CHAPTER XXII.

LUCY BLYTH MAKES A CONQUEST.

“What is tact? ’tis worth revealing-- Tis delicacy’s finest feeling; It is to scan another’s breast, To know the thought ere half expressed; If word or tone should waken pain, To drop the subject or the strain; To twine around, with winning art, And gently steal away the heart.”

_Anon._

The blacksmith’s daughter received her father’s description of the proceedings at the quarterly meeting with much enjoyment, and true to her taste for seeking out the neediest, emphatically endorsed the idea of making evangelical war on Midden Harbour. Pondering how she could help forward this worthy scheme, she made her way, one evening, to pay a visit to the ailing wife of Piggy Morris. Lucy’s piety was a very cheerful and attractive type. Those who think that religion must necessarily tinge the life with melancholy, and wrap its possessor in a veil of gloom, would have felt inclined to question the genuineness of her profession, and to doubt as to whether she had “the root of the matter” within her. Her bright eyes were seldom dim with other tears than those of sympathy and joy; her smiles were never long absent from her face; her full, free, musical ripple of laughter was perfectly contagious, and her manifold charms of form and feature were brightened and intensified by the Christian faith and joy that dwelt within. No one could be long in Lucy’s company before any “megrims” of their own began to pass away; and no sooner did she enter the home of sickness and of sorrow, than the gloom began insensibly to lift, and the inmates were led to look at matters from their brighter side. This power of radiating happiness is of wondrous value, and ought to be cultivated, as it may, by all who keep the heart-fires of grace brightly burning, from whence the subtle and potent blessings are evolved. This cheering quality made Lucy’s visits unspeakably precious to such a despondent invalid as Mrs. Morris. To Mary Morris they were as bright spots in a very cloudy sky, and even Piggy Morris himself, glum and crusty as he was, was fain to declare his pleasure at her visits, and to give her a welcome such as greeted no visitor besides.

“Well, Mrs. Morris, how are you to-day?” said Lucy to the ailing woman, who sat, propped up with pillows, in an old arm-chair by the fireside. “Why, I declare, you look ever so much better and brighter than when I was here last. Some of these fine days we shall be having you out of doors again, and you and Mary will be having a cup of tea with me at the Forge.”

Mrs. Morris’s thin and sallow face gleamed with satisfaction at the sight of her welcome guest; but she shook her head as one who had made up her mind to say “good-bye” to hope, and accept the inevitable.

“No, Miss Blyth, I don’t feel better; I’m not able to say just what ails me, or where or what my complaint is. But I’m wearing away, slowly and surely, and at times I feel such a sinking and a fainting, that I sit waiting and waiting, thinking every moment will be my last.”

“Yes, that’s just it. I don’t believe in ‘thinking and waiting’ of that kind. When you feel a sinking and a fainting, you should tell Mary to get you a little beef-tea, or a cup of tea, to give you a rising; and make up your mind that you aren’t going to die yet, because you’re wanted here.”

“Nay, I don’t know about that,” said the despondent soul, always entertaining hard thoughts about herself. “I’m not wanted here. I’m such a poor helpless invalid that I’m no use to anybody.”

“Oh, that’s it, is it? Mary Morris you just come here. Now, Mrs. Morris, just tell her, will you, that she doesn’t want you, and that you are no use to her!”

Mrs. Morris looked at the speaker, and then into her daughter’s loving and gentle face, down which the tears were quietly descending, and said, as she put her arms around her neck,--

“No. God bless her, I can’t say that, for I know she loves her mother.”

Mary returned the embrace warmly, saying,--

“Love you? Aye, that I do, next to my God.”

“Why, bless my life, Mrs. Morris, there are folks in the world that haven’t got so much as a cat or a dog to wag their tails when they see ’em; and you’ve got such a wealth of tenderness as there is in this girl’s heart to call your own. When did Bob and Dick come to see you last?”

“Oh, they were both here last Sunday. No, Bob was here on Monday, too, and again last night.”

“What did he want?” said Miss Inquisitive.

“Oh, only to inquire how I was. Last night he brought me a few oranges that he had bought.”

“Indeed! Where did he get _them_, I wonder?”

“He fetched them from Kesterton on Monday night after his day’s work was over.”

“Oh, that’s it, is it? And so you have two good sons, who come and spend their Sundays, the only day in the week they have at liberty. One comes again on Monday, after toiling all the day, and the other poor, tired lad goes all the way to Kesterton to buy some oranges to refresh you, and yet you dare to tell me you are not wanted! God bless them both! How dare you?”

At that moment Piggy Morris came in from a distant market.

“Good-night, Miss Blyth,” said he. “It’s as good as a golden guinea to see your smiling face.”

“Is it?” said Lucy. “Then give me a golden guinea for our new chapel, and you shall look at it again.”

A sudden thought struck her. She saw he was in a good humour. Probably markets had been favourable and bargains good. It was a hazard, but she risked it.

“Come here, Mr. Morris,” and taking him by the hand, she led him to his wife. “Look at this dear soul. She says that she isn’t wanted, and is of no use to anybody, because she’s weak and ill,” and Lucy looked at him a whole volume of entreaty and desire.

Morris understood her purpose, and whether he was thinking, as he gazed upon the fallen cheek, the sunken eye, and the dark hair so thickly silvered--remnants of the beauty of the older and brighter days before he brought sorrow over the threshold--or whether Lucy’s influence acted on him like a spell, cannot be said, probably a little of both; but he took his wife’s hand in his, and stroked it, saying,--

“Why, bless you, Sally, there’s nobody we could spare so ill as thee.”

Lucy’s eyes and smile repaid him for that unusual grace, and then turning to his wife, she said,--

“There, you naughty soul. Mary loves you; Bob and Dick love you; your husband loves you, and yet you dare to look me in the face and tell me you’re not wanted!” And, kissing her cheek, “Jesus loves you, and I love you, and if you call the cat it will jump upon your knee and tell you the same thing. Yet you ‘feel a sinking and a fainting,’ and you ‘sit waiting and thinking that every moment is going to be the last!’ Mrs. Morris, I’m”----”

But by this time the work was done. The poor woman’s face was all aglow.

“Yes, yes,” said she. “I am richer than I thought.”

“Richer! I should think you are; and you have all the love of God, all the promises of the Bible, and all the hopes of heaven into the bargain. Mrs. Morris, I’m going to sing, and if you don’t join in the chorus I won’t stop and have a cup of tea.”

Lucy’s singing was an inspiration, and Piggy Morris stopped the process of unlacing his boots to look and listen, as she sang,--

THE DARK AND THE DAWN.

“Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.”--_Ps_. xxx, 5.

To-night there are tears, To-night there are fears, To-night there is sighing and sorrow, My tears shall be dried, My fears shall subside, ’Twill be singing--not sighing--to-morrow!

So this is my song, As I travel along! Come neighbours, and join in my chorus! The tears of the night, Become pearls in the light, The light of the morning before us.

To-night I may sigh; But pray tell me why, From the future more tears I should borrow? No! strengthened by hope, With my cares I will cope, For they all will evanish to-morrow! So this is my song, &c.

Though hard I may toil, And wearily moil, And with tears cast my seed in the furrow; Not long shall I weep; I am certain to reap A harvest of joy on the morrow! So this is my song, &c.

I care not a jot For the crook in my lot, Though I grieve a few moments in sorrow; They soon will be past, And the “First and the Last” Will send me deliv’rance to-morrow. So this is my song, &c.

Even now, as I weep, I see the dawn peep Through the shadowing curtains of sorrow! Hope widens the rift-- Even now do they lift, And the rosy dawn smiles a “Good morrow!”

So this is my song, As I travel along-- Come neighbours and join in my chorus? Be sure by-and-bye We shall reign in the sky, When the glory gates open before us!

You might go far before you found a brighter atmosphere than that which filled the house of Piggy Morris, and all owing to the presence of that concentrated piece of sunshine, Lucy Blyth. After tea Dick came in, and received such a warmth of greeting from her that he almost lost his balance, and blushed like a peony, as hobbledehoys will under such circumstances.

“Why, Mrs. Morris,” said Lucy, “here’s that troublesome fellow here again. He was here last night, and on Monday night, and on Sunday, too. Look here, young man; what do you come here so often for?”

“To see my mother,” said Dick, while Lucy flung a triumphant look at the happy mother, who drew the lad fondly to her side.

When, at last, Lucy rose to take her leave, it was getting dark, and Mary said she would put on her bonnet and go with her a little way.

“Not to-night, Mary. I’ve chattered so much and so long that your mother ought to be in bed. I can manage very well by myself.”

“I’ll go with you, Miss Blyth,” said Dick, jumping to his feet.

“Oh! You think that after you’ve been working like a Briton all the day in Farmer Crabtree’s field, and walked nearly three miles beside to see your mother”--here there was another glance at Mrs. Morris--“and three miles to go back, I’m going to let you walk an extra mile with me! Why, bless the boy, you must think I’ve a heart as hard as my father’s anvil.”

Meanwhile Piggy Morris had been silently re-lacing his boots, and now, getting up from his chair, he reached down his hat from a nail, and said, quietly,--

“Never mind, Dick, my lad, I’ll see Miss Blyth home.”

Piggy Morris, the surly and sour, could not have surprised them more if they had seen a pair of wings sprouting from his shoulder-blades.

Lucy quietly said, “Oh, thank you, Mr. Morris, you are kind,” and giving Ursa Major her arm, the oddly-matched pair turned their steps towards Nestleton Forge.

“What’s cum to feyther?” said Dick, as one who waits for a reply.

“Goodness knows,” said Mary; “I never knew him do such a thing before.”

“My dear,” said Mrs. Morris, “it’s Lucy Blyth’s magic. That girl’s an angel if ever there was one. If your fayther would only go to meeting nobody knows what might happen.” Here the good woman sighed at what appeared to her a vista of delight too good to hope for.

Meanwhile Lucy Blyth and her boorish escort were making their way through the wintry night towards Nestleton Forge. Happily for Morris, with whom words were always few, and usually gruff, his companion rushed into conversation--not that she was that social nuisance, a wordy woman, but that she was a born politician, and meant to turn the golden moments to good account.

“Mrs. Morris is much better and brighter to-night. Don’t you think so?”

“Yes,” was the emphatic reply, “because she’s had you to cheer her up. She does get desperate worritsome at times, though.”

“Why, you see, Mr. Morris, it is hard for her to be almost always a prisoner in her chair, and as for her sick headaches, I don’t know how she does to bear them.”

“Yes, I daresay it’s hard enough,” was the brief reply.

“Mary’s a great comfort to her,” said Lucy. “She is so quiet and gentle, and nurses her so tenderly. I often wonder how she manages to get through her work so well. I _do_ like Mary.”

“Yes, Poll’s a good lass,” said Morris, laconically.

“How kind and nice it is that those boys should come so often and so far to see their mother! I _was_ pleased to hear about Bob.”

“What about Bob?” said Ursa Major.

“Why, on Tuesday, after his day’s work, he walked all the way to Kesterton and bought his mother some oranges.”

“Did he?” quoth Bruin.

“Yes, he did, and Dick’s as kind and good as he is. I _do_ like those lads.”

“It appears to me you like ’em all,” said Piggy Morris, and there was a little querulousness in his tone, as though he felt himself to be a natural exception.

“You never said a truer word,” said Lucy, laughing, “and I’m afraid I shall keep coming to see you, till you turn me out.”

Here Morris gave a chuckle, odd in its character, a cross between a grunt and a hiccup. “Then that’ll be for ever an’ ever, as long as there’s a threshwood to the door, or a tile on the roof.”

“By the way, Mr. Morris, do you know that Squire Fuller has refused us a piece of land for a Methodist chapel? He says he won’t have such a thing in his village.”

“_His_ village! The old fool, it isn’t all his. Midden Harbour belongs to old Crabtree. Squire Fuller’s a bad old”----

“Hush!” said Lucy, “don’t say anything naughty, for my sake.”

Ursa Major growled and finished his sentence, more expressive than refined, in an unknown tongue.

“But it does seem a pity that we can’t have a chapel, doesn’t it? Farmer Houston’s kitchen cannot hold all the people.”

“Humph! What’s the squire care about that?”

“No, more’s the pity, but our young minister, Mr. Mitchell, says that, seeing we can’t get all the people who come into one room, we must try to find another. He would like to get one in Midden Harbour.”

“Midden Harbour! Miss Blyth. Why that’s a rum spot to come into.”

“Why, you see; Squire Fuller couldn’t touch us there.” [O Lucy, you inveterate plotter! you designing woman!] “And you see, Mr. Morris, if your neighbours are a bad lot, it’s time somebody was trying to do them good. But,” said she, heaving a sigh which was intended to search the innermost recesses of his heart, “there’s nobody there that has room enough to take us in.”

Piggy Morris smiled grimly, as he said, “Try Dick Spink, the besom-maker.”

“Oh, don’t mention that wicked man. We must have a more respectable place than that, or we can’t come at all, _and Squire Fuller will get his way_.”

“Nay, I’ll be hanged if he shall. You shall have my house first, though we have no room to spare.”

Piggy Morris stood still a moment. Lucy’s heart beat with hope. Then Morris exclaimed,--

“Lucy Blyth! For your sake, you shall have my old malt house. I can do without it, and the Methody parson shall come into Midden Harbour!”

“Oh, Mr. Morris! God bless you for saying that. Now I shall be able to come and _see you every week_.” That clinched the nail, and as Adam Olliver said at the quarterly meeting, “God was strangger than the devil,” and Midden Harbour couldn’t “keep oot the hosts o’ God’s elect.”

“Come in and tell my father,” said Lucy, as they reached the garden gate, “you’ll be the most welcome guest he’s seen for many a day.”

“Good evening, Morris,” said Natty Blyth, who had come to the door; “Come in a bit!”

“I can’t stop, thank ye,” blurted out Piggy Morris. “They tell me you want to hold your meetings in Midden Harbour. You can have my malt-kiln and welcome, and you may tell the Methody parson that he may thank Lucy Blyth for that. Good night.”