A New Year's Shrine

A NEW YEAR'S SHRINE. (concluded) BY SUSA YOUNG GATES. "Well, well, well! Late again, my dear. Can't be helped, even on Christmas. Here, daughter, put that parcel up. Here, ray dear, there's the holly-berries you asked for; rather late, but maybe they'll do." A brusk breeze seemed eddying through the whole house with the incoming of the master. Doors opened, and shut; steps echoed and swung into every corner of the quiet walls. Up and down, over and around, the air of every room quivered with expectation. ' 'Come on, all hands ready for New Year's dinner. Here we are. Coming, daughter? We're waiting." The dishes even seemed electrified with the current of energy that snapped and twanged on every wave of vibrant air. "A letter from my son? Just arrived? Well, bring it, let's have it now. Wait till after dinner? Oh, well, I don't mind. Come along, then, dinner, dinner!" And the dinner found itself eaten and discussed and praised and appreciated to the full. But it was not till after they were all again upstairs in the sitting-room that the real New Year's spirit seemed ripe and full. And then the good man found his slippers and jacket, the daughter drew her lowest stool to the father's feet, while she gently caressed his hand. ' 'Now, my dear, read the boy's letter. Another letter from your old flame in England? Well, I'll declare. He's a queer chap. Is it all right, you say, daughter, for him to write? Sure. Why not? It pleases him and don't hurt your mother nor me. Let him fire away; relieves the pressure. Read on." The lady opened and read the first letter. It was from her son:

A NEW YEAR'S SHRINE. 297 Dear Mother: — The letter ran. I am planning to have this letter reach you on New Year's Day, if only winds and waves and Western snow-drifts will not hinder me in this effort. 1 can see you all there at home, father busy every moment, and with scarcely time to eat his New Year's dinner! Sister — is she getting prettier, mother? Yet how could she do that — I see sister's eyes dance as she watches you open this poor letter of mine. I shall see her all that or this day busy within and without, living the strenuous American life to the very limit. I wish you would stop and kiss her sweet blue eyes for me right here ! Done ! And you mother — I am so glad always that there is one safe, peaceful retreat in our home, mother — it is your love. I watch you in my thoughts moving about, never in a hurry, never in a worry. I say, father, we're lucky to have mother about, arn't we? Dear old dad! I would regret my work here, and consequently absence from home just as I was qualified to get into active business life, if it were not for the fact that I feel, somehow, that all my powers and capacities are being strengthened and deepened by this experience. I had hoped, father, to make life a little easier for you ; but here I am — The mother paused in her reading and wiped her eyes softly. The father said with unusual quiet softness: "That's a great boy!" And when I do get home, father, we'll shake up every dry bone on the western hills of Salt Lake ! How was it, mother, that you turned down that fine old English gentleman, Mr. Rich, or, as he is now known. Lord Bateman, for a poor man like father? I told you about his rescuing us from his infuriated peasants. He tried to persuade me to drop my present occupation and go to Cambridge and study law. Failing that, he offered to keep me here the rest of my life : make me his heir, and educate me to any profession I liked. When I smiled in reply to this, and said ' 'father lives in America," he looked gravely at me, and murmured, "His mother's son!" But I tell you he's been kind to me and my companions. We "were obliged to be almost rude in order to get away from the luxury with which he would surround us, and to be at our own business. I have not been down to the old gentleman's — The mother slightly gasped at this appellation for her ancient lover. It is strange how a word may envelop the common things of life, with a soft veil of tender romance, and another word shall tear the veil away, exposing all the poor, threadbare outlines of the everyday passion. But she read on, I have not been down to the old gentleman's for several months, as you know. I have just received a letter from him asking me to come up and spend the holidays with him. I am going to take my camera and send you views of the estate. His older brother died twenty years ago, unmarried, and this old gentleman succeeded

298 IMPROVEMENT ERA. to the estate. It is a grand old place, as big as a cattle ranch, with a whole village as a part of the belongings. Great bunches of timber are scattered here and there in the park, as they call it here, with antelopes and rabbits wandering about under the immense oak trees. Hunting here in Europe is about the same as if we would go out and punish tame calves on a ranch; to add to the cruelty, a lot of yelping dogs crowd around the poor hare or gazelle, and make it an absolute coldblooded butchery to kill the tender-eyed, hunted creature. I asked your friend if he had ever hunted here, after living in America. He gave me one of his queer, gentle stares, and answered, "I have hunted buffalo, can I stab a deer?" So that was the reason the deer were so thick in his "preserves," as they call it. The castle itself is very old — that is, part of it. The east side of it is all in ruins, and is grovrn over with luxuriant English ivy. On the south and west is a very large and comfortable house or castle, with fifty or sixty rooms. You would be surprised, no doubt, as I was, to find so many of these old castles and palaces built of cobble rock. Yes, cobbles, all roughly set, and no attempt to plaster or beautify them on the outside. But the solid, splendid architecture of them, with the miles of sweeping parks and sloping hills wooded with the finest of old timber, makes these castles beautiful indeed. Inside they are not up to our standard of comfort, although there are countless treasures everywhere. But hardly any of them have what these poor Americans think are our necessities : viz. , electric lights, modern bath rooms, up-to-date plumbing, telephones, brass beds, easy chairs or rockers, and conveniences for women. Mother thinks her house lacks conveniences and is rambling. Why, when we went over this gentleman's hcuse, I didn't wonder he needed a small army of seiTants to take care of it. The kitchen was as big as our whole basement !" "Well, that's the first clear idea I have had of your remarkable sweetheart's place, " interrupted the father with a sigh of content. The bed chambers are the quaintest things possible. The beds are all canopied and curtained; talk about a stuffy palace car — why they ar'n't in it compared with these closed-in sepulchres. But your old friend hasn't forgotten you, a little bit, mother. And it really touched me to the core to see this life of quaint old romance lived in this busy nineteenth century. He loves old things, old habits and old friends. He says that is the reason he has refused to have a telephone set in his castle. He hates the thoughts of the wires and poles, the bells and the confusion. He took me up to his own suite of rooms, and I tell you they're great. Talk about elegance ! Why the furnishings of one room would buy all our whole place, almost a whole Salt Lake City block. Old tapestries, carved mantles, beams across the ceilings, exquisite paintings and priceless old silver and crystal, were everywhere. I have got on to these things here through inquiry and reading guide books, and I find that our mutual friend's castle is one of the richest and oldest in England. He has changed only one thing since he was here, he told me, and that is in his own room; he has had book shelves put into his private sitting room, so

A NEW YEAR'S SHRINE. 299 that he can sit and study there, instead of going down into the great catacomb of a library, downstairs. He is a great student, and writes for a number of literary and philosophical societies. I asked him once if he was working to elevate humanity with all his literary toil. He stared at me in his gentle way, and said, after a pause, that all work was beneficial to humanity. But he doesn't understand life as I do, or he would get out and get a hustle on him, and tear down the shabby cottages in his village, and put in plumbing and sanitary regulations everywhere. When he offered to make me his heir, I asked him what he would do with his property when he came to die, in case I refused. He answered me with a very calm, contented expression, that the law took care of all that, and his heirs would, no doubt, be quite prepared for the responsibility. Think of a man calmly waiting for money to pile up and go to the other fellow, unused at his death. He invited me into his own chamber, and sending, the valet out, he led me to the round-towered window which ran up through this room. Over the entrance to the circular recess hung a heavy plum-colored, velvet curtain. He told me he had enshrined here his "Living Saint !" I expected, of course, to see his mother's picture. But when he slowly drew aside the curtain, right between the two tower windows, hung a full length picture of you. It was painted years ago from an old daguerreotype which you gave him, and the dress had been described to the painter by himself. It was quite striking, the likeness, only I think it looks almost more like Sis than like you. When I told him that, he made me tell him all about sister. But when I happened to mention some of sister's vigorous methods of thought and work, he shook his head and said, ' 'She may look like your mother, but she has not your mother's disposition." He hit it pretty close, eh? Well, now, I hope to go down theve into Leicestershire for the holidays. Of course, I can't send you any gifts this Holiday season, but I do send my love, my whole, my very self goes out to you all ! The little family group all breathed a sigh of happy content when the good letter from the absent son was finished. They sat silent for a time, gazing into the fire, and each busy with his own thoughtAt last the restless husband and father said briskly, ' 'Daughter, bring your father the Christmas paper. I have had no chance at all to see what's in it." The girl rose quickly, and in a moment she had laid across his knees the brilliant covered, heavy sheets of good cheer. As she laid it down, she said tentatively, "Daddy, ain't you going to listen to the letter from mother's old beau? She has waited to read it to us." "Yes, yes, to be sure, of course. Fire away, mother, let's hear what he has to say for himself."

300 IMPROVEMENT ERA. And with reluctant fingers, he laid his paper down, keeping it open, however, at an interesting page. My Dear Lady : — [the letter read] It seems very unreal to me to sit here in sight of your lovely, enshrined face, and to write to you as if you were still in the living land. To me you are always what you were thirty years ago, and it is thus that my spirit communes with yours. Yet am I brought to realize the changing years, when I look at a bit of pasteboard which your son has just forwarded to me. It is still my living saint, my lady fair, yet — lips and eyes have mellowed by the saddening hand of time and hard weather. You write me that you are very happy and content. I can believe that ! You could not be otherwise; for your very being emanates light and peace, as does a marbled sanctuary, through which the sun's hot rays are cooled and soothed to tender radiance. I look at this strange You, and then at my familiar, long-loved You which hangs upon my wall, and — will the father of youi' son forgive me such loving blasphemy? — I say, lo, he hath the You of Now, but to me belongs the You of Then. My You, my Lady fair, lives still for me, as bright, as calmly beautiful as when, just thirty years come New Year's Eve, her sweet blue eyes last looked in mine and bade me calm good by! Some daj', somewhere, that You I'll claim! I leave to him, your children's father, all his part, I only claim my own! The lady paused, and the young girl looked up in her father's face, which was just now wearing a somewhat puckered smile, and said, "Well, Daddy, where do you and I fit into that scheme?" The smile deepened into a very genuine laugh, as the father replied, "I don't know as it matters, child.. The old gentleman's welcome to your mother's picture and to his imaginations. So long as she makes our mince pies and keeps our house cozy, we are happy, and so he seems to be. We're all suited. " The lady's expression was a mixed one. ' 'Why, my dear, ' ' she said, ' 'is my only value in your eyes that of a good housekeeper?" "Now, mother! you know well enough what I mean. Your old beau has the shadow, I have the substance. Can't I afford to be generous?" Then, seeing the little perplexed frown still on her face, he added, "My dear, my dear! Do you want me to begin my old age by being jealous of you? Pshaw! I couldn't be if I tried! You have never given me the shadow of a cause. I might not trust the Englishman, but I am quite sure of you!"

■ A NEW YEAR'S SHRINE. 301 And he leaned over and patted the still shapely hand lying on her knees. The frown left the lady's face, and she took up the letter to finish its reading: I hope this letter will reach you on or near the New Year's Day, for I would call to your memory the three New Years' I spent in your Western city; all spent neath your mother's roof. She was always so kind to the poor wanderer. And I shared your somewhat scanty holiday cheer each recurring season. What difficult days some of those days were. They are as a long-past dream to me now. Do you recall the very last New Year's Eve I spent in your house? Your mother was trying to prepare some fowls for the oven, and you were busy at her elbow. It was your duty to fill the firebox with wood, and that poor wood was the grey-green sagebrush from your own grey-green hills. How pungent the smell, how difficult the burning process ! Once, when your face was rosy red from pushing in the stiff, unyielding boughs, you said, quite sharply for you, "I'll never do this when I am rich !' ' Do you remember how I seized your hand and said, so eagerly, so eagerly, although the joke was poor, "You can be rich tomorrow, if you'll but say the word!" Your mother laughed. Ah, how she laughed; for she was always full of gaiety and fun. But you! No years will rob my bitter memory of how you looked. The sharp disgust that mantled every feature of your lovely face cankered my very soul. Never before, in all my former friendly intercourse, had such a look come over your face in my presence. And I had inspired it with my idle raillery. I left your city that night, never more to return. And yet — when now my memory paints the scene, there is no anger left — nothing but a brief, shadowy pity for the proud lad who fought his way from poverty and blighted lover back to home and a passive memory. And now that past has surged back with swift, recurring waves of memory. And out of all the debris of what was, and what might have been, some thoughts stand out with painful outlines. What has my past given me, and what has it taken away? Who can tell ! I have been but a dreamer; mayhap I should have done no better in your busy, bustling West. There must be dreams, else would there be no realities. But now, as mine eyes travel the backward road, I find no visible evidence of all that my past has meant to me. . Perhaps I should not have had this thought but for the look I saw once in your son's eyes! Ah well, one can always begin over — is not that your own hopeful doctrine? And so, here in this unfriendly land of mine, I have chosen to crystallize the vague memories and thoughts, the vividly remembered love of my life and all its consequent pain. Your son would not accept my offer of home and heirship, and that somewhat troubled me. Yet could I understand ! These hearts of ours — these loves — these hates — the very I and You — what comes to them with Death! I know what you would say, but my soul finds no answer that can satisfy. Have You, have I endured and joyed in other bodies? Loved in other lives? Or did that You I love so well begin its sweet existence scarce half a century ago? And will my You go on to other forms or other lives?

302 IMPROVEMENT ERA. These solemn questions hannt me with a thousand brooding eyes. 'Tis no avail to ask your pictured face nor any minister. For whatever answer comes, my soul refuses acquiescence. These are my daily ghosts which rise and walk with me in starlight or beneath the mid-day glare. Sometimes a breath of far-off peace broods o'er my restless spirit, and folding wings of calm belief brings rest and happiness. And then my ghosts are clothed upon with rosy flesh, their draperies float out with sweet abandon, and they stretch out dear waiting arms to take me close. Yet, when I spring to their embrace, the rosy, misty cloud-shape which seemed of very solid substance, melts and pours a stream of icy doubt in every crevice of my being ! And so I live from day to day ! Thus, when your son looked in my eyes with his young manhood's question of what my life had done for me, or him, or great humanity, I could not find reply. My ghosts were skeletons, and in a row they stood, and shook their very bones with horrid laughter at my quick dismay. But I have exorcised them — for a time, at least. And now, I fain would show you what my answer is. But I was ever poor and lame at giving details ; you must fill in my outlines or wait until your son comes down to see and tell, and then the heights and depths, the squares and circles of this crystallized fancy of mine will — I warrant you — be amply told and pictured ; measured and described by this bright young American son. Yet, first, dear My Lady, give me your hand and let me conduct you to My Lady's Shrine. Thy feet hath never trodden any land but Utah's vales. If thou couldst travel to the far-off Orient, thou wouldst find a mighty poem, an exquisite mausoleum built in pure, white marble by an East Indian lover to his dead love. Those beauteous walls and minarets, of the lovely Taj Mahal have been the marvel of the centuries. None but a prince, and he of fabulous wealth, could so erect a fitting shrine for adoring love. Yet his faithful affection belongs to every age, finds echo in a thousand hearts, in every land and clime. I stood before your picture and silently communed with you. I told you of my wish that I might in some form embody all that you have been to me. At first your face looked cold and still ;and then methought your eyes grew like your son's, and clearly questioned me about this life's utilities. I tried to argue or to show you where a thought, a love, a pure impulse, can always bless and beautify. But still that questioning look, that silent, constant inquiry — . And therefore, have I builded thee a Shrine. A simple, modest shrine as Thou wouldst choose. And lo — instead of shaping it like a sepulchre, I chose to make it as a church. 'Tis not a place for grief nor mourning, but a sanctuary where love, and hope, and, mayhap, faith, may come and bring their benediction. My peasants eyes have started from the sockets with fearsome awe to see an English gentleman so lost to science, art and culture. For this Shrine, which is a church, is built and will be given to the Faith, so new and strange, which claims my Lady's trust and deep allegiance. Your son will give you all dimensions. Bu^ let me lead you down the long green lane to where the village clusters like a crowded bunch of grapes upon a slender stem. Just at the edge, you turn about, and, bowered in a dozen stately trees, this little edifice is reared. 'Tis like our

A NEW YEAR'S SHRINE. 303 English churches, do you say? and yet the quaint New England primness, which I copied from your own Utah, creates a sad bewilderment in rustic minds. My architect would add a tower or two, and put the entrance in a comer; but come within ! You see there is no chancel rail, no nave, no fretted scrolls, no dizzy pulpit steps. Just simple seats and plenty of them on a platform raised, and railed off from the congregation. One luxury I fain would have. You will forgive — and understand ! Look up to that long window whose radiant colors blend like flowered field of dew and beauty. You see my shrined Saint. No wings, no aureole, mars the tender, pure conception of a sainted human woman. Do you catch that heavenly peace that radiates from every fold of her pure, white drapery, and is centered in that dream-like, exquisite face? 'Tis You, the You that I have loved through all these years. Forever young, forever beautiful? The artist has shaded all his background with rarest opalescent tints which blend with green sward and blue sky like sound-rays of richest harmony. Divinely tall and most divinely fair she stands, my Lady ! And what of strife or evil may dare to enter that sweet presence. No canoned saint was e'er so pure, so fair, or half so dearly worshiped. No one will guess my secret except your clear-eyed boy, and he will understand ! This is my New Year gift to life and love and You. For it will do and say the things I dream and long for. It is my great earth-passion, purified and sanctified of gross and carnal elements. As such I pray you to accept it. Your son will dedicate it unto God, as is your people's custom; but I — ah ghost, dear ghost of doubt and half-belief, I can but dedicate my shrine to my own Lady Love ! And if, in some half-waking moments in thy chamber walls, thou feelest thy spirit slip its leash and fly across the seas, my heart will meet you, and conduct you to this shrine, where fealty and love have crystallized a dream into my Lady's dearly loved Utility. I shall never see thy face on earth again ! But when my soul has freed itself from this poor clay, I shall request one thing of my strange heirs: I wish my body buried 'neath the jewelled window in this church, so that My Lady's eyes will ever rest above my heart, and thus bestow the benediction of a peace this earth denied to me. And all the ghosts which haunt my daily footsteps will flee at thy dear smile. For even as I write this letter— here within the chapel walls— I feel a peace and restful joy that hath not soothed my soul for years. Your son will be here New Year's Day. I trust this letter reaches you upon that day. And as you read it, try to see us gathered here within these walls. Your son shall offer prayer and song of praise. The poor bewildered villagers will gape and stare, but chance it, some may stay to pray and praise . The letter ended, and the lady looked up to her small audience. The daughter sat with her hands clasped over her knees, looking pensively into the fire. The father had fallen asleep, with his paper across his lap. The lady rose, and, going to the desk, she put her letters

304 IMPROVEMENl ERA. away. Then passing by the window, she looked out at the soft, falling snow, to which her long-ago lover had compared herself. ''Violets grow under the snow," she murmured. "Roses blush, and bloom, and all nature springs to life and love anew from its white winter's sleep. The snow is but a kindly vail which hides all nature's scars and blemishes; and human hearts must have some covering, like the snow, to hide their deepest sanctuaries." The lady turned to look within the room. Her eyes were wet with dews of love as her gaze rested on her daughter's lovely face. And then she looked at him — her daughter's father! Weary, bustling, patient toiler! The hands which drooped upon the printed page were rough with toil. He was too tired, even on a New Year's Day, to listen to a lover's tale of faithful love for his own wife! His busy life lay all before her — incomplete, but full of high ambitions. And now she could but know that time would give no further opportunities to finish half the plans and hopes that, like home in which she dwelt, had towered up so grandly when begun. The lover in his English castle stood before her eyes. The lover who could love a shadow woman; one who looked on life from painted canvas, or from opal-tinted, jeweled window. The daughter came to her mother at the window, and the two stood, with arms about each other, looking into the white gloom of the snowy night. ' 'Such a love as that, ' ' said the girl in low tones, * 'will surely sanctify and bless both builder and the shrine. ' ' The lady laid her head upon her daughter's brown tresses, lovingly, and with a sense of peace and pure happiness. "You would not exchange father, even for a castle and an earl, would you, mother mine?" the girl asked. "I am your father's wife for time and all eternity. And he is one of God's own noblemen. Our castle waits us over There! But with some mystic tie, we'll hold the far-off English friend, and make him welcome to our heavenly home." And the snow beat with soft, noiseless fingers against the window glass, while earth and mountain drank in with eager thirst the sweet hope of spring flowers and summer fruitage. And so the New Year closed in upon them all! Salt Lake City, Utah.