The Gates Between Part 14

Nay, verily. An obscure man ignorant of the learning of the land, dest.i.tute of its wealth, unacquainted among its magnates, and without a share in its public interests--nothing was I; nothing had I; nothing could I hope to do, or be, for which my motherless boy should live to bless his father's name. Stung by such thoughts as these, which rankled the more in me the longer I cherished them, I betook myself to brooding and to solitary strolling in quiet places, where I could ponder on my situation undisturbed.

I was in great intellectual and spiritual stress, less for myself than for the child; not more for him, than because of his mother. What would Helen say?

How would she hold me to account for him? How should I meet her--if I ever saw her face again--to own myself scarcely other than a pauper in this spiritual kingdom; our child an untaught, unimportant little fellow, of no more consequence in this place than the _gamins_ of the street before her door?

In these cold and solitary experiences which many a man has known before me, and many more will follow after me, the soul is like a skater, separated from his fellows upon a field of ice. Every movement that he makes seems to be bearing him farther from the society and the sympathy of his kind. Too benumbed, perhaps, to turn, he glides on, helpless as an ice-boat before the wind. Conscious of his mistake, of his danger, and knowing not how to retract the one or avoid the other, his helpless motions, seemingly guided by idleness, by madness, or by folly, lead him to the last place whither he would have led himself,--the weak spot in the ice.

Suddenly, he falls crashing, and sinks. Then lo! as he goes under, crying out that he is lost because no man is with him, hands are down-stretched, swimmers plunge, the crowd gathers, and it seems the whole world stoops to save him. The sympathy of his kind wanted nothing but a chance to reach him.

I cannot tell; no man can tell such things; I cannot explain how I came to do it, or even why I came to do it. But it was on this wise with me. Being alone one evening in a forest, at twilight, taking counsel with myself and pondering upon the mystery from which I could not gather light, these words came into my heart; and when I had cherished them in my heart for a certain time, I uttered them aloud:

"Thou great G.o.d! If there be a G.o.d. Reveal Thyself unto my immortal soul! If I have a soul immortal."

CHAPTER XV.

My little boy came flying to me one fair day; he cried out that he had news for me, that great things were going on in the town. A visitor was expected, whose promised arrival had set the whole place astir with joy. The child knew nothing of what or whom he spoke, but I gathered the impression that some distinguished guest was about to reach us, to whom the honours of the city would be extended. The matter did not interest me; I had so little in common with the people; and I was about to dismiss it idly, when Boy posed me by demanding that I should personally conduct him through the events of the gala day. He was unusually insistent about this; for he was a docile little fellow, who seldom urged his will uncomfortably against my own. But in this case I could not compromise with him, and half reluctantly I yielded. I had no sooner done so than an urgent message to the same effect reached me from my friend the surgeon.

"Go with the current to-day," he wrote; "it sets strongly. Question it not. Resist it not. Follow and be swept."

Immediately upon this some neighbours came hurriedly in, and spoke with me of the same matter eagerly. They pleaded with me on no account to miss the event of the day, upon whose specific nature they were somewhat reticent. They evinced the warmest possible interest in my personal relation to it; as people do who possess a happy secret that they wish, but may not feel at liberty, fully to share with another.

They were excited, and overflowed with happiness. Their very presence raised my spirits. I could not remember when I had received precisely this sort of attention from my neighbours; and it was, somehow, a comfort to me. I should not have supposed that I should value being made of consequence in this trifling way; yet it warmed my heart. I felt less desolate than usual, when I took the hand of my happy boy, and set forth.

The whole vicinity was aroused. Everybody moved in one direction, like "a current," as my friend had said. Shining, solemn, and joyous faces filled the streets and fields. The voices of the people were subdued and sweet. There was no laughter, only smiles, and gentle expectation, and low consulting together, and some there were who mused apart. The "sick of soul" were present with the happier folk: these first had a wistful look, as of those not certain of themselves or of their welcome; but I saw that they were tenderly regarded by the more fortunate. I myself was most gently treated; many persons spoke with me, and I heard expressions of pleasure at my presence. In the crowd, as we moved on, I began to recognize here and there a face; acquaintances, whom I had known in the lower life, became visible to me. Now and then, some one, hastening by, said:--

"Why, Doctor!" and then I would perceive some old patients; the look which only loving patients wear was on their faces, the old impulse of trust and grat.i.tude; they would grasp me heartily by the hand; this touched me; I began to feel a stir of sympathy with the general excitement; I was glad that I had joined the people.

I pressed the hand of my little boy, who was running and leaping at my side. He looked confidingly up into my face, and asked me questions about the day's event; but these I could not answer.

"G.o.d knows, my child," I said. "Your father is not a learned man."

As we swept on, the crowd thickened visibly. The current from the city met streams from the fields, the hills, the forests; all the distance overflowed; the concourse began to become imposing. Here and there I observed still other faces that were not strange to me; flashes of recognition pa.s.sed between us; some also of my own kin, dead years ago, I saw, far off, and I felt drawn to them. In the distance, not near enough to speak with her, shining and smiling, I thought that I perceived Mrs. Faith, once more. My boy threw kisses to her and laughed merrily; he was electric with the universal joy; he seemed to dance upon the air like a tuft of thistledown; to be "light-hearted"

was to be light-bodied; the little fellow's frame seemed to exist only as the expression of his soul. I thought:--

"If he is properly educated in this place, what a spirit he will make!"

I was amazed to see his capacity for happiness. I thought of his mother. I wished to be happy, too.

Now, as we moved on toward the plain, the sound of low chanting began to swell from the crowd. The strain gained in distinctness; power gathered on it; pa.s.sion grew in it; prayer ascended from it. I could not help being moved by this billow of sweet sound. The forms and faces of the people melted together before my eyes; their outlines seemed to quiver in the flood of song; it was as if their manifold personalities blurred in the unity of their feeling; they seemed to me, as I regarded them, like the presence of one great, glad, loving human soul. This was their supplication. Thus arose the heavenly song:--

"Thou that takest away The sins of the world!

Whosoever believeth Shall have life.

Whosoever believeth on Thee Shall have eternal life.

Thou that takest away The sins of the world!

And givest--and givest Eternal life!"

"I cannot sing that pretty song," said my boy sadly. "There is n.o.body to teach me. Father, I wish you _were_ a learned man!"

Now, this smote me to the heart, so that I would even have lifted my voice and sought to join the chant, for the child's sake, and to comfort him; but when I would have done so, behold, I could not lift my soul; it resisted me like a weight too heavy for my lips; for, in this land, song never rises higher than the level of the soul; there are fine laws governing this fact whose nature I may not explain, and could not at that time even understand, but of the fact itself I testify.

"Alas, alas, my son!" I said, "would G.o.d I were!"

Now suddenly, while I was conversing with my child, I perceived a stir among the people, as if they moved to greet some person who was advancing toward them. I looked in the direction whither all eyes were turned; but I saw nothing to account for the excitement. While I stood gazing and wondering, at one movement, as if it were by one heart-heat, the great throng bowed their heads. Some object, some Presence of which I could not catch a glimpse, had entered among them. Whispers ran from lip to lip. I heard men say that He was here, that He was there, that He was yonder, that He had pa.s.sed them, that He touched them.

"He blesseth me!" they murmured.

"And me! And me!"

"Oh, even me!"

I heard low cries of delight and sobs of moving tenderness. I heard strange, wistful words from the disabled of soul who were among us,--pleadings for I knew not what, offered to I knew not whom. I heard words of sorrow and words of utter love, and I saw signs of shame, and looks of rapture, and att.i.tudes of peace and eager hope. I saw men kneeling in reverence. I saw them prostrate in pet.i.tion. I saw them as if they were clinging affectionately to hands that they kissed and wept upon. I saw them bowed as one bows before the act of benediction.

These things I perceived, but alas, I could perceive no more. What went I out, with the heavenly, happy people, for to see?

Naught, G.o.d help me, worse than naught; for mine eyes were holden.

Dark amid that spiritual vision, I stood stricken. Alone in all that blessedness, was I bereft?

Whom, for very rapture, did they melt to welcome? Whom greeted they, with that great wave of love, so annihilating to their consciousness of themselves that I knew when I beheld it, I had never seen the face of Love before?

Among them all, I stood alone--blind, blind. Them I saw, and their blessedness, till I was filled with such a sacred envy of it that I would have suffered some new misery to share it. But He who did move among them thus royally and thus benignly, who pa.s.sed from each man to each man, like the highest longing and the dearest wish of his own heart, who was to them one knew not whether the more of Master or of chosen Friend,--Him, alas, I saw not. To me He was denied. No spiritual optic nerve in me announced His presence. I was blind,--I was blind.

Overcome by this discovery, I did not notice that my boy had loosened his hold upon my hand until his little fingers were quite disengaged from my clasp; and then, turning to speak to him, I found that he had slipped from me in the crowd. This was so great and the absorption so universal that no one noticed the mishap; and grateful, indeed, at that miserable moment, to be un.o.bserved, I went in search of him.

Now, I did not find the child, though I sought long and patiently; and when I was beginning to feel perplexed, and to wonder what chance could have befallen him, I turned, and behold, while I had been searching, the throng had dispersed.

Night was coming on All the citizens were strolling to their homes.

On street, and plain, and hill stirred the shadows of the departing people. They pa.s.sed quietly. Every voice was hushed. All the world was as still as a heart is after prayer.

In the silent purple plain, only I was left alone. Moved by solitude, which is the soul's sincerity, I yielded myself to strange impulses, and turning to the spot, where He who was invisible had pa.s.sed or seemed to pa.s.s, I sought to find upon the ground and in the dusk some chance imprint of His steps. To do this it was necessary for me to stoop; and while I was bowed, searching for some least sign of Him, in the dew and dark, I knew not what wave of shame and sorrow came upon me, but I fell upon my knees. There was no creature to hear me, and I spoke aloud, and said:--

"_Thou departest from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!_" ...

"_Lord,_" I said, "_that I may receive my sight!_"

I thought I had more to say than this, but when I had uttered these words no more did follow them. They seemed to fill my soul and flood it till it overflowed.

And when I had lifted up my eyes, the first sight which did meet them was the face of my own child. I saw at once that he was quite safe and happy. But I saw that he was not alone.

One towered above me, strange and dim, who held the little fellow in His arms. When I cried out to Him, He smiled. And He did give the child to me, and spoke with me.