Lady Sybil's Choice: A Tale of the CrusadesHolt, Emily Sarah
History
Lady Sybil's Choice: A Tale of the Crusades
Holt, Emily Sarah
Crusades -- Fiction; Historical fiction
"Oh, if she has been christened, she must be a Christian," said I.
"Well, what did she say?"
"She said—’All things come to him who knows how to wait.’ It is a
Saracen proverb."
"Well, I do not believe it."
"Ah, let my Damoiselle pardon me, but it is true."
"Well!" said I, half laughing, "then I suppose I do not know how to
wait."
"I do not think my Damoiselle does," answered Marguerite quietly.
"Wilt thou teach me, Margot?"
"Ha! It takes the good God to teach that."
"I should not think it wanted much teaching."
"Let my Damoiselle bear with her servant. The good God has been
teaching it to me for seventy years, and I dare not make so bold as to
say I have learned it yet."
"Why, Margot, thou art as quiet, and calm, and patient as a stone."
"Ah! not _here_," she said, laying her hand upon her bosom. "Perhaps
here,—and here,"—touching her eyes and lips. "But down there,—no!"
"But for what, or for whom, art thou waiting, Margot?" I asked, rather
amused.
"Ha!—it ought to be only whom. But it is too often _what_. We are like
the little children, waiting for the father to come home, but thinking
more of the toys and bonbons he may bring than of himself. And then
there is another thing: before we can learn to wait, we must learn to
trust."
"To trust what, Margot?"
"I believe we all trust in something, if my Damoiselle pleases. A great
many trust in themselves; and a great many more trust in
circumstances,—fate, or chance, or luck,—as they call it. Some few trust
in other human creatures; and their waking is often the saddest of all.
But it seems as if the one thing we found it hardest to do was to trust
the good God. He has to drive us away, often, from every other trust,
before we will learn to trust Him. Oh, how we must grieve His heart,
when He has done so much for us, and yet we _will not_ trust Him!"
I wonder what she means. I feel as if I should like to know, and could
not tell how to begin.
The Lady Queen is gone back to her people. And I am so glad—Lady Judith
is not gone with her. I was sadly afraid she would do. But Melisende
is gone, and Messire Renaud de Montluc, for whom the Lady Queen trusts
to obtain some high position at the Court of the Byzantine Cæsar.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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