She must not yet set out for the park. So she lighted the lamp. For a time she posed and grimaced before the mirror. When she was perfect in the part, she sat in the rocking-chair at the broad window, there to rehea.r.s.e the deceptions it was in her mind to practice. But while she watched the threatening shadows gather, the lights on the river flash into life and go drifting aimlessly away, her mind strayed from this purpose, her willful heart throbbed with sweeter feeling--his childish voice, the depths of his eyes, the grateful weight of his head upon her bosom. Why had he loved her? Because she was his mother! A forgotten perception returned to illuminate her way--a perception, never before reduced to formal terms, that her virtue, her motherly tenderness, were infinitely more appealing to him than the sum of her other attractions.
She started from the chair--her breast heaving with despairing alarm.
Again she stood before the mirror--staring with new-opened eyes at the painted face, the gaudy gown: and by these things she was now horrified.
"He won"t love me!" she thought. "Not this way. He--he--couldn"t!"
It struck the hour.
"Nine o"clock!" she cried. "I got to _do_ something!"
She looked helplessly about the room. Why had he loved her? Because she was his mother! She would be his mother--nothing more: just his mother. She would go to him with that appeal. She would not seek to win him. She would but tell him that she was his mother. She would be his mother--true and tender and holy. He would not resist her plea....
This determined, she acted resolutely and in haste: she stripped off the gown, flung it on the floor, kicked the silken heap under the bed; she washed the paint from her face, modestly laid her hair, robed herself anew. And when again, with these new, seeing eyes, she looked into the gla.s.s, she found that she was young, unspoiled--still lovely: a sweetly wistful woman, whom he resembled. Moreover, there came to transform her, suddenly, gloriously, a revelation: that of the spiritual significance of her motherhood.
"Thank G.o.d!" she thought, uplifted by this vision. "Oh, thank G.o.d!
I"m like them other people. I"m fit to bring him up!"
It thundered ominously.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Tailpiece to _Nearing the Sea_]
[Ill.u.s.tration: Headpiece to _The Last Appeal_]
_THE LAST APPEAL_
She sat waiting for him at the bench by the lilac bush. He was late, she thought--strangely late. She wondered why. It was dark. The night was close and hot. There was no breath of air stirring in the park. From time to time the lightning flashed. In fast lessening intervals came the thunder. Presently she caught ear of his step on the pavement--still distant: approaching, not from the church, but from the direction of the curate"s home.
"And he"s not running!" she thought, quick to take alarm.
They were inexplicable--these lagging feet. He had never before dawdled on the way. Her alarm increased. She waited anxiously--until, with eyes downcast, he stood before her.
"Richard!" she tenderly said.
"I"m here, mother," he answered; but he did not look at her.
She put her arms around him. "Your mother," she whispered, while she kissed him, "is glad--to feel you--lying here."
He lay quiet against her--his face on her bosom. She was thrilled by this sweet pressure.
"Have you been happy?" she asked.
"No."
"Nor I, dear!"
He turned his face--not to her: to the flaming cross above the church.
She had invited a question. But he made no response.
"Nor I," she repeated.
Still he gazed at the cross. It was shining in a black cloud--high in the sky. She felt him tremble.
"Hold me tight!" he said.
She drew him to her--glad to have him ask her to: having no disquieting question.
"Tighter!" he implored.
She rocked him. "Hush, dear!" she crooned. "You"re safe--with your mother. What frightens you?"
"The cross!" he sobbed.
G.o.d knows! "twas a pity that his childish heart misinterpreted the message of the cross--changing his loving purpose into sin. But the misinterpretation was not forever to endure....
The wind began to stir the leaves--tentative gusts: swirling eagerly through the park. There was a flash--an instant clap of thunder, breaking overhead, rumbling angrily away. Two men ran past. Great drops of rain splashed on the pavement.
"Let us go home," the boy said.
"Not yet!" she protested. "Oh, not yet!"
He escaped from her arms.
"Don"t go, Richard!" she whimpered. "Please don"t, dear! Not yet.
I--I"m--oh, I"m not ready to say good-night. Not yet!"
He took her hand. "Come, mother!" he said.
"Not yet!"
He dropped her hand--sprang away from her with a startled little cry.
"Oh, mother," he moaned, "don"t you want me?"
"Home?" she asked, blankly. "Home--with me?"
"Oh, yes, mother! Let me go home. Quick I Let us go.... The curate says I know best. I went straight to him--yesterday--and told him.
And he said I was wiser than he.... And I said good-bye. Don"t send me back. For, oh, I want to go home--with you!"
She opened her arms. At that moment a brilliant flash of lightning illuminated the world. For the first time the child caught sight of her face--the sweet, real face of his mother: now radiant, touched by the finger of the Good G.o.d Himself.
"Is it you?" he whispered.
"I am your mother."