Hope Mills, Amanda Minnie Douglas [good english books to read TXT] 📗

be in again"--looking at the sleeping child--"say about four." Then he changed the medicine for Kitty, and gave one or two orders.

Jack thrust a bank-note in Jenny's hand, with his good-by. "Tom will be so glad to see you, Mr. Darcy," she said, with an effort at calmness.

"Can nothing be done for them?" asked Jack, as they regained the street.

"No. Jamie had gone too far when I was called in. Larger rooms, fresher air, nourishing food: that's the secret of a physician's success in many cases. Poor little ones! He will not go through the night. Now, Jack, you are not to come in here, positively. Stand in this breeze, and blow the scarlet-fever out of your clothes."

He did as he was bid, and, getting tired, tramped up and down. How much of man's selfishness and dishonesty there was in this! If the time could ever come when the mists and fogs of complacency would be swept off, and we could see that it was the innocent suffering for the guilty, not that these poor souls were sinners above all men, as the self-righteous Pharisee preaches!

Maverick rejoined him with a grave face, then the two went down Main Street. Houses to let, stores and shops closed, and those open but half-stocked, and wearing a listless air. If three hard years so told on the place, and there was no prospect of better things, what would it be in five or ten? Was it some such misfortune that had overtaken those grand and luxurious cities of Oriental lands?

"Where are the Lawrences?" Jack asked presently.

"Well, I really do not know. I think I did hear that Mrs. Lawrence had gone to New York. The young man"--

Jack held his breath, and there was a strange flutter at his heart. After all these years he saw again the pale, handsome child who had given him a boy's ardent love.

"I have a fancy that he will not amount to much. Queer idea that of Cameron's, wasn't it, Darcy? Who was it that first preached or wrote of the 'duty nearest one'? Of course things cannot stay this way forever, they must mend; and maybe if some one took hold to help mend them--Cameron's idea is not a bad one. Maybe the same amount of money and energy expended here would be productive of good results: still I hold on to Florida for my poor and wretched suffering ones. But it is worth thinking of. Here, let us turn round by Hope Mills."

Jack was silent. "Hope Mills!" It rang through his brain like a chime of bells. Of course he knew that Mr. Hope had given them his name; but had he builded better than he knew? Was it indicative of something greater than the power of one man,--of many men? of strong, earnest endeavor; of truth, honor, and honesty; of thrift, and happy, jocund industry, once more?

But now it was very silent. The great yard had an untidy look, with some piles of weather-beaten lumber, and old _debris_. The windows were covered with dust; the broad stone steps showed where the winter snows had fallen and melted, leaving streaks of dirt, and more had blown in the corners. No cheerful creak of the great engine; no vapory puffs of smoke circling skyward from the chimney; no whir of looms. It saddened one inexpressibly.

"It is a big subject," said Jack slowly. "I've been puzzling my brains half the winter with what wiser heads than mine have said about capital and labor,--Mill and Brassey and Howell, and our own men, with soft, sweet bits of Ruskin, and savage bits of Carlyle. I don't know but Carlyle was right when he said, 'The beginning and the end of what is the matter with us, in these days, is, that we have forgotten God.' Cameron said it another way,--honor and honesty. Because, certainly, honor appeals to all that is noblest in human nature,--to chivalry, and tenderness and thought for others; and nothing ever prospered, in the long-run, that did not have a substratum of truth."

"Well, according to Bristow, we came back to him this winter--not I, Darcy, I don't make any pretence,"--and he shook his head with slow gravity. "But I was interested in the revival on psychological grounds. I had never been so inside of one before. Bristow is a good man, no doubt; but it is just the one chosen way with him,--strong crying and praying, and believing yourself a sinner above all men, and then a sudden peace and happiness, and a courage to endure,--a blind, unreasoning courage to take the present as it is, because God sent it, and it must be for the best. Boyd and Whitlow and Kenny were the great lights. They went about from house to house; they exhorted and prayed. Whitlow was one of the old bank-directors. Strange to say, he did not lose a penny. His money was in government-bonds; and now he has persuaded Yerbury that if his advice had been taken there would have been no trouble. Whitlow discharged his man this winter, and took in his place a half-grown boy. Mrs. Whitlow sets a good example to her class by discharging one handmaid and making the other do double duty. Yet, so far as I can find, Whitlow is a richer man than he was three years ago. Kenny keeps his factory open, and gives the men three days' work in the week, and pays them in poor shoes, as much as possible; and takes out a good deal in high rent. Boyd, who has the name of being the greatest saint of all,--does what? Opens that miserable row of houses, that he couldn't let on any terms, and takes in tenants who are willing to work out the rent. He gets good prices, too. Is he losing on them? Faugh! the very term of charity makes me sick. And this winter he purchased a good deal of the stock of the relief-store. Wretched flour; miserable, adulterated stuff of tea; pork, some of it that wasn't fit to eat; and cheap butter, that every one would have been ten times better without. I went to him one day, red-hot, in a sanitary view of the business; and he preached religion to me,--his kind. 'Boyd,' said I, 'there's Keppler's saloon, your own property, paying you a good income, no doubt, in these hard times, adding to the want and misery of Yerbury faster than your whole church can save. If you are in earnest, go break up that den of iniquity!'"

Jack laughed. "What did he say to that?"

"Meekly, that Keppler had a lease for five years, and was going on the second. The man is so honorable, he cannot break faith with his fellow-man, forsooth; but he breaks faith with God, in a serene, untroubled manner." And Maverick's lip curled scornfully under the fringe of moustache.

"But there must be some gold, or the counterfeit would not be so successfully received. We have had so much false money everywhere, that, since we can make that pass, we do not trouble ourselves. And yet, Maverick, there _is_ something in it that you and I don't see clearly yet; but we cannot teach it acceptably until we can show better fruit. And, when leaders of all kinds, in high places, show that self only is at the bottom of every thing they do, it seems hopeless to demand that the class below, watching them, and suffering from their wrongdoing, shall attain a higher moral status. How can they help following coarsely in the footsteps of their betters?"

"Darcy, suppose you turn parson!" and Maverick laughed half quizzically. "See here: the world wants a very old sermon preached again to it, hammered into every fibre, put up over every doorway,--the essence of all knowledge, all religion, briefly comprehended in this, 'Love thy neighbor _as_ thyself.' You won't need gown or bands for that work. Not to have one code of morals for the rich, and one for the poor; one creed for Sunday, and quite another belief for Monday; to have no lofty, impossible theories and exalted moods, but truthful, honest living; not to push away the miserable, ignorant souls, but take them by the hand in hearty co-operation. Maybe Cameron has the right clew. Why should we let human love be shamed by such things as an Oneida community or a Mormon city?"

The strong, earnest voice stirred Jack like martial music. All these years he had been struggling with a great, blind, confused something,--perhaps it was not a silver-mine or a railroad, but a work just here in the town of his boyhood, where he was known, where he had played and worked.

"Seventeenthly, and lastly," and Maverick looked at his watch, "I cannot idle any more time upon you, and must cut short with a 'To be continued.' We will talk it over again and again; and, if we cannot get it into shape, there is still Florida left. So, while you are dreaming it out by this great silent mill, whose prisoned spirits should prate of prosperity instead of desolation, I'll run my course around Yerbury, and we'll compare notes over our cigars. _Addio_," waving his hand.

Jack watched the compact figure as it moved briskly away; then he sauntered round the mill, down one street and up another, strolled out to Lovers' Lane, and returned by Larch Avenue. The Barry house began to show signs of life, for old Mat was clearing up the grounds. This was the one oasis that had not been bitten by speculation. He thought of winsome little Sylvie, and one summer evening when Irene Lawrence stepped into that pretty, cosey room with the grace and beauty of a Juno. Where was she now? And what was Fred doing? Making a great leap into name and fame, doubtless, now that he was put upon his mettle. The old boyish freaks came back to his mind, the enthusiastic unreasoning adoration, the last tender parting. An intense and subtile sympathy filled his soul; and, though he smiled a little, the memory was very sacred.

The texture of Jack's mind was not of the quick, brilliant, or sanguine order. He went over his books again; he ruminated as he cleaned the garden-paths, spaded the beds, trimmed the trees and shrubbery, and attended to the odds and ends known only to a careful householder. Cousin Jane was in her element out here; and they two discoursed of farming and gardening, and industry, she in a sharp, trenchant way.

She had remarked incidentally that her visit was near its end. Now that Jack was home, cousin Ellen would not need her.

"I don't see why you should not make your home here, cousin Jane," replied Mrs. Darcy. "Grandmother grows feebler all the time, and you have quite spoiled me by your strength and cheeriness. You have no nearer tie; and if you _could_ content yourself with us--Jack was speaking about it a few evenings since. We should like so to keep you, cousin Jane."

Jane Morgan studied the beseeching eyes a while, then dropped her own, and thought.

"Very well," she answered, "if you like to have it so. While I am well and strong I think I ought to do enough somewhere to earn my living, and not use up the little laid by for a rainy day. If you and Jack are agreed, we'll consider it a bargain for a year. I like to be settled about what I'm going to do: there's nothing so uncomfortable as hanging on tenterhooks. When my visit's through I like to go, if I'm going; not stand an hour or two with the door-knob in my hand."