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diff --git a/18286.txt b/18286.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..48e1845 --- /dev/null +++ b/18286.txt @@ -0,0 +1,13440 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Miller Of Old Church, by Ellen Glasgow + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Miller Of Old Church + +Author: Ellen Glasgow + +Release Date: April 30, 2006 [EBook #18286] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MILLER OF OLD CHURCH *** + + + + +Produced by Doug Levy + + + + + + +THE MILLER OF OLD CHURCH + +by Ellen Glasgow + + To my sister Cary Glasgow McCormack + In loving acknowledgment of help + and sympathy through the years + +CONTENTS + + BOOK FIRST + + JORDAN'S JOURNEY + + + Chapter + + I. At Bottom's Ordinary + II. In Which Destiny Wears the Comic Mask + III. In Which Mr. Gay Arrives at His Journey's End + IV. The Revercombs + V. The Mill + VI. Treats of the Ladies' Sphere + VII. Gay Rushes Into a Quarrel and Secures a Kiss + VIII. Shows Two Sides of a Quarrel + IX. In Which Molly Flirts + X. The Reverend Orlando Mullen Preaches a Sermon + XI. A Flight and an Encounter + XII. The Dream and the Real + XIII. By the Mill-race + XIV. Shows the Weakness in Strength + XV. Shows the Tyranny of Weakness + XVI. The Coming of Spring + XVII. The Shade of Mr. Jonathan + XVIII. The Shade of Reuben + XIX. Treats of Contradictions + XX. Life's Ironies + XXI. In Which Pity Masquerades as Reason + + + BOOK SECOND + + THE CROSS-ROADS + + + Chapter + + I. In which Youth Shows a Little Seasoned + II. The Desire of the Moth + III Abel Hears Gossip and Sees a Vision + IV. His Day of Freedom + V. The Shaping of Molly + VI. In Which Hearts Go Astray + VII. A New Beginning to an Old Tragedy + VIII. A Great Passion in a Humble Place + IX. A Meeting in the Pasture + X. Tangled Threads + XI. The Ride to Piping Tree + XII. One of Love's Victims + XIII. What Life Teaches + XIV. The Turn of the Wheel + XV. Gay Discovers Himself + XVI. The End + + Author's Note: The scene of this story is not the + place of the same name in Virginia. + + + +BOOK FIRST + +JORDAN'S JOURNEY + +THE MILLER OF OLD CHURCH + + + +CHAPTER I + + +AT BOTTOM'S ORDINARY + + +It was past four o'clock on a sunny October day, when a stranger, who +had ridden over the "corduroy" road between Applegate and Old Church, +dismounted near the cross-roads before the small public house known to +its frequenters as Bottom's Ordinary. Standing where the three roads +meet at the old turnpike-gate of the county, the square brick building, +which had declined through several generations from a chapel into a +tavern, had grown at last to resemble the smeared face of a clown under +a steeple hat which was worn slightly awry. Originally covered with +stucco, the walls had peeled year by year until the dull red of the +bricks showed like blotches of paint under a thick coating of powder. +Over the wide door two little oblong windows, holding four damaged +panes, blinked rakishly from a mat of ivy, which spread from the rotting +eaves to the shingled roof, where the slim wooden spire bent under the +weight of creeper and innumerable nesting sparrows in spring. After +pointing heavenward for half a century, the steeple appeared to have +swerved suddenly from its purpose, and to invite now the attention of +the wayfarer to the bar beneath. This cheerful room which sprouted, like +some grotesque wing, from the right side of the chapel, marked not only +a utilitarian triumph in architecture, but served, on market days to +attract a larger congregation of the righteous than had ever stood up +to sing the doxology in the adjoining place of worship. Good and bad +prospects were weighed here, weddings discussed, births and deaths +recorded in ever-green memories, and here, also, were reputations +demolished and the owners of them hustled with scant ceremony away to +perdition. + +From the open door of the bar on this particular October day, there +streamed the ruddy blaze of a fire newly kindled from knots of resinous +pine. Against this pleasant background might be discerned now and then +the shapeless silhouette of Betsey Bottom, the innkeeper, a soft and +capable soul, who, in attaching William Ming some ten years before, had +successfully extinguished his identity without materially impairing her +own. Bottom's Ordinary had always been ruled by a woman, and it would +continue to be so, please God, however loudly a mere Ming might protest +to the contrary. In the eyes of her neighbours, a female, right or +wrong, was always a female, and this obvious fact, beyond and above any +natural two-sided jars of wedlock, sufficed in itself to establish Mrs. +Ming as a conjugal martyr. Being an amiable body--peaceably disposed to +every living creature, with the exception of William--she had hastened +to the door to reprimand him for some trivial neglect of the grey mule, +when her glance lighted upon the stranger, who had come a few minutes +earlier by the Applegate road. As he was a fine looking man of full +habit and some thirty years, her eyes lingered an instant on his face +before she turned with the news to her slatternly negro maid who was +sousing the floor with a bucket of soapsuds. + +"Thar's nobody on earth out thar but young Mr. Jonathan Gay come back to +Jordan's Journey," she said. "I declar I'd know a Gay by his eyes if I +war to meet him in so unlikely a place as Kingdom Come. He's talkin' +to old Adam Doolittle now," she added, for the information of the maid, +who, being of a curious habit of mind, had raised herself on her knees +and was craning her neck toward the door, "I can see his lips movin', +but he speaks so low I can't make out what he says." + +"Lemme git dar a minute, Miss Betsey, I'se got moughty sharp years, I +is." + +"They're no sharper than mine, I reckon, and I couldn't hear if I stood +an' listened forever. It's about the road most likely, for I see old +Adam a-pintin'." + +For a minute after dismounting the stranger looked dubiously at the +mottled face of the tavern. On his head the sunlight shone through +the boughs of a giant mulberry tree near the well, and beyond this the +Virginian forest, brilliant with its autumnal colours of red and copper, +stretched to the village of Applegate, some ten or twelve miles to the +north. + +Starting southward from the cross-roads, the character of the country +underwent so sudden a transformation that it looked as if man, having +contended here unsuccessfully with nature, had signed an ignominious +truce beneath the crumbling gateposts of the turnpike. Passing beyond +them a few steps out of the forest, one found a low hill, on which +the reaped corn stood in stacks like weapons of a vanished army, while +across the sunken road, the abandoned fields, overgrown with broomsedge +and life-everlasting, spread for several miles between "worm fences" +which were half buried in brushwood. To the eyes of the stranger, fresh +from the trim landscapes of England, there was an aspect of desolation +in the neglected roads, in the deserted fields, and in the dim grey +marshes that showed beyond the low banks of the river. + +In the effort to shake off the depression this loneliness had brought +on his spirits, he turned to an ancient countryman, wearing overalls +of blue jeans, who dozed comfortably on the circular bench beneath the +mulberry tree. + +"Is there a nearer way to Jordan's Journey, or must I follow the +turnpike?" he asked. + +"Hey? Young Adam, are you thar, suh?" + +Young Adam, a dejected looking youth of fifty years, with a pair of +short-sighted eyes that glanced over his shoulder as if in fear of +pursuit, shuffled round the trough of the well, and sat down on the +bench at his parent's side. + +"He wants to know, pa, if thar's a short cut from the ornary over to +Jordan's Journey," he repeated. + +Old Adam, who had sucked patiently at the stem of his pipe during the +explanation, withdrew it at the end, and thrust out his lower lip as a +child does that has stopped crying before it intended to. + +"You can take a turn to the right at the blazed pine a half a mile on," +he replied, "but thar's the bars to be pulled down an' put up agin." + +"I jest come along thar, an' the bars was down," said young Adam. + +"Well, they hadn't ought to have been," retorted old Adam, indignantly. +"Bars is bars whether they be public or private, an' the man that pulls +'em down without puttin' 'em up agin, is a man that you'll find to be +loose moraled in other matters." + +"It's the truth as sure as you speak it, Mr. Doolittle," said a wiry, +knocked-kneed farmer, with a hatchet-shaped face, who had sidled up to +the group. "It warn't no longer than yesterday that I was sayin' the +same words to the new minister, or rector as he tries to get us to call +him, about false doctrine an' evil practice. 'The difference between +sprinklin' and immersion ain't jest the difference between a few drips +on the head an' goin' all under, Mr. Mullen,' I said, 'but 'tis the +whole difference between the natur that's bent moral an' the natur that +ain't.' It follows as clear an' logical as night follows day--now, I ax +you, don't it, Mr. Doolittle--that a man that's gone wrong on immersion +can't be trusted to keep his hands off the women?" + +"I ain't sayin' all that, Solomon Hatch," responded old Adam, in a +charitable tone, "seein' that I've never made up my own mind quite clear +on those two p'ints--but I do say, be he immersed or sprinkled, that +the man who took down them bars without puttin' 'em up ain't a man to be +trusted." + +"'Twarn't a man, 'twas a gal," put in young Adam, "I seed Molly +Merryweather goin' toward the low grounds as I come up." + +"Then it's most likely to have been she," commented Solomon, "for she is +a light-minded one, as is proper an' becomin' in a child of sin." + +The stranger looked up with a laugh from the moss-grown cattle +trough beside which he was standing, and his eyes--of a peculiar dark +blue--glanced merrily into the bleared ones of old Adam. + +"I ain't so blind yet as not to know a Gay when I see one," said the +labourer, with a sly chuckle. "If I hadn't closed the eyes of old Mr. +Jonathan when he was found dead over yonder by the Poplar Spring, I'd as +soon as not take my Bible oath that he'd come young agin an' was ridin' +along back to Jordan's Journey." + +"Do you believe down here that my uncle killed himself?" asked the young +man, with a furtive displeasure in his voice, as if he alluded to a +disagreeable subject in response to some pressure of duty. + +"'Tis as it may be, suh, I can't answer for that. To this day if you get +Solomon Hatch or Betsey Bottom, (axin' her pardon for puttin' her last), +started on the subject they'll contend till they're blue in the face +that 'twas naught done but pure murder. However, I'm too old at my time +of life to take up with any opinion that ain't pleasant to think +on, an', when all's said an' done, pure murder ain't a peaceable, +comfortable kind of thing to believe in when thar's only one Justice of +the Peace an' he bed-ridden since Christmas. When you ax me to pin my +faith on any p'int, be it for this world or the next, my first question +consarnin' it is whether that particular p'int happens to be pleasant. +'Tis that little small argyment of mine that has confounded Mr. Mullen +more than once, when he meets me on equal ground outside the pulpit. +'Mebbe 'tis an' mebbe 'tisn't,' as I remarked sociably to him about the +matter of eternal damnation, 'but you can't deny, can you, suh, bein' +outside the pulpit an' bound to speak the truth like the rest of us, +that you sleep a long sight easier in yo' bed when you say to yo'self +that mebbe 'tisn't?'" + +"You see pa's old, an' he won't harbour any belief at his time of +life that don't let him rest comfortable," remarked young Adam, in an +apologetic aside. "It's that weakness of his that keeps him from bein' a +thorough goin' good Christian." + +"That strange young clergyman has stirred us all up about the +doctrines," said Solomon Hatch. "He's opened Old Church agin, an' he +works terrible hard to make us feel that we'd rather be sprinkled on the +head than go under all over. A nice-mannered man he is, with a pretty +face, an' some folks hold it to be a pity that we can't change our ideas +about baptism and become Episcopals in our hearts, jest to oblige him. +The women have, mostly, bein' an accommodatin' sex in the main, with the +exception of Mrs. Mallory, the blacksmith's mother, who declars she'd +rather give up eternal damnation any day than immersion." + +"I ain't goin' so fur as that," rejoined old Adam, "an' mo'over, when +it comes to the p'int, I've never found any uncommon comfort in either +conviction in time of trouble. I go to Mr. Mullen's church regular every +Sunday, seein' the Baptist one is ten miles off an' the road heavy, but +in my opinion he's a bit too zealous to turn over the notions of the +prophets an' set up his own. He's at the age when a man knows everything +on earth an' generally knows it wrong." + +"You see pa had been settin' on the anxious bench for forty years," +explained young Adam, "an' when Mr. Mullen came, he took it away from +under him, so to speak, while he was still settin' on it." + +"'Twas my proper place," said old Adam resentfully, "when it comes to +crops or the weather I am firm fixed enough in my belief, but in matters +of religion I hold with the onsartain." + +"Only his powerful belief in the Devil an' all his works keeps him from +bein' a heathen," observed young Adam in awe-stricken pride. "Even Mr. +Mullen can't move him, he's so terrible set." + +"Well, he ain't my Redeemer, though doubtless he'd be cast down if he +was to hear as I'd said so," chuckled the elder. "The over earnest, like +the women folk, are better not handled at all or handled techily. I'm +near blind as it is, but ain't that the man yonder leadin' his horse out +of the Applegate road?" + +"'Taint the rector, but the miller," responded his son. "He's bringin' +over Mrs. Bottom's sack of meal on the back of his grey mare." + +"Ah, he's one of the folks that's gone over neck an' crop to the +Episcopals," said Solomon Hatch. "His folks have been Presbyterians over +at Piping Tree sence the time of Noah, but he recites the Creed now as +loud as he used to sing the doxology. I declar his voice boomed out so +in my ears last Sunday that I was obleeged to put up my hands to keep +'em from splittin'. Have you ever marked, Mr. Doolittle, havin' had the +experience of ninety years, that when a man once takes up with a heresy, +he shouts a heap louder than them that was born an' baptised in it? It +seems as if they can't desert the ancient ways without defying 'em as +well." + +"'Tis so, 'tis so," admitted old Adam, wagging his head, "but Abel +Revercomb was al'ays the sort that could measure nothin' less than a +bushel. The pity with big-natured folk is that they plough up a mountain +and trip at last over a pea-vine!" + +From the gloom and brightness of the Applegate road there emerged the +large figure of a young man, who led a handsome grey mare by the halter. +As he moved against the coloured screen of the leaves something of the +beauty of the desolate landscape showed in his face--the look of almost +autumnal sadness that one finds, occasionally, in the eyes of the +imaginative rustic. He wore a pair of sheepskin leggins into which the +ends of his corduroy trousers were stuffed slightly below the knees. His +head was bare, and from the open neck of his blue flannel shirt, faded +from many washings, the muscles in his throat stood out like cords in +the red-brown flesh. From his uncovered dark hair to his heavy boots, he +was powdered with the white dust of his mill, the smell of which floated +to the group under the mulberry tree as he passed up the walk to the +tavern. + +"I lay he seed Molly Merryweather comin' up from the low grounds," +remarked Solomon, when the young man had moved out of earshot. + +"Thar's truth spoken for once, if only by accident," retorted old Adam. +"Yonder comes Reuben Merryweather's wagon now, laden with fodder. Is +thar anybody settin' on it, young Adam? My eyes is too po' to make out." + +"Molly Merryweather, who else?" responded the younger. + +The wagon approached slowly, piled high with fodder and drawn by a pair +of old oxen. In the centre of the load a girl was sitting, with a pink +sunbonnet on her shoulders, and the light wind, which drove in gusts +from the river, blowing the bunch of clustering brown curls on her neck. +She was a small vivid creature, with a sunburned colour and changeable +blue eyes that shone almost green in the sunlight. + +"Terr'ble light minded as you can tell to look at her," said Solomon +Hatch, "she's soft enough, so my wife says, where sick folks an' +children an' animals are consarned, but she acts as if men war +born without common feelin's of natur an' didn't come inside the +Commandments. It's beyond me how a kind-hearted woman can be so +unmerciful to an entire sex." + +"Had it been otherwise 'twould have been downright disproof of God's +providence and the bond of matrimony," responded old Adam. + +"True, true, Mr. Doolittle," admitted Solomon, somewhat abashed. "Thar +ain't any in these parts as can equal you on the Scriptures, as I've +said over an' over agin. It's good luck for the Almighty that He has got +you on His side, so to speak, to help Him confound His enemies." + +"Thar're two sides to that, I reckon, seein' I confound not only His +enemies, but His sarvents. Sech is the shot an' shell of my logic that +the righteous fall before it as fast as the wicked--faster even I might +say if I war speakin' particular. Have you marked how skeery Mr. Mullen +has growed about meetin' my eyes over the rail of the pulpit? Why, 'twas +only yesterday that I brought my guns to bear on the resurrection of +the body, an' blowed it to atoms in his presence. 'Now thar's Reuben +Merryweather who buried one leg at Manassas, Mr. Mullen,' I said as +pleasant an' natchel as if I warn't about to confound him, 'an' what I'd +like to have made clear an' easy to me, suh, is what use the Almighty is +goin' to make of that odd leg on the Day of Jedgment? Will he add a +new one onto Reuben,' I axed, 'when, as plain as logic will have it, +it won't be a resurrection, but a creation, or will he start that leg +a-trampin' by itself all the way from Manassas to jine the other at Old +Church?' The parson had been holdin' pretty free all the mornin' with +nobody daring to contradict him, and a man more taken aback by the power +of logic my sight never lit on. 'Spare me, Mr. Doolittle,' was all he +said, never a word mo'. 'Spare me, Mr. Doolittle.'" + +"Ah, a tough customer you are," commented Solomon, "an' what answer did +you make to that, suh?" + +Old Adam's pipe returned to his mouth, and he puffed slowly a minute. +"'Twas a cry for mercy, Solomon, so I spared him," he responded. + +The wagon had reached the well, and without stopping, the large +white-and-red oxen moved on into the turnpike. Bending from her high +seat, Molly Merryweather smiled at the miller, who made a single stride +toward her. Then her glance passed to the stranger, and for an instant +she held his gaze with a pair of eyes that appeared to reflect his in +shape, setting and colour. In the man's face there showed perplexity, +admiration, ironic amusement; in the girl's there was a glimmer of the +smile with which she had challenged the adoring look of the miller. + +The flush left the features of young Revercomb, and he turned back, with +a scowl on his forehead, while old Adam cackled softly over the stem of +his pipe. + +"Wiles come as natchel to women as wickedness to men, young Adam," he +said. "The time to beware of 'em is in yo' youth befo' they've bewitched +yo'. Why, 'tis only since I've turned ninety that I've trusted myself to +think upon the sex with freedom." + +"I'm bewarin'," replied his son, "but when Molly Merryweather widens her +eyes and bites her underlip, it ain't in the natur of man or beast to +stand out agin her. Why, if it had been anybody else but the rector I +could have sworn I saw him squeezin' her hand when he let down the bars +for her last Sunday." + +"It's well knowed that when he goes to upbraid her for makin' eyes at +him durin' the 'Have mercy on me,' he takes a mortal long time about the +business," responded Solomon, "but, good Lord, 'tain't fur me to wish +it different, seein' it only bears out all I've argured about false +doctrines an' evil practice. From the sprinklin' of the head thar's but +a single step downward to the holdin' of hands." + +"Well, I'm a weak man like the rest of you," rejoined young Adam, "an' +though I'm sound on the doctrines--in practice I sometimes backslide. +I'm thankful, however, it's the lesser sin an' don't set so heavy on the +stomach." + +"Ah, it's the light women like Molly Merryweather that draws the eyes of +the young," lamented old Adam. + +"A pretty bit of vanity, is she?" inquired the stranger lightly, and +fell back the next instant before the vigorous form of the miller, who +swung round upon him with the smothered retort, "That's a lie!" The +boyish face of the young countryman had paled under his sunburn and he +spoke with the suppressed passion of a man who is not easily angered and +who responds to the pressure of some absorbing emotion. + +"Lord, Lord, Abel, Mr. Jonathan warn't meanin' no particular disrespect, +not mo' was I," quavered old Adam. + +"You're too pipin' hot, miller," interposed Solomon. "They warn't +meanin' any harm to you nor to the gal either. With half the county +courtin' her it ain't to be expected that she'd go as sober as a grey +mare, is it?" + +"Well, they're wastin' their time," retorted the miller, "for she +marries me, thank God, this coming April." + +Turning away the next instant, he vaulted astride the bare back of the +mare, and started at a gallop in the direction of the turnpike. + +"I'll be blessed if that little gal of Reuben Merryweather's ain't his +religion," commented young Adam. + +"An' he's of the opinion that he's going to marry her this comin' +spring," cackled Solomon. "Well, I could be namin' two or three others +of the same mind, if I'd take the trouble. It's all sensible enough to +lambaste the women when they don't pick up every virtue that we throw +away, but what's to be expected of 'em, I ax, when all the men sence +Adam have been praisin' the sober kind of gal while they was runnin' +arter the silly? Thar're some among 'em, I reckon, as have reasoned out +to themselves that a man's pursuit speaks louder in the years, arter +all, than his praise. Now, thar's a fine, promisin' farmer, like the +miller gone runnin' loose, mo's the pity." + +"A kind heart at bottom," said old Adam, "but he's got a deal of larnin' +to do befo' he'll rest content to bide along quietly in the same world +with human natur." + +"Oh, he's like the Revercombs from the beginnin'," protested Solomon, +"slow an' peaceable an' silent until you rouse 'em, but when they're +once roused, they're roused beyond God or devil." + +"Is this young Cain or Abel the head of the family?" inquired the +stranger. + +"Bless you, no, Mr. Jonathan, he ain't the head--for thar's his brother +Abner still livin'--but, head or tail, he's the only part that counts, +when it comes to that. Until the boy grew up an' took hold of things, +the Revercombs warn't nothin' mo' than slack fisted, out-at-heel po' +white trash, as the niggers say, though the old man, Abel's grandfather, +al'ays lays claim to bein' connected with the real Revercombs, higher +up in the State--However that may be, befo' the war thar warn't no place +for sech as them, an' 'tis only since times have changed an' the bottom +begun to press up to the top that anybody has heerd of 'em. Abel went to +school somehow by hook or crook an' got a good bit of book larnin', they +say, an' then he came back here an' went to turnin' up every stone an' +stick on the place. He ploughed an' he sowed an' he reaped till he'd +saved up enough to buy that piece of low ground betwixt his house and +the grist-mill. Then Ebenezer Timberlake died of the dropsy an' the +first thing folks knew, Abel had moved over and turned miller. All the +grain that's raised about here now goes to his mill, an' they say he'll +be throwin' out the old and puttin' in new-fangled machinery befo' the +year is up. He's the foremost man in these parts, suh, unless you war to +come to Jordan's Journey to live like yo' uncle." + +"To live like my uncle," repeated the young man, with an ironic +intonation that escaped the ears of old Adam. "But what of the miller's +little sweetheart with the short hair and the divine smile? Whose +daughter is she?" + +Old Adam's thin lips flattened until a single loosened tooth midway of +his lower gum wagged impishly back and forth. His face, sunburned +and frosted like the hardened rind of some winter fruit, revealed the +prominent bones of the skull under the sunken flesh. One of his gnarled +old hands, trembling and red, clutched the clay bowl of his pipe; the +other, with the callous skin of the palm showing under the bent fingers, +rested half open on the leather patch that covered the knee of his +overalls. A picture of toilworn age, of the inevitable end of all mortal +labour, he had sat for hours in the faint sunshine, smiling with his +sunken, babyish mouth at the brood of white turkeys that crowded about +the well. + +"Well, she's Reuben Merryweather's granddaughter, suh," replied Solomon +in the place of the elder. "He was overseer at Jordan's Journey, you +know, durin' the old gentleman's lifetime, after the last Jordan died +and the place was bought by yo' uncle. Ah, 'twas different, suh, when +the Jordans war livin'!" + +Some furtive malice in his tone caused the stranger to turn sharply upon +him. + +"The girl's mother--who was she?" he asked. + +"Janet Merryweather, the prettiest gal that ever set foot on these +roads. Ah, 'twas a sad story, was hers, an' the less said about it, +the soonest forgotten. Thar was some folks, the miller among 'em, that +dropped dead out with the old minister--that was befo' Mr. Mullen's +time--for not wantin' her to be laid in the churchyard. A hard case, +doubtless, but a pious man such as I likes to feel sartain that however +much he may have fooled along with sinful women in this world, only the +most respectable of thar sex will rise around him at the Jedgment." + +"And the father?" inquired the stranger, with a sound as if he drew in +his breath sharply. + +"Accordin' to the Law an' the Prophets she hadn't any. That may be goin' +agin natur, suh, but 'tis stickin' close to Holy Writ an' the wisdom of +God." + +To this the young man's only response was a sudden angry aversion that +showed in his face. Then lifting his horse's head from the trodden grass +by the well, he sprang into the saddle, and started, as the miller had +done, over the three roads into the turnpike. Remembering as he passed +the gate posts that he had spoken no parting word to the group under the +mulberry tree, he raised himself in his stirrups, and called back "Good +day to you. Many thanks," in his pleasant voice. + + + +CHAPTER II + + +IN WHICH DESTINY WEARS THE COMIC MASK + + +Putting his horse to a canter, Mr. Jonathan Gay rode through the old +gate into the turnpike. His still indignant look was fixed on the +heavy wheelruts ahead, while his handsome though fleshy figure inclined +slightly forward in the saddle after a foreign fashion. Seen close +at hand his face, which was impressive at a distance, lost a certain +distinction of contour, as though the marks of experience had blurred, +rather than accentuated, the original type. The bones of forehead and +nose still showed classic in outline, but in moulding the mouth and chin +nature had not adhered closely to the aristocratic structure beneath. +The flesh sagged a little in places; the brow was a trifle too heavy, +the jaw a trifle too prominent, the lips under the short dark moustache +were a trifle too full. Yet in spite of this coarseness of finish, his +face was well coloured, attractive, and full of generous, if whimsical, +humour. A judge of men would have seen in it proof that Mr. Gay's +character consisted less in a body of organized tendencies than in a +procession of impulses. + +White with dust the turnpike crawled straight ahead between blood-red +clumps of sumach and bramble on which the faint sunlight still shone. At +intervals, where the dripping from over-hanging boughs had worn the +road into dangerous hollows, boles of young saplings had been placed +cross-wise in a corduroy pattern, and above them clouds of small belated +butterflies drifted in the wind like blown yellow rose leaves. On the +right the thin corn shocks looked as if they were sculptured in bronze, +and amid them there appeared presently the bent figure of a harvester, +outlined in dull blue against a sky of burnt orange. From the low +grounds beside the river a mist floated up, clinging in fleecy shreds to +the short grass that grew in and out of the bare stubble. The aspect of +melancholy, which was depressing even in the broad glare of noon, became +almost intolerable under the waning light of the afterglow. Miles of +loneliness stretched on either side of the turnpike, which trailed, +without fork or bend, into the flat distance beyond the great pine at +the bars. + +For the twentieth time since he had left the tavern, Mr. Gay, whose +habit it was to appear whimsical when he felt despondent, declared to +himself that he'd be damned if the game was worth half what the candle +was likely to cost him. Having arrived, without notable misadventure, +at the age of thirty, he had already reduced experience to a series +of episodes and had embraced the casual less as a pastime than as a +philosophy. + +"If the worst comes to the worst--hang it!--I suppose I may hunt a Molly +Cotton-tail," he grumbled, bringing his horse's gait down to an amble. +"There ought to be good hounds about, judging from the hang-dog look of +the natives. Why in thunder did the old boy want to bury himself and +his heirs forever in this god-forsaken land's end, and what in the deuce +have mother and Aunt Kesiah done with themselves down here for the last +twenty years? Two thousand acres? Damn it! I'd rather have six feet +on the good English soil! Came to get rid of one woman, did he?--and +tumbled into a pretty puddle with another as soon as he got here. By +George, it's in the bone and it is obliged to come out in the blood. +A Gay will go on ogling the sex, I suppose, as long as he is able to +totter back from the edge of the grave." + +As he approached the blazed pine, a spot of darkness, which he had at +first mistaken for a small tree, detached itself from the surrounding +shadows, and assumed gradually a human shape. His immediate impression +was that the shape was a woman and that she was young. With his next +breath he became aware that she was also beautiful. In the fading light +her silhouette stood out as distinctly against the mellow background of +the sky, as did the great pine which marked the almost obliterated path +over the fields. Her dress was the ordinary calico one, of some dull +purplish shade, worn by the wives and daughters of the neighbouring +farmers; and on her bare white arm, with its upturned sleeve, she +carried a small split basket half filled with persimmons. She was of +an almost pure Saxon type--tall, broad-shouldered, deep-bosomed, with +a skin the colour of new milk, and soft ashen hair parted smoothly over +her ears and coiled in a large, loose knot at the back of her head. As +he reached her she smiled faintly and a little brown mole at the corner +of her mouth played charmingly up and down. After the first minute, Gay +found himself fascinated by this single imperfection in her otherwise +flawless features. More than her beauty he felt that it stirred his +blood and aroused in him the physical tenderness which he associated +always with some vague chivalrous impulse. + +She moved slightly when he dismounted beside her, and a number of +small splotches of black circling around her resolved themselves into a +bodyguard of little negroes, clad in checked pinafores, with the scant +locks wrapped tightly with crimson cotton. + +"May I let down the bars for you?" he asked, turning to look into her +face with a smile, "and do you take your collection of piccaninnies +along for protection or for amusement?" + +"Grandma doesn't like me to go out alone, sir--so many dreadful things +happen," she answered gently, with an utter absence of humour. "I can't +take anybody who is at work, so I let the little darkies come. Mary Jo +is the oldest and she's only six." + +"Is your home near here?" + +"I live at the mill. It's a mile farther on, but there is a short cut." + +"Then you are related to the miller, Mr. Revercomb--that fine looking +chap I met at the ordinary?" + +"He is my uncle. I am Blossom Revercomb," she answered. + +"Blossom? It's a pretty name." + +Her gaze dwelt on him calmly for and instant, with the faintest quiver +of her full white lids, which appeared to weigh heavily on her rather +prominent eyes of a pale periwinkle blue. + +"My real name is Keren-happuch," she said at last, after a struggle with +herself, "grandma bein' a great Scripture reader, chose it when I was +born--but they call me Blossom, for short." + +"And am I permitted, Miss Keren-happuch, to call you Blossom?" + +Again she hesitated, pondering gravely. + +"Mary Jo, if you unwrap your hair your mother will whip you," she +said suddenly, and went on without a perceptible change of tone, +"Keren-happuch is an ugly name, and I don't like it--though grandma says +we oughtn't to think any of the Bible names ugly, not even Gog. She +is quite an authority on Scripture, is grandma, and she can repeat the +first chapter in Chronicles backward, which the minister couldn't do +when he tried." + +"I'd like to hear the name that would sound ugly on your lips, Miss +Keren-happuch." + +If the sons of farmers had sought to enchant her ears with similar +strains, there was no hint of it in the smiling eyes she lifted to his. +The serenity of her look added, he thought, to her resemblance to some +pagan goddess--not to Artemis nor to Aphrodite, but to some creature +compounded equally of earth and sky. Io perhaps, or Europa? By Jove he +had it at last--the Europa of Veronese! + +"There'll have to be a big frost before the persimmons get sweet," she +observed in a voice that was remarkably deep and full for a woman. +With the faint light on her classic head and her milky skin, he found +a delicious piquancy in the remark. Had she gossiped, had she even +laughed, the effect would have been disastrous. Europa, he was vaguely +aware, would hardly have condescended to coquetry. Her speech, like her +glance, would be brief, simple, direct. + +"Tell me about the people here," he asked after a pause, in which he +plucked idly at the red-topped orchard grass through which they were +passing. Behind them the six little negroes walked primly in single +file, Mary Jo in the lead and a chocolate-coloured atom of two toddling +at the tail of the procession. From time to time shrill squeaks went up +from the rear when a startled partridge whirred over the pasture or a +bare brown foot came down on a toad or a grasshopper. + +As she made no reply, he added in a more intimate tone, "I am Jonathan +Gay, of Jordan's Journey, as I suppose you know." + +"The old gentleman's nephew?" she said, while she drew slightly away +from him. "Mary Jo, did you tell Tobias's mammy that he was coming +along?" + +"Nawm, I ain done tole nobody caze dar ain nobody done ax me." + +"But I said that you were not to bring him without letting Mahaly know. +You remember what a whipping she gave him the last time he came!" + +At this a dismal howl burst from Tobias. "I +ain't-a-gwine-ter-git-a-whuppin'!" + +"Lawd, Miss Blossom, hit cyarn' hut Tobias ez hit ud hut de res'er us," +replied Mary Jo, with fine philosophy, "case dar ain but two years er +'im ter whup." + +"I ain't-a-gwine-ter-git-a-whuppin'!" sang Tobias in a passionate +refrain. + +"Now that's just it," said Gay, feeling as though he should like to +throttle the procession of piccaninnies. "What I can't understand is why +the people about here--those I met at Bottom's Ordinary, for instance, +seem to have disliked me even before I came." + +Without surprise or embarrassment, she changed the basket from her right +to her left arm, and this simple movement had the effect of placing him +at a distance, though apparently by accident. + +"That's because of the old gentleman, I reckon," she answered, "my folks +all hated him, I don't know why." + +"But can you guess? You see I really want to understand. I've been away +since I was eight years old and I have only the haziest memories." + +The question brought them into a sudden intimacy, as if his impulsive +appeal to her had established a relation which had not existed the +minute before. He liked the look of her strong shoulders, of her deep +bosom rising in creamy white to her throat; and the quiver of her red +lower lip when she talked, aroused in him a swift and facile emotion. +The melancholy of the landscape, reacting on the dangerous softness of +his mood, bent his nature toward her like a flame driven by the wind. +Around them the red-topped orchard grass faded to pale rose in the +twilight, and beyond the crumbling rail fence miles of feathery +broomsedge swept to the pines that stood straight and black against the +western horizon. Impressions of the hour and the scene, of colour and +sound, were blended in the allurement which Nature proffered him, for +her own ends, through the woman beside him. Not Blossom Revercomb, but +the great Mother beguiled him. The forces that moved in the wind, in the +waving broomsedge, and in the call of the whip-poor-will, stirred in +his pulses as they stirred in the objects around him. That fugitive +attraction of the body, which Nature has shielded at the cost of finer +attributes, leaped upon him like a presence that had waited in earth and +sky. Loftier aspirations vanished before it. Not his philosophy but the +accident of a woman's face worked for destiny. + +"I never knew just how it was," she answered slowly as if weighing her +words, "but your uncle wasn't one of our folks, you know. He bought +the place the year before the war broke out, and there was always some +mystery about him and about the life he led--never speaking to anybody +if he could help it, always keeping himself shut up when he could. He +hadn't a good name in these parts, and the house hasn't a good name +either, for the darkies say it is ha'nted and that old Mrs. Jordan--'ole +Miss' they called her--still comes back out of her grave to rebuke the +ha'nt of Mr. Jonathan. There is a path leading from the back porch to +the poplar spring where none of them will go for water after nightfall. +Uncle Abednego swears that he met his old master there one night when he +went down to fill a bucket and that a woman was with him. It all comes, +I reckon, of Mr. Jonathan having been found dead at the spring, and you +know how the darkies catch onto any silly fancy about the dead walking. +I don't believe much in ha'nts myself, though great-grandma has seen +many a one in her day, and all the servants at Jordan's Journey will +never rest quiet. I've always wondered if your mother and Miss Kesiah +were ever frightened by the stories the darkies tell?" For a moment she +paused, and then added softly, "It was all so different, they say, when +the Jordans were living." + +Again the phrase which had begun to irritate him! Who were these dead +and gone Jordans whose beneficent memory still inhabited the house they +had built? + +"I don't think my mother would care for such stories," he replied after +a minute. "She has never mentioned them in her letters." + +"Of course nobody really puts faith in them, but I never pass the +spring, if I can help it, after the sun has gone down. It makes me feel +so dreadfully creepy." + +"The root of this gossip, I suppose, lies in the general dislike of my +uncle?" + +"Perhaps--I'm not sure," she responded, and he felt that her rustic +simplicity possessed a charm above the amenities of culture. "The old +clergyman--that was before Mr. Mullen's day--when we all went to the +church over at Piping Tree--used to say that the mercy of God would have +to exceed his if He was ever going to redeem him. I remember hearing +him tell grandma when I was a child that there were a few particulars +in which he couldn't answer with certainty for God, and that old Mr. +Jonathan Gay was one of 'em. 'God Almighty will have to find His own way +in this matter,' he used to declare, 'for I wash my hands of it.' I'm +sorry, sir," she finished contritely, "I forgot he was your own blood +relation." + +In the spirit of this contrition, she changed the basket back again to +her left arm; and perceiving his advantage, Gay acted upon it with his +accustomed alacrity. + +"Don't apologize, please, I am glad I have this from your lips--not from +a stranger's." + +Under the spell of her beauty, he was aware of a pleasurable sensation, +as though the pale rose of the orchard grass had gone to his head and +coloured his vision. There was a thrill in feeling her large, soft arm +brushing his sleeve, in watching the rise and fall of her bosom under +her tight calico dress. + +"I shall always know that we were friends--good friends, from the +first," he resumed after a minute. + +"You are very kind, sir," she answered, "this is my path over the stile +and it is growin' late--Tobias's mother will surely give him a whippin'. +I hope you don't mind my havin' gathered these persimmons on your land," +she concluded, with an honesty which was relieved from crudeness by her +physical dignity, "they are hardly fit to eat because there has been so +little frost yet." + +"Well, I'm sorry for that, Miss Keren-happuch, or shall it be Blossom?" + +"I like Blossom better," she answered shyly, lifting her scant calico +skirt with one hand as she mounted the stile. + +"Then good night, lovely Blossom," he called gaily while he turned +back into the bridle path which led like a frayed white seam over the +pasture. + + + +CHAPTER III + + +IN WHICH MR. GAY ARRIVES AT HIS JOURNEY'S END + + +Broad and low, with the gabled pediment of the porch showing through +boughs of oaks, and a flight of bats wheeling over the ivied roof, the +house appeared to Gay beyond a slight swell in the meadows. The grove +of oaks, changing from dark red to russet, was divided by a short +walk, bordered by clipped box, which led to the stone steps and to two +discoloured marble urns on which broken-nosed Cupids were sporting. As +he was about to slip his reins over the back of an iron chair on the +lawn, a shriek in a high pitched negro voice pierced his ears from a +half shuttered dormer-window in the east wing. + +"Fo' de Lawd, hit's de ha'nt er ole marster! Yessuh--Yessuh,--I'se +a-comin'--I'se a-comin'." + +The next instant the window slammed with a bang, and the sound of flying +footsteps echoed through the darkened interior of the house. + +"Open the door, you fool! I'm not a ghost!" shouted Gay, but the only +response came in an hysterical babble of moans from the negro quarters +somewhere in the rear and in the soft whir in his face of a leatherwing +bat as it wheeled low in the twilight. There was no smoke in the +chimneys, and the square old house, with its hooded roof and its vacant +windows, assumed a sinister and inhospitable look against the background +of oaks. His mother and his aunt, he concluded, were doubtless away for +their winter's shopping, so lifting his horse's head from the grass, he +passed between the marble urns and the clipped box, and followed a path, +deep in leaves, which led from the west wing of the house to the outside +kitchen beyond a paved square at the back. Half intelligible words +floated to him as he approached, and from an old pear-tree near the door +there was a flutter of wings where a brood of white turkeys settled to +roost. Beyond the bole of the tree a small negro in short skirts was +"shooin'" a large rooster into the henhouse, but at the muffled fall of +Gay's horse's hoofs on the dead leaves, she turned with a choking sound, +and fled to the shelter of the kitchen at her back. + +"My time's done come, but I ain't-a-gwine! I ain't-a-gwine!" wailed +the chorus within. "Ole marster's done come ter fotch me, but I +ain't-a-gwine! O Lawd, I ain't-a-gwine! O Jesus, I ain't-a-gwine!" + +"You fools, hold your tongues!" stormed the young man, losing his +temper. "Send somebody out here to take my horse or I'll give you +something to shout over in earnest." + +The shrieks trembled high for an instant, and then died out in a +despairing moan, while the blanched face of an old servant appeared in +the doorway. + +"Is hit you er yo' ha'nt, Marse Jonathan?" he inquired humbly. + +"Come here, you doddering idiot, and take my horse." + +But half reassured the negro came a step or two forward, and made +a feeble clutch at the reins, which dropped from his grasp when the +roosting turkeys stirred uneasily on the bough above. + +"I'se de butler, marster, en I ain never sot foot in de stable sence de +days er ole miss." + +"Where's my mother?" + +"Miss Angela, she's done gone up ter town en Miss Kesiah she's done gone +erlong wid 'er." + +"Is the house closed?" + +"Naw, suh, hit ain closed, but Miss Molly she's got de keys up yonder at +de house er de overseer." + +"Well, send somebody with a grain of sense out here, and I'll look up +Miss Molly." + +At this the butler vanished promptly into the kitchen, and a minute +later a half-grown mulatto boy relieved Gay of his horse, while he +pointed to a path through an old apple orchard that led to the cottage +of the overseer. As the young man passed under the gnarled boughs to a +short flagged walk before the small, whitewashed house in which "Miss +Molly" lived, he wondered idly if the lady who kept the keys would prove +to be the amazing little person he had seen some hours earlier perched +on the load of fodder in the ox-cart. The question was settled almost +before it was asked, for a band of lamplight streamed suddenly from the +door of the cottage, and in the centre of it appeared the figure of +a girl in a white dress, with red stockings showing under her short +skirts, and a red ribbon filleting the thick brown curls on her +forehead. From her movements he judged that she was mixing a bowl of +soft food for the old hound at her feet, and he waited until she had +called the dog inside for his supper, before he went forward and spoke +her name in his pleasant voice. + +At the sound she turned with a start, and he saw her vivid little face, +with the wonderful eyes, go white for a minute. + +"So you are Mr. Jonathan? I thought so," she said at last, "but +grandfather told me you sent no word of your coming." + +She spoke quickly, with a refinement of accent which puzzled him until +he remembered the malicious hints Solomon Hatch had let fall at the +tavern. That she was, in reality, of his blood and the child of his +uncle, he had not doubted since the moment she had smiled at him from +her seat on the oxcart. How much was known, he now wondered. Had his +uncle provided for her? Was his mother--was his Aunt Kesiah--aware of +the truth? + +"She missed my letter, I suppose," he replied. "Has she been long away?" + +"Only a week. She is expected home day after to-morrow." + +"Then I shall beg you to open the house for me." + +She had turned back to the old hound, and was bending over to place his +bowl of bread and milk on the hearth. A log fire, in which a few pine +branches stood out illuminated like boughs of flame, filled the big +stone fireplace, which was crudely whitewashed to resemble the low walls +of the room. A kettle hung on an iron crane before the blaze, and the +singing of the water made a cheerful noise amid a silence which struck +Gay suddenly as hostile. When the girl raised her head he saw that her +face had grown hard and cold, and that the expression of her eyes had +changed to one of indignant surprise. The charming coquetry had fled +from her look, yet her evident aversion piqued him into a half smiling, +half serious interest. He wondered if she would marry that fine looking +rustic, the miller, and if the riotous Gay blood in her veins would +flow placidly in her mother's class? Had she, too, inherited, if not the +name, yet the weaknesses of an older race? Was she, like himself, cursed +with swift fancies and swifter disillusionments? How frail she was, and +how brilliant! How innocent and how bitter! + +He turned away, ostensibly to examine a print on the wall, and while his +back was toward her, he felt that her gaze stabbed him like the +thrust of a knife. Wheeling quickly about, he met her look, but to his +amazement, she continued to stare back at him with the expression of +indignant surprise still in her face. How she hated him and, by Jove, +how she _could_ hate! She reminded him of a little wild brown animal as +she stood there with her teeth showing between her parted red lips and +her eyes flashing defiance. The next minute he found himself asking if +she could ever grow gentle--could ever soften enough to allow herself +to be stroked? He remembered Solomon Hatch's remark that "she was +onmerciful to an entire sex," and in spite of his effort at composure, a +laugh sprang to his lips. + +In the centre of the room a table was laid, and going over to it, she +busied herself with the cups and saucers as though she were anxious to +put a disagreeable presence out of her thoughts. + +"May I share your supper?" he asked, and waited, not without amusement, +for her answer. + +"I'm sorry there isn't any for you at the big house," she answered +politely. "If you will sit down, I'll tell Delily to bring in some +batter bread." + +"And you?" + +"I'll have mine with grandfather. He's out in the barn giving medicine +to the red cow." + +While she spoke Delily entered with a plate of cornbread and a pot of +coffee, and a minute later Reuben Merryweather paused on the threshold +to shake off a sprinkling of bran from his hair and beard. He was a +bent, mild looking old man, with a wooden leg which made a stumping +noise when he walked, and a pair of wistful brown eyes, like those of an +aged hound that has been worn out by hard service. Past seventy now, +his youth had been trained to a different civilization, and there was +a touching gentleness in his face, as if he expressed still the mental +attitude of a class which had existed merely as a support or a foil to +the order above it. Without spirit to resent, he, with his fellows, had +endured the greatest evils of slavery. With the curse of free labour +on the land, there had been no incentive for toil, no hire for the +labourer. Like an incubus the system had lain over them, stifling +all energy, checking all progress, retarding all prosperity save the +prosperity of the great land-owners. Then the soil had changed hands, +and where the plough had broken the earth, the seeds of a democracy had +germinated and put forth from the very blood of the battlefields. In the +upward pressure of class, he had seen the stability of custom yield at +last to the impetus of an energy that was not racial but individual. Yet +from the transition he had remained always a little apart. Reverence had +become for him a habit of mind, and he had learned that respect could +outlive even a belief in the thing upon which it was founded. Mr. +Jonathan and he had been soldiers together. His old commander still +entered his thoughts to the rattle of musketry and the roar of cannon, +and a single sublime action at Malvern Hill had served in the mind of +the soldier to spread a legendary glamour over a life which held hardly +another incident that was worthy of remembrance. + +At his entrance Molly melted from her hostile attitude, and while she +hung on the old man's breast, Gay noticed, with surprise, that she +was made up of enchanting curves and delicious softness. Her sharpened +features grew rounder, and her thin red lips lost their hardness of +outline. When she raised her head after a minute, he saw that the light +in her eyes adorned and enriched her. By Jove, he had never imagined +that she could change and colour like that! + +"You are late, grandfather," said the girl, "I was coming to look for +you with a lantern." + +"The red cow kept me," answered the old man, adding as he held out his +hand to Gay, "So you've come at last, Mr. Jonathan. Your mother will be +pleased." + +"I was sorry to find her absent," replied Gay, "and I was just asking +your granddaughter if she would permit me to join you at supper?" + +"To be sure--to be sure," responded Reuben, with a cheerfulness which +struck Gay as singularly pathetic. "After supper Molly will go over with +Patsey and see that you are made comfortable." + +The old hound, blind and toothless, fawned at his knees, and leaning +over, he caressed it with a knotted and trembling hand. + +"Has Spot had his supper, Molly?" + +"Yes, grandfather. He can eat only soft bread and gravy." At her voice +the hound groped toward her, and stooping, she laid her soft, flushed +cheek on his head. + +"Well, sit down, suh, sit down," said Reuben, speaking timidly as if +he were not sure he had chosen the right word. "If you'll tell Delily, +honey, Mr. Jonathan will have his supper." + +"On condition that you let me share yours, Mr. Merryweather," insisted +Gay, in his genial tone. "If you're going to make company of me, I shall +go hungry until to-morrow." + +From a wooden safe in the corner Molly brought a plate and a cup, and +made a place for the young man at the end of the red-and-white cloth on +the table. Then she turned away, without speaking, and sat down behind +the tin coffeepot, which emitted a fragrant steam. + +"Cream and sugar?" she inquired presently, meeting his eyes over the +glass lamp which stood midway between them. + +Gay had been talking to Reuben about the roads--"jolly bad roads," +he called them, "wasn't it possible to make them decent for riding?" +Looking up at the girl's question, he answered absently, "two lumps. +Cream? Yes, please, a little," and then continued to stare at her with +a vague and impersonal wonder. She was half savage, of course, with red +hands, and bad manners and dressed like a boy that had got into skirts +for a joke--but, by George, there was something about her that bit into +the fancy. Not a beauty like his Europa of the pasture (who was, when +it came to that?)--but a fascinating little beggar, with a quality of +sudden surprises that he could describe by no word except "iridescent." +He liked the high arch of her brows; but her nose wasn't good and her +lips were too thin except when she smiled. When she smiled! It was her +smile, after all, that made her seem a thing of softness and bloom born +to be kissed. + +Reuben ate his food rapidly, pouring his coffee into the saucer, +and drinking it in loud gulps that began presently to make Gay feel +decidedly nervous. Once the young man inadvertently glanced toward +him, and turning away the instant afterwards, he found the girl's eyes +watching him with a defiant and threatening look. Her passionate defence +of Reuben reminded Gay of a nesting bird under the eye of the hunter. +She did not plead, she dared--actually dared him to criticise the old +man even in his thoughts! + +That Molly herself was half educated and possessed some smattering of +culture, it was easy to see. She was less rustic in her speech than his +Europa, and there was the look of breeding, or of blood, in the fine +poise of her head, in her small shapely hands, which he remembered were +a distinguishing mark of the Gays. + +"Mr. Mullen came for you in his cart," said Reuben, glancing from one +to the other of his hearers with his gentle and humble look. "I told him +you must have forgotten as you'd ridden down to the low grounds." + +"No, I didn't forget," replied Molly, indifferent apparently to the +restraint of Gay's presence, "I did it on purpose." Meeting the young +man's amused and enquiring expression, she added defiantly, "There are +plenty of girls that are always ready to go with him and it's because +I'm not that he wants me." + +"He's not the only one, to judge from what I heard at the ordinary." + +She shrugged her shoulders--an odd gesture for a rustic coquette--while +a frown overshadowed her features. + +"They're all alike," she retorted scornfully. "If you go over to the +mill you'll probably find Abel Revercomb sulking and brow-beating his +mother because I smiled at you this afternoon. And I did it only to +plague him!" + +"Molly's a good girl," said Reuben, rather as if he expected the +assertion to be disputed, "but she was taught to despise folks when she +was a baby--wasn't you, pretty?" + +"Not you--never you, grandfather." + +The intimate nature of the conversation grated upon Gay not a little. +There was something splendidly barbaric about the girl, and yet the +mixture of her childishness and her cynicism affected him unpleasantly +rather than otherwise. His ideal woman--the woman of the early Victorian +period--was submissive and clinging. He was perfectly assured that +she would have borne her wrongs, and even her mother's wrongs, with +humility. Meekness had always seemed to him the becoming mental and +facial expression for the sex; and that a woman should resent appeared +almost as indelicate as that she should propose. + +When supper was over, and Reuben had settled to his pipe, with the old +hound at his feet, Molly took down a bunch of keys from a nail in the +wall, and lit a lantern with a taper which she selected from a china +vase on the mantelpiece. Once outside she walked a little ahead of Gay +and the yellow blaze of the lantern flitted like a luminous bird over +the flagged walk bordered by gooseberry bushes. Between the stones, +which were hollowed by the tread of generations, nature had embroidered +the bare places with delicate patterns of moss. + +At the kitchen the girl stopped to summon Patsey, the maid, who was +discovered roasting an apple at the end of a long string before the +logs. + +"I am going to the big house. Come and make up the bed in the blue +room," Gay heard through the door. + +"Yes'm, Miss Molly, I'se a-comin' in jes a minute." + +"And bring plenty of lightwood. He will probably want a fire." + +With this she appeared again on the outside, crossed the paved square to +the house, and selecting a large key, unlocked the door, which grated on +its hinges as Gay pushed it open. Following her into the hall, he stood +back while she lit a row of tallow candles, in old silver sconces, which +extended up the broad mahogany staircase to the upper landing. One by +one as she applied the taper, the candles flashed out in a misty circle, +and then rising in a clear flame, shone on her upraised hand and on the +brilliant red of her lips and cheeks. + +"That is your mother's room," she said, pointing to a closed door, "and +this is yours. Patsey will make a fire." + +"It's rather gloomy, isn't it?" + +"Shall I bring you wine? I have the key to the cellar." + +"Brandy, if you please. The place feels as if it had been shut up for a +century." + +"It was your uncle's room. Do you mind sleeping here? It's the easiest +to get ready." + +"Not with a fire--and I may have a lamp, I suppose?" + +At his question Patsey appeared with an armful of resinous pine, and a +few minutes later, a cheerful blaze was chasing the shadows up the great +brick chimney. When Molly returned with the brandy, Gay was leaning +against the mantelpiece idly burning a bunch of dried cat-tails he had +taken from a blue-and-white china vase. + +"It's a gloomy old business, isn't it?" he observed, glancing from the +high canopied bed with its hangings of faded damask to an engraving of +the Marriage of Pocahontas between the dormer-windows. "If there are +ghosts about, I suppose I'd better prepare to face them." + +"Only in the west wing, the darkies say, but I think they are bats. +As for those in the haunt's walk, I never believed in them. Patsey is +bringing your brandy. Can I do anything else for you?" + +"Only tell me," he burst out, "why in thunder the whole county hates +me?" + +She laughed shortly. "I can't tell you--wait and find out." + +Here audacity half angered, half paralyzed him. + +"What a vixen you are!" he observed presently with grudging respect. + +The crimson flooded her face, and he watched her teeth gleam +dangerously, as if she were bracing herself for a retort. The impulse to +torment her was strong in him, and he yielded to it much as a boy might +have teased a small captive animal of the woods. + +"With such a temper you ought to have been an ugly woman," he said, "but +you're so pretty I'm strongly inclined to kiss you." + +"If you do, I'll strike you," she gasped. + +The virgin in her showed fierce and passionate, not shy and fleeting. +That she was by instinct savagely pure, he could tell by the look of +her. + +"I believe it so perfectly that I've no intention of trying," he +rejoined. + +"I'm not half so pretty as my mother was," she said after a pause. + +Her loyalty to the unfortunate Janet touched him to sympathy. "Don't +quarrel with me, Molly," he pleaded, "for I mean to be friends with +you." + +As he uttered the words, he was conscious of a pleasant feeling of +self-approbation while his nature vibrated to the lofty impulse. This +sensation was so gratifying while it lasted that his manner assumed a +certain austerity as one who had determined to be virtuous at any cost. +Morally he was on stilts for the moment, and the sense of elevation was +as novel as it was insecure. + +"I know you are a good girl, Molly," he observed staidly, "that is why I +am so anxious to be your friend." + +"Is there nothing more that I can do for you?" she inquired, with frigid +reserve, as she took up the lantern. + +"Yes, one thing--you can shake hands." + +The expression of indignant surprise appeared again in her face, and she +fell back a step, shaking her head stubbornly as she did so. + +"I'd rather not--if you don't mind," she answered. + +"But if I do mind--and I do." + +"Still I'd rather not." + +"Do you really dislike me as much as you dislike the miller?" + +"More." + +"Or the rector?" + +"Oh, far more. You are a Gay." + +"Yes, I am a Gay," he might have retorted, "and you, my pretty savage, +are very much a Gay, also." + +Swinging the lantern in her hand, she moved to the door, as if she were +anxious to put an end to a conversation which had become suddenly too +intimate. On the threshold she looked back, and remarked in a precise, +authoritative voice: + +"There are blankets in the bottom drawer if you find you haven't +covering enough." + +"I shall remember--there are blankets in the bottom drawer." + +"Patsey will bring hot water at eight and Uncle Abednego will give you +breakfast in the dining-room." + +"Then I'm not to have it with you?" + +"With me? Oh, I live with grandfather. I never come to the big house +except when Mrs. Gay is in town." + +"Do you see nothing, then, of my mother when she is at home?" + +"Sometimes I help her to make raspberry vinegar or preserves. If you +hear a noise in the night it is only the acorns dropping on the roof. +There are so many oaks. Good night, Mr. Jonathan." + +"Good night," he returned, "I wish you'd shake hands,"--but she had +vanished. + +The room was cosy and warm now--and flinging himself into a chair with +deep arms that stood on the hearth, he lit his cigar and sipped drowsily +the glass of brandy she had left on a silver tray on the table. +The ceiling was ridiculously high--what a waste of good bricks and +mortar!--the room was ridiculously large! On the smooth white walls +reddish shadows moved in a fantastic procession, and from the big +chintz-covered lounge the monstrous blue poppies leaped out of the +firelight. The high canopy over the bed was draped with prim folds of +damask, and the coverlet was of some quaint crocheted work that hung in +fringed ends to the floor. Here again from the threadbare velvet carpet +the blue poppies stared back at him. + +An acorn dropped on the roof, and in spite of Molly's warning, he +started and glanced toward the window, where a frosted pattern of ivy +showed like a delicate lacework on the small greenish panes. Another +dropped; then another. Gradually he began to listen for the sound and to +miss it when there came a long silence. One might easily imagine it +to be the tapping of ghostly fingers--of the fingers of pretty Janet +Merryweather--some quarter of a century earlier. Her daughter was hardly +more than twenty now, he supposed, and he wondered how long the mad +idyllic period had lasted before her birth? Turning to the books on the +table, he opened one and a yellowed fragment of paper fluttered to the +floor at his feet. When he stooped after it, he saw that there was a +single word on it traced faintly in his uncle's hand: "To-morrow." + +And then, being a person whose imagination dealt with the obvious, +he undressed, blew out the light, and fell peacefully asleep to the +dropping of acorns. + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +THE REVERCOMBS + + +On the morning after the meeting at Bottom's Ordinary, Abel Revercomb +came out on the porch of the little house in which he lived, and looked +across the steep rocky road to the mill-race which ran above a silver +stream known as Sycamore Creek. The grist-mill, a primitive log +building, worked after ancient methods, had stood for a hundred years +or more beside a crooked sycamore tree, which grew mid-way of the stream +and shaded the wheel and the shingled roof from the blue sky above. The +old wooden race, on which the young green mosses shone like a coating of +fresh paint on a faded surface, ran for a short distance over the brook, +where the broad yellow leaves drifted down to the deep pond below. +Across the slippery poplar log, which divided the mill from the road and +the house occupied by the miller, there was a stretch of good corn land, +where the corn stood in shocks after the harvest, and beyond this the +feathery bloom of the broomsedge ran to the luminous band of marshes on +the far horizon. + +From the open door before which the miller was standing, there came the +clatter of breakfast dishes and the sound of Scripture text quoted in +the voice of his mother. Above his head several strings of red pepper +hung drying, and these rustled in the wind with a grating noise that +seemed an accompaniment to the speaker in the kitchen. + +"The Lord said that, an' I reckon He knew His own mind when He was +speakin' it," remarked Sarah Revercomb as she put down the coffeepot. + +"I declare there's mother at it again," observed Abel to himself with +a frown--for it was Sarah's fate that an excess of virtue should have +wrought all the evil of a positive vice. From the days of her infancy, +when she had displayed in the cradle a power of self-denial at which her +pastor had marvelled, she had continued to sacrifice her inclinations +in a manner which had rendered unendurable the lives around her. Her +parents had succumbed to it; her husband had died of it; her children +had resigned themselves to it or rebelled against it according to the +quality of their moral fibre. All her life she had laboured to make +people happy, and the result of this exalted determination was a cowed +and resentful family. + +"Yo' buckwheat cakes will be stone cold if you don't come along in, +Abel," she called now from the kitchen. "You've been lookin' kind of +sallow these last days, so I've got a spoonful of molasses and sulphur +laid right by yo' plate." + +"For heaven's sake, take it away," he retorted irritably. "I don't need +it." + +"I reckon I can tell by the look of you better than you can by the +feelin'," rejoined Sarah grimly, "an' if you know what's good for you, +you'll come and swallow it right down." + +"I'll be hanged if I do!" exclaimed Abel without moving, and his tone +implied that the ceaseless nagging had got at last on his nerves. He +was a robust, well-built, red-brown young fellow, who smelt always of +freshly ground meal, as though his body, from long usage, had grown to +exhale the cleanly odour of the trade he followed. His hair was thick, +dark and powdered usually with mill-dust. His eyes, of a clear bright +hazel, deep-set and piercing, expressed a violence of nature which his +firm, thin-lipped mouth, bare of beard or moustache, appeared to deny. +A certain tenacity--a suggestion of stubbornness in the jaw, gave the +final hint to his character, and revealed that temperamental intolerance +of others of the rustic who has risen out of his class. An opinion once +embraced acquired the authority of a revelation; a passion once yielded +to was transformed into a principle. Impulsive, generous, undisciplined, +he represented, after all, but the reaction from the spirit of racial +submission which was embodied in Reuben Merryweather. Tradition +had bound Reuben in thongs of steel; Abel was conscious only of his +liberated intelligence--of a passionate desire to test to the fullest +the certainty of that liberation. As the elder had suffered beneath the +weight of the established order, so the younger showed the disturbing +effects of a freedom which had resulted from a too rapid change in +economic conditions rather than from the more gradual evolution of +class. When political responsibility was thrust on the plainer people +instead of sought by them, it was but natural that the process of +adjustment should appear rough rather than smooth. The land which had +belonged to the few became after the war within reach of the many. +At first the lower classes had held back, paralyzed by the burden of +slavery. The soil, impoverished, wasted, untilled, rested under the +shadow of the old names--the old customs. This mole-like blindness of +the poorer whites persisted still for a quarter of a century; and the +awakening was possible only after the newer authority was but a shadow; +the past reverence but a delusion. When the black labourer worked, not +freely, but for hire, the wages of the white labourer went up as by +magic. To rise under the old system had been so impossible that Abel's +ancestors had got out of the habit of trying. The beneficent charity of +the great landowners had exhausted the small incentive that might have +remained--and to give had been so much the prerogative of a single +class, that to receive had become a part of the privileges of another. +In that pleasant idyllic period the one act which went unhonoured and +unrewarded was the act of toil. So in the odour of shiftlessness Abel's +father had died; so after ninety years his grandparents still sat by the +hearth to which his mother had called him. + +The house, an oblong frame building, newly shingled, was set back from +the road in a straggling orchard of pear-trees, which bore a hard +green fruit too sour to be used except in the form of preserves. Small +shanties, including a woodhouse, a henhouse, and a smokehouse for drying +bacon and hams, flanked the kitchen garden at the rear, while in front a +short, gravelled path, bordered by portulaca, led to the paling gate at +the branch road which ran into the turnpike a mile or so farther on. In +Abel's dreams another house was already rising in the fair green meadow +beyond the mill-race. He had consecrated a strip of giant pine to this +purpose, and often, while he lingered in the door of his mill, he felt +himself battling against the desire to take down his axe and strike his +first blow toward the building of Molly's home. His mother might nag +at him about Molly now, but let them be married, he told himself, with +sanguine masculine assurance, and both women would reconcile themselves +to a situation that neither could amend. Before the immediate ache of +his longing for the girl, all other considerations evaporated to thin +air. He would rather be unhappy with her, he thought passionately, than +give her up! + +"Abel, if you don't stop mopin' out thar an' come along in, I'll clear +off the dishes!" called his mother again in her rasping voice +which sounded as if she were choking in a perpetual spasm of moral +indignation. + +Jerking his shoulders slightly in an unspoken protest, Abel turned +and entered the kitchen, where Sarah Revercomb--tall, spare and +commanding--was preparing two bowls of mush for the aged people, who +could eat only soft food and complained bitterly while eating that. She +was a woman of some sixty years, with a stern handsome face under harsh +bands of yellowish gray hair, and a mouth that sank in at one corner +where her upper teeth had been drawn. Her figure was erect and flat as a +lath, and this flatness was accentuated by the extreme scantiness of +her drab calico dress. In her youth she had been beautiful in a hard, +obvious fashion, and her eyes would have been still fine except for +their bitter and hostile expression. + +At the table there were Abner Revercomb, some ten or twelve years +older than Abel, and Archie, the youngest child, whom Sarah adored and +bullied. Blossom was busy about something in the cupboard, and on either +side of the stove the old people sat with their small, suspicious eyes +fixed on the pan of mush which Sarah was dividing with a large wooden +spoon into two equal portions. Each feared that the other would receive +the larger share, and each watched anxiously to see into which bowl the +last spoonful would fall. For a week they had not spoken. Their old age +was racked by a sharp and furious jealousy, which was quite exclusive +and not less exacting than their earlier passion of love. + +With a finishing swirl of the big wooden spoon, the last drops of mush +fell into grandfather's bowl, while a sly and injured look appeared +instantly on the face of his wife. She was not hungry, but it annoyed +her unspeakably that she should not be given the larger portion of food. +Her rheumatism was severer than her husband's, and it seemed to her that +this alone should have entitled her to the greater share of attention. +There was a fierce contempt in her manner when she alluded to his age +or to his infirmities, for although he was three years her elder, he was +still chirpy and cheerful, with many summers, as she said resentfully, +left in him yet. + +"Breakfast is ready, grannies," remarked Sarah, who had allowed her +coffee to grow cold while she looked after the others; "are you ready to +eat?" + +Grandmother's sly little eyes slanted over her hooked nose in the +direction of the two bowls which her daughter-in-law was about to +sprinkle with sugar. An idea entered her old head which made her chuckle +with pleasure, and when her mush had been covered, she croaked out +suddenly that she would take her breakfast unsweetened. "I'm too bad to +take sugar--give that to him--he has a stomach to stand it," she said. +Though her mouth watered for sweets, by this trick she had outwitted +grandfather, and she felt that it was better than sugar. + +The kitchen was a large, comfortable room, with strings of red peppers +hanging from the ceiling, and boards of sliced apples drying on upturned +flour barrels near the door. The bright homespun carpet left a strip of +bare plank by the stove, and on this stood two hampers of black walnuts +ready for storing. A few coloured prints, culled from garden magazines, +were tacked on the wall, and these, without exception, represented +blossoms of a miraculous splendour and size. In Sarah's straitened +and intolerant soul a single passion had budded and expanded into +fulfillment. Stern to all mortal things, to flowers alone she softened +and grew gentle. From the front steps to the back, the kitchen +was filled with them. Boxes, upturned flour barrels, corners of +china-shelves and window-sills, showed bowers of luxuriant leaf and +blossom. Her calla lilies had long been famous in the county; they +had taken first prizes at innumerable fairs, and whenever there was a +wedding or a funeral in the neighbourhood, the tall green stalks were +clipped bare of bloom. Many were the dead hands that had been laid in +the earth clasping her lilies. This thought had been for years the chief +solace in her life, and she was accustomed to refer to it in the heat +of religious debates, as though it offered infallible proof of her +contention. After calla lilies, fuchias and tuberoses did best in her +hands, and she had nursed rare night blooming cereus for seven years +in the hope that it would arrive at perfection the following June. Her +marriage had been a disappointment to her, for her husband, a pleasant, +good-looking fellow, had turned out an idler; her children, with the +exception of Archie, the youngest, had never filled the vacancy in her +life; but in her devotion to flowers there was something of the ecstasy +and all of the self-abandonment she had missed in her human relations. + +As he sat down at the table, the miller nodded carelessly to his +brothers, who, having finished their bacon and cornbread, were waiting +patiently until the buckwheat cakes should be ready. The coloured +servant was never allowed to cook because, as Sarah said, "she could not +abide niggers' ways," and Blossom, standing before the stove, with her +apron held up to shield her face, was turning the deliciously browning +cakes with a tin cake lifter. + +"Ain't they done yet, daughter?" asked Abner in his amiable drawling +voice. He was a silent, brooding man, heavily built, with a coarse +reddish beard, stained with tobacco juice, which hung over his chest. +Since the death of his wife, Blossom's mother, some fifteen years +before, he had become more gloomy, more silent, more obstinately +unapproachable. He was one who appeared to dwell always in the shadow of +a great grief, and this made him generally respected by his neighbours +though he was seldom sought. People said of him that he was "a solid +man and trustworthy," but they kept out of his way unless there was road +mending or a sale of timber to be arranged. + +Blossom tossed the buckwheat cakes into a plate and brought them to her +father, who helped himself with his knife. When she passed them to Abel, +who was feeding his favorite hound puppy, Moses, with bacon, he shook +his head and drew back. + +"Give them to mother, Blossom, she never eats a bite of breakfast," he +said. He was the only one of Sarah's sons who ever considered her, but +she was apt to regard this as a sign of weakness and to resent it with +contumely. + +"I ain't hungry," she replied grimly, "an' I reckon I'd rather you'd say +less about my comfort, Abel, and do mo'. Buckwheat cakes don't come well +from a son that flies into his mother's face on the matter of eternal +damnation." + +Without replying, Abel helped himself to the cakes she had refused and +reached for the jug of molasses. Sarah was in one of her nagging moods, +he knew, and she disturbed him but little. The delight and the desire of +first love was upon him, and he was thinking rapturously of the big pine +that would go to the building of Molly's house. + +Grandmother, who wanted syrup, began to cry softly because she must eat +her tasteless mush. "He's got the stomach to stand it," she repeated +bitterly, while her tears fell into her bowl. + +"What is it, granny? Will you try a bite of buckwheat?" inquired Sarah +solicitously. She had never failed in her duty to her husband's parents, +and this virtue also, she was inclined to use as a weapon of offense to +her children. + +"Give it to him--he's got teeth left to chaw on," whimpered grandmother, +and her old chest heaved with bitterness because grandfather, who was +three years the elder, still retained two jaw teeth on one side of his +mouth. + +A yellow-and-white cat, after vainly purring against grandmother's +stool, had jumped on the window-sill in pursuit of a belated wasp, and +Sarah, rushing to the rescue of her flowers, cuffed the animal soundly +and placed her in grandfather's lap. He was a lover of cats--a harmless +fancy which was a source of unceasing annoyance to his wife. + +"Abel, I wish you'd mend that leak in the smokehouse after breakfast," +remarked Sarah, in an aggressive tone that meant battle. "Two shingles +are gone an' thare four more that want patchin'." + +"I can't, I've got work to do at the mill," replied Abel, as he rose +from his chair. "Solomon Hatch sent me his corn to grind and he's coming +over to get the sacks." + +"Well, I reckon I'm worth as much as Solomon Hatch, a little pasty faced +critter like that," rejoined Sarah. + +"Why can't Archie do it? What is he good for?" + +"I'm going hunting with Jim Halloween," returned Archie sullenly, "he's +got some young dogs he wants to break in to rabbit running." + +"I might have known thar warn't nobody to do what I ask 'em," observed +Sarah in the voice and manner of a martyr. "It's rabbits or girls, +one or the other, and if it ain't an old hare it's some light-moraled +critter like Molly Merryweather." + +Abel's face had changed to a dull red and his eyes blazed. + +"Say anything against Molly, mother, an' I'll never speak to you again!" +he cried out angrily. + +"Thar, thar, ma, you an' Abel are too pepper tongued to get into a +quarrel," remarked Abner, the silent, who seldom spoke except for the +promotion of peace. "I'll mend the roof for you whenever you want it." + +"I reckon I've got as much right to use my tongue as anybody else has," +retorted Sarah, indignant because a solution had been found and her +grievance was annulled. "If a girl ain't a fast one that gets as good as +engaged to half the young men in the county, then I'd like to know who +is, that's all?" + +Then, as Abel called sharply to his fox-hound puppy and flung himself +from the room, she turned away and went to sprinkle her calla lilies. +There was an agony in her breast, though she would have bitten out her +tongue sooner than have confessed it. Her strength lay in the fact that +never in her life had she admitted even to herself, that she had been in +the wrong. + + + +CHAPTER V + + +THE MILL + + +Outside, a high wind was driving the fallen leaves in swirls and eddies, +and as Abel crossed the road to the mill, he smelt the sharp autumn +scent of the rotting mould under the trees. Frost still sparkled on the +bright green grasses that had overgrown the sides of the mill-race, and +the poplar log over the stream was as wet as though the dancing shallows +had skimmed it. Over the motionless wheel the sycamore shed its broad +yellow leaves into the brook, where they fluttered downward with a noise +that was like the wind in the tree-tops. + +Inserting a key into the rusty lock, which was much too large for it, +Abel opened the door, and counted Solomon Hatch's sacks of grist, which +stood in a row beside a raised platform where an old mill-stone was +lying. Other sacks belonging to other farmers were arranged in +an orderly group in one corner, and his eye passed to them in a +businesslike appraisement of their contents. According to an established +custom of toll, the eighth part of the grain belonged to the miller; +and this had enabled him to send his own meal to the city markets, where +there was an increasing demand for the coarse, water-ground sort. Some +day he purposed to turn out the old worn-out machinery and supply its +place with modern inventions, but as yet this ambition was remote, and +the mill, worked after the process of an earlier century, had raised his +position to one of comparative comfort and respectability. He was +known to be a man of character and ambition. Already his name had been +mentioned as a possible future representative of the labouring classes +in the Virginia assembly. "There is no better proof of the grit that is +in the plain people than the rise of Abel Revercomb out of Abner, his +father," some one had said of him. And from the day when he had picked +his first blackberries for old Mr. Jonathan and tied his earnings in a +stocking foot as the beginning of a fund for schooling, the story of his +life had been one of struggle and of endurance. Transition had been the +part of the generation before him. In him the democratic impulse was +no longer fitful and uncertain, but had expanded into a stable and +indestructible purpose. + +Before starting the wheel, which he did by thrusting his arm through the +window and lifting the gate on the mill-race, Abel took up a broom, made +of sedges bound crudely together, and swept the smooth bare floor, which +was polished like that of a ballroom by the sacks of meal that had been +dragged back and forth over the boards. From the rafters above, long +pale cobwebs were blown gently in the draught between the door and +window, and when the mill had started, the whole building reverberated +to the slow revolutions of the wheel outside. + +The miller had poured Solomon Hatch's grist into the hopper, and was +about to turn the wooden crank at the side, when a shadow fell over the +threshold, and Archie Revercomb appeared, with a gun on his shoulder and +several fox-hounds at his heels. + +"You'll have to get Abner to help you dress that mill-rock, Abel," he +said, "I'm off for the morning. That's a good pup of yours, but he's old +enough to begin learning." + +With the inherited idleness of the Revercombs, he combined the +headstrong impulses and dogged obstinacy of his mother's stock, yet +because of his personal charm, these faults were not only tolerated but +even admired by his family. + +"You're always off in the mornings when there's work to be done," +replied Abel, "but for heaven's sake, bring home a string of hares to +put ma into a better humour. She whets her tongue on me and I'll be +hanged if it's right." + +"She never used to do it till you went over to Mr. Mullen's church and +fell in love with Molly Merryweather. Great Scott, I'm glad I don't +stand in either of your shoes when it comes to that. Life's too short to +pay for your religion or your sweetheart every day you live." + +"It would have been the same anyway--she's put out with me about +nothing. I had a right to go to Old Church if I wanted to, and what on +earth has she got against Mr. Mullen anyway, except that he couldn't +recite the first chapter in Chronicles? What kind of religion does that +take I'd like to know?" + +The meal poured softly out of the valve into the trough beneath, and +lifting a wooden scoop he bent over and scattered the pile in the +centre. A white dust had settled on his hair and clothes, and this +accentuated the glow in his face and gave to his whole appearance a +picturesque and slightly theatrical cast. + +"If it hadn't been Molly, it would have been some one else," he added +impulsively. "Ma would be sure to hate any woman she thought I'd fallen +in love with. It's born in her to be contrary just as it is in that +hopvine out yonder that you can't train up straight." + +"All the same, if I were going through fire and water for a girl, I'd be +pretty sure to choose one that would make it worth my while at the end. +I wouldn't put up with all that hectoring for the sake of anybody that +was as sweet to half a dozen other fellows as she was to me." + +Abel's face darkened threateningly under his silvered hair. + +"If you are trying to hint anything against Molly, you'd as well stop in +the beginning," he said. "It isn't right--I'll be hanged if it is!--that +every man in the county should be down on a little thing like that, no +bigger than a child. It wasn't her fault, was it, if her father played +false with her mother?" + +"Oh, I'm not blaming her, am I? As far as that goes all the women like +her well enough, and so do all the dogs and the children. The trouble +seems to be, doesn't it, merely that the men like her too much? She's +got a way with her, there's no question about that." + +"Why in thunder do you want to blacken her character?" + +"I wasn't blackenin' her character. I merely meant that she was a flirt, +and you know that as well as I do--better, I shouldn't wonder." + +"It's the way she was brought up. Her mother was crazy for ten years +before she died, and she taught Molly all that foolishness about the +meanness of men." + +"Oh, well, it's all right," said Archie carelessly, "only look out that +you don't go too near the fire and get scorched." + +Whistling to the hounds that were nosing among some empty barrels in a +dark corner, he shouldered his gun more firmly and went off to his hunt. + +After he had gone, the miller stood for a long while, watching the +meal pour from the valve. A bit of chaff had settled on his lashes, +but without moving his hand to brush it away, he shook his head once +or twice with the gesture of an animal that is stung by a wasp. "Why do +they keep at me about her?" he asked passionately. "Is it true that she +is only playing with me as she plays with the others?"--but the pain was +too keen, and turning away with a sigh, he rested his elbows on the +sill of the window and looked out at the moving wheel under the gauzy +shadows. The sound of the water as it rushed through the mill-race into +the buckets and then fell from the buckets into the whirlpool beneath, +was loud in his ears while his quick glance, passing over the drifting +yellow leaves of the sycamore, discerned a spot of vivid red in the +cornlands beyond. The throbbing of his pulses rather than the assurance +of his eyes told him that Molly was approaching; and as the bit of +colour drew nearer amid the stubble, he recognized the jacket of crimson +wool that the girl wore as a wrap on chill autumn mornings. On her head +there was a small knitted cap matching the jacket, and this resting on +her riotous brown curls, lent a touch of boyish gallantry to her slender +figure. Like most women of mobile features and ardent temperament, her +beauty depended so largely upon her mood that Abel had seen her change +from positive plainness to amazing loveliness in the space of a minute. +Her small round face, with its wonderful eyes, dimpled now over the +crimson jacket. + +"Abel!" she called softly, and paused with one foot on the log while the +water sparkled beneath her. Ten minutes before he had vowed to himself +that she had used him badly and he would hold off until she made +sufficient amends; but in forming this resolution, he had reckoned +without the probable intervention of Molly. + +"I thought--as long as I was going by--that I'd stop and speak to you," +she said. + +He shook his head, unsoftened as yet by her presence. "You didn't treat +me fair yesterday, Molly," he answered. + +"Oh, I wanted to tell you about that. I quite meant to go with you--only +it went out of my head." + +"That's a pretty excuse, isn't it, to offer a man?" + +"Well, you aren't the only one I've offered it to," she dimpled +enchantingly, "the rector had to be satisfied with it as well. He asked +me, too, and when I forgot I'd promised you, I said I'd go with him to +see old Abigail. Then I forgot that, too," she added with a penitent +sigh, "and went down to the low grounds." + +"You managed to come up in time to meet Mr. Jonathan at the +cross-roads," he commented with bitterness. + +A less daring adventurer than Molly would have hesitated at his tone and +grown cautious, but a certain blithe indifference to the consequences of +her actions was a part of her lawless inheritance from the Gays. + +"I think him very good-looking, don't you?" she inquired sweetly. + +"Good-looking? I should think not--a fat fop like that." + +"Is he fat? I didn't notice it--but, of course, I didn't mean that he +was good-looking in your way, Abel." + +The small flowerlike shadows trembled across her face, and beneath her +feet the waves churned a creamy foam that danced under her like light. +His eyes warmed to her, yet he held back, gripped by a passion of +jealousy. For the first time he felt that he was brought face to face +with a rival who might prove to have the advantage. + +"I am coming over!" called Molly suddenly, and a minute later she stood +in the square sunshine that entered the mill door. + +Had he preserved then his manner of distant courtesy, it is probable +that she would have melted, for it was not in her temperament to draw +back while her prey showed an inclination for flight. But it was his +nature to warm too readily and to cool too late, a habit of constitution +which causes, usually, a tragedy in matters of sex. + +"You oughtn't to treat me so, Molly!" he exclaimed reproachfully, and +made a step toward her. + +"I couldn't help forgetting, could I? It was your place to remind me." + +Thrust, to his surprise, upon the defensive he reached for her hand, +which was withdrawn after it had lain an instant in his. + +"Well, it was my fault, then," he said with a generosity that did him +small service. "The next time I'll remind you every minute." + +She smiled radiantly as he looked at her, and he felt that her +indiscretions, her lack of constancy, her unkindness even, were but the +sportive and innocent freaks of a child. In his rustic sincerity he was +forever at the point of condemning her and forever relenting before the +appealing sweetness of her look. He told himself twenty times a day that +she flirted outrageously with him, though he still refused to admit that +in her heart she was to blame for her flirting. A broad and charitable +distinction divided always the thing that she was from the thing that +she did. It was as if his love discerned in her a quality of soul of +which she was still unconscious. + +"Molly," he burst out almost fiercely, "will you marry me?" + +The smile was still in her eyes, but a slight frown contracted her +forehead. + +"I've told you a hundred times that I shall never marry anybody," she +answered, "but that if I ever did---" + +"Then you'd marry me." + +"Well, if I were obliged to marry _somebody_, I'd rather marry you than +anybody else." + +"So you do like me a little?" + +"Yes, I suppose I like you a little--but all men are the same--mother +used always to tell me so." + +Poor distraught Janet Merryweather! There were times when he was seized +with a fierce impatience of her, for it seemed to him that her ghost +stood, like the angel with the drawn sword, before the closed gates of +his paradise. He remembered her as a passionate frail creature, with +accusing eyes that had never lost the expression with which they had met +and passed through some hour of despair and disillusionment. + +"But how could she judge, Molly? How could she judge?" he pleaded "She +was ill, she wasn't herself, you must know it. All men are not alike. +Didn't I fight her battles more than once, when you were a child?" + +"I know, I know," she answered gratefully, "and I love you for it. +That's why I don't mind telling you what I've never told a single one of +the others. I haven't any heart, Abel, that's the truth. It's all play +to me, and I like the game sometimes and sometimes I hate it. Yet, +whether I like it or hate it, I always go on because I can't help it. +Your mother once said I had a devil that drives me on and perhaps she +was right--it may be that devil that drives me on and won't let me stop +even when I'm tired, and it all bores me. The rector thinks that I'll +marry him and turn pious and take to Dorcas societies, and Jim Halloween +thinks I'll marry him and grow thrifty and take to turkey raising--and +you believe in the bottom of your heart that in the end I'll fall +into your arms and find happiness with your mother. But you're +wrong--all--all--and I shan't do any of the things you expect of me. I +am going to stay here as long as grandfather lives, so I can take care +of him, and then I'll run off somewhere to the city and trim hats for a +living. When I was at school in Applegate I trimmed hats for all of the +pupils." + +"Oh, Molly, Molly, I'll not give you up! Some day you'll see things +differently." + +"Never--never. Now, I've warned you and it isn't my fault if you keep on +after this." + +"But you do like me a little, haven't you said so?" + +Her frown deepened. + +"Yes, I do like you--a little." + +"Then I'll keep on hoping, anyhow." + +Her smile came back, but this time it had grown mocking. + +"No, you mustn't hope," she answered, "at least," she corrected +provokingly, "you mustn't hope--too hard." + +"I'll hope as hard as the devil, darling--and, Molly, if you marry me, +you know, you won't have to live with my mother." + +"I like that, even though I'm not going to marry you." + +"Come here," he drew her toward the door, "and I'll show you where our +house will stand. Do you see that green rise of ground over the meadow?" + +"Yes, I see it," her tone was gentler. + +"I've chosen that site for a home," he went on, "and I'm saving a good +strip of pine--you can see it over there against the horizon. I've half +a mind to take down my axe and cut down the biggest of the trees this +afternoon!" + +If his ardour touched her there was no sign of it in the movement with +which she withdrew herself from his grasp. + +"You'd better finish your grinding. There isn't the least bit of a +hurry," she returned with a smile. + +"If you'll go with me, Molly, you may take your choice and I'll cut the +tree down for you." + +"But I can't, Abel, because I've promised Mr. Mullen to visit his +mother." + +The glow faded from his eyes and a look like that of an animal under the +lash took its place. + +"Come with me, not with him, Molly, you owe me that much," he entreated. + +"But he's such a good man, and he preaches such beautiful sermons." + +"He does--I know he does, but I love you a thousand times better." + +"Oh, he loves me because I am pretty and hard to win--just as you do," +she retorted. "If I lost my hair or my teeth how many of you, do you +think, would care for me to-morrow?" + +"I should--before God I'd love you just as I do now," he answered with +passion. + +A half mocking, half tender sound broke from her lips. + +"Then why don't you--every one of you, fall head over ears in love with +Judy Hatch?" she inquired. + +"I don't because I loved you first, and I can't change, however badly +you treat me. I'm sometimes tempted to think, Molly, that mother is +right, and you are possessed of a devil." + +"Your mother is a hard woman, and I pity the wife you bring home to +her." + +The softness had gone out of her voice at the mention of Sarah's name, +and she had grown defiant and reckless. + +"I don't think you are just to my mother, Molly," he said after a +moment, "she has a kind heart at bottom, and when she nags at you it is +most often for your good." + +"I suppose it was for my mother's good that she kept her from going to +church and made the old minister preach a sermon against her?" + +"That's an old story--you were only a month old. Can't you forget it?" + +"I'll never forget it--not even at the Day of Judgment. I don't care how +I'm punished." + +Her violence, which seemed to him sinful and unreasonable, reduced him +to a silence that goaded her to a further expression of anger. While +she spoke he watched her eyes shine green in the sunlight, and he told +himself that despite her passionate loyalty to her mother, the blood of +the Gays ran thicker in her veins than that of the Merryweathers. Her +impulsiveness, her pride, her lack of self-control, all these marked her +kinship not to Reuben Merryweather, but to Jonathan Gay. The qualities +against which she rebelled cried aloud in her rebellion. The inheritance +she abhorred endowed her with the capacity for that abhorrence. While +she accused the Gays, she stood revealed a Gay in every tone, in every +phrase, in every gesture. + +"It isn't you, Molly, that speaks like that," he said, "it's something +in you." She had tried his patience almost to breaking, yet in the very +strain and suffering she put upon him, she had, all unconsciously to +them both, strengthened the bond by which she held him. + +"If I'd known you were going to preach, I shouldn't have stopped to +speak to you," she rejoined coldly. "I'd rather hear Mr. Mullen." + +He stood the attack without flinching, his hazel eyes full of an angry +light and the sunburnt colour in his face paling a little. Then when she +had finished, he turned slowly away and began tightening the feed strap +of the mill. + +For a minute Molly paused on the threshold in the band of sunlight. "For +God's sake speak, Abel," she said at last, "what pleasure do you think I +find in being spiteful when you won't strike back?" + +"I'll never strike back; you may keep up your tirading forever." + +"I wouldn't have said it if I'd known you'd take it so quietly." + +"Quietly? Did you expect me to pick you up and throw you into the +hopper?" + +"I shouldn't have cared--it would have been better than your expression +at this minute. It's all your fault anyway, for not falling in love with +Judy Hatch, as I told you to." + +"Don't worry. Perhaps I shall in the end. Your tantrums would wear the +patience of a Job out at last. It seems that you can't help despising a +man just as soon as he happens to love you." + +"I wonder if that's true?" she said a little sadly, turning away from +him until her eyes rested on the green rise of ground over the meadow, +"I've seen men like that as soon as they were sure of their wives, and +I've hated them for it." + +"What I can't understand," he pursued, not without bitterness, "is why +in thunder a man or a woman who isn't married should put up with it for +an instant?" + +At his words she left the door and came slowly back to his side, where +he bent over the meal trough. + +"The truth is that I like you better than anyone in the world, except +grandfather," she said, "but I hate love-making. When I see that look +in a man's face and feel the touch of his hands upon me I want to strike +out and kill. My mother was that way before I was born, and I drank it +in with her milk, I suppose." + +"I know it isn't you fault, Molly, and yet, and yet---" + +She sighed, half pitying his suffering, half impatient of his +obtuseness. As he turned away, her gaze rested on his sunburnt neck, +rising from the collar of his blue flannel shirt, and she saw that his +hair ended in a short, boyish ripple that was powdered with mill-dust. A +sudden tenderness for him as for a child or an animal pierced her like a +knife. + +"I shouldn't mind your kissing me just once, if you'd like to, Abel," +she said. + +A little later, when he had helped her over the stile and she was +returning home through the cornlands, she asked herself with passionate +self-reproach why she had yielded to pity? She had felt sorry for Abel, +and because she had felt sorry she had allowed him to kiss her. "Only +I meant him to do it gently and soberly," she thought, "and he was so +rough and fierce that he frightened me. I suppose most girls like that +kind of thing, but I don't, and I shan't, if I live to be a hundred. +I've got no belief in it--I've got no belief in anything, that is the +trouble. I'm twisted out of shape, like the crooked sycamore by the +mill-race." + +A sigh passed her lips, and, as if in answer to the sound, there came +the rumble of approaching wheels in the turnpike. As she climbed the low +rail fence which divided the corn-lands from the highway, she met the +old family carriage from Jordan's Journey returning with the two ladies +on the rear seat. The younger, a still pretty woman of fifty years, with +shining violet eyes that seemed always apologizing for their owner's +physical weakness, leaned out and asked the girl, in a tone of gentle +patronage, if she would ride with the driver? + +"Thank you, Mrs. Gay, it's only a quarter of a mile and I don't mind the +walk." + +"We've brought an overcoat--Kesiah and I--a good thick one, for your +grandfather. It worried us last winter that he went so lightly clad +during the snow storms." + +Molly's face changed, and her eyes sparkled with pleasure. + +"Oh, thank you, thank you!" she exclaimed, losing her manner of distant +politeness. "I've been trying to persuade him to buy one, but he hates +to spend money on himself." + +Kesiah, who had leaned back during the conversation, with the scowling +look she wore when her heart was moved, nodded grimly while she felt in +the black travelling bag she carried for Mrs. Gay's salts. She was one +of those unfortunate women of a past generation, who, in offering no +allurement to the masculine eye, appeared to defeat the single end +for which woman was formed. As her very right to existence lay in her +possible power to attract, the denial of that power by nature, or the +frustration of it by circumstances, had deprived her, almost from +the cradle, of her only authoritative reason for being. Her small, +short-sighted eyes, below a false front which revealed rather than +obscured her bare temples, flitted from object to object as though in +the vain pursuit of some outside justification of her indelicacy in +having permitted herself to be born. + +"Samson tells me that my son has come, Molly," said Mrs. Gay, in a +flutter of emotion. "Have you had a glimpse of him yet?" + +The girl nodded. "He took supper at our house the night he got here." + +"It was such a surprise. Was he looking well?" + +"Very well, I thought, but it was the first time I had seen him, you +know." + +"Ah, I forgot. Are you sure you won't get in, child? Well, drive on, +Samson, and be very careful of that bird cage." + +Samson drove on at the command, and Molly, plodding obstinately after +the carriage, was enveloped shortly in the cloud of dust that floated +after the wheels. + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +TREATS OF THE LADIES' SPHERE + + +As the carriage rolled up the drive, there was a flutter of servants +between the white columns, and Abednego, the old butler, pushed aside +the pink-turbaned maids and came down to assist his mistress to alight. + +"Take the bird cage, Abednego, I've bought a new canary," said Mrs. Gay. +"Here, hold my satchel, Nancy, and give Patsey the wraps and umbrellas." + +She spoke in a sweet, helpless voice, and this helplessness was +expressed in every lovely line of her figure. The most casual observer +would have discerned that she had surrendered all rights in order to +grasp more effectively at all the privileges. She was clinging and small +and delicate and her eyes, her features, her plaintive gestures, united +in an irresistible appeal to emotions. + +"Where is Jonathan?" she asked, "I hoped he would welcome me." + +"So I do, dearest mother--so I do," replied the young man, running +hurriedly down the steps and then slipping his arm about her. "You came +a minute or two earlier than I expected you, or I should have met you in +the drive." + +Half supporting, half carrying her, he led the way into the house and +placed her on a sofa in the long drawing-room. + +"I am afraid the journey has been too much for you," he said tenderly. +"Shall I tell Abednego to bring you a glass of wine." + +"Kesiah will mix me an egg and a spoonful of sherry, dear, she knows +just how much is good for me." + +Kesiah, still grasping her small black bag, went into the dining-room +and returned, bearing a beaten egg, which she handed to her sister. +In her walk there was the rigid austerity of a saint who has adopted +saintliness not from inclination, but from the force of a necessity +against which rebellion has been in vain. Her plain, prominent features +wore, from habit, a look of sullen martyrdom that belied her natural +kindness of heart; and even her false brown front was arranged in +little hard, flat curls, as though an artificial ugliness were less +reprehensible in her sight than an artificial beauty. + +In the midst of the long room flooded with sunshine, the little lady +reclined on her couch and sipped gently from the glass Kesiah had handed +her. The tapestried furniture was all in soft rose, a little faded from +age, and above the high white wainscoting on the plastered walls, this +same delicate colour was reflected in the rich brocaded gowns in the +family portraits. In the air there was the faint sweet scent of cedar +logs that burned on the old andirons. + +"So you came all the way home to see your poor useless mother," +murmured Mrs. Gay, shielding her cheek from the firelight with a peacock +hand-screen. + +"I wanted to see for myself how you stand it down here--and, by Jove, +it's worse even than I imagined! How the deuce have you managed to drag +out twenty years in a wilderness like this among a tribe of barbarians?" + +"It is a great comfort to me, dear, to think that I came here on your +uncle's account and that I am only following his wishes in making the +place my home. He loved the perfect quiet and restfulness of it." + +"Quiet! With that population of roosters making the dawn hideous! I'd +choose the quiet of Piccadilly before that of a barnyard." + +"You aren't used to country noises yet, and I suppose at first they are +trying." + +"Do you drive? Do you walk? How do you amuse yourself?" + +"One doesn't have amusement when one is a hopeless invalid; one has only +medicines. No, the roads are too heavy for driving except for a month or +two in the summer. I can't walk of course, because of my heart, and as +there has been no man on the place for ten years, I do not feel that +it is safe for Kesiah to go off the lawn by herself. Once she got into +quite a dreadful state about her liver and lack of exercise--(poor dear +mother used to say that the difference between the liver of a lady and +that of another person, was that one required no exercise and the +other did)--but Kesiah, who is the best creature in the world, is very +eccentric in some ways, and she imagines that her health suffers when +she is kept in the house for several years. Once she got into a temper +and walked a mile or two on the road, but when she returned I was in +such a state of nervousness that she promised me never to leave the lawn +again unless a gentleman was with her." + +"What an angel you must be to have suffered so much and complained so +little!" he exclaimed with fervour, kissing her hand. + +Her eyes, which reminded him of dying violets, drooped over him above +the peacock feathers she waved gently before her. + +"Poor Kesiah, it is hard on her, too," she observed, "and I sometimes +think she is unjust enough to blame me in her heart." + +"But she doesn't feel things as you do, one can tell that to look at +her." + +"She isn't so sensitive and silly, you dear boy, but my poor nerves are +responsible for that, you must remember. If Kesiah had been a man she +would have been an artist, and it was really a pity that she happened to +be born a woman. When she was young she had a perfect mania for drawing, +and it used to distress mother so much. A famous portrait painter--I +can't recall his name though I am sure it began with S--saw one of her +sketches by accident and insisted that we ought to send her to Paris to +study. Kesiah was wild to go at the time, but of course it was out of +the question that a Virginia lady should go off by herself and paint +perfectly nude people in a foreign city. There was a dreadful scene, I +remember, and Kesiah even wrote to Uncle William Burwell and asked him +to come down and win mother over. He came immediately, for he was the +kindest soul, but, of course after he understood, he decided against +it. Why on earth should a girl want to go streaking across the water to +study art, he asked, when she had a home she could stay in and men folk +who could look after her? They both told her she made herself ridiculous +when she talked of ambition, and as they wouldn't promise her a penny +to live on, she was obliged in the end to give up the idea. She nursed +mother very faithfully, I must say, as long as she lived, never leaving +her a minute night or day for the last year of her illness. Don't +misjudge poor Kesiah, Jonathan, she has a good heart at bottom, though +she has always been a little soured on account of her disappointment." + +"Oh, she was cut out for an old maid, one can see that," rejoined Gay, +only half interested in the history of his aunt, for he seldom exerted +his imagination except under pressure of his desires, "and, by the way, +mother, what kind of man was my Uncle Jonathan?" + +"The dearest creature, my son, heaven alone knows what his loss meant +to me! Such consideration! Such generosity! Such delicacy! He and Kesiah +never got on well, and this was the greatest distress to me." + +"Did you ever hear any queer stories about him? Was he--well--ah, wild, +would you say?" + +"Wild? Jonathan, I am surprised at you! Why, during the twenty years +that I knew him he never let fall so much as a single indelicate word in +my presence." + +"I don't mean that exactly--but what about his relations with the women +around here?" + +She flinched as if his words had struck her a blow. + +"Dear Jonathan, your poor uncle would never have asked such a question." + +Above the mantel there was an oil portrait of the elder Jonathan at the +age of three, painted astride the back of an animal that disported the +shape of a lion under the outward covering of a lamb. + +"Ah, that's just it," commented Gay, while his inquiring look hung on +the picture. After a minute of uncertainty, his curiosity triumphed over +his discretion and he put, in an apologetic tone, an equally indelicate +question. "What about old Reuben Merryweather's granddaughter? Has she +been provided for?" + +For an instant Mrs. Gay looked at him with shining, reproachful eyes +under a loosened curl of fair hair which was threaded with sliver. Those +eyes, very blue, very innocent, seemed saying to him, "Oh, be careful, +I am so sensitive. Remember that I am a poor frail creature, and do not +hurt me. Let me remain still in my charmed circle where I have always +lived, and where no unpleasant reality has ever entered." The quaint +peacock screen, brought from China by old Jonathan, cast a shadow on her +cheek, which was flushed to the colour of a faded rose leaf. + +"Yes, the girl is an orphan, it is very sad," she replied, and her tone +added, "but what can I do about it? I am a woman and should know nothing +of such matters!" + +"Was she mentioned in my uncles's will, do you remember?" + +His handsome, well-coloured face had taken a sudden firmness of outline, +and even the sagging flesh of his chin appeared to harden with the +resolve of the moment. Across his forehead, under the fine dark hair +which had worn thin on the temples, three frowning wrinkles leaped out +as if in response to some inward pressure. + +"There was something--I can't remember just what it was--Mr. +Chamberlayne will tell you about it when he comes down to-morrow to talk +over business with Kesiah. They keep all such things away from me out of +consideration for my heart. But I've never doubted for an instant that +your uncle did everything that was just and generous in the matter. He +sent the girl to a good school in Applegate, I remember, and there was +a bequest of some sort, I believe--something that she comes into on her +twenty-first birthday." + +"She isn't twenty-one then, is she?" + +"I don't know, Jonathan, I really can't remember." + +"Perhaps Aunt Kesiah can tell me something about her?" + +"Oh, she can and she will--but Kesiah is so violent in all her opinions! +I had to ask her never to mention Brother Jonathan's name to me because +she made me quite ill once by some dreadful hints she let fall about +him." + +She leaned back wearily as if the conversation had exhausted her, while +the peacock firescreen slipped from her hand and dropped on the white +fur rug at her feet. + +"If you'll call Kesiah, Jonathan, I'll go upstairs for a rest," she said +gently, yet with a veiled reproach. "The journey tired me, but I forgot +it in the pleasure of seeing you." + +All contrition at once, he hastily summoned Kesiah from the storeroom, +and between them, with several solicitous maids in attendance, they +carried the fragile little lady up to her chamber, where a fire of +resinous pine was burning in the big colonial fireplace. + +An hour afterwards, when Kesiah had seen her sister peacefully dozing, +she went, for the first time since her return, into her own bedroom, and +stood looking down on the hearth, where the servants had forgotten to +light the sticks that were laid cross-wise on the andirons. It was the +habit of those about her to forget her existence, except when she +was needed to render service, and after more than fifty years of such +omissions, she had ceased, even in her thought, to pass judgment upon +them. In her youth she had rebelled fiercely--rebelled against nature, +against the universe, against the fundamental injustice that divided her +sister's lot from her own. Generations existed only to win love or to +bestow it. Inheritance, training, temperament, all combined to develop +the racial instinct within her, yet something stronger than these--some +external shaping of clay--had unfitted her for the purpose for which +she was designed. And since, in the eyes of her generation, any +self-expression from a woman, which was not associated with sex, was +an affront to convention, that single gift of hers was doomed to wither +away in the hot-house air that surrounded her. A man would have struck +for freedom, and have made a career for himself in the open world, but +her nature was rooted deep in the rich and heavy soil from which she +had tried to detach it. Years after her first fight, on the day of her +mother's death, she had suffered a brief revival of youth; and then she +had pulled in vain at the obstinate tendrils that held her to the spot +in which she had grown. She was no longer penniless, she was no longer +needed, but she was crushed. The power of revolt was the gift of +youth. Middle-age could put forth only a feeble and ineffectual +resistance--words without passion, acts without abandonment. At times +she still felt the old burning sense of injustice, the old resentment +against life, but this passed quickly now, and she grew quiet as soon +as her eyes fell on the flat, spare figure, a little bent in the +chest, which her mirror revealed to her. The period was full of woman's +advancement--a peaceful revolution had triumphed around her--yet she had +taken no part in it, and the knowledge left her unmoved. She had read +countless novels that acclaimed hysterically the wrongs of her sex, but +beneath the hysterics she had perceived the fact that the newer woman +who grasped successfully the right to live, was as her elder sister +who had petitioned merely for the privilege to love. The modern heroine +could still charm even after she had ceased to desire to. Neither in the +new fiction nor in the old was there a place for the unhappy woman who +desired to charm but could not; she remained what she had always been--a +tragic perversion of nature which romance and realism conspired to +ignore. Women in novels had revolted against life as passionately as +she--but one and all they had revolted in graceful attitudes and +with abundant braids of hair. A false front not only extinguished +sentiment--it put an end to rebellion. + +"Miss Kesiah, dar's Marse Reuben in de hall en he sez he'd be moughty +glad ef'n you'd step down en speak a wud wid 'im." + +"In a moment, Abednego. I must take off my things." + +Withdrawing the short jet-headed pins from her bonnet with a hurried +movement, she stabbed them into the hard round pincushion on her bureau, +and after throwing a knitted cape over her shoulders, went down the wide +staircase to where Reuben awaited her in the hall. As she walked she +groped slightly and peered ahead of her with her nervous, short-sighted +gaze. + +At the foot of the staircase, the old man was standing in a patient +attitude, resting upon his wooden leg, which was slightly in advance +of his sound one. His fine bearded face might have been the face of a +scholar, except for its roughened skin and the wistful, dog-like look in +the eyes. + +In response to Kesiah's greeting, he explained that he had come at once +to acknowledge the gift of the overcoat and to "pay his respects." + +"I am glad you like it," she answered, and because her heart was +swelling with kindness, she stammered and grew confused while the +anxious frown deepened between her eyebrows. A morbid horror of making +herself ridiculous prevented her always from making herself understood. + +"It will be very useful to me, ma'am, when I am out of doors in bad +weather," he replied, wondering if he had offended her by his visit. + +"We got it for that purpose," and becoming more embarrassed, she added +hastily, "How is the red cow, Mr. Merryweather?" + +"She mends slowly, ma'am. I am givin' her bran mash twice a day and +keepin' her in the barn. Have you noticed the hogs? They're a fine lot +this year and we'll get some good hams at the killin'." + +"No, I hadn't looked at them, but I've been struck with the corn you've +brought up recently from the low grounds." + +For a minute or two they discussed the crops, both painfully ill at ease +and uncertain whether to keep up the conversation or to let it trail +off into silence. Then at the first laboured pause, Reuben repeated his +message to Mrs. Gay and stamped slowly out of the back door into the +arms of Jonathan, who was about to enter. + +"Halloo! So it's you!" exclaimed the young man in the genial tone which +seemed at once to dispel Kesiah's embarrassment. "I've wanted to talk +with you for two days, but I shan't detain you now for I happen to +know that your granddaughter is hunting for you already. I'll come up +to-morrow and chat awhile in the barn." + +Reuben bowed and passed on, a little flattered by the other's intimate +tone, while Gay followed Kesiah into the drawing-room, and put a +question to her which had perplexed him since the night of his arrival. + +"Aunt Kesiah, was old Reuben Merryweather on friendly terms with my +uncle?" + +She started and looked at him with a nervous twitching of her eyelids. + +"I think so, Jonathan, at least they appeared to be. Old Reuben was born +on the place when the Jordans still lived here, and I am sure your uncle +felt that it would be unjust to remove him. Then they fought through the +war together and were both dangerously wounded in the same charge." + +He gazed at her a moment in silence, narrowing his intense blue eyes +which were so like the eyes of Reuben's granddaughter. + +"Did my uncle show any particular interest in the girl?" he inquired, +and added a little bitterly, "It's not fair to me that I shouldn't know +just where I am standing." + +"Yes, he did show a particular interest in her and was anxious that +she should be educated above her station. She was even sent off to a +boarding-school in Applegate, but she ran away during the middle of the +second session and came home. Her grandfather was ill with pneumonia, +and she is sincerely devoted to him, I believe." + +"Was there any mention of her in Uncle Jonathan's will?" + +"None whatever. He left instructions with Mr. Chamberlayne, however, +which are to be made known next April on Molly's twenty-first birthday. +It is all rather mysterious, but we only know that he owned considerable +property in the far West, which he left away from us and in trust to +his lawyer. I suppose he thought your mother would not be alive when +the girl came of age; for the doctors had agreed that she had only a few +years to live at the utmost." + +"What in the devil did my poor mother have to do with it?" + +She hesitated an instant, positively scowling in her perplexity. + +"Only that I think--I believe your Uncle Jonathan would have married the +girl's mother--Janet Merryweather--but for your mother's influence." + +"How in the deuce! You mean he feared the effect on her?" + +"He broke it to her once--his intention, I mean--and for several days +afterwards we quite despaired of her life. It was then that she made him +promise--he was quite distracted with remorse for he adored Angela--that +he would never allude to it again while she was alive. We thought then +that it would be only for a short while, but she has outlived him ten +years in spite of her heart disease. One can never rely on doctors, you +know." + +"But what became of the girl--of Janet Merryweather, I mean?" + +"That was the sad part, though it happened so long ago--twenty +years--that people have almost forgotten. It seems that your uncle had +been desperate about her for a time--before Angela came to live with +him--and Janet counted rather recklessly upon his keeping his word and +marrying her as he had promised. When her trouble came she went quite +out of her mind--perfectly harmless, I believe, and with lucid intervals +in which she suffered from terrible melancholia. Her child inherits many +of her characteristics, I am told, though I've never heard any harm +of the girl except that she flirts with all the clowns in the +neighbourhood." + +"Uncle Jonathan appears to have been too ready with his promises, but, +I suppose, he thought there was a difference between his obligation to +Janet Merryweather and to his brother's widow?" + +"There was a difference, of course. Janet Merryweather could hardly have +had Angela's sensitive feelings--or at least it's a comfort to think +that, even if it happens not to be true. Before the war one hardly +ever heard of that class, mother used to say, it was so humble and +unpresuming--but in the last twenty-five or thirty years it has +overrun everything and most of the land about here has passed into its +possession." + +She checked herself breathlessly, surprised and indignant that she +should have expressed her feelings so openly. + +"Yes, I dare say," returned Jonathan--"The miller Revercomb is a good +example, I imagine, of just the thing you are speaking of--a kind of new +plant that has sprung up like fire-weed out of the ashes. Less than half +a century produced him, but he's here to stay, of that I am positive. +After all, why shouldn't he, when we get down to the question? He--or +the stock he represents, of course--is already getting hold of the +soil and his descendants will run the State financially as well as +politically, I suppose. We can't hold on, the rest of us--we're losing +grip--and in the end it will be pure pluck that counts wherever it comes +from." + +"Ah, it's just that--pluck--but put the miller in the crucible +and you'll find how little pure gold there is to him. It is not in +prosperity, but in poverty that the qualities of race come to the +surface, and this remarkable miller of yours would probably be crushed +by a weight to which poor little Mrs. Bland at the post-office--she was +one of the real Carters, you know--would hardly bend her head." + +"Perhaps you're right," he answered, and laughed shortly under his +breath, "but in that case how would you fix the racial characteristics +of that little firebrand, Molly Merryweather?" + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +GAY RUSHES INTO A QUARREL AND SECURES A KISS + + +At dawn next morning Jonathan Gay, who had spent a restless night in +his uncle's room, came out into the circular drive with his gun on +his shoulder, and strolled in the direction of the meadows beyond the +haunted Poplar Spring at the end of the lawn. It was a rimy October +morning, and the sun rising slowly above the shadowy aspens in the +graveyard, shone dimly through the transparent silver veil that hung +over the landscape. The leaves, still russet and veined with purple on +the boughs overhead, lay in brown wind-rifts along the drive, where they +had been blown during the night before the changeful weather had settled +into a frosty stillness at daybreak. + +"By Jove, it's these confounded acorns that keep me awake," thought Gay, +with a nervous irritation which was characteristic of him when he had +been disturbed. "A dozen ghosts couldn't have managed to make themselves +more of a nuisance." + +Being an emotional person in a spasmodic and egotistical fashion, +he found himself thinking presently of Janet Merryweather, as he had +thought more than once during the wakeful hours of the night. He felt, +somehow, that she had been treated detestably, and he was angry with +his uncle for having left him, as he described it, "in such a deuce of a +hole." "One can't acknowledge the girl, I suppose, though for the matter +of that those tell-tale eyes of hers are not only an acknowledgment, but +a condemnation." + +With a low whistle, he brought his gun quickly down from his shoulder as +a partridge, rising with a gentle whir from the red-topped orchard grass +in front of him, skimmed lightly into the golden pathway the sun made +through the mist. At the same instant a shot rang out close beside him, +and the bird dropped at his feet while Archie Revercomb sauntered slowly +across the pasture. A string of partridges and several rabbits hung +from his shoulder, and at his heels a pack of fox-hounds followed with +muzzles held close to the moist ground. + +For a minute Gay's angry astonishment left him rooted to the spot. +Accustomed to the rigid game laws of England, and ignorant of the +habits of the country into which he had come, he saw in the act, not the +ancient Virginian acceptance of the bird as the right of the hunter, but +a lawless infringement of his newly acquired sense of possession. + +"You confounded rogue!" he exclaimed hotly, "so you're not only shooting +my partridges, but you're actually shooting them before my eyes." + +"What's that?" asked Archie, only half understanding the words, "were +you after that bird yourself then?" + +"Well, rather, my friend, and I'll trouble you at the same time to hand +over that string on your shoulder." + +"Hand them over? Well, I like that! Why, I shot them." + +"But you shot them on my land didn't you?" + +"What in the devil do you mean by that? My folks have shot over these +fields before yours were ever heard of about here. A bird doesn't happen +to be yours, I reckon, just because it takes a notion to fly over your +pasture." + +"Do you mean to tell me that you don't respect a man's right to his +game?" + +"A man's game is the bird in the bag, not in the air, I reckon. This +land was open hunting in the time of the Jordans, and we're not going to +keep off of it at the first bid of any Tom-fool that thinks he's got a +better right to it." + +The assumption of justice angered Gay far more than the original +poaching had done. To be flouted in his own pasture on the subject of +his own game by a handsome barbarian, whom he had caught red-handed in +the act of stealing, would have appealed irresistibly to his sense of +humour, if it had not enraged him. + +"All the same I give you fair warning," he retorted, "that the next time +I find you trespassing on my land, I'll have the law after you." + +"The law--bosh! Do you think I'm afraid of it?" + +Somewhere at the back of Gay's brain, a curtain was drawn, and he saw +clearly as if it were painted in water colour, an English landscape and +a poacher, who had been caught with a stolen rabbit, humbly pulling +the scant locks on his forehead. Well, this was one of the joys of +democracy, doubtless, and he was in for the rest of them. These people +had got the upper hand certainly, as Aunt Kesiah had complained. + +"If you think I'll tamely submit to open robbery by such insolent +rascals as you, you're mistaken, young man," he returned. + +The next instant he sprang aside and knocked up Archie's gun, which had +been levelled at him. The boy's face was white under his sunburn, and +the feathers on the partridges that hung from his shoulder trembled as +though a strong wind were blowing. + +"Rascal, indeed!" he stammered, and spat on the ground after his words +in the effort to get rid of the taste of them, "as if the whole county +doesn't know that you're another blackguard like your uncle before you. +Ask any decent woman in the neighbourhood if she would have been seen in +his company!" + +His rage choked him suddenly, and before he could speak again the other +struck him full in the mouth. + +"Take that and hold your tongue, you young savage!" + +Then as he stooped for his gun, which he had laid down, a shot passed +over his head and whizzed lightly across the meadow. + +"The next time I'll take better aim!" called Archie, turning away. "I'll +shoot as straight as the man who gave your uncle his deserts down at +Poplar Spring!" + +Whistling to his dogs, he ran on for a short distance; then vaulting the +rail fence he disappeared into the tangle of willows beside the stream +which flowed down from the mill. + +While he watched him the anger in Gay's face faded slowly into disgust. + +"Now I've stirred up a hornet's nest," he thought, annoyed by his +impetuosity. "Who, I wonder, was the fellow, and what a fool--what a +tremendous fool I have been!" + +With his love of ease, of comfort, of popularity, the situation appeared +to him to be almost intolerable. The whole swarm would be at his head +now, he supposed; for instead of silencing the angry buzzing around his +uncle's memory, he had probably raised a tumult which would deafen his +own ears before it was over. Here, as in other hours and scenes, his +resolve had acted less as a restraint than as a spur which had impelled +him to the opposite extreme of conduct. + +Still rebuking his impulsiveness, he shouldered his gun again, and +followed slowly in the direction Archie had taken. The half bared +willows by the brook distilled sparkling drops as the small red sun rose +higher over the meadows, and it was against the shimmering background of +foliage, that the figure of Blossom Revercomb appeared suddenly out of +the mist. Her scant skirts were lifted from the cobwebs on the grass, +and her mouth was parted while she called softly after a cow that had +strayed down to the willows. + +"You, sir!" she exclaimed, and blushed enchantingly under the pearly dew +that covered her face. "One of our cows broke pasture in the night and +we think she must have crossed the creek and got over on your side of +the meadow. She's a wonderful jumper. We'll have to be hobbling her +soon, I reckon." + +"Do you milk?" he asked, charmed by the mental picture of so noble a +dairymaid. + +"Except when grandma is well enough. You can't leave it to the darkies +because they are such terrible slatterns. Put a cow in their hands and +she's sure to go dry before three months are over." + +She looked up at him, while the little brown mole played hide and seek +with a dimple. + +"Have you ever been told that you are beautiful, Miss Keren-happuch?" he +inquired with a laugh. + +Her pale eyes, like frosted periwinkles, dropped softly beneath his +gaze. + +"How can you think so, sir, when you have seen so many city ladies?" + +"I've seen many, but not one so lovely as you are this morning with the +frost on your cheeks." + +"I'm not dressed. I just slip on any old thing to go milking." + +"It's not the dress, that doesn't matter--though I can imagine you in +trailing purple velvet with a trimming of sable." + +An illumination shone in her face, as if her soul had suddenly +blossomed. + +"Purple velvet, and what else did you say, sir?" she questioned. + +"Sable--fur, you know, the richest, softest, queenliest fur there is." + +"I'd like to see it," she rejoined. + +"Well, it couldn't improve you!--remember always that the fewer fine +clothes you have on the better. Tell me, Blossom," he added, touching +her shoulder, "have you many lovers?" + +She shook her head. "There are so few about here that any woman would +look at." + +"I've been told that there's an engaging young rector." + +"Mr. Mullen--well, so he is--and he preaches the most beautiful sermons. +But he fancies Molly Merryweather, they say, like all the others, though +he won't be likely to marry anybody from around here, I suppose." + +Her drawling Southern tongue lent a charm, he felt, to her naive +disclosures. + +"Like all the others?" he repeated smiling. "Do you mean to tell me +that Reuben's piquant little granddaughter is a greater belle in the +neighbourhood than you are?" + +"She has a way with them," said Blossom sweetly. "I don't know what it +is and I am sure she is a good, kind girl--but I sometimes think men +like her because she is so contrary. My Uncle Abel has almost lost his +head about her, yet she plays fast and loose with him in the cruelest +fashion." + +"Oh, well, she'll burn her fingers some day, at her own fire, and then +she'll be sorry." + +"I don't want her to be sorry, but I do wish she'd try just a little +to be kind--one day she promises to marry Abel and the next you'd think +she'd taken a liking to Jim Halloween." + +"Perhaps she has a secret sentiment for the rector?" he suggested, to +pique her. + +"But I don't believe he will marry anybody around here," she insisted, +while the colour flooded her face. + +The discovery that she had once cherished--that she still cherished, +perhaps, a regard for the young clergyman, added a zest to the +adventure, while it freed his passion from the single restraint of which +he had been aware. It was not in his nature to encourage a chivalrous +desire to protect a woman who had betrayed, however innocently, a +sentiment for another man. When the Reverend Mr. Mullen inadvertently +introduced an emotional triangle, he had changed the situation from one +of mere sentimental dalliance into direct pursuit. By some law of reflex +action, known only to the male mind at such instants, the first sign +that she was not to be won threw him into the mental attitude of the +chase. + +"Are the fascinations of your Mr. Mullen confined to the pulpit?" he +inquired after a moment, "or does he wear them for the benefit of the +heterodox when he walks abroad?" + +"Oh, he's not my Mr. Mullen, sir," she hastened to explain though her +words trailed off into a sound that was suspiciously like a sigh. + +"Molly Merryweather's Mr. Mullen, then?" + +"I don't think he cares for Molly--not in that way." + +"Are you quite as sure that Molly doesn't care for him in that way?" + +"She couldn't or she wouldn't be so cruel. Then she never goes to +lectures or Bible classes or mission societies. She is the only girl in +the congregation who never makes him anything to wear. Don't you think," +she asked anxiously, "that if she really cared about him she would have +done some of these things?" + +"From my observation of ladies and clergymen," replied Gay seriously, "I +should think that she would most likely have done all of them." + +She appeared relieved, he thought, by the warmth of his protestation. +Actually Mr. Mullen had contributed a decided piquancy to the episode. + +"I'm afraid, Blossom," he said after a moment, "that I am beginning +to be a little jealous of the Reverend Mullen. By the way, what is the +Christian name of the paragon?" + +"Orlando, sir." + +"Ye Gods! The horror grows! Describe him to me, but paint him mildly if +you wish me to survive it." + +For a minute she thought very hard, as though patiently striving to +invoke a mental image. + +"He's a little taller than you, but not quite--not quite so broad." + +"Thank you, you _have_ put it mildly." + +"He has the most beautiful curly hair--real chestnut--that grows in two +peaks high on his forehead. His eyes are grey and his mouth is small, +with the most perfect teeth. He doesn't wear any moustache, you see, to +hide them, and they flash a great deal when he preaches---" + +"Hold on!" + +"I beg you pardon, sir." + +"I mean that I am overcome. I am mentally prostrated before such +perfections. Blossom, you are in love with him." + +"Oh, no, sir; but I do like to watch him in the pulpit. He gesticulates +so beautifully." + +"And now--speak truth and spare not--how do I compare with him?" + +"Oh, Mr. Jonathan, you are so different!" + +"Do you imply that I am ugly, Blossom?" + +"Why, no--not ugly. Indeed I didn't mean that." + +"But I'm not so handsome as Reverend Orlando?--now, confess it." + +She blushed, and he thought her confusion the most charming he had ever +seen. + +"Well, perhaps you aren't quite so--so handsome; but there's something +about you, sir," she added eagerly, "that reminds me of him." + +"By Jove! You don't mean it!" + +"I can't tell just what it is, but it is something. You both look as +though you'd lived in a city and had learned to wear your Sunday clothes +without remembering that they are your Sunday clothes. Of course, your +hair doesn't curl like his," she added honestly, "and I doubt if you'd +look nearly so well in the pulpit." + +"I'm very sure I shouldn't, but Blossom---" + +"What, Mr. Jonathan?" + +"Do you think you will ever like me as well as you like Mr. Mullen?" + +His gay and intimate smile awaited her answer, and in the pause, he +stretched out his hand and laid it on her large round arm a little +above the elbow. The flush deepened in her face, and he felt a slight +trembling under his fingers like the breast of a frightened bird. + +"Blossom," he repeated, half mocking, half tender, "do you think you +will ever like me better than you like Mr. Mullen?" + +At this her rustic pride came suddenly between them, and withdrawing +her arm from his clasp, she stepped out of the bridle path into the wet +orchard grass that surrounded them. + +"I've known him so much longer," she replied. + +"And if you know me longer will you like me better, Blossom?" + +Then as she still drew back, he pressed nearer, and spoke her name again +in a whisper. + +"Blossom--Blossom, are you afraid of me? Do you think I would hurt you?" + +The gentleness in his voice stayed her flight for an instant, and in +that instant, as she looked up at him, he stooped quickly and kissed her +mouth. + +"What a damned ass I've made of myself," he thought savagely, when she +broke from him and fled over the mill brook into the Revercombs' pasture +beyond. She did not look back, but sped as straight as a frightened hare +to the covert; and by this brilliant, though unconscious coquetry, she +had wrested the victory from him at the moment when it had appeared to +fall too easily into his hands. + +"Well, it's all right now. I'll take better care in the future," he +thought, his self-reproach extinguished by the assurance that, after +all, he had done nothing that justified the intrusion of his conscience. +"By Jove, she's a beauty--but she's not my kind all the same," he added +as he strolled leisurely homeward--for like many persons whose moral +standard exceeds immeasurably their ordinary rule of conduct, he +cherished somewhere in an obscure corner of his brain an image of +perfection closely related to the type which he found least alluring in +reality. Humanly tolerant of those masculine weaknesses he shared, he +had erected mentally a pinnacle of virtue upon which he exacted that +a frailer being should maintain an equilibrium. A pretty woman, it was +true, might go at a merry pace provided she was not related to him, but +he required that both his mother and his aunt should be above suspicion. +In earlier days he had had several affairs of sentiment with ladies to +whom he declined to bow if he happened to be walking with a member of +his family; and this fine discrimination was characteristic of him, for +it proved that he was capable of losing his heart in a direction where +he would refuse to lift his hat. + +At the late breakfast to which he returned, he found Mr. Chamberlayne, +who had ridden over from Applegate to consult with Kesiah. In appearance +the lawyer belonged to what is called "the old school," and his manner +produced an effect of ostentation which was foreign to his character +as a Christian and a gentleman. His eyebrows, which were still dark +and thick, hung prominently over his small, sparkling eyes behind gold +rimmed spectacles, while a lock of silver hair was brushed across his +forehead with the romantic wave which was fashionable in the period when +Lord Byron was the favorite poet. Kindness and something more--something +that was almost a touching innocence, looked from his face. "It is a +good world--I've always found it to be a good world, and if I've ever +heard anything against it, I've refused to believe it," his look seemed +to say. + +All through breakfast he rambled on after his amiable habit--praising +the food, praising the flowers, praising the country, praising +the universe. The only creature or object he omitted to praise was +Kesiah--for in his heart he regarded it as an outrage on the part of +Providence that a woman should have been created quite so ugly. While +he talked he kept his eyes turned away from her, gazing abstractedly +through the window or at a portrait of Mrs. Gay, painted in the first +year of her marriage, which hung over the sideboard. In the mental world +which he inhabited all women were fair and fragile and endowed with +a quality which he was accustomed to describe as "solace." When +occasionally, as in the case of Kesiah, one was thrust upon his +notice, to whom by no stretch of the imagination these graces could be +attributed, he disposed of the situation by the simple device of gazing +above her head. In his long and intimate acquaintance, he had never +looked Kesiah in the face, and he never intended to. He was perfectly +aware that if he were for an instant to forget himself so far as to +contemplate her features, he should immediately lose all patience with +her. No woman, he felt, had the right to affront so openly a man's ideal +of what the sex should be. When he spoke of her behind her back it was +with indignant sympathy as "poor Miss Kesiah," or "that poor good soul +Kesiah Blount"--for in spite of a natural bent for logic, and more than +forty years of sedulous attendance upon the law, he harboured at the +bottom of his heart an unreasonable conviction that Kesiah's plainness +was, somehow, the result of her not having chosen to be pretty. + +"Any sport, Jonathan?" he inquired cheerfully, while he buttered his +waffles. "If I scared up one Molly Cotton-tail out of the briars I did +at least fifty." + +"No, I didn't get a shot," replied Gay, "but I met a poacher on my land +who appeared to have been more successful. There seems to be absolutely +no respect for a man's property rights in this part of the country. The +fellow actually had the impudence to stop and bandy words with me." + +"Well, you mustn't be too hard on him. His ancestors, doubtless, shot +over your fields for generations, and he'd probably look upon an attempt +to enforce the game laws as an infringement of his privileges." + +"Do you mean that the landowner is utterly unprotected?" + +"By no means--go slow--go slow--you might search the round globe, I +believe for a more honest or a more peaceable set of neighbours. But +they've always been taught, you see, to regard the bird in the air as +belonging to the man with the gun. On these large estates game was so +plentiful in the old days and pot-hunters, as they call them, so few, +that it didn't pay a man to watch out for his interest. Now that the +birds are getting scarce, the majority of farmers in the State are +having their lands posted, but your uncle was too little of a sportsman +to concern himself in the matter." + +"Well, I knocked a tooth out of the fellow, so the whole county will be +after me like a pack of hounds, I suppose. I wonder who he was, by the +way--young, good looking, rather a bully?" + +"The description fits a Revercomb. As they are your next neighbours it +was probably the miller or his brother." + +"I know the miller, and it wasn't he--but when I come to think of it, +the youngster had that same rustic look to him. By Jove, I am sorry it +was a Revercomb," he added under his breath. + +A frown had settled on the face of the old gentleman, and he poured the +syrup over his buckwheat cakes with the manner of a man who is about to +argue a case for the defence when his natural sympathies are with the +prosecution. + +"They are an irascible family from the mother down," he observed, "and +I'm sorry you've got into trouble with them so soon for the miller is +probably the most popular man in the county." He paused, cleared his +throat, and after a tentative glance at Kesiah, which fell short of her +bosom, decided to leave the sentence in his mind unspoken while they +remained in her presence. + +A little later, when the two men were smoking in the library, Gay +brought the conversation back again to the point at which the lawyer had +so hastily dropped it. + +"Am I likely, then, to have trouble with the Revercombs?" he asked, with +a disturbing memory of Blossom's flaxen head under the hooded shawl. + +"It's not improbable that the family will take up the matter. These +country folk are fearful partisans, you see. However, it may lead +to nothing worse than the miller's refusing to grind your corn or +forbidding you to use the bridle path over his pasture." + +"Had my uncle any friction in that quarter when he lived here?" + +Mr. Chamberlayne's cigar had gone out while he talked, and striking a +match on a silver box, he watched the thin blue flame abstractedly an +instant before he answered. + +"Were you ever told," he inquired, "that there was some talk of +arresting Abner Revercomb before the coroner's jury agreed on a +verdict?" + +"Abner? He's the eldest of the brothers, isn't he? No, I hadn't heard of +it." + +"It was only the man's reputation for uprightness, I believe, that +prevented the arrest. The Revercombs are a remarkable family for their +station in life, and they derive their ability entirely from their +mother, who was one of the Hawtreys. They belong to the new order--to +the order that is rapidly forging to the surface and pushing us +dilapidated aristocrats out of the way. These people have learned a +lot in the last few years, and they are learning most of all that the +accumulation of wealth is the real secret of dominance. When they get +control of the money, they'll begin to strive after culture, and acquire +a smattering of education instead. It's astonishing, perhaps, but the +fact remains that a reputable, hard-working farmer like our friend the +miller, with his primitive little last century grist-mill, has probably +greater influence in the State to-day than you have, for all your two +thousand acres. He has intelligence enough to go to the Legislature and +make a fair showing, if he wants to, and I don't' believe that either of +us could stand in the race a minute against him." + +"Well, he's welcome to the doubtful honour! But the thing that puzzles +me is why in thunder his brother Abner should have wanted to shoot my +uncle?" + +"It seems--" the lawyer hesitated, coughed and glanced nervously at +the door as if he feared the intrusion of Kesiah--"it seems he was a +lover--was engaged in fact to Janet Merryweather before--before she +attracted your uncle's attention. Later the engagement was broken, and +he married a cousin in a fit of temper, it was said at the time. There +was always ill blood after this, it appeared, and on the morning of your +uncle's death Abner was seen crossing the pasture from Poplar Spring +with his gun on his shoulder." + +"It's an ugly story all round," remarked Gay quietly, "and I wish to +heaven that I were out of it. How has my poor mother stood it?" + +"She has known very little about it," Mr. Chamberlayne answered, while +his jutting eyebrows twitched nervously as he turned away. "Your mother, +my dear boy, is one of those particularly angelic characters from whose +presence even the thought of evil is banished. You have only to look +into her face to discern how pure and spotless she has kept her soul. +My old friend Jonathan was very devoted to her. She represented, indeed, +the spiritual influence in his life, and there was no one on earth whose +respect or affection he valued so highly. It was his consideration for +her alone that prevented him from making a most unfortunate marriage." + +"The girl died insane, didn't she?" + +"It was a distressing--a most distressing case; but we must remember, +in rendering our verdict, that if Janet Merryweather had upheld the +principles of her sex, it would never have happened." + +"We'll rest it there, then--but what of her daughter? The child could +hardly have been accessory before the fact, I suppose?" + +An expression of suffering patience came into the old gentleman's face, +and he averted his gaze as he had done before the looming countenance of +Kesiah. + +"Your uncle rarely spoke to me of her," he answered, "but I have reason +to know that her existence was a constant source of distress to him. He +was most anxious both to protect your mother and to provide generously +for the future of Janet's daughter. + +"Yet I understand that there was no mention of her in his will." + +"This omission was entirely on your mother's account. The considerable +property--representing a third of his entire estate--which was left in +trust to me for a secret purpose, will go, of course, to the girl. In +the last ten years this property has practically doubled in value, and +Molly will take possession of the income from it when she reaches her +twenty-first birthday. The one condition is that at Reuben's death she +shall live with your aunt." + +"Ah," said Jonathan, "I begin to see." + +"At the time, of course, he believed that your mother would survive +him only a few months, and his efforts to shield her from any painful +discoveries extended even after his death. His wish was that the +girl should be well educated and prepared for any change in her +circumstances--but unfortunately she has proved to be rather a wilful +young person, and it has been impossible entirely to fulfil his +intentions with regard to her. Ah, he wasn't wise always, poor Jonathan, +but I never doubted that he meant well at bottom, however things +may have appeared. His anxiety in the case of your mother was very +beautiful, and if his plans seem to have miscarried, we must lay the +blame after all, on the quality of his judgment, not of his heart." + +"And the girl will be twenty-one next April, I am told?" + +"Her birthday is the seventeenth, exactly ten years from the date of +Jonathan's death." + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +SHOWS TWO SIDES OF A QUARREL + + +At dusk that evening the miller, who had spent the day in Applegate, +stopped at Bottom's Ordinary on his way home, and received a garbled +account of the quarrel from the farmers gathered about the hospitable +hearth in the public room. The genius of personality had enabled Betsey +Bottom to hold open doors to the traveller long after the wayside tavern +in Virginia had passed from the road and the one certain fact relating +to the chance comer was that he never came. By combining a store with a +public house, she managed still to defy the progress of time as well as +the absence of guests. "Thank the Lord, I've never been one to give in +to changes!" it was her habit to exclaim. + +The room was full of tobacco smoke when Abel entered, and as he paused, +in order to distinguish the row of silhouettes nodding against the ruddy +square of the fireplace, Adam Doolittle's quavering voice floated to him +from a seat in the warmest corner. The old man was now turning ninety, +and he had had, on the whole, a fortunate life, though he would have +indignantly repudiated the idea. He was a fair type of the rustic of the +past generation--slow of movement, keen of wit, racy of speech. + +"What's this here tale about Mr. Jonathan knockin' Archie down an' +settin' on him, Abel?" he inquired. "Ain't you got yo' hand in yet, +seein' as you've been spilin' for a fight for the last fortnight?" + +"I hadn't heard of it," replied Abel, his face flushing. "What in hell +did he knock Archie down for?" + +"Jest for shooting' a few birds that might as well have been flying +about on yo' land as on his, if thar minds had been set over toward +you." + +"Do you mean Mr. Jonathan got into a quarrel with him for hunting on +his land? Why, we shot over those fields for a hundred years before the +first damned Gay ever came here." + +"So we have--so we have, but it seems we ain't a-goin' to do so any +longer if Mr. Jonathan can find a way to prevent it. Archie was down +here jest a minute or two arter you went by this mornin', an' he was +swearin' like thunder, with a busted lip an' a black eye." + +A smarting sensation passed over Abel, as though the change to the warm +room after the cold outside were stinging his flesh. + +"Well, I wish I had been there," he retorted, "somebody else would have +been knocked down and sat on if that had happened." + +"Ah, so I said--so I said," chuckled old Adam. "Thar ain't many men with +sech a hearty stomach for trouble, I was jest sayin' to Solomon." + +Bending over the fire, he lifted a live ember between two small sticks, +and placing it in the callous palm of his hand, blew softly on it an +instant before he lighted his pipe. + +"What goes against my way of thinkin'," remarked Betsey Bottom, wiping +a glass of cider on her checked apron before she handed it to Abel, "is +that so peaceable lookin' a gentleman as Mr. Jonathan should begin to +start a fuss jest as soon as he lands in the midst of us. Them plump, +soft-eyed males is generally inclined to mildness whether they be men or +cattle." + +"'Taint nothin' on earth but those foreign whims he's brought back an' +is tryin' to set workin' down here," said Solomon Hatch. "If we don't +get our backs up agin 'em in time, we'll find presently we don't even +dare to walk straight along the turnpike when we see him a comin'. A few +birds, indeed!--did anybody ever hear tell of sech doin's? 'Warn't them +birds in the air?' I ax, 'an' don't the air belong to Archie the same as +to him?'" + +"It's because he's rich an' we're po', that he's got a right to lay +claim to it," muttered William Ming, a weakly obstinate person, to whose +character a glass of cider contributed the only strength. + +"You'd better hold yo' tongue, suh," retorted his wife, "it ain't yo' +air anyway, is it?" + +"I reckon it's as much mine as it's Mr. Jonathan's," rejoined William, +who, having taken a double portion, had waxed argumentative. "An' what +I reason is that birds as is in the air ain't anybody's except the man's +that can bring 'em down with a gun." + +"That's mo' than you could do," replied his wife, "an' be that whether +or no, it's time you were thinkin' about beddin' the grey mule, an' she +ain't in the air, anyhow. If I was you, Abel," she continued in a softer +tone, "I wouldn't let 'em make me so riled about Mr. Jonathan till I'd +looked deep in the matter. It may be that he ain't acquainted with the +custom of the neighbourhood, an' was actin' arter some foolish foreign +laws he was used to." + +"I'll give him warning all the same," said Abel savagely, "that if I +ever catch him on my land I'll serve him in the fashion that he served +Archie." + +"You don't lose nothin' by goin' slow," returned Solomon. "Old Adam +there is a born fire eater, too, but he knows how to set back when +thar's trouble brewin'." + +"I ain't never set back mo' than was respectable in a man of ninety," +croaked old Adam indignantly, while he prodded the ashes in his corncob +pipe with his stubby forefinger. "'Tis my j'ints, not my sperits that +have grown feeble." + +"Oh, we all know that your were a gay dog an' a warnin' to the righteous +when you were young," rejoined Solomon, in an apologetic manner, "an' +it must be a deal of satisfaction to be able to look back on a sinful +past when you've grown old and repented. I've been a pious, God-fearing +soul from my birth, as you all know, friends, but sad to relate, I ain't +found the solid comfort in a life of virtue that I'd hoped for, an' +that's the truth." + +"The trouble with it, Solomon," replied old Adam, pushing a log back on +the andirons with his rough, thick soled boot to which shreds of manure +were clinging, "the trouble with it is that good or bad porridge, it all +leaves the same taste in the mouth arter you've once swallowed it. I've +had my pleasant trespasses in the past, but when I look backward on 'em +now, to save my life, I can't remember anything about 'em but some small +painful mishap that al'ays went along with 'em an' sp'iled the pleasure. +Thar was the evening I dressed up in my best clothes an' ran off to +Applegate to take a yellow haired circus lady, in pink skirts, out to +supper. It ought to have been a fine, glorious bit of wickedness to +remember, but the truth was that I'd put on a new pair of boots, an' one +of 'em pinched so in the toes that I couldn't think of another thing +the whole blessed evening. 'Tis al'ays that way in my experience of +life--when you glance back or glance befo' 'tis pleasant enough to the +eye, but at the moment while you're linin' it thar's al'ays the damn +shoe that pinches." + +"Ah, you're right, you're right, Mr. Doolittle," remarked William Ming, +who had lingered in the doorway to follow the conversation. + +"It's life, that's what it is," commented Solomon, heaving a sigh that +burst a button hole in his blue shirt. "An' what's mo' than life, it's +marriage. When I see the way some men wear themselves out with wantin' +little specks of women, I say to myself over an' over agin, 'Ah, if they +only knew that thar ain't nothin' in it except the wantin'.'" + +"Not another thing--not another blessed mite of a thing," agreed +William, who had imbibed secretly again behind the back of his wife. + +"I've know a man to throw himself into the river from sheer love befo' +marriage," said Solomon, "an' two weeks arter the woman had taken +him, to fall out with her because she'd put too much shortenin' in his +pie-crust." + +"It's all love befo' marriage an' all shortenin' arterwards," observed +Betsey Bottom, with scorn. "I've al'ays noticed in this world that the +less men folks have to say for themselves the better case they make of +it. When they've spent all thar time sence Adam tryin' to throw dust in +the eyes of women, it would be better manners if they'd stop twittin' +'em because they'd succeeded." + +"True, true, you never spoke a truer word, ma'am, in my acquaintance +with you," responded Solomon, with what hasty gallantry he could summon. +"I was thinkin' them very things to myself when you mentioned 'em. Not +that anybody could throw dust in yo' eyes, even if he tried to." + +"Well, it would take mo'n a man to do that, I reckon," she replied, +amiably enough, "I saw through 'em early, an' when you've once seen +through 'em it's surprisin' how soon the foolishness of men begins to +look like any other foolishness on earth." + +She was listened to with respectful and flattering attention by her +guests, who leaned forward with pipes in hand and vacant, admiring eyes +on her still comely features. It was a matter of gossip that she had +refused half the county, and that her reason for marrying William had +been that he wasn't "set," and would be easy to manage. The event had +proved the prophecy, and to all appearance it was a perfectly successful +mating. + +Abel was the first to move under her gaze, and rising from his chair by +the fire, he took up his hat, and made his way slowly through the group, +which parted grudgingly, and closed quickly together. + +"Take a night to sleep on yo' temper Abel," called Solomon after him, +"and git a good breakfast inside of you befo' you start out to do +anything rash. Well, I must be gittin' along, folks, sad as it seems to +me. It's strange to think, now ain't it--that when Nannie was married +to Tom Middlesex an' livin' six miles over yonder at Piping Tree, I +couldn't have got over that road too fast on my way to her." + +"You'd still feel like that, friend, if she were still married to Tom +Middlesex," quavered old Adam. "'Tis the woman we oughtn't to think on +that draws us with a hair." + +"Now that's a case in p'int," replied Solomon, nodding after the +vanishing figure of Abel. "All his wits are in his eyes, as you can tell +jest to look at him--an' for sech a little hop-o'-my-thumb female that +don't reach nigh up to his shoulder." + +"I can't see any particular good looks in the gal, myself," remarked +Mrs. Bottom, "but then, when it's b'iled down to the p'int, it ain't +her, but his own wishes he's chasin'." + +"Did you mark the way she veered from him to Mr. Jonathan the other +day?" inquired William Ming, "she's the sort that would flirt with a +scarecrow if thar warn't anything else goin'." + +"The truth is that her eyes are bigger than her morals, an' I said it +the first time I ever seed her," rejoined old Adam. "My taste, even when +I was young, never ran to women that was mo' eyes than figger." + +Still discoursing, they stumbled out into the dusk, through which Abel's +large figure loomed ahead of them. + +"A man that's born to trouble, an' that of the fightin' kind--as the +sparks fly upward," added the elder. + +As the miller drove out of the wood, the rustle of the leaves under his +wheels changed from the soft murmurs in the moist hollows to the crisp +crackle in the open places. In the west Venus hung silver white over the +new moon, and below the star and the crescent a single pine tree stood +as clearly defined as if it were pasted on a grey background of sky. + +Half a mile farther on, where his road narrowed abruptly, a voice +hallooed to him as he approached, and driving nearer he discerned dimly +a man's figure standing beside a horse that had gone lame. + +"Halloo, there? Have you a light? My horse has got a stone or cast a +shoe, I can't make out which it is." + +Reaching for the lantern under his seat, Abel alighted and after calling +"Whoa!" to his mare, walked a few steps forward to the stationary +horse and rider in the dusk ahead. As the light shone on the man and he +recognized Jonathan Gay, he hesitated an instant, as though uncertain +whether to advance or retreat. + +"If I'd known 'twas you," he observed gruffly, "I shouldn't have been so +quick about getting down out of my gig." + +"Thank you, all the same," replied Gay in his pleasant voice. "It +doesn't seem to be a stone, after all," he added. "I'm rather afraid he +got a sprain when he stumbled into a hole a yard or two back." + +Kneeling in the road, Abel lifted the horse's foot, and felt for the +injury with a practised hand. + +"Needs a bandage," he said at last curtly. "I happen to have a bottle of +liniment in the gig." + +The light glided like a winged insect over the strip of corduroy road, +and a minute later the pungent odour of the liniment floated to Gay's +nostrils. + +"Give me anything you have for a compress," remarked the miller, +dropping again on his knees. "Pick a few of those Jimson weeds by the +fence and lend me your handkerchief--or a couple of them would be still +better. There, now, that's the best I can do," he added after a moment. +"Lead him slowly and be sure to look where you're going." + +"I will, thank you--but can you find your way without the lantern?" + +"Hannah can travel the road in the dark and so can I for that matter. +You needn't thank me, by the way. I wouldn't have troubled about you, +but I've a liking for horses." + +"A jolly good thing it was for me that you came up at the instant. I +say, Revercomb, I'm sorry it was your brother I got into a row with this +morning." + +"Oh, that's another score. We haven't settled it yet," retorted the +Miller, as he stepped into his gig. "You've warned us off your land, so +I'll trouble you to keep to the turnpike and avoid the bridle path that +passes my pasture." + +Before Gay could reply, the other had whistled to his mare and was +spinning over the flat road into the star-spangled distance. + +When the miller reached home and entered the kitchen, his mother's first +words related to the plight of Archie, who sat sullenly nursing his +bruised mouth in one corner. + +"If you've got any of the Hawtrey blood in yo' veins you'll take +sides with the po' boy," she said. "Thar's Abner settin' over thar so +everlastin' mealy mouthed that he won't say nothin' mo' to the p'int +than that he knew all the time it would happen." + +"Well, that's enough, ain't it?" growled Abner; "I did know it would +happen sure enough from the outset." + +"Thar ain't any rousin' him," observed Sarah, with scorn. "I declar, +I believe pa over thar has got mo' sperit in him even if he does live +mostly on cornmeal mush." + +"Plenty of sperit in me--plenty of sperit," chirped grandfather, alert +as an aged sparrow that still contrives to hop stiffly in the sunshine. + +"Oh, yes, he's sperit left in him, though he's three years older than +I am," remarked grandmother, with bitterness. "_He_ ain't wo' out with +work and with child bearin' befo' he was ninety. _He_ ain't bald, +_he_ ain't toothless," she concluded passionately, as if each of +grandfather's blessings were an additional insult to her. "He can still +eat hard food when he wants it." + +"For pity's sake, be quiet, ma," commanded Sarah sternly, at which the +old woman broke into sobs. + +"Yes, I must be quiet, but _he_ can still talk," she moaned. + +"Tell me about it, Archie," said Abel, drawing off his overcoat and +sitting down to his supper. "I passed Jonathan Gay in the road and he +asked me to bind up his horse's sprain." + +"He'd be damned befo' I'd bind up a sprain for him!" burst out Archie, +with violence. "Met me with a string of partridges this morning and +jumped on me, blast him, as if he'd caught me in the act of stealing. +I'd like to know if we hadn't hunted on that land before he or his +rotten old uncle were ever thought of?" + +"Ah, those were merry days, those were!" piped grandfather. "Used to go +huntin' myself when I was young, with Mr. Jordan, an' brought home any +day as many fine birds as I could carry. Trained his dogs for him, too." + +"Thar was al'ays time for him to go huntin'," whimpered grandmother. + +"What are you goin' to do about it, Abel?" asked Sarah, turning upon him +with the smoking skillet in her hand. + +At the question Blossom Revercomb, who was seated at work under the +lamp, raised her head and waited with an anxious, expectant look for the +answer. She was embroidering a pair of velvet slippers for Mr. Mullen--a +task begun with passion and now ending with weariness. While she +listened for Abel's response, her long embroidery needle remained +suspended over the toe of the slipper, where it gleamed in the lamp +light. + +"I don't know," replied Abel, and Blossom drew a repressed sigh of +relief; "I've just ordered him to keep clear of our land, if that's what +you're hintin' at." + +"If you had the sperit of yo' grandpa you'd have knocked him down in the +road," said Sarah angrily. + +"Yes, yes, I'd have knocked him down in the road," chimed in the old +man, with the eagerness of a child. + +"You can't knock a man down when he asks to borrow your lantern," +returned Abel, doggedly, on the defensive. + +"Oh, you can't, can't you?" jeered Sarah. "All you're good for, I +reckon, is to shuck corn or peel potatoes!" + +For a minute Abel stared at her in silence. "I declare, mother, I don't +believe you're any better than a heathen," he remarked sadly at last. + +"Well, I'm not the kind of Christian you are, anyway," retorted Sarah, +"I'd like to know whar you'll find anything in Scripture about not +knockin' a man down because he asks you for a lantern. I thought I knew +my Bible--but I reckon you are better acquainted with it--you an' yo' +Mr. Mullen." + +"Of course, you know your Bible. I wasn't meanin' that." + +"Then if readin' yo' Bible ain't bein' a Christian, I suppose it's +havin' curly hair, an' gittin' up in the pulpit an' mincin'. Who are +those slippers for, Keren-happuch?" + +"Mr. Mullen, grandma." + +"Well, if I was goin' to embroider slippers for a minister," taunted +Sarah, "I'd take care to choose one that could repeat his Scripture when +he was called on." + +"Ah, 'tis the age, not the man," lamented grandfather, "'tis an age of +small larnin' an' weak-kneed an' mealy mouthed into the bargain. Why, +they're actually afeared to handle hell-fire in the pulpit any longer, +an' the texts they spout are that tame an' tasteless that 'tis like +dosin' you with flaxseed tea when you're needin' tar-water. 'Twas +different when I was young and in my vigour," he went on eagerly, +undisturbed by the fact that nobody paid the slightest attention to what +he was saying, "for sech was the power and logic of Parson Claymore's +sermons that he could convict you of the unpardonable sin against the +Holy Ghost even when you hadn't committed it. A mo' blameless soul never +lived than my father, yet I remember one Sunday when parson fixed his +eye upon him an' rolled out his stirrin' text 'Thou art the man,' he +was so taken by surprise an' suddenness that he just nodded back at the +pulpit 'an answered, 'Yes, parson, I am, if you'll excuse me.'" + +"It's a pity ain't mo' like Parson Claymore now," remarked Sarah, who +had stopped to listen to the concluding words of the anecdote. "Thar +ain't vim enough in this generation of preachers to skeer a rabbit." + +Her profile, with its sparse wave of hair from the forehead, was +repeated in grotesque exaggeration on the wall at her back. The iron +will in her lent a certain metallic hardness to her features, and her +shadow resembled in outline the head on some ancient coin that had lain +buried for centuries. Intrenched behind an impregnable self-esteem, she +had never conceded a point, never admitted a failure, never accepted a +compromise. "It ain't no wonder that a new comer thinks he can knock +you down an' set on you for shootin' a few birds," she added, after a +moment. + +"He'll find out I ain't done with him yet," growled Archie, and rising +from his seat, he took down his gun and began polishing the barrel with +an old yarn stocking of Sarah's. + +The long needle missed the hole at which Blossom had pointed it, and she +looked up with a sullen droop to her mouth. + +"I reckon Mr. Gay has just as good a right to his things as we have to +ours," she said. + +"Right! Who wants his right?" flared Archie, turning upon her. "You'll +say next, I reckon, that he had a right to split my upper lip open if he +wanted to." + +"From the way grandma carries on anybody would think that was what +_she_ wanted," persisted Blossom, adhering stubbornly to the point, "she +sounds as if she were mad because people ain't everlastingly fighting." + +"You needn't think I don't see what you're aimin' at, Keren-happuch," +rejoined Sarah, who used this name only in moments of anger, "you're +tryin' to make me think a grown man can't do anything better than get up +in the pulpit and mouth texts so soft that a babe couldn't cut its teeth +on 'em. You've had notions in yo' head about Orlando Mullen ever since +he came here, an' you ain't fooled me about 'em." + +"Thar, thar, don't you begin pesterin' Blossom," interposed Abner, +aroused at last from his apathy. + +"Notions about Mr. Mullen!" repeated Blossom, and though there was a hot +flush in her face, her tone was almost one of relief. + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +IN WHICH MOLLY FLIRTS + + +On a November morning several weeks later, when the boughs of trees +showed almost bare against the sky, Molly Merryweather walked down to +Bottom's store to buy a bottle of cough syrup for Reuben, who had a +cold. Over the counter Mrs. Bottom, as she was still called from an +hereditary respect for the house rather than for the husband, delivered +a coarse brown paper. The store, which smelt of dry-goods and ginger +snaps, was a small square room jutting abruptly out of the bar, from +which it derived both its warmth and its dignity. + +"Even men folks have got the sperit of worms and will turn at last," she +remarked in her cheerful voice, which sounded as if it issued from the +feather bed she vaguely resembled. + +"Let them turn--I can do without them very well," replied Molly, tossing +her head. + +"Ah, you're young yet, my dear, an' thar's a long road ahead of you. But +wait till you've turned forty an' you'll find that the man you throwed +over at twenty will come handy, if for nothin' mo' than to fill a gap in +the chimney. I ain't standin' up for 'em, mind you, an' I can't remember +that I ever heard anything particular to thar credit as a sex--but po' +things as we allow 'em to be, thar don't seem but one way to git along +without 'em, an' that is to have 'em. It's sartain sure, however, that +they fill a good deal mo' of yo' thought when they ain't around than +when they are. Why, look at William, now--the first time he axed me to +marry him, I kept sayin' 'you're still slue-footed an' slack-kneed an' +addle-headed an' I'll marry you whether or no.' Twenty years may +not change a man for the better, but it does a powerful lot toward +persuadin' a woman to put up with the worst!" + +"Well, best or worst, I've seen enough of marriage, Mrs. Bottom, to know +that I shouldn't like it." + +"I ain't denyin' it might be improved on without hurtin' it--but a +single woman's a terrible lonesome body, Molly." + +"I'm not lonely, while I have grandfather." + +"He's old an' he ain't got many years ahead of him." + +"If I lose him I'll go to Applegate and trim hats for a living." + +"It's a shame, Molly, with the po' miller splittin' his heart over you." + +"He'll mend it. They're like that, all of them." + +"But Mr. Mullen? Ain't he different now, bein' a parson?" + +"No, he's just the same, and besides he'd always think he'd stooped to +marry me." + +"Then take Jim Halloween. With three good able-bodied lovers at yo' +beck an' call, it's a downright shame to die an old maid just from pure +contrariness. It's better arter all, to eat dough that don't rise than +to go hungry." + +A step sounded on the platform outside and a lank, good-looking +countryman glanced cautiously in through the crack in the door. +Observing Molly, he spat a wad of tobacco over the hitching rail by the +steps, and stopped to smooth his straw-coloured hair with the palm of +his hand before crossing the threshold. + +"Thar's Jim Halloween now jest as we were speakin' of him," whispered +Betsey Bottom, with a nudge at Molly's shoulder. + +"Well, if that don't beat all," drawled the young man, in an embarrassed +rapture, as he entered. "I was gettin' my horse shod over thar at Tim +Mallory's, an' I thought to myself that I'd jest drop over an' say +'howdy' to Mrs. Bottom." + +"Oh, I reckon you caught a glimpse of red through the door," chuckled +Betsey, who was possessed of the belief that it was her Christian duty +to further any match, good or bad, that came under her eye. + +"I must be going, so don't hurry your visit," replied Molly, laughing. +"Mrs. Hatch has been in bed for a week and I'm on my way to see Judy." + +"I'll walk a bit of the road with you if you ain't any serious +objection," remarked the lover, preparing to accompany her. + +"Oh, no, none in the world," she replied demurely, "you may carry my +cough syrup." + +"It ain't for yourself, I hope?" he inquired, with a look of alarm. + +"No, for grandfather. He caught cold staying in the barn with the red +cow." + +"Well, I'm glad 'taint for you--I don't like a weak-chested woman." + +She looked up smiling as they passed the store into the sunken road +which led in the direction of Solomon Hatch's cottage. + +"I did see a speck of red through the crack," he confessed after a +minute, as if he were unburdening his conscience of a crime. + +"You mean you saw my cap or jacket--or maybe my gloves?" + +"It was yo' cap, an' so I came in. I hope you have no particular +objection?" His face had flushed to a violent crimson and in his throat +his Adam's apple worked rapidly up and down between the high points of +his collar. "I mean," he stammered presently, "that I wouldn't have gone +in if I hadn't seen that bit of red through the do'. I suppose I had +better tell you, that I've been thinking a great deal about you in the +evening when my day's work is over." + +"I'm glad I don't interfere with your farming." + +"That would be a pity, wouldn't it? Do you ever think of me, I wonder, +at the same time?" he inquired sentimentally. + +"I can't tell because I don't know just what that time is, you see." + +"Well, along after supper generally--particularly if ma has made +buckwheat cakes an' I've eaten a hearty meal an' feel kind of cosy an' +comfortable when I set down by the fire an' there's nothin' special to +do." + +"But you see I don't like buckwheat cakes, and I've always something +'special' to do at that hour." + +"Ah, you don't mean it, do you--about not liking buckwheat cakes? As +for the rest, bein' a woman, I reckon you would have the washin' up to +attend to just at that time. I don't like a woman that sets around idle +after supper--an' I'm glad you're one to be brisk an' busy about the +house, though I'm sorry you ain't over partial to buckwheat. May I +inquire, if you don't object to tellin' me, what is yo' favourite food?" + +"It's hard to say--I have so many--bread and jam, I believe." + +"I hope you don't think I'm too pressin' on the subject, but ma has +always said that there wasn't any better bond for matrimony than the +same taste in food. Do you think she's right?" + +"I shouldn't wonder. She's had experience anyway." + +"Yes, that's jest what I tell her--she's had experience an' she ought +to know. Pa and she never had a word durin' the thirty years of their +marriage, an' she always said she ruled him not with the tongue, but +with the fryin' pan. I don't reckon there's a better cook than ma in +this part of the country, do you?" + +"I'm quite sure there isn't. She has given up her life to it." + +"To be sure she has--every minute of it, like the woman whose price +is above rubies that Mr. Mullen is so fond of preachin' about." For +a moment he considered the fact as though impressed anew by its +importance. "I'm glad you feel that way, because ma has always stuck out +that you had the makin' of a mighty fine cook in you." + +"Has she? That was nice of her, wasn't it?" + +"Well, she wouldn't have said so if she hadn't thought it. It ain't her +way to say pleasant things when she can help it. You must judge her by +her work not by her talk, pa used to say." + +"She's the kind that doesn't mind taking trouble for you, I know that +about her," replied Molly, gravely. + +"You're right about that, an' you're the same way, I am sure. I've +watched you pretty closely with your grandfather." + +"Yes, I believe I am--with grandfather." + +"'Twill be the same way when you marry, I was sayin' as much to ma only +yesterday. 'She'd be jest as savin' an' thrifty as you,'--I mean, of +course, if the right man got you to marry him,--but 'tis all the same +in the end." Again he paused, cleared his throat, and swallowed +convulsively, "I've sometimes felt that I might be the right man, Miss +Molly," he said. + +"O Mr. Halloween!" + +"Why, I thought you knew I felt so from the way you looked at me." + +"But I can't help the way I look, can I?" + +"Well, I've told you now, so it ain't a secret. I've thought about +askin' you for more than a year--ever since you smiled at me one Sunday +in church while Mr. Mullen was preachin'." + +"Did I? I've quite forgotten it!" + +"I suppose you have, seein' you smile so frequent. But that put the idea +in my head anyway an' I've cared a terrible lot about marryin' you ever +since." + +"But I'm not the kind of person, at all. I'm not saving, I'm not +thrifty." + +"I hope you're wrong--but even if you're not, well, I want you terrible +hard just the same. You see I can always keep an eye on the expenses," +he hastened to add, and made a desperate clutch at her hand. + +The red worsted mitten came off in his grasp, and he stood eyeing it +ruefully while he waited for her answer. + +"I've determined never, never to marry," she replied. + +His chest heaved. "I knew you felt that way about the other's but I +thought somehow I was different," he rejoined. + +"No, it's not the man, but marriage that I don't like," she responded, +shaking her head. "It's all work an' no play wherever I've seen it." + +"It's terrible for a woman to feel like that, an' goes against God an' +nature," he answered. "Have you ever tried prayin' over it?" + +"No, I've never tried that, because you see, I don't really mind it very +much. Please give me my glove now, here is Judy's cottage." + +"But promise me first that you'll try prayin' over your state of mind, +an' that I may go on hopin' that you will change it?" + +Turning with her hand still outstretched for the glove, she glanced +roguishly from his face to the shuttered window of the Hatch cottage. + +"Oh, I don't mind your hoping," she answered, composing her expression +to demureness, "if only you won't hope--very hard." + +Then, leaving him overwhelmed by his emotions, she tripped up the +narrow walk, bordered by stunted rose-bushes, to the crumbling porch of +Solomon's house. At the door a bright new gig, with red wheels, caught +her eye, and before the mischievous dimples had fled from her cheek, she +ran into the arms of the Reverend Orlando Mullen. + +Her confusion brought a beautiful colour into his cheeks, while, in a +chivalrous effort to shield her from further embarrassment, he turned +his eyes to the face of Judy Hatch, which was lifted at his side like +the rapt countenance of one of the wan-featured, adoring saints of a Fra +Angelico painting. No one--not even the nurse of his infancy--had ever +imputed a fault either to his character or to his deportment; for he +had come into the world endowed with an infallible instinct for the +commonplace. In any profession he would have won success as a shining +light of mediocrity, since the ruling motive of his conduct was less the +ambition to excel than the moral inability to be peculiar. His mind was +small and solemn, and he had worn three straight and unyielding wrinkles +across his forehead in his earnest endeavour to prevent people from +acting, and especially from thinking, lightly. This sedulous devotion to +the public morals kept him not only a trifle spare in figure, but lent +an habitual manner of divine authority to his most trivial utterance. +His head, seen from the rear, was a little flat, but this, fortunately, +did not show in the pulpit--where at the age of twenty-four his +eloquence enraptured his congregation. + +"I postponed my visit to Applegate until to-morrow," he said, when +he had given her what he thought was sufficient time to recover her +composure. "If you are returning shortly, perhaps I may have the +pleasure of driving you in my gig. I have just come to inquire after +Mrs. Hatch." + +"It would be kind of you, for I am a little tired," responded Molly. +"I came to speak to Judy, and then I am to stop at the mill to borrow a +pattern from Blossom Revercomb. Are you going that way, I wonder?" + +"I shall make it my way," he replied gallantly, "as soon as you are +ready. Don't hurry, I beg of you. It is gratifying to me to find that +you have so soon taken my advice and devoted a portion of your days to +visiting the sick and the afflicted." + +With her back discreetly turned upon Judy, she looked up at him for a +moment, and something in her eyes rendered unnecessary the words that +fell slowly and softly from her lips. + +"You give such good advice, Mr. Mullen." + +A boyish eagerness showed in his face, breaking through the professional +austerity of his manner. + +"I hope you've advised Judy this morning," she added before he could +answer. + +"To the best of my ability," he replied gravely. "And now, as I have +said before, there is no hurry, but if you are quite ready, I should +suggest our starting." + +"Just a word or two with Judy," she answered, and when the words were +spoken in the doorway she laid her hand in the rector's and mounted, +with his scrupulous assistance, over the red wheel to the shining black +seat of the gig, which smelt of leather and varnish. After he had taken +his place beside her he tucked in the laprobe carefully at the corners, +rearranged the position of his overcoat at her back, and suggested that +she should put the bottle of cough syrup in the bottom of the vehicle. + +Like all his attentions, this solicitude about the cough syrup had an +air that was at once amorous and ministerial, a manner of implying, +"Observe how I take possession of you always to your advantage." + +"Are you quite comfortable?" he asked when they had rolled between the +stunted rose-bushes into the turnpike. + +"Oh, perfectly, you are always so thoughtful, Mr. Mullen." + +"I think I am right in ranking thoughtfulness--or consideration, I +should have said--among the virtues." + +"Indeed you are; as soon as I found that you had not gone to Applegate +as you intended to, I said to myself that, of course, some act of +kindness had detained you." + +His large, very round grey eyes grew soft as he looked at her. + +"You have expressed it beautifully, as 'an act of kindness,'" he +returned, "since you yourself were the cause of my postponing my visit." + +"I--oh, you can't mean it? What have I done?" + +"Nothing. Don't alarm yourself--absolutely nothing. Three months ago +when I spoke to you of marriage, you entreated me to allow you a +little time in which to accustom yourself to my proposal. That time of +probation, which has been, I hope, equally trying to us both, has ended +to-day." + +"But I don't think I really love you, Mr. Mullen." + +"I trust your eyes rather than your words--and your eyes have told me, +all unconsciously to yourself, your secret." + +"Well, I do love your sermons, but---" + +"My sermons are myself. There is nothing in my life, I trust, that +belies my preaching." + +"I know how good you are, but honestly and truly, I don't want to marry +anybody." + +His smile hardened slowly on his face like an impression on metal that +cools into solidity. From the beginning he had conducted his courtship, +as he had conducted his sacred office, with the manner of a gentleman +and the infallibility of an apostle. Doubt of his perfect fitness for +either vocation had never entered his head. Had it done so he would +probably have dismissed it as one of the insidious suggestions of the +lower man--for the lower man was a creature who habitually disagreed +with his opinions and whom his soul abhorred. + +As he sat beside her, clerical, well-groomed, with his look of small yet +solemn intelligence, she wondered seriously if he would, in spite of all +opposition, have his way with her at last and pattern her to his liking? + +"I am not in the least what you think me, Mr. Mullen--I don't know just +how to say it---" + +"There is but one thing you need know, dearest, and that is that you +love me. As our greatest poet has expressed it 'To know no more is +woman's happiest knowledge.'" + +"But I can't feel that you really--really care for me. How can you?" + +With a tender gesture, he laid his free hand on hers while he looked +into her downcast face. + +"You allude, I suppose, to the sad fact of your birth," he replied +gently, "but after you have become my wife, you will, of course need no +name but mine." + +"I'm so sorry, Mr. Mullen, but really I didn't mean you to think--Oh, +there's the mill and Abel looking out of the window. Please, please +don't sit so close to me, and look as if we were discussing your sick +parishioners." + +He obeyed her instantly, quite as circumspect as she in his regard for +the proprieties. + +"You are excited now, Molly dear, but you will not forbid my hoping that +you will accept my proposal," he remarked persuasively as the gig drew +up to the Revercombs' gate. + +"Well, yes, if you'll let me get down now, you may hope, if you wish +to." + +Alighting over the wheel before he could draw off his glove and assist +her, she hurried, under Abel's eyes, to the porch, where Blossom +Revercomb stood gazing happily in the direction of Jordan's Journey. + + + +CHAPTER X + + +THE REVEREND ORLANDO MULLEN PREACHES A SERMON + + + +On the following Sunday, a mild autumn morning, Mr. Mullen preached one +of his most impressive sermons from the text, "_She looketh well to the +ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness_." + +Woman, he said in the course of it, was created to look after the ways +of her household in order that man might go out into the world and make +a career. No womanly woman cared to make a career. What the womanly +woman desired was to remain an Incentive, an Ideal, an Inspiration. If +the womanly woman possessed a talent, she did not use it--for this would +unsex her--she sacrificed it in herself in order that she might +return it to the race through her sons. Self-sacrifice--to use a worn +metaphor--self-sacrifice was the breath of the nostrils of the womanly +woman. It was for her power of self-sacrifice that men loved her and +made an Ideal of her. Whatever else woman gave up, she must always +retain her power of self-sacrifice if she expected the heart of her +husband to rejoice in her. The home was founded on sacrifice, and woman +was the pillar and the ornament of the home. There was her sphere, her +purpose, her mission. All things outside of that sphere belonged to man, +except the privilege of ministering to the sick and the afflicted in +other households. + +He leaned forward in the old pulpit, his shapely, well-kept hand hanging +over the edge in one of his most characteristic gestures; and the autumn +sunlight, falling through the plain glass windows, shone on his temples. +Immediately below him, in a front pew, sat his mother, a dried little +old woman, with beady black eyes and a pointed chin, which jutted out +from between the stiff taffeta strings of her poke bonnet. She gazed +upward, clasping her Prayer-book in her black woollen gloves, which were +darned in the fingers; and though she appeared to listen attentively to +the sermon, she was wondering all the time if the coloured servant at +home would remember to baste the roast pig she had left in the oven. +To-day was the Reverend Orlando's birthday, and the speckled pig she had +fattened throughout the summer, lay now, with an apple in his mouth, on +the trencher. She had invited Molly to dine with them rather against +her wishes, for she harboured a secret fear that the girl was trying +to marry the rector. Besides, as she said to herself, with her eyes +on Orlando's hand, how on earth could he do full justice to the pig if +there was a pretty parishioner to distract his attention? + +In the pew next to Mrs. Mullen sat old Adam Doolittle, his hand behind +his left ear, his withered old lips moving as if he were repeating the +words of the sermon. From time to time he shook his head as though he +disagreed with a sentence, and then his lips worked more rapidly, and +an obstinate, argumentative look appeared in his face. Mentally he was +conducting a theological dispute with the preacher in which the younger +man suffered always a crushing rhetorical defeat. Behind him sat the +miller and Blossom Revercomb, who threw an occasional anxious glance at +the empty seat beside Mrs. Gay and Kesiah; and behind them Judy Hatch +raised her plain, enraptured face to the pulpit, where the rector had +shaken out an immaculately ironed handkerchief and wiped his brow. +She knew who had ironed that handkerchief on Wednesday, which was Mrs. +Mullen's washing day, and her heart rejoiced as she remembered the care +with which she had folded the creases. + +It made no difference, said Mr. Mullen, replacing the handkerchief +somewhere under his white surplice, whether a woman was ugly or +beautiful, since they possessed Scriptural authority for the statement +that beauty was vain, and no God-fearing man would rank loveliness of +face or form above the capacity for self-sacrifice and the unfailing +attendance upon the sick and the afflicted in any parish. Beauty, +indeed, was but too often a snare for the unwary--temptresses, he had +been told, were usually beautiful persons. + +Molly's lips trembled into a smile, and her eyes were wide and bright as +she met those of the preacher. For an instant he looked at her, gentle, +admonishing, reproachful--then his gaze passed over Judy's seraphic +features to the face of an old grey horse that stared wonderingly in +through the south window. Along the whitewashed plank fence of the +church-yard, other horses were waiting patiently for the service to +end, and from several side saddles, of an ancient pattern, hung flopping +alpaca riding skirts, which the farmer's wives or daughters had worn +over their best gowns to church. A few locust trees shed their remaining +small yellow leaves on the sunken graves, which were surrounded by +crumbling wooden enclosures. Here and there, farther off, a flat +tombstone was still visible in the tall grass; and over the dust of old +Jonathan Gay a high marble cross, selected by his brother's widow, bore +the words, unstained by the dripping trees, and innocent of satire: +"Here lieth in the hope of a joyful resurrection---" + +At the end of the service there was a rustle either of relief or +disappointment, and the congregation filed slowly through the south +doors, where the old grey horse stood resigned and expectant amid the +obliterated graves. Mrs. Gay, who had lingered in the walk to speak +to Mr. Mullen, raised her plaintive violet eyes to his face when he +appeared. + +"You are always so comforting. I don't know how to thank you for helping +me," she murmured, and added impulsively to the little old woman at his +side, "Oh, what a blessing such a son must be to you!" + +"Orlando's never given me a moment's worry in his life, ma'am--not even +when he was teething," replied Mrs. Mullen, who looked sharper and more +withered than ever in the broad daylight. "If you'll believe me, he +wasn't more than six months old when I said to his father that I +could tell by the look of him he was intended for the ministry. Such +sweetness, such self-control even as an infant." + +"How happy he must make you! And then, to have the privilege of hearing +his beautiful sermons! But you'll lose him some day, as I was just +saying to Kesiah. It won't be long before some fortunate woman takes him +away from you. We can only hope she will be worthy of the ideal he has +for her." + +"Ah, that's just it, Mrs. Gay, I sometimes tell myself there isn't a +woman in the world that's fit for him." + +She spoke as fast as she could, eager to dilate on the subject of the +embarrassed Orlando's virtues, flattered in her motherly old heart by +the praise of his sermons, and yet, all the time, while her peaked chin +worked excitedly, thinking about the roasted young pig that waited for +her to attend to the garnishing. + +The delay was short; Orlando silenced her at last by a gentle admonitory +pressure of her elbow, and the two ladies drove off in their carriage, +while Molly walked sedately out of the churchyard between the clergyman +and his mother. The girl was pleasantly aware that the eyes of the +miller and of Jim Halloween followed her disapprovingly as she went; and +she thought with complacency that she had never looked better than +she did in her white felt hat with its upturned brim held back by +cherry-coloured ribbon. It was all very well for the rector to say +that beauty was of less importance than visiting the sick, but the fact +remained that Judy Hatch visited the sick more zealously than she--and +yet he was very far, indeed, from falling in love with Judy Hatch! The +contradiction between man and his ideal of himself was embodied before +her under a clerical waistcoat. + +"I believe," remarked the Reverend Orlando, thrusting his short chin as +far as possible over his collar, which buttoned at the back, "I believe +that the elder Doolittle nourishes some private grudge against me. He +has a most annoying habit of shaking his head at me during the sermon as +though he disagreed with my remarks." + +"The man must be an infidel," observed Mrs. Mullen, with asperity, as +she moved on in front of him. + +"He doesn't know half the time what he is doing," said Molly, "you know +he passed his ninetieth birthday last summer." + +"But surely you cannot mean that you consider age an excuse for +either incivility or irreligion," rejoined her lover, pushing aside an +impertinent carrot flower that had shed its pollen on his long coat, +while he regarded his mother's back with the expression of indignant +suspicion he unconsciously assumed on the rare occasions when his +opinions were disputed. "Age should mellow, should soften, should +sweeten." + +"I suppose it should, but very often it doesn't," retorted Molly, a +trifle tartly, for the sermon had bored her and she looked forward with +dread to the dinner. + +At her words Mrs. Mullen, who was walking a little ahead, with her +skirts held up to avoid the yellow stain of the golden-rod, glanced +sharply back, as she had done in church when old Adam had coughed at the +wrong time and spoiled the full effect of a period. + +"One reason that Orlando is so helpful to people is that he always sees +so clearly just what they ought to be," she observed. "I don't believe +there's a man in the ministry or out, who has a higher ideal of woman +and her duty." + +"But do women ever live up to his ideal of them?" + +"It isn't his fault if they don't. All he can do is to point it out to +them earnestly and without ceasing." + +They had reached the rectory gate, where she hesitated an instant with +her hand on the latch, and her head bent toward the house in a surprised +and listening attitude. "I declare, Orlando, if I didn't go off and +leave that cat locked up in the parlour!" she exclaimed in horror as she +hurried away. + +"Yes," observed Mr. Mullen in his tenderest and most ministerial manner, +"my ideal is a high one, and when I look into your face, I see reflected +all the virtues I would have you reach. I see you the perfect woman, +sharing my sorrows, easing my afflictions---" + +Intoxicated by his imagination, he turned toward her as though he beheld +the living embodiment of his eloquence. + +For a minute Molly smiled up at him; then, "I wonder if your mother +really locked the cat in the parlour," she rejoined demurely. + +After the birthday dinner, at which Mrs. Mullen talked ceaselessly of +Orlando's excellencies, while she reserved the choicest piece of meat +and the fattest dumpling for his plate, Molly tied her cherry-coloured +strings under her chin, and started home, with a basket of apple tarts +for Reuben on her arm. At the crossroads Mr. Mullen left her to return +to an afternoon Sunday school, and she was about to stop at the ordinary +to ask William to see her safely over the pasture, when Abel Revercomb, +looking a trifle awkward in his Sunday clothes, came out of the house +and held out his hand for the basket. + +"I thought you'd be coming home this way after dinner," he said, turning +his throat when he moved. His hair was brushed flat on his head as +was his habit on Sundays, and he wore a vivid purple tie, which he had +bought on his last journey to Applegate. He had never looked worse, nor +had he ever felt quite so confident of the entire correctness of his +appearance. + +As Molly made no reply, but merely fell into step at his side, he +inquired, after a moment's pause, "How did you enjoy the sermon?" + +"Oh, I don't like to be preached at, and I'm sorry for Mr. Mullen's wife +if he expects her to ease everybody's pains in the parish. He looked +very handsome in church," she added, "didn't you think so?" + +"I didn't notice," he answered ruefully. "I never pay any attention to +the way a man looks, in church or out of it." + +"Well, I do--and even Judy Hatch does. She asked me the other day whom +I thought the handsomest man in the neighbourhood, and I'm sure she +expected me to say Mr. Mullen." + +She dimpled, and his arm went out impulsively toward her. + +"But you didn't, Molly?" he returned. + +"Why, of course not--did you imagine that I should? I said I thought Mr. +Jonathan Gay was the best looking." + +His arm fell to his side, and for a minute or two he walked on in +silence. + +"I wish I didn't love you, Molly," he burst out at last. "I sometimes +almost believe that you're one of the temptresses Mr. Mullen preached +against this morning. I've tried again and again to tear you out of my +heart, but it is useless." + +"Yes, it's useless, Abel," she answered, melting to dimples. + +"I tell myself," he went on passionately, "that you're not worth +it--that you're perfectly heartless--that you're only a flirt--that +other men have held your hands, kissed your lips even---" + +"And after telling yourself those dreadful truths, what happens?" she +inquired with interest. + +"What happens? Well, I go to work and don't think of you for at least +three hours. Then, when I am dead tired I stop for a minute to rest, and +as soon as my eyes fall on a bit of green grass, or a flower growing by +the road, or the blue sky, there you are again, popping in between them +with your big eyes and your mouth that was made for kisses. I forget how +heartless and light you are, and remember only the times you've crept up +to me and put your hand on my arm and said, 'Abel, I'm sorry.' Most of +all I remember the one time you kissed me, Molly." + +"Don't, Abel," she said quickly, and her voice broke and died in her +throat. + +As he drew close to her, she walked faster until her steps changed into +a run. + +"If you only knew me as I am, you wouldn't care so, Abel," she threw +back at him. + +"I don't believe you know yourself as you are, Molly," he answered. +"It's not you that leads men on to make love to you and then throws them +over--as you have thrown me--as you will throw Mr. Mullen." His tone +grew suddenly stern. "You don't love Mr. Mullen, and you know it," he +added. "If you love any man on earth to-day, you love me." + +At his first change from tenderness to accusation, her face hardened and +her voice returned to her control. + +"What right have you to judge me, Abel Revercomb?" she asked angrily. +"I've had one sermon preached at me to-day, and I'll not listen to +another." + +"You know I'm not preaching at you, Molly, but I'm a man of flesh and +blood, not of straw. How can I have patience?" + +"I never asked you to have patience, did I?" + +"No, and I don't believe you want it. If I'd catch hold of you and shake +you, you'd probably like me better." + +"It's just as well that you don't try it to see how I'll take it." + +"Oh, I shan't try it. I'll go on still believing in you against +yourself, like the born fool I am." + +"You may believe in me or not just as you please--but it isn't my fault +if you won't go off and marry Judy Hatch, as I have begged you to. +She's everything on earth that Mr. Mullen preached about to-day in his +sermon." + +"Hang Judy Hatch! You are bent on starting a quarrel with me, that is +the trouble. As soon as you mentioned Jonathan Gay I knew what you were +in for." + +"As if I couldn't say a man was good looking without putting you into a +rage." + +"I'm not in a rage, but I hate a flirt. Every sensible man does." + +"Judy Hatch isn't a flirt." + +"Leave Judy Hatch out of it--though I've more than half a mind to walk +off and ask her to marry me." + +"That's just what I've advised you to do for the last six months, isn't +it?" + +"Ah, no, you haven't, Molly, no, you haven't--and you'd be just as +sorry as I the minute after I had done it. You've got some small foolish +childish notions in your head about hating men--but you're much nearer +loving me than hating me at this moment, and that's why you're afraid!" + +"I'm not afraid--how dare you say so?" + +"Oh, my pretty, how foolish we are, both of us! I'd work my fingers to +the bone for you, Molly, I'd lie down and let your little feet walk over +me if they wanted to--I'd shed my life's blood for you, day by day, if +it could help you." + +"Every one of you say this in the beginning, but it isn't true in the +end," she answered. + +"Not true--not true? Prove it. Why do you think I've struggled and +raised myself except to keep equal with you? Why did I go to school and +teach myself and make money enough to take classes in Applegate? Just +for you. All those winter afternoons when I drove over there to learn +things, I was thinking of you. Do you remember that when you were at +school in Applegate, you'd tell me the names of the books you read so +that I might get them?" + +"Don't," she cried fiercely, "don't tell me those things, for I'll never +believe them! I'm hard and bitter inside, there's no softness in me. If +I went on my knees and prayed to love, I couldn't do it. Oh, Abel, there +isn't any love in my heart!" + +"Do you remember when you kissed me?" + +"No, I have forgotten." + +"It was only three weeks ago." + +"Yes, that was three weeks ago." + +The light died slowly out of his eyes as he looked at her. + +"When you speak like that I begin to wonder if any good can ever come +to us," he returned. "I've gone on breaking my heart over you ever since +you were a little girl in short dresses, and I can't remember that I've +ever had anything but misery from you in my life. It's damnable the +things I've stood and yet I've always forgotten them afterwards, and +remembered only the times you were soft and gentle and had ceased to be +shrewish. Nobody on earth can be softer than you, Molly, when you want +to, and it's your softness, after all, that has held me in spite of +your treatment. Why, your mouth was like a flower when I kissed you, and +parted and clung to me---" + +"I wish you wouldn't talk about it. I hate to hear such things after +they are over." + +"Such things!" He stood flicking hopelessly with a small branch he +carried at the carrot flowers in the field. "If you will tell me +honestly that you were playing with me, Molly, I'll give you up this +minute," he said. + +The colour was high in her face and she did not look at him. + +"I was playing with you, and I told you so the day afterwards," she +replied. + +"Yes, but you didn't mean it. I can't go any further because this is Mr. +Jonathan's land." + +His eyes had in them the hurt reproachful look of a wounded dog's, and +his voice trembled a little. + +"I meant always--always to lead you on until I could hurt you--as I did +the others--and then throw you over." + +"And now that you can hurt me, you throw me over?" he asked. + +Without speaking, she held out her hand for the basket, which he was +about to fling from him. + +"Then I'll never forgive you, Molly, so help me God," he added harshly; +and turning away from her, struck out across the pasture in the +direction of the mill. + +For a moment she stood looking after him, her lips parted, her eyes wide +and bright as if she were asking a question. + +"I am hard--hard and cruel," she thought as she went slowly up the +witch-hazel path that led by the Poplar Spring, "but I wonder--oh, I +wonder if I treat Abel worst because I like him best?" + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +A FLIGHT AND AN ENCOUNTER + + +When Abel had flung himself over the fence, he snatched the collar from +his neck and threw it away from him into the high grass of the meadow. +The act was symbolical not only of his revolt from the power of love, +but, in a larger measure, of his rebellion against the tyranny of +convention. Henceforth his Sunday clothes might hang in the closet, +for he would never again bend his neck to the starched yoke of custom. +Everything had been for Molly forever. Her smiles or her frowns, +her softness or her cruelty, would make no difference to him in the +future--for had not Molly openly implied that she preferred Mr. Mullen? +So this was the end of it all--the end of his ambition, of his struggle +to raise himself, of his battle for a little learning that she might not +be ashamed. Lifting his head he could see dimly the one great pine that +towered on the hill over its fellows, and he resolved, in the bitterness +of his defeat, that he would sell the whole wood to-morrow in Applegate. +He tried to think clearly--to tell himself that he had never believed in +her--that he had always known she would throw him over at the last--but +the agony in his heart rose in his throat, and he felt that he was +stifling in the open air of the pasture. His nature, large, impulsive, +scornful of small complexities, was stripped bare of the veneer of +culture by which its simplicity had been overlaid. At the instant he was +closer to the soil beneath his feet than the civilization of his race. + +As he neared the brook, which divided his pasture from the fields +belonging to Jordan's Journey, the sound of angry voices came to his +ears, and through the bared twigs of the willows, he saw Archie and +Jonathan Gay standing a little apart, while the boy made threatening +gestures with a small switch he carried. + +"I've told him he was not to come on our land and he's laughed in my +face!" cried Archie, turning to his brother. + +"I'm not laughing, I merely said that the restriction was absurd," +replied Jonathan in a friendly tone. "Why this pasture of yours juts in +between my field and the road, and I'm obliged to cross it. I told you +before I was awfully sorry about the quarrel when I first came, but as +long as you leave my birds alone, you may walk over my land all day if +you like and I shan't care a copper." + +"Damn your birds! I don't take a blow from any man without paying him +back," retorted Archie. + +"Hold your tongue, Archie," said Abel sternly. "It's my farm, I reckon, +and I manage it. I'm sorry, Mr. Jonathan," he added, "that you started +the trouble, but we aren't people to sit down tamely and take a +thrashing from you just because you happen to own Jordan's Journey. I'll +stand by Archie because he's right, though if he were not right, I'd +still stand by him because he's my brother. The best we can do is to +keep clear of each other. We don't go on your place and you'd just as +well take care to keep off ours." + +A frown contracted Gay's brow, while he glanced anxiously over his +shoulder at the crooked path which led in the direction of the mill. + +"Do you mean to say that you object to my taking a stroll through your +meadows?" he asked. + +"Why on earth do you want to stroll over here when you've got two +thousand acres on every other blessed side of you?" + +When the other's reply came there was a curious hesitation about it. + +"Well, a man has his fancies, you know. I've taken a liking to this path +through the willows." + +"All the same I warn you that if you keep it up, you'll very likely run +into trouble. If Archie sets the dogs on you, I'll be obliged to stand +by him." + +Without waiting for a response, he put his hand on the boy's shoulder, +and pushed him over the brook into the path on the opposite side. To his +surprise Blossom, dressed as though for church, appeared there at the +instant. + +"Why, where in thunder are you going?" he demanded, releasing Archie, +who staggered back at the sudden withdrawal of the powerful grasp. He +had always known that his niece was a handsome girl, but the bloom, the +softness of her beauty came to him while he stood there, as vividly as +if for the first time. + +"I--I--have you seen grandma's cat?" she returned after the breathless +suspense of a minute. + +"No, I don't think you'll find her down there. Archie and Mr. Jonathan +have quarreled loud enough to frighten her away." + +"Quarreled again!" she said. "Oh, why have they quarreled again?" + +"He must keep off our place," replied Archie, angrily. "I warned him +I'll set the dogs on him the next time I find him on this side the +fence!" + +"How--how can you be so uncivilized?" she returned, and there were tears +in her eyes. + +"Uncivilized or not, he'll find he can't split my lip open for nothing," +growled Archie, like a sullen child. + +"You'd as well come back with us," said Abel, "the cat isn't down +there--I'd take a look in the mill." + +She turned her face away, stooping to pluck the withered frond of a fern +that grew in the path. When she looked up at him again all the bloom and +radiance had flown. + +"Yes, I'll come back with you," she answered, and falling into step +between them, walked languidly up the hill to the kitchen garden at the +top. In his own misery Abel was hardly aware of her, and he heard as +from a distance, Archie's muttered threats against Gay, and Blossom's +palpitating responses. When they reached the house, Sarah's yellow and +white cat squeezed herself through the door and came purring toward +them. + +"Why, the cat's got back!" exclaimed Archie. + +"It must have been in the store-room all the time," returned Blossom +quickly. "I forgot to look there. Now, I must go and pour out the butter +milk for dinner before grandma scolds me." + +She turned away, glanced back an instant later to make sure that they +had entered the house, and then gathering up her Sunday skirt of blue +Henrietta cloth, started in a rapid run back along the path to the +willows. When she reached a sheltered nook, formed by a lattice of +boughs, she found Gay walking impatiently back and forth, with his hands +in his pockets and the anxious frown still on his forehead. At sight of +her, his face cleared and he held out his arms. + +"My beauty!--I'd just given you up. Five minutes more by my watch, and I +should have gone." + +"I met Abel and Archie as I was coming and they made me go back with +them," she answered, placing her hand on her bosom, which rose and fell +with her fluttering breath. It was characteristic of their different +temperaments that, although he had seen her every day for three weeks, +he still met her with outstretched arms, which she still evaded. +Since that first stolen kiss, she had held off from him, alluring yet +unapproachable, and this gentle, but obstinate, resistance had inflamed +him to a point which he admitted, in the cold grey morning before he had +breakfasted, to have become positively dangerous. Ardently susceptible +to beauty, the freedom of his life had bred in him an almost equal +worship of the unattainable. If that first kiss had stirred his fancy, +her subsequent repulse had established her influence. The stubborn +virtue, which was a part of the inherited fibre of her race, had +achieved a result not unworthy of the most finished coquette. Against +his desire for possession there battled the instinctive chastity that +was woven into the structure of Sarah Revercomb's granddaughter. Hardly +less violent than the natural impulse against which it warred, it gave +Blossom an advantage, which the obvious weakness of her heart had +helped to increase. It was as though she yearned toward him while she +resisted--as though she feared him most in the moment that she repulsed +him. + +"Good God! how beautiful you are and how cold!" he exclaimed. + +"I am not cold. How can you say so when you know it isn't true?" + +"I've been waiting here an hour, half dead with impatience, and you +won't so much as let me touch you for a reward." + +"I can't--you oughtn't to ask me, Mr. Jonathan." + +"Could a single kiss hurt you? I kissed you once." + +"It's--it's because you kissed me once that you mustn't kiss me again." + +"You mean you didn't like it?" + +"What makes you so unkind? You know it isn't that." + +"Then why do you refuse?" He was in an irritable humour, and this +irritation showed in his face, in his movements, in the short, abrupt +sound of his words. + +"I can't let you do it because--because I didn't know what it was like +until that first time," she protested, while two large tears rolled from +her eyes. + +Softened by her confusion, his genial smile shone on her for an instant +before the gloom returned to his features. The last few weeks had preyed +on his nerves until he told himself that he could no longer control the +working of his emotions. The solitude, the emptiness of his days, the +restraint put upon him by his invalid mother--all these engendered a +condition of mind in which any transient fancy might develop into a +winged fury of impulse. There were times when his desire for Blossom's +beauty appeared to fill the desolate space, and he hungered and thirsted +for her actual presence at his side. In the excitement of a great +city, he would probably have forgotten her in a month after their first +meeting. Here, in this monotonous country, there was nothing for him +but to brood over each trivial detail until her figure stood out in his +imagination edged by the artificial light he had created around it. +Her beauty, which would have been noticeable even in a crowd, became +goddess-like against the low horizon in the midst of the November +colours. + +"If you only knew how I suffer from you, darling," he said, "I haven't +slept for nights because you refused to kiss me." + +"I--I haven't slept either," she faltered. + +"Because of me, Blossom?" + +"I begin to think and it makes me so unhappy." + +"Oh, damn it! Do you love me, Blossom?" + +"What difference does it make whether I do or not?" + +"It makes all the difference under Heaven! Would you like to love me, +Blossom?" + +"I oughtn't to let myself think of it, and I don't when I can help it." + +"But can you help it? Tell me, can you help it?" + +Turning away from him, she cast a startled glance under the willows in +the direction of the house. + +"I must be going back. They will miss me." + +"Don't you think I shall miss you, Beauty?" + +"I don't know. I haven't thought." + +"If you knew how miserable I'll be after you have left me, you'd kiss me +once before you go." + +"Don't ask me, I can't--I really can't, Mr. Jonathan." + +"Hang Mr. Jonathan and all that appertains to him! What's to become of +me, condemned to this solitude, if you refuse to become kind to me? By +Jove, if it wasn't for my mother, I'd ask you to marry me!" + +"I don't want to marry you," she responded haughtily, and completed her +triumph. Something stronger than passion--that _something_ compounded +partly of moral fibre, partly of a phlegmatic temperament, guided her +at the critical moment. His words had been casual, but her reception of +them charged them with seriousness almost before he was aware. A passing +impulse was crystallized by the coldness of her manner into a permanent +desire. + +"If I were free to do it, I'd make you want to," he said. + +She moved from him, walking rapidly into the deeper shelter of the +willows. The autumn sunlight, shining through the leafless boughs, cast +a delicate netting of shadows over the brilliant fairness of her body. +He saw the rose of her cheek melting into the warm whiteness of her +throat, which was encircled by two deliciously infantile creases of +flesh. To look at her led almost inevitably to the desire to touch her. + +"Are you going without a word to me, Blossom?" + +"I don't know what to say--you never seem to believe me." + +"You know well enough what I want you to say--but you're frozen all +through, that's what's the matter." + +"Good-bye, Mr. Jonathan." + +"At what hour to-morrow, Blossom?" + +She shook her head, softly obstinate. + +"I mustn't meet you again. If grandma--or any of the others found out +they would never forgive me--they are so stern and straight. I've gone +too far already, and besides---" + +"Besides what?" + +"You make me feel wicked and underhand." + +"Do you mean that you can walk off like this and never see me again?" + +Tears came to her eyes. "You oughtn't to put it like that!" + +"But that's just what it means. Now, darling, do you think you can do +it?" + +"I won't think--but I'll have to do it." + +His nervous irritability became suddenly violent, and the muscles of his +face contracted as if from a spasm of physical pain. + +"Confound it all! Why shouldn't I marry you, Blossom?" he burst out. +"You're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen and you look every inch +a lady. If it wasn't for my mother I'd pick you up to-day and carry you +off to Washington." + +"Your mother would never give in. There's no use talking about it." + +"It isn't her giving in, but her health. You see, she has heart disease, +and any sudden shock brings on one of these terrible attacks that may +kill her. She bears everything like an angel--I never heard a complaint +from her in my life--not even when she was suffering tortures--but the +doctors say now that another failure of her heart would be fatal." + +"I know," she admitted softly, "they said that twenty years ago, didn't +they?" + +"Well, she's been on her back almost all the time during those twenty +years. It's wonderful what she's borne--her angelic patience. And, of +course her hopes all hang on me now. She's got nobody else." + +"But I thought Miss Kesiah was so devoted to her." + +"Oh, she is--she is, but Aunt Kesiah has never really understood her. +Just to look at them, you can tell how different they are. That's how it +is Blossom--I'm tied, you see--tied hand and foot." + +"Yes, I see," she rejoined. "Your uncle was tied, too. I've heard that +he used to say--tied with a silk string, he called it." + +"You wouldn't have me murder my mother, would you?" he demanded +irritably, kicking at the twisted root of a willow. + +"Good-bye, Mr. Jonathan," she responded quietly, and started toward the +house. + +"Wait a minute,--oh, Blossom, come back!" he entreated--but without +pausing she ran quickly up the crooked path under the netting of +shadows. + +"So that's the end," said Gay angrily. "By Jove, I'm well out of it," +and went home to dinner. "I won't see her again," he thought as he +entered the house, and the next instant, when he ascended the staircase, +"I never saw such a mouth in my life. It looks as if it would melt if +you kissed it---" + +The dinner, which was pompously served by Abednego and a younger butler, +seemed to him tasteless and stale, and he complained querulously of +a bit of cork he found in his wine glass. His mother, supported by +cushions in her chair at the head of the table, to which he had brought +her in his arms, lamented his lack of appetite, and inquired tenderly if +he were suffering? For the first time in his life he discovered that +he was extinguishing, with difficulty, a smouldering resentment against +her. Kesiah's ugliness became a positive affront to him, and he felt as +bitterly toward her as though she had purposely designed her appearance +in order to annoy him. The wine she drank showed immediately in her +face, and he determined to tell his mother privately that she must +forbid her sister to drink anything but water. By the dim gilt framed +mirror above the mantel he discovered that his own features were +flushed, also, but a red face was not, he felt, a cause of compunction +to one of his sex. + +"You haven't eaten your mutton, dear," said Mrs. Gay anxiously. "I +ordered it especially because you like it. Are you feeling unwell?" + +"I'm not hungry," he replied, rather crossly. "This place gets on my +nerves, and will end by driving me mad." + +"I suppose you'd better go away," she returned, plaintively wounded. "I +wouldn't be so selfish as to want to keep you by me if you are unhappy." + +"I don't want to leave you, mother--but, I ought to get back to the +stock market. It's no good idling around--I don't think I was cut out +for a farmer." + +"Try this sherry. Your uncle brought if from Spain, and it was buried +during the war." + +He filled his glass, drained it quickly, and with an effort recovered +his temper. + +"Yes, I'd better go," he repeated, and knew while he spoke that he could +not leave as long as the thought of Blossom tormented him. Swift half +visions of her loveliness--of certain delectable details of her face +or figure flitted always before him. He saw her eyes, like frosted +periwinkles under their warm white lids, which appeared too heavy +to open wide; the little brown mole that played up and down when she +laughed; and the soft, babyish creases that encircled her throat. Each +of these memories set his heart to a quicker beating and caused a warm +sensation, like the caress of a burning sun, to pass over his body. + +"The Revercombs over at the mill are kicking up a row, mother," he said +suddenly, again filling his wine glass and again putting it down empty, +"have they any sort of standing in the county, do you suppose?" + +"I've heard they call themselves connections of the Revercombs higher in +the State, dear--but I don't know and I've never come into contact with +any of the country people about here. Kesiah may be able to tell you." + +Until then neither of them had alluded to Kesiah, whom they accepted +by ignoring much as if she had been one of the familiar pieces of +furniture, at which they never glanced because they were so firmly +convinced that it stood in its place. She had eaten her dinner with the +relish of a person to whom food, taken at regular hours three times a +day, has become the prime consolation in life; and when the question +was put to her, she was obliged to ask them to repeat it because she had +been thoughtfully regarding a dish of baked tomatoes and wondering if a +single yielding to temptation would increase a tendency to the gout that +had lately developed. + +"What do you know of the Revercombs, Kesiah? Are they in any degree +above the common people about here?" + +"The miller is a rather extraordinary character, I believe," she +answered, lifting the spoon out of the dish of tomatoes as it was handed +to her, and then shaking her head with a sigh and letting it fall. "Mr. +Chamberlayne says he is quite well educated, but the rest of them, of +course, are very primitive and plain. They have always been strait-laced +and honest and I hear that the mother--she came from Piping Tree and +was one of the Hawtreys--is violently opposed to her son's marriage +with Molly Merryweather. There is a daughter, also, who is said to be +beautiful though rather dull." + +"Yes, I've seen the girl," observed Mrs. Gay, "heavy and blond, isn't +she? The mother, I should say, is decidedly the character of the family. +She has rather terrible convictions, and once a great many years ago, +she came over here--forced her way into my sick-room to rebuke me about +the behaviour of the servants or something. Your Uncle Jonathan was +obliged to lead her out and pacify her--she was quite upset, I remember. +By the way, Kesiah," she pursued, "haven't I heard that Mr. Mullen is +attentive to the daughter? It seems a pity, for he is quite a superior +young man--his sermons are really remarkable, and he might easily have +done better." + +"Oh, that was when he first came here, Angela, before he met Molly +Merryweather. It's singular the fascination that girl possesses for the +men around here." + +Gay laughed shortly. "Well, it's a primitive folk, isn't it?" he said, +"and gets on my nerves after a while." + +Through the afternoon he was restless and out of humour, tormented less +by the memory of Blossom's face than by the little brown mole on her +cheek. He resolved a dozen times a day that he would not see her, and in +the very act of resolving, he would begin to devise means of waylaying +her as she went down to the store or passed to and from the pasture. A +certain sex hatred, which is closely allied to the mere physical fact of +love, asserted itself at times, and he raged hotly against her coldness, +her indifference, against the very remoteness that attracted him. Then +he would soften to her, and with the softening there came always the +longing not only to see, but to touch her--to breathe her breath, to lay +his hand on her throat. + +The next day he went to the willow copse, but she did not come. On the +one following, he took down his gun and started out to shoot partridges, +but when the hour of the meeting came, he found himself wandering over +the fields near the Revercombs' pasture with his eye on the little path +down which she had come that rimy October morning. The third afternoon, +when he had watched for her in a fury of disappointment, he ordered his +horse and went for a gallop down the sunken road to the mill. At the +first turn, where the woods opened into a burned out clearing, he came +suddenly upon her, and the hunger at his heart gave place to a delicious +sense of fulfilment. + +"Blossom, how can you torture me so?" he exclaimed when he had +dismounted at her side and flung his arm about her. + +She drew slowly away, submissive even in her avoidance. + +"I did not mean to torture you--I'm sorry," she answered humbly. + +"It's come to this!" he burst out, "that I can't stand it another week +without losing my senses. I've thought till I'm distracted. Blossom, +will you marry me?" + +"O Mr. Jonathan!" she gasped while her breast fluttered like a bird's. + +"Not openly, of course--there's my mother to think of--but I'll take +you to Washington--we'll find a way somehow. Can't you arrange to go to +Applegate for a day or two, or let your people think you have?" + +"I can--yes--" she responded in the same troubled tone. "I've a school +friend living there, and I sometimes spend several days with her." + +"Then go on Saturday--no, let's see--this is Tuesday. Can you go on +Friday, darling?" + +"Perhaps. I can't tell--I think so--I must see." + +As he drew her forward, she bent toward him, still softly, still humbly, +and an instant later, his arms were about her and his lips pressed hers. + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +THE DREAM AND THE REAL + + +The following Friday Abel drove Blossom in his gig to the house of her +school friend in Applegate, where she was to remain for a week. On +his way home he stopped at the store for a bottle of harness oil, and +catching the red glow of the fire beyond the threshold of the public +room, he went in for a moment to ask old Adam Doolittle about a supply +of hominy meal he had ready for him at the mill. As the ancient man +crouched over the fire, with his bent hands outstretched and his +few silvery hairs rising in the warmth, his profile showed with the +exaggeration of a twelfth century grotesque, the features so distorted +by the quivering shadows that his beaked nose appeared to rest in the +crescent-shaped silhouette of his chin. His mouth was open, and +from time to time he shook his head and muttered to himself in an +undertone--a habit he had fallen into during the monotonous stretches +of Mr. Mullen's sermons. Across from him sat Jim Halloween, and in the +middle of the hearth, Solomon Hatch stood wiping the frost from his face +with a red cotton handkerchief. + +"It's time you were thinkin' about goin' home, I reckon, old Adam," +remarked Mrs. Bottom. "You've had yo' two glasses of cider an' it ain't +proper for a man of yo' years to be knockin' around arter dark. This +or'nary is goin' to be kept decent as long as I keep it." + +"To be sure, to be sure," replied old Adam, nodding cheerfully at the +fire, "I ain't all I once was except in the matter or corn-shuckin'--an' +a cold-snap like this goes clean to the bones when they ain't covered." + +"Did you carry any of yo' winesaps into Applegate, Abel?" inquired Jim +Halloween. "I'm savin' mine till Christmas, when the prices will take a +jump." + +"No, I only drove Blossom over. She's to spend a few days in town." + +"Mr. Jonathan's gone off, too, I see," observed Solomon. "He went by at +the top of his speed while I was haulin' timber this mornin'. Thar's bad +blood still betwixt you an' him, aint' thar, Abel?" + +"Oh, I'm not seekin' a quarrel. The trouble is in Archie's hands an' +he'll have to keep it there." + +"Well, he's a fine shape of a man," declared Betsey Bottom. "Some women +try to make out that they ain't got an eye for the shape as long as the +sense is all square and solid--but I ain't never been one of 'em. Sense +is all right in its place, no doubt, but thar're times when a fine +figger is mo' convincin' than any argyment that ever was uttered." + +"It's a thing that beats me," pondered Solomon Hatch, "why a sensible +woman should care how a man is made on the outside so long as the proper +stuffin' is inside of him. With a man now, of course, it is different, +seein' as natur made 'em with a sharp eye for the beauty in the opposite +sex, an' they're all for natur an' al'ays have been. But I'll be blest +if I can understand it in women." + +"Well, I've noticed that they have a particular likin' for the worthless +over the hardworkin' sort," remarked old Adam, "an' when it comes to +that, I've known a woman to git clear set against a man on o'count of +nothin' bigger than a chaw of tobaccy." + +"It's the way of the sex," said Solomon Hatch. "When I was courtin' my +wife I was obleeged to promise her I'd give up the habit befo' she'd +keep company with me." + +"An' you began agin, I low, after the ceremony was spoken." + +"To be sure--'twas a courtin' promise, not a real one." + +"It happened the same in my case, some sixty years or mo' ago," said old +Adam. "Thar was two of us arter Minnie--for the matter of that, it +never entered my head to court her till I saw that Jacob Halloween--yo' +grandpa, Jim--had begun to git soft on her. It's safer to trust another +man's jedgment than yo' own I said to myself, an' I started into the +race. Well, Jacob was the pious, churchgoin' sort that she liked--but he +would chaw in season an' out of it--thar was some as said he chawed even +when he was sleepin'--an' a woman so out an' out with tobaccy you never +set eyes on. Sez she to me, 'Adam, you will give up the weed for me, +won't you?' An' sez I, 'Why, to be sartin sure, I will,' meanin' of +course, while I was courtin'. Then she answered, 'Well, he's a Christian +an' a churchgoer an' you ain't, but if he was the Angel Gabriel himself, +Adam, an' was a chawer, I wouldn't marry him. The men may make their +habits, Adam,' she said, 'but it takes the women to break 'em.' Lord! +Lord! durin' that courtin' season my mouth would water so for a wad of +tobaccy that I'd think my tongue was goin' to ketch fire." + +"I shouldn't like to have stood in yo' shoes when you began agin," +remarked Betsey Bottom. + +"Oh, she larned, she larned," chuckled the elder, knocking the ashes out +of his pipe on the hearth and then treading them under his boot. "'Tis +amazin' what a deal of larnin' women have to do arter they're married." + +"If they'd done it befo' thar's precious few of 'em that would ever set +foot into the estate!" retorted Betsey. "Thar ain't many men that are +worth the havin' when you git close up to 'em. Every inch of distance +betwixt 'em is an inch added to thar attractions." + +"Now, I've noticed that in my own case," observed Jim Halloween sadly, +"no woman yet has ever let me come with kissin' distance--the nearer I +git, the further an' further they edges away. It's the curse of my luck, +I reckon, for it seems as if I never open my mouth to propose that I +don't put my foot in it." + +"You may comfort yo'self with the thought that it runs in yo' family," +rejoined old Adam. "'Tis a contrariness of natur for which you're not to +be held accountable. I remember yo' grandpa, that same Jacob, tellin' +me once that he never sot out to make love that his tongue didn't take a +twist unbeknownst to him, an' to his surprise, thar'd roll off 'turnips' +an' 'carrots' instid of terms of endearment. Now, with me 'twas quite +opposite, for my tongue was al'ays quicker than my heart in the matter +of courtin'. It used to go click! click! click! quite without my willin' +it whenever my eyes lit on a pretty woman." + +"Ah, you were a gay young bird, but it's over now," commented Solomon. + +"I ain't regrettin' it since I've lived long enough to repent of it," +responded the ancient sinner. + +"What worries me," said young Adam, pursuing his habitual train of +despondency, "is that my life is just one long repentance with naught in +it worth repentin' of. 'Tain't for lack of ch'ice I've never tasted, but +for lack of opportunity." + +"Well, thar's some that even sinners can't suffer," commented his +father. "You are short of words, miller." + +"I was thinkin'," replied Abel roughly, draining his glass, and rising +to his feet while he drew on his sheepskin gloves, "that when the +thought of a woman once gets into the brain it's worse than a maggot." + +"The best way is to get her," retorted Solomon, "but that ain't so easy +a matter as it looks, unless you are a parson. Was thar ever a parson, +Mr. Doolittle, that couldn't get married as often as he'd take the +notion?" + +"Thar may be sech, but I've never seed him an' never heard on him," +responded old Adam. "'Tis kind of professional work with 'em an' they've +got the advantage of the rest of us bein' so used to pulpit speakin'." + +"I suppose our Mr. Mullen might have whomsoever he'd set his eyes on," +pursued Solomon. + +"Without a doubt he might. If all else failed him he'd but to ax her in +his pulpit gown an' his prayin' voice, an' thar'd be no gainsayin' him +for a female. Let him boom out 'Dearly Beloved,' as he does in church +an' ten chances to one she'd answer 'Amen' just out of the habit. I'm a +bold man, suh, an' I've al'ays been, but I ain't one to stand up ag'inst +a preacher when thar's a woman in the race." + +Wrapping his blue knitted comforter about his throat, Abel nodded, +good-humoredly to the group, and went out to his gig, which he had left +under a shed in the yard. As he removed the blanket from his mare, his +mind dwelt stubbornly on the remarks old Adam had let fall concerning +clergymen and women. He had already convinced himself that the Reverend +Mr. Mullen was the object of Molly's preference, and his nature was big +enough to rejoice that she should have chosen so good a man. At least, +if this were true, Jonathan Gay would not be his rival. + +It was the season of the year when the sunny days gave place to frosty +nights, and all the changes of the autumn--the reddening of the fruit, +the ripening of the nuts, the falling of the leaves--appeared to occur +in the hours between sunset and sunrise. A thin and watery moon shed a +spectral light over the meadows, which seemed to float midway between +the ashen band of the road and the jagged tops of the pines on the +horizon. There was no wind, and the few remaining leaves on the trees +looked as if they were cut out of velvet. The promise of a hoar-frost +was in the air--and a silver veil lay already over the distance. + +When he had turned into the branch road that led from the turnpike to +the mill, a gig passed him, driven rapidly, and Reuben Merryweather +called "good-night," in his friendly voice. An instant later a spot of +white in the road caught Abel's glance, and alighting, he picked up a +knitted scarf, which he recognized even in the moonlight as one that +Molly had worn. Looking back he saw that the other gig had stopped at +the turnpike, and as he hastened toward it with the scarf in his hand, +he was rewarded by a flash of bright eyes from the muffled figure at +Reuben's side. + +"I found this in the road," he said, "you must have dropped it." + +"Yes, it fell out--thank you," she answered, and it seemed to him that +her hand lingered an instant in his before it was withdrawn and buried +beneath the rugs. + +The pressure remained with him, and a little later as he drove over the +frosted roads, he could still feel, as in a dream, the soft clinging +touch of her fingers. Essentially an idealist, his character was the +result of a veneering of insufficient culture on a groundwork of raw +impulse. People and objects appeared to him less through forms of +thought than through colours of the emotions; and he saw them out of +relation because he saw them under different conditions from those that +hold sway over this planet. The world he moved in was peopled by a race +of beings that acted under ideal laws and measured up to an impossible +standard; and this mixture of rustic ignorance and religious fervor +had endowed him with a power of sacrifice in large matters, while it +rendered him intolerant of smaller weaknesses. It was characteristic of +the man that he should have arranged for Molly in his thoughts, and at +the cost of great suffering to himself, a happiness that was suited to +the ideal figure rather than to the living woman. + +When he entered the kitchen, after putting the mare into her stall, +the familiar room, with its comfortable warmth, dragged him back into +a reality in which the dominating spirit was Sarah Revercomb. Even his +aching heart seemed to recognize her authority, and to obtrude itself +with a sense of embarrassment into surroundings where all mental +maladies were outlawed. She was on her knees busily sorting a pile of +sweet potatoes, which she suspected of having been frost-bitten; and by +sheer force of character, she managed to convince the despairing lover +that a frost-bitten potato was a more substantial fact than a broken +heart. + +"I declar' if the last one of 'em ain't specked! I knew 'twould be so +when they was left out thar in the smoke-house that cold spell. Abel, +all those sweet potatoes you left out in the smoke-house have been +nipped." + +"Well, I don't care a hang!" retorted Abel, as he unwrapped his muffler. +"If it isn't one thing, it's another. You're enough to drive a sober man +to drink." + +"If you don't care, I'd like to know who ought to," responded Sarah, +whose principal weapon in an argument was the fact that she was always +the injured person. "It seems that 'twas all yo' fault since you put 'em +thar." + +"You'd better give him some supper--he looks almost played out," +observed Abner from a corner of the hearth, where he sat smoking with +his head hanging on his chest. + +Though she might harrow her son's soul, Sarah was incapable of denying +him food, so rising from her knees, she unpinned her skirt, and brought +him coffee and broiled herring from the stove where they had been +keeping hot. + +"Where's Archie?" asked Abel, while she plied him with corn muffins. + +"Courtin', I reckon, though he'd best be down yonder in the swamp +settin' old hare traps. I never saw sech courtin' as you all's anyhow," +she concluded. "It don't seem to lead nowhar, nor to end in nothin' +except itself. That's what this here ever-lastin' education has done for +you, Abel--if you hadn't had those books to give you something to think +about, you'd have been married an' settled a long time befo' now. Yo' +grandpa over thar was steddyin' about raisin' a family before he was +twenty." + +On either side of the stove, grandfather and grandmother nodded like +an ancient Punch and Judy who were at peace only when they slept. +Grandfather's pipe had gone out in his hand, and from grandmother's lap +a ball of crimson yarn had rolled on the rag carpet before the fire. +Twenty years ago she had begun knitting an enormous coverlet in bright +coloured squares, and it was still unfinished, though the strips, packed +away in camphor, filled a chest in Sarah's store closet. + +"You wouldn't like any girl I'd marry," he retorted with a feeble +attempt at mirth. "If I tried to put your advice into practice there'd +be trouble as sure as shot." + +"No, thar wouldn't--not if I picked her out," she returned. + +"Great Scott! Won't you let me choose my own wife even?" he exclaimed, +with a laugh in which there was an ironic humour. The soft pressure of +Molly's fingers was still on his hand, and he saw her face looking up at +him, gentle and beseeching, as she had looked when she offered her lips +to his kiss. Above the yearning of his heart there rose now the decision +of his judgment--and this had surrendered her to Mr. Mullen! Some rigid +strain of morality, inherited from Sarah and therefore continually at +war with her, caused him to torture himself into a mental recognition +that her choice was for the best. + +"That man never walked that had sense enough to pick out a wife," +rejoined Sarah. "To think of a great hulkin' fellow like you losin' yo' +sense over a half mad will-o'-the-wisp that don't even come of decent +people. If she hadn't had eyes as big as saucers, do you reckon you'd +ever have turned twice to look at her?" + +"For God's sake don't talk about her--she's not going to marry me," he +responded, and the admission of the truth he had so often repeated in +his own mind caused a pang of disbelief. + +"I'd like to know why she ain't?" snorted Sarah indignantly, "does she +think she's goin' to get a better catch in this neighbourhood?" + +"Oh, it's all one. She doesn't want to, that is enough." + +"Well, she's a fool if she doesn't want to, an' I'll say it to her face. +If thar's a better lookin' man around here, I'd like to see him, or a +better worker. What have the Merryweathers to be so set up about, I'd +like to know? And that gal without even a father to her name that she +can call her own!" + +"You mustn't--I won't stand it any longer." + +"Well, it's for yo' good, I reckon. If yo' own mother can't take yo' +side, I'd like to know who's goin' to do it?" + +"I don't want anybody to take my side. She's got a right not to marry +me." + +"I ain't saying' she ain't, an' it's a mighty good thing for you that +she's sech a plum fool as not to want to. 'Twould be the worst news I'd +ever heard if she'd been minded to have you. I'd move heaven an' earth +to keep you from marryin' her, an' if the good Lord has done it instead +of me, I'm thankful enough to Him for His trouble." + +Rising from the table, Abel pushed his untasted food aside with a +gesture of loathing. A week ago he had been interested in the minor +details of life; to-night he felt that they bored him profoundly. + +"If you knew what you were saying you'd hold your tongue," he retorted +angrily. + +"Ain't you goin' to eat yo' supper?" inquired Sarah anxiously, "that +herrin' is real nice and brown." + +"I don't want anything. I'm not hungry." + +"Mebbe you'd like one of the brandied peaches I'm savin' for Christmas?" + +"No, I'm dead beat. I'll go up to sleep pretty soon." + +"Do you want a fire? I can lay one in a minute." + +He shook his head, not impatiently, but as one to whom brandied peaches +and wood fires are matters of complete indifference. + +"I've got to see about something in the stable first. Then I'll go to +bed." + +Taking down a lantern from a nail by the door, he went out, as was his +nightly habit, to look at his grey mare Hannah. When he came in again +and stumbled up the narrow staircase to his room, he found that Sarah +had been before him and kindled a blaze from resinous pine on the two +bricks in the fireplace. At the sound of his step, she entered with an +armful of pine boughs, which she tossed to the flames. + +"I reckon the cracklin' will make you feel mo' comfortable," she +observed. "Thar ain't anything like a lightwood fire to drive away the +misery." + +"It does sound friendly," he responded. + +For a moment she hesitated, groping apparently for some topic of +conversation which would divert his mind from one subject that engrossed +him. + +"Archie's just come in," she remarked at last, "an' he walked up with +old Uncle Toby, who said he'd seen a ha'nt in the dusk over at Poplar +Spring. I don't see how Mrs. Gay an' Miss Kesiah can endure to live +thar." + +"Oh, they're just darkies' tales--nobody believes in them any more than +in conjuring and witches." + +"That's true, I reckon, but I shouldn't like to live over thar all +the same. They say old Mr. Jonathan comes out of his grave and walks +whenever one of 'em is to be buried or married." + +"Nobody's dead that I've heard of, and I don't suppose either Mr. +Jonathan or Miss Kesiah are thinking of getting married." + +"Well, I s'pose so--but I'm might glad he ain't taken the notion to walk +around here. I don't believe in ha'nts, but I ain't got no use for 'em." + +She went out, closing the door after her; and dropping into a chair by +the fire, he buried his face in his hands, while he vowed in his heart +that he would stop thinking of Molly. + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +BY THE MILL-RACE + + +A warm, though hazy, sun followed the sharp night, and only the +blackened and damaged plants in the yard bore witness to the frost, +which had melted to the semblance of rain on the grass. On the dappled +boughs of the sycamore by the mill-race several bronze leaves hung limp +and motionless, as if they were attached by silken threads to the stems, +and the coating of moss on the revolving wheel shone like green +enamel on a groundwork of ebony. The white mist, which had wrapped the +landscape at dawn, still lay in the hollows of the pasture, from which +it floated up as the day advanced to dissolve in shining moisture upon +the hillside. There was a keen autumn tang in the air--a mingling of +rotting leaves, of crushed winesaps, of drying sassafras. As Abel passed +from the house to the mill, his gaze rested on a golden hickory tree +near the road, where a grey squirrel sported merrily under the branches. +Like most of his neighbours, he had drawn his weather predictions from +the habits of the wild creatures, and had decided that it would be an +open winter because the squirrels had left the larger part of the nuts +ungarnered. + +At the door of the mill, as he turned the big rusty key in the lock, +he told himself doggedly that since he was not to have Molly, the only +sensible thing was to surrender the thought of her. While he started +a blaze in the stove, and swept the floor with the broomsedge broom he +kept for the purpose, he forced his mind to dwell on the sacks of grist +that stood ready for grinding. The fox-hound puppy, Moses, had followed +him from the house, and sat now over the threshold watching a robin that +hopped warily in the band of sunlight. The robin was in search of a few +grains of buckwheat which had dropped from a measure, and the puppy had +determined that, although he was unable to eat the buckwheat himself, he +would endeavor to prevent the robin from doing so. So intent was he +upon this resolve, that he forgot to bark at an old negro, who drove up +presently in an ancient gig, the harness of which was tied on a decrepit +mule with pieces of rope. The negro had left some corn to be ground, +and as he took his sack of meal from the miller, he let fall a few +lamentations on the general forlorn state of human nature. + +"Dish yer livin' is moughty hard, marster, but I reckon we'se all got +ter come ter hit." + +"Well, you manage to raise a little good corn anyway, so you ought to be +thankful instead of complaining." + +"Dar ain' nuttin' 'tall ter be thankful fur in dat, suh, case de Lawd +He ain' had no mo' ter do wid dat ar co'n den ole Marse Hawtrey way over +yonder at Pipin' Tree. I jes' ris dat ar con' wid my own han' right down +de road at my f'ont do', an' po'd de water on hit outer de pump at my +back un. I'se monst'ous glad ter praise de Lawd fur what He done done, +but I ain' gwine ter gin 'im credit fur de wuk er my own fis' en foot." + +"Are you going by Jordan's Journey, uncle? I'd like to send Reuben +Merryweather's buckwheat to him." + +"Naw, boss, I ain't a-gwine by dar, caze dat ar Jerdan's Jerney ain got +a good name ter my years. I ain't a-feard er ha'nts by daylight, but +I'se monst'ous feared er badness day er nightime, en hit sutney do pear +ter me like de badness er ole Marse Jonathan done got in de a'r er dat +ar Jerdan's Jerney. Hit's ha'nted by badness, dat's what 'tis, en dar +ain nobody cep'n Gawd A'mought Hisse'f dat kin lay badness." + +He went out, stooping under the weight of his bag, and picking up a grey +turkey's wing from the ledge, Abel began brushing out the valve of the +mill, in which the meal had grown heavy from dampness. + +"The truth is, Moses," he remarked, "you are a fool to want what you +can't have in life." The puppy looked up at him inquiringly, its long +ears flapping about its soft foolish face. "But I reckon we're all +fools, when it comes to that." + +When the grinding was over for the day, he shut down the mill, and +calling Moses to heel, went out on the old mill-race, where the upper +gate was locked by a crude wooden spar known as the "key." He was +standing under the sycamore, with this implement in his hand, when he +discerned the figure of Molly approaching slowly amid the feathery white +pollen which lay in patches of delicate bloom over the sorrel waste of +the broomsedge. Without moving he waited until she had crossed the log +and stood looking up at him from the near side of the stream. + +"Abel, are you still angry with me?" she asked, smiling. + +Dropping the key into the lock, he walked slowly to the end of the +mill-race, and descended the short steps to the hillside. + +"No, I'm not angry--at least I don't think I am--but I've taken your +advice and given you up." + +"But, Abel---" + +"I suppose you meant to take Mr. Mullen all the time that you were +making a fool of me. He's a better man for you, probably, than I am." + +"Do you really think that?" she asked in a tone of surprise. "Would you +like to see me married to him?" + +He hesitated an instant and then answered: "I honestly believe that it +is the best thing for you to do." + +Instead of producing the effect he had foreseen his advice brought a +luminous moisture to her eyes. + +"I suppose you think it would do me good to be preached to three times a +day?" she rejoined. + +"Well, I believe it wouldn't hurt you, Molly," he responded with a +smile. + +His attitude of renouncement drew her suddenly nearer. + +"It wasn't about Mr. Mullen that I came to talk to you--there is +something else." + +"Surely you aren't thinking of Jim Halloween?" + +"No, no, it isn't a man. Why do you seem to think that the beginning +and middle and end of my existence is a man? There are times when I find +even a turkey more interesting." + +"It is about a turkey, then, that you have come to see me?" + +"Oh, no, it's a man, after all, but not a lover--he's Mr. Chamberlayne, +the lawyer, from Applegate. Yesterday when he was spending the day at +the big house, he came over to see me." + +"Had he never seen you before?" + +"Of course, when I was little--and later he took me to school in +Applegate. I was to stay there until I was twenty-one you know, but I +ran away the second year because grandfather fell ill with pneumonia and +there was no one to look after him. You remember that, don't you?" + +"Yes, I remember. I picked you up on the road and brought you home in my +gig. There was a heavy snow storm." + +"It seems that I was meant to be educated as a lady. Old Mr. Jonathan +left a letter about it." + +"He did?--damn him! Why didn't he save himself the trouble by acting +decently in the beginning?" + +"That was because of Mrs. Gay--he had promised her, when he thought she +was dying, some dreadful thing. And after that he was afraid--afraid of +her all his life. Isn't it terrible that such a saintly person should +have caused so much sin?" + +"But what was she to him that he should have been such a coward about +her?" + +"Oh, he loved her more than anything on earth--for he loved my mother +only a little while. When Mrs. Gay first came to live with him, she was +so beautiful and so delicate, that she looked as if a wind would +blow her away--so soft that she could smother a person like a mass of +feathers. He felt after that that he had entangled himself, and it was +only at the last when he was dying that he had any remorse. With all +his wickedness there was a terrible kind of religion in him--like a rock +that is buried under the earth--and he wanted to save his soul alive +before he passed on to judgment. As if _that_ did any good--or he +_could_ make amends either to me or to God." + +"I rather hope he was as unsuccessful in the last case as in the first. +But, tell me, Molly, how does it affect you?" + +"Not at all--not at all--if he has left me money, I shall not touch it. +He wasn't thinking of mother, but of his own soul at the end, and can +you tell me that God would wipe out all his dreadful past just because +of one instant's fear?" + +Her passion, so unlike the meekness of Janet Merryweather, made him look +at her wonderingly, and yet with a sympathy that kept him dumb. It took +the spirit of a Gay to match a Gay, he thought, not without bitterness. + +"But why does Mr. Chamberlayne come to you now?" he asked, when he had +regained his voice. + +"It is Mrs. Gay--it has always been Mrs. Gay ever since Mr. Jonathan +first saw her. She smothered his soul with her softness, and wound him +about her little finger when she appeared all the time too weak to +lift her hand. That's just the kind Mr. Mullen preaches about in his +sermons--the kind that rules without your knowing it. But if she'd been +bold and bad instead of soft and good, she couldn't have done half the +harm!" + +"And Miss Kesiah?" he asked, "had she nothing to do with it?" + +"She? Oh, her sister has drained her--there isn't an ounce of red blood +left in her veins. Mr. Jonathan never liked her because she is homely, +and she had no influence over him. Mrs. Gay ruled him." + +"I always thought her so lovely and gentle," he said regretfully, "she +seems to me so much more womanly than Miss Kesiah." + +"I suppose she is as far as her face goes, and that's what people judge +by. If you part your hair and look a certain way nothing that you can do +will keep them from thinking you an angel. When I smile at Mr. Mullen in +church it convinces him that I like visiting the sick." + +"How can you laugh at him, Molly, if you are going to marry him?" + +"Have you positively decided," she inquired, "that I am going to marry +him?" + +"Wasn't that what you meant when you threw me over?" + +She shook her head, "No, it wasn't what I meant--but since you've made +up your mind, I suppose there's no use for me to say a word?" + +"On the whole I don't think there is--for your words are not honest +ones." + +"Then why do you judge me by them, Abel?" she asked very softly. + +"Because a man must judge by something and I can't look into your heart. +But if I'm not to be your lover," he added, "I'll not be your plaything. +It's now or never." + +"Why, Abel!" she exclaimed in mock astonishment. + +"It's the last time I shall ever ask you--Molly, will you marry me?" + +"You've forgotten poor Mr. Mullen." + +"Hang Mr. Mullen! I shall ask you just three times, and the third time +will be the last--Now, Molly will you marry me? That's the second." + +"But it's so sudden, Abel." + +"If ten years can't prepare you, ten minutes will be no better. Here +goes the third and last, Molly---" + +"Abel, how _can_ you be so silly?" + +"That's not an answer--will you---" + +"Do you mean if I don't promise now, I'll never have the chance again?" + +"I've told you--listen---" + +"Oh, wait a minute. Please, go slowly." + +"--Marry me?" + +"Abel, I don't believe you love me!" she said, and began to sob. + +"Answer me and I'll show you." + +"I didn't think you'd be so cruel--when---" + +"When? Remember I've stopped playing, Molly." + +"When you know I'm simply dying for you," she responded. + +He smiled at her without moving. "Then answer my question, and there's +no drawing back this time remember." + +"The question you asked me? Repeat it, please." + +"I've said it three times already, and that's enough." + +"Must I put it into words? Oh Abel, can't you see it?" + +Lifting her chin, he laughed softly as he stooped and kissed her. +"I've seen it several times before, darling. Now I want it put into +words--just plain ones." + +"Then, Mr. Abel Revercomb," she returned demurely, "I should like very +much to marry you, if you have no objection." + +The next instant her mockery fled, and in one of those spells of +sadness, which seemed so alien to her, and yet so much a part of her, +she clung to him, sobbing. + +"Abel, I love you so, be good to me," she entreated. + +"Good to you!" he exclaimed, crushing her to him. + +"Oh, those dreadful days since we quarrelled!" + +"Why did you do it, darling, since you suffered as well as I?" + +"I can't tell--there's something in me like that, I don't know what it +is--but we'll quarrel again after this, I suppose." + +"Then we deserve to be punished and I hope we shall be." + +"How will that help? It's just life and we can't make it different." +She drew gently away from him, while a clairvoyance wiser than her years +saddened her features. "I wonder if love ever lasts?" she whispered half +to herself. + +But there was no room in his more practical mind for the question. "Ours +will, sweetheart--how can you doubt it? Haven't I loved you for the last +ten years, not counting the odd days?" + +"And in all those years you kissed me once, while in the last five +minutes you've kissed me--how many times? You are wasteful, Abel." + +"And you're a dreadful little witch--not a woman." + +"I suppose I am, and a nice girl wouldn't talk like this. I'm not the +wife you're wanting, Abel." + +"The first and last and only one, my darling." + +"Judy Hatch would suit you better if she wasn't in love with the +rector." + +"Confound Judy Hatch! I'll stop your mouth with kisses if you mention +her again." + +At this she clung to him, laughing and crying in a sudden passion of +fear. + +"Hold me fast, Abel, and don't let me go, whatever happens," she said. + +When he had parted from her at the fence which divided his land from +Gay's near the Poplar Spring, he watched her little figure climb the +Haunt's Walk and then disappear into the leafless shrubbery at the back +of the house. While he looked after her it seemed to him that the +wan November day grew radiant with colour, and that spring blossomed +suddenly, out of season, upon the landscape. His hour was upon him +when he turned and retraced his steps over the silver brook and up the +gradual slope, where the sun shone on the bare soil and revealed each +separate clod of earth as if it were seen under a microscope. All nature +was at one with him. He felt the flowing of his blood so joyously that +he wondered why the sap did not rise and mount upward in the trees. + +In the yard Sarah was directing a negro boy, who was spreading a second +layer of manure over her more delicate plants. As Abel closed the gate, +she looked up, and the expression of his face held her eyes while he +came toward her. + +"What has happened, Abel? You look like Moses when he came down from the +mountain." + +"It was all wrong--what I told you last night, mother. Molly is going to +marry me." + +"You mean she's gone an' changed her mind jest as you'd begun to git +along without her. I declar', I don't know what has got into you to show +so little sperit. If you were the man I took you to be, you'd up an' let +her see quick enough that you don't ax twice in the same quarter." + +"Oh, all that's over now--she's going to marry me." + +"You needn't shout so. I ain't deaf. Samson, sprinkle another spadeful +of manure on that bridal-wreath bush over thar by the porch." + +"Won't you say you're pleased?" + +"I ain't pleased, Abel, an' I ain't going to lie about it. When I git +down on my knees to-night, I'll pray harder than I ever prayed in my +life that you'll come to yo' senses an' see what a laughing-stock that +gal has made of you." + +"Then I wish I hadn't told you." + +"Well, I'd have knowed it anyhow--it's burstin' out of you. Where're you +goin' now? The time's gittin' on toward dinner." + +"For my axe. I want to cut a little timber." + +"What on earth are you goin' to cut timber at this hour for?" + +"Oh, I feel like it, that's all. I want to try my strength." + +Going into the kitchen, he came out a minute later with his axe on +his shoulder. As he crossed the log over the mill-stream, the spotted +fox-hound puppy waddled after him, and several startled rabbits peered +out from a clump of sassafras by the "worm" fence. Over the fence went +Abel, and under it, on his fat little belly, went Moses, the puppy. In +the meadow the life-everlasting shed a fragrant pollen in the sunshine, +and a few crippled grasshoppers deluded themselves into the belief that +the summer still lingered. Once the puppy tripped over a love-vine, +and getting his front paws painfully entangled yelped sharply for +assistance. Picking him up, Abel carried him in his arms to the pine +wood, where he place him on a bed of needles in a hollow. + +Through the slender boles of the trees, the sunlight fell in bars on +the carpet of pine-cones. The scent of the living forest was in his +nostrils, and when he threw back his head, it seemed to him that the +blue sky was resting upon the tree-tops. Taking off his coat, he felt +the edge of his blade, while he leaned against the great pine he had +marked out for sacrifice. In the midst of the wood he saw the walls of +his house rising--saw the sun on the threshold--the smoke mount from +the chimney. The dream in his brain was the dream of the race in its +beginning--for he saw the home and in the centre of the home he saw a +woman and in the arms of the woman he saw a child. Though the man would +change, the dream was indestructible, and would flow on from the future +into the future. The end it served was not individual, but racial--for +it belonged not to the soul of the lover, but to the integral structure +of life. + +Moving suddenly, as if in response to a joyous impulse, he drew away +from the tree, and lifting his axe swung it out into the sunlight. For +an instant there was silence. Then a shiver shook the pine from its +roots upward, the boughs rocked in the blue sky, and a bird flying out +of them sailed slowly into the west. + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +SHOWS THE WEAKNESS IN STRENGTH + + +When Abel had gone, Sarah folded her grey woollen shawl over her bosom, +and ordered the boy with the wheelbarrow to return to the barnyard. Left +alone her eyes followed her son's figure as it divided the broomsedge in +the meadow, but from the indifference of her look she might have gazed +on the pine tree toward which he was moving. A little later, when her +glance passed to the roof of the mill there was no perceptible change in +her expression; and she observed dispassionately that the shingles which +caught the drippings from the sycamore were beginning to rot. While she +stood there she was in the throes of one of the bitterest sorrows of +her life; yet there was no hint of it either in her quiet face or in the +rigid spareness of her figure. Her sons had resisted her at times, but +until to-day not one of them had rebelled openly against her authority +in the matter of marriage. Years ago, in the period of Abner's reaction +from a blighted romance, she had chosen, without compunction, a +mild-mannered, tame-spirited maiden for his wife. Without compunction, +when the wedding was over, she had proceeded, from the best possible +motives, to torment the tame-spirited maiden into her grave. + +"He's layin' up misery for himself and for all concerned," she said +aloud, after a moment, "a girl like that with no name and precious +little religion--an idle, vain, silly hussy, with a cropped head!" + +A small coloured servant, in a girl's pinafore and a boy's breeches, +came to the door, and whispered that the old people were demanding a +snack of bread and molasses. + +"Tell 'em it ain't the day for sweets an' they ain't goin' to have meat +an' molasses the same day," she remarked as she entered the kitchen. +"If I didn't watch you every minute, you'd make yo'selves sick with +overeatin'." + +"I reckon you're right, Sary," piped grandfather in angry tones, "but +I ain't so sure I wouldn't rather have the sickness than the watchin'. +It's hard on a man of my years an' experience that he shouldn't be +allowed to project with his own stomach." + +"You'd have been dead long ago but for me, an' you ought to be ashamed +of yo'self for talkin' such foolishness. As if I hadn't wo' myself out +with waitin' on you, an' no blood relation." + +"No blood relation!" chimed in grandmother maliciously, "no blood +relation!" + +"Well, you hurry up an' get ready for dinner, for I'm goin' out +afterwards." + +"Whar on earth are you goin', Sary? It ain't Sunday." + +"It don't matter to you whar I'm goin'--you jest set right up an' eat +yo' soup." + +When she had poured the contents of the pot into the two earthenware +bowls, she crumbled a piece of bread into each, and gave the dinner into +the trembling hands which were stretched out eagerly to receive it. Then +taking the red-and-white cloth from the cupboard, she set the table for +five, and brought the dish of turnips and boiled beef from the stove. +Every detail was carefully attended to as if her thoughts were not +on the hillside with Abel, but she herself could not eat so much as a +mouthful. A hard lump rose in her throat and prevented her swallowing. + +The men did not appear, so leaving their dinner in the stove, she went +upstairs and put on the black poke bonnet and the alpaca mantle trimmed +with bugles which she wore on Sundays and on the occasional visits +to her neighbours. As it was her custom never to call without bearing +tribute in the form of fruit or preserves, she placed a jar of red +currant jelly into a little basket, and started for her walk, holding it +tightly in her black worsted gloves. She knew that if Molly divined her +purpose she would hardly accept the gift, but the force of habit was +too strong for her, and she felt that she could not start out to make a +visit with empty hands. + +Her chief anxiety was to be gone before Abel should return, and for +this reason she left the house by the back door, and chose the small, +descending path that led through the willows to Jordan's Journey. As +she neared the brook a bow of blue ribbon hanging on a branch caught +her eye, and she recognized a bit of the trimming from Blossom's Sunday +dress. Releasing it she put it into her pocket, with the resolve that +she would reprove her granddaughter for wearing her best clothes in such +unsuitable places. Then her thoughts returned to the immediate object +of her visit, and she told herself sternly that she would let Molly +Merryweather know her opinion of her while there was yet time for the +girl to withdraw from the marriage. That she was wronging her son by +exerting such despotic authority was the last thought that would have +occurred to her. A higher morality than that of ordinary mortals had +guided her in the past, and she followed it now. + +When she reached the rail fence, she found some difficulty in climbing +it, since her legs had grown rheumatic with the cold weather; but by +letting the basket down first on a forked stick, she managed to ease +herself gently over to the opposite side. Here she rested, while she +carefully brushed away the dried pollen from the golden-rod, which was +staining her dress. Then regaining her strength after a minute, she +pushed on under the oak trees, where the moist, dead leaves made a soft, +velvety sound, to the apple orchard and the sunken flagged walk that led +to the overseer's cottage. + +In the sunshine on the porch Reuben Merryweather was sitting; and at +sight of his visitor, he rose, with a look of humble surprise, and +invited her into the house. His manner toward her was but a smaller +expression of his mental attitude to the universe. That he possessed +any natural rights as an individual had never occurred to him; and the +humility with which he existed gave place only to the mild astonishment +which filled him at any recognition of that existence by man or +Providence. + +"Walk in an' sit down, ma'am," he said hospitably leading the way into +the little sitting-room, where the old hound dozed on the rug. "Molly's +jest gone down to the spring-house, but she'll be back in a minute." + +"Reuben Merryweather--" began Sarah, and then she stopped, "you ain't +lookin' over sprightly," she said after a pause. + +"I've got a weak chest, an' the cold settles on it." + +"Did you ever try mutton suet laid over it on a piece of red flannel? +'Tis the best cure I know of." + +"Molly makes me a plaster for it at night." The feeling that he had +engrossed the conversation for his selfish ends led him to remark after +a minute, "You have changed but little, Sarah, a brave woman you are." + +"Not so brave, Reuben, but I'm a believer an' that helps me. I'd have +broken down under the burden often enough if my faith hadn't supported +me. You've had yo' troubles, too, Reuben, an' worse ones." + +"It's true, it's true," said the old man, coughing behind his hand, "to +see my po' gal suffer so was worst--but however bad things seemed to us +on top, I've al'ays believed thar was a hidden meanin' in em' that our +eyes couldn't see." + +"Ah, you were al'ays a soft natured man, Reuben, too soft natured for +yo' own good, I used to think." + +"'Twas that that stood against me with you, Sarah, when we were young. +Do you remember the time you refused to drive back with me from that +picnic at Falling Creek because I wouldn't give Jacob Bumpass a hiding +about something? That was a bitter pill to me, an' I've never forgot +it." + +Sarah had flushed a little, and her stern face appeared to have +grown ten years younger. "To think that you ain't forgot all that old +foolishness, Reuben!" + +"Well, thar's been time enough an' trouble enough, no doubt," he +answered, "but seein' you lookin' so like yo' old self put me in mind of +it." + +"Lord, Reuben, I ain't thought of all that for forty years!" + +"No mo' have I, Sarah except when I see you on Sundays sittin' across +the church from me. You were a beauty in yo' day, though some folks use +to think that that little fair thing, Mary Hilliard, was better lookin'. +To me 'twas like settin' a dairy maid beside a queen." + +"Even my husband thought Mary Hilliard, was prettier," said Sarah, and +her tone showed that this tribute to her youthful vanity had touched her +heart. + +"Well, I never did. You were al'ays too good for me an' I never +begrudged you to Abner. He was a better man." + +For an instant she looked at him steadily, while living honesty +struggled in her bosom against loyalty to the dead. + +"No, Reuben, Abner was not a better man," she said presently, as if the +words were thrust out of her by a chastening conscience. "My pride kept +me up after I had married him; but he was born shiftless an' he died +shiftless. He never did a day's work in his life that I didn't drive him +to. His children have never known how it was, for I've al'ays made 'em +think he was a hard worker an' painstakin' to keep back his laziness +from croppin' out in 'em, if I could." + +"You've brought 'em up well. That's a fine son of yours that comes +courtin' my gal, Sarah. I've hoped she'd fancy him for the sake of old +times." + +"I never thought of yo' recollectin' that feelin', Reuben. It makes me +feel almost young again, an' I that old an' wo' out. I've had a hard +life--thar's no disputin' it, marriage is mostly puttin' up with things, +I reckon, when it ain't makin' believe." + +"Thar's mighty few that gits the one that's meant for 'em," said Reuben, +"that's sure enough. If we did we'd stop movin' forward, I suppose, an' +begin to balk. I haven't much life now, except in Molly, an' it's the +things that pleases or hurt her that I feel the most. She's got a warm +heart an' a hot temper like you used to have, Sarah, an' the world ain't +easy generally to yo' sort." + +For a time Sarah was silent, her hands in their black woolen gloves +gripping the handle of the basket. + +"Well, I must be goin', Reuben," she said presently, rising from her +chair. "I'm sorry about yo' chest, an' I jest stepped over to bring you +this glass of currant jelly I made last summer. It goes well with meat +when yo' appetite ain't hearty." + +She held out her hand, shook his with a hurried and awkward movement, +and went out of the front door and down the flagged walk as Molly's +steps were heard in the kitchen at the back. + +"Sarah Revercomb has been here, honey," said Reuben. "She brought me +over this glass of currant jelly, and said she was sorry to miss you." + +"Why, what could she have meant?" asked Molly. "She hates me and she +knows I've never liked her." + +"Like most folks it ain't Sarah but the way you take her that matters. +We've all got the split somewhar in our shell if you jest know how to +find it. I reckon she's given in about Abel an' came over to show it." + +"I'm glad she brought you the jelly, and perhaps she is getting softer +with age," rejoined Molly, still puzzled. + +"Don't worry, honey, she's a good woman at bottom, but mortal slow of +larnin', and thar's a lot of Sarah in that boy of hers." + +"I suppose there is, grandfather, for all their fierce quarrelling. They +have the kind of love that will die for you and yet will not so much as +suffer you to live. That's the way Mrs. Revercomb loves, and it's the +way Abel is loving me now." + +"Let him larn, pretty, let him larn. He'll be worth twice as much at +fifty as he is to-day, an' so will you for that matter. They're fools +that say love is for the young, Molly, don't you believe 'em." + +Sarah, meanwhile, passed slowly down the flagged walk under the gnarled +old apple trees in the orchard. A few heavy-winged insects, awaking from +the frost of the night, droned over the piles of crushed winesaps, and +she heard the sound as though it came to her across a distance of +forty years. They were not easy years; she was worn by their hardness, +crippled by their poverty, embittered by their sorrows. "I've had a hard +life," she thought. "I've had a hard life, an' it warn't fair." For the +first time it occurred to her that the Providence she had served had +not used her honourably in return. "Even Abner al'ays thought that Mary +Hilliard was the prettiest," she added, after a minute. + +As she crossed the lawn at Jordan's Journey, Uncle Abednego, the butler, +appeared at the back door, and detained her with an excited wave of the +hand. + +"Lawd A'mighty, dar's bad times yer, Miss Sary!" he cried, "Miss Angela +she's been mos' dead fur goin' on two hours, en we all's done sont +Cephus on de bay horse arter Marse Jonathan!" + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +SHOWS THE TYRANNY OF WEAKNESS + + +Three days later the bay horse returned at a gallop with Jonathan Gay +in the saddle. At the head of the steps Kesiah was standing, and she +answered the young man's anxious questions with a manner which she tried +to make as sympathetic as the occasion required. This effort to adjust +her features into harmony with her feelings had brought her brows +together in a forbidding scowl and exaggerated the harsh lines between +mouth and chin. + +"Am I in time?" he asked in a trembling voice, and his hand reached out +to her for support. + +"The immediate danger is over, Jonathan," she answered, while she led +him into the library and closed the door softly behind them. "For hours +we despaired of her recovery, but the doctors say now that if there is +no other shock, she may live on for months." + +"I got your note last night in Washington," he returned. "It was +forwarded by mail from Applegate. Is the doctor still with her?" + +"No, he has just gone. The rector is there now. She finds him a great +comfort." + +"It was so sudden, Aunt Kesiah--she appeared well when I left her. What +caused the attack?" + +"A talk she had had with Mr. Chamberlayne. It seems he thought it best +to prepare her for the fact that your Uncle Jonathan left a good deal +of his property--it amounts to an income of about ten thousand a year, +I believe, to Reuben Merryweather's granddaughter when she comes of age. +Of course it wasn't the money--Angela never gave that a thought--but +the admission that the girl was his illegitimate daughter that struck so +heavy a blow." + +"But surely she must have suspected---" + +"She has never suspected anything in her life. It is a part of her +sweetness, you know, that she never faces an unpleasant fact until it is +literally thrust on her notice. As long as your uncle was so devoted to +her and so considerate, she thought it a kind of disloyalty to inquire +as to the rest of his life. Once I remember, twenty years ago, when that +poor distraught creature came to me--I went straight to Angela and tried +to get her to use her influence with her uncle for the girl's sake. But +at the first hint, she locked herself in her room and refused to let +me come near her. Then it was that I had that terrible quarrel with Mr. +Gay, and he hardly spoke to me again as long as he lived. I believe, +though, he would have married Janet after my talk with him except for +Angela's illness, which was brought on by the shock of hearing him speak +of his intention." She sighed wonderingly, her anxious frown deepening +between her eyebrows. "They both seemed to think that in some way I was +to blame for the whole thing," she added, "and your uncle never forgave +me. It's the same way now. Mr. Chamberlayne spoke quite angrily to me +when he saw the effect of his interview. He appeared to think that I +ought to have prevented it." + +"Could it have been kept from her, do you suppose?" + +"That looked impossible, and of course, he broke it to her very gently. +He also, you know, has all his life had a sentiment about Angela, and +that, I think is why he never married. He told me once that she came +nearer than any woman he had ever seen to representing every man's +ideal." + +"What I can't understand is why she should have been so upset by the +discovery?" + +"Well, she was very fond of your uncle, and she has cherished quite +romantically the memory of his affection for her. I think--for that +is Angela's way--that he means much more to her dead than he did +living--and this, she says, has blackened the image." + +"But even then it seems incomprehensible that it should have made her +really so ill." + +"Oh, you don't know her yet, Jonathan. I remember your uncle used to say +that she was more like a flower than a woman, and he was always starting +alarms about her health. We lived in a continual panic about her for +several years, and it was her weakness, as much as her beauty, that gave +her her tremendous power over him. He was like wax in her hands, though +of course he never suspected it." + +The tread of Mr. Mullen was heard softly on the staircase, and he +entered with his hand outstretched from the starched cuff that showed +beneath the sleeve of his black broadcloth coat. Pausing on the rug, he +glanced from Kesiah to Jonathan with a grave and capable look, as +though he wished them to understand that, having settled everything +with perfect satisfaction in the mind of Mrs. Gay, he was now ready to +perform a similar office for the rest of the household. + +"I am thankful to say that I left your dear mother resting peacefully," +he observed in a whisper. "You must have had a distressing journey, Mr. +Gay?" + +"I was very much alarmed," replied Gay, with a nervous gesture as if he +were pushing aside a disagreeable responsibility. "The note took three +days to find me, and I didn't know until I got here whether she was +alive or dead." + +"It is easy to understand your feelings," returned the rector, still +whispering though Gay had spoken in his natural voice. "Such a mother +as yours deserves the most careful cherishing that you can give her. To +know her has been an inspiration, and I am never tired of repeating that +her presence in the parish, and occasional attendance at church, are +privileges for which we should not forget to be thankful. It is not +possible, I believe, for any woman to approach more closely the perfect +example of her sex." + +"Perhaps I had better go up to her at once. We are deeply grateful to +you, Mr. Mullen, for your sympathy." + +"Who would not have felt?" rejoined the other, and taking up his hat +from the table, he went out, still treading softly as though he were +walking upon something he feared to hurt. + +"Poor mother! It's wonderful the way she has with people!" exclaimed +Gay, turning to Kesiah. + +"She's always had it with men--there's something so appealing about her. +You'll be very careful what you say to her, Jonathan." + +"Oh, I'll not confess my sins, if that's what you mean," he responded as +he ascended the staircase. + +The room was fragrant with burning cedar, and from the dormer-windows, +latticed by boughs, a band of sunlight stretched over the carpet to the +high white bed in which his mother was lying. Her plaintive blue eyes, +which clung to him when he entered, appeared to say; "Yes, see how they +have hurt me--a poor frail creature." Above her forehead her hair, which +was going grey, broke into a mist, and spread in soft, pale strands over +the pillow. Never had her helpless sweetness appealed so strongly to his +emotions, as when she laid her hand on his arm and said in an apologetic +whisper: + +"Dear boy, how I hated to bring you back." + +"As if I wouldn't have come from the end of the world, dearest mother," +he answered. + +He had fallen on his knees by her bed, but when Kesiah brought him a +chair, he rose and settled himself more comfortably. + +"I wanted you, dear, but if you knew how I dreaded to become a drag +on you. Men must be free, I know--never let me interfere with your +freedom--I feel such a helpless, burdensome creature." + +"If you could only see how young and lovely you look even when you +are ill, you would never fear becoming a burden. In spite of your grey +hairs, you might pass for a girl at this minute." + +"You wicked flatterer!--but, oh, Jonathan, I've had a blow!" + +"I understand. It must have been rough." + +"And to think how I always idealized him!--how I had believed in his +love for me and cherished his memory! To discover that even at the +last--on his deathbed--he was thinking of that woman!" + +She wept gently, wiping her eyes with a resigned and suffering gesture +on the handkerchief Kesiah had handed her. "I feel as if my whole +universe had crumbled," she said. + +"But it was no affront to you, mother--it all happened before he saw +you, and was only an episode. Those things don't bite into a man's life, +you know." + +"Of course, I knew there had been something, but I thought he had +forgotten it--that he was faithful to his love for me--his spirit +worship, he called it. Then to find out so long after his death--when +his memory had become a part of my religion--that he had turned back at +the end." + +"It wasn't turning away from you, it was merely an atonement. Your +influence was visible even there." + +"I am sorry for the child, of course," she said sadly, after weeping a +little--"who knows but she may have inherited her mother's character?" + +"The doctor said you were to be quiet, Angela," remarked Kesiah, who had +stood at the foot of the bed in the attitude of a Spartan. "Jonathan, if +you begin to excite her, you'd better go." + +"Oh, my boy, my darling boy," sobbed Mrs. Gay, with her head on his +shoulder, "I have but one comfort and that is the thought that you are +so different--that you will never shatter my faith in you. If you only +knew how thankful I am to feel that you are free from these dreadful +weaknesses of men." + +Cowed by her helplessness, he looked down on her with shining eyes. + +"Remember the poor devil loved you, mother, and be merciful to his +memory," he replied, touched, for the first time, by the thought of his +uncle. + +"I shall try, Jonathan, I shall try, though the very thought of evil is +a distress to me," she replied, with a saintly look. "As for the girl, I +have only the tenderest pity for the unfortunate creature." + +"That's like you, mother." + +"Kesiah says that she has behaved very well. Didn't you say so, Kesiah?" + +"Yes, Mr. Chamberlayne told me that she appeared perfectly indifferent +when he spoke to her. She even remarked, I believe, that she didn't see +that it concerned her." + +"Well, she's spirit enough. Now stop talking, mother, I am going." + +"God bless you, my darling boy--you have never failed me." + +Instead of appeasing his conscience, the remark completed his descent +into the state of disenchantment he had been approaching for hours. The +shock of his mother's illness, coming after three days of marriage, had +been too much for his unstable equilibrium, and he felt smothered by +an oppression which, in some strange way, seemed closing upon him from +without. It was in the air--in the faded cretonne of the room, in +the grey flashes of the swallows from the eaves of the house, in the +leafless boughs etched delicately against the orange light of the +sky. Like most adventurers of the emotions, he was given to swift +despondencies as well as to vivid elations, and the tyranny of a mood +was usually as absolute as it was brief. The fact was there while it +lasted like the physical sensation of hunger or gratification. When it +departed he seldom spurred his imagination to the pursuit of it. + +"So it's over," he said under his breath, as he looked through the +lacework of ivy on the small greenish panes to the desolate November +fields, "and I've been a damn fool for the asking!" + +At the end of the week Blossom returned to the mill, and on the +afternoon of her arrival, Gay met her in the willow copse by the brook. +To the casual observer there would have appeared no perceptible change +in his manner, but a closer student of the hearts of lovers might +have drawn an inference from the fact that he allowed her to wait +five minutes for him at the place of meeting. True, as he explained +passionately, his mother had asked for him just as he was leaving the +house, and it was clearly impossible that he should refuse his mother! +That he was still ardent for Blossom's embraces was evident to her +glance, but the affair was settled, the mystery solved, and there was no +longer need that he should torment himself. That the love of his kind is +usually a torment or nothing had not, at this stage, occurred to either +of the lovers. He was feeling strongly that, having conducted himself +in so honourable a manner there was nothing more to be expected of him; +while she assured her heart that when his love had proved capable of so +gallant a sacrifice, it had established the fact of its immortality. The +truth was that the fire still burned, though the obstacles, which had +supplied fuel to the flames, were consumed, and a pleasant warmth rather +than a destroying blaze was the result. Had Gay sounded the depths of +his nature, which he seldom did, he would have discovered that for him +passion was a kind of restlessness translated into emotion. When the +restlessness was appeased, the desire in which it had revealed itself +slowly evaporated. + +"How is your mother?" was Blossom's first eager question, "oh, I do hope +she is better!" + +"Better, yes, but we're still awfully anxious, the least shock may kill +her--Aunt Kesiah and I are walking on pins and needles. How are you, +Beauty? Did you enjoy your visit?" + +He kissed her lips, and she clung to him with the first expression of +weakness she had ever shown. + +"How could I when it ended like that?" + +"Well, you're married anyway--that ought to satisfy you. What does it +feel like?" + +"I can't believe it--and I haven't even any ring." + +"Oh, the ring! If you'd had it, you'd have dropped it about somewhere +and let out the secret." + +"I wish it had been in church and before a clergyman." + +"Are you trying to make me jealous again of the Reverend Orlando? I'm an +old married man now, and it is hopeless." + +"Do you really feel married, Jonathan?" + +"The deuce I don't! If I did I'd be galloping down the turnpike." + +"I wonder why you did it?" she questioned a little wistfully, "you take +it so lightly." + +"I could only take it lightly after I'd done it--that's why, darling." + +"If I could believe in it I shouldn't mind the secrecy," she said, "but +I feel so wicked and underhand that I hardly dare hold up my head before +the folks at home. Jonathan, when do you think we may come out and +confess?" + +For a moment he did not answer, and she watched the frown gather slowly +between his eyebrows. + +"There, there, Blossom, don't begin that already," he responded +irritably, "we can't make it public as long as my mother lives--that's +out of the question. Do you think I could love you if I felt you had +forced me to murder her? Heaven knows I've done enough--I've married you +fair and square, and you ought to be satisfied." + +"I am satisfied," she replied on the point of tears, "but, oh, Jonathan, +I'm not happy." + +"Then it's your own fault," he answered, still annoyed with her. "You've +had everything your own way, and just because I get in trouble and come +to you for sympathy, you begin to nag. For God's sake, don't become a +nagging woman, Blossom. A man hates her worse than poison." + +"O Jonathan!" she cried out sharply, placing her hand on her breast as +though he had stabbed her. + +"Of course, I'm only warning you. Your great charm is poise--I never saw +a woman who had so much of it. That's what a man wants in a wife, +too. Vagaries are all right in a girl, but when he marries, he wants +something solid and sensible." + +"Then you do love me, Jonathan?" + +"Don't be a goose," he rejoined--for it was a question to which he had +never in his life returned a direct answer. + +"Of course, I know you do or you wouldn't have married me--but I wish +you'd tell me so--just in words--sometimes." + +"If I told you so, you'd have no curiosity left, and that would be bad +for you. Come, kiss me, sweetheart, that's better than talking." + +She kissed him obediently, as mildly complaisant as she had once been +coldly aloof. Though the allurement of the remote had deserted her, she +still possessed, in his eyes, the attraction of the beautiful. If the +excitement of the chase was ended, the pleasure of the capture was still +amply sufficient to make up the difference. He laughed softly as he +kissed her, enjoying her freshness, her surrender, her adoration, which +she no longer attempted to hide. + +When he parted from her several hours afterwards, he had almost +recovered the casual gaiety which had become his habit of mind. Life +was too short either to wonder or to regret, he had once remarked, and +a certain easy fatalism had softened so far the pricks of a disturbing +conscience. + +The walk from the pasture to the house led through a tangle of shrubbery +called by the negroes, the Haunt's Walk, and as he pushed the leafless +boughs out of his way, a flitting glimpse of red caught his eye beyond +a turn in the path. An instant later, Molly passed him on her way to the +spring or to the meadows beyond. + +"Good day, Mr. Jonathan," she said, while her lips curved and she looked +up at him with her arch and brilliant smile. + +"Good day to yourself, cousin," he responded gaily, "what is your +hurry?" + +As he made a movement to detain her, she slipped past him, and a minute +afterwards her laugh floated back. + +"Oh, there's a reason!" she called over her shoulder. + +A sudden thought appeared to strike him at her words, and turning +quickly in the path, he looked after her until she disappeared down the +winding path amid the tangle of shrubbery. + +"Jove, she is amazingly pretty!" he said at last under his breath. + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +THE COMING OF SPRING + + +The winter began in a long rain and ended in a heavy snow which lay for +a week over the country. In the chill mornings while she dressed, Molly +watched the blue-black shadows of the crows skimming over the white +ground, and there was always a dumb anxiety at her heart as she looked +after them. + +On Christmas Eve there had been a dance at Piping Tree, and because she +had danced twice with Gay (who had ridden over in obedience to a whim), +Abel had parted from her in anger. For the first time she had felt +the white heat of his jealousy, and it had aroused rebellion, not +acquiescence, in her heart. Jonathan Gay was nothing to her (though +he called her his cousin)--he had openly shown his preference for +Blossom--but she insisted passionately that she was free and would dance +with whomsoever she pleased. To Abel's demand that she should give up +"round dances" entirely, she had returned a defiant and mocking laugh. +They had parted in an outburst of temper, to rush wildly together a few +days later when they met by chance in the turnpike. + +"You love him, but you don't love him enough, honey," said Reuben, +patting her head. "You love yourself still better than him." + +"Three months ago he hardly dared hope for me--he would have kissed the +dust under my feet--and now he flies into fits of jealousy because I +dance with another man." + +"'Tis human natur to go by leaps an' starts in love, Molly." + +"It's a foolish way, grandfather." + +"Well, I ain't claimin' that we're over-wise, but thar's al'ays life +ready to teach us." + +When the snow thawed, spring appeared so suddenly that it looked as +if it had lain there all winter in a green and gold powder over the +meadows. Flashes of blue, like bits of fallen sky, showed from the +rail fences; and the notes of robins fluted up from the budding willows +beside the brook. On the hill behind Reuben Merryweather's cottage the +peach-trees bloomed, and red-bud and dogwood filled the grey woods with +clouds of delicate colour. Spring, which germinated in the earth, moved +also, with a strange restlessness, in the hearts of men and women. As +the weeks passed, that inextinguishable hope, which mounts always with +the rising sap, looked from their faces. + +On the morning of her birthday, a warm April day, Molly smiled at +herself in the mirror, and because the dimples became her, wondered how +she could manage to keep on smiling forever. Blushing and paling she +tried a ribbon on her hair, threw it aside, and picked up another. + +"I am thankful for many things," she was thinking, "and most of all I +am thankful that I am pretty. I suppose it's better to be good like Judy +Hatch, but I'd rather be pretty." + +She was at the age when the forces of character still lie dormant, and +an accident may determine the direction of their future development. +It is the age when it is possible for fortune to make a dare-devil of a +philosopher, a sceptic of a worshipper, a cynic of a sentimentalist. + +When she went down the flagged walk a little later to meet Abel by the +blazed pine as she had promised, she was still smiling to herself and +to the blue birds that sang joyously in the blossoming trees in the +orchard. At the end of the walk her smile vanished for she came face to +face with Jim Halloween, who carried a new-born lamb in his arms. + +"Many happy returns of the day," he began with emotion. "I thought a +present like this would be the most acceptable thing I could bring to +you--an' ma agreed with me when I asked her advice." + +"It's very good of you--and how darling it is! I'll take it back and +make it comfortable before I start out." + +Taking the lamb into her arms, she hid her face in its wool while they +returned to the house. + +"It ain't so young as it looks, an will begin to be peart enough befo' +long," he remarked. "Something useful as well as ornamental, was what I +had in mind to bring you. 'Thar's nothin' mo' suitable all round for the +purpose than a lamb,' was what I said to ma. 'She can make a pet of it +at first, an' then when it gets too big to pet, she can turn it into +mutton.'" + +"But I wouldn't--I'd never let it be killed--the little darling!" + +"Now, that's foolishness, I reckon," he returned admiringly, "but thar's +something downright takin' in foolishness as long as a woman is pretty. +I don't mind it, an' I don't reckon ma would unless it turned to +wastefulness. Is thar' any hope you've changed yo' mind since the last +time I spoke about marriage?" + +"No, I haven't changed, Mr. Halloween." + +He sighed not passionately, but with a resigned and sentimental regret. + +"Well, in that case, it's a pity I've wasted so much time wantin' you, I +reckon," he rejoined. "It ain't sensible to want what you can't have, an +I've always tried to be sensible, seein' I'm a farmer. If I hadn't set +my fancy on you I'd have waited on Blossom Revercomb as likely as not." + +They had reached the house, and she did not reply until she had entered +the living-room and placed the lamb in a basket. Coming out again, she +took up the thread of the conversation as she closed the door behind +her. + +"I wonder all of you don't turn your eyes on Blossom," she observed. + +"Yes, she's handsome enough, but stiff-mouthed and set like all the rest +of the Revercombs. I shouldn't like to marry a Revercomb, when it comes +to that." + +"Shouldn't you?" she asked and laughed merrily. + +"They say down at Bottoms," he went on, "that she's gone moonstruck +about Mr. Jonathan, an' young Adam Doolittle swears he saw them walkin' +together on the other side of old orchard hill." + +"I thought she was too sensible a girl for that." + +"They're none of 'em too sensible. I'm the only man I ever saw who never +had a woman moonstruck about him--an' it makes me feel kind of lonesome +to hear the others talk. It's a painful experience, I reckon, but it +must be a fruitful source of conversation with a man's wife, if he ever +marries. Has it ever struck you," he inquired, "that the chief thing +lackin' in marriage is conversation?" + +"I don't know--I've never thought about it." + +"Now, I have often an' over again, ma bein' sech a silent person to live +with. It's the silence that stands between Blossom Revercomb an' me--an' +her brother Abel is another glum one of the same sort, isn't he?" + +"Do you think so? I hadn't noticed it." + +"An' you seein' so much of him! Well, all folks don't observe things as +sharply as I do--'twas a way I was born with. But I passed him at the +fork as I came up, an' he was standin' just as solemn an' silent while +Mr. Chamberlayne, over from Applegate, was askin' him questions." + +"What questions? Did you hear them?" + +"Oh, about his mother an' prospects of the grist-mill. The lawyer went +on afterward to the big house to do business with Mr. Jonathan." + +They had reached the point in the road where a bridle path from the mill +ran into it; and in the centre of the field, which was woven in faint +spring colours like an unfinished tapestry, Molly descried the figure +of Abel moving rapidly toward her. Dismissing her companion, she ran +forward with her warm blood suffusing her face. + +"Abel," she said, "tell me that you are happy," and lifted her mouth to +his kiss. + +"Something in the spring makes me wild for you, Molly. I can't live +without you another year, and hear the blue birds and see the green +burst out so sudden. There is a terrible loneliness in the spring, +darling." + +"But I'm here, Abel." + +"Yes, you're here, but you aren't near enough, for I'm never sure of +you. That's the cause of it--shall I ever be sure of you even after +we are married? You've got different blood in you, Molly--blood that +doesn't run quiet,--and it makes me afraid. Do you know I've been to +look at the pines this morning, and I am all one big ache to begin on +the house." + +"But you're happy--say you're happy." + +"How can I be happy, when I'm wanting you with every drop of my blood +and yet never certain that I shall have you. The devil has a lot to +do with it, I reckon--for there are times when I am half blind with +jealousy and doubt of you. Did you ever kiss a man before me, Molly?" + +She laughed, moved by an instinct to torment him. "You wouldn't have +asked me that three months ago, and you wouldn't have cared." + +"It's different now. I've got a right to know." + +"You'll never know anything because you have the 'right' to," she +returned impatiently. "I hate the word--how silly you are, Abel." + +"If you'd call me mad you'd come nearer to it, I reckon. It's the way +of the Hawtreys--we've always gone neck and crop over the fences without +giving a thought to the damage we've done by the way. My mother went +like that at religion--she's gone over so hard to religion that she +hasn't left a piece of her for common humanity. All the world is divided +for her between religion and damnation. I believe she thinks the very +eggs in the hen-house are predestined to be saved or damned. And with +me it's the same, only it isn't religion, but you. It's all you to me, +Molly, even the spring." + +"You're so wholehearted, and I'm so lightminded. You ought to have loved +a staid, sober woman. I was born passionate and changeful just as you +were born passionate and steady." + +"Don't, Molly, if you only knew how you hurt me when you talk like that. +You've flown into my heart like a little blue bird into a cage, and +there you'll beat and flutter, but you can't get out. Some day you'll +rest there quiet, sweetheart." + +"Don't call it a cage, and never, never try to hold me or I'll fly +away." + +"Yet you love me, Molly?" + +She threw her arms about his neck, rising on tiptoe while she kissed his +mouth. "I love you--and yet in my heart I don't really believe in love," +she answered. "I shouldn't be surprised to wake up any morning and find +that I had dreamed it." + +"It makes me want to curse those that put your mind out of joint when +you were little and innocent." + +"I don't believe I was ever little and innocent--I was born out of +bitterness." + +"Then I'll cure you, darling. I'll love you so hard that you'll forget +all the terrible things you knew as a child." + +She shook her head, gaily and yet with a touch of scorn for his +assurance. "You may try with all your strength, but when a sapling has +been bent crooked you can't pull it straight." + +"But you aren't crooked, Molly," he answered, kissing her throat above +her open blouse. + +She glowed at his kiss, and for one instant, it seemed to them that +their spirits touched as closely as their bodies, while the longing and +the rapture of spring drew them together. + +"You're mine now, Molly--I've got you close," he said as he held her. + +At his words the rosy waves upon which they had floated broke suddenly +on the earth, and turning slowly they walked hand in hand out of the +field into the turnpike. A strange shyness had fallen over them, for +when Molly tried to meet his eyes, she found that her lashes trembled +and fell;--yet this shyness was as delicious as the ecstasy from which +it had come. + +But Nature seldom suffers such high moments to pass before they +have been paid for in physical values. As the lovers passed into the +turnpike, there came the sound of a horse at a trot, and a minute later +Jonathan Gay rode toward them, leaning slightly over the neck of his +bay. Seeing them, he lifted his hat and brought down his horse to a +walk, as if prompted by a sudden desire to look closer in Molly's face. +Her rapture evidently became her, for after his first casual glance, he +turned again quickly and smiled into her eyes. Her look met his with the +frankness of a child's and taken unawares--pleased, too, that he should +so openly admire her--she smiled back again with the glow of her secret +happiness enriching her beauty. + +In a moment Gay had passed on, and turning to Abel, she saw that a frown +darkened his features. + +"He had no right to look at you like that, and you oughtn't to have +smiled back, Molly," he said sternly. + +Her nature leaped instantly to arms. "I suppose I've a right to my +smiles," she retorted defiantly. + +"No you haven't--not now. An engaged woman ought to be proper and +sober--anybody will tell you so--ask Mr. Mullen. A girl may flirt a +little and nobody thinks any harm of it, but it's different afterwards, +and you know it." + +"I know nothing of the kind, and I refuse to be preached to. I might as +well marry Mr. Mullen." + +The taunt, though it was uttered half in jest, appeared to torment him +beyond endurance. + +"How can you talk to me like this, after what you said five minutes +ago?" he demanded. + +His tone approached, unfortunately, the ministerial, and as he spoke, +her anger flamed over her as hotly as her happiness had done a few +minutes earlier. + +"That was five minutes ago," she retorted with passion. + +Stopping in the road, he caught her arms and held them to her sides, +while the thunder cloud blackened his forehead. Two playthings of +Nature, swept alternately by the calm and the storm of elemental forces, +they faced each other in the midst of mating birds and insects that were +as free as they. + +"Do you mean that you've changed, and in five minutes?" he asked. + +"I've always told you I could change in three," she retorted. + +"I don't believe it--you are behaving foolishly." + +"And you are wise, I suppose--preaching and prating to me as if you +stood in the pulpit. When you were begging me so humbly for a kind word, +I might have known that as soon as you got the kind word, you'd begin to +want to manage me body and soul--that's a man all over." + +"I merely said that an engaged woman ought not to smile too free at +other men--and that you ought not to even more than others, because +there is something so inviting about you. Mr. Mullen would say the same +thing from the pulpit--and what one man can say in the pulpit, I reckon, +another may repeat in the road." + +"No, he mayn't--not if he wants to marry me." + +"If I promise not to say a word more about it, will you get over your +temper?" + +"If you keep your promise, but how am I to know that you won't burst out +again the next time I look at a man?" + +"Only try to look at them a little differently, Molly, not quite so +wide-eyed and red-lipped--but primmer and with lowered lashes, just a +bit contemptuous, as if your were thinking 'you might as well be a stick +or a stone for all the thought I am giving you.'" The mental picture +appeared to afford him satisfaction, for he resumed after a moment. +"I believe if you'd practise it a while before the glass you could do +it--you are so clever." + +"Why on earth should I make myself ugly just to please you?" + +"It wouldn't be making yourself ugly--I can't endure an ugly woman. All +I want you to be is sober." + +"Then what made you fall in love with me? It certainly was not for +soberness." + +He shook his head hopelessly, puzzled for the first time by the too +obvious contradiction between the ideal and the actual--between the +phantom of a man's imagination and the woman who enthralls his heart. + +"To save my life I couldn't tell you why I did," he replied. "It does +seem, a bit foolish to fall in love with a woman as she is and then try +to make her over into something different." + +"Judy Hatch was the person God intended for you, I'm sure of it." + +"Well, I'm not, and if I were I'd go ahead and defeat his intentions +as I'm doubtless doing this minute. Let's make up now, so you'd as well +stop talking silliness." + +"It's you that talks silliness, not I--as if I were going through life +lowering my lashes and looking contemptuous! But you're your mother all +over again. I've heard her say a dozen times that a girl who is born +homely ought to get down on her knees and thank the Lord for protecting +her from temptation." + +"You never heard me say it, did you?" + +"No, but I shall yet if I live long enough--and all because of your +ridiculous jealousy." + +The humour of this struck him, and he remarked rather grimly: + +"Good God, Molly, what a vixen you are!" Then he broke into a laugh, and +catching her to him, stopped her mouth with kisses. + +"Well, we're in it," he said, "and we can't get out, so there's no use +fighting about it." + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +THE SHADE OF MR. JONATHAN + + +Old Reuben, seated in his chair on the porch, watched Molly come up the +flagged walk over the bright green edgings of moss. Her eyes, which +were like wells of happiness, smiled at him beneath the blossoming apple +boughs. Already she had forgotten the quarrel and remembered only the +bliss of the reconciliation. + +"I've had visitors while you were out, honey," said the old man as she +bent to kiss him. "Mr. Chamberlayne and Mr. Jonathan came up and sat a +bit with me." + +"Was it on business, grandfather?" + +"'Twas on yo' business, Molly, an' it eased my mind considerable +about what's to become of you when I'm dead an' gone. It seems old Mr. +Jonathan arranged it all befo' he died, an' they've only been waitin' +till you came of age to let you into the secret. He left enough money in +the lawyer's hands to make you a rich woman if you follow his wishes." + +"Did they tell you his wishes?" she asked, turning from Reuben to Spot +as the blind dog fawned toward her. + +"He wants you to live with Miss Kesiah and Mr. Jonathan when I'm taken +away from you, honey, an' you're to lose all but a few hundred if you +ever marry and leave 'em. Old Mr. Jonathan had sharp eyes, an' he saw +I had begun to fail fast befo' he died. It's an amazin' thing to think +that even after all the morality is wrung out of human natur thar'll +still be a few drops of goodness left sometimes at the bottom of it." + +"And if I don't do as he wished? What will come of it, then, +grandfather?" + +"Then the bulk goes to help some po' heathens over yonder in China to +the Gospel. He was a strange man, was old Mr. Jonathan. Thar warn't +never any seein' through him, livin' or dead." + +"Why did he ever come here in the beginning? He wasn't one of our +people." + +"The wind blew him this way, pretty, an' he was never one to keep goin' +against the wind. When the last Jordan died childless an' the place was +put up to be sold, Mr. Jonathan read about it somewhar, an' it looked to +him as if all he had to do was to come down here an' bury himself alive +to git rid of temptation. But the only way to win against temptation is +to stand square an' grapple with it in the spot whar it finds you, an' +he came to know this, po' sinner, befo' he was done with it." + +"He was a good soldier, wasn't he?" asked Molly. + +"So good a soldier that he could fight as well on one side as on +t'other, an' 'twas only an accident that sent him into the army with +me instead of against me. I remember his telling me once when I met him +after a battle that 'twas the smell of blood, not the cause, that made +him a fighter. Thar's many a man like that on both sides in every war, I +reckon." + +"I wonder how you can be so patient when you think of him!" she said +passionately as he stopped. + +"You'll understand better when you're past seventy," he answered gently. +"Thar's a softness like a sort of green grass that springs up an' covers +you when you begin to git old an' worn out. I've got it an' Spot's +got it--you can tell by the way he won't trouble to git mad with the +chickens that come peckin' around him. As soon as it's safely spread +over you, you begin to see that the last thing to jedge anybody by is +what you've known of the outside of 'em." + +"I can't feel about him as you do, but I don't mind takin' his money as +long as you share it," returned the girl in a softer voice. + +"It's a pile of money such as you've never heard of, Molly. Mr. +Chamberlayne says thar'll be an income of goin' on ten thousand dollars +a year by the time you're a little older." + +"Ten thousand dollars a year just for you an' me!" she exclaimed, +startled. + +"Thar warn't so much when 'twas left, but it's been doublin' on itself +all the while you were waitin'." + +"We could go everywhere an' see everything, grandfather." + +"It ain't for me, pretty. Mr. Jonathan knew you wouldn't come into it +till I was well on my way to the end of things." + +Kneeling at his side, she caught his hands and clung to him sobbing. + +"Don't talk of dying! I can't bear to think of your leaving me!" + +His trembling and knotted hands gathered her to him. "The young an' the +old see two different sides of death, darlin'. When you're young an' +full of spirit, it looks powerful dark an' lonely to yo' eyes, but when +you're gittin' along an' yo' bones ain't quite so steady as they once +were, an' thar seem to be mo' faces you're acquainted with on the other +side than on this one--then what you've been so terrible afeared of +don't look much harder to you than settlin' down to a comfortable rest. +I've liked life well enough, but I reckon I'll like death even better +as soon as I've gotten used to the feel of it. The Lord always appears +a heap nearer to the dead, somehow, than He does to the livin', and +I shouldn't be amazed to find it less lonely than life after I'm once +safely settled." + +"You've seen so many die that you've grown used to it," said Molly +through her tears. + +For a moment he gazed wistfully at the apple boughs, while his face +darkened, as if he were watching a procession of shadows. In his seventy +years he had gained a spiritual insight which penetrated the visible +body of things in search of the truth beneath the ever-changing +appearance. There are a few blameless yet suffering beings on whom +nature has conferred a simple wisdom of the heart which contains +a profounder understanding of life than the wisdom of the mind can +grasp--and Reuben was one of these. Sorrow had sweetened in his soul +until it had turned at last into sympathy. + +"I've seen 'em come an' go like the flakes of light out yonder in the +orchard," he answered almost in a whisper. "Young an' old, glad an' +sorry, I've seen 'em go--an' never one among 'em but showed in thar face +when 'twas over that 'twas the best thing had ever happened. It's hard +for me now to separate the livin' from the dead, unless it be that the +dead are gittin' closer all the time an' the livin' further away." + +"And you're never afraid, grandfather?" + +"Well, when it comes to that, honey, I reckon if I can trust the Lord in +the light, I can trust him in the darkness. I ain't as good a Christian +as my ma was--she could beat Sarah Revercomb when it came to sayin' the +Bible backwards--but I've yet to see the spot of natur, either human +or clay, whar we couldn't find the Lord at work if we was to dig deep +enough." + +He stopped at sight of a small figure running under the apple trees, +and a minute later Patsey, the Gay's maid, reached the flagged walk +and panted out a request that Miss Molly should come to the house for a +birthday present which awaited her there. + +"Won't you go with me, grandfather?" asked the girl, turning to Reuben. + +"I ain't at home thar, Molly," answered the old man. "It's well enough +to preach equality an' what not when you're walking on the opposite side +of the road, as Abel would say, but it don't ring true while yo' feet +are slippin' an' slidin' over a parlour floor." + +"Then I shan't go without you. Where you aren't welcome is a place I can +stay away from." + +"Thar, thar, honey, don't be runnin' arter Abel's notions till you find +out whar they're leadin' you. Things are better as they are or the Lord +wouldn't have made 'em so, an' He ain't goin' to step a bit faster or +slower on o' count of our ragin'. Some folks were meant to be on top an' +some at bottom, for t'otherwise God Almighty wouldn't have put 'em thar. +Abel is like Sarah, only his generation is different." + +"Do you really think he's like his mother?" asked Molly a little +wistfully. + +"As haw is like haw. They're both bent on doin' the Lord's job over +again an' doin' it better, an' thar manner of goin' to work would be +to melt up human natur an' pour it all into the same pattern. It ain't +never entered Sarah's head that you can't fit the same religion to every +man any mo' than you can the same pair of breeches. The big man takes +the big breeches an' the little man takes the small ones, an' it's jest +the same with religion. It may be cut after one pattern, but it's mighty +apt to get its shape from the wearer inside. Why, thar ain't any text so +peaceable that it ain't drawn blood from somebody." + +"All the same I shan't go a step without you," persisted the girl. + +"Then find my stick an' straighten my collar. Or had I better put on my +Sunday black?" + +"No, I like you as you are--only let me smooth your hair a little. Run +ahead, Patsey, and say we're both coming." + +Slipping her arm in his, she led him through the orchard, where the +bluebirds were fluting blissfully in the apple-trees. To the heart of +each spring was calling--but to Molly it meant promise and to Reuben +remembrance. Though the bluebirds sang only one song, they brought to +the old man and to the girl a different music. + +"I've sometimes thought Mr. Mullen better suited to you than Abel, +Molly," said Reuben presently, uttering an idea that had come to him +more than once. "If you'd been inclined to fancy him, I don't believe +either Mrs. Gay or Miss Kesiah could have found any fault with him." + +"But you know I couldn't care for him, grandfather," protested Molly +impatiently. "He is like one of Mrs. Bottom's air plants that grow +without any roots." + +"Well, he's young yet an' his soul struts a trifle, but wait till +he's turned fifty an' he'll begin to be as good a Christian as he is a +parson. It's a good mould, but he congealed a bit too stiff when he was +poured into it." + +They reached the grape arbour as he finished, and a minute later +Abednego lead them into the library, where Kesiah placed Reuben in a +comfortable chair and hastened to bring him a glass of wine from the +sideboard. At Molly's entrance, Gay and Mr. Chamberlayne came forward to +shake hands with her, while Mrs. Gay looked up from her invalid's couch +and murmured her name in a gentle, reproachful voice. The pale blue +circles around the little lady's eyes and faintly smiling mouth were the +only signs of the blighting experience through which she had passed. As +she turned her angelic gaze on old Jonathan's daughter there was not an +instant's doubt in the minds of those about her that she would accept +the blow with the suffering sweetness that enhanced her beauty. + +"We wanted to give you a little reminder of us on your birthday, Molly," +she said, taking up an amethyst cross on a slender chain from the table +beside her, "and Jonathan thought you would like a trinket to wear with +your white dresses." + +"I was right, wasn't I, cousin?" asked Gay, with his genial smile. + +Mrs. Gay flushed slightly at the word, while Reuben cast a grateful +glance at him over the untasted glass of wine in his hand. + +Without drawing a step nearer, Molly stood there in the centre of the +room, nervously twisting her handkerchief in and out of her fingers. +She was physically cramped by her surroundings, and the reproachful +gentleness in Mrs. Gay's face embarrassed her only less than did the +intimate pleasantry of Jonathan's tone. Every detail of the library--the +richness and heaviness of the furniture, the insipid fixed smiles in the +family portrait, the costly fragility of the china ornaments--all these +seemed to unite in some occult power which overthrew her self-possession +and paralyzed her emotions. + +Pitying her shyness, Gay took the chain from his mother's hand, and, +slipping it around Molly's neck, fastened it under the bunch of curls +at the back. Then he patted her encouragingly on the shoulder, while he +spoke directly to Reuben. + +"It looks well on her don't you think, Mr. Merryweather," he inquired. + +"Yes, it's a pretty gift an' she's much obliged to all of you," replied +Reuben, with the natural dignity which never deserted him. "She's a good +girl, Molly is," he added simply. "For all her quick words an' ways +thar ain't a better girl livin'." + +"We are very sure of that," said Mr. Chamberlayne, speaking in Gay's +place. "She is a kinswoman any of us may be proud of owning." And going +a step nearer to her, he began explaining her father's wishes in the +shortest words at his command. + +They were all kind--all honestly anxious to do their duty in aiding the +atonement of old Jonathan. Their faces, their voices, their gestures, +revealed an almost painful effort to make her appear at ease. Yet in +spite of their irreproachable intentions, each one of them was perfectly +aware that the visit was very far from being a success. They admired her +sincerely, but with the exception of Gay, who was bothered by few moral +prejudices, they were one and all nervously constrained in manner. To +Mr. Chamberlayne she represented merely an attractive object of charity; +to Kesiah she appeared as an encroaching member of the inferior order; +to Mrs. Gay she embodied the tragic disillusionment of her life. In time +they would either forget these first impressions or grow accustomed to +them; but while she stood there, awkward and blushing, in the middle of +the library, where old Jonathan had worked out his repentance, even the +lawyer found his legal eloquence tripping confusedly on his tongue, and +turned at last in sheer desperation to stare with a sensation of relief +at the frowning countenance of Kesiah. When, after a hesitating word of +thanks, the girl held out her hand to Reuben, and they went away arm in +arm, as they had come, a helpless glance passed from Jonathan to Mrs. +Gay and from Mrs. Gay into vacancy. + +"Like most eccentric bequests made in moments of great moral purpose, +it was, of course, a mistake," said the lawyer. "Had Jonathan known the +character of the miller, he would certainly have had no objection to +Molly's choice--if she has, indeed, a serious fancy for the young man, +which I doubt. But in his day, we must remember, the Revercombs had +given little promise of either intelligence or industry except in the +mother. Granting this," he added thoughtfully, "it might be possible +to have the conditions set aside, but not without laying bare a scandal +which would cause great pain to sensitive natures---" + +He glanced sympathetically at Mrs. Gay, who responded almost +unconsciously to the emotional suggestion of his ideal of her. + +"Oh, never that! I could not bear that!" she exclaimed. + +"The whole trouble comes of the insane way people arrange the future," +remarked Jonathan with irritation. "He actually believed, I dare say, +that he was assuring the girl's happiness by that ridiculous document. +But for mother I'd fight the thing in the courts and then give Molly her +share outright and let her marry the miller." + +The lawyer shook his head slowly, with his eyes on Mrs. Gay. "Before all +else we must consider your mother," he answered. + +For the first time Kesiah spoke. "I am quite willing to take the girl +when Reuben dies," she said, "but why in the world did he put in that +foolish clause about her living with Jonathan and myself?" + +Without looking at her Mr. Chamberlayne answered almost sharply. "The +whole truth of the matter is that there was a still more absurd idea +in his mind, dear lady," he replied. "I may as well let you know it +now since I combated it uselessly in my last interview with him. At the +bottom of his heart Jonathan remained incorrigibly romantic until his +death, and he clung desperately to the hope that if Molly received +the education he intended her to have, her beauty and her charm, which +seemed to him very remarkable, might win his nephew's affections, if +she were thrown in his way. That in short, is the secret meaning of this +extraordinary document." + +The uncomfortable silence was broken by a laugh as Gay rose to his feet. +"Well, of all the ridiculous ideas!" he exclaimed in the sincerity of +his amusement. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +THE SHADE OF REUBEN + + +Arm in arm Reuben and Molly walked slowly home through the orchard. +Neither spoke until the old man called to Spot at his doorstep, and +then Molly noticed that his breath came with a whistling sound that was +unlike his natural voice. + +"Are you tired, grandfather? What is the matter?" + +"It's my chest, daughter. Let me sit down a while an' it will pass. Who +is that yonder on the bench?" + +"Old Mr. Doolittle. Wait here a minute before you speak to him." + +It was a perfect spring afternoon, and the air was filled with vague, +roving scents, as if the earth exhaled the sweetness of hidden flowers. +In the apple orchard the young grass was powdered with gold, and the +long grey shadows of the trees barred the ground like the sketchy +outlines in a impressionist painting. + +On a bench at one end of the porch old Adam was sitting, and at sight of +them, he rose, and stood waiting with his pipe in his hand. + +"As 'twas sech a fine day an' thar warn't any work on hand for a man of +my years, I thought I'd walk over an' pay my respects to you," he said. +"I've heard that 'twas yo' granddaughter's birthday an' that she's like +to change her name befo' it's time for another." + +"Well, I'm glad to see you, old Adam," replied Reuben, sinking into a +chair while he invited his visitor to another. "I've gone kind of faint, +honey," he added, "an' I reckon we'd both like a sip of blackberry wine +if you've got it handy. Miss Kesiah gave me something to drink, but my +throat was so stiff I couldn't swallow it." + +The blackberry wine was kept in a large stone crock in the cellar, and +while she filled the glasses, Molly heard the voice of old Adam droning +on above the chirping of the birds in the orchard. + +"I've been settin' here steddyin' them weeds out thar over-runnin' +everything," he was saying, "an' it does appear to a considerin' body +that the Lord might have made 'em good grass an' grain with precious +little trouble to Himself an' a mortal lot of satisfaction to the po' +farmers." + +"He knows best. He knows best," responded Reuben. + +"Well, I used to think that way befo' I'd looked into the matter," +rejoined the other, "but the deeper I get, the less reason I see to be +sartain sure. 'Tis the fashion for parsons, an' for some people outside +of the pulpit, to jump to conclusions, an' the one they've jumped the +farthest to get at, is that things are all as they ought to be. If you +ain't possessed of the gift of logic it takes with you, but if you are +possessed of it, it don't. Now, I tell you that if a farmer was to try +to run his farm on the wasteful scale on which this world is conducted, +thar wouldn't be one among us as would trust him with next season's +crops. 'Tis sech a terrible waste that it makes a frugal mind sick to +see it." + +"Let's be thankful that it isn't any worse. He might have made it so," +replied Reuben, shocked by his neighbour's irreverence, yet too modest +to dispute it with authority. + +"Now, if that's logic I don't know what logic is, though I was born with +the gift of it," retorted old Adam. "When twenty seeds rot in the ground +an' one happens up, thar're some folks as would praise the Lord for +the one and say nothin' about the twenty. These same folks are forever +drawin' picturs of wild things hoppin' an' skippin' in the woods, as if +they ever had time to hop an' skip when they're obleeged to keep one +eye on the fox an' the hawk an' t'other on the gun of the hunter. Yet +to hear Mr. Mullen talk in the pulpit, you'd think that natur was all +hoppin' an' skippin'." + +"You're a wicked unbeliever," said Reuben, mildly sorrowful, "an' you +ought to go home and pray over your thankless doubts." + +"I'm as I was made," rejoined the other. "I didn't ax to be born +an' I've had to work powerful hard for my keep." Taking the glass of +blackberry wine from Molly's hand, he smacked his lips over it with +lingering enjoyment. + +"Do you feel better, grandfather?" inquired the girl, in the pause. + +"The wine does me good, honey, but thar's a queer gone feelin' inside +of me. I'm twenty years younger than you, old Adam, but you've got mo' +youth left in you than I have." + +"'Tis my powerful belief in the Lord," chuckled the elder, wiping his +mouth with the back of his hand and placing the glass on the end of the +bench. "No, no, Reuben, when it comes to that I ain't any quarrel with +folks for lookin' al'ays at the pleasant side, but what staggers me is +why they should take it as a merit to themselves when 'tis nothin' less +than a weakness of natur. A man might jest as well pride himself that he +can't see out of but one eye or hear out of but one ear as that he can't +see nothin' but good when evil is so mixed up into it. Thar ain't all +of us born with the gift of logic, but even when we ain't we might set +silent an' listen to them that is." + +A south wind, rising beyond the river, blew over the orchard, and the +barred shadows swung back and forth on the grass. + +"'Tis the eye of sense we see with," remarked Reuben quietly. + +"Eh, an' 'tis the eye of sense you're weak in," responded old Adam. "I +knew a blind man once that had a pictur of the world in his mind jest as +smooth an' pretty as the views you see on the backs of calendars--with +all the stink-weeds an' the barren places left out of it--an' he used to +talk to us seein' ones for all the earth as if he were better acquainted +with natur than we were." + +"I ain't larned an' I never pretended to be," said Reuben, piously, "but +the Lord has used me well in His time an' I'm thankful to Him." + +"Now that's monstrous odd," commented the ancient cynic, "for lookin' at +it from the outside, I'd say He'd used you about as bad as is His habit +in general." + +He rose from the bench, and dusted the seat of his blue overalls, +while he gazed sentimentally over the blossoming orchard. "'Tis the +seventeenth of April, so we may git ahead with plantin'," he remarked. +"Ah, well, it's a fine early spring an' puts me in mind of seventy years +ago when I was courtin'. Thar ain't many men, I reckon, that can +enjoy lookin' back on a courtin' seventy years after it is over. 'Tis +surprisin' how some things sweeten with age, an' memory is one of 'em." + +Reuben merely nodded after him as he went, for he had grown too tired +to answer. A curious stillness--half happiness, half indifference--was +stealing over him, and he watched as in a dream, the blue figure of old +Adam hobble over the sun-flecked path through the orchard. A few minutes +later Molly flitted after the elder, and Reuben's eyes followed her with +the cheerful look with which he had faced seventy years of life. On a +rush mat in the sunshine the old hound flicked his long black ear at a +fly of which he was dreaming, and from a bower of ivy in the eaves there +came the twitter of sparrows. Beyond the orchard, the wind, blowing from +the marshes, chased the thin, sketchy shadows over the lawn at Jordan's +Journey. + +While he sat there Reuben began to think, and as always, his thoughts +were humble and without self-consciousness. As he looked under +the gnarled boughs of the orchard, he seemed to see his whole life +stretching before him--seventy years--all just the same except that +with each he appeared a little older, a little humbler, a little less +expectant that some miracle might happen and change the future. At the +end of that long vista, he saw himself young and strong, and filled with +a great hope for something--he hardly knew what--that would make things +different. He had gone on, still hoping, year by year, and now at +the end, he was an old, bent, crippled man, and the miracle had never +happened. Nothing had ever made things different, and the great hope had +died in him at last as the twenty seeds of which old Adam had spoken had +died in the earth. He remembered all the things he had wanted that he +had never had--all the other things he had not wanted that had made up +his life. Never had a hope of his been fulfilled, never had an event +fallen out as he had planned it, never had a prayer brought him the +blessing for which he had prayed. Nothing in all his seventy years had +been just what he had wanted--not just what he would have chosen if the +choice had been granted him--yet the sight of the birds in the apple +trees stirred something in his heart to-day that was less an individual +note of rejoicing than a share in the undivided movement of life which +was pulsing around him. Nothing that had ever happened to him as Reuben +Merryweather would he care to live over; but he was glad at the end that +he had been a part of the spring and had not missed seeing the little +green leaves break out in the orchard. + +And then while he sat there, half dreaming and half awake, the stillness +grew suddenly full of the singing of blue birds. Spring blossomed +radiantly beneath his eyes, and the faint green and gold of the meadows +blazed forth in a pageant of colour. + +"I'm glad I didn't miss it," he thought. "That's the most that can be +said, I reckon--I'm glad I didn't miss it." + +The old hound, dreaming of flies, flapped his long ears in the sunshine, +and a robin, hopping warily toward a plate of seed-cakes on the arm of +Reuben's chair, winged back for a minute before he alighted suspiciously +on the railing. Then, being an old and a wise bird, he advanced again, +holding his head slightly sideways and regarding the sleeping man with +a pair of bright, inquisitive eyes. Reassured at last by the silence, he +uttered a soft, throaty note, and flew straight to the arm of the chair +in which Reuben was sitting. With his glance roving from the quiet man +to the quiet dog, he made a few tentative flutters toward the plate of +cake. Then, gathering courage from the adventure, he hopped deliberately +into the centre of the plate and began pecking greedily at the scattered +crumbs. + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +TREATS OF CONTRADICTIONS + + +As Molly passed down the Haunt's Walk, it seemed to her, also, that the +spring had suddenly blossomed. A moment before she had not known +that the path she trod was changing to emerald, that the meadows were +spangled with wild-flowers, that the old oaks on the lawn were blushing +in rose and silver. For weeks these miracles had happened around her, +and she had not noticed. As oblivious to them as old Adam Doolittle was, +she had remembered only that her birthday came on the seventeenth of +April, when, except for some luckless mishap, the promise of the spring +was assured. + +A red-winged blackbird darted like a flame across the path in front of +her, and following it into the open, she found Kesiah gathering wild +azalea on the edge of the thicket. + +At the girl's approach, the elder woman rose from her stooping posture, +and came forward, wearing a frown, which, after the first minute, Molly +saw was directed at the sunlight, not at herself. Kesiah's long, sallow +face under the hard little curls of her false front, had never +appeared more grotesque than it did in the midst of the delicate spring +landscape. Every fragile blossom, every young leaf, every blade of +grass, flung an insult at her as she stood there frowning fiercely at +the sunbeams. Yet only five minutes before she had suffered a sharp +recrudescence of soul--of that longing for happiness which is a part +of the resurrection of the spring, and which may survive not only the +knowledge of its own fruitlessness, but a belief in the existence of the +very happiness for which it longs. All the unlived romance in her heart +had come to life with the young green around her. Middle-age had not +deadened, it had merely dulled her. For the pang of desire is not, +after all, the divine prerogative of youth, nor has it even a conscious +relation to the possibility of fulfilment. Her soul looked out of her +eyes while she gazed over the azalea in her hand--yet, in spite of the +songs of the poets, the soul in her eyes did not make them beautiful. + +"I came down with Jonathan, Molly," she said. "You will doubtless find +him at the brook." For an instant she hesitated in confusion and then +added hurriedly, "We were speaking about you." + +"Were you?" asked Molly a little awkwardly, for Kesiah always +embarrassed her. + +"We were both saying how much we admired your devotion to your +grandfather. One rarely finds such attachment in the young to the old." + +"I have always loved him better than anybody except mother." + +"I am sure you have, and it speaks very well for both of you. We are all +much interested in you, Molly." + +"It's kind of you to think about me," answered Molly, and her voice was +constrained as it had been when she spoke in the library at Jordan's +Journey. + +"We feel a great concern for your future," said Kesiah. "Whatever we can +do to help you, we shall do very gladly. I always felt a peculiar pity +and sympathy for your mother." Her voice choked, for it was, perhaps, +as spontaneous an expression of her emotions as she had ever permitted +herself. + +"Thank you, ma'am," replied Molly simply, and the title of respect to +which Reuben had trained her dropped unconsciously from her lips. She +honestly liked Kesiah, though, in common with the rest of her little +world, she had fallen into the habit of regarding her as a person whom +it was hardly worth one's while to consider. Mrs. Gay had so completely +effaced her sister that the rough edges of Kesiah's character were +hardly visible beneath the little lady's enveloping charm. + +"It is natural that you should have felt bitterly toward your father," +began the older woman again in a trembling voice, "but I hope you +realize that the thought of his wrong to you and your mother saddened +his last hours." + +To her surprise Molly received the remark almost passionately. + +"How could that give me back my mother's ruined life?" she demanded. + +"I know, dear, but the fact remains that he was your father---" + +"Oh, I don't care in the least about the fact," retorted Molly, with her +pretty rustic attempt at a shrug, which implied, in this case, that the +government of nature, like that of society, rested solely on the consent +of the governed. What was clear to Kesiah was that this rebellion +against the injustice of the universe, as well as against the expiation +of Mr. Jonathan, was the outcome of a strong, though undisciplined, +moral passion within her. In her way, Molly was as stern a moralist as +Sarah Revercomb, but she derived her convictions from no academic system +of ethics. Kesiah had heard of her as a coquette; now she realized that +beneath the coqueteries there was a will of iron. + +"You must come to us, some day, dear, and let us do what we can to make +you happy," she said. "It would be a pity for all that money to go to +the conversion of the Chinese, who are doubtless quite happy as they +are." + +"I wonder why he chose the Chinese?" replied the girl. "They seem so +far away, and there's poor little Mrs. Meadows at Piping Tree who is +starving for bread." + +"He was always like that--and so is my sister Angela--the thing that +wasn't in sight was the thing he agonized over." She did not confess +that she had detected a similar weakness in herself, and that, seen the +world over, it is the indubitable mark of the sentimentalist. + +Analysis of Mr. Jonathan's character, however, failed to interest his +daughter. She smiled sweetly, but indifferently, and made a movement to +pass on into the meadow. Then, looking into Kesiah's face, she said in +a warmer voice: "If ever you want my help about your store room, Miss +Kesiah, just send for me. When you're ready to change the brine on your +pickles, I'll come down and do it." + +"Thank you, Molly," answered the other; "you're a nice light hand for +such things." + +In some almost imperceptible manner she felt that the girl had rebuffed +her. The conversation had been pleasant enough, yet Kesiah had meant +to show in it that she considered Molly's position changed since the +evening before; and it was this very suggestion that the girl had tossed +lightly aside--tossed without rudeness or malice, but with a firmness, +a finality, which appeared to settle the question forever. The +acknowledged daughter of Mr. Jonathan Gay was determined that she +should continue to be known merely as the granddaughter of his overseer. +Kesiah's overtures, had been--well, not exactly repulsed, but certainly +ignored; her advice had melted to thin air as soon as it was spoken. +As Molly flitted from her over the young weeds in the meadow, the older +woman stood looking after her with a heaviness, like the weight of +unshed tears, in her eyes. Not the girl's future, but her own, appeared +to her barren of interest, robbed even of hope. The spirit that combats, +she saw, had never been hers--nor had the courage that prevails. For +this reason fate had been hard to her--because she had never yielded to +pressure--because she had stepped by habit rather than choice into the +vacant place. She was a good woman--her heart assured her of this--she +had done her duty no matter what it cost her--and she had possessed, +moreover, a fund of common sense which had aided her not a little in +doing it. It was this common sense that told her now that facts were, +after all, more important than dreams--that the putting up of +pickles was a more useful work in the world than the regretting of +possibilities--that the sordid realities were not less closely woven +into the structure of existence than were the romantic illusions. She +told herself these things, yet in spite of her words she saw her future +stretching away, like her past, amid a multitude of small duties for +which she had neither inclination nor talent. One thing after another, +all just alike, day after day, month after month, year after year. +Nothing ahead of her, and, looking back, nothing behind her that she +would care to stop and remember. "That's life," she said softly to +herself and went on her way, while Molly, glancing back, beheld her only +as a blot on the sunshine. + +"Poor Miss Kesiah," the girl thought before she forgot her. "I wonder if +she's ever really lived?" + +Then the wonder fled from her mind, for, as a shadow fell over her path, +she looked up, startled, into the eyes of Gay, who had burst suddenly +out of the willows. His face was flushed and he appeared a trifle +annoyed. As he stopped before her, he cut sharply at the weeds with a +small whip he carried. + +"Don't, please," she said; "I hate to see people cut off the heads of +innocent things." + +"It is rather beastly," her returned, his face clearing. "Did you come +out to find me, cousin?" + +"Why should I, Mr. Jonathan?" + +"You don't soften the blow--but why 'Mr. Jonathan'?" + +"I thought it was your name." + +"It's not my name to you--I say, Molly, do you mind my telling you that +you're a brick?" + +"Oh, no, not if you feel like it." + +"I do feel like it tremendously." + +"Then I don't mind in the least," and to prove it she smiled radiantly +into his face. Her smile was the one really beautiful thing about Molly, +but as far as her immediate purpose went it served her as successfully +as a host. + +"By George, I like your devotion to the old chap!" he exclaimed. "I hope +a girl will stick by me as squarely when I am beginning to totter." + +"Have you ever been as good to one?" she asked quite seriously, and +wondered why he laughed. + +"Well, I doubt if I ever have, but I'd like very much to begin." + +"You're not a grandfather, Mr. Jonathan." + +"No, I'm not a grandfather--but, when I come to think of it, I'm a +cousin." + +She accepted this with composure. "Are you?" she inquired indifferently +after a minute. + +While she spoke he asked himself if she were really dull, or if she +had already learned to fence with her exrustic weapons? Her face was +brimming with expression, but, as he reminded himself, one never could +tell. + +"I haven't any cousin but you, Molly. Don't you think you can agree to +take me?" + +She shook her head, and he saw, or imagined he saw, the shadow of her +indignant surprise darken her features. + +"I've never thought of you as my cousin," she answered. + +"But I am, Molly." + +"I don't think of you so," she retorted. Again, as in the case +of Kesiah's advances, she was refusing to constitute a law by her +acknowledgment. + +"Don't you think if you tried very hard you might begin to?" + +"Why should I try?" + +"Well, suppose we say just because I want you to." + +"That wouldn't help me. I can't feel that it would make any difference." + +"What I want, you mean?" + +"Yes, what you want." + +"Aren't you a shade more tolerant of my existence than you were at +first?" + +"I suppose so, but I've never thought about it--any more than I've +thought of this ten thousand a year. It's all outside of my life, but +grandfather's in it." + +"Don't you ever feel that you'd like to get outside of it yourself? The +world's a big place." + +For the first time she appeared attentive to his words. + +"I've often wondered what it was like--especially the cities--New York, +Paris, London. Paris is the best, isn't it?" + +"Yes, Paris is the best to me. Have you ever thought that you'd like to +wear pretty gowns and drive through a green park in the spring--filled +with other carriages in which are wonderful women?" + +"But I'd feel so miserable and countrified," she answered. "Are they any +happier than I am--those wonderful women?" + +"Perhaps not so happy--there's a green-eyed dragon gnawing at the hearts +of most of them, and you, my nut-brown beauty, have never felt his +fangs." + +"I'd like to see them," she said after a minute, and moved slowly +onward. + +"Some day you may. Look here, Molly," he burst out impulsively, "I'm not +going to be sentimental about you. I haven't the least idea of making +love to you--I've had enough of that sort of rot, God knows--but I do +like you tremendously, and I want to stand to you as a big brother. I +never had a sister, you know," he added. + +Something earnest and tender in his voice touched her generosity, which +overflowed so easily. + +"And I never had a brother," she rejoined. + +"Then, that's where I'll come in, little cousin," he answered gently, +and drawing her to him, kissed her cheek with a caress which surprised +him by its unlikeness to the ordinary manifestations of love. + +His hand was still on her shoulder, when he felt her start back from his +grasp, and, turning quickly in the direction of her glance, he saw the +miller looking at them from the thicket on the opposite side of the +brook. The anger in Abel's face had distorted his handsome features +until they appeared swollen as if from drink, and for a single instant +Gay imagined that it was indeed whisky and not passion that had wrought +so brutal a change in him. + +"So you've made a fool of me, too, Molly?" he said when he had swung +over the stream and stood facing her. + +"You're all wrong, Revercomb," began Gay, and stopped the next instant, +because Molly's hand had shot out to silence him. + +"Will you be quiet?" she flung at him impatiently; and then fixing her +eyes on Abel, she waited silently for him to finish his speech. That +her lover's fiery temper had aroused her own, Gay realized as soon as he +turned to her. Her face was pale, but her eyes blazed and never had he +felt so strongly the tie of blood that united them as he did while she +stood there waiting for Abel's accusations with a gesture which appeared +to fling them back in disdain. + +"I might have known 'twas all fool's play with you--I might have known +you had flirted too much to settle down to an honest love," said Abel, +breathing hard between his word as if each one were torn from him with a +physical wrench at his heart. In losing his self-possession he had +lost his judgment as well, and, grasping something of his love from the +sincerity of his emotion, Gay made another ineffectual effort to present +the situation in a fairer light. + +"If you would only listen, my good fellow--if you would only let me +explain things---" he began. + +"Will you be quiet?" said Molly a second time, and then facing him +passionately she threw him a gesture of dismissal. "If you want to +please me, you will go." + +"And leave you alone with him?" + +She laughed. "Do you think I'm afraid of an angry man, or that I've +never seen one before?" + +With that he obeyed her, turning from time to time on his way over the +meadow to make sure that she did not need his support. In spite of the +utter unreasonableness of the affair, in some unaccountable way his +sympathies were on the side of the miller. The fellow was a boor, of +course, but, by Jove! he was a magnificent boor. It had been long since +Gay had seen such an outburst of primitive feeling--long since he had +come so close to the good red earth on which we walk and of which we are +made. + +"You're out of your head, Abel," said Molly--Gay turned away from +them--and the tone in which she spoke was hardly calculated to bring him +back to the place he had deserted. "You will say things you'll regret, +but I'll never forgive." + +"I'm sick of your eternal forgiveness," he retorted. "I've been forgiven +every time you got into a temper, and I suppose I'll be forgiven next +every time you are kissed." The "rousing" which had threatened every +Revercomb was upon him at last. + +"Well, as a matter of fact it is time enough for you to forgive me when +I ask you to," she returned. + +"You needn't ask. It's too much this time, and I'll be damned before I +will do it." + +Bending over a grey skeleton of last year's golden-rod, she caressed it +gently, without breaking its ghostly bloom. Years afterward, when she +had forgotten every word he uttered, she could still see that dried +spray of golden-rod growing against the April sky--she could still hear +a bluebird that sang three short notes and stopped in the willows. In +the quiet air their anger seemed to rush together as she had sometimes +thought their love had rushed to a meeting. + +"You have neither the right to forgive me nor to judge me," she said. +"Do you think I care what a man imagines of me who believes a thing +against me as easily as you do. If you went on your knees to me now I +should never explain--and if I chose to kiss every man in the county," +she concluded in an outburst of passion, "you have nothing to do with +it!" + +"Explain? How can a girl explain a man's kissing her, except by saying +she let him do it?" + +"I did let him do it," she gasped. + +For an instant they gazed at each other in an anger more violent in its +manifestation than their love had been. An observer, noticing them for +the first time, would have concluded that they had hated each other for +years, not that they had been lovers only a few minutes before. Nature, +having wearied of her play, was destroying her playthings. + +"I would marry no man on earth who wouldn't believe me in spite of +that--and everything else," she said. + +"Do you expect a man to believe you in spite of his eyes?" + +"Eyes, ears--everything! Do you think I'd have turned on you like that +before I had heard you?" + +A sob, not of pity, but of rage, burst from her lips, and the sound +sobered him more completely than her accusations had done. Her temper he +could withstand, but that little childish sob, bitten back almost before +it escaped, brought him again on his knees to her. + +"I can't understand--oh, Molly, don't you see I am in torment?" he +cried. + +But the veil of softness was gone now, and the cruelty that is bound up +in some inexplicable way in all violent emotion--even in the emotion of +love--showed itself on the surface. + +"Then stay there, for you've made it for yourself," she answered, and +turned away from him. As his voice called her again, she broke into a +run, flying before him over the green meadow until she reached the lawn +of Jordan's Journey, and his pursuit ended. Then, hurrying through the +orchard and up the flagged walk, she ascended the steps, and bent over +Reuben in his chair. + +"Grandfather, I am back. Are you asleep?" + +The robin that had flown from the railing at her approach swung on the +bough of an apple-tree and regarded her with attention. + +"Grandfather," she said again, touching him, "oh, grandfather, wake up!" + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +LIFE'S IRONIES + + +When he came down to breakfast next morning, Abel heard of Reuben's +death from his mother. + +"Well, you can't tell who's goin' to be the next," she concluded grimly, +as she poured the coffee. + +In spite of her austere manner and her philosophical platitude, Sarah +was more moved in her heart than she had dared to confess. From the +moment that she had heard of Reuben's death--when she had gone over with +some of her mourning to offer Molly--she had ceased to think of him +as an old man, and her mind had dwelt upon him as one who had been +ruthlessly cut off in his prime--as he might have been had the end come +some thirty or forty years before. Memory, that great miracle worker, +had contrived to produce this illusion; and all Sarah's hard common +sense could not prevent her feeling an indignant pity because Reuben's +possibilities of happiness had been unfulfilled. Trouble after trouble +and never anything to make up for them, and then to go this way while he +was resting! "It's like that," she thought bitterly to herself, alluding +to life. "It's like that!" And it seemed to her suddenly that the whole +of existence was but a continual demonstration of the strong religious +dogmas on which her house of faith had been reared. When you looked +around you, she thought, with triumph, there wasn't any explanation of +the seeming injustice except original sin. There was a strange comfort +in this conviction, as though it represented the single reality to which +she could cling amid the mutable deceptions of life. "Thar wouldn't +be any sense in it if 'twarn't for that," she would sometimes say to +herself, as one who draws strength from a secret source of refreshment. + +In Abel the news of Reuben's death awoke a different emotion, and his +first thought was of Molly. He longed to comfort her in his arms, and +the memory of the quarrel of yesterday and even of the kiss that led to +it seemed to increase rather than diminish this longing. + +Rising from his untasted breakfast, he hurriedly swallowed a cup of +coffee and took up his hat. + +"I am going to see Molly, mother; would you like to send a message?" + +Blossom, who was gazing out of the window with her eyes full of dreams, +turned at his words. + +"Give her my love, Abel," she said. + +"Tell her he was a good man and had fewer sins to his account than most +of us," added Sarah. + +"Did you know, Abel, that old Mr. Jonathan left her ten thousand dollars +a year as long as she lives with the Gays?" asked Blossom, coming over +to where he stood. + +He stared at her in amazement. "Where on earth did you hear that?" he +asked. + +A flush reddened her face. + +"Somebody told me. I forget just who it was," she replied. + +"When did it happen? How long have you known it?" + +But she was on her guard now, wrapped in that soft, pale reticence which +was the spiritual aspect of her beauty. + +"It may have been only one of the darkies' stories. I didn't pay much +attention to it," she answered, and busied herself about the geraniums +in the window. + +"Oh, you can't put any faith in the darkies' tales," rejoined Abel, and +after leaving a message with his mother for a farmer with whom he had +an appointment, he hastened out of the house and over the fields in the +direction of Reuben Merryweather's cottage. Here, where he had expected +to find Molly, Kesiah met him, with some long black things over her arm, +and a frown of anxious sympathy on her face. + +"The child is broken-hearted," she said with dignity, for a funeral +was one of the few occasions upon which she felt that she appeared to +advantage. "I don't think she can see you--but I'll go in and ask, if +you wish it." + +She went in, returning a minute later, with the black things still over +her arm, and a deeper frown on her forehead. + +"No--I'm sorry, but she doesn't wish to see any one. You know, the old +hound died the same night, and that has added to her sorrow." + +"Perhaps if I come back later?" + +"Perhaps; I am not sure. As soon as the funeral is over she will come to +us. You have heard, I suppose, of the change in--in her circumstances?" + +"Then it is true? I heard it, but I didn't believe it." + +Molly had fled suddenly into remoteness--not Reuben's death, but Mr. +Jonathan's "provision," had swept her away from him. Like other +mortals in other crises of experience, she was aware of a helpless, +a rebellious, realization of the power, not of fate, but of money. No +other accident of fortune could have detached her so completely from the +surroundings in which he had known her. Though he told himself that +to think of wealth as a thing to separate them was to show a sordid +brutality of soul, he revolted the next instant from the idea that his +love should demand so great a sacrifice. Like the majority of men who +have risen to comparative comfort out of bitter poverty, he had at the +same time a profound contempt and an inordinate respect for the tangible +fact of money--a contempt for the mere value of the dollar and a respect +for the ability to take stands of which that mystic figure was the +symbol. Sarah's hard common sense, overlaid as it was by an embroidery +of sentiments and emotions, still constituted the basic quality in his +character, and Sarah would have been the last woman in the world to +think lightly of renouncing--or of inviting another to renounce--an +income of ten thousand dollars a year. _He_ might dream that love would +bring happiness, but she was reasonably assured that money would bring +comfort. Between the dream and the assurance there would have been, +in Sarah's mind at least, small room left for choice. He had known few +women, and for one dreadful minute he asked himself, passionately, if +Molly and his mother could be alike? + +Unconsciously to himself his voice when he spoke again had lost its ring +of conviction. + +"Perhaps I may see her later?" he repeated. + +"The funeral will be to-morrow. You will be there?" + +"Yes, I'll be there," he replied; and then because there was nothing +further for him to say, he bowed over his hat, and went down the flagged +walk to the orchard, where the bluebirds were still singing. His misery +appeared to him colossal--of a size that overshadowed not only the +spring landscape, but life itself. He tried to remember a time when he +was happy, but this was beyond the stretch of his imagination at the +moment, and it seemed to him that he had plodded on year after year with +a leaden weight oppressing his heart. + +"I might have known it would be like this," he was thinking. "First, I +wanted the mill, so I'd lie awake at night about it, and then when I got +it all the machinery was worn out. It's always that way and always +will be, I reckon." And it appeared to him that this terrible law of +incompleteness lay like a blight over the over the whole field of human +endeavour. He saw Molly, fair and fitting as she had been yesterday +after the quarrel, and he told himself passionately that he wanted her +too much ever to win her. On the ground by the brook he saw the spray +of last year's golden-rod, and the sight brought her back to him with +a vividness that set his pulses drumming. In his heart he cursed Mr. +Jonathan's atonement more fervently than he had ever cursed his sin. + +The next day he went to Reuben's funeral, with his mother and Blossom +at his side, walking slowly across the moist fields, in which the vivid +green of the spring showed like patches of velvet on a garment of dingy +cloth. In front of him his mother moved stiffly in her widow's weeds, +which she still wore on occasions of ceremony, and in spite of her +sincere sorrow for Reuben she cast a sharp eye more than once on the hem +of her alpaca skirt, which showed a brown stain where she had allowed +it to drag in a forgetful moment. Only Archie was absent, but that was +merely because he had driven over to bring one of the Halloween girls in +Abel's gig. Sarah had heard him whistling in the stable at daybreak, +and looking out of the window a little later she had seen him oiling the +wheels of the vehicle. It had been decided at supper the evening before +that the family as a unit should pay its respects to Reuben. From +Sarah, comforting herself behind her widow's weeds with the doctrine of +original sin, to Archie, eager to give his sweetheart a drive, one and +all had been moved by a genuine impulse to dignify as far as lay +in their power the ceremonial of decay. Even Abner, the silent, had +remarked that he'd "never heard a word said against Reuben Merryweather +in his life." And now at the end of that life the neighbours had +gathered amid the ridges of green graves in the churchyard to bear +witness to the removal of a good man from a place in which he had been +honoured. + +During the service Abel kept his eyes on Molly, who came leaning +on Gay's arm, and wearing what appeared to him a stifling amount of +fashionable mourning. He was too ignorant in such matters to discern +that the fashion was one of an earlier date, or that the mourning had +been hastily gathered from cedar chests by Kesiah. The impression he +seized and carried away was one of elegance and remoteness; and the +little lonely figure in the midst of the green ridges bore no relation +in his mind to the girl in the red jacket, who had responded so ardently +to his kiss. The sunlight falling in flecks through the network of +locust boughs deepened the sense of unreality with which he watched her. + +"It's a good service as such ready-made things go," observed Sarah as +they went homeward, "but it seems to me that a man as upright as Reuben +was is entitled to a sermon bein' preached about him when he's laid in +his grave. What's the difference between the good man and the bad, if +you're goin' to say the same words over the one and the other? I ain't +a friend to flattery, but it can't hurt a man to have a few compliments +paid him in the churchyard, and when all's said an' done, 'lookin' for +the general Resurrection' can't be construed into a personal compliment +to Reuben." + +"When a man has been as pious as that he hasn't any use for compliments, +livin' or dead," rejoined Abner. + +"Well, I ain't contendin'," replied his mother. "The Lord knows thar +ain't any of his kind left, the mo' 's the pity! Things have changed +sence Reuben an' I was young, an' the very language Abel an' Blossom +speak is different from ours. I reckon if old Mr. Jonathan was to ride +along these roads to-day thar wouldn't be anybody, unless it was a +nigger, to open the gate for him." + +"You bet there wouldn't!" exclaimed Abel with fervour. + +Abner, walking at Sarah's side, wore the unnerved and anxious expression +of a man who is conscious that he is wearing his Sunday suit when it has +grown too small to contain him. His agony was so evident that Blossom, +observing it in the midst of her sentimental disturbances, remarked +affectionately that he looked as if he "were tired to death." + +"I've got the church fidgets in my legs," he said. "I reckon I'll get +into my everyday suit an' finish that piece of ploughin'. Are you goin' +back to the mill, Abel?" + +"No, I've shut down for the day," Abel replied. The funeral had turned +his mind into its Sunday habit of thought and he was determined that his +present state of misery should extend reverently until the evening. From +some instinct, which he did not attempt to explain, it appeared more +respectful to Reuben to sit idle for the rest of the day than to follow +Abner's example and go out and finish his work. + +The next morning he decided to write Molly a letter, and as the ordinary +paper his mother kept at the house seemed unsuitable for delivery at +Jordan's Journey, he walked down to the store to purchase a few sheets +from Mrs. Bottoms. + +"Nothing common and cheap," he said, "but the very best you have in the +store--such as they use in the city." + +Suspecting his purpose, she produced at once a turquoise coloured box, +from which she extracted an envelope that was ornamented on the flap +with a white dove holding a true lover's knot in his beak. + +"This is the very thing you're lookin' for," she observed, in the tone +of one who is conscious of being an authority in that sphere to which +God has called her, "the latest style in Applegate." + +Picking up the envelope he held it doubtfully toward the light in the +doorway. + +"Are you sure it isn't a little--a little loud?" he inquired wistfully. + +"Loud? Dear me, to think of you callin' a dove an' a blue ribbon bow +loud! Ain't that jest like a man? They can't be expected to have taste +in sech matters. No, it ain't loud!" she replied with more direct +condescension. "It's the latest thing from Applegate--the girls are all +crazy about it--jest the little artistic trifle that catches a woman's +eye." + +In the end, under the sting of her rebuke, though but half convinced, he +concluded the purchase and went out, bearing the box of ornamented paper +under his arm. An hour later, after the letter was written, misgivings +besieged him anew, and he stood holding the envelope at arm's length, +while he frowned dubiously at the emblematic dove on the flap. + +"It doesn't look just right to me," he said under his breath, "but Mrs. +Bottom ought to know, and I reckon she does." + +The letter went, and the next afternoon he followed it in person to +Jordan's Journey. Gay was coming down the walk when he reached the lawn, +and after a moment's hesitation they stopped to exchange a few remarks +about the weather. + +"There's something I want to explain to you, Revercomb," said Jonathan, +wheeling back abruptly after they had parted. "Molly has become a member +of our household, you see; so my relation to her is really that of a +cousin. She's a staunch little soul--I've a tremendous admiration for +her--but there has never been the slightest sentiment between us, you +understand." + +"Yes, I understand," replied Abel, and fell silent. + +There was a certain magnanimity, he recognized, in Gay's effort to put +things right even while he must have preferred in his heart to have them +remain in the wrong. As Molly's cousin it was hardly probable that he +should care to hasten her marriage to a country miller. + +"Well, I wanted you to know, that was all," said Gay in a friendly tone. +"You'll find Molly in the side-garden, so I wouldn't trouble to knock if +I were you." + +He went on, swinging with an easy stride between the hedges of box, +while Abel, passing the right wing in obedience to the directions, found +Molly walking up and down in a small grassy path, which was sprinkled +with snowdrops. The "side-garden" was a ruined, over-grown square, +planted in miniature box, which the elder Gay had laid out after one +of his visits to Italy. Now, with its dwindling maze and its unpruned +rose-bushes, it resembled a picture which has been blotted out until the +original intention of the artist is no longer discernible. Yet the place +was exquisite still. Spring had passed over it with her magical touch, +and she had decorated the spot she could no longer restore. The scent of +box filled the air, and little new green leaves had put out on the dusky +windings of the maze. + +As Abel approached, Molly was moving slowly away from him, her long +black skirt, which had been made to fit Mrs. Gay, trailing over the +snowdrops in the path. When she turned at the end of the walk, there +was the faintest hesitancy in her manner before she came forward with a +smile and an outstretched hand. In some subtle way she had changed--he +felt it before she reached him--before she uttered a word. He had never +seen her in a long dress until to-day; and in putting on Mrs. Gay's gown +she seemed to have clothed herself in that lady's appealing and pensive +manner. The black skirt, flowing between them on the grass, divided them +more completely than the memory of their quarrel. He was chilled because +it made her appear reserved and distant; she was embarrassed because +she had not yet learned to walk in a train, and while it pleased and +flattered her with a sense of dignity, it also caused her to feel +awkward and unnatural in her movements, as if she were not "playing up" +successfully to the part that had been assigned her. She had learned +a good deal in three days, and she was still a little confused by the +endeavour to understand all of her lessons. Sincere as her sorrow was +for Reuben, her youth and a certain quickness of observation had kept +her mindful of every change through which she had passed, of every +detail which distinguished life at the "big house" from life in the +overseer's cottage. She had learned, for instance, the necessity, in +such circumstances, of eating as if it were an utterly indifferent +matter, and yet of coming to one's meals dressed as elaborately as if +one were on one's way to church. Kesiah had taught her much; but +from Gay, with his abundant kindliness, his self-possession, his good +clothes, she had learned incomparably more. Kesiah had shown her the +external differences in "things," while Gay had opened her eyes to the +external differences that might count in men. Until she knew Gay she +had believed that the cultivation of one's appearance was a matter that +concerned women alone. Now, when moved by some unfortunate impulse of +respect for her mourning, Abel showed himself before her in his Sunday +clothes, she was conscious of a shock which she would never have felt in +the old days in the overseer's cottage. In his working dress, with his +fine throat bared by his blue shirt, there was a splendid vitality about +her lover beside which Jonathan appeared flabby and over-weighted with +flesh. But dressed in imitation of the work of Gay's London tailor, the +miller lost the distinction which nature had given him without acquiring +the one conferred by society. + +"You got my letter, Molly?" he asked--and the question was unfortunate, +for it reminded her not only of the letter, but of Gay's innocent jest +about the dove on the envelope. She had been ashamed at the instant, +and she was ashamed now when she remembered it, for there is nothing so +contagious as an active regard for the petty social values of life. In +three days she had not only begun to lose her own crudeness--she had +attained to a certain small criticism of the crudeness of Abel. Already +the difference between the two men was irritating her, yet she was still +unconscious as to the the exact particular in which this difference lay. +Her vision had perceived the broad distinction of class, though it +was untrained as yet to detect minute variations of manner. She knew +instinctively that Gay looked a man of the world and Abel a rustic, but +this did not shake in the least the knowledge that it was Abel, not Gay, +whom she loved. + +"Yes, I got your letter," she answered, and then she added very softly: +"Abel, I've always known I was not good enough for you." + +Her tone, not her words, checked his advance, and he stood staring at +her in perplexity. It was this expression of dumb questioning which had +so often reminded her of the look in the eyes of Reuben's hound, and as +she met it now, she flinched a little from the thought of the pain she +was inflicting. + +"I'm not good and faithful, Abel; I'm not patient, I'm not thrifty, I'm +not anything your wife ought to be." + +"You're all I'm wanting, anyway, Molly," he replied quietly, but without +moving toward her. + +"I feel--I am quite sure we could not be happy together," she went on, +hurriedly, as if in fear that he might interrupt her before she had +finished. + +"Do you mean that you want to be free?" he asked after a minute. + +"I don't know, but I don't want to marry anybody. All the feeling I had +went out of me when grandfather died--I've been benumbed ever since--and +I don't want to feel ever again, that's the worst of it." + +"Is this because of the quarrel?" + +"Oh, know--you know, I was always like this. I'm a thing of freedom--I +can't be caged, and so we'd go on quarrelling and kissing, kissing and +quarrelling, until I went out of my mind. You'd want to make me over and +I'd want to make you over, like two foolish children fighting at play." + +It was true what she had said, and he realized it, even though he +protested against it. She was a thing of freedom as much as one of the +swallows that flashed by in the sunlight. + +"And you don't want to marry me? You want to be free--to be rich?" + +"It isn't the money--but I don't want to marry." + +"Have you ever loved me, I wonder?" he asked a little bitterly. + +For an instant she hesitated, trying in some fierce self-reproach to +be honest. "I thought so once, and I suppose I'll think so again," +she answered. "The truth is I've loved you some days, and some days I +haven't. I've never believed much in it, you know--I wasn't that kind of +woman. It always meant so much less to me than to others." + +It was true again, he admitted it. She had never been--and he had +always known it--"that kind of woman." She had safely mocked at sex +only because she had never felt its significance. From the depths of his +misery, he told himself, while he faced her, that she would be perfect +if she were only a little different--if she were only "that kind +of woman." She possessed a thousand virtues, he was aware; she was +generous, honourable according to her lights, loyal, brave, charitable, +and unselfish. But it is the woman of a single virtue, not a thousand, +that a man exalts. + +"Yes, I suppose it always meant less to you than to others," he repeated +dully. + +"It wasn't my fault--why do you blame me?" she responded quickly. "Men +hold a woman to blame when she doesn't love, however ill they may use +her as soon as she does it. Oh, I know you're not that sort--you needn't +explain it. You are different, and this is why I am half loving you even +now. Last night when I awoke and heard a mockingbird in the cedars, +I told myself that I could never be happy away from you. But when +the light came, I wanted to see the world, and I forgot you. I'm only +twenty-one. I'm too young to tie myself down forever." + +"My mother married when she was sixteen," he replied, partly because +he could think of nothing else to say at the moment, partly because he +honestly entertained the masculine conviction that the precedent in some +way constituted an argument. + +"And a sensible marriage it was!" retorted Molly with scorn. "She's had +a hard enough lot and you know it." In her earnestness she had almost +assumed the position of Sarah's champion. + +"Yes, I reckon it is," he returned, wounded to the quick. "I've no right +to ask you to exchange what they offer you for a life like my mother's." + +Fulness of emotion lent dignity to his words, but if he had shown +indifference instead of tenderness, it would probably have served him +better. She was so sure of Abel--so ready to accept as a matter of +course the fact that she could rely on him. + +"So you want it to be all over between us?" he asked. + +"I don't want to be tied--I don't think I ought to be." Her tone was +firm, but she plucked nervously at a bit of crape on the sleeve of Mrs. +Gay's gown. + +"Perhaps you're right," he replied quietly. He had spoken in a stiff and +constrained manner, with little show of his suffering, yet all the +while he felt that a band of iron was fastened across his brain, and the +physical effect of this pressure was almost unendurable. He wanted to +ease his swollen heart by some passionate outburst, but an obstinate +instinct, which was beyond his control, prevented his making a +ridiculous display of his emotion. The desire to curse aloud, to hurl +defiant things at a personal deity, was battling within him, but instead +of yielding to it he merely repeated: + +"I reckon you're right--it wouldn't be fair to you in the end." + +"I hope you haven't any hard feeling toward me," she said presently, +sweetly commonplace. + +"Oh no, I haven't any hard feeling. Good-bye, Molly." + +"Good-bye, Abel." + +Turning away from her, he walked rapidly back along the short grassy +path over the snowdrops. As she watched him, a lump rose in her throat, +and she asked herself what would happen if she were to call after him, +and when he looked round, run straight into his arms? She wanted to run +into his arms, but her knowledge of herself told her that once there she +would not want to stay. The sense of bondage would follow--on his part +the man's effort to dominate; on hers the woman's struggle for the +integrity of personality. As long as he did not possess her she knew +that emotion would remain paramount over judgment--that the longing to +win her would triumph over the desire to improve what he had won. But +once surrendered, the very strength and singleness of his love would +bring her to cage. The swallow flights and the freedom of the sky would +be over, and she would either beat her wings hopelessly against the +bars, or learn to eat from his hand, to sing presently at his whistle. +Had passion urged her, this hesitancy would have been impossible. Then +she would either have seen none of these things, or, having seen them, +she would have dared greatly. She was too cool, too clear-sighted, +perhaps, for a heroine of romance. The single virtue that has fed +vampire-like on the blood of the others, the abject attitude of the +heart, the moral chicanery of sex--she would have none of these things. + +"I am very fond of him, but I want to live--to live," she said, raising +her arms with a free movement to the sky, while she looked after his +figure. "Poor Abel," she added after a moment, "he will never get over +it." + +Then, while the sigh of compassion was still on her lips, she was +arrested by a scene which occurred in the sunny meadow. From the brook +a woman's form had risen like a startled rabbit at Abel's approach, +wavering against the background of willows, as if uncertain whether to +advance or to retreat. The next instant, as though in obedience to some +mental change, it came quickly forward and faced the miller with an +upward movement of the hands to shelter a weeping face. + +"I believe--I really believe it is Judy Hatch," said Molly to herself, +and there was a faint displeasure in her voice. "I wonder what she is +doing in the willows?" + +Judy Hatch it was, and at sight of Abel she had sprung up in terror from +the edge of the brook, poised for flight like a wild thing before +the gun of the hunter. He saw that her eyes were red and swollen from +weeping, her face puckered and distorted. The pain in his own heart was +so acute that for a moment he felt a sensation of relief in finding that +he was not alone in his agony--that the universal portion of suffering +had not been allotted entirely to himself, as he had imagined. Had she +smiled, he would have brushed past her in silence, but because of her +agitated and despairing look, he called her name, and when she turned +toward him in bewilderment, held out his hand. It was a small accident +that brought them together--nothing more than the fact that she had +stooped to bathe her eyes in the stream before going on to the turnpike. + +"Don't go, Judy; you're in trouble, I see, and so am I," he said with +bitterness. + +"Oh, Mr. Revercomb!" she blurted out. "I didn't want anybody to catch me +in such a pass!" + +"I'm not anybody, Judy; I'm a poor devil that was born without sense +enough to plough his furrow straight." + +She was a plain woman, but a pretty one would have sent him off in a +panic over the meadow. He had had his lesson from a pretty woman, and +the immediate effect of it was to foster the delusion that there was a +mysterious affinity between ugliness and virtue. + +"Tell me what it is, Judy. Can I help you?" he said kindly. + +"It's nothin'. I am always in trouble," she answered, sobbing outright +behind her sunbonnet. "Between pa and my stepmother, there isn't a spot +on earth I can rest in." + +She looked at him and he knew immediately, from her look, that +neither Solomon Hatch nor his second wife was responsible for Judy's +unhappiness. For a mocking instant it occurred to him that she might +have cherished a secret and perfectly hopeless passion for himself. That +she might be cherishing this passion for another, he did not consider at +the moment--though the truth was that her divinity inhabited not a mill, +but a church, and was, therefore, she felt, trebly unapproachable. But +her worship was increased by this very hopelessness, this elevation. It +pleased her that the object of her adoration should bend always above +her--that in her dreams he should preach a perpetual sermon and wear an +imperishable surplice. + +"Well, I'm sorry for you," said Abel; "I'm sorry for you." And indeed he +was. "You're a good, pious, virtuous girl--just the sort of a girl a man +would want for his wife." + +"I try to be good and I don't see why I should be so--so unhappy," +sobbed Judy. "There ain't a better hand for raisin' chickens and flowers +and young lambs in the county." + +Again she looked up at him through her tears, and the fool that lies at +the bottom of all generous hearts rose instantly to her bait. As he had +once been the sport of his desire, so he was to become now the sport of +his pity. + +"Any man ought to be proud to have you for his wife, Judy," he said. + +"Ought they, Abel?" she replied passionately, with the vision of the +Reverend Orlando rising in serene detachment before her. + +For a moment he gazed down at her without speaking. It was pleasant to +feel pity; it was more than pleasant to receive gratitude in return. On +the raw wound in his heart something that was almost like a cooling balm +had been poured. + +"God knows I'm sorry for you, Judy," he repeated; "we're both in the +same boat, so I ought to be. Come to me if I can ever help you, and +you'll find you may count on my word." + +"I--I'll remember, Abel," she answered tearfully, but her thoughts +were of a certain pair of purple velvet slippers, begun in rivalry of +Blossom's black ones, which she was embroidering in pansies. + +As he turned away from her into the crowd of silver willows beside the +brook, she stood looking after him with the abstracted gaze of one who +dwells not in the world of objects, but in the exalted realm of visions. + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +IN WHICH PITY MASQUERADES AS REASON + + +As Abel crossed the poplar log he said to himself, "I shall not think of +Her again"; when he reached the end of the willows he said, "I must +not think of Her again"; and at the beginning of the kitchen garden, he +changed this to, "I will not think of Her again." + +The scent of hyacinths, which floated from a row blooming on either +side of the white paling gate, whipped his senses into revolt, and +he quickened his steps in a vain effort to escape from the tormenting +fragrance. Yet even while he fled from his pain he knew in his heart +that he did not desire the strength to turn and renounce it--that to +banish the image of Molly from his thoughts was to drive the bloom from +the meadow, the perfume from the air, the sunlight from the orchard. +Spring became as desolate as winter when it was robbed of the thought of +her. + +By the house a late pear-tree was in blossom, and the sunshine, falling +obliquely across it, awoke a white fire in its branches, as if piles +of new fallen snow had warmed suddenly to a reflected flame. Beneath +it Sarah Revercomb was sowing portulaca seeds in a rockery she had made +over a decaying stump. Her back was strained with bending, but not once +had she stopped to gaze at the glorified pear-tree overhead. All her +life she had distinguished carefully between the aristocracy and the +common herd of blossoms, and not all the magic gilding of the spring +sunshine could delude her into regarding the useful product of a +fruit-tree as a flower. + +"I don't see why you want to go wearin' yo' Sunday clothes every day, +Abel," she observed as he was about to pass her. + +"Why shouldn't I?" he retorted with the defiance of despair. + +Something in his voice caused the woman who had borne him to raise +herself from her stooping posture, and stare at him with an amazed and +incredulous expression, as if she were asking herself when and where +she could have given him birth. In her mental vision, which saw only one +thing at a time, but saw that thing with great distinctness, the idea +of love slowly presented itself as the cause of such a reversal of the +natural order as a Sunday suit on week days. Her conceptions of life +were derived so closely from facts, or from a logic as inexorable as +facts, that she was conscious of a baffled and exasperated sensation +when she was confronted by anything intangible which would not, as she +put it in her own mind, "get out of her way." It was natural enough, she +knew, that a material object or condition should possess the power +to block one's progress or even to change the normal current of one's +existence. Such things had happened a dozen times at least in her +limited experience. But when a mere emotion assumed the importance +and the reality of a solid body, she was seized by the indignant +astonishment with which a mathematician might regard the differential +calculus if it ceased suddenly to behave as he expected it to do. She +had always controlled her own feeling with severity, and it was beyond +the power of her imagination to conceive a possible excuse--unless it +was a disordered liver--for another person's inability to do the +same. Besides, as she had often asked herself, what was the use of not +controlling your feelings when you came to think about it? + +"Thar ain't a bit of use in yo' goin' on this way over that girl, Abel," +she said presently, as an annotation to his last remark, "you'd better +jest start along about yo' work, an' put her right straight out of yo' +mind. I al'ays knew thar warn't a particle of sense in it." + +There was sound reason in her advice, and he did not attempt to dispute +it. The unfortunate part was, however, that in the very soundness of +her reason lay its point of offence. Philosophy was dealing again in her +high handed fashion with emotion, and emotion, in its turn, was treating +philosophy with an absence of that respectful consideration to which +she was entitled. Abel knew quite as well as Sarah that there wasn't "a +particle of sense" in his thinking of Molly; but the possession of this +knowledge did not interfere in the least with either the intensity or +the persistence of his thought of her. His mind seemed to have as much +control over the passion that raged in his heart as an admonishing +apostle of peace has over a mob that is headed toward destruction. At +the moment he felt that the last straw--the one burden more that he +could not bear--was to be told to follow what he admitted to be the only +clear and rational course. Turning away from her without a reply, he +rushed through the open gate and across the road and the poplar log into +the friendly shelter of his mill. + +"What he needs is to wear himself out and to settle down into a sort of +quiet despair," thought Sarah as she looked after him. Then lifting her +trowel, she returned with a sigh to the sowing of portulaca seeds in her +rockery. + +In the twilight of the mill, where he was hunted through the door by the +scent of flowers, he went over to the shelf of books in a corner, and +taking down the volumes one by one, turned their leaves with a trembling +and eager hand, as though he were seeking some thought so strong, so +steadying, that once having secured it, the rush of his passion would +beat in vain against its impregnable barrier. But the books, like +Sarah, treated life in the grand manner and with the fine detachment of +philosophy. He could get no assistance from them, because they only told +him that he would be happier if he acted always as a rational being, and +this did not help him. They told him, also, in what seemed a burst of +unanimity, that human nature would be better and happier if it were not +human nature, but something else. Some of the writers believed that this +result might be attained by making many laws and some of them were of +the opinion that the way to it was to undo a majority of the laws that +were already made. All admitted that the world was very badly off and +that something must be done, and done very quickly, to relieve it--but +the trouble was that each writer's remedy was different from every other +writer's, and yet each writer's was the imperative, the essential one. +There was a single point on which they agreed, and that was that human +nature would be better and happier if it were different. But poor human +nature, having known this ever since it left the tree-tops, went on, +just the same, being all the time the thing that it was obliged to be. + +"There's no help for me here," said Abel, and moving away from the +shelf, he leaned his arms in the window, and looked out on the dripping +wheel and the crooked sycamore, which was decorated with little round +greenish balls of flowers. On the hot agony in his heart the languorous +Southern spring laid a cooling and delicate touch. Beneath the throb +of his pain he felt the stirring of formless, indefinite longings, half +spiritual, half physical, which seemed older and more universal than his +immediate suffering. + +For six weeks the canker gnawed at his heart, and he gave no sign of +its presence. Then relief came to him for a few hours one day when he +drifted into a local meeting in Applegate and entered into a discussion +of politics. At the end he spoke for twenty minutes, and when his speech +was over, he told himself that at last he had found something that might +take the place of love in his life. The game of politics showed itself +to him in all the exciting allurement of a passion. + +A gentle mannered old clergyman, with a dream-haunted face and the +patient waiting attitude of one who had watched for miracles for fifty +years, spoke to him when the meeting was breaking up, and after a +brief conversation, invited him to address a club of workingmen on the +following Friday. Though the old clergyman had spent half a century in a +futile endeavour to persuade every man to love his neighbour as himself, +and thereby save society the worry and the expense of its criminal +code, he still hoped on with the divine far-sighted hope of the +visionary--hoped not because he saw anything particularly encouraging +in his immediate outlook, but because it was his nature to hope and he +would probably have continued to do so had Fate been so unjust as to +consign him to an Inferno. He was one of those in whom goodness is a +natural instinct, and whose existence, even in a more or less inglorious +obscurity, leavens the entire lump of humanity. Mr. Mullen, who regarded +him with the active suspicion with which he viewed all living examples +of Christian charity, spoke of him condescendingly as a "man of +impracticable ideas"--a phrase which introduced his index prohibitory of +opinions. But the old clergyman, having attained a serviceable sense +of humour, as well as a heavenly fortitude, went on quietly doing good +after the fashion in which he was made. In his impracticable way he +had solved the problem of life by an indiscriminate application of the +Golden Rule. This solution had appeared to him so simple and yet so +complete, that he had spent fifty years, with but moderate success, in +persuading others to adopt it. At the end he was not what Mr. Mullen +would have called a "shining light," in the Church, yet his bread cast +upon the waters had returned to him in quantities, which, though small +and moist, were sufficient, with stringent economy, to keep body and +soul together. One of these quantities he discerned now in the eager +young countryman, whose face accompanied him through a trying day, and +helped to brighten his self-sacrificing labours. + +To Abel, driving home some hours later in his gig, the old clergyman was +present less as a mental image, than as a vague yet impelling influence +for good. The impression was still in his thoughts, when he overtook +Judy Hatch a mile or two before reaching the crossroads, and stopped to +ask her to drive with him as far as her cottage. At sight of her wan and +haggard face, he felt again that impulse of pity, which seemed while it +lasted to appease the violence of his suffering. + +"I haven't seen you to speak to for a long time," he observed, as she +mounted over the wheel to her place at his side. + +"Not since that day by the brook," she answered, and flinched as if a +raw wound had been touched. + +Though she did not look at him, he was conscious, through some subtle +undercurrent of feeling, that her spirit was drenched with the young +summer, with the pulsing of life of the June forest and the scent of +wild grape and honeysuckle which filled the air. Her face was lifted to +the fluted leaves of a sycamore, from which the song of a thrush rippled +like running water, and which gave her, if he had only known it, a +likeness to one of the minor saints in a primitive Italian painting. So +little, however, did her passion use her body as its medium that, after +glancing casually at her parted lips, he decided that she was probably +counting the eggs she had set to hatch in her hen-house, and hesitated +to interrupt the absorbing business of her calculations. Mentally, +he regarded her with the ungrudging respect which a man of any sort +instinctively yields to a woman who obviously disdains to ensnare his +judgment in the mesh of his senses. The palpitations of her spirit were +communicated to him in so elusive a process, that, even while he felt +the stir of his pulses, he was not aware that it was due in any measure +to the woman at his side. If she had been pretty--if she had been +even attractively plain--it would hardly have occurred to him that her +intense and breathless expression was associated with the hatching of +chickens; but, like other philosophers of whom he had never heard, +it was impossible for him to distinguish the qualities of the +thing-in-itself from the qualities of the phenomenon beneath his eyes. +Had he winnowed his superficial impressions the underlying thought would +probably have been: "No woman with a bosom as flat as that can have any +nonsense about her." From the first moment of their meeting he had never +doubted that it was this lack of "nonsense" which had attracted him. He +liked her evident indifference to his opinion of her, and he liked, too, +her listless silence, when she sat, with clasped hands, gazing straight +ahead through the shadowy colonnade of the woods. Not once had her +troubled look wandered from the moist dead leaves on the ground, to the +misty edges of the forest, where small wild flowers thronged in a pale +procession of pipsissewa, ladies' tresses, and Enchanter's nightshade. + +"Did you know that the Gays are in Europe?" asked Judy turning her eyes +on his face for the first time. + +His heart gave a throb and was quiet. + +"No, I hadn't heard it," he replied in an arid voice. + +"They say it's more than likely Molly will marry Mr. Jonathan. He's +waitin' on her." + +Reaching for the whip, Abel touched the mare lightly on her glossy +flank. After that single pang his suffering had left him--for six weeks +of sleepless nights and tormented days had exhausted his endurance and +reduced him to a condition of emotional lassitude. In his brief +reaction from spiritual revolt into a state of apathetic submission, he +approached his mother's permanent austerity of mind as closely as he was +ever likely to do in the whole of his experience. The mere possibility +of a fresh awakening of feeling filled him with aversion. At the moment +he had as profound a distrust as Sarah of the immaterial elements; and +looking ahead, he saw his future stretching before him as firm and +flat as the turnpike which he was approaching. Delight and despair were +equally distasteful to him. He shrank as instinctively from the thought +of love as a man shrinks from re-opening an old wound which is still +sensitive to the touch, though it has ceased to ache. And so prone +is human nature to affirm its inherent belief in the eternity of the +present, that he was assured, not only that this was the most desirable +point of view he had ever reached, but that it was entirely out of the +question that he should ever travel beyond it to another. Forgetting +the many times when he had revolted from advice merely because it was +"sensible," he began calmly to arrange his life in accordance with that +law of practical expediency against which a month ago he had so hotly +rebelled. + +As they drove out of the woods, and turned into the sunken road beyond +the ordinary which led in the direction of Solomon Hatch's farm, he +withdrew his gaze from the head of his mare and looked attentively at +his companion. + +"I hope you are having an easier time, Judy," he said. + +Her eyes brimmed. "You are the only person who cares about that, Abel." + +"Why shouldn't I care? You are the best and the cleverest girl I know," +he returned. + +Her gratitude fanned his sympathy, which was beginning to smoulder, and +he felt again the pleasant sense of being in the position of benefactor +rather than of the benefited. His eyes rested without shrinking on her +sallow face, with the faint bluish tinge to the eyelids, and on her +scant drab coloured hair, which was combed smoothly back from her +forehead--and while he looked his pity clothed itself in the softer and +gentler aspect of reason. "She ought to be happy," he thought. "It's +a shame they should lead her such a life! It's a shame some good man +doesn't fall in love with her and marry her. She's really not so plain, +after all. I've seen many women who were worse looking than she is." +Unknown to him, an illusion was gradually shedding colour and warmth on +his vision of her. Mentally, he had endowed her with all the sober and +saner virtues to which his present mood was committed--though he had, in +reality, no better reason for so doing than the fact that she evidently +esteemed him and that she was deserving of pity. The discordant forces +of passion no longer disturbed the calm and orderly processes of his +mind, and he told himself that he saw clearly, because he saw stark +images of facts, stripped not only of the glamour of light and shade, +but even of the body of flesh and blood. Life spread before him like +a geometrical figure, constructed of perfect circles and absolutely +conformable to the rules and the principles of mathematics. That these +perfect circles should ever run wild and become a square was clearly +unthinkable. Because his nature was not quiescent it was impossible for +him to conceive of it in motion. + +And all the while, in that silence, which seemed so harmless while it +was, in reality, so dangerous, the repressed yet violent force in +Judy wrought on his mood in which bare sense and bare thought were +unprotected by any covering of the love which had clothed them as far +back as he could remember. That breathless, palpitating appeal for +happiness--an appeal which is as separate from beauty as the body of +flesh is separate from the garment it wears--was drawing him slowly yet +inevitably toward the woman at his side. Her silence--charged as it was +with the intoxicating spirit of June--had served the purpose of life as +neither words nor gestures could have done. It had reconciled him to her +presence in the very moment that made him conscious of the strength of +his pity. + +Presently, as they drove through the burned out clearing, she spoke +again. + +"I wonder why you are always so good to me, Abel?" + +He liked the honest sound of the words, and he did not know that before +uttering them she had debated in her heart whether it was worth while +to marry Abel since she could not marry Mr. Mullen. Marriage, having +few illusions for her, possessed, perhaps for that reason, the greater +practical value. She was unhappy with her stepmother in a negative way, +but so impervious had she become to casual annoyances, that she +hardly weighed the disadvantages of her home against the probable +relinquishment of Mrs. Mullen's washing day after her marriage to Abel. +Her soul was crushed like a trapped creature in the iron grip of a +hopeless passion, and her insensibility to the lesser troubles of +life was but the insensibility of such a creature to the stings of the +insects swarming around its head. The outcome of her drive with Abel +aroused only a dull curiosity in her mind. Some years ago, in the days +before Mr. Mullen, she would probably have fallen a helpless victim to +the miller had his eyes wandered for an instant in her direction. But +those days and that probability were now over forever. + +Unfortunately, however, it is not given to a man to look into the soul +of a woman except through the inscrutable veil of his own personality. +Had Abel pierced that purple calico dress and witnessed the pathetic +struggle in Judy's bosom, his next words would hardly have been uttered. + +"I wish I could do something to make you happier, Judy." + +She looked at him with mysterious, brooding eyes, and he was conscious +again of the attraction, as subtile and as penetrating as a perfume, +which she exhaled in the stillness, and which vanished as soon as she +broke the quivering intensity of the silence. That this attraction was +merely the unconscious vibration of her passion for another man, which +shed its essence in solitude as naturally as a flower sheds its scent, +did not occur to him. Without his newly awakened pity it could not have +moved him. With it he felt that he was powerless to resist its appeal. + +"Why shouldn't I be good to you, Judy?" he repeated. + +Tears overflowed her eyes at his words. Looking at her, he saw her not +as she was, but as he desired that she should be; and this desire, he +knew, sprang from his loneliness and from his need of giving sympathy +to some one outside of himself. The illusion that surrounded her bore +no resemblance to the illusion of love--yet it was akin to it in the +swiftness and the completeness with which it was born. If any one had +told him an hour ago that he was on the verge of marriage to Judy, he +would have scoffed at the idea--he who was the heartbroken lover of +Molly! Yet this sudden protecting pity was so strong that he found +himself playing with the thought of marriage, as one plays in lofty +moments with the idea of a not altogether unpleasant self-abnegation. +He did not love Judy, but he was conscious of an overwhelming desire to +make Judy happy--and like all desires which are conceived in a fog of +uncertainty, its ultimate form depended less upon himself than it did +upon the outward pressure of circumstances. + +"I sometimes think it's more than anybody can stand to go on living as +I do," said Judy, breaking the silence, "to slave an' slave an' never to +get so much as a word of thanks for it." + +For a moment he said nothing. Then turning he looked hard into her humid +eyes, and what he saw there made him bend over and take her hand. + +"Do you think I could make you happier, Judy?" he asked. + + + + +BOOK SECOND + +THE CROSS-ROADS + + + +CHAPTER I + + +IN WHICH YOUTH SHOWS A LITTLE SEASONED + + +Some six months after Abel's parting from Molly, he might have been seen +crossing the lawn at Jordan's Journey on a windy November morning, and +even to a superficial observer it would have been evident that certain +subtle modifications had been at work in his soul. Disappointed love had +achieved this result with a thoroughness which victorious love could +not have surpassed. Because he had lost Molly, he had resolved, in his +returning sanity, that he would make of himself the man who might have +won Molly had she known him in his completeness. And in the act of +resolving, his character had begun to ripen into the mellowness of +maturity. + +The day was bleak, and something of this external bleakness was +reflected in the look which he raised to the ivy draped dormer-windows +in the hooded roof. Small greyish clouds were scudding low above the +western horizon, and the sorrel waste of broomsedge was rolling high as +a sea. The birds, as they skimmed over this billowy expanse, appeared +blown, despite their efforts, on the wind that swept in gusts out of +the west. On the lawn at Jordan's Journey the fallen leaves were dancing +madly like a carnival in rough carousal. Watching them it was easy to +imagine that they found some frenzied joy in this dance of death--the +end to which they had moved from the young green of the bud through the +opulent abundance of the summer. The air was alive with their sighing. +They rustled softly under foot as Abel walked up the drive, and then, +whipped by a strong gust, fled in purple and wine-coloured multitudes +to the shelter of the box hedges, or, rising in flight above the naked +boughs, beat against the closed shutters before they came to rest +against the square brick chimneys on the roof. + +Beneath the trees a solitary old negro was spreading manure over +the grass, hauling it in a wheelbarrow from a pile somewhere in the +barnyard. Back and forth he passed, scattering the fine manure from his +spade until the wheelbarrow was empty, when he replenished it in +the barnyard and returned to his sprinkling. All the while he smoked +steadily a long corncob pipe, and to watch him at his task, was to +receive an impression that the hauling of manure was sufficient to fill +one's life with dignity and contentment. The work appeared no longer a +menial employment but a sober and serious share of the great problem of +production. + +"That's the way I intend to go about the work of my mill," thought Abel, +as he watched him. "When you do it like that it really makes very little +difference what you are doing. It all comes to good." A minute before +his thought had been on the new roller mill he had recently bought and +was now working in his primitive little building, which he had slightly +remodelled. The next thing to go, he supposed, would be the old wooden +wheel, with its brilliant enamel of moss, and within five years he +hoped to complete the reconstruction of his machinery on lines that were +scientific rather than picturesque. His water power was good, and by the +time he could afford an entire modern equipment, he would probably have +all the grain at his door that he was ready to handle. Then he began to +wonder, as he had often done of late, if the work of the farm and +the mill might be left safely to Abner and Archie when he went up to +Richmond to the General Assembly, in the event of his future election? +Already he had achieved a modest local fame as a speaker--for his voice +expressed the gradual political awakening of his class. Though he was in +advance of his age, it was evident, even to the drowsy-eyed, that he was +moving in the direction whither lagging progress was bound. In the last +eighteen months he had devoured the books of the political economists, +and he had sucked in theories of social philosophy as a child sucks in +milk. That the business of the politician is not to reshape theories, +but to readjust conditions he was ready to admit, yet impelled by a +strong religious conviction, by a belief in the determining power of a +practical Christianity, he was sharing the slowly expanding dream of +his century--the dream of a poverty enriched by knowledge, of a +social regeneration that would follow an enlightened and instructed +proletariat. Ripples from the thought waves of the world had reached him +in the dusty corners of his mill at Old Church. Since no man thinketh to +himself, he could no more have escaped the mental impulsion of his +time than he could have arrested his embryonic development from the +invertebrate to the vertebrate. His mind being open, ideas had +entered, and having entered, they proceeded immediately to take active +possession. He was serving a distant Utopia of industrial democracy as +ardently as a lover serves his mistress. + +As for his actual mistress, she had become not only visionary, but +enskied. Some months ago, while his wound was still fresh, he had not +suffered his thoughts to dwell on her because of the violence of the +pain. Pride as well as common sense, he had told himself during the +first weeks of his loss, demanded that he should banish her image from +his mind. Though he had never, even in his first anger, called her +"a light woman," he had come perilously near the feeling that she had +grazed the skirts of impropriety with a recklessness which no sober +minded son of Sarah Revercomb could countenance for a minute. His +very success as a miller depended upon an integrity of character which +permitted no compromise with the fundamental moralities. Youth is the +period of harsh judgments, and a man seldom learns until he reaches +thirty that human nature is made up not of simples, but of compounds. +What Abel had never divined was that Molly, like himself, might +approach the angelic in one mood and fall short of the merely human in +another--that she, also, was capable of moments of sublimation and of +hours of recusancy. There were the ashes of a poet in her soul as in +his, and to contain the ashes of a poet one must have been first the +crucible for purifying flames. + +But it was six months ago that he had condemned her, and since then the +subtle modifications had worked in his habit of thought. As the soreness +passed from his heart, he had nursed the scar much as a crusader might +have cherished a wound out of the Holy Wars. From the actual conditions +of life in which he had loved her, he now beheld her caught up into the +zone of ideal and impossible beauty. Through the outer covering of her +flesh he could see her soul shine, as the stars shone through the web of +purple twilight on the marshes. From his earlier craving for possession, +his love had grown, through frustration and disappointment, into a +simpler passion for service. + +"Well, one has to find out things," he said to himself on this November +morning, while he watched the old negro at his work. Some red leaves +whirled into his face, and the wind, lifting the dark hair from his +forehead, showed three heavy furrows between his knitted brows. He +appeared a little older, a little braver, a little wiser, yet there was +about him still the look of superb physical vitality which had been the +result of a youth spent in the open fields. + +"Howdy, Uncle Boaz," he said to the old negro, who approached with his +wheelbarrow. "Your folks have all gone away for good haven't they?" + +"Hit looks dat ar way, marster, hit sutney do look dat ar way." + +"Well, you keep good grass here all the same." + +"Dar ain' but one way ter do hit, suh, en dat's ter dung hit," replied +Uncle Boaz, and he remarked a minute afterwards, as he put down the +lowered handles of the wheel barrow, and stood prodding the ashes in his +pipe, "I'se gwinter vote fur you, Marse Abel, I sholy is---" + +"Thank you, Uncle Boaz!" + +"En I'se got a sack er co'n I'd be moughty bleeged ter git ground up fur +hominy meal---" + +With a laugh Abel passed on through the side-garden, and entered the +leafless shrubbery that bordered the Haunt's Walk. The old negro had +disturbed his dream, which had been of Molly in her red stockings, with +the red ribbon binding her curls. Then he thought of Spot, the aged +hound--"That dog must have lived to be seventeen years old," he said +aloud in the effort to smother the sharp pang at his heart, "I remember +how fond old Reuben was of him even as a puppy. He would never let him +run hares with anybody except himself." It was seventeen years ago that +Spot was a puppy and he a boy--and now the one was dust with old Reuben, +and the other had settled down so effectually that he was going to marry +Judy in a fortnight. At least Judy was a good woman--nobody had ever +said a word against her--and she would make him a good wife. That, after +all, was what a farmer must think of--a good, saving wife, without any +foolishness about her, who would be thrifty and lend a hand at his work +when he needed it. All the rest was nonsense when once a man married. +Dreams were all very well in their way, but realities and not dreams, +after all, were things he must live with. Looking ahead he saw his +future stretching smooth and firm, like the flat white turnpike that +dragged its solid length into the distance. On that road there was no +place for the absurdity of red stockings! And so, in the absence of all +elation, only the grim sense of duty in the doing soothed him as he made +his way to Solomon Hatch's cottage. + +On the back porch he found Judy deftly taking butter out of the churn, +and watched her while she worked the soft lumps with a wooden paddle +in a large yellow bowl. Though he would have been the last to suspect +it--for passion like temptation appeared to him to beset the beautiful +alone--Judy, in her homely way, was also a crucible, and the little +earthern pot of her body was near to bursting at the moment from the +violence of the flames within. She had just seen a black coated figure +in a red gig spin by on the road, and for one blissful minute, she had +permitted herself a flight of fancy, in which she was the bride, not of +Abel Revercomb, but of Orlando Mullen. To sit in that red wheeled gig, +touching the sleeve of his black coat! To stitch the frayed seams in is +silk waistcoat! To iron his surplices as only she could iron when the +divine fury seized her! To visit his poor and afflicted! To lift her +swooning gaze every Sunday, with a sense of possession, to that pulpit! +For a minute only the rapture lasted, and all the time, she went on +placidly making butter in the large yellow bowl. She was in the mood to +commit sublime follies and magnificent indiscretions. For the sake of +a drive in that red wheeled gig she would have foresworn Abel at +the altar. For the ecstasy of ironing those surplices she would have +remained a spinster forever. + +"That's nice butter, Judy," remarked her lover, and believed that he had +paid her a tribute peculiarly suited to the complexion of her soul. + +His gaze followed the drab sweep of her hair, which was combed straight +back from her forehead. Her eyes were looking heavenward while she +worked, yet they caught no beam, no colour from her celestial visions. +Small hectic blotches burned in the centre of her cheeks, and her +thin lips were pressed tightly together as though she bit back a cry. +Sometimes she would remain dumb for an hour in his presence, while her +thoughts soared like birds in the blue region of dreams. She indulged +her imagination in grotesque but intoxicating reveries, in which she +passed nobly and with honour through a series of thrillingly romantic +adventures; and, in fact, only ten minutes before Abel's arrival, she +had beheld herself and the young clergyman undergoing a rapturous, if +slightly unreal, martyrdom, as missionaries to the Chinese. + +Her dreams dropped suddenly, with broken wings, in their flight, for +her stepmother, a small sickly woman, with a twisted smile, looked out +through the dining-room window, and remarked facetiously: + +"You all don't look much like a co'tin couple to my eyes." + +"I've been admiring her butter," replied Abel, who was always unduly +regardful of his English in the presence of Mrs. Hatch. + +"She's a good hand at butter when she chooses to be, but she has her ups +and downs like the rest of us." + +"All of us have them, I suppose," he rejoined, and Mrs. Hatch drew in +her head. + +"I never imagined that you got put out, Judy," he said, forgetting the +tears that had led him to his sacrifice; "you always seem so quiet and +sober." + +She glanced up, for there was a sound of wheels on the road, and Mr. +Mullen drove by again, sitting very erect, and uncovering, with a +graceful bend, to some one who was visible at the front. Her face +flushed suddenly to the colour of the brickdust, and she felt that +the confusion in her soul must fill the universe with noise. Quiet and +sober, indeed, if he could only have heard it! + +But Abel was busy with his own problems, while his gaze followed Mr. +Mullen's vanishing back, which had, even from a distance, a look of +slight yet earnest endeavour. He still liked the young rector for his +sincerity and his uprightness, but he had found, on the whole, that he +could approach his God more comfortably when the straight and narrow +shadow of the clergyman did not come between. + +"Aren't you going to pat it any more?" he asked presently, returning to +his consideration of the butter. + +Picking up a square linen cloth, Judy dipped it into a basin of brine, +and, after wringing it out, carefully folded it over the yellow bowl. + +"All the buttermilk is out of it," she answered, and thought of the +unfinished pair of purple slippers laid away in tissue paper upstairs in +her bureau drawer. As a married woman could she, with virtue, continue +to embroider slippers in pansies for her rector? These had been laid +aside on the day of her engagement to Abel, but she yearned now to riot +in purple shades with her needle. While she listened with a detached +mind to Abel's practical plans for the future, her only interest in +the details lay in the fact that they would, in a measure, insure the +possibility of a yearly offering of slippers. And while they looked into +each other's eyes, neither suspected for a moment the existence of a +secret chamber in the other's soul. All appeared plain and simple on the +surface, and Judy, as well as Abel, was honestly of the opinion that she +understood perfectly the situation and that the passionate refusal of +her heart was the only element that threatened the conventional security +of appearances. + +She was in the morbid condition of mind when the capacity for feeling +seems concentrated on a single centre of pain. Her soul revolved in a +circle, and outside of its narrow orbit there was only the arid flatness +which surrounds any moment of vivid experience. The velvet slippers, +which might have been worn by the young clergyman, possessed a vital +and romantic interest in her thoughts, but the mill and the machinery +of which Abel was speaking showed to her merely as sordid and mechanical +details of existence. + +Looking at her suddenly, he realized that she had heard nothing of what +he was saying. If he had looked deeper still he would have seen the +tragedy of her lovely little soul spinning the web of its perishing +illusion. Of all the martyrdoms allotted to love's victims, she was +enduring the bitterest, which is the martyrdom of frustration. Yet +because she appeared dull and undesirable on the surface, he had +declined, with the rest of Old Church, to regard her emotions any less +casually than he regarded her complexion. + +"Well, I ought to be a proud man to have you, Judy," he remarked, and +rose to his feet. + +"I hope neither of us will ever regret it," she returned. + +"Not if I can help it," he said, and, putting his arm around her, he +drew her to him and kissed her lips. It was the second time he had +kissed her, and on the first occasion she had burst into hysterical +weeping. He did not know that it was the only caress she had ever +received, and that she had wept because it had fallen so far short of +what her imagination had deluded her into expecting. Now, though she +had herself well in hand and gave no visible sign of her disappointment, +there was a fierce, though unspoken, protest in her heart. "To think +that after all the nights I've lain awake an' wondered what 'twas +like, it should turn out to be so terrible flat," she said bitterly to +herself. + +"It's just a fortnight off now, Judy," he remarked gently, if not +tenderly. + +"I hope your mother will get on with me, Abel." + +"She sets great store by you now. You're pious, and she likes that even +though you do go to the Episcopal church. I heard her say yesterday that +it was a rare thing to see a girl find as much comfort in her religion +as you do." + +"You'll never want to come between me and my church work, will you, +Abel? I do most of the Foreign Mission work, you know, an' I teach in +Sunday school and I visit the sick every Friday." + +"Come between? Why, it makes me proud of you! When I asked Mr. Mullen +about marrying us, he said: 'She's been as good as a right hand to me +ever since I came here, Revercomb.'" + +"Tell me over again. What were his words exactly?" + +"'She's been as good as a right hand to me, Revercomb,' that was what he +said, and he added, 'She's the salt of the earth, that's the only way to +describe her.' And now, goodbye, Judy, I must be going back to work." + +Without glancing round, he went at his rapid stride down the narrow walk +to the whitewashed gate, which hung loose on broken hinges. In the road +he came face to face with Jonathan Gay, who was riding leisurely in the +direction of Jordan's Journey. + +"How are you, Revercomb? All well?" + +"Yes, all well, thank you." Turning in his tracks, he gazed thoughtfully +after the rider for a moment. + +"I wonder why he came out of his way instead of keeping to the +turnpike?" he thought, and a minute later, "that's the third time he's +come back since the family left Jordan's Journey." + + + +CHAPTER II + + +THE DESIRE OF THE MOTH + + +At the gate before the Revercombs' house Blossom was standing in a dress +of vivid blue. + +"Are you going to a party?" Abel inquired as he reached her, and she +answered impatiently: + +"I promised to wear this dress over to Judy's, so that she could see how +it is trimmed." + +"Does she want a blue one?" he asked. It seemed to him little short of +ludicrous that Judy should buy a new dress because she was going to be +married to him; but in the presence of a custom so firmly entrenched +behind the traditions of respectability, he knew that protest would be +useless. Judy would check out her unromantic person in wedding finery +because finery was customary on such occasions. + +"Of course we couldn't dress just alike, Abel," replied Blossom. His +question had seemed foolish to her and her usual soft solemnity was +ruffled by a passing irritation. "Judy's frock will be green, but she +wants bretelles like these on it." + +"Bretelles?" he repeated as incredulously as if he had possessed any but +the vaguest idea of the article the word described. "Why didn't she wait +until she was married, and then I'd have bought them for her," he added. + +"Of course she wants her wedding clothes--all girls do," said Blossom, +invoking tradition. "Are you coming in now. We're having dinner a little +earlier." + +She turned and moved slowly up the walk, while he followed, caressing +the head of Moses, his spotted hound. From the kitchen he could hear +Sarah Revercomb scolding the small negro, Mary Jo, whom she was training +to wait on the table. On one side of the hearth grandmother sat very +alert, waiting for her bowl of soup, into which Mary Jo was crumbling +soft bread, while across from her grandfather chuckled to himself over a +recollection which he did not divulge. + +At Abel's entrance, the old man stopped chuckling and inquired in an +interested tone, + +"Did you buy that ar steer, Abel?" + +"Not yet, I'm to think it over and let Jim Bumpass know." + +"Thar never was sech a man for steers," remarked grandmother, +contemptuously. "Here he's still axin' about steers when he can't hist +himself out of his cheer. If I were you, Abel, I'd tell him he'd better +be steddyin' about everlastin' damnation instead of steers. Steers ain't +goin' to haul him out of hell fire if he once gits down into it." + +"Well, you can tell her, Abel," retorted grandfather, "that it's time +enough to holler 'hell-fire!' when you begin to burn." + +Mary Jo prevented a rejoinder by appearing with a napkin, which she tied +under his wife's chin, and a little later the old woman could be heard +drinking greedily her bowl of soup. She lived for food, yet, like most +passions which have become exaggerated by concentration out of all +proportion to the fact upon which they depend, the moment of fulfilment +seemed always brief and unsatisfactory after the intensity of +anticipation. To-day the trouble was there were no carrots in the soup, +and this omission reduced her to tears because it had blighted the hopes +of her entire morning. + +"An' I'd been hankerin' arter them carrots ever since breakfast," she +whimpered. + +"Don't cry, ma, I'll mash you up some nice ones for supper. That'll +be something to look forward to," said Sarah, who might have won +an immortal crown had such trophies been awarded to the patience of +daughters-in-law. "So you didn't buy that steer, Abel?" + +"No, I didn't buy it." + +"Have you seen Judy to-day?" + +"I stopped there on my way home. She was making butter, and we talked +about buying an extra cow or two and letting Blossom and her send some +to market." + +"Well it beats me!" observed Sarah, but whether her discomfiture was due +to Judy's butter or to Abel's love making, she did not explain. On the +whole the staidness of the courtship was pleasing to her. Her sense +of decorum was flattered by it, for she had as little tolerance of the +softer virtues as of the softer vines. It had been years since she +had felt so indulgent toward her second son; yet in spite of the +gratification his dejection afforded her, she was, as she had just +confessed, utterly and entirely "beat." His period of common sense--of +perfect and complete sobriety--had lasted for half a year, but she +was too shrewd a woman to be deceived by the mere external calmness of +appearances. She had had moreover, a long experience with males of +the Revercomb stock, and she knew that it was when their blood flowed +quietest that there was the greatest danger of an ultimate "rousing." +All her life she had lived in dread of this menace to respectability--to +that strict observance of the letter of the social law for which the +Hawtreys had stood for generations. On several occasions she had seen +a Revercomb really "roused," and when the transformation was once +achieved, not all the gravity of all the Hawtreys could withstand the +force of it. And this terrible potential energy in her husband's stock +would assert itself, she knew, after a period of tranquillity. She +hadn't been married to a Revercomb for nothing, she had once remarked. + +If anything could have put her into a cheerful humour, it would have +been the depressed and solemn manner with which Abel went about the +preparations for his marriage. The inflexible logic of Calvinism had +passed into her fibre, until it had become almost an instinct with her +to tread softly in the way of pleasure lest God should hear. Generations +of joyless ancestors had imbued her with an ineradicable suspicion of +human happiness--as something which must be paid for, either literally +in its pound of flesh, or in a corresponding measure of the materials of +salvation. + +"I declar' things are goin' on so smooth that something must be gettin' +ready to happen," she said anxiously to herself at least twenty times a +day--for she had observed life, and in her opinion, the observation had +verified the rigid principles of her religion. Do what you would the +doctrines of original sin and predestination kept cropping up under the +surface of existence. And so--"It looks all right on top, but you never +can tell," was the habitual attitude of her mind. + +When dinner was over, Abel went out to the mill, with Moses, the hound, +trotting at his heels. The high wind was still blowing, and while he +stood by the mill-race, the boughs of the sycamore rocked back and forth +over his head with a creaking noise. At each swing of the branches a +crowd of broad yellow leaves was torn from the stems and chased over the +moving wheel to the open meadow beyond. + +With the key of the mill in his hand, Abel stopped to gaze over the +green knoll where he had once planned to build his house. Beyond it he +saw the strip of pines, and he knew that the tallest of the trees had +fallen uselessly beneath his axe. The great trunk still lay there, fast +rotting to dust on the carpet of pine cones. He had never sold it for +timber. He would never use it for the rafters of his home. + +As he looked back now all that past life of his appeared to him fair and +desirable. He remembered the early morning risings in his boyhood, +and it seemed to him that he had enjoyed every one of them to its +fullest--that it was only the present that showed stale and unprofitable +in his eyes. A rosy haze obscured all that was harsh and unlovely in the +past, and he thought of himself as always eager and enthusiastic then, +as always finding happiness in the incidents that befell him. The year +when he had gone away, and worked in the factory in order to educate +himself, was revealed as a period of delightful promise, of wonderful +opportunity. In remembering his love for Molly, he forgot the quarrels, +the jealousies, the heartburnings, and recalled only the exquisite +instant of their first lover's kiss. Then, he told himself, that even +while he had enjoyed his life, it had cheated him, and he would not live +it over again if he could. + +Turning presently in the other direction, he discerned a patch of vivid +blue in the pasture, and knew that it was Blossom crossing the fields to +Solomon Hatch's. "She's gone a good piece out of her road," he thought, +and then, "I wonder why she doesn't marry? She might have anybody about +here if she wasn't so particular." The vivid blue spot in the midst of +the russet and brown landscape held his gaze for a moment; then calling +Moses to his side, he unlocked the door of the mill and began counting +the sacks of grist. + +Outside, in the high wind, which made walking difficult, Blossom moved +in the direction of the willow copse. Gay had promised to meet her, +but she knew, from the experience of the last few months, that he would +neither hasten his luncheon nor smoke a cigar the less in order to do +so. As she pressed on the wind sang in her ears. She heard it like the +sound of rushing wings in the broomsedge, and when it died down, she +waited for it to rise again with a silken murmur in the red-topped +orchard grass. She could tell from the sound whether the gust was still +in the field of broomsedge or had swept on to the pasture. + +In spite of her blue dress, in spite of the flush in her cheeks and +the luminous softness in her eyes, the joy in her bosom fluttered on +crippled wings. Gay was kind, he was gentle, he was even solicitous on +the rare occasions when she saw him; but somehow--in some way, it was +different from the ideal marriage of which she had dreamed. If he was +kind, he was also casual. She had hoped once that love would fill her +life, and now, to her despair, it looked as if it might be poured into +a tea-cup. She had imagined that it would move mountains, and the most +ordinary detail of living was sufficient to thrust it out of sight. + +When she reached the brook, she saw Gay coming slowly along the Haunt's +Walk, to the spring. As he walked, he blew little clouds of smoke into +the air, and she thought, as he approached her, that the smell of his +cigar was unlike the cigar of any other man she knew--that it possessed, +in itself, a quality that was exciting and romantic. This trait in +his personality--a disturbing suggestion of the atmosphere of a richer +world--had fascinated her from the beginning, and after eighteen months +of repeated disappointments, it still held her, though she struggled now +in its power like a hare in a trap. + +"So you're here!" he exclaimed as he reached her. Then, after a swift +glance over the fields, he drew her into the shelter of the trees, and +holding his cigar in his left hand, kissed her lips. + +Closing her eyes, she leaned against him, while the scent of tobacco +intoxicated her with its train of happier associations. + +"You're looking all right, though your letters have been rather jumpy. +My dear girl, when you pounce on me like that you frighten me out of my +wits. You really mustn't, you know." + +"O Jonathan!" she gasped, and clung to him. + +"Why, I had to manufacture some excuse on the instant for coming down. I +couldn't tell what foolishness you'd be capable of if I didn't." + +His tone was half caressing, yet beneath it there was a serious +annoyance, which killed the suffering joy in her heart. She was slowly +learning that it is not safe to remind the man of pleasure of his +obligations, since he is attracted chiefly by his opportunities. + +"The time was when you wanted to come just as much as I," she said. + +"Don't I still? Haven't I proved it by telling a tremendous lie and +rushing down here on the first train? Come, now, kiss me like a good +girl and look cheerful. You've got to make up, you know, for all the +trouble you've put me to." + +She kissed him obediently, yielding to his casual embraces with a +docility that would have charmed him had his passion been in its +beginning instead of its decline. + +"You're glad now you came, aren't you?" she asked presently pleading to +be reassured. + +"Oh, yes, of course, I like it, but you mustn't write to me that way +again." + +Putting his arm closer about her, he pressed her to his side, and they +sat in silence while the wind whistled in the tree-tops above them. From +their shelter they could see the empty chimneys of Jordan's Journey, and +a blurred and attenuated figure on the lawn, which was that of the old +negro, who passed back and forth spreading manure. Some swallows with +slate grey wings were flying over the roof, and they appeared from a +distance to whirl as helplessly as the dead leaves. + +"You do love me as much as ever, don't you, Jonathan?" she asked +suddenly. + +He frowned, staring at the moving figure of the old negro. Again she had +blundered, for he was disinclined by temperament to do or say the thing +that was expected of him. + +"Why, of course I do," he answered after a pause. + +She sighed and nestled against him, while his hand which had been on +her shoulder, slipped to her waist. Her heart had turned to lead in her +breast, and, like Judy, she could have wept because the reality of love +was different from her virgin dreams. + + + +CHAPTER III + + +ABEL HEARS GOSSIP AND SEES A VISION + + +Two nights before the wedding a corn shucking was held in the barn at +Bottom's Ordinary--a usually successful form of entertainment, by which +the strenuous labours of a score of able-bodied men were secured at the +cost of a keg of cider and a kettle of squirrel stew. In the centre of +the barn, which was dimly lighted by a row of smoky, strong-smelling +kerosene-oil lanterns, suspended on pegs from the wall, there was a +huge wooden bin, into which the golden ears were tossed, as they were +stripped of the husks, by a circle of guests, ranging in years from +old Adam at the head to the youngest son of Tim Mallory, an inquisitive +urchin of nine, who made himself useful by passing the diminishing +pitcher of cider. It was a frosty night, and the faces of the huskers +showed very red above the knitted woollen comforters which wrapped their +throats. Before each man there was a small pile of corn, still in the +blade, and this was replenished when it began to dwindle by a band of +workers in the moonlight beyond the open windows. In his effort to keep +warm somebody had started a hymn, which was vigorously accompanied by +a beating of numbed feet on the scattered husks on the floor. Above the +volume of sound old Adam's quavering falsetto could be heard piping on +like a cracked and discordant flute. + + "O-ver thar, O-ver thar, + Th-ar's a la-nd of pure de-light. + O-ver th-ar, + We will la-y our bur-den do-wn. + An' re-ceive our gol-den cro-wn. + In that la-nd of pure de-light + O-ver th-ar." + +"That's a cold hymn, an' unsuitable to the weather," remarked Tim +Mallory at the end of the verse. "If you ask me, I'd say thar was mo' +immediate comfort in singin' about the redness of hell-fire, an' how +mortal close we're comin' to it." + +"We don't want no impiousness at this here shuckin', Tim," observed +William Ming, who occupied the position of host in Betsey's absence +about the more important matter of supper. "You fill up with cider an' +go at that thar pile befo' you." + +"Then pass it on," replied Mallory, reaching for the jug of cider, which +travelled in a regular orbit from old Adam's right hand round the circle +to the neighbour on his left, who chanced to be Solomon Hatch. + +"Speakin' of impiousness," remarked that sour-faced little man, "have +you all heard the tales about Reuben Merryweather's gal sence she's had +her windfall? Why, to see the way she trails her skirt, you'd think +she was the real child of her father." Then rushing hurriedly to +generalization at Abel's entrance, he added in a louder tone--"Ah, it's +a sad pass for things to come to, an' the beginnin' of the end of public +morality, when a gal that's born of a mischance can come to act as if a +man was responsible for her. It ain't nothin' mo' nor less than flyin' +in the face of the law, which reads different, an' if it keeps up, +the women folks will be settin' up the same rights as men to all the +instincts of natur'." + +Old Adam--the pride and wonder of the neighbourhood because he could +still walk his half mile with the help of his son and still drink his +share of cider with the help of nobody--bent over the heap of corn +before him, and selecting an ear, divested it of the husks with a +twirling, sleight-of-hand movement. + +"They're losing virtue fast enough," he observed, throwing the naked +ear into the bin and reaching for another. "Why, when I was young thar +warn't nothin' in the way of meanness that a good woman wouldn't put up +with. They'd shut thar eyes to Hagars, white or black, rather than lose +the respect of men by seemin' to be aware of any immodesty." + +"Ah, the times have changed now!" sighed Solomon Hatch, "but thar's one +thing sho' to my mind, an' that is, that if a woman thinks she's goin' +to attract men by pryin' an' peekin' into immorality an' settin' it +straight ag'in, she's gone clean out of her head. Thar's got to be +indecency in the world because thar al'ays has been. But a man sets a +heap mo' sto' by his wife if she ain't too inquirin' upon the subject." + +"True, true, Solomon," said old Adam, "I for one was al'ays set against +teachin' women to read for fear they'd come to know things. Thar's a +deal of evil that gits into print, an' if you ain't acquainted with yo' +letters thar's less temptation to nose arter it. Reuben Merryweather +would have his daughter Janet taught, though I urged strongly against +it--holdin' that she could learn about sins an' immoralities even in +Holy Writ. Who knows if she'd ever have gone wrong if she hadn't learned +to read printed words?" + +"Well, I'm glad print is too difficult for me," observed young Adam. +"The pains I take to spell out the words would stand greatly in the way +of my enj'yin' any immorality if I was to stumble across it. What part +of Scripture, pa, is it that deals with sech doin's?" + +"They crop up powerful thick in Kings, son, but I've found 'em when I +looked sharp in Leviticus." + +"If you are goin' to talk free, men, you can go to yo' own homes to do +it," remarked Betsey, who was accustomed to appear at unexpected moments +in order to impress them with the necessity of earning their supper. +"This ain't no place for loose speakin'," she added, solemnly eyeing +young Adam, who, having a weak memory, was striving to fix the names of +Kings and Leviticus in his mind by repeating them slowly to himself. + +"Axin' yo' pardon, Mrs. Bottom, we didn't know a lady was in hearin' or +we'd never have made so bold," said old Adam. "Stop workin' yo' lips, +son, an' hand Mrs. Bottom a cheer." + +"What's all this talk anyway about Molly Merryweather an' Mr. Jonathan?" +she demanded. "Abel, have you heard anything about it?" + +The men glanced at each other with uneasy eyes, while they worked +nervously at the shucking, for the question had been in the air from the +moment of Abel's entrance, though none of them had been bold enough +to speak it aloud. And now a woman, with characteristic feminine +recklessness, had uttered the thought which had been revolving in each +mind for ten minutes--yet nothing had happened! + +Old Adam, pausing for the first time in his work, glanced with +ungrudging respect at the short, lumpy figure in the black calico dress. +Her face was still comely, and there was the mild mulishness in +her expression that is seen in the countenances of many amiable yet +obstinate persons. + +"No, I haven't heard," replied Abel, and he added a moment later, "What +do they say?" + +"Well, Mr. Halloween had it from a man in Applegate who had it from a +man in Petersburg who had it from a man in Richmond." + +"Had what?" + +"That Mr. Jonathan had been waitin' on her steady for some months, an' +'twas mo' likely than not to end in marriage. She's a good girl, is +Molly. I ain't got no use for a woman that don't stand up for her sex in +the face of men." + +"True, true," admitted her hearers solemnly, one after another, for none +among them had ever dared to defy the source of so many benefactions. + +"Thar're some that thinks morals ain't meant for any but women," she +pursued, "but I ain't one of 'em, as William Ming can testify, that +holds to that view. Viciousness is viciousness whether it be male or +female, and Mr. Mullen himself in the pulpit couldn't convince me that +it don't take two to make an impropriety." + +"True, true," they repeated, belying themselves under coercion in the +accents of the chorus in a Greek drama. "'Tis true, ma'am, as you speak +it." + +"Thar were some mean enough to side against the po' innocent from the +hour of her birth," she continued oracularly, while she looked severely +at Solomon, who nodded in response, "an' these same folks have been +preachin' over her an' pintin' at her ever sence she larned to crawl out +of the cradle. But thar never was a kinder heart or a quicker hand in +trouble than Molly's, an' if she did play fast and loose with the men, +was it any worse, I'd like to know, than they deserve?" + +"Thar's truth in what you say, ma'am, thar's a deal of truth in it," +they agreed, nodding dejected craven heads over their pipes. Like all +born politicians, their eye was for the main chance rather than for +the argument, and they found it easier to forswear a conviction than to +forego a comfort. + +"Well, I'm roastin' a young possum along with the squirrel stew, so +you'd better work up an appetite," she said in a mollified tone at at +the end of her lecture, as though she were desirous of infusing a more +ardent spirit into them before her departure. + +When the barn door closed behind her, a sigh of relief, half stifled +through fear of detection, passed round the group. + +"Thar goes a woman in a thousand," observed old Adam, edging nearer the +bin. + +"In a million--let's make it a million," urged Solomon Hatch. + +"If they were all like that the world would be different, Mr. +Doolittle," remarked Jim Halloween. + +"Ah, yes, it would be different," agreed old Adam, and he sighed again. + +"Thar'd be strict walkin' among us, I reckon," said his son. + +"An' a chalk line the same as we draw for the sex," added Solomon Hatch. + +"Sin would be scarce then an' life earnest," remarked William Ming, +who had alluded to Betsey in the most distant terms ever since he had +married her. + +"We'd abide by the letter like the women, not by the spirit as we do," +reflected Solomon. + +They sighed for the third time more heavily, and the dried husks on the +floor around the bin rattled as though a strong wind had entered. + +"But she's one in a million, Mr. Doolittle," protested Solomon, after a +pause, and his tone had grown cheerful. + +"Yes, I reckon it's a million. Thar ain't mo' than one in a million of +that rare sort," responded old Adam, falling to work with a zest. + +"Was that ar young possum she spoke of the one yo' dawg Bess treed day +befo' yesterday, William?" inquired Jim Halloween, whose hopes were +centred upon the reward of his labours. + +"Naw! that was an old un," replied William. "But thar never was a better +possum dawg than that Bess of ours. I declar, she's got so much sense +that she'll tree anything that grins at her, whether it's nigger or +possum. Ain't that so, old gal?" he inquired of the spotted hound on a +bed of husks at his side. "It wan't no longer than last week that she +kept that little nigger of Uncle Boaz's up a persimmon tree for mo'n an +hour." + +"Thar's some niggers that look so much like possums when they git up in +persimmon branches that it takes a sharp eye to tell the difference," +observed Tim Mallory. + +"Well, I'm partial to possum," remarked old Adam. "When all's said, thar +ain't a better meat to the taste as long as it's plump an' juicy. Will +you hand on that jug of cider, Tim? It's wonderful the way corn shuckin' +manages to parch the throat an' whet the appetite." + +The miller, who had declined Betsey's feast of possum, went out as soon +as he had finished his pipe, and turned into the sunken road that led +to Solomon Hatch's. In the little "best room," which was opened only for +"courtings" or funerals, he found Judy seated under a dim lamp with a +basket of darning in her lap. + +"I was over at Mrs. Mullen's this morning," she explained, "an' she told +me her eyesight was failing, so I offered to do her darnin'." + +Slipping a small round gourd into the toe of a man's black sock, she +examined it attentively, with her needle poised in the lamplight. Then +bending her head slightly sideways, she surveyed her stitches from +another angle, while she smoothed the darn with short caressing strokes +over the gourd. He thought how capable and helpful she was, and from the +cheerful energy with which she plied her needle, he judged that it gave +her pleasure merely to be of use. What he did not suspect was that her +wedding garments had been thrust aside as of less importance than Mrs. +Mullen's basket of darning. She was just the girl for a farmer's wife, +he told himself as he watched her--plain and sensible, the kind that +would make a good mother and a good manager. And all the time a voice in +the back of his brain was repeating distinctly. "They say it will end in +a marriage--they say it will end in a marriage." But this voice seemed +to come from a distance, and to have no connection either with his +thought or with his life. It was independent of his will, and while it +was speaking, he went on calmly thinking of Judy's children and of how +well and properly she would bring them up. + +"I went over again to look at the steer to-day," he said, after a +moment. "There's a Jersey cow, too, I think of buying." + +She nodded, pausing in her work, yet keeping her gaze fixed on the point +of her needle. If he had looked at her darning, he would have seen that +it was woven of exquisite and elaborate stitches--such stitches as went +into ecclesiastical embroideries in the Middle Ages. + +"They're the best kind for butter," she observed, and carefully ran her +needle crosswise in and out of the threads. + +Conversation was always desultory between them, and when it flagged, as +it did now, they could sit for hours in the composed and unembarrassed +silence of persons who meet upon the firm basis of mutual assistance +in practical matters. Their relation was founded upon the simple law of +racial continuance, which is as indifferent to the individual as it is +to the abstract, apotheosis of passion. + +"I'm going to Applegate to-morrow to order a new mill-stone," he said +at last, when he rose. "Is there anything you would like me to get for +you?" + +She reflected a moment. "I need a quarter of a yard of braid to finish +the green dress I am making. Could you match it?" + +"I'll try if you'll give me a sample." + +Laying her work aside for the first time, she hunted amid a number of +coloured spools in her basket, and brought to light a bit of silver +braid, which she handed to him. + +"Was Mr. Mullen at your house to-day, Abel?" she asked suddenly, turning +her face from the lamp. + +"Yes, he comes to see Blossom now, but she doesn't appear to care for +him. I thought she did once, didn't you?" + +"Yes, I thought she did, but that was when he was in love with Molly, +wasn't it?" + +For an instant he gazed at the bit of braid, as though his soul were +intent upon unravelling the intricate pattern. + +"I wonder whether it is that we get a thing when we stop wanting it or +that we merely stop wanting it when we get it?" he demanded passionately +of fate. + +But Judy had no mind for dubious philosophies. The thing she wanted she +knew she should never get and she knew as well that, in all likelihood, +she should never stop wanting it. Only a passionate soul in a +commonplace body could have squandered itself with such superb +prodigality. + +"I don't know," she answered wearily, "I've never noticed much either +what people get or what they want." + +"Well, Blossom wanted Mr. Mullen once and now he wants Blossom. I wish +mother didn't have so poor an opinion of him." + +She flushed and looked up quickly, for in her heart she felt that she +hated Sarah Revercomb. A disgust for her coming marriage swept over her. +Then she told herself stubbornly that everybody married sooner or later, +and that anyway her stepmother would never forgive her if she broke off +with Abel. + +"She doesn't even go to his church. I don't see what right she has to +find fault with him," she said. + +"That's her way, you know. You can't make her over. She pretends he +doesn't know his Scripture and when he comes to see Blossom, she asks +him all sorts of ridiculous questions just to embarrass him. Yesterday +she told him she couldn't call to mind the difference in cubits between +the length and the breadth of Solomon's temple, and would he please save +her the trouble of going to the Bible to find out?" + +"Does she want him to stop coming?" inquired Judy, breathlessly. + +"I don't know what she wants, but I wish Blossom would marry him, don't +you?" + +"Don't I?" she repeated, and her basket of spools fell to the floor, +where they scattered on the square rag carpet of log-cabin pattern. As +they were gathering them up, their heads touched by accident, and he +kissed her gravely. For a moment she thought, while she gazed into his +brilliant eyes, "Abel is really very handsome, after all." Then folding +her work carefully, she stuck her needle through the darn and placed +the basket on a shelf between a bible with gilt clasps and a wreath of +pressed flowers under a glass case. "He couldn't have got anybody to +fill in those holes better," she said to herself, and the reflection was +not without a balm for her aching heart. + +At dawn next morning Abel passed again, driving in the direction of +the Applegate road. The day was breaking clear and still, and over the +autumnal pageantry in the abandoned fields, innumerable silver cobwebs +shone iridescent in the sunrise. Squirrels were already awake, busily +harvesting, and here and there a rabbit bobbed up from beneath a shelter +of sassafras. Overhead the leaves on a giant chestnut tree hung as +heavily as though they were cut out of copper, and beyond a sharp twist +in the corduroy road, a branch of sweet gum curved like a bent flame +on the edge of the twilight dimness of the forest. The scarlet of the +leaves reminded him of the colour of Molly's jacket, and immediately +the voice somewhere in his brain repeated, "They say it will end in +marriage." The words awoke in him a violent and unreasonable resentment. +He could think of his own marriage quite calmly, as something that did +not bear directly upon his ideal of Molly; but the conception of her as +Gay's wife, struck a blow at the image he had enskied and then schooled +himself into worshipping from a distance. He was willing to relinquish +her as too fair and flitting for mortal embraces, but the thought that +another man should possess that elusive loveliness was like the thrust +of hot iron into his wound. That Molly loved Gay he could not believe. +That she was willing to marry him without loving him, was a suggestion +which appeared to him little short of an insult. True, he did not love +Judy to whom he was to be married to-morrow, but that was a case so +entirely and utterly different that there could be no comparison! He was +doing it because he was sorry for Judy and it was the only way he could +help her. Besides, had not Molly urged such a step upon him repeatedly +as the fulfillment of his obvious destiny? + +The reasons were all there. He had them labelled and assorted in his +mind, ready for instant reference should they be required. Sleepless +nights had gone to the preparation of them, and yet--and yet--in his +heart he knew, beyond contradiction, that he was wedding Judy because +his pity had once made a fool of him. He had acted from the loftiest +motives when he had asked her to marry him, and twenty-four hours later +he would have given ten years of his life to have been able to eliminate +those lofty motives from his character. To go back on her was, of +course, out of the question. In the history of Old Church no man--with +the exception of two drunkards and old Mr. Jonathan Gay--had ever +gone back on a woman. With girls it was different, since they, being +sentimentally above the proneness to error as well as practically below +the liability for maintenance, might play fast and loose wherever +their fleeting fancy alighted. But in the case of his unhappy sex an +honourable inclination once yielded to, was established forever. His +sacrifice was sanctioned by custom. There was no escape since it was +tradition that held him by the throat. + +His business in Applegate, which included a careful matching of Judy's +braid, took up the entire morning; and it was dinner time before he +turned back to the little inn, known as Raleigh's Tavern, at which the +farmers usually stopped for meals. Here, after washing his hands in a +basin on the back porch, he hastily smoothed his hair, and passed into +the small paved court in front of the tavern. As he approached the +doorway, the figure of a young woman in a black dress, which he felt +instinctively did not "belong" to Applegate, came down the short steps, +and paused an instant to caress a large dog that was lying in the +sunshine near the entrance. The next minute, while he fell back, hat in +hand, behind a pile of boxes in the yard, he heard his name called in +a familiar voice, and lifting his eyes found himself face to face with +Molly. + +"Abel, aren't you going to speak to me?" she asked, and moving a step +toward him, held out both hands with an impulsive gesture. + +As his hand met hers, he withdrew it quickly as though he were stung by +the touch of her soft fingers. Every nerve in his body leaped suddenly +to life, and the moment was so vivid while he faced her, that he +felt half convinced that all the long months since their parting had +dissolved in shadows. The border line between the dream and actuality +was obliterated. It seemed to him not only impossible, but absurd that +he should ever have believed himself engaged to Judy Hatch--that he +should be going to marry her to-morrow! All that side of his life had +no closer relation to his real self than it had to the self of old Adam +Doolittle. While he had planned it he had been a corpse not a living +man, but at the sound of Molly's voice, at the clasp of her fingers, +at the touching, expectant brightness in her eyes, the resurrection had +happened. Judy was a corpse preparing to wed a corpse that had become +alive--and the mating of death with life was abhorrent to him in his +illumination. + +"We are on our way to Richmond," explained Molly, very gently, "and we +are waiting to change trains. Oh, Abel, I have wanted so much to see +you!" + +It was the old Molly, in truth--Molly in her softest, in her most +dangerous, in her divinest mood. While he gazed at her he could make +no answer because an emotion that was half self-reproach, half furious +longing, choked back his words, and had he opened his lips it would have +been to utter some foolish inarticulate arraignment of destiny. In the +confusion of his senses, he did not notice that she had altered, but the +next day he remembered that her face looked smaller and more delicate, +like a tinted egg-shell he had once seen, and that her eyes in +consequence were wondrously, were almost startlingly, large. All that he +was conscious of when he turned and rushed from her after that one look, +was that the old agony of his loss had resurged afresh in his heart. + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +HIS DAY OF FREEDOM + + +He crossed the courtyard, and turned mechanically into a street which +led in the opposite direction from the road to Old Church. A crowd of +men, gathered in the doorway of the post-office, called to him to join +them, and he answered in a voice that sounded remote and cheerful in his +own ears. + +"If you want to whip the bosses in these parts there's a man for you," +he heard one of them remark, and knew that they were discussing his +political chances. Quickening his steps, he walked rapidly to the end +of the street, passed the scattered negro hovels, surrounded by blighted +sunflowers, and turned into a road which ran between fields of dusty +stubble into a stretch of brown and desolate country. + +Suddenly, as though a screw had loosened in his brain, he felt his +passion slip the control of his will and beat down, one by one, the +orderly procession of reasons that had risen against it. A sense of +exhilaration, of joy so fierce that it was akin to pain, took possession +of him. "I won't go back!" he said defiantly, "I won't go back!" And +with the words his longing for Molly was swallowed up in the tumultuous +consciousness of his release. It was as if he had burst his bonds by a +single effort of strength, and was stretching his cramped limbs in the +open. The idea of escape from captivity was so strong, that he looked +neither to right or left of him, but kept his gaze fixed on the road +straight ahead, as a man does who saves his energy for the final break +from his pursuers. At the moment he would have bartered his soul in +exchange for the unholy, the nameless rapture of the vagabond and the +gipsy, of all the neglected and the despised of civilization. Duty, +love, ambition--all these were nothing beside the perfect, the +incommunicable passion of the open road! + +It is a mood that comes once to every man--to some men more +frequently--a mood in which the prehistoric memory of the soul is +stirred, and an intolerable longing arises for the ancient nomadic +freedom of the race; when the senses surfeited by civilization cry out +for the strong meat of the jungle--for the scent of the raw, dark earth +and for the gleam of the yellow moonlight on the wet, rustling leaves. +This longing may come but once in adolescence, or many times until +the frost of age has withered the senses. It may come amid the showery +warmth and the roving fragrance of an April day, or beside the shining, +brown, leaf-strewn brooks of November. But let it come to a man when +it will, and that man renounces, in spite of himself, his little leaden +gods of prosperity, and in his heart, beneath the woven garment of +custom, he exchanges his birthright of respectability for a mess of +Romany pottage. Under the luminous sweep and rush of this vision, Abel +laughed suddenly at the thought of his marriage to Judy. Obstacles which +had appeared insurmountable at sunrise, showed now as unsubstantial and +evanescent as shadows. + +"I won't go back!" he repeated exultantly, "I won't go back!" + +"You're talkin' to yo'self, mister," said a voice at his side, and +looking down he saw a small barefooted boy, in overalls, with a bag of +striped purple calico hanging from one shoulder. + +"You've been talkin' to yo'self all along the road," the boy repeated +with zest. + +"Have I? What are you up to?" + +"I've been chinquapinin'. Ma, she thinks I'm at school, but I ain't." +He looked up wickedly, bubbling over with the shameless joys of truancy. +"Thar's a lot of chinquapin bushes over yonder in Cobblestone's wood an' +they're chock full of nuts." + +"And they're in your bag now, I suppose?" + +"I've got a peck of 'em, an' I'm goin' to make me a chain as long +as--that. It'll be a watch chain, an' I've made a watch out of a walnut. +It can't keep time, of course," he added, "'cep'n for that it's really a +sho' nough watch." His small freckled face, overhung by a mat of carroty +hair, was wreathed in a contagious, an intoxicating smile--the smile of +one who has bought happiness at the price of duty, and whose enjoyment +is sweetened by the secret knowledge that he has successfully eluded the +Stern Daughter of the Voice of God. Instinctively, Abel was aware that +the savour was not in the chinquapins, but in the disobedience, and his +heart warmed to the boy with the freckled face. + +"Are you going home now?" he asked. + +"You bet I ain't. I've got my snack ma fixed for me." He unrolled a +brown paper package and revealed two thin slices of bread with a fishing +hook stuck in one corner. "Thar's apple-butter between 'em," he added, +rolling his tongue, and a minute later, "Ma'd whip me jest the same, +an' I'd ruther be whipped for a whole day than for a half. Besides," he +burst out as though the mental image convulsed him with delight, "if I +went home I'd have to help her tote the water for the washin'." + +"But what are you going to do with yourself?" + +"I'm goin' huntin' with a gravel shooter, an' I'm goin' fishin' with a +willow pole, an' I'm goin' to find all the old hare traps, an' I'm goin' +to see 'em make hog's meat over at Bryarly's an' I'm goin' to the cider +pressin' down here at Cobblestone's. She ain't goin' to ketch me till +I've had my day!" he concluded with a whoop of ecstasy. Startled by the +sound, a rabbit sprang from a clump of sassafras, and the boy was over +the fence, on a rush of happy bare feet, in pursuit of it. + +The road curved abruptly into a short wood, filled with dwarfed holly +trees, which were sown thickly with a shower of scarlet berries--and +while Abel walked through it, his visions thronged beside him like the +painted and artificial troupe of a carnival. He saw Molly coming to him, +separating him from Judy, surrendering her warm flesh and blood to his +arms. "I won't go back!" he said, still defiantly, "I'll love Molly if +I pay for it to the last day I live." With a terrible exultation he felt +that he was willing to pay for it--to pay any price, even the price of +his honour. His passion rushed like flame through his blood, scorching, +blackening, devouring. + +Beyond the wood, the winding ash-coloured road dipped into a hollow, and +when he reached the brow of the low hill ahead, a west wind, which had +risen suddenly from the river, caught up with his footsteps and raced on +like a wild thing at his side. He could hear it sighing plaintively in +the bared trees he had left, or driving the hurtled leaves like a flock +of frightened partridges over the sumach and sassafras, and then lashing +itself into a frenzy as it chased over a level of broomsedge. Always +it sang of freedom--of the savage desire and thirst for freedom--of the +ineffable, the supreme ecstasy of freedom! And always while he listened +to it, while he felt the dead leaves stinging his flesh, he told +himself passionately that he "would not go back--that he would not marry +to-morrow!" + +For hours he stalked with the wind. Then, turning out of the road, he +flung himself down on the broomsedge and lay for other hours gazing over +the autumn landscape to the softly luminous band on the far horizon. +Somewhere in a darkened corner of his brain there was the resolve that +he would not return until, like the freckled faced, barefooted boy, he +had "had his day." + +At nine o'clock that night he entered an inn in the town of Briarwood, +twenty miles north of Applegate, and sitting down at one of the tables, +ordered something to eat. His limbs ached, not from the walk in the +wind, but from the passion that had whipped his body like a destroying +fire. He felt still the burning throb of the sore that it had left. +Apart from this dull agony he could feel nothing--he could desire +nothing--he could remember nothing. Everything was over except the +instinct that told him that he was empty and must be fed. + +While he sat there, with his aching forehead bowed in his hands, there +came a light touch on his shoulder, and looking up he saw the Reverend +Orlando Mullen, standing at his side like an embodiment of all the +things from which he had fled. For an instant he could only stare +blindly back at him. Then something which had opened in his soul, closed +softly, as if it were a shell of custom, and he knew that he was again +a prisoner. With the sight of that conventional figure, the scattered +instincts of habit and of respectability--of all the qualities for which +the race stood and against which the individual had rebelled--all these +rallied anew to the battlefield from which they had been routed by his +insurgent emotions. + +"I suppose you're waiting, like myself, for the nine-forty-five train?" + +"Yes, I'm waiting for the train." + +"Business brought you so far away?" + +"Yes, business brought me." Lifting his glass of beer, he drained it +slowly under Mr. Mullen's friendly and curious eyes. + +"It looks as if we should have a perfect day for the wedding," remarked +the rector, after a pause. "Like you, I was called off on an urgent +matter, but fortunately, it only means losing a little sleep." + +Then the whistle of the train blew, and ten minutes later, Abel followed +the young clergyman into the single coach and sat down in a vacant seat +at his side. + +It was two o'clock when at last he drove into the back gate at the mill, +and unhitching his mare, turned her out into the pasture. As he crossed +the road to the house, he lifted his eyes mechanically to the sky, and +saw that the stars shone soft and near as if they were watching over a +night of love. + + + +CHAPTER V + + +THE SHAPING OF MOLLY + + +Leaning back in the uncomfortable plush-covered chair in the train to +Richmond, Molly watched the flat landscape glide past, while she thought +a little wistfully of the morning she had made this same trip dressed +in one of Mrs. Gay's gowns. On her knees Mrs. Gay's canary, extinguished +beneath the black silk cover to his cage, uttered from time to time a +feeble pipe of inquiry, and on the rack above her head Mrs. Gay's tea +basket rattled loudly in a sudden lurch of the train. Since the hour in +which she had left the overseer's cottage and moved into the "big house" +at Jordan's Journey, the appealing little lady had been the dominant +influence in her life--an influence so soft and yet so overpowering that +she had at times a sensation of being smothered in scented swansdown. +For several months after leaving Old Church her education had absorbed +her energies, and she had found time merely to gasp occasionally in +the oppressive sweetness of the atmosphere which Mrs. Gay's personality +diffused. Everything was strange then, and her desire for strangeness, +for unfamiliar impressions, had amounted to a passion. She had been very +anxious, too, very much afraid lest she should make a mistake. When she +had entered the hotel dining-room in New York she had felt as if she +were walking on ploughed ground, and the red velvet carpet had seemed +to rise and sink under her feet. That first night had been exquisite +torture to her, and so, she surmised through some intuitive +understanding, had it been to Kesiah. For weeks after that time +of embarrassment, she had watched herself carefully--watched every +instant--and in the end she had triumphed. With her growing ease, +her old impulsiveness had returned to her, and with the wonderful +adaptability of the Southern woman, she had soon ceased to feel a sense +of discomfort in her changed surroundings. The instinct of class she had +never had, and this lack of social reverence had helped her not a +little in her ascent of the ladder. It is difficult to suffer from a +distinction which one does not admit--and her perfect unconsciousness of +inferiority to Mrs. Gay had placed her, without her being aware of it, +in the position of an equal. + +With her hands clasped on the cage of the canary, she gazed thoughtfully +at Kesiah, who was sitting a little in front of her, with her eyeglasses +on her nose and the daily paper opened before her. Gay was to meet them +in Richmond, and as Molly remembered this now, she realized that her +feeling about their meeting had changed during the last few hours. She +liked Gay--she responded to his physical charm, to the indefinable air +of adventure which hangs sometimes about men who have lived hard without +wasting their surplus vitality--but in spite of the strong attraction he +possessed for her, she knew that in her heart she had never thoroughly +believed in him. Unconsciously to herself she had measured his stature +against Abel's and he had come short of her standard. + +"Molly," asked Mrs. Gay, turning her head suddenly, "did you write +Jonathan to expect us by this train?" + +"Yes, Aunt Angela, he knows we are coming. Shall I lower the shade? Is +the sunlight too strong on you?" + +"A little," murmured Mrs. Gay in a tone of resigned sweetness and the +conversation was over. + +At the sound of Molly's voice an old lady, travelling South with a +trained nurse, turned in her chair, and looked at the girl as she might +have looked at a fruit for which she longed, but which she had been +forbidden to touch. Her face, under an elaborate bonnet trimmed with +artificial purple wistaria, was withered and crossed with lines, and her +poor old hands were so knotted from gout that she could hardly lift the +tea-cup from the small table which had been fastened in front of her. +Yet for one instant, as she gazed on Molly's girlish freshness, her +youth stirred feebly somewhere in the dregs of her memory, and her eyes +grew deprecating and piteous, as though her soul were saying, "I know I +have missed it, but it isn't my fault---" + +The tea-cup trembled in her hand, and her old lips fumbled pathetically +for her bit of toast, while across from her, with only the narrow aisle +of the car between, youth incarnate sat weaving its separate dream of a +universe. + +"Yes, two hours earlier," ran Molly's thoughts, "I looked forward to +the meeting with Jonathan, and now, in so short a time, I have grown to +dread it." She tried to think of his pleasant, well-coloured face, of +his whimsical, caressing smile, but in the niche where his image should +have stood, she saw Abel in his country clothes, with his red-brown +throat rising out of his blue shirt and his brilliant eyes under the +dark hair on his forehead. Then suddenly memory played her a ridiculous +trick, for she remembered that his hair grew in a close clipped circular +wave, like the hair which has been bound by a fillet on the head of a +child. + +"I wonder why he wouldn't speak to me?" she thought, with a pang. "I +wonder if he has really got over caring?" She had always thought of +Abel as a possession more absolutely her own than even Mr. Jonathan's +provision. When she had said so passionately that she wanted to be free, +she had not meant that at any minute she chose, Abel would not be ready +and willing to fly back into bondage. That Abel, after all these years, +should actually have ceased to care for her--should have refused even to +speak to her! It was absurd--it was vindictive--it was unchristian! +She had half a mind to get Mr. Mullen to talk to him. Then her heart +throbbed when she remembered the touch of his hand, the look in his +eyes, the thirst of his lips seeking hers. That was only six months +ago--such a very little while--and now he had rushed away from the sight +of her! She thought of their parting, when she had said that she wanted +to see the world, and he had offered at once to release her. Since then +she had seen the world until she was tired of it. At times she had been +terribly homesick for Old Church, and she had never been happy except +when Gay had taken her to see pictures or into wonderful parks. Always +the thought had lain hidden in her mind that some day, when she could +stand it no longer, she would go back and wear her red jacket and run +free in the fields with Abel again. Her very selfishness had seemed +natural to her because Abel had always been there, like the air and the +sky and the broomsedge; he was a part of the scene, and she found it +impossible to detach him from his surroundings. + +At the station in Richmond, Gay met them, and for the first few minutes +his mother absorbed his attention. Molly had not seen him for six +weeks, and she noticed that he had grown fleshier and that this lent an +additional heaviness to his shaven chin. Even his charming smile +could not disguise the slight coarseness of feature, with which he was +beginning already to pay for his pleasures. By the time he was forty, he +would be quite stout and "lumpy," she thought. + +There was much excitement about collecting Mrs. Gay's packages, and the +drive to the hotel was filled with anxious inquiries from Kesiah, who +was always nervous and fussy when she travelled. + +"Molly, did you see my umbrella put in?" + +"Yes, Aunt Kesiah, it is here in the corner by Jonathan." + +"I forgot to notice Angela's medicine case. Did you see that it wasn't +overlooked?" + +"Yes, Patsey has it." + +Then came a solicitous exhibition of filial affection on the part +of Gay, and at last, to Molly's relief, they arrived at the new, +brilliantly lighted hotel, and were led through stifling corridors, +carpeted in red, to their rooms on the second floor in the front of the +building. As she passed over the velvet carpets, Molly had again the +sensation that she was walking over ploughed ground; and when she had +escaped from Mrs. Gay's sitting-room, on the pretext of dressing +for dinner, she threw open the window, and leaned out of the close +atmosphere into the freshness of the November evening. This was what she +had once looked upon as pleasure--or at least as exciting amusement--to +move continually from one hot and over furnished hotel to another, to +fuss about missing packages, to see crowds of strange faces passing +before her, all fat and overfed and all, somehow, looking exactly alike. + +A wave of homesickness for the white roads and the golden broomsedge +of Old Church swept over her. She wanted the open fields, and more than +all, far more than all, she wanted Abel! It was her fault--she had made +her choice--no one else was to blame for it. And, then, though she had +made her choice and no one else was to blame for it, she felt that she +almost hated old Mr. Jonathan, as she still called him in her thoughts, +because he had left her his money. At the bottom of her heart, there +was the perfectly unreasonable suspicion that he had arranged the whole +thing out of spite. + +In the sitting-room, meanwhile, which Kesiah's bedroom separated from +Molly's, Mrs. Gay was lying on a couch beside a table on which stood a +cut-glass bowl of purple orchids sent to her by her son. She was looking +a little pale, but this pallor was not unbecoming since it enhanced the +expression of appealing melancholy in her eyes. To look at her was to +recognize that life had crushed her, and yet that her soul exhaled an +intense sweetness in the midst of its suffering. + +Jonathan had just gone down to buy the evening papers; in the next room +she could hear Kesiah at the unpacking; so she was left for a moment +alone with her imagination. The fatigue of the trip had affected her +nerves, and she sank, while she lay there in her travelling gown, +which she had not yet removed, into one of those spells of spiritual +discontent which followed inevitably any unusual physical discomfort. +She thought, not resentfully but sadly, that Kesiah managed to grow even +more obstinate with years, that Jonathan must have tired of her or he +would never have forgotten the list of medicines she had sent him, that +Molly took Kesiah away from the sickroom entirely too often. From these +reflections she drifted naturally into an emotion of self pity, and +the thought occurred to her, as it did invariably in such hours of +depression, that her world had never been large enough for the full +exercise and appreciation of her highest qualities. If she had only +lived in a richer century amid more congenial surroundings! Who could +tell what her usefulness might have been had not destiny continually +thwarted her aspirations? Before the idea of this thwarted usefulness, +which was always vaguely associated with the moral regeneration of +distinguished historic sinners of the opposite sex, like Lord Byron +or Alfred de Musset, she began to feel that she had been not only +neglected, but wasted in the atmosphere in which she had been placed. + +Jonathan's entrance, with the evening papers in his hand, broke the +thread of her reverie, and as he sat down in a chair by her side, she +wondered if he had inherited her "nature" and if he, also, cherished in +his soul the same spiritual yearnings? Her wonder was, however, entirely +unnecessary, for Jonathan had very little imagination, and would never +have wasted his time yearning over a sinner whom he had never seen. + +"I stopped a minute to get into my evening clothes," he said, in the +cheerful voice of one who is a stranger to aspirations of soul. "I +thought Molly would be dressed by this time. She is usually so quick." + +"Yes, she is usually very quick," replied Mrs. Gay gently, while +she gathered all the forces of her character, which were slightly +disorganized by her recent indulgence in pensive musings, to do battle +against an idea which she had striven repeatedly of late to banish from +her thoughts. "I wish, dear Jonathan," she added, "that you would speak +a few words to Molly. You have such influence with her, and I am sure I +don't wonder." + +"I'll speak them with pleasure, mother. Just drop me a hint as to what +they are to be about." + +"She's a sweet, unselfish girl, we all know that, but there are +times, dear, especially when strangers are present, when she appears a +little--well, a little crude--you know what I mean?" + +"I fancy I know, but I don't see just what we are to do about it. You +might as well attempt to reshape Molly's nose as her character. Let's +admit that both might be improved and then give up the job. She's got +charm--there's no doubt of that. I believe even if she were plain she'd +be almost as attractive. Why, I've seen her when she was very nearly +plain sometimes, and she hasn't been a whit less fascinating than when +she's looking her prettiest. It's the infinite variety and all that, you +know. Her soul does it, I suppose." + +"Yes, she must have charm," replied Mrs. Gay, ignoring what he had said +about "soul" because she felt a vague dislike to hearing a word applied +indiscriminately to others which had become, as it were, associated with +herself. "I can't analyze it, however, for she hasn't a single really +perfect feature except her eyes." + +"But such eyes! In the sunlight they are nearer the colour of a +humming-birds wing than anything I know of." + +"I suppose they are rather unusual, but, after all a fine pair of eyes +can't make exactly a--well, a lady, Jonathan." + +"The deuce!" he ejaculated, and then added quickly, "What has she done +now, mother?" + +One of Mrs. Gay's first principles of diplomacy was that an unpleasant +fact treated as non-existent, was deprived in a measure of its power +for evil. By the application of this principle, she had extinguished her +brother-in-law's passion for Janet Merryweather, and she hoped that it +would prove equally effective in blighting her son's incipient fancy for +Molly. She looked upon Jonathan's infatuation as a mere sinister shadow +as yet, but she was shrewd enough to suspect that the shadow would be +converted into substance at the first hint of her recognition that +it was impending. Indirect influence alone remained to her, and she +surmised that her ultimate triumph would depend upon the perfection of +her indirectness. When it came to the game of strategy, Jonathan, being +of an open nature, was no match for his mother. He was inclined +by temperament to accept things at their face value--particularly +women--and not to worry about them unless they interfered with his +appetite. When he lost his desire for his meals, then he began, somewhat +to his surprise, to consider them seriously. + +"Of course I feel just as you do about it," remarked Mrs. Gay, after a +weighty silence. "I'm fond of her and I see her good points--but there's +something about her--I suppose it's the strain of Merryweather blood, +or the fact of her being born in such unfortunate circumstances--" Her +manner grew severer. "But--whatever the cause, it shows itself in a kind +of social defiance that would always keep her from being just--oh, well, +you know---" + +"She's bright enough, mother, she's quick enough, and she's pretty +enough, isn't she?" + +"She would be, Jonathan, if her defiance did not come from pure +wilfulness. But she says and does the most unconventional things simply +for the pleasure of shocking people. It isn't that she doesn't know, +it's that she doesn't care." + +"But she'll get to care--all women do, if you give them time." His tone +implied that the whole sex was comprised in an elementary branch of +psychology which he had mastered with the help of a few simple rules of +analogy. + +"Well, she may, dear, but I doubt it. She is as absolutely without class +instinct as an anarchist, I believe. When she lived in the overseer's +cottage she never looked up and now that she has come out of it, she +never looks down. We've told her repeatedly that she mustn't talk to +strangers about that part of her life, but it isn't the least bit of +use. Only a few days ago I heard her telling Judge Grayson that nobody +appeared to do any 'courting' in New York." + +To her amazement he burst into a laugh. + +"By Jove, I suppose she misses it," he returned, "but what about that +fellow she picked up in the North who hung around her last summer?" + +"Oh, there have been plenty of them hanging about her. Molly is the +kind, you know, that will have lovers wherever you put her." There was +a faint condescension in her voice, for she herself preferred adorers to +lovers. + +"But she hasn't seemed to care about them," he said. "I believe she has +grown tired of flirting." + +"I'm sure she doesn't flirt with them, and I think it's all because she +is pining for somebody she left at Old Church--the miller or the rector +or somebody we've never even heard of." + +"What's that?" he started a little, and she saw at once that, although +she had used her most delicate weapon, he had flinched from the first +touch of the blade. "I'm positive she hadn't a real fancy for anybody +down there," he added, as he relapsed into his attitude of indifference. + +"I know she says so, Jonathan, but there are other ways of telling." + +"Oh, there's no truth in that--it's all nonsense," he said irritably. + +Then a door creaked in the hall, there was a rustle of silken skirts +on the carpet, and Molly, having dried her tears, came in, pliant, +blushing, and eager to please them both. + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +IN WHICH HEARTS GO ASTRAY + + +She was enchantingly pretty, there was no doubt of that, thought Gay +as he watched her at dinner. He had rarely seen a face so radiant in +expression, and she had lost, he noticed, the touch of provincialism in +her voice and manner. To-night, for the first time, he felt that there +was a fawn-like shyness about her, as if her soul had flown startled +before his approach. Of her meeting with Abel in Applegate he knew +nothing, and while he discerned instinctively the softness and the +richness of her mood, it was but reasonable that he should attribute it +to a different and, as it happened, to a mistaken cause. He liked that +faint shadow of her lashes on her vivid cheeks, and while he drank his +coffee and cracked his nuts, he told himself, half humorously, that the +ideal love, after all, was a perpetual virgin in perpetual flight. As +he rose from the table, he remembered Blossom, and the pile of her +half-read letters in his travelling bag. "She's a dear good girl, and +just because I've got myself into a mess, I've no idea of behaving like +a cad to her," he thought. + +That was downstairs in the hotel dining-room, and an hour later, when he +faced Molly alone in the little sitting-room, he repeated the phrase to +himself with an additional emphasis--for when the woman before him in +flesh and blood looked up at him with entreating eyes, like a child +begging a favour, the woman in his memory faded quickly into remoteness. + +"What's the matter, little girl?" he asked. + +"Oh, Jonathan, I must go back to Old Church--to-morrow!" she said. + +"Why in thunder do you want to do that?" + +"There's something I must see about. I can't wait. I never can wait when +I want anything." + +"So I have observed. This something is so important, by the way, that +you haven't thought of it for six months?" + +"Well, I've thought of it--sometimes," she admitted. + +"Can't you tell me what it is, Molly?" + +She shook her head. Her face was pink and her eyes shone; whatever it +was, it had obviously enriched her beauty. + +"Tell me, little girl," he repeated and leaned closer. There had always +been something comfortable and warm in his nearness to her, and under +the influence of it, she felt tempted to cry out, "I want to go back to +find out if Abel still loves me! I am an idiot, I know, but I feel that +I shall die if I discover that he has got over caring. This suspense +is more than I can bear, yet I never knew until I felt it, how much he +means to me." + +This was what she wanted to say, but instead of uttering it, she merely +murmured: + +"I can't, Jonathan, you would never understand." Her whole being was +vibrant to-night with the desire for love, yet, in spite of his wide +experience with the passion, she knew that he would not comprehend what +she meant by the word. It wasn't his kind of love in the least that she +wanted; it differed from his as the light of the sun differs from the +blaze of a prairie fire. "It's just a feeling," she added, helplessly. +"You don't have feelings, I suppose?" + +"Don't I?" he echoed. "Oh, Molly, if you only knew how many!" + +"While they last--but they don't last, you know, they have their +seasons. That's the curse of them, or the charm. If they only lasted +earth would be paradise or hell, wouldn't it?" + +But generalizations had no further attraction for her. Her mind was one +great wonder, and she felt that she could hardly keep alive until she +could stand face to face with Abel and read the truth in his eyes. + +"All the same I want to go," she repeated obstinately. + +Suspicion seized him, and his mouth grew a little hard under his short +moustache. + +"Molly," he asked, "have you been thinking again about the miller?" + +"How absurd! What put that into your head?" she retorted indignantly. + +The idea, innocent as it was, appeared to incense her. What a little +firebrand she looked, and how hot her eyes glowed when she was angry! + +"Well, I'm glad you haven't--because, you know, really it wouldn't do," +he answered. + +"What wouldn't do?" + +"Your marrying a Revercomb--it wouldn't do in the least." + +"Why wouldn't it?" + +"You can see that for yourself, can't you? You've come entirely out of +that life and you couldn't go back to it." + +"I don't see why I couldn't if I wanted to?" she threw out at him with +sudden violence. + +Clearly, as his mother had said, she was lacking in reverence, yet he +couldn't agree that she would never become exactly a lady. Not with that +high-bred poise of the head and those small, exquisite hands! + +"Well, in the first place, I don't believe you'd ever want to," he +said calmly, "and in the second place, if you ever did such a thing, my +little weather-vane, you'd regret it in ten minutes." + +"If I did it, I don't believe I'd ever regret it," was her amazing +rejoinder. + +Stupefied yet dauntless, he returned to the charge. + +"You're talking sheer nonsense, you silly girl, and you know it," he +said. "If you were to go back to Old Church to marry the miller, you'd +be sorry before you got up to the altar." + +"I'm not going back there to marry him," she persisted stubbornly, "but +I don't' believe if I were to do it, I'd ever regret it." + +"You think you'd be satisfied to give up ten thousand a year and settle +down to raising chickens for a living?" + +"I like raising chickens." + +"And you'd expect that pursuit to make up to you for all you would +sacrifice--for the world and people and freedom to go and come as you +please?" + +"I don't care about the world," she replied, sticking, he told himself, +as obstinately as a mule to her point, "and people seem to me just the +same everywhere." + +"The same?" he repeated, "do you actually mean that you can't see any +difference?" + +"No difference that matters. It's all in the clothes and the sillier +things they talk about. Why, I'd rather hear old Adam Doolittle talk +than that stupid Judge Grayson, who dined with us the other night, and +never mentioned anything but stocks. If I've got to hear about a single +subject I'd rather it would be crops than stocks--they seem more human, +somehow." + +"By Jove!" he exclaimed, under his breath, "what's got into you +to-night, Molly? I honestly believe you've begun to idealize the miller +now you've been away from him. He's a handsome fellow; you don't see +his physical match in a day, I'm willing to admit, but if you went back +again you'd be surprised to find how--well, how rustic he would appear +to you." + +The colour rushed to her face, and her eyes burned hot under the sudden +droop of her lashes. + +"He's better than any one I've seen anywhere," she replied, "he's +bigger, he's stronger, he's kinder. I'm not good enough to marry him, +and I know it." + +For an instant he looked at her in the pained surprise of one who had +never indulged in verbal excesses. Then he said, coldly; "So you're +working yourself into a sentiment over young Revercomb. My dear child, +if you only knew how unspeakably silly it is. Nothing could be more +absurd than to throw away an income of ten thousand dollars a year in +order to marry a poor man." The idea of her committing such folly was +intensely distressing to him. His judgment was now in the ascendant, +and like most men, while under the cool and firm control of the rational +part of his nature, he was incapable of recalling with any sympathy +the times when he had followed the lead of those qualities which rise +superior to reason. + +"I don't care how poor he is," said Molly passionately, for her rational +part was plainly not in the ascendant. "Nobody ever thought about his +being so poor until your uncle left me all that horrid money. He was +honestly born and I wasn't, yet he didn't care. He was big and splendid +and I was little and mean, that was the matter!" + +"By George, you're in love with him!" he exclaimed, and beneath the +coldness of his manner, his heart suffered an incomprehensible pang. +Undoubtedly he had permitted himself to drift into a feeling for +Molly, which, had he been wise, he would have strangled speedily in the +beginning. The obstacles which had appeared to make for his safety, had, +he realized now, merely afforded shelter to the flame until it had grown +strong enough to overleap them. While he stood there, with his angry +gaze on her flushing and paling beauty, he had the helpless sensation of +a man who returns at sunrise to find a forest fire raging where he had +left a few sticks smouldering at midnight. + +"I'm not in love with anybody--you've no right to say so," she returned, +"but I'll not have him abused. It's not true, it's not just, it's not +generous." + +This was too much for his forbearance, though he told himself that, +after all, there was no "getting at" Molly from the surface, and that +this outburst might conceal a fancy for himself quite as well as for +the miller. The last idea, while it tantalized him, was not without a +pleasant sting for his senses. + +"You're a goose, Molly, and I've half a mind to shake you soundly," +he said. "Since there's no other way to cure you of this foolish +infatuation, I'll take you down to Old Church to-morrow and let you see +with your own eyes. You've forgotten how things look there, that's my +opinion." + +"Oh, Jonathan," she said, and grew dangerously sweet, while all her soft +flushing body leaned toward him. "You are a perfect dear, aren't you?" + +"I rather think I am, since you put the question. Molly, will you kiss +me?" + +She drew back at once, a little deprecating, because she was honestly +sorry, since he was so silly as to want to kiss her, that she couldn't +oblige him. For her own part, she felt, she wouldn't have cared, but +she remembered Abel's anger because of the kiss by the brook, and +the thought hardened her heart. It was foolish of men to make so much +importance of kisses. + +"I'm sorry, but I can't. Don't ask me, Jonathan--all the same you are a +darling!" + +Then before he could detain her, she had slipped away from him through +Kesiah's door, which she closed after her. + +"Aunt Kesiah," he heard her exclaim joyously, "Jonathan is going to take +me to Old Church to spend to-morrow!" + +Kesiah, in an ugly grey dressing-gown, tied at the waist with a black +cord, was drying Mrs. Gay's sheets before the radiator. At Molly's +entrance, she turned, and said warningly, "Patsey is rubbing Angela +after her bath. What was that about Old Church, dear?" + +"Jonathan has promised to take me down there to-morrow." + +"To spend the day? Well, I suppose we may trust you with him." From her +manner one might have inferred that the idea of not trusting anybody +with Jonathan would have been a joke. + +She went on calmly shaking out Mrs. Gay's sheets before the radiator, as +if the conversation were over, while behind her on the pale green wall, +her shadow loomed distinct, grotesque, and sexless. But Molly was in +the mood when the need to talk--to let oneself go--is so great that the +choice of a listener is little more than an accident. She had discovered +at last--discovered in that illuminating moment in Applegate--the +meaning of the homesickness, of the restlessness, of the despondency of +the last few months. Before she could understand what Abel had meant to +her, she had been obliged to draw away from him, to measure him from a +distance, to put the lucid revealing silence between them. It was like +looking at a mountain, when one must fall back to the right angle of +view, must gain the proper perspective, before one can judge of the +space it fills on the horizon. What she needed was merely to see Abel +in relation to other things in her life, to learn how immeasurably he +towered above them. Her blood rushed through her veins with a burning +sweetness, and while she stood there watching Kesiah, the wonder and +the intoxication of magic was upon her. She had passed within the +Enchanter's circle, and her soul was dancing to the music of flutes. + +"Aunt Kesiah," she asked suddenly, and her voice thrilled, "were you +ever in love?" + +Kesiah looked up from the sheets with the expression of a person who has +been interrupted in the serious business of life by the fluttering of +a humming-bird. It required an effort for her to recede from the +comfortable habit of thought she had attained to the point of view from +which the aspirations of the soul had appeared of more importance than +the satisfactions of the body. Only for a few weeks in the spring did +she relapse periodically into such a condition of mind. + +"Never," she answered. + +"Did you never feel that you cared about anybody--in that way?" + +"Never." + +It was incredible! It was appalling! But it really had happened! Love, +which filled the world, was not the beginning and the end, as it ought +to be, of every mortal existence. Subtract it from the universe and +there was nothing left but a void, yet in this void, life seemed to +move and feed and have its being just as if it were really alive. People +indeed--even women--would go on, like Kesiah, for almost sixty years, +and not share, for an instant, the divine impulse of creation. They +could exist quite comfortably on three meals a day without ever +suspecting the terrible emptiness that there was inside of them. +They could even wring a stale satisfaction out of this imitation +existence--this play of make-believe being alive. And around them all +the time there was the wonder and the glory of the universe! + +Then Kesiah turned suddenly from the radiator, and there was an +expression in her face which reminded Molly of the old lady with the +bonnet trimmed with artificial purple wistaria she had seen on the +train--an expression of useless knowledge and regret, as though she +realized that she had missed the essential thing and that it was life, +after all, that had been to blame for it. For a minute only the look +lasted, for Kesiah's was a closed soul, and the smallest revelation of +herself was like the agony of travail. + +"If you don't mind, dear, will you carry these sheets to Patsey for +Angela's bed," she said. + +At the time Gay had been only half in earnest when he promised to take +Molly to Old Church, and he presented himself at breakfast next morning +with the unspoken hope in his heart that she had changed her mind during +the night. When she met him with her hat on, he inquired facetiously if +she contemplated a journey, and proceeded to make light of her response +that the carriage was ordered to take them to the station. + +"But we'll starve if we go there," he urged, "the servants are +scattered, and the luncheon I got last time was a subject for bad +language." + +"I'll cook you one, Jonathan. I can cook beautifully," she said. + +The idea amused him. After all they could easily get back to dinner. + +"I wonder if you know that you are a nuisance, Molly?" he asked, +smiling, and she saw that she had won. Winning was just as easy with +Jonathan as it had been with Reuben or with Abel. + +It was a brilliant day, in the midst of a brief spell of Indian +summer. When they left the train and drove along the corduroy road from +Applegate, the forest on either side of them was gorgeous in gold and +copper. Straight ahead, at the end of the long vista, they could see a +bit of cloudless sky beyond the low outlines of a field; and both sky +and field were wrapped in a faint purplish haze. The few belated yellow +butterflies, floating over the moist places in the road, seemed to drift +pensively in the autumnal stillness. + +On the long drive hardly a word was spoken, for Gay was occupied with +the cigar he had not had time to smoke after breakfast, and Molly was +thinking that but for Reuben's death, she would never have accepted Mr. +Jonathan's legacy and parted from Abel. + +"All this happened because I went along the Haunt's Walk and not across +the east meadow that April afternoon," she thought, "but for that, +Jonathan would not have kissed me and Abel and I should not have +quarrelled." It was such a little thing--only the eighth of a mile which +had decided her future. She might just as easily have turned aside if +she had only suspected. But life was like that--you never suspected +until things had happened, and the little decisions, made in the midst +of your ignorance, committed you to your destiny. + +The horses came out of the wood, plodding over the sandy soil, which +marked the beginning of the open country. Across the fields toward +Bottom's Ordinary, scattered groups of people were walking in twos and +threes, showing like disfiguring patches in the midst of the golden +rod and the life-everlasting. Old Adam, hobbling up the path, while +the horses stopped to drink at the well, touched his hat as he steadied +himself with the aid of his big knotted stick. + +"It's a fine sight to see you back among us," he said. "If you'd come a +couple of hours earlier you'd have been in time for the wedding?" + +"What wedding?" asked Gay in a clear voice, but moved by some intuitive +knowledge of what the answer would be, he did not look at Molly. + +"Why, Solomon Hatch's daughter, Judy, to be sure. She's just married +the miller." For a minute he stopped, coughed, spat and then added: "Mr. +Mullen tied 'em up tight all by heart, without so much as glancin' at +the book. Ah, that young parson may have his faults, an' be unsound on +the doctrine of baptism, but he can lay on matrimony with as pious an +air as if he was conductin' a funeral." + +He fell back as Gay nodded pleasantly, and the wheels grated over +the rocky ground by the well. With a slow flick on the long whip, the +carriage crossed the three roads and rolled rapidly into the turnpike. +And while she gazed straight ahead into the flat distance, Molly was +thinking, "All this has happened because I went down the Haunt's Walk +that April afternoon and not over the east meadow." + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +A NEW BEGINNING TO AN OLD TRAGEDY + + +The wedding was over. Mr. Mullen had read the service in his melodious +voice, gazing straight over the Prayer-book as though he saw a vision in +the sunbeam above Judy's head. On that solitary occasion his soul, which +revolted from what he described in secret as the "Methodistical low +church atmosphere" of his parish, had adorned the simple word with the +facial solemnity that accompanies an elaborate ritual. + +From the front pew, Sarah Revercomb, in full widow's weeds, had glared +stonily at the Reverend Orlando, as if she suspected him of some +sinister intention to tamper with the ceremony. At her side, Solomon +Hatch's little pointed beard might have been seen rising and falling +as it followed the rhythmic sound of the clergyman's voice. When the +service was over, and the congregation filed out into the leaf-strewn +paths of the churchyard, it was generally decided that Mr. Mullen's +delivery had never been surpassed in the memory of the several +denominations. + +"'Twas when he came to makin' Abel say 'with all my worldly goods' that +he looked his grandest," commented old Adam, as he started for Solomon's +cottage between Sarah and Mrs. Hatch. "But, them are solemn words an' +he was wise to give a man pause for thought. Thar ain't a mo' inspirin' +sentence in the whole Prayer-book than that." + +"Well, marriage ain't all promisin'," observed Sarah, "thar's a deal to +it besides, an' they're both likely to find it out befo' they're much +older." + +Old Adam, who never contradicted a woman unless he was married to her, +agreed to this with some unintelligible mutters through his toothless +gums, while Mrs. Hatch remarked with effusive amiability that "it's a +sad sight to see a daughter go, even though she's a stepchild. It's +a comfort to think," she added immediately, "that Judy's got a +God-fearin', pious husband an' one with no nonsense about him for all +his good looks." + +"I ain't so sure about the nonsense," retorted Sarah, "Abel's got to be +managed like all men folk, an' he ain't so different from the rest of +'em, unless it is that he's mo' set." + +She harboured a carefully concealed opinion that Abel was "stooping" to +marry Judy, for the Hatches were particularly thriftless and had never +succeeded in paying a long standing mortgage. Besides, they were in the +habit of using their parlour commonly on week days, and Mrs. Hatch had +once been seen at church in a calico dress--though, it was true, she had +slipped out of the side door before the service was over. Added to these +things, Sarah had observed of late that Judy showed an inclination to +shirk her duties, and had a dangerous habit of "mooning" while she was +at the wash tub. + +"Well, I like a man that's set, myself," rejoined Mrs. Hatch, as +effusive as ever. "I used to say thar never was anybody so set as my +first husband till I got my second." + +"I ain't had so wide an experience as you," replied Sarah, as if +she were condescending to an acknowledged lapse in virtue. "Thar's a +difference between marryin' for the sake of matrimony, which is right +an' proper accordin' to Scripture, an' marryin' for the sake of a man, +which is a sign of weakness in a woman." + +"You ain't a friend to the feelin's of natur, ma'am," remarked old Adam, +with respect. + +"No, thar never was much natur in me," responded Sarah, lifting her +bombazine skirt with both hands as she stepped over a puddle. Her +floating crape veil, bought ten years after her husband's death, with +the money made from her turkeys, represented the single extravagance +as well as the solitary ambition of her life. Even as a child she had +longed ardently to wear crape, and this secret aspiration, which had +smouldered in the early poverty-stricken years of her marriage, had +burst suddenly into flame when she found herself a widow. During the +burial service over her husband, while she had sat bowed in musty +black cotton, which had been loaned her by a neighbour, she had vowed +earnestly that she would wear weeds yet for Abner before she died. Ten +years of scraping and saving were devoted to this sacred resolve, and +now, twenty years after the death of Abner Revercomb, she was wearing +a crape veil for him to his son's wedding. As she walked, so strong a +smell of camphor floated from her garments, that old Adam sneezed twice, +and then muttered hurriedly that "'twas the very season for chills." +Something of her secret pride in her garb of mourning had entered into +him while he limped beside her on his rheumatic old legs. + +Instead of stopping with the others for the wedding feast at the +Solomon's cottage, Sarah pleaded a sudden palpitation of the heart, and +hurried home to put the house in order before the arrival of the bride. +Already she had prepared the best chamber and set the supper table with +her blue and white china, but as she walked quietly home from church +at the side of old Adam, she had remembered, with a sensation of panic, +that she had forgotten to make up the the feather bed, which she +rolled over for an airing. Not a speck of dust was left on the floor +or windows, and a little later, while she began spreading the sheets, +without waiting to remove her bonnet, she thought proudly that Judy +probably never stayed in so entirely respectable a chamber in her life. +Even the pitcher and basin were elaborately ornamented with peonies, +the colour of the sampler in crewel work over the washstand; and on the +bureau, between two crocheted mats of an intricate pattern, there was a +pincushion in the shape of a monstrous tomato. + +Yes, it was all ready for them, she reflected, while she stood in the +doorway and surveyed the results of her handiwork. "Thar's something +wantin'," she observed presently to herself. "I never could feel that +a weddin' or a funeral was finished without a calla lily somewhere +around." Going downstairs to the kitchen, she clipped the last forced +blossoms of an unusual size from her "prize" plant, and brought them +back in a small glass vase to decorate Judy's bureau. "Now it's just +like it was when I was married," she thought, "an' it's just as it +will be when Abel's sons are bringin' home their brides." There was no +sentiment in her thoughts, for she regarded sentiment as a mere morbid +stimulant to the kind of emotion she considered both dangerous and +useless. Even the look on Abel's face, which she had been forced to +recognize as that of despair, seemed to her, on the whole, a safer +expression than one of a too-exultant joy. She was not afraid of +despair--its manifestations were familiar to her, and she had usually +found them amenable to the laws of propriety. But she felt vaguely that +happiness in some mysterious way was related to sin, and the shameless +ecstasy with which Abel had announced his engagement to Molly had +branded his emotion as positively immoral in her sight. "No decent +feelin' is goin' to make anybody's face shine like a brass plate," she +had said to herself. + +After straightening the crocheted mats for the last time, she went +downstairs to the kitchen to describe the wedding to the two old +people, who, chained to their chairs by rheumatism, were on the point of +bursting with curiosity. + +"An' you didn't bring me so much as a bite of cake," whimpered +grandmother, seeing her empty hands. "Here I've been settin' all day in +this cheer with my mouth waterin' for that weddin' cake." + +"I'm just as sure as I can be that Mrs. Hatch is goin' to send you some +made by Blossom," replied Sarah soothingly. + +"Ah, to think of Abel bein' at his own weddin' an' we settin' here," +piped grandfather. "'Twas a hasty business, but we Revercombs were +al'ays the folk to swallow our puddin' while 'twas smokin' an' then cry +out that we didn't know 'twas hot. I never knew one of us that didn't +have to larn he was a fool befo' he could come at any wisdom." + +"Well, I ain't got anything particular against the girl," said Sarah, +"but it's my bounden belief that she'll turn out a slattern. Thar's +something moonstruck about her--you can tell it by that shiftin' +skeered-rabbit look in her eyes. She's just the sort to sweep all the +trash under the bed an' think she's cleaned the room." + +"It's amazin', the small sense men have in sech matters," remarked +grandfather. "Thar's a feelin' among us, I don't know whar it comes +from, that the little and squinched-up women generally run to virtue." + +"Oh, I ain't sayin' she's not a good girl accordin' to her lights," +returned Sarah, "an', after all, it ain't a man but his mother that +suffers from a slattern. Well, I must go an' lay off my weeds befo' it's +time for 'em to get here. Don't you fret, ma, Mrs. Hatch is surely goin' +to send you something." + +Inspired by this prophecy, grandmother began immediately to show signs +of reviving hope, and a little later, when the sound of wheels was heard +on the road, she was seized with an anticipation so violent that she +fluttered like a withered leaf in the wind. Then the wheels stopped at +the gate, and Blossom and Mr. Mullen entered, bearing a small basket, +which contained disordered remains of the wedding feast. + +"Whar's Abel?" inquired Sarah, bowing stiffly to the young clergyman. + +"We passed them in the road. My horse for once outstripped his mare," +replied Mr. Mullen, who felt a crawling sensation in the back of his +neck whenever Sarah was present, as if he were called upon to face in +her single person an entire parsimonious vestry. "I had the pleasure of +driving your granddaughter home, and now I must be going back to bring +mother. It was a delightful occasion, Mrs. Revercomb, and you are to be +congratulated on the charming addition to your family." He hadn't +meant to use the word "charming"--he had intended to say "estimable" +instead--but Sarah embarrassed him by her expression, and it slipped out +before he was aware of it. Her manner annoyed him excessively. It was as +bad as looking up suddenly in the midst of one of the finest paragraphs +in his sermon and meeting a supercilious look on a face in his +congregation. + +"Humph!" observed Sarah shortly, and when he had gone, she emitted the +sound again, half to herself, half to her audience, "humph!" + +"What's the matter, grandma?" inquired Blossom listlessly, "you don't +look as if you were pleased." + +"Oh, I'm pleased," replied Sarah curtly. "I'm pleased. Did you notice +how yellow Abel was lookin' at the weddin'? What he needs is a good dose +of castor oil. I've seen him like that befo', an' I know." + +"Oh, grandma! how can you? who ever heard of anybody taking castor oil +on their wedding day?" + +"Well, thar's a lot of 'em that would better," rejoined Sarah in her +tart manner. The perfection of Mr. Mullen's behaviour in church combined +with her forgetfulness to make up the feather bed had destroyed her day, +and her irritation expressed itself as usual in a moral revolt from her +surroundings. "To think of makin' all this fuss about that pop-eyed Judy +Hatch," she thought, and a minute later she said aloud, "Thar they are +now; Blossom, you take Judy upstairs to her room an' I'll see after +Abel. It ain't any use contradictin' me. He's in for a bilious spell +just as sure as you are born." She spoke irritably, for her anxiety +about Abel's liver covered a deeper disquietude, and she was battling +with all the obstinacy of the Hawtreys against the acknowledgment that +the ailment she was preparing to dose with drugs was a simple malady +of the soul. In her moral universe, sin and virtue were two separate +entities, as easily distinguished on the surface as any other phenomena. +That a mere feeling, not produced by a disordered liver, could make a +man wear that drawn and desperate look in his face, appeared to her both +unnatural and reprehensible. + +But Abel did not appear, though Sarah awaited his entrance with a +bottle in her hand. As soon as he had turned his mare out to pasture, he +crossed the road to the mill, and stopping beside the motionless wheel, +watched the excited swallows fly back and forth overhead. He knew how a +man felt who was given a life sentence in prison for an act committed in +a moment of madness. Why he had ever asked Judy to marry him--why he +had gone on calmly approaching the day of his wedding--he could no more +explain than he could explain the motives which impelled him to the +absurdities in a nightmare. It was all a part of the terrible and yet +useful perversity of life--of the perversity that enables a human being +to pass from inconsistency to inconsistency without pausing in his +course to reflect on his folly. + +In front of him was the vivid green rise in the meadow, which showed +like a burst of spring in the midst of the November landscape. Beyond +it, the pines were etched in sharp outlines on the bright blue sky, +where a buzzard was sailing slowly in search of food. The weather was so +perfect that the colours of the fields and the sky borrowed the intense +and unreal look of objects seen in a crystal. + +"Well, it's over and done," said Abel to himself; "it's over and done +and I'm glad of it." It seemed to him while he spoke that it was his +life, not his marriage, to which he alluded--that he had taken the +final, the irremediable step, and there was nothing to come afterwards. +The uncertainty and the suspense were at an end, for the clanging of the +prison doors behind him was still in his ears. To-morrow would be +like yesterday, the next year would be like the last. Forgetting his +political ambition, he told himself passionately that there was nothing +ahead of him--nothing to look forward to. Vaguely he realized that +inconsistent and irreconcilable as his actions appeared, they had been, +in fact, held together by a single, connecting thread, that one dominant +feeling had inspired all of his motives. If he had never loved Molly, +he saw clearly now, he should never have rushed into his marriage with +Judy. Pity had driven him first in the direction of love--he remembered +the pang that had racked his heart at the story of the forsaken +Janet--and pity again had urged him to the supreme folly of his +marriage. All his life he had been led astray by a temptation for drink. + +"Poor Judy," he said aloud after a minute, "she deserves to be happy and +I'm going to try with all the strength that is in me to make her so." + +And then there rose before him, as if it moved in answer to his resolve, +a memory of the past so vivid that it seemed to exist not only in his +thoughts, but in the radiant autumn fields at which he was looking. All +the old passionate sweetness, as sharp as pain, appeared to float there +in the Indian summer before him. Rapture or agony? He could not tell, +but he knew that he had lost it forever. + +Turning away, he recrossed the log, and stood for a moment, hesitating, +with his hand on the gate. A decrepit figure, hobbling with bent head +through a golden cloud of dust, signed to him to stop, and while he +waited, he made out the person of old Adam, slightly the worse, he +gathered, for the wedding feast. + +"I tarried thar till the last, hopin' to have still another taste of +toddy," remarked the aged merrymaker. "When a man has turned ninety he +might as well cease to take thought for his morals, an' let the natchel +bent of 'em have a chance." + +It was plain that his last glass had been too much for him, and that, +for the first time in his temperate career, he was rapidly approaching a +condition of alcoholic ecstasy. + +"You'd better go home and take a nap," said Abel kindly. "You can't very +well get lost between here and your house, or I'd go with you." + +"It warn't the weddin' glass that was too much for me," replied the +old man at the point of tears, "'twas the one I had arterwards at the +or'nary. Not wishin' to depart from an old custom on account of a rare +festival, I stopped at Mrs. Bottom's just as young Mr. Jonathan an' +Reuben Merryweather's gal drove up from Applegate. Ah, sech a sight as +she was--all in shot silk that rustled when you looked at it--an' as +pretty as a pictur." + +"So they've come back?" asked Abel, almost in a whisper. + +"Yes, they've come back, an' a sad comin' it was for her, as I could see +in her face. 'What are you wearin' yo' Sunday best for, Mr. Doolittle?' +asked Mr. Jonathan, spry as a cricket. 'It's a fine weddin' I've been +to, Mr. Jonathan,' I answered, 'an' I've seen two lovin' hearts beatin' +as one befo' Mr. Mullen at the altar.' Then Reuben Merryweather's gal +called out right quickly, 'Whose weddin', old Adam?' an' when I replied, +'Abel Revercomb's,' as I was bound to, her face went as white as a han't +right thar befo' me---" + +"You'd better go home or you won't be in any condition to walk there," +said Abel angrily. "It's down right indecent to see a man of your age +rocking about in the road." + +Turning quickly in his tracks, he went over the log again and on to the +loneliness of the meadows beyond. + +"And she went as white as a haunt," he muttered under his breath. + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +A GREAT PASSION IN A HUMBLE PLACE + + +Time does not stand still even for the unhappily married. A man may +have wedded the wrong woman, but he comes down to his breakfast and goes +about his work as punctually as if he had wedded the right one. To Abel, +with the thought of Molly throbbing like a fever in his brain, it was +still possible to grind his grist and to subtract carefully the eighth +part as a toll--while Judy, hushed in day dreams, went on making +butter in a habit of absent-minded tranquillity. Life seldom deals in +cataclysmic situations--at least on the surface. Living side by side +in a married intimacy for months, Abel and Judy were still strangers to +each other. Their bodies touched while their souls were crucified at an +immeasurable distance. + +To Sarah, who embraced Christian theology while she practised +religiously the doctrine of the physical basis of life, there had seemed +no cause for disturbance, until Judy entered the kitchen on a stormy +evening in June, and turned a pair of inflamed eyes on the face of her +mother-in-law. The young woman wore her wedding dress, now nearly seven +months old, and clasped in her hand a neatly bound prayer-book which had +been the gift of the Reverend Orlando. For more than six months she had +suffered silently under Sarah's eyes, which saw only outward and visible +afflictions. Now, at the first sign of quivering flesh, the older woman +was at once on the alert. + +"Whar you goin', Judy?" she inquired. "You ain't thinkin' about +traipsin' out of doors on a night like this, are you?" + +"Archie promised to take me to the Bible class, an' he hasn't come +back," replied Judy, while her face worked convulsively. "I've waited +for him since half past seven." + +"If that don't beat all!" exclaimed Sarah. "Why, it's thunderin' like +Jedgment Day. Can't you hear it?" + +"But I promised Mr. Mullen I wouldn't let anything prevent me," returned +Judy, growing sullen. "Archie said he'd be back here without fail, an' I +know he's stayed to supper over at the Halloweens'." + +"Isn't it foolish to wear your best hat out in the rain?" asked Blossom, +not without surprise, for her sister-in-law had developed into something +of a slattern. + +"I reckon hats are made to be worn," retorted Judy. As a rule her temper +was placid enough, but Archie's defection, after she had given him +her best neck-tie for the purpose of binding him to his promise, had +overstrained the tension of her nerves. "Where's Abner? He used to go +regular." + +"He's gone upstairs so tired that he can barely hist his foot," replied +Sarah. "You'd better let that Bible class alone this evening, Judy. Yo' +salvation ain't dependin' on it, I reckon." + +But in Judy's colourless body there dwelt, unknown to Nature, which has +no sense of the ridiculous, the soul of a Cleopatra. At the moment she +would cheerfully have died of an asp sooner than relinquish the study +of Exodus under the eyes of the rector. In the arid stretch of her +existence a great passion had flamed, and like most great passions, it +was ruthless, destroying, and utterly selfish. She had made butter +all day with the hope of that Bible class in her mind, and she was +determined that, whatever it cost the Revercombs, she should have her +reward this evening in the commendation of the young clergyman. That +mere thunder and lightning should keep her from his side appeared to her +little less than absurd. She knew that he had received a call within +the week, and she would have walked unshod over burning ploughshares in +order to hear him say that he had declined it. + +"I've got to go," she insisted stubbornly. "If there isn't anybody to go +with me, I'll go alone." + +"Why, if you're so bent on it I'll take you myself," said Abel, looking +up from the barrel of his gun, which he was cleaning. His manner to Judy +was invariably kind and even solicitous, to a degree which caused Sarah +to tell herself at times that "it wasn't natural an' wasn't goin' to +last." As long as men would behave themselves quietly, and go about +their business with the unfailing regularity of the orthodox, +she preferred, on the whole, that they should avoid any unusual +demonstration of virtue. An extreme of conduct whether good or bad made +her uneasy. She didn't like, as she put it in her mind, "anything out of +the way." Once when Abel, nettled by some whim of Judy's, had retorted +with a slight show of annoyance, his mother had experienced a positive +sensation of relief, while she said to herself with a kind of triumph +that "the old Adam was thar still." + +"You've got that hackin' cough, Abel an' you oughtn't to go out in this +storm," remarked Sarah, with an uneasiness she could not conceal. + +"Oh, it won't hurt me. I'm a pine knot. Are you ready, Judy?" + +"It's such a little way," said Judy, still sullen under her +mother-in-law's disapproval. When Abel coughed once, while he was +getting into his rubber coat, she glanced at him angrily. Why couldn't +he have waited at least until he got out of doors? Instead of gratitude +she bore him a dull resentment for having married her, and when she +looked back on her hard life in her father's house, she beheld it +through that rosy veil of idealism in which the imaginative temperament +envelops the past or the future at the cost of the present. Then she had +had time, at least, to dream and to dawdle! During the seven months of +her marriage, she had learned that for the brooding soul there is no +anodyne so soothing as neglect, no comfort so grateful as freedom to be +unhappy. + +When the door closed behind them Sarah looked at Blossom with an +eloquent expression. "Well, I never!" she exclaimed, and wrung the +dough from her hands into the tray over which she was standing. "Well I +never!" + +"I don't believe it's right for Abel to give in to Judy as he does," +said Blossom. + +"I never saw a Revercomb that warn't a fool about something," answered +Sarah. "It don't matter so much what 'tis about, but it's obliged to be +about something." + +Blossom sighed and bent lower over the seam she was running. She had +long since ceased to draw any consolation from her secret marriage, and +her wedding ring (bought weeks after the ceremony by Gay) caused her +pain rather than pleasure when it pressed into her bosom, where it hung +suspended by a blue ribbon from her neck. Her strong Saxon instinct for +chastity--for the integrity of feminine virtue--sometimes awoke in her, +and then she would think exultingly, "At least I am married!" But even +this amazing triumph of morality--of the spirit of Sarah Revercomb over +the spirit of the elder Jonathan Gay--showed pallid and bloodless +beside the evanescent passion to which she had been sacrificed. Destiny, +working through her temperament, had marked her for victory, but it had +been only one of those brief victories which herald defeats. The +forces of law and order--the sound racial instincts which make for the +preservation of society--these had won in the event, though they had +been, after all, powerless to change the ultimate issue. The spirit of +old Jonathan, as well as the spirit of Sarah, was immortal. The racial +battle between the soldier of fortune and the militant Calvinist was not +yet fought to a finish. + +"I believe Abel would give Judy the clothes on his back if he thought +she wanted them," said Blossom, in the effort to turn her musings away +from her own troubles. + +"It ain't natural," rejoined Sarah stubbornly. "It's a man's natur to be +mean about money matters whar his wife is concerned, an' when he begins +to be different it's a sign that thar's a screw loose somewhar inside of +him. My Abner was sech a spendthrift that he'd throw away a day's market +prices down at the or'nary, but he used to expect the money from a +parcel of turkeys to keep me in clothes and medicines and doctor's +bills, to say nothin' of household linen an' groceries for the whole +year round." + +Blossom sighed softly, "I don't suppose there ever was a man who could +see that a woman needed anything except presents now and then," she +said, "unless it's Abel. Do you know, grandma, I sometimes think he's so +kind to Judy because he knows he doesn't love her." + +"Well, I reckon, if thar's got to be a choice between love and kindness, +I'd hold on to kindness," retorted Sarah. + +It was ten o'clock before Abel and Judy returned, and from the hurried +and agitated manner of their entrance, it was plain that the Bible class +had not altogether appeased Judy's temper. + +"She's worn out, that's the matter," explained Abel, while they stopped +to dry themselves in the kitchen. + +"You go straight upstairs to bed, Judy," said Sarah, "an' I'll send you +up a cup of gruel by Abel. You oughtn't to have gone streakin' out in +this rain, an' it's natural that it should have upset you." + +"It wasn't the rain," replied Judy, and the instant afterwards, she +burst into tears and ran out of the room before they could stop her. + +"I declar', I never saw anybody carry on so in my life," observed Sarah. + +Abel glanced at her with a perplexed and anxious frown on his brow. "You +ought to be patient with her condition," he said. His own patience +was inexhaustible, and its root, as Blossom had suspected, lay in his +remorseful indifference. With Molly he had not been patient, but he had +loved her. + +"Don't talk to me about patience," rejoined Sarah, "haven't I had nine +an' lost six?" + +She was entirely without the sentiment which her son felt regarding the +physical function of motherhood, for like the majority of sentiments, it +had worn thin when it had been stretched over a continual repetition of +facts. To Abel the mystery was still shrouded in a veil of sympathy, +and was hardly to be thought of without tenderness. But his solicitude +merely nettled Sarah. Nobody had ever "carried on" over her when she had +had her nine. + +"Have you said anything sharp to her to-day, mother?" he inquired +suspiciously, after a minute. + +"You know I ain't, Abel. She left a dirty glass in the dairy an' I never +so much as mentioned it. Did Mr. Mullen complain of her leavin' off +mission work?" + +"Why, of course not. He talked to us only a few minutes and he seemed +absent-minded. He's had a good call somewhere in the North, and he told +us that he had prayed over it unceasingly and he believed that the Lord +was directing him to larger fields." + +"Did Judy hear that?" + +"Yes, he told us both." + +Sarah was stirring the gruel, and she appeared so absorbed in her task +that the remark she let fall a minute later bore presumably no relation +to the conversation. + +"I sometimes think men ain't got any mo' sense than an unborn babe!" she +observed. + +Taking the cup from her hands, Abel went up the little staircase to the +bedroom, where Judy stood before the bureau, with a long black-headed +hat pin in her hand. She had evidently not begun to undress, for her hat +was still on her head, and under the heavy shadow of the brim her eyes +looked back at her husband with an accusing and hostile expression. + +"Drink this, Judy, while it is hot," he said kindly, placing the cup on +the bureau. + +"I don't want it," she answered, and her voice sounded as if she were +ready to burst again into tears. + +"Are you sick?" + +"No." + +"I'm going to sleep in the attic. Call me if you want anything." + +Without replying she took off her hat and placed it on the top shelf +in the wardrobe. Had he beaten her she felt that she could almost have +loved him, but the primitive sex instinct in her was outraged by his +gentleness. + +"Has anybody hurt your feelings?" asked Abel, turning suddenly on his +way to the door. + +"No." + +"Then, for God's sake, what is it?" he demanded, at his wit's end. "You +look as if you'd lost the last friend you had on earth." + +At this she broke into hard dry sobs which rattled in her throat before +they escaped. A spasm of self-pity worked convulsively in her bosom, +and, turning away, she buried her face in her arms, while the long, +agonized tremors shook her slender figure. Looking at her, he remembered +bitterly that he had married Judy in order to make her happy. By the +sacrifice of his own inclinations he had achieved this disastrous +result. If he had tried to do evil instead of good, he could hardly have +wrought more irreparable mischief--and with the thought, pity, which had +led him astray, winged off, like an ironic sprite, and left his heart +empty of comfort. + +"God knows I am sorry for you, Judy," he said in the effort to reinforce +his compassion. + +But Judy, though she was avid of sympathy, did not crave an expression +of it from her husband--for her temperament was of the morbid kind +that is happiest when it is most miserable. Her heart had fed upon the +sustenance of her brain until the abnormal enlargement of that single +organ had prepared her for inevitable suffering at the hands of men--if +not from actual unkindness, yet from an amiable neglect which could +cut even more deeply. She turned in the direction of sentiment as +instinctively as a plant turns toward light, and the Reverend Orlando +Mullen had had predecessors in her affections who had been hardly so +much as aware of her existence. + +As Abel went out of the door, her accusing eyes followed him while she +thought, with sentimental regret, of the many things she had given up +when she married--of Mrs. Mullen's ironing day, of the rector's darning, +of the red flannel petticoats she had no longer time to make for the +Hottentots. It was over one of these flannel petticoats that Mr. Mullen +had first turned to her with his earnest and sympathetic look, as though +he were probing her soul. At the moment she had felt that his casual +words held a hidden meaning, and to this day, though she had pondered +them in sleepless nights ever since, she was still undecided. + +"I don't believe he knew how much I cared," she said, as she started +mechanically to take out her hairpins. + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +A MEETING IN THE PASTURE + + +As Judy did not appear next morning, her breakfast was carried up to +her by Sarah, who allowed her own cakes to become leathery while she +arranged the tray. Her feet were still on the staircase, when Blossom +turned to Abel and said in a furtive and anxious voice: + +"Mrs. Bottom told me yesterday the Gays were coming back to Jordan's +Journey. Have you heard anything about it?" + +"No, I haven't heard," he answered indifferently, though his pulses +throbbed at the words. Rising from the table an instant later, he went +out into the yard, where the sunshine filtered softly through June +foliage. By the porch a damask rose-bush was in bloom, and the fragrance +followed him along the path between the borders of portulaca. At the +gate he found a young robin too weak to fly, and lifting it carefully, +he returned it to the nest in a pear-tree. Like all young and helpless +things, it aroused in him a tenderness which, in some strange way, was +akin to pain. + +On the crooked sycamore the young leaves fluttered with shirred edges, +and beyond the mill and the fallow field, the slender green ribbons of +the corn were unfolding. As he gazed at the pines on the horizon, he +remembered the day he had swung his axe in joy under their branches, and +it seemed to him, while he looked back upon it, that the hour belonged +to the distant memories of his boyhood. + +"It's over now, and I'm not going to whine about it," he said aloud to +his hound. "A plain fool is bad enough, Moses, my boy, but a whining +fool is the meanest thing God ever made in man or dog. Because I've lost +the thing I wanted most, I've no mind to wallow in the dust--but, oh, +Molly, Molly!" + +She came to him again, not fair and flitting, but ardent and tender, +with her parted red mouth raised to his, and the light and darkness +trembling on her face like faint shadows in the wind. And this vision +of her, which was so vivid that it shook his heart with a pang of agony, +seemed saying to him in words which were not his--which were not words +at all, but some subtler communion of sense--"I am to be loved, but +never possessed, for, like the essence of desire, I elude forever the +conditions of mortality." + +A week later, while the thought of her burned like fire in his brain, he +met her face to face in the path which led from the blazed pine over the +pasture to Jordan's Journey. Had he seen her in time, he would have fled +from the meeting, but she appeared without warning as he turned from the +turnpike to the bars. Almost before he was aware of it, he was within +touch of her and looking into her eyes. She wore her black dress still, +and the air of elegance, of strangeness, was even more obvious than when +he had met her at Applegate the day before his marriage. Her face had +lost a little of its bloom, and there was a look in it which he had +never seen there before--a look which was wistful and yet expectant, as +though, like old Reuben, she was hoping against knowledge and in despite +of disappointment. + +"Molly!" he cried, and stopped short, longing to touch her hand and +yet with something, which was like conscience in the shape of Judy, +restraining him. + +"Abel, how little you've changed!" she said. + +"Haven't I? Well, you're yourself, too, and yet you're different." + +"Different? I suppose you mean I'm wearing better clothes?" + +He smiled for the first time. "I wasn't thinking about your clothes. +They never seemed to matter." + +What he had meant, though he dared not utter the thought aloud, was that +she had grown softer and gentler, and was less the Molly of the flashing +charm and the defiant challenge. + +"Yes, I've changed in a way, of course," she admitted presently, "I feel +grown up now, and I never felt so before. Life was all play to me until +grandfather died." + +"And it isn't now?" + +"Not entirely--I'm still growing." + +Her hand rested on the bars beside which she was standing, and the +fragrant festoons of wild grape blooming beside the post, brushed softly +against her bosom. There was a quietness, a suggestion of restraint in +her attitude which he had never seen in the old Molly. + +"The day you went away you told me you wanted to live," he said. + +"I remember. I couldn't have done differently. I had to find out things +for myself. Of course, life is all just the same everywhere, but then +I didn't know it. I used to think that one had only to travel a certain +distance and one would pass the boundary of the commonplace and come +into the country of adventure. It was silly, of course, but you see +I didn't know any better. It was the fret of youth, I suppose, though +people never seem to think that women ever feel it--or, perhaps, as Mrs. +Bottom used to say, it was only the Gay blood working off." + +"I don't like to hear you talk of the Gay blood in you," he said +quickly. + +His voice betrayed him, and looking up, she asked quietly, "How is Judy, +Abel?" + +"She's not well. It seems she suffers with her nerves." + +"I'm coming to see her. Judy and I were always friends, you know." + +"Yes, I know. You were a friend to every woman." + +"And I am still. I've grown to love Aunt Kesiah, and I believe I'm the +only person who sees just how fine she is." + +"Your grandfather saw, I think. Do you remember he used to say life was +always ready to teach us things, but that some of us were so mortal slow +we never learned till we died?" + +Her eyes were starry as she looked away from him over the meadow. "Abel, +I miss him so," she said after a minute. + +"I know, Molly, I know." + +"Nothing makes up for him. All the rest seems so distant and unhuman. +Nothing is so real to me as the memory of him sitting in his chair on +the porch with Spot at his feet." + +For a minute he did not reply, and when he spoke at last, it was only to +say: + +"I wonder if a single human being could ever understand you, Molly?" + +"I don't understand myself. I don't even try." + +"You've had everything you could want for a year--been everywhere--seen +everything--yet, I believe, you'd give it all up to be back in the +cottage over there with Reuben and his hound?" + +"Why shouldn't I?" she answered passionately, "that was what I loved." + +"I suppose you're right," he said a little sadly, "that was always what +you loved." + +She turned her head away, but he saw the delicate flush pass from her +cheek to her throat. + +"I mean I am faithful to the things that really matter," she answered. + +"And the things that do not really matter are men?" he asked with a +humour in which there was a touch of grimness. + +"Perhaps you're right about some of them, at least," she answered, +smiling at a memory. "I was full of animal spirits--of the joy of +energy, and there was no other outlet. A girl sows her mental wild oats, +if she has any mind, just as a boy does. But what people never seem +to realize is that women go on and change just as men do. They seem to +think that a girl stands perfectly still, that what she is at twenty, +she remains to the end of her life. Of course that's absurd. After the +first shock of real experience that old make-believe side of things +lost all attraction for me. I could no more go back to flirting with Mr. +Mullen or with Jim Halloween than I could sit down in the road and make +mud pies for an amusement. How is Mr. Mullen, by the way?" she inquired +in a less serious tone. + +"Just the same. He's had a call." + +"And old Adam? Is he still living?" + +"He can't walk any longer, but his mind is perfectly clear. Sometimes +his son puts his chair into an oxcart and brings him over to the +ordinary. He's still the best talker about here, and he frets if he is +left by himself." + +For a moment they were silent again. Old Adam, having fulfilled his +purpose, was dismissed into space. Molly watched Abel's eyes turn to the +pines on the horizon, and in the midst of the June meadow, there was a +look in them that reminded her of the autumnal sadness of nature. She +had seen this look in Reuben's face when he gazed wistfully at the +blossoming apple boughs in the spring, and the thought came to her +that just this attitude of soul--this steadfast courage in the face of +circumstance--was the thing that life was meant to teach them both +at the end. If Abel's energy was now less effervescent, she realized +instinctively that it had become more assured. Life or marriage--or, +perhaps, both together had "tamed" him, as Reuben had prophesied, and +the rough edges of his character had worn smooth in the process. + +A butterfly, marked gorgeously in blue and orange, alighted on the bar +by her hand, and when it fluttered off again, drunken with summer, her +gaze followed it into the meadow, where the music of innumerable bees +filled the sunshine. + +"And you, Abel?" she asked, turning presently, "what of yourself?" + +He smiled at her before answering; and with the smile, she felt again +the old physical joy in his presence--in his splendid animal vitality, +in the red-brown colour of his flesh, in the glow of his dark eyes, +which smiled down into hers. No other man had ever made this appeal to +her senses. She had struggled sometimes like a bird in a net against the +memory of it, yet it had held her, in spite of her will, even when she +was farthest away from him. The gentleness from which Judy revolted, +brought Molly's heart back to him with a longing to comfort. + +"Well, I'm learning," he answered, still smiling. + +"And you are happy?" + +He made a gesture of assent, while he looked over her head at the +butterfly--which had found its mate and was soaring heavenward in a +flight of ecstasy. The same loyalty which had prevented his touching her +hand when they met, rebelled now against an implied reflection on Judy. + +"I am glad," she said, "you deserve it." + +She had given her eyes to him almost unconsciously, and their look was +like a cord which drew them slowly to each other. His pulses hammered +in his ears, yet he heard around him still the mellow murmuring of bees, +and saw the butterflies whirling deliriously together. All the forces +which had held him under restraint stretched suddenly, while he met her +eyes, like bands that were breaking. Before the solitary primal fact +of his love for her, the fog of tradition with which civilization +has enveloped the simple relation of man and woman, evaporated in the +sunlight. The harsh outlines of the future were veiled, and he saw only +the present, crowned, radiant, and sweet to the senses as the garlands +of wild grape around which the golden bees hung in a cloud. For an +instant only the vision held him; then the rush of desire faded +slowly, and some unconquerable instinct, of which he had been almost +unconscious, asserted its supremacy in his brain. The ghosts of dead +ancestors who had adhered to law at the cost of happiness; the iron +skeleton of an outgrown and yet indelibly implanted creed; the tenacity +of the racial structure against which his individual impulses had +rebelled--these things, or one of these things, proved in the end +stronger than the appeal of his passion. He longed with all his strength +to hold her in his arms--every nerve in his body ached for her--yet he +knew that because of this unconquerable instinct he was powerless to +follow his longing. + +"I don't think I deserve much, Molly," he said quietly. + +She hesitated still, looking away from him in the direction of her path, +which led over the meadow. + +"Abel, be good to Judy," she said, without turning. + +"I will, Molly, I promise you." + +He moved a step toward the turnpike, stopped, and looked back. + +"I can't do much for you, Molly," he said, "but if you ever need anybody +to die for you, remember I'm ready." + +"I'll remember," she answered, with a smile, but her eyes were misty +when she passed the blazed pine and turned into the little path. + + + +CHAPTER X + + +TANGLED THREADS + + +In front of Molly, the path, deep in silvery orchard grass, wound +through the pasture to the witch-hazel thicket at Jordan's Journey; and +when she entered the shelter of the trees, Gay came, whistling, toward +her from the direction of the Poplar Spring. He walked rapidly, and +his face wore an anxious and harassed expression, for he was making the +unpleasant discovery that even stolen sweets may become cloying to a +surfeited palate. His passion had run its inevitable course of desire, +fulfilment, and exhaustion. So closely had it followed the changing +seasons, that it seemed, in a larger and more impersonal aspect, as much +a product of the soil as did the flame-coloured lilies that bloomed +in the Haunt's Walk. The summer had returned, and a hardier growth had +sprung up from the ground enriched by the decay of the autumn. He was +conscious of a distinct relief because the torment of his earlier love +for Blossom was over. There was no regret in his mind for the poignant +sweetness of the days before he had married her--for the restlessness, +the expectancy, the hushed waitings, the enervating suspense--nor even +for those brief hours of fulfilment, when that same haunting suspense +had seemed to add the sharpest edge to his enjoyment. He did not suffer +to-day if she were a few minutes late at the meeting; and he disliked +suffering so much that the sense of approaching bliss had never +compensated for the pang of it. Her failures now merely made his +manufactured excuses the easier. Once, when she had not been able to +come, he had experienced a revulsion of feeling; like the sudden lifting +of a long strain of anxiety. She still pressed for an acknowledgment +of their marriage, while his refusal was still based on a very real +solicitude for his mother. Only in the last six months had his feeling +for Molly entered into the situation; but like all swift and unguarded +emotions, it absorbed the colour in his thoughts, while it left both the +past and the future in the cover of darkness. + +"I wish you wouldn't wander off alone like this, Molly," he began as he +joined her. + +"Oh, it's perfectly safe, Jonathan--everybody knows me for miles +around." + +"But it would make mother nervous if she were to hear of it. She has +never allowed Aunt Kesiah to go off the lawn by herself." + +"Poor Aunt Kesiah," said Molly softly. + +He glanced at her sharply. "Why do you say that?" he asked, "she has +always seemed to me to have everything she wanted. If she hadn't had +mother to occupy her time, what under heaven would have become of her?" + +"I wonder?" she returned; "but has it ever occurred to you that Aunt +Kesiah and I are not exactly alike, Jonathan?" + +"Well, rather. What are you driving at?" + +Her answering smile, instead of softening the effect of her words, +appeared to call attention to the width of the gulf that separated +Kesiah's generation from her own. The edge of sweetness to her look +tempered but did not blunt the keeness with which it pierced. This +quality of independent decision had always attracted him, and as he +watched her walking under the hanging garland of the wild grape, he +told himself in desperation that she was the only woman he had ever seen +whose infinite variety he could not exhaust. The mere recollection of +the others wearied him. Almost imperceptibly he was beginning to feel +a distaste for the side of life which had once offered so rich an +allurement to his senses. The idea that this might be love, after all, +had occurred to him more than once during the past six months, and he +met the suggestion with the invariable cynical retort that "he hadn't it +in him." Yet only ten minutes before, he had watched Molly coming to him +over the jewelled landscape, and the heavens had opened. Once more the +unattainable had appeared to him wrapped in the myriad-coloured veil of +his young illusions. + +"Molly," he said almost in spite of himself, "what would have happened +to us if we had met five or six years ago?" + +"Nothing, probably." + +"Well, I'm not so sure--not if you like me half as well as I like you. +You understand, don't you, that I got myself tied up--entangled before +I knew you--but, by Jove, if I were free I'd make you think twice about +me." + +"There's no use talking about what might have been, is there?" + +The hint of his "entanglement," she had accepted quite simply as a +veiled allusion to an incident in his life abroad. Her interest in it +would have been keener had she been less indifferent to him as a lover, +but while she walked by his side, smiling in response to his words, she +was thinking breathlessly, like one hushed in suspense, "If Abel had +only been like that a year ago, I should not have left him." That the +qualities she had always missed in the miller had developed only through +the loss of her, she refused to admit. A swift, an almost miraculous +change had passed over her, and all the warm blood in her body seemed +to rush back to her heart, giving it the abundance of life. The world +appeared to her in a clearer and fresher light, as though a perpetual +dawn were hanging above it; and this light shone into the secret +chambers of her mind as well as over the meadows and into the shadowy +places of the Haunt's Walk. "Yes, if he had been like that I should +never have left him and all this would not have happened," she thought +again; "and if I had been like this would he ever have quarrelled with +me?" she asked herself the instant afterwards. + +And Gay, walking at her side, but separated by a mental universe, was +thinking resentfully, "The deuce of it is that it might just as well +never have happened! If I'd only been a little less of a fool--If I'd +only not walked my horse across the pasture that October afternoon--If +I'd only had sense enough to see what was coming--If I'd only--oh, hang +it!" + +"I'd be a better man to-day if I'd known you sooner, Molly," he said +presently. "A man couldn't tire of you because you're never the same +thing two days in succession." + +"Doesn't a man tire of change?" + +"I don't--it's the most blessed thing in life. I wonder why you've given +up flirting?" + +"Perhaps because there isn't anybody to flirt with." + +"I like that. Am I not continually at your service?" + +"But I don't like your kind of flirting, somehow." + +"What you want, I suppose, is a perpetual supply of Mullens. Have you +seen him, by the way?" + +"He called on Aunt Angela this morning and read a chapter from the +Bible. I heard it all the way downstairs on the porch." + +"And the miller?" + +She was walking beside a clump of lilies, and the colour of the flowers +flamed in her face. + +"I saw him for a few minutes this morning." + +"How has his marriage turned out?" + +"I haven't heard. Like all the others, I suppose." + +"Well he's as fine a looking animal as one often encounters. His wife is +that thin, drawn out, anaemic girl I saw at Piping Tree, isn't she? Such +men always seem to marry such women." + +"I never thought Judy unattractive. She's really interesting if you take +the trouble to dig deep enough." + +"I suppose Revercomb dug, but it isn't as a rule a man's habit to go +around with a spade when he's in want of a wife." + +With an impetuous movement, he bent closer to her: + +"Look here, Molly, don't you think you might kiss me?" + +"I told you the first time I ever saw you that I didn't care for +kissing." + +"Well, even if you don't care, can't you occasionally be generous? +You've got a colour in your cheeks like red flowers." + +"Oh, have I?" + +"The trouble is, I've gone and fallen in love with you and it's turning +my head." + +"I don't think it will hurt you, Jonathan." + +She broke away from him before he could detain her, and while a protest +was still on his lips, ran up the walk and under the grape arbour into +the back door of the house. + +Left to himself, Gay wheeled about and passed into the side-garden, +where he found Kesiah snipping off withered roses with a pair of pruning +shears. + +At his approach, she paused in her task and stood waiting for him, with +the expression of interested, if automatic, attention, which appeared on +her face, as in answer to some secret spring, whenever she was invited +to perform the delicate part of a listener. She had attained at last +that battered yet smiling acquiescence in the will of Providence which +has been eloquently praised, under different names, by both theologians +and philosophers. From a long and uncomplaining submission to boredom, +she had arrived at a point of blessedness where she was unable to be +bored at all. Out of the furnace of a too ardent youth, her soul had +escaped into the agreeable, if foggy, atmosphere of middle age. Peace +had been provided for her--if not by generously presenting her with the +things that she desired, still quite as effectually by crippling the +energy of her desires, until they were content to sun themselves quietly +in a row, like aged, enfeebled paupers along the south wall of the +poorhouse. + +"Aunt Kesiah," said Gay, stopping beside her, "do you think any of us +understand Molly's character? Is she happy with us or not?" + +It is a pleasant thing to be at the time of life, and in the possession +of the outward advantages, which compel other persons to stop in the +midst of their own interesting affairs and begin to inquire if they +understand one's character. As Kesiah lifted a caterpillar on a leaf, +and carefully laid it in the centre of the grassy walk, she thought +quite cheerfully that nobody had ever wondered about her character, and +that it must be rather nice to have some one do so. + +"I don't know, Jonathan; you will tread on that caterpillar if you +aren't careful." + +"Hang the caterpillar! I sometimes suspect that she isn't quite so happy +as she ought to be." + +"She didn't get over Reuben's death easily, if that is what you mean." + +"I don't know whether it is what I mean or not." + +"Perhaps her development has surprised you, in a way. The first touch +of sorrow changed her from a child into a woman. No one ever realized, I +suppose, the strength that was in her all the time." + +Turning away from her, he stared moodily at Uncle Boaz, who was trimming +the lawn beyond the miniature box hedges of the garden. Furrows of mown +grass lay like golden green wind-drifts behind the swinging passage of +the scythe, and the face of the old negro showed scarred and wistful +under the dappled sunshine. June beetles, coloured like emeralds, spun +loudly through the stillness, which had in it an almost human quality of +hushed and expectant waiting. All Nature seemed to be breathing softly, +lest she should awake from her illusion and find the world dissolved +into space. + +"I wonder if it is really the miller?" said Gay suddenly. "The truth is +her life seems empty of something." + +"I beg your pardon?" returned Kesiah, startled, for she had been +thinking not of Molly's life, but of her own. It was not much of a life, +to be sure, but it was all she had, so she felt it was only natural that +she should think about it. + +"I said I wondered if it were the miller," repeated Gay a little +impatiently. Like his mother he found Kesiah's attacks of inattention +very trying--and if she were to get deaf the only position she had ever +filled with credit would be necessarily closed to her. What on earth did +she have to occupy her anyway if not other people's affairs? + +"I can hardly believe that," she answered. "Of course he's a very +admirable young man, but it's out of the question that Molly should +worry her mind about him after he has gone and married another woman." + +Her logic seemed rather feeble to Gay, but as he had told himself often +before, Kesiah never could argue. + +"I hear the fellow's come out quite surprisingly. Mr. Chamberlayne tells +me he is speaking now around the neighbourhood, and he has a pretty +command of rough and ready oratory." + +"I suppose that is why Molly is so anxious to hear him. She has ordered +her horse to ride over to a meeting at Piping Tree this afternoon." + +"What?" He stared in amazement. + +"Young Revercomb is going to speak at an open air meeting of some +kind--political, I imagine--and Molly is going to hear him." + +His answer was a low whistle. "At what time?" he asked presently. + +"She ordered her horse at three--the very hottest part of the day." + +"Well, she'll probably have sunstroke," Gay replied, "but at any rate, +I'll not let her have it alone." + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +THE RIDE TO PIPING TREE + + +A look of surprise came into Molly's face when she found Gay waiting for +her, but it passed quickly, and she allowed him to mount her without +a word of protest or inquiry. She had been a good rider ever since +the days when she galloped bareback on Reuben's plough horses to the +pasture, and Gay's eyes warmed to her as she rode ahead of him down the +circular drive, checkered with sunlight. Yet in spite of her prettiness, +which he had never dignified by the name of beauty, he knew that it was +no superficial accident of colour or of feature that had first caught +his fancy and finally ripened his casual interest into love. The charm +was deeper still, and resulted from something far subtler than the +attraction of her girlish freshness--from something vivid yet soft in +her look, which seemed to burn always with a tempered warmth. For need +of a better word he called this something her "soul," though he knew +that he meant, in reality, certain latent possibilities of passion which +appeared at moments to pervade not only her sensitive features, but her +whole body with a flamelike glow and mobility. While he watched her he +remembered his meeting with Blossom, and the marriage to which in some +perfectly inexplicable manner it had led him, but it was not in his +power, even if he had willed it, to conjure up the violence of past +emotions as he could summon back the outlines of the landscape which had +served as their objective background. + +"Molly," he said, riding closer to her as they passed into the turnpike, +"I wish I knew why we are going on this wild goose chase after the +miller?" + +"I'm not going after him--it's only that I want to hear him speak. I +don't see why that should surprise you." + +"I didn't know that you were interested in politics?" + +"I'm not--in politics." + +"In the miller then?" + +"Why shouldn't I be interested in him? I've known him all my life." + +"The fact remains that you're in a different position now and can't +afford a free rein to your sportive fancies." + +"He'd be the last to admit what you say about position--if you mean +class. He doesn't believe in any such thing, nor do I." + +"Money, my dear, is the only solid barrier--but he's got a wife, +anyway." + +"Judy and I are friends. That's another reason for my wanting to hear +him." + +"But to ride six miles at three o'clock on a scorching day to listen to +a stump speech by a rustic agitator, seems to me a bit ridiculous." + +"There was no reason for your coming, Jonathan. I didn't ask you." + +"I accept the reproof, and I am silent--but I can't resist returning it +by telling you that you need a man's strong hand as much as any woman I +ever saw." + +"I don't need yours anyway." + +"By Jove, that's just whose, my pretty. You needn't think that because I +haven't made you love me, I couldn't." + +"I doubt it very much--but you may think so if you choose." + +"Suppose I were to dress in corduroy and run a grist mill." + +Her laugh came readily. + +"You're too fat!" + +"Another thrust like that, and I'll gallop off and leave you." + +His face was bent toward hers, and it was only the quick change in her +expression, and the restive start of her horse, that made him swerve +suddenly aside and glance at the blazed pine they were passing. Leaning +against the tree, with her arms resting on the bars, and her body +as still as if it were chiselled out of stone, Blossom Revercomb was +watching them over a row of tall tiger lilies. Her features were drawn +and pallid, as if from sharp physical pain, and a blight had spread over +her beauty, like the decay of a flower that feeds a canker at its heart. + +With an exclamation of alarm, Molly turned her horse's head in the +direction of the pine, but with a hasty yet courteous gesture, Gay rode +quickly ahead of her, and leaning from his saddle spoke a few words in +an undertone. The next instant Blossom had fled and the two were riding +on again down the turnpike. + +"She looked so unhappy, Jonathan. I wonder what was the matter?" + +"She was tired, probably." He despised himself for the evasion, for +his character was naturally an open one, and he heartily disliked +all subterfuge. Yet he implied the falsehood even while he hated the +necessity which forced him to it. So all his life he had done the things +that he condemned, condemning himself because he did them. For more +than a year now he had lived above a continuous undercurrent of +subterfuge--he had lied to Blossom, he had deceived his mother, he had +wilfully encouraged Molly to believe a falsehood--and yet all the time, +he was conscious that his nature preferred the honourable and the candid +course. His intentions were still honest, but long ago in his boyhood, +when he had first committed himself to impulse, he had prepared the way +for his subsequent failures. To-day, with a weakened will, with an ever +increasing sensitiveness of his nervous system, he knew that he should +go on desiring the good while he compromised with the pleasanter aspect +of evil. + +"She wouldn't speak to me," said Molly, "I can't understand it. What did +you say to her?" + +"I asked her if she were ill and if we could do anything for her." + +"I can't get over her look. I wish I had jumped down and run after her, +but she went off so quickly." + +So intense was the sunshine that it appeared to burn into the white +streak of the road, where the dust floated like some smoke on the +breathless air. From the scorched hedges of sumach and bramble, a chorus +of grasshoppers was cheerfully giving praise to a universe that ignored +it. + +As Molly rode silently at Gay's side, it seemed to her that Blossom's +startled face looked back at her from the long, hot road, from the waste +of broomsedge, from the cloudless sky, so bright that it hurt her eyes. +It was always there wherever she turned: she could not escape it. A +sense of suffocation in the midst of space choked back the words she +would have spoken, and she felt that the burning dust, which hung low +over the road, had drifted into her brain and obscured her thoughts as +it obscured the objects around her. When, after passing the ordinary, +they turned into the Applegate road, the heavy shade brought a sensation +of relief, and the face which had seemed to start out of the blanched +fields, faded slowly away from her. + +As she entered the little village of Piping Tree, her desire to hear +Abel's speech left her as suddenly as it had come, and she began to wish +that she had not permitted herself to follow her impulse, or that at the +last moment she had forbidden Gay to accompany her. In place of the cool +determination of an hour ago, a confusing hesitancy, a baffling shyness, +had taken possession of her, weakening her resolution. She felt all at +once that in coming to Piping Tree she had yielded herself to an emotion +against which she ought to have struggled to the end. Simple as the +incident of the ride had appeared to her in the morning, she saw now +that it was, in reality, one of those crucial decisions, in which the +will, like a spirited horse, had broken control and swerved suddenly +into a diverging road in spite of the pull of the bit. + +"I don't believe I'll stay, after all, Jonathan," she said weakly. "It's +so hot and I don't really want to hear him." + +"But we're here now, Molly, and he's already begun." Against the +feminine instinct to fight the battle and then yield the victory, he +opposed the male determination to exact the reward in return for the +trouble. "It's over there in the picnic grounds by the court-house," he +pursued. "Come on. We needn't dismount if you don't feel like it--but +I've a curiosity to know what he's talking about." + +Her fuss, of course, he told himself, had been foolish, but after she +had made the fuss, he had no intention of returning without hearing +the miller. Abel's ambition as an orator bored him a little, for in his +class the generations ahead of him had depleted the racial supply of +political material. The nuisance of politics had been spared him, he +would have said, because the control of the State was passing from the +higher to the lower classes. To his habit of intellectual cynicism, the +miller's raw enthusiasm for what Gay called the practically untenable +and ideally heroic doctrine of equality, offered a spectacle for honest +and tolerant amusement. + +"Oh, come on," he urged again after a moment, "we'll stop by the fence +under that cherry-tree and nobody will see us." + +As he spoke he turned his horse toward the paling fence, while Molly +hesitated, hung back, regretted bitterly that she had come, and then +slowly followed. In the cherry-tree, which was laden with red cherries a +little over ripe, birds were quarrelling, and for a minute she could not +separate the sound of Abel's voice from the confusion around her. Then +his figure, standing under a stunted cedar on a small raised platform, +which was used for school celebrations or out-of-door concerts, appeared +to gather to itself all that was magnetic and alive in the atmosphere. +Of the whole crowd, including Gay, the speaker in his blue shirt, with +his head thrown back enkindled from the fire of his enthusiasm, seemed +the one masculine and dominating intelligence. To Molly he represented +neither orator nor reformer, but a compelling force which she felt +rather than heard. What he said she was hardly aware of--for it was +emotion not thought that he aroused in her. + +"That's good!" said Jonathan quietly at her side, and glancing at him +she realized that Gay was regarding merely a picturesque embodiment +of the economic upheaval of society. Judging the scene from Gay's +standpoint, she saw that it was, after all, only the ordinary political +gathering of a thinly settled community. The words, she knew now, were +familiar. It was the personality of the speaker which charged them with +freshness, with inspiration. What was it but the old plea for social +regeneration through political purity--an appeal to put the dream of the +idealist into the actual working of the State, since it is only through +the brain of the dreamer that a fact may be born into the world. + +"He can speak all right," observed Gay carelessly, "there's no doubt +about that." + +"I'd like to go, if you don't mind," answered Molly, and turning she +rode softly away from the picnic grounds through the scattered hamlet, +too small to be called a village. An old man, killing slugs in a potato +field, stared after them with his long stemmed corn-cob pipe hanging +loosely between his lips. Then when they had disappeared, he shook his +head twice very solemnly, spat on the ground, and went on patiently +murdering slugs. + +"'Tis that fly-up-the-creek miller as they've come arter," he muttered. +"Things warn't so in my day, so they oughtn't to be so now. I ain't got +no use for anything that ain't never been befo'." + +And in different language, the same thought was stirring in Gay's mind. +"It's all stuff and nonsense, these hifaluting radical theories. There's +never been a fairer distribution of property and there's never going to +be." + +They rode in silence under the flowering locust-trees in the single +street, and then, crossing the grassy common, cantered between two +ripening fields of oats, and turned into the leafy freshness of the +Applegate road. The sun was high, but the long, still shadows had begun +to slant from the west, and the silence was brooding in a mellow light +over the distance. + +"I don't know what we're coming to," said Gay at last, when they had +ridden a mile or two without speaking. What he really meant, though +he did not say it, was, "I don't know why in the devil's name you keep +thinking about that fellow?" + +Though his own emotions were superior to reason, he was vaguely +irritated because Molly had allowed hers, even in a small matter, to +assert such a supremacy. He was accustomed to speak carelessly of +woman as "an emotional being," yet this did not prevent his feeling an +indignant surprise when woman, as occasionally happened, illustrated the +truth of his inherited generalization. A lover of the unconventional for +himself, he was almost as strong a hater of it for the women who were +related to him. It would have annoyed him excessively to see Kesiah make +herself conspicuous in any way, or deviate by a hair's breadth from the +accepted standard of her sex. And now Molly, with whom he had fallen +in love, had actually flushed and paled under his eyes at the sight of +young Revercomb! In some subtle manner she seemed to have stooped in his +estimation--to have lowered herself from the high and narrow pedestal +upon which he had placed her! Yet so contradictory are the passions, +that he felt he loved her the more, if possible, because of the angry +soreness at his heart. + +Turning in the direction of Applegate, they continued their ride at +a canter, and the afternoon was over when they passed the cross-roads +again on their homeward way. A thin mist floated like thistledown from +the marshes, which were so distant that they were visible only as a +pinkish edge to the horizon. Large noisy insects, with iridescent wings, +hovered around the purple, heavy scented tubes of the Jamestown weeds by +the roadside, and the turnpike, glimmering like a white band through +the purple dusk, was spangled with fireflies. Gay was talking as they +approached the blazed pine, which stood out sinister and black against +the afterglow, and it was only when Molly cried out sharply that he saw +Blossom's face looking at them again over the tiger lilies. + +"Why, what in the deuce!" he exclaimed, not in anger, but in amazement. + +"Blossom, wait for me!" called Molly, and would have slipped to the +ground had not Gay reached out and held her in the saddle. + +Then the figure of Blossom, which had waited there evidently since their +first passing, vanished like an apparition into the grey twilight. +The pallid face floated from them through the grape-scented mist, and +Molly's call brought no answer except the cry of a whip-poor-will from +the thicket. + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +ONE OF LOVE'S VICTIMS + + +A week later Jim Halloween stopped with a bit of news at Bottom's +Ordinary, where old Adam Doolittle dozed under the mulberry tree in a +rush chair which had been brought over in his son's oxcart. + +"Have you all heard that our Mr. Mullen has accepted a call to larger +fields?" he inquired, "an' that Judy Revercomb has gone clean daft +because he's going to leave us?" + +"She didn't have far to go," observed Mrs. Bottom. + +"Well, you'd never have known it to look at her," commented young Adam, +"but 'tis a true sayin' that you can't tell the quality of the meat by +the colour of the feathers." + +"You'd better be speakin' particular, suh, an' not general," retorted +old Adam, who was in a querulous mood as the result of too abrupt an +awakening from his nap. "What you ain't known it doesn't follow other +folks ain't, does it? Human natur is generally made with a streak of +foolishness an' a streak of sense, just as fat an' lean runs in a piece +of bacon. That's what I say, an' I reckon I ought to know, bein' turned +ninety." + +"All the same thar's some folks that ain't streaked at all, but a solid +lump of silliness like Judy Hatch," returned his son. + +This was too much for the patience of the patriarchial spirit, and old +Adam began to shake as though he were suddenly smitten with palsy. + +"What do you mean by contradictin' me, suh? Didn't I bring you into the +world?" he demanded. + +A reproachful shake of the head passed round the group. + +"You oughtn't to contradict him, young Adam. Ain't he yo' pa?" said Mrs. +Bottom, rebukingly. + +"I warn't contradictin', I was talkin'," replied young Adam, abashed by +the evident disapprobation that surrounded him. + +"Well, don't talk, suh, until you can talk sense," rejoined his father. +"When a talker has turned ninety an' can meet me on equal ground, I'll +consent to argue with him." + +His lower lip protruded threateningly from his toothless gums, while +two tears of anger rolled slowly out of his eyes and over his veined and +roughened cheeks to the crescent shaped hollow of his chin. So deeply +rooted in his mind was the conviction that his ninety years furnished an +unanswerable argument for the truth of his opinions, that the assurance +of experience had conferred upon him something of that manner of +superhuman authority with which the assurance of inexperience had +endowed Mr. Mullen. + +"I for one was al'ays against Abel's marrying," interposed Betsey with +a placable air. "I knew she'd be a drag on him, an' now that he's goin' +into politics with sech good chances, the mo's the pity. I've told him +so time and agin when he stopped at the or'nary." + +At this point the appearance of Solomon Hatch caused her to explain +hurriedly, "We were jest speakin' of Abel an' his chances for the +Legislature. You've got a mighty good son-in-law, Solomon." + +"Yes," said Solomon, sourly, "yes, but Judy's a fool." + +The confession had burst from an overburdened soul, for like Gay +he could tolerate no divergence from the straight line of duty, no +variation from the traditional type, in any woman who was related to +him. Men would be men, he was aware, but if any phrase so original as +"women will be women" had been propounded to him, he would probably have +retorted with philosophic cynicism, that "he did not see the necessity." +His vision was enclosed in a circle beyond which he could not penetrate +even if he had desire to, and the conspicuous fact within this circle +at the moment was that Judy had made a fool of herself--that she had +actually burst out crying in church when Mr. Mullen had announced his +acceptance of a distant call! He was sorry for Abel, because Judy was +his wife, but, since it is human nature to exaggerate the personal +element, he was far sorrier for himself because she was his daughter. + +"Yes, Judy's a fool," he repeated angrily, and there was a bitter +comfort in the knowledge that he had first put into words the thought +that had engaged every mind at the ordinary. + +"Oh, she's young yet, an' she'll outgrow it," observed Betsey as +sincerely as she had made the opposite remark some minutes before. "A +soft heart is mo' to be pitied than blamed, an' it'll soon harden into +shape now she's settled down to matrimony." + +"I ain't never seen a female with an ounce of good hard sense except +you, Mrs. Bottom," replied Solomon. "Thar's a contrariness in the rest +of 'em that makes 'em tryin' companions to a rational critter like man, +with a firm grip on his heart. To think of gittin' a husband like Abel +Revercomb--the risin' man in the county--an' then to turn aside from the +comforts of life on o'count of nothin' mo' than a feelin'." + +"Well, it ain't as if she'd taken a fancy to a plain, ordinary kind of +man," remarked Betsey. "Thar's somethin' mo' elevatin' about a parson, +an' doubtless it's difficult to come down from a pulpit to common earth +when you've once lifted yo' eyes to it. Thar warn't no shame about her +cryin' out like that in church. They ought to have broke it to her mo' +gently." + +"I warn't thar," said old Adam, "but how did Abel conduct himself?" + +"Oh, he just got up an' led her out sort of gently, while she was cryin' +an' sobbin' so loud that it drowned what Mr. Mullen was sayin'," replied +Betsey. + +"Thar ain't a better husband in the county," said Solomon, "accordin' to +a man's way of lookin' at it, but it seems a woman is never satisfied." + +"I'm glad I never married," remarked young Adam, "for I might have got +one of the foolish sort seein' as they're so plentiful." + +"Well, I never axed much bein' so unattractive to the sex," observed Jim +Halloween, "an' as long as a woman was handsome, with a full figger, an' +sweet tempered an' thrifty an' a good cook, with a sure hand for pastry, +an' al'ays tidy, with her hair curlin' naturally, an' neat an' fresh +without carin' about dress, I'd have been easy to please with just the +things any man might have a right to expect." + +"It's the way with life that those that ax little usually get less," +commented old Adam, "I ain't sayin' it's all as it ought to be, but by +the time the meek inherit the earth thar'll be precious little left on +it except the leavin's of the proud." + +"Thar ain't any way of cultivatin' a proud natur when you're born meek, +is thar?" inquired his son. + +"None that I ever heerd of unless it be to marry a meeker wife. Thar's +something in marriage that works contrariwise, an' even a worm of a man +will begin to try to trample if he marries a worm of a woman. Who's that +ridin' over the three roads, young Adam?" + +"It's Abel Revercomb. Come in an' pass the time of day with us, Abel." + +But the miller merely shouted back that he had ridden to Piping Tree for +a bottle of medicine, and went on at a gallop. Then he passed from the +turnpike into the sunken road that led to the mill, and the cloud of +dust kicked up by his mare drifted after him into the distance. + +In spite of the scene in church, Abel had felt no resentment against +Judy. He knew that she had made herself ridiculous in the eyes of +the congregation, and that people were pitying him on account of +her hopeless infatuation for the young clergyman, but because he was +indifferent to her in his heart, he was able to look at the situation +from an impersonal point of view, and to realize something of what she +had suffered. When Solomon had railed at her after the service, Abel had +stopped him in indignation. + +"If you can't speak civilly to my wife, you can leave my house," he said +sharply. + +"Good God, man! Don't you know she's making a laughin' stock of you?" + +"That's a lie!" Abel had replied curtly, and Solomon, with the craven +spirit of all natural despots, had muttered beneath his breath that he +"reckoned, after all, it must have been a sudden attack of sickness." + +Of the attack and its nature Abel had said no word after this even to +Judy. During that embarrassed walk out of the church, while she clung +sobbing hysterically to his arm, he had resolved once for all that, +even though her behaviour cost him his ambition, he would never stoop to +reproach her. What right, indeed, had he to reproach her when he loved +Molly quite as madly, if not so openly, as she loved the rector? It was +as if he looked on Judy's suffering through his own, and was therefore +endowed with a quality of understanding which his ordinary perceptions +would never have given him. + +When he came in sight of the mill, the flash of red wheels caught his +eyes, and he distinguished Mr. Mullen's gig in the road in front of the +door. Having seen Judy as he rode by on his round of visits, the rector +had stopped for a moment to inquire if she had entirely recovered her +health. + +"I was much concerned about her illness in church yesterday," he +remarked, turning to the miller. + +"I didn't know she was up," replied Abel, observing the inflamed and +swollen state of her features, which had apparently escaped the notice +of Mr. Mullen. "Oughtn't you to have stayed in bed, Judy?" he asked +kindly. + +"Oh, no, I'd rather be about," responded Judy hurriedly. "I came over +from the house with a message for you when I saw Mr. Mullen passin'." + +"I am trying a young horse of Jim Halloween's," said the clergyman, "my +bay has gone lame, and Jim offered me this one for the day. Badly broken +and needs a firm bit. I'm inclined to believe that he has never been +put between shafts before, for I had quite a sharp tussle with him about +passing that threshing machine in Bumpass's field." + +"Oh, that roans all right if you don't fret him," replied Abel, who had +a poor opinion of the rector's horsemanship. "Stop jerking at his mouth, +and give him his head." + +But the Reverend Orlando, having drifted naturally into the habit +of thinking that he had been placed here to offer, not to receive, +instruction, appeared a little restive under the other's directions. + +"I flatter myself that I possess the understanding of horses," he +replied. "I've never had a disagreement with Harry, though I've driven +him every day since I've been here." + +"All the same I'd keep a steady hand if I were going by that threshing +machine up the road," rejoined Abel who magnanimously refrained from +adding that he had assisted at the purchase of Harry, and that horse had +been fourteen, if a day, when he passed into the clergyman's keeping. + +A healthful glow suffused Mr. Mullen's cheeks, while he struggled +valiantly to conceal his annoyance. He was very young, and in spite of +his early elevation to a position of spiritual leadership, he remained +after all merely an ordinary mortal. So he stiffened perceptibly on +the shiny seat of his gig, and gave a sharp pull at the reins, which +wrenched the head of the young roan away from a clump of sassafras. + +"It is better for every man to follow his own ideas, don't you think, +Mr. Revercomb?" he replied, advocating in his resentment a principle +which he would have been the first to rap soundly had it been advanced +by one of his parishioners. "I mean, of course, in the matter of +driving." + +"When do you go?" asked Judy suddenly, and turned her face away because +she could not trust herself to meet his beautiful, earnest eyes. + +"Within a fortnight. It is important that I should assume my new +responsibilities immediately." + +"And you won't come back ever again?" The meadows swam in a blur before +her eyes, and she thought of the purple velvet slippers which would +never be finished. + +He was a kind-hearted young man, who wished well to all the world, and +especially to those of his congregation who had profited spiritually +by his sermons. If he had suspected the existence of Judy's passion, it +would undoubtedly have distressed him--but he did not suspect it, owing +to a natural obliquity of vision, which kept him looking away from the +world as it is in the direction of a mental image of the world as he +imagined it. So, with an amiable word or two of regret that Providence +had arranged his removal to wider fields, he drove on, sitting very +erect and sawing earnestly at the mouth of the young horse. + +"He's a first-rate parson, but a darn fool of a horseman," observed +Abel, with the disgust of a good driver for a poor one. "You'd better go +in and lie down, Judy, you look like a ghost." + +"I don't want to lie down--I wish I were dead," replied Judy, choking +back her hysterical sobs. Then turning suddenly into the mill, she sank +against the old mill-stone on the wooden platform and burst into a fit +of wild and agonized weeping. Her hand, when he touched it, was as cold +as clay and as unresponsive to his. + +"Judy," he said and his voice was wonderfully gentle, "does it really +mean so much to you? Are you honestly grieving like this about Mr. +Mullen?" + +If he had only known it his gentleness to her was the thing for which +at times she almost hated him. The woman in her was very primitive--a +creature that harked back to the raw sensations of the jungle--and +nothing less than sheer brutality on Abel's part could free her from the +charm of the young clergyman's unconscious cruelty. + +She looked up at him with accusing eyes, which said, "I don't care who +knows that I love him," as plainly as did her huddled and trembling +figure, clinging pathetically to the old mill-stone, as though it were +some crudely symbolic Rock of Ages which she embraced. + +"Is it because he is going away or would you have felt this just as much +if he had stayed?" he asked, after a minute in which he had watched her +with humorous compassion. + +Raising herself at the question, she pushed the damp hair from her +forehead, and sat facing him on the edge of the platform. + +"I could have borne it--if--if I might have had his sermons every Sunday +to help me," she answered, and there was no consciousness of shame, +hardly any recognition of her abasement, in her tone. Like all helpless +victims of great emotions, she had ceased to be merely an individual and +had become the vehicle of some impersonal destructive force in nature. +It was not Judy, but the passion within her that was speaking through +her lips. + +"But what good would they have done you? You would have been miserable +still." + +"At--at least I should have seen him, an'--an' been strengthened in my +religion---" + +The grotesque, the pitiless horror of it struck him for an instant. That +she was half distraught and wholly morbid, he saw from her look, and the +sight awakened that indomitable pity which had served always as a medium +for the biting irony of life. + +"To save my soul I can't see what satisfaction you would have got out of +that," he remarked. + +"I did--I did. They helped me to be spiritual minded," wailed Judy with +the incoherence of complete despair. If her infatuation was ridiculous, +it occurred to Abel that her courage, at least, was sublime. From a +distance and with brighter hair, she might even have been mistaken for +a tragic example of immortal passion. The lover in his blood pitied her, +but the Calvinist refused to take her seriously. + +"Well, if I were you, I'd go in and lie down," he said feeling that it +was, after all, the best advice he could offer her. "You're sick, that's +what's the matter with you, and a cup of tea will do you more good than +hugging that old mill-stone. I know you can't help it, Judy," he added +in response to a gesture of protestation, "you were born that way, and +none of us, I reckon, can help the way we're born." And since it is +easier for a man to change his creed than his inheritance, he spoke in +the tone of stern fatalism in which Sarah, glancing about her at life, +was accustomed to say to herself, "It's like that, an' thar wouldn't be +any justice in it except for original sin." + +Judy struggled blindly to her feet, and still he did not touch her. In +spite of his quiet words there was a taste of bitterness on his lips, +as though his magnanimity had turned to wormwood while he was speaking. +After all, he told himself in a swift revulsion of feeling, Judy was his +wife and she had made him ridiculous. + +"I know it's hard on you," she said, pausing on the threshold in the +vain hope, he could see, that some word would be uttered which would +explain things or at least make them bearable. None was spoken, and her +foot was on the single step that led to the path, when there came the +sound of a horse running wildly up the road through the cornlands, +and the next instant the young roan passed them, dragging Mr. Mullen's +shattered rig in the direction of the turnpike. + +"Let me get there, Judy," said Abel, pushing her out of his way, +"something has happened!" + +But his words came too late. At sight of the empty gig, she uttered a +single despairing shriek, and started at a run down the bank, and over +the mill-stream. Midway of the log, she stumbled shrieked again, and +fell heavily to the stream below, from which Abel caught her up as if +she were a child, and carried her to the opposite side, and across the +rocky road to the house. As she lay on Sarah's bed, with Blossom working +over her, she began to scream anew, half unconsciously, in the voice of +frenzied terror with which she had cried out at the sound of the running +horse. Her face was grey, but around her mouth there was a blue circle +that made it look like the sunken mouth of an old woman, and her +eyes--in which that stark terror was still visible, as though it had +been rendered indelible by the violence of the shock that had called +it into being--seemed looking through the figures around her, with the +intense yet unseeing gaze with which one might look through shadows in +search of an object one does not find. + +"Get the doctor at once, Abel," said Blossom, "Grandma says something +has happened to bring on Judy's time. Had you two been quarrelling?" + +"Good God, no. Mr. Mullen's horse ran away with him and Judy saw it +before I could catch her. I don't know yet whether he is dead or alive." + +"I saw him running bareheaded through the cornfield just as you brought +Judy in, and I wondered what was the matter. He was going after his +horse, I suppose." + +"Well, he's done enough harm for one day. I'm off to Piping Tree for Dr. +Fairley." + +But two hours later, when he returned, with the physician on horseback +at his side, Mr. Mullen's driving, like most earnest yet ignorant +endeavours, had already resulted in disaster. All night they worked +over Judy, who continued to stare through them, as though they were but +shadows which prevented her from seeing the object for which she was +looking. Then at sunrise, having brought a still-born child into the +world, she turned her face to the wall and passed out of it in search of +the adventure that she had missed. + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +WHAT LIFE TEACHES + + +Judy was laid away amid the low green ridges in the churchyard, where +the drowsy hum of the threshing in a wheatfield across the road, was the +only reminder of the serious business of life. And immediately, as +if the beneficent green had enveloped her memory, her weaknesses were +effaced and her virtues were exalted in the minds of the living. Their +judgment was softened by a vague feeling of awe, but they were not +troubled, while they stood in a solemn and curious row around her grave, +by any sense of the pathetic futility of individual suffering in the +midst of a universe that creates and destroys in swarms. The mystery +aroused no wonder in their thoughts, for the blindness of habit, which +passes generally for the vision of faith, had paralyzed in youth their +groping spiritual impulses. + +On the following Sunday, before leaving for fresher fields, Mr. Mullen +preached a sermon which established him forever in the hearts of his +congregation, and in the course of it, he alluded tenderly to "the +exalted Christian woman who has been recently removed from among us to a +brighter sphere." It was, on the whole as Mrs. Gay observed afterwards, +"his most remarkable effort"; and even Sarah Revercomb, who had heard +that her daughter-in-law was to be mentioned in the pulpit, and had +attended from the same spiritual pride with which she had read the +funeral notice in the Applegate papers, admitted on her way home that +she "wished poor Judy could have heard him." In spite of the young +woman's removal to a sphere which Mr. Mullen had described as +"brighter," she had become from the instant of her decease, "poor Judy" +in Sarah's thoughts as well as on her lips. + +To Abel her death had brought a shock which was not so much a sense of +personal regret, as an intensified expression of the pity he had felt +for her while she lived. The huddled figure against the mill-stone had +acquired a new significance in the act of dying. A dignity which had +never been hers in life, enfolded her when she lay with the accusing and +hostile look in her face fading slowly into an expression of peace. With +the noble inconsistency of a generous heart, he began to regard Judy +dead with a tenderness he had never been able to feel for Judy living. +The less she demanded of him, the more he was ready to give her. + +"I declar' it does look as if Abel was mournin'," remarked Betsey +Bottom to Sarah on a September afternoon several months later. "It +ain't suprisin' in his case seein' he jest married her to get even with +Molly." + +"I don't believe myself in settin' round an' nursin' grief," responded +Sarah, "a proper show of respect is well an' good, but nobody can expect +a hearty, able bodied man to keep his thoughts turned on the departed. +With women, now, it's different, for thar's precious little satisfaction +some women get out of thar husbands till they start to wearin' weeds for +'em." + +"You've worn weeds steady now, ain't you, Mrs. Revercomb?" + +Sarah set her mouth tightly. "They were too costly to lay away," she +replied, and the words were as real a eulogy of her husband as she had +ever uttered. + +"It's a pity Abel lost Molly Merryweather," said Betsey. "Is thar any +likelihood of thar comin' together again? Or is it true--as the rumour +keeps up--that she is goin' to marry Mr. Jonathan befo' many months?" + +"It ain't likely she'll throw away all that good money once she's got +used to it," said Sarah. "For my part, I don't hold with the folks that +blamed her for her choice. Thar ain't many husbands that would be worthy +of thar hire, an' how was she to find out, till she tried, if Abel was +one of those few or not?" + +"He al'ays seemed to me almost too promisin' for his good looks, Mrs. +Revercomb. I'm mighty partial to looks in a man, thar ain't no use my +denyin' it." + +"Well, I ain't," said Sarah, "they're no mo' than dross an' cobwebs in +my sight, but we're made different an' thar's no sense arguin' about +tastes--though I must say for me that I could never understand how a +modest woman like you could confess to takin' pleasure in the sight of a +handsome man." + +"Well, immodest or not, I hold to it," replied Betsey in as amiable a +manner as if there had been no reflection upon her refinement. "Abel +stands a good chance for the legislature now, don't he?" + +"I ain't a friend to that, for I never saw the man yet that came out of +politics as clean as he went into 'em, and thar ain't nothin' that +takes the place of cleanness with me." In her heart she felt for Betsey +something of the contempt which the stoic in all ranks of life feels for +the epicurean. + +At supper that night Sarah repeated this conversation, and to her +astonishment, not Abel, but Blossom, went pitiably white and flinched +back sharply as if fearing a second fall of the lash. + +"I don't believe it! Mr. Jonathan will never marry Molly. There's no +truth in it!" she cried. + +Over the coffee-pot which she has holding, Sarah stared at her in +perplexity. "Why, whatever has come over you, Blossom?" she asked. + +"You haven't been yo'self for a considerable spell, daughter," said +Abner, turning to her with a pathetic, anxious expression on his great +hairy face. "Do you feel sick or mopin'?" + +He looked at Blossom as a man looks at the only thing he loves in life +when he sees that thing suffering beneath his eyes and cannot divine the +cause. The veins grew large and stood out on his forehead, and the big +knotted hand that was carrying his cup to his lips, trembled in the air +and then sank slowly back to the table. His usually dull and indifferent +gaze became suddenly piercing as if it were charged with electricity. + +"It's nothing, father," said Blossom, pressing her hand to her bosom, +as though she were choking for breath, "and it's all silly talk, I know, +about Molly." + +"What does it matter to you if it's true?" demanded Sarah tartly, +but Blossom, driven from the room by a spasm of coughing, had already +disappeared. + +It was a close September night, and as Abel crossed the road to look +for a young heifer in the meadow the heavy scent of the Jamestown +weeds seemed to float downward beneath the oppressive weight of +the atmosphere. The sawing of the katydids came to him out of the +surrounding darkness, through which a light, gliding like a gigantic +glow-worm along the earth, revealed presently the figure of Jonathan +Gay, mounted on horseback and swinging a lantern from his saddle. + +"A dark night, Revercomb." + +"Yes, there'll be rain before morning." + +"Well, it won't do any harm. The country needs it. I'm glad to hear, by +the way, that you are going into politics. You're a capital speaker. I +heard you last summer at Piping Tree." + +He rode on, and Abel forgot the meeting until, on his way back from the +meadow, he ran against Blossom, who was coming rather wildly from the +direction in which Jonathan had vanished. + +"What has upset you so, Blossom? You are like a ghost. Did you meet Mr. +Jonathan?" + +"No, why should I meet Mr. Jonathan? What do you mean?" + +Without replying she turned from him and ran into the house, while +following her more soberly, he asked himself carelessly what could have +happened to disturb her. "I wonder if she is frettin' about the rector?" +he thought, and his utter inability to understand, or even to recognize +the contradictions in the nature of women oppressed his mind. "First, +she wanted Mr. Mullen and he didn't want her, then he wanted her and she +didn't want him, and now when he's evidently left off caring again, she +appears to be grievin' herself sick about him. I wonder if it's always +like that--everybody wanting the person that wants somebody else? And +yet I know I loved Molly a hundred times more, if that were possible, +when I believed she cared for me." He remembered the December afternoon +so many years ago, when she had run away from the school in Applegate, +and he had found her breasting a heavy snow storm on the road to +Jordan's Journey. Against the darkness he saw her so vividly, as she +looked with the snow powdering her hair and her eyes shining happily up +at him when she nestled for warmth against his arm, that for a minute he +could hardly believe that it was eight years ago and not yesterday. + +Several weeks later, on a hazy October morning, when the air was sharp +with the scent of cider presses and burning brushwood, he met Molly +returning from the cross-roads, in the short path over the pasture. + +"I thought you had gone," he said, and held out his hand. + +"Not yet. Mrs. Gay wants to stay through October." + +In her hand she held a bunch of golden-rod, and behind her the field in +which she had gathered it, flamed royally in the sunlight. + +"Did you know that I rode to Piping Tree to hear you speak one day in +June?" she asked suddenly. + +"I didn't know it, but it was nice of you." + +His renunciation had conferred a dignity upon him which had in it +something of the quiet and the breadth of the Southern landscape. She +knew while she looked at him that he had accepted her decision once for +all--that he still accepted it in spite of the ensuing logic of events +which had refuted its finality. The choice had been offered her between +love and the world, and she had chosen the world--chosen in the heat of +youth, in the thirst for experience. She had not loved enough. Her +love had been slight, young, yielding too easily to the impact of other +desires. There had been no illusion to shelter it. She had never, she +remembered now, had any illusions--all had been of the substance and the +fibre of reality. Then, with the lucidity of vision through which she +had always seen and weighed the values of her emotions, she realized +that if she had the choice to make over again, she could not make it +differently. At the time flight from love was as necessary to her growth +as the return to love was necessary to her happiness to-day. She saw +clearly that her return was, after all, the result of her flight. If +she had not chosen the world, she would never have known how little the +world signified in comparison with simpler things. Life was all of a +single piece; it was impossible to pull it apart and say "without this +it would have been better"--since nothing in it was unrelated to the +rest, nothing in it existed by itself and independent of the events that +preceded it and came after it. Born as she had been out of sin, and the +tragic expiation of sin, she had learned more quickly than other women, +as though the spectre of the unhappy Janet stood always at her side to +help her to a deeper understanding and a sincerer pity. She knew now +that if she loved Abel, it was because all other interests and emotions +had faded like the perishable bloom on the meadow before the solid, the +fundamental fact of her need of him. + +"Do you still get books from the library in Applegate?" she asked +because she could think of nothing to say that sounded less trivial. + +"Sometimes, and second hand ones from a dealer I've found there. One +corner of the mill is given up to them." + +Again there was silence, and then she said impulsively in her old +childlike way. + +"Abel, have you ever forgiven me?" + +"There was nothing to forgive. You see, I've learned, Molly." + +"What you've learned is that I wasn't worth loving, I suppose?" + +He laughed softly. "The truth is, I never knew how much you were worth +till I gave you up," he answered. + +"It was the same way with me--that's life, perhaps." + +"That sounded like my mother. You're too young to have learned what it +means." + +"I don't believe I was ever young--I seem to have known about the +sadness of life from my cradle. That was why I wanted so passionately +some of its gaiety. I remember I used to think that Paris meant gaiety, +but when we went there I couldn't get over my surprise because of all +the ragged people and the poor, miserable horses. They spoiled it to +me." + +"The secret is not to look, isn't it?" he asked. + +"Yes. Jonathan never looked. It all depends, he used to tell me--upon +which set of facts I chose to regard--and he calls it philosophical not +to regard any but pleasant ones." + +"Perhaps he's right, but isn't it, after all, a question of the way he's +made?" + +"Everything is; grandfather used to say that was why he was never able +to judge people. Life was woven of many colours, like Joseph's coat, +he once told me, and we could make dyes run, but we couldn't wash them +entirely out. He couldn't make himself resentful when he tried--not even +with--with Mr. Jonathan." + +"Have you ever forgiven him, Molly?" + +"I've sometimes thought that he was sorry at the end--but how could that +undo the way he treated my mother? Being sorry when you're dying doesn't +help things you've hurt in life--but, then, grandfather would have said, +I suppose, that it was life, not Mr. Jonathan, that was to blame. And +I can see, too, in a way, that we sometimes do things we don't want to +do--that we don't even mean to do--that we regret ever afterwards--just +because life drives us to do them--" For a minute she hesitated, and +then added bravely, "I learned that by taking Mr. Jonathan's money." + +"But you were right," he answered. + +"To have the choice between love and money, and to choose--money?" + +"You're putting it harshly. It wasn't money you chose--it was the world +or Old Church--Jordan's Journey or the grist mill." + +For a moment the throbbing of her heart stifled her. Then she found her +voice. + +"If I had the choice now I'd choose Old Church and the grist mill," she +said. + +There was a short silence, and while it lasted she waited trembling, her +hand outstretched, her mouth quivering for his kisses. She remembered +how eagerly his lips had turned to hers in the past as one who thirsted +for water. + +But when he spoke again it was in the same quiet voice. + +"Would you, Molly!" he answered gently, and that was all. It was not a +question, but an acceptance. He made no movement toward her. His eyes +did not search her face. + +They turned and walked slowly across the pasture over the +life-everlasting, which diffused under their feet a haunting and ghostly +fragrance. Myriads of grasshoppers chanted in the warm sunshine, and a +roving scent of wood-smoke drifted to them from a clearing across the +road. It was the season of the year when the earth wears its richest +and its most ephemeral splendour; when its bloom is so poignantly lovely +that it seems as if a breath would destroy it, and the curves of hill +and field melt like shadows into the faint purple haze on the horizon. + +"If I could change it all now--could take you out of the life that suits +you and bring you back to the mill--I wouldn't do it. I like to think +I'm decent enough not even to want to do it," he said. + +They had reached the fence that separated Gay's pasture from his, and +stopping, he held out his hand with a smile. + +"I hear you're to marry Jonathan Gay," he added, "and whether or not you +do, God bless you." + +"But I'm not, Abel!" she cried passionately as he turned away. + +He did not look back, and when he had passed out of hearing, she +repeated her words with a passionate repudiation of the thing he had +suggested, "I'm not, Abel!--I'm not!" + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +THE TURN OF THE WHEEL + + +Tears blinded her eyes as she crossed the pasture, and when she brushed +them away, she could see nothing distinctly except the single pointed +maple that lifted its fiery torch above the spectral procession of the +aspens in the graveyard. She had passed under the trees at the Poplar +Spring, and was deep in the witch-hazel boughs which made a screen for +the Haunt's Walk, when beyond a sudden twist in the path, she saw ahead +of her the figures of Blossom Revercomb and Jonathan Gay. At first they +showed merely in dim outlines standing a little apart, with the sunlit +branch of a sweet gum tree dropping between them. Then as Molly went +forward over the velvety carpet of leaves, she saw the girl make a swift +and appealing movement of her arms. + +"Oh, Jonathan, if you only would! I can't bear it any longer!" she +cried, with her hands on his shoulders. + +He drew away, kindly, almost caressingly. He was in hunting clothes, and +the barrel of his gun, Molly saw, came between him and Blossom, gently +pressing her off. + +"You don't understand, Blossom, I've told you a hundred times it is out +of the question," he answered. + +Then looking up his eyes met Molly's, and he stood silent without +defence or explanation, before her. + +"What is impossible, Jonathan? Can I help you?" she asked impulsively, +and going quickly to Blossom's side she drew the girl's weeping face to +her breast. "You're in trouble, darling--tell me, tell Molly about it," +she said. + +As they clung together in a passion of despair and of pity--the one +appealing by sheer helplessness, the other giving succour out of an +abundant self-reliance--Gay became conscious that he was witnessing +the secret wonder of Molly's nature. The relation of woman to man was +dwarfed suddenly by an understanding of the relation of woman to woman. +Deeper than the dependence of sex, simpler, more natural, closer to the +earth, as though it still drew its strength from the soil, he realized +that the need of woman for woman was not written in the songs nor in the +histories of men, but in the neglected and frustrated lives which the +songs and the histories of men had ignored. + +"Tell me, Blossom--tell Molly," said the soft voice again. + +"Molly!" he said sharply, and as she looked at him over Blossom's +prostrate head, he met a light of anger that seemed, while it lasted, to +illumine her features. + +"Blossom and I were married nearly two years ago," he said. + +"Nearly two years ago?" she repeated. "Why have we never known it?" + +"I had to think of my mother," he replied almost doggedly. Then driven +by a rush of anger against Blossom because she was to blame for it +all--because he had ever seen her, because he had ever desired her, +because he had ever committed the supreme folly of marrying her, and, +most of all, because she had, in her indiscretion, betrayed him to +Molly--he added with the cruelty which is possible sometimes to generous +and kindly natures--"It was a mistake, of course. I am ready to do +anything in my power for her happiness, but it wouldn't be for her +happiness for us to start living together." + +Blossom raised her face from Molly's bosom, and the strong sunlight +shining through the coloured leaves, showed the blanched look of her +skin and the fine lines chiselled by tears around her eyes. Encircling +her mouth, which Gay had once described as looking "as though it +would melt if you kissed it," there was now a heavy blue shadow which +detracted from the beauty of her still red and voluptuous lips. In many +ways she was finer, larger, nobler than when he had first met her--for +experience, which had blighted her physical loveliness, appeared, also, +to have increased the dignity and quietness of her soul. Had Gay been +able to see her soul it would probably have moved him, for he was easily +stirred by the thing that was beneath the eyes. But it was impossible to +present a woman's soul to him as a concrete image. + +"I don't want to live with him--I don't want anything from him," +responded Blossom, with pride. "I don't want anything from him ever +again," she repeated, and putting Molly's arms away from her, she turned +and moved slowly down the Haunt's Walk toward the Poplar Spring. + +"I couldn't help loving you, could I, Molly?" he asked in a low voice. + +Her face was pale and stern when she answered. + +"And you couldn't help loving Blossom last year, I suppose?" + +"If I could have helped, do you think I should have done it? You don't +understand such things, Molly." + +"No, I don't understand them. When love has to cloak cruelty and +faithlessness, I can't see that it's any better than the thing it +excuses." + +"But all love isn't alike. I don't love you in the least as I loved +Blossom. That was a mere impulse, and incident." + +"But how was Blossom to know that? and how am I?" + +"One can't explain it to a woman. They're not made of flesh and blood as +men are." + +"They've had to drill their flesh and blood," she replied, stern rather +than scornful. + +"I might have known you'd be hard, Molly." + +When she spoke again her voice had softened. + +"Jonathan, it's no use thinking of me--go back to Blossom," she said. + +"Not thinking of you won't make me go back to Blossom. When that sort of +thing is over, it is over once for all." + +"Even if that is true you mustn't think of me--because I belong--every +bit of me--to Abel." + +He stared at her for a moment in silence. "Then it's true," he said at +last under his breath. + +"It has always been true--ever since anything was true." + +"But you didn't always know it." + +"I had to grow to it. I believe I have been growing to it forever. +Everything has helped me to it--even my mistakes." + +She spoke quite simply. Her earnestness was so large that it had swept +away her shyness and her self-consciousness, as a strong wind sweeps +away the smoke over the autumn meadows. And yet this very earnestness, +this passionate sincerity, added but another fold to the luminous evil +of mystery in which she was enveloped. He could not understand her when +she tried to tear the veil away and the terrible clearness of her soul +blinded his sight. Therein lay her charm for him--he could never reach +her, could never possess her even should she seek to approach him. +Behind the mystery of darkness which he might penetrate, there was still +the mystery of light. + +"If you really care about him like that I don't see why you gave him up +and went away from him," he said helplessly. "You wanted to go. Nobody +urged you. It was your own choice." + +"Yes, that's what you could never understand. I wasn't really going away +from him when I went. I was going to him. It was a long and a roundabout +road, but it was safer." + +"You mean it brought you back in the end?" + +"It not only brought me back, it showed me things by the way. It made me +understand about you and Blossom." + +"By Jove!" he exclaimed, and was silent. The pang of his loss was +swallowed up in the amplitude of his wonder. + +"Are you going to marry him, Molly?" he asked when the silence had +become unbearable. + +"If he wants me. I'm not quite sure that he wants me. I know he loves +me," she added, "but that isn't just the same." + +He did not answer, and they stood looking beyond the thick foliage in +the Haunt's Walk, to the meadows, over which a golden haze shimmered as +though it were filled with the beating of invisible wings. + +"Molly," he said suddenly. "Shall I go after Blossom?" + +"Oh, if you would, dear Jonathan," she answered. + +Without a word, he turned from her and walked rapidly down the path +Blossom had followed. + +When he had disappeared, Molly went up the walk to the Italian garden, +and then ascending the front steps passed into the drawing room, where +Kesiah and Mrs. Gay sat in the glow of a cedar fire, reading a new life +of Lord Byron. + +Kesiah's voice, droning monotonously like the loud hum of bees, rose +above the faint crackling of the logs, on which Mrs. Gay had fixed her +soft, unfathomable eyes, while she reconstructed, after the habit of her +imagination, certain magnificent adventures in the poet's life. + +"Have you seen Jonathan, Molly?" asked Kesiah, laying aside her book +while Mrs. Gay wiped her eyes. + +"Yes, I left him in the Haunt's Walk." + +"He has not seemed well of late," said Mrs. Gay softly, "I am trying to +persuade him to leave us and go back to Europe." + +"He is anxious about your health and doesn't like to go so far away from +you," replied Molly, sitting on an ottoman beside her chair. + +Taking her hand, Mrs. Gay caressed it while she answered. + +"I can never think of myself when Jonathan's happiness is to be +considered." Then dropping her voice still lower, she added tenderly, +"You are a great comfort to me, dear, a very great comfort." + +What she meant, and Molly grasped her meaning as distinctly as if she +had put it into words, was that she was comforted, she was reassured by +the girl's obvious indifference to Jonathan's passion. Like many +persons of sentimental turn of mind, she found no great difficulty in +reconciling a visionary romanticism with a very practical regard for the +more substantial values of life. + +"I should never allow the question of my health to interfere with +Jonathan's plans," she repeated, while her expression grew angelic in +the light of her sacrificial fervour. + +"I don't think he wants to go," retorted Kesiah rather snappily, and +opening the book again she began to read. + +For an hour her voice droned steadily in the firelight, while Molly, +with her head against Mrs. Gay's knee, looked through the casement +window to where the October roses bloomed and dropped in the squares of +the Italian garden. Then at the sound of hurried footsteps on the walk +outside, the girl rose from the ottoman and went out, closing the door +after her. In the hall the blanched face of Uncle Abednego confronted +her like the face of a spectre. + +"I ain't a-gwine ter tell Miss Angela--I ain't a-gwine ter tell Miss +Angela," he moaned, "Marse Jonathan, he's been shot down yonder at Poplar +Spring des like Ole Marster!" + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +GAY DISCOVERS HIMSELF + + +As Gay passed rapidly down the Haunt's Walk a rustle in the witch-hazel +bushes accompanied him, stopping instantly when he stopped, and +beginning again when he moved, as though something, crouching there, +listened in breathless suspense for the fall of his footsteps. At +the Poplar Spring the sound grew so distinct that he hastened in the +direction of it, calling in an impatient voice, "Blossom! Are you there, +Blossom?" The words were still on his lips, when a thick grape-vine +parted in front of him, and the bearded immobile face of Abner Revercomb +looked out at him, with hatred in his eyes. + +"Damn you!" said a voice almost in a whisper. The next instant a shot +rang out, and Gay stumbled forward as though he had tripped over the +underbrush, while his gun, slipping from his shoulder, discharged its +load into the air. His first confused impression was that he had knocked +against a poplar bough which had stuck him sharply in the side. Then, as +a small drift of smoke floated toward him, he thought in surprise, +"I'm shot. By Jove, that's what it means--I'm shot." At the instant, +underlying every other sensation or idea, there was an ironic wonder +that anybody should have hated him enough to shoot him. But while the +wonder was still engrossing him--in that same instant, which seemed to +cover an eternity, when the shot rang in his ears, something happened in +his brain, and he staggered through the curtain of grape-vine and sank +down as though falling asleep on the bed of life-everlasting. "It's +ridiculous that anybody should want to shoot me," he thought, while the +little round yellow sun dwindled smaller and smaller until a black cloud +obscured it. + +A minute, or an hour afterwards, he opened his eyes with a start, and +lay staring up at the sky, where a flock of swallows drifted like smoke +in the cloudless blue. He had awakened to an odd sensation of floating +downward on a current that was too strong for him; and though he knew +that the idea was absurd, it was impossible for him to put it out of his +mind, for when he made an effort to do so, he felt that he was slipping +again into oblivion. For a time he let himself drift helplessly like a +leaf on the stream. Then seized by a sudden terror of the gulf beyond, +he tried to stop, to hold back, to catch at something--at anything--that +would check the swiftness of his descent, that would silence the rushing +sound of the river about him. But in spite of his struggles, this +current--which seemed sometimes to flow from a wound in his side, +and sometimes to be only the watery rustle of the aspens in the +graveyard--this imaginary yet pitiless current, bore him always farther +away from the thing to which he was clinging--from this thing he +could not let go because it was himself--because it had separated and +distinguished him from all other persons and objects in the universe. +"I've always believed I was one person," he thought, "but I am a +multitude. There are at least a million of me--and any one of them +might have crowded out all the others if he'd got a chance." A swift and +joyous surprise held him for a moment, as though he were conscious for +the first time of dormant possibilities in himself which he had never +suspected. "Why didn't I know this before?" he asked, like one who +stumbles by accident upon some simple and yet illuminating fact of +nature. "All this has been in me all the time, but nobody told me. I +might just as well have been any of these other selves as the one I +am." The noise of the river began in his head again, but it no longer +frightened him. + +"It's only the hum of bees in the meadow," he said after a minute, "and +yet it fills the universe as if it were the sound of a battle. And now +I've forgotten what I was thinking about. It was very important, but +I shall never remember it." He closed his eyes, while the ghostly +fragrance of the life-everlasting on which he was lying rose in a cloud +to envelop him. Something brushed his face like the touch of wings, +and looking up he saw that it was a golden leaf which had fallen from a +bough of the great poplar above him. He had never seen anything in his +life so bright as that golden bough that hung over him, and when +he gazed through it, he saw that the sky was bluer than he had ever +imagined that it could be, and that everything at which he looked +had not only this quality of intense, of penetrating brightness, but +appeared transparent, with a luminous transparency which seemed a veil +spread over something that was shining beyond it. "I wonder if I'm +dead?" he thought irritably, "or is it only delirium? And if I am dead, +it really doesn't matter--an idiot could see through anything so thin as +this." + +Again the cloud closed over him, and again just as suddenly it lifted +and the joyous surprise awoke in his mind. He remembered feeling the +same sensation in his boyhood, when he had walked one morning at sunrise +on a strange road, and had wondered what would happen when he turned a +long curve he was approaching. And it seemed to him now as then, that a +trackless, a virgin waste of experience surrounded him--that he was in +the midst of an incalculable vastness of wonder and delight. It was +a nuisance to have this web of flesh wrapping about him, binding his +limbs, hindering his efforts, stifling his breath. + +And then, as in the brain of a fevered and delirious man, this +impression vanished as inexplicably as it had come. His ideas were +perfectly independent of his will. He could neither recover one that +he had lost nor summon a fresh one from the border of obscurity that +surrounded a centre of almost intolerable brightness into which his +mental images glided as into a brilliantly lighted chamber. Into this +brightness a troop of hallucinations darted suddenly like a motley and +ill-assorted company of players. He saw first a grotesque and indistinct +figure, which he discerned presently to be the goblin his nurse had used +to frighten him in his infancy; then the face of his uncle, the elder +Jonathan Gay, with his restless and suffering look; and after this the +face of Kesiah, wearing her deprecation expression, which said, "It +isn't really my fault that I couldn't change things"; and then the faces +of women he had seen but once, or passed in the street and remembered; +and in the midst of these crowding faces, the scarred and ravaged face +of an old crossing-sweeper on a windy corner in Paris. . . . "I wish +they'd leave me alone," he thought, with the helplessness of delirium, +"I wish they'd keep away and leave me alone." He wanted to drive these +hallucinations from his brain, and to recapture the exhilarating sense +of discovery he had lost the minute before, but because he sought it, in +some unimaginable way, it continued to elude him. The loud hum of bees +in the Indian summer confused him, and he thought impatiently that if +it would only cease for an instant, his mind might clear again, and he +might think things out--that he might even remember the important things +he had forgotten. "Abner Revercomb shot me," he said aloud. "I don't +know much. I don't know whether I am alive or dead. All I am certain of +is that it doesn't matter in the least--that it's too small a fact to +make any fuss about. It's all so small--the blamed thing isn't any more +important than those bees humming out there in the meadow. And I might +as well have developed into any one of my other selves. What were all +those seeds of possibilities for if they never came to anything? Why, +I might have been a hero--it was in me all the time--I might even have +been a god." + +Then for the first time he became aware of his body as of something +outside of himself--something that had been tacked on to him. He +felt all at once that his feet were as heavy as logs--that they were +benumbed, that they had fallen asleep, and were filled with the sharp +pricking of thorns. Yet he had no control over them; he could not move +them, could hardly even think of them as belonging to himself. This +sensation of numbness began slowly to crawl upward like some gigantic +insect. He knew it would reach his knees and then pass on to his waist, +but the knowledge gave him no power to prevent its coming, and when he +tried to will his hand to move, it refused to obey the action of his +brain. + +"I'm really out of my head," he thought, and the next instant, "or, it's +all a dream, and I've been only a dream from the beginning." + +A century afterwards, he opened his eyes and saw a face bending over +him, which seemed as if it were of gossamer, so vague and shadowy it +looked beside the images of his delirium. An excited and eager humming +was in his ears, but he could not tell whether it was the voices of +human beings or the loud music of the bees in the meadow. From his +waist down he could feel nothing, not even the crawling of the gigantic +insect, but the rest of his body was a single throbbing pain, a pain so +intense that it seemed to drag him back from the gulf of darkness into +which he was drifting. + +"Can you hear?" asked a voice from out the hum of sound, speaking in the +clear, high tone one uses to a deaf man. + +Another voice, he was not sure whether it was his own or a +stranger's--repeated from a distance, "Can I hear?" + +"Did you see who shot you?" said the voice. + +And the second voice repeated after it: "Did I see who shot me?" + +"Was it Abner Revercomb?" asked the first voice. + +He knew then what they meant, and suddenly he began to think lucidly and +rapidly like a person under the mental pressure of strong excitement or +of alcohol. Everything showed distinctly to him, and he saw with this +wonderful distinctness, that it made no difference whether it was Abner +Revercomb or one of his own multitude of selves that had shot him. It +made no difference--nothing mattered except to regain the ineffable +sense of approaching discovery which he had lost. + +"Was it Abner Revercomb?" said the first voice more loudly. + +He was conscious now of himself and of his surroundings, and there was +no uncertainty, no hesitation in his answer. + +"It was an accident. I shot myself," he said, and after a moment he +added angrily, "Why should anybody shoot me? It would be ridiculous." + +It was there again--the unexplored, the incalculable vastness. If they +would only leave him alone he might recover it before it eluded him. + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +THE END + + +In the middle of the afternoon Molly went into the spare room in the +west wing, and stopped beside the high white bed on which Gay was lying, +with the sheet turned down from his face. In death his features wore +a look of tranquil brightness, of arrested energy, as if he had paused +suddenly for a brief space, and meant to rise and go on again about the +absorbing business of living. The windows were open, and through the +closed shutters floated a pale greenish light and the sound of dead +leaves rustling softly in the garden. + +She had hardly entered before the door opened noiselessly again, and +Kesiah came in bringing some white roses in a basket. Drawing a little +away, Molly watched her while she arranged the flowers with light and +guarded movements, as if she were afraid of disturbing the sleeper. Of +what was she thinking? the girl wondered. Was she grieving for her lost +youth, with its crushed possibilities of happiness, or for the rich +young life before her, which had left its look of arrested energy +still clinging to the deserted features? Was she saddened by the tragic +mystery of Death or by the more poignant, the more inscrutable mystery +of Life? Did she mourn all the things that had not been that did not +matter, or all the things that had been that mattered even less? + +Lifting her eyes from Kesiah's face, she fixed them on a small old +picture of the elder Jonathan, which hung under a rusty sword above the +bed. For the first time there came to her an impulse of compassion for +the man who was her father. Perhaps he, also, had suffered because life +had driven him to do the things that he hated--perhaps he, also, had had +his secret chamber in which his spirit was crucified? With the thought +something in her heart, which was like a lump of ice, melted suddenly, +and she felt at peace. "Because I've lived," she said softly to herself, +"I can understand." + +And on the opposite side of the bed, between the long white curtains, +Kesiah was thinking, "Because I've never lived, but have stood apart and +watched life, I can understand." + +Turning away presently, Molly went to the door, where she stood waiting +until the elder woman joined her. + +"Is Mr. Chamberlayne still with Aunt Angela?" she asked. + +"Yes. He was on his way to visit her when Cephus met him near the +cross-roads." For an instant she paused to catch her breath, and then +added softly, "Angela is bearing it beautifully." + +Stooping over, she picked up a few scattered rose leaves from the +threshold and dropped them into the empty basket before she followed +Molly down the hall of the west wing to the lattice door, which opened +on the side-garden. Here the rustling of dead leaves grew louder, and +faint scents of decay and mould were wafted through the evanescent +beauty of the Indian summer. + +While they stood there, Mr. Chamberlayne came down the staircase, wiping +his eyes, which were very red, on his white silk handkerchief. + +"She bears it beautifully, just as we might have expected," he said "I +have seldom witnessed such fortitude, such saintly resignation to what +she feels to be the will of God." + +Molly's eyes left his face and turned to the purple and gold of the +meadows, where webs of silver thistledown were floating over the +path she had trodden only a few hours ago. Nothing had changed in the +landscape--the same fugitive bloom was on the fields, the same shadows +were on the hillside, the same amber light was on the turnpike. She +thought of many things in that instant, but beneath them all, like +an undercurrent, ran the knowledge that Mrs. Gay was "bearing it +beautifully" behind her closed shutters. When her mind went back to the +past, she remembered the elder Jonathan, who had perished in the fine +silken mesh of the influence he was powerless to break. After this came +the memory of the day when Janet Merryweather had flung herself on the +mercy of the gentle heart, and had found it iron. And then she thought +of the son, who had drifted into deceit and subterfuge because he was +not strong enough to make war on a thing so helpless. He, also, had died +because he dared not throw off that remorseless tyranny of weakness. +Without that soft yet indomitable influence, he would never have lied +in the beginning, would never have covered his faithlessness with the +hypocrisy of duty. + +"You have been a great comfort to her, Mr. Chamberlayne," said Kesiah, +breaking the silence at last. + +A low sound, half a sob, half a sigh, escaped the lawyer's lips. "A +spirit like hers needs no other prop than her Creator," he replied. + +"It is when one expects her to break down that she shows her wonderful +fortitude," added Kesiah. + +"Her consolation now is the thought that she never considered either her +health or her happiness where her son was concerned," pursued the old +man. "She clings pathetically to the memory that she urged him to return +to Europe, and that he chose to remain a few weeks for the pleasure of +hunting. Not a breath stains the purity of her utter selflessness. To +witness such spiritual beauty is a divine inspiration." + +For the last few hours, ever since a messenger had met him, half way on +the Applegate road, with the news of Jonathan's death, he had laboured +philosophically to reconcile such a tragedy with his preconceived belief +that he inhabited the best of all possible worlds. Only when suffering +obtruded brutally into his immediate surroundings, was it necessary +for him to set about resolving the problem of existence--for, like most +hereditary optimists, he did not borrow trouble from his neighbours. A +famine or an earthquake at a little distance appeared to him a puerile +obstacle to put forward against his belief in the perfection of the +planetary scheme; but when his eyes rested upon the martyred saintliness +of Mrs. Gay's expression, he was conscious that his optimism tottered +for an instant, and was almost overthrown. That a just and tender Deity +should inflict pain upon so lovely a being was incomprehensible to his +chivalrous spirit. + +"Has any one told her about Blossom?" asked Molly. + +Kesiah shook her head. "Mr. Chamberlayne feels that it would be cruel. +She knows so little about Jonathan's affairs that we may be able to keep +his marriage from her knowledge if she leaves Jordan's Journey a few +days after the funeral." + +"In spite of it all I know that Jonathan hated lies," said Molly almost +fiercely. + +"Our first thought must be to spare her," answered the lawyer. "It +was her son's endeavour always, just as it was my poor old friend +Jonathan's. If you will come with me into the library," he added to +Kesiah, "we will take a few minutes to look over the papers I have +arranged." + +They moved away, walking side by side with halting steps, as though +they were crushed by age, and yet were trying to the last to keep up an +appearance of activity. For a minute Molly gazed after them. Then +her eyes wandered to the light that shimmered over the meadows, and +descending the stone steps into the side-garden, she walked slowly +through the miniature maze, where the paths were buried deep in +wine-coloured leaves which had drifted from the half bared trees on the +lawn. Abel was coming, she knew, and she waited for him in a stillness +that seemed akin to that softly breathing plant life around her. It was +the hour for which she had hungered for weeks, yet now that it had come, +she could hardly recognize it for the thing she had wanted. A sudden +blight had fallen over her, as though she had brought the presence of +death with her out of that still chamber. Every sound was hushed into +silence, every object appeared as unsubstantial as a shadow. Beyond the +lawn, over the jewelled meadows, she could see the white spire of Old +Church rising above the coloured foliage in the churchyard, and beyond +it, the flat ashen turnpike, which had led hundreds of adventurous feet +toward the great world they were seeking. She remembered that the sight +of the turnpike had once made her restless; now it brought her only a +promise of peace. + +Turning at the sound of a step on the dead leaves, she saw that Abel +had entered the garden, and was approaching her along one of the +winding paths. When he reached her, he spoke quickly without taking her +outstretched hand. The sun was in his eyes and he lowered them to the +over-blown roses in a square of box. + +"I came over earlier," he said, "but I couldn't see any one except Mr. +Chamberlayne." + +"He told me you would come back. That was why I waited." + +For a moment he seemed to struggle for breath. Then he said quickly. + +"Molly, do you believe it was an accident?" + +She started and her hands shook. + +"He said so at the end--otherwise--how--how could it have happened?" + +"Yes, how could it have happened?" he repeated, and added after a pause, +"He was a fine fellow. I always liked him." + +Her tears choked her, and when she had recovered her voice, she put +a question or two about Blossom--delaying, through some instinct of +flight, the moment for which she had so passionately longed. + +"It was all so unnecessary," she said, "that is the worst of it. It +might just as easily not have happened." + +"I wish I could be of some use," he answered. "Perhaps Mr. Chamberlayne +has thought of something he would like me to do?" + +"He is in the library. Uncle Abednego will show you." + +He put out his hand, "Then good-bye, Molly," he said gently. + +But at the first touch of his fingers the spell was broken, and the +mystery of life, not of death, rushed over her like waves of light. +She knew now that she was alive--that the indestructible desire for +happiness was still in her heart. The meaning of life did not matter +while the exquisite, the burning sense of its sweetness remained. + +"Abel," she said with a sob, half of joy, half of sorrow, "if I go on my +knees, will you forgive me?" + +He had turned away, but at her voice, he stopped and looked back with +the sunlight in his eyes. + +"There isn't any forgiveness in love, Molly," he answered. + +"Then--oh, then if I go on my knees will you love me?" + +He smiled, and even his smile, she saw, had lost its boyish brightness +and grown sadder. + +"I'd like to see you on your knees, if I might pick you up," he said, +"but, Molly, I can't. You've everything to lose and I've nothing on +God's earth to give you except myself." + +"But if that's all I want?" + +"It isn't, darling. You may think so, but it isn't and you'd find it +out. You see all this time since I've lost you, I've been learning to +give you up. It's a poor love that isn't big enough to give up when the +chance comes to it." + +"If--if you give me up, I'll let everything go," she said passionately. +"I'll not take a penny of that money. I'll stay at Old Church and live +with Betsey Bottom and raise chickens. If you give me up I'll die, +Abel," she finished with a sob. + +At the sound of her sob, he laughed softly, and his laugh, unlike his +smile, was a laugh of happiness. + +"If you go to live with Betsey Bottom I'll come and get you," he +answered, "but Molly, Molly, how you've tortured me. You deserve a worse +punishment than raising chickens." + +"That will be happiness." + +"Suppose I insist that you shall draw the water and chop the wood? My +beauty, your submission is adorable if it would only last!" + +"Abel, how can you?" + +"I can and I will, sweetheart. I might even make a miller's wife of you +if it was likely that I'd ever do anything but worship you and keep you +wrapped in silk. Are you very much in love at last, Molly?" + +The sound of his low laugh was in her blood, and while she leaned toward +him, she melted utterly, drawing him with the light of her face, with +the quivering breath between her parted lips. To his eyes she was all +womanhood in surrender, yet he held back still, as a man who has learned +the evanescence of joy, holds back when he sees his happiness within his +grasp. + +"It's too late except for one thing, Molly," he said. "If it isn't +everything you're offering me--if you are keeping back a particle of +yourself--body or soul--it is too late. I won't take anything from you +unless I take everything--unless your whole happiness as well as mine is +in your giving." + +Then before the look in her face, he held out his arms and stood +waiting. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Miller Of Old Church, by Ellen Glasgow + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MILLER OF OLD CHURCH *** + +***** This file should be named 18286.txt or 18286.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/2/8/18286/ + +Produced by Doug Levy + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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