Miss McDonald Part 7

MISS MCDONALD

She took that name again, and with it, also, Margaret, feeling that Daisy was far too girlish an appellation for one who clad herself almost in widow's weeds, and felt, when she stood at poor Tom's grave, more wretched and desolate than many a wife has felt when her husband was put from her sight.

Tom had meant to make her parents independent of her so that she need not have them with her unless she chose to do so, for, knowing Mr.

McDonald as he did, he thought she would be happier alone, but G.o.d so ordered it that within three months after poor Tom's death they made another grave beside his, and Daisy and her mother were alone.

It was spring-time now, and the two desolate women bade adieu to their dead, and made their way to England, and from there to Scotland, where among the heather hills they pa.s.sed the summer in the utmost seclusion.

Here Daisy had ample time for thought, which dwelt mostly upon the past and the happiness she cast away when she consented to the sundering of the tie which had bound her to Guy Thornton.

"Oh, how could I have been so foolish and so weak," she said, as, with intense contempt for herself, she read over the journal she had kept at Elmwood during the first weeks of her married life.

Guy had said it would be pleasant for her to refer to its pages in after years, little dreaming with what sore anguish of heart poor Daisy would one day weep over the senseless things recorded there.

"Can it be I was ever that silly little fool?" she said bitterly, as she finished her journal. "And how could Guy love me as I know he did. Oh, if I but had the chance again, I would make him so happy! Oh, Guy, Guy--my husband still--mine more than Julia's, if you could know how much I love you now; nor can I feel it wrong to do so, even though I never hope to see your face again. Guy, Guy, the world is so desolate, and I am young, only twenty-three, and life is so long and dreary with nothing to live for or to do. I wish almost that I were dead like Tom, only I dare not think I should go to heaven where he has gone."

In her sorrow and loneliness Daisy was fast sinking into an unhealthy, morbid state of mind from which nothing seemed to arouse her.

"Nothing to live for--nothing to do," was her lament until one golden September day, when there came a turning point in her life, and she found there was something to do.

There was no regular service that Sunday in the church where she usually attended, and as the day was fine and she was far too restless to remain at home, she proposed to her mother that they walk to a little chapel about a mile away, where a young Presbyterian clergyman was to preach.

She had heard much of his eloquence, and as his name was McDonald, he might possibly be some distant relative. Inasmuch as her father was of Scotch descent she felt a double interest in him, and with her mother was among the first who entered the little, humble building and took a seat upon one of the hard, uncomfortable benches near the pulpit.

The speaker was young--about Tom's age--and with a look on his florid face and a sound in his voice so like that of the dead man that Daisy half started to her feet when he first took his stand in front of her and announced the opening hymn. His text was: "Why stand ye here all the day idle?" and so well did he handle it, and so forcible were his gestures and eloquent his style of delivery, that Daisy listened to him spellbound, her eyes fixed intently upon his glowing face and her ears drinking in every word he uttered.

After dwelling for a time upon the loiterers in G.o.d's vineyard, the idlers from choice, who worked not for lack of an inclination to do so, he spoke next of the cla.s.s whose whole life was a weariness for want of something to do, and to these he said: "Have you never read how, when the disciples rebuked the grateful woman for wasting upon her Master's head what might have been sold for three hundred pence and given to the poor, Jesus said unto them, 'The poor ye have with you always,' and is it not so, my hearers? Are there no poor at your door to be fed, no hungry little ones to be cared for out of the abundance which G.o.d has only loaned you for this purpose? Are there no wretched homes which you can make happier, no aching hearts which a kind word would cheer?

Remember there is a blessing p.r.o.nounced for even the cup of cold water, and how much greater shall be the reward of those who, forgetting themselves, seek the good of others and turn not away from the needy and the desolate. See to it, then, you to whom G.o.d has given much. See to it that you sit not down in idle ease, wasting upon yourself alone the goods designed for others, for to whom much is given of him much shall be required."

Attracted, perhaps, by the deep black of Daisy's attire, or the something about her which marked her as different from the ma.s.s of his hearers, the speaker had seemed to address the last of his remarks directly to her, and had the dead Tom risen from his grave and spoken with her face to face, she could hardly have been more affected than she was. The resemblance was so striking and the voice so like her cousin's that she felt as if she had received a message direct from him; or, if not from him, she surely had from G.o.d, whose almoner she henceforth would be.

That day was the beginning of a new life to her. Thenceforth there must be no more repining; no more idle, listless days, no more wis.h.i.+ng for something to do. There was work all around her, and she found it and did it with a will--first, from a sense of duty, and at last for the real pleasure it afforded her to carry joy and gladness to the homes where want and sorrow had sat so long.

Hearing that there were sickness and dest.i.tution among the miners in Peru, where her possessions were, she went early in November, and many a wretched heart rejoiced because of her, and many a lip blessed the beautiful lady whose coming among them was productive of so much good.

Better dwellings, better wages, a church, a schoolhouse followed in her footsteps, and then, when everything there seemed in good working order, there came over her a longing for her native country, and the next autumn found her in New York, where in a short s.p.a.ce of time everybody knew of the beautiful Miss McDonald, who was a millionaire and who owned the fine house and grounds in the upper part of the city not far from the Park.

Here society claimed her again, and Daisy, who had no morbid fancies now, yielded in part to its claims and became, if not a belle, a favorite, whose praises were in every mouth. But chiefly was she known and loved by the poor and the despised whom she daily visited, and to whom her presence was like the presence of an angel.

"You do look lovely and sing so sweet; I know there's nothing nicer in heaven," said a little piece of deformity to her one day as it lay dying in her arms. "I'se goin' to heaven, which I shouldn't have done if you'se hadn't gin me the nice bun and told me of Jesus. I loves him now, and I'll tell him how you bringed me to him."

Such was the testimony of one dying child, and it was dearer to Daisy than all the words of flattery ever poured into her ear. As she had brought that little child to G.o.d, so she would bring others, and she made her work among the children especially, finding there her best encouragement and greatest success.

Once when Guy Thornton chanced to be in the city and driving in the Park, he saw a singular sight--a pair of splendid bays arching their graceful necks proudly, their silver-tipped harness flas.h.i.+ng in the sunlight, and their beautiful mistress radiant with happiness as she sat in her large open carriage, not in the midst of gayly dressed friends, but amid a group of poorly clad, pale-faced little ones, to whom the Park was a paradise, and she was the presiding angel.

"Look--that's Miss McDonald," Guy's friend said to him, "the greatest heiress in New York, and I reckon the one who does the most good. Why, she supports more old people and children and runs more ragged schools than any half-dozen men in the city, and I don't suppose there's a den in New York where she has not been, and never once, I'm told, was she insulted, for the vilest of them stand between her and harm. Once a miscreant on Avenue A knocked a boy down for accidentally stepping in a pool of water and sprinkling her white dress in pa.s.sing. Friday nights she has a reception for these people, and you ought to see how well they behave. At first they were noisy and rough, and she had to have the police, but now they are quiet and orderly as you please. Perhaps you'd like to go to one. I know Miss McDonald, and will take you with me."

Guy said he should not be in town on Friday, as he must return to Cuylerville the next day, and with a feeling he could not quite a.n.a.lyze, he turned to look at the turnout which always excited so much attention.

But it was not so much at the handsome bays and the bevy of queer-looking children he gazed as at the little lady in their midst, clad in velvet and ermine, with a long white feather falling among the curls of her bright hair. When Daisy first entered upon her new life she had affected a nun-like garb as one most appropriate, but after a little child said to her once, "I'se don't like your black gown all the time. I likes sumptin' bright and pretty," she changed her mind and gave freer scope to her natural good taste and love of what was becoming. And the result showed the wisdom of the change, for the children and inmates of the dens she visited, accustomed only to the squalor and ugliness of their surroundings, hailed her more rapturously than they had done before, and were never weary of talking of the beautiful woman who was not afraid to wear her pretty clothes into their wretched houses, which, lest she should soil and defile them, gradually grew more clean and tidy for her sake.

"It wasn't for the likes of them gownds to trail through sich truck,"

Bridget O'Donohue said, and so, on the days when Daisy was expected, she scrubbed the floor, which, until Daisy's advent had not known water for years, and rubbed and polished the one wooden chair kept sacred for the lady's use.

Other women, too, caught Biddy's spirit and scrubbed their floors and their children's faces on the day when Miss McDonald was expected to call, and when she came her silk dress and pretty shawl were watched narrowly lest by some chance a speck of dirt should fasten on them, and her becoming dress and handsome face were commented on and remembered as some fine show which had been seen for nothing. Especially did the children like her in her bright dress, and the velvet and ermine in which she was clad when Guy met her in the Park were worn more for their sakes than for the gaze of those to whom such things were no novelties.

To Guy she looked more beautiful than he had ever seen her before, and there was in his heart a smothered feeling as of a want of something lost, as her carriage disappeared from view and he lost sight of the fair face and form which had once been his own.

The world was going well with Guy, for though d.i.c.k Trevylian had paid no part of the hundred thousand dollars, and he still lived in the brown cottage on the hill, he was steadily working his way to competency, if not to wealth. His profession as a lawyer, which he had resumed, yielded him a remunerative income, while his contributions to different magazines were much sought after, so that to all human appearance he was prosperous and happy. Prosperous in his business, and happy in his wife and little ones, for there was now a second child, a baby Guy of six weeks old, and when on his return from New York the father bent over the cradle of his boy and kissed his baby face, that image seen in the Park seemed to fade away, and the caresses he gave to Julia had in them no faithlessness or insincerity. She was a n.o.ble woman, and had made him a good wife, and he loved her truly, though with a different, less absorbing, less ecstatic love than he had given to Daisy. But he did not tell her of Miss McDonald. Indeed, that name was never spoken now, nor was any reference ever made to her except when little Daisy asked where was the lady for whom she was named, and why she did not send her a doll.

"I hardly think she knows there is such a chit as you," Guy said to her once, when sorely pressed on the subject, and then the child wondered how that could be, and wished she was big enough to write her a letter and ask her to come and see her.

Every day after that little Daisy played "make b'lieve Miss McDolly" was there, said McDolly being represented by a bundle of shawls tied up to look like a figure and seated in a chair. At last there came to the cottage a friend of Julia's, a young lady from New York, who knew Daisy, and who, while visiting in Cuylerville, accidentally learned that she was the divorced wife of whose existence she knew, but of whom she had never spoken to Mrs. Thornton. Hearing the little one talking one day to Miss McDolly and asking her why she never wrote nor sent a "sing" to her sake-name, the young lady said:

"Why don't you send Miss McDonald a letter? You tell me what to say and I'll write it down for you, but don't let mamma know till you see if you get anything."

The little girl's fancy was caught at once with the idea, and the following letter was the result:

"BROWN COTTAGE, 'Most Tissmas time.

"DEAR MISS MCDOLLY:--I'se an 'ittle dirl named for you, I is, Daisy Thornton, an' my papa is Mr. Guy, an' mam-ma is Julia, and 'ittle brother is Guy, too--only he's a baby, and vomits up his dinner and ties awfully sometimes; an' I knows anoder 'ittle girl named for somebody who dives her 'sings,' a whole lot, an' why doesn't youse dive me some, when I'se your sake-name, an' loves you ever so much, and why'se you never turn here to see me. I wish you would. I ask papa is you pretty, an' he tell me yes, bootiful, an' every night I p'ays for you and say G.o.d bress papa an' mam-ma, an' auntie, and Miss McDolly, and 'ittle brodder, an'

make Daisy a dood dirl, and have Miss McDolly send her sumptin' for Tissmas, for Christ's sake. An' I wants a turly headed doll that ties and suts her eyes when she does to seep, and wears a shash and a pairesol, and anodder bigger dolly to be her mam-ma and pank her when she's naughty, an' I wants an 'ittle fat-iron, an' a cookstove, an'

wash-board. I'se dot a tub. An' I wants some dishes an' a stenshun table, an' 'ittle bedstead, an' yuffled seets, an' pillars, an' blue silk kilt, an' ever so many sings which papa cannot buy, 'cause he hasn't dot the money. Vill you send them, Miss McDolly, pese, an' your likeness, too. I wants to see how you looks. My mam-ma is pretty, with black hair an' eyes, but she's awful old--I dess. How old is you? Papa's hair is some dray, an' his viskers, too. My eyes is bue.

"Yours respectfully, DAISY THORNTON."

Miss McDonald had been shopping since ten in the morning, and her carriage had stood before the dry-goods stores, and toy-shops, and candy stores, while bundle after bundle had been deposited on the cus.h.i.+ons, and others ordered to be sent. But she was nearly through now, and just as it was beginning to grow dark in the streets she bade her coachman drive home, where dinner was waiting for her in the dining room, and her mother was waiting in the parlor. Mrs. McDonald was not very well, and had kept her room all day, but she was better that night, and came down to dine with her daughter. The December wind was cold and raw, and a few snowflakes fell on Daisy's hat and cloak as she ran up the steps and entered the warm, bright room, which seemed so pleasant when contrasted with the dreariness without.

"Oh, how nice this is, and how tired and cold I am!" she said, as she bent over the blazing fire.

"Are you through with your shopping?" Mrs. McDonald asked, in a half-querulous tone, as if she did not altogether approve of her daughter's acts.

"Yes, all through, except a shawl for old Sarah Mackie and a few more toys for Biddy Warren's blind boy," Daisy said, and her mother replied: "Well, I'm sure I shall be glad for your sake when it is over. You'll make yourself sick, and you are nearly worn out now, remembering everybody in New York."

"Not quite everybody, mother," Daisy rejoined cheerfully; "only those whom everybody forgets--the poor, whom we have with us always. Don't you remember the text and the little kirk where we heard it preached from? But come--dinner is ready, and I am hungry, I a.s.sure you."

She led the way to the handsome dining room, and took her seat at the table, looking, in her dark street dress, as her mother had said, pale and worn, as if the shopping had been very hard upon her. And yet it was not so much the fatigue of the day which affected her as the remembrance of a past she did not often dare to recall.

It was at Christmas time years ago that she first met with Guy, and all the day long, as she turned over piles of shawls and delaines and flannels, or ordered packages of candy and bonbons and dollies by the dozen, her thoughts had been with Guy and the time she met him at Leiter and Field's and he walked home with her. It seemed to her years and years ago, and the idea of having lived so long made her feel old, and tired, and worn. But the nice dinner and the cheer of the room revived her, and her face looked brighter and more rested when she returned to the parlor and began to show her mother her purchases.

Daisy did not receive many letters except on business, and as these usually came in the morning she did not think to ask if the postman had left her anything; and so it was not until her mother had retired and she was about going to her own room that she saw a letter lying on the hall-stand. Miss Barker, who had instigated the letter, had never written to her more than once or twice, and then only short notes, and she did not recognize the handwriting at once. But she saw it was postmarked Cuylerville, and a sick, faint sensation crept over her as she wondered who had sent it, and if it contained news of Guy. It was long since she had heard of him--not, in fact, since poor Tom's death, and she knew nothing of the little girl called for herself, and thus had no suspicion of the terrible shock awaiting her, when at last she broke the seal. Miss Barker had written a few explanatory lines, which were as follows:

"CUYLERVILLE, Dec., 18--.

"DEAR MISS MCDONALD--Since saying good-by to you last June, and going off to the mountains and seaside, while you like a good Samaritan stayed in the hot city to look after 'your people,' I have flitted hither and thither until at last I floated out to Cuylerville to visit Mrs. Guy Thornton, who is a friend and former schoolmate of mine.

Here--not in the house, but in town--I have heard a story which surprised me not a little, and I now better understand that sad look I have so often seen on your sweet face without at all suspecting the cause.