George Wharton Edwards - "The Book of Old English Ballads"

Moliere [Jean Baptiste Poquelin] - "Don Juan, ou le Festin de pierre"

Guy De Maupassant - "A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales"

Jane M. Bancroft - "Deaconesses in Europe"

Editorial
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

The City of Fire

G >> Grace Livingston Hill >> The City of Fire




They were all there, the doctor, the blacksmith, the postmaster, the
men from the mills, and the banks, and the stores. Economy heard the
bells for Marilyn had hurried to the church and added the fire chime to
the call and came over with their little chemical engine. Monopoly
heard and hurried their brand new hook and ladder up the valley road,
but the fire had been eating long in the heart of the plush mill and
laughed at their puny streams of water forced up from the creek below,
laughed at the chemicals flung in its face like drops of rain on a
sizzling red hot stove. It licked its lips over the edge of the cliff
on which it was built, and cracked its jaws as it devoured the mill,
window by window, section by section, leaping across with an angry red
tongue to the first tall building by its side.

The fire had worked cunningly, for it had crept out of sight to the
lower floors all along the row, and unseen, unknown, had bitten a hold
on each of those doomed buildings till when the men arrived it went
roaring ghoulishly up the high narrow stairs cutting off all escape
from above, and making entrance below impossible. Up at the windows the
doomed people stood, crying, praying, wringing their hands, and some
losing their heads and trying to jump out.

The firemen were brave, and worked wonders. They flung up ladders in
the face of the flames. They risked their lives every step they took,
and brought out one after another, working steadily, grimly, rapidly.
And none were braver among them all than Mark Carter and the minister,
each working on the very top of a tall treacherous ladder, in the face
of constant danger, bringing out one after another until the last.

The next house to the mill had caved in, and Mark had come down just in
time with an old woman who was bedridden and had been forgotten. The
workers had paused an instant as the horrible sound of falling timbers
rent through the other noises of that horrible night, and then hurried
to increase their vigilance. There were people in the top floor of the
next house and it would go next. Then the word went forth that no more
must go up the ladder. The roof was about to fall in, and a young
mother shrieked, "My baby! My baby! She's up in the bed. I thought Bob
had her, but he couldn't get up!" Mark Carter looked at her sharply.
"Which window?" he asked, and was up the ladder before detaining hands
could reach him, and Billy, sliding under the arm of the Fire Chief,
swung up just behind.

The crowd watched breathless as they mounted round after round, Aunt
Saxon standing with a shawl over her head and gasping aloud, "Oh
_Willie!_" and then standing still in fear and pride, the tears
streaming down a smiling countenance on which the red glare of the fire
shone. The ladder was set crazily against the flaming window and swayed
with their weight. Every step seemed as if it would topple the
building, yet the ladder held, and Mark sprang through the blazing
window out of sight. It seemed an eternity till he returned bringing a
tiny bundle with him, and handing it out to Billy waiting below.

The boy received as it had been a holy honor, that little bundle of
humanity handed through the fire, and came solemnly down amid the
breathless gaze of the crowd, but when they looked to the top again
Mark had disappeared!

A murmur of horror went round the throng, for the flames were licking
and snapping, and the roof seemed to vibrate and quiver like a human
thing. Then before any one could stop him or even saw what he was going
to do, the minister sprang forward up the ladder like a cat, two rounds
at a time,--three! He dashed through the fire and was gone!

For an instant it seemed that the people would go mad with the horror
of it. _Those two!_ Even the Fire Chief paused and seemed
petrified. It was Billy who sensed the thing to do.

"Getcher canvas man? Are ya' asleep?"

And instantly a great piece of canvas was spread and lifted. But the
building tottered, the flames ate on, and the window seemed entirely
enveloped. The moment lasted too long for the hearts that waited. A
groan rent the air. Then suddenly a breath seemed to part the flames
and they saw the minister coming forward with Mark in his arms!

It was just at this instant that Lynn came flying down the street. She
had kept the bells going till she knew all the help had come from a
distance, and now she was coming to see if there was anything else for
her to do. There before her she saw her father standing in that awful
setting of fire, with Mark limp and lifeless in his arms! Then the
flames licked up and covered the opening once more. _Oh, God!_
Were they _both gone_?

Only for an instant more the suspense lasted, and then the cateclysm of
fire came. The roof fell carrying with it the floors as it went, down,
down, down, shuddering like a human thing as it went, the rain of fire
pouring up and around in great blistering flakes and scorching the
onlookers and lighting their livid faces as they stood transfixed with
horror at the sight.

The canvas fluttered uselessly down and fire showered thick upon it.
Timbers and beams crumbled like paper things and were no more. The
whole flimsy structure had caved in!

Paralyzed with terror and sorrow the firemen stood gazing, and suddenly
a boy's voice rang out: "Aw Gee! Git to work there! Whatterya doin'?
Playin' dominoes? Turn that hose over there! That's where they fell.
Say, you Jim, get that fire hook and lift that beam--! _Aw Gee_! Ya
ain't gonta let 'em _die,_ are ya,--? _Them two!"_

Billy had seized a heavy hose and was turning it on a central spot and
Jim Rafferty caught the idea and turned his stream that way, and into
the fire went the brave men, one and another, instantly, cheerfully,
devotedly, the men who loved the two men in there. Dead or alive they
should be got out if it killed them all. They would all die together.
The Fire Chief stood close to Billy, and shouted his directions, and
Billy worked with the tallest of them, black, hoarse and weary.

It seemed ages. It was hours. It was a miracle! But they got those two
men out alive! Blackened and bruised and broken, burned almost beyond
recognition, but they were alive. They found them lying close to the
front wall, their faces together, Mark's body covered by the
minister's.

Tender hands brought them forth and carried them gently on stretchers
out from the circle of danger and noise and smoke. Eagerly they were
ministered to, with oil and old linen and stimulants. There were
doctors from Economy and one from Monopoly besides the Sabbath Valley
doctor, who was like a brother to the minister and had known Mark since
he was born. They worked as if their lives depended upon it, till all
that loving skill could do was done.

Billy, his eyelashes and brows gone, half his hair singed off, one eye
swollen shut and great blisters on his hands and arms, sat huddled and
shivering on the ground between the two stretchers. The fire was still
going on but he was "all in." The only thing left he could do was to
bow his bruised face on his trembling knees and pray:

_"Oh God_, Ain't You gonta let 'em live--_please!"_

They carried Mark to the Saxon cottage and laid him on Billy's bed.
There was no lack of nurses. Aunt Saxon and Christie McMertrie, the
Duncannons and Mary Rafferty, Jim too, and Tom. It seemed that
everybody claimed the honors. The minister was across the street in the
Little House. They dared not move him farther. Of the two the case of
the minister was the most hopeless. He had borne the burden of the
fall. He had been struck by the falling timbers, his body had been a
cover for the younger man. In every way the minister had not saved
himself.

The days that followed were full of anxiety. There were a few others
more or less injured in the fire, for there had been fearless work, and
no one had spared himself. But the two who hung at the point of death
for so long were laid on the hearts of the people, because they were
dear to almost every one.

Little neighborhood prayer meetings sprang up quietly here and there,
beginning at Duncannons. The neighbor on either side would come in and
they would just drop down and pray for the minister, and for "that
other dear brave brother." Then the Littles heard of it and called in a
few friends. One night when both sufferers were at the crisis and there
seemed little hope for the minister, Christie McMertrie called in the
Raffertys and they were just on the point of kneeling down when Mrs.
Harricutt came to the door. She had been crying. She said she and her
husband hadn't slept a wink the night before, they were so anxious for
the minister. Christie looked at her severely, but remembering the
commands about loving and forgiving, relented:

"Wull then, come on ben an' pray. Tom, you go call her husband! This is
na time fer holdin' grudges. But mind, wumman, if ye coom heer to pray
ye must pray with as _mooch fervor_ for the healin' o' _Mark
Carter_ as ye do fer the meenister! He's beloved of the Lord too,
an' the meenister nigh give his life for him."

And Mrs. Harricutt put up her apron to her eyes and entered the little
haircloth parlor, while Tom, with a wry face went after the elder. The
elder proved that underneath all his narrowness and prejudice he had a
grain of the real truth, for he prayed with fervor that the Lord would
cleanse their hearts from all prejudice and open their minds to see
with heavenly vision that they might have power in prayer for the
healing of the two men.

So, through the whole little village breaches were healed, and a more
loving feeling prevailed because the bond of anxiety and love held them
all together and drew them nearer to their God.

At last the day came when Mark, struggling up out of the fiery pit of
pain, was able to remember.

Pain, fire, flame, choking gases, smoke, remorse, despair! It was all
vague at first, but out of it came the memory slowly. There had been a
fire. He had gone back up the ladder after Mrs. Blimm's baby. He
remembered groping for the child in the smoke filled room, and bringing
it blindly through the hall and back to the window where the ladder
was, but that room had all been in flames. He had wished for a wet
cloth across his face. He could feel again the licking of the fire as
he passed the doorway. A great weight had been on his chest. His heart
seemed bursting. His head had reeled, and he had come to the window
just in time. Some one had taken the child--was it Billy?--or he would
have fallen. He _did_ fall. The memory pieced itself out bit by
bit. He remembered thinking that he had entered the City of Fire
literally at last, "the minarets" already he seemed to descry "gleaming
vermilion as if they from the fire had issued." It was curious how
those old words from Dante had clung in his memory. "Eternal fire that
inward burns." He thought he was feeling now in his body what his soul
had experienced for long months past. It was the natural ending, the
thing he had known he was coming to all along, the road of remorse and
despair. A fire that goes no more out! And this would last forever now!
Then, someone, some strong arm had lifted him--God's air swept in--and
for an instant there seemed hope. But only that little breath of
respite and there came a cry like myriads of lost souls. They were
falling, falling, down through fire, with fire above, below, around,
everywhere. Down, down,--an abysmal eternity of fire, till his seared
soul writhed from his tortured body, and stood aside looking on at
himself.

There, there he lay, the Mark Carter that had started with life so
fair, friends, prospects, so proud that he was a man, that he could
conquer and be brave--so blest with opening life, and heaven's high
call! And then--in one day--he had sinned and lost it all, and there he
lay, a white upturned face. That was himself, lying there with face
illumined by the fire, and men would call him dead! But he would not be
dead! He would be living on with that inward fire, gnawing at his
vitals, telling him continually what he might have been, and showing
him what high heaven was that he had had, and lost. He saw it now. He
had deliberately thrown away that heaven that had been his. He saw that
hell was hell because he made it so, it was not God that put him there,
but he had chosen there to go. And still the fire burned on and
scorched his poor soul back into the body to be tortured more. The long
weeks upon that bed seemed like an infinite space of burning rosy, oily
flames poured upward from a lake of fire, down through which he had
been falling in constant and increasing agony.

And now at last he seemed to be flung upon this peaceful shore where
things were cool and soothing for a brief respite, that he might look
off at where he had been floating on that molten lake of fire, and
understand it all before he was flung back. And it was all so very
real. With his eyes still closed he could hear the rushing of the
flames that still seemed ascending in columns out a little way from
shore, he could see through his eyelids the rosy hue of livid waters--
of course it was all a hallucination, and he was coming to himself, but
he had a feeling that when he was fully awake it would be even more
terrible than now. Two grim figures, Remorse and Despair, seemed
waiting at either hand above his bed to companion him again when he
could get more strength to recognize them. And so he lay thus between
life and death, and faced what he had done. Hours and hours he faced
it, when they knew not if he was conscious yet, going over and over
again those sins which he knew had been the beginning of all his walk
away from Hope. On through the night and into the next morning he lay
thus, sometimes drowsing, but most of the time alert and silent.

It was a bright and sparkling morning. There was a tang of winter in
the air. The leaves were gone from the apple trees at the window and
the bare branches tapped against the water spout like children playing
with a rattle. A dog barked joyously, and a boy on the street shouted
out to another--_Oh, to be a boy once more!_ And suddenly Mark
knew Billy was sitting there. He opened his eyes and smiled: There were
bandages around his face, but he smiled stiffly, and Billy knew he was
smiling.

"Kid," he said hoarsely from out the bandages, "This is God's world."
It seemed to be a great thought that he had been all this time
grasping, and had to utter.

"Sure!" said Billy in a low happy growl.

A long time after this, it might have been the next day, he wasn't
sure, or perhaps only a few minutes, he came at another truth:

"Kid, you can't get away from God--even when you try."

"I'll say not," said Billy.

"But--when you've sinned--!" speculatively.

"You gotta get it off yer chest."

"You mean--confess?"

"Sure thing. Miss Lynn tells us in Sunday School about a fella in the
Bible got downta eatin' with the pigs in a far country, an' when he
come to himself he thought about his father's servants, an' he said
'I'll get up and beat it home an' say I'm sorry!'"

"I know," said Mark, and was still the rest of the day. But the next
morning he asked the doctor how soon he might get up. This was the
first real indication that Mark was on the mend, and the doctor smiled
with satisfaction. He meant to take off some of the bandages that
morning.

That afternoon with his head unswathed, Mark began to ask questions.
Before that he had seemed to take everything for granted:

"Billy, where's the minister?" For Billy have never left his idol's
side except when Aunt Saxon needed him to help.

"Oh, he's up to tha parsonage," responded Billy carelessly.

"But why hasn't he been to see me, Kid?"

"Why--he--hasn't been feelin' very good." Billy's voice was brisk as if
it wasn't a matter of much moment.

Mark turned his thoughtful gray eyes steadily on Billy:

"Now, look here, Kid, I'm well, and there's no further need to
camouflage. Billy, is the minister dead?"

"Not on yer tin type, he ain't dead!"

"Well, is he hurt?"

"Well, _some_," Billy admitted cheerfully.

"Kid, look me in the eye."

Billy raised a saucy eye as well masked as Mark's own could be on
occasion.

"Kid, how much is he hurt! _Tell me the truth!_ If you don't I'll
get right up and go and see."

"I'll tell the world, you won't!" said Billy rising lazily and taking a
gentle menacing step toward the bed.

"Kid!"

"Well--he's some hurt--but he's getting along fine now. He'll be
aw'wright."

"How'd he get hurt?"

"Oh, the fire, same's you."

"How?" insisted Mark.

"Oh, he went up again after a fella when it was too late--"

"Billy, was it me?"

"Ugh huh!" nodded Billy.

Mark was so still that Billy was frightened. When he looked up worried
he saw that a great tear had escaped out from under the lashes which
were growing nicely now, and had rolled down Mark's cheek. _Mark
crying!_

In consternation Billy knelt beside the bed:

"Aw Gee! Mark, now don't you feel like that. He's gettin' all right now
they hope, an' Gee! He was _great!_ You oughtta seen him!"

"Tell me about it," said Mark huskily.

"He just ran up that there ladder when it was shaking like a leaf, an'
the wall beginning to buckle under it, an' he picked you up. Fer a
minute there the flames kinda blew back, and we seen ya both, and then
the roof caved, an' you all went down. But when we gotcha out he was
layin' right atop of ya, 'ith his arms spread out, trying t'cover ya!
Gee, it was _great!_ Everybody was just as still, like he was
preachin'!"

After a long time Mark said:

"Billy, did you ever hear the words, 'Greater love hath no man than
this, that a man lay down his life for his friend?'"

"Yep," said Billy, "That's in the Bible I think, if 'taint in
Shakespeare. Miss Lynn said it over last Sunday. She says a lot of
things from Shakespeare sometimes, and I kinda get'em mixed."

But Mark did not talk any more that day. He had a great deal to think
about.

But so did Billy, for looking out the window in the direction of the
parsonage he had sighted the big Shafton car stopping before the door
that morning. "Aw Gee!" he said. "That sissy-guy again? Now, how'm I
gonta get rid of him this time? Gee! Just when Mark's gettin' well too!
If life ain't just _one thing after another!"_




XXX


It was a bright frosty morning in the edge of winter when at last they
let Mark go to see the minister, and Billy took care that no hint of
the Shafton car should reach his knowledge. Slowly, gravely he escorted
Mark down the street and up the parsonage steps.

The minister was lying on a couch in the living room and there was a
low chair drawn up near by with a book open at the place, and a bit of
fluffy sewing on the low table beside it. Mark looked hungrily about
for the owner of the gold thimble, but there was no sign of either Mrs.
Severn or Marilyn about.

There was a bandage over the minister's eyes. They hadn't told Mark
about that yet.

The minister held out a groping hand with his old sweet smile and
hearty welcoming voice:

"Well, son, you've come at last! Beat me to it, didn't you? I'm glad.
That was fair. Young blood you know."

Mark knelt down by the couch with his old friend's hand held fast:
Billy had faded into the landscape out on the front steps somewhere,
and was even now settling down for an extended wait. If this interview
went well he might hope to get a little rest and catch up on sports
sometime soon. It all depended on this.

Mark put up his other hand and touched the bandage:

"Father!" he said, "Father!" and broke down "Father, I have sinned--"
he said brokenly.

The minister's arm went lovingly up across the young man's shoulders:

"Son, have you told your heavenly Father that?" he asked gently.

"I've tried," said Mark, "I'm not sure that He heard."

"Oh, He _heard_," said the minister with a ring of joy in his
voice, "While you were a great way off He came to meet you, son."

"You don't know yet," said Mark lifting a white sad face--"

"If you've told Him I'll trust you son. It's up to you whether you tell
me or not."

"It is your right to know, sir. I want you to know. I cannot rest again
until you do."

"Then tell." The minister's hand folded down tenderly over the boy's,
and so kneeling beside the couch Mark told his story:

"I must begin by telling you that I have always loved Marilyn."

"I know," said the minister, with a pressure on the hand he covered.

"One day I heard someone telling Mrs. Severn that I was not good enough
for her;"

"I know," said the minister again.

"You know?" said Mark in surprise.

"Yes, go on."

"I went away and thought it over. I felt as if I would die. I was mad
and hurt clear through, but after I thought it over I saw that all she
had said was true. I wasn't good enough. There was a great deal of
pride mixed with it all of course, I've seen that since, but I wasn't
good enough. Nobody was. Lynn is,--_wonderful--!_ But I was just a
common, insignificant nobody, not fit to be her mate. I knew it! I
could see just how things were going too. I saw you didn't realize it,
you nor Mrs. Severn. I knew Marilyn cared, but I thought she didn't
realize it either, and I saw it was up to me. If she wasn't to have to
suffer by being parted from me when she grew older, I must teach her
not to care before she knew she cared. For days I turned it over in my
mind. Many nights I lay awake all night or walked out on the hills,
threshing it all over again. And I saw another thing. I saw that if it
was so hard for me then when I was not much more than a kid it would be
harder for her if I let her grow up caring, and then we had to be
parted, so I decided to make the break. The day I made the decision I
went off in the hills and stayed all day thinking it out. And then I
looked up in the sky and told God I was done with Him. I had prayed and
prayed that He would make a way out of this trouble for me, and He
hadn't done anything about it, and I felt that He was against me too.
So when I had done that I felt utterly reckless. I didn't care what
happened to me, and I decided to go to the bad as fast as I could. I
felt it would be the best way too to make Marilyn get over being fond
of me. So I went down to Monopoly that night and looked up a fellow
that had been coaching the teams for a while and was put out by the
association because he was rotten. He had always made a fuss over me,
wanted to make a big player out of me, and I knew he would be glad to
see me.

"He was. He took me out to supper that night and gave me liquor to
drink. You know I had never touched a drop. Never had intended to as
long as I lived. But when he offered it to me I took it down as if I
had been used to it. I didn't care. I wanted to do all the wrong I
could.

"I drank again and again, and I must have got pretty drunk. I remember
the crowd laughed at me a great deal. And they brought some girls
around. It makes me sick to think of it now. We went to a place and
danced. I didn't know how, but I danced anyway. And there was more
drinking. I don't remember things very distinctly. I did whatever the
coach said, and he had been going a pretty good pace himself.--That
night--!" His voice choked with shame and it seemed as though he could
not go on--but the minister's clasp was steady and the boy gathered
courage and went on--"That night--we--went--to a house of shame--!"

He dropped his head and groaned. The minister did not attempt to break
the pause that followed. He knew the struggle that was going on in the
bitterness of the young man's soul. He maintained that steady hand
clasp:

"In the morning--when I came to myself--" he went on "I knew what I had
done. I had cut myself off forever from all that made life worth while.
I would never be worthy again to even speak to you all whom I loved so
much. I would never be able to look myself in the face again even. I
was ashamed. I had given up God and love, and everything worth while.

"That was when I went away to New York. Mother tried to stop me, but I
would go. I tried when I got to New York to plunge into a wild life,
but it didn't attract me. I had to force myself. Besides, I had
resolved that whatever came, wherever I went I would not drink and I
would _keep clean_. I thought that by so doing I might in time at
least win back my self respect. Later I conceived the idea of trying to
save others from a life of shame. I did succeed in helping some to
better ways I think, both men and girls. But I only won a worse
reputation at home for it, and I'm not sure I did much good. I only
know I walked in hell from morning to night, and in time I came to
dwell among lost souls. It seemed the only place that I belonged.

"You remember when you read us Dante 'Thou who through the City of Fire
alive art passing'? You used to preach in church about beginning the
eternal life now, and making a little heaven below, I'm sure that is as
true of hell. I began my eternal life five years ago, but it was in
hell, and I shall go on living in that fire of torture forever, apart
from all I love. I tried to get out by doing good to others, but it was
of no avail. I thought never to tell you this, but something made me,
after you--you gave your life for me--!"

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