Maris (14 page)

And then it wasn't Tilford at all. It was Lane Maitland. She almost laughed aloud with relief as she recognized his voice.

"This is Broadcasting Station Number Two," he said solemnly, "reporting on Maitland Detention Camp. Twelve o'clock noon, daylight saving time. The entire force of cadets slept well through the night, save for an hour when they were called out to engage in combat with a bat who had stolen into the barracks. Nevertheless, they arose on time, made their beds, took a swim in the creek, ate a hearty breakfast, had devotions, went through setting up exercises. Then an hour of study personally conducted by the scoutmaster, played two sets of tennis, and now are about to indulge in a noonday repast. They will then pack a lunch and start on a hike to Conner's woods where they will hunt for wildflowers and lichens for tomorrow's natural science study, eat their lunch, and return to camp about sundown. Communication may be had with them by telephoning to Conner's, Severn--1188, who will at once advise the scoutmaster. In case cadets may be needed, they will return by bus, which passes Conner's every fifteen minutes. If these arrangements are not agreeable, kindly advise at once. Lane Maitland speaking."

Maris gave a pleasant little giggle, and the heavy burden she had anticipated rolled away out of sight for the moment. It was like stooping to pick up a great iron weight and finding it only a bundle of feathers.

"Delightful!" she said. "Won't that be grand for the boys! I know they will love it. I approve most heartily. I only hope you won't be worn out. I don't see how I can ever thank you for what you are doing."

"I'm having the time of my life myself. But how about you? Did you have a hard night?"

"A busy one. Not so hard perhaps as it might have been. We were all up most of the night. Dad wasn't so well, and Lexie was restless, but we're all very thankful it was no worse. Mother seems to be resting all right just now."

Her voice trailed off sadly, and the listener thought he discerned anxiety returning to it.

"You are sure it's all right to take the boys away even as far as Conner's? I can keep them happy here at home if you prefer."

"No, I think it's all right. The doctor seems to think Mother has a good chance, though of course he doesn't promise anything."

There was a catch in her voice, and the young man was quick to understand.

"Yes, I know," he said gently. "We've been praying, the boys and I," he added half shyly. "That helps!"

"Oh, thank you!" said Maris fervently. "That does help."

"Well, I won't keep you any longer now. I'll report again this evening."

Maris turned from the telephone strangely comforted. What was there about that simple little conversation that had taken the tiredness away from her heart?

What a blessing that Lane Maitland had come home just at this time.

And then it suddenly came to her mind to wish vaguely that Tilford were something like Lane Maitland.

How Tilford would have loved that!

 

 

As the day wore on toward sunset, Maris had need of all the comfort there was to be had. It was not that any fresh calamity had occurred; it was just that it was not easy to go on making endless strings of paper dollies and reading stories with eyes that were heavy for sleep and a voice that lagged from very weariness. To be patient hour after hour with the poor petulant baby who couldn't understand why she felt so hot and miserable, who wanted things until they came and then snarled at them.

By this time, too, old friends and neighbors were getting to know that Mrs. Mayberry was very ill, and they kept coming to the door, and asking for Maris, or calling up on the telephone and demanding to speak to her. Even the sign of quarantine on the door did not deter them. And every time she was called to the telephone or the front door she went with a tremor lest it would be some of the Thorpes. And yet she would not let herself think about that possibility. She could not prepare to deal with them, because it would surely be the unexpected with which she would have to deal. So she fell into the habit unconsciously of letting her heart cry out for help to God as she went downstairs.

But the day wore on and still there was no word from the Thorpes, and now as she went to lie down and rest a little during an interval after supper, it began to seem ominous, this silence. What did it mean? True, she had given Tilford back his ring and left him. But she could not think that he would take a repulse like that without an argument or some kind of retaliation. A word was never final to him unless he was the one to speak it.

It suddenly came to her, as she lay thinking this over, that she was falling more and more into the attitude of criticizing Tilford, comparing him with others, fearing his decisions. What was the matter with her? Didn't she love him the way a girl should love the man she was to marry?

It wasn't thinkable that Tilford was letting another day go by without making some move about those wedding invitations, either. And now it was definite in her mind that there was nothing she could do about them for the present. Her mother's condition all day had been unchanged. So far as she herself could judge, her mother seemed to be sinking hour by hour. Each time she went to the room and cast a glance toward the bed, her mother's frail sweet face looked more delicate and ethereal, as if a great change was coming over her. And yet the doctor and the nurse did not seem to be particularly troubled. But to her inexperienced eyes there seemed no hope at all that she would rally. Obviously, under such conditions, one could not send out wedding invitations.

And if Mother should die?

Oh, she couldn't go into that thought, not so long as there was a breath of hope. But if Mother should die, what heart could she or anyone have for weddings?

And if Mother didn't die, was the prospect of a wedding any more likely?

Even if she got well, it would be a long time before she would be able to take up life again and look after her family!

The darkness had settled down about Maris and she had not turned on her light. Lexie was asleep, and there was no need to disturb her with a light. Besides, it was pleasanter here on the bed looking out into the soft night. She could even see a few stars twinkling between the tree branches, and there was a soft radiance in the east where sometime soon the moon was about to rise. There was a soft little stir of a breeze that rustled the leaves of the big beech tree outside her window. She was so tired that she longed to drift off and forget all her perplexities, yet her thoughts would not let go while those troublous questions were in her mind.

Suddenly she heard voices, just the other side of the hedge on the Maitland place, under the hemlock trees. It was Merrick and Lane. They had come to the old rustic seats to talk, in order not to disturb the boys, very likely. It was Merrick who was speaking. By the sound, Maris judged he had stretched his length on the rickety old seat, and Lane was hanging up the hammock between the trees. She could hear the grating of the rings as they slipped into the hooks. The old hammock they used to all use so freely, the old hooks! Wouldn't they be rusty and unsafe?

But when Merrick spoke, it seemed as if there must have been some thought transference between him and herself, for he was voicing some of the very questions that had been in her mind.

"Well, I'm sure I don't know what's coming to us all," Merrick was saying in a gloomy voice. "Even if Mother gets well, it'll be a long time. The doctor acknowledged that much. A long time before she's able to be about among us again, looking after everything, you know."

Lane's voice was quiet but had a clear ring to it as he said, "Well, you know that nothing can come to you except with God's permission."

"You think that?" Merrick's voice was almost bitter as he asked the question.

"I know that."

"Doesn't look that way to me," said the younger fellow. "Looks more like some of it came from the devil."

"Well, the devil may have had something to do with it, but for some good, wise reason of His own, God permits it."

"I can't see that," said Merrick, and Maris, listening, could almost see the narrowing of Merrick's eyes and the wry twist of his lips. "I'm beginning to think God doesn't have anything to do with things. Look at marriage, now. They say that marriages were made in heaven. But most of 'em are a mess! I hope I never fall in love. If I do, I'll go and drown myself or something. Marriage makes a lot of trouble for everybody."

"Look here now, brother! I object to a man that has as wonderful a father and mother as you have saying a mean thing like that!"

"Oh, yes, Dad and Mother, of course that's different. There aren't many like them. Why, I believe if anything was to happen to Mother, Dad would just wilt away and die himself, he's so bound up in her."

"Well, I had a mother and father like that, too, so I'm not listening to any tirades like that on marriage."

"Oh, well, I mean modern marriage. Of course, people used to be all right when Dad and Mother were young. But you take today. Take my sister. Here she's all wrapped up in that poor fish she's going to marry, and what's going to become of us when she's gone? Mother down sick for at least a year, Dad hardly able to hold up his head till Mother gets well, and there'll be only me to bring up the family. Nice hand I'll make bringing 'em up. I might make a stab at looking after the boys, but what am I going to do with Gwyneth and Lexie? Where do you think I found Gwyn last night, after we'd sent her over to the Howards to stay all night and study? Down at the drugstore eating ice cream with Rance Mosher, the little rat! Maybe you don't know what he is, but I do, plenty!"

Merrick lowered his voice and talked earnestly. Maris couldn't hear what he said, but she knew he was telling Lane something dreadful Rance had done, for Lane's earnest tones showed that he fully agreed with Merrick in his judgment that Rance was no fit companion for Gwyneth.

"But look here, Merrick," said Lane, and now his voice was louder again so that she distinctly heard the words, "you don't need to worry about that. There'll be some way provided to take care of the family if such a situation arises. Maris and her husband would probably arrange to come and live with you, and she would take charge."

"Not she! She wouldn't be allowed to! You don't know Tilford. He's the most selfish brute that ever walked the earth!"

"Oh, but surely in circumstances like that! No decent man could refuse."

"Couldn't he? Well, maybe he isn't decent, then. But even if he would, we wouldn't want him. He thinks we're the scum of the earth and he's the top layer in paradise. Gosh! I couldn't ask for any worse fate than to have him come and stay in the house awhile. He makes me so mad the way he bosses my sister around, and makes her like it, that I can't see straight. It's partly what's killing Mother, too. Maybe it's even that altogether. That and the fact that she's pretty sure that when Maris is married to him that's the end of her so far as we're concerned. And gosh, Mother's all bound up in Maris! That's what I mean. If God lets that thing happen to us all, I can't see that He can care for any of us!"

"Well, even at that, God might have some great good wrapped up in it for you," said Lane Maitland's slow, earnest voice, thoughtfully.

"I can't see it!"

"It might be there, even if you can't see it."

"Well, have it your own way, Parson, but I tell you it's a pretty tough thing to swallow, having Maris marry that pill. He's all kinds of rich, of course, and is taking her around the world or something like that for a honeymoon, but she might as well be going to heaven as far as we are concerned, and I don't hope to ever see much of her again. Of course, she doesn't see it. She thinks he's all right. But I'd rather see her marry a day laborer that was a good, honest man than this poor fish, even though he did give her a diamond as big as a hen's egg."

It was all very still for a minute, and then Maris heard Lane say slowly, "She's a wonderful girl! It seems as though she ought to rate a man who is exceptionally fine!"

"Yes, that's what I'm saying," broke in Merrick. "She's a wonderful sister! She's always been wonderful, and fine and unselfish, and when I think of her tied to that bird and having to put up with him all her life and run around and pretend she likes it, it makes me see red! I don't see why God lets it happen. That's why I say marriage is a mess and I hope I never fall in love."

"Say, you know marriage wasn't meant to be a mess, and God planned the first marriage to be helpful to both the man and the woman. It wasn't till the man and woman tried to be independent of God that sin came into the world and happiness was spoiled. It's somebody's fault when marriages go wrong."

"Oh, is it! And whose fault would it be?"

"Well, people ought to be careful who they pick to fall in love with in the first place. You don't
have
to fall in love with everybody you admire. You have to watch yourself. You have to choose the right one. You have to get the one God planned for you."

"Oh
yeah
? And how would you know who that was? Now I know a girl I like real well, but how do I know but she'd turn out to be some poor lily like all the ones that run down to Reno today to get disengaged? How are you going to tell, I say?"

"Well, I don't know just whether my rule would apply to you or not, but in the first place, if I found I was getting really interested in a girl, I'd find out whether she was a real sincere Christian or not. If she wasn't and wouldn't take Christ as her Savior and Lord, I'd quit right then and there. That would be my first step in deciding."

There was a sudden prolonged silence out under the trees. Merrick had been listening to a new idea. At last he said embarrassedly, "Well, that's a new one on me. I'm afraid if I found a girl was all that, I'd know I wouldn't be good enough for her."

"Yes? Well, that would be something to think about, too," said Lane quietly. "In a true marriage both parties would have to measure up, wouldn't they? It's only as two people are dominated by the same Spirit and are surrendered to the same Lord that they can live together in harmony, isn't it?"