His Sombre Rivals Part 43

He looked at her almost perfect features with the bloom of health upon them, into her dark eyes with their depths of motherly pride and joy, at her snowy neck and ivory arms bare to the summer heat, and longest at the wavy silver of her hair, that crowned her beauty with an almost supernatural charm.

"Don't I see you as you are, Grace?" he said. "Well, I am often spellbound by what I do see. If Hilda becomes like you, excepting your sorrows, my dearest wish in her behalf will be fulfilled."

Old Aunt Sheba, standing behind the baby's chair, felt a chill at heart as she thought: "Dey'se all a-worshippin' de chile and each oder. I sees it so plain dat I'se all ob a-tremble."

Surely the dark shadows of the past have no place near that birthday feast, but they are coming nearer, closing in, remorseless, relentless as ever, and among them are the gloomy rivals against whom Graham struggled so long. He thought he had vanquished them, but they are stealing upon him again like vindictive, unforgiving savages.

There was a jar of thunder upon the still air, but it was not heeded.

The room began to darken, but they thought only of a shower that would banish the sultriness of the day. Darker shadows than those of thunder-clouds were falling upon them, had they known it.

The wine was brought, and the health of the baby drank. Then Graham, ordering all gla.s.ses to be filled, said reverently: "To the memory of Warren Hilland! May the child who is named for him ever remind us of his n.o.ble life and heroic death."

They drank in silence, then put down the gla.s.ses and sat for moments with bowed heads, Grace's tears falling softly. Without, nature seemed equally hushed. Not a breath stirred the sultry air, until at last a heavier and nearer jar of thunder vibrated in the distance.

The unseen shadows are closing around the little Hilda, whose eyelids are heavy with satiety. Aunt Sheba is about to take her from her chair, when a swift gust, cold and spray-laden, rushes through the house, crushing to the doors and whirling all light articles into a carnival of disorder.

The little gossamer-clad girl shivered, and, while others hastily closed windows, Grace ran for a shawl in which to wrap her darling.

The shower pa.s.sed, bringing welcome coolness. Hilda slept quietly through its turmoil and swishing torrents--slept on into the twilight, until Aunt Sheba seemed a shadow herself. But there were darker shadows brooding over her.

Suddenly, in her sleep, the child gave an ominous barking cough.

"Oh, de good Lor'!" cried Aunt Sheba, springing to her feet. Then with a swiftness in which there was no sign of age, she went to the landing and called, "Mas'r Graham."

Grace was in the room before him. "What is it?" she asked breathlessly.

"Well, Missy Grace, don't be 'larmed, but I tinks Mas'r Graham 'ud better sen' for de doctor, jes' for caution like."

Again came that peculiar cough, terror-inspiring to all mothers.

"Alford, Alford, lose not a moment!" she cried. "It's the croup."

The soldier acted as if his camp were attacked at midnight. There were swift feet, the trampling of a horse; and soon the skill of science, the experience of age, and motherly tenderness confronted the black shadows, but they remained immovable.

The child gasped and struggled for life. Grace, half frantic, followed the doctor's directions with trembling hands, seeking to do everything for her idol herself as far as possible. Mrs. Mayburn, gray, grim, with face of ashen hue, hovered near and a.s.sisted. Aunt Sheba, praying often audibly, proved by her deft hands that the experience of her long-past motherhood was of service now. The servants gathered at the door, eager and impatient to do something for "de bressed chile." The poor old major thumped restlessly back and forth on his crutches in the hall below, half swearing, half praying. Dr. Markham, pale with anxiety, but cool and collected as a veteran general in battle, put forth his whole skill to baffle the destroyer. Graham, standing in the background with clenched hands, more excited, more desperate than he had ever been when sitting on his horse waiting for the bugle to sound the charge, watched his wife and child with eyes that burned in the intensity of his feeling.

Time, of which no notice was taken, pa.s.sed, although moments seemed like hours. The child still struggled and gasped, but more and more feebly. At last, in the dawn, the little Hilda lay still, looked up and smiled. Was it at her mother's face, or something beyond?

"She is better," cried Grace, turning her imploring eyes to the physician, who held the little hand.

Alas! it was growing cold in his. He turned quickly to Graham and whispered: "Support your wife. The end is near."

He came mechanically and put his arm around her.

"Grace, dear Grace," he faltered, hoa.r.s.ely, "can you not bear this sorrow also for my sake?"

"Alford!" she panted with horror in her tones--"Alford! why, why, her hand is growing cold!"

There was a long low sigh from the little one, and then she was still.

"Take your wife away," said Dr. Markham, in a low, authoritative tone.

Graham sought to obey in the same mechanical manner. She sprang from him and stood aloof. There was a terrible light in her eyes, before which he quailed.

"Take me away!" she cried, in a voice that was hoa.r.s.e, strained, and unnatural. "Never! Tell me the belief of your heart. Have I lost my child forever? Is that sweet image of my Hilda nothing but clay? Is there nothing further for this idol of my heart but horrible corruption? If this is true, no more learned jargon to me about law and force! If this is true, I am the creation of a fiend who, with all the cruel ingenuity of a fiend, has so made me that he can inflict the utmost degree of torture. If this is true, my motherhood is a lie, and good is punished, not evil. If this is true, there is neither G.o.d nor law, but only a devil. But let me have the truth: have I lost that child forever?"

He was dumb, and an awful silence fell upon the chamber of death.

Graham's philosophy failed him at last. His own father-heart could not accept of corruption as the final end of his child. Indeed, it revolted at it with a resistless rebound as something horrible, monstrous, and, as his wife had said, devilish. His old laborious reasoning was scorched away as by lightning in that moment of intense consciousness when _his_ soul told him that, if this were true, his nature also was a lie and a cheat. He knew not what he believed, or what was true. He was stunned and speechless.

Despair was turning his wife's face into stone, when old Aunt Sheba, who had been crouching, sobbing and praying at the foot of the little couch, rose with streaming eyes and stretched out her hands toward the desperate mother.

"No, Missy Grace," she cried, in tones that rang through the house; "no, no, no. Your chile am not lost to you; your chile am not dead. She on'y sleeps. Did not de good Lord say: 'Suffer de little chillen ter come unter Me'? An' Hilda, de dear little lamb, hab gone ter Him, an'

is in de Good Shepherd's arms. Your little chile am not lost to you, she's safe at home, de dear bressed home ob heben, whar your moder is Missy Grace. De Hebenly Father say, 'Little Hilda, you needn't walk de long flinty, th.o.r.n.y path and suffer like you'se dear moder. You kin come home now, and I'se 'll take keer ob ye till moder comes.' Bress de little lamb, she smile when de angels come fer her, an' she's safe, safe for ebermore. No tears fer little Hilda, no heartbreak in all her 'ternal life. Dear Missy Grace, my little baby die, too, but I hain't los' it. No, no. De Good Shepherd is a keepin' it safe fer me, an' I shall hab my baby again."

It is impossible to describe the effect of this pa.s.sionate utterance of faith as it came warm and direct from the heart of another bereaved mother, whose lowliness only emphasized the universal human need of something more than negations and theories of law and force. The major heard it in the hall below, and was awed. Mrs. Mayburn and the servants sobbed audibly. The stony look went out of Grace's face; tears welled up into her hot, dry eyes, and she drew near and bent over her child with an indescribable yearning in her face. Aunt Sheba ceased, sank down on the floor, and throwing her ap.r.o.n over her face she rocked back and forth and prayed as before.

Suddenly Grace threw herself on the unconscious little form, and cried with a voice that pierced every heart: "O G.o.d, I turn to Thee, then. Is my child lost to me forever, or is she in Thy keeping? Was my mother's faith true? Shall I have my baby once more? Jesus, art Thou a Shepherd of the little ones? Hast Thou suffered my Hilda to come unto Thee? Oh, if Thou art, Thou canst reveal Thyself unto me and save a broken-hearted mother from despair. This child _was_ mine. Is it mine still?" and she clasped her baby convulsively to her bosom.

"Suffer de little chillen ter come unter me, and forbid dem not,'"

repeated Aunt Sheba in low tones.

Again a deep, awed silence fell upon them all. Grace knelt so long with her own face pressed against her child's that they thought she had fainted. The physician motioned Graham to lift her up, but he shook his head. He was crushed and despairing, feeling that in one little hour he had lost the belief of his manhood, the child that had brought into his home a heaven that he at least could understand, and as he heard his wife's bitter cry he felt that her life and reason might soon go also.

He recognized again the presence of his bitter rivals, Grief and Death, and felt that at last they had vanquished him. He had not the courage or the will to make another effort.

"Mrs. Graham, for your husband's sake--" began Dr. Markham.

"Ah! forgive me, Alford," she said, rising weakly; "I should not have forgotten you for a moment."

She took an uncertain step toward him, and he caught her in his arms.

Laying her head upon his breast, she said gently, "Alford, our baby is not dead."

"Oh, Grace, darling!" he cried in agony, "don't give way, or we are both lost. I have no strength left. I cannot save you again. Oh! if the awful past should come back!"

"It now can never come back. Alford, we have not lost our child. Aunt Sheba has had a better wisdom than you or I, and from this hour forth my mother's faith is mine. Do not think me wild or wandering. In my very soul has come the answer to my cry. Horrible corruption is not the end of that lovely life. You can't believe it, any more than I. Dear little sleeper, you are still _my_ baby. I shall go to you, and you will never suffer as I have suffered. G.o.d bless you, Aunt Sheba! your heaven-inspired words have saved me from despair. Alford, dear Alford, do not give way so; I'll live and be your true and faithful wife. I'll teach you the faith that G.o.d has taught me."

He drew long, deep breaths. He was like a great ship trying to right itself in a storm. At last he said, in broken tones:

"Grace, you are right. It's not law or force. It's either G.o.d, who in some way that I can't understand, will bring good out of all this evil, or else it's all devilish, fiendish. If after this night you can be resigned, patient, hopeful, your faith shall be mine."

The shadows, affrighted, shrank further away than ever before. "I take you at your word," she replied, as she drew him gently away. "Come, let us go and comfort papa."

One after another stole out after them until Mrs. Mayburn was alone with the dead. Long and motionless she stood, with her eyes fixed on the quiet, lovely face.

"Hilda," at last she moaned, "little Hilda, shall poor old grandma ever see our baby again?"

At that moment the sun rose high enough to send a ray through the lattice, and it lighted the baby's face with what seemed a smile of unearthly sweetness.