XXX.
THE COSEY CORNER.
"God takes men's hearty desires and will instead of the deed where they have not the power to fulfill it; but he never took the bare deed instead of the will."—Richard Baxter.
Prue opened the door, and sprang into Marjorie's arms in her old, affectionate way; and Marjorie almost forgot that she was not in Maple Street, when she was led into the front parlor; there was as much of the Maple Street parlor in it as could be well arranged. Hollis was there on the hearth rug, waiting modestly in the background for his greeting; he had not been a part of Maple Street. The greeting he waited for was tardy in coming, and was shy and constrained, and it seemed impossible to have a word with her alone all the evening: she was at the piano, or chatting in the kitchen with old Deborah, or laughing with Prue, or asking questions of Linnet, and when, at last, Mr. Holmes took her upstairs to show her his study, he said good night abruptly and went away.
Marjorie chided herself for her naughty pride and passed another sleepless night; in the morning she looked so ill that the plans for the day were postponed, and she was taken into Mrs. Holmes own chamber to be petted and nursed to sleep. She awoke in the dusk to find Aunt Prue's dear face beside her.
"Aunt Prue," she said, stretching up her hands to encircle her neck, "I don't know what to do."
"I do. Tell me."
"Perhaps I oughtn't to. It's mother's secret."
"Suppose I know all about it."
"You can't! How can you?"
"Lie still," pushing her back gently among the pillows, "and let me tell you."
"I thought I was to tell you."
"A while ago the postman brought me a note from your mother. She told me that she had confessed to you something she told me last summer."
"Oh," exclaimed Marjorie, covering her face with both hands, "isn't it too dreadful!"
"I think your mother saw clearly that she had taken your life into her own hands without waiting to let God work for you and in you. I assured her that I knew all about that dark time of yours, and she wept some very sorrowful tears to think how heartbroken you would be if you knew. Perhaps she thought you ought to know it; she is not one to spare herself; she is even harder upon herself than upon other sinners."
"But, Aunt Prue, what ought I to do now? What can I do to make it right?"
"Do you want to meddle?"
"No, oh no; but it takes my breath away. I'm afraid he began to write to me again because he thought I wanted him to."
"Didn't you want him to?"
"Yes—but not—but not as mother thought I did. I never once asked God to give him back to me; and I should if I had wanted it very much, because I always ask him for everything."
"Your pride need not be wounded, poor little Marjorie! Do you remember telling Hollis about your dark time, that night he met you on your way from your grandfather's?"
"Yes; I think I do. Yes, I know I told him; for he called me 'Mousie,' and he had not said that since I was little; and with it he seemed to come back to me, and I was not afraid or timid with him after that."
"You wrote me about the talk, and he has told me about it since. To be frank, Marjorie, he told me about the conversation with your mother, and how startled he was. After that talk with you he was assured that she was mistaken—but, child, there was no harm, no sin—even if it had been true. The only sin I find was your mother's want of faith in making haste. And she sees it now and laments it. She says making haste has been the sin of her lifetime. Her unbelief has taken that form. You were very chilly to Hollis last night."
"I couldn't help it," said Marjorie. "I would not have come if I could have stayed at home."
"Is that proud heart satisfied now?"
"Perhaps it oughtn't to be—if it is proud."
"We will not argue about it now as there's somebody waiting for you down-stairs."
"I don't want to see him—now."
"Suppose he wants to see you."
"Aunt Prue! I wish I could be selfish just a few minutes."
"You may. A whole hour. You may be selfish up here all by yourself until the dinner bell rings."
Marjorie laughed and drew the lounge afghan up about her shoulders. She was so happy that she wanted to go to sleep;—to go to sleep and be thankful. But the dinner bell found her in the parlor talking to Linnet; Prue and Hollis were chattering together in French. Prue corrected his pronunciation and promised to lend him books.
The most inviting corner in the house to Marjorie was a cosey corner in the library; she found her way thither after dinner, and there Hollis found her, after searching parlors, dining-room, and halls for her. The cosey corner itself was an arm-chair near the revolving bookcase; Prue said that papa kept his "pets" in that bookcase.
Marjorie had taken a book into her hand and was gathering a thought here and there when Hollis entered; he pushed a chair to her side, and, seating himself, took the book from her fingers.
"Marjorie, I have come to ask you what to do?"
"About your father's offer?"
"Yes. I should have written to-day. I fancy how he watches the mail. But
I am in a great state of indecision. My heart is not in his plan."
"Is your heart in buying and selling laces?"
"I don't see why you need put it that way," he returned, with some irritation. "Don't you like my business?"
"Do you?"
"I like what it gives me to do."
"I should not choose it if I were a man."
"What would you choose?"
"I have not considered sufficiently to choose, I suppose. I should want to be one of the mediums through which good passed to my neighbor."
"What would you choose for me to do?"
"The thing God bids you do."
"That may be to buy and sell laces."
"It may be. I hope it was while you were doing it."
"You mean that through this offer of father's God may be indicating his will."
"He is certainly giving you an opportunity to choose."
"I had not looked upon it in that light. Marjorie, I'm afraid the thought of his will is not always as present with me as with you."
"I used to think I needed money, like Aunt Prue, if I would bless my neighbor; but once it came to me that Christ through his poverty made us rich: the world's workers have not always been the men and the women with most money. You see I am taking it for granted that you do not intend to decide for yourself, or work for yourself."
"No; I am thinking of working for you."
"I am too small a field."
"But you must be included."
"I can be one little corner; there's all Middlefield beside. Isn't there work for you as a citizen and as a Christian in our little town? Suppose you go to Middlefield with the same motives that you would go on a mission to India, Africa, or the Isles of the Sea! You will not be sent by any Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, but by him who has sent you, his disciple, into the world. You have your experience, you have your strength, you have your love to Christ and your neighbor, to give them. They need everything in Middlefield. They need young men, Christian young men. The village needs you, the Church needs you. It seems too bad for all the young men to rush away from their native place to make a name, or to make money. Somebody must work for Middlefield. Our church needs a lecture room and a Sunday school room; the village needs a reading room—the village needs more than I know. It needs Christian push. Perhaps it needs Hollis Rheid."
"Marjorie, it will change all my life for me."
"So it would if you should go West, as you spoke last night of doing. If you should study law, as you said you had thought of doing, that would change the course of your life. You can't do a new thing and keep to the old ways."
"If I go I shall settle down for life."
"You mean you will settle down until you are unsettled again."
"What will unsettle me?"
"What unsettled you now?"
"Circumstances."
"Circumstances will keep on being in existence as long as we are in existence. I never forget a motto I chose for my birthday once on a time. 'The Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace.'"
"He commands us to fight, sometimes."
"And then we must fight. You seem to be undergoing some struggles now.
Have you any opening here?"
"I answered an advertisement this morning, but we could not come to terms. Marjorie, what you say about Middlefield is worth thinking of."
"That is why I said it," she said archly.
"Would _you _like that life better?"
"Better for you?"
"No, better for yourself."
"I am there already, you know," with rising color.
"I believe I will write to father and tell him I will take his kindness into serious consideration."
"There is no need of haste."
"He will want to begin to make plans. He is a great planner. Marjorie! I just thought of it. We will rent Linnet's house this summer—or board with her, and superintend the building of our own, Do you agree to that?"
"You haven't taken it into serious consideration yet."
"Will it make any difference to you—my decision? Will you share my life—any way?"
Prue ran in at that instant, Linnet following. Hollis arose and walked around among the books. Prue squeezed herself into Marjorie's broad chair; and Linnet dropped herself on the hassock at Marjorie's feet, and laid her head in Marjorie's lap.
There was no trouble in Linnet's face, only an accepted sorrow.
"Marjorie, will you read to us?" coaxed Prue. "Don't you know how you used to read in Maple Street?"
"What do you feel like listening to?"
"Your voice," said Prue, demurely.