The girl had run to the door and opened it widely. Then she backed away before a little man who removed a clerical hat that was desperately green from exposure to the elements, and which revealed a shock of hair of a dull flaxen hue doubtless washed free of any pigment by salt spray and rain. His garments were also of distinctive cut, though they frankly exposed well-meant though unvailing efforts at matching b.u.t.tons and repairing small rents. He bowed to me, his thin face expanding into a most gentle and somewhat professional smile, and he expressed commiseration at the sight of Daddy in his bed.
"I hope I don"t intrude upon your privacy," he said, with an intonation just as refined as that of his wife, though scarcely as sweet. "I took the liberty of calling, having been informed of your very distressing accident. I fear you have not finished your repast, and perhaps I had better..."
"Do come in and take a seat," I told him. "It is ever so kind of you to call."
"I am very glad to see you, sir," said Daddy, very cordially. "We have not had many opportunities to welcome visitors here, and even our doctor is too busy a man to pay long calls."
"Yes, quite so. Indeed he is at times exceedingly busy. We think him an extremely nice young man; quite delightful, I a.s.sure you, and he does a great deal of good."
The man was rubbing his thin little hands together, with his head c.o.c.ked to one side, looking like an intellectual and benevolent sparrow.
I must say that I was impressed by him. From conversations with the fishermen I had gathered the impression that Mr. Barnett was a perfectly fearless man on land and water, and I had imagined an individual cast in a rather heroic mold.
It hardly seemed possible that this little parson was the subject of the tales I had heard, for he bore a tiny look of timidity and, I was sorry to see, of overwork and underfeeding. But the latter may have been dyspepsia.
"This is rather a large field to which we have been called," he continued. "It gives one very fine opportunities as well as some difficulties to contend with. But of course we keep on striving. It is not missionary work, you understand, for the people are all very firm believers. It is merely a question of lending a helping hand, to the best of one"s ability."
"It must be dreadfully hard at times," I put in. "You had quite a long sail to get here, didn"t you? And isn"t it perfectly awful in winter?"
"I have been carried out to sea, and things have looked rather badly sometimes," he said, deprecatingly. "But one must expect a little trouble now and then, you know."
Daddy began to ask him questions. You know how he prides himself on his ability to turn people inside out, as he expresses it. The poor little man answered, slowly, smiling blandly all the time and looking quite unfit, physically, to face the perils of such a hard life. I became persuaded that under that frail exterior there must be a heart full of strength to endure, of determination to carry out that which he considers to be his duty.
"You know I really am afraid I"m a dreadful coward," he suddenly confessed. "I have been rather badly frightened some times."
"My father was the bravest man I ever knew," said Daddy, "and he acknowledged that he was scared half to death whenever he went into battle, during the war. Yet he was several times promoted for gallantry in the field. I feel quite sure that you must have deserved similar advancement, more than once."
Mr. Barnett looked at him, doubtfully, and with a funny little frightened air.
"I am afraid you must be chaffing me," he said, with a tentative smile.
"No, sir, I am not," clamored Daddy. "Bravery lies in facing the odds, when you have to, and putting things through regardless of one"s fears.
The chap who never gets scared hasn"t enough brains to know danger."
The uneasy look of the parson"s face gave way to a pleased expression.
It was interesting to watch Daddy getting at all the facts, as he calls it, and I suppose that it is a precious talent. In the shortest possible time he knew the birth rate, the chief family histories, the rates for the transportation of codfish to the remotest parts of the world, and how many barrels of flour it took to keep a large family alive for one year, besides a few hundred other things.
During a lull I asked Mr. Barnett whether he would have some tea. Your cultivated taste is the one I have followed as regards this beverage, and I have an ample provision. Before the full-flavored North China infusion, which I kept out of Susie"s devastating hands, and the little biscuits coming from the most British-looking tin box, I saw the Reverend Basil Barnett, late of Magdalen, gradually becoming permeated by a sense of something that had long been missing from his life. When he first caught the aroma he looked incredulous, then his features relaxed in the smile of the expert utterly satisfied.
"Mrs. Barnett and I are exceedingly fond of tea," he said, after I had compelled him to let me fill his cup for the third time.
To-morrow I shall discover some manner of making the dear woman accept a pound or two of it. The appreciation of her spouse made me think of some lion-hearted, little, strenuous lady with an inveterate tea-habit. Can you understand such a confused statement? I realize that it is badly jumbled. At any rate he held his cup daintily, with three fingers, and looked at it as Daddy looks at a gla.s.s of his very special Chateau-Larose.
"I shall have to go now," he announced, perhaps a little regretfully. "I hear, Miss Jelliffe, that you have helped minister to the needs of that poor d.i.c.k Will. I am going to see him now. By the way, I trust I may have the pleasure of seeing you to-morrow at our little church, if you can leave your dear patient long enough."
"Of course I"ll come," I promised, "and I would be glad to go with you now and see d.i.c.k. I know Daddy won"t mind, and I should like to see whether I can do anything to make the man more comfortable."
"Run along, my dear," said Daddy.
Mr. Barnett expressed thanks, and we walked away together. I actually had to shorten my steps a little to accommodate myself to his quick, shuffling gait. It is queer, Aunt Jennie, but before this tiny, unpretentious parson I feel a sense of deference and high regard. To think he is able to overcome his fears, that his gracile body has been called upon to withstand the bufferings of storms, and that his notion of duty should appear to raise him, physically, to the level of these rough vikings among whom he labors, is quite bewildering. And the best of it is that when he talks he is entirely free from that didactic authority so often a.s.sumed by men of his cloth. He just admits you into his confidence, that is all.
"Mrs. Barnett has told me of your kindness to her and the little chaps,"
he said. "I am so pleased that you have become acquainted. The thing a woman misses most, in places like this, is her circle of friends. But she is the bravest soul in the world, and although she worries a good deal when I am away in bad weather she always looks cheerful when I return. I have been blessed beyond my deserts, Miss Jelliffe."
The little man looked up at me, and I could see that his face was bright with happiness, so that I had to smile in sympathy. I don"t know that I have ever realized before what a huge thing love and affection mean in the lives of some people, how they can cast a glamour over sordid surroundings and reward one for all the hardships.
"I am glad that you are happy," I told him. "I think that you have become very fond of the place and of these people."
"I shall miss them if ever I am called away," he acknowledged, looking at the poor, unpainted houses and the rickety flakes.
Dear Auntie Jennie, it looks to me as if these were people to be envied.
To the parson life is the prosecution of a work he deems all-important, and which he carries on with the knowledge that there is always a helping hand lovingly to uphold his own. And yet I admire his wife still more deeply, for she looks like a queen who loves her exile, because the king is with her.
We went into the house in which d.i.c.k found shelter. The men were away fishing, of course, but two women were there, with their fair share of the children who swarm in the Cove. At once ap.r.o.ns were produced for the polishing of the two rough chairs of the establishment.
"We has some merla.s.ses now," one of the women told me, proudly. "Th"
little bye he be allers a puttin" some on bread an" leavin" it on th"
cheers."
Daddy is calling me, so good by for the present. I am so glad the people of Sweetapple Cove interest you.
Lovingly, HELEN.
CHAPTER IX
_From Miss Helen Jelliffe to Miss Jane Van Zandt_
_Dearest Auntie_:
Would you believe that the time here flies at least as fast as in New York during Horse-Show week, although one gets to bed earlier. I am beginning actually to enjoy this place, strange as it may seem. Had it not been for poor Daddy"s accident I should have been the most contented thing you ever saw. He sends his love and says I"ve just got to learn stenography and type-writing so that when he breaks more legs he can write to you daily. I believe he"s forgotten the use of a pen except to sign checks with. His patience is wonderful, but he calls it being a good sportsman. I believe there is a great deal in that word.
It is queer that one can make oneself at home in such a little hole, and find people that are quite absorbing; I mean the natives, as well as the others. The whole place is asleep by eight or nine, unless there has been a good catch of fish, when the little houses on the edge of the cove are full of weary men still ripping away at the cod, that are brought in huge piles dwindling very fast after they are spread out to dry. Daddy gets batches of newspapers, by the uncertain mail, but finishes by nine and requests to be permitted to snore in peace. I write hurriedly for an hour or two, and finally succ.u.mb to the drowsiness you may find reflected in these pages.
On returning from my visit to d.i.c.k Will, Daddy looked at me enquiringly, as I am his chief source of local news and the dear old man is becoming nearly as absorbed in Sweetapple Cove as in Wall Street.
"The parson has gone to pay other visits," I told him, "but I couldn"t leave you any longer. He is such a nice little man. He asked if he could read a chapter from the Bible, and d.i.c.k said he would be very glad. When it was finished the man looked as if he were thinking very hard, and Mr.
Barnett asked if anything were puzzling him. Then d.i.c.k asked about the ice in the Sea of Galilee, because big floes were often ankle-deep and he had often seen men who looked as if they were walking on the water. Mr.
Barnett explained that there was no ice in that country."
"And what did d.i.c.k say?" asked Daddy.
""Then how does they do for swiles?"" was what he asked, and when he was informed that there were no seals in Galilee d.i.c.k expressed commiseration for the poor people.
"They are a pretty ignorant lot," commented Dad, laughing heartily.