The Mill Mystery | Page 2

"but the
future! the future!--what am I to do with my future?"
She did not answer at first. A gleam--I can scarcely call it a
glow--passed over her face, and her eyes took a far-away look that
made them very sweet. Then a little flush stole into her cheek, and,
pressing my hand, she said:
"Will you trust it to me for a while?"
I must have looked my astonishment, for she hastened to add:
"Your future I have little concern for. With such capabilities as yours,
you must find work. Why, look at your face!" and she drew me
playfully before the glass. "See the forehead, the mouth, and tell me
you read failure there! But your present is what is doubtful, and that I
can certainly take care of."
"But----" I protested, with a sensation of warmth in my cheeks.
The loveliest smile stopped me before I could utter a word more.
"As you would take care of mine," she completed, "if our positions
were reversed." Then, without waiting for a further demur on my part,
she kissed me, and as if the sweet embrace had made us sisters at once,
drew me to a chair and sat down at my feet. "You know," she naively
murmured, "I am almost rich; I have five hundred dollars laid up in the
bank, and----"
I put my hand over her lips; I could not help it. She was such a frail
little thing, so white and so ethereal, and her poor five hundred had
been earned by such weary, weary work.
"But that is nothing, nothing," I said. "You have a future to provide for,
too, and you are not as strong as I am, if you have been more
successful."

She laughed, then blushed, then laughed again, and impulsively cried:
"It is, however, more than I need to buy a wedding-dress with, don't
you think?" And as I looked up surprised, she flashed out: "Oh, it's my
secret; but I am going to be married in a month, and--and then I won't
need to count my pennies any more; and, so I say, if you will stay here
with me without a care until that day comes, you will make me very
happy, and put me at the same time under a real obligation; for I shall
want a great many things done, as you can readily conceive."
What did I say--what could I say, with her sweet blue eyes looking so
truthfully into mine, but--"Oh, you darling girl!" while my heart filled
with tears, which only escaped from overflowing my eyes, because I
would not lessen her innocent joy by a hint of my own secret trouble.
"And who is the happy man?" I asked, at last, rising to pull down the
curtain across a too inquisitive ray of afternoon sunshine.
"Ah, the noblest, best man in town!" she breathed, with a burst of
gentle pride. "Mr. B----"
She went no further, or if she did, I did not hear her, for just then a
hubbub arose in the street, and lifting the window, I looked out.
"What is it?" she cried, coming hastily towards me.
"I don't know," I returned. "The people are all rushing in one direction,
but I cannot see what attracts them."
"Come away then!" she murmured; and I saw her hand go to her heart,
in the way it did when she first entered the room a half-hour before. But
just then a sudden voice exclaimed below: "The clergyman! It is the
clergyman!" And giving a smothered shriek, she grasped me by the arm,
crying: "What do they say? '_The clergyman_'? Do they say 'The
clergyman'?"
"Yes," I answered, turning upon her with alarm. But she was already at
the door. "Can it be?" I asked myself, as I hurriedly followed, "that it is
Mr. Barrows she is going to marry?"
For in the small town of S---- Mr. Barrows was the only man who
could properly be meant by "The clergyman"; for though Mr. Kingston,
of the Baptist Church, was a worthy man in his way, and the
Congregational minister had an influence with his flock that was not to
be despised, Mr. Barrows, alone of all his fraternity, had so won upon
the affections and confidence of the people as to merit the appellation
of "The clergyman."

"If I am right," thought I, "God grant that no harm has come to him!"
and I dashed down the stairs just in time to see the frail form of my
room-mate flying out of the front door.
I overtook her at last; but where? Far out of town on that dark and
dismal road, where the gaunt chimneys of the deserted mill rise from a
growth of pine-trees. But I knew before I reached her