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Carved Cupboard (Dramatic Reading)

<h3> His Last Message </h3> I hold it true whate'er befall, I feel it when I sorrow most: ''Tis better to have loved and lost Than never to have loved at all.'—Tennyson. This letter reached Agatha soon after the sad news had come to Clare of Captain Knox's death. At first his relatives hoped there might be some mistake, but when further details came to hand, they corroborated the first tidings received, and some weeks after his baggage was sent home, and as much information was given to his sorrowing relatives as could be gleaned from the one or two survivors of the fated party. His mother wrote kindly to Clare, and gave her as much information as she had herself received, but that was not much. The little party had been surprised one day when out surveying, and were shot down one after the other by an unfriendly tribe who surrounded them. Two escaped to tell the tale, but when a punitive force was sent out at once, there were no signs of the fray. The enemy had carried off the bodies of their victims, and escaped beyond the reach of justice. For days Clare was almost beside herself with grief, and in despair Agatha sent over for Miss Villars. 'She is so fond of you, that you may be able to comfort her as we cannot,' said Agatha, when Miss Villars promptly arrived on the scene. Miss Villars shook her head sadly. 'No human comfort is of much use in a case like this,' she said; but she went upstairs, and remained two hours with Clare, and when she left Clare begged her to come to her again. 'You do me good. You make me think there is a God, after all. I have been doubting everything. I feel it is a judgment on all my discontent and bad temper. I often used to tire of him, and wish he were different; and now I feel it would be heaven itself to see him standing before me as he used to do!' To her sisters Clare preserved a stolid, impassive demeanour. She would not leave the house for three weeks after the tidings had come, and then unfortunately meeting Miss Miller, she was subjected to questionable sympathy. 'Very glad to see you out, my dear. Why haven't you been to church lately? It's a very bad sign to keep away from the means of grace when in trouble. Have you heard the particulars of Captain Knox's death? I hope you are quite certain about it, you seem to have gone into mourning very quickly. In cases like this there are often mistakes made. Was the body identified? Well—well, I am very sorry for you; but you would have felt it more if you had been his wife!' Clare turned and fled from her, and stayed away from church for a month longer, then only going at Agatha's most earnest request. When Gwen's letter was received, and Clare heard the contents, she said listlessly,— 'Walter can have my money if he likes; it will make no difference to me. You can write to Mr. Watkins, and get him to see to it, Agatha.' 'And mine, too,' put in Elfie brightly. 'Gwen has a good head for business, and if she is going to venture hers, I am sure we can ours.' But cautious Agatha shook her head, and spread the papers out before her with a grave and anxious face. Then she disappeared for a short time. She knelt at her bedside and asked for guidance about such an important step. And when she rose from her knees she thought sadly that Gwen had planned and purposed without prayer, and wondered if she were too intent upon her own schemes to be wise in her judgment and decisions. 'I am going up to town to talk it over with Mr. Watkins,' she announced, a short time afterwards. 'I do not wish to be ill-natured, and selfish, and prevent Walter from getting on, but I have a horror of these gold-mining companies; and if it should come to a crash, we should literally have nothing left. Of course, you must do as you please, only don't act hastily. Let me hear what Mr. Watkins says.' So to town she went, and came back very tired, but quite decided in her own mind. Mr. Watkins had not scoffed at the company. He had heard a good deal about it, and had clients who were taking shares in it. He thought it might prove a very good speculation, and there were sound business men backing it up. 'But,' said Agatha, 'he said most emphatically that it was a speculation, and that no one could be positively certain of its success; and, after a great deal of consideration, I have made up my mind to have nothing to do with it.' 'Did Mr. Watkins advise your not having anything to do with it?' asked Elfie. 'No; he was quite neutral. He would not commit himself either way.' The result was that Clare and Elfie transferred their capital to Mr. Montmorency's company, trusting entirely to the assurances of the prospectuses that their dividends would be paid within the first twelvemonth. And Agatha had the unpleasant task of writing her refusal to Walter, who had written by the same mail as Gwen, painting his future in glowing colours, and loud in praise of Mr. Montmorency. 'Clare,' said Elfie one afternoon, coming into the study, where Clare was reading in a dreary manner, 'come and see Deb and Patty with me, will you? Agatha wants some honey, and we haven't seen anything of them for ages!' Clare put down her poetry-book with a sigh, but said she would go, and they were soon sauntering over the meadows to Beehive Cottage, as it was called by the villagers. They found both sisters at home, and Deb was busy remaking two merino skirts for herself and Patty. ''Tis not very often I do dressmakin' at home, but we're gettin' rather shabby, and so I'm turnin' our Sunday bests. Sit down, young ladies, and Patty will get you a glass o' milk.' 'And how is your sister gettin' on over the sea?' asked Patty, when she had brought the milk and taken a seat opposite her visitors. 'Deb and me often wonders of her, and how she be likin' it.' 'Oh, she is all right—very busy, making us send our money out to invest in a gold-mine.' 'To buy a gold-mine!' ejaculated Deb. 'No; to put our money in it.' 'Ay; why the need for buryin' it down so deep? The earth is everywhere; it be a safe bank, 'tis true, but safer close to one, than in furrin parts, it seems to me.' Patty spoke emphatically in her breathless manner; and Elfie laughed outright. 'No, she doesn't want us to bury it. We have taken shares in a company that is working the gold-mine.' Deb and Patty shook their heads doubtfully over this statement. 'The company pickin' up gold is generally a low, bad set,' said Deb. 'I heard tell at Squire Johnson's of a young gentleman who was nigh murdered by a rascally set of men, and all because of gold in his pocket. Gold ofttimes brings a curse, my dears; 'tis best to spend as you goes. And if so be as you put a little by for your burial, well, the earth won't tell tales, and a flower will mark the spot. Did I ever tell you o' my great-gran'mother's money pot?' 'No,' said Clare, with interest, for any old tale delighted her; 'tell it to us now.' 'Great-gran'mother were livin' alone, and gran'mother, she were married four mile off, and used to come in on market days, and see the old lady. Great-gran'mother, she were rather snappy and short, and one day she says to gran'mother, "Sally, my girl, when you come to want, pull up a yaller marigold by the roots"; and gran'mother, she laughs, and says she, "What old wife talk be that, mother? Do marigolds bring luck?" Great-gran'mother, she died soon after, and gran'mother were sore disappointed not to find a few shillin's tied up in a stockin'. The cottage were sold, but gran'father bought it hisself, and moved into it with his family; and years passed, and then gran'father, he died of a fever, and gran'mother brought up eleven boys and girls wi' credit. But times got bad, and she were left wi' a cripple daughter, and the t'others scattered away from her, and work failed her, and they were close on comin' to the House. Gran'mother, she had selled most on her furniture, and there were at last but a crust o' bread in the place, and she were makin' tea-kettle broth—for she were Devonshire, and they folk is great at that—when all on a sudden, as she were a-sayin', "Now, Alice, this be our last meal in this dear place," the words of great-gran'mother come surgin' and rushin' through her brain. "Sally, my girl, when you come to want, pull up a yaller marigold by the roots!" and with a hop and a skip, though she were turned seventy-five, she goes straight down the garden, and tugs at a fine yaller marigold. It took a power o' strength to pull it up; and there to the bottom o' the roots was a pot. She pulled of it up, and it were full o' silver and gold, and kept her and her daughter in ease for ever after.' 'Till they went to the grave,' put in Patty solemnly. 'And do you bury your savings?' asked Elfie, laughing. Deb looked at Patty, and Patty looked at Deb with grave consideration. Then Deb spoke: 'There is things we can't just confide to every one, young ladies. Will you be havin' a taste of Patty's hot cake before you leave? It's just time for it to be comin' out of the oven!' Patty bustled forward to procure it. Nothing pleased the old women more than to show hospitality to any visitors who came to see them. While the cake was being got ready, Clare went out to look at the beehives with Deb. They chatted over them for a few minutes, and then Deb put her hand gently on Clare's arm. 'We've heard o' your sad loss, my dear, and our old hearts have ached for you. 'Tis a heavy cross to have the hope of bein' a happy wife snatched away, and a lone and loveless spinster's lot instead stretchin' out in front o' you. 'Tis a long and weary road for young feet to travel!' Poor Clare burst into tears. She could not bear, as yet, to be reminded of her trouble. 'Don't talk of it, Deb,' she said between her sobs; 'it only makes it worse.' 'Ay, ay,' said the old woman, wiping a sympathetic tear away from her own eye with the corner of her apron; 'ye'll be feelin' it sore for a time. But the good Lord will comfort you, if no one else will.' 'It is so dreadful to have to live, whether you like it or not,' said Clare, in that little burst of confidence she sometimes showed to strangers, though never to her sisters. 'But seems as if it would not be easier to die if one left the work that has been set us to others to finish,' said Deb gravely. 'I have no work at all,' Clare responded quickly, almost passionately. 'I could have been a good wife—I hope I could—but there's nothing left me now; no one wants me, and there's nothing to do, and I'm sick of everybody and everything!' 'I'm no preacher,' said Deb meditatively, 'and I don't live a saintly life, so it's no good my settin' myself above my fellows, but Patty and me has our Bibles out once every weekday, and most of all Sundays we're readin' it, so I'll make so bold as to pass you a verse that I did a powerful lot of thinkin' over last Sunday. 'Tis this, and maybe, with your quick, eddicated brain, you'll take it in quicker nor I did—"Strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering, with joyfulness." Maybe that's your work just at present, my dear. Shall we go in now?' Clare's eyes shone through her tears. Slowly and dimly she was seeing light through her darkness. Miss Villars had done much to help her. But nothing seemed to have shown her the grandeur of suffering as this one verse, uttered in slow, halting accents by an uncultured woman. She never forgot it. The verse—God's message to her—was then and there engraved upon her heart; and though she had not yet found her 'rightful resting-place,' though she was still alternately halting and groping her way towards the Light, yet the possibilities of a noble life, a life in the midst of crushing sorrow, such as represented by Deb's text, had a wonderful attraction for her. She was very silent all the way home that afternoon, and shut herself into the study for some hours' more reading; but this time her poems were laid aside, and the Bible had taken their place. It was only a day or two after that she had a great joy. She received a little parcel from Mrs. Knox, containing a small Testament, a gift of her own to her lover, and inside a letter addressed to her in his handwriting. It had been written just before that fatal day when he had sallied forth so unthinkingly to his death. 'MY DARLING,— 'Just a line to-night, for I may not have much time to write again before the mail. We are off into the bush tomorrow on one of our business expeditions. How I have longed lately for our work to be done, and the steamer to be bringing me back to you! I have been having grave talks lately with one of our fellows who is a religious chap. It has brought vividly before me your sweet gravity in the quaint old study that last night we spent together just before I left, when you told me that you thought we both might have more comfort if we had more religion. Do you remember? What will you say when I tell you that I have found out that you are right? I cannot express myself, darling, as I should wish, but I can tell you that your little Testament is my best friend. I have discovered that religion is something more than a head belief. And here, in the stillness of my tent, I confess——' This was all. He had evidently broken off hurriedly, and the letter had found its way to Clare to give her its unfinished message of hope. She bowed her head over it in the silence of her room, and then down on her knees she dropped in a burst of thankfulness for the mercy and tenderness shown her in letting her receive such a message. All rebellion and mistrust faded away, and in true humility and penitence Clare was enabled to take the final step towards the realization of that peace she had longed for all her life—that peace that only comes to a soul that has truly sought and found its Saviour. <h3> CHAPTER XIV </h3> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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