Book: Flower of the Dusk

M >> Myrtle Reed >> Flower of the Dusk



Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
file which includes the original illustration.
See 18057-h.htm or 18057-h.zip:
(http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/1/8/0/5/18057/18057-h/18057-h.htm)
or
(http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/1/8/0/5/18057/18057-h.zip)





FLOWER OF THE DUSK

by

MYRTLE REED







G. P. Putnam's Sons
New York and London
The Knickerbocker Press
1908
Copyright, 1908
by
Myrtle Reed McCullough
The Knickerbocker Press, New York




By MYRTLE REED.

FLOWER OF THE DUSK.
LOVE AFFAIRS OF LITERARY MEN.
A SPINNER IN THE SUN.
LOVE LETTERS OF A MUSICIAN.
LATER LOVE LETTERS OF A MUSICIAN.
THE SPINSTER BOOK.
LAVENDER AND OLD LACE.
THE MASTER'S VIOLIN.
AT THE SIGN OF THE JACK-O'-LANTERN.
THE SHADOW OF VICTORY.
THE BOOK OF CLEVER BEASTS.
PICKABACK SONGS.




Contents


CHAPTER PAGE

I--A MAKER OF SONGS 1

II--MISS MATTIE 15

III--THE TOWER OF COLOGNE 28

IV--THE SEVENTH OF JUNE 42

V--ELOISE 55

VI--A LETTER 68

VII--AN AFTERNOON CALL 83

VIII--A FAIRY GODMOTHER 98

IX--TAKING THE CHANCE 111

X--IN THE GARDEN 126

XI--BARBARA'S "TO-MORROW" 142

XII--MIRIAM 155

XIII--"WOMAN SUFFRAGE" 169

XIV--BARBARA'S BIRTHDAY 181

XV--THE SONG OF THE PINES 194

XVI--BETRAYAL 209

XVII--"NEVER AGAIN" 225

XVIII--THE PASSING OF FIDO 238

XIX--THE DREAMS COME TRUE 253

XX--PARDON 273

XXI--THE PERILS OF THE CITY 286

XXII--AUTUMN LEAVES 299

XXIII--LETTERS TO CONSTANCE 313

XXIV--THE BELLS IN THE TOWER 327




Flower of the Dusk


[Illustration: "Secretly, too, both were ashamed, having come unawares
upon knowledge that was not meant for them."--_Page 82._
_From a painting by Clinton Balmer_]




I

A Maker of Songs


[Sidenote: Sunset]

The pines, darkly purple, towered against the sunset. Behind the hills,
the splendid tapestry glowed and flamed, sending far messages of light
to the grey East, where lay the sea, crooning itself to sleep. Bare
boughs dripped rain upon the sodden earth, where the dead leaves had so
long been hidden by the snow. The thousand sounds and scents of Spring
at last had waked the world.

The man who stood near the edge of the cliff, quite alone, and carefully
feeling the ground before him with his cane, had chosen to face the
valley and dream of the glory that, perchance, trailed down in living
light from some vast loom of God's. His massive head was thrown back, as
though he listened, with a secret sense, for music denied to those who
see.

[Sidenote: Joyful Memories]

He took off his hat and stray gleams came through the deepening shadows
to rest, like an aureole, upon his silvered hair. Remembered sunsets,
from beyond the darkness of more than twenty years, came back to him
with divine beauty and diviner joy. Mnemosyne, that guardian angel of
the soul, brought from her treasure-house gifts of laughter and tears;
the laughter sweet with singing, and the bitterness of the tears
eternally lost in the Water of Forgetfulness.

Slowly, the light died. Dusk came upon the valley and crept softly to
the hills. Mist drifted in from the sleeping sea, and the hush of night
brooded over the river as it murmured through the plain. A single star
uplifted its exquisite lamp against the afterglow, near the veiled ivory
of the crescent moon.

Sighing, the man turned away. "Perhaps," he thought, whimsically, as he
went cautiously down the path, searching out every step of the way,
"there was no sunset at all."

The road was clear until he came to a fallen tree, over which he stepped
easily. The new softness of the soil had, for him, its own deep meaning
of resurrection. He felt it in the swelling buds of the branches that
sometimes swayed before him, and found it in the scent of the cedar as
he crushed a bit of it in his hand.

Easily, yet carefully, he went around the base of the hill to the
street, where his house was the first upon the right-hand side. The gate
creaked on its hinges and he went quickly up the walk, passing the grey
tangle of last Summer's garden, where the marigolds had died and the
larkspur fallen asleep.

Within the house, two women awaited him, one with anxious eagerness, the
other with tenderly watchful love. The older one, who had long been
listening, opened the door before he knocked, but it was Barbara who
spoke to him first.

"You're late, Father, dear."

"Am I, Barbara? Tell me, was there a sunset to-night?"

"Yes, a glorious one."

[Sidenote: Seeing with the Soul]

"I thought so, and that accounts for my being late. I saw a beautiful
sunset--I saw it with my soul."

"Give me your coat, Ambrose." The older woman stood at his side, longing
to do him some small service.

"Thank you, Miriam; you are always kind."

The tiny living-room was filled with relics of past luxury. Fine
pictures, in tarnished frames, hung on the dingy walls, and worn rugs
covered the floor. The furniture was old mahogany, beautifully cared
for, but decrepit, nevertheless, and the ancient square piano,
outwardly, at least, showed every year of its age.

Still, the room had "atmosphere," of the indefinable quality that some
people impart to a dwelling-place. Entering, one felt refinement,
daintiness, and the ability to live above mere externals. Barbara had,
very strongly, the house-love which belongs to some rare women. And who
shall say that inanimate things do not answer to our love of them, and
diffuse, between our four walls, a certain gracious spirit of kindliness
and welcome?

In the dining-room, where the table was set for supper, there were
marked contrasts. A coarse cloth covered the table, but at the head of
it was overlaid a remnant of heavy table-damask, the worn places
carefully hidden. The china at this place was thin and fine, the silver
was solid, and the cup from which Ambrose North drank was Satsuma.

On the coarse cloth were the heavy, cheap dishes and the discouraging
knives and forks which were the portion of the others. The five damask
napkins remaining from the original stock of linen were used only by the
blind man.

[Sidenote: A Comforting Deceit]

For years the two women had carried on this comforting deceit, and the
daily lie they lived, so lovingly, had become a sort of second nature.
They had learned to speak, casually, of the difficulty in procuring
servants, and to say how much easier it was to do their own small tasks
than to watch continually over fine linen and rare china intrusted to
incompetent hands. They talked of tapestries, laces, and jewels which
had long ago been sold, and Barbara frequently wore a string of beads
which, with a lump in her throat, she called "Mother's pearls."

Discovering that the sound of her crutches on the floor distressed him
greatly, Barbara had padded the sharp ends with flannel and was careful
to move about as little as possible when he was in the house. She had
gone, mouse-like, to her own particular chair while Miriam was hanging
up his coat and hat and placing his easy chair near the open fire. He
sat down and held his slender hands close to the grateful warmth.

"It isn't cold," he said, "and yet I am glad of the fire. To-day is the
first day of Spring."

"By the almanac?" laughed Barbara.

"No, according to the almanac, I believe, it has been Spring for ten
days. Nature does not move according to man's laws, but she forces him
to observe hers--except in almanacs."

[Sidenote: Kindly Shadows]

The firelight made kindly shadows in the room, softening the
unloveliness and lending such beauty as it might. It gave to Ambrose
North's fine, strong face the delicacy and dignity of an old miniature.
It transfigured Barbara's yellow hair into a crown of gold, and put a
new gentleness into Miriam's lined face as she sat in the half-light,
one of them in blood, yet singularly alien and apart.

"What are you doing, Barbara?" The sensitive hands strayed to her lap
and lifted the sheer bit of linen upon which she was working.

"Making lingerie by hand."

"You have a great deal of it, haven't you?"

"Not as much as you think, perhaps. It takes a long time to do it well."

"It seems to me you are always sewing."

"Girls are very vain these days, Father. We need a great many pretty
things."

"Your dear mother used to sew a great deal. She--" His voice broke, for
even after many years his grief was keenly alive.

"Is supper ready, Aunt Miriam?" asked Barbara, quickly.

"Yes."

"Then come, let's go in."

Ambrose North took his place at the head of the table, which, purposely,
was nearest the door. Barbara and Miriam sat together, at the other end.

"Where were you to-day, Father?"

[Sidenote: At the top of the World]

"On the summit of the highest hill, almost at the top of the world.
I think I heard a robin, but I am not sure. I smelled Spring in the
maple branches and the cedar, and felt it in the salt mist that blew
up from the sea. The Winter has been so long!"

"Did you make a song?"

[Sidenote: Always Make a Song]

"Yes--two. I'll tell you about them afterward. Always make a song,
Barbara, no matter what comes."

So the two talked, while the other woman watched them furtively. Her
face was that of one who has lived much in a short space of time and her
dark, burning eyes betrayed tragic depths of feeling. Her black hair,
slightly tinged with grey, was brushed straight back from her wrinkled
forehead. Her shoulders were stooped and her hands rough from hard work.

She was the older sister of Ambrose North's dead wife--the woman he had
so devotedly loved. Ever since her sister's death, she had lived with
them, taking care of little lame Barbara, now grown into beautiful
womanhood, except for the crutches. After his blindness, Ambrose North
had lost his wife, and then, by slow degrees, his fortune. Mercifully, a
long illness had made him forget a great deal.

"Never mind, Barbara," said Miriam, in a low tone, as they rose from the
table. "It will make your hands too rough for the sewing."

"Shan't I wipe the dishes for you, Aunty? I'd just as soon."

"No--go with him."

The fire had gone down, but the room was warm, so Barbara turned up the
light and began again on her endless stitching. Her father's hands
sought hers.

"More sewing?" His voice was tender and appealing.

"Just a little bit, Father, please. I'm so anxious to get this done."

"But why, dear?"

"Because girls are so vain," she answered, with a laugh.

"Is my little girl vain?"

"Awfully. Hasn't she the dearest father in the world and the
prettiest"--she swallowed hard here--"the prettiest house and the
loveliest clothes? Who wouldn't be vain!"

"I am so glad," said the old man, contentedly, "that I have been able to
give you the things you want. I could not bear it if we were poor."

"You told me you had made two songs to-day, Father."

[Sidenote: Song of the River]

He drew closer to her and laid one hand upon the arm of her chair.
Quietly, she moved her crutches beyond his reach. "One is about the
river," he began.

"In Winter, a cruel fairy put it to sleep in an enchanted tower, far up
in the mountains, and walled up the door with crystal. All the while the
river was asleep, it was dreaming of the green fields and the soft,
fragrant winds.

"It tossed and murmured in its sleep, and at last it woke, too soon, for
the cruel fairy's spell could not have lasted much longer. When it found
the door barred, it was very sad. Then it grew rebellious and hurled
itself against the door, trying to escape, but the barrier only seemed
more unyielding. So, making the best of things, the river began to sing
about the dream.

"From its prison-house, it sang of the green fields and fragrant winds,
the blue violets that starred the meadow, the strange, singing harps of
the marsh grasses, and the wonder of the sea. A good fairy happened to
be passing, and she stopped to hear the song. She became so interested
that she wanted to see the singer, so she opened the door. The river
laughed and ran out, still singing, and carrying the door along. It
never stopped until it had taken every bit of the broken crystal far out
to sea."

"I made one, too, Father."

"What is it?"

[Sidenote: Song of the Flax]

"Mine is about the linen. Once there was a little seed put away into the
darkness and covered deep with earth. But there was a soul in the seed,
and after the darkness grew warm it began to climb up and up, until one
day it reached the sunshine. After that, it was so glad that it tossed
out tiny, green branches and finally its soul blossomed into a blue
flower. Then a princess passed, and her hair was flaxen and her eyes
were the colour of the flower.

"The flower said, 'Oh, pretty Princess, I want to go with you.'

"The princess answered, 'You would die, little Flower, if you were
picked,' and she went on.

"But one day the Reaper passed and the little blue flower and all its
fellows were gathered. After a terrible time of darkness and pain, the
flower found itself in a web of sheerest linen. There was much cutting
and more pain, and thousands of pricking stitches, then a beautiful gown
was made, all embroidered with the flax in palest blue and green. And it
was the wedding gown of the pretty princess, because her hair was flaxen
and her eyes the colour of the flower."

[Sidenote: Barbara]

"What colour is your hair, Barbara?" He had asked the question many
times.

"The colour of ripe corn, Daddy. Don't you remember my telling you?"

He leaned forward to stroke the shining braids. "And your eyes?"

"Like the larkspur that grows in the garden."

"I know--your dear mother's eyes." He touched her face gently as he
spoke. "Your skin is so smooth--is it fair?"

"Yes, Daddy."

"I think you must be beautiful; I have asked Miriam so often, but she
will not tell me. She only says you look well enough and something like
your mother. Are you beautiful?"

"Oh, Daddy! Daddy!" laughed Barbara, in confusion. "You mustn't ask such
questions! Didn't you say you had made two songs? What is the other
one?"

Miriam sat in the dining-room, out of sight but within hearing. Having
observed that in her presence they laughed less, she spent her evenings
alone unless they urged her to join them. She had a newspaper more than
a week old, but, as yet, she had not read it. She sat staring into the
shadows, with the light of her one candle flickering upon her face,
nervously moving her work-worn hands.

"The other song," reminded Barbara, gently.

[Sidenote: Song of the Sunset]

"This one was about a sunset," he sighed. "It was such a sunset as was
never on sea or land, because two who loved each other saw it together.
God and all His angels had hung a marvellous tapestry from the high
walls of Heaven, and it reached almost to the mountain-tops, where some
of the little clouds sleep.

"The man said, 'Shall we always look for the sunsets together?'

"The woman smiled and answered, 'Yes, always.'

"'And,' the man continued, 'when one of us goes on the last long
journey?'

"'Then,' answered the woman, 'the other will not be watching alone. For,
I think, there in the West is the Golden City with the jasper walls and
the jewelled foundations, where the twelve gates are twelve pearls.'"

There was a long silence. "And so--" said Barbara, softly.

Ambrose North lifted his grey head from his hands and rose to his feet
unsteadily. "And so," he said, with difficulty, "she leans from the
sunset toward him, but he can never see her, because he is blind. Oh,
Barbara," he cried, passionately, "last night I dreamed that you could
walk and I could see!"

"So we can, Daddy," said Barbara, very gently. "Our souls are neither
blind nor lame. Here, I am eyes for you and you are feet for me, so we
belong together. And--past the sunset----"

"Past the sunset," repeated the old man, dreamily, "soul and body shall
be as one. We must wait--for life is made up of waiting--and make what
songs we can."

"I think, Father, that a song should be in poetry, shouldn't it?"

[Sidenote: The Real Song]

"Some of them are, but more are not. Some are music and some are words,
and some, like prayers, are feeling. The real song is in the thrush's
heart, not in the silvery rain of sound that comes from the green boughs
in Spring. When you open the door of your heart and let all the joy rush
out, laughing--then you are making a song."

"But--is there always joy?"

"Yes, though sometimes it is sadly covered up with other things. We must
find it and divide it, for only in that way it grows. Good-night, my
dear."

He bent to kiss her, while Miriam, with her heart full of nameless
yearning, watched them from the far shadows. The sound of his footsteps
died away and a distant door closed. Soon afterward Miriam took her
candle and went noiselessly upstairs, but she did not say good-night to
Barbara.

[Sidenote: Midnight]

Until midnight, the girl sat at her sewing, taking the finest of
stitches in tuck and hem. The lamp burning low made her needle fly
swiftly. In her own room was an old chest nearly full of dainty garments
which she was never to wear. She had wrought miracles of embroidery upon
some of them, and others were unadorned save by tucks and lace.

When the work was finished, she folded it and laid it aside, then put
away her thimble and thread. "When the guests come to the hotel," she
thought--"ah, when they come, and buy all the things I've made the past
year, and the preserves and the candied orange peel, the rag rugs and
the quilts, then----"

[Sidenote: Dying Embers]

So Barbara fell a-dreaming, and the light of the dying embers lay
lovingly upon her face, already transfigured by tenderness into beauty
beyond words. The lamp went out and little by little the room faded into
twilight, then into night. It was quite dark when she leaned over and
picked up her crutches.

"Dear, dear father," she breathed. "He must never know!"




II

Miss Mattie


Miss Mattie was getting supper, sustained by the comforting thought that
her task was utterly beneath her and had been forced upon her by the
mysterious workings of an untoward Fate. She was not really "Miss,"
since she had been married and widowed, and a grown son was waiting
impatiently in the sitting-room for his evening meal, but her
neighbours, nearly all of whom had known her before her marriage, still
called her "Miss Mattie."

[Sidenote: "Old Maids"]

The arbitrary social distinctions, made regardless of personality, are
often cruelly ironical. Many a man, incapable by nature of life-long
devotion to one woman, becomes a husband in half an hour, duly
sanctioned by Church and State. A woman who remains unmarried, because,
with fine courage, she will have her true mate or none, is called "an
old maid." She may have the heart of a wife and the soul of a mother,
but she cannot escape her sinister label. The real "old maids" are of
both sexes, and many are married, but alas! seldom to each other.

[Sidenote: A Grievance]

In his introspective moments, Roger Austin sometimes wondered why
marriage, maternity, and bereavement should have left no trace upon his
mother. The uttermost depths of life had been hers for the sounding, but
Miss Mattie had refused to drop her plummet overboard and had spent the
years in prolonged study of her own particular boat.

She came in, with the irritating air of a martyr, and clucked sharply
with her false teeth when she saw that her son was reading.

"I don't know what I've done," she remarked, "that I should have to live
all the time with people who keep their noses in books. Your pa was
forever readin' and you're marked with it. I could set here and set here
and set here, and he took no more notice of me than if I was a piece of
furniture. When he died, the brethren and sistern used to come to
condole with me and say how I must miss him. There wasn't nothin' to
miss, 'cause the books and his chair was left. I've a good mind to burn
'em all up."

"I won't read if you don't want me to, Mother," answered Roger, laying
his book aside regretfully.

"I dunno but what I'd rather you would than to want to and not," she
retorted, somewhat obscurely. "What I'm a-sayin' is that it's in the
blood and you can't help it. If I'd known it was your pa's intention to
give himself up so exclusive to readin', I'd never have married him,
that's all I've got to say. There's no sense in it. Lemme see what
you're at now."

She took the open book, that lay face downward upon the table, and read
aloud, awkwardly:

"Leave to the diamond its ages to grow, nor expect to accelerate the
births of the eternal. Friendship demands a religious treatment. We talk
of choosing our friends, but friends are self-elected."

[Sidenote: Peculiar Way of Putting Things]

"Now," she demanded, in a shrill voice, "what does that mean?"

"I don't think I could explain it to you, Mother."

"That's just the point. Your pa couldn't never explain nothin', neither.
You're readin' and readin' and readin' and you never know what you're
readin' about. Diamonds growin' and births bein' hurried up, and friends
bein' religious and voted for at township elections. Who's runnin' for
friend this year on the Republican ticket?" she inquired, caustically.

Roger managed to force a laugh. "You have your own peculiar way of
putting things, Mother. Is supper ready? I'm as hungry as a bear."

"I suppose you are. When it ain't readin', it's eatin'. Work all day to
get a meal that don't last more'n fifteen minutes, and then see readin'
goin' on till long past bedtime, and oil goin' up every six months.
Which'll you have--fresh apple sauce, or canned raspberries?"

"It doesn't matter."

"Then I'll get the apple sauce, because the canned raspberries can lay
over as long as they're kept cool."

[Sidenote: Miss Mattie's Personal Appearance]

Miss Mattie shuffled back into the kitchen. During the Winter she wore
black knitted slippers attached to woollen inner soles which had no
heels. She was well past the half-century mark, but her face had few
lines in it and her grey eyes were sharp and penetrating. Her smooth,
pale brown hair, which did not show the grey in it, was parted precisely
in the middle. Every morning she brushed it violently with a stiff brush
dipped into cold water, and twisted the ends into a tight knot at the
back of her head. In militant moments, this knot seemed to rise and the
protruding ends of the wire hairpins to bristle into formidable weapons
of offence.

She habitually wore her steel-bowed spectacles half-way down her nose.
They might have fallen off had not a kindly Providence placed a large
wart where it would do the most good. On Sundays, when she put on shoes,
corsets, her best black silk, and her gold-bowed spectacles, she took
great pains to wear them properly. When she reached home, however, she
always took off her fine raiment and laid her spectacles aside with a
great sigh of relief. Miss Mattie's disposition improved rapidly as soon
as the old steel-bowed pair were in their rightful place, resting safely
upon the wart.

[Sidenote: Second-hand Things]

When they sat down to supper, she reverted to the original topic. "As
I was sayin'," she began, "there ain't no sense in the books you and
your pa has always set such store by. Where he ever got 'em, I dunno,
but they was always a comin'. Lots of 'em was well-nigh wore out when
he got 'em, and he wouldn't let me buy nothin' that had been used before,
even if I knew the folks.

"I got a silver coffin plate once at an auction over to the Ridge for
almost nothin' and your pa was as mad as a wet hen. There was a name on
it, but it could have been scraped off, and the rest of it was perfectly
good. When you need a coffin plate you need it awful bad. While your pa
was rampin' around, he said he wouldn't have been surprised to see me
comin' home with a second-hand coffin in the back of the buggy. Who ever
heard of a second-hand coffin? I've always thought his mind was
unsettled by so much readin'.

"I ain't a-sayin' but what some readin' is all right. Some folks has
just moved over to the Ridge and the postmaster's wife was a-showin' me
some papers they get, every week. One is _The Metropolitan Weekly_, and
the other _The Housewife's Companion_. I must say, the stories in those
papers is certainly beautiful.

"Once, when they come after their mail, they was as mad as anything
because the papers hadn't come, but the postmaster's wife was readin'
one of the stories and settin' up nights to do it, so she wa'n't to
blame for not lettin' 'em go until she got through with 'em. They slip
out of the covers just as easy, and nobody ever knows the difference.

[Sidenote: The Doctor's Darling]

Copyright (c) 2007. knowncrafts.net. All rights reserved.