CHAPTER XII
A LIGHT IN DARKNESS
Afterward, when the two men had parted for the night, Miner went directly to his home, and there in his usual methodical fashion undressed and got himself into bed, although all the time his dark face was twisting and working, his mouth dry, while the mind of the man had no knowledge of what his hands were doing. For Miner, without understanding it, was alone on his high mountain where every man must stand who knows what it is to desire and to surrender. So what does it matter that his mountain was the attic bedroom of a cottage and that the little man who wrestled with the devil stood but five feet two in his stocking feet and weighed only a hundred and five pounds, or even that his "Get thee behind me, Satan," was so differently put?
Because when Miner's fight was over he merely said: "I ain't never been at all certain in my mind that I could love a woman, so more'n likely I've all along been mistaken 'bout Em'ly. Seems like there ain't but one mortal thing on this earth I am sure on and that's—Ambrose!"
And yet the little man recalled nothing of the story of David and Jonathan, and, even if he had, could never have appreciated how their story touched his.
Nevertheless, it was one thing to decide to make a sacrifice of himself and his love to his friend, and quite a different thing to persuade that friend to accept it. For some time poor Miner puzzled; Ambrose would not even go out to the log cabin during the period of Emily's convalescence, though getting daily reports of her condition through him and through Doctor Webb. Susan Barrows, for some unexplainable reason, absolutely declined to speak to her next door neighbour when, after the period of her nursing was over, she had once more returned home.
There were harassed hours when unwittingly Miner came near to laying the case before Ambrose, being so accustomed, in all other matters requiring imagination, to relying on that of his friend. It is all very well to think that he might just have plainly stated his own change of mind and heart, but measuring the extent of the renunciation by what it would have meant to him, so surely Ambrose would never have accepted his sacrifice.
No, some more ingenious method must be devised, and Hamlet did not devote more agony to discovering a plan for avenging his father's death than Miner to finding a way of new life for Ambrose.
One afternoon the little man was limping slowly along the dusty August turnpike leading out from Pennyroyal with Moses, who, feeling his need, had accompanied him, yet, now too stiff to walk far, was being carried in his arms, when the attention of both the man and dog were arrested by the spectacle of an old darky trying to drive a mule, hitched to a wagonload of green-corn, into Pennyroyal, the mule having at this point positively declined to go farther.
It was inspiration in a strange guise, and yet inspiration must necessarily come to us in the character of the events that make up our lives.
The darky coaxed and threatened and beat his willow switch bare of leaves; the mule, spreading her legs to the four corners of the globe, remained firm. By and by the negro got down from his seat and with Miner's aid gathered a small pile of chips, which, with a piece of paper, were placed under the mule and set fire to. Then an instant later, when the mule started trotting amiably off toward Pennyroyal, Miner's heart began singing its own peculiar anthem of thankfulness, and immediately afterward he hurried off for a visit to Emily at the log cabin.
On coming back to the shop so changed was his expression and so cleared his look of doubt that Ambrose, feeling sure Emily had just accepted him, wished to God Miner would confide in him and so let his darkest hour be lived through.
But Miner said nothing then. However, when his regular hour came around once more he appeared taking his accustomed chair next his friend's under the apple tree in his yard. And yet here Miner still continued mute, although moving about far more restlessly than usual, while Ambrose, patiently waiting for him to speak, felt the sharpness of his earlier desire succeeded by a kind of apathy. Finally at some little distance off a clock in a church tower struck eight.
"My foot itches to-night, Ambrose," Miner announced suddenly.
"Shake it," advised his listener, whose mind was certainly on a far different line of thought.
But Miner, only squirming and twisting about the more, complained:
"Seems like it's one of them things that can't be shook off. I was just a-thinkin' it might be better to go for a walk than to sit here so eternal."
And here Ambrose, feeling that the little man would never get out his confession to-night, sighed: "Suit yourself, ef you like walking better. I reckon I kin make out the rest of the evening alone."
Nevertheless, Miner did not stir. Instead, taking another bite at a fresh plug of tobacco, he chewed on it fiercely for a moment longer. "I was aimin' for you to come with me," he said, "bein's as you know I ain't able to git on too well with this lame leg."
The soft summer night stirred in Ambrose no inclination for movement, and indeed far rather would he have been alone and undisturbed, yet now getting up slowly, lifting his great height in sections, he offered his arm to his friend.
Then the two men started off together, walking far more rapidly than usual on a summer night's stroll, for Miner seemed to have forgotten his lameness, and the fury of his spirit rushed them both ahead. Every now and then, furtively, he kept feeling in his back pocket, but the tall man did not notice him nor was he for some time aware in what direction he was being led.
A half moon shone in the sky, and the night was clear and still.
Then suddenly at a turn in a country road Ambrose abruptly halted, letting his companion's arm slide from his own. For at this turn in the road to the end of his life must Ambrose Thompson wake to consciousness, since from here in the daylight could be seen the first glimpse of the log schoolhouse, and though not visible by night its spiritual presence was the plainer.
"I ain't goin' with you to Em'ly's to-night, Miner," Ambrose declared quietly; "it's more'n I kin stand and more'n you've the right to ask. I wasn't countin' on you tryin' to outwit me." The words were spoken with only reasonable reproach, and yet the little man turned on the speaker fiercely.
"You jist wait here, Ambrose Thompson, till I git back, and keep on waitin' in the same place, for ef you don't I'll never forgive you, God knows." And off trotted Miner toward the cabin, until his small form was lost in the darkness.
Of course Ambrose waited, it having always been his custom to give way to Miner in small things, and, as he had grown unaccountably weary, stretched himself full length on the ground, and there a moment later the man felt himself in the grip of the primal instinct that all big men and some big women know. His will kept his long clean body still, yet everything else in him called out the strong man's right over the weak. The earth that mothered him proved it in all her moods. And yet there only a few paces ahead of him Miner was holding Emily in his arms. One swift rush and—here Ambrose checked his vision, for he would not stir one foot.
Therefore, at first, the slight crackling noise at some little distance off made no impression upon him, but almost at once and without his own volition his long, sensitive nose sniffed the odour of smoke somewhere in the woods. The next instant a flame shot up in the air and Ambrose with it, for the flame came directly from the neighbourhood of Emily's cottage.
"Lord!" murmured Ambrose as he ran, "Em'ly's house is afire, and she hasn't no one but a little runt like Miner to look after her."