The Harvest of Years Part 12

It seemed to me then, and still seems, that he spoke with a power that was divine. The tide of earnest thought and feeling that carried him with his subject out on the depth, carried also his hearers, and we were shown the way to the port of eternal life. Oh, how he strengthened me!

His touching invocation reached, as it seemed, the very doors of heaven and swung them wide open, and when the people joined in singing the good old hymn, written by Sebastian Streeter, whose first verse runs as follows:

What glorious tidings do I hear From my Redeemer's tongue!

I can no longer silence bear, I'll burst into a song.

I cried almost aloud for great joy. My father and mother were moved, and when they saw my tears united their own. To our great surprise, after the service we learned that the professor was the guest of our cousin, Belinda Sprag, and at her house after dinner I had an opportunity to say to him:

"Mr. Ballou, call me your child, for you have to-day baptized me. I am a Universalist, I know, for I love your doctrine."

"Bless you, my daughter," was his reply. "G.o.d finds His own through time. May your young heart be made strong, and your life blossom with roses that have no thorns."

That was great honor to me; the touch of that hand on my head; those words addressed to me. We all went home, having had a feast of good things, and our blessed Clara, who had been the means of leading us to the light, sat all the way as in a dream, only saying:

"I have long known it was true."

Ben added his testimony to the rest.

"When I die," said he, "I want that man to preach my funeral sermon, if he will, and if he can't, I don't want any at all."

Dear boy, he had a loving heart; he was born later than either Hal or me, and had an earlier spiritual development. Is it not always so?

I could not enjoy my new thoughts in silence as Clara did, and gave vent to my theme in the strongest terms. Hal did not ridicule me at all: he was too sensible for this, but he smiled at my strong expressions, and said:

"You will preach yourself if you keep on, and I believe you would make converts. Your eyes are as large again as they were this morning."

"Then it must improve my looks, Hal," I said. "If so, I am glad, for in that respect I have always stood in the background. My brother is an artist, and must, of course, have the handsome face."

He laughed again, and added:

"He will never be ashamed of his sister, I think, and never say 'Emily did it,' even if she turns preacher."

Mr. Benton enquired--with his eyes--the meaning of those words.

I answered:

"Oh! Hal was forever shouting that in my earlier years at my many mistakes, until I almost hated the sound of my own name, for I was always doing the very things I tried not to, and I fear I have not finished all yet. And I thought, for a little, of the wrong light in which Mr. Benton held my strange talk with him.

I was each day more troubled regarding this, and especially so, since I had no one to talk with about it. Clara I must not tell, and I had resolved for her sake to be misunderstood indefinitely, for if I had failed in one point, I had gained in another. The burden was lifted from her, and she had told me the cloud was broken and she felt better, and added the strange words, "It may yet come near me; it seems as if a fringe of the cloud must yet touch me: but I am relieved for the present."

I feared to worry my mother, who, during all these days, was very busy and full of care. Aunt Hildy would hardly understand me, and as I was waiting for something to move as it were, to make room for me to step, I must still wait, and thought what a pity it was I had not waited in the beginning, and then when I did move make all things plain. But then it lay before me, around and within me, this strange compound of good thought and impulsive will, and I must reach and fall until, ah! I could not tell when I should graduate in this school.

I had now power to restrain myself in many ways, and that had been given in the days before described, when I pa.s.sed from girlhood to womanhood, but to sit satisfied and wait, I could not yet do. It seemed as if the wings of my thought must grow, and wanted to help me fly, and I was like a bird longing to get into the freedom that waited, and like the bird too, did not realize that my attempts would be in vain, and I could never get out of the cage until a hand opened its door. Therefore, full often I battled unwisely, but I certainly came to know those times, and never made a mistake that I did not realize just a moment too late. How foolish it was!

I prayed for strength, and after the baptism of Mr. Ballou's preaching, I thought, "This will help to make me stronger; now I shall make fewer mistakes."

This was a comfort and a light before me, but my heart sank a little, thinking I might have penance to do for those already committed,--coming events cast their shadows before.

So full of this thought my heart grew, that I asked Aunt Hildy one day if she ever felt trouble before it came, and if that feeling had ever helped her to avoid any part of what was to come.

"Well," said she,--she was coring and paring apples for pies,--taking up the towel and wiping one apple three or four times over in an absent way, "Well, Emily, I've had a host of troubles in my day. They began early, perhaps they'll end late, but there is one thing, the things we expect are agoin' to kill us, most allus turn out like the shadder of a gate post. You know the shadder sometimes will be clean across the road, but when you find the post itself 'taint more'n five feet high. Then again the things we don't expect 'll come some morning like a great harricane, and kill the marigolds of the heart in just a minit."

I was sorry for her sake I had asked the question, for I knew there was something she thought of that pained her dear old heart, and I kissed her wrinkled cheek and said:

"I hope you will always be with us, and trouble have no part in the matter."

"There, there, child, don't talk so; never mind kissin' my old face neither, I've allus said it only made it worse to think of it, and I've shut up my heart tight and done the best I could as it comes along. When I get in that new body I shall have over there," and her tearful eyes were looking upward then, "perhaps I can hope to have some love that'll touch that empty spot."

I turned to my work and left Aunt Hildy with the shadows of the past clinging about her, her feelings being too sacred for the gaze even of a friend. Every heart knoweth its bitterness, I thought, and secretly wondered if every heart had to bleed a little here, holding some sorrow close to itself. If so, our duty in life would ever be a struggle, whereas it seemed to me the world was so beautiful, and if every life could reflect this beauty, all would be easy, and the pleasure of well-doing be always at hand.

Aunt Peg said 'twas easy enough to preach, but hard work to practise. I began to realize it a little, and the teacher who gave me the most practical ill.u.s.trations was myself.

I wrote a long letter to Louis, telling him of our going to hear Mr.

Ballou preach, and of Matthias' coming among us, and I felt like making him my confessor, and wanted to tell him all about the frantic endeavor I had made for Clara's sake; but my letter was long enough when I felt this impulse, and I thought I could talk it all over with him when he came, and concluded to wait. And here is another lesson, for me to stop and reflect on. As time proved, that impulse was right, and I should have followed its guidance, while the sober second thought which I obeyed and of which I felt proud, led me to just the opposite of what I ought to have done. How was I to find myself out? If I yielded to impulse I was so often wrong, and in that instance I should certainly have been impulsive. Again comes in the text, "the ways of life are past comprehending."

Mr. Benton improved every opportunity to talk with me, and while I did not like the man at first, I became gradually interested in what he said; and when, in confidence, he informed me that Hal was in love with Mary Snow, I had a secret joy at receiving his confidence. He was eighteen years older than myself, and after my mind was settled regarding the wrong estimate in which I had held him, I treated his opinions with more deference than over before, and came to regard him as a good friend to us all.

I intimated to Clara one day that he was a much better man than I had thought, and she gave me no reply, but looked on me with a light of wonder in her eyes.

"He does not trouble you now, Clara, does he?"

"Not as before, Emily."

"Well, does he at all?"

"I cannot say I feel quite at ease, Emily dear," she replied.

And I said: "It is your beautifully sensitive nature, darling; you cannot recover the balance once lost, and the tender nerves that have been shaken are like strings that after a touch continue to vibrate."

"Perhaps so, Emily, but I shall be so glad when the day comes when no mask of smiles can cover the workings of the heart, so glad; when we can really know each other."

"Those are Louis' sentiments."

"Oh yes, my dear boy! he has a heart that beats as mine, Emily, and after many days it shall come to pa.s.s that the desires of his heart shall be gratified."

Something in her tone and manner made me feel strangely; a chill crept over me, and for a second I felt numb.

It pa.s.sed away, however, and through the gate of duty I found work, and left these thoughts.

When March came to us, father insisted that mother should go to Aunt Phebe's, if we could get along without her--she had a little hacking cough every spring, and he knew she needed the change. It was decided that she should go and stay a month, if she could keep away from home so long. Aunt Hildy said: "Why, Mis' Minot, go right along. Don't you take one st.i.tch of work with you neither. Go, and let your lungs get full of different air, and see what that'll do for you. Take along some everlasting flowers I've got, and make a tea and drink it while you're there, and let the tea and the air do their work together."

So, although it was a trial to mother to leave home, she went, and we were to be alone. There were a good many of us, but it seemed to me, the first week, that her place would not be filled by twenty others, and while I enjoyed the thought of her being free from care, I walked out in the cold March wind alone every night after supper, and let the tears fall. If I had been indoors Clara would surely have found me. It was on one of these walks that Mr. Benton overtook me, and pa.s.sed his arm within mine, saying:

"What does this mean, Emily," he dropped "Miss Minot" soon after the first talk, "this is the fifth time I have seen you go out at this hour alone; what is the matter? Are you in trouble?"

"And if I am," I said, "what have you to do with it?" at the same time trying to release his arm from mine.

"I have the right of a dear friend, I hope," he said, and the tears that would keep falling forced a confession from me and provoked his laughter, which grated on my ears at first, but he begged pardon for its seeming rudeness, and said he was thinking only of my going over the hills to cry, when I could have a whole house to fill with tears.