Miriam Coles Harris

SHUT AND BARRED.

The destiny that lay before her was a little harder than even she knew, when she went into the hall that night, throwing off the damp cloak that she had worn, and mechanically walking to the fire in the library to warm herself, after her half-hour in the chilly night air. She thought she knew how dull and hateful her life was to be, how lonely, how uneventful. She was still young—twenty-nine is young when you are twenty-nine, not, of course, when you are seventeen. She had just found out what it is, to have life full and intense in emotion and interest, and now she was turned back into the old path that had seemed good enough before, when she did not know any better one. But still, with resolute courage, she said to herself, her mother, and duty, and study, and health, and money, might do something for her yet, and, after a year or two of bitterness, restore her to content and usefulness.

These things she said to herself, not on that first night of pain, but the next day, when she walked past the shut-up house, and wondered, under the cold gray sky, at the strength of the emotion that had filled her as she had watched, through the darkness, the glimmer of the cigar spark by the gate. Thank heaven, she hadn't spoken! She knew just as well now what she had lost, as then, but daylight, and east wind, level values inevitably. It was all worth less—living and dying, love and loneliness. She could bear what she had chosen, she hadn't any doubt.

How gloomy the day was! Raw and chill, and yet not cold enough to brace the nerves. The gate stood ajar. Missy pushed through it, and walked down the path. Some straw littered the piazza steps; an empty paper box lay on the grass. The windows were all closed. Only the dog, still chained to his kennel, howled her a dismal welcome. He was to go, probably, to some new home that day. Well, Missy thought bitterly, he will at least have novelty to divert him.

She didn't go on the piazza; she remembered, with a sense of shame, the last time she had crossed that threshold, saying it should be the last time. What a tempest of jealousy and anger had been in her heart! Oh, the folly of it (not to say the sin of it). How she had been conquered by those two women (not to say the enemy of souls). She could see it all so clearly now. Every word and look and gesture of Mr. Andrews took a different meaning, now she was in her senses. That dinner had been his last hope, his last attempt to conciliate her. She had repulsed him more sharply than ever that night, stung as she was by the insults of her two rivals. After that, he had made his plans to go away and end the matter. Miss Flora might thank her for "dear Europe," this time.

But poor little Jay, what had he to thank her for? Ah! that gave her heart a pinch to think of. Poor little Jay might set down as the sum of his gratitude to her, a miserable youth, a mercenary rule at home, deceit and worldliness, low aims, and selfishness, that would drive him shelterless into the world to find his pleasure there. For Missy never doubted that Flora would gain her end. She knew Mr. Andrews was not clever enough to stand out very long. "He's just the sort of man," she said to herself, "to be married by somebody who is persistent. He doesn't know women well enough to stand out against them. He will give in for the children's sake, he won't care for his own. And he will spend a life of homeless wretchedness, silent and stolid, protecting the woman who is cheating him, laboring for the children who will disappoint him. Ah! my little Jay, forgive me," she cried, stooping and picking up a broken whip of his that lay in the grass beside the path.

Everybody makes mistakes, but it isn't often given to any one to make such a wholesale one as this. We must be charitable to Missy if she was bitter and gloomy that dark morning. She wandered about the paths for a little while longer, then, picking a few artemesias that grew close up by the house, she turned to go away. At the gate she met a boy with a yellow envelope in his hand. He was just going to her house, he explained, presenting the envelope. It was a telegram, and Missy opened it hastily.

"It is all right," she said, giving him the money, and putting the paper in her pocket. We are apt to be very selfish when we are miserable, and Missy's first thought on reading the message was a selfish one. The message was from her brother. He had just landed, and would be at home that evening. She did not think of the joy it would be to her mother, of the joy it might have been to her; she only thought, "Thank Heaven, this will give me something else to think of for a little while." She was quite bent upon curing herself, even at this early date; but with the supreme selfishness of great disappointment, she thought of nothing but as it influenced her trouble.