was he, this James, and what faith had Aunt Pat that one day joy would come in the morning?
She thought of her own life, blighted right at the start. Would there be joy, too, in some morning for a life like hers that had found a lover false-hearted?
The old lady spoke.
“I’d like to have what’s left of me put here when I am gone!” she said, laying a hand on Sherrill’s arm. “There’s plenty of room. It doesn’t matter, of course; only it is pleasanter to think of being here than up under that great Catherwood monument at Laurel Hill. They can put my name there if they like, but I’ll lie here. It’ll be nice to think of getting up together in the morning.”
“Dear Aunt Patty!” said Sherrill, struggling with a constriction in her throat.
“I’ve put it all in my will, of course, and the stone’s been made ready, just ‘Patricia’ and the date. But I thought I’d like somebody that belonged to me to understand.”
“Of course!” said Sherrill tenderly, catching her breath and trying to steady her voice. “But—you’re not going yet, dear—not for a long time. You wouldn’t leave me—alone!”
“Why, certainly not!” snapped the old lady with one of her quiet grins. “I’ve got to look after you for a spell yet. Come on, let’s walk around. We don’t want a lot of people staring at us. There’s no need for them to know we’re interested in just one grave. Let’s walk around the church. There are some curious stones there, very old. James and I found them that day and talked about them. And there’s a view—look! Away off to the hills! I think it’s a lovely spot!”
“It is indeed,” answered Sherrill, and almost envied her aunt for the joyous look on her face. How she had taken her sorrow and glorified it! Sherrill wondered if she, in like situation, could have risen to such heights, and felt how impossible it would have been for her. Felt how crushed she was by this her own sorrow, which she recognized at once was so much less than what the old lady had borne for years unmurmuring, and said again to herself that there must have been some sustaining Power greater than herself, or human weakness—even human strength—never could have borne it.
There was something glorified in the rest of that day. Sherrill felt that she had been allowed a glimpse into an inner sanctuary of a soul, and life could never again be the trivial, superficial thing that it had seemed to her before.
Aunt Pat was very tired and slept a great part of the afternoon, but in the evening she came down to the living room and sat before a lovely fire that Gemmie had kindled for them. She made Sherrill play all the old hymns she used to love. It brought tears to hear the quavering voice that still had a note of sweetness in it, wavering through a verse here and there, and Sherrill, trying to sing with her felt her own voice breaking.
Yet there was nothing gloomy about the old lady that night, and presently she was joking again in her snappy bright way, for all the world like a young thing, and Sherrill’s heart was less heavy. Aunt Pat wasn’t going away to leave her. Not now anyway.
Chapter 16
Sherrill needn’t have worried about her aunt, for the old lady was up the next morning chipper as a bird, eating her breakfast with a relish.
“We’re going to see Lutie’s mother right away,” she said. “We’ve got to get that family straightened out before we plan to do anything for ourselves.”
“Oh, that will be wonderful!” said Sherrill, who had arisen this morning with a great pall over life. Since there was no immediate action necessary, she could not get hold of anything in which she was interested. But to help another household who were all in trouble intrigued her. It didn’t occur to her either to realize that the canny old lady was wisely arranging to fill her days too full for her to brood over the past.
So they went to the neat little house where Lutie lived. Sherrill was amazed to see how attractive the little weather-beaten house had been made. There was lack of paint on its ugly clapboards, lack of grace in all its lines, lack of beauty in its surroundings, for there were slovenly neighbors all about and a great hideous dump not far away to mar what otherwise might have