The Spirit of the Lilies

The Spirit of the Lilies By Elizabeth Cannon Porter

When Ben Davis returned from his wife's funeral, a drizzling spring rain was falling. It seemed that he had suffered so much the last few days since Elsie died, that he had turned numb with misery. He had braced himself for the ordeal of the services that afternoon, yet strangely enough instead of fresh torture, he had derived some comfort from them. The hushed audience, the peal of the organ in Chopin's funeral march, the mellow tones of the tenor that floated out in the beautiful words of "Come to Me," all vaguely soothed him. The stand was banked with Easter lilies and the young speaker, who had a high spiritual forehead from which his hair curled back gracefully, took his text from them. He said that the body consigned to the earth was like the bulb of the lily, planted in the earth; that it would rise in the hereafter purified and beautified just as the lily blossomed at Easter. Somehow, that idea helped sustain Ben through the ghastly obsequies at the cemetery. When they lowered the casket there were three inches of water in the grave. The hand of Elsie's father shook as he held the umbrella over her gray- haired mother, who wept pitifully. As he stepped out of the automobile on his return, the chill wind whistled around him and made him shiver. He doggedly set his face toward the big house which, since his wife's departure, seemed like a body without a soul. As he went up the path, he noticed the yellow and lavender crocuses, harbingers of spring, and thought how Elsie would have loved them. Davis thought that he had suffered so much, the last few days, that he couldn't suffer any more, yet at the door, fresh calamity awaited him. The nurse met him in the hall. "The baby is ill, sir. Dr. Brant has been here and said that he would look in again before morning." "What seems to be the matter?" "The food disagrees with him and he has fever." Davis went in and bent over the crib. His first feeling, on seeing his new born son several days before, had been one of resentment that this red, wriggling mite had cost the life of his great, splendid girl. Elsie, of the chestnut hair and damask cheek, had always reminded him of an American Beauty Rose.

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She was a queen among women as it was a queen among flowers. Yet, because of that pink morsel, she lay like a magnificent figure, carved in alabaster, stilled forever. When told that there was nothing that he could do, he went to the dining room. He scarcely touched the food, so aware was he of the empty place at the other side of the table, where Elsie had presided so radiantly. He wandered discon- solately through the house, yet each room held its pain. In the drawing room, on the piano, the music was opened to the "Little Grey Home in the West," that his wife sometimes sang to him. In the library, on the table beside her flower bowl, lay the last book she had read, French Chateaus. In the ingle nook by the fireplace lay her sewing basket, with the little half- finished garment in it just as she had laid it down. Upstairs the door of her room was closed, and he avoided it as a Blue- beard's chamber, but when he opened a closet in the bath room, Elsie's yellow silk kimona fluttered out at him. For a moment he thought he would strangle. Then he went to the head of the stairs. Life before him stretched like a drear, gray desert, with nothing in it. As he stood there, an infant's wail was wafted up to him. He hurried down. "How is he?" he asked. "Seems worse," Miss Adams answered tersely. Davis bent over the crib. He felt the little hot head, then the tiny hand; as he did so, the tendrils of fingers, clutched his. When he tried to withdraw it, it only clung tighter. So he drew his chair up and sat down. As a dam will go out before mighty waters, so it seemed that the floodgates of his heart were opened by the clutch of that little hand, and he felt that he could pray again. At the imminence of losing the child, he realized what he meant. His price was above rubies; he had cost the life of his — mother. He had his life-work laid out for him to rear Elsie's — child to manhood such a man-child as Elsie would want. Per- haps he would be like his mother! Paternal pride also welled up in him. He had a son to be a companion to him, to bear his name and carry on his work where he laid it down. Fer- — — vently he prayed, prayed as he had not been able to since Elsie shrieked in pain, that the little life might be spared him, and that he be not left desolate a second time. Silently all night the strong man sat there. The nurse came and went with her duties. Two, three, four, o'clock struck, and Davis felt that he anchored the little soul to earth by grim faith. Just be- fore daylight, the doctor came. He laid his case of instruments on the table and warmed himself at the fire place before he went over to the tiny patient. After a careful examination, he