University of Virginia Library

62. CHAPTER LXII.
THE WIFE'S MEETING.

IT was a drift, two or three feet deep, in and upon
which the still body lay. The cheek of the right
side was next the snow; the head was bare; the
left hand holding, or seeming to hold, the hat; while the
right arm was curved about the head. The outside coat
was partly open, from the top downwards, as if the wearer
might have unbuttoned it, when heated.

The whole attitude was that of one who had laid himself
down to sleep at summer-noon, and the face was
lovely as in sleep; the eyelids were not fast closed; there
was a delicate color in the cheek, and the lips were red.
There was a bright, conscious look, too, as of one that
was scarcely asleep, even.

“Thank God! he's alive!” said young Mr. Urston,
speaking first. “Father Ignatius!” he called, taking him
by the hand; then, correcting himself, “Mister De Brie!”

“Ay! he'll never spake to yon name, no more,” said
the Protestant Jesse.

The Minister, having quickly tried the wrist, was now
feeling within the clothing, over the heart, and looking
anxiously into the face.

The hair was blown restlessly by the wind; but there
was no waking, nor any self-moving of the body.

“N'y,” said Skipper George, gravely, “I'm afeard
this is n' livun.—Oh! Oh!”

“I saw a house not but a step or two off, 's we come
along,” said Mr. Bangs, who had been chafing the hands
with brandy, and had tenderly rubbed a little, with his finger,
inside the nostrils.

The Minister, rising from the snow, shook his head and
turned away. “No, no,” he said, as if to the question of
life.

“Why, he's warm, sir,” urged Urston; “certainly, he's
warm!” The Constable felt of the flesh and said nothing.

“Shall us take un to the tilt?” asked Jesse. “It's
Will Ressle's, Mr. Banks manes.—He's close by.”

“By all means!” answered the Parson. “Yes!”
“Yes!” said Skipper Isaac and the bystanders.

“See, sir!” said Skipper George, “'e didn' fall down.
'E've laid himself down to rest, most like, where the snow
was soft, and falled asleep.—That's bin the w'y of it.
I've bin a'most so far gone, myself, sir, afore now.”

“See how the hair is smoothed away from his temples,”
said young Urston.

“'Twas the dog!” answered the old fisherman, tenderly,
“wi' tryun to bring un to.—Yes,” he added, “'e
was out o' the path, when the good n'ybors from t'other
side comed along, an 'e got into un, agen, after—an' 'e
was tired when 'e comed to this heavy walkun, an' so—
What'll come o' the poor lady!”

As they lifted the body carefully out of the snow, to
bear it away, a new voice spoke:—

“Won't ye put more clothing on um, for it's blowing
bitter cold?”

Father Terence had made his way from New-Harbor

and approached the group in silence. He offered,
for a wrapper, his own great-coat, which he had taken
off.

“We've agot store o' wrappuns, sir; many thanks to
you, sir, all the same,” answered Jesse Hill, very heartily;
and others, too, made their acknowledgments.—They
wrapped the body, from head to foot, in their blankets,
hastily.

Mr. Wellon saluted Father Terence, saying that “he
had very little hope—indeed, he feared that there was no
hope—of that body being restored to life.”

“Oh, dear! I fear not, I fear not!” said Father Terence,
wiping gentle tears away. “Why would he come? Or
why did I hinder um comin' last night?—God have mercy
upon um!—Absolve, quesumus Domine, animam ejus,”
he added, privately, or something to that effect.

Skipper Isaac held the body against his own; Jesse
and Isaac Maffen and young Mr. Urston helped to bear
it; and they went, accompanied by all the others, as fast
as they could go, through the snow, toward the tilt.
Skipper George bore the hat, upon which the grasp of
the owner's cold hand had not been fast. “Eppy,” who
had done his dumb part before any, now followed meekly
behind. Behind all, came the cold, hard wind from
the Barrens, whirling the snow from time to time. The
sky over all was hidden by thick clouds, foreboding
storm.

Within the tilt all that they knew how to do, was done
thoroughly. More than once some one of those engaged
exclaimed that the flesh was growing warmer; but life
did not come back, and the flesh grew surely colder.
The body was dead; and they gave over their useless
work upon it, and clothed it as before.—There it

lay; no priest, no layman, no husband, no father,
no man!—but it was sacred, and it was reverently
treated, as belonging to Christ, who would give it life,
again.

Some said,—among themselves,—that Father O'Toole
had not staid long.

“What more could 'e do?” asked Gilpin.—“'E did
more 'n many would;”—“an' 'e spoke proper feelun,
like,” said others.

Crowds had been gathering about the place where the
melancholy work was going on; these the constable, and
Mr. Skilton and William Frank occupied, drawing them
a little apart, that there might be no hindrance, from the
numbers, to those who were busy about the dead. The
sad, short story, stilled and saddened all. “Dead!”—
“Is 'e dead?”—“so near home, too!”—“It's pity for
un!”—“But 'e died happy, however!” said different
voices.

Presently snow, from the thick sky, began to be borne
upon the wind.

Gilpin, at this, hastened to the door, and others, coming
out, met him.

“How'll we carry un?” the constable asked, in a low
voice. “O' horseback?”

“We was just spakun,” said Jesse, “'twould look like
mockun the dead, to take un ridun, to my seemun.”

“Ay, but we've got to be quick about it; the snow's
coming!”

“What's to hender we carryun? sure it's more feelun.
We wouldn' begredge walkun all the w'y to B'y Harbor,
ef 'twas to B'y-Harbor, even ef it snowed, itself?”

“It would be long waiting for a slide—,” said the constable.

“An' we could'n have un bide in the cold, here, while
we was w'itun,” said Jesse, in course.

It was arranged that one or two of the young men, on
the best horses, should make their way at the utmost
speed, to James Bishop's, the nearest Protestant house
in Castle-Bay, and bring his sled or “slide,” and, in the
mean time, relays of bearers were to carry the body onward
with what haste they could.

The crowd making a long procession, both before and
behind the bearers, trampled the snow; for the most part
in silence. Up the hills and down, many men taking
turns at bearing the body, they made their way between
the woods; while sometimes the snow fell thickly, and,
sometimes, the thick clouds could be seen before them
and overhead.

Three heavy miles they had got over, when the slide
met them; and then the burden was transferred to it; a
sort of dasher, or fender, of boughs was speedily set up
to keep off the snow thrown by the horse's feet; and they
went on: the Minister, Skipper George, Skipper Isaac,
Skipper Henry, Skipper Edward, the constable, and
others of chief authority and dignity, attended at the sides
and behind the sledge; all beside giving place to them.
Suddenly there was a commotion, making itself felt from
the foremost; and then the whole procession opened to
either side, leaving the road bare between.

“Cast off the horse!” cried Skipper George in a
quick low tone, seeing who was coming. The order
was obeyed, as hastily as possible, and then the slide was
left alone, in the middle of the way, while the crowd at
each side stood huddled upon itself, and hushed.

“Oh, I knew it! Oh!” said a woman's voice, heard
by every one, with such a moan of wretchedness that

every man seemed to start, as if it were an appeal to
himself. Mrs. Barrè, pale as death, with tears streaming
down her cheeks, and with light snow lying upon her
dark hair and on many parts of her black dress,—bearing
in her hand, (as she had borne, hours before,) a letter,—
rushed between the sundered crowds, and at the side of
the sledge fell down, across the muffled load that lay
upon it. Every person near drew away.

Great passion appropriates absolutely to itself the time
and place, and makes all other things and persons subordinate
and accessory.

For this widowed lady's sorrow the earth and sky
were already fitted; and so were, not less, the kind hearts
of these men and women.

She lay with her face buried in the folds of the cloak
which the Minister had spread over her husband's body,
and uttered a fondling murmur against the wall of that
desolated chamber, as, not long ago, she had murmured
fondly against the strong, warm bosom of her recovered
love. Many by-standers sobbed aloud.

Then she lifted her head, and turned down the covering
from the face.

“Oh, Walter!” she said, clasping her two hands under
the heavy head, and gazing at the stiffening features,
“Oh, my noble husband!—My beautiful, noble husband!”
then, shaking her head, while the tears dropped from her
eyes, said, in a broken voice: “Is this all, Walter? Is
this the end?—Yes, and it's a good end!” And again she
buried her face on the dead bosom. “Well!—Oh, well!
I did not seek you for myself!—It never was for myself!
No!—No!”

The effort to subdue the human love to the divine,
triumphed in the midst of tears.

By-and-by she rose up, and with streaming eyes
and clasped hands, turned toward the Minister and
said:—

“I am ready, Mr. Wellon! Let us go! God's will be
done!”

She stooped once more; looked with intense love and
sorrow at the face, wiped her tears from the cold features,
covered them again, carefully, and turned her face toward
the rest of the way, homeward.

The constable made a gesture to Jesse Hill and young
Mr. Urston, and the horse was again harnessed to the
slide. The Minister, leading his horse, (which had been
brought so far on the return, by one of the young men,)
came to Mrs. Barrè's side and took her arm in his. He
begged her to allow herself to be lifted to the saddle, and
to ride. Skipper George, also, had come forward to
suggest the same thing.

“It is'n fittun the lady should walk home, sir,” said he
to the Minister, apart.

Mrs. Barrè heard and understood, and answered:—

“Would it make the load too heavy—?—” she finished
with a longing look the sentence which was not finished
with words.

The fishermen at first hesitated at the thought of her
going upon the sledge that bore her husband's corpse.

“It wouldn't be too heavy;” one of them said; and as
if no objection could be made, she went, and, putting her
arm tenderly underneath, lifted the body, seated herself
upon the bier, taking the muffled head in her lap, and
bent over it, lost to all things else.

All other arrangements for riding and walking having
been quietly made, the procession again set forward
towards home faster than before. The snow, at times,

fell fast; but in about an hour more they were descending
the high hill into Castle-Bay; and before them
lay the great, black sea, with its cold bordering of
white.

They passed along the chilly beach. At one point,
whether consciously or unconsciously, Mrs. Barrè lifted
her head and looked toward both sea and land. On the
landward side stretched a little valley, with a knoll and
rock, and tree at its northern edge; a sweet spot in
summer, but now lonely and desolate. She gave a sort
of cry, and turned from the sight.

“O my God, thou knowest!” she could be heard to
say, sobbing over her husband's body; and she looked up
no more until, in another hour, with the cold stars and
drifting clouds over head, they had reached her desolate
house.

“My dear brethren,” said the Minister, “we have not
lost our Sunday; let us close this day with prayer!”

He and all the men stood, heedless of the wintry wind,
before God, and he said:—

“We thank Thee, O Merciful Father, that Thou hast
given to us this, our brother's body, to lay in our hallowed
ground; but, above all, for the hope that his soul, washed
in the blood of the immaculate Lamb who was slain to
take away the sins of the world, has been presented
without spot before Thee. Give our sister, we beseech
Thee, strength and peace; have her and us in Thy safe-keeping,
and bring us to Thy heavenly house, through
Jesus Christ, our Lord.”

“Amen!” “Amen!” said the people; and even from
the quivering lips of her who was sorrowfully holding
the head of her dead husband, there came to the ears of
those nearest, a broken “Amen!”

The congregation having been dismissed with the Blessing,
the Minister and the chief men reverently carried
the body into the parlor, and disposed it there, amid the
memorials of happy former years, and arranged a watch.
Coming away, they left the wind blowing cold against the
house on the outside; but sacred silence within.