The Christmas Miracle | Page 7

first. Each was eager to take the many risks incident to the
long wait in this precarious lodgment. The man was the stronger.
Aurelia was forced into the chair, tied fast, pushed off, waving' her
hand to her husband, shedding floods of tears, looking at him for the
last time, as she fancied, and calling out dismally, "Far'well, Basil,
far'-well."
Even this lugubrious demonstration could not damp the spirits of the
men working like mad at the windlass. They were jovial enough for
bursts of laughter when it became apparent that Basil had utilized the
ensuing interval to tie together, in preparation for the ascent with
himself, the two objects which he next most treasured, his violin and
his old hound. The trusty chair bore all aloft, and Basil was received

with welcoming acclamations.
Before the rope was wound anew and for the last time, the aspect of the
group on the cliff had changed. It had grown eerie, indistinct. The pines
and firs showed no longer their sempervirent green, but were black
amid the white tufted lines on their branches, that still served to
accentuate their symmetry. The vale had disappeared in a sinister abyss
of gloom, though Kennedy would not look down at its menace, but
upward, always upward. Thus he saw, like some radiant and splendid
star, the first torch whitely aglow on the brink of the precipice. It
opened long avenues of light adown the snowy landscape,--soft blue
shadows trailed after it, like half-descried draperies of elusive hovering
beings. Soon the torch was duplicated; another and then another began
to glow. Now several drew together, and like a constellation glimmered
crownlike on the brow of the night, as he felt the rope stir with the
signal to hoist.
Upward, always upward, his eyes on that radiant stellular coronal, as it
shone white and splendid in the snowy night. And now it had lost its
mystic glamour,--disintegrated by gradual approach he could see the
long handles of the pine-knots; the red verges of the flame; the blue and
yellow tones of the focus; the trailing wreaths of dun-tinted smoke that
rose from them. Then became visible the faces of the men who held
them, all crowding eagerly to the verge. But it was in a solemn silence
that he was received; a drear cold darkness, every torch being stuick
downward into the snow; a frantic haste in unharnessing him from the
ropes, for he was almost frozen. He was hardly apt enough to interpret
this as an emotion too deep for words, but now and again, as he was
disentangled, he felt about his shoulders a furtive hug, and more than
one pair of the ministering hands must needs pause to wring his own
hands hard. They practically carried him to a fire that had been built in
a sheltered place in one of those grottoes of the region, locally called
"Rock-houses." Its cavernous portal gave upon a dark interior, and not
until they had turned a corner in a tunnel-like passage was revealed an
arched space in a rayonnant suffusion of light, the fire itself obscured
by the figures about it. His eyes were caught first by the aspect of a
youthful mother with a golden-haired babe on her breast; close by

showed the head and horns of a cow; the mule was mercifully sheltered
too, and stood near, munching his fodder; a cluster of sheep pressed
after the steps of half a dozen men, that somehow in the clare-obscure
reminded him of the shepherds of old summoned by good tidings of
great joy.
A sudden figure started up with streaming white hair and patriarchal
beard.
"Will ye deny ez ye hev hed a sign from the heavens, Jubal Kennedy?"
the old circuit-rider straitly demanded. "How could ye hev strengthened
yer heart fur sech a deed onless the grace o' God prevailed mightily
within ye? Inasmuch as ye hev done it unto one o' the least o' these my
brethern, ye hev done it unto me."
"That ain't the kind o' sign, parson," Kennedy faltered. "I be lookin' fur
a meracle in the yearth or in the air, that I kin view or hear."
"The kingdom o' Christ is a spiritual kingdom," said the parson
solemnly. "The kingdom o' Christ is a spiritual kingdom, an' great are
the wonders that are wrought therein."

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Christmas Miracle, by
Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE
CHRISTMAS MIRACLE ***
***** This file should be named 23553-8.txt or 23553-8.zip *****
This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
http://www.gutenberg.org/2/3/5/5/23553/
Produced by David Widger
Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will be
renamed.

Creating the works from public domain print