CHAPTER XXVII. ROUGH HANDLING OF SORE NERVES

The same Sunday evening that Mary and her brother Mike had devoted to the disciplinary processes with Maggie, had been spent by Eva and her husband at her father's house.

Mrs. Van Arsdel, to say the truth, had been somewhat shaken and disturbed by Aunt Maria's suggestions; and she took early occasion to draw Eva aside, and make many doubtful inquiries and utter many admonitory cautions with regard to the part she had taken for Maggie.

"Of course, dear, it's very kind in you," said Mrs. Van Arsdel; "but your aunt thinks it isn't quite prudent; and, come to think it over, Eva, I'm afraid it may get you into trouble. Everything is going on so well in your house, I don't want you to have anything disagreeable, you know."

"Well, after all, mother, how can I be a Christian, or anything like a Christian, if I am never willing to take any trouble? If you heard the preaching we do every Sunday, you would feel so."

"I don't doubt that Mr. St. John is a good preacher," said Mrs. Van Arsdel; "but then I never could go so far, you know; and your aunt is almost crazy now because the girls go up there and don't sit in our pew in church. She was here yesterday, and talked very strongly about your taking Maggie. She really made me quite uncomfortable."

"Well, I should like to know what concern it is of Aunt Maria's!" said Eva. "It's a matter in which Harry and I must follow our own judgment and conscience; Harry thinks we are doing right, and I suspect Harry knows what is best to do as well as Aunt Maria."

"Well, certainly, Eva, I must say it's an unusual sort of thing to do. I know your motives are all right and lovely, and I stood up for you with your aunt. I didn't give in to her a bit; and yet, all the while, I couldn't help thinking that maybe she was right and that maybe your good-heartedness would get you into difficulty."

"Well, suppose it does; what then? Am I never to have any trouble for the sake of helping anybody? I am not one of the very good women with missions, like Sibyl Selwyn, and can't do good that way; and I'm not enterprising and courageous, like sister Ida, to make new professions for women: but here is a case of a poor woman right under my own roof who is perplexed and suffering, and if I can help her carry her load, ought I not to do it, even if it makes me a good deal of trouble?"

"Well, yes, I don't know but you ought," said Mrs. Van Arsdel, who was always convinced by the last speaker.

"You see," continued Eva, "the priest and the Levite who passed by on the other side when a man lay wounded were just of Aunt Maria's mind. They didn't want trouble, and if they undertook to do anything for him they would have a good deal; so they left him. And if I turn my back on Mary and Maggie I shall be doing pretty much the same thing."

"Well, if you only are sure of succeeding. But girls that have fallen into bad ways are such dangerous creatures; perhaps you can't do her any good, and will only get yourself into trouble."

"Well, if I fail, why then I shall fail. But I think it's better to try and fail in doing our part for others than never to try at all."

"Well, I suppose you are right, Eva; and after all I'm sorry for poor Mary. She had a hard time with her marriage all round; and I suppose it's no wonder Maggie went astray. Mary couldn't control her; and handsome girls in that walk of life are so tempted. How does she get on?"

"Oh, nicely, for the most part. She seems to have a sort of adoration for me. I can say or do anything with her, and she really is very handy and skillful with her needle; she has ripped up and made over an old dress for me so you'd be quite astonished to see it, and seems really pleased and interested to have something to do. If only her mother will let her alone, and not keep nagging her, and bringing up old offenses. Mary is so eager to make her do right that she isn't judicious, she doesn't realize how sensitive and sore people are that know they have been wrong. Maggie is a proud girl."

"Oh, well, she's no business to be proud," said Mrs. Van Arsdel. "I'm sure she ought to be humbled in the very dust; that's the least one should expect."

"And so ought we all," said Eva, "but we are not, and she isn't. She makes excuses for herself, and feels as if she had been abused and hardly treated, just as most of us do when we go wrong, and I tell Mary not to talk to her about the past, but just quietly let her do better in future; but it's very hard to get her to feel that Maggie ought not to be willing to be lectured and preached to from morning till night."

"Your Aunt Maria, no doubt, will come up and free her mind to you about this affair," said Mrs. Van Arsdel. "She has a scheme in her head of getting another girl for you in Mary's place. The Willises are going abroad for three years and have given their servants leave to advertise from the house; and your aunt left me Saturday, saying she was going up there to ascertain all about them and get you the refusal of one of them, provided you wished to get rid of Mary."

"Get rid of Mary! I think I see myself turning upon my good Mary that loves me as she does her life, and scheming to get her out of my house because she's in trouble. No, indeed; Mary has been true and faithful to me, and I will be a true and faithful friend to her. What could I do with one of the Willises' servants, with their airs and their graces? Would they come to a little house like mine, and take all departments in turn, and do for me as if they were doing for themselves, as Mary does?"

"Just so," said Mrs. Van Arsdel. "That's just what I told Maria. I told her that you never would consent. But you know how it is with her when she gets an idea in her head, there's no turning her. You might as well talk to a steam engine. She walked off down stairs straight as a ramrod, and took the omnibus for the Willises, in spite of all I could say; and, sure as the world, she'll be up to talk with you about it. She insisted that it was my duty to interfere; and I told her you had a right to manage your matters in your own way. Then she said if I didn't do my duty by you, she should."

"Well, you have done your duty, Mamma dear," said Eva, kissing her mother. "I'll bear witness to that, and it isn't your fault if I am not warned. But you, dear little mother, have sense to let your children sail their own boat their own way, without interfering."

"Well, I think your ways generally turn out the best ways, Eva," said her mother. "And I think Aunt Maria herself comes into them finally. She is proud as a peacock of your receptions, and takes every occasion to tell people what charming, delightful evenings you have; and she praises your house and your housekeeping and you to everybody, so you may put up with a little bother now and then."

"Oh, I'll manage Aunt Maria, never you fear," said Eva, as she rose confidently and took her husband from a discussion with Mr. Van Arsdel.

"Come, Harry, it's nine o'clock, and we have a long walk yet to get home."

It was brisk, clear winter moonlight in the streets as Harry and Eva took their way homeward—she the while relieving her mind by reciting her mother's conversation.

"Don't it seem strange," she said, "how the minute one actually tries to do some real Christian work everything goes against one?"

"Yes," said Harry; "the world isn't made for the unfortunate or unsuccessful. In general, the instinct of society is the same among men as among animals—anything sickly or maimed is to be fought off and got rid of. If there is a sick bird, all the rest fly at it and peck it to death. So in the world, when man or woman doesn't keep step with respectable people, the first idea is to get them out of the way. We can't exactly kill them, but we can wash our hands of them. Saving souls is no part of the world's work—it interferes with its steady business; it takes unworldly people to do that."

"And when one begins," said Eva, "shrewd, sensible folks, like Aunt Maria, blame us; and little, tender-hearted folks, like mamma, think it's almost a pity we should try, and that we had better leave it to somebody else; and then the very people we are trying to do for are really troublesome and hard to manage—like poor Maggie. She is truly a very hard person to get along with, and her mother is injudicious, and makes it harder; but yet, it really does seem to be our work to help take care of her. Now, isn't it?"

"Well, then, darling, you may comfort your heart with one thought: when you are doing for pure Christian motives a thing that makes you a great deal of trouble, and gets you no applause, you are trying to live just that unworldly life that the first Christians did. They were called a peculiar people, and whoever acts in the same spirit now-a-days will be called the same. I think it is the very highest wisdom to do as you are doing; but it isn't the wisdom of this world. It's the kind of thing that Mr. St. John is sacrificing his whole life to; it is what Sibyl Selwyn is doing all the time, and your little neighbor Ruth is helping in. We can at least try to do a little. We are inexperienced, it may be that we shall not succeed, it may be that the girl is past saving; but it's worth while to try, and try our very best."

Harry was saying this just as he put his latch-key into the door of his house.

It was suddenly opened from within, and Maggie stood before them with her bonnet and shawl on, ready to pass out. There was a hard, sharp, desperate expression in her face as she pressed forward to pass them.

"Maggie, child," said Eva, laying hold of her arm, "where are you going?"

"Away—anywhere—I don't care where," said Maggie, fiercely, trying to pull away.

"But you mustn't," said Eva, laying hold of her.

"Maggie," said Harry, stepping up to her and speaking in that calm, steady voice which controls passionate people, "go into the house immediately with Mrs. Henderson; she will talk with you."

Maggie turned, and sullenly followed Eva into a little sewing room adjoining the parlor, where she had often sat at work.

"Now, Maggie," said Eva, "take off your bonnet, for I'm not going to have you go into the streets at this hour of the night, and sit down quietly here and tell me all about it. What has happened? What is the matter? You don't want to distress your mother and break her heart?"

"She hates me," said Maggie. "She says I've disgraced her and I disgrace you, and that it's a disgrace to have me here. She and Uncle Mike both said so, and I said I'd go off, then."

"But where could you go?" said Eva.

"Oh, I know places enough! They're bad, to be sure. I wanted to do better, so I came away; but I can go back again."

"No, Maggie, you must never go back. You must do as I tell you. Have I not been a friend to you?"

"Oh, yes, yes, you have; but they say I disgrace you."

"Maggie, I don't think so. I never said so. There is no need that you should disgrace anybody. I hope you'll live to be a credit to your mother—a credit to us all. You are young yet; you have a good many years to live; and if you'll only go on and do the very best you can from this time, you can be a comfort to your mother and be a good woman. It's never too late to begin, Maggie, and I'll help you now."

Maggie sat still and gazed gloomily before her.

"Come, now, I'll sing you some little hymns," said Eva, going to her piano and touching a few chords. "You've got your mind all disturbed, and I'll sing to you till you are more quiet."

Eva had a sweet voice, and a light, dreamy sort of touch on the piano, and she played and sung with feeling.

There were truths in religion, higher, holier, deeper than she felt capable of uttering, which breathed themselves in these hymns; and something within her gave voice and pathos to them.

The influence of music over the disturbed nerves and bewildered moral sense of those who have gone astray from virtue, is something very remarkable. All modern missions more or less recognize that it has a power which goes beyond anything that spoken words can utter, and touches springs of deeper feeling.

Eva sat playing a long time, going from one thing to another; and then, rising, she found Maggie crying softly by herself.

"Come, now, Maggie," she said, "you are going to be a good girl, I know. Go up and go to bed now, and don't forget your prayers. That's a good girl."

Maggie yielded passively, and went to her room.

Then Eva had another hour's talk, to persuade Mary that she must not be too exacting with Maggie, and that she must for the future avoid all such encounters with her. Mary was, on the whole, glad to promise anything; for she had been thoroughly alarmed at the altercation into which their attempt at admonition had grown, and was ready to admit to Eva that Mike had been too hard on her. At all events, the family honor had been sufficiently vindicated, and, if Maggie would only behave herself, she was ready to promise that Mike should not be allowed to interfere in future. And so, at last, Eva succeeded in inducing Mary to go to her daughter's room with a reconciling word before she went to bed, and had the comfort of seeing the naughty girl crying in her mother's arms, and the mother petting and fondling her as a mother should.

Alas! it is only in the good old Book that the father sees the prodigal a great way off, and runs and falls on his neck and kisses him, before he has confessed his sin or done any work of repentance. So far does God's heavenly love outrun even the love of fathers and mothers.

"Well, I believe I've got things straightened out at last," said Eva, as she came back to Harry; "and now, if Mary will only let me manage Maggie, I think I can make all go smooth."