Elsie at Nantucket Part 24

"Yes, sir; must I wait for an answer?"

"Oh, no," he replied, with a slight smile; "you may come right back to your place by papa's side."

Elsie read the little missive handed her at a glance, rose up hastily, and went to the captain with it in her hand, a troubled look on her face.

"My dear captain," she said, in a tone of gentle remonstrance, "why did you do this? The child's offence against me was not a grave one in my esteem, and I know that to one of her temperament it would be extremely galling to be made to apologize. I wish you had not required it of her."

"I thought it for her good, mother," he answered; "and I think so still; she is so strongly inclined to impertinence and insubordination that I must do all in my power to train her to proper submission to lawful authority and respect for superiors."

Edward joined them at that moment. He looked disturbed and chagrined.

"Really, captain," he said, "I am not at all sure that Lulu has not as much right to an apology from me as I to this from her. I spoke to her in anger, and with an a.s.sumption of authority to which I really had no right, so that there was ample excuse for her not particularly respectful language to me. I am sorry, therefore, she has had the pain of apologizing."

"You are very kind to be so ready to over look her insolence," the captain said; "but I cannot permit such exhibitions of temper, and must, at whatever cost, teach her to rule her own spirit."

"Doubtless you are right," Edward said; "but I am concerned and mortified to find that I have got her into such disgrace and trouble. I must own I am quite attached to Lulu; she has some very n.o.ble and lovable traits of character."

"She has indeed," said his mother; "she is so free from the least taint of hypocrisy or deceit; so perfectly honest and truthful; so warm-hearted, too; so diligent and energetic in anything she undertakes to do--very painstaking and persevering--and a brave, womanly little thing."

The captain's face brightened very much as he listened to these praises of his child.

"I thank you heartily, mother and brother," he said; "for the child is very dear to her father's heart, and praise of her is sweet to my ear. I can see all these lovable traits, but feared that to other eyes than mine they might be entirely obscured by the very grave faults joined with them. But it is just like you both to look at the good rather than the evil.

"And you have done so much for my children! I a.s.sure you I often think of it with the feeling that you have laid me under obligations which I can never repay."

"Ah, captain," Elsie said, laughingly, "you have a fashion of making a great mountain out of a little mole-hill of kindness. Flattery is not good for human nature, you know, so I shall leave you and go back to papa, who has a wholesome way of telling me of my faults and failings."

"I really don't know where he finds them," returned Captain Raymond, gallantly; but she was already out of hearing.

"Nor I," said Violet, replying to his last remark; "mamma seems to me to be as nearly perfect as a human creature can be in this sinful world."

"Now don't feel troubled about it, Ned," Zoe was saying to her husband, who was again at her side. "I think it was just right that she should be made to apologize to you, for she was dreadfully saucy."

"Yes; but I provoked her, and I ought to be, and am, greatly ashamed of it. I fear, too, that in so doing I have brought a severe punishment upon her."

"Why should you think so?"

"Because I know that such a task could not fail to be exceedingly unpalatable to one of her temperament; and don't you remember how long she stood out against her father's authority last summer when he bade her ask Vi's pardon for impertinence to her?"

"Yes; it took nearly a week of close confinement to make her do it; but as he showed himself so determined in that instance, she probably saw that it would be useless to attempt opposition to his will in this, and so obeyed without being compelled by punishment."

"Well, I hope so," he said. "She surely ought to know by this time that he is not one to be trifled with."

It seemed to Lulu a long time that she was left alone, shut up in the little bedroom of the cottage, though it was in reality scarcely more than half an hour. She was very glad when at last she heard her father's step in the outer room, then his voice as he opened the door and asked, "Would you like to take a walk with your papa, little girl?"

"Yes indeed, papa!" was her joyful reply.

"Then put on your hat and come."

She made all haste to obey.

"Is Gracie going too, papa? or anybody else?" she asked, putting her hand confidingly into his.

"No; you and I are going alone this time; do you think you will find my company sufficient for once?" he asked, smiling down at her.

"Oh yes, indeed, papa; I think it will be ever so nice to have you all to myself; it's so seldom I can."

They took the path along the bluffs toward "Tom Never's Head."

When they had fairly left the village behind, so that no one could overhear anything they might say to each other, the captain said, "I want to have a talk with you, daughter, and we may as well take it out here in the sweet fresh air, as shut up in the house."

"Oh, yes, papa; it is so much pleasanter! I can hardly bear to stay in the house at all down here at the seash.o.r.e; and it seemed a long while that you left me alone there this afternoon."

"Yes, I suppose so: and I hope I shall not have occasion to do so again.

My child, did you ever consider what it is that makes you so rebellious, so unwilling to submit to authority, and so ready to fly into a pa.s.sion and speak insolently to your superiors?"

"I don't quite understand you papa," she said. "I only know that I can't bear to have people try to rule me who have no right."

"Sometimes you are not willing to be ruled even by your father; yet I hardly suppose you would say he has no right?"

"Oh, no, papa; I know better than that," she said, blushing and hanging her head; "I know you have the best right in the world."

"Yet sometimes you disobey me; at others obey in an angry, unwilling way that shows you would rebel if you dared.

"And pride is at the bottom of it all. You think so highly of yourself and your own wisdom that you cannot bear to be controlled or treated as one not capable of guiding herself.

"But the Bible tells us that G.o.d hates pride. 'Every one that is proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord; though hand join in hand, he shall not be unpunished.'

"'Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.'

"'Proud and haughty scorner is his name who dealeth in proud wrath.'

"Ah, my dear daughter, I am sorely troubled when I reflect how often you deal in that. My great desire for you is that you may learn to rule your own spirit; that you may become meek and lowly in heart, patient and gentle like the Lord Jesus, 'who when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He suffered, He threatened not; but committed Himself to Him that judgeth righteously.' Do you never feel any desire to be like Him?"

"Yes, papa, sometimes; and I determine that I will; but the first thing I know I'm in a pa.s.sion again; and I get so discouraged that I think I'll not try any more to be good; for I just can't."

"It is Satan who puts that thought in your heart," the captain said, giving her a look of grave concern; "he knows that if he can persuade you to cease to fight against the evil that is in your nature he is sure to get possession of you at last.

"He is a most malignant spirit, and his delight is in destroying souls.

The Bible bids us, 'Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil as a roaring lion walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.'

"We are all sinners by nature, and Satan, and many lesser evil spirits under him, are constantly seeking our destruction; therefore we have a warfare to wage if we would attain eternal life, and no one who refuses or neglects to fight this good fight of faith will ever reach heaven; nor will any one who attempts it without asking help from on high.

"So if you give up trying to be good you and I will have a sad time; because it will be my duty to compel you to try. The Bible tells me, 'Withhold not correction from the child; for if thou beatest him with the rod he shall not die. Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and shalt deliver his soul from h.e.l.l.'

"I must if possible deliver you from going to that awful place, and also from the dreadful calamities indulgence of a furious temper sometimes brings even in this life; even a woman has been known to commit murder while under the influence of unbridled rage; and I have known of one who lamed her own child for life in a fit of pa.s.sion.

"Sometimes people become deranged simply from the indulgence of their tempers. Do you think I should be a good and kind father if I allowed you to go on in a path that leads to such dreadful ends here and hereafter?"