CHAPTER XIII.

DRIFT-WOOD.

Farewells are spoken--trunks are strapped--Roland's carpet-bag is well packed, filled by good Mrs. Jennings, for she has discovered that he returns on foot.

Sleeping in barns, occasionally at farm-houses, at last he finds himself in sight of Woodcliff; he passes Maple Lane school on his way, and remembers the bright young face that used to smile upon him so kindly, and the reverent folding of her little hands, as Maddy listened to the teaching of her young mentor, so meek under his reproofs, so fiery and impetuous with all others. He wondered how it was now. On, on, past the cottage home, past the cemetery, he finds himself at the gate of Woodcliff.

Walking up the familiar avenue, old Hector bounds to meet him, for he was a staunch friend of Roland Bruce. Effie hears the noise, and runs out to see what is the matter.

A glance at the tall young man is sufficient. It is her own dear, dear brother! and in another minute, Effie is pressed to the warm heart of her only relative. Roland holds her off, and looks anxiously at his dear sister. Is she really paler, thinner; or is it the mourning-dress that makes her look so pallid?

"Are you well, Effie?" asks the anxious brother.

"Oh, yes, Roland, and so happy; they are all so good to me here. Miss Matilda will not let me overwork myself, and Mr. Hamilton is so kind."

"Do you ever hear of Madeline, Effie?"

"Oh, yes, frequently; and she always asks about you, Roland; she is just as glad as I am when you are successful at college."

"Has she been at home lately?"

"She was here at vacation; but it does not take place at the same time with yours."

"Has she grown much, Effie?"

"Very much; she is growing tall, and so beautiful. You know, brother, that I always thought that there was nobody so pretty as Madeline."

"Is she like she used to be, Effie?"

"Not so wild, brother; but just as sweet and affectionate. She used to go every day to see the rose-bush that you planted together, and she was always singing the Scotch songs that you taught her. Where will you stay, brother?"

"At old Peter's; that will do very well for me, Effie. Before I return to college, I am going to the White Mountains; I want to see them so much, and the journey on foot will do me good."

"How about your clothes, brother?"

"Oh, yes, you little rogue, you thought that I could not guess your secret. Why, who else would send me the new shirts and handkerchiefs but Madeline? You had no money, Effie, and she is the only one that cares for me."

Effie smiled. "You've guessed right, brother. When she was at home she gave me the money, and I made them all. What a happy little thing she was when they were done! She skipped about, and danced like a merry little kitten. 'Roland shall look like a gentleman at college,' she said; 'and I know there's not one ahead of him there.'"

"Effie, do you remember our dear mother's last message? Oh, what a comfort it has been to me! 'Looking aloft!' whenever I have felt as if my heart would sink, I have remembered those sweet words, Effie, and they have made me so strong."

"So have I, Roland. I am often very lonely, brother, and sometimes very weak. Sometimes I feel as if my life will be a short time; then the dear words come, 'Looking aloft!' and I think of all that they mean, and they make me happy."

"Shall we go into the conservatory, Effie?" asked her brother.

"Oh, yes; I have taken good care of her flowers, Roland; and that Scotch heather is always so pretty!"

Effie led her brother to the old spot. The flowers were in full bloom. Roland plucked a branch from Madeline's own rose-bush, and another from the heather, and turned away. Next, he entered the library, and on opening one of the book-cases, there lay a glove of his little friend; and in one of the books, a pressed branch of sea-weed.

"I may have these, Effie?"

"Oh, yes; they are of no use to Madeline."

Roland laid them carefully away, and then turned to seek old Peter.

"I shall see you soon again, Effie. Good-bye, now."

"Good-bye, dear brother. I am so glad that you have come."

"Is that you, my lad?" said old Peter. "I'm right glad to see your young face once more."

"Can you let me stay a few days with you, uncle Peter?"

"Why, yes, boy; but ours is a poor place; we can't do much for you."

"It will be well enough. I shall only be here for a few days."

Roland rambled around among the old familiar scenes, and towards evening, returned to the sea-shore. Seating himself upon the rock where he had passed so many happy days, he gazed out upon the wide ocean. The music of its waves was sad, depressing. It spoke of the past; for the future it had no voice. As he mused, a log of drift-wood floated by. How solitary it seemed! All alone! floating on the wide ocean, drifting whither the tide would wash it up at last.

"Is that like me?" thought Roland. "Am I so lonely in this wide world? Am I such a creature of chance?" No human voice was near to answer the question of his soul. The night birds sang their melancholy song around him, and it was an hour of deep sadness.

"Why should I indulge in such a train of thought?" inquired Roland of his heart. "This is the language of despondency, almost of despair. Am I indeed nothing but driftwood?--so useless, so solitary!" Looking upward, the bright fair moon was sailing overhead so serene! so pure! so silent! With her voiceless majesty she answered, and the mother's dying whispers came like sweet music to banish the language of despair:

"'Looking aloft, Roland!' 'Looking aloft!' I will not be the drift-wood of human life. I will seek to fit myself for my place on this great globe, and, obedient to my Maker's laws as is that placid moon, I shall with his blessing move on as surely to my destiny; happy to serve my God here, and enjoy the fulness of His presence hereafter. Float on, thou worthless log! thou shalt not symbolize my fate! Sail on, thou placid moon! Let my course in life be steady, calm, obedient, as thine."

The voice within quickened his pace as he walked up and down the beach, repeating the Psalm of Life:

"Tell me not in mournful numbers, Life is but an empty dream! For the soul is dead that slumbers, And things are not what they seem. Life is real! Life is earnest! And the grave is not its goal; 'Dust thou art, to dust returnest,' Was not spoken of the soul," &c. &c.

Turning his steps towards Uncle Peter's cabin, he slept the quiet sleep of recovered trust and confidence in God.

Next evening he sought his mother's grave. How soothing were the words upon that marble head-stone! "She sleeps in Jesus." And how sweetly did they speak of the dear little friend that placed them there! He had not been seated long before Elsie Gibson made her appearance. She seemed delighted to meet Roland again.

"Weel, Roland, the days o' youth are passing away, a'maist a mon. Ye're the vera image o' ane I luve weel; may ye be a happier mon than he."

"Whom do you mean, Elsie?"

"It matters na, my bairn; I'm glad to hear sic a good account o' ye, Roland, at the college; there's a great wark before ye, my son, may ye live to do it weel."

"Elsie," said Roland, "do you know anything about my father?"

"I used to ken a' aboot him, Roland, in days lang syne, when we were baith young."

"Do you know where he is now, Elsie?"

"Why should ye ask sic a question, Roland? do ye na ken that the vessel in which he sailed was lost?"

"I have heard so, Elsie; but strange thoughts have crossed my mind lately."

"They are silly thoughts, Roland; ye maun think o' yer father as dead. Good-bye, Roland, I maun be awa'."

Roland turned his steps again towards Woodcliff. This time he asked Effie to let him sit alone in the library for a few minutes. He turned over many volumes, which he knew Madeline was in the habit of reading, and in many a page he found her mark. Taking up a small portfolio which contained many scraps of paper, listlessly he sketched the sweet face as he first saw Madeline on the sea-shore with Harry, Charles, and the other children. Roland had cultivated his taste for drawing, and had made a striking pencil-sketch of the scene. Placing it almost unconsciously back in the portfolio, he left the room, and, crossing the hall, met Mr. Hamilton.

"Why, Roland, I am rejoiced to see you. How greatly you have grown,--almost a man!"

"Yes, sir; time makes changes."

"How are you progressing at college, Roland?"

"Very well, sir; there is one of our catalogues," handing one to Mr. Hamilton.

"This is good news, Roland. I hope, my boy, that you will continue to reap such high honors. Stay, and dine with us, Roland."

It was the first time that he had ever been invited to Woodcliff as a table-guest, and with a modest blush, he accepted the courtesy. It pleased him to find that Effie's place was also at the family table, and with the well-bred ease of a native gentleman, he took Mr. Hamilton quite by surprise.

"Madeline would like to see you, Roland; she was at home last vacation, and has greatly improved; you would scarcely recognize little Mad-cap; she is so much more sober."

"Does she sing as much as ever?" asked Roland.

"Yes, her voice is splendid; she shall have the best masters that I can find, Roland. But do you know, boy, that I like the old ballads she used to sing, more than the opera-style, which is now so fashionable?"

Before Roland took his leave, Mr. Hamilton sought a private opportunity to speak to him.

"Is there anything that I can do for you, Roland?"

He grasped Mr. Hamilton's hand warmly, as he answered, "I am already your debtor, sir; and found your gift of inestimable value."

"You were kind to my little daughter, Roland; and I am always at your service."

Roland bowed, and took his departure.

"That is a remarkable youth, Matilda," said Mr. Hamilton, as he closed the door. "I don't know what to make of him; brought up wholly in a cottage, without the advantages of refined society, he has more of the manners of a gentleman than either Harry Castleton or Charles Davenport. He must have had a remarkable mother, and the soul within must be of the noblest mould."

"But really, brother, I don't think it well to encourage the intimacy between this youth and our Madeline. He is growing to be a man, and an attractive one to such a romantic child as yours. You really talked of her to-day to Roland as if he were her equal."

"Really, Matilda, you are simply ridiculous; he is actually a plebeian, and Madeline patronizes him; it has rather amused me to see her independence."

"I don't approve of the levelling system, Lewis Hamilton. Let each one keep his place in society; no good comes of these intimacies."

"I am not afraid, Matilda. I think our Maddy has a good share of pride--enough to keep her from low associates."

"I tell you, Lewis, that Roland Bruce has more influence over that proud and wayward child than any other living person,--a word from him, a look of reproof, I am told, had more power to check her impetuous nature, than all the teachers of Maple Lane school."

"Well, Matilda, he has never taught her anything wrong; she is greatly improved since she knew the Bruce family."

"You are certainly possessed, brother, with a spirit of contradiction; but I have borne my testimony,--you must have your own way. I have said all that I mean to."

Roland's was rather a sad walk back to old Peter's cabin. He felt that he was rapidly approaching the years of manhood, and that Madeline would soon step over the sweet days of childhood, and enter the enchanted ground of young maidenhood. Then, the difference in their social position would raise the barrier over which he dare not step; and Madeline Hamilton and Roland Bruce would henceforth belong to different worlds.

It was a hard thought; but Roland had seen enough, and known enough of worldly pride, to feel that this was so. Not with Madeline herself, for she was too much a child of nature for that; but he must not allow her to incur the displeasure of her father, but especially her aunt, by forgetting the broad gulf between them.

On his next visit to Woodcliff, he was struck with something peculiar in the look of Effie's eyes.

"Your eyes look weak, Effie. I fear that you sew too closely; is it not so?"

"They do annoy me sometimes, Roland; they get so dim that I can hardly use them."

"Do take care of them, sister; any disease of the eye is such a great calamity."

"It would be a sore affliction to lose my sight, Roland; then indeed I should find it difficult to look upward."

"Don't let us forget, Effie, that whatever befalls us, comes from our Father's hand, and must be a part of the training by which He means to fit us for the better world."

"It is a comfort, dear Roland, to feel that God cannot do wrong--if we could only trust him always."

At that moment, Nanny called Effie.

"Here is a letter from Miss Madeline."

"I am so glad that it came while you were with us, Roland," said Effie, as she broke the seal.

She read it hurriedly, and said--

"Here is something about you, Roland;" and she read the quotation.

"I suppose that you hear often from Roland; I should like to know what he is doing--tell him that little Maddy is growing to be quite a studious, serious girl. My chief companion here is Lucy Edmonds; she is a dear, sweet friend; I wish that I were like her. I am learning a great deal of new music, but I have not forgotten any of my old Scotch songs. Take care of my rose-bush, Effie: I mean the one that Roland planted; I hope that it will not die. Be kind to old Hector for my sake, dear old fellow! Now that I am away, I think more of Roland's good lessons than I did when at home; I am sure that I shall never forget them."

Effie handed the letter to Roland, which he read quite through.

"She will be surrounded by snares, Effie, when her education is finished; with all her wealth and beauty, I tremble for Madeline; but still I do not believe that the world will wholly spoil our little friend."

"When will you leave us, Roland?" asked his sister.

"In two days, I think; I have brought up my clothes for you to look over, Effie; so soon as that is done, I shall take up my line of march."

"Will you walk all the way, Roland? it is so far."

"I am used to that, Effie; indeed I prefer it; for I can stop where I please, enjoy all that is beautiful, and rest when I am tired. Don't be afraid of me, little sister; I am very brave and strong."

His preparations were soon made.

"Effie, you don't know what a comfort you are to me--while I have you, I cannot feel alone. Some of these days we shall have a dear little home, where you shall be the household fairy, and your brother the guide and strong arm of his precious sister."

"Take care of yourself, dear Roland; don't be so daring; I don't believe that you ever think of danger."

"I shall climb the highest mountain, Effie, it is such a pleasure to conquer difficulties; and I will bring back to you the beautiful ferns and mosses of the mountains--then you can make one of your pretty baskets for Madeline."

Folding her once more to his heart, Roland took his final leave.

"I shall be back in a few weeks, Effie; good-bye for a little while;" and looking back, he kissed his hand, and smiled upon his dear sister.

Effie looked after her brother with an admiring gaze, and thought "How handsome he is! What a noble walk! God bless my dear, dear brother."