Ethelyn's Mistake Part 9

"You do!" Andy repeated in some surprise, and Ethelyn replied, "Not the way you mean, perhaps; but when I was a baby I was baptized in the church and thus became a member."

"So you never had the Bishop's hands upon your head, and done what the Saviour told us to do to remember him by?"

Ethelyn shook her head, and Andy went on: "Oh, what a pity, when he is such a good Saviour, and would know just how to help you, now you are so sorry-like and homesick, and disappointed. If you had him you could tell him all about it and he would comfort you. He helped me, you don't know how much, and I was dreadful bad once. I used to get drunk, Ethie--drunker'n a fool, and come hiccuppin' home with my clothes all tore and my hat smashed into nothin'."

Andy's face was scarlet as he confessed to his past misdeeds, but without the least hesitation he went on: "Mr. Townsend found me one day in the ditch, and helped me up and got me into his room and prayed over me and talked to me, and never let me off from that time till the Saviour took me up, and now it's better than three years since I tasted a drop. I don't taste it even at the sacrament, for fear what the taste might do, and I used to hold my nose to keep shut of the smell. Mr.

Townsend knows I don't touch it, and G.o.d knows, too, and thinks I'm right, I'm sure, and gives me to drink of his precious blood just the same, for I feel light as air when I come from the altar. If religion could make me, a fool and a drunkard, happy, it would do sights for you who know so much. Try it, Ethie, won't you?"

Andy was getting in earnest now, and Ethelyn could not meet the glance of his honest, pleading eyes.

"I can't be good, Andy," she replied; "I shouldn't know how to begin or what to do."

"Seems to me I could tell you a few things," Andy said. "G.o.d didn't want you to go to Washington for some wise purpose or other, and so he put it into d.i.c.k's heart to leave you at home. Now, instead of crying about that I'd make the best of it and be as happy as I could be here. I know we ain't starched up folks like them in Boston, but we like you, all of us--leastwise Jim and John and me do--and I don't mean to come to the table in my shirt-sleeves any more, if that will suit you, and I won't blow my tea in my sa.s.ser, nor sop my bread in the platter; though if you are all done and there's a lot of nice gravy left, you won't mind it, will you, Ethelyn?--for I do love gravy."

Ethelyn had been more particular than she meant to be with her reasons for her disappointment, and in enumerating the bad habits to which she said Western people were addicted, she had included the points upon which Andy had seized so readily. He had never been told before that his manners were entirely what they ought not to be; he could hardly see it so now, but if it would please Ethie he would try to refrain, he said, asking that when she saw him doing anything very outlandish, she would remind him of it and tell him what was right.

"I think folks is always happier," he continued, "when they forgit to please themselves and try to suit others, even if they can't see any sense in it."

Andy did not exactly mean this as a rebuke, but it had the effect of one and set Ethelyn thinking. Such genuine simplicity and frankness could not be lost upon her, and long after Andy had left her and gone to his room, where he sought in his prayer-book for something just suited to her case, she sat pondering all he had said, and upon the faith which could make even simple Andy so lovable and good.

"He has improved his one talent far more than I have my five or ten,"

she said, while regrets for her own past misdeeds began to fill her bosom, with a wish that she might in some degree atone for them.

Perhaps it was the resolution formed that night, and perhaps it was the answer to Andy's prayer that G.o.d would have mercy upon Ethie and incline her and his mother to pull together better, which sent Ethelyn down to breakfast the next morning and kept her below stairs a good portion of the day, and made her accept James' invitation to ride with him in the afternoon. Then when it was night again, and she saw Eunice carrying through the hall a smoking firebrand, which she knew was designed for the parlor fire, she changed her mind about staying alone upstairs with the books she had commenced to read, but brought instead the white, fleecy cloud she was knitting, and sat with the family, who had never seen her more gracious or amiable, and wondered what had happened. Andy thought he knew; he had prayed for Ethie, not only the previous night, but that morning before he left his room, and also during the day--once in the barn upon a rick of hay and once behind the smoke-house.

Andy always looked for direct answers to his prayers, and believing he had received one his face was radiant with content and satisfaction, when after supper he brushed and wet his hair and plastered it down upon his forehead, and changed his boots for a lighter pair of Richard's, and then sat down before the parlor fire with the yarn sock he was knitting for himself. Ethelyn had never seen him engaged in this feminine employment before, and she felt a strong disposition to laugh, but fearing to wound him, repressed her smiles and seemed not to look at him as he worked industriously on the heel, turning and shaping it better than she could have done. It was not often that Ethelyn had favored the family with music, but she did so that night, playing and singing pieces which she knew were familiar to them, and only feeling a momentary pang of resentment when, at the close of "Yankee Doodle," with variations, quiet John remarked that Melinda herself could not go ahead of that!

Melinda's style of music was evidently preferable to her own, but she swallowed the insult and sang "Lily Dale," at the request of Andy, who, thinking the while of dear little Daisy, wiped his eyes with the leg of his sock, while a tear trickled down his mother's cheek and dropped into her lap.

"I thought Melinda Jones wanted to practice on the pianner," Eunice said, after Ethelyn was done playing; "I heard her saying so one day and wondering if Miss Markham would be willin'."

Ethelyn was in a mood then to a.s.sent to most anything, and she expressed her entire approbation, saying even that she would gladly give Melinda any a.s.sistance in her power. Ethelyn had been hard and cold and proud so long that she scarcely knew herself in this new phase of character, and the family did not know her, either. But they appreciated it fully, and James' eyes were very bright and sparkling when, in imitation of Andy, he bade his sister good-night, thinking, as she left the room how beautiful she was and how pleased Melinda would be, and hoping she would find it convenient to practice there evenings, as that would render an escort home absolutely necessary, unless "Terrible Tim" came for her.

Ethelyn had not changed her mind when Melinda came home next day, and as a matter of course called at the Markhams' in the evening. But Ethelyn's offer had come a little too late--Melinda was going to Washington to spend the winter! A bachelor brother of her mother's, living among the mountains of Vermont, had been elected Member of Congress in the place of the regular member, who had resigned, and as the uncle was wealthy and generous, and had certain pleasant reminiscences of a visit to Iowa when a little black-eyed girl had been so agreeable to him, he had written for her to join him in Washington, promising to defray all expenses and sending on a draft for two hundred dollars, with which she was to procure whatever she deemed necessary for her winter's outfit.

Melinda's star was in the ascendant, and Ethelyn felt a pang of something like envy as she thought how differently Melinda's winter would pa.s.s from her own, while James trembled for the effect Washington might have upon the girl who walked so slowly with him along the beaten path between his house and her father's, and whose eyes, as she bade him good-night, were little less bright than the stars shining down upon her. Would she come back like Ethelyn? He hoped not, for there would then be an end to all fond dreams he had been dreaming. She would despise his homely ways and look for somebody higher than plain Jim Markham in his cowhide boots. James was sorry to have Melinda go, and Ethelyn was sorry, too. It seemed as if she was to be left alone, for two days after Melinda's return, Marcia Fenton and Ella Backus came out from Camden to call, and communicated the news that they, too, were going on to Washington, together with Mrs. Judge Miller, whose father was a United States Senator. It was terrible to be thus left behind, and Ethelyn's heart grew harder against her husband for dooming her to such a fate. Every week James, or John, or Andy brought from the post a letter in Richard's handwriting, directed to Mrs. Richard Markham, and once in two weeks Andy carried a letter to the post directed in Ethelyn's handwriting to "Richard Markham, M.C.," but Andy never suspected that the dainty little envelope, with a Boston mark upon it, inclosed only a blank sheet of paper! Ethelyn had affirmed so solemnly that she would not write to her husband that she half feared to break her vow; and, besides that, she could not forgive him for having left her behind, while Marcia, Ella, and Melinda were enjoying themselves so much. She knew she was doing wrong, and not a night of her life did she go to her lonely bed that there did not creep over her a sensation of fear as she thought, "What if I should die while I am so bad?"

At home, in Chicopee, she used always to go through with a form of prayer, but she could not do that now for the something which rose up between her and Heaven, smothering the words upon her lips, and so in this dreadful condition she lived on day after day, growing more, and more desolately and lonely, and wondering sadly if life would always be as dreary and aimless as it was now. And while she pondered thus, Andy prayed on and practiced his lessons in good manners, provoking the mirth of the whole family by his ludicrous attempts to be polite, and feeling sometimes tempted to give the matter up. Andy was everything to Ethelyn, and once when her conscience was smiting her more than usual with regard to the blanks, she said to him abruptly: "if you had made a wicked vow, which would you do--keep it or break it, and so tell a falsehood?"

Andy was not much of a lawyer, he said, but "he thought he knew some scripter right to the pint," and taking his well-worn Bible he found and read the parable of the two sons commanded to work in their father's vineyard.

"If the Saviour commended the one who said he wouldn't and then went and did it, I think there can be no harm in your breaking a wicked vow: leastways I should do it."

This was Andy's advice, and that night, long after the family were in bed, a light was shining in Ethelyn's chamber, where she sat writing to her husband, and as if Andy's spirit were pervading hers, she softened, as she wrote and asked forgiveness for all the past which she had made so wretched. She was going to do better, she said, and when her husband came home she would try to make him happy.

"But, oh, Richard," she wrote, "please take me away from here to Camden, or Olney, or anywhere--so I can begin anew to be the wife I ought to be.

I was never worthy of you, Richard. I deceived you from the first, and if I could summon the courage I would tell you about it."

This letter which would have done so much good, was never finished, for when the morning came there were troubled faces at the prairie farmhouse--Mrs. Markham looking very anxious and Eunice very scared, James going for the doctor and Andy for Mrs. Jones, while up in Ethie's room, where the curtains were drawn so closely before the windows, life and death were struggling for the mastery, and each in a measure coming off triumphant.

CHAPTER XVI

WASHINGTON

Richard had not been very happy in Washington. He led too quiet and secluded a life, his companions said, advising him to go out more, and jocosely telling him that he was pining for his young wife and growing quite an old man. When Melinda Jones came, Richard brightened a little, for there was always a sense of comfort and rest in Melinda's presence, and Richard spent much of his leisure in her society, accompanying her to concerts and occasionally to a levee, and taking pains to show her whatever he thought would interest her. It was pleasant to have a lady with him sometimes, and he wished so much it had been practicable for Ethelyn to have come. "Poor Ethie," he called her to himself, pitying her because, vain man that he was, he thought her so lonely without him.

This was at first, and before he had received in reply to his letter that dreadful blank, which sent such a chill to his heart, making him cold, and faint, and sick, as he began to realize what it was in a woman's power to do. He had occasionally thought of Ethelyn's threat, not to write him a line, and felt very uncomfortable as he recalled the expression of her eyes when she made it. But he did not believe she was in earnest. She surely could not hold out against the letter he wrote, telling how he missed her every moment, and how, if it had been at all advisable, he would have taken her with him. He did not know Ethelyn, and so was not prepared for the bitter disappointment in store for him when the dainty little envelope was put into his hand. It was her handwriting--so much he knew; and there lingered about the missive faint traces of the sweet perfume he remembered as pervading everything she wore or used. Ethelyn had not kept her vow; and with a throb of joy Richard tore open the envelope and removed the delicate tinted sheet inside. But the hand of the strong man shook and his heart grew heavy as lead when he turned the sheet thrice over, seeking in vain for some line or word, or syllable or sign. But there was none. Ethelyn had kept her vow, and Richard felt for a moment as if all the world were as completely a blank as that bit of gilt-edged paper he crumpled so helplessly in his hand. Anon, however, hope whispered that she would write next time; she could not hold out thus all winter; and so Richard wrote again with the same success, until at last he expected nothing, and people said of him that he was growing old, while even Melinda noticed his altered appearance, and how fast his brown hair was turning gray. Melinda was in one sense his good angel. She brought him news from home and Ethelyn, telling for one thing of Ethie's offer to teach her music during the winter; and for another, of Ethie's long drives upon the prairie, sometimes with James, sometimes with John, but oftenest with Andy, to whom she seemed to cling as to a very dear brother.

This news did Richard good, showing a better side of Ethie's character than the one presented to him. She was not cold and proud to the family at home; even his mother, who wrote to him once or twice, spoke kindly of her, while James warmly applauded her, and Andy wrote a letter, wonderful in composition, and full of nothing but Ethelyn, who made their home so pleasant with her music, and songs, and pretty face. There was some comfort in this^ and so Richard bore his burden in silence, and no one ever dreamed that the letters he received with tolerable regularity were only blank, fulfillments of a hasty vow.

With Christmas came the Van Buren set from Boston--Aunt Sophia, with Frank, and his girlish bride, who soon became a belle, flirting with every man who offered his attentions, while Frank was in no way behind in his flirtations with the other s.e.x. Plain, matter-of-fact Melinda Jones was among the first to claim his notice after he learned that she was niece of the man who drove such splendid blacks and kept so handsome a suite of rooms at Willard's; but Melinda was more than his match, and snubbed him so unmercifully that he gave her up, and sneered at her as "that old-maidish girl from the West." Mrs. Dr. Van Buren had been profuse in her inquiries after Ethelyn, and loud in her regrets at her absence. She had also tried to patronize both Richard and Melinda, taking the latter with her to the theater and to a reception, and trying to cultivate her for the sake of poor Ethie, who was obliged to a.s.sociate with her and people like her. Melinda, however, did not need Mrs. Van Buren's patronage. Her uncle was a man of wealth and mark, who stood high in Washington, where he had been before. His niece could not lack attention, and ere the season was over the two rival belles at Washington were Mrs. Frank Van Buren, from Boston, and Miss Melinda Jones, from Iowa.

But prosperity did not spoil Melinda, and James Markham's chances were quite as good when, dressed in pink silk, with camelias in her hair, she entertained some half-dozen judges and M.C.'s as when in brown delaine and magenta ribbons she danced a quadrille at some "quilting bee out West." She saw the difference, however, between men of cultivation and those who had none, and began to understand the cause of Ethelyn's cold, proud looks when surrounded by Richard's family. She began also silently to watch and criticise Richard, comparing him with other men of equal brain, and thinking how, if she were his wife, she would go to work to correct his manners. Possibly, too, thoughts of James, in his blue frock and cowhide boots, occasionally intruded themselves upon her mind; but if so, they did not greatly disturb her equanimity, for, let what might happen, Melinda felt herself equal to the emergency--whether it were to put down Frank Van Buren and the whole race of impudent puppies like him, or polish rough James Markham if need be. How she hated Frank Van Buren when she saw his neglect of his young wife, whose money was all he seemed to care for; and how utterly she loathed and despised him after the night, when, at a party given by one of Washington's magnates, he stood beside her for half an hour and talked confidently to her of Ethelyn, whom, he hinted, he could have married if he would.

"Why didn't you, then?" and Melinda turned sharply upon him, with a look in her black eyes which made him wince as he replied: "Family interference--must have money, you know! But, zounds! don't I pity her!--tied to that clown, whom--"

Frank did not finish the sentence, for Melinda's eyes fairly blazed with anger as she cut him short with "Excuse me, Mr. Van Buren; I can't listen to such abuse of one whom I esteem as highly as I do Judge Markham. Why, sir, he is head and shoulders above you, in sense and intellect and everything which makes a man," and with a haughty bow, Melinda swept away, leaving the shamefaced Frank alone in his discomfiture.

"I'd like to kick myself if I could, though I told nothing but the truth. Ethie did want me confoundedly, and I would have married her if she hadn't been poor as a church mouse," Frank muttered to himself, standing in the deep recess of the window, and all unconscious that just outside upon the balcony was a silent, motionless form, which had heard every word of his conversation with Melinda, and his soliloquy afterward.

Richard Markham had come to this party just to please Melinda, but he did not enjoy it. If Ethie had been there he might; but he could not forget the blank that day received, or the letter from James, which said that Ethelyn was not looking as well as usual, and had the morning previously asked him to turn back before they had ridden more than two miles. He could not be happy with that upon his mind, and so he stole from the gay scene out upon the balcony, where he stood watching the quiet stars and thinking of Ethelyn, when his ear had caught by the mention of her name.

He had not thought before who the couple were standing so near to him, but he knew now it was Melinda and Frank Van Buren, and became an involuntary listener to the conversation which ensued. There was a clenching of his fist, a shutting together of his teeth, and an impulse to knock the boasting Frank Van Buren down; and then, as the past flashed before him, with the thought that possibly Frank spoke the truth and Ethelyn had loved him, there swept over him such a sense of anguish and desolation that he forgot all else in his own wretchedness. It had never occurred to him that Ethelyn married him while all the time she loved another--that perhaps she loved that other still--and the very possibility of it drove him nearly wild.

He was missed from the party, but no one could tell when he left, for no one saw him as he sprang down into the garden, and taking refuge in the paths where the shades were the deepest, escaped un.o.bserved into the street, and so back to his own room, where he went over all the past and recalled every little act of affection on Ethelyn's part, weighed it in the balance with proofs that she did not care for him and never had.

So much did Richard love his wife and so anxious was he to find her guiltless that he magnified every virtue and excused every error until the verdict rendered was in her favor, and Frank alone was the delinquent--Frank, the vain, conceited c.o.xcomb, who thought because a woman was civil to him that she must needs wish to marry him; Frank, the wretch who had presumed to pity his cousin, and called her husband a clown! How Richard's fingers tingled with a desire to thrash the insulting rascal; and how, in spite of the verdict, his heart ached with a dull, heavy fear lest it might be true in part, that Ethie had once felt for Frank something deeper than what girls usually feel for their first cousins.

"And supposing she has?" Richard's generous nature asked. "Supposing she did love this Frank once on a time well enough to marry him? She surely was all over that love before she promised to be my wife, else she had not promised; and so the only point where she is at fault was in concealing from me the fact that she had loved another first. I was honest with her. I told her of Abigail, and it was very hard to do it, for I felt that the proud girl's spirit rebelled against such as Abigail was years ago. It would have been so easy, then, for Ethelyn to have confessed to me, if she had a confession to make; though how she could ever care for such a jackanapes as that baboon of a Frank is more than I can tell."

Richard was waxing warm against Frank Van Buren, whom he despised so heartily that he put upon his shoulders all the blame concerning Ethelyn, if blame there were. He would so like to think her innocent, and he tried so hard to do it, that he succeeded in part, though frequently as the days pa.s.sed on, and he sat at his post in the House, listening to some tiresome speech, or took his solitary walk toward Arlington Heights, a pang of something like jealousy and dread that all had not been open and fair between himself and his wife cut like a knife through his heart, and almost stopped his breath. The short session was wearing to a close, and he was glad of it, for he longed to be home again with Ethelyn, even if he were doomed to meet the same coldness which those terrible blanks had brought him. Anything was preferable to the life he led, and though he grew pale as ashes and his limbs quivered like a reed when, toward the latter part of February, he received a telegram to come home at once, as Ethelyn was very sick, he hailed the news as a message of deliverance, whereby he could escape from hated Washington a few days sooner. He hardly knew when or how the idea occurred to him that Aunt Barbara's presence would be more acceptable in that house, where he guessed what had happened; but occur to him it did; and Aunt Barbara, sitting by her winter fire and thinking of Ethelyn, was startled terribly by the missive which bade her join Richard Markham at Albany, on the morrow, and go with him to Iowa, where Ethie lay so ill. A pilgrimage to Mecca would scarcely have looked more formidable to the good woman than this sudden trip to Iowa; but where her duty was concerned she did not hesitate, and when at noon of the next day the New York train came up the river, the first thing Richard saw as he walked rapidly toward the Central Depot at Albany was Aunt Barbara's bonnet protruding from the car window and Aunt Barbara's hand making frantic pa.s.ses and gestures to attract his notice.

CHAPTER XVII

RICHARD'S HEIR

For one whole week the windows of Ethelyn's room were darkened as dark as Mrs. Markham's heavy shawl and a patchwork quilt could make them. The doctor rode to and from the farmhouse, looking more and more concerned each time he came from the sick-room. Mrs. Jones was over almost every hour, or if she did not come Tim was sent to inquire, his voice very low and subdued as he asked, "How is she now?" while James' voice was lower and sadder still as he answered, "There is no change." Up and down the stairs Mrs. Markham trod softly, wishing that she had never harbored an unkind thought against the pale-faced girl lying so unconscious of all they were doing for her. In the kitchen below, with a scared look upon her face, Eunice washed and wiped her dishes, and wondered if Richard would get home in time for the funeral, and if he would order from Camden a metallic coffin such as Minnie Dayton had been buried in; and Eunice's tears fell like rain as she thought how terrible it was to die so young, and unprepared, too, as she heard Mrs. Markham say to the Methodist clergyman when he came over to offer consolation.

Yes, Ethelyn was unprepared for the fearful change which seemed so near, and of all the household none felt this more keenly than Andy, whose tears soaked through and through the leaf of the prayer-book, where was printed the pet.i.tion for the sick, and who improvised many a touching prayer himself, kneeling by the wooden chair where G.o.d had so often met and blessed him.

"Don't let Ethie die, Good Father, don't let her die; at least not till she is ready, and d.i.c.k is here to see her--poor old d.i.c.k, who loves her so much. Please spare her for him, and take me in her place. I'm good for nothing, only I do hope I'm ready, and Ethie ain't; so spare her and take me in her place."

This was one of Andy's prayers--generous, unselfish Andy--who would have died for Ethelyn, and who had been in such exquisite distress since the night when Eunice first found Ethelyn moaning in her room, with her letter to Richard lying unfinished before her. No one had read that letter--the Markhams were too honorable for that--and it had been put away in the portfolio, while undivided attention was given to Ethelyn.

She had been unconscious nearly all the time, saying once when Mrs.

Markham asked, "Shall we send for Richard?" "Send for Aunt Barbara; please send for Aunt Barbara."

This was the third day of Ethelyn's danger, and on the sixth there came a change. The shawl was pinned back from the window, admitting light enough for the watchers by the bedside to see if the sufferer still breathed. Life was not extinct, and Mrs. Markham's lips moved with a prayer of thanksgiving when Mrs. Jones pointed to a tiny drop of moisture beneath the tangled hair. Ethelyn would live, the doctor said, but down in the parlor on the sofa where Daisy had lain was a little lifeless form with a troubled look upon its face, showing that it had fought for its life. p.r.o.ne upon the floor beside it sat Andy, whispering to the little one and weeping for "poor old d.i.c.k, who would mourn for his lost boy."

Andy was very sorry, and to one who saw him that day, and, ignorant of the circ.u.mstances, asked what was the matter that he looked so solemn, he answered sadly, "I have just lost my little uncle that I wanted to stand sponsor for. He only lived a day," and Andy's tears flowed afresh as he thought of all he had lost with the child whose life numbered scarcely twenty-four hours in all. But that was enough to warrant its being now among the spirits of the Redeemed, and heaven seemed fairer, more desirable to Andy than it had done before. His father was there with Daisy and his baby uncle, as he persisted in calling Ethelyn's dead boy until James told him better, and pointed out the ludicrousness of the mistake. To Ethelyn Andy was tender as a mother, when at last they let him see her, and his lips left marks upon her forehead and cheek.