For the Major Part 13

"You have always done that, Madam Carroll," said Owen, touched by her emotion.

"You will come, then--on whatever day the doctor makes up his mind," she said, controlling herself, and returning to her subject.

Here Miss Carroll spoke. "Isn't it better not to make engagements for the present, mamma?" she said, warningly. "You will overtax your strength."

"It is overtaxed at this moment far less than it has been for many a long month," answered Madam Carroll, as it seemed to Owen, strangely.

She pa.s.sed her hand over her forehead, and then, as if putting herself aside in order to consider her companions for a moment, she looked first at Sara, then turned and looked at Owen. "Do not stay any longer now,"

she said to him, gently, in an advising tone. He obeyed her, and went away.

On the tenth day after this the doctor, whose conclusions, if slowly made, were sure, announced his decision: it tallied exactly with that of Madam Carroll. The Major was in no present danger; his physical health was fairly good; his condition would not change much, and he might linger on in this state for several years. And then the Far Edgerley people, knowing that no more pain would come to him, and that he was tranquil and even happy, that he recognized his wife, and that she gave to him the most beautiful and tender devotion--then these Far Edgerley people were glad and thankful to have him with them still; not wholly gone, though lying unseen in his peaceful room, which faced the west, so that the sunset could shine every day upon the quiet sunset of his life.

And they thought, some of them, that thanksgiving prayers should be offered for this in the church. And they all prayed for him at home, each family in its own way.

On the afternoon of the day when the doctor had made up his mind, Frederick Owen went to the Farms. Madam Carroll came down to see him; she took him to the library, now unused, and when they had entered, she closed the door. "Will you sit here beside me?" she said, indicating a sofa opposite the window. Again he was struck by the great--as it seemed to him, the marvellous--change in her. She looked even older than before; her hair was put back in the same plain way; there was the same absence of color, the same tired look in her eyes, the same fine net-work of wrinkles over all her small face; but added to these there was now a settled sadness of expression which he felt would never pa.s.s away. He missed, too, all the changing inflections and gestures, the pretty little manner and att.i.tudes, and even the p.r.o.nunciation, which he had supposed to belong inseparably to her, which he had thought entirely her own. He missed likewise, though unconsciously, the prettiness of the bright little gowns she had always worn; she was dressed now in black, without color or ornament.

She seemed to divine his thoughts. "The Major can no longer see me," she said, quietly; "that is, with any distinctness. It is no longer anything to him--what I wear."

He had taken the seat she had offered; she sat beside him, with her hands folded, her eyes on the opposite wall. "I have a story to tell you," she said. "But I can make no prefaces; I cannot speak of feelings.

I hope for your interest, Mr. Owen, even for your sympathy; but if I get them it will be accomplished by a narrative of facts alone, and not by any pathos in the words themselves. I got beyond pathos long ago. My name was Marion More. My father was a missionary in the Southwest--the exact localities I need not give. At sixteen I married. My father died within the year; my mother had died long before. My first child was a son, born when I was seventeen; I called him Julian. Later there came to me a daughter, my little Cecilia. When she was still a baby, and Julian was seven, my husband, in a brawl at a town some miles from our house, killed a man who was well known and liked in the neighborhood; they had both fired, and the other man was the better shot, but upon this occasion his ball happened to miss, and my husband's did not. I was sitting at home, sewing; the baby was in the cradle at my feet, and Julian was playing with his little top on the floor. My husband rode rapidly into the yard on his fast black horse, Tom, sprang down, came into the house, and went into the inner room. He soon came back and went out. He called Julian. The child ran into the yard; then hurried back to get the little overcoat I had made for him. 'Where are you going?' I said. 'To ride with papa,' he answered, and, eager as he was to go, he did not forget to come and kiss me good-by. Then he ran out, and I heard them start; I heard Tom's hoofs on the hard road farther and farther away; then all was still. But less than half an hour afterwards there was noise enough; the garden was full of armed men. The whole country-side were out after him. They hunted him for three days. But he knew the woods and swamps better than they did, and they could not find him. They knew that he would in time make for the river, and they kept a watch along sh.o.r.e. He reached it on the fourth day, at a lonely point; he turned Tom loose, took a skiff which he knew was there, and started out with my little boy upon the swollen tide--for the river was high.

They were soon discovered by the watch on sh.o.r.e. Shots were fired at them. But the skiff was out in the centre of the stream, which was very wide just there, and the shots missed. They followed the skiff along sh.o.r.e. They knew what he did not--that the river narrowed below the bend, and that there were rapids there. He reached the bend, and saw that he was lost; the current carried the boat down towards the narrows; and they began to shoot again; one shot struck Julian. Then his father took him in his arms and jumped overboard with him. That, they knew, was death. They saw the dark bodies whirled round and round, and amused themselves by shooting at them once or twice; they saw them sucked under. Then, farther away, they saw them again swept along like logs, inert, dead; on and on; two black dots; out of sight. Then they rode back, that hunting party; and their wives came and told me, as mercifully as they could, that my husband and my little boy were drowned. I could not bury my dead; on the rapid current of the river they were already miles away; in that country no one cared for the dead.

They cared but little for the living. I took my baby and went away; I left that horrible land. I came eastward. I had no money, or very little; my husband had taken what--what he needed for his flight, and there was nothing left. I tried to teach little day schools for children. I gave music lessons. I did my best. But I was not strong; my little girl, too, was very delicate: there was something the matter with her spine. When this life of ours--hers and mine--had lasted ten years (for I am much older than you have supposed), I met Major Carroll. He was so good as to love me; he was so good as to marry me; he took as his own my poor little girl, and gave her all the comforts and luxuries she needed--things I could not give. She died soon afterwards, in spite of all. But in our new home she had had happy days, and when the end came she did not suffer: she went back to G.o.d in sleep. On the 6th of last July I was in the garden here, gathering some roses; it was below the slope of the knoll, out of sight from the house. The gate opened, and a young man came in. He came across to me. He introduced himself as a stranger in Far Edgerley, who had admired our flowers. He spoke several sentences while I stood looking at him. I was frightened; I knew not why. At last, recovering myself, I turned to walk towards the house.

Then it was that he put his hand on my arm, and said: 'Don't you know me, mother? I am Julian, the little boy you thought dead.' He was thirty-one years old, and I had lost him before he was eight. What had startled me was his likeness to his father. They had escaped, after all.

His father had feigned death; he had let himself be swept along, keeping hold of the child, who was unconscious. It was a desperate expedient.

But he was desperate. He was an expert swimmer, and he succeeded, though barely, with life just fluttering within them. They lay hid in a canebrake for some days, and then, after much difficulty, they made their way out of the country. They went to Mexico. Then they went to the West India Islands. They lived in Martinique, and they took the name of Dupont. My husband did not try to come back; a reward had been offered for him before he fled; there was a price on his head. He knew that I supposed him dead, and he was quite willing to be dead--to me. He was tired of me. I was only a burden to him. I was always talking about little things. My son thought that we were dead--his little sister and I; his father had told him so. But after his father's death he found among his papers some memoranda which made him think that perhaps we were not, that perhaps he could even find us. He did not try immediately; it was but a chance, and he was interested in other things.

But later he did try; that is, in his way; he was never sharp and energetic--as you are. He found me; but his little sister had gone to heaven. My son had had only the education of the islands, and he was, besides, a musician. The temperament of musicians is peculiar. You will allow me to say that I think you do not understand it. He wished to go back to the islands; he had been in the United States for a year, and he did not like the life or climate. I helped him as much as I could. It was not much; but he started. Then he had that illness in New York, and came back. It was most important that he should start again, and soon--before the return of winter. I had nothing to give him, and so I went to my daughter--I mean my step-daughter, Sara. She has, you know, a small income of her own, left her by her uncle. You are asking yourself why I did not go to the Major; why there should have been any secret about it from the first. It was because I had not told him at the time of our marriage, or at any time, that I had ever had a son. He thought when he married me that Cecilia was my only child; he thought me twenty-three, when I was in reality over thirty-five. It would have been a great shock and pain to him to know that I had deceived him--a shock which, in his state of health at that time, he could not have borne.

When Sara knew, she helped me; she helped me n.o.bly. But the time for the semi-annual payment of her income was not until the 12th of October, and by the terms of her uncle's will she could not antic.i.p.ate it; we were therefore obliged to wait. Before the 12th of October my son was taken ill, as I had feared. And the rest--you know. The time when I could tell you this has now come. It has come because nothing can again disturb the Major's peace. He is near us in touch, and close to our love, but earth's sorrows and pains can trouble him no more. I can therefore tell you, and I do it for two reasons. One is that it will explain to you the course we took; it will explain to you what Sara said that afternoon, for I think that it has grieved you--what Sara said. It was an expedient that she thought of to divert your attention, to stop further action on your part. We knew--from your having tried to see the Major, and see him alone--that you had learned something; how much, we could not tell.

And when you came again the next day, and spoke as you did, first to me, and then to her, and I was frightened and lost my courage, fearing lest you should speak to others also; then Sara took the only expedient she could think of to silence you, to stop you effectually, and thus secure her father's peace. But it was only an expedient, Mr. Owen. It was never true." She paused for the first time in the utterance of her brief sentences, turned her head, and looked at him with her faded, tired eyes.

Owen's own eyes were wet. "Even before that," he said, "and I do not deny how important it is to me--more important than anything else in the world--even before that, Madam Carroll, I beg you to say that you forgive me, that you forgive what I did and said. I did not know--how could I?--and I was greatly troubled."

"I think I can say that I have forgiven you," answered Madam Carroll. "I did not at first; I did not for a long time. It is all over now; and of course you did not know. But you never understood my son--you could not; and therefore--if you will be so good--I should prefer that you should not speak to me of him again; it is much the easiest way for us both."

She turned her eyes back to the wall. "About Sara," she continued, without pause, "it was a pity. It has been a long time for you to wait--with that--that mistaken belief on your mind. But, while the Major was still with us in his consciousness and his memory, I could not tell to you, a stranger, what I was not able to tell him."

"You were afraid to trust me!" said Owen, a pained expression coming into his face.

"Yes," answered Madam Carroll, simply.

"You did not know then that I felt as far as possible from being a stranger? That I wished--that I have tried--"

"That is later; I was coming to that. Yes--since I have known that you cared so much for her (though I knew it long ago!)--since you have spoken, rather, I have felt that I wished to tell you, that I would gladly tell you, as soon as I could. The time has come, and it came earlier than I expected, though I knew it could not be long delayed. I have taken the earliest hour."

"Then she--then Miss Carroll told you that I--that I had spoken?" said Owen.

"She told me because I asked her, pressed her. I knew that you had been here--a week ago, wasn't it?--I had caught a glimpse of your face as you left the house. And so I asked her. She is very reticent, very proud; she would never have told me, in spite of my asking, if her wish to show me that I had been mistaken in something I had said to her long before had not been stronger even than her reserve."

"What was it that you were mistaken in?" said Owen, quickly.

"I was not mistaken. But she wished to prove to me that I was. I had told her in October that she cared for you, and that she had made the greatest sacrifice a woman could make in voluntarily lowering herself in your eyes by allowing you to suppose--to suppose what you did."

"You were mistaken, after all, Madam Carroll," said Owen, sadly. "She cares nothing for me."

"Men are dull," answered the mistress of the Farms, wearily. "They have to have everything explained to them. Don't you see that it was inevitable that she should refuse you? As things stood--as you let them stand--she could not stoop to any other course. She knew that you believed that she had cared for--for Louis Dupont" (Madam Carroll's face had here a strange, set sternness, but her soft voice went on unchanged), "and she knew your opinion of him. She knew, moreover, that you believed it clandestine, that she had not dared to tell her father.

For you to come, then, at this late day, believing all this, and tell her that you loved her--that seemed to her an insult. Your tone was, I presume (if not your words), that you loved her in spite of all."

"Yes," Owen answered. "For that was my feeling. I did love her in spite of all. I had fought against it. I had thought--I don't know what. But it was over; whatever it had been it was ended forever, and my love had conquered. I knew that very well!"

"And you told her so, I suppose--'I love you in spite of all'--when you should have said 'I love you; and it never existed.'"

"But had she not told me with her own lips that it did exist, that she was engaged to him?"

"You should not have believed her own lips; you should have risen above that. You should have told her to her face that you did not believe, and never would believe, anything that was, or even seemed to be, against her. I see you know very little about women. You will have to learn. I am taking all this pains for you because I want her to be happy. Her nature is a very n.o.ble one, in spite of an overweight of pride. She could not explain to you, even at that time, without betraying me, and that she would never do. But I doubt whether she would have explained in any case; it would have been doing too much for you."

"All she did was done for her father," said Owen; "and it was the same with you, Madam Carroll. Seldom has man been so loved. My place with her will be but a second one."

"That should content you."

"Ah, you do _not_ like me, though you try to help me," cried the young man. "But give me time, Madam Carroll; give me time."

"To make me like you? Take as much as you please. But do not take it with Sara."

"I shall take five minutes," Owen answered. Then he lifted her hand to his lips. "Forgive me for thinking of my own happiness," he said, with the gentlest respect.

"I like you to think of it; it gives me pleasure. And now I must come to my second reason for telling you. You remember I said that there were two. This is something which even Sara does not know--I would not give her any of that burden; she could not help me, and she had enough to bear. She could not help me; but now you can. It is something I want you to do for me. It could not be done before, it could not be done until the Major became as he is at present. No one now living knows; still, as you are to be one of us, I should like to have you do it for me."

And then she told him.

CHAPTER IX.

On Easter Sunday morning Far Edgerley people woke to find their village robed in blossoms; in one night the fruit trees had burst into bloom, so that all the knolls and Edgerley Street itself stood in bridal array, and walking to church was like taking part in a beautiful procession.

Nearly a month had pa.s.sed since the Major's attack; but all his old friends in the congregation of St. John's missed him more than ever on this Easter morning. Sara and Scar were in the Carroll pew at the head of the aisle; but it looked very empty, nevertheless. During this month there had not been much change in the Major, save that for two weeks after the doctor's decision he had not been so well; restlessness had troubled him. But for the preceding few days he had been much better, and every one was cheered by this; every one was interested in hearing that he had talked quite at length with his wife on simple local subjects, that he enjoyed little things, and thought about them. He lived entirely in the present, the present of the pa.s.sing moment; everything in the past he had forgotten, and he speedily forgot the moment itself as soon as it was gone. What his wife said to him he understood, and he always knew when she was near, though his blind eyes could not see her; he felt for a fold of her dress or the ruffle of her sleeve, and held it; the sense of touch had taken the place of the vanished sight. He listened for Scar's voice too, and seemed to like to have him in the room, to hold the child's hand in his. In the same way he always smiled and was pleased when Sara spoke to him.

When the morning service was over, every one waited to ask how the Major was on this lovely Easter Sunday. Lately they had come to like his daughter far better than they had liked her at first; they said she talked more, that she was not so cold. Certainly there was nothing cold in her face, but a beautiful sweetness, as she rose from her knees and, taking Scar's hand, turned to go down the aisle. She answered their questions on the steps and in the church-yard. For on Easter morning Far Edgerley people always brought many flowers to church; then, after service, they took them out and laid them upon all the graves, so that, as Scar once said, "they could have their Easter Sunday too." Every mound had its blossoms to-day, and there were many upon the grave of the young stranger, Louis Dupont; this was because there was no one, they said, to remember him. So they all remembered him.

A little before sunset Frederick Owen, having officiated at the Easter service of the Sunday-school and at one of his mission stations, was on his way to Carroll Farms. As he came up Carroll Lane and crossed the little bridge over the brook, he saw that there was more bloom here than anywhere else in all the blooming town. For the whole orchard was out behind the house, and all the flowering almonds in front of it; the old stone walls rose close pressed in blossoms. Sara opened the door before he had time to knock. "I was watching for you," she said. "Judith Inches and Caleb have gone up the mountain to see their mother, as they always do on Easter afternoon, and they have taken Scar."

Owen paused in the hall to greet her; he was very proud of this proud, reserved girl whose love he had won.

"Do not wait, Frederick. Mamma has such a pleadingly sorrowful look to-day that I want to have it over."

"Only a moment," said Owen. He was standing with his arm round her, holding her close. "Do you remember that afternoon when I spoke to you of your mother, of the sisterly kindness she had shown to that poor woman who had lost her crippled boy? And do you remember that you said that no one save those who were in the house with her all the time could comprehend the one hundredth part of her tenderness, her constant thought for others? Your answer put me in a glow of pleasure, I did not then comprehend why. I asked myself as I walked home if I cared so much to hear Madam Carroll praised. I know now what I cared for--it was because _you_ had said it. For I had been afraid, unconsciously to myself, perhaps, that you did not fully appreciate her, appreciate her as she seemed to me."

"And I had not until then. I shall always reproach myself--"

"You need not; you have made up for it a hundredfold," answered Owen.

Then, coming back to himself, with love's unfailing egotism--"I wonder if you realize all the suffering I went through?" he continued. "You made me wait in my pain so long, so long!"