Thatcher"s, "n" rocked back "n" forth for ten year, till he wore out five cane-bottomed cheers, "n" then rocked clean through, down cellar, all on account o" Crany Ann Sweat. Well, I hope she got her comeuppance in another world,--she never did in this; she married well "n" lived in Boston.... Mis" Thatcher hopes Seth "ll come home to live. She"s dretful lonesome in that big house, all alone. She"d oughter have somebody for a company-keeper. She can"t see nothin" but trees "n" cows from her winders.... Beats all, the places they used to put houses.... Either they"d get "em right under foot so "t you"d most tread on "em when you walked along the road, or else they"d set "em clean back in a lane, where the women folks couldn"t see face o" clay week in "n" week out....
"Joel Whitten"s widder"s just drawed his pension along o" his bein" in the war o" 1812. ... It"s took "em all these years to fix it. ... Ma.s.sy sakes! don"t some folks have their luck b.u.t.tered in this world?... She was his fourth wife, "n" she never lived with him but thirteen days "fore he up "n" died. ... It doos seem"s if the guv"ment might look after things a little mite closer.... Talk about Joel Whitten"s bein" in the war o" 1812! Everybody knows Joel Whitten wouldn"t have fit a skeeter! He never got any further "n Scratch Corner, any way, "n" there he clim a tree or hid behind a hen-coop somewheres till the regiment got out o" sight.... Yes: one, two, three, four,--Huldy was his fourth wife.
His first was a Hogg, from Hoggses Mills. The second was Dorcas Doolittle, aunt to Jabe Sloc.u.m; she didn"t know enough to make soap, Dorcas didn"t.... Then there was Delia Weeks, from the lower corner....
She didn"t live long.... There was some thin" wrong with Delia.... She was one o" the thin-blooded, white-livered kind.... You couldn"t get her warm, no matter how hard you tried. ... She"d set over a roarin" fire in the cook-stove even in the p.r.i.c.kliest o" the dog-days. ... The mill-folks used to say the Whittens burnt more cut-roun"s "n" stickens "n any three fam"lies in the village. ... Well, after Delia died, then come Huldy"s turn, "n" it"s she, after all, that"s drawed the pension.... Huldy took Joel"s death consid"able hard, but I guess she"ll perk up, now she"s come int" this money. ... She"s awful leaky-minded, Huldy is, but she"s got tender feelin"s.... One day she happened in at noon-time, "n" set down to the table with Si "n" I.... All of a suddent she bust right out cryin" when Si was offerin" her a piece o" tripe, "n"
then it come out that she couldn"t never bear the sight o" tripe, it reminded her so of Joel! It seems tripe was a favorite dish o" Joel"s.
All his wives cooked it firstrate.... Jabe Sloc.u.m seems to set consid"able store by them children, don"t he?... I guess he"ll never ketch up with his work, now he"s got them hangin" to his heels.... He doos beat all for slowness! Sloc.u.m"s a good name for him, that"s certain. An" "s if that wa"n"t enough, his mother was a Stillwell, "n"
her mother was a Doolittle!... The Doolittles was the slowest fam"ly in Lincoln County. (Thank you, I"m well helped, Samanthy.) Old Cyrus Doolittle was slower "n a toad funeral. He was a carpenter by trade, "n"
he was twenty-five years buildin" his house; "n" it warn"t no great, either.... The stagin" was up ten or fifteen years, "n" he shingled it four or five times before he got roun", for one patch o" shingles used to wear out "fore he got the next patch on. He "n" Mis" Doolittle lived in two rooms in the L. There was elegant banisters, but no stairs to "em, "n" no entry floors. There was a tip-top cellar, but there wa"n"t no way o" gittin" down to it, "n" there wa"n"t no conductors to the cisterns. There was only one door panel painted in the parlor. Land sakes! the neighbors used to happen in "bout every week for years "n"
years, hopin" he"d get another one finished up, but he never did,--not to my knowledge.... Why, it"s the gospel truth that when Mis" Doolittle died he had to have her embalmed, so "t he could git the front door hung for the fun"ral! (No more tea, I thank you; my cup ain"t out.) ...
Speakin" o" slow folks, Elder Banks tells an awful good story "bout Jabe Sloc.u.m.... There"s another man down to Edgewood, Aaron Peek by name, that"s "bout as lazy as Jabe. An" one day, when the loafers roun" the store was talkin" "bout "em, all of a suddent they see the two of "em startin" to come down Marm Berry"s hill, right in plain sight of the store.... Well, one o" the Edgewood boys bate one o" the Pleasant River boys that they could tell which one of "em was the laziest by the way they come down that hill.... So they all watched, "n" bime by, when Jabe was most down to the bottom of the hill, they was struck all of a heap to see him break into a kind of a jog trot "n" run down the balance o"
the way. Well, then, they fell to quarrelin"; for o" course the Pleasant River folks said Aaron Peek was the laziest, "n" the Edgewood boys declared he hedn"t got no such record for laziness"s Jabe Sloc.u.m hed; an" when they was explainin" of it, one way "n" "nother, Elder Banks come along, "n" they asked him to be the judge. When he heerd tell how "t was, he said he agreed with the Edgewood folks that Jabe was lazier "n Aaron. "Well, I snum, I don"t see how you make that out," says the Pleasant River boys; "for Aaron walked down, "n" Jabe run a piece o" the way." "If Jabe Sloc.u.m run," says the elder, as impressive as if he was preachin",--"if Jabe Sloc.u.m ever run, then "t was because he was _too doggoned lazy to hold back!_ "an" that settled it!... (No, I couldn"t eat another mossel, Miss c.u.mmins; I"ve made out a splendid supper.) ...
You can"t git such pie "n" doughnuts anywhere else in the village, "n"
what I say I mean.... Do you make your riz doughnuts with emptin"s? I want to know! Si says there"s more faculty in cookin" flour food than there is in meat-victuals, "n" I guess he"s "bout right."
It was bedtime, and Timothy was in his little room carrying on the most elaborate and complicated plots for reading the future. It must be known that Jabe Sloc.u.m was as full of signs as a Farmer"s Almanac, and he had given Timothy more than one formula for attaining his secret desires,--old, well-worn recipes for luck, which had been tried for generations in Pleasant River, and which were absolutely "certain" in their results. The favorites were:--
"Star bright, star light, First star I"ve seen to-night, Wish I may, wish I might, Get the wish I wish to-night;"
and one still more impressive:--
"Four posts upon my bed, Four corners overhead; Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, Bless the bed I _lay_ upon.
Matthew, John, Luke, and Mark, Grant my wish and keep it dark."
These rhymes had been chanted with great solemnity, and Timothy sat by the open window in the sweet darkness of the summer night, wishing that he and Gay might stay forever in this sheltered spot. "I"ll make a sign of my very own," he thought. "I"ll get Gay"s ankle-tie, and put it on the window-sill, with the toe pointing out. Then I"ll wish that if we are going to stay at the White Farm, the angels will turn it around, "toe in" to the room, for a sign to me; and if we"ve got to go, I"ll wish they may leave it the other way; and, oh dear, but I"m glad it"s so little and easy to move; and then I"ll say Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, four times over, without stopping, as Jabe told me to, and then see how it turns out in the morning." ...
But the incantation was more soothing than the breath of Miss Vilda"s scarlet poppies, and before the magical verse had fallen upon the drowsy air for the third time, Timothy was fast asleep, with a smile of hope on his parted lips.
There was a sweet summer shower in the night. The soft breezes, fresh from shaded dells and nooks of fern, fragrant with the odor of pine and vine and wet wood-violets, blew over the thirsty meadows and golden stubble-fields, and brought an hour of gentle rain.
It sounded a merry tintinnabulation on Samantha"s milk-pans, wafted the scent of dripping honeysuckle into the farmhouse windows, and drenched the night-caps in which prudent farmers had dressed their hayc.o.c.ks.
Next morning, the green world stood on tiptoe to welcome the victorious sun, and every little leaf shone as a child"s eyes might shine at the remembrance of a joy just past.
A meadow lark perched on a swaying apple-branch above Martha"s grave, and poured out his soul in grateful melody; and Timothy, wakened by Nature"s sweet good-morning, leaped from the too fond embrace of Miss Vilda"s feather-bed.... And lo, a miracle!... The woodbine clung close to the wall beneath his window. It was tipped with strong young shoots reaching out their innocent hands to cling to any support that offered; and one baby tendril that seemed to have grown in a single night, so delicate it was, had somehow been blown by the sweet night wind from its drooping place on the parent vine, and, falling on the window-sill, had curled lovingly round Gay"s fairy shoe, and held it fast!
SCENE XI.
_The Honeysuckle Porch._
MISS VILDA DECIDES THAT TWO IS ONE TOO MANY, AND TIMOTHY BREAKS A HUMMINGBIRD"S EGG.
It was a drowsy afternoon. The gra.s.shoppers chirped lazily in the warm gra.s.ses, and the toads blinked sleepily under the shadows of the steps, scarcely snapping at the flies as they danced by on silver wings. Down in the old garden the still pools, in which the laughing brook rested itself here and there, shone like gla.s.s under the strong beams of the sun, and the baby horned-pouts rustled their whiskers drowsily and scarcely stirred the water as they glided slowly through its crystal depths.
The air was fragrant with the odor of new-mown gra.s.s and the breath of wild strawberries that had fallen under the sickle, to make the sweet hay sweeter with their crimson juices. The whir of the scythes and the clatter of the mowing machine came from the distant meadows. Field mice and ground sparrows were aware that it probably was all up with their little summer residences, for haying time was at its height, and the Giant, mounted on the Avenging Chariot, would speedily make his appearance, and b.u.t.tercups and daisies, tufted gra.s.ses and blossoming weeds, must all bow their heads before him, and if there was anything more valuable hidden at their roots, so much the worse!
And if a bird or a mouse had been especially far-sighted and had located his family near a stump fence on a particularly uneven bit of ground, why there was always a walking Giant going about the edges with a gleaming scythe, so that it was no wonder, when reflecting on these matters after a day"s palpitation, that the little denizens of the fields thought it very natural that there should be Nihilists and Socialists in the world, plotting to overturn monopolies and other gigantic schemes for crushing the people.
Rags enjoyed the excitement of haying immensely. But then, his life was one long holiday now anyway, and the close quarters, scanty fare, and wearisome monotony of Minerva Court only visited his memory dimly when he was suffering the pangs of indigestion. For in the first few weeks of his life at the White Farm, before his appet.i.te was satiated, he was wont to eat all the white cat"s food as well as his own; and as this highway robbery took place in the retirement of the shed, where Samantha Ann always swept them for their meals, no human being was any the wiser, and only the angels saw the white cat getting whiter and whiter and thinner and thinner, while every day Rags grew more corpulent and aldermanic in his figure. But as his stomach was more favorably located than an alderman"s, he could still see the surrounding country, and he had the further advantage of possessing four legs (instead of two) to carry it about.
Timothy was happy, too, for he was a dreamer, and this quiet life harmonized well with the airy fabric of his dreams. He loved every stick and stone about the old homestead already, because the place had brought him the only glimpse of freedom and joy that he could remember in these last bare and anxious years; and if there were other and brighter years, far, far back in the misty gardens of the past, they only yielded him a secret sense of "having been," a memory that could never be captured and put into words.
Each morning he woke fearing to find his present life a vision, and each morning he gazed with unspeakable gladness at the sweet reality that stretched itself before his eyes as he stood for a moment at his little window above the honeysuckle porch.
There were the cuc.u.mber frames (he had helped Jabe to make them); the old summer house in the garden (he had held the basket of nails and handed Jabe the tools when he patched the roof); the little workshop where Samantha potted her tomato plants (and he had been allowed to water them twice, with fingers trembling at the thought of too little or too much for the tender things); and the grindstone where Jabe ground the scythes and told him stories as he sat and turned the wheel, while Gay sat beside them making dandelion chains. Yes, it was all there, and he was a part of it.
Timothy had all the poet"s faculty of interpreting the secrets that are hidden in every-day things, and when he lay p.r.o.ne on the warm earth in the cornfield, deep among the "varnished crispness of the jointed stalks," the rustling of the green things growing sent thrills of joy along the sensitive currents of his being. He was busy in his room this afternoon putting little part.i.tions in some cigar boxes, where, very soon, two or three dozen birds" eggs were to repose in fleece-lined nooks: for Jabe Sloc.u.m"s collection of three summers (every egg acquired in the most honorable manner, as he explained), had all pa.s.sed into Timothy"s hands that very day, in consideration of various services well and conscientiously performed. What a delight it was to handle the precious bits of things, like porcelain in their daintiness!--to sort out the tender blue of the robin, the speckled beauty of the sparrow; to put the pee-wee"s and the thrush"s each in its place, with a swift throb of regret that there would have been another little soft throat bursting with a song, if some one had not taken this pretty egg. And there was, over and above all, the never ending marvel of the one humming-bird"s egg that lay like a pearl in Timothy"s slender brown hand. Too tiny to be stroked like the others, only big enough to be stealthily kissed. So tiny that he must get out of bed two or three times in the night to see if it is safe. So tiny that he has horrible fears lest it should slip out or be stolen, and so he must take the box to the window and let the moonlight shine upon the fleecy cotton, and find that it is still there, and cover it safely over again and creep back to bed, wishing that he might see a "thumb"s bigness of burnished plumage" sheltering it with her speck of a breast. Ah! to have a little humming-bird"s egg to love, and to feel that it was his very own, was something to Timothy, as it is to all starved human hearts full of love that can find no outlet.
Miss Vilda was knitting, and Samantha was sh.e.l.ling peas, on the honeysuckle porch. It had been several days since Miss c.u.mmins had gone to the city, and had come back no wiser than she went, save that she had made a somewhat exhaustive study of the slums, and had acquired a more intimate knowledge of the ways of the world than she had ever possessed before. She had found Minerva Court, and designated it on her return as a "sink of iniquity," to which Afric"s sunny fountains, India"s coral strand, and other tropical localities frequented by missionaries were virtuous in comparison.
"For you don"t expect anything of black heathens," said she; "but there ain"t any question in my mind about the accountability of folks livin"
in a Christian country, where you can wear clothes and set up to an air-tight stove and be comfortable, to say nothin" of meetinghouses every mile or two, and Bible Societies and Young Men"s and Young Women"s Christian a.s.sociations, and the gospel free to all with the exception of pew rents and contribution boxes, and those omitted when it"s necessary."
She affirmed that the ladies and gentlemen whose acquaintance she had made in Minerva Court were, without exception, a "mess of malefactors,"
whose only good point was that, lacking all human qualities, they didn"t care who she was, nor where she came from, nor what she came for; so that as a matter of fact she had escaped without so much as leaving her name and place of residence. She learned that Mrs. Nancy Simmons had sought pastures new in Montana; that Miss Ethel Montmorency still resided in the metropolis, but did not choose to disclose her modest dwelling-place to the casual inquiring female from the rural districts; that a couple of children had disappeared from Minerva Court, if they remembered rightly, but that there was no disturbance made about the matter as it saved several people much trouble; that Mrs. Morrison had had no relations, though she possessed a large circle of admiring friends; that none of the admiring friends had called since her death or asked about the children; and finally that Number 3 had been turned into a saloon, and she was welcome to go in and slake her thirst for information with something more satisfactory than she could get outside.
The last straw, and one that would have broken the back of any self-respecting (unmarried) camel in the universe, was the offensive belief, on the part of the Minerva Courtiers, that the rigid Puritan maiden who was conducting the examination was the erring mother of the children, visiting (in disguise) their former dwelling-place. The conversation on this point becoming extremely pointed and jocose, Miss c.u.mmins finally turned and fled, escaping to the railway station as fast as her trembling legs could carry her. So the trip was a fruitless one, and the mystery that enshrouded Timothy and Lady Gay was as impenetrable as ever.
"I wish I"d "a" gone to the city with you," remarked Samantha. "Not that I could "a" found out anything more "n you did, for I guess there ain"t anybody thereabouts that knows more "n we do, and anybody "t wants the children won"t be troubled with the relation. But I"d like to give them bold-faced jigs "n" hussies a good piece o" my mind for once! You"re too timersome, Vildy! I b"lieve I"ll go some o" these days yet, and carry a good stout umbrella in my hand too. It says in a book somewhar"s that there"s insults that can only be wiped out in blood. Ketch "em hintin"
that I"m the mother of anybody, that"s all! I declare I don" know what our Home Missionary Societies"s doin" not to regenerate them places or exterminate "em, one or t" other. Somehow our religion don"t take holt as it ought to. It takes a burnin" zeal to clean out them slum places, and burnin" zeal ain"t the style nowadays. As my father used to say, "Religion"s putty much like fish "n" pertetters; if it"s hot it"s good, "n" if it"s cold "tain"t wuth a"--well, a short word come in there, but I won"t say it. Speakin" o" religion, I never had any experience in teachin", but I didn"t s"pose there was any knack "bout teachin"
religion, same as there is "bout teachin" readin" "n" "rithmetic, but I hed hard work makin" Timothy understand that catechism you give him to learn the other Sunday. He was all upsot with doctrine when he come to say his lesson. Now you can"t scare some children with doctrine, no matter how hot you make it, or mebbe they don"t more "n half believe it; but Timothy"s an awful sensitive creeter, "n" when he come to that answer to the question "What are you then by nature? An enemy to G.o.d, a child of Satan, and an heir of h.e.l.l," he hid his head on my shoulder and bust right out cryin". "How many G.o.ds is there?" s" e, after a spell.
"Land!" thinks I, "I knew he was a heathen, but if he turns out to be an idolater, whatever shall I do with him!" "Why, where"ve you ben fetched up?" s" I. "There"s only one G.o.d, the High and Mighty Ruler of the Univa.r.s.e," s" I. "Well," s" e", "there must be more "n one, for the G.o.d in this lesson isn"t like the one in Miss Dora"s book at all!" Land sakes! I don"t want to teach catechism agin in a hurry, not tell I"ve hed a little spiritual instruction from the minister. The fact is, Vildy, that our b"liefs, when they"re picked out o" the Bible and set down square and solid "thout any softening down "n" explainin" that they ain"t so bad as they sound, is too strong meat for babes. Now I"m Orthodox to the core" (here she lowered her voice as if there might be a stray deacon in the garden), "but "pears to me if I was makin" out lessons for young ones I wouldn"t fill "em so plumb full o" brimstun.
Let "em do a little suthin" to deserve it "fore you scare "em to death, say I."
"Jabe explained it all out to him after supper. It beats all how he gets on with children."
"I"d ruther hear how he explained it," answered Samantha sarcastically.
"He"s great on expoundin" the Scripters jest now. Well, I hope it"ll last. Land sakes! you"d think n.o.body ever experienced religion afore, he"s so set up "bout it. You"d s"pose he kep" the latch-key o" the heavenly mansions right in his vest pocket, to hear him go on. He couldn"t be no more stuck up "bout it if he"d ben one o" the two brothers that come over in three ships!"
"There goes Elder Nichols," said Miss Vilda. "Now there"s a plan we hadn"t thought of. We might take the children over to Purity Village. I think likely the Shakers would take "em. They like to get young folks and break "em into their doctrines."
"Tim "d make a tiptop Shaker," laughed Samantha. "He"d be an Elder afore he was twenty-one. I can seem to see him now, with his hair danglin"
long in his neck, a blue coat b.u.t.toned up to his chin, and his hands see-sawin" up "n" down, prancin" round in them solemn dances."
"Tim would do well enough, but I ain"t so sure of Gay. They"d have their hands full, I guess!"
"I guess they would. Anybody that wanted to make a Shaker out o" her would "a" had to begin with her grandmother; and that wouldn"t "a" done nuther, for they don"t b"lieve in marryin", and the thing would "a"
stopped right there, and Gray wouldn"t never "a" been born int" the world."
"And been a great sight better off," interpolated Miss Vilda.
"Now don"t talk that way, Vildy. Who knows what lays ahead o" that child? The Lord may be savin" her up to do some great work for Him," she added, with a wild flight of the imagination.
"She looks like it, don"t she?" asked Vilda with a grim intonation; but her face softened a little as she glanced at Gay asleep on the rustic bench under the window.