She prayed beside; she could not be in trouble and not give the first breath of it to the Lord. Hollis had asked her to write because of what her mother had said to him. He believed--what did he believe?
"O, mother! mother!" she moaned, "you are so good and so lovely, and yet you have hurt me so. How could you? How could you?"
While the clock in Mrs. Kemlo"s room was striking six, a light flashed across her eyes. Her mother stood at the bedside with a lighted candle in her hand.
"I was afraid you would oversleep. Why, child! Didn"t you undress?
Haven"t you had anything but that quilt over you?"
"Mother, I am not going; I never want to see Hollis again," cried Marjorie weakly.
"Nonsense child," answered her mother energetically.
"It is not nonsense. I will not go to New York."
"What will they all think?"
"I will write that I cannot come. I could not travel to-day; I have not slept at all."
"You look so. But you are very foolish. Why should he not speak to me first?"
"It was your speaking to him first. What must he think of me! O, mother, mother, how could you?"
The hopeless cry went to her mother"s heart.
"Marjorie, I believe the Lord allows us to be self-willed. I have not slept either; but I have sat up by the fire. Your father used to say that we would not make haste if we trusted, and I have learned that it is so.
All I have done is to break your heart."
"Not quite that, poor mother. But I shall never write to Hollis again."
Mrs. West turned away and set the candle on the bureau. "But I can," she said to herself.
"Come down-stairs where it is warm, and I"ll make you a cup of coffee.
I"m afraid you have caught your death of cold."
"I _am_ cold," confessed Marjorie, rising with a weak motion.
Her new gray travelling dress was thrown over a chair, her small trunk was packed, even her gloves were laid out on the bureau beside her pocket-book.
"Linnet has counted on it so," sighed her mother.
"Mother!" rising to her feet and standing by the bedside. "I will go.
Linnet shall not be disappointed."
"That"s a good child! Now hurry down, and I"ll hurry you off," said her mother, in her usual brisk tone.
An hour and a half later Mrs. West kissed Marjorie"s pale lips, and bade her stay a good while and have a good time. And before she washed up the breakfast dishes she put on a clean ap.r.o.n, burnished her gla.s.ses, and sat down to write to Hollis. The letter was as plain as her talk had been. He had understood then, he should understand now. But with Marjorie would be the difficulty; could he manage her?
x.x.x.
THE COSEY CORNER.
"G.o.d takes men"s hearty desires and will instead of the deed where they have not the power to fulfill it; but he never took the bare deed instead of the will."--_Richard Baxter_.
Prue opened the door, and sprang into Marjorie"s arms in her old, affectionate way; and Marjorie almost forgot that she was not in Maple Street, when she was led into the front parlor; there was as much of the Maple Street parlor in it as could be well arranged. Hollis was there on the hearth rug, waiting modestly in the background for his greeting; he had not been a part of Maple Street. The greeting he waited for was tardy in coming, and was shy and constrained, and it seemed impossible to have a word with her alone all the evening: she was at the piano, or chatting in the kitchen with old Deborah, or laughing with Prue, or asking questions of Linnet, and when, at last, Mr. Holmes took her upstairs to show her his study, he said good night abruptly and went away.
Marjorie chided herself for her naughty pride and pa.s.sed another sleepless night; in the morning she looked so ill that the plans for the day were postponed, and she was taken into Mrs. Holmes own chamber to be petted and nursed to sleep. She awoke in the dusk to find Aunt Prue"s dear face beside her.
"Aunt Prue," she said, stretching up her hands to encircle her neck, "I don"t know what to do."
"I do. Tell me."
"Perhaps I oughtn"t to. It"s mother"s secret."
"Suppose I know all about it."
"You can"t! How can you?"
"Lie still," pushing her back gently among the pillows, "and let me tell you."
"I thought I was to tell you."
"A while ago the postman brought me a note from your mother. She told me that she had confessed to you something she told me last summer."
"Oh," exclaimed Marjorie, covering her face with both hands, "isn"t it too dreadful!"
"I think your mother saw clearly that she had taken your life into her own hands without waiting to let G.o.d work for you and in you. I a.s.sured her that I knew all about that dark time of yours, and she wept some very sorrowful tears to think how heartbroken you would be if you knew.
Perhaps she thought you ought to know it; she is not one to spare herself; she is even harder upon herself than upon other sinners."
"But, Aunt Prue, what ought I to do now? What can I do to make it right?"
"Do you want to meddle?"
"No, oh no; but it takes my breath away. I"m afraid he began to write to me again because he thought I wanted him to."
"Didn"t you want him to?"
"Yes--but not--but not as mother thought I did. I never once asked G.o.d to give him back to me; and I should if I had wanted it very much, because I always ask him for everything."
"Your pride need not be wounded, poor little Marjorie! Do you remember telling Hollis about your dark time, that night he met you on your way from your grandfather"s?"
"Yes; I think I do. Yes, I know I told him; for he called me "Mousie,"
and he had not said that since I was little; and with it he seemed to come back to me, and I was not afraid or timid with him after that."
"You wrote me about the talk, and he has told me about it since. To be frank, Marjorie, he told me about the conversation with your mother, and how startled he was. After that talk with you he was a.s.sured that she was mistaken--but, child, there was no harm, no sin--even if it had been true. The only sin I find was your mother"s want of faith in making haste. And she sees it now and laments it. She says making haste has been the sin of her lifetime. Her unbelief has taken that form. You were very chilly to Hollis last night."