Berthe knelt beside the child, who was growing alarmed as her intelligence became normally acute. The Frenchwoman prattled soothingly, and Leonard stooped to add some words of encouragement. He stroked the child's hair, and his hand met the soft hand of Berthe and was enclosed within it. He trembled as she drew him downward, and a sob escaped him as his lips met hers and lingered on them in a rapturous kiss.
CHAPTER XII.
HER EYES GREW LIMPID AND HER CHEEKS FLUSHED RED.
When the carriage, which was to convey her to Easthampton, had started, Natalie commenced the re-perusal of Miss Claghorn's invitation, which ran thus:
"My Dear Grand-niece—I address you thus, for though I have never seen you, yet you are of my kindred, and all who bear your name must be dear to me. Your father was so in his youth, and if, in later years, he neglected, if he did not forget, the ties of kinship and of country, I nevertheless mourned for him, even though sensible that all things are ordered by the Lord of heaven and earth and that human regret is useless, and, if unaccompanied with resignation, sinful. Mr. Winter writes me that you are friendless. I offer that which you can justly claim from me—my friendship and a home. As far as earthly cares are concerned, I am willing to relieve you of those incident to your situation. This is plainly my duty, and for many years I have striven, with God's help, to perform with a cheerful spirit that which I have been called upon to do.
"It is this habit which impels me here to refer to your views concerning man's duty toward his Maker. I do not, because conscientiously I cannot, agree with those who profess tolerance in these matters. There should be no tolerance of sin. If we would worthily follow in the steps of Him who died that we might live, we must hate the devil and his children in the same measure that we love our Father and his children. Whose child are you?
"This is a solemn question. I urge you to seek its answer at the Throne. If you will do this, my hope will be mighty. Should you be tempted to resent my solicitude, remember that my religion is a part of my nature, the only part meriting your respect, and that it requires of me that which I have written, as well as much more not set down here, but of which I hope I shall see the fruits. Come to me as soon as possible, and be assured of a welcome. Achsah Claghorn."
The girl smiled, though sadly, as she read this letter. She did not resent the fact that it was confessedly inspired solely by a sense of duty; she rather admired the writer for the uncompromising statement; nor was she offended at the sermon contained in the epistle, or inclined to treat it lightly. It is not probable that the writer of the letter believed that her exhortation would sink deeply in the heart of an "atheist," she being probably unaware that some who know not God crave a knowledge which they find nowhere offered.
The drive was long, the horse sleepy, the driver willing that his steed should doze, while his passenger paid by the hour, for which reason he had chosen the longer road by the sea.
She looked out upon the water with a gaze of longing, as though there might arise from out the solitary deep a vision which would solve that great mystery, which for Miss Claghorn and such as she, was no mystery, but wherein most of us grope as in a fog. But, as to other yearning eyes, so to hers no vision was vouchsafed; though had her sight been strengthened by experience, she might have seen, symbolized in the waters, the life of man. For, against the shore the fretful waves were spent and lost in sand, whereof each particle was insignificant, but which in the mass absorbed the foaming billows, as the vain aspirations of youth absorb its futile energies. Beyond was the green water, still tireless and vexed, and then the smoother blue, as it neared the sky-line, undisturbed, until afar the waters lay at rest in hopeless patience, and the heavens came down and hid the secret of what lay beyond.
But, if youth looked with the eyes of age, there were no youth. She was not yet to know lessons which must be hardly learned, and it was not that one offered by the waters that she saw as she looked out upon the ocean. Far beyond the horizon, in a distant land, her eyes beheld the garden of a village inn where sat a girl, prattling with her father and commenting upon two dusty strangers, who in their turn were eyeing the maid and her companion curiously. She saw the cave, heard Leonard shout the name—and then Mark Claghorn stood before her—as he then had stood, in the jaunty cap and ribbon which proclaimed him "Bursch"; one of those lawless beings of whom she had heard much school-girl prattle. Even then she had contrasted the handsomer face of the simple-minded boy beside her with the harsher and more commanding features of this newcomer. And her fancy wandered on through pleasant German saunterings and Parisian scenes among the churches—to the day when Berthe Lenoir had said that Mark would be her teacher in the lore of love; and she knew that, in the moment of that saying, she had learned the great lesson, never to be forgotten.