T was a bracing morning. Of course it was a November morning, for to-morrow would be Thanksgiving, and Mr. Vale stood looking out of his study window. It was a beautiful window in the spring and summer time, when the afternoon sun came streaming in through the Virginia creeper trained across it. Mr. Vale, who had the happiest way of looking at things, thought it a beautiful window, even in November. It might have opened on a blank wall, or a dull row of houses, as so many city windows do. Instead of that, it overlooked an old-fashioned garden, with little box-bordered flower-beds of every conceivable shape, and narrow gravel paths running between them. In some of the sunniest beds a few hardy chrysanthemums were still blooming, in brilliant reds and yellows. A fine western breeze was whistling through the leafless branches of the vine, and Mr. Vale drew in a long breath of the invigorating air. No doubt he would have drawn a still longer breath of the salt air he revelled in if he had been where his thoughts were, for they were down by the sea, where at this very moment a little party was crowding into a village cart, about to start out on a long-talked-of expedition. If he could have looked into their earnest, rosy faces, and into their eyes brimming over with delight and expectation, I think he would have felt assured of the success of their undertaking. How could anyone resist such a winning troop of little beggars?
At last he closed the windows went back to his study table, and wrote out his Thanksgiving sermon, which he had been turning over in his mind for many a day,—a glorious, invigorating sermon, as any member of the large congregation who heard it next day would have told you; but they could not have told you that it had won much of its inspiration from a little maiden who a few days before had looked up to him and said, with loving admiration, “I like your preaching; I like it very much indeed.” Well, the children were off at last, and they bowled along the hard boulevard road in the highest spirits. They crossed the Sea Bright Bridge, and Pet, who had not been over it since that September morning when they went for the peaches, started to take the road that led to Burchard's orchard.
“No, sir-reel” cried Regie, jerking him back, “we won't go there any more,” and then the children laughed heartily over that eventful day's adventures, when the little red skirt had done such good service. Before long they found themselves in front of Mr. Allan's place, and his name came first on the list. It had been agreed between them that Regie should be spokesman for the party.
“You see, Harry,” Nan had said, when they were discussing the matter in Regie's absence, “Regie has a kind of city way with him that is more taking, you know.”
“I don't know anything of the kind,” Harry had answered. “You're just gone over Regie. It's a pity you could not have had him for a brother instead of me.”
“Now, Harry Murray,” Nan replied, earnestly, “you know I would not exchange you for any brother in the world,” which was pretty good of Nan, considering how large a share of teasing she had to undergo from this same Harry. The discussion had occurred several days previous to the expedition, and now that they had actually set out Harry was only too thankful that he did not have to play the principal part on the programme.
They drove up to the big house and tied Pet to a tree. No one was to be seen, and for a moment their hearts misgave them but it was too late to retrace their steps, and, with the air of a major domo, Harry marched proudly on to the piazza and pulled the bell, which was the special duty allotted to him. A coloured man in unpretentious livery opened the door.
“Does Mr. Allan live here?” asked Rex.
He hoped that the man did not notice that his voice trembled a little.
“Yes; would you like to see him?”
Before Rex could answer, “Yes, if you please,” someone called from the back part of the house, “Is it three little children, Jackson?”
“Yes, sah, it is.”
“Show them right in here, then,” called the voice, and closing the door after them Jackson ushered them into a spacious diningroom, where an old gentleman sat toasting his feet and reading his morning paper before a crackling wood fire.
“Well, my little friends, I'm right glad to see you,” he said, cordially. “You'll excuse my not getting up to meet you, I am such an old fellow, you know. Here, Jackson, put that little rocking-chair here near the fire for the young lady.”
Nan looked about the room to see who the young lady might be.
“Oh! if you mean me,” she said, laughing, taking her seat on a sofa, “I'm too warm to go near the fire, thank you.”
“Pray be seated, gentlemen, and tell me what I can do for you,” said Mr. Allan, turning to the boys.
“I guess you knew we were coming,” Regie answered, sitting down in the nearest chair.
“What makes you think that?”
“Because you called to your man there as we came in to ask if it was not three little children, as though you were sort of expecting us.”
“Oh, to be sure! but couldn't I have seen you as you drove up!”
“Not if you were sitting where you are now, sir,” said honest Harry.
“Well, I guess I shall have to own up, then, that I did know you were coming. This is how I received my information,” and Mr. Allan drew a little case from his pocket and began looking through the papers it contained. Nan gazed at the case in silent admiration. It was made of alligator skin, and had Mr. Allan's initials, R. T. A., in silver letters on the back.
“I wonder,” she thought, “if two dollars would buy one like that for Regie when he goes home at Christmas time?”
And then she remembered with satisfaction that Regie had only two initials, which would probably make it come a little cheaper. Mr. Allan finally found a postal card, and handed it to Regie, who read aloud:—
“'New York, November 21st, 18——.
“'Dear Mr. Allan,—Three little friends of mine will call on you to-morrow. I hope they will be none the less welcome when they have told you their errand.
“'Yours in haste,
“'F. F. Vale.'”
“Then you do not know what we have come for,” and Regie produced his collecting book with a most business like air. Mr. Allan put on his spectacles and examined it carefully. “Oh, I see,” he said at last, “you are collecting for the poor sailors who were saved from the wreck. I hear you turned the church into a hospital. You could not have done a better thing.”
“Yes, we did,” said Nan, proudly, “and the sailors are all very nice men indeed, and if it had not been for Sister Julia's care, two of them would have died.”
“And who is Sister Julia?”
“Don't you know who Sister Julia is?” she asked, incredulously; “why, I thought everyone in New York knew about her. She's——”
“Let Regie tell,” Harry interrupted. “You see he has a kind of city way with him that is more taking, you know,” he added, with a sly wink and in tones too low for Mr. Allan's ear.
Nan immediately relapsed into silence, and Regie came to the front.
“Sister Julia is a nurse, but she's a lady too, and she came to Moorlow to take care of me when I broke my leg last June. She lives in a great hospital in New York, and takes care of sick people, mostly children.”
“But how does she happen to be here now?” asked Mr. Allan. “Those two legs of yours seem to be as strong as anybody's.”
“Oh, yes, it's all right now,” and Regie regarded his right leg rather affectionately; “but Sister Julia stayed on to look after me, because Papa and Mamma Fairfax have gone to Europe.”
“Then you are Curtis Fairfax's adopted boy?'' Mr. Allan exclaimed with some surprise; and readjusting his gold-rimmed spectacles he looked Regie over rather critically.
“Yes, sir, I am,” Rex replied, for almost the first time in his life hearing that word “adopted” without wincing.
“You'll do well then if you make as good a man as your father. He's one of the whitest men in the trade.”
Regie did not quite know what he meant by that, but hesitated to ask.
“Just how are you going to use this money?” asked Mr. Allan.
“For the hospital, sir. It costs seventy dollars a week to run it. The brig was wrecked last week, Wednesday you know, and Sister Julia says they will not be able to go before the middle of next week, so we need a hundred and forty dollars, and sixty dollars more for beds and other things.”
Mr. Allan re-opened the little book.
“I see,” he said, “that you have forty dollars promised already. I recognise Mr. Vale's hand in this first twenty. Are you free to tell who contributes the other?”
“The other twenty!” exclaimed Harry, looking over Mr. Allan's shoulder; “why, that is Regie's writing!”
Rex coloured up to the roots of his brown hair, as though he had been the most guilty of little culprits.
“I have ten dollars now of my own,” he stammered, “and I know of a way I can surely earn ten more when I get back to town, so I am going to ask Mr. Vale to lend me the money.”
“Good for you!” said Mr. Allan, “I call that downright generous, and as I happen to know of a way I can earn sixty dollars when I get back to town, I suppose I ought to put myself down for forty at any rate. I guess I had better draw a check to your order, as you seem to be chairman of the committee,” and crossing the room he sat down at a little oak desk. Nan stared at Rex in mute amazement. She had never dreamed he was such a wealthy personage. Harry's respect was wonderfully increased too, by the way. To think that a boy no older than he actually knew of a way by which he could earn ten dollars! He stowed that piece of information away in his mind as a matter to be inquired into more particularly at a later date, and was so ungracious as to have some doubts as to the perfect truthfulness of the statement.
Just at this moment Jackson came again into the room, bearing a tray laden with cider and doughnuts; clear, amber-coloured cider, in a cut-glass pitcher, and doughnuts generously sprinkled with powdered sugar, and fried that morning.
“I thought dese yere children might enjoy a little sumfin to eat arter their long ride this breezy morning,” said Jackson, setting the tray on the table.
“A happy thought, Jackson,” answered Mr. Allan, smiling; “and now suppose we draw up to the table and be comfortable.”
The children needed no urging, and Jackson, placing a plate in front of each of them, passed the doughnuts, and then filled four tempting little tumblers to the brim.
“Let us drink to the health of Sister Julia,” said Mr. Allan, and he was greatly amused at the easy grace with which the children complied.
Captain Murray had once taken Nan and Harry to a “Rip Van Winkle” matinee, and so they chanced to know what was the proper thing to do when a health was proposed. Afterward, Harry proposed the health of Mr. Vale, because, as he put it, “he was such a brick at the time of the wreck;” and then Regie proposed Captain Murray's. Altogether it was a very merry party, and the children finally bade Mr. Allan a reluctant goodbye, when Rex decided that “they really ought to go on to the next place, for if they kept on at this rate they wouldn't get home till morning.”
They had still four names on their list, and already had half the money.
Feeling sure that Mr. Vale had in each place heralded their coming by a postal, they entered the other houses with an air of childish confidence which seemed to say, “We have called for that money, please.”
Everywhere they were received with more than cordial kindness, and when Pet turned his head homeward the whole amount had been subscribed.
“Oh, dear me!” Nan suddenly exclaimed, quite overcome by a thought that had occurred to her.
“What is it, goosie?” And it is not necessary to mention who asked that.
“Why, we have all the money we need, and we have not called on Miss Vale yet.”
“That's so, by cracky!” said Harry.
“Well, we'll just have to go there and explain,” Rex volunteered.
“Perhaps you had better not give so much yourself,” suggested Harry; “I don't see how you are ever going to earn ten dollars.”
“Well, I do then,” in a kingly way, resenting such interference.
“Oh yes, we ought to go,” said Nan; “I only hope she won't mind our having collected it all.”
It did not occur to either of this committee (and would there were more of these sort of people in the world!) that anyone might possibly prefer not being called upon for a subscription. They themselves regarded the opportunity for giving in the light of an actual privilege. Nan was thankful the money was so easily raised, for she had not a penny in the world to give save that two dollars, which she must reserve for that little wallet for Regie; but she was planning to present a warm comforter, which her own little hands had made, to the Spanish captain, and she thought she might favour the first mate with the rubber pencil-case which she had bought as a parting present for Regie.
When they reached Mr. Avery's they found Miss Vale ready to receive them. She was very much of an invalid, seldom able to leave her room, but in honour of their coming she had put on a pretty wrapper, and was seated in a large rocking-chair. She was anxious to meet these little friends of whom her brother had so often spoken, and looked forward to their coming as quite an event in her quiet life. The nurse led the children up the oaken stair, and Nan trod as noiselessly as possible herself, but was sure she had never heard Harry and Regie make such a noise before.
Miss Vale received them very cordially, and they felt at home with her at once. They talked about the wreck for some time, and then Miss Vale said, “Well, I believe you want some money from me for the hospital?”
“No,” Nan answered, with much seriousness, and as though she was breaking the saddest piece of news imaginable; “we are very sorry, but we don't need any more; we got enough money before we knew it. We couldn't help it, really.”
Nan saw that the nurse was laughing in a quiet way, but never dreamt that she was the cause of the merriment. Miss Vale herself looked amused, but managed to keep her face straight as she said, feigning much anxiety, “Dear me! what am I to do, then? I had made up my mind to give you a hundred dollars.” The finance committee looked puzzled enough, and as though they saw no way out of this difficulty.
“But look here,” Miss Vale continued, “I have an idea. The captain and his crew did not save anything from the wreck, did they?''
“Not a thing, and some of them haven't a penny in the world,” Harry answered.
“How many are there?'
“Seven,” answered the children, in one breath.
“Well then, wouldn't it be a good thing to divide the money among them, so that they will have something to begin life with again?”
“Seven won't go into a hundred evenly,” said Harry, having a horror of fractions.
“Well, I guess we can fix matters if it doesn't,” was Regie's scornful response. “I think it is very kind of you,” turning to Miss Vale. “When shall we give it to them?”
“It seems to me to-morrow would be a good day. Are the men to have a Thanksgiving dinner?”
“Indeed they are,” Nan answered. “They are to have turkey, and mashed potatoes, and cranberries that mother has made in beautiful moulds, and mince-pie, and lots of things. They'll all be able to come to the table too, except the captain.”
“It's just as well that he can't come,” Regie explained, with the air of an experienced doctor. “He isn't strong enough to eat turkey dna hearty things like that.”
“He's to have some very nice gruel, though,” Nan confided, and as though she knew more about it all than both the toys put together; as indeed she did, for she had been present at many a conference between Sister Julia and her mother regarding the dinner.
The children made a long call, and no one knows how much longer they would have lingered in Miss Vale's sunny room, looking at some fine photographs of Mr. Avery's, which the maid had brought up from the parlour, if the old clock in the hall had not struck two very clearly and distinctly.
“Is it as late as that?” cried Nan; “we shall miss our dinner altogether if we don't go home this minute.”
That was sufficient to start the boys, and the children took their departure, Miss Vale promising to send the money down that night in separate envelopes, so that Harry should not be bothered by the difficult division of one hundred by seven.
T is only quite natural that the little folks throughout these United States should set less store by Thanksgiving day than Christmas. It may seem all very fine to sit down to a Thanksgiving dinner, but, after all, Thanksgiving may not hold a candle to Christmas,—to Christmas, with its continued round of excitement, beginning in the small hours of the morning with the inspection of Christmas presents, and ending, in all probability, with the glory and glitter of a well-loaded Christmas tree at night. Yet I doubt if the most favoured little darling in the world, who knew every wish for a twelvemonth would find its fulfilment on Christmas morning, ever looked forward to that day as eagerly as our little friends to this Thanksgiving.
I will do them the credit to say that they gave little thought to the good things that were to fall to their own share. They were each conjuring pictures for themselves of how those Spanish sailors would look when they sat down to that good dinner. Two of the sailors knew nothing of English beyond the two words “thank you.” Nan could see them now saying it with their funny accent every time anything was passed to them. And when she wondered how they would look when the money was handed to them, she could hardly wait for the glad moment to come and see for herself. She did not have to wait long, for those were her last thoughts before falling asleep, and when she awoke it was Thanksgiving morning. Of course the weather would have much to do with the pleasure of the day, so the first thing she did was to fly to the window and throw open the blinds. The late November sun, rising out of the ocean, flooded everything with a rosy light, and the air was mild enough for early October.
Three or four seagulls were sailing over the waves In search of their breakfast, making a dive now and then when their wonderful far-reaching gaze detected a fish near the surface of the water. Nan watched one of them circling round and round, and clapped her hands from sheer delight when she saw him rise from a desperate dive with a fish quivering in his talons, then flying homeward to his nest on the bough of some inland tree. It seemed as though even the seagulls ought to fare better than on other days. To be sure it put a sad ending to the life of the poor little fish, but no doubt it was as allowable for seagulls to dine off men-haden, as for people to dine off roast turkeys and ducks. This logical train of thought, and some other thoughts not as logical, tripped through Nan's mind as she made her neat little toilet. The brown hair was braided quickly but very evenly, and tied with a scarlet ribbon; the whitest of little yoke-aprons was put on over the blue flannel dress, and, notwithstanding it opened down the back and boasted fifteen buttons, was carefully adjusted by Nan's own little fingers. it is astonishing what “own little fingers” can do for the children who must needs wait on themselves.
A radiant embodiment of sweetness and freshness, Nan bustled into the dining-room, to find the boys there before her. They were curled up on the window-seat looking over, for perhaps the tenth time, the budget of envelopes which Miss Vale had sent the night before.
“You look good enough to eat this morning,” said Harry, with a look of honest admiration.
“Well. I guess I shall not be good enough to let you eat me,” Nan answered, blushing a little.
Harry caught her dress as she passed him, and held her firmly while he gave her the heartiest sort of a kiss. The truth is that two months ago Harry would have done nothing of the sort. It might have occurred to him, but he simply would not have done it. Regie had been teaching him a lesson. Always gallant and thoughtful himself toward Nan, Harry had watched him closely, and gradually had come to the conclusion that a brother might really treat his sister with much consideration without being set down for a spoony; indeed, might even go so far as to actually express his admiration, not only in words, but in the deed of an unexpected kiss now and then, without being silly. The lesson was well worth learning, and would it might be taught to a host of well-meaning little Harrys, who need to learn it every whit as much as this Harry in particular! As soon as Sister Julia arrived they had breakfast. She ran up every morning from the hospital, for the sake of the change and fresh air. As soon as the meal was finished, preparations were at once begun for the great Thanksgiving dinner. In the first place Dobbin was brought to the door, and the two boys helped Captain Murray carry out from the hall several well-filled boxes and baskets; for the dinner was to be served in the rear end of the chapel, as Captain Murray's dining-room was too small to accommodate so large a party comfortably; besides, one or two of the men were not so far recovered as to be able to venture out of doors. Pet and the cart were also pressed into service, and made numerous trips to and fro, until at last, with the help of the sailors, everything had been unloaded at the chapel door.
Mrs. Murray, in a long white apron, presided over the cooking, and soon a strange new incense, which was none other than the smell of roasting turkey, began to make its way to the rafters of the church.
The captain on his cot sniffed it gratefully, and he wished from the bottom of his heart that he was up and about and able to enjoy it. Sister Julia busied herself with setting the table. Rex and Harry sat in one corner paring potatoes, and the sailors strolled about with their hands in their pockets, and broad smiles on their dark faces, rendering some little service whenever they could.
The one who could not speak English at all kept near Mrs. Murray, watching her intently with his large black eyes, and trying to anticipate any little thing he might do for her, such as lifting the great pot, in which a Savoury soup was boiling away, or pushing more wood into the cooking-stove.
“Well, Sister Julia, what can I do now?” asked Nan, when she had finished the glasses.
“Let me see,” answered Sister Julia, pausing a second to count the places at the table, to be sure she had made no mistake; “I think you might arrange the fruit. The bananas and oranges will look the better for a careful rubbing with one of the glass towels.”
“All right,” Nan said, cheerily, glad to have so important a task assigned to her. Just as she had gotten everything together a sudden thought occurred to her, and seizing a fruit dish under each arm, she travelled down the aisles and into the vestry.
During the week she and the Spanish captain had grown to be fast friends, and his face brightened the moment he saw her.
“I was thinking you might be a little lonely,” she said; “if you like, I can bring my work in here and do it.”
“Indeed, senorita, nothing would please me better,” the captain answered, in musical broken English. The captain always addressed Nan as “senorita,” the pretty word that stands for miss in his native tongue.
Nan asked two of the sailors to carry the great box of oranges and bananas into the vestry, and seating herself on the floor, with a dish on each side of her, she set to work.
“How do you feel to-day, captain?” she asked, by way of opening the conversation, and rubbing vigorously away at an orange.
“Better, senorita; but one does not want to get well too fast, and say good-bye to Sister Julia and the rest of you who have been so kind to us all.”
“You are sorry, then, that you tried to do it, aren't you?”
“Do what, senorita?” and the colour came into his dark face.
“Why, kill yourself, captain,” polishing away at a banana without looking up, and feeling pretty sure it would have been better not to have said this.
“I had hoped the little senorita did not know about that,” sighed the captain. “It was a cowardly and foolish thing to do.”
“It was a very wicked thing, captain. I hope you never will try to do it again.”
“Never you fear,” he answered, smiling; “all my life I will try to make amends for it; and I will tell you something you may think strange, senorita, and that is, that this has been the happiest week in all my life. Two or three times when I have been lying here, just at sunset, where I could watch the great white breakers come rolling in, and Sister Julia has been playing on the organ in the church there, I have thought I must be dreaming in my berth in the poor Christina. Then I have raised myself on my elbow, so that I could look into the chancel yonder and see the cross on the altar cloth, and feel sure it was really all as it seemed.”
“You are not exactly glad you were wrecked, though?” Nan asked, practically.
“Yes, in a way, I am glad.”
“You don't forget about losing all your money and things, do you?”
“No, but perhaps it's worth while to have lost one's money to be wrecked on a coast of big and little angels.”
“Big and little angels!”
“Yes, and if you want to know why it seems so to me you must listen to a story.”
There was no “must listen” for Nan where a story was concerned. She was all attention in a moment, an eager breathless little listener, and the captain began.
“Just thirty-six years ago a Spanish boy found himself without father or mother, and was set adrift on the world. Not a penny did he own, but he was a hearty, fearless little fellow, and he managed somehow to live, though he seldom knew where the next meal was to come from, or where he would sleep at night. By the time the boy was ten years old he grew tired of his vagabond life, and longed to learn how to read and write. So he resolved to go to the village school, and he earned a little money out of school hours here and there, and was a happier fellow than in the old idle days.
“No sooner had he learned to read and write in pretty decent fashion than he decided to run away to sea, for he had always a notion that he would be a sailor some day. I do not know that you could exactly call it running away, when no one cared very much whether he came or went; but for the next few years he had a pretty hard time of it, for to go to sea before the mast under a harsh and cruel captain is likely to make life rather difficult. Sometimes when he was sent out to reef the top-gallant sail he would balance himself on the yard, wondering if it would not be better to let himself drop into the ocean—the men would only think he had tumbled off; but somehow the fear of God always kept him from it.”
“Notwithstanding the hardship he went to sea again until he was twenty-five years old, and by that time he had worked up to be first mate of the——”
“Of the Christina?” Nan questioned, eagerly.
“Yes, of the Christina,” the captain admitted; “and he had managed to save enough to become part owner of her besides.” Nan had finished her work, but was quite unmindful of the fact, and sat gazing up to the captain's face, with her hands clasped round her knees.
“Had he grown up to be a good man?” she asked, innocently. “I am afraid not, senorita, as you would count goodness.”
“Was he kind to his men?” altogether unconscious of how embarrassing her questions might prove.
“Yes, he was kind. That was the best thing that could be said for him. He did not deserve any credit for that, though, for he had suffered so much himself from unkindness.”
“Then he deserved all the more credit,” Nan said, decidedly, and the colour in the captain's face showed how grateful her praise was to him.
“Well, it happened one November morning,” he continued, “ten years afterward, that when he had been battling all night with the wind and the waves of a terrible storm, his ship ran ashore, and in such a way that he knew he could never save her. All the earnings of his lifetime gone in a minute! What was there to live for? He had not a relative in the world, and that ship was his darling. Then the thought to take his own life came to him, as it used to sometimes when he was a poor little sailor on the top-gallant yard, only now that he was a man no thought of God came with it, and so the desperate deed was attempted.” Nan had never listened to anything so fascinating in all her life before.
“That is not all?” she asked, eagerly, for the captain had paused for a moment.
“Thank God, no! scarcely did the captain—for he was no longer first mate—think that the ugly weapon had done its work, than he seemed to be all by himself in a beautiful silver boat on a wide blue sea. It was a little boat, without sails or oars, and it bounded over the waves of its own free will, so that the captain had simply to let it carry him whither it would. Soon he knew they were nearing a shore, for he recognised the sound of breakers on the beach; but he shuddered as he heard it, for he half-remembered that something terrible had happened when he had heard that sound once before But his fright was over in a moment, for he saw a great banner waving in the air, and on it was printed, in gold letters, 'The Shore of Loving kindness.'”
“As he neared the land, one curling white breaker seemed gently to lift the boat on to the next, until at last it was landed on a great white stretch of beach. It seemed to the captain such a beautiful shore, that he wondered if it might be heaven; and if it was, he knew he had no right there. He tried to lift himself up and step out of the little boat, but somehow he was not able to do that; so he lay quite still and contented, looking up at the stars overhead,—wonderful stars they were, for the only light there was came from them, and yet he could see everything plainly. At last the stars seemed to grow dim and still more dim, and the captain turned himself over on the silk cushions of the boat and fell asleep. When he awoke he stared about him with a wondering gaze, for everything looked so strange. He was no longer in the silk-cushioned boat, but lying on a cot in a little room, a queer little room, with a carved oaken partition, and soft red curtains running along two sides of it. He could not see very plainly, for the light was low in the room, and he could not tell where it came from. He felt something heavy on his head, and put his hand up, for he remembered that he had thought that the little red boat had landed him in heaven. But alas! there was no crown, only a tightly-bound bandage, and the moment his hand touched it he guessed why it was there, and that he was only a shipwrecked captain whom someone had cared for. But where was he? A door led out of his little room—into what? Why, it looked like a church; yes, it was surely a church,' for the moonlight was streaming through the chancel window, and he could see the communion table and some one sitting beyond the chancel rail. How strange! What could it mean? He put his hand to his head again to make sure of the bandage, and that he was not dreaming. And now the figure has left the table, and is moving toward him. It comes gently to the side of his cot, and he can see that it is a woman, a woman with the face of an angel. The captain looks up at her with a wondering gaze; but she puts her finger to her lips as a sign that he must not speak. Then she makes the light brighter in the room, and draws a chair to his side, and tells him in a low, sweet voice all about himself—how he happens to be in the vestry of the little church; and finally she tells him that she means to take care of him until he is entirely well again. But the captain almost wishes he may never be well again, if he may only have that angel face to watch over him.”
“That angel was Sister Julia,” said Nan, with a sigh, as though to relieve her overcharged little heart.
“Yes, that was Sister Julia,” assented the captain.
“But you said there were little angels, too,” Nan said, innocently.
“Certainly. I have a picture of the little archangel (that is, the principal one) here beside me,” and the captain placed a little frame in Nan's eager hands.
Of course it proved to be only a little mirror, in which she saw the reflection of her own fair little face.
“Do you call a round chubby face like that the face of an angel?” she laughed, holding the little mirror at arm's length and looking in, in a funny, half-critical fashion.
“Yes, I do. It has been a real angel face to me, coming in and out of this vestry room with its bright smiles.”
“Why, where is Nan?” someone called just then.
“Coming, Sister Julia,” Nan answered, jumping to her feet, and with an effort lifting one of the heavy fruit dishes.
“I must go,” she said, reluctantly; but when she reached the door she paused for a moment to look back and ask, “It was true, wasn't it, all that about when you were a boy; all except about the boat and the angels?”
“Every word of it,” answered the captain; “and it was true about the angels, too, senorita.”
HE hour-hand of the watch that hung at Sister Julia's belt had just reached three as she put the last touch to the table; that last touch consisted in placing, at each seat, a card bearing the name of the person who was to occupy it. Sister Julia had herself prepared the cards in the little leisure she could spare from hospital duties. On each she had painted some little emblem of the sea—a shell, or a spray of seaweed—introducing the name in odd-shaped letters.
Then on the reverse side she had enrolled the entire party in the order of their seats at the table, knowing that some of their number would cherish those little cards as precious souvenirs for many a long year to come.
The soup was on the table, and Mrs. Murray having instructed the woman who had been helping her just how to bring the dishes to the table, laid aside her great gingham apron, and gave the signal to sit down.
“Why, there's one seat too many!” remarked Harry, when all had found their places.
“Dear me, why so there is!” exclaimed Sister Julia. “How did that ever happen?”
“Why, it happened just this way,” answered a familiar voice; no one could tell just where the voice came from, but all knew whose it was. “It happened just this way. I telegraphed Sister Julia yesterday that if she would put off the dinner till three o'clock I could get through my sermon in time to come, and so here I am, you see,” and Mr. Vale appeared in the door-way, having waited a moment in the vestibule to hang up his coat.
The presence of Mr. Vale was just the one thing needed to complete that Thanksgiving dinner in everyone's estimation.
Even the men, whose knowledge of English was limited to the parrot-learned “Thank you,” brightened when they saw him. There are faces which bear so plainly the imprint of love and sympathy, one does not need to speak a common language to comprehend them.
“You have come at the right moment,” said Sister Julia, and Mr. Vale, knowing what she meant, bowed his head and asked a blessing. It was a prayer as well as a blessing—a prayer for the future of these sailors, who were so soon again to give their lives to the keeping of the sea; and a prayer for the future of the children, that the whole volume of their life might remain as pure and unsullied as the pages of their childhood—nor did he forget the captain lying on his cot in the little vestry room. His voice seemed to gather additional earnestness as he prayed that he might be restored to perfect health, and take up his life again with a divine trust and courage which should be able to grapple victoriously with misfortune and despair, should he again be called to meet them.
At the close of the blessing Sister Julia thought she heard a low fervent “Amen” from the recesses of the little vestry room.
No doubt it was but natural that everyone at that long table should realise that it was no ordinary occasion. Never did a stranger company sit down to a Thanksgiving dinner under stranger circumstances, but they enjoyed it heartily, notwithstanding the strangeness.
Somehow or other, Mr. Vale knew just the way to draw everybody out, and thanks to him the party, that otherwise might easily have found itself a little stiff and embarrassed, became a very merry one.