The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1888-03-10 00:00:00

BARRIER BETWEEN;

OR.

•- REPENTED UNTO DEATH.
CHAPTER Xlll.—(Continued..,
"RR offered me money; but, bitter as my elestatu-
tion is, I could not take it. I threw it at his feet and
fled. Enough, enough. Ask me no more, for I cannot '
bear it. I scarcely know how I got back here, but I ,
did come, and I have been sitting in the darkness for '
hours, afraid to touch my child with my freezing
hands, and yet dreading that the light of another day
would show him to me even colder than I myself am.
Oh, Margaret, are there not creatures on this earth
as wretched as Job was in his hour of greatest tribu-
lation ?"
"No, no: the Great Father has himself said, Am I not
always with you?' and would you blaspheme your
Only help and refuge? What have the poor but faith
In Heaven? Without that we should indeed be lost.
Do not speak so dreadfully, I entreat. Do not look so
wild. You are weary and exhausted. I will make a
fire and have some hot coffee ready by the time mother
Wakes."
"I cannot share your morning meal, for my last
Penny is gone, and I will not rob you and your blind
mother of the little you can earn to keep yourselves
from starving," was the despondent reply.
Margaret only replied by pressing her hand, and
commencing active preparations for the slender repast
she had the means of setting forth. In doing so, she
evidently took great care of her hands, which were of
singular delicacy and fairness. She drew on a pair of
Well-worn gloves before touching the scanty supply of
Wood which was to fill the small stove that stood in one
Forner of the apartment.
This aroused Mrs. Gordon from her stupor of weari-
hess and grief, and she arose and took the wood from
ller, as she said—
, "My sorrow makes me selfish, and heedless of others.
If You do this, your hands will be unfit for lace work
to-day. Let me prepare our food as usual, am', I will
not refuse to partake of it this morning at kast."
Margaret earnestly asked—
"Are you sure you will take your portion.? • You
know that as long as I have anything to. share with
You, neither you nor Grief shall want."
"I know it, Margaret, and I thank you more deeply
than words may express; but after this morning I will
not trespass upon your kindness. I must find other
Work that pays better than the needle. An idea
occurred to me as I sat here in the darkness last night.
You remember the sketches and poems which I have
sometimes amused Grief by reading aloud? They were
written in happier days, and I will select from them
such as I think best) and offer them to the editors
of some of the numerous periodicals in this city. Some
of them pay what to me would now seem a large sum for
such work, and I may chance to get enough to keep
ns from starving till my boy recovers, or enough to
Pay for his coffin and a decent grave in the country,
for I could not bear to have him buried where there is
00 sunshine, no waving trees to make music above his
last resting-place."
"Do not speak of the child's death, Mrs. Gordon, I
have hopes of him still. There is life, much life, in the
darling little fellow yet."
The mother glanced hopelessly toward her sick son,
and an expression of passionate anguish swept over
her face, as she said—
" Yes, there is life enough to be fanned back into
a vital flame, if I had a moiety of the wealth that
Should be freely poured out for him. In this
miserable place—with no comforts, no aid—my little
lad will go down to darkness and the grave! Then
"ill I seek him, and hurl my wretchedness upon
him!"

The expression of Mrs. Gordon's passionate sorrow
as interrupted by the awakening .of Margaret's
Mother, who was blind, and nearly 'helpless. She
could not walk, but she had perfect use of her hands,
and darkened as her sight was, she added a trifle to
the common stock by knitting fancy articles in Berlin
Wool; she excelled in the variety and beauty of her
Patterns, and such was the delicacy of her touch that
she selected her colours wirh unerring skill. At
times she was peevish, and particularly apt to be so
When just aroused from sleep; she sharply asked:
"What is the matter, Margaret? What is all this
going on about? Has anything happened? Is Grief
dead?"
" No, mother; Grief is still sleeping. Mrs. Gordon
is grieving over his condition—that is all."
"And well she may, poor thing—well she may,
though the lad is going from her to a better father
than Shell ever find for him on earth. But it's nature
for the mother's heart to grieve when death comes to
grasp her darling. Ah, me I know what it is, for
I've felt it more than once. Death took from me all
My strong, healthy boys and left me only one delicate
girl, who had no choice but to become a lace-worker,,
as her mother was before her, to wear out her eye-
sight—as I have done, and live in darkness the last
half of her existence."
Mrs. Gordon turned from the fire which was just
beginning to burn, and gazed wistfully at the worn
and wrinkled face of the speaker. She went toward
her, tenderly lifted her in her arms, and placed a
pillow at her back, while her daughter arranged the
bed-clothes around her in such a manner as to protect
her body from the biting coldness of the atmosphere.
She said in broken tones—
" Mrs. Seyton, Grief is my only one, and. he lies
before me, stricken—stricken—even unto death."
"Is it so bad with the lad as that? Must the
tender bud perish, while the withered and sapless
branch remains? How is it with the lad,• Margaret?
His mother is easily alarmed for him, but you can
judge calmly."
"lie sleeps quietly, mother, and I trust that he will
awake stronger than he was last evening," replied the
girl, with cautious regard to her mother's feelings.
"You hear, Margaret herself dares not give hope.
My pretty lad—my bright promising child must perish,
because I have not the means of saving him from the
grave that want and misery are digging for him."
Even as she spoke there was a feeble motion in the
bed of the child, and a faint voice asked for water.
His mother sprang to his side, and Margaret held a
cup to his lips. /is the boy's head was lifted from
the pillow, it revealed a noble and intellectual out-
line, and the attenuated features were of a rare order
of beauty. His hair lay in matted rings above his
broad brow, and the eyes which lifted their weary
lids were of the deep azure of the midnight sky—they
were like the eyes into whose passionate depths
Madeline had looked in the days of love and hope;
and she almost shrank from the tender look which
brought back that vivid dream of happiness which
made the solitary thread of gold in her blighted life.
"My love, my precious darling, are you better this
morning ?" she tenderly inquired.
"I am nearer to Heaven, mother, and that is
better ;" and a bright smile flashed over the sunken
features. The mother involuntarily clasped him
Closer to her heart.
"Do not talk Urns, my child. I cannot bear it. It
takes away the little courage I have left to hear you
Speak in this manner."
"Poor mamma, I know you will cry for your little
Grief until the shining angel makes you know that he
has become your little Joy. In my dream last night
went away with him, and he bore me in his arms
orer what he told me was the silent river; its waters
were deep and clear, but so still they did not seem to
move, though a soft air was blowing all the while."
"Yes, my child, these waters were motionless, be-
cause they are formed by the tears wrung from the
bereaved hearts of earth-born mortals; the air that
breathes above them, of their sighs."
• "But oh, mother, if those who weep could look
beyond that dark river, and see what was shown me
in my dream, they would no longer mourn. I saw
little children sporting among beautiful trees, and
they were crowned with the flowers that grew in
every nook. They sang in chorus, and, as their
voices died away, a bright angel came into their midst.
He spoke sweetly to them, and I thought I heard him
repeat what Mrs. Seyton has so often read to me since
I have been ill, 'Suffer little children to come unto me,
for of such is the kingdom of heaven.'"
"And you are ready to go to him, nY darling? To
leave me here desolate—desolate ?"
"Dear mother, to leave this cold, dismal room for
that beautiful place would be best. You would then
no longer have me to work for, for I know that I am
a great burden to you."
Thus spoke this child, mature beyond his years, to
the breaking heart to which he was held. His mother
had called him her Grief in the first dark days of her
sorrow, but he had wound himself into her affections
until he had become the hope of her life.
The rare gifts, the uncommon beauty of her child,
attracted all who looked on him; and the sad heart
of the forsaken mother admitted bright hopes for
him in the future. She vaguely dreamed that the
Pay wouict come in winch he would be proudly
claimed by the father who had tacitly cast him off
and rejected him.
Gifted herself with imagination, fancy and poetic
talent of a fair order, Madeline assiduously cultivated
the precocious intellect which brightened daily
beneath her fond care. Born herself in an obscure
village, she had enjoyed only such opportunities of
education as are there affordedto the families of those
not too liberally endowed withilis world's goods,but a
natural taste for literature prompted her to devote her
hours of leisure to the cultivation of her mental
powers. Time proved her to be one of those unfortu-
nate children of geuius before whom no future suited
to their capacities ever opens. The anguish of a great
and overwhelming sorrow had first unsealed this
portion of her being, and the country girl knew that
she had the gift of poesy. She poured forth
strains that would have touched the universal hi cart,
for they came fresh from her own, crushed and
bleeding—but not debased; but none of them saw the
light. Those which most vividly pourtrayed her own
state of feeling were destroyed, lest the eye of
another should read and comprehend that bitterness
"with which the stranger intermeddleth not:"
In the old trunk which contained almost her whole
belongings there were a number of prose sketches,
and snatches of song on familiar themes, in which
sentiment or sorrow had no part, and it was to these
she had referred in her eonversation with Margaret,
as a means of obtaining money to sustain herself and
her child. •

CHAPTER XIV
FAITH.

Alns. Szrrox was a Nottin hamshirs

AWSll.ti AL-1014

humble birth, and her family for several generations

had been lace-workers.

After the death of her hus-

band and four sons, the temptation of good work and

higher wages induced her to remove with her young
daughter to London. Here her expenses were so
much greater than in her native village that little
was gained by the exchange, except that Margaret
obtained a fair education. Mrs. Seyton's sight had
long been failing, and the successive losses she wept

ove-r with passionate grief, caused its complete loss.
She became totally blind, and this affliction was
speedily followed by paralysis of the lower limbs.

Thus Margaret was -compelled to apply herself to her
mother's trade as a means of living.
At first, the life of Mrs. Seyton was an inex-
pressible bitterness and weariness to her, and she re-
belled against the fate which had laid her aside, a
darkened, helpless cripple; but soon the abiding faith
of her soul arose triumphant even above this
affliction, and she turned her active mind towards the

possibility of assisting in supporting herself.
With fingers skilled in the delicacy of touch neces-
sary to a lace-worker, she was speedily able to distin-
guish colours by passing her hand over them, and she
commenced knitting articles in Berlin wool. The
exquisite combinations she had once imitated with her
bobbins, she now re-produced from memory, and
wrought articles which were readily purchased by
dealers in fancy goods. Four years had passed since
this calamity fell on her, and the blind widow and her
daughter had managed to live without appealing to the
aid of charity.
When Madeline Gordon came on her wild quest to
London, she wandered from lodging to lodging, each
one poorer than the last, as the money she had brutight
with her melted away. Accident made her known to
Margaret Seyton, and she became a joint tenant of the
little room occupied by herself and her mother. Her
stay was to be temporary, but soon the four forlorn
creatures became so strongly attached to each other,
that all thought of parting was abandoned.
While Margaret worked at her bobbins, and Made-
line made shirts, by which a pittance was gained that
barely enabled to keep her son and herself above want,
the little Grief would sit upon the bed of the blind
woman and read aloud to her from the Bible, or from
the "Pilgrim's Progress," and Doddridge's "Rise and
Progress," three books which the widow prized above
their weight in gold.
This tranquil though poverty- stricken life was
broken by the restlessness of the boy and his deter-
mination to do something toward taking care of him-
self. There was no opening for a friendless lad like
himself, save one—with a trifling capital he could
start as a newsboy. With many tears and misgivings,
his mother saw him start on his new career, but his
success in the first week gave her confidence in his
ability to win his way slowly but surely to a better
position in life.
All her hopes were dashed by his illness. Exposure,
to which he was unaccustomed, brought on an attack
of pneumonia, which ended in a permanent affection of
the lungs, and the bright, promising boy was stricken
with hopeless disease.
Then all the misery of her position came home to
the agonised mother's heart. Her resources were
exhausted, and she was in the midst of that most
heartless, soulless place—the modern Babylon, with-
out a home, without friends who could aid her in her
need. _ _ _

While her money lasted she had advertised and
inquired in every direction for Harold Gordon, Artist.
She wrote again and again to the same address, hn-
ploring aid for her child, for the noble and gifted
creature who might be rescued from death, to become
an ornament and a pride to that family to which he
rightfully belonged.
These appeals, written with all the pathos of a
breaking heart, could not, of course, reach the person
for whom they were intended. Like thousands of
others penned with the same failing hopes, the same
faltering despair, they were sent to the dead letter
office, to be tossed over by some careless official, and
thrown amid the blazing pile of perished hopes and
wasted efforts.
The breakfast, which consisted of a few potatoes,
and a cup of hot coffee, without milk, and with very
little sugar, was soon prepared. Margaret brought
forth a small loaf of bread, from which she cut a slice
for her mother, and another for the sick child; but
when it was offered to him, with a portion of the coffee,
he turned from them with an expression of disgust.
All his mother's entreaties would only induce him to
swallow a few morsels, which were evidently unpala-
table to him.

"My darling, what could you eat? Tell me;
perhaps—perhaps I may be able to get something
better for you. Speak, my own, and let me know
what you would like."
"I wish I had some grapes, mother; and something
to hold me up—l mean something to keep away this
feeling of sick faintness, that makes me think some-
times that I am dying."
"You need wine; and you shall have it, and the
grapes too, my precious boy."
The large, eager eyes of the lad sparkled with mo•
mentary brightness, and then the joyful expression
faded. He glanced around the miserable room and
said— _ _

"I believe I can do without them, mother. I know
you cannot get them for me without pinching your-
self, and you give me too much from your earnings
now." _