A Letter of Credit Part 69

"They think at school, that is, the teachers do, that she is a beauty."

"I dare say they have told her so."

"And you see how Mrs. Mowbray has dressed her up."

"I would not have sent her there, if I had known how it would be.

However, I could not arrange for her so cheaply anywhere else."

"What would you do, mamma, if Mr. Southwode were coming back?"

"I should know, in that case. He will not come yet a while. Now Antoinette, let this subject alone."

"Yes, mamma. You are a clever woman. I don't believe even Mr. Southwode could manage you."

"I can manage Mr. Southwode!" said Mrs. Busby contentedly.

CHAPTER XIX.

A NEW DEPARTURE.

Rotha found her room too cold to stay in, after the first heat of her wrath had pa.s.sed off. The only warm place that she knew of, beside her aunt's dressing room, was the parlour; and after a little hesitation and s.h.i.+vering, she softly crept down the stairs. The warm, luxurious place was empty, of people, that is; and before the glowing grate Rotha sat down on the rug and looked at the situation. Or she looked at that and the room together; the latter made her incensed. It was so full of luxury. The soft plush carpet, the thick rug on which she was crouching; how they glowed warm and rich in the red s.h.i.+ne of the fiery grate; how beautiful the crimson ground was, and how dainty the drab tints of the flowers running over it. How stately the curtains fell to the floor with their bands of drab and crimson; and the long mirror between them, redoubling all the riches reflected in it. What a magnificent extension table, really belonging in the dining room, but doing duty now as a large centre table, only it was shoved up in one corner; and upon it the gas fixture stood, with its green gla.s.s shaft and its cut gla.s.s shade full of bunches of grapes. Nothing else was on the table; not a book; not a trinket; and so all the rest of the room was bare of everything _but_ furniture. The furniture was elegant; but the chairs stood round the sides of the room with pitiless regularity and seemed waiting for somebody that would never come. Empty riches! nothing else. At Mrs.

Mowbray's Rotha was in another world, socially and humanly. Books swarmed from the shelves and lay on every table; pictures hung on the walls and stood on the mantelpieces; here and there some lovely statuette delighted the eye by its beauty or the mind by its a.s.sociations; flowers were sure to be in a gla.s.s or a dish somewhere; and all over there were traces of travel and of cultivation, in bits of marble, or bits of bronze, or photographs, or relics, telling of various ages and countries and nationalities. Here, in Mrs. Busby's handsome rooms, the pretty hanging lamps were exceedingly new, and they were the only bronze to be seen.

Rotha studied it all and made these comparisons for a while, in a vague, purposeless reverie, while she was getting warm; but then her thoughts began to come to a point. Everything and everybody in this house was utterly unsympathetic to her; animate or inanimate; was this her home? In no sense of the word. Had not her aunt just informed her, in effect, that she had no home; that if she lived to grow up she must make her own way and earn her own bread, or have none. Antoinette would grow up to all this luxury, and in all this luxury; while she would be penniless, and homeless. Had she brought this upon herself? Well, she might have been more conciliating; but in her heart of hearts Rotha did not wish she had been other than she had been. A home or friends to be gained only by subserviency and truckling, she did not covet. There came a little whisper of conscience here, suggesting that a medium existed between truckling and defiance; that it was a supposable case that one might be so pure and fair in life and spirit, that the involuntary liking and respect of friends and acquaintances would follow of necessity. Was not Mr. Digby such a person? did not Mrs. Mowbray win good-will wherever she appeared? and Rotha was just enough to acknowledge to herself that her own demeanour had been nothing less than love-winning. Alas, how could she help it, unless she were indeed made over new; a different creature.

How else could she bear what must be borne in this house? But in this house she was an outcast; they would have nothing to do with her more than to see her through her schooling; there was no shelter or refuge here to which she could ever look. Nor did she care for it, if only Mr.

Digby would come again. Was he lost to her? Had he really forgotten her?

would he forget his promise? Rotha did not believe it; her faith in him was steadfast; but she did conceive it possible that business and circ.u.mstances might keep him where his promise would be rendered of little avail; and her heart was wrung with distress at the thought of this possibility. Distress, which but for Mrs. Mowbray would have been desolation. Even as it was, Rotha felt very desolate, very blank; and she remembered again what Mr. Digby had said, about a time that might come when all other help would fail her and she would be _driven_ to seek G.o.d.

All help had not failed yet; Mrs. Mowbray was a blessed good friend; but she was all, and Rotha had no claim upon her. I will not wait to be _driven_, she thought; I will not wait to be driven by extremity; things are bad enough as it is; I will seek G.o.d now.--I have been seeking him.-- Mr. Digby said I must keep on seeking, until I found. I will. But in the mean time I choose. I choose I will be a Christian, and that means, a servant of Jesus. I will be his servant, no matter what he bids me do.

From this time on, I will be his servant. And then, some time, he will keep his word and take the stony heart out of me, and give me a new heart; a heart of flesh, I wonder how I came to be so hard!----

It was a step in advance of all Rotha had made yet. It was _the_ step, which introduces a sinner into the pathway of a Christian; before which that path is not entered, however much it may be looked at and thought desirable. Rotha had made her choice and given her allegiance; for she at once told it to the Lord and asked his blessing.

And then, forthwith, came the trial of her sincerity. The cross was presented to her; which the Lord says those must take up and bear daily who would follow him. People think that crosses start up in every path; it is a mistake; they are only found in the way of following Christ and in consequence of such following. They are things that may be taken up and carried along; that _must_ be, if the Christian follows his Master; but that he may escape if he will turn aside from following him and go with the world. They are of many kinds, but all furnished by the world and Satan without, or by self-will within. The form which the cross took on this occasion for Rotha was of the latter kind. Conscience whispered a reminder--"If thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee--" And instantly Rotha's whole soul rose up in protest. Make an apology to her aunt _now?_ Humble herself to confess herself wrong, when the wrong done to her was so manyfold greater? Bend to the hardness that would crush her? Justify another's evil by confessing her own? Self-will gave her an indignant "Impossible!" And conscience with quiet persistence held forth the cross.

Rotha put both hands to her face and swayed up and down, with a kind of bodily struggle, which symbolized that going on in her mind. It was hard, it was hard! Nature cried out, with a repulsion that seemed unconquerable, against taking up this cross; yet there it was before her, in the inexorable hands of conscience, and Grace said, "Do it; take it up and bear it." And Nature and Grace fought. But all the while, down at the bottom of the girl's heart, was a certain knowledge that the cross must be borne; a certain prevision that she would yield and take it up; that she must, if her new determination meant anything; and Rotha felt she could not afford to let it vanish in air. She struggled, rebelled, repined, and ended with yielding. Her will submitted, and she said in her heart, "I must, and I will."

There came a sort of tired lull over her then, which was grateful, after the battle. She considered _when_ she should do this thing, which it was so disagreeable to do. She could not quite make up her mind; but at the first opportunity, whenever that might be. Before she left the house at any rate, if even she had to make the opportunity she wanted.

Then she thought she would return to her little cold room again, before anybody found her in the parlour. She was thoroughly warmed up, she had no more thinking to do just then; and if need be she would lay herself on the bed and cover herself with blankets, and so wait till luncheon time.

As she went up stairs, something happened that she did not expect; there stole into her heart as it were a rill of gladness, which swelled and grew. "Yes, Jesus _is_ my King, she thought, and I am his child. O I don't care now for anything, for Jesus is my King, and He will help and take care." She went singing that Name in her heart all the way up stairs; for the first time in her life the sweetness of it was sweet to her; for the first time, the strength of it was something to lean upon.

Ay, she was right; she had stepped over the narrow boundary line between the realm of the Prince of this world and the kingdom of Christ. She had submitted herself to the one Ruler; she was no longer under the dominion of the other. And with her first entrance into the kingdom of the Prince of peace, she had stepped out of the darkness into the light, and the air of that new country blew softly upon her. O wonderful! O sweet! O strange!--that such a change should be so quickly made, and yet so hard to make. Rotha had not fought all her battles nor got rid of all her enemies, but that the latter should have no more _dominion_ over her she felt confident. She was a different creature from the Rotha who had fled down stairs an hour or two before in wrath and bitterness.

It was very cold up stairs. She lay down and covered herself with blankets and went to sleep.

She was called to luncheon; got up and smoothed her hair as well as she could with her hands, and thought over what she had to do. She had to set her teeth and go at it like a forlorn-hope upon a battery, but she did not flinch at all.

Mr. Busby was at luncheon, which was unusual and she had not counted upon. He was gracious.

"How do you do, Rotha? Bless me, how you have improved! grown too, I declare."

"There was no need of that, papa," said Antoinette, who was going to be a dumpy.

"What has Mrs. Mowbray done to you? I really hardly know you again."

"Fine feathers, papa."

"Mrs. Mowbray has been very kind to me," Rotha managed to get in quietly.

"She's growing handsome, wife!" Mr. Busby declared as he took his seat at the table.

"You shouldn't say such things to young girls, Mr. Busby," said his wife reprovingly.

"Shouldn't I? Why not? It is expected that they will hear enough of that sort of thing when they get a little older."

"Why should they, Mr. Busby?" asked Rotha, innocently curious.

"Yes indeed, why should they?" echoed her aunt.

"Why should they? I don't know. As I said, it is expected. Young ladies usually demand such tribute from their admirers."

"To tell them they are handsome?" said Rotha.

"Yes," said Mr. Busby looking at her. "Ladies like it. Wouldn't you like it?"

"I should not like it at all," said Rotha colouring with a little excitement. "I don't mind your saying so, Mr. Busby; you have a right to say anything you like to me; but if any stranger said it, I should think he was very impertinent."

"You don't know much yet," said Mr. Busby.

"There is small danger that Rotha will ever be troubled with that sort of impertinence," said Mrs. Busby, with that peculiar air of her head, which always meant that she thought a good deal more than she spoke out at the minute.

"Maybe," returned her husband; "but she is going to deserve it, I can tell you. She'll be handsomer than ever Antoinette will."

Which remark seemed to Rotha peculiarly unlucky for her just that day.

Mrs. Busby reddened with displeasure though she held her tongue.

Antoinette was not capable of such forbearance.

"Papa!" she said, breaking out into tears, "that is very unkind of you!"

"Well, don't snivel," said her father. "You are pretty enough, if you keep a smooth face; but don't you suppose there are other people in the world handsomer? Be sensible."

"It is difficult not to be hurt, Mr. Busby," said his wife, pressing her lips together.

"Mamma!" cried Antoinette in a very injured tone, "he called me 'pretty'?"

"Aint you?" said her father, becoming a little provoked. "I thought you knew you were. But Rotha is going to be a beauty. It is no injury to you, my child."

"You seem to forget it may be an injury to Rotha, Mr. Busby."