The hand with the keys

Chapter I. A Door Outward

TN a far-off corner of the wide grounds, quite away from the house, an old apple tree stretched its untrimmed branches far and wide — outward over the rough stone wall toward the winding countryroad ; inward over the deep grass, where the shifting shadows of its leaves wove strange patterns. One low, drooping limb, gnarled and twisted, formed a natural seat, and comfortably ensconced there was a young girl with sun-bonnet pushed back from her brown face and with a book in her hand. In the branches over her head a robin twittered his defiance of her presence. Through the lush grass at her feet a rabbit darted, and marauding bees, hurrying from the roadside daisies to the nodding tiger-lilies within the wall, buzzed loudly their admiration of their own industry. But the

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young reader noticed none of them. She only stirred a little impatiently and turned a leaf with quicker motion when a call sounded from the house :

“ Pete !”

Still, the book did not seem quite to satisfy its reader, for at last she looked up from it in a halfdiscontented, half-puzzled way :

“ There is no end to it ! Everything turns on something else ; it’s all hinges. Whenever you come to a wall that shuts off everything, there’s sure to be a door through somewhere. I wonder if everything we do is just a hinge for something else, and if all the happenings are only doors ? I should think — •”

“ Pete ! Pete!”

A second call, quick and imperative, aroused the girl.

“ Maybe they do want something this time,” she said ; and, tossing her book on the grass, she lightly followed it. The bonnet, loosened from her neck, dropped beside her, and, throwing it carelessly over her arm instead of on her head — which, in truth, generally scorned a bonnet — she made her way across the sward to the path. A graveled walk of ambitious width it once had been, running

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from an arched gateway to the great house, but the arched entrance had long since vanished, and the walk, worn into ruts and crevices by sun and rain and by the hurrying feet of many years, was intersected by patches of grass and sadly encroached upon by the bunches of poppies and sweet-williams which should have formed its border.

The house, large and lofty, but weather-stained and unpainted and fronted by a wide platform — the beginning of a piazza that had never been finished — was in keeping with the grounds. The double doors leading into a spacious hall were standing open, and as the girl neared the steps a frightened face suddenly flashed out upon her, aud its owner, an old colored woman, called tremblingly as she hurried past,

“ Oh, Miss Pete, we couldn’t find ye ! Be quick, chile ; dar’s somefin’ awful happened.”

“ Something happened ? Where ?” The girl was in the hall in an instant, terrified and bewildered. “ What do you mean, Deb ? What is it?”

The woman had hastened up the stairs without waiting for reply or explanation, and Pete could only follow. On the landing a boy met her, and she caught his arm as he was rushing past :

“ Dick, what is the matter ?”

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<( Don’t stop me ; I must get the doctor/’ he began ; but as he saw Pete’s white face he paused for an instant. u Don’t look like that, Pete. She fell — grandma did ; fainted, or something. Don’t be so frightened ; some people faint often, you know. It’s only queer for grandma. She’ll be better soon. The doctor’ll know what to do, and I’ll have him here right away.” The boy was gone with the last words, and, clearing the piazza with a bound, ran down the walk.

The girl clasped the balustrade to steady her trembling limbs, but the heavy hand that had seemed clutching her heart was loosened. Anything like illness was a relief, compared with the half-formed visions of terrible accidents that had flashed lightning-like through her brain. A swift thought reminded her, too, that it was not so strange an occurrence as Dick imagined. Grandma had complained of faintness several times lately, and an uncomfortable feeling in her head. This must have been a little worse than usual, that was all, and it had frightened poor old Deb. So reassuring herself, Pete was able to enter the room, to lift the unconscious head, to arrange pillows and bring restoratives. But, with all her faith in Dick’s diagnosis and her own reasoning, it was dreadful to see the

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motionless form and the livid face, and to witness her grandfather’s anguish as he chafed the cold hands. She was so unused to illness, so ignorant of what should be done, that she was thankful when neighbors came in and she could yield her place to those who were more experienced.

It seemed long, as such time always does, the waiting for medical aid, yet in reality it was but a few minutes. Dick had been so fortunate as to meet the physician a short distance up the road, and his carriage stopped at the gate as Pete went down to the hall again. She knew him by reputation and by sight, as so important a member of the community was sure to be known even to those whose homes had not needed his services. So, also, she knew that the young lady who came with him was his sister and only a visitor in the village. They were out riding when Dick summoned him, the doctor briefly explained, and his sister would wait for him.

The young lady’s quick eye read the slight embarrassment her presence caused — that her young hostess did not know exactly the proper disposition to make of her — and her low even voice and quiet manner promptly settled the matter :

“ Only let me sit here by this window, please,

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Miss Wilder — it is so much more comfortable than waiting in the carriage — and do not feel that you need pay me any attention.”

Easy, graceful speech was not Pete’s either by nature or by acquirement. She gravely nodded, allowed the lady to seat herself and silently led the doctor up stairs. There the group at the bed made way for him, and the girl anxiously lingered near the door to catch the words which should assure her that the attack was but a slight one and would soon be over. But the physician expressed no opinion, and his low- voiced questions and directions told her nothing. Still, his presence gave her confidence, though she shrank from the white, drawn face on the pillow and from the sound of the slow, oppressed respiration.

One of the women noticed the young girl and kindly insisted on her going away :

" You can’t be of any use here ; there’s plenty to do everything there is to be done, and not much for anybody to do now, in fact, but to wait. And it only troubles you to see her so. You’d better go down stairs a while, and I’ll call you if you’re wanted.”

Pete mechanically obeyed, and went back to the room where the stranger sat. The old clock in the

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corner struck the hour, and she looked up at it in amazement. Could it be only so short a time since she had gone happily out of the house, book in hand, for her favorite nook? Everything had been so peacefully commonplace then, and her grandmother’s voice — that brisk, cheery voice that ordered everything about the place — had called after her with its familiar injunction : “ Do wear your bonnet, daughter ! You’ll be as brown as an Indian soon.” How could so much have happened since? It was like a dream, this strange presence here, those others in the upper room and the unwonted stir about the house, while away across the lawn, its branches visible from the window, waved and nodded the old tree where she had lingered in such care-free, happy leisure only a little half hour ago.

With an uncomfortable feeling that utter silence might be construed into discourtesy, Pete tried to talk to the. young lady. The effort would not have been a remarkable success at the best of times, so far as Pete was concerned, for the fluff of yellow hair, the perfectly gloved hands and the sweep of the silken skirt, with its marvelous loopings and drapery, marked one of those whom Pete and her brother Dick were wont to speak of

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scornfully as “ fancy articles ” and “ none of our sort.” As for the stranger, she replied and questioned politely and pleasantly, but inwardly was only moved to a wonder which found expression the moment she was out of hearing :

“ How odd of that girl to come down stairs and actually try to entertain me while her grandmother is so ill l”

It was a welcome release to both when the doctor entered.

“She is better?” said Pete, in mingled affirmation and inquiry.

“No; I can hardly say that — yet.” The doctor spoke slowly and looked at Pete as if uncertain how much it would be well to tell her. “ It is paralysis.”

The physician’s sister looked up with a quick comprehending glance, but the words conveyed no intelligence to Pete.

“ I have done all that can be done for her. I will come again in the morning if — if there should be any need.” He turned abruptly away then, as if to avoid saying more, and his sister barred any further question by her pleasantly murmured thanks and good-bye. As they reached the walk she glanced back at the house, and, forgetful of the

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open window, her comment went floating into the room :

“ What a queer place, inside and out ! It looks like a mass of unfinished beginnings that had never come to anything.”

Dick, with boyish dislike of manifesting any emotion before strangers, or even of meeting them, had kept out of sight, but the moment they were gone he confronted Pete anxiously:

“ Well, what did he say?”

“ Not much ; he hurried away so,” answered Pete, scarcely satisfied. “But he thought she would be better soon. At least, that is what he must have meant, for he spoke as if there would be no need of his coming again.”

Dick’s freckled, honest face brightened, and he softly whistled a note of relief :

“ That’s good ! Fact is, Pete, I was considerably scared, though I wouldn’t own it even to myself. I am glad, I tell you.”

So was Pete. Her meagre information seemed to grow fuller with the weight of Dick’s interpretation added to her own ; and when the boy went cheerily out to bring in the wood and water for the evening, Pete looked out at the last slant sunbeams resting on the lilies and the poppies, and

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felt that the world was once more almost her own comfortable every-day world : it soon would be ; and, with a new sympathy born of the afternoon’s experience, she pitied people to whom dreadful things did happen — really happen. Then, standing there, she suddenly remembered those last words of her visitor — words not intended foy her hearing — and wondered what she had meant by them.

“‘A mass of unfinished beginnings that had never come to anything,’ ” Pete repeated, looking around the large room.

The fireplace below the marble mantel was filled in by a board covered with cheap paper ; the faded and dingy Brussels carpet, from which had been removed some pieces that had utterly outlived their usefulness, was supplemented by breadths of rag carpeting; a grand piano elaborately inlaid with pearl originally, and overlaid with dents and scratches since, stood in a corner: it was out of date, out of tune and covered with a plaid shawl which was also considerably past its first glory. All these details were familiar enough, but they had never impressed Pete as they did now.

“ That’s what it does look like — what it is, I suppose — a mass of beginnings : we haven’t minded

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much because we have always been waiting for the finishing to come, but it has been a good while — almost all my life,” she said, slowly.

The life numbered seventeen years now. Pete had never thought of herself as a young lady, but it occurred to her that the young lady who had just gone away could not be more than three or four years older than herself.

“So I am almost old enough to be one, but I am only a 1 mass of beginnings/ like the house,” she concluded, with a glance at the old mirror in tarnished gilt frame above the mantel. The dark hair smoothly brushed back from her face and braided in one long stiff plait down her back, with the sole idea of getting it out of the way as completely and expeditiously as possible, the plain calico dress, the hands browned by exposure to all weather and bearing numerous scratches from rosebushes and berry-vines, presented a marked contrast to the specimen of young ladyhood she had been considering; and for the first time in her life Pete was conscious of a lurking doubt whether the points of difference were so entirely in her own favor as she and Dick had always imagined. It was only a flitting thought; the next one was a wonder why she had not been summoned up stairs.

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u Mrs. Leib promised to call me when I was wanted. I’m sure grandma will want me as soon as she is well enough to ask for me, and I think that ought to be by this time. I may not know much about sickness, but she will want me near her,” she said, with the comforting conviction that, whatever her deficiencies as a nurse or a young lady, there was one place where she was first.

But the kindly eyes that had always brightened at Pete’s coming did not notice the girl as she entered. They were still half closed and the strange heavy breathing was unchanged. Through an open door Pete saw her grandfather sitting in an adjoining apartment, his gray head bowed upon his hands. The hushed room, the strong odor of camphor, the low voices of the two neighbors, who still lingered, all oppressed Pete, and, though she did not quite know why, she shrank from asking any questions. She quietly passed to a window and sat down there alone.

The sun slowly vanished beyond the line of distant hills and the long twilight faded. Deb went down stairs and looked after the evening work. A few people came to the door, made inquiries and went away again, and the summer night settled down. Pete occasionally stole to the bedside and

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watched for a few minutes for some sign of returning consciousness, only to go away troubled and perplexed by the still form and the breathing that grew more slow and difficult. It was hard to realize that it could be her grandmother lying there to be taken care of instead of watching over and caring for others. Her cheerful, motherly presence had always been the life of the house. Her hopeful, happy temperament had made the place and the circumstances and mode of life connected with it appear not as failure and hardship, but only as a waiting for the something better that was just about to come.

The great house was merely one of many grand beginnings, for its builder, Richard Wilder, was one who saw most things, especially his own projects and possibilities, in magnificent proportions. Versatile, ambitious and energetic, he abounded in wonderful schemes and mighty enterprises, and all his days had been just on the verge of achieving a fortune. A competence, indeed, had been more than once within his grasp, and had been risked and lost in the effort to capture some greater prize that lay beyond. Early in life he had married a prospective heiress — the inheritance never became anything more than prospective — and when she

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died, leaving him an infant daughter, he confided the little one to the care of his father and his mother and plunged more deeply than ever into his various business ventures. Railroad-building, land-offices, silver-mining companies, or whatever it might be, each new speculation was sure to prove the most profitable in which he had engaged, and with firm faith in his own plans, and with a fluent tongue to persuade others to like faith, he was constantly pushing forward some great undertaking. He remarried soon, but the father and the mother, living quietly in a little country home in New England, had for years seldom seen the son who was too busy for visiting, and they never saw his second wife. Two or three years later he had discovered in the vicinity of this village of Western Pennsylvania some peculiarities of soil and water which suggested to him the probable presence of petroleum. Elated with the idea, he secured the services of one supposed to be an expert in such matters, and privately instituted a series of experiments that convinced him of the correctness of his theories. Then, purchasing the tract of land, he openly avowed his discovery and set about reaping his golden harvest. The little village rejoiced in a sudden breeze — or, rather, whirlwind — of prosperity. The unpretend-

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ing “ Traveler’s Home/’ near the railway, blossomed out in wide wooden wings and yards of veranda and became the “ Metropolitan Hotel.” Stores and offices took on city airs of paint and plate-glass, and a forest of derricks sprung up in the suburbs. Mr. Wilder was offered handsome sums for his purchase, or for even a part of it, but he refused to sell. He held at last the solid foundation of a fortune that would satisfy him, and he meant to keep it in his own possession, he said ; he had found a business that would do to settle down upon. It was with this triumphant feeling that he and his wife gave to their baby-daughter the somewhat fanciful name of Petra.

While the sinking of the wells and the putting up of requisite buildings progressed Mr. Wilder purchased another piece of ground, on the opposite side of the village, and began the erection of a house that might serve as a country residence, but the plans for its elaborate finishing and for laying out and beautifying the grounds were never carried into effect. The flow of oil from the first well steadily diminished, and boring deeper, digging other wells, and all the costly experiments born of desperation that followed, did not increase the yield, but gradually revealed the fact that the promise

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had been delusive : it was all a failure. Whether the disappointment and the anxiety bore too heavily upon a proud and ambitious spirit and a physical frame naturally fragile, or from some other cause, Mrs. Wilder speedily drooped into a listless, unhappy invalid, and when her little son was born slipped out of a world that had not satisfied her.

With the failure of the petroleum enterprise the village dropped back into more than its former obscurity, and Mr. Wilder’s property there was as valueless as a ship built too far inland ever to reach the ocean. It was all that was left him, however; he had put into the venture all that he was worth. He could not even dispose of the land for the modest sum he had originally paid for it, and there was little prospect of any growth in the village that would ever make the ground more valuable. The mounds of earth, the useless buildings and the great derricks standing like giant skeletons to blacken in sun and wind were abandoned, but the house he had built was tenable. He could neither sell it nor complete it, but he could use it. His parents were readily prevailed upon to come there with the little Kitty and take charge of the two younger children also, and then he gladly availed himself of a commission that would take him to Europe.

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He had remained abroad ever since, now here, now there, always engaged in some great scheme that was to work wonderful results and bring wealth to those at home. When the village people heard, as they rarely did, of any of these great expectations, they laughed incredulously over the prospect of “ Dick Wilder’s ship coming in again,” but the father and the mother never lost faith in “son Richard” and his abilities. They were simple, kindly people, content with their quiet life and devoted to the children, whom, after the manner of grandparents, they petted and indulged to the extent of their power.

The large garden and one or two cows furnished a considerable part of the family income, which was supplemented by occasional remittances from abroad. When these last were tolerably liberal, they were freely expended in the pleasant faith that the expected era of plenty was at hand ; when, as oftener happened, they were scant and long delayed, the mother was only full of pity for Richard, who “ must be hard pressed just now, poor fellow !” and she was cheerily certain that “ for themselves they could manage to get along for a while.” Getting along for a while was all that was ever planned for.

That house — “ The Barracks ” the neighbors had

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long ago christened it — had been Petra’s home since she could remember. Her name, like the other ambitious plannings about the place, had been cut short, and “Pete” was all that common use had left of it. It suited her well enough. So, too, her unfettered, careless life suited her. She had not thought of it as lacking advantages. Much which that term commonly signifies she and Dick had proudly scoffed at as disadvantages of the most absurd sort, and they wondered that Kitty could be so silly as to want to go away to the city to live. A relative of Kitty, a cousin of her mother, had invited the girl to spend two or three years with her, urging the benefit of superior schools and refined society, and the grandparents, sore-hearted at the parting, but unselfish, had accepted the offer. Pete openly rejoiced that she had no relatives to extend similar privileges to her. Dick declared that a girl who could climb into a cherry tree, jump over a ditch and go into a berry-pasture without screaming about snakes was worth “ forty frizzled and ruffled girls who knew how to thump on a piano and Pete had very heartily accepted Dick’s opinion and his praise.

But to-night, as Pete sat by the open window, alert to catch every whisper in the room, but with

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nothing to busy her except her own thoughts, she found herself wondering whether things could always go on in this old fashion and what sort of a life it would make if they did. Her afternoon’s reading, the strange presence of illness in the house, the chance remark of the doctor’s sister, combined to awaken questions and reflections that were new. She remembered that the promised fortune which was to round all these beginnings into completeness was really no nearer now than it had been when she was a little child. Indeed, it seemed farther away if she could judge by the sums from abroad, which had grown smaller and less frequent, until of late there had been a long silence over which her grandparents marveled and worried. For herself, she had not thought much about it; she had known no lack of care or of love, and her absent father was little more than a name to her. But she began to realize, as she considered the matter, that his health and success must mean a great deal to her grandfather, who was now growing old; she had not thought how old until she saw the bowed gray head to-day.

Two or three hours passed away without any apparent change in the sufferer. A shaded lamp had been brought into the sick-room, and the

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watchers softly arranged chairs and table in the position most convenient for the night. Pete was silently wondering whether they intended to stay, when Mrs. Leib came to her and said with an odd gentleness in her usually crisp, sharp tones,

“ Hadn’t you better go and lie down, Sis? Like as not there will not be any change till mornin,’ and we can call you right away if there is. You’ll be all tired out settin’ here.”

“ Oh, I couldn’t sleep ; I’d rather be here,” the girl urged ; and the neighbor went away and left her with her head leaning against the window-sill, her eyes watching the starry sky.

Despite the protest of Pete, she must have dropped into a light slumber, for she had lost consciousness of her surroundings and her thoughts were confusedly trying to settle some tangle of happenings and hinges when she was aroused by a sobbing voice at her side.

“ Oh, Miss Pete, it am cornin’ now,” whispered Deb. “ It’ll be all ober ’fore de daylight.”

“ What ? Who is coming ?” questioned Pete, bewildered.

“Oh, chile, don’ ye know there is any such ting as def in dis worl’ ?”

Death ! The girl started to her feet. Her

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grandfather was kneeling by the bedside; in the doorway stood Dick with white, frightened face, and even as Pete reached the foot of the couch Mrs. Leib said huskily,

“It’s all over!”

A door had suddenly unclosed in Petra’s life — a door that opened outward into eternity.

Chapter II. “over This Jordan.”

mHERE had come the strange days of bewilderment, the pitiful effort to stagger to the feet again which must follow such a crushing sudden blow, the slow awakening of stunned heart and brain to the keen anguish of realization, the dazed surprise of finding that the world must still go on after it has seemed to end, the intrusive persistence of common daily cares and petty demands that still make life move forward in ghastly mocking semblance of the days when it had a soul.

“ Forty and five years together, and now it’s all done! Forty-five years repeated the old man, now to himself and now to others, in the amazement of his grief. “ Seems like ’most all of me is gone away. It — it wasn’t like Mary to go and leave me. I don’t seem to know what is left.”

It was evident, as weeks wore away, that what

was left would never again be the man who had 28 carried his years so blithely, going about the place in the vigor of his hale and cheerful old age, attending to the garden, the poultry and all that belonged to the grounds.

“ Miss Pete,” said Deb, standing in the doorway one morning, “ dere ain’t no meat in de house for dinner, an’ no tea. De coffee’s done used up too. ’Pears like tings didn’t las’ no time when all dem folks was hyer — Miss Kitty an’ yer aunt Maria,” she added, apologetically.

“She isn’t my aunt,” interrupted Pete. She had never liked Kitty’s city friends, and she aroused from her despondent attitude to repudiate the relationship. It had hurt her that Kitty had come home to the funeral — weeping until her pretty eyes were disfigured, it is true, and declaring that she “missed dear grandma everywhere” — and then had gone away again as if she were only a visitor. And as for Miss Maria — Kitty’s cousin instead of aunt — her way of tiptoeing about the house, patting Pete on the shoulder whenever she met her, and pouring out her platitudes of consolation in a voice that had no tone of real sympathy, — it had all been wellnigh intolerable.

“ Mebby she ain’t, chile, dat’s so, but de coffee’s

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ao

gone, all de same,” said Deb, returning to the main point. “ An* der ain’t no meat for dinner.”

“ Oh, Deb, what does it matter ?” answered Pete, wearily. “ It is only a dinner, and no one cares what we have or whether there is anything at all.”

Deb dissentingly shook her turbaned head :

“ If ’twas jes’ one dinner ’n no mo’, ole Deb wouldn’t trouble ye, honey ; but dar’s de nex’ day, an’ de nex’. Days won’t stop cornin’, an’ folks dat ain’t called ter die has got to keep doin’ jes’ de same as when deir heart was in it. Somebody mus’ take keer ob him.” She nodded toward the figure seated in the old arm-chair where the sunlight slanted through the hall.

Pete’s glance followed Deb’s, noted the listless drooping of the form so lately erect, and awakened with a pang of self-reproach to the meaning of Deb’s words. It was the old command — the hardest, perhaps, that ever falls on our mortal ears: “ My servant is dead ; now arise and go over this Jordan.” At the river’s brink we may have parted from our best beloved. On the hither side lie all the old sweet days, the happy work together, the precious memories, and we linger weeping. When the dark stream swept across our path, it bore away all hope or care for any years beyond. Nevertheless, in one form or another comes speedily the mandate that must be obeyed : “ Tarry not here to mourn. 1 Arise and go over this Jordan*” to the duties that still must be done.