CHAPTER XXII

"The Little White Wild Rose"

Across the threshold led, And every tear kissed off as soon as shed, His house she enters, there to be a light; Shining within when all without is night, A guardian-angel o'er his life presiding, Doubling his pleasure, and his cares dividing! ROGERS.

IT was five o'clock in the afternoon. Sycamore Farm lay bathed in golden sunshine, save where the old trees from which it got its name cast soft shadows across the green lawn. The front of the house preserved that peculiar stillness that was always its characteristic on summer afternoons. The very bees seemed sleeping in their hives; a few butterflies drowsily flitted to and fro. The old-fashioned roses filled the air with their fragrance, and the house itself, covered with its wealth of creepers, seemed to be in an attitude of quiet waiting.

Inside, the atmosphere was one of expectancy. Mrs. Winstone, in her Sunday best, was wandering from room to room. A bright rosy-faced maid, in black dress and white cap and apron, was following in her steps, duster in hand, giving a touch here, and a rub there, to articles of furniture that were already shining from the care and attention that had been bestowed upon them. Every few minutes Mrs. Winstone would glance out of the windows anxiously; and at last the sound of wheels, for which she had been waiting, sent her flying to the door, her face wreathed in smiles; and the little maid followed behind, in a fluttering state of curiosity and awe.

The bridegroom was bringing home his bride. As Betty stepped in, she held out both hands to Mrs. Winstone, and greeted her with pretty frankness.

"We are home, Mrs. Winstone, and it looks as I have always pictured it in my dreams."

Then Gerald put her arm in his, and led her from room to room. The hall, with its old hearth and staircase, was much as she remembered it, but the dining-room had been enlarged and a study had been built out. In the dining-room tea was spread on a snowy cloth, and a bowl of pink roses and jessamine reposed on the centre of the table. The study led out of the dining-room, and Betty exclaimed, as she gazed at the well-filled bookshelves,—

"Why, Gerald, it looks just like the Red Manor library? Oh, how comfortable you will be here!"

"Our dear old friend's thought again," said Gerald. "He bought all these at the sale, and left them to me in his will. He seemed determined that I should suffer as little as possible from the loss of what I valued most."

"And this is where I shall spend most of my time," said Betty, looking up into his face archly. "You must not monopolise this room entirely. I love books as well as you. I have a Chaucer of yours that I almost know by heart; I have read every page of it, and some of them two or three times over."

He smiled.

"But my little wife has a room of her own; a room that I shall come to when I want to be comforted and rested. Shall we come back to it?"

He led her into the hall again, and opened the door that Molly had once described to her as the one that was kept locked, and was that of the best parlour.

Now, as he opened it, Betty caught her breath and gave an exclamation of delight. It was a room which had been enlarged, and contained, in one deep recess, the beautiful little organ that Betty had seen in the music-room at the Red Manor. A deep bay window looked out on a green lawn with old-fashioned flower beds bordering a winding path, and in the window recess, at one corner was a Chippendale writing-cabinet, and in the other, an old-fashioned inlaid work-table. The room was papered with a soft dull green, bordered by a dado of white roses on a green background; the carpet was a green of a darker tone, with a border of white roses, and the chintzes, again, were white rosebuds on a soft green ground. China bowls and vases of white roses were in every direction, and on one side of the room hung, in its gold frame, Mr. Russell's last picture. The sun was just touching it as Betty looked, and it seemed to throw out the wistful longing in the young girl's face. She looked round the room again, but her gaze came back to the picture.

"Why did he paint it?" she whispered. "How did he think it would bring us together?"

Gerald gazed at it with a smile.

"He wanted me to hasten matters. He used to tell me I was too diffident and cautious; and then he set to work and painted this as typical of our two lives. He called me in to see it, and asked me if I liked his name for it."

"What was it?" asked Betty. "I remember so well when he took us in and showed it to us; I thought he wanted us to choose the name."

"He had written under it, 'Divided by Diffidence,' but I made him paint it out the morning before you came over. He said he would not do it, unless I promised him to speak to you that day. And you know how I tried, and how you snubbed me."

"I was so frightened," said Betty, pressing closer against the strong arm that was round her. "I hated your name for it—'Love and Duty.' I hated Tennyson for writing it, I remember, and I think I almost hated you for disagreeing with the only lines that would have brought me comfort. I found the book open, when I came over here that day, and I almost rubbed your 'No' out on the margin of it, and wrote 'Yes.' What would you have thought of me if I had done so? But when you spoke to me in the garden, I tried to encourage you. You can't say I didn't!"

"Yes, you did in one breath, but you brought despair into my heart in the next."

"I knew I had, by the look in your face, and I was so miserable. Gerald, tell me, why did you wait so long?"

Gerald did not answer at first. He looked round the room, and then he stooped down and drew his wife closer to him, and kissed her tenderly.

"My little white rose," he said. "You 'hung too high for me.' I did not wish to soil your petals or bend your head by bringing you into my humble life."

Betty looked up at him wonderingly, then she smiled.

"Oh, Gerald, Gerald, do you think your love would not reach far enough? Why did you place me on such a pedestal? If I was like a little wild rose at all, I was in the ditch below your feet, waiting for you to pick me up. I understand this room. You are full of romance and poetry; and you have carried it into your furnishing. It is too beautiful for me, but I just love it."

Laughter and tears were struggling for predominance in her voice.

"Mrs. St. Clair helped me with it. I told her what I wanted."

"And your mother's organ," said Betty, looking towards it reverently. "Shall I ever dare to touch it?"

"I brought it into this house with thoughts of you. And if you had never come to me, no other hand should ever have touched it. I have wandered into this room before it was properly furnished, when the organ was the only thing in it, and I have tried to imagine myself coming in here, tired and weary, and listening to you playing. I want you to play on it to-night."

"I will," said Betty softly. "I shall love to."

They went back to the dining-room then, and Betty poured out tea with a pretty importance. Afterwards, they went over the upper part of the house, and then inspected the farmyard and outside premises. It was getting dusk when they came back to Betty's drawing-room, and they stood together at the open window looking out into the still, silent garden. A sweet smell of newly cut hay, and the scent of mignonette under the window, made Betty open her lips and draw in a long breath. Then Gerald spoke.

"Betty darling, I want to know when you first saw me. You said you would tell me. I think the time has come for you to do it."

Betty was silent for a minute, then she said very quietly,—

"I saw you, Gerald, lying face downwards in a field, and when you looked up trouble seemed to be breaking your heart. I went home; but your face haunted me and—I can tell you now—I prayed that night, and every night after, that God Himself would comfort you."

Gerald was profoundly touched.

"I have a dim remembrance of shaking off somebody's touch and dashing away, for I was beside myself with grief. I had heard that afternoon from my lawyer of my uncle's existence and intention, and it seemed more than I could bear. Was it really you who touched me? How little I thought you would be the comfort that God would send me! Life seemed so hopelessly dark to me then."

"But you did not succumb," said Betty. "That was what made me wonder at you so. You were so bright and brave when I met you; so full of thought about others. Do you remember giving me a verse for Mat? And asking me to visit your almshouses? Oh, Gerald, I knew then what Christianity was worth, when it could hold you up, and make you face the world so brightly at such a time as that which followed!"

"Yes," assented her husband. "It needs God's own presence and grip through the deep waters. Then we have the promise, 'they shall not overflow thee.'"

"I remember," said Betty musingly, "how I used to long for tribulation as a little child. I used to fancy that it was a sign that we were being made fit for heaven. I suppose I was right, but when it comes to us in older life it seems so mysterious and inexplicable. Yet if I have learnt any lesson in the past two years which have brought me the greatest sorrow and the greatest joy in my life, it is, that we can have joy and peace outside our circumstances.

"And, Gerald, I was looking through the last chapters of St. John the other day—the chapters that Christ speaks to His disciples when their hearts must have been heavy with doubt and dread, and I was astonished to see how often He mentioned 'joy' to them. Don't you think that Mr. Russell was right when he said to me that 'joy' was an important Christian virtue, for it recommended our religion to the world at large?"

"'And your joy no man taketh from you!'"

Betty's expressive little face looked radiant.

"It is true," she said, with a little nod; "for I have learned to find it so."

A few minutes later she was seated at the organ, and her husband, leaning back in an easy-chair, listened with a rested soul.

"'What are these which are arrayed in white robes, and whence come they? These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.'"

Again and again the sweet notes sounded out—

"'They came out of great tribulation.'"

The triumphant strain at the close sent a little thrill through the hearts of singer and listener. They seemed to be brought into close touch with the one who had left them; and as the last notes died away silence fell in the room.

Then, very softly, again Betty laid her hands on the keys, and her voice vibrated with happy assurance as she sang—

"'The King of love my Shepherd is, Whose goodness faileth never; I nothing lack if I am His, And He is mine, for ever.

"'Where streams of living water flow My ransomed soul He leadeth, And where the verdant pastures grow, With food celestial feedeth.

"'Perverse and foolish oft I strayed, But yet in love He sought me, And on His shoulder gently laid, And home, rejoicing, brought me.

"'In death's dark vale I fear no ill, With Thee, dear Lord, beside me; Thy rod and staff my comfort still, Thy cross before to guide me.

"'And so through all the length of days Thy goodness faileth never; Good Shepherd, may I sing Thy praise Within Thy house for ever!'"

FINIS.

——————————————————————————————— Printed by Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury.