"Pray do not speak of abusing," said Eleanor; "n.o.body minds the books here; I am glad they are good to anybody else.--I am interrupting you."
"Not at all!" said he, bringing up a great chair for her,--"or only agreeably. Pray sit down--you are not fit to stand."
Eleanor however remained standing, and hesitating, for a moment.
"I wish you would tell me a little more about what we were talking of,"
she said with some effort.
"Do you feel your want of the helmet?" he said gravely.
"I feel that I haven"t it," said Eleanor.
"What is it that you are conscious of wanting?"
She hesitated; it was a home question; and very unaccustomed to speak of her secret thoughts and feelings to any one, especially on religious subjects, which however had never occupied her before, Eleanor was hardly ready to answer. Yet in the tones of the question there was a certain quiet a.s.surance and simplicity before which she yielded.
"I felt--a little while ago--when I was sick--that I was not exactly safe."
Eleanor spoke, hesitating between every few words, looking down, and falling her voice at the end. So she did not see the keen intentness of the look that was fixed upon her.
"You felt that there was something wanting between you and G.o.d?"
"I believe so."
His accent was as deliberately clear as her"s was hesitating. Every word went into Eleanor"s soul.
"Then you can understand now, that when one can say, joyfully, "I know that my Redeemer liveth";--when he is no vague abstraction, but felt to be a _Redeemer;_--when one can say a.s.suredly, he is _my_ Redeemer; I know he has bought back my soul from sin and from the punishment of sin, which is death; I feel I am forgiven; and I know he liveth--my Redeemer--and according to his promise lives to deliver me from every evil and will preserve me unto his heavenly kingdom;--do you see, now, that one who can say this has on his head the covering of an infinite protection--an infinite shelter from both danger and fear?--a helmet, placed on his head by his Lord"s own hand, and of such heavenly temper that no blows can break through it."
Eleanor was a little time silent, with downcast eyes.
"You do not mean to say, that this protection is against _all_ evil; do you? sickness and pain are evils are they not?"
"Not to him."
"Not to him?"
"No. The evil of them is gone. They can do him no harm; if they come, they will do good. He that wears this helmet has absolutely no evil to fear. All things shall work good to him. There shall no evil happen to the just. Blessed be the Lord, who only doeth wondrous things!"
Eleanor stood silenced, humbled, convinced; till she recollected she must not stand there so, and she lifted her eyes to bid good-night.
Then the face she met gave a new turn to her thoughts. It was a changed face; such a light of pure joy and deep triumph shone over it, not hiding nor hindering the loving care with which those penetrating eyes were reading herself. It gave Eleanor a strange compression of heart; it told her more than his words had done; it shewed her the very reality of which he spoke. Eleanor went away overwhelmed.
"Mr. Rhys is a happy man!" she said to herself;--"happy, happy! I wish,--I wish, I were as happy as he!"
CHAPTER IV.
IN THE SADDLE.
"She has two eyes, so soft and brown, Take care!
She gives a side-glance and looks down, Beware! beware!"
A few days more saw Eleanor restored to all the strength and beauty of health which she had been accustomed to consider her natural possession. And then--it is likely to be so--she was so happy in what mind and body had, that she forgot her wish for what the spirit had not. Or almost forgot it. Eleanor lived a very full life. It was no dull languid existence that she dragged on from day to day; time counted out none but golden pennies into her hand. Every minute was filled with business or play, both heartily entered into, and pursued with all the energy of a very energetic nature. Study, when she touched it, was sweet to her; but Eleanor did not study much. Nature was an enchanted palace of light and perfume. Bodily exertion, riding and walking, was as pleasant to her as it is to a bird to use its wings.
Family intercourse, and neighbourly society, were nothing but pleasure.
Benevolent kindness, if it came in her way, was a labour of love; and a hundred home occupations were greatly delighted in. They were not generally of an exalted character; Eleanor"s training and a.s.sociations had not led her into any very dignified path of human action; she had led only a b.u.t.terfly"s life of content and pleasure, and her character was not at all matured; but the capabilities were there; and the energy and will that might have done greater things, wrought beautiful embroidery, made endless fancy work, ordered well such part of the household economy as was committed to her, carried her bright smile into every circle, and made Eleanor"s foot familiar with all the country where she could go alone, and her pony"s trot well known in every lane and roadway where she could go with his company.
All these enjoyments of her life were taken with new relish and zeal after her weeks of illness had laid her aside from them. Eleanor"s world was brighter than ever. And round about all of these various enjoyments now, circling them with a kind of halo of expectancy or possibility, was the consciousness of a prospect that Eleanor knew was opening before her--a brilliant life-possession that she saw Fortune offering to her with a gracious hand. Would Eleanor take it? That Eleanor did not quite know. Meanwhile her eyes could not help looking that way; and her feet, consciously or unconsciously, now and then made a step towards it.
She and her mother were sitting at work one morning--that is to say, Eleanor was drawing and Mrs. Powle cutting tissue paper in some very elaborate way, for some unknown use or purpose; when Julia dashed in.
She threw a bunch of bright blue flowers on the table before her sister.
"There," she said--"do you know what that is?"
"Why certainly," said Eleanor. "It is borage."
"Well, do you know what it means?"
"What it _means?_ No. What does any flower mean?"
"I"ll tell you what _this_ means"--said Julia.
"I, borage Bring courage."
"That is what people used to think it meant."
"How do you know that."
"Mr. Rhys says so. This borage grew in Mrs. Williams"s garden; and I dare say she believes it."
"Who is Mrs. Williams?"
"Why!--she"s the old woman where Mr. Rhys lives; he lives in her cottage; that"s where he has his school. He has a nice little room in her cottage, and there"s n.o.body else in the cottage but Mrs. Williams."
"Do, Julia, carry your flowers off, and do not be so hoydenish," said Mrs. Powle.
"We have not seen Mr. Rhys here in a great while, mamma," said Eleanor.
"I wonder what has become of him."
"I"ll tell you," said Julia--"he has become not well. I know Mr. Rhys is sick, because he is so pale and weak. And I know he is weak, because he cannot walk as he used to do. We used to walk all over the hills; and he says he can"t go now."
"Mamma, it would be right to send down and see what is the matter with him. There must be something. It is a long time--mamma, I think it is weeks--since he was at the Lodge."
"Your father will send, I dare say," said Mrs. Powle, cutting her tissue paper.