Part 6
Only, sometimes I can’t manage them, and I don’t know why. They sweep over me like the waves of the sea, and trample me like wild horses. It isn’t often like that; but when it is, I know I’m in for it—and also that I’m dead sure to get out of it after a while. I’m lying here—this racketty old body, with a piece of me, myself, inside it, just about as miserable as such a combination can get to be. And the rest of me is hanging around outside, looking on, and saying, “Just lie low and keep quiet, old lady. It’s tough, but it won’t last. Lay your nose to the wind and let it howl. If it blows you even on both sides, you’ll get out of it without being crank-sided, and that’s the best you can do.” So I lie here; and after awhile the comfort of knowing it’s just a mood soaks in till I can feel it and get the good of it—and then the storm is past. I come out of it, too, with my self-respect unimpaired; because, no matter how it raged inside, I did keep quiet on the outside till it blew over.
So it blew over this time also. And after awhile even Grumpy was forced to admit that it was morning, for all the world was drenched with light. The long, level beams slipped across the hills as the sun rose, and touched the tree-tops, one by one; and behold, life had risen—in the night. Every twig of the tulip-tree was tipped with green where the great terminal buds had burst their sheaths; and down by the brook a fairy mist of color clung tenuously about the willows. The mocking-bird was in a rapture of prophecy in the maple; and the English sparrows were actually housebuilding in a beautiful hole in the scarlet oak.
Nobody else thinks of nest building yet; but among the birds, as among humans, the increase of population is most rapid where one would fain find it least. These sparrows will be rearing half a dozen families before the year is out—good, large families, too; and it behooves them to select their apartment early in the season. That hole belongs to the wrens, but that’s of no consequence to the sparrows, who have the pleasant habit of taking whatever they want.
It must be owned they are a hardworking tribe, even though their works be evil. If the fathers left their wives to do all the work, after the bluebirds’ fashion, some of the broods would surely starve; the mothers would succumb to nervous prostration before all the mouths could be filled. But the head of the family rolls up his feathers and pitches right in, from nest building days until frost. Nuisances though they be, there isn’t a shirker among them; and they will drop their petty personal squabbles instantly, to make common cause against any bird, big or little, not of sparrow feather. But they shall not have the wren’s hole for all that—not while Uncle Milton can climb a tree for me.
* * * * *
_March 6th._ The blackbirds are falling in love. Even sensible, lovely creatures are a bit comical when hard hit by the tender passion. In its first inflammatory stages it so utterly destroys the patient’s sense of proportion that one smiles even when one’s heart is aglow with sympathy. But a blackbird lover, a sleek, slick gentleman, oppressed with more dignity than an archbishop could carry gracefully, trying to unlimber enough to convince his _inamorata_ that he desires her favor when he merely wishes to air his perfections for her dazzlement!
One flies to a branch in plain sight of the greedy black gang, gobbling crumbs below, and meditates. Shall he condescend, or shall he not? Well, maybe she is worth it; and it will display his feathers to an admiring world. He ducks a little, spreads wings and tail, rises a-tiptoe, and says something through his nose to call attention to his noble self, though a compliment may be tacked on in the last note. I know that’s just the way Cousin Chad did it when he courted Cousin Jane. And think of the laughterless depths of Cousin Jane’s soul that she found it a performance to take seriously! Things are pretty much evened up in this life, after all. It is true Cousin Jane has no back; but think of a blackbird husband—and of me with the Peon!
* * * * *
_March 10th._ Rain, rain, rain. I’ve been examining my mercies this morning to see which of them can stand the strain of a three-days’ cold down-pour, a week of almost utter sleeplessness, and a spine that is conducive to profanity. The mercies look badly frazzled; but they were all right the other day, and couldn’t possibly wear out as fast as this. I suppose it’s the same old trouble—my eyes are moth-eaten, and need to be done up in camphor at once.
Anyway, it’s a piece of a mercy that if I had to get so much worse I did it in weather when I couldn’t go outdoors if I were able. It is awfully cold. Grumpy says it will frost when it clears off, and all the peaches will be killed. Cheerful, isn’t it, when David’s pet peach-orchard experiment is in full bloom for the first time? But the peach trees are like us humans: they never can tell what is ahead of them. They have to go on in the dark with such capital of good-will and ignorance as they possess, and take the consequences without kicking.
I think the titmice might be counted as mercies today. The other birds have disappeared, but the titmice are as jaunty as possible in their trim gray rain coats, whistling like boys calling dogs.
And pray, if a titmouse can keep his crest starched in this down-pour, why should the spirit of mortal be limp?
* * * * *
_March 12th._ If one be born a coward, one cannot help that; and what one cannot help is no disgrace, but a burden to be carried in patience to the end of life.
But in my childhood it came to me that though one be born a coward beyond escape, it is never necessary to behave like one. That has been my comfort a thousand times, and it is my comfort tonight—a comfort great enough to hold me steady in the iron grip of pain.
Coward I am, and will be, to the end of life. But I have not behaved like a coward this day! And now the day is ended—lived through forever. And I can remember it unashamed.
VI BEFORE THE DAWN
_March 18th._ If the outward pressure of necessity for self-control be great enough to balance the inward pressure of pain, one can keep fairly steady. But a week after the Peon left on one of those long western trips something came up that made it necessary for David to drop everything and go to Atlanta. He was detained there beyond his expectations, and then wrote me he must go to New York before returning home. He begged me again, as when he first left, to send for Grace; but I did not want her. At first it was a relief to be alone, with no need for effort or concealment. Afterwards, I did not want her because her sympathy would have been more than I could bear.
It wasn’t just the day’s pain, or the night’s—one can usually manage that somehow. What Grumpy did was to set today’s pain by that of yesterday, and the day before that; to add last week’s to last year’s, to the pain of ten years, twenty years, back. He applied his recollections like a mustard plaster, and rubbed them in like a liniment. Then he took tomorrow, and next year, and the year after that, and built them all into one long _via dolorosa_—a life-time path of pain. I might have stood that; I have before. But beside the pain he set the idleness—this horrible, useless idleness. That is the killing part! He set it all before me, as plain in the black and sleepless nights as in the day: and while I cowered, he gibed and threatened till I feared to look ahead and dared not hope. And when I tried to run away to Make-Believe, for the first time in all my life I could not find the way! That finished everything.
So I lay still and silent one age-long night, shut fast in my body at last, the slow tears dripping on my pillow on either side. Suddenly, in the dawning, a purpose leaped within me; Ella should come to me—here, in this very room, from which I could no longer escape. If Make-Believe were closed to me, I would command her here. I would tell her everything: I could not bear it in silence any more.
Since we first went to the city I had loved her. And after Great-aunt Letitia died, until she went North to live, she had been constantly in my home. And after that—oh, we knew the way to Make-Believe, we two! Never a day but we met there, for many a year. She knew all about the pain, though we never spoke of it. It wasn’t merely that words were unnecessary, but that pain, in her presence, seemed so small a part of life. Nothing really mattered but love and kindness and happy human laughter.
Yet she had never had a real home, nor even a care-free childhood. Her life had been one long sacrifice for those who took her bounty as their right. But the laughing blue eyes, the heart of kindness, the sturdy, sensible, joyous spirit of her, blended of love and humor and common sense! The children in the streets ran after her, and tired faces brightened as she passed.
For three years and a half now I had not seen her, even in Make-Believe, where I met every one else I love, both living and dead. Somehow I could not pretend about her any more, after that strange day when my letter came back unopened—the happy letter I had written to tell her I was going to a sanitarium to be made over new, so that I could come and pay her a “really truly” visit on my way home. She never saw the letter. They sent it back unopened; and I could not play about her any more.
But now, if I must stay shut in my body, she must come. She should never leave me. I would tell her every day just how hard life was. And she would be sorry for me; she would understand. I reached out with all the life left in me to draw her out of Make-Believe, now shut against me, and bring her to share my prison, and to hear my complaints.
* * * * *
I turned my head upon the pillow and lifted my heavy lids. She was coming toward the bed. I raised my arms feebly, and her own were round me. My head fell on her breast, and I lay there, drawing long, sobbing breaths, while she stroked my hair with firm and gentle fingers. There was no need for speech: her touch was always plainer than other people’s words.
But presently I was aware of a difference in her touch, a something new and strange. I whispered weakly, without opening my eyes.
“What is it dear? What troubles you? Why don’t you speak to me?”
Silence. Only that tender, pitying touch.
“I knew you’d be sorry for me,” I whispered on; “and oh, I want you to be! I wouldn’t have called you if it were real, you know—I wouldn’t hurt you for the world. But nothing can hurt you now. Isn’t Love so plain to you, and the end of things, and the reasons why they must be—isn’t all that so shining clear to you that even my being like this can’t hurt? Tell me about it. I want to know it is clear to somebody—I’m so far gone in the dark.”
Still no answer.
“Then be sorry for me,” I went on, dashing my desperate pleading against that strange, disquieting silence. “I’ve borne so much. I must tell somebody, and it isn’t fair to talk about it to them here at home. I’ve never talked to anybody before, even to you. I’ve never even cried, never once, except all by myself in the dark. And I’m such a coward about everything, and specially about pain; I’ve been so afraid of it all my life. And it never stops. It’s been years, Ella, years and years. And oh, I can’t bear it any more! You don’t know what it’s like just to be still and suffer when you can’t _do_ anything. It wasn’t so bad when I could keep going; I could fight. But now I can’t fight any more. I want to die. I think God ought to let me die.—I’ve tried; I’ve tried my best so long. And I can’t try any more.”
The words were scarcely breathed, and I stopped in exhaustion, the slow tears dropping on her breast.
Still she did not speak. Deeper and deeper sank her silence, pressed in by that strange, tender touch.
Suddenly I shivered, and my eyes flew wide. Her own were full of love and sorrow—a sorrow that looked past all my complaints to something deeper and more vital. I shrank away from her.
“I can’t,” I said. “I can’t any more; I can’t.”
Behind the sorrow in her eyes a light was kindled; but it only frightened me the more.
“I have tried,” I protested. “I’ve done nothing else the most of my life. Is there no pity, even in you?”
Still she gazed; and something in her look called to something dead in me. I shook my head feebly and closed my eyes; but through the shut lids her gaze commanded.
“I have come to the end,” I persisted; “and if you do not understand, there is nothing left. I can’t try any more, and I won’t. Go away.”
I gasped as I said it, and opened my eyes again. Her look pierced and held me like the point of a sword. I turned my head from side to side, shivering, but there was no escape. The dead thing in me stirred to life and dragged itself up to look truth in the face once more.
“Yes,” I said, “It is true. I can’t because I won’t. I thought I wouldn’t because I couldn’t, but that is a lie. I can endure if I will—and if I can, I must. But will it never end?”
She lifted her head a little. Her eyes shone, and a smile curved the sweet corners of her mouth. It was not the old, brave, happy laughter, but something wiser and more compelling—the overflow of an exhaustless joy.
“You _know_,” I whispered. “You learned it even in your life down here. And to keep on trying is to conquer, isn’t it?—even though one fails with every breath. And the only irreparable calamity is to turn coward and quit.”
Her face was heavenly sweet.
“I must never send for you again?” I asked, like a child. “Not to say things are hard, or to cry?—But if I play, in the real Make-Believe, will you talk to me there as you used? If I see you there I won’t need you this way again. Good-bye.”
Her fingers brushed my hair once more as I lay back on the pillow; and then I knew she was gone.—O bravest friend! Not even in my own coward thoughts could your courage be bent to the service of fear; to think of you was to find strength, even against my will!
For a long time I lay there, while the slow day passed and twilight deepened again into night. All her life passed before me—its selflessness, its courage, its joy. No creature that knew her went unblessed of her. What gifts pain brought, what power of helpfulness, what fullness of life and love!
Suddenly, there in the deep stillness, it was as if the night were drawn away like a veil; and I saw out to the very edges of the world, and back into far-off ages, and on into days that are yet to be; and everywhere was light. And the light came from countless faces; and I knew that to each one pain had come—pain of body or pain of soul—and because of the pain they had found the light. And down, under the light, looking up to it, drawn by it, stumbling forward by it, were those to whom the vision had not come. And I—was I offered such a fellowship only to run away in fear?
The veil of night fell dark again, but a song was in my heart. When daylight came I wrote it down—the song my friend had given me. It is called
_THE INITIATES_
_Wide as the world their company,_ _Many the paths they tread;_ _Here may a toil-worn peasant be,_ _Yonder a crownèd head._ _Famed or unknown, each one must fare_ _Forth on a bidden way;_ _That which awaits no man may share,_ _Lonely ’mid throngs are they._ _Yet comrades all they come to be:_ _Far-sundered, yet one line,_ _They march in this great company,_ _Deep in their souls its sign._
_How shall ye know them? Some there be_ _So wasted and worn and weak,_ _So anguished in body, ye all may see_ _They bear the sign ye seek._ _But some in this brotherhood there be_ _Who in such secret wise_ _Meet suffering, no man may see_ _Wherein their sorrow lies._ _Their laughter rings out true and free,_ _Ye look for the sign in vain,_ _Nor guess they are of this company,_ _Marked with the mark of pain._
_Thus shall ye know them: On their eyes_ _Falls the light of things unseen;_ _Their pain-cleared vision sweeps the skies_ _And the hearts of men, I ween;_ _The things that pass, and the things that remain,_ _Lie open to their sight,_ _And that which they learn as they dwell with pain_ _Gives strength to the world, and light._ _Patient, and wise, and glad they be,_ _Rich with love’s own increase—_ _They of this world-wide company_ _Who suffer, and find peace._
_Freed as by fire? Yet the fire shall pass,_ _And the freedom shall stand for aye;_ _And what would be the hope for the mass_ _If these should shrink in dismay?_ _So may I cast aside all fear;_ _So may my soul aspire;_ _So may I climb pain’s pathway drear_ _To heights of my soul’s desire._ _And there, with heart grown wise to see,_ _Counting nor loss nor gain._ _May I serve with this brave company_ _Who bear the mark of pain!_
VII SPRING MAGIC
_April 2nd._ The Peon came home ten days ago, and David a day later. They looked as solemn as owls, and developed a tendency to neglect their business and sit in my room which was fast getting on my nerves. So I rose up and put a stop to it. You simply can’t lie still in peace when your eyes won’t stay open, if you have any consciousness that somebody is watching you while he’s pretending to read a book. And I don’t need a doctor. I’ve been like this, and worse, a thousand times, and the Head said when I came home I was bound to get well crab-fashion—going backward lots of the time. So I laid down the law that if my eyes were shut and I didn’t speak when they opened the door, my family was to be sensible and go away.
That was why I didn’t look when the door opened one day last week. I was thinking of all the Head had said about backsets, and how, when they ended, I would come out of them more and more quickly, and they’d be farther and farther apart; and I was wondering how fast I’d go, once I had finished with this one. When the door opened I hadn’t the energy to spare for talking—I needed it for my cheerful speculations. But, instead of going away, my visitor came quietly in. Then I heard a little gasp, a soft rustle beside me, and little warm hands caught mine—Caro’s hands! She was there on her knees, her face hidden in the bedclothes, and crying as if her heart would break! Caro crying was a sight to galvanize a graven image: I sat up straight in the bed and drew her to me.
“Dear, what is it?” I implored. “Tell me quick: I’ll fix it!”
She bubbled with laughter as she caught me in her arms and eased me back on the pillow, dropping a tear and a kiss on my nose.
“You darling! If you were at your own funeral and heard one of us crying, you’d hop right up and straighten things out for us, wouldn’t you? There’s not a thing the matter with me except I’ve been so homesick for you all winter I couldn’t stand it any longer: and now I’m crying because I’m so glad I’m home.”
“But Caro——”
“Don’t ‘Caro’ me and don’t ‘but’ me, for I’ve come to stay. Mammy Lil, you’re an accomplished liar; but when your writing kept looking like chicken-tracks, I knew better than to believe a word of your sprawly, rickety tales that trailed all over the sheet. And I _hate_ music. And besides, I can drive the family to drink with what I know already.”
“But Daddy Jack, dear, and Cousin Jane.”
Caro laughed again.
“Daddy Jack says he wrote for me yesterday—after I’d started, all by my smart self. And I’ll tell Cousin Jane after a while. She’ll have something brand-new to lecture us about for the next twenty-five years. I feel like Carnegie and Rockefeller rolled into one: it isn’t often she gets the benefaction of an enormity like this, is it?”
It had been a cloudy morning, dark, and wet with the night’s rain; but now the sunlight swept across the hills and up from the branch, and struck through the soft colors shimmering about the trees like rainbows in a mist. The Peon and David tiptoed in, beaming.
“You’d better let us go by and break the news to them at Cousin Chad’s,” said David; “you’ll get a shock over the ’phone if they aren’t prepared.”
“I’m going over there this afternoon,” said Caro calmly. “I’m going all by myself and engineer Cousin Jane through the boiling-over process; she’ll be all right when she settles down to a simmer. Now get out, both of you: Mammy Lil and I want to rest.”
She slipped into her kimono and stretched herself beside me, holding my arm across her breast and stroking it with a light touch which expressed everything without words. Once in awhile she talked a little in her own sweet, whimsical way, and then lapsed again into the silence of utter content.
I turned my head to speak to her presently, and found her gone. The shadows, which had been dancing up toward the house when the sun came out, had lengthened all down the lawn to the valley, and across it to the hills on the other side. I lay watching them with that long-lost sense of refreshment which follows unbroken sleep. Down by the gate David was letting in Caro’s pony-cart and climbing to a seat beside her. Presently their laughter floated through the windows, and then she was in the room again, perched on the window-seat by the bed.
“I’m trying not to be proud, Mammy Lil,” she observed in a chastened voice; “but Cousin Jane is done to a turn, and almost cool enough to set away in the cellar. She’s pleased with me, too; she said if she just could have kept Lyddy from meddlin’ she believed she could have raised me up to be a real comfort to her. Why didn’t you let her? She gave me some outing cloth to make into petticoats for a missionary box that’s to go west. Who but Aunt Jane would bestow fuzzy petticoats on missionaries in the spring? But she bought the stuff at a bargain sale for four cents a yard, and feels that it’s providential; and we can put in plenty ourselves to make up for it.”
“And she won’t fuss about your staying here?” I asked anxiously.
“Why, of course she’ll fuss; how could she get any fun out of it if she didn’t? But she’s fussed all she’s going to right now; and next time I’ll make some more petticoats, or cut down her fifth-best winter coat for one of the little missionaries to wear on the Fourth of July. ——Don’t look so horrified, Mammy Lil; you know I’ll never let it get in the box! Now lie still like a good child till I fix your supper. I’m going to feed you myself,” and she fluttered away, singing under her breath.
* * * * *