XXVII.
ANOTHER WALK AND ANOTHER TALK.
"We are not to lead events but to follow them."—Epictetus.
Marjorie was so happy that she trembled with the joy of it. The relief from her burden, at times, was almost harder to bear than the burden itself. She sang all day hymns that were the outpouring of her soul in love to Christ.
"What a child you are, Marjorie," her mother said one day. "You were as doleful as you could be, and now you are as happy as a bird."
"Do you remember what Luther says?"
"Luther says several wise and good things."
"And this is one of them; it is one of Aunt Prue's favorite sayings: 'The Christian should be like a little bird, which sits on its twig and sings, and lets God think for it.'"
"That's all very well for a bird; but we have to do," replied her mother sharply.
"We have to do what God thinks, though," returned Marjorie quickly.
"Child, you are your father all over again; he always wanted to wait and see; but mine was the faith that acted."
"But now can we act, until we wait and see?" persisted Marjorie. "I want to be sure that God means for us to do things."
"Many a thing wouldn't have happened if I hadn't pushed through—why, your father would have been willing for Linnet to be engaged years and years."
"So would I," said Marjorie seriously.
A week later, one afternoon towards dusk, Marjorie was walking home from her grandfather's. Her happy face was shaded by a brown straw hat, her hands were sunburned, and her fingers were scratched with numerous berrying expeditions. There was a deepened color in the roundness of her cheeks; she was a country maiden this afternoon, swinging an empty basket in her hand. She was humming to herself as she walked along, hurrying her steps a little as she remembered that it was the mail for her long, foreign letter. This afternoon she was as happy as she wanted to be. Within half a mile of home she espied a tall figure coming towards her,—a figure in a long linen duster, wearing a gray, low-crowned, felt hat. After an instant she recognized Hollis and remembered that to-day he was expected home. She had not thought of it all day.
"Your mother sent me to meet you," he said, without formal greeting. Instantly she detected a change in his manner towards her; it was as easy as if he were speaking to Linnet.
"I've been off on one of my long walks."
"Do you remember our walk together from your grandfather's—how many years ago?"
"When I appealed to your sympathies and enlisted you in my behalf?"
"You were in trouble, weren't you? I believe it is just seven years ago."
"Physiologists tell us we are made over new every seven years, therefore you and I are another Hollis and another Marjorie."
"I hope I am another Hollis," he answered gravely.
"And I am sure I am another Marjorie," she said more lightly. "How you lectured me then!"
"I never lectured any one."
"You lectured me. I never forgot it. From that hour I wanted to be like your cousin Helen."
"You do not need to copy any one. I like you best as yourself."
"You do not know me."
"No; I do not know you; but I want to know you."
"That depends upon yourself as well as upon me."
"I do not forget that. I am not quick to read and you are written in many languages."
"Are you fond of the study—of languages? Did you succeed in French?"
"Fairly. And I can express my wants in German. Will you write to me again?"
There was a flush now that was not sunburn; but she did not speak; she seemed to be considering.
"Will you, Marjorie?" he urged, with gentle persistence.
"I—don't know."
"Why don't you know."
"I have not thought about it for so long. Let me see—what kind of letters did you write. Were they interesting?"
"Yours were interesting. Were you hurt because—"
It happened so long ago that she smiled as she looked up at him.
"I have never told you the reason. I thought Morris Kemlo had a prior claim."
"What right had you to think that?"
"From what I heard—and saw."
"I am ignorant of what you could hear or see. Morris was my twin-brother; he was my blessing; he is my blessing."
"Is not my reason sufficient?"
"Oh, yes; it doesn't matter. But see that sumach. I have not seen anything so pretty this summer; mother must have them. You wouldn't think it, but she is very fond of wild flowers."
She stepped aside to pluck the sumach and sprays of goldenrod; they were growing beside a stone wall, and she crossed the road to them. He stood watching her. She was as unconscious as the goldenrod herself.
What had her mother meant? Was it all a mistake? Had his wretched days and wakeful nights been for nothing? Was there nothing for him to be grieved about? He knew now how much he loved her—and she? He was not a part of her life, at all. Would he dare speak the words he had planned to speak?
"Then, Marjorie, you will not write to me," he began afresh, after admiring the sumach.
"Oh, yes, I will! If you want to! I love to write letters; and my life isn't half full enough yet. I want new people in it."
"And you would as readily take me as another," he said, in a tone that she did not understand.
"More readily than one whom I do not know. I want you to hear extracts from one of Mrs. Holmes' delicious letters to-night."
"You are as happy as a lark to-day.
"That is what mother told me, only she did not specify the bird. Morris,
I am happier than I was Sunday morning."
He colored over the name. She smiled and said, "I've been thinking about him to-day, and wanting to tell him how changed I am."
"What has changed you?" he asked.
Her eyes filled before she could answer him. In a few brief sentences, sentences in which each word told, she gave him the story of her dark year.
"Poor little Mousie," he said tenderly. "And you bore the dark time all by yourself."
"That's the way I have my times. But I do not have my happy times by myself, you see."
"Did nothing else trouble you?"
"No; oh, no! Nothing like that. Father's death was not a trouble. I went with him as far as I could—I almost wanted to go all the way."
"And there was nothing else to hurt you?" he asked very earnestly.
"Oh, no; why should there be?" she answered, meeting his questioning eyes frankly. "Do you know of anything else that should have troubled me?"
"No, nothing else. But girls do have sometimes. Didn't your mother help you any? She helps other people."
"I could not tell her. I could not talk about it. She only thought I was ill, and sent for a physician. Perhaps I did worry myself into feeling ill."
"You take life easily," he said.
"Do I? I like to take it as God gives it to me; not before he gives it to me. This slowness—or faith—or whatever it is, is one of my inheritances from my blessed father. Who is it that says, 'I'd see to it pretty sharp that I didn't hurry Providence.' That has helped me."
"I wish it would some one else," he said grimly.
"I wish it would help every one else. Everything is helping me now; if
I were writing to you I could tell you some of them."
"I like to hear you talk, Marjorie."
"Do you?" she asked wonderingly. "Linnet does, too, and Mrs. Kemlo. As I shall never write a book, I must learn to talk, and talk myself all out. Aunt Prue is living her book."
"Tell me something that has helped you," he urged.
She looked at the goldenrod in her hand, and raised it to her lips.
"It is coming to me that Christ made everything. He made those lilies of which he said, 'Consider the lilies.' Isn't it queer that we will not let him clothe us as he did the lilies? What girl ever had a white dress of the texture and whiteness and richness of the lily?"
"But the lily has but one dress; girls like a new dress for every occasion and a different one."
"'Shall he not much more clothe you?' But we do not let him clothe us. When one lily fades, he makes another in a fresh dress. I wish I could live as he wants me to. Not think about dress or what we eat or drink? Only do his beautiful work, and not have to worry and be anxious about things."
"Do you have to be?" he asked smiling.
"My life is a part of lives that are anxious about these things. But I don't think about dress as some girls do. I never like to talk about it. It is not a temptation to me. It would not trouble me to wear one dress all my life—one color, as the flowers do; it should be a soft gray—a cashmere, and when one was soiled or worn out I would have another like it—and never spend any more thought about it. Aunt Prue loves gray—she almost does that—she spends no thought on dress. If we didn't have to 'take thought,' how much time we would have—and how our minds would be at rest—to work for people and to study God's works and will."
Hollis smiled as he looked down at her.
"Girls don't usually talk like that," he said.
"Perhaps I don't—usually. What are you reading now?"
"History, chiefly—the history of the world and the history of the church."
They walked more and more slowly as they drifted into talk about books and then into his life in New York and the experiences he had had in his business tours and the people whom he had met.
"Do you like your life?" she asked.
"Yes, I like the movement and the life: I like to be 'on the go.' I expect to take my third trip across the ocean by and by. I like to mingle with men. I never could settle down into farming; not till I am old, at any rate."
They found Marjorie's mother standing in the front doorway, looking for them. She glanced at Hollis, but he was fastening the gate and would not be glanced at. Marjorie's face was no brighter than when she had set out for her walk. Linnet was setting the tea-table and singing, "A life on the ocean wave."
After tea the letter from Switzerland was read and discussed. Miss Prudence, as Mrs. West could not refrain from calling her, always gave them something to talk about. To give people something to think about that was worth thinking about, was something to live for, she had said once to Marjorie.
And then there was music and talk. Marjorie and Hollis seemed to find endless themes for conversation. And then Hollis and Linnet went home. Hollis bade them good-bye; he was to take an early train in the morning. Marjorie's mother scanned Marjorie's face, and stood with a lighted candle in her hand at bedtime, waiting for her confidence; but unconscious Marjorie closed the piano, piled away the sheets of music, arranged the chairs, and then went out to the milkroom for a glass of milk.
"Good-night, mother," she called back. "Are you waiting for anything?"
"Did you set the sponge for the bread?"
"Oh, yes," in a laughing voice.
And then the mother went slowly and wonderingly up the stairs, muttering
"Well! well! Of all things!"
Marjorie drew Aunt Prue's letter from her pocket to think it all over again by herself. Mr. Holmes was buried in manuscript. Prue was studying with her, beside studying French and German with the pastor's daughter in the village, and she herself was full of many things. They were coming home by and by to choose a home in America.
"When I was your age, Marjorie, and older, I used to fall asleep at night thinking over the doings of the day and finding my life in them; and in the morning when I awoke, my thought was, 'What shall I do to-day?' And now when I awake—now, when my life is at its happiest and as full of doings as I can wish, I think, instead, of Christ, and find my joy in nearness to him, in doing all with his eye upon me. You have not come to this yet; but it is waiting for you. Your first thought to-morrow morning may be of some plan to go somewhere, of some one you expect to see, of something you have promised to-day; but, by and by, when you love him as you are praying to love him, your first thought will be that you are with him. You can imagine the mother awaking with joy at finding her child asleep beside her, or the wife awaking to another day with her husband; but blessed more than all is it to awake and find the Lord himself near enough for you to speak to."
Marjorie went to sleep with the thought in her heart, and awoke with it; and then she remembered that Hollis must be on his way to the train, and then that she and Linnet were to drive to Portland that day on a small shopping excursion and to find something for the birthday present of Morris' mother.
Several days afterward when the mail was brought in Mrs. West beckoned
Marjorie aside in a mysterious manner and laid in her hand a letter from
Hollis.
"Yes," said Marjorie.
"Did you expect it?"
"Oh, yes."
Mrs. West waited until Marjorie opened it, and felt in her pocket for her glasses. In the other time she had always read his letters. But Marjorie moved away with it, and only said afterward that there was no "news" in it.
It was not like the letters of the other time. He had learned to write as she had learned to talk. Her reply was as full of herself as it would have been to Morris. Hollis could never be a stranger again.