Jane Was Here (26 page)

Therefore imagine, if you can, what miracle of joy irradiated my heart when I received your letter. To read of your days and nights of prayer and fasting, to know how you struggled and won, and that Jesus Himself spoke to you, bidding you “go forth and love, in innocence, thy sister soul!” Oh, Lysander, that blessed utterance of our Redeemer relieves me of my guilt, when I thought I had lost you because of my words that, while sincere, were too immodestly expressed. I told myself, “You bared your love to him, and it was not returned.” But now I know that you love me, too, and moreover, that Heaven condones it!

And our fair weather, if it lasts, affords us new opportunities to meet. Since you have lately cast aside your cane, a walk in the hills would be a healthy enterprise for restoring the strength in your leg. Ask directions to Mr. Quirk’s farm, and an ascending path will take you to his lands, which are bounded on the east by a low rock wall. Follow this wall past a sheep meadow and then a field of winter rye. At the end of Mr. Quirk’s lands, the wall turns left. Instead of following, look a little further on and you shall see a cluster of lofty white pines with low-drooping branches. They will be our curtains, to surround and hide us from view, as we meet to continue our holy work together.

My father has given me leave to take walks in the fresh air, since I have appeared so pale and dispirited of late. I expect my route will pass by Farmer Quirk’s wall about two o’clock tomorrow afternoon. May the Lord give me angels’ wings!

Your adoring
Jane

Dear Lysander,

I write hastily as Letty gathers her few belongings to leave us – she is dismissed – wrongly! – I will explain – we must exchange letters some other way – look for my letter in Farmer Quirk’s wall near our pines – Please give poor Letty whatever money you can spare – we will never see her again – I have lost a great friend

Jane

Dear Lysander,

What a bedlam was yesterday, our small household shattered in pieces. Papa has noticed for some time that money was missing from his desk, a little at a time, and finally he accused Letty of stealing from him! She denied it, but has returned in disgrace to her family in Boston. I thank you for whatever monetary assistance you gave her, for she is now without means, and completely innocent besides. I dare not tell Papa that the thief is Rebecca. She has been surreptitiously taking a few coins at a time from his desk, over many years. She does not know I am aware of her petty theft. She conceals the money in her wedding chest, and only spends a little now and then on fripperies like ribbons. I cannot say what possesses her to steal, when Father has always provided adequately for us, but it is a kind of distemper I believe, and without logical cause. I do not wish to expose her, for the sorrow it would cause Papa. Neither should I desire to see Rebecca humiliated, for I do love my sister, and the amounts she steals are so little. I wish your influence had bestowed in her a reverence for God’s laws and the path of righteousness, but she does not seem to have profited in a deep way from your many meetings.

Papa will go to the shanties on Thursday morning to find a substitute for Letty (though I cannot expect another such companion ever again!) and thus I am at liberty to take another walk up Rowell Hill. Beloved, will you be there? If your answer be yes, leave open the glass door on Widow Seeley’s porch lantern, for we will be passing by tomorrow on our way to service and I shall subtly note your signal.

I have recently experienced qualms about deceiving Papa, for while Rebecca disdains the Eighth Commandment of our Lord by stealing, I forsake the Fifth by not honoring my father. Then your words return to me, and I am consoled: that I have but one Father, and He is in Heaven, and it is He who must be obeyed, and it is His Will that we be together in worship. It is strange to find myself turning from all I have been taught, yet I am filled with certainty every time you revise my thinking. Truly one feels what is right and true, in an innermost place of knowing, when it is God that speaks to our ear. How beautiful it is to serve Him.

Your devoted
Jane

Dear Lysander,

This afternoon I went to our spot, even though we had no assignation. The day was hazy and unusually warm. I removed my bonnet to feel the sun upon my face (despite knowing well that freckles would be my penance!). I lay on the spring grass, on the bosom of God’s earth, and felt the rise and fall of my breath couple with the throb of nature, whose Author I praise and worship with my whole body, and I sensed divinity at my fingertips, so attuned have I become to His presence.

I spent a pleasant hour thus, in remembering our last meeting. We have covered much ground in our spiritual conference, yet I realize I am far, far from pure. Indeed, the battle against human desire is more difficult than I conceived. I have mused much on the equally natural desire to be good. I suppose it is the Devil’s handiwork that slyly braids the two strands together, to confuse us, so that we incline towards our bodies’ desire as if it is for our good! How important, therefore, to be forever mindful of our innocence, and while our kisses and clasped hands may construe as children’s play, and thus without stain, yet at our feet the vines of lust seek purchase, at first lovingly as tendrils, and then – so quickly – as strangling coils. (How right you were, last Thursday, to end our meeting or we might have been beguiled by happiness to tempt sin. We each shall be vigilant for the other, and when one weakens we know the other will prevail.)

When I rose from the grass to turn homeward, I paused to admire the scene, which I fancied to be our Garden of Eden, wherein sin does not yet exist, and innocence claims the day, and the Father smiles on our virgin union. The Lord challenges us to protect this Eden – that it may last more than a moment – and extend into precious eternity.

Tuesday next, in the late afternoon, would suit – or Wednesday if it rains. Use our signal.

Take care of yourself, my love. I do adore to stroke your face – it is my prayer of thanks to the One who brought us together. Hallowed be His name!

Your loving
Jane

Dear Lysander,

Yesterday I climbed to our spot and waited in the rain, even though I knew you would not come in such weather. I paid for my imprudence, and slipped on the way down, nearly sliding the whole rest of the slope in the mud. Fortunately I was able to change my clothes before Papa came home and without Rebecca seeing – she has transferred her bed to the kitchen while she has the whooping cough.

To my surprise, Ellis Graynier called in the afternoon after the rain ended. He was very respectful and subdued when I sat with him (Papa removed to his study to read the newspaper, he said, but I rather suspect he went into the backyard to smoke his pipe, which I have forbidden him to do on account of his lungs!). Ellis seemed much shaken by his father’s condition, which is very grave. You might say he poured out his heart to me – if he had a heart to tip over. But I am being unchristian, and here was a fellow human in pain, and I made the best I could of such poor material. I urged him to join me in prayer, which I promised would bring him much solace. Then he teased me, wondering who it was that decided God wished us to worship Him on our knees, and what if He had been misunderstood, and we were meant to stand on our heads, and such a mistake would account for why so many of our prayers went ignored. When he saw I did not find this humorous, he apologized. Nonetheless, you see how there is no room for reform in this young man. He cannot be blamed altogether, for his mother died when he was young, and almost immediately afterward his father acquired a Negro slave from Martinique who, it is said, is his concubine as well as his chattel – thus the sins of the father have poisoned and deformed the son’s character!

My unwanted caller stayed on for more than an hour, seeming eager to prolong our intercourse. But my mind continually wandered. Truly since you and I pledged ourselves, I have felt far away from worldly preoccupations – my mundane life seems so little – I watch with dwindling interest the actions of these small figures upon a stage. No more than a snip of a scissors and I would float free of this tiny drama, just as I did quit my body when I was ill, to fly on wings to thee and the Glory.

The ground will be drier in a day or two. Let us try again to meet in our Eden – Monday afternoon, God willing, three o’clock. I await your signal as ever.

Always your
Jane