Charles Major

“ You are lucky, Dic, but she is luckier. When you first told me of—of what happened last night, I was disappointed because I saw your career simply knocked end over end. No man, having as sweet a wife as Rita, ever amounted to anything, unless she happened to be ambitious, and Rita has no more ambition than a spring violet. Such a woman, unless she is ambitious, takes all the ambition out of a man. She becomes sufficient for him. She absorbs his aspirations, and gives him in exchange nothing but contentment. ”

“ I know more about girls than you do; but, above all, I know Rita."
Miss Tousy watched him as he stood before her, hanging his head, a very handsome picture of abject humility. After a moment of silence Dic answered:—
"Miss Tousy, the truth is, I have lost all self-respect, and know that I am both a fool and a—a criminal. Rita will not, cannot, and ought not to forgive me. I am entirely unworthy of her. She is gentle and tender as she can be; but she has more spirit than you would suspect. I have seen her under the most trying circumstances, and with all her gentleness she is very strong. ”

“ He took pride in his dress and was as cleanly as an Englishman. He was reasonably willing to do the duty that confronted him, and loved but three forms of recreation,—to be with his two most intimate friends, Rita and Dic, to wander in the trackless forests, and to play upon his piano. His piano was his sweetheart, and often in the warm summer evenings, when his neighbors were in bed, would the strains of his music lull them to sleep, and float out into the surrounding forests, awakening the whippoorwill to heart-rending cries of anguish that would give a man the "blues" for a month. ”

“ Billy sat contemplative for a moment with his finger tips together. "Men are brutes"—another pause—"but they salt the earth while women sweeten it. Personally, I would rather sweeten the earth than salt it; but a sweet man is like a pokeberry—sugarish, nauseating and unhealthful. My love for sweetness has made me a failure."
"You are not a failure, Billy Little. You are certainly of the salt of the earth," insisted Dic.
"A man fails when he does not utilize his capabilities to their limit," said Billy, philosophically. "He is a success when he accomplishes all he can. ”

“ After the eventful night of Scott's social, Rita's surrender of self had grown in its sweetness hour by hour; and although Dic's love had also deepened, as his confidence grew apace he assumed an air of patronage toward the girl which she noticed, but which she considered quite the proper thing in all respects.
There was no abatement of his affection this last evening together, but she was sorry to see him so joyful at leaving her. Their situation was simply a repetition of the world-wide condition: the man with many motives and ambitions, the woman with one—love. ”

“ If you live among the trees, the wild flowers, and the birds, you will always remain a child. Rita was little more than a child in years, and I know you will love Dic better because within his man's heart was still the heart of his childhood. The great oak of the forest year by year takes on its encircling layer of wood, but the layers of a century still enclose the heart of a sprig that burst forth upon a spring morning from its mother acorn. ”

“ She will cry, and a woman's tears hurt the right sort of man. But bless my soul, Dic, why don't you settle your own affairs? I'm tired of it all. It's getting to trouble me as much as it troubles you." Billy paused, gazing into the fire, and dropped into a half-revery. "I can see the poor little dimpler weeping and grieving. I can hear her sobs and feel her heartaches. She is not good; but the fault is not hers, and I wish I might bear her pain and suffer in her stead. I believe it hurts me more to see others suffer than to suffer myself. ”

“ Here, at last, was the rich man from the city who could give Rita the fine mansion, carriages, and servants she deserved. Now that these great benefactions were at her feet, would Dic be as generous as when he told Billy Little that Rita was not for him, but for one who could give her these? Would he unselfishly forego his claim to make her great, and perhaps happy? Great love in a great heart has often done as much, permitting the world to know nothing of the sacrifice. I have known a case where even the supposed beneficiary was in ignorance of the real motive. ”

“ We all, saving a woman here and there, have our sins, little and great, and many times in the day we put in jeopardy that future bliss. But I console myself with the hope that there is as much forgiveness in heaven as there is sin on earth, save for the hypocrite. There may be forgiveness even for him, but I trust not.
I have done this bit of philosophizing that I might give Dic and Rita a moment to themselves on the sycamore divan. You may have known the time in your life when you were thankful for the sight of a dear friend's back. ”

“ Surely, thought Williams, the girl could not kill a mouse. Where, then, would she find strength to kill a man? But she told him, in meagre outline, her story, and he learned that a great, self-controlled, modest strength nestled side by side with ineffable gentleness in the heart of this young girl; and that was the moment of Roger Williams's undoing, and the beginning of Rita's woe. ”

“ Rita ran for the camphor, Mr. Bays fetched the whiskey, and under these restoratives Madam Jeffreys so far recovered that her husband and son were able to remove her from the chair to the bed. Rita, in tribulation and tears, sat upon the bedside, chafing her mother's hands and doing all in her power to relieve the sufferer.
"Don't touch me, ungrateful child," cried Mrs. Margarita, "don't touch me! If you won't save your father and brother from ruin when you can, you are not fit to touch your mother. I am dying now," she continued, gasping for breath. ”

“ You did not make yourself love him, and you cannot throw off your love. You may for a time convince yourself that you are indifferent, but you are simply lying to yourself, my dear girl, and you had better lie to any one else—the consequences will be less serious. Never deceive yourself, Rita. That is a deception you can't maintain. You may perhaps deceive all the rest of the world so long as you live—many a person has done it—but yourself—hopeless, Rita, perfectly hopeless. ”

“ At no place in all the earth, and at no time in all its history, has the hearth done more in moulding human character than it did in the wilderness on the north side of the lower Ohio when the men who felled the forest and conquered nature offered their humble devotions on its homely altar.
So it came to pass that Dic and Rita grew up together on the heart of the hearth; and what wonder that their own hearts were welded by the warmth and light of its cheery god. Thus the boy grew to manhood and the girl to maidenhood, then to young womanhood, at which time, of course, her troubles began. ”

“ Do not from the foregoing remark conclude that Dic was selfish in his lack of pain at parting from Rita. He also lacked her fears. Did the fear exist in her and not in him because her love was greater or because she was more timid? Had her abject surrender made him over-confident? When a woman gives as Rita did she should know her man, else she is in danger. If he happens to be a great, noble soul, she makes her heaven and his then and there. If he is a selfish brute, she will find another place of which we all stand in wholesome dread. ”

“ No, it isn't nonsense, Rita. You are the prettiest girl I ever saw—but no matter. She is pretty enough for me to hate her. She is the sort of pretty girl that all women hate and fear. She obtrudes her prettiness—keeps her attractions always en évidence, as the French say. She moistens her lips to make them tempting, and twitches the right side of her face to work that dimple of hers. She is so attractive that she is not usually driven to seek a man openly; but Dic—I mean Mr. Bright—did not even see her smiles. ”

“ Bays, taking the package from Rita's hand, opened it; and there, nestling in a bed of blue velvet, was a tiny watch, rich with jewels, and far more beautiful than the one Dic had brought from New York. Encircling the watch were many folds of a massive gold chain. Mrs. Bays held the watch up to the light of the firelight, and Dic, with an aching sensation in the region of his heart, saw its richness at a glance. He knew at once that the giver must be a man of wealth ”

“ Williams, I beg you will not—" cried Rita, endeavoring to withdraw her hand.
"You shall listen to me," he cried, half in anger, half pleadingly. "I have loved you as tenderly and unselfishly as woman ever was loved, since I first knew you. I know I am not worthy of you, but I am the equal of any other man, and you shall treat me fairly."
The girl, in alarm, struggled to free herself from his grasp, but he held her and continued:—
"No other man can give you the love I feel for you, and you shall respond to it."
"It is impossible, Mr. Williams," she said pleadingly. "You do not know all. ”

“ Burglary is a profitable and honorable occupation. Go it, Billy Little.—And for this you came like a wise man out of the East to leaven the loaf of the West—all for the sake of a girl, a mere child, whom you are foolish enough to—nonsense—and for the sake of the man she is to marry." Then the grief of his life seemed to come back to him in a flood, and he continued almost bitterly: "I don't believe I have led an evil life. ”

“ Take the advice of one who is older than you," continued Miss Tousy, the old and the wise, "and never, never again allow anything to separate you. Love is the sweetest blossom of life, whose gentle wings will always cover you with the aromatic harmony of an everlasting sunlight." Rita thought the metaphor beautiful, and Dic was too interested to be critical. Then Rita and Miss Tousy, without any reason at all, began to weep, and Dic felt as uncomfortable as the tears of two women could make him. ”

“ She judged Dic by herself, and feared she had made a mistake.
There were but two modes of living in peace with this woman—even in semi-peace. Domineer her coldly, selfishly, and cruelly as did Tom, and she would be a worm; or submit to her domineering, be a worm yourself, and she would be a tyrant. Those who insist on domineering others usually have their way. The world is too good-natured and too lazy to combat them. Fight them with their own weapons, and they become an easy prey. Tom was his mother's own son. He domineered her, his father, and Rita ”

“ Many an evening, long after Tom had unceremoniously climbed the rude stairway to bed, would the brown-eyed maid, with her quaint, wistful touch of womanhood, sit beside Dic on the ciphering log inside the fireplace, listening to him read from one of Billy Little's books, watching him trace continents, rivers, and mountains on a map, or helping him to cipher a complicated problem in arithmetic. ”

“ Even at this long distance of time, when June is abroad, if I catch the odor of locust blossoms, my mind and heart travel back on the wings of a moment, and I hear the buzzing of the wild bees, the song of the meadow-lark, the whistle of bob-white, and the gurgling of the creek—all blended into one sweet refrain like the mingling tones of a perfect orchestra by the soft-voiced babble of my wee girl-baby friend. ”

“ Out of the trunk came one of the gold-mounted boxes, and out of the box came a package of letters neatly tied with a faded ribbon. Billy lifted the package to his face and inhaled the faint odor of lavender given forth; then he—yes, even he, Billy Little, quaint old cynic, pressed the dainty bundle to his lips and breathed a sigh of mingled sorrow and relief.
"Ah, I knew they would help me," he said. "They always do. Whatever my troubles, they always help me." ”

“ But with all my yearning, life has never held a real purpose compared with that I now have in you. The desire for fame, Rita, the throbbing of ambition, the lust for gold and dominion, are considered by the world to be the great motives of human action. ”

“ Had not Rita been so gentle, yielding, and submissive, or had her father, Tom Bays,—husband to the Chief Justice,—been more combative and less amenable to the corroding influences of henpeck, I doubt if Madam Bays would ever have attained a dignity beyond that of "Associate Justice." That strong sense of domineering virtue which belongs to the truly just must be fed, and it waxes fat on an easy-going husband and a loving, tender daughter. ”

“ His love was so unselfish that he was willing to give up not only the girl, but himself, his blood, his life, for her sweet sake. With all his love for Dic, that young man was chiefly important as a means to Rita's happiness, and now he had become worse than useless because he was a source of wretchedness to her. You may understand, then, the reason for Billy's extreme anger against this young man, who since childhood had been his friend, almost as dear as if he were his son. ”

“ That girl is in love with him, and has set this trap to steal him from you and get him for herself. She has been trying for a long time to entrap him, and you are helping her. Dic is a true, pure man, who has been enticed into error and suffers for it. You had better die unmarried than to lose him."
"I hope to die unmarried, and I pray that I may die soon," returned Rita with a deep, sad sigh.
"No, you'll not die unmarried. You will marry Williams," said Billy, looking earnestly into her eyes. ”

“ The letter Sue Davidson had found altered Rita's feeling toward Sukey; but it left untouched Dic's sin against herself, and she insisted that she did not care for him, and never, never would forgive. With all her gentleness she had strong nerves, and her spirit, when aroused, was too high to brook patiently the insult Dic had put upon her. Miss Tousy's words had not moved her from her position. Dic was no longer Dic. He was another person, and she could love no man but Dic. She had loved him all her life, and she could love none other. ”

“ How sweet it is to prepare one's self deliberately for good news! Billy, in a glow of joy, lighted his pipe, moved his chair close to the fireplace, for the day was cold, and gave the word of command—"Go ahead!"
Dic told him all that had happened in Miss Tousy's parlor, omitting, of course, to mention the blank hour, and added: "I had a letter from Rita this morning, and she feels as I do, that we are very cruel; but she says she would rather be selfish and happy than unselfish and miserable, which, as you know, is not at all true. She couldn't be selfish if she were to try." ”