From Jest to Earnest

by Edward Payson Roe

In his case also sleep proved "nature's sweet restorer." In the morning faith and reason sat together on their throne, and he recognized his duty to act the part of a man and a Christian, whatever the truth might be.

He sat down at last and calmly tried to disentangle the web. Second thoughts brought wiser judgment, for, after going over every day and hour of his acquaintance with Lottie, he could scarcely resist the conclusion that if she had begun in falsehood she was ending in truth. If she, in all her words and manner, had been only acting, he could never trust his senses again, or be able to distinguish between the hollow and the real.

Hour after hour he sat and thought. He held a solemn assize within his own breast, and marshalled all he could remember as witnesses for and against her. Much in her conduct that at first had puzzled him now grew clear in view of her purpose to victimize him, and, even as late as Christmas eve, he remembered how her use of the word "comedy" had jarred unpleasantly upon his ear. But on the other hand there seemed even more conclusive evidence that she had gradually grown sincere, and come to mean all she said and did. Could the color that came and went like light from an inner flame,—could tears that seemed to come more from her heart than from her eyes,—could words that had sounded so true and womanly, and that had often dwelt on the most sacred themes, be only simulated?

"If so," he groaned, "then there are only two in the wide universe that I can ever trust,—God and mother."

Moreover, in her trial, Lottie had an eloquent advocate to whom even deliberate reason appeared only too ready to lend an attentive ear,—the student's heart.

Therefore she finally received a better vindication than the Scotch verdict "not proven," and the young man began to condemn himself bitterly for having left so hastily, and before Lottie had time to explain and defend herself.

His first impulse was to go back at once and give her another hearing. But, almost before he was aware, he found a new culprit brought to the bar for judgment,—himself.

If the trial, just completed, had failed to prove Lottie's guilt, it had most conclusively shown him his love. He saw how it had developed while he was blind to its existence. He saw that his wild agony of the preceding day was not over falsehood and deception in the abstract, but over the supposed falsehood of a woman whom he had come to love as his own soul. And even now he was exulting in the hope that she might have passed, as unconsciously as himself, into like sweet thraldom. In the belief of her truthfulness, how else could he interpret her glances, tones, actions, and even plainly-spoken words?

But the flame of hope, that had burned higher and brighter, gradually sank again as he recalled his aunt's words, "How is all this sentiment to end?—in only sentiment?"

He remembered his chosen calling. Could he ask this child of luxury to go with him to the far West and share his life of toilsome privation? He had long felt that the work of a missionary was his vocation. She had never had any such feeling. He recalled her words, spoken but yesterday, it seemed: "Do you imagine that any nice girl will go out with you among the border ruffians?"