Sister Carmen Part 6

CHAPTER VIII.

The next day Mauer was still so entirely unnerved and overcome by the events of the day before that it was with the greatest difficulty he rose from the bed; and yet it was intolerable misery to remain there.

All Carmen's persuasions were of no avail; he insisted on getting up and dressing; but was quite unable to leave the house, and required the most perfect quietness. She tried to divert his mind, by gentle, cheerful conversation, from the sad, gloomy thoughts which seemed to oppress him. It made the girl's tender heart ache, as she looked into his unutterably sad face, which only yesterday was beaming with such great joy.

At ten o'clock Jonathan came to pay a friendly visit. Fortunately Carmen, who was standing at the window, saw him coming across the street towards the house, and warning her father of the approaching visit, she could see how he started with terror at the information.

But he soon controlled himself, and said in a resigned tone: "Let him come in. The sooner I get through all the meetings and greetings, the sooner I will have some rest. I must grow accustomed to seeing him, and I feel stronger to-day than yesterday. I have not seen him before, since your dear mother died, Carmen, and life has been one long unbroken sorrow since then." She made a movement to leave the room, so that the meeting between the friends should be private, but Mauer held her back and pleaded: "Stay with me, my child," as if he could not bear to have her out of his sight.

When Jonathan entered, he stood for a moment near the door, and his eyes sought to read the expression of the sick man's face. The latter sat with his head resting against the sofa-cushion, and his deep-sunken eyes fixed beseechingly on the visitor, as if saying, "Spare me!"

"Good-morning Brother Mauer!" cried Jonathan. "Are you feeling better to-day?" He held out his hand, into which the other placed his hesitatingly, and would have quickly withdrawn it had not Jonathan held it fast as he said:

"Let me feel your pulse. You are still very much fatigued, and your hand is as cold as ice."

"Thank you, Brother Jonathan," said the invalid; "I think perfect rest is the best remedy. I have borne many heavy burdens, dear Brother, which have weighed me down intolerably; and now that the Lord has led me home again, let your pity and sympathy be with me on account of all I have suffered."

"Certainly, Brother Michael; it cannot be otherwise. Your return has been a matter of great rejoicing with us all," replied Jonathan. "But I must give you a prescription, that you may gain your strength more quickly. Do not talk too much to-day; some time, later on, you must give us an account of your travels." With these words, he turned to Carmen with a searching look, as if to divine how far he might trust to her silence. She purposely avoided his eye, and remained standing at the window.

"I will make your father well again, if you will be kind to me in return," he said with emphasis.

Then she was compelled to turn and speak. This man ruled her, in spite of her dislike.

"If you can do anything for my father, Brother Jonathan, you will please not consider me in the matter, but do it for G.o.d's sake and your own," she replied calmly.

He drew a chair up to the table, and, seating himself, wrote a prescription which he handed to Carmen.

"Have that prepared at once, dear Sister," he said, "and give it to your father according to the directions; it will benefit him very much.

You know, Brother Michael, my remedies are very powerful." A peculiar, sarcastic expression played around his mouth as he spoke, and Carmen, whose quick eye perceived it, wondered what he was ridiculing. Was it her anxiety about her father, or was it the old man's weakness? But it came and went like a flash, and he resumed his usual manner as he rose to leave, saying to Mauer: "Adieu, Brother. May the Lord keep you and give you a speedy recovery!"

"I will have the medicine prepared at once, father," said Carmen, heaving a sigh of relief as the door closed behind the physician. But when she looked at the old man, a chill of anguish struck through her heart, for she saw how he had clasped his hands before his face, to hide the big tears which were trickling between his fingers.

Many days pa.s.sed quietly away after Jonathan's visit. Carmen's soothing, cheering influence seemed to have somewhat allayed her father's nervousness, and a calmer, more equable mood seemed to have come over him, as his state of health daily improved. But the nameless shadow of a hidden grief seemed to hang over him. For his wants he needed but little; self-denial and sacrifice had grown to be a second nature to him, his one earthly wish seeming to be to have a house where he and Carmen could live alone together; but as regards others, he was open-handed and generous to help wherever it was needed. It was a very difficult matter to find just the right dwelling to suit his taste, so he finally concluded to build, renting in the meantime a comfortable suite of apartments for himself, while Carmen continued to live as heretofore in the Sisters' house; giving the smaller children a few hour's instruction, and pa.s.sing the rest of the day with her father.

She had regained all her vivacity of manner, for she considered her dear father her protector and support; little guessing that it was, in reality, quite the contrary, as he looked to her as his stay on which to lean. When alone with him, she allowed her naturally gay humor to have full sway, and he would smile contentedly when he heard her exquisite voice warbling forth, now a hymn, now a Spanish love-song, or when he saw her feet, as if inspired, try a half-forgotten Spanish dance, which seemed like a greeting to him from that tropical world where he had loved and suffered. Sometimes she would caress him with pretty, fascinating ways, as if her heart longed to lavish on him all the tenderness which had been gathering intensity during all the long years of separation.

"You are so like Inez! Gay and merry, like her," he would say with emotion, his eyes beaming with love. Thus she would succeed in charming away, for a few moments at least, the shadow which rested ever on his brow; and this success gave her a pure happiness she had never known before.

As the invalid grew stronger, every one hastened to visit him. The elders wanted a full account of his missionary work in Mongolia, and of the religious condition of the heathen in Bengal and the Himalayas; so Mauer was at last obliged to consent to give a public narration of his experiences. This could not fail to give him a certain degree of importance in the settlement, and it was suggested that he be elected to some public office. But he divested their minds of any such thought, and desired to be allowed a quiet and retired life; he was too modest and reserved to put himself forward at any time, and now anything like publicity was positively painful to him. Even when chatting socially with old friends, he displayed more or less shyness, and especially when Jonathan was present.

"A strange sort of friendship!" thought Carmen, as she noticed how her father never sought the doctor's society, but, on the contrary, seemed to tolerate his company with a kind of bitter endurance, as if he were in some secret way the master and Mauer the slave. Often, when Jonathan addressed him, he would suddenly change color and an involuntary expression of terror pa.s.s over his countenance; then the physician's words would a.s.sume a slightly scornful tone, and Mauer would humbly lower his eyes.

A few days after Jonathan's visit, he inquired how the prescribed medicine had affected him.

"Most beneficially," replied Mauer. "I feel stronger in every way."

"Just as I thought," said the other, smiling kindly. "I ordered fifteen drops, but now you can begin to take twenty; that will not be too strong--but positively not more, dear Brother."

Mauer looked up at him with an expression of keenest anguish, and gasped for breath; while Jonathan continued to smile at him.

No wonder Carmen thought, "What a strange sort of friendship!"

"It must be with my dear father as it is with me," she said to herself by way of explanation. "He recognizes the snake-like nature in Brother Jonathan, but dares not show it; and having been friends in early youth, he still loves him in spite of everything."

Weeks and months pa.s.sed away. Mauer's house was in process of being completed, and he was constantly urging the workmen to have it ready for him as soon as possible, as he longed to be settled.

The plan had evidently been drawn on the same simple and s.p.a.cious style of the hacienda in Jamaica, where Carmen's mother had lived. A wide, shady veranda was to extend all around, and a broad flight of steps to lead from it to the s.p.a.cious grounds. Deep-seated windows were to open out on the garden, and elms instead of magnolias must shade them. But the veranda had to be given up, for, when the plan came under the observation of the elders, a committee called on Mauer and represented to him that such a thing would be a gross violation of the severe laws respecting the simple style of building used in the settlement, and would give cause for great offence. The inhabitants of the town must be content to live without ostentation and show, abiding by the general customs, and conducting themselves as humble members of the faith.

"Just to think: I, an old man, was going to set such a bad example and encourage foolish ideas!" said Mauer to his daughter, deeply mortified.

"When one has been abroad, in different lands, as I have, much that belongs to the outside world clings to him when he gets home, and is never so noticeable as when he mingles once more with his brethren.

The renouncing of our own will, and compliance with the wishes of others, has all to be learned over again."

"But," cried Carmen, impatiently, "they find impropriety in so many things here that one must needs give up thinking, in order to please them. The free spirit within us is so cramped and restricted that we cease to be individuals. It is surely not necessary to make automatons of ourselves if we wish to be good. No; we should choose the right of our own free will, because it is right; then we will not fail to do what is pleasing in the sight of G.o.d."

"Free spirit within us! What do you mean by that? We are so often the slaves of our own desires that our ideas of right and wrong get confused, and we lose our own souls thereby," returned her father, much agitated. "We should, therefore, never reject the path which our religion requires us to choose, but rather submit patiently, without arguing or any wish to rebel."

Thus the building which had been so beautifully planned, and with so much pleasure, turned out to be, when finished, just like all the others. But Carmen did not bear the frustration of their cherished hopes as calmly as the old man. Her visit to Wollmershain, although it had not given rise to any new tastes or dislikes regarding the home customs, had strengthened the long-buried desires which lay within her breast, and quickened her natural spirit of resistance to the existing state of things. Frau von Trautenau, as well as the style and manner of life at Wollmershain, was peculiarly congenial to her taste.

Therefore, although the visit had never been repeated, she often lived it over again in her thoughts, and in speaking with her father always referred enthusiastically to persons and things there. One day, while describing the unrestrained and harmonious life of her new friends, the sound of trumpets playing a hymn came wafted in through the open door.

"Who is dead, Carmen?" asked Mauer, listening intently as he sat by the window. "Is that not the dirge of a bachelor Brother? I remember the air, as I do that of all our funeral hymns. How often, when suffering under my bondage as a slave, I have thought that at my death no music would be heard. But now I know that some day the trumpets will tell to the other brothers when the heart of old Mauer has ceased to beat."

"Oh, my father, you must not speak thus!" said Carmen, anxiously. "The person for whom the music is sounding is the bachelor Brother Christopher Yager, who died yesterday evening. He was the one who spoke in defence of our unmarried sisters in the general council; and now some one will have to be elected in his place."

This election followed immediately after the funeral, the elders casting votes for those they deemed most suitable for the position.

The majority were in favor of Jonathan Fricke, who was received with universal satisfaction. No one was more pleased with the result than Sister Agatha, who always depended so much on him for advice. She felt that now, being able to entrust the affairs of her department to his wisdom and circ.u.mspection, his piety and brotherly love, was as if she handed her ship over to the guidance of a skilful and able captain. He received the honor with great humility, as a duty laid upon him from which he must not shrink, however unworthy he felt to bear the heavy responsibility. Yet in spite of all his apparent absence of pride, there was something about him which elicited the homage of the Sisters as they gave their promise to be willing to trust him with their confidence and follow his instructions.

CHAPTER IX.

Notwithstanding its being the month of September, a burning July heat prevailed, and, as a breath of wind would occasionally stir, great clouds of dust rose from the streets and lanes of the settlement. But in spite of the intense warmth of the sun, masons and carpenters were busily at work on Brother Mauer's house, which was located in a pleasant district on the outskirts of the town. From the windows on the first floor, which stood quite high from the ground, one could catch a fine view of the broad, sunny landscape. There was the green meadow-land, with its duck-pond, and beyond, round the road to the old mill in the valley, the steep path leading uphill to the graveyard, and finally, away off towards the south, great ma.s.ses of dense forest, rising one above the other, covering the mountain-sides and shutting out all that lay beyond.

"So that will be your room dear father, and this one next to it mine,"

said Carmen, pleasantly, as she and the old man wandered about in the bright morning air over the grounds and through the partially finished building which was to be their home.

"How pretty it will be here, father! I will raise vines all around the windows, so that, in summer, a pretty shade will fall in the rooms; and even though we are not allowed to have any ornaments, a cabinet of books will be here, and by the window shall stand a table with a vase of flowers on it, while over there I will make a cosey little nook, like the one Frau von Trautenau has in her room. And then when evening comes, dear father, you shall sit by me, and tell me of the snow-capped Himalayas, and the wonders of the East Indian world. Or when the lamp is lighted, I will read to you, just as I did to Frau von Trautenau in her dear little nook."

"How often you speak of that lady, Carmen! Is she so very dear to you?" asked Mauer.

"Yes, very dear, father," she replied eagerly, and the warmth of her feelings betrayed itself in her countenance. "She was very, very kind to me; and with her, I, who was so lonely, felt how good it must be to look into a mother's eyes. I could always turn to her for sympathy and advice, feeling sure of being understood; and that was a great comfort to me, when I thought you never would return, father. She is not grave and austere, like our Sisters here, but is in all things n.o.ble and good; and even though she belongs to those who are outside in the world, yet anyone following her could not go wrong. The world!" she continued thoughtfully. "We are all of this world as long as we live.

How can one set of people consider themselves so much better than the others?"

"We do not think ourselves better, child, but on a surer road to become so," interrupted the father. "And yet, even with us, there are no insurmountable barriers to keep us from straying into the by-paths which lead us away from the goal!" he added, with a sigh.

"Yes father," she said, with a fond smile. "That is just what I say.

The right way and the wrong, cross each other everywhere in life, and we must ever be striving more and more to distinguish between them."

"May your heart never mislead you, child!" answered the old man with emotion. "One who has lived as long as I have, who has fallen and endeavored to make atonement, learns to mistrust the human heart."