Without this incentive to self-control, she felt that she would have given way to the hot disappointed tears that were choking in her throat.
How sad her heart was as she sat there alone in the prayer-room. It was early and but few were present. She had never felt so much alone. The companionship which had been so close and so constant during the few weeks past seemed suddenly to have been removed from her, and when she essayed to go back to the old friend, she had stood coldly and heartlessly--aye, worse than that--mockingly aloof.
She had overheard her, that very afternoon, detailing to one of the under teachers, fragments of the conversation in the library. Marion"s heart was wounded to its very depths. Perhaps it is little wonder that she had made no other attempt to secure company for the evening. There were school-girls by the score that she might have asked; doubtless some one of the number would accept her invitation, but she had not thought so. She had shrunken from any other effort, in mortal terror.
"I am not fitted for such work," she said, in bitterness of soul; "not even for _such_ work; what _can_ I do?" and then, despite the cla.s.s, she had brushed away a tear. So there she sat alone, till suddenly the door opened with more force than usual, and closed with a little bang, and Eurie Mitch.e.l.l, with a face on which there glowed traces of excitement, came like a whiff of wind and rustled into a seat beside her, alone like herself.
"You here?" she said, and there was surprise in her whisper. "Thought you would be late, and not be alone. I am glad of it--I mean I am almost glad. Don"t you think, Nell wouldn"t come with me! I counted on him as a matter of course, he is so obliging--always willing to take me wherever I want to go, and often disarranging his own engagements so that I need not be disappointed. I was just as sure of him I thought as I was of myself, and then I coaxed him harder than I ever did before in my life, and he wouldn"t come in." He came to the door with me, and said I needn"t be afraid but that he would be on hand to see me home, and he would see safely home any number of girls that I chose to drum up, but as for sitting in here a whole hour waiting for it to be time to go home, that was beyond him--too much for mortal patience!
"Wasn"t it just too bad! I was so sure of it, too. I told him about our plans--about our promise, indeed, and how I had counted on him, and all he said was: "Don"t you know the old proverb, sis: "Never count your chickens before they are hatched;" or, a more elegant phrasing of it, "Never eat your fish till you catch him?" Now, I"m not caught yet; someway the right sort of bait hasn"t reached me yet." I was never so disappointed in my life! Didn"t you try to get some one to come?"
"Yes," said Marion, "and failed." She forced herself to say that much.
How _could_ Eurie go through with all these details? "If her heart had ached as mine does, she couldn"t," Marion told herself. She might have known if she had used her judgment that Eurie"s heart was not of the sort that would ever ache over anything as hers could; and yet Eurie was bitterly disappointed.
She had counted on Nell, and expected him, had high hopes for him; and here they were dashed into nothingness! Who knew that he could be so obstinate over a trifle? Surely it was a trifle just to come to prayer-meeting once! She knew she would have done it for him, even in the days when it would have been a bore. She did not understand it at all.
Meantime, Ruth had been having her experiences. This promise of hers troubled her. Perhaps you cannot imagine what an exceedingly disagreeable thing it seemed to her to go hunting up somebody to go to prayer-meeting with her. Where could she turn? There were so few people with whom she came in contact that it would not be absurd to ask.
Her father she put aside at once as entirely out of the question. It was simply an absurdity to think of asking him to go to prayer-meeting! He rarely went to church even on the Sabbath; less often now than he used to do. It would simply be annoying him and exposing religion to his contempt; so his daughter reasoned. She sighed over it while she reasoned; she wished most earnestly that it were not so; she prayed, and she thought it was with all her heart, that G.o.d would speak to her father in some way, by some voice that he would heed; and yet she allowed herself to be sure that his only and cherished daughter had the one voice that could not hope to influence him in the least.
Well, there was her friend, Mr. Wayne. I wonder if I can describe to you how impossible it seemed to her to ask him to go? Not that he would not have accompanied her; he would in a minute; he would do almost anything she asked; she felt as sure that she could get him to occupy a seat in the First Church prayer-room that evening as she felt sure of going there herself; but she asked herself, of what earthly use would it be?
He would go simply to please what he would suppose was a whim of hers; he would listen with an amused smile, slightly tinged with sarcasm, to all the words that would be spoken that evening, and he would have ready a hundred mildly funny things to say about them when the meeting closed; for weeks afterward he would be apt to bring in nicely fitting quotations gleaned from that evening of watchfulness, fitting them into absurd places, and making them seem the veriest folly--that would be the fruit.
Ruth shrank with all her soul from such a result; these things were sacred to her; she did not see how it would be possible to endure the quizzical turn that would be given to them. I want you to notice that in all this reasoning she did not see that she had undertaken not only her own work but the Lord"s. When one attempts not only to drop the seed, but to _make_ the fruit that shall spring up, no wonder one stands back appalled!
Yet was she not busying her heart with the results? The end of it was that she decided whatever else she did, to say nothing to Mr. Wayne about the meeting. No, I am mistaken, that was not the end; there suddenly came in with these musings a startling thought:
"If I cannot endure the foolishness that will result from one evening, how am I to endure companionship for a lifetime?"
That was a thought that would not slumber again. But she must find some one whom she was willing to ask to go to prayer-meeting; there was her miserable promise hedging her in.
Who was she willing to ask? She ran over her list of acquaintances; there wasn"t one. How strange it was! She could think of those whom Flossy might ask, and there was Eurie surrounded by a large family; and as for Marion, her opportunities were unlimited; but for her forlorn self, in all the large circle of her acquaintance, there seemed no one to ask. The truth was, Ruth was shiveringly afraid of casting pearls before swine--not that she put it in that way; but she would rather have been struck than to have been made an object of ridicule. And yet there were times when she wished she had lived in the days of martyrdom! The church of to-day is full of just such martyr spirits!
The result was precisely what might have been expected: she dallied with her miserable cowardice, which she did not call by that name at all, until there really was no person within reach to invite to the meeting.
Who would have supposed all this of Ruth Erskine! No one would have been less likely to have done so than herself.
She went alone to the meeting at a late hour, and with a very miserable, sore, sad heart, to which Marion"s was nothing in comparison. Yet there was something accomplished, if she had but known it. She was beginning to understand herself; she had a much lower opinion of Ruth Erskine as she sat there meeting the wondering gaze of Eurie, and the quick, inquiring glance of Marion than she ever had felt in her life.
I said she was late, but Flossy was later. Somebody else must have been at work about that meeting, and have been more successful than our girls, for the room was fuller than usual. Marion had begun to grow anxious for the little Flossy that had crept so near to their hearts, and to make frequent turnings of the head to see if she were not coming.
When at last she shimmered down the aisle, a soft, bright rainbow, for she hadn"t given over wearing her favorite colors, and she could no more help getting them on becomingly than a bird can help looking graceful in its plumage. (Why should either of them try to help it?) But Flossy was not alone; there was a tall portly form, and a splendidly balanced head, resting on firm shoulders, that followed her down to the seat where the girls were waiting for her.
[Ill.u.s.tration]
[Ill.u.s.tration]
CHAPTER XX.
HOW IT WAS DONE.
FLOSSY came quite down the broad aisle to the seat which the girls had, by tacit understanding, chosen for their own, her face just radiant with a sort of surprised satisfaction, and the gentleman who followed her with an a.s.sured and measured step was none other than Judge Erskine himself. He may have been surprised at his own appearance in that place for prayer, but no surprise of his could compare with the amazement of his daughter Ruth. For once in her life her well-bred composure forsook her, and her look could be called nothing less than an absolute stare.
Of the four, Flossy only had succeeded. The way of it was this:
Having become a realist, in the most emphatic sense of that word, to have promised to bring some one with her to meeting if she possibly could, meant to her just that, and nothing less than that. Of course, such an understanding of a promise made it impossible to stop with the asking of one person, or two, or three, provided her invitations met with only refusals.
She had started out as confident of success as Eurie; she felt nearly certain of Col. Baker; not because he was any more likely of his own will to choose the prayer-meeting than he had been all his life thus far, but because he was growing every day more anxious to give pleasure to Flossy.
Having some dim sense of this in her heart, Flossy reasoned that it would be right to put this power of hers to the good use of winning him to the meeting, for who could tell what words from G.o.d"s Spirit might reach him while there? So she asked him to go.
To her surprise, and to Col. Baker"s real annoyance, he was obliged to refuse her. He was more than willing to go, even to a prayer-meeting, if thereby he could take one step forward toward the place in her life that he desired to fill. Therefore his regrets were profuse and sincere.
It was club night, and, most unluckily, they were to meet with him, and he was to provide the entertainment. Under almost any other circ.u.mstances he could have been excused. Had he even had the remotest idea that Flossy would have liked his company that evening, he could have made arrangements for a change of evening for the club; that is, had he known of it earlier. But, as it was, she would see how impossible it would be for him to get away. Quick-witted Flossy took him at his word.
"Would he remember, then," she asked, with her most winning smile, "that of all places where she could possibly like to see him regularly, the Wednesday evening prayer-meeting at the First Church was the place."
What a bitter pill an evening prayer-meeting would be to Col. Baker! But he did not tell her so. He was even growing to think that he could do that, for a while at least.
From him Flossy turned to her brother; but it was club night to him, too, and while he had not the excuse that the entertainer of the club certainly had, it served very well as an excuse, though he was frank enough to add, "As for that, I don"t believe I should go if I hadn"t an engagement; I won"t be hypocrite enough to go to the prayer-meeting."
Such strange ideas have some otherwise sensible people on this subject of hypocrisy!
It required a good deal of courage for Flossy to ask her mother, but she accomplished it, and received in reply an astonished stare, a half-embarra.s.sed laugh, and the expression:
"What an absurd little fanatic you are getting to be, Flossy! I am sure one wouldn"t have looked for it in a child like you! Me? Oh, dear, no! I can"t go; I never walk so far you know; at least very rarely, and Kitty will have the carriage in use for Mrs. Waterman"s reception. Why don"t you go there, child? It really isn"t treating Mrs. Waterman well; she is such an old friend."
These were a few of the many efforts which Flossy made. They met with like results, until at last the evening in question found her somewhat belated and alone, ringing at Judge Erskine"s mansion. That important personage being in the hall, in the act of going out to the post-office, he opened the door and met her hurried, almost breathless, question:
"Judge Erskine, is Ruth gone? Oh, excuse me. Good-evening. I am in such haste that I forgot courtesy. Do you think Ruth is gone?"
Yes, Judge Erskine knew that his daughter was out, for she stepped into the library to leave a message a few moments ago, and she was then dressed for the street, and had pa.s.sed out a moment afterward.
Then did he know whether Katie Flinn, the chamber-maid, was in? "Of course you won"t know," she added, blushing and smiling at the absurdity of her question. "I mean could you find out for me whether she is in, and can I speak to her just a minute?"
He was fortunately wiser to-night than she gave him credit for being, Judge Erskine said, with a courtly bow and smile.
It so happened that just after his daughter departed, Katie had sought him, asking permission to be out that evening until nine o"clock, a permission that she had forgotten to secure of his daughter; therefore, as a most unusual circ.u.mstance which must have occurred for Flossy"s special benefit, he was posted even as to Katie"s whereabouts. He was unprepared for the sudden flushing of Flossy"s cheeks, and quiver of her almost baby chin.
"Oh, I am _so_ sorry!" she said, and there were actual tears in her blue eyes.
Judge Erskine saw them, and felt as if he were in some way a monster. He hastened to be sympathetic. If she was alone and timid it would afford him nothing but pleasure to see her safely to any part of the city she chose to mention. He was going out simply for a stroll, with no business whatever.
"Oh, it isn"t that," Flossy said, hastily. "I am such a little way from the chapel, and it is so early I shall not be afraid; but I am so disappointed. You see, Judge Erskine, we girls were each to bring one with us to the meeting to-night, and I have tried so hard, I have asked almost a dozen people, and none of them could go. At last I happened to think of your Katie Flinn: I knew she was in our Sunday-school, and I thought perhaps if I asked her she would go with me, if Ruth had not done it before me. She was my last chance, and I am more disappointed than I can tell you."
Shall I try to describe to you what a strange sensation Judge Erskine felt in the region of his heart as he stood there in the hall with that pretty blushing girl, who seemed to him only a child, and found that her quivering chin and swimming eyes meant simply that she had failed in securing even his chambermaid to attend the prayer-meeting? He never remembered to have had such an astonishing feeling, nor such a queer choking sensation in his throat.