Hills of the Shatemuc Part 47

"He is a lawyer in Mannahatta."

"Do you know where he lives?"

"No, Winnie; but other people do."

"What are you going to see him for, Governor?"

"To ask him if he will let me read law in his office."

"Will he want to be paid for it?"

"I don't know."

"Suppose he should, Governor?"

"Then I will pay him, Winifred."

"How can you?"

Her brother smiled a little. "My eyes are not far-sighted enough to tell you, Winnie. I can only give you the fact."

Winifred smiled too, but in her heart believed him.

"Did you ever see Mr. De Wort?"

"Never."

"Then what makes you choose him?"

"Because he is said to be the best lawyer in the city."

Winifred put her fingers thoughtfully through and through the short dark wavy brown hair which graced her brother's broad brow, and wondered with herself whether there would not be a better lawyer in the city before long. And then in a sweet kind of security laid her head down again upon his breast.

"I'll have a house for you there, by and by, Winnie," he said, as his arm drew round her.

"O I couldn't leave mother, you know," she answered.

Her mother called her at this instant, and she ran off, leaving him alone.

He had spoken to her all the while with no change on his wonted calm brow and lip; but when she left the room he left it; and wandering down to some hiding place on the rocky sh.o.r.e, where only the silent cedars stood witnesses, he wept there till his strong frame shook, with what he no more than the rocks would shew anywhere else. It never was shewn. He was just as he had been. n.o.body guessed, unless his mother, the feeling that had wrought and was working within him; and she only from general knowledge of his nature. But the purpose of life had grown yet stronger and struck yet deeper roots instead of being shaken by this storm. The day of his setting off for Mannahatta was not once changed after it had been once fixed upon.

And it came. Almost at the end of November; a true child of the month; it was dark, chill, gloomy. The wind bore little foretokens of rain in every puff that made its way up the river, slowly, as if the sea had charged it too heavily, or as if it came through the fringe of the low grey cloud which hung upon the tops of the mountains. But n.o.body spoke of Winthrop's staying his journey. Perhaps everybody thought, that the day before, and the night before, and so much of the morning, it were better not to go over again.

"Hi!" sighed old Karen, as she took the coffee-pot off the hearth and wiped the ashes from it, -- "it's a heavy place for our feet, just this here; -- I wonder why the Lord sends 'em.

_He_ knows."

"Why he sends what, Karen?" said Winifred, taking the coffee- pot from her, and waiting to hear the answer.

"Oh go 'long, dear," said the old woman; -- "I was quarrelling with the Lord's doings, that's all."

"_He_ knows!" repeated Winnie, turning away and bending her face down till hot tears fell on the cover of the coffee-pot. She stopped at the door of the keeping-room and fought the tears with her little hand desperately, for they were too ready to come; once and again the hand was pa.s.sed hard over cheeks and eyes, before it would do and she could open the door.

"Well, mother," said Mr. Landholm, coming back from a look at the weather, -- "let's see what comfort can be got out of breakfast!"

None, that morning. It was but a sham, the biscuits and coffee. They were all feeding on the fruits of life-trials, struggles and cares, past and coming; and though some wild grown flowers of hope mingled their sweetness with the harsh things, they could not hide nor smother the taste of them.

That taste was in Mr. Landholm's coffee; the way in which he set down the cup and put the spoon in, said so; it was in Winthrop's biscuit, for they were broken and not eaten; it seemed to be in the very light, to Winifred's eyes, by the wistful unmarking look she gave to everything the light s.h.i.+ned upon.

It was over; and Mrs. Landholm had risen from the tea-board and stood by the window. There Winthrop parted from her, after some tremulous kisses, and with only the low, short, "Good bye, mother!" He turned to meet the arms of his little sister, which held him like some precious thing that they might not hold. It was hard to bear, but he bore it; till she s.n.a.t.c.hed her arms away from his neck and ran out of the room. Yet she had not bid him good bye and he stood in doubt, looking after her. Then remembered Karen.

He went into the kitchen and shook the old shrivelled hand which was a.s.sociated in his memory with many an old act of kindness, many a time of help in days of need.

"Good bye, Karen."

"Well -- good bye, --" said the old woman slowly, and holding his hand. "I sometimes wonder what ever you were brought into the world for, Mr. Winthrop."

"Why, Karen?"

"Because I aint much better than a fool," she said, putting her other hand to her eyes. "But ye're one of the Lord's precious ones, Governor; he will have service of ye, wherever ye be."

Winthrop wrung her hand. Quitting her, he saw his sister waiting for him at the kitchen door. She let him come within it, and then holding up her Bible which had hung in one hand, she pointed with her finger to these words where she had it open; --

"G.o.d now commandeth all men everywhere to repent."

Her finger was under the word '_now_.' She added nothing, except with her eyes, which went wistfully, searchingly, beggingly, into his; till a film of tears gathered, and the book fell, and her arms went round him again and her face was hid.

"I know, dear Winnie," he said softly, stooping to her after the silent embrace had lasted a minute. -- "I must go -- kiss me."

There was a great deal in her kiss, of hope and despair; and then he was gone; and she stood at the window looking after him as long as a bit of him could be seen; clearing away the tears from her eyes that she might watch the little black speck of the boat, as it grew less and less, further and further off down the river. Little speck as it was, he was in it.

The world seemed to grow dark as she looked, -- in two ways.

The heavy rain clouds that covered the sky stooped lower down and hung their grey drapery on the mountains more thick and dark. But it did not rain yet, nor till Winifred turned wearily away from the window, saying that "they had got there;" -- meaning that the little black speck on the water had reached the little white and brown spot on the sh.o.r.e which marked the place of Cowslip's Mill. Then the clouds began to fringe themselves off into rain, and Cowslip's Mill was soon hid, and river and hills were all grey under their thick watery veil. "But Governor will be in the stage, mamma," said Winifred. "He won't mind it."

Poor Winifred! Poor Governor! -- He was not in the stage. There was no room for him. His only choice was to take a seat beside the driver, unless he would wait another day; and he never thought of waiting. He mounted up to the box, and the stage- coach went away with him; while more slowly and soberly the little boat set its head homewards and pulled up through the driving rain.

It rained steadily, and all things soon owned the domination of the watery clouds. The horses, the roads, the rocks, the stage-coach, and the two outsiders, who submitted for a long distance in like silence and quiet; though with the one it was the quiet of habit and with the other the quiet of necessity.

Or it might be of abstraction; for Winthrop's mind took little heed to the condition of his body.

It was busy with many greater things. And among them the little word to which his sister's finger had pointed, lodged itself whether he would or no, and often when he would not.

Now NOW, -- "G.o.d NOW commandeth all men everywhere to repent."

It was at the back of Winthrop's thoughts, wherever they might be; it hung over his mental landscape like the rain-cloud; he could look at nothing, as it were, but across the gentle shadows of that truth falling upon his conscience. The rain- drops dimpled it into the water, when the road lay by the river-side; and the bare tree-stems they were pa.s.sing, that said so much of the past and the future, said also quietly and soberly, "NOW." The very stage-coach reminded him he was on a journey to the end of which the stage-coach could not bring him, and for the end of which he had no plans nor no preparations made. And the sweet images of home said, "_now_ -- make them." And yet all this, though true and real in his spirit, was so still and so softly defined, that, -- like the reflection of the hills in the smooth water of the river, -- he noted without noting, he saw without dwelling upon it. It was the depth of the picture, and his mind chose the stronger outlines. And then the water ruffled, and the reflection was lost.

The ride was in dull silence, till after some hours the coachman stopped to give his horses water; though he remarked, "it was contrary in them to want it." But after that his tongue seemed loosed.

"Dampis.h.!.+" he remarked to his fellow-traveller, as he climbed up to his place again and took the reins.

"Can you stand it?" said Winthrop.

"Stand what?"