Rose Mather: A tale

by Mary Jane Holmes

She had never called him Jimmie before, in his hearing, and as she did it now, the dark, handsome face into which she was looking, flushed with a sudden joy, as if he thought she were relenting. But she was not; she could only be his friend,—his best friend, she repeated, and her face was very pale, as she told him how she should remember him, and work for him, and pray for him, when he was gone. And then she gave him her hand, saying to him, “It is nearly time for you to go. I would rather say good-bye here.”

And Jimmie took her hand, and, pressing it between his own, said to her:

“You have hurt me cruelly, Annie Graham, for I believed you cared for me; but I cannot hate you for it, though I tried to do so all night long. I love you just the same as ever, and always shall. Remember your promise to come to me when I am sick, and let me kiss you once for the sake of what I hoped might be.”

She did not refuse his request; and when at last he left her there was a red spot on her cheek where Jimmie Carleton’s lips had been. From her window she watched him going down the walk; and while with widow Simms he waited at the depot for the coming of the train, she on her knees was praying for him and his safety, just as, eighteen months before, she prayed for George when he was going from her.

CHAPTER XXIII.
TOM AND JIMMIE.

Jimmie’s journey was performed in safety, and he won golden opinions from his traveling companion, for whom he had cared as kindly as if it had been his mother instead of the “crabbed widow” in her eternal leghorn, with the vail of faded green. He had left her at one of the hospitals in Washington, where she was to begin her work as nurse, and hastened on to join his regiment. Captain Carleton was glad to welcome back the brother whom he had missed so much, but he saw that something was wrong; and that night, as they sat around the tent fire, he asked what it was, and why the face, usually so bright and cheerful, seemed so sober and sad. Tom had made minute inquiries concerning his mother, and Rose, and Susan Simms, and even poor old Mrs. Baker. But not a word of Annie. He could not speak of her, with that unfinished letter lying in his little travelling writing-case,—that letter commencing “My dear Mrs. Graham,” and over the wording of which Tom had spent more time by far than he did over the first epistle sent to Mary Williams. That had been dashed off in all the heat of a young man’s first ardent passion, just as Jimmie two weeks ago would have written to Annie. But Tom was eight years older than Jimmie. His first love had met its full fruition, and Mary, the object, was dead. Tom had always been old for his years. He looked, and seemed, and felt, full forty now, save when he thought of Annie, who was only twenty-one. Then he went back to thirty-two, glad that he had numbered no more birth-days. He had made up his mind to write to her. A friendly letter the first should be, he said,—a letter merely asking if she would correspond with him, and hinting at the interest he had felt in her ever since he saw how much she was to Rose, and how constant were her labors for the suffering soldiers. If her answer was favorable, he should ere long ask her to be his wife, and this is the way he took to win the woman whose name he would not mention to his brother. He had been a little uneasy when Jimmie first went home, for he knew how popular the wayward youth was with all the ladies; but as Rose had never written a word to strengthen him in his fears, he had thrown them aside and commenced the letter which to-night, after Jimmie was gone, he was intending to finish for the morrow’s mail. He changed his mind, however, as the night wore on, for in reply to his question as to what was the matter, Jimmie had burst out impetuously with,

“It is all over with me and the widow. I went in strong for her, Tom. I told her all my badness, confessed everything I could, and then she said it could not be. I tell you, Tom, I did not know a man could be so sore about a woman!” And with a great choking sob Jimmie Carleton laid his head upon Tom’s lap, and moaned like some wounded animal.

Tom, who had been as a father to this younger brother, was touched to his heart’s core, and felt as if by having that unfinished letter in his possession he was in some way guilty, and as a pitying woman would have done, he smoothed the dark curly hair, and tried to speak words of comfort.

“What had Annie said? Perhaps she might relent. Would Jimmie tell him about it?”