 Chapter 17 of Sewing and Reaping by Francis E. W. Harper This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 17. I'm sorry, very sorry, said Belle Gordon as a shadow of deep distress flitted over her pale sad face. She was usually cheerful and serene in her manner, but now it seemed as if the very depths of her soul had been stirred by some mournful and bitter memory. Your question was so unexpected. And, and what, said Paul, in a tone of sad expectancy, so unwelcome. It was so sudden I was not prepared for it. I do not, said Paul, ask an immediate reply. Give yourself ample time for consideration. Mr. Clifford, said Belle, her voice gathering firmness as she proceeded, while all the relations of life demand that there should be entire truthfulness between us and our fellow creatures, I think we should be especially sincere and candid in our dealings with each other on this question of marriage, a question not only as affecting our own welfare but that of others, a relation which may throw its sunshine or shadow over the track of unborn ages. Permit me now to say to you that there is no gentleman of my acquaintance whom I esteem more highly than yourself, but when you ask me for my heart and hand I almost feel as if I had no heart to give, and you know it would be wrong to give my hand where I could not place my heart. But would it be impossible for you to return my affection? I don't know, but I'm only living out my vow of truthfulness when I say to you, I feel as if I had been undone for love, you tell that in offering your hand that you bring me a heart unhacked neat in the arts of love, that my heart is the first and only shrine on which you have ever laid the wealth of your affections, I cannot say the same in reply. I've had my bright and beautiful daydream, but it has faded, and I've learned what is the hardest of all lessons for a woman to learn. I've learned to live without love. Oh, no, said Paul, not to live without love. In darkened homes how many grateful hearts rejoice to hear your footsteps on the threshold. I have seen the eyes of young Arabs of the street grow brighter as you approached and say, that's my lady. She comes to see my man when she's sick, and I've seen little girls in the street quicken their face to catch a loving smile from their dear Sunday school teacher. Oh, Miss Bell, instead of living without love, I think you are surrounded with a cordon of loving hearts. Yes, and I appreciate them, but this is not the love to which I refer. I mean a love which is mine, as anything else on earth is mine. A love precious and enduring and strong, which brings hope and joy and sunshine over one's path in light. A love which commands my allegiance and demands my respect. This is the love I have learned to do without, and perhaps the poor and needy had learned to love me less, had this love surrounded me more. Miss Bell, perhaps I was presumptuous to have asked a return of the earnest affection I have for you, but I had hoped that you would give the question some consideration, and may I not hope that you will think kindly of my proposal. Oh, Miss Gordon, ever since the death of my sainted mother, I've had in my mind's eye the ideal of a woman, nobly planned, beautiful, intellectual, true, and defectionate, and you have filled out that ideal in all its loveliest proportions. And I hope that my desire will not be like reaching out to some bright particular star and wishing to win it. It seems to me, he said with increasing earnestness, whatever obstacle may be in the way, I would go through fire and water to remove it. I am sorry, said Bell, as if speaking to herself and her face had an absent look about it, as if instead of being interested in the living present, I was grouping amid the ashes of the dead past. At length, she said, Mr. Clifford, permit me to say in the first place, let there be truth between us. If my heart seems callous and indifferent to your love, believe me, it is warm to esteem and value you as a friend. I might almost say as a brother, for in sympathy of feeling and congeniality of disposition, you are nearer to me than my own brother, but I do not think where I so inclined that it would be advisable for me to accept your hand without letting you know something of my past history. I told you a few moments since that I had my daydream, permit me to tell you for I think you are entitled to my confidence. The object of that daydream was Charles Romain. Charles Romain! And there was a tone of wonder in the voice and a puzzled look on the face of Paul Clifford. Yes, Charles Romain! Not as you know him now, the marks of dissipation on his once handsome face. But Charles Romain, as I knew him, when he stood upon the threshold of early manhood, the very incarnation of beauty, strength and grace, not Charles Romain with the blurred and bloated countenance, the staggering gait, the confused and vacant eye, but Charles Romain as a young, handsome and talented lawyer, the pride of our village, the hope of his father and the joy of his mother, for whom the future was opening full of rich and rare promises. Need I tell you that when he sought my hand in preference to all the other girls in our village, that I gave him what I never can give to another the first deep love of my girly shard? For nearly a whole year I wore his betrothal ring upon my finger when I saw to my utter anguish and dismay that he was fast becoming a drunkard. Oh, Mr. Clifford, if I could have saved him, I would have taken blood from every vein and strength from every nerve. We met frequently at entertainments, I noticed time after time the effects of the wine he had imbibed upon his manner and conversation. At first I shrank from Ramon straining with him until the burden lay so heavy on my heart that I felt I must speak out, let the consequences be what they might. And so when evening I told him plainly and seriously my fears about his future, he laughed lightly and said my fears were unfounded that I was nervous in giving away to idle fancies that his father always had wine at the table and that he had never seen him under the influence of liquor. Silence, but not convinced, I watched his course with painful solicitude. All Ramon's trances on my part seemed thrown away. He always had the precedent of his father to plead and reply to my earnest entreaties. At last when Ramon's trances and entreaties seemed to be all in vain, I resolved to break the engagement. My harsh and hard alternative but I would not give my hand where my respect could not follow. It may be that I thought too much of my own happiness but I felt that marriage must be, for me, positive misery or positive happiness and I feared that if I married a man so lacking in self-control as to become a common drunkard that when I cease to love and respect him I should be constantly tempted to hate and despise him. I think one of the satisfies that can befall a woman is to be tied for life to a miserable, exploded wreck of humanity. There may be some women with broad generous hearts and great charity strong enough to lift such men out of the depths but I had no such faith in my strength and so I gave him back his ring. He accepted it but we parted as friends. For a while after our engagement was broken we occasionally met at the houses of our mutual friends and social gatherings and I noticed with intense satisfaction that whenever wine was offered he scrupulously abstained from ever tasting a drop though I think at times his self-control was severely tested. Oh, what hope revived in my heart! Here I said to myself his compensation for all I have suffered. If by it he shall be restored to manhood, usefulness and society and learn to make his life not a thing of careless ease and sensuous indulgence but of noble struggle and I and holy endeavor. But while I was picturing out for him a magnificent future imagining the lofty triumphs of his intellect and intellect grand in its achievements and glorious in its possibilities my beautiful daydream was rudely broken up and vanished away like the rays of sunset mingling with the shadows of night. My aunt Mrs. Rowland celebrated her silver wedding and my cousin's birthday by giving a large entertainment and among other things she had a plentiful supply of wine. Mr. Romain had lately made the acquaintance of my cousin Jeanette Rowland. She was both beautiful in person and fascinating in her manners and thoughtlessly she held a glass of wine in her hand and asked Mr. Romain if he would not honor the occasion by drinking her mother's health. For a moment he hesitated, his cheek paled and flushed alternately. He looked irresolute while I watched him in silent anguish it seemed as if the agony of yours was compressed in a few moments. I tried to catch his eye but failed and with a slight tremor in his hand he lifted the glass to his lips and drank. I do not think I would have felt greater anguish had I seen him suddenly drowned in sight of land. Oh, Mr. Clifford, that night comes before me so vividly. It seems as if I am living it all over again. I do not think Mr. Romain has ever recovered from the reawakening of his appetite. He has since married Jeanette. I meet her occasionally. She has a beautiful home, dresses magnificently and has a retinue of servants and yet I fancy she is not happy. That somewhere hidden out of sight there is a worm eating at the core of her life. She has a way of dropping her eyes and an absent look about her that I do not fully understand but it seems to me that I miss the old elasticity of her spirits, the merry ring of her voice, the pleasant thrills of girlish laughter and though she never confesses it to me I doubt that Jeanette is happy and with this sad experience in the past can you blame me if I am slow, very slow to let the broken tendrils of my heart entwine again. I will not let that bell, said Paul Clifford, catching eagerly at the smallest straw of hope if you can not give me the first love of our fresh young life. I'm content with the rich aftermath of your mature years and ask from life no higher prize. May I not hope for that? I will think on it but for the present let us change the subject. Do you think Jeanette is happy? She seems so different from what she used to be, said Miss Tabitha Jones to several friends of her. Happy, replied Mary Gladstone, don't see what's to hinder her from being happy. She is everything that heart can wish. I was down to her house yesterday and she has just moved in her new home. It is all the modern improvements and everything is in excellent taste. Her furniture is of that latest style and I think it is really superb. Yes, said her sister and she dresses magnificently. Last week she showed me a most beautiful set of jewelry, Anna Campbell's hair shawl and I believe it is real camel's hair. I think you could almost run it through a ring. If I had all she has, I think I should be as happy as the days are long. I don't believe I would let a wave of trouble roll across my peaceful breast. Oh, Annette, said Mrs. Gladstone, don't speak so extravagantly and I don't like to hear you quote those lines for such an occasion. Why not, mother? Where's the harm? That him has been associated in my mind with my earliest religious impressions and experience and I don't like to see you lifted out of it sacred associations for such a trifling occasion. Oh, mother, you are so strict. I shall never be able to keep time with you but I do think if I was off as Jeanette that I would be as blind and happy as a lark and instead of that she seems to be constantly drooping and fading. Annette, said Mrs. Gladstone, I knew a woman who possesses more than Jeanette does and yet she died of starvation. Died of starvation? Why? When and where did that happen and what became of her husband? He is in society, caressed and looked on by the girls of his set and I have seen a number of managing mammas to whom I have imagined he would not be an objectionable son-in-law. Do I know him, mother? No, and I hope you never will. My mother, I would like to know how he starved his wife to death and yet escaped the law. The law helped him. In genuine astonishment, I thought, said Mary Gladstone, it was the province of the law to protect women. I was just telling Ms. Bassenkett yesterday when she was talking about women's suffrage that I had as many rights as I wanted and that I was willing to let my father and brothers do all the voting for me, forgetting my dear that there are millions of women who haven't such fathers and brothers as you have. No, my dear, when you examine the matter a little more closely you will find that there is no reason for women. But, mother, I do think it would be a dreadful thing for women to vote. Oh, just think of women being hustled and crowded at the polls. By rude men, their breaths reeking with whiskey and tobacco, the very air heavy with their owls, and then they have the polls at public houses. Oh, mother, I never want to see the day when women vote. Well, I do because we have one of the kindest and best fathers and husbands and good brothers who would not permit us to vote for a reason. We should throw ourselves between the sunshine and our less fortunate sisters who shiver in the blast. But, mother, I don't see how voting would help us. I'm sure we have influence. I have often heard papa say that you were the first to awaken him to a sense of the normity of slavery. Now, mother, if we women would use our influence with our fathers, brothers, husbands and sons, could we not have everything we want? No, my dear, we could not with women, which flows from the possession of power. I want women to possess power as well as influence. I want every Christian woman as she passes by a grog shop or liquor saloon to feel that she has on her heart a burden of responsibility for its existence. I hope, my dear, that a nation as well as an individual should have a conscience, and on this liquor question there is room for woman's conscience, not merely as a persuasive influence, but as an enlightened and aggressive power. Now, I think you would make a first-class stump speaker. I expect when women vote we should be constantly having calls for the gifted and talented Mrs. Gladstone to speak on the duties and perils of the hour, and I would do it. I would go among my sister women and try to persuade them to use their vote as a moral lever, not to make home less happy but society more holy. I would have good insensible women, grave in manner, and cultured in intellect attend the primary meetings and bring their moral power to frown down corruption, chicanery, and low cunning. The mother just think if women went to the polls how many vicious ones would go. I hope and believe for the honour of our sex that the vicious women of the community are never in the majority that for one woman whose feet turn aside from the paths of rectitude that there are thousands of feet that never stray into forbidden paths, and today I believe there is virtue enough in society to confront its vice and intelligence enough to grapple with its ignorance. End of Chapter 17 Chapter 18 of Sewing and Reaping by Francis E. W. Harper this LibriVox recording is in the public domain Chapter 18 Why Mrs. Gladstone said Miss Tabitha you are as zealous as a new convert to the cause of women's suffrage we single women who are constantly taxed without being represented know what it is to see ignorance and corruption striking hands together and voting away our money for whatever purposes they choose I pay as large attacks as many of the men in AP and yet cannot say who shall assess my property for a single year and there is another thing said Mrs. Gladstone ought to be brought to the consideration of the men and it is this they refuse to let us vote and yet fail to protect our homes from the ravages of Rome my young friend whom I said died of starvation foolishly married a dissipated man who happened to be rich and handsome she was gentle, loving sensitive to a fault he was quarrelous, fault-finding and irritable because his nervous system was constantly unstrung black tenderness, sympathy and heart support and at last faded and died not starvation of the body but a trophy of the soul and when I say the law helped I mean it licensed the places that kept the temptation ever in his way and I fear that is the secret of Jeanette's faded looks and unhappy bearing no, Jeanette was not happy night after night would she paste the floor of her splendidly furnished chamber waiting and watching for her husband's footsteps she and his friends had hoped that her influence would be strong enough to win him away from his boon companions that his home and beautiful bride would present superior attractions to Anderson's saloon, his gambling pool and champagne suppers and for a while they did but soon the novelty wore off and Jeanette found out to her great grief that her power to bind him to the simple ends of home were as futile as a roll of cobwebs to moor a ship to the shore when it has drifted out and is dashing among the breakers he learned to live an element of excitement and to depend upon artificial stimulation until it seemed as if the very blood in his veins grew sluggish fictitious excitement was removed his father hopeless of his future had dissolved partnership with him and for months there had been no communication between them and Jeanette saw with agony and dismay that his life was being wrecked upon the broad sea of sin and shame where is his father the child can't live it is one of the worst cases of croup I have had this year why didn't you send for me sooner where is his father it is now just twelve o'clock time for all respectable men to be in the house said the bluff but kind hearted family doctor looking tenderly upon Jeanette's little boy who lay gasping for breath in the last stages of croup no said Jeanette her face grimzenning beneath the doctor's searching glance I suppose he is down to Anderson's said the doctor in a tone of hearty indignation what business has he there and his child dying here but doctor he didn't know the child had fever when he went out but neither of us thought much of it till I was awakened by his strange and unnatural breathing I sent for you as soon as I could rouse the servants will rouse them again and tell them to go down to Anderson's husband that his child is dying oh no not dying doctor you surely don't mean it yes Jeanette said the old up family doctor tenderly and sadly I can do nothing for him let me take him in my arms and rescue dear little darling he will be saved from the evils to come just as his life was trembling on its frailest chords and its delicate machinery almost wound up Charles Romain returned sober enough to take in the situation he strode up to the dying child took the clammy hands in his and said in a tone of bitter anguish Charlie don't you know papa wouldn't you speak one little word to papa but it was too late the shadows that never deceived flitted over the pale beauty of the marble brow the wax and lid closed over the once bright and laughing eye and the cold grave for its rest had won the child End of Chapter 18 Chapter 20 of Sewing and Reaping by Francis E. W. Harper this LibriVox recording is in the public domain Chapter 20 if riches could bring happiness John Anderson should be a happy man and yet he is far from being happy he has succeeded in making money but failed in everything else but let us enter his home as you open the parlor door your feet sink in the rich and beautiful carpet exquisite statuary and superbly framed pictures greet your eye and you are ready to exclaim oh how lovely here are the beautiful conceptions of painter's art and sculpture skill it is a home of wealth luxury and display but not of love refinement and culture before John Anderson came to live in the city of AP he had formed an attachment for an excellent young lady who taught school in his native village and they were engaged to be married but after coming to this city and forming new associations visions of wealth dazzled his brain and unsettled his mind till the idea of love in a cottage grew distasteful to him he had seen men with no more ability than himself who had come to this city almost panelist and who had grown rich in a few years and he made up his mind that if possible he would do two things acquire wealth and live an easy life and he thought the easiest way to accomplish both ends was to open up a gorgeous palace of sin and entice into his meshes the unwary, the inexperienced and the misguided slaves of appetite for a while after he left his native village and he had finally to his betrothed but as new objects and interests engaged his attention his letters became colder and less frequent until they finally ceased and the engagement was broken at first the blow fell heavily upon the heart of his afianst but she was too sensible to fade away and die the victim of unquited love in and after years when she had thrown her whole soul into the temperance cause and consecrated her life to the work of uplifting fall and humanity she learned to be thankful that it was not her lot to be united to a man who stood as a barrier across the path of human progress and would have been a weight to her instead of wings released from his engagement he entered it into an alliance for that is the better name for a marriage which was not a union of hearts or inter communion of kindred souls but only an affair of convenience in a word he married for money a woman who was no longer young in years nor beautiful in person nor amiable in temper but she was rich and her money like charity covered a multitude of faults and as soon as he saw the golden bait he caught at it and they were married for he was willing to do almost anything for money except work hard for it it was a marriage however that brought no happiness to either party Mrs. Anderson was an illy educated self-willed narrow-minded woman full of heirs and pretensions the only daughter of a man who made the foundation of his wealth by keeping a low groggy and dying had left her his only heir John Anderson was selfish and grasping he loved money and she loved display and their home was often the scene of the most pitiful contentions about money matters harsh words and bitter recriminations were almost common household usages the children brought up in this unhealthy atmosphere naturally took sides with their mother and their home and provided against itself the foolish conduct of their mother inspired the children with disrespect for their father who failed to support the authority of his wife as the mother and mistress of the home as her sons grew older they often saw attractions in questionable places away from the somber influences of their fireside and the daughters as soon as they stood upon the verge of early womanhood learn to look upon marriage as an escaped out from domestic home with all its costly surroundings insumptuous furniture there was always something wanting there was always a lack of tenderness sympathy a mutual esteem I can't afford it said John Anderson to his wife who had been asking for money for a trip to a fashionable watering place you will have to spend the summer elsewhere can't afford it what nonsense is not it as much to your interest as mine to carry the girls around and give them a chance a chance for what why to see something of the world you don't know what may happen that English Earl was very attentive last night to Sophronias at Mrs. Jessup's ball an English count who is he and where did he spring from why he's from England and is said to be the only Senate heir of a very rich nobleman I don't believe it I don't believe he is an Earl any more than I am that's just like you always throw cold water on everything I say it is no such thing but I don't believe in picking up strangers and putting them into my bosom it is not all gold that glitters I know that but how soon can you let me have some money I want to go out this afternoon and do some shopping and engage this some stress I tell you and that I have not the money to spare the money market is very tight and I have very heavy bills to meet this month the money market tight why it has been tight ever since I've been married well you may believe it or not just as you choose but I tell you this crew setting has made quite a hole in my business now John Anderson tell that to somebody that don't know I don't believe this crew setting has laid a finger's weight upon your business yes it has and if you read the papers you would find that it has even affected the revenue of the state and you will have to retrench somewhere well I'll retrench somewhere I think we are paying our servants to high wages and anyhow Mrs. Jen Flint gets twice as much work done for the same money I'll retrench John Anderson but I want you to remember that I did not marry you empty handed I don't think she'll be apt to forget it in a hurry while I have such a gentle reminder at hand he replied sarcastically and I suppose you would not have married me if I had had no money no I would not said John Anderson thoroughly exasperated and I would have been a fool if I had these bitter words spoken in the heat of passion were calculated to work disastrously in that sin darkened home for sometimes she had been expecting that her money had been the chief inducement which led him to seek her hand and now her worst suspicions were confirmed and the last thread of confidence was severed I should not have said it said Anderson to himself but the woman is so provoking and unreasonable I suppose she will have a fit of socks for a month and never be done brooding over those foolish words and Anderson sighed as if he were an ill-used man he had married for money and he'd got what he bargained for love confidence and mutual esteem sought in the contract and these do not necessarily come of themselves well the best I can do is to give her what money she wants and be done with it is not in a room no sir and her bed has not been rumpled where in the world can she be I don't know but here is a note she left what does she say read it Annette she said she feels that you were unjust to the Earl and that she hopes you will forgive her the stuff she has taken but by the time the letter reaches you she expects to be the Countess of Clarendon poor foolish girl you see what comes of taking a stranger to your bosom in making so much of him that's just like you John Anderson everything that goes wrong is blamed on me I wish I was dead I wish so too thought Anderson but he concluded it was prudent to keep the wish to himself John Anderson had no faith whatever in the pretensions of his new son-in-law but his vain and foolish wife on the other hand was elated at the dazzling prospects of her daughter and often in her imagination visited the palatial residence of my son the Earl and was graciously received in society as the mother of the Countess of Clarendon she was also highly gratified at the supposed effect of Sophronia's marriage upon a certain click who had been too exclusive to admit her in their set should not those Gladstone girls be ready to snag themselves and there was that Mary Talbot did everything she could to attract his attention but it was no go my little Sophronia came along and took the rag off the bush I guess they will almost die with envy if he had waited for her father's consent we might have waited till the end of the chapter but I took the responsibility on my shoulders and the thing is done my daughter the Countess of Clarendon I like the ring of the words but dear me here's the morning mail and a letter from the Countess but what does it mean come to me I'm in great trouble in quick response to the appeal Mrs. Anderson took the first train to New York and found her daughter in great distress the Earl had been arrested for forgery and stealing and darker suspicions were hinted against him he had been a body servant to a nobleman who had been traveling for his health and who had died by a lonely farmhouse where he had gone for fresh air and quiet and his servant had seized upon his effects and letters of introduction and passed himself off as the original Earl and imitating his handwriting had obtained large remittances for which he was arrested tried and sent to prison and thus entered the enchanting dream of my daughter the Countess of Clarendon End of Chapter 20 Chapter 21 of Sewing and Reaping by Francis E. W. Harper this LibriVox recording is in the public domain Chapter 21 I cannot ensure your life a single hour unless you quit business you are liable to be stricken with paralysis at any moment if once subject to the least excitement can't you trust your business in the hands of your sons doctor said John Anderson I have only two boys my oldest went west several years ago and never writes to us unless he wants something and as to Frank if I would put the concern into his hands he would drink himself into the grave in less than a month the whole fact is this, my children are the curse of my life and there was bitterness in the tone of John Anderson as he uttered these words of fearful sorrow well said the doctor you must have rest and quiet or I will not answer for the consequences rest and quiet said John Anderson to himself I don't see how I am as I've always worrying and bothering me about something Mr. Anderson said one of the servants Mrs. Anderson says please come as quick as possible into Mr. Frank's room what's the matter now I don't know but Mr. Frank's acting mighty queer he thinks there are snakes and lizards crawling over him he's got the horrors just what I expected tell me about rest and quiet I'll be there in a minute oh what's the matter I feel strange said Anderson falling back on the bed suddenly stricken with paralysis while in another room lay his younger son a victim to delirium tremens and dying in fearful agony the curse that John Anderson had sent to other homes had come back darkened with the shadow of death to brood over his own habitation his son is dying but he has no word of hope to cheer the parting spirit as it passed out into the eternity for him the darkness of the tomb is not gilded with the glory of the resurrection the best medical skill has been summoned to the aid of John Anderson but neither art nor skill can bind anew the broken threads of life the chamber in which he is confined is a marvel of decoration light streams into his home through pains of beautifully stained glass pillars of the softest down are placed beneath his head beautiful cushions lie at his feet that will never take another step on the errands of sin but no appliances of wealth can give peace to his guilty conscience he looks back upon the past and the retrospect is a worse than wasted life and when the future looms up before him he shrinks back from the contemplation for the sins of the past throw their shadow over the future he has houses, money and land but he is a pauper in his soul and a bankrupt in his character in his eager selfish grasp for gold he has shriveled his intellect and hardened and dried up his heart in and so doing he has cut himself off from the richest sources of human enjoyment he has wasted life's best opportunities and there never was an angel however bright, terrible and strong that ever had power to roll away the stone from the grave of a dead opportunity and what John Anderson has lost in time he can never make up in eternity he has formed no taste for reading and thus has cut himself off from the glorious companionship of the good, the great and the wise of all ages he has been selfish, mean and grasping and the blessing of the poor and needy never fall as benedictions on his weary head a beautiful home with disease and death clutching at his heartstrings he has wealth that he cannot enjoy luxuries that pawl upon his taste and magnificence that can never satisfy the restless craving of his soul his life has been a wretched failure he neglected his children to amass the ways of iniquity and their coldness and indifference pierce him like poisoned arrows marriage has brought him money but not the sweet tender administrations of his wifely care and so he lives on starving in the midst of plenty dying of thirst with life's sweetest fountains eluding his grasp Charles Romain is sleeping in a drunkard's grave after the death of his boy there was a decided change in him night after night he tore himself away from John Anderson's saloon and struggled with a monster that had enslaved him and for a while victory seemed to be a solution another child took the place of the first born and the dead and hope and joy began to blossom around Jeanette's path his mother who had never seized to visit the house marked the change with great satisfaction and prevailed upon his father to invite Charles and Jeanette to a new year's dinner only a family gathering Jeanette being unwell excused herself from going and Charles went alone Jeanette felt fearful foreboding leaving the door and said to herself I hope his father will not offer him wine I am so afraid that something will happen to him and yet I hated to persuade him not to go his mother might think I was averse to his reconciliation with his father it looks very natural to have Charles with us again said Mrs. Romain looking fondly on her son yes it seems like old times when I always had my seat next to yours and I hope said his father it will never be vacant again the dinner hour passed on in live and by social chat and pleasant reminiscences and there was nothing to mar the harmony of the occasion Mrs. Romain had been careful to keep everything from the table that would be apt to awaken the old appetite for liquor but after dinner Mr. Romain invited Charles into the library to smoke here said he handing him a cigar is one of the finest brands of old wine more than 25 years old which was sent to me yesterday by an old friend and college classmate of mine let me pour you out a glass Charles suddenly became agitated but as his father's back was turned to him pouring out the wine he did not notice the sudden paling of his cheek and the hesitation of his manner and Charles checking back his scruples took the glass and drained it to the bottom there is a fable that a certain king once permitted the devil to kiss his shoulder and out of those shoulders sprang two serpents that in the fury of their hunger aimed at his head and tried to get at his brain he tried to extricate himself from their terrible power he tore at them with his fingers and found that it was his own flesh that he was lacerating dormant but not dead was the appetite for strong drink in Charles Romain and that one glass awakened the serpent coiled up in his flesh he went out from his father's house with a newly awakened appetite for strong drink every saloon he passed adding intensity to his craving it lasted his appetite over mastered him and he almost rushed into a saloon and waited impatiently till he was served every nerve seemed to be quivering with excitement, restlessness and there was a look of wild despairing anguish on his face as he clutched the glass to allay the terrible craving of his system he drank till his head was giddy and his gait was staggering and then started for home he entered the gate and slipped on the ice and being too intoxicated to rise or comprehend his situation he lay helpless in the dark and cold until there crept over him that sleep from which there is no awakening and when morning had broken in all its glory Charles Romain had drifted out of life slain by the wine which at last had bitten like an adder and stung like a serpent Jeanette had waited and watched through the small hours of the night till nature or weary had sought a repose and sleep and rising very early in the morning she had gone to the front door to look down the street for his coming when the first object that met her gaze was the lifeless form of her husband one wild and bitter shriek rent the air and she felt fainting on the frozen corpse her friends gathered round her all that love and tenderness could do was done for the wretched wife but nothing could erase from her mind one agonizing sorrow it was the memory of her fatal triumph over his good resolution years ago at her mother's silver wedding carelessly she had sowed the seeds of transgression whose fearful yield was a harvest of bitter misery Mrs. Clifford came to her in her hour of trial and tried to comfort and sustain the heart-stricken woman who had tried to take life easy but found it terribly hard and she has miserably succeeded in the home of her cousin she is trying to bear the burden of her life as well as she can the joy, the bloom and flush have left her care-worn face tears from her eyes long used to weeping have blenched the coloring of her life existence and she is passing through life with a shatter of the grave upon her desolate heart Joe Goff has been true to his pledge plenty and comfort have taken the place of poverty and pain he continued his membership with the church of his choice and Mary is also striving to live a new life and to be the ministering angel to prayer his appetite for a strong drink has been taken away life with Mrs. Clifford has become a thing of brightness and beauty and when children sprang up in her path making gladness and sunshine around her home she was a wife and tender mother, fond but not foolish firm in her household government but not stern and unsympathizing in her manner the faithful friend and companion of her daughters she won their confidence by her loving care and tender caution she taught her sons to be as upright in their lives and as pure in their conversation as she would have her daughters recognizing for each only one coat of morals and one law of spiritual life and in course of time she saw her daughters ripening into such a beautiful womanhood and her sons entering the arena of life not with the simplicity which is ignorant of danger and evil but with the sterling integrity which baffles the darts of her life and her sons entering the arena in integrity which baffles the darts of temptation with the panoply of principle and the armor of uprightness unconsciously she elevated the tone of society in which she moved by a life which was a beautiful and earnest expression of patience and well-doing. Paul Clifford's life has been a grand success not in the mere accumulation of wealth but in the enrichment of his moral and spiritual nature he is still ever ready to lend a helping hand he has not lived merely for wealth but happiness lasting and true springs up in his soul as naturally as a flower leaps into blossoms and whether he is loved or hated honored or forgotten he constantly endeavors to make the world better by his example and gladdened by his presence feeling that if everyone would be faithful to duty that even here Eden would spring up in our path and paradise be around our way. End of chapter 21 End of Sewing and Reaping by Francis C. W. Harper