I knew, when the wealth came, that it would not make her any the less my friend, but I was only one among her many friends. I knew that our paths would be different now, and though she would always think kindly of me, I could not expect to see and know her as I had fondly dreamed in the first days of our friendship.
“No, I can never return to her what she can give, what she has already given to me; my little life can play but a small part in the large life that has come to her,” I said drearily, as I turned back, after the first shock of surprise, to readjust myself to the old routine of thought and feeling, which, I had dared to hope, had been put behind me forever.
“Ah, well, I have made believe be happy before, I can do so again,” I said to myself, grimly.
But one day—how well I remember it—as I passed down Chestnut Street in Salem noting the brilliant winter sunlight shining down from the cloudless blue through the black lace work of branches high arching overhead, and casting fantastic shadows on the brick walls of the stately old mansions on either side, some one handed me a letter. This is what it said:—
... “You asked me to be your friend, you said I could help you, and now I ask you to be my friend, to come here to this great city where I must be for a time and help me. I felt brave and strong at first, I was not afraid to be rich, but I begin to tremble now, to feel strangely weak and girlish and unprotected; to feel, in short, that I need a friend, that I need what I think you can be to me. After aunt Madison had been with me only a few days she was obliged to return to Boston, leaving me quite alone. Of course Madam Grundy says that I must have a chaperon, but I do not want a chaperon, and I should be wretched with a ‘companion,’ perfunctorily trying to entertain me, learning all my plans and secrets, and hypocritically assenting to everything I do and say. No; I want an honest friend, one who knows the world as you do, who will honestly speak her mind, who will take an interest in all my schemes, and help to keep me from making blunders.
“I believe I could talk more freely, think more clearly, and do better work if you were beside me, your honest eyes looking into mine. For, let me tell you the secret, dear, of what first drew me to you. You are most strangely like the sister whom I lost years ago, and whose companionship, if she had lived, would have made life so rich for me. I feel myself so alone; never before have I had so keen a sense of loneliness as now, here, in this modern Babylon, with my old life and work abandoned, and the new perplexing life which my wealth has brought me just begun. Like me, you are alone in the world, singularly alone; so come and be to me what my little Ruby would have been. When you speak I could almost believe that I hear her voice; when you look at me I see her eyes again. Your face haunts me. Come to me and I shall feel that my Ruby is with me again.”
Standing in the sunshine beneath the old elms I read these loving words. When I lifted my eyes again, the beautiful quaint old street was suddenly transfigured. For months it had been to me but a bare prison-house; now the sunshine was real sunshine, the sky was no longer leaden, the world was, after all, a beautiful world, and I was glad to live.
So bidding farewell to quiet Chestnut Street and the staid, historic old city, I went to the “modern Babylon” to meet Mildred, and the new life began. As the days went on I perceived that she seemed to have a feverish dread that she should die with her work undone. My constant anxiety was that she would succumb to the fearful nervous strain which her sudden accession to wealth and responsibility had brought upon her. But nothing seemed to rest her or relieve her mind except the accomplishment of some of the ends she had in view, and as every new project was consummated, she showed a relief and delight that to the average society woman would have appeared inexplicable and at the same time amusing.
“It seems to me,” said Mildred one day as we were strolling through the park, after a morning on Cherry Street; “it seems to me that most people have no imagination. It cannot be that all the pleasant, cultured people whom one meets are so shamefully heartless and indifferent. They simply have not the smallest realization of what is going on in this great city, or any thought of their personal, individual responsibility about it. They hear it all as a tale that is told. They have always heard it. They are used to hearing it. From constant hearing it has become as meaningless to them as the Lord’s Prayer has to most people. How many who dare to say ‘Thy kingdom come, on earth as it is in heaven,’ ever actually mean a word that they say, or lift a finger to bring it about?”
We walked on in silence. Presently Mildred burst out again: