Chapter XVI: Lost and Found

EDWARD PRYSE had no time to linger among the exquisite beauties of Nannie's mountain home, fraught though they were with the dearest and most tender associations. Here he was treading in the very footsteps of his Ethel; and where she had dwelt must henceforth be a sacred place to him. He looked out upon the sunlit hills cradling the peaceful lake, and thought how her dear eyes had rested on them, as in spirit she travelled across the wide sea, yearning for one word to soothe her aching heart. The silence and calm loveliness of nature would make her feel yet more lonely; they could not fill the strange void, nor bear a message to her beloved.

Sadly and mournfully Edward turned away from this beautiful and sequestered spot, to exchange it, after a weary journey, for the tumult and busy stir of the great port of Liverpool. When he reached it, gaslights were blazing in the shops and thoroughfares, and enormous buildings, telling of wealth and luxury, rose on either hand. Edward noted nothing as he drove on, through the din and crowd, to the hotel where he passed the night.

At an early hour the following morning, he was at the well-known shipping agent's office. There seemed an unusual amount of business on hand, and Edward found it no easy task to find the clerks who could be of any assistance to him. But after patient and persistent waiting, and being referred from one place to another, his search was not in vain. The answers he received were gruff and unsatisfactory at first, for the Company did not care to be reminded of one of the most serious disasters they had ever experienced.

But Edward was firm in his determination and polite in speech, and, quietly persisting in his inquiries, he soon received a due amount of attention. The sheet of the "Illustrated London News" secretly abstracted from the country inn in Scotland, and containing a picture of the ship "Ocean Queen," was of the greatest service, for with the date, it gave exact information concerning the disaster.

Books were referred to, and passenger lists consulted, but "Pryse" was not among the names of the passengers who had sailed in the fatal ship. This was what Edward had expected, as the thought had struck him on his journey that for some reason Ethel might have assumed her maiden name. Was there a passenger of the name of Macdonald? How his heart throbbed in expectation of the answer! Yes, there was, in the steerage list: "Ethel Macdonald, aged twenty-five, and infant."

There was nothing further to be gained from the hard-looking clerks, whose information had just crushed out the last spark of hope that Ethel might after all be somewhere in the world. What did it concern them that a lonely stranger had timidly moved among them fourteen years ago? How had she looked? What did she say? Who knew, and who cared? Edward felt hopeless tears rush into his eyes as he asked himself these questions. He was just leaving the office, his confused thoughts surging through his brain, when he caught sight of a respectable-looking porter, whose face he fancied he had seen when in Liverpool before.

The man touched his cap to him, and something within him made Edward stop and speak.

"I think I can remember your face," he said; "you must have been in the Company's service for many years."

"Yes, sir," replied the man; "I pretty well know the look of this place, for I have been about it twenty years."

"Indeed!" rejoined Mr. Pryse. "Then you must have seen a good deal of the bustle of life in that time. I suppose, though, you never notice who comes, or who goes in here?"

"Tisn't very often, sir, I have much occasion to. There's so many faces that I get confused among them all, and couldn't tell at the end of the year whether I had seen them or no. But sometimes things happen that a lifetime wouldn't make one forget. Did you ever hear of the 'Ocean Queen,' sir, one of our fine paddle-steamers that was wrecked off the Welsh coast?"

Edward leaned against the wall he stood near, and a dizzy faintness came over him, which greatly surprised his interlocutor. But he checked himself sufficiently to answer in a hollow voice: "Yes. I have been making inquiries concerning that very ship. Do you know anything about her?"

"Why, sir, 'tis this way. I think it must be fourteen or fifteen years ago, when one day I noticed a pretty young woman standing here with a baby in her arms. She asked me a few questions, and I found she was quite a stranger to Liverpool. It seemed as if she hardly knew what she was saying or doing. Her dress was not like a lady's, but she had the face and speech of one, and a more modest-looking young woman I never saw in my life. She had come to inquire about her husband, who, she said, had gone to America."

Edward grasped his arm. "For mercy's sake, tell me all you know about her!"

The man looked wonderingly, but continued: "Well, sir, while I was talking to her, she suddenly fell forward in a fainting-fit, but I caught her before any harm was done. There she lay looking like death, and I couldn't tell what to do with her, nor where to take her. A crowd soon gathered round, prying and wondering. But I was so sorry for the poor young thing, and didn't like her to be made a public spectacle of, so I hailed a cab and took her right off to my missus, who is always a wonderful hand at doing people good. She soon got better in our little parlour. I think it was the crying of the baby that roused her to herself.

"Our hearts ached when she told us her story. Ethel Macdonald was her name; and oh, what a long journey she had taken to hear about her husband. She wanted to go to America after him, but we told her that would be no good, if she didn't know where he was. Then we asked her if she had any relations, and she said, 'Yes, her husband's people lived in South Wales; she would go to them.'

"One of them, I think she said, was a clergyman of the name of Pryse, but I cannot recollect the name of the place she said he lived in. I only know it was a country town somewhere on the coast. Her husband had promised to take her there some day, she said, but they were all strangers to her, so she would not write to them. My wife and I looked at each other, and we both made up our minds that she should not be turned out into the street, helpless and forlorn, for she looked so ill and tired out, poor thing."

"God bless you," said Edward, when he could speak, "for your kindness; you will have your reward. That lady was my wife."

The man started, and looked incredulous, but one glance at Edward's blanched and haggard face was enough.

"Beg pardon, sir; who would thought it? And that is why you have come to Liverpool, I suppose. Things do happen queer in this world sometimes! I am just going home, sir; if you will come with me, I will tell you the rest of the sad tale."

Edward obeyed mechanically, feeling as if in a dream.

"'Twas our doing, I fear, sir, that your good lady was put into the 'Ocean Queen,' but we thought we were performing the greatest kindness. My wife's sister was then staying with us, and she had arranged to go back to her home in Cork in this very ship. Her husband traded in a small vessel between Ireland and a Welsh port; and being a native of South Wales, he knew about everything and everybody in that part of the country.

"After we had consulted together, we thought the best plan would be for the poor lady to take her passage with my sister-in-law, who also had a young baby. She took no end of a fancy to the lady's pretty child. Eliza promised that as soon as they reached Cork, she would put Mrs. Macdonald under her husband's care. He would be sure to know whether there was a clergyman called Pryse living in the place the lady mentioned; and he was such a good, kind man, he would not leave her until he had discovered her friends, and seen her safely with them. My wife will tell you the rest, sir," added the man, as he opened the door of a quiet-looking dwelling in a back street.

A pale, middle-aged woman was sitting at work in the little parlour into which Edward was ushered. The man, in a few low words, communicated to her who the stranger was. She put her hand to her brow, and looked earnestly at him, then her face filled with a reverent pity.

"Oh, sir!" said she, as the tears gathered in her eyes. "That was a sad year for you and for us. My dear sister and her young baby we never saw again from that day to this. The news stunned us when it came, 'All hands lost!'

"I was so ill for weeks after, my husband thought that I should have died. And the poor man in Ireland, who was looking out for his dear wife, was in such a state I believe he lost his senses for a time. And that lonely lady, with her sweet face and ways, and the darling little child, all drowned! Oh, it was heart-rending!"

"I grieve to recall these sad facts to your memory," said Edward gently, "but you will be doing me the greatest service on earth if you will only tell me all you can."

"Well, sir," continued the woman, "I am sure, then, for her dear sake I will. It seems as though it only happened yesterday, it is all so fresh in my mind. She was only with us two days, but though the time was so short, I got to love her dearly; for oh, she was such a Christian, and it was a great comfort to talk to one who followed the dear Saviour so closely. I shall never forget the last morning when I watched her dress her baby, and saw it playing with a beautiful locket that hung from a chain round the mother's neck. It was a gold one set round with pearls—very valuable, I should think. Baby thought it a fine toy, and liked having it between her little fat hands better than anything else, and the mother laughed and told her it should be her own some day."

"I wonder," thought Edward, "if that locket was found by the fishermen! If it was on the body, it must be in some one's possession. But, ah no, the woman would surely have mentioned such a fact as that, for it would be the chief clue to the child's identity. Besides, such a valuable article as that would not be kept long by poor people; they would be sure to turn it into money. Still if it had even been seen by some one, there would be sufficient ground for claiming the child."

Edward started from his reverie, to see the woman watching him intently with her sad eyes.

"God has directed my way to you," he said; "it must be so, for otherwise I should never have found this last link in the wonderful chain of evidence that has guided me so unerringly in the long search for my lost ones."

Mr. Pryse then proceeded to make the most minute inquiries into details of all that Ethel had said or done during her brief stay with these Good Samaritans, and the kind woman told him all she knew. This account, when added to the Diary so abruptly broken off, gave Edward a connected story of the sweet, sorrowful life, since the day their hands had parted, and the long good-bye was said.

It was late on Saturday night before he could manage to reach St. Elvis, even by the most rapid travelling, so there were no curious gossips standing about to watch him as he entered "The Jolly Sailors" and engaged his rooms. He could see the churchyard from his window, and stood watching late into the night the waving sycamores over those two graves in the corner, until his heart felt ready to burst with its sorrow.

And there down the quiet valley, with the sea breaking near it, stood the cottage that sheltered his precious child—his one link with Ethel in heaven. Would she be glad to call him father, when he clasped her in his arms? Or would she turn away and say she did not need his love now? This agonising doubt prevented sleep from visiting his eyelids until daylight began to dawn through the dingy stuff curtains of his room.

Then he fell into a troubled but heavy slumber, from which he was only awakened by the ringing of the church bells for morning service. Voices and footsteps hurried by in the street below, and he caught snatches of sentences—

"Dr. Pryse is not going to preach till afternoon," said one.

"It will be Mr. David, then, I suppose."

"Ay, ay; he's a fine preacher, that young man."

"Who would have thought of Widow Gwynne's son rising to be a minister!"

"He speaks plain enough, don't he?" said the first speaker.

"Ay, that he do, indeed; he don't mind calling things by their right names, do he? Offence or no offence; and yet he's a good friend to the poor."

The conversation grew distant, and Edward Pryse relapsed into his reverie.

The afternoon sun was streaming into the church windows, showing the dancing motes. Service had just begun, when Lettice noticed the mysterious stranger who had taken such a fancy to her child come in and seat himself near her, in one of the free seats by the font. Her heart gave a little flutter when she saw him; she could not tell why. What had he come back for? Who was he? Lettice felt quite ashamed to discover her thoughts were causing her mind to wander utterly from the service. She had not heard any of it for the last five minutes, nor joined in a single response!

When they rose to sing, Ermyn handed a hymn-book to the sad-looking gentleman, whom she recognised as the same who had taken her likeness.

Dr. Pryse ascended the pulpit-stairs, and in a distinct though faltering and aged voice read as his text the story of the Prodigal Son. Then, after a pause, continued:

"What a sad and life-like picture we have here! A dearly loved son, with every comfort and blessing round him, wishes to leave it all and go away from his father's face.

"'Give me the portion that falleth to me.'

"What was it? Just the very portion that men of the world are craving for nowadays—'his living;' all that they think life is worth; the worship of the golden god with all his attendant train, 'the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life': this trinity of evil was what the young man desired as his portion, and he got it.

"Did it satisfy him? Was it a portion that filled him with good? Ah no! Alone in a stranger-land, he sat and wept. Instead of the dainty meat he had once fed upon, there was the swine's trough set before him. In vain he held out his empty hands. 'No man gave unto him.'

"Then he remembered the light and love in his father's dwelling. There, in that home of peace and purity, no rough winds could come; no hunger, no drought. Thrice blessed they who dwelt beneath its shelter! There was not only food, but enough and to spare. Even the hired servants could know no want. Alas for him, sitting out there alone in the cold, with no eye to pity, no hand to raise up! But while he mused over his desolation and misery, a light shone into his soul,—a light as bright as that which lit up the prison darkness that surrounded Saint Peter.

"'Arise!' it said. 'How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants.' 'If only I can be in my own fair home again, and under the same roof as my father, he may give me the office of a menial; I will serve him joyfully.'

"Ah, but he did not know the father's love even then; he put a limit to it. He was judging him according to his own poor standard. He could not believe that from the day the erring one left the shelter of his home the father had yearned for his return. My friends, have you ever known what it was to lose a son? I do not mean by death. Has your well-beloved child ever wandered away upon the mountains and never come home?"

The aged pastor could get no further, for a sob choked his utterance, as he leaned heavily on the pulpit cushion. But he checked himself. For years he had struggled to speak to his people from this parable, but could not. He must do it now.

"Does not the love for the absent one," he continued, "grow deeper and deeper as the years move on? Would you not give all you possessed for that precious life? Forgiveness! Ah, that is only the glistening surface of the deep well. You must go beyond that, deeper and deeper still. It is all love beneath, nothing but love! How was the prodigal received?

"'When he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had
compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.'

"Oh, my friends, behold this Divine Compassion, so far beyond our poor earthly love, however deep that may be. Alas! An earthly parent may have been the cause of driving his son into the far country. We can never say that of God.

"'He willeth not the death of a sinner, but rather that he should turn
from his wickedness and live.'

"It is 'we' who have turned our backs upon Him.

"'Come home, O wanderer!' calls the voice. 'Come home! Come home!'

"Poor sinner, God loves you. He is your Father. Will you not turn and seek His face, and let Him lead you home? A royal welcome awaits you there—the best robe, fair and white, and the jewelled ring of His everlasting love. If that poor young man had stayed where he was in the fields, and made no effort to arise and come, he would never have been clasped in his father's loving arms.

"See how God's grace to the guilty one is shown forth in this story. He first convinces him of sin by His Holy Spirit, causing him to cry,—'Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in Thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called Thy son,' and then gives him the white robe that will make him clean and fair for ever.

"'Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.'"

Lettice started and turned pale, for she thought she heard near her a groan and a heavy sob. A few minutes after, to her great surprise, the stranger rose hastily and left the church.

Edward Pryse could not stay to hear the remainder of that sermon. The arrow, feathered with love, had shot straight into his heart, making it bleed with sorrow and contrition. He sought where to weep. The churchyard was no fit place, for in a few minutes the people would be coming out. He quickly made up his mind. There was but one place. It was his home, and thither he went.

The Rectory doors were never locked on Sunday, though Molly was in church with her mistress. So Edward passed into the quiet, empty house, unperceived by any one.

The study door stood open, and he crept stealthily in. Nothing was changed! There were the shabby carpet and ancient furniture, the books, the pictures, and quaint sampler. The colour had faded a little out of the sweet girlish face that smiled at him from its frame. Yes, Minnie had looked just like that, when, struck one day by her artistic appearance, he had made his first study from life. Those laughing eyes seemed as if they could never know sorrow. He had left his little sister bright and young, and such she would ever be to him, while he had grown grey in the stern soil of grief. The last wind of trouble had stripped and made bare his branches, and he felt very, very old.

The window was open, and a gentle breeze stirred the ivy leaves outside, bringing whispers to his memory of that sad night long ago, when he had crouched beneath them to listen to his father's wrathful sentence. Suddenly, and overpowering the sound of the rustling leaves, came the echo of human voices from the churchyard. The service was over, the congregation was dispersing. His father and Silexa would be at home in a few minutes!

Should he flee and hide himself? Oh, he dared not meet them. What should he say? He felt like a guilty thief. He thought of the lonely garret at the top of the house. But just as he was meditating a flight to it, he heard Molly enter by the back door, and he was afraid to run the risk of meeting her. So he stood still as if spellbound, gazing at the picture. His heart felt as if it must stop beating when he heard a firm, decided footstep approaching the door. He could not turn round to see who it was. Trembling in every limb with nervous agitation, he heard the handle sharply turned. Some one had entered. Yes, he must face that person, whoever it might be. One look was enough.

"Edward! My brother!" burst from Silexa's lips, as she sprang forward and knelt beside the fainting figure, that had sunk into a seat below the picture.

In that moment of wonder and amazement, her yearning sister-heart had penetrated the disguise that Time had woven round him. She had heard of the mysterious stranger's visit to St. Elvis, but had refused to allow herself to dream of the possibility she so often longed for. Now she read the secret. The sea of sorrow had given up its dead!

When Edward came to himself, her strong arms were supporting him, his head was on her breast, and he knew it was his own sister Silexa who was weeping over him.

"Don't talk yet," she said, rousing herself with her usual brave determination. "Rest here, Edward, on this sofa. No one will disturb you. I must go to our father. The shock might kill him. How thankful I am David detained him, and that Eudora is waiting in the churchyard to bring him home!"

Silexa calmly retraced her steps to the lych gate, but what a mingling of thanksgiving and sorrow was going on in her heart! My readers know enough of Silexa's past history to enable them to understand what she felt at such a crisis.

Eudora was seated on a moss-grown tombstone, but rose when she saw her aunt coming through the gate.

"What is it, auntie dear? David and grandpapa are having such a long talk. Did you want me? Oh, auntie, why are you looking so white? And you are shaking all over. Something is the matter."

Silexa took the girl's hand and sat down beside her.

"I am weak and foolish," she said, wiping away the tears that would drop from the grey eyes. "Oh, Dora, my darling, help me to bear up! Your grandfather's life depends on whether we can be calm and patient. I can trust you," she added, looking into the sweet upturned face. "Dora, your Uncle Edward has come home."

Eudora had heard the sad history since she had grown up, for the confidence had become dearer and closer every day between aunt and niece since Eudora's dangerous illness. But as it was before her birth that this sorrow had come to the Rectory, she had never known the agony of the loss, nor half its bitterness. Therefore, this sudden news was only the source of the keenest joy to her. Yet the gentle, sensitive girl understood the situation in an instant, and took in all its emergencies. She put her arms round Silexa's neck, and in that loving caress whispered, "Our Father has been very good to us, auntie. How safe we are in His keeping! Your prayers have indeed been answered. There is grandpapa coming towards us," she added. "I will run and meet him as if nothing had happened."

But David lingered by the old man's side, as he watched Eudora glide gently along the daisy-bordered path. Dr. Pryse put his hand forward and took her arm. Eudora felt perplexed, and wished David would say good-bye. But she could not tell him this. What was to be done?

"Ah, Silexa!" said the aged minister. "I thought you had gone home. Why did you wait?"

"I came back again, father, to tell you some one is in your study waiting to see you."

"Who is it? Where did he come from?"

David and Eudora always remembered the clever way in which Silexa parried these questions, until she had paved the way for a safe avowal.

"Father," she said, at length; "you have been telling us about the Prodigal Son this afternoon."

"Yes, Silexa, yes, but it was a sore subject for me. God grant that my people may never know such a sorrow as mine!"

"Father, what would you say if 'your' prodigal came home? We have never actually heard of his death."

"Ah, my daughter, a father's welcome should be his, but that can never be now on earth. I shall clasp him to my bosom in the Father's house above. I know we shall meet there."

"Father dearest, God will let you meet him before then. It has pleased Him to hear our prayers and wipe away our tears. Edward has come home. He is the stranger I have called you in to meet."

The poor old man seemed as though he heard not, but gazed from one to the other. David came closer to him, and supported him as he trembled from head to foot. He could not speak, but began to sob like a child. Tenderly they led him on through the garden and into the study. David and Eudora turned away on the threshold.

Silexa guided the tottering footsteps to the accustomed seat in the great mahogany chair, and then put Edward's hand into her father's. The penitent knelt down, and with bowed head received the paternal kiss and blessing. The sister softly turned to leave the parent and the son alone, and heard her father murmur, as she closed the door,—

"'This my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.'"