The Rich Little Poor Boy Part 60

It was while he was kneeling that he saw, entering between those portieres, some one dressed in white--a woman. White she wore, too, upon the silky white of her hair. The snowy headdress framed a face pale, but beautiful, with the beauty that comes from service and self-sacrifice and suffering.

The instant Johnnie glimpsed that face, and looked into the sad, brave eyes, he knew her!--knew her though she wore no red cross upon her sleeve. Of course, among all the souls in the great universe, she would be the one to come now, just when he, Johnnie, needed the sight of her to make him more staunch!

He remembered how she had stood before the firing-squad, not shrinking from her fate, not crying out in terror of the cruel bullets. And now how poised she was, how fearless, in this room where Death was waiting!

Awe-struck, adoring her, and scarcely daring to breathe lest she vanish, he got slowly to his feet.

"Edith Cavell!" he whispered.

"Edith--Cavell!" echoed Father Pat. "'Twas her dyin'--that helped--manny----"

"It's time to go," she said softly. "Tell the Father good-by."

Dutifully he turned to take that last farewell. But now that he had the martyred nurse at his side, he determined to endure the parting manfully. He knelt again, and tried to smile at the face smiling back at him from the pillow. He tried to speak, too, but his lips seemed stiff, for some reason, and his tongue would not obey. But he kept his bright head up.

He heard a whisper--Father Pat was commending this scout he loved to the mercy of a higher power. Next, he felt himself lifted gently and guided backward from the bed. He did not want to go. He wanted to keep on seeing, seeing that dear face, to hold on longer to that weak hand. "Oh, don't--don't take me!" he pleaded.

The dying eyes followed, oh, how affectionately, the small, khaki-clad figure. "G.o.d's--own--child!" breathed the priest, and there was tender pride in the faint tones. "G.o.d's--blessed--lad!"

"Father!"

Then the folds of the portieres brushed Johnnie's shoulders, and fell between his eyes and the wide, white bed.

He had taken his last look.

He was nearly home when he discovered the letter--a thick letter in a long envelope. It was in his hand, though he could not remember how it came to be there. But it was undoubtedly his, for both sides of it bore his name in Father Pat's own handwriting: _John Blake_.

He did not open it. He could not read it just yet. Thrusting it into a coat pocket, he stumbled on. Had he complained and cried just because Cis was to live in another part of this same city? Had he actually thought the loss of a suit and some books enough to feel bad and bitter about? Was it he who had said, after Cis went, that nothing worse could happen?

Ah, how small, how trivial, all other troubles seemed as compared to this new, strange, terrible thing--Death! And how little, before this, he had known of genuine grief!

Now something really grievous had happened. And it seemed to him as if his whole world had come suddenly tumbling down in pieces--in utter chaos--about his yellow head.

CHAPTER x.x.xIX

THE LETTER

"LAD DEAR, I was saying to myself the other day, 'Patrick Mungovan, when you go home to G.o.d, what will you be leaving--you that haven't a red cent to your name--to that mite of a boy, John?' 'Well,' Patrick Mungovan answered back, 'to be truthful, I've nothing to leave but the memory of a sweet friendship and, maybe, a letter.'

"So down I sat, and started this. Just at the beginning of it, where it can help to ease any pain in your heart, let me say a word about my going, for I want you to be happy always when you're thinking of me. So believe what I say: though we can't sit and talk together, as we have, still we'll never be parted. No! For the reason that I'll live on, not only in the spirit, but also in that fine brain of yours! And whenever you'll be wanting me, you'll think me with you, and there I'll be, never a day older, never a bit less red-headed, or dear to your loving eyes.

So! We're friends, you and I, as long as memory lasts!

"Lad dear, I called you rich once. You didn't understand all I meant by it, and I'm going to explain myself here. And I'll start the list of your riches with this: though you've been shut in, and worked hard, and fed none too well, and dressed badly, and cheated by Tom Barber out of the smiles, and the decent words of praise, and the consideration and politeness that's every child's honest due--in spite of all this, I say, you've gone right on, ignoring what you couldn't help, learning what you could, improving yourself, preserving your sense of humor (which is the power to see what's funny in everything), and never letting your young heart forget to sing.

"'But,' you'll ask, 'how is it that not caring too much about food and clothes may be counted as a valuable possession?' And I'll answer, 'That man is strong, John, whose appet.i.te is his servant, not his master. And that man is stronger yet if, wearing ragged, old clothes, all the same he can keep his pride high. For "Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?" Well, that's how it's been with you!

"Some of your riches consist of things which you haven't got--now that sounds strange, does it not? And I don't mean the scarlet fever which you haven't, or a hair lip, or such like. No. You're rich in not being morbid, for instance,--in not dwelling on what's unpleasant, and ugly.

Also because you don't harbor malice and ill-will. Because you don't fret, and sulk, and brood, all these goings-on being a sad waste of time.

"And now let's count over the riches that you've got in your character.

In the back of your Handbook, Mr. Roosevelt, writing about boy scouts, named four qualities for a fine lad: unselfish, gentle, strong, brave.

They're your qualities, lad dear. And you proved the last one when you took that whipping with the ropes--ah, is a boy poor when he's got the s.p.u.n.k in him? He is not! Well, along with those four qualities I can honestly add these others: you're grateful, you're clean (in heart and in mouth, liking and speaking what's good), you're merciful, you're truthful, you're ambitious, you've got decent instincts--inherited, but a part of your riches, just the same.

"As for the way you like what helps you (and queer as it may seem, too many boys _don't_ like what helps them), that has astonished and pleased me many a day. I remember your telling me once that you got tired of prunes and potatoes. And I said to you, 'Prunes are good for you, and nothing could be better than baked potatoes,'--I knowing how you relished them mashed! Well, after that, never another mashed potato dared to show its eyes! And, oh, how you did make away with the prunes!

"It's the good things you've got in your character, and the bad things that you haven't got, which explain how it comes that you're loved the way you are--by Narcissa, and Grandpa (ah, it's handsome, is that old soldier's love for you! it's grand!), and Mrs. Kukor, and the Western gentleman, and Mr. Perkins, and me! With so much love as all that, could you ever think of yourself as poor? Now you just couldn't!

"And then consider the way you love each of us in return! And no lad can say he's poor when he's got the power to love in him! and the sweet sacrifice! And you know the kind of love that all sound young hearts give to the crippled and the helpless and the dumb. Grandpa would say Yes to that if he could. And so would the sparrows on the window sill!

"But, of course, we'll not be forgetting that you've got your youth, and most precious it is, and two rows of teeth which don't need bridging!

Also, you're as good-looking as any boy ought to be, you're improving in strength, and you're healthy. Why, there's many a millionaire who'd give his fortune if he had that grand little tummy of yours, which can digest the k.n.o.bs off the doors!

"Already--at twelve!--you've got the habit of work, and, oh, what a blessing that habit is, and what an insurance against Satan! And you've got the book habit, a glorious one, since it gives you information, entertains you, and teaches you to think, to argue things out for yourself. Yes, it's reading which makes a lad strong in himself. You don't need racket, and the company of other lads, in order to have a good time. And, John, you know how to listen, and that's uncommon, too.

"But thinking is your greatest blessing. You get your joy, not out of what you _have_, for G.o.d in His wisdom knows how little that is, but out of what you _think_. If there's something you haven't, you go ahead and supply it with your thoughts, creating beauty where there isn't any, building a world of your own. Never before have I met a lad who could dream as you can dream. Ah, and what it's done for you--in that dark, dirty, little flat!

"Dreams! Behind every big thing that's ever happened was a dream! The Universe itself was first of all just an idea in the mind of Almighty G.o.d. In His wisdom and love He left it to man to work out other plans less grand. And who's ever been great that didn't dream? First you dream a thing; then you do it. Take Samuel Morse, for instance. He had a wonderful thought. Next, with his telegraph, he'd constructed the nerves of the world! And there's Mr. Marconi. Not so long ago, they'd have burned him as a gentleman witch!

"Imagination! I've no doubt you've often envied Aladdin his wonderful lamp? (They're not making so many of those lamps these days!) But, boy dear, every lad's got a lamp that's just as wonderful! The lamp of knowledge. Get knowledge, John. Then--_rub it with your imagination_.

"And look at all the marvels that lie about you waiting to help! The books, the paintings, the schools, the churches, the universities, the music, the museums, the right kind of plays--they're all right here in New York City. Why, lad dear, even the shops are an education, with their rugs, and their fine weaves, and furniture, and crystal, and china, and all the rest of it. Think of having such a city just to go out and walk around in! And you'll not cast aside a single opportunity!

"So what of your future? Here! Take Father Pat's hand, and shut your eyes, and we'll go on an Aladdin trip together, this to see what became of certain other poor little boys. Here's a wonderful office, and a man is sitting at his desk. He heads one of the biggest concerns in the world, he's cultured, and generous, and a credit to his country. Suppose we go back with him thirty years. Oh, look, lad! _He's selling newspapers!_

"We're off again. We're in a room that's lofty and grand. And looking at a man in a solemn mantle. He's high in our nation's counsels, he's honored, and known by the whole world. He's a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States of America. Let's go back with _him_ thirty years. Dear! dear! what do we see! A poor, little, tattered youngster who's driving home the cows!

"Ah, Johnnie, lads don't get on by having things soft. Give a lad a hundred thousand dollars, and it's likely you'll ruin him. Let him _make_ a hundred thousand, _honestly_, and--you've got a man!

"Seldom do the sons of rich men distinguish themselves. Theodore Roosevelt did (he that said, 'Don't go around; go over--or through').

And, yes, I recall another--that fine gentleman who was a great electrical engineer, Peter Cooper Hewitt. But most of the big men in this country were _poor boys_. Having to struggle, they grew strong.

"For instance, there were the Wright brothers, who turned men into eagles! Their sister was called 'the little schoolma'am with the crazy brothers!' Robert Burns, the Scotch poet, was the son of a laboring man.

Charles d.i.c.kens earned money by sticking labels in a shoe-blacking factory. William Shakespeare's father made gloves. Benjamin Franklin was the son of a candlemaker. Daniel Defoe, who wrote that _Robinson Crusoe_ you love so much, helped his father around the butcher shop. John Bunyan was a traveling tinker. And Christopher Columbus was the son of a wool comber, and himself worked before the mast.

"They're gone, but their thoughts live on, as busy as ever, whirling about us like the rain out of Heaven. Each of them dreamed, and what they dreamed is our heritage. When such men pa.s.s, we must have lads who can take their places. And I believe that you are one of these lads. For n.o.body can tell me that the power you have of seeing things with your brain--things you've never seen with your eyes--won't carry you far and high among your fellowmen. And some day, you'll be one of the greatest in this dear land. And it'll be told of you how you lived in the East Side, in a sc.r.a.p of a flat, where you were like a prisoner, and took care of a weak, old soldier, and did your duty, though it came hard, and began the dreaming of your dreams.

"Thinking about the big ones that won out against long odds will help you--will give you the grit to carry on. And grit makes a good, solid foundation, whether it's for a house or a lad. And when you've accomplished the most for yourself, then I know you'll remember that doing for yourself is just a small part of it; the other part--the grand part--is what you can do for your fellowmen.

"There's a true saying that 'G.o.d helps them who help themselves.' But, suppose you lived where it wasn't possible for you to help yourself? And there are countries just like that. But here, in the United States, you _can_ help yourself! Ah, that's a great blessing, my yellow-head! Oh, Johnnie, was there ever a land like this one before? Boy dear, this United States, _this_ is the Land of Aladdin!

"Young friend, as I close I want to thank you for what you've done for a smashed-up priest--gladdened his last days with the sight of a grand lad, a good scout. And I've got just a single warning for you, and it's this: Watch your play! For it's not by the work that a man does that you can judge him. No; I'll tell you what a man is like if you'll tell me _how he plays_.

"One thing more: do you remember the vow the knights used to take in the old days?--'live pure, speak true, right wrong, follow the king.' Father Pat knows he can trust John Blake to keep that vow. And his last wish, and his dying prayer is, O little, little lad, that you put your trust in G.o.d--just that, and everything else will come right for you--put your trust in G.o.d.