Chapter 4 Arthur
Chapter 4
Arthur
Some months later, as Lucy entered her room one afternoon, she was startled to hear suppressed but very bitter weeping. She stopped and listened. It came from Arthur’s room, which adjoined her own. She went and knocked gently at the door. He didn’t answer, but the sound of the weeping ceased, and there was a great silence. Lucy lingered, perplexed and anxious. “It must be something very bad to make him cry!” she thought. “He doesn’t cry at every little thing!”
She went down, hoping to learn the cause of Arthur’s grief without betraying him. “Do you know where Arthur is?” she inquired of Hatty.
“I heard him singing in his room just now,” returned Hatty.
“Singing! Yes, a sad kind of singing! Even crying sounds cheerful to Hatty, she is always in such good spirits herself,” thought Lucy.
“And speaking of Arthur reminds me that he doesn’t have a whole sock to his name, and it’s getting cold for bare feet. I declare, I forgot all about them.”
“I’m glad you’re not responsible for my things,” said Rebecca.
“And I’m glad you haven’t the care of mine,” retorted Hatty. “They would never be done, I’m sure. Now you’ll see how soon I’ll have those socks done. While you are saying ‘Jack Robinson’ I’ll darn every hole in them.”
“I ain’t going to say ‘Jack Robinson,’” said Rebecca. “And it isn’t my fault if I’m slow. I was made that way.”
“Then I’d go back and be made faster,” said Hatty. Rebecca was silent. Hatty’s tone had been unkind.
“Rebecca is slow to take offense,” said Lucy. “I wish I had half her patience.” Rebecca looked up gratefully at Lucy, and Hatty felt reproached by the look.
“Dear me!” she cried. “I’m always hurting somebody’s feelings, and yet there’s nobody in the world I would hurt on purpose. Why, I wouldn’t kill a fly, if I could help it. Come, have we made up?” she cried, dropping socks, balls of yarn, thimble, and scissors from her lap and kneeling down before Rebecca. Who could resist the beautiful young face as it now looked up, half penitent, half saucy, into Rebecca’s? Not that good, patient sister, at least. They kissed each other and were friends again, and Hatty forgot in two minutes that she had offended, repented, and been forgiven. She resumed her work and admired the fair ringlets that fell around her shoulders as she leaned over her socks, lay on her lap, and caught in her scissors.
“Mary Johnson says my hair is lovely,” she said.
“Yes, it is,” said Rebecca.
“But it isn’t as nice as Lucy’s,” continued Hatty. “Nobody has such beautiful hair as she, unless it’s the angels.”
“Angels!” said Rebecca. “Do angels have hair? Aren’t you thinking of mermaids?”
Down again fell Hatty’s work, her balls, and her scissors.
“Mermaids!” she cried, convulsing with laughter. “Oh, Becky, you’ll kill me yet!” Both Lucy and Rebecca laughed too, for Hatty’s mirth was good-humored this time, and infectious.
“These poor socks will never be done at this rate,” said Lucy at last. “Come, let me do them.” She soon finished them and then ventured again to Arthur’s door.
“Arthur,” she cried from the outside, “here are your socks.” He opened the door a little way, reaching out his hand. “Can’t I come in?” He let her in and she sat, with her usual tact, where she could not see his face. She made some cheerful remark about his books, which, few as they were, had been arranged neatly on shelves he had made himself. He didn’t answer.
At last, he asked abruptly, “Lucy, how soon are boys old enough to earn money?”
“I don’t know,” she answered. “Some boys start very young.”
“As young as I am?”
“Oh dear, no; I guess not. Why, do you want money?”
“Not for myself.” He was silent again. Lucy knew him too well to press him, so she was silent too.
“Don’t they hire boys my age at stores?” he asked at last.
“Yes, I believe they do, but they don’t pay much. It would take all you could earn and more for your board and clothes.”
“How do you know? Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure. I heard Mr. Johnson say he thought of sending Josiah to New York or somewhere, and he made inquiries about it. He told Father one day.”
“I wish I was out of the way, at any rate,” he said, gloomily.
“Out of the way! Why, Arthur! What can you mean?”
“Nothing, but I wish I was out of the way.”
“I used to wish that once,” said Lucy. “But it wasn’t right. We are just where God has put us, and it is a pleasant place, after all.”
“Do you call it pleasant to be as poor as we are?”
“God has made us poor,” she answered, with a tone that said, “And so I call it pleasant.”
“Yes,” said Arthur seriously, “it is right, I know, but it’s very hard. You see, I never knew until today‚ although I suppose you’ve known it a long time‚ that Father is in debt. Thinking about it has made me wish I could do something for him instead of idling around here.”
“I’m sorry you’ve found that out,” said Lucy. “I’ve only known it a few months myself, but somehow it seems as if I’ve grown old fast since then.”
“It’s made me feel the same,” cried Arthur. “I’m going to leave school if Father will let me, and help him, and I’ve made up my mind not to go to college.”
“Not go to college!” cried Lucy in dismay. “Oh, Arthur! Father has always said you should go, and you’ve been talking of it ever since you were a little bit of a boy.”
“Then there’s the less need of my talking about it now.”
“Father will be sorry to know this,” said Lucy. “All that keeps him going is his love for us, and if he knows we are thwarted in any of our great wishes, it wears upon him sadly.”
“Well, I’ve made up my mind what my duty is,” replied Arthur. “I won’t go to college. I’ll stay and help Father.”
“You will go!” cried Lucy. “I’m strong and well. I’m older than you. I can earn money somehow, and I will.” Arthur smiled and shook his head.
“Anyway, don’t say anything yet to Father. I don’t believe it’s a very large debt, and we’re all growing older, and before long you’ll see me teaching school, and money will be as plentiful as blackberries.”
Half believing herself, and having quite cheered him, Lucy was about to leave the room. “I must go down and see about tea now,” she said.
“There’s always something for you to see about,” he answered, half detaining her. “I think you should allow yourself time to breathe.” An impatient, restless feeling gnawed at Lucy’s heart as she detached herself from his grasp and went down. It said, “Yes, you’ve always something to see about except your own business. It’s too bad!”
But something else exclaimed, “Your own business! Have you really any of your own?”
“No, I’m not my own!” she answered, “and I’m glad that I’m not. I’m glad that there is a God, and that I’m His child, and that I don’t have anything to do except obey Him.” The restless feeling vanished for the time, and she went cheerfully about her work, “doing it as unto God.”
Her father, who had come in tired and not inclined to talk, sat watching her. Eventually, he said, “What are you thinking of now, Darling?”
She stopped and smiled, as she answered, “Just some lines that keep running through my head from a hymn about serving with careful Martha’s hands and loving Mary’s heart.
He was touched by the tone in which she spoke, for he knew how distasteful all housework was to her.
“It is homely discipline,” he thought, “but its results are just as beautiful.”
He closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair. They all assumed he was asleep, but his thoughts were very busy. When the children began to whisper, “Father’s asleep; let’s not make any noise,” he astonished them by rising and going out to his favorite seat on the doorstep.
It was now Lucy’s turn to watch him, and after a while, she ventured to go out and whisper, “Is anything the matter, Father?”
“No, dear, no,” he answered. “I was only thinking how much discipline it takes to make us suitable for God’s kingdom, and that you are having your share!”
She looked at him in surprise. “Why, Father! Nothing awfully bad happens to me! Nothing special, I’m sure!” She felt ashamed to have her petty trials called “discipline.”
“Your trials, such as they are,” he answered, “serve as discipline, just as truly as great afflictions and misfortunes could. God can sanctify the small as well as the great events of our lives.”
“But, Father, I am not unhappy or discontented. I enjoy a great deal.” She was thinking of her little room upstairs, and of the true peace she had so often found there.
“But you could not always say that,” he answered. “This is the fruit of years of gentle but constant chastening.” Lucy was silent. She felt herself almost blush with shame. “I understand you, Lucy,” he went on. “I know what it is to have one’s tastes thwarted and put aside as yours have been. I know what it is to long for solitude and be forced into a crowd. To thirst for knowledge and be consumed by that thirst.”
He had touched the soft spots now. Sigh after sigh, suppressed, and yet very heavy, confirmed it as Lucy stood behind and out of his sight.
“Oh, Father,” she said at last, “let’s not think of it!”
“No, I’d rather we walk boldly up to the truth and look it in the face,” he answered. “You will find your burden easier to bear when you have learned exactly what it is, who has appointed it, and who will help carry it. I have to tell you, I can’t send you away to school. I see no reason to think I ever can.”
“Oh, I had given all that up long ago!” cried Lucy. “And I never even think of it now, except when—” She stopped, for at that moment she remembered her recent conversation with Arthur and her promise that she would teach school, and so help him through college.
“Well, I don’t feel anxious about it anymore,” she said.
“It’s hard to have to deny you such a rational wish, my dear child. When you were just a baby on my knee, and I encouraged the desire you showed even then for knowledge, I never thought that the time would come when I would have to extinguish it.”
“You can’t extinguish it,” said Lucy. “But you can help me to be cheerful and even happy, and that’s better. Oh, Father! I feel so grateful to you for teaching me to love God!”
“I trust He has taught you that Himself,” he answered. “And with it, I am sure He will give you everything else you need. I rejoice that I can trust Him for that! It is my only comfort!”