Contending Forces

another part of the house Ma Smith sat before the fire in her chamber and meditated on many things. The knitting with which the busy hands were always engaged when at leisure, dropped in her lap, and lay there unheeded. She thought of the incident of Sappho and the rose of the night before, and the merry, teasing look that had flashed out at her for one instant from Dora’s laughing eyes. Could it be possible that she was about to lose her son? Dora’s engagement to John Langley had been a source of great satisfaction to her; the old-fashioned notion was still strong within her that it was the right destiny for girls to marry, and that the only cause for a mother to grieve in the idea of marriage for her daughter was the awful chance of that daughter’s remaining single. The girl’s life should be lost in that of the wife and mother. Such an end to maidenhood was a happy achievement for the girl and a glory to her family. But with her boy it was different. He was her firstborn, and memory was busy tonight with the past.

Her Will with a wife! herself a grandmother! To renew at this age the joys which had been hers when first he lay within her arms a soft morsel of humanity, with sweet brown face and melting black eyes that mirrored themselves within the citadel of her heart. Ma Smith had known much sorrow in her life. She could tell you of hard times when it seemed that the combined efforts of her husband and herself would not avail to keep the wolf from the door. She knew what it was to bake and brew, to mend and make over, to minister to the needs of childhood with increasing maternal cares near at hand. With all this, the offered work which added a few dollars to their little store was always gladly accepted. But she would tell you also that she would not have given one hour of those days, with all their privations, for the happiness that she enjoyed when in the privacy of a humble home she counted her “precious jewels”⁠—an honest husband and two beautiful children. “Yes,” she was wont to say, “we had a hard time, and sometimes the waters of affliction seemed about to sweep us from our foothold, but somehow just when everything was darkest we could see the light of prosperity shining through the clouds, and we would take courage, bless the Lord, and keep on struggling.”

Tonight she lived those struggles over again, and tried to imagine what it would be to have another share the love and reverence of the idolized son. At first it seemed that she could not endure the thought; but then she remembered how happy she had been in her married life, and prayed the Lord to deliver her from selfish desires. Who was she to stand in the way of her son’s happiness⁠—a son whom she loved? Sappho Clark was beautiful; she believed her to be a girl of exemplary conduct. Sappho was always deferential to her, giving to the elder woman the gentle deference which, coming from youth, is so dear to those advanced in years. So with a heart overflowing with love, and filled with kind and tender thoughts, it was no mystery where the pretty old face had caught its added charm of heavenly brightness. So Dora found her when she returned from spending the evening with some young friends.

“Why, mummy dear, I declare you are growing younger and handsomer every day. We girls must look to our laurels if you keep on growing so pretty.”

“Well, my love, I have been thinking of your father tonight, and how happy we were when you and Will were wee tots.”

Dora knew well what had set her mother thinking. She appreciated her feelings. She knew that her mother had always felt that no woman could be good enough for Will’s wife. She felt instinctively that her mother had faced the difficulty alone that evening and conquered it, effacing herself and her desires for the happiness of her son. With her usual impulsiveness Dora threw herself on her knees beside her mother’s chair, and drawing her face down to her, kissed the wrinkled brow and smoothed the soft white hair.

“Mummy, dear,” she said, “you have made up your mind to give him up to Sappho if things turn out that way?”

“Yes, my dear,” replied her mother, with her hand upon the dark braids beside her, “I will not say that it was not a struggle, but mothers know, if they stop to think, that they must lose their babies sometime. Your father and I made a home for ourselves, so I must look forward to the time when you young birds will want to build a nest away from me. But what is the matter with you, Dora? you look worried. Is anything wrong?”

“Oh, no,” replied the girl, as she rose from her knees by her mother’s side and began putting her things away and preparing for the night. “Isn’t it strange what a queer old world this is? If you are happy I am not, or vice versa. It does seem that one thing or another is always happening to vex a body. And the worst of it is that it may happen that we are impatient and unhappy about things that are trivial. I don’t feel sweet-tempered tonight, and really, I can’t tell why.”

Ma Smith glanced at her daughter sharply but said nothing, as Dora thrust her bare feet into bedroom slippers and proceeded to undo the thick masses of curling brown hair, and brush and arrange it for the night. The mother knew that her daughter would unburden her mind presently, and so she waited patiently. It was not like Dora to be petulant and have moods. She was a happy, healthy, active girl, with a kindly disposition.

“Ma,” said Dora after a silence,