Chapter XXVIII: "to Old Point Comfort, Dear"

I shall begin this chapter, perhaps the closing chapter of my artless story, with the simple statement that we were back again in St. Andrew's Church. This restoration was effected about seven months after the incident with which the last chapter had its close. How it came about, or why, I shall not pause to tell. But there was a vacancy there--in St. Andrew's, that is--and the thought of nearly the whole congregation had gradually turned towards Gordon. He had proved his worth, had fought a fight so stern and long, and had come out of it with a faith so clear and a power so manifest, that it was only natural they should covet his ministry again.

He returned gladly enough, pride and gratitude mingling in his heart; and the Presbytery seemed rejoiced to welcome him within their fold again. He still retained Swan Hollow--this he insisted upon--as a kind of associate charge. They gave him an assistant, and Gordon selected a young minister fresh from Edinboro', for Scotchmen are the most clannish of all living things--and they worked the two places together, taking the morning and evening services alternately.

Going back to the church was gladsome enough to me. But it was the veriest trifle compared with our return to the dear old manse, where our children had been born. What memories thronged about us when the nightfall found us once again beneath the roof of St. Andrew's Manse! A few were there to welcome us; we tried to make merry with them--but my heart ached till they should be gone. And then, hand in hand as in other days, Gordon and I went up-stairs to the little room where our treasures used to lie. Only one was there that night, our lovely Dorothy, and she lay in slumbering beauty where she used to sleep before. The other bed was beside hers as in the days of yore--I had directed that it should be so--but it was empty.

Poor Gordon! All the joy, the triumph even, of his return to the scene of our former life was lost in sorrow because that bed was empty.

"I'd sooner be in the poorest hovel, Helen," he said as he stood beside the unused couch, "if Harold were only back--Harold and Dorothy. Our cup of happiness would be full, wouldn't it, dear, if both were only here?"

"But he'll come back some day," I tried to assure him; "that's why I have his bed all ready--everything has always come right, Gordon, even if it did come late."

"If we only knew where he is," Gordon went on, not seeming to hear; "but it looks as if we'd never learn. Do you know," and the strong voice was choked with tears again, "do you know, Helen, what I wonder every night before I go to sleep?"

"No, what is it, Gordon?"

"I always wonder if he's cold--or hungry. But especially if he's cold. Oh, surely there's nothing so sweet to a father as tucking his children up at night--so they won't be cold. After we left here, the home we went to was so little, and so hard to heat--but don't you remember how we used to go in and tuck them up, so warm and cozy?"

I tried my best to comfort him, though my heart had its own load to carry. For the dark mystery still hung about us; we had heard never a word from Harold. His debt was paid--as has been told, or implied, already--and nothing really stood in the way of his coming back except that we did not know where to find him. And every effort to discern his whereabouts had ended in utter failure. But we still kept the little tryst, still kept praying on, still hoping and trusting that the Great Father would staunch the wound which no human hand could heal.

The summer passed and still no tidings came.

Then I began to fear seriously for Gordon. The very splendour of his make-up was his peril; it is ever so with natures such as his. And his sorrow seemed to find expression in an ever more passionate devotion to his work, a devotion that was making him the idol of his people, even if it brought him daily nearer to collapse.

Which came at last. It was one Sabbath in early November, and Gordon had preached that morning from the text, "I will arise and go unto my father." I suppose it was the tragedy whose home was his own broken heart that inspired him; in any case, he poured his soul out that day with a passion and pathos such as none could have imagined who did not feel the torrent of his power. He seemed to interpret the very heart of a lonely and imploring God.

But what the effort took out of him nobody saw but me. That he was utterly exhausted was evident as he walked home after church, but I thought little of it; yet, even then, I noticed a strange incoherency in his speech, and a tremulousness about his voice, that boded ill. The collapse came during the afternoon; by eventide he was not my Gordon any more, his mind wandering far, voicing itself in strange plaint and heart-breaking appeal, the name of his absent Harold sounding through it all in pitiful refrain.

I don't think the physician I called in haste that day knew anything about the skeleton closet in our home--it is wonderful how soon people forget, even those who know you best--but he located the hidden wound with wonderful acuteness. "It's an utter collapse," he said; "what might be called a severe form of nervous breakdown--it generally occurs with people of strong emotional temperament. Has your husband had any great shock?--or has he been carrying any specially heavy burden, probably for months?"

I told him as much as I thought was necessary.

"Just what I surmised," he said; "he's suffering from what the German physicians call 'the sad heart'--and all this derangement is due to the sympathy between the brain and the nerves. Highly-strung organism, you see--intense emotional nature, that's evident; all this disturbance is a result of tension--the strain was simply too much for him. But he'll recover all right--only it will take time, time and rest."

A consultation followed soon; and the result of it all was that Gordon was to be removed to other scenes just as early as he would be able to travel. I watched by him night and day, and soon the first storm of emotion was succeeded by a deep and silent calm that I found almost harder to be borne than the other. He would sit by the hour poring over Harold's old school books, or gazing at some boyish photographs of the wanderer, or holding his cricket bat or butterfly net lovingly in his hands. Sometimes he spoke of him, but not often. When I told him we were going away for a little holiday he consented readily enough.

"Where shall we go, Gordon?" I asked him, with but little hope that he would choose.

"We'll go to Old Point Comfort," he answered unhesitatingly; "that's where we went before."

I had to turn away. For there came before me, with a flash of memory, the days to which I knew my husband's words referred. Old Point Comfort, of dear and blessed memory!--thither had we turned our steps the night of our wedding day, going forth by the moonlit bay on our love-bright journey, the future years, with all the thorny paths that awaited us, veiled in the mist of happiness that arose from our singing hearts. Ah me! I could see again the unseamed face, the hair untouched by time, the swimming eyes of love, when my lover was still young and joyous, unworn with toil and care.

"That's where we'll go," I answered; "we'll go to Old Point, Gordon."

The arrangements for our journey were soon complete. I do not think, even were it possible, that I would willingly forego all the discipline--and the blessing--that our years of poverty had brought me; but now I blessed the providence that had made it possible for me to take Gordon away like this. Money was not lacking now--thanks to grandfather and that blessed mine--and I joyed over it as men rejoice in harvest or as robbers that divide the spoil.

The evening before the very day we were to start, something occurred which wrung my heart as nothing, not even the loss of Harold, had ever done before. I had been compelled to leave Gordon for a little while, some detail of preparation demanding my attention. Returning to the study, our usual resort, I found it empty; and my heart chilled with fear.

"Come, Helen," I suddenly heard Gordon's voice crying from without; "oh, Helen, come, come quick." There was a strange note of excitement, even of rapture, in the voice that called me.

Hatless, coatless, I rushed out into the frosty night. And just across the way, in a large adjoining yard, I could see Gordon hurrying fast toward a little pond in the distance. Sometimes he looked back and called me, then hurried on again, the strange exultation still sounding in his voice. When I overtook him, he was clasping in his arms a wondering boy, a solitary skater on the frozen pond.

"It's our boy, mother--oh, Helen, he's come at last. It's Harold, mother"--and I noticed in the failing light that the lad was actually about Harold's size and form. "I knew you'd come back, Harold," he cried as he held the youth to his bosom; "oh, my son, I knew you'd come--but what made you stay away so long? And are you cold, Harold?--I've been so afraid you might be cold." Then he held the startled boy out before him, his eyes lingering with pitiful intentness on the face he held upturned to his own. "You've grown some," he said fondly, "but you're my own Harold yet--come, come on home now with me and mother. Your bed's all ready for you, Harold; and Dorothy will be so glad--she's lonely, she's lonely for you, Harold."

I stood transfixed and mute with grief. Then the lad made some reply, I know not what. But he broke the awful silence with a word--and Gordon's hands fell to his side like lead. He stood a moment under the trembling stars, then stooped and gazed long into the face that had filled his soul with fleeting rapture. Slowly he turned, looked a moment upward at the wintry sky, then silently moved towards me.

"It isn't Harold," he said after a long pause, his eyes searching my face with unutterable yearning; "it's somebody else's boy--let us go home again," as we started back hand in hand. The clock in an adjoining steeple struck the hour as we went our way; and its knell is with me yet.

The next day saw us off upon our southward journey, Dorothy and Gordon and I. The doctor had filled me with high hope; the change of air, and especially of scene, he said, were almost sure to do great things for my dear one. And the very features that alarmed me most were those by which he seemed to be reassured. The very acuteness of the malady, he said, was its most hopeful sign. I have often thought of this since and applied it to many things other than bodily infirmities; the acute is the transient, let all sufferers bear in mind, and all who think life's battle hard.

We arrived at Old Point in the morning, and the balmy air and genial skies seemed to help Gordon from the first. Oh, sweet Southern air and sweeter Southern skies! how unspeakably dear to me I knew not till I thus returned after all the maze of years. It was so delicious to hear again the soft Southern accent, to catch the liquid voices of the negroes, to breathe in the fragrance of the flowers that bloom in our dear Southland even in November.

I remembered--what woman would forget?--the very room that had been ours when we were there in that same hotel on our bridal tour so long ago, the dearest little room, with a tiny balcony that looked out upon the ocean. And I arranged that we should have it now--I would take no other. Not a word did I say to Gordon. But the first night we were there, after Dorothy had been safely stored away, I was sitting beside him, looking out over the moonlit harbour. The night was hushed, the ocean calm; voices of darkey stevedores floated softly up to us as they moved hither and thither with their creaking wheelbarrows on the wharf.

Suddenly Gordon turned his face full on mine in the moonlight. "Helen," he began huskily, "do you know what room this is, Helen?"

I yielded to his arms as he slowly drew me within their shelter; "it's where we were before--when you were my bride, my lovely, lovely bride," he said softly; "did you know it, Helen?"

I nodded, smiling up to his bending face. "Yes, I knew it, darling," I said; "that's why I chose it, Gordon."

I know not why it was--I suppose no one could explain it--but the dawn came to us, and the darkness rolled away, in that blessed hour. Tears came at last to Gordon; slowly at first; then in copious flow; then in a gush of feeling that wrung his whole form till it shook and sobbed like the frame of a little child. Passionately he held me, his kisses falling on my lips while he murmured such words of love as the days of courtship had never heard.

"It was like this before," he cried, pointing to the radiant sea; "the moon shone on it, just like this. And we were so happy then, darling--we didn't know of the long years, with their care and sorrow, that stretched before us. And you've been so good, Helen, so true and faithful--and so brave; whatever I've done, or been, I owe to you, my darling," and through all the gust of passion his voice had a naturalness, his eye a new-found calm, that told me the long dark night was past.

"We were so happy then, weren't we, dear?" he said again after a little stillness.

"I'm happier now," I answered, nestling in.

"Why?" he exclaimed. Then, suddenly discerning: "I know why--it's because we have the children now. Isn't that why, Helen--isn't it Dorothy and Harold?"

I told him Yes; and the fancy, if it can so be called, seemed to help and comfort him. "Yes," he said musingly, "it's wonderful, isn't it, how we could have been happy then at all--when we didn't have them. But God gave them to us, didn't He, Helen?"

"Yes," I murmured, my face hidden; "yes, God gave them."

"And they're still His to give," he went on, a great peace in his voice such as it thrilled my soul to feel; "they're still His to give. And I know--I'm almost sure--that He'll give us Harold back again. Something tells me that it's coming near; I knew it when I looked out on the water--when the dark fled before the light that flooded it. Don't you think so, my darling?"

I forget just what my answer was; but we sat long, soothing and comforting each other, drinking deep from Memory's spring. By and by Gordon fell asleep with his head resting on my arm, the moonlight still playing on the pure and lovely features as we sat by the open window. I brooded above him, thanking God for the change I could see upon the care-worn face. The tide had turned, the reaction had come at last, the strife of battle seemed spent and gone. All night long he slept the sleep of a little child; the morning found him bright and tranquil, and his first waking word was to say that he was well.

For a couple of weeks, or perhaps a little longer we lingered on in our quiet retreat, every hour blissful with its evidence of returning strength. Gordon spoke often of Harold, but always now with a sweet trustfulness that was beautiful to see; I really believe God made him well by touching his spirit with the calm of a childlike faith. It was a miracle, I have never ceased to think, let the critics say what they will. And as his strength came back his heart began to turn wistfully towards his work; I really don't believe any one ever knew how much he loved St. Andrew's, and had loved it all through the years.

I protested against his returning, but in vain. So it was all arranged that we were to start home on the following Monday. The evening before, Gordon preached for a clergyman whose acquaintance he had formed, the minister of a little Methodist church not far away. I was there, of course; and the sermon was one of the noblest I ever heard Gordon give. It was from the words: "Casting all your care upon Him," and I know every listener felt that the message was heaven-born.

After the service was finished I was going down the aisle alone, when suddenly I heard some one pronounce my name.

"Miss Helen!" said the voice, and bygone years rolled back upon me at the tone.

I swung around, wildly excited. It was a voice from home. "Mr. Slocum!" I cried, so loud that everybody stood still and looked at me; "Frank Slocum!--Oh, Frank!" and I stood gasping in the aisle. It was one of the friends of my early girlhood--the same who had been my escort to the ball that far departed night when we had first discussed the Presbytery, and the attic guest it was to bring us.

"I wa'n't right sure," he began, rosy as the dawn; "but some one told me the preacher was Mr. Laird--then I knew you were Mrs. Laird."

"Oh, Frank!" I cried, "please call me Helen," for the music of it was refreshing; "come away--come, and go home with me and Gordon."

I believe Gordon enjoyed that evening with Frank quite as much as I, which is saying a good deal. He said afterwards that I reminded him of a child running hither and thither through a flower-strewn glade, plucking whatever her hands could reach. Thus did I gather news from Frank. My questions rained in on him from every point of the compass, leaping from one subject to another like a peewee on the shore. (That's a kind of witches' dance in metaphors, I know, but they all mean the same thing anyhow.) I cross-questioned Frank about everything and everybody, while Gordon sat listening with an amused expression on his face. Particularly did I put him through his facings about my old schoolgirl friends. The first question, without exception, was as to how many children they had--till this became so chronic that Frank would begin with this himself, not waiting to be asked. It saddened me some to learn that several of them had twice as many as I. One old friend, Sadie Henderson, had exactly three times as many--but two of them came at once, so that they didn't really count. Others, moreover, had none at all, which brought Gordon and me pretty well up on the average.

Frank had little to say about Uncle Henry and Aunt Agnes except that they were getting older, which I would have surmised myself. Besides, Frank had a sensitive nature; and I suppose he remembered the stormy scene when Gordon left my uncle's house. I fancied, in a woman's instinctive way, that there was something he wanted to say to me alone. And I was right enough. For when I walked with him as far as the hotel piazza, while we were gazing out over the shimmering sea Frank told me something that proved to be a word of destiny.

"You all are going back by New York, you said?" he began, looking up significantly. The idiom sounded sweet--_you all_--how long since I had heard that brace of words before!

"Yes," I answered; "why?"

"Well, I'll tell you something interesting; I didn't care to say it before your husband, for fear it might affect his plans--I know how matters stand between him and your uncle, you know--but I think you ought to be told. Your uncle's in New York."

"What?" I gasped, and I felt the colour leave my cheek; "uncle's what?--he's where?"

"He's in New York," Frank repeated calmly. "I've just come from there--we were staying at the same hotel."

"And Aunt Agnes?" I asked swiftly, my eyes fixed on him in the gloom.

"No, Mrs. Lundy's at home--your uncle went up on some business, I believe. Mighty successful too, as far as I could judge," Frank added.

I cared nothing for this. "What hotel, Frank?" I demanded eagerly; "tell me the hotel."

"The St. Denis--opposite Grace Church, you know."

Little more was said and I soon bade Frank farewell. Then I walked slowly back to Gordon, trying to compose myself, struggling to subject my impulse to my judgment. But it was of no use. My heart was the heart of childhood once again; all I knew was this, that a few hours would bring us to New York, that we had intended going there anyhow--and that my uncle was within reach of one who had never ceased to love him.

I paused a moment before I opened the door and went in where Gordon was still sitting, gazing out on the ever fascinating scene.

"Well, dear, did you pump him dry?" he asked jauntily as I entered.

"Oh, Gordon," and now I was on his knee (woman's throne of power) with his face between my hands; "oh, Gordon, don't say No. Don't, Gordon--won't you do this for me, this, that I'm going to ask?"

Soon I had poured out the whole story to him. I noticed his brow darken a little at first, and the quivering lip told how much I had asked of him.

But Gordon was all gold through and through; he always was, my Gordon was, from that first hour when my eyes fell upon his face till now; and the love of this later day, although I suppose folks call us old, exceeds that early ardour as the noontide mocks the dawn.

"Yes, my wife," he said, stroking my hair and looking with almost pitying fondness on my face; "yes, brave heart and true--you were his before you were mine. And we'll go, Helen--we'll both go."