LITMIR.BIZ

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Martha Heath ever since.

      It was my custom on Saturdays after I had eaten my lunch at the factory, to take my wheel and go on a long ride, sometimes in the summer as far as Niagara Falls, getting back late in the evening. These long quiet rides I anticipated with much pleasure, for to get away from the strife of men out into the quiet country, seemed to give me new life. The winter gave me little opportunity for these trips, so I looked forward longingly to the coming of spring.

      The month of April, 1891, it will be remembered was remarkable, in that there was not a single fall of rain from the 10th to the 30th. The roads were dry and dusty as in summer. Saturday afternoon, April 30th, when I rode out Clinton street in the delightful sunshine which seemed to bear healing on its wings, women were working in the gardens, cleaning up the rubbish; children playing on the road; a faint smell of bonfire from burning rubbish, people starting in in the spring to keep the yards clean; men plowing in the fields; and how the frogs did croak! Joy and gladness on every hand. Out through Gardenville, past Ebenezer, five o’clock found me at Hurdville. I was so very busy drinking in the glorious scene that I had ridden slower than I intended, for I had made calculations to be at Aurora before this time, and well on the way homeward.

      “Well,” said I, “Aspasia Hobbs, you had better hurry up or night will catch you. Besides, the wind has come up strong from the southwest, and away off over the Colden hills is a little black cloud – what a joke if you should get wet?”

      There is a lane running across from Hurdville to the Buffalo plank road, so I decided to cut my trip short and strike across at once. I looked at my watch and it was just 5:15 when I entered the lane, which was grass-grown and not at all adapted for bicycling. As I pushed on, the road grew worse, so I got off and pushed the wheel ahead of me. Rather hard work it proved, as I wore a long woolen dress, which I had to hold up in walking.

      Then I tried riding again. A great yellow ominous brightness was in the west, and soon I noticed it was growing dark, and that the little cloud had grown until it seemed to cover the whole western sky. A few big rain drops fell as I looked again at my watch, which said six o’clock. I kept thinking I must come to the plank road every minute, and strained my eyes for the telegraph poles which I knew marked the highway. But no, I could not see them. “Surely this lane must cross the main road or I am turned around and am following a road running parallel with the other,” I concluded.

      Still I trudged on, now riding, then walking. It began to rain now in right good earnest. I felt the mud sticking to my shoes and my clothes growing heavy. My arms grew tired pushing the wheel before me as I walked. The spokes had become a solid mass of mud. I tried to mount the wheel. It swerved and I lay in the ditch. I then realized that to try to push the bicycle further or to ride would be folly; so I pulled the machine into the bushes, and looked around me on every side. Not even a lightning glare to relieve the gloom and brighten the landscape. The rain still fell in torrents. I covered my face with my hands. I thought of my mother waiting in the bright light of our little dining-room, the supper on the table. I tried to imagine this howling wind and blackness of the night was a dream; but no, I was alone – alone, lost.

      CHAPTER VI.

      THE LOG CABIN

      It was the worst night I ever saw, and I hope I may never see another one like it. How the winds did roar through the branches and the wild crash now and then of a falling tree was most appalling. The darkness was intense. The cold rain came in beating gusts, and I felt it was gradually turning to sleet and snow.

      Think of it, I, a city-bred woman, alone on an out-of-the-way country road, dense woods on either side, mud and slush ankle deep, wandering I knew not where!

      My clothes weighed a hundred pounds. They clung to my tired form and I seemed ready to fall with fatigue, when I saw, not far ahead of me, the glimmer of a light which seemed to come from a small log house a quarter of a mile back from the road.

      Straight toward the welcoming glimmering light, through bramble, bush and stumps, I stumbled my way, now and then sinking near knee deep in some hole where a tree had been uprooted. I think I rather pounded on the door than rapped, and so fearful was I that I would not meet with a welcome reception, that I began scarcely before the door was opened explaining in a loud and excited voice (for I am but a woman after all), begging that I might be warmed and sheltered only until daylight, when I could make my way back, promising pay in a sight draft on Hustler & Co., for in my coming away I had left my purse in my office dress. I only remember that what I took for an old man opened the door, led me in, showing not the slightest look of curiosity or surprise, but seeming rather to be expecting me. He stopped my excited talking by saying, in the mildest, sweetest baritone I ever heard,

      “Yes, I know. It is turning to snow. You lost your way and are wet and cold. Look at this cheerful fireplace and this pile of pine wood. My wife is here; but no, I have no woman’s clothes either. You had better take off your dress and let it dry over the chair. Then if you stand before the fire your other raiment will soon dry on you, which is as good as changing; and in the meantime, I will get you something to eat.”

      That night seems now as if it belonged to a former existence, so soft and hazy when viewed across memory’s landscape. I only know that as soon as the man stopped my hurried explanations, the sense of fear vanished, and I felt as secure as when a child I prattled about my mother’s rocking-chair as she watched me with loving eyes. I said not a word, so great was the peace that had come over me. After a plain supper, of which I partook heartily, I remember climbing a ladder up into the garret of this log house, and stooping so as not to strike my head against the rafters; also The Man’s tucking me in bed as though I were a child, putting an extra blanket over me while saying softly to himself as if he were speaking to a third person,

      “She must be kept warm. Nature’s balm will heal, sleep is the great restorer, to-morrow she will feel all the better for this little experience. So is the seeming bad turned into good.”

      He passed his hand gently over my eyes, took up the candle and I heard him move down the ladder and – sweet childlike sleep held me fast.

      CHAPTER VII.

      THE MAN

      The morning sun came creeping through the cracks of the garret as I slowly awoke to consciousness and began rubbing my eyes, trying to make out where I was and how I came there. Slowly it dawned upon me, the awful work of trying to push that wheel through the mud; the descending darkness; the increasing storm; of how I left the bicycle by the road-side and the sickening sense that came over me as I felt that I had lost my way and must find shelter or perish; of how my heavy woolen dress, soaked with water, tangled my tired legs as I struggled forward; of the glimmering light, and how I feared that though I had at last found a house they might mistake me for an outcast and have no pity on me; of the sweet peace I experienced when the old man spoke to me; of following his suggestion that I should remove my dress; of how I stood clad only in my under-clothing before the fire, and of how he put me to bed, and I was all unabashed and unashamed. I thought of all this and more, and was just getting ready to be thoroughly frightened when my reverie was broken into by hearing a step come lightly up the ladder, and the beautiful face of The Man framed in its becoming snowy white hair appeared.

      “Yes, she is awake,” he said, again seemingly talking to a third person. “She will be a little sore of course after the exertion, but refreshed and all the stronger for the hard work. Paradoxical – effort put forth causes power to accumulate in the body, which is only a storage battery after all. By giving out power we gain it, by losing life we save it. How simple yet how wonderful are the works of God!” Then speaking to me: “I will bring you warm water for a bath. It will take the stiffness out of your limbs. Breakfast will be ready when you are.”

      I bathed, dressed without the aid of a glass, and was surprised to feel how strong and well I felt. Down I went cautiously on the ladder, and we ate breakfast, neither speaking a word. It seemed as if (glib as I generally am – “A regular gusher,” Martha Heath says) to break in on the silence would be sacrilege. Silence is music at rest.

      Out of every fifty men who pass along the street, only one thinks; the forty-nine have feelings but no thoughts. We have no time here to treat of the forty-nine; let us leave them out

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