"I suppose Mr. Webbe will do most of what work there is to do," I said, "but he will be an easy person to work with on a committee, I should think."
"Yes, marm, he will," the blacksmith responded heartily. "There ain"t a squarer fellow alive than Tom Webbe. Tom"s been a bit wild, perhaps; but he"s an awful good fellow just the same, if you know him. I"m pleased to be on the committee with him, Miss Privet; and I"ll do my best. I think the boys"ll do about as I want "em to."
I had only to see Mr. Turner to understand why Deacon Daniel had chosen him. I think the committee--but "oh, good gracious mercy me," as the old woman in the story says, it just occurs to me that I have not said a word to Tom about the whole business!
September 28. It is strange that my only difficulty in arranging about the reading-room should come from Tom, on whom I had counted as a matter of course; but it is fortunate that I had a.s.sumed he would serve, for this is what made him consent. When I saw him to-day, and told him what I had done, he at first said he could not possibly have anything to do with the whole matter.
"I thank you, Ruth," he said, "but don"t you see I had better not give folks any occasion to think of me at all just now? The gossips need only to be reminded of my being alive, and they will begin all over again."
"Tom," I asked him desperately, "are you never going to get over this bitter feeling? I can"t bear to have you go on thinking that everybody is talking about you."
"I don"t blame them for talking," was his answer.
I a.s.sured him he would have been pleased if he could have heard the way in which Mr. Turner spoke of him yesterday.
"Oh, Cy! he is too good-hearted to fling at anybody."
"But Deacon Richards was just as friendly," I insisted.
"Yes, he would be. It isn"t the men, Ruth; they are ready to give a fellow a chance; but the women"--
He did not seem to know how to finish his sentence, and I reminded him that I too was a woman.
"Oh, you," responded Tom, "you"re an angel. You might almost be a man."
I laughed at him for putting men above angels, and so by making him smile, by coaxing him, and appealing to his friendliness to back me up now I had committed myself, I prevailed upon him to serve. I am sure it will be good for the reading-room, and I am equally sure it will be good for Tom. Why in the world this victory should have left me a little inclined to be blue, I do not understand.
X
OCTOBER
October 5. I went this afternoon to walk on the Rim road. The day was beyond words in its beauty,--crisp, and clear, and rich with all that vitality which nature seems so full of in autumn, as if it were filling itself with life to withstand the long strain of the winter. The leaves were splendid in their color, and shone against the sky as if they were full of happiness. Perhaps it was the day that made it possible for me to see the red house without a pang, but I think it was the sense of baby at home, well and happy, and learning, unconsciously of course, to love me with every day that goes over her small head. A thin thread of smoke trickled up from the chimney, and I thought I ought to go in to see if the old grandmother was there. I wonder if it is right not to try if the blessed granddaughter might not soften her old heart, battered and begrimed if it be. n.o.body answered my knock, however, and so I did not see Mrs. Brownrig, for which I was selfishly glad. She has not been very gracious when I have sent her things, so I was not, I confess, especially anxious for an interview. I went away smiling to myself over a saying of Father"s: "There is nothing so pleasant as a disagreeable duty conscientiously escaped."
October 6. I really know something which has escaped the acuteness of Aunt Naomi, and I feel greatly puffed up in consequence. Deacon Richards has been here this evening, and as it was rather cool I had a brisk, cheery fire.
"I do like to be warm," he said, stretching out his hand luxuriously to the blaze. "I never could understand why I feel the cold so. I should think it was age, if it hadn"t always been so from the time I was a boy."
I thought of the cold vestry, and smiled to myself as I wondered if Deacon Daniel had ascetic ideas of self-torture.
"Then I should think you would be fond of big fires," I observed.
"I am," he responded, "only they make me sleepy. I"m like a kitten; I go to sleep when I get warmed through."
I laughed outright, and when he asked me what I was laughing at I told him it was partly at the idea of his being like a kitten, and partly because I had found him out.
"It is all very well for you to keep the vestry as cold as a barn so that you can keep awake," I added; "but don"t you think it is unfair to the rest of the congregation to freeze them too?"
He looked rather disconcerted a moment, and then grinned, though sheepishly.
"Heat makes other people sleepy too," he said defensively.
I chaffed him a little, and told him I should send a couple of loads of wood to the vestry, and that if it were necessary I would give him a bottle of smelling-salts to keep him awake, but certainly the room must be warmer. I declared I would not have dear old lady Andrews exposed to the danger of pneumonia, even if he was like a kitten. It is really quite as touching as it is absurd to think of his sitting in prayer-meeting shivering and uncomfortable because he feels it his duty to keep awake. In biblical times dancing before the Lord was a legitimate form of worship; it is almost a pity that sleeping before the Lord cannot be put among proper religious observances. Dear Miss Charlotte always sleeps--devoutly, I am sure--at every prayer-meeting, and then comes out declaring it has been a beautiful meeting. I have no doubt she has been spiritually refreshed, even if she has nodded. Father used to say that no religion could be permanent until men were able to give their deity a sense of humor; and I do think a supreme being which could not see the humorous side of Deacon Richards" pathetic mortification of the flesh in his frosty vestry could hardly have the qualifications necessary to manage the universe properly.
October 12. Ranny Gargan has settled the question of marriage for the present at least. He has remarried his first wife to prevent her from bringing suit against him. As Miss Charlotte rather boldly said, he has legitimized the beating by marrying the woman.
Rosa takes the matter coolly. She says she is glad to have things so she can"t think of Ranny, for now she can take Dennis, and not bother any more about it.
"It"s a comfort to any woman not to have to decide what man she"ll marry," she remarked with her amazing philosophy.
"Then you"d like to have somebody arrange a marriage for you, Rosa," I said, rather for the sake of saying something.
"Arrange, is it?" she cried, bristling up suddenly. "What for would I have somebody making my marriage? I"d like to see anybody that would dare!"
The moral of which seems to be that if Rosa is so much of a philosopher that she sometimes seems to me to be talking sc.r.a.ps out of old heathen sages, she is yet only a woman.
October 20. Aunt Naomi had about her when she came stealthily in this afternoon an air of excitement so evident as almost to be contagious. I could see by the very hurry of her sliding step and the extra tightness of her veil that something had stirred her greatly.
"What is it, Aunt Naomi?" I asked at once. "You fairly bristle with news. What"s happened?"
She smiled and gave a little cluck, but my salutation made her instantly moderate her movements. She sat down with a composed and self-contained air, and only by the unusually vigorous swinging of her foot showed that she was not as serene as on ordinary occasions.
"Who said anything had happened?" she demanded.
I returned that she showed it by her looks.
"Something is always happening, I suppose."
I know Aunt Naomi well enough to understand that the quickest way of coming at her tidings was to pretend indifference, so I asked no more questions, but made a careless remark about the weather.
"What made you think anything had happened?" persisted she.
"It was simply an idea that came into my head," was my reply. "I hope Deacon Daniel keeps the vestry warm in these days."
Aunt Naomi was not proof against this parade of indifference, and in a moment she broke out with her story.
"Well," she declared, "Tom Webbe seems bound to be talked about."
"Tom Webbe!" I echoed. "What is it now?"
I confess my heart sank with the fear that he had become desperate with the pressure of weary days, and had somehow defied all the narrow conventionalities which hem him in here in this little town.