Show MISS RUODY III BY HAEEIET PRESCOTT SPOFFOED i Copyright 1S9S the S S McClure Co Rhoda the elder said meant a rose or something like But surely if there i J was anything of the rose about Hiss i Rhody it was a faded a pressed and I withered one And yet a certain hint of the sweetness of the rose always hung about her perhaps spiritualized but none the less sweet The children recognized it for it was Miss Rhody who put the buttered brown paper on their bruises and consoled them for I their bumps now with an apple when no one else had applesfor Miss Rho dys few trees always bore on the off year and now with a shining square of t loaf sugar from tHe great cone wrapped in purple paper which seemed to them a part of the wonders of the outlandish countries on the other side of the world where people walked head down i as the flies do on the celling And now and then she consoled one of the ten derest and dearest with a kiss instead which the little thing endured for the sake of the cuddling on the soft shoulder shoul-der the agreeableness of the half guessed scent of dried roses that she was never without and the dollbaby rags that came afterward And the young girls recognized it for it was to Miss Rhody they came with the weighty confidences of their hopes and their griefs and hesitations their gushes and blushes and it was from her that they had the excellent advice fle n 3ell which they never followed The mothers moth-ers recognized it for it was not only that Miss Rhody came to them in their Illness and the illnesses of their children I chil-dren nor that she brought them the bunch of peonies for the parlor pitcher but she seemed to have an insight into experiences which she had never shared and gave them silent sympathy at unexpected moments when they would have been the last to confess they needed it And the old people recognized it too but loth to say not altogether with the same friendliness of reeling toward it for it was Miss Rhody who so long had dressed their dear ones for the last long rest that they knew she was the one likely to 4 perform that office for themselves and I that flowerlike sweetness of hers had Ito J I-to them something of the quality of the flower blossoming on graves There was only one person on all the I r < i i l ft t f 11 f A 1 I Sunday Mbrninsrs Sometimes Before Be-fore Meeting t shore really indifferent to this poor charm of Miss Rhodys and that was Will Mather who never perceived any charm at all about her and who looked on her with a goodnatured indulgence as he would have looked on Ann Maters Mat-ers canary had it escaped and come across his way and who never thought of her when he did not see her Her I pale thin personality was such a colorless color-less thing beside that of her cousin Ann the blackeyed redcheeked beauty or eel beside the tender smiling loveliness loveli-ness of the pretty Sally whom Tom Brie i ould have died for and whom Humphrey Lavendar had made his own She was in fact to Will Mather only like the shadows of someone else and Will Mather was the only one t whose feeling in regard to herself had any vital significance i to Miss Rhody t I t ec Every time that he came home from a t voyage more bluff and burly and i I I trumpettoned than before all the suggestions of the romance of the deep i I seas gathered about him in her fancy i and the whole outside foreign world j i came with him He was the hero of i wild wrestles with wind and weather j I what dangers of night and storm had j threatened him what triumphs were I I his when he brought his white canvas II I into port For Will was now the captain cap-tain of the ManoMull a man of I mark and of authority in the village of the shore But to Miss Rhody he had I I I been as much as this and more before j ever he ran away to sea always an I j ideal adways a being of adventure It i 1 might have seemed to another that she t wavered a little in her allegiance when I I Humphrey Lavendar took the hand of I r his crazy mother as she was dancing i i in the street and put her shawl about i I her and led her home and Rhody ran and took her other hand I sharing ba Humphrey the shame and 1 i I pain of the thing he was one day to in j i t herit But it was nothing of the sort j I f Humphrey was some one in distress j and she went to him just as she went i t to the hurt creature out of the abundance S abun-dance of her hearts tenderness But 1 f as for Will he would never be one off of-f those in any distress for even before I she was a dozen years old she had felt j all that was potent and fortunate and I I i that captivated all the girls in town j r F in his strong and reckless nature even j before he climbed the outside of the meeting house steeple to rescue a parrot I par-rot that had taken a flight of fancy to I t the vane and had hurt its wing and t feared to try its fate downward To i be sure he was thrashed for it And I deserved it said Will But I had the climb I Ill teach you to frighten your mother again you ships monkey I cried his father But Will saw the j I twinkle in his fathers eye for all the i blows and knew there wasa bubbling I pride over the boys achievement in the I old sailors heart A chip of the old I block the father was muttering to I himself as he put up the strap and I that in pite of the fact that he had I 1 been heard to say that he would rather I the boy died youhg than live to follow I i his fathers path in blue water But nothing of that matfered to I Rhody and to the little public to Ann and Flora and Humphrey to Sally and I Tom Brier and Iry Hodge and the rest of them to whom the thrashing was an I affair of every day but the climbing set their nerves to thrilling and their blood to spinning They held counCir I among themselves and knew that soon or or later it was decreed in fate that I Will Mather would run away to sea I And he was as good as their word To I sea he went and when he came back I breezy and brown and rolling in his salt he could have had any girl on the shore for the askingexcept Sally It f is hardly any sacrifice of her maiden modesty to say he could have had Rhody although I do not know but the asking would have surprised her I Y1 out of the possibility for she did not I j look on him as girls look upon a lover but as a subject looks upon a king as a j slave upon a master he was the hero b of the long unwritten romance she was E spelling out and reading every hour r But Will Mather hardly knew that poor Rhody existed other than as part of the dim outlines and phantasmagoria that fill up the background otjM peoples r peo-ples memories Her cousin Anns rich color her flashing eyes and sparkling teeth her ringing laugh and gay spirit f 7 n 1 all that In deed filled up the foreground fore-ground of Wills fancy and when l1e took ship again it was with Anns 1 promise that she would be his wife when he should ship first mate What Will wanted to go to sea for when 1 he could stay at home and be happy I with her Ann could never imagine but I I Rhody understood it all She too without j with-out being a poet knew the tune Will I Mathers heart was beating I God help me save I take a part Of danger on the roaring sea A devil rises In my heart I For worse than death to me I and her thoughts followed him all along the wide sea ways and into storms and into calms and into strange ports of the orient 0 Ann she would say running in at the close of a lowering low-ering day or when such tempest of rain and sleet was beating that no one who could stay at home ventured abroad I thought Id jes step over you must be so sort of dismal But you know it aint blowing any such way as this down on the other side of the globeWell Well Rhody you must think As if I didnt know that was the reply with a toss of the sleek black head I suppose Rhody continued the suns shining enough to tan melons down there where he is Where who is 0 Will I do know Im sure Why Arn do you mean to say you dont feel all sorter worked up with the wind roaring down chimbly like this and you hear the pounding of the big waves rolling in across the bar I know I better I know how hard it seems an I made shift to run over because I guessed your heart was in your throat every time the wind nut its great shoul I der to the house i My gracious Then youd better make shift to run back The idea In I this weather And Ill be bound you aint any rubbers on As if rubbers I Youre allus so in the clouds Rhody that you dont know where you set your feet an both of em hev ben in a puddle and If you dont take your I death o coldYou better go home an go to bed an drink a hot bowl of thoroughwort tea 0 Ill jes toast em by the fire here You all us do hey a good fire Ann 1 hope Wills got as good a one wherever he is isWhat What in the world does Will want with a fire down under the equator Do you suppose thats where he is said Rhody wistfully reaching the point for which she started her errand of consolation having been occasioned chiefly by her wanting consolation herself her-self it may be Myhow It blows Or thereabouts answered Ann snipping off her threads And you dont really feel concerned about his being safe Well you are soft Rhody For my part give Will a stick and a string and Id trust him against any storm that blows Rhody looked at her admiringly Youre jes the wife for him aint you Ann she said sweetly if 1 was t sailors wife I should be scared to death and hide my head in the blan kets every time the weather changed All the same I dont believe but what you be a little stirred up an thats why I comeover to keep you heartened like I suppose she went on dreamily dream-ily looking into the fire if one was high enough to see the earth would be like Miss Briers blue changeable silk here a bit of blue sea and there a bit of gray storm and there a bit of greenfield green-field and there clear silver blue again all sort 0 changeable and shining and youre here in the bit of trrav storm nn Wills out therein the silver blue I I should liketo know the good of such notions Id a sight rather bethinking be-thinking of the peeny muslins Will will fetch home I I should think twas a plenty if he brought himself home if I was you AnnI I declare youre enough to make a person creep What was that Did you hear the door rattle 0 Rhody what i them old songs an stories is true Sometimes in themiddle of the night I wake up in a cold chill the stories of the dead and drowned sailor comin to the door Yes yes sobbed Rhody I 0 I remember Hed a sailors cap and a visage pale As he died on board of the Nightingale And they locked their arms about each other both crying together And Rhody had to stay that night to keep I Anns tremors company with her own which after all was why she came over But when it was sunny and only a soft southwest breeze sighing through the old garden Rhodys heart was as light as the wings of the birds that had the old garden all their own way I was a spacious place long since run wild here and there a bed of oldfash ioned flowers or potherbs that Rhody gave the little care they needed saying the bunches of sage and mint and balm and pennyroyal for she was already becoming the village nurse and here at odd times she sat in the back porch at her sewing the breath of the undying old roses and honeysuckles blowing about her and all her soul as tranquil as the sur ncr seas where her fancy went out and hovered over Will plowing plow-ing his ship along under fullflowing snowy sails Rhodys father had been the lawyer of the shore but he had not been particularly par-ticularly obedient to law himself that is the law of healthy living and he had early left her to buffet the world as she could with nothing but the old house for her portion I had long fallen into disrepair but when it leaked too seri ously in one room Rhody moved to another I was said that Iry Hodge once paid court to her till he found in her complete unsuspiciousness of his wearing the negative of his desires de-sires But he cherished no illlwill on account of that On the contrary with considerable circumlocution he induced the other young men once when Will was at home to help him and with I Tnt and Humphrey Lavendar and Tom Brier and Joe Burns he had the old roof shingled and the back porch rebuilt re-built for Rhody Poor Iry of course had small credit for it I with Rhody For though she thanked him very pretty pret-ty In her heart of hearts she was sure that it was Will who first thought of the kindness and put it into execution and she was the happier thinking of the nobility and generosity of his nature thus manifested than she was in the repairs themselVes And as she sat In the porch now this poor billy Miss Rhody she had an unspoken sense that it was Wills protection surrounding her and she dropped her needle and leaned back and dreamed so long that the lowflying birds regarded her no more than if she were the silver aspen which had sprung up wild in one of the I old oaths I By some virtue of her temperament there was hardly any trail of selfishness in RTiodys dreams Now she was building a bark of which Will was to go master or now she was collecting collect-ing bright strips to make the carpet for Anns new parlor or best of all she was having Wills portrait painted and hung up in a big gold frame in the same splendid room for all Anns belongings partook of the character with which Will had been invested And dream as she would Rhody could do Ann no wrong for fn reality the being of her thoughts differed from the rude sailor that followed the sea and drank his jorum of grog and swore his round oath on accasion as apleee of sculptured marble differs from I lump of soil except for a bit of flashing color a big stature and a name they had nothing in common So when in good time Ann and Will Mather were married and went off together to-gether on the next voyage I there were any tinge of melancholy in sweet poetic melancholy which Is al i > y Rhodys thoughts i was only that most a pleasure in itself And she welcomed wel-comed them back Joyfully and gave them a little tea party to which Iry Hodge refused to come and at which she served her quince preserves that had candied through long keeping in the old Lowenstahl ware that she sold next ea to a fancier for a sum sufficient suffi-cient to let her have that portrait paintedthe portrait she had so long felt the world would be poorer vithout The artist a poor wandering fellow of an uncertain talent stayed with her during tie progress of the work and one and another came to assist with great frankness both concerning the painting and the sitter but on the whole not with unkindness She could never quite understand why Try Hodge alone looked with a cruel criticism upon that painting making unpleasant remarks about the angles of the eyes and saying that Weather did did as you may say coarsen the color of a mans skin To her eyes the colors were Will Mathers and so were faultless I fault-less and she had the thing sent to Ann at last feeling as if she had given her the worth of a kingdom And so the years crept by Miss Rhody I did not take many to fade her delicate tints to bleach her pale i hair to leave her the wraith of herself i for thinness to settle her in her vocation j voca-tion as the village nurse But she would i have told you that she was happy I She enjoyed her evening meeting her I preparatory lecture her call from the I elder her little tea gatherings Some i times when she was off duty she had a childrens party in her old garden I with real tea in as many of her eggshell egg-shell cups as remained with tiny sandwiches i sand-wiches with honey after which repast there were games and forfeits the children dren adoring Miss Rhody on these occasions oc-casions although when they met her in the streets going about her business I with her basket on her arm they recognized rec-ognized the basket with a slight sensation sensa-tion of awe as the one in which she had first brought them to their mothers moth-ers and were persuaded that a damp place at the foot of the garden where the quince bushes grew and that was barred against them by a tangle of briers in some mysterious way had I to do with the filling of that basket j I But on these picknicking tea parts Miss Rhody was as much a child herself I her-self as any of them except perhaps little Polly Lavendar who after all I was more a sprite than a child now i whirling like a dervish now laughing uproariously about nothing till she cried also about nothing nw mounting mount-ing through the scuttle and walking the ridgepole with outstretched arms springing from the eaves into a tree top clutching the branches and letting r himself down hand over foot while Miss Rhody shut her eyes and screamed and the other children ached with desire to do what Polly did And then Poly at Miss Rhodys reproof would burst Into passionate crying and run and hide her face In Miss Rhodys throat and kiss and kiss her and Miss Rhody would feel her heart overflow on Polly and on all the rest on account of Pol lys tears and kisses For all the chil dren on the shore were Miss Rhodys I dont know what she would have done if there had been a Mather child but fortunately for the other children there never was one It was through the love of the children chil-dren that sometimes great spiritual renewal re-newal and joy came to Miss Rhody I she had her superstitions you must pardon her for if she thought she saw the soul of little Mary Burns hovering in a thin mist over the body i hal just left you need not believe it but i comforted both herself and la smother s-mother And as the breathing of old Mr Brier ceased to lift his weary breast and only moved his nerveless ins and fluttered and fluttered there till it ceased if Miss Rhody saw a great white butterfly poised in flight above that faltering lip so fa as she was concerned she really did see a white butterfly and i meant whole gospels to her She had never let the children chase the white butterflies since she had heard Will Mather relate some legend le-gend of the east They are little Chinese Chi-nese ghosts the white butterflies she said to the children They are flying round the world to find a way out oft of-t We must not hinder them Miss Rhody was with Sally Lavendar the night that little Polly died The child had been in a delirium and Sally had sat on one side of the bed holding her Miss Rhody on the other Hum phrey was pacing up and down the big outer kitchen like a wild animal in a cage and PoI havng dropped Into a momentary sleep Sally had just gone to him It was just before dawn and a great star like a shining tear hung Ion I I-on the sky Suddenly ths child awoke apparently all herself 0 i is dark it Is dark I am afraid she cried presently Take my hand Somebody Lead me Its all right Polly darling Im here cried Miss Rhody Youre only dreaming dear Dont you see the lamp Heres my hand And then Sally came running back She turned up the light but it flickered and went out She threw herself on the bed again and took Pollys head on her breast Why said Polly it isnt dark at all now You brought tJle light in with you ma Did you bring the people too See them sec them the pretty girl with the sweetbrier The childrens faces Oh they are like the blossoms in the apple tree so many of them so many of them They are going to take me with themyes Im coming And asthe breath left her lips with the words Miss Rhody declared j de-clared she saw as plainly as ever she saw anything in her life that girl with the sweetbrier in one light lovely as youth and joy in another with the look of age that Sallys little grandmother hadsaw too that cloud of cherub facesa wall of them like roses thick upon a golden trellis before Sallys desolate wall brought her back to pain and grief and her consoling work again For Sally believed that Rhody saw It all and grieved that she was not good enough to see it herself She was bereft I be-reft but looking at Humphrey she I did not grieve for Polly Ann did not always go to sea with her husband When she did she left J 2 I I 11 I the key of their house with Miss Rhody Who was to go in and air it once in awhile I was aired much more frequently fre-quently than need was There seemed to Rhody much danger of the portraits getting mouldy or mildewed or something some-thing Rhody used to let the sun in and gaze on i those days with a forgetful for-getful rapture And the voyages when I Ann remained at home it went hard wth Rhody if she did not get In to see Annand the picture every afternoon I for just a moment or two And in the nights of her sick watching she used I to find a window where she could lookout i j look-out at the stars and wonder if Will saw I them too and if he was thinking Of the j shore and of Ann and of her perhaps also And when down at the portt the j bark came in safe and sound she had a renewed assurance that the world I was right side up Then there was a lightness and a sweetness in the air 1 I there was a sort of sunshine even on a I rainy day and she thanked heaven for I i her lot and felt that there were few j i more blessed among women than she I I with her home to go te with the children chil-dren that were hers almost as much as they were their mothers with her work and her friends But one voyage the bark did not comeback come-back A typhoon swept the Indian seas and the bones of the Man o Mull were strewn from Celeoes to Malabar And a for Will Mather no one knows where his grave is to this day When the loss was a definite thing to the underwriters Ann received her insurance In-surance moneya tidy little sum for her small way of life and she put on her black and In time she took it off again and a brisk and busy body she took her pleasure with her neighbors as she had always done If her wash was out before Mrs Burns whitened the yard behind If her baked beans were pronounced one atom crIsper than Ir Dennis I the recipe for her rule of fruit cake was in demand if she had cherry tonic and jellies to send to the ailing if her house cleaning was over the first along the shore if her best black silk would stand alone if she knew all that was going on and keep Ing one eye on Sally Lavendars door had the last news of Humphrey and his odd behavior and another eye on the goings and comings of the rest of the village she was content enough and after awhile Ann was not at all unhappy un-happy and even had a mild satisfaction satisfac-tion in Try Hodges admiration of her still buxom beauty But it was a much longer time before Miss Rhody would accept the fact of Will Mathers loss He had been so full of life and vigor she could never make him dead She was always expecting to see him step down from the coach every time it came lumbering along irom pore ace uia not see a strange boat in the stream along the shore but she thought It might hold Will Every time she ran over to Anns she hoped to hear a great voice roaring out a welcome wel-come and when that failed to sound she still had time to hope Ann had had a letter sayIng he had been wrecked on desert shores and was now on his way home agan Her dreams were all of I this Now she saw him struggling with night and storm in the black seas now wandering forlorn among strange folk I of a strange tongue now cast on barren places and watching feverishly the I gleam of a sail upon the sky line and every dream a misery and chiefly a I misery because the atmosphere of power with which Will had always been clothed In her mind was wanting there But on the other hand her day dreams I were a joy In them as she went about her nursing as she washed the newly I born or stroked the newly dead as she i sat at home sewing in her arlor Will was always returning after multitudinous multitudin-ous deep sea adventures she saw him I hurrying up the road and entering to And big and bronzd and full of glad expectation and although she varied the dream a thousand ways it was always I I al-ways the same dream Will Mather I coming home You may judge then of her dismay I when she heard that the banns were published for Ann Mather and Iry i Hedge for somehow Annjiad not been j able to bring herself to brak the news I to Rhody She hurried over as you may suppose Ann she cried And then she softened the reproach Ann dear what does It mean Do you really know what they are saying about you I Really you must not let Iry in so much It is making no end of talk They say people sayOhl know they say is a liar But they do saythat you are going to marry Iry And so I am said Ann But she looked out of the window Rhody sat frozen to stone She could not move her lips at first And when she could It was only to whisper You are Will Mathers wife Rlr1T I ip I I I crv jcv V vv r 2J f vaIi i 7tAr I > t I J AND ON AND ANOTH ER CAME TO ASSIST Oh you be still Rhody said Ann biting off the thread with which she was running up the breadths of a fine wedding garment and showing all her handsome teeth Why I cant be still whispered Rhody who for the life of her could not move What will Will say I Nothing I guess i But If he should come back Ann I gathering strength What a simpleton you are Rhody I After all these years an the insurance paid and all Youre a prefect deaths head at the feast An look here I wont have you talking to me And Iry wouldnt like it at 0 Iry with infinite contempt Yes Iry I always liked Iry An hes the lawyer of this village an tlsnt every one marries the lawyer And every one respects him Irys well enough I aint nothin to say against Iry Ive allus liked him too But Iry aint no business her lie aint comin here Im going to his house Ann WeI do no how you can stan that longwinded talk o hisn Rhcdy If you wasnt my oldest friend TIm T-Im moren your fren Im your blood relation Ive a right to speak an youve a right to think shame of i yourself And to think what If Will The ManoMull hesnt ben heard from for moren seven years And Im quite within the law Iry says so But there was Robinsoe Grubr 0 Rhody youll be the death of me yet I believe youre as crazy as Hum phrey Lavendar I guess one Robinson Robin-son Crusoe 1 do An now youve spoken out and done your duty your consciences clear an so is mine was a good wife to Can T Mather an1 I shall be a good wife to Iry Hodge Then murmured Rhody the tears pouring over her face and her thin purpleveined hands with which she tried to hide them the day you marry IryO my I dono how you canI should think you would be You neednt ask me to come to the weddin I shant countenance I But you wil send me over Wills picture then wont you You wont want it for a reminder And Id better take care of it for you I dont know said Ann glancing up at the dark and dashing likeness I > looks good on the wall Ive kep th frame real bright There aint nothin mean about Iry he wouldnt put Wil outn his place But there you allu I did set by it An you paid for It anyway any-way An Perhaps some tender I memory swept over Ann Yes sh went on I guess it belongs most t < you But but Will belonged to me And then Ann began to cry and Rhod Kissed hershe couldnt help it i wa Ann And then she ran home as if a ghost pursued her One day the picture came and llhoi put it upstairs in the spare room I was not for all the world to see Ant she made a case for It as tenderly f ever Elaine wrought on that for Lane lots shield If it were not so beautifm It was of crazy patchwork a thing o silken shreds and patches She mad herself a black gown too in those day She had always worn light colors about the sick she said i was more Chelf or them and rainy afternoons she hr made a point of putting on 1 bit I bright ribbon or a floer or a ga apron or her topaz breastpin as I some pleasant thing were expected Bu she slipped into her black govC n n < w saying nothing to anyone I i hac hen cloth of gold and sewn with je W jls i would have been less precou < = for to her i was the symbol of om thing she was doing for Yii But none n-one on all the shore except p < rhap Sally Lavendar had an Idea that Alls Rhody was wearing black Days and nights away at her worl she felt that her house helasometiin sacred now To go home to i to thai picture was to look forward to a jo She seldom allowed herself to gaze It Sunday mornings sometimes bcf < r meetingcommunion Sunday mornings she stole in and let the sun li through the open shutter 1 moment and looked at the bold black eyes thi followed hers the hair like a mass c carved ebony the ruddy cheek th laughing mouth and Ti was the more alive to her than ever When th great equinoxes blew she comfort herself again by the assurance that i gave a robust life And summer Sunday Sun-day nights she sat a little while before be-fore it a moonbeam slanting over i and refining I and giving i an al I almost of unreality And in those moments mo-ments she felt a deep peace in he heart Ann was the happy wife of Ir Hodge but there was a life to come and in thatwho knew To be sur i that life they neither marry nor ar iven in marriage but love service companionship those things must bt long to all lives Only onlyif Wil Mather should come home again Sh covered the portrait quickly lest tha moonlighted face should figure rudel in the dreams of thp nlsit because o t p t hat foolish fear of aier |