Our Little Lady Part 13

"Less than I said to her."

"You dunnot mean she hearkened you?"

"Not at first. But in the end, she hearkened me, and made me no answer."

Dan looked his visitor all over from head to foot.

"Well!" said he, and shook his head slowly. "Well!" and wiped his face with his ap.r.o.n, "Well!" he exclaimed a third time. "If I'd ha' knowed!

I'd ha' given forty marks [Note 1.] to see th' like o' that. Eh, do 'bide a minute, and let me take th' measure on you! T' chap that could strike our Filomena dumb mun ha' come straight fro' Heaven, for there isn't his like o' earth! Now, Father, do just tell a body, what did you say to her?"

"I told her how to be happy."

Dan stared. "She wants no tellin' that, I'll go bail! she's got every mortal thing her own way."

"That is not the way to be happy," answered the priest. "Nay, my son, she is a most unhappy woman, and her face shows it. Thou art happier far than she."

Dan dropped the big hammer in sheer astonishment, and if Father Thomas had not made a rapid retreat, more than his eyes and ears would have told him so.

"Me happier nor our Filomena! Me! Father, dunnot be angered wi' me, but either you're downright silly, or you're somewhat more nor other folks."

"I have told thee the truth, my son. Now, wilt thou do somewhat to help thy wife to be happy? If she is happy, she will be humble and meek-- happy, that is, in the way I mean."

"I'll do aught as 'll make our Filomena meek," replied Dan, with a shake of his grizzled head: "but how that's going to be shaped beats me, I can tell you. Mun I climb up to th' sky and stick nails into th' moon?"

"Nay," said the priest with a smile. "Thou shalt pray G.o.d to make her as a little child."

"That's a corker, _that_ is!" Dan picked up the hammer, and began meditatively to fas.h.i.+on a nail. "Our Ank'ret were a babby once," said he, as if to himself. "She were a bonnie un, too. She were, so! I used to sit o' th' bench at th' door of an even, wi' her on my knee, a-smilin' up like--eh, Father, but I'll tell you what, if them times could come back, it 'd be enough to make a chap think he'd getten into Heaven by mistake."

"I trust, my son, thou wilt some day find thee in Heaven, not by mistake," said the priest. "But if so, Daniel, thou must have a care to go the right road thither."

"Which road's that, Father?"

"It is a straight road, my son, and it is a narrow road. And the door to it goes right through the cross whereon Jesus Christ died for thee and me. Daniel, dost thou love the Lord Jesus?"

"Well, you see, Father, I'm not much acquaint wi' Him. He's a great way up, and I'm down here i' t' smithy."

"He will come down here and abide with thee, my son, if thou wilt but ask Him. So dear He loveth man, that He will come any whither on earth save into sin, if so be He may have man's company. 'Greater than this love hath no man, that he give his life for his friends.'"

"Well, that stands to reason," said Dan. "When man gives his life, he gives all there is of him."

"Thou sayest well. And is it hard to love man that giveth his life to save thine?"

"I reckon it 'd be harder to help it, Father."

Father Thomas turned as if to go. "My son," said he, "wilt thou let the Lord Jesus say to the angels round His Throne,--'I gave all there was of Me for Daniel Greensmith, and he doth not love Me for it?'"

The big smith had never had such an idea presented to him before. His simple, transparent, child-like nature came up into his eyes, and ran over. Men did not think it in those earlier ages any discredit to their manliness to let their hearts be seen. Perhaps they were wiser than we are.

"Eh, Father, but you never mean it'd be like that?" cried poor Dan.

"Somehow, it never come real to me, like as you've put it. Do you mean 'at He _cares_--that it makes any matter to Him up yonder, whether old Dan at t' smithy loves Him or not? I'm no-but a common smith. There's hundreds just like me. Does He really care, think you?"

"Thou art a man," said the priest, "and it was for men Christ died. And there is none other of thee, though there were millions like thee. Is a true mother content with any babe in exchange for her own, because there are hundreds of babes in the world? Nay, Daniel Greensmith, it was for thee the Lord Christ shed His blood on the cruel cross, and it is thyself whose love and thanksgivings He will miss, though all the harps of all the angels make music around His ear. Shall He miss them any longer, my son?"

Once more Dan threw aside the big hammer--this time on the inner side of the smithy.

"Father," said he, "you've knocked me clean o'er. I never knowed till now as it were real."

"As a little child!" said Father Thomas to himself, as he went back to Lincoln. "The road into the kingdom will be far smoother for him than her. Yet the good Lord can lead them both there."

The very next visit that Dan paid to Avice and Bertha showed them plainly that a change of some sort had come over him, and as time went on they saw it still more plainly. His heart had opened to the love of Christ like a flower to the sunlight. The moment that he really saw Him, he accepted Him. With how many is it not the case that they do not love Christ because they do not know Him, and they do not know Him because no one of those who do puts Him plainly before them?

It was much longer before Father Thomas and Avice saw any fruit of their prayers for Filomena. There was so much more to undo in her case than in her husband's, that the growth was a great deal slower and less apparent. Avice discovered that Dan's complaints were fewer, but she set it down entirely to the change in himself, long before she noticed that Filomena's voice was less sharp, and her fats of fury less frequent. But at length the day came when Filomena, having been betrayed into a very mild copy of one of her old storms of temper, would suddenly catch herself up and walk determinately out of the back door till she grew cool: and when she came back would lay her hand upon her husband's shoulder, and say--

"Dan, old man, I'm sorry I was bad to thee. Forgive me!"

And Dan, at first astounded beyond measure, grew to accept this conclusion as a matter of course, and to say--

"Let her alone, and she'll come round."

And then Avice's eyes were opened.

One day, when she was unusually softened by the death of Susanna's baby, Filomena opened her heart to her niece.

"Eh, Avice, it's hard work! n.o.body knows how hard, that hasn't had a temper as mastered 'em. I've pretty nigh to bite my tongue through, many a time a day. I wish I'd begun sooner--I do! It'd ha' come easier a deal then. But I'm trying hard, and I hope our Lord'll help me. Thou does think He'll help me, doesn't thou, Avice? I'm not too bad, am I?"

"Father Thomas says, Aunt," replied Avice, "that G.o.d helps all those who want His help: and the worse we are, the more we want of His mercy."

"That's true!" said Filomena.

"And Father Thomas says," continued Avice, "that we must all go to our Lord just like little children, ready to take what He sees good for us, and telling Him all our needs of body and soul, as a child would tell its mother."

They were walking slowly up Steephill when Avice said this.

"Father Thomas has one apt scholar," said the priest's unexpected voice behind her. "But it was a Greater than I, my daughter, who told His disciples that 'whosoever did not receive the kingdom of G.o.d as a little child, should in no wise enter therein.'"

Note 1. A mark was 13 s.h.i.+llings 4 pence, and was the largest piece of money then known.

THE END.