Myrtle Reed

“ Rose walked home, disdaining the waiting carriage. She had forgotten her hat and the sunset lent radiance to a face that needed no more. By rare tact and kindness, Allison had removed the sting from her shame and the burden she had borne so long was lifted from her heavy heart.
She was happier now than she had ever been before in her life, but she must hide her joy from the others as she had previously hidden her pain —or tried to. She knew that Isabel would not see, but Aunt Francesca's eyes were keen and she could not tell even her just now. ”

“ Marriage is said to be sufficient "career" for any woman, and it is equally true of men. Like Emerson's vision of friendship, it is fit "not only for serene days and pleasant rambles, but for all the passages of life and death."
It is to make one the stronger because one does not have to go alone. It is to make one's joy the sweeter because it is shared. It is to take the sting away from grief because it is divided, and the dear comfort of the other's love lies forever around the sore and doubting heart. ”

“ As if the little light could reach the veil which hangs between us and Eternity, or penetrate the greyness which never parts save for a passage! As if all Miss Ainslie's love and faith could bring the dead to life again, even to be forgiven!
Her lips quivered when she thought of Miss Ainslie's tenderness for Carl and the little whispered lullabies that she sang to herself, over and over again. “She does not know,” thought Ruth. “Thank God, she will never know!”
She put the rest of the things into the chest and closed it, covering it, as before, with the rug Miss Ainslie loved. ”

“ The grey head turned towards the player—a strange new light in his eyes. But seeing only the vision of his childhood the young man played on and on, and somehow into the symphony crept all the love and sadness of a life time. As he played he threw his whole soul into the music. Oh, the indescribable sweetness of the master's violin! At last his vision faded, and he saw the massive head drop on the same old sill—he heard once more the sobs that come with tears.
The music ended with a broken chord, and he looked up—to find his friend gazing at him with ineffable happiness. ”

“ All at once he knew that he loved Beatrice with every fibre of his being—that she held his heart in the hollow of her hand, to crush or hurt as she pleased. He was shaken like an aspen in a storm—this, then, was why her flower-like face had haunted his dreams.
Swiftly upon the knowledge came a great uplifting, such as Love brings to the man whose life has been clean. It was a proud heart yielding only to the keeper of its keys—the absolute surrender of a kingdom to its queen.
Beatrice was late to breakfast, as usual; and Robert, acutely self-conscious, could not meet her eyes. ”

“ Yet these hours had become a rosary of memories to her, jewelled upon the chain of her uneventful days. Alden's unfailing friendliness and sympathy warmed her heart, though she had never thought of him as a possible lover. In her eyes, he was as far above her as the fairy prince had been above Cinderella. It was only kindness that made him stoop at all.
When the school bell, sounding for dismissal, echoed through the valley below, Rosemary hung her scarlet signal to the outstanding bough of the lowest birch, and went back to the crest of the hill to wait for him. ”

“ Kirsten, literally paralysed with horror, stood like a statue.
The Bear was gaining at every step. Go it, Miranda! On, for Heaven’s sake on! Heed not the thorns that pierce thy tender feet, but run, Miranda, run!
With an inarticulate moan, Mrs. Kirsten flew down the steps, her arms outstretched, and I followed, willing to sacrifice my own life, if need be, to save the child of the woman I loved. But we were too late. Snoof—for it was she—felled Miranda to the ground with one blow, turned her limp body over, face upward, and took something out of her hand, throwing it aside with an angry sniff. ”

“ The beautiful words chanted themselves over and over in her consciousness. The past, with all its pain and grieving, fell from her like a garment. She was one with the sun and the morning; uplifted by all the world's joy.
The True Lover
Her blood sang within her and it seemed that her heart had wings. All of life lay before her—that life which is made sweet by love. She felt again the ecstasy that claimed her in the Tower of Cologne, when she and the Boy, after a lifetime of waiting, had rung all the golden bells at once.
And the Boy was Roger—always had been Roger—only she did not know. ”

“ If the woman is here, and you can find your friend, we may help him to wash the stain of cowardice off his soul. Sometimes," cried Thorpe passionately, "I think there is no sin but shirking. I can excuse a liar, I can pardon a thief, I can pity a murderer, but a shirk—no!" His voice broke and his wrinkled old hands trembled.
"My—my friend," lied Anthony Dexter, wiping the cold sweat from his forehead, "lives abroad. I have no way of finding him."
"It is a pity," returned Thorpe. "Think of a man meeting his God like that! It tempts one to believe in a veritable hell!" ”

“ With a lover's fond fancy, Allison had written a note to Isabel, asking her to meet him in the garden by the lily-pool, at nine, and to wear the silver-spangled gown. It was already past the hour and he had begun to be impatient, though he was sure she had received the note.
A cobweb in the grass at his feet shone faintly afar—like Isabel's spangles, he thought. A soft-winged wayfarer of the night brushed lightly against his cheek in passing, and he laughed aloud, to think that a grey moth should bring the memory of a kiss. ”

“ There is a certain pitiful change which comes with marriage. The sound of her voice would thrill him to his finger-tips, the touch of her hand make his throat ache, and the light in her eyes set the blood to singing in his veins. With possession, ecstasy changes to content, and the loving woman, dreaming that she may again find what she has so strangely lost, tries to waken the old feeling by pathetic little ways which women read at once, but men never know anything about.
In a way, woman is to blame, but not so much. ”

“ At once, the music came, and to the great heart of the organ which swelled with pity and tenderness, he told his story. Wild and stormy with resentment at first, anger, love, passion, and pain blended together in the outburst which shook the very walls of the church.
"God gives us hearts—and breaks them," he thought and his face grew white with bitterness.
Beside himself with passion, he played on, and on, till the sun sank behind the trees and the afternoon shaded into twilight.
As the shadows filled the church, he accidentally struck a minor chord, plaintive, sweet, almost sad. ”

“ The new joy surged in every heart-beat as Rosemary went up the Hill of the Muses, late in the afternoon. Instinctively, she sought the place of fulfilment, yearning to be alone with the memory of yesterday.
Nothing was wrong in all the world; nothing ever could be wrong any more. She accepted the brown alpaca and the brown gingham as she did the sordid tasks of every day. That morning, for the first time, it had been a pleasure to wash dishes and happiness to build a fire.
Grandmother and Aunt Matilda had been annoyances to her ever since she could remember. ”

“ And so the sea, singing forever of Love, creeps around the world upon an unending quest. When the tide sweeps in with the cold grey waves, foam-crested, or in shining sapphire surges that break into pearls, it is only the sea searching eagerly for the lost. So the loneliness and the beauty, the longing and the pain, belong to Love as to the sea."
"Oh, Daddy," breathed Barbara, "I want it so."
"What, dear? The sea?"
"Yes. The music and the colour and the vastness of it. I can hardly wait until I can go." ”

“ Miss Evelina dreamed of peace as a prisoner in a dungeon may dream of green fields. To sleep and wake no more, never to feel again the cold hand upon her heart that tore persistently at the inmost fibres of it, to forget——
Miss Evelina took the vial from her bag and uncorked it. The incense of the poppies crept subtly through the room, mingling inextricably with the mustiness and the dust. The grey cobwebs swayed at the windows, sunset touching them to iridescence. Conscious that she was the most desolate and lonely thing in all the desolate house, Miss Evelina buried her face in her hands. ”

“ When a man has once deeply wounded a woman's pride, he may just as well give up his hope of winning her. At that barrier, the little blind god may plead in vain. Love's face may be sad, his big, sightless eyes soft with tears, and his helpless hands outstretched in pleading and prayer, but that stern sentinel will never yield. Wounded love is easily forgiven, wounded belief sometimes forgotten, but wounded pride—never. It is the adamantine fortress. There is only one path which leads to the house of forgiveness—that of understanding, and it is impassable if woman's pride has come between. ”

“ Rose had worn white at dinner, as she always did, now, the night the June moon came to its full. Isabel, too, was in white, but with a difference, for as surely as the older woman's white was mourning, her silver spangles were donned for joy. At the table, Madame had done most of the talking, for Isabel's conversational gifts were limited, at best, and Rose was weary beyond all words.
After dinner she went to the piano and struck a few aimless chords. Isabel, with a murmured excuse, went up to her own room. "Nothing that is not true," said Rose to herself, steadily; "nothing that is not true." ”

“ Vaguely conscious of the unfamiliar and uncomfortable chair in which he sat, the young man looked out upon Rosemary, bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh, with an all-embracing, all-understanding love. It came to her with a sense of surprise that father was only a little older than she was; he had paused, and she, receiving the gift of life from him, had gone on. And the little mother, brave in her white satin, with her long veil trailing down from her wreath of orange blossoms; she too, loved Rosemary; indeed, with a holy deepening of her soul, she loved the whole world. ”

“ The boy trembled. In slow, measured sweetness the music came—a deep wonderful harmony that held him spellbound. There was a tender cadence that swayed the player's soul, and into the theme crept the passionate pain of one who had loved and lost.
The child knew that the man was suffering—that music like that could only come from an aching heart. With double notes, in a minor key, the master played on; then the violin slipped to the floor unheeded, and the old man laid his head on the window sill, and wept like a child.
Pedro crept away; he could bear no more. ”

“ Ambrose North lifted his grey head from his hands and rose to his feet unsteadily. "And so," he said, with difficulty, "she leans from the sunset toward him, but he can never see her, because he is blind. Oh, Barbara," he cried, passionately, "last night I dreamed that you could walk and I could see!"
"So we can, Daddy," said Barbara, very gently. "Our souls are neither blind nor lame. Here, I am eyes for you and you are feet for me, so we belong together. And—past the sunset——"
"Past the sunset," repeated the old man, dreamily, "soul and body shall be as one. ”

“ Evelina sighed. She was standing close to Anthony Dexter now without fear. She had no wish to torture him, as she once had, with the sight of her unveiled face. It was the man she had loved, now—the emotion which had made him hideous to her was past and gone. To her, as to him the night before, death seemed the solution of all problems, the supreme answer to all perplexing questions.
Ralph crept out of the room and closed the door so softly that she did not hear. She was alone, as every woman some day is; alone with her dead. ”

“ Why should she keep the pretence of coyness long after she has been won?
The Old, Old Law
Far beneath the tinsel of our restless age lies the old, old law, and she who scorns it does so at the peril of all she holds most dear. Legislation may at times be disobeyed, but never law, for the breaking brings swift punishment of its own.
Too often a generous-hearted woman makes the mistake of full revelation. She wishes him to understand her every deed, her every thought. Nothing is left to his imagination—the innermost corners of her heart are laid bare. ”

“ More than once Rose had laughingly accused her of being vain of her feet.
"Why shouldn't I be vain?" she had retorted, in self-defence. "Aren't they pretty?"
"Of course they are," smiled Rose, bending down to kiss her. "They're the prettiest little feet in all the world."
Madame's fancy ran seriously to shoes and stockings, of which she had a marvellous collection. Silk stockings in grey and white, and in all shades of lavender and purple, embroidered and plain, with shoes to match in satin and suede, occupied a goodly space in her wardrobe. ”

“ Time and space were no more. At the portal of the lips, soul met soul. The shaded veranda, and even the house itself faded away. Only this new-born ecstasy lived, like a flaming star suddenly come to earth.
Madame stirred in her sleep. Then she called, drowsily: "Alden! Edith!" No one answered, because no one heard. She got up, smothering a yawn behind her hand, wondered that there were no lights, waited a moment, heard nothing, and came to the window.
The moon flooded the earth with enchantment—a silvery ocean of light breaking upon earth-bound shores. ”

“ True sympathy is possible only when the season of one soul accords with that of another, or else when memory, divinely tender, brings back a vivid, scarlet hour out of grey, forgotten days, to enable us to share, with another, his own full measure of sorrow or of joy.
Ah, but the world was awake at last! Javelin-like, across a field of melting snow, went a flash of blue wings, and in Madame Francesca's own garden a robin piped his cheery strain upon the topmost bough of a dripping tree.
The woman, too, was awake, in every fibre of body and soul. Even her finger-tips seemed sentient and alive ”

“ Outside the gate she paused, irresolute. At the last moment, it seemed as if she could never enter the house again. A light snow had fallen upon the dead garden, covering its scarred face with white. Miss Evelina noted quickly that her garden, too, was hidden as by chiffon.
A gust of wind made her shiver—or was it the veiled garden? Nerving herself to her necessity, she took up her satchel and went up the path as one might walk, with bared feet, up a ladder of swords. Each step that took her nearer the house hurt her the more, but she was not of those who cry out when hurt. ”

“ That little mound of earth upon the distant hill, over which the sun and stars pass in endless sequence, and where the quiet is unbroken through the change of spring to autumn, and the change of autumn to spring, has not the power to destroy love, but rather to make it more sure.
The one who sleeps is forever beyond the reach of doubt and misunderstanding. Separation, estrangement, and bitterness, which are sometimes concealed in the cup that Life and Love have given, are forever taken out by Death, who is never cruel and who is often kind. ”

“ The slanting sunbeams of late afternoon came into the attic, but Barbara still studied the sweet face of the picture. Constance was made for love, and love had come when it was too late. What tenderness she was capable of; what toilsome journeys she would undertake without fear, if her heart bade her go! And what courage must have nerved her dimpled hands when she opened the grey, mysterious door of the Unknown! There was no hint of weakness in the face, but Constance had died rather than to take the chance of betraying the man who held her pledge. ”

“ Madame Bernard, for the thousandth time, looked at her curiously. From the shapely foot that tapped restlessly on the rug beneath her white lace gown, to the crown of dusky hair with red- gold lights in it, Rose was made for love—and Madame wondered how she had happened to miss it.
"Aunt Francesca," said Rose, with a whimsical sadness, "do you realise that I'm forty to-day?"
"That's nothing," returned the other, serenely. "Everybody has been forty, or will be, if they live."
"I haven't lived yet," Rose objected. "I've only been alive." ”

“ The battle is still to the strong, but just as surely her knight comes back with his shield untarnished, his colours unstained, and his heart aglow with love of her who gave him courage.
The centuries have brought new striving, which the Lady of the Court could never know. The daughter of to-day endeavours to be worthy of the knightly worship—to be royal in her heart and queenly in her giving; to be the exquisitely womanly woman he sees behind her faulty clay, so that if the veil of illusion he has woven around her should ever fall away, the reality might be even fairer than his dream. ”

“ Anthony Dexter had seen enough of the world to recognise cowardice when he saw it, even in himself. His books had taught him that the mind could hold but one thought at a time, and, persistently, he had displaced the unpleasant ones which constantly strove for the right of possession.
Hard work and new love and daily wearying of the body to the point of exhaustion had banished those phantoms of earlier years, save in his dreams. At night, the soul claims its own—its right to suffer for its secret sins, its shirking, its betrayals. ”

“ Barbara nodded.
"You're not afraid?"
Barbara's blue eyes opened wide with astonishment. "Why should I be afraid?" she asked. "Do you take me for a coward?"
Eloise knelt beside Barbara's low chair and put her strong arms around the slender, white-clad figure. "Listen, dear," she said. Her face was shining as though with some great inner light.
"My own dear father died when I was a child. My mother died when I was born. I have never had anything but money. I have never had anyone to take care of, no one to make sacrifices for, no one to make me strong because I was needed. ”

“ Proudly she said to herself that she would seek no man, though her heart should break for love of him; that though her soul writhed in anguish, neither he nor the woman who took him from her should ever even suspect she cared.
She forced herself to meet Allison's eyes with a smile, to answer his questions, and to put in a word, now and then, when Madame or the Colonel paused. Yet, with every sense at its keenest, she noted Isabel's downcast eyes, the self-conscious air with which Allison spoke to her, and the exaggerated consideration of Juliet which he instinctively adopted as a shield. ”

“ The petals of crushed roses rustle at his feet—his roses—in the inmost places of her heart. And beyond, of spotless marble, with the infinite calm of mountains and perpetual snow, is something which he seldom comprehends—her love of her own whiteness.
It is a wondrous thing. For it is so small he could hold it in the hollow of his hand, yet it is great enough to shelter him forever. All the world may not break it if his love is steadfast and unchanging, and loving him, it becomes deep enough to love and pity all the world. ”

“ I'd not be minding the scars," he added, "since they're brave scars, and not the marks of sin or shame. I'm thinking that 't is the brave scars that have made you so beautiful—so beautiful," he repeated, "that you hide your face."
Into Evelina's heart came something new and sweet—that perfect, absolute, unwavering trust which a woman has but once in her life and of which Anthony Dexter had never given her the faintest hint. All at once, she knew that she could not let him go; that he must either stay, or take her, too. ”

“ A flower dropped from its vase, a book lying half open, a crumpled handkerchief upon his chiffonier, the pervading scent of attar of roses and dried petals—all these brought him a strange sense of nearness to Rose, as a perfume may be distilled from a memory.
Day by day, Isabel became more remote. He thought of her without emotion when he thought of her at all, for only women may know the agony of love enduring after the foundation upon which it was built has been swept away.
The strange men from distant places came less frequently. Days would pass, and bring no word. ”

“ The lips that quiver with sobs will some day smile again, eyes dimmed by long weeping will dance with laughter, hearts that once ached bitterly will some day swell and overflow with a new love.
This knowledge lies heavily upon a woman's soul and saddens, though often imperceptibly, the happiest marriage. All her toil and striving may some day be for naught. The fruits of her industry and thrift may some day gleam in jewels upon the white throat of another woman. Silks and laces which she could not have will add to the beauty of the possible woman who will ascend her vacant throne. ”

“ Miss Evelina drew her veil about her and went out into the garden, the vial in her hand.
Where was it that she had planted the poppies? Through the mass of undergrowth and brambles, she made scant headway. Thorns pressed forward rudely as if to stab the intruder. Vines, closely matted, forbade her to pass, yet she kept on until she reached the western slope of the garden.
Here, unshaded, and in the full blaze of the Summer sun, the poppies had spread their brilliant pageantry. In all the village there had been no such poppies as grew in Evelina's garden. ”

“ He took her hand for a moment, in his warm, steady clasp, and subtly, Rose answered to the man—not the violin. She was deathly white when the door closed, and she trembled all the way up-stairs.
When she saw herself in the mirror, she was startled, for, in her ghostly pallor, her deep eyes burned like stars. She knew, now. The woman who had so hungered for Life had suddenly come face to face with its utmost wonder; its highest gift of joy—or pain.
The heart of a man is divided into many compartments, mostly isolated. ”

“ No single cry, no weak clasp of baby fingers is ever forgotten. Through all the years, unchanging, and taking on new beauty with every fleeting day, the little face is still before her. And thus in a way Death brings her a blessing, for when the others have grown she has it still—the child upon her breast.
Love's best gifts are not to be taken away. Tender memories must always be inwoven with the sad, and the sympathy and unselfishness which great loves ever bring are left to make sweet the nature of one who is chastened by sorrow. Grief itself never stings ”

“ It means there is nothing in the world that you have to face alone, that all your joys are doubled and all your sorrows shared. It means that there is no depth into which you can go alone, that one other hand is always in yours; trusting, clinging, tender, to help you bear whatever comes.
"It means that the infinite love has been given, in part, to you, for daily strength and comfort. It is a balm for every wound, a spur for every lagging, a sure dependence in every weakness, a belief in every doubt. The perfect being is neither man nor woman, but a merging of dual natures into a united whole. ”