Helen and Arthur; or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel

Even Louis could scarcely keep up with her rapid strides. He trembled for the consequences of her anger, just as it was, and followed close to see if Mittie, undaunted as she was, did not shrivel in her gaze.

Mittie was seated in a window, busily studying, or pretending to study, not even turning her head, though Miss Thusa’s steps resounded as if she were shod with iron.

“Look round, Miss, if you please, and tell me if you know any thing of this,” cried Miss Thusa, laying her left hand on her shoulder, and bringing the ball so close to her face that her nose came in contact with it.

Mittie jerked away from the hand laid upon her with no velvet pressure, without opening her lips, but the guilty blood rising to her face spoke eloquently; though she had a kind of Procrustes bed of her own, according to which she stretched or curtailed the truth, she had not the hardihood to tell an unmitigated falsehood, in the presence of her brother, too, and in the light of his truth-beaming eye.

“You are always accusing me of every thing,” said she, at length. “I didn’t do it——all;” the last syllable was uttered in a low, indistinct tone.

“You are a mean coward,” cried the spinster, hurling the ball across the room with such force that it rebounded against the wall. “You’re a coward with all your audacity, and do tricks you are ashamed to acknowledge. You’ve spoiled the honest earnings of the whole winter, and destroyed the beautifullest suit of thread that ever was spun by mortal woman.”

“I can pay you for all I spoiled and more too,” said Mittie, sullenly.

“Pay me,” repeated Miss Thusa, while the scorching fire of her eye slowly went out, leaving an expression of profound sorrow. “Can you pay me for a value you can’t even dream of? Can you pay me for the lonely thoughts that twisted themselves up with that thread, day after day, and night after night, because they had nothing else to take hold of? Can you pay me for these grooves in my fingers’ ends, made by the flax as I kept drawing it through, till it often turned red with my blood? No, no, that thread was as dear to me as my own heart strings—for they were twined all about it; it was like something living to me—and I loved it in the same way as I do little Helen. I shall never, never spin any more.”

“You will spin more merrily than ever,” cried Louis, soothingly, “you see if you don’t, Miss Thusa.”

Miss Thusa shook her head, and though she almost suffocated herself in the effort to repress them, tears actually forced themselves into her eyes, and splashed on her cheeks. Seating herself in a low chair, she took up the corner of her apron to hide what she considered a shame and disgrace, when Helen glided near and wiped away the drops with her own handkerchief.

“Bless you darling,” cried the subdued spinster—“and you will be blessed. There’s no malice, nor hard-heartedness in you. You never turned your foot upon a worm. But as for her,” continued she, pointing prophetically at Mittie, and fixing upon her her grave and gloomy eyes—“there’s no blessing in store. She don’t feel now, but if she lives to womanhood she will. The heart of stone will turn to flesh then, and every fibre it has got will learn how to quiver, as I’ve seen twisted wire do, when strong fingers pull it—I know it will. She will shed tears one of these days, and no one will wipe them off, as this little angel has done for me. I’ve done, now. I didn’t mean to say what I did, but the Lord put it in my head, and I’ve spoken according to my gift.”

Mittie ran out of the room before the conclusion of the speech, unable to stand the moveless glance, that seemed to burn like heated metal into her conscience.

“Come, Miss Thusa,” said Louis, amiably, desirous of turning her thoughts into a new channel, and pitying while he blamed his offending sister, for the humiliation he knew she must endure—“come and tell us a story, while you are inspired. It is so long since I have heard one! Let it be something new and exciting.”

“I don’t believe I could tell you one to save my life, now,” replied Miss Thusa, her countenance lighting up with a gleam of satisfaction—“at least I couldn’t act it out.”

“Never mind the acting, Miss Thusa, provided we hear the tale. Let it be a powerful one.”

“Don’t tell the worm-eaten traveler,” whispered Helen. “I never want to hear that again.”

Miss Thusa see-sawed a moment in her low chair, to give a kind of balance to her imagination, and then began:

“Once there was a maiden, who lived in a forest, a deep wild forest, in which there wasn’t so much as the sign of a path, and nobody but she could find their way in or out. How this was, I don’t know, but it was astonishing how many people got lost in those woods, where she rambled about as easy as if somebody was carrying a torch before her. Perhaps the fairies helped her—perhaps the evil spirits—I rather think the last, for though she was fair to look upon, her heart was as hard as the nether mill-stone.”

Miss Thusa caught a glimpse of Mittie, on the porch, through the open doors, and she raised her voice, as she proceeded:

“One night, when the moon was shining large and clear, she was wandering through the forest, all alone, when she heard a little, tender voice behind her, and turning round, she saw a young child, with its hair all loose and wet, as ’twere, calling after her.

“‘I’ve lost my way,’ it cried—‘pray help me to find a path in the greenwood.’

“‘Find it by the moonlight,’ answered the maiden, ‘it shines for you, as well as for me.’

“‘But I’m little,’ cried the child, beginning to weep, ‘and my feet are all blistered with running. Take me up in your arms a little while, for you are strong, and the Saviour will give you a golden bed in Heaven to lie down on.’

“‘I want no golden bed. I had rather sleep on down than gold,’ answered the maid, and she mocked the child, and went on, putting her hands to her ears, to keep out the cries of the little one, that came through the thick trees, with a mighty piteous sound—the hard-hearted creature!”

“How cruel!” said Helen, “I hope she got lost herself.”

“Don’t interrupt, Helen,” said Louis, whose eyes were kindling with excitement. “You may be sure she had some punishment.”

“Yes, that she did,” continued the narrator, “and I tell you it was worse than being lost, bad as that is. By-and-by she came out of the forest, into a smooth road, and a horseman galloped to meet her, that would have scared anybody else in the world but her. Not that he was so ugly, but he was dressed all in black, and he had such a powerful head of black hair, that hung all about him like a cloak, and mixed up with the horse’s flowing mane, and that was black too, and so was his horse, and so were his eyes, but his forehead was as white as snow, and his cheeks were fair and ruddy. He rode right up to the young maiden, and reaching down, swung his arm round her, and put her up before him on the saddle, and away they rode, as swift as a weaver’s shuttle. I don’t believe a horse ever went so fast before. Every little stone his hoofs struck, would blaze up, just for a second, making stars all along the road. As they flew on, his long black hair got twisted all around her, and every time the wind blew, it grew tighter and tighter, till she could scarcely breathe, and she prayed him to stop, and unwind his long black hair, before it reached her throat, for as sure as she was alive then, it would strangle her.

“‘You have hands as well as I,’ said he, with a mocking laugh, ‘unwind it yourself, fair maiden.’

“Then she remembered what she had said to the poor little lost child, and she cried out as the child did, when she left it alone in the forest. All the time the long locks of hair seemed taking root in her heart, and drawing it every step they went.

“‘Now,’ said her companion, reining up his black horse, ‘I’ll release you.’

“And unsheathing a sharp dagger, he cut the hair through and through, so that part of it fell on the ground in a black shower. Then giving her a swing, he let her fall by the way-side, and rode on hurraing by the light of the moon.”

Miss Thusa paused to take breath, and wiped her spectacles, as if she had been reading with them all the time she had been talking.

“Is that all?” asked Helen.

“No, indeed, that cannot be the end,” said Louis. “Go on Miss Thusa. The black knight ought to be scourged for leaving her there on the ground.”

“There she lay,” resumed Miss Thusa, “moaning and bewailing, for her heart’s blood was oozing out through every wound his dagger had made, for I told you his locks had taken root in her heart, and he cut the cords when he slashed about among his own long, black hair.

“‘I’m dying,’ said the maiden. ‘Oh, what would I give now for that golden bed of the Saviour, the little child promised me.’

“Just then she heard the patter of little feet among the fallen leaves, and looking up, there was the child, sure enough, right by her side, and there was something bright and shining all around its head. How it found its way out of the woods, the Lord only knows. Well, the child didn’t bear one bit of malice, for it was a holy child, and kneeling down, it took a crystal vial from its bosom, and poured balm on the bleeding heart of the maiden, and healed every wound.

“‘You are a holy child,’ said the maiden, rising up, and taking the child in her arms, and pressing her close to her bosom. ‘I know it by the light around your head. I’ll love all little children for your sake, and nevermore mock the cry of sorrow or of want.’

“So they went away together into the deep woods, and one could see the moon shining on them, every now and then, through the trees, and it was a lovely sight.”

There was silence for a few moments after Miss Thusa finished her legend, for never had she related any thing so impressively.

“Oh, Miss Thusa,” cried Helen, “that is the prettiest story I ever heard you relate. I am glad the child was not lost, and I am glad that the maiden did not die, but was sorry for what she had done.”

“Do you make up your tales yourself, Miss Thusa,” asked Louis, “or do you remember them? I cannot imagine where they all come from.”

“Some are the memories of my childhood;” replied she, “and some the inventions of my own brain; and some are a little of one and a little of the other; and some are the living truth itself. I don’t always know what I am going to say myself, when I begin, but speak as the spirit moves. This shows that it is a gift—praise the Lord.”

“Well, Miss Thusa, the spirit moves you to say that the little child forgave the cruel maiden, and poured balm upon her bleeding heart,” said Louis, with one of his own winning smiles.

“And you think an old woman should forgive likewise!” cried Miss Thusa, looking as benignantly as she could look upon the boy. “You are right, you are right, but her heart don’t bleed yet—not yet.”

Mittie, believing herself unseen, had listened to the tale with an interest that chained her to the spot where she stood. She unconsciously identified herself with the cruel maiden, and in after years she remembered the long, sweeping locks of the knight, and the maiden’s bleeding heart.

PART SECOND.

The young doctor did not forget to speak to his mother of the interesting child, whom destiny seemed to have made a protegé of his own. In consequence, a pressing invitation was sent by Mrs. Hazleton, the widowed mother of Arthur, to the young Helen, who, from that time became an annual guest at the Parsonage—such was the name of the home of the young doctor. It was about a day’s ride from Mr. Gleason’s, and situated in one of the loveliest portions of the lovely valley of the Connecticut. Helen soon ceased to consider herself a visitor, and to look upon the Parsonage as another and dearer home; for though she dearly loved her father and brother, she found a far lovelier and more lovable sister in the sweet, blind Alice, than the heart-repelling Mittie.

Miss Thusa, whose feelings towards Mittie had been in a kind of volcanic state, since the destruction of her thread, always on the verge of an eruption, determined, during the first absence of her favorite Helen to resume her itinerant mode of existence; so, sending her wheel in advance, the herald cry of “Miss Thusa’s coming,” once more resounded through the neighborhood.

Louis entered college at a very early age, leaving a dreary blank in the household, which his joyous spirit had filled with sunshine.

It is not strange that under such circumstances the lonely widower should think of a successor to his lost wife, for Mittie needed a mother’s restraining influence and guardian care. Nor is it strange, with her indomitable self-will, she should resist the authority of a stranger. When her father announced his intention of bringing home a lady to preside over his establishment, claiming for her all filial respect and obedience, she flew into a violent passion, and declared she would never own her as a mother, never address her as such—that she would leave home and never return, before she would submit to the government of a stranger. Unwilling to expose the woman who had consented to be his wife to scenes of strife and unhappiness, Mr. Gleason, as the only alternative, resolved to send his daughter to a boarding-school, before his mansion received its new mistress. Mittie exulted in this arrangement, for a boarding-school was the Ultima Thule of her ambition, and she boasted to her classmates that her father was afraid of her, and that he dared not marry while she was at home. Amiable boast of a child!—especially a daughter.

Mr. Gleason was anxious to recall Helen, and place her at once under her new mother’s guardianship, but Mrs. Hazleton pleaded, and the blind Alice pleaded with the mute eloquence of her sightless eyes, and the young doctor pleaded; and Helen, after being summoned to welcome her new parent, and share in the wedding festivities, was permitted to return to her beloved Parsonage.

It was a beautiful spot—so rural, so retired, so far from the public road, so removed from noise and dust. It had such a serene, religious aspect, the traveler looking up the long avenue of trees, with a gradually ascending glance, to the unambitious, gray-walled mansion, situated at its termination, thought it must be one of the sweetest havens of rest that God ever provided for life’s weary pilgrim.

And so it was—and so Helen thought, when wandering with the blind Alice through the sequestered fields and wild groves surrounding the dwelling, or seated within the low, neat, white-washed walls, and listening to the mild, maternal accents of Arthur Hazleton’s mother.

It was a mild summer evening. The windows were all open, and the smell of the roses that peeped in through the casements, made sweeter as well as brighter by the dews of night, perfumed the whole apartment. Sometimes the rising breeze would scatter a shower of rose-leaves on the carpet, casting many a one on the heads of the young girls seated at a table, on either side of Mrs. Hazleton. Helen heeded not the petals that nestled in the hazel waves of her short, brown hair, but Alice, whose touch and hearing were made marvelously acute by her blindness, could have counted every rose-leaf that covered her fair, blonde ringlets.

They were both engaged in the same occupation—knitting purses—and no one could have told by the quick, graceful motions of the fingers of Alice, that they moved without one guiding ray from those beautiful blue eyes, that seemed to follow all their intricacies. Neither could any one have known, by gazing on those beautiful eyes, that the soul did not look forth from their azure depths. There was a soft dreaminess floating over the opaque orbs, like the dissolving mist of a summer’s morning, that appeared but the cloudiness of thought. Alice was uncommonly lovely. Her complexion had a kind of rosy fairness, indicative of the pure under-current which, on every sudden emotion, flowed in bright waves to her cheeks. This was a family peculiarity, and one which Helen remarked in the young doctor the first time she beheld him. Her profuse flaxen hair fell shadingly over her brow, and an acute observer might have detected her blindness by her suffering the fair locks to remain till a breeze swept them aside. They did not veil her vision. Mrs. Hazleton, with pardonable maternal vanity, loved to dress her beautiful blind child in a manner decorating to her loveliness. A simple white frock in summer, ornamented with a plain blue ribbon, constituted her usual holiday attire. She could select herself the color she best liked, by passing her hand over the ribbon, and though her garments and Helen’s were of the same size, she could tell them apart, from the slightest touch.

Helen was less exquisitely fair, less beautiful than Alice, but hers was an eye of sunbeams and shadows, that gave wonderful expression to her whole face. Some one has observed that “every face is either a history or a prophecy.” Child as Helen was, hers was both. You could read in those large, pensive, hazel eyes, a history of past sufferings and trials. You could read, too, in their deep, appealing, loving expression, a prophecy of all a woman’s heart is capable of feeling or enduring.

“I never saw such eyes in the head of a child,” was a common remark upon Helen. “There is something wildly, hauntingly interesting in them; one loves and pities her at the first glance.”

Helen was too pale and thin to be a beautiful child, but with such a pair of haunting eyes, soft, silky hair of the same hazel hue, hanging in short curls just below her ears, and a mouth of rare and winning sweetness, she was sure to be remembered when no longer present. She looked several years older than Alice, though of the same age, for the calm features of the blind child had never known the agitations of terror or the vague apprehensions of unknown evil. Every one said “Helen would be pretty,” and felt that she was interesting.

Now, while knitting her purse, and sliding the silver beads along the blue silken thread, she would look up with an eager, listening countenance, as if her thoughts were gone forth to meet some one, who delayed their coming.

Alice, too, was listening with an expecting, waiting heart—one could tell it by the fluttering of the blue ribbon that encircled her neck.

“He will not come to-night, mother,” said she, with a sigh. “It is never so late as this, when he rides in through the gate.”

“I fear some accident has happened,” cried Helen, “he has a very bad bridge to cross, and the stream is deep below.”

“How much that sounds like Helen,” exclaimed Mrs Hazleton, “so fearful and full of misgivings! I shall not give him up before ten o’clock. If you like, you can both sit up and bear me company—if not, you may leave me to watch alone.”

They both eagerly exclaimed that they would far rather sit up with her, and then they were sure they could finish their purses, and have them ready as gifts for the brother and friend so anxiously looked for. Though the distance that separated them from him was short, and his visits frequent, they were ever counted as holidays of the heart, as eras from which all past events were dated—and on which all future ones were dependent.

“When Arthur was here, we did so and so.” “When Arthur comes, we will do this and that.” A stranger would have thought Arthur the angel of the Parsonage, and that his coming was the advent of peace, and joy, and love. It was ever thus that listening ears and longing eyes and waiting hearts watched his approach. He was an only son and brother, and seldom indeed is it that Heaven vouchsafes such a blessing to a household, as a son and brother like Arthur Hazleton.

“He’s coming,” cried Alice, jumping up and clapping her hands, “I hear his horse galloping towards the gate. I know the sound of its hoofs from all others.”

This was true. The unerring ear of the blind girl never deceived her. Arthur was indeed coming. The gate opened. His rapid footstep was heard passing through the avenue, bounding up the steps, and there they were arrested by the welcoming trio, all ready to greet him. It was a happy moment for Arthur when wrapped in that triune embrace, for Helen, timid as she was, had learned to look upon him as a dear, elder brother, whose cares and affection were divided between her and the sightless Alice; and for whom she felt a love equal to that which she cherished for Louis, mingled with a reverence and admiration that bordered upon worship.

“My dear mother,” said he, when they had escorted him into the sitting-room, and in spite of his resistance made him take the best and pleasantest seat in the room, “my dear mother, I hope I have not kept you up too late; I would have been here sooner, but you know I am a servant of the public, and my time is not my own.”

“Oh! brother, I am so glad to see you!” cried Alice, pressing her glowing cheek against his hand. It was thus she always said; and she did see him with her spirit’s eyes, beautiful as a son of the morning, and radiant as the god of day. She passed her hands softly over his dark, brown locks, over the contour of his cheeks and chin with a kind of lingering, mesmerizing touch, which seemed to delight in tracing the lineaments of symmetry and grace.

“Brother,” she said, “your cheeks are reddening—I know it by their warmth. What makes the blood come up to the cheeks when the heart is glad? Helen’s are red, too, for I know it by the throbbings of her heart.”

“Helen has one pale cheek and one red one,” answered Arthur, passing his arm around her and drawing her towards him. “If she were a little older,” added he, bending down and kissing the pale cheek, “we might bring a rose to this, and then they would be blooming twins.”

The rose did bloom most beautifully at his touch, and a smile of affectionate delight gilded the child’s pensive lips.

“Alice, my dear, what have you and Helen been doing since I was here? You are always planning something to surprise me—something to make me glad and grateful.”

“We have been knitting a purse for you, brother, each of us; and mother had just finished sewing on the tassel when you came. Tell me which is mine, and which is Helen’s,” cried she, taking them both from the table and mingling the hues of cerulean and emerald, the glitter of the golden globules which ornamented the one, and the silver beads which starred the other, in her hand.

“The green and gold must be Helen’s—the silver and blue yours, Alice. Am I right?”

“No. But will you care if it is exactly the reverse. Helen chose the blue because it was my favorite color, and she thought you would prize it most. Green was left for me, and then, you know, I was obliged to mix it with gold.”

“But why was green left for you? and why were you obliged to mix it with gold, instead of silver?” asked he, interested in tracing the origin of her associations.

“I like but two colors,” she replied, thoughtfully; “blue and green, the blue of the heavens, the green of the earth. It seems that gold is like sunshine, and the golden beads must resemble sunbeams on the green grass. Silver is like moonlight, and Helen’s purse must make you think of moonbeams, shining from the bright blue sky.”

“Why, my sweet Alice, where did the poetry of your thoughts come from? I know not how such charming associations are born, unless of sight. Oh! there must be an inner light, purer and clearer than outward vision knows, in which the great source of light bathes the spirit of the blind.”

He paused a moment, with his eyes intently fixed on the soft, hazy orbs, which gave back no answering rays—then added, in a gayer tone—

“And so I am the owner of these beautiful purses. How proud and happy I ought to be! It will be long, I fear, before I shall fill them with gold—and even if I could, it would be a shame to soil them with the yellow dust of temptation. I will cherish them both. Yours, Alice, will always remind me of all that is beautiful on earth, woven of this brilliant green and gold. And yours, Helen, blue as the sky, of all that is holy in Heaven.

“But while I am thus receiving precious gifts,” he added, “I must not forget that I am the bearer of some also. My saddle-bags are not entirely filled with vials and pills. Here, mother, is a bunch of thread, sent by Miss Thusa, white as the fleece of the unshorn lamb. She says she spun it expressly for you, because of your kindness to Helen.”

“I know by experience the beauty and value of Miss Thusa’s thread,” said Mrs Hazleton, admiring the beautiful white hanks, which her son unrolled; “ever since I knew Helen I have had a yearly supply, such as no other spinster ever made. How shall I make an adequate return?”

“There is a nicely bound book in our library, mother, which would please her beyond expression—a history of all the celebrated murders in the country, within the last ten years. Here, Helen, are some keepsakes for you and Alice, from your mother.”

“How kind, how good,” exclaimed Helen, “and how beautiful! A work-box for me, and a toilet-case for Alice. How nice—and convenient. Surely we ought to love her. Mittie cannot help loving her when she comes. I’m sure she cannot.”

“Your father is going for Mittie soon,” said Arthur. “He bids me tell you that you must be ready to accompany him, and remain in her stead for at least three years.”

A cloud obscured the sunshine of Helen’s countenance. The prospect which Mittie had hailed with exultation, Helen looked forward to with dismay. To be sent to a distant school, among a community of strangers, was to her timid, shrinking spirit, an ordeal of fire. To be separated from Alice, Arthur, and Mrs. Hazleton, seemed like the sentence of death to her loving, clinging heart.

“We must all learn self-reliance, Helen,” said Arthur, “we must all pass through the discipline of life. The time will soon come when you will assume woman’s duties, and it is well that you go forth awhile to gather strength and wisdom, to meet and fulfil them. You need something more bracing and invigorating than the atmosphere of love that surrounds you here.”

Helen always trembled when Arthur looked very grave from the fear that he was displeased with her. When speaking earnestly, he had a remarkable seriousness of expression, implying that he meant all that he uttered. When Arthur Hazleton was first introduced to the reader, he was only eighteen; and consequently was now about twenty-four years of age. There was a blending of firmness and gentleness, of serene gravity and beaming cheerfulness in his character and countenance, which even in early boyhood had given him an ascendency over his young companions. There was a searching power in the glance of his grave, dark eye, from which one might shrink, were it not often softened by an expression of even womanly sweetness harmonizing with the gentle smile of his lips. He very seldom spoke of his feelings, but the rich, mantling color that ever and anon came glowingly to his cheek, indicated a depth of sensibility he was unwilling words should reveal. Left his own master at a very early age, his will had become strong and invincible. As he almost always willed what was right, his mother seldom sought to bend it, and she was the only being in the world whose authority he acknowledged, and to whom he was willing to sacrifice his pride by submission.

An incident which occurred the evening after his arrival, may illustrate his firmness and his power.

It was a lovely summer afternoon, and Arthur rambled with Helen and Alice amid the charming groves and wild glens of his native place. His local attachments were exceedingly strong, for they were cherished by dear and sacred associations. There was a history attached to every rock and tree and waterfall, making it more beautiful and interesting than all others.

“Here, Alice,” he would say, “look at this magnificent tree. Our father used to sit under its shade and sketch the outline of his sermons. Here, in God’s own temple, he worshiped, and his pure thoughts mingled with the incense that arose from the bosom of nature.”

Then Alice would clasp her fair arms round the tree, and laying her soft check against the rough bark, consecrate it to the memory of the father, who had died ere she beheld the light. Alas! she never had beheld it; but ere the light had beamed on the sightless azure of her eyes.

“Helen, do you see that beetling rock, half covered with lichens and moss, hanging over the brawling stream? It was there I used to recline, when a little boy, shaded by that gnarled and fantastic looking tree, with book in hand, but studying most of all from the great book of nature. Oh! I love that spot. If I ever live to be an old man, though I may have wandered to the wide world’s end, I want to come back and throw myself once more on the shelving rock where I made my boyhood’s bed.”

While he was speaking, he led Alice and Helen on to the very verge of the rock, and looked down on the waterfall, tumbling below. Alice stood calm and still, holding, with perfect confidence, her brother’s hand, but Helen recoiled and shuddered, and her cheek turned visibly paler.

“We are close to the edge, brother—I know it by the sound of your voice,” said Alice. “It seems to sink down and mingle with the roar of the water-fall.”

“Do you not fear, Alice?” asked her brother, drawing her still a little nearer.

“Oh, no,” she answered, with a radiant smile. “How can I fear, when I feel your hand sustaining me? I know, you would not lead me into danger. You would never let me fall.”

“Do you hear her?” asked he, looking reproachfully at Helen. “Oh, thou of little faith. When will you learn to confide, with the undoubting trust of this helpless blind girl? Do you believe that I would willingly expose you to danger or suffering?”

He withdrew his hand as he spoke, and Helen believing him seriously displeased, turned away to hide the tears that swelled into her eyes. In the meantime, Arthur led Alice along the edge of the rock to a little, natural bower beyond, which Alice called her bower, and where she and Helen had made a bed of moss, and adorned it with shells. Helen stood a moment alone on the rock, feeling as desolate as if she were the inhabitant of a desert island. She thought Arthur unkind, and the beautiful, embowering trees, gurgling waters, and sweet, singing birds, lost their charms to her. Slowly turning her steps homeward, yet not willing to enter the presence of Mrs. Hazleton without her companions, she lingered in the garden, making a bouquet, which she intended to give as a peace-offering to Arthur, when he returned. She did not enter the house till nearly dark, when she was surprised by seeing Arthur alone.

“Where is Alice?” said he.

“Alice!” repeated she, “I left her in the woods with you.”

“Yes! but I left her there also, in the arbor of moss, supposing you would soon return to her.”

“Left her alone!” cried Helen, wondering why Arthur, who seemed to idolize his lovely, blind sister, could have been so careless of her safety.

“Alice is not afraid to be alone, Helen, she knows that God is with her. But it will soon be night, and she must not remain in the dark, damp woods much longer. You will go back and accompany her home, Helen, before the night-dew falls?”

Helen’s heart died within her at the mere thought of threading alone a path so densely shaded, and of passing over that beetling rock, beneath the gnarled, fantastic looking tree. It would be so dark before she returned! She went to the window, and looked out, then turned towards him with such a timid, wistful look, it was astonishing how he could have resisted the mute appeal.

“Make haste, Helen,” said he, gently, “it will be dark if you do not.”

“Will you not go with me?” she at length summoned boldness to ask.

“Are you afraid to go, Helen?”

She felt the dark power of his eye to her inmost soul. Death itself seemed preferable to his displeasure.

“I am afraid,” she answered, “but I will go since you will it.”

“I do wish it,” he replied, “but I leave it to your own will to accomplish it.”

Helen could not believe that he really intended she should go alone, when he had left his sister behind. She was sure he would follow and overtake her before she reached the narrow path she so much dreaded to traverse. She went on very rapidly, looking back to see if he were not behind, listening to hear if her name were not called by his well-known voice. But she heard not his footsteps, nor the sound of his voice. She heard nothing but the wind sighing through the trees, or the notes of some solitary bird, seeking its nest among the branches.

“Arthur is not kind, to-day,” thought she. “I wonder what has changed him so. It was not my place to go after Alice, when he left her himself in the woods. What right has he to command me so? And how foolish I am to obey him, as if he were my master and lord!”

She was at first very angry with Arthur, and anger always gives one strength and power. Any excited passion does. She ran on, almost forgetting her fears, and the shadows lightened up as she met them face to face. Then she thought of Alice alone in the woods—so blind and helpless. Perhaps she would be frightened at the darkening solitude, and try to find her path homeward, on the edge of that slippery, beetling rock. With no hand to sustain, no eye to guide, how could she help falling into the watery chasm below? In her fears for Alice, she forgot her own imaginary danger, and flew on, sending her voice before her, bearing on its trembling tones the sweet name of Alice.

She reached the rock, and paused under the tree that hung so darkly over it. The waterfall sounded so much louder than when she stood there last, she was sure the waters had accumulated, and were threatening to dash themselves above. They had an angry, turbulent roar, and keeping close in a line with the tree, she hurried on to the silver bower Alice so much loved, and which she had seen her enter, clinging to the hand of Arthur. Helen, had to lift up the hanging boughs and sweeping vines at the entrance of the arbor, and cold shivers of terror ran through her frame, for no voice responded to hers, though she had made the silence all the way vocal with the name of Alice.

“If she is not here, she is dead,” she cried, “and I will lie down and die, too; for I cannot return without her.”

Creeping slowly in, with suppressed breath and trembling limbs, she discovered something white lying on the bed of moss, so still and white, that it might have been mistaken in the dimness for a snow-drift, were it not a midsummer eve. All the old superstitions implanted in her infant mind by Miss Thusa’s terrific legends, seized upon her imagination. Any thing white and still, reminded her of the never-to-be-forgotten moment when she gazed upon her dead mother, and sunk overpowered by the terror and majesty of death. If it was Alice lying there, she must be dead, and how could she approach nearer and encounter that cold presence which had once communicated a death-chill to her young life? Then the thought of Alice’s death was fraught with such anguish, it carried her out of herself. The grief of Arthur, the agony of his mother; it was too terrible to think of. Springing into the arbor, she ran up to the white object, and kneeling down, beheld the fair, clustering ringlets and rosy cheek of Alice dimly defined through the growing shadows. She inhaled her warm breath as she stooped over her, and knew it was sleep, not death, that bound her to the spot. As she came in contact with life, warm, breathing vitality, an instantaneous conviction of the folly, the preposterousness of her own fears, came over her. Alice calmly and quietly had fallen asleep as night came on, not knowing it by its darkness, but its stillness. Helen felt the presence of invisible angels round the slumbering Alice, and her fears melted away. Putting her arms softly round her, and laying her cheek to hers, she called upon her to wake and return, for the woods were getting dark with night.

“Oh! how I love to sleep on this soft, mossy bed,” cried Alice, sitting up and passing her fingers over her eyes. “I fell asleep on brother’s arm, with the waterfall singing in my ears. Where is he, Helen? I do not hear his voice.”

“He is at home, and sent me after you, Alice,” replied Helen. “How could he leave you alone?” she could not help adding.

“I am never afraid to be left alone,” said Alice, “and he knows it. But I am not alone. I hear some one breathing in the grotto besides you, Helen. I heard it when I first waked.”

Helen started and grasped the hand of Alice closer and closer in her own. Looking wildly round the grotto, she beheld a dark figure crouching in the corner, half-hidden by the shrubbery, and uttering a low scream, was about to fly, when a hoarse laugh arrested her.

“It’s only me,” cried a rough, good-natured voice. “It’s nobody but old Becky. Young master told me to stay and watch Miss Alice, while she slept, till somebody came after her. He knew old Becky wouldn’t let anybody harm the child—not she.”

Old Becky, as she called herself, was a poor, harmless, half-witted woman, who roamed about the neighborhood, subsisting on charity, whom everybody knew and cared for. She was remarkably fond of children, and had always shown great attachment for the blind girl. She had the fidelity and sagacity of a dog, and would never leave any thing confided to her care. She would do any thing in the world for young Master Arthur as she styled him, or Mrs. Hazleton, for at the Parsonage she always found a welcome, and it seemed to her the gate of Heaven. During the life of Mr. Hazleton, she invariably attended public worship, and listened to his sermons with the most reverential attention, though she understood but a small portion of them—and when he died, her chief lamentation was that he could not preach at her funeral. If young master were a minister, that would be next best, but as he was only a doctor, she consoled herself by asking him for medicine whenever he visited home, whether she needed it or not, and Arthur never failed to make up a quantity of bread pills and starch powders to gratify poor, harmless Becky.

“Walk before us, please, Becky,” cried Helen with a lightened heart, and Becky marched on, proud to be of service, looking back every moment to see if they were safe.

When they reached home, the candles were burning brightly in the sitting-room, and the rose trees at the windows shone with a kind of golden lustre in their beams. Helen suffered Becky to accompany Alice into the house, knowing it would be to her a source of pride and pleasure, and seating herself on the steps, tried to school herself so as to appear with composure, and not allow Arthur to perceive how deeply his apparent unkindness had wounded her feelings. While she thus sat, breathing on the palm of her hand, and pressing it against her moist eyelids to absorb the welling tears, Arthur himself crossed the yard and came rapidly up the steps.

“What are you doing here, my sister?” said he, sitting down by her and drawing away the hand from her showery eyes. Never had he spoken so gently, so kindly. Helen could not answer. She only bowed her head upon her lap.

“My dear Helen,” said he, in that grave, earnest tone which always had the effect of command, “raise your head and listen to me. I have wounded my own feelings that I might give you a needed lesson, and prove to yourself that you have moral courage sufficient to triumph over physical and mental weakness. You have thought me cruel. Perhaps I have been so—but I have given present pain for your future joy and good. I followed you, though you knew it not, ready to ward off every real danger from your path. Oh, Helen, I grieve for the sufferings constitutional sensitiveness and inculcated fear occasion you, but I rejoice when I see you struggling with yourself, and triumphing through the strength of an exerted will.”

“I deserve no credit for going,” sobbed Helen. “I could not help it.”

“But no one forced you, Helen.”

“When you say I will do any thing, I feel a force acting upon me as strong as iron.”

“It is the force of your own inborn sense of right called into action by me. You knew it was not right to leave our blind Alice in the dark woods alone. If I were cruel enough to desert her, and refuse to seek her, her claim on your kindness and care was not the less commanding. You could not have laid your head upon your pillow, or commended yourself to the guardianship of Providence, thinking of Alice in the lonely woods, damp with the dews of night. Besides, you knew in your secret heart I could not send you on a dangerous mission. Oh! Helen, would that I could inspire you, not so much with implicit confidence in me, as in that Mighty guardian power that is ever around and about you, from whose presence you cannot flee, and in whose protection you are forever safe.”

“Forgive me,” cried Helen, in a subdued, humble tone. “I have done you great wrong in thinking you cruel. I wonder you have not given me up long ago, when I am so weak and foolish and distrustful. I thought I was growing brave and strong—but the very first trial proved that I am still the same, and so it will ever be. Neither the example of Alice, nor the counsels of your mother, nor your own efforts, do me any good. I shall always be unworthy of your cares.”

“Nay, Helen, you do yourself great injustice. You have shown a heroism this very night in which you may glory. Though you have encountered no real danger, you battled with an imaginary host, which no man could number, and the victory was as honorable to yourself as any that crowns the hero’s brow with laurels. Mark me, Helen, the time will come when you will smile at all that now fills you with apprehension, in the development of your future, nobler self.”

Helen looked up and smiled through her tears.

“Oh! if I dared to promise,” said she, “I would pledge my word never to distrust you, never to be so foolish and weak again. But I think, I believe that I never will.”

“Do not promise, my dear Helen, for you know not your own strength. But, remember, that without faith you will grope in darkness through the world—faith in your friends—faith in your God—and I will add—faith in yourself. From the time I first saw you a little, terror-stricken child, to the present moment, I have sought only your happiness and good—and yet forgetting all the past, you distrusted my motives even now, and your heart rose up against me. From the first dawn of your being to this sweet, star-lighted moment, God has been to you a tender, watchful parent, tenderer than any earthly parent, kinder than any earthly friend—and yet you fear to trust yourself to His providence, to remain with Him who fills immensity with His presence. You have no faith in yourself, though there is a legion of angels, nestling, with folded wings in that young heart, ready to fly forth at your bidding, and fulfil their celestial mission. Come, Helen,” added he, rising, and lifting her at the same time from her lowly seat, “let us go in—but tell me first that I am forgiven.”

“Forgiven!” cried she, fervently. “How can I ever thank you, ever be sufficiently grateful for your goodness?”

“By treasuring up my words, and remembering them when you are far away. I have influence over you now, because you are so very young, and know so little of the world, but a few years hence it will be very different. You may think of me then as a severe mentor, a cold, unfeeling sage, and wonder at the gentleness with which you bore my reproofs, and the docility with which you yielded to my will.”

“I shall always think of you as the best and truest friend I ever had in the world,” cried Helen, enthusiastically, as they entered the sitting-room, where Mrs. Hazleton and Alice awaited them.

“Because he sent you out into the woods alone?” said Mrs. Hazleton, smiling, “young despot that he is.”

“Yes,” replied Helen, “for I feel so much better, stronger and happier for having gone. Then, if possible, I love Alice more than ever.”

“How do you account for that, Helen?” asked Arthur.

“I don’t know,” she answered, “unless it is I went through a trial for her sake.”

“Helen is a metaphysician,” said the young doctor. “She could not have given a better solution.”

CHAPTER VI.

It is seldom that the widow of a country minister is left with more than the means of subsistence. Mrs. Hazleton was no exception to the general rule. But Arthur treasured up every word his blind sister uttered, and resolved to appropriate to this sacred purpose the first fruits of his profession. It was for this he had anticipated the years of manhood, and commenced the practice of medicine, under the auspices of his father’s venerable friend, Doctor Sennar, at an age when most young men are preparing themselves for their public career. Success far transcending his most sanguine hopes having crowned his youthful exertions, he was now enabled to purchase the Parsonage, and present it as a filial offering to his mother, and also to defray the expenses of his sister’s education.

Alice had never before visited the home of Helen, and it was an interesting sight to see with what watchful care and protecting tenderness Helen guided and guarded her steps. Louis, who was at home also passing his summer holidays, beheld for the first time the lovely blind girl of whom Helen had so often spoken and written.

He was now a man in appearance, of noble stature, and most prepossessing countenance. Helen was enthusiastically fond of her brother, and had said to Alice, with unconscious repetition—

“Oh! how I wish you could see Louis. He is so handsome and is so good. He has such a brave rejoicing look. Somehow or other, I always feel safe in his presence.”

“Is he handsomer than Arthur?” Alice would ask.

“No, not handsomer—but then he’s so different, one cannot compare them. Arthur is so much older, you know.”

“Arthur doesn’t look old, does he?”

“No, not old—but he has such an air of authority sometimes, which gives you such an impression of power, that I would fear him, did he not all at once appear so gentle and so kind. Louis makes you love him all the time, and you never think of his being displeased.”

Still, while Helen dwelt on her brother’s praise with fond and fluent tongue, she felt without being able to describe her feelings, that he had lost something of his original beauty. The breath of the world had passed over the mind and dimmed its purity. His was the joyous, reckless spirit that gave life to the convivial board; and temptations, which a colder temperament might have resisted, often held him in ignoble vassalage. Now inhaling the hallowed atmosphere of home, all the pure influences of his boyhood resumed their empire over his heart—and he wondered that he could ever have mingled with the grosser elements of society.

“Blind!” repeated he to himself, while gazing on the calm, angelic countenance of Alice, so beautiful in its repose. “Is it possible that a creature so fair and bright, dwells in the darkness of perpetual midnight? Can no electric ray pierce the cloud that is folded over her vision? Is there no power in science to remove the dark fillet that binds those celestial eyes, and pour in upon them the light of a new-born day?”

While he thus gazed on the unseeing face, so near him that perhaps she might have had a vague consciousness of the intensity, the warmth of the gaze, Helen approached, and taking the hand of Alice, passed it softly over the features of her brother, as well as his profuse and clustering hair.

“Alice has eyes in her fingers, Louis—I want her to see you and tell me if I have been a true painter.”

Louis felt the blood mounting to his temples, as the soft hand of Alice analyzed the outline of his face, and lingered in his hair. It seemed to him a cherub was fluttering its wings against his cheek, diffusing a peace and balminess that no language could describe.

Alice, who had yielded involuntarily to the movement of Helen, drew her hand blushingly away.

“I cannot imagine how any one can see without touching,” said Alice, “how they can take in an image into the soul, by looking at it far off. You tell me the eyes feel no pleasure when gazing at any thing—that it is the mind only which perceives. But my fingers thrill with delight when I touch any thing that pleases, long afterwards.”

Louis longed to ask her if she felt the vibration then, but he dared not do it. He, in general so reckless in words, experienced a restraining influence he had never felt before. She seemed so set apart, so holy, it would be sacrilegious to address her with levity. He felt a sudden desire to be an oculist, that he might devote himself to the task of restoring to her the blessing of sight. Then he thought how delightful it would be to lead such a sweet creature through the world, to be eyes to her darkness, strength to her helplessness—the sun of her clouded universe. Louis had a natural chivalry about him that invested weakness, not only with a peculiar charm, but with a sacred right to his protection. With the quick, bounding impulses of eighteen, his spirit sprang forward to meet every new attraction. Here was one so novel, so pure, that his soul seemed purified from the soil of temptation, while he involuntarily surrendered himself to it, as Miss Thusa’s thread grew white under the bleaching rays of a vernal sun.

Miss Thusa! yes, Miss Thusa came to welcome home her young protegé, unchanged even in dress. It is probable she had had several new garments since she related to Helen the history of the worm-eaten traveler, but they were all of the same gray color, relieved by the black silk neckerchief and white tamboured muslin cap—and under the cap there was the same opaque fold of white paper, carefully placed on the top of the head.

Alice had a great curiosity to see Miss Thusa, as she expressed it, and hear some of her wild legends. When she traced the lineaments, of her majestic profile, and her finger suddenly rose on the lofty beak of her nose, she laughed outright. Alice did not often laugh aloud, but when she did, her laugh was the most joyous, ringing, childish burst of silvery music that ever gushed from the fountain of youth. It was impossible not to echo it. Helen feared that Miss Thusa would be offended, especially as Louis joined merrily in the chorus—and she looked at Alice as if her glance had power to check her. But she did not know all the windings of Miss Thusa’s heart. Any one like Alice, marked by the Almighty, by some peculiar misfortune, was an object not only of tenderness, but of reverence in her eyes. The blasted tree, the blighted flower, the smitten lamb—all touched by the finger of God, were sacred things—and so were blindness and deafness—and any personal calamity. It was strange, but it was only in the shadows of existence she felt the presence of the Deity.

“Never mind her laughing,” said she, in answer to the apprehensive glance of Helen, “it don’t hurt me. It does me good to hear her. It sounds like a singing bird in a cage; and, poor thing, she’s shut in a dark cage for life.”

“No, not for life, Miss Thusa,” exclaimed Louis; “I intend to study optics till I have mastered the whole length and breadth of the science, on purpose to unseal those eyes of blue.”

Alice turned round so suddenly, and following the sound of his voice, fixed upon him so eagerly those blue eyes, the effect was startling.

“Will you do so?” she cried, “can you do so? oh! do not say it, unless you mean it. But I know it is impossible,” she added in a subdued tone, “for I was born blind. God made me so, and He has made me very happy too. I sometimes think it would be beautiful to see, but it is beautiful to feel. As brother says, there is an inner-light which keeps us from being all dark.”

Louis regretted the impulse which urged him to utter his secret wishes. He resolved to be more guarded in future, but he was already in imagination a student in Germany, under some celebrated optician, making discoveries so amazing that he would undoubtedly give a new name to the age in which he lived.

When night came on they gathered round Miss Thusa, entreating her for a farewell legend, not a gloomy one, not one which would give Alice a sad, dark impression, but something that would come to her memory like a ray of light.

“You must let me have my own way,” said she, putting her spectacles on the top of her head, and looking around her with remarkable benignity. “If the spirit moves me one way, I cannot go another. But I will try my best, for may-be it’s the last time some of you will ever listen to old Thusa’s tales. She’s never felt just right since they tangled up her heart-strings with that whitened thread. Oh! that was a vile, mean trick!”

“Forget and forgive, Miss Thusa,” cried Louis; “I dare say Mittie has repented of it in dust and ashes.”

“I have forgiven, long ago,” resumed Miss Thusa, “but as for forgetting, that is out of the question. Ever since then, when the bleaching time comes, it keeps me perfectly miserable till it is over. I’ve never had any thread equal to it, for I’m afraid to let it stay long enough to be as powerful white as it used to be. Well, well, let it rest. You want me to tell you a story, do you?”

Miss Thusa had an auditory assembled round her that might have animated a spirit less open to inspiration than hers. There was Mr. and Mrs. Gleason, the latter a fine, dignified-looking lady, and the young doctor, with his countenance of grave sweetness, and Louis, with an expression of resolute credulity, and Helen and Alice, with their arms interlaced, and the locks of their hair mingling like the tendrils of two forest vines. And what perhaps gave a glow to her spirit, deeper than the presence of all these, Mittie, her arch enemy, was not there, to mock her with her deriding black eyes.

“You’ve talked to me so much about not telling you any terrible things,” said she, with a troubled look, “that you’ve made me like a candle under a bushel, instead of a light upon a hill-top. I’ve never told such stories since, as I used to tell when the first Mrs. Gleason was alive, and I spun in the nursery all the evening, and little Helen was the only one to listen to what I had to say. There was something in the child’s eyes that kept me going, for they grew brighter and larger every word I said.”

Helen looked up, and met the glance of the young doctor, riveted upon her with so much pity and earnestness, she looked down again with a blending of gratitude and shame. She well knew that, notwithstanding her reason now taught her the folly and madness of her superstitious terrors, the impressions of her early childhood were burnt into her memory and never could be entirely obliterated.

“I remember a story about a blind child, which I heard myself, when a little girl,” said Miss Thusa, “and if I should live to the age of Methuselah, I never should forget it. I don’t know why it stayed with me so long, for it has nothing terrific in it, but it comes to me many a time when I’m not thinking of it, like an old tune, heard long, long ago.

“Once there was a woman who had an only child, a daughter, whose name was Lily. The woman prayed at the birth of the child that it might be the most beautiful creature that ever the sun shone upon, and she prayed, too, that it might be good, but because she prayed for beauty before goodness, it was accounted to her as a sin. The child grew, and as long as it was a babe in the arms, they never knew that the eyes, which gave so much light to others, took none back again. The mother prayed again, that her child might see, no matter how ugly she might become, no matter how dull and dim her eyes, let them but have the gift of sight. But Lily walked in a cloud, from the cradle to the time when the love-locks began to curl round her forehead, and her cheeks would flush up when the young men told her she was beautiful. When it was sunlight, her mother watched her every step she took, for fear she would get into danger, but she never thought of watching her by night, for she said the angels took care of her then. Lily had a little bed of her own, right by the window, for she told her mother she loved to feel the moon shining on her eye-lids, making a sort of faintish glimmer, as it were.

“One night she lay down in the moonshine, and fell asleep, and her mother looked upon her for a long time, thinking how beautiful she was, and what a pity the young men could not take her to be a wife, she had such a loving heart, and seemed made so much for love. At last she fell asleep herself, dreaming of Lily, and did not wake till past midnight. Her first thought was of Lily, and she leaned on her elbow, and looked at the little bed, with its white counterpane, that glittered like snow in the moonshine. But Lily was not there, and the window was wide open. The woman jumped up in fright, and ran to the window and looked out, but she could see nothing but the trees and the woods. I wouldn’t have been in her place for the gold of Solomon, for she was all alone, and there was no one living within a mile of her house. It was a wild, lonesome place, on a hill-side, and you could hear the roaring of water, all down at the bottom of the hill. Even in the day-time it was mighty dangerous walking among the torrents, let alone the night.

“Well, the woman lifted up her voice, and wept for her blind child, but there was none but God to hear—and she went out into the night, calling after Lily every step she took, but her own voice came back to her, not Lily’s. She went on and on, and when she got to a narrow path, leading along to a great waterfall, she stopped to lay her hand on her heart, to keep it from jumping out of her body. There was a tall, blasted pine, that had fallen over that waterfall, making a sort of slippery bridge to pass over. What should she see, right in the middle of the blasted pine tree, as it lay over the roaring stream, but Lily, all in white, walking as if she had a thousand pair of eyes, instead of none, or at least none that did her any good. The mother dared not say a word, any more than if she were dumb, so she stood like a dead woman, that is, as still, looking at her blind daughter, fluttering like a bird with white wings over the black abyss.

“But what was her astonishment to behold a figure approaching Lily, from the opposite side of the stream, all clothed in white, too, with long, fair hair, parted from its brow, and large shining wings on its shoulders. The face was that of a beautiful youth, and he had eyes as soft and glorious as the moon itself, though they looked dark for all that.

“‘I come, my beloved,’ cried Lily, stretching out her arms over the water. ‘I see thee—I know thee. There is no darkness now. Oh, how beautiful thou art! The beams of thy shining wings touch my eyelids, and little silver arrows come darting in, on every side. Take me over this narrow bridge, lest my feet slide, and I fall into the roaring water.’

“‘I cannot take thee over the bridge,’ replied the youth, ‘but when thou hast crossed it, I will bear thee on my wings to a land where there is no blindness or darkness, not even a shadow, beautiful as these shadows are, all round us now. Walk in faith, and look not below. Press on, and fear no evil.’

“‘Oh! come back, my daughter!’ shrieked the poor mother, rousing up from the trance of fear—‘come back, my Lily, and leave me not alone. Come back, my poor blind child.’

“Lily turned back a moment, and looked at her mother, who could see her, just as plain as day. Such a look! It was just as if a film had fallen from off her eyes, and a soul had come into them. They were live eyes, and they had been cold and dead before. They smiled with her smiling lips. They had never smiled before, and the mother trembled at their strange intelligence. She dared not call her back any more, but knelt right down on the ground where she was, and held her breath, as one does when they think a spirit is passing by.

“‘I can’t come back, mother,’ said Lily, just as she reached the bank, where the angel was waiting for her, for it was nobody else but an angel, as one might know by its wings. ‘You will come to me by-and-by—I can see you now, mother. There’s no more night for me.’

“Then the angel covered her, as it were, with his wings—or rather, they seemed to have one pair of wings between them, and they began to rise above the earth, slow at first, and easy, just as you’ve seen the clouds roll up, after a shower. Then they went up faster and higher, till they didn’t look bigger than two stars, shining up overhead.

“The next day a traveler was passing along the banks of the stream, below the great waterfall, and he found the body of the beautiful blind girl, lying among the water-lilies there. Her name was Lily, you know. She looked as white and sweet as they did, and there never was such a smile seen, as there was upon her pale lips. He took her up, and curried her to the nearest house, which happened to be her own mother’s. Then the mother knew that Lily had been drowned the night before, and that she had seen her going up to Heaven, with the twin angel, created for her and with her, at the beginning of creation. She felt happy, for she knew Lily was no longer blind.”

If we could give an adequate idea of Miss Thusa’s manner, so solemn and impressive, of the tones of her voice, monotonous and slightly nasal, yet full of intensity, and, above all, of the expression of her foreboding eye, while in the act of narration, it would be easy to account for the effect which she produced. Helen and Alice were bathed in tears before the conclusion, and a deepening seriousness rested on the countenances of all her auditors.

“You will be sad and gloomy, Miss Thusa,” cried Louis; “see what you have done; you should not have chosen such a subject.”

“I don’t think it is sad,” exclaimed Alice, raising her head and shaking her ringlets over her eyes to veil her tears. “I did not weep for sorrow, but it is so touching. Oh! I could envy Lily, when the beautiful angel came and bore her away on his shining wings.”

“I think with Alice,” said the young doctor, “that it is far from being a gloomy tale, and the impression it leaves is salutary. The young girl, walking by faith, over the narrow bridge that spans the abyss of death, the waiting angel, and upward flight, are glorious emblems of the spirit’s transit and sublime ascent. We are all blind, and wander in darkness here, but when we look back, like Lily, on the confines of the spirit-land, we shall see with an unclouded vision.”

Helen turned to him with a smile that was radiant, beaming through her tears. It seemed to her, at that moment, that all her vague terrors, all her misgivings for the future, her self-distrust and her disquietude melted away and vanished into air.

Miss Thusa, pleased with the comment of the young doctor, was trying to keep down a rising swell of pride, and look easy and unconcerned, when Louis, taking a newspaper from his pocket, began to unfold it.

“Here is a paper, Miss Thusa,” said he, handing it to her as he spoke, “which I put aside on purpose for you. It contains an account of a celebrated murder, which occupies several columns. It is enough to make one’s hair stand on end, ‘like quills upon the fretted porcupine.’ I am sure it will lift the paper crown from your head.”

Miss Thusa took the paper graciously, though she called him a “saucy boy,” and adjusting her spectacles on the lofty bridge of her nose, she held the paper at an immense distance, and began to read.

At first, they amused themselves observing the excited glance of Miss Thusa, moving rapidly from left to right, her head following it with a quick, jerking motion; but as the article was long, they lost sight of her, in the interest of conversation. All at once, she started up with a sudden exclamation, that galvanized Helen, and brought Louis to his feet.

“What does this mean?” she cried, pointing with her finger to a paragraph in the paper, written in conspicuous characters. “Read it, for I do believe that my glasses are deceiving me.”

Louis read aloud, in a clear, emphatic voice, the following advertisement:

“If Lemuel Murrey, or his sister Arathusa, are still living, if he, or in case of his death, she will come immediately to the town of ——, and call at office No. 24, information will be given of great interest and importance. Country editors will please insert this paragraph, several times, and send us their account.”

“Why, Miss Thusa,” cried Louis, flourishing the paper over his head, “somebody must have left you a fortune. Only hear—of great importance! Let me be the first to congratulate you,” bowing almost to her feet.

“Nonsense!” exclaimed Miss Thusa, “I have not a relation, that I know of, this side of the Atlantic, and if I had, they would not be worth a cent in the world. It must be an imposition,” and she looked sharply at Louis through her lowered glasses.