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In League With Israel

<h2>CHAPTER X.</h2> <div class='chaptertitle'>THE DEACONESS'S STORY.</div> <div class="figleft"> <ANTIMG src="images/drop_a.png" width-obs="86" height-obs="100" alt="A" /></div> <div class='unindent'> UGUST slipped into September. The vase on Bethany's desk, that Mrs. Marion had kept filled with lilies, brightened the room with the glow of the earliest golden-rod.</div> "Isn't it pretty?" said Jack, drawing a spray through his fingers. "It makes me think of your hair, sister. They are both so soft and fuzzy-looking." "And like the sunshine," added David mentally, wishing he dared express his admiration as openly as Jack. His desk was at an angle overlooking Bethany's, and he often studied her face while she worked, as he would have studied some rare portrait—not so much for the perfect contour and delicacy of coloring as for the soul that shone through it. She had seldom spoken to him of spiritual things. It was from Jack he learned how interested she was in all her Church relationships.[164] Still he felt forcibly an influence that he could not define; that silent charm of a consecrated life, linked close with the perfect life of the Master. One day when he was thus idly occupied, the janitor tiptoed into the room, ushering a lady past to Bethany's desk. David looked up as she passed, attracted by her unusual costume. It was all black, except that there were deep, white cuffs rolled back over the sleeves, and a large, white collar. The close-fitting black bonnet was tied under the chin with broad white bows. She was a sweet-faced woman, with strong, capable looking hands. David heard Bethany exclaim, "Why, Josephine Bentley!" as if much surprised to see her. Then they stood face to face, holding each other's hands while they talked in low, rapid tones. The stranger staid only a few moments. After she passed out, David strolled leisurely up to Bethany's desk. "I hope you'll excuse my curiosity, Miss Hallam," he said. "I am interested in the costume of the lady who was here just now. I've seen one like it before. Can you tell me to what[165] order she belongs? Is it anything like the Sisters of Charity?" "Yes, something like it," she answered. "She is a deaconess. There is this difference. They take no vows of perpetual service to the order, but their lives are as entirely consecrated to their work as though they had 'taken the veil,' as the nuns call it. This friend of mine who was just here, is a visiting deaconess. She goes about doing good in the Master's own way, to rich and poor alike. She came in just now to report a case of destitution she had discovered. I am chairman of the Mercy and Help Department in our League." "Is that all they do?" asked David. "All!" repeated Bethany. "You should see the Deaconess Home on Clark Street. They have a hospital there, and a Kitchen-garten. It is the work of some of these women to gather in all the poor, neglected girls they can find. They make it so very attractive that the poor children are taught to be respectable little housekeepers, without suspecting that the music and games are really lessons. Homes that could be reached in no other way have some wonderful changes wrought in them." [166] "You have so many different organizations in your Church," said David. "Seems to me I am always hearing of a new one. There is an old saying, 'Too many cooks spoil the broth.' Did you never prove the truth of that?" "Now, that's one beauty of Methodism," exclaimed Bethany. "The little wheels all fit into the big one like so many cogs, and all help each other. For instance, here is the deaconess work. It goes hand in hand with the League, only reaching out farther, with our motto of 'Lift Up,' for they have an 'open sesame' that unbars all avenues to them. Of all hard, self-sacrificing lives, it seems to me a nurse deaconess has the hardest. She goes only into homes unable to pay for such services, and whatever there is to do in the way of nursing, or of cleansing these poverty-stricken homes, she does unflinchingly." "The reason I asked," answered David, "is that one day last week I went down to that terrible quarter of the city near the lower wharves. I wanted to find a man who I knew would be a valuable witness in the Dartmon murder case. I had been told that the only time to find him would be before six o'clock, as he was a deckhand on one of the early boats. I had been[167] directed to a laundry-office in a row of rotten old tenements near the river. I found the room used as an office was down in a damp basement. It was about half-past five when I reached there. I went down the rickety old stairs and knocked several times. You can imagine my surprise when the door was opened by a refined-looking woman, in just such a costume as your friend wore, except, of course, the little bonnet. When I told her my errand, she asked me to step inside a moment. The smell of sewer-gas almost stifled me at first. There was a narrow counter where a few bundles were lying, still uncalled for. I learned afterward, that the laundry had failed, and these were left to await claimants. There was a calico curtain stretched across the room to form a partition. She drew it aside, and motioned me to look in. There was a table, two chairs, a gasoline stove, and an old bed. Lying across the foot of the bed, as if utterly worn-out with weariness and sorrow, lay a young girl heavily sleeping. A baby, only a few months old, was lying among the pillows, as white and still as if it were dead. The woman dropped the curtain with a shudder. 'It is the poor girl's husband you are looking for,' she said. 'He is[168] a rough, drunken fellow, and has been away for days, nobody knows where. The baby is dying. I was called here at three o'clock this morning. A physician came for me, but he said it could not live many hours. O, it was awful! The cockroaches swarmed all over the floor, and the rats were so bad they fairly ran over our feet. The poor girl sank in a heavy stupor soon after I came, from sheer exhaustion. There is nothing to eat in the house, and the milk I brought with me for the baby has soured. It seems a dreadful thing to say, but I dare not leave the baby while she is asleep long enough to get anything—on account of the rats.' Of course I went out and got the things she needed. Then there was nothing more I could do, she said. The wretched poverty of the scene, and the woman's bravery, have been in my thoughts ever since." "I heard of that case yesterday," Bethany said, when he had finished. "I know the nurse, Belle Carleton. The baby died, and they took the mother to the Deaconess Hospital. She has typhoid fever. Belle told me of another experience she had. Her life is full of them. She was sent to a family where drunkenness was the cause of the poverty. The man had not had steady[169] work for a year, because he was never sober more than a few days at a time. They lived in three rooms in the rear basement of a large tenement-house. Belle said, when she opened the door of the first room, it seemed the most forlorn place she had ever seen. There was a table piled full of dirty dishes, and a cooking-stove covered with ashes, on which stood a wash-boiler filled with half-washed clothes. The floor looked as if it had never known the touch of a broom. The odor of the boiling suds was sickening. A slatternly, half-grown girl, one of the neighbors, stood beside a leaky tub, washing as best she knew how. Four dirty, half-starved children were playing on the bare floor. Their mother was sick in the next room. I couldn't begin to repeat Belle's description of that bedroom, it was so filthy and infested with vermin. She said, when she saw all that must be done, that repulsive creature bathed, the dishes washed, and the floor scrubbed, a great loathing came over her. She felt that she could not possibly touch a thing in the room. She wanted to turn and run away from it all. I said to her, 'O, Belle, how could you force yourself to do such repulsive things?'" [170] "What did she say?" exclaimed Herschel. Bethany's face reflected some of the tenderness that must have shone in Belle Carleton's, as she repeated her answer softly, "For Jesus' sake!" There was a long pause, which Herschel broke by saying: "And she staid there, I suppose, forced her shrinking hands into contact with what she despised, did the most menial services, from a sense of duty to a man whom she had never seen, who died centuries ago? Miss Hallam, how could she? I find it very hard to understand." "No, not from a sense of duty," corrected Bethany, "so much as love." "Well, for love then. What was there in this man of Nazareth to inspire such devotion after such a lapse of time? I understand how one might admire his ethical teaching, how one might even try to embody his precepts in a code to live by; but how he can inspire such sublime annihilation of self, surpasses my comprehension. He was no greater lawgiver than Moses, yet who makes such sacrifices for the love of Moses? Peter suffered martyrdom, and Paul;[171] yet who is ready to lay down his life cheerfully and say, 'I do it for the sake of Peter—or Paul?'" "Mr. Herschel," said Bethany, looking up at him wistfully, "don't you see that it is no mere man who exercises such power; that he must be what he claimed—one with the Father?" Cragmore's passionate exclamation that day on the train came back to him: "O, my friend, if you could only see my Savior as he has been revealed to me!" Then he seemed to hear Lessing's voice as they paced back and forth in front of the tent, arm in arm in the darkness. "Of a truth you can not understand these things, unless you be born again—be born of the Spirit, into a realm of spiritual knowledge you have never yet even dreamed of. Winged life is latent in the worm, even while it has no conception of any existence higher than the cabbage-leaf it crawls upon. But how is it possible for it to conceive of flight until it has passed through some change that bursts the chrysalis and provides the wings?" [172] The silence was growing oppressive. David shook his head, rose, and slowly walked out of the room. <hr class="tb" /> "Sister," said Jack, a few days after, as she wheeled him homeward from the office at noon-time, "Mr. Herschel keeps teasing me all the time about something I said once about preaching to the Jews. He brings it up so often, that if he doesn't look out I'll begin on him sure enough." Whatever answer Bethany might have made was interrupted by Miss Caroline, who met them as they turned a corner. "Do tell!" she exclaimed in surprise. "You were in my mind just this minute. I wondered if I might not chance to meet you." "Where have you been, Aunt Carrie?" asked Jack, seeing that she carried several small parcels. "Shopping," she said. "Just think of it! Caroline Courtney actually out shopping in the dry-goods stores." "What's the occasion?" asked Bethany. "It must be something important. I can't remember that you have done such a thing before[173] since I have known you. Have you been invited to a ball, a wedding, or a wake?" Miss Caroline beamed on them through her spectacles. "Really, my dears, that is just what I would like to know myself. That's why I had to make these purchases. Your cousin Ray came in this morning, just after you had gone, to invite us all to go to her house at half-past six this evening. She wouldn't tell us what sort of an occasion she was planning, only that it was a surprise for everybody, Mr. Marion most of all. He has been gone a week on a business trip, but will get home to-night at six. Sister and I have been trying to think what kind of an occasion it could be. I know it isn't their wedding anniversary, nor her birthday. Maybe it is his. So you see we couldn't decide just how we ought to dress—whether to wear our very best dove-colored silks and point lace, or the black crepon dresses we have had two seasons. Sister absolutely refuses to carry her elegant fan that she got in Brussels, although I want very much to take mine, especially if we wear the gray dresses. My second best is broken, and of course we wouldn't want to carry a palm-leaf. There was no other way but to take the second best fan[174] down and match it. Then she had lost one of the bows of ribbon that was on her gray dress, and I had to match that, in case we decided to wear the grays. Here I have spent the whole morning over my fan and her ribbon." "Dear me!" said Jack. "Why don't you carry your Brussels fan and wear your gray dress, and let her wear her black dress and take the kind of fan she wanted?" "O, my child!" exclaimed Miss Caroline, "Neither of us would have taken a mite of comfort so. You don't understand how it feels when there are two of you. When you have spent—well, a great many years, in having things alike, you don't feel comfortable unless you are in pairs." It was arranged that Jack should not go back to the office that afternoon. The sisters volunteered to take him with them. Bethany hurried through her work, but it seemed to her she had never had so many interruptions, or so much to do. It was after six when she closed her desk. Mr. Edmunds noticed the tired look on her flushed face, and said: "Miss Hallam, my carriage is waiting down[175] stairs. I have to stay here some time longer to meet a man who is late in keeping his engagement. Jerry may as well take you home while he is waiting." He went down on the elevator with her, and handed her into the carriage. "Better stay out in the fresh air a little before you start home," he said, kindly. "It will do you good." Bethany sank back gratefully among the cushions. Jerry had been her father's coachman at one time. He grinned from ear to ear as she took her seat. "We'll take a spin along the river road," she said. "Give me a glimpse of the fields and the golden-rod, and then take me to Mrs. Marion's, on Phillips Avenue." "Yes, miss," said Jerry, touching his hat. "I know all the roads you like best!" The impatient horses needed no urging. They fairly flew down the beaten track that led from the noisy, bouldered streets into the grassy byways. On they went, past suburban orchards and outlying pastures, to the sights and sounds of the real country. Bethany heard the slow, restful tinkle of bells in a quiet lane where the cows stood softly[176] lowing at the bars. She heard the coo of doves in the distance, and the call of a quail in a brown stubble-field near by. Then the wind swept up from the river, now turning red in the sunset. It put new life into her pulses, and a new light in her eyes. The weariness was all gone. The wind had blown the light, curly hair about her face, and she put up her hands to smooth it back, as they came in sight of Mrs. Marion's house. "It doesn't make any difference," she thought. "I can run up into Cousin Ray's room and put myself in order before any one sees me." As the carriage stopped, some one stepped up quickly to assist her alight. It was David Herschel. "Of all times!" she thought; "when I am literally blown to pieces. How queerly things do happen in this world!" To her still greater wonderment, instead of closing the gate after her and going on down the street, he followed her up the steps. "Cousin Ray said this was to be a surprise," she thought. "This must be part of it." Miss Harriet and Miss Caroline had just smoothed their plumage in the guest-chamber,[177] and were coming down the stairs hand in hand as David and Bethany entered the reception-hall. This was their first glimpse of David. They had been very curious to see him. Jack had talked about him so much that they recognized him instantly from his description. Miss Caroline squeezed Miss Harriet's hand, and said in a dramatic whisper, "Sister! the surprise." "Look at Bethany," remarked Miss Harriet. "How unusually bright she looks, and yet a little flushed and confused. I wonder if he has been saying anything to her. They came in together." "Pooh!" puffed Miss Caroline. Then they both moved forward with their most beaming "company smile," as Jack called it, to meet Mr. Herschel. "Come in here," said Mrs. Marion, leading the way into the drawing-room, while Bethany made her escape up stairs. "Mrs. Courtney, allow me to introduce Mrs. Dameron." "Sally Atwater!" fairly shrieked Miss Caroline[178] and Miss Harriet in chorus, as a tall, thin woman, with gray hair and sharp, twinkling eyes rose to meet them; "Sally Atwater, for the land's sake! how did you ever happen to get here?" "It's an old school friend of theirs," explained Mrs. Marion to David, as the twins stood on tiptoe to grasp her around the neck and kiss her repeatedly between their exclamations of joyful surprise. "They haven't seen her since they were married. I'll present you, and then we'll leave them to have a good old gossip." During the introductions in the drawing-room, Mr. Marion came into the hall, with his gripsack in his hand. "Why, hello, Jack!" he called cheerily. "How are you, my boy? I'm so glad to see you." He hung up his hat, and went forward to clap him on the shoulder and hold the little hands lovingly in his big, strong ones. While he still sat on the arm of Jack's chair, there was a sudden parting of the portieres behind them, a swift rustle, and two white hands met over his eyes and blindfolded him. "O! O!" cried Jack ecstatically, and then[179] clapped his hand over his mouth as he heard a warning "Sh!" "It's Ray, of course," said Mr. Marion, laughing and reaching backwards to seize whoever had blindfolded him. "Nobody else would take such liberties." "O, wouldn't they?" cried a mocking voice. "What about Ray's younger sister?" He turned around, and catching her by the shoulders, held her out in front of him. "Well, Lois Denning!" he exclaimed in amazement. "When did you get here, little sister? I never imagined you were within two hundred miles of this place." "Neither did Ray until this morning. I just walked in unannounced." When he had given her a hearty welcome she said: "O, I'm not the only one to surprise you. Just go in the other room, Brother Frank, and see who all's there, while I talk with this young man I haven't seen for a year." Lois Denning had been Jack's favorite cousin since he was old enough to fasten his baby fingers in her long, brown hair. In her yearly visits to her sister she had devoted so much of her time to him, and been such a willing slave,[180] that he looked forward to her coming even a shade more eagerly than he watched for Christmas. There was one thing that remained longest in the memory of every guest who had ever enjoyed the hospitality of the Marion home. It was the warm welcome that made itself continually felt. It met them even in the free swing of the wide front door that seemed to say, "Just walk right in now, and make yourself at home." There was an atmosphere of genial comfort and cheer that cast its spell on all who strayed over its inviting threshold. It made them long to linger, and loath to leave. David Herschel was quick to appreciate the warm cordiality of his greeting. He had not been in the house five minutes until he felt himself on the familiar footing of an old friend. At first he wondered at the strange assortment of guests, and thought it queer he had been asked to meet the elderly twins and their old friend, who were so absorbed in each other. Then Mrs. Marion brought in her sister, Lois Denning—a slim, graceful girl in a white duck suit, with a red carnation in the lapel of the jaunty jacket. She was a lively, outspoken girl,[181] decided in her opinions, and original in her remarks. "That red carnation just suits her," said David to himself, as they talked together. "She is so bright and spicy." "Isn't it time for dinner, Ray?" asked Mr. Marion, anxiously. "It's getting dark, and I'm as hungry as a schoolboy." "Yes, and your guests will think you are as impatient as one," she answered, laughingly. "We must wait a few minutes longer. Mr. Cragmore hasn't come yet." "Cragmore!" cried Mr. Marion, starting to his feet. "O dear," exclaimed his wife, "I didn't intend to tell you he was coming. I knew you hadn't seen the report from Conference yet, and I wanted to surprise you. He has been sent to the Clark Street Church. I met him coming up from the depot this morning, and asked him to dine with us to-night." "Now I do wish I were a school-boy!" exclaimed Mr. Marion, "so that I might give vent to my delight as I used to." "I remember how loud you could whoop when you were two feet six," remarked Mrs.[182] Dameron. "I should not care to risk hearing you, now that you are six feet two." There was a quick ring at the front door, and the next instant Frank Marion and George Cragmore were shaking hands as though they could never stop. "I'm going to see if they fall on each other's necks and weep a la Joseph and his brethren," said Lois, tiptoeing towards the hall. "I've heard so much about George Cragmore, that I feel that I am about to be presented to a whole circus—menagerie and all." "And how are ye, Mistress Marion?" they heard his musical voice say. "Will ye moind that now," commented Lois in an undertone. "How's that for a touch of the rale auld brogue?" He was introduced to the old ladies first, then to the saucy Lois and Jack. Then he caught sight of Herschel. They met with mutual pleasure, and were about cordially to renew their acquaintance, begun that day on the car, when Cragmore glanced across the room and saw Bethany. Both Lois and David noticed the way his[183] face lighted up, and the eagerness with which he went forward to speak to her. That evening was the beginning of several things. The Hebrew class was organized. Mr. Marion had found only two of his teachers willing to undertake the work, but Lois cheerfully allowed herself to be substituted for the third one he had been so sure would join them. "I'll not be here more than long enough to get a good start," she said, "but I'm in for anything that's going—Hebrew or Hopscotch, whichever it happens to be." The twins declined to take any part. "I know it is beyond us," sighed Miss Harriet. "The Latin conjugations were always such a terror to me, and sister never did get her bearings in the German genders." When it came time for the merry party to break up, Frank Marion would not listen to any good-nights from Cragmore. "You're not going away. That's the end of it," he declared. "I'll walk down with you to the hotel, and have your trunk sent up. You're to stay here until you get a boarding place to suit you. I wouldn't let you go then,[184] if I did not know it was essential for you to live nearer your congregation." Mr. Marion walked on ahead, pushing Jack's chair, with Miss Caroline on one side, and Miss Harriet on the other. Bethany followed with George Cragmore. There was a brilliant moonlight, and they walked slowly, enjoying to the utmost the rare beauty of the night. "Come in a moment, George," called Mr. Marion, as he wheeled Jack up the steps. "I want to finish spinning this yarn." They all went into the hall. Bethany opened the door into the library and struck a match. Cragmore took it from her and lighted the gas. But Mr. Marion still stood in the hall with his attentive audience of three. "I'll be through in a moment," he called. The sisters dropped down in a large double rocker. "You might as well sit down, too, Mr. Cragmore," said Bethany. "His minute may prove to be elastic." Cragmore looked around the homelike old room, and then down at the fair-haired woman[185] at his side. "Not to-night, thank you," he responded; "but I should like to come some other time. Yes, I think I should like to come here very often, Miss Hallam." The admiration in his eyes, and the tone, made the remark so very personal that Bethany was slightly annoyed. "O, our latch-string is always out to the clergy," she said lightly, and then led the way back to the hall to join the others. <hr class="chap" />[186] <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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