The Flower Brides

by Grace Livingston Hill

  Some young men arrived after dinner, and Diana liked them all well enough. There wasn’t one among them like Bobby Watkins. But she couldn’t quite imagine any of them dropping a single flower in the grass day after day. Her mysterious donor was probably only a woman. But no, she would not limit those spirit flowers to any earthly means. As long as she could, she would think of them as having come straight from God. It might be that God had somewhere a young knight who would love a lonely girl and woo her with flowers, but she did not know such a one. She could please herself by thinking of it all as romance in the form of a fairy tale, but she felt a growing conviction that behind it all was God, calling to her, trying to let her know He cared, and the belief comforted her.

  The young men flocked around her as they did to the other girls. She did not feel left out. One especially seemed drawn to her, Jerry Lange. He called her Diana as soon as they were introduced.

  “Diana, you for mine!” he said engagingly as they paired off for the fun of the evening.

  And Diana liked it. Yet as the evening went forward in the usual amusements, she had a feeling that they were just children, playing at life, not really in earnest at all, and she alone of them all had grown up. What they were doing so eagerly soon palled on her. Was that what trouble and loneliness did to your soul, made it suddenly grow old and satiated? Though she had never had a great deal of frivolity in her life, yet it seemed so trifling now. She thought of her dreary, crowded third-floor room in the unkempt street. She thought of the restaurant where she was going to work on Monday. She thought of her home, now her home no longer, and then strangely she thought of God. Was He caring for her, here, now in the midst of this bright laughing scene? Was He standing unseen behind her here and caring? What a strange thought that was to come into the midst of her outing!

  She looked around at them all. She looked into Jerry’s laughing eyes as he tried to tell her how he had just been waiting all his life to find her and called her “beautiful” and “darling” in the parlance of the day, laughing and giving her charming courtesy that didn’t, of course, mean a thing. Just fun. And she wondered if Jerry knew God. If God cared for all these here. Of course He did, for that verse had said, “God so loved the world.” Nobody could claim to be left out of that. God was caring for them, but they—were they—? No, they were obviously not conscious of Him. Not at the moment, anyway. And it was altogether likely that none of them ever thought of God at all. They were all as she had been before her trouble came.

  She wondered idly as she watched the handsome youth beside her, talking brilliant nonsense to her, what would be his reaction if she could ask him about it? What, for instance, would he say if she were to ask, “Do you know God, Jerry?” Of course, she would not do it, but she could almost feel the chill silence that would ensue for an instant, the blank surprise with which he would look at her. But it would not be for long, likely. He would have ready some flippant reply, some brightly funny answer, and suddenly she knew she would not want to hear it. It would hurt her sense of reverence for the Lord who cared for her. What had happened to her? It couldn’t be all merely sorrow that had done this. But if it was, it had certainly done something definite to her. She never used to think about God before, any more than they did. But now she realized that she had become God-conscious.

  She was glad when they turned from the games and the dancing, for she somehow felt very little interest in them, and voted to go for a drive in the big convertible that one of the young men had brought. They put down the top of the car, for there was moonlight, and besides, the night was unusually warm. All eight of them piled into the car noisily, and Jerry sat by Diana and tried to hold her hand. She had some trouble to keep it to herself, for now and again he would catch it up impulsively as though they were children at play. But on the whole the ride was a lovely experience, crowded cheerily together under the white flood of moonlight, flashing out through the city streets, rushing traffic lights, barely missing pedestrians and smaller cars, and sweeping out a wide silver road into less populated regions. The sultriness of the evening was gone.

  As the soft summer breeze played in Diana’s hair, it seemed pleasant to have Jerry beside her, saying bright nothings, seeing to it that she was supplied with candy and that her wrap was adjusted when the breeze grew a bit chilly as they swept into the countryside. This was the life she was born to, good fellowship and fun and friendships like this. This would have been hers as a matter of course if her mother had lived. They had often talked about how she would go out to parties and enjoy herself when her school days were over. And then—they had never been over! They had just stopped!

  All at once Diana realized that the road they were traveling was familiar. Her heart stood still. They were on the highway that led directly to her home! Oh, why had she come to this party? Why had she come on this drive? She nestled her frightened face down into the knot of fringed blossoms on her shoulder as if they would somehow help her through. She felt herself growing weak with the thought of the nearness of the spot that had always been the dearest on earth to her.

  Then she tried to rally her forces. None of this crowd knew where she lived, except Edith, and it was to her only a name, only a postal address, she had never been there. She perhaps did not even know where they were. She had only so recently come to the city and was not familiar with the roads.

  Diana felt as if she must do something to still the wild beating of her heart lest the others should hear it. How silly she was, she told herself. Even if Edith recognized the place and spoke of it, she need only be quiet. It was not likely they would ask her questions. She could just act as if it were a matter of course. If Edith should suddenly cry out as they passed the town and she saw the name somewhere, “Why, Di, isn’t this where you live?” she could just say, “Yes, it isn’t far from here,” and be very vague about it. Would she be able to keep her voice steady to say that, she wondered?

  And now they were rushing through the village. The lights were bright along the way. The village shops were blazing with display windows. There was the electric shop with its big white refrigerators and ranges and lamps. There was the post office and the drugstore. There was that new florist’s shop, the window filled with gorgeous blossoms with tall tropical ferns in the background. Her flowers had come from there. Her heart gave a wild little thrill, and she put her face down close to them, her lips upon them, as if she would hush their very perfume lest it should call attention to where they came from.

  And now they were passing the bank with the name of the town in large stone letters across its white front, a floodlight bringing it out like a picture. It was a beautiful building, and it was new. The town was proud of it. But Diana trembled as they shot by it and then drew a breath of relief as they passed on up the wide avenue into the region of high hedges and estates. In a moment more her home would be in sight! Could she get by it without sobbing?

  There, there it was, its whiteness gleaming against the dim green of the dark pines in the background. She wanted to close her eyes until they were by, but Jerry was looking down into them and he would ask her why she was doing it, “beautiful?” if she did. No, she must keep them open and smile back to what he was saying, though she hadn’t heard a word of it. She must laugh and not seem to be interested in anything along the way. Soon it would all be past, and none of them would know that it had taken the heart out of her to pass that way, so near to home and Father and not know what was going on, not have him know that she was there! Oh, why had she come to this party?

  Then suddenly one of the girls cried out, “Oh, see that lovely mansion, boys and girls, isn’t it just ideal? See the way that lawn curves up to the terrace! And aren’t those pines simply ducky behind there. I’ll bet they have a swimming pool and a sunken garden behind it. My, I’d like to go there and visit. Pity we haven’t any friends around here to scrape acquaintance with whoever lives there. Where is this, anyway? I want to remember it.”

  Diana dropped her face d
own lower and held her breath. Now it would come! Somebody would be sure to know the name of the suburb and there would be an outcry, and Edith would say, “Why, Diana, isn’t this where—?”

  She could see the lights of her home now, flung out like a banner to challenge the moonlight on the lawn. She could identify each light. The front door was flung wide, just as it had been the night she went away. And was that Helen standing in the doorway talking to a man?—not her father, she could see that, he was too short for her father.

  But then the hedge and a group of trees swept in and hid the house from view for an instant, and the identity of the place had not yet been discovered. Oh, would they never get by? Why were they slowing up?

  Here was the stone cottage at last, dear little stone cottage where she heard that prayer. She gave it a hungry, fleeting glance, and then looked again, for the door was suddenly flung open and a young man came and stood in the entrance looking out. She looked again. Could that be the man who had prayed? How she wished she knew!

  Then as if in answer to her wish, their car suddenly swept up to the curve and stopped dead with a startling abruptness, and Diana’s heart simply stood still. What, oh, what was going to happen now, and what should she do? Jump out and run away?

  Her frightened heart seemed to be beating in her ears like a drum, and she dared not look up. Why was she so frightened? Nothing was going to happen. Nobody was looking at her. Or, were they? Perhaps they had somehow gotten a message from her father and were taking her home for a joke! Oh—!

  Then the driver called out and broke the awful spell that held her.

  “Hey, brother, which way to Windham Road?”

  The young man in the doorway came down the step and stood in the moonlight answering. His voice had a pleasant accent. “Straight on two miles and turn to your left. Filling station on the corner. You can’t miss it.”

  “Thanks a lot!” said the youth who was driving. Then he shot on down the road so that it seemed they had scarcely paused.

  It was all over as quickly as that, and the white mansion with its grassy slope and its background of dark pines was gone, gone the little cottage with the tall young man in the doorway. But the voice that had answered their question lingered in Diana’s heart.

  For that was the voice that had prayed, “And, Lord, we would ask Thy mercy and tenderness and leading for the people up at the great house. Perhaps some of them are sad. Lord, give them comfort. Perhaps they need guidance. Do Thou send Thy light—”

  What a prayer! And how its accents came back with the sound of that voice. That voice so strangely familiar! Where had she heard it before? Had she really heard it before the prayer, or only in her dreams? And his face as he stood there in the moonlight, a fine face, strong and trustworthy and yet tender—a face that matched the voice! It thrilled her to think of his face as he stood there in the moonlight looking at them all so interestedly and speaking with that pleasant voice. Who was he? Where did he come from? Was he just a visitor there?

  And suddenly she knew where she had heard that voice before! It was the voice that had spoken in the darkness when Bobby Watkins—

  “What is it, beautiful? What are you thinking about? I’ve asked you the same question three times and you haven’t heard it yet!”

  “Oh, did you?” she said, rousing with a little laugh that somehow seemed to have a new lilt in it. “Do excuse me! Ask it again. I was so taken up with the beauty of the night that everything else was just a dream!”

  He asked his question and she answered it superficially, keeping up her end of the cheerful banter skillfully, with only half of her mind upon it, for deep down in her heart she was hugging to herself the thought that she had seen the man who had prayed for her house. And was it conceivable that he was still praying for them, and was she possibly included in that prayer? How she wished that sometime she might meet him and ask him some of those throbbing questions that had been roused in her mind by the little tract given to her in the railway station and her reading of the Bible!

  There was more cheerful banter as they swept on through the moonlight; singing, too, rollicking songs, love songs; and shouting out of their youth and high spirits. It was all like a dream after that to Diana. She went through everything, smilingly gracious, yet pleasantly distraught.

  They stopped by the wayside and had ice cream. Then they went back to the city house again and sang more songs and played more games, but at last it was over, and in the small hours of Sunday morning Diana found herself alone in the lovely guest room lying in the cool darkness dropping off to sleep, with one sweet carnation lying against her cheek on the pillow and the sound of a voice praying, a voice that soon blended with her dreams and prayed for her by name with great gentleness. And so she drifted off to sleep.

  Chapter 17

  Diana went back to her hot third-story room in the city early Monday morning before the rest of the weekend party was awake.

  She had had much fuss to prevent their taking her wherever she was going and had to resort to strategy to keep them from knowing her present place of residence. She was utterly aghast at the thought of Jerry or any of the others escorting her to her train, for she had told them she had an engagement for the day in another part of the city. So in the very early morning, quite before any of the servants were stirring in the great beautiful house, except perhaps a sleepy cook down in the kitchen, she arose, wrote a hasty note, slipped it under Edith’s door, and went silently down the velvet-shod stairs and out of the house without disturbing anyone.

  The note said:

  Dear Edith,

  I’m dreadfully sorry to run away this way without seeing you again, but in thinking it over I find I must get another change of garments before I go on my way for the day’s engagement, so I’m just running off without waking you. I know you will forgive me. And I shall hope to see you again soon. I’m not just sure where I shall be the rest of the summer, but if I ever do get home again I hope I can have the pleasure of a visit from you. I’ve had such a lovely time! Thank you for asking me.

  Lovingly,

  Diana

  So Diana had slipped around the corner from the house and waited in the next street for the bus, while the morning dawned in rosy glory and most of the city was still sleeping.

  Diana had gone through the Sabbath as in a pleasant dream, taking as little part as possible in the hilarity and fun that was the atmosphere of the gathering, smiling sweetly at everybody, but in reality not absorbed in what went on.

  The young men had arrived again early in the day, and Jerry was as devoted as ever but failed to get the overwhelming interest from this girl that was actually accorded him everywhere. Diana was a nice, good comrade, but she seemed somehow remote. He couldn’t quite understand it. He looked for an engagement ring, but there was none. And perhaps her attitude only intrigued him the more, for he was most devoted all the day and evening and quite insisted that she let him come with his car in the morning and drive her home. She had succeeded in putting him off at last by saying her plans were not fully made yet, she wasn’t sure just what time she would be going, and so he said good night with a warning that he would be back early the next day to be ready for whatever plan she made.

  So Diana escaped them all and went to the rooming house to change from her festive garments into the plainest black dress she owned.

  She had ripped off the only pretense at decoration it had and cut the sleeves to the elbow, with just a plain hem, but even so she had a stylish look as she surveyed herself in the mirror before leaving for her day’s work. Even when she enveloped herself in the big white apron she had brought, she looked a thing apart from that restaurant. Not a ring on her finger, not even a string of beads around her neck nor a pin at her throat to fasten the plain white collar, yet there were “lines” unmistakable to the simple dress that showed it well cut and tailored. There was a trimness to her plain black pumps and a delicacy of face and figure that showed she was not the usual waitress in
a cheap restaurant.

  Even her watch had to be left in her room. It was a pretty toy, platinum set with diamonds around its face and in the delicate links of the bracelet. It would never do to pass ham and cabbage and baked beans with such a wristwatch. She would be suspected at once, as well as being a prey for thieves.

  So she locked her watch into her bureau and went her way through the noisy waking streets, dreading what was before her yet not thinking about it as much as she had expected, for in her mind there lingered the memory of a voice, a strong face with wonderful eyes, and a prayer that seemed following her out into this new unknown world, which she was to enter today.

  And then she prayed to herself before she left her room, a little, trembling prayer, shyly, as if the man who had once prayed for her were there before God with her and listening to what she said. Just a shy claiming of God’s guidance, an affirmation that she was trusting, and then, after a pause, an “I thank you!” She didn’t say for what, but in her heart it was that she had seen the one who had prayed that night and whose words had lingered all these days in her heart. It seemed to her that the earth did not reel quite as much under her untried way as it had on Saturday, nor was the way quite as dark and empty and long since she knew there was a man like that and he had prayed for her, even just once.

  So she entered her new world and was suddenly faced with all its sordidness anew.

  The other waitresses were coming in, yawning, heavy eyed, loud voiced, discontented. She heard them telling one another where they had been the night before and how late they had been up. She heard their half-finished confidences, their bitter laughter; their faces wore heavy makeup, their garments were cheap but gaudy; and most of them had dark circles of unhappiness and exhaustion under their eyes. Looking at them, it suddenly occurred to Diana that these were all a part of God’s world as much as she was, that He must love them, since He died for all, and the thought was startling. It made her look at them from a new standpoint, so that their commonness and coarseness and lack of culture did not stand out to her gaze as they otherwise would have done. They were dear to her God; she must not turn from them as her natural instincts would have had her do!