Elijah handed it to her, and in some way their fingers touched as Lucy took the letter, and then she deliberately tore it into bits and scattered the pieces down upon the top of the log.

A sudden light came into Elijah Clifford's eyes.

"Is that your answer to it?" he said, moving over on the log a little nearer to Lucy.

"Yes," she answered, and it is a historical fact that she did not move back any. But she said afterwards that she was sitting near the end of the log and couldn't have moved far without falling off and that Elijah knew it.

"Then you don't need my advice? What made you ask for it?"

Lucy Gray, prim school ma'am as she had called herself, answered between crying and laughing, "Oh, I don't care for him. Why, he is only twenty-four and I am twenty-eight. And I can never leave these people here. I am so in love with them."

"With all of them?" asked Elijah desperately.

"Yes. But with some more than others."

Again a light came into Clifford's face as he moved up a little nearer. The bits of paper which had been poor Walter's letter began to fall over the sides of the log. But Elijah Clifford was pale as he said:

"Lucy, I don't want to make another mistake. I have not been able to conceal my feeling for you and I realise the great distance between us when it comes to education. I'm not college bred. And no one feels it more than I do. But I'm not too old to learn. I'm only thirty. And I find my brain works pretty well when I have a motive. I can almost read Herrmann und Dorothea. And I've committed no end of Heine. I can say 'Die schonste die Jungfrauen sitszet, Dort oben wunderbar' and a lot more. But—I don't dare ask you again to be my wife unless—unless—I can be sure that the differences between us will not make you unhappy. But, oh, if this happiness could be mine! You cannot love these people more than I do. Or yearn over them more. And we are not so far apart after all."

"I'm sure," said Lucy Gray, looking up at him, tears flowing down her cheeks. "I'm sure, Elijah, that we are not so very far apart in any way. And if you want to be happy I am sure–"

She did not need to say any more. Elijah Clifford saw happiness looking into his eyes out of hers and he would have been very much lacking in education if he had not then and there claimed his own.

They did not hear Mr. and Mrs. Masters approach because sand does not echo under peoples' feet, but they heard Mr. Masters say to his wife:

"I'm sorry we left the kodak up at the house. I've been hoping and praying for this for the last two years. And now my prayers have been answered, I would like to have some record of the fact."

Elijah Clifford and Lucy Gray stood up side by side. They were not embarrassed nor confused. The light of heaven seemed to shine on them out of that Thanksgiving Day glow in the desert sky. Their happiness had a sacred divine atmosphere about it that checked even as joyful a word of congratulation as Mr. Masters was about to speak. Ansa had come running down from the Mission and seeing Miss Gray and Clifford there she had come up and put her little hands one in each of theirs.

"Ah!" cried Masters. "This is the picture we want!" while Lucy and Elijah standing there by Ansa spoke of the years they were now to live together in the sacred union of husband and wife, consecrated heart and mind to the love of a neglected people, their human happiness intensified and purified by the service they were to give as one in answer to that which spoke to them even louder than their own earthly love—the sound of the High Calling.

If, as is easy for the writer and reader, we agree to let a few years slip by, as they have a way of doing whether we wish to let them or not, we shall find ourselves again in Milton at the home of the Douglases.

It is Thanksgiving Day again and Esther seems to have even more than the usual happy look on her face as she says to Helen:

"Isn't it remarkable that Walter coming up from the Isthmus is going to bring Bauer with him from Berlin? The world is getting smaller every day."

"We must learn to say 'Professor' Bauer, mother. You know Walter wrote that he has several honorary degrees conferred on him for his inventions. I understand he is held in high respect at all the universities."

"He will never be anything but plain Felix Bauer to me, Helen. And I hope his honours have not spoiled him. I don't believe they could."

Helen is silent as she sits down by the window which commands a view of the front walk. Time has dealt generously and kindly with her. The girlhood has ripened into the stately strong womanhood. Many suitors have come and gone, among them some noble gentlemen who have received their answers from her with sore hearts, but Helen still has not seen her ideal of the romantic days and her heart is yet—she says to herself—free—at least she has refused both wealth and high character for the vision she has cherished all these years of the nameless one who, so far, she says, has never appeared to her. And all through this testing, refining process of growth, she has developed into a spirit of rare strength and grace, of whom Paul and Esther have been increasingly proud.

Two young men come briskly up the walk. Mrs. Douglas opens the door and rushes out on the porch as Helen rises to tell her they are coming.

Walter laughingly lifts Esther off her feet as he kisses her and then turns to Helen. Evidently he has not broken his heart over that romance in the desert.

First greetings over he announced Bauer just as Paul steps into the front room.

"Professor Felix Bauer, F. R. G. S., F. S. S. K. L. G. X. Y. Z. and others. Isn't he great?"

Esther simply says, "Felix, welcome. I do not know how to say 'professor.'"

Bauer lifts her hands to his lips. Helen looks at him as if she were seeing some new vision at a distance. Felix Bauer smiles in the old way and says:

"Mrs. Douglas, I don't care for these titles. I would gladly give a bushel of them for one kind word from Walter's mother."

He looks at Helen as he speaks and Helen notes his clear, strong accent and the self-control and ease of a man who has met the world and looked it in the face without fear and without shame.

It is only when they are seated at the table that Helen has opportunity to note Bauer's strong face and figure, and wonder at the transformation time and testing have made in him. He still speaks in the slow deliberate fashion of the other days, but he is a full grown man now, conscious of power and Helen has to readjust her picture of him as she last saw him.

As the talk goes on, Paul's probing questions, aided by Walter and his mother, bring out the facts about Bauer which his own modesty would keep in the background.

Страница 68 из 69

Назад 1…67 68 69 Далее