Chapter XXIII

The days that followed were filled with new things for Mamie Williams. However shallow her hurt had been it was deep enough to make her shrink decidedly from returning to the store. The young man whose charms had fascinated her was not yet gone, and Miss Simmons brought word from day to day that there had been delay in sending him away. The yellow haired girl seemed to have returned to her place behind the candy counter. After this report had gone on for about a week, Mamie suddenly manifested a desire to return to her position, with the expressed hope that she might still win her lover back, but Miss Hannah, feeling that this might be the turning point in her life, had a long talk with her, the result of which was that she appeared in the kitchen an hour after, with red eyes, a meek air and a clean gingham apron and made herself generally useful. Molly, who had kept herself informed of the state of the case nodded approval and announced to Miss Grant at the first opportunity that she didn’t know but that girl had some chance of growing a little sense after all.

It is doubtful whether Mamie’s resolution would have outlasted the next day, however, had not several things occurred to strengthen what Miss Grant had said to her during that long earnest talk. The first was the announcement that the charming Mr. Harold Adams had departed from the city to parts unknown, taking with him a goodly portion of the profits of the three-cent business, which he had, by a careful system of bookkeeping, been laying up for himself against this day. Neither had the yellow-haired girl shared in his booty. She seemed to be as happy as ever, and as the days went by was reported to be “making up” to the new head of the business, who had come to straighten out affairs.

Mamie, on the announcement of this news, betook herself to her room for a whole morning, where she cried and was angry alternately, and from whence she came out a wiser and a meeker maiden, quite ready to do what Miss Grant should ask of her, and to look for another position. But that lady was in no haste to urge the girl to apply for another position. Life in such a store, as Mamie would be likely in her present stage of development, to get into, was too dangerous and risky a thing for the unformed girl, who seemed to be hesitating on the brink of better things. After careful thought, and much discussion with Celia, Miss Grant told Mamie that she would like it very much, if she would be willing to help her for two or three weeks, with upstairs work, sweeping and table setting, until she could find another second girl who suited her. She told her she would give her what she had been paying to the second girl who had just left, and that she would of course have her board, so that she might be able to look about her leisurely for the right place, and still lose nothing by being out of work. Mamie, after a struggle with her pride, and reiterating many times to her roommate that she only did this for a few days as a favor to Miss Grant, finally accepted, and was somewhat surprised that she was not scoffed at by Miss Simmons for “doing housework,” which to the minds of both girls had always been menial service quite beneath them.

But it turned out that Miss Simmons had other things to think of than Mamie Williams’ affairs. It was scarcely three weeks after Mamie had left the three-cent store, when it was discovered that the said Miss Simmons had “eloped” with the friend of the oily youth who had been visiting her. Just what she had eloped from, as she had no friends or kindred in the city who seemed in the least interested in her welfare, it was perhaps hard to make out, but she left a note in Mamie’s Sunday dress pocket stating that she had eloped, and bidding an affectionate farewell. It was no more than was to have been expected, Miss Grant thought afterward, as she turned over pile after pile of romantic, third-class, sensational novels in the closet, after the departure of the young girl, but she sighed and brushed away a tear, that she had not been permitted to help this girl also. She had by this time some hopes of Mamie. The affair of Miss Simmons, she feared, might perhaps upset her, and excite her desire for some romance herself, but happily it worked the other way, rather frightening her, and making her cling close to Miss Grant, asking her advice daily and almost hourly. This effect became still more salutary when it was learned some days after that the young man with whom Miss Simmons had eloped had already a wife in another state. During the passage of these events Mamie cried a good deal, but there was growing in her face the shadow of a sweet womanliness which gave promise of what might be in the future if all things went well. She had not even the brakeman to brighten this hard time for her, for he had been sent out West on some special work by one of the heads of the road, and would not return for a month. Mamie learned to efface herself somewhat, and gradually seemed to be cultivating some of Celia’s quietness and repose of manner. Celia, on her part, was much interested in the girl. She kept her in mind daily, and was always trying to help her, and praying for her.

“I’m not sure, auntie, after all, but she may develop enough to become a ribbon girl some time,” she said one night, when Mamie had left them.

Aunt Hannah smiled dreamily. She was beginning to have much hope of her young protégée herself.

“Yes,” she said, with her far-away look in her eyes, “she may be fit for the white linen dress some day. Who knows?”

“You mean the tailor-made one?” asked Cecil, mischievously.

“The heavenly-made one, anyway, dear. She told me to-night that she was beginning to feel as if she really prayed like other people now.”

There were other influences at work also. Mr. Stafford was holding meetings every night in the new chapel, and the boarders had as a family adopted that church as their own. It was becoming a regular thing now for every one who was able, to attend service morning and evening on Sunday, and several of them had dropped in to the special meetings. Miss Hannah, Celia, and Mamie Williams had been there every night. Harry Knowles had joined the choir, and his friends rejoiced that at last all his evenings were securely filled for him. His face was bright and interested. He was enthusiastic in sounding the praises of Mr. Stafford, and ready to do anything to help in the church work, though as yet he did not seem to have made any move to number himself among the Christians. Celia was deeply interested in a class of big boys who were most of them beginning to attend the services. She kept herself in the background with them as much as possible. No one could say of her that she was trying to get the attention of the minister. She tried with all her might to keep away from him, insomuch, sometimes, that he noticed it and was puzzled and troubled. He sometimes sat with his eyes shaded by his hand up in his room when he was weary with his work, and thought about it. Did she dislike him? Or was there some one else who so filled her life that she had no desire to have other friends? More and more her sweet, womanly face, and her pleasant ways were making their impression upon his mind. He began to confess it to himself by and by, and he thought of what his friend Roger Houston had said about finding a wife that night he had met him in search of a boarding-place. His heart told him that there was more possibility of such a thing happening than he would care to confess to his friend just yet. In fact, Mr. Houston had visited Mr. Stafford several times, and once had remained to dinner with him, since which time he had unreservedly gone over in favor of the new boarding-house, declaring that the cooking was as good as they had at his own home, though perhaps not quite so stylishly served. He had laughed, it is true, at Bob Yates, who that evening favored the house with one of his high-keyed solos, while Roger and Mr. Stafford tried to talk in the latter’s room directly over the organ; and he had mimicked Miss Burns’ laugh—for he was a born mimic—and had denominated Mamie Williams and Carrie Simmons as “giggling kids,” but he admired Miss Grant, and declared Celia to be artistic in the extreme. He kept talking about her after they came upstairs. He was an artist by profession, and he begged his friend to ask her to sit as a model for him, and was surprised at the prompt way the suggestion was squelched. He asked if Celia’s character was as fine as her face, and pondered much afterward over the slow thoughtful answer of his host, “Yes, I think it is.” He was so possessed of the idea of catching Celia’s expression on canvas for a picture he had it in mind to paint, that he asked again as he was leaving, “And you don’t think you can ask that girl to sit for me, Horace? I like that style of face awfully, and I don’t know just where else to turn for it.”

“I don’t think there _is_ another face anywhere just like hers,” answered the minister slowly again.

“Now look here, Horace, you talk as if you were personally interested in her. Don’t go so far as that, I beg of you. You ought to marry a rich girl, for you never will allow yourself to get money any other way, unless you fall dead in love with it. Well, I suppose I may ask her myself. It won’t hurt my feelings, if she does refuse, you know. Where can I find her?”

A firm line came around the minister’s mouth, as he said, decidedly,

“I would rather you would not do that, Roger. She is not that kind of a girl.”

Afterward, the young artist remembered his friend’s face, and whistled on his way home as he thought it over.

But though Mr. Stafford had watched Celia for several months now, had seen her under varying and trying circumstances sometimes; had shown her little attentions, which were the outcome of a frank talk he had within himself, wherein he confessed a deep interest in her, she still held aloof from him. Miss Grant had given up trying to make it out. Celia was too deep for her.

Meantime Bob Yates came home from the West. He had been working hard and was glad to get back again. He had been promoted to an engineer’s position, and was off duty every evening now. He seemed much struck with the change in Mamie Williams. Miss Grant noticed it the first evening at dinner. There was a deference about his manner when he addressed her that was new. She noticed also its reflex influence on Mamie. Had she taken a lesson from Celia’s reserve, or were the influences of prayer and daily life about her, and her new hopes and resolves making the change? Miss Grant wondered. Mamie flushed a little, but she drooped her eyes modestly, and was quite unobtrusive during the entire meal, a thing so unlike the old Mamie Williams that the contrast was marked. Bob Yates admired it evidently, for he cast many glances across the table at her, and his own loud, jolly voice seemed somewhat toned down, in harmony.

Celia passed through the hall behind them after dinner and heard Mamie shyly declining an invitation to the theatre. “I’d like awful well to go, but we all go to meetin’ every night now,” she was saying. “I promised in the meeting last night I’d bring somebody along to-night and I don’t just like to break my promise. Mebbe you’d just as soon go to meetin’ as the theatre to-night, then I’d have somebody to take to keep my promise with. The minister’s awful good, and the singin’ is fine. They’d like your voice in the choir, I know.”

And so Bob Yates willingly gave up the theatre to go to meeting. He was not greatly concerned where he took his amusement. The theatre had no especial attraction for him, but he had thought of it because Mamie had once told him she would rather go to the theatre than anywhere else in the world. In fact, the prospect of a “good sing” was rather more enticing in itself than sitting still and listening to the singing of other people.

That night the minister was very much in earnest. He preached a soul searching sermon. Some of Celia’s boys arose, when at the close of the sermon the invitation was given for all who would like to belong to Christ to stand with those who were Christians during the singing of a hymn. Mamie sat quite still, her cheeks pink and her eyes downcast during the singing of the first verse and part of the second. She held one side of the hymn book with Bob Yates and her hand trembled a little. He was singing with his usual fervor the deep, heart-stirring words, but Mamie did not sing. Just as the second verse was nearly finished, she suddenly rose with a jerk and an embarrassed countenance, leaving the singing book in the hands of the man by her side. He looked up astonished, and went on singing, but not quite so loud as before, and his words seemed to be getting mixed up. He fidgeted on his chair, and when they began to sing the next verse, he arose also and stood beside Mamie, offering her again the book. She took it, looking down, her heart fluttering gladly that he had arisen too, and kept her company, and so they stood until the benediction was pronounced.

“Say,” said Mamie, softly, when they had walked half of the way home in an embarrassed silence, “what did you mean by that? Did you mean what the minister said? What made you do it?”

“Mean it? ’Course I did!” answered Bob, heartily. “My mother used to be a good woman, an’ I’ve always meant to turn that way some time myself. The first time I ever heard Mr. Stafford, I made out he was more’n half-way right, an’ to-night I thought so again. I don’t know as I should ’a’ said so out’n out fer folks to see, ef you hadn’t, but I calculated I wanted to be on that side ef you was, so I stood up. Why?”

“Well, I didn’t know,” said Mamie, embarrassedly, “I was afraid mebbe you just did it out o’ politeness. But I’m real glad you meant it.”

“Are you? Sure?” He looked at her searchingly by the light of the next street lamp, and then added, “Well, I don’t mind tellin’ you ’twas you that did it. That what you said about wearin’ a white dress got me to thinkin’. You seem most’s if you was wearin’ it yourself since I come home. I didn’t know but ’twas my ’magination, but when I see you get up in meetin’, I knew it was that there white dress in the Bible you was wearin’. I mostly made up my mind while I was out to Ohio, I wanted to be fit to walk along side o’ you.”

Mamie’s heart fairly stood still with a joy she had not known before and only half understood. It was the joy of having helped another immortal soul to find the Light.

“I’m only just startin’ myself,” she murmured low. “I ain’t half fit for that white dress yet, but I’m goin’ to try, an’ I’m awful glad you think I helped you.”

“Well, then, let’s start out together, and mebbe we can help each other,” he said, and she murmured with downcast eyes, “All right,” as he grasped her hand in a hearty clasp, and then helped her up the steps into the house.

Other young men had, on occasion, clasped Mamie’s hand in more or less hearty grasp on the way home from places of amusement, but no hand ever touched in her the chord of such true, healthful, honest friendship, and purpose to do right. She felt as though she had been uplifted in some way and yet she knew not how nor why.

A little later Harry Knowles sat in Miss Grant’s little private sitting-room, his head leaning on his hand, his whole attitude indicative of deep thought.

“I tell you, Miss Grant,” he had been saying, “it was that three-cent girl. When I saw her stand up there all by herself, right in the middle of a hymn, too, when no one else was rising, it made me ashamed. Here was I who had been brought up to pray and read the Bible and know how to be good, and had a good mother, sitting still; and that girl, who never had any bringing up to amount to much I guess, _coming_, right away as soon as she was asked. I can’t stand it any longer, and I wanted to talk to somebody about it, so I came to you. I knew you would help me, and it would seem some like having mother to tell it to. I’ve made up my mind to be a Christian. Yes, I’ll tell the minister by and by, but I wanted to talk to you first, and he was busy anyway. But I don’t know as I’d ever have done it, if it hadn’t been for Mamie Williams to-night.”

Verily the mysteries of influence in this world are great, and past understanding, and we cannot tell if our actions may not affect the eternal welfare of some one whom we have never seen.

Certainly, Mamie Williams, as she sat reading her Bible that night, did not dream that she had helped to bring Harry Knowles to Christ.

“Hast thou not garnered many fruits
Of other’s sowing, whom thou knowest not?
Canst tell how many struggles, sufferings, tears,
All unrecorded, unremembered all,
Have gone to build up what thou hast of good?”