Newspaper Page Text
2
ODNEY, I consent, as the bride of
humanity.”
The sweet voice trailed into silence.
A blur of sunshine . which filtered
through the windowblind fell like an
omen of good on the hands, clasped on
the rose-colored silk coverlet.
“It is something,” he said, after a
pause more eloquent than words, “to
R
make a living 1 roan happy; but to give hope to the
dying, hope in an eternal life, when I was utterly
hopeless, that seems to me to be a work that an
angel might well covet. And, Sylvia, to add to that
the gracious promise, that you will take from these
helpless hands the power to uplift humanity, that
instead of me you will command conditions, and
smooth the way for thousands of discouraged souls!
That you will endow institutions, select wise helpers,
those who really care for the derelicts who have
been counted down and out by the world’s code, I
think that is the work an arch-angel might be
willing to doff his crown to do.
“I am glad to feel,” he continued, a tender
smile hovering about his handsome mouth, ‘‘that
this will atone as far as possible for my fatal mis
take, and that my father and mother will have a
noble daughter to take the place of an unwise son.
But, my dearest, I know that the time is short,
there is much to do. I wish to see father now,
and, later, Dr. Redmond. Kiss me once, though I
am all unworthy. I must be quick.”
Behind her glorious beauty, vibrant with youth
and health, he saw white death waiting for him,
and he thought of the picture of love and death
that hung in Sylvia’s home. She alone stood be
tween him and the great invisible.
Like an angel of love and life she bent over
him, and he felt the wine of her lips run like flame
through his wasted body. White death turned his
face away at the sight of her.
“Ah, Rodney,” she said, and her agony was
very great, “if my poor lips could bring you back
to life!”
“Don’t weep, Sylvia, I am not worth it.”
“I feel,” she said, “that you have not sinned
alone. But I had to learn how to forgive.”
“You must not grieve, Sylvia.” He touched
the bronze aurora of her hair, that he loved so well.
She felt his last caress for many a year. “ And
now . . . the end!”
His lips were wrung white with agony as he
touched an electric button.
“Dr. Horton,” to the physician who responded,
“the most powerful hypodermic I can stand. I
have got to do the work of thirty wasted years in
a few hours.”
“I may be killing you, Mr. Hill. I would like to
consult ... ”
“Sylvia, will you kindly call Dr. Redmond over
the phone?”
Sylvia picked up the silver ’phone by his bed.
“The Hills ruled while they were dying,” Dr.
Horton mused.
Violets bloomed in Sylvia’s hand a moment. Then
Rodney’s hungry fingers closed over them. It was
her last message to him.
Rodney Hill, Sr., came to the door. Sylvia
crossed the carpet bravely enough, then she reeled,
and the multi-milionaire gathered'her in his arms.
“You will not faint, child,” he said, leading her
out into the long, beautiful passageway. “Those
flowers yonder are from Luther Burbank’s magic
fields. You know he is a wizard, but he toils until
he gets a color to suit him, even if he works for
years. ’ ’
“Your kindness and gentleness are like his,”
she said, with a nod of her head toward the cham
ber where death had taken his stand.
“You love him then, Sylvia?”
THR MISSION GIRL
By Odessa Strickland Payne,
Author of "Psyche, ” "Esther TerraU's Experiment,” Etc.
The Golden Age for November 19, 1908.
“I have promised to be his bride,” she said,
with a soft blush.
The old lion lifted his head. His blue eyes
gleamed. This prodigal son of his was a man, in
spite of his sins. Lie repressed the Forty-niner in
him, that had a great desire to swear in the old
Western fashion. He lifted his hand, a hand that
had gripped a six-shooter in his mining days for
life or death more than once.
“I am proud to be his father.”
Sylvia went back to her room, sharing in <he
exaltation of mood that had come to her dying
lover. Rodney was safe! Eternally and forever
safe! That was enough! As for the millions, she
was impressed deeply with the fact they
would only be a stewardship. Hers, only to pass
on to the poor, the suffering, the needy. She felt
the shadow of the great but glorious responsibility.
Then, suddenly, a thought came to her, which
paled her cheek, and make her sink suddenly to her
knees.
“0, God,” she said, “let him live, a long, long
time!” She sent her psychic force whirling ifito the
face of death, and white death, standing by Rod
ney’s portal, fled for awhile. And yet her prayer
was only the compassion of a great heart.
The marriage occurred at four o’clock. It was
simple in all its appointments. The pastor of a
Mission church (Rodney would have it so) per- •
formed the brief ceremony. There were no guests.
The two families, the house physician, the young
millionaire’s nurse, made up the tableau. The
well-trained servants stepped about as if nothing
out of the usual was going on.
After it was all over, the bridegroom sank
rapidly. Dr. Redmond shared the last watch with
Sylvia and those who loved him. Once, as Dr.
Redmond lifted him, pillows and all, in his strong
arms, to a position where breath was made easier,
he spoke:
“God loves me better than father, Reece.”
“As the love of a Heavenly Father surpasses
that of an earthly one, Rodney.” Then he quoted
triumphantly: “For I am persuaded that neither
death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor
things present, nor things to come, shall be able to
separate us from the love of God, which is in
Christ Jesus our Lord.”
“Amen,” said Mrs. Hill, her voice sweet 'and
thrilling, as she clasped the hand of the hour’s
bride on one side of the French bed. The master
of millions stood by the mantel, not unmoved, his
blue eyes, full of a terrible psychic force, as he
mentally fought death for awhile. His ringed left
hand rested on the polished mahogany. He lis
tened to the sharp challenge of the enemy; now
and then a wave of feeling swept over his face.
He was more like a force of nature than a man —■
and yet he suffered.
Ro*dney Hill, Jr’s., last hours were slipping away
softly, as a summer’s dream. His bitter railing
at fate, his despair at pain, his shrinking from his
doom, had all been changed.
The girl who had come in the special had brought
him hope about the sphere to which he was being
summoned. Whether Sylvia carried out Rodney’s
wishes or not, it was worth millions to Rodney
Hill, Sr., to see his son face death like a man.
Rodney’s last words were about his young bride.
He looked long and tenderly upon her pale, lovely
face, and, as his glance lingered, murmured:
“How strange! My father’s daughter; my
mother’s little girl. The bride of humanity! And
pledged to serve the least of these.”
Through the Golden Gate went the boom of sun
set guns, and the tide was full.
Sylvia rose to her feet, with a face like an
angel’s.
“And the King shall answer and say, ‘lnasmuch
as ye did it,’ that will mean you and I, Rodney, at
the last judgment, ‘unto the least of these, my
brethren, ye did it unto Me.’ ”
He raised her violets in reverent salute.
Dr. Redmond lifted him in his arms. There
would be no struggle for his soul to leave the body.
“Sunset and evening bell,
And one clear call for me;
And may there be no sadness of farewell
When I put out to sea.”
Again the flowers were lifted slightly. Then his
soul winged its flight past the sunset bars of the
Golden Gate, past the blue and white miles of
space infinite, to the city which hath twelve manner
of foundations.
After the funeral the Hills decided upon a world
trip in their private yacht. They, of course, wished
their new daughter to accompany them abroad.
Sylvia did not desire to go. For while she ap
preciated Rodney’s parents, in a tender way, on
account of not having any of her own, still she was
anxious to begin the life work whose sacred obliga
tions she had assumed.
She went down to the Palace Hotel in the big,
green, gold-striped motor one afternoon, and was
elevated upward to Mrs. Rawson’s suite of rooms.
Aunt Lila had been polishing the fine china cups
in the dainty Louis XV. cabinet, much to the
housemaid’s half-concealed amusement, and she
rose, with a partial apology, silk handkerchief in
hand.
“My dear, Reece is never here, and I just had
to dust a little, hotel rules or no hotel rules, to
keep from stagnation.”
“I feel that I ought to go,” said Sylvia, intent
upon her own problem, and missing the profound
astonishment in her aunt’s eyes.
“But, dear, er—er —you’ve just come.,’ suggested
Mrs. Rawson.
Sylvia threw back her deep mourning veil with a
smile.
“I feel that I ought to go with the Hills,” she
explained, resting .her arm on the mantel and
dropping her dainty chin into the soft palm of her
hand, “when I think about how kind Mr. and Mrs.
Hill have been to me, and how they seem to lean
upon me for comfort, and . . ”
“Wait, child, where are you going? I mean
where are the Hills going?”
“Around the world in their yacht,” said Sylvia.
Aunt Lila considered this fob a bit.
“If their yacht is as nice as the ‘Halcyon’ I
would not mind being invited to go, if I were you.
Now, yachts are somewhat harder to keep in the
right track than palace cars, but the Hills do
everything beautifully. Now that poor boy’s . .”
Aunt Lila bit her unduly tongue, just as she was
about to recall the sad event.
“But still, Aunt Lila,” Sylvia continued where
she had broken her thread of thought, “that is not
keeping my word to Rodney. I am troubled about
that aspect of the question.”
“Quite perplexing, I am sure,” commented Mrs.
Rawson, “but I am charmed to hear that the Hills
are going around the world.”
'She motioned Slivia to a chair, just as Dr. Red
mond came in.
“Don’t rise,” said Dr. Redmond, as he shook
hands with her, and took up his stand by a broad
window which looked down upon the tide of the
street.
“No, dear, keep seated,” said Aunt Lila, coming
in somewhat late with her shot, “it’s only dear old
Reece, only he is not old, you know, at all.”
Again a smile swept across Sylvia’s mouth. This
was Aunt Lila at her best.
“I am not going just yet,” she said, looking at
Dr. Redmond’s athletic back. Surely, he could
have been more gracious to her. Her sorrows had
been heavy. (To Continued.)
