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"THE LADY TEO El ALABAMA”
Tty Odessa Strickland Payne and Lamar Strickland Payne, Authors of "Psyche”, "Limit of the Line”, "Mission Girl”, Pte,
CHAPTER XXVII.
FTER Burwood Morris’ tragical taking
away, and the burial at “Solitude,” the
days seemed leadened-winged not only
to Rose Churchill, but to the girl to
whom he had once given the devotion
of a brother. Mrs. Morris, after a brief
trial of the little cottage, where she was
continually reminded of the forceful
personality of her son, broke up the
A
home, suddenly, and went to live with a widowed
sister of her husband’s in another state.
She was not a weak woman, but the sight of his
room, his books and pictures and gun, were all so
many tangible evidences of a past, that she could
not afford to be in touch with, if she meant to live.
Rose and Schiller vied with each other, in many
tactful ways, to manifest their devotion to her, dur
ing the last days in the little suburban cottage. But,
since nothing could bring back the brilliant boy,
who with all his extravaganzas of sentiment, was
the idol of her heart, she seemed to be scarcely con
scious of their beautiful ministrations.
That he had died of heart failure, which had its
• origin in dissipation, seemed the climax of her grief.
And yet, she sometimes remembered to her com
fort, that he had faced about, grandly, before the
last summons came, and that the death angel had
found him with the cup of happiness in his grasp,
sparkling to the rosy brim, with the beautiful doors
of the house of fulfillment thrown wide open before
his real self. That he must fall on the threshold,
with all the splendor of his young manhood’s gifts
unproven, meant that the sting of the serpent still
lingered in the wine when it was red, after the glass
had been shattered to atoms, on the white, pure
stones of reformation.
During the last hours, in the little home, Mrs.
Morris had taken down a picture, in an oxidized
silver frame, from over Burwood’s mantel, and, as
she placed it in her niece’s hands, she had said, in a
voice of unmistakable feeling:
“He always loved you, Schiller, like a sister, and,
I want you to remember that, child, when you think
of him.”
The photograph was a cabinet-sized one of Schiller
taken during her college life, in her white com
mencement dress, with her hands full of flowers.
On the bottom of the cardboard was written the
words:
“Dear heart, forgive.”
Schiller kissed her aunt, her eyes full of the sweet
mist of tears, and comprehending the appeal, in the
glance of the elder woman, she said very gently.
“I forgave him long ago, Aunt Alma, in order that
I myself might be forgiven.”
Rose Churchill’s infatuation for the young man,
her intuitive power to grasp the manhood back of
the mask, always seemed to Schiller one of love’s
miarcles, sent like an auroro to brighten the last
days of a strange and gifted soul. Rose could see
how the story of their brief association interested
her, and, it made a profound impression upon her,
so much so, indeed, that Schiller became quite un
consciously the golden link between her and her
deeply cherished past.
But Life could never mean again, what it once
had, to the richly-dowered girl.
And having had her high hopes of perfect happi
ness shattered in her grasp, she began to reach out,
blindly, in her grief, for something to cling to, to
take the place of the buried glory of her dream
life.
Von Bulow was strangely fond of his youngest sis
ter, and the fact that she persistently stayed at “Sol
itude,” in order to share his life and make an at
mosphere of home possible, within the grand old
walls, had been appreciated, within the depths of
his solitary heart. He knew that she had remained,
because she preferred the out-of-doors and freedom,
to their father's palatial city home; but she had
also elected to be with him, because she loved him
so much, because she did not wish to be separated
from him.
The Golden Age for July 21, 1910.
Mr. Churchill and June were of course anxious
about Rose, and, as the weeks crept by, and her
pale cheeks grew paler, and her attitude toward
everything under the sun, more and more listless,
the whole family became aware of the fact, that
something ought to be done to rescue her.
She protested that she was not sick, and when
Von Bulow proffered to take her, on a trip to Can
ada and the lakes, she refuesd, quietly but persist
ently, to go. It was inevitable that the grand burial
given to Burwood Morris at “Solitude” should be
come known to the world, and with it Rose’s ro
mance, so that it was hardly to be wondered at, that
her masculine friends should respect her grief
enough to stay away.
Now and then, of course, Von Bulow had a friend
out to dine with him, but nobody ever came for any
length of time, except Carrol Hall, and he sometimes
did not see Rose at all during his entire visit.
One night when the moonlight was shimmering in
silver radiance over Hayden Park, and the great
columned front of the Churchill residence, June
walked restlessly up and down on the wide porch,
with her hands locked in front of her. She was
dressed in a dark blue silk house gown, out of which
her white shoulders and half-bare arms gleamed, in
conspicuous lines of beauty. But she was not think
ing of the eternally feminine question of clothes, at
the moment.
She had just held a conversation-with Von Bulow
over the telephone, in regard to Rose’s condition,
which had been far from reassuring. In fact, her
brother had terminated the conversation, with char
acteristic masculine impatience, by an ominous pre
diction.
“Well, all I can say, is that you had better find a
way out of this distressing situation, or we won’t
have any sister. The Rose of Solitude is withering
to the death, and that is all there is about it.”
June, with an alarmed face, had hung up the re
ceiver, and gone out on the great columned porch,
because she felt that she could not breathe in the
house. For spacious and artistic as it was, the
home was unspeakably lonely tonight. Her father
was attending some kind of meeting in the inter
ests of civic righteousness, down in the city.
She grew weary at length of her thoughts and her
aimless promenade, with only the stars for friendly
spectators, and sat down on a rustic seat, between
two columns, in the dim shadow of a rose vine. The
girl had had time to grow tired of this change, when
she saw a man of commanding figure, dressed in a
light summer suit, mounting the terrace steps. June
acknowledged to herself, that the intruder was wel
come, even before she recognized that it was her
neighbor, Professor Cam Blake.
She met him at the porch steps with hands out
stretched.
“I am glad to see you,” she said, impulsively, “the
Pater is down town, and I don’t think I was ever
so lonely in my life. The stillness,” and she made
a backward gesture toward the great house, “has
been perfectly appalling here tonight. I am alone,
and I have been walking up and down the porch for
a half hour, with only the ghosts of my ancestors
for company.”
Cam Blake became illuminated. He was pleased
over the warmth of her welcoming as a boy.
“I don’t feel like,” he said, lightly, as he followed
her lead to the rustic seat, in the shadow of the
rose vine, “that I would enjoy the presence of one
of your ancestors, at lehst, tonight.
“That document, Jeremiah Churchill’s will,” he
added, grimly, as he sat down, “which Von Bulow
was good enough to send me, is iron clad. It is full
of the bitterness of prejudice and of ecclesiastical
bigotry. There is no loophole in it, for any of his
descendants, who would dare to choose a mate, born
north of Mason and Dixon’s line, or who had ever
matriculated in a Catholic school.
“If I had a fortune, June,” he continued, in a tone
whose rich inflexions touched the heart of the girl,
“I would consider it nobly forfeited, if I could win
you, by the loss of every penny of it.
“But, listen!” he adjured, and his tone sank into
deepest tenderness, “I do not blame you, like I did
at first, for I have come to believe that you do love
humanity, in a very rare and unselfish way. Dr.
Carr has told me something about the beauty of your
work and the fullness of your manifold charities,
until I have caught a glimmer of the wonderful
light, in which you walk all the time.
“Yet, still, dear, because I believe you love me,
I can not relinquish the hope of some day winning
you. There must be away out of this crucial tor
ture: for that is my mental state about the matter,
if I could only find the path.
“It is not, however,” he added, with conviction,
“by the way of Jeremiah Churchill’s will. If you
could only find someone to whom you would be sat
isfied to turn over your work! Ah! but there’s the
rub. Your part of the estate woqld be forfeited to
Von Bulow and Rose, and, of course, neither one
of them takes any vital or absorbing interest, in
the masses.”
“Had you heard about Rose’s sorrow?” Miss
Churchill asked. “But, certainly, you have; it has
been quite a nine day wonder, I understand, among
the social elect.”
“Yes; it was a strange infatuation,” he mused,
“and the young man’s dramatic exit has emphasized
it. How is she? I understood from mother that the
family had been somewhat alarmed as to her health
of late.”
“I had a conversation with Von Bulow,” Miss
Churchill explained, “over the phone, just before
you caihe, and he is very much overwrought about
Rose’s condition. In fact, he is almost hopeless. I
am going out to ‘Solitude’ tomorrow, to try to get
my sister to come into the city. Von Bulow has
commissioned me, to be frank, to find away out
of the tragic situation. But, alas! we have tried
so many experiments and failed, that I do not know
what to propose. I really feel like we had all
reached the limit of the line.”
“Time is the great healer,” Professor Blake re
plied. “And if you could only get her to take an
interest in something or somebody, that would mean
a great deal. You have heard, have you not, about
the great Parisian artist, who had failed, and was
on the verge of despair, and was saved by a poor
little yellow waif of a kitten? He had quite deter
mined that he would never make another stroke
with his brush; but as he gazed around his dis
mantled attic, he saw the kitten curled up in the
sunset glow, against the window pane. It looked
like he felt —too hopeless to do anything but breathe
to the end. And, being moved with compassion,
he took a crayon sheet and sketched it.
“The picture sold, and orders followed for yellow
cats galore. And the man was saved, and became
a great and famous artist. But, in his palatial home
there was always one picture, which stood on a hand
some easel, and which his friends never failed to
admire. And that was of the yellow waif, which
had turned the tide of fortune, i wish that I could
find a mascot, who would turn the currents of des
tiny for me as dramatically.”
“Wait!” June whispered, “let me get the story
straight. The artist was in despair, but the sight
of the poor kitten touched him, and he was moved
with compassion, so that he took up the brush again,
and with it his life work. Rose,” she finished, re
flectively, “is also an artist. Perhaps, we have been
trying to arouse her on the wrong lines.”
“Perhaps,” said Professor Blake. “Meantime, there
is somebody else in the world who needs your sym
pathy, as well as Rose.”
“But you have it,” she answered very gently, “all
the time. And your coming tonight has been of
very great comfort to me. And since you do not
blame me, so bitterly, any more,” she added, as she
gave him her hand as he arose to go, “suppose you
call oftener on your neighbors.
“Oh, thank you for the privilege!” he said, with an
inscrutable look in his dark eyes, as he turned to
leave.
“Solitude,” with its green environment of hills,
its wide English lawns and the riotous growth of
(Continued on Page 15.)
