CHAPTER XVIII

THE BATTLE WITH SELF

The room was bare of furnishings save a cot; no dresser, table, stand, even chair, was there. The windows were of wire glass and guarded by metal screens, the lights were in shielded recesses, the floor was polished but without covering. No pictures, flowers, nor the dainty things which normal women crave were to be seen. On the cot sat a woman, Marie Wentworth, sullen and defiant, a worse than failure, locked in this protected room of a special hospital. Isolated with her caretaker, she was watched day and night-watched to save her from successfully carrying out her determination of self-destruction, a determination which had found expression in more than words, for only the day before-the day of her admission—she had swallowed some cleverly hidden, antiseptic tablets. The trained habits of observation of the skilful nurse had saved her from death. Crafty, vindictive, malicious, reckless, heartless! Her care demanded tireless watching— hence this room, void of anything by which she could possibly injure herself or others. Nor was she more attractive than her surroundings. Her skin was sallow and unwholesome; yellow-gray rings added dulness to her black eyes. Scrawny of figure, hard and repelling of features, an atmosphere of malevolence seemed to emanate from her presence. She took little note of what was happening, though occasional, furtive glances gave intimation of her knowledge of the nurse's presence. When stimulated to expression there were explosions of violent abuse, directed chiefly against her older sister, explosions punctuated by vicious flashes of profanity which left doubt in no mind of the hatred which rankled-hatred of family, hatred of order and authority, hatred of goodness however expressed, hatred of life and damnations of the hereafter. An unholy picture she was of a demoralized soul in which smoldered and from which flared forth a peace-destroying fire—the rebellion of a depraved body and mind against the moral self. She had been placed in this institution under legal restraint to be treated for morphinism, and, according to her brother, "pure cussedness."

How did it happen? The Wentworths lived well, very well indeed, in a bluegrass county-seat of fair Kentucky. The father was an attorney by profession, a horse-fancier by choice, and for years before Marie's birth relieved the monotony of office duties and race-track pleasures by vivid, gentlemanly "sprees." Marie was only six when his last artery essential to the business of living became properly hardened, and Marie's mother was a widow.

Mrs. Wentworth was to the manor born. She took pride in her home and thoroughly admired the brilliant qualities of her husband. Adorned with old jewels and old lace, she regularly graced her table at the periodic big dinners it was her pride to give. In fact, her pride extended to the planning of three fine meals a day. An unsentimental science suggests that her husband's arteries, as well as her fatal cancer, might have been avoided had chronic proteid intoxication not been the result of her menus. She also took pride in her family and trained the two older children as well as she knew, instilling in them both a loyalty to certain ideals which evolved into morality. But her failing health left Marie much to the care of her sister, and more to the tutelage of her own desires. Unhappily, there was little of beauty in the mother's last months which made any appeal to her child's love, or left much to inspire a twelve-year-old girl's devotion when but memory was left.

When the insurance was collected and all settlements made, the comfortable old home and the jewels sold, each of the three children had five thousand dollars. The brother's success was limited. He invested his all, together with many notes of promise payable to his senior partner, in a dry-goods business, and while he carried most of the details of the establishment, the everlasting interest on his notes, and his wife's love of and demand for fine feathers, kept ends from ever successfully meeting.

The sister, the eldest, was fine. The illness and death of her parents laid grave responsibilities on her young life, and she met them seriously, wholesomely, constructively. She early proved herself capable of large sacrifices. She had finished her college course before her mother's death, and after the home was sold she secured a position in the local woman's college, where she continued to teach and to merit a growing respect for many years. She was not perfect; the Wentworth temper flashed out most inopportunely, and work and pray and sacrifice and resolve as she would, her rule of Marie was unfortunate-flint and steel strike fire. Probably she "school-manned" rather than mothered the child.

But with all environment favorable, Marie would have proven a "proposition." The sporting blood and Bourbon high-balls of the father and the mother's love of the good things of life more than neutralized the latter's Methodism. Marie was a healthy, well-built, lithe lassie, with raven-black hair and eyes which snapped equally with pleasure or with wrath. Impulsive, intense, wilful, tempestuous, bright and possessing capacity, pleasure-loving and ever impatient of restraint, we see in her the highly developed nervous temperament. She feared nothing save the "horrible nightmares" which frequently followed the big dinners-a child who could have been led to Parnassus, but who was driven nearly to Hell! She went through the public schools without conscious effort, but her buxom figure, the rich flush of health, her vivacity, her bearing, were irresistible to the youth of the community, and a series of escapades culminated in her dismissal from college; her indiscretions cost her the respect of the one man she loved. At twenty she had spent two thousand of the five thousand left her, while she and the sister failed to find harmony together. She had little sympathy with her sister's plodding life, but realized the need of preparing herself to earn, so entered a Cincinnati hospital. She had many qualities which made her a valuable student-nurse, with propensities which kept her in hot water. She had completed her second year of training when she was dismissed. The interns could not resist her, nor she them, and only so many midnight lunches on duty can be winked at, even in a hospital needing nurses. For nearly a year she was spasmodically occupied as an experienced nurse. The end of this year found her one thousand dollars poorer, while her heritage was becoming more manifest. In the place of her father's periodic alcoholism, it was periodic headaches. She was thoroughly impatient of personal suffering, or of any hygienic restraint, and so took heavy doses of headache-powders and, if these did not relieve, opiates. By falsifying her record, she succeeded in entering another training- school, a smaller one, in her own state. For a year she was careful- she was anxious to graduate-and developed real cunning in the use of drugs; but dependence upon these steadily undermined her reserve until she was almost daily using something for the "tired feeling" which was now so chronic. Nearly two years had passed before her drug-taking habit was discovered. Prompt dismissal necessarily followed. Her sister was informed, and insisted upon her going to an institution to be cured. Five hundred dollars were spent, and three months of treatment, directed to the withdrawal of her drug, gave no insight into her need for seriously altering her habits of life and feeling, brought no least conception of her defects of character without change of which there could be, for her, no safe living.

During the next ten years her physical and mental deterioration increased apace. Other courses of treatment were taken with no lasting benefit. Her misfortunes seemed to culminate when she voluntarily entered a "drug-cure" institute which was practically a resort for drug-users. There are in every country unworthy places of this kind, where no real effort to cure patients is made. Sufferers with means are kept comfortable by being given drugs whenever they demand them, thus satisfying their consciences that they are being "treated," while vainly waiting till they are sufficiently strong to get entirely off "dope." In such a house of quackery Marie stayed two years. Her remaining fifteen hundred dollars and a thousand of her sister's went for fake treatment. She learned to smoke cigarettes with the young doctor; she played cards, gossiped, ate, slept and was never refused a comforting dose whenever she couldn't "stand it a minute longer." Worse than wasted years these, for even the remnants of her pride faded, and she lived a sordid life of the flesh. The sister, when she finally realized the gravity of the situation, lost all hope whatever for any restoration and, acting under the advice of the old family physician, had her committed to the State Hospital for the Insane as an incurable narco-maniac. Here she was rudely but promptly deprived of all narcotics, nor by any hook nor crook, cunning though she was, could she secure a quieting, solacing grain. The wise superintendent, believing that there was little chance for her true regeneration in the surroundings of even his best wards, advised that she be sent to a hospital where she would receive special care. The sister's funds alone could make this possible, and her genuine worth is shown in her willingness to spend a quarter of her entire savings that Marie might have this chance. Here, thirty-three years old, we found her the day after she had been transferred, the day after she had vainly tried to carry out her vow to end things if she were ever "forced into another treatment."

Throughout the years the primitive self had been pitted against her own soul. She had always rebelled at her misfortunes, though they were largely of her own making. She blamed others for her hardships, and through the intensity of her resentment but made things harder. Not the least expression of her depravity was her hatred for all who had interfered with her wilful desires, particularly the sister, whose sacrifice she ignored, but whom she took a malicious delight in proclaiming to be the one who had forever ruined her chances in life by committing her to an insane asylum. But her delight was malicious, and all that she got out of her hate and maligning was deeper misery. The bitter dregs of twenty years of soulless living were all the cup of life now held for her—all the more bitter because of the finer qualities of her nature. There were possibilities in this highly organized girl which could have led her into an unusual wholeness of living.

Six months passed, months of sullen, dogged resistance-resistance to the returning health which was again rounding her form and glowing her cheeks, resistance to proffered kindnesses of fellow-patients and nurses, resistance to any appeal to pride, honor, ambition, right. Sick of soul, she abjured the interest of the hospital workers, the love of her sister whose weekly letters she left unopened, the wholesome atmosphere of her surroundings, the personal appeal of those whose hearts were heavy with desire to help.

Then the miracle!-for one came who cast out devils. She was not only a nurse, she was one of those divinely human beings who, with a nurse's knowledge and training, attain practical sainthood. She, too, had frequently been repelled in her hours of contact with this unhappy creature, but she believed that under all this unholiness there was a soul. She was a busy, hard-worked nurse, but in time Marie became aware that she was spending part of her limited off-duty hours to minister to her, that she had requested a special assignment of duty which would throw them together. Marie's four years of training made her recognize the rareness of this giving. Curiosity at least was aroused, and she began asking personal questions. An unconscious self- pity impelled her to discuss the grievances of the life of nursing, the unfairness common in training-schools, the injustices of long hours and inadequate appreciation, with scores of other quarrels which she had with life. Each of these was met squarely by her nurse-friend, who, free from platitudes and cant, ever saw the ideal above it all, who, loving her profession and loving humanity and promised to a life of service, gently, beautifully, firmly stood by her principles. For three months they were in daily contact—three thankless months for the nurse, three months of cunning, evil-minded, suspicious testing by the patient. Finally the very goodness of her friend seemed intolerable, and a paroxysm of rage and resentment broke loose, in which she cursed and abused her helper beyond sufferance. The nurse suddenly grasped the unhappy woman's arms to shake some sense of decency into her warped nature, one would have thought, but in truth that eye might meet eye, and in this look the rare love, which can persist through such provocation, awakened a soul. That look was at once the revelation of the worth of the one and the worthlessness of the other. A flood of tears drowned, it would seem forever, the evil which was cursing. In a day, in an hour, the change was wrought, that miraculous change which enters every life when the soul comes into its own.

There were months in which the battle of self ebbed and flowed, but never did defeat seem again imminent, and the final victory was found in a high resolve which took her back home a quiet, subdued woman, forgetful of self in her sense of debt to the sister whose goodness she had never before admitted. For years they lived together, she keeping the simple home and keeping it well, saving, industrious, devoted, even loving. She has largely avoided publicity, though always ready to nurse in emergencies. Nobly she is expiating the past, and has long since worthily won the "well-done" of her moral self.



CHAPTER XIX

THE SUFFERING OF SELF-PITY

Alac MacReady was not much of an oarsman. Big and strong, and heretofore so successful that his large self-confidence had never been badly jolted, he was quite at a disadvantage, this June afternoon, as he attempted to row pretty Annette Neil across the head of the lake to where she said the fishing was good. Twice already he had splashed her dainty, starched frock, ironed, he knew, in the highest perfection of the art, by her own active, shapely, brown hands. And each awkward splashing had been followed by flashing glances which shriveled self- esteem even as they fascinated. They had planned to spend the sunset hour fishing, then land in time to meet the crowd and be driven on to Border City to a neighboring dance, and all come back to Geneva together.

Alac's rural North-England training had developed in him many qualifications of worth but, among these, boating was not one. Had he told the truth when this little trip was planned, he would have admitted that he had never rowed a boat a half-mile in his life. Annette could do it tip-top; why not he? But things were unquestionably perverse. The boat wouldn't go in a straight line-in fact, it didn't go very fast anyway. The black eyes before him framed by that impudently beautiful face, so pert, so naive, so understandingly aware—so "damned handsome" he said to himself, prodded him to redoubled effort. He was swinging his two hundred pounds lustily, unevenly—an unusually vicious jerk, and snap went the old oar! Off the seat he tumbled, and, with land-lubber's luck, unshipped the other oar and away it floated, and a mile from land, they drifted.

Alac MacReady was Scotch-English. The family had executed a number of important contracts for the British government; one of these had brought two of the boys to Canada. With their family backing, they had undertaken some constructive work in northern New York, and, at this time, were building a railroad which passed through Geneva. Alac had been in the neighborhood for two months supervising operations. He was striking in appearance—a florid-faced' blonde, brusque in business, quite jovial socially, and cracking—full of the conceit of youth, wealth and station. So far, life had, in practically nothing, refused his bidding.

Annette Neil's father kept a small store, Annette did much of the clerking. She was unquestionably the prettiest girl in Geneva; indeed she was as pretty as girls are made. With all her small-town limitations she was bright as a pin, and as sharp; fine of instinct and, withal, coy as a coquette. The first time Alac addressed her it was as a shop-keeper. Something she said kept turning over in his brain and he realized next morning, as he was shaving, that her reply had been impertinent. Piqued, he returned the day after to make another purchase, and made the greater mistake of being patronizing. Mr. Alac MacReady discovered, without any prolonged period of rumination, that he had a bee in his bonnet, and left the little shop semispeechless and irate. He was not satisfied to leave the honors with this "snip of an American girl," and evolved a plan of verbal assault which was to bring the provincial upstart to her senses, only to discover that she had a dozen defenses for each attack, and to find himself, for two consecutive, disconcerting minutes, wondering if perchance he might be a "boob." With each visit—and they were almost daily and many of them made in the face of strong, contrary resolution—he felt the distinction in their stations disappearing. He later found himself calling on Annette's mother, and, stiffly at first, later humbly asking for the company of the bewitching girl, who, coy witch that she was, steadfastly refused to be "company" even when her mother said she might. This trip across the lake was the first real concession the little minx had made-and how "bloomingly" he "messed it up"! He was not used to the water, and, oarless, became "panicky." A pair of ridiculing eyes caused him to break off his second bellow for help, in its midst.

The little boat drifted slowly. The June breeze was not strong. The sun slipped behind radiant clouds, clouds which shifted and softened, and tinted and toned through the pastels into the neutrals. Gently they were nearing the shore when the great, golden moon rose in the east, and soon brightening, shimmered the lake with countless, dancing splotches of silver. The water lapped with ceaseless, dainty caresses the sides of the boat. Some mother-bird nestling near the water's edge crooned her good-night message to her mate. A halo surrounded and softened the white face so near and, as part of the evening symphony, two dark eyes rested upon his face, deeply luminous. There are different stories of what he said. He admitted he was never so awkward. But they missed their companions, and the dance, and walked all the way 'round the head of the lake, home, this proud son of near- nobility doing obeisance to his untutored queen. So Alac and Annette married. They traveled far, first to Canada, then to England. Annette's sheer beauty and remarkable taste in the use of Alac's prodigal gifts of clothing and jewels carried the badly disturbed and certainly unfavorably prejudiced MacReady family by assault. Ten years they lived in the big Northumberland home. A boy and a girl came, both blondes like their father. The MacReady boys were not meeting the same success in their contracting ventures for which two former generations had been noted. And, after their father's death, one particularly disastrous contract quite reduced the family's financial standing and consequent importance. The three brothers could not agree as to which was to blame, so Alac and his family returned to America and located in Rochester. Their few thousands Alac invested in a small manufacturing concern which never prospered sufficiently to maintain him in his life-long habits of good living. Unhappily, too, strong as Alac was in many ways, his one weakness grew. Three or four times a year he would make trips to Toronto or New York, drink gloriously, spend hundreds of dollars, and return home meek and dutiful, almost praying Annette not to say what he knew was in her mind. Of the two children, little Alac multiplied his father's weaknesses by an unhappily large factor. He never amounted to much, developing little but small bombast. Charlotte was the child, dutiful, studious, rather serious perhaps, but very conscientious. Her features were those of neither father nor mother, but peculiarly delicate, strikingly refined. When she was fifteen her father was found dead, one morning, in an obscure hotel in the Middle West. He had neglected his insurance premiums. The resourceful little widow went to work at once. The products of her needle were exquisite. She sold some of the handsome old furniture and, during the next five years, most of her jewels went to keep the children in school. She had given absolutely to her husband and to her home, and through the years to come her cheer was never bedimmed save when the husband was mentioned. Charlotte became more attractive. She was slender, fair—the English type was apparent; she was a distinct contrast to her highly colored, brunette mother, who, however, might have been but an older sister, she had so preserved her youth. Charlotte was periodically morbid, a transmuted heritage. The financial need directed her training into practical lines; she studied stenography and was fortunate in securing a position in the office of John Evanson, the energetic senior member of a growing leather-manufacturing firm. There was something poetically appealing to this busy man in the quiet, sometimes sad-faced, fine- faced, competent woman, which gradually created in him a hungering sense of need-and he called one night. He afterwards said if he hadn't married Charlotte, he would have married her mother, who, to tell the truth, put what sparkle there was into the courtship.

Charlotte's cup of happiness should have been overflowing when she moved into the handsome, big house. Her mother was to live with them, and such a mother-in-law would be a welcome asset to any home. Mr. Evanson gave Alac Junior the only good position he ever had—a position which he never filled to any one's satisfaction but his own. For two years Charlotte's virtues were expressed in quiet, almost thoughtful home-devotion, entertainment of poor relatives, and church- work. John Evanson was simple and rational in his tastes. In business he was enterprising and a keen fighter of competition. He cleverly managed his interests, which had grown through years of steadfast attention. He was nearly forty when he married, and his new home was to him a haven. The mother adapted herself superbly and was a real joy in the household through her wit and daintiness and ingenious thoughtfulness.

Charlotte was not well for several months before the birth of the much-wished-for baby, which unhappily never breathed. A sharp illness which lingered was followed by eight miserable months, then an operation, and the surgeon pronounced her well-but she could not believe she was. Two years of rather unassuming semi-invalidism passed. She made few complaints; she was evidently repressing expression of the recurring symptoms of her discomfort. But since her baby's death she had recovered little ability for effort. She tired quickly. She was living a life of quiet, sheltered, almost luxurious inadequacy. Dr. Corning was puzzled. Mrs. Evanson had appealed to his professional pride and sympathetic nature strongly. Was there something obscure, a lurking condition which he had overlooked? He would have his work reviewed by the celebrated New York internist. Nothing was found which resulted helpfully. Mrs. MacReady was patient. Her innate good judgment withheld discussion of details with her unhappy daughter. She believed Charlotte to be secretly mourning for the little one who had not lived. She spent hours with her son-in-law in anxious conference. What could get her poor child out of this almost apathy? She looked so well; she had never weighed so much; but twice she had been found looking over the baby's things. Was her sorrow eating away at her heart? Hadn't he noticed that for months she left the room when her father or the baby was mentioned! And hadn't he noticed the marks of tears when she came back? The husband had never loved his wife more; he pitied her; he yearned to share the burden which she did not mention. He watched the change in her moods and brought something new each day to please, divert, to interest-books and flowers, periodicals, clothing, jewelry. Pets proved tiresome. She wearied soon on every attempted trip. Concerts and the theater, and music in the home, all made her "nervous."

Mrs. MacReady firmly believed the trouble was a haunting spirit of unsatisfied mother-love, and suggested bringing a child into the home. This plan did arouse new interest. Months were spent in making the selection. Scores of points must be satisfactorily fulfilled, or the plan would prove but a bitter disappointment. At last, a nine-months- old girl-baby was discovered who promised to resemble her foster- mother, and who had a "respectable heritage 'way back on both sides." It seemed most fortunate for both the little orphan and the hungering woman-this adoption. Charlotte spent much time in getting the little one outfitted and settled. The child brought new problems, such as worthy nursemaids, sleep-hours and safe feeding-and Charlotte was better.

Mrs. MacReady had not been looking well. For months she had been slowly losing weight, although there had been not a syllable of complaint. Mr. Evanson finally insisted-the examination revealed an incurable condition—presto! Charlotte was prostrated. The trained nurse, secured for the mother, spent most of her time attending the multiplying needs of the daughter, whose apprehension grew until she began sending for her husband during his office-hours, fearing that her mother was worse; or because she looked as if she might have one of the hemorrhages the doctor feared, or to discuss what they would do when her mother died. The months dragged on. The splendid mother radiated cheer to the last. Then began the reign of terror. Stimulants and sedatives seemed necessary to protect Charlotte from "collapse." For a month, Mr. Evanson did not go near the office; for years, he was subject to calls by day, was disturbed mercilessly at night. No nurse could fill his place. It seemed chiefly the sick woman's "heart." Dr. Corning was too frank-Charlotte insisted he did not "understand." Dr. Winton was "sympathetic." He was physician for many society women. He was an adept in providing understanding and comfort. He never advised "dangerous operations or nasty mixtures," and was no fanatic on diet and exercise.

When Charlotte married, she was "lily-fair," and weighed one hundred and sixteen. Five years after her mother's death she was florid, vapid, and weighed one hundred and sixty-eight miserable pounds. She ran the gamut of nervous ailments: disturbances of circulation, digestion, breathing, eating, sleeping, antagonism to draughts and noises, and a special antipathy to the odor from the exhaust of motor- cars. This last made her faint, and of her fainting attacks pages might be written. The home of John Evanson was now a dreary place. It was a household subsidized to the whims of a self-pitying woman. Her loss of father, baby and mother had "wrecked her life." Husband, child, nurse, servants, were all under the blight of her enslaving self-commiseration. For years all church and social activities were unattempted. Relatives and friends could not be entertained, for every one's attention was demanded to meet the varying possible emergencies of symptoms and to keep her mind from dwelling on her losses and the wretchedness of her fate.

Mr. Evanson's business interests were neglected. His devotion to his morbid, now thoroughly selfish wife lost him big opportunities. His nerves, too, suffered from the unceasing strain. Serious-minded, nonimaginative, honest, it never occurred to him that the illness of his "poor afflicted wife" was an illness of the soul only. The adopted daughter was surrounded by an atmosphere of unnatural repression, an atmosphere charged with false sympathy and unwholesome concessions to the selfish weaknesses of her foster-mother. Dr. Winton advised many comfortable and diverting variations in treatment, but life in the Evanson home became increasingly distorted. At last John realized he was losing out badly-he must have a change. Through some subconscious inspiration he took Dr. Winton with him. They spent two weeks hunting and fishing in the Maine woods. John sought to get in touch with the man behind the doctor. The doctor soon realized the manliness of his companion. They were resting after a taxing portage, both feeling the fine exhilaration of perfect physical relaxation after productive physical weariness. The two men were pretty close. Shop had not been mentioned during the two weeks.

"Doctor, tell me about my wife, just as though she were a sister."

The doctor mused several minutes. "It is not pleasant... it is not easy to tell... you won't want to hear it. You probably will not accept what I have to say... you may resent it."

"Tell me straight; you know how vitally I and my household need to understand the truth."

Gravely the physician spoke—as friend to friend: "Your wife has leprosy!—not the physical form, but the kind that anesthetizes, ulcerates, deforms the soul—the leprosy of self-pity. It began with her father's death. It has eaten deeper and deeper, fed by the unselfishness of her mother and of yourself, unchecked by the soothing salves applied by doctors like me. I early recognized that she would not pay the price of radical cure—the price of effortful living. Her understanding soul has degenerated—something vital to Christ-like living is, I believe, lost. She believes her undiseased body to be ill. Her reason is distorted by her disease-obsessions; her will has been pampered into a selfish caricature. She has accepted the false counsel of her selfishness so long that she is attracted by error, and repelled by truth. I see relief for her only through the culminating self-deception that disease does not exist. If this error is accepted by her, she will become as fanatically superior to her wretched sensations as she is now subservient to them. In other words, she is a worse than useless woman whom Christian Science may transform. She is emotionally sick. Christian Science appeals to the emotional life; it is not concerned with reason-no more is she. It negates physical illness and thus might replace her morbid, hopeless, selfish sufferings with years of applied, wholesome cheer and faith."

Some details were discussed. A fine personality, a woman who devoutly accepted the teachings of Mrs. Eddy, who would have been an example of selfless living, regardless of details of religious faith, was interested in poor Charlotte. Progress was slow at first. Then the leaven began to work. One day the expressman moved a big box from the Evanson home to a local hospital. It contained the paraphernalia of a one-time invalid. One plastic nurse lost a chronic case. To-day in the Evanson household, all discussions of illness are under the ban. The home is no longer a private infirmary, but breathes a bit of the after-glow of cheer which should linger long after the passing of one so worthy and radiant as Annette—the mother beautiful in body and spirit.



CHAPTER XX

THE SLAVE OF CONSCIENCE

In the following life-story, our sympathies are strongly drawn to the conscientious woman who gave so many years of uncomplaining service—a giving which should have brought its daily reward of satisfaction; yet she sorrowed through her youth because she lacked the charity that "suffereth long and is kind," finding which, her problem was met.

The never too attractive Yarnell home was in a mess. Irene, the eight- year-old child, seemed seriously ill. The doctor had said, the night before, that they might have to operate if the pain in her side didn't get better; and the little girl prayed that they would, and prayed specially that she would die while they were doing it. She didn't want to live. She wanted to go rather than to stay forever with the new mother her father had brought home last month. Big Sister wouldn't stay; she ran away the second week and married Tim Shelby, and had a good home now with Tim's people—even though her father hadn't spoken to the Shelbys for years. Aunt Erne had gone too, dear Aunt Erne, her mother's sister, who had been mother to her ever since her real mother died—just after she was born—that precious mother, who, Aunt Effie used to tell her, had died happy that her little girl might live. Aunt Effie had always taught her a beautiful love, and every night she said a beautiful prayer for the mother she had never seen. Aunt Effie tried to stay, too, but couldn't. She left the same day the new mother asked father, before them all, how he was ever going to keep up with all the expenses of so many and give a tenth of his salary to the church.

The very night her aunt went away, the step-mother had told Irene that it was wicked to "do up" her hair in curl-papers, and when she begged her, "Just this once," because she had a "piece to speak" in school next day, and cried in her disappointment, her stepmother had shaken her so hard that something seemed to tear loose in her side. Irene had never hated any one before—and it was wicked to hate; and so she was praying her real mother to come and take her before she became a sinner. But in spite of her prayers, she shrank when her stepmother came near and chilled whenever touched by her. She couldn't eat the food she brought, and every time she thought of her, the pain was worse. Both her father and his new wife seemed so strange. She felt like some stray, hurt animal, not loved by any one.

The new Mrs. Yarnell had been a maiden-lady many years. During her spinstership she had given herself without stint to the activities of her small church, a church belonging to an obscure denomination which teaches that holiness is nigh upon us; that if we but supplement conversion by a second act of grace, sanctification here and forevermore is ours. Hers was not an easy disposition to live with. She had ably held her own through years of bickerings and wordy contentions with an overworked, irritable mother. She gave little love. She received little. But her underdeveloped, souring heart instinctively craved some drops of sweetness. So, when she listened to the fervid exhorter, revealing the new highway to heaven, that glorious way where the good Lord carries all our burdens, if we will just cast them upon Him, a great light illumined her soul. Why a weary life of strife and misunderstanding? She would give herself without reserve, and even in the giving she could feel her burden roll away. In a flash it seemed, life had changed. She was now the Lord's—mind, soul and body. He directed; she followed. He could not lead her wrong, and, as all her impulses and desires were now divine, she could do no wrong. She could think no wrong. Having given all, she was now saved to the uttermost. Misunderstood she must be, of course, by those who knew not the holy leadings of her sanctified soul. Serenely, supremely, she lived. Her old biting temper was now righteous indignation. Her dislike for household work was only an evidence that, like beautiful Mary, she had chosen the better part. What her mother had always called obstinacy and perversity were now stead-fastness in the Lord. Oddly, her tart, sarcastic, even flaying tongue was not softened by any gentleness of divine inspiration. Incidentally, the Lord had given her a plump figure, and a knack of apparel which had long appealed to Widower Yarnell's eye. And the Lord approved; in truth He said "Yes!" so audibly that Miss Spinster hesitated hut one maidenly minute.

Mrs. Yarnell's sanctification washed dishes, kept house, and nursed lonely, sick, little children most inefficiently. So, after Aunt Effie and Big Sister, both willing workers, left, the new bride found unforeseen difficulties in following the Lord's leadings, which seemed to call to real back-and-muscle taxing effort for other people—such was for the world of Marthas. So things in the Yarnell household got in a mess.

It seemed hard for Irene to recover. But her returning strength found early tonic in the house-work which was left for her to do. The new mother's church activities occupied so much of her time that little was left for any but unavoidable essentials. Irene became a fine little worker, and should have had all the honors and happiness due the model child. Neat, rapid, effective, an excellent student, she developed physically strong, the possessor of that rare and attractive glow of health, into a thoroughly wholesome looking young woman. Deep within, however, she had not known peace since the day Aunt Effie left. For years she had fought smoldering resentment and an embittering sense of injustice, until at fourteen the deeper depths were stirred by a slow but irresistible religious awakening. Her stepmother's church was on the opposite side of town, too far for them both to attend. Her own mother's church was in the neighborhood, and throughout the years she had usually been able to attend Sunday-school there and be home again in time to get dinner. Her young understanding had long been in a turmoil as to what religion and right are. Aunt Effie had taught gentleness of conduct and charity of speech, and forgetfulness of self in service. Mrs. Yarnell constantly proclaimed that, until the Lord entered her heart to absolutely sanctify it, she was certain to be miserable, unless she became a hopelessly hardened sinner.

Unhappy the child surely was. Her conscience was a sensitive one; it seemed ever to chide, and often to condemn. No matter how faithfully she followed duty, her failure to receive that wonder-working "second blessing" left her feeling as an unworthy one outside of the fold. Then, when she neglected, even for an hour, her household duties or school-work for church-socials or class-picnics, her conscience, and usually her step-mother, pounced upon her mercilessly. At early fourteen, she was feeling the chilling shadows of a morbid conscience. Her stepmother was away for two weeks attending a denominational conference, and it seemed to Irene that she had more time than usual; so she talked her perplexities over with the pastor of her mother's church. A good man he was, but far from being an expert physician of the soul. He did not seem to sense her deeper problem-the one daily hurting her sensitive spirit, but asked a number of questions, her answers to which convinced him that she was entirely ready to join the church, which he definitely advised her to do, believing thereby she would find the peace she sought. So without delay, even before her stepmother's return, and without consulting her, she followed the minister's advice. Unhappily, her business-burdened father had no special interest in the welfare of any one's soul. Mrs. Yarnell henceforth treated Irene as a religious inferior. High school brought more work and little play. The unsuccessful father died with bad arteries when Irene was eighteen. He left little beside the mortgaged place; so Irene took up bookkeeping, and before she was twenty had a bank-position which, through her ability and merit and trustworthy conscientiousness, she has held through the years and the vicissitudes, supporting herself and her stepmother. Irene's play days had been rare. Her conscience was a grim-visaged angel whose flaming sword she ever saw barring each path to pleasure.

The president of her bank was also an elder in her church. His mind was pretty well filled with business, still he took occasional thought for his employees, and the summer Irene was twenty-three, he asked her how she would spend her two vacation weeks. "No," she was not going to leave Wheeling. "Yes," it was hot, but she had much sewing to do, and if she could save for two years more, the mortgage would be paid. The banker noticed, even as they talked, the slight tremor of fingers and lips which bespeaks tension; and that not a little of her appearance of reserve and strength had slipped away through the grind of the years.

Three delegates were to be sent to the Chautauqua Assembly for a two weeks' special conference, and somehow it turned out that, with those of Mrs. Crumb, the pastor's wife, and Matthew Reynolds, a theologic student the church was helping educate, Irene Tarnell's name was read. Two weeks at Chautauqua, her railway-fare paid both ways!-a score of the best people of the church assuring her that it was her duty-and an envelope with the banker's personal check for twenty dollars, endorsed "for incidentals as delegate"! Thus Irene set forth on her first foreign mission, her first trip out into this big, busy world, about which she had, wrongfully, of course, wasted a few minutes now and then in dreaming. Who could have been more companionable than Matthew, or who more thoughtful and self-eliminating than Mrs. Crumb whose thrifty, matronly heart early sensed the promise and wisdom-and excitement, too, of a romance en route. And dear Mrs. Crumb was deft, and Matthew supremely susceptible, and Irene-she was in the clouds! How like a story-book, the kind that ends happily, it would have worked out, if alas! Matthew had not been quite so susceptible. There was a Pittsburgh girl who had the advantage of prior association and, unfortunately, the young student's pledge of eternal devotion. Still, Irene was a mighty good-looking girl; in fact, Matthew admitted, the third day of their trip, when her fine color began to flash back, that she was better looking than his promised, and so refreshingly free from worldly-mindedness. Mrs. Crumb did not know of Matthew's entanglements, while the devotion of his attentions, a certain lighting of his eyes, and gentleness of speech and demeanor convinced her that all she wished was going very well. So convinced was she that she made bold, early the second week, to express her belief in Irene's almost unequaled qualifications for a minister's wife, to which dutiful Matthew gave unreserved assent.

Nothing of importance was scheduled for Wednesday afternoon, and Mrs. Crumb showed that she was not lacking in an understanding of young folks' human nature when she planned the little excursion which was to offer ample opportunity for the consummation she believed so impending. They had all taken some tramps together. She was not quite equal, she said, to the walk around to Mayfield, but it would make a fine afternoon trip for the young folks. She would go down on the steamer, and they could all come back and enjoy the refreshing, evening water-trip together.

Matthew had certainly been attentive, giving an attention which Irene had never before received. For days she had been happy, the first joy- days she had known since she was eight. The very near future loomed large with intoxicating promise. Mrs. Crumb had talked to her, also, of Matthew, and of his fine record at college, and of his gentle nature. The early afternoon was hot; they walked slowly; they loitered when they came to shade. Then out of the west came booming black clouds, and they were caught in a mid-summer thunderstorm. He helped her as they ran for shelter, but, almost blinded by the pelting rain, she tripped and fell awkwardly, twisting her ankle cruelly. She probably fainted. Matthew was frightened, and in his helplessness lost his head. She was roused by him chafing her hands, and his importunate "Dear Irene," bundled stunned senses, soaked, chilling apparel and stabbing ankle into one unutterable confusion of unspeakable joy. And "devil-inspired fool" that she was, she reached up, drew his tense face, so near, against hers, and "hateful bliss," it stayed there a full minute. Then life went black, for he tore himself away, almost savagely putting her arm aside. "It is wrong; you have made me sin!"

"It is wrong; you have made me sin!" were burned in loathsome black across the face of her conscience, accusing cruelly, unendingly accusing. Tears passed-those years that drag, and she never knew of the girl in Pittsburgh. She did not know other than that she had transgressed and tempted a fine, good man; that she had tempted him from the sanctity of great religious purpose-and her branded, sick conscience proved itself a poison to mind and body.

Dazed, the hurt woman returned to the loveless home. Mechanically, for months, her hands made that home comfortable and toiled on at the bank. We wonder how the break could have been held back so long, in one so sensitive. The staunch body and well-trained mind must have carried her on through mere momentum. But it had to come. Self- condemnation and self-depreciation gave birth to false self- accusation. She began to question the worth of all she did. Repeatedly she must add and re-add a column of figures; even the evidence of the adding-machine had to be proven. She wakened at night questioning the correctness of her entries, and her work became slow and inaccurate. All she did, physically and mentally, became a dread. The very act of walking to and from the bank seemed to drain her waning strength. She refused a vacation suggested by her employer, who gradually became genuinely concerned about her health. He knew but little of the affair at Chautauqua. Mrs. Crumb was too good a woman to let drop any hint of what she may have surmised; she actually knew only of the storm and sprained ankle.

One morning Mrs. Yarnell called a neighboring doctor. She couldn't waken Irene. It was found that her sleep had become so poor that she had bought some powders from the druggist. Never having taken medicine, she was easily influenced, and the ordinary dose left her confused for twenty-four hours. Two weeks' rest at home, if one could rest in Mrs. Yarnell's company, found the girl no stronger. The banker and the doctor had a conference. She must be gotten away from home. The banker had a doctor-friend, a man whose means made it unnecessary for him to give his years of strength to the unceasing demands of a general practice. He had long been keenly interested in the complicated and growing problem of nervousness. He owned a beautiful place down the Ohio River where, for years, he had been taking into his home a few deserving, nervous invalids. He had learned to enter into their lives with a specialist's skill-with a father's understanding. Thus he gave largely—to some it would seem, of his substance, but the true giving was his discerning, constructive comprehension of human problems. Into this atmosphere, God and the banker sent Irene.

For nearly twenty years this oversensitive girl had known few hours of understanding and sympathy. For a week or two she merely rested; then one evening, it seemed precipitate, but some way it was as easy as anything she had ever done, she told the story we have heard. There, revealed, was the defect of a life, a problem to be worked out by the analytic student of mankind. Was it to introduce a little saving recklessness, the redeeming truth of honesty and justice to self, or the neutralizing of self-negation by the acceptance of merited worth! Even through our weaknesses are we sometimes healed. If any reason existed which could merit one self-accusing thought, the doctor found it when he uncovered the resentment which had never healed toward the usurping stepmother—"a woman who had proved her limitations and should be mercifully judged thereby," he told Irene.

"Yes," the doctor said, "you have missed the 'second blessing'; you have missed a thousand blessings because the generosity of your years of fine doing were lacking in the gentleness of feeling which Aunt Effie taught you, and which made your mother so beloved. Lacking this, even in the fulness of your much giving, you have failed. You have been seeking the true religion. Your mother had it-the kind that lightens the dead heaviness and puts heaven's color into the dull, dark hours at home. Herein, only, have you fallen short."

The doctor knew men, and he was able to show her how utterly innocent she was of the slightest hint of wrong in her relations with Matthew, how impossible that her spontaneous act could have wrought a second's harm to any good man. There was much more said helpfully, but the most good, unquestionably, came from the unspoken influence of the thoughtful personal consideration and discerning kindness of this scientific lover of his kind. Three months Irene spent with them, the doctor and his equally good wife; she returned home radiant.

The years pass. During the Great War, when trained men were scarce, our restituted woman acted as cashier and drew almost a cashier's salary. The mortgage is paid. Two women live in the little house. The older is very religious. She still attends many church services; she dutifully gives her tenth to the cause, and, in and out of season, proclaims her way as the perfect road to the heights beyond. Old and practically unchangeable, she is not lovable and she never has been, but near-by tenderness has softened some of her self-satisfied asperities. Still radiant is the younger woman-the righteous woman whose righteousness has put unfailing cheer in service most of us would call "fierce," a righteousness which has learned to be charitably blind where most of us would see and resent, a righteousness which has brought abiding happiness to a life that had long suffered, a slave to its conscience. Cleverness and wealth-having not charity-have sought such happiness in vain through the ages.



CHAPTER XXI

CATASTROPHE CREATING CHARACTER

Grandfather Scott was a blacksmith. He was much more-a natural amateur mechanic-the only man in those early days in the little town of Warren, who could successfully tinker sewing-machines, repair clocks, or make a new casting for a broken Franklin heater. He was a hale, ruddy man who lived, worked and died with much peace. There were girls, but David was the only boy, and a lusty youth he was. The absence of brothers, or possibly an excess of sisters, gave him, both as youth and young man, much more liberty of action and right of way than was good for his soul. At any rate, he early developed a steadfastness which, throughout his life, stood for both strength of purpose and hard-headed, sometimes hard-hearted wilfulness. His father had dreamed a dream: his smithy was to grow into a shop, and later the shop was to become a factory where a hundred men would do his bidding and supply the country with products of his inventive genius. But so far as his own life was to realize, it remained a dream. The shop was never built; the genius failed to invent. But his son, David! Yes, he would have the schooling and advantages that the father had not known. And so it was: at thirty, David Scott had been well educated in mechanics; at forty, he had made improvements on the sewing-machine, which gave him valuable patents; at fifty, his factory employed ten times the number his father had visioned. Thus was fulfilled the dream of the ancestor.

Business success was large for Mr. David Scott. But what of his success as a father? He married at twenty-eight, a handsome woman whose pride in appearance stood out through the years and influenced the training given her three children. Little David, or "Dave," as he was early called in distinction to his father, was petted by his mother and, in spite of evidences to the contrary, was his father's pride. The family moved to Cleveland when Dave was a little fellow. His father would not be cramped, so, with what proved to be rare foresight, bought part of an old farm on Mayfield Heights. Both here and at Granddad's, where Dave was sent each summer, there was ample out-of-doors, and the lad grew sturdy of limb. With a flaming shock of curling, copper hair, his eyes deepest blue, and skin as fair as a girl's, he was a boy for mother, teachers and later for maidens to spoil. But an attractive personality, an inherent fineness never left him while he was conscious, and seldom when he was irresponsible.

Dave's mother was proud, proud of her successful husband, of the mansion and estate of which she was the envied mistress, proud of her handsome self and handsome daughters, and specially proud of Dave, the brightest and handsomest of them all. It is a pity that she who so fully enjoyed the pleasures of wealth, and of wealth-shielded motherhood, might not have lived to drink to her full of the joys she loved. Pride, insufficient clothing, wealth, inadequate exercise, exposure in a raw, March bluster, defective personal resistance, pneumonia!—and in a week, the life was gone.

Dave was only fourteen, but, in face of his spoiling, was ready for St. Paul's, where he was sent the next fall. He was bright-even brilliant in his prep school work. Mathematics, the sciences and history seemed almost play for him, while in languages, and especially in English, he did an unusual amount of "not required" work.

Dave made his father his hero, and for many years was instant in doing his will. Had the older man taken serious thought of his son's personality and entered into the boy's developmental needs with his wonted intelligence and thoroughness, the two could have grown into a closeness which would have made the Scott name one to be reckoned with in the manufacturing world.

The father's business was growing even beyond his own dreams, and he found little time to give his boy, whom, in fact, he saw but rarely, save at Christmas holidays. So it happened that Dave was more deeply influenced by his mother's love for the beautiful than by machine-shop realities; and the aesthetic developed in him to the exclusion of the father's practical life.

For many years wine had been served at the family dinners. Mr. Scott drank only at home, and then never more than two small glasses. He had no respect for the man who overindulged any weakness. He little thought his own blood could be different than he. This father was a man of exceptional energy who had wrought miracles financially, and was, without question, master in his thoroughly organized factory. He dominated his surroundings. Where he willed to lead—whether in business circles, in the vestry, in his own home—the strength of his intellect, the force of his purpose and his quiet but tangible assertiveness were felt. He had never been balked in any determined course of action.

When Dave went East to school, he possessed physique and health which should have made athletics a desire and a joy. But on both the baseball and football squads were a few fellows not choice in their use of English. In fact, even at this excellent church-school, these exceptions did considerable "cussing." Dave's mother and sisters were fastidious, and Dave found himself, even at fourteen, resenting coarseness. He, therefore, chose the "nice fellows" as associates, and made friends to his liking in books. We must not think of him as "prissy" or snobbish, but he distinctly disliked crudity however expressed, and this dislike grew and was strengthened by his increasing devotion to the aesthetic. Otherwise, Dave's prep school years were those of an unusually fine fellow, whose mind promised both brilliance and strength. Sadly, during these vital years, Dave had no mature counselor; no strong character was sufficiently close to sense his needs and court his confidence. So some of the proclivities of his early home influence persisted and developed, which normally should have been displaced by others standing for oncoming manhood.

College life, unfortunately, but increased his opportunities to indulge his weaknesses, and his three years at Yale found him a dependable member of a refined fast-set. With his unusual mind—giving no time to athletics—there were many idle hours at his disposal. He now discovered that he liked cigarettes which his father held in supreme contempt, while, from time to time, a quiet wine-supper with a select few, where spirits blended so finely when mellowed by champagne, stood for the acme of social pleasure. Dave could not carry much liquor and mellowed early, and rather soon slipped quietly under the table, to be told the next day most of the snappy toasts and stories the other fellows had contributed to the occasion. These entertainments soon forced Dave to overdraw his allowance. A business- like letter asking explanations came from his father, and this was followed by a peremptory command that he live within his already "ample remittance." Father and son had never been companions, and here the boy's devotion deserted, and a growing estrangement began. Dave, knowing his father's wealth, resented his lack of liberality, and he knew him too well to protest. For three months he heeded parental injunction; then a trip to New York to grand opera. Entertainment accepted must be returned. Another wine-supper, paid for by a draft on his father-and family warfare was on! The draft was paid-the family credit must not be questioned, but a house was divided against itself, and the letter David sent Dave left a trail of blue smoke. It left also a reckless, rebellious son.

Adelaide Foster's grandfather was wealthy. Her mother had suited her own taste-not her parents'-when she married attractive Fred Foster. The grandfather dallied too often with the "bucket-shop" before he forgave his foolish child, and when he came to his better paternal self, he hadn't much to leave his little granddaughter. But Adelaide made much of her little, and spent two very developing years at Barnard.

Dave and Adelaide met on terms artistic which were most satisfying to them both. Dave had made good junior marks in spite of his inoffensive sprees and conflicts with his father. He was in many ways Adelaide's superior, but she gave him a large companionship in things beautiful, and worshiped at his feet in questions profound. His father had ignored, or failed to notice, Dave's references to the young lady-so there was a little wedding-ceremony with four witnesses, an almost impulsive wedding. The elder Scott was not expecting this flank- movement, but family pride again helped Dave out, and a liberal check followed the stiff telegram of "best wishes."

Six months the young folks spent abroad. The beautiful in nature and art which Europe offered blended into their honeymoon. The last wedding-gift dollar had been spent when they returned to East Best, the paternal mansion in Cleveland. Two evenings later Mr. Scott called his son into the library. It was time to reassert his sovereignty. This, too, was business; so it was curt and direct. "Well, sir, I trust you have sown your wild oats. You have married. It is high time you settled down. I shall give you and Adelaide a home with us, or, if you prefer to live elsewhere, one hundred dollars a month for living expenses. This, mark you, is my gift to her. You don't earn a cent of it. You will have to start in the business at the bottom. You may choose the shops or the office. You will be paid what you earn. I hope you will make good. You are capable. Good-night."

Dave chose the office. The shops were "ugly." Unhappily, much of the good, the useful and the necessary was being classed as "ugly" in this young aesthete's mind, and worse, he was finding himself uncomfortable in the presence of an increasing number of normal, even practically essential conditions. This gifted and promising young man was at odds with reality. He refused to accept reality as real. For him in beauty of line and color and sound, in beauty of thought and expression, only, was the truth. He suffered in other surroundings. He had become aesthetically hypersensitive. And of all reality's ruthlessness, what was less tolerable than monotony? What less capable of leading a man to the heights than the eternal grind of the office?

Even Adelaide and the baby bored him at times. Young Scott could do anything well to which he gave effort. And his father was considering giving him a raise, when at the end of six months he disappeared. The second day after, the distraught wife received a message from New York. He was all right, and would be home next week. The father, however, had to honor another draft before his son could square accounts and purchase a return ticket. This was the first of his retreats from the grim battle-front of reality. Six months seemed the limit of his capacity to face a work-a-day life. He read much, and of the best. He took up Italian alone and soon read it easily. When at home his chief excesses were books-but the Scott table was amply supplied, and in view of his inactive physical habits we realize that Dave was a high liver.

Adelaide had proven a most dutiful daughter-in-law, and with the baby long kept the headsman's ax from descending. But even their restraining power had its limitations. The irk of that "godless" office was being more and more poorly met by Dave. Five times during the fourth year he took ungranted periods of relaxation. The last time the usual draft was not paid. He unwisely signed a check, badly overdrawing his private account. His father seemed waiting for such an opportunity, and took drastic action. Under an old law, he had his son apprehended as a spend thrift, and so adjudged, deprived of his rights and made ward of a guardian. A young physician was made deputy in charge of his person—a man chosen, apparently, with much care. It was to be his business to teach this wealthy man's son to work with his hands and to live on a stipulated sum. There is no question that immediate good followed these aggressive tactics, and in the personality of his companion-guardian he found much that was wholesome. A sturdy character was the doctor, who had fought his way through poverty to a liberal education, and was entering a special study of nervous disorders. His good theoretical training was planted in a rich soil of common-sense. For three months they worked on a farm, shoulder to shoulder. The two men became friends, a most helpful friendship for Dave, whose admiration for the young doctor had proven a path which led him, for the first time, to a realization of the hidden beauties in a life of overcoming, and this lies close to the nobility of the love of work.

Dave was accepting his need for the bitter medicine which was being administered. He had forgiven Adelaide who sided with his father and, for the first time, had written, acknowledging some of his past failures. He wanted some books. He needed clothes. The orders given the doctor had been rigid as to spending-money and diversions. The determined father disapproved the expense account. Another man was sent to relieve the doctor-companion-a man who could be depended upon to carry out the letter of the father's law. Rebellion, fierce—and it seemed, righteous—flamed forth in Dave Scott's soul. He was doing his best. He was working as he never had worked before. He had seen his need—he had the vision of self-mastery. All this, and more he had seriously confided to the man his father, through the court, had placed over him. Without a word of explanation he was again to be turned over to the custody of a stranger. Was he a child or a chattel? Was he mentally irresponsible that he should be thus transferred from one hand to another without a hearing? He wired his protests, and received in return an assurance that he would accept his new custodian or be cut off without a cent. In that hour the real character of David Scott was born. He consulted an attorney and learned the limited power of his guardians. Outside of Ohio he was legally free. He pawned some of his few belongings. Adelaide and the child were financially cared for. Over night he left the State. He would be a man, penniless, rather than the chattel-son of a millionaire!

The United States had just entered the Great War. The Marines were being recruited everywhere for "early over-seas service," and Dave Scott, the aesthetic, volunteered as a "buck-private." Few got over as fast as they wished. It was six months for Dave at Paris Island. There were few in the ranks of his mental ability, and physically he became as hard as the toughest. He was soon a corporal and later a sergeant. And he worked. He met the roughest of camp duties, at first with set jaw and revolting senses, later with a grim smile; finally, and then the emancipation, with a sense of the closeness of man to man in mankind's work. And the men began turning to him, and as he sweated with them he learned to discern the manliness in the crudest of them. He went across at the end of six months, to France. He was a replacement in the Sixth.

The French line had been beaten thin as gold-foil. If it broke, Paris was at the mercy of the Hun. Then eight thousand of Uncle Sam's Marines were thrown in where the line was thinnest and the pressure heaviest. Sharp-shooters, expert marksmen, were most of them. The enemy was now in the open. They had not before met riflemen who boldly stood up and coolly killed at one thousand yards. Crested German helmets made superb targets, and the officers bit the dust disastrously. At the end of three days, six thousand of these eight thousand Marines were dead or casuals. But the tide of the Great War was turned-and Dave Scott was one of the immortals who forced the flood back upon the Rhine. What miracle was it that shielded that ever-smiling white face, crowned with its flaming shock, from the storm of lead and death? With the fate of nations trembling in the balance, who can know the part his blue eyes, now true as steel, played in the great decision as, hour after hour with deadly precision, he turned his hand to slaughter? Five times the gun he was using became too hot and was replaced by that of a dead comrade. After those three days at Chateau-Thierry, no mortal could question that Dave Scott had forsworn aesthetics; that he was a demon of reality. Later he saw service on the Champagne front, and then was invalided home.

It was a chastened father, a magnificently proud father, who was the first to greet him. For the time he was unable to put into words the honor he had for the son whom, so few months before, he considered worthless. "It's all past now, Dave. That past we won't speak of again. I've arranged for your discharge. You'll be home to stay, inside of a month."

Dave's answer, probably more than any act in battle, proved that his character had been remade: "No, Father, I have enlisted for four years. I belong to the Marines till my time is up. I owe it to you, to Adelaide, to the boy, to myself, to prove that I can be the man in peace that I have tried to be in training-camp and in France. I know I can face reality when spurred by excitement. I have yet to prove that I can face the monotony of two years and a half of routine service."



CHAPTER XXII

FINDING THE VICTORIOUS SELF

The victorious soul counts life as a gift which, far from growing darker and more dreary as the sun falls into the west, may daily become more rich and beautiful and worthy. To the soul victorious our span of years is not menaced by misfortune and misery, is not degraded by bitterness, discord and hatred, but hourly thrills with the realization that the worst which life may bring but challenges the divine within to masterful assertion. And the soul victorious has risen unscathed—glorified—above every attack of fate.

Mrs. Herman Judson was a sight to make the gods weep. With features more than usually attractive, softened by a halo of waving, silvery hair, she was but a mushy bog of misery. It was three P. M.; she had just been carried downstairs, and in spite of the usual host of apprehension, with some added new ones for to-day, no slightest accident had marred the perilous trip from her front bedroom to the living-room below; still everything and everybody, save old Dr. Bond, was in a flutter. Tension and apprehension marked the faces and actions of all. Not till the last of six propping, easing, supporting pillows had been adjusted; till hot-water bottles were in near contact with two "freezing" ankles; till her shoulder-shawl had been taken off—a twist straightened out—and accurately replaced; till the room, already ventilated to a preordered nicety of temperature, had a door opened and both windows closed; not till the screen had been moved twice to modify the "glare" of the lights, and to protect from possible "draughts"; not until the "Sunset Scene from Venice" had been turned face to the wall so the reflection from its glass wouldn't make her "eyes run cold water"; and finally, not until ten drops from the bottle labeled "For spinal pain" had been taken, and five minutes spent by her niece, fanning so very gently, "so as not to smother my breath"—not till this formidable contribution to the pitiful slavery of petted sensations had been slavishly offered, could the invalid find strength to greet her childhood playmate, quiet, observing, charitable Dr. Willard Bond.

Twice a day for many months the household held its breath while this moving-down, and later moving-back (and to-day's was an uncomplicated, unusually peaceable one), was being accomplished. "Held its breath," is really not quite accurate, for Ben, the colored butler, and 'Lissie, the colored cook, found much reason for strenuous respiration, as Mrs. Judson and her rocker, with pillows, blankets and the ever present afghan, weighed two hundred and eight pounds-one hundred and eighty pounds of woman, twenty-eight pounds of accessories! And Ben and 'Lissie were the ones who logically deserved fanning and attention to ventilation, especially after the seven P. M. trip back.

And they were always so solemn, so tensifyingly solemn, these risky journeys up and down. The niece, Irma, carried the hot-water bottles, the extra blankets and the fan. The nurse had the medicine-box and a small tray with water-glasses—for when things went wrong, the cavalcade must stop and some of the "Heart-weakness drops" be given, or some whiffs taken from the pungent "For tightness of breath" bottle, before further progress was safe.

Mrs. Judson knew her symptoms so well. There were eighteen of special importance; and Dr. Cummings, the successful young surgeon, a far-away relative-by-marriage, had, in all seriousness, prescribed eighteen lotions, elixirs, powders, pills and potions, to meet each of the eighteen varied symptoms. Nine months ago this progressively developing invalidism of twenty years had culminated in what Dr. Cummings suspected to be a severe gall-stone attack. A few days later, when his sensitive patient was measurably relieved, he had told her his fears and suggested a possible operation. Within two minutes Mrs. Judson was faint and chilling. Since then the doctor, the nurse, the niece, not to forget Ben and 'Lissie, had labored without ceasing to prevent a return of the "awful gall-stone attacks," and, with the Lord's help, to get Mrs. Judson "strong enough for an operation." But progress was dishearteningly slow. Every mention of "operation" seemed to make their patient worse. And now for over eight months she had not walked a step and had been an hourly care.

For the first time since the beginning of the gall-stone trouble, Dr. Cummings was going to be away for two weeks, and he, with Dr. Bond, had witnessed the downstairs trip in anticipation of a conference. Dr. Bond lived but two doors away, and as he had retired from active practice, could always respond to a call if needed. Moreover, it had been discovered that he was a neighbor-playmate of Mrs. Judson during her girlhood. He had but recently come to Detroit from their old home in Charlestown, under the shadow of Bunker Hill monument, about which they had often played as children. Dr. Bond had lived there alone for many years following his wife's death, and had now come to make a home with his successful son. He was giving his time, and he felt the best year of his life, writing a series of chapters on "Our Nerves and Our Morals." He had never been a specialist, claiming only to be a family- doctor. But for over thirty years he had been ministering most wisely to the ills of the soul as well as of the body. A large, compelling sympathy he gave his patients. He saw their ills. He felt their fears. He sensed their sorrows. He understood their weaknesses. He looked beyond the manifest ailments of flesh and blood. His fine discernment revealed the obscure sicknesses which affect hearts and souls. And his rational sympathies penetrated with the deftness and beneficence of the surgeon's scalpel. He stood for that type of man whom God has raised up to help frail and needing human-kind in body, mind and spirit.

"Sixty years is a long time to pass between meetings, isn't it?" said Dr. Bond after Mrs. Judson's needs had severally and successfully been humored, and she was able to note and recognize the old-new doctor's presence and offer a plump, tremulous hand in greeting.

"You don't know how nearly you have missed seeing me," she replied. "I have been on the verge for months, but Dr. Cummings has been able to pull me through. You see, he knows all my dangers, and has given me the best medicines that medical science knows for each of them. Have him tell you about it, Dr. Bond. I do hope nothing will happen while he's gone." Dr. Bond replied that he was sure, with Dr. Cummings' advice and the nurse's and the niece's help and understanding, there would be no danger; that he was so near he would come in each afternoon and they could talk about the old days and the old childhood friends around Boston. "I hope so," Mrs. Judson replied, "but you know I can't talk long. But do come every day. I'll feel safer, I'm sure. And promise me that you won't delay a minute if I send for you for my gall-stones. If they get started, I die a thousand deaths."

"I shall come at once, you may be sure, but tell the nurse to put those gall-stones to bed at ten p. m., because you and I are too old to be spreeing around during sleeping hours."

But Mrs. Judson couldn't find a ghost of a smile for this pleasantry. In fact, her look of alarm caused Dr. Bond to add, "Don't fear, Mrs. Judson, I can still dress in five minutes and will promise faithfully to come at any hour."

The two physicians left the room together. Thirty-five and sixty-five they were, both earnest, capable, honest men, one a master of modern medical science, the elder a thoroughly equipped physician, and a deep student of humanity.

"I am very glad you are going to see my aunt. For months I have wished to call in a consultant, but she has always refused. I know much of her trouble is nervous, and you know how little time most of us have to study nervousness, and I am sure you will see clearly much which has been rather hazy to me. I think you were concealing a laugh when they gave her the 'Spinal-pain drops,' and frankly, there is very little that has much strength in all those pills and powders I've given her. I have learned that she gets along very well much of the time when she can anticipate her symptoms and prescribe for herself. In fact, it's about all that the poor old lady has to do these days. I am not absolutely sure, either, about those gall-stones. The symptoms are not classic, but she certainly does suffer, and I have had to give her pretty heavy doses of morphine several times, and then she's wretchedly sick for some days. Believe me, Doctor, I do not feel competent in her case. It's not my line. Find out all you can. Do whatever you feel is best, and you may depend upon my endorsement of any changes you may see fit to make. It will be a God's mercy if you can win her confidence and share the burden of her treatment with me. Of course, she's too old to get well, and I'm afraid if we ever have to operate, there will be a funeral."

Dr. Bond thanked the younger man heartily. He felt his earnestness and honesty, and saw that he had done all he knew to help his patient.

That evening the old doctor's mind spanned the gulf of nearly two generations. He was again a little fellow, and Rhoda Burrows lived across the street. Their mothers were friends; they were playmates. And through the years he had treasured her happy, sunny, beautiful face as an ideal of girlhood perfection. She was older than he, and how she had "big sistered" and "mothered" him! How his little hurts and sorrows had fled before her laughter and caresses! Hundreds and thousands had touched his inner life since Rhoda moved West with her parents, but that gleam of girlhood had remained etched with the clearness of a miniature upon his mind, undimmed by the crowding, jostling throng. Rhoda Burrows, the fairy-child of his boyish dreams, and Mrs. Herman Judson, the acme of self-pitying and self-petting selfishness, the same! It seemed impossible—yet—and here his big charity spoke—all of the choice spirit of the girl cannot have been swallowed up in the sordidness of a selfish, old age. And that same charity breathed upon the physician's soul till his helpful and hopeful interest for this pitiful wreck of wretchedness was aglow. He would give her his best, and he knew that best sometimes wrought wonders.

Dr. Bond first had a conference with the niece, who was pure gold, and who accepted each of her aunt's complaints as a warning which could but disastrously be ignored. But, and this was good to know, he learned that when Aunt Rhoda was better, she was kind and good- hearted. From the nurse, the doctor learned other details, and what was of special significance, that the invalid's appetite rarely flagged-then he saw a reason for her one hundred and eighty pounds; and when he learned that rare broiled beef, or rare roast beef was served the physically inert patient and bountifully eaten twice each day, his understanding became active.

Mrs. Judson's presiding fates were good to her the next week. She would have denied it with the sum total of her vehemence, which incidentally was some sum, but Dr. Bond says it is true. It was after eleven, one night. He was just finishing his day's writing. It was the nurse 'phoning. "I am truly sorry to call you, Doctor, but I've given three doses of the gall-stone medicine, and it always relieves unless a real attack is on. I am sure she is suffering." The old doctor was not surprised. The patient had been doing unusually well for two or three days and had spoken particularly of her better appetite. The doctor's first query, upon reaching the house, related to the details of the evening meal. "No, there was no steak to-night. We had chicken- salad. 'Lissie had tried herself; Mrs. Judson was hungry and asked for a second portion."

Gently, carefully, thoroughly, the suffering woman was examined. There was no doubt that her pain was severe, but in conclusion, the old doctor did doubt decidedly the presence of gall-stones. He believed it to be duodenal colic. "I don't wish to give you a hypodermic," he told her. "I know it will relieve you quickly to-night, but it will set you back several days. I am going to ask you to be patient, and to take an unpleasant dose, and I think the nurse and I can relieve you completely within two hours, and you will be little the worse; in fact, you may be better, to-morrow."

"She won't take it," the nurse said, as the doctor called her from the room. "Dr. Cummings suggested it once, and she held it against him for weeks. She said her mother whipped her when she was a child and then couldn't make her swallow it."

"You will fix it as I tell you, then bring it in to me," the Doctor replied. Dubiously the nurse carried out the order. She thanked her stars that the Doctor, not she, was to give it. Yet it looked very nice when she brought it into the sick-room, redolent with lemon and peppermint.

"Think of this, Mrs. Judson, as your best friend to-night in all the realm of medicine. Take it with my belief that it is to prove the cure of your gall-stones. It is not nice. It's not easy to swallow. Don't sip it. Take it all at a gulp."

But she sipped it. And she screamed, not a scream of pain, but of rage, of violated dignity-insulted-outraged. "Castor oil! I'll die first. Why, that stuff isn't fit to give an animal. Are you trying to kill me I Oh, you old fogy! I knew something would happen when I let Dr. Cummings go. I wouldn't give such stuff to a sick cat."

All symptoms of pain seemed gone for the time. Generous as he was, the old Doctor stiffened in the face of her tirade, yet with dignity, replied: "You are refusing a real help. I speak from long experience. I can give you nothing else till you have taken this."

"Then go!" she snapped out. But the "o-o-o" was prolonged into a wail as a particularly pernicious jab in the midst of her duodenum-"a providential thrust," Dr. Bond said—doubled her up, if rotundity can be said to double. The Doctor was obdurate. Colic was trumps—and won!

The first dose did not meet a hospitable reception, but another was promptly given. Then other nicer things were done and the Doctor was home and the patient comfortably asleep soon after one. The next day's conference between the two was strictly professional, nor was there much thawing till the third day after. Mrs. Judson's ire must have been of Celtic origin, for it was not long-lived.

The following Sunday afternoon seemed propitious for the beneficent work of the soul-doctor. The whole family had told Mrs. Judson how much better she was looking-the Doctor had kept her on soft diet since her attack. "You have told me so little of yourself," said Dr. Bond. "I only know that sorrow came." He then told her of herself as she had lived in his memory. She had forgotten the beauty of her childhood. The Doctor brought back the picture in tones which could stand only for high reverence. She felt he wanted to know, and she knew she wanted to tell. So for two hours they sat, hand in hand, as in their childhood, and he heard of her father's moderate success as an editorial writer after he came West when she was nine, of their comfortable home in Detroit, how well she had done in school, of her early ability as a teacher, of her election as super-intendent of the St. Claire Academy for Girls when she was twenty-five, of her marriage to Herman Judson, a childless widower fifteen years her senior, before she was thirty, of their very happy home, of her own little girl and how she grew into womanhood, of her daughter's marriage, and then of tier little girl, and how wonderful it was to be a grandmother before she was fifty!

Then it was "Nurse, the bottle for 'Tightness of breath'... I don't see how I can tell it. You can't know. Nobody can. It was never the same for any one else. The train went through a bridge, and they were all three killed, my husband, my only girl, the darling grandchild. God turned His face away that night they brought them home. I've never seen Him since. I've never looked for Him since. I don't see how I kept my mind. Something snapped inside. I couldn't go to the funeral, and while I brought my sister home to live with me, and after she died, have done the best I could to raise Irma, her child, and Irma's tried, I know, to be a daughter to me, yet I've always been so lonely, so wretched and miserable and sick. I haven't anything to live for-but I'm afraid to die."

Then began the cheapening catalog of the nearly twenty years of illness, her weak and sensitive spine, her constant difficulty in breathing, and the eternal thumping of her heart. And on and on, the list so old to Dr. Bond's ears, so commonly heard in the experience of helpers of the nervous sick-as usual to the nerve-specialist as the inflamed appendix to the modern surgeon—yet in the mind of every nerve-sufferer so unique, so individual, so different. But of all the long, two-hour story, one short sentence stood out, eloquent in the doctor's mind, "I haven't anything to live for, yet I'm afraid to die." He gently thanked her. He had felt with her in the recital of her great sorrow, and she knew he had suffered in her suffering. "You can get well. You can find something worth living for, and you can lose your fear of death, if you will pay the price." For the moment she misunderstood.

"Why, Doctor, I would gladly give thousands for health."

Again, gently, "Your dollars are worthless. You are poor in the gold which will buy your restoration. I shall tell you about it Wednesday if you want to know."

On both Monday and Tuesday visits her curiosity prompted her to refer to the great cure Dr. Bond mentioned. But it was Wednesday afternoon before he spoke seriously.

"You were very ill last week—such illnesses have frequently proved fatal to life, when ignorantly managed. But as I see you to-day, knowing your radiant childhood, and the good fortune which was yours for years, and the heart-tearing shock which came so cruelly, I see a sickness more dire and fatal than any for which you have ever yet been treated. The beauty and youth and charity of your spirit are mortally ill. I see your soul an emaciated remnant, a skeleton of its possible self. It threatens to die before your body. Selfish sorrow has infected and permeated your once lovely, better self, and to-day you have no true goodness left. You are good to others that they may be better to you. You are generous with your means-a generosity which costs you no sacrifice, that you may buy back the generosity without which you could not live. Four useful lives are emptying the best of their strength, ability and love into years of service that you may know a poor, low-grade, selfish, physical comfort. You are taking from them and others consideration, self-sacrifice, loyalty, unstinted devotion, and giving in return only ungrateful dollars. You are rich in these, but poorer than Lazarus in the least of the qualities which make life worth living a day, which keep Death from being a haunting terror. You have not one physical symptom of your endless catalog which cannot be removed if you meet the blessings half-way which discomforts offer."

It couldn't have been what Dr. Bond said—it must have been what he was himself that made those unwelcome, humiliating truths carry conviction, win confidence, and waken hope. Possibly his last sentence helped her decision—his serious confidence in his ability to remove those terrifying, ever impending threats of physical anguish. At any rate, she gave her promise-for six months she would implicitly follow his instruction, with the understanding that if she did not see herself better at the end of four months, she was to be released from further treatment.

It would be a long story, a story of remarkable medical finesse; it would be describing the work of an artist—for such was Dr. Bond as he turned bodies from sickness to health and souls from perdition to salvation. But victory came! In six weeks, the invalid was walking. In six months she was walking three miles a day. She was eating, bathing, sleeping and working more like a woman under sixty than one nearing seventy. She spent the summer with the doctor's people in their bungalow on Lake Huron. She now gave of her means thoughtfully, with growing unselfishness, and soon after she began to look up and out there came the peace within, so long a stranger. And she told Dr. Bond, simply, one day, that God had come back to her, and he as simply replied: "You have come back to God."

That winter, Dr. Bond spent in the East. One day the expressman brought a package—some books he had always loved, in remarkable bindings, and this note:

"My best Friend:

"To-day I am seventy. I haven't been so young since sorrow was sent to prove me, nor more happy since I nursed your hurt arm when we were children. I walked down town, two miles you know, and back, and a mile in the stores, I am sure, to find these books you love, in bindings worthy your better enjoyment of them. All that you have promised has come to me. God bless you!"



CHAPTER XXIII

THE TRIUMPH OF HARMONY

When man "conceives his superpower, his miraculous power to meet disaster, and in it to find profit; to face defeat after defeat and therein acquire faith in his own permanence; to live for years within a frail, defective body, with a mind unable to respond to the promptings of ambition and inspiration, and thereby take on the greatness of gentleness-the conviction comes clear, a conviction which will not comfortably stay put aside, that life is intended to develop a noble self."