Chapter 24

"HERE!"

From that time we all were, to all seeming, just as we had been before that day. Dr. Sandford went his rounds, with no change perceptible in his manner towards any- body, or towards me. I think I was not different in the ward from what I had been, except to one pair of eyes: The duties of every day rolled on as they had been accustomed to do; the singing of every night was just as usual. One thing was a little changed. I sought no longer to hide that Mr. Thorold was something to me. The time for that was past. Of the few broken minutes that remained to us, he should lose none, nor I, by unnecessary difficulty. I was by his side now, all I could without neglecting those who also needed me. And we talked, all we could, with his strength and my time. I cared not now, that all the ward should see and know what we were to each other.

Mr. Thorold saw a change in me, and asked the reason. And I gave it. And then we talked no more of our own losses.

"I am quite ready to go, Daisy," he had said to me, with a look both bright and sweet which it breaks my heart, while it gladdens me, to remember. "You will come by and by, and I shall be looking for you; and I am ready now, love."

After that, we spoke no more of our parting. We talked a very great deal of other things, past and future; talks, that it seems to me - now were scarce earthly, for their pure high beauty, and truth, and joy. The strength of them will go with me all my life. Dr. Sandford let us alone; ministered, to Mr. Thorold and me, all he could; and interfered with me no more. Preston took an opportunity to grumble; but that was soon silenced, for I showed him that I would not bear it.

And the days in the hospital sped away. I do not know how; I did not know at the time. Only as one lives and works and breathes and sleeps in the presence of a single thought, enveloping and enfolding everything else. The life was hardly my own life; it was the life of another; or rather the two lives were for the time so joined that they were almost one. In a sort happy, as long as it was so.

But I knew it could not last; and the utter uncertainty when it would end, oppressed me fearfully. Nothing in Mr. Thorold's looks or manner gave me any help to judge about it. His face was like itself always; his eye yet sometimes flashed and sparkled after its own brilliant fashion, as gayly and freely as ever. It always gave me untold pain; it brought life and death into such close neighbourhood, and seemed to mock at the necessity which hung over us. And then, if Mr. Thorold saw a shadow come over my brow, he would give me such words and looks of comfort and help, that again death was half swallowed up of a better life, before the time. So the days went; and Mr. Thorold said I grew thin; and the nurses and attendants were almost reverentially careful of me; and Dr. Sandford was a silent servant of mine and of Mr. Thorold's too, doing all that was possible for us both. And Preston was fearfully jealous and irritable; and wrote, I knew long afterwards, to my mother; and my mother sent me orders to return home to her at once and leave everything; and Dr. Sandford never gave me the letters. I missed nothing; knew nothing; asked nothing; until the day came that I was looking for.

It came, and left me. I had done all I had to do; all I wanted to do; I had been able to do it all. Through the hours of the last struggle, no hand but mine had touched him. It was borne, as everything else had been borne, with a clear, brave uncomplainingness; his eye was still bright and quiet when it met mine, and the smile sweet and ready. We did not talk much; we had done that in the days past; our thoughts were known to each other; we were both looking now to the time of next meeting. But his head lay on my shoulder at the very last, and his hand was in mine. I don't think I knew when the moment was; until somebody drew him out of my hands and placed him back on the pillow. It was I then closed the eyes; and then I laid my brow for a few minutes on the one that was growing cold, for the last leave-taking. Nobody meddled with me; I saw and heard nothing; and indeed when I stood up I was blind; I was not faint, but I could see nothing. Some one took my hand, I felt, and drew my arm through his and led me away. I knew, as soon as my hand touched his arm, that it was Dr. Sandford.

I did not go back to the ward that day, and I never went back. I charged Dr. Sandford with all my remaining care, and he accepted the charge. No illness seized me, but my heart failed. That was worse. Better have been sick. Bodily illness is easier to get at.

And there was nobody to minister to mine. Dr. Sandford's presence worried me, somehow. It ought not, but it did. Mrs. Sandford was kind, and of course helpless to do me good. I think the doctor saw I was not doing well, nor likely to be better, and he brought me on to New York, to my mother.

Mamma understood nothing of what had passed, except what Preston's letter had told her. I do not know how much, or what, it was; and I did not care. Mamma, however, was wrought up to a point of discomfort quite beyond the usual chronic unrest of the year past. She exclaimed at my appearance; complained of my change of manner; inveighed against hospitals, lady nurses, Dr. Sandford, the war, Yankees and Washington air; and declaimed against the religion which did not make daughters dutiful and attentive to their mothers. It was true, some of it; but my heart was dead, for the time, and powerless to heed. - I heard, and did not feel. I could not minister to my mother's happiness now, for I had no spring of strength in my own; and ministry that was not bright and winsome did, not content her. Such as I had I gave; I knew it was poor, and she said so.

As the spring drew on, and days grew gentle, and soft weather replaced the strong brace of the winter frost, my condition of health became more and more unsatisfactory. My mother grew seriously uneasy at length and consulted Dr. Sandford. And the next thing was Dr. Sandford's appearance at our hotel.

"What is the matter with you, Daisy?" he asked, very professionally. Mamma was out when he came.

"Nothing -" I answered; "except what will take its own time."

"Not like you, that answer," he said.

"It is like me now," I replied.

"We must get back to a better condition. It is not I good for you to be in this place. Would you like to go into quarters near Melbourne, for the summer?"

"Better than anything! - if you could manage it. Mamma would not like it."

"I think I can convince her."

Dr. Sandford I knew had powers of convincing, and I judge they were helped on this occasion by facts in the pecuniary state of our affairs, to which my mother could no longer quite shut her eyes. She had not money to remain where she was. I think she had not been able, properly, to be there, for a good while past; though the bills were paid somehow. But now her resources failed; the war was evidently ending disastrously for the South; her hopes gave way; and she agreed to let Dr. Sandford make arrangements for our going into the country. It was very bitter to her, the whole draught she had to swallow; and the very fact of being under necessity. Dr. Sandford had a deal of trouble, I fancy, to find any house or arrangement that would content her. No board was procurable that could be endured even for a day. The doctor found at last, and hired, and put in order for us, a small cottage on the way between Melbourne and Crum Elbow; and there, early in June, mamma and I found ourselves established; "Buried," she said; "sheltered," I thought.

"I wish I was dead," mamma said next morning.

"Mamma - why do you speak so? just now."

"There is no sort of view here - nothing in the world but those grass fields."

"We have this fine elm tree over the house, mamma, to shade us. That is worth a great deal."

"If the windows had Italian shades, they would be better. What windows! Who do you suppose lived here before us?"

"Mamma, I do think it is very comfortable."

"I hope you will show that you think so, then. I have had no comfort in you for a long time past."

I thought, _I_ should never have comfort in anybody any more.

"What has changed you so?"

"Changes come to everybody, I suppose, mamma, now and then."

"Is that all your boasted religion is good for?"

I could not answer. Was it? What is the boat which can only sail in smooth water? But though feeling reproached, and justly, I was as far from help as ever. Mamma went on -

"You used to be always bright - with your sort of brightness; there was not much brilliance to it; but you had a kind of steady cheerfulness of your own, from a child. What has become of it?"

"Mamma, I am sorry it is gone. Perhaps it will wake up one of these days."

"I shall die of heartache first. It would be the easiest thing I could do. To live here, is to die a long death. I feel as if I could not get a free breath now."

"I think, mamma, when we get accustomed to the place, we shall find pleasantness in it. It is a world pleasanter than New York."

"No, it is not," said mamma vehemently; "and it never will be. In a city, you can cover yourself up, as it were, and half hide yourself from even yourself; in such a place as this, there is not a line in your lot but you have; leisure to trace it all out; and there is not a rough place in your life but you have time to put your foot on every separate inch of it. Life is bare, Daisy; in a city one lives faster, and one is in a crowd, and things are covered up or one passes them over somehow. I shall die here!"

"Next spring you can have Melbourne again, mamma, you know."

But mamma burst into tears. I knew not how to comfort.

"Would'st thou go forth to bless? be sure of thine own ground; "Fix well thy centre first; then draw thy circle round."

I was silent, while mamma wept.

"I wish you would keep Dr. Sandford from coming here!" she said suddenly.

"I see his curricle at the gate now, mamma."

"Then I'll go. I don't want to see him. Do give him a dismissal, Daisy!"

Our only faithful kind friend; how could I? It was not possible that I should do such a thing.

"How is all here?" said the doctor, coming in.

I told him, as well as usual - or not quite. Mamma had not got accustomed to the change yet.

"And Daisy?"

"I like it."

The doctor took an ungratified survey of my countenance.

"Don't you want to see some of your old friends?"

"Friends? - _here?_ Who, Dr. Sandford?"

"Old Juanita would like to see you."

"Juanita!" said I. "Is she alive?"

"You do not seem very glad of it?"

I was not glad of anything. But I did not say so.

"She would like to see you."

"I suppose she would."

"Do you not incline to gratify her?"

"Did you tell her of - my being here, Dr. Sandford?"

"It was a very natural thing to do. If I had not, somebody else would."

"I will go over to see her some time," I said. "I suppose it is not too far for me to walk."

"It is not too far for you to ride," said the doctor. "I am going that way now. Put on your hat and come. The air will be good for you."

It was not pleasant to go. Nevertheless I yielded and went. I knew how it would be. Every foot of the way pain. The doctor let me alone. I was thankful for that. And he left me alone at Juanita's cottage. He drove on, and I walked up the little path where I had first gone for a drink of water almost eleven years ago. Yet eleven years, from ten to twenty-one, is not so much, in most cases, I thought. In mine, it was a whole life- time, and the end of a life-time. So it seemed.

The interview with my old nurse was not satisfactory. Not to me, and I think not to her. I did not seem to her quite the same Daisy Randolph she had known; indeed I was not the same. Juanita had a little awe of me; and I could not be unreserved and remove the awe. I could not tell her my heart's history; and without telling it, in part, I could not but keep at a distance from my old friend. Time might bring something out of our intercourse; but I felt that this first sight of her had done me no good. So Dr. Sandford found that I felt; for he took pains to know.

Juanita was but little changed. The eleven years had just touched her. She was more wrinkled, hardly so firm in her bearing, not quite so upright, as her beautiful presence used to be. There was no deeper change. The brow was as peaceful and as noble as ever. I thought, speculating upon it, that she must have seen storms, too, in her life-time. The clouds were all cleared away, long since. Perhaps it will be so with me, I thought, some day; by and by.

I thought Dr. Sandford would be discouraged in trying to do me good; however, a day or two after this drive, I saw his horses stopping again at our gate. My mother uttered an exclamation of impatience.

"Does that man come to see you or me, Daisy?" she asked.

"Mamma, I think he is a kind friend to both of us," I said.

"I suppose every woman has a tenderness for a man that is enamoured of her, if he is ever so great a fool," she remarked.

"Mamma! - nobody ever accused Dr. Sandford before of being a fool."

"He is a fool to look at you. Do get a little wisdom into his head, Daisy!" And she left the room again as the doctor entered the house.

I knew he and I understood each other; and though he might be a fool after mamma's reckoning, I had a great kindness for him. So I met him with frank kindness now. The doctor walked about the room a while, talking of indifferent things; and then said suddenly, -

"Do you remember old Molly Skelton?"

"Certainly. What of her?"

"She is dying, poor creature."

"Does _she_ know I am here?" I asked.

"I have not told her."

"Would she like to see me, do you think?" I said, with an uneasy consciousness that I must go, whatever the answer were.

"If she can recognise you-I presume there is nobody else she would so like to see. As in reason there ought not."

"Can you take me there, Dr. Sandford?"

"Not at this hour; I am going another way. This afternoon I will take you, if you will go. Will you go?"

"If you will be so good as to take me."

"I will come for you then at four o'clock."

That ride I have reason to remember. It was a fair June afternoon, though the month was almost out now; the peculiar brilliance which distinguishes June shone through the air and sparkled on the hills. With clear bright outlines the Catskill range stretched away right and left before us, whenever our road brought us in view of it; fulness of light on the sunny slopes, soft depth of shadow on the others, proclaiming the clear purity of the atmosphere. The blue of the sky, the fresh sweetness of the air, the life of colour in the fields and trees, all I suppose made their appeal at the doors of my heart; for I felt the pressure. It is the life in this June weather, I think, that reproaches what in us is not life; and my spirit was dead. Not really, but practically; and the June beauty gave me pain. I was out of harmony with it. And I heard nature's soft whisper of reproof. Justly given; for when one is out of harmony with nature, there is sure to be some want of harmony with the Author of nature. The doctor drove me silently, letting nature and me have it out together; till we came to the old cottage of Molly Skelton, and he handed me from the curricle. Still the doctor was silent.

He stopped, purposely I think, to speak to his groom; and I went in first. The rows of flowers by the side of the walk were tangled and overgrown and a thicket of weeds; no care had visited them for many a day; but they were there yet. Molly had not forgotten her old tastes. I went on, wondering at myself, and entered the cottage. The sick woman lay on the bed there, alone and seemingly asleep; I turned from her to look at the room. The same old room; little different from what it used to be; even two pots with geraniums in them stood on the window-sill, drooping their heads for want of water. Nobody had watered them for so long. Clearly Molly had not changed. Was it only I? I looked and wondered, as I saw myself again at ten years old in that very room. Here had been those first cups of tea; those first lessons in A B C; and other lessons in the beginnings of a higher knowledge. What had they all come to? Was Molly the better in anything beyond her flowers? What had eleven years wrought for her?

I turned again from the past, as the doctor came in, to look at the poor creature herself. She did not answer the words he addressed to her; I doubted if she heard them; she was evidently oppressed with disease, which was fast making an end of her. Experience had taught me now to judge somewhat of the looks and condition of sick people. Molly, I saw, was very sick; and I knew soon that it was with a combination of evils, which had taken hold of her, and made her poor existence a wearisome thing. It was near an end now.

"Speak to her," - said the doctor.

And I did, and he did; but we got no response. None in words; I fancied that the look of the face bore witness to some aroused attention; might it be more? One hand of Molly's lay stretched out upon the coverlid. She was a mass of disease; I should not have thought once that I could touch that hand; but I had had training since then. I put my hand upon that poor hand and clasped it. I fancied, I cannot tell why, that Molly was sensible of my action and that she liked it; yet she did not speak. - We sat so, my hand in hers, or hers in mine, and Dr. Sandford watching us. Time went by. I hardly knew how it went.

"How long will you stay?" he asked at length.

"I cannot leave her so, Dr. Sandford."

"You cannot stay here!"

"Why not?"

"It would be a peculiar proceeding. You would not do it?"

"I cannot do otherwise, Dr. Sandford. I cannot leave her alone in this condition."

"I cannot leave _you_," he said.

"There is nothing to be afraid of," I returned, looking at him. "And something may need to be done."

The doctor's look in answer was unguarded; it expressed so much that he did not generally allow himself to express; it was full of tenderness, of reverence, of affection. Full it was of sorrow too. It was not a look I could meet. I turned from it hastily; the former question was let drop; and we were again still and silent. I had enough to keep me silent, and Dr. Sandford was as mute. All three of us only breathed in company, for a long while more; though I suppose some of Dr. Sandford's meditations and mine came near together. I do not know how time went; but then, the one to break silence was the one I had thought might never speak again. Suddenly she began in a low sort of crooning voice, saying over and over the same words -

"I am in the valley - in the valley - in the valley -"

Maybe half a dozen times she repeated these words; and forlornly true as they seemed of her, I was in doubt whether she knew of what she was speaking. Could intelligence be awake, in that oppressed condition of the bodily powers? Her speech was a sort of mumbling repetition. But then, with a change of tone, clean and round the words came out -

"But there's light in the valley! -"

My heart sprang with such an impulse of joy as quite overleaped all my own sorrows and took me out of them. Then Molly had not forgotten; then the seed sown long ago had not perished in the ground or been caught away; it had been growing and springing all these years; life had sprung up in the ungenial soil, even everlasting life; and what were earth's troubles to that? One vision of unseen things, rushing in, made small all the things that are seen. The poor old cripple, deformed and diseased, whose days must have been long a burden to her, was going even now to drop the slough of her mortality and to take on her the robes of light and the life that is all glory. What if my own life were barren for a while; then comes the end! What if I must be alone in my journey; I may do the Master's work all the way. And _this_ is His work; to set the captive free; light to the blind; the opening of the prison doors to them that are bound; riches to the poor; yes, life to the dead. If I may do this work, shall I complain, because I have not the helper I wanted; when God is my helper?

I waited but till Dr. Sandford was gone, for I made him go; and then I knelt down by Molly's bedside, very, very humbled, to weep out my confession and prayer.

Molly slumbered on, wanting nothing, when I rose to my feet; and I went to the cottage door and sat down on the step. The sun was going to set in glory beyond the blue misty line of the mountains; the June evening light was falling, in freshness and sweetness, on every leaf and blade of grass; and the harmony I had wanted I had got again.

Molly's words had made the first rift in my cloud; the first sunshine had reached me that I had seen for many a long day. I saw it at last, as I sat in the cottage door and looked at the glory of the evening. I saw, that although my life might be in shadow for most of its way, yet the sunshine was on the other side of the cloud, unchanged, and I should come out into it in due time. And others were in its full rays already; - and my poor Molly was just going to find its brightness. Could I not wait a while? - just for myself? - and meanwhile do my blessed work?

And now, in the hush of my spirit, nature came home to me with her messages. The sunbeams laid their promise at my feet, of everlasting joy; the hills told me of unchangeableness and strength, and reminded me of what Mont Pilatte used to say. The air breathed balm, comfort, the earnest of gracious supply; the beauty around me said that God would not withhold anything that was good for me. I could trust Him; and I thanked Him for the messages of His creatures; and I prayed that I, an intelligent living creature of higher order, might live to carry higher messages, for Him, to all within my reach. I gave myself to do His will. And as for the comfort of my life, God would take care of that, and be Himself my portion and my exceeding great reward.

The sun went down behind the Catskill leaving the mountains in a bath of glorified mist; and I, strengthened and comforted, left my door-step and went back to Molly. She lay as she had lain, in what I might have supposed stupor; and perhaps it was; but she had said there was light in the valley she was going through. That was enough. She might speak no more; and in effect she never did intelligibly; it did not matter. My heart was full of songs of gladness for her; yes, for a moment I almost stood up yonder, among the harpers harping with their harps. Meanwhile I put the little room to rights; even as I had tried to do when I was a little child. I succeeded better now; and then I sat down to wait; there seemed nothing more to be done. The evening shades closed in; I wondered if I were to spend the night alone with the dying woman; but I was not afraid. I think I have done with fear in this world. Even as the thought passed me, Dr. Sandford came in.

He had not been able to get any help, and he came to take my place, that I might go home. It ended in our watching the night through together; for of course I would not leave the cottage. It was a night of strange and new peace to me; peace that I had not known for many months. Molly was slowly passing away; not seeming to suffer much, needing little care; she was past it; and Dr. Sandford bestowed his attention upon me. He sent for refreshments; had a fire built, for the June night was chill; and watched me and waited upon me. And I let him, for I knew it gave him pleasure.

"How do you do?" he said to me one time when the night was far spent.

"Why do you ask that, Dr. Sandford?"

"Must you know, before you tell me?"

"No, not at all; I was only curious, because I know you always have a reason for your questions."

"Most people have, I believe."

"Yes, curiosity; but it is knowledge, not ignorance, that prompts your inquiries, Dr. Sandford."

He smiled at that; one of the pleasant smiles I used to know so well. I saw them rarely now. It made me a little sad, for I knew Dr. Sandford's life had suffered an eclipse, as well as mine.

"I have not so much knowledge that I do not desire more," he said.

"Yes, I know. I am very well, thank you."

"You were not very well when I brought you here."

"No. I was well in body."

"You are better?"

"Yes."

"If it were not impertinent, I would like to ask more."

"It is not impertinent. You may ask."

"In pursuit of my old psychological study, you know. What has happened in this poor little place, by this poor creature's bedside, to do any good to Daisy Randolph?"

Now it was not according to my nature to like to tell him. But what had I just been asking, but that I might carry messages? So I spoke, slowly.

"This poor creature is just going to step out of this poor place, into glory. The light of that glory is shining around her now, for she said so. You heard her."

"Yes," said the doctor. "Well?"

"Well, Dr. Sandford, it reminded me how near the glory is, and how little this world's things are in face of it. I have remembered that I am a servant of the King of that land, and an heir of the glory; and that He loves me now, and has given me work to do for Him, and when the work is done will take me home. And I am content."

"What 'work' are you going to do?" the doctor asked, rather growlingly.

"I do not know. What He gives me."

And even as I spoke, there was a rush of tears to my eyes, with the thought that I must do my work alone; but I was content, nevertheless. Dr. Sandford was not. His fingers worked restlessly among the thick locks of his hair; as if he were busy with a thicket of thoughts as well; but he said nothing more.

Towards morning Molly passed away from the scene of her very lonely and loveless life journey. I went to the door again, in time to see the rays of the morning brightening the blue ridge which lay clear and cool over against me.

What light for Molly now! And what new light for me.

I drove home through that new light, outward and inward. I could and did give mamma some pleasure at breakfast; and then slept a quiet, dreamless sleep, to make up for my loss of the night before.

I have got through my story now, I think. In Molly's cottage, life started anew for me, on a new basis. Not my own special gratification, but my Lord's will. And I seeking that, He takes care of the other. I find it so. And He has promised that everybody shall find it so. My only care is to do exactly the work He means I shall do. It is not so easy always to find out and make sure of that. I would like, if I followed my liking, I would like to go South and teach in the Freedmen's schools somewhere. But that is not my work now, for mamma claims me here.

We are at Melbourne again. As soon as the last tenant's term of possession was expired, Dr. Sandford had the house put in order for us, and mamma and I moved in. There is a sort of pleasure, in being here, in the old place; but it is a mingled pleasure. I think all places are pleasant to me now. Mamma reigns here queen, as of old; - for Ransom will not come North, and leaves all in her hand. All the enjoyment, that is. Dr. Sandford manages the business. I do not know how long this will last; for Ransom may marry, and in that case he may wish to live in the place himself, and mamma and I would have to go; but that day is not yet; and the blue mountains across the river, and the slopes of green turf, and the clumps and groves of trees which stand about the house and adorn the grounds, are all in even greater beauty than when I was ten years old; and I enjoy them even more.

Dr. Sandford takes care of everything that mamma cannot manage. I know why he does it; and I am sorry. He is like a good brother to me, and I am very fond of him; he is coming and going in our house continually; he furthers my plans, and ministers to all my pleasure, and looks after my well-being, somewhat as he did when I was ten years old; only with much more of freedom and acknowledged affection and authority. I think he fancies that time will befriend him and bring me to look upon him in a light more kindly for his wishes. He is mistaken. People may love truly and love again, I suppose; I have no doubt men may; but I think not women. Not true women, when they have once thoroughly given their hearts. I do not think they can take them back to give again. And mine is Mr. Thorold's.

My writing all this has been a great comfort to me and done me good. Have I accomplished what I said at the beginning I would try to do, - follow out the present truth of my life to the possible glory? Surely I have found it. Through sorrow and joy, through gain and loss, yes, and I suppose by means of these, I have come to know that all joy, even fulness of joy, is summed up in being wholly the Lord's child. To do His will, and to be filled with the happiness that He can give and He alone, that is enough for anybody. It is enough for me.

THE END.

Note by the transcriber : DAISY IN THE FIELD is the continuation of MELBOURNE HOUSE and DAISY.