The summer passed and still no tidings came.
Then I began to fear seriously for Gordon. The very splendour of his make-up was his peril; it is ever so with natures such as his. And his sorrow seemed to find expression in an ever more passionate devotion to his work, a devotion that was making him the idol of his people, even if it brought him daily nearer to collapse.
Which came at last. It was one Sabbath in early November, and Gordon had preached that morning from the text, "I will arise and go unto my father." I suppose it was the tragedy whose home was his own broken heart that inspired him; in any case, he poured his soul out that day with a passion and pathos such as none could have imagined who did not feel the torrent of his power. He seemed to interpret the very heart of a lonely and imploring God.
But what the effort took out of him nobody saw but me. That he was utterly exhausted was evident as he walked home after church, but I thought little of it; yet, even then, I noticed a strange incoherency in his speech, and a tremulousness about his voice, that boded ill. The collapse came during the afternoon; by eventide he was not my Gordon any more, his mind wandering far, voicing itself in strange plaint and heart-breaking appeal, the name of his absent Harold sounding through it all in pitiful refrain.
I don't think the physician I called in haste that day knew anything about the skeleton closet in our home—it is wonderful how soon people forget, even those who know you best—but he located the hidden wound with wonderful acuteness. "It's an utter collapse," he said; "what might be called a severe form of nervous breakdown—it generally occurs with people of strong emotional temperament. Has your husband had any great shock?—or has he been carrying any specially heavy burden, probably for months?"
I told him as much as I thought was necessary.
"Just what I surmised," he said; "he's suffering from what the German physicians call 'the sad heart'—and all this derangement is due to the sympathy between the brain and the nerves. Highly-strung organism, you see—intense emotional nature, that's evident; all this disturbance is a result of tension—the strain was simply too much for him. But he'll recover all right—only it will take time, time and rest."
A consultation followed soon; and the result of it all was that Gordon was to be removed to other scenes just as early as he would be able to travel. I watched by him night and day, and soon the first storm of emotion was succeeded by a deep and silent calm that I found almost harder to be borne than the other. He would sit by the hour poring over Harold's old school books, or gazing at some boyish photographs of the wanderer, or holding his cricket bat or butterfly net lovingly in his hands. Sometimes he spoke of him, but not often. When I told him we were going away for a little holiday he consented readily enough.
"Where shall we go, Gordon?" I asked him, with but little hope that he would choose.
"We'll go to Old Point Comfort," he answered unhesitatingly; "that's where we went before."