Chapter XXXVII: Softening Influences

After a time Clara went to her grandmother’s room. The old lady was still on the bed, very pale and weak, but her eyes were bright and keen as steel, when the girl approached her. She understood in a moment that everything was known.

“I will get up,” she said, rising with some difficulty from her pillow. “Betsey Vose is making tea for us both; you and I will drink it up here.”

Clara helped the old lady from the bed and placed her in an easy-chair. “Your tea will come up in a few minutes. Don’t look at me so pitifully, grandmother; I am not fretting much.”

The old woman’s eyesight was very poor and the paper shades at the window dimmed the light in the room, so that she could not distinctly see Clara’s face, and those kind words soothed her a little.

“You feel better,” she said.

“Yes, grandmamma; we have borne so much—we can bear this.”

She made the old lady as comfortable as possible in the stiff chair, placed a footstool under her feet, and threw a shawl over her shoulders.

Betsey Vose came up and was about to spread a cloth on the round stand, but the old lady made a sign of dissent.

“Not yet, Betsey; I don’t want anything just now—by-and-by, when I am in bed. I want to talk with my child here.”

Clara was softened greatly by this unusual tenderness. It was so child-like, so loving, that the sweetness of it drove half the bitter pain from her heart. She began to reflect that while such love existed under her own roof, there was something worth living for. She longed to converse freely with her only relative, but saw how weak she was, and desisted.

Still her heart was full, and she wished for some one with whom she could talk without giving pain, who would direct her how to meet this slander with the truth. When tea was over she said to her grandmother:

“Was not the minister coming to see me?”

“Yes,” Mrs. Anderson said, beginning to tremble anew.

“He wanted to talk about—about—”

She could not finish the sentence; there was no need, the old woman understood only too well.

“Yes, he thought it was his duty. I belong to his church,” replied Mrs. Anderson, faintly.

The girl was silent a few moments, then she said, “I am going to see him, grandmother.”

“The minister?”

“Yes; I will hear what he can say.”

Mrs. Anderson had a truly New England reverence for her clergyman, and believed that if any one could offer counsel in an extremity like that it would be a man of God. She would never have proposed the thing to Clara, but it was like a gleam of hope in great darkness to hear her mention it.

“I am glad,” she said. “He is a good man—go to him, Clara.”

“I will at once.”

She rose with a return of her old decision.

“Clara!”

“Yes, grandmother.”

“Be patient, you know, and listen—”

“You need not be afraid.”

She went up-stairs, put on her bonnet, and came down into the room again.

“I shall not be gone long; you won’t mind?”

“No, come here, Clara—kiss me before you go.”

Clara bent over the old woman and kissed her tenderly. It was very seldom that those withered lips sought caresses, and this went to the girl’s heart.

Clara rose at length, and said very gently,

“Now, I am going.”

The restless hand of that old woman clung to hers with tender longing.

“Bless me again, before I go; it makes me strong,”

Once more the grandmother’s lips repeated the sweet and holy words.

Clara turned to go. “I can bear it now,” she said, “good-by, grandmother.”

“May the God of heaven bless you, oh, my child,” she said, with unusual solemnity, and closing her eyes she seemed to pray.

“Now I will lie down again,” she said. “Help me a little.”

Clara helped the old lady undress, and robed her in a night-gown, kissing the old face as she fastened the garment at the throat. Then she took off the cap which covered an unusual quantity of hair, white and soft as sea-foam, which the old lady was accustomed to shake afloat when she slept.

“You will rest a while now, and have some tea by-and-by,” said the girl, as she drew the bed-clothes softly over the old lady whose hearing seemed unusually keen, for a distant knock at the street door made her start.

“Who is it, Clara?”

“I don’t know. The minister, perhaps: some one said that he might come.”

“The minister! oh, that is best. A kinder man never lived. Tell him I said so: he will be glad to know that I had faith in him to the last.”

“You shall tell him yourself: he will want to see you, of course. Do not look at me so, grandmother. I feel sure that this good man will befriend us when he knows the truth.”

“Go to him, child, as if he were your own father.”

“I will, I will.”

“Tell him that I, the oldest member of his church, charge him in the name of my God to hold you scathless from the slanders I have this day denied.”

The old woman rose up and, leaning her elbow on the pillow, pointed her quivering finger upwards, appealing directly to heaven.

“Oh, grandmother,” said Clara, shivering under the effect of that solemn picture of inspired old age; “I will not forget one word that you have said to me.”

The old woman fell slowly back on her pillow.

“Clara!”

The word seemed to come from a great distance, recalling her from the door. She went back, holding her breath.

“Grandmother!”

The old woman reached out her hand. Instinctively the girl knelt, and it was laid softly on her head. She heard no sound save low whispers that she knew was a blessing. Then that old voice spoke out very tenderly,

“Go, now. I shall sleep, I shall sleep.”