Christmas Child — Chapter 4

CHAPTER IV LOST AND FOUND

It was a very happy Christmas Day for Joan, though she never left her little bedroom.

Her delight was in watching the wonderful Christmas child all day, and in helping to nurse him.

Never had she seen anything so perfectly lovely as his tiny hands and feet, and the little head that nestled down so peacefully on her arm.

A good part of the day she was left alone with the baby, for Nurse Williams was busy about the house, where there was a good deal of stir and excitement.

The neighbours were coming in to inquire about the rumours that had reached them, and Nathan was away, and Miss Priscilla had shut herself up in her room, taking no notice whatever of any appeals to her to open the door or to speak.

Happy as it was to Joan, to old Nathan it was the saddest Christmas Day of his life.

He was seeking some trace or tidings of the baby's mother;

and his weary feet, made heavy by his heavy heart, trod many a mile that short wintry day in quest of her.

It could be no one else but Rhoda who had laid the child in the manger.

She had never been heard of since Aunt Priscilla had answered her first and only letter, asking forgiveness, by a bitter, stern, and terrible command that she must never show her face again at home, or dare to ask for any help, whatever misery befell her.

But Nathan's search was all in vain.

No one had seen her down in the village, or in the scattered dwellings far and wide upon the mountains.

But more than one had hinted to him that there were places, not far away, where the cliffs overhung the sea; and as he returned sorrowfully homewards he could hear the sad moaning and sobbing of the sea following him through the stillness of the night air.

But sad as the day was to Nathan, it was most miserable of all for Aunt Priscilla.

She had shut out the grey light of the wintry sky from her room, and sat in gloom and cold, doing nothing.

But she could not shut out her thoughts and memories; she could not make her heart be still.

When she heard through the thin walls the faint little cry of the baby, she fancied it was Rhoda's cry when she lay a helpless little creature on her lap.

Again and again Joan's young voice reached her ears, lulling the baby to sleep with the old, familiar words of the Christmas Hymn-- Peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled.

But there was no peace for her.

She paced restlessly up and down her darkened room, repeating to herself hundreds of times, "God and sinners reconciled!"

But she could never be reconciled to God, for she had vowed never to be reconciled to Rhoda, who had sinned against her.

She had sworn that Rhoda should never enter her doors or see her face again.

Would God let her enter into His house, or behold His face?

A silent, secret voice kept whispering in her heart, "So likewise shall My Heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your heart forgive not every one his brother their trespasses."

Late at night Nathan knocked at her door; but she neither spoke nor opened it.

"Miss Priscilla," he said, "I can find no sign of her anywhere.

She's gone, poor creature!

There's some as fancy she's cast herself away into the sea; and maybe that's true.

It's borne in on my heart as that's true; but God knows!"

Aunt Priscilla shuddered.

She seemed to see in the darkness a slender, girlish figure standing on the edge of one of the cliffs, and casting herself down into the restless tide below.

But she did not answer old Nathan, and he went away with a very troubled heart.

But in a few days a rumour ran all through the country-side that Miss Priscilla Parry's farmstead was haunted.

And what spirit could haunt it except Rhoda's?

The washerwoman, coming to wash at three o'clock in the morning, had seen a dim shape moving slowly in the black shadow of the wall, made visible by a faint light from the setting moon.

The ploughboy and Nathan, going out early to work, had heard low, rustling footsteps in the cow-shed as they opened the door.

Nurse Williams, who came every night to sleep with the baby, fancied she was awakened by tappings on the lattice panes of the casement.

Even little Joan could hear Rhoda's sobs and moans, as she lay awake shivering and trembling in bed, with her arm stretched across the baby to save it from all harm.

Everybody was certain now that Rhoda had thrown herself from the cliffs into the sea; and though her body had been drifted away by the currents, her ghost had come back to haunt the place where she had once been so happy, and where her little baby was living.

Aunt Priscilla had not left her locked and darkened room since she had entered it on Christmas morning.

No one dared to tell her directly of Rhoda's spirit having come back to trouble and haunt the quiet homestead.

But she could hear all that went on in the kitchen below;

and in the daytime the neighbours were glad of any excuse to come to the haunted house, though after nightfall no one would venture out into the fold except old Nathan.

The rough servant-girl and the ploughboy had both been to her door, and given her notice that they were going to leave; but she had not asked them for any reason.

The last injury Rhoda could do to her was to make the house a terror and a talk in the country.

And now, as she sat alone, brooding over the past, with no work filling the hard hands which were used to be so busy, she no longer thought of Rhoda with the bitterness of wrath.

She remembered what a young girl she was, and how full of fancies, which made it easy for people to deceive her.

How terrible must have been the girl's misery before she could drown herself in the sea!

And there was no rest for her troubled spirit, even in death!

She was not sleeping peacefully in the little churchyard down by the shore, where all their kinsfolk lay within sound of the sea by night and day.

There was something awful to Aunt Priscilla in the thought of Rhoda's homeless and restless spirit wandering about the places where she had been an innocent and a happy child.

Late on New Year's Eve Aunt Priscilla drew aside the curtain which had hung across her window since Christmas Day, and sat in the darkness gazing out into the field.

In the house all was as silent as the grave, and out of doors there was the hush of night.

A hoar-frost had fallen, and gave a glimmer of light, even where the shadows fell, when otherwise it would have been utter blackness.

The waning moon hung in the dark sky, above a bank of thick and gloomy clouds.

She could hear the distant undertone of the sea, and the murmuring of the many brooks running down the mountain slopes in the winter, for the cold was not yet sharp enough to freeze them.

And she could hear a far-off house-dog barking, and the nearer clanking of the chains by which the cows were fastened to their mangers, and the loud ticking of the old clock in the kitchen below.

It would very soon be midnight.

She felt the chill of the keen air, and she shivered as she huddled her shawl closer about her; but it was not the cold that made her lips tremble and her heart throb painfully.

She could fancy--oh, how easily!

--that she saw Rhoda, as she had often seen her, tripping along the causeway, with her bonny, merry face, and her dancing feet.

But she knew well it was only a trick her memory was playing.

The fold lay all silent and deserted beneath her watchful eyes, with every door safely closed, and the gate at the far end locked.

Everything was precisely the same as usual.

She was almost dozing in her chair, when all at once she felt her flesh creep, and her heart throb more violently than ever.

A black form was stirring, creeping slowly under the walls of the barn, and seemed to be holding itself up by the empty spaces where the bricks had been left out in the building of it.

It moved so gradually that it hardly seemed to come closer to the house; and yet it stole on nearer and nearer, a tall, thin, creeping shadow in the midnight gloom.

To Aunt Priscilla it appeared to be hours, though it could only have been some minutes, before the shape reached the house-door, and sunk down out of sight on the threshold, under the shadow of the little pent-roof over the doorway.

She could no longer see it without opening her window and stretching out her head.

It was there, just out of sight; and it seemed more terrifying to her than while she could watch its languid and ghostlike progress.

She sat motionless, with no power to move.

Poor Rhoda!

poor little child, whom she had loved so fondly!

Not escaped from her misery, even though she was dead; but wandering, a lost and restless spirit, about her old home!

A rush of troubled tenderness flooded Aunt Priscilla's heart.

"God help me!"

she breathed half aloud.

"I never wished her harm like this; I'll speak to her; I'll call to her.

Perhaps she's something to say, and can't rest till she's said it.

Oh!

my poor, poor girl!"

Trembling all over, she unlatched her casement and swung it back on its rusty hinges, which creaked loudly in the utter stillness.

The dark heap on the threshold stirred a little; and Aunt Priscilla called to it in a very low, quivering, and sorrowful voice-- "Rhoda!"

"Yes, aunty," came the answer, in a tone so hollow and faint that she could hardly be sure whether it had been spoken, or that she had fancied it.

"Why do you come to trouble us like this?"

asked Aunt Priscilla.

"Baby's here, and you, and Joan," moaned the faint voice again, "and there's nowhere else in all the world for me."

"Is there anything I can do to give you rest?"

asked Aunt Priscilla, shivering.

"If you'd only forgive me before I die!"

answered Rhoda, lifting up a white, thin face, which could be seen dimly in the gloom.

Aunt Priscilla sunk down on her knees before the open window.

Rhoda was not dead, then!

It was she herself, not her ghost, that was wandering about the old places, and haunting the home that had once been hers, and which now sheltered her baby.

Where she had been all the week Aunt Priscilla did not know.

But what was she to do with her now?

Must she let her die outside her door on this winter's night?

As she knelt there in silence she heard the clock strike twelve, and the bells from the little grey belfry of the church on the shore ring cheerily out into the night.

Two years ago she and her neighbours had watched the Old Year out in the kitchen below; and she could see, as it were, Rhoda's pretty face again, and Joan's sleepy eyes, as they stood beside her singing the New Year hymn, as soon as the clock had finished striking.

The familiar verses of the hymn ran through her mind till she came to the last but one-- Oh!

that each in the day of His coming may say, "I have fought my way through, I have finished the work Thou didst give me to do."

But Aunt Priscilla felt that she had not finished the work the Lord had given her to do for Rhoda; she had not even begun what He had given her to do for little Joan.

If Rhoda had sinned against her, surely she had sinned against Christ.

With a heavy sob she rose from her knees and went downstairs.

The house was empty, except that Joan and the baby were sleeping in Rhoda's old bedroom; for all the rest had gone to keep the watch-night in a chapel two miles or more away.

The house-door was not fastened, and she had only to lift the latch in order to open it.

There was not the slightest sound from the threshold outside where Rhoda was crouching; no moaning or sobbing, no movement of any kind.

Aunt Priscilla opened the door very gently and noiselessly.

"Rhoda!"

she said, very pitifully.

But the girl did not answer her.

She stooped down and raised her up against her shoulder.

Oh!

what a small, light burden she seemed, no heavier than when she was a young child like Joan.

Aunt Priscilla lifted her quite easily in her arms, and carried her upstairs and laid her on the bed.

Then she struck a light, and, shading it with her hand, looked down on Rhoda's face, as she had done many a time when she had been a sleeping child.

The face was sharp and thin and death-like; she looked like one who had perished from hunger and want.

Was she really dead?

[Illustration: JOAN SAW HER AUNT STANDING BY HER BEDSIDE] Little Joan was awakened suddenly from a sound sleep, and saw her aunt standing by her bedside, looking to her dazzled eyes a very image of terror.

The child uttered a shrill scream, and threw both her arms round the baby, who was lying on a pillow beside her.

She thought Aunt Priscilla had come, knowing that everybody was gone out, to take away the Christmas child.

She must defend him with all her might.

"Get up, Joan," said Aunt Priscilla.

"Rhoda is come home, and you must bring the little baby to her."

She had not seen the child before; and now she stood looking down on the small sleeping face with tears streaming from her eyes.

She bent over him and Joan, and kissed them both with a strange solemnity, as if she was making a vow to God.

Then she lighted a candle, and bidding Joan come as quickly as she could, she went away again; and in a few minutes Joan followed her, carefully carrying the baby in her arms.

There was a pale, sunken face resting on Aunt Priscilla's pillow, and thin, wasted hands lying on the counterpane.

The eyelids were fast closed, and the lips clenched.

And yet it was Rhoda's face that Joan saw, and she called to her loudly and joyfully.

"See, Rhoda," she cried, "I found the little baby in the manger on Christmas morning!"

But Rhoda neither saw nor heard.

Aunt Priscilla took the baby from Joan and laid it on Rhoda's bosom, and placed her hand tenderly on Rhoda's head.

Then it seemed to her that a flicker of life moved over her set and death-like face.

"Sing, Joan, sing," said Aunt Priscilla, earnestly; and Joan, with her hands clasped, and her eyes fastened upon Rhoda's dear face, sang in a loud, clear voice-- Hark!

the herald angels sing!

As she came to the last line, "God and sinners reconciled," Rhoda's lips moved, as if she was repeating the words to herself, and her white eyelids slowly opened.

"Not to me!"

she murmured.

"Oh!

yes, yes, my darling!"

cried Aunt Priscilla, falling on her knees--"you and me are reconciled, and God 'ill be reconciled to us both.

We are both sinners; but He'll forgive both you and me."

"And my baby," whispered Rhoda again, slowly moving one of her wasted arms to put it round him, and gazing mournfully into her aunt's face.

"I'll take care of him," she answered; "God has sent him and Joan to me, and I'll take care of them for His sake.

I took care of you for my own sake, Rhoda."

There was a faint smile on Rhoda's face; and her eyelids closed again, as if she was too weak to keep them open longer.

By-and-by there came into the quiet room the sound of distant voices, and Aunt Priscilla crept noiselessly downstairs and across the fold to the gate, to tell Nathan what had happened and to bring them all into the house quietly.

That New Year's Day was as strangely happy a day to Joan as the Christmas Day before it had been.

She never left the room where Rhoda was lying; for Rhoda could not bear her to go out of sight, and only seemed content while she could watch her nursing the baby, in her old-fashioned, motherly manner.

As Joan sat on a low rocking-chair, lulling him to sleep with snatches of hymns, and soothing him tenderly if he began to cry, Rhoda's eyes shone with a tender light, though the tears dimmed them at times.

It was a peaceful, tranquil day, with few words spoken by anyone.

Aunt Priscilla's step had never been so quiet, or her voice so gentle; and she seemed to Joan to be quite a different person.

When the short afternoon was over, and Nathan's work was done, he came upstairs to visit Rhoda.

She had been as dear to him as his own child;

and as he took her small, withered hand in his, his dim old eyes grew dark with tears.

"I saw you every day twice," she said, pausing often for breath; "I was hiding in the barn.

I hid myself on Christmas Eve among the straw--like Joan and me used to do for fun--and I laid the baby asleep in the manger--for Joan to find; and I saw her come, and heard her sing--I was watching her and you.

And after that I couldn't go away; there was nowhere and nobody to go to; and I stayed hiding in the barn.

But I was very cold and miserable; I was frightened of dying there in the barn.

And in the night I came close to the house--to look for food--and hearken if I could hear the baby.

I'm not frightened or miserable now."

"Never mind the trouble now, Rhoda," said old Nathan.

"Your aunt's forgiven you, and taken you home again; and God, He'll forgive us all, and take us home again some day.

Think o' getting well and strong again, my poor lass."

"Not me," murmured Rhoda, faintly; "it's best for me to die, I know.

Baby 'll be happier without me.

I couldn't play with him and make him merry.

Joan 'ill be as a little mother to him, won't you, Joan?

I'm going to give him to you for your very own."

"For my very own!"

repeated Joan, with wondering, wide-open eyes.

[Illustration: NATHAN CAME UPSTAIRS TO VISIT RHODA] "Ay!

if aunty will let me," answered Rhoda, smiling; "she 'll love the baby, I know, now she's reconciled to me.

Nathan, she forgives me, and God forgives me.

I'm not unhappy any more."

"Rhoda, my lass," said old Nathan, "thy aunt 'ill never be happy no more, if thou dies.

She's pardoned thee with all her heart; and thou must try to live, and pay her back.

Tell me where thou 's been all this long while."

For a few minutes Rhoda lay silent, with a look of pain on her young, pale face.

"I dare n't ever have spoke to aunty," she murmured at last, "she's so bitter against marrying.

And so I ran away, and we were married at Bristol; and then we went to London; and Evan deserted me before baby was born.

I couldn't find him again anywhere in London; and it was a dreadful place to stay in without money, and no home.

He hadn't been good to me for a long while before he left me.

I've been a very wicked girl, but I've been sorely punished for it, Nathan; and I'd rather die now, I think, than get well again."

"My poor lass!"

answered old Nathan, pitifully, "say, 'Let it be as God pleases.'

" "Let it be as God pleases!"

repeated Rhoda, in her faint, hollow voice.

Never could anyone be better nursed than Rhoda was nursed.

Aunt Priscilla watched over her day and night, hardly taking rest, and sleeping only a few minutes at a time.

No noise was permitted about the farm that could disturb her; only the old, familiar sounds of cattle lowing, and sheep bleating, and the cackling of barn-door fowls, which were as soothing as pleasant music to her ears.

Joan and the baby were always in sight; except when they were sleeping in a little bed on the floor, near at hand, that she might never feel any fear concerning them.

Every morsel of food she ate was prepared by Aunt Priscilla herself, who would not trust even Nurse Williams to do anything for Rhoda.

For a few days it was very doubtful whether she could recover from the cold and hunger and weariness she had endured; but by-and-by there came a slight change, and by the time the spring began there was no longer any fear of her dying.

But Rhoda was never the same again.

Her pretty looks were gone, and so were her merry ways.

She was a quiet and grave woman now; often sad.

Year after year went by, and she heard nothing of the husband who had deserted her.

Her aunt found her more of a companion than she had ever been before; and they two, with old Nathan, gleaned all the brightness of their lives from Joan and the baby.

The old farmstead was a happier home for Joan than it had ever been for Rhoda.

She had few indulgences, but she had the baby, the wonderful child whom she had found lying in the manger on Christmas Day.

By-and-by, as she grew older, she understood Rhoda's sorrowful story, and how it was he had been laid there in order that she might find him.

But every Christmas morning she stole early across the fold, and into the silent and empty shed, as if to seek the Christmas child; and when the baby was old enough she took him with her, and told him how she had found him there, and knew he was come to bring Peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled.

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