The Inner Flame E-Book

Clara Louise Burnham

• Herausgeber: Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Seitenzahl: 431

Beschreibung

Soft snowflakes whirled around the lonely mountain cabin under a November sky. The wind that had rushed up the valley sighing and groaning between the wooded walls, now roared its wild delight in the freedom of the heights. The twilight was deepening fast. Two women were alone in the cabin. The one who was at home stooped and put another log on the blazing fire. The other could not have stooped, no matter how willing her spirit, so straitly and fashionably was her ample figure bound by artful bone and steel. "Mercy, Mary!" she ejaculated, standing stock still in the middle of the room, fixed there by a triumphant shriek of the rioting wind. "I never had the least desire to go up in an aeroplane. Are you well anchored here?" "Like a lichen on a rock," returned Mary Sidney, smiling. "Take off your hat, Isabel, and be comfy." "Do you think we must stay all night?" demurred the visitor. "You know I love you, Mary, and if that wind would just let us hear ourselves think, I wouldn't ask anything better than an evening's chat with you alone." "You wouldn't as it is," returned Mrs. Sidney soothingly, approaching her cousin and unpinning the veil which Mrs. Fabian had not raised. The visitor clung to her wraps with the feeling that an entire readiness to flee back to the haunts of men would aid her to depart. Mary Sidney's calm amused smile carried some reassurance. It flickered across her face as the firelight flickered across the dark rafters above.

Leseprobe

The Inner Flame

The Inner FlameCHAPTER ICHAPTER IICHAPTER IIICHAPTER IVCHAPTER VCHAPTER VICHAPTER VIICHAPTER VIIICHAPTER IXCHAPTER XCHAPTER XICHAPTER XIICHAPTER XIIICHAPTER XIVCHAPTER XVCHAPTER XVICHAPTER XVIICHAPTER XVIIICHAPTER XIXCHAPTER XXCHAPTER XXICHAPTER XXIICHAPTER XXIIICHAPTER XXIVCHAPTER XXVCHAPTER XXVICHAPTER XXVIICHAPTER XXVIIICopyright

The Inner Flame

Clara Louise Burnham

CHAPTER I

A NOVEMBER NIGHTSoft snowflakes whirled around the lonely mountain cabin under a November sky. The wind that had rushed up the valley sighing and groaning between the wooded walls, now roared its wild delight in the freedom of the heights. The twilight was deepening fast. Two women were alone in the cabin. The one who was at home stooped and put another log on the blazing fire. The other could not have stooped, no matter how willing her spirit, so straitly and fashionably was her ample figure bound by artful bone and steel."Mercy, Mary!" she ejaculated, standing stock still in the middle of the room, fixed there by a triumphant shriek of the rioting wind. "I never had the least desire to go up in an aeroplane. Are you well anchored here?""Like a lichen on a rock," returned Mary Sidney, smiling. "Take off your hat, Isabel, and be comfy.""Do you think wemuststay all night?" demurred the visitor. "You know I love you, Mary, and if that wind would just let us hear ourselves think, I wouldn't ask anything better than an evening's chat with you alone.""You wouldn't as it is," returned Mrs. Sidney soothingly, approaching her cousin and unpinning the veil which Mrs. Fabian had not raised. The visitor clung to her wraps with the feeling that an entire readiness to flee back to the haunts of men would aid her to depart. Mary Sidney's calm amused smile carried some reassurance. It flickered across her face as the firelight flickered across the dark rafters above."ItoldHenry I thought the sky looked threatening before we left town," declared the guest while she submitted to the gentle touch, "but nothing would do but that he should visit the mine this very afternoon. Isn't this fearful, Mary?" as a renewed gust shook the firelit rafters until they creaked heavily."Oh, no, this sounds a great deal worse than it is," was the response."You're comforting me, I know you are"; and Mrs. Fabian, denuded of her correct hat, permitted herself to take the offered chair by the fire. "I hope, though, that you have a kennel of St. Bernard dogs in the back yard. Ishouldlike to see Henry again, bad as he is!"Mrs. Sidney took the other chair and rolled a blazing log to a better position."You'll see the men coming along in a little while—when they grow hungry," she returned placidly."And how in the world do you get servants up here?" demanded the other."We don't. We could get a Chinaman, but if we had him we'd have to amuse him, there's no one else for him to talk to, so we go without.""Horrors!" ejaculated Mrs. Fabian with solemn repugnance. "And you live here alone!"The hostess laughed at her tone. "Not enough of the year to dislike it. One learns a lot of things in these hills—bidding farewell to time, for instance. You see a man with a gun tramping through the valley and you rush to the door, and cry out, 'Hey, there, you with the gun, what day is this?' and the man turns and shouts back, 'You can't prove it by me!'"Mrs. Sidney laughed again and her cousin shuddered."Thank God for civilization!" ejaculated the latter devoutly; then, as the window-glass sucked in and out with a cracking sound, "Give me my hat, Mary," she said, sitting up. "If we're going down the mountain-side, let's go decently and in order.""For shame, you Maine woman!" was the laughing rejoinder. "Your sea-captains would call this 'a breeze o' wind!' That's all. That's another thing one becomes acquainted with up here: the wind. I didn't know anything about it when I came. You should be here some nights if you call this a storm! I used to set my dish-pans out at the door; but when a few had whirled down the mountain-side into the valley, I learned caution. One can't go around the corner here and buy a dish-pan.""Mary," Mrs. Fabian eyed her with bewildered admiration, "you're wonderful! You didn't used to be wonderful," she added in an argumentative tone. "Once you'd have made just as much fuss about this as I would. You remember—if you try, you'll remember perfectly—that I warned you, more than twenty-five years ago, not to marry a mining engineer. I told you then it was just as bad as marrying an army officer. There would be no repose about it, and no comfort. You see I was right. Here we are, to all intents and purposes, in a shrieking balloon, and you call it home!" The speaker kept a watchful eye on the rattling casement and drew herself up with renewed tension at each wind blast, but nevertheless she talked on."With it all you haven't as many lines in your face as I have, and your hair is as brown as ever. Mine would be white if I lived here instead of in New York. And the calmness of your eyes, and your smile! Tell me, Mary, tell me now honestly,—I shall sympathize with you,—isit the calmness of despair?"Mary Sidney did not smile. She looked into the depths of the fire and her guest wondered what memories were unfolding themselves to her rapt vision."No," she answered simply at last, "such calmness as I possess is not of despair, but of—faith." The speaker paused before the utterance of the last word as if hesitating for the one which should best express her meaning."Do you mean something religious?" asked Mrs. Fabian stiffly.The stiffness was not disapproval. It was owing to the divided attention she was bestowing upon the storm, lest if she took her mind off the wind it might seize the advantage and hurl the cabin from its moorings."I should think a person wouldhaveto be religious here," she went on. "You must be reduced—simplyreducedto trusting in Providence!"Mary Sidney smiled at the fire. "I didn't have a trusting disposition. I didn't have even a happy disposition, as you evidently remember.""Well," returned Isabel, "it wasn't a bad one: I didn't imply anything like that; but you were one of the spoiled-beauty sort of girls, not a bit cut out for hardship," the speaker looked judicially at the once familiar face, softened from its old brilliancy. "What an advantage it is to have beautiful eyes!" she added bluntly. "They don't desert you when other things go;—not that it matters a bit what sort of eyes a woman has, living the life you have.""Oh, Allan thinks it does," returned Mary in her restful manner."Does he appreciate you?" Mrs. Fabian asked the question almost angrily.Mrs. Sidney smiled. "We don't talk much about that, but we're better companions, happier, dearer, than we were twenty-five years ago."Her cousin gazed curiously. "Then it did turn out all right. You've written so little to your friends. How could your relatives tell?""You see, now, why," returned the other. "There's not much letter-material here, and even when we're living in town, all our friends and our pursuits are so foreign to the people at home. Little by little one gets out of the way of writing.""Don't you ever long for Fifth Avenue?" asked Mrs. Fabian suddenly, her cousin's exile impressing her more and more as utter forlornity."Oh, no, not for many years.""You never could have kept your figure there as you have here," admitted the other in a spirit of justice. "I must say that," and the speaker composed her own rigid armor into a less uncomfortable position."Do your own housework, Isabel," advised the hostess with a smile."Heavens! it is too late to talk to me about that. I've enough to do without housework, I should hope. You've no idea how much worse things have grown in twenty-five years, Mary. A woman has so much on her mind now that nothing but regular massage from the crown of her head to her heels will offset it. The modistes and milliners are in a conspiracy to change styles so often that it takes active thought to keep abreast of them. Then you no sooner settle down really to learn Bridge, for instance, and feel that you can hold your own, than everybody begins playing Auction! And to know what people are talking about at luncheons you must see plays, and skim through books, reading at least enough so you can express an opinion; not that anybody listens. They all talk at once, their one and only object seems to be to get their own ideas out of their systems. I was glad to send Kathleen off to school. It does seem as if the girls had to go to college to escape as great a rush as we grownups live in. Then when they come back, having had another environment for four years, they adjust themselves to their own homes with such a sense of superiority that it makes youtired; that's what it does, Mary,tired. I've had a taste of it this summer. Kathleen has another year to go, but already she is perfectly changed. She cares no more for my advice, I assure you, than if I had just come down from Mars and had no judgment as to the things of this world. She's well-bred, of course,—I hope no daughter of mine could be less than well-bred,—but when I give her directions, or try to guide her in any way, there's a twinkle in her eye that I resent, Mary, I resent it distinctly. So there you are!" Mrs. Fabian gestured with a perfectly kept hand whereon a blazing gem flashed in the firelight. "There we are between Scylla and Charybdis. We either have to send our girls to college and let the little upstarts think they've outgrown us, or else have them rushed to death at home, keep them up on tonics, and let them sleep till noon!"With this dismal peroration Mrs. Fabian sat as far back in her chair as disciplined adipose would permit, and shuddered again at the wind."Is a son an easier proposition then, in that madding crowd of yours?""A boy does seem to have his life more plainly mapped out than a girl. Edgar is in his father's office." The speaker sighed unconsciously. "What is your boy like, Mary?"Mrs. Sidney kept silence for a thoughtful moment before answering."He is like Pegasus harnessed to a coal-wagon," she said at last slowly."How very extraordinary. What do you mean?"Instead of replying, Mrs. Sidney went to a table in the far corner of the cabin and brought therefrom a portfolio which she opened on the chair beside her guest.A mass of sketches was disclosed,—charcoal, water-color, oil. Mrs. Sidney lifted one, and held it before the other's eyes.Mrs. Fabian raised her lorgnette."Why, it's you, Mary; and it's capital!" she ejaculated.Another and another sheet was offered for her inspection."Why, they're all of you. The artist must be in love with you."Mary Sidney gave her a slight smile. "I hope so, a little, but it was Hobson's choice when it came to models. Phil seldom could get any one beside me. Here's one of his father. He had to do it slyly behind a newspaper, for Allan is rather impatient of Phil's tendency.""So that is what your boy is at! It's real talent, isn't it?""Yes, it is," returned the mother with quiet conviction."And where is he studying?""He has never studied anything but mining engineering. He is working with his father here."The unconscious sadness of the speaker's tone impressed her listener."He does landscapes, too," went on the mother, lifting one after another of the sketches of mountain, valley, and streamlet, "a little of everything, you see." Mrs. Sidney regarded the work wistfully."Why, they're lovely," declared Mrs. Fabian. "Why don't you pin them up on the walls?""Because it rather annoys Phil's father, to see them, and it only tantalizes the boy.""So Mr. Sidney isn't willing he should study?""I don't think he would thwart us if he saw any hope in it, but one can't enter on the life of an art-student without any capital. Allan knows there is a living for Phil in the work of a mining engineer, so he has discouraged the boy's talent.""It is a great responsibility to thwart a child's bent," declared Mrs. Fabian impressively."I have always felt so. I used to be very restless and anxious about it. My husband seemed to feel that because Phil was a strapping boy, a natural athlete, that painting was a womanish profession for him. He had the ability to help him into mining engineering lines, and he always pooh-poohed the idea of Phil's attempting to be an artist." Mrs. Sidney gave a little shrug. "We didn't have the money anyway, so Allan naturally has had his way.""One can't blame him," returned Mrs. Fabian, who had relaxed as the wind ceased to shake the cabin. "Painting is even more precarious than acting; yet what a talent the boy has!"She held before her a bold sketch in charcoal of the mountain-side in the winter—few in strokes, but striking in its breadth and power."He has had an offer from a newspaper in Denver to take the position of cartoonist. His ability for caricature is good. See these of Allan."Mrs. Fabian laughed as she examined the small sheets. "I haven't seen your husband for ten years, Mary, but these recall his clean-cut face better than a photograph would, I believe. Phil rather gets back at his father in these, doesn't he?""Oh, Allan laughed at them too. He's secretly proud of Phil's cleverness, even while he discourages it. He tells him it is all right for an accomplishment, but a forlorn hope for a living.""And right he is," responded Mrs. Fabian, laying down the sketches. "Look at Aunt Mary's experience. There she has lived alone all these years and given her life to the attempt to make a name in the artistic world. I go sometimes to see her, of course, for there she is right in town, but her pictures"—Mrs. Fabian lifted her eyes to the rafters—"they're daubs!""I know," returned Mary Sidney, looking back into the fire. "She sent me one on my last birthday. She never forgets her name-child."Mrs. Fabian laughed. "I fancy you wished she would, for that time.""No," returned the hostess, slowly, "I think Aunt Mary sees more than she has the technique to express. She gets an effect."Mrs. Fabian raised her eyebrows. "She certainly does. She makes me want to run a mile.""The gift led to our having a little correspondence. I sent her a couple of Phil's sketches and she was delighted with them.""She might well be," was the answer. There was a brief silence, then the visitor continued: "So Phil is something of a bone of contention between you and his father?""It is our only difference. Yet it can scarcely even be called that, because it is a fact that we haven't the money to give him the start he should have."Mrs. Fabian looked at her cousin curiously."So this new calmness of yours—this repose. It is resignation, at least, if not despair."Mary Sidney smiled at the fire. "No," she returned, "I told you. It is faith.""Religion?""Yes, religion. Not the sort of ideas we were brought up in, Isabel. Something quite different.""What is it, then? Where did you find it?""It found me.""How mysterious! Is that wind coming up again, Mary?""How it blew that night!" said Mary Sidney thoughtfully, still looking into the fire. "It was just before Thanksgiving, I remember, five years ago. Allan and I had come up to the mine, Phil had gone back to college, and one night a belated traveller, overtaken by the storm which came up as suddenly as this, stopped at the door and asked if he could stay all night with us. He was one of these vital men, full of energy, who seem to exhale good cheer. Allan thoroughly enjoyed a talk with him that evening, and when we went to bed I remember his sighing and remarking that a man must be either a fool or a philosopher who could keep such an optimistic outlook on life as this Mr. Tremaine. I returned that perhaps our guest had struck a gold-mine here in the mountains, and I remember how Allan grumbled—'Either that, or the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.'"Allan came in here once, where we had left the guest to sleep on the couch, to see if he wanted anything; and he found him reading in front of the embers. When he came back he remarked: 'That fellow has a smile that doesn't usually last beyond the tenth year.' The next morning dawned bright and our guest was in haste to depart. He tried in the nicest way to pay us for taking in a stranger, and we quite honestly told him that if any money were to pass it should go from us to him for cheering our exile. He took from his pocket a small black book and held it out to me. 'Then,' he said, 'may I leave with you a little book which has broken up the clouds of life for me, and let the light stream through? You have time up here to read,—and to think?' He made the addition with that smile which had roused Allan's curiosity, shook hands with us both, thanked us again, mounted his horse and rode away. We never saw him afterward. I often wish I knew where he was, that I might thank him.""What was the book?" asked Mrs. Fabian, impressed by the fervor of the other's tone."A—a commentary on the Bible. A new light on the meaning of the Bible.""How queer! I'm sure I thought our family knew as much about the Bible as the average of decent people."Mrs. Fabian's tone was slightly resentful."We did," returned Mary Sidney."So that's what you meant a few minutes ago by the calm of faith."Mrs. Sidney nodded. "I know now what that sentence means: 'Cast your burden on the Lord.' Phil is the most precious thing on earth to me. The years seem to be slipping by without showing us a possible path to what we wish. 'Wait patiently on the Lord' doesn't mean inaction either. I've learned that. I know that at the right time—the right moment—circumstances will arise to show us if Phil is to—"A sudden blast of wind brought a start and a muffled exclamation from the guest, and at the same instant a stamping sounded outside. The lamp-flames rose wildly, and smoked in the instant of opening the door wide enough to admit the lithe form of a man whose shoulders and soft felt hat glistened with snow. He quickly closed the door and stamped again, taking off the hat from his short damp locks and shaking it vigorously."Phil, this is my cousin, Mrs. Fabian," said Mrs. Sidney. "You used to call her Aunt Isabel when you were a little chap and we went to visit her once. Do you remember?""When a cousin is once removed she becomes an aunt," declared Mrs. Fabian, looking the young man over with approval."My hand is too wet to shake," he said, meeting her interested gaze, his own luminous in the firelight."Lucky boy! You have your mother's eyes!" she exclaimed."Oh, no," said Mary Sidney; "Phil's are blue.""Dark with terror, then!" exclaimed Mrs. Fabian, again anxious. "Isn't the storm frightful?"Phil's amused glance sought his mother's."It's sort of spitting outside," he returned, unbuttoning his corduroy coat."You're making fun of a tenderfoot," said Mrs. Fabian, watching his keen face admiringly. "Don't pretend. What have you done with my poor innocent husband?""He'll be up here in a few minutes with my poor innocent father who has been showing him why he'll never be a millionaire out of that mine.""What do I care if he isn't, so long as he isn't lost in this storm!""I came on ahead because the mail had just been brought in." As he spoke, the young man brought a small bunch of letters and papers from an inner pocket."A great excitement, Isabel," said the hostess. "Only twice a week, you know.""There's another letter from the Denver paper," went on Phil, looking at his mother steadily."You'll forgive us if we open everything, won't you, Isabel?" asked Mrs. Sidney."Indeed, yes. Don't mind me." Mrs. Fabian returned to her chair by the fire and regarded the pair who seated themselves by the table.Phil had slipped off the damp coat, and his arm in its striped linen sleeve was thrown around his mother's shoulders.The visitor's eyes filled with something like envy. Kathleen and Edgar were her step-children, the boy had been five years of age when she began to be, to use her own declaration, the best stepmother in the world. Edgar would never think of reading his letters with her in this frankly affectionate attitude. Must one live on a mountain-top, she wondered, to win the sort of look she had seen in this son's eyes?"I've been showing your Aunt Isabel your sketches, Phil," said Mrs. Sidney, holding open a letter they had just read. "I told her about the Denver paper. This is another offer from them, Isabel, an increased offer.""I'm sure that's very flattering," returned Mrs. Fabian.Phil did not speak. His straight brows were knit in perplexity, and his lips were set in the look of longing that his mother knew."I don't know this writing from New York," said Mrs. Sidney, opening the next letter.Glancing over it she gave a startled exclamation."Whew!" breathed the boy, reading over her shoulder. "Poor Aunt Mary!""Isabel, Aunt Mary has gone!" exclaimed Mrs. Sidney."What! I didn't know she was ill. She wasn't ill. Who is there to attend to things? Who wrote you?""Eliza Brewster. This is from her. It was very sudden. She had been at work at her easel an hour before. How sad it seems! How lonely! I wish we had both been there, Isabel. There is the letter." Phil took it across to Mrs. Fabian. "You see. She was buried day before yesterday. Oh, I'm glad we had that little interchange in the summer. Eliza loves her, but, after all, she is not her own."Phil mechanically opened another letter. His thoughts were with that unknown relative with cravings like to his, working through the gathering years toward a goal which had ever retreated before her. He unfolded a business letter. It enclosed a small sealed envelope addressed to himself in another handwriting."Aunt Mary's!" said his mother. The son's arm was again around her as with heads close together they perused the following:—My dear Grand-Nephew, Philip Sidney:—When you open this letter, I shall have gone to a world where surely I shall be permitted to come nearer to the source of beauty.My family all consider me a failure. I know it. They have laughed at my poor efforts. I know it; but since your mother wrote to me a month ago, sending me your sketches and telling me your longings, I have felt that out in the free Western country, there lives one with my blood in his veins, who will understand the thirst that has led me on, and nerved me to untiring effort—that has made it my only hope of happiness to live as I have lived, and work as I have worked. He will also understand, perhaps, that few as my rewards have been, I have occasionally felt that some beauty has crept through my brain and been fixed to the canvas, and that such moments have given me the highest bliss this world could bestow.For a month, then, I have taken comfort in my artist-boy, no matter if you are known to others as an engineer. I have kept on my easel the photograph your mother sent me, and every day while I work, I look from time to time into your eyes, your mother's lovely eyes. I rejoice in your thick hair, and your splendid chin and firm, full-curved mouth. It isn't often that a head wanders from the Louvre and becomes set on a pair of modern shoulders. I, the old woman, peering through her spectacles, and painting with a hand that is often far from steady, have found a joy in studying the harmony of your promise. You have my blood in your veins, but you will succeed where I have failed. A happy failure, Philip. Don't feel sad for me. I've had moments of joy that no one knew. No one took the trouble to know; but nobody is to blame. Lives are very full in these rushing days.I believe in you, and I long for you to get started toward that land where you fain would be. Your mother says that the door hasn't opened yet. Looking into your young eyes, a great thought came to me. Supposing I, the ineffectual, could set that door ajar! With the thought came the first great regret for my poverty. Never mind, thought I stoutly; if I can set that door a wee bit open, his young strength can do the rest!I have had warnings that soon the great door will be opened for me; the door that ushers in to the heart's desire. Mine has been for Truth and Beauty, O God, Thou knowest!So I am making my will—such a poor little short will; but all for you, my kindred spirit, my knight who will deliver from failure, my Philip Sidney.The faithful maid Eliza will take care of my effects for you. You will find some useful things among the paraphernalia here. I look at my old easel and wonder if it will ever be promoted to hold a canvas of yours.This letter will be enclosed to you in one from my lawyer, telling you the business side of my wishes. The heart side no one can tell. I swell with longing for your success, and happiness; and so good-bye.The mother who never had a son, gains one in you. The painter who never was an artist, becomes one in you!And so, dear, I am your happyAunt Mary.Mary Sidney and her boy exchanged a look. With unsteady hands Phil straightened the legal letter, and they read it together. Then they rose from the table with one accord.Mrs. Fabian, wrapped in thought, looked up at the sudden movement.Phil's concentrated gaze went past her to the fire, and he stood motionless, one hand leaning on the table, the other arm around his mother. Mary Sidney clasped the rustling paper to her breast. All the self-forgetfulness of mother-love shone in her wet eyes as she met Mrs. Fabian's questioning look."Isabel, I told you it would come," she said. "I told you we should know. The light is here. Phil is going to New York."

CHAPTER II

SEVERED COMPANIONSHIP

Eliza Brewster could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times that tears had escaped her pale eyes. She had always felt for those who wept easily, the same leniency without comprehension that she entertained for women who fainted.

Trials had come and gone in her life; but never, since the day when she discovered some boys maltreating her cat, had she shed such tears as flowed now in her sorrow. The cat's abbreviated tail bore witness still to that day's conflict, but both his wound and hers had healed.

When would this new wound cease to ache and palpitate! Each day there in the lonely flat, Eliza Brewster renewed war with the memories to which she had no mind to succumb. The gentleness of her mistress, her innocent, ever-springing hope, her constant disappointments, the solitariness of her narrow life, the neglect of her relatives—all these things recurred to the faithful handmaiden with the terrific appeal which contracts the newly bereft heart, causing it to bleed afresh. Mary Ballard, in spite of her twenty years' greater age, had been child as well as mistress to the faithful woman, who cared for the quiet, shy dreamer of dreams through the twenty-five years of the latter's widowhood.

Now Eliza's occupation was gone. All her rather hard philosophy, all her habitual self-possession, was swamped in a world where she could no longer call her dear one from the easel to her meals; and where the rooms of the little apartment grew spacious and echoed from sheer emptiness.

Mrs. Ballard had bequeathed her maid all her clothing, and all her personal possessions, save one old-fashioned diamond brooch, which was to be sent to her namesake, Mary Sidney. Some weeks before her death, she told Eliza of the disposition of her effects. In referring to the small gift of money which was to be hers, she said:—

"I wish it were more, Eliza, but," looking wistfully into the eyes of her companion, "I have a great mission for my little capital as I have told you. If only the amount were as great as the object!"

"Nonsense, talking about wills," rejoined Eliza brusquely, a new delicacy in the loved face making her tone sharp, "more likely I'll be leaving something to you; though I don't know what it would be, unless 'twas the cat."

Mrs. Ballard smiled. "Not a bad legacy," she replied. "Pluto is very sympathetic. He likes to watch me paint. He has really concluded to endure the smell of oil and turpentine just to keep me company."

At the moment the night-black cat was lifting green eyes of approval to his own portrait which stood near, and Mrs. Ballard buried a veined hand in his glossy fur. A few weeks later that hand was still. Oh, the dear garments with the outline of the wearer still warm in their curves! Who has not known the tender, overpowering anguish of their touch? Every day Eliza tried to systematize and pack her new belongings, and every day she postponed the ordeal until to-morrow.

Mrs. Ballard's watch alone stood on the table at the head of her bed, hanging in the little satin slipper just as it had ticked beside her mistress's sleeping form so many years. The watch seemed as alive as Pluto, and almost as much of a companion. It spoke eloquently of the gentle being who had always been unconscious of its warnings.

On the mantelpiece in the living-room, which had been studio as well, was Philip Sidney's photograph and his two sketches, one of his mother, and one of a storm-beaten tree. They were the two that Mary Sidney had sent in response to her aunt's gift in the summer-time. All three pictures were turned now to the wall. Mrs. Sidney was a relative. That stamped her for Eliza. The sketches had been either the vainglorious gift of a fond mamma, or else prompted by hope of the very result they had gained. As for the photograph of the artist, Eliza could not deny that it had marvellously cheered and companioned the last months of her dear one's life.

Indeed, in those days, recent yet already seeming so long past, Eliza, out in her kitchen, had often laughed grimly to herself at the infatuation for the picture shown by her mistress.

"If she was sixteen she couldn't be more head over heels in love," she would soliloquize. "I s'pose an artist has got to be just so stirred up by good looks, whether it's a landscape or a human; but I know I wouldn't trust a handsome man around the corner with a dog's dinner."

In pursuance of these reflections, when her mistress had gone, Phil's picture went with the sketches, his face to the wall.

Eliza's attitude toward the whole world was defiance on the subject of her mistress's lifework. Of course, Mrs. Ballard was an artist; a great artist. Eliza knew it must be so, there were so many of her pictures that she could not understand.

A canvas which was a blur to her contained so much which the painter would explain while Eliza stood devotedly by, dutifully assenting to the unravelling of the snarl of form and color.

"You don't care for it, do you, Eliza?" the artist would say sometimes, wistfully.

"Indeed, I do, Mrs. Ballard," would come the response, and never words rang more prompt and true. "I'm just one o' those folks so practical, I can't see an inch before my nose and I've never had advantages. I haven't got any insight, as you call it, beyond a dishpan; but when you explain it so clear, that's when I begin to see."

This latter was a loyal lie; as a rule, Eliza never did see; but she applauded just the same with vague murmurs of wonder and admiration.

It hurt the faithful soul even now to recall how, when the sketches came from the West, her mistress had eagerly examined them, and bitten her lip, her eyes glistening. "There's the true touch, Eliza," she had said quietly. "This boy has a spark of the divine fire."

"Pooh! I don't think so at all," Eliza had returned stoutly and contemptuously. "Of course, that drawin' of his mother is pleasant enough, but you haven't seen her in years. You don't know how good the likeness is; and as for that landscape, that rough twisted tree most blown off its feet and clouds racin' above those rocks, nobody'd ever think they was anything except just what they are, a tree and rocks and clouds; awful pokerish, I call it, not a bit pretty." Eliza's long nose lifted in scorn.

Mrs. Ballard smiled and bowed her head over the wind-blown tree.

"My flesh and blood, still," she murmured.

Now, in the dreary days, Eliza moved about aimlessly, forgetting to eat, and roused only by Pluto's indignantmeows, to remember that, though he might mourn, still he felt that he owed it to himself to keep his coat glossy by milk baths, taken internally.

Never had he known such long luxurious naps in the lap of his mistress as now. Wrapped in thought she sat for hours without moving; the irrepressible tears welling up from her heart and creeping, one by one, down her thin cheeks.

She had made no friends in the cheap apartment building where they lived. It was a changing population, which ebbed and flowed at the mercy of its own financial tide.

"There ain't a lady in this house except you," Eliza had been wont to say to her mistress.

"I don't believe we know that," Mrs. Ballard had rejoined; "but we're too busy for neighboring, aren't we, Eliza?"

Whenever there had been any leisure, Mrs. Ballard had taken her handmaiden to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Not for worlds would Eliza mar the joy with which her mistress bestowed upon her this treat. So she climbed endless stairs, and plodded weary miles with fortitude, having ready a response to every worshipful utterance with which Mrs. Ballard pointed out this and that marvel.

"Wonderful, ain't it!" Eliza would respond with the regularity of clockwork.

"How I love to get you out of that kitchen, Eliza, up into this atmosphere of genius!" her mistress would say, in a burst of affection for the strong mainspring of her household.

"Wonderful, ain't it!" returned the beneficiary, stepping on the other foot in the effort to rest one leg.

The sight of the very exterior of the great repository of art-treasures caused Eliza's bones to ache, if she caught sight of the imposing pile from a car window.

One day, however, all this was changed. The Metropolitan Museum of Art rose in Eliza's estimation to the level of her own kitchen where a chromo depicting kittens in various attitudes of abandon hung over the table.

Mistress and maid were doing the well-worn circuit. The faithful echo had repeated "Wonderful, ain't it!" for the twentieth time. The ardor in Mrs. Ballard's eyes was lending wings to her slender body, but Eliza had lagged, spurred on, and rested the other leg, until, to paraphrase a bit from Mr. Lowell—

"On which leg she felt the worse,

She couldn't 'a' told you, 'nother,"—

when suddenly an inspiration of deliverance seized her. The fact that it had not seized her months before was simply another proof of devotion to the sun of her existence. Each time she entered the massive gates to her place of torture, she left such mentality as she possessed behind her. As well might a fish be expected to navigate in the free air of heaven as Eliza in these marble halls. This was her mistress's element. Let her guide. But one memorable day the two were standing before a marine.

"Oh, Eliza, that's new!" exclaimed Mrs. Ballard; and from the vigor of her tone, her handmaid feared the worst. She had believed they were nearly ready to depart. Now her companion seemed inspired for another two hours.

"Might it not have been painted from your island," continued Mrs. Ballard. "What adorable work!"

"Wonderful, ain't it!" came Eliza's wooden accents.

"What feeling!" murmured her rapt companion.

"I only hope 'tain't sciatica," thought Eliza, wiggling her hip. Her casually roving eye caught sight of one vacancy on the bench in the middle of the room.

"Don't you want to sit down a spell and look at it, Mrs. Ballard?" she asked. "There's a place."

"No," was the slow, absent reply. "I seem to prefer to stand in its presence—a royal presence, Eliza."

Miss Brewster waited no longer. With incontinent haste she limped, as in seven-league boots, toward the desired haven. She saw that a portly gentleman was heading for the same spot. She sprinted. She beat him by a toe's length, and nearly received him on her maiden lap. He recovered himself and glared at her. She maintained an unconscious air, her gaze fixed on the sky of the marine painting. It was all she could see; there were so many standing in front of her, welcoming this new treasure to the home of beauty.

Presently Mrs. Ballard, missing her shadow, looked about and at last descried Eliza. She approached, her small, veined hands clasped on her breast for joy.

"It seems as if it must have been done from the island!" she exclaimed. "How can you sit down, Eliza! I should think it would take you straight to your old home!"

Miss Brewster did not say that she thought there was more likelihood of her again seeing her native place if she did sit down; but for once her clockwork did not act. It seemed as if the succumbing of her legs had impeded the other mechanism.

"I just felt as if I had to, Mrs. Ballard," she answered numbly.

"You dear!" exclaimed her mistress impulsively, speaking low. "I might have known it. You felt overcome. I don't wonder. It took me back to the island, too, in a flash! I dare say you often conceal homesickness from me, Eliza. We must try to go there next summer! I did use to think that perhaps Mrs. Fabian—but, no matter; we can go on our own account, Eliza, and we will, too."

"It would be lots better for you than staying here in summer, that's sure."

Mrs. Ballard sighed, "Yes, if only the rent didn't keep on, and keep on."

Eliza knew the arguments. She did not pursue the subject now. She rose, keeping firm pressure, however, against the bench.

"Take this place, Mrs. Ballard, and rest a minute."

"Oh, I'm not a bit tired. I thought we'd take one or two more rooms. The light is wonderful to-day."

Up to the present moment Eliza in this temple of genius had, as has been said, galvanized her energies and followed where her mistress led, at any cost, as unquestioningly as the needle follows the magnet; but this was the moment of her emancipation. Mrs. Ballard herself gave her the cue, for she added with consideration for an unwonted sentiment:—

"Unless you'd rather stay and look at that reminder of home a while longer, Eliza? I'll come back for you."

"Oh, would you, just as soon, Mrs. Ballard?"

The eagerness of the tone touched her mistress.

"Why, of course, my dear, do so; but I'd get up if I were you." Eliza had sunk back upon the bench with the certainty and impact of a pile-driver. "There is such a crowd you can't see anything from here but the sky."

"I feel as if I could look at that sky for a week," responded Eliza with a sincerity which admitted of no doubt.

"It is wonderful, isn't it?" returned her mistress, unconscious of plagiarism. She patted Eliza's shoulder. "I'll be back soon," she assured her, and moved away.

"The good creature!" she thought. "How selfish I have been to her! I ought occasionally to let her go home; but I know she'd never go without me. She wouldn't believe that I'd eat three meals a day, no matter how faithfully I promised." And Mrs. Ballard laughed a little before becoming engrossed in an old favorite.

She was gone so long that Eliza cogitated with newly acquired ingenuity.

"It's a good thing," she reflected, "that the fool-catcher ain't artistic. He'd 'a' caught me here lots o' times. Supposin' I was with that dear crazy critter all this time, hoppin' along in misery, or standin' in front o' some paintin' like a stork." Eliza's light eyes twinkled. "Why shouldn't I set up a taste in pictures, too? Just watch me from this on."

After this day Mrs. Ballard did observe with joy a transformation in her handmaid's attitude. When they visited the galleries Eliza would move along with her usual calm until suddenly some picture would particularly hold her attention.

"Is that a very fine paintin'?" she would ask of her cicerone.

"Which one, Eliza? Oh, yes, I see. Certainly, or it wouldn't be here; but in that next room are those I thought we should make a study of to-day."

Eliza's light eyes swept the unbroken polished surface of the floor of the adjoining room. "I know I haven't got very far along in understandin' these things," she said modestly, "but to my eyes there is a certain somethin' there,"—she paused and let her transfixed gaze toward the chosen picture say the rest.

Mrs. Ballard held her lip between her teeth reflectively as she looked at it too. On that first occasion it was a summer landscape painted at sunset.

"We've passed it many times," she thought, "but it's evident that Eliza is waking up!"

The reflection was exultant. Far be it from Mrs. Ballard to interrupt the birth throes of her companion's artistic consciousness.

"Then stay right here, Eliza, as long as you wish," she replied sympathetically. "I shall be near by."

She hurried away in her light-footed fashion, and Eliza continued to stand before her cynosure long enough to disarm possible suspicion, and then backed thoughtfully away until she reached a bench upon which she sank, still with eyes upon the picture.

Mrs. Ballard from the next room observed her trance.

"She is waking up. Her eyes are opening, bless her heart," she thought. "Constant dropping does wear the stone."

Eliza would have paraphrased the proverb and declared that constant dropping saves the life.

From this day on she professed, and triumphantly acted upon, an appreciation for certain pictures; and Mrs. Ballard marvelled with pride at the catholicity of her taste; for such serpentine wisdom did Eliza display in passing, unseeing, many an inviting bench, that never, to their last pilgrimage to Mrs. Ballard's mecca, did the latter suspect the source of her companion's modest enthusiasm.

"Poor thing," thought Eliza during these periods of rest; "it's a sin and a shame that she hasn't got anybody worthy to come with her. If those relatives of hers were, any of 'em, fit to live, one of 'em would bring her here sometimes. The poor dear, as long as she hasn't a soul but an ignorant country body like me to sympathize with her, I've got to do my best; and really if I set a spell once in a while, I'll have more sprawl and can seem to enjoy it more. It's awful hard when you can't think of anything but your joints! I'm younger'n she is, and I'm ashamed o' gettin' so tuckered; but she's got some kind o' wings that seem to lift her along."

Mrs. Ballard, from the next room, caught Eliza's eye, smiled, and nodded, well pleased. So the era of peace ensued; and when Miss Brewster caught sight from a street car of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, she was able to regard it without a frown.

CHAPTER III

MRS. FABIAN'S VISIT

Eliza was not obliged to give up the apartment until the end of the month. Hence her drifting from day to day, and Pluto's naps in the lap of luxury.

All her energy and systematic habits were in a state of suspension. Her clocks ran down. The watch in the tiny satin slipper beside her bed alone ticked the minutes away, and when Eliza wound it her eyes were too wet to see the time. Night fell and she went to bed. Morning dawned and she arose. She drank tea, but it was too much trouble to eat.

One day the bell rang. At first she determined not to answer it. Then second thought came to her. What was she waiting here for except to answer the bell? Was her next duty not to introduce the usurper into his kingdom—to give into his desecrating hands those objects,—easel, palette, brushes, paints,—hallowed by her dear one's use? At the sound of a knock she hastened to fling open the door. Mrs. Fabian, elegantly gowned and furred, stood before her.

Eliza gazed at this apparition dumb.

"Why, Eliza Brewster," exclaimed the visitor with concern, "I scarcely knew you." After the mutual gaze of astonishment the caller moved in with her air of stately assurance, and Eliza followed her perforce into the living-room. Here Mrs. Fabian swiftly examined the possibilities of the scanty chairs, then seated herself in the largest.

"You have been ill, too, Eliza? You look like a ghost!"

The gaunt woman in the alpaca dress, so filled with resentment that she begrudged her own tears because they informed this "relative" of her grief, stood in silence with a beating heart.

"Sit down, you poor creature," went on Mrs. Fabian, unsuspecting hidden fires.

They burned higher at the tone of patronage, but Eliza, weakened from mourning and lack of food, felt her knees trembling and sank into the nearest chair.

Mrs. Fabian, genuinely touched by the ravages she saw, broke the silence that followed.

"I was greatly surprised and shocked to hear of Aunt Mary's sudden going."

She began to feel uncomfortable under the set gaze of Eliza's swollen eyes.

"I suppose you sent to my house at once, and found that Mr. Fabian and I were in the far West."

"No, I didn't think of sending," returned Eliza.

"You should have done so. Surely there was no one nearer to Aunt Mary than I."

"It was in the paper," said Eliza dully.

"Had I been here I should, of course, have taken charge of the funeral."

The pale eyes emitted a curious light.

"No, you wouldn't, Mrs. Fabian," was the quiet reply.

"Why do you say that?"

"Because the time for you to have done something for Mrs. Ballard was while she was alive."

Eliza was too spent physically to speak other than softly, but her words brought the amazed color to her visitor's face.

"You are presuming," Mrs. Fabian said, after a moment. "What do you know about it? I suppose Aunt Mary did not think it worth while to tell you all the things I did for her."

"No," agreed Eliza, "she never said a word about the times you came with your automobile to take her riding; nor the picture exhibitions you took her to see, or the way you had her to dinner Thanksgivin' time and other times, or how you had her to spend part o' the summer with you at the island, or—"

"Eliza Brewster, what does this mean!" Mrs. Fabian's eyes were dilated. "Aunt Mary was not related to my husband or to his children. I never expected him to marry my family."

Miss Brewster's gaze was fixed upon the speaker with pale scorn, but the latter continued with what she endeavored to make a dignified defence. "I always sent Aunt Mary a present at Christmas."

"Yes," interrupted Eliza. "Last season 'twas a paper-cutter. You gave her cuts enough without that."

"And I called upon her at intervals," continued the visitor in a heightened tone to drown the small voice.

"Intervals of a year," said Eliza.

Mrs. Fabian started to rise, but bethought herself, and sank back.

"You are impertinent," she said coldly. "A person in your position cannot understand the duties of one in mine. There can be no discussion between you and me." The speaker stirred in her chair and collected herself. "I—and every one of Aunt Mary's relatives—appreciate your faithful service to her, and thank you for it."

"Don't you dare!" ejaculated Eliza, with such sudden belligerency that Mrs. Fabian started.

"You're almost crazed with fatigue and grief, poor creature," she said at last. "I can see that you are scarcely responsible for what you say to-day. You must take a long rest. Shall you go home to the island or take another place in town? I can find you one."

Mrs. Fabian felt the superiority of her own self-control as she made this kind offer; besides, in these troublous days with servants, steady, reliable Eliza, with a sure touch in cookery, was not to be despised. The visitor accompanied her offer with a soothing attempt at a smile.

Eliza had relapsed into dullness. "I won't trouble you," she said.

"It would not be any trouble," was the magnanimous reply. "Just let me know any time when you would like a reference, Eliza. It will give me pleasure to reward your faithfulness."

Mrs. Fabian loved approval quite as much as she did admiration. She would feel much more comfortable to win that of even this uncompromising, cranky individual, so lined with the signs of suffering. As Eliza Brewster was a native of the island where Mrs. Fabian had resorted from the days of her girlhood, she had a very slight but old acquaintance with this woman. As she glanced at the thin hair, now fast turning grey, the sunken eyes and cheeks, and the bony, roughened hands, she shuddered beneath her ermine-lined sables, to remember that she and Eliza Brewster were about the same age. She passed a white-gloved hand over the firm contour of her smooth cheek as if to make sure of its firmness. "I believe it was I who recommended you to Aunt Mary in the first place, long ago," she added.

"That's one o' your mistakes," said Eliza drily.

"On the contrary," returned Mrs. Fabian graciously. She was determined to warm this forlorn specimen of New England frigidity into something humanly companionable, else how was she going to attain the object of her visit? She went on with such flattery of manner as she might have employed toward a desirable débutante. "It has proved quite the best thing that I ever did for Aunt Mary; securing her comfort and thereby the peace of mind of all who belonged to her. Don't call it a mistake, Eliza."

"However that may be," returned the other immovably, "'t wa'n't you that did it. 'Twas your Cousin Mary."

"Oh—was it? Oh, indeed?" responded Mrs. Fabian, slipping back her furs still further. Eliza Brewster's disagreeable manner was making her nervous. "Yes, I believe Mrs. Sidney was with us on her wedding-trip just at that time. Mr. Fabian and I have just returned from visiting Mrs. Sidney out in her wild mountain home."

Eliza's eyes roved involuntarily to two blank sheets of board standing on the mantelpiece; but she was silent.

"Do you know the contents of Aunt Mary's will, Eliza?" asked Mrs. Fabian, after waiting vainly for an inquiry as to her cousin's well-being.

"I do."

"What do you think of it?"

"That don't matter, does it?"

A streak of light illumined Mrs. Fabian's annoyance. Ah, that was what was the matter with Eliza. After twenty-five years of faithful service, she had expected to inherit her mistress's few hundreds. Full explanation, this, of the present sullenness. The disappointment must, indeed, have been bitter.

Mrs. Fabian felt an impulse of genuine sympathy. She knew the singular loneliness of Eliza's situation; knew that she had no near kin, and the transplanting from the island home had been complete. What an outlook now, was Eliza Brewster's!

"Perhaps the will was as much of a surprise to you as it was to the rest of us," Mrs. Fabian went on. "The Sidneys were amazed. They didn't tell me just how much Aunt Mary left young Mr. Sidney. Do you know?"

"Yes," replied Eliza promptly.

And again Mrs. Fabian looked at her interrogatively. As well question the Sphinx. She comprehended the stony closing of the thin lips. There might be a combination which would make them open, but she did not have it. She shrugged her fine-cloth shoulders. "Oh, well, it doesn't matter. It must have been very little, anyway."

She sighed. She must get at her business, though she dreaded absurdly to introduce it. "Well, Eliza, if you will take me to Aunt Mary's room, I will go through her belongings. It is always the most painful duty connected with a death, but it cannot be escaped."

Eliza stared at her, speechless.

"Aunt Mary had a few very nice things," went on Mrs. Fabian. She tried to smile as at a loving memory. "The regulation treasures of a dear old lady,—her diamond ring, a diamond brooch, and a camel's hair shawl—My heavens!" cried the visitor, interrupting herself suddenly with a shriek of terror. "Take it away! Take it away!"

She clung to the back of her chair; for Pluto, silent as a shadow, had sprung upon the ends of her pelerine as they lay in her lap and was daintily nosing the fur, while perilously grasping its richness, his eyes glowing with excitement. Eliza rose, and sweeping him into one arm resumed her seat.

"Oh, how that frightened me!" Mrs. Fabian panted and looked angrily at the animal with the jetty coat and abbreviated tail, whose eyes, live emeralds, expanded and contracted as they glowed still upon the coveted fur.

If she expected an apology, none came. Eliza's pale face showed no emotion. Endurance was written in every line.

"To be interrupted at such a critical moment!" Mrs. Fabian felt it was unbearable.