Fetzer rose from the bed.
"I'm so tired I could drop. And nervous! Lay down and go to sleep, Ellen."
But sleep was not to be so easily commanded. Ellen sat long with her hands clasped round her knees. The strange impressions of that July afternoon came back to her; then in a wave grief wiped out all recollection of Hilda's behavior. She had never ceased to hope that she would find her father's friend, that he would in some fashion help her; but now she had seen him and he had not known her, had not even looked at her. She had no eyes for his disquiet. She felt alone in the great house. Presently her cheeks burned. She made no allowance for the transforming years which had changed her into a woman. She resented their failure to recognize her. When she was learned and famous and not until then she would tell them who she was! Now she hated them.
CHAPTER XXI
A LOST SHEEP
Grandfather Milhausen, having heard the echoes of the slamming door die away and the gate close with a loud click after angry Matthew, began to pray. The traditional language of petition was on his lips a powerful vehicle; noble periods poured forth eloquently. He prayed as though the safety of the universe depended upon his entreaties. He asked for the blessing of God upon them all, and especially upon Matthew and Ellen, and he asked specifically that Ellen be led to return with an inclination to take up the great work which might be hers.
He did not observe that he failed to lift his companion's spirit with his own, and that along the treasured and brittle pages of "The Mystic Dove" a desecrating pencil made angry strokes. Matthew's account of Ellen's situation appalled Amos; the evil influences of the world must already have been at work upon her.
Through a sleepless night Grandfather's anxiety deepened. He reproached himself because since Levis's death he had trusted too much to the softening influence of grief upon Ellen's heart. He should have importuned her, he should have laid her responsibility before her. The deep regret for his marriage and his own consequent forfeiting of power returned. God had given him another chance in his grandchildren—had he also forfeited that? The consciousness of the immanence of God was strong within him, but it was the immanence of a reproachful God. He had slept when he should have watched and idled when he should have toiled.
Toward morning he began to pray, and at last, when he had made a promise to God, he fell asleep. He would go to find Ellen and would bring her back.