Read Ebook: The Little Gray Lady 1909 by Smith Francis Hopkinson

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Ebook has 118 lines and 7717 words, and 3 pages

"But don't you love Christmas?" Kate argued, her nervousness increasing. The ghostly light and the note of pain in her companion's voice were strangely affecting.

The Little Gray Lady leaned forward in her chair and looked long and steadily at the heap of smouldering ashes; then she answered slowly, each word vibrating with the memory of some hidden sorrow: "I've had mine, dearie."

"But you can have some more," urged Kate.

"Not like those that have gone before, dearie--no, not like those."

Something in the tones of her voice and quick droop of the dear head stirred the girl to her depths. Sinking to her knees she hid her face in the Little Lady's lap.

"And you sit here in the dark with only one candle?" she whispered.

"Yes, always," she answered, her fingers stroking the fair hair. "I can see those I have loved better in the dark. Sometimes the room is full of people; I have often to strain my eyes to assure myself that the door is really shut. All sorts of people come--the girls and boys I knew when I was young. Some are dead; some are far away; some so near that should I open the window and shout their names many of them could hear. There are fewer above ground every year--but I welcome all who come. It's the old maid's hour, you know--this twilight hour. The wives are making ready the supper; the children are romping; lovers are together in the corner where they can whisper and not be overheard. But none of this disturbs me--no big man bursts in, letting in the cold. I have my chair, my candle, my thoughts, and my fire. When you get to be my age, Kate, and live alone--and you might, dearie, if Mark should leave you--you will love these twilight hours, too."

The girl reached up her hands and touched the Little Gray Lady's cheek, whispering:

"Yes, sometimes."

For a moment Kate remained silent, then she asked in a faltering voice through which ran a note almost of terror:

"Do you think I shall ever be like--like--that is--I shall ever be--all alone?"

"I don't know, dearie. No one can ever tell what will happen. I never thought twenty years ago I should be all alone--but I am."

The girl raised her head, and with a cry of pain threw her arms around the Little Gray Lady's neck:

"Oh, no!--no! I can't bear it!" she sobbed! "I'll tell Mark! I'll send for him--to-night-before I go to bed!"

It was not until Kate Dayton reached her father's gate that the spell wrought by the flickering firelight and the dim glow of the ghostly candle wore off. The crisp air of the winter night--for it was now quite dark--had helped, but the sight of Mark's waiting figure striding along the snow-covered path to her home and his manly outspoken apology, "Please forgive me, Kate, I made an awful fool of myself," followed by her joyous refrain, "Oh, Mark! I've been so wretched!" had done more. It had all come just as Cousin Annie had said; there had been neither pride nor anger. Only the Little Gray Lady's timely word.

But if the spell was broken the pathetic figure of the dear woman, her eyes fixed on the dying embers, still lingered in Kate's mind.

"Oh, Mark, it is so pitiful to see her!--and I got so frightened; the whole room seemed filled with ghosts. Christmas seems her loneliest time. She won't have but one candle lighted, and she sits and mopes in the dark. Oh, it's dreadful! I tried to cheer her up, but she says she likes to sit in the dark, because then all the dead people she loves can come to her. Can't we do something to make her happy? She is so lovely, and she is so little, and she is so dear!"

They had entered the house, now a blaze of light. Kate's father was standing on the hearth rug, his back to a great fireplace filled with roaring logs.

"Where have you two gadabouts been?" he laughed merrily. "What do you mean by staying out this late? Don't you know it's Christmas Eve?"

"We've been to see Cousin Annie, daddy; and it would make your heart ache to look at her! She's there all alone. Can't you go down and bring her up here?"

"Yes, I could, but she wouldn't come, not on Christmas Eve. Did she have her candle burning?"

"Yes, just one poor little miserable candle that hardly gave any light at all."

"And it was in the corner on a little table?"

"Yes, all by itself."

"Poor dear, she always lights it. She's lighted it for almost twenty years."

"Is it for somebody she loved who died?"

"No--it's for somebody she loved who is alive, but who never came back and won't."

He studied them both for a moment, as if in doubt, then he added in a determined voice, motioning them to a seat beside him:

"It is about time you two children heard the story straight, for it concerns you both, so I'll tell you. Your Uncle Harry, Mark, is the man who never came back and won't. He was just your age at the time. He and Annie were to be married in a few months, then everything went to smash. And it was your mother, Kate, who was the innocent cause of his exile. Harry, who was the best friend I had in the world, tried to put in a good word for me--this was before I and your mother were engaged--and Annie, coming in and finding them, got it all crooked. Instead of waiting until Harry could explain, she flared up, and off he went. Her hair turned white in a week when she found out how she had misjudged him, but it was too late then--Harry wouldn't come back, and he never will. When he told you, Mark, last year in Rio that he was coming home Christmas I knew he'd change his mind just as soon as you left him, and he did. Queer boy, Harry. Once he gets an idea in his head it sticks there. He was that way when he was a boy. He'll never come back as long as Annie lives, and that means never."

He stopped a moment, spread his fingers to the blazing logs, and then, with a smile on his face, said: "If ever I catch you two young turtledoves making such fools of yourselves, I'll turn you both outdoors," and again his hearty laugh rang through the cheery room.

The girl instinctively leaned closer to her lover. She had heard some part of the story before--in fact, both of them had, but never in its entirety. Her heart went out to the Little Gray Lady all the more.

Mark now spoke up. He, too, had had an hour of his own with the Little Gray Lady, and the obligation still remained unsettled.

"Well, if she won't come up here and have Christmas with us," he cried, "why can't we go down there and have Christmas with her? Let's surprise her, Kate; let's clean out all those dead people. I know she sits in the dark and imagines they all come back, for I've seen her that way many a time when I drop in on her in the late afternoon. Let's show her they're alive."

Kate started up and caught Mark's arm. "Oh, Mark! I have it!" she whispered, "and we will--yes--that will be the very thing," and so with more mumblings and mutterings, not one word of which could her father hear, the two raced up-stairs to the top of the house and the garret.

Two hours later a group of young people led by Mark Dabney trooped out of Kate's gate and turned down the Little Gray Lady's street. Most of them wore long cloaks and were muffled in thick veils.

They were talking in low tones, glancing from side to side, as if fearing to be seen. The moon had gone under a cloud, but the light of the stars, aided by an isolated street lamp, showed them the way. So careful were they to conceal their identity that the whole party--there were six in all--would dart into an open gate, crouching behind the snow-laden hedge to avoid even a single passer-by. Only once were they in any danger, and that was when a sleigh gliding by stopped in front of them, the driver calling out in a voice which sounded twice as loud in the white stillness: "Where's Mr. Dabney's new house?" . No one else stopped them until they reached the Little Gray Lady's porch.

Kate crept up first, followed by Mark, and peered in. So far as she could see everything was just as she had left it.

"The candle is still burning, Mark, and she's put more wood on the fire. But I can't find her. Oh, yes--there she is--in her big chair--you can just see the top of her head and her hand. Hush! don't one of you breathe. Now, listen, girls! Mark and I will tiptoe in first--the front door is never fastened--and if she is asleep--and I think she is--we will all crouch down behind her until she wakes up."

"And another thing," whispered Mark from behind his hand--"everybody must drop their coats and things in the hall, so we can surprise her all at once."

The strange procession tiptoed in and arranged itself behind the Little Gray Lady's chair. Kate was dressed in her mother's wedding-gown, flaring poke bonnet, and long, faded gloves clear to her shoulder; Mark had on a blue coat with brass buttons, a buff waistcoat, and black stock, the two points of the high collar pinching his ruddy cheeks--the same dress his father and Uncle Harry had worn, and all the young bloods of their day, for that matter. The others were in their grandmother's or grandfather's short and long clothes, Tom Fields sporting a tight-sleeved, high-collared coat, silk-embroidered waistcoat, and pumps.

Kate crept up behind her chair, but Mark moved to the fireplace and rested his elbow on the mantel, so that he would be in full view when the Little Gray Lady awoke.

At last her eyes opened, but she made no outcry, nor did she move, except to lift her head as does a fawn startled by some sudden light, her wondering eyes drinking in the apparition. Mark, hardly breathing, stood like a statue, but Kate, bending closer, heard her catch her breath with a long, indrawn sigh, and next the half-audible words: "No--it isn't so--How foolish I am--" Then there came softly: "Harry"--and again in almost a whisper--as if hope had died in her heart--"Harry--"

Kate, half frightened, sprang forward and flung her arms around the Little Gray Lady.

"Why, don't you know him? It's Mark, Cousin Annie, and here's Tom and Nanny Fields, and everybody, and we're going to light all the candles--every one of them, and make an awful big fire--and have a real, real Christmas."

The Little Gray Lady was awake now.

Soon the lid of the old piano was raised, a spinet, really, and one of the girls began running her fingers over the keys; and later on it was agreed that the first dance was to be the Virginia reel, with all the hospitable chairs and the fire screen and the gouty old sofa rolled back against the wall.

This all arranged, Mark took his place with the Little Gray Lady for a partner. The music struck up a lively tune and as quickly ceased as the sound of bells rang through the night air. In the hush that followed a sleigh was heard at the gate.

Kate sprang up and clapped her hands.

"Oh, they are just in time! There come the rest of them, Cousin Annie. Now we are going to have a great party! Let's be dancing when they come in; keep on playing!"

At this instant the door opened and Margaret put in her head. "Somebody," she said, with a low bow, "wants to see Mr. Mark on business."

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