Better go back, Lottie; ye were dead tired last time,” said Steady to his sister on the evening of the next lecture, as she sat down by the road-side to rest, on her way to the steward’s cottage.
“I was not half so tired as my heart felt afore I went to the meeting,” replied Lottie. “Thought I, if I don’t get some help with this burden of trouble, I’ll just lie down and die. All the people looking so strangely at me, and speaking so cruelly of me—no news from mother—no news of poor father—and now my dear young mistress nursing a lady in the small-pox, and I away! Oh, if she catches it!” Lottie started up as if the idea had inspired her with fresh energy, “I will go and nurse her; nothing shall stay me; she shall see that I ain’t ungrateful.”
“Maybe she won’t catch it,” observed Steady.
“I pray God with all my heart and soul that she may not!” cried Lottie. “I should like,” she continued, more quietly, as she plodded along the dusty highroad with her brother—“I should like to have nursed Miss Madden, not ’cause I care for her, but for the sake of her brother, Mr. Arthur.”
“He was the best friend as ever we had,” observed Steady.
“He taught us about heaven—he helped us in trouble—he worked so hard to put out the fire when the flames were a’most catching our cottage. And to think of his lying dying far, far away in Jerusalem!” The black eyes of Lottie Stone were brimming over with tears.
“Mind—you’ll be run over!” exclaimed Steady, suddenly pulling his sister to one side, out of the way of an open carriage which was coming up rapidly behind them. The Stones had been walking in the centre of the road.
Full as she was of her own mournful thoughts, Lottie did not even look at the carriage as it whirled past; but she was startled by a voice from it suddenly exclaiming, “Stop, coachman, stop! Yes; that is Lottie Stone, with her brother!”
Lottie uttered a low cry of delight as she glanced up and recognized the face—emaciated, indeed, and very pale—of the benefactor of her family, as he bent smiling from the carriage to greet those whom he had not seen for years. Arthur Madden and his sister Lina had a few hours before arrived at Axe, having hastened thither immediately upon reaching England, from hearing tidings of the illness of Cora. They had been relieved from anxiety on her account by Mr. Eardley, from whom they learned that the invalid was in a fair way to recover. Medical men had strictly forbidden Arthur to expose himself in his weakened state to any hazard of infection; and Lina, his devoted nurse, was thankful not to be obliged to leave him, as the clergyman informed her how tenderly Cora was watched over by Isa Gritton.
THE RECOGNITION.
Arthur and Lina had taken up their quarters at a quiet hotel at Axe. A message from the former to the vicar had brought Mr. Eardley instantly to see them. With hearty joy and fervent thanksgiving, Henry wrung the thin hand of his friend.
“The accounts of you had been so alarming that I had hardly ventured to hope to see your face again in this world!” cried the vicar.
“The voyage did me much good; and the sight of dear familiar faces will do me much more,” said Arthur. “I long to be again amongst my old pupils at Wildwaste, and to meet with honest Holdich once more. Do you still hold your little week-day services in that honey-suckle-mantled cottage, which is connected in my mind with some of its pleasant recollections?”
“I hold one there this evening,” replied Mr. Eardley.
“Then we will go to it,” cried Arthur Madden; “it will so remind us of auld lang syne. Nay, no remonstrance, Lina,” he added gaily, as he read an objection in the face of his anxious young nurse; “it will not tire me, it will not give me a chill; it will make me feel ten years younger to find myself amongst my poor friends again: and I should like our first meeting to be in that place, where we used to worship together. I will ring and order an open carriage to be here early enough to give us half an hour for greetings before the service begins; at least, if it be not inconvenient for you to start so soon,” said Arthur, addressing himself to the vicar, “for you must come with us in the carriage, and tell us on the way the thousand things which I wish to hear of Wildwaste and its people.”
There is nothing so healthful as happiness. The keen enjoyment which Arthur felt in returning to the place where he had first laboured for God, where he had first realized what a blessed thing it is to win souls for Christ, was as a powerful tonic to his enfeebled constitution. Never had his eye looked brighter, or his voice sounded more cheerful, than during that drive from Axe, as he recognized familiar landmarks, and questioned his friend, Mr. Eardley, as to the fortunes of those whom he had known before quitting England.
“I remember that Wildwaste is not in your parish. Has it the same aged minister still?”
“Yes; but I hear that Mr. Bull is about to resign his cure. He is now unable to perform even the shortest service.”
“I hope and trust that an earnest, hard-working man may be put in his place,” said Arthur.
“God grant it!” was the vicar’s response.
“And old Tychicus Bolder, the teetotaller,” inquired young Madden after a pause; “does he still declaim as fiercely as ever against the evils of Wildwaste?”
“The rod of affliction has been heavy on poor Bolder. He suffered so greatly from rheumatism last winter that it was feared that he might altogether lose the use of his limbs; but he has rallied wonderfully during the last few days, and he expressed a hope, when I last saw him, that he would be able to get to church again in the summer.”
“He seemed to me,” observed Lina Madden, “one of the most proud, uncharitable, and self-righteous men that I ever had met with; but I suppose that we shall see him much changed.”
“He is much changed indeed,” replied Mr. Eardley; “for to poor Bolder suffering has not been sent in vain. He used to look around him for subjects of censure, now he has learned to look within; and what he did before to be honoured of men, he does now for the sake of his God. Human nature regards sickness and pain as enemies; but it is through such enemies that a message of love and mercy has come to Bolder.”
“And little Lottie Stone, my first acquaintance in Wildwaste, how fares she?” asked Arthur Madden. “Methinks I see her now, in my mind’s eye, the gipsy-like child, with her earnest black eyes, wrapped up in the old scarlet cloak, and—why, surely, there is Lottie herself!” he exclaimed, and calling to the coachman to stop, Arthur Madden, as we have already seen, greeted the young Stones with pleasure, which was more than reciprocated by them.
With the young hope is buoyant, and the sense of happiness keen. The sight of her benefactor living, convalescent, looking bright and kind as ever, seemed to Lottie’s warm young heart an earnest that, like her late anxiety upon his account, all her other troubles would soon pass away. Her mother would come back—her father would live to be a blessing and comfort in his home—her own character would be fully cleared—Miss Gritton and her dear pastor would smile upon her again—and Heaven would guard her sweet lady from taking the infection of the fever. Mr. Eardley looked on that beaming young face, and his reflection was much the same as that of Isa had been, “There is no sense of guilt weighing on the conscience of that child; truth and innocence are written upon every feature.”
“If you, too, are going to the lecture, Lottie, we’ll spare you the long walk,” said the smiling Lina.
“Yes; up with you, Lottie, beside the coachman,” cried Arthur. “Steady will follow; I’ll be bound he’ll be in time. I never knew him late at my class; he was one on whom I could always depend.”
The few words of kindly praise called up a grin of pleasure on the sun-burned face of the dull-witted but true-hearted lad, who went plodding on his lonely way almost as happy as his sister.
The rapid motion of the vehicle on which she was mounted was very exhilarating to Lottie. She felt herself metaphorically, as well as literally, lifted on high from the dust, relieved from oppressive weariness, given rest and enjoyment while at the same time borne swiftly onwards. When the carriage stopped at the honey-suckle covered porch, Lottie sprang down from her lofty seat light as a squirrel. She had no fear now of encountering cold looks, suspicious glances, as groups from the neighbourhood dropped into the meeting. Every eye was fixed upon Arthur Madden; no one seemed to have a thought but for him and his sister, so lately arrived from the Holy Land. Lottie missed, indeed, amongst the throng her young mistress and Rebekah Holdich, who were both absent from fear of conveying infection; but her prayers for them both rose now with a feeling of joyous confidence, to which the poor girl had been a stranger since making that promise of silence to Gaspar, which had been the source of such pain and distress.
