Not My Will and The Light in My Window

by Francena H. Arnold

  “Oh, we’d love to!”

  “Well, I’ll be working on a list, and before you go, you ask Connie to come in and see me.”

  An hour later Connie and Mary Lou came in all ready for the drive, Connie looking fresh and lovely in the new blue suit and Mary Lou walking primly behind her in a pretty dark blue coat that had been freshly sponged and pressed.

  “You look like two princesses!” exclaimed Eleanor admiringly. “Oh, Connie, be sure to get a red hat. With that blue suit and white blouse, it would be lovely.”

  “Do you think so?” asked Connie. “My purse and gloves are blue, you know.”

  “So much the better,” Eleanor assured her. “You mustn’t match everything. It spoils the effect.”

  “Where is your purse, Mary Lou?” asked Eleanor, turning to that effervescent little person. “I want to put this list in it.”

  “I haven’t any good one,” said Mary Lou reluctantly. “Just a teeny one I got when I was six, and it looks silly now. So Connie has my money. I thought I’d buy a purse today, but eighty-three cents won’t buy me a purse and the other things I want too.”

  “I’m so glad it won’t,” said Eleanor with a smile. “I’ve been lying here trying to think up something I could buy to show you how dear my new sisters are to me, but I didn’t know what you needed. Connie, I want you to get a nice red purse and gloves to change off with. You’re going to look positively stunning in that suit with red accessories! And Mary Lou must pick out a purse and gloves for herself too.”

  “Gloves—for me!” squealed Mary Lou. “I never had any just-for-looks gloves. They were always to keep warm in. Oh, I’m ’most afraid to think of it.”

  Eleanor and Connie laughed, then Eleanor asked, “Connie, what does Mother need? Has she a nice purse?”

  “It’s not very nice,” said Mary Lou before Connie could answer. “She always stuffs it so full of things.”

  “What kind of things?” laughed Eleanor.

  “Oh, books and papers and things to carry to Sunday school,” answered Connie. “You see, she teaches the primary class, and she almost needs a suitcase to carry her things in.”

  “Well, we can fix that. You girls pick out a nice zipper case with several pockets and have her initials put on it. No, don’t object,” she said as Connie’s face took on a protesting frown. “I have to get a little fun out of these long days. Oh, and I want you to get Patty a bonnet, a pink satin one if you can find it, like the one Marilyn was admiring in the catalog. Then buy a big, big box of chocolates for Bob and Marilyn, and go to an ice cream parlor and get yourselves the nicest treats you can.”

  As she concluded, Mary Lou jumped and squealed again in joyous anticipation, but Connie leaned over the bed and kissed Eleanor, saying softly, “I’ll do it because I know it will make you happy. Isn’t there anything you want for yourself?”

  Eleanor laughed. “Oh, I forgot about me. Yes, I want a box of letter paper and five three-cent stamps. That’s truly all I want just now.”

  A few minutes after Mary Lou and Connie left, Marilyn and Bob came in carrying baby Patty, dressed to go out. “She’s come to tell Auntie bye-bye,” said Marilyn. “She’s going to visit her other grandma. Connie and Mary Lou will drop us off there this morning and pick up Bob again tonight to bring him back. Patty and I shall stay a week.”

  Eleanor reached out her arms for the rosy-cheeked baby and held her close for a minute before handing her back to her mother. “Take good care of her,” she said gently.

  “Yes, and you keep on getting better,” returned Marilyn. “When I come home I’ll expect to see you out driving a team of horses.”

  “I wish I could.” Eleanor laughed. “It won’t be long now.”

  A few minutes later she heard the car go down the drive as Mrs. Stewart called a cheery good-bye from the porch. Then the house was strangely quiet, and Eleanor returned to her thoughts.

  This was the first time she had ever held baby Patty, though she had often longed to cradle her in her arms. Now her arms seemed so empty that she almost cried out with pain. Burying her head in her arms on the pillow, Eleanor wept and prayed. Her thoughts were once more with her own little lost baby. She realized that soon she must again face the tangled issues of life.

  But now she knew she did not have to go through life alone. Her Savior would take her by the hand and lead her. The Stewarts said so.

  Eleanor went over again in her mind the story of her loving Savior; how He had come to earth as the divine Son of God, had died for her—for her—on Calvary’s cross, and had risen again, the victor over death, in order that she, Eleanor Stewart, might be enabled to live a right life and serve Him forever. And some day, perhaps soon, He was coming again to take His own back to glory with Him to live there forever, joyous and glad.

  To all of this Eleanor had once given intellectual assent but had kept back her will from surrendering to this wonderful Savior. Now all her selfishness had been seared away. Christ had won her completely for Himself.

  “Oh, Father,” Eleanor prayed, glad tears running down her cheeks, “I’m Thine, and I am so glad. Jesus, I love Thee, and I thank Thee for this wonderful peace. Father, not my will but Thine be done, for the rest of my life and forever.”

  God had answered Chad’s prayer.

  From this day on, she was His. A phrase she had heard Chad use came to her mind: “Christ’s—for service or sacrifice.” If He wanted her to live and work for Him, she would do it with all her strength and talent. If He wanted her to suffer for Him, she could do that too. She knew her life would always have its share of sorrow, for no happiness could ever be great enough to overcome her grief for her baby. But God could use even that to His glory. Eleanor wanted to rest in His hands, unresisting as a piece of soft clay, His to use just as He willed.

  She prayed again: “Dear Lord, forgive the failures and terrible mistakes that came because I was so willful—and take me now to use just as Thou wilt. Show me the way, and help me to walk in it. Teach me to trust Thee in everything. Thou canst care for my baby. Help me to trust even in that. And if it be Thy will, let me live to show the world what Thou canst do with even the poorest material Thou hast. Amen.”

  Eleanor had sought peace in work, in love, in self-abnegation, but now she had found it forever in Jesus Christ, her Savior.

  In the middle of the morning Mrs. Stewart came in. “Why, what a happy face you have this morning,” she exclaimed, setting down a big glass of milk. “Is there something special that makes it beam so?”

  “Something very special, Mother,” Eleanor responded in a glad voice. “I have just completed the transaction of turning over what is left of this life of mine to the One who bought and paid for it. He has accepted me, and—oh, Mother, I’m so happy!” Eleanor’s voice broke.

  Mrs. Stewart’s face was transformed with joy. Kissing Eleanor she said, “My dear, there is joy even in heaven over this. Surely there is joy here, for we have all been praying for you. How glad Chad would be!”

  “Chad doesn’t seem so far away now,” said Eleanor thoughtfully, “for he is with the Lord, and the Lord is right here, isn’t He?”

  “Yes, dear, with us always. Chad and my own dear husband aren’t really far from us, Len. They’ve just gone on a little while before, and we must walk together here and help each other bear the loneliness.”

  “Oh, we will!”

  “You’re going to be a big blessing to me, Len,” said Mother Stewart, “because you have known sorrow yourself and can understand mine.”

  “I’ll do anything to show you how grateful I am!” exclaimed Eleanor happily.

  “Well, right now, little lady, you will please me by drinking that nice glass of milk I brought you. Then you and I are going to plan a picnic.”

  “A picnic?” said Eleanor curiously, sipping away at the milk.

  “Yes, ma’am! Doctor Leigh says you are to get up today! What do you think of that? So you’re going to dress and take a long trip to—the livi
ng room, where you can sit in a big chair or lie on the couch when you feel like it, while I do the family mending. We’ll have lunch brought in to us like real ladies of leisure. This afternoon you must rest awhile, but tonight, if you are not too tired, you may eat with us at the table.”

  “How grand!” Eleanor’s eyes sparkled. “It will feel so good to be dressed again. I wonder if my clothes will fit,” she remarked, glancing at the thin hand that held the glass of milk.

  “If they don’t now, they soon will,” said Mother Stewart cheerily. “Good milk and eggs and country air do wonders for all my patients.”

  Then Mother Stewart combed the brown curls and tied them up with a blue ribbon. Eleanor looked with a mixture of emotions as out of the closet came the blue jersey dress she had worn the night she came. How much her world had changed since she had last worn it! Now she still had sorrow, but she had a great joy, also, and instead of longing for death she wanted to live and serve.

  The sunshine was streaming through the windows in the living room, and to Eleanor, who had lain so long in the little bedroom, the world looked gay and bright. Mother Stewart settled her carefully on the davenport, drew a shawl over her, then carried in a bag bulging with darning and sat down in the big chair opposite Eleanor.

  “This isn’t one week’s accumulation.” She laughed, threading a needle. “I haven’t mended a pair of socks since you came. My family are about to go barefoot.”

  “I don’t think Mary Lou would mind,” smiled Eleanor. “She would probably welcome the opportunity.”

  They sat in silence for a moment, Eleanor drinking in the sunshine, Mother Stewart rocking and industriously weaving her needle in and out. Then the older woman leaned forward and said encouragingly, “I don’t wish to urge matters unduly, my dear, but don’t you think that today, while we are alone, would be a good day for you to tell me the story you have been saving up? Let’s get it over with once for all.”

  “Yes, let’s do,” said Eleanor, “although it isn’t a bit easy to tell. I couldn’t do it if I weren’t so eager to clear Chad of any blame in the matter. He was so fine and straight, Mother. It was my crooked thinking that twisted up both our lives so badly.”

  “Suppose you just tell me the facts and let me form my own opinion,” said Mother Stewart gently. “But tell me all of it, because if you are going to put this thing behind you forever, you mustn’t leave any little bits of it hanging around in your memory.”

  This was the first time Eleanor had been able to talk to anyone of Chad, and at first her voice trembled as she told of the Christmas house party and the night on the moonlit crest of the hill. As she progressed, however, she grew more sure of herself and was able to talk quietly and even happily of their love for each other and their longing for marriage. But Eleanor’s face grew downcast as she confessed her scheme for the marriage.

  “You can’t understand that, Mother, because you never knew my aunt,” Eleanor tried to explain. “She meant well, but actually she helped me lay the foundation for all this trouble.”

  With mingled desire and reluctance Eleanor described their marriage and the weekends they had spent at the cottage, the days in school when they barely saw each other, and the summer when they were torn apart by the circumstances they themselves had created.

  “That must have been harder on Chad than me,” Eleanor mused. “I was pleasing myself about keeping the secret, while Chad was only keeping quiet because I said he must. Mother, Chad hated that secrecy. It hurts me so to think how I must have hurt him. I was just determined to have my own way. He was so loyal to me that he never criticized. That must have been a hard summer for him!”

  “I believe it was, dear,” replied Mother Stewart, rocking quietly, “although he never spoke of the sacrifice he was making. He did the farm work and teased the girls and spent his evenings with Bob so that none of us would guess his feelings. But since then I have remembered many times when he would be gone all of Sunday afternoon and none of us would see him. He must have been taking long walks in the woods, alone with his heavenly Father. He and I had some conversations together that told me he was growing closer to the Lord. So although I sensed, as mothers do, that he was troubled over something, I knew the matter could be left in God’s hands.”

  Eleanor reached out impulsively and smoothed the work-worn hand that had paused momentarily from its work.

  “No wonder Chad was so good, with a mother like you!” she exclaimed.

  “Chad was much more like his father than like me, Eleanor” was the reply. “Both Chad and Mary Lou inherited appearance and temperament from my husband.”

  After a few moments’ quietness, Eleanor spoke again. She described their last autumn together, the little apartment, the happy hours of study and work, the attendance at the shabby little church—and always the growing realization that their duty was to confess their marriage and face the consequences together.

  “Then came that Thanksgiving, Mother. It’s hard to talk of that even to you, for it was four days of heaven. I can’t be altogether sorry about anything that gave us so much happiness. My only regret is that we didn’t come out with the truth when we should have. Perhaps we might have had a lifetime together instead of … this.” Her voice dropped almost to a whisper, and her lips trembled.

  Then came the story of the trip to church on the Sunday after Thanksgiving. “I haven’t any idea who that preacher was,” Eleanor declared. “But I’m sure God sent us there that day, for I never had a minute’s peace from then on until I told Chad everything. But that was after we came home. It must have been a shock to him, but he didn’t scold me. He did try to show me the right way, and I know he was praying all the time that I’d decide to tell the truth and trust God for the future. That last night—oh, Mother, how can I tell it?—he kissed me good-bye and went to the lab. I know now that he went there to pray. And even while he was probably on his knees in prayer, I decided against the right way. I determined to keep the secret and get Aunt Ruth’s money. That was the night that—oh, it hurts so, Mother—he … never came back!”

  The mother dropped her sewing from her lap and gathered the weeping girl close. For the first time that she could remember, Eleanor knew the comfort of a mother’s arms, and from that haven she sobbed out the rest of the story.

  “I did make him glad at the last, for I put on his ring and told him we’d tell everyone at once. But when he … went … I thought God had turned His back on me. So I changed my mind and put the ring away. The day of the funeral I couldn’t even look at you for fear I’d collapse and tell the whole story.”

  Fumbling for a handkerchief, Eleanor wiped her eyes, drew a long breath, and resumed her tale. “Even when I knew the baby was coming, I wouldn’t give in. I can’t tell you much about that time, for I don’t remember. There’s a sort of haze over it all. I went to the cottage and hired a dear Swedish woman to live with me, and it seemed as though Chad were there too. I still remember how close he seemed, and how I could even talk to him. I wasn’t unhappy at all. It’s hard to believe it was just a year ago.”

  Noticing that Mother Stewart’s eyes were growing misty, Eleanor hesitated for a moment, but at the quiet words “Go on, dear,” she obediently continued.

  “This—oh, this is the hardest of all, Mother. I know that Chad is with the Lord, and even though I blame myself for his death, I can’t grieve too much knowing how happy he is. But oh, Mother—how can I go on without my baby? How could I ever have done such a thing? I ask myself those questions over and over and realize I must have been absolutely out of my mind!”

  “Why did you do it, dear?”

  “I don’t remember very well. I remember thinking he would burden me and keep me from going on with my work. It wasn’t money, for I had all I needed. I could have placed him in some home until I finished school, but my mind was so unsettled I couldn’t think at all. Oh, if I could do it over again!”

  Her voice was broken, and her hands were twisting the already-wet
handkerchief into knots. Mrs. Stewart feared the effect that this emotional outburst would have on her, yet knew Eleanor would not be at ease mentally until she had poured out this great heartful of trouble she had kept to herself so long. Praying for wisdom, the older woman continued. “Tell me about him, dear. What did he look like? How large was he?”

  “I don’t know much. I wouldn’t look at him. The nurse said he weighed ten pounds, so he must have been quite large for a baby, though he seemed tiny. I don’t remember ever really looking at his face,” she repeated dismally. “He wasn’t strong, you know. The doctor was worried about him at first, but by the time the man … took him away, the doctor said he was all right.”

  “How did you arrange the adoption?” Mother Stewart asked in forced tones. Her heart ached for the girl, but her own grief was about to overwhelm her.

  “The doctor did it. I only made one requirement—that the parents must be Christians. I must have thought I was making a concession to Chad—I don’t know. I wanted to get it all over with and get back to school. They took him away, and I never kissed him once!”

  For some time they sat in silence. Then, thinking the story concluded, Mother Stewart began to speak, but Eleanor interrupted.

  “Let me go on. There’s only a little more. I want to be done with it. When I did go back to school, I was tormented with trying to remember Chad’s face. The harder I tried, the more hazy it became. Then I got to thinking of the baby, and finally I couldn’t study or concentrate on anything. I think the dean has told you how my schoolwork went to pieces. I began to blame Aunt Ruth and you for it all. I blamed Auntie for making my marriage difficult, and you because your influence made Chad feel as he did about it. At last things were so bad I thought I would go crazy if I couldn’t feel near to Chad and see his face again. I thought, if I confessed to my lawyer and you, that God would do something for me—perhaps give back Chad’s memory.”

  On hearing about the trip to the lawyer’s office and the discovery of the second will, Mrs. Stewart sympathized with Eleanor.