Mrs. Roberts

“ She had not seen Robert. She had just once heard his name, spoken casually, as that of one whose absence seemed a thing unusual, whose presence seemed a thing to be desired. She knew that she had made an impression. She knew, even, that she had made herself popular, at least with the men. With her accustomed candour she had proclaimed herself a rebel, in response to some jest at the expense of Boston, and had settled the score thrice over by her witty jibes at King George. But even in that royalist circle her audacity had done her no harm. ”

“ Robert felt a fierce hatred of the man George of England, who was so unworthy of his kingship! He was mad to throw himself at Barbara's feet, and tell her all his life was hers to do as she would with, to offer his faith, loyalty, honour, a living sacrifice to her love, and bid her send him to fight under whatever flag she called hers! But—he held the madness in leash. The tough fibre of his will gave a little, but would not break. The drops stood out on his forehead. But all he said was:
"Beloved, beloved, I worship you. You are all I can dream of womanhood. ”

“ There's a sword in the air, John!"
"It's surely a stiff-necked king, Jim," muttered Doctor John.
"The sword of a Gault will ever leap from its scabbard to serve the king!" said Robert, loftily, his grave eyes aglow with exaltation.
As he made this proclamation of his faith, devoting himself to a cause of which she disapproved, and quite ignoring her feelings in the matter, Barbara felt a sudden pang of loneliness. She seemed forgotten, or, at least, grown secondary and trivial.
"Do let us hurry home to Uncle Bob!" she pleaded, her voice pathetic, her eyes tired and dissatisfied. ”

“ I am your wife, I, Ermentrude Roberts, married to you in the sight of God and man. I cannot prove it, but as you once said, our hearts know it and will continue to know it as long as either of us lives. But I am not going to obtrude my claims upon you, Carleton, or stand like a specter in your path. Had this woman you have deceived been weak or foolish or unloving, or indeed anything but what she is, I might have held to my rights and insisted upon a recognition which would have profited you in the end. But I cannot shame that woman—I can neither shame her nor bring her to grief. ”

“ If she could not be strong now, what right had she to call herself a woman, or to love a man. She felt at his heart and found that he was alive. She saw that he was sorely wounded. She told herself that he had swooned from loss of blood, weariness, hunger,—but that he had lived, would live, must live. Then she dragged him further back into the grass, where he was hidden.
Calling Keep from the canoe, she sat down for a moment with Robert's head in her lap, and planned what should be done. He must not be found in Second Westings, that she knew. ”

“ At an hour almost unseemly Robert came, of course. And Barbara was gracious to him. As if there had been no estrangement, she talked frankly of Second Westings matters,—of Doctor John's service in the siege of Boston, of Doctor Jim's danger because of his opinions, of Mistress Mehitable's need of her presence at Westings House,—just as if they were Robert's concern as well as hers. The gladness came back to Robert's dark face, and for a moment he was forgetting the barrier between them.
"And what are you doing, Robert? Is it not becoming a little dangerous for you in New York now?" ”

“ She has never sent her anywhere to learn a trade or to work in a factory or to stand behind a counter. It is too true.
No, I was almost sure you did not approve of it. But, for all that, I don't mean to argue Mrs. Roberts' cause. “To her own Master she standeth or falleth.”
Not but what Mrs. Roberts has argued, on occasion,—with Gracie Dennis, for instance, who paid her a few weeks' visit, less than three months after she first went home.
“Flossy,” she would say, “what are you going to do—with the girl? Do you really mean to keep her here?” ”

“ Take the chance I offer you. Hit the trail. Life is precious, man!... You've no chance here. And what's one girl more or less to you?”
“Kells, I may be a fool, but I'm a man,” passionately rejoined Roberts. “Why, you're somethin' inhuman! I knew that out in the gold-fields. But to think you can stand there—an' talk sweet an' pleasant—with no idee of manhood!... Let her come now—or—or I'm a-goin' for my gun!”
“Roberts, haven't you a wife—children?”
“Yes, I have,” shouted Roberts, huskily. “An' that wife would disown me if I left Joan Randle to you. An' I've got a grown girl. ”

“ MRS. ROBERTS. No you don't, M'm. You've got your children, and you'll never need to trouble for them.
ENID. [Gently.] You oughtn't to be talking so much, Annie. [Then, in spite of herself.] But Roberts was paid a lot of money, was n't he, for discovering that process?
MRS. ROBERTS. [On the defensive.] All Roberts's savin's have gone. He 's always looked forward to this strike. He says he's no right to a farthing when the others are suffering. 'T is n't so with all o' them! Some don't seem to care no more than that—so long as they get their own. ”

“ Yet Robert's eye was the eye of the hunter, skilled in the ruses of all quarry. Barbara's woodcraft went immeasurably beyond his,—and perceiving this, her last resentment faded out and she began to initiate him. She named and distinguished for him birds of which he had never even heard, and corrected him with gleeful pride when he innocently mistook the cry of a woodpecker for that of a jay. As for Robert, his delight in this initiation was second only to his delight in his wilful initiator, who was now all earnestness and to him a marvel of abstruse erudition. ”

“ Shall I court disaster by leaving the most fickle as the fairest of her sex to the wiles of this pale hero, this wounded champion of dames!"
"You're right, Jack!" cried Miss Betty. "I see he's dying with impatience to go and find her, and claim a champion's reward! She's here, Mr. Gault. I saw her but a moment back. Go wherever you see the men a-crowding fiercest!"
So Robert had fought for some woman, had he? He had a tie, then! Barbara felt a tightening about her heart, an impulse to rush from the room. Then she said to herself, "What more natural? What are we but the best of friends? ”

“ Like many men in his day, Mr Roberts looked upon a wife not as somebody who would look after him, in the sense of making him comfortable, but rather as one whom he would have the trouble of perpetually keeping out of all sorts of ways that were naughty and wrong. ”

“ I acquiesced at once, relieved beyond measure, “true, there can be no witchcraft in it but that which ever resides in every hair of that dear head. Not her, alas! but me, me it ensnares. God bless you, mother, for this wonderful gift.”
“Be of good cheer, Master Paul,” she said, hobbling briskly off. “I will bring thee some word often to the wicket.”
“I am ready now for the inside of these walls, monsieur,” said I, turning to Waldron, with a warm elation at my heart. The hair I had coiled and slipped into the little deerskin pouch wherein the eye of Manitou slumbered. ”

“ But slay the gallants, slay them, sweetheart! They be king's men, mostly,—and there'll be so many the less to fight, by and by, for the king!"
"I'll do what such a homely little brown thing can!" laughed Barbara, blithely, an excited thrill in her voice. But even at the moment her heart misgave her, at the thought that, more than likely, Robert was one of these same "king's men!" ”

“ Roberts: ‘I’m afraid so. I’ll have the chain mended, of course. But when I went out this evening I left my watch on my dressing-table, and when you struck against me in the Common I missed it, and supposed I had been robbed, and I ran after you and took yours—’
Willis: ‘Being a man of the most violent temper and the most desperate courage—’
Roberts: ‘But I hope, my dear sir, that I didn’t hurt you seriously?’
Bemis: ‘Not at all—not the least.’ Shaking him cordially by both hands: ‘I’m all right. Mrs. Roberts has healed all my wounds with her skilful needle ”

“ Here we be at the top of the lane now, and as ye haven’t spoke, I d’ ’low ye’re willin’ to take me.”
Mrs Roberts jerked at the reins, but she was not quick enough for Sol, who in a moment leaped into the cart, and took up his position beside her.
“Now then, my maid,” he cried jubilantly, “we’re sweethearts.” ”

“ For a little while they eyed each other steadily enough—her face still beautiful despite the bantering cruelty of lips and eyes, and the loathing in every line of it; his the face of a devil. Then, with a muttered oath, he closed his fingers on her tender flesh, pressing with all his strength.
"Ah, my fine lady," he cried, harshly, "you think yourself strong enough to flout Pierre d'Antons, do you? Strong enough to spurn the protection of a soldier and a gentleman! Cry now for your girl-faced Kingswell—for your golden-haired fellow countryman." ”

“ An' then—an' then ye'll be mine—an' when Father McQueen comes in June 'twill be time for the weddin'—for that part o' it. Ye've put the names o' coward an' beast on to me—an' by Saint Peter, ye'll live to change them names or to know them!"
Some color came back to Flora's cheeks and her clear eyes shone to their depths.
"If you fight fair," she said, faintly but steadily, "he will give you what you deserve. I am not afraid. God will be with him—and he is the better man!"
The skipper laughed, then stooped suddenly, caught her in his arms and kissed her on the lips. ”

“ All wise parents chasten their offspring. Would to God they would lovingly, wisely administer more corrections than they do. The outcome, I verily believe, would be a wonderful foretaste of heaven on earth. But I find I am digressing.
Immediately following my conversion came the desire to impart the knowledge received, to my friends and neighbors. The result was that a report somewhat like the following was soon circulated: "Poor Mrs. Roberts! Have you heard the news? Her husband's financial losses have affected her mind; she is going crazy. ”

“ Roberts spoke bitterly. “Martin! For the last time I ask you to forget a cycle that has brought you only unhappiness.”
Martin got out of his chair.
“You should never try to be clever with me, Roberts. I respect the frank demands of the body. Petty intrigues disgust me. Your intricate desires have overruled your intelligence. As an invert I respected you. As a subverter I find you intolerable.”
Roberts walked toward him, motioning, his head shaking. His shining black hair fell across his face which had turned from red to a lurid purple. The white part of his eyes took on the same color. ”

“ Besides, there were reasons for believing that anything of value would find its way from that cellar to a pawnbroker's in a very short space of time.
Having spent hours over many different schemes, and rejected each one as liable to bring disaster, Mrs. Roberts was obliged to betake herself to prayer. If the watching Saviour wanted her to work through the medium of this lecture on this particular child of His, He could certainly see that she was present; could furnish her with clothes to wear, either through herself or some other of His servants. She would wait and watch. ”

“ The stranger opened her eyes and looked at the old woman. Her wonderful eyes seemed to bewitch Mother Nolan, even as they had bewitched the skipper. The old dame stared, trembled and babbled. Turning to the gaping men, including Denny, she cried to them to get out where they belonged and shut the door after them. They obeyed, treading on each other's heels. Even the skipper departed, though reluctantly.
"May every hair o' yer head turn into a wax candle to light ye to glory," babbled the old woman, as she unwound the coarse blankets from about the girl's unresisting body. ”

“ But she managed to remember that even a very small girl may be heavy to carry over a rough road in the dusk, when the man who carries her has had a hard day's work chasing her. And, furthermore, she thought how very, very little, how poor and pitiful a heroine she would seem in Robert's eyes if he should chance to remember her existence and look back! She pulled herself together with a fierce effort, and choked down her sobs.
"Thank you so much, dear Doctor John!" she whispered in his ear. "I'm better now, and you must put me down. I'm too heavy."
"Tut, tut, sweetheart!" ”

“ Jenny fairly shivered with pleasure to think of the silk she had hidden inside the inner room. Real silk it was and new, not a cast-off rag from Mrs. Alexander, of the Kamloops Hotel. The tulips of the dressing-gown faded clean out of sight: they died down in their monstrous array. She saw the Dress, saw it made up, saw the world admire it: heard the other klootchmen clicking envious admiration. But how was she to account for it to Pete? She had been kissed by Quin, and she knew he liked her, wanted her. The big man flattered her senses, he was a white man, rich and strong. ”

“ Four savages were in sight, sprawling in indolent attitudes under the shade of a wide water-maple. In their midst, at the foot of the tree, lay a woman bound securely. She was huddled together in a posture of hopeless despair; and a dishevelled glory of gold-red tresses fell over her face to hide it. She lay in a moveless silence. Yet the sound of weeping continued, and Marc, gripping my hand fiercely, set his mouth to my ear and gasped:—
"'Tis my own maid! 'Tis Prudence!" ”