THREE in the afternoon of that memorable sixth day of March, found Mrs. Harrington unable to speak or hear; cold, stiff, without pulse, and her eyes set in death. “Just the same as dead,” the two hired nurses said to each other as they stood at the bedside.
“Sakes alive! and there is that child in the room!” exclaimed the elder woman impatiently, pointing to a forlorn little figure timidly crouching at the foot of the bed, which had been drawn out from the wall, so that the sick woman might be the better able to get her breath.
“Please let me stay,” moaned the child, with an appealing look. “I was in the room when papa died, and I was six months younger than I am now; and—and I have only mama left!”
“And she’s as good as dead,” answered the younger nurse more kindly, but still taking her cue from the elder. “She doesn’t know you, and never will again, so you might as well go into the parlor,” opening the door into that room as she spoke.
CALIFORNIA SCENERY, No. 28.—Cypress of Monterey, Cal. An evergreen of the species Cupressus sempervirens, of which there are several varieties. The most common variety is tall, with upright branches, somewhat resembling the poplar. The C. horizontalis is described as a low, flat-topped tree, with wide-spreading branches, evidently the one here represented. The peculiar one-sided appearance of the top is due to the heavy breezes blowing in from the sea, near which the cypresses of Monterey are found. The wood of the cypress is fine-grained and very durable, and has been known to suffer no decay by the lapse of 1,100 years. Many authorities hold it to be the gopher wood of the Scriptures. The tree grew on Mt. Hermon, and is cultivated in the lower levels of Syria. See Isa. 44:14. Egyptian mummy cases were also made of cypress wood.
Slowly the child walked in, her bosom heaving with emotion, and with sobs that would not be suppressed.
She was a little thing, yet with an old, wise face, as of one that had lived, and thought, and suffered. It was hard to believe her only twelve, tho she did not look more than eight or ten. But she was the child of her parents’ old age—their companion as well as their pet, the youngest of her father’s second family, and the only one that lived. No wonder that she was old and thoughtful beyond her years. She had been a bookworm, this little maid, for over six years, reading everything that she could lay hand on, and that her judicious mother did not interdict.
Now this idolized parent lay dying, “as good as dead,” the nurses said. And only six months before her precious father had fallen asleep. O, how could she live through it all! And, throwing herself on her knees at a chair, she cried passionately:—
“Lord, what shall I do? My heart will break.”
Instantly rising from her knees, she as promptly turned to the center table as if she had been sent, and, taking from it a tiny, blue-covered book, began hurriedly turning over the leaves. It had been given her on New Year’s day, by her Sunday-school teacher, and contained a text for every day in the year. That for March 6 read:—
“The Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it can not save; neither His ear heavy, that it can not hear.” Isa. 59:1.
“O,” exclaimed the child to herself, as if it had been a voice speaking to her, “then I am to pray for my mother’s life!”
No sooner said than done. Down on her knees she got again.
“Heavenly Father, give my mother back to me, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.”
Only that; what need of more? God had said that His hand was not shortened that He could not save, and that His ear was not heavy that He could not hear. So she took Him at His word and asked; and of course her prayer would be answered.
Going to the bedroom door, she opened it with the air of one that had a right to do so, and in a firm, expectant tone, asked:—
“How is my mother now?”
“Just as she was, child; the same as dead. Can’t you stay in there without bothering us all the time?” asked the elder nurse querulously—worn out by loss of sleep, and perhaps naturally petulant. She did not mean to be unkind.
“Ah! but she will be better soon. You don’t understand, you see,” the child returned patiently. “I felt that my heart would break, so I asked the Lord what I should do, and He told me that His hand wasn’t shortened that He couldn’t save, nor His ear heavy that He couldn’t hear. So I asked Him to give my mother back to me.”
The nurses stared as tho they thought the child were out of her senses. The elder one muttered, “Much good asking when she’s just as good as dead.” But the younger one said soothingly, “Well, you go back meantime; it isn’t fitin’ for a little mite like you to be in this room now.”
The child obeyed; but her expectancy drove her back every ten or fifteen minutes, the same question on her lips (never once did she return to the Lord; between them it was definitely settled), till the elder nurse’s patience gave way, and she positively forbade her leaving the parlor to come to them with any more questions.
Fortunately at this juncture her quick ear13caught the firm step of the doctor on the terrace steps leading to the house. The little girl was a great favorite with that good man, for he had learned to know her as her father’s most devoted attendant during the long months of his tedious illness, spending the most of her time at his side, reading to him, singing and playing for him, and walking out with him till he could no longer leave the house.
Now, slipping her hand in the doctor’s, she said expectantly:—
“Please tell me how my mother is now.”
Echoing the words of the nurses, he replied:
“My child, she is just as good as dead.”
“Ah, but, doctor, you don’t understand!” she again patiently explained. “You see I felt as if my heart would break, and I asked God what I should do, and He told me that His hand was not shortened that He couldn’t save, nor His ear heavy that He couldn’t hear. So I asked Him to give my mother back to me; and that is how I know that she will be better.”
“Not in this world,” the doctor answered sadly; “your prayers came too late, my child.”
“No, doctor,” the child repeated with gentle insistence, “for He told me so.”
Shaking his head, the kind-hearted man turned away to brush off the sudden tear, but said no more.
It was 5 o’clock when he left, saying as he did so:—
“I have a patient who needs me; the dead are past help; but I will look in again on my way home.”
At 9 o’clock the nurses, who were alone in the house with the mother and daughter, sent the little girl to bed. She slept the sound sleep of healthy childhood, and did not even wake till 5 the next morning, when the doctor’s step aroused her. Jumping up quickly, she ran to the head of the stairs to hear what they would say when they let him in.
“Well, when did she die?” was the form of question he used.
The answer came slowly and hesitatingly:—
“Why, doctor, she isn’t dead; and it does seem as tho she were better, for she can see and hear, altho she can neither speak nor move yet.”
“That is a miracle,” he replied emphatically.
Into her clothes sprang the little maid, and down the stairs she swiftly ran, and into her mother’s room. Slipping her hand into the doctor’s, as was her wont, she looked brightly into his face, as she joyously exclaimed:—
“I told you that she would be better, doctor.”
“O my child, don’t build on this!” the good man replied hurriedly, as he drew her into the adjoining apartment, and closed the door. “It is impossible that your mother should live in her physical condition. There have been cases known when, after apparent death, patients have come to life again, but never to last longer than a few hours or days at the farthest.”
“Doctor,” exclaimed the child with energy, “I did not ask the Lord to give her back to me only for hours or days. He knows what was in my heart. He would never treat me so.”
“Your prayer came too late, dear child,” returned the doctor. “Why, there is only a small portion of one lung through which your mother can breathe at all; and her heart is enormously enlarged! No, no, little one, don’t build hopes on this passing improvement. Under existing circumstances it is impossible that she should live. Ask the Lord to help you to give her up.”
“She will not die, doctor,” persisted the child. “She will get better. I prayed the Lord to give her back to me, and He has done so. God does not break His word.”
Again with tear-wet eyes the good man turned away, for the child’s confidence touched him strangely. He was a Christian, and had been one for more years than she had lived, yet her faith was higher and deeper than ever he had known.
And Mrs. Harrington did live. It was a whole month before she was able to be lifted from one bed to another to have hers made; a year before she was able to walk out-of-doors; but for five years—perhaps the most important of all the years of a young girl’s life, from twelve to seventeen, she was spared to her little daughter, now a gray-haired woman.
I have often heard her relate the incident, and always with this additional remark:—
“And had I asked to have my mother made perfectly whole, that too would have been granted. But I had never known her as anything but an invalid, and hence my only thought was to have her given back to me.”
Children, God hears you when you pray, just as much as He hears your elders. And when you plead His promises and ask what is in harmony with His will, you may be sure that your requests will be granted—unless you begin to doubt and question His doing so.
Parents, if you have never failed to keep your word to your children, it will be just so much easier for them to believe that their heavenly Father will not break His word. Remember that you have a responsibility in the matter, as well as they. And may He help both you and them.
