Stephen Grattan's Faith Part 3

As for Stephen, if his faith did not hold out for his friend now, no one would have guessed it from his prayers, or from his words of encouragement to Morely. According to him, it was the helpless and hopeless sort that the Lord came to save. He had done it before; He could do it again; and He would do it.

"I've been a sight deeper down in this pit than ever you've been yet.

But, down or up, it's all the same to Him that's got the pulling of you out. There's no up nor down, nor far nor near, to Him. 'O ye of little faith, wherefore do ye doubt?' He's a-saying this to you now; and He's a-saying, too, 'This kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting.' But _He_ drove that kind out by a word, just as He drove all the rest. Hang onto His own word, John. He's said, time and again, that He'll save the man that trusts in Him; and don't you let go of that. You've been trying to be sober, and to get back your good name, for the wife's sake and the babies. You would give all the world to know again how it feels to be a free man. Just you give all that up. Seek to be the Lord's.

His grace is all-sufficient. His strength will be made perfect in your weakness. If you're His, He'll keep you, and no mistake. Give all the rest up, and hang on to the Lord in simple faith. You can never do this thing of yourself; but the Lord'll give you the help of His grace, if you ask Him. I _know_, because I've tried Him."

Whatever was said, it always ended thus: "You can do nothing of yourself; but with the Lord's help you can do all things. Hold fast to Him. Let your cry be, 'Lord Jesus, save, or I perish.'"

Poor Morely listened, and tried to hope. If ever he was saved from the power of his foe, the Lord must surely do it, he felt, for he could do nothing; and, in a blind, weak way, he did strive to put his trust in G.o.d.

When the time came that he was well enough to go away, Stephen would fain have gone with him, to encourage him and stand by him till he could get something to do. But this could not be. They lived by his daily labour, and his business had been neglected of late, through his care for his friend; and he could only write to a friend of his, praying him to interest himself in Morely's behalf.

His letter, written out word for word, just as he sent it, would very likely excite laughter. But it answered the end for which it was sent.

It awoke in another true heart sympathy for the poor desponding Morely; it strengthened another kind hand to labour in his behalf. So he did not find himself homeless and friendless in the streets of a great city, as he had been before. In Montreal a welcome awaited him, and a home; and something like hope once more sprang up in Morely's heart, as he heard his new friend's cheerful words and responded to the warm grasp of his hand.

Stephen and his wife saw hard times after Morely went away. And yet not so very hard, either, seeing they were endured for a friend. They never said to each other that the times were hard.

There were no more suppers or breakfasts of thin gruel at the little log-house on the hill. In a few days after his first memorable visit, Stephen Grattan was there again, and again Farmer Jackson's oxen called forth the wonder and admiration of the little Morelys. For Stephen, as he took great pains to explain to Mrs Morely, had taken advantage of the opportunity afforded by the return of the farmer's empty sled, to bring up the barrel of flour and the bag of meal that ought to have been sent up the very night her husband went away. There were fish, too, and meat, and some other things, and a piece of spare-rib, which, Stephen acknowledged, his Dolly had been saving for some good purpose all through the winter.

And Stephen brought something for which Mrs Morely was more grateful than even for the spare-rib. He brought an offer of needle-work from a lady in the town who had many little children. The lady, it seemed, had a strange prejudice against sewing-machines, and in favour of skilful fingers, for the doing of fine white work. This did much to restore the mother's health and peace of mind; and a letter that came from her husband about this time did more. Not that it was a very hopeful letter. He said little, except that he had got work, and that he hoped soon to be able to send much more than the trifle he enclosed. But, though he did not say in words that he had withstood all temptation, yet at the very end he said, "Pray for me, Alice, that I may be strong to stand." And her heart leaped with joy, as she said to herself, "He did not need to ask me to do that." And yet she was really more glad to be asked that than for all the letter and the enclosure besides.

CHAPTER SIX.

A LIFE HISTORY.

And so the winter wore away. January, February, March, pa.s.sed; and when April came in there were only here and there, on the hillocks, bits of bare ground to tell that the spring was coming.

"And to think that all my father's fields are sown and growing green by this time--and the violets and the primroses out in all the dales!" said Mrs Morely, with a sudden rush of homesick tears.

Mrs Grattan was with her, paying a long day's visit; for they had been all the morning talking cheerfully of many things.

"Our winter is long," she said.

"Oh, so long and dreary!" sighed Mrs Morely. "No, you must not think me discontented and unthankful," she added, meeting Mrs Grattan's grave looks. "Only a little homesick now and then. If I were sure that all was well with--" She hesitated.

"'I will trust, and not be afraid,'" said Mrs Grattan, softly.

They had not spoken much to one another about their troubles,--these two women. Mrs Morely's reserve, even at the time of little Ben's death, had never given way so far as to permit her to speak of her husband's faults and her own trials. And Mrs Grattan's sympathy, though deep, had been silent--expressed by deeds rather than by words. She knew well how full of fear for her husband the poor wife's heart had been all the winter; but she could not approach the subject until she herself introduced it.

"'I will trust, and not be afraid,'" said Mrs Morely, repeating her friend's words. "I can do naught else; and not always that."

"'Lord, increase our faith!'" murmured Dolly.

There was a pause, during which Mrs Morely went about, busy with some household matter. When she sat down again, she said:

"You must not think I am pining for home. If I were sure that it is well with my husband, nothing else would matter."

"You have good hope that it is well with him," said Mrs Grattan.

"Oh, I do not know. I cannot tell. I can only leave him in G.o.d's hand." But she did not speak very hopefully.

"And surely there's no better thing to do for him than that," said Mrs Grattan.

"I know it. But I have hoped so many times, and so few of the poor souls who have gone so far astray as he has done come back to a better life. I fear no more than I hope."

There was a long pause after that, and then, in a voice that seemed quite changed, Mrs Grattan said, "I never told you about Stephen and me, did I?"

"No. I know that you have had some great trouble in your life, like mine--indeed, your husband has told me that: that is all I know."

"Well, it's not to be spoken of often. But, just to show what the Lord can do when He sets out to save a poor creature to the uttermost, I will tell you what He has done for Stephen and me. It must be told in few words, though. It shakes me to go back to those days.

"We were born in Vermont--as good a State as any to be born and brought up in. It was quite a country place we lived in. My father was a farmer--a grave, quiet man. My mother was never very strong; and I was the only one spared to them of five children. We lived a very quiet, humble sort of life; but, if ever folks lived contented and happy, we did.

"Stephen was one of many children--too many for them all to get a living on their little stony farm; and his father sent his boys off as soon as they were able to go, and Stephen, who was the second son, was sent to learn the shoemaker's trade in Weston, about twenty miles away.

"We had kept company, Stephen and me--as boys and girls will, you know-- before he went; and it went on all the time he was learning his trade, whenever he came home on a visit. When his time was out, he stayed on as a journeyman in the same place; but he fell into bad hands, I suppose, for it began to come out through the neighbours, who saw him there sometimes, that he wasn't doing as he ought to do; and when my father heard from them that they had seen him more than once the worse for liquor, he would let him have nothing more to say to me.

"You will scarcely understand just how it seemed to our folks. There was hardly a man who tasted liquor in all our town in those days. To have been betrayed into taking too much just once would have been to lose one's character; and when my father heard of Stephen's being seen a good many times when he was not able to take care of himself, it seemed to him that it was a desperate case. I think he would as lief have laid me down in the graveyard beside my little brothers, as have thought of giving me to Stephen then.

"I didn't know how much I thought of him till there was an end put to his coming to our house. I believe I grew to care more about him when other folks turned against him. Not that I ever thought hard of my father: I knew he was right, and I didn't mean to let him see that I was worrying; but he did see it, and when Stephen came home and worked, sometimes at his trade and sometimes on his father's farm, a year quite steady, he felt every day more and more like giving it up, and taking him into favour again. He never said so, but I am sure my mother thought so, and sometimes I did too.

"My mother died that fall, and we had a dreadful still, lonesome winter--my father and me; and when after a while Stephen came to see me, as he used to do, my father didn't seem to mind. And pretty soon Stephen took courage and asked the old man for me. He said that I would be the saving of him, and that we would always stay with him in his old age--which came on him fast after my mother died. So, what with one thing and what with another, he was wrought on to consent to our marriage: but I do believe it was the thought of helping to save a soul from death, that did more than all the rest to bring him round.

"Things went well with us for a while--for more than two years--nearly three; but then one day Stephen went to Weston, and got into trouble; and the worst was, having begun, he couldn't stop. It was a miserable time. My father lost faith in Stephen after that, and Stephen lost faith in himself, and he got restless and uneasy, and it was a dreadful cross to him to have to stay at father's, knowing that he wasn't trusted and depended on as he used to be. And I suppose it was a cross to father to have him there; for when I spoke of going away, though he said it would break his heart to part from me, his only child, he said, too, that it would not do to part husband and wife, and perhaps it would be better to try it, for a while at least. So we went to live in Weston, and Stephen worked at his trade.

"Then father married again. He was an old man, and it never would have happened if I could have stayed with him. But what could he do? He couldn't stay alone. The woman he married was a widow with children, and I knew there never would be room for me at home any more.

"We had a sad time at Weston. I had always lived on a farm, and, though Weston wasn't much of a place then, it seemed dreadful close and shut-up and dismal to me. I was homesick and miserable there, and maybe I didn't do all I might have done to make things pleasant for Stephen, and help to keep him straight. It was a dreadful time for him, and for me too.

"Well, after a while our children were born--twin boys. Stephen was always tender-hearted over all little children; and over his own--I couldn't tell you what he was. It did seem then as though, if he could get a fair start and begin again, he might do better, for his children's sake. So, when I got well, I made up my mind that I would ask a little help from father, and we'd go west.

"I knew I never could go home to stay now. But, when I saw the old place for the last time, I thought my heart would break. It wasn't much of a place. There were only a few stony fields of pasture-land, and a few narrow meadows; but, oh, I thought, if my babies had only been born when we were in that safe, quiet place, it might have been so different!

And my father was so feeble and old, and helpless-like, I could not bear to think of going so far away that I could never hope to see him again.

"But there was no help for it. It would give Stephen another chance; and so, with the little help my father could give us, we went out west and settled.

"So we left the old life quite behind, and began again. We had a hard time, but no harder than people generally have who go to a new country.

Stephen kept up good courage, and stuck to his work; and I helped him all I could; and if I was sometimes a little discouraged and homesick, he never guessed it. And I never _was_ much of either; for I was busy always, and there was my babies--" Dolly's voice broke into a shrill wail as she spoke the word, and she sat with her face hidden a little while before she could go on again.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

WAITING FOR NEWS.

"Well, the time went by till our children were two years old--not, to be sure, without some trouble, but still we got along, and I was never without the hope that better days were coming. About that time we got some new neighbours; but it was a dark day for us,--the day that Sam Healy came and took a place near us. They were kind folks enough, and I don't think the man began by wis.h.i.+ng to do my Stephen harm. He could drink and stop when he wanted to--at least, so he said; but Stephen couldn't, and I was never sure of him after the Healys came.

"They came in the fall and a dreary winter followed their coming; but when spring opened things began to mend with us. I did what I could to help Stephen, and kept by him in the field. There wasn't much to do within doors. There was only one room in the house, and a bed and table and a bench or two was all the furniture we had; but we might have been well and happy there till now, if we had been let alone.