Page:The Atlantic Monthly Volume 2.djvu/708

 -book, and handing it to her friend, who opened it in a matter-of-course way that was full of delicacy; and—no doubt accidentally, and innocently, as to any trick of pretty sentiment— deposited the check and the bank-note beside that card.

And now it was time to part. Miss Wimple took up the dim chamber-lamp, and led Madeline down the stairs,—both silent, calm: those were not crying women. As they entered the shop, Miss Wimple immediately set down the lamp on the nearest end of the counter, and went with Madeline straight to the door, whither its slender ray hardly reached, and where the blood-spots and the rents on her shoulder might not be noticed,—or, at least, not clearly defined. Then, with a business-like "Ah! I had forgotten,"—admirably feigned,—she hastily removed the shawl from Madeline's shoulders, and the lace cape from her own; and she put the lace cape on Madeline, and covered it with the shawl. This time Madeline shrank, and would have forbidden the charitable surprise; but Miss Wimple moved as though to open the door, and said,—

"Madeline, in mind, and heart, and soul, do you feel ready?"

"Yes!"

"Then go!—Believe in God and yourself, and do the best you can."

And Madeline said,—

"And you, also, must believe in me, and pray for me; be patient with me, and wait. If the time should ever come when I can comfort you, with God's help I will hasten to you, wherever you may be."

And they kissed each other, and both said, "God bless you!"

So Madeline departed quickly, and presently was lost in the shadows beyond the shop-lamps.

[Next morning, when Sally Wimple went to take down the bars, her neighbors were astonished; for it was already reported and believed that she had been seen going from the Athenæum to the ten o'clock train the night before.]

Then Miss Wimple closed the door and went back to her room, where she sat down on the bed and had a good cry, which was a great comfort. When, after that, she arose, and, standing before the glass to undress herself, perceived the blood-stains and the rents, she straightway went and brought her work-basket, and, seating herself under the dim lamp, without fear or hesitation cut down the dress, low-neck—There!—Then she lay down in the bed and slept sweetly, with a smile on her face.

Ah! cunning, artless Sally Wimple! No wonder the dashing directness of your character had ever by your neighbors been mistaken for simplicity. The thing which was easiest for you to do was ever the hardest thing for you to bear. In the morning, this new Godiva of Hendrik—not less to be honored than she of Coventry, in all she underwent and overcame—descended to her shop, "clothed on with chastity"; and then her dreadful trial began. I claim for her even more merit than the pure heart of the world has accorded to her namesake who: "took the tax away, And built herself an everlasting name,"

by as much as her task was harder, herself more helpless, and her reward less. Like her of Coventry, "left alone, the passions of her mind, As winds from all the compass shift and blow,  Made war upon each other for an hour,  Till Pity won."

She said to the World,—"If this woman pay your tax, she dies."

And the World mocked,—"You would not let your little finger ache for such as this!"

"But I would die," said she,—"and more,—I will bear your mocking and your hisses!"

"Oh! ay, ay, ay! you talk!" said the World.

But we have seen already. She had no herald to send forth and "bid him cry, with sound of trumpet, all the hard condition." No palfrey awaited her, "wrapt in purple, blazoned with armorial gold." For her, indeed,