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Herb of Grace

<h3> CHAPTER XXI </h3> <h3> "IF I WERE ONLY LIKE YOU!" </h3> Who, seeking for himself alone, ever entered heaven? In blessing we are blest. —C. SEYMOUR. There is no separation—no Past; Eternity, the Now is continuous.... The continuity of Now is for ever. —RICHARD JEFFERIES. The party from the Crow's Nest were somewhat late in arriving the following evening. Verity made her excuses very prettily. "It was all darling Babs's fault," she said to Miss Templeton; "she would play instead of going to sleep. Mr. Herrick lost patience at last, and declared he would go on alone." "I must take my god-daughter in hand, or she will be ruined body and soul," observed Malcolm severely. "Babs is already a domestic tyrant, and screams the house down if any of her fads and fancies are resisted. I am thinking of writing a series of essays on degenerate and irresponsible parents, and the cruelty of modern education in the nursery, which out-Herods Herod." Of course they all laughed at this idea, and then David Carlyon crossed the room to shake hands with Malcolm and to introduce his father. The two men were curiously alike. The Rev. Rupert Carlyon was an older, shabbier, and more careworn David; but there was the same broad, intellectual brow, the same bright intelligence of expression, and their voices were so strangely similar that if Malcolm had closed his eyes he could not have distinguished between them; they both spoke with the same quickness, and in the same clipping fashion. Malcolm noticed before the evening was over that David Carlyon looked unusually pale and tired, though he seemed in excellent spirits. Dinah made the same remark to his father. "Oh, I have been giving that boy of mine a lecture," he said quickly; "he is a perfect spendthrift and prodigal with regard to the midnight oil, and burns both ends of his candle in the most reckless fashion." "I should not have thought a sleepy little place like Rotherwood would have overtaxed his energies," observed Malcolm in rather a surprised tone. The elder man shook his head. "There is always work enough if one looks for it. My son is a sort of medical missionary in his way, and concerns himself with the bodies as well as the souls of his people. The last two nights he has been up until nearly dawn with a stranger—a sort of commercial traveller who has been taken ill at 'The Plough.' It is a sad case: he is quite a young man, and our doctor fears that he will not pull through." But Mr. Carlyon forbore to state the fact that each night he had relieved his son, rising from his bed in the gray pearly dawn, before the first bird-twitter was heard, to take his watch beside the fever-stricken stranger. The Carlyons were men whose left hand did not know what their right hand did, and the Rev. Rupert Carlyon's ministry had been a record of humble, unobtrusive acts of good-will and kindness to man, woman, and child; nay, the very dumb animals knew their friend, and would come to him for protection. The Carlyons took their leave soon after this. Elizabeth walked down to the gate with them. Malcolm thought she looked rather grave when she returned, as though something troubled her, but she would not hear of the party breaking up, and promised Malcolm that she would sing all his favourite songs to his friends, and she kept her word. Malcolm sat in a trance of beatitude while the beautiful voice floated out into the darkness, startling some night-bird in the copse; and Verity's eyes were wet, and she stole closer to her husband, for it seemed to her as though the shadows from the old life were creeping round her; and unseen by any one but Dinah, she leant her cheek against Amias's hand. "Oh, how can you sing like that!" exclaimed Verity in her naive way, when Elizabeth joined them on the terrace. "You sing right down into people's hearts. Oh, I felt so sad, and then so happy, and the world did not seem wide enough to contain me." "You must not flatter me," returned Elizabeth, but she was evidently gratified. Then she turned her head to Malcolm, who was behind her, and said in an undertone, "You were quite right, the Jacobis are coming to our party. I have sent them a card this afternoon." "I hope Miss Templeton approved of my suggestion?" "Yes, she thought with you that it would be an excellent opportunity of taking stock of the enemy. And Cedric was so pleased. Mr. Herrick," she continued, as they walked down the terrace, "I must tell you that we are charmed with Mrs. Keston. She is a dear little thing, and so fascinating and original, and she looks really pretty to-night." "No, she is not pretty," returned Malcolm, "but her dress becomes her. We call it Keston's chef d'oeuvre. He always designs her gowns. He is very aesthetic in his tastes, and he knows exactly what suits her. If Verity were left to her own devices, she would be very crude and unfinished." "He is very proud of her," observed Elizabeth. "It is good to see two such happy people. We like them immensely, and shall hope to see a great deal of them;" and Malcolm was so elated by these encomiums on his friends, and by Elizabeth's gracious friendliness, that he actually suggested that she should walk down the drive with them; but to his secret chagrin she made some excuse. Half an hour later she entered her sister's room. Dinah was reading as usual, with her little green lamp beside her; but she closed her book and looked up at her inquiringly. "What is it, Betty?" she said gently. "Something has been troubling you to-night." Then Elizabeth turned aside her face for a moment, but she was not regarding herself in the great mirror. "It concerns David," continued Dinah calmly. Then Elizabeth gave vent to a heavy sigh. "Yes, it concerns David," she returned. "I have been talking to him, oh so seriously, and to his father too; but it is no use. They will let me do nothing to help them. I wanted to send in a night nurse, but they will have it that it is not necessary. Old Mrs. Roper takes care of the patient by day, and it is only the night." "But, Betty dear, surely David Carlyon is not going there again to-night?" "Indeed he is," very sadly. "I heard them arranging it this afternoon. Mr. Carlyon is to relieve him at three. He was so tired that he could scarcely eat his dinner, and he told me that he dared not stay for the music, as I should certainly sing him to sleep. Die," in rather a choked voice, "it is not right. He will kill himself if he goes on like this." It was evident that Elizabeth was in a depressed mood; perhaps she was tired too. Dinah, who knew her well, quite understood her. "Don't worry, Betty," she said kindly. "David Carlyon is young enough and strong enough to bear the loss of a few nights' rest, and the fever is not infectious. By all accounts the poor fellow cannot last many days. Tomorrow I will go over to the White Cottage and talk to them both. I shall tell David that he has no right to let his father work so hard during his holiday." "Tell him we know such a nice woman, Die," and Dinah promised that she would do her very best. But Elizabeth had not wholly eased her mind; she stood looking at her sister rather doubtfully, and then she said abruptly— "Die, there is something I want to ask you. You heard from Douglas Fraser this morning, did you not?" Then a faint colour came to Dinah's pale cheeks. "Were you afraid to ask me that before, my dear?" she said with a smile. "But it was my fault; I ought to have told you—this sort of question is not easy even for a sister to ask. Yes, Douglas wrote and Agnes too. Dear little Lettice is so much better. He thinks she will pull through now, thank God! but they nearly lost her." "Was it so bad as that, Die?" in an awed tone. "Yes, it has been a terrible illness. They have nurses, of course, but poor Agnes is almost worn out. She is their only girl, and Douglas does so doat on her. He has suffered so—one can read it in every word," and Dinah's voice shook a little. Perhaps it needed only that to bring Elizabeth's emotion to a culminating point, for to Dinah's surprise she suddenly knelt down and put her arms round her and the tears were running down her face. "Oh, Die, stop! I cannot bear to hear you—it pains me so—it pains me all over!" "My darling Bet! Oh, you foolish, foolish Betty!" But Elizabeth was not to be soothed so easily. "That is why I never mention his name. I try to pretend sometimes that I do not see his handwriting. Oh, Die," caressing her, "how can any woman be such an angel! It is not natural. In your place, under your circumstances, I would never have seen him again." "Dear Elizabeth," returned Dinah quietly, but her face had grown very white, "you must surely remember that we never met—never thought of meeting—until dear Agnes herself brought us together. Don't you recollect how sweetly she wrote and begged me to be their friend. She said that it would make him happier, and herself too—that she never wished him to forget me; that it was through my influence that he had been brought right and that they were no longer divided in faith. Oh, Betty, I was a happy woman the day I got that letter, and I have been a happy woman since. 'Through pain to peace,'" she went on softly, "I should like those words to be inscribed on my tombstone. To think of the terror and the struggle, the buffeting of all those cruel waves and billows, and then to see land at last! Dearest, how you cry! You will make me cry too, and I have been singing a Te Deum in my heart all day for dear Lettice's sake." Then Elizabeth tried to control her sobs. "Die, I am quite ashamed of myself. I cannot think what has come to me. Think of a woman of thirty blubbering like a little school-girl! It is not like me, is it, dear? but my heart feels as heavy as lead to-night. Things are going wrong somehow, or is it my fancy?" And then she said a little wildly, "Oh, my darling, if I were only like you!" "Like me! Oh no, Elizabeth," for Dinah's humility could ill brook this speech. "But it is no use—I could never reach you. I am so human—a passionate, self-willed woman, who wants her own way in everything; and you, oh, Die, you are miles above me. That is why I love you so—I love you so!" "Not more than I love you," returned her sister tenderly. "Dear Elizabeth, it is only your generosity that makes you say this, but it is not true. I wish I knew what has upset you so to-night." But Elizabeth made no reply to this; the friendship between the sisters was so perfect that speech did not always seem necessary. When Elizabeth remained silent, Dinah did not repeat her question. Elizabeth had seated herself on the cushioned window-seat close to Dinah's chair. The little green lamp had been extinguished, and the room was bathed in moon-light. Down below were the dark woodlands. "Let me stay for a little while," Elizabeth had whispered, and then they had both remained silent. Dinah felt perplexed and troubled by her sister's unusual emotion. Elizabeth's strong, healthy nature was never morbid; her temperament was even and sunshiny, and a depressed mood was a rare thing with her. Dinah's sweet serenity was vaguely disturbed, and the quiet tears gathered in her eyes. Silence was good for both of them, she thought. When one has lived through a great pain, and by God's grace has conquered, it is better to bury the dead past. Elizabeth's passionate incredulity, the difficulty she felt in understanding her sister's motives, her exaggerated praise, made Dinah wince in positive pain. How could human love misjudge her so! Did not even her nearest and dearest—her own sister-friend—know how often she had striven and failed and fainted under that hard cross that had been laid upon her? And in truth few women had suffered as Dinah had in the sweet blossom of her early womanhood, and more than once she had been very near the gates of the dark valley whose shadow is the shadow of death. How she had gloried in her lover—her "Douglas—Douglas, tender and true," as she had called him to herself—in his great intellect and his strong man's heart, in the plan and purpose of his life, with its scientific research and its passionate love of truth! And then that awful struggle between her affection and her sense of right, the doubts and terrors, the wakeful nights and joyless days, the vast blank of life that stretched before her poor eyes, half-blind with their woman's weeping. "O Galilaean, Thou hast conquered," were the words that came to her when the crucial test had been passed, and she had parted with her beloved. Those were sad days at the Wood House, and there were sadder days still at Rome; but she lived through them, and Elizabeth helped her; and so by and bye the light of a new dawn—a little gray and misty perhaps, but still dawn—opened before Dinah's tired eyes. "I loved much and I prayed much, and God answered my prayers," she said long afterwards. But the wound was wide and deep and healed slowly, and it was not until Douglas Fraser had married a noble-hearted and beautiful woman, whom he called his Lady of Consolation, that Dinah recovered a measure of her former cheerfulness. But the day she heard that he was no longer an agnostic was always kept by her as a festival. Then indeed the cup of her pure joy seemed full to the very brim. He had come right, and now all was well with him and with her too. Pain and loss had been his teachers, and great indeed was her reward. "It was your renunciation and sacrifice that first opened my eyes," he wrote. "I know now how rightly you acted. If I had married you then—if my entreaties had prevailed—I should never have made you happy. My dear Agnes has taught me this." And this cherished letter was Dinah's treasure. She and Dr. Fraser seldom met—not more than once a year—but from time to time he wrote to her, and his wife and children were very dear to her. "I cannot understand it," Elizabeth had more than once said. But Dinah could furnish no explanation: she only knew that it was so—that her life was a happy one, and that she asked for nothing more. Douglas and his wife were her dearest friends, and Lettice, her sweet god-daughter, ranked next to Cedric in her heart. With so many to love, how could life fail to satisfy her! "And it so short—so short," she would say to herself. "One sees so little of one's friends here; but one will have plenty of time to enjoy them in Paradise." Continuity of life—continuity of love, this was Dinah's simple creed, but it kept her young and happy. "Dinah has the secret of perpetual youth," Elizabeth would say to her friend Mrs. Godfrey; but she generally ended with a sigh, "If only I were like her!" <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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