Helen and Arthur Part 5

When they came to the fence, surrounding the strawberry-field, Helen's steps involuntarily grew slower, and she hung back heavily on the hand of her companion. Her old fears came rus.h.i.+ng over her, drowning her new-born courage.

Arthur laid his hand on the top rail, and vaulted over as lightly as a bird, then held out his arms towards her.

"Climb, and I will catch you," said he, with an encouraging smile. Poor little Helen felt constrained to obey him, though she turned white as snow--and when he took her in his arms, he felt her heart beating and fluttering like the wings of a caged humming-bird.

"Ah, I see the silver bucket," he cried, "all filled with strawberries.

The enemy is fled; the coast is clear."

He still held her in his arms, while he stooped and lifted the bucket, then again vaulted over the fence, as if no burden impeded his movements.

"You are safe," said he, "and you can now gladden your mother's heart by this sweet offering. Are you sorry you came?"

"Oh! no," she replied, "I feel happy now." She insisted upon his eating part of the strawberries, but he refused, and as they walked home, he gathered green leaves and flowers, and made a garland round them.

"What makes you so good to me?" she exclaimed, with an irresistible impulse, looking gratefully in his face.

"Because I like you," he replied; "you remind me, too, of a dear little sister of mine, whom I love very tenderly. Poor unfortunate Alice! Your lot is happier than hers."

"What makes _me_ happier?" asked Helen, thinking that one who had so kind a brother ought to be happy.

"She is blind," he replied, "she never saw one ray of light."

"Oh! how dreadful!" cried Helen, "to live all the time in the dark! Oh!

I should be afraid to live at all!"

"I said you were happier, Helen; but I recall my words. She is not afraid, though all the time midnight shadows surround her. A sweet smile usually rests upon her face, and her step is light and springy as the gra.s.shopper's leap."

"But it must be so dreadful to be blind!" repeated Helen. "How I do pity her!"

"It is a great misfortune, one of the greatest that can be inflicted upon a human being--but she does not murmur. She confides in the love of those around her, and feels as if their eyes were her own. Were I to ask her to walk over burning coals, she would put her hand in mine, to lead her, so entire is her trust, so undoubting is her faith."

"How I wish I could be like her!" said Helen, in a tone of deep humility.

"You are like her at this moment, for you have gone where you believed great danger was lurking, trusting in my promise of protection and safety,--trusting in me, who am almost a stranger to you."

Helen's heart glowed within her at his approving words, and she rejoiced more than ever that she had obeyed his will. Her sympathies were painfully awakened for the blind child, and she asked him a thousand questions, which he answered with unwearied patience. She repeated over and over again the sweet name of Alice, and wished it were hers, instead of Helen.

At the great double gate, that opened into the wood-yard, Arthur left her, and she hastened on, proud of the victory she had obtained over herself. Mittie was standing in the back door; as Helen came up the steps, she pointed in derision at her soiled and disordered dress.

"I couldn't help it," said Helen, trying to pa.s.s her, "I fell down."

"Oh! what nice strawberries!" exclaimed Mittie, "and so many of them.

Give me some."

"Don't touch them, Mittie--they are for mother," cried Helen, spreading her hand over the top of the bucket, as Mittie seized the handle and jerked it towards her.

"You little, stingy thing, I _will_ have some," cried Mittie, plunging her hand in the midst of them, while the sweet wild flowers which Arthur's hand had scattered over them, and the s.h.i.+ning leaves with which he had bordered them, all fell on the steps. Helen felt as if scalding water were pouring into her veins, and in her pa.s.sion she lifted her hand to strike her, when a hollow cough, issuing from her mother's room, arrested her. She remembered, too, what the young doctor had said, "that it was harder to keep from doing wrong, than to do what was right."

"If he saw me strike Mittie, he would think it wrong," thought she, "though if he knew how bad she treats me, he'd say 'twas hard to keep from it."

Kneeling on one knee, she picked up the scattered flowers, and on every flower a dew drop fell, and sparkled on its petals.

They had a witness of whom they were not aware. The tall, gray figure of Miss Thusa, appeared in the opposite door, at the moment of Mittie's rude and greedy act. The meekness of Helen exasperated her still more against the offender, and striding across the pa.s.sage, she seized Mittie by the arm, and swung her completely on one side.

"Let me alone, old Madam Thusa," exclaimed Mittie, "I'm not going to mind _you_. That I'm not. You always take her part against me. Every body does--that makes me hate her."

"For shame! for shame!" cried the tall monitor, "to talk so of your little sister. You're like the girl in the fairy tale, who was so spiteful that every time she spoke, toads and vipers crawled out of her mouth. Helen, I'll tell you that story to-night, before you go to sleep."

Helen could have told her that she would rather not hear any thing of vipers that night, but she feared Miss Thusa would be displeased and think her ungrateful. Notwithstanding Mittie's unkindness and violence of temper, she did not like to have such dreadful ideas a.s.sociated with her. When, however, she heard the whole story, at the usual witching hour, she felt the same fascination which had so often enthralled her.

As it was summer, the blazing fire no longer illuminated the hearth, but a little lamp, whose rays flickered in the wind that faintly murmured in the chimney. Miss Thusa sat spinning by the open window, in the light of the solemn stars, and as she waxed more and more eloquent, she seemed to derive inspiration from their beams. She could see one twinkling all the time in the little gourd of water, swinging from her distaff, and in spite of her preference for the dark and the dreadful, she could not help stopping her wheel, to admire the trembling beauty of that solitary star.

CHAPTER III.

"Pale as the corse o'er which she leaned, As cold, with stifling breath, Her spirit sunk before the might, The majesty of death."

"A man severe he was, and stern to view, I knew him well, and every truant knew-- Yet he was kind, or if severe in aught, The love he bore for learning was in fault."

_Goldsmith._

The darkened room, the stilly tread, the m.u.f.fled knocker and slowly closing door, announced the presence of that kingly guest, who presides over the empire of _terror_ and the grave. The long-expected hour was arrived, and Mrs. Gleason lay supported by pillows, whose soft down would never more sink under the pressure of her weary head. The wasting fires of consumption had burned and burned, till nothing but the ashes of life were left, save a few smouldering embers, from which flashed occasionally a transient spark. Mr. Gleason sat at the bed's head, with that grave, stern, yet bitter grief on his countenance which bids defiance to tears. She had been a gentle and devoted wife, and her quiet, home-born virtues, not always fully appreciated, rose before his remembrance, like the angels in Jacob's dream, climbing up to Heaven.

Louis stood behind him, his head bowed upon his shoulder, sobbing as if his heart would break. Helen was nestled in her father's arms, with the most profound and unutterable expression of grief and awe and dread, on her young face. She was told that her mother was dying, going away from her, never to return, and the anguish this conviction imparted would have found vent in shrieks, had not the awe with which she beheld the cold, gray shadows of death, slowly, solemnly rolling over the face she loved best on earth, the face which had always seemed to her the perfection of mortal beauty, paralyzed her tongue, and frozen the fountain of her tears. Mittie stood at the foot of the bed, looking at her mother through the opening of the curtain, partly veiled by the long, white fringe that hung heavily from the folds, and which the wind blew to and fro, with something like the sweep of the willow. The windows were all open to admit the air to the faintly heaving lungs of the sufferer, and gradually one curtain after another was lifted, as the struggle for breath and air increased, and the light of departing day streamed in on the sunken and altered features it was never more to illuminate. Mittie was awe struck, but she manifested no tenderness or sensibility. It was astonis.h.i.+ng how so young a child could see _anyone_ die, and above all a _mother_--a mother, so kind and affectionate, with so little emotion. She was far more oppressed by the realization of her own mortality, for the first time pressed home upon her, than by her impending bereavement. What were the feelings of that speechless, expiring, but fully conscious mother, as she gazed earnestly, wistfully, thrillingly on the group that surrounded her? There was the husband, whom she had so much loved, he, who often, when weary with business, and perplexed with anxiety, had seemed careless and indifferent, but who, as life waned away, had shown the tenderness of love's early day, and who she knew would mourn her deeply and _long_. There was her n.o.ble, handsome, warm-hearted, high-souled boy--the object of her pride, as well as her affection--he, who had never willfully given her a moment's pain--and though his irrepressive sighs and suffocating sobs she would have hushed, at the expense of all that remained of life to her--there was still a music in them to her dying ear, that told of love that would not forget, that would twine in perennial garlands round her grave. Poor little Helen, as she looked at her pale, agonized face, and saw the _terror_ imprinted there, she remembered what she had once said to Miss Thusa, of being after death an object of _terror_ to her child, and she felt a sting that no language could express. She longed to stretch out her feeble arms, to fold them round this child of her prayers and fears, to carry her with her down the dark valley her feet were treading, to save her from trials a nature like hers was so ill-fitted to sustain.

She looked from her to Mittie, the cold, insensible Mittie, whose large, black eyes, serious, but not sad, were riveted upon her through the white fringe of the curtain, and another sting sharper still went through her heart.

"Oh! my child," she would have said, could her thoughts have found utterance, "forget me if you will--mourn not for me, the mother who bore you--but be kind, be loving to your little sister, more young and helpless than yourself. You are strong and fearless--she is a timid, trembling, clinging dove. Oh! be gentle to her, for my sake, gentle as I have ever been to you. And you, too, my child, the time will come when you will _feel_, when your heart will awake from its sleep--and if you only feel for yourself, you will be wretched."

"Why art thou cast down, oh! my soul? and why art thou disquieted within me?" were the meditations of the dying woman, when turning from earth, she raised her soul on high. "I leave my children in the hands of a heavenly Father, as well as a mighty G.o.d--in the care of Him who died that man might live forevermore."

But there was one present at this scene, who seemed a priestess presiding over some mystic rite. It was Miss Thusa. Notwithstanding the real kindness of her heart, she felt a strange and intense delight in witnessing the last struggle between vitality and death, in gazing on the marble, soulless features, from which life had departed, and composing the icy limbs for the garniture of the grave. She would have averted suffering and death, if she could, from all, but since every son and daughter of Adam were doomed to bear them, she wanted the privilege of beholding the conflict, and gazing on the ruins. She would sit up night after night, regardless of fatigue, to watch by the pillow of sickness and pain, and yet she felt an unaccountable sensation of disappointment when her cares were crowned with success, and the hour of danger was over. She would have climbed mountains, if it were required, to carry water to dash on a burning dwelling, yet wished at the same time to see the flames grow redder and broader, and more destructive.

She would have liked to live near the smoke and fire of battle, so that she might wander in contemplation among the unburied slain.

The sun went down, but the sun of life still lingered on the verge of the horizon. The dimness of twilight mingled with the shadows of death.

"Take me out," cried Helen, struggling to be released from her father's arms. "Oh! take me from here. It don't seem mother that I see."

"Hush--hush," said Mr. Gleason, sternly, "you disturb her last moments."

But Helen, whose feelings were wrought up to a pitch which made stillness impossible, and restraint agonizing, darted from between her father's knees and rushed into the pa.s.sage. But how dim and lonely it was! How melancholy the cat looked, waiting near the door, with its calm, green eyes turned towards the chamber where its gentle mistress lay! It rubbed its white, silky sides against Helen, purring solemnly and musically, but Helen recollected many a frightful tale of cats, related by Miss Thusa, and recoiled from the contact. She longed to escape from herself, to escape from a world so dark and gloomy. Her mother was going, and why should she stay behind? _Going!_ yet lying so still and almost breathless there! She had been told that the angels came down and carried away the souls of the good, but she looked in vain for the track of their silvery wings. One streak of golden ruddiness severed the gray of twilight, but it resembled more a fiery bar, closing the gates of heaven, than a radiant opening to the spirit-land. While she stood pale and trembling, with her hand on the latch of the door, afraid to stay where she was, afraid to return and confront the mystery of death, the gate opened, and Arthur Hazleton came up the steps. He had been there a short time before, and went away for something which it was thought might possibly administer relief. He held out his hand, and Helen clung to it as if it had the power of salvation. He read what was pa.s.sing in the mind of the child, and pitied her. He did not try to reason with her at that moment, for he saw it would be in vain, but drawing her kindly towards him, he told her he was sorry for her. His words, like "flaky snow in the day of the sun," melted as they fell and sunk into her heart, and she began to weep. He knew that her mother could not live long, and wis.h.i.+ng to withdraw her from a scene which might give a shock from which her nerves would long vibrate, he committed her to the care of a neighbor, who took her to her own home.

Mrs. Gleason died at midnight, while Helen lay in a deep sleep, unconscious of the deeper slumbers that wrapped the dead.

And now a terrible trial awaited her. She had never looked on the face of death, and she shrunk from the thought with a dread which no language can express. When her father, sad and silent, with knit brow and quivering lip, led her to the chamber where her mother lay, she resisted his guidance, and declared she would never, never go in _there_. It would have been well to have yielded to her wild pleadings, her tears and cries. It would have been well to have waited till reason was stronger and more capable of grappling with terror, before forcing her to read the first awful lesson of mortality. But Mr. Gleason thought it his duty to require of her this act of filial reverence, an act he would have deemed it sacrilegious to omit. He was astonished, grieved, angry at her resistance, and in his excitement he used some harsh and bitter words.

Finding persuasions and threats in vain, he summoned Miss Thusa, telling her he gave into her charge an unnatural, rebellious child, with whose strange temper he was then too weak to contend. It was a pity he summoned such an a.s.sistant, for Miss Thusa thought it impious as well as unnatural, and she had bound herself too by a sacred promise, that she would not suffer Helen to _fear_ in death the mother whom in life she had so dearly loved. Helen, when she looked into those still, commanding eyes, felt that her doom was sealed, and that she need struggle no more.

In despair, rather than submission, she yielded, if it can be called yielding, to suffer herself to be dragged into a room, which she never entered afterwards without dread.

The first glance at the interior of the chamber, struck a chill through her heart. It was so still, so chill, so dim, yet so white. The curtains of white muslin fell in long, slumberous folds down to the floor, their fringes resting lifelessly on the carpet. The tables and chairs were all covered with white linen, and something shrouded in white was stretched out on a table in the centre of the room. The sheet which covered it flapped a moment as the door opened, and then hung motionless. The outline of a human form beneath was visible, and when Miss Thusa lifted her in her arms and carried her to the spot, Helen was conscious of an awful curiosity growing up within her that was stronger than her terrors. Her breath came quick and short, a film came over her eyes, and cold drops of sweat stood upon her forehead, yet she would not now have left the room without penetrating into the mystery of death. Miss Thusa laid her hand upon the sheet and turned it back from the pale and ghastly face, on whose brow the mysterious signet of everlasting rest was set. Still, immovable, solemn, placid--it lay beneath the gaze, with shrouded eye, and cheek like concave marble, and hueless, waxen lips.

What depth, what grandeur, what duration in that repose! What inexpressible sadness, yet what sublime tranquillity! Helen held her breath, bending slowly, lower and lower, as if drawn down by a mighty, irresistible power, till her cheek almost touched the clay-cold cheek over which she leaned. Then Miss Thusa folded back the sheet still farther, and exposed the shrouded form, which she had so carefully prepared for its last dread espousals. The fragrance of white roses and geranium leaves profusely scattered over the body, mingled with the cold odor of mortality, and filled the room with a deadly, sickening perfume.