Doctor Luke of the Labrador by Norman Duncan (color ebook reader .txt) 📖

was late in the night. My mother and I sat alone in her dim-lit room. We were waiting--both waiting. And I was waiting for the lights of the returning punts.

"Davy!" my mother called. "You are still there?"

"Ay, mother," I answered. "I'm still sittin' by the window, lookin' out."

"I am glad, dear," she sighed, "that you are here--with me--to-night."

She craved love, my love; and my heart responded, as the knowing hearts of children will.

"Ah, mother," I said, "'tis lovely t' be sittin' here--all alone with you!"

"Don't, Davy!" she cried, catching her breath. "I'm not able to bear the joy of it. My heart----"

"'Tis so," I persisted, "'cause I loves you so!"

"But, oh, I'm glad, Davy!" she whispered. "I'm glad you love your mother. And I'm glad," she added, softly, "that you've told me so--to-night."

By and by I grew drowsy. My eyes would not stay open. And I fell asleep with my head on the window-sill. I do not know how long I slept.

"Davy!" my mother called.

"Ay?" I answered, waking. "Sure, I been asleep!"

"But you're not wanting to go to bed?" she asked, anxiously. "You'll not leave your mother all alone, will you?"

"No, no, mama!"

"No," she said. "Do not leave your mother, now."

Again I fell asleep. It may be that I wasted a long, long time in sleep.

"Davy!" she called.

I answered. And, "I cannot stay awake," I said. "Sure, 'tis quite past me t' do it, for I'm so wonderful sleepy."

"Come closer," she said. "Tired lad!" she went on, when she had my hand in hers. "Sleepy head! Lie down beside me, dear, and go to sleep. I'm not afraid--not afraid, at all--to be left alone. Oh, you're so tired, little lad! Lie down and sleep. For your mother is very brave--to-night. And tell your father, Davy--when he comes and wakes you--and tell your sister, too--that your mother was happy, oh, very happy and brave, when...."

"When you fell asleep?" I asked.

"Yes," she answered, in a voice so low I could but hear it. "That I was happy when--I fell asleep."

I pulled off my jacket.

"I'm wanting to hear you say your prayers, Davy," she said, "before you go to sleep. I'm wanting once again--just once again--to hear you say your prayers."

I knelt beside the bed.

"My little son!" my mother said. "My--little--son!"

"My mother!" I responded, looking up.

She lifted my right hand. "Dear Jesus, lover of children," she prayed, "take, oh, take this little hand!"

And I began to say my prayers, while my mother's fingers wandered tenderly through my curls, but I was a tired child, and fell asleep as I prayed. And when I awoke, my mother's hand lay still and strangely heavy on my head.

* * * * *


Then the child that was I knew that his mother was dead. He leaped from his knees with a broken cry, and stood expectant, but yet in awe, searching the dim, breathless room for a beatified figure, white-robed, winged, radiant, like the angel of the picture by his bed, for he believed that souls thus took their flight; but he saw only shadows.

"Mama," he whispered, "where is you?"

There was no answer to the child's question. The risen wind blew wildly in the black night without. But it was still dim and breathless in the room.

"Mama," said the child, "is your soul hidin' from me?"

Still the child was left unanswered. He waited, listening--but was not answered.

"Don't hide," he pleaded. "Oh, don't hide, for I'm not wantin' to play! Oh, mother, I'm wantin' you sore!"

And, now, he knew that she would come, for, "I'm wantin' you, mother!" he had been used to crying in the night, and she had never failed to answer, but had come swiftly and with comfort. He waited for a voice and for a vision, surely expecting them in answer to his cry; but he saw only shadows, heard only the scream of the wind, and a sudden, angry patter of rain on the roof. Then the child that was I fancied that his mother's soul had fled while yet he slept, and, being persuaded that its course was heavenward, ran out, seeking it. And he forgets what then he did, save that he climbed the broken cliff behind the house, crying, "Wait, oh, wait!" and that he came, at last, to the summit of the Watchman, where there was a tumult of wind and rain.

"Mama!" he screamed, lifting his hands in appeal to the wide, black sky. "You forgot t' kiss me good-bye! Oh, come back!"

He flung himself prone on the naked rock, for the soul of his mother did not come, though patiently he had watched for the glory of its returning flight.

"She've forgot me!" he moaned. "Oh, she've forgot me!"

* * * * *


When, trembling and bedraggled, I came again to the room where my mother's body lay, my sister was kneeling by the bed, and my father was in converse with a stranger, who was not like the men of our coast. "Not necessarily mortal," this man was saying. "An operation--just a simple operation--easily performed with what you have at hand--would have saved the woman."

"Saved her, Doctor?" said my father passionately. "Is you sayin' _that_?"

"I have said so. It would have saved her. Had we been wrecked five days ago she would have been alive."

A torrent of rain beat on the house.

"Alive?" my father muttered, staring at the floor. "She would have been alive!"

The stranger looked upon my father in pity. "I'm sorry for you, my man," he said.

"'Tis strange," my father muttered, still staring at the floor. "'Tis strange--how things--comes about. Five days--just five...."

He muttered on.

"Yes," the stranger broke in, stirring nervously. "Had I come but five days ago."

A sudden rising of the gale--the breaking of its fury--filled the room with a dreadful confusion.

"Indeed--I'm--sorry--very sorry," the stranger stammered; his lips were drawn; in his eyes was the flare of some tragedy of feeling.

My father did not move--but continued vacantly to stare at the floor.

"Really--you know--I am!"

"Is you?" then my father asked, looking up. "Is you sorry for me an' Davy an' the lass?" The stranger dared not meet my father's eyes. "An' you could have saved her," my father went on. "_You_ could have saved her! She didn't have t' go. She died--for want o' you! God Almighty," he cried, raising his clenched hand, "this man come too late God Almighty--does you hear me, God Almighty?--the man you sent come too late! An' you," he flashed, turning on the stranger, "could have saved her? Oh, my dear lass! An' she would have been here the night? Here like she used t' be? Here in her dear body? Here?" he cried, striking his breast. "She would have lain here the night had you come afore? Oh, why didn't you come?" he moaned. "You hold life an' death in your hands, zur, t' give or withhold. Why didn't you come--t' give the gift o' life t' she?"

The stranger shrank away. "Stop!" he cried, in agony. "How was I to know?"

"Hush, father!" my sister pleaded.

In a flash of passion my father advanced upon the man. "How was you t' know?" he burst out. "Where you been? What you been doin'? Does you hear me?" he demanded, his voice rising with the noise of wind and rain. "What you been doin'?"

"Stop it, man! You touch me to the quick! You don't know--you don't know--"

"What you been doin'? We're dyin' here for want o' such as you. What you been doin'?"

There was no answer. The stranger had covered his face with his hands.

"O God," my father cried, again appealing to Heaven, "judge this man!"

"Stop!"

It was a bitter cry--the agony sounding clear and poignant above the manifold voices of the storm--but it won no heed.

"O God, judge this man!"

"Will no one stop him?" the stranger moaned. "For God's sake--stop him--some one!"

"O God, judge this man!"

The stranger fled....

* * * * *


"Oh, my dear wife!" my father sobbed, at last, sinking into the great armchair, wherein the mail-boat doctor had not sat. "Oh, my dear wife!"

"Father!" my dear sister whispered, flinging her soft arms about his neck and pressing her cheek against his brow. "Dear father!"

And while the great gale raged, she sought to comfort my father and me, but could not.


XI

The WOMEN at The GATE

By and by my sister put me in dry clothes, and bidding me be a good lad, sat me in the best room below, where the maids had laid a fire. And Skipper Tommy Lovejoy, finding me there disconsolate, took me to the seaward hills to watch the break of day: for the rain had ceased, the wind fallen away; and the gray light of dawn was in the eastern sky.

"I'm wantin' t' tell you, Davy," he said, in a confidential way, as we trudged along, "about the gate o' heaven."

I took his hand.

"An' I _been_ wantin' t' tell you," he added, giving his nose a little tweak, "for a long, long time."

"Is you?"

"Ay, lad; an' about the women at the gate."

"Women, Skipper Tommy?" said I, puzzled. "An', pray, who is they?"

"Mothers," he answered. "Just mothers."

"What they doin' at the gate? No, no! They're not _there_. Sure, they're playin' harps at the foot o' the throne."

"No," said he, positively; "they're at the gate."

"What they doin' there?"

"Waitin'."

We were now come to the crest of a hill; and the sea was spread before us--breaking angrily under the low, black sky.

"What's they waitin' for?" I asked.

"Davy, lad," he answered, impressively, "they're waitin' for them they bore. _That's_ what they're waitin' for."

"For their sons?"

"Ay; an' for their daughters, too."

While I watched the big seas break on the rocks below--and the clouds drift up from the edge of the world--I pondered upon this strange teaching. My mother had never told me of the women waiting at the gate.

"Ah, but," I said, at last, "I'm thinkin' God would never allow it t' go on. He'd want un all t' sing His praises. Sure, they'd just be wastin' His time--waitin' there at the gate."

Skipper Tommy shook his head--and smiled, and softly patted my shoulder.

"An' He'd gather un there, at the foot o' the throne," I went on, "an' tell un t' waste no more, but strike up their golden harps."

"No, no!"

"Why not?"

"They wouldn't go."

"But He'd _make_ un go."

"He couldn't."

"Not _make_ un!" I