Elsie at Ion

by Martha Finley

  CHAPTER XV.

  THE captain’s pupils were jubilant over the prospect of soon leavingfor the sea-shore at the North. Inquiries in regard to differentlocations had been set on foot some weeks previous, and now it wasdecided to take possession for the season of several dwellings in theneighborhood of Cape Ann, Mass. In one of them, which was quite large,too large to be called a cottage, the Ion and Woodburn families wouldbe together much of the time, a little building near at hand containingthe overflow when guests would render accommodations at the largerhouse too small.

  Edward and Zoe with their little ones would remain at home for thepresent, that he might oversee the work on the plantation, and theFairview family would go for a time at least to Evelyn’s home on thebanks of the Hudson. The families at the Oaks and the Laurels were notgoing North at present, but might do later in the season.

  The Raymonds were to take their journey by sea in the _Dolphin_, theothers, with their guests, going by rail.

  That was the plan at first, but only a day or two before they startedMary Keith received a letter from her father giving her permission toaccept an invitation from the relatives to spend the summer with themat the sea-shore, which she did with delight.

  “Oh, I am so glad, Mary!” Violet exclaimed when she heard the news;“and I want you to go with us on the _Dolphin_. Won’t you? It will be anew and, I hope, pleasant experience for you, and we shall be so gladto have your company.”

  Captain Raymond, who was present, warmly seconded the invitation, andMary accepted it.

  This talk was at Ion, where the captain and Violet were making a shortcall. They took their leave almost immediately, saying that the timefor their preparations for leaving home was growing very short, andthere were a number of matters still claiming their attention.

  Before they had reached the avenue gates the captain turned to hiswife, saying, “I think, my dear, if you have no objection, we willdrive over to Roselands for a short call before going home. I want tosay a few words to Cal.”

  There was a twinkle of fun in his eye, and Violet returned laughingly,“Yes, I understand. Let us go by all means.”

  On reaching Roselands they did not alight, but said to Calhoun, whocame out to welcome them, that they were in haste, only wanted a fewwords with him, and then must return home.

  “Yes,” he said; “you leave day after to-morrow, I believe? Is theresomething you would like me to attend to for you in your absence,captain?”

  “No, thank you,” was the smiling reply; “what we want is to take youwith us. You have not taken a holiday for years; we have plenty of roomfor you on the yacht, and can assure you of pleasant company—the verypleasantest you could have, for Cousin Mary Keith has consented to gowith us.”

  “And you think that furnishes an additional inducement?” Calhounreturned, coloring and laughing. “Well, I won’t deny that it does. Butthis is very sudden.”

  “You needn’t decide at once; talk it over with Art, and we shall hopeyou will decide to go. We shall be glad to take you as a passenger,though it should be at the last minute. Good-morning;” and with thelast word the carriage started down the avenue.

  Arthur called that evening to thank the captain for the invitation toCalhoun and say that it would be accepted.

  “He really needs a rest,” he said, “and though I had some difficultyin persuading him that he could be done without for a few weeks,I succeeded at last, though a bit of information about a certainpassenger,” he added with a smile, “had probably more to do with hisacceptance than anything else.”

  “O Cousin Arthur, I wish you could go too!” exclaimed Violet. “Don’tyou think you could?”

  “Yes, can’t you?” asked the captain. “We should be delighted to haveyou, for the sake of your pleasant company, to say nothing of theconvenience of having our medical adviser close at hand in case ofsickness or accident.”

  “Thank you kindly,” returned the doctor. “I should greatly enjoy going,especially in such pleasant company, but it would not do for Cal andme to absent ourselves at one and the same time. Besides, I have somepatients that I could not leave just at present.”

  “Then take your turn after Calhoun comes home,” said the captain. “Hewould be a welcome guest as long as he might choose to stay, but if Iknow him as I think I do, he is not likely to stay as long as we do.”

  “No, not he,” said Arthur; “if he stays two or three weeks it will bequite as much as I expect.”

  “And we shall hope to see you after that,” said the captain. “Don’tforget that ‘all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy,’ and we couldill afford to have our doctor so transformed.”

  “Many thanks,” returned Arthur. “I sometimes feel that such a restwould do me a world of good, and perhaps prevent or delay such acatastrophe as you speak of,” he added with a smile; “but it is reallya very difficult thing for a busy country doctor to get away from hiswork for even a brief holiday.”

  “Yes, but I think he should take one occasionally nevertheless,” saidthe captain; “since by so doing he is likely to last the longer, and inthe end do more for his fellow-creatures.”

  “Very pleasant doctrine, captain,” laughed Arthur. “But I must be goingnow, as some of these same fellow-creatures are in need of my servicesat this present moment.”

  “I wish you were going with us now, Art,” said Violet as she bade himgood-by. “It would be really delightful to have you along as friend andrelative as well as physician.”

  “That is very good and kind in you,” he returned. “I won’t forget it,and perhaps I may look in on you before the summer is over.”

  That day and the next were very busy ones at Woodburn and Ion, and thesucceeding one saw them all on their way northward. Mary Keith wasdelighted with the yacht, which she had not seen until she boardedit in company with the Raymonds. It was a pleasure to Violet to takeher cousin down into the cabin and show her all its beauties andconveniences, including the state-room she was to occupy on the voyage.

  “Oh, how lovely!” cried Mary; “and how good in you to ask me to go withyou in this beautiful vessel. I am sure the journey will not be half sowearisome as it would in the cars.”

  “I hope not,” returned Violet, “but I hope you won’t be sea-sick; forif you are you will probably wish we had not induced you to try thevoyage in preference to the journey by land.”

  “And perhaps that you had my doctor brother as fellow-passenger insteadof myself,” remarked a familiar voice behind them—that of CalhounConly—and turning quickly they discovered him and the captain standingnear by, regarding them with amused, smiling countenances.

  “Welcome! I’m glad to see you, Cal,” said Violet, holding out her hand.

  “Thank you, Vi,” he returned, taking the hand in a cordial grasp. “Andyou, Miss Mary, are not displeased, I hope, that I have accepted aninvitation to join your party on the voyage and for a short time at thesea-shore.”

  “No, Mr. Conly,” laughed Mary. “Whom the captain and Violet choose toinvite is, I am sure, no affair of mine; nor should I object to yourcompany so long as you continue so inoffensive as you have been duringour brief acquaintance.”

  “Thanks,” he returned, bowing low; “now I feel entirely comfortable.”

  “That’s right, Cal,” said the captain. “And suppose we all go on deckto see the weighing of the anchor and the starting of the vessel; forthe steam is up and we are about ready to move.”

  An awning shaded the deck and a breeze from the sea made it a pleasantplace to lounge and read or chat. The children were already seatedthere, watching the movements of the sailors and of the people on thewharf.

  “How d’y do, Cousin Cal?” said Lulu, making room for him and Mary Keithon the settee she had been occupying. “I’m glad you are going with us,and I hope you and Cousin Mary will have a good time, for I think ajourney taken on the _Dolphin_ is very much more enjoyable than one byrail.”

  “I have no doubt of it—if one is not attacked by sea-s
ickness,”returned Calhoun.

  “Are you likely to be?” she asked.

  “Well, that I cannot tell, as this will be my first voyage,” heanswered.

  “As it is mine,” said Mary.

  “If you are both sick you can sympathize each with the other,” remarkedViolet laughingly.

  But the captain had walked forward to give his orders, the work ofweighing anchor was beginning, and all kept silence while watching it.Presently the vessel was speeding on her way, and they had nothing todo but sit under the awning enjoying the breeze and the prospect of thewide expanse of ocean on the one side and the fast-receding shore onthe other.

  The voyage proved a speedy and prosperous one, continuous fair weatherand favorable winds making it most enjoyable. One pleasant afternoonthey entered Gloucester harbor, and before night were safely housed intheir new temporary home, where they found the Dinsmores and Travillasawaiting them.

  Mr. Croly too was there to join in the greetings. Domiciled withrelatives who occupied a cottage but a few rods distant, he passed muchof his time with Harold and Herbert, fishing, boating, bathing, riding,or driving; pleasures that were now shared by the other gentlemenand ladies and more or less by the children also; the captain, younguncles, and occasionally Mr. Croly caring for them when in bathing andseeing that they had a fair share of the pleasures of the older people.

  There were many beautiful drives to be taken, some interesting spots tovisit. One day they took a long drive, much of it through a pleasantwood, whence they emerged within a few hundred yards of the sea-shore,there very high and rocky. They fastened their horses in the edge ofthe wood, alighted, and walked out in the direction of the sound of thedashing, booming waves.

  Stepping across a narrow fissure in the rocks, the gentlemen helpingthe ladies and children over, they could see that it widened toward thewater and that the sea roared and foamed like a seething caldron aboutthe base of the rocks, which were very steep and uneven, in many placesgreat stones piled upon each other in a way that made them look as ifit would take very little to send them toppling down into the roaring,fuming water below.

  Grace clung to her father in affright. “O papa, please don’t let us goany nearer,” she said; “please hold me tight.”

  “I will, my darling,” he answered soothingly. “We are in no dangerhere, and you can just stand and look, seeing all you need care to.Then I will take you back to mamma, over yonder where she is gatheringflowers for Elsie and Ned, and you can stay with and amuse them whileshe comes here to take a look.”

  “Yes, I’d rather be there,” she said, “for it seems so dangerous here.O papa, see! Lu is going so near the edge. I’m afraid she’ll fall in.”

  “Uncle Harold has her hand,” he said; “still I do not like to see herventuring so near the edge. Lucilla,” he called, “come here, daughter.”

  She turned about and came at once. “Uncle Harold was taking care of me,papa,” she said; “but oh, it does look dangerous, and I shouldn’t liketo go climbing about over the rocks as Cousin Mary and Rosie are doing;at least not unless I had you to hold me, papa.”

  “I shall not take you into any such dangerous place,” he said, “norwill I allow any one else to do so. Do you see that little crossthere?” pointing to a small wooden one driven in the rock near by.

  “Yes, sir. What is it there for?” asked Lulu.

  “As a reminder of a sad accident that happened here some years ago. Aparty of summer visitors to this coast came out here one day as wehave done and went down near the waves. Among them was a very estimableyoung lady, a Christian, I believe she was, a teacher too, supportingher aged parents by her industry. She was soon to be married, and withher were the parents of her intended husband.

  “It seems they all went down near the waves, this young lady nearerthan the others. She seated herself on the rock against which the wavesdash up. Some of the others called to her that she was not in a safeplace, but she replied that she thought it safe; the waves did notcome up close to her, and they looked away in another direction for amoment; when they turned to look for her again she was gone from therock, and all they could see of her was one hand held up out of theboiling waves as if in a wild appeal for help. Help which they couldnot give, for they had no boat and no other way of reaching her.”

  “Was she drowned, papa?” asked Grace.

  “Yes, my child; she could not live many minutes amid such waves androcks. They made all the haste they could to get help, but none wasnear at hand, and she must have been dead long before they got itthere. They did get the body finally, with grappling irons, but thesoul had fled.

  “My children, remember what I say to you now. Never run the riskof losing your lives when nothing is to be gained by it for eitheryourselves or others; to do so is both wrong and foolish; it is reallybreaking the sixth commandment—‘Thou shalt not kill.’ We have no rightto kill ourselves, not even to escape great suffering, but must waitGod’s time to call us hence.

  “Now I will take you to your little sister and brother, to take chargeof them while your mamma comes to view Rafe’s Chasm.”

  In the mean time Grandma Elsie had called to Rosie and Walter, and wastalking to them, in much the same strain, of the folly and sinfulnessof unnecessarily exposing themselves to danger.

  “You can see almost as much from this safe place as you can by goinginto those very dangerous ones,” she said. Then she told them the samestory the captain had just been telling his little girls.

  “O mamma, how dreadful, how very dreadful!” exclaimed Rosie; “it was sosad to be snatched away from life so suddenly, while young and well andwith so much to live for.”

  “Yes,” sighed her mother; “my heart aches for the poor parents, evenmore than for the lover. He has probably found another bride beforethis, while they still mourn the irreparable loss of their deardaughter.”

  “Your mother is right, children,” said Mr. Dinsmore, standing near.“Heed her teachings, and never risk life or limb in a mere spirit ofbravado.”

  The captain now stood beside them with Violet on his arm, and theothers came climbing back, till they all stood in a group together.

  “What an awful occurrence that was! what a dreadful death to die—tossedabout by those booming waves, that raging, foaming water, against thosecruel rocks till life was extinct,” Violet said, gazing down into thechasm while clinging tightly to her husband’s arm.

  “Yes,” said Mary Keith, “and I feel that I was hardly right to run therisk I did in climbing about as I have been doing.”

  “Nor I,” said Croly.

  “Nor any of the rest of us,” added Calhoun; “but we won’t do it anymore. But what is it Vi refers to? Has there ever been an accidenthere?”

  “Yes; have you not heard the story?” said his uncle. “Has no one toldyou the meaning of yonder cross?” pointing to it as he spoke.

  “No, sir; and I had not noticed it before.”

  Mr. Dinsmore briefly told the sad tale; then slowly and almost insilence they turned and left the spot.

  Harold, Herbert, and Will Croly were strolling together along the beachthat evening, and for a time their talk was of Rafe’s Chasm and theaccident there, the story of which they had heard that day.

  “It has been a good deal in my mind ever since I heard it,” remarkedCroly, “and I have asked myself what must it be to be called sosuddenly from earth to heaven. It is a solemn thought that we maybe so called any day or hour, but a sweet one also; for to theChristian, what is sudden death but sudden glory, a sudden awaking inthe land where pain and sickness, sin and sorrow are unknown, and inthe immediate presence of the dear Master who has loved us with aneverlasting love? Oh, I cannot think sudden death a calamity to theChristian!”

  “No,” said Harold, “but it is sad for the surviving relatives andfriends. Oh, what a heart-breaking thing to lose our mother in thatway, for instance!”

  “Yes; such a terrible death,” said Herbert in moved tones.

  “But the s
uffering was very short,” said Croly. “Doubtlessconsciousness was soon lost, and I have heard again and again thatthose who have been taken from the water apparently dead—so nearlygone that if left to themselves they would never have recoveredconsciousness—have said that it was an easy death to die. Those who dieby disease must often and often suffer far more in the weeks and monthswhile disease is slowly making its way to the citadel of life.”

  “Yes, that is true,” answered Harold; “yet thinking of it all does notrouse in me any desire for drowning. I believe I have never told you,Will,” he added, facing round upon his friend and speaking in tonesslightly tremulous with emotion, “that I was once as near drowningas one could be and live; yes, should probably never have recoveredconsciousness but for my dear mother’s determined perseverance withefforts at resuscitation, when every one else had given me up as dead.”

  “No,” returned Croly in an awestruck tone, “I never heard it before.No wonder you love her so dearly, for leaving that out of the account,she is a woman in a thousand. Ah, I often envy you fellows when I seeyou with your mother and think of mine, sick and suffering away on theother side of the sea.”

  “But you are hoping she and your father will return soon, are you not,Will?” asked Herbert in a tone of sympathy.

  “Yes, I am hoping every day to hear that they are about sailing; but Ihave heard nothing at all for some weeks, and am growing more anxiousday by day. Aunt and uncle try to comfort and reassure me with the oldsaying that ‘no news is good news,’ but—well, my only comfort is incasting my cares on the Lord, remembering that he cares for both themand me, and that his promise is, ‘As thy days, so shall thy strengthbe.’”

  “That is one of my mother’s favorite texts,” remarked Herbert, “and shesays it has always been fulfilled to her.”

  “And she has seen some sore trials?”

  “Yes; my father’s death for one. I know that was the greatest of all;though before that, death had snatched away from her a very dear andlovely little daughter,” said Harold.

  “And she has had trials in other forms,” added Herbert. “Some personswould esteem it a very great trial to be called to choose between adifficult and dangerous surgical operation and certain, painful deathfrom disease.”

  “And she has had that trial?” asked Croly.

  “Yes; and went through it bravely, trusting in the Lord to spare herlife or take her to dwell with him in bliss forever.”

  “She is a noble and lovely woman,” remarked Croly. “I never saw onewhom I admired more.”

  “Ah, you do not know half how sweet and good, and what a devotedChristian she—our beloved mother—is,” said Harold earnestly. “I thankGod every day for giving me such a mother.”

  “As I do,” said Herbert. “I often think if there is anything good inme, it is the result of my mother’s kind, wise, loving training.”