not see her face, but his heart sank within him, for he thought that to her it would seem quixotic and become another barrier between them; but he answered, firmly: "Yes, till G.o.d, who has imposed the burden, removes it, and enables me to place them among friends in a good home. Mrs. Bruder, before she died, wrote to her family in Germany, telling her whole story. Relatives may take the children; if not, some way will be provided."

"Mr. Fleet, I wonder at you," was her answer. "Give me that child, and you bring the others."

He wondered at her as he saw her take the child and imprint a kiss on the sleepy, dirty face; and Ernst, who had been eying her askance, crept timidly nearer when he saw the kiss, and whispered, "Perhaps her old outside heart has been burned away."

They followed to a lobby of the lecture-room, and here she procured a damp towel and proceeded to remove the tear and dust stains from the round and wondering faces of the children. Having restored them to something of their original color, she took them away to supper, saying to Dennis, with a decided nod, "You stay here till I come for you."

Something in her manner reminded him of the same little autocrat who had ordered him about when they arranged the store together. She soon returned with a basin of water and a towel, saying: "See what a luxury you secure by obeying orders. Now give an account of yourself, as every lady's knight should on his return. How have you spent the day?"

He could not forbear laughing as he said: "My employment has been almost ludicrously incongruous with the t.i.tle by which you honor me.

I have been shovelling brick and mortar with other laborers."

"All day?"

"All day."

Her glance became so tender and wistful that he forgot to wash his hands in looking at her, and felt for the moment as if he could shovel rubbish forever, if such could be his reward.

Seemingly by an effort, she regained her brusque manner, which he did not know was but the mask she was trying to wear, and said, quickly: "What is the matter? Why don't you wash your face?"

"You told me to give an account of myself," he retorted, at the same time showing rising color in his dust-begrimed face.

"Well, one of your ability can do two things at once. What have you got in that bundle?"

"You may have forgotten, but I promised to bring you home something that you chose to regard as charity."

"If I was so ungracious, you ought to have rewarded me by bringing me a broken brick. Will you let me see what you brought?" but without waiting for permission she pounced upon the bundle and dragged out the peaches and sardines.

He, having washed and partially wiped his face, was now able to display more of his embarra.s.sment, and added, apologetically: "That is not all I had. I also bought some cake and fruit, and then my money gave out."

"And do you mean to say that you have no money left?"

"Not a penny," he answered, desperately.

"But where are the cake and fruit?"

"Well," he said, laughingly, "I found the little Bruders famishing on the sidewalk, and they got the best part of your supper."

"What an escape I have had!" she exclaimed. "Do you think I should have survived the night if I had eaten those strangely a.s.sorted dainties, as in honor bound I would have done, since you brought them?"

Then with a face of comical severity she turned upon him and said: "Mr. Fleet, you need some one to take care of you. What kind of economy do you call this, sir, especially on the part of one who has burdened himself with four helpless children?"

There was a mingling of sense and seriousness in her raillery, which he recognized, and he said, with a half-vexed laugh at himself: "Well, really, Miss Ludolph, I suppose that I have not wholly regained my wits since the fire. I throw myself on your mercy." (The same expression he had used once before. She remembered it, and her face changed instantly.) Turning hastily away to hide her feelings, she said, in a rather husky voice, "When I was a wicked fool, I told you I had none; but I think I am a little changed now." Then she added, sharply, "Please don't stand there keeping our friends waiting"; and she led the way into the lecture-room, now filled with tables and hungry people.

Dennis was in a maze, and could scarcely understand her, she was so different from the pensive lady, shrinking from rude contact with the world, that he had expected to meet. He did not realize that there was not a particle of weak sentimentality about her, and that, since now pride was gone, her energetic spirit would make her as truly a leader in scenes like these as in those with which she had been familiar.

Much less could he understand that she was hiding a heart br.i.m.m.i.n.g over with love to him.