The Chronicles of Rhoda Part 22

So d.i.c.k and I played "Little Sallie Waters" together. It was hard work, there being only two of us, but we went around and around in a solemn circle, and sang the words earnestly, and when we came to the lines,

"Rise, Sallie, rise, Wipe out your eyes, Fly to the East, Fly to the West, Fly to the very one That you love best,"

we both kissed little Amy Dean, and she smiled at us again from her mother's arms, where she had been watching us with her great, mysterious, melancholy eyes.

"Sure she's better," the woman cried, in a tone between laughter and tears. "My own darlint! She's better! She's better already! They've done her more good than the doctor. Sure, she was lonesome for the likes of her own!"

Her face shone. She looked as if she could hug us both from grat.i.tude.

"I've got a doll at home whose name is Amy," I announced, bashfully, trying to make conversation.

"That you have," the woman agreed, heartily. "And without doubts you'll be bringing it for my little girl to see."

"I'll bring her to-morrow," I promised.

"Do you hear that, Amy?" the mother commented, happily.

"And I've got a horse named Alcibiades," d.i.c.k added, in his turn. "He's got red nostrils and a bushy tail. He prances. Like this."

He gave a spirited portrayal of Alcibiades all around the room, ending with a great whinny of delight.

"Would you let wee Amy take a ride on the pretty horse?" the mother inquired, persuasively.

"Yes," d.i.c.k promised, with eager gallantry. "Dozens and dozens of rides."

"See there now!" the woman exclaimed. "Won't my Amy have a grand time playing with the little lady and gentleman!"

The child seemed pleased. She laid one little wasted arm about her mother's neck in a loving way, and stretched out the other to us. I almost thought that she tried to speak. Then she settled back again, and her eyes gazed off far beyond us, through the roof of the mean house, higher and higher, perhaps at greater joys and glories that were to be hers forever.

The woman caught the little form to her quickly.

"Sing something else!" she cried, wildly. "Sing--"

She hesitated a moment, rocking herself to and fro on the edge of the bed with the child in her arms.

"Couldn't you sing a hymn?" she whispered. "Couldn't you, dears?"

d.i.c.k and I knew lots and lots of hymns. We always learned them on Sundays to please our grandmother. We stood closer together, and sang with full hearts, our voices rising up, clearly, shrilly, with childish emphasis:

"There's a Home for little children, Above the bright blue sky, Where Jesus reigns in glory, A Home of peace and joy; No home on earth is like it, Nor can with it compare, For everyone is happy, Nor can be happier there."

There was a sound of weeping in the room, but we sang on, earnestly, line after line, just as we had played.

Suddenly a hand was laid on each of our heads, and we looked up to see an old priest standing by us. He motioned for us to be silent, and went on to the corner where the child lay on the bed with the woman on her knees beside her, her face buried in the tiny dress.

"My daughter?" he said, inquiringly.

The pretty gay head came up with a start. The red cheeks were disfigured with weeping.

"She's gone, father!" the woman cried.

She dragged herself around, still on her knees, and laid her head against his hand.

"I've tried so hard to be good, father. Ever since you talked to me I've tried and I've tried. You know I have. But it's no use. No use.

Everything goes wrong with me. And now my Amy's gone!"

She burst into tears again, her words becoming incoherent from grief, and sobbed wildly, her head falling back against the bed.

"Where did these children come from?" the priest demanded, sternly.

She explained through her tears.

"I brought them here for Amy to play with. I thought-- You know how they all look down on her here, father. She never had a playmate. I thought if she were happier, if there were little friends of her own age about her, that I might coax her back again, get her to stay with me for awhile. I saw the two children standing at their gate. I only borrowed them. Sure, I didn't mean them any harm."

Her voice broke off again into sobs.

It was d.i.c.k who created a diversion at this moment. He had been hunting through his pockets, and now he brought out all his precious things,--the k.n.o.b off the machine drawer, the stopper of the cologne bottle, the ten missionary cents that were to educate the native child in India, even the Waterbury watch,--and laid them in a little pile on the bed. He pulled the old priest's hand to attract his attention.

"They're for her," he explained, with a nod at the bed.

He half touched the watch, and drew his hand away again.

"To keep," he persisted, bravely. "Tell her not to cry. Oh, tell her not to cry!"

But the woman cried only the harder.

The old priest took us home very carefully, down the rickety steps, and through the dirty courts and lanes, straight to the Green Door. All the ferocious-looking black men whom we met stopped to speak to him, and he ordered them about, with an air of authority, like so many small children. On the way he asked us many questions, and I confided the whole story to him, of how little brother d.i.c.k had been naughty, and had eaten the gingerbread and had been disowned, and how we had started out into the wide world together. Somehow I was glad that we hadn't gone any farther. Somehow home seemed a nicer place now. It was so quiet and so safe, with pleasant rooms, and a peaceful, sunny garden, and white, comfortable beds, where we slept through the long nights, and kind faces to smile on us, and love to surround us always. I cried a little as I told him about it.

"There is only one home, and one father and mother," the old priest said, seriously. "Remember that. And be good children. The holy grace of G.o.d be upon you, my dears."

His kind hands hovered over our heads for a moment.

He took us back into the yard, and locked the Green Door himself, and went into the house to see my mother. He stayed a long, long while.

Afterwards my mother came out into the garden, and kissed us both, with all her old affection. Her face was very gentle, as if she, too, had been crying.

"Where is my little son?" she asked, breathlessly.

But she had her arms around me as well as around d.i.c.k.

IX

THE HIDDEN TALENT

CLOSE in a sheltered corner in our parlor there stood a bookcase. It had two gla.s.s doors, and a bra.s.s key, and rows and rows of books that looked out invitingly on the world, and seemed to say, "Come, read me." On the bottom shelf of all there were children's books,--"The Child's History of England," "Plutarch's Lives" in brown and gold, a green "Ivanhoe," a red "Alice in Wonderland," and a fat blue book, "The Child's Own Book of Fairy Tales," with rubbed corners, and loose leaves, and a crooked signature on the front page that read, painstakingly, "Rhoda Harcourt."