"Isn't it worth coming for!—" said Faith, when they had taken it all in for a few minutes without interrupting the birds.
"More than that—and the 'it' is very plural. Faith, do you see that butterfly?"—A primrose-winged rover was meandering about in the soft air before them, flitting over the buttercups with a listless sort of admiration.
"Poor thing, he has come out too soon," said Faith. "He will have some frost yet, for so summery as it is to-day." But Faith gave a graver look at the butterfly than his yellow wings altogether warranted.
"Among the ancients," said Mr. Linden, "the word for a butterfly and the word for the soul were the same,—they thought the first was a good emblem of the lightness and airiness of the last. So they held, that when a man died a butterfly might be seen flitting above his head. I was thinking how well this one little thing shews the exceeding lowness of heathen ideas."
"Did they think the butterfly was his very spirit, in that form?"
"I suppose so—or thought they did. But look at that creature's wavering, unsteady flight; his aimless wanderings, anywhere or nowhere; and compare it with the 'mounting up with wings as eagles', which a Christian soul may know, even in this life,—compare it with the swift 'return to God who gave it'—with the being 'caught up to meet the Lord' which it shall surely know at death."
"And the butterfly isn't further from that," said Faith clasping her hands together,—"than many a real, living soul in many a living person!"—
"No, not further; and so what the old Greeks made an emblem of the immortal soul, gives name, with us, to those persons who are most tied down to mortality. What were you thinking of, a minute ago, when I shewed you the butterfly?"
"I was thinking of somebody that I am afraid a butterfly will always remind me of,"—Faith answered with a slight colour;—"and of the time he got the name."
"He got it by favour of his office, you know—not otherwise."
"I know—"
But with that, Faith jumped up to see to the state of the fire; and then after some conjuration in her basket produced a suspicious-looking tin vessel, for which the proper bed of coals was found. Leaving it and the fire to agree together, Faith came back to the rock and Mr. Linden and stood a little while silently looking and breathing the sweetness.
"I always did love everything in the world, that my eyes could see," she said gravely. "But I love them so much more now!—now that the hand that made them is not such a strange far-off hand to me. It makes a kind of new world to me, Endecott."
"Yes—and you can understand how—even without physical changes—when we 'shall know as we are known,' the 'heavens and earth wherein dwelleth righteousness' may be preëminently 'new'."
Faith stood without reply a few minutes longer, then ran back to her fire; and after a short space called to Mr. Linden to ask if he would like to come and see what the prince had been picking up wood for?
To which the prince responded with very un-royal alacrity, bringing a well-put-together knot of buttercups to adorn one side of Miranda's head; which he declared looked better than gold beads, if they didn't cost as much.
A napkin was spread on the rock, conveniently near to the fire; on which plates and bread and a bottle of cream and a dainty looking pasty were irregularly bestowed. Mr. Linden threw himself down on the moss; and Faith had got a cup and saucer out of her basket and was just sugaring and creaming the prince's reward before applying to her dish on the fire for the crowning coffee; when her eye was caught by a spectator lately come upon the scene. No other than a somewhat ragged little boy, who eyeing them from the bank had been irresistibly lured nearer and nearer, by the grace of the preparations and the steam of the hot coffee perhaps, till he now stood by the trunk of the nearest tree.
"What are you doin'?" he said.
"What are you?" said Mr. Linden, turning to look at the boy—not just as he looked at the coffee, but very much as the coffee looked at him. "Did you never see people eat dinner?"
The boy stood his ground with, "What you got?"
"When was the last time?" said Mr. Linden. ("Princess—this may turn out to be a subject!")
"Last time what?" said the "subject" stoutly.
"The last time you saw people eating dinner," said Mr. Linden. "Did you ever go to the Museum?"
"I've went to Pettibaug!"—
"When is the last time you saw people eating dinner?" said Faith.
"We haint got none to our house."
"What's the matter?"
"Mintie said there warn't nothin' to eat and I might go a blackberryin'."
"You've come to the right place," said Mr. Linden,—"I don't believe they're ripe anywhere else. Who is 'Mintie'? and who stays with her while you're after blackberries?"
"Mintie's sissy. There aint nobody stayin' with her—she's stayin' along o' mother—when she's up."
"Where is she?—I mean where does she live—and you, and Mintie. Where is your house?"
"Round there—'Taint fur. What you got?"
Faith set down her cup and looked at Mr. Linden.
"What is the matter with your mother?"
"She's sick."
"Well if I give you a basket, and this lady puts some dinner in it for your mother and Mintie and you, do you think you can carry it home?"
"Is your sister sick too?" said Faith.
"She's got the fever nagur."
"Endecott," said Faith softly,—"shall we go and see them?"
"Yes, of course. What's your name, child?"
"My name's Bob Tuck."
Mr. Linden looked at him.
"How comes it that you and Dromy are no more alike?" he said.
"Mother says Dromy aint like nothin' I be."
"Well Bob Tuck," said Mr. Linden smiling, "have you got a broom at home?"
"There's two old ones."
"Then if you will go home and sweep the floor as well as you can, with the two old brooms, and set the table, I'll bring this lady to see you and we'll carry the basket—(which means, Princess, that I will!)—and you can let the blackberries hang on till they get ripe. Do you understand?"
"If I'll sweep the floor, you'll fetch the basket?" said Bob.
"Yes. And you can wash your hands nicely and be ready to help me take the things out of it."
Bob started. "How soon 'll you come?"
"As soon as I finish my dinner."
"How good it is I brought the whole pie!" said Faith, as she poured the delayed coffee upon the cream and sugar. "And there's your shad, Endecott! unless you prefer to take that home, and we'll send something else.—Now you see what you picked up sticks for?"
"I see—" Mr. Linden said, looking at her. "And you see, Princess, what royalty is apt to meet if it will go wandering round the world."
"What?"
"Bob Tuck!—"
"Well—it's a good thing for Bob Tuck to meet with royalty,"—saidFaith, looking at the pie Mr. Linden was cutting.
"Princess," said Mr. Linden, "have you any 'Queen Anne' in your basket?"
Faith looked, her merry, puzzled, grave look of inquiry,—and then there was nothing for it but a ringing laugh again.
"I would rather have that at a venture, if I were the sick one," said Mr. Linden. "But the specific most prized by that class of the population who have 'fever nagur', is called in their vernacular 'Queen Anne'—anglice, quinine. Faith, you have no idea how those buttercups are beautified!"
"Flowers always are, that you handle," said Faith.
"You see how appropriate they are to my Sunbeam—for
'The buttercup catches the sun in his chalice'."
"What is a chalice?"
"A sort of cup—a church service cup, generally. Did you admire so much the head of clover I gave you once down at the shore?"
Faith gave him a curious glance of recollection; but though there was a half smile on her face too, she remained silent.
"Well, little bird?" he said smiling. "Of what is that look compounded?"
"Various things, I suppose. Let me have your cup, Endecott?"
"Do you know," he said, "that for a scholar, you are—remarkably—unready to answer questions?"
"I didn't know it."
"Are you not aware of any class of recollective remarks or inquiries which now and then break forth, and which you invariably smother with a thick blanket of silence?"
There was another quick glance and smile, and then Faith said as she handed him his cup,—
"What do you want to know, Endecott?"
"I want to know where there was ever just such another princess. And by the way, speaking of the shore—I have something that belongs to her."
"To me?"
"Oui, mademoiselle."
"May I know what?"
"You may, yet not just now. You may guess what it is."
But Faith gave up guessing in despair at one of Mr. Linden's puzzles.
The basket was repacked when the lunch was done; and they set out on their walk. The way, following Bob's direction, led along the bank under the trees, turning a little before the Mong was reached. The house was soon found; standing alone, in an enclosed garden ground where no spade had been struck that season; and at the end of a farm road that shewed no marks of travel.
Bob had not only swept the room, but his tidings had roused apparently his sister to prepare herself also; for Mintie met them as they came in. She was a handsome girl, with a feverish colour in her cheeks that made her appearance only more striking. There was pride and poverty here, clearly. Faith's simple words neither assumed the one nor attacked the other. The girl looked curiously at her and at the other visiter.
"Who be you?"
"We do not live in this neighbourhood," said Faith. "We came up toKildeer river to-day, and met your little brother down by the shore."
"What did he say to you?"
"He told us you were sick and in want of help."
Another look laid the girl's jealousy asleep. She told her story—her father had died six months ago; she and her mother and brother lived there alone. It was an "unlikely place to get to," and no neighbours very near. Her mother had been sick abed for a number of weeks; and she had had all to do, and now for a week past had been unable to do anything, go to Pettibaug or anywhere else, to get what they wanted. And so they "had got out of 'most everything." Dromy Tuck, Mr. Linden's scholar, lived at Farmer Davids' in the capacity of farm-boy; Mrs. Davids being a far-off connexion.
So much was all pride permitted to be told. Without much questioning, her visiters contrived to find out what they could do for her. Faith put the coffee-pot on the fire, declaring that it would do Mintie good like medicine; and served it to her when it was hot, with some bread and chicken, as if it had been indeed medicine and Faith a doctor. Then while Bob and she were dining, Faith went in to see the sick woman. She was much more communicative, and half avowed that she believed what she wanted now was "nourishing things"—"but with me lyin' here on my back," she said, "'taint so easy to find 'em." Faith gave her a cup of coffee too and some bread; she had hardly drunk any herself at lunch; and leaving her patient much inspirited, came back to Mr. Linden in the other room. Apparently his words and deeds had been acceptable too,—Bob's face was shining, not only with dinner but with the previous cold water applications which Mr. Linden had insisted on, and Mintie's mind was evidently at work upon various things. The basket was soon emptied of all but its dishes, and the prince and princess went on their way down the hill.
"Faith," said Mr. Linden, "shall we go and sit in the boat for half an hour, considering various things, and then have our wild flower hunt? Or would you prefer that first?"
"O no! I would rather have the half hour in the boat."
It was good time yet in the afternoon, and though the little boat now lay partly shadowed by the hill, it was none the worse resting place for that. Again Faith was seated there in all the style that shawls and cushions furnished, and just tired enough to feel luxurious in the soft atmosphere. Mr. Linden arranged and established her to his liking; then he took out of his pocket a letter.
It was one which had been opened and read; but as he unfolded it, there appeared another—unopened, unread; its dainty seal unbroken, and on the back in fair tracery, the words, "Miss Faith Derrick." As Faith read them and saw the hand, her eye glanced first up at Mr. Linden with its mute burden of surprise, and then the roses bloomed out over her cheeks and even threw their flush upon her brow. Her eye was cast down now and fixed on the unopened letter, with the softest fall of its eyelid.
"Shall I read you a part of mine first?"
"If you please. I wish you would."
"Only a little bit," he said smiling—thinking perhaps that she did not know to what she gave her assent so readily,—"you shall read the whole of it another time." The "little bit" began rather abruptly.
"'I have written to your darling, Endy—Not much, tell her; because what I have in my heart for her cannot be told. I know how precious any one must be whom you love so much. But make her love me a little before she reads my letter—and don't let her call me anything but Pet—and then I shall feel as if I had a sister already. And so I have, as you say. What a glad word!—I could cry again with the very writing of it.
'Endy—I did cry a little over your letter, but only for joy: if it had been for sorrow I should have cried long ago; for I knew well enough what was coming. Only I want more than ever to be at home,—and to see you, and to see Faith—don't let her think I am like you!
'My letter wouldn't hold much, as I told you. But I give you any number of (unspeakable!) messages for her, John Endy. I suppose you will take charge of them? I may feel sure they have all reached their destination?'"
Long before the reading was finished, Faith's head had sunk—almost to the cushions beside her. The reader's voice and intonation had given every word a sort of ring in her heart, though the tone was low. One hand came round her when she put her head down, taking possession of her hand which lay so still, with the unopened letter in its clasp. But now she was gently raised up.
"Precious child," Mr. Linden said, "what are you drooping your head for?"
"For the same reason she had, I suppose,—" said Faith half laughing, though witnesses of another kind were in her eyes.
"Who are you talking about?"
"Your sister."
"Why don't you begin to practise your lesson?"
Perhaps Faith thought that she was. She looked at nothing but her letter.
"Will you wait for your messages till we get home?—this place not being absolute seclusion."
"Shall I read this now?" said Faith rather hastily.
"I should think there would be no danger in that."
With somewhat unsteady fingers, that yet tried to be quiet, Faith broke the seal; and masking her glowing face with one hand, she bent over the letter to read it.
"My very dear, and most unknown, and most well-known little sister! I have had a picture sent me of you—as you appeared one night, when you sat for your portrait, hearing Portia; and with it a notice of several events which occurred just before that time. And both picture and events have gone down into my heart, and abide there. Endecott says you are a Sunbeam—and I feel as if a little of the light had come over the water to me,—ever since his letter came I have been in a state of absolute reflection!
"I thought my love would not be the first to 'find out the way'—even then when I wrote it! Faith—do you know that there is nobody in the world just like him? because if you do not—you will find it out!—I mean! like Endecott—not like Love. My dear, I beg pardon for my pronoun! But just how I have loved you all these months, for making him so happy, I cannot tell you.
"And I cannot write to-day—about anything,—my thoughts are in too uneven a flow to find their way to the end of my pen, and take all possible flights instead. Dear Faith, you must wait for a letter till the next steamer. And you cannot miss it—nor anything else, with Endecott there,—it seems to me that to be even in the same country with him is happiness.
"You must love me too, Faith, and not think me a stranger,—and let me be your (because I am Endy's)
"PET."
Faith took a great deal more time than was necessary for the reading of this letter. Very much indeed she would have liked to do as her correspondent confessed she had done, and cry—but there was no sign of such an inclination. She only sat perfectly moveless, bending over her letter. At last suddenly looked up and gave it to Mr. Linden.
"Well?" he said with a smile at her as he took it.
"You'll see—" she said, a little breathlessly. And still holding her hand fast, Mr. Linden read the letter, quicker than she had done, and without comment—unless when his look shewed that it touched him.
"You will love her, Faith!" he said as he folded the letter up again,—"in spite of all your inclinations to the contrary!"
"Do you think that is in the future tense? But I am afraid," addedFaith,—"she thinks too much of me now."
"She does not think as much of you as I do," Mr. Linden said, with a look and smile that covered all the ground of present or future fear. "And after all it is a danger which you will share with me. It is one of Pet's loveable feelings to think too much of some people whom she loves just enough."
Humility is not a fearful thing. Whatever had been in Faith's speech, her look, bright, wistful, and happy, had no fear, truly bumble though it was. "There is no danger of my loving this letter too much"—she said as she carefully restored it to its envelope; said with a secret utterance of great gratification.
The promised half hour was much more than up, and the broadening shadow on Kildeer river said that the time which could be given to wild flowers was fast running away. Perhaps, too, Mr. Linden thought Faith had mused and been excited enough, for he made a move. Everything in the boat was put up in close order, and then the two went ashore again, flower basket in hand.
The long shadows heightened the beauty of the woods now, falling soft and brown upon the yet browner carpet of dry leaves, and the young leaves and buds overhead shewed every tint, from yellow to green. Under the trees were various low shrubs in flower,—shad-blossom, with its fleecy stems, and azalia in rosy pink; and the real wild flowers—the dainty things as wild in growth as in name, were sprinkled everywhere. Wind flowers and columbine; orchis sweet as any hyacinth; tall Solomon's seal; spotless bloodroot; and violets—white, yellow, and purple. The dogwood stretched its white arms athwart hemlock and service; the creeping partridge berry carried its perfumed white stars over rocks and moss in the deep shade below. Yellow bellwort hung its fair flowers on every ridge; where the ground grew wet were dog's-tooth violet and chick wintergreen. There the red maples stood, with bunches of crimson keys,—at the edge of the higher ground their humbler growing sister the striped bark, waved her green tresses. There seemed to be no end to the flowers—nor to the variety—nor to the pleasure of picking.
"Faith—" said Mr. Linden.
Faith looked up from a bunch of Sanguinaria beside which she was crouching.
"I find so much Mignonette!—do you?"
Faith's eye flashed, and taking one of those little white stars she threw it towards Mr. Linden. It went in a graceful parabolic curve and fell harmlessly, like her courage, at his feet.
"What has become of the princess?"
"You ought rather to ask after the prince!" said Mr. Linden, picking up the Sanguinaria with great devotion. "Is this the Star of the Order of Merit?"
"I am not Queen Flora. I don't know."
"As what then was it bestowed?"
"It might be Mignonette's shield, which she used as a weapon because she hadn't any other! Endy, look at those green Maple flowers! You can reach them."
He gathered some of the hanging clusters, and then came and sat down where she was at work and began to put them into her basket, arranging and dressing the other flowers the while dextrously.
"Do you know, my little Sunbeam," he said, "that your namesakes are retreating?"
"I know it, Endy," she said hastening her last gatherings—"and I am ready."
They began their homeward way to the boat, wandering a little still, for flowers, and stopping to pick them, so that the sun was quite low before Kildeer river was reached. There Mr. Linden stood a moment looking about.
"Do you see the place where we sat, Faith?" he said,—"over on the other bank?"
She looked, and looked at him and smiled—very different from her look then! A glance comprehensive and satisfactory enough without words, so without any more words they went on their way along the shore of the river. As they neared their boat, the rays of the setting sun were darted into Kildeer river and gilded the embayed little vessel and all the surrounding shores. Rocks and trees and bits of land glowed or glistened in splendour wherever a point or a spray could catch the sun; the water in both rivers shone with a long strip of gold. They had had nothing so brilliant all day.
In the full glow and brightness Faith sat down in the boat with her flowers near her, and Mr. Linden loosened the sail. How pretty the bank looked as they were leaving it! the ashes of their fire on the rock, and the places where they had sat or wandered, and talked—such happy words!
"I shall always love Kildeer river," said Faith with little long breath, "because I read my letter here."
"And so shall I," said Mr. Linden,—"but my love for it dates back to the first piece of reading I ever did in its company." He looked back for a minute or two—at the one shore and the other—the sunlight, the trees, the flowery hillside, and it was well then that his face was not seen by Faith—there fell on it such a shadow of pain. But he presently turned to her again with just the former look.
"Now," he said, "do you think you can steer home in the twilight?"
"I don't know. Can I? I can follow directions."
"And I can give them."
And with that arrangement they ran out from the clean woody shores of Kildeer river, and set their sail for Pattaquasset. How fair, at that point of weather and day! a little quieter than the morning spring-tide of everything, but what was less gay was more peaceful; and against a soft south wind the little boat began to beat her way down, favoured however by the tide. These tacks made Mr. Linden's counsels more especially needed, but the short swift runs back and forth across the river were even more inspiriting than a steady run before the wind, and the constant attention which helm and sail required made talk and action lively enough.
"This is good, Endecott!" said Faith as the little boat came about for the fifth or sixth time.
"Faith," he said, smiling at her, "you look just as fresh as a rose!—the day does not seem to have tired you one bit."
"Tired!" she said,—"yes, I am a little bit tired—or hungry—but was there ever such a day as we have had?—since the first of January!"
"My dear little Mignonette!" Mr. Linden said—but if it was a "message" Faith had then, it came from somewhere nearer than across the water. "If you are tired, dear child, give up the rudder to me, and lay down your head and rest. Do you see after what a sleep-inviting fashion the lights are twinkling all down the shore?"
"I'm not sleepy a bit;" said Faith,—"nor tired, except just enough; and I like this small portion of power you have put in my hands. How beautiful those lights look!—and the lights overhead, Endy. How beautiful every thing is!"—
"Yes," said Mr. Linden, "when there is light within.—
'He that hath light within his own clear breast,
May sit i' the centre and enjoy bright day.'"
"That's beautiful!" said Faith after a pause.
And now the brush and stir of "coming about" again claimed their attention, and in a minute more they were stretching away on a new tack, with another set of constellations opposite to them in the sky. The breeze was fresh, though as mild as May; the boat made good speed; and in spite of beating down the river the mouth of the Mong was neared fast. Pattaquasset lights, a little cluster of them, appeared unmistakably; for down by the point there was a little knot of houses, variously concerned in trade or fisheries. Mr. Linden had to put his hand upon the tiller sometimes then, till they got in. Mr. Skip and Jerry were in waiting; had been, "a sight o' half hours," the former stated. Baskets and shad and passengers were transferred to the wagon, and within a moderate time thereafter welcomed (the latter) by Mrs. Derrick and supper—wherein, after a little delay therefor, the shad played a conspicuous and most satisfactory part.
Now there are no shad like the shad that come out of the Mong.