Mercy Philbrick's Choice

who finds men

they know not

ckless feet, whe

to deadlier de

him whose tru

ls their moral nig

what words ca

ep gratitude f

se,--and these t

, like a quenchl

h shall burn on T

ruth worshipped

and love, the

re Truth's alt

ilbrick'

pte

ast sensitive of souls. Now, at sunset, a dull red tint was slowly stealing over the west; but the gray cloud was too thick for the sun

to enforce the idea of seclusion and privacy, by building a fence around houses only ten or twelve feet away from the public road, and only forty or fifty feet from each other. Rows of picketed palings and gates with latches and loc

at the feet, they managed to tug the heavy old man through without taking down the palings. This was so long ago that now there was nobody left who remembered Billy Jacobs distinctly, except his widow, who lived in a poor little house on the outskirts of the town, her only income being that derived from the renting of the large house, in which she had once lived in comfort with her husband and son. The house was a double house; and for a few years Billy Jacobs's twin brother, a sea captain, had lived in the other half of it. But Mrs. Billy could not abide Mrs. John, and so with a big heart wrench the two brothers, who loved each other as only twin children can love, had separated. Captain John took his wife and went to sea again. The ship was never heard of, and to the day of Billy Jacobs's death he never forgave his w

herself and her boy, although the rent of her old homestead was quite enough to make them comfortable. In a few years, to complete the poor woman's misery, her son ran away and went to sea. The sea-farer's stories which his Uncle John had told him, when he was a little child, had never left his mind; and the drearier his mother made life for him on land, the more l

I sympathize with you most deeply. I think the boy will soon come ba

hed clothes that she was almost an object of terror to children when they met her in lonely fields and woods, bending down to the ground and searching for herbs like an old witch. At one time, also, she went in great haste to a lawyer in the village, and with his assistance raised three thousand dollars on a mortgage on her house, mortgaging it very nearly to its full value. In vain he represented to her that, in case the house should chance to stand empty for a year, she would ha

this evening, as he stood listlessly leaning on the gate, and looking down at the unsightly

ddenly seized a book of his father's,--an old, shabby, worn dictionary,--and flung it into the fire with uncontrollable passion; and, on being asked why he did it, had nothing to say in justification of his act, except this extraordinary statement: "It was an ugly book; it hurt me. Ugly books ought to go in the fire." What the child suffered, and, still more, what the man suffered from this hatred of ugliness, no words could portray. Ever since he could remember, he had been unhappy from the lack of the beautiful in the surroundings of his daily life. His father had been poor; his mother had been an invalid; and neither father nor mother had a trace of the artistic temperament. From what long-forgotten ancestor in his plain, hard-working fa

n the house. "It's all tom- foolery. Things was well enough before." But in their hearts they were secretly a little elate, as in latter years they had come to know, by books and papers whic

his house to live. Many and many a time he had walked past the old house, and thought, as he looked at it, what a bare, staring, hopeless, joyless-looking old house it was. It had originally been a small, square house. The addition which Billy Jacobs had made to it was oblong, running out to the south, and projecting on the front a few feet beyond the other part. This obtrusive jog was certainly very ugly; a

more like a tangle of wild trees than like any thing which had ever been an orchard. Yet the Roxbury Russets and Baldwins of that orchard had once been Billy Jacobs's great pride, the one point of hospitality which his miserliness never conquered. Long after it would have broken his heart to set out a generou

to externals, rebelled at first at the id

going to live in half a house with the mill people; and it's

ution in his mother's having come at last to a sense of suffering

ther than gently to his mother, though to every one e

s in one half of it, we shall find it much easier to get good tenants for the other part. I promise you non

etermination, as contrasted with Stephen's gentle, slow, almost hesitating utterance of his opinions or intentions, might have assumed that she would always conquer; but it was not so. In all little things, Stephen was her slave, because she was

tain and his wife had lived. This half of the house was not so pleasant as the other, had less sun, and had no doo

e should find it hardest to

ere would have been plenty of applicants for it, but it had been noised in the town that the Whites had given out that none but people as good as they were themselves would be allowe

ithout observing that Mr. Barker stood in it, ready to bow and smile to the whole world. Mr. Barker's sister had just married an overseer in the mill; and they had been very anxious t

over told her, in no very guarded terms, the reason they

on seen whether Madam White's got the right to say who's to come and who's to go in that house. It's a nasty old yaller shell anyhow, not to say nothin' o' it's bein' haunted, 's like 's not. But there ain't no other pla

l sight of two people perched on barrels on the sidewalk roused Stephen from the deep reverie in which he habitually walked. Lifting his hat as courteously as if he were addressing the most distinguished of women, he bowed, and said smiling,

r saw one on ye yet thet wasn't caug

ing so soon given the lie to her own words of bravado;

ers o' my own, 's well's he. When a man bids me a pleasant good-mornin', I ain'

ey can be traced back to their spring, as a stream can: one lucky or unlucky word or deed, years ago, made a friend or an enemy of one person, and that person's influence has divided itself again and again, as brooks part off and divide into countless rivulets, and water whole districts. But generally one finds it impossible to trace the like o

ordinary New England town, neighborhood never means much: there is a dismal lack of cohesion to the relations between people. The community is loosely held together by a few accidental points of contact or common interest. The individuality of individuals is, by a strange sort of paradox, at once respected and ignored. This is indifference rather than consideration, selfishness rather than generosity; it is an unsuspected root of much of our national failure, is responsible for much of our natio

ally did not care for their neighbors; why should their neighbors care for them? secondly, a diminished familiarity of intercourse would have to him great compensations. There were few people in the town, whose clothes, whose speech, whose behav

e; and the man who shuts himself apart from his fellows, above all, the man who thus shuts himself apart because he thinks of his fellows with pitying condescension as his inferiors, is a fool and a blasphemer,--a fo

against Stephen, as an aristocratic fellow, given to dreams and fancies; and Stephen knew very well that he held the position only as it were on a sort of sufferance, because Mr. Williams had loved his father. Moreover, law business in Penfield was growing duller and duller. A younger firm in the county town, only twelve miles away, was robbing them of clients continually; and there were many long days during which Stephen sat idle at his desk, looking out in a vague, dreamy way on the street below, and wonder

n! she might a great deal b

ould lose our interest, for t

these long hours of perplexity and misgiving. It was a question of casuistry which might, perhaps, have puzzled a finer moral sense than Stephen's. Why should he treat old Mrs. Jacobs with any more consi

men, parishioners of his, who were obliged to move to some inland town on account of the elder woman's failing health. They were mother and daughter, but both widows. The younger woman's marriage had been a tragically sad one, her husband having died suddenly, only a few days a

hese. The negotiations were soon concluded; and at the time of

to be interfered with now. But he had a singular consciousness that some new element was coming into his life. He did not define this; he hardly recognized it in its full extent; but if a bystander could have looked into his mind, followin

er his roof, that Stephen did not indulge in, as he stood leaning with his folded arms on the gate, in the gray

uch more she must know of life than I do. I suppose she can't be a lady, exactly,--being a sea captain's wife.

. She 's so alone." And Stephen's face clouded, as he reflected how very seldom the

door, and go in and out that way, as the Jacobses used to. It would be unlucky though, I reckon, to use that door. I guess I'll plas

gan to fall in slow, drizzling drops. Still Stephen sto

air made the flame flicker and flare, and, as she put up one hand to shade it, the light was throw

'n half an hour. Lor's sake, what's the boy thinkin' on now, I wonder?" s

nce of rare springs of each in her own nature, surely not by any uncommon lovableness in either Mr. or Mrs. White, or by any especial comforts in her situation, she had stayed on a quarter of a century, in the hard position of woman of all work in a poor family. She worshipped Stephen, and, as I said, her face had never once looked other than lovingly into his; but he could not remember the time when he had not thought her hideous. She had a big brown mole on her chin, out of which grew a few bristling hairs. It was an unsightly thing, no doubt, on a woman's chin; and sometimes, when Marty was very angry, the hairs did actually se

e. Anybody 'ud think you hadn't common sense," he replied with perfect good nature, and as heartily l

things in that light. A rude or harsh word, a loud, angry tone, jarred on his every sense like a discord in music, or an inharmonious color; so he never used them. But as he ran upstairs, three steps at a time, after his kind, off-hand words to Marty, he said to himself, "Good heavens! I do believe Marty gets uglier every day. What a picture Rembrandt wou

en who were coming to live under h

pte

shrank from them. They seemed to pierce her lungs like arrows of ice-cold steel, at once wounding and benumbing. Yet the habit and love of the seashore life were so strong upon her that she would never have been able to tear herself away from her old home, had it not been for her daughter's determined will. Mercy Philbrick was a woman of slight frame, gentle, laughing, brown eyes, a pale skin, pale ash-brown hair, a small nose; a sweet and changeful mouth, the upper lip too short, the lower lip much too full; little hands, little feet, little wrists. Not one indication of

climate," Mercy looked at him for a moment with an expression of terror. In an ins

t she might be well i

s in a dryer, milder air. There is as yet no a

nterrup

rely prolonging her life as a suffering invalid?" she said; adding i

n at all, if she could breathe only inland air. She will never be strong a

bit of wood fell into a stream, where the water was largely impregnated with some chemical matter which had the power to eat out the fibre of the wood, and in each spot thus left empty to deposit itself in an exact image of the wood it had eaten away. Molecule by molecule, in a mystery too small for human eye to detect, even had a watchful human eye been lying in wait to observe, the marvellous process went on; until, after the lapse of nobody knows how many centuries, the wood was gone, and in its place lay its exact image in stone,--rings of growth, individual peculiarities of structure, knots, broken slivers and chips; color, shape, all perfect. Men call it agatized wood, by a feeble effort to translate the mystery of its existence; but i

h her wonderful joyousness, and the maiden with her wondrous cheer, came too late to undo what the years had done. The most they could do was to interrupt the process, to stay it at that point. The consequence was that Mrs. Carr at sixty-five was

ll the house and move away before the winter set in, she literally opened her mou

don't le

ut, some time before Mercy had come to the end of her explanation, the childish soul had accepted the whole thing as fixed, had begun already to project itsel

' I s'pose we shall hev to, don't ye th

quaint, trim beds of old-fashioned pinks and ladies' delights and sweet-williams which bordered the little path, "This is the only house in this town I want t

really want to

, in the matter of sale and purchase. Adepts in traffic

and I am afraid I shall have to sell it for a g

isn't another house in the village you'd like half so well. Is it too large for you?" continued Mr. Allen, hurriedly. Then Mercy told him all her pla

he letter, in which Stephen had said: "Meantime, I am waiting as patiently as I can for a tenant for the other half of this house. It seems to be very hard to find just the right sort of person. I cannot take in any of the mill operatives. They are noisy and unti

ed her head with increasing emphasis, and finally exclaimed: "That is precisely such a spot as Dr. Wheeler said we ought to go to. I think you're right, Mr. Allen. It's a Providence. And I'd be so glad to be good to that poor old wom

rs of out-door life. But he had never forgotten the grand out-look and off-look from the town. Lying itself high up on the western slope of what must once have been a great river terrace, it commanded a view of a wide and fertile meadow country, near enough to be a most beautiful feature in the landscape, but far enough away to prevent any danger from its moisture. To the south and sou

From the two highest of these, the views were grand. It was like living on a mountain, and yet there was the rich beauty of coloring o

were fast driving out of their minds the thought of the sale, which had been mentioned in the beginni

ve sold this house. Did you really want to buy it?

"Dear me, what children we are! Mercy, I don't honestly

Mercy; "but that seems a great deal to me: though not in a good cranberry year, perhaps," added she, ingen

eting-house hill. I wouldn't like to have anybody else own the canvas on which the picture of my home will be oftenest painted for my eyes. I'll give you three thousa

t believe in such sudden good fortune; "but do you think you ought to buy it so quick? Per

ou three thousand dollars for the house, because nobody might happen to want to live in it. But Deacon Jones knows better than anybody else the value of property here, and I am perfectly willing to give you the price he se

e were reading a writing a great way off,--"I don't know about that. I doubt very much i

t accept. In the bottom of her heart, she fully believed that they would never again see one of those boxes. The contents of some which she had herself packed were of a most motley description. In the beginning of the breaking up, while Mercy was at her wits' end, with the unwonted perplexities of packing the whole belongings of a house, her mother had tormented her incessantly by bringing to her every few min

ercy was born. No old magpie was ever a more indiscriminate hoarder than Mrs. Carr had been; and, among all her hoardings, there was none more amusing than her hoarding of old wall-papers. A scrap a foot square seemed to her too precious to throw away. "It might be jest the right size to cover suthin' with," she would say; and, to do her justice, she did u

t you can paper except that." Mrs. Carr took the suggestion in perfect good faith, and convul

rds they're so rough, the paper wouldn't lay smooth, anyhow; and I couldn't well get at the

the desperateness of the trouble suggested a remedy. Select

ant to carry. And, if this box isn't large enough, you shall have two more. Don't tire yourself out:

half-guilty, as one does when one h

as she sorted. Now and then she would come across something which would rouse an electric chain of memories in the dim chambers of her old, worn-out brain, and she would sit motionless for a long time on the garret floo

He traded off some shells for it in some o' them furrin places. You wouldn't think it now, but it used to be jest the color o' a robin's egg or a light-blue 'bachelor's button;' and your father he used to stick one o' them in my belt whenever they was in blossom, when I hed

gain. She was most loyally affectionate to her mother, but the sentiment was not a wholly filial one. There was too much reversal of the natural order of the protector and the protected in it; and her life was on too different a plane of thought, feeling, and interest from the life of the uncultured, undeveloped, childish, old woman. Yet no one who saw them together would have detected any trace of this shortcoming in Mercy's feeling towards her mother. She had in her nature a fine and lofty fibre of loyalty which could never condescend even to parley with a thought derogatory to its obje

n usual without any sound from the garret, where her mother was still at work o

nd papers. The rags and papers were spread around her on the floo

ng, Mrs. Carr held up a little piece of carved ivory. It was of a creamy yellow, and shone like satin: a long shred of frayed pink ribbon hung fr

other? Why does it make you cry?" asked Merc

ame v'yage I told ye he brought the blue crape. He knowed I was a expectin' to be sick, and he was drefful afraid he wouldn't get hum in time; but he did. He jest come a sailin' into th' harbor, with every mite o' sail the old brig '

'Bos'u'n,' and he'd stick this ere whistle into his mouth an' try to make him blow it afore he was a month old. But by the time he was nine months old he'd blow it ez loud ez I could. And his father he'd just lay back 'n his chair, and laugh 'n' laugh, 'n' call out, 'Blow away, my hearty!' Oh, my! it don't seem any longer ago'n yesterday. I wish I'd ha' known. I wa'n't neve

e had lived, mother?" said Mercy, anxious to

am I, Mercy? Dear me! hain't I lost my memory, sure enough, ex

" said Mercy. "Don't you know

en Caley,--Caley, he'd be, let me see--you reckon it,

ver the faded and frayed pink ribbon, and looked at it with an indefinable sense of its being a strange link between her and a distant past, which, though she had never shared it, belonged to her

whistled with. We'll keep this to amuse children with: you carry it in your pocket. Perhaps we shall meet some c

hinkin' o' things." And, easily diverted as a child, the old woman dropped the wh

coming upon her first-born child's first toy, lost for forty years; the picture, too, of the history of the quaint piece of carving itself; the day it was slowly cut and chiselled by a patient and ill-paid toiler in some city of China; its voyage

m for three weeks to come. She was, in fact, so much of a child that she was in a state of eager delight at every new scene and person. Her childishness proved the best of claims upon every one's courtesy. Everybody was ready to help "that poor sweet old woman;" and she was so simply and touchingly

ent at her fellow-passengers, not one of whom apparently observed that on either hand were stretching away to the east and the west fields that were, even in this late autumn, like carpets of gold and green. Through these fertile meadows ran a majestic river, curving and doubling as if loath to leave such fair shores. The wooded mountains changed fast from green to purple, from purple to dark gray; and almost before Mercy had comprehended the beauty of the region, it was lost from her sight, veiled in the twilight's pa

"It'll be dark when we get in; an' it's begi

t be carriages at the depot? We are going

an' there may not: there's no knowin'. Ef it d

ver failed her. She laugh

he, on the nights when he

laughed too, a

unds, an' more 'n half the time I don't carry nobody over this last ten miles. Most o' the people from our town go the other way, on the river road. It's shorter, an' some cheaper. There isn

conductor, sensitive as are most New England people, spite of their apparent familiarity of address, to the least rebuff, felt the change in Mercy's to

cy's heart. Her mother, but half-awake, clung nervously to her, asking purposeless and incoherent questions. The conductor, still surly from his fancied rebuff at Mercy's ha

t of the darkness behind them; and, in a second more, M

meet us!" exclaimed Mercy. "You a

rriage which the town boasts, wait, in case you should be here. Here it is!" And, before Mercy had time to analyze or even to realiz

eaking through the carriage window; "but, if you will

was under our seat. The brakeman said he would ta

k the train, and swung himself on the last car, in search of the "one small valise" belonging to his tenants. It was a very shabby valise: it had

ery unpleasing sights to my eyes. I did hope she'd be good-looking." How many times in after years did Stephen recall with laughter his first impressions

o the house to-m

hree or four weeks yet. Our furnitu

ught of that. I will call on you a

all things to a sensitive nature, a kindly indifference, was

e feeling. "What business had I to expect that he was going to be

g man he is, to be sure,

indliness of tone and speec

said Mercy; "but I don't think

was most uncommon friendly for a stranger, running back afte

lights of fires and lamps shine out, than they do in broad daylight, with open windows and people coming and going through open doors, and a general air of comradeship and busy living, it is hard to see. But there is not a lonely vagabond in the world who does not know that they do. One may see on a dark night many a wistful face of lonely man or lonely woman, hurrying resolutely past, and looking away from, the illumined houses which mean nothing to them except the keen reminder of what they are without. Oh, the homeless people there are in this world! Did anybody ever th

and consideration, of "Old Mis' Carr," or, as she was perhaps more often called, "Widder Carr." Mercy had not thought--in her utter inexperience of change, it could not have occurred to her--what a very different thing it was to be simply unknown and poor people in a strange place. The sense of all this smote upon her suddenly and keenly, as they jolted along in the noisy old carriage on this dark, rainy night. Stephen White's indifferent though kindly manner first brought to her the thought, or rather the feeling, of this. Each new glimmer of the home-lights deepened her sense of desolation. Every gust of rain that beat on the carriage roof and windows made her feel more and more like an outcast. She never forgot these moments. She used to say that in them she had lived the whole life of the loneliest ou

oved so slowly to alight that he

er with you? Ain't you goin' to

us: it is all right." But her voice and face belied her words. She moved all through the rest of the evening like one in a dream. She said little, but busied herself in making her mother as comfortable as i

ter

e were no town ordinance forbidding all running of cattle in the streets. A few shabby old farm-wagons stood here and there by these fences; the sleepy horses which had drawn them thither having been taken out of the shafts, and tethered in some mysterious way to the hinder part of the wagons. A court was in session; and these were the wagons of lawyers and clients, alike humble in their style of equipage. On the left-hand side of the hotel, down the eastern slope of the hill ran an irregular block of brick buildings, no two of a height or size, The block had burned down in spots several times, and each owner had rebuilt as much or as little as he chose, which had resulted in as incoherent a bit of architecture as is often seen. The general effect, however, was of a tendency to a certain parallelism with the ground line: so that the block itself seemed to be sliding down hill; the roof of the building farthest east being not much above the level of the first story windows in the building farthest west. To add to the queerness of this "Brick Row," as it was called, the ingenuity of all the sign-painters of the region had been called into requisition. Signs alphabetical, allegorical, and symbolic; signs in black on whi

steep descent had a sunken look, as if they were slipping into their own cellars. The grass was too

although of a better order than those on the eastern side of the common, had somewhat of the same sunken air. Mercy's heart turned to the north with a sudden and instinctive recognition. "I am sure that is the right part of the town for mother," she said. "If Mr. White's house is down in that hollow, we'll not live in it long." She was so absorbed in her study of the place, and in her conjectures as to their home, that she did not realize that she herself was no ordinary sight in that street: a slight, almost girlish figure, in

orhood, that he was so unconscious of the reflection it conveyed. The cook and the stable-boy also came running to the kitchen door, on hearin

r mother. Darned sight better-lookin' by dayl

nster, at least fifty years old. "The gal isn't any thin' so amazin' for good looks, 's I can see; but

d the stable-boy. "Seth sed he handed on 'em into the k

girl: she's come o' real humbly people. Anybody with half an eye can see that. Good gracious! I believe she's goin' to stand still, and let old man Wheeler run over her. Look out there, look out, gal!" screamed the cook, and pounded vigorously with her rolling-pin on the s

your pardon, beg pardon, miss. Bad habit of mine, very bad habit,--walk along without looking. Walked on a dog the other day; hurt

t kept continually stepping, stepping, without advancing or retreating, striking his heavy cane on the ground at each step, as if beating time to his jerky syllables. He had twinkling blue eyes, which were half hid under heavy, projecting eyebrows, and shut up

in his face, as she retreated a few

ad no business to be standing stock-still

gentleman, peering out from under the eaves of his eyebrows, and scrutinizing Mercy as a child might scrutinize a new-come

ow my face. I only cam

g, nothing at all, nowadays," jerked on the queer old gentleman, still shifting rapidly from one foot to the other, and beating time co

d face, good face, very good face," continued the inexplicable old man. "Don't like many p

nough to counterbalance the incoherent talk: the old man was not crazy, only eccentric to a rare de

, too,--you look so merry. I think I and my mother will be very glad to k

, Wheeler. Good enough name. 'Old Man Wheeler' some think's better. I hear 'em: my cane don't make so much noise but I hear 'em. Ha! ha! wolves, wolves, wolves! People are all wolves, all alike, all

e was something inexplicable in the affectiona

e said. "We are not rich

away from you. They're nothing but wolves, wolves, wolves;" and, saying these words, t

ever-increasing astonishment, he turned suddenly

-morning,--bad habit. Too old to change, too old to change. Bad habit, bad hab

usement and wonder, and gave her mother a mo

and I believe he'll be a great friend of

k, without any counting of stitches; others that were in the process of heeling or toeing, and required the closest attention. She had been setting a heel while Mercy was speaking, and did not reply for a moment. Then, push

et, in two jiffeys, if he took a likin' to him; and there might be neighbors a livin' right long 'side on us, for years an' years, thet he'd never any more 'n jest pass the time o' day with, 'n' he wa'n't a bit stuck up, either. I used ter ask him, often 'n' often, what made him

I get with some people, I feel just as if I had been changed into somebody else. I can't bear to open my mouth

n her chair, and beginning to make her needles fly. "Nobody don't never trouble me much, one way or the other.

father must have been queer, too." But she glanced at the placid old face, and forbore. There was a truth a

see their new home; but she could not

re. It seems like heaven, arter them pesky joltin' cars. I ain't in no hurry to see the house. It can't run away, I

and we can't move in until our furniture comes, of course. But I do lo

how. You jest go by yourself, ef you want to so much, an' let me set right here. It don't seem to me 's I'll ever want to g

n of anybody, she turned

, and their green furnished a fine dark background for the gay colors. Mercy had often read of the glories of autumn in New England's thickly wooded regions; but she had never dreamed that it could be so beautiful as this. Rows of young maples lined the street which led up to this wooded hill. Each tree seemed a full sheaf of glittering color; and yet the path below was strewn thick with fallen leaves no less bright. Mercy walked lingeringly, each moment stopping to pick up some new

ese shades and colors sometimes being seen upon one long runner. The effect of these wreaths and tangles of color upon the old, gray stones was so fine that Mercy stood still and involuntarily exclaimed aloud. Then she picked a few of the most beautiful vines, and, climbing up on the wall, sat down to arrange them with the maple-leaves she had already gathered. She made a most picturesque picture as she sat there, in her severe black gown and quaint little

ng day. He slackened his pace, and, perceiving how entirely unconscious Mercy was of his approach, deliberately stud

a return of the annoyance and mortification which had stung her at intervals all day, whenever she recalled their interview of the previous evening. Mercy combined, in a very singular manner, some of the traits of an impulsive nature with those of an unimpulsive one. She did things, said things, and felt things with the instantaneous intensity of the poetic temperament; but she was quite capabl

moment when the sound of Stephen's footsteps first reached her ear, and caused her to look up. The sight of his face at that particular moment was so startling and so unpleasant to her th

onfusion. "I was just on the point of speaking, when you heard me. I ought to have spoken before, but you made so

straightforward nature to any thing which could be even suspected of not being true. The few direct compliments she had received had been

much, Mr. White; but it is not of the least consequence," she turned to walk

pray tell me what you think of the house.

lied Mercy, in the same c

ere on your own stone wall? There is the house;" and Mercy, following the gesture of his hand, saw, not more than twenty rods beyond the spot where she had been sitting,

her face in silence for a moment; the

s just what I had said about it hundreds of times, and wondered how anybody could possibly live in it. B

er eyes scanned the building. An express

phen. "Some of the rooms are quite pleasant. The sou

is little, unknown woman from Cape Cod, who looked with the contemptuous

. Philbrick, if you choose. It was, perhaps, hardly f

deliberation; "but, then, I have not seen many houses. In our village at home, all the houses are low and broad and comfortable-looking. They look as if they had sat down and leaned back to take their ease; and they are all neat and clean-looking,

off in winter," said Stephen, apologetically, "we have such heavy s

house, with not a shadow of relenting in their expression. It was

nd, Stephen White read the successive phases of thought and struggle which passed through Mercy's mind for the next five minutes;

hocked at the first sight of the house. It isn't your house, you know, so it isn't quite so bad for me to

I can't. I hate it more and more, I verily believe, each time I come home; an

same contempt with which she had looked at the

with the sudden recollection of a grief that she had not been able to rise above. "Of course, I don't mean real troubles, like grief about any one you love. One can't wholly conquer such troubles as that; but one can

me into the house, and speak to my mother a moment. You do

There is no reason why I should call on your mother,

ever leaves her bed. She has probably been watching us from the window. She always watches for me. She will wonder if

of men are continually making blunders in their relations with women; especially if they are so unfortunate as to occupy in any sense a position involving a relation to two women at once. The relation may be ever so rightful a

o interfere. Stephen's work for the day was done: he took great pains to tell her at this time every thing which he had seen or heard which could give her the least amusement. She looked forward all through her long lonely days to the evenings, as a child looks forward to Saturday afternoons. Like all invalids whose life has been forced into grooves, she was impatient and unreasonable when anybody or any thing interfered with her routine. A five minutes' delay was to her a serious annoyanc

rought Mrs. Philb

as this she had had no conception. It would be hard to do justice in words to Mrs. White's capacity to be disagreeable when she chose. She had gray eyes, which, though they had a very deceptive trick of suffusing with tears as of great sensibility on occasion, were capable of resting upon a person with a positively unhuman coldness; her voice also had at these times a distinctly unhuman quality in its tones. She had apparently no conception of any necessity of

into a pool he fears he may drown in, and began to give a voluble account of how he had found Mrs. Philbrick sitting on their stone wall, so absorbed in looking at the bright leaves that she had not even seen the house. He ran on in this strain for some min

o take off your bonnet and take tea with

you. I did not dream that it was so late. My mother will be anxio

ow and stony syllables, came from Mrs. White's

hope you will be able to make allowances for my mother's manner. It is all my fault. I know that she can ne

r reception was too great

," she exclaimed. "Good-night," and she was out of

man seemed accoutred in the ordinary fashion of soldiers; but, whenever a bullet struck him, it glanced off harmlessly as if turned back by a spell. It was so with Stephen White's silence: in ordinary intercourse, he was social genial; he talked more than average men talk; he took or seemed to take, more interest than men usually take in the common small talk of average people; but the instant there was a manifestation of anger, of discord of any thing unpleasant, he entrenched himself in silence. This was especially

k, Stephen?" sh

s to make you happy, it is of no use for me to keep on saying it. If it would make you any happier to ke

ess of his organization, this tyrannical woman held him chained. His submission to her would have seemed abject, if it had not been based on a sentiment and grounded in a loyalty which compelled respect. He had accepted this burden as the one great duty of his life; and, whatever became of him, whatever became of his life, the burden should be carried. This helpless woman, who stood to him in the relation of mother, should be made happy. From the moment of his father's death, he had assumed this obligation as a sacrament; and, if it lasted his life out, he would never dream of evading or lessening it. In this fine fibre of loyalty, Stephen White and Mercy Philb

s she walked away after Mrs. White's inhospitable invitation to tea. "I wouldn't allow

save for a certain compression of the mouth, and a look of patient endurance in the eyes, to a torrent of ill-natur

so late to tea, when you know it is all I have to look forward to, all day long. Yo

I had, I shoul

had your watch

, mo

ll things,--when you know I hate to see people near my meal-times, and you must have known it was near supper-time. At any rate, watch or no watch, I suppose you didn't

You often complain of being so lonely, of no one's coming in," replied Stephen, i

, you wouldn't speak at all," said the angry

. He would have liked to avoid it; he was instinctively conscious that it often betrayed to other people what he suffered. But it was beyond his co

I should think I was the one to be angry. You're all I've got in the world, Stephen; and you know what a life I lead. It isn't as if I could go about, like other women; then I s

hundred and sixty-five in a year. Was not t

pte

ely mentioned the fact of her having met Mr. White near the house,

ed Mrs. Carr, eagerly. "Is sh

and Good-evening. But Mr. White says she is very lonely; people don't go to see her much: so I should think she would be very glad of somebody her own

, I hope I'll never be that way. What'u'd yo

rs. White," said Mercy, with an incautious emphasi

a most awful dread o' gettin' a cancer. There ain't no death like thet. There wuz my mother's half-sister, Keziah,--she that married Elder Swift for her second husband. She died o' cancer; an' her oldest boy by her first husband he hed it in his face awful. But he held on ter life 's ef he couldn't say die, nohow; and I tell yer, Mercy

ul to talk about. I can't bear to think that any human being h

Mercy, ain't you? You allus was orful feelin' for everybody when you wuz little, 'n' I don't see 's you've outgrowed it a bit. But I expect it's thet makes you sech friends with folks, an' makes you such a good gal to your poor old mother. Kiss me, child," and Mrs. Carr lifted up

essedness of it! No little child six years old ever rested more entirely and confidingly in the love and kindness and shelter and direction of its mother than did Mrs. Carr in the love and kindness and shelter and direction of her daughter Mercy. It had begun to be so, while Mercy was yet a little girl. Before she was fifteen years old, she felt a responsibility for her mother's happiness, a watc

the house they were to

on her nose, and with her head well thrown back, she took a survey of the building in silence. Th

Jenkins'

aughed

ght of it. It looks just like th

hought o' offerin' to hire a barn to live in afore, but I s'

a year, mother," said

inside, an' I reckon we needn't roost on the fences outside, a-lookin' at it, any more'n we choose to. It does look, for all the world though, like 'Bijah Jenkins's o

r on the middle of the north side, and then run a piazza across the west side, and carry the platform round both the bay windows. I saw a picture of a house in a book Mr. Allen had, which looked very much a

re that ere jog comes. Your bay window mightn't come so's't would be of an

houses. I was only amusing myself by planning it. I'd rather have that house, old and horrid as it is, than any house in the town. I like the s

, in a tone of unqualified wonder. "How

chool," said Mercy, coloring. "Mr. Allen said I was quite

r clothes? I'm sure I don't need much; an' I could do with a good deal less, if there was any thing you wanted, dear. Your father he 'd never rest in his grave, ef he though

lk gowns brought from many a land; they were to have ornaments of quaint fashion, picked up here and there; they were to have money enough in the bank to live on in quiet comfort during the intervals when the husbands sailed away to make more. So strong was this feeling that it crystallized into a traditionary custom of life, which even poverty finds it hard to overcome. You shall find to-day, in any one of the seaport cities or towns of New England, widows and daughters of sea-captains, living, or rather seeming to live, upon the most beggarly incomes, but still keeping up a certain pathetic sham of appearance of being at ease. If they are really face to face with prob

bhorrent to her: not that she reasoned about it, and submitting it to her conscience found it wicked, and therefore hateful; but that she disliked it instinctively,--as instinctively as she disliked pain. Her moral nerves shrank from it, just as nerves of the body shrink from suffering; and she recoiled from the suggestion of such a thing with the same involuntary quickness with which we put up the hand to ward off a falling blow, or drop the eyelid to protect an endangered eye. Physicians tell us that there are in men and women such enormous differences in this matter of sensitiveness to physical pain that one person may die of a pain which would be comparatively slight to another; and this is a fact which has to be taken very carefully into accou

sly exemplified, even in the trivial matter of near-sightedness. We are almost always a little vexed, when we

is the frequent retort, and in t

and. During such seasons as these, her treatment of her friends and acquaintances had odd alternations of frank friendliness and reticent coolness. A sudden misgiving whether she might not be appearing to like her friend more than she really did would seize her at most inopportune moments, and make her absent-minded and irresponsive. She would leave sentences abruptly unfinished,--invitations, perhaps, or the acceptances of invitations, the mere words of which spring readily to one's

least danger of your ever being any thing but truthful. Nature and grace are both too strong in you. There is no lie in saying to a person who has come to see you in your own house, 'I am glad to see you,'

would reply u

s to see you, you give pleasure: t

, and am willing to make my fellow-creatures happy at any sacrifice, even at the frightful one of entertaining such a bore as you are!' He would never come near me again, if he knew I thought that; and yet, if I do think so, and make him think I do not, is not that the biggest sort of a lie? Why, Mr. Alle

being: any thing less gives pain, repels people from us, and hinders our being able to do them good. There is no more doubt of this than of any other first principle of Christian conduct; and I am

d that stern words were most likely to convince her of her mistake. It was a sort of battle, however,--this battle which Mercy was forced to fight,--in which no human being can help another, unless he has first been throu

her mother was a very harmless one. To people of the world, it would appear so trivial a thing, that the conscience which could feel itself wounded by reticence on such a point would seem hardly worth a sneer. Mr. Allen, who had been Mercy's teacher for three years, had early seen in her a strong poetic impulse, and had fostered and stimulated it by every means in his power. He believed that in the exercise of this talent she would find the best possible help for her loneliness and comfort for her sorrow. He recognized clearly that, to so exceptional a nature as Mercy's, a certain amount of isolation was inevitable, all through her life, however fortunate she might be in entering into new and wider relations. The loneliness of intense individuality is the loneliest loneliness in the world,--a loneliness which crowds only aggravate, and which even the closest and happiest companionship can only in part cure. The creative faculty is the most inalienable and uncontrollable of individualities. It is at once its own reward and its own penalty: until it has conquered the freedom of its own city, in which it must for ever dwell, more or less apart, it is only a prisoner in the cities of others. All this Mr. Allen felt for Mercy, recognized in Mercy. He felt and recognized it by the instinct of love, rather than by any intellectual perception. Intellectually, he was, in spite of his superior culture, far Mercy's inferior. He had been brave enough and manly enough to recognize this, and also to recognize what it took still more manliness to recognize,--that she could never love a man of his temperament. It would have been very easy for him to love Mercy. He was not a man of a passionate nature; but he felt himself strangely stirred whenever he looked into her sensitive, orchid-like face. He felt in every fibre of him that to have the whole love of such a woman would be bewildering joy; yet never for one moment did he allow himself to think of seeking it. "I might make her think she loved me, perhaps," he said to himself. "She is so lonely and sad, and has seen so few men; but it would be base. She needs a nature totally different from mine, a life unlike the life I shall lead. I will never try to make her love me. And he never did. He taught her and trained he

y faithful and joyous every day, in intercourse with only common and uncultivated people, if fate sets her among them. She seems to me sometimes to be more literally a child of God, in the true and complete sense of the word 'child,' than any one I ever knew. She takes every thing which comes to her just as a happy and good little child takes every thing that is given to him, and is pleased with all; yet she is not at all a religious person. I am often distressed by her lack of impulse to worship. I think she has no strong sense of

n, with a gesture of impatience, tore the sheets down

If Stephen is the person to amount to any thing in her life, he will recognize her. If he is not

h. He sent two of her poems to a friend of his, who was the editor of one of the leading magazines in the country. The welcome they met exceeded even his anticipations. By the very next mail, he received a note from his friend, enclosing a check, which to Harley A

e money she had unwittingly earned. He feared that she would resent it; he feared that she would be too elated by it; he feared a dozen different things in as many minutes, as he sat turning the check over and over in his hands. But his fears were all unfounded. Mercy had too genuine an artistic nature to be elated, too much simplicity to be offended. Her

e verses were really worth it? Are you quite sure the editor did not

Allen l

ill some day laugh heartily, as you look back upon the misgivings with which you received the first money earned by y

eyes f

, and take journeys," she said in a tone of

w you were such a discontented girl. Hav

over with joys and delights; that is, except when I was for a little while bowed down by a grief nobody could bear up under," she added, with a sudden drooping of every feature in her expressive face, as she r

ealist to understand this. He loo

chids, and another full of only palms and ferns. I should like to wear always the costliest of silks, very plain and never of bright colors, but heavy and soft and shining; and laces that were like fleecy clouds when they are just scattering. I should like to be perfectly beautiful, and to have perfectly beautiful people around me. But all this doesn't make me one bit less contented. I care just

ations which the world must offer to one so sensitive as you are to all its beauties," replied Mr. Allen, sadly. Mercy was displeased. She was al

I do not think that the Lord made the beautiful things in this world for temptations; and I bel

sound irreverent: they shock me!" exclaimed Mr.

uch real irreverence in saying that the Lord expects us to look out for ourselves and keep out of mischief as there is in teaching that he

s in this frame of mind, it was of no use to argue

there is no reason why you should not have a genuine success as a writer, and put yourself in a position to

ther, Mercy started, and

ver once thoug

t, mystified. "Never once thought

ght about telling her about th

ly like the money, but be very proud of y

ercy, reflectively: "it would seem quite diffe

o," laughed Mr. Allen.

ney for what he can do. I can do sewing, and you can preach; and of the two, if people must go without one or the other, they could do without sermons better than without clothes,--eh, Mr. Allen?" and Mercy laughed mischievously. "But once when I told mother I believed I would turn dressmaker for the town, I knew I could ea

come between Mercy and her work. "It is only a prejudice. And you need never let your mother

rom what they are, to save my feelings? or to adapt the truth to my feebleness, which is not like the feebleness of old age, to be sure, but is feebleness in comparison with your

t, unless you choose to. You are a mature and independent woman: she is old and childish. The relation between you is really reversed. You are the mot

yet, and I don't believe I ever will," said Mercy. "You'll never make me thi

xclaimed. "But it must be all my stupid way of putting t

he subject, and had been frightened back,--sometimes by her own unconquerable dislike to speaking of her poetry; sometimes, as in the instance above, by an outbreak on her mother's part of indign

ny verses by that time to read to her." And so the secret grew bigger and heavier, and yet Mercy grew more used to carrying it, until she herself began

pte

half delight. Four weeks had passed since the unlucky evening on which he had taken Mercy to his mother's room, and he had not seen her face again. He had c

come to wondering why she never met him in her walks; and, what was still more significant, to mistaking other men for him, at a distance. This is one of the oddest tricks of a brain preoccupied with the image of one human being. One would think that it would make the eye clearer-sighted, well-nigh infallible, in the recognition of the loved for

phenomenon. Stephen White, however, had more than once during these four weeks quickened his pace to overtake some slender figure clad in black, never doubting that it was Mercy Philbrick, until he came so near that his eyes were forced to tell him the truth. It was truly a strange thing that he and Mercy did not once meet during all these weeks. It was no doubt an important element in the growth of their relat

the house, Stephen was standing at his

he said. "I think I wil

nd spoke in the measured syllables and unvibrating tone w

of you in some other part of the town: would you have felt called upon to pay them t

if it did not in the smallest way interfere with her comfort; and this cold, sarcastic manner of speaking was, of all the forms of her ill-nature, the one he found most unbearable. He made no reply, but stood sti

nued in the same

asure. It is nothing to me, I am sure, if you choose to be all the time doing all

replied Stephen, gently. "But you know you and I never agree upon such poin

han like any sound possible to human organs. "I don't want to hear any thing about

in the same unruffled tone. "They have g

or open their boxes," sneered Mrs. White, still with the same intolerable

not wish to go near them or ever see them, if it will ma

ike to know? Have I ever tried to shut you up, or keep you

en, "you never have. But I w

ut it does vex me to see you always so ready to be at everybody's beck and call; and, where it's a woman, it naturally vex

er thoughts about Mercy Philbrick? And was her only thought of the possibility

his mother had said, "You wouldn't want to be misunderstood, or make a woman care more for you than she ought," struck terror to his very soul. The apparent amicableness of her remark at the present moment did not in the least blind him to the enormous possibilities of future misery involved in such a train of feeling and thought on her part.

ideas into your head? Of course I sho

l of gossiping people, and women are very impressionable, especially such high-strung women

he saw a storm or a siege of embarrassing questioning about to begin, he looked around for a newspaper as involuntarily as a soldier feels in his belt for his pistol. He had more than once smiled b

one of her great pleasures to have him read aloud to her. It mattered little what he read: she was equally interested in the paragraphs of small local news, and in the telegraphic summaries of foreign affa

ey did his mother's. They had lived so long alone in the house in absolute quiet, save for the semi-occasional stir of Marty's desultory house-cleaning, that these sounds w

l get settled in a day or two, and th

made so much noise. It's astonishing to me that folks can't do things without making a racket;

g, he accidentally glanced out of the window, and saw Mercy wal

morning," he thought to him

of Stephen's eye ever esc

going down town at this hour? You will have to manage to go eith

n this instance, and had reason to regret it long. He spoke impulsively on the instant, and revealed to mot

, Harley Allen; and I am in duty bound to show her some attention, and help her if I can. She is also a bright, interesting person; and I do not know so many such th

she said, in a slow and deliberate manner, as if reflecting on a problem,--"You en

hall enjoy it very much, and I think you will enjoy it more than I shall;

eplied Mrs. White, with an emphasis on the last perso

hort about is not always the best way of getting off a wrong road, though it may be the quickest way. Stephen turned short about, and exclaimed with a forced laugh, "Well, mother, I don't suppose it will make any great diffe

ce was of mingled perplexity and displeasure. After a time, these gave place to a more c

thought. "I'll just watch and see how things go. No

White was very much mistaken in

ma. Their clock was broken, hopelessly broken. It had been packed in too frail a box; and heavier boxes placed above it had crashed through, making a complete wreck of the whole thing,--frame, works, all. It w

der if there are any such clocks to be bought anywhere nowadays?" She stopped presently before a jeweller's and watchmaker's shop in the Brick Row, and eagerly scrutinized the long line of clocks

hed Mercy, invo

ps of a cane on the sidewalk. She turned and looked into the face of her friend, "Old Man Wheeler," who was standin

n't go to see anybody,--never go! never go! People are all wolves, wolves, wolves; but I'll come an' see you. Like your face,--good face, good face. What're you lookin'

ly trying to keep the muscles of her face quiet. "I

u a good man, not this feller in here,--he's only good for o

e ceiling, and had beautiful carved work on it. But it's in five hundred pieces, I do believe. A heavy bo

eccentric old man, starting off at a quick pace. Mercy did not stir. Presently,

and. Come on, child,--come on! I've got a clock like yours. Don't want it. Never use

rself, "do you really want to sell the clock? If you have no use for it, I'd be very glad to b

't sell clocks: never sold a clock yet. I'll give yer the clock, if yer like it.

ther would not like to have you give us a clock. I will buy it of you; but I really canno

, "Can't you see I'm an old man, child? Don't pester me now. Come, on, come on! I tell you I want to show yer that clock. Give it to you 's well 's not. Stood in the lumber-room twenty years. Come on, c

the level of the Odd Fellows regalia, and only used by them on rare occasions. For the last ten years, however, it had done miscellaneous duty as warder of Old Man Wheeler's lumber-room. If a key could be supposed to peep through a keyhole, and speculate on the nature of the service it was rendering to humanity, in keeping safe the contents of the room into which it gazed, this key might have indulged in fine conjectures, and have passed its lifetime in a state of chronic bewil

d themselves here. A huge stack of calico comforters, their tufts gray with dust and cobwebs, lay on top of two old ploughs, in one corner: kegs of nails, boxes of soap, rolls of leather, harnesses stiff and cracking with age, piles of books, chairs, bedsteads, andirons, tubs, stone ware, crockery ware, carpets, files of old newspapers, casks, feather-beds, jars of druggists' medicines, old signboards, rake

n threw down his cane, and ran swiftly from corner to corner, and pile to pile, peering around, pulling out first one thing and then another. He darted fro

he muttered to himself as he ran. "

together, Mr. Wheeler?" Mercy ventured

er. He pulled them too hastily, and the whole stack tumbled forward, and rolled heavily in all directions, raising a suffocating dust,

" cried Mercy,

augh, more like a chu

pretty choky, though." And he sat down on one of the leather rolls, and held his sides through a hard coughing fit. As the dust slowly subsided, Mercy s

ck you meant, Mr. Wh

ter, 'tain't wuth nothin' to me. Wouldn't hev it in the house 'n' more than I'd git the town 'us

d," replied Mercy. "But I really cannot thin

at the leather bale rolled away from him, and he nearl

n' I won't sell it ter ye,--won't, won't, won't," and he picked up his cane, and stood leaning upon it with both his han

r. Whee

--take it, take it, take it, or else leave it, just's you like. I ain't a-goin' to

lock was its own advocate, almost

though I don't know what my mother will say. It is a most va

minute. I'll get two men to carry it." And, before Mercy realized his intention, he had shut the door, locked it, and left her alone in the warehouse. Her first sensation was of sharp terror; but she ran to the one window which was accessible, and, seeing that it looked out on the busiest thorough

he place as Mercy had. With gaping mouths an

earn yer money!" exclaimed the old man, pointing to th

understand? Hark 'e! do ye understand? Not a cent more," he said, f

se those rascals will cheat you. Men are wolves, wolves, wolves. They're to carry the cl

y the porters. "Oh, yes, I have my portemonnaie here," holding it up. "This is th

at her with a keen,

was goin' to give ye money, did ye? Oh,

rer pang to give away fifty cents than to have parted with

n me just the same as money. Such a clock as

e, use. Can't have enough on't. People get it all away from you. They're wolves, wolves, wolves," replied the old man

up! I won't pay you, if you don

w ahead, now lagging behind, now talking in an eager and animated manner with Mercy, now breaking off to admonish or chastise the bearers of the clock. The eccentric old fellow used his cane as freely as if it had been a hand. There were few boys in town who had not felt its weight; and his more familiar acquainta

w up the window and leaned out, to assure himself that he was not mistaken. Mercy heard the sound, looked up, and met Stephen's eye. She colored violently, b

man gazed at her angrily for a moment, then stopped short, planted his cane on the ground, and

ock, too. Don't you go to lettin' him handle your money, child. Mind now! I'll be a good friend to you, if y

se words; but she repelled it, as she would have r

speak so to me about Mr. White. He is almost an entire stranger to me as yet. We live in his house; but we do not know him or h

they reached Mercy's gate. Here the clock-carriers were about to set th

Into the house! into the house,

ey'd ha' left it right out doors here. Cheats! Pe

oor bewildered Mrs. Carr's presence he strode, the men f

s. Carr was, as usual, knitting. She rose up suddenly, confused at the strange apparitions before her, and let her knitting fall on the floor. The ball rolled swiftly towards Mr. Wheeler, and tangled the yarn around his feet. He

gentleman I told you of,--Mr. Wheeler. He has very kindly

or bewildered old woman, and, dropping her

you, sir. Pray

wn in houses,--never, never. Where'll

imed, lifting his cane, and threatening the men who were on the point of setting the

took out her portemonnaie, and came forward to pay the bearers. As she opened it, the old man stepped nearer to her, and peered curiously into her hand. The money in the portemonnaie was neatly folded and assorted, eac

naie for a ten-cent piece. It looks neater, too, than to have it all in a crumpled mass," she added, smiling and

out the room with a dissatisfied expression of c

the furniture

Mercy; but Mercy laughed, and replied as sh

have for this room, however. These rooms are all larger than our rooms wer

y lumber-room? Have it's well's

from you. We are under great obligation to you now for the clock," said Mercy; and Mrs. Carr be

hild, and tapping his cane on the floor at every step. In the doorway he halted a moment, and, without loo

s clock. Whatever made you take it, child?" exclaimed Mrs. Carr, walking round

nd he is ever, ever so rich. The clock isn't really of any value to him; that is, he'd never do any thing with it. He has a huge room half as big as this house, just crammed with thin

ly; "but I can't quite see it's you do. It seems to me ama

Mercy, laughing; "and I'm sure nobody can say any thing ill-natured ab

had watched the procession from her window, and had heard the confused sounds of talking and moving of furniture in t

ho ever heard of his being seen walking with a woman before? Even as a young man, he never would have

. You forget that we know literally nothing about these people. So far from being queer, it

thought, as his mother di

pte

in the sun like white satin ribbons flung out in all directions. The groves of maple and hickory and beech were bare. Their delicate gray tints spread in masses over the hillsides like a transparent, gray veil, through which every outline of the hills was clear, but softened. The massive pines and spruces looked almost black against the white of the snow, and the whole landscape was at once shining and sombre; an effect which is peculiar

of the wood-cutters far into the depths of the forests, and found there on sunny days, in sheltered spots, where the feet of the men and horses and the runners of the heavy sledges had worn away the snow, green mosses and glossy ferns and shining clumps of the hepatica. It was a startling sight on a December day, when the snow was lying many inches deep, to come suddenly on Mercy walking in the middle of the road, her hands filled with green ferns and mosses and vines. There were three different species of ground-pine in these woods, and hepatica and p

tuff?" she thought. "She's carried in enou

red her perplex

rick come into the house without somethin' green in her h

that very thing myself. They can't be a brewin' beer this time

ite, "and see if you can any way find out what it's all for. Sh

with green vines. There were evergreen trees in boxes; the window-seats were filled with

ouse or out in the woods, the whole place smelled o' hemlock so, an' looked so kind o' sunny and shady al

face darken

s made so dark and damp," she said. "I sh

settin'-room, an' the sun a-streamin' into both the south winders. It made shadders on the floor, jest a

earthen dish with ferns growing in it. It was the day before Christmas; and Mercy had been busy all day, putting up the Christmas decorations in her rooms. As she hung cross after cross, a

y her something; and I may as well do it first as last. Perhaps she doesn't care any thing about things from the woods; but I think they may do her good without her knowing i

again to see my mother? I do assur

is tone and his eyes. They said as

u could only once get her to like you, and would come and see her now and then, it would be a kindness to her, and a great help to m

olving in her thoughts, as she deftly and with almost a magic touch laid the soft mosses in the earthen dish, and planted them thick with ferns and hepatica and partridge-berry v

he dish of mosses than her face lighted up, and exclaiming, "Oh, where did you get those partridge-berry vines?" she involuntarily stretched out her hands. The ice was broken. Mercy

. White. Let me hold them down l

th tears, as she lifted the vines gently in her fingers, and looked at them. Mercy watched her with great surprise; but w

m when you were a child,

I was young: not when I was a child, though. May I have one of them to keep?"

u, for Christmas," exclaimed

y sorely he was often puzzled to select a thing which should not jar either on his own taste or his mother's sense of utility. But a gift of this kind, a simple little tribute to her supposed womanly l

, and in a gentler tone than Mercy had before heard from h

the windows. As she moved about the room lightly, now and then spea

ued to think happily of the pleasant incident of the fresh bright face and the sweet voice. F

ill his mother should have spoken of them first, that he might know whether she were pleased or not by the gift. So infinitely small are the first beginnings of the course of deceit into which tyranny always drives its victim. It could not be called a deceit, the simple forbearing to speak of a new object which one observed in a room. No; but the motive made it a sure seed of a deceit: for when Mrs. White

u to tell me about them," and even then would have been torture

h leaf minutely; then he walked to the windows and examined the wreaths. He felt himself so suddenly gladdened by these tokens of Mercy's presence, and by his mother's evident change of feeling towards her, t

anged; and it was so thoughtful of her to bring them in for you for

e dinner with us to-morrow. Marty's made some capital mince-pies, and is going to roast

most dumb with astonishment. A certain fear mingled with it. What meant this sudden change? Did it portend good or evil? It seemed too sudden, too inexpli

ld be very nice. It is a long time sin

ea and ask them," replied Mrs. Wh

if he were a man talking in a dream. "I hav

go; that the call should be purely at her suggestion. The patience and silence with which he sat waiting for her to remember and speak of it were the very essence of deceit again,--twice in this one hour an acted lie, of which his dull

it's getting near nine o'clock. You'd bet

his own sensations, he would ha

ppose I had better go now," he sa

t that a new element was to be introduced into his life; a vague, prophetic sense of some change at hand. Then came the first interview, and his sudden disappointment, which he now blushed to recollect. It seemed to him as if some magician must have laid a spell upon his eyes, that he did not see even in that darkness how lovely a face Mercy had, did not feel even through all the embarrassment and strangeness the fascination of her personal presence. Then he dwelt lingeringly on the picture, which had never faded from his brain, of his nex

int of going upstairs. Their little maid of all work had alr

pon her at once. Mercy herself was astonished, and ran hastily to open the door. When she saw Stephe

k. I know it is late, but my moth

evening makes us all jump. Pray come in," and she threw open the door into the sitting-room, where the lamps had already been put out, and the light of a blazing hickory log made long

inner with us to-morrow. We live in the plainest way, and cannot entertain in the ordinary acceptation of the term. We only ask you to our ordinary home-dinner," he added, with a sudden sense of th

re just saying that it would be the first Christmas dinner we ever ate alone. But you must come in, Mr

ing-room he paused and stood silent for so

lease not light the lamps. This firelight on the

her own house, Mercy blew out the lamp she had lighted, and drawing a chair close up to the hearth sat do

ht. Some evenings we do not light the lamps at all. Mother can

est. Some lines, which were a shade too strong and positive when her face fully confronted you, disappeared entirely when it was thrown

anger, forgot every thing, except the one intense consciousness of this sw

xpression gathering in her eyes, as she looked steadily at him with unutterable surprise. "Do not be angry with me. I could not help saying it; but I do not say it as men generally say such t

alm, dreamy tone and look heightened this impression. Moreover, as Stephen's soul had been during all the past four weeks slowly growing into the feeling which made it inevitable that he should say the

ating syllables, quite unli

t say it as other men have said it. But will you please to re

almost have said "Mercy,"--and looked at her wit

ow already asking at her hands she hardly knew what, and compelling her

ur mother seemed very much pleased with the ferns I carri

say," answered Stephen, absently

cared for them," said Mercy, laughing; for s

d air, and rising to go. "I thank you for letting me come into this beautiful room with you.

are you, Mr. White?" as

never go away. How could I

oke as if you never expected to see

nded person," he said. "I did not mean that at all.

ften as you like to come. You may be sure of that; but you mu

o go in until his mother was asleep. Very well he knew that it would be better that she did not see his face

come," he replied, and ran

no answer came framed in words, no explanation suggested itself, only Stephen's face rose up before her, vivid, pleading, as he had looked when he said, "Never again, Mrs. Philbrick?" and as she looked again into the dark blue eyes, and heard the low tones over again, she sank into a deeper and deeper reverie, from which gradually all self-accusation, all perplexity, faded away, leaving behind them only a vague happiness, a dreamy sense of joy. If lovers could look back on the first quickening of love in their souls, how precious would be the memories;

o care-so much for her, and perhaps still more strange that she herself found it not unpleasing that he did so. Stephen's reminiscences were at once more distinct and more indistinct,--more distinct of his emotions, more indistinct of t

flashed like millions of prisms in the sun. The beauty of the scene was almost solemn. The air was so frosty cold that even the noon sun did not melt these ice-sheaths; and, under the flood of the full mid-day light, t

, the light would not hurt your eyes. It is the glare of it coming through the glass. Let us wrap you up, and draw you

h a plan as this of getting out-d

the room too

When Stephen came in, Mercy stood behind her, a fleecy white cloud thrown over her head, pointing out eagerly every point of beauty in the view. A high bush of sweet-brier, with long, slender, curving branches, grew just in front of the window. Many of the cup-like seed-vessels still hung on the boughs: they were all finely enc

sky!" she cried. "Isn't it enough

?" thought Stephen. "She is the swe

eetness and much love of the beautiful; but his love of the beautiful was an indolent, and one might almost say a-haughty, demand in his nature. Mercy's was a bounding and delighted acceptance. She was cheery: he was only placid. She was full of delight; he, only of satisfaction. In her, joy was of the spirit, spiritual. Keen as were her senses, it was her soul which marshalled them all. In him, though the soul's forces were not feeble, the senses foreran them,--compelled them, sometimes conquered them. It would have been impos

e, talked and laughed together in an evident gay delight, which made matters worse every moment. A short and surly reply from Mrs. White to an innocent question of Mrs. Carr's fell suddenly on Mercy's ear. Keenly alive to the smallest slight to her mother, she turned quickly towards Mrs. White, and, to her consternation, met the same steady, pitiless, aggressive look which she had seen on her face in their first interview. Mercy's first emotion was one of great indignation: her second was a quick flash of comprehension of the whole thing. A great wave of rosy color swept over her face; and, without knowing what she was doing, she lo

e now. I have l

f chatty gossip with her neighbor; but she saw that Mercy had some

l Mrs. White's faults it must be confessed th

k," fell from her lips in the same measured syllables and the s

as soon as they had crossed the threshold of their own

She got very tired before dinner was over. I could see that, poor thing! She

o reply, but changed he

her, if she can," she thought. "Maybe it'll help divert

aid "good-by," he had suddenly held out his hand, and, clasping hers tightly, had looked a

selfish. How mean, how base of her, to be so jealous of his talking with me! If she were his wife, it would be another thing. But he doesn't belong to her body and soul, if she is his mother. If ever I know him well enough, I'

few feet away, separated from her only by a wall, were having a fierce and angry ta

you showed in conversing with Mrs. Philbrick? I

s face. At this attack, it grew deeper stil

ee your face. It is

y man's face, mother, to be accused so," re

what I observe. You needn't think you can deceive me about the least t

Too well he knew his inability

erstand what you are driving at about Mrs. Philbrick, nor why you show these capricious changes of feeling towards her. I

n you. It is enough to turn her head to see that she has such power over a man li

h a half-smothered ejaculation

lbrick and Stephen White,--the old year in which they had been nothin

ter

y. But she, too, had had a season of reflection this morning, and was much absorbed in her own plans. She heartily regretted having shown so much ill-feeling in regard to Mercy; and she had resolved to atone for it in some way, if she could. Above all, she had resolved, if possible, to banish from Stephen's mind the idea that sh

be very fond of her mothe

swered Stephen,

een old when Mrs. Philbrick was born. I don't thi

ing about her age," replied Stephen, still mor

he is that," said Mrs. White; "and she really is

The first time I saw her, I thought she was uncommonly plain; but afterwards I saw tha

rry, Steve, you thought I didn't treat her well yesterday. I didn't mean to be rude, but you know it always does vex me to see a woman's head turned by a man's

apparent softening of mood, and instincti

them to stay. Perhaps she didn't notice it, only thought you were tired. It isn't any great matter, any w

ighborly terms. The old mother is a childish old thing,

aid Stephen; "but she's so simple, and so mu

a conflict. One of the resolutions he had taken was that he would wait for Mercy this morning on a street he knew she must pass on her way to market. He did not define to himself any motive for this act, except the simple longing to see her face. He had not said to himself wh

ng on with her own swift, elastic tread, and thinking warmly and shyly of the look with which Stephen had bade her good-by the day before. She was walking, as was her habit, with her eyes cast down, and did not observe that any one approached her, until she suddenly heard Stephen's voice saying

r thought of seeing you. I thought you w

lied Stephen, in a tone as simply hones

ringly, but did not s

ar thing," he said: "only

lence, so full was it of sweet meanings to them in the simple fact that they were walking by each other's side. The few words they did speak were of the purposeless and irrelevant sort in which unacknowledged lov

the village about this time

ays," rep

I would like sometimes to w

d Mercy, eagerly. "I used to walk a great

membered now that he had thought at the time some of the expressions in his friend's letter argued an unusual interest in the young widow. Of course no man could know Mercy withou

ee him for half an hour." Love knows the secret of true joy better than that. Love throws open wider doors,--lifts a great veil from a measureless vista: all the rest of life is tran

aid to herself. Her second thought was a perplexed instinct of the truth: "I wonder if he can be afraid to have his mother see him with me?" At this thought, Mercy's face burned, a

he corner where he wa

erself, Mercy lingered and looked ba

nd then the very first morning not come?" sh

for Stephen at every cross-street. She fancied she heard his step behind her; she fancied she saw his tall figure in the distance. After she reached home and the expectation was over for that day, she took herself angrily to task for her folly. She reminded herself that Stephen had said "som

day for a walk! He wi

d fixed her eyes on the street. No person was to be seen in it. She walked slower and slower: she could not believe that he was not there. Then she began to fear that she had come a little too early. She turned to retrace her steps; but a sudden sense of shame withheld her, and she turned back again almost immediately, and continued her course towards the village, walking very slowly, and now and then halting and looking back. Still no Stephen. Street after street she passed: no Stephen. A sort of indignant grief swelled up in Mercy's bosom; she was indignant with herself, wi

lbrick! do not walk so fast.

ick enough to hide her red eyes; vainly trying to regain her composure enough to speak in her natural voice, and smi

n started; at the first sound of her v

had not been too honest to make the attempt. She looked up mischievously at him, a

Forgetting that they were on a public street, forgetti

it? Do let me he

Mercy." It seemed only natural. Without reali

were already triumphant. Instinct told Stephen in the same second what she had me

id not come? Bless you, darling! I don't dare to speak to

a few poverty-stricken houses, in which colored people lived. The snow lay piled in drifts here all winter, and in spring it was an almost impassable slough of mud. There was now no trodden path, only the track made by sleighs in the middle of the lane. Into this strode Stephen, in his excit

came out; but a man whom I could not get away from stopped me, and I had to stand sti

up timidly in his face. "I felt sure yo

t?" said Ste

any particular morning; and that was what vexed me so, that I should have been silly and set my heart on it. That was what

in the face without spea

l you Merc

she r

ou exactly what

d again, a little

her or ourselves. I care very, very much for you, and you care very much for me. We have come very close to each other, and neither of our

y gathered on his countenance, and his last words were spoken more in the tone of one who felt a new exaltation of suffering than of o

not so? Are we not ve

bly: it was as if a chill wind had suddenly blown at noonday, and made her shiver in spite of full

k it is

tephen. "I want to feel sure that you

ddenly, and looking into Stephen's face with all the fulness

ught not to have brought you into this lane. If people were to see us walking here, they would think it strange." And, as they reached the entrance of the lane, his manner suddenly became most ceremonious; and, e

people see us together? What does it mean? What reason can he possibly have?" Scores of questions like these crowded on her mind, and hurt her sorely. Her conjecture even ran so wide as to suggest the possibility of his being engaged to another woman,--some old and mistaken promise

the joy which she had at first felt in the consciousness that Stephen loved her died away in the strain of these conflicting uncertainties:

and, stretching both his han

sweet friend! are yo

" replied Mercy, in a tone very gent

ngible but inexorable thing which stood between this man's soul and hers? She could not doubt that he loved her; she knew that her whole soul went out towards him with a love of which she had never before had even a conception. It seemed to her that the words he had spoken and she had received had already wrought a bond between them which nothing could hinder or harm. Why should they

ady sorry that I care so much for you.

said Mercy. "I am very gla

you do not care so much for me a

plied poor Mercy

ilent for a long ti

me to look on the face of a woman whom it seems to me no man could help loving. I suppose many men have loved you, Mercy, and many more men will. I do not think any man has ever felt for you, or ever will feel for you, as I feel. My love for you includes every love the heart can know,--the love of father, brother, friend, lover. Young as I am, you seem to me like my child, to be taken care of; and you seem like my sister, to be trusted and loved; and like my

h way safety might lie. If she had listened dispassionately to such words, spoken to any other woman, her native honesty of soul would have repelled them as unfair. But every insti

ntently as if she would read t

stand me, Mer

," she replie

earing you, knowing that you are near, makes all my life seem changed. It is not very much for you to give me, Mercy, after all, out of the illimitable riches of your beauty, your brightness, your spirit, your strength,--just a few words, just a few smiles, just a little love,--for the few days, or it may be

ance," murmured Mercy. "I must ha

men call happiness, if I must live lonely and alone to the end, I should still have the memory of you,--of your face, of your hand, and the voice in which you said you ca

her head on his shoulder, sobbing. Shame filled her soul, and burned in her cheeks, when Stephen, lifti

ossibility come to regret at some future time. I ought perhaps to be unselfish enough not to ask

Mercy,--"too late now." And sh

s. I thought that you, too, could find joy, and perhaps help, in my love, as I could in yours. If it is to give you pain and not happiness, it we

to a man whom she so loved that at that moment she would have died to shield him from pain, she li

very dearly," she added in a lower voice, with a tone of such incomparable sweetness that it took almost superhuman control on Stephen's part to refrain

can do something to make you happy. To know that I love yo

ercy, "a great de

know some joys, Mercy, which joyous lovers never know. Happy people do not need each other as sad people do

gan to seem to her. It was rather by her magnetic consciousness of all that he was thinking and feeling than by the literal acceptance of any thing or all things which he said. She seemed t

ce of one who had entered into a great steadfastness of joy. Stephen wondered greatly at this transition from the exci

most impossible to turn away while the sweet face hel

, when I shall not be able to do as you would like to have me, when yo

said Mercy, impetuously. "One can't take tru

smile of sorrow r

me other than you ha

d Mercy, proudly. "It is not that I 'believe' you. I

ake far into the early hours of the morning, living over every word that he had spoken, looking resolutely and even joyously into the strange future which was opening before her, and scanning with loving in

ret it,--never. We can have a great deal of happiness t

en my mother dies, I shall be free." His fine fastidiousness would shrink from it, as from the particular kind of brutality and bad taste involved in a murder. If the whole truth

rned Mercy of what lay before her. She was like a traveller going into a country whose language he has never heard, and whose currency he does not understand. However eloquent he may be in his own land, he is dumb and helpless here; and of the fortune with which he was rich at home he is robbed at every turn by false exchanges which impose on his i

ou are the one brig

e understood, precisely the p

er think any thing of it. And, even if he has not, it is all the same. He knows very well no human being could live in the house with her, to say nothing of his being so terribly poor

e most honestly in the very beginning just how it was. He always said he would never fetter me by a word; and, once when I forgot myself for a moment, and threw myself into his very arms, he only kissed my forehead as if I were his sister, and put me away from him almost with a reproof. No, indeed! he is the very soul of honor. It is I who choose to love him with all my soul and all my strength. Why should no

n being perfectly happy. All hindrances and difficulties, all drawbacks and sacrifices, seemed less than nothing to her. When she saw Stephen, she was happy because she saw him; and when she did not see him, she was happy because she had seen him, and would soon see him again. Past, present, a

e himself never chafed at the barriers, little or great, which kept him from Mercy. But there were many days when his sense of deprivation made him sad, subdued, and quiet. When, in these moods, he came

would say. "Is not that enough? Or even, when I c

said once, stung by a sense of his own unworth

he whole world, even down to the smallest grass-blade, seems to me different because you are alive." She said these words

loving each other, Stephen. That's the way children do with th

net,--the first words she had written o

Was

one? I think

ow how clouds

or how snowflake

hills. One secr

s have. No sun

id flowers open

est things

es tru

so we know th

so, like the c

wing of the mo

f true loving

ght, in purer

of deep joy i

are the tokens,

ter

o is that girl with fair hair and blue eyes, who, whenever you meet her in the street, always looks as if she had just heard some good news?" was asked

ck. She came last winter with her mother, who is an inva

destined to exercise almost as powerful an influence a

ter the birth of her first child, she sank at once into a hopeless invalidism,--an invalidism all the more difficult to bear, and to be borne with, that it took the shape of distressing nervous maladies which no medical skill could alleviate. The brilliant mind became almost a wreck, and yet retained a preternatural restlessness and activity. Many regarded her condition as insanity, and believed that Mr. Dorrance erred in not giving her up to the care of those making mental disorders a specialty. But his love and patience were untiring. When her mental depression and suffering reached such a stage that she could not safely see a human face but his, he shut himself up with her in her darkened room till the crisis had passed. There were times when she could not close her eyes in sleep unless he sat by her side, holding her hand in his, and gently stroking it. He spent weeks of nights by her bedside in this way. At any hour of the day, a summons might come from her; and, whatever might be his engagement, it was instantly laid aside,--laid aside, too, with cheerfulness and alacrity. At times, all his college duties would be suspended on her account; and his own specialties of scientific research, in which he was beginning to win recognition even from the great masters of science in Europe, were very early laid aside for

ve ever been lived which have left such a stamp on a community? No man could be so gross that he would utterly fail to feel its purity, no man so stupid that he

e walked. They all loved him as a comrade, and reverenced him as a teacher. They wanted him at their picnics; and, whenever he preached, they flocked to hear him. It was a significant thing that his title of Professor was never heard. From first to last, he was always called "Parson Dorrance;" and there were few Sundays on which he did not preach at home or abroad. It was one of the forms of his active benevolence. If a poor minister broke down and needed rest, Parson Dorrance preached for him, for one month or for three, as the case required. If a little church were without a pastor and could not find one, or were in debt and could not afford to hire one, it sent to ask Parson Dorrance to supply the pulpit; and he always went. Finally, not content with these ordinary and established channels for preaching the gospel, he sought out for himself a new one. About eight miles from the village there was a negro settlement known as "The Cedars." It was a wild place. Great outcropping ledges of granite, with big boulders toppling over, and piled upon each other, and all knotted together by the gnarled roots of ancient cedar-trees, made the place seem like ruins of old fortresses. There were caves of great depth, some of them with two entrances, in which, in the time of the fugitive slave law, many a poor hunted creature had had safe refuge. Besides the cedar-trees, there were sugar-maples and white birches; and the beautiful rock ferns grew all over the ledges in high waving tufts, almost as luxuriantly as if they were in the tropics; so that the spot, wild and fierce as it was, had great beauty. Many of the fugitive slaves had built themselves huts here: some lived in the caves. A few poor and vicious whites had joined them, intermarried with them, and from these h

teal fruit?" And, when they met the Parson, they laughed at him. "Come, come, Parson," they said,

rance's ey

you do," he replied. "They

you something on th

er," answered the Parson, "because you se

on's faith, his friend exclaimed, "I'd like

rrance lo

have let you wager me on that. I've given the

had found that Stephen did not sympathize at all in her enthusiasm. "The people over at Danby are all crazy about him, I think," said Stephen. "He is a very good man no doubt, and does no end of things for the college boys, that none of the other professors

sentimental, I am sure. His sermons were clear and logical and terse,--not

wonder if you would love me better if I were a preache

from most trains of thought to their possible bearing on her love for him, had begun to

ides seeming to imply a sort of distrust of my love for you, they a

usual shield of silence. This also was foreign to Mercy's habit and impulse. When any thing went wrong, it was Mercy's way to speak out honestly; to have the matter set in a

for us to be forced into keeping things back from the

very new to it. Still she never wavered for a moment in her devotion to Stephen. If she had stood acknowledged b

such gathering was ever thought complete without the Parson's presence. Again and again one might hear it said in the

for things of that sort. His manner was wrongly interpreted, however: it was really only the constraint born of the feeling that he was out of his place, or t

ld exclaim: "I feel so dumb, eve

people I meet are profoundly uninteresting to me; and half of the other half paralyze me at first sight, a

and absorbed sometimes that it makes me fe

u?--Darling," she added, "at those very times when you see me seem so absorbed and happy in company

e Stephen w

hese meadow-lands, seen from the top of this mountain which overhangs them. The mountain is only about twenty-five hundred feet high: therefore, one loses no smallest shade of color in the view; even the difference between the green of broom-corn and clover records itself to the eye looking down from the mountain-top. As far as one can see to n

d by the unutterable beauty of the landscape below. Stephen had missed her, but had not yet dared to go in search of her. He imposed on himself a very rigid law in public, and never permitted himself to do or say or even look any thing which could su

ciate our names together, and there is no limit to the things they would say. We cannot be too careful. That is one thing you must let me be the judge of, dear. You cann

g often, and wounded, in spite of all reasoning with herself that she had no cause to do so, that Stephen was but

the same year that Parson Dorrance had taken his professorship in Danby, and the two men had been close friends from that day till the day of Mr. Adams's death. Little Lizzy Adams had been Parson Dorrance's

ould see and know her new friend, Mercy. But Mercy was very shy of seeing the man for whom she felt such reverence, and had steadily refused to meet him.

e Dorrance!

ut; holding out both his hands to Mercy, he said in a deep,

en telling me about you for a long time. You know I'm the same as a fa

shamefacedly and half

feelings, tastes, the incidents of your life, your plans and purposes, as if he were a species of father confessor. He questioned you so gently, yet with such an air of right; he listened so observantly and sympathetically. He did not treat Mercy Philbrick as a stranger; for Mrs. Hunter had told him already all she knew of her friend's life, and had showed him several of Mercy's poems, which had surprised him much by their beauty, and still more by their condensation of thought. They seemed to him almost more masculine than feminine; and he had unconsciously anticipated that in seeing Merc

r English poets a great deal, have you not?" he said

, Mr. Dorrance. I know Herbert a little; but most of the old English poets I

rth, I hope," he

Allen said I must. But I can't. I don't care any thing about him." And she looke

into the presence of Wordsworth, as a traveller finds some day, upon a well-known road, a grand cathedral, into which he turns aside and worship

yes, only a question of time," they said; "and it is our time now, Parson. You must come with us. No monopoly of the Parson a

ch of the Parson, remained behind, and made a sign to Mercy t

n we came up? Your face looked a

ing about him. It was like music, like far off music," and she repeated i

m a good deal older than you. I think two thirds of

. Some terrible convulsion must have shaken the huge mass to its centre, to have made such a rift. At the bottom ran a stream, looking from this height like little more than a silver thread. Shrubs and low flowering things were waving all the way do

hing!" exclaimed Mercy. "It looks a

ercy closed her eyes. She would not look on Stephen in such peril. She did not move nor open her eyes, until he stood by her side, exclaiming, "Why, Mer

r such a thing as that! The sight

endeavoring to take it from her hand; but s

flower as long as I live!" And she did,--kept it wrappe

ome

s an inse

unny sum

iny snow-wh

den crevic

gile-leaved

cks piled up l

o the shini

cipitous

nt-up riv

as at bo

adly, at

th a ripp

silence by

n's whisper

inty, daunt

secret o

yous and li

readful cha

rted an

p or cheer

inty, daun

eature of

woman saw

nstant sa

recipice s

at her, a

shimmering

ve and sub

ked the ti

ry, dizzy

smiling, a

danger to

over in l

s her face

t the blood

e brief mo

anguish of

ery pulse s

ad she sat

o the stirl

a seco

aping, cam

smiling, la

blossom a

my love!" sh

flower by Deat

fe so litt

ve for that

ready th

ious love

eep this

r which ca

e I scarce d

ife to me

earer tha

in the mountain-side. A little inn, which was famous for its beer, stood on the meadow space, bounded by these two streams; and the picnic party halted before its door. While the white foamy glasses were clinked and tossed, Mercy ran down the narrow strip of land at the

ing together at that point! For a little while you can trace the mountain water by itself in the other: then it is a

point of

mountains s

one as dre

wo streams th

east, and o

and sparkled

like racers

as if the ra

e point of

stood, like

n banners i

victory

won, but n

y by a swe

for ever

swift, the tw

, separate,

currents see

in one tumu

stronger t

south! O str

the other, w

most, which

urrenderi

en point of

mountains s

love, and, h

e streams tha

pte

n far keener than her own. Her mind was fed and trained by an intellect so much stronger than her own that it compelled her assent and her allegiance. She came to him almost as a maiden, in the ancient days of Greece, would have gone to the oracle of the holiest shrine. Parson Dorrance in his turn was as much impressed by Mercy; but he was never able to see in her simply the pupil, the questioner. To him she was also a warm and glowing personality, a young and beautiful woman. Parson Dorrance's hair was white as snow; but his eyes were as keen and dark as in his youth, his step as firm, and his pulse as quick. Long before he dreamed of such a thing, he might have known, if he had taken counsel of his heart, that Mercy was becoming to him the one woman in the world. There was always this peculiarity in Mercy's influence upon all who came to love her. She was so unique and incalculable a person that she made all other women seem by comparison with her monotonous a

he busy tongues which are always in motion in small villages. It was not long, moreover, before

nce would marry Mercy, how happy I shou

ed by his unconscious jealousy of every new friend Mercy made, that she had set him down in her own mind as a dull and surly man, and rarely thought of him. And, as one of poor Mercy's many devices for keeping up with her co

hite, Mercy. Is he an agr

dly in the Parson's face, and r

h, yes! we do pay rent to him; but it was paid for the w

ther, and he distrusted the son. "Advance? advance?" he e

e was in a great strait for money, so I was very glad to give it to him. Such a mother is a terrible burden on a youn

ke her withdraw herself altogether. So she contented herself with talking to her in what she thought were safe generalizations on the subject of marriage. Lizzy Hunter was one of the clinging, caressing, caressable women, who nestle into men's affections as kittens nestle into warm corners, an

so confidently that you will never be married. You don't know what you are talking about: you don

er mother is no longer with me; and I am afraid that is very near, she has failed s

y. Of course you can always be comfortable, s

d Mercy, laughing,--"a great way. No husband c

an not to have anybody need her, not to have anybody to love her more than he loves all the rest of the

er soul of which a woman like Lizzy could not even dream. But she spok

ch a glorious thing to have a soul and a body, and to get the most out of them. Just from the purely selfish point of view, it seems to me a delight to live; and when you look at it from a higher point, and think how much each

he very way he takes up my children and hugs them and kisses

ess for himself he never thinks, because he is on a plane above happiness,--a plane of perpetual joy." Mercy hesitated, paused, and then went on, "I don't mean to be irreverent, but I could never think of his

aid Lizzy, timidly. "I can't conceive of

not lie out far beyond every fact in life, include and control them all, as the great truth of gravitation outlies and embraces the physical universe? Did God so need as well as so love the world, that he gave his only begotten Son for it? Is this what it meant to be "one with God"? Then, if the great, illimitable heart of God thus yearns for t

hall never forget it. Perhaps you are right about the Parson, too. I wonder if there is

;" but she wisely forbore and they parted in silence, Mercy absorbed in thinking of this new view of God's relation

ercy was very patient with him. She loved him unutterably. She never forgot for an instant the quiet heroism with which he bore his hard life. As the months had gone on, she had gradually established a certain kindly familiarity with his mother; going in often to see her, taking her little gifts of flowers or fruit, and telling her of all little incidents which might amuse her. She seemed to herself in this way to be doing a little towards sharing Stephen's burd

never let go on you. There ain't nothin' to hender my goin' away any day, an' there hain't been for twenty year; but she sez I'm to stay till she dies,

avish upon Stephen every device of love and cheer which she could in

were his mother's. Only after she slept did he have freedom. Just as soon as it was safe for hi

lize that I am with you, m

of harder for him. Even the concealment, which was at times well-nigh insupportable to her, she never complained of now.

had been resolute about this. When she found Stephen insisting upon going in by-ways and lanes, lest some one should see t

time. Don't urge me to any such thing; for I am not sure that too much of it would not kill my love for you. Let us be patient. Chance will do a good deal for us; but I will not plan to meet clandestinely. Whenever you can

rcy!" he exclaimed. "Are y

all my joy in my love for you; and that would be as terrible to you as if the love were

is decision, and was guided implicitly by his taste and wish in her writing and in her studies. But, when Stephen was a boy in college, Parson Dorranee had seemed to him an old man; and he now seemed venerable. Stephen could not have been freer from a lover's jealousy of him, if he had been Mercy's own father. Perhaps, if his instinct had

It was true, as she had said to Lizzy, that she would have died to give him a pleasure; and yet she was forced to inflict on him the hardest of all pains. Eve

cretly hoping that he would ask her to help him in teaching the negroes. The day was one of those radiant and crystalline days peculiar to the New England autumn. On such days, joy becomes inevitable even to inert and lifeless natures: to enthusiastic and spontaneous ones, the exhilaration of the air and the sun is as intoxicating as wine. Mercy was in one of her most mirthful moods. She frolicked with the negro children, and decked their little woolly heads with wreaths of golden-rod, till they looked as fantastic as dancin

lowers. What becomes of the poor flower, any way? it lives such a short whil

s the thing for which all the powers of nature are at work. We, you and Lizzy and I, will drop off our

Mercy, impetuously. "You will never be old, Mr. Dorrance, not i

bernacle. Lizzy Hunter, however, saw the flush, and knew what it meant, and her heart gave a leap of joy. "Now he can see that Mercy never thinks of him as an old man, and never would," she thought to herself; and while her hands were id

ss over great rocks; some of them were soft yielding masses of moss, low cornel, blueberry-bushes, wintergreen, blackberry-vines, and sweet ferns; dainty, fragrant, crowded ovals, lovelier

g a tiny satin disk behind it on its stem. She took the bell and tried to fit it again on its place; then she turned it over and over, held it up to the light and looked through it. "It makes me sad," she said: "I wish I knew if

ly: Lizzy's so full of placid content, unquestioning affection, and acceptance;

rong with her! If only I might dare to take her fate into my hands! I do not believe an

ed to say to himself, that he would ask Mercy to be his wife. He knew that the thought of it was more and more present with him, grew sweeter and sweeter; yet he had never ceased resisting it, saying that it was impossible. That is, he had never

days together, the bright happiness of the first close intimacy and interchange,--these reach their destined moment, to pass on and make room for

e "vitalized individuality," perhaps, would come as near describing it as is possible; for it was not merely that the rooms looked unlike other rooms. Every article in them seemed to stand in the place where it must needs stand by virtue of its use and its quality. Every thing had a certain sort of dramatic fitness, without in the least trenching on the theatrical. Her effects w

r at that instant, he went swiftly towards her with outstretched hands, and a look

ld; and she was bringing to her teacher now a little poem, of which her thoughts were full. She did

he paper, she

at thought that haunted me so yesterday at 'The C

ed the paper, and read

er

upatorium

eads of petals

me its blossom

flutter, silent

stirs the

sk, "W

lossy leaves

s lie low, and

sk of pearly

of the lily's

stirs the

ask "

sunrise does

fruit of my s

lowers, to rea

floated si

stirs the

sk, "W

rse, his face altered.

deed, it doesn't mean doubt. I know very well no day dies; but we can't

y: they were both standing. He laid

a 'sweet yester

s the flowers. But all days are heavenly sweet out of doors with you and Lizzy," she cont

you? Come to me, darling, and let me try!" came fr

hen she uttered a sharp cry, as of one who had suddenly got a wound, and, bu

gle moment, to wrench a great hope out of a man's heart. But, as she continued sobbing, he understood. Unselfish to the core, his first tho

Mercy did not an

a firmer tone. "Mercy, m

ith the tears streaming. As soon as she saw Parson Dorrance's face, sh

new it. It wou

ng; and you must forgive me, and forget it. You are not in the least to blame. It is

y, vehemently,--"it is not that a

it is not that!" had not fallen on his ear gratefully, and made hope stir in his

ason. There could be no other." He paused. Mercy shuddered, and opened her lips to speak again; but

!" Even in her tumult of suffering, she was distinctly conscious of all this. The words "I could have loved him, I know I could! I ca

or him to make to her, was to enable her, if possible, to look on him as she had done before. But Mercy herself made this more difficult. Suddenly wiping her tears, she looked very steadily into his face, and said slowly,--"It is not of the least use, Mr. Dorran

lowly as she had done. "All my life has been one long sacrific

er hands tighte

said you were on a plane above al

ked bewildered

my child, very de

do!" cried Mercy

ot have said that. You know I am a

moane

ness I can have, the greatest help in my loneliness, is the love of my two daughters. You wi

id not

almost of the old affectionate authority;

es

hair where his hand had lain a

go. Good-b

er sitting there bowed and heart-stricken, in the little room so ga

pte

ed gentleness and love of quiet, which partially disguised the loss of strength. She would sit in her chair from morning till night, looking out of the window or watching the movements of those around her, with an expression of perfect placidity on her face. When she was spoken to, she smiled, but did not often speak. The smile was meaningless and yet infinitely pathetic: it was an infant's smile on an aged face; the infant's heart and infant's brain had come back. All the weariness, all the perplexity, all the sorrow, had gone from life, had slipped away from memory. This state had come on so gradually that even Mercy hardly realized the extent of it. The silent smile or the gentle, simple ejaculations with which her mother habitually replied meant more to her than they did to others. She did not comprehend how little they rea

e skinny and claw-like, and the traces of intellect and thought more and more faded away from the features, the horror deepened, until Mercy feared that her own brain must be giving way. She revolted from the very thought of herself for having such a feeling towards her mother. Every instinct of loyalty in her deeply loyal nature rose up indignantly against her. She would reiterate to herself the word, "Mother! mother! mother!" as she sat gazing with a species of horror-stricken fascination into the meaningless face. But she could not shake off the feeling. Her nerves were fast giving way under the strain, and no one could help her. If she left the room or the house, the consciousness that the helpless creature was lying silently weeping for lack of the sight of her pursued her like a presence. She saw the piteous old face

now that I have deceived her abo

g in the bed made them turn: Mrs. Carr had half-lifted her head from the pillow, her lower jaw had fallen to its utmost extent in her effort to arti

s she certainly does know things; but she never looks

ken as Mercy. "It is very strange though,

t that you were slowly getting to care about me; but now, wherever her s

did. She sprang after him, and clasped both her hands on his arm. "O Stephen, darling,--precious, brave, strong darling! do forgive

think of the joy," and he laid her hand on his lips. "All the pain that you could possibly give me

ade all manner of excuses, true and false, reasonable and unreasonable, to speak to her for a moment at the door in the morning. He carried the few verses in his pocket-book she had given him; and, although he knew them nearly by heart, he spent long hours in his office turning the little papers over and over. Some of them were so joyous that they stirred in him almost a bitter incredulity as he read them in these days of loss and pain. On

ve him thi

Absent

nge should come

hat I cannot

seems dark as

ut. Each wonted

that I wande

y the most f

one who rous

f ecstasy, a

he be sleepi

art so foolis

own, de

to be m

ll my foolish

em a coward

e,--but first tho

ch other "good-by," and she had kissed him,--a rare thing for Mercy to do, he had exclaimed, "That kiss wil

e him this littl

rling. I should never have thoug

ur de

o-day "Coule

,--oh

my dear lo

oh,

eyes her li

d warm and

e pas

d not my ey

a rosy va

sit, wher

very glance

o-day "Coule

t thus? Alas

sk an

fades, "Coul

oh,

t joy and sw

se lips up

neve

r heads were w

bitterest sto

le and a

low: all lif

love "Coule

tephen's, and not her own, because he had ask

s' Th

rth when, breakin

sudden Dawn im

ors all alon

sea, as it tur

e molten silve

eastward when t

me to

t, love, w

ea, may feel. Ho

s by this,--t

on my silenc

rsts and lights

ce doth not g

es, or hill-tops

e in one of the magazines; and it had been more than once said of it, "Surely no one but a genuine outcast could have written such a poem as this." It was hard for Mercy's friends to associate the words with her. When she was asked how it happen

Outc

wind, thou a

rce rain, I n

touch upo

rothers! Wre

all these dw

so pitiles

riendless out

ose glow hat

rays the ni

outcast, fr

n those do

ow well I kn

oning, the

nd pity at

if it wou

alms of mea

eckless, st

e truth imp

bread or me

alms my real

d fain come

fire, and h

; yea, and

and I dared

t child shoul

child up

would my s

to banqu

pulses o

s men the cro

e haughty s

ey'd say, "Th

postor's fa

nt these be

happy pe

is as fier

break, that

n come at las

knock, I wi

wait,--the w

'll run a ra

ay not seem

not marked p

des, under

't will b

separation lasted much longer, he should lose all faith in the fact of their relation. Very impatient thoughts of poor old Mrs. Carr filled Stephen's thoughts in these days. Heretofore she had been no barrier to his happiness; her still and childlike presence was no restraint upon him; he had come to disregard it as he would the presence of an infant in a cradle. Therefore, he had, or thought he had, the kindest of feelings towards her; but now that her helpless paraly

s, and see him often, would soonest win back for him his old place in Mercy's life. The one great desire he had left now was to re

o the door one morning by the message that a stranger wished to speak to her. She found standing th

Mrs. Ph

rcy. "Did you

g to phrase her sentence, and then burst

nd come home. He is so sick, and I believ

t, and her first thought was that she mu

he first saw you on the street, that day. You're the only human being I've ever known h

in one place, sometimes in another. He had old warehouses, old deserted mills and factories, and uninhabited rooms and houses in all the towns in the vicinity. There was hardly any article of merchandise which he had not at one time or another had a depot for, or a manufactory of.

it here. I'll make it myself." And up would start a new ma

y enough to keep him alive, and then bury himself again in darkness and solitude. If the absence did not last more than three or four days, his wife and sons gave themselves no concern about him. He usually returned a saner and healthier man than he went away. When the absences were longer, they went in search of him, and could usually prevail on him to return home with them. But this last absence had been much longer than usual before they found him. He was as cunning and artful as a fugitive from justice in concealing his haunt. At last he was discovered in the old garret store-room over the Brick Row. The marvel was that he had not died of cold there. He

lways been very good to me, in his way. He'd never give me a cent o' money; but he'd always pay bills,--that is, that was any way reasonable. But I said to 'Siah this morning, 'If there's anybody on earth can coax your father to let us take him home, it's that Mrs. Philbrick; and I'm going to find her.' 'Siah didn't want me to. The boys are so ashamed

y thing," said Mercy, much touched by the appeal to her. "I have wondered v

he poured out a volley of angry reproaches to his son "'Siah," a young man of eighteen or twenty years old, who sat on a roll of leather at a safe distance from his father's lair. As t

ul!" he exclaimed, trying to draw t

his own home. She said nothing to suggest that he had done any thing unnatural in hiding himself, and spoke of his severe cold as being merely what every one e

other long. I will come and see you again to-

g I 'd better move h

exchanged glances. This was m

ing this room, is there?" said she, looking all about, as if to see if it might not be possible still to put up a stove there. "'Siah" turned his head away to hide a smile, so amused was he by t

money, don't she! No, no! I can walk." And

o him, and laid her

t you to go home in the carriage. It is a terribly cold day, and the streets are very icy. I nearly fell several times mys

uch; but tell him I'll only pay a quarter,--only a quarter, remember.

in a few minutes!" exclaimed Mercy, and ran out of th

sight when Mercy reached the foot of the staircase. So in le

was so weak that his son had to carry him down the stairs; and his face, seen in the broad dayli

er, tell him." And, as Seth whipped up his horses and drove off, the words, "

Mrs. Wheeler, as she turned to Mercy. "I never can thank you

he lived only a few days. He had intervals of partial consciousness, and in those he seemed to be much touched by the patient care which his two sons were giving to him. He had always been a hard father; ha

ey, might have left them more. Mistake, mistake!" Once he roused, and with great vehemence asked to have his lawyer sent for immediately. But, when the lawyer came, the de

certain amount of capital to go into business with,--the very thing which he had never done for his own children. The trust was burdened with such preposterous conditions, however, that it never

zing state, smiling whenever Mercy spoke to her, and making great efforts to swallow food whenever Mercy offered it

, all wrung Mercy's heart. It was her first experience of being alone. She had often pictured to herself, or rather she thought she had, what it would be; but no human imagination can ever sound the depths of that word: only the heart can feel it. It is a marvel that hearts do not break under it oftener than they do. The silence which is like that darkness which could be felt; the sudden awakening in the night with a wonder what it means that the loved one is

prised even himself to see what a sort of respectful affection he felt for her in her grave. Any misgiving that this new quiet and undisturbed possession of Mercy might not continue did not cross his mind; and when Mercy

to me to be all alone in these rooms. Perhaps in new rooms I should not feel it so much. I have always looked forward to being left alone at some time, and have thought I would still have my home; but I did not think it could feel like this. I simply cannot bear it,--at any rate

alled her to life now! Mercy's words carried instantaneous conviction to his mind.

, we have been living so so long. You are right: you cannot sta

"for you have still your work left you to do. If I had any hu

" asked Stephen, in a tone

old home for a visit, I think, and then to some cit

g to lose you,--lose you u

ou. You bear your hard life so uncomplainingly, so bravely, that it seems as if you could not have a vestige of

ell me, Mercy! You are my life: that is the whole of it. All that a man has he will give for his life. Is it selfishness?" Stephen locked his hands tight together, and looked at Mercy almost angrily. She was writhing under his words. She had always an un

't understand why you are not as brave and patient about al

alize the equivocal form of his question. An indignant look swept over Mercy

d have done it. I thought then that it would be best," she said, with hot bl

in a lower tone, "You know you are free, Mercy,--utterly

lf-bitterly, as

words to say that I am free. I do not want to be free, darling," she added, i

ng away, his face changed as if some fierce spasm wr

deal better for you in every way. This is no place for you now. Y

s the voice of a truer love than the other. She fought against the feeling as against a treason; but the t

pte

terrified at this very absence of suffering. Then again he had hours and days of a dull despair, which was worse than any more active form of suffering. Now he understood, he thought, how in the olden time men had often withdrawn themselves from the world after some great grief, and had lived long, stagnant lives in desert

ll. If she had known that at the very moment when he uttered these words he had one long letter from Mercy and another to her lying in his pocket, the shock might well-nigh have killed her; for never once in Mrs. White's most jealous and ill-natured hours had the thought crossed her mind that her son would tell her a deliberate lie. He told it, however, unflinchingly, in as gentle and even a tone and with as unruffled a brow as he would have bade her go

, and her influence felt. Her verses were simple, and went to people's hearts. They were also of a fine and subtle flavor, and gave pleasure to the intellect. Strangers began to write words of encouragement to her,--sometimes a word of gratitude for help, sometimes a word of hearty

here came to her by mail, on a sheet of coarse paper, two faded roses, fragrant,--for they were cinnamon roses, whose fragrance never dies,--but yellow and crumpled, for they had journeyed many days to reach her. They

hich were written some graceful verses, evidently by a not unpractised hand. The signature was in initials

E

e stream cam

it cried, "thi

us, bound

e meagre,

abundance

n thy smalle

No thirst i

slake for m

! O sea

s of toil

yfarers reac

eagues we cam

ous, boun

waves of th

shores where

ly wildernes

ream has be

desert we

oases

efreshed

eam, lost

of a lifeti

us, bound

ng symbol o

reless E

ream, O sea,

e words have

unknown fri

ught, wa

stream

s the long leagu

t her no room for any such passionate longing and brooding as Stephen poured out to her in his letters. He looked in vain for any response to these expressions.

ght; and the months between now and then seem to me one solid interval of time to be filled up and made the most of, just as the interval of the daytime between your going away in the morning and coming home at night used to seem to me. I do not think,

rowing Stephen White. She did not in the least suspect that her affection and her loyalty were centring around an ideal personality, to which she gave his name, but which had in reality never existed. She believed honestly that she was living for and in Stephen all this time; that she was his, as he was hers, inalienably and for ever. If it had been suggested to her that it was unnatural that she should be so content in a daily life which he did not share, so busy and glad in occupations and plans and aspirations into which he did not enter, she would have been astonished. She would have said, "How foolish of me to do otherwise! We have our lives to lead, our work to do. It would be a sin to waste one's life, to leave one's work undone, because of the mere lack of seeing any one human being, however dear." Stephen knew love better than this: he knew that life without the daily sight of Mercy was a blank drudgery; that, day by day, month by month, he was growing duller and duller, and more and mor

ge isolation into which he and his mother were forced. His sympathies were not broad and general enough to comprehend it. He did not know how quickly all people feel an atmosphere of withdrawal, an air of indifference. If Stephen had been rich and powerful, the world

done this three months ago, except for your strong feeling against it. I am very sorry for old Mrs. Jacobs; but it is her misfortune, not my fault. I have my mother to provide for, and my first duty is to her. Of course, Mrs. Jacobs will now have to go to the alms-house bu

shall put this house into good repair, run a piazza around it as you suggested, and paint it; and then I think I shall be sure of finding a purchaser. It

m; but her heart ached for the poor friendless old woman, who was thus to lose her last dollar. If it had been possible for Mercy to have continued to pay the

rity from you! I think I should go to the alms-house myself firs

r before knew of anybody who had not a relative or a friend in the world; and I am afraid

t how she drove them out of the house; and she was cruel to her son too, and drove him away from home. Of course, I am sorry to be the instrument of punishing her, a

.'" Such conversations as these had prepared Mercy for the news which Stephen now wrote her; but they had in no wise changed her feeling in regard to it. She believed in the bottom of

way. If the house does fall into my hands, I shall sell it; and, even if I don't get the full a

plans for improving the house; but the thing was done, and it was not Merc

now how I always felt for poor old Granny Jacobs. Perhaps we can do something to m

uld never lack for food and fire, however unwilling the o

s. I have found a lot of money in your old fireplace. Just think of our having sat there so quietly night after night, within hands' rea

"cheated out of her rights again," but with a pang she changed the phrase into "none the better off for it.

last night, and I declare, Mercy, I haven't shut my eyes all night long. It seems to me too good to be true. I think there must be as much as three thousand dollars, all in solid gold. Some of the coins I

r more than she had from the house." And Mercy laid the letter in her lap and fell into a reverie, thinking how strange

ng unable to go out into the world and make my fortune as other men do, as I think I might, if I were free. But this sum, small as it is, will be a nucleus, I feel sure it will, of a competency at least. I know of several openings where I can pla

o be chilling her to the very marrow of her bones; and a vague but terrible sense of horror, mentally. The letter fell to the floor. She did not observe it. A half-hour pa

f." Half-formed, incoherent sentences like these floated in her mi

of drowning people are said to review in one swift flash of consciousness their whole lives, so now in this moment did Mercy look back over the months of her life with Stephen. Her sense of the baseness of his action now was like a lightning illuming every corner of the past: every equivocation, every concealment, every subterfuge he had pra

human soul could see clearly, standing where he stands. There is a moral warp in his nature, for which he is no more responsible than a tree is responsible for having grown into a crooked shape when it was broken down by heavy stones wh

oul was tossed. She could not sleep. As the morning dawned, she rose with haggard and weary eyes, and prepared to write to Stephen. In some of her calmer intervals, she had read the remainder of his letter. It was chiefly filled with the details of the manner in which the gold had been hidden. A second fireplace had been built inside the first, leaving a space of several inches between the two brick walls. On each side two bricks h

more likely to have foreign gold; but why should he hide it in his brother's fireplace? At any rate, to whicheve

obs is dead. Then there would be nobody who had any right to

and, when she sat down to write to Step

obody but her husband or his brother could have put it there. Nobody else has lived in the house, except very poor people. Forgive me, dear, but perhaps you had not thought of this when you first wrote: it ha

the very next mail. It w

t she was last week; but she has no more claim on that money than any other old woman in town. I can't suppose you would think me a thief, Mercy; but your letter strikes me as a very strange one. Suppose I were to discover that there is a gold mine in the orchard,--stranger things than that have happened,--would you say th

d it was a hard blow to him. His conscience was as free from any shadow of guilt in the matter of that money as if it had been his

tone of confident, almost arrogant, assumption in the letter, it seemed to Mercy, which irritated her. She did not perceive that it was the inevitable confidence of a person so sure he is right that he cannot comprehend any doubt in another's mind on the subject. There was in Mercy's nature a vein of intolerance, which was capable of the most terrible severity. She was as blinded, to Stephen's

d delayed answering this second letter.

said to herself, "till I am sure past all dou

e been less fatal to her love. There were many species of wrong-doing which would have been less hateful in her sight. It seemed to her sometimes that there could be no crime in the world which would appear to her so odious as this. H

uspicious thoughts and conjectures ran far back into the past, fastening on the beginnings of all this trouble. She recollected old Mr. Wheeler's warnings about Stephen, in the first weeks of her stay in Penfield. She recollec

logies she had been in the habit of making for Stephen's insincerities to his mother and to the world seemed to her now less than nothing; and she wondered how she ever could have held them as sufficient. In vain her heart pleaded. In vain tender memories thrilled her, by their vi

hen was waiting and l

ter

and noted without surprise it was very light. The superscription was written with unusual care. Mercy's handwriting was free and bold, but illegible, unless she made a special effort to write with care; and she never made that effort in writing to Stephen. How many times h

t the words, as a condemned prisoner might shrink from reading his own death-warrant. The room was bitterly cold. Fires in bed-rooms were a luxury Stephen had never known. As he sat there, his body and heart seemed to be growing numb together. At last he said, "I may as well read it," and took the letter up. As he opened it and read the first words, "My darling Stephen," his heart gave a great bound. She loved him still. What a reprieve in that! He had yet to learn that love can be crueller than any friendship, than any indifference, than any hate: nothing is so exacting, so inexorable, as love. The letter was full of love; but it was, nevertheless, hard and pitiless in its tone. Stephen read it again and again: then he held it in the flame

were sad, strange letters to have passed

sitatingly. Why? Because you would have said, 'This woman's husband built this house. No one except his brother who could possibly have deposited this money here has lived in the house. One of those two men was the owner of that gold. In either case, she is the only heir, and it is hers. I am sure you would have felt this, had we chanced to discover the money on one of those winter nights you refer to. Now in what has the moral obligation been changed by the fact that the house has come into your hands? Not by ordinary sale, either; but simply by foreclosure of a mortgage, under conditions which were certainly very hard for Mrs. Jacobs, inasmuch as one-half the interest has always been paid. This money which you have found would have paid nearly the whole of the original loan. It was hers, only she did not know where it lay. O Stephen, my darling, I do implore you not to do this great wrong. You will certainly come to see, sooner or later, that it was

er

ites. His life-long habit of repression of all signs of annoyance, all complaints, all traces of suffering, told still more on his written words than on his daily speec

tion. If I had only my own future to consider, I might give it up, for the sake of your peace of mind. But it is not so. I have a helpless invalid dependent on me; and one of the hardest things in my life to bear has always been the fear that I might lose my health, and be unable to earn even the poor living we now have. This sum, small as it is, will remove that fear, will enable me to insure for my mother a reasonable amount of comfort as long as she lives; and I cannot give it up. I do not supp

eph

n this letter that Stephen might possibly

r his thinking it was his, if only the money goes where it belongs. He will see afterwards that I was rig

is sentence, he uttered an ejaculation of surprise. What possible comfort there could have been

ght in the matter of this ill-fated money. O Stephen, I could be almost happy again, if you would do this! You say it would make no difference in my feeling about it, if you gave the money up only to please me, and not because you thought it wrong to keep it. No, indeed! that is not so. I would be happier, if you saw it as I do, of course; but, if you cannot, then the next best thing, the only thing left for my happiness, is to have you yield to my wish. Why, Stephen, I have even felt so strongly about it as this: that sometimes, in thinking it over, I have had a wild impulse to tell you that if you did not give the money to Mrs. Jacobs I would inform the authorities that you had it, and so test the question whether you had the right to keep it or not. Any thing, even your humiliation, has at times seemed to me better than that you should go on living in the possession of stolen money. You can see from this how deeply I felt about the thing. I suppose I really never could have done this. At the last moment, I should have found it impossible to ar

elief she would feel from his surrendering the money at her request. She wrote as buoyantly, as confidently, as if his doing that would do away with the whole wrong from the beginning. In her overflowing, impetuosity, also, she did not consider what s

ems sometimes as if fate delighted in lifting us up only to cast us down, in taking us up into a high mountain

e very end. For the time being it seemed to actually obliterate every trace of his love fo

phen wrote Mercy very much such a letter as he would have written to a man under the same circumstances. Luckily, he kept it a day, and, rereading it in a co

hat I might, for the sake of your peace of mind, give up this money, if it were not for my obligations to my mother. It was a foolish thing to say, since those obligati

against me. I can only warn you that all you would gain by it would be a most disagreeable exposure of your own and my private affairs, and much mortification to both of us. The money is mine beyond all question. I shall not reply to any more letters from you on this subject. There is nothing more to be said; and all prolonging of the discussion is a needless pain, and is endangering the very foundations of our affection for each other. I want to say one thing more, however; and I hop

thought, with a sense of relief, that, if I died, you would never see my mother suffer; but now any such thought is inseparably associated with bitter memories. And my mot

p accusations and reproaches. I cannot be lover and culprit at once, as you are able to be lover and accuser, or judge.

regard to the money seemed cast into shadow and removed by all this suffering in her personal relation with Stephen; but the personal suffering had not so deep a foundation as the other. Gradually, all sense of her own individual hurts in Stephen's words, in his acts, in the weakening of the bond which held them together, died out, and left behind it o

she could not give way. To all these out-pourings Stephen made no reply. He answered the letters punctually, but made no reference to the question of the money, save by a few short words at the end of his letter, or in a p

on. The old longings, broodings, and passionate yearnings, which he used to pour out, ceased. Stephen was wounded to the very quick; and the wound did not heal. Yet he felt no withdrawal from Mercy:

uched her, as the look of patient endurance on his face used to tou

k with me about such a vital matter." If any one had said to Mercy, "He has as much right to refuse

, like an exultation over his ill-gotten gains. Slowly there crept into her feeling towards him a certain something which was akin to scorn,--the most fatal of deaths to love. The hateful word "thief" seemed to be perpetually ringing in her ears. When she read

ad been driven by his poverty to knocking men down on the highway, an

he hypocrite to her own heart in thinking thus of a man and loving him still; for that she still loved Stephen, she did not once doubt. At this time, she printed a little poem, which set many of her friends to vondering

an's

now thou'lt w

hast the s

t sailing i

creeping

t dream that

up with co

ay my woun

like frenzy st

el the tug

are heavy, h

on their f

keep my co

will be short

y thou train

us,--me to d

brighter s

not dream th

by with co

e hope that it was true in this case. But it was not. Already Mercy had a sense of antagonism, of warfare, with Stephen, or rather with her love for him. Already her pride was beginning to array itself in reticence, in withdrawal, in suppression. More than once she had said to herself "I can live without him! I could bear that pain better than this." More than once she had asked herself with a kind of terror, "Do I really wish ever to see

ran

o live. He wishes to see you. He

Y HUN

ter

snow lying under the fences, and thin rims of ice along the edges of the streams and pools. The sky was gray; the bare trees were gray: all life looked gray and hopeless to Mercy. She had had an over-mastering presentiment from the moment when she read the telegram that she should reach Penfield too late to see Parson Dorrance alive. A strange certainty that he h

y, Merc

terrupted Mercy, in a calm

laimed Lizzy. "He only died a f

to recollect something accurately about which her memory was not clear. Her look

laimed. "Speak to me! Oh, do cry, can'

, low voice. "I wish I could have spoken to him once, though. Did he

urpose. Lizzy was convulsed with grief, sobbing like a child, and pouring out one incoherent sentence after another. Mercy soothed her and comforted her as a mother might have done, a

ut you have sealed up all my tears," cried Lizzy, later in the day, when Mercy had been talking l

he is, and that we must be glad for him." And Mercy's eyes shone as they looked steadfastly across the room, as if the empty space were, to her vision, peopled with spirits. This mood of exa

Then, turning suddenly t

d asked me to be his wife? This is why I

sudden look she turned upon Mercy. "I thought so! I thought so! But I never be

ently; "and so you might. But

in her excitement, Lizzy stretched out her right hand towards the rigid, motion

face of the dead. It was a strange place for thes

e face growing whiter as she spoke. "But"--she paused. No words ca

e sank to a

love?" And Lizzy's face, even in that solemn hour, took a look

g low, she kissed the rigid hands which lay folded on the heart of the man she ought to have loved, but

, Lizzy, remember." Lizzy was over

services were to begin, every pew was filled, and the aisles were crowded with those who could not find seats. From every parish within twenty miles the mourners had come. There was not one there who had not heard words of help or comfort from Parson Dorrance's lips. The students of the college filled the body of the church; the Faculty and distinguished strangers sat in the front pews. The pews under one of the galleries had been reserved for the negroes from "The Cedars." Early in the morning the poor creatures had begun to flock in. Not a seat was empty: old women, women

ht from her old haunts in the woods masses of the glossy evergreen fern, and interwoven them with the boughs of cedar. At t

heep, they rushed confusedly towards the pulpit, and gathered round the coffin. Now burst out the grief which had been pent up: with cries and ejaculations, they went tottering and stumbling down the aisles. One old man, with hair as white as snow,--one of

ce's philanthropies. They shrugged their shoulders sometimes at the mention of his parish at "The Cedars;" they regarded him as old-fashioned and unpractical. They sat conscience-stricken and abashed now; the

he youngest and hitherto most cynical of Parson Dorrance's c

o the cemetery, two miles farther away from their homes; but they repelled all suggestions of the exposure with indignant looks, and pressed on. When the coffin was lowered into the grave, they pushed timidly forward, and began to throw in their green boughs and bunches of ferns. Ever

Stephen had called to see her. She had s

all is over. The funeral will be to-morrow.

r the time, in the sight of her grief, all the unhappiness of their relation for the past few months. He had unconsciously felt all along that, if he could but once look in her eyes, all would be well. How could he help feeling so, when he recalled the expression of childlike trust and devo

t had been a festival of sorrow. A large sheaf of callas had stood on a small table at the head of the coffin. The table had not yet been moved from the place where it stood near the centre of the room; but it stood there now alone, with a strange expression of being left by accident. Stephen bent over it, looking into the deep creamy cups, and thinking dreamily that Mercy's nature

eous smile, and said, "

you so love that man?" exclaimed Stephen, a sudden pang seizing him of f

, as if a sharp pain ha

not as you mean. You know how ve

for you. You are not well," said Stephen, tenderly, coming nearer

Mercy's voice. Stephen dropped it, and, looking fixedly at Merc

No possible form of words could have been so absolute. "I can't!" "I do not," would have

near the white callas; her hands clasped, and her eyes fixed on Stephen. At last sh

on his eyes for one second, then shook them has

nough for a lifetime." And Stephen smiled,--a smile more pathetic than Mercy's had been. He went on, still in the same gentle voice,--a voice out of which the very life

Stephen accepted this great grief, and made no effort to gainsay it. Mercy tried again

it, Stephen,--I

n. Touched to the heart by his sweetness and forbearance, Mercy went nearer

ad pride lighted Stephen's face at the thought of the clinging affection which even now stirred this woman's veins for him,--"any more than you can help having ceased to trust me. If the trust ever comes back, th

something I can do to help you, I

red Mercy. "

when you need me, ... or trust me ...

te love. Her heart thrilled under it. She made an eager step forward. If he had returned, she would have thrown herself into his arms, and cried out, "O Stephen, I

or two years all in all to each other, who had written on each other'

lowed her to the end, in spite of her having become a very outcast of crime, if she had continued to love him; and it was simply impossible for him to conceive of her love's bei

i

th that kills

even Christ

ied my

! if o

him lifeless s

face with tears

s in anguish w

if I could h

ife. Mere sep

alances of l

mes only by d

vain! And wea

ed so well, lov

esurrection f

God could gi

ld's common consent calls religion. Most of the words spoken by the teachers of churches repelled Mercy by their monotonous iteration of the letter which killeth. But her realization of the solemn significance of the great fact of being alive deepened every hour; her tenderness, her sense of brotherhood to every human being, and her sense of the actual presence and near love of God. Her old intolerance was softened, or rather it had changed from antagonisms on the surface to living principles at the core. Truth, truth, truth, was still the war-cry of her soul; and there was an intensity in every word of her written or spoken pleadings on t

e. On the other hand, her thoughts of Parson Dorrance grew constantly warmer, tenderer, more assured. His character, his love for her, his beautiful life, rose steadily higher and higher, and brighter and brighter on her horizon, as the lofty snow-clad peaks of a mountain land reveal themselves in all their grandeur to our vision only when we have journeyed away from their base. Slowly the whole allegiance of her heart transferred itself to the dead man's memory; slowly her grief for his loss deepened, and yet with the deepened grief came a certain new and holy joy. It surely could not be impossible for him to know in heaven that she was his on earth? As confidently as if she had been wedded to him here, she looked forward to the reunion with him there, and found in her secret conscio

hildren at their play. She stood sometimes at her window at dusk, and watched the poor laboring men and women going home, leading or carrying their children; and it seemed as if her heart would break. Everywhere, her eye noted the swarming groups of children, poor, uncared for, so often unwelcome; and she said sadly to

as a home to them all, and she reproduced in her own life very nearly the relation which Parson Dorrance had held to the young people of Danby. Her friend Lizzy Hunter was now th

y left him had grown harder and harder, day by day; but he bore the last as silently and patiently a

y, Steve,--a good boy. Y

e he read eagerly, and kept them carefully in scrap-books. He took great delight in collecting all the copies of her verses. Sometimes a little verse of hers would go the rounds of the newspapers for months, and each reappearan

never love any other woman. I am free now. My mother has died this night. May I co

eph

eased to be a personality to her. Striving very earnestly with herself to be kind, and to do for this stranger wh

t free to live your life like other men. I think that the future ought to hold some very great and good gi

, as you say you do, in your affection. I am truly grieved that you do this, and I hope that in your new free life you will very soon find other relations which will make you forget your old one with me. I did you a great

most ho

er

ars cherished a hope that there might yet be a future in store for him and Mercy. Now, by the new sense of des

d Jacobs house back again, and fitted it up in every respect as Mercy had once suggested. This done, he sat down to wait--for he knew not what. He had a vague feeling that he would die soon, and leave the house and his small fortune to Mercy; and she would come and spend her summers there, and so he would recall to

full, fresh countenance and bounding elasticity, than that his dream of going first, and leaving to

reluctant to leave her; but, with her usual vehemence, she resisted all their protestations, and compelled them to join the party. She was thus left alone in a house crowded with people, all of whom were strangers to her. Some of them recollected afterward to have noticed her sitting on the piazza at sunset, looking at the mountains with an expression of great delight; but no one

le room, stood around Mercy's bed. It seemed a sad way to die, surrounded by strangers, who did not even know her name;

Hunter of her having twice had threatenings of a paralytic seizure. "If only I die at once," she had said to Lizzy, "

it stopped. In a few hours, there settled upon her features an expression of such

who had died thus suddenly and alone. In the confusion of their arrival, Mercy had omitted to register their names. In the smaller White Mountain houses, this formality is not rigidly enforced. And so it came

ral New England to robe the dead. They put a cap of stiff white muslin over Mercy's brown hair, which even now, in her fiftieth year, showed

'spect she was married, don't you?" said Ann Sweetser, Mrs. Bu

e broad gold band on the third finger of Mercy's left hand. "But yer can't allers tell by that nowaday

rarely dramatic in all the surroundings of these last hours. Among the guests in the house was one, a woman, herself a poet, who toward the end of the second day came into the chamber, bringing long trailing vines of the sweet Linnea, which was then in full bloom. Her poet's heart was moved to the de

he cold forehead. Then she laid the fragrant vines around the face and across the bosom, and went away, feeling an inexplicable sense of nearness to the woman she had kissed. When the next morning she knew that it was Me

ugh she knew that he was living in the Jacobs house. Their paths never crossed, and Lizzy had long ago forgotten her passing suspicion of Mercy's regard for him. The

solicitude in her face she offered him a chair. "I merely wi

papers, yellow, creased, old. He unfolded o

,--"when she was living in my house. She said at that time that she would like to have it put on her

Stephen stood leaning heavily on the back of a chai

Mr. White! You are i

en. His eyes were fixed on the spot where thirty years

et with tears rolli

iful!" she exclaimed. "Why d

ingle thrill of pride followed by a

sked her not

om for wonder or resentment at this, or even to realize in th

I have been thinking that there were no words fit to put above her grave. No one but

d, "I cannot part with that. I have brought a copy

atience, smote her like a cry. She was about to speak to him eagerly and with sympathy, but he was gone. His errand was finished,--the

" she said, and watched his figure l

ch was cut on the ston

gra

set, the ship he

ine out beneath

ells with eager

him who goes, a

lands, new homes,

k: the rest bu

tanch ship her f

t myriad colo

s, and rich, und

in the distant

sky because th

, not,--"Died i

ated to ano