Family Pride Or Purified by Suffering Part 50

The heat, the smoke, the thunder of the battle were over, and the fields of Gettysburg, where the terrible three days' fight had been, were drenched with human blood and covered with the dead and dying. The contest had been fearful, and its results carried sorrow and anguish to many a heart waiting for tidings from the war, and looking so anxiously for the names of the loved ones who, on the anniversary of the day which saw our nation's independence, lay upon the hills and plains of Gettysburg, their white faces upturned to the summer sky, and wet with the raindrops which like tears for the n.o.ble dead the pitying clouds had shed upon them. And nowhere, perhaps, was there a whiter face or a more anxious heart than at the farmhouse, where both Helen and her mother-in-law were spending the hot July days. Since the Christmas Eve when Helen had watched her husband going from her across the wintry snow, he had not been back, though several times he had made arrangements to do so. Something, however, had always happened to prevent. Once it was sickness which kept him in bed for a week or more; again his regiment was ordered to advance, and the third time it was sent on with others to repel the invaders from Pennsylvania soil.

Bravely through each disappointment Helen bore herself, but her cheek always grew paler and her eye darker in its hue when the evening papers came, and she read what progress our soldiers had made, feeling that a battle was inevitable, and praying so earnestly that Mark Ray might be spared. Then when the battle was over, and up the Northern hills came the dreadful story of thousands and thousands slain, there was a fearful look in her eyes, and her features were rigid as marble, while the quivering lips could scarcely pray for the great fear tugging at her heart. Mark Ray was not with his men when they came from that terrific onslaught. A dozen had seen him fall, struck down by a rebel ball, and that was all she heard for more than a week, when there came another relay of news.

Captain Mark Ray was a prisoner of war, with several of his own company.

An inmate of Libby Prison and a sharer from choice of the apartment where his men were confined. As an officer, he was ent.i.tled to better quarters than the filthy pen where the poor privates were, but Mark Ray had a large, warm heart, and he would not desert those who had been so faithful to him, and so he took their fare, and by his genial humor and unwavering cheerfulness kept many a heart from fainting and made the prisoners' life more bearable than it could have been without him. To young Tom Tubbs, who had enlisted six months before, he was a ministering angel, and many times the poor, homesick boy crept to the side of his captain, and laying his burning head in his lap, wept himself to sleep and dreamed he was at home again. The horrors of that prison life have never been told, but Mark bore up manfully, suffering less in mind, perhaps, than did the friends at home, who lived, as it were, a thousand years in that one brief summer while he languished in that horrid den whose very name had a power to send a thrill of fear to every heart.

At last, as the frosty days of October came on, they began to hope he might be exchanged, and Helen's face grew bright again, until one day there came a soiled, half-worn letter, in Mark's own handwriting. It was the first word received from him since his capture in July, and with a cry of joy Helen s.n.a.t.c.hed it from Uncle Ephraim, for she was still at the farmhouse, and sitting down upon the doorstep just where she had been standing, read the words which Mark had sent to her. He said nothing of the treatment he received, for he wanted the letter to reach her, and he knew well that if he complained the chances were small for the missive ever to leave the capital of the "chivalry." He was very well, he said, and had been all the time, but he pined for home, longing for the dear girl-wife never so dear as now, when separated by so many miles, with prison walls on every side, and an enemy's line between them.

"But be of good cheer, darling," he wrote. "I shall come back to you some time, and life will he all the brighter for what you suffer now. I am so glad my darling consented to be my wife, even though I could stay with her but a moment. The knowing you are really mine makes me happy even here, for I think of you by day, and in my dreams I always hold you in my arms and press you to my heart."

Far different from this cheerful letter was the one which Tom inclosed in it for his family--a wild, homesick outburst, containing so much of truth that it was strange it was ever permitted to leave the city. Of this letter Helen heard by way of Mattie Tubbs, and hope died within her, especially as Tom spoke of their being sent further South as a probable event.

"If Mark goes I shall never see him again," Helen said, despairingly; and when at last the message came that Mark had been removed, and that, too, just at the time when an exchange was constantly expected, she gave him up as lost, feeling almost as much widowed as Katy in her weeds.

Slowly the winter pa.s.sed away, and the country was rife with stories of the inhuman treatment of our men, daily dying by hundreds, while those who survived the cruelties were reduced to maniacs and imbeciles. And Helen, as she listened, grew nearly frantic with the sickening suspense.

She did not know now where her husband was. He had made several attempts to escape, and with each failure had been removed to safer quarters, so that the chances now of his being exchanged seemed very far away. Week after week, month after month, pa.s.sed on, until came the memorable battle of the Wilderness, when Lieutenant Bob, as yet unharmed, stood bravely in the thickest of the fight, his tall figure towering above the rest, and his soldier's uniform b.u.t.toned over a dark tress of hair, and a face like Bell Cameron's, Lieutenant Bob had taken two or three furloughs, but the one which had left the sweetest, pleasantest memory in his heart was that of the autumn before, when the crimson leaves of the maple and the golden tints of the beech were burning themselves out on the hills of Silverton, where his furlough was mostly pa.s.sed, and where, with Bell Cameron, he scoured the length and breadth of Uncle Ephraim's farm, now stopping by the sh.o.r.e of Fairy Pond and again sitting for hours on a ledge of rocks far up the hill, where, beneath the softly-whispering pines nodding above their heads, Bell gathered the light brown cones, and said to him the words he had so thirsted to hear:

"I love you, Robert Reynolds."

Much of Bell's time was pa.s.sed with Katy at the farmhouse, and here Lieutenant Reynolds found her, accepting readily of Uncle Ephraim's hearty invitation to remain; and spending his entire vacation there, with the exception of three days given to his family. Perfectly charmed with quaint Aunt Betsy, whom he remembered so well, he flattered and courted her almost as much as he did Bell, but did not take her with him in his long rambles over the hills, or sit with her at night alone in the parlor until the clock struck twelve--a habit which Aunt Betsy greatly disapproved, but overlooked for this once, seeing, as she said, that:

"The young leftenant was none of her kin, and Isabel only a little."

Those were halcyon days which Robert pa.s.sed at Silverton, but one stood out prominently before him, whether sitting by his camp-fire or plunging into the battle, and that the one when, casting aside all pride and foolish theories, Bell Cameron freely acknowledged her love for the man to whom she had been so long engaged, and paid him back the kisses she had before refused to give.

"I shall be a better soldier for this," Robert had said, as he guided her down the steep of rocks, and with her hand in his, walked slowly back to the farmhouse, which, on the morrow, he left to take again his place in the army.

There were no more furloughs for him after that, and the winter pa.s.sed away, bringing the spring again, when came that battle in the Wilderness, and like a hero he fought until, becoming separated from his comrades, he fell into the enemy's hands, and two days after there sped along the telegraphic wires to New York:

"Lieutenant Robert Reynolds captured the first day of the battle."

Afterward there came news that Andersonville was his destination, together with many others made prisoners that day.

"It is better than being shot, and a great deal better than being burned, as some of the poor wretches were," Juno said, trying to comfort Bell, who doubted a little her sister's word.

True, there was now the shadow of a hope that he might survive the horrors, the mere recital of which made the strongest heart s.h.i.+ver with dread; but the probabilities were all against it, and Bell's face grew almost as white as Helen's, while her eyes acquired that restless, watchful, anxious look which has crept into the eyes of so many sorrowing women, looking away to the southward, where the dear ones were languis.h.i.+ng in the filthy rebel holes, unworthy the name of prison.

CHAPTER LI.

DR. GRANT.

Morris had served out his time as surgeon in the army, had added to it an extra six months, and by his humanity, his skill and Christian kindness, made for himself a name which would be long remembered by the living to whom he had ministered so carefully, while many a dying soldier had blessed him for pointing out the way which leadeth to the life everlasting, and in many a mourning family his name was a household word for the good he had done to a dying son and brother. But Morris'

hospital work was over. He had gone a little too far, incurring too much risk, until his own strength had failed from long-continued toil, and now in the month of June, when Linwood was bright with the early summer blossoms, he was coming back, with health greatly impaired and a dark cloud before his vision, so that he could not see how beautiful his home was looking, or gaze into the faces of those who waited so anxiously to welcome again their beloved physician. Blind, some said he was, but the few lines sent to Helen announcing the day of his arrival contradicted that report. His eyes were very much diseased, his amanuensis wrote, but he trusted that the pure air of his native hills and the influence of old scenes and a.s.sociations would soon effect a cure. If not too much trouble, he added, please see that the house is made comfortable, and have John meet me on Friday at the station.

Helen had just returned from New York, where she could not remain any longer, for the scenes of gayety in which she was sometimes compelled to mingle were utterly distasteful to her, and she longed for the seclusion of the farmhouse and the quiet there is among the hills. She was glad Morris was coming home, for he always did her good; he could comfort her better than any other, unless it were Katy, whose loving, gentle words of hope were very soothing to her.

"Poor Morris!" she sighed, as she finished his letter, and then took it to the family sitting upon the pleasant piazza, which, at Katy's expense and her own, had been added to the house, overlooking Fairy Pond and the pleasant hills beyond.

"Morris is coming home," she said, as Aunt Betsy asked: "What news?" "He will be here on Friday, and he wishes us to see that all things are in order at Linwood for his reception. His eyes are badly diseased, but he is not blind, and he hopes that coming back to us will cure him," she added, glancing aside at Katy, who sat upon a step of the piazza, her hands folded together upon her lap and her blue eyes looking far off into the fading sunset, just as Evangeline sits looking down the Mississippi River.

When she heard Morris' name she turned her head a little, so that the ripple of her golden hair was more distinctly visible beneath the silken net she wore, and a deep tinge of red dyed her cheeks; but she made no comment or showed by any sign that she heard what they were saying. Katy was very lovely and consistent in her young widowhood, and not a whisper of gossip had the Silvertonians coupled with her name since she came to them, leaving her husband in Greenwood. There had been no parading of her grief before the public or a.s.sumption of greater sorrow than many others had known; but the soberness of her demeanor, and the calm, subdued expression of her face, attested to what she had suffered.

Sixteen months had pa.s.sed since Wilford died, and she still wore her deep mourning weeds, except the widow's cap, which, at her mother's and Aunt Betsy's earnest solicitations, she had laid aside, subst.i.tuting in its place a simple net, which confined her waving hair and kept it from breaking out in flowing curls, as it was disposed to do. Against this fas.h.i.+on Aunt Betsy also inveighed.

"Couldn't a body curl their hair when nater intended it to curl, and mourn a-plenty, too?" For her part, she believed it people's duty to look as well as they could, mournin' or not mournin', and Katy couldn't look much wus' than she did, with her hair shoved back under that net, unless it was when she wore that heathenish cap, which made her look so like a grandmother.

This was Aunt Betsy's opinion, but to others there was something singularly sweet and beautiful in the childish face, from which the golden hair was brushed back so plainly, waving softly about the forehead, and occasionally escaping from its confinement in a graceful curl, which Katy suffered to remain for Aunt Betsy's sake. Katy had never been prettier than she was now, in her mature womanhood, and to the poor and sorrowful, whose homes she cheered so often, she was an angel of goodness.

Truly she had been purified by suffering; the dross had been burned out, and only the gold remained, shedding its brightness on all with which it came in contact.

They would miss her at the farmhouse now far more than they did when she first went away, for she made the suns.h.i.+ne of their home, filling Helen's place when she was in New York, and when she came back proving to her a stay and comforter. Indeed, but for Katy's presence, Helen often felt that she could not endure the sickening suspense and doubt which hung so darkly over her husband's fate.

"He is alive; he will come back," Katy always said, and from her perfect faith, Helen, too, caught a glimpse of hope.

Could they have forgotten Mark they would have been happy at the farmhouse now, for with the budding spring and blossoming summer, Katy's spirits had returned, and her old, musical laugh rang often through the house just as it used to do in the happy days of girlhood, while the same silvery voice which led the chair in the brick church, and sang with the little children their Sunday hymns, often broke forth into s.n.a.t.c.hes of songs, which made even the robins listen, as they built their nests in the trees; while Uncle Ephraim, far from condemning this lightness of spirits, thanked G.o.d, who had brought his darling safely through the cloud to where the sun was s.h.i.+ning.

If Katy thought of Morris she never spoke of him when she could help it.

It was a morbid fancy to which she clung; that duty to Wilford's memory required her to forget, or, at least, avoid the man who had so innocently come between them; and when she heard he was coming home she felt more pain than sorrow. She liked going up to Linwood, as she often did. Its quiet seclusion, and the beauty of its grounds suited her taste, and she often pa.s.sed hours in the pleasant summer house, or on the broad piazza, dreaming sometimes of the past, and sometimes, it must be confessed, dreaming of a future, and wondering what it would bring her when Mark came back, as come he would, and Helen was gone for good.

She would be very lonely with people so much older than herself, and who did not understand the different tastes and ways of thinking which she had acquired. She was very happy at the farmhouse, it is true, and loved its inmates with a deep, unselfish love, but Helen's frequent absences from home showed her that even the farmhouse could be dreary with no congenial spirit to sympathize with her as Helen did.

Matters were in this state when news came of Morris' intended return, and Katy, sitting on the piazza step, and gazing dreamily into the crimson clouds piled against the western sky, seemed not to hear what her sister was saying. She did hear, however, and the blood leaped more swiftly through her veins for a moment, as she thought of Morris at Linwood just as he used to be. But when she remembered Wilford's words, "He confessed to me that he loved you," she felt only a nervous dread of Morris' coming, and forthwith set to work to fortify herself at every point with a stricture of reserve which she was far from feeling.

The day of his return was balmy and beautiful as the days of June are apt to be, and at an early hour Helen went over to Linwood to see that everything was in order for his arrival.

"Mrs. Hull will have dinner waiting for him, and I shall stay," she said to Katy, adding: "I wish you would come over, too. Morris will feel grateful, I know."

Katy did not reply, but struck softly the chords of the piano and thought how foolish she was to feel as she did. Suppose Morris had loved her once, he probably did not now, and even if he did, it could do no good, for she was the same as dead to all that kind of thing. She had tried matrimony, and found it--she did not say what. She never allowed herself to think an unkind thing of Wilford if she could help it, but a tear dropped upon the piano keys as she unconsciously hummed a part of the song commencing "I would not, no, I would not, recall the past again, for mingled with the pleasure was too much grief and pain."

Katy's tears were falling fast by the time the song was ended, but she dashed them away and sprang from the stool, exclaiming:

"Crying because Morris is coming home, poor, worn-out, half-blind Morris, who has done so much for the soldiers, I will go up and welcome him. I will not be so silly as to imagine he still retains a fancy for an old woman of twenty-three, even if he had one for the girl of seventeen."

Katy felt very old just then, and walking to the gla.s.s, was almost vexed at the smooth, round face which met her view.

"I ought to look older at twenty-three," she said. "Morris will think I have not mourned a bit, nor cared for Wilford," and another tear glistened on her eyelashes as she thought of being accused of forgetfulness of the dead.

Katy did look very young for twenty-three. Her health was perfect now, and save as the change in her character showed itself upon her face, she had scarcely changed at all since the day when she came home from Canandaigua with her heart and head so full of him who now lay sleeping in Greenwood.

"I know what's the matter. It's the net," she said, frowning disapprovingly upon the silken meshes which confined her hair. "Yes, it's nothing but this net which makes me look so young. Every schoolgirl wears one, and I have followed the fas.h.i.+on, letting it hang down my back in a way very unbecoming to a widow of my age. I'll take it off, or at all events I won't wear it to Linwood," and tossing aside the offending net, Katy bound her luxuriant hair in bands which she coiled around the back of her head and then put on the widow's cap, discarded so many months, and from which she shrank a little as she surveyed herself in the gla.s.s.

It was not exactly unbecoming; nothing could be unbecoming to that fair, open face, which, surrounded by the white border, looked much like a sweet baby's face, except that it was older; but it was now so long since Katy had seen anything of the kind, and as habit is everything, she was not quite as well pleased with her headgear as in New York, where such things were common. Nevertheless, she would wear it to Linwood, and she went for her round straw hat, but, alas, the sun hat which made her look so frightfully young was not made for the widow's cap, and casting it aside, Katy threw a thick black veil over her head, and then stepping to the door of the room where her mother and Aunt Betsy were busy at work, she said:

"I am going to Linwood, and shall stay there to dinner."

"In the name of the people, what has the child rigged herself out in that shape for?" Aunt Betsy exclaimed, letting fall the knife with which she was chopping cheese curd, and staring in astonishment. "I'd enough sight rather you'd frizzle your hair over rats, as Helen does, making herself look like some horned critter, than wear that heathenish thing.