SHORT STORIES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2571, 24 June 1903, Page 74

SHORT STORIES.

FROM MY NOTEBOOK. A WOMAN AND A FRIEND, (By Attkoha Ly»tne.) . I rem«mber one that perished, Sweetly did she Bpeak and move; Such a one do I remembeT, "Whom to look at was to love. "Locksley Hall."— Tennyson. HEE LIFE. 0 was lying on a bed of sickness when Ac first came into my life. There were no women near to give kindly aid, and I ■*wi3 a stranger in a« strange land — a land that in every way was antagonistic to my feelings and desires. I knew no one, and did not want to know any, and being imprisoned in a sick room in the depth of •winter my outlook was consequently dreary. , Her tap "at the door was gentle, her foot- j steps equally so, and when she entered I looked and wondered — she was so small, co pale, so thin, so subdued. She came in like some wraith, quietly and unobtrusively, ■with a nameless air of subdued patience that caught my pity and sympathy even in that first moment of meeting. Her manner was quiet and devout, childish in ■ its simplicity ; she was so shy thai it was a little painful during this first visit to 'maintain a conversation. When I spoke she raised her eyes, then dropped them • slightly ; no colour ever came into her face • — she was too bloodless for that — but her eyes revealed tha timidity of a fawn. H&r fir|st visit was a short one, but it was long enough to show me that while I could repine others could endure. Her family was a large one, though she was still quite young, and they were mostly boys — great, etrong. working boys — over whom she had Bittle control, for she^shrank f-om chastising them. To punish them meant to inflict the greater amount of suffering on herself, 3bot if she was backward at punishing the father of the boys was just the reverse. ■He punished often and heavily, and she ■was kept constantly acting as interceder te'tween them. This in itself was a source of worry to her. Her health was not good either, for she was a prey to all nervous disorders, yet she never complainedShe was* always cooking for that family c£ hearty eaters, always slaving to keep the children clean and nise, and ever considering their wants. They all liad their different likes and dislikes in food, and they were all considered — all but herself. Many a time when I visited her Lad it leaked out from the little ones that mother had not iiaken any dinner that day. She would iook aa confused and ashamed as a child caught in a guilty action, and would immediately find excuses. How she kept ■working like she did I never could imagine. I have undergone a good deal of misery myself through suffering from nervous disorders, and I know what evil they wreck on the system. Yet she was always cheerful, always patient, if not always happy. 'A visit to her was like a tonic: one felt the better for contact with this gentle little toul. Her husband was a big, bluff, hearty «nan, a kindly nature if you did not cross iiim, and one who liked to be worfehipped. She was a white slave to him and to her children, but it was only outsiders who saw it. He, in his big, selfish way, accepted her attentions as his right, and she j-would tell you in her calm, childlike way 4hafc John was considerate to her when ehe was ill. True, he considered her then, Jbut I think it was because he had such a iiorroT of illness, and because he felt so ipowerless to do aught with that big family of little ones when she was incapacitated. ]God knows, I do not v. ish to do him- an injustice, for he was good to me, and she ,-was, without one exception, the kindest little soul that it has ever been my lot to meet yet : so, for her sake, I have tried not to think hardly of him, but in the light ef later events I have wondered if all his eeeming consideration were assumed, or if Ihe reauy did care! I have seen him myself lie on .the sofa and allow her, though an a delicate state of health, to go down amongst the long, soaking grass in the jgarden on a showery day to pick him a plateful of ripe gooseberries True, he had to. touch, of rheumatics, but then it is equally nrue that she had been a martyr for weeks to acute neuralgia, and in any case .she was totally unfit to be- out on such a day. Shortly after this we took a holiday, and the day before we left I visited her to say [good-bye for a few weeks. Though it was only a fortnight since I Ihad seen her I was shocke-i at the change in her face. Always delicate looking, there "yras now something unejrthlv about her Jeatures. I could not take mv eves off her, and I felt as if a tight band were clutching at my throat. . Whtit was unusual, she talked all the time of heiself— mot in a complaining way, but ju?t as she anight talk of a sick sister She had been Ordered to rest as much as possible and to lie down a lot, or at least to keep her feet tas high up as she comfortably could while sitting. Yet here she was sitting on a (high, hard sofa, with her feet on the (ground or walking round knitting, or. worse still, bustling round to help the girl if she got slightly behind with the work. I remonstrated. "Oh, my dear!" she said "gently, "I am not happy doing nothing. Then she ate nothing. Always a small 'eater, now a whole day would g6 by without her touching more than a half slice of kread and a half-cup of tea. And j^would try to eat, pnor little soul, knov ing how anxious it made us all. but fche ■was so weak that nothing would stay down. Tins was tin only occasion on ■" ■which I heard anything at all in the nature of a complaint pa^s her lips, and shf did not mean it as Mich th"n Always loy.il to her husband, she found f.vi,-ps. It was in answer to mj rem.u-L- about the

small honse and its surroundings, for I always insisted that that house, so patchy and damp, and those big trees so close and high, shutting out all the sunlight and view, were responsible for her disordered nerves, I had been complaining against it. There was a much nicer situation on which the house might have been built. She heard me in silence, and for a minute afterwards said nothing. "I did think he would have built up there this spring," she said in a low tone, as if ashamed of herself for speaking so, "but he said nothing about it, co I suppose he was not ready, but I never liked the house here."' Knowing that she had come into a sum of £300 just a year ago through the death of her father I wondered greatly, but kept silence, and as she said no more the subject was dropped^ ( That day of my visit I shall never forget. For a wonder she wis mo-bid and seemed fearful of the future. Knowing that under certain conditions we women are apt to get low spirited and morbid, I tried to cheer and brighten her up, though I felt nervous and fearful enough for her myself. She listened in that quiet, cenO way, and only said, "We never know wha+ may happen !" The tears were trickling down my face, but she was quite calm. 'You know, dear" — she spoke very low and as if she restrained herself— "I feel as if we shall never meet again!"' A sob broke from me ; mv heart felt bursting. I could only murmur., "No, no, don't say that !" My voice fell choked. She pave one fleeting glance at mv face. Did she s>ee the fear in mv eyes? They felt veiy tell-tale to me ; but she only said gently and soothingly. "Don't worry, dear!' I could hardly leave her thatj daV. Somehow it seemed so crued to go awpy, knowing that .«he must so through that, terrible ordeal bsfore I could be back. i If I had oniv known ! But God is merciful in hiding from us the terrible events of the future. Mv anxious, tortured mind read death in hpr fao» in her eves, and I hasrenpd across the paddocks as if a spirit were after me. j HER DEATH. I feel I shall owe >ou a debt, Tha-t I never can hope to pay; i And if ever I should foTget That I owe this debt to you. And, for your sweet sake, to your 3; O then, what, then, shall I say— If ever I should forget, Jtay God make me more wretched Than ever I have been yet! "Maud."— Tennyson. One of the saddest of sad things is to have lived a life and to have wasted it, so that in looking backward over the years that have gone one could only say with truth and infinite regret, "What I might have done!" Bui still pathetically sad is it to see a life that has been crushed in its youth and nipped in its promise ; an old head on "young shouldeis ; a face that ought by every right of nature to appear fresh and bright — such a face showing the ravaging lines of care, worry, hard work, and ill-health. I had always had an infinite pity for this little woman friend of mine, saddened with all thess cares — there was so little of brightness in her life and so much of gloom. My thoughts in my holiday tour were very anxious, and she was hardly ever absent from my mind, for my last glimpse of her had b^en so disquieting. But though I wa*> anxious, I was scarcely prepared for the news which greeted me on my arrival at my house. It was blurted out to me in all its pitiless cruelty, and it staggered me. My little friend had died of childbirth— that saddest of deaths— only a few days after we left for our trip. I felt as though 1 hud done a cowardly thing [ in leaving her, aud y«t, had it been possible for me to have stayed at home without spoiling another's holiday, I should have done so We v. ent across the paddocks to the old house that lay so quietly in amongst the tiees with very mixed feelings and heavy hearts. She had been s>uch p good 1 , kind neighbour, and such a sincere little soul. Her husband met us ; he seemed to take his loss very badly. His voice faltered and broke, and he turned his back to compose h-mself. We heard afterwards that he had been almost frantic at his loss, and had behaved so wildly that people were quite bewildered a-s how to act. Now, in seeing lijm so broken-hearted, for the fir.-t time 1 realised a little of why she had worshipped him so ! Though he had never seemed to appreciate her splendid qualities while she was in life, now he appeared to fully understand all that the had been and all he had lost. Different natuies take their griefs and joys in different as ays It seemed a lelief to lum to talk of her and praise her. That morning she had seemed so much bettei than usual, he and, what was very strange, her appetite ha<l been good, yet he had only been away from the house aboil' an hour when he was sent for. He found her lying on the flooi in great agony. They got her to bed, and fb.e was so very weak that the pain quite exhausted her. A nur^e was sent for, but •she would not hear of a doctor. P&r a while longer she lay suffeii-iig this terrible agony, and then, though her w i^ii was greatly against it, they sent for the nearest medical man. He came, but came too late to wive her. "Things were at such a pass that he could do nothing," he said. "It meant death either way, f-o it wa« best to let nature take its own course!' 1 There had been delay somewhere, aud s-o this little woman, with her beautiful, kindly, G-od-given nature, died, and sevtn little children — some of them greatly needing her care — were left motherless. She *oon understood that her end was near. She took it ouietly, as one might expect from her, and" seeing the nurse crying, said consolingly: "Don't cry! I am 'not afraid of death." Before long the pain got co agon,ii-rng that her cries seemed to pierce everyone's heart. Her children had been her joy always. and they, thinking to plea<-e Tier, brought them to her bedside. Poor little things.' They tame, silent and troubled and open-eyed, but she gave just one look at them Mid turned ay, ay. Her hu&bpnd wa*>

by her side, and her arms were around his •neck. Up to the last she screamed with pain, imploring them to help her., to- ease her. To those watching beside her and knowing that her case was hopeless, death came as a release, for those hours of agony seemed unendurable. As one watcher •said : "It was the hardest, cruellest death I have ever witnessed !"' The little one never breathed, which in some ways was, perhaps!, a blessing. As her husband told us about her he cried like a woman, and my heart went out to him. Now, at least, he seemed to realise all that she had been to him, and those words by Tennyson oame into my mind : If ever I should forget That I owe this debt to you. T thought thit his grief would last bim lm lifetime. Never for a momsnt did I think that a second maniage would enter his thoughts. Yet — Gcd forcive him! — in less than four months, incredible as it may seem, he had, as he put it himeelf, another woman in his- eye Before eight months he had offered himself to two women, and I rould have shaken hands with them when I heard they had refused him. He is not married yet, though he is stiH looking for a wife, and her little grave lies in the churchyard. ■