The Redemption of David CorsonGoss, Charles Frederic
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The Redemption of David Corson
Goss, Charles Frederic
Society of Friends -- Fiction
As they walked onward, they vaguely felt the influence of the repose
that was stealing upon the tired world; the intellectual and volitional
elements of their natures becoming gradually quiescent, the emotions
were given full sway. They felt themselves drawn toward each other by
some irresistible power, and, although they had never before been
conscious of any incompleteness of their lives, they suddenly discovered
affinities of whose existence they had never dreamed. Their two
personalities seemed to be absorbed into one new mysterious and
indivisible being, and this identity gave them an incomprehensible joy.
Over them as they walked, Nature brooded, sphynx-like. Their young and
healthy natures were tuned in unison with the harmonies of the world
like perfect instruments from which the delicate fingers of the great
Musician evoked a melody of which she never tired, reserving her
discords for a future day. On this delicious evening she permitted them
to be thrilled through and through with joy and hope and she accompanied
the song their hearts were singing with her own multitudinous voices.
"Be happy," chirped the birds; "be happy," whispered the evening
breeze; "be happy," murmured the brook, running along by their side and
looking up into their faces with laughter. The whole world seemed to
resound with the refrain, "Be happy! Be happy! for you are young, are
young, are young!"
Pepeeta first broke the silence.
"I had never heard of the things about which you talked," she said.
"Thee never had? How could that be? I thought that every one knew them!"
"I must have lived in a different world from yours."
"What sort of a world has thee lived in?"
"A world of fairs and circuses, of traveling everywhere and never
stopping anywhere."
"Has thee never been in a church?"
"Never until that night."
"And thee knows nothing of God?"
"Nothing except the gypsy god, and he was not like yours."
"And thee was happy?"
"I thought so until I heard what you said. Since then I have been full
of care and trouble. I wish I knew what you meant! But I have seen that
wonderful light!"
"Thee has seen it?"
"Yes, to-day! And I followed it; I shall always follow it."
"When does thee leave the village?" David asked, fearing the
conversation would lead where he did not want to go.
"To-morrow," she said.
"Does thee think that the doctor would renew his offer to take me with
him?"
"Do I think so? Oh! I am sure."
"Then I will go."
"You will go? Oh! I am so happy! The doctor was very angry; he has not
been himself since. You don't know how glad he will be."
"But will not thee be happy, too?" he asked.
"Happier than you could dream," she answered with all the frankness of a
child. "But what made you change your mind?"
"I will tell thee sometime; it is too late now. There is my home and I
have much work to do before dark."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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