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A Face Illumined, a novel by Edward Payson Roe |
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Chapter 26. Sunday Table-Talk |
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_ Chapter XXVI. Sunday Table-talk To the relief of all save Mrs. Mayhew, Sibley dined with a couple of young, fast men, who enforced their invitation by the irresistible attraction of a bottle of wine. "There is too much starch and dignity at that table to suit me, any way," he remarked. "There are those two model saints, who led our devotions last Sunday evening, flirting with ponderous gravity with that deep little school-ma'am, who has turned both their heads, but can't make up her mind which of them to capture, both being such marvellously good game for one of her class. Cute Yankee as she believes herself to be, she's a fool to think that either of them is more than playing with her. By Jupiter! but it would be sport to cut 'em both out; and I could do it if I were up here a week. Those who know the world know that such women cipher out these matters in the spirit of New England thrift, and you have only to mislead them with sufficient plausible data to capture them body and soul." And Sibley complacently sipped his wine as if he had stated all there was to be said on the subject. Few men prided themselves more on a profound knowledge of the world than he. Ida's despondency while at dinner was so great she could not throw it off. Listlessly and wearily she barely tasted of the different courses as they were passed to her. She consciously made only one effort, and that was to appear utterly indifferent to Van Berg; and both circumstances and his contemptuous neglect made but little feigning necessary. The evening before had associated her so inseparably in his mind with Sibley, that he was beginning to regard her with aversion. "Trivial natures are disturbed by trivial causes," he thought; "and she looks as if the world had turned black because Sibley has been lured from her side for an hour by a bottle of wine. He'll revive her again before supper." "How wintry that old gentleman looks who is just entering!" Stanton remarked. "It makes one shiver to think of becoming as frosty and white as he." "Oh, don't speak of being old!" cried Mrs. Mayhew. "Remember there are some at the table who are in greater danger of that final misfortune than you young people." "Do you dread being old, Miss Burton?" Van Berg asked. "No; but I do the process of growing old." "For once we think alike, Miss Burton," said Ida abruptly. "To think of plodding on through indefinite dreary years toward the miserable conclusion of old age! and yet it is said nothing is so sweet as life." "Really, Cousin, your advance down the ages reminds one more of a quickstep than of 'plodding,'" remarked Stanton. "The step matters little," she retorted, "as long as you feel as if you were going to your own funeral. I agree with Miss Burton, that growing old is worse than being old, thought Heaven knows that both are bad enough." "I'm not sure that Heaven would agree with either of us," said Miss Burton, gently. "I fear the sermon did not do you much good, Coz," said Stanton, maliciously. "No; it did not. It did me harm, if such a thing were possible," was the reckless reply. "Human nature is generally regarded as capable of improvement," remarked Stanton, sententiously. "I was not speaking of human nature generally," said Ida; "I was thinking of myself." "As usual, my charming Cousin." She flushed resentfully, but did not reply. "And I feel that Miss Mayhew has done herself injustice in her thought," said Miss Burton, with a sympathetic glance at Ida. "And how is it with you, Mr. Van Berg? Do you dread growing old?" "I fear my opinion will remind you of Jack Bunsby," replied the artist. "Growing old is like a prospective journey. So much depends upon the country through which you travel and your company. My father and mother are taking a summer excursion through Norway and Sweden, and I know they are enjoying themselves abundantly. They have had a good time growing old. Why should not others?" Ida appeared to resent his words bitterly; and with a tone and manner that surprised every one she said: "Mr. Van Berg, I could not have believed that you were capable of making so superficial a reply. Why not say, if the poor were rich, if the ugly were beautiful, if the sick were well, if the bad were good, and we all had our heart's desires, we could journey on complacently and prosperously?" The artist flushed deeply under this address, coming from such an unexpected quarter; but he replied quietly: "That allusion with which I prefaced my remark, Miss Mayhew, proved that I regard my opinion as of little value; and yet I have no better one to offer. Nothing is more trite than the comparison of life to a journey or a pilgrimage. If one were compelled to travel with very disagreeable people, in fifth-rate conveyances, and through regions uninteresting or repulsive, the journey, or to abandon the figure, growing old, might well be dreaded. From my soul I would pity one condemned to such a fate. It would, indeed, be 'dreary plodding' where one's best hope would be that he might stumble upon his grave as soon as possible. But I do not believe in any such dreary fatalism. We are endowed with intelligence to choose carefully our paths and companions; and I cannot help thinking that the majority might choose wisely enough to make life an agreeable journey in the main." "Look here, Van; I'm no casuist," said Stanton with a shrug; "but I can detect a flaw in your philosophy at once. Suppose one wanted good company and could not get it." "He had better jog on alone, in that case, than take bad company." "And heavy jogging it might be too," muttered Stanton, with a frown. Ida's head dropped low and her face became very pale. Her impulsive cousin in expressing his own tormenting fear, had unconsciously defined what promised to be her wretched experience. She felt that the artist's eyes were upon her; and in the blind impulse to shield her secret, which then was so vividly plain to her consciousness, she raised her head suddenly, and with a reckless laugh remarked: "For a wonder I also can half agree with Mr. Van Berg--congenial society for me or none at all." A second later she could have bitten her tongue out before uttering words virtually claimed Sibley as her most congenial companion. "Miss Mayhew is better than most of us in that she lives up to her theories," Van Berg remarked, coldly. Her eyes shot at him a sudden flash of impotent protest and resentment, and then she lowered her head with a flush of the deepest shame. At that moment a loud discordant laugh from Sibley caused many to look around toward him, and not a few shook their heads and exchanged significant glances, intimating that they thought the young man was in a "bad way." "Your philosophy, Mr. Van Berg," said Miss Burton, "may answer very well for the wise and fortunate, for those whose lives are as yet unspoiled and unblighted by themselves or others. But even an artist, who by his vocation gives his attention to the beautiful, must nevertheless see that there are many in the world who are neither wise nor fortunate--who seem predestined by their circumstances, folly, and defective natures to blunder and sin till they reach a point where reason and intelligence can do little more for them than reveal how foolish and wrong they have been, or how great a good they have missed and lost irrevocably. The past, with its opportunities, has gone, and the remnant of earthly life offers such a dismal prospect, and they find themselves so shut up to a certain lot, so shackled by the very conditions in which they exist, that they are disheartened. It is hard for many of us not to feel that we have been utterly defeated and so sink into fatal apathy." Mr. Mayhew, who had been coldly impassive and resolutely taciturn thus far, now leaned back in his chair, and his eyes glowed like two lamps from beneath the eaves of his shaggy brows. A young and lovely woman was giving voice to his own crushed and ill-starred nature; and strange to say, she identified herself with the class for which she spoke. in the depths of his heart he bowed down, reverenced, and thanked her for claiming this kinship to himself, even thought he knew it must be misfortune and not wrong that had marred her life. If Van Berg had not been so preoccupied with the speaker, he would have seen that the daughter also was hanging on the lips that were expressing simply and eloquently the thoughts with which her own heavy heart was burdened. But when the artist began to speak, Ida's face grew paler than ever as she saw the glow of admiration and sympathy that lighted up his features. Compliments she had received in endless variety all her life, but never had she seen a man look at her with that expression. "Pardon me, Miss Burton," he said, "if I protest against your using the pronoun you did. No one will ever be able to associate the word 'defeat' with you. I do not understand your philosophy; but I know it is far better than mine. While I admit the truth of your words that I do professionally shut my eyes as far as possible to all the ugly facts of life, still I have been compelled to note that the world is full of evils for which I can see no remedy, and as a matter of common experience they apparently never are remedied. Good steering and careful seamanship are immensely important; but of what use are they if one is caught in a tornado or maelstrom, or wedged in among rocks, so that going to pieces is only a question of time? Good seamanship ought to keep one from such a fate, it may be said. So it does in the majority of instances; but often the wisest are caught. If you will realize it, Miss Burton, all in this house, men, women, and children, are about as able to take a ship across the Atlantic, as to make the life voyage wisely and safely. As a rule we only sail and sail. Where we are going, and what we shall meet, the Lord only knows--we don't. I have travelled abroad at times, and have seen a little of society at home, and if growing selfish, mean, and vicious, is going to the bad, than it would seem that more find the bottom than any port." "Oh, hush, Mr. Van Berg," cried Miss Burton. "You will fill the world with a blind, stupid fate and the best one can hope for is the rare good luck or the skilful dodging which enables one to escape the random blows and storms. I believe in God and law, although I confess I can understand neither. As the good Mussulman looks towards Mecca, so I look toward them and pray and hope on. This snarl of life will yet be untangled." "I assure you that I try to do the same, but not with your success, I fear. Your illustration strikes me as unfortunate. The Moslem looks toward Mecca; but what is there in Mecca worth looking toward? If he only thought so, might he not as well look in any other direction?" "Please don't talk so, Mr. Van Berg. Don't you see that he can't look in any other direction? He has been taught to look thither till it is part of his nature to do so. In destroying his faith you may destroy him. Pardon me, if I ask you to please remember that faith in God and a future life is more vitally important to some of us than our daily bread. We may not be able to explain it, but we must hope and trust or perish. To go back to your nautical illustration, suppose some who had been wrecked were clinging to a rocky shore, and trying to clamber up out of the cold spray and surf to warmth and safety; would it not be a cruel thing to go along the shore and unloosen the poor numb hands however gently and scientifically it might be done? Loosing that hold means sinking to unknown depths. With complacent self-approval and with learned Athenian airs, many of the savans of the day are virtually guilty of this horrible cruelty." "I do not take sides with the Athenians who called St. Paul a babbler," said Van Berg, flushing; "yet truth compels me to admit that I could worship more sincerely at the 'Alter of the unknown God,' than before any conception of Deity that modern Theology has presented to my mind. That does not prove much, I am bound to say, for I have never given these subjects sufficient attention to be entitled to have opinions. Still, I like fair play, whatever be the consequences. Your arraignment of talking skeptics is a severe one and strikes me in a new light. Might they not urge, in self-defence, that there was a deeper and darker abyss on the farther side of the rock to which the wrecked were clinging? May they not argue that the grasp of faith may lead to a deeper and more bitter disappointment?" "How can they know that? How can they know what shall be in the ages to come?" replied Miss Burton, speaking rapidly. "This is the situation:--I am clinging to some hope, something that I believe will be truth which sustains me, and the only force of the skeptic's words is to loosen my grasp. No better support is given, no new hope inspired. Believe me," she concluded passionately, "I would rather die a thousand deaths by torture than lose my faith that there is a God who will bring order out of this chaos of broken, thwarted lives, of which the world is full, and that those who seek a 'happier shore' will eventually find it." "You will find it," said Van Berg, in low emphatic tones; and then he added with a shrug, as he rose from the table, "I wish my chances were as good." Ida, who a few weeks before would have heard this conversation with unqualified disgust, had listened with eager eyes and parted lips, and she now said coldly, but with a deep sigh: "Your God and happy shore, Miss Burton, are too vague and far away. Troubles and temptations are in our very hearts." Van Berg looked hastily toward her, but she rose and turned her face from him. Mr. Mayhew shook his head despondently, as if his daughter's words found a deep, sad echo in his own nature. "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter; said the wise man of old, 'all is vanity and vexation of spirit,'" cried Stanton, with the air of one who was trying to escape from a nightmare. Miss Burton at once became her old, smiling self. "You do not quote 'the wise man' correctly," she said; "but you remind me that he did say 'a merry heart doeth good like a medicine.' It is like mercy 'twice blessed.' This much, at least, I know is true; and Mr. Van Berg's words have put us all at sea to such an extant that it is well to find one wee solid point to stand on." As the artist passed out he found opportunity to whisper in her ear: "I cannot tell you how much I honor the woman who with her SAD heart makes others 'merry.'" She blushed and smiled, but only said: "How blind you are, Mr. Van Berg! Can't you perceive that nothing else does me so much good? Now you see how selfish I am." Ida saw him whisper, and noted the answering smile and blush. Was it strange that so slight a thing should depress her more than all the evils of the present world and the world to come? Surely, since human hearts are what they are, a far-away God would be like the sun of the tropics to the ice-bound at the poles. _ |
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