Dimbie

“ I am weak and sorrowful and lonely. I cannot understand it yet; I cannot see the reason why. I am as a little child groping in the darkness. The darkness stretches away to an eternity, and I can see no daylight. But help me to smile, help me to smile when Dimbie comes home.
The afternoon is hot and long and very silent.
Mother and Peter are gone. Instinctively mother knew I wanted to be alone to meet Dimbie. How wise mothers are! ”

“ It matters not that my happiness is marred so long as Dimbie never knows it—if my tears fall in the darkness when he is asleep; if my spirit cries out in its anguish, and only God hears. God will not mind as Dimbie would mind, for Dimbie loves me. It is hard to believe that God loves me, or why give me such happiness just for a little while only to wrest it from me? It is He who has crippled me for life ”

“ I quivered when they touched me—Peter, mother, Amelia—they all came to me, and I cried, 'Leave me, leave me!'"
With a passionate movement Dimbie made to speak, but I laid my fingers on his lips.
"Wait," I said. "Hush, dear. I don't feel unhappy now, that has all gone, you have sent it away. For above all my grief there was a sorrow which was a thousand-fold more keen, more bitter. I doubted you. I doubted your love, and I did not in my mind reproach you, Dimbie. 'He is young and strong,' I cried, 'and I am a cripple. He cannot spend the remainder of his life with a hopeless invalid. ”

“ A great stillness broods o'er our little garden. No blade of grass or leaf of tree moves or rustles to disturb the silence. Jumbles lies curled upon the warm front doorstep; Dimbie lies asleep in a low hammock chair. The birds and insects, and even the ants, have joined in the general siesta; and I, generally having more time than the others in which to indulge in flights to the land of Nod, am keeping awake to take care of all my friends of the garden. I have to keep removing a fly from Dimbie's nose ”

“ Bring a brush, Amelia, and try to weave into my dull hair a little of the bright sunshine. Pin the red rose you gathered into my gown. Twine around your finger the damp tendrils which lie on my forehead, and make them curl as of old. Tell me a funny story of the Tompkinses to straighten up the droop of my mouth. For Dimbie is coming down the lane—I hear his footstep eager and fast—and I want to look like the Marguerite he married.
A bird has broken into song in the apple tree—a golden melody. Is he singing for the coming of Dimbie? ”

“ Sometimes I wonder why God has given me so much happiness. I don't deserve it any more than anyone else. Peter, all my worries are behind me; in front of me is joy. I seem to have stepped on to a little green island of content, set in the midst of a sun-kissed ocean. The waves lap the shores lovingly; the breezes linger in our hair with a caress. You and I are alone, Dimbie. ”

“ Then he stroked the back of my head the wrong way, the dear old way he has always stroked it.
"I do love you, sweetheart," he murmured, kissing the nape of my neck. "There never was a Marguerite like mine."
It is at such moments that the tears come unbidden, tears of intense happiness.
Will Dimbie ever realise how much I love him? My words are few. I remember what Nanty said, although she has now recalled her advice. I don't seem to be able to let Dimbie know what he is to me. Human language is not sufficient, speech is so bald. ”

“ It is said that the young look forward and the old look backward. I am still young enough, I suppose, to live chiefly in the future—a beautiful future, with Dimbie ever as the central figure. But should I live to be an old woman, and send my thoughts backward through the years, a smile will rise to my lips unbidden at the memory of a certain dinner at which Peter and Amelia played prominent parts. ”

“ And from me came the words, 'God is good! Allah is great!' And I laughed aloud, and Dimbie stirred and woke. 'What is it, girl?' he asked. 'Have you had a good night?'
"'A bad, bad night, but such a dawn. Look! Here from my corner I can see all the beauty of the world—shell-pink softness, the red glory of sunrise, a distant cornfield touched with gold, dewdrops on gossamer web.
"'O world as God has made it, all is beauty;
And knowing this is love, and love is duty.
What further may be sought for——'
And Dimbie put a gentle arm around me and drew my head on to his shoulder. ”

“ I said musingly, as I folded the letter and took a photograph out of my desk—a photograph of a strong, smiling face, with low, broad forehead, over which the hair was parted on one side, clear, unflinching eyes, and large mobile mouth.
"Why don't you put her into a frame somewhere about the room?" asked Dimbie. "It is a fine face."
"Because I promised her she should never be on view. She imagined she was plain. I think clever people are as sensitive about their looks as stupid." ”

“ It is something far more delightful than any of these things. I will whisper it to you. "Dimbie is coming home this evening." You smile while I ecstatically hug Jumbles. "Dimbie's a dog?" you hazard. "A white, pink-eyed, objectionable Maltese terrier." I chuckle at your being so very wrong. You are not brilliant; in fact, you are stupid.
Dimbie's a husband. My husband. And he's been away for three days at the bedside of his sick Aunt Letitia, who lives in Yorkshire. I think it is most unreasonable for any aunt to live in Yorkshire and be ill when we live in Surrey. It is so far away. ”

“ Do you still love them? But, ah, I forgot—Mr. Dimbie will be there to take you. There will always be a husband now, tiresome man! Forgive me, but I want to step back to the dear old days when I had my little pupil all to myself.
"Till the fifteenth of September good-bye. I shall, on reaching London, travel straight to Pine Tree Valley. It is so good of you to ask me, and much gooder of your husband.
"'Always your affectionate,
"'JANE FAIRBROTHER.'"
I smiled up at Dimbie, who was leaning over me, but there was no response. ”

“ You will be lonely."
And Dimbie little knew how earnestly during the next quarter of an hour I longed for the loneliness he had predicted. Never had I more fervently yearned to be by myself, for as soon as ever Jane and Dimbie had driven away the Help appeared. She came slowly and deliberately into the room and seated herself on a chair opposite to the couch. She wore the black crêpe bonnet, a black dress, black kid gloves, and she carried a black parasol and a prayer-book. ”

“ Dimbie went very white when I told him. He walked to the window and stared for some time at the gathering darkness. I had chosen this hour, knowing my face would be in shadow. It is so much easier to control one's voice than one's features. Jumbles rubbed his face against my shoulder. I could hear Amelia singing, "Her golden hair is hanging down her back." She sounded cheerful and happy. Nurse had gone to the village to post a letter. She would be back soon to "settle" me for the night. Why didn't Dimbie speak—say something? I wanted to be comforted as only Dimbie could comfort me. ”

“ Dimbie always knows what is right.
In a few brief words he explained to Professor Leighrail that I was a prisoner to my couch, and that he must conduct him to the house. The Professor started as though to offer me words of sympathy, and then stopped. Simply taking my hand in his he pressed it gently, and then followed Dimbie into the house.
"That was nice of him," I thought. "I wish Nanty was here that they might renew their old friendship. Perhaps they—but no," I laughed, "they are a little old, and—Nanty hates men."
Amelia bore down upon me with intense excitement. ”

“ She looked at me with incredulous eyes.
"You still find your year—what was it you called it—wonderful?"
"I have Dimbie."
"And an aching back."
"That would be worse if I hadn't Dimbie."
"No man is worth such love from a woman."
"Mine is," I said indignantly.
"Well, don't flash out at me like that. He must be an exception."
"Of course he is."
"And all women think the same when they are first married."
"Nanty, you are a pessimist."
"Optimists are tiresome and always boring."
"They add to the cheerfulness of the world." ”

“ Dimbie will be coming home now, but—not for four days. Four days seem a long time in which to bury a very tired, little, old lady. What am I saying? Am I growing selfish? "Forgive me, Aunt Letitia. I will not grudge Dimbie to you at the last, when you have done so much for him." And the time will pass, for mother and Peter are still here, and one cannot be dull when Peter is in the neighbourhood.
I hear Amelia's footsteps. She enters the room and tells me I must get up. ”

“ The look which Peter gave to Dimbie obliged me to press my mouth against the tortoise's back to keep from screaming.
Peter sat down heavily.
"I don't know whether you think you are being funny, sir, but I don't. To wake a man up from a much-needed sleep to talk about da—ahem, squirrels and blackberries seems to me to be about the most deucedly idiotic thing—"
"Hsh, father!" I said. "Dimbie wants you to go for a walk with him to the spinny. It's a lovely evening, and you might just happen to come across some squirrels and blackberries." ”

“ Only women understand that which pertaineth to love. Men are very ignorant."
Dimbie smiled and smoked for a while in silence, while I thought of the happiness of Jane. We had had a long and intimate talk the previous evening. Dimbie had left us and gone to the fields in search of mushrooms at my special request. Mushrooms, I had felt, were the one thing needed to complete our evening in the garden, for we were to sup under the apple tree; and Dimbie on his return was to hang out our Chinese lanterns and dot fairy lights about the lawn. ”

“ He's not handsome. For which Nanty, mother's old schoolfellow, says I should be deeply grateful. Handsome men, she tells me, have no time to admire their own wives, so taken up are they with their own graces, which is a pity for the wives.
In addition to the crooked nose I mentioned Dimbie has also a crooked mouth, giving him the most humorous, comical, and at the same time the most kindly expression. I wouldn't have Dimbie's mouth straight for the world. ”

“ A lark was singing rapturously above us far away out of sight, a thrush was breathing forth liquid notes of silver, and a little golden gorse bush was giving of its best and sweetest to the inmates of the grassy lane.
What a beautiful thing is a lane in which the grass runs softly riotous. A street of pure gold, as it were transparent glass, was what St. John saw in his vision. To me such a street, hard and metallic, would be a disappointment. I want in my heaven cool, grassy lanes, soothing and comforting to tired feet.
"What a birthday!" said Dimbie. ”

“ I continued, "to take me away from the garden that I love, from our pretty cottage, would be to tear out my heart-strings. Perhaps you will think it sentiment, Dimbie, but I want to finish our year here—our wonderful year. Into the branches and green lace-work of the trees, into the dewy grass, into the sweet-peas and roses, into the beech—which is always so kind and friendly—into the frog-pond, and, above all, into our much-loved apple tree, are woven a thousand beautiful associations and memories. The memories, you will say, will remain with us, be with us wherever we go ”

“ But she is old-fashioned in the sense that she appears to have our interests most tremendously at heart, is quite painfully economical, is forever scrubbing and cleaning, and calls me "mum" instead of "madam" when she isn't calling me "miss."
Just now she invited me to go and see how far she had got the brush up the flue. She was hurt because Dimbie had said he should have to get up early and see what he could do about the hot water. In fact, she had laughed derisively behind the roller-towel. She thinks no more of Dimbie's capabilities than of mine. ”

“ Knowing that the Tompkinses are superior people, indulging in "hoary doves" at their dinner, I say "Yes" without any further parley, trusting to their good taste.
Mother is coming to-morrow, and I know just how she is feeling about me. She will be thinking if ever her daughter Marguerite wanted her it will be now—now, when she is lonely and tired and without Dimbie. Her dear face will be brimful of joy at being wanted by anyone, and at the prospect of getting away from Peter. She would not own up to the last. If ever there was a loyal, patient soul in this world it is mother. ”

“ Your mistress is poorly, weak and nervous, and she is not to be worried. Now go! Not a word. Go!"
Dimbie stopped for breath, and weeping, humiliated, and very unhappy, Amelia went. Whether she straightway fisted Peter, whether she peppered him from every point of vantage, we have not inquired; but during the last six hours there has been a marked improvement in the behaviour of both. Peter is not bearing Dimbie any grudge for his ejectment, which seems to me remarkable, but which Dimbie says isn't. "Bully a bully and he becomes an angel." ”

“ Has it suffered, lived on since that cruel moment when my bicycle crushed it to earth, or was its life snatched away from it? If it has lived it will be a big chicken now. The soft down will have become feathers, the wee legs will have grown long and thin.
This morning I found courage to voice my request, to tell Dimbie of my longing. ”