The Promise
Murray was not as one without hope,
for there was the Promise. The remembrance of
it set him now to exulting, in an odd, restrained
little way, where a moment ago he had been desponding.
He clasped plump, brown little hands around a plump,
brown little knee and swayed gently this way and that.
“Maybe she’ll begin with
my shoes,” Murray thought, and held his foot
quite still. He could almost feel light fingers
unlacing the stubbed little shoe; Sheelah’s
fingers were rather heavy and not patient with knots.
Hers would be patient there are some things
one is certain of.
“When she unbuttons me,”
Murray mused on, sitting absolutely motionless, as
if she were unbuttoning him now “when
she unbuttons me I shall hold in my breath this
way,” though he could hardly have explained
why.
She had never unlaced or unbuttoned
him. Always, since he was a little, breathing
soul, it had been Sheelah. It had never occurred
to him that he loved Sheelah, but he was used to her.
All the mothering he had ever experienced had been
the Sheelah kind thorough enough, but lacking
something; Murray was conscious that it lacked something.
Perhaps perhaps to-night he should find
out what. For to-night not Sheelah, but his mother,
was going to undress him and put him to bed.
She had promised.
It had come about through his unprecedented
wail of grief at parting, when she had gone into the
nursery to say good-bye, in her light, sweet way.
Perhaps it was because she was to be gone all day;
perhaps he was a little lonelier than usual.
He was always rather a lonely little boy, but there
were worse times; perhaps this had been a worse
time. Whatever had been the reason that prompted
him, he had with disquieting suddenness, before Sheelah
could prevent it, flung his arms about the pretty
mother and made audible objection to her going.
“Why, Murray!” She had
been taken by surprise. “Why, you little
silly! I’m coming back to-night; I’m
only going for the day! You wouldn’t see
much more of me if I stayed at home.” Which,
from its very reasonableness, had quieted him.
Of course he would not see much more of her.
As suddenly as he had wailed he stopped wailing.
Yet she had promised. Something had sent her
back to the nursery door to do it.
“Be a good boy and I’ll
come home before you go to bed! I’ll put
you to bed,” she had promised. “We’ll
have a regular lark!”
Hence he was out here on the door-step
being a good boy. That Sheelah had taken unfair
advantage of the Promise and made the being good rather
a perilous undertaking, he did not appreciate.
He only knew he must walk a narrow path across a long,
lonely day.
There were certain things one
especial certain thing he wanted to know,
but instinct warned him not to interrupt Sheelah till
her work was done, or she might call it not being
good. So he waited, and while he waited he found
out the special thing. An unexpected providence
sent enlightenment his way, to sit down beside him
on the door-step. Its other name was Daisy.
“Hullo, Murray! Is it you?”
Daisy, being of the right sex, asked needless questions
sometimes.
“Yes,” answered Murray, politely.
“Well, le’s play. I can stay half
a hour. Le’s tag.”
“I can’t play,”
rejoined Murray, caution restraining his natural desires.
“I’m being good.”
“Oh, my!” shrilled the
girl child derisively. “Can’t you
be good tagging? Come on.”
“No; because you might I
might get no-fairing, and then Sheelah’d come
out and say I was bad. Le’s sit here and
talk; it’s safer to. What’s a lark,
Daisy? I was going to ask Sheelah.”
“A lark? Why, it’s a bird,
of course!”
“I don’t mean the bird
kind, but the kind you have when your mother puts
you when something splendid happens.
That kind, I mean.”
Daisy pondered. Her acquaintance
with larks was limited, unless it meant
“Do you mean a good time?”
she asked. “We have larks over to my house
when we go to bed ”
“That’s it! That’s
the kind!” shouted delighted Murray. “I’m
going to have one when I go to bed. Do you have
reg’lar ones, Daisy?” with a secret
little hope that she didn’t. “I’m
going to have a reg’lar one.”
“Huh! chase all ‘round
the room an’ turn somersaults an’ be highway
robberers? An’ take the hair-pins out o’
your mother’s hair an’ hide in
it what?”
Murray gasped a little at the picture
of that kind of a lark. It was difficult to imagine
himself chasing ’round the room or being a highwayman;
and as for somersaults he glanced uneasily
over his shoulder, as if Sheelah might be looking
and read “somersaults” through the back
of his head. For once he had almost turned one
and Sheelah had found him in the middle of it and
said pointed things. In Sheelah’s code
of etiquette there were no somersaults in the “s”
column.
“It’s a reg’lar
lark to hide in your mother’s hair,” was
going on the girl child’s voice. “Yes,
sir, that’s the reg’larest kind!”
Murray gasped again, harder.
For that kind took away his breath altogether and
made him feel a little dizzy, as if he were were
doing it now hiding in his mother’s
hair! It was soft, beautiful, gold-colored hair,
and there was a great deal of it oh, plenty
to hide in! He shut his eyes and felt it all
about him and soft against his face, and smelled the
faint fragrance of it. The dizziness was sweet.
Yes, that must be the reg’larest
kind of a lark, but Murray did not deceive himself,
once the dream was over. He knew that kind
was not waiting for him at the end of this long day.
But a lark was waiting, anyway a plain
lark. It might have been the bird kind in his
little heart now, singing for joy at the prospect.
Impatience seized upon Murray.
He wanted this little neighbor’s half-hour to
be up, so that he could go in and watch the clock.
He wanted Sheelah to come out here, for that would
mean it was ten o’clock; she always came at
ten. He wanted it to be noon, to be afternoon,
to be night! The most beautiful time in his
rather monotonous little life was down there at the
foot of the day, and he was creeping towards it on
the lagging hours. He was like a little traveller
on a dreary plain, with the first ecstatic glimpse
of a hill ahead.
Murray in his childish way had been
in love a long time, but he had never got very near
his dear lady. He had watched her a little way
off and wondered at the gracious beauty of her, and
loved her eyes and her lips and her soft, gold-colored
hair. He had never oh, never been
near enough to be unlaced and unbuttoned and put to
bed by the lady that he loved. She had come in
sometimes in a wondrous dress to say good night, but
often, stopping at the mirror on the way across to
him, she had seen a beautiful vision and forgotten
to say it. And Murray had not wondered, for he
had seen the vision, too.
“Your mamma’s gone away, hasn’t
she? I saw her.”
Daisy was still there! Murray
pulled himself out of his dreaming, to be polite.
“Yes; but she’s coming back to-night.
She promised.”
“S’posing the cars run
off the track so she can’t?” Daisy said,
cheerfully.
“She’ll come,” Murray
rejoined, with the decision of faith. “She
promised, I said.”
“S’posing she’s killed ’most
dead?”
“She’ll come.”
“Puffickly dead s’posing?”
Murray took time, but even here his
faith in the Promise stood its ground, though the
ground shook under it. Sheelah had taught him
what a promise was; it was something not to be shaken
or killed even in a railroad wreck.
“When anybody promises, they
do it,” he said, sturdily. “She
promised an’ she’ll come.”
“Then her angel will have to
come,” remarked the older, girl child, coolly,
with awful use of the indicative mood.
When the half-hour was over and Murray
at liberty, he went in to the clock and stood before
it with hands a-pocket and wide-spread legs. A
great yearning was upon him to know the mystery of
telling time. He wished oh, how he
wished he had let Sheelah teach him! Then he could
have stood here making little addition sums and finding
out just how long it would be till night. Or
he could go away and keep coming back here to make
little subtraction sums, to find out how much time
was left now and now and
now. It was dreadful to just stand and wonder
things.
Once he went up-stairs to his own
little room out of the nursery and sat down where
he had always sat when Sheelah unlaced him, before
he had begun to unlace himself, and stood up where
he had always stood when Sheelah unbuttoned him.
He sat very still and stood very still, his grave
little face intent with imagining. He was imagining
how it would be when she did it. She would
be right here, close if he dared, he could
put out his hand and smooth her. If he dared,
he could take the pins out of her soft hair, and hide
in it
He meant to dare!
“Little silly,” perhaps
she would call him; perhaps she would remember to
kiss him good-night. And afterwards, when the
lark was over, it would stay on, singing in his heart.
And he would lie in the dark and love Her.
For Her part, it was a busy day enough
and did not lag. She did her shopping and called
on a town friend or two. In the late afternoon
she ran in to several art-stores where pictures were
on exhibition. It was at the last of these places
that she chanced to meet a woman who was a neighbor
of hers in the suburbs.
“Why, Mrs. Cody!” the
neighbor cried. “How delightful! You’ve
come in to see Irving, too?”
“No,” with distinct regret
answered Murray’s mother, “but I wish I
had! I’m only in for a little shopping.”
“Not going to stay! Why,
it will be wicked to go back to-night unless,
of course, you’ve seen him in Robespierre.”
“I haven’t. Cicely
Howe has been teasing me to stop over and go with
her. It’s a ‘sure-enough’ temptation,
as Fred says. Fred’s away, so that part’s
all right. Of course there’s Murray, but
there’s also Sheelah ” She
was talking more to herself now than to the neighbor.
The temptation had taken a sudden and striking hold
upon her. It was the chance of a lifetime.
She really ought
“I guess you’ll stop over!”
laughed the neighbor. “I know the signs.”
“I’ll telephone to Sheelah,”
Murray’s mother decided, aloud, “then
I’ll run along back to Cicely’s. I’ve
always wanted to see Irving in that play.”
But it was seven o’clock before
she telephoned. She was to have been at home
at half-past seven.
“That you, Sheelah? I’m
not coming out to-night not until morning.
I’m going to the theatre. Tell Murray I’ll
bring him a present. Put an extra blanket over
him if it comes up chilly.”
She did not hang up the receiver at
once, holding it absently at her ear while she considered
if she ought to say anything else to Sheelah.
Hence she heard distinctly an indignant exclamation.
“Will you hear that, now!
An’ the boy that certain! ‘She’s
promised,’ he says, an’ he’ll kape
on ‘She’s-promising’ for all o’
me, for it’s not tell him I will! He can
go to slape in his poor little boots, expectin’
her to kape her promise!”
The woman with the receiver at her
ear uttered a low exclamation. She had not forgotten
the Promise, but it had not impressed her as anything
vital. She had given it merely to comfort Little
Silly when he cried. That he would regard it
as sacred that it was sacred came
to her now with the forcible impact of a blow.
And, oddly enough, close upon its heels came a remembrance
picture of a tiny child playing with his
soldiers on the floor. The sunlight lay over
him she could see it on his little hair
and face. She could hear him talking to the “Captain
soldier.” She had at the time called it
a sermon, with a text, and laughed at the child who
preached it. She was not laughing now.
“Lissen, Cappen Sojer, an’
I’ll teach you a p’omise. A p’omise a
p’omise why, when anybody p’omises,
they do it!”
Queer how plainly she could hear Little
Silly say that and could see him sitting in the sun!
Just the little white dress he had on tucks
in it and a dainty edging of lace! She had recognized
Sheelah’s maxims and laughed. Sheelah was
stuffing the child with notions.
“If anybody p’omises,
they do it.” It seemed to come to her over
the wire in a baby’s voice and to strike against
her heart. This mother of a little son stood
suddenly self-convicted of a crime the crime
of faithlessness. It was not, she realized with
a sharp stab of pain, faith in her the little
child at the other end of the line was exercising,
but faith in the Promise. He would keep on “She-promising”
till he fell asleep in his poor little boots
“Oh!” breathed in acute
distress the mother of a little son. For all
unexpectedly, suddenly, her house built of cards of
carelessness, flippancy, thoughtlessness, had fallen
round her. She struggled among the flimsy ruins.
Then came a panic of hurry. She
must go home at once, without a moment’s delay.
A little son was waiting for her to come and put him
to bed. She had promised; he was waiting.
They were to have a regular little lark that
she remembered, too, with distinctness. She was
almost as uncertain as Murray had been of the meaning
of a “lark”; she had used the word, as
she had used so many other words to the child, heedlessly.
She had even and odd, uncertain little feeling as
to what it meant to put a little son to bed, for she
had never unlaced or unbuttoned one. She had
never wanted to until now. But now she
could hardly wait to get home to do it. Little
Silly was growing up the bare brown space
between the puffs of his little trousers and the top
rims of his little socks were widening. She must
hurry, hurry! What if he grew up before she got
there! What if she never had a chance to put
a little son to bed! She had lost so many chances;
this one that was left had suddenly sprung into prominence
and immense value. With the shock of her awakening
upon her she felt like one partially paralyzed, but
with the need upon her to rise and walk to
run.
She started at once, scarcely allowing
herself time to explain to her friend. She would
listen to no urgings at all.
“I’ve got to go, Cicely I’ve
promised my little son,” was all she took time
to say; and the friend, knowing of the telephone message,
supposed it had been a telephone promise.
At the station they told her there
was another train at seven-thirty, and she walked
about uneasily until it came. Walking about seemed
to hurry it along the rails to her.
Another woman waited and walked with
her. Another mother of little sons, she decided
whimsically, reading it in the sweet, quiet face.
The other woman was in widow’s black, and she
thought how merciful it was that there should be a
little son left her. She yielded to an inclination
to speak.
“The train is late,” she said. “It
must be.”
“No.” The other woman
glanced backward at the station clock. “It’s
we who are early.”
“And in a hurry,” laughed
Murray’s mother, in the relief of speech.
“I’ve got to get home to put my little
son to bed! I don’t suppose you are going
home for that?”
The sweet face for an instant lost
its quietness. Something like a spasm of mortal
pain crossed it and twisted it. The woman walked
away abruptly, but came back. “I’ve
been home and put him to bed,” she
said, slowly “in his last little bed.”
Then Murray’s mother found herself
hurrying feverishly into a car, her face feeling wet
and queer. She was crying.
“Oh, the poor woman!”
she thought, “the poor woman! And I’m
going home to a little live one. I can cover
him up and tuck him in! I can kiss his little,
solemn face and his little, brown knees. Why haven’t
I ever kissed his knees before? If I could only
hurry! Will this car ever start?” She put
her head out of the window. An oily personage
in jumpers was passing.
“Why don’t we start?” she said.
“Hot box,” the oily person replied, laconically.
The delay was considerable to a mother
going home to put her little child to bed. It
seemed to this mother interminable. When at length
she felt a welcome jar and lurch her patience was threadbare.
She sat bolt upright, as if by so doing she were helping
things along.
It was an express and leaped ahead
splendidly, catching up with itself. Her thoughts
leaped ahead with it. No, no, he would not be
in bed. Sheelah was not going to tell him, so
he would insist upon waiting up. But she might
find him asleep in his poor little boots! She
caught her breath in half a sob, half tender laugh.
Little Silly!
But if an express, why this stop?
They were slowing up. It was not time to get
to the home station; there were no lights. Murray’s
mother waylaid a passing brakeman.
“What is it? What is it?”
“All right, all right!
Don’t be scairt, lady! Wreck ahead somewheres freight-train.
We got to wait till they clear the track.”
But the misery of waiting! He
might get tired of waiting, or Sheelah might tell
him his mother was not coming out to-night; he might
go to bed, with his poor little faith in the Promise
wrecked, like the freight on there in the dark.
She could not sit still and bear the thought; it was
not much easier pacing the aisle. She felt a wild
inclination to get off the train and walk home.
At the home station, when at last
she reached it, she took a carriage. “Drive
fast!” she said, peremptorily. “I’ll
pay you double fare.”
The houses they rattle past were ablaze
with light down-stairs, not up-stairs where little
sons would be going to bed. All the little sons
had gone to bed.
They stopped with a terrific lurch.
It threw her on to the seat ahead.
“This is not the place,”
she cried, sharply, after a glance without.
“No’m; we’re stopping
fer recreation,” drawled sarcastically
the unseen driver. He appeared to be assisting
the horse to lie down. She stumbled to the ground
and demanded things.
“Yer’ll have to ax this
here four-legged party what’s doin’. I
didn’t stop I kep’ right on
goin’. He laid down on his job, that’s
all, marm. I’ll get him up, come Chris’mas.
Now then, yer olé fool!”
There was no patience left in the
“fare” standing there beside the plunging
beast. She fumbled in her purse, found something,
dropped it somewhere, and hurried away down the street.
She did not walk home, because she ran. It was
well the streets were quiet ones.
“Has he gone to bed?”
she came panting in upon drowsy Sheelah, startling
that phlegmatic person out of an honest Irish dream.
“Murray Little Silly has
he gone to bed? Oh no!” for she saw him
then, an inert little heap at Sheelah’s feet.
She gathered him up in her arms.
“I won’t! I won’t
go, Sheelah! I’m waiting. She promis ”
in drowsy murmur.
“She’s here she’s
come, Murray! Mamma’s come home to put you
to bed Little Silly, open your eyes and
see mamma!”
And he opened them and saw the love
in her eyes before he saw her. Sleep took instant
wings. He sprang up.
“I knew you’d come!
I told Sheelah! When anybody promises, they
Come on quick up-stairs! I can unlace myself,
but I’d rather ”
“Yes, yes!” she sobbed.
“And we’ll have a lark,
won’t we? You said a lark; but not the
reg’larest kind I don’t suppose
we could have the reg’larest kind?”
“Yes yes!”
“Oh! why!”
His eyes shone. He put up his hand, then drew
it shyly back. If she would only take out the
pins herself if he only dared to
“What is it, Little Silly darling?”
They were up in his room. She had her cheek against
his little, bare, brown knees. It brought her
soft, gold-colored hair so near if he only
dared
“What is it you’d like,
little son?” And he took courage. She had
never called him Little Son before. It made him
brave enough.
“I thought the reg’larest
kind your hair if you’d
let it tumble all down, I’d hide
in it,” he breathed, his knees against her cheek
trembling like little frightened things.
It fell about him in a soft shower
and he hid in it and laughed. Sheelah heard them
laughing together.