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THE LEPER.
The faint, sweet, luminous jar of bow and string, as betwixt them
they tore the silky air into a dying sound, came hovering--
neither could have said whether it was in the soul only, or there
and in the outer world too.
"What is that?" said Tom.
"Mary!" Letty called into the other room, "there is our friend
with the violin again! Don't you think Tom would like to hear
him?"
"Yes, I do," answered Mary.
"Then would you mind asking him to come and play a little to us?
It would do Tom good, I do think." Mary went up the one stair--
all that now divided them, and found the musician with his
sister--his half-sister she was.
"I thought we should have you in upon us!" said Ann. "Joe thinks
he can play so as nobody can hear him; and I was fool enough to
let him try. I am sorry."
"I am glad," rejoined Mary, "and am come to ask him down stairs;
for Mrs. Helmer and I think it will do her husband good to hear
him. He is very fond of music."
"Much help music will be to him, poor young man!" said Ann,
scornfully.
"Wouldn't you give a sick man a flower, even if it only made him
a little happier for a moment with its scent and its loveliness?"
asked Mary.
"No, I wouldn't. It would only be to help the deceitful heart to
be more desperately wicked."
I will not continue the conversation, although they did a little
longer. Ann's father had been a preacher among the followers of
Whitefield, and Ann was a follower of her father. She laid hold
upon the garment of a hard master, a tyrannical God. Happy he who
has learned the gospel according to Jesus, as reported by John--
that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all! Happy he who
finds God his refuge from all the lies that are told for him, and
in his name! But it is love that saves, and not opinion that
damns; and let the Master himself deal with the weeds in his
garden as with the tares in his field.
"I read my Bible a good deal," said Mary, at last, "but I never
found one of those things you say in it."
"That's because you were never taught to look for them," said
Ann.
"Very likely," returned Mary. "In the mean time I prefer the
violin--that is, with one like your brother to play it."
She turned to the door, and Joseph Jasper, who had not spoken a
word, rose and followed her. As soon as they were outside, Mary
turned to him, and begged he would play the same piece with which
he had ended on the former occasion.
"I thought you did not care for it! I am so glad!" he said.
"I care for it very much," replied Mary, "and have often thought
of it since. But you left in such haste! before I could find
words to thank you!"
"You mean the ten lepers, don't you?" he said. "But of course you
do. I always end off with them."
"Is that how you call it?" returned Mary. "Then you have given me
the key to it, and I shall understand it much better this time, I
hope."
"That is what I call it," said Joseph, "--to myself, I mean, not
to Ann. She would count it blasphemy. God has made so many things
that she thinks must not be mentioned in his hearing!"
When they entered the room, Joseph, casting a quick look round
it, made at once for the darkest corner. Three swift strides took
him there; and, without more preamble than if he had come upon a
public platform to play, he closed his eyes and began.
And now at last Mary understood at least this specimen of his
strange music, and was able to fill up the blanks in the
impression it formerly made upon her. Alas, that my helpless
ignorance should continue to make it impossible for me to
describe it!
A movement even and rather slow, full of unexpected chords,
wonderful to Mary, who did not know that such things could be
made on the violin, brought before her mind's eye the man who
knew all about everything, and loved a child more than a sage,
walking in the hot day upon the border be-tween Galilee and
Samaria. Sounds arose which she interpreted as the stir of
village life, the crying and calling of domestic animals, and of
busy housewives at their duties, carried on half out of doors, in
the homeliness of country custom. Presently the instrument began
to tell the gathering of a crowd, with bee-like hum, and the
crossing of voice with voice--but, at a distance, the sounds
confused and obscure. Swiftly then they seemed to rush together,
to blend and lose themselves in the unity of an imploring melody,
in which she heard the words, uttered afar, with uplifted hands
and voices, drawing nearer and nearer as often repeated, "Jesus,
Master, have mercy on us." Then came a brief pause, and then
what, to her now fully roused imagination, seemed the voice of
the Master, saying, "Go show yourselves unto the priests." Then
followed the slow, half-unwilling, not hopeful march of timeless
feet; then a clang as of something broken, then a silence as of
sunrise, then air and liberty--long-drawn notes divided with
quick, hurried ones; then the trampling of many feet, going
farther and farther--merrily, with dance and song; once more a
sudden pause--and a melody in which she read the awe-struck
joyous return of one. Steadily yet eagerly the feet drew nigh,
the melody growing at once in awe and jubilation, as the man came
nearer and nearer to him whose word had made him clean, until at
last she saw him fall on his face before him, and heard his soul
rushing forth in a strain of adoring thanks, which seemed to end
only because it was choked in tears.
The violin ceased, but, as if its soul had passed from the
instrument into his, the musician himself took up the strain, and
in a mellow tenor voice, with a mingling of air and recitative,
and an expression which to Mary was entrancing, sang the words,
"And he was a Samaritan."
At the sound of his own voice, he seemed to wake up, hung his
head for a moment, as if ashamed of having shown his emotion,
tucked his instrument under his arm, and walked from the room,
without a word spoken on either side. Nor, while he played, had
Mary once seen the face of the man; her soul sat only in the
porch of her ears, and not once looked from the windows of her
eyes.
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