Windyridge

by W. Riley

CHAPTER XXVII

MOTHER HUBBARD HEARS THE CALL

The world is very drab to-day, as I look out of my bedroom window at the Hall and once more open the book in which I set down the experiences of my pilgrimage. I am living in luxury again, a luxury which has, alas! more of permanency in it than before. The little room in which I am writing is charming in the daintiness of its colouring and the simplicity of its furnishings. There is just a suspicion of pink in the creamy wallpaper, and the deeper cream of the woodwork. The bed, like the dressing table and the chairs, is in satinwood, beautifully inlaid, and the wardrobe is an enormous cavern in the wall, with mirrored doors behind which my few belongings hang suspended like ghostly stalactites. The floor is nearly covered with a Wilton rug, and the rest of it is polished until it looks like glass. A few choice etchings and engravings hang upon the walls—Elaine dreaming of Lancelot, Dante bending over the dead body of Beatrice, Helen of Troy, and similar subjects, with two of Leader's landscapes. The counterpane gleams, snowy white, beneath the lovely satin eider-down, which gives a splash of colour to the room; and the room is mine!

Mine! Yes, but the world is very drab all the same. The sky is grey to its farthest limits—an unrelieved greyness which presses upon one's spirits. The landscape is grey, with no solitary touch of brightness in it until you come to the lawn in front of my window, where there is a gorgeous display of chrysanthemums. The cawing of the rooks is a shade more mournful than usual, and the grey smoke from the stacks above my head floats languidly on the heavy air.

And for the moment I would have it so, for it harmonises with my mood and gives me the inspiration I need in order to write down the occurrences of these later days. It is not that I am morbid or downcast; I am sad, but not depressed; the outlook is not black—it is just drab.

I suppose if anyone were to read what I have written thus far they would guess the truth—that my dear old Mother Hubbard has been taken from me. We laid her to rest a week ago in the little plot of ground which must ever henceforward be very dear to me, and my heart hungers for the sound of her voice and the sight of her kindly face. But I cannot doubt that for her it is "far better," so I will not stoop to self-pity.

And, after all, there is not a streak of grey in the picture I have to reproduce. As I live over again those few last days of companionship I feel the curtains to be drawn back from the windows of my soul; I experience the freshness of a heaven-born zephyr. I find myself smiling as one only smiles when memory is pleasing and there is deep content, and I say to myself: "Thank God, it was indeed 'sunset and evening star' and there was no 'moaning of the bar' when the spirit of the gentle motherkin 'put out to sea,' and she went forth to meet her 'Pilot face to face.'"

I think the shock of Sar'-Ann's death upset her, for, like her Master, she was easily touched with the feeling of other people's infirmities, and though outwardly she was unexcited I knew that the deeps within her were stirred.

We always slept together now, for I was uneasy when I was not with her. For months past my cottage had been rarely used except as a bedroom, but now I abandoned it altogether and had my bed brought into Mother Hubbard's cottage and placed in the living-room, quite near to her own, so that I could hear her breathing. Far into the night I would lie awake and watch the dying embers on the hearth, and the light growing fainter upon the walls, and listen for any sound of change.

Each morning she rose at the same hour, dressed with the same care, and sought to follow the old, familiar routine; but she did not demur when I placed her in her chair and assumed the air and authority of commander-in-chief.

"I must work while it is day, love," she said, smiling up at me in the way which always provoked a caress.

"Martha, Martha," I always replied, "thou art anxious and troubled about many things: but one thing is needful, and that in your case is rest."

She drew my head on to her breast one day as I said this for the hundredth time—I had knelt down upon the rug, and mockingly held her prisoner—and she said very, very softly:

"Grace love, I am going to give in. The voice within tells me you are right, and I do not fret. 'In quietness and in confidence shall be your strength.' It is because I am so strong in spirit that I do not recognise how weak I am in body; but I think, love, I am beginning to realise it now. And as I have you to look after me I have much to thank God for. Do you know, Grace love, I am sure the Lord sent you to Windyridge for my sake. It is wonderful how He makes things work together for the good of many. He knew this poor old Martha would soon need somebody to pet her and look after her, so he sent you to be an angel of comfort."

"Well," I said, as cheerfully as I could with my spirit in chains, "He has paid me good wages, and I have a royal reward. Why, my own cup is filled to overflowing, 'good measure, pressed down, running over'—isn't that the correct quotation? I wouldn't have missed these twelve months of Mother-Hubbardism for a king's ransom."

She pressed my head still more closely to her. "Are you very busy this morning, love?" she asked. "I feel that I can talk to you just now if you have time to listen, and it will do me good to speak."

It had come at last, and I braced myself to meet it. "What have you got to say to me, motherkin? Speak on. I am very comfy, and my work will wait."

"Yes, love," she said—and it was so unlike her to acquiesce so readily that my heart grew heavier still—"work can wait, but the tide of life waits for no man, and there is something I want to say before the flood bears me away."

"Are you feeling worse, dear?" I asked; "would you like me to ask Dr. Trempest to call? I can telephone from the Hall."

"No, love," the gentle voice replied, "I am past his aid. I shall slip away some day without pain; that is borne in upon me, and I am thankful, for your sake as well as for my own. The doctor will just call to see me in the usual way, but you will not have to send fer him. No; I just want to discuss one or two things with you, love, whilst my mind is clear and my strength sufficient. And you are going to be my own cheerful, business-like Grace, aren't you, love?"'

"Yes," I said, swallowing my lump, and summoning my resources.

"Well, now, love, I want to make my will, and you shall do it for me when we have talked about it. I have neither chick nor child, and if I have relatives I don't know them, and once over I thought of leaving all I have to you, love, for you have been more than a daughter to me; but after thinking it over I am not going to do so."

"It was sweet of you to think of it, dear," I said, "but I really do not need it, and I am glad you have changed your mind. Tell me."

She stroked my face with a slow, patting movement as she continued: "You won't need it, love. You have a little of your own, and you are young and can work; but I would have added my little to yours if that had been all, but I know you will not need it, and I am glad. But you will like to have something which I have valued, and you shall have whatever I hold most dear."

She paused a moment or two, but I knew she would not wish me to speak just then.

"There are three things, love, which are very precious to me," she continued; "one is the ring which Matthew gave me when he asked me to be his wife. I have never worn it since he died, but it is in the little silver box in my cap drawer. I want you to wear it, love, in remembrance of me. Then there is the little box itself. Besides the ring, it contains my class tickets—tickets of membership, you know, love; I have them all from the very first, and Matthew bought the little box for me to put them in, and he called it my 'Ark.' I am so pleased to think that you will have it, but I would like the tickets to be buried with me."

She broke off and laughed. "That sounds silly, love, doesn't it? It looks as if I thought the tickets would help me to the next world; but, of course, I didn't mean that. They are just bits of printed paper, but I don't want them to be burned or thrown into the rubbish heap, that's all.

"Last and dearest of all, there's my Bible. It wouldn't fetch a penny anywhere, for it's old and yellow and thumbed, and the back is loose; but its value to me, love, is just priceless, and I should hardly die happy unless someone had it who would love it too. Now that's your share."

I drew her hand to my lips and kissed it; she knew what I was feeling.

"Give Reuben the old grandfather's clock. It is oak and will match his furniture, and he can give his mahogany one to Ben. Reuben has always admired the clock, and he will be pleased I remembered him. Let my clothes go to any of the neighbours who are poor and need them. And the lamp which his scholars gave Matthew when his health failed and he had to give up teaching——-"

She paused, and I held my peace. It was a chaste and artistic production in brass, which had always seemed to me rather out of place amid its homely surroundings, and I should not have been sorry if it had been amongst the treasures to be bequeathed to me...

"Yes, dear," I said at length, "the lamp?"

"I want you to ask Mr. Derwent, love, to accept the lamp. He admired it very much, and he has been so very nice to me; and give him the china, too.

"You will not live here alone, Grace, when I am gone. Mr. Evans will want you, and you will not have to deny him then as you have done previously for my sake. These old eyes have seen more, love, than you have realised, and I am very grateful. The Lord bless you!

"Both the cottages are mine. I bought this one when Matthew died, and Reuben sold me the other one, just as it stands, whilst you were away, and we arranged to keep it a secret for a while. Then there will be about £1,500 in the bank and Building Society when everything has been paid. I have thought a great deal about what to do with it, and I am going to leave both the cottages, with all the furniture, for the use of poor widows who otherwise might have to go to the workhouse; and the interest on the money will keep them from want.

"I haven't much head for business, but a lawyer will work it out all right. You see, love, I was left comfortably off by Matthew, and I think the Lord would like me to remember that all widows are not so fortunate; and I don't want to forget that it is His money I have to dispose of."

The tears came into my eyes now and I could not speak. The sun was shining brightly outside, but within that humble room there was a radiance that outshone that of the sun, even the reflected splendour of heaven.

After a while she continued: "I want you and Reuben to decide who are to live in the cottages, but I should like Ginty's mother to have the first offer, love, and I think she will not refuse for my sake; and you must arrange about the other. You will see Lawyer Simpson in Fawkshill, love, and tell him all this. Go this afternoon, for I shall be restless now until all is done. And now let me tell you what no lawyer need know."

Again she rested for a while and then continued:

"They are sure to want a service at the chapel, for I am the oldest member, and a class leader. But I do so dislike doleful singing, so I have been thinking it over and I have put down on a paper which you will find in my Bible the hymns which I should like to have sung. Ask them to sing first 'My God, the spring of all my joys,' to the tune of 'Lydia.' You won't know the tune, love, for it is a very old-fashioned one, but I have always liked it, and it goes with a rare swing. Then I must have 'Jesu, Lover of my soul' to 'Hollingside,' for that is the hymn of my experience; and to conclude with let them sing a child's hymn. I'm afraid you will laugh at me, Grace, but I would like to have 'There is a better world, they say.' I think these will be sufficient, and they are all very cheerful hymns and tunes."

"And the minister?" I asked, for her calmness was infectious.

"Oh, either of them, love," she said; "they are both good men, and they must arrange to suit their own convenience. Now give me a kiss. I am so glad to have got this done, and though I am tired I feel ever so much better."

I saw the lawyer in the afternoon, and he called with the draft on the following day, and by the next it had been signed, witnessed and completed.

Mother Hubbard did not go to chapel on the Sunday, but on the Thursday she expressed her fixed determination to take her class. I protested in vain; the motherkin had made up her mind.

"I must, love; it is laid upon me, and I am not at all excited."

"But, dear," I urged, "I shall worry terribly whilst you are out of my care. You are not fit to go—you are not strong enough."

"It is only a step, love," she replied, "and the evening is warm; why need you worry when you can come with me?"

She had never suggested this before—indeed, when I had laughingly suggested it she had been visibly alarmed, and I admit that the idea was not attractive. Somehow or other I distrusted the Methodist class meeting. But my love for the class leader prevailed.

"Very well," I said; "if you go, I go too."

We went together and found eight or nine women of various ages assembled in the little vestry. Mother Hubbard took her seat at the table, and I sat next to Widow Smithies, who moved up to make room for me.

We sang a hymn, and then Mother Hubbard prayed—prayed in a gentle voice which had much humility in it, but an assured confidence which showed her to be on intimate terms with her Lord; and when she had finished I read the 103rd Psalm at her request, and we sang again.

Then she spoke, and her voice gathered strength as she proceeded. I cannot write down all she said, but some of the sentences are burned into my memory, though the connections have escaped me.

"We will not have an experience meeting to-night, my friends, because I want to speak to you, and God has given me strength to do so. I am weak in body, but my spirit was never stronger. It is the spirit which is the real life, so I was never more alive. I have thought a good deal lately on those words:

"'Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall. But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength: they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.'

"'They that wait upon the Lord' shall do this. Not just the strong and powerful, but poor, weak old women like me; aye, those weaker still who are helpless on sick-beds; the paralysed and lame who cannot walk at all—all these shall 'renew their strength.' They are unable even to totter to the old pew in the house of God, so weak and shaky is their poor human frame; aye, but they shall 'mount up with wings as eagles.' The eagle is a strong bird; it makes its nest on the cliffs of high mountains, it soars up and up into the clouds, and it can carry sheep in its talons, so great is its strength. And, do you realise it? they that wait upon the Lord are like that. Weak and worn out in body, but

"'Strong in the strength which God supplies
Through His Eternal Son.'

"My friends, I thank God that in that sense I am strong to-night; and do you think that when I am so strong I am going to die? Never! Life is going to be fuller, richer, more abundant."

I gazed upon Mother Hubbard in astonishment. She was not excited, but she was exalted. No earthly light was in her eyes, no earthly strength was in those triumphant tones. Death had laid his hand upon her but she shook him off and spoke like a conqueror. I looked at her members, and saw that every eye was fixed upon her, and that reverential fear held them immovable. There was a clock over the mantelpiece, and it ticked away slowly, solemnly, but no other sound disturbed the stillness.

"I have heard some of you speak often of your crosses, and God knows how heavy some of them have been, and how I have pitied and tried to help you. You will not think I am boasting when I say that I have had crosses to carry, too, but I have always endeavoured to make light of them, and I am so glad of that to-night. Because, dear friends, I realise very clearly now that to carry a cross that is laid upon us is to help the Master. I think Simon was a strong, kindly man, who was glad to carry the cross for Christ's sake. I like to think of him as pushing his way through the crowd and saying: 'Let me help the Master: I will gladly carry it for Him.' And I want to say this: that all through my life when I have tried to carry my cross cheerfully the Master has always taken the heavier end—always!

"You will go on having crosses to carry so long as ever you love the Lord Jesus Christ; but remember this—all troubles are not crosses. God has nothing to do with lots of our troubles. Indeed, I am not sure that what we call a trouble is ever a cross. That only is a cross which we carry for His sake. It is a privilege to carry a cross, and we ought to be glad when we are selected.

"'But suppose we fall under it?' some of you may say. Listen: 'They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.' You forgot that. 'When I am weak then I am strong.' Why? Because the good Lord never asks us to carry a cross without giving us strength for the burden. His grace is always sufficient for us. Never forget my words—they are perhaps the last I shall speak as your leader, and oh, my dear friends, how my heart yearns over you! how very dear to me is your truest welfare!—no trouble need ever o'erwhelm you, no temptation need ever cause you to fall, no weakness of the body need ever affect the strength of the soul, no darkness of earth need ever shut out the light of heaven, because—listen, 'Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world'!"

She paused, and the women, unaccustomed to self-control, were sobbing audibly into their handkerchiefs, and Mother Hubbard noticed it.

"We will not sing a closing hymn," she said; "let us pray."

The women knelt; but she merely leaned forward, with her hands clasped on the table in front of her, and commended them all to God. She prayed for each of them individually, using their Christian names, and remembering all their families and family difficulties. She prayed for the absent ones, for the toilworn and the sick; and she prayed for me—and may God in His mercy answer that prayer, then shall my life be blessed indeed.

When she had pronounced the benediction in a very low voice we rose from our knees, and saw her with her face uplifted to heaven, and the calm of heaven spread over it, like the clear golden calm of a cloudless sunset. Then, slowly, the head dropped upon her hands; and when at length we tried to rouse her we found that she was beyond our call.