University of Virginia Library

32. CHAPTER XXXII.

THE mocking-bird sang as of yore in the myrtle-boughs
that shaded the study-window, and within
the parsonage reigned the peaceful repose
which seemed ever to rest like a benediction
upon it. A ray of sunshine stealing through the myrtle-leaves
made golden ripples on the wall; a bright wood-fire
blazed in the wide, deep, old-fashioned chimney; the white
cat slept on the rug, with her pink paws turned toward the
crackling flames; and blue and white hyacinths hung their
fragrant bells over the gilded edge of the vases on the mantel-piece.
Huldah sat on one side of the hearth peeling a
red apple; and, snugly wrapped in his palm-leaf cashmere
dressing-gown, Mr. Hammond rested in his cushioned easy-chair,
with his head thrown far back, and his fingers clasping
a large bunch of his favorite violets. His snowy hair
drifted away from a face thin and pale, but serene and
happy, and in his bright blue eyes there was a humorous
twinkle, and on his lips a half-smothered smile, as he listened
to the witticisms of his Scotch countrymen in “Noctes
Ambrosianæ.”

Close to his chair sat Edna, reading aloud from the quaint
and inimitable book he loved so well, and pausing now and
then to explain some word which Huldah did not understand,
or to watch for symptoms of weariness in the countenance
of the invalid.

The three faces contrasted vividly in the ruddy glow of
the fire. That of the little girl, round, rosy, red-lipped,

dimpled, merry-eyed; the aged pastor's wrinkled cheeks
and furrowed brow and streaming silver beard; and the
carved ivory features of the governess, borrowing no color
from the soft folds of her rich crimson merino dress. As
daylight ebbed, the ripple danced up to the ceiling and
vanished, like the pricked bubble of a human hope; the
mocking-bird hushed his vesper hymn; and Edna closed the
book and replaced it on the shelf.

Huldah tied on her scarlet-lined hood, kissed her friends
good-bye, and went back to Le Bocage; and the old man
and the orphan sat looking at the grotesque flicker of the
flames on the burnished andirons.

“Edna, are you tired, or can you sing some for me?”

“Reading aloud rarely fatigues me. What shall I sing?'

“That solemn, weird thing in the `Prophet,' which suits
your voice so well.”

She sang “Ah, mon fils!” and then, without waiting for
the request which she knew would follow, gave him some
of his favorite Scotch songs.

As the last sweet strains of “Mary of Argyle” echoed
through the study, the pastor shut his eyes, and memory
flew back to the early years when his own wife Mary had
sung those words in that room, and his dead darlings clustered
eagerly around the piano to listen to their mother's
music. Five fair-browed, innocent young faces circling
about the idolized wife, and baby Annie nestling in her
cradle beside the hearth, playing with her waxen fingers
and crowing softly. Death had stolen his household jewels;
but recollection robbed the grave, and music's magic touch
unselaed “memory's golden urn.”

Edna thought he had fallen asleep, he was so still, his
face was so placid; and she came softly back to her chair
and looked at the ruby temples and towers, the glittering
domes and ash-grey ruined arcades built by the oak coals.

A month had elapsed since her arrival at the parsenage,
and during that short period Mr. Hammond had rallied and
recovered his strength so unexpectedly that hopes were
entertained of his entire restoration; and he spoke confidently
of being able to reënter his pulpit on Easter Sunday.

The society of his beloved pupil seemed to render him
completely happy, and his countenance shone in the blessed
light that gladdened his heart. After a long, dark, stormy
day, the sun of his life was preparing to set in cloudless
peace and glory.

Into all of Edna's literary schemes he entered eagerly.
She read to him the MS. of her new book as far as it was
finished, and was gratified by his perfect satisfaction with
the style, plot, and aim.

Mrs. Murray came every day to the parsonage, but Edna
had not visited Le Bocage; and though Mr. Murray spent
two mornings of each week with Mr. Hammond, he called
at stated hours, and she had not yet met him. Twice she
had heard his voice in earnest conversation, and several
times she had seen his tall figure coming up the walk, but
of his features she caught not even a glimpse. St. Elmo's
name had never been mentioned in her presence by either
his mother or the pastor, but Huldah talked ceaselessly of
his kindness to her. Knowing the days on which he came
to the parsonage, Edna always absented herself from the
invalid's room until the visit was over.

One afternoon she went to the church to play on the
organ; and after an hour of mournful enjoyment in the gallery
so fraught with precious reminiscences, she left the
church and found Tamerlane tied to the iron gate, but his
master was not visible. She knew that he was somewhere
in the building or the yard, and denied herself the pleasure
of going there a second time.

Neither glance nor word had been exchanged since they
parted at the railroad station, eighteen months before. She
longed to know his opinion of her book, for many passages

had been written with special reference to his perusal; but
she would not ask; and it was a sore trial to sit in one
room, hearing the low, indistinct murmur of his voice in the
next, and yet never to see him.

Few women could have withstood the temptation; but
the orphan dreaded his singular power over her heart, and
dared not trust herself in his presence.

This evening, as she sat with the fire-light shining on
her face, thinking of the past, she could not realize that
only two years had elapsed since she came daily to this
quiet room to recite her lessons; for during that time she
had suffered so keenly in mind and body that it seemed as
if weary ages had gone over her young head. Involuntarily
she sighed, and passed her hand across her forehead.
A low tap at the door diverted her thoughts, and a servant
entered and gave her a package of letters from New-York.

Every mail brought one from Felix; and now opening his
first, a tender smile parted her lips as she read his passionate,
importunate appeal for her speedy return, and saw that
the closing lines were blotted with tears. The remaining
eight letters were from persons unknown to her, and contained
requests for autographs and photographs, for short
sketches for papers in different sections of the country, and
also various inquiries concerning the time when her new book
would probably be ready for press. All were kind, friendly,
gratifying, and one was eloquent with thanks for the good
effect produced by a magazine article on a dissipated, irreligious
husband and father, who, after its perusal, had resolved
to reform, and wished her to know the beneficial influence
which she exerted. At the foot of the page was a
line penned by the rejoicing wife, invoking heaven's choicest
blessings on the author's head.

“Is not the laborer worthy of his hire?” Edna felt that
her wages were munificent indeed; that her coffers were
filling, and though the “thank God!” was not audible, the
great joy in her uplifted eyes attracted the attention of the

pastor, who had been silently watching her, and he laid his
hand on hers.

“What is it, my dear?”

“The reward God has given me!”

She read aloud the contents of the letter, and there
was a brief silence, broken at last by Mr. Hammond.

“Edna, my child, are you really happy?”

“So happy that I believe the wealth of California could
not buy this sheet of paper, which assures me that I have
been instrumental in bringing sunshine to a darkened
household; in calling the head of a family from haunts of
vice and midnight orgies back to his wife and children;
back to the shrine of prayer at his own hearthstone! I
have not lived in vain, for through my work a human soul
has been brought to Jesus, and I thank God that I am accounted
worthy to labor in my Lord's vineyard! Oh! I
will wear that happy wife's blessing in my inmost heart,
and like those old bells in Cambridgeshire, inscribed, `Pestem
fungo! Sabbata pango!' it shall ring a silvery chime,
exorcising all gloom, and loneliness, and sorrow.”

The old man's eyes filled as he saw the almost unearthly
radiance of the woman's lovely face.

“You have indeed cause for gratitude and great joy, as
you realize all the good you are destined to accomplish;
and I know the rapture of saving souls, for, through God's
grace, I believe I have snatched some from the brink of
ruin. But Edna, can the triumph of your genius, the applause
of the world, the approval of conscience, even the
assurance that you are laboring successfully for the cause
of Christ—can all these things satisfy your womanly heart—
your loving, tender heart? My child, there is a dreary
look sometimes in your eyes, that reveals loneliness, almost
weariness of life. I have studied your countenance closely
when it was in repose; I read it I think without errors; and
as often as I hear your writings praised, I recall those lines,
written by one of the noblest of your own sex:

Edna, are you perfectly contented with your lot?”

A shadow drifted slowly over the marble face, and
though it settled on no feature, the whole countenance was
changed.

“I can not say that I am perfectly content, and yet I
would not exchange places with any woman I know.”

“Do you never regret a step which you took one evening,
yonder in my church?”

“No, sir, I do not regret it. I often thank God that I
was able to obey my conscience and take that step.”

“Suppose that in struggling up the steep path of duty
one soul needs the encouragement, the cheering companionship
which only one other human being can give? Will
the latter be guiltless if the aid is obstinately withheld?”

“Suppose the latter feels that in joining hands both
would stumble?”

“You would not, O Edna! you would lift each other to
nobler heights! Each life would be perfect, complete. My
child, will you let me tell you some things that ought
to—”

She threw up her hand, with that old, childish gesture
which he remembered so well, and shook her head.

“No, sir; no, sir! Please tell me nothing that will
rouse a sorrow I am striving to drug. Spare me, for as St.
Chrysostom once said of Olympias the deaconess, I `live in
perpetual fellowship with pain.'”

“My dear little Edna, as I look at you and think of your
future, I am troubled about you. I wish I could confidently
say to you, what St. Chrysostom wrote to Pentadia:
`For I know your great and lofty soul, which can sail as
with a fair wind through many tempests, and in the midst
of the waves enjoy a white calm.'”

She turned and took the minister's hand in hers, while
an indescribable peace settled on her countenance, and
stilled the trembling of her low, sweet voice:

“Across the gray stormy billows of life, that `white
calm' of eternity is rimming the water-line, coming to meet
me. Already the black pilot-boat heaves in sight; I hear
the signal, and Death will soon take the helm and steer my
little bark safely into the shining rest, into God's `white
calm.'”

She went to the piano and sang, as a solo, “Night's
Shade no Longer,” from Moses in Egypt.

While the pastor listened, he murmured to himself:

She turned over the sheets of music, hunting for a German
hymn of which Mr. Hammond was very fond, but he
called her back to the fire-place.

“My dear, do you recollect that beautiful passage in
Faber's `Sights and Thoughts in Foreign Churches'?
`There is seldom a line of glory written upon the earth's
face but a line of suffering runs parallel with it; and they
that read the lustrous syllables of the one, and stoop not to
decipher the spotted and worn inscription of the other, get
the least half of the lesson earth has to give.'”

“No, sir; I never read the book. Something in that
passage brings to my mind those words of Martin Luther's,
which explain so many of the `spotted inscriptions' of this
earth: `Our Lord God doth like a printer, who setteth the
letters backward. We see and feel well His setting, but
we shall read the print yonder, in the life to come!' Mr.
Hammond, it is said that, in the Alexandrian MS., in the
British Museum, there is a word which has been subjected
to microscopic examination, to determine whether it is οϲ,

who, or θϹ—which is the abbreviation of θεοϛ, God. Some
times I think that so ought we to turn the lens of faith
on many dim perplexing inscriptions traced in human history,
and perhaps we might oftener find God.”

“Yes, I have frequently thought that the MS. of every
human life was like a Peruvian Quippo, a mass of many-colored
cords or threads, tied and knotted by unseen, and,
possibly, angel hands. Here, my dear, put these violets in
water; they are withering. By the way, Edna, I am glad
to find that in your writings you attach so much importance
to the ministry of flowers, and that you call the attention
of your readers to the beautiful arguments which they furnish,
in favor of the Christian philosophy of a divine design
in nature. Truly,

At this moment the door-bell rang, and soon after the
servant brought in a telegraphic dispatch, addressed to Mr.
Hammond.

It was from Gordon Leigh, announcing his arrival in
New-York, and stating that he and Gertrude would reach
the parsonage some time during the ensuing week.

Edna went into the kitchen to superintend the preparation
of the minister's supper; and when she returned and
placed the waiter on a table near his chair, she told him
that she must go back to New-York immediately after the
arrival of Gordon and Gertrude, as her services would no
longer be required at the parsonage, and her pupils needed
her.

Two days passed without any further allusion to a subject
which was evidently uppermost in Mr. Hammond's
mind.

On the morning of the third, Mrs. Murray said, as she
rose to conclude her visit: “You are so much better, sir,

that I must claim Edna for a day at least. She has not yet
been to Le Bocage; and as she goes away so soon, I want to
take her home with me this morning. Clara Inge promised
me that she would stay with you until evening. Edna, get
your bonnet. I shall be entirely alone to-day, for St. Elmo
has carried Huldah to the plantation, and they will not get
home until late. So, my dear, we shall have the house all
to ourselves.”

The orphan could not deny herself the happiness offered;
she knew that she ought not to go, but for once her strength
failed her, she yielded to the temptation.

During the ride Mrs. Murray talked cheerfully of various
things, and for the first time laid entirely aside the
haughty constraint which had distinguished her manner
since they travelled south from New-York.

They entered the noble avenue, and Edna gave herself
up to the rushing recollections which were so mournfully
sweet. As they went into the house, and the servants hurried
forward to welcome her, she could not repress her
tears. She felt that this was her home, her heart's home;
and as numerous familiar objects met her eyes, Mrs. Murray
saw that she was almost overpowered by her emotions.

“I wonder if there is any other place on earth half so
beautiful!” murmured the governess several hours later,
as they sat looking out over the lawn, where the deer and
sheep were browsing.

“Certainly not, to our partial eyes. And yet without you,
my child, it does not seem like home. It is the only
home where you will ever be happy.”

“Yes, I know it; but it can not be mine. Mrs. Murray,
I want to see my own little room.”

“Certainly; you know the way. I will join you there
presently. Nobody has occupied it since you left, for I feel
toward your room as I once felt toward the empty cradle
of my dead child.”

Edna went up-stairs alone and closed the door of the

apartment she had so long called hers, and looked with
childish pleasure and affection at the rosewood furniture.

Turning to the desk where she had written much that
the world now praised and loved, she saw a vase containing
a superb bouquet, with a card attached by a strip of
ribbon. The hot-house flowers were arranged with exquisite
taste, and the orphan's cheeks glowed suddenly as she
recognized Mr. Murray's handwriting on the card: “For
Edna Earl.” When she took up the bouquet a small envelope
similarly addressed dropped out.

For some minutes she stood irresolute, fearing to trust
herself with the contents; then she drew a chair to the
desk, sat down, and broke the seal:

Ah my God! pity me! Why—oh! why is it that I
am tantalized with glimpses of a great joy never to be
mine in this life! Why, in struggling to do my duty, am
I brought continually to the very gate of the only Eden I
am ever to find in this world, and yet can never surprise
the watching Angel of Wrath, and have to stand shivering
outside, and see my Eden only by the flashing of the sword
that bars my entrance?”

Looking at the chirography, so different from any other
which she had ever examined, her thoughts were irresistibly
carried back to that morning when, at the shop, she
saw this handwriting for the first time on the blank leaf-of
the Dante; and she recalled the shuddering aversion with
which her grandfather had glanced at it, and advised her
to commit it to the flames of the forge.

How many such notes as this had been penned to Annie
and Gertrude, and to that wretched woman shut up in an
Italian convent, and to others of whose names she was ignorant?

Mrs. Murray opened the door, looked in, and said:

“Come, I want to show you something really beautiful.”

Edna put the note in her pocket, took the bouquet, and
followed her friend down-stairs, through the rotunda, to
the door of Mr. Murray's sitting-room.

“My son locked this door and carried the key with him;
but after some search, I have found another that will open
it. Come in, Edna. Now look at that large painting hanging
over the sarcophagus. It is a copy of Titian's `Christ
Crowned with Thorns,' the original of which is in a Milanese
church, I believe. While St. Elmo was last abroad,
he was in Genoa one afternoon when a boat was capsized.
Being a fine swimmer, he sprang into the water
where several persons were struggling, and saved the lives
of two little children of an English gentleman, who had his
hands quite full in rescuing his wife. Two of the party
were drowned; but the father was so grateful to my son,

that he has written him several letters, and last year he
sent him this picture, which, though of course much smaller
than the original, is considered a very fine copy. I begged
to have it hung in the parlor, but fearing, I suppose, that its
history might possibly be discovered, (you know how he
despises any thing like a parade of good deeds,) St. Elmo
insisted on bringing it here to this Egyptian Museum,
where, unfortunately, people can not see it.”

For some time they stood admiring it, and then Edna's
eyes wandered away to the Taj Mahal, to the cabinets and
bookcases. Her lip began to quiver as every article of
furniture babbled of the By-Gone—of the happy evenings
spent here—of that hour when the idea of authorship first
seized her mind and determined her future.

Mrs. Murray walked up to the arch, over which the curtains
fell touching the floor, and laying her hand on the
folds of silk, said hesitatingly:

“I am going to show you something that my son would
not easily forgive me for betraying; for it is a secret he
guards most jealously—”

“No, I would rather not see it. I wish to learn nothing
which Mr. Murray is not willing that I should know.”

“You will scarcely betray me to my son when you see
what it is; and besides, I am determined you shall have no
room to doubt the truth of some things he has told you.
There is no reason why you should not look at it. Do you
recognize that face yonder, over the mantel-piece?”

She held the curtains back, and despite her reluctance to
glancing into the inner room, Edna raised her eyes timidly,
and saw, in a richly-carved oval frame, hanging on the opposite
wall, a life-size portrait of herself.

“We learned from the newspapers that some fine photographs
had been taken in New-York, and I sent on and
bought two. St. Elmo took one of them to an artist in
Charleston, and superintended the painting of that portrait.
When he returned, just before I went North, he brought

the picture with him, and with his own hands hung it yonder.
I have noticed that since that day he always keeps
the curtains down over the arch, and never leaves the house
without locking his rooms.”

Edna had dropped her crimsoned face in her hands, but
Mrs. Murray raised it forcibly and kissed her.

“I want you to know how well he loves you—how necessary
you are to his happiness. Now I must leave you,
for I see Mrs. Montgomery's carriage at the door. You
have a note to answer; there are writing materials on the
table yonder.”

She went out, closing the door softly, and Edna was
alone with reminiscences that pleaded piteously for the absent
master. Oxalis and heliotrope peeped at her over the
top of the lotos vases; one of a pair of gauntlets had fallen
on the carpet near the cameo cabinet; two or three newspapers
and a meerschaum lay upon a chair; several theological
works were scattered on the sofa, and the air was
heavy with lingering cigar-smoke.

Just in front of the Taj Mahal was a handsome copy of
Edna's novel, and a beautiful morocco-bound volume containing
a collection of all her magazine sketches.

She sat down in the crimson-cushioned arm-chair that
was drawn close to the circular table, where pen and paper
told that the owner had recently been writing, and
near the inkstand was a handkerchief with German initials,
S. E. M.

Upon a mass of loose papers stood a quaint bronze paperweight,
representing Cartaphilus, the Wandering Jew; and
on the base was inscribed Mr. Murray's favorite Arabian
maxim: “Ed dünya djifetun ve talibeha kilab”: “The
world is an abomination, and those who toil about it are
dogs.”

There, too, was her own little Bible; and as she took it
up it opened at the fourteenth chapter of St. John, where
she found, as a book-mark, the photograph of herself from

which the portrait had been painted. An unwithered geranium
sprig lying among the leaves, whispered that the
pages had been read that morning.

Out on the lawn birds swung in the elm-twigs, singing
cheerily, lambs bleated and ran races, and the little silver
bell on Huldah's pet fawn, “Edna,” tinkled ceaselessly.

“Help me, O my God! in this the last hour of my
trial.”

The prayer went up moaningly, and Edna took a pen and
turned to write. Her arm struck a portfolio lying on the
edge of the table, and in falling loose sheets of paper fluttered
out on the carpet. One caught her eye; she picked
it up, and found a sketch of the ivied ruins of Phyle. Underneath
the drawing, and dated fifteen years before, were
traced, in St. Elmo's writing, those lines, which Henry
Soame is said to have penned on the blank leaf of a copy
of the “Pleasures of Memory”:

The lonely woman looked upward, appealingly, and there
upon the wall she met—not as formerly, the gleaming, augurous,
inexorable eyes of the Cimbrian Prophetess—but
the pitying God's gaze of Titian's Jesus.

When Mrs. Murray returned to the room, Edna sat as
still as one of the mummies in the sarcophagus, with her
head thrown back, and the long, black eyelashes sweeping
her colorless cheeks.

One hand was pressed over her heart, the other held a
note directed to St. Elmo Murray; and the cold, fixed features
were so like those of an Angel of Death sometimes
sculptured on cenotaphs, that Mrs. Murray uttered a cry of
alarm.

As she bent over her, Edna opened her arms and said in
a feeble, spent tone:

“Take me back to the parsonage. I ought not to have
come here; I might have known I was not strong enough.”

“You have had one of those attacks. Why did you not
call me? I will bring you some wine.”

“No; only let me go away as soon as possible. Oh! I
am ashamed of my weakness.”

She rose, and her pale lips writhed as her sad eyes wandered
in a farewell glance around the room.

She put the unsealed note in Mrs. Murray's hand, and
turned toward the door.

“Edna! My daughter! you have not refused St. Elmo's
request?”

“My mother Pity me! I could not grant it.”