"DR.
LAVENDAR," said William King, "some time when Goliath is doing his
2.40 on a plank road, don't you want to pull him up at that house on the
Perryville pike where the Grays used to live, and make a call? An old fellow
called Roberts has taken it; he is a --"
"Teach your
grandmother," said Dr. Lavendar; "he is an Irvingite. He comes from
Lower Ripple, down on the Ohio, and he has a daughter, Philippa."
"Oh," said
Dr. King, "you know 'em, do you?"
"Know them? Of
course I know them! Do you think you are the only man who tries to enlarge his
business? But I was not successful in my efforts. The old gentleman doesn't go
to any church; and the young lady inclines to the Perryville meeting-house --
the parson there is a nice boy."
"She is an
attractive young creature," said the doctor, smiling at some pleasant
memory; "the kind of girl a man would like to have for a daughter. But did
you ever know such an old-fashioned little thing!"
"Well, she's like
the girls I knew when I was the age of the Perryville parson, so I suppose
you'd call her old- fashioned," Dr. Lavendar said. "There aren't many
such girls nowadays; sweet- tempered and sensible and with some fun in
'em."
"Why don't you say
'good,' too?" William King inquired.
"Unnecessary,"
Dr. Lavendar said, scratching Danny's ear; "anybody who is amiable,
sensible, and humorous is good. Can't help it."
"The father is
good," William King said, "but he is certainly not sensible. He's an
old donkey, with his Tongues and his Voice!"
Dr. Lavendar's face
sobered. "No," he said, "he may be an Irvingite, but he isn't a
donkey."
"What on earth is
an Irvingite, anyhow?" William asked.
Dr. Lavendar looked at
him, pityingly: "William, you are so ridiculously young! Well, I suppose
you can't help it. My boy, about the time you were born, there was a man in
London -- some folks called him a saint, and some folks called him a fool; it's
a way folks have had ever since our Lord came into this world. His name was
Irving, and he started a new sect." (Dr. Lavendar was as open-minded as it
is possible for one of his Church to be, but even he said "sect" when
it came to outsiders.) "He started this new sect, which believed that the
Holy Ghost would speak again by human lips, just as on the Day of Pentecost.
Well, there was 'speaking' in his congregation; sort of outbursts of
exhortation, you know. Mostly unintelligible. I remember Dr. Alexander said it
was 'gibberish'; he heard some of it when he was in London. It may have been
'gibberish,' but nobody can doubt Irving's sincerity in thinking it was the
Voice of God. When he couldn't understand it, he just called it an 'unknown
tongue.' Of course he was considered a heretic. He was put out of his Church.
He died soon after, poor fellow."
"Doesn't Mr.
Roberts's everlasting arguing about it tire you out?" William asked.
"Oh no," Dr.
Lavendar said, cheerfully; "when he talks too long I just shut my eyes; he
never notices it! He's a gentle old soul. When I answer back -- once in a while
I really have to speak up for the Protestant Episcopal Church, -- I feel as if
I had kicked Danny."
William King grinned.
Then he got up and, drawing his coat-tails forward, stood with his back to the
jug of lilacs in Dr. Lavendar's fireplace. "Oh, well, of course it's all
bosh," he said, and yawned; "I was on a case till four o'clock this
morning," he apologized.
"William,"
said Dr. Lavendar, admiringly, "what an advantage you fellows have over us
poor parsons! Everything a medical man doesn't understand is 'bosh'! Now, we
can't classify things as easily as that."
"Well, I don't
care," William said, doggedly; "from my point of view --"
"From your point
of view," said Dr. Lavendar, "St. Paul was an epileptic, because he
heard a Voice?"
"If you really
want to know what I think --"
"I don't,"
Dr. Lavendar said; "I want you to know what I think. Mr. Roberts hasn't
heard any Voice, yet; he is only listening for it. William, listening for the
Voice of God isn't necessarily a sign of poor health; and provided a man
doesn't set himself up to think he is the only person his Heavenly Father is
willing to speak to, listening won't do him any harm. As for Henry Roberts, he
is a humble old man. An example to me, William! I am pretty arrogant once in a
while. I have to be, with such men as you in my congregation. No; the real
trouble in that household is that girl of his. It isn't right for a young thing
to live in such an atmosphere."
William agreed
sleepily.
"Pretty creature.
Wish I had a daughter just like her," he said, and took himself off to
make up for a broken night's rest. But Dr. Lavendar and Danny still sat in
front of the lilac-filled fireplace, and thought of old Henry Roberts listening
for the Voice of God, and of his Philippa.
The father and daughter
had lately taken a house on a road that wandered over the hills between
elderberry-bushes and under sycamores, from Old Chester to Perryville. They
were about halfway between the two little towns, and they did not seem to
belong to either. Perryville's small manufacturing bustle repelled the silent
old man whom Dr. Lavendar called an "Irvingite"; and Old Chester's
dignity and dull aloofness repelled young Philippa. The result was that the
Robertses and their one woman servant, Hannah, had been living on the
Perryville pike for some months before anybody in either village was quite
aware of their existence. Then one day in May, Dr. Lavendar's sagging old buggy
pulled up at their gate, and the old minister called over the garden wall to
Philippa: "Won't you give me some of your apple blossoms?"
That was the beginning
of Old Chester's knowledge of the Roberts family. A little later Perryville
came to know them, too: the Rev. John Fenn, pastor of the Perryville
Presbyterian Church, got off his big, raw-boned Kentucky horse at the same
little white gate in the brick wall at which Goliath had stopped, and walked
solemnly -- not noticing the apple blossoms -- up to the porch. Henry Roberts
was sitting there in the hot twilight, with a curious listening look in his
face -- a look of wait- ing expectation; it was so marked, that the caller
involuntarily glanced over his shoulder to see if any other visitor was
approaching; but there was nothing to be seen in the dusk but the roan nibbling
at the hitching-post. Mr. Fenn said that he had called to inquire whether Mr.
Roberts was a regular attendant at any place of worship. To which the old man
replied gently that every place was a place of worship, and his own house was
the House of God.
John Fenn was honestly
dismayed at such sentiments -- dismayed, and a little indignant; and yet,
somehow, the self- confidence of the old man daunted him. It made him feel very
young, and there is nothing so daunting to Youth as to feel young. Therefore he
said, venerably, that he hoped Mr. Roberts realized that it was possible to
deceive oneself in such matters. "It is a dangerous thing to neglect the
means of grace," he said.
"Surely it
is," said Henry Roberts, meekly; after which there was nothing for the
caller to do but offer the Irvingite a copy of the American Messenger and take
his departure. He was so genuinely concerned about Mr. Roberts's "danger,"
that he did not notice Philippa sitting on a stool at her father's side. But
Philippa noticed him.
So, after their kind,
did these two shepherds of souls endeavor to establish a relationship with
Henry and Philippa Roberts.
And they were equally
successful. Philippa gave her apple blossoms to the old minister, -- and went
to Mr. Fenn's church the very next Sunday. Henry Roberts accepted the tracts
with a simple belief in the kindly purpose of the young minister, and stayed
away from both churches. But both father and daughter were pleased by the
clerical attentions:
"I love Dr.
Lavendar," Philippa said to her father.
"I am obliged to
Mr. Fenn," her father said to Philippa. "The youth," he added,
"cares for my soul. I am obliged to any one who cares for my soul."
He was, indeed, as Dr.
Lavendar said, a man of humble mind; and yet with his humbleness was a serene
certainty would have been impossible to John Fenn, who measured every man's
chance of salvation by his own theological yardstick, or even to Dr. Lavendar,
who thought salvation unmeasurable. But then neither of these two ministers had
had Henry Roberts's experience. It was very far back, that experience; it
happened before Philippa was born; and when they came to live between the two
villages Philippa was twenty-four years old. . . . It was in the thirties that
young Roberts, a tanner in Lower Ripple, went to England to collect a small
bequest left him by a relative. The sense of distance, the long weeks at sea in
a sailing-vessel, the new country and the new people, all impressed themselves
upon a very sensitive mind, a mind which, even without such emotional
preparation, was ready to respond to any deeply emotional appeal. Then came the
appeal. It was that new gospel of the Tongues, which, in those days, astounded
and thrilled all London from the lips of Edward Irving -- fanatic, saint, and
martyr! -- the man who, having prayed that God would speak again in prophecy,
would not deny the power of prayer by refusing to believe that his prayer was
answered, even though the prophecy was unintelligible. And later, when the
passionate cadences of the spirit were in English, and were found to be only
trite or foolish words, repeated and repeated in a wailing chant by some
sincere, hysterical woman, he still believed that a new day of Pentecost had
dawned upon a sinful world! "For," said he, "when I asked for
bread, would God give me a stone?"
Henry Roberts went to
hear the great preacher and forgot his haste to receive his little legacy so
that he might hurry back to the tanyard. Irving's eloquence entranced him, and
it alone would have held him longer than the time he had allowed himself for
absence from the tannery. But it happened that he was present on that Lord's
Day when, with a solemn and dreadful sound, the Tongues first spoke in that
dingy Chapel in Regent Square, -- and no man who heard that Sound ever forgot
it! The mystical youth from America was shaken to his very soul. He stayed on
in London for nearly a year, immersing himself in those tides of emotion which
swept saner minds than his from the somewhat dry land of ordinary human
experience. That no personal revelation was made to him, that the searing
benediction of the Tongues had not touched his own awed, uplifted brow, made no
difference: he believed! -- and prayed God to help any lingering unbelief that
might be holding him back from deeper knowledges. To the end of his days he was
Edward Irving's follower; and when he went back to America it was as a
missionary of the new sect, that called itself by the sounding title of The
Catholic Apostolic Church.
In Lower Ripple he
preached to any who would listen to him the doctrine of the new Pentecost. At
first curiosity brought him hearers; his story of the Voice, dramatic and
mysterious, was listened to in doubting silence; then disapproved of -- so
hotly disapproved of that he was sessioned and read out of Church.
But in those days in
western Pennsylvania, mere living was too engrossing a matter for much thought
of "tongues" and "voices"; it was easier, when a man talked
of dreams and visions, not to argue with him, but to say that he was
"crazy." So by and by Henry Roberts's heresy was forgotten and his
religion merely smiled at. Certainly it struck no roots outside his own heart.
Even his family did not share his belief. When he married, as he did when he
was nearly fifty, his wife was impatient with his Faith -- indeed, fearful of
it, and with persistent, nagging reasonableness urged his return to the
respectable paths of Presbyterianism. To his pain, when his girl, his Philippa,
grew up she shrank from the emotion of his creed; she and her mother went to
the brick church under the locust-trees of Lower Ripple; and when her mother
died Philippa went there alone, for Henry Roberts, not being permitted to bear
witness in the Church, did so out of it, by sitting at home on the Sabbath day,
in a bare upper chamber, waiting for the manifestation of the Holy Spirit. It
never came. The Tongues never spoke. Yet still, while the years passed, he
waited, -- listening -- listening -- listening; a kindly, simple old man with
mystical brown eyes, believing meekly in his own unworth to hear again that
Sound from Heaven, as of a rushing, mighty wind, that had filled the London
Chapel, bowing human souls before it as a great wind bows the standing corn!
It was late in the
sixties that Henry Roberts brought this faith and his Philippa to the stone
house on the Perryville pike, where, after some months had passed, they were
discovered by the old and the young ministers. The two clergymen met once or
twice in their calls upon the new-comer, and each acquired an opinion of the
other: John Fenn said to himself that the old minister was a good man, if he
was an Episcopalian; and Dr. Lavendar said to William King that he hoped there
would be a match between the "theolog" and Philippa.
"The child ought
to be married and have a dozen children," he said; "although Fenn's
little sister will do to begin on -- she needs mothering badly enough. Yes,
Miss Philly ought to be making smearkase and apple-butter for that pale and
excellent young man. He intimated that I was a follower of the Scarlet Woman
because I wore a surplice."
"Now look here! I
draw the line at that sort of talk," the doctor said; "he can lay
down the law to me, all he wants to; but when it comes to instructing you
--"
"Oh, well, he's
young," Dr. Lavendar soothed him; "you can't expect him not to know
everything at his age."
"He's a
squirt," said William. In those days in Old Chester middle age was apt to
sum up its opinion of youth in this expressive word. "We were all squirts
once," said Dr. Lavendar, "and very nice boys we were, too -- at
least I was. Yes, I hope the youngster will see what a sweet creature old
Roberts's Philippa is."
She was a sweet creature;
but as William King said, she was amusingly old-fashioned. The Old Chester girl
of those days, who seems (to look back upon her in these days) so medieval, was
modern compared to Philippa! But there was nothing mystical about her; she was
just modest and full of pleasant silences and soft gaieties and simple,
startling truth-telling. At first, when they came to live near Perryville, she
used, when the weather was fine, to walk over the grassy road, under the brown
and white branches of the sycamores, into Old Chester, to Dr. Lavendar's
church. "I like to come to your church," she told him, "because
you don't preach quite such long sermons as Mr. Fenn does." But when it
rained or was very hot she chose the shorter walk and sat under John Fenn,
looking up at his pale, ascetic face, lighted from within by his young
certainties concerning the old ignorances of people like Dr. Lavendar -- life
and death and eternity. Of Dr. Lavendar's one certainty, Love, he was deeply
ignorant, this honest boy, who was so concerned for Philippa's father's soul!
But Philippa did not listen much to his certainties; she coaxed his little
sister into her pew, and sat with the child cuddled up against her, watching
her turn over the leaves of the hymn-book or trying to braid the fringe of Miss
Philly's black silk mantilla into little pigtails. Sometimes Miss Philly would
look up at the careworn young face in the pulpit and think how holy Mary's
brother was, and how learned -- and how shabby; for he had only a housekeeper,
Mrs. Semple, to take care of him and Mary. Not but what he might have had
somebody besides Mrs. Semple! Philippa, for all her innocence, could not help
being aware that he might have had -- almost anybody! For others of Philly's
sex watched the rapt face there in the pulpit. When Philippa thought of that, a
slow blush used to creep up to her very temples. She saw him oftener in the
pulpit than out of it, because when he came to call on her father she was apt
not to be present.
At first he came very
frequently to see the Irvingite, because he felt it his duty to
"deal" with him; but he made so little impression that he foresaw the
time when it would be necessary to say that Ephraim was joined to his idols.
But though it might be right to "let him alone," he could not stop
calling at Henry Roberts's house; "for," he reminded himself,
"the believing daughter may sanctify the unbelieving father!" He said
this once to Dr. Lavendar, when his roan and old Goliath met in a narrow lane
and paused to let their masters exchange a word or two.
"But do you know
what the believing daughter believes?" said Dr. Lavendar. He wiped his
forehead with his red bandanna, for it was a hot day; then he put his old straw
hat very far back on his head and looked at the young man with a twinkle in his
eye, which, considering the seriousness of their conversation, was
discomfiting; but, after all, as John Fenn reminded himself, Dr. Lavendar was
very old, and so might be forgiven if his mind was lacking in seriousness. As
for his question of what the daughter believed:
"I think -- I
hope," said the young minister, "that she is sound. She comes to my
church quite regularly."
"But she comes to
my church quite irregularly," Dr. Lavendar warned him; and there was
another of those disconcerting twinkles.
The boy looked at him
with honest, solemn eyes. "I still believe that she is sound," he
said, earnestly.
Dr. Lavendar blew his
nose with a flourish of the red bandanna. "Well, perhaps she is, perhaps
she is," he said, gravely.
But the reassurance of
that "perhaps" did not make for John Fenn's peace of mind; he could
not help asking himself whether Miss Philippa was a "believing
daughter." She did not, he was sure, share her father's heresies, but
perhaps she was indifferent to them? -- which would be a grievous thing! And
certainly, as the old minister had declared, she did go "irregularly"
to the Episcopal Church. John Fenn wished that he was sure of Miss Philippa's
state of mind; and at last he said to himself that it was his duty to find out
about it, so, with his little sister beside him, he started on a round of
pastoral calls. He found Miss Philly sitting in the sunshine on the lowest step
of the front porch -- and it seemed to Mary that there was a good deal of delay
in getting at the serious business of play; "for brother talks so
much," she complained. But "brother" went on talking. He told
Miss Philippa that he understood she went sometimes to Old Chester to church?
"Sometimes,"
she said.
"I do not
mean," he said, hesitatingly, "to speak uncharitably, but we all know
that Episcopacy is the handmaid of Papistry."
"Do we?"
Philly asked, with grave eyes.
"Yes," said
Mr. Fenn. "But even if Dr. Lavendar's teachings are defective," --
Mary plucked at his sleeve, and sighed loudly; "(no, Mary!) -- even if his
teachings are defective, he is a good man according to his lights; I am sure of
that. Still, do you think it well to attend a place of worship when you cannot
follow the pastor's teachings?"
"I love him. And I
don't listen to what he says," she excused herself.
"But you should
listen to what ministers say," the shocked young man protested -- "at
least to ministers of the right faith. But you should not go to church because
you love ministers."
Philippa's face flamed.
"I do not love -- most of them."
Mary, leaning against
the girl's knee, looked up anxiously into her face. "Do you love
brother?" she said.
They were a pretty
pair, the child and the girl, sitting there on the porch with the sunshine
sifting down through the lacy leaves of the two big locusts on either side of
the door. Philippa wore a pink and green palm-leaf chintz; it had six ruffles
around the skirt and was gathered very full about her slender waist; her lips
were red, and her cheeks and even her neck were delicately flushed; her
red-brown hair was blowing all about her temples; Mary had put an arm around
her and was cuddling against her. Yes, even Mary's brother would have thought
the two young things a pretty sight had there been nothing more serious to
think of. But John Fenn's thoughts were so very serious that even Mary's
question caused him no embarrassment; he merely said, stiffly, that he would
like to see Miss Philippa alone. "You may wait here, Mary," he told
his little sister, who frowned and sighed and went out to the gate to pull a
handful of grass for the roan.
Philippa led her caller
to her rarely used parlor, and sat down to listen in silent pallor to his
exhortations. She made no explanations for not coming to his church regularly;
she offered no excuse of filial tenderness for her indifference to her father's
mistaken beliefs; she looked down at her hands, clasped tightly in her lap,
then out of the window at the big roan biting at the hitching- post or standing
very still to let Mary rub his silky nose. But John Fenn looked only at
Philippa. Of her father's heresies he would not, he said, do more than remind
her that the wiles of the devil against her soul might present themselves
through her natural affections; but in regard to her failure to wait upon the
means of grace he spoke without mercy, for, he said, "faithful are the
wounds of a friend."
"Are you my
friend?" Philly asked, lifting her gray eyes suddenly.
Mr. Fenn was greatly
confused; the text-books of the Western Seminary had not supplied him with the
answer to such a question. He explained, hurriedly, that he was the friend of
all who wished for salvation.
"I do not
especially wish for it," Philippa said, very low.
For a moment John Fenn
was silent with horror. "That one so young should be so hardened!" he
thought; aloud, he bade her remember hell fire. He spoke with that sad and
simple acceptance of the fact with which, even less than fifty years ago, men
humbled themselves before the mystery which they had themselves created, of
divine injustice. She must know, he said, his voice trembling with sincerity,
that those who slighted the offers of grace were cast into outer darkness?
Philly said, softly,
"Maybe."
"'Maybe?'
Alas, it is, certainly!
Oh, why, why do you absent yourself from the house of God?" he said,
holding out entreating hands. Philippa made no reply. "Let us pray!"
said the young man; and they knelt down side by side in the shadowy parlor.
John Fenn lifted his harsh, melancholy face, gazing upward passionately, while
he wrestled for her salvation; Philly, looking downward, tracing with a
trembling finger the pattern of the beadwork on the ottoman before which she
knelt, listened with an inward shiver of dismay and ecstasy. But when they rose
to their feet she had nothing to say. He, too, was silent. He went away quite
exhausted by his struggle with this impassive, unresisting creature.
He hardly spoke to Mary
all the way home. "A hardened sinner," he was thinking. "Poor,
lovely creature! So young and so lost!" Under Mary's incessant chatter,
her tugs at the end of the reins, her little bursts of joy at the sight of a
bird or a roadside flower, he was thinking, with a strange new pain -- a pain
no other sinner had ever roused in him -- of the girl he had left.
He knew that his
arguments had not moved her. "I believe," he thought, the color
rising in his face, "that she dislikes me! She says she loves Dr.
Lavendar; yes, she must dislike me. Is my manner too severe? Perhaps my
appearance is unattractive." He looked down at his coat uneasily.
As for Philly, left to
herself, she picked up a bit of sewing, and her face, at first pale, grew
slowly pink. "He only likes sinners," she thought; "and, oh, I
am not a sinner!"
AFTER that on Sabbath
mornings Philippa sat with her father, in the silent upper chamber. At first
Henry Roberts, listening -- listening -- for the Voice, thought, rapturously,
that at the eleventh hour he was to win a soul -- the most precious soul in his
world! -- to his faith. But when, after a while, he questioned her, he saw that
this was not so; she stayed away from other churches, but not because she cared
for his church. This troubled him, for the faith he had outgrown was better
than no faith.
"Do you have
doubts concerning the soundness of either of the ministers -- the old man or
the young man?" he asked her, looking at her with mild, anxious eyes.
"Oh no, sir,"
Philly said, smiling.
"Do you dislike
them -- the young man or the old man?"
"Oh no, father. I
love -- one of them."
"Then why not go
to his church? Either minister can give you the seeds of salvation; one not
less than the other. Why not sit under either ministry?"
"I don't
know," Philippa said, faintly. And indeed she did not know why she
absented herself. She only knew two things: that the young man seemed to
disapprove of the old man; and when she saw the young man in the pulpit,
impersonal and holy, she suffered. Therefore she would not go to hear either
man.
When Dr. Lavendar came
to call upon her father, he used to glance at Philippa sometimes over his
spectacles while Henry Roberts was arguing about prophecies; but he never asked
her why she stayed away from church; instead, he talked to her about John Fenn,
and he seemed pleased when he heard that the young man was doing his duty in
making pastoral calls. "And I -- I, unworthy as I was!" Henry Roberts
would say, "I heard the Voice, speaking through a sister's lips; and it
said: Oh, sinner! for what, for what, what can separate, separate, from the
love. . . . Oh, nothing. Oh, nothing. Oh, nothing." He would stare at Dr.
Lavendar with parted lips. "I heard it," he would say, in a whisper.
And Dr. Lavendar,
bending his head gravely, would be silent for a respectful moment, and then he
would look at Philippa. "You are teaching Fenn's sister to sew?" he
would say. "Very nice! Very nice!"
Philly saw a good deal
of the sister that summer; the young minister, recognizing Miss Philippa's
fondness for Mary, and remembering a text as to the leading of a child, took
pains to bring the little girl to Henry Roberts's door once or twice a week;
and as August burned away into September Philippa's pleasure in her was like a
soft wind blowing on the embers of her heart and kindling a flame for which she
knew no name. She thought constantly of Mary, and had many small anxieties
about her -- her dress, her manners, her health; she even took the child into
Old Chester one day to get William King to pull a little loose white tooth.
Philly shook very much during the operation and mingled her tears with Mary's
in that empty and bleeding moment that follows the loss of a tooth. She was so
passionately tender with the little girl that the doctor told Dr. Lavendar that
his match-making scheme seemed likely to prosper -- "she's so fond of the
sister, -- you should have heard her sympathize with the little thing! -- that
I think she will smile on the brother," he said.
"I'm afraid the
brother hasn't cut his wisdom teeth yet," Dr. Lavendar said, doubtfully;
"if he had, you might pull them, and she could sympathize with him; then
it would all arrange itself. Well, he's a nice boy, a nice boy; -- and he won't
know so much when he gets a little older."
It was on the way home
from Dr. King's that Philippa's feeling of responsibility about Mary brought
her a sudden temptation. They were walking hand in hand along the road. The
leaves on the mottled branches of the sycamores were thinning now, and the
sunshine fell warm upon the two young things, who were still a little shaken
from the frightful experience of toothpulling. The doctor had put the small
white tooth in a box and gravely presented it to Mary, and now, as they walked
along, she stopped sometimes to examine it and say, proudly, how she had "bleeded
and bleeded!"
"Will you tell
brother the doctor said I behaved better than the circus lion when his tooth
was pulled?"
"Indeed I will,
Mary!"
"An' he said he'd
rather pull my tooth than a lion's tooth?"
"Of course I'll
tell him."
"Miss Philly,
shall I dream of my tooth, do you suppose?"
Philippa laughed and
said she didn't know.
"I hope I will; it
means something nice. I forget what, now."
"Dreams don't mean
anything, Mary."
"Oh yes, they
do!" the child assured her, skipping along with one arm round the girl's
slender waist. "Mrs. Semple has a dream-book, and she reads it to me every
day, an' she reads me what my dreams mean. Sometimes I haven't any
dreams," Mary admitted, regretfully, "but she reads all the same. Did
you ever dream about a black ox walking on its back legs? I never did. I don't
want to. It means trouble."
"Goosey!"
said Miss Philippa.
"If you dream of
the moon," Mary went on, happily, "it means you are going to have a
beau who'll love you."
"Little girls
mustn't talk about love," Philippa said, gravely; but the color came
suddenly into her face. To dream of the moon means -- Why! but only the night
before she had dreamed that she had been walking in the fields and had seen the
moon rise over shocks of corn that stood against the sky like the plumed heads
of Indian warriors! "Such things are foolish, Mary," Miss Philly
said, her cheeks very pink. And while Mary chattered on about Mrs. Semple's
book Philippa was silent, remembering how yellow the great flat disk of the
moon had been in her dream; how it pushed up from behind the black edge of the
world, and how, suddenly, the misty stubble-field was flooded with its strange
light: -- "you are going to have a beau!"
Philippa wished she
might see the book, just to know what sort of things were read to Mary.
"It isn't right to read them to the child," she thought; "it's a
foolish book, Mary," she said, aloud. "I never saw such a book."
"I'll bring it the
next time I come," Mary promised.
"Oh no, no,"
Philly said, a little breathlessly; "it's a wrong book. I couldn't read
such a book, except -- except to tell you how foolish and wrong it is."
Mary was not concerned
with her friend's reasons; but she remembered to bring the ragged old book with
her the very next time her brother dropped her at Mr. Roberts's gate to spend
an hour with Miss Philippa. There had to be a few formal words between the
preacher and the sinner before Mary had entire possession of her play- mate,
but when her brother drove away, promising to call for her later in the
afternoon, she became so engrossed in the important task of picking hollyhock
seeds that she quite forgot the dream-book. The air was hazy with autumn, and
full of the scent of fallen leaves and dew-drenched grass and of the fresh tan-bark
on the garden paths. On the other side of the road was a corn-field, where the
corn stood in great shocks. Philly looked over at it, and drew a quick breath,
-- her dream!
"Did you bring
that foolish book?" she said.
Mary, slapping her
pocket, laughed loudly. "I 'most forgot! Yes, ma'am; I got it. I'll show
what it says about the black ox --"
"No; you
needn't," Miss Philly said; "you pick some more seeds for me, and
I'll -- just look at it." She touched the stained old book with shrinking
fingertips; the moldering leather cover and the odor of soiled and thumb-marked
leaves offended her. The first page was folded over, and when she spread it
out, the yellowing paper cracked along its ancient creases; it was a map, with
the signs of the Zodiac; in the middle was a single verse:
Mortal! Wouldst thou
scan aright
Dreams and visions of
the night?
Wouldst thou future
secrets learn
And the fate of dreams
discern?
Wouldst thou ope the
Curtain dark
And thy future fortune
mark?
Try the mystic page,
and read
What the vision has
decreed.
Philly, holding her red
lip between her teeth, turned the pages:
"Money. To dream
of finding money; mourning and loss.
"Monkey. You have
secret enemies.
"Moon."
(Philippa shivered.) "A good omen; it denotes coming joy. Great success in
love."
She shut the book
sharply, then opened it again. Such books sometimes told (so foolishly!) of
charms which would bring love. She looked furtively at Mary; but the child,
pulling down a great hollyhock to pick the fuzzy yellow disks, was not noticing
Miss Philly's interest in the "foolish book." Philippa turned over
the pages. Yes; the charms were there! . . .
Instructions for making
dumb-cake, to cut which reveals a lover: "Any number of young females
shall take a handful of wheaten flour --" That was no use; there were too
many females as it was!
"To know whether a
man shall have the woman he wishes." Philippa sighed. Not that. A holy man
does not "wish" for a woman.
"A charm to charm
a man's love." The blood suddenly ran tingling in Philly's veins.
"Let a young maid pick of rosemary two roots; of monk's-hood --" A
line had been drawn through this last word, and another word written above it;
but the ink was so faded, the page so woolly and thin with use, that it was
impossible to decipher the correction; perhaps it was "mother- wort,"
an herb Philly did not know; or it might be "mandrake"? It looked as
much like one as the other, the writing was so blurred and dim. "It is
best to take what the book says," Philly said, simply; "besides, I
haven't those other things in the garden, and I have monk's-hood and rosemary
-- if I should want to do it, just for fun."
"Of monk's-hood
two roots, and of the flower of corn ten threads; let her sleep on them one
night. In the morning, let her set them on her heart and walk backwards ten
steps, praying for the love of her beloved. Let her then steep and boil these
things in four gills of pure water on which the moon has shone for one night.
When she shall add this philter to the drink of the one who loves her not, he
shall love the female who meets his eye first after the drinking thereof.
Therefore let the young maid be industrious to stand before him when he shall
drink it." "There is no harm in it," said Philly.
"SOMEBODY making
herb tea and stealing my business?" said William King, in his kindly
voice; he had called to see old Hannah, who had been laid up for a day or two,
and he stopped at the kitchen door to look in. Henry Roberts, coming from the
sitting-room to join him, asked his question, too:
"What is this
smell of herbs, Philippa? Are you making a drink for Han- nah?"
"Oh no,
father," Philly said, briefly, her face very pink.
William King sniffed
and laughed. "Ah, I see you don't give away your secrets to a rival,"
he said; and added, pleasantly, "but don't give your tea to Hannah without
telling me what it is."
Miss Philippa said,
dutifully, "Oh no, sir." But she did not tell him what the
"tea" was, and certainly she offered none of it to old Hannah. All
that day there was a shy joyousness about her, with sudden soft blushes, and
once or twice a little half-frightened laugh; there was a puzzled look, too, in
her face, as if she was not quite sure just what she was going to do, or rather,
how she was going to do it. And, of course, that was the difficulty. How could
she "add the philter to the drink of one who loved her not"?
Yet it came about
simply enough. John Fenn had lately felt it borne in upon him that it was time
to make another effort to deal with Henry Roberts; perhaps, he reasoned, to
show concern about the father's soul might touch the daughter's hardened heart.
It was when he reached this conclusion that he committed the extravagance of
buying a new coat. So it happened that that very afternoon, while the house was
still pungent with the scent of steeping herbs, he came to Henry Roberts's
door, and knocked solemnly, as befitted his errand; (but as he heard her step
in the hall he passed an anxious hand over a lapel of the new coat). Her
father, she said, was not at home; would Mr. Fenn come in and wait for him? Mr.
Fenn said he would. And as he always tried, poor boy! to be instant in season
and out of season, he took the opportunity, while he waited for her father and
she brought him a glass of wine and a piece of cake, to reprove her again for
absence from church. But she was so meek that he found it hard to inflict those
"faithful wounds" which should prove his friendship for her soul; she
sat before him on the slippery horsehair sofa in the parlor, her hands locked
tightly together in her lap, her eyes downcast, her voice very low and
trembling. She admitted her backslidings: she acknowl- edged her errors; but as
for coming to church -- she shook her head:
"Please, I won't
come to church yet."
"You mean you will
come, sometime?"
"Yes;
sometime."
"Behold, now is
the accepted time!"
"I will come . . .
afterwards."
"After what?"
he insisted.
"After --"
she said, and paused. Then suddenly lifted bold, guileless eyes: "After
you stop caring for my soul."
John Fenn caught his
breath. Something, he did not know what, seemed to jar him rudely from that
pure desire for her salvation; he said, stumblingly, that he would always care
for her soul! -- "for -- for any one's soul." And was she quite well?
His voice broke with tenderness. She must be careful to avoid the chill of
these autumnal afternoons; "you are pale," he said, passionately --
"don't -- oh, don't be so pale!" It occurred to him that if she
waited for him "not to care" for her salvation, she might die in her
sins; die before coming to the gate of heaven, which he was so anxious to open
to her!
Philippa did not see
his agitation; she was not looking at him. She only said, softly, "Perhaps
you will stay to tea?"
He answered quickly
that he would be pleased to do so. In the simplicity of his saintly egotism it
occurred to him that the religious pleasure of entertaining him might be a means
of grace to her. When she left him in the dusk of the chilly room to go and see
to the supper, he fell into silent prayer for the soul that did not desire his
care.
Henry Roberts, summoned
by his daughter to entertain the guest until supper was ready, found him
sitting in the darkness of the parlor; the old man was full of hospitable
apologies for his Philippa's forgetfulness; "she did not remember the
lamp!" he lamented; and making his way through the twilight of the room,
he took off the prism-hung shade of the tall astral lamp on the center-table,
and fumbled for a match to light the charred and sticky wick; there were very
few occasions in this plain household when it was worth while to light the best
lamp! This was one of them, for in those days the office dignified the man to a
degree that is hardly understood now. But Henry Roberts's concern was not
entirely a matter of social propriety; it was a desire to propitiate this young
man who was living in certain errors of belief, so that he would be in a
friendly attitude of mind and open to the arguments which were always burning
on the lips of Edward Irving's follower. He did not mean to begin them until
they were at supper; so he and John Fenn sat in silence waiting Philippa's
summons to the dining-room. Neither of them had any small talk; Mr. Roberts was
making sure that he could trust his memory to repeat those wailing cadences of
the Voice, and John Fenn, still shaken by something he could not understand
that had been hidden in what he understood too well -- a sinner's indifference
to grace -- was trying to get back to his serene, impersonal arrogance.
As for Philippa, she
was frightened at her temerity in having invited the minister to a Hannahless
supper; her flutter of questions as to "what" and "how"
brought the old woman from her bed, in spite of the girl's half-hearted
protests that she "mustn't think of getting up! Just tell me what to
do," she implored, "I can manage. We are going to have -- tea!"
"We always have
tea," Hannah said, sourly; yet she was not really sour, for, like William
King and Dr. Lavendar, Hannah had discerned possibilities in the Rev. John
Fenn's pastoral visits. "Get your Sunday-go-to-meeting dress on," she
commanded, hunching a shawl over a rheumatic shoulder and motion- ing the girl
out of the kitchen.
Philippa, remorseful
and breathless, ran quickly up to her room to put on her best frock, smooth her
shining hair down in two loops over her ears, and pin her one adornment, a flat
gold brooch, on the bosom of her dress. She lifted her candle and looked at
herself in the black depths of the little swinging glass on her high bureau,
and her face fell into sudden wistful lines. "Oh, I do not look
wicked," she thought, despairingly.
John Fenn, glancing at
her across the supper-table, had some such thought himself; how strange that
one who was so perverted in belief should not betray perversion in her
countenance. "On the contrary, her face is pleasing," he said,
simply. He feared, noticing the brooch, that she was vain, as well as
indifferent to her privileges; he wondered if she had observed his new coat.
Philippa's vanity did
not, at any rate, give her much courage; she scarcely spoke, except to ask him
whether he took cream and sugar in his tea. When she handed his cup to him, she
said, very low, "Will you taste it, and see if it is right?"
He was so conscious of
the tremor of her voice and hand that he made haste to reassure her, sipping
his tea with much politeness of manner; as he did so, she said, suddenly, and with
compelling loudness, "Is it -- agreeable?"
John Fenn, startled,
looked at her over the rim of his cup. "Very; very indeed," he said,
quickly. But he instantly drank some water. "It is, perhaps, a little
strong," he said, blinking. Then, having qualified his politeness for
conscience' sake, he drank all the bitter tea for human kindness' sake -- for
evidently Miss Philippa had taken pains to give him what he might like. After
that she did not speak, but her face grew very rosy while she sat in silence
listening to her father and their guest. Henry Roberts forgot to eat, in the
passion of his theological arguments, but as supper proceeded he found his
antagonist less alert than usual; the minister defended his own doctrines
instead of attacking those of his host; he even admitted, a little listlessly,
that if the Power fell upon him, if he himself spoke in a strange tongue, then
perhaps he would believe -- "that is, if I could be sure I was not out of
my mind at the time," he qualified, dully. Philippa took no part in the
discussion; it would not have been thought becoming in her to do so; but
indeed, she hardly heard what the two men were saying. She helped old Hannah
carry away the dishes, and then sat down by the table and drew the lamp near
her so that she could sew; she sat there smiling a little, dimpling even, and
looking down at her seam; she did not notice that John Fenn was being worsted,
or that once he failed altogether to reply, and sat in unprotesting silence
under Henry Roberts's rapt remembrances. A curious blackness had settled under
his eyes, and twice he passed his hand across his lips.
"They are
numb," he said, in surprised apology to his host. A moment later he
shivered violently, beads of sweat burst out on his forehead, and the color
swept from his face. He started up, staring wildly about him; he tried to
speak, but his words stumbled into incoherent babbling. It was all so sudden,
his rising, then falling back into his chair, then slipping sidewise and
crumpling up upon the floor, all the while stammering unmeaning words -- that
Henry Roberts sat looking at him in dumb amazement. It was Philippa who cried
out and ran forward to help him, then stopped midway, her hands clutched
together at her throat, her eyes dilating with a horror that seemed to paralyze
her so that she was unable to move to his assistance. The shocked silence of
the moment was broken by Fenn's voice, trailing on and on, in totally
unintelligible words.
Henry Roberts, staring
open-mouthed, suddenly spoke: "The Voice!" he said.
But Philippa, as though
she were breaking some invisible bond that held her, groaning even with the
effort of it, said, in a whisper: "No. Not that. He is dying. Don't you
see? That's what it is. He is dying."
Her father, shocked
from his ecstasy, ran to John Fenn's side, trying to lift him and calling upon
him to say what was the matter.
"He is going to
die," said Philippa, monotonously.
Henry Roberts, aghast,
calling loudly to old Hannah, ran to the kitchen and brought back a great bowl
of hot water. "Drink it!" he said. "Drink it, I tell ye! I
believe you're poisoned!"
And while he and Hannah
bent over the unconscious young man, Philippa seemed to come out of her trance;
slowly, with upraised hands, and head bent upon her breast, she stepped
backward, backward, out of the room, out of the house. On the doorstep, in the
darkness, she paused and listened for several minutes to certain dreadful
sounds in the house. Then, suddenly, a passion of purpose swept the daze of
horror away.
"He shall not
die," she said.
She flung her skirt
across her arm that her feet might not be hampered, and fled down the road
toward Old Chester. It was very dark. At first her eyes, still blurred with the
lamplight, could not distinguish the footpath, and she stumbled over the grassy
border into the wheel-ruts; then, feeling the loose dust under her feet, she
ran and ran and ran. The blood began to sing in her ears; once her throat
seemed to close so that she could not breathe, and for a moment she had to walk,
-- but her hands, holding up her skirts, trembled with terror at the delay. The
road was very dark under the sycamore-trees; twice she tripped and fell into
the brambles at one side or against a gravelly bank on the other. But stumbling
somehow to her feet, again she ran and ran and ran. The night was very still;
she could hear her breath tearing her throat; once she felt something hot and
salty in her mouth; it was then she had to stop and walk for a little space --
she must walk or fall down! And she could not fall down, no! no! no! he would
die if she fell down! Once a figure loomed up in the haze, and she caught the
glimmer of an inquisitive eye. "Say," a man's voice said, "where
are you bound for?" There was something in the tone that gave her a stab
of fright; for a minute or two her feet seemed to fly, and she heard a laugh
behind her in the darkness: "What's your hurry?" the voice called
after her. And still she ran. But she was saying to herself that she must stop;
she must stand still -- just for a moment. "Oh, just for a minute?"
her body whimperingly entreated; she would not listen to it! She must not
listen, even though her heart burst with the strain. But her body had its way,
and she fell into a walk, although she was not aware of it. In a gasping
whisper she was saying, over and over: "Doctor, hurry; he'll die; hurry; I
killed him." She tried to be silent, but her lips moved mechanically.
"Doctor, hurry; he'll -- Oh, I mustn't talk!" she told herself,
"it takes my breath" -- but still her lips moved. She began to run,
heavily. "I can't talk -- if -- I -- run --" It was then that she saw
a glimmer of light and knew that she was almost in Old Chester. Very likely she
would have fallen if she had not seen that far-off window just when she did.
At William King's house
she dropped against the door, her fingers still clinging to the bell. She was
past speaking when the doctor lifted her and carried her into the office.
"No; don't try to tell me what it is," he said; "I'll put Jinny
into the buggy, and we'll get back in a jiffy. I understand; Hannah is
worse." "Not . . . Hannah --"
"Your
father?" he said, picking up his medicine-case.
"Not father; Mr.
-- Fenn --"
As the doctor hurried
out to the stable to hitch up he bade his wife put certain remedies into his
bag, -- "and look after that child," he called over his shoulder to
his efficient Martha. She was so efficient that when he had brought Jinny and
the buggy to the door, Philly was able to gasp out that Mr. Fenn was sick. "Dying."
"Don't try to
talk," he said again, as he helped her into the buggy. But after a while
she was able to tell him, hoarsely:
"I wanted him to
love me." William King was silent. "I used a charm. It was
wicked."
"Come, come; not
wicked," said the doctor; "a little foolish, perhaps. A new frock,
and a rose in your hair, and a smile at another man, would be enough of a
charm, my dear."
Philippa shook her
head. "It was not enough. I wore my best frock, and I went to Dr.
Lavendar's church --"
"Good
gracious!" said William King.
"They were not
enough. So I used a charm. I made a drink --"
"Ah!" said
the doctor, frowning. "What was in the drink, Miss Philly?"
"Perhaps it was
not the right herb," she said; "it may have been 'mother- wort'; but
the book said 'monk'shood,' and I --"
William King reached
for his whip and cut Jinny across the flanks. "Aconite!" he said
under his breath, while Jinny leaped forward in shocked astonishment.
"Will he
live?" said Philippa.
Dr. King, flecking
Jinny again, and letting his reins hang over the dashboard, could not help
putting a comforting arm around her. "I hope so," he said; "I
hope so!" After all, there was no use telling the child that probably by
this time her lover was either dead or getting better. "It's his own
fault," William King thought, angrily. "Why in thunder didn't he fall
in love like a man, instead of making the child resort to -- G'on, Jinny!
G'on!"
He still had the whip
in his hand when they drew up at the gate.
WHEN Philippa Roberts
had fled out into the night for help, her father and old Hannah were too
alarmed to notice her absence. They went hurrying back and forth with this
remedy and that. Again and again they were ready to give up; once Henry Roberts
said, "He is gone!" and once Hannah began to cry, and said,
"Poor lad, poor boy!" Yet each made one more effort, their shadows
looming gigantic against the walls or stretching across the ceiling, bending
and sinking as they knelt beside the poor young man, who by that time was
beyond speech. So the struggle went on. But little by little life began to
gain. John Fenn's eyes opened. Then he smiled. Then he said something -- they
could not hear what.
"Bless the
Lord!" said Henry Roberts.
"He's asking for
Philly," said old Hannah. By the time the doctor and Philippa reached the
house the shadow of death had lifted.
"It must have been
poison," Mr. Roberts told the doctor. "When he gets over it he will
tell us what it was."
"I don't believe
he will," said William King; he was holding Fenn's wrist between his firm
fingers, and then he turned up a fluttering eyelid and looked at the still
dulled eye.
Philippa, kneeling on
the other side of John Fenn, said loudly: "I will tell him -- and perhaps
God will forgive me."
The doctor, glancing up
at her, said: "No, you won't -- anyhow at present. Take that child
up-stairs, Hannah," he commanded, "and put her to bed. She ran all
the way to Old Chester to get me," he explained to Henry Roberts.
Before he left the
house that night he sat for a few minutes at Philippa's bedside. "My dear
little girl," he said, in his kind, sensible voice, "the best thing
to do is to forget it. It was a foolish thing to do -- that charm business; but
happily no harm is done. Now say nothing about it, and never do it again."
Philippa turned her
shuddering face away. "Do it again? Oh!"
As William King went
home he apologized to Jinny for that cut across her flanks by hanging the reins
on the overhead hook, and letting her plod along at her own pleasure. He was
saying to himself that he hoped he had done right to tell the child to hold her
tongue. "It was just tomfoolery," he argued; "there was no sin
about it, so confession wouldn't do her any good; on the contrary, it would
hurt a girl's self-respect to have a man know she had tried to catch him. But
what a donkey he was not to see. . . . Oh yes; I'm sure I'm right," said
William King. "I wonder how Dr. Lavendar would look at it?"
Philippa, at any rate,
was satisfied with his advice. Perhaps the story of what she had done might
have broken from her pale lips had her father asked any questions; but Henry
Roberts had retreated into troubled silence. There had been one wonderful
moment when he thought that at last his faith was to be justified and by the
unbeliever himself! and he had cried out, with a passion deferred for more than
thirty years: "The Voice!" But behold, the voice, babbling and
meaningless, was nothing but sickness. No one could guess what the shock of
that disappointment was. He was not able even to speak of it. So Philippa was
asked no awkward questions, and her self- knowledge burned deep into her heart.
In the next few days,
while the minister was slowly recovering in the great four-poster in Henry
Roberts's guestroom, she listened to Hannah's speculations as to the cause of
his attack, and expressed no opinion. She was dumb when John Fenn tried to tell
her how grateful he was to her for that terrible run through the darkness for
his sake.
"You should not be
grateful," she said, at last, in a whisper.
But he was grateful;
and, furthermore, he was very happy in those days of slow recovery. The fact
was that that night, when he had been so near death, he had heard Philippa, in
his first dim moments of returning consciousness, stammering out those
distracted words: "Perhaps God will forgive me." To John Fenn those
words meant the crowning of all his efforts: she had repented!
"Truly," he
said, lying very white and feeble on his pillow and looking into Philly's face
when she brought him his gruel, "truly,
"He moves in a
mysterious way
His wonders to
perform!"
The "mysterious
way" was the befalling of that terrible illness in Henry Roberts's house,
so that Philippa should be impressed by it. "If my affliction has been
blessed to any one else, I am glad to have suffered it," he said.
Philippa silently put a
spoonful of gruel between his lips; he swallowed it as quickly as he could.
"I heard you call
upon God for forgiveness; the Lord is merciful and gracious!"
Philly said, very low,
"Yes; oh yes."
So John Fenn thanked
God and took his gruel, and thought it was very good. He thought, also, that
Miss Philippa was very good to be so good to him. In those next few days,
before he was strong enough to be moved back to his own house, he thought more
of her goodness and less of her salvation. It was then that he had his great
moment, his revealing moment! All of a sudden, at the touch of Life, his honest
artificiality had dropped from him, and he knew that he had never before known
anything worth knowing! He knew he was in love. He knew it when he realized
that he was not in the least troubled about her soul. "That is what she
meant!" he thought; "she wanted me to care for her, before I cared
for her soul." He was so simple in his acceptance of the revelation that
she loved him, that when he went to ask her to be his wife the blow of her
reply almost knocked him back into his ministerial affectations:
"No."
When John Fenn got home
that evening he went into his study and shut the door. Mary came and pounded on
it, but he only said, in a muffled voice: "No, Mary. Not now. Go
away." He was praying for resignation to what he told himself was the will
of God. "The Lord is unwilling that my thoughts should be diverted from
His service by my own personal happiness." Then he tried to put his
thoughts on that service by deciding upon a text for his next sermon. But the
texts which suggested themselves were not steadying to his bewildered mind:
"Love one
another." ("I certainly thought she loved me.")
"Marvel not, my
brethren, if the world hate you." ("I am, perhaps, personally
unattractive to her; and yet I wonder why?")
He was not a conceited
man; but, like all his sex, he really did "marvel" a little at the
lack of feminine appreciation.
He marveled so much
that a week later he took Mary and walked out to Mr. Roberts's house. This time
Mary, to her disgust, was left with Miss Philly's father, while her brother and
Miss Philly walked in the frosted garden. Later, when that walk was over, and
the little sister trudged along at John Fenn's side in the direction of Perryville,
she was very fretful because he would not talk to her. He was oc- cupied, poor
boy, in trying again not to "marvel," and to be submissive to the
divine will.
After that, for several
months, he refused Mary's plea to be taken to visit Miss Philly. He had, he
told himself, "submitted"; but submission left him very melancholy
and solemn, and also a little resentful; indeed, he was so low in his mind,
that once he threw out a bitter hint to Dr. Lavendar, -- who, according to his
wont, put two and two together.
"Men in our
profession, sir," said John Fenn, "must not expect personal
happiness."
"Well," said
Dr. Lavendar, meditatively, "perhaps if we don't expect it, the surprise
of getting it makes it all the better. I expected it; but I've exceeded my
expectations!"
"But you are not
married," the young man said, impulsively.
Dr. Lavendar's face
changed; "I hope you will marry, Fenn," he said, quietly. At which
John Fenn said, "I am married to my profession; that is enough for any
minister."
"You'll find your
profession a mighty poor housekeeper," said Dr. Lavendar.
It was shortly after
this that Mr. Fenn and his big roan broke through the snow-drifts and made
their way to Henry Roberts's house. "I must speak to you alone, sir,"
he said to the Irvingite, who, seeing him approaching, had hastened to open the
door for him and draw him in out of the cold sunshine.
What the caller had to
say was brief and to the point: Why was his daughter so unkind? John Fenn did
not feel now that the world -- which meant Philippa -- hated him. He felt -- he
could not help feeling -- that she did not even dislike him; "on the
contrary. . . ." So what reason had she for refusing him? But old Mr.
Roberts shook his head. "A young female does not have 'reasons,'" he
said. But he was sorry for the youth, and he roused himself from his
abstraction long enough to question his girl:
"He is a worthy
young man, my Philippa. Why do you dislike him?"
"I do not dislike
him."
"Then why
--?" her father protested.
But Philly was silent.
Even Hannah came to the
rescue:
"You'll get a
crooked stick at the end, if you don't look out!"
Philly laughed; then
her face fell. "I sha'n't have any stick, ever!"
And Hannah, in her
concern, confided her forebodings about the stick to Dr. King.
"I wonder,"
William said to himself, uneasily, "if I was wise to tell that child to
hold her tongue? Perhaps they might have straightened it out between 'em before
this, if she had told him and been done with it. I've a great mind to ask Dr.
Lavendar."
He did ask him; at
first with proper precautions not to betray a patient's confidence, but, at a
word from Dr. Lavendar, tumbling into truthfulness.
"You are talking
about young Philippa Roberts?" Dr. Lavendar announced, calmly, when
William was half-way through his story of concealed identities.
"How did you guess
it?" the doctor said, astonished; "oh, well, yes, I am. I guess
there's no harm telling you --"
"Not the
slightest," said Dr. Lavendar, "especially as I knew it already from
the young man -- I mean, I knew she wouldn't have him. But I didn't know why
until your story dovetailed with his. William, the thing has festered in her!
The lancet ought to have been used the next day. I believe she'd have been
married by this time if she'd spoken out, then and there."
William King was much
chagrined. "I thought, being a girl, you know, her pride, her self-respect
--"
"Oh yes; the
lancet hurts," Dr. Lavendar admitted; "but it's better than -- well,
I don't know the terms of your trade, Willy -- but I guess you know what I
mean?"
"I guess I
do," said William King, thoughtfully. "Do you suppose it's too late
now?"
"It will be more
of an operation," Dr. Lavendar conceded.
"Could I tell
him?" William said, after a while.
"I don't see why
not," Dr. Lavendar said.
"I suppose I'd
have to ask her permission?"
"Nonsense!"
said Dr. Lavendar.
That talk between the
physician of the soul and the physician of the body happened on the very night
when John Fenn, in his study in Perryville, with Mary dozing on his knee, threw
over, once and for all, what he had called "submission" and made up
his mind to get his girl! The very next morning he girded himself and walked
forth upon the Pike toward Henry Roberts's house. He did not take Mary with
him, -- but not because he meant to urge salvation on Miss Philly! As it
happened, Dr. King, too, set out upon the Perryville road that morning,
remarking to Jinny that if he had had his wits about him that night in
November, she would have been saved the trip on this May morning. The trip was
easy enough; William had found a medical pamphlet among his mail, and he was
reading it, with the reins hanging from the crook of his elbow. It was owing to
this method of driving that John Fenn reached the Roberts house before Jinny
passed it, so she went all the way to Perryville, and then had to turn round to
follow on his track.
"Brother went to
see Miss Philly, and he wouldn't take me," Mary complained to William
King, when he drew up at the minister's door; and the doctor was sympathetic to
the extent of five cents for candy comfort.
But when Jinny reached
the Roberts gate Dr. King saw John Fenn down in the garden with Philippa.
"Ho -- ho!" said William. "I guess I'll wait and see if he works
out his own salvation." He hitched Jinny, and went in to find Philippa's
father, and to him he freed his mind. The two men sat on the porch looking down
over the tops of the lilac-bushes into the garden, where they could just see
the heads of the two young, unhappy people.
"It's nonsense,
you know," said William King, "that Philly doesn't take that boy.
He's head over heels in love with her."
"She is not
attached to him in any such manner," Henry Roberts said; "I wonder a
little at it, myself. He is a good youth."
The doctor looked at
him wonderingly; it occurred to him that if he had a daughter he would
understand her better than Philly's father understood her. "I think the child
cares for him," he said; then, hesitatingly, he referred to John Fenn's
sickness. "I suppose you know about it?" he said.
Philly's father bent
his head; he knew, he thought, only too well; no divine revelation in a
disordered digestion!
"Don't you think,"
William King said, smiling, "you might try to make her feel that she is
wrong not to accept him, now that the charm has worked, so to speak?"
"The charm?"
the old man repeated, vaguely.
"I thought you
understood," the doctor said, frowning; then, after a minute's hesitation,
he told him the facts.
Henry Roberts stared at
him, shocked and silent; his girl, his Philippa, to have done such a thing!
"So great a sin -- my little Philly!" he said, faintly. He was pale
with distress.
"My dear
sir," Dr. King protested, impatiently, "don't talk about sin in
connection with that child. I wish I'd held my tongue!"
Henry Roberts was
silent. Philippa's share in John Fenn's mysterious illness removed it still
further from that revelation, waited for during all these years with such
passionate patience. He paid no attention to William King's reassurances; and
his silence was so silencing that by and by the doctor stopped talking and
looked down into the garden again. He observed that those two heads had not
drawn any nearer together. It was not John Fenn's fault. . . .
"There can be no
good reason," he was saying to Philippa. "If it is a bad reason, I
will overcome it! Tell me why?"
She put her hand up to
her lips and trembled.
"Come," he
said; "it is my due, Philippa. I will know!"
Philippa shook her
head. He took her other hand and stroked it, as one might stroke a child's hand
to comfort and encourage it.
"You must tell me,
beloved," he said.
Philippa looked at him
with scared eyes; then, suddenly pulling her hands from his and turning away,
she covered her face and burst into uncontrollable sobbing. He, confounded and
frightened, followed her and tried to soothe her.
"Never mind,
Philly, never mind! if you don't want to tell me --"
"I do want to tell
you. I will tell you! You will despise me. But I will tell you. I did a wicked
deed. It was this very plant -- here, where we stand, monk's-hood! It was
poison. I didn't know -- oh, I didn't know. The book said monk's-hood -- it was
a mistake. But I did a wicked deed. I tried to kill you --"
She swayed as she
spoke, and then seemed to sink down and down, until she lay, a forlorn little
heap, at his feet. For one dreadful moment he thought she had lost her senses.
He tried to lift her, saying, with agitation:
"Philly! We will
not speak of it --"
"I murdered
you," she whispered. "I put the charm into your tea, to make you . .
. love me. You didn't die. But it was murder. I meant -- I meant no harm
--"
He understood. He
lifted her up and held her in his arms. Up on the porch William King saw that
the two heads were close together!
"Why!" the
young man said. "Why -- but Philly! You loved me!"
"What difference
does that make?" she said, heavily.
"It makes much
difference to me," he answered; he put his hand on her soft hair and tried
to press her head down again on his shoulder. But she drew away.
"No; no."
"But --" he
began. She interrupted him.
"Listen," she
said; and then, sometimes in a whisper, sometimes breaking into a sob, she told
him the story of that November night. He could hardly hear it through.
"Love, you loved
me! You will marry me."
"No; I am a wicked
girl -- a -- a -- an immodest girl --"
"My beloved, you
meant no wrong --" He paused, seeing that she was not listening.
Her father and the
doctor were coming down the garden path; William King, beaming with
satisfaction at the proximity of those two heads, had summoned Henry Roberts to
"come along and give 'em your blessing!"
But as he reached them,
standing now apart, the doctor's smile faded -- evidently something had
happened. John Fenn, tense with distress, called to him with frowning command:
"Doctor! Tell her, for heaven's sake, tell her that it was nothing -- that
charm! Tell her she did no wrong."
"No one can do
that," Henry Roberts said; "it was a sin."
"Now, look here
--" Dr. King began.
"It was a sin to
try to move by foolish arts the will of God."
Philippa turned to the
young man, standing quivering beside her. "You see?" she said.
"No! No, I don't
see -- or if I do, never mind."
Just for a moment her
face cleared. (Yes, truly, he was not thinking of her soul now!) But the gleam
faded. "Oh, father, I am a great sinner," she whispered.
"No, you're
not!" William King said.
"Yes, my Philippa,
you are," Henry Roberts agreed, solemnly.
The lover made a
despairing gesture: "Doctor King! tell her 'no!' 'no!'"
"Yes," her
father went on, "it was a sin. Therefore, Philippa, sin no more. Did you
pray that this young man's love might be given to you?"
Philippa said, in a
whisper, "Yes."
"And it was given
to you?"
"Yes."
"Philippa, was it
the foolish weed that moved him to love?" She was silent. "My child,
my Philly, it was your Saviour who moved the heart of this youth, because you
asked Him. Will you do such despite to your Lord as to reject the gift he has
given in answer to your prayer?" Philippa, with parted lips, was listening
intently: "The gift He had given!"
Dr. King dared not
speak. John Fenn looked at him, and then at Philippa, and trembled. Except for
the sound of a bird stirring in its nest overhead in the branches, a sunny
stillness brooded over the garden. Then, suddenly, the stillness was shattered
by a strange sound -- a loud, cadenced chant, full of rhythmical repetitions.
The three who heard it thrilled from head to foot; Henry Roberts did not seem
to hear it: it came from his own lips.
"Oh, Philippa! Oh,
Philippa! I do require -- I do require that you accept your Saviour's gift. Add
not sin to sin. Oh, add not sin to sin by making prayer of no avail! Behold, He
has set before thee an open door. Oh, let no man shut it. Oh, let no man shut
it. . . ."
The last word fell into
a low, wailing note. No one spoke. The bird rustled in the leaves above them; a
butterfly wavered slowly down to settle on a purple flag in the sunshine.
Philly's eyes filled with blessed tears. She stretched out her arms to her
father and smiled. But it was John Fenn who caught those slender, trembling
arms against his breast; and, looking over at the old man, he said, softly,
"The Voice of God."
. . . "and
I," said William King, telling the story that night to Dr. Lavendar --
"I just wanted to say 'the voice of common sense!'"
"My dear
William," said the old man, gently, "the most beautiful thing in the
world is the knowledge that comes to you, when you get to be as old as I am, that
they are the same thing."
THE END