University of Virginia Library

39. CHAPTER XXXIX.

It is now about a month after the conversation which we
have recorded, and during that time the process which was
to loose from this present life had been going on in Mara
with a soft, insensible, but steady power. When she ceased
to make efforts beyond her strength, and allowed herself
that languor and repose which nature claimed, all around her
soon became aware how her strength was failing; and yet
a cheerful repose seemed to hallow the atmosphere around
her. The sight of her every day in family worship, sitting
by in such tender tranquillity, with such a smile on her face,
seemed like a present inspiration. And though the aged pair
knew that she was no more for this world, yet she was comforting
and inspiring to their view as the angel who of old
rolled back the stone from the sepulchre and sat upon it.
They saw in her eyes, not death, but the solemn victory
which Christ gives over death.

Bunyan has no more lovely poem than the image he
gives of that land of pleasant waiting which borders the
river of death, where the chosen of the Lord repose, while
shining messengers, constantly passing and repassing, bear
tidings from the celestial shore, opening a way between
earth and heaven. It was so, that through the very thought
of Mara an influence of tenderness and tranquillity passed
through the whole neighborhood, keeping hearts fresh with
sympathy, and causing thought and conversation to rest on

those bright mysteries of eternal joy which were reflected
on her face.

Sally Kittridge was almost a constant inmate of the brown
house, ever ready in watching and waiting; and one only
needed to mark the expression of her face to feel that a
holy charm was silently working upon her higher and spiritual
nature. Those great, dark, sparkling eyes that once
seemed to express only the brightness of animal vivacity,
and glittered like a brook in unsympathetic gayety, had in
them now mysterious depths, and tender, fleeting shadows,
and the very tone of her voice had a subdued tremor. The
capricious elf, the tricksy sprite, was melting away in the
immortal soul, and the deep pathetic power of a noble heart
was being born. Some influence sprung of sorrow is necessary
always to perfect beauty in womanly nature. We feel
its absence in many whose sparkling wit and high spirits
give grace and vivacity to life, but in whom we vainly seek
for some spot of quiet tenderness and sympathetic repose.
Sally was, ignorantly to herself, changing in the expression
of her face and the tone of her character, as she ministered
in the daily wants which sickness brings in a simple household.

For the rest of the neighborhood, the shelves and larder
of Mrs. Pennel were constantly crowded with the tributes
which one or another sent in for the invalid. There was jelly
of Iceland moss sent across by Miss Emily, and brought by
Mr. Sewell, whose calls were almost daily. There were
custards and preserves, and every form of cake and other
confections in which the house-keeping talent of the neighbors
delighted, and which were sent in under the old
superstition that sick people must be kept eating at all
hazards.

At church, Sunday after Sunday, the simple note requested
the prayers of the church and congregation for
Mara Lincoln, who was, as the note phrased it, drawing
near her end, that she and all concerned might be prepared
for the great and last change. One familiar with New
England customs must have remembered with what a plaintive
power the reading of such a note, from Sunday to Sunday,
has drawn the thoughts and sympathies of a congregation
to some chamber of sickness; and in a village church,
where every individual is known from childhood to every
other, the power of this simple custom is still greater.

Then the prayers of the minister would dwell on the
case, and thanks would be rendered to God for the great
light and peace with which he had deigned to visit his
young handmaid; and then would follow a prayer that when
these sad tidings should reach a distant friend who had
gone down to do business on the great waters, they might
be sanctified to his spiritual and everlasting good. Then
on Sunday noons, as the people ate their dinners together
in a room adjoining the church, all that she said and did
was talked over and over, — how quickly she had gained
the victory of submission, the peace of a will united with
God's, mixed with harmless gossip of the sick chamber, —
as to what she ate and how she slept, and who had sent
her gruel with raisins in it, and who jelly with wine, and
how she had praised this and eaten that twice with a relish,
but how the other had seemed to disagree with her. Thereafter
would come scraps of nursing information, recipes
against coughing, specifics against short breath, speculations
about watchers, how soon she would need them, and long
legends of other death-beds where the fear of death had
been slain by the power of an endless life.

Yet through all the gossip, and through much that might
have been called at other times commonplace cant of religion,
there was spread a tender earnestness, and the whole
air seemed to be enchanted with the fragrance of that fading
rose. Each one spoke more gently, more lovingly to each,
for the thought of her.

It was now a bright September morning, and the early
frosts had changed the maples in the pine-woods to scarlet,
and touched the white birches with gold, when one morning
Miss Roxy presented herself at an early hour at Captain
Kittridge's.

They were at breakfast, and Sally was dispensing the tea
at the head of the table, Mrs. Kittridge having been prevailed
on to abdicate in her favor.

“It is such a fine morning,” she said, looking out at the
window, which showed a waveless expanse of ocean. “I
do hope Mara has had a good night.”

“I 'm a-goin' to make her some jelly this very forenoon,”
said Mrs. Kittridge. “Aunt Roxy was a-tellin' me yesterday
that she was a-goin' down to stay at the house regular,
for she needed so much done now.”

“It 's 'most an amazin' thing we don't hear from Moses
Pennel,” said Captain Kittridge. “If he don't make haste
he may never see her.”

“There 's Aunt Roxy at this minute,” said Sally.

In truth the door opened at this moment, and Aunt Roxy
entered with a little blue band-box and a bundle tied up in
a checked handkerchief.

“Oh, Aunt Roxy,” said Mrs. Kittridge, “you are on your
way, are you? Do sit down, right here, and get a cup of
strong tea.”

“Thank you,” said Aunt Roxy, “but Ruey gave me a
humming cup before I came away.”

“Aunt Roxy, have they heard anything from Moses?”
said the Captain.

“No, father, I know they have n't,” said Sally. “Mara
has written to him and so has Mr. Sewell, but it is very
uncertain whether he ever got the letters.”

“It 's most time to be a-lookin' for him home,” said
the Captain. “I should n't be surprised to see him any
day.”

At this moment Sally, who sat where she could see from
the window, gave a sudden start and a half scream, and rising
from the table, darted first to the window and then to
the door, whence she rushed out eagerly.

“Well, what now?” said the Captain.

“I am sure I don't know what 's come over her,” said
Mrs. Kittridge, rising to look out.

“Why, Aunt Roxy, do look; I believe to my soul that
ar 's Moses Pennel!”

And so it was. He met Sally, as she ran out, with a
gloomy brow and scarcely a look even of recognition; but
he seized her hand and wrung it in the stress of his emotion
so that she almost screamed with the pain.

“Tell me, Sally,” he said, “tell me the truth. I dared
not go home without I knew. Those gossiping, lying reports
are always exaggerated. They are dreadful exaggerations,
— they frighten a sick person into the grave; but
you have good sense and a hopeful, cheerful temper, — you
must see and know how things are. Mara is not so very
— very” — He held Sally's hand and looked at her
with a burning eagerness. “Say, what do you think of
her?”

“We all think that we cannot long keep her with us,”
said Sally. “And oh, Moses, I am so glad you have
come.”

“It 's false, — it must be false,” he said, violently; “nothing
is more deceptive than these ideas that doctors and
nurses pile on when a sensitive person is going down a
little. I know Mara; everything depends on the mind
with her. I shall make her up out of this dream. She
is not to die. She shall not die, — I come to save her.”

“Oh, if you could!” said Sally mournfully.

“It cannot be; it is not to be,” he said again, as if to
convince himself. “No such thing is to be thought of.
Tell me, Sally, have you tried to keep up the cheerful side
of things to her, — have you?”

“Oh, you cannot tell, Moses, how it is, unless you see
her. She is cheerful, happy; the only really joyous one
among us.”

“Cheerful! joyous! happy! She does not believe, then,
these frightful things? I thought she would keep up; she
is a brave little thing.”

“No, Moses, she does believe. She has given up all
hope of life, — all wish to live; and oh, she is so lovely, —
so sweet, — so dear.”

Sally covered her face with her hands and sobbed. Moses
stood still, looking at her a moment in a confused way, and
then he answered, —

“Come, get your bonnet, Sally, and go with me. You
must go in and tell them; tell her that I am come, you
know.”

“Yes, I will,” said Sally, as she ran quickly back to the
house.

Moses stood listlessly looking after her. A moment after

she came out of the door again, and Miss Roxy behind.
Sally hurried up to Moses.

“Where 's that black old raven going?” said Moses, in
a low voice, looking back on Miss Roxy, who stood on the
steps after them.

“What, Aunt Roxy?” said Sally; “why, she 's going up
to nurse Mara, and take care of her. Mrs. Pennel is so old
and infirm she needs somebody to depend on.”

“I can't bear her,” said Moses. “I always think of sick-rooms
and coffins and a stifling smell of camphor when I
see her. I never could endure her. She 's an old harpy
going to carry off my dove.”

“Now, Moses, you must not talk so. She loves Mara
dearly, the poor old soul, and Mara loves her, and there is
no earthly thing she would not do for her. And she knows
what to do for sickness better than you or I. I have found
out one thing, that it is n't mere love and good-will that is
needed in a sick-room; it needs knowledge and experience.”

Moses assented in gloomy silence, and they walked on
together the way that they had so often taken laughing and
chatting. When they came within sight of the house, Moses
said, —

“Here she came running to meet us; do you remember?”

“Yes,” said Sally.

“I was never half worthy of her. I never said half what
I ought to,” he added. “She must live! I must have one
more chance.”

When they came up to the house, Zephaniah Pennel was
sitting in the door, with his gray head bent over the leaves
of the great family Bible.

He rose up at their coming, and with that suppression of

all external signs of feeling for which the New Englander is
remarkable, simply shook the hand of Moses, saying, —

“Well, my boy, we are glad you have come.”

Mrs. Pennel, who was busied in some domestic work in
the back part of the kitchen, turned away and hid her face
in her apron when she saw him. There fell a great silence
among them, in the midst of which the old clock ticked loudly
and importunately, like the inevitable approach of fate.

“I will go up and see her, and get her ready,” said Sally,
in a whisper to Moses. “I 'll come and call you.”

Moses sat down and looked around on the old familiar scene;
there was the great fireplace where, in their childish days,
they had sat together winter nights, — her fair, spiritual face
enlivened by the blaze, while she knit and looked thoughtfully
into the coals; there she had played checkers, or fox
and geese, with him; or studied with him the Latin lessons;
or sat by, grave and thoughtful, hemming his toy-ship sails,
while he cut the moulds for his anchors, or tried experiments
on pulleys; and in all these years he could not remember
one selfish action, — one unlovely word, — and he thought
to himself, — “I hoped to possess this angel as a mortal
wife! God forgive my presumption.”