“When I did this I emerged from suffering and darkness, and for the first time in the memory of my conscious existence felt my spirit at rest.”
CHAPTER XVII.
UPROOTING A HUMAN TREE.
A man said unto his angel:
“My spirits are fallen through,
And I cannot carry this battle:
O Brother, what shall I do?”
Then said to the man his angel:
“Thou wavering, foolish soul,
Back to the ranks! What matter
To win or lose the whole.”
—Louise Imogen Guiney.
The Joys, otherwise the Hanleys, fell into financial trouble. Burton Hanley was forced to make an assignment for the benefit of his creditors. He had enough to pay every dollar he owed, and he turned it all over with an out-of-date honesty that scandalized the community.
The envious found a certain sweetness in this news. Nodding their heads knowingly, they said they guessed the Joys were about done with Joy. But this did not seem to be the case. On the evening following the assignment they were at an entertainment in the house of a friend and were the blithest guests, as they generally were.
The knowing ones said this light-heartedness was put on—a mere bluff to make others think they did not value money. As a matter of fact it was not. They had simply forgotten all about their financial troubles in the engrossing pleasures of the hour. This enviable faculty for enjoying the present moment, unclouded by past or future shadows was largely responsible for their joyous lives. For them there was only the now. They never reasoned or philosophized about it, but just lived that way by nature.
“Wait till they have a hand-to-hand fight with Poverty,” said the knowing ones, who are often the cruel ones. “Wait till he writes his name on their clothes, their faces and their thoughts. Wait till he walks with them, sits with them, eats with them and never leaves them for an instant! Wait!” They said this in a way that made their hearers understand the waiting would not require patience.
Kinder ones sighed and said the Joys, poor souls, laughed at poverty, because they didn’t know its horrors. But they were destined to better acquaintance with the dreaded spectre. Meantime they went their way rejoicing that affairs were no worse.