 | CHAPTER XLVIII.
TINA'S SOLUTION. Oldtown folks |  |
48. CHAPTER XLVIII.
TINA'S SOLUTION.
HARRY and I had gone back to our college room after the
wedding. There we received an earnest letter from Miss
Mehitable, begging us to come to her at once. It was brought
by Sam Lawson, who told us that he had got up at three o'clock
in the morning to start away with it.
“There 's trouble of some sort or other in that 'ere house,”
said Sam. “Last night I was in ter the Deacon's, and we was
a talkin' over the weddin', when Polly came in all sort o' flustered,
and said Miss Rossiter wanted to see Mis' Badger; and
your granny she went over, and did n't come home all night.
She sot up with somebody, and I 'm certain 't wa' n't Miss Rossiter,
'cause I see her up tol'able spry in the mornin'; but, lordy
massy, somethin' or other 's ben a usin' on her up, for she was
all wore out, and looked sort o' limpsy, as if there wa' n't no starch
left in her. She sent for me last night. `Sam,' says she, `I
want to send a note to the boys just as quick as I can, and I don't
want to wait for the mail; can't you carry it?' `Lordy massy,
yes,' says I. `I hope there ain't nothin' happened,' says I; and
ye see she did n't answer me; and puttin' that with Mis' Badger's
settin' there all night, it 'peared to me there was suthin', I can 't
make out quite what.”
Harry and I lost no time in going to the stage-house, and
found ourselves by noon at Miss Mehitable's door.
When we went in, we found Miss Mehitable seated in close
counsel with Mr. Jonathan Rossiter. His face looked sharp, and
grave, and hard; his large gray eyes had in them a fiery, excited
gleam. Spread out on the table before them were files of letters,
in the handwriting of which I had before had a glimpse. The
brother and sister had evidently been engaged in reading them,
as some of them lay open under their hands.
When we came into the room, both looked up. Miss Mehitable
rose, and offered her hands to us in an eager, excited way,
as if she were asking something of us. The color flashed into
Mr. Rossiter's cheeks, and he suddenly leaned forward over the
papers and covered his face with his hands. It was a gesture of
shame and humiliation infinitely touching to me.
“Horace,” said Miss Mehitable, “the thing we feared has
come upon us. O Horace, Horace! why could we not have
known it in time?”
I divined at once. My memory, like an electric chain, flashed
back over sayings and incidents of years.
“The villain!” I said.
Mr. Rossiter ground his foot on the floor with a hard, impatient
movement, as if he were crushing some poisonous reptile.
“It 's well for him that I 'm not God,” he said through his
closed teeth.
Harry looked from one to the other of us in dazed and inquiring
surprise. He had known in a vague way of Emily's disappearance,
and of Miss Mehitable's anxieties, but it never had
occurred to his mind to connect the two. In fact, our whole
education had been in such a wholesome and innocent state of
society, that neither of us had the foundation, in our experience
or habits of thought, for the conception of anything like villany.
We were far enough from any comprehension of the melodramatic
possibilities suggested in our days by that heaving and
tumbling modern literature, whose waters cast up mire and dirt.
Never shall I forget the shocked, incredulous expression on
Harry's face as he listened to my explanations, nor the indignation
to which it gave place.
“I would sooner have seen Tina in her grave than married to
such a man,” he said huskily.
“O Harry!” said Miss Mehitable.
“I would!” he said, rising excitedly. “There are things that
men can do that still leave hope of them; but a thing like this is
final, — it is decisive.”
“That is my opinion, Harry,” said Mr. Rossiter. “It is a sin
that leaves no place for repentance.”
“We have been reading these letters,” said Miss Mehitable;
“they were sent to us by Tina, and they do but confirm what I
always said, — that Emily fell by her higher nature. She learned,
under Dr. Stern, to think and to reason boldly, even when differing
from received opinion; and this hardihood of mind and
opinion she soon turned upon the doctrines he taught. Then
she abandoned the Bible, and felt herself free to construct her
own system of morals. Then came an intimate friendship with
a fascinating married man, whose domestic misfortunes made a
constant demand on her sympathy; and these charming French
friends of hers — who were, as far as I see, disciples of the new
style of philosophy, and had come to America to live in a union
with each other which was not recognized by the laws of France
— all united to make her feel that she was acting heroically
and virtuously in sacrificing her whole life to her lover, and
disregarding what they called the tyranny of human law. In
Emily's eyes, her connection had all the sacredness of marriage.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Rossiter, “but see now how all these infernal,
fine-spun, and high-flown notions always turn out to the disadvantage
of the weaker party! It is man who always takes advantage
of woman in relations like these; it is she that gives all, and
he that takes all; it is she risks everything, and he risks
nothing. Hard as marriage bonds bear in individual cases, it is
for woman's interest that they should be as stringently maintained
as the Lord himself has left them. When once they begin to be
lessened, it is always the weaker party that goes to the wall!”
“But,” said I, “suppose a case of confirmed and hopeless
insanity on either side.”
He made an impatient gesture. “Did you ever think,” he said,
“if men had the laws of nature in their hands, what a mess they
would make of them? What treatises we should have against
the cruelty of fire in always burning, and of water in always drowning!
What saints and innocents has the fire tortured, and what
just men made perfect has water drowned, making no exceptions!
But who doubts that this inflexibility in natural law is,
after all, the best thing? The laws of morals are in our hands,
I think they should cut their way like those of nature,
inflexibly and eternally!”
Here the sound of wheels startled us. I went to the window,
and, looking through the purple spikes of the tall old lilacs,
which came up in a bower around the open window, I saw Tina
alighting from a carriage.
“O Aunty,” I said involuntarily, “it is she. She is coming,
poor child.”
We heard a light fluttering motion and a footfall on the stairs,
and the door opened, and in a moment Tina stood among us.
She was very pale, and there was an expression such as I
never saw in her face before. There had been a shock which
had driven her soul inward, from the earthly upon the spiritual
and the immortal. Something deep and pathetic spoke in her
eyes, as she looked around on each of us for a moment without
speaking. As she met Miss Mehitable's haggard, careworn face,
her lip quivered. She ran to her, threw her arms round her,
and hid her face on her shoulder, and sobbed out, `O Aunty,
Aunty! I did n't think I should live to make you this trouble.”
“You, darling!” said Miss Mehitable. “It is not you who
have made it.”
“I am the cause,” she said. “I know that he has done
dreadfully wrong. I cannot defend him, but oh! I love
him still. I cannot help loving him; it is my duty to,” she
added. “I promised, you know, before God, `for better, for
worse'; and what I promised I must keep. I am his wife; there
is no going back from that.”
“I know it, darling,” said Miss Mehitable, stroking her head.
“You are right, and my love for you will never change.”
“I am come,” she said, “to see what can be done.”
“Nothing can be done!” spoke out the deep voice of Jonathan
Rossiter. “She is lost and we disgraced beyond remedy!”
“You must not say that,” Tina said, raising her head, her
eyes sparkling through her tears with some of her old vivacity.
“Your sister is a noble, injured woman. We must shield her and
save her; there is every excuse for her.”
“There is NEVER any excuse for such conduct,” said Mr. Rossiter,
harshly.
Tina started up in her headlong, energetic fashion. “What
right have you to talk so, if you call yourself a Christian?” she
said. “Think a minute. Who was it said, `Neither do I condemn
thee'? and whom did he say it to? Christ was not afraid
or ashamed to say that to a poor friendless woman, though he
knew his words would never pass away.”
“God bless you, darling, — God bless you!” said Miss Mehitable,
clasping her in her arms.
“I have read those letters,” continued Tina, impetuously.
“He did not like me to do it, but I claimed it as my right, and
I would do it, and I can see in all a noble woman, gone astray
from noble motives. I can see that she was grand and unselfish
in her love, that she was perfectly self-sacrificing, and I believe
it was because Jesus understood these things in the hearts of
women that he uttered those blessed words. The law was against
that poor woman, the doctors, the Scribes and Pharisees, all respectable
people, were against her, and Christ stepped between
all and her; he sent them away abashed and humbled, and spoke
those lovely words to her. O, I shall forever adore him for it!
He is my Lord and my God!”
There was a pause for a few moments, and then Tina spoke
again.
“Now, Aunty, hear my plan. You, perhaps, do not believe any
good of him, and so I will not try to make you; only I will say
that he is anxious to do all he can. He has left everything in
my hands. This must go no farther than us few who now know
it. Your sister refused the property he tried to settle on her. It
was noble to do it. I should have felt just as she did. But, dear
Aunty, my fortune I always meant to settle on you, and it will be
enough for you both. It will make you easy as to money, and
you can live together.”
“Yes, my dear,” said Miss Mehitable; “but how can this be
kept secret when there is the child?”
“I have thought of that, Aunty. I will take the poor little
one abroad with me, — children always love me. I can make
her for all this wrong. Let me see your sister, aunty, and tell
her about it.”
“Dear child,” said Miss Mehitable, “you can do nothing with
her. All last night I thought she was dying. Since then she
seems to have recovered her strength; but she neither speaks
nor moves. She lies with her eyes open, but notices nothing you
say to her.”
“Poor darling!” said Tina. “But, Aunty, let me go to her.
I am so sure that God will help me, — that God sends me to
her. I must see her!”
Tina 's strong impulses seemed to carry us all with her. Miss
Mehitable arose, and, taking her by the hand, opened the door of
a chamber on the opposite side of the hall. I looked in, and saw
that it was darkened. Tina went boldly in, and closed the door.
We all sat silent together. We heard her voice, at times soft and
pleading; then it seemed to grow more urgent and impetuous as
she spoke continuously and in tones of piercing earnestness.
After a while, there were pauses of silence, and then a voice
in reply.
“There,” said Miss Mehitable, “Emily has begun to answer
her, thank God! Anything is better than this oppressive silence.
It is frightful!”
And now the sound of an earnest conversation was heard, waxing
on both sides more and more ardent and passionate. Tina 's
voice sometimes could be distinguished in tones of the most pleading
entreaty; sometimes it seemed almost like sobbing. After a
while, there came a great silence, broken by now and then an indistinct
word; and then Tina came out, softly closing the door.
Her cheeks were flushed, her hair partially dishevelled, but she
smiled brightly, — one of her old triumphant smiles when she
had carried a point.
“I 've conquered at last! I 've won!” she said, almost breathless.
“O, I prayed so that I might, and I did. She gives all
up to me; she loves me. We love each other dearly. And now
I 'm going to take the little one with me, and by and by I will
bring her back to her, and I will make her so happy. You
us; for we are going to sail next week. We sail sooner than I
thought,” she said; “but this makes it best to go at once.”
Miss Mehitable rose and went out, but soon reappeared, leading
in a lovely little girl with great round, violet blue eyes,
and curls of golden hair. The likeness of Ellery Davenport was
plainly impressed on her infant features.
Tina ran towards her, and stretched out her arms. “Darling,”
she said, “come to me.”
The little one, after a moment's survey, followed that law of
attraction which always drew children to Tina. She came up
confidingly, and nestled her head on her shoulder.
Tina gave her her watch to play with, and the child shook it
about, well pleased.
“Emily want to go ride?” said Tina, carrying her to the window
and showing her the horses.
The child laughed, and stretched out her hand.
“Bring me her things, Aunty,” she said. “Let there not be a
moment for change of mind. I take her with me this moment.”
A few moments after, Tina went lightly tripping down the
stairs, and Harry and I with her, carrying the child and its little
basket of clothing.
“There, put them in,” she said. “And now, boys,” she said,
turning and offering both her hands, “good by. I love you
both dearly, and always shall.”
She kissed us both, and was gone from our eyes before I awoke
from the dream into which she had thrown me.
“Well,” said Miss Mehitable, when the sound of wheels died
away, “could I have believed that anything could have made my
heart so much lighter as this visit?”
“She was inspired,” said Mr. Rossiter.
“Tina's great characteristic,” said I. “What makes her differ
from others is this capacity of inspiration. She seems sometimes
to rise, in a moment, to a level above her ordinary self, and to
carry all up with her!”
“And to think that such a woman has thrown herself away
on such a man!” said Harry.
“I foresee a dangerous future for her,” said Mr. Rossiter.
“With her brilliancy, her power of attraction, with the temptations
of a new and fascinating social life before her, and with
only that worthless fellow for a guide, I am afraid she will not
continue our Tina.”
“Suppose we trust in Him who has guided her hitherto,” said
Harry.
“People usually consider that sort of trust a desperate resort,”
said Mr. Rossiter. “`May the Lord help her,' means, `It 's all
up with her.'”
“We see,” said I, “that the greatest possible mortification and
sorrow that could meet a young wife has only raised her into a
higher plane. So let us hope for her future.”
| CHAPTER XLVIII.
TINA'S SOLUTION. Oldtown folks | |