Edith Barnard Delano

“ She lifted her head a little, still turned from him, but did not speak.
"Rosamund!" he cried. "Forgive me!"
It was now unmistakably a cry of pain, appealing and revealing; it steadied her, as a woman is always steadied by that tone in a man's voice, until the moment when she is prepared to welcome it. On the instant, she was no longer the woman of the past weeks, simple, companionable, revealing herself as naturally as a child; she was once more the Miss Randall the world knew, haughty, reserved, aloof. Even her eyes, as she turned to smile at him, were not those he had known. ”

“ For a few moments Rosamund pondered; then she met his look, but there was no smile on her face.
"Do you know," she said, "I have always thought that the people I lived among were the only ones who really knew life, the only ones who felt, or thought, or lived! Lately I seem to have come into a new world."
The doctor's smile faded, and he ran his fingers through his hair. "No," he said, "it's the same old world! Human nature's pretty much the same, wherever you find it. Human experience is bounded by life, and the boundaries are not very wide, either. ”

“ There is far more of pure hero-worship in the friendships of men than the world gives them credit for. Flood and Ogilvie had met on a mountain-top, and on a height their friendship was to remain. Each saw in the other "a splendid fellow"; neither would have admitted in his friend the least shadow of baseness. So, after the unforeseen disclosure of that look, each man felt generously on his honor to appear unaware of any possible feeling on the part of his friend toward Rosamund, even going so far, in his heart and hopes, as to deny that such might exist. ”

“ Rosamund could find no fitting words before the miracle. The joyous words of an ancient song echoed in her heart, "Mine eyes have seen Thy Salvation!"
But she was far from ready for her own Nunc Dimittis. The future drew her, life was welcoming her to its fulfillment. She kissed the pale, smiling mother, went swiftly from the room, past the two men whom she saw through a blur of tears, and out to the road where spring was waiting.
There, presently, Ogilvie joined her. Her look deeply stirred him. ”

“ Suddenly Rosamund's face changed from its blankness to a look of horror.
"Then—if—I—had gone away, as he wanted me to—Oh! Eleanor, then he would not—"
But Eleanor's arms were around her. "Don't, Rosamund! Don't let yourself do that! There's not one of us could live and be sane, if we dwelt on our 'ifs'!"
"But it is true!"
"It is not true. It is not! Because there was no 'if'; there could not have been! You had to stay; you had to obey your own reasoning, not his. We all have to decide for ourselves. It is when we don't, that we get into trouble. ”

“ The ridge-road was only one of the little mountain by-ways that wind through woods and up and down dale as the necessities of the mountain people wear them; the turnpike was an ancient artery connecting North and South, threading cities and villages and farms along its length like trophies on a chain. The shy windings of the mountain road knew nothing more modern than the doctor's vehicle drawn by White Rosy, nothing more exciting than the little companies of armed, silent men who tramped over it by night, or crossed it stealthily by day ”

“ Joy, happiness, exaltation of spirit, return only in new guises; they, too, make their impression upon the memory, but otherwise. The shock of loss, the agony of parting, the fear and dread of the suffering of loved ones, the bitterness of self-reproach, the message of loss—these are the things that return and return again; and of such as these were the hours of that afternoon to Rosamund. Not only on that first night, once more in the small upper room at Mother Cary's, but often and often during her after life did the shock and agony of those hours return to her. ”

“ Yetta called, loudly and shrilly; Flood lifted the boy and carried him towards the house, and Rosamund followed; but halfway up the path she paused, half in amazement, half in repulsion.
Yetta's call had brought to the doorway the strangest of small creatures—a tiny, bent old woman. She braced herself on one side against the doorway, on the other with a queer little crutch with padded top, held by a strap across her shoulder; as she came forward to meet them she moved the crutch, like some strange crab, obliquely, grotesquely, yet with the adeptness of the life-long cripple. ”

“ They did not suspect Ogilvie; why, then, should they look upon her innocent self as a spy?
But morning found her with all terrors gone. Pride of race and knowledge of good intentions had come to sustain her.
In gold, in gems, it is friction which produces brilliancy; in the finer grades of humanity it is opposition, anxiety, suffering, even misfortune, which bring out inherent noble qualities that might else remain undiscovered. The fine courage of high race Rosamund had always possessed, but it lay hidden within her until the sting of an unseen enemy brought it to light. ”

“ Oh—Doctor Ogilvie, be fair! Credit me with a purpose! I have never before had a chance to go on in a simple, clearly defined line of action. It would not seem very much to most people, I suppose—merely to stay here, to live in this little cottage with Eleanor and the children. But it's the only real life I've ever known, as far as I can remember. I was dropped into this place by accident, and I found something to do. What is more, I found myself among real people. It is not much—but to live my own life—that is what I want!" In her emotion she stood before him, straight and purposeful. ”

“ Although no further warnings had come, either to herself or Grace, and although the mountain people continued to show themselves more and more friendly, Rosamund was conscious of a feeling of uneasiness, a dread of ominous, unseen horrors hovering near, of stealthy presences following her, of eyes peering at her from the leafless undergrowth or through the branches of the scrub pine. She tried to persuade herself that it was all a part of the foolish imaginings of a timid woman, yet had to admit that she had never been timid before ”

“ Rosamund sat back in her big chair, her eyes partly closed, deep in thought. The day had been full of crowding emotions. She mentally recalled first one and then another, trying to marshal them into some sequence of cause and event.
On the last moments between herself and John Ogilvie she dwelt least; even in memory they were too palpitating. It is only after surrender, or after loss, that a woman loves to dwell upon such moments; before, they hold too much of fear, not to call forth the feminine withdrawal of the unwon. ”

“ He drew well into the green of the roadside; for, highway and turnpike though it was, the road was narrow enough in this unfrequented part to make passing a matter of calculation. The driver of the automobile had evidently discovered that for himself, for he was climbing slowly and carefully, sounding his horn as frequently as if driving through a village. As the car came out upon the cleared space of the crossroads, Ogilvie turned, with the frank interest of the country dweller in the passer-by, and with the countryman's etiquette of the road waved to its solitary occupant. ”

“ When she spoke of her hope of having Grace live with them, the doctor's face became grave.
"It would be the best thing in the world for Grace, in one way, and perhaps for you; but—I am not thinking of anything specific—but Joe Tobet, if angered, might be a dangerous enemy. If he should resent Grace's defection, and blame it on you——"
Rosamund laughed. "Oh, but I am not in the least afraid of any Joe Tobets, you know!" she said. "What on earth could he do to me?"
"I suppose you mean what could a man of his class do to injure a woman of yours?" ”

“ Pendleton liked Flood. He liked him for the virile strength of his personality, as well as for his possessions; he knew him only in his hours of leisure, and might not have liked him so well, nor at all, if he had known him only when he was engrossed in business. But toward Ogilvie he could not disguise an antagonism which would have shown itself openly if he had been more courageous, and which as it was, appeared in countless small spitefulnesses.
To the man who does nothing there are no creatures less interesting than those whose every moment is taken up with affairs. ”

“ The placing of that light in the window, Mother Cary had told her, was the uninterrupted custom of the house since her first child was born. On that day of wonder, when the shadows had deepened in the quiet room where the miracle had taken place, they had set a lamp on the window sill, and a light had burned in the same window every night since then, a signal to all who should see it that happiness had come to live on the mountain, and still dwelt there. ”

“ While they talked, Tim had been tramping back and forth on the front veranda of the house, himself the horse of a little iron wagon that was one of his new toys. He was seldom willing that Eleanor should waste time in uninteresting conversation with grown-ups. He had taken her for his own; and Rosamund, Yetta, Mother Cary—everyone who had ministered to him before—were all but forgotten. Eleanor must now do everything for him; nothing less than complete possession could satisfy his hungry little heart. And Eleanor's hunger for Tim went beyond his for her ”

“ She had been so sure that the new life was the best one! Now she was disgusted with herself to find that something of the old restlessness had returned. She told herself, with increasing determination, as the empty days wore on, that she had become dissatisfied with the pleasant monotony of the new life because a breath of the old one had blown toward her. For her admission to Flood, drawn from her unawares, as it had been, even before Ogilvie himself had demanded it, gave her a self-consciousness which was hard to bear. But apparently her secret was to remain with Flood. ”