Read CHAPTER SIX - A life history of Stephen Grattan's Faith A Canadian Story , free online book, by Margaret M Robertson, on ReadCentral.com.

And so the winter wore away. January, February, March, passed; and when April came in there were only here and there, on the hillocks, bits of bare ground to tell that the spring was coming.

“And to think that all my father’s fields are sown and growing green by this time and the violets and the primroses out in all the dales!” said Mrs Morely, with a sudden rush of homesick tears.

Mrs Grattan was with her, paying a long day’s visit; for they had been all the morning talking cheerfully of many things.

“Our winter is long,” she said.

“Oh, so long and dreary!” sighed Mrs Morely. “No, you must not think me discontented and unthankful,” she added, meeting Mrs Grattan’s grave looks. “Only a little homesick now and then. If I were sure that all was well with ” She hesitated.

“`I will trust, and not be afraid,’” said Mrs Grattan, softly.

They had not spoken much to one another about their troubles, these two women. Mrs Morely’s reserve, even at the time of little Ben’s death, had never given way so far as to permit her to speak of her husband’s faults and her own trials. And Mrs Grattan’s sympathy, though deep, had been silent expressed by deeds rather than by words. She knew well how full of fear for her husband the poor wife’s heart had been all the winter; but she could not approach the subject until she herself introduced it.

“`I will trust, and not be afraid,’” said Mrs Morely, repeating her friend’s words. “I can do naught else; and not always that.”

“`Lord, increase our faith!’” murmured Dolly.

There was a pause, during which Mrs Morely went about, busy with some household matter. When she sat down again, she said:

“You must not think I am pining for home. If I were sure that it is well with my husband, nothing else would matter.”

“You have good hope that it is well with him,” said Mrs Grattan.

“Oh, I do not know. I cannot tell. I can only leave him in God’s hand.” But she did not speak very hopefully.

“And surely there’s no better thing to do for him than that,” said Mrs Grattan.

“I know it. But I have hoped so many times, and so few of the poor souls who have gone so far astray as he has done come back to a better life. I fear no more than I hope.”

There was a long pause after that, and then, in a voice that seemed quite changed, Mrs Grattan said, “I never told you about Stephen and me, did I?”

“No. I know that you have had some great trouble in your life, like mine indeed, your husband has told me that: that is all I know.”

“Well, it’s not to be spoken of often. But, just to show what the Lord can do when He sets out to save a poor creature to the uttermost, I will tell you what He has done for Stephen and me. It must be told in few words, though. It shakes me to go back to those days.

“We were born in Vermont as good a State as any to be born and brought up in. It was quite a country place we lived in. My father was a farmer a grave, quiet man. My mother was never very strong; and I was the only one spared to them of five children. We lived a very quiet, humble sort of life; but, if ever folks lived contented and happy, we did.

“Stephen was one of many children too many for them all to get a living on their little stony farm; and his father sent his boys off as soon as they were able to go, and Stephen, who was the second son, was sent to learn the shoemaker’s trade in Weston, about twenty miles away.

“We had kept company, Stephen and me as boys and girls will, you know before he went; and it went on all the time he was learning his trade, whenever he came home on a visit. When his time was out, he stayed on as a journeyman in the same place; but he fell into bad hands, I suppose, for it began to come out through the neighbours, who saw him there sometimes, that he wasn’t doing as he ought to do; and when my father heard from them that they had seen him more than once the worse for liquor, he would let him have nothing more to say to me.

“You will scarcely understand just how it seemed to our folks. There was hardly a man who tasted liquor in all our town in those days. To have been betrayed into taking too much just once would have been to lose one’s character; and when my father heard of Stephen’s being seen a good many times when he was not able to take care of himself, it seemed to him that it was a desperate case. I think he would as lief have laid me down in the graveyard beside my little brothers, as have thought of giving me to Stephen then.

“I didn’t know how much I thought of him till there was an end put to his coming to our house. I believe I grew to care more about him when other folks turned against him. Not that I ever thought hard of my father: I knew he was right, and I didn’t mean to let him see that I was worrying; but he did see it, and when Stephen came home and worked, sometimes at his trade and sometimes on his father’s farm, a year quite steady, he felt every day more and more like giving it up, and taking him into favour again. He never said so, but I am sure my mother thought so, and sometimes I did too.

“My mother died that fall, and we had a dreadful still, lonesome winter my father and me; and when after a while Stephen came to see me, as he used to do, my father didn’t seem to mind. And pretty soon Stephen took courage and asked the old man for me. He said that I would be the saving of him, and that we would always stay with him in his old age which came on him fast after my mother died. So, what with one thing and what with another, he was wrought on to consent to our marriage: but I do believe it was the thought of helping to save a soul from death, that did more than all the rest to bring him round.

“Things went well with us for a while for more than two years nearly three; but then one day Stephen went to Weston, and got into trouble; and the worst was, having begun, he couldn’t stop. It was a miserable time. My father lost faith in Stephen after that, and Stephen lost faith in himself, and he got restless and uneasy, and it was a dreadful cross to him to have to stay at father’s, knowing that he wasn’t trusted and depended on as he used to be. And I suppose it was a cross to father to have him there; for when I spoke of going away, though he said it would break his heart to part from me, his only child, he said, too, that it would not do to part husband and wife, and perhaps it would be better to try it, for a while at least. So we went to live in Weston, and Stephen worked at his trade.

“Then father married again. He was an old man, and it never would have happened if I could have stayed with him. But what could he do? He couldn’t stay alone. The woman he married was a widow with children, and I knew there never would be room for me at home any more.

“We had a sad time at Weston. I had always lived on a farm, and, though Weston wasn’t much of a place then, it seemed dreadful close and shut-up and dismal to me. I was homesick and miserable there, and maybe I didn’t do all I might have done to make things pleasant for Stephen, and help to keep him straight. It was a dreadful time for him, and for me too.

“Well, after a while our children were born twin boys. Stephen was always tender-hearted over all little children; and over his own I couldn’t tell you what he was. It did seem then as though, if he could get a fair start and begin again, he might do better, for his children’s sake. So, when I got well, I made up my mind that I would ask a little help from father, and we’d go west.

“I knew I never could go home to stay now. But, when I saw the old place for the last time, I thought my heart would break. It wasn’t much of a place. There were only a few stony fields of pasture-land, and a few narrow meadows; but, oh, I thought, if my babies had only been born when we were in that safe, quiet place, it might have been so different! And my father was so feeble and old, and helpless-like, I could not bear to think of going so far away that I could never hope to see him again.

“But there was no help for it. It would give Stephen another chance; and so, with the little help my father could give us, we went out west and settled.

“So we left the old life quite behind, and began again. We had a hard time, but no harder than people generally have who go to a new country. Stephen kept up good courage, and stuck to his work; and I helped him all I could; and if I was sometimes a little discouraged and homesick, he never guessed it. And I never was much of either; for I was busy always, and there was my babies ” Dolly’s voice broke into a shrill wail as she spoke the word, and she sat with her face hidden a little while before she could go on again.