Chapter VIII: Questionings

"UNCLE, have you known Madge Hardwicke a great many years?"

"Just as long as I have lived in Alyn, my dear."

"All that time! And how did you first come across her?"

It was something so unusual for Mona to start anything in the way of conversation, that the doctor was delighted. He sat upright, stirring carefully the cup of tea which Mona had handed to him, on his awaking from a brief after-dinner nap.

"Curiously, rather. She was the first person in the place with whom I exchanged a word, if we except porters and cabmen. When I drove up to my garden-gate from the station, Madge happened to be standing close outside, resting for a moment on her way up the hill. I suppose her pleasant face fascinated me, for I was not wont to be particularly sociable in those days with strangers. However, she dropped that quaint curtsey of hers, and we struck up an acquaintance then and there in the road. She has been a regular stand-by of mine ever since. If I happen to have a desperate case which nobody else can manage, I send for Madge Hardwicke. I don't know how many lives she has saved among my patients."

"Was she a widow then, uncle?"

"Dear me, no. Have I never told you the poor thing's history? Her husband was a sailor,—one of those manly open-hearted fellows whom everybody likes. I suppose that little cottage up on the cliff was one of the happiest homes in Alyn, not to say England. There never were husband and wife better suited to each other than Ned and Madge. And to make matters perfect, they had one child, about the most splendid specimen of small boyhood I ever knew. To see Ned Hardwicke on a summer evening in his garden, playing with that child, and Madge standing by with her smiling pride in both of them,—I declare it was worth a five miles' walk. There wasn't a house in Alyn that I used so to enjoy visiting."

"Was Ned Hardwicke a good man?" asked Mona.

"A first-rate husband and father, as brave as a lion, and by natural sequence as gentle as a lamb. As religious as Madge herself, which I suppose is what you mean. They were quite agreed on all points, which of course is desirable in husband and wife."

"How did he die?" asked Mona.

"It was a sudden death," said the doctor, doubting all at once whether the tale were a very good one for Mona to hear. He found, however, that he had no choice about proceeding. "Just going off to his boat one morning, and had said good-bye to his wife. He went to the edge of the cliff to look over, stood there whistling a moment, and then the earth gave way beneath his feet, and he fell down the sheer three hundred feet. He was dead when he reached the bottom."

Mona shuddered, and grew white.

"Madge was like a frantic woman the first few minutes, they said; and when she found that all was over, she appeared stunned. I used to wonder whether she would ever rally. But when the funeral was passed, she seemed to step out into fresh life, grave and quiet as she is now, but ready and busy and capable. I suppose Neill was her great comfort all that time."

"The baby?" asked Mona.

"He was not a baby then. I ought to have made you understand. Neill was eight or nine years old when his father died—the most beautiful child I ever saw, and desperately wilful, in spite of all their judicious training. The fact is, people spoilt him by too much notice. There was no preventing it. Hardly a visitor walked over the hill who didn't make friends with Neill for the sake of his handsome face. Artists would come, and beg to have him for a subject, and folks talked about him to that degree in his hearing, that the boy's head was completely turned. It was a great trouble to Madge, poor thing. I think she would almost have given all she possessed to have had her boy no better-looking than other boys, though she could not help being proud of him."

"Well?" said Mona.

"Well, then came poor Ned's terrible death, and the boy seemed sobered down for a time. But, naturally enough, the impression passed off, and he grew more wild than ever, and got among a number of bad companions. He was always very fond of his mother, and had plenty of penitent fits; but he generally went off and did something worse than usual after them. The last few months he seemed to grow harder, and his face quite lost the pleasant look it used to have."

"And then, what happened to him?"

"He ran away, and has never been heard of since."

"Poor Madge! Poor Madge!" said Mona compassionately.

"Ay, poor thing, it has been a sad trouble to her. Four years ago that was, and no one can say now whether Neill is alive or dead. My own impression is that he must be dead. Otherwise, I think he would have written. But of course I don't try to destroy her faith in his return."

"O no; it would be cruel."

"Though, on the other hand, I don't count it wise to nurse a feeling of too great certainty on her part," added the doctor, recollecting divers remarks of his own, which had not savoured of over-encouragement.

"How she can look so cheerful, with such a lonely life to live!" Mona murmured, half to herself.

"'Tis a marvel, I don't deny. And it is not with Madge, as with some people, that she get easily over her sorrow, and takes up other interests. Honestly I don't believe a single day ever passes that that woman does not pray for Neill's return and set herself to look out for his coming in answer to her prayer. I don't understand—I can't understand it," repeated the doctor, in genuine perplexity. Nor was it possible that he should understand, the said habit of prayer and trust being simply an absolute delusion in his eyes. "I can understand forgetfulness or long-continued sorrow—either the one or the other—but how she keeps on her grief, and yet contrives to live such a happy life, is past my comprehension. The woman is a mystery, but a very agreeable one."

"I like her—oh, more than I can tell," said Mona. "Only I do wonder a little that you and she get on so well together."

"Get on splendidly, I assure you," said the doctor, smiling. "She is the most useful woman, and the most unobtrusive creature, in the world. O I see,—you mean on account of our religious views."

Mona winced at the air of mild superiority.

"Well, we each leave the other room for our respective opinions to enjoy full swing. Madge and I have cracked many a hard nut in the way of discussion, and I fancy she has pretty nearly abandoned hopes of converting me by this time. Finds me rather a tough subject," added the doctor complacently.

Mona's two hands, lying in a careless clasp upon her knee, tightened and quivered suddenly.

"That little Nannie, now, is a singular example of the forgiving nature of children," observed Mr. Chetwynd, after a pause. "It does not seem to occur to her for a moment that she has any real reason for resentment against her father."

"Poor little child!" said Mona. "It is very sweet of her."

"There is something particularly charming in a child's innocent ways," remarked the doctor.

For, having had no children or brothers, and but one yielding sister of his own, he was quite able to believe that a readiness to forgive injuries is the universal characteristic of childhood. Mona knew better, through practical experience, but would not risk a discussion by saying so.

Conversation flagged thenceforward, from lack of response on Mona's part, and the doctor presently, finding himself disposed to yawn, advised her to retire to rest after the day's fatigues. Mona accepted the hint, and went to her own room.

She was tired enough to be glad to remove her dress, and put on her dressing-gown, and let her hair fall loosely about her shoulders. But after that stage, advance was slow. According to the habit of years, she took out her Bible, sat down in the white easy-chair, with a candle by her side, and began to read.

Or rather, she tried to begin. Wearily and listlessly her eyes travelled down the lines through the greater part of a chapter. And then it struck her that she had taken in the sense of not one single verse, so she went over it a second time, with just the same success. A third time, but she broke off in the middle hopelessly, and leant back in her chair, clasping her hands over her eyes with a bitter sigh. Only a few weeks back, she had read those same words to her mother, and had seen them full of heavenly peace and joy. And they were nothing to her now. Senselessly and drearily, as the dead autumn leaf falls from the half-bare tree, fell those cold Bible words on Mona's heart—those utterances which had once been instinct with such fervent loving life.

Why were they so different? In old days, she could scarcely open upon a chapter in the Bible, which had not its living lesson for her soul. No divinely-sent message of sweet and holy power came ever to her spirit now.

How could it come? For even as she read, dark questionings came rising in her heart, like a cloud between her and the light. Or, as with the Pilgrim Good-Intent, when he fled through bewildering underground passages, from the false Philosopher's house, which he had rashly entered—as with him, so with Mona, did clouds of winged creatures, called Doubts, flap thickly around, hiding with their rustling wings the shining of the holy page before her. And Mona had allowed these questionings to hold sway, till at last, she had lost all power to set them aside.

What to believe, and what not to believe! How to reconcile the seemingly conflicting elements of revealed truth! Whether there were reality in Madge Hardwicke's faith on the one hand, or in Mr. Chetwynd's unbelief on the other! What of prayer and foreknowledge? And what of faith and works? And what of election and free choice? And what of this, that, and the other? Poor girl, she was tossed sorely to and fro, in a very whirlpool of misery. And she ended by pushing the book aside, and flinging herself on her knees, with her face pressed down on her folded arms, and short sobs breaking through the words which strove for utterance:—

"O if I only knew what to do, and what to believe! If I only had some one to tell me clearly what is truth! Mother—mother—surely you cannot have been utterly mistaken. Such loving trust as yours was—and I used to think I had a little of the same, but it is all gone now. Is uncle Chetwynd really wiser than you were? He is clever and kind, and he has studied his Bible too. It is not as if he had never learnt what I have. I don't know what to do, or who to believe. O mother, it is such a dark dark sky over me, and it seems as if heaven and everything were gone. O God, save me. O God, please teach me. 'Thou wilt show me the path of life.' It is in Thy Word, and Thou hast promised—promised—and Thou must not break Thy word. 'Lead me forth to the light, and let me behold Thy righteousness. O send out Thy light and Thy truth—let them lead me, let them bring me unto Thy holy hill, and to Thy tabernacles.'"

She found herself instinctively falling into Bible expressions, and the very sound of the familiar words from her own lips seemed to bring a shade of comfort.

"O God, for the sake of Thy dear Son, leave me not to perish. 'In Thy faithfulness answer me, and in Thy righteousness . . . For the enemy hath persecuted my soul; he hath smitten my life down to the ground; he hath made me to dwell in darkness, as those that have been long dead. Therefore is my spirit overwhelmed within me; my heart within me is desolate . . . I stretch forth my hands unto Thee; my soul thirsteth after Thee, as a thirsty land. Hear me speedily, O Lord, my spirit faileth; hide not Thy face from me, lest I be like unto them that go down into the pit . . . Cause me to know the way wherein I should walk; for I lift up my soul unto Thee . . . Quicken me, O Lord, for Thy Name's sake; for Thy righteousness' sake bring my soul out of trouble.'

"O Lord, I have gone astray—utterly astray—'like a lost sheep.' I can't get back. I am helpless—hopeless—all in the dark. 'Seek Thy servant, for I do not forget Thy commandments.' O hear me, for my Saviour's sake, and have mercy, have mercy upon me."

And then, after those low broken cries for help, she knelt on silently—neither struggling nor praying, surrounded still with darkness, and unable yet to trust. But down below, one little gleam of comfort had reached her. For, in spite of all her questionings, the power to pray had not forsaken her; and not all her doubtings could entirely do away with the consciousness that One above, of infinite power and boundless love, had listened to her cry.