Ruth Erskine

“ It seemed to her that she had lived a little life-time, and learned a great deal, and it seemed a wonderful thing that she was actually going to Susan Erskine with a petition for help. Who could have supposed that she, Ruth Erskine, would ever have reached such a period in her history that she would turn to her as the only a available source of supply and comfort. A great deal of [314] thinking can be done in one night, and Ruth had lain awake and gone over her ground with steady gaze and a determined heart. ”

“ She had known by the start and the swift look of pain which swept over Erskine's face when he first met Maybelle at the dinner table, that the girl in her radiant beauty suggested his dead wife. To Ruth there was a strange unlikeness to the face that she had not loved; but her heart was able to understand how Irene had been to one whom she had loved, nay worshipped, as she had her husband, a very different being, living a life solely for him, and leaving a memory that the fair girl could awaken. ”

“ WEARY days now in store for Ruth Erskine—far more weary and dispiriting than she had imagined were possible to endure. It was such a strange experience to stand at the window and watch passers-by, hurrying out of the neighborhood of the plague-spotted house; crossing the street at most inconvenient points, to avoid a nearer contact. It was so strange to have day after day pass, and never hear the sound of the door-bell—never see the face of a caller—never receive an invitation. ”

“ And Erskine Roberts, who had been half angry with the man ever since he had heard the strange story—though he admitted all the time to his secret soul that Erskine Burnham had been in no wise to blame, went over loyally and royally to his side, and said to Ruth while his honest eyes filmed with something like tears and his voice was husky:—
"Aunt Ruth, it must be a grand thing for a mother to have a son like that man across the hall. If I can be half like him in true nobility, my mother will have reason to be proud." ”

“ It is hard to be despised by one's child. I tell you truly, Ruth, that the bitterest of this bitterness is the thought of you."
The proud man's lip quivered and his voice trembled, just here.
Poor Ruth Erskine! "I am willing to do anything," she had said to Marion, not two hours before; and here was a thing, the possibility of which she had never dreamed, staring her in the face, waiting to be done, and she felt that she could not do it. Oh, why was it necessary? "Why not let everything be as it has been?" said that wily villain Satan, whispering in her ears. ”

“ Erskine, though occasionally she had fond memories of the green silk dress, and the red bow—which she began to be dimly conscious were never destined to shine together—yet took in so much of the general effect as filled her with surprise and reconciled her to the position of lay figure in Ruth’s hands, looking upon her step-daughter with the same degree of surprised awe that a statue might, could it be gifted with life and behold itself getting draped for the tableau. ”

“ Altogether, it was a life replete with satisfaction to both mother and son. Not that they shut themselves away from society. Such of his friends as Erskine thought his mother would enjoy or could help he brought freely to their rooms, and between several of the students and herself there was built up by degrees that kind of friendship which one occasionally sees between self-respecting young men and certain middle-aged women. It was a very pleasant experience, and it made Ruth feel, as she expressed it to Erskine, that she had several sons always ready to serve her. ”

“ Ruth smiled proudly as she made her verbal explanations. "Thank you very much, but Erskine says I am to go with him; he cannot think of trusting me to myself; he has taken care of me for a long time, you know." There was not a thought of sarcasm in this suggestion. She knew that the assumption of authority sat well on her handsome son who could look down on her from his splendid height; it seemed quite in keeping with his appearance and character that he was going to take his mother with him in order to take care of her. ”

“ There would be just little hints of me about them, not a likeness of me at all, but a beautiful girl, and the tears would come into papa's dear eyes when he looked at her, and he would say softly, 'It is her image.'"
When Maybelle talked in this way to Ruth, she once or twice said wistfully:—
"It must be beautiful to be loved in the way that my father loved my mother." But Erskine Roberts never heard any words of this kind. ”

“ Ruth had seen her twice a day ever since there had been any admittance for other than those in constant attendance, but her visits had necessarily been very brief, and there had been no attempt at conversation.
[pg 340] "Yes, indeed!" she made haste to say. "He is growing finely; you will be astonished to find how strong he is, and he seems to be perfectly well."
"He does you credit." His mother's tone was listlessness personified. Ruth, looking at her closely, began to realize that some strange change which seemed not to be accounted for by illness had come upon Irene. ”

“ Irene was as one who had not heard.
"You do not know the worst," she said, still speaking as though her words were about some one else; but she was deathly pale. "There was a child."
[pg 352] Ruth hurriedly wet a cloth in a restorative and bathed her face, while she spoke low and soothingly, as to a child.
"Yes, I know; there was a dear little girl, who is a young woman now,—one of the sweetest, dearest girls in the world. I know her and love her. Irene, for Erskine's sake, won't you try to be careful!" ”

“ Rebecca, the nurse, expressed her mind to Ruth in anxious whispers.
"Doesn't it seem queer to you, ma'am, that she doesn't notice baby more? and he growing so smart and cunning! You know how she was just bound up in the child, and couldn't seem to think of anything else?"
"It is because she is still so weak that she cannot yet think connectedly about anything," Ruth replied with a confidence that she was far from feeling. "You noticed, didn't you, that she said he was so full of life it wearied her to look at him?" ”

“ So marked was this condition of things becoming to the servants that Ruth, beyond measure distressed and bewildered, stayed much of the time in her own room, and considered and abandoned a dozen schemes for going away again. The difficulty was to make any movement that would not excite Erskine's suspicion; for Erskine, being a man and a very busy one, continued to be what Irene once told him he was, "as blind as a bat." ”

“ Roberts's young people came home—an event that Ruth, at least, had dreaded for Maybelle's sake—it was found that the charm was increased. Ruth, in writing to Erskine about them, which she did at some length, had added: "I might have saved you much of this description, by simply saying that the children are very like their mother. Even Erskine, tall and muscular as he is, a thorough boy in every sense of the word, and a manly [pg 281] one, yet has that indefinable indescribable charm about him that our little Flossy always had and always will have, should she live to be a hundred, bless her! ”

“ Ruth said to herself as she sat in her room with folded hands and listened to the vigorous protests of the boy across the hall, and knew that she, his grandmother, who loved every hair of his dear golden head, must hold herself from going to him. "I am sure she hates me, and the feeling grows stronger every day. Oh, what shall I do? what can I do! How is one to endure such a state of things for a lifetime? I am not an old woman. ”

“ From that hour those who watched Ruth anxiously to see whether the sweet young life which was a part of herself would win her back to her covenant vows, saw with ever-deepening pain that this new-born soul was only another and a stronger idol. With all the fierceness of her strong nature, with all the unrest of her dissatisfied heart, did the mother bow before this tiny soul and bring it worship. ”

“ I have kept it to myself just as long as I can. Since Baby came, my life has been a daily terror. Will you tell me how you came to know about me, and why you have not told Erskine? I am sure you have not, but I do not understand why."
[pg 354] "Because," said Ruth, solemnly, "Jesus Christ, to whom I belong, told me not to do so. It is your secret, Irene, yours and His. You must let Him tell you what to do with it."
Irene gazed at her. "You are a strange woman," she said at last, "a very strange woman; but you are good, and I have not understood you. ”

“ Then she arose, realizing that nothing of this afternoon’s crosses would be borne if she whiled the time on Flossy Shipley and Marion Dennis.
From the moment that the two were seated in Mrs. Schuyler Colman’s parlor peace left Ruth’s heart. Here was responsibility, solemn and overwhelming—how to tide this uncultured woman through the shoals and breakers of this aristocratic atmosphere. No sooner was Mrs. Erskine fairly seated than she broke the proprieties of the occasion with the exclamation:
“Why, my patience! if there isn’t Dr. Mason Kent, staring right straight at me! ”

“ She could not plan for the future, and for the present, Maybelle and Erskine Roberts were simply comrades heartily enjoying each other's society, as her own Erskine and Alice Warder had done, without apparently other thoughts than those shared with them by Marian Roberts, who was Erskine's twin.
Ruth wrote to Miss Parker that same evening, giving her a detailed account of one of her talks with Maybelle.
"You may well call hers a 'loyal heart,' my friend," she wrote. "You should hear the pathetic way in which the child talks about you by the hour! ”

“ When at last he excused himself for a business conference and took his guest [pg 332] to the library, Ruth stood where he had left her, irresolute and distressed. Under normal conditions the proper and natural thing for a mother whose daughter was suffering with headache would be to go to her with sympathetic inquiries and offers of help. Should she attempt this? Would Erskine think it the right step for her to take? She feared that she knew only too well how Irene would receive her; but no matter. The question was, What did Erskine want? ”

“ An unpremeditated sentence, evidently from the heart. It was what Susan Erskine had been patiently biding her time and waiting for. It had come sooner than she expected. It made her cheeks glow.
“I will go home with you at once,” she said, in a business-like way. “There is nothing to hinder. The machinery of this house is in running order again. That new second girl is a treasure, Ruth, and, by the way, she has a sister who might develop into a treasure for you. [318] Now let me see if I understand things. What do you want to do first?”
“First,” said Ruth, smiling, “I need to go shopping. ”

“ Boys learn manhood by hairbreadth escapes, you know." She had laughed at Ruth's shudder and had told Marian privately that "Ruth was simply idiotic over that poor boy."
Only Flossy, their dainty, gentle, still beautiful Flossy, had seemed to understand. Had she too meant a caution? As she kissed Ruth good-by, the four girls of Chautauqua memory having spent a never-to-be-forgotten week together at Ruth Burnham's home, she had said gently:—
"The best place in the world for a boy, dear Ruth, is as close to his mother as he wants to be, just as long as he plans to be there. ”

“ I can see that you are not like the Madame the least bit in the world, and I am glad, glad! Oh! I am a very wicked girl! I ought not to have said that; she is good, she is very good; and she is patient [pg 272] with my faults and follies; and yet—there are times when I almost hate her! Oh, dear! what will you think of me? I don't act like this very often; I don't cry often—I don't cry at all! but now I must, or I shall die!"
Then followed another outburst of passionate weeping.
"Cry as much as you want to, dear child," Ruth said. "It is only natural, and will do you good." ”

“ A vivid crimson mounted to the very forehead of the fair-faced girl, and she seemed at a loss how to reply; but she certainly had not been troubled by his appeal whatever it was, so the [pg 376] indulgent mother slipped away and left the young people to themselves.
"Am I to tell her, Erskine?" Ruth had asked her son, on the day that she was to go to the station to meet Maybelle. He shook his head. ”

“ Sometimes I think I know that fact better than any other; I have had so many illustrations of it in my life. It must be hard for him that his wife does not always think just as he does in this. At least I should think it would be very hard indeed for married people not to be as one in such matters."
"Yes," said Ruth, "it is very hard." Then she turned suddenly to a radically different subject, with the conviction strong upon her that she could talk no more about Erskine and Irene without saying what would be better left unsaid. ”

“ From her thick, short hair, down to her thickly-shod feet, she seemed to be almost equally shapeless and graceless; fat, red cheeks; small, round eyes shining out from layers of fat; large, ill-shaped hands; remarkably large feet, apparently, or else her shoes were, and arrayed in a large plaided dress of red and green, which was much too low in the neck and much too short-waisted, and was absolutely uncouth! Swiftly, silently, Ruth took in all these details. ”