The Sherrods Part 7

CHAPTER VII.

LEAVING PARADISE.

Jud hurried down the slope and s.n.a.t.c.hed up the piece of cardboard. His eyes sought the name, then the departing enchantress. His heart was full of thankfulness to the stranger, whose gray figure was disappearing among the oaks.

"She seems just like the fairy queen in the stories we used to read, Jud," said Justine. Looking over his shoulders, she read aloud: "'Miss Wood.' Oh, dear; it doesn't give her first name. How I wish I knew it!"

"And it don't say where she lives," said Jud slowly.

"Chicago, I'm sure. Don't you remember what she said about wishing she had you there? Dear me, what could she do with a country boy like you in that great place? Harve Crose says there are more people there than there are in this whole county. But wasn't she nice, Jud, wasn't she nice? And did you ever see such a beautiful face?" Here Jud's sober, thoughtful eyes looked so intently upon his wife's brilliant face that she blushed under the unspoken compliment. "And her clothes, Jud!

Weren't they grand? Oh, oh, I never saw any one like her!"

The two walked slowly homeward, excitedly discussing the fair stranger and her generosity. All the evening she and the fifty dollars so unexpectedly acquired were the topics of conversation. Jud insisted upon buying a new dress for Justine--as a "wedding present"--but she demurred. The money was to go into the bank the next day, she insisted; and she ruled.

He was lying beneath a big tree in the yard, looking up at the stars, reflectively drawing a long spear of wire gra.s.s through his teeth. She sat beside him, her back against the tree, serene, proud, and happy.

It was he who broke the long silence, dreamily.

"I wonder if I could make it go in Chicago."

She started from her reverie and her hand fell upon his arm. For an instant her big eyes narrowed as if trying to penetrate some shadow.

In another moment they opened wide again, and she was earnestly seeking to convince him that he could succeed in the great city.

The months sped by and side by side they toiled, she with love and devotion in her soul, he with ambition added. As the winter came he slaved with his pencil and pen, his heart bound to the new hope. The prediction at Proctor's Falls had inspired him; the glowing blue eyes had not lied to him even though the lips might have flattered. She had praised his work, and she knew! She must have known what he could do!

Justine shared the enthusiasm that had been awakened by Miss Wood. She looked upon that young woman as a G.o.ddess who had transformed her husband into a genius whose gifts were to make the world fall down in worship.

As the spring drew near Jud began to speak more often of the city and his chances for success there. He could see the pride and devotion in his wife's eyes, but he could also see a certain dim, wistful shadow in the depths. He knew she was grieving over the fear that some day he would desert their happy, simple home and rush out into the world, leaving her behind until he had won a place for her. She knew that he could not take her with him at the outset. He was to try his fortune in the strange, big city, and she was to stay in the little cottage and pray for the day to come speedily that would take her to him.

With him, ambition was tempered by love for her and the certainty that he could not leave her even to win fame and fortune. When he allowed himself to think of her alone in the cottage, looking sadly at the stars and thinking of him in the rushing city, he said to himself: "I can't leave her!" Both knew, although neither spoke it aloud, that if he went, he would have to go alone.

Justine understood his hesitation and its cause. She knew that she was holding him back, that she alone kept him from making the plunge into the world, and her heart was sore. Night after night she lay awake in his arms, her poor heart throbbing against his ambitious heart, writhing beneath the certain knowledge that she was the weight about his neck.

One day, late in the fall, when the strain upon her heart had become too great, she broke the fetters. It was at dusk, and, coming around the corner of the cottage, she found him sitting on the doorstep, his gaze far away, his dejection showing in the droop of the broad shoulders. A little gasp of pain came from her lips--pain mingled with love and pity for him. She stood for a moment, reading his thoughts as if they were printed before her eyes--thoughts of fame, honor, success, trial, chance! How good, how handsome, how n.o.ble he was! She was the weight, the drag! The hour had come for her to decide. He would never say the word--that much she knew.

"Jud," she said, standing bravely before him. He looked up, shaking off his dream. "Don't you think it about time you were trying your luck in Chicago? You surely have worked hard enough at your drawing, and I don't see why you put it off any longer."

For a moment he was unable to speak. Into his eyes came a blur of tears.

"But, Justine, dear, how are we to live there? They say it takes a fortune," he said. There was a breath of eagerness in his voice and she detected it.

She sat beside him and laid her arm about his shoulder. He turned his face to hers, wondering, and their eyes met. For a long time neither spoke by tongue, but they understood. A sob came into his throat as he lifted her hand from her lap and drew her to him almost convulsively.

"Justine, I can't do that! I can't go away off there and leave you here alone. Why, sweetheart, I'd die without you," he cried.

"But when you are able, dear, to take me to you in the great city, we can be the happiest people in the world," she said huskily. "I'll be lonesome and you'll be lonesome, but it won't be for long. You will succeed. I know it, dear, and you must not waste another day in this wilderness----"

"It is the sweetest place in the world," he cried, pa.s.sionately.

"Wilderness? With you here beside me? Oh, Justine, it will be wilderness if I go away from you!"

"Surely, _surely_, Jud, it is for the best. I know you can't take me now, but you can come after me some day, and then I'll know that I have lost nothing by letting you go. You will be a great--you _will_ succeed! Why, Jud, you draw better than any one I ever knew about.

Your pictures even now are better than any I have ever seen. They can't help liking you in Chicago. You must go--you must, Jud!" She was talking rapidly, excitedly.

"You love me so much that you are blind, dear. Up in Chicago they have thousands of artists who are better than I am, and they are starving.

Wait a minute! Suppose I should fail! Suppose they should laugh at me and I couldn't get work. What then? I have no money, no friends up there. If I don't get on, what is to become of me? Did you ever think of that?"

"Haven't you me and the little farm to come back to, Jud? I'll be here and I'll love you more than ever. And I'll die here on this old place with you beside me, and never be sorry that you couldn't do for me everything you wish," she said solemnly. Then she went on quickly: "But you won't fail--you can't, Jud, you can't. Don't you remember what pretty Miss Wood said about your work? Well, didn't she know? Of course, she did. She _lives_ in Chicago and she knows."

"If I knew where to find her or write to her, she might help me," said he, a new animation in his voice. "But there's no one I can write to.

I don't know how to go about it."

"Go about it like other boys have done. Lots of them have gone out into the world and won their way. Now, Jud, when will you go?"

The moment of decision came too suddenly. He was not ready to meet it.

"I--I--oh, we can talk about this later on," he faltered.

"We must settle it now."

"Do you want me to go?" he asked after a moment.

"Yes, I do, Jud."

"How queer you are! I'd rather die than leave you, and yet you want me to go away from you," he said inconsistently.

"Don't say that! I love you better than my life! Don't you see that is why I want you to go? It is because I love you so, oh, so much, and I know it is for the best. It's not like losing you altogether. We'll be with each other soon, I know. You can come home to see me every once in awhile, don't you see? And then, when you feel that you can do so, you will take your poor little country girl into the great city to live with you. You'll be great, then; will you be ashamed of me?"

"Ashamed of you!" he cried.

For a long time he held her in his arms in the twilight, and pleaded with her to let him remain. To her courage, to the breaking of her heart, was due the step which started him out into the world to seek his fortune and hers.

The day was set for his departure. She drew from the bank the fifty dollars his first picture had brought, and pressed it into his reluctant hands. It was she who drove him into the village. In the pocket of his Sunday clothes he carried the names of newspaper artists, so familiar to him; they were the men he was to see--the strangers who were to be his Samaritans. If they lent him a helping hand all might go well.

She was to live without him in the little paradise, with old Mrs. Crane and Caleb Spangler's boy as companions. They were to conduct the affairs of the farm through the winter months, while he fought for a footing in another universe.

It was a sobbing girl who lay all that night in the broad bed, thinking of the boy whose curly head was missing from the pillow beside her, whose loving arms were gone, perhaps forever.

'Gene Crawley knew of Jud's intentions long before his departure. In fact, the whole township was aware of the great undertaking, and there was more or less gossip, and no end of doubt as to the wisdom of the step. It was generally conceded that Jud was a bright boy, but still "he wuzn't much to git ahead, even out in the country, so how in tarnation did he expect to make it go in the city?" A few of the evil-minded saw signs of waning love in the Sherrod cottage; others slyly winked and intimated that 'Gene Crawley had something to do with it; and the whole neighborhood solemnly shook hands with Jud and "hoped he'd come back richer'n Vanderbilt."

Crawley saw them drive away to the station in the village, and he saw the dejected young wife come slowly homeward at dusk. That night, while she rolled and sobbed in her bed, he sat on the fence across the lane from the dark cottage until long after midnight.

CHAPTER VIII.