Sept. 30th. I made bread, tidied drawers and closets, filled all the vases with fresh flowers, and walked for two hours and half.
Oct. 1st. Writing in the morning on “The Maid of Maiden Lane,” and in the afternoon watching the gathering of the apples, and the digging of the potatoes.
In November I finished “The Maid of Maiden Lane” and made an arrangement with Mr. Dodd to write “The Lion’s 450 Whelp.” For these two books, I was to receive three thousand dollars each.
In December I suffered a great loss. I had as cook a Mrs. Kirkpatrick, the wife of that Thomas Kirkpatrick, whom I have named as my first caller at Cherry Croft, and who was at this very time my gardener. She had both my trust and my affection, for she was faithful and kind to me, and had fine spiritual instincts, which I delighted to inform and to direct. On Sunday, the eleventh of December, she appeared to be in as perfect health as a woman in the prime of life could be, yet when I awoke out of deep sleep, soon after midnight, I knew that something was going to happen; for I could not move a finger, nor could I open my eyes. I lay motionless waiting and listening. Then I heard steps mounting the stairs—steps, no human foot could make—the strong swift steps of a Messenger whom nothing could delay. At the head of the stairs was a corridor on which my room, my study, a guest room and Alice’s two rooms opened. At the end of the corridor there was a door, always locked at night, then two steps leading down to a small hall, on which Mrs. Kirkpatrick’s room, and another room opened.
Into which of these rooms was He going? I listened awestruck and breathless. Past my door, my study, and the guest room He went; past the open door leading into Alice’s rooms, and then I heard the same fateful tread going down the two steps into the outer hall, after which there was dead silence. In a few minutes I was able to move, and I sat up and considered. I was certain that I had locked the door between the corridor and the small hall. Yet there had been no delay at the door, nor any sound of a lock turning. I struck a light and went to the door. It was locked. It had been no impediment unto Him who passed through it, shut and locked. Alice was in a deep sleep; Mrs. Kirkpatrick, also. I went back to my room and sat down. And that night I slept no more.
In the morning Mrs. Kirkpatrick told me she was sick. “I will go home,” she said, “and send my daughter to do my work. I shall be well in a day or two.” I held her hand as she spoke, and looked into her kind face, where I saw written what no 451 mortal could either write, or blot out. As she passed through the gate, I called Alice, to “come and take a last look at Mrs. Kirkpatrick;” and we both watched her hurrying up the hill, until she was out of sight. Seven days after she died of pneumonia.
That night as I sat quite alone by the parlor fire, praying for the passing soul, Lilly came to me. And I cried with joy, while together we sought “Him that ... turneth the shadow of death into the morning” (Amos, 5:8). She spent two days in packing and preparing the house for the winter, and on the third day, I went with Alice to the Fifth Avenue Hotel in New York, leaving Thomas Kirkpatrick, the sorrowful husband, in charge of the house.
I do not like to write much about 1899. The first three months my doctor forbid me to write, and I amused myself by reading everything I could find on the new cults and “isms” then clamoring for recognition. Theosophy for a few weeks fascinated me, but Christian Science, never for one hour made any impression. I thought it, only a huge misunderstanding of the Bible. Spiritualism I had examined many years previously, and discarded its pretensions at once. Truly God speaks to men, but when he so favors any soul, He asks no dollar fee, and needs no darkened room, veiled cabinet, nor yet any hired medium to interpret His message. He can make Himself heard in the stir and traffic of Broadway, and in the sunshine of midday, as well as in the darkness of midnight. And when I had satisfied my foolish curiosity, I was sorry and ashamed, and with deep contrition asked only to be permitted to say once more “Our Father!” Going back to my Bible, was like going back home, after being lost in a land of darkness and despair.
This three months’ reading, often by electric light, made havoc with my sight, and I was obliged to spend six weeks in a darkened room after it. Lilly spent them with me, and I was greatly consoled by this proof of her affection for me. I was very anxious about money matters, for though I could not write, the expenses of the house went on. But God did not forget His Promise to me. Towards the end of March Mr. Stone of Chicago wrote to me for a novel, and I sold him “Was It Right to 452 Forgive?” for twelve hundred dollars; soon after Mr. Jewett came up to Cherry Croft, told me he had gone into the publishing business with his friend Taylor, and bought the book rights of “Trinity Bells,” for two thousand dollars. These two events, both most unexpected, made my mind easy; and I improved so rapidly, that in May I began to write a little. Then Dr. Klopsch ordered twenty short articles, and these gave me just the work I could do, because I could leave it, and take it up, whenever it was prudent to do so.
I spent the winter of 1900 at Atlantic City, and on the sixth of February, the novelist, Robert Barr of London, came to visit me. He was delighted with Atlantic City, and stayed more than a week. At this time I had a remarkable dream. I thought I stood on the piazza at Cherry Croft, and was looking upward at an immense black African bull, that rose and fell between the sky and the earth. Sometimes he was very high, sometimes he came near to the ground, but as I watched he fell to the earth, and his head came off, and rolled out of sight. And the grass was high, and I called Kirkpatrick and said, “The grass is ready, you will cut it to-morrow.”