Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin

“ This gap seems to be filled now and then by some inspired little creature like Mistress Mary, with enough potential maternity to mother an orphan asylum; too busy, too absorbed, too radiantly absent-minded to see a husband in any man, but claiming every child in the universe as her very own. There was never anywhere an urchin so dirty, so ragged, so naughty, that it could not climb into Mistress Mary’s lap, and from thence into her heart. ”

“ HOW THE NEW PLANT GREW
‘Now, Rhoda dear,’ said Mistress Mary one day, when Lisa had become somewhat wonted to her new surroundings, ‘you are to fold your hands respectfully in your lap and I will teach you things,—things which you in your youth and inexperience have not thought about as yet. The other girls may listen, too, and catch the drippings of my wisdom. I really know little about the education of defective children, but, thank heaven, I can put two and two together, as Susan Nipper said. ”

“ They were alone together, each heart knit to all the others by the close bond of a common vocation; and though a heretofore unknown experience, it seemed a natural one when Mistress Mary suddenly bent her head, and said softly:
‘Father in heaven, it is by the vision of Thy relation to us that we can apprehend our relation to these little ones. As we have accepted that high trust, so make us loyal to it. When our feet grow weary and our faith grows dim, help us to follow close after the ever perfect One who taught even as we are trying to teach. ”

“ Behind this honoured steed came a mammoth rock-cod in a pagoda of his own, and then, heralded by a fusilade of fire-crackers, the new dragon itself, stretching and wriggling its monster length through one entire block. A swarm of men cleared the way for it, gesticulating like madmen in their zeal to get swimming-room for the sacred monster. Never before in her brief existence had Pacific Simonson been afraid of anything, but if she had been in the street, and had so much as caught the wink of the dragon’s eye, or a wave of its consecrated fin, she would have dropped senseless to the earth ”

“ It certainly was a very merry place, and if its presiding geniuses were engaged in conscious philanthropy, the blighting hallmark was conspicuous by its absence. Peals of laughter rang through the rooms; smiling faces leaned from the upstairs windows, bowing greeting to the ashman, the scissors-grinder, the Italian and Chinese vegetable-vendors, the rag-sack-and-bottle man, and the other familiar figures of the neighbourhood.
It was at the end of a happy, helpful day that Mistress Mary stood in the front door and looked out over her kingdom. ”

“ Would it not be a lovely tribute to the secret power of this place, to the healing atmosphere of love that we try to create—that atmosphere in which we bathe our own tired spirits day by day, recreating ourselves with every new dawn? But whether our benefactor be the Solitary or not, some heart has been brought into new relation with us and with the world. It only confirms my opinion that everybody is at his or her best in the presence of children. ”

“ When we think of our success with this experiment, we must try to keep our faith in human nature, even under the trying ordeal of the twins.’
‘My faith in human nature is absolutely intact,’ answered Rhoda; ‘the trouble is that the Warrior and the Cyclone are not altogether human. Atlantic is the coldest creature I ever knew,—so cold that he could stand the Shadrach-Meshech-and Abednego test with impunity; Pacific is hot,—so hot-tempered that one can hardly touch her without being scorched. ”

“ The highest of all, the Nirmanakayas, are self-conscious without the body, travelling hither and thither with but one object, that of helping humanity. As we descend the scale, we find Adepts (and a few second-class Mahatmas) living in the body, for the wheel of Karma has not entirely revolved for them; but they have a key to their “prison” (that is what Mrs. Grubb calls her nice, pretty body!) , and can emerge from it at pleasure. That is, any really capable and energetic Adept can project his soul from its prison to any place that he pleases, with the rapidity of thought. ”

“ I thought it was a good deal more important that the Army of Present Perfection should have a roof over its head than that Lisa Bennett should be fed and clothed; that is, if both could not be done.’
‘I don’t know the creed of the Army, but it seems to me your Presently Perfect soldiers would have been rather uncomfortable under their roof if Lisa Bennett had been naked and starving outside.’
‘Oh, it would never have come to that,’ responded Mrs. Grubb easily. ‘There is plenty of money in the world, and it belongs equally to the whole human race. ”

“ Mary groaned. ‘Then there was another young minister? It doesn’t make any difference, Rhoda, whether you spend your summers in the woods or by the sea, in the valleys or on the mountains, there is always a young minister. Have all the old ones perished off the face of the earth, pray? And what do the young ones see in you, you dear unregenerate, that they persist in following you about threatening my peace of mind and your future career? ”

“ Lisa was wilful; the twins had a moral relapse; the young minister came again, and, oh, the interminable length of time he held Rhoda’s hand at parting! Is it not strange that, with the whole universe to choose from, his predatory eye must fall upon my blooming Rhoda? I wonder whether the fragrance she will shed upon that one small parsonage will be as widely disseminated as the sweetness she exhales here, day by day, among our “little people all in a row”? ”

“ Her vocation had called her so imperiously that disobedience was impossible. It is all very well if a certain work asks one in a quiet and courteous manner to come and do it, when one has time and inclination; but it is quite another matter if it coaxes one so insistently that one can do nothing else properly, and so succumbs finally to the persuasive voice. Still, the world must be mothered somehow, and there are plenty of women who lack the time or the strength, the gift or the desire, the love or the patience, to do their share. ”

“ Marm Lisa could push the twins up to this vantage-ground, and crawl up after them. Once ensconced, if they had chosen the right time of day, interesting events were sure to be forthcoming. In a large playground within range of vision, there were small children, as many in number as the sands of the seashore. At a given moment, a lovely angel with black hair and a scarlet apron would ring a large bell. Simultaneously, a lovely angel with brown hair and a white apron would fly to the spot, and the children would go through a mysterious process like the swarming of bees around a queen. ”

“ The whole question of diet reform is in an awful state, and a Congress is the only way to settle it.’
‘How do men stand on the diet question?’ asked Mary, with a twinkle in her eye.
‘They don’t stand at all,’ answered Mrs. Grubb promptly. ‘They sit right still, and some of them lie down flat, you might say, whenever it’s mentioned. They’ll do even more for temperance than they will for reformed diet, though goodness knows they’re fond enough of drinking. The Edenites number about sixty-seven in this city, and nine is the largest number of gentlemen that we’ve been able to interest. ”

“ At such times, those deux petits cœurs secs, Atlantic and Pacific, and all the other full-fledged and half-fledged scape-graces, forgot to be naughty, and the millennium was foreshadowed. The neophytes declared Mistress Mary a bit of a magician. Somehow or other, the evil imps in the children shrank away, abashed by the soft surprise of a glance that seemed to hope something better, and the good angels came out of their banishment, unfolded their wings, and sunned themselves in the warmth of her approving smile. ”

“ Grubb outgrew her shell and built herself a more stately chamber. Another clue to the universe was soon forthcoming, for all this happened in a city where it is necessary only for a man to open his lips and say, ‘I am a prophet’, and followers flock unto him as many in number as the stars. She was never disturbed that the last clue had brought her nowhere; she followed the new one as passionately as the old, and told her breathless pupils that their feet must not be weary, for they were treading the path of progress ”

“ Slowly, reluctantly, painfully, the swarm settled itself into lines in conformance with some hidden law or principle unknown to Marm Lisa. Then, when comparative order had been evolved from total chaos, the most beautiful angel of all would appear in a window; and the reason she always struck the onlookers as a being of beauty and majesty was partly, perhaps, because her head seemed to rise from a cloud of white (which was in reality only a fichu of white mull) , and partly because she always wore a slender fillet of steel to keep back the waves of her fair hair. ”

“ There! she has just come into the playground with Edith. Will wonders never cease? Pacific is embracing her knees, and Atlantic allows himself to be hugged!’
Marm Lisa was indeed beside herself with joy at the meeting. She clung to the infant rebels, stroked their hair, admired their aprons, their clean hands, their new boots; and, on being smartly slapped by Atlantic for putting the elastic of his hat behind his ears, kissed his hand as if it had offered a caress. ‘He’s so little,’ she said apologetically, looking up with wet eyes to Edith, who stood near. ”

“ They had climbed the picket fence, then. Yes; Atlantic, while availing himself of its unassuming aid, had left a clue in a fragment of his trousers. She opened the gate, and ran breathlessly along the streets to that Garden of Eden where joy had always hitherto awaited her. Some instinct of fear or secrecy led her to go quietly through all the rooms and search the playground without telling any one of her trouble. ”

“ It seems as if heaven’s sweet air must play about the towers, and heaven’s sunshine stream in at every window, of a house built from turret to foundation-stone of such royal material. The Castle might look like other castles, but every enchanted brick and stone and block of wood, every grain of mortar, every bit of glass and marble, unlike all others of its kind, would be transformed by the thought it represented and thrilled with the message it bore. ”

“ I didn’t worry, supposing that Lisa was with them.’
‘Nobody on earth could take a fancy to the twins or keep them an hour longer than necessary, and you know it, Mrs. Grubb,’ said Rhoda, who seldom minced matters; ‘and in case no one should ever have the bad manners to tell you the whole truth, I want to say here and now that you neglect everything good and sensible and practical,—all the plain, simple duties that stare you directly in the face,—and waste yourself on matters that are of no earthly use to anybody. ”

“ CLEANSING FIRES
It was the afternoon of the day before Christmas, and all the little people had gone home, leaving the room vacant for the decking of the Wonderful Tree. Edith, Helen, and others were perched on step-ladders, festooning garlands and wreaths from window to window and post to post. Mary and Rhoda were hanging burdens of joy among the green branches of the tree. ”

“ I don’t recognise anybody’s right to have a dollar more than I have; but Mr. Grubb could never accept any belief that had been held less than a thousand years, and before he died he gave some money to a friend of his, and told him to pay me ten dollars every month towards Lisa’s board. Untold gold could never pay for what my pride has suffered in having her, and if she hadn’t been so useful I couldn’t have done it,—I don’t pretend that I could. She’s an offence to the eye.’
‘Not any longer,’ said Mary proudly. ”

“ Mistress Mary, I am not sure but that, in self-defence, we ought to become a highly specialised Something. We are now a home, a mother, a nursery, a labour bureau, a divorce court, a registry of appeals, a soup kitchen, an advisory hoard, and a police force. If we take her, what shall we be?’
‘We will see first where she belongs,’ smiled Mary. (Nobody could help smiling at Rhoda.) ‘Somebody has been neglecting his or her duty. If we can make that somebody realise his delinquencies, all the better, for the responsibility will not be ours. ”

“ Everybody thought something was going to happen. Mary had dozens of friends and more acquaintances in that motley assemblage, and they somehow felt that there were dramatic possibilities in the situation. Unless she could think of something, Marm Lisa’s last chance was gone: that was the sentiment of the crowd, and Mary agreed in it.
Her cape had long since dropped from her shoulders, her hat was trampled under foot, the fair coil of hair had loosened and was falling on her neck, and the steel fillet blazed in the firelight. ”

“ I’ve always had a burning desire to explore the secret chambers of Thought, always yearned to understand and explain the universe.’
‘I have never tried to explain it,’ sighed Mary a little wearily; ‘one is so busy trying to keep one’s little corner clean and sweet and pleasant, a helpful place where sad and tired souls can sit down and rest.’
‘Who wants to sit down and rest? Not I!’ exclaimed Mrs. Grubb. ‘But then, I’m no criterion, I have such an active mind.’
‘There are just a few passive virtues,’ said Mary teasingly. ‘We must remember that activity doesn’t always make for good ”

“ Grubb sank down in the rocking-chair in despair. ‘Don’t I need some consideration as well as that little imbecile? Am I, with my ambitions and aspirations, to be for ever hampered by these three nightmares of children? Oh, if I could once get an astral body, I would stay in it, you may be sure!’
‘You do not absolutely need Lisa yourself,’ argued Mary. ‘It is the twins to whom she has been indispensable. Provide for them in some way, and she is freed from a responsibility for which she is not, and never was, fit. ”

“ She hardly knew why, but Mistress Mary’s wet eyes tortured her; she made an ejaculation of discomfort and resentment, and taking the corner of her apron wiped her new friend’s face softly, gazing at her with a dumb sorrow until the smile came back; then she took out her string and her doll and played by herself as contentedly as usual.
It was thus that heaven began to dawn on poor Marm Lisa. At first only a physical heaven: temporary separation from Atlantic and Pacific; a chair to herself in a warm, sunshiny room; beautiful, bright, incomprehensible things hanging on the walls ”

“ Every eye was fixed on the motionless figure of Marm Lisa, who had drawn her shawl over her head, as if just conscious of nearer heat.
The wind changed, and blew the smoke away from her figure. The men on the roof stopped work, not caring for the moment whether they saved the tenement house or not, since a human life was hanging in the balance. The intoxicated woman threw a beer-bottle into the street, and her son ran up from the crowd and locked her safely in her kitchen at the back of the house.
‘Jump this minute, or you’re a dead girl!’ shouted the officer, hoarse with emotion. ”

“ Edith’s group was slaving over Helen’s gift, Rhoda’s over Edith’s, and so on, while all the groups had some marvellous bit of co-operative work in hand for Mistress Mary. At the afternoon council, the neophytes were obliged to labour conscientiously on presents destined for themselves, rubbing off stains, disentangling knots, joining threads, filling up wrong holes and punching right ones, surreptitiously getting the offerings of love into a condition where the energetic infants could work on them again. ”

“ Grubb’s perplexities. It does not and cannot always happen, in a world like this, that vice is assisted to shirk, and virtue aideth to do, its duty; but any man as marvellously afflicted as Mr. Grubb is likely to receive not only spiritual consolation, but miraculous aid of some sort. The spectacle of the worthy creature as he gave the reluctant twins their occasional bath, and fed them on food regularly prescribed by Mrs. Grubb, and almost as regularly rejected by them, would have melted the stoniest heart. And who was the angel of deliverance? ”

“ Her spiritual antennæ were so fine, so fine, that they discerned the good in everything; they were feeling now after the soft spot in the rocky heart of Atlantic Simonson; they had not found it yet, but they would—oh, they would in time; for if hope is the lover’s staff, it is no less that of the idealist.
Marm Lisa looked upon the miracles that happened under Mistress Mary’s roof with a sort of dazed wonder, but her intelligence grew a little day by day; and though she sadly taxed everybody’s patience, she infused a new spirit into all the neophytes. ”

“ Atlantic and Pacific Simonson had previously known little, and Marm Lisa less, of Christmas-time, but the whole month of December in Mistress Mary’s garden was a continual feast of the new-born Babe. There was an almost oppressive atmosphere of secrecy abroad. Each family of children, working in the retirement of its particular corner, would shriek, ‘Oh, don’t come!’ and hide small objects under pinafores and tables when Mary, Rhoda, Edith, or Helen appeared. ”