Then came the hush again, and Dan started to his feet, and began to walk up and down the room as if something drove him; but wearying, he stood and leaned his head on the chimney there. And mother's voice broke the stillness anew, and she said,—
"Hath God forgotten to be gracious? His mercy endureth forever. And none of them that trust in him shall be desolate."
There was something in mother's tone that made me forget myself and my sorrow, and look; and there she was, as she hadn't been before for six months, half risen from the bed, one hand up, and her whole face white and shining with confident faith. Well, when I see all that such trust has buoyed mother over, I wish to goodness I had it: I take more after Martha. But never mind, do well here and you'll do well there, say I. Perhaps you think it wasn't much, the quiet and the few texts breathed through it; but sometimes when one's soul's at a white heat, it may be moulded like wax with a finger. As for me, maybe God hardened Pharaoh's heart,—though how that was Pharaoh's fault I never could see. But Dan,—he felt what it was to have a refuge in trouble, to have a great love always extending over him like a wing; he longed for it; he couldn't believe it was his now, he was so suddenly convicted of all sin and wickedness; and something sprang up in his heart, a kind of holy passion that he felt to be possible for this great and tender Divine Being; and he came and fell on his knees by the side of the bed, crying out for mother to show him the way; and mother, she put her hand on his head and prayed,—prayed, oh, so beautifully, that it makes the water stand in my eyes now to remember what she said. But I didn't feel so then, my heart and my soul were rebellious, and love for Dan alone kept me under, not love for God. And in fact, if ever I'd got to heaven then, love for Dan'd have been my only saving grace; for I was mighty high-spirited, as a girl. Well, Dan he never made open profession; but when he left the house, he went and asked Faith to marry him.
Now Faith didn't care anything about Dan,—except the quiet attachment that she couldn't help, from living in the house with him, and he'd always petted and made much of her, and dressed her like a doll,—he wasn't the kind of man to take her fancy: she'd have maybe liked some slender, smooth-faced chap; but Dan was a black, shaggy fellow, with shoulders like the cross-tree, and a length of limb like Saul's, and eyes set deep, like lamps in caverns. And he had a great, powerful heart,—and, oh, how it was lost! for she might have won it, she might have made him love her, since I would have stood wide away and aside for the sake of seeing him happy. But Faith was one of those that, if they can't get what they want, haven't any idea of putting up with what they have,—God forgive me, if I'm hard on the child! And she couldn't give Dan an answer right off, but was loath to think of it, and went flirting about among the other boys; and Dan, when he saw she wasn't so easily gotten, perhaps set more value on her. For Faith, she grew prettier every day; her great brown eyes were so soft and clear, and had a wide, sorrowful way of looking at you; and her cheeks, that were usually pale, blossomed to roses when you spoke to her, her hair drooping over them dark and silky; and though she was slack and untidy and at loose ends about her dress, she somehow always seemed like a princess in disguise; and when she had on any thing new,—a sprigged calico, and her little straw bonnet with the pink ribbons, and Mrs. Devereux's black scarf, for instance,—you'd have allowed that she might have been daughter to the Queen of Sheba. I don't know, but I rather think Dan wouldn't have said any more to Faith, from various motives, you see, notwithstanding the neighbors were still remonstrating with him, if it hadn't been that Miss Brown—she that lived round the corner there; the town's well quit of her now, poor thing!—went to saying the same stuff to Faith, and telling her all that other folks said. And Faith went home in a passion,—some of your timid kind nothing ever abashes, and nobody gets to the windward of them,—and, being perfectly furious, fell to accusing Dan of having brought her to this, so that Dan actually believed he had, and was cut to the quick with contrition, and told her that all the reparation he could make he was waiting and wishing to make, and then there came floods of tears. Some women seem to have set out with the idea that life's a desert for them to cross, and they've laid in a supply of water-bags accordingly,—but it's the meanest weapon! And then again, there's men that are iron, and not to be bent under calamities, that these tears can twist round your little finger. Well, I suppose Faith concluded 'twas no use to go hungry because her bread wasn't buttered on both sides, but she always acted as if she'd condescended ninety degrees in marrying Dan, and Dan always seemed to feel that he'd done her a great injury; and there it was.
I kept in the house for a time; mother was worse.—and I thought the less Dan saw of me the better; I kind of hoped he'd forget, and find his happiness where it ought to be. But the first time I saw him, when Faith had been his wife all the spring, there was the look in his eyes that told of the ache in his heart. Faith wasn't very happy herself, of course, though she was careless; and she gave him trouble,—keeping company with the young men just as before; and she got into a way of flying straight to me, if Dan ventured to reprove her ever so lightly; and stormy nights, when he was gone, and in his long trips, she always locked up her doors and came over and got into my bed; and she was one of those that never listened to reason, and it was none so easy for me, you may suppose.
Things had gone on now for some three years, and I'd about lived in my books,—I'd tried to teach Faith some, but she wouldn't go any farther than newspaper stories,—when one day Dan took her and me to sail, and we were to have had a clam-chowder on the Point, if the squall hadn't come. As it was, we'd got to put up with chicken-broth, and it couldn't have been better, considering who made it. It was getting on toward the cool of the May evening, the sunset was round on the other side of the house, but all the east looked as if the sky had been stirred up with currant-juice, till it grew purple and dark, and then the two light-houses flared out and showed us the lip of froth lapping the shadowy shore beyond, and I—heard father's voice, and he came in.
There was nothing but the fire-light in the room, and it threw about great shadows, so that at first entering all was indistinct; but I heard a foot behind father's, and then a form appeared, and something, I never could tell what, made a great shiver rush down my back, just as when a creature is frightened in the dark at what you don't see, and so, though my soul was unconscious, my body felt that there was danger in the air. Dan had risen and lighted the lamp that swings in the chimney, and father first of all had gone up and kissed mother, and left the stranger standing; then he turned round, saying,—
"A tough day,—it's been a tough day; and here's some un to prove it. Georgie, hope that pot's steam don't belie it, for Mr. Gabriel Verelay and I want a good supper and a good bed."
At this, the stranger, still standing, bowed.
"Here's the one, father," said I. "But about the bed,—Faith'll have to stay here,—and I don't see—unless Dan takes him over"——