CHAPTER XXXVIII
“Father,” whispered Helen Preston, in the low voice of despair. “Father, don’t you know me?”
The old warrior who loved Dunvegan sat still as death in his arm chair, a happy smile on his face.
“Father, it is Helen. Oh, father! Don’t you know me?”
Slowly he opened his eyes with a look of incredulous disappointment.
“Oh! Helen, child, is it you? Why disturb me? I was with him—we had just won a great victory—the men were cheering old Traveler as he came down the battle line—”
“But, father, you had been quiet so long—I was afraid—I—”
He had sunk again into a stupor.
She rose heart-broken, and pressed her wan face against the window pane.
“He will die soon,” she murmured, “and I shall be alone. Tait has Annie, but Ervin is so far away! Oh, if he could only come!”
She looked, as always, from the window that faced the southwest, where the ivy-covered cabin crouched, only her eyes now wandered on over the green wheat fields to the blue range of the Wa-haws. Beyond them Ervin was, Ervin who loved her, and would come back some day, and claim his highland lassie.
The twilight was falling gently in the Silver Creek valley, the cooing of the dove came softly from the piny woods. She closed her eyes—and—
The fighting is ended, the tears are over and gone. Of a glad day he comes back stronger, nobler, manlier. The little red church in under the oaks is garlanded with roses. Annie is playing the wedding march, and Dr. Allerton—
“Miss Helen,” called a happy old voice.
“Why, Ben—you—I was asleep surely! What are you grinning at?” Helen asked dazedly.
“I’se got some good news for de young mistis! Ole Ben’s shorely got some good news. De white pigeon what was lost is come home!”
In her anguish she saw him wounded—a great hole, perhaps, in his breast. Pathetically crowning him with her own motives, she hears him tell them to loose the dragoon, reads the one thought of his soul, that Helen should know and come to him.
“Helen, my child,” a weak voice called from the arm chair, “come near me—do not go far away—I feel ill—my child—it is so good to have you with me at the last—so good to know that you—will not go—a—”
He sank again into a stupor.
She slowly lifted her hand from his forehead where he had lovingly placed it. Her little figure trembled as a soul before the breath of Jehovah. She fell on her knees by the bedside, where her mother had taught her to pray. For an hour the duties fought bloodily over her heart, then she rose and went toward the stable.
Half an hour later Dr. Allerton heard a knock on his door. He saw her by the candle light.
“Helen, my child, what can—is he—dead?”
“Oh, Doctor,” she pleaded, piteously, “tell me what to do!”
“Trust, my child,” he said, seating her tenderly.
She told him all, and when it was done he encouraged her.
“How good it is to know that your brother is with him!”
“Tait? No, I have not even that comfort. He is in Virginia.”
“He is everywhere.”
Then she understood.
“Oh, Doctor Allerton, may I go? Tell me I may go!” she pleaded.
For a long while he sat silent, while a memory of the long ago came stealing through the closed window. A face—a death—a promise kept through forty long years of celibacy. The face laughed at him as he sat silent there, as if he had pleased her well.
“Go,” he said.
And he raised his hand in benediction and blessed her.