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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/18801-8.txt b/18801-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..230217c --- /dev/null +++ b/18801-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9384 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Green Valley, by Katharine Reynolds, +Illustrated by Nana French Bickford + + +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: Green Valley + + +Author: Katharine Reynolds + + + +Release Date: July 10, 2006 [eBook #18801] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GREEN VALLEY*** + + +E-text prepared by Al Haines + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustration. + See 18801-h.htm or 18801-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/8/0/18801/18801-h/18801-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/8/0/18801/18801-h.zip) + + + + + +GREEN VALLEY + +by + +KATHARINE REYNOLDS + +Frontispiece by Nana French Bickford + + + + + + + +[Frontispiece: They came to her hand in hand and said not a word.] + + + + +Grosset & Dunlap +Publishers ------ New York +Copyright, 1919, +by Little, Brown, and Company. +All rights reserved + + + + + Dedication + + TO ALL THE LITTLE ONE-HORSE TOWNS WHERE + LIFE IS SWEET AND ROOMY AND OLD-FASHIONED; + WHERE THE DAYS ARE FULL OF SUNSHINE AND + RAIN AND WORK; WHERE NEIGHBORS REALLY + NEIGHBOR AND MEN AND WOMEN ARE LIFE-SIZE + + + + +AUTHOR'S NOTE + +This book was written to cure a heartache, to ease a very real and bad +case of homesickness. I wrote it just for myself when I was very +nearly ten thousand miles away from home and knew that I couldn't go +back to the U. S. A. for two long years. It is a picture of a little +Yankee town, the town I tried so hard to see over ten thousand miles of +gray-green ocean. + +When I was sailing from New York for South America that sunny June +morning in 1913, about the last thing the last friend hurrying down the +gangplank said was this: + +"Of course you are going to be homesick. But it's worth it." + +And I laughed. + +But before that long stretch of gray-green ocean was plowed under I +knew--oh, I knew--that I was going to be most woefully homesick for the +U. S. A. + +A certain tall Swede from New Jersey and I discovered that fact about +the same minute Fourth of July morning. We were standing on the deck, +staring miserably back over the awful miles to where somewhere in that +lost north our town lay with flags fluttering, picnic baskets getting +into trains and everybody out on their lawns and porches. + +We didn't look at each other after that first glance--that Swede and I. +And we said the sunlight hurt our eyes. + +Three months later I was sitting under the velvet-soft, star-sown night +sky of the Argentine cattle country. I had seen volcano-scarred +Martinique and had watched the beautiful island of Barbados rising like +a fairy dream out of a foamy sea. + +I had marveled at the endless beauties of Rio lying so picturesquely in +its immense harbor and at the foot of its great, shaggy, sun-splashed, +smoke-wreathed mountains. I had tramped through unsanitary Santos and +loved it because it looked like Chicago in spite of its mountains and +banana trees. I had witnessed a wonderful fiesta in Buenos Aires and +had churned two hundred miles up the La Plata when it was bubbling with +rain. And I had had a tooth pulled in Paysandu, the second largest +city in Uruguay. + +All that in three months! And there were still a million wonders to +see. I loved and shall always love these radiant, sun-drenched +uncrowded lands. But my heart was heavy as lead. For I was homesick. +My eyes were tired of alien starshine, of alien, unfamiliar things, and +my heart cried out for the little home towns of my own country. + +But I could not go back for many, many months. So I learned Spanish +and hobnobbed with wonderfully wise and delightful Spanish +grandmothers. I grew to love some darling Indian babies. I +interviewed interesting South American cowboys and discussed war and +socialism with an Argentine navy officer. I exchanged calls and true +blue friendships with soft-voiced Englishwomen. And I took tea and +dinner aboard the ships of Welsh sea captains from Cardiff. + +I had a wonderful time. I filled my notebook, took pictures and +collected souvenirs. I laughed and told stories. Folks down there +said I was good company. + +But oh! In the hush of a rain-splashed night, when the fire in the +grate dozed and dreamed and a boat siren somewhere out on the inky La +Plata wailed and moaned through the black night, my heart flew back +over those gray-green waves to a little town that I knew in the U. S. +A. And to ease my longing I wrote Green Valley. + +KATHARINE REYNOLDS. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAPTER + + I EAST AND WEST + II SPRING IN GREEN VALLEY + III THE LAST OF THE CHURCHILLS + IV A RAINY DAY + V CYNTHIA'S SON + VI GOSSIP + VII THE WEDDING + VIII LILAC TIME + IX GREEN VALLEY MEN + X THE KNOLL + XI GETTING ACQUAINTED + XII THE PATH OF TRUE LOVE + XIII AUTUMN IN GREEN VALLEY + XIV THE CHARM + XV INDIAN SUMMER + XVI THE HOUSEWARMING + XVII THE LITTLE SLIPPER + XVIII THE MORNING AFTER + XIX A GRAY DAY + XX CHRISTMAS BELLS + XXI FANNY'S HOUR + XXII BEFORE THE DAWN + XXIII FANNY COMES BACK + XXIV HOME AGAIN + + + + +GREEN VALLEY + +CHAPTER I + +EAST AND WEST + +"Joshua Churchill's dying in California and Nanny Ainslee's leaving +to-night for Japan! And there's been a wreck between here and Spring +Road!" + +Fanny fairly gasped out the astounding news. Then she sank down into +Grandma Wentworth's comfortable kitchen rocker and went into details. + +"The two telegrams just came through. Uncle Tony's gone down to the +wreck. I happened to be standing talking to him when Denny came +running out of the station. Isn't it too bad Denny's so bow-legged? +Though I don't know as it hinders him from running to any noticeable +extent. I had an awful time trying to keep up so's to find out what +had happened. I bet you Nan's packing right this minute and just +loving it. My--ain't some people born lucky? Think of having the +whole world to run around in!" + +The telephone tinkled. + +"Yes, Nan," Grandma smiled as she answered, "I know. Fanny's just this +minute telling me. Yes, of course I can. I'll be over as soon as my +bread's done baking. Yes--I'll bring along some of my lavender to pack +in with your things." + +"Land sakes, Grandma," exclaimed Fanny, "don't stop for the bread. +I'll see to that. Just you git that lavender and go. And tell Nanny +I'll be at the station to see her off." + +Up-stairs in a big sunny room of the Ainslee house Grandma Wentworth +looked reproachfully at a flushed, busy girl who was laughing and +singing snatches of droll ditties the while she emptied closets and +dresser drawers and tucked things into four trunks, two suitcases and a +handbag. + +"Nanny, are you never going to settle down and stay at home?" sighed +Grandma. + +"Yes, ma'am," Nanny's eyes danced, "some day when a man makes me fall +in love with him and there are no more new places to go to. But so +long as I am heartfree and footfree, and there's one alien shore +calling, I'll have the wanderlust. I declare, Grandma, if that man +doesn't turn up soon there will be no new places left for a honeymoon!" + +Grandma smiled in spite of herself. There were things she wanted very +much to say and other things she wanted very much to ask; but the +trunks had to get down to the station and already the afternoon sun was +low. + +The two women worked feverishly and almost in silence so that when the +packing was done they might get in the little visit both craved before +the months of separation. + +Nanny finally jumped on the trunks, snapped them shut, locked them and +watched the expressman carry them down and out into his waiting dray. +Then she sat down with a trembling little laugh. + +"There--it's over and I'm really going! I have been to just about +every country but Japan. I believe father would rather have skipped +off alone this time. It seems to be some suddenly important +international crisis that we are going over to settle. That's why we +are going East the roundabout way. We must stop at Washington for +instructions, then again at London and Paris." + +"Nanny," mused Grandma, "there's a good many years difference in our +ages but there's only one woman I ever loved as I love you. I think I +might have loved your mother but she died the very first year your +father brought her here. And she was ailing when she came. The other +woman that meant so much to me used to go traveling too. I always +helped her with her packing. Then one day she packed and went away, +never to come back." + +"Was that Cynthia Churchill?" Nan asked gently. + +"Yes--Cynthia. She was dearer than a sister to me, and neither of us +dreamed that a whole wide world would divide us." + +"Why did she go, Grandma?" + +"Because a Green Valley man well-nigh broke her heart." + +"A Green Valley man did--_that_? Oh, dear! And here I have been +hoping that some day I might marry a Green Valley man myself." + +"Nanny, I expect I'm old and foolish but I've been hoping and hoping +that you'd marry a home boy and fearing you'd meet up with some one on +your travels who would take you away from us forever. It would be hard +to see you go." + +The last sunbeam had faded away and golden twilight filled the room. +Outside little day noises were dying out. + +"Grandma dear, don't you worry about me. I intend to marry a Green +Valley man if possible. But even if I didn't I'd always come back to +Green Valley." + +"No, you wouldn't. You couldn't, any more than Cynthia could. Cynthia +loved this town better even than you love it. Yet she is lying under +strange stars in a foreign land, far from her old home. Her father, +they say, is dying in California. I suppose the old Churchill place +will go now unless Cynthia's son comes back to take it over. But that +isn't likely." + +"Why--did Cynthia Churchill leave a son?" wondered Nanny. + +"Yes. He must be a few years older than you. He was born and raised +in India. 'Tisn't likely he'd come to Green Valley now that he's a man +grown. Still, if Joshua Churchill dies out there in California, that +boy will come into all his grandfather's property." + +"Well," Nanny stood up and walked to the window from which she could +see the fine old home of the Churchills, "if any one willed me a lovely +old place like that Churchill homestead I'd come from the moon to claim +it, let alone India." + +"Nanny, are you sure there's no boy now in Green Valley who could keep +you from roaming? I thought maybe Max Longman or Ronny Deering--" + +"No--no one yet, Grandma. I like them all--but love--no. Love, it +seems to me, must be something very different." + +"Yes, I know," sighed Grandma. + +When Uncle Tony returned from viewing the wreck he assured his townsmen +that it was a wreck of such beautiful magnitude that traffic on the +Northwestern would be tied up for twenty-four hours. It was feared +that Mr. Ainslee would not be able to get his train and would have to +drive five miles to the other railroad. + +However Uncle Tony was reckoning things from a Green Valley point of +view. As a matter of fact the wreckage was sufficiently cleared away +so that the eastbound trains were running on time. It was the +westbound ones that were stalled. The Los Angeles Limited Pullmans +stood right in the Green Valley station. They were still standing +there when Nanny and her father came to take the 10:27 east. + +Perhaps nothing could explain so well Nanny Ainslee's popularity as the +gathering of folks who came to see her off. + +Fanny had stopped at the drug store and bought some headache pills. + +"This excitement and hurry and you not scarcely eating any supper is +apt to give you a bad headache. They'll come handy. And here's some +seasick tablets. Martin says they're the newest thing out. And oh, +Nanny, when you're seeing all those new places and people just take an +extra look for me, seeing as I'll never know the color of the ocean." + +Uncle Tony was tending to Nanny's hand luggage and in his heart wishing +he could go along, even though he knew that one week spent away from +his beloved hardware store would be the death of him. + +It was a neighborly crowd that waited for the 10:27. And as it waited +Jim Tumley started singing "Auld Lang Syne." He began very softly but +soon the melody swelled to a clear sweetness that hushed the laughing +chatter and stilled the shuffling feet of the Pullman passengers who +crowded the train vestibules or strolled in weary patience along the +station platform. + +Then the 10:27 swung around the curve and the good-bys began. + +"So long, dear folks! I shall write. Don't you dare cry, Grandma. +I'll be back next lilac time. Remember, oh, just remember, all you +Green Valley folks, that I'll be back when the lilacs bloom again!" + +Nanny's voice, husky with laughter and tears, rippled back to the +cluster of old neighbors waving hats and handkerchiefs. They watched +her standing in the golden light of the car doorway until the train +vanished from their sight. Then they drifted away in twos and threes. + +From the dimmest corner of the observation platform a man had witnessed +the departure of Nanny Ainslee. He had heard Jim's song, had caught +the girl's farewells. And now he was delightedly repeating to himself +her promise--"I'll be back when the lilacs bloom again." + +Then quite suddenly he stepped from the train and made his way to where +the magenta-pink and violet lights of Martin's drugstore glowed in the +night. He bought a soda and some magazines and asked the druggist an +odd question. + +"When," asked the stranger, smiling, "will the lilacs bloom again in +this town?" + +Martin, who for hours had been rushing madly about, waiting on the +thirsty crowd of stalled visitors, stopped to stare. But he answered. +Something in the mysteriously rich face of the big, brown boy made him +eager to answer. + +"From the middle of next May on into early June." + +The stranger smiled his thanks in a way that made Martin look at his +clerk with a mournful eye. + +"Jee-rusalem! Now, Eddie, why can't you smile like that? Say, if I +had _that_ fellow behind this soda counter I'd be doing a rushing +business every night." + +When the Limited was again winging its way toward the Golden West and +train life had settled down to its regular routine, one dining-car +waiter was saying to another: + +"Yes, sah--the gentleman in Number 7 is sure the mighty-nicest white +man I eber did see. And he sure does like rice. Says he comes from +India where everybody eats it all the time. I ain' sure but what that +man ain' a sure-enough prince." + + + + +CHAPTER II + +SPRING IN GREEN VALLEY + +Traveling men have a poor opinion of it. Ministers of the gospel have +been known to despair of it. Socially ambitious matrons move out of it, +or, if that is not possible, despise it. Real estate men can not get +rich in it. And humorless folk sometimes have a hard, sad time of it in +Green Valley. + +But Uncle Tony, the slowest man in town but the very first at every fire +and accident, says that once, when the Limited was stalled at the Old +Roads Corner, a crowd of swells gathered on the observation platform and +sized up the town. + +One official, who--Uncle Tony says--couldn't have been anything less than +a Chicago alderman, said right out loud: + +"Great Stars! What peace--and cabbages!" + +And another said solemnly, said he, "This is the place to come to when +you have lost your last friend." And there was no malice, only a hungry +longing in his voice. + +The stylish, white-haired woman who, Uncle Tony guessed, must have been +the alderman's wife, said, "Oh--John! What healing, lovely gardens!" + +There's always a silly little wind fooling around the Old Roads Corners +and so you get all the sweet smells from Grandma Wentworth's herb garden +and all the heavenly fragrance that the flower gardens of this end of +town send out. + +Standing there you can look into any number of pretty yards but +especially Ella Higgins'. Of course Ella's yard and garden is a wonder. +It's been handed down from one old maid relative to another till in +Ella's time it does seem as if every wild and home flower that ever +bloomed was fairly rooted and represented there. It's in Ella's garden +that the first wild violets bloom; where the first spring beauty nods +under the bushes of bridal wreath; where the last chrysanthemum glows. + +Everybody in town got their lilies-of-the-valley roots and their yellow +roses from Ella. Her peonies and roses, pansies and forget-me-nots are +known clear over in Bloomingdale and bespoken by flower lovers in Spring +Road. And as for her tulips, well--there are little flocks of them +everywhere about, looking for all the world like crowds of gayly dressed +babies toddling off to play. + +The only time that poor Fanny Foster came near making trouble was when +she said that of course Ella's place was all right but that it had no +style or system, and that you couldn't have a proper garden without a +gardener. Ella had scolded Fanny's children for carelessly stripping the +lilacs. + +Fanny Foster is as wonderful in her way as Ella's garden, though not so +beautiful at first sight. Of course Green Valley loves Fanny Foster. +Green Valley has reason to. Fanny did Green Valley folks a great service +one still spring morning. But strangers just naturally misunderstand +Fanny. They see only a tall, sharp-edged wisp of a woman with a mass of +faded gold hair carelessly pinned up and two wide-open brown eyes fairly +aching with curiosity. You have to know Fanny a long time before the +poignant wistfulness of her clutches at your heart, before you can know +the singular sweetness of her nature. And even when you come to love her +you keep wishing that her collars were pinned on straight and that her +skirts were hung evenly at the bottom. There are those who remember the +time when Fanny was a beautiful girl, happy-go-lucky but always +kind-hearted. Now she is famous for her marvelous instinct for news +gathering and her great talent in weaving the odds and ends of +commonplace daily living into an interesting, gossipy yarn. Green Valley +without Fanny Foster would not be Green Valley, for she is a town +institution. + +However, before going any further into Green Valley's special characters +and institutions it would be well to get a general feel of the town into +one's mind. For it is only when you know how cozily Green Valley sets in +its hollows, how quaintly its old tree-shaded roads dip and wander about +over little sunny hills and through still, deep woods that you can guess +the charm of it, can believe in the joyousness of it. For Green Valley +is a joyous, sweetly human old town to those who love and understand it. + +Take an early spring day when the winter's wreck and rust and deadness +seem to be everywhere. Yet here in the Green Valley roads and streets +little warm winds are straying, looking for tulip beds and spring +borders. The sunshine that elsewhere looks thin and pale drops warmly +here into back yards and ripples ever so brightly up and down Rabbit's +Hill, where the hedges are turning green and David Allan is plowing. + +The willows back of Dell Parsons' house are budding and all aquiver with +the wildly glad, full-throated warblings of robins, bluebirds, red-winged +blackbirds and bobolinks. While somewhere from the swaying tops of last +year's reeds, up from the grassy slopes of Churchill's meadow, comes the +sweet, clear call of meadow larks. + +In the ditches the cushioning moss is green and through the brown tangled +weeds along Silver Creek the new grass is peeping. The sunny clearing +back of Petersen's woods will be full of mushrooms as the days deepen. +And already there are big golden dandelions in Widow Green's orchard. + +In these still, warm noons you can hear through the waiting, echoing air +the laughing shouts of playing children and the low-dropping honk of the +wild geese that in a scarcely quivering line are sailing northward across +the reedy lowlands which the gentle spring rains will turn into soft, +violet, misty marshes. + +The last bit of frost has thawed out of the old Glen Road and in the +young sunshine it seems to laugh goldenly as it climbs up, up to Jim +Gray's squatty, weathered little farmhouse. The eastern windows of this +little silver-gray house are gay with blossoming house plants and across +the back dooryard, flapping gently in the spring breeze, is a line of +gayly colored bed quilts. For Martha Gray has begun her house-cleaning. + +The woodsy part of Grove Street, the part that was opened up only five +years ago and is called Lovers' Lane because it curves and winds +mysteriously through a lovely bit of woodland, is already shimmering with +the life and beauty of spring. + +Down on Fern Avenue, which is a wide, grassy road and no avenue at all, +Uncle Roger Allan is carefully painting his chicken coops. Roger Allan +is a tall, twinkling, smooth-shaven old man, and he lives in a house as +twinkling and as tidy as himself. He is a bachelor, but years ago he +took little David from the dead arms of an unhappy, wild young stepsister +and has brought him up as his own. People used to know the reasons why +Roger Allan had never married but few remember now. Here he is at any +rate, painting his chicken coops and standing still every now and then to +stare off at Rabbit's Hill where his boy, tall, sturdy David Allan, is +plowing the warm, black fields. + +Up in a narrow lane, at the side window of a blind-looking little house, +sits Mrs. Rosenwinkle. She is German and badly paralyzed and she +believes that the earth is flat and that if you walked far enough out +beyond Petersen's pasture you would most certainly fall off. She also +believes that only Lutherans like herself can go to heaven. But to-day, +beside the open window, with a soft, wooing, eiderdown little breeze +caressing her face, she is happy and unworried, her eyes busy with the +tender world and the two chubby grandchildren tumbling gleefully about in +the still lane. + +In his little square shoe shop built out from his house Joe Baldwin is +arranging his spring stock in his two modest show windows. Joe is a +widower with two boys, a gentle voice, a gentle, wondering mind, and a +remarkable wart in the very center of his left palm. His shop is a +sunny, cheerful room with plenty of benches and chairs. The little shop +has a soft gray awning for the hot days and a wide-eyed competent stove +for cold ones. Nobody but Grandma Wentworth and such other folks like +Roger Allan ever suspect the real reason for all those comfortable +sitting-down places in Joe's shop. And Joe never tells a soul that it is +just an idea of his for keeping his own two boys and the boys of other +men under his eye. In Joe's gentle opinion the hotel and livery barn and +blacksmith shop are not exactly the best places for young boys to +frequent. But of course Joe never mentions such opinions out loud even +to the boys. He just makes his shop as inviting and homelike as +possible, keeps the daily papers handy on the counter and a basket of +nuts or apples maybe under his workbench. He is never lonely nor does he +miss a bit of news though he seldom goes anywhere but to the barber shop +on Saturdays and to church on Sundays. + +Out on her sunny cellar steps sits Mrs. Jerry Dustin, sorting onion sets +and seed potatoes. She is a little, rounded old lady with silvery hair, +the softest, smoothest, fairest of complexions, forget-me-not eyes and a +smile that is as gladdening as a golden daffodil. Few people know that +she has in her heart a longing to see the world, a longing so intense, a +life-long wanderlust so great that had she been a man it would have swept +her round the globe. But she has never crossed the State line. She has +big sons and daughters who all somehow have inherited their father's +stay-at-home nature. Her youngest boy, Peter, however, is only seventeen +and on him she has built her last hopes. He, like herself, has a gipsy +song in his heart and she often dreams of the places they will visit +together. + +And while she is waiting for Peter to grow up she travels about and +around Green Valley. She wanders far up the Glen Road into the deep +fairy woods between Green Valley and Spring Road. Here she strays alone +for hours, searching for ferns and adventure. + +Once a week she rides away to the city where she spends the morning in +the gay and crowded stores and the afternoon in the Art Institute. She +never wearies of seeing pictures. She never, if she can help it, misses +an exhibition, and whenever the day's doings have not tired her too much +this little old lady will steal off to the edge of the great lake and +dream of what lies in the world beyond its rim. She often wishes she +could paint the restless stretch of water but though she knows its every +mood and though she is a wonderful judge of pictures she can not +reproduce except in words the lovely nooks and beauty spots of her little +world. + +Perhaps it is this knowledge of her limitations that causes that little +strain of wistful sadness to creep into her voice sometimes and that +sends her very often out beyond the town, south along Park Lane to the +little Green Valley cemetery. + +She loves to read on the mossy stones the unchanging little histories, so +brief but so eloquent, some of them. The stone that interests her most +and that each time seems like a freshly new adventure is the simple shaft +that bears no name, no date, just the tenderly sweet and pathetic little +message: + + "I miss Thee so." + +Mrs. Jerry Dustin knows very well for whom that low green bed was made +and who has had that little message of lonely love cut into stone. But +she longs to know the rest of the story. + +Sometimes she has a real adventure. It was here at the cemetery one day +that she met Bernard Rollins, the artist. He was out sketching the +fields that lie everywhere about, rounding and rolling off toward the +horizon with the roofs of homesteads and barns just showing above the +swells, with crows circling about the solitary clusters of trees, and men +and horses plodding along the furrows. + +No artist could have passed Mrs. Jerry Dustin by, for in her face and +about her was the beauty that she had for years fed her soul. So Rollins +spoke to her that summer day and they are friends now, great friends. +She visits his studio frequently and he tells her all about France or +Venice or wherever he has spent his busy summer. And she sits and +listens happily. + +Rollins bought out what used to be in Chicago's young days an old tavern +and half-way house. It was a dilapidated old ruin, crumbling away in a +shaggy old orchard full of gnarled and ancient apple trees, satin-skinned +cherry trunks, some plums and peaches, and tangled shrubs of all kinds. + +With the aid of his wife Elizabeth, some dollars and much work, Rollins +transformed the old ruin into the sort of a country place that one reads +about and imagines only millionaires may have. They say that when Old +Skinflint Holden saw the transformation he stood stock-still, then tied +his team to the artistic hitching post under the old elms and went in +search of Rollins. He found him in the orchard in the laziest of +hammocks literally worshipping the flowering trees all about him. Old +Skinflint Holden was awed. + +"Jehohasaphat! Bern, how did you do it?" + +"Oh," smiled the artist, "we cleaned and patched it, put on a new bit +here and there and sort of nursed it into shape. Doc Philipps gave us +bulbs and seeds and loads of advice and then Elizabeth, I guess, sort of +loved it into a home." + +"Well--I guess," mused Skinflint Holden. "Must have cost you a pretty +penny?" + +"Why, no, it didn't. I'm telling you it wasn't a matter of dollars so +much as love. If you use plenty of that you can economize on the money +somewhat. Of course, it means work but love always means service, you +know." + +Old Skinflint Holden couldn't understand that sort of talk. It was said +that love was one of the things he knew nothing about. His great star +was money. He had had a chance to buy the old tavern but had seen no +possibilities in it of any kind. So he had passed it up and now a man +whose star was love and home had made a paradise of the hopeless ruin. + +"And I'll be danged if he didn't have a whole small field of them there +blue lilies that the children calls flags, over to one corner looking so +darn pretty, like a chunk of sky had dropped there. I'd a never believed +it if I hadn't saw it. I guess Doc Philipps didn't give him them." + +Rollins is a great crony of Doc Philipps who almost any day of the year +may be caught burrowing in the ground. For Doc Philipps is a tree maniac +and father to every little green growing thing. He knows trees as a +mother knows her children and he never sets foot outside his front gate +without having tucked somewhere into the many pockets about his big +person a stout trowel, some choice apple seeds, peach and cherry stones +or seedlings of trees and shrubs. In every ramble, and he is a great +walker, he searches for a spot where a tree seedling might grow to +maturity and the minute he finds such a place off comes his coat, back +goes his broad-rimmed hat and out comes the trowel and seed. Travelers +driving along the road and catching sight of the big man on his knees say +to each other, "There's Doc Philipps, planting another tree." + +Up in the big, prim old Howe house sits Madam Howe. She is called Madam +to distinguish her from her daughter-in-law, Mrs. George Howe. She is a +regal old lady of eighty-three and spends most of her time in her room +up-stairs where are gathered the wonderful heirlooms,--older, far older +than she. + +There is the mellow brown spinning wheel, and armchairs nearly two +hundred years old and a walnut table that was mixed up in countless +weddings and a beautifully carved old chest and a brocade-covered settee. +There are old, old books and family portraits and there is the wonderful +Madam herself, regal and silver-haired. If she likes you she will take +you to her great room and tell you about the Revolutionary War as it +happened in and to her family; and about her great ride westward in the +prairie schooner; about the Indians and the babyhood of great cities, and +the lovely wild flowers of the virgin prairie; about the wild animals, +the snakes, the pioneer men and women of what is now only the Middle West. + +She will take from out that age-darkened, beautiful chest dresses and +bits of lace and samplers like the one that hangs framed above her +writing desk and tells how it was stitched by one, + + ABIGAIL WINSLOW PAGE, + Age 13. + +There is one thing you must always remember if you wish to stand in +Madam's good graces. You must never sit down on the brocade-covered +settee with the beautiful rose wreath hand-carved on its gracefully +curving walnut back. Some day when she gets to know you very well she +will tell you of the wonderful love stories that were enacted on that +settee. She will begin away, away back with some great-great-grandmother +or some great-grand-aunt and come gradually down to her own time and +history; and as she tells of the young years of her life, her eyes will +go dreaming off into the past and she will forget you entirely. And you +will slip away from that great room and leave her sitting there, regal +and silver haired, her face mellow and sweet with the golden memories of +far, by-gone days. + +You can wander in this happy, aimless fashion all about Green Valley, go +in and out its deep-rooted old homes, stroll through its tree-guarded old +streets, and at every turn taste romance and adventure, revel in beauty +of some sort. Even the old, red-brick creamery, ugly in itself, is a +thing of beauty when seen against a sunset sky. + +The people who pass you on the streets all smile and nod, stranger though +you are. And if you happen to be at the little undistinguished depot +just as the 6:10 pulls in, you will see pouring joyously out of it the +Green Valley men, those who every day go to the great city to work and +every night come thankfully back to their little home town to live. + +They hurry along in twos and threes, waving newspaper and hand greetings +to the home folks and the store proprietors who stand in their doorways +to watch them go by. + +There is a fragrant smell of supper in the air and a slight feel of +coming rain. Here and there a mother calls a belated child. Doors slam, +dogs bark and a baby frets loudly somewhere. In somebody's chicken coop +a frightened, dozing hen gargles its throat and then goes to sleep again. +The frogs along Silver Creek and in Wimple's pond are going full blast, +and in her fragrant herb garden stands Grandma Wentworth. She is looking +at the gold-smudged western sky and watching the sweet, spring night sift +softly down on Green Valley. + +She stands there a long time sensing the great tide of new life that is +flushing the world into a new, tingling beauty. She sees the lacy +loveliness of the birches, the budding green glory of her garden. Then +she smiles as she tells herself: + +"It won't be long now till the lilacs bloom again. Nanny will be here +soon now. And who knows! Cynthia's boy may come back to live in his +mother's old home." + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE LAST OF THE CHURCHILLS + +Even in beautiful Los Angeles days can be rainy and full of gnawing +cold and gloom. + +On such a day Joshua Churchill lay dying. He could have died days +before had he cared to let himself do so. But he was holding on grimly +to the life he no longer valued and held off as grimly the death he +really craved. He was waiting for the coming of the boy who was so +soon to be the last of the Churchills. + +He meant, this grim old man, to live long enough to greet the boy whom +he remembered first as a baby, then as a little chap of ten, and later +as a shy boy of seventeen. + +Joshua Churchill had been to India several times. But he had never +stayed long. He said that no man who had spent the greater part of his +life in Green Valley could ever be happy or feel at home anywhere else. + +Joshua Churchill went to India to see his daughter and grandson; but +mostly to coax that daughter's wonderful husband to give up his +fanatically zealous work among the heathen of the Orient and come and +live in peace and plenty in a little Yankee town where there was a drug +store and a post office and a mossy gray old stone church with a mellow +bell in its steeple. + +The wonderful and big son-in-law always listened respectfully to his +big Yankee father-in-law. Then he would smile and point to the little +brown babies lying sick in their mothers' arms. + +"Somebody," he would say gently, "must help and heal and neighbor with +these people." + +As there was no answer that could be made to this the Yankee +father-in-law said nothing. But the very last time he was in India he +looked sharply at his daughter and then said wearily and bitterly: + +"Sinner and saint--we men are all alike. We each in our own way kill +the women we love. Cynthia is dying for a sight of Green Valley and +Green Valley folks." + +At that Cynthia's husband cried out. But Joshua Churchill did not stay +to argue. He went away and never came back. He wanted of course to go +back to Green Valley. But he could not bear to live alone in the big +house where he had once been so happy. So he went instead into exile. +And now he was dying in California. + +As for Cynthia's husband, he discovered when it was too late to do any +good that while he had been saving the souls and the children of alien +women and men he had let the woman who was dearer to him than life die +slowly and unnoticed. Saints have always done that and they always +will. + +Joshua Churchill meant to stay alive long enough to explain the +shortcomings of both saints and sinners to the boy who was the last of +the Churchills. He had half a mind to exact a promise from the boy. +He meant too to tell him a long and a rather strange story and implore +him to beware of a number of things. + +But when Cynthia's son,--tall, bronzed and serene, smiled down on the +old man who even in death had the look of a master, the warnings, the +bitterness melted away and Joshua Churchill smiled back and sighed +gratefully. + +"Well, son,--I don't know as that saint father of yours and your +sinning granddad made such a mess of things after all. It's something +to give the world a man. Go back home to Green Valley and marry a +Green Valley girl." + +And without bothering to say another word Joshua Churchill died. + +Nanny came back to her valley town when the budded lilacs dripped with +rain and the wooded hillsides were blurred with spring mists. + +But Green Valley rain never bothered Nanny Ainslee. Those who were not +out to greet her telephoned as soon as they heard she was back home +again. + +And just as she had gone to help pack, Grandma Wentworth came to help +unpack. There were three trunks besides those Nanny had taken, from +Green Valley. Nanny laughed and chuckled as she explained. + +"The joke's on father. We met up with a nice American chap on our +travels. He was so likable that father, who was pretty homesick by +that time and would have loved anything American, fell in love with +him. I can't quite understand why I didn't lose my head too. I came +mighty near it once or twice. But the minute I'd think of that boy +here in Green Valley I'd grow cool and calm. That's all that saved me, +I believe. But father was quite taken with him and being a man he felt +sure that I must be. He was so sure that my maiden days were over that +he dared to be funny. One day he sent up these three brand new trunks +to the hotel. Said I might as well get my trousseau while I was +gadding about this time. Well--I was pretty mad for a minute. But I +concluded that father wasn't the only one in our family who is fond of +a joke. So I just blushed properly and went off shopping. And I tell +you, Grandma, Green Valley will just grow cross-eyed looking at the +pretties that I have in these treasure chests. I showed Dad every +mortal thing I bought and asked his advice and was oh, so shy--and +wondered if he just _could_ let me spend so much; and Dad just laughed +and said he guessed an only daughter could be a bit extravagant, and to +just go ahead. So I smiled again shyly and demurely and went ahead. +And when not so much as a bit of ribbon or a chiffon veil could be +squeezed in anywhere I shut those trunks and sat on them and swung my +feet and bet Dad that I wouldn't marry that boy after all. And he was +so sure that he was rid of me at last and that he could start out on +his next trip blissfully free and alone that he bet me Jim Gray's +Gunshot that I'd be married in six months to the gentleman in question. +Of course it was a disgraceful business, the two of us betting on a +thing like that, but somehow we never thought of that, we were so busy +teasing each other. Well, of course Dad lost. I refused that nice +chap three times in one week. And here I am, heart-free still, with +three trunks of booty and the finest, blackest, and swiftest little +horse in the county--mine. This has certainly been a profitable trip! +Poor Dad, he's so delightfully old-fashioned. He does so believe in +early marriages and husbands and wedding veils. And he thinks that +twenty-three is absolutely a grewsome age. Poor Dad! And he says too +that for what I have done to him in this trunk deal I shall be duly +punished. That the good Lord who looks after the fathers of willful, +old-maidish daughters will see to that. Why, he has gone so far as to +say that he wouldn't be surprised if I wound up by marrying some weird +country minister. Fancy that! Why, that from father is almost a +curse. And he's worried sick about my riding Gunshot. But I shall +manage. So expect to see me dash up to your gate in great style any +day now." + +"Nanny," warned Grandma, "I don't trust that horse either. You'd +better be mighty careful. That horse isn't mean but it's young and +scary." + +Nan however laughed at fear and rode all about and around Green Valley +town. And then one evening when she was least watchful and tired from +the long day's sport, a glaring red motor came honking unexpectedly +around the corner. So sudden was its appearance, so startling its body +in the sunset light, so shrill its screeching siren, that the young +horse reared. And Nan, caught unprepared, was helpless. + +From the various groups of people standing about figures detached +themselves and shot across the square. But before any one could reach +her or even see how it happened, a tall stranger was holding the daring +girl close against his breast with one arm, and the quivering young +horse with the other. + +He was reassuring the frightened animal and looking quietly down at the +girl's face against his breast. Under that quiet look Nan's blue-white +lips flushed with life and she tried to smile gratefully. When he +smiled back and said, "So you _did_ get back by lilac time," Nan was +well enough to wonder what he meant. And the little crowd of rescuers +arrived only just in time to hear Nanny thanking him. + +But when he asked her where in Green Valley town Mary Wentworth lived +everybody stared and listened. Even Nan came near staring. But after +the puzzled look her face broke into a smile. + +"Oh--you mean Grandma Wentworth?" + +He smiled too and said, "Perhaps. I am a stranger in Green Valley. +But my mother was a Green Valley girl. She was Cynthia Churchill and +Mary Wentworth was her dearest friend." + +"Then you are--why, you must be--" stammered Nanny. + +"I am Cynthia Churchill's son." + +"From India?" questioned Nan. + +"From India," he said quietly. + +From out the group of Green Valley folks, now dim in the May twilight, +a voice spoke. + +"You may come from India but if you are Cynthia Churchill's son you are +a Green Valley man and this is home. So I say--welcome home." + +Roger Allan, straight and tall and speaking with a sweetness in his +voice those listening had never heard before, stepped up to the young +man with outstretched hand. + +The young stranger looked for a moment at the dimming streets, into the +kindly faces about him, and then shook hands gladly. + +"It is good to be home," he said, "but I wish I had mother here with +me." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +A RAINY DAY + +On a rainy day Green Valley is just as interesting as it is in the +sunshine. Somehow though the big trees sag and drip and the wind sighs +about the corners there is nothing mournful about the streets. + +The children go to school just as joyously in raincoats and rubber +boots. Their round glad faces, minus a tooth here and there, smile up +at you from under big umbrellas. After the school bell rings the +streets do get quiet but there is nothing depressing about that; for as +you pass along you see at doors and windows the contented faces of busy +women. + +Old Mrs. Walley sits at her up-stairs front window sewing carpet rags. +Grandma Dudley at her sitting room window is darning her +grandchildren's stockings and carefully watching the street. Whenever +anybody passes to whom she wants to talk she taps on the window with +her thimble. She is a dear entertaining old soul but hard to get away +from. Women with bread at home waiting to be put into pans and men +hungry for their supper try not to let Grandma Dudley catch sight of +them. + +Bessie Williams always makes cinnamon buns or doughnuts on rainy days. +She always leaves her kitchen door open while she is doing this because +she says she likes to hear the rain while she is working--that it +soothes her nerves. + +So as you come up from around Bailey's strawberry patch and Tumley's +hedge you get a whiff of such deliciousness as makes your mouth water. +And more than likely Bessie sees you and comes running out with a few +samples of her heavenly work. As you dispose of those cinnamon buns +you forget that Bessie's voice is a trifle too high and too sweet, and +that she is inclined to be at times a bit overly religious and too +watchful of what she calls "vice" in people. + +Over in front of the hotel Seth Curtis is standing up in his wagon and +sawing his horses' mouths cruelly. Seth has been so viciously +mistreated in his youth that he now abuses at times the very things +that he loves. He has paid two hundred and fifty dollars apiece for +those horses and is mighty proud of them. But Seth's temper is never +good on a rainy day. Rain means no teaming and a money loss. Seth is +a mite too conscious of money. At any rate, the loss of even a dollar +makes him a sullen and at the least provocation an angry man. He isn't +liked much except by his wife and children. + +In his home Seth is gentle and kind. Maybe because here he finds the +love and trust that all his life he has craved and been denied. Few of +his neighbors know how he laughs and romps and sings with his children +and what wonderful yarns he tells them, all made up out of his own head. + +He is known to come from York State and has a Yankee shrewdness that +some people say can at times be called something else. He is wide and +square-shouldered though short, has a round stubborn head of reddish +hair with a promising bald spot, close-set blue eyes and an annoying, +almost an insulting habit of paying all his bills promptly and asking +odds and favors of nobody. + +To-day he was to have taken a load of stones, granite niggerheads of +all sizes, up to Colonel Stratton's place. The Colonel is going to +make a fern bed around his summer house. + +Colonel Stratton is a real military colonel. He wears burnsides and +they are very becoming. He has the most beautifully located residence +in Green Valley and like Doc Philipps has some of the most beautiful +trees in town. The great silver-leaf poplar guarding the wide front +lawns and the magnificent hardwood maples are the pride of the +colonel's heart. + +The colonel has a cultivated garden that keeps his gardener pretty +busy. But the wild-flower garden along the rambling old north fence +the colonel tends himself. In June it is a hedge of lovely wild roses +followed a little later by masses of purple phlox. Then come the +meadow lilies and the painted cup and so on, until in late October you +can not see the old fence for the goldenrod, asters and gentians. + +Today the colonel hoped to work on his fern bed but the weather being +what it is he takes instead from his well-filled book shelves "The +Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" and settles down to a day of +solid joy. + +In the big, softly stained house that stands in the solemn shade of +immense pines, just diagonally across from the colonel's house, lives +and labors Joshua Stillman, a man with the most wonderful memory, the +readiest tongue when there is real need of it, a little man brimful of +the most varied information and the sharpest humor. + +For forty years and more he has been Green Valley's self-appointed +librarian. He draws no salary except the joy of doing what he loves to +do and he squanders, as his friends truly suspect, much secret money of +his own on it. The library is housed in the old church in a room so +small and dark that it hides the big work of this little man. + +Joshua Stillman must be old but nobody ever thinks of what his age +might be, he is so very much alive. He goes to the city every day and +comes back early every afternoon. As he so seldom talks about himself +nobody knows exactly what he does except that it has to do with books +and small print. + +Like Madam Howe, Joshua Stillman comes from the Revolutionary War +district and has great family traditions to uphold. He upholds them +with great humor. Not only is he full of old war and family lore, but +he has been mixed up with things literary. He has known men such as +Lowell and tells yarns about Emerson and Oliver Wendell Holmes. + +He too came West in a prairie schooner and remembers all its wildness, +its uncouthness, its railroadless state. And he tells marvellous +stories about snakes, Indians and the little Chicago town built out on +the mudflats. He remembers very well indeed the steady stream of +ox-teams toiling over the few crude state roads. And he has in his +house rare volumes, valuable editions of famous works. He lets you +examine these if he thinks you are trustworthy and have a gentle way +with books. + +There is another rare soul, the Reverend Alexander Campbell, who must +be introduced this rainy spring day. He is a retired Green Valley +minister and is full of humor and wisdom. He is an easily traced +descendant of the Scottish Stuarts. On a rainy day you will always +find him busy writing up the history of his family. Not that he +himself cares a fig for his genealogy. He is writing the book because +it gives him something to do and earns him a little peace from the +women folks. + +He is a man whom the Lord has seen fit to try with a host of female +relatives, all family proud. He can fight the Devil and has done so +quite gallantly in four or five volumes of really good old-fashioned +sermons, "books," as he will tell you with a twinkle in his eye, "that +nobody could or would read nowadays." But he can not fight the women +of his family, so with a mournful chuckle he sits down every rainy day +and labors mightily on this great "historical work." + +On sunny days he goes about his grounds, petting his trees and his +chickens, and working in his garden. He has several ingenious methods +of fighting weeds and raises the earliest, best and latest sweet corn +in Green Valley. + +But men like the Colonel and Joshua Stillman and the Reverend Alexander +Campbell are representatives of Green Valley's leisure class. They +give Green Valley its high peace, its aristocratic flavor. But they +are a little remote from the town's workday life, being given to dreams +and memories and scholarly pursuits. They know little of the doings +and talks that go on in Billy Evans' livery barn, or the hotel. They +do, of course, go to the barber shop, the bank and the postoffice, and +always when abroad give courteous greeting to every townsman. But they +have never sat in the smoky, red-painted blacksmith shop or among the +patriarchs and town wits who in summer keep open-air sessions on the +wide, inviting platform in front of Uncle Tony's hardware store, and in +winter hold profound meetings around the store's big, glowing stove. + +Uncle Tony's is the most social spot in town and is from a +news-gathering point of view most ideally situated. Sitting in one of +the smooth-worn old armchairs that Uncle Tony always keeps handy, you +can view the very heart of Green Valley's business life. Without +turning your head scarcely you can keep an eye on Martin's drug store, +keep tab on the comings and goings of the town's two doctors, and the +hotel's arriving and departing guests. If a commotion of any kind +occurs in front of Robert Hill's general store you see all the details +without losing count of the various parties who go in and out of Green +Valley's new bank. + +Twice a day the active part of Green Valley dribbles into the +post-office where friends instantly pair off and mere acquaintances +stand idly by and discuss the weather. Besides its mail, Green Valley +usually buys two cents' worth of yeast and a dozen of baker's buns and +then goes down the street and orders its regular groceries at Jessup's. + +Jessup's has been the one Green Valley grocery store ever since the +flood or thereabout, so venerable an establishment is it. Green Valley +would as soon think of changing its name as permitting a new grocer to +open up a rival store. And nobody dreams of disloyalty when buying +trifles at the post-office. In fact housewives are openly glad that +Dick, the postmaster, has taken to keeping strictly fresh yeast for +their leisure days and nice bakery things for times of stress and +unexpected company. + +Dick Richards is a small, smiling, curly-headed man who looks older +than he should. This is because he wears a big man's mustache and is a +self-made boy. His parents died when he was barely old enough to +realize his loss and since then he has fought the world without a +single weapon unless cheerfulness and a giant patience can be called +weapons. Small, ungifted, he early learned to be content with little. +But side by side with this cheerful content is always the giant hope of +great things to come. And so though Green Valley buys only its yeast +and buns over his little counter he is happy and wraps each purchase up +carefully. And all the time he is thoughtfully, carefully setting out +other handy things and aids to the harassed housewife. For with his +giant patience Dick is waiting,--waiting and planning for a time that +is coming, that he knows must come. He talks these matters over with +no one except Joe Baldwin. He and Joe are great friends. Joe's little +shop is such a restful, hopeful place and Joe himself a gentle rather +than a loud and swearing man. One can talk things over joyfully with +Joe and feel sure of having one's confidence understood and kept. Like +Joe, Dick shrinks a little from the noisy, wholly earthy atmosphere of +the livery barn and blacksmith shop. He and Joe often go together of a +Saturday to the barber shop. They usually stay after closing hours for +the barber is their mutual friend. + +This barber, John Gans, is a talker, a somewhat fierce and vehement +little man who lectures on many subjects but mostly on human rights and +politics. Joe and Dick, both silent men, look with awe at John's great +mental and discoursive powers. And because his views are theirs they +listen with something like joyful gratitude to hear their own thoughts +so clearly and fearlessly expressed. + +The fiery little barber is thought by some to be a German anarchist and +by others a Russian socialist. Joe and Dick have been repeatedly +warned against him. But they are his loyal friends at all times. This +three-cornered friendship is little understood by the town and +ridiculed as a childish thing by the great minds that foregather at +Uncle Tony's. + +But Grandma Wentworth remarked one Saturday afternoon, right in the +heart of town too, when Main Street was so crowded that everything that +was said aloud would be told and retold at church the next moraine and +repeated through the countryside the week following,--pointing to Joe, +Dick and John who all three happened to be going to the bank for +change,--"There go Green Valley's three good little men. And that +makes me think. I have another letter from Nanny Ainslee from Italy +enclosing foreign stamps for John." + +Now until then nobody knew that John Gans was collecting stamps. But +that's Grandma Wentworth. She always knows things about people that +nobody else knows. And when any Green Valley folks go a-traveling they +sooner or later write to Grandma Wentworth. Sooner or later they get +homesick for Green Valley and they write for news to the one person +who, they know, will not fail to answer. + +Of course some of them, like Jamie Danby, get into trouble. Jamie ran +away from home with a third-rate show. The show got stranded somewhere +in the western desert and Jamie wanted to come home. He knew that his +mother would be glad to see him but he wasn't at all sure of his +father. So he wrote to Grandma Wentworth, begging her to fix things +up. And she did. + +And there was Tommy Dudley who went away home-steading somewhere out +West and who writes regularly to Grandma Wentworth in this fashion: + +". . . for heaven's sake send me your baking-powder biscuit recipe and +how do you make buckwheat pancakes, and send me all kinds of vegetable +seeds and what's good for chicken lice and a sore throat, and tell +Carrie Bailey I ain't forgot her and that as soon as I've got things +going half-way straight here I'll come back and get her. Just now the +dog, the mules and chickens and a family of mice and I are all living +peacefully together in the one room but we're awful healthy if a good +appetite is any kind of a sign. I can't write to Carrie because her +folks open all her letters and they'd nag her into marrying that old +knock-kneed, squint-eyed, fat-necked son-of-a-gun of an Andrew Langly, +if they thought she was having anything to do with a worthless heathen +cuss like me. And say, Grandma, throw in some of your flower seeds, +those right out of your own garden, you know, the tall ones along the +fence and the little ones with the blue eyes and the still white ones +that smell so sweet. You don't know how lonesome I get off here. I've +got that picture of you in the sunbonnet right where it's handy, but +how I wish I had a picture of you without the sunbonnet so's I could +see your face, and say, Grandma, since I've been alone out here I've +come to see the sense in praying now and then, and tell Freddy Williams +I'll knock the stuffin's out of him when I hit town which will be in +about two years at the latest. He knows what for. Is Hank Lolly still +talking his way into three square meals a day and drinks, and is all +the news still ground over at Uncle Tony's gossip factory and is Mert +Hagley as big a tightwad as ever and is it true that Billy Evans +married a red-headed girl from Bloomingdale and started a livery barn, +and has Green Valley got a minister yet that's suitable to you and +Uncle Roger Allan? I'll have to stop and run out to the mail box with +this. The nearest one is twenty-five miles away but that's near in +this country and now for pity's sake, Grandma, don't forget . . ." + +She didn't forget a thing. The messages were all delivered, the seeds +sent off and every question fully answered. Grandma did more than +that. She had Nanny Ainslee take pictures of the various Green Valley +institutions while going full blast. How Tommy laughed at the familiar +faces in Uncle Tony's armchairs and at Hank Lolly leaning up against +the livery barn, and how homesick he grew as he looked at the crowd +getting off at the station, and the school children playing in the old +school yard where he used to play. The picture of Grandma Wentworth +and Carrie standing on Grandma's front porch hurt his throat and shook +him strangely. That was Tommy Dudley. + +And there was Susie Melton. Grandma saved and remade Susie that time +she went to New York to see the world. Susie had taught a country +school for twenty years, ever since she was sixteen, and that trip to +New York was her first vacation. Susie was an innocent soul and the +very second day in the great city some heartless thief took everything +out of her purse but a two-cent stamp. Susie was panic-stricken and +the only thing she could think of was Grandma Wentworth's face. So she +took that stamp and sent a letter to Green Valley and it was Grandma +Wentworth who really managed that vacation though to this day nobody +but she herself knows how and she won't tell. Susie came back so +rejuvenated, with such color in her cheeks, such brightness in her +eyes, and so much snap and spunk in her system that Jake Tuttle up and +married her two months after she came home. And he's been happy ever +since for in spite of her school-teaching handicap Susie has turned out +to be a born cook and housewife. And as if to make up to her those +twenty colorless years Providence sent Susie twin boys at the end of +her first year and twin girls at the end of the third. + +This blossoming out of little drab Susie Melton was a shock to Green +Valley. But Grandma Wentworth wasn't a mite surprised and said she +knew that Susie would come into her own some day. As for Jake, he is +so in love with his rosy little wife and his four good-looking children +that he just goes on raising bumper crops without hardly knowing how he +does it. And he says he doesn't hanker much after heaven; that home is +plenty good enough for him. And when he goes to town Jake takes care +to tie his team in front of Billy Evans' place instead of the hotel. + +"Not that I can't take a drink or two and stop," he explained to Billy, +"but I have good cider and buttermilk and Susie's grape juice to home +and the smartest of us ain't any too wise while we stand beside a bar. +And I'd ruther go home dead than go back to Susie and the children the +least bit silly with liquor. When the Almighty sends a man like me a +family like mine He's got something in His mind and I ain't agoing to +spoil things just for a drink or two of slops." + +So on rainy days Billy's office is the gathering place for such men as +find the atmosphere in the hotel and blacksmith shop a little too +fragrantly spirited for their eventual domestic happiness. + +Not that Billy is a teetotaler. No, indeed. He has his drink whenever +he wants it. And he good-naturedly permits such staggering wretches as +the hotel refuses to accommodate to sleep it off in his barns. And he +is the only man in Green Valley who ever seriously hired Hank Lolly and +kept him sober twelve hours at a stretch. The other business men make +considerable fun of Billy's hired help; the trifling boys he hires, +boys that everybody else has tried and sent packing. Billy says +nothing though he did explain fully to Grandma Wentworth once. + +"You see it's like this, Grandma. I ain't fixed to pay fancy wages +just yet and those kids that everybody runs down ought to be off the +streets doing something. Of course some of them _are_ trifling. But I +ain't such a stickler for sharp-edged goodness myself nor in any way at +all virtuous. I'm terrible easy-going myself and I know just how kids +like Charlie Pinley feel working for a man, a careful, exact man like +Mr. James D. Austin. By gosh! if I had to work a whole week for Mr. +Austin I'd kill myself. Never could stand too much neatness and +worrying about time being money and human nature too full of meanness. +No, sir,--I can't live like that. I guess maybe it's because I'm kind +of no-account myself that I understand these kids and they understand +me. They all like horses same as me and I pay them all I can afford +and will do more for them when things pick up and grow. + +"Now there's people as laugh about me hiring Hank Lolly. I guess it's +the first time Hank has ever held a job longer than a week. But I tell +you, Grandma, I like Hank and I understand him. And I don't ever think +I'm fit enough myself to be forever preaching at him about reforming. +I figure that what a man eats and drinks is none of my business in a +way. But I did explain to Hank that if he would come and work for me +I'd furnish him with so many drinks every day and meals and a +comfortable place to sleep. I showed him that it was better to be sure +of a few drinks every day than to get blind drunk on a week's wages and +then go weeks maybe without a decent spree, without decent meals, maybe +without underwear and an overcoat. And Hank saw the sense of that. He +gets his meals up at the house. My old woman (Billy's wife was a +pretty girl of twenty-three and still a bride) sides in with what I'm +doing and she sets Hank down every day to three square meals. And a +man just can't hold so much liquor on a comfortably filled stomach. +Anyhow, Hank is doing fine and I'm putting a few dollars in the bank +unbeknownst for him. I can't trust him just yet with any noticeable +amount of cash. But I'm never down on him for his drinking. No, sir! +Every time he feels that he must get drunk or die why he just comes up +and tells me and I get him whatever he thinks he needs for his jag and +let him get full right here where I can watch him. Why--Grandma, Hank +has an easier life than I have. He doesn't need to worry about +anything and he knows it. And I'll be goshed if I don't think he's +improving. He don't need a jag near so often as he used to and I can +trust him now with any kind of work. Why, only last week I gave him a +moving job, a big one, and sent him off twenty miles with my two best +teams. And he brought those loads of furniture back O. K., dry and +without a scratch, though I couldn't sleep all night listening to the +buckets of rain dashing against the house and thinking of Hank drunk +out there in it with the furniture and wagons in splinters and the +horses dead maybe. And honest, when I saw him pull up into the barns, +I just hauled him off that seat and--well--I just said things, told him +what I thought of him and how I appreciated what he'd done. 'And now, +Hank,' I says, 'you can have the greatest old jag you've ever planned +on for this.' + +"And I'm goshed if he didn't laugh out kind of funny and says he, +'Billy, I'm so goldarned wet right now that I couldn't stand another +drop of wetness anywhere. But all these five hours that the rain was +a-sloshing me I kept thinking of them there apple dumplings with cream +that Mrs. Evans makes (Hank always calls the old woman Mrs. Evans). +So, Billy, if it's all the same to you and I could get full on them +there apple dumplings, why, them's my choice.' + +"Well--say, I just jumped to the telephone and I guess the old woman +was making apple dumplings before I got through talking. Anyway, Hank +filled up so that he said he felt like a flour barrel with an apple +tree a-sprouting out of it. And Doc Philipps says it's a good sign, +Hank liking sweet things that way, because a man soaked in alcohol +can't abide sweets. + +"And so that's Hank. Now this week I hired that little spindle-legged +Barney boy. I hired him to keep this dumbed office clean so's my old +woman wouldn't raise such hell every time she steps in here. I'm +goshed if this here stove don't get fuller of ashes quicker than any +other stove in Green Valley. And you know the boys who come in here do +spit about careless like and that dumbed screen door is always open and +the calendars do get specked up considerable. And the old woman is +just where I don't want her being upset about anything. + +"Well, I hired that Barney boy to keep the place clean. You know that +So-and-So (we won't mention any names) fired him because he said the +kid stole money. Well, now--Grandma, you know that's a hard thing to +start out a boy in life with in a town of this size, especially a +little spindle-legged one at that. I felt real sorry for the young one +so I calls him in here day before yisterday and I says: + +"'Look here, Barney, could you keep this place clean?' + +"'Sure,' he says. + +"'All right, then sail in now. The broom's right behind the door +somewheres and scarcely used and there's sawdust and rags somewheres in +the barn. Ask Hank about them. And Barney,' I says, 'here's the money +in this right-hand drawer. Sometimes people come in when everybody's +out and you might have to make change.' + +"The boy kind of flushed but I didn't let on I noticed. I only said, +'You know, Barney, I'm just beginning this business and I'm poor so you +keep a sharp eye on the change and help me get this business going +lickety-split so's we'll all be rich together. For when the profits go +up here the wages are going up. It isn't just my livery barn, Barney, +but yours, too, so just you go to it and if ever you want anything or +make a mistake just you come and tell me and it'll be all right.' + +"Now, Grandma, that's all I said to that young one and I'll be goshed +if I don't think that kid's turning out to be the best bet I've made. +But, of course, I always think that about every one of them. But, +honestly, Grandma, Barney has brought in five new customers and last +week he kept chinning and holding on to a sixth man that come in here +until I came in and made the deal. Never let go of him a minute and +just entertained him to kill time and give me a chance to get here. +And I'm going to buy some books to learn myself and Barney bookkeeping. +We can't none of us keep books here and that dumbed account book is +lost every time you want it and I've got the poorest memory. Of +course, now and then a party comes in and tries to get out of paying +but the boys usually settle him and so I don't lose much that way. But +the old woman wants me to do this slick and proper and her word goes. +So Barney and I are going to study. + +"I'm telling you all this, Grandma, because you always did understand +my crazy way of doing things ever since that time when you sent me to +the store for that can of molasses and I give the money to the tramp +instead. Remember?" + +Billy laughed heartily at the memory and Grandma Wentworth laughed, +too, laughed so hard that she had to wipe her eyes. And she smiled all +the way home. + +"Some day," said Grandma Wentworth to her old friend and neighbor, +Roger Allan, "I'll ask some minister to preach a sermon on 'God's +Humor.' I suppose that the Almighty gets so tired running things just +so and listening to petitions for sunshine and petitions for rain and +to prayers for automobiles and diamonds and interest on mortgages and +silk stockings, death and babies that some days he just gets tired of +being a serious God and shuffles things up for a joke. And, mark me, +Roger, that boy, Billy Evans, is just one of God's tender jokes. If +only people would see that and laugh. + +"Now, Billy has no money sense, no business ability. That's what the +real business men like George Hoskins and all the old blessed Solomons +at Uncle Tony's say. Yet Billy is making money. His business is +growing just because without knowing it Billy has got hold of the +biggest force in the world to run his business. He's just using +love,--plain, old-fashioned love,--and love is making money for Billy. +He's picked out of the very gutters all the human waste and rubbish +that the others, the wise business men, threw there and with the town's +worst drunkard and half a dozen mistreated, misborn, misunderstood boys +he's playing the business game and winning. He's got the knack of +making his help feel like partners and he's so square and sensible in +his dealings with them that they are all ready to die for him. Now if +that isn't the greatest kind of a business gift I want to know. + +"And every time I think of smiling, untidy Billy Evans with a pretty +wife as neat as wax, living in a house that she has made as sweet and +pretty as a picture--well--I just laugh. Nobody but God could have +arranged things and balanced them up like that. Talk about any of us +improving things in this world! If we'd only learn to mind our own +business as well as God minds His." + +But very few besides Grandma Wentworth understood Billy and his livery +barn. Even Joe Baldwin failed to see just what Billy was doing in his +droll, unconscious, warm-hearted way. Still Joe liked Billy. In fact, +everybody liked Billy. And he was welcomed everywhere and nowhere more +than in George Hoskins' blacksmith shop. + +Next to the bank building George Hoskins was considered the most solid +thing in town. He was the brawny blacksmith and people said a very +rich man. He was big in every way. Big in body, big in temper, big in +his friendships, big in his drinks. He was indeed so big a man that he +did not know how to be mean or little in any way. He did not know his +own great strength nor think much of the weakness of his fellows. His +grand proportions and great simplicity were what attracted men to him. +Women did not know and so could not like him. + +To them George Hoskins was a great, grimy ogre. George, big in all +things, was big in his love for the tiny woman who was his wife. Other +women George did not see though he spoke to them on the street. He had +pleaded on bended knees for the love of his tiny woman and when he got +her all other women became just strange shadows. So only his wife and +Doc Philipps knew how tender a heart was his. + +Green Valley housewives caught glimpses of this man's great figure +towering above the roaring forge and saw the crowd of lesser men, their +husbands, gathered about him. They went home and told each other that +George Hoskins was a big, rude brute, that he drank like a fish and +would bring the town to ruin, for he was the village president. + +And while they were saying these things about George Hoskins he was +perhaps throwing out of his shop some smug traveling man who had +stepped into it to get in out of the rain and had mistakenly tried to +make himself at home there by telling a filthy yarn that sullied all +womanhood. + +These then are a few of the many human attractions of Green Valley. +They are listed here to give the right sort of setting and the proper +feel to this story of Green Valley life. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +CYNTHIA'S SON + +So Cynthia's son came home and Green Valley took him to its heart and +loved him as it had loved his mother long ago. Everywhere he was +spoken of as Cynthia's boy and no one seemed to remember that he was +born in heathen India instead of in the old porticoed house on the +Churchill farm. + +Green Valley knew that very first week, of course, that Cynthia's son +was very nearly twenty-eight years old and that his full name was John +Roger Churchill Knight. But what it did not know for some weeks was +that among other interesting things Cynthia's son was a minister, a +duly certified preacher of the gospel. It was remembered in a general +way that Cynthia's husband had been some sort of a wonderful foreign +missionary or something; but a man who was Joshua Churchill's only +grandchild and heir needed no other ancestor. So Green Valley was +astounded one Sunday morning, when the Reverend Campbell was +unexpectedly ill, and the Reverend Courtney off somewhere answering a +new call, and Green Valley without a pastor, to have Cynthia's boy +quietly offer to take charge of the services. + +If Green Valley was astounded to hear that Cynthia's son was a minister +it was too awed to speak in anything but an amazed whisper of that +first sermon that the tall young man from India talked off so quietly +from the pulpit of the old gray stone church. + +To this day they tell how without a scrap of paper to look at, without +raising his voice in the slightest, this boy made Green Valley listen +as it had never listened before. For an hour he talked and for that +length of time Green Valley neighbored with India, saw it as plainly as +if it was looking over an unmended, sagging old fence right into +India's back yard. + +With the simplicity of a child this boy with Cynthia Churchill's eyes +and smile and voice told of Indian women and children and Indian homes. +The colors, the smells, the mystic beauty and the dark tragedy of it he +painted and then very gently and easily he told of his trip back to his +mother's home town and so without a jar he landed his listeners, +wide-eyed, breathless and prayerfully thankful for their manifold +blessings back in their own sunlit and tree-guarded streets. + +For no reason at all seemingly Green Valley began to wipe its eyes and +come out of its trance. Neighbor looked at neighbor and strange things +were seen to have happened. + +Old man Wiley, the aged and chronically sleepy janitor was actually +sitting wide awake. Old Mrs. Vingie, who for years annoyed every Green +Valley parson by holding her hand to her right ear and pretending to be +deafer than she really was, was sitting bolt upright, both ears and +hands forgotten. For once Dolly Beatty forgot to fuss with her hat or +admire her hands in the new lavender gloves two sizes too small. The +choir even forgot to flirt and yawn and never once looked bored or +superior. + +Jimmy Rand, after having carefully inserted in his hymn book a copy of +Diamond Dick's latest exploits, forgot to read it. And the row of +little boys whose mothers always made them sit in the very first pew +never so much as thought of kicking each other's shins or passing a +hard pinch down the line or even quietly swapping lucky stones and fish +hooks for a snake skin or a choice piece of colored glass. + +Why, it was even reported that Mert Hagley so far forgot himself as to +absent-mindedly drop a bill into the basket when it came by. Some +said, of course, that Mert was after the repair work on the old +Churchill homestead but those nearest Mert swore that this could not +be, that Mert had looked as surprised as those around him when he saw +what he had done. Green Valley laughed and said a miracle had +happened. And even Seth Curtis got curious and remarked that he had +half a mind to go and hear the boy himself, that anybody who could peel +a bill off of Mert Hagley's roll was surely a curiosity. + +Cynthia's son had walked with Roger Allan through the twilight of his +first real day in Green Valley to Grandma Wentworth's cottage and the +three had sat talking until the small hours. Then Grandma had taken +Cynthia's tall son up-stairs into the large airy guest room. She came +down a little later to find Roger gazing at a framed photograph of a +long gone day. + +She came and looked too at the group of young faces. At herself, then +a girl of eighteen; at the boy beside her who later became her husband; +and at Cynthia, lovely Cynthia Churchill, laughing out at life in her +sweet yet serious way. + +"Well, Roger," Grandma spoke softly with a hint of tears in her voice, +"we have waited years, you and I, for a message from her, a heart +message. And now it has come--it has come. She has sent us her boy." + +"Yes," breathed Roger Allan, "she has sent us the message--she has sent +me her son." + +They knew, these two, why he had come. It may be that even the tall +young man whose father and mother were sleeping the long sleep in +far-off India may have guessed why in the end the frail but still +lovely mother had begged him to go back to Green Valley, to its sweet +old homes and warm-hearted folk. To bring comfort and find it--that +had been the little mother's plan. + +He believed he would find it. The loneliness that had tired him so +ever since his mother slipped away was no longer a sharp, never silent +pain, a great emptiness, but rather a sweet sorrow that was almost a +friend. + +He slept in the big airy room with its patchwork quilt of blue and +white, its rugs and curtains to match, and looked at pictures of his +mother. From the windows he watched the sun rise and shine on the +merry little hills and the yellow road that wound up to his mother's +old home. As he breathed in the wine of the spring mornings he +comprehended the great hunger, the wild longing, that at times must +have overwhelmed the little mother in those last days in India. And he +thought he understood those last words of hers. + +"Son, you must stay with your father as long as he needs you. But when +that duty is over you must go back to the little green town on the +other side of the world. Your father and I brought a message to India. +You must take one back to my people. Oh, you will love it--you will +love it--the little dear town full of friends and everywhere the +fragrance of home. Oh, there are many there who will love you for my +sake and who will make up to you for--me." + +Her hand caressed his hair and her voice trailed off into a sigh for +she knew what he didn't, wouldn't believe--that she was never to see +that little green town across the gray-green ocean waves. + +At the very last she had whispered: + +"Oh, Boy of Mine, when you go home greet them all for me. And if ever +you go to rummaging about in the attic remember you must never open the +square trunk with the brass nail heads unless Mary Wentworth is there +to explain. Tell Mary I love her and that I am not sorry. She will +understand." + +So as he looked out of Grandma Wentworth's upstairs windows he +remembered those last talks and understood that yearning for home. +When he had been in Green Valley only a few weeks the old life began to +grow vague and unreal. The mother was real and near. But the splendid +figure of his father was fading into a strange memory. He was a father +to be proud of, that strong, cool, selfless man who had asked nothing +of life but to take what it would of him. + +He had seemed so towering, so enduring, that preacher father. Yet when +the frail mother went the strong man followed within a year. So then +there was nothing to do but go home to Green Valley. He went. And the +spirit of the vivid little mother seemed to have come with him. Every +day that he spent in the town that had reared her seemed to bring her +nearer. He could picture her going about the sunny roads and friendly +streets and stopping to chat and neighbor with Green Valley folks. + +So he too roamed over the town and chatted and neighbored as he felt +she would have done. That was how he came to know every nook and +cranny, every turn of the happily straying roads and all the lame, odd, +damaged and droll characters that make a town home just as the +broken-nosed pitcher, the cracked old mirror in an up-stairs bedroom, +and the sagging old armchair in the shadowy corner of the sitting room +make home. + +Not only did he come to know these people but he understood them. For +his was the quick eye and interpreting heart willed him by a great +father and an equally great mother. And because he came into Green +Valley with a fresh mind and a keen appetite for life nothing escaped +him, not even old Mrs. Rosenwinkle sitting in paralyzed patience beside +the open window of her little blind house. + +He was strolling one day up the little grassy lane, thinking that it +led into the cool, thick grove back of the little house that stared so +blindly out into the green world. He had been following a new bird and +it had darted into the grove. So he came upon the little house and the +still grim old soul who sat at the open window as if to guard that +little end of the world. + +It was a snug, still spot, that little green lane, and was so carpeted +with thick grasses and screened with verdure that the harsh noises of a +chattering, working world could not ruffle its peace and serenity. +Cynthia's son filled it and the still, lonely old woman was fascinated +with his bigness, his merry gladness, but most of all with his +understanding friendliness. She told him all her story, her past +trials and present griefs. And he told her strange things about people +he had seen in other parts of the world, blind people living in foul +alleys instead of sunny lanes, crippled ones with neither home nor kin +of any kind. He told her much but made no effort to convince her that +the earth was round, and when he went he left with her the very fine +pair of field glasses with which he had been tracking the wonderful +song bird that had escaped him. He showed her how to use them and for +the first time in fifteen years old Mrs. Rosenwinkle forgot that she +was paralyzed. + +When he came in to his supper that evening Cynthia's son wanted to know +why old Mrs. Rosenwinkle couldn't have a wheel-chair, one of those that +she could work with her hands. He said that he thought she must be +pretty tired sitting beside that window even if it was open. And why +couldn't she have a window on each of the other sides of her room? + +Grandma stared. + +"My stars--boy! There's no reason that I know of why that old body +can't have a wheel chair or more windows. Only Green Valley hasn't +ever thought of it. She's always been so set in her notions and so out +of the way of things that I expect we have forgotten her." + +The third time that Cynthia's son brought little Jim Tumley home +because the little man's wandering feet could not find their way to +shelter, he wanted to know why little Jim was not in the choir. So +Grandma told him, and it was his turn to be puzzled. + +"But I don't understand. The church is for the weak, the needy, the +blind, maimed and foolish who don't know how to seek happiness wisely. +The happy, strong, sensible people don't, as a matter of fact, need +looking after," said Cynthia's son. + +"My!" laughed Grandma, "I believe I've heard that or read that +somewhere. Do they really practice that kind of religion in aged +India? In these parts the churches are still built by the good for the +good and the unfit have to shift for themselves." + +But when he asked why Jim Tumley didn't have a piano to take up his +spare time and keep him out of harm's way, Grandma was a bit +scandalized. + +"Why, people in Jim Tumley's circumstances don't own pianos. It +wouldn't be proper. A second-hand organ is all they have any right to +be ambitious for. Why, Mary Tumley would no more think of touching her +savings, of buying a piano, than I would think of buying a second black +silk or a diamond ring. So much style would be wicked." + +"But if it would help to save the little man--if--" + +"Well," smiled Grandma, "I'll mention it to Mary the very next time I +see her." + +"Do. And while you are about it you might ask Jim to sing a solo for +us both Sunday morning and evening. If little Jim Tumley doesn't sing +I won't talk," said the Reverend John Roger Churchill Knight. + +So Joshua Churchill's rich grandson, Cynthia's son, traveled the high +roads and low roads and had all manner of experiences and adventures +and he discovered many stray, odd facts which later came in mighty +handy. + +He rode out into the country districts with Hank Lolly, sitting beside +that worthy on the high wagon seat and listening most carefully to the +description of every farm, its inmates, the barn dimensions and +contents, the depth of the well, cost of the silo, number of pigs, +sheep, the amount of tiling, and the make of the family graphophone. + +Sometimes busy farm wives came hurrying out from the back or side +doors, wiping their hands on their aprons, to ask Hank to take a mess +of peas or beans to a less fortunate neighbor or to carry a basket of +dishes over to the next farm where the thrashers were going to be for +supper; and "Hank, just bring me a setting of turkey eggs from Emily +Elby's. I've 'phoned and she has them all ready." + +Mrs. Tooley, up the Elmwood road, entrusted the obliging Hank with the +following message: + +"Tell Doc Mitchell that if he don't get my new set of teeth ready for +the thrashing I'll hev the law on him for breaking up my happy home. +Two of my old beaux're coming to the thrashing and if they was to see +me without my teeth they'd jest naturally make Jim miserable and me a +divorcee." + +Mrs. Bodin was sending her daughter, Stella, some little overalls made +over for the twins from their grandpa's and a bottle of home made cough +medicine "and one of my first squash pies for Al. And here's a pie for +your trouble, Hank, and a few of these cookies you said you like." + +Hank stowed everything carefully away, with no show of nervous haste, +and when they were well started remarked to John Churchill Knight: + +"You know the best part of staying sober is that you get taken in on so +many things and almost you might say into so many families. People +tell you things and ask your help and advice and by gum after awhile +you get to feeling that maybe you're somebody too instead of jest a +mess of miserableness. Why, I've got friends jest about everywhere, I +guess. + +"There's them as asks me sarcastic like if I don't find this kind of +work dry and lonesome but I jest ask them to come along and see. Why, +do you see that there house yonder? Those folks are relatives of Billy +Evans' and as soon as ever I turn this corner, Mollie, that's the +youngest girl, will start the graphophone going with my favorite piece. +The last time I come by I found a box of candy on the mail box for me. +That was from Winnie, the oldest, for bringing home her new dress from +the dressmaker's. + +"Yes, sir, it's jest wonderful how human and pleasant everybody is. +Why, if I jest keep on a-being sober and associating with folks like +this--why--I'm jest naturally bound to be kind of decent myself. And +when you think of what I was--well--there's no use in talking--I was +low--jest low. Ask anybody but Billy Evans and they'll tell you fast +enough. Of course Billy's naturally prejudiced and his word ain't +hardly to be credited. + +"And here I am on a nice summer morning riding with the minister and +with the whole country acting as if I'd always been decent." + +Maybe it was Hank who first called him the minister. It may of course +have been that old Mrs. Rosenwinkle, who, not knowing his name for some +time, explained him to her daughter as "the new preacher of the lost." + +At any rate, when Fanny Foster came to make her periodical report it +was found that to the lonely, the outcast and the generally unfit +Cynthia's son was "the new minister." And his influence was already +felt by those who as yet regarded him as just a Green Valley boy who +was helping out. Fanny Foster voiced this sentiment in Joe Baldwin's +shop when she was paying for the four patches Joe had just put on her +second best pair of shoes. + +"Well--I shouldn't wonder if Green Valley hadn't got a minister to its +taste at last. He hasn't been regularly appointed and I guess he don't +realize himself that he's it but I'm pretty sure that the minute Parson +Courtney steps out that's just what's going to happen. Of course +there's them that says it can't. Mr. Austin says it would be a +terrible mistake, that he's too young; and Seth Curtis says no rich man +would be fool enough to pester himself with a dinky country church. +But I guess people like Seth and Mr. Austin ain't the kind of people +that have much to say. He's doing regular minister's work, comforting +the sick and picking up the fallen and pacifying the quarrelsome, and +it's work like that that'll elect him. + +"And he's getting mighty popular, let me tell you, even with them that +no other minister could please or get near. There's old Mrs. +Rosenwinkle. She loves him just because he never tried to tell her +that the earth was round. Why, she says he's as good as any Lutheran. +And Hank Lolly said that maybe when that new suit Billy's ordered him +out of the new mail-order catalogue gets here, he'll go hear him +preach. It seems the minister's been driving around with Hank all over +creation and Hank says he can get along with him as easy as he does +with Billy. + +"And did you hear what he did for Jim Tumley? It seems the minister +told Grandma Wentworth what a fine voice Jim had and what an ear for +music. And he was most surprised that Jim never even had a second-hand +organ of his own in the house but had to go over to his sister's, Mrs. +Hoskins, for to play a little tune when the fancy took him. He said it +was an awful pity that a man who wanted music so badly and was always +so obliging at weddings and funerals and entertainments should be +without a proper instrument. And Grandma just said, 'My land, nobody's +ever thought of that but I'll speak of it.' + +"Well, she did and the consequence is that Mary Tumley is so nervous +she can't sleep. She says if she takes the savings out of the bank +there won't be enough money for a Keeley cure, or a respectable funeral +for Jim in case he dies. She's struggled and struggled but come to the +conclusion that it wouldn't be right and would set an awful example to +the Luttins next door, who are extravagant enough as it is. + +"But it's my notion that Jim Tumley will get his organ and maybe a +piano. I saw him going in with Frank Burton on that early morning +train and it means something. Besides, Grandma told me that Frank +fairly hates himself for not thinking of it before and waiting like a +born idiot for a boy to come all the way from India and tell him what +to do for his best friend. + +"Agnes Tomlins says she's got a good mind to go and see the minister +about Hen. She says that if Hen don't quit abusing her and tormenting +her she's going to leave him; that her sister Mary over in Aberdeen has +a big up-stairs bedroom all aired and waiting for her. It seems that +Hen's more than contrarily stubborn lately. He's contradicted Agnes +publicly time and again and gone against her in private till Agnes says +there's no living with him. + +"But she says she would overlook everything except Hen's keeping a +secret drawer in his chiffonier. It seems Hen has gone and locked that +bottom drawer and Agnes can't either buy or borry a key that will open +it. And she can't find where Hen has hid his, try as she may. And +when she mentions that drawer to Hen, saying she wants to red up, he +lets on like he don't know what she's talking about but he does, +because he told Doc Philipps, when he went to see about his liver, that +if he couldn't wear a soft collar or a soft hat like other men and keep +a dog and smoke in the house, and eat strawberries or whistle or go to +ball games on Sundays and prize fights on the sly, why, there was one +thing he could do and would have and that was a drawer, a whole +chiffonier drawer, all to himself. And that he bet there weren't many +men in Green Valley that could say as much. Hen just swore that he +intends to have something all his own and that nobody'll open that +drawer except over his dead body. + +"Dolly Beatty was sitting in the waiting room and heard him. Of +course, she's a great friend of Bessie Williams and told her and Bessie +told Laura Enbry and of course it got to Agnes. So she's going to +speak to the minister and maybe get a divorce, which will be the first +divorce scandal in Green Valley. + +"Now that's the sort of thing that goes on in Green Valley. And if the +new minister is supposed to calm these troubled waters he's got my +sympathy. Joe, I think you're charging me ten cents too much for these +patches. They're not as big as the ones you put on the other pair and +those were fifty cents." + +So without a conscious move on anybody's part Cynthia's son became +Green Valley's minister. All the necessary rites gone through, Green +Valley accepted him as it accepted the sunshine and rain, the larks and +wild roses, and all the other gifts that heaven chose to send. + +Roger Allan and Grandma Wentworth began to call him John. But Nanny +Ainslee always spoke of him and addressed him as Mr. Knight. And he +discovered after a time that for some strange reason he did not like +this. + +One day he mentioned the matter. He was walking home from church with +her. Mr. Ainslee had invited him up for Sunday dinner and the party of +them were chatting pleasantly as they walked along together. + +In asking him a question Nan addressed him as Mr. Knight. Then it was +that he stopped and made his startling request. He addressed them all +but he meant only Nan. + +"I wish," he said suddenly, "you would not call me Mr. Knight." + +Mr. Ainslee and Billy hid a smile, said nothing and walked on. But Nan +stopped in amazement. + +"Why not?" she asked a little breathlessly. + +"Nobody else does. I was never called that in India. It makes me feel +lonely, and a stranger here." + +"But," Nanny's voice was colorless and almost dreary, even though a +wicked little gleam shot into her eyes, "what in the world shall I call +you? I can't call you--_John_. And 'parson' always did seem to me +rather coarse and disrespectful." + +He had stopped when she did and now was looking straight down into her +eyes. Before the hurt and surprise and bewilderment in his face the +wicked little gleam retreated and a deep pink began to flush Nanny's +cheeks. The suspicion crossed her mind that this tall young man from +India with the unconquered eyes and the directness of a child might be +a rather difficult person to deal with. + +He just stood there and looked at her and said never a word. Then he +quietly turned and walked on up the road with her. + +For the first time in her life Nanny felt queer in the company of a +man, queer and puzzled and almost uncomfortable. She was not a flirt +and her remark was commonplace and trivial. Yet this new chap was +taking it seriously and making her feel insincere and trifling. She +told herself that she was not going to like him and kept her eyes +studiously on the road and wayside flowers. + +They mounted the front steps in silence but before he opened the door +to let her pass in he paused and waited for her to raise her eyes to +his. She did it much against her will. He spoke then as if they two +were all alone in the world together. + +"It is true that you have not known me long. But I have known you for +some time. I saw you leave Green Valley one summer night last year and +I came from the West two months before I should have just to see if you +got safely back at lilac time." + +At that Nanny's eyes lost all their careful pride and he saw them +lovely with surprise. So he explained. + +"I was standing on the back platform of the Los Angeles Limited the +night you went East with your father." + +Then a smile that the Lord gives only now and then, to a man that He is +sure He can trust, flitted over the tall boy's face as he added: + +"And the very first evening I came back to Green Valley I held you in +my arms--rescued you." + +He laughed boyishly, plaguing her. But she stood motionless with +amazement,--too angry to say a word. When that smile came her anger +faded. Through her heart there flashed the mad conviction, through her +mind the certain knowledge, that for her in the time to come the height +of bliss would be to cry in this strange man's arms. + +Then she recollected herself and flamed with shame so bitter that her +lower lip quivered and she hoped he would ask her again to call him +John so that she could make him pay for her momentary madness. + +But he never asked again. It seemed he was not that kind of a man. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +GOSSIP + +The last and surest sign of spring's arrival in Green Valley is gossip. +The mornings may be ever so full of meadow larks, the woods moistly +sweet and carpeted with spring's frail and dainty blossoms, but no one +dreams of letting the furnace go out or their base burner get cold +until they see Fanny Foster flitting about town at all hours of the day +and behold the array of shiny armchairs standing so invitingly in front +of Uncle Tony's hardware store. + +When these two great news agencies open up for business Green Valley +laughs and goes to Martin's drug store to buy moth balls and talks +about how it's going to paint its kitchen woodwork and paper its +upstairs hall and where it's buying its special garden seed. + +Then the whole town wakes up and comes outdoors to work and talk. +There are fences to be mended and gardens to be planted and houses to +be cleaned and all the winter happenings to be gone over. All the +doctor cases have to be discussed critically and the winter invalids, +strong once again, come out to visit one another and compare notes. +Letters from special relatives and former Green Valley souls are passed +around and read and all new photographs and the winter's crop of fancy +work exhibited and carefully examined. + +Everybody talks so much that nobody listens very carefully, only half +hearing things. And when the spring madness and gladness begin to +settle and people start to repeat the things they only half heard +strange and weird tales are at times the result. And from these spring +still more fantastic rumors and versions that ripple over Green Valley +like waves of sunshine or cloud shadows, sometimes causing much joy and +merriment and sometimes considerable worry and uneasiness. + +And all these rumors come eventually to Uncle Tony's where they are +solemnly examined, edited and frequently so enhanced and touched up in +color and form as to sound almost new. Then they are sent out again to +begin life all over. Many of them die but some live on and on, and +after a sufficient test of time become a part of the town chronicles. + +Everybody, of course, takes a hand at helping a yarn get from house to +house but nobody makes such a specialty of this sort of social work as +Fanny Foster. There are some Green Valley folks who attribute Fanny's +up and down thinness to this wearing industry yet both men and women +are always glad to see her and her reports always drive blue cares away +and provoke ripples of sunny laughter. + +Everybody in town has tried their hand at hating Fanny and despising +her and ignoring her and putting her in her place. But everybody has +long ago given it up. Stylish and convention-loving newcomers are +always disgusted and keep her at arm's length. But sooner or later +such people break an arm or a leg right in the midst of strawberry +canning maybe and it so happens that nobody sees them do this but +Fanny. And when this does happen they don't even have to mortify +themselves by calling her. She just comes of her own accord, +forgetting the cruel snubbings. She fixes that stand-offish person as +comfortable as can be, makes them laugh even, and telephones to the +doctor. Then she rolls up her sleeves and without so much as an apron +has those strawberries scientifically canned and that messy kitchen +beautifully clean. + +And the curious, the pitifully, laughably incomprehensible part of it +is that in her own house Fanny absolutely never can seem to take the +least interest. Her own dishes are always standing about unwashed. +Her kitchen is spoken of in horrified whispers; her children, +buttonless, garterless, mealless, stray about in all sorts of improper +places and weather. The whole town is home to them but they generally +feel happiest at Grandma Wentworth's. She sets them down in her +kitchen to a hot meal and then makes them sew on their buttons under +her watchful eye. Sooner or later, usually later, Fanny comes as +instinctively as her children to Grandma's door to report Green Valley +doings. + +This particular spring things promised to be unusually lively. But the +rains, though gentle, had been persistent and Fanny was a full two +weeks behind with her news schedule. But if late, her report was +thorough. She dropped wearily into Grandma's soft cushioned kitchen +rocker, slipped her cold feet without ceremony into the warm stove oven +and began: + +"Good land! I never see such a town and such people and such weather! +Jim Tumley's drunk again and as sick as death and Mary's crying over +him as usual and blaming the hotel crowd. She says he's a good man and +don't care for liquor at all and that their liking to hear him sing +ain't no reason for getting him drunk and a poor way of showing their +thanks and appreciation, and that they all know that he can't stand it, +him being weak in the stomach that way, like all the Tumleys. Mary's +just about ready to give up everything and everybody, she's that +discouraged. + +"Well--that's one mess and now there's Uncle Tony in another. It seems +Uncle Tony sold Seth Curtis a hand axe for a dollar and ten cents. Of +course Seth paid for it like he always does--right away. But you know +how forgetful Uncle Tony is getting. Well, it seems he clean forgot +about Seth paying and sent in a bill for a dollar. And now Seth's +hanging around, wanting his ten cents back and saying mean, smart +things. + +"And that lazy, gossiping crowd of worthless men folks was just killing +themselves laughing and making fun of poor Uncle Tony, sitting right in +his very own chairs and warming their lazy feet at his comfortable +fire. Uncle Tony happened to be out and those loafers just started in +and what they said about that kind old man made my blood boil. They +were all mean enough, with Seth egging them on every now and then about +that dime that he was cheated out of. But Mert Hagley was the worst. +Of course, everybody knows Mert's just dying to hog Uncle Tony's +business along with his shop, as if the stingy thing wasn't rich enough +already. Well, when Mert heard about that ten-cent mistake he said it +was about time there were a few business changes in Green Valley, that +a few business funerals would help a lot and freshen up things; that +Uncle Tony was no business man, and a lot of that sort of stuff. And +of course Hughey Mason, being a smart Aleck, pipes up and says, 'That's +so, Uncle Tony is no business man. Why, Tom Hall says that when you +find Uncle Tony's emporium locked at eleven o'clock of a winter morning +you can bet your bottom dollar Uncle Tony's home shaking down the +furnace, and if it's closed at four of a summer afternoon Uncle Tony's +sneaked off home to mow the lawn.' + +"Well, those idiots and old hypocrites were talking just like that, +goodness knows how long. They never took the trouble to see if Uncle +Tony was really around or not. But all of a sudden I looked around the +corner of the middle row of shelves and there was that poor old man +sitting as still as death in his cashier's cage and looking sick to +death. You know he wouldn't cheat a soul, and as for that store, he'd +die without it. It's all the family he has. Well I had stepped in +there to buy a couple of flat-irons. The children mislaid mine. But I +walked right out for I didn't want to call him out to wait on me. + +"I was so mad I just walked around the block till I met Mrs. Jerry +Dustin right at Simpson's corner and I told her the whole thing. She +was as hurt about it as Uncle Tony and kept holding on to Simpson's +garden fence and saying, 'Dear me, Fanny, we must do something. I have +a message for Tony, anyway, and this is just the time to deliver it.' + +"So back we went and we met Uncle Tony stepping in at the front door +too. He must have sneaked out the back way and come around the front +so's not to let on he'd heard anything. He was kind of white and +miserable about the mouth and his eyes looked out kind of blind. But +he smiled when Mrs. Jerry Dustin said, 'Good morning, Tony.' I +wonder," Fanny digressed, "if it's true that Uncle Tony wanted to marry +Mrs. Dustin once. Sadie Dundry says so but you know how unreliable +Sadie is about what she knows. + +"Well, anyhow, those miserable men things around that stove just smiled +at Uncle Tony like so many Judases and all commenced talking at once. +But Mrs. Dustin didn't give them much chance. She just took up all +Uncle Tony's attention and time. She bought and bought, being real +careful of course to ask only for the things she knew he had; and to +top it all she bought four quarts of robin's-egg blue paint. You know +that's Uncle Tony's favor-ite woodwork paint and nobody goes in there +for paint but what he's trying to get them to buy robin's-egg blue. +Seems his mother's kitchen on the old farm was done that way and Uncle +Tony's never been able to see any other color. + +"Well, I thought those four cans of paint was about the highest kind of +good luck but when Mrs. Dustin give her message I nearly fell dead, and +as for them old he-gossips they were about paralyzed, I guess. Why +even you, Grandma, couldn't hardly guess what that message was;" here +Fanny pulled up a sagging stocking and hurried on lest she should be +interrupted. + +"It was nothing more nor less than that Bernard Rollins, the artist, +wants to paint Uncle Tony's portraiture. 'And, of course, Tony,' said +Mrs. Dustin in that sweet way of hers, 'you won't refuse, will you?' +And I declare the lovely way she looked at him and he at her I come +near believing Sadie might be right by accident. But, land--in this +town everybody has growed up with everybody else and somebody is always +saying that somebody is sweet on somebody else or was when he or she +were young. + +"So there's that portraiture to look forward to. And now there's that +yarn that some careless busybody started about Nanny Turner being left +a fortune of eighteen thousand dollars. Everybody's been crazy, +praising her luck to her face and envying her behind her back. +Everybody most but Dell Parsons. Dell felt sick when she heard it +because she and Nanny have been such friends and Dell just knew that no +matter how they'd both try to keep things the same there'd always be +that eighteen-thousand-dollar difference between them when now there's +nothing dividing them but a little low honeysuckle fence with a gate +cut through it. And there would, of course. Nanny'd be on one side, +cutting aprons out of nice new gingham, and Dell'd be on the other, +cutting _her_ aprons out of Jim's old shirt backs. + +"But as soon as Nanny heard it she up and told everybody it wasn't so, +that she and Will wouldn't thank anybody for a fortune now that they've +paid for their home and garden. + +"I met Jessie Williams in the drug store. She was buying dye to do +over her last year's silk and she says Nanny was a fool to contradict a +fine story like that. That she should have said nothing and used the +rumor to her social advantage. Jessie says that story alone would have +brought that uppish Mrs. Brownlee that's moved into that stylish new +bungalow next to Will Turner's to time and sociability. Though the +daughter isn't uppish a bit, so Nanny and Dell says, and visits right +over the fence and just loves the children. But she don't know +anything seemingly--the daughter don't. Wears fancy caps and +high-heeled shoes to work in mornings and was caught planting onion +sets root up and doing dishes without an apron and drying them without +scalding them first. But they say she's awful sweet and pretty, in +spite of her terrible ignorance. + +"Old Mr. Dunn told me this Mrs. Brownlee was a bankrupt's widow, that +when the husband died there was nothing left but this Green Valley lot, +which he bought absent-mindedly one day, and his life insurance which +though was a good one. And the widow having no money didn't want to +stay amongst her rich city friends and so she's come here. They say +she hates Green Valley like poison but that the girl Jocelyn thinks +it's fun living here, even though her hands are blistered and there's +no place to go evenings. I heard that David Allan's been plowing up +the Brownlee garden lot and helping the girl set things out. + +"And now, Grandma, what of all things do you suppose has happened? Old +man Mullin's back. Nobody can hardly believe it. He's been gone these +ten years and nobody blamed him a mite when he left that miserly, +nagging wife of his and went off to California. Why, they say she +nearly died giving him a ten-cent piece every week for spending money +and that he used to work on the sly unbeknownst to her to get money for +his tobacco and then didn't dare smoke it where she could see him. And +he's come back. Some say he's got so much money of his own that she +can't worry him and that he's got to be so deaf besides that he's safe +more or less. + +"And as if that wasn't enough, there's talk of Sam Ellis's selling the +hotel and going out of business. It seems since the two boys and the +girl came back from college they've talked nothing but temperance and +prohibition. Not that they are a mite ashamed of Sam. But not one of +them will step into the hotel for love or money. And Sam's beginning +to think as they do, seems like. For they say he was awful mad when he +heard about Jim Tumley getting so full he was sick. Sam was out that +afternoon and he says Curley Watson, his barkeeper, is a danged +chucklehead. And that ain't all. They're saying that Sam told George +Hoskins to let up on the drinks the other night, that maybe he could +stand it but other men couldn't. And Sam the hotel keeper, mind you! +Of course Sam is well off but still the men haven't got over it yet. +They say you could have heard a pin drop and that George stood with his +mouth open for five full minutes. + +"Somebody told John Gans that there was going to be another barber shop +in town and so he's excited. And Mr. Pelly and Mrs. Dudley had their +first fight this year over their chickens. Mr. Pelly swears she lets +them out a-purpose before he's awake in the morning and Mrs. Dudley +says that if he don't mend his fence and hurts a feather of a single +one of her animals she'll have him before Judge Hewitt. + +"Of course, Marion Travers is spending every cent of her husband's +salary on new clothes, trying to get in with the South End crowd. And +Sam Bobbins has given up trying to raise violets to make a sudden +fortune. He's changed his mind and gone to raising mushrooms down in +his cellar. Simpson's gray horse is dead, the lame one, and one of the +White twins cut his head pretty bad on a toy engine and Benny Smith's +wife is giving strawberry sets away. Jessups are all out of tomato +plants and onion sets and won't get any more, but Dick has them, +besides a real tasty looking lot of garden seed. Ella Higgins actually +found that Dick had two kinds of flower seed that she'd never grown or +heard of. + +"Mrs. Rosenwinkle's full of rheumatism with all joints swelled and says +the world is coming to a terrible end. I guess she figures though that +she and those two grandchildren of hern will be about all that's left +after the thing blows over. My land, ain't some folks ignorant! +And--what was I going to say--oh, yes, of course Robinson ain't +expected to live--and well--what _was_ it I was going to say--something +that begins with a c--good land, there's the 6:10 and I bet John's on +it. He never misses his train twice in a year's time. Get out of +here, children. You know your father wants to see you all at home when +he gets there." + +There was a scramble for the door and Grandma Wentworth's heart ached +for John Foster, the big, silent, steady man who brushes his girls' +hair every Sunday morning and brings them fresh hair ribbons and who +somehow manages to get them to Sunday School looking half respectable. +John never says a word scarcely to any one, from one week's end to the +other. He never spends a free hour away from home, he never invites a +man to his house, and he seldom smiles except at the children or when +visiting with Grandma Wentworth or Roger Allan, his two friends and +nearest neighbors. Sometimes he goes for long walks with his girls and +little Bobby. Most people think him a fool and he knows it. + +Grandma Wentworth sighed a little as she thought of John Foster. Then +she put fresh wood on her fire and poked at the stove grate till it +glowed. She smiled as she remembered Fanny's report. + +"Well, spring is here for certain. Now we'll have a wedding and some +new babies. They always come next." + +Then sitting there beside her glowing stove Grandma fell to dreaming of +Green Valley and the Green Valley folks of other days, Green Valley as +it used to be in the springs of long ago. Of the days when Roger Allan +was a young, strength-mad fellow and Richard Wentworth was his chum and +her lover. And she remembered too how right Sadie Dundry was. For +Uncle Tony, in the springs of long ago, had loved the girl who was now +Mrs. Jerry Dustin. + +They were such wander-mad dreamers, Tony and Rosalie, and exactly alike +in those days. They used to go together to watch an occasional picnic +train or election special go through the station, and they thought +because they were so exactly alike they would most surely marry. But +life, that wisely and for posterity's sake mates not the like but the +unlike, brought Jerry Dustin on the scene,--good, practical, +stay-at-home Jerry Dustin. And the girl who used to sit with Tony on +the station bench and watch the trains pull out into the wide big world +left her childhood friend sitting alone and went to Jerry, answered his +smile and call. + +So Tony sits alone, for he still visits the station on sunny +afternoons. But now he doesn't sit on the bench but perches on the top +rail of the fence and curls his toes about the lower one. + +Bernard Rollins caught him sitting so once, day-dreaming over the past. +It was Tony's face as Rollins saw it then,--full of a young, boyish +wistfulness and sweet pain, unmarred dreams and unstained, unbroken +illusions,--that Rollins wanted to paint. Rollins knew that Mrs. +Dustin was a great friend of Tony's and that she would be the best +person to coax a consent from the shy, gentle old man. + +Life, mused Grandma, was a matter full of sweet and incomprehensible +things,--things that now, after long years when the stories were almost +finished, seemed right and just enough but that at the time were cruel +and hard to bear. There was Roger Allan and that lonely stone in the +peaceful cemetery. It still seemed a cruel tragedy. Like Mrs. Jerry +Dustin she wondered often about it. + +The soft spring night was full of memories and the wood fire sang of +them sadly, sweetly and softly. Grandma rose and mentally shook +herself. + +"I declare, I believe I'm lonely or getting old or something," Grandma +chided herself; "here I am poking at the bygone years like an old maid +with the heartache and here's the whole world terribly alive and +needing attention. And here's Cynthia's boy back from India, and a +real Green Valley kind of minister, I do believe; a straightforward +chap to tell us of life, its miracles and mysteries; of God and +eternity as he honestly thinks, but mostly of love and the little happy +ways of earthly living. A man who won't be always dividing us into +sheep and goats but will show us the sheep and the goat in ourselves. +This is a queer old town and it almost seems as if a minister wouldn't +hardly have to know so much about heaven as about fighting neighbors +and chickens, gossiping folks like Fanny and drunken ones like Jim +Tumley. Well, maybe,--" + +But just then she looked up and found David Allan laughing at her from +the doorway. + +"Stop dreaming and scolding yourself, Grandma," laughed David. +"There's a little city girl living up on the hill back of Will Turner's +who needs you most awful bad. I offered to bring her down here but she +thinks it wouldn't be proper. She says you haven't called and she +wants to do things right and that maybe you wouldn't want to know her. +She's mighty lonely and strange about Green Valley ways of doing +things. I most wished to-day that I was a woman so I could help her. +Her mother's been sick more or less since they come here and she's +looking after things herself. I'd like to help her but there's things +a man just can't tell a girl or do for her. Uncle Roger sent me over +here to tell you to come across and talk about some church matters with +him. But I think this little girl business ought to be tended to right +away." + +"Rains and gossip and new girls and first violets. I declare, it _is_ +spring, David. And Nanny Ainslee is back. Of course, I'll see about +that little girl. You tell her I'm coming to call on her the day after +tomorrow. Tell her I'll come up the woodsy side of her garden and I'll +be wearing my pink sunbonnet and third best gingham apron." + +Grandma took up a pan of fresh light biscuit, rolled them up in a crisp +linen cloth and started out with David. + +Outdoors she stopped and breathed deeply. + +"I declare, David, I was almost lonesome before you stepped in but now +I feel--well, spring mad or something. I do believe we'll have a +wedding soon and a real old-fashioned springtime." + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +THE WEDDING + +Grandma Wentworth got her wedding but not just the kind of a wedding +she had expected. + +"Though, when you stop to think of it, an elopement is about as proper +a spring happening as I know of. It's due mostly to this weather. We +had too much rain in April and nothing but sweet sunshine and mad +moonlight ever since." + +Most Green Valley courtships and weddings are conducted in a more or +less public and leisurely fashion and elopements are rare. Green +Valley was at first inclined to be a little shocked and resentful about +this performance. Weddings do not happen every day and Green Valley +was so accustomed to knowing weeks beforehand what the bride was going +to wear, and how many of the two sets of relatives were to be there, +and who was giving presents and what, and what the refreshments were +going to cost, and just how much more this was than what the bride's +mother could afford to spend, that there was a little murmur of +astonishment, resentment even, when it was found that just a bare, bald +marriage had been perpetrated in the old town. Green Valley did not +resent the scandal of the occurrence. It was the absence of details +that was so maddening. But gradually these began to trickle from +doorstep to doorstep and by nightfall Green Valley was crowding out of +its front gates with little wedding gifts under its arms. + +It seems that little, meek, eighteen-year-old Alice Sears had eloped +with twenty-one-year-old Tommy Winston. She explained her foolishness +in a little letter which she left on the kitchen table for her mother. +The letter ran something like this: + + +Dear Mother:-- + +It's no use waiting any longer for any of the good times or new dresses +you said I'd have by and by. We never have any good times and I'm +tired waiting for a real new hat. Tommy's going to buy me one with +bunches of violets on it and he don't drink, so it's alright and you +don't need to worry. I'll live near and be handy and don't you let +father swear too much at you because I did this. + + Your loving child, + ALICE. + + +When Mrs. Sears found the letter she read it six times, over and over +till she knew it by heart. It wasn't the first such letter she had +ever had. When Johnny went off to Alaska or somewhere away off, +because his father took the twenty-five dollars that the +nineteen-year-old boy had saved so prayerfully for a bicycle, Johnny +had left just such a letter. When Jimmy went away he left a letter +that sounded very much like it on the top of his mother's sewing +machine. + +It wasn't a bicycle with Jimmy. It was chickens. Jimmy was wild over +chickens. He was a great favorite with Frank Burton. He helped Frank +about the coops and was so handy that Frank paid him regular wages and +gave him several settings of eggs. And in no time the boy had a +thriving little chicken business that might have grown into bigger +things. But Sears sold the whole thing out one day when he wanted +money worse than usual. And Jimmy, white to the very roots of his +reddish-brown hair, cursed his father and left home. He wandered +about, the Lord knows where, but eventually joined the army. He wrote +home once to tell his mother what he had done and to say that he +intended to save all his pay for the three years and start a chicken +farm with it somewhere. + +And now gentle, little, eighteen-year-old Alice was gone too. + +Mrs. Sears sat down and cried in that patient, helpless, miserable way +of hers. She didn't know just what she was crying for, herself or the +children. Life was a hopeless, unmanageable tangle that seemed to give +her nothing and take her all. So Mrs. Sears sat and cried. It was a +habit she had. + +Fanny Foster came along just then. She had run over to see if she +couldn't borrow a cake of yeast. She was going to town in an hour, she +said, but she wanted to set her bread before she went and she'd bring +yeast back with her and-- + +"Why, for pity's sake alive, Mrs. Sears, what's the matter?" + +That was just Fanny's luck or perhaps her misfortune, her happening on +events first-hand that way. She read the letter of course, sympathized +with Mrs. Sears, patted her check and told her not to worry, that +everything would be all right and to set right still, that she'd be +right back to do the dishes and stay with her. + +And Fanny hurried to town, talking all the way. She came back in +record time but by the time she had her hands in Mrs. Sears' dishpan +Green Valley was already buzzing with astonishment. Some were shaking +their heads in utter unbelief, some were smiling and one or two who had +slept badly were saying something like this: + +"Well, did you ever! And you never can tell. Those meek, quiet little +things are usually deep. And the dear Lord only knows what the true +state of things is. And poor Mrs. Sears! Of course, she's done her +best, but isn't it too bad to have a batch of children turn out so kind +of disappointing and her so meek and patient and hard-working!" + +In three hours the news had gotten out to the out-lying homes and +Sears, the little bride's father, heard it as he was nailing siding on +one of the two new bungalows that were being built in that part of +Green Valley. + +When Sears heard the rumor he put down his hammer and quit work. He +was a man who made a practice of quitting work at the least +provocation. He said what a man needed most was self-respect and he, +Will Sears, would have it at any cost. He had it. In fact, he was so +respectful and thoughtful of himself that he never had time to respect +the rights of any one else. + +Green Valley saw him going home and because Green Valley knew him well +and respected him not at all it took no pains to hush its chatter, and +so he heard a good deal that it may have done him good to hear. At any +rate, it sort of prepared him for what came later. + +He stamped into the house and wanted to know why in this and that he +hadn't been told about all this before he went to work, and what in +this and that she meant by such doings and goings on. + +And Mrs. Sears, whose greatest daily trial was getting her husband off +to work on such mornings as he felt so inclined, said tearfully: + +"Why, father, you know that when I'm getting you off of a morning I +wouldn't see a twenty-dollar gold piece if it was right before my eyes +on the table. I never found the piece of paper with Alice's letter on +it till you'd gone and I'd set down for a cup of coffee." + +For thirty years Milly Sears had called her husband "father" and now +that he had fathered all his children away from home she still called +him "father." Poor Mrs. Sears had no sense of humor. + +After her pitiful little explanation Mrs. Sears sank down into her +rocker and went back to weeping. It was her way of taking life's +sudden turns. + +Sears tore through the house and every once in a while he'd walk back +to the kitchen and swear. Sears was not in any way a likeable man. +Though so self-respecting, he had all his life been careless about his +language and his breath. That was probably the reason why his children +never got the habit of running out to meet him or bringing their thorns +and splinters for him to pull out with his jackknife. He was a man who +never stopped in the front yard to see how the clover was coming up, +who never hoed around his currant bushes or ever found time to prune +his fruit trees. He was in short a mean, selfish man who was yet +decent enough to know himself for what he was but not decent enough to +admit it and mend his ways. It may be that he did not know how to go +about this. + +At any rate, here he was, pacing back and forth in his still, empty +house, swearing and threatening all manner of terrible things. That +was his way of showing his helplessness. + +And all about this helpless, incompetent father and patiently sobbing +mother the Green Valley world buzzed and the prettiest kind of a May +day smiled. All their life was a muddle with this dreary ending but +the world outside was as young, as bright, as promising as ever. +Something of this must have come to these two for Mrs. Sears' sobs +quieted and out in the front room Sears sank into a chair and grew +still. + +And then it was that Fanny Poster, who had been flitting about like a +very spirit of help and curiosity, flitted down the road to Grandma +Wentworth's. For Fanny felt that somebody had to do something and +Fanny knew that nobody could do it so efficiently as the strong, sweet, +gray-eyed Grandma Wentworth who, for all her sweetness, could yet +rebuke most sternly and fearlessly even while she helped and advised +wisely. + +Green Valley had its generous share of philosophers and helpful spirits +but Grandma Wentworth towered above them all. And every soul in the +village, when in trouble, turned to her as naturally as flowers turn +their faces to the sun. + +Her little vine-clad cottage sat just beyond the curve where the three +roads met at Old Roads Corners. Her back garden was full of the +choicest vegetables and sweetest-smelling herbs and there was a +heavenly array of flowers all about the front windows. The neighbors +said that Grandma Wentworth's house and garden looked just like her and +ministers usually sent their spiritually hopeless cases to her because +she dared and knew how to say the soul-necessary things that no +bread-and-butter-cautious minister can find the courage to say. + +The path to Grandma's house was worn smooth by the feet of the many who +came for advice, encouragement and for sheer love of the woman who +lived in that little garden. + +And so Fanny went flying to Grandma now, perfectly, childishly +confident that Grandma would and could fix up everything. She began to +talk as soon as she opened the door. But what she saw in Grandma's +kitchen sent the words tumbling down her throat. + +For there sat little Alice, eating a late breakfast with Grandma. She +looked a little scared around the eyes but smiley round the mouth and +there was a gold ring on her left hand. + +When Grandma caught sight of Fanny she smiled. + +"Come right in, Fanny. I've been expecting you. But first let me make +you acquainted with Mrs. Tommy Winston. That rascal of a boy run away +with her last night as far as Spring Road, where Judge Edwards married +them. And then Tommy brought her here to me to spend the night while +he went and rented that funny little box of a house just back of that +stylish Mrs. Brownlee. And that's where the wedding supper's going to +be to-night. Of course you're invited. I'm going right now to see +Milly Sears about what we must cook up and bake. I was going over to +get you too to help out. The little house'll need overhauling but I +know I can depend on you, Fanny. Do your very best and there'll be--" + +But by this time Fanny found her voice and began to tell about how +Sears was going on. But Grandma only smiled and said, "Yes, of course, +I know. But don't worry about that. I'll attend to Will Sears. You +two just skip along now to the house and start the wedding." + +Grandma walked over to the Sears cottage without any show of worry or +hurry. But she wasn't smiling. Those gray eyes of hers were sparkling +with something very different. And when Will Sears saw her coming in +the gate he was both relieved and uncomfortably uneasy. + +She came right in and just looked at that desolate couple for a few +seconds. Then: + +"Will Sears," she asked briefly, "what are you aiming to do about this?" + +Sears, who couldn't do anything, didn't know how to do anything about +it but swear, said pompously: + +"What any decent, respectable, hard-working man would do,--bring back +the girl and horsewhip that whippersnapper." + +Then Grandma, who knew just how much this sort of bluster was worth, +let herself go. + +"Will Sears, if you honestly have an idea that you are a decent, +respectable, hard-working man, hold on to it for the love of heaven, +for you're the only human in this town that has any such notion." + +"I work," Sears began defiantly. + +"Oh, yes, Will, you work in a sort of a way; though I can remember the +time when Green Valley folks thought you were going to be a big +contractor. You promised well but somehow you never worked hard +enough. You work at things now to keep your own miserable self alive, +I guess, because when you get through using your week's wages there's +hardly enough left to keep bare life and decency in your family." + +"I'm not a drunkard," Sears muttered, "and you know it." + +"No, you're not a drunkard, Will Sears, more's the pity. When it comes +to choosing between a man who gets openly drunk and staggers down Main +Street in drunken penitence to his wife and children and the man who +drinks just enough to be a surly, selfish brute and yet look half-way +respectable on the outside, why, give me the drunk every time. + +"You don't get drunk, only just full enough to have your family afraid +and ashamed of you. You have made life a hateful, shameful, miserable +existence for your wife and children. You've robbed them of every +right and what pitiful little possessions, hopes and plans they'd been +able to find for themselves. That's why John's in Alaska, Jimmy in the +army and Alice an eighteen-year-old wife. A precious father you've +been to make your children choose the bitter snows, the jungle and a +doubtful future with a stranger to life with you, their father." + +"I've fed my children and clothed them," again muttered Sears. + +"Yes, Will, you have. But--man, man--it takes more than just blood, +three begrudged meals a day and a skimpy calico dress to prove real +fatherhood. But I'm not blaming you any more than I'm blaming this +wife of yours. + +"For thirty years, Milly Sears, you've been so busy trying to be a +doormat saint that you had no time to be a strong, useful mother. When +you married Will he was no worse than the average fellow. He had +faults aplenty but he had goodnesses too, and hopes and dreams. And +you, you Milly, let all the hopes and dreams die and the faults grow +and multiply. Just by letting Will backslide, forget and grow careless. + +"Somebody told you that patience was a pretty ornament. It is if it's +the genuine article and properly used. But letting a man spend his +wages hoggishly on himself and robbing his children and driving them +from their lawful home and cheating you out of every right and even +your self-respect is nothing to be patient about. As for tears, they +have their uses, but they never mended wrongs that I know of. It's +fool, weeping, patient women that make selfish, mean men. It's plain, +honest, righteous anger that brings about the reforms in this world. + +"If the first time that Will got ugly drunk or swearing cross about +nothing you had stood up for yourself and the children and reminded him +sharply of the decencies instead of crying softly and praying for +patience, you wouldn't be sitting here, the two of you, in an empty +house with your children God knows where. + +"I've known you since before you were married and I'm sorry for you +because I know--" + +Then it was that Grandma Wentworth began to talk as only she knew how. +She forgot nothing. She recalled to that man and woman all the beauty +and the wonder of the beginning; the new furniture, the summer +moonlight when their home was young and they were waiting for their +first baby; his coming; his blue eyes and Jimmy's brown ones and little +Alice's gentle ways. All the past sweetness that had been theirs and +was not wholly forgotten she brought back, and in the end when they +sobbed aloud she cried a bit with them, for they were of her +generation. And then she rose to go. + +"Well, now that I've had my say I'll tell you that I really came to +invite you to your daughter's wedding supper to-night. Tommy Winston's +married your Alice sure enough, but he's a good boy even if he is +motherless and fatherless and has sort of shifted for himself in odd +ways. He brought Alice to me last night all properly married and she's +been with me ever since, so everything is all right and respectable, +for which you may thank the dear Lord on bended knees. Tommy's been +and rented the little Bently place over on the hill and is getting it +into shape with a few pieces of furniture. It's such a doll house it +won't take much to furnish it. I've found half a dozen things up attic +and, Milly, if you look around, you'll find plenty here to help start +the little new home in fair shape. Thank heavens, life in Green Valley +is still simple enough so's people can every now and then marry for +love and not much of anything else. Though Tommy's got a little +besides his horse and wagon. He's already bought Alice a new hat and +fixings and he's going down to Tony's hardware store this afternoon to +order up a good cook stove. So you see--" + +But at this point Sears woke up and hoarsely, defiantly and a little +tremulously announced: + +"He'll do no such thing. I'm going down right now to buy that there +cook stove." + +So that was settled and a new home peaceably, respectably started as +every home should be. And it would have been hard to say who was the +busiest and happiest of all the people who helped make a wedding that +day. + +By three o'clock, however, everything was about done and there were +only the final touches to be put on. Grandma engineered everything +over the telephone and Green Valley responded whole-heartedly, as it +always did to all her work. + +Fanny Foster had found time to run down to Jessup's and buy the bride a +first-class tablecloth and some towels. Fanny was always buying the +most appropriate, tasty and serviceable things for other people and the +most outlandish, cheap and second-hand stuff for herself. The +tablecloth was extravagantly good, as Grandma sternly told her. + +But, "La--what of it! I was saving the money to buy myself a silk +petticoat," Fanny defended herself. "I wanted to know just once before +I died what and how it felt like to rustle up the church aisle instead +of slinking down it on a Sunday morning. But I just think a silk +petticoat isn't worth thinking about when a thing like this happens." + +So Grandma smiled and as she laid out her best black silk she made a +mental note of the fact that Fanny Foster was to have, sometime or +other, a silk petticoat, made up to her for this day's work and +self-sacrifice. For Grandma was one of those rare practical people who +yet believed in respecting the foolish dreams of impractical humans. + +So it came about that everybody who could walk was at Tommy's and +Alice's wedding. The bride wore a beautifully simple dress that came +from Paris in Nan's trunk. And there were roses in her hair and Tommy +hardly knew her, and her father and mother certainly did not, so dazed +were they. + +The little doll house was already a home, with all of Green Valley +trooping in to leave little gifts and stopping long enough to shake +Tommy's hand and wish him luck and health and maybe twins. + +Indeed, Alice Sears' elopement and wedding became a part of Green +Valley history, so great an event was it, what with the suddenness of +it and the whole town being asked and Nan Ainslee coming home so +providentially, and Cynthia's son making a speech. + +The crowd was so great and so merry that the little Brownlee girl, +having tucked her fretful mother up in bed, stole out to the garden +fence and watched the doings with all a child's wistful eyes. David +Allan, who happened to drift out that way, found her there and they +visited over the fence. It took David quite a while to tell her what +it all meant, for she was of course a stranger to Green Valley and +Green Valley ways. + +Grandma watched her town folk a little mistily that night and expressed +her opinion a little tremulously to Roger Allan. + +"Roger, did you ever see a town so chockful of people that you have to +laugh over one minute and cry over the next?" + +Nan's father, walking home with her through the quiet streets, stopped +to light a cigar. When it was burning properly he remarked innocently +to his daughter: + +"I don't know when I've met so unusually good-looking and likeable a +fellow as this minister chap, Knight." + +Nan looked at her father with cold and suspicious eyes and her voice +when she answered was scornful. + +"You thought, Mr. Ainslee, that you met the handsomest and most +likeable chap on earth in Yokohama--if you remember," she reminded him +icily. + +"Yes, of course--I remember. But I have come to believe that I was +somewhat mistaken in that boy in Yokohama. He lacked something that +this chap has--an elusive quality that is hard to put a name to but +which is one of the big essentials that makes for success." + +"Ministers," drawled Nanny wickedly, "have never been noticeably +successful in Green Valley." + +"No," admitted her father, "they haven't. And of course it's too bad +the boy's a minister. He's badly handicapped, naturally. Still, I +never remember when I'm with him that he is a parson. It may be that +women feel the same way. And you noticed that he had the good sense +not to wear a frock coat to this informal little wedding. I can't +recall that he has ever worn a frock coat since he's been here. I +think you'd like ministers, Nanny, if they weren't so given to wearing +frock coats. In fact, I'm willing to bet that you are going to like +this wonderful boy from India immensely." + +Nanny stood still and faced her father. + +"I loathe ministers--in any kind of a coat," she explained firmly. +"And I'll bet no bets with you. Such offers are unseemly in a man of +your years and already apparent grayness. They are, moreover, +detrimental to my morals. I should think you'd be ashamed,--and also +mindful of your former losses and mistaken prophecies." + +"Oh," her father assured her, "I admit my losses and mistakes. But I +have by no means lost hope or faith. You never can tell. I'm bound to +guess right some day. And I'm rather partial to this minister chap. +It would be so natural and fitting a punishment for an irreverent young +woman. For Nanny," the father added with teasing gentleness, "sweet as +you are and lovable, a little reverence and religion wouldn't hurt you." + +"I've always heard it said," demurely recollected Nanny, "that girls +generally take after the father." + +"That may be," agreed this particular father. "In that case I should +think you'd be willing to marry a little religion into the family for +my sake, if not your own." + +Nanny's patience was beginning to feel the strain. + +"Mr. Ainslee," she warned him sternly, "if this was snowball time +instead of springtime in Green Valley, I'd snowball you black and blue." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +LILAC TIME + +To the knowing and observant and the loyal Green Valley is dear at all +times. But what most touches and wakens a Green Valley heart is lilac +time. + +There are on the Green Valley calendar many red-letter days beside the +regularly recurring national holidays, but lilac time, or Lilac Sunday, +is Green Valley's very own glad day. It is in the spring what +Thanksgiving is in the fall and wanderers who can not get home for +Thanksgiving and Christmas ease their homesick hearts with promises of +lilac time in the old town. + +On this particular Lilac Sunday, Nan, radiant and dressed in the sort +of clothes that only Nan knew how to buy and wear, was on her way to +church. She was early and decided to pass the Churchill place. She +always did at lilac time, for then it was fairly embedded in fragrance +and flowery glory. She had cut the blooms from her own bushes and sent +them on. She carried only a few of her most perfect sprays. She saw +that the Churchill gardens too had been trimmed but plenty of beauty +remained. + +She stopped a moment to admire the wonderful old red-brick house +glowing through the tender greens of spring. Her eyes drank in its +beauty and then fell on two huge perfect lilac plumes on the bush +nearest her. They were larger and lovelier than her own. + +With a little smile Nan reached out to gather them. She broke off the +first and was about to gather the other when Cynthia's son came slowly +and laughingly from around the bush. + +"Let me get it for you. You will soil your glove." + +Nan was startled and unaccountably embarrassed. She flushed with +something like annoyance. + +"Mercy! I had no idea you were anywhere about. I suppose I'm greedy +but these did seem lovelier than mine. This is Lilac Sunday and I +thought--perhaps nobody told you--that as long as you had so many you +wouldn't mind--I hope you don't think--" + +She was so very evidently bothered over the whole affair, so +disconcerted, she who was always so coolly dignified, that he laughed +with boyish delight. + +"Oh--don't explain, I understand," he begged. + +The red in Nan's cheeks deepened. She stiffened and half turned away. + +"Goodness," she exclaimed to no one in particular, "how I _do_ dislike +ministers. They always understand everything. You just can't tell +them anything. How I loathe them! They're insufferable." + +It was his turn to look a little startled and embarrassed. + +"But you don't have to like me as a minister. I don't want to be +_your_ minister." + +She looked up to see just what he meant. But he seemed to have +forgotten her, for the smile had gone from his eyes and though he +looked at her she knew that he didn't see her; that he was looking +beyond her at some one, something else. When he spoke it was with a +winning gravity and a wistfulness that Nanny tried not to hear. + +"I miss my mother more than any one here can guess. Grandma Wentworth +is wonderful. She is so wise and good and I love her. But my mother +was young and gay and very beautiful. She played and laughed and +talked with me. She was the loveliest soul I ever knew. You are very +much like her. I have wanted you for a friend. I never had a sister +but if I could have had I should have asked for a girl like you." + +Oh, Nanny sensed the pitiful, childish loneliness of that plea! The +wistfulness of the boy stabbed through her really tender heart. But +Nanny Ainslee was a joyous, laughter-loving creature. And the idea of +this boy whom already she half loved asking her to be his _friend_, his +_sister_! Oh, it was childishly funny. How her father would chuckle +if he knew that she who had dismissed so many suitors with platonic +friendliness and sisterly solicitude was now being offered that same +platonic friendliness and brotherly love. It was too much for Nanny's +sense of humor! + +So Nanny giggled. She giggled disgracefully and could not stop +herself,--giggled even though she knew that the tall boy beside her was +flushing a painful red and slowly freezing into a hurt and painful +silence. But she could not save herself or him. + +"You had better let me cut you a few more sprays," he said at last +curtly. + +She let him lay them in her arms and they walked to church in absolute +silence. Nanny never knew that any living man could be so stubbornly +silent. She was sorry and she wanted to tell him so. But he gave her +no chance. It seemed he was a young man who never asked for things +twice. Nanny was sorry but she was also, for some incomprehensible +reason, angry. And the sorrier she grew the angrier she became. +Cynthia's son seemed not to notice. He walked straight on into the +church but Nanny stayed outside and held open court under the big horse +chestnuts in front of the church door. + +She had left the olive groves and almond groves, the thick roses and +the blue waters of Italy, in order to be at home in time to see her +native town wrapped up in its fragrant lilac glory. + +She stayed out now, her arms full of lilac plumes, watching the little +groups of her townspeople coming down the village streets toward the +church whose bell was tolling so sweetly through the warm, spring air. + +Here came Mrs. Dustin with Peter and Joe Baldwin with his two boys and +Colonel Stratton with his sweet-faced wife. From the opposite +direction came the Reverend Alexander Campbell with his wife in black +silk, his sister in gray silk, his elderly niece in blue silk and his +wife's second cousin in lavender. There was Joshua Stillman and his +quiet daughter, Uncle Tony and Uncle Tony's brother William, with his +four girls and Seth Curtis' wife, Ruth. + +Seth never went to church, having a profound scorn for the clergy. But +he always fixed things so his wife could go. He said ministers were +poor business men, selfish husbands and proverbially poor fathers, from +all he'd seen of them. Somehow Seth was a singularly unfortunate man +in the matter of seeing things. But there was no denying the fact that +he was an unusual husband. He had been caught time and again by his +men friends and neighbors on a Sunday morning with one of his wife's +aprons tied about him, holding the baby in one arm, while he stirred +something on the stove with the other, and in various other ways +superintending his household while Ruth was at church. But neither +jeers nor sympathy ever upset him. + +"No, I can't say that I've ever hankered for sermons much. They don't +generally tally with what I've seen and know of life. But Ruth now can +get something helpful out of even a fool's remarks and comes home +rested and cheerful. I figure that a woman as smart as Ruth about +working and saving sure earns her right to a bit of a church on Sunday +if she wants it. And furthermore, I aim to give my wife anything in +reason that she wants. It doesn't hurt any man to learn from a little +personal experience that babies aren't just little blessings full of +smiles and dimples but darn little nuisances, let me tell you. This +little kid is as good as they make them but he gives me a backache all +over, puts bumps on my temper and ties my nerves up in knots. And I've +discovered that just watching bread or pies or pudding is work. And +when a man's peeled the potatoes and set the table and sliced the bread +and filled the water glasses and opened the oven a dozen times and +strained and stirred and mashed and salted and peppered, he begins to +understand why his wife is so tired after getting a Sunday dinner. And +when he thinks of other days, washing days and ironing and baking and +scrubbing and sewing days, why, if he's anyway decent he begins to +suspect that he's darn lucky to get a full-grown woman to do all that +work for just her room and board. And when he stops to count the times +she's tied his necktie, darned his socks and patched his clothes, +besides giving him a clean bed, a pretty sitting room to live in, +children to play with and brag about, and a bank book to make him sleep +easy on such nights as the storms are raging outside, why, a man just +don't have to go to church to believe in God. He's got proofs enough +right in his kitchen. It's the wife who ought to go if it's only to +sit still for an hour and get time to tell herself that there is a God +and that some day the work will let up maybe and her back won't ache +any more and Johnny won't be so hard on his shoes and Sammy on his +stockings. Why, I tell you I'm afraid to keep Ruth from church, afraid +that if she loses her belief in a married woman's heaven she'll leave +me for somebody better or get so discouraged that she'll just hold her +breath and die." + +So Ruth Curtis went to church every Sunday. And Seth saw to it that +she always looked pretty. This particular Lilac Sunday she was wearing +the sprigged dimity that Seth bought her over in Spring Road at +Williamson's spring sale. + +Softly the bell tolled and the last stragglers came hurrying leisurely, +every soul carrying the lovely fragrant plumes so that the church would +be sweet with the breath of spring. Later, these armfuls of beauty +would be packed into huge boxes and shipped to the city hospitals to +gladden pain-racked bodies and weary hearts. + +Nanny Ainslee was still outside waiting for Grandma Wentworth. Lilac +Sunday Nanny always waited for Grandma and always sat with her, because +of a certain story that Grandma had told her once when the lamps were +not yet lit and the soft summer moonlight lay in windowed squares on +Grandma's sitting room floor. Nanny began to inquire of the last +comers. But Tommy and Alice Winston, still bridey and shy, said they +had seen nothing of her, and even Roger Allan supposed of course that +she must be in her favorite pew, known to the oldtimers as Inspiration +Corner. For it had been observed that all ministers sooner or later +delivered their discourses to Grandma Wentworth. They were always sure +of her undivided attention. Other people's eyes and minds might +wander, some might be even openly bored, but Grandma's uplifted face +was always kindly and encouraging, even though the sermon was +hopelessly jumbled. She was the surest, severest critic and yet each +man preached to her feeling that with the criticism would come +kindliness and the sort of mother comfort that Grandma somehow knew how +to give to the meanest and most blundering of creatures. Indeed, it +was the least successful of Green Valley's ministers who had designated +Grandma's seat as Inspiration Corner. And then had in a final burst of +wrath told Green Valley that like Sodom and Gomorrah it was doomed, +that no mere man preacher could save it, that its only hope lay in +Grandma Wentworth, who alone understood its miserable, petty orneriness. + +He meant to leave town a sputtering, raging man, that minister,--full +of what he called righteous wrath. But he went to say good-by to +Grandma and experienced a change of heart. + +He began his farewell by unburdening his heart and soul of all the +ponderous doctrines that sunny, joyful Green Valley had refused to +listen to. He spoke earnestly of the world's terrible need of +salvation, the fearful necessity for haste and wholesale repentance and +the awful menace of God's wrath. And the fact that he was a man +entering his forties instead of his thirties made matters worse. + +But Grandma listened patiently and when he was emptied of all his +sorrows and worriments she took him out into her herb-garden, seated +him where he could see the sunset hills and then she preached a +marvellous sermon to just this one man alone. No one but he knows what +she told him but he went forth a humble, tired, quiet man, filled to +the brim with a sudden belief in just life as it is lived by a few +hundred million humans. Five years later word came to Green Valley +that this same man was a much loved pastor somewhere in the mountains. +And Green Valley, perennially young, unthinking, joyous Green Valley, +laughed incredulously as a sweet-hearted but wrongly educated child +always laughs at a true fairy tale or a simple miracle. + +"If I had the making and raising of ministers," Grandma was heard to +say, apropos of this clergyman, "about the first thing I'd set them to +learning would be to laugh, first at themselves and then at other +people. And as for this repentance and exhortation business I believe +it is worn out. Humans have gotten tired of that 'last call for the +paradise express.' They like this world and its life and they know +they could be pretty decent if somebody would only explain a few little +things to them. It isn't that they hate religion but they want to be +allowed to grow into it naturally and sanely. Religion getting ought +to be the quietest, happiest process, just pleasant neighboring like +and comparing of ideas, with every now and then a holy hush when men +and women have suddenly sensed some big beauty in life. All this noise +is unnecessary, for every living soul of us, barring idiots, repents +several times a day even though we don't admit it in so many words. +And as for righteous wrath--it's a good thing and I believe in it, but +like cayenne pepper it wants to be used sparingly and only at the right +place and on the right person. Any one would think to hear some +ministers talk that the Almighty was a combination of Theodore +Roosevelt, the Kaiser and a New York Police Commissioner working the +third degree. + +"I wonder what the colleges can be thinking of, turning loose such +stale foolishness and old canned stuff on a mellow, sunny little home +town like Green Valley that's full of plain, blundering but +well-meaning, God-fearing people who work joyfully at their business of +living and turn up more religion when they plow a furrow or make over +the wedding dress for the baby than these ministers can dig up out of +all their musty books. I've prayed for all kinds of qualities in +ministers but I've come to the point where I ask nothing more of a +preacher than a laugh now and then, some horse sense and health. + +"I used to think that only mature men ought to be sent out but now I +shall be glad to see a boy in the pulpit to show us the way to +salvation,--a boy it may be with a head full of foolish notions that +old folks say are not practical and some of which won't of course stand +wear; but a boy, with a glad young face, eyes full of faith and dreams +and the sort of insane courage and daring that only the young know. +Such a boy needs considerable education in certain earthly matters, of +course, but he's lovable and teachable and will in time grow into a +real, God-knowing, truth-interpreting man." + +Oh, Grandma Wentworth was an authority on ministers--ministers and +babies. And it was a baby that had kept her away from church this +Lilac Sunday; a little, merry, red-headed boy baby that had come in the +early morning to make glad the heart of unbusinesslike Billy Evans and +his neat businesslike wife. For several hours Doc Philipps and Grandma +had despaired of both baby and mother, but when the pink dawn came +smiling over the world's rim Billy's little son was born alive and +unblemished and Billy's wife crept back from the Valley of the Shadow +and smiled a bit into Billy's white, stricken face. And Billy looked +deep down into the brown eyes of the girl and the terrible numbness +went out of his muscles and the icy hardness from around his heart and +he slipped out into the morning world to thank the Great Spirit that +moved it for His mercy and wonderful gift. He just stood on his front +doorstep and, looking about his pretty home and remembering the miracle +within the house, poured a great prayer into the heart of the glad +morning. + +Billy's house was one of the most picturesque of the many pretty homes +in Green Valley. It had been a ramshackle, tumbled-down old cabin lost +in a tangle of bushes and hidden from the road by a shabby, unsightly +row of old willows. Billy was going to rent it for temporary barn +purposes but his wife, who had a nimble and a prophetic eye, made him +buy it. Then, under her supervision Billy enlarged and remodeled it +and Billy's wife waved some sort of a fairy wand over it, for it became +over night a lovely, story-book home. When everything was ready she +had the unsightly willows cut, revealing a gently rising stretch of +mossy sward ending in a cluster of old trees from which the cozy house +peeped roguishly, tantalizingly. Two old walnuts guarded the little +footpath to the door and two huge lilac bushes screened the porch from +the too curious gaze of travelers on the road below. Indeed, so +altogether taking and fascinating a bit of property did it become after +its transformation that it was said that two of Green Valley's real +estate men never went down that road without doing sums in their heads +and calling themselves names for overlooking such a bargain. It takes +constructive imagination to be successful in real estate. + +And now around this cozy home spot Billy wandered deliriously, +aimlessly. It was the tolling of the church bell and the smell of the +lilacs that recalled to him the significance of the day. + +"Why, he was born on Lilac Sunday and he's red-headed just like Her. +Gosh--I must a bin born lucky!" + +Billy looked once more all about his story-book home and then his eyes +strayed away to Petersen's Woods, fairy green and already full of deep +shadowed aisles, full of fretted beauty and solemnity. Beyond them lay +the creek, a pool of silver draped in misty morning veils. + +"Gosh--I wish to God I was religious!" suddenly, contritely murmured +Billy Evans. In high heaven the angels, and in Billy's kitchen Grandma +Wentworth, overheard and smiled. + +When Hank Lolly came up from the livery barn for a late breakfast, his +face drawn and eyes full of fear for the man and woman who had been +family and home to him, Billy went down the footpath to meet him. + +"It's all right, Hank! He's here, red hair and all," Billy informed +him in the merest breath of a whisper. Hank wiped his face in limp +relief and sat down quite suddenly on the grass beside the path. +Instinctively Billy sat down with him. + +They said nothing for a time, just looked and looked at the wide blue +sky, the green sweet world, tried for perhaps the millionth time to +sense Eternity and the what-and-why-and-how of it all and then gave it +up and like children accepted the day, the little new life, the whole +wonder of it as happy children accept it all, on faith and with +untainted joy. It was just good to be there and there was no doubting +the perfect May day. So they sat reverently until Billy, looking again +at that mass of shimmering greens and into those church-like aisles, +said: + +"Hank, some one of us had ought to go to church to-day. I wish to God +I had kep' up going to Sunday school. Mother got me started but she +died before she could get me started in on church. So I never went. +It's a terrible thing for a man not to learn religion along with his +reading and writing and 'rithmetic. I used to think it was nobody's +business whether I had any religion or not after mother died. I knew +that where she was she'd understand. But I see now it was a terrible +mistake thinking that way and not laying in a supply of religion. A +man thinks he owns himself and that certain things are nobody's +business, but by-and-by along comes a wife or a red-headed baby and +things happen different from what you've ever expected, things that you +just got to have religion for, and gosh--what are you going to do then +if you ain't got any?" + +This terrible situation being beyond the mental powers of Hank, that +soul just sat still until Billy puzzled a way out. + +"Somebody'd ought to go to church from out this house to-day," went on +Billy in a low voice. "Grandma Wentworth can't go on account of Her +and It. I can't go because--gosh--I'm so kind of split, my head going +one way and my legs another, that as likely as not I'd wind up in the +blacksmith shop or the hotel or fall in the creek. I ain't safe on the +streets to-day, Hank. And, anyway, I've got to keep up fires and water +boiling and them dumb'd frogs under the willows from croaking so's She +can sleep to-night. That leaves nobody but you, Hank." + +Billy hesitated, realizing the enormity of the request he was about to +make. + +"Hank--I wish to God, you'd go and sort of settle the bill up for me. +Just go, Hank, and tell Him, that's the Big Boss, how darned thankful +we all are about what's happened to-day and that we'll do right by the +little shaver and that we'll try to run the livery business so's He +won't find too many mistakes when He gets around to looking over the +books Barney and you and me's keeping. And you might mention how we've +always made it a point to treat our horses well but will do better in +the future. And tell Him I'll see that the Widow Green's spring +plowing is done sooner after this. It was a darn shame her being left +last like that but that she never asked me, me being so easy-going and +she so neat, until the rest of them left her in the lurch. And tell +Him I'll take the sheriff's job, though if there's one thing I can't do +it's watching people and jumping on them. Just talk to Him that way, +Hank. Put in any little thing you happen to think of and go as far as +you like in promises and subscriptions. The business is moving and +what promises you and I can't keep She'll find a way to pay off. And +here's a ten-dollar gold piece to drop in the hat when it comes around. +You--" + +But Hank was standing now and looking at his employer with such terror +in every line of his weather-beaten face that Billy paused again. + +"My God--Billy! You ain't asking me--_me_--to--to--to--to go to +_church_?" Hank's voice fairly squeaked and stuttered with the horror +that clutched him. + +"Hank, if there was any one else--" + +But Hank, shaking in every joint and muscle of his still flabby body, +wagged his head in utter misery. + +"Billy, I'll do anything else for you and Mrs. Evans and little +Billy--anything but that. I'll jump into Wimple's pond, get drunk, +sign the pledge--anything but that. What you're a-wanting, Billy, +ain't to be thought of. You're forgetting, Billy, what I was and what +I am. Why, Billy, that there church belongs to the best people in this +town and it ain't for the likes of me to go into such vallyable places, +a-tramplin' on that there expensive carpet we both of us hauled free of +charge last September. There's Doc Philipps and Tony and Grandma +Wentworth and any number of good friends of mine in there. And do you +think I want to shame them and insult them by coming into their church, +disturbing the doings? You just let things be and when Mrs. Evans is +up and around again she'll go like she always does when she's got +enough vittles cooked up for us men folks. I'm a miserable, no-account +drunk, that's what I am, Billy Evans, and I ain't no proper person to +send on an errand to the Lord. Why, church ain't for the likes of +me--it's--it's--" + +But at this point language failed Hank entirely, and the enormity of +the proposed undertaking once more sweeping over him, Hank searched for +his bandanna and wiped the beads of cold sweat from around his mouth +and the back of his stringy neck. + +Billy was silent. He knew that Hank was right and that he had asked an +impossible service of his faithful helper. Still there in the morning +sun glistened the green grove and through the holiness of the spring +morning tolled the old church bell. So Billy rose and walked slowly +and a little sadly up the narrow path. And Hank walked up with him. + +It was in silence that they sat down to their late breakfast. But in +the act of swallowing his tenth cornmeal pancake dripping with maple +syrup Hank had a sudden inspiration. The misery in his face gave place +to a grim determination. + +"Billy," he offered remorsefully, "I can't go to church for you, but +I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll go to the dentist's and have these +bad teeth fixed that Doc and Mrs. Evans and you have been at me about. +Next to going to church that's the awfullest thing I know of and I'll +do it. Doc says that bad teeth make a bad stomach and a bad stomach +makes a bad man and it may be so. And as for that ten-dollar gold +piece, I don't see why you can't send that by Barney, same as you'd +send him to the bank for change or to Tony's to pay the gas bill. When +I go back now I'll just send Barney along with it, and then I'll go see +Doc Mitchell and let him kill me with that there machine of his." + +That's how it happened that a little thin hand caught Nanny Ainslee's +just as she was entering the church door and Barney of the spindle legs +begged frenziedly for assistance. + +"Aw, Nan--look at this!" and he held out the gold piece. "Billy Evans' +got a little baby down to his house and he's clean crazy. Grandma +Wentworth's bossing the baby show and she says for you to take the +minister home to dinner. And Billy's sent this here and wants me to +put it in the collection box and I don't dast. Why, say, old man +Austin that passes the collection plate would have me pinched if he saw +me drop that in it. + +"And, anyhow, I ain't been liked around here ever since last Christmas +when I got three boxes of candy by mistake. And, gee--Nan, I don't +know what to do about it. Billy Evans is the best man in this here +town and I'd do most anything for him, but he's such a good guy himself +he don't see that church ain't any place for a kid like me and that it +was a mistake to send me with this coin." + +Nan's amazement gave way to sudden enlightenment. She knew now why +Grandma Wentworth had not put in an appearance, and knowing Billy Evans +well, she instantly comprehended the situation. + +"Barney, what in the world are you talking about, saying this church is +no place for you. This is just the place for a boy who gets several +boxes of Christmas candy by mistake. You come right along with me." + +"Aw, Nan, why can't you drop it in for me? I just ain't got the nerve. +I'd rather get all my teeth pulled like Hank is going to do. Why, say, +Nan, just the sight of old Austin makes my hair curl. I tell ya he +don't like me and I'll be pinched--" + +But Nan had already drawn Billy's spindle-legged assistant inside and +as no man yet had been known to show anything but quiet pride when +escorting Nanny Ainslee, Barney straightened manfully and with an +outward serenity that amazed even himself he gracefully slid into a +seat, having first gallantly stepped aside to permit his gracious lady +to be seated. And life being that morning especially a thing of tender +humor, they had no sooner settled themselves comfortably when Fanny +Foster, the last comer, sank down beside them, breathing heavily. + +Fanny Foster was always late for church, not from any notion that a +late entrance was fashionable but because of some hitch in her domestic +affairs. She always explained to the congregation afterward just what +had caused her delay and the congregation was always ready to listen to +her excuses, for they were as a rule highly original ones. + +Fate was always sending Fanny the most thrilling experiences at the +most improper times. The children were always falling into the cistern +or setting the barn afire as she was about to start out somewhere. And +such things as buttonhooks and hairpins had a way of disappearing just +when she was in the greatest hurry. Not that the lack of these toilet +necessities ever stopped Fanny from attending any town function. + +If the buttonhook could not be found she set out with her shoes +unbuttoned, borrowing the necessary implement on the way. If she had +no hairpins she put her hair up temporarily with two knitting needles +or lead pencils or anything like that that came handy, stopped at +Jessup's, bought her hairpins, and while reporting news in Mrs. Green's +kitchen did up her hair without the aid of brush, comb or mirror. + +This trait Fanny came by naturally. She had had a droll grandmother. +It was authentic history that once at the very moment when she was +getting ready to attend a Green Valley funeral this grandmother's false +teeth broke, leaving her somewhat dazed. But only for a moment, for +she was a woman with a perfect memory. She suddenly remembered that +the wife of the deceased had an old emergency set; so, slipping through +the back streets, she arrived at the house of grief, borrowed the new +widow's old teeth and wept as copiously and sincerely, albeit a little +carefully, over the remains as any one else there. + +Now, scarcely waiting to regain her breath, Fanny turned to Nanny with +the usual explanations, only stopping to exclaim over Barney--"Land +sakes, Barney, what are you doing here!" A breath and then in sibilant +whispers: + +"Well--I thought I'd never get here. When I come to dress I found the +children had cut up my corset into a harness for the dog and Jessup's +said they hadn't anybody to send up with a new one and John said he +couldn't go because his foot's bad, him having stepped on the rake +yesterday afternoon and not wanting to irritate it, so's he could go to +work tomorrow as usual. And Grandma's up to Billy Evans' trying to +keep him from going crazy or I could have borrowed one of hers. So I +'phoned Central to see if she couldn't hunt up somebody to bring me +that new corset from Jessup's. Well, who does she get hold of but +Denny, just as he's going past with a telegram for Jocelyn Brownlee. +He brought the corset with the string gone and the box broken and asked +me to help him figure out what that telegram meant. It said, + +"'Coming better call it phyllis + BOB.' + + +"There's few men that can write a proper letter. We had to give it up. +And as if that wasn't enough, when I got to the creamery I met +Skinflint Holden and he told me there was a lot of disease amongst the +cattle and the men all got together and had a meeting and made Jake +Tuttle deputy marshal or something. It's a wonder Jake wouldn't say +something. I suppose he thinks the few old cows we have here in town +ain't worth saving. + +"Well, anyhow, I was hurrying along so's not to be late and just as I +turned Tumley's hedge didn't Bessie come out with her face swollen so +she looked homelier than Theresa Meyer. It seems she had a birthday +and Alex brought her a big box of chocolates and they give her the +toothache. She went to Doc Mitchell but he put her off because he was +regulating and pulling every tooth in Hank Lolly's head. She was just +sick to think she had to miss Lilac Sunday and Mr. Courtney's last +sermon, but she told me to be sure and listen and if he let on he was +sorry he was leaving not to believe him, because he's had everything +except the parlor furniture crated for a month. They've been eating +off tin plates and drinking out of two enamel cups on the kitchen +table. Bessie thinks that for a minister he's full of sin and +self-pride. But I say even a minister--" + +But at this point the hymn singing was over, the congregation settled +itself in comfortable attitudes, and the careful Mr. Courtney rose to +deliver his farewell sermon. + +It was a sermon that stirred nobody. Green Valley was as glad to see +the Reverend Courtney departing as he was to go. His one cautious +reference to their pastorless state, for he did not know that Green +Valley had already selected its new minister, brought not a line of +worry to the faces turned so politely to the pulpit, for on Lilac +Sunday and to a farewell sermon Green Valley was ever polite. + +Green Valley, listening, thought with relief of the Sundays ahead and +felt very much the way a hospitable housewife feels when an uncongenial +guest departs and the home springs back to its old cheery order and +family peace. + +When the services were over Green Valley strolled out into the May +sunshine in twos and threes and stood about as always in little groups +to exchange the week's news. Billy Evans' new happiness, the +ten-dollar gold piece and all its attending incidents were duly talked +over. Under the horse chestnuts Max Longman was telling Colonel +Stratton how the day before Sam Ellis had at last leased the hotel to a +Chicago man. It was reported that there was to be no new barber shop, +but that over on West Street a poolroom, also run by a city stranger, +was already doing business. Several people had passed it that morning +on their way to church and all said it had a peculiar appearance. + +"Looks like one of those woebegone city dens, with its green plush +curtains so you can't see what's going on inside. All it needs is fly +specks on the windows and a strong smell at its side door. That'll +come with time. I hear you can play billiards and pool in there and +there's some slot machines for those too young to take a hand at cards." + +So said Jake Tuttle, who now that he was a deputy sheriff on the watch +for diseases threatening his and his neighbors' cattle, suddenly +realized that there might be such a thing as a deputy sheriff to look +out for the physical and moral health of humans. + +Green Valley listened to Max Longman's announcement and Jake's comment +and made up its mind to go around and see. Sam Ellis' withdrawal from +business made Green Valley folks a little uneasy. The hotel in other +hands might become a strange place. For a moment an uncomfortable +feeling gripped those who heard. Sam, an old friend and a neighbor, +with his genial good sense and old-fashioned hotel was one thing. A +stranger from the big and wicked city was another. + +Green Valley almost began to worry a bit. But on the way home this +feeling wore off. How could things change? Why, there were the +Spencer boys taking turns at the ice-cream freezer on the back porch. +There was Ella Higgins coming out with a saucer of milk for her cat. +Downer's barn door was open and any one could see by the new buggy that +stood in it that Jack Downer's brother and family had driven in from +the farm for a Sunday dinner and visit. Williamson's dog, Caesar, was +tied up,--a sure sign that Mel and Emmy had gone off to see Emmy's +folks over in Spring Road. The chairs in Widow Green's orchard told +plainly that her sister's girls had come in from the city for the +week-end. On the Fenton's front porch sat pretty Millie Fenton, +waiting to put a flower in Robbie Longman's buttonhole. While +everybody knew that just next door homely Theresa Meyer was putting an +extra pan of fluffy soda biscuits into the oven as the best preparation +for _her_ beau. + +So Green Valley looked and smiled and went joyously home to its +fragrant, old-fashioned Sunday dinner. New elements might and would +come but this smiling town would absorb them, mellow them to its own +golden hue and go on its way living and rejoicing. + +Cynthia's son went to dinner with the Ainslees. He walked with Mr. +Ainslee while Nan and her brother went on ahead. Nan was almost +noisily gay but no one seemed to be at all aware of it. + +The dinner was delicious and went off without the least bit of +embarrassment. At the table Nan was as suddenly still as she had been +noisily gay. She let the men do the talking while she scrupulously +attended to their wants. Once she forgot herself and while he was +talking studied the face of Cynthia's son. Her father caught her at it +and smiled. This made her flush and to even up matters she +deliberately put salt instead of sugar into her father's after-dinner +cup of coffee. Whereupon he, tasting the salt, made an irrelevant +remark about handwriting on the wall. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +GREEN VALLEY MEN + +Close on the heels of Lilac Sunday comes Decoration Day. And nowhere +is it observed so thoroughly as in Green Valley. + +The whole week preceding the day there is heard everywhere the whir of +sewing machines. New dresses are feverishly cut and made; old ones +ripped and remade. Hats are bought, old ones are retrimmed. Buggies +are repainted and baby carriages oiled. Dick does a thriving business +in lemons, picnic baskets, flags, peanuts and palm-leaf fans, these +being things that Jessup's chronically forget to carry, regarding them +as trifles and rather scornfully leaving them to Dick, who makes a +point of having on hand a very choice supply. + +This fury of work gradually dies down, to be followed by such an +epidemic of baking that the old town smells like a sweet old bakery +shop with its doors and windows wide open. There is then every evening +a careful survey of the flower beds in the garden, a rigid economy of +blossoms and even much skilful forcing of belated favorites. + +The last day is generally given over to hat buying, the purchasing of +the last forgotten fixings and clothes inspections. From one end of +the town to the other clotheslines, dining-room chairs, porch rockers +and upstairs bedrooms are overflowing with silk foulards, frilled +dimities, beribboned and belaced organdies, not to mention the billows +of dotted swiss and muslin. + +On short clotheslines, stretched across corners of back and side +porches or in the tree-shaded nooks of back yards, may be seen hanging +the holiday garments of Green Valley men. But what most catches the +eye are the old suits of army blue flapping gently in the spring breeze +with here and there a brass button glinting. There are a surprising +number of these suits of army blue just as there are a surprising +number of graves in the little Green Valley cemetery over which, the +long year through, flutters the small flag set there by loving hands +each Decoration Day. + +There are all manner of cleaning operations going on in full view of +anybody and everybody who might be interested enough to look. For +there is no streak of mean secretiveness in Green Valley folks. + +This is the one time in the year when Widow Green takes off and "does +up" the yellow silk tidy that drapes the upper right-hand corner of her +deceased husband's portrait which stands on an easel in the darkest +corner of her parlor. This little service is not the tender attention +of a loving and grieving wife for a sadly missed husband but rather a +patriotic woman's tribute to a man, who, worthless and cruel as a +husband, had yet been a gallant and an honorable soldier. + +As the widow sits on the back steps carefully washing the tidy in a +hand basin and with a bar of special soap highly recommended by Dick, +she looks over into the next yard and calls to Jimmy Rand and asks him +whether he's going to march with the rest of the school children and +will there be anything special on the programme this year. And he +tells her sure he's going to march. Ain't he got a new pair of pants, +a blouse, a navy blue tie and a new stickpin? And as for the +programme, he warns her to watch out "fur us kids because we're going +to be fixed up for something, but I dassent tell because it's a +surprise the teachers got up." + +This is the one day in the year when Jimmy Rand polishes his +grandfather's shoes with scrupulous care and without demanding the +usual nickel. He takes his payment in watching the blue army suit +swaying on the line under the tall poplars and in hearing the crowds on +Decoration Day shout themselves hoarse for old Major Rand. + +It is the one time too when Old Skinflint Holden gets from his fellow +citizens and neighbors a certain grave respect, for they all know that +on the morrow among the men in blue will be this same Old Skinflint +Holden with a medal on his breast. + +Though every preparation has seemingly been made days ago, still that +last night before the event is the very busiest time of all. + +Joe Baldwin's little shop is crowded. Jake Tuttle is there with the +four children, buying them the fanciest of footgear for the morrow. +The two Miller boys, who work in the creamery until nine every night +but have special leave this day to purchase holiday necessities, are +standing awkwardly near Joe's side door and waiting patiently for +Frankie Stevens and Dora Langely, better known as "Central," to depart +with their black velvet slippers, before making any effort to have Joe +try his wares on their awkward feet. Little Johnny Peterson comes in +to inquire if Joe has sewed the buttons on his, Johnny's, shoes, and +Martha Gray has a hard time trying to decide which of two pairs of +moccasins are most becoming to her youngest baby. Any number of youths +are hanging about waiting for Joe to get around to selling them a box +of his best shoe polish and some, getting impatient, wait on +themselves. Joe, with his spectacles pushed up into his hair, is +rushing around from customer to customer and through it all is dimly +conscious of the fact that outside under the awning Dolly Beatty is +waiting anxiously for the men folks to get out before she ventures in +to buy her Joe's special brand of corn salve and bunion plaster. + +And so it is all the way down Main Street. In the gents' furnishings' +corner of Peter Sweeney's dry-goods store Seth Curtis is buying a new +hat, a little jaunty hat that seems to fit his head well enough but +doesn't somehow become the rest of him. Seth looks best in a cap and +always wears one except, of course, on such state occasions as the +coming one. He asks the Longman boys how he looks in the brown fedora +Pete has just put on his head and Max Longman laughs and wants to know +what difference it makes how a married man with a bald spot looks. +Then he turns away to pick out carefully the kind of tie that will make +him most pleasing in Clara's sight on the morrow. + +In the ladies' department of that same store Jocelyn Brownlee is asking +for long, white silk gloves. A little hush falls on the crowd of +feminine shoppers as Mrs. Pete gets the stepladder, mounts it and +brings down with a good deal of visible pride a pasteboard box +containing six pairs of white silk gloves that Pete bought three years +ago in a moment of incomprehensible madness, a thing which Mrs. Pete +has never until this minute forgiven him. + +Jocelyn, pretty, eager, unaffected, selects the very first pair and is +wholly unconscious of the stir she has made. It is only when David +Allan comes up and asks her if she is ready that she becomes confused +and conscious of the watching eyes of the other buyers. + +She has promised to go to the Decoration Day exercises with David and +has hurried to buy gloves for the occasion not knowing, in her city +innocence, that gloves aren't the style in Green Valley, leastways not +for any outdoor festival. + +David watches the gloves being wrapped up and that reminds him that it +wouldn't hurt to buy a new buggy whip, one of the smart ones with the +bit of red, white and blue ribbon on its tip that he saw standing in +Dick's window. + +So he and Jocelyn go off together to get the whip. It is the first +time that Jocelyn has been out in the village streets after nightfall +and she looks about her with eager eyes. + +"My--how pretty the streets look and sound! It's ever so much prettier +than village street scenes on the stage!" she confides to David. And +David laughs and takes her over to Martin's for a soda and then, +because it is still early, he coaxes her to walk about town with him +and as a final treat they stop in front of Mary Langely's millinery +shop. + +Mary Langely's shop stands right back of Joe Baldwin's place on the +next street. Mary is a widow with two girls. Dora is the Green Valley +telephone operator and Nellie is typist and office girl for old Mr. +Dunn who is Green Valley's best real estate and lawyer man. He sells +lots, now and then a house, writes insurance and draws up wills, +collects bills or rather coaxes careless neighbors to settle their +accounts, and he absolutely does not believe in divorce or woman +suffrage. These two matters stir the gentle little man to great wrath. +His wife is even a gentler soul than he is. She is the eldest of the +Tumleys, sister of George Hoskins' wife and to Joe Tumley, the little +man with a voice as sweet as a skylark's. + +You go to Mr. Dunn's office through a little low gate and you find an +old, deep-eaved, gambrel-roofed house with a hundred little window +panes smiling at you from out its mantle of ivy. You love it at once +but you don't go in right away, because the great old trees won't let +you. You go and stand under them and wonder how old they are and lay +your hand caressingly on the fine old trunks. And then you see the +myrtle and violets growing beneath them and near the house clumps of +daisies and forget-me-nots. And then you spy the beehives and the +quaint old well and you walk through the cool grape arbor right into +the little kitchen, where Mrs. Dunn, as likely as not, is making a +cherry pie or currant jell or maybe a strawberry shortcake. She is a +delicious and an old-fashioned cook. Why, she even keeps a giant +ten-gallon cooky jar forever filled with cookies, although there are +now no children in this sweet old manse. Nobody now but Nellie Langely +who goes home every night to the millinery shop where she helps her +mother make and sell the bonnets that have made Mary Langely famous in +all the country round. + +Green Valley folks have never quite gotten over wondering about Mary +Langely. When Tom Langely was alive Mary was a self-effacing, oddly +silent woman. People said she and Tom were a queer pair. Tom had +great ambitions in almost every direction. He even made brave +beginnings. But that was all. Then one day, in the midst of all +manner of ambitious enterprises, he grew tired of living and died. And +then it was that Mary Langely rose from obscurity and made Green Valley +rub its eyes. For within a week after Tom's death she had gathered +together all the loose ends of things that he had started, clapped a +frame second story on the imposing red brick first floor of the house +Tom had begun, converted this first floor into a store, and inside of a +month was selling hats to women who hadn't until then realized they +needed a hat. + +There were more electric bulbs and mirrors in Mary's shop than in any +three houses in Green Valley. That was why it was always the gayest +spot in town on the night preceding any holiday. + +It was interesting and pleasant to watch through the brightly lighted +windows and the wide double glass doors the women trying on the gay +creations and hovering over the heaps of flowers and glittering +ornaments heaped upon the counters. + +Jocelyn and David stood in the soft shadow of an old elm and while they +watched David explained the customers going in and coming out. He told +her that the tall straight woman buying the spray of purple lilacs for +her last year's hat was the Widow Green. The short, waddly woman +trying on the wide hat with the pink roses was Bessie Williams. The +tall girl with the pretty braids wound round her head was Bonnie Don, +big Steve Meckling's sweetheart. Steve, David explained, was so +foolishly in love that he was ready to commit murder if another lad so +much as looked at Bonnie. + +The tall quiet man buying hats and ribbons for his girls was John +Foster. And the little bow-legged one, with the hard hat two sizes too +big, was Hen Tomlins who always went shopping with his wife. + +So Green Valley made its purchases and hastened home to pack its lunch +basket and lay out all its clothes on the spare-room bed. Even as +David and Jocelyn walked home through the laughing streets, lights were +being winked out in the lower living rooms only to flash out somewhere +up-stairs where the family was wisely going to bed early. No one even +glanced at the sky, for it was taken for granted that Green Valley +skies would do their very best, as a matter of course. + + +When the last star began to fade and the first little breath of a new +morning ruffled the soft gray silence a sudden sharp volley rang out. +It was the Green Valley boys setting off cannon crackers in front of +the bank. And it must be said right here that that first signal volley +was about all the fireworks ever indulged in in Green Valley. This +little town, nestling in the peaceful shelter of gentle hills and +softly singing woods, naturally disliked harsh, ugly sounds and was +moreover far too thrifty, too practical and sane a community to put +firearms and flaming death into the hands of its children. Green +Valley patriotism was of a higher order. + +At that sharp volley Green Valley awoke with a start and a laugh and +ran to put flags on its gateposts and porch pillars and loop bunting +around its windows. And when the morning broke like a great pink rose +and shed its rosy light over the dimpling hills and lacy, misty +woodlands the old town was a-flutter with banners, everybody was about +through with breakfast and certain childless and highly efficient +ladies were already taking their front and side hair out of curl papers. + +At eight o'clock sharp the school bell summoned the children. Then a +little later the church bell summoned the veterans. And by nine the +procession was marching down Maple Street, flags waving, band playing +and every face aglow. + +First came the little tots all in white, the boy babies bearing little +flags and the girl babies little baskets of flowers, with little +Eleanor Williams carrying in her tiny hands a silken banner on which +Bessie Williams, her mother, had beautifully embroidered a dove and the +lovely word, "Peace." + +Then came the older children, a whole corps it seemed of Red Cross +nurses, followed by a regiment of merry sailor boys. There were +cowboys and Boy Scouts, boys in overalls and brownies. There were +girls in liberty caps, crinolines and sunbonnets. + +So grade after grade Green Valley's children came, a proud and happy +escort for the men in blue who followed. Nanny Ainslee's father led +the veterans, sitting his horse right gallantly. Nanny and her father +were both riding and so was Doc Philipps. + +There were plenty of people on horseback but most of the town marched, +even The Ladies Aid Society, every member wearing her badge and new hat +with conscious pride and turning her head continually to look at the +children, as the head of the procession turned corners. The young +married women with babies rode in buggies, from every one of whose +bulging sides flags drooped and fat baby legs and picnic baskets +protruded. + +Everything went smoothly, joyously along, though a few incidents in +various parts of the procession caused smiles, gusts of laughter and +even alarm. + +Jimmy Rand had a few anxious moments when the four fat puppies he +thought he had shut safely into the barn came yelping and tumbling +joyously into the very heart of the marching crowds. + +Jim Tumley was down on the day's programme for several numbers. But as +the line swung around the hotel and the spring winds stained with the +odors of liquor swept temptingly over him he half started to step out +of line. But Frank Burton guessed his trouble and ordered Martin's +clerk, Eddie, to bring the little chap an extra large and fine soda +instead. + +Mrs. Hen Tomlins upset things by ordering Hen back home to change his +shirt. It seems that Hen had deliberately put on a shirt with a soft +collar and in the excitement of getting under way and trying to +remember which way her new hat was supposed to set Mrs. Hen had failed +to notice the crime until, her fears set at rest by Mary Langeley, she +turned around to see if Hen looked all right. + +Uncle Tony was in a great state of excitement. He was continually +leaving his place in The Business Men's Association to have a look from +the side lines at the imposing spectacle. + +Here and there mothers close enough to their offspring were suggesting +a more frequent use of handkerchiefs and calling attention to +traitorous garters and wrinkled stockings. Tommy Downey had forgotten +what his mother had told him about being sure to put his ears inside +his cap and those two appendages, burned and already blistered by the +hot May sun, stood out in solemn grandeur from his small, round, +grinning face. The school teachers were keeping anxious eyes on their +particular broods and insisting that the eager feet keep solemn step to +the music. + +Sam Ellis' new greenhorn hired girl, Francy, was sitting in the back +seat of the buggy, holding down the brimming baskets and leaning out as +far as possible so as not to miss anything that might happen at either +end as well as the middle of the procession. She had been utterly +unable to pin on her first American hat with hatpins, so had wisely +tied it to her head with a large red-bordered handkerchief which she +had brought over from the old country. + +Jocelyn Brownlee, sitting beside David in his smart rig, had begged him +to go last so that she could see everything. This was her first +country festival and no child in that throng was so happily, wildly +eager to drain the day to the very last drop of enjoyment. + +Jocelyn and David however did not end the procession. Behind them, +though quite a way back, was Uncle Tony's brother William. William was +driving his span of grays so slowly that the pretty creatures tossed +their heads restlessly, impatiently, lonely for the companionship of +the gay throng ahead. + +But though their owner knew what they wanted he held them back sternly. +But he looked as wistfully as they at the fluttering flags and listened +as keenly to the puffs of music that the wind dashed into his face +every now and then. + +Every Decoration Day Uncle Tony's brother William rode just so, slowly +and alone at the end of the gay procession. On that day he was a +lonely and tragic figure. Loved and respected every other day in the +year, on this he was shunned. For he was the only man in all Green +Valley who, when conscripted, would not go to the war but sent a +substitute, one Bob Saunders. + +Bob was killed at Gettysburg and nobody mourned him, not even his very +own sister though Green Valley was duly proud of the way he died. Only +on this one day did Green Valley remember the man whose death was the +one and only worth while deed of a misspent life. But on this one day +too Green Valley shunned the man who sent him to his death. + +So every Decoration Day William came alone to put a wreath on Bob's +grave and watch the exercises from a distance. When it was over he +went home--alone. And Green Valley let him do it year after year. + +He was never known to murmur at Green Valley's annual censure nor did +he ever seem to hope for forgiveness. Green Valley had asked him once +why he had done it and he said that he would have been worthless as a +soldier because he did not believe in killing people and was himself +horribly afraid of being butchered. + +Green Valley was appalled at this terrible confession, at the absence +in one of its sons of even the common garden variety of courage. It +did its best for a while to despise William. But it is hard work +despising an honest, quiet, just and lovable man. So gradually William +was allowed to come home into Green Valley's life. And it was only on +this one holiday that he was an outcast. Neither did any one ever +remind William's children of what years ago their father had done. But +of course they knew. Their father had told them himself. They were in +no way cast down. They were all girls who loved their father and did +not believe in war. + +In that fashion then, and in that order, Green Valley marched down Main +Street, up Grove, through lovely Maple and very slowly down Orchard +Avenue so that Jeremy Collins, who was bedridden because of a bullet +wound suffered at Shiloh, could see his old comrades with whom he could +no longer march. + +All the way down Park Lane the band played its very best and loudest as +if calling from afar to those comrades who lay sleeping beneath the +pines and oaks of the little cemetery. And just as the Green Valley +folks came in sight of the white headstones the Spring Road procession +came tramping over the old bridge, and Elmwood, with its flags and +band, was coming up the new South Road. The three towns met nicely at +the very gates of the cemetery and together made the sort of sound and +presented the sort of sight that lingers in the heart long after other +things have faded from one's memory. + +Then the bands grew still and there was quiet, a quiet that every +minute grew deeper so that the noisiest youngster grew round-eyed and +the fat sleek horses moved never a hoof. And then, sweet and soft +through the waiting, hushed air, came the notes of Major Rand's cornet. +He was playing for his comrades as he had played at Shiloh, at +Chickamauga and many another place in the Southland. He played all +their old favorites and then very, very softly the cornet wailed--"We +are tenting to-night on the old camp ground"--and somewhere beside it +little Jim Tumley began to sing. + +From the high blue sky and the softly stirring tree-tops the words seem +to drop into little hearts and big hearts and the sweet, melting +sadness of them misted the eyes. When the last feathery echo had died +away the men in blue passed two by two through the cemetery gate. +Reverend Campbell, who had been their chaplain, said a short prayer. +At its end the children, with their arms full of flowers, crowded up +and the men in blue stopped at every grave. The little boys planted +their flags at the head and the little girls scattered the blossoms +deep. + +From beyond the gates Green Valley and Spring Road and Elmwood watched +its heroes and its children. In David Allan's smart rig sat a little +city girl, her face crumpled and stained like a rain-beaten rose. She +was saying to no one in particular, "Oh--my daddy was a soldier too but +I know that he never had a Decoration Day like this." + +The bands played again and each class went through its number on the +programme with grace and only a very few noticeable blunders. Tommy +Downey, ears rampant, a tooth missing and a face radiant with joy and +absolute self-confidence, mounted the bunting and flag-draped stage and +in a booming voice wholly out of proportion to his midget dimensions +and in ten dashing verses assured those assembled that the man who wore +the shoulder straps was a fine enough fellow to be sure, but that it +was after all the man without them who had to win the day. + +The old country roads rippled with applause and Tommy's mother, +forgetting for once Tommy's funny ears which were her greatest source +of grief, drew the funny little body close and explained to admiring +bystanders that Tommy "took" after one of her great-uncles, a soul much +given to speech making. + +So number after number went off and then there came the speech of the +day. It had been decided at the last moment that Doc Philipps must +make this, because the specially ordered and greatly renowned speaker, +one Daniel Morton from down Brunesville way, had at the last moment and +at his ridiculous age contracted measles. + +Now Green Valley knew how Doc Philipps hated to talk about almost +everything except trees. But Green Valley also knew that Doc could +talk about most anything if he was so minded. He was, moreover, as +well known and loved in Spring Road and Elmwood as he was in his own +town. So Green Valley folks leaned back, certain that this speech +would be worth hearing. + +The bulky figure in army blue stepped to the edge of the platform and +for a silent minute towered above his neighbors like one of the great +trees he so loved. Then, without warning or preface, he began to talk +to them. + +"War is pretty--when the uniforms are new and the band is playing. War +is glorious to read about and talk about--when it's all over. But war +is every kind of hell imaginable for everybody and everything while +it's going on! And they lie who say that it ever was, is, or can be +anything else. Every soldier here to-day above ground or below it will +and would tell you the same. + +"And they are fools who say that wars cannot be prevented. War is the +rough and savage tool of a world as yet too ignorant to invent and use +any other. But here and there, in odd corners of the world, an +ever-increasing number of men are recognizing it as a disease, due to +ignorance, as possible to cure and wipe out, as any other of the +horrible plagues of mankind. + +"When I was twenty-three I too believed in war. I liked the uniform, I +liked the excitement of going, I liked the idea of 'fighting for the +right.' I was too young and too ignorant to realize that older, better +men than I on the other side felt just as right as I did. In those +days war was the only tool and we thought it right, and some of us went +hating it and some of us went shouting like fools. I went for the lark +of it, for I knew no better. I marched away in a new uniform with the +band playing and the flags snapping. And on the little old farm my +father gave me I left a nineteen-year-old wife with my one-year-old +baby. + +"Next door to that wife and baby of mine lived a man who did not +believe in war, a man who, even when conscription came and he was +called, refused to go to war. He hired a substitute and stayed at +home. And for that Green Valley has marked that man a coward and every +year sits in judgment upon him. + +"Yet the man who would not go to war stayed at home to plough my fields +and plant them. He it was who saw to it that that wife of mine and the +wives of other war-mad boys did not want for bread. He stayed at home +here and minded his business and ours as well. He wrote letters and +got news for our women when they got to fretting too hard. He +harvested our crops, tended our stock, and mended our fences because he +is so made that he cannot bear to see things wasted, neglected, ruined. + +"As a soldier that man was worthless, for the business of a soldier is +to kill, to burn, to waste, to maim. He knew that and he knew that +being what he was he could serve his country better doing the things he +liked and believed in. + +"I came out of that war a physical wreck but with a heart purified. I +saw such a hell of evil, such destruction, such misery that to-day I am +a doctor and a planter of trees. When I saw men torn to rags and +lovely strips of woodland ripped to splintered ugliness I vowed that if +I ever came through that madness I would make amends. I swore I would +go through the world mending things. So terribly did those war horrors +grip me. And I have tried to keep my promise. For every tree I saw +splintered I have tried to plant another somewhere. I have been able +to do this because of that old neighbor of mine. + +"When I came home a wreck and said that I wanted to be a doctor, people +laughed at the idea. But the man who does not believe in war came to +me at night and offered to help me through the medical school. It was +that man who made a doctor of me. He had the courage to believe and +trust when every one else laughed. + +"Yet that is the man Green Valley has been punishing all these years. +You have been counting that man a coward when you know he is no coward. +When Petersen's fool hired man let that bull out of its stall to rage +through Green Valley's streets it was Green Valley's coward who caught +him at the risk of his life. When Johnny Bigelow was sick with +smallpox it was the coward who nursed him. + +"You know all that. Yet, because of outlived and mossy tradition, you +let that man ride alone, keep him out of a Green Valley day, you who +count yourselves such good neighbors. + +"I tell you we men in blue and gray are dead and our tool of war is a +poor and clumsy thing of the past. Ours was a brave enough, great +enough day. But it has passed, its story is over and done with. + +"It is the new brand of courage that the new generations want and will +have. And no old soldier here but is glad to feel that the days of +bloodshed are over, that somewhere in the days ahead there is coming +the dawn of peace, a world peace forevermore." + +As suddenly as he began he stopped, for a long second there was a +strange silence. For just the space of ten heart flutters there was +amazement at this new style of address. No old soldier had ever talked +to them in that fashion. But when they saw him striding over that +stage and headed straight for William the storm broke and eddied out to +where William sat, holding in the grays, not even dreaming that at last +he was understood and forgiven. + +After the last songs were sung the sun stood high. So then the great +gathering broke into little family groups that strolled off up the +roads in every direction. Here in shady spots tablecloths were spread +and soon everybody seemed to be opening a basket and the feast was on. + +In half an hour all manner of things had happened. The Whitely twins +fell into some strawberry pies, and supposedly hard boiled eggs were in +many cases found to be extremely soft boiled. Boys of all sizes were +beginning to be smeared from ear to ear and two of Hen Tomlin's wife's +doughnuts were found to be quite raw inside, a discovery that so +stunned that careful lady that she never noticed Hen had taken off his +stiff linen collar, opened his shirt and tucked both it and his +undershirt into a very cool and comfortable décolleté effect. + +In another half hour fat babies fell asleep where they sat, their +little fat hands holding tight to some goody. Boys old enough to +wonder about the contrariness of things mortal looked sadly at the +still inviting tables and marveled that a thoughtful and farseeing +Providence should have made a boy's stomach in so careless and +penurious a fashion. + +They made as many as a dozen trials to see if by any chance some corner +of the said organ could be further reenforced. But when even ice-cream +and marshmallows refused to go down they gave up and dragged themselves +away to some spot where a more lucky or efficient comrade was still +blissfully busy. + +The married men openly loosened their belts and looked about for a +quiet and restful spot. The unmarried ones went sneaking off where +their mothers and their best girls couldn't see them smoking their +cigarettes. + +In the general relaxation Dolly Beatty slipped off her tightest shoe, +one bunion and four corns clamoring loudly for room. And though nobody +saw her do it, everybody knew that Sam Bobbins' wife had gone behind +some convenient bush and taken off her new corset. + +In this quiet time old friends searched each other out and sat +peacefully talking over old times. The married women kept their eyes +on the strolling couples, hoping to see a lovers' quarrel or discover a +new and as yet unannounced affair. Little by little news was +disseminated and listened to that in the elaborate preparations of the +past days had been overlooked or unreported. + +David and Jocelyn were in the crowd of merrymakers and yet not of it. +They had selected a fine old tree a little removed from the thick of +things and here Jocelyn spread their luncheon. + +"It's a lucky thing," she explained shyly, "that Decoration Day doesn't +come earlier in the year or I'd never have dared to go to a party like +this and be responsible for lunch. About all I knew how to make when +we came to Green Valley was fudge, fruit salad and toasted +marshmallows. And before Annie Dolan came to teach me how to do things +I nearly died trying. I was all black and blue from falling down the +cellar and scarred and blistered from frying things. But now I know +ever so much. + +"I can make two lovely soups and biscuits and apple pie and gravy. And +I know how to clean and stuff a turkey. Only last week Annie taught me +how to make red raspberry and currant jell. And my burns are nearly +all healed except this one. It was pretty bad, but I was ashamed to go +to the doctor's so it's not quite healed yet. That's why I just had to +have gloves to cover the bandage. But nobody else seems to be wearing +elbow gloves so I guess I'll take mine off and be comfortable. Would +you mind putting them in your pocket for me?" + +David caught the silken ball she tossed him and carefully tucked it +away. He insisted on seeing the burn but Jocelyn waved him aside, +declaring that her hunger was worse just then. + +So they ate and then sat and talked quietly of everything and nothing. +All about them people laughed and chattered. Every now and then some +one called to them and they answered correctly enough, yet knew not +what they had said. For as naturally as all the simple unspoiled +things of God's world find each other, so this sweet, unspoiled little +city girl and the big, unspoiled country boy had found each other. And +a great content possessed them. They did not know as yet what it was +but knew only that the world for them was complete and every hour +perfect that they spent together. + +They sat under their tree even after the games and races had begun and +were rather glad that in the excitement over the afternoon's programme +they two were forgotten and free to roam about. + +They went down to the creek where the burned arm was unbandaged. +Jocelyn was rosily pleased to see David frown at the ugly raw scar. He +gathered the leaves of some weed strange to her and when he had pounded +them to a cool pulp he laid them on the burn and once more bound up the +arm. He was as glad to do it as she was to have him and each knew how +the other felt. + +They strolled through the now deserted cemetery and read the epitaphs +on the mossy stones and yet nothing seemed old or sad or caused them +the least surprise. They saw Nanny Ainslee standing with Cynthia's son +before a stone that had neither name nor date but only the love-sad +words: + + "I Miss Thee So." + + +But they thought nothing of it. The world was far away and they were +serenely happy in a rarer one of their own. + +Slowly the golden afternoon was waning. Little children were beginning +to pull on their stockings, mothers began packing up the baskets and +fathers were harnessing the horses. Soon everybody was ready and Green +Valley, Spring Road and Elmwood, with many waves of flags and hands, +each started down its own road toward home. + +It was a tired, happy town that straggled down Main Street just as the +sun was gilding it with his last rays. Green Valley mothers were +everywhere hurrying their broods on to bread and milk and bed. In the +sunset streets only the little groups of grown-ups lingered to talk +over the day and exchange last jokes before going on toward home and +rest. + + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE KNOLL + +There were whole days when Cynthia's son did nothing but loaf,--whole +days when he went off by himself into the still corners of his world +and let the whole wide universe talk and sing to him and awe him with +its mystery. + +He would lie for hours in some cool, shady fern nook under a sheltering +road hedge or in the shade of some giant tree friend. At such times he +scaled the thinking, wondering part of himself and opened wide his +heart to the great whisper that rippled the grain, to the sweet song +that swelled the throat of the oriole and lark, to the beauty that dyed +the heavens and the earth, to the glad struggle for life everywhere. + +In this way he had always healed all his griefs, freed his soul from +doubts and stilled the many strange longings that made his heart ache +for things whose name and nature he knew not. + +He had discovered many of these still, restful corners from which to +watch life as it went by. But his favorite spot was right on his own +farm. + +At the very end of the Churchill estate, as if thrown in for good +measure, was a little knoll, smooth and grassy and crowned with a +little grove of God's own planting. + + +For there were gathered together big gnarled oaks, maples, old hickory +trees and many poplars. There were on that knoll three snowy, bridal +birches, the rough trunks of horse-chestnuts and a few solemn pines. +As if that were not enough, in the very heart of this woody temple were +two shaggy old crab-apple trees and one stray wild plum. + +In the spring here was fairyland. And into it Cynthia's son retired at +every fair opportunity. Here he sat and looked off at the dimpling, +rippling farmlands, the wandering old roads and at Green Valley roofs +nestling so securely in their setting of rich greens and dappled +sunshine. + +From his seat beneath an oak he could see Wimple's pond with its circle +of trees and through the far willow hedges caught the glittering sheen +and sparkle of Silver Creek. And there before and below him lay the +mellow old farm that his grandfather had left him. + +The warm brick walls with their wide brick chimneys already had a +welcoming look. For the tenant was gone and the old home was being +repaired for its owner. But from the knoll no sound of hammer or sight +of workmen marred the soft silence and sunny peace of the day. So +Green Valley's young minister sprawled comfortably down, closed his +eyes and let the earth music wrap him round. + +He was not even day dreaming the day Nan Ainslee stumbled on him there +under the oaks and pines. She had discovered the knoll when she was +six years old and claimed it for her very own, sharing its beauties +with no one, not even her brother. When she grew to young ladyhood she +often left Green Valley for wonderful trips to the ends of the world. +But she always came back to the lilacs and the seat under the great oak. + +At every return she hastened out to see anew her home valley as it +looked from her grove. So it was with something very close to +annoyance that she looked at the sprawling figure of the usurper. + +"Well, for pity sakes! What are you doing here?" she demanded. + +He opened his eyes slowly and looked at her. She fitted in so well +with the velvet whisper of the wind, the cool blue of the sky and the +world's fresh beauty that he took her appearance as a part of the +picture and was silent. It was only when she repeated her question +rather sharply that he sat up to explain. + +"Why, I found this spot months ago! It is the stillest, most heavenly +nook in Green Valley. I come up here whenever I'm tired of thinking." + +"Well--I found this place years and years ago," Nanny complained. + +"What's the matter with us both using it?" he said very civilly. + +"But," objected Nan, "this is the sort of a place that you want all to +yourself." + +"Yes, it is," he agreed and did not let the situation worry him +further. He didn't offer her a seat or give her a chance to take +herself off gracefully. And Nanny was beginning to feel a little +awkward. She wasn't used to being ignored in this strange fashion. + +"Are you very old?" the minister asked suddenly and looked up at her +with eyes as innocent and serene as a child's. + +"I'm twenty-three," Nan was startled into confessing. + +"Why aren't you married?" + +As she gasped and searched about for an answer he added: + +"In India a girl is a grandmother at that age." + +"This isn't India," smiled Nan good-naturedly, for she saw quite +suddenly that this big young man knew very little about women, +especially western women. + +"No--this isn't India." He repeated her words slowly, little wrinkles +of pain ruffling his face. For his inner eye was blotting out the +Green Valley picture and painting in its stead the India of his memory, +the India of gorgeous color, the bazaars, the narrow streets; the India +that held within its mystic arms two plain white stones standing side +by side and bearing the inscriptions "Father" and "Mother." + +Nan, not guessing what was going on in his heart, took advantage of his +silence to get even. + +"How old are you?" + +"Twenty-eight." + +"Why aren't you married?" + +"Why in the world should I be?" he wanted to know. + +"Green Valley men are usually the fathers of two or three children at +your age," she informed him calmly. + +"Oh," he smiled frankly, "of course I shall marry some day. But a man +need never hurry. He, unlike a woman, can always marry. And I intend +to have children--many children, because one child is always so lonely. +I know because I was an only child." + +This astounding piece of confidence kept Nan's tongue tied and for a +few seconds all manner of funny emotions fought within her. She wanted +to laugh, to get angry at the lordly superiority of the idea that a +woman must hurry to the altar. She felt that she ought to feel +embarrassed but the innocent sincerity with which it was all uttered +kept her from blushing and her eyes from snapping. She told herself +instead that of all man creatures she had ever encountered, this boy +from India was certainly the weirdest. And she wondered what a woman +not his mother could do with him. + +After a while she tried again. + +"Don't you feel rather guilty loafing here in the sunshine?" + +"No. Why--what should I be doing?" + +"These beautiful afternoons you ought to be devoting to pastoral calls." + +"But I attended to all the day's work this morning. I helped Uncle +Roger Allan build a fence and doctored up David's pet horse, Dolly. I +spaded up a flower plot for Grandma Wentworth and visited little Jimmy +Trumbull who's home from the hospital. Doc Philipps says he won't be +up for some time yet, so to cheer him up I've promised him a party. I +also drove to the station with Mrs. Bates' ancient horse and brought +home her new incubator. While I was there Jocelyn Brownlee came down +to get a box she said she had there. Some teasing cousin sent her a +little live pig and when she found out what was in the box she didn't +know what to do. So I put the pig beside the incubator and sat Jocelyn +beside me and we proceeded on our way. + +"That horse belonging to Mrs. Bates is certainly a solemn, stately +beast but Jocelyn's little pig was anything but stately. We made an +interesting and a musical spectacle as we went along, and I know that +one little red-headed boy in this town was late for school because he +followed us halfway home. We passed the Tomlins place and Hen was +sitting at the window, propped up with pillows. It was his first day +up and we made him laugh so hard that his wife was a little worried, I +think." + +"Agnes is rather good to Hen these days, isn't she?" Nan ventured to +ask, for the whole town knew how Agnes had gone to the minister with +her domestic troubles and how in some mysterious fashion this young man +had worked a miracle. For both Agnes and Hen were as suddenly and +happily in love with one another as though they were newly married +instead of being a middle-aged and childless couple. + +But that was all the town did know about the matter. For strange to +say Agnes, who had talked loud enough and long enough before about her +unhappiness, now was still, with never a word to say about what made +her so contented and happy. Green Valley saw her look at Hen as if he +were suddenly precious and smooth his pillow and wait on him. And +Green Valley wanted to know all about it. But so far nobody knew but +Agnes, Hen and the new minister and he didn't seem inclined to speak +about it. Not even to satisfy Nanny Ainslee's curiosity. + +Once more Nanny was embarrassed and a little angry. She swung up her +sunshade and started to go. This minister man with his ignorance of +women and his knowledge of Hen's domestic affairs was, she told +herself, a crazy, impossible creature and he could sit in his little +grove on his little knoll till he died for all she cared. She'd take +mighty good care never again to stray into his domain. + +But just as she really got up speed the big chap under the oak stood up +and spoke. + +"Don't go, Nan." + +The shock of hearing him say that stopped her and turned her sharply +around, so that she looked straight at him and found him looking at her +in a way that made the whole green world suddenly fade away into misty +insignificance. Something about that look of his made her walk back. + +But she trailed her sunshade a little defiantly and kept her eyes down +carefully. She was a little frightened too. Because for the first +time in her life she was conscious of her heart. She felt it beating +queerly and almost audibly. With every step that she took back toward +him she grew strangely happy and strangely angry. + +He silently arranged a seat for her beside him and she sat down, folded +her hands in her lap, looked off at the village roofs and waited. + +He looked at her a long time. For Nanny was good to look at. Then he +began to talk in an odd, quiet way as if they two were at home alone +and the world was shut out and far away. And he told her the story of +that locked drawer in Hen Tomlins' chiffonier. + +That drawer and Hen's growing stubbornness, due no doubt to the gradual +coming on of his serious illness, had very nearly been the death of +poor, dictatorial Agnes Tomlins. She had always picked out Hen's +shirts, bought his ties and ordered his suits and Hen had never +rebelled openly. Nor did he, so far as she knew, ever dare to have a +thought, a memory or a possession of which she was not fully informed. + +But this last year Hen had become secretive, openly rebellious, +strangely despondent, with now and then flashes of a very real and +unpleasant temper. Agnes, baffled, curious, hurt, angry and afraid, +had at last taken her burden to the boyish minister and then went in +trembling triumph to Hen and told him what she had done. + +"Yes," Hen told her quietly, "I know. He was in here when you went to +the drug store and told me. He advised me to open that drawer and let +you see what's in it. And I'll do it to please him. But I won't open +it myself and he's the only one I'll let do it. So just you send for +him. As long as you told him, I want him to see there's nothing in +that drawer that I need to be ashamed of." + +At this point in the story Cynthia's son paused and looked so long at +the sun-splashed village roofs that. + +Nan stirred impatiently. + +"Well--what was it that Hen was guarding so carefully from Agnes?" she +wanted to know. + +"Oh--just odds and ends--mostly trifles. There was a dance programme, +a black kid glove of his wife's, some letters from a chum that's dead, +an old knife his grandfather once gave him when he was a boy, the last +knit necktie his mother had made him and a box of toys, beautiful, +hand-carved toys. + +"It seems that the Tomlinses had a baby a long time ago and all the +time they were expecting it Hen was carving it these beautiful toys. +It was a boy and, lived to be a year old, just old enough to begin to +play with things. Then it died. And nobody, it seems, knew how Hen +missed that baby, not even his wife. But he had kept that box of toys +in his tool shed all those years and in the last year had put it in the +drawer with a few other treasures which he had had hidden in odd +crannies without anybody suspecting. It was all he had, he said, that +was his very own. And he showed me the handle of the little hammer +where the baby's playing hands had soiled it." + +It seems that Hen explained the other things too. The dance programme +he saved because that was where he first knew that his wife cared about +him. She had selected him for the lady's choice number. The other +things Hen kept because they were given to him by people who had all +sincerely liked him. + +"You see," Hen had said, "nobody knows how hard it is to be a little +man. Nobody respects you. Your folks always apologize and try to +explain your size or tell you not to mind. And strangers and friends +poke fun at you. After a while, of course, you learn to laugh at +yourself on the outside and folks get to think that it's all a joke for +you too and that you don't mind. But you never laugh on the inside or +when you're by yourself. And you get awful tired of looking up to +other people all the time and you begin to wish somebody'd look up to +you once in a while. + +"I used to think Aggie thought a heap of me even if I wasn't as tall as +other men. Grandfather and mother and Bill Simons cared a whole lot +and they didn't mind showing it often. I banked an awful lot on that +baby. And he did sure like me. He followed me all around and minded +me better than Aggie. It was me that always put him to bed and took +him up in the morning. And he'd look up at me and raise his little +hands to me and--" + +Cynthia's son looked steadily at Nan. + +"Do you want to hear any more?" he asked gently. + +"No--no--I don't. Oh, you shouldn't have told me. I'm not good enough +to be trusted with things like that," Nanny said brokenly and winked +and winked her long lashes to shake off the tears. + +"You wanted to be told. You were going away because I didn't want to +tell you," he reminded her quietly. + +"I know, but I'm just naturally spoiled and mean and wicked. But oh, +won't I be nice to poor Hen Tomlins after this!" + +"I'm going to have him take charge of a class in wood-carving as soon +as we can get one together. He's a master hand at that sort of work +and there are any number of boys in this town who will love it and look +up to Hen," said the man who did not understand women. The sun was +slipping low in the west, pouring a flood of mellow gold over the +landscape. It caught the attic windows of the old brick farmhouse that +was so nearly ready for its new and young owner. + +"Look," exclaimed Nan, pointing down toward it, "there is fairy +treasure in your attic." + +"Yes," he smiled, "there is. There are trunks up there full of all +manner of things that five generations of Churchills could not bear to +burn or give away. Some day when the rain is drumming on the roof and +the gutters are spouting and all the birds are tucked away in dripping +trees and the world is misty with tears, I'm going up there and just +revel in second-hand adventure, dead dreams and cobwebs." + +"Oh, my gracious, how I'd like to be there too," enviously cried Nanny +Ainslee and the next moment crimsoned angrily at herself. + +"If you won't mind coming to my house in the rain," said the man who +did not understand women--but Nanny wasn't listening. The setting sun +flared into a last widespread glory that bathed every grass blade in +Green Valley and in this strong and golden light Nan saw the 6:10 +pulling in and Fanny Foster hurrying home. Jessup's delivery boy, +driving back from his last trip, was larruping his horse and careful +Ellen Nuby was taking in her clotheslines. + +On the back porch of the Brownlee bungalow Jocelyn was shaking a white +tablecloth, for the Brownlees had supper early. Jocelyn flapped and +flapped, then folded the cloth neatly as she had seen Green Valley +matrons do. That done, she waited. + +David Allan was coming home over the hills with his team and Jocelyn +was waiting till he came closer before she waved to him and greeted +him. All Green Valley knew of these sunset greetings and approved. + +So now Nan, with a smile of understanding sympathy, watched and waited +too. She could almost see Jocelyn's happy, eager child face. David +slowly drew nearer. But after one careless look at the little figure +on the porch, his fine head drooped and he went on without a word and +left Jocelyn standing there. + +From her tree shelter Nan could see the little city girl standing very +still, staring after David. Then slowly the little figure went down +the steps and into the back garden. There it stood motionless again, +staring into the fading sky as if seeking an explanation for David's +strange conduct. + +But up on the hilltop Nanny beat her hands softly and cried out in pain +for Jocelyn. For Nanny knew her Green Valley and she knew that the +story of Jocelyn's morning ride with the minister in the Bates' ancient +carryall had already gone the rounds, even finding David in the furrows +of the fields. And now the big boy was worried and wretched and +perhaps angry at the little city girl whom he had so openly courted. + +"Oh, dear!" Nanny began to speak her mind but stopped abruptly. For +how could she tell this young man from India that he had that morning +spoiled forever perhaps a lovely romance. She knew that he was +innocent, as innocent as Jocelyn. And she knew that Green Valley meant +no harm. It was nothing. And yet so often trouble, sorrow and +heartache start in just that kind of nothingness. Out of playful +little whirlwinds of careless laughter cruel storms are born. + +When Cynthia's son turned to walk home with her Nanny waved him back +and spoke curtly. + +"My goodness--no! You mustn't. I never let anybody escort me about +this foolish little town." + +Then she hurried home alone and left John Knight standing on his +hilltop. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +GETTING ACQUAINTED + +Nobody but a Green Valley man would have dared to do the things that +the new minister did in those first months, when even the most daring +of reverend gentlemen is apt to be a bit careful and given to the +tactful searching for the straight and narrow path which is the earthly +lot of pastors. + +Cynthia's son however was one of those unconsciously successful men who +are so simply true to life and life's laws that the world joyously +meets them halfway. And then too his was a rich heritage. + +From his great preacher father he had the power of seeing visions and +dreaming dreams and the still greater gift of making and persuading +other people to see them too. From his mother he had the comrade smile +and warm intuitive heart that brought him close to even little souls. +And from old Joshua Churchill came that rock-like determination, the +uncompromising honesty and, better than all else, that rare common +sense touched with humorous shrewdness without which no man can greatly +aid his fellows or enjoy life. + +All this the new Green Valley minister had, besides bits of very +valuable and legal papers and the old porticoed homestead dozing on a +hill and waiting for the touch of a young hand to wake it into vigorous +and new life. Such parts of Green Valley as failed to appreciate the +more spiritual qualifications of the tall young man from India were +properly impressed with his worldly possessions. + +So it was that armed with these advantages Cynthia's son went his way, +smashing hoary precedents and the mossy conventions that will spring up +and grow fibrously strong even in so sunny a spot as Green Valley. + +Nobody was surprised, of course, to see little Jim Tumley in the choir; +nor to hear that the minister was giving him lessons on the new piano +whose arrival the prophetic soul of Fanny Foster had predicted. People +passing the Tumley house did however stop beside the hedge and listen +in amazement to the minister playing, for he played surprisingly well. +When complimented on this accomplishment he explained that his mother +had had a piano in India and had taught him how. + +But nobody in Green Valley dreamed of seeing old Mrs. Rosenwinkle +marketing right in the madly busy heart of town all on a Saturday +morning. But there she was in her wheel chair, with the minister +alongside to see that the road was safe and clear. + +And they say that every little while, right in the midst of her +bargaining, she would look around and say: + +"My, but the world is big and pretty." + +And when somebody reminded her of her belief that the world was flat +and ended on the far side of Petersen's pasture she never argued the +matter fiercely, as was her wont, but said instead that it _had_ ended +for her with Petersen's pasture until the day the new minister came. + +And her daughter told how the paralyzed old body prayed day and night +for this new minister's salvation, he being other than a Lutheran. +Somebody thought that too good a joke to keep and told Cynthia's son +how hard old Mrs. Rosenwinkle was praying for his soul. They expected +him to laugh. But he didn't. He looked suddenly serious just as his +mother used to do when something touched the deep down places in her +heart. + +All he said was that no man could ever have too many women praying for +him and that he was grateful as only a man whose mother was sleeping +thousands of miles away in a foreign land could be grateful. + +He had his mother's trick of letting people look quite suddenly into +that part of his soul where he kept his finest thoughts and emotions. +And people looked and saw and then usually tiptoed away in puzzled awe +or a dim sympathy. And he had such a habit of turning common sense and +daylight on matters which seemed so baffling until he explained them. + +It was just the minister's plain, common sense that finally got Hank +Lolly into the church. When the minister first suggested that Hank +ought to attend church services that worthy stared in amazed horror at +his new friend. And he gave his perfectly good reasons why the likes +of him had no right to step on what was Green Valley's sacred ground. + +"Hank, you are entirely mistaken. I have seen you go into Green Valley +parlors and every other room in the house. I watched you move that +clumsy old sideboard of Mrs. Luttins down that narrow stairway and then +through the little side gate. You never chipped a bit of plaster or +trampled a flower beside the walk. Why, you never even tore a bit of +vine off the gate. And yesterday I saw you walking your horses ever so +carefully to the station because inside the van little Jimmy Drummond +was lying on stretchers, going to the hospital. And I was told that +Doc Philipps said he wouldn't have trusted another driver with Jimmy." + +"But," groaned Hank, "people like me don't go to church." + +"Hank, most ministers don't ride around the country on a moving dray. +But I rode out with you many a time and I sort of feel that you might +come along with me now and then and see the people and things along my +route. You've given me a good time and I'd like to pay back. You'll +like the music and I'm sure you'll understand it all, because I talk +English you know. And anyhow, things get as lonesome sometimes for a +minister in the pulpit as the roads get for a dray driver and I'd +appreciate it to have a friend like you along. I never know when I'll +need a lift and a little help that you could give. Sometimes we have +to move the Sunday-school organ about and there are windows that stick +and all manner of things about a church that only a practiced mover and +driver could do. You know the janitor is rather old and infirm and as +for me--well, Hank, when you come down to it, that's about all we +ministers are, just movers. Our business is to help find just the +right and happiest places for people, to show them their part in the +game of life and keep them from bruising themselves and others. I'm +doing about the same sort of work as you are; that's why I'm asking you +to come along with me." + +"Well--if you put it that way,--" murmured Hank, still miserable, "why, +maybe I could drop in. Billy's ordered me a new suit and so--" + +"That settles it then, Hank. For there's no sense in getting a new +suit unless you go out in it. And there's no sense in going out unless +you have some definite place to go to. Why, half the people get +clothes just to go to church and the other half go to church just to +wear their clothes. I'll expect you. You can sit comfortably in the +back and watch things and tell me later what you think of the way +things are managed here. You'll see things from the door that I never +see from the pulpit." + +Hank went to church in a pair of shoes that squeaked agonizingly and a +suit of clothes that was a marvel of mail-order device. He also wore a +Stetson hat that was new when he entered the church door but which, +through nervous manipulation, aged terribly in that first half hour. + +He came early because he felt that he could not endure the thought of +entering a crowded church and then suffered torment as one by one the +congregation nodded to him or addressed him in sepulchral whispers. +When, however, Grandma Wentworth sat down beside him and visited +comfortably before services, and Nan Ainslee stopped to thank him for +something or other he had done for her the week before, he felt better. + +As soon as Jim Tumley began to sing and the minister to talk Hank +forgot about himself and became absorbed in the proceedings. He told +the minister later that he'd meant to keep an eye on things for him but +that he got so interested he'd forgotten. About all that he had +observed was that Mrs. Sloan passed her handkerchief a little too +frequently and publicly to the little Sloans. Hank said he thought +they were old enough to have handkerchiefs of their own. He also felt +sure, he said, that Mrs. Osborn and Mrs. Pelham, Jr. were on the outs +again, because of the fact that though Mrs. Pelham's switch was falling +loose and Mrs. Osborn sitting right behind her saw it, she made no +effort to repin it or tell the unfortunate woman about it. Hank +further informed the minister that that second Crawley boy was a limb +and closed his observations by asking the Reverend John Roger Churchill +Knight if he didn't think Nanny Ainslee was the prettiest girl in +church? Whereupon the minister promptly agreed with him. + +That, then, was Hank Lolly's introduction to a proper and conventional +religious life. Hank, as soon as he felt sure that he was going to +survive the experience, became wonderfully interested and the next +Sunday reappeared with Barney in tow. It seems that Barney also had +been provided with a new suit and accessories and Hank had promptly +demanded his presence in church. + +"You ought to go once, Barney, if only to show the minister that you're +rightly grateful to him for showing you about them there books and +figures and a-pointing out your mistakes to you. And anyhow, if you +don't go, you'll be hanging out in that there pool-room, and first +thing you know you won't be decent and respectable and Billy'll have to +fire you." + +"What do you know about that there poolroom, Mr. Lolly?" demanded +Barney. + +"Never mind. I know what I know. You're trying to be smart and I'm +surprised. I've heard of your kid doings in that place and I'm +surprised, that's what I am. You don't see Billy Evans trying to make +money in cute ways over night. No, sir! He does a day's work for a +man and throws in a little for good measure before he takes a day's +wages. And he don't do business behind closed doors and thick +curtains, neither. So just you keep out of that there poolroom or I'll +take you over to Doc Mitchell's and have every one of them there +crooked teeth of yourn straightened out." + +"All right, Mr. Lolly, I'll do just as you say and go to church. It +ain't as hard as it sounds, that ain't. Because, honest, Hank, ain't +that there minister a fine guy? He's as good, I believe, as Billy. He +asked me to come on and be in his Sunday-school class and get in on +some fun. And he says to wait until he gets his barn fixed; that he'll +show us boys something. And I bet he will. Why, say, Hank, maybe he +kin do all sorts of circus stunts. You know he's from India and that's +where all the snake charmers and sword swallowers come from, ain't it?" + +In this perfectly simple and artless fashion Cynthia's son went about +the creation of his own special Sunday-school class and when he got +through the result was startling. It was the largest and somebody said +the weirdest Sunday-school class ever seen in Green Valley. Indeed, +when Mr. James D. Austin, who was about the most respectable man in +town, saw it he grew quite distressed and suddenly very tired. + +He had tried, since the age of ten when he had formally and publicly +joined the church on the very crest of a great religious wave, to do +his part towards making and keeping the Green Valley church on a high +spiritual plane. He felt at times that he was close to success and now +here from the very ends of the earth came a boy to upset all his plans. + +So Mr. Austin suddenly felt ill and old and he went to see Doc Philipps +about a tonic. Doc Philipps, who could have been as good a lawyer as +he was a doctor, asked a few questions about politics, religion and +Mrs. Austin's lumbago and knew exactly what was the matter with James +D. Austin. The next time he ran across Cynthia's son he hailed him. + +"Look here, Knight, what you been doing to James D. lately? +Been turning his nice little church all upside down, ain't +you? Driven him right into a fearful case of grouch and an +I-am-through-with-the-things-of-this-world attack, that's what you +have." + +Cynthia's son looked very soberly and very directly at his friend the +doctor and turned on his heel. + +"Doc, I'm going to see that poor man right now," said he and Doc +Philipps, in telling Nan Ainslee about it afterwards, swore that not +only the minister's two eyes but his very voice twinkled. + +Cynthia's son found Mr. Austin in his proper and neat office. He went +straight to the point. + +"Mr. Austin, I've just heard that you were not feeling well, that you +were seriously ill from overwork. I can readily believe that. You +need rest and a change and freedom from wearisome responsibilities. I +think I know just how you feel. Sort of tired and listless. Mother +used to get that way in India. Even father used to say sometimes that +things did every once in a while look mighty hopeless and useless, but +that they'd look bright again after a week or two in the hills. So +then we went off for a vacation. That's just what's the matter with +you. You need a vacation. And in so far as I can I want to help you +get one. You work too hard for the church. Keeping track of accounts +and generally managing church matters is always a trying matter. +Father always found it so. + +"So I have been thinking of getting you an assistant, some one to look +after things while you take a rest. Why, they tell me you have +shouldered church responsibilities since you were a child." + +"Yes," modestly admitted the most respectable Mr. Austin. "I have +worked for the church these many years and I do need a vacation. But +who is there to attend to these matters? I know of no one in Green +Valley who could fill my place." + +So in complacent, pathetic self-conceit said poor Mr. Austin. And he +was utterly unprepared for what followed. + +"Why," said Green Valley's new minister without so much as winking an +eyelash, "I've been thinking of Seth Curtis for the place. I have been +wondering just how I could interest Seth in his town church, how to +make him see that its business is his business, and this is my +opportunity. Seth, they tell me, is very good at figures. Somebody +said that Seth could figure to live comfortably on nothing if he found +he had to. Now most churches are perilously near the place where they +have to live on nothing and so, if any one can steer our finances in an +exact and careful manner, Seth can. And it is the only, absolutely the +only way in which he can be interested." + +"But," the horrified Mr. Austin found his voice at last, "Seth Curtis +is impossible. Even if he joined the church he would be an unbeliever. +I have heard him criticize churches. Why, it can't be thought of! +Why, what would people say if you were to put a man like that right +into church work? It would be sacrilege." + +There was a little pause and when the minister spoke again there was +the unmistakable ring of cool authority in his voice. Mr. Austin +suddenly realized that he was speaking to his pastor, the Reverend John +Roger Churchill Knight. And as Mr. Austin himself worshipped authority +and always saw to it that in his little sphere his own slightest word +was obeyed, he listened respectfully. + +"I think, Mr. Austin, you are mistaken about Seth Curtis. Seth does +not make fun of religion. He merely criticizes churches and their +management. Seth is what in these times we call an efficiency expert. +And it always makes such a man impatient to watch waste of money and +effort. + +"Seth must think well of the church for he sends his wife and children. +And no sane man sends what is dearest to him to a place he does not +approve of. Besides, Seth has a very high opinion of you, Mr. Austin." + +Which of course had nothing to do with the case. Yet it may have been +this irrelevant, human little touch that settled it. For after a +little more talk Mr. Austin gave in and, figuratively speaking, turned +his face to the wall and hoped to die. And the minister went off to +persuade Seth Curtis that his church needed his services. + +And that was not nearly as difficult a matter as Green Valley thought +it was. For Seth had sense and a love of order and economy and the +minister talked to all that was best and wisest in Seth. Though Seth's +head was growing bald and Cynthia's son was just a youngster, yet the +boy seemed to take Seth's heart right into the hollow of his hand and +talk to it as no one but Seth's wife Ruth talked. So to the amazement +of himself and family and all of Green Valley Seth Curtis went into the +church for the very quality in his make-up that his neighbors were in +the habit of ridiculing. + +It was amazingly funny, Seth's conversion. But when Green Valley heard +how the minister got acquainted with Frank Burton Green Valley laughed +and laughed and forgot to eat its meals in telling and retelling it. + +Frank Burton, besides being, according to his neighbors, a hopeless +atheist, was unlike other Green Valley men in that he had to take a +much earlier train to the city mornings and came home two trains later +than the other men. Grandma Wentworth always said that it was that +difference in Frank's train time that made him so bitter at times. + +Frank did, however, have his Saturday afternoons and Sundays, and these +he spent almost entirely with his chickens and garden and strange +assortment of books. He was a man who did his own thinking, never gave +advice, never took it and believed in all creatures tending strictly to +their own affairs. + +Every once in a while, perhaps from a sudden heart hunger, Frank would +select from a whole townful of human beings some one soul for +friendship. Frank never got acquainted accidentally. He picked out +his few friends deliberately and loved them openly and forever. + +Of course, Frank's oldest and dearest friend was Jim Tumley. People +said they were born friends. Their mothers had been inseparable, the +boys were born within a few days of each other and seemed to be marked +with a passion of loyalty for one another. Only in their love for +music were they alike however. + +Frank was a big, square, burly man who went his way surely, +confidently, though a little belligerently. Jim was little and fair +and ever so gentle. There was never a harsh word in Jim's mouth or a +bitter thought in his heart against the world that often bruised him +because of his gentleness and frailty. Jim had had only one fight in +his life. + +When he and Frank were about twelve years old, strange to say, Jim was +the taller and stronger. And it was then that Jim fought and +vanquished a bully who for months had been making Frank miserable. + +Frank never forgot that one fight of Jim's. He shot head and shoulders +over his friend and filled out beyond all recognition and took his turn +at fighting. And most of his battles then as now were over little Jim +Tumley. + +To Frank, Jim was the one great friend life had given him. To very +many people in Green Valley Jim was just a gentle, frail little chap +with a beautiful, golden voice and a miserably weak stomach. + +When the new minister put Jim in the choir, Green Valley was mildly +surprised though it quickly saw the common sense of the arrangement. +But Frank Burton was for the first time, to Green Valley's certain +knowledge, wholly pleased. And he showed his pleasure by never once +saying one single, scathing, cynical thing, even when told that Seth +Curtis was keeping the church books and getting religion on the side. +And he could have said so much. + +What he did say was that he wouldn't mind seeing this kid minister from +India. For though months had passed since Cynthia's son arrived Frank +had never seen him. His unfortunate train time and his home-staying +habits kept him from meeting the newcomer. He pictured him as a rather +immature, likable, enthusiastic young person whom it might not be a +trial to meet once and then forget. And Frank made up his mind that if +he ever ran into the boy he would be sincerely courteous to him in +payment for his kindness to Jim. Then he promptly forgot everything in +his plans for a new chicken house. + +He was reading his favorite poultry journal on the train one night when +the tall stranger accosted him. Frank didn't remember meeting the man, +but the stranger seemed to know him, so without hardly knowing why or +how Frank began to talk. And it was surprising how much the stranger +knew about chickens, pheasants and wild game. Indeed, he knew so much +that five stations from the city Frank was showing him diagrams of his +new chicken house and explaining how anxious he was to get at it before +the fall rains commenced but that he had so little time, only his +Saturday afternoons and Sundays. + +"Let me give you a hand then Saturday, Mr. Burton. I need outdoor work +and I'd enjoy building a chicken house and neighboring properly with +you Green Valley folks. You know I'm new to Green Valley and as long +as I intend to spend the rest of my life here I've a lot to learn." + +"Well, there are worse places than Green Valley," admitted Frank, +thinking that the man must be the occupant of some one of the new +bungalows that had gone up that spring and summer. + +"Green Valley," continued Frank, "has its faults and its fools and bad +spots here and there in the roads and entirely too much back-fence and +street-corner gossip. But I've seen days here in Green Valley that +just about melt all the meanness out of one, they're so fine; and +moonlight so soft and pure and holy that you wouldn't mind dying in it. +And Green Valley folks are ornery enough on top and when things are +going smoothly for you. But just let there be a smash-up or a stroke +of bad luck and their shells crack and humanness just oozes out of +them. They're about as decent a lot as you'll find anywhere." + +This, after a hard day and on an empty stomach, was a remarkable speech +for Frank Burton. He was not much given to voicing his real feelings +and showing his heart to light-hearted Green Valley and usually covered +his deeper sentiments with a sturdy flow of fault-finding. + +But there was something magnetic about the young stranger and to his +own growing surprise Frank talked on and enjoyed doing it. The two men +left the train together and parted at Martin's drug store with the +understanding that if it didn't rain they would on the coming Saturday +start on that chicken house. + +And they did. Frank came home that evening in unusually fine spirits +and asked his wife about the various new people. He told her of his +meeting with the stranger who seemed to know him but whom he did not +remember ever seeing before. + +Jennie guessed him to be, "Mrs. Hamilton's husband. I've never seen +him either but they say he's such a pleasant man. They're both +Christian Scientists or something like that and she's ever so nice a +woman. They've only been here a few months but everybody likes them." + +"Well," spoke up Frank, still thinking of the pleasant passing of what +was usually a tiresome train trip, "if Christian Science makes a man as +likable and neighborly as that I, for one, approve of Christian +Science. What did you say his name was--Hamilton?" + +It was because Frank was so willing to let every man worship his God in +his very own way that Green Valley, that is the religiously watchful +part of it, had decided that Frank was an atheist. For, said these +cautious children of God, "He who is willing to believe in all things +believes in nothing." + +But it wasn't religion that the two men talked that Saturday afternoon. +The sun was warm, the lumber dry, the saws sharp and with the work +going smoothly along there was plenty of time for talk, talk on all +manner of subjects. + +Frank's wife had gone over to Randall's to a special meeting of the +sewing society. Not only were the women going to cut out and make up +little aprons and dresses for the inmates of the nearest orphanage but +they intended to discuss several new social problems that confronted +Green Valley. The two most vital being "What do you make of that new +saloon keeper and his wife?" and "What goes on behind those poolroom +curtains, especially nights?" + +Not that there was in Green Valley any interfering Civic League or any +such thing as a Pure Morals Society. Green Valley had never had to +resort to such measures. It had hitherto trusted human nature, Green +Valley sunshine and neighborliness to do whatever work of social +mending and reforming had to be done. + +But something had happened to the big city to the east, some new mayor +or some new civic force had stirred things up in that huge caldron of +humanity and slopped it over so that it had begun to trickle away into +such quiet little hollows as Green Valley. It trickled so slowly and +was as yet so thin a stream that the little towns were hardly aware of +it as yet. + +Green Valley was only just beginning to itch and wiggle and search and +wonder what the matter could be. It was the women, the mothers, who +scented trouble first. The men were still placidly doing the same old +Saturday afternoon tasks, mowing lawns, talking road improvements, +swapping yarns and brands of tobacco or, like Frank Burton, doing +various building jobs about their premises. + +Frank and his helper were certainly enjoying themselves. When the +skeleton of that hen house was half up Frank thought it was about time +to call a halt for refreshments. He went to the ice-box and brought +out a nice home-boiled ham, commandeered a golden loaf of fresh bread, +searched about for pickles, mustard, preserves and butter. Then they +sat down. And as he ate Frank again waxed talkative. + +"I've heard people," he said, "both men and women, talk about marriage +being slavery and a lottery and not worth the price folks have to pay +for it. But I'm freer as a married man than ever I was single. Why, +where I boarded before I married Jennie, you couldn't get a slice of +bread and butter or a toothpick between meals even if you'd been a +growing kid. And in those days I was always hungry. And I've always +hated restaurants where food is cooked in tanks instead of nice little +home kettles in a blue and white kitchen. And I hate restaurant +dishes. There's never anything interesting about them. And most +waitresses are discouraging sort of girls. I just kind of existed in +those days. + +"But ever since I've married Jennie I've lived. Jennie never talks +much about what she's cooking. But she'll let you come in the kitchen +and lift the kettle lids if you want to and poke around and never once +let on that you're a nuisance. And she never gets angry if you dig +into the fresh bread or crack the frosting on the new cake. So take it +all in all I've always considered all this talk about married life +being nothing but self-sacrifice just so much rot--why--hello, Sammy!" + +This to a little overall-clad figure that was pressing itself +insinuatingly against the back gate. + +"Want to come in and help with the tools?" called Frank, well knowing +that that jar of Jennie's preserves was perfectly visible from that +back gate. + +Sammy said hello and sure he'd come in and help, and did with +remarkable speed. When he came up to the two men he looked shyly at +Frank's assistant and said, "Hello! What are _you_ doing around here?" + +And the tall stranger laughed and said he was helping with the tools +too. + +And then Frank asked Sammy if his mother allowed him to eat between +meals and Sammy said, "Oh, sure--I kin eat any time at all--it never +hurts me." So Frank got him nicely started. + +In no time at all however two other figures appeared and swung +themselves up on the back fence. They sat quietly, at first waiting +for some one to discover them. Both men had their backs to the fence +now and Sammy, though perfectly aware of the new arrivals, was +selfishly busy. + +So presently two pair of bare feet began to swing harder and harder and +a careless but piercing whistle began to challenge a selfish world's +attention. + +Frank winked at his helper and said nothing nor moved. + +The whistle became shriller. And then came a sudden suspicious silence +that evidently made Sammy a little uncomfortable. He knew just about +what was coming. + +"Hello--Pieface," came one gentle greeting. + +"Hello--Dearie," chirped the owner of the second pair of bare feet. + +"Look at Mother's Darling feeding his face!" + +"Isn't he cunning! Isn't he cute!" + +A third figure swung itself to the top of the fence. + +"Don't fill your little tummy too full, Sammy dear," it contributed +dutifully. + +At the malice and scorn that fairly dripped from the words Sammy raised +resentful eyes from his slice of bread and jam. Frank smiled hopefully. + +"Oh, Frank, Sammy goes to Sunday-school he does." + +"Every Sunday--don't ya, Sammy?" + +"Bet he goes to Sunday-school just to sponge. Bet he's a grafter--bet +he--" + +But at this point Frank's helper turned about and faced the fence. And +a strange thing happened. The three little figures sitting in a row +gave one look, one shout of, "Holy gee--it's _him_!" and vanished as +suddenly as they had come. + +Frank laughed and then grew puzzled. + +"Some friends of mine and Sammy's. I wonder what made the little imps +bolt like that. They usually sit on that back fence till every bit of +language is used up. Why, they hadn't got more than started and Sammy +here hadn't even begun. What ailed you, Sammy?" + +"Oh, I rather think I frightened them," said Frank's assistant. "But I +think that before long they will feel enough at home with me to come +and sit on my back fence." + +Sammy was left to clear up while the men went back to work. Both +hammers were merrily ringing when old man Vingie strolled by and +stopped to visit. He went on presently but before he was out of sight +Bill Trumbull and Old Peter Endby came up. + +There was a worried look in Bill's large florid face and the light of +utter unbelief in Peter's eye. They both laid their arms neighbor +fashion along the fence and watched the toilers silently for a few +seconds. Then Peter spoke up in grieved tones: + +"Seems like you might have asked old neighbors to give you a hand, +Frank. I had no notion you was in any such turrible hurry to start +this here new chicken house of yourn. It don't look respectable or +kindly, you acting that way, neglecting to tell old neighbors--" + +"It's a slander on this here neighborhood, that's whot it is, Frank," +Bill Trumbull complained. "Here's Peter and me both old-time +carpenters, full of energy and advice and ripe years and experience, +and you don't drop so much as a hint. Why, I remember the time when we +put up barns with wooden pegs and durn good barns they were and are, +for there's some of them still standing as strong as the day they were +built. There's the Churchill barn. That's our work, Peter's and mine. +Seems you've forgotten considerable, Frank. Why, your father wouldn't +have thought of starting a chicken house without first talking it over +with us." + +When they had passed on, Bill supporting Peter's left elbow so's to +case the rheumatism in his partner's left knee, Frank turned amazed +eyes to his assistant. + +"Now what in time," he wanted to know, "is the matter with those two +precious old lunatics? Why, Pap Trumbull and Dad Endby are both over +eighty. Dad's so twisted with rheumatism that he couldn't bend to pick +up his pipe if he dropped it. And Pap's got asthma so bad that it's +all he can do to draw his breath on the installment plan. Why, I've +never consulted them in all my born days though I always let them come +over and criticize my work to their heart's content. But something's +eating them to-day." + +"Perhaps they're surprised at seeing me, a comparative stranger here, +helping you. They may even be a bit jealous, you know." + +Frank's assistant volunteered this explanation wonderingly as if he too +were puzzled about something. + +"Well--it gets me," murmured Frank, then added under his breath, "well, +by jinks--if here ain't old Knock-kneed Bailey and Shorty Collins going +by. And they're looking this way. And by the Lord Harry--there's +Curley Anderson. Why, Curley hasn't been over on this side of town +since he sold that little house of his that he built all by himself, +working nights, with nothing but an old saw and a second-hand hammer. +His wife was left a fortune right after and made Curley sell and build +her a cement block villa over on Broadway. She won't even let Curley +walk down this way, though they say he hates her villa and just hankers +for this little bit of a home he built himself here ten years ago. + +"Well--by the holy smoke--look yonder! I'm seeing things to-day. Why +there's Dudley Rivers and James D. Austin, that holy man, and he's +actually bowing to me. Now what do you know about that? What's going +on in this town to-day, anyhow? It must be something unusual to bring +out a crowd like that." + +Frank's lower jaw suddenly dropped. Sudden suspicion leaped into his +gray-blue eyes. He turned to the man who all afternoon had been +helping him build his chicken house. + +"Say--who in hell--are you anyhow?" + +And Cynthia's son mopped his thick hair and looked as suddenly +dumfounded. After that he grinned. + +"For pity sakes--don't you know me? Why, you were pointed out to me +the very second week I came as the town atheist. I supposed of course +I had been pointed out to you. I'm Cynthia Churchill's son. I buried +father and mother in India and then came home, as they wanted me to. +And I'm glad I came. It's home and these Green Valley folks are my +people. They have made me feel welcome. I supposed everybody knew me +from seeing me about town." + +For a long while Frank said nothing. With the explanation his +momentary anger and amazement died away. He was remembering, +remembering Cynthia Churchill. Why, he remembered as though it was +yesterday that when she was twenty he was ten. And he had loved her +because she had once helped him to tie up his pet chicken's broken leg. + +And so this tall big chap with the glad eyes was Cynthia's son! Years +ago the mother had tied up his pet hen's leg. And to-day her son had +helped him build his most pretentious hen house. + +"No," said Frank at last, "I didn't know you were the chap from India. +I thought you belonged up in one of those new bungalows. Of course, +that accounts for the crowd. Why, we've been making history here in +this back yard this afternoon. The atheist and the preacher building a +chicken coop! Oh, say, John, Green Valley will be talking about this +fifty years from now. Let's have some buttermilk. This thing has just +about knocked me over." + +When they had had two glasses apiece Frank again inspected his +assistant. + +"But say--do ministers in India do such darn common things as building +chicken houses? I can't remember ever seeing a minister mixing so +carelessly with us low-down sinners or standing around in public with +his sleeves rolled up and his frock coat off. Aren't you a queer breed +of parson?" + +"Maybe," Cynthia's son admitted, "but so was father. He could help +bring a baby into the world, could wash and dress it, cure it if it was +sick, bury it if it died. He could teach a woman how to cook a meal +and cut out a dress. He knew how to heal a horse's sore back and how +to help a man get over needing whisky. He used to brush my mother's +hair nights when her head ached and make whistles for me and tell the +little brown children stories, study the stars with the old men and +coax the women into using his medicines instead of their charms." + +"For heaven's sake! When did your father get time to talk religion?" +wondered Frank. + +"Oh, he never talked religion much. He just sort of lived and +neighbored with his people and just laughed most of the time at mother +and me. He was always busy and never took care of himself. Just +before he died he explained things to me. He said: + +"'Son, I came out of the West to bring a message to the East. You go +back to the West with a message from the Orient. Tell them back home +there that hearts are all alike the world over. And that we all, white +men, black men, yellow men and brown men, are playing the very same +game for the very same stakes and that somehow, through ways devious +and incomprehensible, through honesty and faith, failure and +perseverance, we find at last the great content, the peace that passeth +understanding.' + +"So I have come home to preach that. But I haven't had time as yet to +do much. I've been getting up a Sunday-school class and getting Seth +Curtis interested in the church finances and getting acquainted with +Hank Lolly and Mrs. Rosenwinkle and--atheists." + +"Yes--and among other things you've put Jim into the choir." + +"Oh, that was easy--just common sense. It's going to be ever so much +harder though to get at Jim Tumley's generous friends and convince them +that Jim's stomach won't stand their friendly donations. + +"I don't know how I'm going to show them that if they love him they +must protect him from themselves. It's going to be hard work. But +he's worth saving, that little man with the lark's voice and the gentle +heart." + + +When Jennie, hearing the news, hurried home from the other end of town, +really frightened for the first time in her married life, the young +minister was gone and Frank was sitting out on the back porch staring +at nothing. + +"Frank," Jennie began breathlessly, "is he gone?" + +"Yes--he's gone." + +"Frank--you--I hope you didn't get mad at him. He's different--not +like other ministers--and he's really a boy in some things." + +"Jennie," and Frank reassured her, "you're darn right that boy is +different. He's so darn different from all the rest of them I've met +that I'm going to church next Sunday. James D. and Dudley and others +of that stripe will probably die of shock but just you press your best +dress, Jennie, for we're surely going. Why that man's no minister. +Don't slander him. He's a human being." + +Jennie's eyes grew a bit misty, for with no babies to love, Frank was +her all in all and her one great sorrow was that so few people knew the +real Frank. + +"And come to think of it, Jennie," Frank mused, "you weren't so far +wrong in thinking that it was a Christian Scientist who was coming. I +guess that's just about what he is--a Christian scientist." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +THE PATH OF TRUE LOVE + +Nanny was cross. She had lost her bubbling merriment and her family +wondered. + +"Sis, I believe you will be an old maid, all right. I'm beginning to +see the signs already," her brother lazily told her one day when to +some innocent remark of his she made a snapping answer. + +Mr. Ainslee laughed. + +"You aren't reading the signs correctly, Son," he said. "Nan's +crossness can be interpreted another way. It's my private opinion that +Nanny's in love." + +Whereupon Mr. Ainslee dodged for he fully expected that Nanny would +hurl a pillow his way. But Nanny didn't. She turned a little white, +caught her breath a little hurriedly and then stood looking quietly at +the two men. When she left the room her father was a little worried +and her brother a little uncomfortable. + +"I guess we'd better let up on the teasing, Dad," the boy suggested in +the serious, soft voice that had been his mother's, the mother who had +never teased. + +"I wouldn't hurt Nanny for the world," penitently murmured Mr. Ainslee. +"I had no idea--oh, Son," he suddenly groaned, "I wish your mother was +here to look after us all." + +And the great diplomat who was known and welcomed at the courts of +great nations was suddenly only a plain man, crying out his heart's +need of the loved woman he had lost so many years ago. + +And because the boy was the son of the woman for whom his father +grieved he knew how to sympathize and comfort the man. + +"I've missed her too--lots of times--even though, Dad, you've been the +most wonderful father two kids ever had." + +The man stared out into the sunny world outside the windows and all +unashamed let the tears fill his fine eyes. + +The boy, seeing those tears, all at once remembered now many times, +when he was an unheeding youngster, he had seen this same father +sitting at the departed mother's desk with his head pillowed in his +arms. + +"Dad," the boy's awed voice questioned, "is love a thing as big and +terrible and lasting as that?" + +The man wiped his eyes and smiled. + +"Yes, Son, love is as wonderful and lasting and in a way as terrible as +that. It was wrong of me to tease Nanny. But I have been worried +about my motherless girl. I'd like to see her happily settled. +Somehow I've never worried about you." + +"No," and the boy smiled an odd little smile that showed just how he +had missed a mother's petting, "it's always mothers that worry about +the boys, isn't it?" + +At this second revelation and blunder Mr. Ainslee was so startled that +he forgot to go in search of Nanny. + +As a matter of fact Nanny had left the house. She wanted to go to the +knoll and think over carefully certain matters that had been puzzling +her of late. But she dared not go to the grove on the hilltop. For +only half an hour before she had seen Green Valley's young minister +walking up to her old seat under the oaks. Perhaps if her father had +not said what he did--Nanny frowned impatiently, then sighed and walked +down the road to Grandma Wentworth's. She told herself that she was +going down to visit Grandma and tell her the week's news. But she was +really going to find heartease and because at Grandma's she would hear +oftenest the name that now had the power to quicken her heart beats and +bring her a pain that was strangely edged with joy. + +Grandma was weeding her seed onions and very sensibly let Nanny help. +Nanny's fingers flew in and out and because she dared not tell her own +heart troubles she told Grandma about Jocelyn and David and the foolish +bit of gossip that had come between them. + +"I think, Grandma, somebody ought to do something about it. Can't +you--" + +Grandma shook her head. + +"Nanny," Grandma mourned, "I'm afraid to meddle in things like that. +Love is a wonderful strange thing for which there are no rules. And +the hearts of men and women must all have their share of sorrow. For +it's only through pain and endless blunders that we human folks ever +learn. I've seen strange love history in this town and lots of it. +And I've learned one thing and that is that each heart wants to do its +loving in its own way without help or hindrance from the rest of the +world. So we'd best say nothing and let David and Jocelyn find a way +out of their trouble and misunderstanding." + +But Nanny, with all the impatience of youth, rebelled. + +"It's foolish," she stormed, "when just a dozen frank words would +straighten it out." + +"Yes--a dozen words would do it," sighed Grandma, "But think, Nanny, +what it would cost David to say those dozen words--or Jocelyn." + +"Conventions are foolish. Honesty is better." + +"Yes, honesty is always best. But truth is something that lovers find +hardest to manage and listen to. And you know, Nanny, even a happy +love means a certain amount of sorrow." + +"Does it?" the girl wondered. + +"Yes," said Grandma softly, "it does, as I and many another woman can +testify. I'm only hoping that a love great and fine will come to +Cynthia's boy and that it won't cost him too much." + +"Why," asked Nanny carelessly, "should life be easier and richer for +him?" + +"Because long before he was born his mother paid for his birthright and +happiness with part of her own, and if God is just and life fair then +her courage and sorrow ought to count for something and her loss be his +gain." + +"Hadn't you better tell me the whole story, Grandma?" begged Nan. + +"It isn't exactly all mine to tell. But some day I dare say I shall." + +Grandma rose and glanced mischievously at the girl. + +"Nanny, I'll tell you the day you come to me and tell me you're in +love. Not engaged, you understand, but in love." + +Again Nanny whitened and caught her breath and then looked quietly at +Grandma in a way that made the dear old soul say hurriedly: + +"There, there, child, I didn't mean to meddle or hurt." + +To herself she added, "We're all blundering fools at times. And why is +it that youth always thinks that all the world is blind and stupid?" + +Grandma's penitent mind then recalled the box of pictures that +Cynthia's son had brought down to show her the night before. It still +stood on the living-room table. So the wise and tender soul sent Nanny +in to fetch it. + +They sat on the back steps and looked at pictures of Cynthia in her +far-away home in India. There were pictures of her husband and the +brown babies and of their neighbors. But mostly the pictures were of a +boy, a drolly solemn little fellow. Nanny exclaimed again and again +over these and the one of the boy holding a pet hen in his arms she +fairly devoured. + +"What a darling kiddy he was," she laughed tenderly. "No wonder his +mother loved him so." + +"He ought to be a fine boy. His mother paid a big price for him," +Grandma told her. + +But Nanny didn't hear. She had just discovered that there were two of +those boy and hen pictures and she wondered if-- + +Just then Grandma spied a hen in her lavender bed and went off to shoo +her out. And while her back was so providentially turned Nanny +Ainslee, an honorable, world-famous diplomat's only daughter, coolly +and deliberately tucked the picture of a little boy and his pet hen +down into the bosom of her gown. + +Shortly after Nanny said she guessed she'd have to be going, that it +was getting late and that she had had an argument with her father just +before she came and had been short an answer. But that she had just +this minute thought of something to say. + +Grandma let her go without a word because she thought that, like +herself, the girl had seen Cynthia's boy coming down the hill and +wished with girlish shyness to be out of the house when he came. But +Nanny had not seen him, had not been watching the roads, so taken was +she with her guilty secret. Her surprise when she almost ran into him +was genuine enough. + +His face lighted at sight of her. + +"I spent the afternoon up on the hill. I thought maybe I should find +you there. It was rather lonesome." + +He had evidently forgotten and forgiven her rudeness on the hilltop +that day when they had been up there together. Nanny was suddenly so +happy and confused that she could think of nothing to say except to +make the formal little confession: + +"I have been visiting Grandma Wentworth and looking at pictures of you. +You were a mighty nice little boy in those days." + +The new softness in her words made him look at her wistfully for a +second but the hint of laughter that went with it made him cautious. +This lovely, laughing girl had hurt him several times and had laughed +at him. He meant to be careful. So he said gravely and politely: + +"Did you see the pictures of my mother?" + +"Yes. She must have been a wonderful and an adorable mother." + +That made him happy. He wanted very much to turn and walk back with +her, this girl whose presence always brought him such pleasure. But +she had forbidden him to do this. It seemed that in his home land +women were wonderfully independent creatures. + +So he let her go on alone and with a disappointed heart. For Nanny had +hoped that he would ask and she had meant to let him. With the +disappointment came the taunting memory of her words to Grandma +Wentworth: "Honesty is best. A dozen words would do it." + +That evening when her father clumsily tried to make amends Nan said +carelessly: + +"Never mind, Dad. I _am_ in love--with a little boy and his pet hen." + +But she had the grace to blush. And that night as she slipped the +picture under her pillow she said a little defiantly: + +"Well--what of it? All is fair in love and war." + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +AUTUMN IN GREEN VALLEY + +Joe Baldwin was standing in front of his little shop. He was +bareheaded and that meant that he was worried. For it was only in +moments of mental distress that Joe laid aside the black cap that gave +him the look of a dashing driver of the Twentieth Century Limited. + +In the autumn dusk a chilly little wind played about the street corners +and wailed softly through the thinning tree-tops. The big lamp above +Joe's workbench was unlighted so the little shop was in darkness except +for the fitful wavering of the ruddy wood fire in the big stove. + +The streets were empty and quiet. It was an hour after supper and +Green Valley was indoors sitting about its first fires and talking of +the coming winter; remembering cold spells of other years; thanking its +stars that the coal bin was full and wondering whether it hadn't better +put on its heaviest underwear. + +Joe knew just about what Green Valley was thinking and saying. From +where he stood he could see what a part of Green Valley was doing. For +this early in the evening Green Valley never pulled down its shades. +So when the lights flared out in the Wendells' west front up-stairs +window Joe saw Mrs. Wendell go to the clothes closet and bring out +various newspaper parcels. Joe knew very well that those parcels +contained furs. + +Furs and ferns were Mildred Wendell's two passions. She had furs of +all sizes and colors and weights, beginning with the little muff and +tippet her favorite aunt had given her long ago when she was only five +to the really beautiful and expensive set her son, Charlie, had given +her for her last birthday. As for ferns, she had so many that Green +Valley always went to her for its wedding and funeral decorations. And +she was only too happy to lend her collection of feathery beauty. + +From where he stood on his doorstep Joe could look down three streets +and see Green Valley in its shirt sleeves and slippers and its gingham +apron, so to speak. He could look over the white sash curtains right +into Mert Hagley's kitchen for Mert lived behind his store. Joe saw +Mary, Mert's wife, turning the pages of the evening paper and studying +the advertisements. And he knew as well as he knew his own name that +Mary was talking to Mert about a new heater, begging him to buy a nice +new hard-coal heater instead of the second-hand hot blast stove he was +thinking of buying from some man in Spring Road. + +John Henderson had another one of his bad headaches for Joe saw him +lying on the dining-room couch. His wife was applying cold-water +bandages and tenderness to that bald pate of his when she knew better +than any one that what he needed was a stiff dose of salts and castor +oil and a little self-control on the nights she had ham and cabbage for +supper. + +Over in the Morrison cottage Grandma Whitby was knitting stockings for +the little Morrisons at a furious rate and every once in a while +sending one of the children out for more wood or a fresh pail of water +or some more yarn. Joe could see the children sitting around the +dining-room table with their books and games and arguing with each +other every time the grandmother made a new request. + +Grandma Whitby was a dictatorial old soul. She not only was eternally +busy herself but she kept everybody around her forever on the jump. +Mrs. Morrison was her only child and once in a moment of bitterness +said that her eight children seemed like a houseful until they got to +running errands for mother and that then she realized that eight wasn't +anywhere near enough. And the Morrison's second boy, John William, +once explained to Joe that he wore out his shoes, "running errands for +Granny." + +Alice Richards' baby was ailing again. Joe could see Allie walking the +floor, could almost hear her comforting the restless mite in her arms. + +Somebody came hurrying down the street and as they passed a street lamp +Joe saw that it was Mrs. Downey, taking Tommy to the dentist. Doc +Mitchell was a nice enough chap but as Joe watched Tommy's legs saw the +air he thought the doctor might be a little mite gentler with the boy +orator. But Doc was getting old and he was probably tired. These +first autumn days before the snap and sparkle and snowy gleam of real +winter sets in always told on the older folks. They sort of seemed +tired and worried and sad. + +So Joe stood there, looking at the purple and green and magenta-pink +lights of Martin's drug store, the sleepily winking lights of the +little station and the mellow golden glow of Sophie Forbes' yellow +parlor lamp. Then he turned and looked straight down his own street, +past the post-office, the tin shop, the dry-goods store to the spot +where a faint light seeped through drawn curtains and faint rowdy +noises came from behind closed doors. + +It was what he guessed was behind those closed doors that had brought +Joe out of his shop bareheaded and caused him to feel as Doc Mitchell +maybe felt--a little old and sad and tired and even a bit helpless. + +Usually on this first night of autumn Joe's shop was crowded with noisy +feet and voices of all sizes that squeaked one minute in a shrill +soprano and in the next sank to a ragged bass. Joe's shades were never +drawn and all the world could see the boys playing Old Maid and Rummy, +shooting caroms or sitting on the counter, swinging their feet, eating +apples and cracking nuts for themselves and Joe who was questioning +them about the day's happenings. + +But to-night--involuntarily Joe turned and looked back into the soft +darkness of his little shop where the firelight flickered softly, +tenderly through the gloom. His heart cramped. Then he looked again +to the place where heavy curtains were drawn over dirty windows. He +caught again that muffled rough noise of young voices. And his mind +was made up. + +He stepped back into his shop, turned on all the lights, put the basket +of ruddy apples on the counter, straightened the pile of old magazines +and pulled out the carom board, the box of chess and checkers. He took +a last housewifely look around, then put on his hat and coat and +started out. There was pain and anger and a terrible determination in +his usually gentle face. + +But as he stepped to the door it opened, admitting Mrs. Jerry Dustin. +That sweet-faced little woman looked about with anxious eyes, then +turned to the little shoemaker. + +"Joe--I'm looking for Peter. Wasn't he here with you? He said he was +coming here to see the boys." + +"He was here and he saw the boys. They all went off together." + +"Joe"--fear and worry leaped to the lovely corn-flower eyes, +"Joe--not--surely they didn't go--they aren't down _there_?" + +"That's just where they are. I was just going after them." + +For still seconds this father and mother of boys looked at each other +in misery. Both were thinking the same thing, both shrank from what +was before them, but even as Joe squared his shoulders Mrs. Dustin +straightened hers. + +"I'm going with you, Joe." + +So down the autumn street went these two. Joe, because he had promised +Hattie when she was sick unto death that he would always watch over the +boys, would love and cherish and guard them. + +Mrs. Dustin was going because Peter was her baby, her strange, weird +duckling, full of whimsical fancies and fantastic longings. He was a +sort of dream child for whom she alone felt wholly responsible. All +the others were good, understandable children. But Peter was odd and +nobody but his blue-eyed mother knew how to handle him. + +"Rosalie, I've never whipped those boys of mine. Some way I couldn't +with Hattie gone and them having no one but me. But maybe it was a +mistake." + +"No, it wasn't, Joe. The Greatest Teacher that ever lived used only +truth and gentleness and look at the size of His school now. No--this +trouble isn't in the children exactly. It must be in us. We're stupid +and don't know how to do for the children. People say that young folks +must be young folks. And we let our boys and even our girls flounder +through a lot of cheap foolishness before we expect them to settle down. + +"But it's my opinion, Joe, that letting them flounder all alone through +these raw years of their life is plain wickedness. Peter has a good +home and he's loved and he knows it. Yet he's got to the place now +where he wants something that I and the home can't seem to give him. I +don't know just what it is. But this place, Joe, bad as it is, must +have the thing that our half-grown children want and that's what brings +them here even against our will. And I'm going to-night to find out +what it is." + +"It can't be good for them, Rosalie, when it drives them into lying and +stealing. Why only to-day Josie Landis sent Eddie to me with fifty +cents for the shoes I mended for her. And he gambled that fifty cents +away in the slot machine and came and told me a lie!" + +"Little Eddie Landis! Why--Joe, he's just a baby." + +"Well--that's what the place is doing to the babies. I don't like it. +It's dirty and sneaky and it's working hand in hand with the saloon. +It has no business in this town." + +"But, Joe, it must have something that this town wants or it wouldn't +be doing business. It can't be all pure wickedness." + +But Joe's anger was rising in leaps and bounds so that his very hands +shook. Mrs. Dustin stopped and laid a soothing hand on the little +shoemaker's arm. + +"Joe, whatever you do don't get angry in there. Hold on to your temper +and don't let yourself even look mad if you can help it. We mustn't +humiliate the children for they'd never forgive. You better let me do +all the talking at first." + +Joe nodded and with that they came abreast of the curtained windows and +stood still for a second to gather up their courage. Then Mrs. Dustin +very quietly opened the door and stepped in with Joe. + +She stood smiling at the door and at sight of her the noise stopped as +if by magic. Every child there knew the lovely, blue-eyed little +mother of Peter Dustin. The only one who did not know her was the +proprietor standing in stupid wonder behind his counter. But she +pretended not to see his astonishment as she made her laughing +explanations. + +"We got lonesome, Joe and I. You know these first autumn nights do +chill us older folks a bit and make us sad. We want bright fires and +lots of children racketing around to keep us from feeling old and +frightened. And I guess the children get the blues from us for I +notice that that's just the time they want to get off by themselves for +a good time. We're all trying to forget that the year is dying, I +expect, and we're crowding together to cheer each other up. That's +what's making the streets so lonely to-night. As I came along I felt +so bad that I thought I'd just drop in on Joe and get cheered up with +the children. They're usually there. But Joe was standing on his +doorstep as lonely as I was. He was missing the children too. We saw +your light and heard the children laughing, and we just thought we'd +come in and see if we couldn't feel young again. We didn't come in to +spoil your fun, so just you go on with it. Joe and I'll watch and +maybe join in. You were dancing, weren't you, Mollie?" + +Mrs. Dustin asked this of a little russet-haired girl of fourteen who +in her sudden amazement at the visitors was still standing in the +middle of the floor with her arms about Peter, who had a mouth organ in +his mouth. She was a graceful little thing and she had been teaching +Peter how to dance. But now she stood stiff with fright and +embarrassment. + +"Why, don't be afraid of my mother, Mollie," Peter said gently, for he +himself was in no way frightened at his mother's appearance. + +So when Mrs. Dustin repeated her question, Mollie said shyly: "Yes, +ma'am, we were trying to dance." + +"Bless me," laughed Mrs. Dustin. "Why, I never realized that Peter was +old enough to want to dance. You should have told me, Peter Boy. Why, +you should have all told me, because," she smiled gloriously at them +all, "because I used to be the star dancer twenty-five years ago. +Wasn't I, Joe?" + +"You sure were," Joe answered promptly. His face still looked a little +queer and his voice was not quite steady but he was bravely following +the wise little woman with the blue eyes. + +"Let me show you. Play something, Peter." + +Mrs. Dustin picked up Mollie and began to dance. And in exactly five +turns about the room all the poetry, the joy of motion in Mollie caught +fire and her little slim feet just fairly twinkled in happy abandonment. + +"Why, Mollie, girl, you're a fairy on your feet," praised Mrs. Dustin +and the happy face at her breast flushed with pleasure and gratitude at +the words. + +Peter was not the least bit surprised at his mother's antics. He knew +that she was a glorious mother and full of surprises. The other +youngsters however were not so sure. So Peter suggested to the +proprietor that he start the graphophone. The proprietor nodded and +soon they were all dancing, Mrs. Dustin taking a new partner every few +minutes. + +"And children," she suddenly remembered, "Joe can jig--why, he used to +jig beautifully." + +So Joe took his turn in amusing the children and while he did it Mrs. +Dustin examined some machines lined up along the wall. + +"When you drop a nickel in the slot do you get gum, peanuts or your +fortune told or does a Punch and Judy pop out?" she laughingly and +innocently asked Sim and Sammy Berwick who stood near. + +Sim looked uneasy and Sammy said, "Aw, them things are no good, Mrs. +Dustin. You don't want to monkey with them. You might--" + +But Mrs. Dustin was already dropping her nickel in and when Peter came +up she was shaking out an empty purse. + +"Why, Peter, what's the matter with these machines? I guess I didn't +work them right. I've dropped all my money in, and I haven't gotten a +thing. It's the money I was saving for the framing of that picture Mr. +Rollins gave me. Don't you think you can get it for me? Jemmy Hills +sent me word to-day that the picture was all framed and ready." + +Peter all at once looked sick. He knew how his mother had been saving +to buy a pretty frame for the lovely water color Bernard Rollins had +given her. She had even given up the idea of a new knot of flowers for +her hat. And now she had dropped the precious coins down the hungry +mouth of a slot machine. And the worst of it was she didn't seem to +know what she had done. + +"Mother," Peter began miserably, "you've lost the money and I don't see +how you can ask--" + +"Oh, well, Peter Boy,--never mind. I expect it's some new game and I +didn't play it right. I'm sorry I was stupid. Let's see what else we +can do. I wanted to treat you children to soda but maybe Joe has some +money. Joe," she called merrily to the shoemaker, "won't you treat?" + +Joe caught the odd little note in her voice. His hand rattled the +loose change in his pocket and he smiled a spontaneous smile that had +however more than a bit of malice in it. + +"Sure, I'll treat," and he turned to the proprietor who still looked as +though he was seeing things but came to life when Joe stepped up to the +counter. + +"What'll you have?" + +"Oh," said Joe carelessly, "give me what you give the rest of the +boys," and here Joe winked at the proprietor. + +"And I'll have the same," laughed Mrs. Dustin, and again Joe winked at +the proprietor. + +But the children had grown strangely quiet, especially the boys. And +slim Mollie once more grew frightened as she watched the proprietor +setting out glass after glass of foaming beer. + +Mrs. Dustin was busy talking to the children and didn't seem to see the +foaming glasses until Joe called, + +"Come on, everybody--line up." + +Then the lovely mother face was raised and at the look that came into +the blue eyes every child there grew sick and miserable. + +"Ah, gee--whad he give her that for?" muttered Sammy Berwick. + +But Mrs. Dustin, after looking once into Peter's tortured eyes, stood +up and laughed. + +"Well, children," she confessed, "I've never tasted beer in my life, +but it's your party and I invited myself so it would be rude to refuse." + +And with that she picked up her glass. + +"Well," laughed Joe, "this is my first drink too. But I'm not going to +be an old fogey. What's good enough for my boys is good enough for me." + +Every child there held its breath for they knew that Joe spoke the +truth. As for the proprietor, that puzzled man thought that the little +shoemaker was trying to be funny and he laughed his first laugh that +evening. + +Peter Dustin stood beside his mother, his horrified eyes on the little +toil-worn hand that was curled about the stem of a beer glass. He +wanted to snatch that glass away, wanted to shout to her not to touch +the stuff. But his throat was closed and he was conscious only of the +fact that somewhere down inside of the anguish that filled him +something was praying for help, something was begging God to keep the +little, blue-eyed mother stainless and sweet and unharmed. + +Joe's boys were not beside their father. They were at the other end of +the counter staring, just staring, unconscious of everything, hearing +only that strange new laugh of their father's and noticing what no one +else except Mrs. Dustin saw--that Joe's hand as he raised his glass +shook wretchedly. + +And then, before any of them could bring their glasses to their lips, +the thing the anguished soul of Peter Dustin had been praying for +happened. The door opened and within its frame stood the big handsome +figure of Green Valley's new minister. + +One glance of his took in the scene and the smile he wore never changed +nor did an eyelash so much as quiver even after the blue eyes of +Peter's mother had flashed their message. + +"Well--I've come to invite folks to my party and I find a party going +on. I'm going to give a housewarming soon, and I came over to ask +Williams here where he bought his graphophone and records. We must +have one at my party so that when the musicians get tired we can have +other music. And, Williams, I'm expecting you to come over that night +and run the thing for me. I shall be too busy attending to other +matters. And now, as long as we're all here would you mind letting me +hear 'Annie Laurie' again?" + +The song was put on and the children crowded round. + +Joe and Mrs. Dustin were listening silently to the song that always +brought back old faces and scenes and that old haunting ache for the +things of long ago. + +"That's my favorite tune," said the proprietor suddenly to Mrs. Dustin. + +"It's one of mine too," she smiled back with soft, shining eyes. + +"My wife's name was Annie," he said again and as suddenly. + +"Have you lost her?" Mrs. Dustin asked gently. + +"Yes. Quite a while ago. You make me think of her. She was little +and had blue eyes. She died on me when the baby came. She took the +baby with her." + +"Oh," murmured Mrs. Dustin and she forgot the beer growing stale on the +counter, forgot the slot machines against the walls, forgot everything +but this man who for this minute stood out from a world of men with +this unhealed sorrow in his heart. + + "And for bonny Annie Laurie + I'd lay me doon and dee," + +sang the famous singer softly and the proprietor turned his head away. + +"It gets damn lonesome sometimes," he said huskily. And at that a +toil-worn hand touched his arm in healing sympathy and a little +shoemaker who had come out into the night with anger in his heart said +with a huskiness that rivalled the proprietor's, + +"My God, man, don't I know!" + +The minister played other tunes, then he pulled out his watch and +laughed and that ended the party. In a few minutes he was alone with +the proprietor. + +When the last footstep had lost itself in the still streets the +proprietor turned to the big young man who was sitting on an ice-cream +table, carelessly swinging his feet. + +"I feel so damn funny," said the proprietor, "and all shook up +to-night. And I don't know whether it all really happened or whether I +just dreamed it--the little woman with the blue eyes and the soft-faced +little guy. Say, parson, what were they after, anyway?" + +"Williams," the parson made grave answer, "I rather think those two +were looking for their children." And Cynthia's son told the story of +Joe and Hattie and Mrs. Dustin and Peter as Green Valley had told it to +him. And when it was told the two men sat still and listened to the +little wind mourning somewhere outside. + +"Yes--that's it. They were looking for their children. If mine hadn't +a-died that's maybe what I'd be doing now. Oh, God, parson, I'm in +wrong again. I've been in wrong ever since Annie died. If she was +alive I'd be working in a machine shop somewheres, bringing home my +twenty-two a week with more for overtime and going around with my wife +and the kid and living natural, like other men. My God," he groaned, +"the lights just went out when she went and I've been stumbling around +in the dark, not knowing how to live or die. + +"I quit work the day after I buried her. What was the use of working +then? I had half a mind to blow in all I had but I couldn't. Seemed +like she was still there with me, trying to cheer me up. I slunk +around like a shadow for months. And then I got hungry for people. A +single man don't get asked around much and he's got to hang around with +the boys. + +"So I took what money I had and started a pool-room. I thought maybe +I'd feel better seeing people around all day. Well--it wasn't so bad. +But one night a little woman with a baby in her arms came to the door +and begged me to send her husband home and not let him play in my place +any more. She said she had no milk for the baby and no fire, that he +was spending everything he earned in my poolroom. + +"So help me, God, parson, that part of it had never struck me. I ain't +bright and never was. But I ain't no skunk. I give that woman some of +her own money back and that week I sold out at a loss and slunk around +some more. I couldn't go back to my own work. I had a grudge against +it, someway. By and by the money was all gone and an old pal of mine +offered to set me up in business out here, away from the city and old +memories. And here I am again--the same old fool and numbskull. I'll +sell out this week and git. What I'll do I don't know. I'm not a +smart man. It was always Annie that did the heavy thinking and the +advising and had the ideas for starting things." + +The boy who was born in India, who had heard hundreds of gripping, +human tales in that land of story and proverb, listened as if this was +the first breath of grief his heart had ever experienced. Then he took +the dead Annie's place. + +"Williams, sometime next spring, Billy Evans is going to add a garage +to his livery barn. He'll need a mechanic. That will be just the +place for you. In the meantime I'm buying a little car and am in need +of a driver. So until Billy is ready you'd better come and bach with +me. The farm is big and I'm nearly as lonely at times as you are." + +And he told his poolroom friend a tale of India and of two plain white +stones that lay somewhere within the heart of it. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +THE CHARM + +It was a wonderful charm--that picture of a little boy and his pet hen. +Nanny carried it about during the day and felt almost safe and easier +of heart. She wondered what had become of all her old happiness, the +carefree joy that had been hers before she met the boy who came from +India and who did not understand women. + +Ever since that day on the hill top Nanny's life had been troubled. +She was haunted with strange, vague fears. She woke up one morning +with the knowledge that she had dreamed the night long of the boy from +India. That afternoon she found herself unable to think of anything +but him. + +A panic seized her. She began to be afraid of herself. She caught +herself looking out of the windows and down the dusty summer roads, at +first unconsciously and then with a curious expectancy that grew to a +longing so real that she could not help but understand. + +It came to Nanny with a terrible shock--the knowledge that at last she +loved a man. She remembered then the eyes of the men who had loved her +and whom she had so carelessly sent away. She understood then the hurt +they had carried away with them and hoped penitently that each had +found the comfort and love he had craved. + +She wondered how and where she was to look for comfort. She saw with +something very much like horror that, unlike the men who had sought +her, she dared make no plea, could not by word or look give any sign of +what had befallen her. + +If others came to know, her misery would be unbearable. The terrible +thought came that perhaps Cynthia's son might come to see. At that the +earth seemed to go soft beneath her feet and her world lay blurred in a +mist of amazed misery. + +She was wretched and gay by turns. The day came when her father and +brother noticed this and spoke of it. Then it was that Nanny turned +white and walked away to Grandma Wentworth's. She had half a mind to +tell Grandma and perhaps through that wonder-wise soul find her way +back to peace and sanity. But Grandma had teased too and so Nanny held +on desperately to her secret, wondering how she was to go on enduring. + +When she came to the picture of the little, grave-eyed chap Nanny stole +it without a moment's hesitation. And it acted like a charm. Lying +warm above her heart it dulled the longing and helped her to laugh +again, gayly, saucily even. + +She had brave minutes when with her eyes on the picture she told +herself that it wasn't the man she loved but this grave-eyed boy in him +that had never grown up or died. She had always loved children, she +told herself, so there was no shame in that. But the next minute her +heart would call up the image of this boy grown up, a boy still, but a +boy with a man's eyes and a man's dormant strength. Being an honest +soul Nanny flushed and cried for the mother she could not remember. + +Still as the days went by Nanny found that the little fellow stood +gallantly by her. Somehow he helped her to grow used to the pain and +the burning joy of her secret. He helped her to endure the questions +and the teasing that is the lot of girls as lovely as Nanny. + +He helped her to laugh when she felt like crying. And best of all he +steadied her when Cynthia's son was by, when her heart was beating +horribly and her head was dizzy with happiness and fright. + +She was a new girl to the boy from India. He was no longer afraid of +her. She no longer said bright, sharp things that puzzled and hurt +him. She was quiet and kind and frequently now exceedingly ill at ease. + +One day while they were walking along the road he stopped suddenly and +looked at her. + +"Are you tired?" he asked abruptly. + +"No--I'm not tired," Nanny said a little surprised at the question. + +"Are you ill?" he next wanted to know. + +"Ill? Why--no. Not that I know of." + +He searched her eyes for the truth. Nanny, not daring to trust +herself, turned away her head with an unsteady little laugh. + +"Why?" + +"Because," the puzzled boy explained, "you have been so quiet and so +nice and kind to me." + +The laughable innocence of him was all that saved Nanny that time. + +She thought of going away. But she lacked the courage. The thought of +going made the pain worse and there was no place in all the world to +which she cared to go. + +Then a brilliant idea came to her. It might after all, she told +herself, be purely imaginary,--this strange torture that she thought +was love. It might after all be only a foolish fancy born of her quiet +isolated life in the dreamy old town. She would fill the house with +people, with men and women and music. + +So for a time the Ainslees were very gay. House party followed house +party and there were always guests. Secure with the security of +numbers Nanny invited Cynthia's son. Then she stood back and watched +him draw both men and women about him. He was utterly at ease with the +men but quiet and reserved with the girls. Instinctively he sorted out +the comfortable, less brilliant ones and chatted with them, all +unconscious of the light in the eyes of the others. Nanny watched him +and as she watched there was born in her heart a new fear and torture. +She realized that some day love would come to Cynthia's son and feared +that she would have to stand by unseen and forgotten. + +So then she began to distrust those of her feminine guests who smiled +at him and chatted with him. And as soon as she decently could she +sent all her company packing. When they were gone she knew beyond any +possibility of doubt that she loved him and would always love him and +that the vengeance that her father had predicted had overtaken her. + +The very next time Cynthia's son came he found the house quiet and +Nanny alone. + +"Are they all gone?" he asked. + +"Yes," she told him. + +"When is your next crowd coming?" he wondered. + +"There aren't going to be any more crowds," Nanny informed him. + +"That's nice. It's pleasanter this way." + +Nanny's poor heart longed to ask why but it dared not. + +So then she drifted and didn't care. Though she prayed a little +miserably at times for peace and a home shore. They seemed to meet by +accident on the sunny summer roads and whenever they did they strolled +on aimlessly but contented. Because she was now so quiet and kind he +told her things that he had never told to any one else. She marvelled +at the simple heart of him, its freedom from self-consciousness. She +had not dreamed that there was anywhere in the world a grown-up man +like that. + +Had he been different she could never have lived, it seemed to her, +through the fearful hour of humiliation on the Glen Road. She stooped +for a spray of scarlet sumach one early autumn afternoon. They had +been looking through the hedges for the first hazel nuts and he was +standing beside her when, in some way, the little picture worked its +way out of her soft silk blouse and fell at his feet, face up. + +Fright as terrible and as cold as death laid its hand on Nanny's heart. +It seemed to her that she never again could raise her eyes to his. +Fortunately her body went through its mechanical duties. She bent, her +hand picked up the picture, and her voice of its own accord was +explaining: + +"This belongs to you. I took it the day I was looking over the +pictures at Grandma Wentworth's. I should, of course, have returned it +long ago but I kept neglecting to do it. It's one of the dearest child +pictures I have ever seen." + +She raised her eyes then, eyes as careless as she could make them. +Fright kept the flame of bitter shame from her cheeks and the tremor +out of her voice. She held the little picture out to him, forcing her +eyes to meet his. + +And those eyes of his looked down at her, first with wonder and then +with a pleased smile, and she knew that he didn't know, didn't +understand, saw nothing strange in the incident. He took her calm +explanation for the whole truth. The man had absolutely no vanity. + +"Why, I don't want that," he told her wonderingly. "Are you making a +collection of children's pictures?" he asked with such innocent +curiosity that Nanny's self-control gave way and she laughed until she +cried. He stood by, helpless and puzzled. When Nanny, having gotten +to the tears, searched in vain for her handkerchief he gravely offered +his. + +Nanny took it and used it and then looked up at him with eyes as full +of laughing despair as his were full of bewilderment. + +"John Roger Churchill Knight--you will some day be the very death of +me." + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +INDIAN SUMMER + +"Well, I guess this is about the last spell of pretty weather we're +going to have," sighed Fanny Foster as she sat herself down on Grandma +Wentworth's back steps and went right to work helping Grandma sort the +herbs and bulbs and the seeds she had been gathering for a whole week. + +"I'm hoping not," said Grandma, "though when the air is like warm gold +dust, and the sun's heat just mellows you through and through, and the +last bobolink calls from the hill, why, a body just knows such perfect +days can't last. Still, I'm hoping it'll stay a bit longer, though I +can't say I'm not ready for cold weather." + +"Oh, I guess everybody is," agreed Fanny with that joyous, bubbling, +luxurious note that Grandma knew so well. "I saw Mary Hagley polishing +her very knuckles off on that second-hand stove Mert bought from that +watery-eyed man from Spring Road who drives through here with the lame +buckskin horse and pieced-out harness. Lutie Barlow's got her fall +tinting and painting all done. She's painted the inside of her chicken +coops a bright yellow, so's to fool her hens into thinking the sun's +forever shining, and the inside of her stormshed a red, so's to make it +seem warmer when she goes out there on a cold day to the coal and wood +box. There ain't anybody can beat Lutie on color ideas. + +"Minnie Eton's dyed her heavy lace curtains in coffee and has a new set +made for the dining room, besides having a picture of the third boy +enlarged for the parlor. She started crocheting the lace for a new +bedspread for her company bedroom yesterday. And--oh, my lands, I +forgot to tell you the rest of that second-hand stove business. You +see Mary was feeling pretty bad about having to put up with another old +stove and envying Cissie Harvey hers. Cissie's new parlor stove is a +monster, made seemingly of nothing but pure nickel and isinglass. Mary +went over to look at it and when she come home and took another look at +her old thing she just sat down and cried. She cried till she was too +tired to care and then went to Jessup's for some stove polish. On the +way she met Judy Parks who told her that Dick had a new kind of polish +that gave a beautiful shine without hardly any work. So Mary got that +and it proved to be all Judy said it was and in no time at all Mary +turned that old stove of hers into a shining glory. And just as she +was standing back admiring her work in comes Cissie, wringing her +hands. The baby had poked out every last one of those isinglass +windows while Cissie was in the kitchen warming up his milk. And there +you are. And there's people that say there is no God and no justice in +this world. + +"Josephine Rand's starting in on her rugs and begging rags from friends +and enemies. She's going a little easy though since last week. She +cut up what Ted says was a perfectly good pair of his pants. He had +them hanging up in the basement and was hoping Josephine would wash and +press them some day. He kept them down in the basement because he knew +that if he left them in his closet she'd give them away to a hobo on +account of her always feeling so sorry for tramps and believing +everything they tell her. Ted says he always liked these particular +pants on account of them making him look slim and being made of the +same kind of cloth as his first long pair of pants that he got as a +boy. So he was cherishing them and Josephine goes and cuts them into +tatters. He's so mad, she says she don't dare leave a rag rug in his +sight. + +"Mat Wilson and his wife ain't on the very best conjugal terms either. +It seems Mat has a felon right under his thumb nail, about the worst +place you can have one, he thinks. It's kept him awake nights and made +him miserable, so naturally he felt entitled to a good deal of +sympathy. And he got it. Everybody has sympathized so much that Clara +just got mad and said that that there felon of Mat's isn't half as bad +as the one that she had at the end of her thumb two years ago. She +says she got hollow-eyed and consumptive looking with hers but that Mat +looks about the same as usual, maybe brighter. Anyhow, they've argued +and scrapped about their felons so that Clara's aunt's gone off for a +visit to Ioway, and Mat says that there sure is a recompense for +everything in this world, even felons and domestic misery, and Clara +wants to know if he's meaning to insinuate that her aunt is a nuisance, +because if he is she ain't going to send his aunt the Christmas present +that she's got half done for her. But Mat won't say, just keeps +showing his thumb to everybody and talking about silver linings to +every cloud. There's no use talking, some men are aggravating. + +"Mandy Jutlins don't know whether to have the telephone put in or not. +She says the Lord knows she has enough children to run all her errands +and take all messages and that the two dollars a month comes in handy +for a new pair of shoes. And if it's in she says more than likely +she'll be wasting her time listening to a lot of silly gossip. Of +course that was a foolish remark for Mandy to make, seeing all her +friends have telephones. Two or three's took it personal and aren't +speaking a word to Mandy but plenty about her. One of them is supposed +to have said that it's a fact that Mandy doesn't need a telephone, that +she talks enough without it, and that in her opinion the worst kind of +a gossip is the kind that stays at home the whole enduring time, never +taking pains to see how things really happen and always knowing +everything. + +"Emmy Smith doesn't know what to do with her oldest girl, Eleanor. +Eleanor just won't wash the knives and forks and spoons. She'll scrape +and scald and polish the pots and pans and does the china beautiful, +but she will leave the knives and forks and even hides them away dirty. +Did you ever hear of such a thing? Emmy can't explain it unless it's +due to the shiftless streak in all the Smiths. + +"Agnes Hooper's crab-apple jell is about all gone and here it's hardly +cool yet. Those boys of hers just want to live on crab-apple jell and +Aggie says she's got to the end of her strength and patience, that +Charlie'd better pull up and move out among the Mormons where he could +have a couple of more wives to help keep those boys filled up. + +"Jennie Burton's sauerkraut isn't going to keep and hasn't turned out +well, she thinks. Fremy Stockton says it's because she forgot to put +in a little mite of sugar and altogether too much salt. + +"Grace Cook's husband bought a whole pig from some farmer Bloomingdale +way, thinking it was going to be good and cold by this time. And Grace +has got up at four o'clock every morning for a week and stayed up till +midnight, trying to get that pig out of sight. She's rendered lard and +made sausage and salted and smoked meat till every crock is full. +Yesterday she was making head cheese, sick to her stomach and crying +because there were still the four feet to cook up, and she said she +didn't know how to cook them and that each one looked to her about as +big as the kitchen stove. + +"So I just took off my hat and put those four pig's feet on the stove +to simmer, and I helped her to get the head cheese out of the way. +When there's two working and talking, why, the time goes and when we +turned around there were those pig's feet as tender as could be, so +when the children came in we sat down and had pig's feet with +horse-radish. Grace wouldn't touch them; said she had enough pig in +her system to last her ten years and she knew she'd break out in +gumboils. + +"I suppose you've heard how Malcolm Gross thought he'd lay in a nice +supply of maple syrup for his buckwheat pancakes this winter, and how +the children went to tasting and forgot to cork the big can, and the +cat went climbing around for mice and bacon rind and knocked the thing +down. Florence says there's maple syrup tracked all over the house and +she says her rugs are ruined. + +"It seems as if Grove Street was full of trouble, for while Grace was +crying over her pig, Elsie Winters next door was crying over her blue +henrietta dress that didn't dye right. Elsie swears it was old dye +Martin sold her and wishes we'd have another drug store because a +little competition would do Martin good. And next door to Elsie, Pete +Sweeney's tickled to death. He says it serves Elsie right, that Green +Valley women've got a mania for dyeing things and trying to make 'em +last forever; that he's had two bolts of just the kind of color Elsie +was trying to get but that she wouldn't look at it. + +"And Pete Sweeney's not the only one that's down on the women. Andy +Smiley cleaned up so much money on those new bungalows that he went to +the city and came home with twenty-five dollars' worth of ostrich +plumes for Nettie. He said he was bound that Nettie'd have a real hat +once in her life, that he's tired of watching her making her own hats, +even piecing out the shapes with bits of cardboard and trimming and +retrimming. She got in the way of it the first ten years they were +married, when Andy was having such poor luck and now, poor thing, I +guess she can't get out of it, because the day after Andy brought the +plumes Nettie went to the city and bought a thirty-nine-cent shape to +put them on. And she's wearing it like that, looking worse than ever. +They say Andy's swearing awful and that Mary Langely almost cried when +she saw those lovely plumes and begged Nettie to come in and let her +fix up her hat proper and without charge. But Nettie just smiled that +happy little smile of hers and shook her head. + +"Andy Smiley ain't the only one that's doing well. Johnny Peters got a +raise the other day and Claudie's treated herself to two dozen +beautiful linen dish towels. She says she's used flour sacks to wipe +dishes ever since she was six years old and she's always been hoping +she'd be rich enough some day to have real linen dish towels. So she's +got 'em. But they're so nice she hardly likes to use them, and the two +weeks she was sick and had to have her washing done at the laundry she +was mighty careful not to send them. She washed them herself right +there beside her bed, and her sick with rheumatism. They say Doc +Philipps used awful language, for he caught her right at it. But when +she explained he just blew his nose and never said another word. But +he talked to Johnny and Johnny went out and bought four dozen dish +towels such as Green Valley has never seen. Why, Sadie Dundry says +even the Ainslees haven't got dish towels like that. Doc says that if +he can coax some man to get Dolly Beatty good woolen stockings and keep +her from wearing those transparent things this winter he'll be almost +happy; says if Dolly should marry that widower he'll talk to him. + +"All Elm Street's laughing at Alexander Sabin and Carrie and their +pump. That pump of theirs has been out of order all summer and +Carrie's been sick from nothing else but getting mad every time she'd +go out for a pail of water. Alexander promised to fix it but instead +of that he's repaired everybody else's all up and down Elm Street and +just can't seem to get started on his own. Carrie's going on a strike +to-morrow, ain't going to cook a mouthful of victuals, she says, until +that pump is fixed. The neighbors, much as they like Alexander, are +all on her side and have promised not to invite him in, even for a +drink of water from the pumps he's fixed. And his mother's away at +Barton, nursing her sick sister, so it looks as if Alexander will be +starved into fixing that pump of his. + +"Debby Collins is going to give the minister one of her cats, the one +that has to have a cold potato for its lunch every day. She says it's +the most mannerly of all her cats and that she'd never think of giving +it to any one but the minister and not even to him but that now that +he's going to have a proper home and a housekeeper, why, it'll be safe. + +"Everybody, of course, is crazy about the housewarming the minister is +going to give next week. I guess everybody is going. It'll be a fine +night for thieves, Bessie Williams says, with every soul gone. That +girl's mind just naturally turns to evil. She knows there ain't ever +been a thing stolen in this town, less it was a kiss or two. But +Bessie's the only one, so far as I could hear, who was borrowing +trouble. The rest of the town is dying to get into that house that's +been closed so long. And everybody's curious to know just what Hen +Tomlins's been doing to the furniture. You know when the minister +found out what a fine wood-carver and cabinet-maker Hen was he had him +go through the house. And they say that Bernard Rollins, the +portraiture man, is mixed up in the housewarming too. But nobody can +figure out how. And that ain't the worst. Uncle Tony says that he +heard that the minister bought out the poolroom man, because some one +saw the music box being hauled over to the minister's house. You know +Jake and some others were planning to run that poolroom man out of +town, even whispering about tar and feathers. But the minister asked +them to let him manage and try to fix things up first. So they did and +he's done it, because the poolroom's closed; the stuff went out +yesterday and Effie Struby's brother Alf swears he saw that poolroom +man fooling with the minister's automobile out in the barn. But you +know how near-sighted Alf is and his word ain't credited much, and +everybody's so busy getting ready for the party that they can't stop to +investigate. And ain't it funny how none of us don't somehow ask the +minister things, just wait until he tells us? And ain't he got a funny +way of just talking about nothing special, only being pleasant, and +then letting you find out weeks after that he did tell you something +that you'd been needing to know? My! I bet that boy could give a +child castor oil and make him honestly think it was candy. Why, they +say that as far as anybody can find out, he's never give that poolroom +man even one good talking to. Jake, who's been itching to lambaste the +man, says 's-far's he can see, it was the poolroom man who did all the +talking. And once Jake says he just dropped in himself, just to see +what line of argument the minister was using, and he says that he'd be +danged if the minister did a blessed thing but play 'Annie Laurie' and +'We'd Better Bide a Wee' over and over on that music box. Jake hasn't +figured it out yet. + +"Why, Grandma, there's some thinks maybe Cynthia's son has brought back +some Indian magic. They say India's chuckful of it--but law--it'll +take more than magic to save little Jim Tumley, for he's beginning +again. While the minister kept close he was all right but the +housewarming and that poolroom took up time, and then Jim's sister, +Mrs. Hoskins, got sick and Jim goes there to play and sing to her, and +you know what George Hoskins is. He must have his drink and offer +visitors some--and poor Jim--just the smell of it knocks him out. The +minister says Jim must be saved. But how's it to be done, tell me +that? There ain't anything smart or knowing about me, but the +minister'll never save Jim Tumley less'n he kills off a few of our +comfortable, respectable drinkers and closes up the hotel. And I tell +you, nobody but God Almighty could make this town dry." + +"Well, Fanny," smiled Grandma, "I've noticed that if there ever is a +job that nobody but the Almighty can handle, He generally takes it in +hand and settles it." + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +THE HOUSEWARMING + +Jocelyn Brownlee was dressing for the minister's party. She was laying +out the prettiest of her pretty things and sighing as she did it. For +what two months before would have seemed a joyous occasion was now +nothing but a painful, trying ordeal, an ordeal that must, however, be +gallantly gone through with. + +Ever since that afternoon when she had stood on the back porch waving +joyfully to David and received no answer her world had lost its color. +All the rose and gold had faded and she stood lonely and lost and cold +in a mist of mystery. + +She had seen David since that day, had even spoken to him. But her +words were few and full of a gracious courtesy that put a whole wide +world between them. + +"Are you going to the minister's housewarming, Jocelyn?" David had +asked painfully. He had realized the raw cruelty of that afternoon and +had come over to explain and make amends. + +"Yes--I'm going, David. All the town will be there, won't it?" she had +answered and asked gently. + +"Shall I stop for you?" begged the big boy. + +"Why, no, David--thank you. I shall not need an escort. It's such a +little way and I'm used to Green Valley now." But David knew just how +afraid this city mouse was of the country roads at night. + +She was such a gracious little body as she stood there in her garden +that David wondered how he had ever for a moment doubted her and what +madness in his blood had made him yield to the cruelty that had shut +her heart and door to him. + +For closed they were and gone was the simple, confiding girl who had +picnicked with him one May day. In her place was this quiet young +woman who talked to him pleasantly but did not ask him in, and who +scared him with her calm and sweetness and drove the stumbling +explanation from his lips. + +So Jocelyn was laying out her pretty things and sighing. As long as +she was not going with David she decided to wear the smart slippers +with the high heels and the pretty buckles. David did not approve of +high heels. + +She knew that a great many of the Green Valley women would wear dresses +with collars to their chins. So she smiled just a bit wickedly as she +glanced at the soft, misty dress like pink sea foam, from which her +head and lovely throat rose like a flower. She wondered if it was +wicked to be glad that she was pretty and to want David to see just how +pretty she really was. + +She didn't want to go, but go she must, for she knew Green Valley. She +knew it and loved it. But she feared it too, because she did not know +it well enough. + +So half-past eight found her stepping daintily and a little tipsily in +her high-heeled slippers over the road, after the last stragglers. She +did not want to be seen going in alone and so hung back till the last, +a lonely little figure in the cool shadows. Yet she was not so far +back that she could not feel the comforting nearness of the folks +ahead. She even heard snatches of conversation and smiled +understandingly, for she too knew now the little daily trials, the +family sorrows and dissensions, the occasional soul tempests, the +laughable ways and tenderly pathetic ambitions of these simple, +guileless human folks. + +She heard enough to know that the couple just ahead was Sam Bobbins and +his wife, Dudy; the Sam Bobbins who tried to get rich raising violets +and failed; who then began raising mushrooms in his cellar and failed; +who last year spent good money trying to raise pedigreed dogs and +failed; and who only the week before paid ten dollars for a fancy +rooster and was happily telling his neighbors how rich he was going to +be, selling fighting stock. His wife stepped on her skirt and ripped +it. Jocelyn could hear her worried wail and Sam comforting her with +promises of new dresses when the roosters began to sell. She could +hear fat Mrs. Glenn puffing and laughing her way up the little crests +of the road and could guess that her thin husband was doing his best to +help her. + +She was so interested in the folks ahead that she forgot to be afraid +and never once glanced back into the shadows. Had she done so she +might have seen David loitering along, keeping faithful watch over her. +So nicely did he time his steps that when she reached the door of the +minister's country house he was right behind her, and all Green Valley +saw them come in together. + +When Jocelyn, in slipping from her evening wrap, turned and saw him and +flushed, he covered her confusion by saying reproachfully but gently: + +"Those slippers are ever so pretty, Jocelyn, but you ought not to wear +them on these rough country roads and they are hardly warm enough for +these cool evenings, are they?" + +She gave him a little smile full of saucy wickedness for she heard the +pain in his voice and saw the lover's hunger in his eyes and knew that +she was loved well and truly. But she had been hurt and she was too +much a woman and far too human not to take her turn at gentle cruelty. + +"What a couple," breathed Joshua Stillman, standing beside the blazing +fireplace with Colonel Stratton. "She's like a dewy sweet rosebud and +he's a regular story-book lover in looks and a rare fine boy. We +haven't had a wild rose romance like this one for a long while." + +"We'll have a finer when that young parson wakes up. He has the look +of a great lover, and look at the love history of the Churchills." + + It was evident that no man there dreamed of criticizing +the dress that looked like pink sea foam. Even David drank in the +picture of his little sweetheart and saw how necessary to this wild +rose sweetness the high-heeled slippers were. He wondered if ever in +his life he would kiss her and, should such glory come to him, if he +would live through the joy of it. + +It was the women who were inclined to murmur. But as soon as they +caught a look or a smile meant just for them their primness melted. +Their duty to their conscience and their upbringing done, they smiled +back lovingly at the girl, for who could be critical of a sweet wild +rose! + +Jocelyn was not the only one whose gown had no collar. Nan Ainslee +wore a plain dress that was so beautiful it made the women catch their +breath. When Dolly asked the Green Valley dressmaker if she could make +her one like it, that body sighed and shook her head and said that she +knew that that dress looked awful simple but that it wasn't as simple +as it looked and she knew better than to try and copy it. + +Some one overheard and asked somebody else why Dolly Beatty should +happen to want a dress like that, and instantly somebody smiled and +whispered that Charlie Peters, the widower from North Road, was making +eyes at her and calling regularly. + +So the ball was set rolling and soon everybody knew that Grandma +Wentworth had just had a letter from Tommy Dudley, saying that he was +doing so well out West on his homestead that he was building himself a +new house and was aiming to make Green Valley a visit next lilac time. + +And Jimmy Sears, Milly Sears' second boy, was a sergeant in the army +and was having a wonderful time somewhere down in Panama. Milly had a +letter from him with photographs and was showing them around. Not only +did Jimmy give her news of himself but he wrote that John, the oldest +boy, was up in Canada and doing well. Jimmy was sending his mother and +sister Alice some wonderful laces and embroideries and Frank Burton +several kinds of strange fowl by a sailor friend from one of the +warships who was going home. So patient, long-suffering Milly Sears +was wholly happy for the first time in years. + +And no sooner had all this news been digested than somebody discovered +a diamond ring on Clara Tuttle's left hand. So Clara was surrounded +and an explanation demanded. But before she could conquer her blushes +and stammer out her news Max Longman came in from another room and, +putting his arms about her, said, "Don't be afraid, girl of mine, I'm +here." And so everybody knew then that it was Max, after all, and not +Freddy Wilson. + +Over near one of the big windows Steve Meckling was looking down at +Bonnie Don. + +"Bonnie, when will you stop torturing me? When will you let me give +you a ring?" + +Bonnie was Clara Tuttle's chum and she was watching Clara's face, the +light in Clara's eyes, the happy curve of her lips. It was a happiness +that made Bonnie's eyes wistful. + +"Steve," she said softly, "would you always love me and be gentle with +me?" + +At that big Steve caught his breath and put his hungry arms behind his +back out of temptation's way and said huskily, "Oh, Bonnie, girl, just +try me!" + +So Bonnie raised her eyes and the big man was at peace. + +Billy Evans was the last to arrive. He had to get all the old folks to +the party before he and Hank could put in an appearance. But his wife +and little Billy were there, little Billy with his ruddy hair curling +about his merry little face and his eyes dancing at everything and +every one. + +Green Valley was full of lovable little ones, but they were as a rule +kept closely sheltered in the front and back yards. But Billy was a +town baby. His days were spent in and around his father's livery barn. +He went to his twelve o'clock dinner perched on Hank Lolly's shoulder, +and it had gotten so no gathering of men in his father's office was +considered complete without him. + +And maybe it was just as well; for since Billy's coming there was less +careless language, less careless gossip. And if some one's tongue did +slip now and then, Hank Lolly had a way of putting his head in and +saying solemnly: + +"Guess you forgot that Mrs. Evans' boy was around when you said that." + +For Hank Lolly was little Billy's proud godfather and Billy's welfare +was a matter that kept Hank awake nights. + +It was Hank who introduced little Billy to all the livery horses and +patiently developed deep friendships between the animals and the child. + +"I've fixed it so's no horse of ourn'll ever hurt the boy. But that +ain't saying that somebody's ornery critter won't harm him. There's +some awful mean horses in this town, Billy," Hank worried. But Billy +Evans only laughed. + +"Hank," he said, "with you and God taking turns minding that kid, and +his ma and me doing a little now and then, I guess he'll grow up." + +So Billy was at the minister's party, as were very nearly all the other +Green Valley youngsters. For these were old-fashioned folks whose +entertainments were so simple and harmless that children could always +be present. + +As a matter of fact Green Valley folks never had to be entertained. +All one had to do was to call them together and they entertained +themselves. + +Cynthia's son knew this. So he had made no elaborate plans. He knew +too that it was the old homestead they came to see, and to find out +what that poolroom man was doing in his back yard, and why Hen Tomlins +had been coming up so regularly, and why Bernard Rollins had been +asking to see people's old albums for the past three months. + +So Cynthia's son had no programme. He just threw open every door and +invited them to walk through and look. He explained that in the +kitchen his housekeeper, Mary Dooley, and her two cousins from Meacham +were getting up the refreshments and that any one who strayed in there +would in all probability be put to work. + +Still he wanted Green Valley housewives to go in and see if they could +think of anything that would make Mary's work easier. He had, he said, +tried to make that kitchen a livable kind of a room, a room that would +be easy on a woman's feet and back and restful to her heart. + +In the library and scattered all about were samples of Hen Tomlins' +art. Hen was a rare workman, their minister told them. With his box +of tools and his cunning hands Hen had taken old, broken but still +beautiful heirloom furniture and refashioned it into new life and +beauty. + +In his little study just off the library his Green Valley neighbors +would find all manner of oriental things, treasures gathered for him by +his wonderful mother and father and given to him by his many dear and +far-away Indian friends. He had put little cards on the articles, +explaining their history and uses. + +For the babies there were big, quiet, safe rooms upstairs, and for the +young people there was the hall and the back sitting room, the piano, +the music box and Timothy Williams. Timothy was the man who up till +the day before yesterday had owned and run the poolroom. But he wasn't +in the poolroom business any more. He was now his, John Knight's, +assistant and friend. Timothy's story was a common enough little +story--the story of a man without a home. If they'd all listen a +minute he'd tell them all there was to tell. + +So, in the midst of a merrymaking, John Roger Churchill Knight +introduced Timothy Williams to Green Valley, introduced him in such a +way as to pave a wide clear path for him into Green Valley hearts. And +so quick was Green Valley's response that before that same merrymaking +was over Green Valley was calling him Timothy and inviting him over for +Sunday dinner. + +So then they were all provided for. And here was the house. It was +years since some of them were in it, and to a home-loving, +home-worshipping people it was a treat to go from room to room. In +spite of the changes, the newness everywhere, there was much of the old +home left. Its soul was still the same. The new hangings, the new +wicker furniture, the oriental treasures were all duly inspected, +commented upon and admired. + +But it was the old things, the Green Valley things that made the great +appeal. And Green Valley folks rested loving hands every now and then +on some fine old heavy chair that a long-gone Churchill had with his +own hands fashioned from his own walnut trees. + +There were pictures to look at, old familiar faces, the faces of men +and women who had been born and raised in this joyous little valley +town; who had gone to the village school and had in their courting days +strolled over the shady old town roads. + +Here was a picture of Cynthia's mother in a crinoline with her baby on +her knee. There was a famous artist's painting of a storm passing over +the wooded knoll that now was John Knight's favorite retreat. The +famous artist had been visiting John Knight and had painted the storm +as he watched it from the sitting-room windows. + +There were old candlesticks, guns, old dishes, old patterns, hand-sewn +quilts and such little things of long ago as stirred the oldest folks +there very nearly to tears and awed even the youngsters into a +wondering respect for the old days they could never know. + +The old house hummed with the treasured memories of a hundred years. +Groups of twos and threes stood everywhere about, hovering over some +article. In every such group there would be at first a short hushed +silence, then would come the sudden burst of memories spattering like a +shower of raindrops; then the turning away of eyes full of misty, +unbelieving, far-away smiles. + +Cynthia's son watched and smiled too. But his thoughts flew back and +he longed with a cruel ache for the mother who lay sleeping in a far +and foreign land. + +By and by a gong sounded somewhere. That was the signal for supper. +So they gathered around the tables and Cynthia's son explained that +Bernard Rollins had for the last three months been painting a portrait +of Cynthia Churchill, Cynthia as they knew her. That was why Rollins +had searched old albums for pictures that might give him an idea of the +sweetness of her smile. That was the surprise of the evening and the +meaning of the shrouded picture above the library fireplace. She had +so loved Green Valley, had so longed to be there. + +They sat very still and waited while Grandma Wentworth uncovered the +face of the girl who had been so loved by Green Valley folks. +Grandma's face was a little white with memories and the hand that was +reaching for the cord to draw away the covering shook a little. +Cynthia Churchill and she had been dearer to each other than sisters. +They had gone to school together in the days of pinafores and +sunbonnets and picked spring's wild flowers along the roadsides and in +the woodlands. They had knitted and made lace together, gone to +picnics and parties, always together, until the time came when a tall +Green Valley boy walked beside each. And even then they were +inseparable. Why, they made their wedding things together and when +Mollie Wentworth passed out of the village church a wife, Cynthia, +lovely as the bride, walked behind as bridesmaid. And Mollie was to +have returned the favor in a few days. But something happened, +something tragic and cruel, and lovely Cynthia never wore the wedding +gown that had been fashioned for her. It was packed away and on what +was to have been her wedding day Cynthia left Green Valley and was gone +a long while. She came back once or twice but in the end Green Valley +heard that she married a wonderful missionary and sailed away to India. + +So Grandma's hand shook and her face was white. But when the covering +slipped off and a lovely, laughing face looked down at them Grandma +smiled, even though the tears were running down her cheeks. + +Yes, that was Cynthia. Disappointment could never mar the high joy of +her nature. She was laughing at them, telling them that with all its +sorrows and bitterness and heartache life was worth while. + +Her son stood beneath her picture and read to them parts of her +letters, last messages to many of them. She had written them on her +deathbed and they were full of yearning for the town of her birth, for +the old trees and familiar flowers, home voices and the sound of the +old church bell sighing through the summer night. + +"But," ran one letter, "I am sending you my son and I want you to tell +him all the old stories and town chronicles, sing him all the old songs +and love him for my sake--for he's going home--going home to Green +Valley--alone." + +Oh, they cried, those Green Valley folks, for they were as one family +and they guessed what it must have been to die away from home and +kindred. + +But Cynthia's son did not weep. He had shed his tears long ago and had +learned to smile. He was smiling at them now. + +"I had planned to have Jim Tumley sing some of the old songs for us +to-night. But Jim isn't here and so if somebody will offer to play +them we can all sing. Jim promised he'd come," the young host's face +was troubled and they all guessed what was worrying him, "but he isn't +here--" + +"Yes--he--is," a strange voice chirped somewhere near the door. Green +Valley turned and looked and froze with horror. For there, staggering +grotesquely, came little Jim Tumley, a piteous figure. He had kept his +promise to his new friend--he had come to sing the old songs. + +Not a soul stirred. Only somewhere in the heart of the seated audience +Frank Burton groaned. This was a fight that he could not fight for +little Jim. + +Nan Ainslee had stepped to the piano but her fingers were lead. And +for once the young minister was unable to rise to the situation. A +dark agony flooded his eyes and kept him motionless. It was the look +Grandma Wentworth had once seen in Cynthia's eyes. And it was that +look that took the strength from Grandma so that she too was helpless. + +For sick, still minutes Green Valley watched little Jim stumble about +and fumble for his handkerchief. They stared at the stricken face of +their minister and at the laughing face whose memory they had come to +honor. + +And then, when the deathly silence was becoming unbearable, a girl in a +dress like pink sea foam rose from her chair and stepped quietly, +daintily down the room until she stood beside the swaying figure of Jim +Tumley. She placed her hand gently on the little man's arm and turned +to her Green Valley neighbors. + +"I shall sing the old songs with him," she said quietly. + +She found an armchair and put the docile Jim into it. Then she smiled +at Nan Ainslee and told her what to play. + +Nan's fingers touched the keys softly and from the slim throat that +rose like a flower stem from the pink sea foam there rolled out a +great, deep contralto. + +It was unbelievable, that rich deep voice. It blotted out +everything--little Jim, the room, all sense of time and place--and +brought to the listeners instead the deep echoes of cathedral aisles, +the holy peace of a still gray day and the joy of coming sunshine. She +sang all the old songs, tenderly, softly. When she could sing no more +and they showered her with smiles and tears and applause, she raised +her hand for silence, for she had something to say. + +"I am glad you liked the songs. I always sang them for father. I am +glad that I could do something for you, for you have all been so +wonderfully kind to me from the very first day that I came to Green +Valley. But why are you not kinder to Jim Tumley? Why don't you vote +the thing that is hurting him out of your town? If the women here +could vote that's what they would do. But surely you men will do it to +save Jim Tumley." + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +THE LITTLE SLIPPER + +They sat stunned and stared at the slip of a girl in pink who was +speaking in so matter-of-fact a fashion. + +And then Seth Curtis laughed; but he laughed kindly. + +"Why," he shouted, "she can't only sing; she can preach too--woman +suffrage and prohibition." + +The laugh grew and smiles went round and the whole trying situation +eased up. Jocelyn laughed too and turned to say good night to her +host. And from somewhere in the crowd Frank Burton strode up and +carried Jim out and drove him home. + +Everybody began to get ready to go, glad that the evening so nearly +tragic had been happily saved. And all Green Valley mentally promised +to repay the girl who had had the wit and the sweetness to serve in an +hour of need. + +But while the young people and the married ones with children were +crowding out through the front door, Grandma Wentworth was still in the +library, staring up into the laughing eyes of the dearest friend life +had given her and taken away. + +"Cynthia, dear," whispered Grandma brokenly, "it is still here, the +thing that hurt you so--that made a widow of me at twenty-eight. We +have grown no wiser in spite of the pain." + +Sitting in the armchair that Jocelyn had pulled out for Jim Tumley was +Roger Allan. His face was a-quiver with pain. And he too was staring +hungrily at the pictured face. + +"Oh, Roger," wept Grandma, "if only we could have her back, her and +Richard." + +"Yes," hoarsely whispered he, "if only the years would come back and we +could have another chance to live them." + +Over in one corner of the room Green Valley's three good little men +were discussing something hotly. That is, the fiery little barber was +discussing something. The other two just listened. + +"I tell you that preacher boy is right. This town needs a home, a +place where it can all get together for a good time. No one home, not +even this one, is big enough. That's why part of the town hangs out in +the hotel, another part in the blacksmith shop, the kids in Joe's shoe +shop or a poolroom. We need a big assembly room with smaller rooms off +of it for all kinds of honest fun--pool, billiards, bowling, dancing, +swimming. I tell you I ain't crazy and no more is the preacher. And +Joshua Stillman's library that he pretty near gave all his life and +money to needs to be moved out into the sunlight and stretched to its +full, grand size. I tell you it would be a great thing for this town. +This town's sociable but it ain't social--no, sir!" + +Sam Ellis was going home from the party with his girl and two boys. + +"Well, father," bitterly spoke up the eldest, "it's still our saloon +that's killing Jim Tumley, even though we aren't running it." + +"Oh, father," murmured Tessie miserably, "can't you do anything about +it?" + +Sam groaned. + +"Dear God--what can I do? I tell you selling the hotel or renting it +or dynamiting it won't stop drinking in this town, so long as there are +men in it who want drink and will drink. I don't think even the vote +that that little girl suggested will do it. If you vote it out you'll +have blind pigs to fight. No, sir! It ain't my fault nor no one man's +fault. The whole town's to blame. There's only one thing will stop +it. If men in this country will quit making it other men will stop +drinking it. So long as it's made it'll be used. The whole country's +to blame." + +Fanny Foster, having nobody else to talk to, was speaking her mind to +John, her husband. + +"I told Grandma Wentworth nobody but the Almighty could do anything for +Jim. You'll see that I'm right. I know." + +Fanny was right. But what she did not know was that she herself was to +be one of the instruments with which a stern and patient God was to +clean out forever the one foul blot on Green Valley life. + +The one person who was not discussing Jim Tumley and his trouble was +Jocelyn. She couldn't. She was too occupied with troubles of her own. + +She had been the first to leave. She slipped away unobserved for she +could not bear to have Green Valley see her leave without an escort. +So she got away as noiseless as a fairy. And for the first few rods +all was well. The excitement of the past hours, the worry of getting +away unseen, kept her mind occupied. But as the night wind cooled her +cheeks and the lighted house back of her grew smaller she grew +frightened. She was, after all, a city girl and to her there was +something fearful in the stillness of the country and the loneliness of +the dark road. She hurried her steps, jumped at every sound and grew +cold from pure terror as the awful stillness and emptiness closed in +about her. She stood still every few minutes, staring at blurred +bushes beside the road. The screech of an owl almost made her scream. +And in the dark the hard lumpy road hurt her feet cruelly. The little +slippers were never meant for dark country roads. So Jocelyn had to +pick her steps, and with every second's delay her terror grew. + +Finally the trees thinned a bit and for a good space ahead there was a +clearing where the night was not so dark and the road not so lumpy. +She hurried to get out of the smother of trees. When once she crossed +that open space all would be well, she told herself, for then the +village lights would wink at her and the sidewalks begin. As soon as +she could see her own lighted windows and set foot on a cement walk she +would no longer be afraid. + +So, head bent, she hurried along and was almost near the walk when, +looking up, she saw a man hurrying toward her through a little footpath +that led to the road. She stood motionless with horror. Then the +scream that had hovered on her lips all the way escaped her and she +tried to run. + +She did not run far. For one of the high-heeled slippers just curled +up under her and she went down, sobbing "David--David." + +And she kept sobbing just that over and over even after David had +picked her up and folded her safe in his arms. He tried to soothe her +and explained that he had missed her, had guessed that she would try to +get home alone down this road and so took the short cut in order to +catch up with her and make sure that she got home safely. He never +dreamed of frightening her so, but she was safe with him now and there +was absolutely nothing to fear. + +"But my foot, David. It's swelling. I can feel it--and it hurts." + +David took off the little slipper and put it in his pocket. Then he +told her not to worry because he could carry her home easily enough. +But first he sat down with her on an old stone wall and talked to her +until the last sob died away and her head nestled gratefully on his big +comfortable shoulder. + +"Jocelyn," he asked presently, "are you still angry with me?" + +She shook her head. + +"I've never been angry with you, David. But I thought you didn't want +to be bothered any longer with a silly girl like me and so--I tried to +help and be sensible." + +"I know. I was crazy that day you rode through town with the minister. +I had no right--" + +"Oh,"--she raised her head and looked at him in shy wonder and shocked +relief, "oh, David--was it that--you were hurt at that?" + +For answer he gently drew her close to him. + +"But David, I didn't go riding with the minister. I was just taking a +little pig home that a boy cousin of mine, who loves to tease me, sent +me. I didn't know anything about pigs and the minister happened to be +there and helped. He meant no harm." + +"Oh, I know, Jocelyn. But he is such a wonderful man. Only another +man, I guess, can know what a fine chap he is. And I thought if he did +like you I couldn't stand in your way. I found out, of course, that I +was mistaken. The minister doesn't care anything about girls. But +that wasn't all. You know, Jocelyn, I'm Uncle Roger's own nephew but I +bear his name because he legally gave it to me and because I have no +name of my own. I was a fatherless baby and a girl like you ought to +be courted by a better man than I am." + +It was costing David Allan something to tell the girl in his arms all +that. She guessed how the telling must hurt the boy, for she stopped +it with a little, tender laugh. + +"But, David dear, I knew all that the day you took me to the Decoration +Day exercises. Grandma Wentworth told me. She said she knew you'd +likely tell me yourself some day but she said that she liked you and +she noticed that people who liked you always liked you a little better +after they heard that." + +He sat still, overwhelmed with her sweetness. Then, "Jocelyn, is it +only liking?" + +Her answer came like a soft note of joy. + +"No, David. It's something bigger than liking and when you wouldn't +speak to me that afternoon you darkened all my world." + +She had not shed a tear through all those lonely days but now she +buried her face in David's breast and cried bitterly. + +And then it was that David kissed his sweetheart and the touch of her +answering lips healed forever the dull ache that had gnawed at his +heart ever since he was old enough to understand the story of his +cheated childhood. + +They sat in the soft darkness of the night that was full of autumn +sighs, a night that stirred in their hearts wistful longings for a low, +snug roof singing with rain and a drowsy little home fire beneath it. + +When they had sat long enough to remember their great hour forever and +had repeated the litany of love to each other till they sensed its +wonder, David said regretfully: + +"And now I must take you to your mother. And Jocelyn, I'm terribly +afraid of that mother of yours." + +Jocelyn laughed. + +"Why, David, mother isn't as bad as all that. And she likes you. She +said you made her think of father. And, David, she's always given me +everything I've honestly wanted and she could give. She hasn't been +out much here. She hasn't cared to do much of anything since father +died. But in the city she used to be so busy. You know she's a great +club woman and a suffragette and oh, such a beautiful speaker. It's +from her I get my funny, big, deep voice. She used to be in such +demand at meetings. But she's given it all up. She blames herself for +leaving father so much and not going out to the country with him. He +never asked her to leave the city but I know he wanted to. When he +died she just came out here to do penance. She thought there wasn't +anything for her to do in a place like this. But just wait till I tell +her about Jim Tumley. Oh, she'll know what to do. Why, mother's +wonderful in her way, David! Why, I just know she can do something for +Jim Tumley." + +David shook his head. + +"Jocelyn," he sighed, "it'll take this whole town and God Almighty too +to save Jim Tumley now." + +"Well, mother will do her share. And, Dav--id, I'd like another +kiss--if you don't mind." + +David didn't mind in the least. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +THE MORNING AFTER + +The very best part of every Green Valley doing is talking it over the +morning after. + +Nobody even pretended to work the morning after the minister's party. +Dell Parsons never even brushed out her lovely hair that morning; just +wound it round her head in two big braids and went through the little +gate in the hedge to talk it over with Nan Turner. + +She found Nan standing over a steaming dishpan, stirring the dishes +about absent-mindedly with the pancake spoon. At the sight of Dell she +turned her back on the cluttered sink. + +"Dell, I'm only just beginning to take in the meaning of what that +little neighbor girl of ours said last night. Why, Dell Parsons, we've +both been born in this here town; we're only twenty-two miles out from +the heart of one of the world's greatest cities and we've never sensed +the true meaning of this thing they call woman suffrage and +prohibition. Why, we've poked fun at it and jogged along our ignorant +hayseed way and watched and watched little sweet-hearted men like Jim +Tumley just stumble miserably into their graves, or a man like Sears +drive his children from their home and curse his wife, or perhaps we've +shuddered at the sight of Hank Lolly lying drunk in the road among the +wild flowers. + +"When one of our drunkards dies we cut our choicest flowers and go to +the funeral and maybe cry with the wife and children and then go home +and wait for the next one to do it. Of course, we talk to the children +and try to scare the boys into letting it alone. But that doesn't do +much good because, Dell, we don't bury enough drunkards at one time to +make a strong impression and convince the boys that we are right. Our +boys see big, respectable men like George Hoskins and Seth Curtis and +even good Billy Evans taking their drinks regularly and living and +prospering. So they make up their minds that mothers are all a little +bit crazy on the drink question. And the first thing we know we find +that our boys have been washing down their cigarettes with a drink. +And in those first sick five minutes we know, Dell, that the thing has +beaten us to the boy." + +"Yes," mused Dell aloud, "but we aren't the only ones who feel beaten. +The men aren't all against us, Nan. Lots of them right here in this +town are on our side. And I tell you it's no joke for a natural man +who loves to hang around and pal with his neighbors to put himself in +the position of a spoilsport or an odd goody-goody. There's Uncle +Tony's brother William. He's been against war and drink and smoking +all his life, and look at the dog's life he's led. Nan, I believe the +men are as helpless as we. The Thing has grown so huge that we can't +fight it. It's got us all. And we're so helpless because we're +ignorant and won't think this thing out. Look at Frank Burton, who'd +give his soul to save Jim Tumley's. Yet it's only last year that he +gave up having drink in the house. He never realized until so late +that just by having it around he was hurting the man he'd die to save. +And there's Billy Evans. Why, Nan, Billy has sat up nights pulling +Hank Lolly through a jag. Yet Billy lets Hank see him take a drink +every day. And, Nan, it must be plain hell for Hank to see that. Why, +Billy wouldn't tempt Hank or make him suffer torment knowingly for a +million dollars. And yet he does it every day of his life because he's +ignorant, doesn't know any bigger, finer, more unselfish way of helping +Hank. No, Nan, you can't make me believe our Green Valley men are a +mean lot, meaner than others. They just don't know and when once they +realize, why, they'll put an end to it themselves fast enough." + +"That's all right, but, Dell Parsons, you know that the world over men +have to be nagged and coaxed into seeing the right by their women +folks. And I tell you I'm going to begin right now to do a little of +both. And as for that vote--I've laughed about that long enough. Now +I'm going after it. It's just struck me that we women need a vote +about as much as we need a pair of scissors, a bread board or a wash +boiler, cook stove and bank book. We need it along with the other +things to keep our children properly clothed, fed, housed and educated." + +The blacksmith shop was closed. George Hoskins' wife was pretty sick. +So the crowd that was usually seated about the forge was crowded into +Billy Evans' office. + +It was a big crowd but it wasn't feeling any jollier because of its +size. Each man there had had a word or two with his wife that morning. +Not a few wives had begun to discuss the Jim Tumley incident seriously +the minute they got home and got the children to bed the night before. +Every man in Billy's office felt more or less uncomfortable and talked +in nervous, disconnected snatches. + +Said one: + +"Well--I drove in to town this morning so's not to have words with +Rose--and just to escape the whole dumbed subject--but if--I'd known +that everybody I met and talked to and set down with--was a-going to +talk about the same dumbed thing I'd a-stayed to home." + +"The whole trouble," argued another, "is just women's imagination, +that's all. I never saw a woman that had a living father, brother, +beau, husband, brother-in-law, father-in-law, cousin or boy baby in +arms that she wasn't worrying all the time night and day that drink'd +get him. It's just their way of being foolish, that's all. And as for +all this talk about the terrible danger and it being a menace to the +future generation, that's all slop and slush." + +Billy was irritable this morning for the first time in months. It must +be remembered that Billy's wife was red-headed and a highly efficient +soul. She had very frankly and plainly told Billy what she thought of +a town that was run in so slack a fashion that it couldn't protect one +of its own lovable citizens. She had never spoken so sharply in all +their days together and Billy felt that he had lost his bride forever. +And he had. + +"Well--boys, I'll tell you," sighed Billy. "The old woman gave me +hell, I tell you--as if--great gosh, it was all my fault. The women +are partly right and we all know it. That's why they talk up so and +why we have to take it. I've about come to the conclusion that as long +as the women are partly right and we are partly wrong I'm going to quit +it, as far as I myself am concerned. But don't think for one minute +that I fancy that I have a right to vote this town dry for any other +man. Live and let live's my way of thinking and doing." + +"Well, Billy," spoke up Jake Tuttle who had come out strongly for a dry +town, a dry state and a dry country, "you're fair and square and +a-doing all you honestly can. Maybe the time will come when you'll +feel that voting it out is the only thing." + +"Why," grumbled another member of this caucus, "anybody'd think that +this whole town had ought to turn in and just die of thirst on account +of a man that ain't much bigger than a pint of cider and never did have +no proper stomach. Why, who ever heard of sech a thing as a whole town +being run for one man?" + +"A town that ain't run fair and square for one man isn't run fair and +square for any man," insisted Jake. "And as for hearing strange +things, I've heerd tell of a man once, a poor kind of low-style Jew he +was, lived over in a little two by four town called Nazareth, who not +only believed in going dry and hungry for other people but actually +died so's to show them a finer way of living and a braver way of dying. +I've heerd tell that they called that man the Greatest Fool that ever +lived and that they killed Him fur His foolishness. So, if this whole +town should turn in an' help Jim Tumley there'd be nothing new in that." + +The pause that followed would have been uncomfortable if Seth Curtis +hadn't opened the door just then and squeezed in. + +Seth was mad. For the first time since their marriage he had +quarrelled with his wife. Docile, sweet-tempered Ruth Curtis was +aflame with mother wrath. She, like a great many Green Valley women, +thought of Jim Tumley not as a man but as a voice, the voice of a lark +on a summer morning. That other men's selfish strength should still +that voice made her sweet eyes flame and her soft voice shake with +anger. That Seth, who so hated waste of any kind, could stand calmly +by while a lovable human soul was being thrown away puzzled her at +first. She tried to argue with him. If Jim Tumley were trying to save +his burning barn or mend his fence Seth would have helped him gladly. +But Jim was trying to save his body and soul and Green Valley men, even +though they knew he was not equal to the struggle, could not see that +it was their business to help. + +Seth resented this passionate fight for little Jim that the women were +making. In his anger Seth could not see that beyond the figure of the +gentle singing man stood the children of Green Valley. In this +harmless little man who could not save himself every mother saw her +boy, her girl; one a drunkard-to-be perhaps, the other mayhap a +drunkard's wife and the mother of more drunkards. + +Seth's eyes blazed around Billy's crowded office and he waited for the +question that he knew he would be asked: + +"Well--Seth--you voting the town dry this morning?" + +And then Seth let loose. He said fool things to ease his ugly temper +but he wound up his argument with the telling reminder that Green +Valley couldn't afford to lose the fifteen-hundred-dollar yearly +license tax. + +"Not only would we men lose our freedom and be a thirsty lot of +wife-driven idiots but our taxes would rise." + +And that argument told. It had been overlooked somehow. But at the +mention of it every man's face but Jake's brightened. Why, sure--Seth +was right. That fifteen hundred dollars kept the taxes down and was an +argument that ought to appeal to every Green Valley woman whose life +was an eternal struggle to save. + +"Why, yes, that's so," agreed Jake. "It seems as if the women ought to +see that, but like as not they'll talk back and say that if there was +no hotel bar to attract us men there'd be less time wasted and more +than fifteen hundred dollars' worth of extra work turned out. And for +all they talk so everlastingly about saving, there's some kind of money +that no nice woman will touch with a ten-foot pole. And just put it up +to them as to which they want, Jim Tumley or fifteen hundred a year, +and see what they say." + +Jake was the richest man of all the men packed in Billy Evans' office. +He could afford to talk bravely for he had no need to curry any man's +favor. And he could demand respectful attention for his opinions. +There were those present who resented this independence. + +"These farmers nowadays are getting danged smart and officious," +muttered Sears to Sam Bobbins. + +But Sam wasn't listening. He too had an argument and he wanted to +voice it. + +"Mightn't the closing of the bar lose us a lot of outside trade, ruin +our business life?" + +At that Billy's eyes twinkled. + +"By gosh--Sam--I hadn't thought of that. I sure would miss the poor +drunks that crawl in here to sleep it off. And like as not I'd not get +to drive old man Hathaway home every time he hits town and tries to +paint it red. Never have dared to leave that old fool in town when he +was drunk. Never can tell what that poor miserable mind of his +mightn't prompt him to do. Might set fire to something or hang himself +on somebody's front door." + +As town marshal Billy had a pretty accurate idea of the kind of trade +that the hotel bar attracted. There was a levity in Billy's voice and +a dancing light in Billy's eye. He could never take anything seriously +for any great length of time. However, old man Sears didn't like this +attitude of Billy's. + +"It isn't only losing that fifteen-hundred-dollar license and losing +outside trade but we'd be robbing an honest and respectable man of his +livelihood," said Sears with his most ponderous air. + +An unwilling, sheepish grin ruffled every man's face and Seth said with +a rasp: + +"Well, Sears, I wouldn't lose any sleep worrying about that honest, +respectable man's livelihood if I were you. He owns a fine +seven-passenger car, some fancy driving horses, and that diamond pin he +wears week days in his tie would keep my meat bill paid for many and +many a day. No, I can't say that I'd let that make my conscience ache." + +"What say if we all go over and ask him what he thinks of it. It looks +like rain and I'll have to be starting for home," suggested the bright +and peace-loving soul who had left home that morning to avoid +unpleasantness. + +This brilliant suggestion was promptly acted on and they filed out, +leaving Billy standing alone in the doorway. Billy watched them +shuffle into the hotel, then he looked up and down Main Street, +studying every old landmark and battered hitching post. He told +himself that he hoped the old town wouldn't change too much. Hank +Lolly came out of the barn just then and Billy turned to him. + +"Hank, that innocent little girl in a pink dress last night has sure +raised one gosh darned lot of argument in this here town." + +"Billy," Hank's voice shook a little, "Billy, I heerd some of those +arguments--in there. But, my God, Billy--look at me--look at me! I'm +the best argument in this here town for voting that bar out. For, +Billy, so long as that hotel sells liquor, so long as the doors swing +open so that the smells can get out, and so long as the winds blow in +Green Valley, bringing those smells to me--just so long I'll be +afraid--afraid. And Billy, if ever I let go again, it'll be the +madhouse for me. I know. I've had a grandfather and two uncles go +that way." + +Over at the hotel the high, foaming glasses slid along the bar. The +hotel man with the diamond in his tie greeted the men who lined up at +the rail with an indifferent smile. The glasses were raised and +drained. And then some bold spirit asked the man with the diamond how +he'd feel if the town went dry. + +"Why," drawled that individual, "I've been looking down men's throats +and watching their Adam's apple and listening to them guzzling their +liquor for something like twenty years now and I wouldn't mind a +change. I left the city because I was hankering for something I didn't +know the name of. Thought I'd find it here. Thought this was a mighty +restful town. It is--but not for me and my business. But I'm glad I +came, for that young parson of yours put me next to what I really want +to do. I've been wanting all my life to run a stock farm. But I +didn't know it till that kid preacher told me so. Seems he's been +knocking around the country with Hank Lolly and knows of two or three +that are up for sale. I'm going out with him next week to look at +them. So this town running dry won't upset me any. I've just about +made up my mind to quit this game and spend the rest of my life +with--cattle. I won't mind the dryness. I don't drink. Never have." + +The rain that had been threatening for an hour came suddenly, came down +in big angry drops; and there was everywhere in town a scurrying for +home. Men buttoned their coats and bent their heads and hurried home, +hoping to find there cheerful wives and peace. + +They found their wives cheerful enough, almost suspiciously so, and +exceedingly busy with the telephone. By listening to several one-sided +conversations Green Valley men learned that while they had been +discussing things in Billy's office, Mrs. Brownlee had called on Jim +Tumley's wife and on several other more prominent Green Valley matrons; +had telephoned to others and had in three morning hours organized a +Woman's Civic League. + +"A Civic League? What's that? And what for?" Green Valley husbands +wanted to know. + +"Why, I don't know. I said yes, of course I'd join. I couldn't be +mean to the woman after what her little girl did last night," said +Green Valley wives. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +A GRAY DAY + +Up on his wooded knoll Green Valley's young minister lay grieving and +staring up into a gray unhappy sky, a sky choked with thick gray clouds +that hung so low and were so full of sadness that even the little hills +mourned and the Green Valley world all about lay hushed and penitent. + +Summer was dead and everywhere tired winds moaned and sighed and sobbed +and then grew suddenly still. The fine old trees were shriveled and +weary, as if trying were no longer worth while. They craved sleep and +peace--just rest. The gay grasses were dry and faded and when the +little winds tried to rouse them they only rustled impatiently, +dolefully and murmured, "Oh what's the use?" + +The heart of Cynthia's son studied the low brooding sky, the dying +world, listened to the wailing, mourning winds, the sighing of the +grasses and it too said wearily, "Yes--what's the use of anything?" + +What's the use of working and trying when the thing you want most to do +you can't do. What's the use of longing when the thing you crave most +can never again be given to you? What's the use of feeling big, +eternal, divine, when you know that every day is dwarfed by your +limitations, every friendship marred by your helplessness, every dream +blurred by your ignorance? The sweetest things in life, Cynthia's son +told himself with all the bitterness of youth, were memories and hopes. +Memories of happy moments, hours perhaps, memories of perfect days and +hopes of new days, new friends, new skies. + +To-day all hope seemed dead, gone from the hillsides with the summer +flowers. And the world was a sad and a lonely place. Cynthia's son +had yet to learn that gray days are home days. That if it were not for +gray skies there would be no low roofs gleaming through tree tops, no +home fires glowing anywhere. Gray days are heart days, for it is then +that the heart hungers for sympathy, for kinship. It is then that men +draw together for comfort and cheer. + +Cynthia's son never felt quite so alone in the world before--the last +of his line. He was young and did not know what ailed him. So he lay +heartsick and puzzled on his hill top and wished he had some one all +his own to talk to. + +There are things you can whistle to a robin, whisper to a tree friend +or look into the heart of the sunset. There are problems you can argue +out with a neighbor or solve with the help of a friend. But the heart +has certain longings that you can share only with some one who is all +your own and very, very dear. + +It is hard to be the last of a line, Cynthia's son told himself +bitterly, and in his loneliness he turned over and hid his face on his +arm and let his homesick heart stray off across the seas to the land +that for so long had been home to him, the land that held the dead +hearts that had always robbed his gray days of all sadness. + +He craved the hot sunshine, the brittle blue skies, the crowded little +lanes full of filth and feet and eternal noise. Perhaps there in the +old home he might find eyes that held a bit of the great love he longed +for, a voice that had in it the hint of a caress, the note that would +give him new courage, new hope. + +No--he did not know what was the matter with him. All he knew was that +summer was dead and that he had no one in all the world he could call +his very own. He did not know that lying there he was really waiting +for a step and a voice, a step that would stir the leaves with a joyous +rustling, a voice that even on a gray day sounded gay and sunshiny. He +had always liked Nan Ainslee's voice. Lately he had begun to notice +other pleasant things about her. Last night, for instance, he had for +the first time seen her hair, the beauty of her creamy throat and had +really looked down into her laughing, wide eyes and forgotten all the +world for a second or two. And the hand she gave him when she said +good night was warm and full of a strange comfort. He had almost asked +her to stay a while after the others left and sit beside his fire in a +low chair and talk the party over with him. + +The world was so still it seemed as if it waited with him. And then it +came--that voice warm and gay. + +"Hello--you here again?" + +Then something about that head buried on that out-flung arm made her +laugh softly, oddly, and say, "Isn't this a delicious, restful, dozy +day? You'd better sit up and look at those shaggy gray clouds over +yonder. Or are you listening to the little winds sighing out +lullabies? I came here today to hear the world being hushed to sleep." + +He heard and his heart jumped queerly. But he didn't raise his head +until he was sure the homesick longing for some one all his own was +gone from his eyes. + +She had on a gray dress as soft as wood smoke. He caught flashes of +flame color beneath the gray and at her breast fluttered a knot of +scarlet silk. She looked like somebody's home fire, all fragrant smoke +and golden flame and ruddy coals. Her eyes held the dancing lights, +the visions and her voice had the tender warmth. She was the spirit of +the day and the sight of her comforted his soul and filled his heart +with content. + +"I think it is a sad day," he said, "and I have been desperately lonely +for India and my mother and father and all the little brothers and +sisters and playmates that I never had. The only playmates I ever had +were camels and missionaries and a few brown babies and two white hens." + +He had not meant to talk in this grieving, childish fashion. But +something about her brought his heart thoughts to his lips. And to-day +he found no pleasure in looking down on the village roofs where Joe +Tumley lay sick and miserable and Mary, his wife, wept and men and +women talked and argued as he very well knew they were talking and +arguing. + +"What! No playmates? No boy friends--not even a dog?" Nan grieved +with him. + +"Oh, I had an Irish soldier's boy for two months once and a little +brown dog for a week. Mother was always afraid of disease." + +He could hardly believe that remembrance of these long-past things was +in him. Yet he was suddenly remembering many old, old matters and with +it came back the old, childish pain. + +She sat down on the oak stump quite near him and there was more than +pity in her eyes, only he did not see. + +"Why," she advised gently, "you must have a dog at once. I can give +you a wonderful collie and then on gray days you can bring him up here +to your hill top or go tramping through woods and ravines with him. A +dog is the finest kind of company for a gray day. And there is your +attic. Why, I always spend hours in my attic these still, gentle days. +I go up there to read old letters and look over old boxes full of queer +keepsakes. I sit in a three-legged chair and sometimes, if I find an +old coverless book and if the rain begins to drum softly on the +shingles, I go to sleep on an ancient sagging sofa and dream great +dreams. Haven't you ransacked that attic of yours yet?" she wanted to +know. + +"No. And the housekeeper insists on my doing it soon. Says that if +I'm going to give Jimmy Trumbull that party I promised him I'd better +have the barn and the attic all fixed up for it, because the boys +wouldn't have any fun in the house and the house wouldn't stand it any +better." + +And then because neither one of them could think of anything else to +say they were perfectly still there on the hill top. There seemed to +be no need for speech. Nanny looked down at the little town and +Cynthia's son lay contentedly at her feet, looking at her and rustling +the dead leaves with an idle hand. + +It might have become dangerous, that contented silence. For Nan at +least was thinking. She was thinking how often she came to the hill +top to visit with this man at her feet and how seldom he came to her +door to visit with her. When he came it was not to see her but her +father, her brother. With a sick shame Nanny thought how the sight of +him, the sound of his voice, the very mention of his name made her +heart fill with warm gladness. She loved him and he had no need of +love--her love. She who had turned men away, men who were-- + +She rose suddenly. There was a kind of terror in her eyes and she +locked her hands together to warm them, for they had suddenly grown icy +cold. + +"I must go," she murmured in real distress. + +But he just looked up and put out his hand. And she sat down again and +let her hand rest in his. And half her joy was pure misery. For she +did not understand the ways of this strange, boyish man and she did not +know what the end of such a friendship could be. + +When those first angry drops pattered down on the leaves Nanny started +up in alarm and would have raced for home. But he caught her quickly, +slipped her cloak on, and before she had time to protest, they were +running hand in hand down the hillside. Just as the full fury of the +storm struck the house they banged the front door shut and stood +panting and laughing in the hall. + +It was very pleasant to sit by his fire and let the storm and the ruddy +flames do the talking. But even as she sat and dreamed Nanny knew it +would never do. Green Valley knew and loved her but that would not +save her. So Nanny walked to the telephone and called up the one soul +it was always safe to tell things to. And twenty minutes later Grandma +Wentworth arrived. + +It was while they sat talking in cozy comfort before the snapping fire +that Cynthia's son suggested the attic. + +"Mother told me once never to rummage through her old trunks unless +Mary Wentworth was by to explain. So come along." + +Grandma looked a little startled at that. + +"We'll go," she said. "It's the finest kind of a day to go messing in +an attic. But I'll step into the kitchen first and borrow two all-over +aprons. My dress isn't new but Nan's is." + +The old Churchill homestead was built in the days when folks believed +reverently in attics. Not little cubby-holes under the roof but in +generous, well-lighted, nicely-floored affairs that less reverent +generations have turned into smoking dens, studios and ballrooms. + +A properly kept attic in the olden days was no dark, musty-smelling, +cobwebby affair. It was as neat in its way as the parlor and a hundred +times more interesting. The parlor was a stiff room with stiff +furniture and stiff family portraits. The attic was a big, natural +room filled with mellow light, a vague hush and memories--memories of +lost days, lost dreams, lost youth with its joys and hopes and sorrows. + +People instinctively speak softly and reverently in an old-fashioned +attic. Much of the irreverence of the young generation is due to the +fact that men have stopped building the wide, deep fireplaces of old +and the old-fashioned style of attic. When you take the family +hearthstone and the prayer and memory closet out of a home you must +expect irreverence. + +There were plenty of wonderful attics in Green Valley, but not many +were so crowded with colorful riches as the attic which Cynthia's son +owned. When Cynthia was a girl that attic was generously stored. +Cynthia's mother made her pilgrimages to it and added to its wealth of +memories. Before Cynthia herself sailed away to far-off India she +carried armfuls of her own heart treasures up there. One gray day, +twenty gray days, could not exhaust this Green Valley attic. + +Cynthia's son, being a man, went up heedlessly, even a little noisily, +for attics were to him a new thing. Nan went breathlessly, her heart +thumping with delight. She guessed that much joy and beauty and wonder +lay stored in that great room. Grandma went up slowly and a little +tremblingly. She remembered that the very last time she had climbed +those attic stairs Cynthia had been with her. Their arms had been full +of treasure and their eyes had been full of tears. + +The three now had no sooner reached the last step than the attic laid +its mystic hush upon them. They stood still and looked about, each +somehow waiting for one of the others to speak. It was Grandma who +broke the silence softly: + +"You had some of the old furniture moved there in the corner but the +rest is just as it was forty years ago--when I was here last." + +Grandma knew the history of pretty near everything in sight and they +followed her about, looking and listening. Somehow there was at first +no desire to touch and handle things. But soon the strange charm of an +old attic stole over them and they began to look more closely at +things, to exclaim over weird relics, to touch old books and quaint +garments. Then as the wonders multiplied and the rain drummed steadily +on the roof, time and the world without was forgotten and the three +became absorbed in the past. + +When first she had looked about her Grandma's eyes had searched for a +certain trunk, and when at last she spied it something like an old +grief clouded her eyes. But as she peered about and began pulling +things out to the light she forgot the trunk with the brass nailheads. +She laughed when she came across the crinoline hoops and the droll +little velvet bonnets. + +"Here are your great-grandmother's crinolines, John. My! The times we +girls had playing with these things, for even in our day they were +old-fashioned. And this little velvet hat I remember Cynthia wore once +to an old-time social and took a prize." + +Over in another corner Nan was making discoveries. + +"My conscience--look at this!" she suddenly cried. "Here's an etching, +a genuine etching, a beautiful thing and all covered with dust. Why, +the one I bought for a hundred and fifty dollars in Holland last year +isn't half as good. Why, whoever had it put up here?" + +From the other side of the huge room Cynthia's son wanted to know if an +old grandfather's clock couldn't be mended. + +"Why, it must be as old as the hills. It has a copy of Franklin's Poor +Richard's Almanac pasted on the back. It--why, it's an heirloom and +I'm going to get it patched up." + +"That clock used to tick in the up-stairs hall forty years ago--I +remember--" Grandma stopped as if a sudden thought had struck her. +She dropped an old faded lamp mat and a rag rug and came over to look +at the face of what had been an old friend. Many and many a time its +mellow booming of the hours had cut short a lengthy, merry conference +in Cynthia's room and sent her scurrying home to her waiting tasks. + +"John," whispered Grandma with sudden intuition, "I don't believe +there's anything the matter with that clock. It was stopped--they said +your grandfather stopped it after your mother left for India. I used +to watch him wind it--here, let me at it. Yes," triumphantly, "here's +the key." + +Grandma's hands shook noticeably and her lips trembled as she wound it. +And when it began to whir and then settled down to its clear even tick +Grandma just sat down and cried a bit. + +"I can't help it," she explained as she wiped her eyes, "that clock +knows me as well as I know its face. Why, many a time Cynthia and I'd +sit right where we could look at it--while we were telling each other +foolish little happenings--so's we wouldn't talk too long." + +Grandma went back to where she had left that faded lamp mat but she +knew what was about to happen in that attic that day. She picked up +one thing after another but she no longer saw what it was her hands +were holding. For above the steady patter of the rain she could hear +the old clock ticking. And to her, knowing what she did, it seemed to +say: + +"Tell him--tell--him--Cynthia wants you to tell him." + +So she just sat down in an old chair and waited for Cynthia's son to +find that square trunk with the brass nail-heads. She tried to read +something in some faded yellow fashion papers but the letters jumped +and blurred. And she was glad to hear the boy's shout of discovery. + +"Why, here's that trunk mother must have meant! Come over here, +Grandma, and look at it." + +She went and sat down and was so quiet that Nanny, who had been looking +up from the pictures she was dusting, laid them down and came over to +watch too. Something about Grandma's drooping head and folded hands +must have touched the boy, for as he turned the key in the lock he +looked up and asked a question. + +"Do you know what's in it, Grandma?" + +"Yes," she nodded, "I know what's in it because I helped fill it. Open +it carefully." + +So the boy raised the lid slowly. Very carefully he removed the old +newspapers, then the soft linen sheet and took out a flat bundle that +lay on top, all snugly pinned up. Nan helped take out the pins, then +gave a smothered cry at the lovely wedding gown of stiff creamy satin. + +In silence the other things were brought out. The lacy bridal veil, +the little buckled slippers, the full, filmy petticoats and all the +soft white ribbony things that it is the right of every bride to have. +Down at the very bottom of the trunk were bundles of letters, some +faded photographs and a little jewel box in which was a little silver +forget-me-not ring. + +Grandma put out her hand for the faded photographs, stared at them, +then passed one to Cynthia's son. + +"Look closely and see if you can guess who it is?" + +He took it to a window and looked long at the pictured face but finally +shook his head. + +"Give it to Nan," directed Grandma. + +Nan looked only a second. + +"Why, it's Uncle Roger Allan!" + +"Yes--it's Roger Allan." + +"But what has--" began Cynthia's son, when Grandma interrupted him. + +"You'd better both sit down to hear this," she suggested. "Of course, +I knew, John, the very first week you were home, that your mother never +told you about this trunk. I can see why and I agree with her. In the +first place it all happened nearly forty years ago. Then she couldn't +be sure that the trunk was still here. It wasn't altogether her story +to tell. She knew you were coming home to Green Valley and she didn't +want to prejudice you in any way. She knew that if you learned to know +Green Valley folks first you'd understand everything better when you +did find out. I'm glad to have the telling of it. I'm glad to do her +that service and, after all, it's my story as much as hers. + +"We were great friends--Cynthia and I--dearer than sisters and +inseparable. Our friendship began in pinafore days. We weren't the +least bit alike in a worldly way. Cynthia was pretty--oh, ever so +pretty--and rich. I was what everybody calls a very sensible girl, +respectable but poor. But what we looked like or what we had never +bothered us. In those days the town was smaller and playmates were +scarcer. When we boys and girls wanted any real interesting games we +had to get together. + +"The two boys at our end of town who were the nicest were Roger Allan +and Dick Wentworth. They did everything together, same as Cynthia and +I. It was natural, I suppose, that we four should sort of grow up +together, and that having grown up we should pair off--Cynthia and +Roger, Dick and I. + +"We went through all the stages until we got to the forget-me-not rings +and our wedding dresses. The boys were very happy the day they put +those rings on our fingers and we were--oh, so proud! It hurts to this +day to remember. I think Cynthia and I were about the happiest girls +life ever smiled at. Only one thing troubled us. + +"In those days Cynthia's father owned the hotel. That meant then +mostly a barroom. Of course, he himself was never seen there unless +there were special guests staying over night. It was a lively place, +almost the only really lively place in town. I suppose men had more +time then and prohibition was something even the most worried and +heartbroken drunkard's wife smiled about unbelievingly. Men had always +had their liquor and of course they always would. Women's business was +to cry a bit, pray a great deal and be patient. As I said, all men +drank in those days and the woman didn't live that hadn't or didn't +expect to see her father, sweetheart, husband or son drunk sometime. +We all hoped we wouldn't but we all dreaded it. We heard tell of a man +somewhere near Elmwood who never drank a drop but he didn't seem real. +Our mothers, I expect, got to feel that drunkenness was God's will and +the drink habit the same as smallpox or yellow fever. It was sent to +be endured. We all felt that there was something wrong somewhere and a +terrible injustice put on us but we didn't know what to do about it and +so we all tried to learn to be cheerful and like our men in spite of +their shortcomings. + +"But one woman in this town was an out-and-out prohibitionist. She was +Cynthia's mother. She came from some odd sort of a settlement in the +East and Cynthia's father used to laugh and say he stole her. And I +think he did. She was so lovely and sweet and had such strange notions +of right and wrong. But for all her sweetness she was firm. And she +set her face sternly and publicly against drink. It was the only +thing, people said, about which Joshua Churchill and his wife Abby ever +disagreed. Though she didn't convince him still she went to her grave +without ever seeing her husband drunk. + +"And her girl, Cynthia, swore that she would do the same. For Cynthy +was just like her mother and as full of strange notions of right. + +"Well, it was bound to happen. The wonder of it is it didn't happen +before. I think I always knew that Dick and Roger drank a little +sometimes with the other boys. But Cynthia never thought about it, I +guess. She was an only child and guarded from everything and she +supposed every man was like her father. And, anyhow, she was too happy +to think of trouble. Dick and Roger were considered two of the best +boys in town. There were stories now and then of Roger's mad doings +but they never got to Cynthia, and if they had she would have just +laughed, I expect, so sure was she that her boy was all she thought him. + +"I was to be married one week and Cynthy the next. We had our wedding +things ready. And my wedding day came. Cynthy was bridesmaid and +Roger was best man and everything went off beautifully until the dance +in the evening. Dick and I were too poor to take a wedding trip so we +had a dance instead. + +"And then came the tragedy. Some of the older men did it. They didn't +stop to think. But they meant no real harm. In those days it was +considered funny to get another man drunk. But they didn't know +Cynthia's strange heart. They brought drink, more than was at all +necessary and--and--all I remember of my wedding night is standing in +the moonlight, holding on to Cynthia and crying miserably. I knew it +would come sometime but I never dreamed it would come to hurt me then. + +"But Cynthy didn't cry. She never said a word--only her whole little +body seemed turned to ice. She smiled and helped us to get through +with things as best we could but the smiles slipped like dull beads +from her lips instead of rippling like waves of sunshine over her face. + +"I had been crying for myself, over my boy, but when I saw how Cynthy +took her trouble I saw that she was hurt far worse than I. But I never +dreamed that things could not be mended, that she would take back her +wedding day. But that's what she did. + +"She refused to see Roger. Her father pleaded with her, even her +mother begged her to think; the wedding was all planned, everything +prepared; relatives from a distance had already started. But Cynthia +never stopped smiling and shaking her head. Roger was frantic and +begged me to come with him, to make her listen. I went and Dick went +with me. + +"When Cynthy saw me she let us in. Her father and mother and two aunts +came in when they heard us. In the midst of these people Roger and +Cynthy stood looking at each other with death in their eyes. They +didn't seem to know anybody was there. + +"'Cynthy--I love you--I love you,' Roger begged. + +"'I know, Dear Boy, I know!' she cried back to him. + +"'Forgive--my God, Cynthy, forgive.' + +"'I do.' + +"'Marry me.' + +"'Oh, I want to--oh, I want to marry you,' sobbed poor Cynthy. + +"'Then marry me. I'm not good enough--but I know no other man who is.' + +"'Oh--Roger--Roger--you are good enough for me--you are good enough for +_me_. But you are not good enough for my children. You are not good +enough to be the father of my son.' + +"I think we all knew then that it was useless. There was no answer and +we were too startled to say anything. Roger grew white and the +strength seemed to leave his body. His eyes filled with horror and +fright. + +"'Cynthy, sweetheart--' he moaned and she flew to comfort him. She let +him hold her and kiss her. Then she drew his head down and kissed his +hair, his eyes, his lips. She laid his hands against her cold white +cheeks, then crushed them to her lips and fled. + +"Roger never saw her again. + +"She went away and was gone a long time. I got letters every now and +then from out-of-the-way places. + +"For five years I was happy. It was hard to live without Cynthy. But +Roger had left town and Dick was good to me. I knew that the shock of +Roger's tragedy had kept him from touching anything those five years. +But as time passed and memories faded I grew afraid once more. Dick +was no drinking man but everybody drank a little then, even the women. +Men joked about it and the women, poor souls, tried to. Well--just +five years almost to a day they brought him home to me--dead. He had +had a few drinks--the first since our marriage. He was driving an ugly +horse--and it happened. + +"Some way Cynthia heard and she came home to comfort me. I think that +when she stood with me beside Dick's grave she was glad she had done +what she had done and felt a kind of peace. Roger was still gone but +it would not have mattered. It was then that we carried these wedding +things up here and locked them in this old square trunk with the brass +nail-heads. And we thought that life for us both was over. + +"Cynthy's father was glad to have her home. He sold the hotel and +never went near it. He tried in every way to make up to Cynthy and his +wife. For Cynthy's mother grieved about it all long after Cynthy had +learned to smile again. And that nearly killed Cynthy's father. Some +folks claimed it really did worry Mrs. Churchill to death, for she died +the spring after Dick was buried. + +"After that Cynthia took her father traveling, for he was very nearly +heartbroken over his wife's death. It was somewhere in England that +they met your father, John. Of course, I can understand how a man like +your father must have loved Cynthy on sight. But she never could +understand it. She thought she was all through with love. She wrote +and told me how she had explained all about Roger and how he had said +it made him love her all the more. She tried to fight him but strong +men are hard to deny. He had a hard time of it, I imagine, but he won +her at last and took her away to India. She wrote me when you were +born and for some years after, but toward the end, when she was sick so +much, I think my letters made her homesick. + +"Roger came back. His stepsister got into trouble and died, leaving +little David. Roger took him and raised him in memory of the son he +knew he might have had. When he found Cynthia was married he had that +stone put in the cemetery. He explained the idea to me. + +"'The girl, Cynthia, was mine and I killed her. She is dead and it is +to the memory of her sweetness that I have erected that stone. The +woman, Cynthia, is another man's wife.' + +"So that, then, is the history of that trunk. The thing, John, that is +killing little Jim Tumley is the thing that worried your grandmother to +death, nearly broke your mother's heart and certainly embittered her +youth, that sent your grandfather into exile and made a widow of me. +It robbed Roger Allan of the only woman he could love. + +"Since that day a great many of us have learned to fight it. And there +are now any number of men in Green Valley who are opposed to it and who +even vote the prohibition ticket. But Green Valley is still far from +understanding that until the weakest among us is protected none of us +are safe. + +"Some day perhaps the women will cease worrying. But before that day +comes many here will pay the price. And it is usually the innocent who +pay. Now let's put these memories back before they tucker me out +completely." + +Cynthia's son stood spellbound. He stared at the faded pictures and +the little silver ring. Nan was pinning up the wedding dress and +weeping openly and unashamed. It was the sight of her quiet tears that +brought him back to earth. + +"Oh--Nan--don't. Don't grieve about this evil thing. We're going to +fight it and fight it hard. We shall save Jim Tumley yet and purify +Green Valley." + +When Nan got back home she went up to her room and looked down to where +Cynthia Churchill's old home glowed among its autumn-tattered trees. + +"What a woman! What a mother! And he is her son!" + +She stood a long time at her window, then turned away with a little +sigh. + +"I am not made of heroic stuff. But I shall see to it that my son need +never be ashamed of his mother. If one woman could fight love so can +another." + +When Grandma was taking off her rubbers in her little storm-shed she +smiled and fretted: + +"Dear me, Cynthy, that boy of yours is as innocent right now as you +were in the olden days. He--why, he just doesn't know anything!" + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +CHRISTMAS BELLS + +After the last bit of glory has faded from the autumn woods and the +first snowfall comes to cover the tired fields, Green Valley, all +snugly housed and winter proof, settles down to solid comfort and +careful preparation for the two great winter festivals--Thanksgiving +and Christmas. + +The question of whether the Thanksgiving dinner is to be eaten at home +or whether "we're going away for Thanksgiving" has in all probability +been settled long ago. For in Green Valley Thanksgiving invitations +begin to be exchanged and sent out to distant parts as early as July. +That is, of course, if the matter of who's to go where had not already +been settled the Thanksgiving before. In some families the last rite +of each Thanksgiving feast is to discuss this question and settle it +then and there for the following year. Conservative and clannish +families who live far enough apart so that little quarrels can not be +born among them to upset this fixed yearly programme usually do this. + +The greater part of Green Valley however leaves itself absolutely free +until some time in August. By that time though, the heat is so intense +that stout, collarless men in shirt sleeves, in searching about for +some relief, think gratefully of Thanksgiving and snowdrifts and ask +their wives whom they are planning to have for Thanksgiving. + +"Why," may be the answer, "I hadn't thought of it yet. But I rather +think Aunt Eleanor expects us this year." + +"Well," answers the husband, "all right. Only if you decide to go, +don't forget to take along some of your own pumpkin pies. Your Aunt +Eleanor's never quite suit me. I like considerable ginger in my +pumpkin pies." + +Another husband may say, "No, sir! Not on your life are we going to +Jim's for Thanksgiving. That wife of his is much too young to know how +to make just the right kind of turkey dressing. And I'm too old to +take chances on things like that now. Those pretty brides are apt to +get so excited over their lace table doilies that they forget to put in +the sage or onions and there you are--one whole Thanksgiving Day and a +turkey spoiled forever. No, sir--count me out!" + +Sometimes wives say, "We've been invited to three places, Jemmy, but +let's stay home. When we go out I always get white meat and I hate it. +And I like my cranberries hulls and all instead of just jell." + +It is just such little human likes and notions that finally decide the +matter. And so it was this year. + +Sam Bobbins' eldest sister was having Sam and his wife "because Sam's +spent so much money for his fighting roosters that he ain't got money +for a Thanksgiving turkey." + +Dolly Beatty's mother was having Charlie Peters for Thanksgiving dinner +and all the immediate relatives to pass judgment on him. He had +proposed and Dolly had accepted but no announcement was to be made +until all the Beattys and Dundrys had had their say. + +Frank Burton and Jenny were going by train to Jennie's rich and haughty +and painfully religious aunt in Cedar Point. All Jennie's sisters, +even the one from Vermont, were to be there and Jennie did want to go +to visit with the girls. She and Frank had never been invited to any +semi-religious festival by this aunt, owing to Frank's atheistic +tendencies. + +But the haughty and religious dame had heard rumors and was curious. + +"I'll go for your sake, Jennie. But she'll be disappointed. Maybe I'd +better shave my mustache so's to let her see some change in me." + +Of course everybody who had a grandmother in the country was going to +grandma's and early Thanksgiving morning teams were arriving for the +various batches of grandchildren. + +That was the only fault one could find with a Green Valley +Thanksgiving--that so many went away to spend the day. + +But with Christmas it was different. Christmas in Green Valley was a +home day. The town was full of visitors and sleigh bells and merry +calls and walking couples. Everybody was waving Christmas presents or +wearing them. For Green Valley believed in Christmas presents. Not +the kind that make people he awake nights hating Christmas and that +call for "do your shopping early" signs. But the old-fashioned kind of +presents that are not stained with hate or worry or debt. + +The giving of Christmas presents was the pleasantest kind of a game in +Green Valley. Of course everybody knew everybody's needs so well that +weeks before the gifts, wrapped in tissue paper, lay waiting in a trunk +up in the attic. And as a general thing everybody was happy over what +they got. No present cost much money but oh, what a world of thought +and love and fun went into it. Nor was it hard for Green Valley folks +to decide what to give. + +When Dell Parsons saw her dearest friend admiring her asparagus fern +she divided it in the fall and tended it carefully and sent it to Nan +Turner on Christmas morning. + +When folks found out that some time next spring Alice Sears might have +a baby to dress they sent her ever so many lovely, soft little things +so she would not have to worry or grieve because her first baby could +not have its share of pretties. + +As soon as Green Valley knew that Jocelyn Brownlee was engaged it sent +her a tried and true poor-man's-wife cookbook, big gingham aprons, +holders to keep her from burning her hands and samples of their best +jellies, pickles and preserves. + +And such a time as Green Valley grandmothers had weaving, knitting and +crocheting beautiful rag rugs to match blue and white bathrooms, yellow +and green kitchens, pink and cream bedrooms. And every year there was +a large crop of home knitted mittens that Green Valley girls and boys +wore with pride and comfort. No city pair of gloves ever equaled +grandma's knitted ones that went very nearly to the elbow and were the +only thing for skating and coasting. + +Christmas was the time too when dreams came true. Fanny Foster knew +this when Christmas morning she opened a parcel and found a beautiful +silk petticoat. No card came with it but Fanny knew. + +Hen Tomlins had a baby boy for his best Christmas gift. Agnes had +always opposed all talk of adopting a baby, but this year that was her +gift to Hen. And they were all happy about it. + +Of course, even in Green Valley a certain amount of foolishness +prevailed. Everybody smiled when a week before Christmas Jessie +Williams said she had all her presents ready but Arthur's; that she was +waiting for the next pay day to get his; that she believed she'd get +him a new pink silk lamp shade but she knew beforehand he wouldn't be +pleased and would only say that he wished to heaven she'd let him have +the money. + +Lutie Barlow was badly disappointed with the hundred and fifty dollar +victrola her husband bought her. She said she wanted a red cow to +match her Rhode Island Reds. + +Perhaps no one in Green Valley was so generously remembered as the +young minister. But though every one of the many gifts that came +pleased him he was strangely unhappy and restless. Invitations as +usual had poured in on him but he had chosen to spend the day with +Grandma Wentworth. And yet, though he was glad to be with her, his +thoughts strayed off to a certain gray day in the fall when he ran down +a hill with a girl's hand in his. He remembered the surge of joy that +had rushed through him when he got her safely into his storm-proof +house and banged shut the door on the stormy world without. + +He thought of the hour they spent in silence before the fire that +roared exultantly as the storm tore with angry fingers at the doors and +windows. That, he now felt, was the most perfect hour of his life. + +His mind was struggling to understand these memories, these strange new +emotions. He had a queer feeling that something wonderful was waiting +just outside his reach, something was waiting for his recognition. + +He was standing in Grandma Wentworth's dining room, looking out the +window at the winter landscape. Grandma was in the kitchen seeing to +the dinner, for she was to have quite a party--Roger and David, Mrs. +Brownlee and Jocelyn, Cynthia's son and his man Timothy. + +Idly Cynthia's son watched the rest of the party coming through the +little path that led to Grandma's door. He saw them all plainly +through the curtains and plants that screened him. Jocelyn and David +came last. David made a great to-do about stamping the snow off his +feet, taking pains to stand between Jocelyn and the door. Then, just +as Jocelyn was about to slip past him, the minister saw David reach out +and sweep the girl into his arms. And Cynthia's son could not help but +see the glory in the boy's eyes as the girl's wild-rose face turned up +to meet her lover's kiss. + +For blind seconds John Roger Churchill Knight crashed through space. +And then the next minute he was living in a shining world that was all +roses and skylarks and dew. He laughed, for all at once he knew what +ailed him; he knew that the wonderful, tantalizing something that had +so steadily eluded him, tormented him was--just Nan, the girl of the +gray day, the log fire and the storm. + +He was the maddest, gladdest man in all Green Valley that day until he +remembered that he had sent Nan no gift, not even a greeting or a word +of thanks for the beautiful collie dog she had sent him. He stood in +horrified amazement at his stupidity. Jocelyn had been showing them +her new ring. And Nan, his sweetheart, had not even a Christmas card. + +Cynthia's son went to the telephone but even as he raised the receiver +he somehow guessed what the answer would be. + +Nan's father answered. + +"Why, John, she left on that 1:10 for Scranton, Pennsylvania. It's the +first fool thing I have ever known her to do. Stayed right here till +she'd given us our Christmas gifts and dinner and then off she went to +see this old aunt in Scranton. Why, yes--you can send a telegram. +She'll get it when she arrives." + +So it happened that when a tired, homesick, wretched girl reached her +aunt's house in Scranton, Pennsylvania, she found the one gift for +which her heart had cried all that long, long Christmas day. It was +just a bit of yellow paper that said: + + "oh gray day girl don't stay too long the + fire is singing your chair is waiting and I have + so much to tell you come home and forgive." + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +FANNY'S HOUR + +Nobody had asked Fanny to be a member of the Civic League but she was +its most energetic promoter, its most zealous advocate. Never had she +had such a cold weather opportunity. + +Fanny hated cold weather. It shut people up in houses, shut their +mouths, their purses, their laughter. It made life grim and rather +gray. Fanny loved sunshine and open sunny roads. She tried to do her +duty in winter as well as in summer but when the weather drops to ten +or twenty below the sunniest of natures is bound to feel it. + +But this winter Green Valley women were so stirred and roused that they +thought of other things beside the price of coal and sugar and yarn. +The short winter days fairly flew. The Civic League was young but +already it was laying out an ambitious spring programme. No mere man +was a member but all the men had to do was to show a little attention +to Fanny Foster to know what was going on. + +"We're going to set up a drinking fountain in the business square," +Fanny explained. "The men of this town have the hotel but the horses +never did have a decent trough of clean water. And we're going to have +a little low place fixed so's the dogs can get a drink too. This is to +prevent hydrophobia. + +"We've already started the boys to building bird houses so's to have +them ready to put up the first thing in the spring. There'll be less +killing of song birds with sling-shots, though of course there's never +been much of that done in Green Valley. + +"Then that crossing at West End is going to be attended to. There's +been enough rubbers lost in that mudhole to about fill it, so it won't +take much to fill it up. We're going to have a little bridge built +over that ditch on Lane Avenue so's we women don't dislocate our joints +jumping over it. But first the ditch is going to be deepened and +cleaned so's it won't smell so unhealthy. When that's done the ladies +aim to plant wild flowers along it, careless like, to make it look as +if God had made it instead of lazy men. + +"We're going to suggest that all buildings in the business section put +out window boxes. We'll furnish the flowers. It will give a +distinctive note of beauty to the town." Fanny was carefully quoting +Mrs. Brownlee. + +"Billy Evans' wife promised to see to it that Billy painted the livery +barn and there's a delegation of ladies appointed to wait on Mert +Hagley and see if we can't get him to mend his sheds. They're so +lopsided and rickety that Mrs. Brownlee says they're an eyesore and a +menace to public safety. + +"There's another delegation that's going to ask the saloon keeper to +keep the basement door shut when the trains come in so's to keep that +beery and whisky smell out of the streets as much as possible while +maybe visitors are walking about. + +"We're going to send a special committee to see what the railroad will +do about fixing up this old station or, better still, giving us a new +one and beautifying its grounds. + +"We're planning to see Colonel Stratton about starting up a club for +the preservation of our wild flowers and Doc Philipps is to have charge +of a fight on the moths and things that are eating and killing our +fruit trees. + +"The school buildings will be investigated and conditions noted. Doc +Philipps says that if the heating plant and ventilation and light was +tended to we wouldn't have so much sickness among the children or so +many needing glasses. + +"As soon as spring really comes the Woman's Civic League is going to +start up a clean-up campaign. Of course, Green Valley never was a +dirty town. Everybody likes to have their yard nice but there's +considerable old faded newspaper and rusty tin cans lying along the +roads farther out and in unnoticed corners that nobody's felt +responsible for. That will all be attended to. We'll have no filth, +no germs, no ugliness anywhere, Mrs. Brownlee says. + +"And I've been appointed a committee of one to wait on Seth Curtis and +call his attention to the careless way he leaves his horses standing +about the town. Those horses are dangerous and getting uglier in +temper every day. And Seth is just as bad." + +This was only too true. Seth had grown bitter and even reckless of +late. Ever since his quarrel with Ruth about Jim Tumley Seth had been +boiling with temper. Old poisons that had spoiled his life in many +ways and that he thought he had conquered crept back to tyrannize over +him. Poor Seth had had so much discipline in his youth that the least +hint of pressure threw him into a state of vicious rebellion. Seth had +a fine mind, could think quicker and straighter to the point than a +good many Green Valley men. But when that mind was clouded with anger +and stubbornness Seth was a hopeless proposition. Ruth was his one +star and even she, Seth felt, had set herself against him. + +So Seth, who seldom had frequented the hotel, was there almost every +day now when he should have been working. He even drank more than +before. Not that he cared more for it but it was his way of showing +independence. + +So Seth was very ugly these days and his horses suffered as they had +never suffered before. They too were growing ugly and vicious and so +nervous that the least noise, the least stir, sent them into a +quivering frenzy of fright. + +Every one in Green Valley knew this and not a few men and women were +worrying. Several men were making up their minds to speak sharply to +Seth about it. But everybody smiled and even felt relieved when they +heard that Fanny had offered her services to the Civic League in this +capacity. Green Valley knew Seth and knew Fanny Foster. Fanny would +most certainly tell Seth about it. And everybody knew just how mad +Seth would get. Fanny would not of course accomplish much. But she +would open up the subject, suffer the first violence of Seth's anger +and so make it easier for some more competent person to take Seth to +task and force him to be reasonable. + +The minister had spoken to Seth long ago but though Seth listened +quietly to the quiet words of the one man he had come to love in his +queer fashion, he had set his jaw grimly at the end and said, "No, sir! +I've made up my mind not to stand this interference with my personal +liberty and God Himself can't budge me!" + +"Yes, He can, Seth. But don't let it go that far," Cynthia's son had +begged. + +Now all Green Valley was waiting to see Fanny tackle Seth in the name +of the Civic League. It would be funny, everybody said. + +Fanny did it one sunny afternoon in early spring when the streets were +gay with folks all out to taste the first bit of gladness in the air. +Fanny did it in her usual lengthy and thorough manner and permitted no +interruptions. She was talking for the first time in her life with +authority vested in her by a civic body. So there was a strength and a +conscientiousness about her remarks that struck home. + +Seth was standing alone on the hotel steps when Fanny began talking but +all of Green Valley that was abroad was gathered laughingly about her +when she finished and stood waiting for Seth's answer. + +Seth had had a glass too much or he would never have done, never have +said what he did and said that day. He would never have taken poor, +harmless, laughter-loving, happy-go-lucky Fanny Foster, who had never +done a mean, malicious thing in her life, who had let her world use her +for all the little hateful tasks that nobody else would do and in which +there was no thanks or any glory,--Seth in his senses would never have +held up this dear though unfinished soul to the scorn, the pitiless +ridicule of her townsmen. + +If Fanny had been touched with fire and eloquence because she spoke +with authority, Seth too talked with a bitter brilliance that won the +crowd and held it against its will. With biting sarcasm and horrible +accuracy Seth drew a picture of Fanny as made Green Valley smile and +laugh before it could catch itself and realize the cruelty of its +laughter. + +Fanny stood at the foot of the wide flight of stairs like a criminal at +the bar. As Seth's words grew more biting, his judgments more cruel, +Fanny's face flushed with shame, then faded white with pain. + +But Seth went too far. He went so far that he couldn't stop himself. +And the crowd who had gathered to hear a little harmless fun now stood +petrified and heartsick. No one stirred, though everybody was wishing +themselves miles away. And Seth's voice, dripping with cruelty, went +on. + +Then all at once from the heart of the crowd a little figure pushed its +way. It was Seth's wife, Ruth. She walked halfway up that flight of +stairs and looked steadily at her husband. Seth stopped in the middle +of a word. + +"Seth Curtis," Ruth's face was as white as Fanny's and her voice rang +out like a silver bell, "Seth Curtis, you will apologize, ask +forgiveness of Fanny Foster, who is my friend and an old schoolmate, or +before God and these people I will disown you as my husband and the +father of my children. Fanny Foster never had an apple or a goody in +her lunch in the old school days that she didn't share it with +somebody. She has never had a dollar or a joy that she hasn't divided. +No one in Green Valley ever had a pain or a sorrow that she did not +make it hers and try to help in some way. And in all the world there +can be no more willing hands than hers." + +The silver voice stopped, choked with sobs, and Ruth's eyes, looking +down on the shrunken, bowed figure of Green Valley's gossip, brimmed +over with tears. + +Seth, sober now, stared at his wife, at the broken, crushed Fanny, at +the crowd that stood waiting in still misery. + +Ruth walked down to Fanny and flung her arms about her. Fanny patted +her friend's shoulder softly and tried to comfort not herself but Ruth. +"There, there, Ruthie, don't, don't take on so. Remember, you're +nursing a baby and it might make him sick. It's all right, +everything's all right. Only," Fanny's voice was dull and colorless +and she never once raised her head, "only I wish John wouldn't hear of +this. I've been such a disappointment to John without--this." + +Though she spoke only to Ruth everybody heard. It was the first and +only favor Fanny Foster had ever asked of Green Valley. And Green +Valley, as it watched Ruth lead her away, swore that if possible John +should not hear. + +But John did hear three days later. And then the quiet man whose +patience had made people think him a fool let loose the stored-up +bitterness of years. He who in the beginning should and could have +saved his girl wife with love and firmness now judged and rejected her +with the terrible wrath, the cold merciless justice of a man slow to +anger or to judge. + +It was springtime and Grandma, sitting in her kitchen, heard and wept +for Fanny. The windows at the Foster house were open and John talked +for all the world to hear. His name had been dragged through the +gutter and he was past caring for appearances. Grandma writhed under +the words that were more cruel than a lash. At the end John Foster +swore that so long as he lived he would never speak to Fanny. And +Grandma shivered, for she knew John Foster. + +For days not even Grandma saw Fanny. Then she saw her washing windows, +scrubbing the porch steps, hanging up clothes. There came from the +Foster house the whir of a sewing machine, the fragrant smell of fresh +bread. The children came out with faces shining as the morning, hair +as smooth as silk, shoes polished. And Grandma knew that if John +Foster found a speck of dirt in his house he would have to look for it +with a microscope. But there was a kind of horror in the eyes of +Fanny's children. They didn't play any more or run away but of their +own accord stayed home to fetch and carry for the strange mother who +was now always there, who never sang, never spoke harshly to them, who +worked bitterly from morning till night. + +Every spring Fanny Foster used to flit through Green Valley streets +like a chattering blue-jay. But now nobody saw her, only now and then +at night, slinking along through the dark. And many a kindly heart +ached for her, remembering how Fanny loved the sunshine and laughter. + +But at last the spring grew too wonderful to resist. Even Fanny's numb +heart and flayed spirit was warmed with the golden heat. She had some +money that she wanted to deposit in the bank for John. For Fanny was +saving now as only Fanny knew how when she set her mind to it. And she +had set not only her mind but her very soul on making good. Every +cruel taunt had left a ghastly wound and only work of the hardest kind +could ease the hurt. + +Fanny walked through the streets as though she had just recovered from +a long illness. Everybody who saw her hurried out to greet her and +talk but she only smiled in a pitiful sort of way and hastened on. It +was nearly noon and she wanted to avoid the midday bustle and the +crowds of children. She had set out the children's dinner but she +hoped to get back before they reached home. + +She came out of the bank and stood on the bank steps. She looked down +the streets. Nobody was about and so against her will her eyes turned +to the spot where she had been so pitilessly pilloried a month before. + +As then, Seth's team was standing in front of the hotel. Little Billy +Evans was climbing into the big wagon. She watched the child in a kind +of stupor. She knew he ought not to do that. Seth's horses were not +safe for a grown-up, much less a child. She wondered where Seth was or +Billy Evans or Hank. She wondered if she'd better have them telephone +to Billy from the bank and have him get little Billy. She half turned +to do that and then out of the hotel door Jim Tumley came reeling and +singing. Only his voice was a maudlin screech. Little Billy had by +this time gotten into the wagon, pulled the whip from its socket, and +just as Jim came staggering up, touched the more nervous of the two +horses with it. And then it happened--what Green Valley had been +dreading for months. + +When men heard the commotion and turned to look they saw Seth's horses +tearing madly round the hotel corner. Little Billy Evans was rattling +around in the wagon box like a cork on the water and Fanny Foster, +swaying like a reed, was hanging desperately to the horses' heads. + +Hank Lolly was pitching hay into the barn loft. He saw, jumped and +then lay still with a broken leg. Seth saw and Billy Evans and scores +of other men, and they all ran madly to help. But the terrified +animals waited for no man. And then from the throats of the running +crowd a groan broke, for the school doors opened and into the spring +sunshine and the arms of certain death the little first and second +graders came dancing. + +The school building hid the danger from the children and they did not +comprehend the hoarse shouts of warning. But Fanny heard, heard the +childish laughter and the screams of horror. She knew those horses +must not turn that corner. Her feet swung against the shafts. Her +heel caught for a minute and she jerked with all her might. The mad +creatures swerved and dashed themselves and her against a telegraph +pole. + +When they picked up little Billy and Fanny they were both unconscious. +One of Billy's little arms was broken, so violently had he been flung +about and against the iron bars of the scat. Fanny's injuries were +more serious. + +They took her home to her spotless house with the children's dinner set +out on the red tablecloth in the kitchen. The pussy willows the +children had brought her the day before were in a vase in the center. +Her husband came home and spoke to her but she neither saw him nor +heard. They gave him a blood-stained bank book with his name on it. + +And so she lay for days and sometimes Doc Philipps thought she would +live and at other times he was sure she couldn't; but if she lived he +knew that she would never again flit like vagrant sunshine through +Green Valley streets. She would spend the rest of her days in a wheel +chair or on crutches. + +When they got courage finally to tell her, Fanny only smiled and said +nothing. But she ate less and smiled more and steadily grew weaker and +weaker and as steadily refused to see her husband. + +"No," she said quietly, "there's nothing I want to see John about and +there's nothing for him to see me about any more. I guess," she smiled +at the gruff old doctor, "you're about the only man I can stand the +sight of or who would put up with me." + +"Fanny," Doc Philipps told her, "if you don't buck up and get well, if +you die on my hands, it will be the first mean thing you ever did." + +"Oh, well--it would be the last," laughed Fanny. + +"Fanny, don't you know that Seth Curtis and nearly all the town comes +here at least once a day? How do you suppose John and Seth and the +rest of us will feel if you just quit and go?" + +And then in bitterness of heart Fanny answered. + +"Oh, I'm tired of living, of being snubbed and made fun of. I'm past +caring how anybody else will feel. I tell you I'm a misfit. God never +took pains to finish me. I've been a miserable failure, no good to +anybody. My children will be better off without me. John said so." + +"My God!" groaned the old doctor, "did John say that?" He knew now +that no medicine that he could give, no skill of his would mend a heart +bruised like that. + +"Yes--he said that--and a whole lot more. Said I've eternally +disgraced him and dragged him down and will land him in jail or the +poorhouse. And I guess maybe it's so. Only all the time he was +talking I kept thinking how he teased me to marry him. I really liked +Bud Willis over in Elmwood better, in a way, than I did John. And I +meant to marry Bud. He wasn't as good a boy as John, but he was so +jolly and we'd have had such a good time together that I'd never have +got mixed up in any mess like this. Maybe we would have ended in the +poorhouse but we'd have had a good time going, and I bet Bud and I +would have found something to laugh at even when we got there. Oh, I'm +glad it's over. Don't think I'm afraid to die. I kind of hate to +leave Robbie. Robbie's like me. And some day somebody'll tell him +what a fool he is--like they told me. I wish I could warn him or learn +him not to care. But, barring Robbie, I'm not afraid to go. But I'd +be afraid to live. To live all the rest of my days on my back or in a +chair--I--who was made to go? John can't abide me well and able to +work. He'd hate the sight of me useless. No, sir! There's nothing +nor nobody I'd sit in a chair for all the rest of my life." + +"Yes, there is--Peggy." + +John spoke from the shadowy doorway, for the dusk had fallen. + +"You will do it for me, girl. I'll get you the nicest chair and the +prettiest crutches. And when you are tired of them I'll carry you +about in my arms. And you'll never again--I swear it--be sorry that +you didn't marry Bud Willis." + +The spring twilight filled the room. Through it the doctor tiptoed to +the door and left these two to build a new world out of the fragments +and blunders of the old. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +BEFORE THE DAWN + +"I wonder if Fanny's sacrifice isn't enough to drive the evil thing out +of our lives and out of Green Valley forever. Seems as if everybody +ought to vote the saloon out now," said Grandma Wentworth to Cynthia's +son a couple of weeks later, when the whole town was celebrating +because Fanny Foster had sat up for the first time in her chair that +day. + +After all, John didn't buy Fanny her chair. Seth Curtis wanted to do +it all himself but Green Valley wouldn't let him. It was a wonderful +chair. You could lower it to different heights and it was full of all +manner of attachments to make the invalid forget her helplessness. Of +course Fanny was still too weak to use these but she knew about them +and seemed pleased, even said she believed that when she got the hang +of it she could get about the house and yard and might even venture +into the streets in time. + +And early in the morning of the day she was to get up Doc Philipps +drove up in his buggy with what seemed like a young garden tucked +inside it. Fanny's garden and borders had been sadly neglected during +her sickness. The doctor had had John clean the whole thing up and +then he came with his arms and buggy full of blossoming tulips, +hyacinths and every bloom that was in flower then and would bear +transplanting. And for hours he and John worked to make a little +fairyland for Fanny. + +"My God, John, I couldn't mend her body--nobody could. But between us +we have got to mend her spirit." And the old doctor blew his nose hard +to hide the trembling of his chin. + +But no chair, no amount of tulips and hyacinths, could make up to Fanny +the loss of her body. And Green Valley knew this. So Green Valley was +talking more seriously than ever of driving out from among them the +thing that was pushing Jim Tumley into a drunkard's grave, that was +estranging hitherto happy wives and husbands and maiming innocent men, +women and children. Little Billy was all right again but he was now a +timid youngster and inclined to be jumpy at sight of a smartly trotting +horse. Hank Lolly's leg was healed up but Doc said he would always +limp a bit. Seth and his wife had made up, of course, but neither of +them could ever efface from their hearts and memories the cruel scenes +that had marred their life this past year. + +Seth no longer went near the saloon. He had paid dearly for his +stubbornness and would continue to pay to the end of his days. Billy +Evans had swung around and was fighting the saloon now with a grimness +that was terrible in one so easy-going and liberal as Billy. + +But nothing seemingly could convert George Hoskins. And so long as +George Hoskins was against a measure its passage was a hopeless matter, +for men like George always have a host of followers. + +George was a huge man whose mind worked slowly. When he first heard +the talk about the town going dry he laughed--and that was enough. No +one argued the matter with him for no one relished the thought of an +argument with George. And only the minister had dared to mention Jim +Tumley. In his big way George loved little Jim, but since his wife had +sickened George spent every spare minute in her sick room and so +witnessed none of the scenes that were rousing Green Valley folks into +open rebellion against the evil that enslaved them. + +George belonged to the old school that declared that to mind one's own +business was the highest duty of man. No one in Green Valley, not even +Cynthia's son, could make the huge man understand that he in a sense +was little Jim's keeper; that since Jim could not save himself the +strong men of the community would have to do it for him. George +wondered at the seriousness with which the thing was discussed. He +treated it as a joke. And this attitude was doing more harm than if he +had been bitterly hostile to the idea. + +The Civic League was counting the votes, wondering if Green Valley +could go dry over George Hoskins' head. But Grandma Wentworth was +hoping for one more miracle before election day. + +"Something'll happen to swing George into line. We Green Valley people +have always done everything together. It would spoil things to have +one half the town fighting the other half. We must do this thing with +everybody's consent or it will do no good. So let's hope for a +miracle." + +And then the whole thing was wiped out of everybody's mind by the death +of Mary Hoskins. It was over at last and nobody but the doctor knew +how hard the big man had fought for his wife's life. So nobody quite +guessed the bitterness of the big man's grief. But everybody had heard +that Mary's last words were a plea to have little Jim sing her to her +last sleep and resting-place. And George had promised that Jim would +sing. + +Jim had been drinking so steadily of late that he was a wreck. People +wondered if he could sing. When they told him his sister was dead he +laughed miserably and said nothing. No one was surprised when the hour +for the funeral services arrived to find Jim missing. Messengers had +to be sent out. They searched the town but could find no trace of Jim. +For an hour Green Valley waited in that still home. Then the +undertaker from Elmwood whispered something to the crushed, terrified +giant who stood staring at the dead face of his wife like a soul in +torment. + +Mary Hoskins left her home without the song George had promised her. + +At the grave there was another, a more terrible wait. + +"My God--wait! They'll find him. God, men--wait--wait! I can't bury +her, without Jim's song. I promised her--I tell you I promised--oh, my +God--it was the last thing she wanted--and I promised." + +So Green Valley waited, with horror in its eyes and the bitterness of +death in its heart. As the minutes dragged women began to sob +hysterically, in nervous terror. Men looked at the yawning grave, the +waiting coffin, the low-dropping sun and mumbled strange prayers. + +Through a mist of tears the waiting watchers saw Hank Lolly and Billy +Evans pass through the cemetery gate, dragging something between them. +It was something that laughed and sobbed and gibbered horribly. Hank +and Billy tried to hold the ghastly thing erect between them but it +slipped from their trembling hands and lay, a twitching heap, at the +head of the open grave. + +That was Green Valley's darkest hour. And after that came the dawn. +The following week Green Valley men walked quietly to the polls and as +one man voted the horror out of their lives. The day after little Jim +went off to take the Keeley cure. And then for two long weeks Green +Valley was still with the stillness of exhaustion. + +Spring deepened and brought with it all the old gladness and a new +sweet peace, a peace such as Green Valley had never known. Gardens +began to bloom again and streets rippled with the laughter of +neighboring men and women. Life swung back to normal. Only the hotel +stood silent, a still vacant-eyed reminder of past pain. Nobody +mentioned it. Every one tried to forget it. But so long as it stood +there, a specter within its heart, Green Valley could not forget. It +was said that Sam Ellis had put it up for sale. But who would buy the +huge place? + +Then it was that Green Valley's three good little men came forward. +Joe Gans, the socialist barber, was spokesman. He presented a plan +that made Green Valley catch its breath. + +Why--said the three good little men--could not Green Valley buy the +hotel for its own use? Why not remodel it, make a Community House of +it? Why not move Joshua Stillman's wonderful library out of the little +dark room into which it was packed and spread it out in a big sunny +place, with comfortable chairs and rockers and a couple of nice long +reading tables? Why not fix a place for the young people to dance in +and have their parties? Why not have a real assembly hall--a big +enough and proper place to hold political meetings and all indoor +celebrations? Why not have pool, billiards, a bowling alley? Why not +have a manual-training room for Hen Tomlins and his boys? Why not have +a sewing room and cooking for the girls? + +Oh, it was a glorious plan and Green Valley listened as a child does to +a fairy tale. Of course it couldn't really be done, many people said, +but--oh, my--if it only could! + +But the three good little men had no sooner explained their fairy dream +than things began to happen. Cynthia's son came forward with the first +payment on the property. Colonel Stratton, Joshua Stillman, Reverend +Campbell offered to take care of other payments. Jake Tuttle +telephoned in from his farm that he was in on it. The Civic League +offered to do all the cleaning, the furnishing, to give pictures, +curtains, potted plants. The church societies offered to make money +serving chicken dinners on the hotel veranda to motorists who, now that +Billy Evans had a garage, came spinning along thick as flies. Nan +Ainslee's father, besides contributing to the purchasing fund, offered +to provide the library furniture, the billiard and pool tables. Seth +Curtis and Billy Evans not only gave money but offered to do all the +hauling. That shamed the masons and carpenters into giving their +Saturday afternoons for repair work. And after them came the painters +and decorators, with Bernard Rollins at their head. So in the end +every soul in Green Valley gave something and so the dream came true, +as all dreams must when men and women get together and work +whole-heartedly for the common good. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +FANNY COMES BACK + +"If only I felt the way I look. If only my feelings had been smashed +too," sobbed Fanny to the doctor that first week that she sat up in her +chair. "But I'm just the same inside that I always was and I want to +go and see and hear things." + +So the old doctor, who knew how much more real were the ills of the +spirit than any hurts of the flesh, dropped a word here and there and +now no days passed that Fanny did not have callers, did not in some way +get messages, the vagrant scraps and trifles of news that, so valueless +in themselves, yet were to Fanny the lovely bits of fabric out of which +she pieced a laughing tale of life. + +Outwardly Fanny was changed. She was pale and quiet and her thick +lovely hair was always smooth now and glossy and carefully dressed. It +was the one thing she still could do for herself and she did it with a +pitiful care. She looked ten years younger, in a way. And her house +was spick and span at ten o'clock every morning now. From her chair +she directed the children and because in all Green Valley there was no +woman who knew better how work ought to be done it was well done. And +then came the long empty hours when she sat, as she was sitting now, in +her chair on the sunny side of the house where she could look at her +little sea of tulips and hyacinths and drink in their perfume. + +She had been trying to crochet but had dropped her needle. It lay in +the grass at her feet. She could see it but she could not pick it up. +She had not as yet acquired the skill and the inventive faculty of an +invalid. + +And so she sat there, staring at the bit of glistening steel as wave +after wave of bitterness swept over her. Her tragedy was still so new +that she could feel it with every breath. Every hour she was reminded +of her loss by a thousand little things like this crochet hook. She +was forced to sit still, her busy hands idle in her lap, while spring +was calling, calling everywhere. She told herself, with a mad little +laugh, that she would never again pick up anything; never again would +she run through her neighbors' gates, tap on their doors and visit them +in their kitchens. Never again could she hurry up the spring street +with the south wind caressing her cheek. No more would she gad about +to learn the doings of her little world. Would it come to talk to her, +to make her laugh now that she was helpless? Was she never to hear the +music of living? Was she to lose her knack of making people laugh? To +lose her place in life--to live and yet be forgotten--would she have to +face that? + +These were some of the thoughts that were torturing poor Fanny that +day. And then she gave a cry, for around the corner of the house came +Nanny Ainslee in just the same old way. Grandma Wentworth and the +minister were just behind her. + +They stared lovingly at each other, the girl who was as lovely as life +and love and springtime could make her, and the woman whom the game had +broken. Then Nanny spoke--not to the broken body of Fanny Foster but +to the gipsy, springtime spirit of Fanny. + +"I only just came home, Fanny. I went through town and saw pretty +nearly everybody, and every soul tried to tell me a little something. +But it's all a jumble. So, Fanny Foster, I want you to begin with +Christmas Day and tell me all that's happened in Green Valley while +I've been away." + +Never a word of her accident, never so much as a glance of pity at the +wonderful chair. Just the old Nan Ainslee asking the old Fanny Foster +for Green Valley news. + +In the scarred soul of Fanny Foster, down under the bitterness and +crumbled pride, something stirred, something that Fanny thought was +dead forever. + +Then Nanny spoke again. + +"I have come to tell you that I am to be married to John Roger +Churchill Knight. I have told no one but you and Grandma. I have +promised to marry him in June, so I haven't much time to get ready. +I'm hoping, Fanny, that you will come and help out." + +At that, of a sudden all the old-time zest for living, the joy of +seeing, hearing and doing, surged to Fanny's very throat and force of +habit brought the words. + +"Oh, land alive, Nanny," fairly gurgled the old Fanny, "such a time as +we've had in Green Valley! It was that awful cold spell after +Christmas that began it. Old man Pelley died--of complications--and +everybody thought Mrs. Dudley would sing hymns of praise in public, +they'd fought so about their chickens. But I declare if she didn't cry +about the hardest at the funeral and even blamed herself for +aggravating him. + +"Of course him dying left old Mrs. Pelley alone in a big house, and her +being pretty feeble, she felt that Harry and Ivy ought to come and live +with her. Well,--Ivy went--but she vowed that there were two things +she would do, mother-in-law or no mother-in-law. She said she'd put as +many onions in her hamburger steak and Irish stew as she pleased--you +know Mrs. Pelley can't stand onions--and she'd have a fire in the +fireplace as often as the fancy struck her. Everybody thought there'd +be an awful state of things--but land--now that Mrs. Pelley has got +used to the open fire you can't drive her away from it with a stick and +she don't seem to bother her head about Ivy's cooking and last week she +actually ate three helpings of hamburger steak that Ivy said was just +reeking with onions. + +"A body's never too old to learn, I suppose. There's Henry Rawlins +suddenly took the notion to quit smoking. Ettie'd been at him for +twenty-five years with twenty good reasons to quit, but no. And all of +a sudden--when Ettie's give up hope and not mentioned it for a couple +of months--he up and quits and won't even tell why. Ettie's +worried--says he's eating himself out of house and home and wants to +sleep about twenty-four hours a day. + +"Talking about houses makes me think that the Stockton girls are having +their house painted by a man with a wooden leg. Billy Evans picked him +up somewhere and Seth Curtis was telling me how he came to lose that +leg. Seems like he was prospecting somewheres in Montana, got drunk, +froze it, gangrene set in and they had to amputate. They say he's a +mighty smart man too. Maybe John'll get him to paint our house when +he's through at the Stocktons. + +"Talk about physical deformities! Eva Collins has got it into her head +that she's too fat entirely and she's been dieting and rolling and +taking all sorts of exercises religiously. Seems she got so set on +being thin that she practices these exercises whenever she happens to +think of it and wherever she happens to be. She happened to be right +under the lights three or four times and so she smashed them, globes +and all. Bill says she'd better reduce in the barn or else let him +charge admission for a rolling performance to pay for the broken lights. + +"So there's Eva trying to thin off and they say Mert Hagley's swollen +all out of shape, having been stung almost to death by his own bees. +Of course, nobody's sympathizing overmuch with Mert. He was so afraid +of losing a swarm of bees that he forgot to be cautious and there he is +laid out. But it isn't the bee stings that hurt him so much. Mary's +been willed a good farm and a big lump of cash by some aunt that died a +month ago and hated Mert like poison. And the thing's just gone to +Mary's head. + +"She's gone into the city on regular spending sprees and Mert's wild. +He can't touch the farm and he's afraid Mary'll have that lump of money +all spent before he gets out of bed. Everybody's hoping she will and +advising her to buy every blessed thing she ever had a hankering for +and things she never even heard of. Mrs. Brownlee, the president of +the Civic League, even told her to buy a dish-washing machine, and +heavens, if Mary didn't go right down and buy it. Doc Philipps advised +her to buy herself the very best springs and mattress on the +market--that it would help her back to sleep decently of nights. She's +having hot-water heat put in and is going to do her washing with an +electric washer. Seth Curtis put her up to that. And as soon as Mert +gets better she's going visiting her sister in Colorado. She says +she'll likely die of homesickness but that she's just got to go off +somewhere to get used to and learn to wear properly all the new clothes +she's got. + +"Well, Mary's buying all these labor-saving machines got the whole town +to thinking and spending. Dick's put in a new cash register they say +is nice enough to have in the parlor. It made Jessie Williams buy a +lot of new silver that she didn't need no more than a cat needs a +match-box. But she got it and she gave a luncheon the other day to +some of the South End crowd and tried to get just about all that silver +on the table, I guess. Of course, it looked mighty nice but when the +women came to eat they didn't know what to do with it. They got pretty +miserable, all sticking to just the one knife and fork and spoon. And +Jessie got so rattled that she just about forgot to use the stuff too. +And finally old Mrs. Vingie, that Jessie asked just to have the news +spread, got up mad as a hornet and marched out, saying she was too old +to be insulted. + +"Until a week ago Bessie Williams wouldn't speak to Alex. You know her +hair's got awful white this last year and of course, her being kind of +stout, she does look older than Al. But she says that's no reason why, +when a peddler comes to the door with anything, Al needs to let the man +think she's his mother. + +"Mrs. Jerry Dustin's been to see Uncle Tony's portraiture hanging in +the art gallery. She says it's so lifelike it made her cry. And she's +awful happy about Peter. Peter's been posing for a picture for Bernard +Rollins and while he was in the studio he got to fooling with the +paints and brushes, and lo and behold, if he didn't daub up something +that looked like his mother's face when she's smiling. They say +Rollins jumped he was so surprised and he put the boy through some +paces and swore he'd make a better artist out of him than he was +himself. So there you are, and now Mrs. Dustin is dreaming of Peter in +Italy, Peter in Rome, Peter everywhere in creation, and her tagging +along with his brushes and dust rags. So she's happy. + +"And Milly Sears is house-cleaning like mad, for both the boys are +coming home from the ends of the earth to visit. And Alice is putting +off the christening of her baby boy until they come. She was here to +show me the baby the other day. It's a darling. Jocelyn Brownlee came +with her and brought me samples of all her wedding dresses, wedding +gown and all. As soon as the dressmaker is through I'm to go over and +see the whole trousseau. + +"There, I nearly forgot the best thing of all. It's about Sam Bobbins. +My! Here we've all been pitying Sam and Fortune's just kicked in his +door and walked in. You remember of course about Sam and his fighting +roosters? Well, Sam went off for Thanksgiving to his sister's and +while he was gone something ate up his prize stock. Must have been a +skunk, Frank Burton says. Well, they say that Sam's heart was just +about broken. Not just because his stock was gone but more because he +couldn't think of another thing to turn his hand to. + +"Well, he got through the winter some way and then, while he was +sitting in the train one day coming home, he overheard two men talking +about turtles going up. Must have been two hotel men. Anyway, that +gave Sam an idea and he started right in wading through Petersen's +slough for turtles. Why, he pulled up barrels of them, and would you +believe it, they sold in the city for real money! Sam went +crazy--about as crazy as Mary Hagley got over her luck. And then along +came rheumatism and knocked Sam flat, just when he was doing so well. +Everybody said it was just poor Sam's luck. So there was Sam sick +abed, thinking about those turtles moving off somewheres else maybe, or +somebody else getting rich on them. + +"And all the time he lay in bed groaning Sam's wife went around the +house doing the same. Only her trouble wasn't turtles but corsets. +Seems like Sam always promised Dudy that if he made any money she was +to have plenty to spend. Well, he treated her mighty handsome about +that turtle money. Dudy had the sense to take all he gave her and she +vowed that for once in her life she'd get herself a corset that was +comfortable. + +"Well, Nanny, heavens only knows how many brands she tried but none of +them seemed built for her. Some pinched her here and others squeezed +her there and she was as full of misery as Sam was of rheumatism. Sam +finally took notice and just to keep his mind off his own troubles he +got to watching her suffering for breath and a nice shape. + +"Now you know Sam's always thought the world of Dudy. So one day, when +she was getting ready to go to the Civic League meeting to read a paper +on the best ways of getting rid of flies and nearly crying because she +couldn't get herself to look right, Sam said, half joking, 'By gum, +Dudy, I'll _make_ you a corset that will fit you.' + +"Well, sir, the thing stuck in his mind and grew and grew, and heavens +to Betsey, if Sam didn't really make a corset, even helping Dudy with +some of the sewing. + +"Dudy wore it and took everybody's breath away, she looked so nice and +could breathe without puffing and laugh as much as she pleased. The +women got to talking about it and mentioned it to Mrs. Brownlee. And +mind you, Mrs. Brownlee went to Sam and asked him had he patented the +thing. And when he said no she went to a woman lawyer friend of hers +and she got Sam a patent, and first thing Green Valley knew here come +three big corset men to town, all of them offering to buy Dudy's +home-made corset. So Sam Bobbins has got his fortune and nobody's +begrudging it to him. The whole town is mighty proud of Sam, I tell +you. + +"Good land--it must be four o'clock, for here come the children! +My--Nanny, but it's good to have you home again!" + +"Well," smiled Grandma, as she watched the spring twilight sift down +over Green Valley that evening, "I've always said that this town was +full of folks who make you cry one minute and laugh the next." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +HOME AGAIN + +It had pleaded for forgiveness and an early homecoming, that little +yellow slip that Nanny Ainslee treasured so. But the bluebirds were +darting through leafy bowers and the ploughed, furrowed fields lay +smoking in the spring sunshine before Nan came back. + +A week after her arrival in Scranton the old aunt had been taken sick, +and it was months before the old soul was herself again. Nan stayed +through it all. But the day came when she was free to go back to the +little home town where the cloud shadows were rippling over low, +dimpling hills, already gay with the gold of wild mustard and the +tender blues and greens of a new glad spring. + +She came home one evening when Green Valley lay wrapped in a warm, +thick, fragrant mist. So no one saw her step off the train straight +into the arms of Cynthia's son. And nobody heard the quivering joy of +his one cry at the sight of her. + +"Nan!" + +Slowly, as in a dream, they walked through their fragrant, misty world +to where, in a deep, old hearth, a fire sang of love and home, dreams +and eternal happiness; where an armchair waited with its mate and an +old clock ticked on the stairs. + +Oh, that first perfect hour beside his fire! He had pleaded so hard +for it in all his letters. So she gave it to him, knowing that for +them both no hour could ever again be just like that. + +She sat and listened to the wonder of his love; then, frightened at the +might of it, the lovely reverence of it, crept into his arms for sweet +comfort. And he held her in awe and wonder against his heart, kissed +the quivering lips and knew such joy as angels might envy. Then he +took her to her father. + +The next day, in the shy sunshine of a perfect day, they went hand in +hand to their knoll to look once more upon their valley town and talk +over all of life from the first hour of meeting. + +And when they had satisfied the hunger for understanding the miracle +that had befallen them he told her of all that had happened in the +months that she had been away. How Jim Tumley slipped beyond the love +and help of them all. How Mary Hoskins grew weaker and weaker. How +the Civic League struggled and the three good little men dreamed and +planned. How Fanny Foster came to pay the great price for Green +Valley's salvation. How in death gentle Mary Hoskins paid too. He +explained why Seth Curtis was a gentler man and why John Foster hurried +home each day to laugh and talk with his crippled wife. He told her of +that awful day that had crushed George Hoskins so that he went about a +broken, shrunken man, praying and searching for peace through service. +It was George who bought the beautiful new piano for the Community +House, who was paying for little Jim's cure. + +And then because the girl he loved was sobbing over the sins and +sorrows of the little town that lay in the sunshine below them, he told +her about the baby boy that Hen Tomlins had gotten for Christmas and +how happy the little man was making toys for the toddler who followed +him about from morning till night. And because her eyes were still wet +with tears he laughed teasingly and said: + +"And I never knew that I loved you until I saw David Allan kiss his +sweetheart." + +Of course, at that she sat up very straight and wanted to know all +about it. + +"I suppose you expect me to wait a whole proper year for my wedding +day," he sighed after a little. + +"I think we ought to. And I couldn't possibly be ready before then." + +"Do you mean to tell me that it takes a whole year to make a wedding +dress?" + +And then the cruelty that lies in every woman made her shake her head +and say, "No--that isn't why nice folks wait a whole year. They wait +to give each other plenty of time to change their minds." + +"Nan!" + +And she saw then by his hurt white face that, man grown though he was, +with a genius for handling other men, he would always be a child in +some things. He never would or could understand trifling in any form, +having all a child's honesty and directness. And she knew that she, +more than any one else, would always have the power to hurt him. + +"Nan," he asked slowly, "did you go to Scranton because you thought I +might ask before you were ready?" + +She laughed tenderly. + +"Oh--Dear Heart--no. I went to Scranton because I was afraid I might +propose before you were ready." + +But he never quite understood that and she didn't expect him to. +However, if she thought she had won, she was mistaken. The persistency +in matters of love that is the heritage of all men made him say +carelessly a half hour later: + +"Oh, well--I suppose waiting a year is the best, the wise thing to do. +But why must I be the only one to obey the law? Nobody else is waiting +a year. All the other men are marrying their sweethearts in June. +There's David and Jocelyn, Max Longman and Clara, Steve and Bonnie, +Dolly Beatty and Charlie Peters. And only last week Grandma Wentworth +got a letter from out West saying some chap is coming from the very +wilds to marry Carrie. He's hired the reception hall of the Community +House so that Carrie may have a proper wedding in case her folks refuse +to give their blessing. So I'm going to marry all those chaps and then +calmly go on just being engaged myself." + +All of a sudden Nan saw why Seth Curtis gave in and joined the church, +why Hank Lolly forgot his fears and came to the services, why the +poolroom man gave up his business and was now a respected automobile +man and mechanic; why the former saloon keeper was the happy owner of a +stock farm; why Frank Burton no longer bragged about being an atheist +but went to church with Jennie; why Mrs. Rosenwinkle no longer argued +about the flatness of the earth. + +He was always doing this to every one, this boy from India; always +making people see how ridiculous and petty were the man-made +conventions and human notions and stubbornness when looked at in the +light of common sense and sincerity. + +"Oh, well," Nan gave in with a laugh that was half a sob, "I may as +well be a June bride with the rest. And now, John Roger Churchill +Knight, take me down to see my town. I want to see all the new +gardens, the new babies, the new spring hats and dress patterns. + +"I want to see Ella Higgins' tulips and forget-me-nots and attend Uncle +Tony's open-air meeting. I want to have an ice-cream soda at Martin's +and wave my hand at John Gans while he's shaving a customer. I want to +see all the store windows, especially Joe Baldwin's. I want to shake +hands with Billy Evans and Hank Lolly and hug little Billy. + +"I want to go to the post-office for my mail when everybody else is +getting theirs. I want to know if the bank is still there and if the +bluebirds and flickers are as thick as ever in Park Lane. I want to +hear Green Valley women calling to each other from their back yards and +see them leaning over the fences to visit--and giving each other clumps +of pansies, and golden glow and hollyhocks. I want to see Mrs. Jerry +Dustin's smile and ask her when I can see Uncle Tony's 'portraiture' at +the Art Institute. I want to see the boys' bare feet kicking up the +dust and their hands hitching up their overall straps and hear them +whistling to each other and giving their high signs. I'm longing to +know who's had their house repainted and where the new houses are going +up. + +"But--oh--most of all, I want to hear Green Valley folks say with their +eyes and hands and voice--'Hello, Nanny Ainslee, when did _you_ get +back' and 'My, Nanny, it's good to see and have you home again.' So, +John Roger Churchill Knight, take me down to see my home town--Green +Valley at springtime." + +They went down through Green Valley streets where the spring sunshine +lay warm and golden. They greeted Green Valley men and women and were +greeted as only Green Valley knows how to greet those it loves. + +Though they said not a word, all Green Valley read their secret in +their eyes, heard it in the rich deep note of the boy's voice, in +Nanny's lilting laugh. + +And having made the rounds the boy and girl naturally came to Grandma +Wentworth's gate. They walked through the gay front garden, followed +the little gravel path around the house, and found Grandma standing +among her fragrant herbs and healing grasses. + +They came to her hand in hand and said not a word. And Grandma raised +her head and looked at them. Then her eyes filled and her lips +quivered tenderly and the two, both motherless, knew that they had a +mother's blessing. + +It was so restful, that back yard of Grandma's, as the three sat there, +talking quietly and happily. And the world seemed strangely full of a +golden peace. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GREEN VALLEY*** + + +******* This file should be named 18801-8.txt or 18801-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/8/0/18801 + + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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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 <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: Green Valley</p> +<p>Author: Katharine Reynolds</p> +<p>Release Date: July 10, 2006 [eBook #18801]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GREEN VALLEY***</p> +<br><br><center><h3>E-text prepared by Al Haines</h3></center><br><br> +<hr class="full" noshade> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<A NAME="img-front"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-front.jpg" ALT="They came to her hand in hand and said not a word." BORDER="2" WIDTH="394" HEIGHT="613"> +<H3> +[Frontispiece: They came to her hand in hand and said not a word.] +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +GREEN VALLEY +</H1> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +BY +</H3> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +KATHARINE REYNOLDS +</H2> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FRONTISPIECE BY +<BR> +NANA FRENCH BICKFORD +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +GROSSET & DUNLAP +<BR> +PUBLISHERS ——— NEW YORK +</H4> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +<I>Copyright, 1919</I>, +<BR> +BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. +<BR><BR> +<I>All rights reserved</I> +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +Dedication +</H3> + +<P CLASS="dedication"> +TO ALL THE LITTLE ONE-HORSE TOWNS WHERE<BR> +LIFE IS SWEET AND ROOMY AND OLD-FASHIONED;<BR> +WHERE THE DAYS ARE FULL OF SUNSHINE AND<BR> +RAIN AND WORK; WHERE NEIGHBORS REALLY<BR> +NEIGHBOR AND MEN AND WOMEN ARE LIFE-SIZE<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AUTHOR'S NOTE +</H3> + +<P> +This book was written to cure a heartache, to ease a very real and bad +case of homesickness. I wrote it just for myself when I was very +nearly ten thousand miles away from home and knew that I couldn't go +back to the U. S. A. for two long years. It is a picture of a little +Yankee town, the town I tried so hard to see over ten thousand miles of +gray-green ocean. +</P> + +<P> +When I was sailing from New York for South America that sunny June +morning in 1913, about the last thing the last friend hurrying down the +gangplank said was this: +</P> + +<P> +"Of course you are going to be homesick. But it's worth it." +</P> + +<P> +And I laughed. +</P> + +<P> +But before that long stretch of gray-green ocean was plowed under I +knew—oh, I knew—that I was going to be most woefully homesick for the +U. S. A. +</P> + +<P> +A certain tall Swede from New Jersey and I discovered that fact about +the same minute Fourth of July morning. We were standing on the deck, +staring miserably back over the awful miles to where somewhere in that +lost north our town lay with flags fluttering, picnic baskets getting +into trains and everybody out on their lawns and porches. +</P> + +<P> +We didn't look at each other after that first glance—that Swede and I. +And we said the sunlight hurt our eyes. +</P> + +<P> +Three months later I was sitting under the velvet-soft, star-sown night +sky of the Argentine cattle country. I had seen volcano-scarred +Martinique and had watched the beautiful island of Barbados rising like +a fairy dream out of a foamy sea. +</P> + +<P> +I had marveled at the endless beauties of Rio lying so picturesquely in +its immense harbor and at the foot of its great, shaggy, sun-splashed, +smoke-wreathed mountains. I had tramped through unsanitary Santos and +loved it because it looked like Chicago in spite of its mountains and +banana trees. I had witnessed a wonderful fiesta in Buenos Aires and +had churned two hundred miles up the La Plata when it was bubbling with +rain. And I had had a tooth pulled in Paysandu, the second largest +city in Uruguay. +</P> + +<P> +All that in three months! And there were still a million wonders to +see. I loved and shall always love these radiant, sun-drenched +uncrowded lands. But my heart was heavy as lead. For I was homesick. +My eyes were tired of alien starshine, of alien, unfamiliar things, and +my heart cried out for the little home towns of my own country. +</P> + +<P> +But I could not go back for many, many months. So I learned Spanish +and hobnobbed with wonderfully wise and delightful Spanish +grandmothers. I grew to love some darling Indian babies. I +interviewed interesting South American cowboys and discussed war and +socialism with an Argentine navy officer. I exchanged calls and true +blue friendships with soft-voiced Englishwomen. And I took tea and +dinner aboard the ships of Welsh sea captains from Cardiff. +</P> + +<P> +I had a wonderful time. I filled my notebook, took pictures and +collected souvenirs. I laughed and told stories. Folks down there +said I was good company. +</P> + +<P> +But oh! In the hush of a rain-splashed night, when the fire in the +grate dozed and dreamed and a boat siren somewhere out on the inky La +Plata wailed and moaned through the black night, my heart flew back +over those gray-green waves to a little town that I knew in the U. S. +A. And to ease my longing I wrote Green Valley. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +KATHARINE REYNOLDS. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +CONTENTS +</H2> + +<BR> + +<CENTER> + +<TABLE WIDTH="80%"> +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">CHAPTER</TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">I </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap01">EAST AND WEST</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap02">SPRING IN GREEN VALLEY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap03">THE LAST OF THE CHURCHILLS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap04">A RAINY DAY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap05">CYNTHIA'S SON</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap06">GOSSIP</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap07">THE WEDDING</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap08">LILAC TIME</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap09">GREEN VALLEY MEN</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap10">THE KNOLL</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap11">GETTING ACQUAINTED</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap12">THE PATH OF TRUE LOVE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap13">AUTUMN IN GREEN VALLEY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap14">THE CHARM</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap15">INDIAN SUMMER</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap16">THE HOUSEWARMING</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap17">THE LITTLE SLIPPER</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap18">THE MORNING AFTER</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap19">A GRAY DAY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap20">CHRISTMAS BELLS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap21">FANNY'S HOUR</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap22">BEFORE THE DAWN</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap23">FANNY COMES BACK</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap24">HOME AGAIN</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +</CENTER> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +GREEN VALLEY +</H1> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER I +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +EAST AND WEST +</H3> + +<P> +"Joshua Churchill's dying in California and Nanny Ainslee's leaving +to-night for Japan! And there's been a wreck between here and Spring +Road!" +</P> + +<P> +Fanny fairly gasped out the astounding news. Then she sank down into +Grandma Wentworth's comfortable kitchen rocker and went into details. +</P> + +<P> +"The two telegrams just came through. Uncle Tony's gone down to the +wreck. I happened to be standing talking to him when Denny came +running out of the station. Isn't it too bad Denny's so bow-legged? +Though I don't know as it hinders him from running to any noticeable +extent. I had an awful time trying to keep up so's to find out what +had happened. I bet you Nan's packing right this minute and just +loving it. My—ain't some people born lucky? Think of having the +whole world to run around in!" +</P> + +<P> +The telephone tinkled. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, Nan," Grandma smiled as she answered, "I know. Fanny's just this +minute telling me. Yes, of course I can. I'll be over as soon as my +bread's done baking. Yes—I'll bring along some of my lavender to pack +in with your things." +</P> + +<P> +"Land sakes, Grandma," exclaimed Fanny, "don't stop for the bread. +I'll see to that. Just you git that lavender and go. And tell Nanny +I'll be at the station to see her off." +</P> + +<P> +Up-stairs in a big sunny room of the Ainslee house Grandma Wentworth +looked reproachfully at a flushed, busy girl who was laughing and +singing snatches of droll ditties the while she emptied closets and +dresser drawers and tucked things into four trunks, two suitcases and a +handbag. +</P> + +<P> +"Nanny, are you never going to settle down and stay at home?" sighed +Grandma. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, ma'am," Nanny's eyes danced, "some day when a man makes me fall +in love with him and there are no more new places to go to. But so +long as I am heartfree and footfree, and there's one alien shore +calling, I'll have the wanderlust. I declare, Grandma, if that man +doesn't turn up soon there will be no new places left for a honeymoon!" +</P> + +<P> +Grandma smiled in spite of herself. There were things she wanted very +much to say and other things she wanted very much to ask; but the +trunks had to get down to the station and already the afternoon sun was +low. +</P> + +<P> +The two women worked feverishly and almost in silence so that when the +packing was done they might get in the little visit both craved before +the months of separation. +</P> + +<P> +Nanny finally jumped on the trunks, snapped them shut, locked them and +watched the expressman carry them down and out into his waiting dray. +Then she sat down with a trembling little laugh. +</P> + +<P> +"There—it's over and I'm really going! I have been to just about +every country but Japan. I believe father would rather have skipped +off alone this time. It seems to be some suddenly important +international crisis that we are going over to settle. That's why we +are going East the roundabout way. We must stop at Washington for +instructions, then again at London and Paris." +</P> + +<P> +"Nanny," mused Grandma, "there's a good many years difference in our +ages but there's only one woman I ever loved as I love you. I think I +might have loved your mother but she died the very first year your +father brought her here. And she was ailing when she came. The other +woman that meant so much to me used to go traveling too. I always +helped her with her packing. Then one day she packed and went away, +never to come back." +</P> + +<P> +"Was that Cynthia Churchill?" Nan asked gently. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—Cynthia. She was dearer than a sister to me, and neither of us +dreamed that a whole wide world would divide us." +</P> + +<P> +"Why did she go, Grandma?" +</P> + +<P> +"Because a Green Valley man well-nigh broke her heart." +</P> + +<P> +"A Green Valley man did—<I>that</I>? Oh, dear! And here I have been +hoping that some day I might marry a Green Valley man myself." +</P> + +<P> +"Nanny, I expect I'm old and foolish but I've been hoping and hoping +that you'd marry a home boy and fearing you'd meet up with some one on +your travels who would take you away from us forever. It would be hard +to see you go." +</P> + +<P> +The last sunbeam had faded away and golden twilight filled the room. +Outside little day noises were dying out. +</P> + +<P> +"Grandma dear, don't you worry about me. I intend to marry a Green +Valley man if possible. But even if I didn't I'd always come back to +Green Valley." +</P> + +<P> +"No, you wouldn't. You couldn't, any more than Cynthia could. Cynthia +loved this town better even than you love it. Yet she is lying under +strange stars in a foreign land, far from her old home. Her father, +they say, is dying in California. I suppose the old Churchill place +will go now unless Cynthia's son comes back to take it over. But that +isn't likely." +</P> + +<P> +"Why—did Cynthia Churchill leave a son?" wondered Nanny. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes. He must be a few years older than you. He was born and raised +in India. 'Tisn't likely he'd come to Green Valley now that he's a man +grown. Still, if Joshua Churchill dies out there in California, that +boy will come into all his grandfather's property." +</P> + +<P> +"Well," Nanny stood up and walked to the window from which she could +see the fine old home of the Churchills, "if any one willed me a lovely +old place like that Churchill homestead I'd come from the moon to claim +it, let alone India." +</P> + +<P> +"Nanny, are you sure there's no boy now in Green Valley who could keep +you from roaming? I thought maybe Max Longman or Ronny Deering—" +</P> + +<P> +"No—no one yet, Grandma. I like them all—but love—no. Love, it +seems to me, must be something very different." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I know," sighed Grandma. +</P> + +<P> +When Uncle Tony returned from viewing the wreck he assured his townsmen +that it was a wreck of such beautiful magnitude that traffic on the +Northwestern would be tied up for twenty-four hours. It was feared +that Mr. Ainslee would not be able to get his train and would have to +drive five miles to the other railroad. +</P> + +<P> +However Uncle Tony was reckoning things from a Green Valley point of +view. As a matter of fact the wreckage was sufficiently cleared away +so that the eastbound trains were running on time. It was the +westbound ones that were stalled. The Los Angeles Limited Pullmans +stood right in the Green Valley station. They were still standing +there when Nanny and her father came to take the 10:27 east. +</P> + +<P> +Perhaps nothing could explain so well Nanny Ainslee's popularity as the +gathering of folks who came to see her off. +</P> + +<P> +Fanny had stopped at the drug store and bought some headache pills. +</P> + +<P> +"This excitement and hurry and you not scarcely eating any supper is +apt to give you a bad headache. They'll come handy. And here's some +seasick tablets. Martin says they're the newest thing out. And oh, +Nanny, when you're seeing all those new places and people just take an +extra look for me, seeing as I'll never know the color of the ocean." +</P> + +<P> +Uncle Tony was tending to Nanny's hand luggage and in his heart wishing +he could go along, even though he knew that one week spent away from +his beloved hardware store would be the death of him. +</P> + +<P> +It was a neighborly crowd that waited for the 10:27. And as it waited +Jim Tumley started singing "Auld Lang Syne." He began very softly but +soon the melody swelled to a clear sweetness that hushed the laughing +chatter and stilled the shuffling feet of the Pullman passengers who +crowded the train vestibules or strolled in weary patience along the +station platform. +</P> + +<P> +Then the 10:27 swung around the curve and the good-bys began. +</P> + +<P> +"So long, dear folks! I shall write. Don't you dare cry, Grandma. +I'll be back next lilac time. Remember, oh, just remember, all you +Green Valley folks, that I'll be back when the lilacs bloom again!" +</P> + +<P> +Nanny's voice, husky with laughter and tears, rippled back to the +cluster of old neighbors waving hats and handkerchiefs. They watched +her standing in the golden light of the car doorway until the train +vanished from their sight. Then they drifted away in twos and threes. +</P> + +<P> +From the dimmest corner of the observation platform a man had witnessed +the departure of Nanny Ainslee. He had heard Jim's song, had caught +the girl's farewells. And now he was delightedly repeating to himself +her promise—"I'll be back when the lilacs bloom again." +</P> + +<P> +Then quite suddenly he stepped from the train and made his way to where +the magenta-pink and violet lights of Martin's drugstore glowed in the +night. He bought a soda and some magazines and asked the druggist an +odd question. +</P> + +<P> +"When," asked the stranger, smiling, "will the lilacs bloom again in +this town?" +</P> + +<P> +Martin, who for hours had been rushing madly about, waiting on the +thirsty crowd of stalled visitors, stopped to stare. But he answered. +Something in the mysteriously rich face of the big, brown boy made him +eager to answer. +</P> + +<P> +"From the middle of next May on into early June." +</P> + +<P> +The stranger smiled his thanks in a way that made Martin look at his +clerk with a mournful eye. +</P> + +<P> +"Jee-rusalem! Now, Eddie, why can't you smile like that? Say, if I +had <I>that</I> fellow behind this soda counter I'd be doing a rushing +business every night." +</P> + +<P> +When the Limited was again winging its way toward the Golden West and +train life had settled down to its regular routine, one dining-car +waiter was saying to another: +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sah—the gentleman in Number 7 is sure the mighty-nicest white +man I eber did see. And he sure does like rice. Says he comes from +India where everybody eats it all the time. I ain' sure but what that +man ain' a sure-enough prince." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER II +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +SPRING IN GREEN VALLEY +</H3> + + +<P> +Traveling men have a poor opinion of it. Ministers of the gospel have +been known to despair of it. Socially ambitious matrons move out of it, +or, if that is not possible, despise it. Real estate men can not get +rich in it. And humorless folk sometimes have a hard, sad time of it in +Green Valley. +</P> + +<P> +But Uncle Tony, the slowest man in town but the very first at every fire +and accident, says that once, when the Limited was stalled at the Old +Roads Corner, a crowd of swells gathered on the observation platform and +sized up the town. +</P> + +<P> +One official, who—Uncle Tony says—couldn't have been anything less than +a Chicago alderman, said right out loud: +</P> + +<P> +"Great Stars! What peace—and cabbages!" +</P> + +<P> +And another said solemnly, said he, "This is the place to come to when +you have lost your last friend." And there was no malice, only a hungry +longing in his voice. +</P> + +<P> +The stylish, white-haired woman who, Uncle Tony guessed, must have been +the alderman's wife, said, "Oh—John! What healing, lovely gardens!" +</P> + +<P> +There's always a silly little wind fooling around the Old Roads Corners +and so you get all the sweet smells from Grandma Wentworth's herb garden +and all the heavenly fragrance that the flower gardens of this end of +town send out. +</P> + +<P> +Standing there you can look into any number of pretty yards but +especially Ella Higgins'. Of course Ella's yard and garden is a wonder. +It's been handed down from one old maid relative to another till in +Ella's time it does seem as if every wild and home flower that ever +bloomed was fairly rooted and represented there. It's in Ella's garden +that the first wild violets bloom; where the first spring beauty nods +under the bushes of bridal wreath; where the last chrysanthemum glows. +</P> + +<P> +Everybody in town got their lilies-of-the-valley roots and their yellow +roses from Ella. Her peonies and roses, pansies and forget-me-nots are +known clear over in Bloomingdale and bespoken by flower lovers in Spring +Road. And as for her tulips, well—there are little flocks of them +everywhere about, looking for all the world like crowds of gayly dressed +babies toddling off to play. +</P> + +<P> +The only time that poor Fanny Foster came near making trouble was when +she said that of course Ella's place was all right but that it had no +style or system, and that you couldn't have a proper garden without a +gardener. Ella had scolded Fanny's children for carelessly stripping the +lilacs. +</P> + +<P> +Fanny Foster is as wonderful in her way as Ella's garden, though not so +beautiful at first sight. Of course Green Valley loves Fanny Foster. +Green Valley has reason to. Fanny did Green Valley folks a great service +one still spring morning. But strangers just naturally misunderstand +Fanny. They see only a tall, sharp-edged wisp of a woman with a mass of +faded gold hair carelessly pinned up and two wide-open brown eyes fairly +aching with curiosity. You have to know Fanny a long time before the +poignant wistfulness of her clutches at your heart, before you can know +the singular sweetness of her nature. And even when you come to love her +you keep wishing that her collars were pinned on straight and that her +skirts were hung evenly at the bottom. There are those who remember the +time when Fanny was a beautiful girl, happy-go-lucky but always +kind-hearted. Now she is famous for her marvelous instinct for news +gathering and her great talent in weaving the odds and ends of +commonplace daily living into an interesting, gossipy yarn. Green Valley +without Fanny Foster would not be Green Valley, for she is a town +institution. +</P> + +<P> +However, before going any further into Green Valley's special characters +and institutions it would be well to get a general feel of the town into +one's mind. For it is only when you know how cozily Green Valley sets in +its hollows, how quaintly its old tree-shaded roads dip and wander about +over little sunny hills and through still, deep woods that you can guess +the charm of it, can believe in the joyousness of it. For Green Valley +is a joyous, sweetly human old town to those who love and understand it. +</P> + +<P> +Take an early spring day when the winter's wreck and rust and deadness +seem to be everywhere. Yet here in the Green Valley roads and streets +little warm winds are straying, looking for tulip beds and spring +borders. The sunshine that elsewhere looks thin and pale drops warmly +here into back yards and ripples ever so brightly up and down Rabbit's +Hill, where the hedges are turning green and David Allan is plowing. +</P> + +<P> +The willows back of Dell Parsons' house are budding and all aquiver with +the wildly glad, full-throated warblings of robins, bluebirds, red-winged +blackbirds and bobolinks. While somewhere from the swaying tops of last +year's reeds, up from the grassy slopes of Churchill's meadow, comes the +sweet, clear call of meadow larks. +</P> + +<P> +In the ditches the cushioning moss is green and through the brown tangled +weeds along Silver Creek the new grass is peeping. The sunny clearing +back of Petersen's woods will be full of mushrooms as the days deepen. +And already there are big golden dandelions in Widow Green's orchard. +</P> + +<P> +In these still, warm noons you can hear through the waiting, echoing air +the laughing shouts of playing children and the low-dropping honk of the +wild geese that in a scarcely quivering line are sailing northward across +the reedy lowlands which the gentle spring rains will turn into soft, +violet, misty marshes. +</P> + +<P> +The last bit of frost has thawed out of the old Glen Road and in the +young sunshine it seems to laugh goldenly as it climbs up, up to Jim +Gray's squatty, weathered little farmhouse. The eastern windows of this +little silver-gray house are gay with blossoming house plants and across +the back dooryard, flapping gently in the spring breeze, is a line of +gayly colored bed quilts. For Martha Gray has begun her house-cleaning. +</P> + +<P> +The woodsy part of Grove Street, the part that was opened up only five +years ago and is called Lovers' Lane because it curves and winds +mysteriously through a lovely bit of woodland, is already shimmering with +the life and beauty of spring. +</P> + +<P> +Down on Fern Avenue, which is a wide, grassy road and no avenue at all, +Uncle Roger Allan is carefully painting his chicken coops. Roger Allan +is a tall, twinkling, smooth-shaven old man, and he lives in a house as +twinkling and as tidy as himself. He is a bachelor, but years ago he +took little David from the dead arms of an unhappy, wild young stepsister +and has brought him up as his own. People used to know the reasons why +Roger Allan had never married but few remember now. Here he is at any +rate, painting his chicken coops and standing still every now and then to +stare off at Rabbit's Hill where his boy, tall, sturdy David Allan, is +plowing the warm, black fields. +</P> + +<P> +Up in a narrow lane, at the side window of a blind-looking little house, +sits Mrs. Rosenwinkle. She is German and badly paralyzed and she +believes that the earth is flat and that if you walked far enough out +beyond Petersen's pasture you would most certainly fall off. She also +believes that only Lutherans like herself can go to heaven. But to-day, +beside the open window, with a soft, wooing, eiderdown little breeze +caressing her face, she is happy and unworried, her eyes busy with the +tender world and the two chubby grandchildren tumbling gleefully about in +the still lane. +</P> + +<P> +In his little square shoe shop built out from his house Joe Baldwin is +arranging his spring stock in his two modest show windows. Joe is a +widower with two boys, a gentle voice, a gentle, wondering mind, and a +remarkable wart in the very center of his left palm. His shop is a +sunny, cheerful room with plenty of benches and chairs. The little shop +has a soft gray awning for the hot days and a wide-eyed competent stove +for cold ones. Nobody but Grandma Wentworth and such other folks like +Roger Allan ever suspect the real reason for all those comfortable +sitting-down places in Joe's shop. And Joe never tells a soul that it is +just an idea of his for keeping his own two boys and the boys of other +men under his eye. In Joe's gentle opinion the hotel and livery barn and +blacksmith shop are not exactly the best places for young boys to +frequent. But of course Joe never mentions such opinions out loud even +to the boys. He just makes his shop as inviting and homelike as +possible, keeps the daily papers handy on the counter and a basket of +nuts or apples maybe under his workbench. He is never lonely nor does he +miss a bit of news though he seldom goes anywhere but to the barber shop +on Saturdays and to church on Sundays. +</P> + +<P> +Out on her sunny cellar steps sits Mrs. Jerry Dustin, sorting onion sets +and seed potatoes. She is a little, rounded old lady with silvery hair, +the softest, smoothest, fairest of complexions, forget-me-not eyes and a +smile that is as gladdening as a golden daffodil. Few people know that +she has in her heart a longing to see the world, a longing so intense, a +life-long wanderlust so great that had she been a man it would have swept +her round the globe. But she has never crossed the State line. She has +big sons and daughters who all somehow have inherited their father's +stay-at-home nature. Her youngest boy, Peter, however, is only seventeen +and on him she has built her last hopes. He, like herself, has a gipsy +song in his heart and she often dreams of the places they will visit +together. +</P> + +<P> +And while she is waiting for Peter to grow up she travels about and +around Green Valley. She wanders far up the Glen Road into the deep +fairy woods between Green Valley and Spring Road. Here she strays alone +for hours, searching for ferns and adventure. +</P> + +<P> +Once a week she rides away to the city where she spends the morning in +the gay and crowded stores and the afternoon in the Art Institute. She +never wearies of seeing pictures. She never, if she can help it, misses +an exhibition, and whenever the day's doings have not tired her too much +this little old lady will steal off to the edge of the great lake and +dream of what lies in the world beyond its rim. She often wishes she +could paint the restless stretch of water but though she knows its every +mood and though she is a wonderful judge of pictures she can not +reproduce except in words the lovely nooks and beauty spots of her little +world. +</P> + +<P> +Perhaps it is this knowledge of her limitations that causes that little +strain of wistful sadness to creep into her voice sometimes and that +sends her very often out beyond the town, south along Park Lane to the +little Green Valley cemetery. +</P> + +<P> +She loves to read on the mossy stones the unchanging little histories, so +brief but so eloquent, some of them. The stone that interests her most +and that each time seems like a freshly new adventure is the simple shaft +that bears no name, no date, just the tenderly sweet and pathetic little +message: +</P> + +<P> + "I miss Thee so."<BR> +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Jerry Dustin knows very well for whom that low green bed was made +and who has had that little message of lonely love cut into stone. But +she longs to know the rest of the story. +</P> + +<P> +Sometimes she has a real adventure. It was here at the cemetery one day +that she met Bernard Rollins, the artist. He was out sketching the +fields that lie everywhere about, rounding and rolling off toward the +horizon with the roofs of homesteads and barns just showing above the +swells, with crows circling about the solitary clusters of trees, and men +and horses plodding along the furrows. +</P> + +<P> +No artist could have passed Mrs. Jerry Dustin by, for in her face and +about her was the beauty that she had for years fed her soul. So Rollins +spoke to her that summer day and they are friends now, great friends. +She visits his studio frequently and he tells her all about France or +Venice or wherever he has spent his busy summer. And she sits and +listens happily. +</P> + +<P> +Rollins bought out what used to be in Chicago's young days an old tavern +and half-way house. It was a dilapidated old ruin, crumbling away in a +shaggy old orchard full of gnarled and ancient apple trees, satin-skinned +cherry trunks, some plums and peaches, and tangled shrubs of all kinds. +</P> + +<P> +With the aid of his wife Elizabeth, some dollars and much work, Rollins +transformed the old ruin into the sort of a country place that one reads +about and imagines only millionaires may have. They say that when Old +Skinflint Holden saw the transformation he stood stock-still, then tied +his team to the artistic hitching post under the old elms and went in +search of Rollins. He found him in the orchard in the laziest of +hammocks literally worshipping the flowering trees all about him. Old +Skinflint Holden was awed. +</P> + +<P> +"Jehohasaphat! Bern, how did you do it?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh," smiled the artist, "we cleaned and patched it, put on a new bit +here and there and sort of nursed it into shape. Doc Philipps gave us +bulbs and seeds and loads of advice and then Elizabeth, I guess, sort of +loved it into a home." +</P> + +<P> +"Well—I guess," mused Skinflint Holden. "Must have cost you a pretty +penny?" +</P> + +<P> +"Why, no, it didn't. I'm telling you it wasn't a matter of dollars so +much as love. If you use plenty of that you can economize on the money +somewhat. Of course, it means work but love always means service, you +know." +</P> + +<P> +Old Skinflint Holden couldn't understand that sort of talk. It was said +that love was one of the things he knew nothing about. His great star +was money. He had had a chance to buy the old tavern but had seen no +possibilities in it of any kind. So he had passed it up and now a man +whose star was love and home had made a paradise of the hopeless ruin. +</P> + +<P> +"And I'll be danged if he didn't have a whole small field of them there +blue lilies that the children calls flags, over to one corner looking so +darn pretty, like a chunk of sky had dropped there. I'd a never believed +it if I hadn't saw it. I guess Doc Philipps didn't give him them." +</P> + +<P> +Rollins is a great crony of Doc Philipps who almost any day of the year +may be caught burrowing in the ground. For Doc Philipps is a tree maniac +and father to every little green growing thing. He knows trees as a +mother knows her children and he never sets foot outside his front gate +without having tucked somewhere into the many pockets about his big +person a stout trowel, some choice apple seeds, peach and cherry stones +or seedlings of trees and shrubs. In every ramble, and he is a great +walker, he searches for a spot where a tree seedling might grow to +maturity and the minute he finds such a place off comes his coat, back +goes his broad-rimmed hat and out comes the trowel and seed. Travelers +driving along the road and catching sight of the big man on his knees say +to each other, "There's Doc Philipps, planting another tree." +</P> + +<P> +Up in the big, prim old Howe house sits Madam Howe. She is called Madam +to distinguish her from her daughter-in-law, Mrs. George Howe. She is a +regal old lady of eighty-three and spends most of her time in her room +up-stairs where are gathered the wonderful heirlooms,—older, far older +than she. +</P> + +<P> +There is the mellow brown spinning wheel, and armchairs nearly two +hundred years old and a walnut table that was mixed up in countless +weddings and a beautifully carved old chest and a brocade-covered settee. +There are old, old books and family portraits and there is the wonderful +Madam herself, regal and silver-haired. If she likes you she will take +you to her great room and tell you about the Revolutionary War as it +happened in and to her family; and about her great ride westward in the +prairie schooner; about the Indians and the babyhood of great cities, and +the lovely wild flowers of the virgin prairie; about the wild animals, +the snakes, the pioneer men and women of what is now only the Middle West. +</P> + +<P> +She will take from out that age-darkened, beautiful chest dresses and +bits of lace and samplers like the one that hangs framed above her +writing desk and tells how it was stitched by one, +</P> + +<CENTER> +<P CLASS="noindent"> +ABIGAIL WINSLOW PAGE,<BR> +Age 13. +</P> +</CENTER> + +<BR> + +<P> +There is one thing you must always remember if you wish to stand in +Madam's good graces. You must never sit down on the brocade-covered +settee with the beautiful rose wreath hand-carved on its gracefully +curving walnut back. Some day when she gets to know you very well she +will tell you of the wonderful love stories that were enacted on that +settee. She will begin away, away back with some great-great-grandmother +or some great-grand-aunt and come gradually down to her own time and +history; and as she tells of the young years of her life, her eyes will +go dreaming off into the past and she will forget you entirely. And you +will slip away from that great room and leave her sitting there, regal +and silver haired, her face mellow and sweet with the golden memories of +far, by-gone days. +</P> + +<P> +You can wander in this happy, aimless fashion all about Green Valley, go +in and out its deep-rooted old homes, stroll through its tree-guarded old +streets, and at every turn taste romance and adventure, revel in beauty +of some sort. Even the old, red-brick creamery, ugly in itself, is a +thing of beauty when seen against a sunset sky. +</P> + +<P> +The people who pass you on the streets all smile and nod, stranger though +you are. And if you happen to be at the little undistinguished depot +just as the 6:10 pulls in, you will see pouring joyously out of it the +Green Valley men, those who every day go to the great city to work and +every night come thankfully back to their little home town to live. +</P> + +<P> +They hurry along in twos and threes, waving newspaper and hand greetings +to the home folks and the store proprietors who stand in their doorways +to watch them go by. +</P> + +<P> +There is a fragrant smell of supper in the air and a slight feel of +coming rain. Here and there a mother calls a belated child. Doors slam, +dogs bark and a baby frets loudly somewhere. In somebody's chicken coop +a frightened, dozing hen gargles its throat and then goes to sleep again. +The frogs along Silver Creek and in Wimple's pond are going full blast, +and in her fragrant herb garden stands Grandma Wentworth. She is looking +at the gold-smudged western sky and watching the sweet, spring night sift +softly down on Green Valley. +</P> + +<P> +She stands there a long time sensing the great tide of new life that is +flushing the world into a new, tingling beauty. She sees the lacy +loveliness of the birches, the budding green glory of her garden. Then +she smiles as she tells herself: +</P> + +<P> +"It won't be long now till the lilacs bloom again. Nanny will be here +soon now. And who knows! Cynthia's boy may come back to live in his +mother's old home." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER III +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE LAST OF THE CHURCHILLS +</H3> + + +<P> +Even in beautiful Los Angeles days can be rainy and full of gnawing +cold and gloom. +</P> + +<P> +On such a day Joshua Churchill lay dying. He could have died days +before had he cared to let himself do so. But he was holding on grimly +to the life he no longer valued and held off as grimly the death he +really craved. He was waiting for the coming of the boy who was so +soon to be the last of the Churchills. +</P> + +<P> +He meant, this grim old man, to live long enough to greet the boy whom +he remembered first as a baby, then as a little chap of ten, and later +as a shy boy of seventeen. +</P> + +<P> +Joshua Churchill had been to India several times. But he had never +stayed long. He said that no man who had spent the greater part of his +life in Green Valley could ever be happy or feel at home anywhere else. +</P> + +<P> +Joshua Churchill went to India to see his daughter and grandson; but +mostly to coax that daughter's wonderful husband to give up his +fanatically zealous work among the heathen of the Orient and come and +live in peace and plenty in a little Yankee town where there was a drug +store and a post office and a mossy gray old stone church with a mellow +bell in its steeple. +</P> + +<P> +The wonderful and big son-in-law always listened respectfully to his +big Yankee father-in-law. Then he would smile and point to the little +brown babies lying sick in their mothers' arms. +</P> + +<P> +"Somebody," he would say gently, "must help and heal and neighbor with +these people." +</P> + +<P> +As there was no answer that could be made to this the Yankee +father-in-law said nothing. But the very last time he was in India he +looked sharply at his daughter and then said wearily and bitterly: +</P> + +<P> +"Sinner and saint—we men are all alike. We each in our own way kill +the women we love. Cynthia is dying for a sight of Green Valley and +Green Valley folks." +</P> + +<P> +At that Cynthia's husband cried out. But Joshua Churchill did not stay +to argue. He went away and never came back. He wanted of course to go +back to Green Valley. But he could not bear to live alone in the big +house where he had once been so happy. So he went instead into exile. +And now he was dying in California. +</P> + +<P> +As for Cynthia's husband, he discovered when it was too late to do any +good that while he had been saving the souls and the children of alien +women and men he had let the woman who was dearer to him than life die +slowly and unnoticed. Saints have always done that and they always +will. +</P> + +<P> +Joshua Churchill meant to stay alive long enough to explain the +shortcomings of both saints and sinners to the boy who was the last of +the Churchills. He had half a mind to exact a promise from the boy. +He meant too to tell him a long and a rather strange story and implore +him to beware of a number of things. +</P> + +<P> +But when Cynthia's son,—tall, bronzed and serene, smiled down on the +old man who even in death had the look of a master, the warnings, the +bitterness melted away and Joshua Churchill smiled back and sighed +gratefully. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, son,—I don't know as that saint father of yours and your +sinning granddad made such a mess of things after all. It's something +to give the world a man. Go back home to Green Valley and marry a +Green Valley girl." +</P> + +<P> +And without bothering to say another word Joshua Churchill died. +</P> + +<P> +Nanny came back to her valley town when the budded lilacs dripped with +rain and the wooded hillsides were blurred with spring mists. +</P> + +<P> +But Green Valley rain never bothered Nanny Ainslee. Those who were not +out to greet her telephoned as soon as they heard she was back home +again. +</P> + +<P> +And just as she had gone to help pack, Grandma Wentworth came to help +unpack. There were three trunks besides those Nanny had taken, from +Green Valley. Nanny laughed and chuckled as she explained. +</P> + +<P> +"The joke's on father. We met up with a nice American chap on our +travels. He was so likable that father, who was pretty homesick by +that time and would have loved anything American, fell in love with +him. I can't quite understand why I didn't lose my head too. I came +mighty near it once or twice. But the minute I'd think of that boy +here in Green Valley I'd grow cool and calm. That's all that saved me, +I believe. But father was quite taken with him and being a man he felt +sure that I must be. He was so sure that my maiden days were over that +he dared to be funny. One day he sent up these three brand new trunks +to the hotel. Said I might as well get my trousseau while I was +gadding about this time. Well—I was pretty mad for a minute. But I +concluded that father wasn't the only one in our family who is fond of +a joke. So I just blushed properly and went off shopping. And I tell +you, Grandma, Green Valley will just grow cross-eyed looking at the +pretties that I have in these treasure chests. I showed Dad every +mortal thing I bought and asked his advice and was oh, so shy—and +wondered if he just <I>could</I> let me spend so much; and Dad just laughed +and said he guessed an only daughter could be a bit extravagant, and to +just go ahead. So I smiled again shyly and demurely and went ahead. +And when not so much as a bit of ribbon or a chiffon veil could be +squeezed in anywhere I shut those trunks and sat on them and swung my +feet and bet Dad that I wouldn't marry that boy after all. And he was +so sure that he was rid of me at last and that he could start out on +his next trip blissfully free and alone that he bet me Jim Gray's +Gunshot that I'd be married in six months to the gentleman in question. +Of course it was a disgraceful business, the two of us betting on a +thing like that, but somehow we never thought of that, we were so busy +teasing each other. Well, of course Dad lost. I refused that nice +chap three times in one week. And here I am, heart-free still, with +three trunks of booty and the finest, blackest, and swiftest little +horse in the county—mine. This has certainly been a profitable trip! +Poor Dad, he's so delightfully old-fashioned. He does so believe in +early marriages and husbands and wedding veils. And he thinks that +twenty-three is absolutely a grewsome age. Poor Dad! And he says too +that for what I have done to him in this trunk deal I shall be duly +punished. That the good Lord who looks after the fathers of willful, +old-maidish daughters will see to that. Why, he has gone so far as to +say that he wouldn't be surprised if I wound up by marrying some weird +country minister. Fancy that! Why, that from father is almost a +curse. And he's worried sick about my riding Gunshot. But I shall +manage. So expect to see me dash up to your gate in great style any +day now." +</P> + +<P> +"Nanny," warned Grandma, "I don't trust that horse either. You'd +better be mighty careful. That horse isn't mean but it's young and +scary." +</P> + +<P> +Nan however laughed at fear and rode all about and around Green Valley +town. And then one evening when she was least watchful and tired from +the long day's sport, a glaring red motor came honking unexpectedly +around the corner. So sudden was its appearance, so startling its body +in the sunset light, so shrill its screeching siren, that the young +horse reared. And Nan, caught unprepared, was helpless. +</P> + +<P> +From the various groups of people standing about figures detached +themselves and shot across the square. But before any one could reach +her or even see how it happened, a tall stranger was holding the daring +girl close against his breast with one arm, and the quivering young +horse with the other. +</P> + +<P> +He was reassuring the frightened animal and looking quietly down at the +girl's face against his breast. Under that quiet look Nan's blue-white +lips flushed with life and she tried to smile gratefully. When he +smiled back and said, "So you <I>did</I> get back by lilac time," Nan was +well enough to wonder what he meant. And the little crowd of rescuers +arrived only just in time to hear Nanny thanking him. +</P> + +<P> +But when he asked her where in Green Valley town Mary Wentworth lived +everybody stared and listened. Even Nan came near staring. But after +the puzzled look her face broke into a smile. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—you mean Grandma Wentworth?" +</P> + +<P> +He smiled too and said, "Perhaps. I am a stranger in Green Valley. +But my mother was a Green Valley girl. She was Cynthia Churchill and +Mary Wentworth was her dearest friend." +</P> + +<P> +"Then you are—why, you must be—" stammered Nanny. +</P> + +<P> +"I am Cynthia Churchill's son." +</P> + +<P> +"From India?" questioned Nan. +</P> + +<P> +"From India," he said quietly. +</P> + +<P> +From out the group of Green Valley folks, now dim in the May twilight, +a voice spoke. +</P> + +<P> +"You may come from India but if you are Cynthia Churchill's son you are +a Green Valley man and this is home. So I say—welcome home." +</P> + +<P> +Roger Allan, straight and tall and speaking with a sweetness in his +voice those listening had never heard before, stepped up to the young +man with outstretched hand. +</P> + +<P> +The young stranger looked for a moment at the dimming streets, into the +kindly faces about him, and then shook hands gladly. +</P> + +<P> +"It is good to be home," he said, "but I wish I had mother here with +me." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A RAINY DAY +</H3> + + +<P> +On a rainy day Green Valley is just as interesting as it is in the +sunshine. Somehow though the big trees sag and drip and the wind sighs +about the corners there is nothing mournful about the streets. +</P> + +<P> +The children go to school just as joyously in raincoats and rubber +boots. Their round glad faces, minus a tooth here and there, smile up +at you from under big umbrellas. After the school bell rings the +streets do get quiet but there is nothing depressing about that; for as +you pass along you see at doors and windows the contented faces of busy +women. +</P> + +<P> +Old Mrs. Walley sits at her up-stairs front window sewing carpet rags. +Grandma Dudley at her sitting room window is darning her +grandchildren's stockings and carefully watching the street. Whenever +anybody passes to whom she wants to talk she taps on the window with +her thimble. She is a dear entertaining old soul but hard to get away +from. Women with bread at home waiting to be put into pans and men +hungry for their supper try not to let Grandma Dudley catch sight of +them. +</P> + +<P> +Bessie Williams always makes cinnamon buns or doughnuts on rainy days. +She always leaves her kitchen door open while she is doing this because +she says she likes to hear the rain while she is working—that it +soothes her nerves. +</P> + +<P> +So as you come up from around Bailey's strawberry patch and Tumley's +hedge you get a whiff of such deliciousness as makes your mouth water. +And more than likely Bessie sees you and comes running out with a few +samples of her heavenly work. As you dispose of those cinnamon buns +you forget that Bessie's voice is a trifle too high and too sweet, and +that she is inclined to be at times a bit overly religious and too +watchful of what she calls "vice" in people. +</P> + +<P> +Over in front of the hotel Seth Curtis is standing up in his wagon and +sawing his horses' mouths cruelly. Seth has been so viciously +mistreated in his youth that he now abuses at times the very things +that he loves. He has paid two hundred and fifty dollars apiece for +those horses and is mighty proud of them. But Seth's temper is never +good on a rainy day. Rain means no teaming and a money loss. Seth is +a mite too conscious of money. At any rate, the loss of even a dollar +makes him a sullen and at the least provocation an angry man. He isn't +liked much except by his wife and children. +</P> + +<P> +In his home Seth is gentle and kind. Maybe because here he finds the +love and trust that all his life he has craved and been denied. Few of +his neighbors know how he laughs and romps and sings with his children +and what wonderful yarns he tells them, all made up out of his own head. +</P> + +<P> +He is known to come from York State and has a Yankee shrewdness that +some people say can at times be called something else. He is wide and +square-shouldered though short, has a round stubborn head of reddish +hair with a promising bald spot, close-set blue eyes and an annoying, +almost an insulting habit of paying all his bills promptly and asking +odds and favors of nobody. +</P> + +<P> +To-day he was to have taken a load of stones, granite niggerheads of +all sizes, up to Colonel Stratton's place. The Colonel is going to +make a fern bed around his summer house. +</P> + +<P> +Colonel Stratton is a real military colonel. He wears burnsides and +they are very becoming. He has the most beautifully located residence +in Green Valley and like Doc Philipps has some of the most beautiful +trees in town. The great silver-leaf poplar guarding the wide front +lawns and the magnificent hardwood maples are the pride of the +colonel's heart. +</P> + +<P> +The colonel has a cultivated garden that keeps his gardener pretty +busy. But the wild-flower garden along the rambling old north fence +the colonel tends himself. In June it is a hedge of lovely wild roses +followed a little later by masses of purple phlox. Then come the +meadow lilies and the painted cup and so on, until in late October you +can not see the old fence for the goldenrod, asters and gentians. +</P> + +<P> +Today the colonel hoped to work on his fern bed but the weather being +what it is he takes instead from his well-filled book shelves "The +Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" and settles down to a day of +solid joy. +</P> + +<P> +In the big, softly stained house that stands in the solemn shade of +immense pines, just diagonally across from the colonel's house, lives +and labors Joshua Stillman, a man with the most wonderful memory, the +readiest tongue when there is real need of it, a little man brimful of +the most varied information and the sharpest humor. +</P> + +<P> +For forty years and more he has been Green Valley's self-appointed +librarian. He draws no salary except the joy of doing what he loves to +do and he squanders, as his friends truly suspect, much secret money of +his own on it. The library is housed in the old church in a room so +small and dark that it hides the big work of this little man. +</P> + +<P> +Joshua Stillman must be old but nobody ever thinks of what his age +might be, he is so very much alive. He goes to the city every day and +comes back early every afternoon. As he so seldom talks about himself +nobody knows exactly what he does except that it has to do with books +and small print. +</P> + +<P> +Like Madam Howe, Joshua Stillman comes from the Revolutionary War +district and has great family traditions to uphold. He upholds them +with great humor. Not only is he full of old war and family lore, but +he has been mixed up with things literary. He has known men such as +Lowell and tells yarns about Emerson and Oliver Wendell Holmes. +</P> + +<P> +He too came West in a prairie schooner and remembers all its wildness, +its uncouthness, its railroadless state. And he tells marvellous +stories about snakes, Indians and the little Chicago town built out on +the mudflats. He remembers very well indeed the steady stream of +ox-teams toiling over the few crude state roads. And he has in his +house rare volumes, valuable editions of famous works. He lets you +examine these if he thinks you are trustworthy and have a gentle way +with books. +</P> + +<P> +There is another rare soul, the Reverend Alexander Campbell, who must +be introduced this rainy spring day. He is a retired Green Valley +minister and is full of humor and wisdom. He is an easily traced +descendant of the Scottish Stuarts. On a rainy day you will always +find him busy writing up the history of his family. Not that he +himself cares a fig for his genealogy. He is writing the book because +it gives him something to do and earns him a little peace from the +women folks. +</P> + +<P> +He is a man whom the Lord has seen fit to try with a host of female +relatives, all family proud. He can fight the Devil and has done so +quite gallantly in four or five volumes of really good old-fashioned +sermons, "books," as he will tell you with a twinkle in his eye, "that +nobody could or would read nowadays." But he can not fight the women +of his family, so with a mournful chuckle he sits down every rainy day +and labors mightily on this great "historical work." +</P> + +<P> +On sunny days he goes about his grounds, petting his trees and his +chickens, and working in his garden. He has several ingenious methods +of fighting weeds and raises the earliest, best and latest sweet corn +in Green Valley. +</P> + +<P> +But men like the Colonel and Joshua Stillman and the Reverend Alexander +Campbell are representatives of Green Valley's leisure class. They +give Green Valley its high peace, its aristocratic flavor. But they +are a little remote from the town's workday life, being given to dreams +and memories and scholarly pursuits. They know little of the doings +and talks that go on in Billy Evans' livery barn, or the hotel. They +do, of course, go to the barber shop, the bank and the postoffice, and +always when abroad give courteous greeting to every townsman. But they +have never sat in the smoky, red-painted blacksmith shop or among the +patriarchs and town wits who in summer keep open-air sessions on the +wide, inviting platform in front of Uncle Tony's hardware store, and in +winter hold profound meetings around the store's big, glowing stove. +</P> + +<P> +Uncle Tony's is the most social spot in town and is from a +news-gathering point of view most ideally situated. Sitting in one of +the smooth-worn old armchairs that Uncle Tony always keeps handy, you +can view the very heart of Green Valley's business life. Without +turning your head scarcely you can keep an eye on Martin's drug store, +keep tab on the comings and goings of the town's two doctors, and the +hotel's arriving and departing guests. If a commotion of any kind +occurs in front of Robert Hill's general store you see all the details +without losing count of the various parties who go in and out of Green +Valley's new bank. +</P> + +<P> +Twice a day the active part of Green Valley dribbles into the +post-office where friends instantly pair off and mere acquaintances +stand idly by and discuss the weather. Besides its mail, Green Valley +usually buys two cents' worth of yeast and a dozen of baker's buns and +then goes down the street and orders its regular groceries at Jessup's. +</P> + +<P> +Jessup's has been the one Green Valley grocery store ever since the +flood or thereabout, so venerable an establishment is it. Green Valley +would as soon think of changing its name as permitting a new grocer to +open up a rival store. And nobody dreams of disloyalty when buying +trifles at the post-office. In fact housewives are openly glad that +Dick, the postmaster, has taken to keeping strictly fresh yeast for +their leisure days and nice bakery things for times of stress and +unexpected company. +</P> + +<P> +Dick Richards is a small, smiling, curly-headed man who looks older +than he should. This is because he wears a big man's mustache and is a +self-made boy. His parents died when he was barely old enough to +realize his loss and since then he has fought the world without a +single weapon unless cheerfulness and a giant patience can be called +weapons. Small, ungifted, he early learned to be content with little. +But side by side with this cheerful content is always the giant hope of +great things to come. And so though Green Valley buys only its yeast +and buns over his little counter he is happy and wraps each purchase up +carefully. And all the time he is thoughtfully, carefully setting out +other handy things and aids to the harassed housewife. For with his +giant patience Dick is waiting,—waiting and planning for a time that +is coming, that he knows must come. He talks these matters over with +no one except Joe Baldwin. He and Joe are great friends. Joe's little +shop is such a restful, hopeful place and Joe himself a gentle rather +than a loud and swearing man. One can talk things over joyfully with +Joe and feel sure of having one's confidence understood and kept. Like +Joe, Dick shrinks a little from the noisy, wholly earthy atmosphere of +the livery barn and blacksmith shop. He and Joe often go together of a +Saturday to the barber shop. They usually stay after closing hours for +the barber is their mutual friend. +</P> + +<P> +This barber, John Gans, is a talker, a somewhat fierce and vehement +little man who lectures on many subjects but mostly on human rights and +politics. Joe and Dick, both silent men, look with awe at John's great +mental and discoursive powers. And because his views are theirs they +listen with something like joyful gratitude to hear their own thoughts +so clearly and fearlessly expressed. +</P> + +<P> +The fiery little barber is thought by some to be a German anarchist and +by others a Russian socialist. Joe and Dick have been repeatedly +warned against him. But they are his loyal friends at all times. This +three-cornered friendship is little understood by the town and +ridiculed as a childish thing by the great minds that foregather at +Uncle Tony's. +</P> + +<P> +But Grandma Wentworth remarked one Saturday afternoon, right in the +heart of town too, when Main Street was so crowded that everything that +was said aloud would be told and retold at church the next moraine and +repeated through the countryside the week following,—pointing to Joe, +Dick and John who all three happened to be going to the bank for +change,—"There go Green Valley's three good little men. And that +makes me think. I have another letter from Nanny Ainslee from Italy +enclosing foreign stamps for John." +</P> + +<P> +Now until then nobody knew that John Gans was collecting stamps. But +that's Grandma Wentworth. She always knows things about people that +nobody else knows. And when any Green Valley folks go a-traveling they +sooner or later write to Grandma Wentworth. Sooner or later they get +homesick for Green Valley and they write for news to the one person +who, they know, will not fail to answer. +</P> + +<P> +Of course some of them, like Jamie Danby, get into trouble. Jamie ran +away from home with a third-rate show. The show got stranded somewhere +in the western desert and Jamie wanted to come home. He knew that his +mother would be glad to see him but he wasn't at all sure of his +father. So he wrote to Grandma Wentworth, begging her to fix things +up. And she did. +</P> + +<P> +And there was Tommy Dudley who went away home-steading somewhere out +West and who writes regularly to Grandma Wentworth in this fashion: +</P> + +<P> +". . . for heaven's sake send me your baking-powder biscuit recipe and +how do you make buckwheat pancakes, and send me all kinds of vegetable +seeds and what's good for chicken lice and a sore throat, and tell +Carrie Bailey I ain't forgot her and that as soon as I've got things +going half-way straight here I'll come back and get her. Just now the +dog, the mules and chickens and a family of mice and I are all living +peacefully together in the one room but we're awful healthy if a good +appetite is any kind of a sign. I can't write to Carrie because her +folks open all her letters and they'd nag her into marrying that old +knock-kneed, squint-eyed, fat-necked son-of-a-gun of an Andrew Langly, +if they thought she was having anything to do with a worthless heathen +cuss like me. And say, Grandma, throw in some of your flower seeds, +those right out of your own garden, you know, the tall ones along the +fence and the little ones with the blue eyes and the still white ones +that smell so sweet. You don't know how lonesome I get off here. I've +got that picture of you in the sunbonnet right where it's handy, but +how I wish I had a picture of you without the sunbonnet so's I could +see your face, and say, Grandma, since I've been alone out here I've +come to see the sense in praying now and then, and tell Freddy Williams +I'll knock the stuffin's out of him when I hit town which will be in +about two years at the latest. He knows what for. Is Hank Lolly still +talking his way into three square meals a day and drinks, and is all +the news still ground over at Uncle Tony's gossip factory and is Mert +Hagley as big a tightwad as ever and is it true that Billy Evans +married a red-headed girl from Bloomingdale and started a livery barn, +and has Green Valley got a minister yet that's suitable to you and +Uncle Roger Allan? I'll have to stop and run out to the mail box with +this. The nearest one is twenty-five miles away but that's near in +this country and now for pity's sake, Grandma, don't forget …" +</P> + +<P> +She didn't forget a thing. The messages were all delivered, the seeds +sent off and every question fully answered. Grandma did more than +that. She had Nanny Ainslee take pictures of the various Green Valley +institutions while going full blast. How Tommy laughed at the familiar +faces in Uncle Tony's armchairs and at Hank Lolly leaning up against +the livery barn, and how homesick he grew as he looked at the crowd +getting off at the station, and the school children playing in the old +school yard where he used to play. The picture of Grandma Wentworth +and Carrie standing on Grandma's front porch hurt his throat and shook +him strangely. That was Tommy Dudley. +</P> + +<P> +And there was Susie Melton. Grandma saved and remade Susie that time +she went to New York to see the world. Susie had taught a country +school for twenty years, ever since she was sixteen, and that trip to +New York was her first vacation. Susie was an innocent soul and the +very second day in the great city some heartless thief took everything +out of her purse but a two-cent stamp. Susie was panic-stricken and +the only thing she could think of was Grandma Wentworth's face. So she +took that stamp and sent a letter to Green Valley and it was Grandma +Wentworth who really managed that vacation though to this day nobody +but she herself knows how and she won't tell. Susie came back so +rejuvenated, with such color in her cheeks, such brightness in her +eyes, and so much snap and spunk in her system that Jake Tuttle up and +married her two months after she came home. And he's been happy ever +since for in spite of her school-teaching handicap Susie has turned out +to be a born cook and housewife. And as if to make up to her those +twenty colorless years Providence sent Susie twin boys at the end of +her first year and twin girls at the end of the third. +</P> + +<P> +This blossoming out of little drab Susie Melton was a shock to Green +Valley. But Grandma Wentworth wasn't a mite surprised and said she +knew that Susie would come into her own some day. As for Jake, he is +so in love with his rosy little wife and his four good-looking children +that he just goes on raising bumper crops without hardly knowing how he +does it. And he says he doesn't hanker much after heaven; that home is +plenty good enough for him. And when he goes to town Jake takes care +to tie his team in front of Billy Evans' place instead of the hotel. +</P> + +<P> +"Not that I can't take a drink or two and stop," he explained to Billy, +"but I have good cider and buttermilk and Susie's grape juice to home +and the smartest of us ain't any too wise while we stand beside a bar. +And I'd ruther go home dead than go back to Susie and the children the +least bit silly with liquor. When the Almighty sends a man like me a +family like mine He's got something in His mind and I ain't agoing to +spoil things just for a drink or two of slops." +</P> + +<P> +So on rainy days Billy's office is the gathering place for such men as +find the atmosphere in the hotel and blacksmith shop a little too +fragrantly spirited for their eventual domestic happiness. +</P> + +<P> +Not that Billy is a teetotaler. No, indeed. He has his drink whenever +he wants it. And he good-naturedly permits such staggering wretches as +the hotel refuses to accommodate to sleep it off in his barns. And he +is the only man in Green Valley who ever seriously hired Hank Lolly and +kept him sober twelve hours at a stretch. The other business men make +considerable fun of Billy's hired help; the trifling boys he hires, +boys that everybody else has tried and sent packing. Billy says +nothing though he did explain fully to Grandma Wentworth once. +</P> + +<P> +"You see it's like this, Grandma. I ain't fixed to pay fancy wages +just yet and those kids that everybody runs down ought to be off the +streets doing something. Of course some of them <I>are</I> trifling. But I +ain't such a stickler for sharp-edged goodness myself nor in any way at +all virtuous. I'm terrible easy-going myself and I know just how kids +like Charlie Pinley feel working for a man, a careful, exact man like +Mr. James D. Austin. By gosh! if I had to work a whole week for Mr. +Austin I'd kill myself. Never could stand too much neatness and +worrying about time being money and human nature too full of meanness. +No, sir,—I can't live like that. I guess maybe it's because I'm kind +of no-account myself that I understand these kids and they understand +me. They all like horses same as me and I pay them all I can afford +and will do more for them when things pick up and grow. +</P> + +<P> +"Now there's people as laugh about me hiring Hank Lolly. I guess it's +the first time Hank has ever held a job longer than a week. But I tell +you, Grandma, I like Hank and I understand him. And I don't ever think +I'm fit enough myself to be forever preaching at him about reforming. +I figure that what a man eats and drinks is none of my business in a +way. But I did explain to Hank that if he would come and work for me +I'd furnish him with so many drinks every day and meals and a +comfortable place to sleep. I showed him that it was better to be sure +of a few drinks every day than to get blind drunk on a week's wages and +then go weeks maybe without a decent spree, without decent meals, maybe +without underwear and an overcoat. And Hank saw the sense of that. He +gets his meals up at the house. My old woman (Billy's wife was a +pretty girl of twenty-three and still a bride) sides in with what I'm +doing and she sets Hank down every day to three square meals. And a +man just can't hold so much liquor on a comfortably filled stomach. +Anyhow, Hank is doing fine and I'm putting a few dollars in the bank +unbeknownst for him. I can't trust him just yet with any noticeable +amount of cash. But I'm never down on him for his drinking. No, sir! +Every time he feels that he must get drunk or die why he just comes up +and tells me and I get him whatever he thinks he needs for his jag and +let him get full right here where I can watch him. Why—Grandma, Hank +has an easier life than I have. He doesn't need to worry about +anything and he knows it. And I'll be goshed if I don't think he's +improving. He don't need a jag near so often as he used to and I can +trust him now with any kind of work. Why, only last week I gave him a +moving job, a big one, and sent him off twenty miles with my two best +teams. And he brought those loads of furniture back O. K., dry and +without a scratch, though I couldn't sleep all night listening to the +buckets of rain dashing against the house and thinking of Hank drunk +out there in it with the furniture and wagons in splinters and the +horses dead maybe. And honest, when I saw him pull up into the barns, +I just hauled him off that seat and—well—I just said things, told him +what I thought of him and how I appreciated what he'd done. 'And now, +Hank,' I says, 'you can have the greatest old jag you've ever planned +on for this.' +</P> + +<P> +"And I'm goshed if he didn't laugh out kind of funny and says he, +'Billy, I'm so goldarned wet right now that I couldn't stand another +drop of wetness anywhere. But all these five hours that the rain was +a-sloshing me I kept thinking of them there apple dumplings with cream +that Mrs. Evans makes (Hank always calls the old woman Mrs. Evans). +So, Billy, if it's all the same to you and I could get full on them +there apple dumplings, why, them's my choice.' +</P> + +<P> +"Well—say, I just jumped to the telephone and I guess the old woman +was making apple dumplings before I got through talking. Anyway, Hank +filled up so that he said he felt like a flour barrel with an apple +tree a-sprouting out of it. And Doc Philipps says it's a good sign, +Hank liking sweet things that way, because a man soaked in alcohol +can't abide sweets. +</P> + +<P> +"And so that's Hank. Now this week I hired that little spindle-legged +Barney boy. I hired him to keep this dumbed office clean so's my old +woman wouldn't raise such hell every time she steps in here. I'm +goshed if this here stove don't get fuller of ashes quicker than any +other stove in Green Valley. And you know the boys who come in here do +spit about careless like and that dumbed screen door is always open and +the calendars do get specked up considerable. And the old woman is +just where I don't want her being upset about anything. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I hired that Barney boy to keep the place clean. You know that +So-and-So (we won't mention any names) fired him because he said the +kid stole money. Well, now—Grandma, you know that's a hard thing to +start out a boy in life with in a town of this size, especially a +little spindle-legged one at that. I felt real sorry for the young one +so I calls him in here day before yisterday and I says: +</P> + +<P> +"'Look here, Barney, could you keep this place clean?' +</P> + +<P> +"'Sure,' he says. +</P> + +<P> +"'All right, then sail in now. The broom's right behind the door +somewheres and scarcely used and there's sawdust and rags somewheres in +the barn. Ask Hank about them. And Barney,' I says, 'here's the money +in this right-hand drawer. Sometimes people come in when everybody's +out and you might have to make change.' +</P> + +<P> +"The boy kind of flushed but I didn't let on I noticed. I only said, +'You know, Barney, I'm just beginning this business and I'm poor so you +keep a sharp eye on the change and help me get this business going +lickety-split so's we'll all be rich together. For when the profits go +up here the wages are going up. It isn't just my livery barn, Barney, +but yours, too, so just you go to it and if ever you want anything or +make a mistake just you come and tell me and it'll be all right.' +</P> + +<P> +"Now, Grandma, that's all I said to that young one and I'll be goshed +if I don't think that kid's turning out to be the best bet I've made. +But, of course, I always think that about every one of them. But, +honestly, Grandma, Barney has brought in five new customers and last +week he kept chinning and holding on to a sixth man that come in here +until I came in and made the deal. Never let go of him a minute and +just entertained him to kill time and give me a chance to get here. +And I'm going to buy some books to learn myself and Barney bookkeeping. +We can't none of us keep books here and that dumbed account book is +lost every time you want it and I've got the poorest memory. Of +course, now and then a party comes in and tries to get out of paying +but the boys usually settle him and so I don't lose much that way. But +the old woman wants me to do this slick and proper and her word goes. +So Barney and I are going to study. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm telling you all this, Grandma, because you always did understand +my crazy way of doing things ever since that time when you sent me to +the store for that can of molasses and I give the money to the tramp +instead. Remember?" +</P> + +<P> +Billy laughed heartily at the memory and Grandma Wentworth laughed, +too, laughed so hard that she had to wipe her eyes. And she smiled all +the way home. +</P> + +<P> +"Some day," said Grandma Wentworth to her old friend and neighbor, +Roger Allan, "I'll ask some minister to preach a sermon on 'God's +Humor.' I suppose that the Almighty gets so tired running things just +so and listening to petitions for sunshine and petitions for rain and +to prayers for automobiles and diamonds and interest on mortgages and +silk stockings, death and babies that some days he just gets tired of +being a serious God and shuffles things up for a joke. And, mark me, +Roger, that boy, Billy Evans, is just one of God's tender jokes. If +only people would see that and laugh. +</P> + +<P> +"Now, Billy has no money sense, no business ability. That's what the +real business men like George Hoskins and all the old blessed Solomons +at Uncle Tony's say. Yet Billy is making money. His business is +growing just because without knowing it Billy has got hold of the +biggest force in the world to run his business. He's just using +love,—plain, old-fashioned love,—and love is making money for Billy. +He's picked out of the very gutters all the human waste and rubbish +that the others, the wise business men, threw there and with the town's +worst drunkard and half a dozen mistreated, misborn, misunderstood boys +he's playing the business game and winning. He's got the knack of +making his help feel like partners and he's so square and sensible in +his dealings with them that they are all ready to die for him. Now if +that isn't the greatest kind of a business gift I want to know. +</P> + +<P> +"And every time I think of smiling, untidy Billy Evans with a pretty +wife as neat as wax, living in a house that she has made as sweet and +pretty as a picture—well—I just laugh. Nobody but God could have +arranged things and balanced them up like that. Talk about any of us +improving things in this world! If we'd only learn to mind our own +business as well as God minds His." +</P> + +<P> +But very few besides Grandma Wentworth understood Billy and his livery +barn. Even Joe Baldwin failed to see just what Billy was doing in his +droll, unconscious, warm-hearted way. Still Joe liked Billy. In fact, +everybody liked Billy. And he was welcomed everywhere and nowhere more +than in George Hoskins' blacksmith shop. +</P> + +<P> +Next to the bank building George Hoskins was considered the most solid +thing in town. He was the brawny blacksmith and people said a very +rich man. He was big in every way. Big in body, big in temper, big in +his friendships, big in his drinks. He was indeed so big a man that he +did not know how to be mean or little in any way. He did not know his +own great strength nor think much of the weakness of his fellows. His +grand proportions and great simplicity were what attracted men to him. +Women did not know and so could not like him. +</P> + +<P> +To them George Hoskins was a great, grimy ogre. George, big in all +things, was big in his love for the tiny woman who was his wife. Other +women George did not see though he spoke to them on the street. He had +pleaded on bended knees for the love of his tiny woman and when he got +her all other women became just strange shadows. So only his wife and +Doc Philipps knew how tender a heart was his. +</P> + +<P> +Green Valley housewives caught glimpses of this man's great figure +towering above the roaring forge and saw the crowd of lesser men, their +husbands, gathered about him. They went home and told each other that +George Hoskins was a big, rude brute, that he drank like a fish and +would bring the town to ruin, for he was the village president. +</P> + +<P> +And while they were saying these things about George Hoskins he was +perhaps throwing out of his shop some smug traveling man who had +stepped into it to get in out of the rain and had mistakenly tried to +make himself at home there by telling a filthy yarn that sullied all +womanhood. +</P> + +<P> +These then are a few of the many human attractions of Green Valley. +They are listed here to give the right sort of setting and the proper +feel to this story of Green Valley life. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER V +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CYNTHIA'S SON +</H3> + + +<P> +So Cynthia's son came home and Green Valley took him to its heart and +loved him as it had loved his mother long ago. Everywhere he was +spoken of as Cynthia's boy and no one seemed to remember that he was +born in heathen India instead of in the old porticoed house on the +Churchill farm. +</P> + +<P> +Green Valley knew that very first week, of course, that Cynthia's son +was very nearly twenty-eight years old and that his full name was John +Roger Churchill Knight. But what it did not know for some weeks was +that among other interesting things Cynthia's son was a minister, a +duly certified preacher of the gospel. It was remembered in a general +way that Cynthia's husband had been some sort of a wonderful foreign +missionary or something; but a man who was Joshua Churchill's only +grandchild and heir needed no other ancestor. So Green Valley was +astounded one Sunday morning, when the Reverend Campbell was +unexpectedly ill, and the Reverend Courtney off somewhere answering a +new call, and Green Valley without a pastor, to have Cynthia's boy +quietly offer to take charge of the services. +</P> + +<P> +If Green Valley was astounded to hear that Cynthia's son was a minister +it was too awed to speak in anything but an amazed whisper of that +first sermon that the tall young man from India talked off so quietly +from the pulpit of the old gray stone church. +</P> + +<P> +To this day they tell how without a scrap of paper to look at, without +raising his voice in the slightest, this boy made Green Valley listen +as it had never listened before. For an hour he talked and for that +length of time Green Valley neighbored with India, saw it as plainly as +if it was looking over an unmended, sagging old fence right into +India's back yard. +</P> + +<P> +With the simplicity of a child this boy with Cynthia Churchill's eyes +and smile and voice told of Indian women and children and Indian homes. +The colors, the smells, the mystic beauty and the dark tragedy of it he +painted and then very gently and easily he told of his trip back to his +mother's home town and so without a jar he landed his listeners, +wide-eyed, breathless and prayerfully thankful for their manifold +blessings back in their own sunlit and tree-guarded streets. +</P> + +<P> +For no reason at all seemingly Green Valley began to wipe its eyes and +come out of its trance. Neighbor looked at neighbor and strange things +were seen to have happened. +</P> + +<P> +Old man Wiley, the aged and chronically sleepy janitor was actually +sitting wide awake. Old Mrs. Vingie, who for years annoyed every Green +Valley parson by holding her hand to her right ear and pretending to be +deafer than she really was, was sitting bolt upright, both ears and +hands forgotten. For once Dolly Beatty forgot to fuss with her hat or +admire her hands in the new lavender gloves two sizes too small. The +choir even forgot to flirt and yawn and never once looked bored or +superior. +</P> + +<P> +Jimmy Rand, after having carefully inserted in his hymn book a copy of +Diamond Dick's latest exploits, forgot to read it. And the row of +little boys whose mothers always made them sit in the very first pew +never so much as thought of kicking each other's shins or passing a +hard pinch down the line or even quietly swapping lucky stones and fish +hooks for a snake skin or a choice piece of colored glass. +</P> + +<P> +Why, it was even reported that Mert Hagley so far forgot himself as to +absent-mindedly drop a bill into the basket when it came by. Some +said, of course, that Mert was after the repair work on the old +Churchill homestead but those nearest Mert swore that this could not +be, that Mert had looked as surprised as those around him when he saw +what he had done. Green Valley laughed and said a miracle had +happened. And even Seth Curtis got curious and remarked that he had +half a mind to go and hear the boy himself, that anybody who could peel +a bill off of Mert Hagley's roll was surely a curiosity. +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son had walked with Roger Allan through the twilight of his +first real day in Green Valley to Grandma Wentworth's cottage and the +three had sat talking until the small hours. Then Grandma had taken +Cynthia's tall son up-stairs into the large airy guest room. She came +down a little later to find Roger gazing at a framed photograph of a +long gone day. +</P> + +<P> +She came and looked too at the group of young faces. At herself, then +a girl of eighteen; at the boy beside her who later became her husband; +and at Cynthia, lovely Cynthia Churchill, laughing out at life in her +sweet yet serious way. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Roger," Grandma spoke softly with a hint of tears in her voice, +"we have waited years, you and I, for a message from her, a heart +message. And now it has come—it has come. She has sent us her boy." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," breathed Roger Allan, "she has sent us the message—she has sent +me her son." +</P> + +<P> +They knew, these two, why he had come. It may be that even the tall +young man whose father and mother were sleeping the long sleep in +far-off India may have guessed why in the end the frail but still +lovely mother had begged him to go back to Green Valley, to its sweet +old homes and warm-hearted folk. To bring comfort and find it—that +had been the little mother's plan. +</P> + +<P> +He believed he would find it. The loneliness that had tired him so +ever since his mother slipped away was no longer a sharp, never silent +pain, a great emptiness, but rather a sweet sorrow that was almost a +friend. +</P> + +<P> +He slept in the big airy room with its patchwork quilt of blue and +white, its rugs and curtains to match, and looked at pictures of his +mother. From the windows he watched the sun rise and shine on the +merry little hills and the yellow road that wound up to his mother's +old home. As he breathed in the wine of the spring mornings he +comprehended the great hunger, the wild longing, that at times must +have overwhelmed the little mother in those last days in India. And he +thought he understood those last words of hers. +</P> + +<P> +"Son, you must stay with your father as long as he needs you. But when +that duty is over you must go back to the little green town on the +other side of the world. Your father and I brought a message to India. +You must take one back to my people. Oh, you will love it—you will +love it—the little dear town full of friends and everywhere the +fragrance of home. Oh, there are many there who will love you for my +sake and who will make up to you for—me." +</P> + +<P> +Her hand caressed his hair and her voice trailed off into a sigh for +she knew what he didn't, wouldn't believe—that she was never to see +that little green town across the gray-green ocean waves. +</P> + +<P> +At the very last she had whispered: +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, Boy of Mine, when you go home greet them all for me. And if ever +you go to rummaging about in the attic remember you must never open the +square trunk with the brass nail heads unless Mary Wentworth is there +to explain. Tell Mary I love her and that I am not sorry. She will +understand." +</P> + +<P> +So as he looked out of Grandma Wentworth's upstairs windows he +remembered those last talks and understood that yearning for home. +When he had been in Green Valley only a few weeks the old life began to +grow vague and unreal. The mother was real and near. But the splendid +figure of his father was fading into a strange memory. He was a father +to be proud of, that strong, cool, selfless man who had asked nothing +of life but to take what it would of him. +</P> + +<P> +He had seemed so towering, so enduring, that preacher father. Yet when +the frail mother went the strong man followed within a year. So then +there was nothing to do but go home to Green Valley. He went. And the +spirit of the vivid little mother seemed to have come with him. Every +day that he spent in the town that had reared her seemed to bring her +nearer. He could picture her going about the sunny roads and friendly +streets and stopping to chat and neighbor with Green Valley folks. +</P> + +<P> +So he too roamed over the town and chatted and neighbored as he felt +she would have done. That was how he came to know every nook and +cranny, every turn of the happily straying roads and all the lame, odd, +damaged and droll characters that make a town home just as the +broken-nosed pitcher, the cracked old mirror in an up-stairs bedroom, +and the sagging old armchair in the shadowy corner of the sitting room +make home. +</P> + +<P> +Not only did he come to know these people but he understood them. For +his was the quick eye and interpreting heart willed him by a great +father and an equally great mother. And because he came into Green +Valley with a fresh mind and a keen appetite for life nothing escaped +him, not even old Mrs. Rosenwinkle sitting in paralyzed patience beside +the open window of her little blind house. +</P> + +<P> +He was strolling one day up the little grassy lane, thinking that it +led into the cool, thick grove back of the little house that stared so +blindly out into the green world. He had been following a new bird and +it had darted into the grove. So he came upon the little house and the +still grim old soul who sat at the open window as if to guard that +little end of the world. +</P> + +<P> +It was a snug, still spot, that little green lane, and was so carpeted +with thick grasses and screened with verdure that the harsh noises of a +chattering, working world could not ruffle its peace and serenity. +Cynthia's son filled it and the still, lonely old woman was fascinated +with his bigness, his merry gladness, but most of all with his +understanding friendliness. She told him all her story, her past +trials and present griefs. And he told her strange things about people +he had seen in other parts of the world, blind people living in foul +alleys instead of sunny lanes, crippled ones with neither home nor kin +of any kind. He told her much but made no effort to convince her that +the earth was round, and when he went he left with her the very fine +pair of field glasses with which he had been tracking the wonderful +song bird that had escaped him. He showed her how to use them and for +the first time in fifteen years old Mrs. Rosenwinkle forgot that she +was paralyzed. +</P> + +<P> +When he came in to his supper that evening Cynthia's son wanted to know +why old Mrs. Rosenwinkle couldn't have a wheel-chair, one of those that +she could work with her hands. He said that he thought she must be +pretty tired sitting beside that window even if it was open. And why +couldn't she have a window on each of the other sides of her room? +</P> + +<P> +Grandma stared. +</P> + +<P> +"My stars—boy! There's no reason that I know of why that old body +can't have a wheel chair or more windows. Only Green Valley hasn't +ever thought of it. She's always been so set in her notions and so out +of the way of things that I expect we have forgotten her." +</P> + +<P> +The third time that Cynthia's son brought little Jim Tumley home +because the little man's wandering feet could not find their way to +shelter, he wanted to know why little Jim was not in the choir. So +Grandma told him, and it was his turn to be puzzled. +</P> + +<P> +"But I don't understand. The church is for the weak, the needy, the +blind, maimed and foolish who don't know how to seek happiness wisely. +The happy, strong, sensible people don't, as a matter of fact, need +looking after," said Cynthia's son. +</P> + +<P> +"My!" laughed Grandma, "I believe I've heard that or read that +somewhere. Do they really practice that kind of religion in aged +India? In these parts the churches are still built by the good for the +good and the unfit have to shift for themselves." +</P> + +<P> +But when he asked why Jim Tumley didn't have a piano to take up his +spare time and keep him out of harm's way, Grandma was a bit +scandalized. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, people in Jim Tumley's circumstances don't own pianos. It +wouldn't be proper. A second-hand organ is all they have any right to +be ambitious for. Why, Mary Tumley would no more think of touching her +savings, of buying a piano, than I would think of buying a second black +silk or a diamond ring. So much style would be wicked." +</P> + +<P> +"But if it would help to save the little man—if—" +</P> + +<P> +"Well," smiled Grandma, "I'll mention it to Mary the very next time I +see her." +</P> + +<P> +"Do. And while you are about it you might ask Jim to sing a solo for +us both Sunday morning and evening. If little Jim Tumley doesn't sing +I won't talk," said the Reverend John Roger Churchill Knight. +</P> + +<P> +So Joshua Churchill's rich grandson, Cynthia's son, traveled the high +roads and low roads and had all manner of experiences and adventures +and he discovered many stray, odd facts which later came in mighty +handy. +</P> + +<P> +He rode out into the country districts with Hank Lolly, sitting beside +that worthy on the high wagon seat and listening most carefully to the +description of every farm, its inmates, the barn dimensions and +contents, the depth of the well, cost of the silo, number of pigs, +sheep, the amount of tiling, and the make of the family graphophone. +</P> + +<P> +Sometimes busy farm wives came hurrying out from the back or side +doors, wiping their hands on their aprons, to ask Hank to take a mess +of peas or beans to a less fortunate neighbor or to carry a basket of +dishes over to the next farm where the thrashers were going to be for +supper; and "Hank, just bring me a setting of turkey eggs from Emily +Elby's. I've 'phoned and she has them all ready." +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Tooley, up the Elmwood road, entrusted the obliging Hank with the +following message: +</P> + +<P> +"Tell Doc Mitchell that if he don't get my new set of teeth ready for +the thrashing I'll hev the law on him for breaking up my happy home. +Two of my old beaux're coming to the thrashing and if they was to see +me without my teeth they'd jest naturally make Jim miserable and me a +divorcee." +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Bodin was sending her daughter, Stella, some little overalls made +over for the twins from their grandpa's and a bottle of home made cough +medicine "and one of my first squash pies for Al. And here's a pie for +your trouble, Hank, and a few of these cookies you said you like." +</P> + +<P> +Hank stowed everything carefully away, with no show of nervous haste, +and when they were well started remarked to John Churchill Knight: +</P> + +<P> +"You know the best part of staying sober is that you get taken in on so +many things and almost you might say into so many families. People +tell you things and ask your help and advice and by gum after awhile +you get to feeling that maybe you're somebody too instead of jest a +mess of miserableness. Why, I've got friends jest about everywhere, I +guess. +</P> + +<P> +"There's them as asks me sarcastic like if I don't find this kind of +work dry and lonesome but I jest ask them to come along and see. Why, +do you see that there house yonder? Those folks are relatives of Billy +Evans' and as soon as ever I turn this corner, Mollie, that's the +youngest girl, will start the graphophone going with my favorite piece. +The last time I come by I found a box of candy on the mail box for me. +That was from Winnie, the oldest, for bringing home her new dress from +the dressmaker's. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir, it's jest wonderful how human and pleasant everybody is. +Why, if I jest keep on a-being sober and associating with folks like +this—why—I'm jest naturally bound to be kind of decent myself. And +when you think of what I was—well—there's no use in talking—I was +low—jest low. Ask anybody but Billy Evans and they'll tell you fast +enough. Of course Billy's naturally prejudiced and his word ain't +hardly to be credited. +</P> + +<P> +"And here I am on a nice summer morning riding with the minister and +with the whole country acting as if I'd always been decent." +</P> + +<P> +Maybe it was Hank who first called him the minister. It may of course +have been that old Mrs. Rosenwinkle, who, not knowing his name for some +time, explained him to her daughter as "the new preacher of the lost." +</P> + +<P> +At any rate, when Fanny Foster came to make her periodical report it +was found that to the lonely, the outcast and the generally unfit +Cynthia's son was "the new minister." And his influence was already +felt by those who as yet regarded him as just a Green Valley boy who +was helping out. Fanny Foster voiced this sentiment in Joe Baldwin's +shop when she was paying for the four patches Joe had just put on her +second best pair of shoes. +</P> + +<P> +"Well—I shouldn't wonder if Green Valley hadn't got a minister to its +taste at last. He hasn't been regularly appointed and I guess he don't +realize himself that he's it but I'm pretty sure that the minute Parson +Courtney steps out that's just what's going to happen. Of course +there's them that says it can't. Mr. Austin says it would be a +terrible mistake, that he's too young; and Seth Curtis says no rich man +would be fool enough to pester himself with a dinky country church. +But I guess people like Seth and Mr. Austin ain't the kind of people +that have much to say. He's doing regular minister's work, comforting +the sick and picking up the fallen and pacifying the quarrelsome, and +it's work like that that'll elect him. +</P> + +<P> +"And he's getting mighty popular, let me tell you, even with them that +no other minister could please or get near. There's old Mrs. +Rosenwinkle. She loves him just because he never tried to tell her +that the earth was round. Why, she says he's as good as any Lutheran. +And Hank Lolly said that maybe when that new suit Billy's ordered him +out of the new mail-order catalogue gets here, he'll go hear him +preach. It seems the minister's been driving around with Hank all over +creation and Hank says he can get along with him as easy as he does +with Billy. +</P> + +<P> +"And did you hear what he did for Jim Tumley? It seems the minister +told Grandma Wentworth what a fine voice Jim had and what an ear for +music. And he was most surprised that Jim never even had a second-hand +organ of his own in the house but had to go over to his sister's, Mrs. +Hoskins, for to play a little tune when the fancy took him. He said it +was an awful pity that a man who wanted music so badly and was always +so obliging at weddings and funerals and entertainments should be +without a proper instrument. And Grandma just said, 'My land, nobody's +ever thought of that but I'll speak of it.' +</P> + +<P> +"Well, she did and the consequence is that Mary Tumley is so nervous +she can't sleep. She says if she takes the savings out of the bank +there won't be enough money for a Keeley cure, or a respectable funeral +for Jim in case he dies. She's struggled and struggled but come to the +conclusion that it wouldn't be right and would set an awful example to +the Luttins next door, who are extravagant enough as it is. +</P> + +<P> +"But it's my notion that Jim Tumley will get his organ and maybe a +piano. I saw him going in with Frank Burton on that early morning +train and it means something. Besides, Grandma told me that Frank +fairly hates himself for not thinking of it before and waiting like a +born idiot for a boy to come all the way from India and tell him what +to do for his best friend. +</P> + +<P> +"Agnes Tomlins says she's got a good mind to go and see the minister +about Hen. She says that if Hen don't quit abusing her and tormenting +her she's going to leave him; that her sister Mary over in Aberdeen has +a big up-stairs bedroom all aired and waiting for her. It seems that +Hen's more than contrarily stubborn lately. He's contradicted Agnes +publicly time and again and gone against her in private till Agnes says +there's no living with him. +</P> + +<P> +"But she says she would overlook everything except Hen's keeping a +secret drawer in his chiffonier. It seems Hen has gone and locked that +bottom drawer and Agnes can't either buy or borry a key that will open +it. And she can't find where Hen has hid his, try as she may. And +when she mentions that drawer to Hen, saying she wants to red up, he +lets on like he don't know what she's talking about but he does, +because he told Doc Philipps, when he went to see about his liver, that +if he couldn't wear a soft collar or a soft hat like other men and keep +a dog and smoke in the house, and eat strawberries or whistle or go to +ball games on Sundays and prize fights on the sly, why, there was one +thing he could do and would have and that was a drawer, a whole +chiffonier drawer, all to himself. And that he bet there weren't many +men in Green Valley that could say as much. Hen just swore that he +intends to have something all his own and that nobody'll open that +drawer except over his dead body. +</P> + +<P> +"Dolly Beatty was sitting in the waiting room and heard him. Of +course, she's a great friend of Bessie Williams and told her and Bessie +told Laura Enbry and of course it got to Agnes. So she's going to +speak to the minister and maybe get a divorce, which will be the first +divorce scandal in Green Valley. +</P> + +<P> +"Now that's the sort of thing that goes on in Green Valley. And if the +new minister is supposed to calm these troubled waters he's got my +sympathy. Joe, I think you're charging me ten cents too much for these +patches. They're not as big as the ones you put on the other pair and +those were fifty cents." +</P> + +<P> +So without a conscious move on anybody's part Cynthia's son became +Green Valley's minister. All the necessary rites gone through, Green +Valley accepted him as it accepted the sunshine and rain, the larks and +wild roses, and all the other gifts that heaven chose to send. +</P> + +<P> +Roger Allan and Grandma Wentworth began to call him John. But Nanny +Ainslee always spoke of him and addressed him as Mr. Knight. And he +discovered after a time that for some strange reason he did not like +this. +</P> + +<P> +One day he mentioned the matter. He was walking home from church with +her. Mr. Ainslee had invited him up for Sunday dinner and the party of +them were chatting pleasantly as they walked along together. +</P> + +<P> +In asking him a question Nan addressed him as Mr. Knight. Then it was +that he stopped and made his startling request. He addressed them all +but he meant only Nan. +</P> + +<P> +"I wish," he said suddenly, "you would not call me Mr. Knight." +</P> + +<P> +Mr. Ainslee and Billy hid a smile, said nothing and walked on. But Nan +stopped in amazement. +</P> + +<P> +"Why not?" she asked a little breathlessly. +</P> + +<P> +"Nobody else does. I was never called that in India. It makes me feel +lonely, and a stranger here." +</P> + +<P> +"But," Nanny's voice was colorless and almost dreary, even though a +wicked little gleam shot into her eyes, "what in the world shall I call +you? I can't call you—<I>John</I>. And 'parson' always did seem to me +rather coarse and disrespectful." +</P> + +<P> +He had stopped when she did and now was looking straight down into her +eyes. Before the hurt and surprise and bewilderment in his face the +wicked little gleam retreated and a deep pink began to flush Nanny's +cheeks. The suspicion crossed her mind that this tall young man from +India with the unconquered eyes and the directness of a child might be +a rather difficult person to deal with. +</P> + +<P> +He just stood there and looked at her and said never a word. Then he +quietly turned and walked on up the road with her. +</P> + +<P> +For the first time in her life Nanny felt queer in the company of a +man, queer and puzzled and almost uncomfortable. She was not a flirt +and her remark was commonplace and trivial. Yet this new chap was +taking it seriously and making her feel insincere and trifling. She +told herself that she was not going to like him and kept her eyes +studiously on the road and wayside flowers. +</P> + +<P> +They mounted the front steps in silence but before he opened the door +to let her pass in he paused and waited for her to raise her eyes to +his. She did it much against her will. He spoke then as if they two +were all alone in the world together. +</P> + +<P> +"It is true that you have not known me long. But I have known you for +some time. I saw you leave Green Valley one summer night last year and +I came from the West two months before I should have just to see if you +got safely back at lilac time." +</P> + +<P> +At that Nanny's eyes lost all their careful pride and he saw them +lovely with surprise. So he explained. +</P> + +<P> +"I was standing on the back platform of the Los Angeles Limited the +night you went East with your father." +</P> + +<P> +Then a smile that the Lord gives only now and then, to a man that He is +sure He can trust, flitted over the tall boy's face as he added: +</P> + +<P> +"And the very first evening I came back to Green Valley I held you in +my arms—rescued you." +</P> + +<P> +He laughed boyishly, plaguing her. But she stood motionless with +amazement,—too angry to say a word. When that smile came her anger +faded. Through her heart there flashed the mad conviction, through her +mind the certain knowledge, that for her in the time to come the height +of bliss would be to cry in this strange man's arms. +</P> + +<P> +Then she recollected herself and flamed with shame so bitter that her +lower lip quivered and she hoped he would ask her again to call him +John so that she could make him pay for her momentary madness. +</P> + +<P> +But he never asked again. It seemed he was not that kind of a man. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +GOSSIP +</H3> + + +<P> +The last and surest sign of spring's arrival in Green Valley is gossip. +The mornings may be ever so full of meadow larks, the woods moistly +sweet and carpeted with spring's frail and dainty blossoms, but no one +dreams of letting the furnace go out or their base burner get cold +until they see Fanny Foster flitting about town at all hours of the day +and behold the array of shiny armchairs standing so invitingly in front +of Uncle Tony's hardware store. +</P> + +<P> +When these two great news agencies open up for business Green Valley +laughs and goes to Martin's drug store to buy moth balls and talks +about how it's going to paint its kitchen woodwork and paper its +upstairs hall and where it's buying its special garden seed. +</P> + +<P> +Then the whole town wakes up and comes outdoors to work and talk. +There are fences to be mended and gardens to be planted and houses to +be cleaned and all the winter happenings to be gone over. All the +doctor cases have to be discussed critically and the winter invalids, +strong once again, come out to visit one another and compare notes. +Letters from special relatives and former Green Valley souls are passed +around and read and all new photographs and the winter's crop of fancy +work exhibited and carefully examined. +</P> + +<P> +Everybody talks so much that nobody listens very carefully, only half +hearing things. And when the spring madness and gladness begin to +settle and people start to repeat the things they only half heard +strange and weird tales are at times the result. And from these spring +still more fantastic rumors and versions that ripple over Green Valley +like waves of sunshine or cloud shadows, sometimes causing much joy and +merriment and sometimes considerable worry and uneasiness. +</P> + +<P> +And all these rumors come eventually to Uncle Tony's where they are +solemnly examined, edited and frequently so enhanced and touched up in +color and form as to sound almost new. Then they are sent out again to +begin life all over. Many of them die but some live on and on, and +after a sufficient test of time become a part of the town chronicles. +</P> + +<P> +Everybody, of course, takes a hand at helping a yarn get from house to +house but nobody makes such a specialty of this sort of social work as +Fanny Foster. There are some Green Valley folks who attribute Fanny's +up and down thinness to this wearing industry yet both men and women +are always glad to see her and her reports always drive blue cares away +and provoke ripples of sunny laughter. +</P> + +<P> +Everybody in town has tried their hand at hating Fanny and despising +her and ignoring her and putting her in her place. But everybody has +long ago given it up. Stylish and convention-loving newcomers are +always disgusted and keep her at arm's length. But sooner or later +such people break an arm or a leg right in the midst of strawberry +canning maybe and it so happens that nobody sees them do this but +Fanny. And when this does happen they don't even have to mortify +themselves by calling her. She just comes of her own accord, +forgetting the cruel snubbings. She fixes that stand-offish person as +comfortable as can be, makes them laugh even, and telephones to the +doctor. Then she rolls up her sleeves and without so much as an apron +has those strawberries scientifically canned and that messy kitchen +beautifully clean. +</P> + +<P> +And the curious, the pitifully, laughably incomprehensible part of it +is that in her own house Fanny absolutely never can seem to take the +least interest. Her own dishes are always standing about unwashed. +Her kitchen is spoken of in horrified whispers; her children, +buttonless, garterless, mealless, stray about in all sorts of improper +places and weather. The whole town is home to them but they generally +feel happiest at Grandma Wentworth's. She sets them down in her +kitchen to a hot meal and then makes them sew on their buttons under +her watchful eye. Sooner or later, usually later, Fanny comes as +instinctively as her children to Grandma's door to report Green Valley +doings. +</P> + +<P> +This particular spring things promised to be unusually lively. But the +rains, though gentle, had been persistent and Fanny was a full two +weeks behind with her news schedule. But if late, her report was +thorough. She dropped wearily into Grandma's soft cushioned kitchen +rocker, slipped her cold feet without ceremony into the warm stove oven +and began: +</P> + +<P> +"Good land! I never see such a town and such people and such weather! +Jim Tumley's drunk again and as sick as death and Mary's crying over +him as usual and blaming the hotel crowd. She says he's a good man and +don't care for liquor at all and that their liking to hear him sing +ain't no reason for getting him drunk and a poor way of showing their +thanks and appreciation, and that they all know that he can't stand it, +him being weak in the stomach that way, like all the Tumleys. Mary's +just about ready to give up everything and everybody, she's that +discouraged. +</P> + +<P> +"Well—that's one mess and now there's Uncle Tony in another. It seems +Uncle Tony sold Seth Curtis a hand axe for a dollar and ten cents. Of +course Seth paid for it like he always does—right away. But you know +how forgetful Uncle Tony is getting. Well, it seems he clean forgot +about Seth paying and sent in a bill for a dollar. And now Seth's +hanging around, wanting his ten cents back and saying mean, smart +things. +</P> + +<P> +"And that lazy, gossiping crowd of worthless men folks was just killing +themselves laughing and making fun of poor Uncle Tony, sitting right in +his very own chairs and warming their lazy feet at his comfortable +fire. Uncle Tony happened to be out and those loafers just started in +and what they said about that kind old man made my blood boil. They +were all mean enough, with Seth egging them on every now and then about +that dime that he was cheated out of. But Mert Hagley was the worst. +Of course, everybody knows Mert's just dying to hog Uncle Tony's +business along with his shop, as if the stingy thing wasn't rich enough +already. Well, when Mert heard about that ten-cent mistake he said it +was about time there were a few business changes in Green Valley, that +a few business funerals would help a lot and freshen up things; that +Uncle Tony was no business man, and a lot of that sort of stuff. And +of course Hughey Mason, being a smart Aleck, pipes up and says, 'That's +so, Uncle Tony is no business man. Why, Tom Hall says that when you +find Uncle Tony's emporium locked at eleven o'clock of a winter morning +you can bet your bottom dollar Uncle Tony's home shaking down the +furnace, and if it's closed at four of a summer afternoon Uncle Tony's +sneaked off home to mow the lawn.' +</P> + +<P> +"Well, those idiots and old hypocrites were talking just like that, +goodness knows how long. They never took the trouble to see if Uncle +Tony was really around or not. But all of a sudden I looked around the +corner of the middle row of shelves and there was that poor old man +sitting as still as death in his cashier's cage and looking sick to +death. You know he wouldn't cheat a soul, and as for that store, he'd +die without it. It's all the family he has. Well I had stepped in +there to buy a couple of flat-irons. The children mislaid mine. But I +walked right out for I didn't want to call him out to wait on me. +</P> + +<P> +"I was so mad I just walked around the block till I met Mrs. Jerry +Dustin right at Simpson's corner and I told her the whole thing. She +was as hurt about it as Uncle Tony and kept holding on to Simpson's +garden fence and saying, 'Dear me, Fanny, we must do something. I have +a message for Tony, anyway, and this is just the time to deliver it.' +</P> + +<P> +"So back we went and we met Uncle Tony stepping in at the front door +too. He must have sneaked out the back way and come around the front +so's not to let on he'd heard anything. He was kind of white and +miserable about the mouth and his eyes looked out kind of blind. But +he smiled when Mrs. Jerry Dustin said, 'Good morning, Tony.' I +wonder," Fanny digressed, "if it's true that Uncle Tony wanted to marry +Mrs. Dustin once. Sadie Dundry says so but you know how unreliable +Sadie is about what she knows. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, anyhow, those miserable men things around that stove just smiled +at Uncle Tony like so many Judases and all commenced talking at once. +But Mrs. Dustin didn't give them much chance. She just took up all +Uncle Tony's attention and time. She bought and bought, being real +careful of course to ask only for the things she knew he had; and to +top it all she bought four quarts of robin's-egg blue paint. You know +that's Uncle Tony's favor-ite woodwork paint and nobody goes in there +for paint but what he's trying to get them to buy robin's-egg blue. +Seems his mother's kitchen on the old farm was done that way and Uncle +Tony's never been able to see any other color. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I thought those four cans of paint was about the highest kind of +good luck but when Mrs. Dustin give her message I nearly fell dead, and +as for them old he-gossips they were about paralyzed, I guess. Why +even you, Grandma, couldn't hardly guess what that message was;" here +Fanny pulled up a sagging stocking and hurried on lest she should be +interrupted. +</P> + +<P> +"It was nothing more nor less than that Bernard Rollins, the artist, +wants to paint Uncle Tony's portraiture. 'And, of course, Tony,' said +Mrs. Dustin in that sweet way of hers, 'you won't refuse, will you?' +And I declare the lovely way she looked at him and he at her I come +near believing Sadie might be right by accident. But, land—in this +town everybody has growed up with everybody else and somebody is always +saying that somebody is sweet on somebody else or was when he or she +were young. +</P> + +<P> +"So there's that portraiture to look forward to. And now there's that +yarn that some careless busybody started about Nanny Turner being left +a fortune of eighteen thousand dollars. Everybody's been crazy, +praising her luck to her face and envying her behind her back. +Everybody most but Dell Parsons. Dell felt sick when she heard it +because she and Nanny have been such friends and Dell just knew that no +matter how they'd both try to keep things the same there'd always be +that eighteen-thousand-dollar difference between them when now there's +nothing dividing them but a little low honeysuckle fence with a gate +cut through it. And there would, of course. Nanny'd be on one side, +cutting aprons out of nice new gingham, and Dell'd be on the other, +cutting <I>her</I> aprons out of Jim's old shirt backs. +</P> + +<P> +"But as soon as Nanny heard it she up and told everybody it wasn't so, +that she and Will wouldn't thank anybody for a fortune now that they've +paid for their home and garden. +</P> + +<P> +"I met Jessie Williams in the drug store. She was buying dye to do +over her last year's silk and she says Nanny was a fool to contradict a +fine story like that. That she should have said nothing and used the +rumor to her social advantage. Jessie says that story alone would have +brought that uppish Mrs. Brownlee that's moved into that stylish new +bungalow next to Will Turner's to time and sociability. Though the +daughter isn't uppish a bit, so Nanny and Dell says, and visits right +over the fence and just loves the children. But she don't know +anything seemingly—the daughter don't. Wears fancy caps and +high-heeled shoes to work in mornings and was caught planting onion +sets root up and doing dishes without an apron and drying them without +scalding them first. But they say she's awful sweet and pretty, in +spite of her terrible ignorance. +</P> + +<P> +"Old Mr. Dunn told me this Mrs. Brownlee was a bankrupt's widow, that +when the husband died there was nothing left but this Green Valley lot, +which he bought absent-mindedly one day, and his life insurance which +though was a good one. And the widow having no money didn't want to +stay amongst her rich city friends and so she's come here. They say +she hates Green Valley like poison but that the girl Jocelyn thinks +it's fun living here, even though her hands are blistered and there's +no place to go evenings. I heard that David Allan's been plowing up +the Brownlee garden lot and helping the girl set things out. +</P> + +<P> +"And now, Grandma, what of all things do you suppose has happened? Old +man Mullin's back. Nobody can hardly believe it. He's been gone these +ten years and nobody blamed him a mite when he left that miserly, +nagging wife of his and went off to California. Why, they say she +nearly died giving him a ten-cent piece every week for spending money +and that he used to work on the sly unbeknownst to her to get money for +his tobacco and then didn't dare smoke it where she could see him. And +he's come back. Some say he's got so much money of his own that she +can't worry him and that he's got to be so deaf besides that he's safe +more or less. +</P> + +<P> +"And as if that wasn't enough, there's talk of Sam Ellis's selling the +hotel and going out of business. It seems since the two boys and the +girl came back from college they've talked nothing but temperance and +prohibition. Not that they are a mite ashamed of Sam. But not one of +them will step into the hotel for love or money. And Sam's beginning +to think as they do, seems like. For they say he was awful mad when he +heard about Jim Tumley getting so full he was sick. Sam was out that +afternoon and he says Curley Watson, his barkeeper, is a danged +chucklehead. And that ain't all. They're saying that Sam told George +Hoskins to let up on the drinks the other night, that maybe he could +stand it but other men couldn't. And Sam the hotel keeper, mind you! +Of course Sam is well off but still the men haven't got over it yet. +They say you could have heard a pin drop and that George stood with his +mouth open for five full minutes. +</P> + +<P> +"Somebody told John Gans that there was going to be another barber shop +in town and so he's excited. And Mr. Pelly and Mrs. Dudley had their +first fight this year over their chickens. Mr. Pelly swears she lets +them out a-purpose before he's awake in the morning and Mrs. Dudley +says that if he don't mend his fence and hurts a feather of a single +one of her animals she'll have him before Judge Hewitt. +</P> + +<P> +"Of course, Marion Travers is spending every cent of her husband's +salary on new clothes, trying to get in with the South End crowd. And +Sam Bobbins has given up trying to raise violets to make a sudden +fortune. He's changed his mind and gone to raising mushrooms down in +his cellar. Simpson's gray horse is dead, the lame one, and one of the +White twins cut his head pretty bad on a toy engine and Benny Smith's +wife is giving strawberry sets away. Jessups are all out of tomato +plants and onion sets and won't get any more, but Dick has them, +besides a real tasty looking lot of garden seed. Ella Higgins actually +found that Dick had two kinds of flower seed that she'd never grown or +heard of. +</P> + +<P> +"Mrs. Rosenwinkle's full of rheumatism with all joints swelled and says +the world is coming to a terrible end. I guess she figures though that +she and those two grandchildren of hern will be about all that's left +after the thing blows over. My land, ain't some folks ignorant! +And—what was I going to say—oh, yes, of course Robinson ain't +expected to live—and well—what <I>was</I> it I was going to say—something +that begins with a c—good land, there's the 6:10 and I bet John's on +it. He never misses his train twice in a year's time. Get out of +here, children. You know your father wants to see you all at home when +he gets there." +</P> + +<P> +There was a scramble for the door and Grandma Wentworth's heart ached +for John Foster, the big, silent, steady man who brushes his girls' +hair every Sunday morning and brings them fresh hair ribbons and who +somehow manages to get them to Sunday School looking half respectable. +John never says a word scarcely to any one, from one week's end to the +other. He never spends a free hour away from home, he never invites a +man to his house, and he seldom smiles except at the children or when +visiting with Grandma Wentworth or Roger Allan, his two friends and +nearest neighbors. Sometimes he goes for long walks with his girls and +little Bobby. Most people think him a fool and he knows it. +</P> + +<P> +Grandma Wentworth sighed a little as she thought of John Foster. Then +she put fresh wood on her fire and poked at the stove grate till it +glowed. She smiled as she remembered Fanny's report. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, spring is here for certain. Now we'll have a wedding and some +new babies. They always come next." +</P> + +<P> +Then sitting there beside her glowing stove Grandma fell to dreaming of +Green Valley and the Green Valley folks of other days, Green Valley as +it used to be in the springs of long ago. Of the days when Roger Allan +was a young, strength-mad fellow and Richard Wentworth was his chum and +her lover. And she remembered too how right Sadie Dundry was. For +Uncle Tony, in the springs of long ago, had loved the girl who was now +Mrs. Jerry Dustin. +</P> + +<P> +They were such wander-mad dreamers, Tony and Rosalie, and exactly alike +in those days. They used to go together to watch an occasional picnic +train or election special go through the station, and they thought +because they were so exactly alike they would most surely marry. But +life, that wisely and for posterity's sake mates not the like but the +unlike, brought Jerry Dustin on the scene,—good, practical, +stay-at-home Jerry Dustin. And the girl who used to sit with Tony on +the station bench and watch the trains pull out into the wide big world +left her childhood friend sitting alone and went to Jerry, answered his +smile and call. +</P> + +<P> +So Tony sits alone, for he still visits the station on sunny +afternoons. But now he doesn't sit on the bench but perches on the top +rail of the fence and curls his toes about the lower one. +</P> + +<P> +Bernard Rollins caught him sitting so once, day-dreaming over the past. +It was Tony's face as Rollins saw it then,—full of a young, boyish +wistfulness and sweet pain, unmarred dreams and unstained, unbroken +illusions,—that Rollins wanted to paint. Rollins knew that Mrs. +Dustin was a great friend of Tony's and that she would be the best +person to coax a consent from the shy, gentle old man. +</P> + +<P> +Life, mused Grandma, was a matter full of sweet and incomprehensible +things,—things that now, after long years when the stories were almost +finished, seemed right and just enough but that at the time were cruel +and hard to bear. There was Roger Allan and that lonely stone in the +peaceful cemetery. It still seemed a cruel tragedy. Like Mrs. Jerry +Dustin she wondered often about it. +</P> + +<P> +The soft spring night was full of memories and the wood fire sang of +them sadly, sweetly and softly. Grandma rose and mentally shook +herself. +</P> + +<P> +"I declare, I believe I'm lonely or getting old or something," Grandma +chided herself; "here I am poking at the bygone years like an old maid +with the heartache and here's the whole world terribly alive and +needing attention. And here's Cynthia's boy back from India, and a +real Green Valley kind of minister, I do believe; a straightforward +chap to tell us of life, its miracles and mysteries; of God and +eternity as he honestly thinks, but mostly of love and the little happy +ways of earthly living. A man who won't be always dividing us into +sheep and goats but will show us the sheep and the goat in ourselves. +This is a queer old town and it almost seems as if a minister wouldn't +hardly have to know so much about heaven as about fighting neighbors +and chickens, gossiping folks like Fanny and drunken ones like Jim +Tumley. Well, maybe,—" +</P> + +<P> +But just then she looked up and found David Allan laughing at her from +the doorway. +</P> + +<P> +"Stop dreaming and scolding yourself, Grandma," laughed David. +"There's a little city girl living up on the hill back of Will Turner's +who needs you most awful bad. I offered to bring her down here but she +thinks it wouldn't be proper. She says you haven't called and she +wants to do things right and that maybe you wouldn't want to know her. +She's mighty lonely and strange about Green Valley ways of doing +things. I most wished to-day that I was a woman so I could help her. +Her mother's been sick more or less since they come here and she's +looking after things herself. I'd like to help her but there's things +a man just can't tell a girl or do for her. Uncle Roger sent me over +here to tell you to come across and talk about some church matters with +him. But I think this little girl business ought to be tended to right +away." +</P> + +<P> +"Rains and gossip and new girls and first violets. I declare, it <I>is</I> +spring, David. And Nanny Ainslee is back. Of course, I'll see about +that little girl. You tell her I'm coming to call on her the day after +tomorrow. Tell her I'll come up the woodsy side of her garden and I'll +be wearing my pink sunbonnet and third best gingham apron." +</P> + +<P> +Grandma took up a pan of fresh light biscuit, rolled them up in a crisp +linen cloth and started out with David. +</P> + +<P> +Outdoors she stopped and breathed deeply. +</P> + +<P> +"I declare, David, I was almost lonesome before you stepped in but now +I feel—well, spring mad or something. I do believe we'll have a +wedding soon and a real old-fashioned springtime." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE WEDDING +</H3> + + +<P> +Grandma Wentworth got her wedding but not just the kind of a wedding +she had expected. +</P> + +<P> +"Though, when you stop to think of it, an elopement is about as proper +a spring happening as I know of. It's due mostly to this weather. We +had too much rain in April and nothing but sweet sunshine and mad +moonlight ever since." +</P> + +<P> +Most Green Valley courtships and weddings are conducted in a more or +less public and leisurely fashion and elopements are rare. Green +Valley was at first inclined to be a little shocked and resentful about +this performance. Weddings do not happen every day and Green Valley +was so accustomed to knowing weeks beforehand what the bride was going +to wear, and how many of the two sets of relatives were to be there, +and who was giving presents and what, and what the refreshments were +going to cost, and just how much more this was than what the bride's +mother could afford to spend, that there was a little murmur of +astonishment, resentment even, when it was found that just a bare, bald +marriage had been perpetrated in the old town. Green Valley did not +resent the scandal of the occurrence. It was the absence of details +that was so maddening. But gradually these began to trickle from +doorstep to doorstep and by nightfall Green Valley was crowding out of +its front gates with little wedding gifts under its arms. +</P> + +<P> +It seems that little, meek, eighteen-year-old Alice Sears had eloped +with twenty-one-year-old Tommy Winston. She explained her foolishness +in a little letter which she left on the kitchen table for her mother. +The letter ran something like this: +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +Dear Mother:— +</P> + +<P> +It's no use waiting any longer for any of the good times or new dresses +you said I'd have by and by. We never have any good times and I'm +tired waiting for a real new hat. Tommy's going to buy me one with +bunches of violets on it and he don't drink, so it's alright and you +don't need to worry. I'll live near and be handy and don't you let +father swear too much at you because I did this. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Your loving child,<BR> + ALICE.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +When Mrs. Sears found the letter she read it six times, over and over +till she knew it by heart. It wasn't the first such letter she had +ever had. When Johnny went off to Alaska or somewhere away off, +because his father took the twenty-five dollars that the +nineteen-year-old boy had saved so prayerfully for a bicycle, Johnny +had left just such a letter. When Jimmy went away he left a letter +that sounded very much like it on the top of his mother's sewing +machine. +</P> + +<P> +It wasn't a bicycle with Jimmy. It was chickens. Jimmy was wild over +chickens. He was a great favorite with Frank Burton. He helped Frank +about the coops and was so handy that Frank paid him regular wages and +gave him several settings of eggs. And in no time the boy had a +thriving little chicken business that might have grown into bigger +things. But Sears sold the whole thing out one day when he wanted +money worse than usual. And Jimmy, white to the very roots of his +reddish-brown hair, cursed his father and left home. He wandered +about, the Lord knows where, but eventually joined the army. He wrote +home once to tell his mother what he had done and to say that he +intended to save all his pay for the three years and start a chicken +farm with it somewhere. +</P> + +<P> +And now gentle, little, eighteen-year-old Alice was gone too. +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Sears sat down and cried in that patient, helpless, miserable way +of hers. She didn't know just what she was crying for, herself or the +children. Life was a hopeless, unmanageable tangle that seemed to give +her nothing and take her all. So Mrs. Sears sat and cried. It was a +habit she had. +</P> + +<P> +Fanny Foster came along just then. She had run over to see if she +couldn't borrow a cake of yeast. She was going to town in an hour, she +said, but she wanted to set her bread before she went and she'd bring +yeast back with her and— +</P> + +<P> +"Why, for pity's sake alive, Mrs. Sears, what's the matter?" +</P> + +<P> +That was just Fanny's luck or perhaps her misfortune, her happening on +events first-hand that way. She read the letter of course, sympathized +with Mrs. Sears, patted her check and told her not to worry, that +everything would be all right and to set right still, that she'd be +right back to do the dishes and stay with her. +</P> + +<P> +And Fanny hurried to town, talking all the way. She came back in +record time but by the time she had her hands in Mrs. Sears' dishpan +Green Valley was already buzzing with astonishment. Some were shaking +their heads in utter unbelief, some were smiling and one or two who had +slept badly were saying something like this: +</P> + +<P> +"Well, did you ever! And you never can tell. Those meek, quiet little +things are usually deep. And the dear Lord only knows what the true +state of things is. And poor Mrs. Sears! Of course, she's done her +best, but isn't it too bad to have a batch of children turn out so kind +of disappointing and her so meek and patient and hard-working!" +</P> + +<P> +In three hours the news had gotten out to the out-lying homes and +Sears, the little bride's father, heard it as he was nailing siding on +one of the two new bungalows that were being built in that part of +Green Valley. +</P> + +<P> +When Sears heard the rumor he put down his hammer and quit work. He +was a man who made a practice of quitting work at the least +provocation. He said what a man needed most was self-respect and he, +Will Sears, would have it at any cost. He had it. In fact, he was so +respectful and thoughtful of himself that he never had time to respect +the rights of any one else. +</P> + +<P> +Green Valley saw him going home and because Green Valley knew him well +and respected him not at all it took no pains to hush its chatter, and +so he heard a good deal that it may have done him good to hear. At any +rate, it sort of prepared him for what came later. +</P> + +<P> +He stamped into the house and wanted to know why in this and that he +hadn't been told about all this before he went to work, and what in +this and that she meant by such doings and goings on. +</P> + +<P> +And Mrs. Sears, whose greatest daily trial was getting her husband off +to work on such mornings as he felt so inclined, said tearfully: +</P> + +<P> +"Why, father, you know that when I'm getting you off of a morning I +wouldn't see a twenty-dollar gold piece if it was right before my eyes +on the table. I never found the piece of paper with Alice's letter on +it till you'd gone and I'd set down for a cup of coffee." +</P> + +<P> +For thirty years Milly Sears had called her husband "father" and now +that he had fathered all his children away from home she still called +him "father." Poor Mrs. Sears had no sense of humor. +</P> + +<P> +After her pitiful little explanation Mrs. Sears sank down into her +rocker and went back to weeping. It was her way of taking life's +sudden turns. +</P> + +<P> +Sears tore through the house and every once in a while he'd walk back +to the kitchen and swear. Sears was not in any way a likeable man. +Though so self-respecting, he had all his life been careless about his +language and his breath. That was probably the reason why his children +never got the habit of running out to meet him or bringing their thorns +and splinters for him to pull out with his jackknife. He was a man who +never stopped in the front yard to see how the clover was coming up, +who never hoed around his currant bushes or ever found time to prune +his fruit trees. He was in short a mean, selfish man who was yet +decent enough to know himself for what he was but not decent enough to +admit it and mend his ways. It may be that he did not know how to go +about this. +</P> + +<P> +At any rate, here he was, pacing back and forth in his still, empty +house, swearing and threatening all manner of terrible things. That +was his way of showing his helplessness. +</P> + +<P> +And all about this helpless, incompetent father and patiently sobbing +mother the Green Valley world buzzed and the prettiest kind of a May +day smiled. All their life was a muddle with this dreary ending but +the world outside was as young, as bright, as promising as ever. +Something of this must have come to these two for Mrs. Sears' sobs +quieted and out in the front room Sears sank into a chair and grew +still. +</P> + +<P> +And then it was that Fanny Poster, who had been flitting about like a +very spirit of help and curiosity, flitted down the road to Grandma +Wentworth's. For Fanny felt that somebody had to do something and +Fanny knew that nobody could do it so efficiently as the strong, sweet, +gray-eyed Grandma Wentworth who, for all her sweetness, could yet +rebuke most sternly and fearlessly even while she helped and advised +wisely. +</P> + +<P> +Green Valley had its generous share of philosophers and helpful spirits +but Grandma Wentworth towered above them all. And every soul in the +village, when in trouble, turned to her as naturally as flowers turn +their faces to the sun. +</P> + +<P> +Her little vine-clad cottage sat just beyond the curve where the three +roads met at Old Roads Corners. Her back garden was full of the +choicest vegetables and sweetest-smelling herbs and there was a +heavenly array of flowers all about the front windows. The neighbors +said that Grandma Wentworth's house and garden looked just like her and +ministers usually sent their spiritually hopeless cases to her because +she dared and knew how to say the soul-necessary things that no +bread-and-butter-cautious minister can find the courage to say. +</P> + +<P> +The path to Grandma's house was worn smooth by the feet of the many who +came for advice, encouragement and for sheer love of the woman who +lived in that little garden. +</P> + +<P> +And so Fanny went flying to Grandma now, perfectly, childishly +confident that Grandma would and could fix up everything. She began to +talk as soon as she opened the door. But what she saw in Grandma's +kitchen sent the words tumbling down her throat. +</P> + +<P> +For there sat little Alice, eating a late breakfast with Grandma. She +looked a little scared around the eyes but smiley round the mouth and +there was a gold ring on her left hand. +</P> + +<P> +When Grandma caught sight of Fanny she smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"Come right in, Fanny. I've been expecting you. But first let me make +you acquainted with Mrs. Tommy Winston. That rascal of a boy run away +with her last night as far as Spring Road, where Judge Edwards married +them. And then Tommy brought her here to me to spend the night while +he went and rented that funny little box of a house just back of that +stylish Mrs. Brownlee. And that's where the wedding supper's going to +be to-night. Of course you're invited. I'm going right now to see +Milly Sears about what we must cook up and bake. I was going over to +get you too to help out. The little house'll need overhauling but I +know I can depend on you, Fanny. Do your very best and there'll be—" +</P> + +<P> +But by this time Fanny found her voice and began to tell about how +Sears was going on. But Grandma only smiled and said, "Yes, of course, +I know. But don't worry about that. I'll attend to Will Sears. You +two just skip along now to the house and start the wedding." +</P> + +<P> +Grandma walked over to the Sears cottage without any show of worry or +hurry. But she wasn't smiling. Those gray eyes of hers were sparkling +with something very different. And when Will Sears saw her coming in +the gate he was both relieved and uncomfortably uneasy. +</P> + +<P> +She came right in and just looked at that desolate couple for a few +seconds. Then: +</P> + +<P> +"Will Sears," she asked briefly, "what are you aiming to do about this?" +</P> + +<P> +Sears, who couldn't do anything, didn't know how to do anything about +it but swear, said pompously: +</P> + +<P> +"What any decent, respectable, hard-working man would do,—bring back +the girl and horsewhip that whippersnapper." +</P> + +<P> +Then Grandma, who knew just how much this sort of bluster was worth, +let herself go. +</P> + +<P> +"Will Sears, if you honestly have an idea that you are a decent, +respectable, hard-working man, hold on to it for the love of heaven, +for you're the only human in this town that has any such notion." +</P> + +<P> +"I work," Sears began defiantly. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes, Will, you work in a sort of a way; though I can remember the +time when Green Valley folks thought you were going to be a big +contractor. You promised well but somehow you never worked hard +enough. You work at things now to keep your own miserable self alive, +I guess, because when you get through using your week's wages there's +hardly enough left to keep bare life and decency in your family." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not a drunkard," Sears muttered, "and you know it." +</P> + +<P> +"No, you're not a drunkard, Will Sears, more's the pity. When it comes +to choosing between a man who gets openly drunk and staggers down Main +Street in drunken penitence to his wife and children and the man who +drinks just enough to be a surly, selfish brute and yet look half-way +respectable on the outside, why, give me the drunk every time. +</P> + +<P> +"You don't get drunk, only just full enough to have your family afraid +and ashamed of you. You have made life a hateful, shameful, miserable +existence for your wife and children. You've robbed them of every +right and what pitiful little possessions, hopes and plans they'd been +able to find for themselves. That's why John's in Alaska, Jimmy in the +army and Alice an eighteen-year-old wife. A precious father you've +been to make your children choose the bitter snows, the jungle and a +doubtful future with a stranger to life with you, their father." +</P> + +<P> +"I've fed my children and clothed them," again muttered Sears. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, Will, you have. But—man, man—it takes more than just blood, +three begrudged meals a day and a skimpy calico dress to prove real +fatherhood. But I'm not blaming you any more than I'm blaming this +wife of yours. +</P> + +<P> +"For thirty years, Milly Sears, you've been so busy trying to be a +doormat saint that you had no time to be a strong, useful mother. When +you married Will he was no worse than the average fellow. He had +faults aplenty but he had goodnesses too, and hopes and dreams. And +you, you Milly, let all the hopes and dreams die and the faults grow +and multiply. Just by letting Will backslide, forget and grow careless. +</P> + +<P> +"Somebody told you that patience was a pretty ornament. It is if it's +the genuine article and properly used. But letting a man spend his +wages hoggishly on himself and robbing his children and driving them +from their lawful home and cheating you out of every right and even +your self-respect is nothing to be patient about. As for tears, they +have their uses, but they never mended wrongs that I know of. It's +fool, weeping, patient women that make selfish, mean men. It's plain, +honest, righteous anger that brings about the reforms in this world. +</P> + +<P> +"If the first time that Will got ugly drunk or swearing cross about +nothing you had stood up for yourself and the children and reminded him +sharply of the decencies instead of crying softly and praying for +patience, you wouldn't be sitting here, the two of you, in an empty +house with your children God knows where. +</P> + +<P> +"I've known you since before you were married and I'm sorry for you +because I know—" +</P> + +<P> +Then it was that Grandma Wentworth began to talk as only she knew how. +She forgot nothing. She recalled to that man and woman all the beauty +and the wonder of the beginning; the new furniture, the summer +moonlight when their home was young and they were waiting for their +first baby; his coming; his blue eyes and Jimmy's brown ones and little +Alice's gentle ways. All the past sweetness that had been theirs and +was not wholly forgotten she brought back, and in the end when they +sobbed aloud she cried a bit with them, for they were of her +generation. And then she rose to go. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, now that I've had my say I'll tell you that I really came to +invite you to your daughter's wedding supper to-night. Tommy Winston's +married your Alice sure enough, but he's a good boy even if he is +motherless and fatherless and has sort of shifted for himself in odd +ways. He brought Alice to me last night all properly married and she's +been with me ever since, so everything is all right and respectable, +for which you may thank the dear Lord on bended knees. Tommy's been +and rented the little Bently place over on the hill and is getting it +into shape with a few pieces of furniture. It's such a doll house it +won't take much to furnish it. I've found half a dozen things up attic +and, Milly, if you look around, you'll find plenty here to help start +the little new home in fair shape. Thank heavens, life in Green Valley +is still simple enough so's people can every now and then marry for +love and not much of anything else. Though Tommy's got a little +besides his horse and wagon. He's already bought Alice a new hat and +fixings and he's going down to Tony's hardware store this afternoon to +order up a good cook stove. So you see—" +</P> + +<P> +But at this point Sears woke up and hoarsely, defiantly and a little +tremulously announced: +</P> + +<P> +"He'll do no such thing. I'm going down right now to buy that there +cook stove." +</P> + +<P> +So that was settled and a new home peaceably, respectably started as +every home should be. And it would have been hard to say who was the +busiest and happiest of all the people who helped make a wedding that +day. +</P> + +<P> +By three o'clock, however, everything was about done and there were +only the final touches to be put on. Grandma engineered everything +over the telephone and Green Valley responded whole-heartedly, as it +always did to all her work. +</P> + +<P> +Fanny Foster had found time to run down to Jessup's and buy the bride a +first-class tablecloth and some towels. Fanny was always buying the +most appropriate, tasty and serviceable things for other people and the +most outlandish, cheap and second-hand stuff for herself. The +tablecloth was extravagantly good, as Grandma sternly told her. +</P> + +<P> +But, "La—what of it! I was saving the money to buy myself a silk +petticoat," Fanny defended herself. "I wanted to know just once before +I died what and how it felt like to rustle up the church aisle instead +of slinking down it on a Sunday morning. But I just think a silk +petticoat isn't worth thinking about when a thing like this happens." +</P> + +<P> +So Grandma smiled and as she laid out her best black silk she made a +mental note of the fact that Fanny Foster was to have, sometime or +other, a silk petticoat, made up to her for this day's work and +self-sacrifice. For Grandma was one of those rare practical people who +yet believed in respecting the foolish dreams of impractical humans. +</P> + +<P> +So it came about that everybody who could walk was at Tommy's and +Alice's wedding. The bride wore a beautifully simple dress that came +from Paris in Nan's trunk. And there were roses in her hair and Tommy +hardly knew her, and her father and mother certainly did not, so dazed +were they. +</P> + +<P> +The little doll house was already a home, with all of Green Valley +trooping in to leave little gifts and stopping long enough to shake +Tommy's hand and wish him luck and health and maybe twins. +</P> + +<P> +Indeed, Alice Sears' elopement and wedding became a part of Green +Valley history, so great an event was it, what with the suddenness of +it and the whole town being asked and Nan Ainslee coming home so +providentially, and Cynthia's son making a speech. +</P> + +<P> +The crowd was so great and so merry that the little Brownlee girl, +having tucked her fretful mother up in bed, stole out to the garden +fence and watched the doings with all a child's wistful eyes. David +Allan, who happened to drift out that way, found her there and they +visited over the fence. It took David quite a while to tell her what +it all meant, for she was of course a stranger to Green Valley and +Green Valley ways. +</P> + +<P> +Grandma watched her town folk a little mistily that night and expressed +her opinion a little tremulously to Roger Allan. +</P> + +<P> +"Roger, did you ever see a town so chockful of people that you have to +laugh over one minute and cry over the next?" +</P> + +<P> +Nan's father, walking home with her through the quiet streets, stopped +to light a cigar. When it was burning properly he remarked innocently +to his daughter: +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know when I've met so unusually good-looking and likeable a +fellow as this minister chap, Knight." +</P> + +<P> +Nan looked at her father with cold and suspicious eyes and her voice +when she answered was scornful. +</P> + +<P> +"You thought, Mr. Ainslee, that you met the handsomest and most +likeable chap on earth in Yokohama—if you remember," she reminded him +icily. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, of course—I remember. But I have come to believe that I was +somewhat mistaken in that boy in Yokohama. He lacked something that +this chap has—an elusive quality that is hard to put a name to but +which is one of the big essentials that makes for success." +</P> + +<P> +"Ministers," drawled Nanny wickedly, "have never been noticeably +successful in Green Valley." +</P> + +<P> +"No," admitted her father, "they haven't. And of course it's too bad +the boy's a minister. He's badly handicapped, naturally. Still, I +never remember when I'm with him that he is a parson. It may be that +women feel the same way. And you noticed that he had the good sense +not to wear a frock coat to this informal little wedding. I can't +recall that he has ever worn a frock coat since he's been here. I +think you'd like ministers, Nanny, if they weren't so given to wearing +frock coats. In fact, I'm willing to bet that you are going to like +this wonderful boy from India immensely." +</P> + +<P> +Nanny stood still and faced her father. +</P> + +<P> +"I loathe ministers—in any kind of a coat," she explained firmly. +"And I'll bet no bets with you. Such offers are unseemly in a man of +your years and already apparent grayness. They are, moreover, +detrimental to my morals. I should think you'd be ashamed,—and also +mindful of your former losses and mistaken prophecies." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh," her father assured her, "I admit my losses and mistakes. But I +have by no means lost hope or faith. You never can tell. I'm bound to +guess right some day. And I'm rather partial to this minister chap. +It would be so natural and fitting a punishment for an irreverent young +woman. For Nanny," the father added with teasing gentleness, "sweet as +you are and lovable, a little reverence and religion wouldn't hurt you." +</P> + +<P> +"I've always heard it said," demurely recollected Nanny, "that girls +generally take after the father." +</P> + +<P> +"That may be," agreed this particular father. "In that case I should +think you'd be willing to marry a little religion into the family for +my sake, if not your own." +</P> + +<P> +Nanny's patience was beginning to feel the strain. +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Ainslee," she warned him sternly, "if this was snowball time +instead of springtime in Green Valley, I'd snowball you black and blue." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap08"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +LILAC TIME +</H3> + + +<P> +To the knowing and observant and the loyal Green Valley is dear at all +times. But what most touches and wakens a Green Valley heart is lilac +time. +</P> + +<P> +There are on the Green Valley calendar many red-letter days beside the +regularly recurring national holidays, but lilac time, or Lilac Sunday, +is Green Valley's very own glad day. It is in the spring what +Thanksgiving is in the fall and wanderers who can not get home for +Thanksgiving and Christmas ease their homesick hearts with promises of +lilac time in the old town. +</P> + +<P> +On this particular Lilac Sunday, Nan, radiant and dressed in the sort +of clothes that only Nan knew how to buy and wear, was on her way to +church. She was early and decided to pass the Churchill place. She +always did at lilac time, for then it was fairly embedded in fragrance +and flowery glory. She had cut the blooms from her own bushes and sent +them on. She carried only a few of her most perfect sprays. She saw +that the Churchill gardens too had been trimmed but plenty of beauty +remained. +</P> + +<P> +She stopped a moment to admire the wonderful old red-brick house +glowing through the tender greens of spring. Her eyes drank in its +beauty and then fell on two huge perfect lilac plumes on the bush +nearest her. They were larger and lovelier than her own. +</P> + +<P> +With a little smile Nan reached out to gather them. She broke off the +first and was about to gather the other when Cynthia's son came slowly +and laughingly from around the bush. +</P> + +<P> +"Let me get it for you. You will soil your glove." +</P> + +<P> +Nan was startled and unaccountably embarrassed. She flushed with +something like annoyance. +</P> + +<P> +"Mercy! I had no idea you were anywhere about. I suppose I'm greedy +but these did seem lovelier than mine. This is Lilac Sunday and I +thought—perhaps nobody told you—that as long as you had so many you +wouldn't mind—I hope you don't think—" +</P> + +<P> +She was so very evidently bothered over the whole affair, so +disconcerted, she who was always so coolly dignified, that he laughed +with boyish delight. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—don't explain, I understand," he begged. +</P> + +<P> +The red in Nan's cheeks deepened. She stiffened and half turned away. +</P> + +<P> +"Goodness," she exclaimed to no one in particular, "how I <I>do</I> dislike +ministers. They always understand everything. You just can't tell +them anything. How I loathe them! They're insufferable." +</P> + +<P> +It was his turn to look a little startled and embarrassed. +</P> + +<P> +"But you don't have to like me as a minister. I don't want to be +<I>your</I> minister." +</P> + +<P> +She looked up to see just what he meant. But he seemed to have +forgotten her, for the smile had gone from his eyes and though he +looked at her she knew that he didn't see her; that he was looking +beyond her at some one, something else. When he spoke it was with a +winning gravity and a wistfulness that Nanny tried not to hear. +</P> + +<P> +"I miss my mother more than any one here can guess. Grandma Wentworth +is wonderful. She is so wise and good and I love her. But my mother +was young and gay and very beautiful. She played and laughed and +talked with me. She was the loveliest soul I ever knew. You are very +much like her. I have wanted you for a friend. I never had a sister +but if I could have had I should have asked for a girl like you." +</P> + +<P> +Oh, Nanny sensed the pitiful, childish loneliness of that plea! The +wistfulness of the boy stabbed through her really tender heart. But +Nanny Ainslee was a joyous, laughter-loving creature. And the idea of +this boy whom already she half loved asking her to be his <I>friend</I>, his +<I>sister</I>! Oh, it was childishly funny. How her father would chuckle +if he knew that she who had dismissed so many suitors with platonic +friendliness and sisterly solicitude was now being offered that same +platonic friendliness and brotherly love. It was too much for Nanny's +sense of humor! +</P> + +<P> +So Nanny giggled. She giggled disgracefully and could not stop +herself,—giggled even though she knew that the tall boy beside her was +flushing a painful red and slowly freezing into a hurt and painful +silence. But she could not save herself or him. +</P> + +<P> +"You had better let me cut you a few more sprays," he said at last +curtly. +</P> + +<P> +She let him lay them in her arms and they walked to church in absolute +silence. Nanny never knew that any living man could be so stubbornly +silent. She was sorry and she wanted to tell him so. But he gave her +no chance. It seemed he was a young man who never asked for things +twice. Nanny was sorry but she was also, for some incomprehensible +reason, angry. And the sorrier she grew the angrier she became. +Cynthia's son seemed not to notice. He walked straight on into the +church but Nanny stayed outside and held open court under the big horse +chestnuts in front of the church door. +</P> + +<P> +She had left the olive groves and almond groves, the thick roses and +the blue waters of Italy, in order to be at home in time to see her +native town wrapped up in its fragrant lilac glory. +</P> + +<P> +She stayed out now, her arms full of lilac plumes, watching the little +groups of her townspeople coming down the village streets toward the +church whose bell was tolling so sweetly through the warm, spring air. +</P> + +<P> +Here came Mrs. Dustin with Peter and Joe Baldwin with his two boys and +Colonel Stratton with his sweet-faced wife. From the opposite +direction came the Reverend Alexander Campbell with his wife in black +silk, his sister in gray silk, his elderly niece in blue silk and his +wife's second cousin in lavender. There was Joshua Stillman and his +quiet daughter, Uncle Tony and Uncle Tony's brother William, with his +four girls and Seth Curtis' wife, Ruth. +</P> + +<P> +Seth never went to church, having a profound scorn for the clergy. But +he always fixed things so his wife could go. He said ministers were +poor business men, selfish husbands and proverbially poor fathers, from +all he'd seen of them. Somehow Seth was a singularly unfortunate man +in the matter of seeing things. But there was no denying the fact that +he was an unusual husband. He had been caught time and again by his +men friends and neighbors on a Sunday morning with one of his wife's +aprons tied about him, holding the baby in one arm, while he stirred +something on the stove with the other, and in various other ways +superintending his household while Ruth was at church. But neither +jeers nor sympathy ever upset him. +</P> + +<P> +"No, I can't say that I've ever hankered for sermons much. They don't +generally tally with what I've seen and know of life. But Ruth now can +get something helpful out of even a fool's remarks and comes home +rested and cheerful. I figure that a woman as smart as Ruth about +working and saving sure earns her right to a bit of a church on Sunday +if she wants it. And furthermore, I aim to give my wife anything in +reason that she wants. It doesn't hurt any man to learn from a little +personal experience that babies aren't just little blessings full of +smiles and dimples but darn little nuisances, let me tell you. This +little kid is as good as they make them but he gives me a backache all +over, puts bumps on my temper and ties my nerves up in knots. And I've +discovered that just watching bread or pies or pudding is work. And +when a man's peeled the potatoes and set the table and sliced the bread +and filled the water glasses and opened the oven a dozen times and +strained and stirred and mashed and salted and peppered, he begins to +understand why his wife is so tired after getting a Sunday dinner. And +when he thinks of other days, washing days and ironing and baking and +scrubbing and sewing days, why, if he's anyway decent he begins to +suspect that he's darn lucky to get a full-grown woman to do all that +work for just her room and board. And when he stops to count the times +she's tied his necktie, darned his socks and patched his clothes, +besides giving him a clean bed, a pretty sitting room to live in, +children to play with and brag about, and a bank book to make him sleep +easy on such nights as the storms are raging outside, why, a man just +don't have to go to church to believe in God. He's got proofs enough +right in his kitchen. It's the wife who ought to go if it's only to +sit still for an hour and get time to tell herself that there is a God +and that some day the work will let up maybe and her back won't ache +any more and Johnny won't be so hard on his shoes and Sammy on his +stockings. Why, I tell you I'm afraid to keep Ruth from church, afraid +that if she loses her belief in a married woman's heaven she'll leave +me for somebody better or get so discouraged that she'll just hold her +breath and die." +</P> + +<P> +So Ruth Curtis went to church every Sunday. And Seth saw to it that +she always looked pretty. This particular Lilac Sunday she was wearing +the sprigged dimity that Seth bought her over in Spring Road at +Williamson's spring sale. +</P> + +<P> +Softly the bell tolled and the last stragglers came hurrying leisurely, +every soul carrying the lovely fragrant plumes so that the church would +be sweet with the breath of spring. Later, these armfuls of beauty +would be packed into huge boxes and shipped to the city hospitals to +gladden pain-racked bodies and weary hearts. +</P> + +<P> +Nanny Ainslee was still outside waiting for Grandma Wentworth. Lilac +Sunday Nanny always waited for Grandma and always sat with her, because +of a certain story that Grandma had told her once when the lamps were +not yet lit and the soft summer moonlight lay in windowed squares on +Grandma's sitting room floor. Nanny began to inquire of the last +comers. But Tommy and Alice Winston, still bridey and shy, said they +had seen nothing of her, and even Roger Allan supposed of course that +she must be in her favorite pew, known to the oldtimers as Inspiration +Corner. For it had been observed that all ministers sooner or later +delivered their discourses to Grandma Wentworth. They were always sure +of her undivided attention. Other people's eyes and minds might +wander, some might be even openly bored, but Grandma's uplifted face +was always kindly and encouraging, even though the sermon was +hopelessly jumbled. She was the surest, severest critic and yet each +man preached to her feeling that with the criticism would come +kindliness and the sort of mother comfort that Grandma somehow knew how +to give to the meanest and most blundering of creatures. Indeed, it +was the least successful of Green Valley's ministers who had designated +Grandma's seat as Inspiration Corner. And then had in a final burst of +wrath told Green Valley that like Sodom and Gomorrah it was doomed, +that no mere man preacher could save it, that its only hope lay in +Grandma Wentworth, who alone understood its miserable, petty orneriness. +</P> + +<P> +He meant to leave town a sputtering, raging man, that minister,—full +of what he called righteous wrath. But he went to say good-by to +Grandma and experienced a change of heart. +</P> + +<P> +He began his farewell by unburdening his heart and soul of all the +ponderous doctrines that sunny, joyful Green Valley had refused to +listen to. He spoke earnestly of the world's terrible need of +salvation, the fearful necessity for haste and wholesale repentance and +the awful menace of God's wrath. And the fact that he was a man +entering his forties instead of his thirties made matters worse. +</P> + +<P> +But Grandma listened patiently and when he was emptied of all his +sorrows and worriments she took him out into her herb-garden, seated +him where he could see the sunset hills and then she preached a +marvellous sermon to just this one man alone. No one but he knows what +she told him but he went forth a humble, tired, quiet man, filled to +the brim with a sudden belief in just life as it is lived by a few +hundred million humans. Five years later word came to Green Valley +that this same man was a much loved pastor somewhere in the mountains. +And Green Valley, perennially young, unthinking, joyous Green Valley, +laughed incredulously as a sweet-hearted but wrongly educated child +always laughs at a true fairy tale or a simple miracle. +</P> + +<P> +"If I had the making and raising of ministers," Grandma was heard to +say, apropos of this clergyman, "about the first thing I'd set them to +learning would be to laugh, first at themselves and then at other +people. And as for this repentance and exhortation business I believe +it is worn out. Humans have gotten tired of that 'last call for the +paradise express.' They like this world and its life and they know +they could be pretty decent if somebody would only explain a few little +things to them. It isn't that they hate religion but they want to be +allowed to grow into it naturally and sanely. Religion getting ought +to be the quietest, happiest process, just pleasant neighboring like +and comparing of ideas, with every now and then a holy hush when men +and women have suddenly sensed some big beauty in life. All this noise +is unnecessary, for every living soul of us, barring idiots, repents +several times a day even though we don't admit it in so many words. +And as for righteous wrath—it's a good thing and I believe in it, but +like cayenne pepper it wants to be used sparingly and only at the right +place and on the right person. Any one would think to hear some +ministers talk that the Almighty was a combination of Theodore +Roosevelt, the Kaiser and a New York Police Commissioner working the +third degree. +</P> + +<P> +"I wonder what the colleges can be thinking of, turning loose such +stale foolishness and old canned stuff on a mellow, sunny little home +town like Green Valley that's full of plain, blundering but +well-meaning, God-fearing people who work joyfully at their business of +living and turn up more religion when they plow a furrow or make over +the wedding dress for the baby than these ministers can dig up out of +all their musty books. I've prayed for all kinds of qualities in +ministers but I've come to the point where I ask nothing more of a +preacher than a laugh now and then, some horse sense and health. +</P> + +<P> +"I used to think that only mature men ought to be sent out but now I +shall be glad to see a boy in the pulpit to show us the way to +salvation,—a boy it may be with a head full of foolish notions that +old folks say are not practical and some of which won't of course stand +wear; but a boy, with a glad young face, eyes full of faith and dreams +and the sort of insane courage and daring that only the young know. +Such a boy needs considerable education in certain earthly matters, of +course, but he's lovable and teachable and will in time grow into a +real, God-knowing, truth-interpreting man." +</P> + +<P> +Oh, Grandma Wentworth was an authority on ministers—ministers and +babies. And it was a baby that had kept her away from church this +Lilac Sunday; a little, merry, red-headed boy baby that had come in the +early morning to make glad the heart of unbusinesslike Billy Evans and +his neat businesslike wife. For several hours Doc Philipps and Grandma +had despaired of both baby and mother, but when the pink dawn came +smiling over the world's rim Billy's little son was born alive and +unblemished and Billy's wife crept back from the Valley of the Shadow +and smiled a bit into Billy's white, stricken face. And Billy looked +deep down into the brown eyes of the girl and the terrible numbness +went out of his muscles and the icy hardness from around his heart and +he slipped out into the morning world to thank the Great Spirit that +moved it for His mercy and wonderful gift. He just stood on his front +doorstep and, looking about his pretty home and remembering the miracle +within the house, poured a great prayer into the heart of the glad +morning. +</P> + +<P> +Billy's house was one of the most picturesque of the many pretty homes +in Green Valley. It had been a ramshackle, tumbled-down old cabin lost +in a tangle of bushes and hidden from the road by a shabby, unsightly +row of old willows. Billy was going to rent it for temporary barn +purposes but his wife, who had a nimble and a prophetic eye, made him +buy it. Then, under her supervision Billy enlarged and remodeled it +and Billy's wife waved some sort of a fairy wand over it, for it became +over night a lovely, story-book home. When everything was ready she +had the unsightly willows cut, revealing a gently rising stretch of +mossy sward ending in a cluster of old trees from which the cozy house +peeped roguishly, tantalizingly. Two old walnuts guarded the little +footpath to the door and two huge lilac bushes screened the porch from +the too curious gaze of travelers on the road below. Indeed, so +altogether taking and fascinating a bit of property did it become after +its transformation that it was said that two of Green Valley's real +estate men never went down that road without doing sums in their heads +and calling themselves names for overlooking such a bargain. It takes +constructive imagination to be successful in real estate. +</P> + +<P> +And now around this cozy home spot Billy wandered deliriously, +aimlessly. It was the tolling of the church bell and the smell of the +lilacs that recalled to him the significance of the day. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, he was born on Lilac Sunday and he's red-headed just like Her. +Gosh—I must a bin born lucky!" +</P> + +<P> +Billy looked once more all about his story-book home and then his eyes +strayed away to Petersen's Woods, fairy green and already full of deep +shadowed aisles, full of fretted beauty and solemnity. Beyond them lay +the creek, a pool of silver draped in misty morning veils. +</P> + +<P> +"Gosh—I wish to God I was religious!" suddenly, contritely murmured +Billy Evans. In high heaven the angels, and in Billy's kitchen Grandma +Wentworth, overheard and smiled. +</P> + +<P> +When Hank Lolly came up from the livery barn for a late breakfast, his +face drawn and eyes full of fear for the man and woman who had been +family and home to him, Billy went down the footpath to meet him. +</P> + +<P> +"It's all right, Hank! He's here, red hair and all," Billy informed +him in the merest breath of a whisper. Hank wiped his face in limp +relief and sat down quite suddenly on the grass beside the path. +Instinctively Billy sat down with him. +</P> + +<P> +They said nothing for a time, just looked and looked at the wide blue +sky, the green sweet world, tried for perhaps the millionth time to +sense Eternity and the what-and-why-and-how of it all and then gave it +up and like children accepted the day, the little new life, the whole +wonder of it as happy children accept it all, on faith and with +untainted joy. It was just good to be there and there was no doubting +the perfect May day. So they sat reverently until Billy, looking again +at that mass of shimmering greens and into those church-like aisles, +said: +</P> + +<P> +"Hank, some one of us had ought to go to church to-day. I wish to God +I had kep' up going to Sunday school. Mother got me started but she +died before she could get me started in on church. So I never went. +It's a terrible thing for a man not to learn religion along with his +reading and writing and 'rithmetic. I used to think it was nobody's +business whether I had any religion or not after mother died. I knew +that where she was she'd understand. But I see now it was a terrible +mistake thinking that way and not laying in a supply of religion. A +man thinks he owns himself and that certain things are nobody's +business, but by-and-by along comes a wife or a red-headed baby and +things happen different from what you've ever expected, things that you +just got to have religion for, and gosh—what are you going to do then +if you ain't got any?" +</P> + +<P> +This terrible situation being beyond the mental powers of Hank, that +soul just sat still until Billy puzzled a way out. +</P> + +<P> +"Somebody'd ought to go to church from out this house to-day," went on +Billy in a low voice. "Grandma Wentworth can't go on account of Her +and It. I can't go because—gosh—I'm so kind of split, my head going +one way and my legs another, that as likely as not I'd wind up in the +blacksmith shop or the hotel or fall in the creek. I ain't safe on the +streets to-day, Hank. And, anyway, I've got to keep up fires and water +boiling and them dumb'd frogs under the willows from croaking so's She +can sleep to-night. That leaves nobody but you, Hank." +</P> + +<P> +Billy hesitated, realizing the enormity of the request he was about to +make. +</P> + +<P> +"Hank—I wish to God, you'd go and sort of settle the bill up for me. +Just go, Hank, and tell Him, that's the Big Boss, how darned thankful +we all are about what's happened to-day and that we'll do right by the +little shaver and that we'll try to run the livery business so's He +won't find too many mistakes when He gets around to looking over the +books Barney and you and me's keeping. And you might mention how we've +always made it a point to treat our horses well but will do better in +the future. And tell Him I'll see that the Widow Green's spring +plowing is done sooner after this. It was a darn shame her being left +last like that but that she never asked me, me being so easy-going and +she so neat, until the rest of them left her in the lurch. And tell +Him I'll take the sheriff's job, though if there's one thing I can't do +it's watching people and jumping on them. Just talk to Him that way, +Hank. Put in any little thing you happen to think of and go as far as +you like in promises and subscriptions. The business is moving and +what promises you and I can't keep She'll find a way to pay off. And +here's a ten-dollar gold piece to drop in the hat when it comes around. +You—" +</P> + +<P> +But Hank was standing now and looking at his employer with such terror +in every line of his weather-beaten face that Billy paused again. +</P> + +<P> +"My God—Billy! You ain't asking me—<I>me</I>—to—to—to—to go to +<I>church</I>?" Hank's voice fairly squeaked and stuttered with the horror +that clutched him. +</P> + +<P> +"Hank, if there was any one else—" +</P> + +<P> +But Hank, shaking in every joint and muscle of his still flabby body, +wagged his head in utter misery. +</P> + +<P> +"Billy, I'll do anything else for you and Mrs. Evans and little +Billy—anything but that. I'll jump into Wimple's pond, get drunk, +sign the pledge—anything but that. What you're a-wanting, Billy, +ain't to be thought of. You're forgetting, Billy, what I was and what +I am. Why, Billy, that there church belongs to the best people in this +town and it ain't for the likes of me to go into such vallyable places, +a-tramplin' on that there expensive carpet we both of us hauled free of +charge last September. There's Doc Philipps and Tony and Grandma +Wentworth and any number of good friends of mine in there. And do you +think I want to shame them and insult them by coming into their church, +disturbing the doings? You just let things be and when Mrs. Evans is +up and around again she'll go like she always does when she's got +enough vittles cooked up for us men folks. I'm a miserable, no-account +drunk, that's what I am, Billy Evans, and I ain't no proper person to +send on an errand to the Lord. Why, church ain't for the likes of +me—it's—it's—" +</P> + +<P> +But at this point language failed Hank entirely, and the enormity of +the proposed undertaking once more sweeping over him, Hank searched for +his bandanna and wiped the beads of cold sweat from around his mouth +and the back of his stringy neck. +</P> + +<P> +Billy was silent. He knew that Hank was right and that he had asked an +impossible service of his faithful helper. Still there in the morning +sun glistened the green grove and through the holiness of the spring +morning tolled the old church bell. So Billy rose and walked slowly +and a little sadly up the narrow path. And Hank walked up with him. +</P> + +<P> +It was in silence that they sat down to their late breakfast. But in +the act of swallowing his tenth cornmeal pancake dripping with maple +syrup Hank had a sudden inspiration. The misery in his face gave place +to a grim determination. +</P> + +<P> +"Billy," he offered remorsefully, "I can't go to church for you, but +I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll go to the dentist's and have these +bad teeth fixed that Doc and Mrs. Evans and you have been at me about. +Next to going to church that's the awfullest thing I know of and I'll +do it. Doc says that bad teeth make a bad stomach and a bad stomach +makes a bad man and it may be so. And as for that ten-dollar gold +piece, I don't see why you can't send that by Barney, same as you'd +send him to the bank for change or to Tony's to pay the gas bill. When +I go back now I'll just send Barney along with it, and then I'll go see +Doc Mitchell and let him kill me with that there machine of his." +</P> + +<P> +That's how it happened that a little thin hand caught Nanny Ainslee's +just as she was entering the church door and Barney of the spindle legs +begged frenziedly for assistance. +</P> + +<P> +"Aw, Nan—look at this!" and he held out the gold piece. "Billy Evans' +got a little baby down to his house and he's clean crazy. Grandma +Wentworth's bossing the baby show and she says for you to take the +minister home to dinner. And Billy's sent this here and wants me to +put it in the collection box and I don't dast. Why, say, old man +Austin that passes the collection plate would have me pinched if he saw +me drop that in it. +</P> + +<P> +"And, anyhow, I ain't been liked around here ever since last Christmas +when I got three boxes of candy by mistake. And, gee—Nan, I don't +know what to do about it. Billy Evans is the best man in this here +town and I'd do most anything for him, but he's such a good guy himself +he don't see that church ain't any place for a kid like me and that it +was a mistake to send me with this coin." +</P> + +<P> +Nan's amazement gave way to sudden enlightenment. She knew now why +Grandma Wentworth had not put in an appearance, and knowing Billy Evans +well, she instantly comprehended the situation. +</P> + +<P> +"Barney, what in the world are you talking about, saying this church is +no place for you. This is just the place for a boy who gets several +boxes of Christmas candy by mistake. You come right along with me." +</P> + +<P> +"Aw, Nan, why can't you drop it in for me? I just ain't got the nerve. +I'd rather get all my teeth pulled like Hank is going to do. Why, say, +Nan, just the sight of old Austin makes my hair curl. I tell ya he +don't like me and I'll be pinched—" +</P> + +<P> +But Nan had already drawn Billy's spindle-legged assistant inside and +as no man yet had been known to show anything but quiet pride when +escorting Nanny Ainslee, Barney straightened manfully and with an +outward serenity that amazed even himself he gracefully slid into a +seat, having first gallantly stepped aside to permit his gracious lady +to be seated. And life being that morning especially a thing of tender +humor, they had no sooner settled themselves comfortably when Fanny +Foster, the last comer, sank down beside them, breathing heavily. +</P> + +<P> +Fanny Foster was always late for church, not from any notion that a +late entrance was fashionable but because of some hitch in her domestic +affairs. She always explained to the congregation afterward just what +had caused her delay and the congregation was always ready to listen to +her excuses, for they were as a rule highly original ones. +</P> + +<P> +Fate was always sending Fanny the most thrilling experiences at the +most improper times. The children were always falling into the cistern +or setting the barn afire as she was about to start out somewhere. And +such things as buttonhooks and hairpins had a way of disappearing just +when she was in the greatest hurry. Not that the lack of these toilet +necessities ever stopped Fanny from attending any town function. +</P> + +<P> +If the buttonhook could not be found she set out with her shoes +unbuttoned, borrowing the necessary implement on the way. If she had +no hairpins she put her hair up temporarily with two knitting needles +or lead pencils or anything like that that came handy, stopped at +Jessup's, bought her hairpins, and while reporting news in Mrs. Green's +kitchen did up her hair without the aid of brush, comb or mirror. +</P> + +<P> +This trait Fanny came by naturally. She had had a droll grandmother. +It was authentic history that once at the very moment when she was +getting ready to attend a Green Valley funeral this grandmother's false +teeth broke, leaving her somewhat dazed. But only for a moment, for +she was a woman with a perfect memory. She suddenly remembered that +the wife of the deceased had an old emergency set; so, slipping through +the back streets, she arrived at the house of grief, borrowed the new +widow's old teeth and wept as copiously and sincerely, albeit a little +carefully, over the remains as any one else there. +</P> + +<P> +Now, scarcely waiting to regain her breath, Fanny turned to Nanny with +the usual explanations, only stopping to exclaim over Barney—"Land +sakes, Barney, what are you doing here!" A breath and then in sibilant +whispers: +</P> + +<P> +"Well—I thought I'd never get here. When I come to dress I found the +children had cut up my corset into a harness for the dog and Jessup's +said they hadn't anybody to send up with a new one and John said he +couldn't go because his foot's bad, him having stepped on the rake +yesterday afternoon and not wanting to irritate it, so's he could go to +work tomorrow as usual. And Grandma's up to Billy Evans' trying to +keep him from going crazy or I could have borrowed one of hers. So I +'phoned Central to see if she couldn't hunt up somebody to bring me +that new corset from Jessup's. Well, who does she get hold of but +Denny, just as he's going past with a telegram for Jocelyn Brownlee. +He brought the corset with the string gone and the box broken and asked +me to help him figure out what that telegram meant. It said, +</P> + +<P> +"'Coming better call it phyllis + BOB.'<BR> +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +"There's few men that can write a proper letter. We had to give it up. +And as if that wasn't enough, when I got to the creamery I met +Skinflint Holden and he told me there was a lot of disease amongst the +cattle and the men all got together and had a meeting and made Jake +Tuttle deputy marshal or something. It's a wonder Jake wouldn't say +something. I suppose he thinks the few old cows we have here in town +ain't worth saving. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, anyhow, I was hurrying along so's not to be late and just as I +turned Tumley's hedge didn't Bessie come out with her face swollen so +she looked homelier than Theresa Meyer. It seems she had a birthday +and Alex brought her a big box of chocolates and they give her the +toothache. She went to Doc Mitchell but he put her off because he was +regulating and pulling every tooth in Hank Lolly's head. She was just +sick to think she had to miss Lilac Sunday and Mr. Courtney's last +sermon, but she told me to be sure and listen and if he let on he was +sorry he was leaving not to believe him, because he's had everything +except the parlor furniture crated for a month. They've been eating +off tin plates and drinking out of two enamel cups on the kitchen +table. Bessie thinks that for a minister he's full of sin and +self-pride. But I say even a minister—" +</P> + +<P> +But at this point the hymn singing was over, the congregation settled +itself in comfortable attitudes, and the careful Mr. Courtney rose to +deliver his farewell sermon. +</P> + +<P> +It was a sermon that stirred nobody. Green Valley was as glad to see +the Reverend Courtney departing as he was to go. His one cautious +reference to their pastorless state, for he did not know that Green +Valley had already selected its new minister, brought not a line of +worry to the faces turned so politely to the pulpit, for on Lilac +Sunday and to a farewell sermon Green Valley was ever polite. +</P> + +<P> +Green Valley, listening, thought with relief of the Sundays ahead and +felt very much the way a hospitable housewife feels when an uncongenial +guest departs and the home springs back to its old cheery order and +family peace. +</P> + +<P> +When the services were over Green Valley strolled out into the May +sunshine in twos and threes and stood about as always in little groups +to exchange the week's news. Billy Evans' new happiness, the +ten-dollar gold piece and all its attending incidents were duly talked +over. Under the horse chestnuts Max Longman was telling Colonel +Stratton how the day before Sam Ellis had at last leased the hotel to a +Chicago man. It was reported that there was to be no new barber shop, +but that over on West Street a poolroom, also run by a city stranger, +was already doing business. Several people had passed it that morning +on their way to church and all said it had a peculiar appearance. +</P> + +<P> +"Looks like one of those woebegone city dens, with its green plush +curtains so you can't see what's going on inside. All it needs is fly +specks on the windows and a strong smell at its side door. That'll +come with time. I hear you can play billiards and pool in there and +there's some slot machines for those too young to take a hand at cards." +</P> + +<P> +So said Jake Tuttle, who now that he was a deputy sheriff on the watch +for diseases threatening his and his neighbors' cattle, suddenly +realized that there might be such a thing as a deputy sheriff to look +out for the physical and moral health of humans. +</P> + +<P> +Green Valley listened to Max Longman's announcement and Jake's comment +and made up its mind to go around and see. Sam Ellis' withdrawal from +business made Green Valley folks a little uneasy. The hotel in other +hands might become a strange place. For a moment an uncomfortable +feeling gripped those who heard. Sam, an old friend and a neighbor, +with his genial good sense and old-fashioned hotel was one thing. A +stranger from the big and wicked city was another. +</P> + +<P> +Green Valley almost began to worry a bit. But on the way home this +feeling wore off. How could things change? Why, there were the +Spencer boys taking turns at the ice-cream freezer on the back porch. +There was Ella Higgins coming out with a saucer of milk for her cat. +Downer's barn door was open and any one could see by the new buggy that +stood in it that Jack Downer's brother and family had driven in from +the farm for a Sunday dinner and visit. Williamson's dog, Caesar, was +tied up,—a sure sign that Mel and Emmy had gone off to see Emmy's +folks over in Spring Road. The chairs in Widow Green's orchard told +plainly that her sister's girls had come in from the city for the +week-end. On the Fenton's front porch sat pretty Millie Fenton, +waiting to put a flower in Robbie Longman's buttonhole. While +everybody knew that just next door homely Theresa Meyer was putting an +extra pan of fluffy soda biscuits into the oven as the best preparation +for <I>her</I> beau. +</P> + +<P> +So Green Valley looked and smiled and went joyously home to its +fragrant, old-fashioned Sunday dinner. New elements might and would +come but this smiling town would absorb them, mellow them to its own +golden hue and go on its way living and rejoicing. +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son went to dinner with the Ainslees. He walked with Mr. +Ainslee while Nan and her brother went on ahead. Nan was almost +noisily gay but no one seemed to be at all aware of it. +</P> + +<P> +The dinner was delicious and went off without the least bit of +embarrassment. At the table Nan was as suddenly still as she had been +noisily gay. She let the men do the talking while she scrupulously +attended to their wants. Once she forgot herself and while he was +talking studied the face of Cynthia's son. Her father caught her at it +and smiled. This made her flush and to even up matters she +deliberately put salt instead of sugar into her father's after-dinner +cup of coffee. Whereupon he, tasting the salt, made an irrelevant +remark about handwriting on the wall. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IX +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +GREEN VALLEY MEN +</H3> + + +<P> +Close on the heels of Lilac Sunday comes Decoration Day. And nowhere +is it observed so thoroughly as in Green Valley. +</P> + +<P> +The whole week preceding the day there is heard everywhere the whir of +sewing machines. New dresses are feverishly cut and made; old ones +ripped and remade. Hats are bought, old ones are retrimmed. Buggies +are repainted and baby carriages oiled. Dick does a thriving business +in lemons, picnic baskets, flags, peanuts and palm-leaf fans, these +being things that Jessup's chronically forget to carry, regarding them +as trifles and rather scornfully leaving them to Dick, who makes a +point of having on hand a very choice supply. +</P> + +<P> +This fury of work gradually dies down, to be followed by such an +epidemic of baking that the old town smells like a sweet old bakery +shop with its doors and windows wide open. There is then every evening +a careful survey of the flower beds in the garden, a rigid economy of +blossoms and even much skilful forcing of belated favorites. +</P> + +<P> +The last day is generally given over to hat buying, the purchasing of +the last forgotten fixings and clothes inspections. From one end of +the town to the other clotheslines, dining-room chairs, porch rockers +and upstairs bedrooms are overflowing with silk foulards, frilled +dimities, beribboned and belaced organdies, not to mention the billows +of dotted swiss and muslin. +</P> + +<P> +On short clotheslines, stretched across corners of back and side +porches or in the tree-shaded nooks of back yards, may be seen hanging +the holiday garments of Green Valley men. But what most catches the +eye are the old suits of army blue flapping gently in the spring breeze +with here and there a brass button glinting. There are a surprising +number of these suits of army blue just as there are a surprising +number of graves in the little Green Valley cemetery over which, the +long year through, flutters the small flag set there by loving hands +each Decoration Day. +</P> + +<P> +There are all manner of cleaning operations going on in full view of +anybody and everybody who might be interested enough to look. For +there is no streak of mean secretiveness in Green Valley folks. +</P> + +<P> +This is the one time in the year when Widow Green takes off and "does +up" the yellow silk tidy that drapes the upper right-hand corner of her +deceased husband's portrait which stands on an easel in the darkest +corner of her parlor. This little service is not the tender attention +of a loving and grieving wife for a sadly missed husband but rather a +patriotic woman's tribute to a man, who, worthless and cruel as a +husband, had yet been a gallant and an honorable soldier. +</P> + +<P> +As the widow sits on the back steps carefully washing the tidy in a +hand basin and with a bar of special soap highly recommended by Dick, +she looks over into the next yard and calls to Jimmy Rand and asks him +whether he's going to march with the rest of the school children and +will there be anything special on the programme this year. And he +tells her sure he's going to march. Ain't he got a new pair of pants, +a blouse, a navy blue tie and a new stickpin? And as for the +programme, he warns her to watch out "fur us kids because we're going +to be fixed up for something, but I dassent tell because it's a +surprise the teachers got up." +</P> + +<P> +This is the one day in the year when Jimmy Rand polishes his +grandfather's shoes with scrupulous care and without demanding the +usual nickel. He takes his payment in watching the blue army suit +swaying on the line under the tall poplars and in hearing the crowds on +Decoration Day shout themselves hoarse for old Major Rand. +</P> + +<P> +It is the one time too when Old Skinflint Holden gets from his fellow +citizens and neighbors a certain grave respect, for they all know that +on the morrow among the men in blue will be this same Old Skinflint +Holden with a medal on his breast. +</P> + +<P> +Though every preparation has seemingly been made days ago, still that +last night before the event is the very busiest time of all. +</P> + +<P> +Joe Baldwin's little shop is crowded. Jake Tuttle is there with the +four children, buying them the fanciest of footgear for the morrow. +The two Miller boys, who work in the creamery until nine every night +but have special leave this day to purchase holiday necessities, are +standing awkwardly near Joe's side door and waiting patiently for +Frankie Stevens and Dora Langely, better known as "Central," to depart +with their black velvet slippers, before making any effort to have Joe +try his wares on their awkward feet. Little Johnny Peterson comes in +to inquire if Joe has sewed the buttons on his, Johnny's, shoes, and +Martha Gray has a hard time trying to decide which of two pairs of +moccasins are most becoming to her youngest baby. Any number of youths +are hanging about waiting for Joe to get around to selling them a box +of his best shoe polish and some, getting impatient, wait on +themselves. Joe, with his spectacles pushed up into his hair, is +rushing around from customer to customer and through it all is dimly +conscious of the fact that outside under the awning Dolly Beatty is +waiting anxiously for the men folks to get out before she ventures in +to buy her Joe's special brand of corn salve and bunion plaster. +</P> + +<P> +And so it is all the way down Main Street. In the gents' furnishings' +corner of Peter Sweeney's dry-goods store Seth Curtis is buying a new +hat, a little jaunty hat that seems to fit his head well enough but +doesn't somehow become the rest of him. Seth looks best in a cap and +always wears one except, of course, on such state occasions as the +coming one. He asks the Longman boys how he looks in the brown fedora +Pete has just put on his head and Max Longman laughs and wants to know +what difference it makes how a married man with a bald spot looks. +Then he turns away to pick out carefully the kind of tie that will make +him most pleasing in Clara's sight on the morrow. +</P> + +<P> +In the ladies' department of that same store Jocelyn Brownlee is asking +for long, white silk gloves. A little hush falls on the crowd of +feminine shoppers as Mrs. Pete gets the stepladder, mounts it and +brings down with a good deal of visible pride a pasteboard box +containing six pairs of white silk gloves that Pete bought three years +ago in a moment of incomprehensible madness, a thing which Mrs. Pete +has never until this minute forgiven him. +</P> + +<P> +Jocelyn, pretty, eager, unaffected, selects the very first pair and is +wholly unconscious of the stir she has made. It is only when David +Allan comes up and asks her if she is ready that she becomes confused +and conscious of the watching eyes of the other buyers. +</P> + +<P> +She has promised to go to the Decoration Day exercises with David and +has hurried to buy gloves for the occasion not knowing, in her city +innocence, that gloves aren't the style in Green Valley, leastways not +for any outdoor festival. +</P> + +<P> +David watches the gloves being wrapped up and that reminds him that it +wouldn't hurt to buy a new buggy whip, one of the smart ones with the +bit of red, white and blue ribbon on its tip that he saw standing in +Dick's window. +</P> + +<P> +So he and Jocelyn go off together to get the whip. It is the first +time that Jocelyn has been out in the village streets after nightfall +and she looks about her with eager eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"My—how pretty the streets look and sound! It's ever so much prettier +than village street scenes on the stage!" she confides to David. And +David laughs and takes her over to Martin's for a soda and then, +because it is still early, he coaxes her to walk about town with him +and as a final treat they stop in front of Mary Langely's millinery +shop. +</P> + +<P> +Mary Langely's shop stands right back of Joe Baldwin's place on the +next street. Mary is a widow with two girls. Dora is the Green Valley +telephone operator and Nellie is typist and office girl for old Mr. +Dunn who is Green Valley's best real estate and lawyer man. He sells +lots, now and then a house, writes insurance and draws up wills, +collects bills or rather coaxes careless neighbors to settle their +accounts, and he absolutely does not believe in divorce or woman +suffrage. These two matters stir the gentle little man to great wrath. +His wife is even a gentler soul than he is. She is the eldest of the +Tumleys, sister of George Hoskins' wife and to Joe Tumley, the little +man with a voice as sweet as a skylark's. +</P> + +<P> +You go to Mr. Dunn's office through a little low gate and you find an +old, deep-eaved, gambrel-roofed house with a hundred little window +panes smiling at you from out its mantle of ivy. You love it at once +but you don't go in right away, because the great old trees won't let +you. You go and stand under them and wonder how old they are and lay +your hand caressingly on the fine old trunks. And then you see the +myrtle and violets growing beneath them and near the house clumps of +daisies and forget-me-nots. And then you spy the beehives and the +quaint old well and you walk through the cool grape arbor right into +the little kitchen, where Mrs. Dunn, as likely as not, is making a +cherry pie or currant jell or maybe a strawberry shortcake. She is a +delicious and an old-fashioned cook. Why, she even keeps a giant +ten-gallon cooky jar forever filled with cookies, although there are +now no children in this sweet old manse. Nobody now but Nellie Langely +who goes home every night to the millinery shop where she helps her +mother make and sell the bonnets that have made Mary Langely famous in +all the country round. +</P> + +<P> +Green Valley folks have never quite gotten over wondering about Mary +Langely. When Tom Langely was alive Mary was a self-effacing, oddly +silent woman. People said she and Tom were a queer pair. Tom had +great ambitions in almost every direction. He even made brave +beginnings. But that was all. Then one day, in the midst of all +manner of ambitious enterprises, he grew tired of living and died. And +then it was that Mary Langely rose from obscurity and made Green Valley +rub its eyes. For within a week after Tom's death she had gathered +together all the loose ends of things that he had started, clapped a +frame second story on the imposing red brick first floor of the house +Tom had begun, converted this first floor into a store, and inside of a +month was selling hats to women who hadn't until then realized they +needed a hat. +</P> + +<P> +There were more electric bulbs and mirrors in Mary's shop than in any +three houses in Green Valley. That was why it was always the gayest +spot in town on the night preceding any holiday. +</P> + +<P> +It was interesting and pleasant to watch through the brightly lighted +windows and the wide double glass doors the women trying on the gay +creations and hovering over the heaps of flowers and glittering +ornaments heaped upon the counters. +</P> + +<P> +Jocelyn and David stood in the soft shadow of an old elm and while they +watched David explained the customers going in and coming out. He told +her that the tall straight woman buying the spray of purple lilacs for +her last year's hat was the Widow Green. The short, waddly woman +trying on the wide hat with the pink roses was Bessie Williams. The +tall girl with the pretty braids wound round her head was Bonnie Don, +big Steve Meckling's sweetheart. Steve, David explained, was so +foolishly in love that he was ready to commit murder if another lad so +much as looked at Bonnie. +</P> + +<P> +The tall quiet man buying hats and ribbons for his girls was John +Foster. And the little bow-legged one, with the hard hat two sizes too +big, was Hen Tomlins who always went shopping with his wife. +</P> + +<P> +So Green Valley made its purchases and hastened home to pack its lunch +basket and lay out all its clothes on the spare-room bed. Even as +David and Jocelyn walked home through the laughing streets, lights were +being winked out in the lower living rooms only to flash out somewhere +up-stairs where the family was wisely going to bed early. No one even +glanced at the sky, for it was taken for granted that Green Valley +skies would do their very best, as a matter of course. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +When the last star began to fade and the first little breath of a new +morning ruffled the soft gray silence a sudden sharp volley rang out. +It was the Green Valley boys setting off cannon crackers in front of +the bank. And it must be said right here that that first signal volley +was about all the fireworks ever indulged in in Green Valley. This +little town, nestling in the peaceful shelter of gentle hills and +softly singing woods, naturally disliked harsh, ugly sounds and was +moreover far too thrifty, too practical and sane a community to put +firearms and flaming death into the hands of its children. Green +Valley patriotism was of a higher order. +</P> + +<P> +At that sharp volley Green Valley awoke with a start and a laugh and +ran to put flags on its gateposts and porch pillars and loop bunting +around its windows. And when the morning broke like a great pink rose +and shed its rosy light over the dimpling hills and lacy, misty +woodlands the old town was a-flutter with banners, everybody was about +through with breakfast and certain childless and highly efficient +ladies were already taking their front and side hair out of curl papers. +</P> + +<P> +At eight o'clock sharp the school bell summoned the children. Then a +little later the church bell summoned the veterans. And by nine the +procession was marching down Maple Street, flags waving, band playing +and every face aglow. +</P> + +<P> +First came the little tots all in white, the boy babies bearing little +flags and the girl babies little baskets of flowers, with little +Eleanor Williams carrying in her tiny hands a silken banner on which +Bessie Williams, her mother, had beautifully embroidered a dove and the +lovely word, "Peace." +</P> + +<P> +Then came the older children, a whole corps it seemed of Red Cross +nurses, followed by a regiment of merry sailor boys. There were +cowboys and Boy Scouts, boys in overalls and brownies. There were +girls in liberty caps, crinolines and sunbonnets. +</P> + +<P> +So grade after grade Green Valley's children came, a proud and happy +escort for the men in blue who followed. Nanny Ainslee's father led +the veterans, sitting his horse right gallantly. Nanny and her father +were both riding and so was Doc Philipps. +</P> + +<P> +There were plenty of people on horseback but most of the town marched, +even The Ladies Aid Society, every member wearing her badge and new hat +with conscious pride and turning her head continually to look at the +children, as the head of the procession turned corners. The young +married women with babies rode in buggies, from every one of whose +bulging sides flags drooped and fat baby legs and picnic baskets +protruded. +</P> + +<P> +Everything went smoothly, joyously along, though a few incidents in +various parts of the procession caused smiles, gusts of laughter and +even alarm. +</P> + +<P> +Jimmy Rand had a few anxious moments when the four fat puppies he +thought he had shut safely into the barn came yelping and tumbling +joyously into the very heart of the marching crowds. +</P> + +<P> +Jim Tumley was down on the day's programme for several numbers. But as +the line swung around the hotel and the spring winds stained with the +odors of liquor swept temptingly over him he half started to step out +of line. But Frank Burton guessed his trouble and ordered Martin's +clerk, Eddie, to bring the little chap an extra large and fine soda +instead. +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Hen Tomlins upset things by ordering Hen back home to change his +shirt. It seems that Hen had deliberately put on a shirt with a soft +collar and in the excitement of getting under way and trying to +remember which way her new hat was supposed to set Mrs. Hen had failed +to notice the crime until, her fears set at rest by Mary Langeley, she +turned around to see if Hen looked all right. +</P> + +<P> +Uncle Tony was in a great state of excitement. He was continually +leaving his place in The Business Men's Association to have a look from +the side lines at the imposing spectacle. +</P> + +<P> +Here and there mothers close enough to their offspring were suggesting +a more frequent use of handkerchiefs and calling attention to +traitorous garters and wrinkled stockings. Tommy Downey had forgotten +what his mother had told him about being sure to put his ears inside +his cap and those two appendages, burned and already blistered by the +hot May sun, stood out in solemn grandeur from his small, round, +grinning face. The school teachers were keeping anxious eyes on their +particular broods and insisting that the eager feet keep solemn step to +the music. +</P> + +<P> +Sam Ellis' new greenhorn hired girl, Francy, was sitting in the back +seat of the buggy, holding down the brimming baskets and leaning out as +far as possible so as not to miss anything that might happen at either +end as well as the middle of the procession. She had been utterly +unable to pin on her first American hat with hatpins, so had wisely +tied it to her head with a large red-bordered handkerchief which she +had brought over from the old country. +</P> + +<P> +Jocelyn Brownlee, sitting beside David in his smart rig, had begged him +to go last so that she could see everything. This was her first +country festival and no child in that throng was so happily, wildly +eager to drain the day to the very last drop of enjoyment. +</P> + +<P> +Jocelyn and David however did not end the procession. Behind them, +though quite a way back, was Uncle Tony's brother William. William was +driving his span of grays so slowly that the pretty creatures tossed +their heads restlessly, impatiently, lonely for the companionship of +the gay throng ahead. +</P> + +<P> +But though their owner knew what they wanted he held them back sternly. +But he looked as wistfully as they at the fluttering flags and listened +as keenly to the puffs of music that the wind dashed into his face +every now and then. +</P> + +<P> +Every Decoration Day Uncle Tony's brother William rode just so, slowly +and alone at the end of the gay procession. On that day he was a +lonely and tragic figure. Loved and respected every other day in the +year, on this he was shunned. For he was the only man in all Green +Valley who, when conscripted, would not go to the war but sent a +substitute, one Bob Saunders. +</P> + +<P> +Bob was killed at Gettysburg and nobody mourned him, not even his very +own sister though Green Valley was duly proud of the way he died. Only +on this one day did Green Valley remember the man whose death was the +one and only worth while deed of a misspent life. But on this one day +too Green Valley shunned the man who sent him to his death. +</P> + +<P> +So every Decoration Day William came alone to put a wreath on Bob's +grave and watch the exercises from a distance. When it was over he +went home—alone. And Green Valley let him do it year after year. +</P> + +<P> +He was never known to murmur at Green Valley's annual censure nor did +he ever seem to hope for forgiveness. Green Valley had asked him once +why he had done it and he said that he would have been worthless as a +soldier because he did not believe in killing people and was himself +horribly afraid of being butchered. +</P> + +<P> +Green Valley was appalled at this terrible confession, at the absence +in one of its sons of even the common garden variety of courage. It +did its best for a while to despise William. But it is hard work +despising an honest, quiet, just and lovable man. So gradually William +was allowed to come home into Green Valley's life. And it was only on +this one holiday that he was an outcast. Neither did any one ever +remind William's children of what years ago their father had done. But +of course they knew. Their father had told them himself. They were in +no way cast down. They were all girls who loved their father and did +not believe in war. +</P> + +<P> +In that fashion then, and in that order, Green Valley marched down Main +Street, up Grove, through lovely Maple and very slowly down Orchard +Avenue so that Jeremy Collins, who was bedridden because of a bullet +wound suffered at Shiloh, could see his old comrades with whom he could +no longer march. +</P> + +<P> +All the way down Park Lane the band played its very best and loudest as +if calling from afar to those comrades who lay sleeping beneath the +pines and oaks of the little cemetery. And just as the Green Valley +folks came in sight of the white headstones the Spring Road procession +came tramping over the old bridge, and Elmwood, with its flags and +band, was coming up the new South Road. The three towns met nicely at +the very gates of the cemetery and together made the sort of sound and +presented the sort of sight that lingers in the heart long after other +things have faded from one's memory. +</P> + +<P> +Then the bands grew still and there was quiet, a quiet that every +minute grew deeper so that the noisiest youngster grew round-eyed and +the fat sleek horses moved never a hoof. And then, sweet and soft +through the waiting, hushed air, came the notes of Major Rand's cornet. +He was playing for his comrades as he had played at Shiloh, at +Chickamauga and many another place in the Southland. He played all +their old favorites and then very, very softly the cornet wailed—"We +are tenting to-night on the old camp ground"—and somewhere beside it +little Jim Tumley began to sing. +</P> + +<P> +From the high blue sky and the softly stirring tree-tops the words seem +to drop into little hearts and big hearts and the sweet, melting +sadness of them misted the eyes. When the last feathery echo had died +away the men in blue passed two by two through the cemetery gate. +Reverend Campbell, who had been their chaplain, said a short prayer. +At its end the children, with their arms full of flowers, crowded up +and the men in blue stopped at every grave. The little boys planted +their flags at the head and the little girls scattered the blossoms +deep. +</P> + +<P> +From beyond the gates Green Valley and Spring Road and Elmwood watched +its heroes and its children. In David Allan's smart rig sat a little +city girl, her face crumpled and stained like a rain-beaten rose. She +was saying to no one in particular, "Oh—my daddy was a soldier too but +I know that he never had a Decoration Day like this." +</P> + +<P> +The bands played again and each class went through its number on the +programme with grace and only a very few noticeable blunders. Tommy +Downey, ears rampant, a tooth missing and a face radiant with joy and +absolute self-confidence, mounted the bunting and flag-draped stage and +in a booming voice wholly out of proportion to his midget dimensions +and in ten dashing verses assured those assembled that the man who wore +the shoulder straps was a fine enough fellow to be sure, but that it +was after all the man without them who had to win the day. +</P> + +<P> +The old country roads rippled with applause and Tommy's mother, +forgetting for once Tommy's funny ears which were her greatest source +of grief, drew the funny little body close and explained to admiring +bystanders that Tommy "took" after one of her great-uncles, a soul much +given to speech making. +</P> + +<P> +So number after number went off and then there came the speech of the +day. It had been decided at the last moment that Doc Philipps must +make this, because the specially ordered and greatly renowned speaker, +one Daniel Morton from down Brunesville way, had at the last moment and +at his ridiculous age contracted measles. +</P> + +<P> +Now Green Valley knew how Doc Philipps hated to talk about almost +everything except trees. But Green Valley also knew that Doc could +talk about most anything if he was so minded. He was, moreover, as +well known and loved in Spring Road and Elmwood as he was in his own +town. So Green Valley folks leaned back, certain that this speech +would be worth hearing. +</P> + +<P> +The bulky figure in army blue stepped to the edge of the platform and +for a silent minute towered above his neighbors like one of the great +trees he so loved. Then, without warning or preface, he began to talk +to them. +</P> + +<P> +"War is pretty—when the uniforms are new and the band is playing. War +is glorious to read about and talk about—when it's all over. But war +is every kind of hell imaginable for everybody and everything while +it's going on! And they lie who say that it ever was, is, or can be +anything else. Every soldier here to-day above ground or below it will +and would tell you the same. +</P> + +<P> +"And they are fools who say that wars cannot be prevented. War is the +rough and savage tool of a world as yet too ignorant to invent and use +any other. But here and there, in odd corners of the world, an +ever-increasing number of men are recognizing it as a disease, due to +ignorance, as possible to cure and wipe out, as any other of the +horrible plagues of mankind. +</P> + +<P> +"When I was twenty-three I too believed in war. I liked the uniform, I +liked the excitement of going, I liked the idea of 'fighting for the +right.' I was too young and too ignorant to realize that older, better +men than I on the other side felt just as right as I did. In those +days war was the only tool and we thought it right, and some of us went +hating it and some of us went shouting like fools. I went for the lark +of it, for I knew no better. I marched away in a new uniform with the +band playing and the flags snapping. And on the little old farm my +father gave me I left a nineteen-year-old wife with my one-year-old +baby. +</P> + +<P> +"Next door to that wife and baby of mine lived a man who did not +believe in war, a man who, even when conscription came and he was +called, refused to go to war. He hired a substitute and stayed at +home. And for that Green Valley has marked that man a coward and every +year sits in judgment upon him. +</P> + +<P> +"Yet the man who would not go to war stayed at home to plough my fields +and plant them. He it was who saw to it that that wife of mine and the +wives of other war-mad boys did not want for bread. He stayed at home +here and minded his business and ours as well. He wrote letters and +got news for our women when they got to fretting too hard. He +harvested our crops, tended our stock, and mended our fences because he +is so made that he cannot bear to see things wasted, neglected, ruined. +</P> + +<P> +"As a soldier that man was worthless, for the business of a soldier is +to kill, to burn, to waste, to maim. He knew that and he knew that +being what he was he could serve his country better doing the things he +liked and believed in. +</P> + +<P> +"I came out of that war a physical wreck but with a heart purified. I +saw such a hell of evil, such destruction, such misery that to-day I am +a doctor and a planter of trees. When I saw men torn to rags and +lovely strips of woodland ripped to splintered ugliness I vowed that if +I ever came through that madness I would make amends. I swore I would +go through the world mending things. So terribly did those war horrors +grip me. And I have tried to keep my promise. For every tree I saw +splintered I have tried to plant another somewhere. I have been able +to do this because of that old neighbor of mine. +</P> + +<P> +"When I came home a wreck and said that I wanted to be a doctor, people +laughed at the idea. But the man who does not believe in war came to +me at night and offered to help me through the medical school. It was +that man who made a doctor of me. He had the courage to believe and +trust when every one else laughed. +</P> + +<P> +"Yet that is the man Green Valley has been punishing all these years. +You have been counting that man a coward when you know he is no coward. +When Petersen's fool hired man let that bull out of its stall to rage +through Green Valley's streets it was Green Valley's coward who caught +him at the risk of his life. When Johnny Bigelow was sick with +smallpox it was the coward who nursed him. +</P> + +<P> +"You know all that. Yet, because of outlived and mossy tradition, you +let that man ride alone, keep him out of a Green Valley day, you who +count yourselves such good neighbors. +</P> + +<P> +"I tell you we men in blue and gray are dead and our tool of war is a +poor and clumsy thing of the past. Ours was a brave enough, great +enough day. But it has passed, its story is over and done with. +</P> + +<P> +"It is the new brand of courage that the new generations want and will +have. And no old soldier here but is glad to feel that the days of +bloodshed are over, that somewhere in the days ahead there is coming +the dawn of peace, a world peace forevermore." +</P> + +<P> +As suddenly as he began he stopped, for a long second there was a +strange silence. For just the space of ten heart flutters there was +amazement at this new style of address. No old soldier had ever talked +to them in that fashion. But when they saw him striding over that +stage and headed straight for William the storm broke and eddied out to +where William sat, holding in the grays, not even dreaming that at last +he was understood and forgiven. +</P> + +<P> +After the last songs were sung the sun stood high. So then the great +gathering broke into little family groups that strolled off up the +roads in every direction. Here in shady spots tablecloths were spread +and soon everybody seemed to be opening a basket and the feast was on. +</P> + +<P> +In half an hour all manner of things had happened. The Whitely twins +fell into some strawberry pies, and supposedly hard boiled eggs were in +many cases found to be extremely soft boiled. Boys of all sizes were +beginning to be smeared from ear to ear and two of Hen Tomlin's wife's +doughnuts were found to be quite raw inside, a discovery that so +stunned that careful lady that she never noticed Hen had taken off his +stiff linen collar, opened his shirt and tucked both it and his +undershirt into a very cool and comfortable décolleté effect. +</P> + +<P> +In another half hour fat babies fell asleep where they sat, their +little fat hands holding tight to some goody. Boys old enough to +wonder about the contrariness of things mortal looked sadly at the +still inviting tables and marveled that a thoughtful and farseeing +Providence should have made a boy's stomach in so careless and +penurious a fashion. +</P> + +<P> +They made as many as a dozen trials to see if by any chance some corner +of the said organ could be further reenforced. But when even ice-cream +and marshmallows refused to go down they gave up and dragged themselves +away to some spot where a more lucky or efficient comrade was still +blissfully busy. +</P> + +<P> +The married men openly loosened their belts and looked about for a +quiet and restful spot. The unmarried ones went sneaking off where +their mothers and their best girls couldn't see them smoking their +cigarettes. +</P> + +<P> +In the general relaxation Dolly Beatty slipped off her tightest shoe, +one bunion and four corns clamoring loudly for room. And though nobody +saw her do it, everybody knew that Sam Bobbins' wife had gone behind +some convenient bush and taken off her new corset. +</P> + +<P> +In this quiet time old friends searched each other out and sat +peacefully talking over old times. The married women kept their eyes +on the strolling couples, hoping to see a lovers' quarrel or discover a +new and as yet unannounced affair. Little by little news was +disseminated and listened to that in the elaborate preparations of the +past days had been overlooked or unreported. +</P> + +<P> +David and Jocelyn were in the crowd of merrymakers and yet not of it. +They had selected a fine old tree a little removed from the thick of +things and here Jocelyn spread their luncheon. +</P> + +<P> +"It's a lucky thing," she explained shyly, "that Decoration Day doesn't +come earlier in the year or I'd never have dared to go to a party like +this and be responsible for lunch. About all I knew how to make when +we came to Green Valley was fudge, fruit salad and toasted +marshmallows. And before Annie Dolan came to teach me how to do things +I nearly died trying. I was all black and blue from falling down the +cellar and scarred and blistered from frying things. But now I know +ever so much. +</P> + +<P> +"I can make two lovely soups and biscuits and apple pie and gravy. And +I know how to clean and stuff a turkey. Only last week Annie taught me +how to make red raspberry and currant jell. And my burns are nearly +all healed except this one. It was pretty bad, but I was ashamed to go +to the doctor's so it's not quite healed yet. That's why I just had to +have gloves to cover the bandage. But nobody else seems to be wearing +elbow gloves so I guess I'll take mine off and be comfortable. Would +you mind putting them in your pocket for me?" +</P> + +<P> +David caught the silken ball she tossed him and carefully tucked it +away. He insisted on seeing the burn but Jocelyn waved him aside, +declaring that her hunger was worse just then. +</P> + +<P> +So they ate and then sat and talked quietly of everything and nothing. +All about them people laughed and chattered. Every now and then some +one called to them and they answered correctly enough, yet knew not +what they had said. For as naturally as all the simple unspoiled +things of God's world find each other, so this sweet, unspoiled little +city girl and the big, unspoiled country boy had found each other. And +a great content possessed them. They did not know as yet what it was +but knew only that the world for them was complete and every hour +perfect that they spent together. +</P> + +<P> +They sat under their tree even after the games and races had begun and +were rather glad that in the excitement over the afternoon's programme +they two were forgotten and free to roam about. +</P> + +<P> +They went down to the creek where the burned arm was unbandaged. +Jocelyn was rosily pleased to see David frown at the ugly raw scar. He +gathered the leaves of some weed strange to her and when he had pounded +them to a cool pulp he laid them on the burn and once more bound up the +arm. He was as glad to do it as she was to have him and each knew how +the other felt. +</P> + +<P> +They strolled through the now deserted cemetery and read the epitaphs +on the mossy stones and yet nothing seemed old or sad or caused them +the least surprise. They saw Nanny Ainslee standing with Cynthia's son +before a stone that had neither name nor date but only the love-sad +words: +</P> + +<P> + "I Miss Thee So."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +But they thought nothing of it. The world was far away and they were +serenely happy in a rarer one of their own. +</P> + +<P> +Slowly the golden afternoon was waning. Little children were beginning +to pull on their stockings, mothers began packing up the baskets and +fathers were harnessing the horses. Soon everybody was ready and Green +Valley, Spring Road and Elmwood, with many waves of flags and hands, +each started down its own road toward home. +</P> + +<P> +It was a tired, happy town that straggled down Main Street just as the +sun was gilding it with his last rays. Green Valley mothers were +everywhere hurrying their broods on to bread and milk and bed. In the +sunset streets only the little groups of grown-ups lingered to talk +over the day and exchange last jokes before going on toward home and +rest. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap10"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER X +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE KNOLL +</H3> + + +<P> +There were whole days when Cynthia's son did nothing but loaf,—whole +days when he went off by himself into the still corners of his world +and let the whole wide universe talk and sing to him and awe him with +its mystery. +</P> + +<P> +He would lie for hours in some cool, shady fern nook under a sheltering +road hedge or in the shade of some giant tree friend. At such times he +scaled the thinking, wondering part of himself and opened wide his +heart to the great whisper that rippled the grain, to the sweet song +that swelled the throat of the oriole and lark, to the beauty that dyed +the heavens and the earth, to the glad struggle for life everywhere. +</P> + +<P> +In this way he had always healed all his griefs, freed his soul from +doubts and stilled the many strange longings that made his heart ache +for things whose name and nature he knew not. +</P> + +<P> +He had discovered many of these still, restful corners from which to +watch life as it went by. But his favorite spot was right on his own +farm. +</P> + +<P> +At the very end of the Churchill estate, as if thrown in for good +measure, was a little knoll, smooth and grassy and crowned with a +little grove of God's own planting. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +For there were gathered together big gnarled oaks, maples, old hickory +trees and many poplars. There were on that knoll three snowy, bridal +birches, the rough trunks of horse-chestnuts and a few solemn pines. +As if that were not enough, in the very heart of this woody temple were +two shaggy old crab-apple trees and one stray wild plum. +</P> + +<P> +In the spring here was fairyland. And into it Cynthia's son retired at +every fair opportunity. Here he sat and looked off at the dimpling, +rippling farmlands, the wandering old roads and at Green Valley roofs +nestling so securely in their setting of rich greens and dappled +sunshine. +</P> + +<P> +From his seat beneath an oak he could see Wimple's pond with its circle +of trees and through the far willow hedges caught the glittering sheen +and sparkle of Silver Creek. And there before and below him lay the +mellow old farm that his grandfather had left him. +</P> + +<P> +The warm brick walls with their wide brick chimneys already had a +welcoming look. For the tenant was gone and the old home was being +repaired for its owner. But from the knoll no sound of hammer or sight +of workmen marred the soft silence and sunny peace of the day. So +Green Valley's young minister sprawled comfortably down, closed his +eyes and let the earth music wrap him round. +</P> + +<P> +He was not even day dreaming the day Nan Ainslee stumbled on him there +under the oaks and pines. She had discovered the knoll when she was +six years old and claimed it for her very own, sharing its beauties +with no one, not even her brother. When she grew to young ladyhood she +often left Green Valley for wonderful trips to the ends of the world. +But she always came back to the lilacs and the seat under the great oak. +</P> + +<P> +At every return she hastened out to see anew her home valley as it +looked from her grove. So it was with something very close to +annoyance that she looked at the sprawling figure of the usurper. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, for pity sakes! What are you doing here?" she demanded. +</P> + +<P> +He opened his eyes slowly and looked at her. She fitted in so well +with the velvet whisper of the wind, the cool blue of the sky and the +world's fresh beauty that he took her appearance as a part of the +picture and was silent. It was only when she repeated her question +rather sharply that he sat up to explain. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, I found this spot months ago! It is the stillest, most heavenly +nook in Green Valley. I come up here whenever I'm tired of thinking." +</P> + +<P> +"Well—I found this place years and years ago," Nanny complained. +</P> + +<P> +"What's the matter with us both using it?" he said very civilly. +</P> + +<P> +"But," objected Nan, "this is the sort of a place that you want all to +yourself." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, it is," he agreed and did not let the situation worry him +further. He didn't offer her a seat or give her a chance to take +herself off gracefully. And Nanny was beginning to feel a little +awkward. She wasn't used to being ignored in this strange fashion. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you very old?" the minister asked suddenly and looked up at her +with eyes as innocent and serene as a child's. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm twenty-three," Nan was startled into confessing. +</P> + +<P> +"Why aren't you married?" +</P> + +<P> +As she gasped and searched about for an answer he added: +</P> + +<P> +"In India a girl is a grandmother at that age." +</P> + +<P> +"This isn't India," smiled Nan good-naturedly, for she saw quite +suddenly that this big young man knew very little about women, +especially western women. +</P> + +<P> +"No—this isn't India." He repeated her words slowly, little wrinkles +of pain ruffling his face. For his inner eye was blotting out the +Green Valley picture and painting in its stead the India of his memory, +the India of gorgeous color, the bazaars, the narrow streets; the India +that held within its mystic arms two plain white stones standing side +by side and bearing the inscriptions "Father" and "Mother." +</P> + +<P> +Nan, not guessing what was going on in his heart, took advantage of his +silence to get even. +</P> + +<P> +"How old are you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Twenty-eight." +</P> + +<P> +"Why aren't you married?" +</P> + +<P> +"Why in the world should I be?" he wanted to know. +</P> + +<P> +"Green Valley men are usually the fathers of two or three children at +your age," she informed him calmly. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh," he smiled frankly, "of course I shall marry some day. But a man +need never hurry. He, unlike a woman, can always marry. And I intend +to have children—many children, because one child is always so lonely. +I know because I was an only child." +</P> + +<P> +This astounding piece of confidence kept Nan's tongue tied and for a +few seconds all manner of funny emotions fought within her. She wanted +to laugh, to get angry at the lordly superiority of the idea that a +woman must hurry to the altar. She felt that she ought to feel +embarrassed but the innocent sincerity with which it was all uttered +kept her from blushing and her eyes from snapping. She told herself +instead that of all man creatures she had ever encountered, this boy +from India was certainly the weirdest. And she wondered what a woman +not his mother could do with him. +</P> + +<P> +After a while she tried again. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't you feel rather guilty loafing here in the sunshine?" +</P> + +<P> +"No. Why—what should I be doing?" +</P> + +<P> +"These beautiful afternoons you ought to be devoting to pastoral calls." +</P> + +<P> +"But I attended to all the day's work this morning. I helped Uncle +Roger Allan build a fence and doctored up David's pet horse, Dolly. I +spaded up a flower plot for Grandma Wentworth and visited little Jimmy +Trumbull who's home from the hospital. Doc Philipps says he won't be +up for some time yet, so to cheer him up I've promised him a party. I +also drove to the station with Mrs. Bates' ancient horse and brought +home her new incubator. While I was there Jocelyn Brownlee came down +to get a box she said she had there. Some teasing cousin sent her a +little live pig and when she found out what was in the box she didn't +know what to do. So I put the pig beside the incubator and sat Jocelyn +beside me and we proceeded on our way. +</P> + +<P> +"That horse belonging to Mrs. Bates is certainly a solemn, stately +beast but Jocelyn's little pig was anything but stately. We made an +interesting and a musical spectacle as we went along, and I know that +one little red-headed boy in this town was late for school because he +followed us halfway home. We passed the Tomlins place and Hen was +sitting at the window, propped up with pillows. It was his first day +up and we made him laugh so hard that his wife was a little worried, I +think." +</P> + +<P> +"Agnes is rather good to Hen these days, isn't she?" Nan ventured to +ask, for the whole town knew how Agnes had gone to the minister with +her domestic troubles and how in some mysterious fashion this young man +had worked a miracle. For both Agnes and Hen were as suddenly and +happily in love with one another as though they were newly married +instead of being a middle-aged and childless couple. +</P> + +<P> +But that was all the town did know about the matter. For strange to +say Agnes, who had talked loud enough and long enough before about her +unhappiness, now was still, with never a word to say about what made +her so contented and happy. Green Valley saw her look at Hen as if he +were suddenly precious and smooth his pillow and wait on him. And +Green Valley wanted to know all about it. But so far nobody knew but +Agnes, Hen and the new minister and he didn't seem inclined to speak +about it. Not even to satisfy Nanny Ainslee's curiosity. +</P> + +<P> +Once more Nanny was embarrassed and a little angry. She swung up her +sunshade and started to go. This minister man with his ignorance of +women and his knowledge of Hen's domestic affairs was, she told +herself, a crazy, impossible creature and he could sit in his little +grove on his little knoll till he died for all she cared. She'd take +mighty good care never again to stray into his domain. +</P> + +<P> +But just as she really got up speed the big chap under the oak stood up +and spoke. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't go, Nan." +</P> + +<P> +The shock of hearing him say that stopped her and turned her sharply +around, so that she looked straight at him and found him looking at her +in a way that made the whole green world suddenly fade away into misty +insignificance. Something about that look of his made her walk back. +</P> + +<P> +But she trailed her sunshade a little defiantly and kept her eyes down +carefully. She was a little frightened too. Because for the first +time in her life she was conscious of her heart. She felt it beating +queerly and almost audibly. With every step that she took back toward +him she grew strangely happy and strangely angry. +</P> + +<P> +He silently arranged a seat for her beside him and she sat down, folded +her hands in her lap, looked off at the village roofs and waited. +</P> + +<P> +He looked at her a long time. For Nanny was good to look at. Then he +began to talk in an odd, quiet way as if they two were at home alone +and the world was shut out and far away. And he told her the story of +that locked drawer in Hen Tomlins' chiffonier. +</P> + +<P> +That drawer and Hen's growing stubbornness, due no doubt to the gradual +coming on of his serious illness, had very nearly been the death of +poor, dictatorial Agnes Tomlins. She had always picked out Hen's +shirts, bought his ties and ordered his suits and Hen had never +rebelled openly. Nor did he, so far as she knew, ever dare to have a +thought, a memory or a possession of which she was not fully informed. +</P> + +<P> +But this last year Hen had become secretive, openly rebellious, +strangely despondent, with now and then flashes of a very real and +unpleasant temper. Agnes, baffled, curious, hurt, angry and afraid, +had at last taken her burden to the boyish minister and then went in +trembling triumph to Hen and told him what she had done. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," Hen told her quietly, "I know. He was in here when you went to +the drug store and told me. He advised me to open that drawer and let +you see what's in it. And I'll do it to please him. But I won't open +it myself and he's the only one I'll let do it. So just you send for +him. As long as you told him, I want him to see there's nothing in +that drawer that I need to be ashamed of." +</P> + +<P> +At this point in the story Cynthia's son paused and looked so long at +the sun-splashed village roofs that. +</P> + +<P> +Nan stirred impatiently. +</P> + +<P> +"Well—what was it that Hen was guarding so carefully from Agnes?" she +wanted to know. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—just odds and ends—mostly trifles. There was a dance programme, +a black kid glove of his wife's, some letters from a chum that's dead, +an old knife his grandfather once gave him when he was a boy, the last +knit necktie his mother had made him and a box of toys, beautiful, +hand-carved toys. +</P> + +<P> +"It seems that the Tomlinses had a baby a long time ago and all the +time they were expecting it Hen was carving it these beautiful toys. +It was a boy and, lived to be a year old, just old enough to begin to +play with things. Then it died. And nobody, it seems, knew how Hen +missed that baby, not even his wife. But he had kept that box of toys +in his tool shed all those years and in the last year had put it in the +drawer with a few other treasures which he had had hidden in odd +crannies without anybody suspecting. It was all he had, he said, that +was his very own. And he showed me the handle of the little hammer +where the baby's playing hands had soiled it." +</P> + +<P> +It seems that Hen explained the other things too. The dance programme +he saved because that was where he first knew that his wife cared about +him. She had selected him for the lady's choice number. The other +things Hen kept because they were given to him by people who had all +sincerely liked him. +</P> + +<P> +"You see," Hen had said, "nobody knows how hard it is to be a little +man. Nobody respects you. Your folks always apologize and try to +explain your size or tell you not to mind. And strangers and friends +poke fun at you. After a while, of course, you learn to laugh at +yourself on the outside and folks get to think that it's all a joke for +you too and that you don't mind. But you never laugh on the inside or +when you're by yourself. And you get awful tired of looking up to +other people all the time and you begin to wish somebody'd look up to +you once in a while. +</P> + +<P> +"I used to think Aggie thought a heap of me even if I wasn't as tall as +other men. Grandfather and mother and Bill Simons cared a whole lot +and they didn't mind showing it often. I banked an awful lot on that +baby. And he did sure like me. He followed me all around and minded +me better than Aggie. It was me that always put him to bed and took +him up in the morning. And he'd look up at me and raise his little +hands to me and—" +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son looked steadily at Nan. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you want to hear any more?" he asked gently. +</P> + +<P> +"No—no—I don't. Oh, you shouldn't have told me. I'm not good enough +to be trusted with things like that," Nanny said brokenly and winked +and winked her long lashes to shake off the tears. +</P> + +<P> +"You wanted to be told. You were going away because I didn't want to +tell you," he reminded her quietly. +</P> + +<P> +"I know, but I'm just naturally spoiled and mean and wicked. But oh, +won't I be nice to poor Hen Tomlins after this!" +</P> + +<P> +"I'm going to have him take charge of a class in wood-carving as soon +as we can get one together. He's a master hand at that sort of work +and there are any number of boys in this town who will love it and look +up to Hen," said the man who did not understand women. The sun was +slipping low in the west, pouring a flood of mellow gold over the +landscape. It caught the attic windows of the old brick farmhouse that +was so nearly ready for its new and young owner. +</P> + +<P> +"Look," exclaimed Nan, pointing down toward it, "there is fairy +treasure in your attic." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," he smiled, "there is. There are trunks up there full of all +manner of things that five generations of Churchills could not bear to +burn or give away. Some day when the rain is drumming on the roof and +the gutters are spouting and all the birds are tucked away in dripping +trees and the world is misty with tears, I'm going up there and just +revel in second-hand adventure, dead dreams and cobwebs." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, my gracious, how I'd like to be there too," enviously cried Nanny +Ainslee and the next moment crimsoned angrily at herself. +</P> + +<P> +"If you won't mind coming to my house in the rain," said the man who +did not understand women—but Nanny wasn't listening. The setting sun +flared into a last widespread glory that bathed every grass blade in +Green Valley and in this strong and golden light Nan saw the 6:10 +pulling in and Fanny Foster hurrying home. Jessup's delivery boy, +driving back from his last trip, was larruping his horse and careful +Ellen Nuby was taking in her clotheslines. +</P> + +<P> +On the back porch of the Brownlee bungalow Jocelyn was shaking a white +tablecloth, for the Brownlees had supper early. Jocelyn flapped and +flapped, then folded the cloth neatly as she had seen Green Valley +matrons do. That done, she waited. +</P> + +<P> +David Allan was coming home over the hills with his team and Jocelyn +was waiting till he came closer before she waved to him and greeted +him. All Green Valley knew of these sunset greetings and approved. +</P> + +<P> +So now Nan, with a smile of understanding sympathy, watched and waited +too. She could almost see Jocelyn's happy, eager child face. David +slowly drew nearer. But after one careless look at the little figure +on the porch, his fine head drooped and he went on without a word and +left Jocelyn standing there. +</P> + +<P> +From her tree shelter Nan could see the little city girl standing very +still, staring after David. Then slowly the little figure went down +the steps and into the back garden. There it stood motionless again, +staring into the fading sky as if seeking an explanation for David's +strange conduct. +</P> + +<P> +But up on the hilltop Nanny beat her hands softly and cried out in pain +for Jocelyn. For Nanny knew her Green Valley and she knew that the +story of Jocelyn's morning ride with the minister in the Bates' ancient +carryall had already gone the rounds, even finding David in the furrows +of the fields. And now the big boy was worried and wretched and +perhaps angry at the little city girl whom he had so openly courted. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, dear!" Nanny began to speak her mind but stopped abruptly. For +how could she tell this young man from India that he had that morning +spoiled forever perhaps a lovely romance. She knew that he was +innocent, as innocent as Jocelyn. And she knew that Green Valley meant +no harm. It was nothing. And yet so often trouble, sorrow and +heartache start in just that kind of nothingness. Out of playful +little whirlwinds of careless laughter cruel storms are born. +</P> + +<P> +When Cynthia's son turned to walk home with her Nanny waved him back +and spoke curtly. +</P> + +<P> +"My goodness—no! You mustn't. I never let anybody escort me about +this foolish little town." +</P> + +<P> +Then she hurried home alone and left John Knight standing on his +hilltop. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap11"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +GETTING ACQUAINTED +</H3> + + +<P> +Nobody but a Green Valley man would have dared to do the things that +the new minister did in those first months, when even the most daring +of reverend gentlemen is apt to be a bit careful and given to the +tactful searching for the straight and narrow path which is the earthly +lot of pastors. +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son however was one of those unconsciously successful men who +are so simply true to life and life's laws that the world joyously +meets them halfway. And then too his was a rich heritage. +</P> + +<P> +From his great preacher father he had the power of seeing visions and +dreaming dreams and the still greater gift of making and persuading +other people to see them too. From his mother he had the comrade smile +and warm intuitive heart that brought him close to even little souls. +And from old Joshua Churchill came that rock-like determination, the +uncompromising honesty and, better than all else, that rare common +sense touched with humorous shrewdness without which no man can greatly +aid his fellows or enjoy life. +</P> + +<P> +All this the new Green Valley minister had, besides bits of very +valuable and legal papers and the old porticoed homestead dozing on a +hill and waiting for the touch of a young hand to wake it into vigorous +and new life. Such parts of Green Valley as failed to appreciate the +more spiritual qualifications of the tall young man from India were +properly impressed with his worldly possessions. +</P> + +<P> +So it was that armed with these advantages Cynthia's son went his way, +smashing hoary precedents and the mossy conventions that will spring up +and grow fibrously strong even in so sunny a spot as Green Valley. +</P> + +<P> +Nobody was surprised, of course, to see little Jim Tumley in the choir; +nor to hear that the minister was giving him lessons on the new piano +whose arrival the prophetic soul of Fanny Foster had predicted. People +passing the Tumley house did however stop beside the hedge and listen +in amazement to the minister playing, for he played surprisingly well. +When complimented on this accomplishment he explained that his mother +had had a piano in India and had taught him how. +</P> + +<P> +But nobody in Green Valley dreamed of seeing old Mrs. Rosenwinkle +marketing right in the madly busy heart of town all on a Saturday +morning. But there she was in her wheel chair, with the minister +alongside to see that the road was safe and clear. +</P> + +<P> +And they say that every little while, right in the midst of her +bargaining, she would look around and say: +</P> + +<P> +"My, but the world is big and pretty." +</P> + +<P> +And when somebody reminded her of her belief that the world was flat +and ended on the far side of Petersen's pasture she never argued the +matter fiercely, as was her wont, but said instead that it <I>had</I> ended +for her with Petersen's pasture until the day the new minister came. +</P> + +<P> +And her daughter told how the paralyzed old body prayed day and night +for this new minister's salvation, he being other than a Lutheran. +Somebody thought that too good a joke to keep and told Cynthia's son +how hard old Mrs. Rosenwinkle was praying for his soul. They expected +him to laugh. But he didn't. He looked suddenly serious just as his +mother used to do when something touched the deep down places in her +heart. +</P> + +<P> +All he said was that no man could ever have too many women praying for +him and that he was grateful as only a man whose mother was sleeping +thousands of miles away in a foreign land could be grateful. +</P> + +<P> +He had his mother's trick of letting people look quite suddenly into +that part of his soul where he kept his finest thoughts and emotions. +And people looked and saw and then usually tiptoed away in puzzled awe +or a dim sympathy. And he had such a habit of turning common sense and +daylight on matters which seemed so baffling until he explained them. +</P> + +<P> +It was just the minister's plain, common sense that finally got Hank +Lolly into the church. When the minister first suggested that Hank +ought to attend church services that worthy stared in amazed horror at +his new friend. And he gave his perfectly good reasons why the likes +of him had no right to step on what was Green Valley's sacred ground. +</P> + +<P> +"Hank, you are entirely mistaken. I have seen you go into Green Valley +parlors and every other room in the house. I watched you move that +clumsy old sideboard of Mrs. Luttins down that narrow stairway and then +through the little side gate. You never chipped a bit of plaster or +trampled a flower beside the walk. Why, you never even tore a bit of +vine off the gate. And yesterday I saw you walking your horses ever so +carefully to the station because inside the van little Jimmy Drummond +was lying on stretchers, going to the hospital. And I was told that +Doc Philipps said he wouldn't have trusted another driver with Jimmy." +</P> + +<P> +"But," groaned Hank, "people like me don't go to church." +</P> + +<P> +"Hank, most ministers don't ride around the country on a moving dray. +But I rode out with you many a time and I sort of feel that you might +come along with me now and then and see the people and things along my +route. You've given me a good time and I'd like to pay back. You'll +like the music and I'm sure you'll understand it all, because I talk +English you know. And anyhow, things get as lonesome sometimes for a +minister in the pulpit as the roads get for a dray driver and I'd +appreciate it to have a friend like you along. I never know when I'll +need a lift and a little help that you could give. Sometimes we have +to move the Sunday-school organ about and there are windows that stick +and all manner of things about a church that only a practiced mover and +driver could do. You know the janitor is rather old and infirm and as +for me—well, Hank, when you come down to it, that's about all we +ministers are, just movers. Our business is to help find just the +right and happiest places for people, to show them their part in the +game of life and keep them from bruising themselves and others. I'm +doing about the same sort of work as you are; that's why I'm asking you +to come along with me." +</P> + +<P> +"Well—if you put it that way,—" murmured Hank, still miserable, "why, +maybe I could drop in. Billy's ordered me a new suit and so—" +</P> + +<P> +"That settles it then, Hank. For there's no sense in getting a new +suit unless you go out in it. And there's no sense in going out unless +you have some definite place to go to. Why, half the people get +clothes just to go to church and the other half go to church just to +wear their clothes. I'll expect you. You can sit comfortably in the +back and watch things and tell me later what you think of the way +things are managed here. You'll see things from the door that I never +see from the pulpit." +</P> + +<P> +Hank went to church in a pair of shoes that squeaked agonizingly and a +suit of clothes that was a marvel of mail-order device. He also wore a +Stetson hat that was new when he entered the church door but which, +through nervous manipulation, aged terribly in that first half hour. +</P> + +<P> +He came early because he felt that he could not endure the thought of +entering a crowded church and then suffered torment as one by one the +congregation nodded to him or addressed him in sepulchral whispers. +When, however, Grandma Wentworth sat down beside him and visited +comfortably before services, and Nan Ainslee stopped to thank him for +something or other he had done for her the week before, he felt better. +</P> + +<P> +As soon as Jim Tumley began to sing and the minister to talk Hank +forgot about himself and became absorbed in the proceedings. He told +the minister later that he'd meant to keep an eye on things for him but +that he got so interested he'd forgotten. About all that he had +observed was that Mrs. Sloan passed her handkerchief a little too +frequently and publicly to the little Sloans. Hank said he thought +they were old enough to have handkerchiefs of their own. He also felt +sure, he said, that Mrs. Osborn and Mrs. Pelham, Jr. were on the outs +again, because of the fact that though Mrs. Pelham's switch was falling +loose and Mrs. Osborn sitting right behind her saw it, she made no +effort to repin it or tell the unfortunate woman about it. Hank +further informed the minister that that second Crawley boy was a limb +and closed his observations by asking the Reverend John Roger Churchill +Knight if he didn't think Nanny Ainslee was the prettiest girl in +church? Whereupon the minister promptly agreed with him. +</P> + +<P> +That, then, was Hank Lolly's introduction to a proper and conventional +religious life. Hank, as soon as he felt sure that he was going to +survive the experience, became wonderfully interested and the next +Sunday reappeared with Barney in tow. It seems that Barney also had +been provided with a new suit and accessories and Hank had promptly +demanded his presence in church. +</P> + +<P> +"You ought to go once, Barney, if only to show the minister that you're +rightly grateful to him for showing you about them there books and +figures and a-pointing out your mistakes to you. And anyhow, if you +don't go, you'll be hanging out in that there pool-room, and first +thing you know you won't be decent and respectable and Billy'll have to +fire you." +</P> + +<P> +"What do you know about that there poolroom, Mr. Lolly?" demanded +Barney. +</P> + +<P> +"Never mind. I know what I know. You're trying to be smart and I'm +surprised. I've heard of your kid doings in that place and I'm +surprised, that's what I am. You don't see Billy Evans trying to make +money in cute ways over night. No, sir! He does a day's work for a +man and throws in a little for good measure before he takes a day's +wages. And he don't do business behind closed doors and thick +curtains, neither. So just you keep out of that there poolroom or I'll +take you over to Doc Mitchell's and have every one of them there +crooked teeth of yourn straightened out." +</P> + +<P> +"All right, Mr. Lolly, I'll do just as you say and go to church. It +ain't as hard as it sounds, that ain't. Because, honest, Hank, ain't +that there minister a fine guy? He's as good, I believe, as Billy. He +asked me to come on and be in his Sunday-school class and get in on +some fun. And he says to wait until he gets his barn fixed; that he'll +show us boys something. And I bet he will. Why, say, Hank, maybe he +kin do all sorts of circus stunts. You know he's from India and that's +where all the snake charmers and sword swallowers come from, ain't it?" +</P> + +<P> +In this perfectly simple and artless fashion Cynthia's son went about +the creation of his own special Sunday-school class and when he got +through the result was startling. It was the largest and somebody said +the weirdest Sunday-school class ever seen in Green Valley. Indeed, +when Mr. James D. Austin, who was about the most respectable man in +town, saw it he grew quite distressed and suddenly very tired. +</P> + +<P> +He had tried, since the age of ten when he had formally and publicly +joined the church on the very crest of a great religious wave, to do +his part towards making and keeping the Green Valley church on a high +spiritual plane. He felt at times that he was close to success and now +here from the very ends of the earth came a boy to upset all his plans. +</P> + +<P> +So Mr. Austin suddenly felt ill and old and he went to see Doc Philipps +about a tonic. Doc Philipps, who could have been as good a lawyer as +he was a doctor, asked a few questions about politics, religion and +Mrs. Austin's lumbago and knew exactly what was the matter with James +D. Austin. The next time he ran across Cynthia's son he hailed him. +</P> + +<P> +"Look here, Knight, what you been doing to James D. lately? Been +turning his nice little church all upside down, ain't you? Driven him +right into a fearful case of grouch and an +I-am-through-with-the-things-of-this-world attack, that's what you +have." +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son looked very soberly and very directly at his friend the +doctor and turned on his heel. +</P> + +<P> +"Doc, I'm going to see that poor man right now," said he and Doc +Philipps, in telling Nan Ainslee about it afterwards, swore that not +only the minister's two eyes but his very voice twinkled. +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son found Mr. Austin in his proper and neat office. He went +straight to the point. +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Austin, I've just heard that you were not feeling well, that you +were seriously ill from overwork. I can readily believe that. You +need rest and a change and freedom from wearisome responsibilities. I +think I know just how you feel. Sort of tired and listless. Mother +used to get that way in India. Even father used to say sometimes that +things did every once in a while look mighty hopeless and useless, but +that they'd look bright again after a week or two in the hills. So +then we went off for a vacation. That's just what's the matter with +you. You need a vacation. And in so far as I can I want to help you +get one. You work too hard for the church. Keeping track of accounts +and generally managing church matters is always a trying matter. +Father always found it so. +</P> + +<P> +"So I have been thinking of getting you an assistant, some one to look +after things while you take a rest. Why, they tell me you have +shouldered church responsibilities since you were a child." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," modestly admitted the most respectable Mr. Austin. "I have +worked for the church these many years and I do need a vacation. But +who is there to attend to these matters? I know of no one in Green +Valley who could fill my place." +</P> + +<P> +So in complacent, pathetic self-conceit said poor Mr. Austin. And he +was utterly unprepared for what followed. +</P> + +<P> +"Why," said Green Valley's new minister without so much as winking an +eyelash, "I've been thinking of Seth Curtis for the place. I have been +wondering just how I could interest Seth in his town church, how to +make him see that its business is his business, and this is my +opportunity. Seth, they tell me, is very good at figures. Somebody +said that Seth could figure to live comfortably on nothing if he found +he had to. Now most churches are perilously near the place where they +have to live on nothing and so, if any one can steer our finances in an +exact and careful manner, Seth can. And it is the only, absolutely the +only way in which he can be interested." +</P> + +<P> +"But," the horrified Mr. Austin found his voice at last, "Seth Curtis +is impossible. Even if he joined the church he would be an unbeliever. +I have heard him criticize churches. Why, it can't be thought of! +Why, what would people say if you were to put a man like that right +into church work? It would be sacrilege." +</P> + +<P> +There was a little pause and when the minister spoke again there was +the unmistakable ring of cool authority in his voice. Mr. Austin +suddenly realized that he was speaking to his pastor, the Reverend John +Roger Churchill Knight. And as Mr. Austin himself worshipped authority +and always saw to it that in his little sphere his own slightest word +was obeyed, he listened respectfully. +</P> + +<P> +"I think, Mr. Austin, you are mistaken about Seth Curtis. Seth does +not make fun of religion. He merely criticizes churches and their +management. Seth is what in these times we call an efficiency expert. +And it always makes such a man impatient to watch waste of money and +effort. +</P> + +<P> +"Seth must think well of the church for he sends his wife and children. +And no sane man sends what is dearest to him to a place he does not +approve of. Besides, Seth has a very high opinion of you, Mr. Austin." +</P> + +<P> +Which of course had nothing to do with the case. Yet it may have been +this irrelevant, human little touch that settled it. For after a +little more talk Mr. Austin gave in and, figuratively speaking, turned +his face to the wall and hoped to die. And the minister went off to +persuade Seth Curtis that his church needed his services. +</P> + +<P> +And that was not nearly as difficult a matter as Green Valley thought +it was. For Seth had sense and a love of order and economy and the +minister talked to all that was best and wisest in Seth. Though Seth's +head was growing bald and Cynthia's son was just a youngster, yet the +boy seemed to take Seth's heart right into the hollow of his hand and +talk to it as no one but Seth's wife Ruth talked. So to the amazement +of himself and family and all of Green Valley Seth Curtis went into the +church for the very quality in his make-up that his neighbors were in +the habit of ridiculing. +</P> + +<P> +It was amazingly funny, Seth's conversion. But when Green Valley heard +how the minister got acquainted with Frank Burton Green Valley laughed +and laughed and forgot to eat its meals in telling and retelling it. +</P> + +<P> +Frank Burton, besides being, according to his neighbors, a hopeless +atheist, was unlike other Green Valley men in that he had to take a +much earlier train to the city mornings and came home two trains later +than the other men. Grandma Wentworth always said that it was that +difference in Frank's train time that made him so bitter at times. +</P> + +<P> +Frank did, however, have his Saturday afternoons and Sundays, and these +he spent almost entirely with his chickens and garden and strange +assortment of books. He was a man who did his own thinking, never gave +advice, never took it and believed in all creatures tending strictly to +their own affairs. +</P> + +<P> +Every once in a while, perhaps from a sudden heart hunger, Frank would +select from a whole townful of human beings some one soul for +friendship. Frank never got acquainted accidentally. He picked out +his few friends deliberately and loved them openly and forever. +</P> + +<P> +Of course, Frank's oldest and dearest friend was Jim Tumley. People +said they were born friends. Their mothers had been inseparable, the +boys were born within a few days of each other and seemed to be marked +with a passion of loyalty for one another. Only in their love for +music were they alike however. +</P> + +<P> +Frank was a big, square, burly man who went his way surely, +confidently, though a little belligerently. Jim was little and fair +and ever so gentle. There was never a harsh word in Jim's mouth or a +bitter thought in his heart against the world that often bruised him +because of his gentleness and frailty. Jim had had only one fight in +his life. +</P> + +<P> +When he and Frank were about twelve years old, strange to say, Jim was +the taller and stronger. And it was then that Jim fought and +vanquished a bully who for months had been making Frank miserable. +</P> + +<P> +Frank never forgot that one fight of Jim's. He shot head and shoulders +over his friend and filled out beyond all recognition and took his turn +at fighting. And most of his battles then as now were over little Jim +Tumley. +</P> + +<P> +To Frank, Jim was the one great friend life had given him. To very +many people in Green Valley Jim was just a gentle, frail little chap +with a beautiful, golden voice and a miserably weak stomach. +</P> + +<P> +When the new minister put Jim in the choir, Green Valley was mildly +surprised though it quickly saw the common sense of the arrangement. +But Frank Burton was for the first time, to Green Valley's certain +knowledge, wholly pleased. And he showed his pleasure by never once +saying one single, scathing, cynical thing, even when told that Seth +Curtis was keeping the church books and getting religion on the side. +And he could have said so much. +</P> + +<P> +What he did say was that he wouldn't mind seeing this kid minister from +India. For though months had passed since Cynthia's son arrived Frank +had never seen him. His unfortunate train time and his home-staying +habits kept him from meeting the newcomer. He pictured him as a rather +immature, likable, enthusiastic young person whom it might not be a +trial to meet once and then forget. And Frank made up his mind that if +he ever ran into the boy he would be sincerely courteous to him in +payment for his kindness to Jim. Then he promptly forgot everything in +his plans for a new chicken house. +</P> + +<P> +He was reading his favorite poultry journal on the train one night when +the tall stranger accosted him. Frank didn't remember meeting the man, +but the stranger seemed to know him, so without hardly knowing why or +how Frank began to talk. And it was surprising how much the stranger +knew about chickens, pheasants and wild game. Indeed, he knew so much +that five stations from the city Frank was showing him diagrams of his +new chicken house and explaining how anxious he was to get at it before +the fall rains commenced but that he had so little time, only his +Saturday afternoons and Sundays. +</P> + +<P> +"Let me give you a hand then Saturday, Mr. Burton. I need outdoor work +and I'd enjoy building a chicken house and neighboring properly with +you Green Valley folks. You know I'm new to Green Valley and as long +as I intend to spend the rest of my life here I've a lot to learn." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, there are worse places than Green Valley," admitted Frank, +thinking that the man must be the occupant of some one of the new +bungalows that had gone up that spring and summer. +</P> + +<P> +"Green Valley," continued Frank, "has its faults and its fools and bad +spots here and there in the roads and entirely too much back-fence and +street-corner gossip. But I've seen days here in Green Valley that +just about melt all the meanness out of one, they're so fine; and +moonlight so soft and pure and holy that you wouldn't mind dying in it. +And Green Valley folks are ornery enough on top and when things are +going smoothly for you. But just let there be a smash-up or a stroke +of bad luck and their shells crack and humanness just oozes out of +them. They're about as decent a lot as you'll find anywhere." +</P> + +<P> +This, after a hard day and on an empty stomach, was a remarkable speech +for Frank Burton. He was not much given to voicing his real feelings +and showing his heart to light-hearted Green Valley and usually covered +his deeper sentiments with a sturdy flow of fault-finding. +</P> + +<P> +But there was something magnetic about the young stranger and to his +own growing surprise Frank talked on and enjoyed doing it. The two men +left the train together and parted at Martin's drug store with the +understanding that if it didn't rain they would on the coming Saturday +start on that chicken house. +</P> + +<P> +And they did. Frank came home that evening in unusually fine spirits +and asked his wife about the various new people. He told her of his +meeting with the stranger who seemed to know him but whom he did not +remember ever seeing before. +</P> + +<P> +Jennie guessed him to be, "Mrs. Hamilton's husband. I've never seen +him either but they say he's such a pleasant man. They're both +Christian Scientists or something like that and she's ever so nice a +woman. They've only been here a few months but everybody likes them." +</P> + +<P> +"Well," spoke up Frank, still thinking of the pleasant passing of what +was usually a tiresome train trip, "if Christian Science makes a man as +likable and neighborly as that I, for one, approve of Christian +Science. What did you say his name was—Hamilton?" +</P> + +<P> +It was because Frank was so willing to let every man worship his God in +his very own way that Green Valley, that is the religiously watchful +part of it, had decided that Frank was an atheist. For, said these +cautious children of God, "He who is willing to believe in all things +believes in nothing." +</P> + +<P> +But it wasn't religion that the two men talked that Saturday afternoon. +The sun was warm, the lumber dry, the saws sharp and with the work +going smoothly along there was plenty of time for talk, talk on all +manner of subjects. +</P> + +<P> +Frank's wife had gone over to Randall's to a special meeting of the +sewing society. Not only were the women going to cut out and make up +little aprons and dresses for the inmates of the nearest orphanage but +they intended to discuss several new social problems that confronted +Green Valley. The two most vital being "What do you make of that new +saloon keeper and his wife?" and "What goes on behind those poolroom +curtains, especially nights?" +</P> + +<P> +Not that there was in Green Valley any interfering Civic League or any +such thing as a Pure Morals Society. Green Valley had never had to +resort to such measures. It had hitherto trusted human nature, Green +Valley sunshine and neighborliness to do whatever work of social +mending and reforming had to be done. +</P> + +<P> +But something had happened to the big city to the east, some new mayor +or some new civic force had stirred things up in that huge caldron of +humanity and slopped it over so that it had begun to trickle away into +such quiet little hollows as Green Valley. It trickled so slowly and +was as yet so thin a stream that the little towns were hardly aware of +it as yet. +</P> + +<P> +Green Valley was only just beginning to itch and wiggle and search and +wonder what the matter could be. It was the women, the mothers, who +scented trouble first. The men were still placidly doing the same old +Saturday afternoon tasks, mowing lawns, talking road improvements, +swapping yarns and brands of tobacco or, like Frank Burton, doing +various building jobs about their premises. +</P> + +<P> +Frank and his helper were certainly enjoying themselves. When the +skeleton of that hen house was half up Frank thought it was about time +to call a halt for refreshments. He went to the ice-box and brought +out a nice home-boiled ham, commandeered a golden loaf of fresh bread, +searched about for pickles, mustard, preserves and butter. Then they +sat down. And as he ate Frank again waxed talkative. +</P> + +<P> +"I've heard people," he said, "both men and women, talk about marriage +being slavery and a lottery and not worth the price folks have to pay +for it. But I'm freer as a married man than ever I was single. Why, +where I boarded before I married Jennie, you couldn't get a slice of +bread and butter or a toothpick between meals even if you'd been a +growing kid. And in those days I was always hungry. And I've always +hated restaurants where food is cooked in tanks instead of nice little +home kettles in a blue and white kitchen. And I hate restaurant +dishes. There's never anything interesting about them. And most +waitresses are discouraging sort of girls. I just kind of existed in +those days. +</P> + +<P> +"But ever since I've married Jennie I've lived. Jennie never talks +much about what she's cooking. But she'll let you come in the kitchen +and lift the kettle lids if you want to and poke around and never once +let on that you're a nuisance. And she never gets angry if you dig +into the fresh bread or crack the frosting on the new cake. So take it +all in all I've always considered all this talk about married life +being nothing but self-sacrifice just so much rot—why—hello, Sammy!" +</P> + +<P> +This to a little overall-clad figure that was pressing itself +insinuatingly against the back gate. +</P> + +<P> +"Want to come in and help with the tools?" called Frank, well knowing +that that jar of Jennie's preserves was perfectly visible from that +back gate. +</P> + +<P> +Sammy said hello and sure he'd come in and help, and did with +remarkable speed. When he came up to the two men he looked shyly at +Frank's assistant and said, "Hello! What are <I>you</I> doing around here?" +</P> + +<P> +And the tall stranger laughed and said he was helping with the tools +too. +</P> + +<P> +And then Frank asked Sammy if his mother allowed him to eat between +meals and Sammy said, "Oh, sure—I kin eat any time at all—it never +hurts me." So Frank got him nicely started. +</P> + +<P> +In no time at all however two other figures appeared and swung +themselves up on the back fence. They sat quietly, at first waiting +for some one to discover them. Both men had their backs to the fence +now and Sammy, though perfectly aware of the new arrivals, was +selfishly busy. +</P> + +<P> +So presently two pair of bare feet began to swing harder and harder and +a careless but piercing whistle began to challenge a selfish world's +attention. +</P> + +<P> +Frank winked at his helper and said nothing nor moved. +</P> + +<P> +The whistle became shriller. And then came a sudden suspicious silence +that evidently made Sammy a little uncomfortable. He knew just about +what was coming. +</P> + +<P> +"Hello—Pieface," came one gentle greeting. +</P> + +<P> +"Hello—Dearie," chirped the owner of the second pair of bare feet. +</P> + +<P> +"Look at Mother's Darling feeding his face!" +</P> + +<P> +"Isn't he cunning! Isn't he cute!" +</P> + +<P> +A third figure swung itself to the top of the fence. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't fill your little tummy too full, Sammy dear," it contributed +dutifully. +</P> + +<P> +At the malice and scorn that fairly dripped from the words Sammy raised +resentful eyes from his slice of bread and jam. Frank smiled hopefully. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, Frank, Sammy goes to Sunday-school he does." +</P> + +<P> +"Every Sunday—don't ya, Sammy?" +</P> + +<P> +"Bet he goes to Sunday-school just to sponge. Bet he's a grafter—bet +he—" +</P> + +<P> +But at this point Frank's helper turned about and faced the fence. And +a strange thing happened. The three little figures sitting in a row +gave one look, one shout of, "Holy gee—it's <I>him</I>!" and vanished as +suddenly as they had come. +</P> + +<P> +Frank laughed and then grew puzzled. +</P> + +<P> +"Some friends of mine and Sammy's. I wonder what made the little imps +bolt like that. They usually sit on that back fence till every bit of +language is used up. Why, they hadn't got more than started and Sammy +here hadn't even begun. What ailed you, Sammy?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I rather think I frightened them," said Frank's assistant. "But I +think that before long they will feel enough at home with me to come +and sit on my back fence." +</P> + +<P> +Sammy was left to clear up while the men went back to work. Both +hammers were merrily ringing when old man Vingie strolled by and +stopped to visit. He went on presently but before he was out of sight +Bill Trumbull and Old Peter Endby came up. +</P> + +<P> +There was a worried look in Bill's large florid face and the light of +utter unbelief in Peter's eye. They both laid their arms neighbor +fashion along the fence and watched the toilers silently for a few +seconds. Then Peter spoke up in grieved tones: +</P> + +<P> +"Seems like you might have asked old neighbors to give you a hand, +Frank. I had no notion you was in any such turrible hurry to start +this here new chicken house of yourn. It don't look respectable or +kindly, you acting that way, neglecting to tell old neighbors—" +</P> + +<P> +"It's a slander on this here neighborhood, that's whot it is, Frank," +Bill Trumbull complained. "Here's Peter and me both old-time +carpenters, full of energy and advice and ripe years and experience, +and you don't drop so much as a hint. Why, I remember the time when we +put up barns with wooden pegs and durn good barns they were and are, +for there's some of them still standing as strong as the day they were +built. There's the Churchill barn. That's our work, Peter's and mine. +Seems you've forgotten considerable, Frank. Why, your father wouldn't +have thought of starting a chicken house without first talking it over +with us." +</P> + +<P> +When they had passed on, Bill supporting Peter's left elbow so's to +case the rheumatism in his partner's left knee, Frank turned amazed +eyes to his assistant. +</P> + +<P> +"Now what in time," he wanted to know, "is the matter with those two +precious old lunatics? Why, Pap Trumbull and Dad Endby are both over +eighty. Dad's so twisted with rheumatism that he couldn't bend to pick +up his pipe if he dropped it. And Pap's got asthma so bad that it's +all he can do to draw his breath on the installment plan. Why, I've +never consulted them in all my born days though I always let them come +over and criticize my work to their heart's content. But something's +eating them to-day." +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps they're surprised at seeing me, a comparative stranger here, +helping you. They may even be a bit jealous, you know." +</P> + +<P> +Frank's assistant volunteered this explanation wonderingly as if he too +were puzzled about something. +</P> + +<P> +"Well—it gets me," murmured Frank, then added under his breath, "well, +by jinks—if here ain't old Knock-kneed Bailey and Shorty Collins going +by. And they're looking this way. And by the Lord Harry—there's +Curley Anderson. Why, Curley hasn't been over on this side of town +since he sold that little house of his that he built all by himself, +working nights, with nothing but an old saw and a second-hand hammer. +His wife was left a fortune right after and made Curley sell and build +her a cement block villa over on Broadway. She won't even let Curley +walk down this way, though they say he hates her villa and just hankers +for this little bit of a home he built himself here ten years ago. +</P> + +<P> +"Well—by the holy smoke—look yonder! I'm seeing things to-day. Why +there's Dudley Rivers and James D. Austin, that holy man, and he's +actually bowing to me. Now what do you know about that? What's going +on in this town to-day, anyhow? It must be something unusual to bring +out a crowd like that." +</P> + +<P> +Frank's lower jaw suddenly dropped. Sudden suspicion leaped into his +gray-blue eyes. He turned to the man who all afternoon had been +helping him build his chicken house. +</P> + +<P> +"Say—who in hell—are you anyhow?" +</P> + +<P> +And Cynthia's son mopped his thick hair and looked as suddenly +dumfounded. After that he grinned. +</P> + +<P> +"For pity sakes—don't you know me? Why, you were pointed out to me +the very second week I came as the town atheist. I supposed of course +I had been pointed out to you. I'm Cynthia Churchill's son. I buried +father and mother in India and then came home, as they wanted me to. +And I'm glad I came. It's home and these Green Valley folks are my +people. They have made me feel welcome. I supposed everybody knew me +from seeing me about town." +</P> + +<P> +For a long while Frank said nothing. With the explanation his +momentary anger and amazement died away. He was remembering, +remembering Cynthia Churchill. Why, he remembered as though it was +yesterday that when she was twenty he was ten. And he had loved her +because she had once helped him to tie up his pet chicken's broken leg. +</P> + +<P> +And so this tall big chap with the glad eyes was Cynthia's son! Years +ago the mother had tied up his pet hen's leg. And to-day her son had +helped him build his most pretentious hen house. +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Frank at last, "I didn't know you were the chap from India. +I thought you belonged up in one of those new bungalows. Of course, +that accounts for the crowd. Why, we've been making history here in +this back yard this afternoon. The atheist and the preacher building a +chicken coop! Oh, say, John, Green Valley will be talking about this +fifty years from now. Let's have some buttermilk. This thing has just +about knocked me over." +</P> + +<P> +When they had had two glasses apiece Frank again inspected his +assistant. +</P> + +<P> +"But say—do ministers in India do such darn common things as building +chicken houses? I can't remember ever seeing a minister mixing so +carelessly with us low-down sinners or standing around in public with +his sleeves rolled up and his frock coat off. Aren't you a queer breed +of parson?" +</P> + +<P> +"Maybe," Cynthia's son admitted, "but so was father. He could help +bring a baby into the world, could wash and dress it, cure it if it was +sick, bury it if it died. He could teach a woman how to cook a meal +and cut out a dress. He knew how to heal a horse's sore back and how +to help a man get over needing whisky. He used to brush my mother's +hair nights when her head ached and make whistles for me and tell the +little brown children stories, study the stars with the old men and +coax the women into using his medicines instead of their charms." +</P> + +<P> +"For heaven's sake! When did your father get time to talk religion?" +wondered Frank. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, he never talked religion much. He just sort of lived and +neighbored with his people and just laughed most of the time at mother +and me. He was always busy and never took care of himself. Just +before he died he explained things to me. He said: +</P> + +<P> +"'Son, I came out of the West to bring a message to the East. You go +back to the West with a message from the Orient. Tell them back home +there that hearts are all alike the world over. And that we all, white +men, black men, yellow men and brown men, are playing the very same +game for the very same stakes and that somehow, through ways devious +and incomprehensible, through honesty and faith, failure and +perseverance, we find at last the great content, the peace that passeth +understanding.' +</P> + +<P> +"So I have come home to preach that. But I haven't had time as yet to +do much. I've been getting up a Sunday-school class and getting Seth +Curtis interested in the church finances and getting acquainted with +Hank Lolly and Mrs. Rosenwinkle and—atheists." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—and among other things you've put Jim into the choir." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, that was easy—just common sense. It's going to be ever so much +harder though to get at Jim Tumley's generous friends and convince them +that Jim's stomach won't stand their friendly donations. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know how I'm going to show them that if they love him they +must protect him from themselves. It's going to be hard work. But +he's worth saving, that little man with the lark's voice and the gentle +heart." +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +When Jennie, hearing the news, hurried home from the other end of town, +really frightened for the first time in her married life, the young +minister was gone and Frank was sitting out on the back porch staring +at nothing. +</P> + +<P> +"Frank," Jennie began breathlessly, "is he gone?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—he's gone." +</P> + +<P> +"Frank—you—I hope you didn't get mad at him. He's different—not +like other ministers—and he's really a boy in some things." +</P> + +<P> +"Jennie," and Frank reassured her, "you're darn right that boy is +different. He's so darn different from all the rest of them I've met +that I'm going to church next Sunday. James D. and Dudley and others +of that stripe will probably die of shock but just you press your best +dress, Jennie, for we're surely going. Why that man's no minister. +Don't slander him. He's a human being." +</P> + +<P> +Jennie's eyes grew a bit misty, for with no babies to love, Frank was +her all in all and her one great sorrow was that so few people knew the +real Frank. +</P> + +<P> +"And come to think of it, Jennie," Frank mused, "you weren't so far +wrong in thinking that it was a Christian Scientist who was coming. I +guess that's just about what he is—a Christian scientist." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap12"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE PATH OF TRUE LOVE +</H3> + + +<P> +Nanny was cross. She had lost her bubbling merriment and her family +wondered. +</P> + +<P> +"Sis, I believe you will be an old maid, all right. I'm beginning to +see the signs already," her brother lazily told her one day when to +some innocent remark of his she made a snapping answer. +</P> + +<P> +Mr. Ainslee laughed. +</P> + +<P> +"You aren't reading the signs correctly, Son," he said. "Nan's +crossness can be interpreted another way. It's my private opinion that +Nanny's in love." +</P> + +<P> +Whereupon Mr. Ainslee dodged for he fully expected that Nanny would +hurl a pillow his way. But Nanny didn't. She turned a little white, +caught her breath a little hurriedly and then stood looking quietly at +the two men. When she left the room her father was a little worried +and her brother a little uncomfortable. +</P> + +<P> +"I guess we'd better let up on the teasing, Dad," the boy suggested in +the serious, soft voice that had been his mother's, the mother who had +never teased. +</P> + +<P> +"I wouldn't hurt Nanny for the world," penitently murmured Mr. Ainslee. +"I had no idea—oh, Son," he suddenly groaned, "I wish your mother was +here to look after us all." +</P> + +<P> +And the great diplomat who was known and welcomed at the courts of +great nations was suddenly only a plain man, crying out his heart's +need of the loved woman he had lost so many years ago. +</P> + +<P> +And because the boy was the son of the woman for whom his father +grieved he knew how to sympathize and comfort the man. +</P> + +<P> +"I've missed her too—lots of times—even though, Dad, you've been the +most wonderful father two kids ever had." +</P> + +<P> +The man stared out into the sunny world outside the windows and all +unashamed let the tears fill his fine eyes. +</P> + +<P> +The boy, seeing those tears, all at once remembered now many times, +when he was an unheeding youngster, he had seen this same father +sitting at the departed mother's desk with his head pillowed in his +arms. +</P> + +<P> +"Dad," the boy's awed voice questioned, "is love a thing as big and +terrible and lasting as that?" +</P> + +<P> +The man wiped his eyes and smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, Son, love is as wonderful and lasting and in a way as terrible as +that. It was wrong of me to tease Nanny. But I have been worried +about my motherless girl. I'd like to see her happily settled. +Somehow I've never worried about you." +</P> + +<P> +"No," and the boy smiled an odd little smile that showed just how he +had missed a mother's petting, "it's always mothers that worry about +the boys, isn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +At this second revelation and blunder Mr. Ainslee was so startled that +he forgot to go in search of Nanny. +</P> + +<P> +As a matter of fact Nanny had left the house. She wanted to go to the +knoll and think over carefully certain matters that had been puzzling +her of late. But she dared not go to the grove on the hilltop. For +only half an hour before she had seen Green Valley's young minister +walking up to her old seat under the oaks. Perhaps if her father had +not said what he did—Nanny frowned impatiently, then sighed and walked +down the road to Grandma Wentworth's. She told herself that she was +going down to visit Grandma and tell her the week's news. But she was +really going to find heartease and because at Grandma's she would hear +oftenest the name that now had the power to quicken her heart beats and +bring her a pain that was strangely edged with joy. +</P> + +<P> +Grandma was weeding her seed onions and very sensibly let Nanny help. +Nanny's fingers flew in and out and because she dared not tell her own +heart troubles she told Grandma about Jocelyn and David and the foolish +bit of gossip that had come between them. +</P> + +<P> +"I think, Grandma, somebody ought to do something about it. Can't +you—" +</P> + +<P> +Grandma shook her head. +</P> + +<P> +"Nanny," Grandma mourned, "I'm afraid to meddle in things like that. +Love is a wonderful strange thing for which there are no rules. And +the hearts of men and women must all have their share of sorrow. For +it's only through pain and endless blunders that we human folks ever +learn. I've seen strange love history in this town and lots of it. +And I've learned one thing and that is that each heart wants to do its +loving in its own way without help or hindrance from the rest of the +world. So we'd best say nothing and let David and Jocelyn find a way +out of their trouble and misunderstanding." +</P> + +<P> +But Nanny, with all the impatience of youth, rebelled. +</P> + +<P> +"It's foolish," she stormed, "when just a dozen frank words would +straighten it out." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—a dozen words would do it," sighed Grandma, "But think, Nanny, +what it would cost David to say those dozen words—or Jocelyn." +</P> + +<P> +"Conventions are foolish. Honesty is better." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, honesty is always best. But truth is something that lovers find +hardest to manage and listen to. And you know, Nanny, even a happy +love means a certain amount of sorrow." +</P> + +<P> +"Does it?" the girl wondered. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Grandma softly, "it does, as I and many another woman can +testify. I'm only hoping that a love great and fine will come to +Cynthia's boy and that it won't cost him too much." +</P> + +<P> +"Why," asked Nanny carelessly, "should life be easier and richer for +him?" +</P> + +<P> +"Because long before he was born his mother paid for his birthright and +happiness with part of her own, and if God is just and life fair then +her courage and sorrow ought to count for something and her loss be his +gain." +</P> + +<P> +"Hadn't you better tell me the whole story, Grandma?" begged Nan. +</P> + +<P> +"It isn't exactly all mine to tell. But some day I dare say I shall." +</P> + +<P> +Grandma rose and glanced mischievously at the girl. +</P> + +<P> +"Nanny, I'll tell you the day you come to me and tell me you're in +love. Not engaged, you understand, but in love." +</P> + +<P> +Again Nanny whitened and caught her breath and then looked quietly at +Grandma in a way that made the dear old soul say hurriedly: +</P> + +<P> +"There, there, child, I didn't mean to meddle or hurt." +</P> + +<P> +To herself she added, "We're all blundering fools at times. And why is +it that youth always thinks that all the world is blind and stupid?" +</P> + +<P> +Grandma's penitent mind then recalled the box of pictures that +Cynthia's son had brought down to show her the night before. It still +stood on the living-room table. So the wise and tender soul sent Nanny +in to fetch it. +</P> + +<P> +They sat on the back steps and looked at pictures of Cynthia in her +far-away home in India. There were pictures of her husband and the +brown babies and of their neighbors. But mostly the pictures were of a +boy, a drolly solemn little fellow. Nanny exclaimed again and again +over these and the one of the boy holding a pet hen in his arms she +fairly devoured. +</P> + +<P> +"What a darling kiddy he was," she laughed tenderly. "No wonder his +mother loved him so." +</P> + +<P> +"He ought to be a fine boy. His mother paid a big price for him," +Grandma told her. +</P> + +<P> +But Nanny didn't hear. She had just discovered that there were two of +those boy and hen pictures and she wondered if— +</P> + +<P> +Just then Grandma spied a hen in her lavender bed and went off to shoo +her out. And while her back was so providentially turned Nanny +Ainslee, an honorable, world-famous diplomat's only daughter, coolly +and deliberately tucked the picture of a little boy and his pet hen +down into the bosom of her gown. +</P> + +<P> +Shortly after Nanny said she guessed she'd have to be going, that it +was getting late and that she had had an argument with her father just +before she came and had been short an answer. But that she had just +this minute thought of something to say. +</P> + +<P> +Grandma let her go without a word because she thought that, like +herself, the girl had seen Cynthia's boy coming down the hill and +wished with girlish shyness to be out of the house when he came. But +Nanny had not seen him, had not been watching the roads, so taken was +she with her guilty secret. Her surprise when she almost ran into him +was genuine enough. +</P> + +<P> +His face lighted at sight of her. +</P> + +<P> +"I spent the afternoon up on the hill. I thought maybe I should find +you there. It was rather lonesome." +</P> + +<P> +He had evidently forgotten and forgiven her rudeness on the hilltop +that day when they had been up there together. Nanny was suddenly so +happy and confused that she could think of nothing to say except to +make the formal little confession: +</P> + +<P> +"I have been visiting Grandma Wentworth and looking at pictures of you. +You were a mighty nice little boy in those days." +</P> + +<P> +The new softness in her words made him look at her wistfully for a +second but the hint of laughter that went with it made him cautious. +This lovely, laughing girl had hurt him several times and had laughed +at him. He meant to be careful. So he said gravely and politely: +</P> + +<P> +"Did you see the pictures of my mother?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes. She must have been a wonderful and an adorable mother." +</P> + +<P> +That made him happy. He wanted very much to turn and walk back with +her, this girl whose presence always brought him such pleasure. But +she had forbidden him to do this. It seemed that in his home land +women were wonderfully independent creatures. +</P> + +<P> +So he let her go on alone and with a disappointed heart. For Nanny had +hoped that he would ask and she had meant to let him. With the +disappointment came the taunting memory of her words to Grandma +Wentworth: "Honesty is best. A dozen words would do it." +</P> + +<P> +That evening when her father clumsily tried to make amends Nan said +carelessly: +</P> + +<P> +"Never mind, Dad. I <I>am</I> in love—with a little boy and his pet hen." +</P> + +<P> +But she had the grace to blush. And that night as she slipped the +picture under her pillow she said a little defiantly: +</P> + +<P> +"Well—what of it? All is fair in love and war." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap13"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AUTUMN IN GREEN VALLEY +</H3> + + +<P> +Joe Baldwin was standing in front of his little shop. He was +bareheaded and that meant that he was worried. For it was only in +moments of mental distress that Joe laid aside the black cap that gave +him the look of a dashing driver of the Twentieth Century Limited. +</P> + +<P> +In the autumn dusk a chilly little wind played about the street corners +and wailed softly through the thinning tree-tops. The big lamp above +Joe's workbench was unlighted so the little shop was in darkness except +for the fitful wavering of the ruddy wood fire in the big stove. +</P> + +<P> +The streets were empty and quiet. It was an hour after supper and +Green Valley was indoors sitting about its first fires and talking of +the coming winter; remembering cold spells of other years; thanking its +stars that the coal bin was full and wondering whether it hadn't better +put on its heaviest underwear. +</P> + +<P> +Joe knew just about what Green Valley was thinking and saying. From +where he stood he could see what a part of Green Valley was doing. For +this early in the evening Green Valley never pulled down its shades. +So when the lights flared out in the Wendells' west front up-stairs +window Joe saw Mrs. Wendell go to the clothes closet and bring out +various newspaper parcels. Joe knew very well that those parcels +contained furs. +</P> + +<P> +Furs and ferns were Mildred Wendell's two passions. She had furs of +all sizes and colors and weights, beginning with the little muff and +tippet her favorite aunt had given her long ago when she was only five +to the really beautiful and expensive set her son, Charlie, had given +her for her last birthday. As for ferns, she had so many that Green +Valley always went to her for its wedding and funeral decorations. And +she was only too happy to lend her collection of feathery beauty. +</P> + +<P> +From where he stood on his doorstep Joe could look down three streets +and see Green Valley in its shirt sleeves and slippers and its gingham +apron, so to speak. He could look over the white sash curtains right +into Mert Hagley's kitchen for Mert lived behind his store. Joe saw +Mary, Mert's wife, turning the pages of the evening paper and studying +the advertisements. And he knew as well as he knew his own name that +Mary was talking to Mert about a new heater, begging him to buy a nice +new hard-coal heater instead of the second-hand hot blast stove he was +thinking of buying from some man in Spring Road. +</P> + +<P> +John Henderson had another one of his bad headaches for Joe saw him +lying on the dining-room couch. His wife was applying cold-water +bandages and tenderness to that bald pate of his when she knew better +than any one that what he needed was a stiff dose of salts and castor +oil and a little self-control on the nights she had ham and cabbage for +supper. +</P> + +<P> +Over in the Morrison cottage Grandma Whitby was knitting stockings for +the little Morrisons at a furious rate and every once in a while +sending one of the children out for more wood or a fresh pail of water +or some more yarn. Joe could see the children sitting around the +dining-room table with their books and games and arguing with each +other every time the grandmother made a new request. +</P> + +<P> +Grandma Whitby was a dictatorial old soul. She not only was eternally +busy herself but she kept everybody around her forever on the jump. +Mrs. Morrison was her only child and once in a moment of bitterness +said that her eight children seemed like a houseful until they got to +running errands for mother and that then she realized that eight wasn't +anywhere near enough. And the Morrison's second boy, John William, +once explained to Joe that he wore out his shoes, "running errands for +Granny." +</P> + +<P> +Alice Richards' baby was ailing again. Joe could see Allie walking the +floor, could almost hear her comforting the restless mite in her arms. +</P> + +<P> +Somebody came hurrying down the street and as they passed a street lamp +Joe saw that it was Mrs. Downey, taking Tommy to the dentist. Doc +Mitchell was a nice enough chap but as Joe watched Tommy's legs saw the +air he thought the doctor might be a little mite gentler with the boy +orator. But Doc was getting old and he was probably tired. These +first autumn days before the snap and sparkle and snowy gleam of real +winter sets in always told on the older folks. They sort of seemed +tired and worried and sad. +</P> + +<P> +So Joe stood there, looking at the purple and green and magenta-pink +lights of Martin's drug store, the sleepily winking lights of the +little station and the mellow golden glow of Sophie Forbes' yellow +parlor lamp. Then he turned and looked straight down his own street, +past the post-office, the tin shop, the dry-goods store to the spot +where a faint light seeped through drawn curtains and faint rowdy +noises came from behind closed doors. +</P> + +<P> +It was what he guessed was behind those closed doors that had brought +Joe out of his shop bareheaded and caused him to feel as Doc Mitchell +maybe felt—a little old and sad and tired and even a bit helpless. +</P> + +<P> +Usually on this first night of autumn Joe's shop was crowded with noisy +feet and voices of all sizes that squeaked one minute in a shrill +soprano and in the next sank to a ragged bass. Joe's shades were never +drawn and all the world could see the boys playing Old Maid and Rummy, +shooting caroms or sitting on the counter, swinging their feet, eating +apples and cracking nuts for themselves and Joe who was questioning +them about the day's happenings. +</P> + +<P> +But to-night—involuntarily Joe turned and looked back into the soft +darkness of his little shop where the firelight flickered softly, +tenderly through the gloom. His heart cramped. Then he looked again +to the place where heavy curtains were drawn over dirty windows. He +caught again that muffled rough noise of young voices. And his mind +was made up. +</P> + +<P> +He stepped back into his shop, turned on all the lights, put the basket +of ruddy apples on the counter, straightened the pile of old magazines +and pulled out the carom board, the box of chess and checkers. He took +a last housewifely look around, then put on his hat and coat and +started out. There was pain and anger and a terrible determination in +his usually gentle face. +</P> + +<P> +But as he stepped to the door it opened, admitting Mrs. Jerry Dustin. +That sweet-faced little woman looked about with anxious eyes, then +turned to the little shoemaker. +</P> + +<P> +"Joe—I'm looking for Peter. Wasn't he here with you? He said he was +coming here to see the boys." +</P> + +<P> +"He was here and he saw the boys. They all went off together." +</P> + +<P> +"Joe"—fear and worry leaped to the lovely corn-flower eyes, +"Joe—not—surely they didn't go—they aren't down <I>there</I>?" +</P> + +<P> +"That's just where they are. I was just going after them." +</P> + +<P> +For still seconds this father and mother of boys looked at each other +in misery. Both were thinking the same thing, both shrank from what +was before them, but even as Joe squared his shoulders Mrs. Dustin +straightened hers. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm going with you, Joe." +</P> + +<P> +So down the autumn street went these two. Joe, because he had promised +Hattie when she was sick unto death that he would always watch over the +boys, would love and cherish and guard them. +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Dustin was going because Peter was her baby, her strange, weird +duckling, full of whimsical fancies and fantastic longings. He was a +sort of dream child for whom she alone felt wholly responsible. All +the others were good, understandable children. But Peter was odd and +nobody but his blue-eyed mother knew how to handle him. +</P> + +<P> +"Rosalie, I've never whipped those boys of mine. Some way I couldn't +with Hattie gone and them having no one but me. But maybe it was a +mistake." +</P> + +<P> +"No, it wasn't, Joe. The Greatest Teacher that ever lived used only +truth and gentleness and look at the size of His school now. No—this +trouble isn't in the children exactly. It must be in us. We're stupid +and don't know how to do for the children. People say that young folks +must be young folks. And we let our boys and even our girls flounder +through a lot of cheap foolishness before we expect them to settle down. +</P> + +<P> +"But it's my opinion, Joe, that letting them flounder all alone through +these raw years of their life is plain wickedness. Peter has a good +home and he's loved and he knows it. Yet he's got to the place now +where he wants something that I and the home can't seem to give him. I +don't know just what it is. But this place, Joe, bad as it is, must +have the thing that our half-grown children want and that's what brings +them here even against our will. And I'm going to-night to find out +what it is." +</P> + +<P> +"It can't be good for them, Rosalie, when it drives them into lying and +stealing. Why only to-day Josie Landis sent Eddie to me with fifty +cents for the shoes I mended for her. And he gambled that fifty cents +away in the slot machine and came and told me a lie!" +</P> + +<P> +"Little Eddie Landis! Why—Joe, he's just a baby." +</P> + +<P> +"Well—that's what the place is doing to the babies. I don't like it. +It's dirty and sneaky and it's working hand in hand with the saloon. +It has no business in this town." +</P> + +<P> +"But, Joe, it must have something that this town wants or it wouldn't +be doing business. It can't be all pure wickedness." +</P> + +<P> +But Joe's anger was rising in leaps and bounds so that his very hands +shook. Mrs. Dustin stopped and laid a soothing hand on the little +shoemaker's arm. +</P> + +<P> +"Joe, whatever you do don't get angry in there. Hold on to your temper +and don't let yourself even look mad if you can help it. We mustn't +humiliate the children for they'd never forgive. You better let me do +all the talking at first." +</P> + +<P> +Joe nodded and with that they came abreast of the curtained windows and +stood still for a second to gather up their courage. Then Mrs. Dustin +very quietly opened the door and stepped in with Joe. +</P> + +<P> +She stood smiling at the door and at sight of her the noise stopped as +if by magic. Every child there knew the lovely, blue-eyed little +mother of Peter Dustin. The only one who did not know her was the +proprietor standing in stupid wonder behind his counter. But she +pretended not to see his astonishment as she made her laughing +explanations. +</P> + +<P> +"We got lonesome, Joe and I. You know these first autumn nights do +chill us older folks a bit and make us sad. We want bright fires and +lots of children racketing around to keep us from feeling old and +frightened. And I guess the children get the blues from us for I +notice that that's just the time they want to get off by themselves for +a good time. We're all trying to forget that the year is dying, I +expect, and we're crowding together to cheer each other up. That's +what's making the streets so lonely to-night. As I came along I felt +so bad that I thought I'd just drop in on Joe and get cheered up with +the children. They're usually there. But Joe was standing on his +doorstep as lonely as I was. He was missing the children too. We saw +your light and heard the children laughing, and we just thought we'd +come in and see if we couldn't feel young again. We didn't come in to +spoil your fun, so just you go on with it. Joe and I'll watch and +maybe join in. You were dancing, weren't you, Mollie?" +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Dustin asked this of a little russet-haired girl of fourteen who +in her sudden amazement at the visitors was still standing in the +middle of the floor with her arms about Peter, who had a mouth organ in +his mouth. She was a graceful little thing and she had been teaching +Peter how to dance. But now she stood stiff with fright and +embarrassment. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, don't be afraid of my mother, Mollie," Peter said gently, for he +himself was in no way frightened at his mother's appearance. +</P> + +<P> +So when Mrs. Dustin repeated her question, Mollie said shyly: "Yes, +ma'am, we were trying to dance." +</P> + +<P> +"Bless me," laughed Mrs. Dustin. "Why, I never realized that Peter was +old enough to want to dance. You should have told me, Peter Boy. Why, +you should have all told me, because," she smiled gloriously at them +all, "because I used to be the star dancer twenty-five years ago. +Wasn't I, Joe?" +</P> + +<P> +"You sure were," Joe answered promptly. His face still looked a little +queer and his voice was not quite steady but he was bravely following +the wise little woman with the blue eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Let me show you. Play something, Peter." +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Dustin picked up Mollie and began to dance. And in exactly five +turns about the room all the poetry, the joy of motion in Mollie caught +fire and her little slim feet just fairly twinkled in happy abandonment. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, Mollie, girl, you're a fairy on your feet," praised Mrs. Dustin +and the happy face at her breast flushed with pleasure and gratitude at +the words. +</P> + +<P> +Peter was not the least bit surprised at his mother's antics. He knew +that she was a glorious mother and full of surprises. The other +youngsters however were not so sure. So Peter suggested to the +proprietor that he start the graphophone. The proprietor nodded and +soon they were all dancing, Mrs. Dustin taking a new partner every few +minutes. +</P> + +<P> +"And children," she suddenly remembered, "Joe can jig—why, he used to +jig beautifully." +</P> + +<P> +So Joe took his turn in amusing the children and while he did it Mrs. +Dustin examined some machines lined up along the wall. +</P> + +<P> +"When you drop a nickel in the slot do you get gum, peanuts or your +fortune told or does a Punch and Judy pop out?" she laughingly and +innocently asked Sim and Sammy Berwick who stood near. +</P> + +<P> +Sim looked uneasy and Sammy said, "Aw, them things are no good, Mrs. +Dustin. You don't want to monkey with them. You might—" +</P> + +<P> +But Mrs. Dustin was already dropping her nickel in and when Peter came +up she was shaking out an empty purse. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, Peter, what's the matter with these machines? I guess I didn't +work them right. I've dropped all my money in, and I haven't gotten a +thing. It's the money I was saving for the framing of that picture Mr. +Rollins gave me. Don't you think you can get it for me? Jemmy Hills +sent me word to-day that the picture was all framed and ready." +</P> + +<P> +Peter all at once looked sick. He knew how his mother had been saving +to buy a pretty frame for the lovely water color Bernard Rollins had +given her. She had even given up the idea of a new knot of flowers for +her hat. And now she had dropped the precious coins down the hungry +mouth of a slot machine. And the worst of it was she didn't seem to +know what she had done. +</P> + +<P> +"Mother," Peter began miserably, "you've lost the money and I don't see +how you can ask—" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, well, Peter Boy,—never mind. I expect it's some new game and I +didn't play it right. I'm sorry I was stupid. Let's see what else we +can do. I wanted to treat you children to soda but maybe Joe has some +money. Joe," she called merrily to the shoemaker, "won't you treat?" +</P> + +<P> +Joe caught the odd little note in her voice. His hand rattled the +loose change in his pocket and he smiled a spontaneous smile that had +however more than a bit of malice in it. +</P> + +<P> +"Sure, I'll treat," and he turned to the proprietor who still looked as +though he was seeing things but came to life when Joe stepped up to the +counter. +</P> + +<P> +"What'll you have?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh," said Joe carelessly, "give me what you give the rest of the +boys," and here Joe winked at the proprietor. +</P> + +<P> +"And I'll have the same," laughed Mrs. Dustin, and again Joe winked at +the proprietor. +</P> + +<P> +But the children had grown strangely quiet, especially the boys. And +slim Mollie once more grew frightened as she watched the proprietor +setting out glass after glass of foaming beer. +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Dustin was busy talking to the children and didn't seem to see the +foaming glasses until Joe called, +</P> + +<P> +"Come on, everybody—line up." +</P> + +<P> +Then the lovely mother face was raised and at the look that came into +the blue eyes every child there grew sick and miserable. +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, gee—whad he give her that for?" muttered Sammy Berwick. +</P> + +<P> +But Mrs. Dustin, after looking once into Peter's tortured eyes, stood +up and laughed. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, children," she confessed, "I've never tasted beer in my life, +but it's your party and I invited myself so it would be rude to refuse." +</P> + +<P> +And with that she picked up her glass. +</P> + +<P> +"Well," laughed Joe, "this is my first drink too. But I'm not going to +be an old fogey. What's good enough for my boys is good enough for me." +</P> + +<P> +Every child there held its breath for they knew that Joe spoke the +truth. As for the proprietor, that puzzled man thought that the little +shoemaker was trying to be funny and he laughed his first laugh that +evening. +</P> + +<P> +Peter Dustin stood beside his mother, his horrified eyes on the little +toil-worn hand that was curled about the stem of a beer glass. He +wanted to snatch that glass away, wanted to shout to her not to touch +the stuff. But his throat was closed and he was conscious only of the +fact that somewhere down inside of the anguish that filled him +something was praying for help, something was begging God to keep the +little, blue-eyed mother stainless and sweet and unharmed. +</P> + +<P> +Joe's boys were not beside their father. They were at the other end of +the counter staring, just staring, unconscious of everything, hearing +only that strange new laugh of their father's and noticing what no one +else except Mrs. Dustin saw—that Joe's hand as he raised his glass +shook wretchedly. +</P> + +<P> +And then, before any of them could bring their glasses to their lips, +the thing the anguished soul of Peter Dustin had been praying for +happened. The door opened and within its frame stood the big handsome +figure of Green Valley's new minister. +</P> + +<P> +One glance of his took in the scene and the smile he wore never changed +nor did an eyelash so much as quiver even after the blue eyes of +Peter's mother had flashed their message. +</P> + +<P> +"Well—I've come to invite folks to my party and I find a party going +on. I'm going to give a housewarming soon, and I came over to ask +Williams here where he bought his graphophone and records. We must +have one at my party so that when the musicians get tired we can have +other music. And, Williams, I'm expecting you to come over that night +and run the thing for me. I shall be too busy attending to other +matters. And now, as long as we're all here would you mind letting me +hear 'Annie Laurie' again?" +</P> + +<P> +The song was put on and the children crowded round. +</P> + +<P> +Joe and Mrs. Dustin were listening silently to the song that always +brought back old faces and scenes and that old haunting ache for the +things of long ago. +</P> + +<P> +"That's my favorite tune," said the proprietor suddenly to Mrs. Dustin. +</P> + +<P> +"It's one of mine too," she smiled back with soft, shining eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"My wife's name was Annie," he said again and as suddenly. +</P> + +<P> +"Have you lost her?" Mrs. Dustin asked gently. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes. Quite a while ago. You make me think of her. She was little +and had blue eyes. She died on me when the baby came. She took the +baby with her." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh," murmured Mrs. Dustin and she forgot the beer growing stale on the +counter, forgot the slot machines against the walls, forgot everything +but this man who for this minute stood out from a world of men with +this unhealed sorrow in his heart. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + "And for bonny Annie Laurie<BR> + I'd lay me doon and dee,"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +sang the famous singer softly and the proprietor turned his head away. +</P> + +<P> +"It gets damn lonesome sometimes," he said huskily. And at that a +toil-worn hand touched his arm in healing sympathy and a little +shoemaker who had come out into the night with anger in his heart said +with a huskiness that rivalled the proprietor's, +</P> + +<P> +"My God, man, don't I know!" +</P> + +<P> +The minister played other tunes, then he pulled out his watch and +laughed and that ended the party. In a few minutes he was alone with +the proprietor. +</P> + +<P> +When the last footstep had lost itself in the still streets the +proprietor turned to the big young man who was sitting on an ice-cream +table, carelessly swinging his feet. +</P> + +<P> +"I feel so damn funny," said the proprietor, "and all shook up +to-night. And I don't know whether it all really happened or whether I +just dreamed it—the little woman with the blue eyes and the soft-faced +little guy. Say, parson, what were they after, anyway?" +</P> + +<P> +"Williams," the parson made grave answer, "I rather think those two +were looking for their children." And Cynthia's son told the story of +Joe and Hattie and Mrs. Dustin and Peter as Green Valley had told it to +him. And when it was told the two men sat still and listened to the +little wind mourning somewhere outside. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—that's it. They were looking for their children. If mine hadn't +a-died that's maybe what I'd be doing now. Oh, God, parson, I'm in +wrong again. I've been in wrong ever since Annie died. If she was +alive I'd be working in a machine shop somewheres, bringing home my +twenty-two a week with more for overtime and going around with my wife +and the kid and living natural, like other men. My God," he groaned, +"the lights just went out when she went and I've been stumbling around +in the dark, not knowing how to live or die. +</P> + +<P> +"I quit work the day after I buried her. What was the use of working +then? I had half a mind to blow in all I had but I couldn't. Seemed +like she was still there with me, trying to cheer me up. I slunk +around like a shadow for months. And then I got hungry for people. A +single man don't get asked around much and he's got to hang around with +the boys. +</P> + +<P> +"So I took what money I had and started a pool-room. I thought maybe +I'd feel better seeing people around all day. Well—it wasn't so bad. +But one night a little woman with a baby in her arms came to the door +and begged me to send her husband home and not let him play in my place +any more. She said she had no milk for the baby and no fire, that he +was spending everything he earned in my poolroom. +</P> + +<P> +"So help me, God, parson, that part of it had never struck me. I ain't +bright and never was. But I ain't no skunk. I give that woman some of +her own money back and that week I sold out at a loss and slunk around +some more. I couldn't go back to my own work. I had a grudge against +it, someway. By and by the money was all gone and an old pal of mine +offered to set me up in business out here, away from the city and old +memories. And here I am again—the same old fool and numbskull. I'll +sell out this week and git. What I'll do I don't know. I'm not a +smart man. It was always Annie that did the heavy thinking and the +advising and had the ideas for starting things." +</P> + +<P> +The boy who was born in India, who had heard hundreds of gripping, +human tales in that land of story and proverb, listened as if this was +the first breath of grief his heart had ever experienced. Then he took +the dead Annie's place. +</P> + +<P> +"Williams, sometime next spring, Billy Evans is going to add a garage +to his livery barn. He'll need a mechanic. That will be just the +place for you. In the meantime I'm buying a little car and am in need +of a driver. So until Billy is ready you'd better come and bach with +me. The farm is big and I'm nearly as lonely at times as you are." +</P> + +<P> +And he told his poolroom friend a tale of India and of two plain white +stones that lay somewhere within the heart of it. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap14"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE CHARM +</H3> + + +<P> +It was a wonderful charm—that picture of a little boy and his pet hen. +Nanny carried it about during the day and felt almost safe and easier +of heart. She wondered what had become of all her old happiness, the +carefree joy that had been hers before she met the boy who came from +India and who did not understand women. +</P> + +<P> +Ever since that day on the hill top Nanny's life had been troubled. +She was haunted with strange, vague fears. She woke up one morning +with the knowledge that she had dreamed the night long of the boy from +India. That afternoon she found herself unable to think of anything +but him. +</P> + +<P> +A panic seized her. She began to be afraid of herself. She caught +herself looking out of the windows and down the dusty summer roads, at +first unconsciously and then with a curious expectancy that grew to a +longing so real that she could not help but understand. +</P> + +<P> +It came to Nanny with a terrible shock—the knowledge that at last she +loved a man. She remembered then the eyes of the men who had loved her +and whom she had so carelessly sent away. She understood then the hurt +they had carried away with them and hoped penitently that each had +found the comfort and love he had craved. +</P> + +<P> +She wondered how and where she was to look for comfort. She saw with +something very much like horror that, unlike the men who had sought +her, she dared make no plea, could not by word or look give any sign of +what had befallen her. +</P> + +<P> +If others came to know, her misery would be unbearable. The terrible +thought came that perhaps Cynthia's son might come to see. At that the +earth seemed to go soft beneath her feet and her world lay blurred in a +mist of amazed misery. +</P> + +<P> +She was wretched and gay by turns. The day came when her father and +brother noticed this and spoke of it. Then it was that Nanny turned +white and walked away to Grandma Wentworth's. She had half a mind to +tell Grandma and perhaps through that wonder-wise soul find her way +back to peace and sanity. But Grandma had teased too and so Nanny held +on desperately to her secret, wondering how she was to go on enduring. +</P> + +<P> +When she came to the picture of the little, grave-eyed chap Nanny stole +it without a moment's hesitation. And it acted like a charm. Lying +warm above her heart it dulled the longing and helped her to laugh +again, gayly, saucily even. +</P> + +<P> +She had brave minutes when with her eyes on the picture she told +herself that it wasn't the man she loved but this grave-eyed boy in him +that had never grown up or died. She had always loved children, she +told herself, so there was no shame in that. But the next minute her +heart would call up the image of this boy grown up, a boy still, but a +boy with a man's eyes and a man's dormant strength. Being an honest +soul Nanny flushed and cried for the mother she could not remember. +</P> + +<P> +Still as the days went by Nanny found that the little fellow stood +gallantly by her. Somehow he helped her to grow used to the pain and +the burning joy of her secret. He helped her to endure the questions +and the teasing that is the lot of girls as lovely as Nanny. +</P> + +<P> +He helped her to laugh when she felt like crying. And best of all he +steadied her when Cynthia's son was by, when her heart was beating +horribly and her head was dizzy with happiness and fright. +</P> + +<P> +She was a new girl to the boy from India. He was no longer afraid of +her. She no longer said bright, sharp things that puzzled and hurt +him. She was quiet and kind and frequently now exceedingly ill at ease. +</P> + +<P> +One day while they were walking along the road he stopped suddenly and +looked at her. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you tired?" he asked abruptly. +</P> + +<P> +"No—I'm not tired," Nanny said a little surprised at the question. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you ill?" he next wanted to know. +</P> + +<P> +"Ill? Why—no. Not that I know of." +</P> + +<P> +He searched her eyes for the truth. Nanny, not daring to trust +herself, turned away her head with an unsteady little laugh. +</P> + +<P> +"Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"Because," the puzzled boy explained, "you have been so quiet and so +nice and kind to me." +</P> + +<P> +The laughable innocence of him was all that saved Nanny that time. +</P> + +<P> +She thought of going away. But she lacked the courage. The thought of +going made the pain worse and there was no place in all the world to +which she cared to go. +</P> + +<P> +Then a brilliant idea came to her. It might after all, she told +herself, be purely imaginary,—this strange torture that she thought +was love. It might after all be only a foolish fancy born of her quiet +isolated life in the dreamy old town. She would fill the house with +people, with men and women and music. +</P> + +<P> +So for a time the Ainslees were very gay. House party followed house +party and there were always guests. Secure with the security of +numbers Nanny invited Cynthia's son. Then she stood back and watched +him draw both men and women about him. He was utterly at ease with the +men but quiet and reserved with the girls. Instinctively he sorted out +the comfortable, less brilliant ones and chatted with them, all +unconscious of the light in the eyes of the others. Nanny watched him +and as she watched there was born in her heart a new fear and torture. +She realized that some day love would come to Cynthia's son and feared +that she would have to stand by unseen and forgotten. +</P> + +<P> +So then she began to distrust those of her feminine guests who smiled +at him and chatted with him. And as soon as she decently could she +sent all her company packing. When they were gone she knew beyond any +possibility of doubt that she loved him and would always love him and +that the vengeance that her father had predicted had overtaken her. +</P> + +<P> +The very next time Cynthia's son came he found the house quiet and +Nanny alone. +</P> + +<P> +"Are they all gone?" he asked. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," she told him. +</P> + +<P> +"When is your next crowd coming?" he wondered. +</P> + +<P> +"There aren't going to be any more crowds," Nanny informed him. +</P> + +<P> +"That's nice. It's pleasanter this way." +</P> + +<P> +Nanny's poor heart longed to ask why but it dared not. +</P> + +<P> +So then she drifted and didn't care. Though she prayed a little +miserably at times for peace and a home shore. They seemed to meet by +accident on the sunny summer roads and whenever they did they strolled +on aimlessly but contented. Because she was now so quiet and kind he +told her things that he had never told to any one else. She marvelled +at the simple heart of him, its freedom from self-consciousness. She +had not dreamed that there was anywhere in the world a grown-up man +like that. +</P> + +<P> +Had he been different she could never have lived, it seemed to her, +through the fearful hour of humiliation on the Glen Road. She stooped +for a spray of scarlet sumach one early autumn afternoon. They had +been looking through the hedges for the first hazel nuts and he was +standing beside her when, in some way, the little picture worked its +way out of her soft silk blouse and fell at his feet, face up. +</P> + +<P> +Fright as terrible and as cold as death laid its hand on Nanny's heart. +It seemed to her that she never again could raise her eyes to his. +Fortunately her body went through its mechanical duties. She bent, her +hand picked up the picture, and her voice of its own accord was +explaining: +</P> + +<P> +"This belongs to you. I took it the day I was looking over the +pictures at Grandma Wentworth's. I should, of course, have returned it +long ago but I kept neglecting to do it. It's one of the dearest child +pictures I have ever seen." +</P> + +<P> +She raised her eyes then, eyes as careless as she could make them. +Fright kept the flame of bitter shame from her cheeks and the tremor +out of her voice. She held the little picture out to him, forcing her +eyes to meet his. +</P> + +<P> +And those eyes of his looked down at her, first with wonder and then +with a pleased smile, and she knew that he didn't know, didn't +understand, saw nothing strange in the incident. He took her calm +explanation for the whole truth. The man had absolutely no vanity. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, I don't want that," he told her wonderingly. "Are you making a +collection of children's pictures?" he asked with such innocent +curiosity that Nanny's self-control gave way and she laughed until she +cried. He stood by, helpless and puzzled. When Nanny, having gotten +to the tears, searched in vain for her handkerchief he gravely offered +his. +</P> + +<P> +Nanny took it and used it and then looked up at him with eyes as full +of laughing despair as his were full of bewilderment. +</P> + +<P> +"John Roger Churchill Knight—you will some day be the very death of +me." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap15"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +INDIAN SUMMER +</H3> + + +<P> +"Well, I guess this is about the last spell of pretty weather we're +going to have," sighed Fanny Foster as she sat herself down on Grandma +Wentworth's back steps and went right to work helping Grandma sort the +herbs and bulbs and the seeds she had been gathering for a whole week. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm hoping not," said Grandma, "though when the air is like warm gold +dust, and the sun's heat just mellows you through and through, and the +last bobolink calls from the hill, why, a body just knows such perfect +days can't last. Still, I'm hoping it'll stay a bit longer, though I +can't say I'm not ready for cold weather." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I guess everybody is," agreed Fanny with that joyous, bubbling, +luxurious note that Grandma knew so well. "I saw Mary Hagley polishing +her very knuckles off on that second-hand stove Mert bought from that +watery-eyed man from Spring Road who drives through here with the lame +buckskin horse and pieced-out harness. Lutie Barlow's got her fall +tinting and painting all done. She's painted the inside of her chicken +coops a bright yellow, so's to fool her hens into thinking the sun's +forever shining, and the inside of her stormshed a red, so's to make it +seem warmer when she goes out there on a cold day to the coal and wood +box. There ain't anybody can beat Lutie on color ideas. +</P> + +<P> +"Minnie Eton's dyed her heavy lace curtains in coffee and has a new set +made for the dining room, besides having a picture of the third boy +enlarged for the parlor. She started crocheting the lace for a new +bedspread for her company bedroom yesterday. And—oh, my lands, I +forgot to tell you the rest of that second-hand stove business. You +see Mary was feeling pretty bad about having to put up with another old +stove and envying Cissie Harvey hers. Cissie's new parlor stove is a +monster, made seemingly of nothing but pure nickel and isinglass. Mary +went over to look at it and when she come home and took another look at +her old thing she just sat down and cried. She cried till she was too +tired to care and then went to Jessup's for some stove polish. On the +way she met Judy Parks who told her that Dick had a new kind of polish +that gave a beautiful shine without hardly any work. So Mary got that +and it proved to be all Judy said it was and in no time at all Mary +turned that old stove of hers into a shining glory. And just as she +was standing back admiring her work in comes Cissie, wringing her +hands. The baby had poked out every last one of those isinglass +windows while Cissie was in the kitchen warming up his milk. And there +you are. And there's people that say there is no God and no justice in +this world. +</P> + +<P> +"Josephine Rand's starting in on her rugs and begging rags from friends +and enemies. She's going a little easy though since last week. She +cut up what Ted says was a perfectly good pair of his pants. He had +them hanging up in the basement and was hoping Josephine would wash and +press them some day. He kept them down in the basement because he knew +that if he left them in his closet she'd give them away to a hobo on +account of her always feeling so sorry for tramps and believing +everything they tell her. Ted says he always liked these particular +pants on account of them making him look slim and being made of the +same kind of cloth as his first long pair of pants that he got as a +boy. So he was cherishing them and Josephine goes and cuts them into +tatters. He's so mad, she says she don't dare leave a rag rug in his +sight. +</P> + +<P> +"Mat Wilson and his wife ain't on the very best conjugal terms either. +It seems Mat has a felon right under his thumb nail, about the worst +place you can have one, he thinks. It's kept him awake nights and made +him miserable, so naturally he felt entitled to a good deal of +sympathy. And he got it. Everybody has sympathized so much that Clara +just got mad and said that that there felon of Mat's isn't half as bad +as the one that she had at the end of her thumb two years ago. She +says she got hollow-eyed and consumptive looking with hers but that Mat +looks about the same as usual, maybe brighter. Anyhow, they've argued +and scrapped about their felons so that Clara's aunt's gone off for a +visit to Ioway, and Mat says that there sure is a recompense for +everything in this world, even felons and domestic misery, and Clara +wants to know if he's meaning to insinuate that her aunt is a nuisance, +because if he is she ain't going to send his aunt the Christmas present +that she's got half done for her. But Mat won't say, just keeps +showing his thumb to everybody and talking about silver linings to +every cloud. There's no use talking, some men are aggravating. +</P> + +<P> +"Mandy Jutlins don't know whether to have the telephone put in or not. +She says the Lord knows she has enough children to run all her errands +and take all messages and that the two dollars a month comes in handy +for a new pair of shoes. And if it's in she says more than likely +she'll be wasting her time listening to a lot of silly gossip. Of +course that was a foolish remark for Mandy to make, seeing all her +friends have telephones. Two or three's took it personal and aren't +speaking a word to Mandy but plenty about her. One of them is supposed +to have said that it's a fact that Mandy doesn't need a telephone, that +she talks enough without it, and that in her opinion the worst kind of +a gossip is the kind that stays at home the whole enduring time, never +taking pains to see how things really happen and always knowing +everything. +</P> + +<P> +"Emmy Smith doesn't know what to do with her oldest girl, Eleanor. +Eleanor just won't wash the knives and forks and spoons. She'll scrape +and scald and polish the pots and pans and does the china beautiful, +but she will leave the knives and forks and even hides them away dirty. +Did you ever hear of such a thing? Emmy can't explain it unless it's +due to the shiftless streak in all the Smiths. +</P> + +<P> +"Agnes Hooper's crab-apple jell is about all gone and here it's hardly +cool yet. Those boys of hers just want to live on crab-apple jell and +Aggie says she's got to the end of her strength and patience, that +Charlie'd better pull up and move out among the Mormons where he could +have a couple of more wives to help keep those boys filled up. +</P> + +<P> +"Jennie Burton's sauerkraut isn't going to keep and hasn't turned out +well, she thinks. Fremy Stockton says it's because she forgot to put +in a little mite of sugar and altogether too much salt. +</P> + +<P> +"Grace Cook's husband bought a whole pig from some farmer Bloomingdale +way, thinking it was going to be good and cold by this time. And Grace +has got up at four o'clock every morning for a week and stayed up till +midnight, trying to get that pig out of sight. She's rendered lard and +made sausage and salted and smoked meat till every crock is full. +Yesterday she was making head cheese, sick to her stomach and crying +because there were still the four feet to cook up, and she said she +didn't know how to cook them and that each one looked to her about as +big as the kitchen stove. +</P> + +<P> +"So I just took off my hat and put those four pig's feet on the stove +to simmer, and I helped her to get the head cheese out of the way. +When there's two working and talking, why, the time goes and when we +turned around there were those pig's feet as tender as could be, so +when the children came in we sat down and had pig's feet with +horse-radish. Grace wouldn't touch them; said she had enough pig in +her system to last her ten years and she knew she'd break out in +gumboils. +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose you've heard how Malcolm Gross thought he'd lay in a nice +supply of maple syrup for his buckwheat pancakes this winter, and how +the children went to tasting and forgot to cork the big can, and the +cat went climbing around for mice and bacon rind and knocked the thing +down. Florence says there's maple syrup tracked all over the house and +she says her rugs are ruined. +</P> + +<P> +"It seems as if Grove Street was full of trouble, for while Grace was +crying over her pig, Elsie Winters next door was crying over her blue +henrietta dress that didn't dye right. Elsie swears it was old dye +Martin sold her and wishes we'd have another drug store because a +little competition would do Martin good. And next door to Elsie, Pete +Sweeney's tickled to death. He says it serves Elsie right, that Green +Valley women've got a mania for dyeing things and trying to make 'em +last forever; that he's had two bolts of just the kind of color Elsie +was trying to get but that she wouldn't look at it. +</P> + +<P> +"And Pete Sweeney's not the only one that's down on the women. Andy +Smiley cleaned up so much money on those new bungalows that he went to +the city and came home with twenty-five dollars' worth of ostrich +plumes for Nettie. He said he was bound that Nettie'd have a real hat +once in her life, that he's tired of watching her making her own hats, +even piecing out the shapes with bits of cardboard and trimming and +retrimming. She got in the way of it the first ten years they were +married, when Andy was having such poor luck and now, poor thing, I +guess she can't get out of it, because the day after Andy brought the +plumes Nettie went to the city and bought a thirty-nine-cent shape to +put them on. And she's wearing it like that, looking worse than ever. +They say Andy's swearing awful and that Mary Langely almost cried when +she saw those lovely plumes and begged Nettie to come in and let her +fix up her hat proper and without charge. But Nettie just smiled that +happy little smile of hers and shook her head. +</P> + +<P> +"Andy Smiley ain't the only one that's doing well. Johnny Peters got a +raise the other day and Claudie's treated herself to two dozen +beautiful linen dish towels. She says she's used flour sacks to wipe +dishes ever since she was six years old and she's always been hoping +she'd be rich enough some day to have real linen dish towels. So she's +got 'em. But they're so nice she hardly likes to use them, and the two +weeks she was sick and had to have her washing done at the laundry she +was mighty careful not to send them. She washed them herself right +there beside her bed, and her sick with rheumatism. They say Doc +Philipps used awful language, for he caught her right at it. But when +she explained he just blew his nose and never said another word. But +he talked to Johnny and Johnny went out and bought four dozen dish +towels such as Green Valley has never seen. Why, Sadie Dundry says +even the Ainslees haven't got dish towels like that. Doc says that if +he can coax some man to get Dolly Beatty good woolen stockings and keep +her from wearing those transparent things this winter he'll be almost +happy; says if Dolly should marry that widower he'll talk to him. +</P> + +<P> +"All Elm Street's laughing at Alexander Sabin and Carrie and their +pump. That pump of theirs has been out of order all summer and +Carrie's been sick from nothing else but getting mad every time she'd +go out for a pail of water. Alexander promised to fix it but instead +of that he's repaired everybody else's all up and down Elm Street and +just can't seem to get started on his own. Carrie's going on a strike +to-morrow, ain't going to cook a mouthful of victuals, she says, until +that pump is fixed. The neighbors, much as they like Alexander, are +all on her side and have promised not to invite him in, even for a +drink of water from the pumps he's fixed. And his mother's away at +Barton, nursing her sick sister, so it looks as if Alexander will be +starved into fixing that pump of his. +</P> + +<P> +"Debby Collins is going to give the minister one of her cats, the one +that has to have a cold potato for its lunch every day. She says it's +the most mannerly of all her cats and that she'd never think of giving +it to any one but the minister and not even to him but that now that +he's going to have a proper home and a housekeeper, why, it'll be safe. +</P> + +<P> +"Everybody, of course, is crazy about the housewarming the minister is +going to give next week. I guess everybody is going. It'll be a fine +night for thieves, Bessie Williams says, with every soul gone. That +girl's mind just naturally turns to evil. She knows there ain't ever +been a thing stolen in this town, less it was a kiss or two. But +Bessie's the only one, so far as I could hear, who was borrowing +trouble. The rest of the town is dying to get into that house that's +been closed so long. And everybody's curious to know just what Hen +Tomlins's been doing to the furniture. You know when the minister +found out what a fine wood-carver and cabinet-maker Hen was he had him +go through the house. And they say that Bernard Rollins, the +portraiture man, is mixed up in the housewarming too. But nobody can +figure out how. And that ain't the worst. Uncle Tony says that he +heard that the minister bought out the poolroom man, because some one +saw the music box being hauled over to the minister's house. You know +Jake and some others were planning to run that poolroom man out of +town, even whispering about tar and feathers. But the minister asked +them to let him manage and try to fix things up first. So they did and +he's done it, because the poolroom's closed; the stuff went out +yesterday and Effie Struby's brother Alf swears he saw that poolroom +man fooling with the minister's automobile out in the barn. But you +know how near-sighted Alf is and his word ain't credited much, and +everybody's so busy getting ready for the party that they can't stop to +investigate. And ain't it funny how none of us don't somehow ask the +minister things, just wait until he tells us? And ain't he got a funny +way of just talking about nothing special, only being pleasant, and +then letting you find out weeks after that he did tell you something +that you'd been needing to know? My! I bet that boy could give a +child castor oil and make him honestly think it was candy. Why, they +say that as far as anybody can find out, he's never give that poolroom +man even one good talking to. Jake, who's been itching to lambaste the +man, says 's-far's he can see, it was the poolroom man who did all the +talking. And once Jake says he just dropped in himself, just to see +what line of argument the minister was using, and he says that he'd be +danged if the minister did a blessed thing but play 'Annie Laurie' and +'We'd Better Bide a Wee' over and over on that music box. Jake hasn't +figured it out yet. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, Grandma, there's some thinks maybe Cynthia's son has brought back +some Indian magic. They say India's chuckful of it—but law—it'll +take more than magic to save little Jim Tumley, for he's beginning +again. While the minister kept close he was all right but the +housewarming and that poolroom took up time, and then Jim's sister, +Mrs. Hoskins, got sick and Jim goes there to play and sing to her, and +you know what George Hoskins is. He must have his drink and offer +visitors some—and poor Jim—just the smell of it knocks him out. The +minister says Jim must be saved. But how's it to be done, tell me +that? There ain't anything smart or knowing about me, but the +minister'll never save Jim Tumley less'n he kills off a few of our +comfortable, respectable drinkers and closes up the hotel. And I tell +you, nobody but God Almighty could make this town dry." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Fanny," smiled Grandma, "I've noticed that if there ever is a +job that nobody but the Almighty can handle, He generally takes it in +hand and settles it." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap16"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE HOUSEWARMING +</H3> + + +<P> +Jocelyn Brownlee was dressing for the minister's party. She was laying +out the prettiest of her pretty things and sighing as she did it. For +what two months before would have seemed a joyous occasion was now +nothing but a painful, trying ordeal, an ordeal that must, however, be +gallantly gone through with. +</P> + +<P> +Ever since that afternoon when she had stood on the back porch waving +joyfully to David and received no answer her world had lost its color. +All the rose and gold had faded and she stood lonely and lost and cold +in a mist of mystery. +</P> + +<P> +She had seen David since that day, had even spoken to him. But her +words were few and full of a gracious courtesy that put a whole wide +world between them. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you going to the minister's housewarming, Jocelyn?" David had +asked painfully. He had realized the raw cruelty of that afternoon and +had come over to explain and make amends. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—I'm going, David. All the town will be there, won't it?" she had +answered and asked gently. +</P> + +<P> +"Shall I stop for you?" begged the big boy. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, no, David—thank you. I shall not need an escort. It's such a +little way and I'm used to Green Valley now." But David knew just how +afraid this city mouse was of the country roads at night. +</P> + +<P> +She was such a gracious little body as she stood there in her garden +that David wondered how he had ever for a moment doubted her and what +madness in his blood had made him yield to the cruelty that had shut +her heart and door to him. +</P> + +<P> +For closed they were and gone was the simple, confiding girl who had +picnicked with him one May day. In her place was this quiet young +woman who talked to him pleasantly but did not ask him in, and who +scared him with her calm and sweetness and drove the stumbling +explanation from his lips. +</P> + +<P> +So Jocelyn was laying out her pretty things and sighing. As long as +she was not going with David she decided to wear the smart slippers +with the high heels and the pretty buckles. David did not approve of +high heels. +</P> + +<P> +She knew that a great many of the Green Valley women would wear dresses +with collars to their chins. So she smiled just a bit wickedly as she +glanced at the soft, misty dress like pink sea foam, from which her +head and lovely throat rose like a flower. She wondered if it was +wicked to be glad that she was pretty and to want David to see just how +pretty she really was. +</P> + +<P> +She didn't want to go, but go she must, for she knew Green Valley. She +knew it and loved it. But she feared it too, because she did not know +it well enough. +</P> + +<P> +So half-past eight found her stepping daintily and a little tipsily in +her high-heeled slippers over the road, after the last stragglers. She +did not want to be seen going in alone and so hung back till the last, +a lonely little figure in the cool shadows. Yet she was not so far +back that she could not feel the comforting nearness of the folks +ahead. She even heard snatches of conversation and smiled +understandingly, for she too knew now the little daily trials, the +family sorrows and dissensions, the occasional soul tempests, the +laughable ways and tenderly pathetic ambitions of these simple, +guileless human folks. +</P> + +<P> +She heard enough to know that the couple just ahead was Sam Bobbins and +his wife, Dudy; the Sam Bobbins who tried to get rich raising violets +and failed; who then began raising mushrooms in his cellar and failed; +who last year spent good money trying to raise pedigreed dogs and +failed; and who only the week before paid ten dollars for a fancy +rooster and was happily telling his neighbors how rich he was going to +be, selling fighting stock. His wife stepped on her skirt and ripped +it. Jocelyn could hear her worried wail and Sam comforting her with +promises of new dresses when the roosters began to sell. She could +hear fat Mrs. Glenn puffing and laughing her way up the little crests +of the road and could guess that her thin husband was doing his best to +help her. +</P> + +<P> +She was so interested in the folks ahead that she forgot to be afraid +and never once glanced back into the shadows. Had she done so she +might have seen David loitering along, keeping faithful watch over her. +So nicely did he time his steps that when she reached the door of the +minister's country house he was right behind her, and all Green Valley +saw them come in together. +</P> + +<P> +When Jocelyn, in slipping from her evening wrap, turned and saw him and +flushed, he covered her confusion by saying reproachfully but gently: +</P> + +<P> +"Those slippers are ever so pretty, Jocelyn, but you ought not to wear +them on these rough country roads and they are hardly warm enough for +these cool evenings, are they?" +</P> + +<P> +She gave him a little smile full of saucy wickedness for she heard the +pain in his voice and saw the lover's hunger in his eyes and knew that +she was loved well and truly. But she had been hurt and she was too +much a woman and far too human not to take her turn at gentle cruelty. +</P> + +<P> +"What a couple," breathed Joshua Stillman, standing beside the blazing +fireplace with Colonel Stratton. "She's like a dewy sweet rosebud and +he's a regular story-book lover in looks and a rare fine boy. We +haven't had a wild rose romance like this one for a long while." +</P> + +<P> +"We'll have a finer when that young parson wakes up. He has the look +of a great lover, and look at the love history of the Churchills." +</P> + +<P> +t was evident that no man there dreamed of criticizing<BR> +the dress that looked like pink sea foam. Even David drank in the +picture of his little sweetheart and saw how necessary to this wild +rose sweetness the high-heeled slippers were. He wondered if ever in +his life he would kiss her and, should such glory come to him, if he +would live through the joy of it. +</P> + +<P> +It was the women who were inclined to murmur. But as soon as they +caught a look or a smile meant just for them their primness melted. +Their duty to their conscience and their upbringing done, they smiled +back lovingly at the girl, for who could be critical of a sweet wild +rose! +</P> + +<P> +Jocelyn was not the only one whose gown had no collar. Nan Ainslee +wore a plain dress that was so beautiful it made the women catch their +breath. When Dolly asked the Green Valley dressmaker if she could make +her one like it, that body sighed and shook her head and said that she +knew that that dress looked awful simple but that it wasn't as simple +as it looked and she knew better than to try and copy it. +</P> + +<P> +Some one overheard and asked somebody else why Dolly Beatty should +happen to want a dress like that, and instantly somebody smiled and +whispered that Charlie Peters, the widower from North Road, was making +eyes at her and calling regularly. +</P> + +<P> +So the ball was set rolling and soon everybody knew that Grandma +Wentworth had just had a letter from Tommy Dudley, saying that he was +doing so well out West on his homestead that he was building himself a +new house and was aiming to make Green Valley a visit next lilac time. +</P> + +<P> +And Jimmy Sears, Milly Sears' second boy, was a sergeant in the army +and was having a wonderful time somewhere down in Panama. Milly had a +letter from him with photographs and was showing them around. Not only +did Jimmy give her news of himself but he wrote that John, the oldest +boy, was up in Canada and doing well. Jimmy was sending his mother and +sister Alice some wonderful laces and embroideries and Frank Burton +several kinds of strange fowl by a sailor friend from one of the +warships who was going home. So patient, long-suffering Milly Sears +was wholly happy for the first time in years. +</P> + +<P> +And no sooner had all this news been digested than somebody discovered +a diamond ring on Clara Tuttle's left hand. So Clara was surrounded +and an explanation demanded. But before she could conquer her blushes +and stammer out her news Max Longman came in from another room and, +putting his arms about her, said, "Don't be afraid, girl of mine, I'm +here." And so everybody knew then that it was Max, after all, and not +Freddy Wilson. +</P> + +<P> +Over near one of the big windows Steve Meckling was looking down at +Bonnie Don. +</P> + +<P> +"Bonnie, when will you stop torturing me? When will you let me give +you a ring?" +</P> + +<P> +Bonnie was Clara Tuttle's chum and she was watching Clara's face, the +light in Clara's eyes, the happy curve of her lips. It was a happiness +that made Bonnie's eyes wistful. +</P> + +<P> +"Steve," she said softly, "would you always love me and be gentle with +me?" +</P> + +<P> +At that big Steve caught his breath and put his hungry arms behind his +back out of temptation's way and said huskily, "Oh, Bonnie, girl, just +try me!" +</P> + +<P> +So Bonnie raised her eyes and the big man was at peace. +</P> + +<P> +Billy Evans was the last to arrive. He had to get all the old folks to +the party before he and Hank could put in an appearance. But his wife +and little Billy were there, little Billy with his ruddy hair curling +about his merry little face and his eyes dancing at everything and +every one. +</P> + +<P> +Green Valley was full of lovable little ones, but they were as a rule +kept closely sheltered in the front and back yards. But Billy was a +town baby. His days were spent in and around his father's livery barn. +He went to his twelve o'clock dinner perched on Hank Lolly's shoulder, +and it had gotten so no gathering of men in his father's office was +considered complete without him. +</P> + +<P> +And maybe it was just as well; for since Billy's coming there was less +careless language, less careless gossip. And if some one's tongue did +slip now and then, Hank Lolly had a way of putting his head in and +saying solemnly: +</P> + +<P> +"Guess you forgot that Mrs. Evans' boy was around when you said that." +</P> + +<P> +For Hank Lolly was little Billy's proud godfather and Billy's welfare +was a matter that kept Hank awake nights. +</P> + +<P> +It was Hank who introduced little Billy to all the livery horses and +patiently developed deep friendships between the animals and the child. +</P> + +<P> +"I've fixed it so's no horse of ourn'll ever hurt the boy. But that +ain't saying that somebody's ornery critter won't harm him. There's +some awful mean horses in this town, Billy," Hank worried. But Billy +Evans only laughed. +</P> + +<P> +"Hank," he said, "with you and God taking turns minding that kid, and +his ma and me doing a little now and then, I guess he'll grow up." +</P> + +<P> +So Billy was at the minister's party, as were very nearly all the other +Green Valley youngsters. For these were old-fashioned folks whose +entertainments were so simple and harmless that children could always +be present. +</P> + +<P> +As a matter of fact Green Valley folks never had to be entertained. +All one had to do was to call them together and they entertained +themselves. +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son knew this. So he had made no elaborate plans. He knew +too that it was the old homestead they came to see, and to find out +what that poolroom man was doing in his back yard, and why Hen Tomlins +had been coming up so regularly, and why Bernard Rollins had been +asking to see people's old albums for the past three months. +</P> + +<P> +So Cynthia's son had no programme. He just threw open every door and +invited them to walk through and look. He explained that in the +kitchen his housekeeper, Mary Dooley, and her two cousins from Meacham +were getting up the refreshments and that any one who strayed in there +would in all probability be put to work. +</P> + +<P> +Still he wanted Green Valley housewives to go in and see if they could +think of anything that would make Mary's work easier. He had, he said, +tried to make that kitchen a livable kind of a room, a room that would +be easy on a woman's feet and back and restful to her heart. +</P> + +<P> +In the library and scattered all about were samples of Hen Tomlins' +art. Hen was a rare workman, their minister told them. With his box +of tools and his cunning hands Hen had taken old, broken but still +beautiful heirloom furniture and refashioned it into new life and +beauty. +</P> + +<P> +In his little study just off the library his Green Valley neighbors +would find all manner of oriental things, treasures gathered for him by +his wonderful mother and father and given to him by his many dear and +far-away Indian friends. He had put little cards on the articles, +explaining their history and uses. +</P> + +<P> +For the babies there were big, quiet, safe rooms upstairs, and for the +young people there was the hall and the back sitting room, the piano, +the music box and Timothy Williams. Timothy was the man who up till +the day before yesterday had owned and run the poolroom. But he wasn't +in the poolroom business any more. He was now his, John Knight's, +assistant and friend. Timothy's story was a common enough little +story—the story of a man without a home. If they'd all listen a +minute he'd tell them all there was to tell. +</P> + +<P> +So, in the midst of a merrymaking, John Roger Churchill Knight +introduced Timothy Williams to Green Valley, introduced him in such a +way as to pave a wide clear path for him into Green Valley hearts. And +so quick was Green Valley's response that before that same merrymaking +was over Green Valley was calling him Timothy and inviting him over for +Sunday dinner. +</P> + +<P> +So then they were all provided for. And here was the house. It was +years since some of them were in it, and to a home-loving, +home-worshipping people it was a treat to go from room to room. In +spite of the changes, the newness everywhere, there was much of the old +home left. Its soul was still the same. The new hangings, the new +wicker furniture, the oriental treasures were all duly inspected, +commented upon and admired. +</P> + +<P> +But it was the old things, the Green Valley things that made the great +appeal. And Green Valley folks rested loving hands every now and then +on some fine old heavy chair that a long-gone Churchill had with his +own hands fashioned from his own walnut trees. +</P> + +<P> +There were pictures to look at, old familiar faces, the faces of men +and women who had been born and raised in this joyous little valley +town; who had gone to the village school and had in their courting days +strolled over the shady old town roads. +</P> + +<P> +Here was a picture of Cynthia's mother in a crinoline with her baby on +her knee. There was a famous artist's painting of a storm passing over +the wooded knoll that now was John Knight's favorite retreat. The +famous artist had been visiting John Knight and had painted the storm +as he watched it from the sitting-room windows. +</P> + +<P> +There were old candlesticks, guns, old dishes, old patterns, hand-sewn +quilts and such little things of long ago as stirred the oldest folks +there very nearly to tears and awed even the youngsters into a +wondering respect for the old days they could never know. +</P> + +<P> +The old house hummed with the treasured memories of a hundred years. +Groups of twos and threes stood everywhere about, hovering over some +article. In every such group there would be at first a short hushed +silence, then would come the sudden burst of memories spattering like a +shower of raindrops; then the turning away of eyes full of misty, +unbelieving, far-away smiles. +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son watched and smiled too. But his thoughts flew back and +he longed with a cruel ache for the mother who lay sleeping in a far +and foreign land. +</P> + +<P> +By and by a gong sounded somewhere. That was the signal for supper. +So they gathered around the tables and Cynthia's son explained that +Bernard Rollins had for the last three months been painting a portrait +of Cynthia Churchill, Cynthia as they knew her. That was why Rollins +had searched old albums for pictures that might give him an idea of the +sweetness of her smile. That was the surprise of the evening and the +meaning of the shrouded picture above the library fireplace. She had +so loved Green Valley, had so longed to be there. +</P> + +<P> +They sat very still and waited while Grandma Wentworth uncovered the +face of the girl who had been so loved by Green Valley folks. +Grandma's face was a little white with memories and the hand that was +reaching for the cord to draw away the covering shook a little. +Cynthia Churchill and she had been dearer to each other than sisters. +They had gone to school together in the days of pinafores and +sunbonnets and picked spring's wild flowers along the roadsides and in +the woodlands. They had knitted and made lace together, gone to +picnics and parties, always together, until the time came when a tall +Green Valley boy walked beside each. And even then they were +inseparable. Why, they made their wedding things together and when +Mollie Wentworth passed out of the village church a wife, Cynthia, +lovely as the bride, walked behind as bridesmaid. And Mollie was to +have returned the favor in a few days. But something happened, +something tragic and cruel, and lovely Cynthia never wore the wedding +gown that had been fashioned for her. It was packed away and on what +was to have been her wedding day Cynthia left Green Valley and was gone +a long while. She came back once or twice but in the end Green Valley +heard that she married a wonderful missionary and sailed away to India. +</P> + +<P> +So Grandma's hand shook and her face was white. But when the covering +slipped off and a lovely, laughing face looked down at them Grandma +smiled, even though the tears were running down her cheeks. +</P> + +<P> +Yes, that was Cynthia. Disappointment could never mar the high joy of +her nature. She was laughing at them, telling them that with all its +sorrows and bitterness and heartache life was worth while. +</P> + +<P> +Her son stood beneath her picture and read to them parts of her +letters, last messages to many of them. She had written them on her +deathbed and they were full of yearning for the town of her birth, for +the old trees and familiar flowers, home voices and the sound of the +old church bell sighing through the summer night. +</P> + +<P> +"But," ran one letter, "I am sending you my son and I want you to tell +him all the old stories and town chronicles, sing him all the old songs +and love him for my sake—for he's going home—going home to Green +Valley—alone." +</P> + +<P> +Oh, they cried, those Green Valley folks, for they were as one family +and they guessed what it must have been to die away from home and +kindred. +</P> + +<P> +But Cynthia's son did not weep. He had shed his tears long ago and had +learned to smile. He was smiling at them now. +</P> + +<P> +"I had planned to have Jim Tumley sing some of the old songs for us +to-night. But Jim isn't here and so if somebody will offer to play +them we can all sing. Jim promised he'd come," the young host's face +was troubled and they all guessed what was worrying him, "but he isn't +here—" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—he—is," a strange voice chirped somewhere near the door. Green +Valley turned and looked and froze with horror. For there, staggering +grotesquely, came little Jim Tumley, a piteous figure. He had kept his +promise to his new friend—he had come to sing the old songs. +</P> + +<P> +Not a soul stirred. Only somewhere in the heart of the seated audience +Frank Burton groaned. This was a fight that he could not fight for +little Jim. +</P> + +<P> +Nan Ainslee had stepped to the piano but her fingers were lead. And +for once the young minister was unable to rise to the situation. A +dark agony flooded his eyes and kept him motionless. It was the look +Grandma Wentworth had once seen in Cynthia's eyes. And it was that +look that took the strength from Grandma so that she too was helpless. +</P> + +<P> +For sick, still minutes Green Valley watched little Jim stumble about +and fumble for his handkerchief. They stared at the stricken face of +their minister and at the laughing face whose memory they had come to +honor. +</P> + +<P> +And then, when the deathly silence was becoming unbearable, a girl in a +dress like pink sea foam rose from her chair and stepped quietly, +daintily down the room until she stood beside the swaying figure of Jim +Tumley. She placed her hand gently on the little man's arm and turned +to her Green Valley neighbors. +</P> + +<P> +"I shall sing the old songs with him," she said quietly. +</P> + +<P> +She found an armchair and put the docile Jim into it. Then she smiled +at Nan Ainslee and told her what to play. +</P> + +<P> +Nan's fingers touched the keys softly and from the slim throat that +rose like a flower stem from the pink sea foam there rolled out a +great, deep contralto. +</P> + +<P> +It was unbelievable, that rich deep voice. It blotted out +everything—little Jim, the room, all sense of time and place—and +brought to the listeners instead the deep echoes of cathedral aisles, +the holy peace of a still gray day and the joy of coming sunshine. She +sang all the old songs, tenderly, softly. When she could sing no more +and they showered her with smiles and tears and applause, she raised +her hand for silence, for she had something to say. +</P> + +<P> +"I am glad you liked the songs. I always sang them for father. I am +glad that I could do something for you, for you have all been so +wonderfully kind to me from the very first day that I came to Green +Valley. But why are you not kinder to Jim Tumley? Why don't you vote +the thing that is hurting him out of your town? If the women here +could vote that's what they would do. But surely you men will do it to +save Jim Tumley." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap17"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE LITTLE SLIPPER +</H3> + + +<P> +They sat stunned and stared at the slip of a girl in pink who was +speaking in so matter-of-fact a fashion. +</P> + +<P> +And then Seth Curtis laughed; but he laughed kindly. +</P> + +<P> +"Why," he shouted, "she can't only sing; she can preach too—woman +suffrage and prohibition." +</P> + +<P> +The laugh grew and smiles went round and the whole trying situation +eased up. Jocelyn laughed too and turned to say good night to her +host. And from somewhere in the crowd Frank Burton strode up and +carried Jim out and drove him home. +</P> + +<P> +Everybody began to get ready to go, glad that the evening so nearly +tragic had been happily saved. And all Green Valley mentally promised +to repay the girl who had had the wit and the sweetness to serve in an +hour of need. +</P> + +<P> +But while the young people and the married ones with children were +crowding out through the front door, Grandma Wentworth was still in the +library, staring up into the laughing eyes of the dearest friend life +had given her and taken away. +</P> + +<P> +"Cynthia, dear," whispered Grandma brokenly, "it is still here, the +thing that hurt you so—that made a widow of me at twenty-eight. We +have grown no wiser in spite of the pain." +</P> + +<P> +Sitting in the armchair that Jocelyn had pulled out for Jim Tumley was +Roger Allan. His face was a-quiver with pain. And he too was staring +hungrily at the pictured face. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, Roger," wept Grandma, "if only we could have her back, her and +Richard." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," hoarsely whispered he, "if only the years would come back and we +could have another chance to live them." +</P> + +<P> +Over in one corner of the room Green Valley's three good little men +were discussing something hotly. That is, the fiery little barber was +discussing something. The other two just listened. +</P> + +<P> +"I tell you that preacher boy is right. This town needs a home, a +place where it can all get together for a good time. No one home, not +even this one, is big enough. That's why part of the town hangs out in +the hotel, another part in the blacksmith shop, the kids in Joe's shoe +shop or a poolroom. We need a big assembly room with smaller rooms off +of it for all kinds of honest fun—pool, billiards, bowling, dancing, +swimming. I tell you I ain't crazy and no more is the preacher. And +Joshua Stillman's library that he pretty near gave all his life and +money to needs to be moved out into the sunlight and stretched to its +full, grand size. I tell you it would be a great thing for this town. +This town's sociable but it ain't social—no, sir!" +</P> + +<P> +Sam Ellis was going home from the party with his girl and two boys. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, father," bitterly spoke up the eldest, "it's still our saloon +that's killing Jim Tumley, even though we aren't running it." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, father," murmured Tessie miserably, "can't you do anything about +it?" +</P> + +<P> +Sam groaned. +</P> + +<P> +"Dear God—what can I do? I tell you selling the hotel or renting it +or dynamiting it won't stop drinking in this town, so long as there are +men in it who want drink and will drink. I don't think even the vote +that that little girl suggested will do it. If you vote it out you'll +have blind pigs to fight. No, sir! It ain't my fault nor no one man's +fault. The whole town's to blame. There's only one thing will stop +it. If men in this country will quit making it other men will stop +drinking it. So long as it's made it'll be used. The whole country's +to blame." +</P> + +<P> +Fanny Foster, having nobody else to talk to, was speaking her mind to +John, her husband. +</P> + +<P> +"I told Grandma Wentworth nobody but the Almighty could do anything for +Jim. You'll see that I'm right. I know." +</P> + +<P> +Fanny was right. But what she did not know was that she herself was to +be one of the instruments with which a stern and patient God was to +clean out forever the one foul blot on Green Valley life. +</P> + +<P> +The one person who was not discussing Jim Tumley and his trouble was +Jocelyn. She couldn't. She was too occupied with troubles of her own. +</P> + +<P> +She had been the first to leave. She slipped away unobserved for she +could not bear to have Green Valley see her leave without an escort. +So she got away as noiseless as a fairy. And for the first few rods +all was well. The excitement of the past hours, the worry of getting +away unseen, kept her mind occupied. But as the night wind cooled her +cheeks and the lighted house back of her grew smaller she grew +frightened. She was, after all, a city girl and to her there was +something fearful in the stillness of the country and the loneliness of +the dark road. She hurried her steps, jumped at every sound and grew +cold from pure terror as the awful stillness and emptiness closed in +about her. She stood still every few minutes, staring at blurred +bushes beside the road. The screech of an owl almost made her scream. +And in the dark the hard lumpy road hurt her feet cruelly. The little +slippers were never meant for dark country roads. So Jocelyn had to +pick her steps, and with every second's delay her terror grew. +</P> + +<P> +Finally the trees thinned a bit and for a good space ahead there was a +clearing where the night was not so dark and the road not so lumpy. +She hurried to get out of the smother of trees. When once she crossed +that open space all would be well, she told herself, for then the +village lights would wink at her and the sidewalks begin. As soon as +she could see her own lighted windows and set foot on a cement walk she +would no longer be afraid. +</P> + +<P> +So, head bent, she hurried along and was almost near the walk when, +looking up, she saw a man hurrying toward her through a little footpath +that led to the road. She stood motionless with horror. Then the +scream that had hovered on her lips all the way escaped her and she +tried to run. +</P> + +<P> +She did not run far. For one of the high-heeled slippers just curled +up under her and she went down, sobbing "David—David." +</P> + +<P> +And she kept sobbing just that over and over even after David had +picked her up and folded her safe in his arms. He tried to soothe her +and explained that he had missed her, had guessed that she would try to +get home alone down this road and so took the short cut in order to +catch up with her and make sure that she got home safely. He never +dreamed of frightening her so, but she was safe with him now and there +was absolutely nothing to fear. +</P> + +<P> +"But my foot, David. It's swelling. I can feel it—and it hurts." +</P> + +<P> +David took off the little slipper and put it in his pocket. Then he +told her not to worry because he could carry her home easily enough. +But first he sat down with her on an old stone wall and talked to her +until the last sob died away and her head nestled gratefully on his big +comfortable shoulder. +</P> + +<P> +"Jocelyn," he asked presently, "are you still angry with me?" +</P> + +<P> +She shook her head. +</P> + +<P> +"I've never been angry with you, David. But I thought you didn't want +to be bothered any longer with a silly girl like me and so—I tried to +help and be sensible." +</P> + +<P> +"I know. I was crazy that day you rode through town with the minister. +I had no right—" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh,"—she raised her head and looked at him in shy wonder and shocked +relief, "oh, David—was it that—you were hurt at that?" +</P> + +<P> +For answer he gently drew her close to him. +</P> + +<P> +"But David, I didn't go riding with the minister. I was just taking a +little pig home that a boy cousin of mine, who loves to tease me, sent +me. I didn't know anything about pigs and the minister happened to be +there and helped. He meant no harm." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I know, Jocelyn. But he is such a wonderful man. Only another +man, I guess, can know what a fine chap he is. And I thought if he did +like you I couldn't stand in your way. I found out, of course, that I +was mistaken. The minister doesn't care anything about girls. But +that wasn't all. You know, Jocelyn, I'm Uncle Roger's own nephew but I +bear his name because he legally gave it to me and because I have no +name of my own. I was a fatherless baby and a girl like you ought to +be courted by a better man than I am." +</P> + +<P> +It was costing David Allan something to tell the girl in his arms all +that. She guessed how the telling must hurt the boy, for she stopped +it with a little, tender laugh. +</P> + +<P> +"But, David dear, I knew all that the day you took me to the Decoration +Day exercises. Grandma Wentworth told me. She said she knew you'd +likely tell me yourself some day but she said that she liked you and +she noticed that people who liked you always liked you a little better +after they heard that." +</P> + +<P> +He sat still, overwhelmed with her sweetness. Then, "Jocelyn, is it +only liking?" +</P> + +<P> +Her answer came like a soft note of joy. +</P> + +<P> +"No, David. It's something bigger than liking and when you wouldn't +speak to me that afternoon you darkened all my world." +</P> + +<P> +She had not shed a tear through all those lonely days but now she +buried her face in David's breast and cried bitterly. +</P> + +<P> +And then it was that David kissed his sweetheart and the touch of her +answering lips healed forever the dull ache that had gnawed at his +heart ever since he was old enough to understand the story of his +cheated childhood. +</P> + +<P> +They sat in the soft darkness of the night that was full of autumn +sighs, a night that stirred in their hearts wistful longings for a low, +snug roof singing with rain and a drowsy little home fire beneath it. +</P> + +<P> +When they had sat long enough to remember their great hour forever and +had repeated the litany of love to each other till they sensed its +wonder, David said regretfully: +</P> + +<P> +"And now I must take you to your mother. And Jocelyn, I'm terribly +afraid of that mother of yours." +</P> + +<P> +Jocelyn laughed. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, David, mother isn't as bad as all that. And she likes you. She +said you made her think of father. And, David, she's always given me +everything I've honestly wanted and she could give. She hasn't been +out much here. She hasn't cared to do much of anything since father +died. But in the city she used to be so busy. You know she's a great +club woman and a suffragette and oh, such a beautiful speaker. It's +from her I get my funny, big, deep voice. She used to be in such +demand at meetings. But she's given it all up. She blames herself for +leaving father so much and not going out to the country with him. He +never asked her to leave the city but I know he wanted to. When he +died she just came out here to do penance. She thought there wasn't +anything for her to do in a place like this. But just wait till I tell +her about Jim Tumley. Oh, she'll know what to do. Why, mother's +wonderful in her way, David! Why, I just know she can do something for +Jim Tumley." +</P> + +<P> +David shook his head. +</P> + +<P> +"Jocelyn," he sighed, "it'll take this whole town and God Almighty too +to save Jim Tumley now." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, mother will do her share. And, Dav—id, I'd like another +kiss—if you don't mind." +</P> + +<P> +David didn't mind in the least. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap18"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE MORNING AFTER +</H3> + + +<P> +The very best part of every Green Valley doing is talking it over the +morning after. +</P> + +<P> +Nobody even pretended to work the morning after the minister's party. +Dell Parsons never even brushed out her lovely hair that morning; just +wound it round her head in two big braids and went through the little +gate in the hedge to talk it over with Nan Turner. +</P> + +<P> +She found Nan standing over a steaming dishpan, stirring the dishes +about absent-mindedly with the pancake spoon. At the sight of Dell she +turned her back on the cluttered sink. +</P> + +<P> +"Dell, I'm only just beginning to take in the meaning of what that +little neighbor girl of ours said last night. Why, Dell Parsons, we've +both been born in this here town; we're only twenty-two miles out from +the heart of one of the world's greatest cities and we've never sensed +the true meaning of this thing they call woman suffrage and +prohibition. Why, we've poked fun at it and jogged along our ignorant +hayseed way and watched and watched little sweet-hearted men like Jim +Tumley just stumble miserably into their graves, or a man like Sears +drive his children from their home and curse his wife, or perhaps we've +shuddered at the sight of Hank Lolly lying drunk in the road among the +wild flowers. +</P> + +<P> +"When one of our drunkards dies we cut our choicest flowers and go to +the funeral and maybe cry with the wife and children and then go home +and wait for the next one to do it. Of course, we talk to the children +and try to scare the boys into letting it alone. But that doesn't do +much good because, Dell, we don't bury enough drunkards at one time to +make a strong impression and convince the boys that we are right. Our +boys see big, respectable men like George Hoskins and Seth Curtis and +even good Billy Evans taking their drinks regularly and living and +prospering. So they make up their minds that mothers are all a little +bit crazy on the drink question. And the first thing we know we find +that our boys have been washing down their cigarettes with a drink. +And in those first sick five minutes we know, Dell, that the thing has +beaten us to the boy." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," mused Dell aloud, "but we aren't the only ones who feel beaten. +The men aren't all against us, Nan. Lots of them right here in this +town are on our side. And I tell you it's no joke for a natural man +who loves to hang around and pal with his neighbors to put himself in +the position of a spoilsport or an odd goody-goody. There's Uncle +Tony's brother William. He's been against war and drink and smoking +all his life, and look at the dog's life he's led. Nan, I believe the +men are as helpless as we. The Thing has grown so huge that we can't +fight it. It's got us all. And we're so helpless because we're +ignorant and won't think this thing out. Look at Frank Burton, who'd +give his soul to save Jim Tumley's. Yet it's only last year that he +gave up having drink in the house. He never realized until so late +that just by having it around he was hurting the man he'd die to save. +And there's Billy Evans. Why, Nan, Billy has sat up nights pulling +Hank Lolly through a jag. Yet Billy lets Hank see him take a drink +every day. And, Nan, it must be plain hell for Hank to see that. Why, +Billy wouldn't tempt Hank or make him suffer torment knowingly for a +million dollars. And yet he does it every day of his life because he's +ignorant, doesn't know any bigger, finer, more unselfish way of helping +Hank. No, Nan, you can't make me believe our Green Valley men are a +mean lot, meaner than others. They just don't know and when once they +realize, why, they'll put an end to it themselves fast enough." +</P> + +<P> +"That's all right, but, Dell Parsons, you know that the world over men +have to be nagged and coaxed into seeing the right by their women +folks. And I tell you I'm going to begin right now to do a little of +both. And as for that vote—I've laughed about that long enough. Now +I'm going after it. It's just struck me that we women need a vote +about as much as we need a pair of scissors, a bread board or a wash +boiler, cook stove and bank book. We need it along with the other +things to keep our children properly clothed, fed, housed and educated." +</P> + +<P> +The blacksmith shop was closed. George Hoskins' wife was pretty sick. +So the crowd that was usually seated about the forge was crowded into +Billy Evans' office. +</P> + +<P> +It was a big crowd but it wasn't feeling any jollier because of its +size. Each man there had had a word or two with his wife that morning. +Not a few wives had begun to discuss the Jim Tumley incident seriously +the minute they got home and got the children to bed the night before. +Every man in Billy's office felt more or less uncomfortable and talked +in nervous, disconnected snatches. +</P> + +<P> +Said one: +</P> + +<P> +"Well—I drove in to town this morning so's not to have words with +Rose—and just to escape the whole dumbed subject—but if—I'd known +that everybody I met and talked to and set down with—was a-going to +talk about the same dumbed thing I'd a-stayed to home." +</P> + +<P> +"The whole trouble," argued another, "is just women's imagination, +that's all. I never saw a woman that had a living father, brother, +beau, husband, brother-in-law, father-in-law, cousin or boy baby in +arms that she wasn't worrying all the time night and day that drink'd +get him. It's just their way of being foolish, that's all. And as for +all this talk about the terrible danger and it being a menace to the +future generation, that's all slop and slush." +</P> + +<P> +Billy was irritable this morning for the first time in months. It must +be remembered that Billy's wife was red-headed and a highly efficient +soul. She had very frankly and plainly told Billy what she thought of +a town that was run in so slack a fashion that it couldn't protect one +of its own lovable citizens. She had never spoken so sharply in all +their days together and Billy felt that he had lost his bride forever. +And he had. +</P> + +<P> +"Well—boys, I'll tell you," sighed Billy. "The old woman gave me +hell, I tell you—as if—great gosh, it was all my fault. The women +are partly right and we all know it. That's why they talk up so and +why we have to take it. I've about come to the conclusion that as long +as the women are partly right and we are partly wrong I'm going to quit +it, as far as I myself am concerned. But don't think for one minute +that I fancy that I have a right to vote this town dry for any other +man. Live and let live's my way of thinking and doing." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Billy," spoke up Jake Tuttle who had come out strongly for a dry +town, a dry state and a dry country, "you're fair and square and +a-doing all you honestly can. Maybe the time will come when you'll +feel that voting it out is the only thing." +</P> + +<P> +"Why," grumbled another member of this caucus, "anybody'd think that +this whole town had ought to turn in and just die of thirst on account +of a man that ain't much bigger than a pint of cider and never did have +no proper stomach. Why, who ever heard of sech a thing as a whole town +being run for one man?" +</P> + +<P> +"A town that ain't run fair and square for one man isn't run fair and +square for any man," insisted Jake. "And as for hearing strange +things, I've heerd tell of a man once, a poor kind of low-style Jew he +was, lived over in a little two by four town called Nazareth, who not +only believed in going dry and hungry for other people but actually +died so's to show them a finer way of living and a braver way of dying. +I've heerd tell that they called that man the Greatest Fool that ever +lived and that they killed Him fur His foolishness. So, if this whole +town should turn in an' help Jim Tumley there'd be nothing new in that." +</P> + +<P> +The pause that followed would have been uncomfortable if Seth Curtis +hadn't opened the door just then and squeezed in. +</P> + +<P> +Seth was mad. For the first time since their marriage he had +quarrelled with his wife. Docile, sweet-tempered Ruth Curtis was +aflame with mother wrath. She, like a great many Green Valley women, +thought of Jim Tumley not as a man but as a voice, the voice of a lark +on a summer morning. That other men's selfish strength should still +that voice made her sweet eyes flame and her soft voice shake with +anger. That Seth, who so hated waste of any kind, could stand calmly +by while a lovable human soul was being thrown away puzzled her at +first. She tried to argue with him. If Jim Tumley were trying to save +his burning barn or mend his fence Seth would have helped him gladly. +But Jim was trying to save his body and soul and Green Valley men, even +though they knew he was not equal to the struggle, could not see that +it was their business to help. +</P> + +<P> +Seth resented this passionate fight for little Jim that the women were +making. In his anger Seth could not see that beyond the figure of the +gentle singing man stood the children of Green Valley. In this +harmless little man who could not save himself every mother saw her +boy, her girl; one a drunkard-to-be perhaps, the other mayhap a +drunkard's wife and the mother of more drunkards. +</P> + +<P> +Seth's eyes blazed around Billy's crowded office and he waited for the +question that he knew he would be asked: +</P> + +<P> +"Well—Seth—you voting the town dry this morning?" +</P> + +<P> +And then Seth let loose. He said fool things to ease his ugly temper +but he wound up his argument with the telling reminder that Green +Valley couldn't afford to lose the fifteen-hundred-dollar yearly +license tax. +</P> + +<P> +"Not only would we men lose our freedom and be a thirsty lot of +wife-driven idiots but our taxes would rise." +</P> + +<P> +And that argument told. It had been overlooked somehow. But at the +mention of it every man's face but Jake's brightened. Why, sure—Seth +was right. That fifteen hundred dollars kept the taxes down and was an +argument that ought to appeal to every Green Valley woman whose life +was an eternal struggle to save. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, yes, that's so," agreed Jake. "It seems as if the women ought to +see that, but like as not they'll talk back and say that if there was +no hotel bar to attract us men there'd be less time wasted and more +than fifteen hundred dollars' worth of extra work turned out. And for +all they talk so everlastingly about saving, there's some kind of money +that no nice woman will touch with a ten-foot pole. And just put it up +to them as to which they want, Jim Tumley or fifteen hundred a year, +and see what they say." +</P> + +<P> +Jake was the richest man of all the men packed in Billy Evans' office. +He could afford to talk bravely for he had no need to curry any man's +favor. And he could demand respectful attention for his opinions. +There were those present who resented this independence. +</P> + +<P> +"These farmers nowadays are getting danged smart and officious," +muttered Sears to Sam Bobbins. +</P> + +<P> +But Sam wasn't listening. He too had an argument and he wanted to +voice it. +</P> + +<P> +"Mightn't the closing of the bar lose us a lot of outside trade, ruin +our business life?" +</P> + +<P> +At that Billy's eyes twinkled. +</P> + +<P> +"By gosh—Sam—I hadn't thought of that. I sure would miss the poor +drunks that crawl in here to sleep it off. And like as not I'd not get +to drive old man Hathaway home every time he hits town and tries to +paint it red. Never have dared to leave that old fool in town when he +was drunk. Never can tell what that poor miserable mind of his +mightn't prompt him to do. Might set fire to something or hang himself +on somebody's front door." +</P> + +<P> +As town marshal Billy had a pretty accurate idea of the kind of trade +that the hotel bar attracted. There was a levity in Billy's voice and +a dancing light in Billy's eye. He could never take anything seriously +for any great length of time. However, old man Sears didn't like this +attitude of Billy's. +</P> + +<P> +"It isn't only losing that fifteen-hundred-dollar license and losing +outside trade but we'd be robbing an honest and respectable man of his +livelihood," said Sears with his most ponderous air. +</P> + +<P> +An unwilling, sheepish grin ruffled every man's face and Seth said with +a rasp: +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Sears, I wouldn't lose any sleep worrying about that honest, +respectable man's livelihood if I were you. He owns a fine +seven-passenger car, some fancy driving horses, and that diamond pin he +wears week days in his tie would keep my meat bill paid for many and +many a day. No, I can't say that I'd let that make my conscience ache." +</P> + +<P> +"What say if we all go over and ask him what he thinks of it. It looks +like rain and I'll have to be starting for home," suggested the bright +and peace-loving soul who had left home that morning to avoid +unpleasantness. +</P> + +<P> +This brilliant suggestion was promptly acted on and they filed out, +leaving Billy standing alone in the doorway. Billy watched them +shuffle into the hotel, then he looked up and down Main Street, +studying every old landmark and battered hitching post. He told +himself that he hoped the old town wouldn't change too much. Hank +Lolly came out of the barn just then and Billy turned to him. +</P> + +<P> +"Hank, that innocent little girl in a pink dress last night has sure +raised one gosh darned lot of argument in this here town." +</P> + +<P> +"Billy," Hank's voice shook a little, "Billy, I heerd some of those +arguments—in there. But, my God, Billy—look at me—look at me! I'm +the best argument in this here town for voting that bar out. For, +Billy, so long as that hotel sells liquor, so long as the doors swing +open so that the smells can get out, and so long as the winds blow in +Green Valley, bringing those smells to me—just so long I'll be +afraid—afraid. And Billy, if ever I let go again, it'll be the +madhouse for me. I know. I've had a grandfather and two uncles go +that way." +</P> + +<P> +Over at the hotel the high, foaming glasses slid along the bar. The +hotel man with the diamond in his tie greeted the men who lined up at +the rail with an indifferent smile. The glasses were raised and +drained. And then some bold spirit asked the man with the diamond how +he'd feel if the town went dry. +</P> + +<P> +"Why," drawled that individual, "I've been looking down men's throats +and watching their Adam's apple and listening to them guzzling their +liquor for something like twenty years now and I wouldn't mind a +change. I left the city because I was hankering for something I didn't +know the name of. Thought I'd find it here. Thought this was a mighty +restful town. It is—but not for me and my business. But I'm glad I +came, for that young parson of yours put me next to what I really want +to do. I've been wanting all my life to run a stock farm. But I +didn't know it till that kid preacher told me so. Seems he's been +knocking around the country with Hank Lolly and knows of two or three +that are up for sale. I'm going out with him next week to look at +them. So this town running dry won't upset me any. I've just about +made up my mind to quit this game and spend the rest of my life +with—cattle. I won't mind the dryness. I don't drink. Never have." +</P> + +<P> +The rain that had been threatening for an hour came suddenly, came down +in big angry drops; and there was everywhere in town a scurrying for +home. Men buttoned their coats and bent their heads and hurried home, +hoping to find there cheerful wives and peace. +</P> + +<P> +They found their wives cheerful enough, almost suspiciously so, and +exceedingly busy with the telephone. By listening to several one-sided +conversations Green Valley men learned that while they had been +discussing things in Billy's office, Mrs. Brownlee had called on Jim +Tumley's wife and on several other more prominent Green Valley matrons; +had telephoned to others and had in three morning hours organized a +Woman's Civic League. +</P> + +<P> +"A Civic League? What's that? And what for?" Green Valley husbands +wanted to know. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, I don't know. I said yes, of course I'd join. I couldn't be +mean to the woman after what her little girl did last night," said +Green Valley wives. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap19"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIX +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A GRAY DAY +</H3> + + +<P> +Up on his wooded knoll Green Valley's young minister lay grieving and +staring up into a gray unhappy sky, a sky choked with thick gray clouds +that hung so low and were so full of sadness that even the little hills +mourned and the Green Valley world all about lay hushed and penitent. +</P> + +<P> +Summer was dead and everywhere tired winds moaned and sighed and sobbed +and then grew suddenly still. The fine old trees were shriveled and +weary, as if trying were no longer worth while. They craved sleep and +peace—just rest. The gay grasses were dry and faded and when the +little winds tried to rouse them they only rustled impatiently, +dolefully and murmured, "Oh what's the use?" +</P> + +<P> +The heart of Cynthia's son studied the low brooding sky, the dying +world, listened to the wailing, mourning winds, the sighing of the +grasses and it too said wearily, "Yes—what's the use of anything?" +</P> + +<P> +What's the use of working and trying when the thing you want most to do +you can't do. What's the use of longing when the thing you crave most +can never again be given to you? What's the use of feeling big, +eternal, divine, when you know that every day is dwarfed by your +limitations, every friendship marred by your helplessness, every dream +blurred by your ignorance? The sweetest things in life, Cynthia's son +told himself with all the bitterness of youth, were memories and hopes. +Memories of happy moments, hours perhaps, memories of perfect days and +hopes of new days, new friends, new skies. +</P> + +<P> +To-day all hope seemed dead, gone from the hillsides with the summer +flowers. And the world was a sad and a lonely place. Cynthia's son +had yet to learn that gray days are home days. That if it were not for +gray skies there would be no low roofs gleaming through tree tops, no +home fires glowing anywhere. Gray days are heart days, for it is then +that the heart hungers for sympathy, for kinship. It is then that men +draw together for comfort and cheer. +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son never felt quite so alone in the world before—the last +of his line. He was young and did not know what ailed him. So he lay +heartsick and puzzled on his hill top and wished he had some one all +his own to talk to. +</P> + +<P> +There are things you can whistle to a robin, whisper to a tree friend +or look into the heart of the sunset. There are problems you can argue +out with a neighbor or solve with the help of a friend. But the heart +has certain longings that you can share only with some one who is all +your own and very, very dear. +</P> + +<P> +It is hard to be the last of a line, Cynthia's son told himself +bitterly, and in his loneliness he turned over and hid his face on his +arm and let his homesick heart stray off across the seas to the land +that for so long had been home to him, the land that held the dead +hearts that had always robbed his gray days of all sadness. +</P> + +<P> +He craved the hot sunshine, the brittle blue skies, the crowded little +lanes full of filth and feet and eternal noise. Perhaps there in the +old home he might find eyes that held a bit of the great love he longed +for, a voice that had in it the hint of a caress, the note that would +give him new courage, new hope. +</P> + +<P> +No—he did not know what was the matter with him. All he knew was that +summer was dead and that he had no one in all the world he could call +his very own. He did not know that lying there he was really waiting +for a step and a voice, a step that would stir the leaves with a joyous +rustling, a voice that even on a gray day sounded gay and sunshiny. He +had always liked Nan Ainslee's voice. Lately he had begun to notice +other pleasant things about her. Last night, for instance, he had for +the first time seen her hair, the beauty of her creamy throat and had +really looked down into her laughing, wide eyes and forgotten all the +world for a second or two. And the hand she gave him when she said +good night was warm and full of a strange comfort. He had almost asked +her to stay a while after the others left and sit beside his fire in a +low chair and talk the party over with him. +</P> + +<P> +The world was so still it seemed as if it waited with him. And then it +came—that voice warm and gay. +</P> + +<P> +"Hello—you here again?" +</P> + +<P> +Then something about that head buried on that out-flung arm made her +laugh softly, oddly, and say, "Isn't this a delicious, restful, dozy +day? You'd better sit up and look at those shaggy gray clouds over +yonder. Or are you listening to the little winds sighing out +lullabies? I came here today to hear the world being hushed to sleep." +</P> + +<P> +He heard and his heart jumped queerly. But he didn't raise his head +until he was sure the homesick longing for some one all his own was +gone from his eyes. +</P> + +<P> +She had on a gray dress as soft as wood smoke. He caught flashes of +flame color beneath the gray and at her breast fluttered a knot of +scarlet silk. She looked like somebody's home fire, all fragrant smoke +and golden flame and ruddy coals. Her eyes held the dancing lights, +the visions and her voice had the tender warmth. She was the spirit of +the day and the sight of her comforted his soul and filled his heart +with content. +</P> + +<P> +"I think it is a sad day," he said, "and I have been desperately lonely +for India and my mother and father and all the little brothers and +sisters and playmates that I never had. The only playmates I ever had +were camels and missionaries and a few brown babies and two white hens." +</P> + +<P> +He had not meant to talk in this grieving, childish fashion. But +something about her brought his heart thoughts to his lips. And to-day +he found no pleasure in looking down on the village roofs where Joe +Tumley lay sick and miserable and Mary, his wife, wept and men and +women talked and argued as he very well knew they were talking and +arguing. +</P> + +<P> +"What! No playmates? No boy friends—not even a dog?" Nan grieved +with him. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I had an Irish soldier's boy for two months once and a little +brown dog for a week. Mother was always afraid of disease." +</P> + +<P> +He could hardly believe that remembrance of these long-past things was +in him. Yet he was suddenly remembering many old, old matters and with +it came back the old, childish pain. +</P> + +<P> +She sat down on the oak stump quite near him and there was more than +pity in her eyes, only he did not see. +</P> + +<P> +"Why," she advised gently, "you must have a dog at once. I can give +you a wonderful collie and then on gray days you can bring him up here +to your hill top or go tramping through woods and ravines with him. A +dog is the finest kind of company for a gray day. And there is your +attic. Why, I always spend hours in my attic these still, gentle days. +I go up there to read old letters and look over old boxes full of queer +keepsakes. I sit in a three-legged chair and sometimes, if I find an +old coverless book and if the rain begins to drum softly on the +shingles, I go to sleep on an ancient sagging sofa and dream great +dreams. Haven't you ransacked that attic of yours yet?" she wanted to +know. +</P> + +<P> +"No. And the housekeeper insists on my doing it soon. Says that if +I'm going to give Jimmy Trumbull that party I promised him I'd better +have the barn and the attic all fixed up for it, because the boys +wouldn't have any fun in the house and the house wouldn't stand it any +better." +</P> + +<P> +And then because neither one of them could think of anything else to +say they were perfectly still there on the hill top. There seemed to +be no need for speech. Nanny looked down at the little town and +Cynthia's son lay contentedly at her feet, looking at her and rustling +the dead leaves with an idle hand. +</P> + +<P> +It might have become dangerous, that contented silence. For Nan at +least was thinking. She was thinking how often she came to the hill +top to visit with this man at her feet and how seldom he came to her +door to visit with her. When he came it was not to see her but her +father, her brother. With a sick shame Nanny thought how the sight of +him, the sound of his voice, the very mention of his name made her +heart fill with warm gladness. She loved him and he had no need of +love—her love. She who had turned men away, men who were— +</P> + +<P> +She rose suddenly. There was a kind of terror in her eyes and she +locked her hands together to warm them, for they had suddenly grown icy +cold. +</P> + +<P> +"I must go," she murmured in real distress. +</P> + +<P> +But he just looked up and put out his hand. And she sat down again and +let her hand rest in his. And half her joy was pure misery. For she +did not understand the ways of this strange, boyish man and she did not +know what the end of such a friendship could be. +</P> + +<P> +When those first angry drops pattered down on the leaves Nanny started +up in alarm and would have raced for home. But he caught her quickly, +slipped her cloak on, and before she had time to protest, they were +running hand in hand down the hillside. Just as the full fury of the +storm struck the house they banged the front door shut and stood +panting and laughing in the hall. +</P> + +<P> +It was very pleasant to sit by his fire and let the storm and the ruddy +flames do the talking. But even as she sat and dreamed Nanny knew it +would never do. Green Valley knew and loved her but that would not +save her. So Nanny walked to the telephone and called up the one soul +it was always safe to tell things to. And twenty minutes later Grandma +Wentworth arrived. +</P> + +<P> +It was while they sat talking in cozy comfort before the snapping fire +that Cynthia's son suggested the attic. +</P> + +<P> +"Mother told me once never to rummage through her old trunks unless +Mary Wentworth was by to explain. So come along." +</P> + +<P> +Grandma looked a little startled at that. +</P> + +<P> +"We'll go," she said. "It's the finest kind of a day to go messing in +an attic. But I'll step into the kitchen first and borrow two all-over +aprons. My dress isn't new but Nan's is." +</P> + +<P> +The old Churchill homestead was built in the days when folks believed +reverently in attics. Not little cubby-holes under the roof but in +generous, well-lighted, nicely-floored affairs that less reverent +generations have turned into smoking dens, studios and ballrooms. +</P> + +<P> +A properly kept attic in the olden days was no dark, musty-smelling, +cobwebby affair. It was as neat in its way as the parlor and a hundred +times more interesting. The parlor was a stiff room with stiff +furniture and stiff family portraits. The attic was a big, natural +room filled with mellow light, a vague hush and memories—memories of +lost days, lost dreams, lost youth with its joys and hopes and sorrows. +</P> + +<P> +People instinctively speak softly and reverently in an old-fashioned +attic. Much of the irreverence of the young generation is due to the +fact that men have stopped building the wide, deep fireplaces of old +and the old-fashioned style of attic. When you take the family +hearthstone and the prayer and memory closet out of a home you must +expect irreverence. +</P> + +<P> +There were plenty of wonderful attics in Green Valley, but not many +were so crowded with colorful riches as the attic which Cynthia's son +owned. When Cynthia was a girl that attic was generously stored. +Cynthia's mother made her pilgrimages to it and added to its wealth of +memories. Before Cynthia herself sailed away to far-off India she +carried armfuls of her own heart treasures up there. One gray day, +twenty gray days, could not exhaust this Green Valley attic. +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son, being a man, went up heedlessly, even a little noisily, +for attics were to him a new thing. Nan went breathlessly, her heart +thumping with delight. She guessed that much joy and beauty and wonder +lay stored in that great room. Grandma went up slowly and a little +tremblingly. She remembered that the very last time she had climbed +those attic stairs Cynthia had been with her. Their arms had been full +of treasure and their eyes had been full of tears. +</P> + +<P> +The three now had no sooner reached the last step than the attic laid +its mystic hush upon them. They stood still and looked about, each +somehow waiting for one of the others to speak. It was Grandma who +broke the silence softly: +</P> + +<P> +"You had some of the old furniture moved there in the corner but the +rest is just as it was forty years ago—when I was here last." +</P> + +<P> +Grandma knew the history of pretty near everything in sight and they +followed her about, looking and listening. Somehow there was at first +no desire to touch and handle things. But soon the strange charm of an +old attic stole over them and they began to look more closely at +things, to exclaim over weird relics, to touch old books and quaint +garments. Then as the wonders multiplied and the rain drummed steadily +on the roof, time and the world without was forgotten and the three +became absorbed in the past. +</P> + +<P> +When first she had looked about her Grandma's eyes had searched for a +certain trunk, and when at last she spied it something like an old +grief clouded her eyes. But as she peered about and began pulling +things out to the light she forgot the trunk with the brass nailheads. +She laughed when she came across the crinoline hoops and the droll +little velvet bonnets. +</P> + +<P> +"Here are your great-grandmother's crinolines, John. My! The times we +girls had playing with these things, for even in our day they were +old-fashioned. And this little velvet hat I remember Cynthia wore once +to an old-time social and took a prize." +</P> + +<P> +Over in another corner Nan was making discoveries. +</P> + +<P> +"My conscience—look at this!" she suddenly cried. "Here's an etching, +a genuine etching, a beautiful thing and all covered with dust. Why, +the one I bought for a hundred and fifty dollars in Holland last year +isn't half as good. Why, whoever had it put up here?" +</P> + +<P> +From the other side of the huge room Cynthia's son wanted to know if an +old grandfather's clock couldn't be mended. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, it must be as old as the hills. It has a copy of Franklin's Poor +Richard's Almanac pasted on the back. It—why, it's an heirloom and +I'm going to get it patched up." +</P> + +<P> +"That clock used to tick in the up-stairs hall forty years ago—I +remember—" Grandma stopped as if a sudden thought had struck her. +She dropped an old faded lamp mat and a rag rug and came over to look +at the face of what had been an old friend. Many and many a time its +mellow booming of the hours had cut short a lengthy, merry conference +in Cynthia's room and sent her scurrying home to her waiting tasks. +</P> + +<P> +"John," whispered Grandma with sudden intuition, "I don't believe +there's anything the matter with that clock. It was stopped—they said +your grandfather stopped it after your mother left for India. I used +to watch him wind it—here, let me at it. Yes," triumphantly, "here's +the key." +</P> + +<P> +Grandma's hands shook noticeably and her lips trembled as she wound it. +And when it began to whir and then settled down to its clear even tick +Grandma just sat down and cried a bit. +</P> + +<P> +"I can't help it," she explained as she wiped her eyes, "that clock +knows me as well as I know its face. Why, many a time Cynthia and I'd +sit right where we could look at it—while we were telling each other +foolish little happenings—so's we wouldn't talk too long." +</P> + +<P> +Grandma went back to where she had left that faded lamp mat but she +knew what was about to happen in that attic that day. She picked up +one thing after another but she no longer saw what it was her hands +were holding. For above the steady patter of the rain she could hear +the old clock ticking. And to her, knowing what she did, it seemed to +say: +</P> + +<P> +"Tell him—tell—him—Cynthia wants you to tell him." +</P> + +<P> +So she just sat down in an old chair and waited for Cynthia's son to +find that square trunk with the brass nail-heads. She tried to read +something in some faded yellow fashion papers but the letters jumped +and blurred. And she was glad to hear the boy's shout of discovery. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, here's that trunk mother must have meant! Come over here, +Grandma, and look at it." +</P> + +<P> +She went and sat down and was so quiet that Nanny, who had been looking +up from the pictures she was dusting, laid them down and came over to +watch too. Something about Grandma's drooping head and folded hands +must have touched the boy, for as he turned the key in the lock he +looked up and asked a question. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you know what's in it, Grandma?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," she nodded, "I know what's in it because I helped fill it. Open +it carefully." +</P> + +<P> +So the boy raised the lid slowly. Very carefully he removed the old +newspapers, then the soft linen sheet and took out a flat bundle that +lay on top, all snugly pinned up. Nan helped take out the pins, then +gave a smothered cry at the lovely wedding gown of stiff creamy satin. +</P> + +<P> +In silence the other things were brought out. The lacy bridal veil, +the little buckled slippers, the full, filmy petticoats and all the +soft white ribbony things that it is the right of every bride to have. +Down at the very bottom of the trunk were bundles of letters, some +faded photographs and a little jewel box in which was a little silver +forget-me-not ring. +</P> + +<P> +Grandma put out her hand for the faded photographs, stared at them, +then passed one to Cynthia's son. +</P> + +<P> +"Look closely and see if you can guess who it is?" +</P> + +<P> +He took it to a window and looked long at the pictured face but finally +shook his head. +</P> + +<P> +"Give it to Nan," directed Grandma. +</P> + +<P> +Nan looked only a second. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, it's Uncle Roger Allan!" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—it's Roger Allan." +</P> + +<P> +"But what has—" began Cynthia's son, when Grandma interrupted him. +</P> + +<P> +"You'd better both sit down to hear this," she suggested. "Of course, +I knew, John, the very first week you were home, that your mother never +told you about this trunk. I can see why and I agree with her. In the +first place it all happened nearly forty years ago. Then she couldn't +be sure that the trunk was still here. It wasn't altogether her story +to tell. She knew you were coming home to Green Valley and she didn't +want to prejudice you in any way. She knew that if you learned to know +Green Valley folks first you'd understand everything better when you +did find out. I'm glad to have the telling of it. I'm glad to do her +that service and, after all, it's my story as much as hers. +</P> + +<P> +"We were great friends—Cynthia and I—dearer than sisters and +inseparable. Our friendship began in pinafore days. We weren't the +least bit alike in a worldly way. Cynthia was pretty—oh, ever so +pretty—and rich. I was what everybody calls a very sensible girl, +respectable but poor. But what we looked like or what we had never +bothered us. In those days the town was smaller and playmates were +scarcer. When we boys and girls wanted any real interesting games we +had to get together. +</P> + +<P> +"The two boys at our end of town who were the nicest were Roger Allan +and Dick Wentworth. They did everything together, same as Cynthia and +I. It was natural, I suppose, that we four should sort of grow up +together, and that having grown up we should pair off—Cynthia and +Roger, Dick and I. +</P> + +<P> +"We went through all the stages until we got to the forget-me-not rings +and our wedding dresses. The boys were very happy the day they put +those rings on our fingers and we were—oh, so proud! It hurts to this +day to remember. I think Cynthia and I were about the happiest girls +life ever smiled at. Only one thing troubled us. +</P> + +<P> +"In those days Cynthia's father owned the hotel. That meant then +mostly a barroom. Of course, he himself was never seen there unless +there were special guests staying over night. It was a lively place, +almost the only really lively place in town. I suppose men had more +time then and prohibition was something even the most worried and +heartbroken drunkard's wife smiled about unbelievingly. Men had always +had their liquor and of course they always would. Women's business was +to cry a bit, pray a great deal and be patient. As I said, all men +drank in those days and the woman didn't live that hadn't or didn't +expect to see her father, sweetheart, husband or son drunk sometime. +We all hoped we wouldn't but we all dreaded it. We heard tell of a man +somewhere near Elmwood who never drank a drop but he didn't seem real. +Our mothers, I expect, got to feel that drunkenness was God's will and +the drink habit the same as smallpox or yellow fever. It was sent to +be endured. We all felt that there was something wrong somewhere and a +terrible injustice put on us but we didn't know what to do about it and +so we all tried to learn to be cheerful and like our men in spite of +their shortcomings. +</P> + +<P> +"But one woman in this town was an out-and-out prohibitionist. She was +Cynthia's mother. She came from some odd sort of a settlement in the +East and Cynthia's father used to laugh and say he stole her. And I +think he did. She was so lovely and sweet and had such strange notions +of right and wrong. But for all her sweetness she was firm. And she +set her face sternly and publicly against drink. It was the only +thing, people said, about which Joshua Churchill and his wife Abby ever +disagreed. Though she didn't convince him still she went to her grave +without ever seeing her husband drunk. +</P> + +<P> +"And her girl, Cynthia, swore that she would do the same. For Cynthy +was just like her mother and as full of strange notions of right. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, it was bound to happen. The wonder of it is it didn't happen +before. I think I always knew that Dick and Roger drank a little +sometimes with the other boys. But Cynthia never thought about it, I +guess. She was an only child and guarded from everything and she +supposed every man was like her father. And, anyhow, she was too happy +to think of trouble. Dick and Roger were considered two of the best +boys in town. There were stories now and then of Roger's mad doings +but they never got to Cynthia, and if they had she would have just +laughed, I expect, so sure was she that her boy was all she thought him. +</P> + +<P> +"I was to be married one week and Cynthy the next. We had our wedding +things ready. And my wedding day came. Cynthy was bridesmaid and +Roger was best man and everything went off beautifully until the dance +in the evening. Dick and I were too poor to take a wedding trip so we +had a dance instead. +</P> + +<P> +"And then came the tragedy. Some of the older men did it. They didn't +stop to think. But they meant no real harm. In those days it was +considered funny to get another man drunk. But they didn't know +Cynthia's strange heart. They brought drink, more than was at all +necessary and—and—all I remember of my wedding night is standing in +the moonlight, holding on to Cynthia and crying miserably. I knew it +would come sometime but I never dreamed it would come to hurt me then. +</P> + +<P> +"But Cynthy didn't cry. She never said a word—only her whole little +body seemed turned to ice. She smiled and helped us to get through +with things as best we could but the smiles slipped like dull beads +from her lips instead of rippling like waves of sunshine over her face. +</P> + +<P> +"I had been crying for myself, over my boy, but when I saw how Cynthy +took her trouble I saw that she was hurt far worse than I. But I never +dreamed that things could not be mended, that she would take back her +wedding day. But that's what she did. +</P> + +<P> +"She refused to see Roger. Her father pleaded with her, even her +mother begged her to think; the wedding was all planned, everything +prepared; relatives from a distance had already started. But Cynthia +never stopped smiling and shaking her head. Roger was frantic and +begged me to come with him, to make her listen. I went and Dick went +with me. +</P> + +<P> +"When Cynthy saw me she let us in. Her father and mother and two aunts +came in when they heard us. In the midst of these people Roger and +Cynthy stood looking at each other with death in their eyes. They +didn't seem to know anybody was there. +</P> + +<P> +"'Cynthy—I love you—I love you,' Roger begged. +</P> + +<P> +"'I know, Dear Boy, I know!' she cried back to him. +</P> + +<P> +"'Forgive—my God, Cynthy, forgive.' +</P> + +<P> +"'I do.' +</P> + +<P> +"'Marry me.' +</P> + +<P> +"'Oh, I want to—oh, I want to marry you,' sobbed poor Cynthy. +</P> + +<P> +"'Then marry me. I'm not good enough—but I know no other man who is.' +</P> + +<P> +"'Oh—Roger—Roger—you are good enough for me—you are good enough for +<I>me</I>. But you are not good enough for my children. You are not good +enough to be the father of my son.' +</P> + +<P> +"I think we all knew then that it was useless. There was no answer and +we were too startled to say anything. Roger grew white and the +strength seemed to leave his body. His eyes filled with horror and +fright. +</P> + +<P> +"'Cynthy, sweetheart—' he moaned and she flew to comfort him. She let +him hold her and kiss her. Then she drew his head down and kissed his +hair, his eyes, his lips. She laid his hands against her cold white +cheeks, then crushed them to her lips and fled. +</P> + +<P> +"Roger never saw her again. +</P> + +<P> +"She went away and was gone a long time. I got letters every now and +then from out-of-the-way places. +</P> + +<P> +"For five years I was happy. It was hard to live without Cynthy. But +Roger had left town and Dick was good to me. I knew that the shock of +Roger's tragedy had kept him from touching anything those five years. +But as time passed and memories faded I grew afraid once more. Dick +was no drinking man but everybody drank a little then, even the women. +Men joked about it and the women, poor souls, tried to. Well—just +five years almost to a day they brought him home to me—dead. He had +had a few drinks—the first since our marriage. He was driving an ugly +horse—and it happened. +</P> + +<P> +"Some way Cynthia heard and she came home to comfort me. I think that +when she stood with me beside Dick's grave she was glad she had done +what she had done and felt a kind of peace. Roger was still gone but +it would not have mattered. It was then that we carried these wedding +things up here and locked them in this old square trunk with the brass +nail-heads. And we thought that life for us both was over. +</P> + +<P> +"Cynthy's father was glad to have her home. He sold the hotel and +never went near it. He tried in every way to make up to Cynthy and his +wife. For Cynthy's mother grieved about it all long after Cynthy had +learned to smile again. And that nearly killed Cynthy's father. Some +folks claimed it really did worry Mrs. Churchill to death, for she died +the spring after Dick was buried. +</P> + +<P> +"After that Cynthia took her father traveling, for he was very nearly +heartbroken over his wife's death. It was somewhere in England that +they met your father, John. Of course, I can understand how a man like +your father must have loved Cynthy on sight. But she never could +understand it. She thought she was all through with love. She wrote +and told me how she had explained all about Roger and how he had said +it made him love her all the more. She tried to fight him but strong +men are hard to deny. He had a hard time of it, I imagine, but he won +her at last and took her away to India. She wrote me when you were +born and for some years after, but toward the end, when she was sick so +much, I think my letters made her homesick. +</P> + +<P> +"Roger came back. His stepsister got into trouble and died, leaving +little David. Roger took him and raised him in memory of the son he +knew he might have had. When he found Cynthia was married he had that +stone put in the cemetery. He explained the idea to me. +</P> + +<P> +"'The girl, Cynthia, was mine and I killed her. She is dead and it is +to the memory of her sweetness that I have erected that stone. The +woman, Cynthia, is another man's wife.' +</P> + +<P> +"So that, then, is the history of that trunk. The thing, John, that is +killing little Jim Tumley is the thing that worried your grandmother to +death, nearly broke your mother's heart and certainly embittered her +youth, that sent your grandfather into exile and made a widow of me. +It robbed Roger Allan of the only woman he could love. +</P> + +<P> +"Since that day a great many of us have learned to fight it. And there +are now any number of men in Green Valley who are opposed to it and who +even vote the prohibition ticket. But Green Valley is still far from +understanding that until the weakest among us is protected none of us +are safe. +</P> + +<P> +"Some day perhaps the women will cease worrying. But before that day +comes many here will pay the price. And it is usually the innocent who +pay. Now let's put these memories back before they tucker me out +completely." +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son stood spellbound. He stared at the faded pictures and +the little silver ring. Nan was pinning up the wedding dress and +weeping openly and unashamed. It was the sight of her quiet tears that +brought him back to earth. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—Nan—don't. Don't grieve about this evil thing. We're going to +fight it and fight it hard. We shall save Jim Tumley yet and purify +Green Valley." +</P> + +<P> +When Nan got back home she went up to her room and looked down to where +Cynthia Churchill's old home glowed among its autumn-tattered trees. +</P> + +<P> +"What a woman! What a mother! And he is her son!" +</P> + +<P> +She stood a long time at her window, then turned away with a little +sigh. +</P> + +<P> +"I am not made of heroic stuff. But I shall see to it that my son need +never be ashamed of his mother. If one woman could fight love so can +another." +</P> + +<P> +When Grandma was taking off her rubbers in her little storm-shed she +smiled and fretted: +</P> + +<P> +"Dear me, Cynthy, that boy of yours is as innocent right now as you +were in the olden days. He—why, he just doesn't know anything!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap20"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XX +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHRISTMAS BELLS +</H3> + + +<P> +After the last bit of glory has faded from the autumn woods and the +first snowfall comes to cover the tired fields, Green Valley, all +snugly housed and winter proof, settles down to solid comfort and +careful preparation for the two great winter festivals—Thanksgiving +and Christmas. +</P> + +<P> +The question of whether the Thanksgiving dinner is to be eaten at home +or whether "we're going away for Thanksgiving" has in all probability +been settled long ago. For in Green Valley Thanksgiving invitations +begin to be exchanged and sent out to distant parts as early as July. +That is, of course, if the matter of who's to go where had not already +been settled the Thanksgiving before. In some families the last rite +of each Thanksgiving feast is to discuss this question and settle it +then and there for the following year. Conservative and clannish +families who live far enough apart so that little quarrels can not be +born among them to upset this fixed yearly programme usually do this. +</P> + +<P> +The greater part of Green Valley however leaves itself absolutely free +until some time in August. By that time though, the heat is so intense +that stout, collarless men in shirt sleeves, in searching about for +some relief, think gratefully of Thanksgiving and snowdrifts and ask +their wives whom they are planning to have for Thanksgiving. +</P> + +<P> +"Why," may be the answer, "I hadn't thought of it yet. But I rather +think Aunt Eleanor expects us this year." +</P> + +<P> +"Well," answers the husband, "all right. Only if you decide to go, +don't forget to take along some of your own pumpkin pies. Your Aunt +Eleanor's never quite suit me. I like considerable ginger in my +pumpkin pies." +</P> + +<P> +Another husband may say, "No, sir! Not on your life are we going to +Jim's for Thanksgiving. That wife of his is much too young to know how +to make just the right kind of turkey dressing. And I'm too old to +take chances on things like that now. Those pretty brides are apt to +get so excited over their lace table doilies that they forget to put in +the sage or onions and there you are—one whole Thanksgiving Day and a +turkey spoiled forever. No, sir—count me out!" +</P> + +<P> +Sometimes wives say, "We've been invited to three places, Jemmy, but +let's stay home. When we go out I always get white meat and I hate it. +And I like my cranberries hulls and all instead of just jell." +</P> + +<P> +It is just such little human likes and notions that finally decide the +matter. And so it was this year. +</P> + +<P> +Sam Bobbins' eldest sister was having Sam and his wife "because Sam's +spent so much money for his fighting roosters that he ain't got money +for a Thanksgiving turkey." +</P> + +<P> +Dolly Beatty's mother was having Charlie Peters for Thanksgiving dinner +and all the immediate relatives to pass judgment on him. He had +proposed and Dolly had accepted but no announcement was to be made +until all the Beattys and Dundrys had had their say. +</P> + +<P> +Frank Burton and Jenny were going by train to Jennie's rich and haughty +and painfully religious aunt in Cedar Point. All Jennie's sisters, +even the one from Vermont, were to be there and Jennie did want to go +to visit with the girls. She and Frank had never been invited to any +semi-religious festival by this aunt, owing to Frank's atheistic +tendencies. +</P> + +<P> +But the haughty and religious dame had heard rumors and was curious. +</P> + +<P> +"I'll go for your sake, Jennie. But she'll be disappointed. Maybe I'd +better shave my mustache so's to let her see some change in me." +</P> + +<P> +Of course everybody who had a grandmother in the country was going to +grandma's and early Thanksgiving morning teams were arriving for the +various batches of grandchildren. +</P> + +<P> +That was the only fault one could find with a Green Valley +Thanksgiving—that so many went away to spend the day. +</P> + +<P> +But with Christmas it was different. Christmas in Green Valley was a +home day. The town was full of visitors and sleigh bells and merry +calls and walking couples. Everybody was waving Christmas presents or +wearing them. For Green Valley believed in Christmas presents. Not +the kind that make people he awake nights hating Christmas and that +call for "do your shopping early" signs. But the old-fashioned kind of +presents that are not stained with hate or worry or debt. +</P> + +<P> +The giving of Christmas presents was the pleasantest kind of a game in +Green Valley. Of course everybody knew everybody's needs so well that +weeks before the gifts, wrapped in tissue paper, lay waiting in a trunk +up in the attic. And as a general thing everybody was happy over what +they got. No present cost much money but oh, what a world of thought +and love and fun went into it. Nor was it hard for Green Valley folks +to decide what to give. +</P> + +<P> +When Dell Parsons saw her dearest friend admiring her asparagus fern +she divided it in the fall and tended it carefully and sent it to Nan +Turner on Christmas morning. +</P> + +<P> +When folks found out that some time next spring Alice Sears might have +a baby to dress they sent her ever so many lovely, soft little things +so she would not have to worry or grieve because her first baby could +not have its share of pretties. +</P> + +<P> +As soon as Green Valley knew that Jocelyn Brownlee was engaged it sent +her a tried and true poor-man's-wife cookbook, big gingham aprons, +holders to keep her from burning her hands and samples of their best +jellies, pickles and preserves. +</P> + +<P> +And such a time as Green Valley grandmothers had weaving, knitting and +crocheting beautiful rag rugs to match blue and white bathrooms, yellow +and green kitchens, pink and cream bedrooms. And every year there was +a large crop of home knitted mittens that Green Valley girls and boys +wore with pride and comfort. No city pair of gloves ever equaled +grandma's knitted ones that went very nearly to the elbow and were the +only thing for skating and coasting. +</P> + +<P> +Christmas was the time too when dreams came true. Fanny Foster knew +this when Christmas morning she opened a parcel and found a beautiful +silk petticoat. No card came with it but Fanny knew. +</P> + +<P> +Hen Tomlins had a baby boy for his best Christmas gift. Agnes had +always opposed all talk of adopting a baby, but this year that was her +gift to Hen. And they were all happy about it. +</P> + +<P> +Of course, even in Green Valley a certain amount of foolishness +prevailed. Everybody smiled when a week before Christmas Jessie +Williams said she had all her presents ready but Arthur's; that she was +waiting for the next pay day to get his; that she believed she'd get +him a new pink silk lamp shade but she knew beforehand he wouldn't be +pleased and would only say that he wished to heaven she'd let him have +the money. +</P> + +<P> +Lutie Barlow was badly disappointed with the hundred and fifty dollar +victrola her husband bought her. She said she wanted a red cow to +match her Rhode Island Reds. +</P> + +<P> +Perhaps no one in Green Valley was so generously remembered as the +young minister. But though every one of the many gifts that came +pleased him he was strangely unhappy and restless. Invitations as +usual had poured in on him but he had chosen to spend the day with +Grandma Wentworth. And yet, though he was glad to be with her, his +thoughts strayed off to a certain gray day in the fall when he ran down +a hill with a girl's hand in his. He remembered the surge of joy that +had rushed through him when he got her safely into his storm-proof +house and banged shut the door on the stormy world without. +</P> + +<P> +He thought of the hour they spent in silence before the fire that +roared exultantly as the storm tore with angry fingers at the doors and +windows. That, he now felt, was the most perfect hour of his life. +</P> + +<P> +His mind was struggling to understand these memories, these strange new +emotions. He had a queer feeling that something wonderful was waiting +just outside his reach, something was waiting for his recognition. +</P> + +<P> +He was standing in Grandma Wentworth's dining room, looking out the +window at the winter landscape. Grandma was in the kitchen seeing to +the dinner, for she was to have quite a party—Roger and David, Mrs. +Brownlee and Jocelyn, Cynthia's son and his man Timothy. +</P> + +<P> +Idly Cynthia's son watched the rest of the party coming through the +little path that led to Grandma's door. He saw them all plainly +through the curtains and plants that screened him. Jocelyn and David +came last. David made a great to-do about stamping the snow off his +feet, taking pains to stand between Jocelyn and the door. Then, just +as Jocelyn was about to slip past him, the minister saw David reach out +and sweep the girl into his arms. And Cynthia's son could not help but +see the glory in the boy's eyes as the girl's wild-rose face turned up +to meet her lover's kiss. +</P> + +<P> +For blind seconds John Roger Churchill Knight crashed through space. +And then the next minute he was living in a shining world that was all +roses and skylarks and dew. He laughed, for all at once he knew what +ailed him; he knew that the wonderful, tantalizing something that had +so steadily eluded him, tormented him was—just Nan, the girl of the +gray day, the log fire and the storm. +</P> + +<P> +He was the maddest, gladdest man in all Green Valley that day until he +remembered that he had sent Nan no gift, not even a greeting or a word +of thanks for the beautiful collie dog she had sent him. He stood in +horrified amazement at his stupidity. Jocelyn had been showing them +her new ring. And Nan, his sweetheart, had not even a Christmas card. +</P> + +<P> +Cynthia's son went to the telephone but even as he raised the receiver +he somehow guessed what the answer would be. +</P> + +<P> +Nan's father answered. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, John, she left on that 1:10 for Scranton, Pennsylvania. It's the +first fool thing I have ever known her to do. Stayed right here till +she'd given us our Christmas gifts and dinner and then off she went to +see this old aunt in Scranton. Why, yes—you can send a telegram. +She'll get it when she arrives." +</P> + +<P> +So it happened that when a tired, homesick, wretched girl reached her +aunt's house in Scranton, Pennsylvania, she found the one gift for +which her heart had cried all that long, long Christmas day. It was +just a bit of yellow paper that said: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + "oh gray day girl don't stay too long the<BR> + fire is singing your chair is waiting and I have<BR> + so much to tell you come home and forgive."<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap21"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FANNY'S HOUR +</H3> + + +<P> +Nobody had asked Fanny to be a member of the Civic League but she was +its most energetic promoter, its most zealous advocate. Never had she +had such a cold weather opportunity. +</P> + +<P> +Fanny hated cold weather. It shut people up in houses, shut their +mouths, their purses, their laughter. It made life grim and rather +gray. Fanny loved sunshine and open sunny roads. She tried to do her +duty in winter as well as in summer but when the weather drops to ten +or twenty below the sunniest of natures is bound to feel it. +</P> + +<P> +But this winter Green Valley women were so stirred and roused that they +thought of other things beside the price of coal and sugar and yarn. +The short winter days fairly flew. The Civic League was young but +already it was laying out an ambitious spring programme. No mere man +was a member but all the men had to do was to show a little attention +to Fanny Foster to know what was going on. +</P> + +<P> +"We're going to set up a drinking fountain in the business square," +Fanny explained. "The men of this town have the hotel but the horses +never did have a decent trough of clean water. And we're going to have +a little low place fixed so's the dogs can get a drink too. This is to +prevent hydrophobia. +</P> + +<P> +"We've already started the boys to building bird houses so's to have +them ready to put up the first thing in the spring. There'll be less +killing of song birds with sling-shots, though of course there's never +been much of that done in Green Valley. +</P> + +<P> +"Then that crossing at West End is going to be attended to. There's +been enough rubbers lost in that mudhole to about fill it, so it won't +take much to fill it up. We're going to have a little bridge built +over that ditch on Lane Avenue so's we women don't dislocate our joints +jumping over it. But first the ditch is going to be deepened and +cleaned so's it won't smell so unhealthy. When that's done the ladies +aim to plant wild flowers along it, careless like, to make it look as +if God had made it instead of lazy men. +</P> + +<P> +"We're going to suggest that all buildings in the business section put +out window boxes. We'll furnish the flowers. It will give a +distinctive note of beauty to the town." Fanny was carefully quoting +Mrs. Brownlee. +</P> + +<P> +"Billy Evans' wife promised to see to it that Billy painted the livery +barn and there's a delegation of ladies appointed to wait on Mert +Hagley and see if we can't get him to mend his sheds. They're so +lopsided and rickety that Mrs. Brownlee says they're an eyesore and a +menace to public safety. +</P> + +<P> +"There's another delegation that's going to ask the saloon keeper to +keep the basement door shut when the trains come in so's to keep that +beery and whisky smell out of the streets as much as possible while +maybe visitors are walking about. +</P> + +<P> +"We're going to send a special committee to see what the railroad will +do about fixing up this old station or, better still, giving us a new +one and beautifying its grounds. +</P> + +<P> +"We're planning to see Colonel Stratton about starting up a club for +the preservation of our wild flowers and Doc Philipps is to have charge +of a fight on the moths and things that are eating and killing our +fruit trees. +</P> + +<P> +"The school buildings will be investigated and conditions noted. Doc +Philipps says that if the heating plant and ventilation and light was +tended to we wouldn't have so much sickness among the children or so +many needing glasses. +</P> + +<P> +"As soon as spring really comes the Woman's Civic League is going to +start up a clean-up campaign. Of course, Green Valley never was a +dirty town. Everybody likes to have their yard nice but there's +considerable old faded newspaper and rusty tin cans lying along the +roads farther out and in unnoticed corners that nobody's felt +responsible for. That will all be attended to. We'll have no filth, +no germs, no ugliness anywhere, Mrs. Brownlee says. +</P> + +<P> +"And I've been appointed a committee of one to wait on Seth Curtis and +call his attention to the careless way he leaves his horses standing +about the town. Those horses are dangerous and getting uglier in +temper every day. And Seth is just as bad." +</P> + +<P> +This was only too true. Seth had grown bitter and even reckless of +late. Ever since his quarrel with Ruth about Jim Tumley Seth had been +boiling with temper. Old poisons that had spoiled his life in many +ways and that he thought he had conquered crept back to tyrannize over +him. Poor Seth had had so much discipline in his youth that the least +hint of pressure threw him into a state of vicious rebellion. Seth had +a fine mind, could think quicker and straighter to the point than a +good many Green Valley men. But when that mind was clouded with anger +and stubbornness Seth was a hopeless proposition. Ruth was his one +star and even she, Seth felt, had set herself against him. +</P> + +<P> +So Seth, who seldom had frequented the hotel, was there almost every +day now when he should have been working. He even drank more than +before. Not that he cared more for it but it was his way of showing +independence. +</P> + +<P> +So Seth was very ugly these days and his horses suffered as they had +never suffered before. They too were growing ugly and vicious and so +nervous that the least noise, the least stir, sent them into a +quivering frenzy of fright. +</P> + +<P> +Every one in Green Valley knew this and not a few men and women were +worrying. Several men were making up their minds to speak sharply to +Seth about it. But everybody smiled and even felt relieved when they +heard that Fanny had offered her services to the Civic League in this +capacity. Green Valley knew Seth and knew Fanny Foster. Fanny would +most certainly tell Seth about it. And everybody knew just how mad +Seth would get. Fanny would not of course accomplish much. But she +would open up the subject, suffer the first violence of Seth's anger +and so make it easier for some more competent person to take Seth to +task and force him to be reasonable. +</P> + +<P> +The minister had spoken to Seth long ago but though Seth listened +quietly to the quiet words of the one man he had come to love in his +queer fashion, he had set his jaw grimly at the end and said, "No, sir! +I've made up my mind not to stand this interference with my personal +liberty and God Himself can't budge me!" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, He can, Seth. But don't let it go that far," Cynthia's son had +begged. +</P> + +<P> +Now all Green Valley was waiting to see Fanny tackle Seth in the name +of the Civic League. It would be funny, everybody said. +</P> + +<P> +Fanny did it one sunny afternoon in early spring when the streets were +gay with folks all out to taste the first bit of gladness in the air. +Fanny did it in her usual lengthy and thorough manner and permitted no +interruptions. She was talking for the first time in her life with +authority vested in her by a civic body. So there was a strength and a +conscientiousness about her remarks that struck home. +</P> + +<P> +Seth was standing alone on the hotel steps when Fanny began talking but +all of Green Valley that was abroad was gathered laughingly about her +when she finished and stood waiting for Seth's answer. +</P> + +<P> +Seth had had a glass too much or he would never have done, never have +said what he did and said that day. He would never have taken poor, +harmless, laughter-loving, happy-go-lucky Fanny Foster, who had never +done a mean, malicious thing in her life, who had let her world use her +for all the little hateful tasks that nobody else would do and in which +there was no thanks or any glory,—Seth in his senses would never have +held up this dear though unfinished soul to the scorn, the pitiless +ridicule of her townsmen. +</P> + +<P> +If Fanny had been touched with fire and eloquence because she spoke +with authority, Seth too talked with a bitter brilliance that won the +crowd and held it against its will. With biting sarcasm and horrible +accuracy Seth drew a picture of Fanny as made Green Valley smile and +laugh before it could catch itself and realize the cruelty of its +laughter. +</P> + +<P> +Fanny stood at the foot of the wide flight of stairs like a criminal at +the bar. As Seth's words grew more biting, his judgments more cruel, +Fanny's face flushed with shame, then faded white with pain. +</P> + +<P> +But Seth went too far. He went so far that he couldn't stop himself. +And the crowd who had gathered to hear a little harmless fun now stood +petrified and heartsick. No one stirred, though everybody was wishing +themselves miles away. And Seth's voice, dripping with cruelty, went +on. +</P> + +<P> +Then all at once from the heart of the crowd a little figure pushed its +way. It was Seth's wife, Ruth. She walked halfway up that flight of +stairs and looked steadily at her husband. Seth stopped in the middle +of a word. +</P> + +<P> +"Seth Curtis," Ruth's face was as white as Fanny's and her voice rang +out like a silver bell, "Seth Curtis, you will apologize, ask +forgiveness of Fanny Foster, who is my friend and an old schoolmate, or +before God and these people I will disown you as my husband and the +father of my children. Fanny Foster never had an apple or a goody in +her lunch in the old school days that she didn't share it with +somebody. She has never had a dollar or a joy that she hasn't divided. +No one in Green Valley ever had a pain or a sorrow that she did not +make it hers and try to help in some way. And in all the world there +can be no more willing hands than hers." +</P> + +<P> +The silver voice stopped, choked with sobs, and Ruth's eyes, looking +down on the shrunken, bowed figure of Green Valley's gossip, brimmed +over with tears. +</P> + +<P> +Seth, sober now, stared at his wife, at the broken, crushed Fanny, at +the crowd that stood waiting in still misery. +</P> + +<P> +Ruth walked down to Fanny and flung her arms about her. Fanny patted +her friend's shoulder softly and tried to comfort not herself but Ruth. +"There, there, Ruthie, don't, don't take on so. Remember, you're +nursing a baby and it might make him sick. It's all right, +everything's all right. Only," Fanny's voice was dull and colorless +and she never once raised her head, "only I wish John wouldn't hear of +this. I've been such a disappointment to John without—this." +</P> + +<P> +Though she spoke only to Ruth everybody heard. It was the first and +only favor Fanny Foster had ever asked of Green Valley. And Green +Valley, as it watched Ruth lead her away, swore that if possible John +should not hear. +</P> + +<P> +But John did hear three days later. And then the quiet man whose +patience had made people think him a fool let loose the stored-up +bitterness of years. He who in the beginning should and could have +saved his girl wife with love and firmness now judged and rejected her +with the terrible wrath, the cold merciless justice of a man slow to +anger or to judge. +</P> + +<P> +It was springtime and Grandma, sitting in her kitchen, heard and wept +for Fanny. The windows at the Foster house were open and John talked +for all the world to hear. His name had been dragged through the +gutter and he was past caring for appearances. Grandma writhed under +the words that were more cruel than a lash. At the end John Foster +swore that so long as he lived he would never speak to Fanny. And +Grandma shivered, for she knew John Foster. +</P> + +<P> +For days not even Grandma saw Fanny. Then she saw her washing windows, +scrubbing the porch steps, hanging up clothes. There came from the +Foster house the whir of a sewing machine, the fragrant smell of fresh +bread. The children came out with faces shining as the morning, hair +as smooth as silk, shoes polished. And Grandma knew that if John +Foster found a speck of dirt in his house he would have to look for it +with a microscope. But there was a kind of horror in the eyes of +Fanny's children. They didn't play any more or run away but of their +own accord stayed home to fetch and carry for the strange mother who +was now always there, who never sang, never spoke harshly to them, who +worked bitterly from morning till night. +</P> + +<P> +Every spring Fanny Foster used to flit through Green Valley streets +like a chattering blue-jay. But now nobody saw her, only now and then +at night, slinking along through the dark. And many a kindly heart +ached for her, remembering how Fanny loved the sunshine and laughter. +</P> + +<P> +But at last the spring grew too wonderful to resist. Even Fanny's numb +heart and flayed spirit was warmed with the golden heat. She had some +money that she wanted to deposit in the bank for John. For Fanny was +saving now as only Fanny knew how when she set her mind to it. And she +had set not only her mind but her very soul on making good. Every +cruel taunt had left a ghastly wound and only work of the hardest kind +could ease the hurt. +</P> + +<P> +Fanny walked through the streets as though she had just recovered from +a long illness. Everybody who saw her hurried out to greet her and +talk but she only smiled in a pitiful sort of way and hastened on. It +was nearly noon and she wanted to avoid the midday bustle and the +crowds of children. She had set out the children's dinner but she +hoped to get back before they reached home. +</P> + +<P> +She came out of the bank and stood on the bank steps. She looked down +the streets. Nobody was about and so against her will her eyes turned +to the spot where she had been so pitilessly pilloried a month before. +</P> + +<P> +As then, Seth's team was standing in front of the hotel. Little Billy +Evans was climbing into the big wagon. She watched the child in a kind +of stupor. She knew he ought not to do that. Seth's horses were not +safe for a grown-up, much less a child. She wondered where Seth was or +Billy Evans or Hank. She wondered if she'd better have them telephone +to Billy from the bank and have him get little Billy. She half turned +to do that and then out of the hotel door Jim Tumley came reeling and +singing. Only his voice was a maudlin screech. Little Billy had by +this time gotten into the wagon, pulled the whip from its socket, and +just as Jim came staggering up, touched the more nervous of the two +horses with it. And then it happened—what Green Valley had been +dreading for months. +</P> + +<P> +When men heard the commotion and turned to look they saw Seth's horses +tearing madly round the hotel corner. Little Billy Evans was rattling +around in the wagon box like a cork on the water and Fanny Foster, +swaying like a reed, was hanging desperately to the horses' heads. +</P> + +<P> +Hank Lolly was pitching hay into the barn loft. He saw, jumped and +then lay still with a broken leg. Seth saw and Billy Evans and scores +of other men, and they all ran madly to help. But the terrified +animals waited for no man. And then from the throats of the running +crowd a groan broke, for the school doors opened and into the spring +sunshine and the arms of certain death the little first and second +graders came dancing. +</P> + +<P> +The school building hid the danger from the children and they did not +comprehend the hoarse shouts of warning. But Fanny heard, heard the +childish laughter and the screams of horror. She knew those horses +must not turn that corner. Her feet swung against the shafts. Her +heel caught for a minute and she jerked with all her might. The mad +creatures swerved and dashed themselves and her against a telegraph +pole. +</P> + +<P> +When they picked up little Billy and Fanny they were both unconscious. +One of Billy's little arms was broken, so violently had he been flung +about and against the iron bars of the scat. Fanny's injuries were +more serious. +</P> + +<P> +They took her home to her spotless house with the children's dinner set +out on the red tablecloth in the kitchen. The pussy willows the +children had brought her the day before were in a vase in the center. +Her husband came home and spoke to her but she neither saw him nor +heard. They gave him a blood-stained bank book with his name on it. +</P> + +<P> +And so she lay for days and sometimes Doc Philipps thought she would +live and at other times he was sure she couldn't; but if she lived he +knew that she would never again flit like vagrant sunshine through +Green Valley streets. She would spend the rest of her days in a wheel +chair or on crutches. +</P> + +<P> +When they got courage finally to tell her, Fanny only smiled and said +nothing. But she ate less and smiled more and steadily grew weaker and +weaker and as steadily refused to see her husband. +</P> + +<P> +"No," she said quietly, "there's nothing I want to see John about and +there's nothing for him to see me about any more. I guess," she smiled +at the gruff old doctor, "you're about the only man I can stand the +sight of or who would put up with me." +</P> + +<P> +"Fanny," Doc Philipps told her, "if you don't buck up and get well, if +you die on my hands, it will be the first mean thing you ever did." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, well—it would be the last," laughed Fanny. +</P> + +<P> +"Fanny, don't you know that Seth Curtis and nearly all the town comes +here at least once a day? How do you suppose John and Seth and the +rest of us will feel if you just quit and go?" +</P> + +<P> +And then in bitterness of heart Fanny answered. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I'm tired of living, of being snubbed and made fun of. I'm past +caring how anybody else will feel. I tell you I'm a misfit. God never +took pains to finish me. I've been a miserable failure, no good to +anybody. My children will be better off without me. John said so." +</P> + +<P> +"My God!" groaned the old doctor, "did John say that?" He knew now +that no medicine that he could give, no skill of his would mend a heart +bruised like that. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—he said that—and a whole lot more. Said I've eternally +disgraced him and dragged him down and will land him in jail or the +poorhouse. And I guess maybe it's so. Only all the time he was +talking I kept thinking how he teased me to marry him. I really liked +Bud Willis over in Elmwood better, in a way, than I did John. And I +meant to marry Bud. He wasn't as good a boy as John, but he was so +jolly and we'd have had such a good time together that I'd never have +got mixed up in any mess like this. Maybe we would have ended in the +poorhouse but we'd have had a good time going, and I bet Bud and I +would have found something to laugh at even when we got there. Oh, I'm +glad it's over. Don't think I'm afraid to die. I kind of hate to +leave Robbie. Robbie's like me. And some day somebody'll tell him +what a fool he is—like they told me. I wish I could warn him or learn +him not to care. But, barring Robbie, I'm not afraid to go. But I'd +be afraid to live. To live all the rest of my days on my back or in a +chair—I—who was made to go? John can't abide me well and able to +work. He'd hate the sight of me useless. No, sir! There's nothing +nor nobody I'd sit in a chair for all the rest of my life." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, there is—Peggy." +</P> + +<P> +John spoke from the shadowy doorway, for the dusk had fallen. +</P> + +<P> +"You will do it for me, girl. I'll get you the nicest chair and the +prettiest crutches. And when you are tired of them I'll carry you +about in my arms. And you'll never again—I swear it—be sorry that +you didn't marry Bud Willis." +</P> + +<P> +The spring twilight filled the room. Through it the doctor tiptoed to +the door and left these two to build a new world out of the fragments +and blunders of the old. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap22"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +BEFORE THE DAWN +</H3> + + +<P> +"I wonder if Fanny's sacrifice isn't enough to drive the evil thing out +of our lives and out of Green Valley forever. Seems as if everybody +ought to vote the saloon out now," said Grandma Wentworth to Cynthia's +son a couple of weeks later, when the whole town was celebrating +because Fanny Foster had sat up for the first time in her chair that +day. +</P> + +<P> +After all, John didn't buy Fanny her chair. Seth Curtis wanted to do +it all himself but Green Valley wouldn't let him. It was a wonderful +chair. You could lower it to different heights and it was full of all +manner of attachments to make the invalid forget her helplessness. Of +course Fanny was still too weak to use these but she knew about them +and seemed pleased, even said she believed that when she got the hang +of it she could get about the house and yard and might even venture +into the streets in time. +</P> + +<P> +And early in the morning of the day she was to get up Doc Philipps +drove up in his buggy with what seemed like a young garden tucked +inside it. Fanny's garden and borders had been sadly neglected during +her sickness. The doctor had had John clean the whole thing up and +then he came with his arms and buggy full of blossoming tulips, +hyacinths and every bloom that was in flower then and would bear +transplanting. And for hours he and John worked to make a little +fairyland for Fanny. +</P> + +<P> +"My God, John, I couldn't mend her body—nobody could. But between us +we have got to mend her spirit." And the old doctor blew his nose hard +to hide the trembling of his chin. +</P> + +<P> +But no chair, no amount of tulips and hyacinths, could make up to Fanny +the loss of her body. And Green Valley knew this. So Green Valley was +talking more seriously than ever of driving out from among them the +thing that was pushing Jim Tumley into a drunkard's grave, that was +estranging hitherto happy wives and husbands and maiming innocent men, +women and children. Little Billy was all right again but he was now a +timid youngster and inclined to be jumpy at sight of a smartly trotting +horse. Hank Lolly's leg was healed up but Doc said he would always +limp a bit. Seth and his wife had made up, of course, but neither of +them could ever efface from their hearts and memories the cruel scenes +that had marred their life this past year. +</P> + +<P> +Seth no longer went near the saloon. He had paid dearly for his +stubbornness and would continue to pay to the end of his days. Billy +Evans had swung around and was fighting the saloon now with a grimness +that was terrible in one so easy-going and liberal as Billy. +</P> + +<P> +But nothing seemingly could convert George Hoskins. And so long as +George Hoskins was against a measure its passage was a hopeless matter, +for men like George always have a host of followers. +</P> + +<P> +George was a huge man whose mind worked slowly. When he first heard +the talk about the town going dry he laughed—and that was enough. No +one argued the matter with him for no one relished the thought of an +argument with George. And only the minister had dared to mention Jim +Tumley. In his big way George loved little Jim, but since his wife had +sickened George spent every spare minute in her sick room and so +witnessed none of the scenes that were rousing Green Valley folks into +open rebellion against the evil that enslaved them. +</P> + +<P> +George belonged to the old school that declared that to mind one's own +business was the highest duty of man. No one in Green Valley, not even +Cynthia's son, could make the huge man understand that he in a sense +was little Jim's keeper; that since Jim could not save himself the +strong men of the community would have to do it for him. George +wondered at the seriousness with which the thing was discussed. He +treated it as a joke. And this attitude was doing more harm than if he +had been bitterly hostile to the idea. +</P> + +<P> +The Civic League was counting the votes, wondering if Green Valley +could go dry over George Hoskins' head. But Grandma Wentworth was +hoping for one more miracle before election day. +</P> + +<P> +"Something'll happen to swing George into line. We Green Valley people +have always done everything together. It would spoil things to have +one half the town fighting the other half. We must do this thing with +everybody's consent or it will do no good. So let's hope for a +miracle." +</P> + +<P> +And then the whole thing was wiped out of everybody's mind by the death +of Mary Hoskins. It was over at last and nobody but the doctor knew +how hard the big man had fought for his wife's life. So nobody quite +guessed the bitterness of the big man's grief. But everybody had heard +that Mary's last words were a plea to have little Jim sing her to her +last sleep and resting-place. And George had promised that Jim would +sing. +</P> + +<P> +Jim had been drinking so steadily of late that he was a wreck. People +wondered if he could sing. When they told him his sister was dead he +laughed miserably and said nothing. No one was surprised when the hour +for the funeral services arrived to find Jim missing. Messengers had +to be sent out. They searched the town but could find no trace of Jim. +For an hour Green Valley waited in that still home. Then the +undertaker from Elmwood whispered something to the crushed, terrified +giant who stood staring at the dead face of his wife like a soul in +torment. +</P> + +<P> +Mary Hoskins left her home without the song George had promised her. +</P> + +<P> +At the grave there was another, a more terrible wait. +</P> + +<P> +"My God—wait! They'll find him. God, men—wait—wait! I can't bury +her, without Jim's song. I promised her—I tell you I promised—oh, my +God—it was the last thing she wanted—and I promised." +</P> + +<P> +So Green Valley waited, with horror in its eyes and the bitterness of +death in its heart. As the minutes dragged women began to sob +hysterically, in nervous terror. Men looked at the yawning grave, the +waiting coffin, the low-dropping sun and mumbled strange prayers. +</P> + +<P> +Through a mist of tears the waiting watchers saw Hank Lolly and Billy +Evans pass through the cemetery gate, dragging something between them. +It was something that laughed and sobbed and gibbered horribly. Hank +and Billy tried to hold the ghastly thing erect between them but it +slipped from their trembling hands and lay, a twitching heap, at the +head of the open grave. +</P> + +<P> +That was Green Valley's darkest hour. And after that came the dawn. +The following week Green Valley men walked quietly to the polls and as +one man voted the horror out of their lives. The day after little Jim +went off to take the Keeley cure. And then for two long weeks Green +Valley was still with the stillness of exhaustion. +</P> + +<P> +Spring deepened and brought with it all the old gladness and a new +sweet peace, a peace such as Green Valley had never known. Gardens +began to bloom again and streets rippled with the laughter of +neighboring men and women. Life swung back to normal. Only the hotel +stood silent, a still vacant-eyed reminder of past pain. Nobody +mentioned it. Every one tried to forget it. But so long as it stood +there, a specter within its heart, Green Valley could not forget. It +was said that Sam Ellis had put it up for sale. But who would buy the +huge place? +</P> + +<P> +Then it was that Green Valley's three good little men came forward. +Joe Gans, the socialist barber, was spokesman. He presented a plan +that made Green Valley catch its breath. +</P> + +<P> +Why—said the three good little men—could not Green Valley buy the +hotel for its own use? Why not remodel it, make a Community House of +it? Why not move Joshua Stillman's wonderful library out of the little +dark room into which it was packed and spread it out in a big sunny +place, with comfortable chairs and rockers and a couple of nice long +reading tables? Why not fix a place for the young people to dance in +and have their parties? Why not have a real assembly hall—a big +enough and proper place to hold political meetings and all indoor +celebrations? Why not have pool, billiards, a bowling alley? Why not +have a manual-training room for Hen Tomlins and his boys? Why not have +a sewing room and cooking for the girls? +</P> + +<P> +Oh, it was a glorious plan and Green Valley listened as a child does to +a fairy tale. Of course it couldn't really be done, many people said, +but—oh, my—if it only could! +</P> + +<P> +But the three good little men had no sooner explained their fairy dream +than things began to happen. Cynthia's son came forward with the first +payment on the property. Colonel Stratton, Joshua Stillman, Reverend +Campbell offered to take care of other payments. Jake Tuttle +telephoned in from his farm that he was in on it. The Civic League +offered to do all the cleaning, the furnishing, to give pictures, +curtains, potted plants. The church societies offered to make money +serving chicken dinners on the hotel veranda to motorists who, now that +Billy Evans had a garage, came spinning along thick as flies. Nan +Ainslee's father, besides contributing to the purchasing fund, offered +to provide the library furniture, the billiard and pool tables. Seth +Curtis and Billy Evans not only gave money but offered to do all the +hauling. That shamed the masons and carpenters into giving their +Saturday afternoons for repair work. And after them came the painters +and decorators, with Bernard Rollins at their head. So in the end +every soul in Green Valley gave something and so the dream came true, +as all dreams must when men and women get together and work +whole-heartedly for the common good. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap23"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FANNY COMES BACK +</H3> + + +<P> +"If only I felt the way I look. If only my feelings had been smashed +too," sobbed Fanny to the doctor that first week that she sat up in her +chair. "But I'm just the same inside that I always was and I want to +go and see and hear things." +</P> + +<P> +So the old doctor, who knew how much more real were the ills of the +spirit than any hurts of the flesh, dropped a word here and there and +now no days passed that Fanny did not have callers, did not in some way +get messages, the vagrant scraps and trifles of news that, so valueless +in themselves, yet were to Fanny the lovely bits of fabric out of which +she pieced a laughing tale of life. +</P> + +<P> +Outwardly Fanny was changed. She was pale and quiet and her thick +lovely hair was always smooth now and glossy and carefully dressed. It +was the one thing she still could do for herself and she did it with a +pitiful care. She looked ten years younger, in a way. And her house +was spick and span at ten o'clock every morning now. From her chair +she directed the children and because in all Green Valley there was no +woman who knew better how work ought to be done it was well done. And +then came the long empty hours when she sat, as she was sitting now, in +her chair on the sunny side of the house where she could look at her +little sea of tulips and hyacinths and drink in their perfume. +</P> + +<P> +She had been trying to crochet but had dropped her needle. It lay in +the grass at her feet. She could see it but she could not pick it up. +She had not as yet acquired the skill and the inventive faculty of an +invalid. +</P> + +<P> +And so she sat there, staring at the bit of glistening steel as wave +after wave of bitterness swept over her. Her tragedy was still so new +that she could feel it with every breath. Every hour she was reminded +of her loss by a thousand little things like this crochet hook. She +was forced to sit still, her busy hands idle in her lap, while spring +was calling, calling everywhere. She told herself, with a mad little +laugh, that she would never again pick up anything; never again would +she run through her neighbors' gates, tap on their doors and visit them +in their kitchens. Never again could she hurry up the spring street +with the south wind caressing her cheek. No more would she gad about +to learn the doings of her little world. Would it come to talk to her, +to make her laugh now that she was helpless? Was she never to hear the +music of living? Was she to lose her knack of making people laugh? To +lose her place in life—to live and yet be forgotten—would she have to +face that? +</P> + +<P> +These were some of the thoughts that were torturing poor Fanny that +day. And then she gave a cry, for around the corner of the house came +Nanny Ainslee in just the same old way. Grandma Wentworth and the +minister were just behind her. +</P> + +<P> +They stared lovingly at each other, the girl who was as lovely as life +and love and springtime could make her, and the woman whom the game had +broken. Then Nanny spoke—not to the broken body of Fanny Foster but +to the gipsy, springtime spirit of Fanny. +</P> + +<P> +"I only just came home, Fanny. I went through town and saw pretty +nearly everybody, and every soul tried to tell me a little something. +But it's all a jumble. So, Fanny Foster, I want you to begin with +Christmas Day and tell me all that's happened in Green Valley while +I've been away." +</P> + +<P> +Never a word of her accident, never so much as a glance of pity at the +wonderful chair. Just the old Nan Ainslee asking the old Fanny Foster +for Green Valley news. +</P> + +<P> +In the scarred soul of Fanny Foster, down under the bitterness and +crumbled pride, something stirred, something that Fanny thought was +dead forever. +</P> + +<P> +Then Nanny spoke again. +</P> + +<P> +"I have come to tell you that I am to be married to John Roger +Churchill Knight. I have told no one but you and Grandma. I have +promised to marry him in June, so I haven't much time to get ready. +I'm hoping, Fanny, that you will come and help out." +</P> + +<P> +At that, of a sudden all the old-time zest for living, the joy of +seeing, hearing and doing, surged to Fanny's very throat and force of +habit brought the words. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, land alive, Nanny," fairly gurgled the old Fanny, "such a time as +we've had in Green Valley! It was that awful cold spell after +Christmas that began it. Old man Pelley died—of complications—and +everybody thought Mrs. Dudley would sing hymns of praise in public, +they'd fought so about their chickens. But I declare if she didn't cry +about the hardest at the funeral and even blamed herself for +aggravating him. +</P> + +<P> +"Of course him dying left old Mrs. Pelley alone in a big house, and her +being pretty feeble, she felt that Harry and Ivy ought to come and live +with her. Well,—Ivy went—but she vowed that there were two things +she would do, mother-in-law or no mother-in-law. She said she'd put as +many onions in her hamburger steak and Irish stew as she pleased—you +know Mrs. Pelley can't stand onions—and she'd have a fire in the +fireplace as often as the fancy struck her. Everybody thought there'd +be an awful state of things—but land—now that Mrs. Pelley has got +used to the open fire you can't drive her away from it with a stick and +she don't seem to bother her head about Ivy's cooking and last week she +actually ate three helpings of hamburger steak that Ivy said was just +reeking with onions. +</P> + +<P> +"A body's never too old to learn, I suppose. There's Henry Rawlins +suddenly took the notion to quit smoking. Ettie'd been at him for +twenty-five years with twenty good reasons to quit, but no. And all of +a sudden—when Ettie's give up hope and not mentioned it for a couple +of months—he up and quits and won't even tell why. Ettie's +worried—says he's eating himself out of house and home and wants to +sleep about twenty-four hours a day. +</P> + +<P> +"Talking about houses makes me think that the Stockton girls are having +their house painted by a man with a wooden leg. Billy Evans picked him +up somewhere and Seth Curtis was telling me how he came to lose that +leg. Seems like he was prospecting somewheres in Montana, got drunk, +froze it, gangrene set in and they had to amputate. They say he's a +mighty smart man too. Maybe John'll get him to paint our house when +he's through at the Stocktons. +</P> + +<P> +"Talk about physical deformities! Eva Collins has got it into her head +that she's too fat entirely and she's been dieting and rolling and +taking all sorts of exercises religiously. Seems she got so set on +being thin that she practices these exercises whenever she happens to +think of it and wherever she happens to be. She happened to be right +under the lights three or four times and so she smashed them, globes +and all. Bill says she'd better reduce in the barn or else let him +charge admission for a rolling performance to pay for the broken lights. +</P> + +<P> +"So there's Eva trying to thin off and they say Mert Hagley's swollen +all out of shape, having been stung almost to death by his own bees. +Of course, nobody's sympathizing overmuch with Mert. He was so afraid +of losing a swarm of bees that he forgot to be cautious and there he is +laid out. But it isn't the bee stings that hurt him so much. Mary's +been willed a good farm and a big lump of cash by some aunt that died a +month ago and hated Mert like poison. And the thing's just gone to +Mary's head. +</P> + +<P> +"She's gone into the city on regular spending sprees and Mert's wild. +He can't touch the farm and he's afraid Mary'll have that lump of money +all spent before he gets out of bed. Everybody's hoping she will and +advising her to buy every blessed thing she ever had a hankering for +and things she never even heard of. Mrs. Brownlee, the president of +the Civic League, even told her to buy a dish-washing machine, and +heavens, if Mary didn't go right down and buy it. Doc Philipps advised +her to buy herself the very best springs and mattress on the +market—that it would help her back to sleep decently of nights. She's +having hot-water heat put in and is going to do her washing with an +electric washer. Seth Curtis put her up to that. And as soon as Mert +gets better she's going visiting her sister in Colorado. She says +she'll likely die of homesickness but that she's just got to go off +somewhere to get used to and learn to wear properly all the new clothes +she's got. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Mary's buying all these labor-saving machines got the whole town +to thinking and spending. Dick's put in a new cash register they say +is nice enough to have in the parlor. It made Jessie Williams buy a +lot of new silver that she didn't need no more than a cat needs a +match-box. But she got it and she gave a luncheon the other day to +some of the South End crowd and tried to get just about all that silver +on the table, I guess. Of course, it looked mighty nice but when the +women came to eat they didn't know what to do with it. They got pretty +miserable, all sticking to just the one knife and fork and spoon. And +Jessie got so rattled that she just about forgot to use the stuff too. +And finally old Mrs. Vingie, that Jessie asked just to have the news +spread, got up mad as a hornet and marched out, saying she was too old +to be insulted. +</P> + +<P> +"Until a week ago Bessie Williams wouldn't speak to Alex. You know her +hair's got awful white this last year and of course, her being kind of +stout, she does look older than Al. But she says that's no reason why, +when a peddler comes to the door with anything, Al needs to let the man +think she's his mother. +</P> + +<P> +"Mrs. Jerry Dustin's been to see Uncle Tony's portraiture hanging in +the art gallery. She says it's so lifelike it made her cry. And she's +awful happy about Peter. Peter's been posing for a picture for Bernard +Rollins and while he was in the studio he got to fooling with the +paints and brushes, and lo and behold, if he didn't daub up something +that looked like his mother's face when she's smiling. They say +Rollins jumped he was so surprised and he put the boy through some +paces and swore he'd make a better artist out of him than he was +himself. So there you are, and now Mrs. Dustin is dreaming of Peter in +Italy, Peter in Rome, Peter everywhere in creation, and her tagging +along with his brushes and dust rags. So she's happy. +</P> + +<P> +"And Milly Sears is house-cleaning like mad, for both the boys are +coming home from the ends of the earth to visit. And Alice is putting +off the christening of her baby boy until they come. She was here to +show me the baby the other day. It's a darling. Jocelyn Brownlee came +with her and brought me samples of all her wedding dresses, wedding +gown and all. As soon as the dressmaker is through I'm to go over and +see the whole trousseau. +</P> + +<P> +"There, I nearly forgot the best thing of all. It's about Sam Bobbins. +My! Here we've all been pitying Sam and Fortune's just kicked in his +door and walked in. You remember of course about Sam and his fighting +roosters? Well, Sam went off for Thanksgiving to his sister's and +while he was gone something ate up his prize stock. Must have been a +skunk, Frank Burton says. Well, they say that Sam's heart was just +about broken. Not just because his stock was gone but more because he +couldn't think of another thing to turn his hand to. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, he got through the winter some way and then, while he was +sitting in the train one day coming home, he overheard two men talking +about turtles going up. Must have been two hotel men. Anyway, that +gave Sam an idea and he started right in wading through Petersen's +slough for turtles. Why, he pulled up barrels of them, and would you +believe it, they sold in the city for real money! Sam went +crazy—about as crazy as Mary Hagley got over her luck. And then along +came rheumatism and knocked Sam flat, just when he was doing so well. +Everybody said it was just poor Sam's luck. So there was Sam sick +abed, thinking about those turtles moving off somewheres else maybe, or +somebody else getting rich on them. +</P> + +<P> +"And all the time he lay in bed groaning Sam's wife went around the +house doing the same. Only her trouble wasn't turtles but corsets. +Seems like Sam always promised Dudy that if he made any money she was +to have plenty to spend. Well, he treated her mighty handsome about +that turtle money. Dudy had the sense to take all he gave her and she +vowed that for once in her life she'd get herself a corset that was +comfortable. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Nanny, heavens only knows how many brands she tried but none of +them seemed built for her. Some pinched her here and others squeezed +her there and she was as full of misery as Sam was of rheumatism. Sam +finally took notice and just to keep his mind off his own troubles he +got to watching her suffering for breath and a nice shape. +</P> + +<P> +"Now you know Sam's always thought the world of Dudy. So one day, when +she was getting ready to go to the Civic League meeting to read a paper +on the best ways of getting rid of flies and nearly crying because she +couldn't get herself to look right, Sam said, half joking, 'By gum, +Dudy, I'll <I>make</I> you a corset that will fit you.' +</P> + +<P> +"Well, sir, the thing stuck in his mind and grew and grew, and heavens +to Betsey, if Sam didn't really make a corset, even helping Dudy with +some of the sewing. +</P> + +<P> +"Dudy wore it and took everybody's breath away, she looked so nice and +could breathe without puffing and laugh as much as she pleased. The +women got to talking about it and mentioned it to Mrs. Brownlee. And +mind you, Mrs. Brownlee went to Sam and asked him had he patented the +thing. And when he said no she went to a woman lawyer friend of hers +and she got Sam a patent, and first thing Green Valley knew here come +three big corset men to town, all of them offering to buy Dudy's +home-made corset. So Sam Bobbins has got his fortune and nobody's +begrudging it to him. The whole town is mighty proud of Sam, I tell +you. +</P> + +<P> +"Good land—it must be four o'clock, for here come the children! +My—Nanny, but it's good to have you home again!" +</P> + +<P> +"Well," smiled Grandma, as she watched the spring twilight sift down +over Green Valley that evening, "I've always said that this town was +full of folks who make you cry one minute and laugh the next." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap24"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXIV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +HOME AGAIN +</H3> + + +<P> +It had pleaded for forgiveness and an early homecoming, that little +yellow slip that Nanny Ainslee treasured so. But the bluebirds were +darting through leafy bowers and the ploughed, furrowed fields lay +smoking in the spring sunshine before Nan came back. +</P> + +<P> +A week after her arrival in Scranton the old aunt had been taken sick, +and it was months before the old soul was herself again. Nan stayed +through it all. But the day came when she was free to go back to the +little home town where the cloud shadows were rippling over low, +dimpling hills, already gay with the gold of wild mustard and the +tender blues and greens of a new glad spring. +</P> + +<P> +She came home one evening when Green Valley lay wrapped in a warm, +thick, fragrant mist. So no one saw her step off the train straight +into the arms of Cynthia's son. And nobody heard the quivering joy of +his one cry at the sight of her. +</P> + +<P> +"Nan!" +</P> + +<P> +Slowly, as in a dream, they walked through their fragrant, misty world +to where, in a deep, old hearth, a fire sang of love and home, dreams +and eternal happiness; where an armchair waited with its mate and an +old clock ticked on the stairs. +</P> + +<P> +Oh, that first perfect hour beside his fire! He had pleaded so hard +for it in all his letters. So she gave it to him, knowing that for +them both no hour could ever again be just like that. +</P> + +<P> +She sat and listened to the wonder of his love; then, frightened at the +might of it, the lovely reverence of it, crept into his arms for sweet +comfort. And he held her in awe and wonder against his heart, kissed +the quivering lips and knew such joy as angels might envy. Then he +took her to her father. +</P> + +<P> +The next day, in the shy sunshine of a perfect day, they went hand in +hand to their knoll to look once more upon their valley town and talk +over all of life from the first hour of meeting. +</P> + +<P> +And when they had satisfied the hunger for understanding the miracle +that had befallen them he told her of all that had happened in the +months that she had been away. How Jim Tumley slipped beyond the love +and help of them all. How Mary Hoskins grew weaker and weaker. How +the Civic League struggled and the three good little men dreamed and +planned. How Fanny Foster came to pay the great price for Green +Valley's salvation. How in death gentle Mary Hoskins paid too. He +explained why Seth Curtis was a gentler man and why John Foster hurried +home each day to laugh and talk with his crippled wife. He told her of +that awful day that had crushed George Hoskins so that he went about a +broken, shrunken man, praying and searching for peace through service. +It was George who bought the beautiful new piano for the Community +House, who was paying for little Jim's cure. +</P> + +<P> +And then because the girl he loved was sobbing over the sins and +sorrows of the little town that lay in the sunshine below them, he told +her about the baby boy that Hen Tomlins had gotten for Christmas and +how happy the little man was making toys for the toddler who followed +him about from morning till night. And because her eyes were still wet +with tears he laughed teasingly and said: +</P> + +<P> +"And I never knew that I loved you until I saw David Allan kiss his +sweetheart." +</P> + +<P> +Of course, at that she sat up very straight and wanted to know all +about it. +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose you expect me to wait a whole proper year for my wedding +day," he sighed after a little. +</P> + +<P> +"I think we ought to. And I couldn't possibly be ready before then." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you mean to tell me that it takes a whole year to make a wedding +dress?" +</P> + +<P> +And then the cruelty that lies in every woman made her shake her head +and say, "No—that isn't why nice folks wait a whole year. They wait +to give each other plenty of time to change their minds." +</P> + +<P> +"Nan!" +</P> + +<P> +And she saw then by his hurt white face that, man grown though he was, +with a genius for handling other men, he would always be a child in +some things. He never would or could understand trifling in any form, +having all a child's honesty and directness. And she knew that she, +more than any one else, would always have the power to hurt him. +</P> + +<P> +"Nan," he asked slowly, "did you go to Scranton because you thought I +might ask before you were ready?" +</P> + +<P> +She laughed tenderly. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—Dear Heart—no. I went to Scranton because I was afraid I might +propose before you were ready." +</P> + +<P> +But he never quite understood that and she didn't expect him to. +However, if she thought she had won, she was mistaken. The persistency +in matters of love that is the heritage of all men made him say +carelessly a half hour later: +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, well—I suppose waiting a year is the best, the wise thing to do. +But why must I be the only one to obey the law? Nobody else is waiting +a year. All the other men are marrying their sweethearts in June. +There's David and Jocelyn, Max Longman and Clara, Steve and Bonnie, +Dolly Beatty and Charlie Peters. And only last week Grandma Wentworth +got a letter from out West saying some chap is coming from the very +wilds to marry Carrie. He's hired the reception hall of the Community +House so that Carrie may have a proper wedding in case her folks refuse +to give their blessing. So I'm going to marry all those chaps and then +calmly go on just being engaged myself." +</P> + +<P> +All of a sudden Nan saw why Seth Curtis gave in and joined the church, +why Hank Lolly forgot his fears and came to the services, why the +poolroom man gave up his business and was now a respected automobile +man and mechanic; why the former saloon keeper was the happy owner of a +stock farm; why Frank Burton no longer bragged about being an atheist +but went to church with Jennie; why Mrs. Rosenwinkle no longer argued +about the flatness of the earth. +</P> + +<P> +He was always doing this to every one, this boy from India; always +making people see how ridiculous and petty were the man-made +conventions and human notions and stubbornness when looked at in the +light of common sense and sincerity. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, well," Nan gave in with a laugh that was half a sob, "I may as +well be a June bride with the rest. And now, John Roger Churchill +Knight, take me down to see my town. I want to see all the new +gardens, the new babies, the new spring hats and dress patterns. +</P> + +<P> +"I want to see Ella Higgins' tulips and forget-me-nots and attend Uncle +Tony's open-air meeting. I want to have an ice-cream soda at Martin's +and wave my hand at John Gans while he's shaving a customer. I want to +see all the store windows, especially Joe Baldwin's. I want to shake +hands with Billy Evans and Hank Lolly and hug little Billy. +</P> + +<P> +"I want to go to the post-office for my mail when everybody else is +getting theirs. I want to know if the bank is still there and if the +bluebirds and flickers are as thick as ever in Park Lane. I want to +hear Green Valley women calling to each other from their back yards and +see them leaning over the fences to visit—and giving each other clumps +of pansies, and golden glow and hollyhocks. I want to see Mrs. Jerry +Dustin's smile and ask her when I can see Uncle Tony's 'portraiture' at +the Art Institute. I want to see the boys' bare feet kicking up the +dust and their hands hitching up their overall straps and hear them +whistling to each other and giving their high signs. I'm longing to +know who's had their house repainted and where the new houses are going +up. +</P> + +<P> +"But—oh—most of all, I want to hear Green Valley folks say with their +eyes and hands and voice—'Hello, Nanny Ainslee, when did <I>you</I> get +back' and 'My, Nanny, it's good to see and have you home again.' So, +John Roger Churchill Knight, take me down to see my home town—Green +Valley at springtime." +</P> + +<P> +They went down through Green Valley streets where the spring sunshine +lay warm and golden. They greeted Green Valley men and women and were +greeted as only Green Valley knows how to greet those it loves. +</P> + +<P> +Though they said not a word, all Green Valley read their secret in +their eyes, heard it in the rich deep note of the boy's voice, in +Nanny's lilting laugh. +</P> + +<P> +And having made the rounds the boy and girl naturally came to Grandma +Wentworth's gate. They walked through the gay front garden, followed +the little gravel path around the house, and found Grandma standing +among her fragrant herbs and healing grasses. +</P> + +<P> +They came to her hand in hand and said not a word. And Grandma raised +her head and looked at them. Then her eyes filled and her lips +quivered tenderly and the two, both motherless, knew that they had a +mother's blessing. +</P> + +<P> +It was so restful, that back yard of Grandma's, as the three sat there, +talking quietly and happily. And the world seemed strangely full of a +golden peace. +</P> + + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> +<hr class="full" noshade> + +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GREEN VALLEY***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 18801-h.txt or 18801-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/8/0/18801">http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/8/0/18801</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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For +example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at: + +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/0/2/3/10234 + +or filename 24689 would be found at: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/8/24689 + +An alternative method of locating eBooks: +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL">http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL</a> + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** +</pre> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/18801-h/images/img-front.jpg b/18801-h/images/img-front.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..0f51c80 --- /dev/null +++ b/18801-h/images/img-front.jpg diff --git a/18801.txt b/18801.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1114438 --- /dev/null +++ b/18801.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9384 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Green Valley, by Katharine Reynolds, +Illustrated by Nana French Bickford + + +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: Green Valley + + +Author: Katharine Reynolds + + + +Release Date: July 10, 2006 [eBook #18801] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GREEN VALLEY*** + + +E-text prepared by Al Haines + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustration. + See 18801-h.htm or 18801-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/8/0/18801/18801-h/18801-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/8/0/18801/18801-h.zip) + + + + + +GREEN VALLEY + +by + +KATHARINE REYNOLDS + +Frontispiece by Nana French Bickford + + + + + + + +[Frontispiece: They came to her hand in hand and said not a word.] + + + + +Grosset & Dunlap +Publishers ------ New York +Copyright, 1919, +by Little, Brown, and Company. +All rights reserved + + + + + Dedication + + TO ALL THE LITTLE ONE-HORSE TOWNS WHERE + LIFE IS SWEET AND ROOMY AND OLD-FASHIONED; + WHERE THE DAYS ARE FULL OF SUNSHINE AND + RAIN AND WORK; WHERE NEIGHBORS REALLY + NEIGHBOR AND MEN AND WOMEN ARE LIFE-SIZE + + + + +AUTHOR'S NOTE + +This book was written to cure a heartache, to ease a very real and bad +case of homesickness. I wrote it just for myself when I was very +nearly ten thousand miles away from home and knew that I couldn't go +back to the U. S. A. for two long years. It is a picture of a little +Yankee town, the town I tried so hard to see over ten thousand miles of +gray-green ocean. + +When I was sailing from New York for South America that sunny June +morning in 1913, about the last thing the last friend hurrying down the +gangplank said was this: + +"Of course you are going to be homesick. But it's worth it." + +And I laughed. + +But before that long stretch of gray-green ocean was plowed under I +knew--oh, I knew--that I was going to be most woefully homesick for the +U. S. A. + +A certain tall Swede from New Jersey and I discovered that fact about +the same minute Fourth of July morning. We were standing on the deck, +staring miserably back over the awful miles to where somewhere in that +lost north our town lay with flags fluttering, picnic baskets getting +into trains and everybody out on their lawns and porches. + +We didn't look at each other after that first glance--that Swede and I. +And we said the sunlight hurt our eyes. + +Three months later I was sitting under the velvet-soft, star-sown night +sky of the Argentine cattle country. I had seen volcano-scarred +Martinique and had watched the beautiful island of Barbados rising like +a fairy dream out of a foamy sea. + +I had marveled at the endless beauties of Rio lying so picturesquely in +its immense harbor and at the foot of its great, shaggy, sun-splashed, +smoke-wreathed mountains. I had tramped through unsanitary Santos and +loved it because it looked like Chicago in spite of its mountains and +banana trees. I had witnessed a wonderful fiesta in Buenos Aires and +had churned two hundred miles up the La Plata when it was bubbling with +rain. And I had had a tooth pulled in Paysandu, the second largest +city in Uruguay. + +All that in three months! And there were still a million wonders to +see. I loved and shall always love these radiant, sun-drenched +uncrowded lands. But my heart was heavy as lead. For I was homesick. +My eyes were tired of alien starshine, of alien, unfamiliar things, and +my heart cried out for the little home towns of my own country. + +But I could not go back for many, many months. So I learned Spanish +and hobnobbed with wonderfully wise and delightful Spanish +grandmothers. I grew to love some darling Indian babies. I +interviewed interesting South American cowboys and discussed war and +socialism with an Argentine navy officer. I exchanged calls and true +blue friendships with soft-voiced Englishwomen. And I took tea and +dinner aboard the ships of Welsh sea captains from Cardiff. + +I had a wonderful time. I filled my notebook, took pictures and +collected souvenirs. I laughed and told stories. Folks down there +said I was good company. + +But oh! In the hush of a rain-splashed night, when the fire in the +grate dozed and dreamed and a boat siren somewhere out on the inky La +Plata wailed and moaned through the black night, my heart flew back +over those gray-green waves to a little town that I knew in the U. S. +A. And to ease my longing I wrote Green Valley. + +KATHARINE REYNOLDS. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAPTER + + I EAST AND WEST + II SPRING IN GREEN VALLEY + III THE LAST OF THE CHURCHILLS + IV A RAINY DAY + V CYNTHIA'S SON + VI GOSSIP + VII THE WEDDING + VIII LILAC TIME + IX GREEN VALLEY MEN + X THE KNOLL + XI GETTING ACQUAINTED + XII THE PATH OF TRUE LOVE + XIII AUTUMN IN GREEN VALLEY + XIV THE CHARM + XV INDIAN SUMMER + XVI THE HOUSEWARMING + XVII THE LITTLE SLIPPER + XVIII THE MORNING AFTER + XIX A GRAY DAY + XX CHRISTMAS BELLS + XXI FANNY'S HOUR + XXII BEFORE THE DAWN + XXIII FANNY COMES BACK + XXIV HOME AGAIN + + + + +GREEN VALLEY + +CHAPTER I + +EAST AND WEST + +"Joshua Churchill's dying in California and Nanny Ainslee's leaving +to-night for Japan! And there's been a wreck between here and Spring +Road!" + +Fanny fairly gasped out the astounding news. Then she sank down into +Grandma Wentworth's comfortable kitchen rocker and went into details. + +"The two telegrams just came through. Uncle Tony's gone down to the +wreck. I happened to be standing talking to him when Denny came +running out of the station. Isn't it too bad Denny's so bow-legged? +Though I don't know as it hinders him from running to any noticeable +extent. I had an awful time trying to keep up so's to find out what +had happened. I bet you Nan's packing right this minute and just +loving it. My--ain't some people born lucky? Think of having the +whole world to run around in!" + +The telephone tinkled. + +"Yes, Nan," Grandma smiled as she answered, "I know. Fanny's just this +minute telling me. Yes, of course I can. I'll be over as soon as my +bread's done baking. Yes--I'll bring along some of my lavender to pack +in with your things." + +"Land sakes, Grandma," exclaimed Fanny, "don't stop for the bread. +I'll see to that. Just you git that lavender and go. And tell Nanny +I'll be at the station to see her off." + +Up-stairs in a big sunny room of the Ainslee house Grandma Wentworth +looked reproachfully at a flushed, busy girl who was laughing and +singing snatches of droll ditties the while she emptied closets and +dresser drawers and tucked things into four trunks, two suitcases and a +handbag. + +"Nanny, are you never going to settle down and stay at home?" sighed +Grandma. + +"Yes, ma'am," Nanny's eyes danced, "some day when a man makes me fall +in love with him and there are no more new places to go to. But so +long as I am heartfree and footfree, and there's one alien shore +calling, I'll have the wanderlust. I declare, Grandma, if that man +doesn't turn up soon there will be no new places left for a honeymoon!" + +Grandma smiled in spite of herself. There were things she wanted very +much to say and other things she wanted very much to ask; but the +trunks had to get down to the station and already the afternoon sun was +low. + +The two women worked feverishly and almost in silence so that when the +packing was done they might get in the little visit both craved before +the months of separation. + +Nanny finally jumped on the trunks, snapped them shut, locked them and +watched the expressman carry them down and out into his waiting dray. +Then she sat down with a trembling little laugh. + +"There--it's over and I'm really going! I have been to just about +every country but Japan. I believe father would rather have skipped +off alone this time. It seems to be some suddenly important +international crisis that we are going over to settle. That's why we +are going East the roundabout way. We must stop at Washington for +instructions, then again at London and Paris." + +"Nanny," mused Grandma, "there's a good many years difference in our +ages but there's only one woman I ever loved as I love you. I think I +might have loved your mother but she died the very first year your +father brought her here. And she was ailing when she came. The other +woman that meant so much to me used to go traveling too. I always +helped her with her packing. Then one day she packed and went away, +never to come back." + +"Was that Cynthia Churchill?" Nan asked gently. + +"Yes--Cynthia. She was dearer than a sister to me, and neither of us +dreamed that a whole wide world would divide us." + +"Why did she go, Grandma?" + +"Because a Green Valley man well-nigh broke her heart." + +"A Green Valley man did--_that_? Oh, dear! And here I have been +hoping that some day I might marry a Green Valley man myself." + +"Nanny, I expect I'm old and foolish but I've been hoping and hoping +that you'd marry a home boy and fearing you'd meet up with some one on +your travels who would take you away from us forever. It would be hard +to see you go." + +The last sunbeam had faded away and golden twilight filled the room. +Outside little day noises were dying out. + +"Grandma dear, don't you worry about me. I intend to marry a Green +Valley man if possible. But even if I didn't I'd always come back to +Green Valley." + +"No, you wouldn't. You couldn't, any more than Cynthia could. Cynthia +loved this town better even than you love it. Yet she is lying under +strange stars in a foreign land, far from her old home. Her father, +they say, is dying in California. I suppose the old Churchill place +will go now unless Cynthia's son comes back to take it over. But that +isn't likely." + +"Why--did Cynthia Churchill leave a son?" wondered Nanny. + +"Yes. He must be a few years older than you. He was born and raised +in India. 'Tisn't likely he'd come to Green Valley now that he's a man +grown. Still, if Joshua Churchill dies out there in California, that +boy will come into all his grandfather's property." + +"Well," Nanny stood up and walked to the window from which she could +see the fine old home of the Churchills, "if any one willed me a lovely +old place like that Churchill homestead I'd come from the moon to claim +it, let alone India." + +"Nanny, are you sure there's no boy now in Green Valley who could keep +you from roaming? I thought maybe Max Longman or Ronny Deering--" + +"No--no one yet, Grandma. I like them all--but love--no. Love, it +seems to me, must be something very different." + +"Yes, I know," sighed Grandma. + +When Uncle Tony returned from viewing the wreck he assured his townsmen +that it was a wreck of such beautiful magnitude that traffic on the +Northwestern would be tied up for twenty-four hours. It was feared +that Mr. Ainslee would not be able to get his train and would have to +drive five miles to the other railroad. + +However Uncle Tony was reckoning things from a Green Valley point of +view. As a matter of fact the wreckage was sufficiently cleared away +so that the eastbound trains were running on time. It was the +westbound ones that were stalled. The Los Angeles Limited Pullmans +stood right in the Green Valley station. They were still standing +there when Nanny and her father came to take the 10:27 east. + +Perhaps nothing could explain so well Nanny Ainslee's popularity as the +gathering of folks who came to see her off. + +Fanny had stopped at the drug store and bought some headache pills. + +"This excitement and hurry and you not scarcely eating any supper is +apt to give you a bad headache. They'll come handy. And here's some +seasick tablets. Martin says they're the newest thing out. And oh, +Nanny, when you're seeing all those new places and people just take an +extra look for me, seeing as I'll never know the color of the ocean." + +Uncle Tony was tending to Nanny's hand luggage and in his heart wishing +he could go along, even though he knew that one week spent away from +his beloved hardware store would be the death of him. + +It was a neighborly crowd that waited for the 10:27. And as it waited +Jim Tumley started singing "Auld Lang Syne." He began very softly but +soon the melody swelled to a clear sweetness that hushed the laughing +chatter and stilled the shuffling feet of the Pullman passengers who +crowded the train vestibules or strolled in weary patience along the +station platform. + +Then the 10:27 swung around the curve and the good-bys began. + +"So long, dear folks! I shall write. Don't you dare cry, Grandma. +I'll be back next lilac time. Remember, oh, just remember, all you +Green Valley folks, that I'll be back when the lilacs bloom again!" + +Nanny's voice, husky with laughter and tears, rippled back to the +cluster of old neighbors waving hats and handkerchiefs. They watched +her standing in the golden light of the car doorway until the train +vanished from their sight. Then they drifted away in twos and threes. + +From the dimmest corner of the observation platform a man had witnessed +the departure of Nanny Ainslee. He had heard Jim's song, had caught +the girl's farewells. And now he was delightedly repeating to himself +her promise--"I'll be back when the lilacs bloom again." + +Then quite suddenly he stepped from the train and made his way to where +the magenta-pink and violet lights of Martin's drugstore glowed in the +night. He bought a soda and some magazines and asked the druggist an +odd question. + +"When," asked the stranger, smiling, "will the lilacs bloom again in +this town?" + +Martin, who for hours had been rushing madly about, waiting on the +thirsty crowd of stalled visitors, stopped to stare. But he answered. +Something in the mysteriously rich face of the big, brown boy made him +eager to answer. + +"From the middle of next May on into early June." + +The stranger smiled his thanks in a way that made Martin look at his +clerk with a mournful eye. + +"Jee-rusalem! Now, Eddie, why can't you smile like that? Say, if I +had _that_ fellow behind this soda counter I'd be doing a rushing +business every night." + +When the Limited was again winging its way toward the Golden West and +train life had settled down to its regular routine, one dining-car +waiter was saying to another: + +"Yes, sah--the gentleman in Number 7 is sure the mighty-nicest white +man I eber did see. And he sure does like rice. Says he comes from +India where everybody eats it all the time. I ain' sure but what that +man ain' a sure-enough prince." + + + + +CHAPTER II + +SPRING IN GREEN VALLEY + +Traveling men have a poor opinion of it. Ministers of the gospel have +been known to despair of it. Socially ambitious matrons move out of it, +or, if that is not possible, despise it. Real estate men can not get +rich in it. And humorless folk sometimes have a hard, sad time of it in +Green Valley. + +But Uncle Tony, the slowest man in town but the very first at every fire +and accident, says that once, when the Limited was stalled at the Old +Roads Corner, a crowd of swells gathered on the observation platform and +sized up the town. + +One official, who--Uncle Tony says--couldn't have been anything less than +a Chicago alderman, said right out loud: + +"Great Stars! What peace--and cabbages!" + +And another said solemnly, said he, "This is the place to come to when +you have lost your last friend." And there was no malice, only a hungry +longing in his voice. + +The stylish, white-haired woman who, Uncle Tony guessed, must have been +the alderman's wife, said, "Oh--John! What healing, lovely gardens!" + +There's always a silly little wind fooling around the Old Roads Corners +and so you get all the sweet smells from Grandma Wentworth's herb garden +and all the heavenly fragrance that the flower gardens of this end of +town send out. + +Standing there you can look into any number of pretty yards but +especially Ella Higgins'. Of course Ella's yard and garden is a wonder. +It's been handed down from one old maid relative to another till in +Ella's time it does seem as if every wild and home flower that ever +bloomed was fairly rooted and represented there. It's in Ella's garden +that the first wild violets bloom; where the first spring beauty nods +under the bushes of bridal wreath; where the last chrysanthemum glows. + +Everybody in town got their lilies-of-the-valley roots and their yellow +roses from Ella. Her peonies and roses, pansies and forget-me-nots are +known clear over in Bloomingdale and bespoken by flower lovers in Spring +Road. And as for her tulips, well--there are little flocks of them +everywhere about, looking for all the world like crowds of gayly dressed +babies toddling off to play. + +The only time that poor Fanny Foster came near making trouble was when +she said that of course Ella's place was all right but that it had no +style or system, and that you couldn't have a proper garden without a +gardener. Ella had scolded Fanny's children for carelessly stripping the +lilacs. + +Fanny Foster is as wonderful in her way as Ella's garden, though not so +beautiful at first sight. Of course Green Valley loves Fanny Foster. +Green Valley has reason to. Fanny did Green Valley folks a great service +one still spring morning. But strangers just naturally misunderstand +Fanny. They see only a tall, sharp-edged wisp of a woman with a mass of +faded gold hair carelessly pinned up and two wide-open brown eyes fairly +aching with curiosity. You have to know Fanny a long time before the +poignant wistfulness of her clutches at your heart, before you can know +the singular sweetness of her nature. And even when you come to love her +you keep wishing that her collars were pinned on straight and that her +skirts were hung evenly at the bottom. There are those who remember the +time when Fanny was a beautiful girl, happy-go-lucky but always +kind-hearted. Now she is famous for her marvelous instinct for news +gathering and her great talent in weaving the odds and ends of +commonplace daily living into an interesting, gossipy yarn. Green Valley +without Fanny Foster would not be Green Valley, for she is a town +institution. + +However, before going any further into Green Valley's special characters +and institutions it would be well to get a general feel of the town into +one's mind. For it is only when you know how cozily Green Valley sets in +its hollows, how quaintly its old tree-shaded roads dip and wander about +over little sunny hills and through still, deep woods that you can guess +the charm of it, can believe in the joyousness of it. For Green Valley +is a joyous, sweetly human old town to those who love and understand it. + +Take an early spring day when the winter's wreck and rust and deadness +seem to be everywhere. Yet here in the Green Valley roads and streets +little warm winds are straying, looking for tulip beds and spring +borders. The sunshine that elsewhere looks thin and pale drops warmly +here into back yards and ripples ever so brightly up and down Rabbit's +Hill, where the hedges are turning green and David Allan is plowing. + +The willows back of Dell Parsons' house are budding and all aquiver with +the wildly glad, full-throated warblings of robins, bluebirds, red-winged +blackbirds and bobolinks. While somewhere from the swaying tops of last +year's reeds, up from the grassy slopes of Churchill's meadow, comes the +sweet, clear call of meadow larks. + +In the ditches the cushioning moss is green and through the brown tangled +weeds along Silver Creek the new grass is peeping. The sunny clearing +back of Petersen's woods will be full of mushrooms as the days deepen. +And already there are big golden dandelions in Widow Green's orchard. + +In these still, warm noons you can hear through the waiting, echoing air +the laughing shouts of playing children and the low-dropping honk of the +wild geese that in a scarcely quivering line are sailing northward across +the reedy lowlands which the gentle spring rains will turn into soft, +violet, misty marshes. + +The last bit of frost has thawed out of the old Glen Road and in the +young sunshine it seems to laugh goldenly as it climbs up, up to Jim +Gray's squatty, weathered little farmhouse. The eastern windows of this +little silver-gray house are gay with blossoming house plants and across +the back dooryard, flapping gently in the spring breeze, is a line of +gayly colored bed quilts. For Martha Gray has begun her house-cleaning. + +The woodsy part of Grove Street, the part that was opened up only five +years ago and is called Lovers' Lane because it curves and winds +mysteriously through a lovely bit of woodland, is already shimmering with +the life and beauty of spring. + +Down on Fern Avenue, which is a wide, grassy road and no avenue at all, +Uncle Roger Allan is carefully painting his chicken coops. Roger Allan +is a tall, twinkling, smooth-shaven old man, and he lives in a house as +twinkling and as tidy as himself. He is a bachelor, but years ago he +took little David from the dead arms of an unhappy, wild young stepsister +and has brought him up as his own. People used to know the reasons why +Roger Allan had never married but few remember now. Here he is at any +rate, painting his chicken coops and standing still every now and then to +stare off at Rabbit's Hill where his boy, tall, sturdy David Allan, is +plowing the warm, black fields. + +Up in a narrow lane, at the side window of a blind-looking little house, +sits Mrs. Rosenwinkle. She is German and badly paralyzed and she +believes that the earth is flat and that if you walked far enough out +beyond Petersen's pasture you would most certainly fall off. She also +believes that only Lutherans like herself can go to heaven. But to-day, +beside the open window, with a soft, wooing, eiderdown little breeze +caressing her face, she is happy and unworried, her eyes busy with the +tender world and the two chubby grandchildren tumbling gleefully about in +the still lane. + +In his little square shoe shop built out from his house Joe Baldwin is +arranging his spring stock in his two modest show windows. Joe is a +widower with two boys, a gentle voice, a gentle, wondering mind, and a +remarkable wart in the very center of his left palm. His shop is a +sunny, cheerful room with plenty of benches and chairs. The little shop +has a soft gray awning for the hot days and a wide-eyed competent stove +for cold ones. Nobody but Grandma Wentworth and such other folks like +Roger Allan ever suspect the real reason for all those comfortable +sitting-down places in Joe's shop. And Joe never tells a soul that it is +just an idea of his for keeping his own two boys and the boys of other +men under his eye. In Joe's gentle opinion the hotel and livery barn and +blacksmith shop are not exactly the best places for young boys to +frequent. But of course Joe never mentions such opinions out loud even +to the boys. He just makes his shop as inviting and homelike as +possible, keeps the daily papers handy on the counter and a basket of +nuts or apples maybe under his workbench. He is never lonely nor does he +miss a bit of news though he seldom goes anywhere but to the barber shop +on Saturdays and to church on Sundays. + +Out on her sunny cellar steps sits Mrs. Jerry Dustin, sorting onion sets +and seed potatoes. She is a little, rounded old lady with silvery hair, +the softest, smoothest, fairest of complexions, forget-me-not eyes and a +smile that is as gladdening as a golden daffodil. Few people know that +she has in her heart a longing to see the world, a longing so intense, a +life-long wanderlust so great that had she been a man it would have swept +her round the globe. But she has never crossed the State line. She has +big sons and daughters who all somehow have inherited their father's +stay-at-home nature. Her youngest boy, Peter, however, is only seventeen +and on him she has built her last hopes. He, like herself, has a gipsy +song in his heart and she often dreams of the places they will visit +together. + +And while she is waiting for Peter to grow up she travels about and +around Green Valley. She wanders far up the Glen Road into the deep +fairy woods between Green Valley and Spring Road. Here she strays alone +for hours, searching for ferns and adventure. + +Once a week she rides away to the city where she spends the morning in +the gay and crowded stores and the afternoon in the Art Institute. She +never wearies of seeing pictures. She never, if she can help it, misses +an exhibition, and whenever the day's doings have not tired her too much +this little old lady will steal off to the edge of the great lake and +dream of what lies in the world beyond its rim. She often wishes she +could paint the restless stretch of water but though she knows its every +mood and though she is a wonderful judge of pictures she can not +reproduce except in words the lovely nooks and beauty spots of her little +world. + +Perhaps it is this knowledge of her limitations that causes that little +strain of wistful sadness to creep into her voice sometimes and that +sends her very often out beyond the town, south along Park Lane to the +little Green Valley cemetery. + +She loves to read on the mossy stones the unchanging little histories, so +brief but so eloquent, some of them. The stone that interests her most +and that each time seems like a freshly new adventure is the simple shaft +that bears no name, no date, just the tenderly sweet and pathetic little +message: + + "I miss Thee so." + +Mrs. Jerry Dustin knows very well for whom that low green bed was made +and who has had that little message of lonely love cut into stone. But +she longs to know the rest of the story. + +Sometimes she has a real adventure. It was here at the cemetery one day +that she met Bernard Rollins, the artist. He was out sketching the +fields that lie everywhere about, rounding and rolling off toward the +horizon with the roofs of homesteads and barns just showing above the +swells, with crows circling about the solitary clusters of trees, and men +and horses plodding along the furrows. + +No artist could have passed Mrs. Jerry Dustin by, for in her face and +about her was the beauty that she had for years fed her soul. So Rollins +spoke to her that summer day and they are friends now, great friends. +She visits his studio frequently and he tells her all about France or +Venice or wherever he has spent his busy summer. And she sits and +listens happily. + +Rollins bought out what used to be in Chicago's young days an old tavern +and half-way house. It was a dilapidated old ruin, crumbling away in a +shaggy old orchard full of gnarled and ancient apple trees, satin-skinned +cherry trunks, some plums and peaches, and tangled shrubs of all kinds. + +With the aid of his wife Elizabeth, some dollars and much work, Rollins +transformed the old ruin into the sort of a country place that one reads +about and imagines only millionaires may have. They say that when Old +Skinflint Holden saw the transformation he stood stock-still, then tied +his team to the artistic hitching post under the old elms and went in +search of Rollins. He found him in the orchard in the laziest of +hammocks literally worshipping the flowering trees all about him. Old +Skinflint Holden was awed. + +"Jehohasaphat! Bern, how did you do it?" + +"Oh," smiled the artist, "we cleaned and patched it, put on a new bit +here and there and sort of nursed it into shape. Doc Philipps gave us +bulbs and seeds and loads of advice and then Elizabeth, I guess, sort of +loved it into a home." + +"Well--I guess," mused Skinflint Holden. "Must have cost you a pretty +penny?" + +"Why, no, it didn't. I'm telling you it wasn't a matter of dollars so +much as love. If you use plenty of that you can economize on the money +somewhat. Of course, it means work but love always means service, you +know." + +Old Skinflint Holden couldn't understand that sort of talk. It was said +that love was one of the things he knew nothing about. His great star +was money. He had had a chance to buy the old tavern but had seen no +possibilities in it of any kind. So he had passed it up and now a man +whose star was love and home had made a paradise of the hopeless ruin. + +"And I'll be danged if he didn't have a whole small field of them there +blue lilies that the children calls flags, over to one corner looking so +darn pretty, like a chunk of sky had dropped there. I'd a never believed +it if I hadn't saw it. I guess Doc Philipps didn't give him them." + +Rollins is a great crony of Doc Philipps who almost any day of the year +may be caught burrowing in the ground. For Doc Philipps is a tree maniac +and father to every little green growing thing. He knows trees as a +mother knows her children and he never sets foot outside his front gate +without having tucked somewhere into the many pockets about his big +person a stout trowel, some choice apple seeds, peach and cherry stones +or seedlings of trees and shrubs. In every ramble, and he is a great +walker, he searches for a spot where a tree seedling might grow to +maturity and the minute he finds such a place off comes his coat, back +goes his broad-rimmed hat and out comes the trowel and seed. Travelers +driving along the road and catching sight of the big man on his knees say +to each other, "There's Doc Philipps, planting another tree." + +Up in the big, prim old Howe house sits Madam Howe. She is called Madam +to distinguish her from her daughter-in-law, Mrs. George Howe. She is a +regal old lady of eighty-three and spends most of her time in her room +up-stairs where are gathered the wonderful heirlooms,--older, far older +than she. + +There is the mellow brown spinning wheel, and armchairs nearly two +hundred years old and a walnut table that was mixed up in countless +weddings and a beautifully carved old chest and a brocade-covered settee. +There are old, old books and family portraits and there is the wonderful +Madam herself, regal and silver-haired. If she likes you she will take +you to her great room and tell you about the Revolutionary War as it +happened in and to her family; and about her great ride westward in the +prairie schooner; about the Indians and the babyhood of great cities, and +the lovely wild flowers of the virgin prairie; about the wild animals, +the snakes, the pioneer men and women of what is now only the Middle West. + +She will take from out that age-darkened, beautiful chest dresses and +bits of lace and samplers like the one that hangs framed above her +writing desk and tells how it was stitched by one, + + ABIGAIL WINSLOW PAGE, + Age 13. + +There is one thing you must always remember if you wish to stand in +Madam's good graces. You must never sit down on the brocade-covered +settee with the beautiful rose wreath hand-carved on its gracefully +curving walnut back. Some day when she gets to know you very well she +will tell you of the wonderful love stories that were enacted on that +settee. She will begin away, away back with some great-great-grandmother +or some great-grand-aunt and come gradually down to her own time and +history; and as she tells of the young years of her life, her eyes will +go dreaming off into the past and she will forget you entirely. And you +will slip away from that great room and leave her sitting there, regal +and silver haired, her face mellow and sweet with the golden memories of +far, by-gone days. + +You can wander in this happy, aimless fashion all about Green Valley, go +in and out its deep-rooted old homes, stroll through its tree-guarded old +streets, and at every turn taste romance and adventure, revel in beauty +of some sort. Even the old, red-brick creamery, ugly in itself, is a +thing of beauty when seen against a sunset sky. + +The people who pass you on the streets all smile and nod, stranger though +you are. And if you happen to be at the little undistinguished depot +just as the 6:10 pulls in, you will see pouring joyously out of it the +Green Valley men, those who every day go to the great city to work and +every night come thankfully back to their little home town to live. + +They hurry along in twos and threes, waving newspaper and hand greetings +to the home folks and the store proprietors who stand in their doorways +to watch them go by. + +There is a fragrant smell of supper in the air and a slight feel of +coming rain. Here and there a mother calls a belated child. Doors slam, +dogs bark and a baby frets loudly somewhere. In somebody's chicken coop +a frightened, dozing hen gargles its throat and then goes to sleep again. +The frogs along Silver Creek and in Wimple's pond are going full blast, +and in her fragrant herb garden stands Grandma Wentworth. She is looking +at the gold-smudged western sky and watching the sweet, spring night sift +softly down on Green Valley. + +She stands there a long time sensing the great tide of new life that is +flushing the world into a new, tingling beauty. She sees the lacy +loveliness of the birches, the budding green glory of her garden. Then +she smiles as she tells herself: + +"It won't be long now till the lilacs bloom again. Nanny will be here +soon now. And who knows! Cynthia's boy may come back to live in his +mother's old home." + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE LAST OF THE CHURCHILLS + +Even in beautiful Los Angeles days can be rainy and full of gnawing +cold and gloom. + +On such a day Joshua Churchill lay dying. He could have died days +before had he cared to let himself do so. But he was holding on grimly +to the life he no longer valued and held off as grimly the death he +really craved. He was waiting for the coming of the boy who was so +soon to be the last of the Churchills. + +He meant, this grim old man, to live long enough to greet the boy whom +he remembered first as a baby, then as a little chap of ten, and later +as a shy boy of seventeen. + +Joshua Churchill had been to India several times. But he had never +stayed long. He said that no man who had spent the greater part of his +life in Green Valley could ever be happy or feel at home anywhere else. + +Joshua Churchill went to India to see his daughter and grandson; but +mostly to coax that daughter's wonderful husband to give up his +fanatically zealous work among the heathen of the Orient and come and +live in peace and plenty in a little Yankee town where there was a drug +store and a post office and a mossy gray old stone church with a mellow +bell in its steeple. + +The wonderful and big son-in-law always listened respectfully to his +big Yankee father-in-law. Then he would smile and point to the little +brown babies lying sick in their mothers' arms. + +"Somebody," he would say gently, "must help and heal and neighbor with +these people." + +As there was no answer that could be made to this the Yankee +father-in-law said nothing. But the very last time he was in India he +looked sharply at his daughter and then said wearily and bitterly: + +"Sinner and saint--we men are all alike. We each in our own way kill +the women we love. Cynthia is dying for a sight of Green Valley and +Green Valley folks." + +At that Cynthia's husband cried out. But Joshua Churchill did not stay +to argue. He went away and never came back. He wanted of course to go +back to Green Valley. But he could not bear to live alone in the big +house where he had once been so happy. So he went instead into exile. +And now he was dying in California. + +As for Cynthia's husband, he discovered when it was too late to do any +good that while he had been saving the souls and the children of alien +women and men he had let the woman who was dearer to him than life die +slowly and unnoticed. Saints have always done that and they always +will. + +Joshua Churchill meant to stay alive long enough to explain the +shortcomings of both saints and sinners to the boy who was the last of +the Churchills. He had half a mind to exact a promise from the boy. +He meant too to tell him a long and a rather strange story and implore +him to beware of a number of things. + +But when Cynthia's son,--tall, bronzed and serene, smiled down on the +old man who even in death had the look of a master, the warnings, the +bitterness melted away and Joshua Churchill smiled back and sighed +gratefully. + +"Well, son,--I don't know as that saint father of yours and your +sinning granddad made such a mess of things after all. It's something +to give the world a man. Go back home to Green Valley and marry a +Green Valley girl." + +And without bothering to say another word Joshua Churchill died. + +Nanny came back to her valley town when the budded lilacs dripped with +rain and the wooded hillsides were blurred with spring mists. + +But Green Valley rain never bothered Nanny Ainslee. Those who were not +out to greet her telephoned as soon as they heard she was back home +again. + +And just as she had gone to help pack, Grandma Wentworth came to help +unpack. There were three trunks besides those Nanny had taken, from +Green Valley. Nanny laughed and chuckled as she explained. + +"The joke's on father. We met up with a nice American chap on our +travels. He was so likable that father, who was pretty homesick by +that time and would have loved anything American, fell in love with +him. I can't quite understand why I didn't lose my head too. I came +mighty near it once or twice. But the minute I'd think of that boy +here in Green Valley I'd grow cool and calm. That's all that saved me, +I believe. But father was quite taken with him and being a man he felt +sure that I must be. He was so sure that my maiden days were over that +he dared to be funny. One day he sent up these three brand new trunks +to the hotel. Said I might as well get my trousseau while I was +gadding about this time. Well--I was pretty mad for a minute. But I +concluded that father wasn't the only one in our family who is fond of +a joke. So I just blushed properly and went off shopping. And I tell +you, Grandma, Green Valley will just grow cross-eyed looking at the +pretties that I have in these treasure chests. I showed Dad every +mortal thing I bought and asked his advice and was oh, so shy--and +wondered if he just _could_ let me spend so much; and Dad just laughed +and said he guessed an only daughter could be a bit extravagant, and to +just go ahead. So I smiled again shyly and demurely and went ahead. +And when not so much as a bit of ribbon or a chiffon veil could be +squeezed in anywhere I shut those trunks and sat on them and swung my +feet and bet Dad that I wouldn't marry that boy after all. And he was +so sure that he was rid of me at last and that he could start out on +his next trip blissfully free and alone that he bet me Jim Gray's +Gunshot that I'd be married in six months to the gentleman in question. +Of course it was a disgraceful business, the two of us betting on a +thing like that, but somehow we never thought of that, we were so busy +teasing each other. Well, of course Dad lost. I refused that nice +chap three times in one week. And here I am, heart-free still, with +three trunks of booty and the finest, blackest, and swiftest little +horse in the county--mine. This has certainly been a profitable trip! +Poor Dad, he's so delightfully old-fashioned. He does so believe in +early marriages and husbands and wedding veils. And he thinks that +twenty-three is absolutely a grewsome age. Poor Dad! And he says too +that for what I have done to him in this trunk deal I shall be duly +punished. That the good Lord who looks after the fathers of willful, +old-maidish daughters will see to that. Why, he has gone so far as to +say that he wouldn't be surprised if I wound up by marrying some weird +country minister. Fancy that! Why, that from father is almost a +curse. And he's worried sick about my riding Gunshot. But I shall +manage. So expect to see me dash up to your gate in great style any +day now." + +"Nanny," warned Grandma, "I don't trust that horse either. You'd +better be mighty careful. That horse isn't mean but it's young and +scary." + +Nan however laughed at fear and rode all about and around Green Valley +town. And then one evening when she was least watchful and tired from +the long day's sport, a glaring red motor came honking unexpectedly +around the corner. So sudden was its appearance, so startling its body +in the sunset light, so shrill its screeching siren, that the young +horse reared. And Nan, caught unprepared, was helpless. + +From the various groups of people standing about figures detached +themselves and shot across the square. But before any one could reach +her or even see how it happened, a tall stranger was holding the daring +girl close against his breast with one arm, and the quivering young +horse with the other. + +He was reassuring the frightened animal and looking quietly down at the +girl's face against his breast. Under that quiet look Nan's blue-white +lips flushed with life and she tried to smile gratefully. When he +smiled back and said, "So you _did_ get back by lilac time," Nan was +well enough to wonder what he meant. And the little crowd of rescuers +arrived only just in time to hear Nanny thanking him. + +But when he asked her where in Green Valley town Mary Wentworth lived +everybody stared and listened. Even Nan came near staring. But after +the puzzled look her face broke into a smile. + +"Oh--you mean Grandma Wentworth?" + +He smiled too and said, "Perhaps. I am a stranger in Green Valley. +But my mother was a Green Valley girl. She was Cynthia Churchill and +Mary Wentworth was her dearest friend." + +"Then you are--why, you must be--" stammered Nanny. + +"I am Cynthia Churchill's son." + +"From India?" questioned Nan. + +"From India," he said quietly. + +From out the group of Green Valley folks, now dim in the May twilight, +a voice spoke. + +"You may come from India but if you are Cynthia Churchill's son you are +a Green Valley man and this is home. So I say--welcome home." + +Roger Allan, straight and tall and speaking with a sweetness in his +voice those listening had never heard before, stepped up to the young +man with outstretched hand. + +The young stranger looked for a moment at the dimming streets, into the +kindly faces about him, and then shook hands gladly. + +"It is good to be home," he said, "but I wish I had mother here with +me." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +A RAINY DAY + +On a rainy day Green Valley is just as interesting as it is in the +sunshine. Somehow though the big trees sag and drip and the wind sighs +about the corners there is nothing mournful about the streets. + +The children go to school just as joyously in raincoats and rubber +boots. Their round glad faces, minus a tooth here and there, smile up +at you from under big umbrellas. After the school bell rings the +streets do get quiet but there is nothing depressing about that; for as +you pass along you see at doors and windows the contented faces of busy +women. + +Old Mrs. Walley sits at her up-stairs front window sewing carpet rags. +Grandma Dudley at her sitting room window is darning her +grandchildren's stockings and carefully watching the street. Whenever +anybody passes to whom she wants to talk she taps on the window with +her thimble. She is a dear entertaining old soul but hard to get away +from. Women with bread at home waiting to be put into pans and men +hungry for their supper try not to let Grandma Dudley catch sight of +them. + +Bessie Williams always makes cinnamon buns or doughnuts on rainy days. +She always leaves her kitchen door open while she is doing this because +she says she likes to hear the rain while she is working--that it +soothes her nerves. + +So as you come up from around Bailey's strawberry patch and Tumley's +hedge you get a whiff of such deliciousness as makes your mouth water. +And more than likely Bessie sees you and comes running out with a few +samples of her heavenly work. As you dispose of those cinnamon buns +you forget that Bessie's voice is a trifle too high and too sweet, and +that she is inclined to be at times a bit overly religious and too +watchful of what she calls "vice" in people. + +Over in front of the hotel Seth Curtis is standing up in his wagon and +sawing his horses' mouths cruelly. Seth has been so viciously +mistreated in his youth that he now abuses at times the very things +that he loves. He has paid two hundred and fifty dollars apiece for +those horses and is mighty proud of them. But Seth's temper is never +good on a rainy day. Rain means no teaming and a money loss. Seth is +a mite too conscious of money. At any rate, the loss of even a dollar +makes him a sullen and at the least provocation an angry man. He isn't +liked much except by his wife and children. + +In his home Seth is gentle and kind. Maybe because here he finds the +love and trust that all his life he has craved and been denied. Few of +his neighbors know how he laughs and romps and sings with his children +and what wonderful yarns he tells them, all made up out of his own head. + +He is known to come from York State and has a Yankee shrewdness that +some people say can at times be called something else. He is wide and +square-shouldered though short, has a round stubborn head of reddish +hair with a promising bald spot, close-set blue eyes and an annoying, +almost an insulting habit of paying all his bills promptly and asking +odds and favors of nobody. + +To-day he was to have taken a load of stones, granite niggerheads of +all sizes, up to Colonel Stratton's place. The Colonel is going to +make a fern bed around his summer house. + +Colonel Stratton is a real military colonel. He wears burnsides and +they are very becoming. He has the most beautifully located residence +in Green Valley and like Doc Philipps has some of the most beautiful +trees in town. The great silver-leaf poplar guarding the wide front +lawns and the magnificent hardwood maples are the pride of the +colonel's heart. + +The colonel has a cultivated garden that keeps his gardener pretty +busy. But the wild-flower garden along the rambling old north fence +the colonel tends himself. In June it is a hedge of lovely wild roses +followed a little later by masses of purple phlox. Then come the +meadow lilies and the painted cup and so on, until in late October you +can not see the old fence for the goldenrod, asters and gentians. + +Today the colonel hoped to work on his fern bed but the weather being +what it is he takes instead from his well-filled book shelves "The +Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" and settles down to a day of +solid joy. + +In the big, softly stained house that stands in the solemn shade of +immense pines, just diagonally across from the colonel's house, lives +and labors Joshua Stillman, a man with the most wonderful memory, the +readiest tongue when there is real need of it, a little man brimful of +the most varied information and the sharpest humor. + +For forty years and more he has been Green Valley's self-appointed +librarian. He draws no salary except the joy of doing what he loves to +do and he squanders, as his friends truly suspect, much secret money of +his own on it. The library is housed in the old church in a room so +small and dark that it hides the big work of this little man. + +Joshua Stillman must be old but nobody ever thinks of what his age +might be, he is so very much alive. He goes to the city every day and +comes back early every afternoon. As he so seldom talks about himself +nobody knows exactly what he does except that it has to do with books +and small print. + +Like Madam Howe, Joshua Stillman comes from the Revolutionary War +district and has great family traditions to uphold. He upholds them +with great humor. Not only is he full of old war and family lore, but +he has been mixed up with things literary. He has known men such as +Lowell and tells yarns about Emerson and Oliver Wendell Holmes. + +He too came West in a prairie schooner and remembers all its wildness, +its uncouthness, its railroadless state. And he tells marvellous +stories about snakes, Indians and the little Chicago town built out on +the mudflats. He remembers very well indeed the steady stream of +ox-teams toiling over the few crude state roads. And he has in his +house rare volumes, valuable editions of famous works. He lets you +examine these if he thinks you are trustworthy and have a gentle way +with books. + +There is another rare soul, the Reverend Alexander Campbell, who must +be introduced this rainy spring day. He is a retired Green Valley +minister and is full of humor and wisdom. He is an easily traced +descendant of the Scottish Stuarts. On a rainy day you will always +find him busy writing up the history of his family. Not that he +himself cares a fig for his genealogy. He is writing the book because +it gives him something to do and earns him a little peace from the +women folks. + +He is a man whom the Lord has seen fit to try with a host of female +relatives, all family proud. He can fight the Devil and has done so +quite gallantly in four or five volumes of really good old-fashioned +sermons, "books," as he will tell you with a twinkle in his eye, "that +nobody could or would read nowadays." But he can not fight the women +of his family, so with a mournful chuckle he sits down every rainy day +and labors mightily on this great "historical work." + +On sunny days he goes about his grounds, petting his trees and his +chickens, and working in his garden. He has several ingenious methods +of fighting weeds and raises the earliest, best and latest sweet corn +in Green Valley. + +But men like the Colonel and Joshua Stillman and the Reverend Alexander +Campbell are representatives of Green Valley's leisure class. They +give Green Valley its high peace, its aristocratic flavor. But they +are a little remote from the town's workday life, being given to dreams +and memories and scholarly pursuits. They know little of the doings +and talks that go on in Billy Evans' livery barn, or the hotel. They +do, of course, go to the barber shop, the bank and the postoffice, and +always when abroad give courteous greeting to every townsman. But they +have never sat in the smoky, red-painted blacksmith shop or among the +patriarchs and town wits who in summer keep open-air sessions on the +wide, inviting platform in front of Uncle Tony's hardware store, and in +winter hold profound meetings around the store's big, glowing stove. + +Uncle Tony's is the most social spot in town and is from a +news-gathering point of view most ideally situated. Sitting in one of +the smooth-worn old armchairs that Uncle Tony always keeps handy, you +can view the very heart of Green Valley's business life. Without +turning your head scarcely you can keep an eye on Martin's drug store, +keep tab on the comings and goings of the town's two doctors, and the +hotel's arriving and departing guests. If a commotion of any kind +occurs in front of Robert Hill's general store you see all the details +without losing count of the various parties who go in and out of Green +Valley's new bank. + +Twice a day the active part of Green Valley dribbles into the +post-office where friends instantly pair off and mere acquaintances +stand idly by and discuss the weather. Besides its mail, Green Valley +usually buys two cents' worth of yeast and a dozen of baker's buns and +then goes down the street and orders its regular groceries at Jessup's. + +Jessup's has been the one Green Valley grocery store ever since the +flood or thereabout, so venerable an establishment is it. Green Valley +would as soon think of changing its name as permitting a new grocer to +open up a rival store. And nobody dreams of disloyalty when buying +trifles at the post-office. In fact housewives are openly glad that +Dick, the postmaster, has taken to keeping strictly fresh yeast for +their leisure days and nice bakery things for times of stress and +unexpected company. + +Dick Richards is a small, smiling, curly-headed man who looks older +than he should. This is because he wears a big man's mustache and is a +self-made boy. His parents died when he was barely old enough to +realize his loss and since then he has fought the world without a +single weapon unless cheerfulness and a giant patience can be called +weapons. Small, ungifted, he early learned to be content with little. +But side by side with this cheerful content is always the giant hope of +great things to come. And so though Green Valley buys only its yeast +and buns over his little counter he is happy and wraps each purchase up +carefully. And all the time he is thoughtfully, carefully setting out +other handy things and aids to the harassed housewife. For with his +giant patience Dick is waiting,--waiting and planning for a time that +is coming, that he knows must come. He talks these matters over with +no one except Joe Baldwin. He and Joe are great friends. Joe's little +shop is such a restful, hopeful place and Joe himself a gentle rather +than a loud and swearing man. One can talk things over joyfully with +Joe and feel sure of having one's confidence understood and kept. Like +Joe, Dick shrinks a little from the noisy, wholly earthy atmosphere of +the livery barn and blacksmith shop. He and Joe often go together of a +Saturday to the barber shop. They usually stay after closing hours for +the barber is their mutual friend. + +This barber, John Gans, is a talker, a somewhat fierce and vehement +little man who lectures on many subjects but mostly on human rights and +politics. Joe and Dick, both silent men, look with awe at John's great +mental and discoursive powers. And because his views are theirs they +listen with something like joyful gratitude to hear their own thoughts +so clearly and fearlessly expressed. + +The fiery little barber is thought by some to be a German anarchist and +by others a Russian socialist. Joe and Dick have been repeatedly +warned against him. But they are his loyal friends at all times. This +three-cornered friendship is little understood by the town and +ridiculed as a childish thing by the great minds that foregather at +Uncle Tony's. + +But Grandma Wentworth remarked one Saturday afternoon, right in the +heart of town too, when Main Street was so crowded that everything that +was said aloud would be told and retold at church the next moraine and +repeated through the countryside the week following,--pointing to Joe, +Dick and John who all three happened to be going to the bank for +change,--"There go Green Valley's three good little men. And that +makes me think. I have another letter from Nanny Ainslee from Italy +enclosing foreign stamps for John." + +Now until then nobody knew that John Gans was collecting stamps. But +that's Grandma Wentworth. She always knows things about people that +nobody else knows. And when any Green Valley folks go a-traveling they +sooner or later write to Grandma Wentworth. Sooner or later they get +homesick for Green Valley and they write for news to the one person +who, they know, will not fail to answer. + +Of course some of them, like Jamie Danby, get into trouble. Jamie ran +away from home with a third-rate show. The show got stranded somewhere +in the western desert and Jamie wanted to come home. He knew that his +mother would be glad to see him but he wasn't at all sure of his +father. So he wrote to Grandma Wentworth, begging her to fix things +up. And she did. + +And there was Tommy Dudley who went away home-steading somewhere out +West and who writes regularly to Grandma Wentworth in this fashion: + +". . . for heaven's sake send me your baking-powder biscuit recipe and +how do you make buckwheat pancakes, and send me all kinds of vegetable +seeds and what's good for chicken lice and a sore throat, and tell +Carrie Bailey I ain't forgot her and that as soon as I've got things +going half-way straight here I'll come back and get her. Just now the +dog, the mules and chickens and a family of mice and I are all living +peacefully together in the one room but we're awful healthy if a good +appetite is any kind of a sign. I can't write to Carrie because her +folks open all her letters and they'd nag her into marrying that old +knock-kneed, squint-eyed, fat-necked son-of-a-gun of an Andrew Langly, +if they thought she was having anything to do with a worthless heathen +cuss like me. And say, Grandma, throw in some of your flower seeds, +those right out of your own garden, you know, the tall ones along the +fence and the little ones with the blue eyes and the still white ones +that smell so sweet. You don't know how lonesome I get off here. I've +got that picture of you in the sunbonnet right where it's handy, but +how I wish I had a picture of you without the sunbonnet so's I could +see your face, and say, Grandma, since I've been alone out here I've +come to see the sense in praying now and then, and tell Freddy Williams +I'll knock the stuffin's out of him when I hit town which will be in +about two years at the latest. He knows what for. Is Hank Lolly still +talking his way into three square meals a day and drinks, and is all +the news still ground over at Uncle Tony's gossip factory and is Mert +Hagley as big a tightwad as ever and is it true that Billy Evans +married a red-headed girl from Bloomingdale and started a livery barn, +and has Green Valley got a minister yet that's suitable to you and +Uncle Roger Allan? I'll have to stop and run out to the mail box with +this. The nearest one is twenty-five miles away but that's near in +this country and now for pity's sake, Grandma, don't forget . . ." + +She didn't forget a thing. The messages were all delivered, the seeds +sent off and every question fully answered. Grandma did more than +that. She had Nanny Ainslee take pictures of the various Green Valley +institutions while going full blast. How Tommy laughed at the familiar +faces in Uncle Tony's armchairs and at Hank Lolly leaning up against +the livery barn, and how homesick he grew as he looked at the crowd +getting off at the station, and the school children playing in the old +school yard where he used to play. The picture of Grandma Wentworth +and Carrie standing on Grandma's front porch hurt his throat and shook +him strangely. That was Tommy Dudley. + +And there was Susie Melton. Grandma saved and remade Susie that time +she went to New York to see the world. Susie had taught a country +school for twenty years, ever since she was sixteen, and that trip to +New York was her first vacation. Susie was an innocent soul and the +very second day in the great city some heartless thief took everything +out of her purse but a two-cent stamp. Susie was panic-stricken and +the only thing she could think of was Grandma Wentworth's face. So she +took that stamp and sent a letter to Green Valley and it was Grandma +Wentworth who really managed that vacation though to this day nobody +but she herself knows how and she won't tell. Susie came back so +rejuvenated, with such color in her cheeks, such brightness in her +eyes, and so much snap and spunk in her system that Jake Tuttle up and +married her two months after she came home. And he's been happy ever +since for in spite of her school-teaching handicap Susie has turned out +to be a born cook and housewife. And as if to make up to her those +twenty colorless years Providence sent Susie twin boys at the end of +her first year and twin girls at the end of the third. + +This blossoming out of little drab Susie Melton was a shock to Green +Valley. But Grandma Wentworth wasn't a mite surprised and said she +knew that Susie would come into her own some day. As for Jake, he is +so in love with his rosy little wife and his four good-looking children +that he just goes on raising bumper crops without hardly knowing how he +does it. And he says he doesn't hanker much after heaven; that home is +plenty good enough for him. And when he goes to town Jake takes care +to tie his team in front of Billy Evans' place instead of the hotel. + +"Not that I can't take a drink or two and stop," he explained to Billy, +"but I have good cider and buttermilk and Susie's grape juice to home +and the smartest of us ain't any too wise while we stand beside a bar. +And I'd ruther go home dead than go back to Susie and the children the +least bit silly with liquor. When the Almighty sends a man like me a +family like mine He's got something in His mind and I ain't agoing to +spoil things just for a drink or two of slops." + +So on rainy days Billy's office is the gathering place for such men as +find the atmosphere in the hotel and blacksmith shop a little too +fragrantly spirited for their eventual domestic happiness. + +Not that Billy is a teetotaler. No, indeed. He has his drink whenever +he wants it. And he good-naturedly permits such staggering wretches as +the hotel refuses to accommodate to sleep it off in his barns. And he +is the only man in Green Valley who ever seriously hired Hank Lolly and +kept him sober twelve hours at a stretch. The other business men make +considerable fun of Billy's hired help; the trifling boys he hires, +boys that everybody else has tried and sent packing. Billy says +nothing though he did explain fully to Grandma Wentworth once. + +"You see it's like this, Grandma. I ain't fixed to pay fancy wages +just yet and those kids that everybody runs down ought to be off the +streets doing something. Of course some of them _are_ trifling. But I +ain't such a stickler for sharp-edged goodness myself nor in any way at +all virtuous. I'm terrible easy-going myself and I know just how kids +like Charlie Pinley feel working for a man, a careful, exact man like +Mr. James D. Austin. By gosh! if I had to work a whole week for Mr. +Austin I'd kill myself. Never could stand too much neatness and +worrying about time being money and human nature too full of meanness. +No, sir,--I can't live like that. I guess maybe it's because I'm kind +of no-account myself that I understand these kids and they understand +me. They all like horses same as me and I pay them all I can afford +and will do more for them when things pick up and grow. + +"Now there's people as laugh about me hiring Hank Lolly. I guess it's +the first time Hank has ever held a job longer than a week. But I tell +you, Grandma, I like Hank and I understand him. And I don't ever think +I'm fit enough myself to be forever preaching at him about reforming. +I figure that what a man eats and drinks is none of my business in a +way. But I did explain to Hank that if he would come and work for me +I'd furnish him with so many drinks every day and meals and a +comfortable place to sleep. I showed him that it was better to be sure +of a few drinks every day than to get blind drunk on a week's wages and +then go weeks maybe without a decent spree, without decent meals, maybe +without underwear and an overcoat. And Hank saw the sense of that. He +gets his meals up at the house. My old woman (Billy's wife was a +pretty girl of twenty-three and still a bride) sides in with what I'm +doing and she sets Hank down every day to three square meals. And a +man just can't hold so much liquor on a comfortably filled stomach. +Anyhow, Hank is doing fine and I'm putting a few dollars in the bank +unbeknownst for him. I can't trust him just yet with any noticeable +amount of cash. But I'm never down on him for his drinking. No, sir! +Every time he feels that he must get drunk or die why he just comes up +and tells me and I get him whatever he thinks he needs for his jag and +let him get full right here where I can watch him. Why--Grandma, Hank +has an easier life than I have. He doesn't need to worry about +anything and he knows it. And I'll be goshed if I don't think he's +improving. He don't need a jag near so often as he used to and I can +trust him now with any kind of work. Why, only last week I gave him a +moving job, a big one, and sent him off twenty miles with my two best +teams. And he brought those loads of furniture back O. K., dry and +without a scratch, though I couldn't sleep all night listening to the +buckets of rain dashing against the house and thinking of Hank drunk +out there in it with the furniture and wagons in splinters and the +horses dead maybe. And honest, when I saw him pull up into the barns, +I just hauled him off that seat and--well--I just said things, told him +what I thought of him and how I appreciated what he'd done. 'And now, +Hank,' I says, 'you can have the greatest old jag you've ever planned +on for this.' + +"And I'm goshed if he didn't laugh out kind of funny and says he, +'Billy, I'm so goldarned wet right now that I couldn't stand another +drop of wetness anywhere. But all these five hours that the rain was +a-sloshing me I kept thinking of them there apple dumplings with cream +that Mrs. Evans makes (Hank always calls the old woman Mrs. Evans). +So, Billy, if it's all the same to you and I could get full on them +there apple dumplings, why, them's my choice.' + +"Well--say, I just jumped to the telephone and I guess the old woman +was making apple dumplings before I got through talking. Anyway, Hank +filled up so that he said he felt like a flour barrel with an apple +tree a-sprouting out of it. And Doc Philipps says it's a good sign, +Hank liking sweet things that way, because a man soaked in alcohol +can't abide sweets. + +"And so that's Hank. Now this week I hired that little spindle-legged +Barney boy. I hired him to keep this dumbed office clean so's my old +woman wouldn't raise such hell every time she steps in here. I'm +goshed if this here stove don't get fuller of ashes quicker than any +other stove in Green Valley. And you know the boys who come in here do +spit about careless like and that dumbed screen door is always open and +the calendars do get specked up considerable. And the old woman is +just where I don't want her being upset about anything. + +"Well, I hired that Barney boy to keep the place clean. You know that +So-and-So (we won't mention any names) fired him because he said the +kid stole money. Well, now--Grandma, you know that's a hard thing to +start out a boy in life with in a town of this size, especially a +little spindle-legged one at that. I felt real sorry for the young one +so I calls him in here day before yisterday and I says: + +"'Look here, Barney, could you keep this place clean?' + +"'Sure,' he says. + +"'All right, then sail in now. The broom's right behind the door +somewheres and scarcely used and there's sawdust and rags somewheres in +the barn. Ask Hank about them. And Barney,' I says, 'here's the money +in this right-hand drawer. Sometimes people come in when everybody's +out and you might have to make change.' + +"The boy kind of flushed but I didn't let on I noticed. I only said, +'You know, Barney, I'm just beginning this business and I'm poor so you +keep a sharp eye on the change and help me get this business going +lickety-split so's we'll all be rich together. For when the profits go +up here the wages are going up. It isn't just my livery barn, Barney, +but yours, too, so just you go to it and if ever you want anything or +make a mistake just you come and tell me and it'll be all right.' + +"Now, Grandma, that's all I said to that young one and I'll be goshed +if I don't think that kid's turning out to be the best bet I've made. +But, of course, I always think that about every one of them. But, +honestly, Grandma, Barney has brought in five new customers and last +week he kept chinning and holding on to a sixth man that come in here +until I came in and made the deal. Never let go of him a minute and +just entertained him to kill time and give me a chance to get here. +And I'm going to buy some books to learn myself and Barney bookkeeping. +We can't none of us keep books here and that dumbed account book is +lost every time you want it and I've got the poorest memory. Of +course, now and then a party comes in and tries to get out of paying +but the boys usually settle him and so I don't lose much that way. But +the old woman wants me to do this slick and proper and her word goes. +So Barney and I are going to study. + +"I'm telling you all this, Grandma, because you always did understand +my crazy way of doing things ever since that time when you sent me to +the store for that can of molasses and I give the money to the tramp +instead. Remember?" + +Billy laughed heartily at the memory and Grandma Wentworth laughed, +too, laughed so hard that she had to wipe her eyes. And she smiled all +the way home. + +"Some day," said Grandma Wentworth to her old friend and neighbor, +Roger Allan, "I'll ask some minister to preach a sermon on 'God's +Humor.' I suppose that the Almighty gets so tired running things just +so and listening to petitions for sunshine and petitions for rain and +to prayers for automobiles and diamonds and interest on mortgages and +silk stockings, death and babies that some days he just gets tired of +being a serious God and shuffles things up for a joke. And, mark me, +Roger, that boy, Billy Evans, is just one of God's tender jokes. If +only people would see that and laugh. + +"Now, Billy has no money sense, no business ability. That's what the +real business men like George Hoskins and all the old blessed Solomons +at Uncle Tony's say. Yet Billy is making money. His business is +growing just because without knowing it Billy has got hold of the +biggest force in the world to run his business. He's just using +love,--plain, old-fashioned love,--and love is making money for Billy. +He's picked out of the very gutters all the human waste and rubbish +that the others, the wise business men, threw there and with the town's +worst drunkard and half a dozen mistreated, misborn, misunderstood boys +he's playing the business game and winning. He's got the knack of +making his help feel like partners and he's so square and sensible in +his dealings with them that they are all ready to die for him. Now if +that isn't the greatest kind of a business gift I want to know. + +"And every time I think of smiling, untidy Billy Evans with a pretty +wife as neat as wax, living in a house that she has made as sweet and +pretty as a picture--well--I just laugh. Nobody but God could have +arranged things and balanced them up like that. Talk about any of us +improving things in this world! If we'd only learn to mind our own +business as well as God minds His." + +But very few besides Grandma Wentworth understood Billy and his livery +barn. Even Joe Baldwin failed to see just what Billy was doing in his +droll, unconscious, warm-hearted way. Still Joe liked Billy. In fact, +everybody liked Billy. And he was welcomed everywhere and nowhere more +than in George Hoskins' blacksmith shop. + +Next to the bank building George Hoskins was considered the most solid +thing in town. He was the brawny blacksmith and people said a very +rich man. He was big in every way. Big in body, big in temper, big in +his friendships, big in his drinks. He was indeed so big a man that he +did not know how to be mean or little in any way. He did not know his +own great strength nor think much of the weakness of his fellows. His +grand proportions and great simplicity were what attracted men to him. +Women did not know and so could not like him. + +To them George Hoskins was a great, grimy ogre. George, big in all +things, was big in his love for the tiny woman who was his wife. Other +women George did not see though he spoke to them on the street. He had +pleaded on bended knees for the love of his tiny woman and when he got +her all other women became just strange shadows. So only his wife and +Doc Philipps knew how tender a heart was his. + +Green Valley housewives caught glimpses of this man's great figure +towering above the roaring forge and saw the crowd of lesser men, their +husbands, gathered about him. They went home and told each other that +George Hoskins was a big, rude brute, that he drank like a fish and +would bring the town to ruin, for he was the village president. + +And while they were saying these things about George Hoskins he was +perhaps throwing out of his shop some smug traveling man who had +stepped into it to get in out of the rain and had mistakenly tried to +make himself at home there by telling a filthy yarn that sullied all +womanhood. + +These then are a few of the many human attractions of Green Valley. +They are listed here to give the right sort of setting and the proper +feel to this story of Green Valley life. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +CYNTHIA'S SON + +So Cynthia's son came home and Green Valley took him to its heart and +loved him as it had loved his mother long ago. Everywhere he was +spoken of as Cynthia's boy and no one seemed to remember that he was +born in heathen India instead of in the old porticoed house on the +Churchill farm. + +Green Valley knew that very first week, of course, that Cynthia's son +was very nearly twenty-eight years old and that his full name was John +Roger Churchill Knight. But what it did not know for some weeks was +that among other interesting things Cynthia's son was a minister, a +duly certified preacher of the gospel. It was remembered in a general +way that Cynthia's husband had been some sort of a wonderful foreign +missionary or something; but a man who was Joshua Churchill's only +grandchild and heir needed no other ancestor. So Green Valley was +astounded one Sunday morning, when the Reverend Campbell was +unexpectedly ill, and the Reverend Courtney off somewhere answering a +new call, and Green Valley without a pastor, to have Cynthia's boy +quietly offer to take charge of the services. + +If Green Valley was astounded to hear that Cynthia's son was a minister +it was too awed to speak in anything but an amazed whisper of that +first sermon that the tall young man from India talked off so quietly +from the pulpit of the old gray stone church. + +To this day they tell how without a scrap of paper to look at, without +raising his voice in the slightest, this boy made Green Valley listen +as it had never listened before. For an hour he talked and for that +length of time Green Valley neighbored with India, saw it as plainly as +if it was looking over an unmended, sagging old fence right into +India's back yard. + +With the simplicity of a child this boy with Cynthia Churchill's eyes +and smile and voice told of Indian women and children and Indian homes. +The colors, the smells, the mystic beauty and the dark tragedy of it he +painted and then very gently and easily he told of his trip back to his +mother's home town and so without a jar he landed his listeners, +wide-eyed, breathless and prayerfully thankful for their manifold +blessings back in their own sunlit and tree-guarded streets. + +For no reason at all seemingly Green Valley began to wipe its eyes and +come out of its trance. Neighbor looked at neighbor and strange things +were seen to have happened. + +Old man Wiley, the aged and chronically sleepy janitor was actually +sitting wide awake. Old Mrs. Vingie, who for years annoyed every Green +Valley parson by holding her hand to her right ear and pretending to be +deafer than she really was, was sitting bolt upright, both ears and +hands forgotten. For once Dolly Beatty forgot to fuss with her hat or +admire her hands in the new lavender gloves two sizes too small. The +choir even forgot to flirt and yawn and never once looked bored or +superior. + +Jimmy Rand, after having carefully inserted in his hymn book a copy of +Diamond Dick's latest exploits, forgot to read it. And the row of +little boys whose mothers always made them sit in the very first pew +never so much as thought of kicking each other's shins or passing a +hard pinch down the line or even quietly swapping lucky stones and fish +hooks for a snake skin or a choice piece of colored glass. + +Why, it was even reported that Mert Hagley so far forgot himself as to +absent-mindedly drop a bill into the basket when it came by. Some +said, of course, that Mert was after the repair work on the old +Churchill homestead but those nearest Mert swore that this could not +be, that Mert had looked as surprised as those around him when he saw +what he had done. Green Valley laughed and said a miracle had +happened. And even Seth Curtis got curious and remarked that he had +half a mind to go and hear the boy himself, that anybody who could peel +a bill off of Mert Hagley's roll was surely a curiosity. + +Cynthia's son had walked with Roger Allan through the twilight of his +first real day in Green Valley to Grandma Wentworth's cottage and the +three had sat talking until the small hours. Then Grandma had taken +Cynthia's tall son up-stairs into the large airy guest room. She came +down a little later to find Roger gazing at a framed photograph of a +long gone day. + +She came and looked too at the group of young faces. At herself, then +a girl of eighteen; at the boy beside her who later became her husband; +and at Cynthia, lovely Cynthia Churchill, laughing out at life in her +sweet yet serious way. + +"Well, Roger," Grandma spoke softly with a hint of tears in her voice, +"we have waited years, you and I, for a message from her, a heart +message. And now it has come--it has come. She has sent us her boy." + +"Yes," breathed Roger Allan, "she has sent us the message--she has sent +me her son." + +They knew, these two, why he had come. It may be that even the tall +young man whose father and mother were sleeping the long sleep in +far-off India may have guessed why in the end the frail but still +lovely mother had begged him to go back to Green Valley, to its sweet +old homes and warm-hearted folk. To bring comfort and find it--that +had been the little mother's plan. + +He believed he would find it. The loneliness that had tired him so +ever since his mother slipped away was no longer a sharp, never silent +pain, a great emptiness, but rather a sweet sorrow that was almost a +friend. + +He slept in the big airy room with its patchwork quilt of blue and +white, its rugs and curtains to match, and looked at pictures of his +mother. From the windows he watched the sun rise and shine on the +merry little hills and the yellow road that wound up to his mother's +old home. As he breathed in the wine of the spring mornings he +comprehended the great hunger, the wild longing, that at times must +have overwhelmed the little mother in those last days in India. And he +thought he understood those last words of hers. + +"Son, you must stay with your father as long as he needs you. But when +that duty is over you must go back to the little green town on the +other side of the world. Your father and I brought a message to India. +You must take one back to my people. Oh, you will love it--you will +love it--the little dear town full of friends and everywhere the +fragrance of home. Oh, there are many there who will love you for my +sake and who will make up to you for--me." + +Her hand caressed his hair and her voice trailed off into a sigh for +she knew what he didn't, wouldn't believe--that she was never to see +that little green town across the gray-green ocean waves. + +At the very last she had whispered: + +"Oh, Boy of Mine, when you go home greet them all for me. And if ever +you go to rummaging about in the attic remember you must never open the +square trunk with the brass nail heads unless Mary Wentworth is there +to explain. Tell Mary I love her and that I am not sorry. She will +understand." + +So as he looked out of Grandma Wentworth's upstairs windows he +remembered those last talks and understood that yearning for home. +When he had been in Green Valley only a few weeks the old life began to +grow vague and unreal. The mother was real and near. But the splendid +figure of his father was fading into a strange memory. He was a father +to be proud of, that strong, cool, selfless man who had asked nothing +of life but to take what it would of him. + +He had seemed so towering, so enduring, that preacher father. Yet when +the frail mother went the strong man followed within a year. So then +there was nothing to do but go home to Green Valley. He went. And the +spirit of the vivid little mother seemed to have come with him. Every +day that he spent in the town that had reared her seemed to bring her +nearer. He could picture her going about the sunny roads and friendly +streets and stopping to chat and neighbor with Green Valley folks. + +So he too roamed over the town and chatted and neighbored as he felt +she would have done. That was how he came to know every nook and +cranny, every turn of the happily straying roads and all the lame, odd, +damaged and droll characters that make a town home just as the +broken-nosed pitcher, the cracked old mirror in an up-stairs bedroom, +and the sagging old armchair in the shadowy corner of the sitting room +make home. + +Not only did he come to know these people but he understood them. For +his was the quick eye and interpreting heart willed him by a great +father and an equally great mother. And because he came into Green +Valley with a fresh mind and a keen appetite for life nothing escaped +him, not even old Mrs. Rosenwinkle sitting in paralyzed patience beside +the open window of her little blind house. + +He was strolling one day up the little grassy lane, thinking that it +led into the cool, thick grove back of the little house that stared so +blindly out into the green world. He had been following a new bird and +it had darted into the grove. So he came upon the little house and the +still grim old soul who sat at the open window as if to guard that +little end of the world. + +It was a snug, still spot, that little green lane, and was so carpeted +with thick grasses and screened with verdure that the harsh noises of a +chattering, working world could not ruffle its peace and serenity. +Cynthia's son filled it and the still, lonely old woman was fascinated +with his bigness, his merry gladness, but most of all with his +understanding friendliness. She told him all her story, her past +trials and present griefs. And he told her strange things about people +he had seen in other parts of the world, blind people living in foul +alleys instead of sunny lanes, crippled ones with neither home nor kin +of any kind. He told her much but made no effort to convince her that +the earth was round, and when he went he left with her the very fine +pair of field glasses with which he had been tracking the wonderful +song bird that had escaped him. He showed her how to use them and for +the first time in fifteen years old Mrs. Rosenwinkle forgot that she +was paralyzed. + +When he came in to his supper that evening Cynthia's son wanted to know +why old Mrs. Rosenwinkle couldn't have a wheel-chair, one of those that +she could work with her hands. He said that he thought she must be +pretty tired sitting beside that window even if it was open. And why +couldn't she have a window on each of the other sides of her room? + +Grandma stared. + +"My stars--boy! There's no reason that I know of why that old body +can't have a wheel chair or more windows. Only Green Valley hasn't +ever thought of it. She's always been so set in her notions and so out +of the way of things that I expect we have forgotten her." + +The third time that Cynthia's son brought little Jim Tumley home +because the little man's wandering feet could not find their way to +shelter, he wanted to know why little Jim was not in the choir. So +Grandma told him, and it was his turn to be puzzled. + +"But I don't understand. The church is for the weak, the needy, the +blind, maimed and foolish who don't know how to seek happiness wisely. +The happy, strong, sensible people don't, as a matter of fact, need +looking after," said Cynthia's son. + +"My!" laughed Grandma, "I believe I've heard that or read that +somewhere. Do they really practice that kind of religion in aged +India? In these parts the churches are still built by the good for the +good and the unfit have to shift for themselves." + +But when he asked why Jim Tumley didn't have a piano to take up his +spare time and keep him out of harm's way, Grandma was a bit +scandalized. + +"Why, people in Jim Tumley's circumstances don't own pianos. It +wouldn't be proper. A second-hand organ is all they have any right to +be ambitious for. Why, Mary Tumley would no more think of touching her +savings, of buying a piano, than I would think of buying a second black +silk or a diamond ring. So much style would be wicked." + +"But if it would help to save the little man--if--" + +"Well," smiled Grandma, "I'll mention it to Mary the very next time I +see her." + +"Do. And while you are about it you might ask Jim to sing a solo for +us both Sunday morning and evening. If little Jim Tumley doesn't sing +I won't talk," said the Reverend John Roger Churchill Knight. + +So Joshua Churchill's rich grandson, Cynthia's son, traveled the high +roads and low roads and had all manner of experiences and adventures +and he discovered many stray, odd facts which later came in mighty +handy. + +He rode out into the country districts with Hank Lolly, sitting beside +that worthy on the high wagon seat and listening most carefully to the +description of every farm, its inmates, the barn dimensions and +contents, the depth of the well, cost of the silo, number of pigs, +sheep, the amount of tiling, and the make of the family graphophone. + +Sometimes busy farm wives came hurrying out from the back or side +doors, wiping their hands on their aprons, to ask Hank to take a mess +of peas or beans to a less fortunate neighbor or to carry a basket of +dishes over to the next farm where the thrashers were going to be for +supper; and "Hank, just bring me a setting of turkey eggs from Emily +Elby's. I've 'phoned and she has them all ready." + +Mrs. Tooley, up the Elmwood road, entrusted the obliging Hank with the +following message: + +"Tell Doc Mitchell that if he don't get my new set of teeth ready for +the thrashing I'll hev the law on him for breaking up my happy home. +Two of my old beaux're coming to the thrashing and if they was to see +me without my teeth they'd jest naturally make Jim miserable and me a +divorcee." + +Mrs. Bodin was sending her daughter, Stella, some little overalls made +over for the twins from their grandpa's and a bottle of home made cough +medicine "and one of my first squash pies for Al. And here's a pie for +your trouble, Hank, and a few of these cookies you said you like." + +Hank stowed everything carefully away, with no show of nervous haste, +and when they were well started remarked to John Churchill Knight: + +"You know the best part of staying sober is that you get taken in on so +many things and almost you might say into so many families. People +tell you things and ask your help and advice and by gum after awhile +you get to feeling that maybe you're somebody too instead of jest a +mess of miserableness. Why, I've got friends jest about everywhere, I +guess. + +"There's them as asks me sarcastic like if I don't find this kind of +work dry and lonesome but I jest ask them to come along and see. Why, +do you see that there house yonder? Those folks are relatives of Billy +Evans' and as soon as ever I turn this corner, Mollie, that's the +youngest girl, will start the graphophone going with my favorite piece. +The last time I come by I found a box of candy on the mail box for me. +That was from Winnie, the oldest, for bringing home her new dress from +the dressmaker's. + +"Yes, sir, it's jest wonderful how human and pleasant everybody is. +Why, if I jest keep on a-being sober and associating with folks like +this--why--I'm jest naturally bound to be kind of decent myself. And +when you think of what I was--well--there's no use in talking--I was +low--jest low. Ask anybody but Billy Evans and they'll tell you fast +enough. Of course Billy's naturally prejudiced and his word ain't +hardly to be credited. + +"And here I am on a nice summer morning riding with the minister and +with the whole country acting as if I'd always been decent." + +Maybe it was Hank who first called him the minister. It may of course +have been that old Mrs. Rosenwinkle, who, not knowing his name for some +time, explained him to her daughter as "the new preacher of the lost." + +At any rate, when Fanny Foster came to make her periodical report it +was found that to the lonely, the outcast and the generally unfit +Cynthia's son was "the new minister." And his influence was already +felt by those who as yet regarded him as just a Green Valley boy who +was helping out. Fanny Foster voiced this sentiment in Joe Baldwin's +shop when she was paying for the four patches Joe had just put on her +second best pair of shoes. + +"Well--I shouldn't wonder if Green Valley hadn't got a minister to its +taste at last. He hasn't been regularly appointed and I guess he don't +realize himself that he's it but I'm pretty sure that the minute Parson +Courtney steps out that's just what's going to happen. Of course +there's them that says it can't. Mr. Austin says it would be a +terrible mistake, that he's too young; and Seth Curtis says no rich man +would be fool enough to pester himself with a dinky country church. +But I guess people like Seth and Mr. Austin ain't the kind of people +that have much to say. He's doing regular minister's work, comforting +the sick and picking up the fallen and pacifying the quarrelsome, and +it's work like that that'll elect him. + +"And he's getting mighty popular, let me tell you, even with them that +no other minister could please or get near. There's old Mrs. +Rosenwinkle. She loves him just because he never tried to tell her +that the earth was round. Why, she says he's as good as any Lutheran. +And Hank Lolly said that maybe when that new suit Billy's ordered him +out of the new mail-order catalogue gets here, he'll go hear him +preach. It seems the minister's been driving around with Hank all over +creation and Hank says he can get along with him as easy as he does +with Billy. + +"And did you hear what he did for Jim Tumley? It seems the minister +told Grandma Wentworth what a fine voice Jim had and what an ear for +music. And he was most surprised that Jim never even had a second-hand +organ of his own in the house but had to go over to his sister's, Mrs. +Hoskins, for to play a little tune when the fancy took him. He said it +was an awful pity that a man who wanted music so badly and was always +so obliging at weddings and funerals and entertainments should be +without a proper instrument. And Grandma just said, 'My land, nobody's +ever thought of that but I'll speak of it.' + +"Well, she did and the consequence is that Mary Tumley is so nervous +she can't sleep. She says if she takes the savings out of the bank +there won't be enough money for a Keeley cure, or a respectable funeral +for Jim in case he dies. She's struggled and struggled but come to the +conclusion that it wouldn't be right and would set an awful example to +the Luttins next door, who are extravagant enough as it is. + +"But it's my notion that Jim Tumley will get his organ and maybe a +piano. I saw him going in with Frank Burton on that early morning +train and it means something. Besides, Grandma told me that Frank +fairly hates himself for not thinking of it before and waiting like a +born idiot for a boy to come all the way from India and tell him what +to do for his best friend. + +"Agnes Tomlins says she's got a good mind to go and see the minister +about Hen. She says that if Hen don't quit abusing her and tormenting +her she's going to leave him; that her sister Mary over in Aberdeen has +a big up-stairs bedroom all aired and waiting for her. It seems that +Hen's more than contrarily stubborn lately. He's contradicted Agnes +publicly time and again and gone against her in private till Agnes says +there's no living with him. + +"But she says she would overlook everything except Hen's keeping a +secret drawer in his chiffonier. It seems Hen has gone and locked that +bottom drawer and Agnes can't either buy or borry a key that will open +it. And she can't find where Hen has hid his, try as she may. And +when she mentions that drawer to Hen, saying she wants to red up, he +lets on like he don't know what she's talking about but he does, +because he told Doc Philipps, when he went to see about his liver, that +if he couldn't wear a soft collar or a soft hat like other men and keep +a dog and smoke in the house, and eat strawberries or whistle or go to +ball games on Sundays and prize fights on the sly, why, there was one +thing he could do and would have and that was a drawer, a whole +chiffonier drawer, all to himself. And that he bet there weren't many +men in Green Valley that could say as much. Hen just swore that he +intends to have something all his own and that nobody'll open that +drawer except over his dead body. + +"Dolly Beatty was sitting in the waiting room and heard him. Of +course, she's a great friend of Bessie Williams and told her and Bessie +told Laura Enbry and of course it got to Agnes. So she's going to +speak to the minister and maybe get a divorce, which will be the first +divorce scandal in Green Valley. + +"Now that's the sort of thing that goes on in Green Valley. And if the +new minister is supposed to calm these troubled waters he's got my +sympathy. Joe, I think you're charging me ten cents too much for these +patches. They're not as big as the ones you put on the other pair and +those were fifty cents." + +So without a conscious move on anybody's part Cynthia's son became +Green Valley's minister. All the necessary rites gone through, Green +Valley accepted him as it accepted the sunshine and rain, the larks and +wild roses, and all the other gifts that heaven chose to send. + +Roger Allan and Grandma Wentworth began to call him John. But Nanny +Ainslee always spoke of him and addressed him as Mr. Knight. And he +discovered after a time that for some strange reason he did not like +this. + +One day he mentioned the matter. He was walking home from church with +her. Mr. Ainslee had invited him up for Sunday dinner and the party of +them were chatting pleasantly as they walked along together. + +In asking him a question Nan addressed him as Mr. Knight. Then it was +that he stopped and made his startling request. He addressed them all +but he meant only Nan. + +"I wish," he said suddenly, "you would not call me Mr. Knight." + +Mr. Ainslee and Billy hid a smile, said nothing and walked on. But Nan +stopped in amazement. + +"Why not?" she asked a little breathlessly. + +"Nobody else does. I was never called that in India. It makes me feel +lonely, and a stranger here." + +"But," Nanny's voice was colorless and almost dreary, even though a +wicked little gleam shot into her eyes, "what in the world shall I call +you? I can't call you--_John_. And 'parson' always did seem to me +rather coarse and disrespectful." + +He had stopped when she did and now was looking straight down into her +eyes. Before the hurt and surprise and bewilderment in his face the +wicked little gleam retreated and a deep pink began to flush Nanny's +cheeks. The suspicion crossed her mind that this tall young man from +India with the unconquered eyes and the directness of a child might be +a rather difficult person to deal with. + +He just stood there and looked at her and said never a word. Then he +quietly turned and walked on up the road with her. + +For the first time in her life Nanny felt queer in the company of a +man, queer and puzzled and almost uncomfortable. She was not a flirt +and her remark was commonplace and trivial. Yet this new chap was +taking it seriously and making her feel insincere and trifling. She +told herself that she was not going to like him and kept her eyes +studiously on the road and wayside flowers. + +They mounted the front steps in silence but before he opened the door +to let her pass in he paused and waited for her to raise her eyes to +his. She did it much against her will. He spoke then as if they two +were all alone in the world together. + +"It is true that you have not known me long. But I have known you for +some time. I saw you leave Green Valley one summer night last year and +I came from the West two months before I should have just to see if you +got safely back at lilac time." + +At that Nanny's eyes lost all their careful pride and he saw them +lovely with surprise. So he explained. + +"I was standing on the back platform of the Los Angeles Limited the +night you went East with your father." + +Then a smile that the Lord gives only now and then, to a man that He is +sure He can trust, flitted over the tall boy's face as he added: + +"And the very first evening I came back to Green Valley I held you in +my arms--rescued you." + +He laughed boyishly, plaguing her. But she stood motionless with +amazement,--too angry to say a word. When that smile came her anger +faded. Through her heart there flashed the mad conviction, through her +mind the certain knowledge, that for her in the time to come the height +of bliss would be to cry in this strange man's arms. + +Then she recollected herself and flamed with shame so bitter that her +lower lip quivered and she hoped he would ask her again to call him +John so that she could make him pay for her momentary madness. + +But he never asked again. It seemed he was not that kind of a man. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +GOSSIP + +The last and surest sign of spring's arrival in Green Valley is gossip. +The mornings may be ever so full of meadow larks, the woods moistly +sweet and carpeted with spring's frail and dainty blossoms, but no one +dreams of letting the furnace go out or their base burner get cold +until they see Fanny Foster flitting about town at all hours of the day +and behold the array of shiny armchairs standing so invitingly in front +of Uncle Tony's hardware store. + +When these two great news agencies open up for business Green Valley +laughs and goes to Martin's drug store to buy moth balls and talks +about how it's going to paint its kitchen woodwork and paper its +upstairs hall and where it's buying its special garden seed. + +Then the whole town wakes up and comes outdoors to work and talk. +There are fences to be mended and gardens to be planted and houses to +be cleaned and all the winter happenings to be gone over. All the +doctor cases have to be discussed critically and the winter invalids, +strong once again, come out to visit one another and compare notes. +Letters from special relatives and former Green Valley souls are passed +around and read and all new photographs and the winter's crop of fancy +work exhibited and carefully examined. + +Everybody talks so much that nobody listens very carefully, only half +hearing things. And when the spring madness and gladness begin to +settle and people start to repeat the things they only half heard +strange and weird tales are at times the result. And from these spring +still more fantastic rumors and versions that ripple over Green Valley +like waves of sunshine or cloud shadows, sometimes causing much joy and +merriment and sometimes considerable worry and uneasiness. + +And all these rumors come eventually to Uncle Tony's where they are +solemnly examined, edited and frequently so enhanced and touched up in +color and form as to sound almost new. Then they are sent out again to +begin life all over. Many of them die but some live on and on, and +after a sufficient test of time become a part of the town chronicles. + +Everybody, of course, takes a hand at helping a yarn get from house to +house but nobody makes such a specialty of this sort of social work as +Fanny Foster. There are some Green Valley folks who attribute Fanny's +up and down thinness to this wearing industry yet both men and women +are always glad to see her and her reports always drive blue cares away +and provoke ripples of sunny laughter. + +Everybody in town has tried their hand at hating Fanny and despising +her and ignoring her and putting her in her place. But everybody has +long ago given it up. Stylish and convention-loving newcomers are +always disgusted and keep her at arm's length. But sooner or later +such people break an arm or a leg right in the midst of strawberry +canning maybe and it so happens that nobody sees them do this but +Fanny. And when this does happen they don't even have to mortify +themselves by calling her. She just comes of her own accord, +forgetting the cruel snubbings. She fixes that stand-offish person as +comfortable as can be, makes them laugh even, and telephones to the +doctor. Then she rolls up her sleeves and without so much as an apron +has those strawberries scientifically canned and that messy kitchen +beautifully clean. + +And the curious, the pitifully, laughably incomprehensible part of it +is that in her own house Fanny absolutely never can seem to take the +least interest. Her own dishes are always standing about unwashed. +Her kitchen is spoken of in horrified whispers; her children, +buttonless, garterless, mealless, stray about in all sorts of improper +places and weather. The whole town is home to them but they generally +feel happiest at Grandma Wentworth's. She sets them down in her +kitchen to a hot meal and then makes them sew on their buttons under +her watchful eye. Sooner or later, usually later, Fanny comes as +instinctively as her children to Grandma's door to report Green Valley +doings. + +This particular spring things promised to be unusually lively. But the +rains, though gentle, had been persistent and Fanny was a full two +weeks behind with her news schedule. But if late, her report was +thorough. She dropped wearily into Grandma's soft cushioned kitchen +rocker, slipped her cold feet without ceremony into the warm stove oven +and began: + +"Good land! I never see such a town and such people and such weather! +Jim Tumley's drunk again and as sick as death and Mary's crying over +him as usual and blaming the hotel crowd. She says he's a good man and +don't care for liquor at all and that their liking to hear him sing +ain't no reason for getting him drunk and a poor way of showing their +thanks and appreciation, and that they all know that he can't stand it, +him being weak in the stomach that way, like all the Tumleys. Mary's +just about ready to give up everything and everybody, she's that +discouraged. + +"Well--that's one mess and now there's Uncle Tony in another. It seems +Uncle Tony sold Seth Curtis a hand axe for a dollar and ten cents. Of +course Seth paid for it like he always does--right away. But you know +how forgetful Uncle Tony is getting. Well, it seems he clean forgot +about Seth paying and sent in a bill for a dollar. And now Seth's +hanging around, wanting his ten cents back and saying mean, smart +things. + +"And that lazy, gossiping crowd of worthless men folks was just killing +themselves laughing and making fun of poor Uncle Tony, sitting right in +his very own chairs and warming their lazy feet at his comfortable +fire. Uncle Tony happened to be out and those loafers just started in +and what they said about that kind old man made my blood boil. They +were all mean enough, with Seth egging them on every now and then about +that dime that he was cheated out of. But Mert Hagley was the worst. +Of course, everybody knows Mert's just dying to hog Uncle Tony's +business along with his shop, as if the stingy thing wasn't rich enough +already. Well, when Mert heard about that ten-cent mistake he said it +was about time there were a few business changes in Green Valley, that +a few business funerals would help a lot and freshen up things; that +Uncle Tony was no business man, and a lot of that sort of stuff. And +of course Hughey Mason, being a smart Aleck, pipes up and says, 'That's +so, Uncle Tony is no business man. Why, Tom Hall says that when you +find Uncle Tony's emporium locked at eleven o'clock of a winter morning +you can bet your bottom dollar Uncle Tony's home shaking down the +furnace, and if it's closed at four of a summer afternoon Uncle Tony's +sneaked off home to mow the lawn.' + +"Well, those idiots and old hypocrites were talking just like that, +goodness knows how long. They never took the trouble to see if Uncle +Tony was really around or not. But all of a sudden I looked around the +corner of the middle row of shelves and there was that poor old man +sitting as still as death in his cashier's cage and looking sick to +death. You know he wouldn't cheat a soul, and as for that store, he'd +die without it. It's all the family he has. Well I had stepped in +there to buy a couple of flat-irons. The children mislaid mine. But I +walked right out for I didn't want to call him out to wait on me. + +"I was so mad I just walked around the block till I met Mrs. Jerry +Dustin right at Simpson's corner and I told her the whole thing. She +was as hurt about it as Uncle Tony and kept holding on to Simpson's +garden fence and saying, 'Dear me, Fanny, we must do something. I have +a message for Tony, anyway, and this is just the time to deliver it.' + +"So back we went and we met Uncle Tony stepping in at the front door +too. He must have sneaked out the back way and come around the front +so's not to let on he'd heard anything. He was kind of white and +miserable about the mouth and his eyes looked out kind of blind. But +he smiled when Mrs. Jerry Dustin said, 'Good morning, Tony.' I +wonder," Fanny digressed, "if it's true that Uncle Tony wanted to marry +Mrs. Dustin once. Sadie Dundry says so but you know how unreliable +Sadie is about what she knows. + +"Well, anyhow, those miserable men things around that stove just smiled +at Uncle Tony like so many Judases and all commenced talking at once. +But Mrs. Dustin didn't give them much chance. She just took up all +Uncle Tony's attention and time. She bought and bought, being real +careful of course to ask only for the things she knew he had; and to +top it all she bought four quarts of robin's-egg blue paint. You know +that's Uncle Tony's favor-ite woodwork paint and nobody goes in there +for paint but what he's trying to get them to buy robin's-egg blue. +Seems his mother's kitchen on the old farm was done that way and Uncle +Tony's never been able to see any other color. + +"Well, I thought those four cans of paint was about the highest kind of +good luck but when Mrs. Dustin give her message I nearly fell dead, and +as for them old he-gossips they were about paralyzed, I guess. Why +even you, Grandma, couldn't hardly guess what that message was;" here +Fanny pulled up a sagging stocking and hurried on lest she should be +interrupted. + +"It was nothing more nor less than that Bernard Rollins, the artist, +wants to paint Uncle Tony's portraiture. 'And, of course, Tony,' said +Mrs. Dustin in that sweet way of hers, 'you won't refuse, will you?' +And I declare the lovely way she looked at him and he at her I come +near believing Sadie might be right by accident. But, land--in this +town everybody has growed up with everybody else and somebody is always +saying that somebody is sweet on somebody else or was when he or she +were young. + +"So there's that portraiture to look forward to. And now there's that +yarn that some careless busybody started about Nanny Turner being left +a fortune of eighteen thousand dollars. Everybody's been crazy, +praising her luck to her face and envying her behind her back. +Everybody most but Dell Parsons. Dell felt sick when she heard it +because she and Nanny have been such friends and Dell just knew that no +matter how they'd both try to keep things the same there'd always be +that eighteen-thousand-dollar difference between them when now there's +nothing dividing them but a little low honeysuckle fence with a gate +cut through it. And there would, of course. Nanny'd be on one side, +cutting aprons out of nice new gingham, and Dell'd be on the other, +cutting _her_ aprons out of Jim's old shirt backs. + +"But as soon as Nanny heard it she up and told everybody it wasn't so, +that she and Will wouldn't thank anybody for a fortune now that they've +paid for their home and garden. + +"I met Jessie Williams in the drug store. She was buying dye to do +over her last year's silk and she says Nanny was a fool to contradict a +fine story like that. That she should have said nothing and used the +rumor to her social advantage. Jessie says that story alone would have +brought that uppish Mrs. Brownlee that's moved into that stylish new +bungalow next to Will Turner's to time and sociability. Though the +daughter isn't uppish a bit, so Nanny and Dell says, and visits right +over the fence and just loves the children. But she don't know +anything seemingly--the daughter don't. Wears fancy caps and +high-heeled shoes to work in mornings and was caught planting onion +sets root up and doing dishes without an apron and drying them without +scalding them first. But they say she's awful sweet and pretty, in +spite of her terrible ignorance. + +"Old Mr. Dunn told me this Mrs. Brownlee was a bankrupt's widow, that +when the husband died there was nothing left but this Green Valley lot, +which he bought absent-mindedly one day, and his life insurance which +though was a good one. And the widow having no money didn't want to +stay amongst her rich city friends and so she's come here. They say +she hates Green Valley like poison but that the girl Jocelyn thinks +it's fun living here, even though her hands are blistered and there's +no place to go evenings. I heard that David Allan's been plowing up +the Brownlee garden lot and helping the girl set things out. + +"And now, Grandma, what of all things do you suppose has happened? Old +man Mullin's back. Nobody can hardly believe it. He's been gone these +ten years and nobody blamed him a mite when he left that miserly, +nagging wife of his and went off to California. Why, they say she +nearly died giving him a ten-cent piece every week for spending money +and that he used to work on the sly unbeknownst to her to get money for +his tobacco and then didn't dare smoke it where she could see him. And +he's come back. Some say he's got so much money of his own that she +can't worry him and that he's got to be so deaf besides that he's safe +more or less. + +"And as if that wasn't enough, there's talk of Sam Ellis's selling the +hotel and going out of business. It seems since the two boys and the +girl came back from college they've talked nothing but temperance and +prohibition. Not that they are a mite ashamed of Sam. But not one of +them will step into the hotel for love or money. And Sam's beginning +to think as they do, seems like. For they say he was awful mad when he +heard about Jim Tumley getting so full he was sick. Sam was out that +afternoon and he says Curley Watson, his barkeeper, is a danged +chucklehead. And that ain't all. They're saying that Sam told George +Hoskins to let up on the drinks the other night, that maybe he could +stand it but other men couldn't. And Sam the hotel keeper, mind you! +Of course Sam is well off but still the men haven't got over it yet. +They say you could have heard a pin drop and that George stood with his +mouth open for five full minutes. + +"Somebody told John Gans that there was going to be another barber shop +in town and so he's excited. And Mr. Pelly and Mrs. Dudley had their +first fight this year over their chickens. Mr. Pelly swears she lets +them out a-purpose before he's awake in the morning and Mrs. Dudley +says that if he don't mend his fence and hurts a feather of a single +one of her animals she'll have him before Judge Hewitt. + +"Of course, Marion Travers is spending every cent of her husband's +salary on new clothes, trying to get in with the South End crowd. And +Sam Bobbins has given up trying to raise violets to make a sudden +fortune. He's changed his mind and gone to raising mushrooms down in +his cellar. Simpson's gray horse is dead, the lame one, and one of the +White twins cut his head pretty bad on a toy engine and Benny Smith's +wife is giving strawberry sets away. Jessups are all out of tomato +plants and onion sets and won't get any more, but Dick has them, +besides a real tasty looking lot of garden seed. Ella Higgins actually +found that Dick had two kinds of flower seed that she'd never grown or +heard of. + +"Mrs. Rosenwinkle's full of rheumatism with all joints swelled and says +the world is coming to a terrible end. I guess she figures though that +she and those two grandchildren of hern will be about all that's left +after the thing blows over. My land, ain't some folks ignorant! +And--what was I going to say--oh, yes, of course Robinson ain't +expected to live--and well--what _was_ it I was going to say--something +that begins with a c--good land, there's the 6:10 and I bet John's on +it. He never misses his train twice in a year's time. Get out of +here, children. You know your father wants to see you all at home when +he gets there." + +There was a scramble for the door and Grandma Wentworth's heart ached +for John Foster, the big, silent, steady man who brushes his girls' +hair every Sunday morning and brings them fresh hair ribbons and who +somehow manages to get them to Sunday School looking half respectable. +John never says a word scarcely to any one, from one week's end to the +other. He never spends a free hour away from home, he never invites a +man to his house, and he seldom smiles except at the children or when +visiting with Grandma Wentworth or Roger Allan, his two friends and +nearest neighbors. Sometimes he goes for long walks with his girls and +little Bobby. Most people think him a fool and he knows it. + +Grandma Wentworth sighed a little as she thought of John Foster. Then +she put fresh wood on her fire and poked at the stove grate till it +glowed. She smiled as she remembered Fanny's report. + +"Well, spring is here for certain. Now we'll have a wedding and some +new babies. They always come next." + +Then sitting there beside her glowing stove Grandma fell to dreaming of +Green Valley and the Green Valley folks of other days, Green Valley as +it used to be in the springs of long ago. Of the days when Roger Allan +was a young, strength-mad fellow and Richard Wentworth was his chum and +her lover. And she remembered too how right Sadie Dundry was. For +Uncle Tony, in the springs of long ago, had loved the girl who was now +Mrs. Jerry Dustin. + +They were such wander-mad dreamers, Tony and Rosalie, and exactly alike +in those days. They used to go together to watch an occasional picnic +train or election special go through the station, and they thought +because they were so exactly alike they would most surely marry. But +life, that wisely and for posterity's sake mates not the like but the +unlike, brought Jerry Dustin on the scene,--good, practical, +stay-at-home Jerry Dustin. And the girl who used to sit with Tony on +the station bench and watch the trains pull out into the wide big world +left her childhood friend sitting alone and went to Jerry, answered his +smile and call. + +So Tony sits alone, for he still visits the station on sunny +afternoons. But now he doesn't sit on the bench but perches on the top +rail of the fence and curls his toes about the lower one. + +Bernard Rollins caught him sitting so once, day-dreaming over the past. +It was Tony's face as Rollins saw it then,--full of a young, boyish +wistfulness and sweet pain, unmarred dreams and unstained, unbroken +illusions,--that Rollins wanted to paint. Rollins knew that Mrs. +Dustin was a great friend of Tony's and that she would be the best +person to coax a consent from the shy, gentle old man. + +Life, mused Grandma, was a matter full of sweet and incomprehensible +things,--things that now, after long years when the stories were almost +finished, seemed right and just enough but that at the time were cruel +and hard to bear. There was Roger Allan and that lonely stone in the +peaceful cemetery. It still seemed a cruel tragedy. Like Mrs. Jerry +Dustin she wondered often about it. + +The soft spring night was full of memories and the wood fire sang of +them sadly, sweetly and softly. Grandma rose and mentally shook +herself. + +"I declare, I believe I'm lonely or getting old or something," Grandma +chided herself; "here I am poking at the bygone years like an old maid +with the heartache and here's the whole world terribly alive and +needing attention. And here's Cynthia's boy back from India, and a +real Green Valley kind of minister, I do believe; a straightforward +chap to tell us of life, its miracles and mysteries; of God and +eternity as he honestly thinks, but mostly of love and the little happy +ways of earthly living. A man who won't be always dividing us into +sheep and goats but will show us the sheep and the goat in ourselves. +This is a queer old town and it almost seems as if a minister wouldn't +hardly have to know so much about heaven as about fighting neighbors +and chickens, gossiping folks like Fanny and drunken ones like Jim +Tumley. Well, maybe,--" + +But just then she looked up and found David Allan laughing at her from +the doorway. + +"Stop dreaming and scolding yourself, Grandma," laughed David. +"There's a little city girl living up on the hill back of Will Turner's +who needs you most awful bad. I offered to bring her down here but she +thinks it wouldn't be proper. She says you haven't called and she +wants to do things right and that maybe you wouldn't want to know her. +She's mighty lonely and strange about Green Valley ways of doing +things. I most wished to-day that I was a woman so I could help her. +Her mother's been sick more or less since they come here and she's +looking after things herself. I'd like to help her but there's things +a man just can't tell a girl or do for her. Uncle Roger sent me over +here to tell you to come across and talk about some church matters with +him. But I think this little girl business ought to be tended to right +away." + +"Rains and gossip and new girls and first violets. I declare, it _is_ +spring, David. And Nanny Ainslee is back. Of course, I'll see about +that little girl. You tell her I'm coming to call on her the day after +tomorrow. Tell her I'll come up the woodsy side of her garden and I'll +be wearing my pink sunbonnet and third best gingham apron." + +Grandma took up a pan of fresh light biscuit, rolled them up in a crisp +linen cloth and started out with David. + +Outdoors she stopped and breathed deeply. + +"I declare, David, I was almost lonesome before you stepped in but now +I feel--well, spring mad or something. I do believe we'll have a +wedding soon and a real old-fashioned springtime." + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +THE WEDDING + +Grandma Wentworth got her wedding but not just the kind of a wedding +she had expected. + +"Though, when you stop to think of it, an elopement is about as proper +a spring happening as I know of. It's due mostly to this weather. We +had too much rain in April and nothing but sweet sunshine and mad +moonlight ever since." + +Most Green Valley courtships and weddings are conducted in a more or +less public and leisurely fashion and elopements are rare. Green +Valley was at first inclined to be a little shocked and resentful about +this performance. Weddings do not happen every day and Green Valley +was so accustomed to knowing weeks beforehand what the bride was going +to wear, and how many of the two sets of relatives were to be there, +and who was giving presents and what, and what the refreshments were +going to cost, and just how much more this was than what the bride's +mother could afford to spend, that there was a little murmur of +astonishment, resentment even, when it was found that just a bare, bald +marriage had been perpetrated in the old town. Green Valley did not +resent the scandal of the occurrence. It was the absence of details +that was so maddening. But gradually these began to trickle from +doorstep to doorstep and by nightfall Green Valley was crowding out of +its front gates with little wedding gifts under its arms. + +It seems that little, meek, eighteen-year-old Alice Sears had eloped +with twenty-one-year-old Tommy Winston. She explained her foolishness +in a little letter which she left on the kitchen table for her mother. +The letter ran something like this: + + +Dear Mother:-- + +It's no use waiting any longer for any of the good times or new dresses +you said I'd have by and by. We never have any good times and I'm +tired waiting for a real new hat. Tommy's going to buy me one with +bunches of violets on it and he don't drink, so it's alright and you +don't need to worry. I'll live near and be handy and don't you let +father swear too much at you because I did this. + + Your loving child, + ALICE. + + +When Mrs. Sears found the letter she read it six times, over and over +till she knew it by heart. It wasn't the first such letter she had +ever had. When Johnny went off to Alaska or somewhere away off, +because his father took the twenty-five dollars that the +nineteen-year-old boy had saved so prayerfully for a bicycle, Johnny +had left just such a letter. When Jimmy went away he left a letter +that sounded very much like it on the top of his mother's sewing +machine. + +It wasn't a bicycle with Jimmy. It was chickens. Jimmy was wild over +chickens. He was a great favorite with Frank Burton. He helped Frank +about the coops and was so handy that Frank paid him regular wages and +gave him several settings of eggs. And in no time the boy had a +thriving little chicken business that might have grown into bigger +things. But Sears sold the whole thing out one day when he wanted +money worse than usual. And Jimmy, white to the very roots of his +reddish-brown hair, cursed his father and left home. He wandered +about, the Lord knows where, but eventually joined the army. He wrote +home once to tell his mother what he had done and to say that he +intended to save all his pay for the three years and start a chicken +farm with it somewhere. + +And now gentle, little, eighteen-year-old Alice was gone too. + +Mrs. Sears sat down and cried in that patient, helpless, miserable way +of hers. She didn't know just what she was crying for, herself or the +children. Life was a hopeless, unmanageable tangle that seemed to give +her nothing and take her all. So Mrs. Sears sat and cried. It was a +habit she had. + +Fanny Foster came along just then. She had run over to see if she +couldn't borrow a cake of yeast. She was going to town in an hour, she +said, but she wanted to set her bread before she went and she'd bring +yeast back with her and-- + +"Why, for pity's sake alive, Mrs. Sears, what's the matter?" + +That was just Fanny's luck or perhaps her misfortune, her happening on +events first-hand that way. She read the letter of course, sympathized +with Mrs. Sears, patted her check and told her not to worry, that +everything would be all right and to set right still, that she'd be +right back to do the dishes and stay with her. + +And Fanny hurried to town, talking all the way. She came back in +record time but by the time she had her hands in Mrs. Sears' dishpan +Green Valley was already buzzing with astonishment. Some were shaking +their heads in utter unbelief, some were smiling and one or two who had +slept badly were saying something like this: + +"Well, did you ever! And you never can tell. Those meek, quiet little +things are usually deep. And the dear Lord only knows what the true +state of things is. And poor Mrs. Sears! Of course, she's done her +best, but isn't it too bad to have a batch of children turn out so kind +of disappointing and her so meek and patient and hard-working!" + +In three hours the news had gotten out to the out-lying homes and +Sears, the little bride's father, heard it as he was nailing siding on +one of the two new bungalows that were being built in that part of +Green Valley. + +When Sears heard the rumor he put down his hammer and quit work. He +was a man who made a practice of quitting work at the least +provocation. He said what a man needed most was self-respect and he, +Will Sears, would have it at any cost. He had it. In fact, he was so +respectful and thoughtful of himself that he never had time to respect +the rights of any one else. + +Green Valley saw him going home and because Green Valley knew him well +and respected him not at all it took no pains to hush its chatter, and +so he heard a good deal that it may have done him good to hear. At any +rate, it sort of prepared him for what came later. + +He stamped into the house and wanted to know why in this and that he +hadn't been told about all this before he went to work, and what in +this and that she meant by such doings and goings on. + +And Mrs. Sears, whose greatest daily trial was getting her husband off +to work on such mornings as he felt so inclined, said tearfully: + +"Why, father, you know that when I'm getting you off of a morning I +wouldn't see a twenty-dollar gold piece if it was right before my eyes +on the table. I never found the piece of paper with Alice's letter on +it till you'd gone and I'd set down for a cup of coffee." + +For thirty years Milly Sears had called her husband "father" and now +that he had fathered all his children away from home she still called +him "father." Poor Mrs. Sears had no sense of humor. + +After her pitiful little explanation Mrs. Sears sank down into her +rocker and went back to weeping. It was her way of taking life's +sudden turns. + +Sears tore through the house and every once in a while he'd walk back +to the kitchen and swear. Sears was not in any way a likeable man. +Though so self-respecting, he had all his life been careless about his +language and his breath. That was probably the reason why his children +never got the habit of running out to meet him or bringing their thorns +and splinters for him to pull out with his jackknife. He was a man who +never stopped in the front yard to see how the clover was coming up, +who never hoed around his currant bushes or ever found time to prune +his fruit trees. He was in short a mean, selfish man who was yet +decent enough to know himself for what he was but not decent enough to +admit it and mend his ways. It may be that he did not know how to go +about this. + +At any rate, here he was, pacing back and forth in his still, empty +house, swearing and threatening all manner of terrible things. That +was his way of showing his helplessness. + +And all about this helpless, incompetent father and patiently sobbing +mother the Green Valley world buzzed and the prettiest kind of a May +day smiled. All their life was a muddle with this dreary ending but +the world outside was as young, as bright, as promising as ever. +Something of this must have come to these two for Mrs. Sears' sobs +quieted and out in the front room Sears sank into a chair and grew +still. + +And then it was that Fanny Poster, who had been flitting about like a +very spirit of help and curiosity, flitted down the road to Grandma +Wentworth's. For Fanny felt that somebody had to do something and +Fanny knew that nobody could do it so efficiently as the strong, sweet, +gray-eyed Grandma Wentworth who, for all her sweetness, could yet +rebuke most sternly and fearlessly even while she helped and advised +wisely. + +Green Valley had its generous share of philosophers and helpful spirits +but Grandma Wentworth towered above them all. And every soul in the +village, when in trouble, turned to her as naturally as flowers turn +their faces to the sun. + +Her little vine-clad cottage sat just beyond the curve where the three +roads met at Old Roads Corners. Her back garden was full of the +choicest vegetables and sweetest-smelling herbs and there was a +heavenly array of flowers all about the front windows. The neighbors +said that Grandma Wentworth's house and garden looked just like her and +ministers usually sent their spiritually hopeless cases to her because +she dared and knew how to say the soul-necessary things that no +bread-and-butter-cautious minister can find the courage to say. + +The path to Grandma's house was worn smooth by the feet of the many who +came for advice, encouragement and for sheer love of the woman who +lived in that little garden. + +And so Fanny went flying to Grandma now, perfectly, childishly +confident that Grandma would and could fix up everything. She began to +talk as soon as she opened the door. But what she saw in Grandma's +kitchen sent the words tumbling down her throat. + +For there sat little Alice, eating a late breakfast with Grandma. She +looked a little scared around the eyes but smiley round the mouth and +there was a gold ring on her left hand. + +When Grandma caught sight of Fanny she smiled. + +"Come right in, Fanny. I've been expecting you. But first let me make +you acquainted with Mrs. Tommy Winston. That rascal of a boy run away +with her last night as far as Spring Road, where Judge Edwards married +them. And then Tommy brought her here to me to spend the night while +he went and rented that funny little box of a house just back of that +stylish Mrs. Brownlee. And that's where the wedding supper's going to +be to-night. Of course you're invited. I'm going right now to see +Milly Sears about what we must cook up and bake. I was going over to +get you too to help out. The little house'll need overhauling but I +know I can depend on you, Fanny. Do your very best and there'll be--" + +But by this time Fanny found her voice and began to tell about how +Sears was going on. But Grandma only smiled and said, "Yes, of course, +I know. But don't worry about that. I'll attend to Will Sears. You +two just skip along now to the house and start the wedding." + +Grandma walked over to the Sears cottage without any show of worry or +hurry. But she wasn't smiling. Those gray eyes of hers were sparkling +with something very different. And when Will Sears saw her coming in +the gate he was both relieved and uncomfortably uneasy. + +She came right in and just looked at that desolate couple for a few +seconds. Then: + +"Will Sears," she asked briefly, "what are you aiming to do about this?" + +Sears, who couldn't do anything, didn't know how to do anything about +it but swear, said pompously: + +"What any decent, respectable, hard-working man would do,--bring back +the girl and horsewhip that whippersnapper." + +Then Grandma, who knew just how much this sort of bluster was worth, +let herself go. + +"Will Sears, if you honestly have an idea that you are a decent, +respectable, hard-working man, hold on to it for the love of heaven, +for you're the only human in this town that has any such notion." + +"I work," Sears began defiantly. + +"Oh, yes, Will, you work in a sort of a way; though I can remember the +time when Green Valley folks thought you were going to be a big +contractor. You promised well but somehow you never worked hard +enough. You work at things now to keep your own miserable self alive, +I guess, because when you get through using your week's wages there's +hardly enough left to keep bare life and decency in your family." + +"I'm not a drunkard," Sears muttered, "and you know it." + +"No, you're not a drunkard, Will Sears, more's the pity. When it comes +to choosing between a man who gets openly drunk and staggers down Main +Street in drunken penitence to his wife and children and the man who +drinks just enough to be a surly, selfish brute and yet look half-way +respectable on the outside, why, give me the drunk every time. + +"You don't get drunk, only just full enough to have your family afraid +and ashamed of you. You have made life a hateful, shameful, miserable +existence for your wife and children. You've robbed them of every +right and what pitiful little possessions, hopes and plans they'd been +able to find for themselves. That's why John's in Alaska, Jimmy in the +army and Alice an eighteen-year-old wife. A precious father you've +been to make your children choose the bitter snows, the jungle and a +doubtful future with a stranger to life with you, their father." + +"I've fed my children and clothed them," again muttered Sears. + +"Yes, Will, you have. But--man, man--it takes more than just blood, +three begrudged meals a day and a skimpy calico dress to prove real +fatherhood. But I'm not blaming you any more than I'm blaming this +wife of yours. + +"For thirty years, Milly Sears, you've been so busy trying to be a +doormat saint that you had no time to be a strong, useful mother. When +you married Will he was no worse than the average fellow. He had +faults aplenty but he had goodnesses too, and hopes and dreams. And +you, you Milly, let all the hopes and dreams die and the faults grow +and multiply. Just by letting Will backslide, forget and grow careless. + +"Somebody told you that patience was a pretty ornament. It is if it's +the genuine article and properly used. But letting a man spend his +wages hoggishly on himself and robbing his children and driving them +from their lawful home and cheating you out of every right and even +your self-respect is nothing to be patient about. As for tears, they +have their uses, but they never mended wrongs that I know of. It's +fool, weeping, patient women that make selfish, mean men. It's plain, +honest, righteous anger that brings about the reforms in this world. + +"If the first time that Will got ugly drunk or swearing cross about +nothing you had stood up for yourself and the children and reminded him +sharply of the decencies instead of crying softly and praying for +patience, you wouldn't be sitting here, the two of you, in an empty +house with your children God knows where. + +"I've known you since before you were married and I'm sorry for you +because I know--" + +Then it was that Grandma Wentworth began to talk as only she knew how. +She forgot nothing. She recalled to that man and woman all the beauty +and the wonder of the beginning; the new furniture, the summer +moonlight when their home was young and they were waiting for their +first baby; his coming; his blue eyes and Jimmy's brown ones and little +Alice's gentle ways. All the past sweetness that had been theirs and +was not wholly forgotten she brought back, and in the end when they +sobbed aloud she cried a bit with them, for they were of her +generation. And then she rose to go. + +"Well, now that I've had my say I'll tell you that I really came to +invite you to your daughter's wedding supper to-night. Tommy Winston's +married your Alice sure enough, but he's a good boy even if he is +motherless and fatherless and has sort of shifted for himself in odd +ways. He brought Alice to me last night all properly married and she's +been with me ever since, so everything is all right and respectable, +for which you may thank the dear Lord on bended knees. Tommy's been +and rented the little Bently place over on the hill and is getting it +into shape with a few pieces of furniture. It's such a doll house it +won't take much to furnish it. I've found half a dozen things up attic +and, Milly, if you look around, you'll find plenty here to help start +the little new home in fair shape. Thank heavens, life in Green Valley +is still simple enough so's people can every now and then marry for +love and not much of anything else. Though Tommy's got a little +besides his horse and wagon. He's already bought Alice a new hat and +fixings and he's going down to Tony's hardware store this afternoon to +order up a good cook stove. So you see--" + +But at this point Sears woke up and hoarsely, defiantly and a little +tremulously announced: + +"He'll do no such thing. I'm going down right now to buy that there +cook stove." + +So that was settled and a new home peaceably, respectably started as +every home should be. And it would have been hard to say who was the +busiest and happiest of all the people who helped make a wedding that +day. + +By three o'clock, however, everything was about done and there were +only the final touches to be put on. Grandma engineered everything +over the telephone and Green Valley responded whole-heartedly, as it +always did to all her work. + +Fanny Foster had found time to run down to Jessup's and buy the bride a +first-class tablecloth and some towels. Fanny was always buying the +most appropriate, tasty and serviceable things for other people and the +most outlandish, cheap and second-hand stuff for herself. The +tablecloth was extravagantly good, as Grandma sternly told her. + +But, "La--what of it! I was saving the money to buy myself a silk +petticoat," Fanny defended herself. "I wanted to know just once before +I died what and how it felt like to rustle up the church aisle instead +of slinking down it on a Sunday morning. But I just think a silk +petticoat isn't worth thinking about when a thing like this happens." + +So Grandma smiled and as she laid out her best black silk she made a +mental note of the fact that Fanny Foster was to have, sometime or +other, a silk petticoat, made up to her for this day's work and +self-sacrifice. For Grandma was one of those rare practical people who +yet believed in respecting the foolish dreams of impractical humans. + +So it came about that everybody who could walk was at Tommy's and +Alice's wedding. The bride wore a beautifully simple dress that came +from Paris in Nan's trunk. And there were roses in her hair and Tommy +hardly knew her, and her father and mother certainly did not, so dazed +were they. + +The little doll house was already a home, with all of Green Valley +trooping in to leave little gifts and stopping long enough to shake +Tommy's hand and wish him luck and health and maybe twins. + +Indeed, Alice Sears' elopement and wedding became a part of Green +Valley history, so great an event was it, what with the suddenness of +it and the whole town being asked and Nan Ainslee coming home so +providentially, and Cynthia's son making a speech. + +The crowd was so great and so merry that the little Brownlee girl, +having tucked her fretful mother up in bed, stole out to the garden +fence and watched the doings with all a child's wistful eyes. David +Allan, who happened to drift out that way, found her there and they +visited over the fence. It took David quite a while to tell her what +it all meant, for she was of course a stranger to Green Valley and +Green Valley ways. + +Grandma watched her town folk a little mistily that night and expressed +her opinion a little tremulously to Roger Allan. + +"Roger, did you ever see a town so chockful of people that you have to +laugh over one minute and cry over the next?" + +Nan's father, walking home with her through the quiet streets, stopped +to light a cigar. When it was burning properly he remarked innocently +to his daughter: + +"I don't know when I've met so unusually good-looking and likeable a +fellow as this minister chap, Knight." + +Nan looked at her father with cold and suspicious eyes and her voice +when she answered was scornful. + +"You thought, Mr. Ainslee, that you met the handsomest and most +likeable chap on earth in Yokohama--if you remember," she reminded him +icily. + +"Yes, of course--I remember. But I have come to believe that I was +somewhat mistaken in that boy in Yokohama. He lacked something that +this chap has--an elusive quality that is hard to put a name to but +which is one of the big essentials that makes for success." + +"Ministers," drawled Nanny wickedly, "have never been noticeably +successful in Green Valley." + +"No," admitted her father, "they haven't. And of course it's too bad +the boy's a minister. He's badly handicapped, naturally. Still, I +never remember when I'm with him that he is a parson. It may be that +women feel the same way. And you noticed that he had the good sense +not to wear a frock coat to this informal little wedding. I can't +recall that he has ever worn a frock coat since he's been here. I +think you'd like ministers, Nanny, if they weren't so given to wearing +frock coats. In fact, I'm willing to bet that you are going to like +this wonderful boy from India immensely." + +Nanny stood still and faced her father. + +"I loathe ministers--in any kind of a coat," she explained firmly. +"And I'll bet no bets with you. Such offers are unseemly in a man of +your years and already apparent grayness. They are, moreover, +detrimental to my morals. I should think you'd be ashamed,--and also +mindful of your former losses and mistaken prophecies." + +"Oh," her father assured her, "I admit my losses and mistakes. But I +have by no means lost hope or faith. You never can tell. I'm bound to +guess right some day. And I'm rather partial to this minister chap. +It would be so natural and fitting a punishment for an irreverent young +woman. For Nanny," the father added with teasing gentleness, "sweet as +you are and lovable, a little reverence and religion wouldn't hurt you." + +"I've always heard it said," demurely recollected Nanny, "that girls +generally take after the father." + +"That may be," agreed this particular father. "In that case I should +think you'd be willing to marry a little religion into the family for +my sake, if not your own." + +Nanny's patience was beginning to feel the strain. + +"Mr. Ainslee," she warned him sternly, "if this was snowball time +instead of springtime in Green Valley, I'd snowball you black and blue." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +LILAC TIME + +To the knowing and observant and the loyal Green Valley is dear at all +times. But what most touches and wakens a Green Valley heart is lilac +time. + +There are on the Green Valley calendar many red-letter days beside the +regularly recurring national holidays, but lilac time, or Lilac Sunday, +is Green Valley's very own glad day. It is in the spring what +Thanksgiving is in the fall and wanderers who can not get home for +Thanksgiving and Christmas ease their homesick hearts with promises of +lilac time in the old town. + +On this particular Lilac Sunday, Nan, radiant and dressed in the sort +of clothes that only Nan knew how to buy and wear, was on her way to +church. She was early and decided to pass the Churchill place. She +always did at lilac time, for then it was fairly embedded in fragrance +and flowery glory. She had cut the blooms from her own bushes and sent +them on. She carried only a few of her most perfect sprays. She saw +that the Churchill gardens too had been trimmed but plenty of beauty +remained. + +She stopped a moment to admire the wonderful old red-brick house +glowing through the tender greens of spring. Her eyes drank in its +beauty and then fell on two huge perfect lilac plumes on the bush +nearest her. They were larger and lovelier than her own. + +With a little smile Nan reached out to gather them. She broke off the +first and was about to gather the other when Cynthia's son came slowly +and laughingly from around the bush. + +"Let me get it for you. You will soil your glove." + +Nan was startled and unaccountably embarrassed. She flushed with +something like annoyance. + +"Mercy! I had no idea you were anywhere about. I suppose I'm greedy +but these did seem lovelier than mine. This is Lilac Sunday and I +thought--perhaps nobody told you--that as long as you had so many you +wouldn't mind--I hope you don't think--" + +She was so very evidently bothered over the whole affair, so +disconcerted, she who was always so coolly dignified, that he laughed +with boyish delight. + +"Oh--don't explain, I understand," he begged. + +The red in Nan's cheeks deepened. She stiffened and half turned away. + +"Goodness," she exclaimed to no one in particular, "how I _do_ dislike +ministers. They always understand everything. You just can't tell +them anything. How I loathe them! They're insufferable." + +It was his turn to look a little startled and embarrassed. + +"But you don't have to like me as a minister. I don't want to be +_your_ minister." + +She looked up to see just what he meant. But he seemed to have +forgotten her, for the smile had gone from his eyes and though he +looked at her she knew that he didn't see her; that he was looking +beyond her at some one, something else. When he spoke it was with a +winning gravity and a wistfulness that Nanny tried not to hear. + +"I miss my mother more than any one here can guess. Grandma Wentworth +is wonderful. She is so wise and good and I love her. But my mother +was young and gay and very beautiful. She played and laughed and +talked with me. She was the loveliest soul I ever knew. You are very +much like her. I have wanted you for a friend. I never had a sister +but if I could have had I should have asked for a girl like you." + +Oh, Nanny sensed the pitiful, childish loneliness of that plea! The +wistfulness of the boy stabbed through her really tender heart. But +Nanny Ainslee was a joyous, laughter-loving creature. And the idea of +this boy whom already she half loved asking her to be his _friend_, his +_sister_! Oh, it was childishly funny. How her father would chuckle +if he knew that she who had dismissed so many suitors with platonic +friendliness and sisterly solicitude was now being offered that same +platonic friendliness and brotherly love. It was too much for Nanny's +sense of humor! + +So Nanny giggled. She giggled disgracefully and could not stop +herself,--giggled even though she knew that the tall boy beside her was +flushing a painful red and slowly freezing into a hurt and painful +silence. But she could not save herself or him. + +"You had better let me cut you a few more sprays," he said at last +curtly. + +She let him lay them in her arms and they walked to church in absolute +silence. Nanny never knew that any living man could be so stubbornly +silent. She was sorry and she wanted to tell him so. But he gave her +no chance. It seemed he was a young man who never asked for things +twice. Nanny was sorry but she was also, for some incomprehensible +reason, angry. And the sorrier she grew the angrier she became. +Cynthia's son seemed not to notice. He walked straight on into the +church but Nanny stayed outside and held open court under the big horse +chestnuts in front of the church door. + +She had left the olive groves and almond groves, the thick roses and +the blue waters of Italy, in order to be at home in time to see her +native town wrapped up in its fragrant lilac glory. + +She stayed out now, her arms full of lilac plumes, watching the little +groups of her townspeople coming down the village streets toward the +church whose bell was tolling so sweetly through the warm, spring air. + +Here came Mrs. Dustin with Peter and Joe Baldwin with his two boys and +Colonel Stratton with his sweet-faced wife. From the opposite +direction came the Reverend Alexander Campbell with his wife in black +silk, his sister in gray silk, his elderly niece in blue silk and his +wife's second cousin in lavender. There was Joshua Stillman and his +quiet daughter, Uncle Tony and Uncle Tony's brother William, with his +four girls and Seth Curtis' wife, Ruth. + +Seth never went to church, having a profound scorn for the clergy. But +he always fixed things so his wife could go. He said ministers were +poor business men, selfish husbands and proverbially poor fathers, from +all he'd seen of them. Somehow Seth was a singularly unfortunate man +in the matter of seeing things. But there was no denying the fact that +he was an unusual husband. He had been caught time and again by his +men friends and neighbors on a Sunday morning with one of his wife's +aprons tied about him, holding the baby in one arm, while he stirred +something on the stove with the other, and in various other ways +superintending his household while Ruth was at church. But neither +jeers nor sympathy ever upset him. + +"No, I can't say that I've ever hankered for sermons much. They don't +generally tally with what I've seen and know of life. But Ruth now can +get something helpful out of even a fool's remarks and comes home +rested and cheerful. I figure that a woman as smart as Ruth about +working and saving sure earns her right to a bit of a church on Sunday +if she wants it. And furthermore, I aim to give my wife anything in +reason that she wants. It doesn't hurt any man to learn from a little +personal experience that babies aren't just little blessings full of +smiles and dimples but darn little nuisances, let me tell you. This +little kid is as good as they make them but he gives me a backache all +over, puts bumps on my temper and ties my nerves up in knots. And I've +discovered that just watching bread or pies or pudding is work. And +when a man's peeled the potatoes and set the table and sliced the bread +and filled the water glasses and opened the oven a dozen times and +strained and stirred and mashed and salted and peppered, he begins to +understand why his wife is so tired after getting a Sunday dinner. And +when he thinks of other days, washing days and ironing and baking and +scrubbing and sewing days, why, if he's anyway decent he begins to +suspect that he's darn lucky to get a full-grown woman to do all that +work for just her room and board. And when he stops to count the times +she's tied his necktie, darned his socks and patched his clothes, +besides giving him a clean bed, a pretty sitting room to live in, +children to play with and brag about, and a bank book to make him sleep +easy on such nights as the storms are raging outside, why, a man just +don't have to go to church to believe in God. He's got proofs enough +right in his kitchen. It's the wife who ought to go if it's only to +sit still for an hour and get time to tell herself that there is a God +and that some day the work will let up maybe and her back won't ache +any more and Johnny won't be so hard on his shoes and Sammy on his +stockings. Why, I tell you I'm afraid to keep Ruth from church, afraid +that if she loses her belief in a married woman's heaven she'll leave +me for somebody better or get so discouraged that she'll just hold her +breath and die." + +So Ruth Curtis went to church every Sunday. And Seth saw to it that +she always looked pretty. This particular Lilac Sunday she was wearing +the sprigged dimity that Seth bought her over in Spring Road at +Williamson's spring sale. + +Softly the bell tolled and the last stragglers came hurrying leisurely, +every soul carrying the lovely fragrant plumes so that the church would +be sweet with the breath of spring. Later, these armfuls of beauty +would be packed into huge boxes and shipped to the city hospitals to +gladden pain-racked bodies and weary hearts. + +Nanny Ainslee was still outside waiting for Grandma Wentworth. Lilac +Sunday Nanny always waited for Grandma and always sat with her, because +of a certain story that Grandma had told her once when the lamps were +not yet lit and the soft summer moonlight lay in windowed squares on +Grandma's sitting room floor. Nanny began to inquire of the last +comers. But Tommy and Alice Winston, still bridey and shy, said they +had seen nothing of her, and even Roger Allan supposed of course that +she must be in her favorite pew, known to the oldtimers as Inspiration +Corner. For it had been observed that all ministers sooner or later +delivered their discourses to Grandma Wentworth. They were always sure +of her undivided attention. Other people's eyes and minds might +wander, some might be even openly bored, but Grandma's uplifted face +was always kindly and encouraging, even though the sermon was +hopelessly jumbled. She was the surest, severest critic and yet each +man preached to her feeling that with the criticism would come +kindliness and the sort of mother comfort that Grandma somehow knew how +to give to the meanest and most blundering of creatures. Indeed, it +was the least successful of Green Valley's ministers who had designated +Grandma's seat as Inspiration Corner. And then had in a final burst of +wrath told Green Valley that like Sodom and Gomorrah it was doomed, +that no mere man preacher could save it, that its only hope lay in +Grandma Wentworth, who alone understood its miserable, petty orneriness. + +He meant to leave town a sputtering, raging man, that minister,--full +of what he called righteous wrath. But he went to say good-by to +Grandma and experienced a change of heart. + +He began his farewell by unburdening his heart and soul of all the +ponderous doctrines that sunny, joyful Green Valley had refused to +listen to. He spoke earnestly of the world's terrible need of +salvation, the fearful necessity for haste and wholesale repentance and +the awful menace of God's wrath. And the fact that he was a man +entering his forties instead of his thirties made matters worse. + +But Grandma listened patiently and when he was emptied of all his +sorrows and worriments she took him out into her herb-garden, seated +him where he could see the sunset hills and then she preached a +marvellous sermon to just this one man alone. No one but he knows what +she told him but he went forth a humble, tired, quiet man, filled to +the brim with a sudden belief in just life as it is lived by a few +hundred million humans. Five years later word came to Green Valley +that this same man was a much loved pastor somewhere in the mountains. +And Green Valley, perennially young, unthinking, joyous Green Valley, +laughed incredulously as a sweet-hearted but wrongly educated child +always laughs at a true fairy tale or a simple miracle. + +"If I had the making and raising of ministers," Grandma was heard to +say, apropos of this clergyman, "about the first thing I'd set them to +learning would be to laugh, first at themselves and then at other +people. And as for this repentance and exhortation business I believe +it is worn out. Humans have gotten tired of that 'last call for the +paradise express.' They like this world and its life and they know +they could be pretty decent if somebody would only explain a few little +things to them. It isn't that they hate religion but they want to be +allowed to grow into it naturally and sanely. Religion getting ought +to be the quietest, happiest process, just pleasant neighboring like +and comparing of ideas, with every now and then a holy hush when men +and women have suddenly sensed some big beauty in life. All this noise +is unnecessary, for every living soul of us, barring idiots, repents +several times a day even though we don't admit it in so many words. +And as for righteous wrath--it's a good thing and I believe in it, but +like cayenne pepper it wants to be used sparingly and only at the right +place and on the right person. Any one would think to hear some +ministers talk that the Almighty was a combination of Theodore +Roosevelt, the Kaiser and a New York Police Commissioner working the +third degree. + +"I wonder what the colleges can be thinking of, turning loose such +stale foolishness and old canned stuff on a mellow, sunny little home +town like Green Valley that's full of plain, blundering but +well-meaning, God-fearing people who work joyfully at their business of +living and turn up more religion when they plow a furrow or make over +the wedding dress for the baby than these ministers can dig up out of +all their musty books. I've prayed for all kinds of qualities in +ministers but I've come to the point where I ask nothing more of a +preacher than a laugh now and then, some horse sense and health. + +"I used to think that only mature men ought to be sent out but now I +shall be glad to see a boy in the pulpit to show us the way to +salvation,--a boy it may be with a head full of foolish notions that +old folks say are not practical and some of which won't of course stand +wear; but a boy, with a glad young face, eyes full of faith and dreams +and the sort of insane courage and daring that only the young know. +Such a boy needs considerable education in certain earthly matters, of +course, but he's lovable and teachable and will in time grow into a +real, God-knowing, truth-interpreting man." + +Oh, Grandma Wentworth was an authority on ministers--ministers and +babies. And it was a baby that had kept her away from church this +Lilac Sunday; a little, merry, red-headed boy baby that had come in the +early morning to make glad the heart of unbusinesslike Billy Evans and +his neat businesslike wife. For several hours Doc Philipps and Grandma +had despaired of both baby and mother, but when the pink dawn came +smiling over the world's rim Billy's little son was born alive and +unblemished and Billy's wife crept back from the Valley of the Shadow +and smiled a bit into Billy's white, stricken face. And Billy looked +deep down into the brown eyes of the girl and the terrible numbness +went out of his muscles and the icy hardness from around his heart and +he slipped out into the morning world to thank the Great Spirit that +moved it for His mercy and wonderful gift. He just stood on his front +doorstep and, looking about his pretty home and remembering the miracle +within the house, poured a great prayer into the heart of the glad +morning. + +Billy's house was one of the most picturesque of the many pretty homes +in Green Valley. It had been a ramshackle, tumbled-down old cabin lost +in a tangle of bushes and hidden from the road by a shabby, unsightly +row of old willows. Billy was going to rent it for temporary barn +purposes but his wife, who had a nimble and a prophetic eye, made him +buy it. Then, under her supervision Billy enlarged and remodeled it +and Billy's wife waved some sort of a fairy wand over it, for it became +over night a lovely, story-book home. When everything was ready she +had the unsightly willows cut, revealing a gently rising stretch of +mossy sward ending in a cluster of old trees from which the cozy house +peeped roguishly, tantalizingly. Two old walnuts guarded the little +footpath to the door and two huge lilac bushes screened the porch from +the too curious gaze of travelers on the road below. Indeed, so +altogether taking and fascinating a bit of property did it become after +its transformation that it was said that two of Green Valley's real +estate men never went down that road without doing sums in their heads +and calling themselves names for overlooking such a bargain. It takes +constructive imagination to be successful in real estate. + +And now around this cozy home spot Billy wandered deliriously, +aimlessly. It was the tolling of the church bell and the smell of the +lilacs that recalled to him the significance of the day. + +"Why, he was born on Lilac Sunday and he's red-headed just like Her. +Gosh--I must a bin born lucky!" + +Billy looked once more all about his story-book home and then his eyes +strayed away to Petersen's Woods, fairy green and already full of deep +shadowed aisles, full of fretted beauty and solemnity. Beyond them lay +the creek, a pool of silver draped in misty morning veils. + +"Gosh--I wish to God I was religious!" suddenly, contritely murmured +Billy Evans. In high heaven the angels, and in Billy's kitchen Grandma +Wentworth, overheard and smiled. + +When Hank Lolly came up from the livery barn for a late breakfast, his +face drawn and eyes full of fear for the man and woman who had been +family and home to him, Billy went down the footpath to meet him. + +"It's all right, Hank! He's here, red hair and all," Billy informed +him in the merest breath of a whisper. Hank wiped his face in limp +relief and sat down quite suddenly on the grass beside the path. +Instinctively Billy sat down with him. + +They said nothing for a time, just looked and looked at the wide blue +sky, the green sweet world, tried for perhaps the millionth time to +sense Eternity and the what-and-why-and-how of it all and then gave it +up and like children accepted the day, the little new life, the whole +wonder of it as happy children accept it all, on faith and with +untainted joy. It was just good to be there and there was no doubting +the perfect May day. So they sat reverently until Billy, looking again +at that mass of shimmering greens and into those church-like aisles, +said: + +"Hank, some one of us had ought to go to church to-day. I wish to God +I had kep' up going to Sunday school. Mother got me started but she +died before she could get me started in on church. So I never went. +It's a terrible thing for a man not to learn religion along with his +reading and writing and 'rithmetic. I used to think it was nobody's +business whether I had any religion or not after mother died. I knew +that where she was she'd understand. But I see now it was a terrible +mistake thinking that way and not laying in a supply of religion. A +man thinks he owns himself and that certain things are nobody's +business, but by-and-by along comes a wife or a red-headed baby and +things happen different from what you've ever expected, things that you +just got to have religion for, and gosh--what are you going to do then +if you ain't got any?" + +This terrible situation being beyond the mental powers of Hank, that +soul just sat still until Billy puzzled a way out. + +"Somebody'd ought to go to church from out this house to-day," went on +Billy in a low voice. "Grandma Wentworth can't go on account of Her +and It. I can't go because--gosh--I'm so kind of split, my head going +one way and my legs another, that as likely as not I'd wind up in the +blacksmith shop or the hotel or fall in the creek. I ain't safe on the +streets to-day, Hank. And, anyway, I've got to keep up fires and water +boiling and them dumb'd frogs under the willows from croaking so's She +can sleep to-night. That leaves nobody but you, Hank." + +Billy hesitated, realizing the enormity of the request he was about to +make. + +"Hank--I wish to God, you'd go and sort of settle the bill up for me. +Just go, Hank, and tell Him, that's the Big Boss, how darned thankful +we all are about what's happened to-day and that we'll do right by the +little shaver and that we'll try to run the livery business so's He +won't find too many mistakes when He gets around to looking over the +books Barney and you and me's keeping. And you might mention how we've +always made it a point to treat our horses well but will do better in +the future. And tell Him I'll see that the Widow Green's spring +plowing is done sooner after this. It was a darn shame her being left +last like that but that she never asked me, me being so easy-going and +she so neat, until the rest of them left her in the lurch. And tell +Him I'll take the sheriff's job, though if there's one thing I can't do +it's watching people and jumping on them. Just talk to Him that way, +Hank. Put in any little thing you happen to think of and go as far as +you like in promises and subscriptions. The business is moving and +what promises you and I can't keep She'll find a way to pay off. And +here's a ten-dollar gold piece to drop in the hat when it comes around. +You--" + +But Hank was standing now and looking at his employer with such terror +in every line of his weather-beaten face that Billy paused again. + +"My God--Billy! You ain't asking me--_me_--to--to--to--to go to +_church_?" Hank's voice fairly squeaked and stuttered with the horror +that clutched him. + +"Hank, if there was any one else--" + +But Hank, shaking in every joint and muscle of his still flabby body, +wagged his head in utter misery. + +"Billy, I'll do anything else for you and Mrs. Evans and little +Billy--anything but that. I'll jump into Wimple's pond, get drunk, +sign the pledge--anything but that. What you're a-wanting, Billy, +ain't to be thought of. You're forgetting, Billy, what I was and what +I am. Why, Billy, that there church belongs to the best people in this +town and it ain't for the likes of me to go into such vallyable places, +a-tramplin' on that there expensive carpet we both of us hauled free of +charge last September. There's Doc Philipps and Tony and Grandma +Wentworth and any number of good friends of mine in there. And do you +think I want to shame them and insult them by coming into their church, +disturbing the doings? You just let things be and when Mrs. Evans is +up and around again she'll go like she always does when she's got +enough vittles cooked up for us men folks. I'm a miserable, no-account +drunk, that's what I am, Billy Evans, and I ain't no proper person to +send on an errand to the Lord. Why, church ain't for the likes of +me--it's--it's--" + +But at this point language failed Hank entirely, and the enormity of +the proposed undertaking once more sweeping over him, Hank searched for +his bandanna and wiped the beads of cold sweat from around his mouth +and the back of his stringy neck. + +Billy was silent. He knew that Hank was right and that he had asked an +impossible service of his faithful helper. Still there in the morning +sun glistened the green grove and through the holiness of the spring +morning tolled the old church bell. So Billy rose and walked slowly +and a little sadly up the narrow path. And Hank walked up with him. + +It was in silence that they sat down to their late breakfast. But in +the act of swallowing his tenth cornmeal pancake dripping with maple +syrup Hank had a sudden inspiration. The misery in his face gave place +to a grim determination. + +"Billy," he offered remorsefully, "I can't go to church for you, but +I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll go to the dentist's and have these +bad teeth fixed that Doc and Mrs. Evans and you have been at me about. +Next to going to church that's the awfullest thing I know of and I'll +do it. Doc says that bad teeth make a bad stomach and a bad stomach +makes a bad man and it may be so. And as for that ten-dollar gold +piece, I don't see why you can't send that by Barney, same as you'd +send him to the bank for change or to Tony's to pay the gas bill. When +I go back now I'll just send Barney along with it, and then I'll go see +Doc Mitchell and let him kill me with that there machine of his." + +That's how it happened that a little thin hand caught Nanny Ainslee's +just as she was entering the church door and Barney of the spindle legs +begged frenziedly for assistance. + +"Aw, Nan--look at this!" and he held out the gold piece. "Billy Evans' +got a little baby down to his house and he's clean crazy. Grandma +Wentworth's bossing the baby show and she says for you to take the +minister home to dinner. And Billy's sent this here and wants me to +put it in the collection box and I don't dast. Why, say, old man +Austin that passes the collection plate would have me pinched if he saw +me drop that in it. + +"And, anyhow, I ain't been liked around here ever since last Christmas +when I got three boxes of candy by mistake. And, gee--Nan, I don't +know what to do about it. Billy Evans is the best man in this here +town and I'd do most anything for him, but he's such a good guy himself +he don't see that church ain't any place for a kid like me and that it +was a mistake to send me with this coin." + +Nan's amazement gave way to sudden enlightenment. She knew now why +Grandma Wentworth had not put in an appearance, and knowing Billy Evans +well, she instantly comprehended the situation. + +"Barney, what in the world are you talking about, saying this church is +no place for you. This is just the place for a boy who gets several +boxes of Christmas candy by mistake. You come right along with me." + +"Aw, Nan, why can't you drop it in for me? I just ain't got the nerve. +I'd rather get all my teeth pulled like Hank is going to do. Why, say, +Nan, just the sight of old Austin makes my hair curl. I tell ya he +don't like me and I'll be pinched--" + +But Nan had already drawn Billy's spindle-legged assistant inside and +as no man yet had been known to show anything but quiet pride when +escorting Nanny Ainslee, Barney straightened manfully and with an +outward serenity that amazed even himself he gracefully slid into a +seat, having first gallantly stepped aside to permit his gracious lady +to be seated. And life being that morning especially a thing of tender +humor, they had no sooner settled themselves comfortably when Fanny +Foster, the last comer, sank down beside them, breathing heavily. + +Fanny Foster was always late for church, not from any notion that a +late entrance was fashionable but because of some hitch in her domestic +affairs. She always explained to the congregation afterward just what +had caused her delay and the congregation was always ready to listen to +her excuses, for they were as a rule highly original ones. + +Fate was always sending Fanny the most thrilling experiences at the +most improper times. The children were always falling into the cistern +or setting the barn afire as she was about to start out somewhere. And +such things as buttonhooks and hairpins had a way of disappearing just +when she was in the greatest hurry. Not that the lack of these toilet +necessities ever stopped Fanny from attending any town function. + +If the buttonhook could not be found she set out with her shoes +unbuttoned, borrowing the necessary implement on the way. If she had +no hairpins she put her hair up temporarily with two knitting needles +or lead pencils or anything like that that came handy, stopped at +Jessup's, bought her hairpins, and while reporting news in Mrs. Green's +kitchen did up her hair without the aid of brush, comb or mirror. + +This trait Fanny came by naturally. She had had a droll grandmother. +It was authentic history that once at the very moment when she was +getting ready to attend a Green Valley funeral this grandmother's false +teeth broke, leaving her somewhat dazed. But only for a moment, for +she was a woman with a perfect memory. She suddenly remembered that +the wife of the deceased had an old emergency set; so, slipping through +the back streets, she arrived at the house of grief, borrowed the new +widow's old teeth and wept as copiously and sincerely, albeit a little +carefully, over the remains as any one else there. + +Now, scarcely waiting to regain her breath, Fanny turned to Nanny with +the usual explanations, only stopping to exclaim over Barney--"Land +sakes, Barney, what are you doing here!" A breath and then in sibilant +whispers: + +"Well--I thought I'd never get here. When I come to dress I found the +children had cut up my corset into a harness for the dog and Jessup's +said they hadn't anybody to send up with a new one and John said he +couldn't go because his foot's bad, him having stepped on the rake +yesterday afternoon and not wanting to irritate it, so's he could go to +work tomorrow as usual. And Grandma's up to Billy Evans' trying to +keep him from going crazy or I could have borrowed one of hers. So I +'phoned Central to see if she couldn't hunt up somebody to bring me +that new corset from Jessup's. Well, who does she get hold of but +Denny, just as he's going past with a telegram for Jocelyn Brownlee. +He brought the corset with the string gone and the box broken and asked +me to help him figure out what that telegram meant. It said, + +"'Coming better call it phyllis + BOB.' + + +"There's few men that can write a proper letter. We had to give it up. +And as if that wasn't enough, when I got to the creamery I met +Skinflint Holden and he told me there was a lot of disease amongst the +cattle and the men all got together and had a meeting and made Jake +Tuttle deputy marshal or something. It's a wonder Jake wouldn't say +something. I suppose he thinks the few old cows we have here in town +ain't worth saving. + +"Well, anyhow, I was hurrying along so's not to be late and just as I +turned Tumley's hedge didn't Bessie come out with her face swollen so +she looked homelier than Theresa Meyer. It seems she had a birthday +and Alex brought her a big box of chocolates and they give her the +toothache. She went to Doc Mitchell but he put her off because he was +regulating and pulling every tooth in Hank Lolly's head. She was just +sick to think she had to miss Lilac Sunday and Mr. Courtney's last +sermon, but she told me to be sure and listen and if he let on he was +sorry he was leaving not to believe him, because he's had everything +except the parlor furniture crated for a month. They've been eating +off tin plates and drinking out of two enamel cups on the kitchen +table. Bessie thinks that for a minister he's full of sin and +self-pride. But I say even a minister--" + +But at this point the hymn singing was over, the congregation settled +itself in comfortable attitudes, and the careful Mr. Courtney rose to +deliver his farewell sermon. + +It was a sermon that stirred nobody. Green Valley was as glad to see +the Reverend Courtney departing as he was to go. His one cautious +reference to their pastorless state, for he did not know that Green +Valley had already selected its new minister, brought not a line of +worry to the faces turned so politely to the pulpit, for on Lilac +Sunday and to a farewell sermon Green Valley was ever polite. + +Green Valley, listening, thought with relief of the Sundays ahead and +felt very much the way a hospitable housewife feels when an uncongenial +guest departs and the home springs back to its old cheery order and +family peace. + +When the services were over Green Valley strolled out into the May +sunshine in twos and threes and stood about as always in little groups +to exchange the week's news. Billy Evans' new happiness, the +ten-dollar gold piece and all its attending incidents were duly talked +over. Under the horse chestnuts Max Longman was telling Colonel +Stratton how the day before Sam Ellis had at last leased the hotel to a +Chicago man. It was reported that there was to be no new barber shop, +but that over on West Street a poolroom, also run by a city stranger, +was already doing business. Several people had passed it that morning +on their way to church and all said it had a peculiar appearance. + +"Looks like one of those woebegone city dens, with its green plush +curtains so you can't see what's going on inside. All it needs is fly +specks on the windows and a strong smell at its side door. That'll +come with time. I hear you can play billiards and pool in there and +there's some slot machines for those too young to take a hand at cards." + +So said Jake Tuttle, who now that he was a deputy sheriff on the watch +for diseases threatening his and his neighbors' cattle, suddenly +realized that there might be such a thing as a deputy sheriff to look +out for the physical and moral health of humans. + +Green Valley listened to Max Longman's announcement and Jake's comment +and made up its mind to go around and see. Sam Ellis' withdrawal from +business made Green Valley folks a little uneasy. The hotel in other +hands might become a strange place. For a moment an uncomfortable +feeling gripped those who heard. Sam, an old friend and a neighbor, +with his genial good sense and old-fashioned hotel was one thing. A +stranger from the big and wicked city was another. + +Green Valley almost began to worry a bit. But on the way home this +feeling wore off. How could things change? Why, there were the +Spencer boys taking turns at the ice-cream freezer on the back porch. +There was Ella Higgins coming out with a saucer of milk for her cat. +Downer's barn door was open and any one could see by the new buggy that +stood in it that Jack Downer's brother and family had driven in from +the farm for a Sunday dinner and visit. Williamson's dog, Caesar, was +tied up,--a sure sign that Mel and Emmy had gone off to see Emmy's +folks over in Spring Road. The chairs in Widow Green's orchard told +plainly that her sister's girls had come in from the city for the +week-end. On the Fenton's front porch sat pretty Millie Fenton, +waiting to put a flower in Robbie Longman's buttonhole. While +everybody knew that just next door homely Theresa Meyer was putting an +extra pan of fluffy soda biscuits into the oven as the best preparation +for _her_ beau. + +So Green Valley looked and smiled and went joyously home to its +fragrant, old-fashioned Sunday dinner. New elements might and would +come but this smiling town would absorb them, mellow them to its own +golden hue and go on its way living and rejoicing. + +Cynthia's son went to dinner with the Ainslees. He walked with Mr. +Ainslee while Nan and her brother went on ahead. Nan was almost +noisily gay but no one seemed to be at all aware of it. + +The dinner was delicious and went off without the least bit of +embarrassment. At the table Nan was as suddenly still as she had been +noisily gay. She let the men do the talking while she scrupulously +attended to their wants. Once she forgot herself and while he was +talking studied the face of Cynthia's son. Her father caught her at it +and smiled. This made her flush and to even up matters she +deliberately put salt instead of sugar into her father's after-dinner +cup of coffee. Whereupon he, tasting the salt, made an irrelevant +remark about handwriting on the wall. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +GREEN VALLEY MEN + +Close on the heels of Lilac Sunday comes Decoration Day. And nowhere +is it observed so thoroughly as in Green Valley. + +The whole week preceding the day there is heard everywhere the whir of +sewing machines. New dresses are feverishly cut and made; old ones +ripped and remade. Hats are bought, old ones are retrimmed. Buggies +are repainted and baby carriages oiled. Dick does a thriving business +in lemons, picnic baskets, flags, peanuts and palm-leaf fans, these +being things that Jessup's chronically forget to carry, regarding them +as trifles and rather scornfully leaving them to Dick, who makes a +point of having on hand a very choice supply. + +This fury of work gradually dies down, to be followed by such an +epidemic of baking that the old town smells like a sweet old bakery +shop with its doors and windows wide open. There is then every evening +a careful survey of the flower beds in the garden, a rigid economy of +blossoms and even much skilful forcing of belated favorites. + +The last day is generally given over to hat buying, the purchasing of +the last forgotten fixings and clothes inspections. From one end of +the town to the other clotheslines, dining-room chairs, porch rockers +and upstairs bedrooms are overflowing with silk foulards, frilled +dimities, beribboned and belaced organdies, not to mention the billows +of dotted swiss and muslin. + +On short clotheslines, stretched across corners of back and side +porches or in the tree-shaded nooks of back yards, may be seen hanging +the holiday garments of Green Valley men. But what most catches the +eye are the old suits of army blue flapping gently in the spring breeze +with here and there a brass button glinting. There are a surprising +number of these suits of army blue just as there are a surprising +number of graves in the little Green Valley cemetery over which, the +long year through, flutters the small flag set there by loving hands +each Decoration Day. + +There are all manner of cleaning operations going on in full view of +anybody and everybody who might be interested enough to look. For +there is no streak of mean secretiveness in Green Valley folks. + +This is the one time in the year when Widow Green takes off and "does +up" the yellow silk tidy that drapes the upper right-hand corner of her +deceased husband's portrait which stands on an easel in the darkest +corner of her parlor. This little service is not the tender attention +of a loving and grieving wife for a sadly missed husband but rather a +patriotic woman's tribute to a man, who, worthless and cruel as a +husband, had yet been a gallant and an honorable soldier. + +As the widow sits on the back steps carefully washing the tidy in a +hand basin and with a bar of special soap highly recommended by Dick, +she looks over into the next yard and calls to Jimmy Rand and asks him +whether he's going to march with the rest of the school children and +will there be anything special on the programme this year. And he +tells her sure he's going to march. Ain't he got a new pair of pants, +a blouse, a navy blue tie and a new stickpin? And as for the +programme, he warns her to watch out "fur us kids because we're going +to be fixed up for something, but I dassent tell because it's a +surprise the teachers got up." + +This is the one day in the year when Jimmy Rand polishes his +grandfather's shoes with scrupulous care and without demanding the +usual nickel. He takes his payment in watching the blue army suit +swaying on the line under the tall poplars and in hearing the crowds on +Decoration Day shout themselves hoarse for old Major Rand. + +It is the one time too when Old Skinflint Holden gets from his fellow +citizens and neighbors a certain grave respect, for they all know that +on the morrow among the men in blue will be this same Old Skinflint +Holden with a medal on his breast. + +Though every preparation has seemingly been made days ago, still that +last night before the event is the very busiest time of all. + +Joe Baldwin's little shop is crowded. Jake Tuttle is there with the +four children, buying them the fanciest of footgear for the morrow. +The two Miller boys, who work in the creamery until nine every night +but have special leave this day to purchase holiday necessities, are +standing awkwardly near Joe's side door and waiting patiently for +Frankie Stevens and Dora Langely, better known as "Central," to depart +with their black velvet slippers, before making any effort to have Joe +try his wares on their awkward feet. Little Johnny Peterson comes in +to inquire if Joe has sewed the buttons on his, Johnny's, shoes, and +Martha Gray has a hard time trying to decide which of two pairs of +moccasins are most becoming to her youngest baby. Any number of youths +are hanging about waiting for Joe to get around to selling them a box +of his best shoe polish and some, getting impatient, wait on +themselves. Joe, with his spectacles pushed up into his hair, is +rushing around from customer to customer and through it all is dimly +conscious of the fact that outside under the awning Dolly Beatty is +waiting anxiously for the men folks to get out before she ventures in +to buy her Joe's special brand of corn salve and bunion plaster. + +And so it is all the way down Main Street. In the gents' furnishings' +corner of Peter Sweeney's dry-goods store Seth Curtis is buying a new +hat, a little jaunty hat that seems to fit his head well enough but +doesn't somehow become the rest of him. Seth looks best in a cap and +always wears one except, of course, on such state occasions as the +coming one. He asks the Longman boys how he looks in the brown fedora +Pete has just put on his head and Max Longman laughs and wants to know +what difference it makes how a married man with a bald spot looks. +Then he turns away to pick out carefully the kind of tie that will make +him most pleasing in Clara's sight on the morrow. + +In the ladies' department of that same store Jocelyn Brownlee is asking +for long, white silk gloves. A little hush falls on the crowd of +feminine shoppers as Mrs. Pete gets the stepladder, mounts it and +brings down with a good deal of visible pride a pasteboard box +containing six pairs of white silk gloves that Pete bought three years +ago in a moment of incomprehensible madness, a thing which Mrs. Pete +has never until this minute forgiven him. + +Jocelyn, pretty, eager, unaffected, selects the very first pair and is +wholly unconscious of the stir she has made. It is only when David +Allan comes up and asks her if she is ready that she becomes confused +and conscious of the watching eyes of the other buyers. + +She has promised to go to the Decoration Day exercises with David and +has hurried to buy gloves for the occasion not knowing, in her city +innocence, that gloves aren't the style in Green Valley, leastways not +for any outdoor festival. + +David watches the gloves being wrapped up and that reminds him that it +wouldn't hurt to buy a new buggy whip, one of the smart ones with the +bit of red, white and blue ribbon on its tip that he saw standing in +Dick's window. + +So he and Jocelyn go off together to get the whip. It is the first +time that Jocelyn has been out in the village streets after nightfall +and she looks about her with eager eyes. + +"My--how pretty the streets look and sound! It's ever so much prettier +than village street scenes on the stage!" she confides to David. And +David laughs and takes her over to Martin's for a soda and then, +because it is still early, he coaxes her to walk about town with him +and as a final treat they stop in front of Mary Langely's millinery +shop. + +Mary Langely's shop stands right back of Joe Baldwin's place on the +next street. Mary is a widow with two girls. Dora is the Green Valley +telephone operator and Nellie is typist and office girl for old Mr. +Dunn who is Green Valley's best real estate and lawyer man. He sells +lots, now and then a house, writes insurance and draws up wills, +collects bills or rather coaxes careless neighbors to settle their +accounts, and he absolutely does not believe in divorce or woman +suffrage. These two matters stir the gentle little man to great wrath. +His wife is even a gentler soul than he is. She is the eldest of the +Tumleys, sister of George Hoskins' wife and to Joe Tumley, the little +man with a voice as sweet as a skylark's. + +You go to Mr. Dunn's office through a little low gate and you find an +old, deep-eaved, gambrel-roofed house with a hundred little window +panes smiling at you from out its mantle of ivy. You love it at once +but you don't go in right away, because the great old trees won't let +you. You go and stand under them and wonder how old they are and lay +your hand caressingly on the fine old trunks. And then you see the +myrtle and violets growing beneath them and near the house clumps of +daisies and forget-me-nots. And then you spy the beehives and the +quaint old well and you walk through the cool grape arbor right into +the little kitchen, where Mrs. Dunn, as likely as not, is making a +cherry pie or currant jell or maybe a strawberry shortcake. She is a +delicious and an old-fashioned cook. Why, she even keeps a giant +ten-gallon cooky jar forever filled with cookies, although there are +now no children in this sweet old manse. Nobody now but Nellie Langely +who goes home every night to the millinery shop where she helps her +mother make and sell the bonnets that have made Mary Langely famous in +all the country round. + +Green Valley folks have never quite gotten over wondering about Mary +Langely. When Tom Langely was alive Mary was a self-effacing, oddly +silent woman. People said she and Tom were a queer pair. Tom had +great ambitions in almost every direction. He even made brave +beginnings. But that was all. Then one day, in the midst of all +manner of ambitious enterprises, he grew tired of living and died. And +then it was that Mary Langely rose from obscurity and made Green Valley +rub its eyes. For within a week after Tom's death she had gathered +together all the loose ends of things that he had started, clapped a +frame second story on the imposing red brick first floor of the house +Tom had begun, converted this first floor into a store, and inside of a +month was selling hats to women who hadn't until then realized they +needed a hat. + +There were more electric bulbs and mirrors in Mary's shop than in any +three houses in Green Valley. That was why it was always the gayest +spot in town on the night preceding any holiday. + +It was interesting and pleasant to watch through the brightly lighted +windows and the wide double glass doors the women trying on the gay +creations and hovering over the heaps of flowers and glittering +ornaments heaped upon the counters. + +Jocelyn and David stood in the soft shadow of an old elm and while they +watched David explained the customers going in and coming out. He told +her that the tall straight woman buying the spray of purple lilacs for +her last year's hat was the Widow Green. The short, waddly woman +trying on the wide hat with the pink roses was Bessie Williams. The +tall girl with the pretty braids wound round her head was Bonnie Don, +big Steve Meckling's sweetheart. Steve, David explained, was so +foolishly in love that he was ready to commit murder if another lad so +much as looked at Bonnie. + +The tall quiet man buying hats and ribbons for his girls was John +Foster. And the little bow-legged one, with the hard hat two sizes too +big, was Hen Tomlins who always went shopping with his wife. + +So Green Valley made its purchases and hastened home to pack its lunch +basket and lay out all its clothes on the spare-room bed. Even as +David and Jocelyn walked home through the laughing streets, lights were +being winked out in the lower living rooms only to flash out somewhere +up-stairs where the family was wisely going to bed early. No one even +glanced at the sky, for it was taken for granted that Green Valley +skies would do their very best, as a matter of course. + + +When the last star began to fade and the first little breath of a new +morning ruffled the soft gray silence a sudden sharp volley rang out. +It was the Green Valley boys setting off cannon crackers in front of +the bank. And it must be said right here that that first signal volley +was about all the fireworks ever indulged in in Green Valley. This +little town, nestling in the peaceful shelter of gentle hills and +softly singing woods, naturally disliked harsh, ugly sounds and was +moreover far too thrifty, too practical and sane a community to put +firearms and flaming death into the hands of its children. Green +Valley patriotism was of a higher order. + +At that sharp volley Green Valley awoke with a start and a laugh and +ran to put flags on its gateposts and porch pillars and loop bunting +around its windows. And when the morning broke like a great pink rose +and shed its rosy light over the dimpling hills and lacy, misty +woodlands the old town was a-flutter with banners, everybody was about +through with breakfast and certain childless and highly efficient +ladies were already taking their front and side hair out of curl papers. + +At eight o'clock sharp the school bell summoned the children. Then a +little later the church bell summoned the veterans. And by nine the +procession was marching down Maple Street, flags waving, band playing +and every face aglow. + +First came the little tots all in white, the boy babies bearing little +flags and the girl babies little baskets of flowers, with little +Eleanor Williams carrying in her tiny hands a silken banner on which +Bessie Williams, her mother, had beautifully embroidered a dove and the +lovely word, "Peace." + +Then came the older children, a whole corps it seemed of Red Cross +nurses, followed by a regiment of merry sailor boys. There were +cowboys and Boy Scouts, boys in overalls and brownies. There were +girls in liberty caps, crinolines and sunbonnets. + +So grade after grade Green Valley's children came, a proud and happy +escort for the men in blue who followed. Nanny Ainslee's father led +the veterans, sitting his horse right gallantly. Nanny and her father +were both riding and so was Doc Philipps. + +There were plenty of people on horseback but most of the town marched, +even The Ladies Aid Society, every member wearing her badge and new hat +with conscious pride and turning her head continually to look at the +children, as the head of the procession turned corners. The young +married women with babies rode in buggies, from every one of whose +bulging sides flags drooped and fat baby legs and picnic baskets +protruded. + +Everything went smoothly, joyously along, though a few incidents in +various parts of the procession caused smiles, gusts of laughter and +even alarm. + +Jimmy Rand had a few anxious moments when the four fat puppies he +thought he had shut safely into the barn came yelping and tumbling +joyously into the very heart of the marching crowds. + +Jim Tumley was down on the day's programme for several numbers. But as +the line swung around the hotel and the spring winds stained with the +odors of liquor swept temptingly over him he half started to step out +of line. But Frank Burton guessed his trouble and ordered Martin's +clerk, Eddie, to bring the little chap an extra large and fine soda +instead. + +Mrs. Hen Tomlins upset things by ordering Hen back home to change his +shirt. It seems that Hen had deliberately put on a shirt with a soft +collar and in the excitement of getting under way and trying to +remember which way her new hat was supposed to set Mrs. Hen had failed +to notice the crime until, her fears set at rest by Mary Langeley, she +turned around to see if Hen looked all right. + +Uncle Tony was in a great state of excitement. He was continually +leaving his place in The Business Men's Association to have a look from +the side lines at the imposing spectacle. + +Here and there mothers close enough to their offspring were suggesting +a more frequent use of handkerchiefs and calling attention to +traitorous garters and wrinkled stockings. Tommy Downey had forgotten +what his mother had told him about being sure to put his ears inside +his cap and those two appendages, burned and already blistered by the +hot May sun, stood out in solemn grandeur from his small, round, +grinning face. The school teachers were keeping anxious eyes on their +particular broods and insisting that the eager feet keep solemn step to +the music. + +Sam Ellis' new greenhorn hired girl, Francy, was sitting in the back +seat of the buggy, holding down the brimming baskets and leaning out as +far as possible so as not to miss anything that might happen at either +end as well as the middle of the procession. She had been utterly +unable to pin on her first American hat with hatpins, so had wisely +tied it to her head with a large red-bordered handkerchief which she +had brought over from the old country. + +Jocelyn Brownlee, sitting beside David in his smart rig, had begged him +to go last so that she could see everything. This was her first +country festival and no child in that throng was so happily, wildly +eager to drain the day to the very last drop of enjoyment. + +Jocelyn and David however did not end the procession. Behind them, +though quite a way back, was Uncle Tony's brother William. William was +driving his span of grays so slowly that the pretty creatures tossed +their heads restlessly, impatiently, lonely for the companionship of +the gay throng ahead. + +But though their owner knew what they wanted he held them back sternly. +But he looked as wistfully as they at the fluttering flags and listened +as keenly to the puffs of music that the wind dashed into his face +every now and then. + +Every Decoration Day Uncle Tony's brother William rode just so, slowly +and alone at the end of the gay procession. On that day he was a +lonely and tragic figure. Loved and respected every other day in the +year, on this he was shunned. For he was the only man in all Green +Valley who, when conscripted, would not go to the war but sent a +substitute, one Bob Saunders. + +Bob was killed at Gettysburg and nobody mourned him, not even his very +own sister though Green Valley was duly proud of the way he died. Only +on this one day did Green Valley remember the man whose death was the +one and only worth while deed of a misspent life. But on this one day +too Green Valley shunned the man who sent him to his death. + +So every Decoration Day William came alone to put a wreath on Bob's +grave and watch the exercises from a distance. When it was over he +went home--alone. And Green Valley let him do it year after year. + +He was never known to murmur at Green Valley's annual censure nor did +he ever seem to hope for forgiveness. Green Valley had asked him once +why he had done it and he said that he would have been worthless as a +soldier because he did not believe in killing people and was himself +horribly afraid of being butchered. + +Green Valley was appalled at this terrible confession, at the absence +in one of its sons of even the common garden variety of courage. It +did its best for a while to despise William. But it is hard work +despising an honest, quiet, just and lovable man. So gradually William +was allowed to come home into Green Valley's life. And it was only on +this one holiday that he was an outcast. Neither did any one ever +remind William's children of what years ago their father had done. But +of course they knew. Their father had told them himself. They were in +no way cast down. They were all girls who loved their father and did +not believe in war. + +In that fashion then, and in that order, Green Valley marched down Main +Street, up Grove, through lovely Maple and very slowly down Orchard +Avenue so that Jeremy Collins, who was bedridden because of a bullet +wound suffered at Shiloh, could see his old comrades with whom he could +no longer march. + +All the way down Park Lane the band played its very best and loudest as +if calling from afar to those comrades who lay sleeping beneath the +pines and oaks of the little cemetery. And just as the Green Valley +folks came in sight of the white headstones the Spring Road procession +came tramping over the old bridge, and Elmwood, with its flags and +band, was coming up the new South Road. The three towns met nicely at +the very gates of the cemetery and together made the sort of sound and +presented the sort of sight that lingers in the heart long after other +things have faded from one's memory. + +Then the bands grew still and there was quiet, a quiet that every +minute grew deeper so that the noisiest youngster grew round-eyed and +the fat sleek horses moved never a hoof. And then, sweet and soft +through the waiting, hushed air, came the notes of Major Rand's cornet. +He was playing for his comrades as he had played at Shiloh, at +Chickamauga and many another place in the Southland. He played all +their old favorites and then very, very softly the cornet wailed--"We +are tenting to-night on the old camp ground"--and somewhere beside it +little Jim Tumley began to sing. + +From the high blue sky and the softly stirring tree-tops the words seem +to drop into little hearts and big hearts and the sweet, melting +sadness of them misted the eyes. When the last feathery echo had died +away the men in blue passed two by two through the cemetery gate. +Reverend Campbell, who had been their chaplain, said a short prayer. +At its end the children, with their arms full of flowers, crowded up +and the men in blue stopped at every grave. The little boys planted +their flags at the head and the little girls scattered the blossoms +deep. + +From beyond the gates Green Valley and Spring Road and Elmwood watched +its heroes and its children. In David Allan's smart rig sat a little +city girl, her face crumpled and stained like a rain-beaten rose. She +was saying to no one in particular, "Oh--my daddy was a soldier too but +I know that he never had a Decoration Day like this." + +The bands played again and each class went through its number on the +programme with grace and only a very few noticeable blunders. Tommy +Downey, ears rampant, a tooth missing and a face radiant with joy and +absolute self-confidence, mounted the bunting and flag-draped stage and +in a booming voice wholly out of proportion to his midget dimensions +and in ten dashing verses assured those assembled that the man who wore +the shoulder straps was a fine enough fellow to be sure, but that it +was after all the man without them who had to win the day. + +The old country roads rippled with applause and Tommy's mother, +forgetting for once Tommy's funny ears which were her greatest source +of grief, drew the funny little body close and explained to admiring +bystanders that Tommy "took" after one of her great-uncles, a soul much +given to speech making. + +So number after number went off and then there came the speech of the +day. It had been decided at the last moment that Doc Philipps must +make this, because the specially ordered and greatly renowned speaker, +one Daniel Morton from down Brunesville way, had at the last moment and +at his ridiculous age contracted measles. + +Now Green Valley knew how Doc Philipps hated to talk about almost +everything except trees. But Green Valley also knew that Doc could +talk about most anything if he was so minded. He was, moreover, as +well known and loved in Spring Road and Elmwood as he was in his own +town. So Green Valley folks leaned back, certain that this speech +would be worth hearing. + +The bulky figure in army blue stepped to the edge of the platform and +for a silent minute towered above his neighbors like one of the great +trees he so loved. Then, without warning or preface, he began to talk +to them. + +"War is pretty--when the uniforms are new and the band is playing. War +is glorious to read about and talk about--when it's all over. But war +is every kind of hell imaginable for everybody and everything while +it's going on! And they lie who say that it ever was, is, or can be +anything else. Every soldier here to-day above ground or below it will +and would tell you the same. + +"And they are fools who say that wars cannot be prevented. War is the +rough and savage tool of a world as yet too ignorant to invent and use +any other. But here and there, in odd corners of the world, an +ever-increasing number of men are recognizing it as a disease, due to +ignorance, as possible to cure and wipe out, as any other of the +horrible plagues of mankind. + +"When I was twenty-three I too believed in war. I liked the uniform, I +liked the excitement of going, I liked the idea of 'fighting for the +right.' I was too young and too ignorant to realize that older, better +men than I on the other side felt just as right as I did. In those +days war was the only tool and we thought it right, and some of us went +hating it and some of us went shouting like fools. I went for the lark +of it, for I knew no better. I marched away in a new uniform with the +band playing and the flags snapping. And on the little old farm my +father gave me I left a nineteen-year-old wife with my one-year-old +baby. + +"Next door to that wife and baby of mine lived a man who did not +believe in war, a man who, even when conscription came and he was +called, refused to go to war. He hired a substitute and stayed at +home. And for that Green Valley has marked that man a coward and every +year sits in judgment upon him. + +"Yet the man who would not go to war stayed at home to plough my fields +and plant them. He it was who saw to it that that wife of mine and the +wives of other war-mad boys did not want for bread. He stayed at home +here and minded his business and ours as well. He wrote letters and +got news for our women when they got to fretting too hard. He +harvested our crops, tended our stock, and mended our fences because he +is so made that he cannot bear to see things wasted, neglected, ruined. + +"As a soldier that man was worthless, for the business of a soldier is +to kill, to burn, to waste, to maim. He knew that and he knew that +being what he was he could serve his country better doing the things he +liked and believed in. + +"I came out of that war a physical wreck but with a heart purified. I +saw such a hell of evil, such destruction, such misery that to-day I am +a doctor and a planter of trees. When I saw men torn to rags and +lovely strips of woodland ripped to splintered ugliness I vowed that if +I ever came through that madness I would make amends. I swore I would +go through the world mending things. So terribly did those war horrors +grip me. And I have tried to keep my promise. For every tree I saw +splintered I have tried to plant another somewhere. I have been able +to do this because of that old neighbor of mine. + +"When I came home a wreck and said that I wanted to be a doctor, people +laughed at the idea. But the man who does not believe in war came to +me at night and offered to help me through the medical school. It was +that man who made a doctor of me. He had the courage to believe and +trust when every one else laughed. + +"Yet that is the man Green Valley has been punishing all these years. +You have been counting that man a coward when you know he is no coward. +When Petersen's fool hired man let that bull out of its stall to rage +through Green Valley's streets it was Green Valley's coward who caught +him at the risk of his life. When Johnny Bigelow was sick with +smallpox it was the coward who nursed him. + +"You know all that. Yet, because of outlived and mossy tradition, you +let that man ride alone, keep him out of a Green Valley day, you who +count yourselves such good neighbors. + +"I tell you we men in blue and gray are dead and our tool of war is a +poor and clumsy thing of the past. Ours was a brave enough, great +enough day. But it has passed, its story is over and done with. + +"It is the new brand of courage that the new generations want and will +have. And no old soldier here but is glad to feel that the days of +bloodshed are over, that somewhere in the days ahead there is coming +the dawn of peace, a world peace forevermore." + +As suddenly as he began he stopped, for a long second there was a +strange silence. For just the space of ten heart flutters there was +amazement at this new style of address. No old soldier had ever talked +to them in that fashion. But when they saw him striding over that +stage and headed straight for William the storm broke and eddied out to +where William sat, holding in the grays, not even dreaming that at last +he was understood and forgiven. + +After the last songs were sung the sun stood high. So then the great +gathering broke into little family groups that strolled off up the +roads in every direction. Here in shady spots tablecloths were spread +and soon everybody seemed to be opening a basket and the feast was on. + +In half an hour all manner of things had happened. The Whitely twins +fell into some strawberry pies, and supposedly hard boiled eggs were in +many cases found to be extremely soft boiled. Boys of all sizes were +beginning to be smeared from ear to ear and two of Hen Tomlin's wife's +doughnuts were found to be quite raw inside, a discovery that so +stunned that careful lady that she never noticed Hen had taken off his +stiff linen collar, opened his shirt and tucked both it and his +undershirt into a very cool and comfortable decollete effect. + +In another half hour fat babies fell asleep where they sat, their +little fat hands holding tight to some goody. Boys old enough to +wonder about the contrariness of things mortal looked sadly at the +still inviting tables and marveled that a thoughtful and farseeing +Providence should have made a boy's stomach in so careless and +penurious a fashion. + +They made as many as a dozen trials to see if by any chance some corner +of the said organ could be further reenforced. But when even ice-cream +and marshmallows refused to go down they gave up and dragged themselves +away to some spot where a more lucky or efficient comrade was still +blissfully busy. + +The married men openly loosened their belts and looked about for a +quiet and restful spot. The unmarried ones went sneaking off where +their mothers and their best girls couldn't see them smoking their +cigarettes. + +In the general relaxation Dolly Beatty slipped off her tightest shoe, +one bunion and four corns clamoring loudly for room. And though nobody +saw her do it, everybody knew that Sam Bobbins' wife had gone behind +some convenient bush and taken off her new corset. + +In this quiet time old friends searched each other out and sat +peacefully talking over old times. The married women kept their eyes +on the strolling couples, hoping to see a lovers' quarrel or discover a +new and as yet unannounced affair. Little by little news was +disseminated and listened to that in the elaborate preparations of the +past days had been overlooked or unreported. + +David and Jocelyn were in the crowd of merrymakers and yet not of it. +They had selected a fine old tree a little removed from the thick of +things and here Jocelyn spread their luncheon. + +"It's a lucky thing," she explained shyly, "that Decoration Day doesn't +come earlier in the year or I'd never have dared to go to a party like +this and be responsible for lunch. About all I knew how to make when +we came to Green Valley was fudge, fruit salad and toasted +marshmallows. And before Annie Dolan came to teach me how to do things +I nearly died trying. I was all black and blue from falling down the +cellar and scarred and blistered from frying things. But now I know +ever so much. + +"I can make two lovely soups and biscuits and apple pie and gravy. And +I know how to clean and stuff a turkey. Only last week Annie taught me +how to make red raspberry and currant jell. And my burns are nearly +all healed except this one. It was pretty bad, but I was ashamed to go +to the doctor's so it's not quite healed yet. That's why I just had to +have gloves to cover the bandage. But nobody else seems to be wearing +elbow gloves so I guess I'll take mine off and be comfortable. Would +you mind putting them in your pocket for me?" + +David caught the silken ball she tossed him and carefully tucked it +away. He insisted on seeing the burn but Jocelyn waved him aside, +declaring that her hunger was worse just then. + +So they ate and then sat and talked quietly of everything and nothing. +All about them people laughed and chattered. Every now and then some +one called to them and they answered correctly enough, yet knew not +what they had said. For as naturally as all the simple unspoiled +things of God's world find each other, so this sweet, unspoiled little +city girl and the big, unspoiled country boy had found each other. And +a great content possessed them. They did not know as yet what it was +but knew only that the world for them was complete and every hour +perfect that they spent together. + +They sat under their tree even after the games and races had begun and +were rather glad that in the excitement over the afternoon's programme +they two were forgotten and free to roam about. + +They went down to the creek where the burned arm was unbandaged. +Jocelyn was rosily pleased to see David frown at the ugly raw scar. He +gathered the leaves of some weed strange to her and when he had pounded +them to a cool pulp he laid them on the burn and once more bound up the +arm. He was as glad to do it as she was to have him and each knew how +the other felt. + +They strolled through the now deserted cemetery and read the epitaphs +on the mossy stones and yet nothing seemed old or sad or caused them +the least surprise. They saw Nanny Ainslee standing with Cynthia's son +before a stone that had neither name nor date but only the love-sad +words: + + "I Miss Thee So." + + +But they thought nothing of it. The world was far away and they were +serenely happy in a rarer one of their own. + +Slowly the golden afternoon was waning. Little children were beginning +to pull on their stockings, mothers began packing up the baskets and +fathers were harnessing the horses. Soon everybody was ready and Green +Valley, Spring Road and Elmwood, with many waves of flags and hands, +each started down its own road toward home. + +It was a tired, happy town that straggled down Main Street just as the +sun was gilding it with his last rays. Green Valley mothers were +everywhere hurrying their broods on to bread and milk and bed. In the +sunset streets only the little groups of grown-ups lingered to talk +over the day and exchange last jokes before going on toward home and +rest. + + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE KNOLL + +There were whole days when Cynthia's son did nothing but loaf,--whole +days when he went off by himself into the still corners of his world +and let the whole wide universe talk and sing to him and awe him with +its mystery. + +He would lie for hours in some cool, shady fern nook under a sheltering +road hedge or in the shade of some giant tree friend. At such times he +scaled the thinking, wondering part of himself and opened wide his +heart to the great whisper that rippled the grain, to the sweet song +that swelled the throat of the oriole and lark, to the beauty that dyed +the heavens and the earth, to the glad struggle for life everywhere. + +In this way he had always healed all his griefs, freed his soul from +doubts and stilled the many strange longings that made his heart ache +for things whose name and nature he knew not. + +He had discovered many of these still, restful corners from which to +watch life as it went by. But his favorite spot was right on his own +farm. + +At the very end of the Churchill estate, as if thrown in for good +measure, was a little knoll, smooth and grassy and crowned with a +little grove of God's own planting. + + +For there were gathered together big gnarled oaks, maples, old hickory +trees and many poplars. There were on that knoll three snowy, bridal +birches, the rough trunks of horse-chestnuts and a few solemn pines. +As if that were not enough, in the very heart of this woody temple were +two shaggy old crab-apple trees and one stray wild plum. + +In the spring here was fairyland. And into it Cynthia's son retired at +every fair opportunity. Here he sat and looked off at the dimpling, +rippling farmlands, the wandering old roads and at Green Valley roofs +nestling so securely in their setting of rich greens and dappled +sunshine. + +From his seat beneath an oak he could see Wimple's pond with its circle +of trees and through the far willow hedges caught the glittering sheen +and sparkle of Silver Creek. And there before and below him lay the +mellow old farm that his grandfather had left him. + +The warm brick walls with their wide brick chimneys already had a +welcoming look. For the tenant was gone and the old home was being +repaired for its owner. But from the knoll no sound of hammer or sight +of workmen marred the soft silence and sunny peace of the day. So +Green Valley's young minister sprawled comfortably down, closed his +eyes and let the earth music wrap him round. + +He was not even day dreaming the day Nan Ainslee stumbled on him there +under the oaks and pines. She had discovered the knoll when she was +six years old and claimed it for her very own, sharing its beauties +with no one, not even her brother. When she grew to young ladyhood she +often left Green Valley for wonderful trips to the ends of the world. +But she always came back to the lilacs and the seat under the great oak. + +At every return she hastened out to see anew her home valley as it +looked from her grove. So it was with something very close to +annoyance that she looked at the sprawling figure of the usurper. + +"Well, for pity sakes! What are you doing here?" she demanded. + +He opened his eyes slowly and looked at her. She fitted in so well +with the velvet whisper of the wind, the cool blue of the sky and the +world's fresh beauty that he took her appearance as a part of the +picture and was silent. It was only when she repeated her question +rather sharply that he sat up to explain. + +"Why, I found this spot months ago! It is the stillest, most heavenly +nook in Green Valley. I come up here whenever I'm tired of thinking." + +"Well--I found this place years and years ago," Nanny complained. + +"What's the matter with us both using it?" he said very civilly. + +"But," objected Nan, "this is the sort of a place that you want all to +yourself." + +"Yes, it is," he agreed and did not let the situation worry him +further. He didn't offer her a seat or give her a chance to take +herself off gracefully. And Nanny was beginning to feel a little +awkward. She wasn't used to being ignored in this strange fashion. + +"Are you very old?" the minister asked suddenly and looked up at her +with eyes as innocent and serene as a child's. + +"I'm twenty-three," Nan was startled into confessing. + +"Why aren't you married?" + +As she gasped and searched about for an answer he added: + +"In India a girl is a grandmother at that age." + +"This isn't India," smiled Nan good-naturedly, for she saw quite +suddenly that this big young man knew very little about women, +especially western women. + +"No--this isn't India." He repeated her words slowly, little wrinkles +of pain ruffling his face. For his inner eye was blotting out the +Green Valley picture and painting in its stead the India of his memory, +the India of gorgeous color, the bazaars, the narrow streets; the India +that held within its mystic arms two plain white stones standing side +by side and bearing the inscriptions "Father" and "Mother." + +Nan, not guessing what was going on in his heart, took advantage of his +silence to get even. + +"How old are you?" + +"Twenty-eight." + +"Why aren't you married?" + +"Why in the world should I be?" he wanted to know. + +"Green Valley men are usually the fathers of two or three children at +your age," she informed him calmly. + +"Oh," he smiled frankly, "of course I shall marry some day. But a man +need never hurry. He, unlike a woman, can always marry. And I intend +to have children--many children, because one child is always so lonely. +I know because I was an only child." + +This astounding piece of confidence kept Nan's tongue tied and for a +few seconds all manner of funny emotions fought within her. She wanted +to laugh, to get angry at the lordly superiority of the idea that a +woman must hurry to the altar. She felt that she ought to feel +embarrassed but the innocent sincerity with which it was all uttered +kept her from blushing and her eyes from snapping. She told herself +instead that of all man creatures she had ever encountered, this boy +from India was certainly the weirdest. And she wondered what a woman +not his mother could do with him. + +After a while she tried again. + +"Don't you feel rather guilty loafing here in the sunshine?" + +"No. Why--what should I be doing?" + +"These beautiful afternoons you ought to be devoting to pastoral calls." + +"But I attended to all the day's work this morning. I helped Uncle +Roger Allan build a fence and doctored up David's pet horse, Dolly. I +spaded up a flower plot for Grandma Wentworth and visited little Jimmy +Trumbull who's home from the hospital. Doc Philipps says he won't be +up for some time yet, so to cheer him up I've promised him a party. I +also drove to the station with Mrs. Bates' ancient horse and brought +home her new incubator. While I was there Jocelyn Brownlee came down +to get a box she said she had there. Some teasing cousin sent her a +little live pig and when she found out what was in the box she didn't +know what to do. So I put the pig beside the incubator and sat Jocelyn +beside me and we proceeded on our way. + +"That horse belonging to Mrs. Bates is certainly a solemn, stately +beast but Jocelyn's little pig was anything but stately. We made an +interesting and a musical spectacle as we went along, and I know that +one little red-headed boy in this town was late for school because he +followed us halfway home. We passed the Tomlins place and Hen was +sitting at the window, propped up with pillows. It was his first day +up and we made him laugh so hard that his wife was a little worried, I +think." + +"Agnes is rather good to Hen these days, isn't she?" Nan ventured to +ask, for the whole town knew how Agnes had gone to the minister with +her domestic troubles and how in some mysterious fashion this young man +had worked a miracle. For both Agnes and Hen were as suddenly and +happily in love with one another as though they were newly married +instead of being a middle-aged and childless couple. + +But that was all the town did know about the matter. For strange to +say Agnes, who had talked loud enough and long enough before about her +unhappiness, now was still, with never a word to say about what made +her so contented and happy. Green Valley saw her look at Hen as if he +were suddenly precious and smooth his pillow and wait on him. And +Green Valley wanted to know all about it. But so far nobody knew but +Agnes, Hen and the new minister and he didn't seem inclined to speak +about it. Not even to satisfy Nanny Ainslee's curiosity. + +Once more Nanny was embarrassed and a little angry. She swung up her +sunshade and started to go. This minister man with his ignorance of +women and his knowledge of Hen's domestic affairs was, she told +herself, a crazy, impossible creature and he could sit in his little +grove on his little knoll till he died for all she cared. She'd take +mighty good care never again to stray into his domain. + +But just as she really got up speed the big chap under the oak stood up +and spoke. + +"Don't go, Nan." + +The shock of hearing him say that stopped her and turned her sharply +around, so that she looked straight at him and found him looking at her +in a way that made the whole green world suddenly fade away into misty +insignificance. Something about that look of his made her walk back. + +But she trailed her sunshade a little defiantly and kept her eyes down +carefully. She was a little frightened too. Because for the first +time in her life she was conscious of her heart. She felt it beating +queerly and almost audibly. With every step that she took back toward +him she grew strangely happy and strangely angry. + +He silently arranged a seat for her beside him and she sat down, folded +her hands in her lap, looked off at the village roofs and waited. + +He looked at her a long time. For Nanny was good to look at. Then he +began to talk in an odd, quiet way as if they two were at home alone +and the world was shut out and far away. And he told her the story of +that locked drawer in Hen Tomlins' chiffonier. + +That drawer and Hen's growing stubbornness, due no doubt to the gradual +coming on of his serious illness, had very nearly been the death of +poor, dictatorial Agnes Tomlins. She had always picked out Hen's +shirts, bought his ties and ordered his suits and Hen had never +rebelled openly. Nor did he, so far as she knew, ever dare to have a +thought, a memory or a possession of which she was not fully informed. + +But this last year Hen had become secretive, openly rebellious, +strangely despondent, with now and then flashes of a very real and +unpleasant temper. Agnes, baffled, curious, hurt, angry and afraid, +had at last taken her burden to the boyish minister and then went in +trembling triumph to Hen and told him what she had done. + +"Yes," Hen told her quietly, "I know. He was in here when you went to +the drug store and told me. He advised me to open that drawer and let +you see what's in it. And I'll do it to please him. But I won't open +it myself and he's the only one I'll let do it. So just you send for +him. As long as you told him, I want him to see there's nothing in +that drawer that I need to be ashamed of." + +At this point in the story Cynthia's son paused and looked so long at +the sun-splashed village roofs that. + +Nan stirred impatiently. + +"Well--what was it that Hen was guarding so carefully from Agnes?" she +wanted to know. + +"Oh--just odds and ends--mostly trifles. There was a dance programme, +a black kid glove of his wife's, some letters from a chum that's dead, +an old knife his grandfather once gave him when he was a boy, the last +knit necktie his mother had made him and a box of toys, beautiful, +hand-carved toys. + +"It seems that the Tomlinses had a baby a long time ago and all the +time they were expecting it Hen was carving it these beautiful toys. +It was a boy and, lived to be a year old, just old enough to begin to +play with things. Then it died. And nobody, it seems, knew how Hen +missed that baby, not even his wife. But he had kept that box of toys +in his tool shed all those years and in the last year had put it in the +drawer with a few other treasures which he had had hidden in odd +crannies without anybody suspecting. It was all he had, he said, that +was his very own. And he showed me the handle of the little hammer +where the baby's playing hands had soiled it." + +It seems that Hen explained the other things too. The dance programme +he saved because that was where he first knew that his wife cared about +him. She had selected him for the lady's choice number. The other +things Hen kept because they were given to him by people who had all +sincerely liked him. + +"You see," Hen had said, "nobody knows how hard it is to be a little +man. Nobody respects you. Your folks always apologize and try to +explain your size or tell you not to mind. And strangers and friends +poke fun at you. After a while, of course, you learn to laugh at +yourself on the outside and folks get to think that it's all a joke for +you too and that you don't mind. But you never laugh on the inside or +when you're by yourself. And you get awful tired of looking up to +other people all the time and you begin to wish somebody'd look up to +you once in a while. + +"I used to think Aggie thought a heap of me even if I wasn't as tall as +other men. Grandfather and mother and Bill Simons cared a whole lot +and they didn't mind showing it often. I banked an awful lot on that +baby. And he did sure like me. He followed me all around and minded +me better than Aggie. It was me that always put him to bed and took +him up in the morning. And he'd look up at me and raise his little +hands to me and--" + +Cynthia's son looked steadily at Nan. + +"Do you want to hear any more?" he asked gently. + +"No--no--I don't. Oh, you shouldn't have told me. I'm not good enough +to be trusted with things like that," Nanny said brokenly and winked +and winked her long lashes to shake off the tears. + +"You wanted to be told. You were going away because I didn't want to +tell you," he reminded her quietly. + +"I know, but I'm just naturally spoiled and mean and wicked. But oh, +won't I be nice to poor Hen Tomlins after this!" + +"I'm going to have him take charge of a class in wood-carving as soon +as we can get one together. He's a master hand at that sort of work +and there are any number of boys in this town who will love it and look +up to Hen," said the man who did not understand women. The sun was +slipping low in the west, pouring a flood of mellow gold over the +landscape. It caught the attic windows of the old brick farmhouse that +was so nearly ready for its new and young owner. + +"Look," exclaimed Nan, pointing down toward it, "there is fairy +treasure in your attic." + +"Yes," he smiled, "there is. There are trunks up there full of all +manner of things that five generations of Churchills could not bear to +burn or give away. Some day when the rain is drumming on the roof and +the gutters are spouting and all the birds are tucked away in dripping +trees and the world is misty with tears, I'm going up there and just +revel in second-hand adventure, dead dreams and cobwebs." + +"Oh, my gracious, how I'd like to be there too," enviously cried Nanny +Ainslee and the next moment crimsoned angrily at herself. + +"If you won't mind coming to my house in the rain," said the man who +did not understand women--but Nanny wasn't listening. The setting sun +flared into a last widespread glory that bathed every grass blade in +Green Valley and in this strong and golden light Nan saw the 6:10 +pulling in and Fanny Foster hurrying home. Jessup's delivery boy, +driving back from his last trip, was larruping his horse and careful +Ellen Nuby was taking in her clotheslines. + +On the back porch of the Brownlee bungalow Jocelyn was shaking a white +tablecloth, for the Brownlees had supper early. Jocelyn flapped and +flapped, then folded the cloth neatly as she had seen Green Valley +matrons do. That done, she waited. + +David Allan was coming home over the hills with his team and Jocelyn +was waiting till he came closer before she waved to him and greeted +him. All Green Valley knew of these sunset greetings and approved. + +So now Nan, with a smile of understanding sympathy, watched and waited +too. She could almost see Jocelyn's happy, eager child face. David +slowly drew nearer. But after one careless look at the little figure +on the porch, his fine head drooped and he went on without a word and +left Jocelyn standing there. + +From her tree shelter Nan could see the little city girl standing very +still, staring after David. Then slowly the little figure went down +the steps and into the back garden. There it stood motionless again, +staring into the fading sky as if seeking an explanation for David's +strange conduct. + +But up on the hilltop Nanny beat her hands softly and cried out in pain +for Jocelyn. For Nanny knew her Green Valley and she knew that the +story of Jocelyn's morning ride with the minister in the Bates' ancient +carryall had already gone the rounds, even finding David in the furrows +of the fields. And now the big boy was worried and wretched and +perhaps angry at the little city girl whom he had so openly courted. + +"Oh, dear!" Nanny began to speak her mind but stopped abruptly. For +how could she tell this young man from India that he had that morning +spoiled forever perhaps a lovely romance. She knew that he was +innocent, as innocent as Jocelyn. And she knew that Green Valley meant +no harm. It was nothing. And yet so often trouble, sorrow and +heartache start in just that kind of nothingness. Out of playful +little whirlwinds of careless laughter cruel storms are born. + +When Cynthia's son turned to walk home with her Nanny waved him back +and spoke curtly. + +"My goodness--no! You mustn't. I never let anybody escort me about +this foolish little town." + +Then she hurried home alone and left John Knight standing on his +hilltop. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +GETTING ACQUAINTED + +Nobody but a Green Valley man would have dared to do the things that +the new minister did in those first months, when even the most daring +of reverend gentlemen is apt to be a bit careful and given to the +tactful searching for the straight and narrow path which is the earthly +lot of pastors. + +Cynthia's son however was one of those unconsciously successful men who +are so simply true to life and life's laws that the world joyously +meets them halfway. And then too his was a rich heritage. + +From his great preacher father he had the power of seeing visions and +dreaming dreams and the still greater gift of making and persuading +other people to see them too. From his mother he had the comrade smile +and warm intuitive heart that brought him close to even little souls. +And from old Joshua Churchill came that rock-like determination, the +uncompromising honesty and, better than all else, that rare common +sense touched with humorous shrewdness without which no man can greatly +aid his fellows or enjoy life. + +All this the new Green Valley minister had, besides bits of very +valuable and legal papers and the old porticoed homestead dozing on a +hill and waiting for the touch of a young hand to wake it into vigorous +and new life. Such parts of Green Valley as failed to appreciate the +more spiritual qualifications of the tall young man from India were +properly impressed with his worldly possessions. + +So it was that armed with these advantages Cynthia's son went his way, +smashing hoary precedents and the mossy conventions that will spring up +and grow fibrously strong even in so sunny a spot as Green Valley. + +Nobody was surprised, of course, to see little Jim Tumley in the choir; +nor to hear that the minister was giving him lessons on the new piano +whose arrival the prophetic soul of Fanny Foster had predicted. People +passing the Tumley house did however stop beside the hedge and listen +in amazement to the minister playing, for he played surprisingly well. +When complimented on this accomplishment he explained that his mother +had had a piano in India and had taught him how. + +But nobody in Green Valley dreamed of seeing old Mrs. Rosenwinkle +marketing right in the madly busy heart of town all on a Saturday +morning. But there she was in her wheel chair, with the minister +alongside to see that the road was safe and clear. + +And they say that every little while, right in the midst of her +bargaining, she would look around and say: + +"My, but the world is big and pretty." + +And when somebody reminded her of her belief that the world was flat +and ended on the far side of Petersen's pasture she never argued the +matter fiercely, as was her wont, but said instead that it _had_ ended +for her with Petersen's pasture until the day the new minister came. + +And her daughter told how the paralyzed old body prayed day and night +for this new minister's salvation, he being other than a Lutheran. +Somebody thought that too good a joke to keep and told Cynthia's son +how hard old Mrs. Rosenwinkle was praying for his soul. They expected +him to laugh. But he didn't. He looked suddenly serious just as his +mother used to do when something touched the deep down places in her +heart. + +All he said was that no man could ever have too many women praying for +him and that he was grateful as only a man whose mother was sleeping +thousands of miles away in a foreign land could be grateful. + +He had his mother's trick of letting people look quite suddenly into +that part of his soul where he kept his finest thoughts and emotions. +And people looked and saw and then usually tiptoed away in puzzled awe +or a dim sympathy. And he had such a habit of turning common sense and +daylight on matters which seemed so baffling until he explained them. + +It was just the minister's plain, common sense that finally got Hank +Lolly into the church. When the minister first suggested that Hank +ought to attend church services that worthy stared in amazed horror at +his new friend. And he gave his perfectly good reasons why the likes +of him had no right to step on what was Green Valley's sacred ground. + +"Hank, you are entirely mistaken. I have seen you go into Green Valley +parlors and every other room in the house. I watched you move that +clumsy old sideboard of Mrs. Luttins down that narrow stairway and then +through the little side gate. You never chipped a bit of plaster or +trampled a flower beside the walk. Why, you never even tore a bit of +vine off the gate. And yesterday I saw you walking your horses ever so +carefully to the station because inside the van little Jimmy Drummond +was lying on stretchers, going to the hospital. And I was told that +Doc Philipps said he wouldn't have trusted another driver with Jimmy." + +"But," groaned Hank, "people like me don't go to church." + +"Hank, most ministers don't ride around the country on a moving dray. +But I rode out with you many a time and I sort of feel that you might +come along with me now and then and see the people and things along my +route. You've given me a good time and I'd like to pay back. You'll +like the music and I'm sure you'll understand it all, because I talk +English you know. And anyhow, things get as lonesome sometimes for a +minister in the pulpit as the roads get for a dray driver and I'd +appreciate it to have a friend like you along. I never know when I'll +need a lift and a little help that you could give. Sometimes we have +to move the Sunday-school organ about and there are windows that stick +and all manner of things about a church that only a practiced mover and +driver could do. You know the janitor is rather old and infirm and as +for me--well, Hank, when you come down to it, that's about all we +ministers are, just movers. Our business is to help find just the +right and happiest places for people, to show them their part in the +game of life and keep them from bruising themselves and others. I'm +doing about the same sort of work as you are; that's why I'm asking you +to come along with me." + +"Well--if you put it that way,--" murmured Hank, still miserable, "why, +maybe I could drop in. Billy's ordered me a new suit and so--" + +"That settles it then, Hank. For there's no sense in getting a new +suit unless you go out in it. And there's no sense in going out unless +you have some definite place to go to. Why, half the people get +clothes just to go to church and the other half go to church just to +wear their clothes. I'll expect you. You can sit comfortably in the +back and watch things and tell me later what you think of the way +things are managed here. You'll see things from the door that I never +see from the pulpit." + +Hank went to church in a pair of shoes that squeaked agonizingly and a +suit of clothes that was a marvel of mail-order device. He also wore a +Stetson hat that was new when he entered the church door but which, +through nervous manipulation, aged terribly in that first half hour. + +He came early because he felt that he could not endure the thought of +entering a crowded church and then suffered torment as one by one the +congregation nodded to him or addressed him in sepulchral whispers. +When, however, Grandma Wentworth sat down beside him and visited +comfortably before services, and Nan Ainslee stopped to thank him for +something or other he had done for her the week before, he felt better. + +As soon as Jim Tumley began to sing and the minister to talk Hank +forgot about himself and became absorbed in the proceedings. He told +the minister later that he'd meant to keep an eye on things for him but +that he got so interested he'd forgotten. About all that he had +observed was that Mrs. Sloan passed her handkerchief a little too +frequently and publicly to the little Sloans. Hank said he thought +they were old enough to have handkerchiefs of their own. He also felt +sure, he said, that Mrs. Osborn and Mrs. Pelham, Jr. were on the outs +again, because of the fact that though Mrs. Pelham's switch was falling +loose and Mrs. Osborn sitting right behind her saw it, she made no +effort to repin it or tell the unfortunate woman about it. Hank +further informed the minister that that second Crawley boy was a limb +and closed his observations by asking the Reverend John Roger Churchill +Knight if he didn't think Nanny Ainslee was the prettiest girl in +church? Whereupon the minister promptly agreed with him. + +That, then, was Hank Lolly's introduction to a proper and conventional +religious life. Hank, as soon as he felt sure that he was going to +survive the experience, became wonderfully interested and the next +Sunday reappeared with Barney in tow. It seems that Barney also had +been provided with a new suit and accessories and Hank had promptly +demanded his presence in church. + +"You ought to go once, Barney, if only to show the minister that you're +rightly grateful to him for showing you about them there books and +figures and a-pointing out your mistakes to you. And anyhow, if you +don't go, you'll be hanging out in that there pool-room, and first +thing you know you won't be decent and respectable and Billy'll have to +fire you." + +"What do you know about that there poolroom, Mr. Lolly?" demanded +Barney. + +"Never mind. I know what I know. You're trying to be smart and I'm +surprised. I've heard of your kid doings in that place and I'm +surprised, that's what I am. You don't see Billy Evans trying to make +money in cute ways over night. No, sir! He does a day's work for a +man and throws in a little for good measure before he takes a day's +wages. And he don't do business behind closed doors and thick +curtains, neither. So just you keep out of that there poolroom or I'll +take you over to Doc Mitchell's and have every one of them there +crooked teeth of yourn straightened out." + +"All right, Mr. Lolly, I'll do just as you say and go to church. It +ain't as hard as it sounds, that ain't. Because, honest, Hank, ain't +that there minister a fine guy? He's as good, I believe, as Billy. He +asked me to come on and be in his Sunday-school class and get in on +some fun. And he says to wait until he gets his barn fixed; that he'll +show us boys something. And I bet he will. Why, say, Hank, maybe he +kin do all sorts of circus stunts. You know he's from India and that's +where all the snake charmers and sword swallowers come from, ain't it?" + +In this perfectly simple and artless fashion Cynthia's son went about +the creation of his own special Sunday-school class and when he got +through the result was startling. It was the largest and somebody said +the weirdest Sunday-school class ever seen in Green Valley. Indeed, +when Mr. James D. Austin, who was about the most respectable man in +town, saw it he grew quite distressed and suddenly very tired. + +He had tried, since the age of ten when he had formally and publicly +joined the church on the very crest of a great religious wave, to do +his part towards making and keeping the Green Valley church on a high +spiritual plane. He felt at times that he was close to success and now +here from the very ends of the earth came a boy to upset all his plans. + +So Mr. Austin suddenly felt ill and old and he went to see Doc Philipps +about a tonic. Doc Philipps, who could have been as good a lawyer as +he was a doctor, asked a few questions about politics, religion and +Mrs. Austin's lumbago and knew exactly what was the matter with James +D. Austin. The next time he ran across Cynthia's son he hailed him. + +"Look here, Knight, what you been doing to James D. lately? +Been turning his nice little church all upside down, ain't +you? Driven him right into a fearful case of grouch and an +I-am-through-with-the-things-of-this-world attack, that's what you +have." + +Cynthia's son looked very soberly and very directly at his friend the +doctor and turned on his heel. + +"Doc, I'm going to see that poor man right now," said he and Doc +Philipps, in telling Nan Ainslee about it afterwards, swore that not +only the minister's two eyes but his very voice twinkled. + +Cynthia's son found Mr. Austin in his proper and neat office. He went +straight to the point. + +"Mr. Austin, I've just heard that you were not feeling well, that you +were seriously ill from overwork. I can readily believe that. You +need rest and a change and freedom from wearisome responsibilities. I +think I know just how you feel. Sort of tired and listless. Mother +used to get that way in India. Even father used to say sometimes that +things did every once in a while look mighty hopeless and useless, but +that they'd look bright again after a week or two in the hills. So +then we went off for a vacation. That's just what's the matter with +you. You need a vacation. And in so far as I can I want to help you +get one. You work too hard for the church. Keeping track of accounts +and generally managing church matters is always a trying matter. +Father always found it so. + +"So I have been thinking of getting you an assistant, some one to look +after things while you take a rest. Why, they tell me you have +shouldered church responsibilities since you were a child." + +"Yes," modestly admitted the most respectable Mr. Austin. "I have +worked for the church these many years and I do need a vacation. But +who is there to attend to these matters? I know of no one in Green +Valley who could fill my place." + +So in complacent, pathetic self-conceit said poor Mr. Austin. And he +was utterly unprepared for what followed. + +"Why," said Green Valley's new minister without so much as winking an +eyelash, "I've been thinking of Seth Curtis for the place. I have been +wondering just how I could interest Seth in his town church, how to +make him see that its business is his business, and this is my +opportunity. Seth, they tell me, is very good at figures. Somebody +said that Seth could figure to live comfortably on nothing if he found +he had to. Now most churches are perilously near the place where they +have to live on nothing and so, if any one can steer our finances in an +exact and careful manner, Seth can. And it is the only, absolutely the +only way in which he can be interested." + +"But," the horrified Mr. Austin found his voice at last, "Seth Curtis +is impossible. Even if he joined the church he would be an unbeliever. +I have heard him criticize churches. Why, it can't be thought of! +Why, what would people say if you were to put a man like that right +into church work? It would be sacrilege." + +There was a little pause and when the minister spoke again there was +the unmistakable ring of cool authority in his voice. Mr. Austin +suddenly realized that he was speaking to his pastor, the Reverend John +Roger Churchill Knight. And as Mr. Austin himself worshipped authority +and always saw to it that in his little sphere his own slightest word +was obeyed, he listened respectfully. + +"I think, Mr. Austin, you are mistaken about Seth Curtis. Seth does +not make fun of religion. He merely criticizes churches and their +management. Seth is what in these times we call an efficiency expert. +And it always makes such a man impatient to watch waste of money and +effort. + +"Seth must think well of the church for he sends his wife and children. +And no sane man sends what is dearest to him to a place he does not +approve of. Besides, Seth has a very high opinion of you, Mr. Austin." + +Which of course had nothing to do with the case. Yet it may have been +this irrelevant, human little touch that settled it. For after a +little more talk Mr. Austin gave in and, figuratively speaking, turned +his face to the wall and hoped to die. And the minister went off to +persuade Seth Curtis that his church needed his services. + +And that was not nearly as difficult a matter as Green Valley thought +it was. For Seth had sense and a love of order and economy and the +minister talked to all that was best and wisest in Seth. Though Seth's +head was growing bald and Cynthia's son was just a youngster, yet the +boy seemed to take Seth's heart right into the hollow of his hand and +talk to it as no one but Seth's wife Ruth talked. So to the amazement +of himself and family and all of Green Valley Seth Curtis went into the +church for the very quality in his make-up that his neighbors were in +the habit of ridiculing. + +It was amazingly funny, Seth's conversion. But when Green Valley heard +how the minister got acquainted with Frank Burton Green Valley laughed +and laughed and forgot to eat its meals in telling and retelling it. + +Frank Burton, besides being, according to his neighbors, a hopeless +atheist, was unlike other Green Valley men in that he had to take a +much earlier train to the city mornings and came home two trains later +than the other men. Grandma Wentworth always said that it was that +difference in Frank's train time that made him so bitter at times. + +Frank did, however, have his Saturday afternoons and Sundays, and these +he spent almost entirely with his chickens and garden and strange +assortment of books. He was a man who did his own thinking, never gave +advice, never took it and believed in all creatures tending strictly to +their own affairs. + +Every once in a while, perhaps from a sudden heart hunger, Frank would +select from a whole townful of human beings some one soul for +friendship. Frank never got acquainted accidentally. He picked out +his few friends deliberately and loved them openly and forever. + +Of course, Frank's oldest and dearest friend was Jim Tumley. People +said they were born friends. Their mothers had been inseparable, the +boys were born within a few days of each other and seemed to be marked +with a passion of loyalty for one another. Only in their love for +music were they alike however. + +Frank was a big, square, burly man who went his way surely, +confidently, though a little belligerently. Jim was little and fair +and ever so gentle. There was never a harsh word in Jim's mouth or a +bitter thought in his heart against the world that often bruised him +because of his gentleness and frailty. Jim had had only one fight in +his life. + +When he and Frank were about twelve years old, strange to say, Jim was +the taller and stronger. And it was then that Jim fought and +vanquished a bully who for months had been making Frank miserable. + +Frank never forgot that one fight of Jim's. He shot head and shoulders +over his friend and filled out beyond all recognition and took his turn +at fighting. And most of his battles then as now were over little Jim +Tumley. + +To Frank, Jim was the one great friend life had given him. To very +many people in Green Valley Jim was just a gentle, frail little chap +with a beautiful, golden voice and a miserably weak stomach. + +When the new minister put Jim in the choir, Green Valley was mildly +surprised though it quickly saw the common sense of the arrangement. +But Frank Burton was for the first time, to Green Valley's certain +knowledge, wholly pleased. And he showed his pleasure by never once +saying one single, scathing, cynical thing, even when told that Seth +Curtis was keeping the church books and getting religion on the side. +And he could have said so much. + +What he did say was that he wouldn't mind seeing this kid minister from +India. For though months had passed since Cynthia's son arrived Frank +had never seen him. His unfortunate train time and his home-staying +habits kept him from meeting the newcomer. He pictured him as a rather +immature, likable, enthusiastic young person whom it might not be a +trial to meet once and then forget. And Frank made up his mind that if +he ever ran into the boy he would be sincerely courteous to him in +payment for his kindness to Jim. Then he promptly forgot everything in +his plans for a new chicken house. + +He was reading his favorite poultry journal on the train one night when +the tall stranger accosted him. Frank didn't remember meeting the man, +but the stranger seemed to know him, so without hardly knowing why or +how Frank began to talk. And it was surprising how much the stranger +knew about chickens, pheasants and wild game. Indeed, he knew so much +that five stations from the city Frank was showing him diagrams of his +new chicken house and explaining how anxious he was to get at it before +the fall rains commenced but that he had so little time, only his +Saturday afternoons and Sundays. + +"Let me give you a hand then Saturday, Mr. Burton. I need outdoor work +and I'd enjoy building a chicken house and neighboring properly with +you Green Valley folks. You know I'm new to Green Valley and as long +as I intend to spend the rest of my life here I've a lot to learn." + +"Well, there are worse places than Green Valley," admitted Frank, +thinking that the man must be the occupant of some one of the new +bungalows that had gone up that spring and summer. + +"Green Valley," continued Frank, "has its faults and its fools and bad +spots here and there in the roads and entirely too much back-fence and +street-corner gossip. But I've seen days here in Green Valley that +just about melt all the meanness out of one, they're so fine; and +moonlight so soft and pure and holy that you wouldn't mind dying in it. +And Green Valley folks are ornery enough on top and when things are +going smoothly for you. But just let there be a smash-up or a stroke +of bad luck and their shells crack and humanness just oozes out of +them. They're about as decent a lot as you'll find anywhere." + +This, after a hard day and on an empty stomach, was a remarkable speech +for Frank Burton. He was not much given to voicing his real feelings +and showing his heart to light-hearted Green Valley and usually covered +his deeper sentiments with a sturdy flow of fault-finding. + +But there was something magnetic about the young stranger and to his +own growing surprise Frank talked on and enjoyed doing it. The two men +left the train together and parted at Martin's drug store with the +understanding that if it didn't rain they would on the coming Saturday +start on that chicken house. + +And they did. Frank came home that evening in unusually fine spirits +and asked his wife about the various new people. He told her of his +meeting with the stranger who seemed to know him but whom he did not +remember ever seeing before. + +Jennie guessed him to be, "Mrs. Hamilton's husband. I've never seen +him either but they say he's such a pleasant man. They're both +Christian Scientists or something like that and she's ever so nice a +woman. They've only been here a few months but everybody likes them." + +"Well," spoke up Frank, still thinking of the pleasant passing of what +was usually a tiresome train trip, "if Christian Science makes a man as +likable and neighborly as that I, for one, approve of Christian +Science. What did you say his name was--Hamilton?" + +It was because Frank was so willing to let every man worship his God in +his very own way that Green Valley, that is the religiously watchful +part of it, had decided that Frank was an atheist. For, said these +cautious children of God, "He who is willing to believe in all things +believes in nothing." + +But it wasn't religion that the two men talked that Saturday afternoon. +The sun was warm, the lumber dry, the saws sharp and with the work +going smoothly along there was plenty of time for talk, talk on all +manner of subjects. + +Frank's wife had gone over to Randall's to a special meeting of the +sewing society. Not only were the women going to cut out and make up +little aprons and dresses for the inmates of the nearest orphanage but +they intended to discuss several new social problems that confronted +Green Valley. The two most vital being "What do you make of that new +saloon keeper and his wife?" and "What goes on behind those poolroom +curtains, especially nights?" + +Not that there was in Green Valley any interfering Civic League or any +such thing as a Pure Morals Society. Green Valley had never had to +resort to such measures. It had hitherto trusted human nature, Green +Valley sunshine and neighborliness to do whatever work of social +mending and reforming had to be done. + +But something had happened to the big city to the east, some new mayor +or some new civic force had stirred things up in that huge caldron of +humanity and slopped it over so that it had begun to trickle away into +such quiet little hollows as Green Valley. It trickled so slowly and +was as yet so thin a stream that the little towns were hardly aware of +it as yet. + +Green Valley was only just beginning to itch and wiggle and search and +wonder what the matter could be. It was the women, the mothers, who +scented trouble first. The men were still placidly doing the same old +Saturday afternoon tasks, mowing lawns, talking road improvements, +swapping yarns and brands of tobacco or, like Frank Burton, doing +various building jobs about their premises. + +Frank and his helper were certainly enjoying themselves. When the +skeleton of that hen house was half up Frank thought it was about time +to call a halt for refreshments. He went to the ice-box and brought +out a nice home-boiled ham, commandeered a golden loaf of fresh bread, +searched about for pickles, mustard, preserves and butter. Then they +sat down. And as he ate Frank again waxed talkative. + +"I've heard people," he said, "both men and women, talk about marriage +being slavery and a lottery and not worth the price folks have to pay +for it. But I'm freer as a married man than ever I was single. Why, +where I boarded before I married Jennie, you couldn't get a slice of +bread and butter or a toothpick between meals even if you'd been a +growing kid. And in those days I was always hungry. And I've always +hated restaurants where food is cooked in tanks instead of nice little +home kettles in a blue and white kitchen. And I hate restaurant +dishes. There's never anything interesting about them. And most +waitresses are discouraging sort of girls. I just kind of existed in +those days. + +"But ever since I've married Jennie I've lived. Jennie never talks +much about what she's cooking. But she'll let you come in the kitchen +and lift the kettle lids if you want to and poke around and never once +let on that you're a nuisance. And she never gets angry if you dig +into the fresh bread or crack the frosting on the new cake. So take it +all in all I've always considered all this talk about married life +being nothing but self-sacrifice just so much rot--why--hello, Sammy!" + +This to a little overall-clad figure that was pressing itself +insinuatingly against the back gate. + +"Want to come in and help with the tools?" called Frank, well knowing +that that jar of Jennie's preserves was perfectly visible from that +back gate. + +Sammy said hello and sure he'd come in and help, and did with +remarkable speed. When he came up to the two men he looked shyly at +Frank's assistant and said, "Hello! What are _you_ doing around here?" + +And the tall stranger laughed and said he was helping with the tools +too. + +And then Frank asked Sammy if his mother allowed him to eat between +meals and Sammy said, "Oh, sure--I kin eat any time at all--it never +hurts me." So Frank got him nicely started. + +In no time at all however two other figures appeared and swung +themselves up on the back fence. They sat quietly, at first waiting +for some one to discover them. Both men had their backs to the fence +now and Sammy, though perfectly aware of the new arrivals, was +selfishly busy. + +So presently two pair of bare feet began to swing harder and harder and +a careless but piercing whistle began to challenge a selfish world's +attention. + +Frank winked at his helper and said nothing nor moved. + +The whistle became shriller. And then came a sudden suspicious silence +that evidently made Sammy a little uncomfortable. He knew just about +what was coming. + +"Hello--Pieface," came one gentle greeting. + +"Hello--Dearie," chirped the owner of the second pair of bare feet. + +"Look at Mother's Darling feeding his face!" + +"Isn't he cunning! Isn't he cute!" + +A third figure swung itself to the top of the fence. + +"Don't fill your little tummy too full, Sammy dear," it contributed +dutifully. + +At the malice and scorn that fairly dripped from the words Sammy raised +resentful eyes from his slice of bread and jam. Frank smiled hopefully. + +"Oh, Frank, Sammy goes to Sunday-school he does." + +"Every Sunday--don't ya, Sammy?" + +"Bet he goes to Sunday-school just to sponge. Bet he's a grafter--bet +he--" + +But at this point Frank's helper turned about and faced the fence. And +a strange thing happened. The three little figures sitting in a row +gave one look, one shout of, "Holy gee--it's _him_!" and vanished as +suddenly as they had come. + +Frank laughed and then grew puzzled. + +"Some friends of mine and Sammy's. I wonder what made the little imps +bolt like that. They usually sit on that back fence till every bit of +language is used up. Why, they hadn't got more than started and Sammy +here hadn't even begun. What ailed you, Sammy?" + +"Oh, I rather think I frightened them," said Frank's assistant. "But I +think that before long they will feel enough at home with me to come +and sit on my back fence." + +Sammy was left to clear up while the men went back to work. Both +hammers were merrily ringing when old man Vingie strolled by and +stopped to visit. He went on presently but before he was out of sight +Bill Trumbull and Old Peter Endby came up. + +There was a worried look in Bill's large florid face and the light of +utter unbelief in Peter's eye. They both laid their arms neighbor +fashion along the fence and watched the toilers silently for a few +seconds. Then Peter spoke up in grieved tones: + +"Seems like you might have asked old neighbors to give you a hand, +Frank. I had no notion you was in any such turrible hurry to start +this here new chicken house of yourn. It don't look respectable or +kindly, you acting that way, neglecting to tell old neighbors--" + +"It's a slander on this here neighborhood, that's whot it is, Frank," +Bill Trumbull complained. "Here's Peter and me both old-time +carpenters, full of energy and advice and ripe years and experience, +and you don't drop so much as a hint. Why, I remember the time when we +put up barns with wooden pegs and durn good barns they were and are, +for there's some of them still standing as strong as the day they were +built. There's the Churchill barn. That's our work, Peter's and mine. +Seems you've forgotten considerable, Frank. Why, your father wouldn't +have thought of starting a chicken house without first talking it over +with us." + +When they had passed on, Bill supporting Peter's left elbow so's to +case the rheumatism in his partner's left knee, Frank turned amazed +eyes to his assistant. + +"Now what in time," he wanted to know, "is the matter with those two +precious old lunatics? Why, Pap Trumbull and Dad Endby are both over +eighty. Dad's so twisted with rheumatism that he couldn't bend to pick +up his pipe if he dropped it. And Pap's got asthma so bad that it's +all he can do to draw his breath on the installment plan. Why, I've +never consulted them in all my born days though I always let them come +over and criticize my work to their heart's content. But something's +eating them to-day." + +"Perhaps they're surprised at seeing me, a comparative stranger here, +helping you. They may even be a bit jealous, you know." + +Frank's assistant volunteered this explanation wonderingly as if he too +were puzzled about something. + +"Well--it gets me," murmured Frank, then added under his breath, "well, +by jinks--if here ain't old Knock-kneed Bailey and Shorty Collins going +by. And they're looking this way. And by the Lord Harry--there's +Curley Anderson. Why, Curley hasn't been over on this side of town +since he sold that little house of his that he built all by himself, +working nights, with nothing but an old saw and a second-hand hammer. +His wife was left a fortune right after and made Curley sell and build +her a cement block villa over on Broadway. She won't even let Curley +walk down this way, though they say he hates her villa and just hankers +for this little bit of a home he built himself here ten years ago. + +"Well--by the holy smoke--look yonder! I'm seeing things to-day. Why +there's Dudley Rivers and James D. Austin, that holy man, and he's +actually bowing to me. Now what do you know about that? What's going +on in this town to-day, anyhow? It must be something unusual to bring +out a crowd like that." + +Frank's lower jaw suddenly dropped. Sudden suspicion leaped into his +gray-blue eyes. He turned to the man who all afternoon had been +helping him build his chicken house. + +"Say--who in hell--are you anyhow?" + +And Cynthia's son mopped his thick hair and looked as suddenly +dumfounded. After that he grinned. + +"For pity sakes--don't you know me? Why, you were pointed out to me +the very second week I came as the town atheist. I supposed of course +I had been pointed out to you. I'm Cynthia Churchill's son. I buried +father and mother in India and then came home, as they wanted me to. +And I'm glad I came. It's home and these Green Valley folks are my +people. They have made me feel welcome. I supposed everybody knew me +from seeing me about town." + +For a long while Frank said nothing. With the explanation his +momentary anger and amazement died away. He was remembering, +remembering Cynthia Churchill. Why, he remembered as though it was +yesterday that when she was twenty he was ten. And he had loved her +because she had once helped him to tie up his pet chicken's broken leg. + +And so this tall big chap with the glad eyes was Cynthia's son! Years +ago the mother had tied up his pet hen's leg. And to-day her son had +helped him build his most pretentious hen house. + +"No," said Frank at last, "I didn't know you were the chap from India. +I thought you belonged up in one of those new bungalows. Of course, +that accounts for the crowd. Why, we've been making history here in +this back yard this afternoon. The atheist and the preacher building a +chicken coop! Oh, say, John, Green Valley will be talking about this +fifty years from now. Let's have some buttermilk. This thing has just +about knocked me over." + +When they had had two glasses apiece Frank again inspected his +assistant. + +"But say--do ministers in India do such darn common things as building +chicken houses? I can't remember ever seeing a minister mixing so +carelessly with us low-down sinners or standing around in public with +his sleeves rolled up and his frock coat off. Aren't you a queer breed +of parson?" + +"Maybe," Cynthia's son admitted, "but so was father. He could help +bring a baby into the world, could wash and dress it, cure it if it was +sick, bury it if it died. He could teach a woman how to cook a meal +and cut out a dress. He knew how to heal a horse's sore back and how +to help a man get over needing whisky. He used to brush my mother's +hair nights when her head ached and make whistles for me and tell the +little brown children stories, study the stars with the old men and +coax the women into using his medicines instead of their charms." + +"For heaven's sake! When did your father get time to talk religion?" +wondered Frank. + +"Oh, he never talked religion much. He just sort of lived and +neighbored with his people and just laughed most of the time at mother +and me. He was always busy and never took care of himself. Just +before he died he explained things to me. He said: + +"'Son, I came out of the West to bring a message to the East. You go +back to the West with a message from the Orient. Tell them back home +there that hearts are all alike the world over. And that we all, white +men, black men, yellow men and brown men, are playing the very same +game for the very same stakes and that somehow, through ways devious +and incomprehensible, through honesty and faith, failure and +perseverance, we find at last the great content, the peace that passeth +understanding.' + +"So I have come home to preach that. But I haven't had time as yet to +do much. I've been getting up a Sunday-school class and getting Seth +Curtis interested in the church finances and getting acquainted with +Hank Lolly and Mrs. Rosenwinkle and--atheists." + +"Yes--and among other things you've put Jim into the choir." + +"Oh, that was easy--just common sense. It's going to be ever so much +harder though to get at Jim Tumley's generous friends and convince them +that Jim's stomach won't stand their friendly donations. + +"I don't know how I'm going to show them that if they love him they +must protect him from themselves. It's going to be hard work. But +he's worth saving, that little man with the lark's voice and the gentle +heart." + + +When Jennie, hearing the news, hurried home from the other end of town, +really frightened for the first time in her married life, the young +minister was gone and Frank was sitting out on the back porch staring +at nothing. + +"Frank," Jennie began breathlessly, "is he gone?" + +"Yes--he's gone." + +"Frank--you--I hope you didn't get mad at him. He's different--not +like other ministers--and he's really a boy in some things." + +"Jennie," and Frank reassured her, "you're darn right that boy is +different. He's so darn different from all the rest of them I've met +that I'm going to church next Sunday. James D. and Dudley and others +of that stripe will probably die of shock but just you press your best +dress, Jennie, for we're surely going. Why that man's no minister. +Don't slander him. He's a human being." + +Jennie's eyes grew a bit misty, for with no babies to love, Frank was +her all in all and her one great sorrow was that so few people knew the +real Frank. + +"And come to think of it, Jennie," Frank mused, "you weren't so far +wrong in thinking that it was a Christian Scientist who was coming. I +guess that's just about what he is--a Christian scientist." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +THE PATH OF TRUE LOVE + +Nanny was cross. She had lost her bubbling merriment and her family +wondered. + +"Sis, I believe you will be an old maid, all right. I'm beginning to +see the signs already," her brother lazily told her one day when to +some innocent remark of his she made a snapping answer. + +Mr. Ainslee laughed. + +"You aren't reading the signs correctly, Son," he said. "Nan's +crossness can be interpreted another way. It's my private opinion that +Nanny's in love." + +Whereupon Mr. Ainslee dodged for he fully expected that Nanny would +hurl a pillow his way. But Nanny didn't. She turned a little white, +caught her breath a little hurriedly and then stood looking quietly at +the two men. When she left the room her father was a little worried +and her brother a little uncomfortable. + +"I guess we'd better let up on the teasing, Dad," the boy suggested in +the serious, soft voice that had been his mother's, the mother who had +never teased. + +"I wouldn't hurt Nanny for the world," penitently murmured Mr. Ainslee. +"I had no idea--oh, Son," he suddenly groaned, "I wish your mother was +here to look after us all." + +And the great diplomat who was known and welcomed at the courts of +great nations was suddenly only a plain man, crying out his heart's +need of the loved woman he had lost so many years ago. + +And because the boy was the son of the woman for whom his father +grieved he knew how to sympathize and comfort the man. + +"I've missed her too--lots of times--even though, Dad, you've been the +most wonderful father two kids ever had." + +The man stared out into the sunny world outside the windows and all +unashamed let the tears fill his fine eyes. + +The boy, seeing those tears, all at once remembered now many times, +when he was an unheeding youngster, he had seen this same father +sitting at the departed mother's desk with his head pillowed in his +arms. + +"Dad," the boy's awed voice questioned, "is love a thing as big and +terrible and lasting as that?" + +The man wiped his eyes and smiled. + +"Yes, Son, love is as wonderful and lasting and in a way as terrible as +that. It was wrong of me to tease Nanny. But I have been worried +about my motherless girl. I'd like to see her happily settled. +Somehow I've never worried about you." + +"No," and the boy smiled an odd little smile that showed just how he +had missed a mother's petting, "it's always mothers that worry about +the boys, isn't it?" + +At this second revelation and blunder Mr. Ainslee was so startled that +he forgot to go in search of Nanny. + +As a matter of fact Nanny had left the house. She wanted to go to the +knoll and think over carefully certain matters that had been puzzling +her of late. But she dared not go to the grove on the hilltop. For +only half an hour before she had seen Green Valley's young minister +walking up to her old seat under the oaks. Perhaps if her father had +not said what he did--Nanny frowned impatiently, then sighed and walked +down the road to Grandma Wentworth's. She told herself that she was +going down to visit Grandma and tell her the week's news. But she was +really going to find heartease and because at Grandma's she would hear +oftenest the name that now had the power to quicken her heart beats and +bring her a pain that was strangely edged with joy. + +Grandma was weeding her seed onions and very sensibly let Nanny help. +Nanny's fingers flew in and out and because she dared not tell her own +heart troubles she told Grandma about Jocelyn and David and the foolish +bit of gossip that had come between them. + +"I think, Grandma, somebody ought to do something about it. Can't +you--" + +Grandma shook her head. + +"Nanny," Grandma mourned, "I'm afraid to meddle in things like that. +Love is a wonderful strange thing for which there are no rules. And +the hearts of men and women must all have their share of sorrow. For +it's only through pain and endless blunders that we human folks ever +learn. I've seen strange love history in this town and lots of it. +And I've learned one thing and that is that each heart wants to do its +loving in its own way without help or hindrance from the rest of the +world. So we'd best say nothing and let David and Jocelyn find a way +out of their trouble and misunderstanding." + +But Nanny, with all the impatience of youth, rebelled. + +"It's foolish," she stormed, "when just a dozen frank words would +straighten it out." + +"Yes--a dozen words would do it," sighed Grandma, "But think, Nanny, +what it would cost David to say those dozen words--or Jocelyn." + +"Conventions are foolish. Honesty is better." + +"Yes, honesty is always best. But truth is something that lovers find +hardest to manage and listen to. And you know, Nanny, even a happy +love means a certain amount of sorrow." + +"Does it?" the girl wondered. + +"Yes," said Grandma softly, "it does, as I and many another woman can +testify. I'm only hoping that a love great and fine will come to +Cynthia's boy and that it won't cost him too much." + +"Why," asked Nanny carelessly, "should life be easier and richer for +him?" + +"Because long before he was born his mother paid for his birthright and +happiness with part of her own, and if God is just and life fair then +her courage and sorrow ought to count for something and her loss be his +gain." + +"Hadn't you better tell me the whole story, Grandma?" begged Nan. + +"It isn't exactly all mine to tell. But some day I dare say I shall." + +Grandma rose and glanced mischievously at the girl. + +"Nanny, I'll tell you the day you come to me and tell me you're in +love. Not engaged, you understand, but in love." + +Again Nanny whitened and caught her breath and then looked quietly at +Grandma in a way that made the dear old soul say hurriedly: + +"There, there, child, I didn't mean to meddle or hurt." + +To herself she added, "We're all blundering fools at times. And why is +it that youth always thinks that all the world is blind and stupid?" + +Grandma's penitent mind then recalled the box of pictures that +Cynthia's son had brought down to show her the night before. It still +stood on the living-room table. So the wise and tender soul sent Nanny +in to fetch it. + +They sat on the back steps and looked at pictures of Cynthia in her +far-away home in India. There were pictures of her husband and the +brown babies and of their neighbors. But mostly the pictures were of a +boy, a drolly solemn little fellow. Nanny exclaimed again and again +over these and the one of the boy holding a pet hen in his arms she +fairly devoured. + +"What a darling kiddy he was," she laughed tenderly. "No wonder his +mother loved him so." + +"He ought to be a fine boy. His mother paid a big price for him," +Grandma told her. + +But Nanny didn't hear. She had just discovered that there were two of +those boy and hen pictures and she wondered if-- + +Just then Grandma spied a hen in her lavender bed and went off to shoo +her out. And while her back was so providentially turned Nanny +Ainslee, an honorable, world-famous diplomat's only daughter, coolly +and deliberately tucked the picture of a little boy and his pet hen +down into the bosom of her gown. + +Shortly after Nanny said she guessed she'd have to be going, that it +was getting late and that she had had an argument with her father just +before she came and had been short an answer. But that she had just +this minute thought of something to say. + +Grandma let her go without a word because she thought that, like +herself, the girl had seen Cynthia's boy coming down the hill and +wished with girlish shyness to be out of the house when he came. But +Nanny had not seen him, had not been watching the roads, so taken was +she with her guilty secret. Her surprise when she almost ran into him +was genuine enough. + +His face lighted at sight of her. + +"I spent the afternoon up on the hill. I thought maybe I should find +you there. It was rather lonesome." + +He had evidently forgotten and forgiven her rudeness on the hilltop +that day when they had been up there together. Nanny was suddenly so +happy and confused that she could think of nothing to say except to +make the formal little confession: + +"I have been visiting Grandma Wentworth and looking at pictures of you. +You were a mighty nice little boy in those days." + +The new softness in her words made him look at her wistfully for a +second but the hint of laughter that went with it made him cautious. +This lovely, laughing girl had hurt him several times and had laughed +at him. He meant to be careful. So he said gravely and politely: + +"Did you see the pictures of my mother?" + +"Yes. She must have been a wonderful and an adorable mother." + +That made him happy. He wanted very much to turn and walk back with +her, this girl whose presence always brought him such pleasure. But +she had forbidden him to do this. It seemed that in his home land +women were wonderfully independent creatures. + +So he let her go on alone and with a disappointed heart. For Nanny had +hoped that he would ask and she had meant to let him. With the +disappointment came the taunting memory of her words to Grandma +Wentworth: "Honesty is best. A dozen words would do it." + +That evening when her father clumsily tried to make amends Nan said +carelessly: + +"Never mind, Dad. I _am_ in love--with a little boy and his pet hen." + +But she had the grace to blush. And that night as she slipped the +picture under her pillow she said a little defiantly: + +"Well--what of it? All is fair in love and war." + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +AUTUMN IN GREEN VALLEY + +Joe Baldwin was standing in front of his little shop. He was +bareheaded and that meant that he was worried. For it was only in +moments of mental distress that Joe laid aside the black cap that gave +him the look of a dashing driver of the Twentieth Century Limited. + +In the autumn dusk a chilly little wind played about the street corners +and wailed softly through the thinning tree-tops. The big lamp above +Joe's workbench was unlighted so the little shop was in darkness except +for the fitful wavering of the ruddy wood fire in the big stove. + +The streets were empty and quiet. It was an hour after supper and +Green Valley was indoors sitting about its first fires and talking of +the coming winter; remembering cold spells of other years; thanking its +stars that the coal bin was full and wondering whether it hadn't better +put on its heaviest underwear. + +Joe knew just about what Green Valley was thinking and saying. From +where he stood he could see what a part of Green Valley was doing. For +this early in the evening Green Valley never pulled down its shades. +So when the lights flared out in the Wendells' west front up-stairs +window Joe saw Mrs. Wendell go to the clothes closet and bring out +various newspaper parcels. Joe knew very well that those parcels +contained furs. + +Furs and ferns were Mildred Wendell's two passions. She had furs of +all sizes and colors and weights, beginning with the little muff and +tippet her favorite aunt had given her long ago when she was only five +to the really beautiful and expensive set her son, Charlie, had given +her for her last birthday. As for ferns, she had so many that Green +Valley always went to her for its wedding and funeral decorations. And +she was only too happy to lend her collection of feathery beauty. + +From where he stood on his doorstep Joe could look down three streets +and see Green Valley in its shirt sleeves and slippers and its gingham +apron, so to speak. He could look over the white sash curtains right +into Mert Hagley's kitchen for Mert lived behind his store. Joe saw +Mary, Mert's wife, turning the pages of the evening paper and studying +the advertisements. And he knew as well as he knew his own name that +Mary was talking to Mert about a new heater, begging him to buy a nice +new hard-coal heater instead of the second-hand hot blast stove he was +thinking of buying from some man in Spring Road. + +John Henderson had another one of his bad headaches for Joe saw him +lying on the dining-room couch. His wife was applying cold-water +bandages and tenderness to that bald pate of his when she knew better +than any one that what he needed was a stiff dose of salts and castor +oil and a little self-control on the nights she had ham and cabbage for +supper. + +Over in the Morrison cottage Grandma Whitby was knitting stockings for +the little Morrisons at a furious rate and every once in a while +sending one of the children out for more wood or a fresh pail of water +or some more yarn. Joe could see the children sitting around the +dining-room table with their books and games and arguing with each +other every time the grandmother made a new request. + +Grandma Whitby was a dictatorial old soul. She not only was eternally +busy herself but she kept everybody around her forever on the jump. +Mrs. Morrison was her only child and once in a moment of bitterness +said that her eight children seemed like a houseful until they got to +running errands for mother and that then she realized that eight wasn't +anywhere near enough. And the Morrison's second boy, John William, +once explained to Joe that he wore out his shoes, "running errands for +Granny." + +Alice Richards' baby was ailing again. Joe could see Allie walking the +floor, could almost hear her comforting the restless mite in her arms. + +Somebody came hurrying down the street and as they passed a street lamp +Joe saw that it was Mrs. Downey, taking Tommy to the dentist. Doc +Mitchell was a nice enough chap but as Joe watched Tommy's legs saw the +air he thought the doctor might be a little mite gentler with the boy +orator. But Doc was getting old and he was probably tired. These +first autumn days before the snap and sparkle and snowy gleam of real +winter sets in always told on the older folks. They sort of seemed +tired and worried and sad. + +So Joe stood there, looking at the purple and green and magenta-pink +lights of Martin's drug store, the sleepily winking lights of the +little station and the mellow golden glow of Sophie Forbes' yellow +parlor lamp. Then he turned and looked straight down his own street, +past the post-office, the tin shop, the dry-goods store to the spot +where a faint light seeped through drawn curtains and faint rowdy +noises came from behind closed doors. + +It was what he guessed was behind those closed doors that had brought +Joe out of his shop bareheaded and caused him to feel as Doc Mitchell +maybe felt--a little old and sad and tired and even a bit helpless. + +Usually on this first night of autumn Joe's shop was crowded with noisy +feet and voices of all sizes that squeaked one minute in a shrill +soprano and in the next sank to a ragged bass. Joe's shades were never +drawn and all the world could see the boys playing Old Maid and Rummy, +shooting caroms or sitting on the counter, swinging their feet, eating +apples and cracking nuts for themselves and Joe who was questioning +them about the day's happenings. + +But to-night--involuntarily Joe turned and looked back into the soft +darkness of his little shop where the firelight flickered softly, +tenderly through the gloom. His heart cramped. Then he looked again +to the place where heavy curtains were drawn over dirty windows. He +caught again that muffled rough noise of young voices. And his mind +was made up. + +He stepped back into his shop, turned on all the lights, put the basket +of ruddy apples on the counter, straightened the pile of old magazines +and pulled out the carom board, the box of chess and checkers. He took +a last housewifely look around, then put on his hat and coat and +started out. There was pain and anger and a terrible determination in +his usually gentle face. + +But as he stepped to the door it opened, admitting Mrs. Jerry Dustin. +That sweet-faced little woman looked about with anxious eyes, then +turned to the little shoemaker. + +"Joe--I'm looking for Peter. Wasn't he here with you? He said he was +coming here to see the boys." + +"He was here and he saw the boys. They all went off together." + +"Joe"--fear and worry leaped to the lovely corn-flower eyes, +"Joe--not--surely they didn't go--they aren't down _there_?" + +"That's just where they are. I was just going after them." + +For still seconds this father and mother of boys looked at each other +in misery. Both were thinking the same thing, both shrank from what +was before them, but even as Joe squared his shoulders Mrs. Dustin +straightened hers. + +"I'm going with you, Joe." + +So down the autumn street went these two. Joe, because he had promised +Hattie when she was sick unto death that he would always watch over the +boys, would love and cherish and guard them. + +Mrs. Dustin was going because Peter was her baby, her strange, weird +duckling, full of whimsical fancies and fantastic longings. He was a +sort of dream child for whom she alone felt wholly responsible. All +the others were good, understandable children. But Peter was odd and +nobody but his blue-eyed mother knew how to handle him. + +"Rosalie, I've never whipped those boys of mine. Some way I couldn't +with Hattie gone and them having no one but me. But maybe it was a +mistake." + +"No, it wasn't, Joe. The Greatest Teacher that ever lived used only +truth and gentleness and look at the size of His school now. No--this +trouble isn't in the children exactly. It must be in us. We're stupid +and don't know how to do for the children. People say that young folks +must be young folks. And we let our boys and even our girls flounder +through a lot of cheap foolishness before we expect them to settle down. + +"But it's my opinion, Joe, that letting them flounder all alone through +these raw years of their life is plain wickedness. Peter has a good +home and he's loved and he knows it. Yet he's got to the place now +where he wants something that I and the home can't seem to give him. I +don't know just what it is. But this place, Joe, bad as it is, must +have the thing that our half-grown children want and that's what brings +them here even against our will. And I'm going to-night to find out +what it is." + +"It can't be good for them, Rosalie, when it drives them into lying and +stealing. Why only to-day Josie Landis sent Eddie to me with fifty +cents for the shoes I mended for her. And he gambled that fifty cents +away in the slot machine and came and told me a lie!" + +"Little Eddie Landis! Why--Joe, he's just a baby." + +"Well--that's what the place is doing to the babies. I don't like it. +It's dirty and sneaky and it's working hand in hand with the saloon. +It has no business in this town." + +"But, Joe, it must have something that this town wants or it wouldn't +be doing business. It can't be all pure wickedness." + +But Joe's anger was rising in leaps and bounds so that his very hands +shook. Mrs. Dustin stopped and laid a soothing hand on the little +shoemaker's arm. + +"Joe, whatever you do don't get angry in there. Hold on to your temper +and don't let yourself even look mad if you can help it. We mustn't +humiliate the children for they'd never forgive. You better let me do +all the talking at first." + +Joe nodded and with that they came abreast of the curtained windows and +stood still for a second to gather up their courage. Then Mrs. Dustin +very quietly opened the door and stepped in with Joe. + +She stood smiling at the door and at sight of her the noise stopped as +if by magic. Every child there knew the lovely, blue-eyed little +mother of Peter Dustin. The only one who did not know her was the +proprietor standing in stupid wonder behind his counter. But she +pretended not to see his astonishment as she made her laughing +explanations. + +"We got lonesome, Joe and I. You know these first autumn nights do +chill us older folks a bit and make us sad. We want bright fires and +lots of children racketing around to keep us from feeling old and +frightened. And I guess the children get the blues from us for I +notice that that's just the time they want to get off by themselves for +a good time. We're all trying to forget that the year is dying, I +expect, and we're crowding together to cheer each other up. That's +what's making the streets so lonely to-night. As I came along I felt +so bad that I thought I'd just drop in on Joe and get cheered up with +the children. They're usually there. But Joe was standing on his +doorstep as lonely as I was. He was missing the children too. We saw +your light and heard the children laughing, and we just thought we'd +come in and see if we couldn't feel young again. We didn't come in to +spoil your fun, so just you go on with it. Joe and I'll watch and +maybe join in. You were dancing, weren't you, Mollie?" + +Mrs. Dustin asked this of a little russet-haired girl of fourteen who +in her sudden amazement at the visitors was still standing in the +middle of the floor with her arms about Peter, who had a mouth organ in +his mouth. She was a graceful little thing and she had been teaching +Peter how to dance. But now she stood stiff with fright and +embarrassment. + +"Why, don't be afraid of my mother, Mollie," Peter said gently, for he +himself was in no way frightened at his mother's appearance. + +So when Mrs. Dustin repeated her question, Mollie said shyly: "Yes, +ma'am, we were trying to dance." + +"Bless me," laughed Mrs. Dustin. "Why, I never realized that Peter was +old enough to want to dance. You should have told me, Peter Boy. Why, +you should have all told me, because," she smiled gloriously at them +all, "because I used to be the star dancer twenty-five years ago. +Wasn't I, Joe?" + +"You sure were," Joe answered promptly. His face still looked a little +queer and his voice was not quite steady but he was bravely following +the wise little woman with the blue eyes. + +"Let me show you. Play something, Peter." + +Mrs. Dustin picked up Mollie and began to dance. And in exactly five +turns about the room all the poetry, the joy of motion in Mollie caught +fire and her little slim feet just fairly twinkled in happy abandonment. + +"Why, Mollie, girl, you're a fairy on your feet," praised Mrs. Dustin +and the happy face at her breast flushed with pleasure and gratitude at +the words. + +Peter was not the least bit surprised at his mother's antics. He knew +that she was a glorious mother and full of surprises. The other +youngsters however were not so sure. So Peter suggested to the +proprietor that he start the graphophone. The proprietor nodded and +soon they were all dancing, Mrs. Dustin taking a new partner every few +minutes. + +"And children," she suddenly remembered, "Joe can jig--why, he used to +jig beautifully." + +So Joe took his turn in amusing the children and while he did it Mrs. +Dustin examined some machines lined up along the wall. + +"When you drop a nickel in the slot do you get gum, peanuts or your +fortune told or does a Punch and Judy pop out?" she laughingly and +innocently asked Sim and Sammy Berwick who stood near. + +Sim looked uneasy and Sammy said, "Aw, them things are no good, Mrs. +Dustin. You don't want to monkey with them. You might--" + +But Mrs. Dustin was already dropping her nickel in and when Peter came +up she was shaking out an empty purse. + +"Why, Peter, what's the matter with these machines? I guess I didn't +work them right. I've dropped all my money in, and I haven't gotten a +thing. It's the money I was saving for the framing of that picture Mr. +Rollins gave me. Don't you think you can get it for me? Jemmy Hills +sent me word to-day that the picture was all framed and ready." + +Peter all at once looked sick. He knew how his mother had been saving +to buy a pretty frame for the lovely water color Bernard Rollins had +given her. She had even given up the idea of a new knot of flowers for +her hat. And now she had dropped the precious coins down the hungry +mouth of a slot machine. And the worst of it was she didn't seem to +know what she had done. + +"Mother," Peter began miserably, "you've lost the money and I don't see +how you can ask--" + +"Oh, well, Peter Boy,--never mind. I expect it's some new game and I +didn't play it right. I'm sorry I was stupid. Let's see what else we +can do. I wanted to treat you children to soda but maybe Joe has some +money. Joe," she called merrily to the shoemaker, "won't you treat?" + +Joe caught the odd little note in her voice. His hand rattled the +loose change in his pocket and he smiled a spontaneous smile that had +however more than a bit of malice in it. + +"Sure, I'll treat," and he turned to the proprietor who still looked as +though he was seeing things but came to life when Joe stepped up to the +counter. + +"What'll you have?" + +"Oh," said Joe carelessly, "give me what you give the rest of the +boys," and here Joe winked at the proprietor. + +"And I'll have the same," laughed Mrs. Dustin, and again Joe winked at +the proprietor. + +But the children had grown strangely quiet, especially the boys. And +slim Mollie once more grew frightened as she watched the proprietor +setting out glass after glass of foaming beer. + +Mrs. Dustin was busy talking to the children and didn't seem to see the +foaming glasses until Joe called, + +"Come on, everybody--line up." + +Then the lovely mother face was raised and at the look that came into +the blue eyes every child there grew sick and miserable. + +"Ah, gee--whad he give her that for?" muttered Sammy Berwick. + +But Mrs. Dustin, after looking once into Peter's tortured eyes, stood +up and laughed. + +"Well, children," she confessed, "I've never tasted beer in my life, +but it's your party and I invited myself so it would be rude to refuse." + +And with that she picked up her glass. + +"Well," laughed Joe, "this is my first drink too. But I'm not going to +be an old fogey. What's good enough for my boys is good enough for me." + +Every child there held its breath for they knew that Joe spoke the +truth. As for the proprietor, that puzzled man thought that the little +shoemaker was trying to be funny and he laughed his first laugh that +evening. + +Peter Dustin stood beside his mother, his horrified eyes on the little +toil-worn hand that was curled about the stem of a beer glass. He +wanted to snatch that glass away, wanted to shout to her not to touch +the stuff. But his throat was closed and he was conscious only of the +fact that somewhere down inside of the anguish that filled him +something was praying for help, something was begging God to keep the +little, blue-eyed mother stainless and sweet and unharmed. + +Joe's boys were not beside their father. They were at the other end of +the counter staring, just staring, unconscious of everything, hearing +only that strange new laugh of their father's and noticing what no one +else except Mrs. Dustin saw--that Joe's hand as he raised his glass +shook wretchedly. + +And then, before any of them could bring their glasses to their lips, +the thing the anguished soul of Peter Dustin had been praying for +happened. The door opened and within its frame stood the big handsome +figure of Green Valley's new minister. + +One glance of his took in the scene and the smile he wore never changed +nor did an eyelash so much as quiver even after the blue eyes of +Peter's mother had flashed their message. + +"Well--I've come to invite folks to my party and I find a party going +on. I'm going to give a housewarming soon, and I came over to ask +Williams here where he bought his graphophone and records. We must +have one at my party so that when the musicians get tired we can have +other music. And, Williams, I'm expecting you to come over that night +and run the thing for me. I shall be too busy attending to other +matters. And now, as long as we're all here would you mind letting me +hear 'Annie Laurie' again?" + +The song was put on and the children crowded round. + +Joe and Mrs. Dustin were listening silently to the song that always +brought back old faces and scenes and that old haunting ache for the +things of long ago. + +"That's my favorite tune," said the proprietor suddenly to Mrs. Dustin. + +"It's one of mine too," she smiled back with soft, shining eyes. + +"My wife's name was Annie," he said again and as suddenly. + +"Have you lost her?" Mrs. Dustin asked gently. + +"Yes. Quite a while ago. You make me think of her. She was little +and had blue eyes. She died on me when the baby came. She took the +baby with her." + +"Oh," murmured Mrs. Dustin and she forgot the beer growing stale on the +counter, forgot the slot machines against the walls, forgot everything +but this man who for this minute stood out from a world of men with +this unhealed sorrow in his heart. + + "And for bonny Annie Laurie + I'd lay me doon and dee," + +sang the famous singer softly and the proprietor turned his head away. + +"It gets damn lonesome sometimes," he said huskily. And at that a +toil-worn hand touched his arm in healing sympathy and a little +shoemaker who had come out into the night with anger in his heart said +with a huskiness that rivalled the proprietor's, + +"My God, man, don't I know!" + +The minister played other tunes, then he pulled out his watch and +laughed and that ended the party. In a few minutes he was alone with +the proprietor. + +When the last footstep had lost itself in the still streets the +proprietor turned to the big young man who was sitting on an ice-cream +table, carelessly swinging his feet. + +"I feel so damn funny," said the proprietor, "and all shook up +to-night. And I don't know whether it all really happened or whether I +just dreamed it--the little woman with the blue eyes and the soft-faced +little guy. Say, parson, what were they after, anyway?" + +"Williams," the parson made grave answer, "I rather think those two +were looking for their children." And Cynthia's son told the story of +Joe and Hattie and Mrs. Dustin and Peter as Green Valley had told it to +him. And when it was told the two men sat still and listened to the +little wind mourning somewhere outside. + +"Yes--that's it. They were looking for their children. If mine hadn't +a-died that's maybe what I'd be doing now. Oh, God, parson, I'm in +wrong again. I've been in wrong ever since Annie died. If she was +alive I'd be working in a machine shop somewheres, bringing home my +twenty-two a week with more for overtime and going around with my wife +and the kid and living natural, like other men. My God," he groaned, +"the lights just went out when she went and I've been stumbling around +in the dark, not knowing how to live or die. + +"I quit work the day after I buried her. What was the use of working +then? I had half a mind to blow in all I had but I couldn't. Seemed +like she was still there with me, trying to cheer me up. I slunk +around like a shadow for months. And then I got hungry for people. A +single man don't get asked around much and he's got to hang around with +the boys. + +"So I took what money I had and started a pool-room. I thought maybe +I'd feel better seeing people around all day. Well--it wasn't so bad. +But one night a little woman with a baby in her arms came to the door +and begged me to send her husband home and not let him play in my place +any more. She said she had no milk for the baby and no fire, that he +was spending everything he earned in my poolroom. + +"So help me, God, parson, that part of it had never struck me. I ain't +bright and never was. But I ain't no skunk. I give that woman some of +her own money back and that week I sold out at a loss and slunk around +some more. I couldn't go back to my own work. I had a grudge against +it, someway. By and by the money was all gone and an old pal of mine +offered to set me up in business out here, away from the city and old +memories. And here I am again--the same old fool and numbskull. I'll +sell out this week and git. What I'll do I don't know. I'm not a +smart man. It was always Annie that did the heavy thinking and the +advising and had the ideas for starting things." + +The boy who was born in India, who had heard hundreds of gripping, +human tales in that land of story and proverb, listened as if this was +the first breath of grief his heart had ever experienced. Then he took +the dead Annie's place. + +"Williams, sometime next spring, Billy Evans is going to add a garage +to his livery barn. He'll need a mechanic. That will be just the +place for you. In the meantime I'm buying a little car and am in need +of a driver. So until Billy is ready you'd better come and bach with +me. The farm is big and I'm nearly as lonely at times as you are." + +And he told his poolroom friend a tale of India and of two plain white +stones that lay somewhere within the heart of it. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +THE CHARM + +It was a wonderful charm--that picture of a little boy and his pet hen. +Nanny carried it about during the day and felt almost safe and easier +of heart. She wondered what had become of all her old happiness, the +carefree joy that had been hers before she met the boy who came from +India and who did not understand women. + +Ever since that day on the hill top Nanny's life had been troubled. +She was haunted with strange, vague fears. She woke up one morning +with the knowledge that she had dreamed the night long of the boy from +India. That afternoon she found herself unable to think of anything +but him. + +A panic seized her. She began to be afraid of herself. She caught +herself looking out of the windows and down the dusty summer roads, at +first unconsciously and then with a curious expectancy that grew to a +longing so real that she could not help but understand. + +It came to Nanny with a terrible shock--the knowledge that at last she +loved a man. She remembered then the eyes of the men who had loved her +and whom she had so carelessly sent away. She understood then the hurt +they had carried away with them and hoped penitently that each had +found the comfort and love he had craved. + +She wondered how and where she was to look for comfort. She saw with +something very much like horror that, unlike the men who had sought +her, she dared make no plea, could not by word or look give any sign of +what had befallen her. + +If others came to know, her misery would be unbearable. The terrible +thought came that perhaps Cynthia's son might come to see. At that the +earth seemed to go soft beneath her feet and her world lay blurred in a +mist of amazed misery. + +She was wretched and gay by turns. The day came when her father and +brother noticed this and spoke of it. Then it was that Nanny turned +white and walked away to Grandma Wentworth's. She had half a mind to +tell Grandma and perhaps through that wonder-wise soul find her way +back to peace and sanity. But Grandma had teased too and so Nanny held +on desperately to her secret, wondering how she was to go on enduring. + +When she came to the picture of the little, grave-eyed chap Nanny stole +it without a moment's hesitation. And it acted like a charm. Lying +warm above her heart it dulled the longing and helped her to laugh +again, gayly, saucily even. + +She had brave minutes when with her eyes on the picture she told +herself that it wasn't the man she loved but this grave-eyed boy in him +that had never grown up or died. She had always loved children, she +told herself, so there was no shame in that. But the next minute her +heart would call up the image of this boy grown up, a boy still, but a +boy with a man's eyes and a man's dormant strength. Being an honest +soul Nanny flushed and cried for the mother she could not remember. + +Still as the days went by Nanny found that the little fellow stood +gallantly by her. Somehow he helped her to grow used to the pain and +the burning joy of her secret. He helped her to endure the questions +and the teasing that is the lot of girls as lovely as Nanny. + +He helped her to laugh when she felt like crying. And best of all he +steadied her when Cynthia's son was by, when her heart was beating +horribly and her head was dizzy with happiness and fright. + +She was a new girl to the boy from India. He was no longer afraid of +her. She no longer said bright, sharp things that puzzled and hurt +him. She was quiet and kind and frequently now exceedingly ill at ease. + +One day while they were walking along the road he stopped suddenly and +looked at her. + +"Are you tired?" he asked abruptly. + +"No--I'm not tired," Nanny said a little surprised at the question. + +"Are you ill?" he next wanted to know. + +"Ill? Why--no. Not that I know of." + +He searched her eyes for the truth. Nanny, not daring to trust +herself, turned away her head with an unsteady little laugh. + +"Why?" + +"Because," the puzzled boy explained, "you have been so quiet and so +nice and kind to me." + +The laughable innocence of him was all that saved Nanny that time. + +She thought of going away. But she lacked the courage. The thought of +going made the pain worse and there was no place in all the world to +which she cared to go. + +Then a brilliant idea came to her. It might after all, she told +herself, be purely imaginary,--this strange torture that she thought +was love. It might after all be only a foolish fancy born of her quiet +isolated life in the dreamy old town. She would fill the house with +people, with men and women and music. + +So for a time the Ainslees were very gay. House party followed house +party and there were always guests. Secure with the security of +numbers Nanny invited Cynthia's son. Then she stood back and watched +him draw both men and women about him. He was utterly at ease with the +men but quiet and reserved with the girls. Instinctively he sorted out +the comfortable, less brilliant ones and chatted with them, all +unconscious of the light in the eyes of the others. Nanny watched him +and as she watched there was born in her heart a new fear and torture. +She realized that some day love would come to Cynthia's son and feared +that she would have to stand by unseen and forgotten. + +So then she began to distrust those of her feminine guests who smiled +at him and chatted with him. And as soon as she decently could she +sent all her company packing. When they were gone she knew beyond any +possibility of doubt that she loved him and would always love him and +that the vengeance that her father had predicted had overtaken her. + +The very next time Cynthia's son came he found the house quiet and +Nanny alone. + +"Are they all gone?" he asked. + +"Yes," she told him. + +"When is your next crowd coming?" he wondered. + +"There aren't going to be any more crowds," Nanny informed him. + +"That's nice. It's pleasanter this way." + +Nanny's poor heart longed to ask why but it dared not. + +So then she drifted and didn't care. Though she prayed a little +miserably at times for peace and a home shore. They seemed to meet by +accident on the sunny summer roads and whenever they did they strolled +on aimlessly but contented. Because she was now so quiet and kind he +told her things that he had never told to any one else. She marvelled +at the simple heart of him, its freedom from self-consciousness. She +had not dreamed that there was anywhere in the world a grown-up man +like that. + +Had he been different she could never have lived, it seemed to her, +through the fearful hour of humiliation on the Glen Road. She stooped +for a spray of scarlet sumach one early autumn afternoon. They had +been looking through the hedges for the first hazel nuts and he was +standing beside her when, in some way, the little picture worked its +way out of her soft silk blouse and fell at his feet, face up. + +Fright as terrible and as cold as death laid its hand on Nanny's heart. +It seemed to her that she never again could raise her eyes to his. +Fortunately her body went through its mechanical duties. She bent, her +hand picked up the picture, and her voice of its own accord was +explaining: + +"This belongs to you. I took it the day I was looking over the +pictures at Grandma Wentworth's. I should, of course, have returned it +long ago but I kept neglecting to do it. It's one of the dearest child +pictures I have ever seen." + +She raised her eyes then, eyes as careless as she could make them. +Fright kept the flame of bitter shame from her cheeks and the tremor +out of her voice. She held the little picture out to him, forcing her +eyes to meet his. + +And those eyes of his looked down at her, first with wonder and then +with a pleased smile, and she knew that he didn't know, didn't +understand, saw nothing strange in the incident. He took her calm +explanation for the whole truth. The man had absolutely no vanity. + +"Why, I don't want that," he told her wonderingly. "Are you making a +collection of children's pictures?" he asked with such innocent +curiosity that Nanny's self-control gave way and she laughed until she +cried. He stood by, helpless and puzzled. When Nanny, having gotten +to the tears, searched in vain for her handkerchief he gravely offered +his. + +Nanny took it and used it and then looked up at him with eyes as full +of laughing despair as his were full of bewilderment. + +"John Roger Churchill Knight--you will some day be the very death of +me." + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +INDIAN SUMMER + +"Well, I guess this is about the last spell of pretty weather we're +going to have," sighed Fanny Foster as she sat herself down on Grandma +Wentworth's back steps and went right to work helping Grandma sort the +herbs and bulbs and the seeds she had been gathering for a whole week. + +"I'm hoping not," said Grandma, "though when the air is like warm gold +dust, and the sun's heat just mellows you through and through, and the +last bobolink calls from the hill, why, a body just knows such perfect +days can't last. Still, I'm hoping it'll stay a bit longer, though I +can't say I'm not ready for cold weather." + +"Oh, I guess everybody is," agreed Fanny with that joyous, bubbling, +luxurious note that Grandma knew so well. "I saw Mary Hagley polishing +her very knuckles off on that second-hand stove Mert bought from that +watery-eyed man from Spring Road who drives through here with the lame +buckskin horse and pieced-out harness. Lutie Barlow's got her fall +tinting and painting all done. She's painted the inside of her chicken +coops a bright yellow, so's to fool her hens into thinking the sun's +forever shining, and the inside of her stormshed a red, so's to make it +seem warmer when she goes out there on a cold day to the coal and wood +box. There ain't anybody can beat Lutie on color ideas. + +"Minnie Eton's dyed her heavy lace curtains in coffee and has a new set +made for the dining room, besides having a picture of the third boy +enlarged for the parlor. She started crocheting the lace for a new +bedspread for her company bedroom yesterday. And--oh, my lands, I +forgot to tell you the rest of that second-hand stove business. You +see Mary was feeling pretty bad about having to put up with another old +stove and envying Cissie Harvey hers. Cissie's new parlor stove is a +monster, made seemingly of nothing but pure nickel and isinglass. Mary +went over to look at it and when she come home and took another look at +her old thing she just sat down and cried. She cried till she was too +tired to care and then went to Jessup's for some stove polish. On the +way she met Judy Parks who told her that Dick had a new kind of polish +that gave a beautiful shine without hardly any work. So Mary got that +and it proved to be all Judy said it was and in no time at all Mary +turned that old stove of hers into a shining glory. And just as she +was standing back admiring her work in comes Cissie, wringing her +hands. The baby had poked out every last one of those isinglass +windows while Cissie was in the kitchen warming up his milk. And there +you are. And there's people that say there is no God and no justice in +this world. + +"Josephine Rand's starting in on her rugs and begging rags from friends +and enemies. She's going a little easy though since last week. She +cut up what Ted says was a perfectly good pair of his pants. He had +them hanging up in the basement and was hoping Josephine would wash and +press them some day. He kept them down in the basement because he knew +that if he left them in his closet she'd give them away to a hobo on +account of her always feeling so sorry for tramps and believing +everything they tell her. Ted says he always liked these particular +pants on account of them making him look slim and being made of the +same kind of cloth as his first long pair of pants that he got as a +boy. So he was cherishing them and Josephine goes and cuts them into +tatters. He's so mad, she says she don't dare leave a rag rug in his +sight. + +"Mat Wilson and his wife ain't on the very best conjugal terms either. +It seems Mat has a felon right under his thumb nail, about the worst +place you can have one, he thinks. It's kept him awake nights and made +him miserable, so naturally he felt entitled to a good deal of +sympathy. And he got it. Everybody has sympathized so much that Clara +just got mad and said that that there felon of Mat's isn't half as bad +as the one that she had at the end of her thumb two years ago. She +says she got hollow-eyed and consumptive looking with hers but that Mat +looks about the same as usual, maybe brighter. Anyhow, they've argued +and scrapped about their felons so that Clara's aunt's gone off for a +visit to Ioway, and Mat says that there sure is a recompense for +everything in this world, even felons and domestic misery, and Clara +wants to know if he's meaning to insinuate that her aunt is a nuisance, +because if he is she ain't going to send his aunt the Christmas present +that she's got half done for her. But Mat won't say, just keeps +showing his thumb to everybody and talking about silver linings to +every cloud. There's no use talking, some men are aggravating. + +"Mandy Jutlins don't know whether to have the telephone put in or not. +She says the Lord knows she has enough children to run all her errands +and take all messages and that the two dollars a month comes in handy +for a new pair of shoes. And if it's in she says more than likely +she'll be wasting her time listening to a lot of silly gossip. Of +course that was a foolish remark for Mandy to make, seeing all her +friends have telephones. Two or three's took it personal and aren't +speaking a word to Mandy but plenty about her. One of them is supposed +to have said that it's a fact that Mandy doesn't need a telephone, that +she talks enough without it, and that in her opinion the worst kind of +a gossip is the kind that stays at home the whole enduring time, never +taking pains to see how things really happen and always knowing +everything. + +"Emmy Smith doesn't know what to do with her oldest girl, Eleanor. +Eleanor just won't wash the knives and forks and spoons. She'll scrape +and scald and polish the pots and pans and does the china beautiful, +but she will leave the knives and forks and even hides them away dirty. +Did you ever hear of such a thing? Emmy can't explain it unless it's +due to the shiftless streak in all the Smiths. + +"Agnes Hooper's crab-apple jell is about all gone and here it's hardly +cool yet. Those boys of hers just want to live on crab-apple jell and +Aggie says she's got to the end of her strength and patience, that +Charlie'd better pull up and move out among the Mormons where he could +have a couple of more wives to help keep those boys filled up. + +"Jennie Burton's sauerkraut isn't going to keep and hasn't turned out +well, she thinks. Fremy Stockton says it's because she forgot to put +in a little mite of sugar and altogether too much salt. + +"Grace Cook's husband bought a whole pig from some farmer Bloomingdale +way, thinking it was going to be good and cold by this time. And Grace +has got up at four o'clock every morning for a week and stayed up till +midnight, trying to get that pig out of sight. She's rendered lard and +made sausage and salted and smoked meat till every crock is full. +Yesterday she was making head cheese, sick to her stomach and crying +because there were still the four feet to cook up, and she said she +didn't know how to cook them and that each one looked to her about as +big as the kitchen stove. + +"So I just took off my hat and put those four pig's feet on the stove +to simmer, and I helped her to get the head cheese out of the way. +When there's two working and talking, why, the time goes and when we +turned around there were those pig's feet as tender as could be, so +when the children came in we sat down and had pig's feet with +horse-radish. Grace wouldn't touch them; said she had enough pig in +her system to last her ten years and she knew she'd break out in +gumboils. + +"I suppose you've heard how Malcolm Gross thought he'd lay in a nice +supply of maple syrup for his buckwheat pancakes this winter, and how +the children went to tasting and forgot to cork the big can, and the +cat went climbing around for mice and bacon rind and knocked the thing +down. Florence says there's maple syrup tracked all over the house and +she says her rugs are ruined. + +"It seems as if Grove Street was full of trouble, for while Grace was +crying over her pig, Elsie Winters next door was crying over her blue +henrietta dress that didn't dye right. Elsie swears it was old dye +Martin sold her and wishes we'd have another drug store because a +little competition would do Martin good. And next door to Elsie, Pete +Sweeney's tickled to death. He says it serves Elsie right, that Green +Valley women've got a mania for dyeing things and trying to make 'em +last forever; that he's had two bolts of just the kind of color Elsie +was trying to get but that she wouldn't look at it. + +"And Pete Sweeney's not the only one that's down on the women. Andy +Smiley cleaned up so much money on those new bungalows that he went to +the city and came home with twenty-five dollars' worth of ostrich +plumes for Nettie. He said he was bound that Nettie'd have a real hat +once in her life, that he's tired of watching her making her own hats, +even piecing out the shapes with bits of cardboard and trimming and +retrimming. She got in the way of it the first ten years they were +married, when Andy was having such poor luck and now, poor thing, I +guess she can't get out of it, because the day after Andy brought the +plumes Nettie went to the city and bought a thirty-nine-cent shape to +put them on. And she's wearing it like that, looking worse than ever. +They say Andy's swearing awful and that Mary Langely almost cried when +she saw those lovely plumes and begged Nettie to come in and let her +fix up her hat proper and without charge. But Nettie just smiled that +happy little smile of hers and shook her head. + +"Andy Smiley ain't the only one that's doing well. Johnny Peters got a +raise the other day and Claudie's treated herself to two dozen +beautiful linen dish towels. She says she's used flour sacks to wipe +dishes ever since she was six years old and she's always been hoping +she'd be rich enough some day to have real linen dish towels. So she's +got 'em. But they're so nice she hardly likes to use them, and the two +weeks she was sick and had to have her washing done at the laundry she +was mighty careful not to send them. She washed them herself right +there beside her bed, and her sick with rheumatism. They say Doc +Philipps used awful language, for he caught her right at it. But when +she explained he just blew his nose and never said another word. But +he talked to Johnny and Johnny went out and bought four dozen dish +towels such as Green Valley has never seen. Why, Sadie Dundry says +even the Ainslees haven't got dish towels like that. Doc says that if +he can coax some man to get Dolly Beatty good woolen stockings and keep +her from wearing those transparent things this winter he'll be almost +happy; says if Dolly should marry that widower he'll talk to him. + +"All Elm Street's laughing at Alexander Sabin and Carrie and their +pump. That pump of theirs has been out of order all summer and +Carrie's been sick from nothing else but getting mad every time she'd +go out for a pail of water. Alexander promised to fix it but instead +of that he's repaired everybody else's all up and down Elm Street and +just can't seem to get started on his own. Carrie's going on a strike +to-morrow, ain't going to cook a mouthful of victuals, she says, until +that pump is fixed. The neighbors, much as they like Alexander, are +all on her side and have promised not to invite him in, even for a +drink of water from the pumps he's fixed. And his mother's away at +Barton, nursing her sick sister, so it looks as if Alexander will be +starved into fixing that pump of his. + +"Debby Collins is going to give the minister one of her cats, the one +that has to have a cold potato for its lunch every day. She says it's +the most mannerly of all her cats and that she'd never think of giving +it to any one but the minister and not even to him but that now that +he's going to have a proper home and a housekeeper, why, it'll be safe. + +"Everybody, of course, is crazy about the housewarming the minister is +going to give next week. I guess everybody is going. It'll be a fine +night for thieves, Bessie Williams says, with every soul gone. That +girl's mind just naturally turns to evil. She knows there ain't ever +been a thing stolen in this town, less it was a kiss or two. But +Bessie's the only one, so far as I could hear, who was borrowing +trouble. The rest of the town is dying to get into that house that's +been closed so long. And everybody's curious to know just what Hen +Tomlins's been doing to the furniture. You know when the minister +found out what a fine wood-carver and cabinet-maker Hen was he had him +go through the house. And they say that Bernard Rollins, the +portraiture man, is mixed up in the housewarming too. But nobody can +figure out how. And that ain't the worst. Uncle Tony says that he +heard that the minister bought out the poolroom man, because some one +saw the music box being hauled over to the minister's house. You know +Jake and some others were planning to run that poolroom man out of +town, even whispering about tar and feathers. But the minister asked +them to let him manage and try to fix things up first. So they did and +he's done it, because the poolroom's closed; the stuff went out +yesterday and Effie Struby's brother Alf swears he saw that poolroom +man fooling with the minister's automobile out in the barn. But you +know how near-sighted Alf is and his word ain't credited much, and +everybody's so busy getting ready for the party that they can't stop to +investigate. And ain't it funny how none of us don't somehow ask the +minister things, just wait until he tells us? And ain't he got a funny +way of just talking about nothing special, only being pleasant, and +then letting you find out weeks after that he did tell you something +that you'd been needing to know? My! I bet that boy could give a +child castor oil and make him honestly think it was candy. Why, they +say that as far as anybody can find out, he's never give that poolroom +man even one good talking to. Jake, who's been itching to lambaste the +man, says 's-far's he can see, it was the poolroom man who did all the +talking. And once Jake says he just dropped in himself, just to see +what line of argument the minister was using, and he says that he'd be +danged if the minister did a blessed thing but play 'Annie Laurie' and +'We'd Better Bide a Wee' over and over on that music box. Jake hasn't +figured it out yet. + +"Why, Grandma, there's some thinks maybe Cynthia's son has brought back +some Indian magic. They say India's chuckful of it--but law--it'll +take more than magic to save little Jim Tumley, for he's beginning +again. While the minister kept close he was all right but the +housewarming and that poolroom took up time, and then Jim's sister, +Mrs. Hoskins, got sick and Jim goes there to play and sing to her, and +you know what George Hoskins is. He must have his drink and offer +visitors some--and poor Jim--just the smell of it knocks him out. The +minister says Jim must be saved. But how's it to be done, tell me +that? There ain't anything smart or knowing about me, but the +minister'll never save Jim Tumley less'n he kills off a few of our +comfortable, respectable drinkers and closes up the hotel. And I tell +you, nobody but God Almighty could make this town dry." + +"Well, Fanny," smiled Grandma, "I've noticed that if there ever is a +job that nobody but the Almighty can handle, He generally takes it in +hand and settles it." + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +THE HOUSEWARMING + +Jocelyn Brownlee was dressing for the minister's party. She was laying +out the prettiest of her pretty things and sighing as she did it. For +what two months before would have seemed a joyous occasion was now +nothing but a painful, trying ordeal, an ordeal that must, however, be +gallantly gone through with. + +Ever since that afternoon when she had stood on the back porch waving +joyfully to David and received no answer her world had lost its color. +All the rose and gold had faded and she stood lonely and lost and cold +in a mist of mystery. + +She had seen David since that day, had even spoken to him. But her +words were few and full of a gracious courtesy that put a whole wide +world between them. + +"Are you going to the minister's housewarming, Jocelyn?" David had +asked painfully. He had realized the raw cruelty of that afternoon and +had come over to explain and make amends. + +"Yes--I'm going, David. All the town will be there, won't it?" she had +answered and asked gently. + +"Shall I stop for you?" begged the big boy. + +"Why, no, David--thank you. I shall not need an escort. It's such a +little way and I'm used to Green Valley now." But David knew just how +afraid this city mouse was of the country roads at night. + +She was such a gracious little body as she stood there in her garden +that David wondered how he had ever for a moment doubted her and what +madness in his blood had made him yield to the cruelty that had shut +her heart and door to him. + +For closed they were and gone was the simple, confiding girl who had +picnicked with him one May day. In her place was this quiet young +woman who talked to him pleasantly but did not ask him in, and who +scared him with her calm and sweetness and drove the stumbling +explanation from his lips. + +So Jocelyn was laying out her pretty things and sighing. As long as +she was not going with David she decided to wear the smart slippers +with the high heels and the pretty buckles. David did not approve of +high heels. + +She knew that a great many of the Green Valley women would wear dresses +with collars to their chins. So she smiled just a bit wickedly as she +glanced at the soft, misty dress like pink sea foam, from which her +head and lovely throat rose like a flower. She wondered if it was +wicked to be glad that she was pretty and to want David to see just how +pretty she really was. + +She didn't want to go, but go she must, for she knew Green Valley. She +knew it and loved it. But she feared it too, because she did not know +it well enough. + +So half-past eight found her stepping daintily and a little tipsily in +her high-heeled slippers over the road, after the last stragglers. She +did not want to be seen going in alone and so hung back till the last, +a lonely little figure in the cool shadows. Yet she was not so far +back that she could not feel the comforting nearness of the folks +ahead. She even heard snatches of conversation and smiled +understandingly, for she too knew now the little daily trials, the +family sorrows and dissensions, the occasional soul tempests, the +laughable ways and tenderly pathetic ambitions of these simple, +guileless human folks. + +She heard enough to know that the couple just ahead was Sam Bobbins and +his wife, Dudy; the Sam Bobbins who tried to get rich raising violets +and failed; who then began raising mushrooms in his cellar and failed; +who last year spent good money trying to raise pedigreed dogs and +failed; and who only the week before paid ten dollars for a fancy +rooster and was happily telling his neighbors how rich he was going to +be, selling fighting stock. His wife stepped on her skirt and ripped +it. Jocelyn could hear her worried wail and Sam comforting her with +promises of new dresses when the roosters began to sell. She could +hear fat Mrs. Glenn puffing and laughing her way up the little crests +of the road and could guess that her thin husband was doing his best to +help her. + +She was so interested in the folks ahead that she forgot to be afraid +and never once glanced back into the shadows. Had she done so she +might have seen David loitering along, keeping faithful watch over her. +So nicely did he time his steps that when she reached the door of the +minister's country house he was right behind her, and all Green Valley +saw them come in together. + +When Jocelyn, in slipping from her evening wrap, turned and saw him and +flushed, he covered her confusion by saying reproachfully but gently: + +"Those slippers are ever so pretty, Jocelyn, but you ought not to wear +them on these rough country roads and they are hardly warm enough for +these cool evenings, are they?" + +She gave him a little smile full of saucy wickedness for she heard the +pain in his voice and saw the lover's hunger in his eyes and knew that +she was loved well and truly. But she had been hurt and she was too +much a woman and far too human not to take her turn at gentle cruelty. + +"What a couple," breathed Joshua Stillman, standing beside the blazing +fireplace with Colonel Stratton. "She's like a dewy sweet rosebud and +he's a regular story-book lover in looks and a rare fine boy. We +haven't had a wild rose romance like this one for a long while." + +"We'll have a finer when that young parson wakes up. He has the look +of a great lover, and look at the love history of the Churchills." + + It was evident that no man there dreamed of criticizing +the dress that looked like pink sea foam. Even David drank in the +picture of his little sweetheart and saw how necessary to this wild +rose sweetness the high-heeled slippers were. He wondered if ever in +his life he would kiss her and, should such glory come to him, if he +would live through the joy of it. + +It was the women who were inclined to murmur. But as soon as they +caught a look or a smile meant just for them their primness melted. +Their duty to their conscience and their upbringing done, they smiled +back lovingly at the girl, for who could be critical of a sweet wild +rose! + +Jocelyn was not the only one whose gown had no collar. Nan Ainslee +wore a plain dress that was so beautiful it made the women catch their +breath. When Dolly asked the Green Valley dressmaker if she could make +her one like it, that body sighed and shook her head and said that she +knew that that dress looked awful simple but that it wasn't as simple +as it looked and she knew better than to try and copy it. + +Some one overheard and asked somebody else why Dolly Beatty should +happen to want a dress like that, and instantly somebody smiled and +whispered that Charlie Peters, the widower from North Road, was making +eyes at her and calling regularly. + +So the ball was set rolling and soon everybody knew that Grandma +Wentworth had just had a letter from Tommy Dudley, saying that he was +doing so well out West on his homestead that he was building himself a +new house and was aiming to make Green Valley a visit next lilac time. + +And Jimmy Sears, Milly Sears' second boy, was a sergeant in the army +and was having a wonderful time somewhere down in Panama. Milly had a +letter from him with photographs and was showing them around. Not only +did Jimmy give her news of himself but he wrote that John, the oldest +boy, was up in Canada and doing well. Jimmy was sending his mother and +sister Alice some wonderful laces and embroideries and Frank Burton +several kinds of strange fowl by a sailor friend from one of the +warships who was going home. So patient, long-suffering Milly Sears +was wholly happy for the first time in years. + +And no sooner had all this news been digested than somebody discovered +a diamond ring on Clara Tuttle's left hand. So Clara was surrounded +and an explanation demanded. But before she could conquer her blushes +and stammer out her news Max Longman came in from another room and, +putting his arms about her, said, "Don't be afraid, girl of mine, I'm +here." And so everybody knew then that it was Max, after all, and not +Freddy Wilson. + +Over near one of the big windows Steve Meckling was looking down at +Bonnie Don. + +"Bonnie, when will you stop torturing me? When will you let me give +you a ring?" + +Bonnie was Clara Tuttle's chum and she was watching Clara's face, the +light in Clara's eyes, the happy curve of her lips. It was a happiness +that made Bonnie's eyes wistful. + +"Steve," she said softly, "would you always love me and be gentle with +me?" + +At that big Steve caught his breath and put his hungry arms behind his +back out of temptation's way and said huskily, "Oh, Bonnie, girl, just +try me!" + +So Bonnie raised her eyes and the big man was at peace. + +Billy Evans was the last to arrive. He had to get all the old folks to +the party before he and Hank could put in an appearance. But his wife +and little Billy were there, little Billy with his ruddy hair curling +about his merry little face and his eyes dancing at everything and +every one. + +Green Valley was full of lovable little ones, but they were as a rule +kept closely sheltered in the front and back yards. But Billy was a +town baby. His days were spent in and around his father's livery barn. +He went to his twelve o'clock dinner perched on Hank Lolly's shoulder, +and it had gotten so no gathering of men in his father's office was +considered complete without him. + +And maybe it was just as well; for since Billy's coming there was less +careless language, less careless gossip. And if some one's tongue did +slip now and then, Hank Lolly had a way of putting his head in and +saying solemnly: + +"Guess you forgot that Mrs. Evans' boy was around when you said that." + +For Hank Lolly was little Billy's proud godfather and Billy's welfare +was a matter that kept Hank awake nights. + +It was Hank who introduced little Billy to all the livery horses and +patiently developed deep friendships between the animals and the child. + +"I've fixed it so's no horse of ourn'll ever hurt the boy. But that +ain't saying that somebody's ornery critter won't harm him. There's +some awful mean horses in this town, Billy," Hank worried. But Billy +Evans only laughed. + +"Hank," he said, "with you and God taking turns minding that kid, and +his ma and me doing a little now and then, I guess he'll grow up." + +So Billy was at the minister's party, as were very nearly all the other +Green Valley youngsters. For these were old-fashioned folks whose +entertainments were so simple and harmless that children could always +be present. + +As a matter of fact Green Valley folks never had to be entertained. +All one had to do was to call them together and they entertained +themselves. + +Cynthia's son knew this. So he had made no elaborate plans. He knew +too that it was the old homestead they came to see, and to find out +what that poolroom man was doing in his back yard, and why Hen Tomlins +had been coming up so regularly, and why Bernard Rollins had been +asking to see people's old albums for the past three months. + +So Cynthia's son had no programme. He just threw open every door and +invited them to walk through and look. He explained that in the +kitchen his housekeeper, Mary Dooley, and her two cousins from Meacham +were getting up the refreshments and that any one who strayed in there +would in all probability be put to work. + +Still he wanted Green Valley housewives to go in and see if they could +think of anything that would make Mary's work easier. He had, he said, +tried to make that kitchen a livable kind of a room, a room that would +be easy on a woman's feet and back and restful to her heart. + +In the library and scattered all about were samples of Hen Tomlins' +art. Hen was a rare workman, their minister told them. With his box +of tools and his cunning hands Hen had taken old, broken but still +beautiful heirloom furniture and refashioned it into new life and +beauty. + +In his little study just off the library his Green Valley neighbors +would find all manner of oriental things, treasures gathered for him by +his wonderful mother and father and given to him by his many dear and +far-away Indian friends. He had put little cards on the articles, +explaining their history and uses. + +For the babies there were big, quiet, safe rooms upstairs, and for the +young people there was the hall and the back sitting room, the piano, +the music box and Timothy Williams. Timothy was the man who up till +the day before yesterday had owned and run the poolroom. But he wasn't +in the poolroom business any more. He was now his, John Knight's, +assistant and friend. Timothy's story was a common enough little +story--the story of a man without a home. If they'd all listen a +minute he'd tell them all there was to tell. + +So, in the midst of a merrymaking, John Roger Churchill Knight +introduced Timothy Williams to Green Valley, introduced him in such a +way as to pave a wide clear path for him into Green Valley hearts. And +so quick was Green Valley's response that before that same merrymaking +was over Green Valley was calling him Timothy and inviting him over for +Sunday dinner. + +So then they were all provided for. And here was the house. It was +years since some of them were in it, and to a home-loving, +home-worshipping people it was a treat to go from room to room. In +spite of the changes, the newness everywhere, there was much of the old +home left. Its soul was still the same. The new hangings, the new +wicker furniture, the oriental treasures were all duly inspected, +commented upon and admired. + +But it was the old things, the Green Valley things that made the great +appeal. And Green Valley folks rested loving hands every now and then +on some fine old heavy chair that a long-gone Churchill had with his +own hands fashioned from his own walnut trees. + +There were pictures to look at, old familiar faces, the faces of men +and women who had been born and raised in this joyous little valley +town; who had gone to the village school and had in their courting days +strolled over the shady old town roads. + +Here was a picture of Cynthia's mother in a crinoline with her baby on +her knee. There was a famous artist's painting of a storm passing over +the wooded knoll that now was John Knight's favorite retreat. The +famous artist had been visiting John Knight and had painted the storm +as he watched it from the sitting-room windows. + +There were old candlesticks, guns, old dishes, old patterns, hand-sewn +quilts and such little things of long ago as stirred the oldest folks +there very nearly to tears and awed even the youngsters into a +wondering respect for the old days they could never know. + +The old house hummed with the treasured memories of a hundred years. +Groups of twos and threes stood everywhere about, hovering over some +article. In every such group there would be at first a short hushed +silence, then would come the sudden burst of memories spattering like a +shower of raindrops; then the turning away of eyes full of misty, +unbelieving, far-away smiles. + +Cynthia's son watched and smiled too. But his thoughts flew back and +he longed with a cruel ache for the mother who lay sleeping in a far +and foreign land. + +By and by a gong sounded somewhere. That was the signal for supper. +So they gathered around the tables and Cynthia's son explained that +Bernard Rollins had for the last three months been painting a portrait +of Cynthia Churchill, Cynthia as they knew her. That was why Rollins +had searched old albums for pictures that might give him an idea of the +sweetness of her smile. That was the surprise of the evening and the +meaning of the shrouded picture above the library fireplace. She had +so loved Green Valley, had so longed to be there. + +They sat very still and waited while Grandma Wentworth uncovered the +face of the girl who had been so loved by Green Valley folks. +Grandma's face was a little white with memories and the hand that was +reaching for the cord to draw away the covering shook a little. +Cynthia Churchill and she had been dearer to each other than sisters. +They had gone to school together in the days of pinafores and +sunbonnets and picked spring's wild flowers along the roadsides and in +the woodlands. They had knitted and made lace together, gone to +picnics and parties, always together, until the time came when a tall +Green Valley boy walked beside each. And even then they were +inseparable. Why, they made their wedding things together and when +Mollie Wentworth passed out of the village church a wife, Cynthia, +lovely as the bride, walked behind as bridesmaid. And Mollie was to +have returned the favor in a few days. But something happened, +something tragic and cruel, and lovely Cynthia never wore the wedding +gown that had been fashioned for her. It was packed away and on what +was to have been her wedding day Cynthia left Green Valley and was gone +a long while. She came back once or twice but in the end Green Valley +heard that she married a wonderful missionary and sailed away to India. + +So Grandma's hand shook and her face was white. But when the covering +slipped off and a lovely, laughing face looked down at them Grandma +smiled, even though the tears were running down her cheeks. + +Yes, that was Cynthia. Disappointment could never mar the high joy of +her nature. She was laughing at them, telling them that with all its +sorrows and bitterness and heartache life was worth while. + +Her son stood beneath her picture and read to them parts of her +letters, last messages to many of them. She had written them on her +deathbed and they were full of yearning for the town of her birth, for +the old trees and familiar flowers, home voices and the sound of the +old church bell sighing through the summer night. + +"But," ran one letter, "I am sending you my son and I want you to tell +him all the old stories and town chronicles, sing him all the old songs +and love him for my sake--for he's going home--going home to Green +Valley--alone." + +Oh, they cried, those Green Valley folks, for they were as one family +and they guessed what it must have been to die away from home and +kindred. + +But Cynthia's son did not weep. He had shed his tears long ago and had +learned to smile. He was smiling at them now. + +"I had planned to have Jim Tumley sing some of the old songs for us +to-night. But Jim isn't here and so if somebody will offer to play +them we can all sing. Jim promised he'd come," the young host's face +was troubled and they all guessed what was worrying him, "but he isn't +here--" + +"Yes--he--is," a strange voice chirped somewhere near the door. Green +Valley turned and looked and froze with horror. For there, staggering +grotesquely, came little Jim Tumley, a piteous figure. He had kept his +promise to his new friend--he had come to sing the old songs. + +Not a soul stirred. Only somewhere in the heart of the seated audience +Frank Burton groaned. This was a fight that he could not fight for +little Jim. + +Nan Ainslee had stepped to the piano but her fingers were lead. And +for once the young minister was unable to rise to the situation. A +dark agony flooded his eyes and kept him motionless. It was the look +Grandma Wentworth had once seen in Cynthia's eyes. And it was that +look that took the strength from Grandma so that she too was helpless. + +For sick, still minutes Green Valley watched little Jim stumble about +and fumble for his handkerchief. They stared at the stricken face of +their minister and at the laughing face whose memory they had come to +honor. + +And then, when the deathly silence was becoming unbearable, a girl in a +dress like pink sea foam rose from her chair and stepped quietly, +daintily down the room until she stood beside the swaying figure of Jim +Tumley. She placed her hand gently on the little man's arm and turned +to her Green Valley neighbors. + +"I shall sing the old songs with him," she said quietly. + +She found an armchair and put the docile Jim into it. Then she smiled +at Nan Ainslee and told her what to play. + +Nan's fingers touched the keys softly and from the slim throat that +rose like a flower stem from the pink sea foam there rolled out a +great, deep contralto. + +It was unbelievable, that rich deep voice. It blotted out +everything--little Jim, the room, all sense of time and place--and +brought to the listeners instead the deep echoes of cathedral aisles, +the holy peace of a still gray day and the joy of coming sunshine. She +sang all the old songs, tenderly, softly. When she could sing no more +and they showered her with smiles and tears and applause, she raised +her hand for silence, for she had something to say. + +"I am glad you liked the songs. I always sang them for father. I am +glad that I could do something for you, for you have all been so +wonderfully kind to me from the very first day that I came to Green +Valley. But why are you not kinder to Jim Tumley? Why don't you vote +the thing that is hurting him out of your town? If the women here +could vote that's what they would do. But surely you men will do it to +save Jim Tumley." + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +THE LITTLE SLIPPER + +They sat stunned and stared at the slip of a girl in pink who was +speaking in so matter-of-fact a fashion. + +And then Seth Curtis laughed; but he laughed kindly. + +"Why," he shouted, "she can't only sing; she can preach too--woman +suffrage and prohibition." + +The laugh grew and smiles went round and the whole trying situation +eased up. Jocelyn laughed too and turned to say good night to her +host. And from somewhere in the crowd Frank Burton strode up and +carried Jim out and drove him home. + +Everybody began to get ready to go, glad that the evening so nearly +tragic had been happily saved. And all Green Valley mentally promised +to repay the girl who had had the wit and the sweetness to serve in an +hour of need. + +But while the young people and the married ones with children were +crowding out through the front door, Grandma Wentworth was still in the +library, staring up into the laughing eyes of the dearest friend life +had given her and taken away. + +"Cynthia, dear," whispered Grandma brokenly, "it is still here, the +thing that hurt you so--that made a widow of me at twenty-eight. We +have grown no wiser in spite of the pain." + +Sitting in the armchair that Jocelyn had pulled out for Jim Tumley was +Roger Allan. His face was a-quiver with pain. And he too was staring +hungrily at the pictured face. + +"Oh, Roger," wept Grandma, "if only we could have her back, her and +Richard." + +"Yes," hoarsely whispered he, "if only the years would come back and we +could have another chance to live them." + +Over in one corner of the room Green Valley's three good little men +were discussing something hotly. That is, the fiery little barber was +discussing something. The other two just listened. + +"I tell you that preacher boy is right. This town needs a home, a +place where it can all get together for a good time. No one home, not +even this one, is big enough. That's why part of the town hangs out in +the hotel, another part in the blacksmith shop, the kids in Joe's shoe +shop or a poolroom. We need a big assembly room with smaller rooms off +of it for all kinds of honest fun--pool, billiards, bowling, dancing, +swimming. I tell you I ain't crazy and no more is the preacher. And +Joshua Stillman's library that he pretty near gave all his life and +money to needs to be moved out into the sunlight and stretched to its +full, grand size. I tell you it would be a great thing for this town. +This town's sociable but it ain't social--no, sir!" + +Sam Ellis was going home from the party with his girl and two boys. + +"Well, father," bitterly spoke up the eldest, "it's still our saloon +that's killing Jim Tumley, even though we aren't running it." + +"Oh, father," murmured Tessie miserably, "can't you do anything about +it?" + +Sam groaned. + +"Dear God--what can I do? I tell you selling the hotel or renting it +or dynamiting it won't stop drinking in this town, so long as there are +men in it who want drink and will drink. I don't think even the vote +that that little girl suggested will do it. If you vote it out you'll +have blind pigs to fight. No, sir! It ain't my fault nor no one man's +fault. The whole town's to blame. There's only one thing will stop +it. If men in this country will quit making it other men will stop +drinking it. So long as it's made it'll be used. The whole country's +to blame." + +Fanny Foster, having nobody else to talk to, was speaking her mind to +John, her husband. + +"I told Grandma Wentworth nobody but the Almighty could do anything for +Jim. You'll see that I'm right. I know." + +Fanny was right. But what she did not know was that she herself was to +be one of the instruments with which a stern and patient God was to +clean out forever the one foul blot on Green Valley life. + +The one person who was not discussing Jim Tumley and his trouble was +Jocelyn. She couldn't. She was too occupied with troubles of her own. + +She had been the first to leave. She slipped away unobserved for she +could not bear to have Green Valley see her leave without an escort. +So she got away as noiseless as a fairy. And for the first few rods +all was well. The excitement of the past hours, the worry of getting +away unseen, kept her mind occupied. But as the night wind cooled her +cheeks and the lighted house back of her grew smaller she grew +frightened. She was, after all, a city girl and to her there was +something fearful in the stillness of the country and the loneliness of +the dark road. She hurried her steps, jumped at every sound and grew +cold from pure terror as the awful stillness and emptiness closed in +about her. She stood still every few minutes, staring at blurred +bushes beside the road. The screech of an owl almost made her scream. +And in the dark the hard lumpy road hurt her feet cruelly. The little +slippers were never meant for dark country roads. So Jocelyn had to +pick her steps, and with every second's delay her terror grew. + +Finally the trees thinned a bit and for a good space ahead there was a +clearing where the night was not so dark and the road not so lumpy. +She hurried to get out of the smother of trees. When once she crossed +that open space all would be well, she told herself, for then the +village lights would wink at her and the sidewalks begin. As soon as +she could see her own lighted windows and set foot on a cement walk she +would no longer be afraid. + +So, head bent, she hurried along and was almost near the walk when, +looking up, she saw a man hurrying toward her through a little footpath +that led to the road. She stood motionless with horror. Then the +scream that had hovered on her lips all the way escaped her and she +tried to run. + +She did not run far. For one of the high-heeled slippers just curled +up under her and she went down, sobbing "David--David." + +And she kept sobbing just that over and over even after David had +picked her up and folded her safe in his arms. He tried to soothe her +and explained that he had missed her, had guessed that she would try to +get home alone down this road and so took the short cut in order to +catch up with her and make sure that she got home safely. He never +dreamed of frightening her so, but she was safe with him now and there +was absolutely nothing to fear. + +"But my foot, David. It's swelling. I can feel it--and it hurts." + +David took off the little slipper and put it in his pocket. Then he +told her not to worry because he could carry her home easily enough. +But first he sat down with her on an old stone wall and talked to her +until the last sob died away and her head nestled gratefully on his big +comfortable shoulder. + +"Jocelyn," he asked presently, "are you still angry with me?" + +She shook her head. + +"I've never been angry with you, David. But I thought you didn't want +to be bothered any longer with a silly girl like me and so--I tried to +help and be sensible." + +"I know. I was crazy that day you rode through town with the minister. +I had no right--" + +"Oh,"--she raised her head and looked at him in shy wonder and shocked +relief, "oh, David--was it that--you were hurt at that?" + +For answer he gently drew her close to him. + +"But David, I didn't go riding with the minister. I was just taking a +little pig home that a boy cousin of mine, who loves to tease me, sent +me. I didn't know anything about pigs and the minister happened to be +there and helped. He meant no harm." + +"Oh, I know, Jocelyn. But he is such a wonderful man. Only another +man, I guess, can know what a fine chap he is. And I thought if he did +like you I couldn't stand in your way. I found out, of course, that I +was mistaken. The minister doesn't care anything about girls. But +that wasn't all. You know, Jocelyn, I'm Uncle Roger's own nephew but I +bear his name because he legally gave it to me and because I have no +name of my own. I was a fatherless baby and a girl like you ought to +be courted by a better man than I am." + +It was costing David Allan something to tell the girl in his arms all +that. She guessed how the telling must hurt the boy, for she stopped +it with a little, tender laugh. + +"But, David dear, I knew all that the day you took me to the Decoration +Day exercises. Grandma Wentworth told me. She said she knew you'd +likely tell me yourself some day but she said that she liked you and +she noticed that people who liked you always liked you a little better +after they heard that." + +He sat still, overwhelmed with her sweetness. Then, "Jocelyn, is it +only liking?" + +Her answer came like a soft note of joy. + +"No, David. It's something bigger than liking and when you wouldn't +speak to me that afternoon you darkened all my world." + +She had not shed a tear through all those lonely days but now she +buried her face in David's breast and cried bitterly. + +And then it was that David kissed his sweetheart and the touch of her +answering lips healed forever the dull ache that had gnawed at his +heart ever since he was old enough to understand the story of his +cheated childhood. + +They sat in the soft darkness of the night that was full of autumn +sighs, a night that stirred in their hearts wistful longings for a low, +snug roof singing with rain and a drowsy little home fire beneath it. + +When they had sat long enough to remember their great hour forever and +had repeated the litany of love to each other till they sensed its +wonder, David said regretfully: + +"And now I must take you to your mother. And Jocelyn, I'm terribly +afraid of that mother of yours." + +Jocelyn laughed. + +"Why, David, mother isn't as bad as all that. And she likes you. She +said you made her think of father. And, David, she's always given me +everything I've honestly wanted and she could give. She hasn't been +out much here. She hasn't cared to do much of anything since father +died. But in the city she used to be so busy. You know she's a great +club woman and a suffragette and oh, such a beautiful speaker. It's +from her I get my funny, big, deep voice. She used to be in such +demand at meetings. But she's given it all up. She blames herself for +leaving father so much and not going out to the country with him. He +never asked her to leave the city but I know he wanted to. When he +died she just came out here to do penance. She thought there wasn't +anything for her to do in a place like this. But just wait till I tell +her about Jim Tumley. Oh, she'll know what to do. Why, mother's +wonderful in her way, David! Why, I just know she can do something for +Jim Tumley." + +David shook his head. + +"Jocelyn," he sighed, "it'll take this whole town and God Almighty too +to save Jim Tumley now." + +"Well, mother will do her share. And, Dav--id, I'd like another +kiss--if you don't mind." + +David didn't mind in the least. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +THE MORNING AFTER + +The very best part of every Green Valley doing is talking it over the +morning after. + +Nobody even pretended to work the morning after the minister's party. +Dell Parsons never even brushed out her lovely hair that morning; just +wound it round her head in two big braids and went through the little +gate in the hedge to talk it over with Nan Turner. + +She found Nan standing over a steaming dishpan, stirring the dishes +about absent-mindedly with the pancake spoon. At the sight of Dell she +turned her back on the cluttered sink. + +"Dell, I'm only just beginning to take in the meaning of what that +little neighbor girl of ours said last night. Why, Dell Parsons, we've +both been born in this here town; we're only twenty-two miles out from +the heart of one of the world's greatest cities and we've never sensed +the true meaning of this thing they call woman suffrage and +prohibition. Why, we've poked fun at it and jogged along our ignorant +hayseed way and watched and watched little sweet-hearted men like Jim +Tumley just stumble miserably into their graves, or a man like Sears +drive his children from their home and curse his wife, or perhaps we've +shuddered at the sight of Hank Lolly lying drunk in the road among the +wild flowers. + +"When one of our drunkards dies we cut our choicest flowers and go to +the funeral and maybe cry with the wife and children and then go home +and wait for the next one to do it. Of course, we talk to the children +and try to scare the boys into letting it alone. But that doesn't do +much good because, Dell, we don't bury enough drunkards at one time to +make a strong impression and convince the boys that we are right. Our +boys see big, respectable men like George Hoskins and Seth Curtis and +even good Billy Evans taking their drinks regularly and living and +prospering. So they make up their minds that mothers are all a little +bit crazy on the drink question. And the first thing we know we find +that our boys have been washing down their cigarettes with a drink. +And in those first sick five minutes we know, Dell, that the thing has +beaten us to the boy." + +"Yes," mused Dell aloud, "but we aren't the only ones who feel beaten. +The men aren't all against us, Nan. Lots of them right here in this +town are on our side. And I tell you it's no joke for a natural man +who loves to hang around and pal with his neighbors to put himself in +the position of a spoilsport or an odd goody-goody. There's Uncle +Tony's brother William. He's been against war and drink and smoking +all his life, and look at the dog's life he's led. Nan, I believe the +men are as helpless as we. The Thing has grown so huge that we can't +fight it. It's got us all. And we're so helpless because we're +ignorant and won't think this thing out. Look at Frank Burton, who'd +give his soul to save Jim Tumley's. Yet it's only last year that he +gave up having drink in the house. He never realized until so late +that just by having it around he was hurting the man he'd die to save. +And there's Billy Evans. Why, Nan, Billy has sat up nights pulling +Hank Lolly through a jag. Yet Billy lets Hank see him take a drink +every day. And, Nan, it must be plain hell for Hank to see that. Why, +Billy wouldn't tempt Hank or make him suffer torment knowingly for a +million dollars. And yet he does it every day of his life because he's +ignorant, doesn't know any bigger, finer, more unselfish way of helping +Hank. No, Nan, you can't make me believe our Green Valley men are a +mean lot, meaner than others. They just don't know and when once they +realize, why, they'll put an end to it themselves fast enough." + +"That's all right, but, Dell Parsons, you know that the world over men +have to be nagged and coaxed into seeing the right by their women +folks. And I tell you I'm going to begin right now to do a little of +both. And as for that vote--I've laughed about that long enough. Now +I'm going after it. It's just struck me that we women need a vote +about as much as we need a pair of scissors, a bread board or a wash +boiler, cook stove and bank book. We need it along with the other +things to keep our children properly clothed, fed, housed and educated." + +The blacksmith shop was closed. George Hoskins' wife was pretty sick. +So the crowd that was usually seated about the forge was crowded into +Billy Evans' office. + +It was a big crowd but it wasn't feeling any jollier because of its +size. Each man there had had a word or two with his wife that morning. +Not a few wives had begun to discuss the Jim Tumley incident seriously +the minute they got home and got the children to bed the night before. +Every man in Billy's office felt more or less uncomfortable and talked +in nervous, disconnected snatches. + +Said one: + +"Well--I drove in to town this morning so's not to have words with +Rose--and just to escape the whole dumbed subject--but if--I'd known +that everybody I met and talked to and set down with--was a-going to +talk about the same dumbed thing I'd a-stayed to home." + +"The whole trouble," argued another, "is just women's imagination, +that's all. I never saw a woman that had a living father, brother, +beau, husband, brother-in-law, father-in-law, cousin or boy baby in +arms that she wasn't worrying all the time night and day that drink'd +get him. It's just their way of being foolish, that's all. And as for +all this talk about the terrible danger and it being a menace to the +future generation, that's all slop and slush." + +Billy was irritable this morning for the first time in months. It must +be remembered that Billy's wife was red-headed and a highly efficient +soul. She had very frankly and plainly told Billy what she thought of +a town that was run in so slack a fashion that it couldn't protect one +of its own lovable citizens. She had never spoken so sharply in all +their days together and Billy felt that he had lost his bride forever. +And he had. + +"Well--boys, I'll tell you," sighed Billy. "The old woman gave me +hell, I tell you--as if--great gosh, it was all my fault. The women +are partly right and we all know it. That's why they talk up so and +why we have to take it. I've about come to the conclusion that as long +as the women are partly right and we are partly wrong I'm going to quit +it, as far as I myself am concerned. But don't think for one minute +that I fancy that I have a right to vote this town dry for any other +man. Live and let live's my way of thinking and doing." + +"Well, Billy," spoke up Jake Tuttle who had come out strongly for a dry +town, a dry state and a dry country, "you're fair and square and +a-doing all you honestly can. Maybe the time will come when you'll +feel that voting it out is the only thing." + +"Why," grumbled another member of this caucus, "anybody'd think that +this whole town had ought to turn in and just die of thirst on account +of a man that ain't much bigger than a pint of cider and never did have +no proper stomach. Why, who ever heard of sech a thing as a whole town +being run for one man?" + +"A town that ain't run fair and square for one man isn't run fair and +square for any man," insisted Jake. "And as for hearing strange +things, I've heerd tell of a man once, a poor kind of low-style Jew he +was, lived over in a little two by four town called Nazareth, who not +only believed in going dry and hungry for other people but actually +died so's to show them a finer way of living and a braver way of dying. +I've heerd tell that they called that man the Greatest Fool that ever +lived and that they killed Him fur His foolishness. So, if this whole +town should turn in an' help Jim Tumley there'd be nothing new in that." + +The pause that followed would have been uncomfortable if Seth Curtis +hadn't opened the door just then and squeezed in. + +Seth was mad. For the first time since their marriage he had +quarrelled with his wife. Docile, sweet-tempered Ruth Curtis was +aflame with mother wrath. She, like a great many Green Valley women, +thought of Jim Tumley not as a man but as a voice, the voice of a lark +on a summer morning. That other men's selfish strength should still +that voice made her sweet eyes flame and her soft voice shake with +anger. That Seth, who so hated waste of any kind, could stand calmly +by while a lovable human soul was being thrown away puzzled her at +first. She tried to argue with him. If Jim Tumley were trying to save +his burning barn or mend his fence Seth would have helped him gladly. +But Jim was trying to save his body and soul and Green Valley men, even +though they knew he was not equal to the struggle, could not see that +it was their business to help. + +Seth resented this passionate fight for little Jim that the women were +making. In his anger Seth could not see that beyond the figure of the +gentle singing man stood the children of Green Valley. In this +harmless little man who could not save himself every mother saw her +boy, her girl; one a drunkard-to-be perhaps, the other mayhap a +drunkard's wife and the mother of more drunkards. + +Seth's eyes blazed around Billy's crowded office and he waited for the +question that he knew he would be asked: + +"Well--Seth--you voting the town dry this morning?" + +And then Seth let loose. He said fool things to ease his ugly temper +but he wound up his argument with the telling reminder that Green +Valley couldn't afford to lose the fifteen-hundred-dollar yearly +license tax. + +"Not only would we men lose our freedom and be a thirsty lot of +wife-driven idiots but our taxes would rise." + +And that argument told. It had been overlooked somehow. But at the +mention of it every man's face but Jake's brightened. Why, sure--Seth +was right. That fifteen hundred dollars kept the taxes down and was an +argument that ought to appeal to every Green Valley woman whose life +was an eternal struggle to save. + +"Why, yes, that's so," agreed Jake. "It seems as if the women ought to +see that, but like as not they'll talk back and say that if there was +no hotel bar to attract us men there'd be less time wasted and more +than fifteen hundred dollars' worth of extra work turned out. And for +all they talk so everlastingly about saving, there's some kind of money +that no nice woman will touch with a ten-foot pole. And just put it up +to them as to which they want, Jim Tumley or fifteen hundred a year, +and see what they say." + +Jake was the richest man of all the men packed in Billy Evans' office. +He could afford to talk bravely for he had no need to curry any man's +favor. And he could demand respectful attention for his opinions. +There were those present who resented this independence. + +"These farmers nowadays are getting danged smart and officious," +muttered Sears to Sam Bobbins. + +But Sam wasn't listening. He too had an argument and he wanted to +voice it. + +"Mightn't the closing of the bar lose us a lot of outside trade, ruin +our business life?" + +At that Billy's eyes twinkled. + +"By gosh--Sam--I hadn't thought of that. I sure would miss the poor +drunks that crawl in here to sleep it off. And like as not I'd not get +to drive old man Hathaway home every time he hits town and tries to +paint it red. Never have dared to leave that old fool in town when he +was drunk. Never can tell what that poor miserable mind of his +mightn't prompt him to do. Might set fire to something or hang himself +on somebody's front door." + +As town marshal Billy had a pretty accurate idea of the kind of trade +that the hotel bar attracted. There was a levity in Billy's voice and +a dancing light in Billy's eye. He could never take anything seriously +for any great length of time. However, old man Sears didn't like this +attitude of Billy's. + +"It isn't only losing that fifteen-hundred-dollar license and losing +outside trade but we'd be robbing an honest and respectable man of his +livelihood," said Sears with his most ponderous air. + +An unwilling, sheepish grin ruffled every man's face and Seth said with +a rasp: + +"Well, Sears, I wouldn't lose any sleep worrying about that honest, +respectable man's livelihood if I were you. He owns a fine +seven-passenger car, some fancy driving horses, and that diamond pin he +wears week days in his tie would keep my meat bill paid for many and +many a day. No, I can't say that I'd let that make my conscience ache." + +"What say if we all go over and ask him what he thinks of it. It looks +like rain and I'll have to be starting for home," suggested the bright +and peace-loving soul who had left home that morning to avoid +unpleasantness. + +This brilliant suggestion was promptly acted on and they filed out, +leaving Billy standing alone in the doorway. Billy watched them +shuffle into the hotel, then he looked up and down Main Street, +studying every old landmark and battered hitching post. He told +himself that he hoped the old town wouldn't change too much. Hank +Lolly came out of the barn just then and Billy turned to him. + +"Hank, that innocent little girl in a pink dress last night has sure +raised one gosh darned lot of argument in this here town." + +"Billy," Hank's voice shook a little, "Billy, I heerd some of those +arguments--in there. But, my God, Billy--look at me--look at me! I'm +the best argument in this here town for voting that bar out. For, +Billy, so long as that hotel sells liquor, so long as the doors swing +open so that the smells can get out, and so long as the winds blow in +Green Valley, bringing those smells to me--just so long I'll be +afraid--afraid. And Billy, if ever I let go again, it'll be the +madhouse for me. I know. I've had a grandfather and two uncles go +that way." + +Over at the hotel the high, foaming glasses slid along the bar. The +hotel man with the diamond in his tie greeted the men who lined up at +the rail with an indifferent smile. The glasses were raised and +drained. And then some bold spirit asked the man with the diamond how +he'd feel if the town went dry. + +"Why," drawled that individual, "I've been looking down men's throats +and watching their Adam's apple and listening to them guzzling their +liquor for something like twenty years now and I wouldn't mind a +change. I left the city because I was hankering for something I didn't +know the name of. Thought I'd find it here. Thought this was a mighty +restful town. It is--but not for me and my business. But I'm glad I +came, for that young parson of yours put me next to what I really want +to do. I've been wanting all my life to run a stock farm. But I +didn't know it till that kid preacher told me so. Seems he's been +knocking around the country with Hank Lolly and knows of two or three +that are up for sale. I'm going out with him next week to look at +them. So this town running dry won't upset me any. I've just about +made up my mind to quit this game and spend the rest of my life +with--cattle. I won't mind the dryness. I don't drink. Never have." + +The rain that had been threatening for an hour came suddenly, came down +in big angry drops; and there was everywhere in town a scurrying for +home. Men buttoned their coats and bent their heads and hurried home, +hoping to find there cheerful wives and peace. + +They found their wives cheerful enough, almost suspiciously so, and +exceedingly busy with the telephone. By listening to several one-sided +conversations Green Valley men learned that while they had been +discussing things in Billy's office, Mrs. Brownlee had called on Jim +Tumley's wife and on several other more prominent Green Valley matrons; +had telephoned to others and had in three morning hours organized a +Woman's Civic League. + +"A Civic League? What's that? And what for?" Green Valley husbands +wanted to know. + +"Why, I don't know. I said yes, of course I'd join. I couldn't be +mean to the woman after what her little girl did last night," said +Green Valley wives. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +A GRAY DAY + +Up on his wooded knoll Green Valley's young minister lay grieving and +staring up into a gray unhappy sky, a sky choked with thick gray clouds +that hung so low and were so full of sadness that even the little hills +mourned and the Green Valley world all about lay hushed and penitent. + +Summer was dead and everywhere tired winds moaned and sighed and sobbed +and then grew suddenly still. The fine old trees were shriveled and +weary, as if trying were no longer worth while. They craved sleep and +peace--just rest. The gay grasses were dry and faded and when the +little winds tried to rouse them they only rustled impatiently, +dolefully and murmured, "Oh what's the use?" + +The heart of Cynthia's son studied the low brooding sky, the dying +world, listened to the wailing, mourning winds, the sighing of the +grasses and it too said wearily, "Yes--what's the use of anything?" + +What's the use of working and trying when the thing you want most to do +you can't do. What's the use of longing when the thing you crave most +can never again be given to you? What's the use of feeling big, +eternal, divine, when you know that every day is dwarfed by your +limitations, every friendship marred by your helplessness, every dream +blurred by your ignorance? The sweetest things in life, Cynthia's son +told himself with all the bitterness of youth, were memories and hopes. +Memories of happy moments, hours perhaps, memories of perfect days and +hopes of new days, new friends, new skies. + +To-day all hope seemed dead, gone from the hillsides with the summer +flowers. And the world was a sad and a lonely place. Cynthia's son +had yet to learn that gray days are home days. That if it were not for +gray skies there would be no low roofs gleaming through tree tops, no +home fires glowing anywhere. Gray days are heart days, for it is then +that the heart hungers for sympathy, for kinship. It is then that men +draw together for comfort and cheer. + +Cynthia's son never felt quite so alone in the world before--the last +of his line. He was young and did not know what ailed him. So he lay +heartsick and puzzled on his hill top and wished he had some one all +his own to talk to. + +There are things you can whistle to a robin, whisper to a tree friend +or look into the heart of the sunset. There are problems you can argue +out with a neighbor or solve with the help of a friend. But the heart +has certain longings that you can share only with some one who is all +your own and very, very dear. + +It is hard to be the last of a line, Cynthia's son told himself +bitterly, and in his loneliness he turned over and hid his face on his +arm and let his homesick heart stray off across the seas to the land +that for so long had been home to him, the land that held the dead +hearts that had always robbed his gray days of all sadness. + +He craved the hot sunshine, the brittle blue skies, the crowded little +lanes full of filth and feet and eternal noise. Perhaps there in the +old home he might find eyes that held a bit of the great love he longed +for, a voice that had in it the hint of a caress, the note that would +give him new courage, new hope. + +No--he did not know what was the matter with him. All he knew was that +summer was dead and that he had no one in all the world he could call +his very own. He did not know that lying there he was really waiting +for a step and a voice, a step that would stir the leaves with a joyous +rustling, a voice that even on a gray day sounded gay and sunshiny. He +had always liked Nan Ainslee's voice. Lately he had begun to notice +other pleasant things about her. Last night, for instance, he had for +the first time seen her hair, the beauty of her creamy throat and had +really looked down into her laughing, wide eyes and forgotten all the +world for a second or two. And the hand she gave him when she said +good night was warm and full of a strange comfort. He had almost asked +her to stay a while after the others left and sit beside his fire in a +low chair and talk the party over with him. + +The world was so still it seemed as if it waited with him. And then it +came--that voice warm and gay. + +"Hello--you here again?" + +Then something about that head buried on that out-flung arm made her +laugh softly, oddly, and say, "Isn't this a delicious, restful, dozy +day? You'd better sit up and look at those shaggy gray clouds over +yonder. Or are you listening to the little winds sighing out +lullabies? I came here today to hear the world being hushed to sleep." + +He heard and his heart jumped queerly. But he didn't raise his head +until he was sure the homesick longing for some one all his own was +gone from his eyes. + +She had on a gray dress as soft as wood smoke. He caught flashes of +flame color beneath the gray and at her breast fluttered a knot of +scarlet silk. She looked like somebody's home fire, all fragrant smoke +and golden flame and ruddy coals. Her eyes held the dancing lights, +the visions and her voice had the tender warmth. She was the spirit of +the day and the sight of her comforted his soul and filled his heart +with content. + +"I think it is a sad day," he said, "and I have been desperately lonely +for India and my mother and father and all the little brothers and +sisters and playmates that I never had. The only playmates I ever had +were camels and missionaries and a few brown babies and two white hens." + +He had not meant to talk in this grieving, childish fashion. But +something about her brought his heart thoughts to his lips. And to-day +he found no pleasure in looking down on the village roofs where Joe +Tumley lay sick and miserable and Mary, his wife, wept and men and +women talked and argued as he very well knew they were talking and +arguing. + +"What! No playmates? No boy friends--not even a dog?" Nan grieved +with him. + +"Oh, I had an Irish soldier's boy for two months once and a little +brown dog for a week. Mother was always afraid of disease." + +He could hardly believe that remembrance of these long-past things was +in him. Yet he was suddenly remembering many old, old matters and with +it came back the old, childish pain. + +She sat down on the oak stump quite near him and there was more than +pity in her eyes, only he did not see. + +"Why," she advised gently, "you must have a dog at once. I can give +you a wonderful collie and then on gray days you can bring him up here +to your hill top or go tramping through woods and ravines with him. A +dog is the finest kind of company for a gray day. And there is your +attic. Why, I always spend hours in my attic these still, gentle days. +I go up there to read old letters and look over old boxes full of queer +keepsakes. I sit in a three-legged chair and sometimes, if I find an +old coverless book and if the rain begins to drum softly on the +shingles, I go to sleep on an ancient sagging sofa and dream great +dreams. Haven't you ransacked that attic of yours yet?" she wanted to +know. + +"No. And the housekeeper insists on my doing it soon. Says that if +I'm going to give Jimmy Trumbull that party I promised him I'd better +have the barn and the attic all fixed up for it, because the boys +wouldn't have any fun in the house and the house wouldn't stand it any +better." + +And then because neither one of them could think of anything else to +say they were perfectly still there on the hill top. There seemed to +be no need for speech. Nanny looked down at the little town and +Cynthia's son lay contentedly at her feet, looking at her and rustling +the dead leaves with an idle hand. + +It might have become dangerous, that contented silence. For Nan at +least was thinking. She was thinking how often she came to the hill +top to visit with this man at her feet and how seldom he came to her +door to visit with her. When he came it was not to see her but her +father, her brother. With a sick shame Nanny thought how the sight of +him, the sound of his voice, the very mention of his name made her +heart fill with warm gladness. She loved him and he had no need of +love--her love. She who had turned men away, men who were-- + +She rose suddenly. There was a kind of terror in her eyes and she +locked her hands together to warm them, for they had suddenly grown icy +cold. + +"I must go," she murmured in real distress. + +But he just looked up and put out his hand. And she sat down again and +let her hand rest in his. And half her joy was pure misery. For she +did not understand the ways of this strange, boyish man and she did not +know what the end of such a friendship could be. + +When those first angry drops pattered down on the leaves Nanny started +up in alarm and would have raced for home. But he caught her quickly, +slipped her cloak on, and before she had time to protest, they were +running hand in hand down the hillside. Just as the full fury of the +storm struck the house they banged the front door shut and stood +panting and laughing in the hall. + +It was very pleasant to sit by his fire and let the storm and the ruddy +flames do the talking. But even as she sat and dreamed Nanny knew it +would never do. Green Valley knew and loved her but that would not +save her. So Nanny walked to the telephone and called up the one soul +it was always safe to tell things to. And twenty minutes later Grandma +Wentworth arrived. + +It was while they sat talking in cozy comfort before the snapping fire +that Cynthia's son suggested the attic. + +"Mother told me once never to rummage through her old trunks unless +Mary Wentworth was by to explain. So come along." + +Grandma looked a little startled at that. + +"We'll go," she said. "It's the finest kind of a day to go messing in +an attic. But I'll step into the kitchen first and borrow two all-over +aprons. My dress isn't new but Nan's is." + +The old Churchill homestead was built in the days when folks believed +reverently in attics. Not little cubby-holes under the roof but in +generous, well-lighted, nicely-floored affairs that less reverent +generations have turned into smoking dens, studios and ballrooms. + +A properly kept attic in the olden days was no dark, musty-smelling, +cobwebby affair. It was as neat in its way as the parlor and a hundred +times more interesting. The parlor was a stiff room with stiff +furniture and stiff family portraits. The attic was a big, natural +room filled with mellow light, a vague hush and memories--memories of +lost days, lost dreams, lost youth with its joys and hopes and sorrows. + +People instinctively speak softly and reverently in an old-fashioned +attic. Much of the irreverence of the young generation is due to the +fact that men have stopped building the wide, deep fireplaces of old +and the old-fashioned style of attic. When you take the family +hearthstone and the prayer and memory closet out of a home you must +expect irreverence. + +There were plenty of wonderful attics in Green Valley, but not many +were so crowded with colorful riches as the attic which Cynthia's son +owned. When Cynthia was a girl that attic was generously stored. +Cynthia's mother made her pilgrimages to it and added to its wealth of +memories. Before Cynthia herself sailed away to far-off India she +carried armfuls of her own heart treasures up there. One gray day, +twenty gray days, could not exhaust this Green Valley attic. + +Cynthia's son, being a man, went up heedlessly, even a little noisily, +for attics were to him a new thing. Nan went breathlessly, her heart +thumping with delight. She guessed that much joy and beauty and wonder +lay stored in that great room. Grandma went up slowly and a little +tremblingly. She remembered that the very last time she had climbed +those attic stairs Cynthia had been with her. Their arms had been full +of treasure and their eyes had been full of tears. + +The three now had no sooner reached the last step than the attic laid +its mystic hush upon them. They stood still and looked about, each +somehow waiting for one of the others to speak. It was Grandma who +broke the silence softly: + +"You had some of the old furniture moved there in the corner but the +rest is just as it was forty years ago--when I was here last." + +Grandma knew the history of pretty near everything in sight and they +followed her about, looking and listening. Somehow there was at first +no desire to touch and handle things. But soon the strange charm of an +old attic stole over them and they began to look more closely at +things, to exclaim over weird relics, to touch old books and quaint +garments. Then as the wonders multiplied and the rain drummed steadily +on the roof, time and the world without was forgotten and the three +became absorbed in the past. + +When first she had looked about her Grandma's eyes had searched for a +certain trunk, and when at last she spied it something like an old +grief clouded her eyes. But as she peered about and began pulling +things out to the light she forgot the trunk with the brass nailheads. +She laughed when she came across the crinoline hoops and the droll +little velvet bonnets. + +"Here are your great-grandmother's crinolines, John. My! The times we +girls had playing with these things, for even in our day they were +old-fashioned. And this little velvet hat I remember Cynthia wore once +to an old-time social and took a prize." + +Over in another corner Nan was making discoveries. + +"My conscience--look at this!" she suddenly cried. "Here's an etching, +a genuine etching, a beautiful thing and all covered with dust. Why, +the one I bought for a hundred and fifty dollars in Holland last year +isn't half as good. Why, whoever had it put up here?" + +From the other side of the huge room Cynthia's son wanted to know if an +old grandfather's clock couldn't be mended. + +"Why, it must be as old as the hills. It has a copy of Franklin's Poor +Richard's Almanac pasted on the back. It--why, it's an heirloom and +I'm going to get it patched up." + +"That clock used to tick in the up-stairs hall forty years ago--I +remember--" Grandma stopped as if a sudden thought had struck her. +She dropped an old faded lamp mat and a rag rug and came over to look +at the face of what had been an old friend. Many and many a time its +mellow booming of the hours had cut short a lengthy, merry conference +in Cynthia's room and sent her scurrying home to her waiting tasks. + +"John," whispered Grandma with sudden intuition, "I don't believe +there's anything the matter with that clock. It was stopped--they said +your grandfather stopped it after your mother left for India. I used +to watch him wind it--here, let me at it. Yes," triumphantly, "here's +the key." + +Grandma's hands shook noticeably and her lips trembled as she wound it. +And when it began to whir and then settled down to its clear even tick +Grandma just sat down and cried a bit. + +"I can't help it," she explained as she wiped her eyes, "that clock +knows me as well as I know its face. Why, many a time Cynthia and I'd +sit right where we could look at it--while we were telling each other +foolish little happenings--so's we wouldn't talk too long." + +Grandma went back to where she had left that faded lamp mat but she +knew what was about to happen in that attic that day. She picked up +one thing after another but she no longer saw what it was her hands +were holding. For above the steady patter of the rain she could hear +the old clock ticking. And to her, knowing what she did, it seemed to +say: + +"Tell him--tell--him--Cynthia wants you to tell him." + +So she just sat down in an old chair and waited for Cynthia's son to +find that square trunk with the brass nail-heads. She tried to read +something in some faded yellow fashion papers but the letters jumped +and blurred. And she was glad to hear the boy's shout of discovery. + +"Why, here's that trunk mother must have meant! Come over here, +Grandma, and look at it." + +She went and sat down and was so quiet that Nanny, who had been looking +up from the pictures she was dusting, laid them down and came over to +watch too. Something about Grandma's drooping head and folded hands +must have touched the boy, for as he turned the key in the lock he +looked up and asked a question. + +"Do you know what's in it, Grandma?" + +"Yes," she nodded, "I know what's in it because I helped fill it. Open +it carefully." + +So the boy raised the lid slowly. Very carefully he removed the old +newspapers, then the soft linen sheet and took out a flat bundle that +lay on top, all snugly pinned up. Nan helped take out the pins, then +gave a smothered cry at the lovely wedding gown of stiff creamy satin. + +In silence the other things were brought out. The lacy bridal veil, +the little buckled slippers, the full, filmy petticoats and all the +soft white ribbony things that it is the right of every bride to have. +Down at the very bottom of the trunk were bundles of letters, some +faded photographs and a little jewel box in which was a little silver +forget-me-not ring. + +Grandma put out her hand for the faded photographs, stared at them, +then passed one to Cynthia's son. + +"Look closely and see if you can guess who it is?" + +He took it to a window and looked long at the pictured face but finally +shook his head. + +"Give it to Nan," directed Grandma. + +Nan looked only a second. + +"Why, it's Uncle Roger Allan!" + +"Yes--it's Roger Allan." + +"But what has--" began Cynthia's son, when Grandma interrupted him. + +"You'd better both sit down to hear this," she suggested. "Of course, +I knew, John, the very first week you were home, that your mother never +told you about this trunk. I can see why and I agree with her. In the +first place it all happened nearly forty years ago. Then she couldn't +be sure that the trunk was still here. It wasn't altogether her story +to tell. She knew you were coming home to Green Valley and she didn't +want to prejudice you in any way. She knew that if you learned to know +Green Valley folks first you'd understand everything better when you +did find out. I'm glad to have the telling of it. I'm glad to do her +that service and, after all, it's my story as much as hers. + +"We were great friends--Cynthia and I--dearer than sisters and +inseparable. Our friendship began in pinafore days. We weren't the +least bit alike in a worldly way. Cynthia was pretty--oh, ever so +pretty--and rich. I was what everybody calls a very sensible girl, +respectable but poor. But what we looked like or what we had never +bothered us. In those days the town was smaller and playmates were +scarcer. When we boys and girls wanted any real interesting games we +had to get together. + +"The two boys at our end of town who were the nicest were Roger Allan +and Dick Wentworth. They did everything together, same as Cynthia and +I. It was natural, I suppose, that we four should sort of grow up +together, and that having grown up we should pair off--Cynthia and +Roger, Dick and I. + +"We went through all the stages until we got to the forget-me-not rings +and our wedding dresses. The boys were very happy the day they put +those rings on our fingers and we were--oh, so proud! It hurts to this +day to remember. I think Cynthia and I were about the happiest girls +life ever smiled at. Only one thing troubled us. + +"In those days Cynthia's father owned the hotel. That meant then +mostly a barroom. Of course, he himself was never seen there unless +there were special guests staying over night. It was a lively place, +almost the only really lively place in town. I suppose men had more +time then and prohibition was something even the most worried and +heartbroken drunkard's wife smiled about unbelievingly. Men had always +had their liquor and of course they always would. Women's business was +to cry a bit, pray a great deal and be patient. As I said, all men +drank in those days and the woman didn't live that hadn't or didn't +expect to see her father, sweetheart, husband or son drunk sometime. +We all hoped we wouldn't but we all dreaded it. We heard tell of a man +somewhere near Elmwood who never drank a drop but he didn't seem real. +Our mothers, I expect, got to feel that drunkenness was God's will and +the drink habit the same as smallpox or yellow fever. It was sent to +be endured. We all felt that there was something wrong somewhere and a +terrible injustice put on us but we didn't know what to do about it and +so we all tried to learn to be cheerful and like our men in spite of +their shortcomings. + +"But one woman in this town was an out-and-out prohibitionist. She was +Cynthia's mother. She came from some odd sort of a settlement in the +East and Cynthia's father used to laugh and say he stole her. And I +think he did. She was so lovely and sweet and had such strange notions +of right and wrong. But for all her sweetness she was firm. And she +set her face sternly and publicly against drink. It was the only +thing, people said, about which Joshua Churchill and his wife Abby ever +disagreed. Though she didn't convince him still she went to her grave +without ever seeing her husband drunk. + +"And her girl, Cynthia, swore that she would do the same. For Cynthy +was just like her mother and as full of strange notions of right. + +"Well, it was bound to happen. The wonder of it is it didn't happen +before. I think I always knew that Dick and Roger drank a little +sometimes with the other boys. But Cynthia never thought about it, I +guess. She was an only child and guarded from everything and she +supposed every man was like her father. And, anyhow, she was too happy +to think of trouble. Dick and Roger were considered two of the best +boys in town. There were stories now and then of Roger's mad doings +but they never got to Cynthia, and if they had she would have just +laughed, I expect, so sure was she that her boy was all she thought him. + +"I was to be married one week and Cynthy the next. We had our wedding +things ready. And my wedding day came. Cynthy was bridesmaid and +Roger was best man and everything went off beautifully until the dance +in the evening. Dick and I were too poor to take a wedding trip so we +had a dance instead. + +"And then came the tragedy. Some of the older men did it. They didn't +stop to think. But they meant no real harm. In those days it was +considered funny to get another man drunk. But they didn't know +Cynthia's strange heart. They brought drink, more than was at all +necessary and--and--all I remember of my wedding night is standing in +the moonlight, holding on to Cynthia and crying miserably. I knew it +would come sometime but I never dreamed it would come to hurt me then. + +"But Cynthy didn't cry. She never said a word--only her whole little +body seemed turned to ice. She smiled and helped us to get through +with things as best we could but the smiles slipped like dull beads +from her lips instead of rippling like waves of sunshine over her face. + +"I had been crying for myself, over my boy, but when I saw how Cynthy +took her trouble I saw that she was hurt far worse than I. But I never +dreamed that things could not be mended, that she would take back her +wedding day. But that's what she did. + +"She refused to see Roger. Her father pleaded with her, even her +mother begged her to think; the wedding was all planned, everything +prepared; relatives from a distance had already started. But Cynthia +never stopped smiling and shaking her head. Roger was frantic and +begged me to come with him, to make her listen. I went and Dick went +with me. + +"When Cynthy saw me she let us in. Her father and mother and two aunts +came in when they heard us. In the midst of these people Roger and +Cynthy stood looking at each other with death in their eyes. They +didn't seem to know anybody was there. + +"'Cynthy--I love you--I love you,' Roger begged. + +"'I know, Dear Boy, I know!' she cried back to him. + +"'Forgive--my God, Cynthy, forgive.' + +"'I do.' + +"'Marry me.' + +"'Oh, I want to--oh, I want to marry you,' sobbed poor Cynthy. + +"'Then marry me. I'm not good enough--but I know no other man who is.' + +"'Oh--Roger--Roger--you are good enough for me--you are good enough for +_me_. But you are not good enough for my children. You are not good +enough to be the father of my son.' + +"I think we all knew then that it was useless. There was no answer and +we were too startled to say anything. Roger grew white and the +strength seemed to leave his body. His eyes filled with horror and +fright. + +"'Cynthy, sweetheart--' he moaned and she flew to comfort him. She let +him hold her and kiss her. Then she drew his head down and kissed his +hair, his eyes, his lips. She laid his hands against her cold white +cheeks, then crushed them to her lips and fled. + +"Roger never saw her again. + +"She went away and was gone a long time. I got letters every now and +then from out-of-the-way places. + +"For five years I was happy. It was hard to live without Cynthy. But +Roger had left town and Dick was good to me. I knew that the shock of +Roger's tragedy had kept him from touching anything those five years. +But as time passed and memories faded I grew afraid once more. Dick +was no drinking man but everybody drank a little then, even the women. +Men joked about it and the women, poor souls, tried to. Well--just +five years almost to a day they brought him home to me--dead. He had +had a few drinks--the first since our marriage. He was driving an ugly +horse--and it happened. + +"Some way Cynthia heard and she came home to comfort me. I think that +when she stood with me beside Dick's grave she was glad she had done +what she had done and felt a kind of peace. Roger was still gone but +it would not have mattered. It was then that we carried these wedding +things up here and locked them in this old square trunk with the brass +nail-heads. And we thought that life for us both was over. + +"Cynthy's father was glad to have her home. He sold the hotel and +never went near it. He tried in every way to make up to Cynthy and his +wife. For Cynthy's mother grieved about it all long after Cynthy had +learned to smile again. And that nearly killed Cynthy's father. Some +folks claimed it really did worry Mrs. Churchill to death, for she died +the spring after Dick was buried. + +"After that Cynthia took her father traveling, for he was very nearly +heartbroken over his wife's death. It was somewhere in England that +they met your father, John. Of course, I can understand how a man like +your father must have loved Cynthy on sight. But she never could +understand it. She thought she was all through with love. She wrote +and told me how she had explained all about Roger and how he had said +it made him love her all the more. She tried to fight him but strong +men are hard to deny. He had a hard time of it, I imagine, but he won +her at last and took her away to India. She wrote me when you were +born and for some years after, but toward the end, when she was sick so +much, I think my letters made her homesick. + +"Roger came back. His stepsister got into trouble and died, leaving +little David. Roger took him and raised him in memory of the son he +knew he might have had. When he found Cynthia was married he had that +stone put in the cemetery. He explained the idea to me. + +"'The girl, Cynthia, was mine and I killed her. She is dead and it is +to the memory of her sweetness that I have erected that stone. The +woman, Cynthia, is another man's wife.' + +"So that, then, is the history of that trunk. The thing, John, that is +killing little Jim Tumley is the thing that worried your grandmother to +death, nearly broke your mother's heart and certainly embittered her +youth, that sent your grandfather into exile and made a widow of me. +It robbed Roger Allan of the only woman he could love. + +"Since that day a great many of us have learned to fight it. And there +are now any number of men in Green Valley who are opposed to it and who +even vote the prohibition ticket. But Green Valley is still far from +understanding that until the weakest among us is protected none of us +are safe. + +"Some day perhaps the women will cease worrying. But before that day +comes many here will pay the price. And it is usually the innocent who +pay. Now let's put these memories back before they tucker me out +completely." + +Cynthia's son stood spellbound. He stared at the faded pictures and +the little silver ring. Nan was pinning up the wedding dress and +weeping openly and unashamed. It was the sight of her quiet tears that +brought him back to earth. + +"Oh--Nan--don't. Don't grieve about this evil thing. We're going to +fight it and fight it hard. We shall save Jim Tumley yet and purify +Green Valley." + +When Nan got back home she went up to her room and looked down to where +Cynthia Churchill's old home glowed among its autumn-tattered trees. + +"What a woman! What a mother! And he is her son!" + +She stood a long time at her window, then turned away with a little +sigh. + +"I am not made of heroic stuff. But I shall see to it that my son need +never be ashamed of his mother. If one woman could fight love so can +another." + +When Grandma was taking off her rubbers in her little storm-shed she +smiled and fretted: + +"Dear me, Cynthy, that boy of yours is as innocent right now as you +were in the olden days. He--why, he just doesn't know anything!" + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +CHRISTMAS BELLS + +After the last bit of glory has faded from the autumn woods and the +first snowfall comes to cover the tired fields, Green Valley, all +snugly housed and winter proof, settles down to solid comfort and +careful preparation for the two great winter festivals--Thanksgiving +and Christmas. + +The question of whether the Thanksgiving dinner is to be eaten at home +or whether "we're going away for Thanksgiving" has in all probability +been settled long ago. For in Green Valley Thanksgiving invitations +begin to be exchanged and sent out to distant parts as early as July. +That is, of course, if the matter of who's to go where had not already +been settled the Thanksgiving before. In some families the last rite +of each Thanksgiving feast is to discuss this question and settle it +then and there for the following year. Conservative and clannish +families who live far enough apart so that little quarrels can not be +born among them to upset this fixed yearly programme usually do this. + +The greater part of Green Valley however leaves itself absolutely free +until some time in August. By that time though, the heat is so intense +that stout, collarless men in shirt sleeves, in searching about for +some relief, think gratefully of Thanksgiving and snowdrifts and ask +their wives whom they are planning to have for Thanksgiving. + +"Why," may be the answer, "I hadn't thought of it yet. But I rather +think Aunt Eleanor expects us this year." + +"Well," answers the husband, "all right. Only if you decide to go, +don't forget to take along some of your own pumpkin pies. Your Aunt +Eleanor's never quite suit me. I like considerable ginger in my +pumpkin pies." + +Another husband may say, "No, sir! Not on your life are we going to +Jim's for Thanksgiving. That wife of his is much too young to know how +to make just the right kind of turkey dressing. And I'm too old to +take chances on things like that now. Those pretty brides are apt to +get so excited over their lace table doilies that they forget to put in +the sage or onions and there you are--one whole Thanksgiving Day and a +turkey spoiled forever. No, sir--count me out!" + +Sometimes wives say, "We've been invited to three places, Jemmy, but +let's stay home. When we go out I always get white meat and I hate it. +And I like my cranberries hulls and all instead of just jell." + +It is just such little human likes and notions that finally decide the +matter. And so it was this year. + +Sam Bobbins' eldest sister was having Sam and his wife "because Sam's +spent so much money for his fighting roosters that he ain't got money +for a Thanksgiving turkey." + +Dolly Beatty's mother was having Charlie Peters for Thanksgiving dinner +and all the immediate relatives to pass judgment on him. He had +proposed and Dolly had accepted but no announcement was to be made +until all the Beattys and Dundrys had had their say. + +Frank Burton and Jenny were going by train to Jennie's rich and haughty +and painfully religious aunt in Cedar Point. All Jennie's sisters, +even the one from Vermont, were to be there and Jennie did want to go +to visit with the girls. She and Frank had never been invited to any +semi-religious festival by this aunt, owing to Frank's atheistic +tendencies. + +But the haughty and religious dame had heard rumors and was curious. + +"I'll go for your sake, Jennie. But she'll be disappointed. Maybe I'd +better shave my mustache so's to let her see some change in me." + +Of course everybody who had a grandmother in the country was going to +grandma's and early Thanksgiving morning teams were arriving for the +various batches of grandchildren. + +That was the only fault one could find with a Green Valley +Thanksgiving--that so many went away to spend the day. + +But with Christmas it was different. Christmas in Green Valley was a +home day. The town was full of visitors and sleigh bells and merry +calls and walking couples. Everybody was waving Christmas presents or +wearing them. For Green Valley believed in Christmas presents. Not +the kind that make people he awake nights hating Christmas and that +call for "do your shopping early" signs. But the old-fashioned kind of +presents that are not stained with hate or worry or debt. + +The giving of Christmas presents was the pleasantest kind of a game in +Green Valley. Of course everybody knew everybody's needs so well that +weeks before the gifts, wrapped in tissue paper, lay waiting in a trunk +up in the attic. And as a general thing everybody was happy over what +they got. No present cost much money but oh, what a world of thought +and love and fun went into it. Nor was it hard for Green Valley folks +to decide what to give. + +When Dell Parsons saw her dearest friend admiring her asparagus fern +she divided it in the fall and tended it carefully and sent it to Nan +Turner on Christmas morning. + +When folks found out that some time next spring Alice Sears might have +a baby to dress they sent her ever so many lovely, soft little things +so she would not have to worry or grieve because her first baby could +not have its share of pretties. + +As soon as Green Valley knew that Jocelyn Brownlee was engaged it sent +her a tried and true poor-man's-wife cookbook, big gingham aprons, +holders to keep her from burning her hands and samples of their best +jellies, pickles and preserves. + +And such a time as Green Valley grandmothers had weaving, knitting and +crocheting beautiful rag rugs to match blue and white bathrooms, yellow +and green kitchens, pink and cream bedrooms. And every year there was +a large crop of home knitted mittens that Green Valley girls and boys +wore with pride and comfort. No city pair of gloves ever equaled +grandma's knitted ones that went very nearly to the elbow and were the +only thing for skating and coasting. + +Christmas was the time too when dreams came true. Fanny Foster knew +this when Christmas morning she opened a parcel and found a beautiful +silk petticoat. No card came with it but Fanny knew. + +Hen Tomlins had a baby boy for his best Christmas gift. Agnes had +always opposed all talk of adopting a baby, but this year that was her +gift to Hen. And they were all happy about it. + +Of course, even in Green Valley a certain amount of foolishness +prevailed. Everybody smiled when a week before Christmas Jessie +Williams said she had all her presents ready but Arthur's; that she was +waiting for the next pay day to get his; that she believed she'd get +him a new pink silk lamp shade but she knew beforehand he wouldn't be +pleased and would only say that he wished to heaven she'd let him have +the money. + +Lutie Barlow was badly disappointed with the hundred and fifty dollar +victrola her husband bought her. She said she wanted a red cow to +match her Rhode Island Reds. + +Perhaps no one in Green Valley was so generously remembered as the +young minister. But though every one of the many gifts that came +pleased him he was strangely unhappy and restless. Invitations as +usual had poured in on him but he had chosen to spend the day with +Grandma Wentworth. And yet, though he was glad to be with her, his +thoughts strayed off to a certain gray day in the fall when he ran down +a hill with a girl's hand in his. He remembered the surge of joy that +had rushed through him when he got her safely into his storm-proof +house and banged shut the door on the stormy world without. + +He thought of the hour they spent in silence before the fire that +roared exultantly as the storm tore with angry fingers at the doors and +windows. That, he now felt, was the most perfect hour of his life. + +His mind was struggling to understand these memories, these strange new +emotions. He had a queer feeling that something wonderful was waiting +just outside his reach, something was waiting for his recognition. + +He was standing in Grandma Wentworth's dining room, looking out the +window at the winter landscape. Grandma was in the kitchen seeing to +the dinner, for she was to have quite a party--Roger and David, Mrs. +Brownlee and Jocelyn, Cynthia's son and his man Timothy. + +Idly Cynthia's son watched the rest of the party coming through the +little path that led to Grandma's door. He saw them all plainly +through the curtains and plants that screened him. Jocelyn and David +came last. David made a great to-do about stamping the snow off his +feet, taking pains to stand between Jocelyn and the door. Then, just +as Jocelyn was about to slip past him, the minister saw David reach out +and sweep the girl into his arms. And Cynthia's son could not help but +see the glory in the boy's eyes as the girl's wild-rose face turned up +to meet her lover's kiss. + +For blind seconds John Roger Churchill Knight crashed through space. +And then the next minute he was living in a shining world that was all +roses and skylarks and dew. He laughed, for all at once he knew what +ailed him; he knew that the wonderful, tantalizing something that had +so steadily eluded him, tormented him was--just Nan, the girl of the +gray day, the log fire and the storm. + +He was the maddest, gladdest man in all Green Valley that day until he +remembered that he had sent Nan no gift, not even a greeting or a word +of thanks for the beautiful collie dog she had sent him. He stood in +horrified amazement at his stupidity. Jocelyn had been showing them +her new ring. And Nan, his sweetheart, had not even a Christmas card. + +Cynthia's son went to the telephone but even as he raised the receiver +he somehow guessed what the answer would be. + +Nan's father answered. + +"Why, John, she left on that 1:10 for Scranton, Pennsylvania. It's the +first fool thing I have ever known her to do. Stayed right here till +she'd given us our Christmas gifts and dinner and then off she went to +see this old aunt in Scranton. Why, yes--you can send a telegram. +She'll get it when she arrives." + +So it happened that when a tired, homesick, wretched girl reached her +aunt's house in Scranton, Pennsylvania, she found the one gift for +which her heart had cried all that long, long Christmas day. It was +just a bit of yellow paper that said: + + "oh gray day girl don't stay too long the + fire is singing your chair is waiting and I have + so much to tell you come home and forgive." + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +FANNY'S HOUR + +Nobody had asked Fanny to be a member of the Civic League but she was +its most energetic promoter, its most zealous advocate. Never had she +had such a cold weather opportunity. + +Fanny hated cold weather. It shut people up in houses, shut their +mouths, their purses, their laughter. It made life grim and rather +gray. Fanny loved sunshine and open sunny roads. She tried to do her +duty in winter as well as in summer but when the weather drops to ten +or twenty below the sunniest of natures is bound to feel it. + +But this winter Green Valley women were so stirred and roused that they +thought of other things beside the price of coal and sugar and yarn. +The short winter days fairly flew. The Civic League was young but +already it was laying out an ambitious spring programme. No mere man +was a member but all the men had to do was to show a little attention +to Fanny Foster to know what was going on. + +"We're going to set up a drinking fountain in the business square," +Fanny explained. "The men of this town have the hotel but the horses +never did have a decent trough of clean water. And we're going to have +a little low place fixed so's the dogs can get a drink too. This is to +prevent hydrophobia. + +"We've already started the boys to building bird houses so's to have +them ready to put up the first thing in the spring. There'll be less +killing of song birds with sling-shots, though of course there's never +been much of that done in Green Valley. + +"Then that crossing at West End is going to be attended to. There's +been enough rubbers lost in that mudhole to about fill it, so it won't +take much to fill it up. We're going to have a little bridge built +over that ditch on Lane Avenue so's we women don't dislocate our joints +jumping over it. But first the ditch is going to be deepened and +cleaned so's it won't smell so unhealthy. When that's done the ladies +aim to plant wild flowers along it, careless like, to make it look as +if God had made it instead of lazy men. + +"We're going to suggest that all buildings in the business section put +out window boxes. We'll furnish the flowers. It will give a +distinctive note of beauty to the town." Fanny was carefully quoting +Mrs. Brownlee. + +"Billy Evans' wife promised to see to it that Billy painted the livery +barn and there's a delegation of ladies appointed to wait on Mert +Hagley and see if we can't get him to mend his sheds. They're so +lopsided and rickety that Mrs. Brownlee says they're an eyesore and a +menace to public safety. + +"There's another delegation that's going to ask the saloon keeper to +keep the basement door shut when the trains come in so's to keep that +beery and whisky smell out of the streets as much as possible while +maybe visitors are walking about. + +"We're going to send a special committee to see what the railroad will +do about fixing up this old station or, better still, giving us a new +one and beautifying its grounds. + +"We're planning to see Colonel Stratton about starting up a club for +the preservation of our wild flowers and Doc Philipps is to have charge +of a fight on the moths and things that are eating and killing our +fruit trees. + +"The school buildings will be investigated and conditions noted. Doc +Philipps says that if the heating plant and ventilation and light was +tended to we wouldn't have so much sickness among the children or so +many needing glasses. + +"As soon as spring really comes the Woman's Civic League is going to +start up a clean-up campaign. Of course, Green Valley never was a +dirty town. Everybody likes to have their yard nice but there's +considerable old faded newspaper and rusty tin cans lying along the +roads farther out and in unnoticed corners that nobody's felt +responsible for. That will all be attended to. We'll have no filth, +no germs, no ugliness anywhere, Mrs. Brownlee says. + +"And I've been appointed a committee of one to wait on Seth Curtis and +call his attention to the careless way he leaves his horses standing +about the town. Those horses are dangerous and getting uglier in +temper every day. And Seth is just as bad." + +This was only too true. Seth had grown bitter and even reckless of +late. Ever since his quarrel with Ruth about Jim Tumley Seth had been +boiling with temper. Old poisons that had spoiled his life in many +ways and that he thought he had conquered crept back to tyrannize over +him. Poor Seth had had so much discipline in his youth that the least +hint of pressure threw him into a state of vicious rebellion. Seth had +a fine mind, could think quicker and straighter to the point than a +good many Green Valley men. But when that mind was clouded with anger +and stubbornness Seth was a hopeless proposition. Ruth was his one +star and even she, Seth felt, had set herself against him. + +So Seth, who seldom had frequented the hotel, was there almost every +day now when he should have been working. He even drank more than +before. Not that he cared more for it but it was his way of showing +independence. + +So Seth was very ugly these days and his horses suffered as they had +never suffered before. They too were growing ugly and vicious and so +nervous that the least noise, the least stir, sent them into a +quivering frenzy of fright. + +Every one in Green Valley knew this and not a few men and women were +worrying. Several men were making up their minds to speak sharply to +Seth about it. But everybody smiled and even felt relieved when they +heard that Fanny had offered her services to the Civic League in this +capacity. Green Valley knew Seth and knew Fanny Foster. Fanny would +most certainly tell Seth about it. And everybody knew just how mad +Seth would get. Fanny would not of course accomplish much. But she +would open up the subject, suffer the first violence of Seth's anger +and so make it easier for some more competent person to take Seth to +task and force him to be reasonable. + +The minister had spoken to Seth long ago but though Seth listened +quietly to the quiet words of the one man he had come to love in his +queer fashion, he had set his jaw grimly at the end and said, "No, sir! +I've made up my mind not to stand this interference with my personal +liberty and God Himself can't budge me!" + +"Yes, He can, Seth. But don't let it go that far," Cynthia's son had +begged. + +Now all Green Valley was waiting to see Fanny tackle Seth in the name +of the Civic League. It would be funny, everybody said. + +Fanny did it one sunny afternoon in early spring when the streets were +gay with folks all out to taste the first bit of gladness in the air. +Fanny did it in her usual lengthy and thorough manner and permitted no +interruptions. She was talking for the first time in her life with +authority vested in her by a civic body. So there was a strength and a +conscientiousness about her remarks that struck home. + +Seth was standing alone on the hotel steps when Fanny began talking but +all of Green Valley that was abroad was gathered laughingly about her +when she finished and stood waiting for Seth's answer. + +Seth had had a glass too much or he would never have done, never have +said what he did and said that day. He would never have taken poor, +harmless, laughter-loving, happy-go-lucky Fanny Foster, who had never +done a mean, malicious thing in her life, who had let her world use her +for all the little hateful tasks that nobody else would do and in which +there was no thanks or any glory,--Seth in his senses would never have +held up this dear though unfinished soul to the scorn, the pitiless +ridicule of her townsmen. + +If Fanny had been touched with fire and eloquence because she spoke +with authority, Seth too talked with a bitter brilliance that won the +crowd and held it against its will. With biting sarcasm and horrible +accuracy Seth drew a picture of Fanny as made Green Valley smile and +laugh before it could catch itself and realize the cruelty of its +laughter. + +Fanny stood at the foot of the wide flight of stairs like a criminal at +the bar. As Seth's words grew more biting, his judgments more cruel, +Fanny's face flushed with shame, then faded white with pain. + +But Seth went too far. He went so far that he couldn't stop himself. +And the crowd who had gathered to hear a little harmless fun now stood +petrified and heartsick. No one stirred, though everybody was wishing +themselves miles away. And Seth's voice, dripping with cruelty, went +on. + +Then all at once from the heart of the crowd a little figure pushed its +way. It was Seth's wife, Ruth. She walked halfway up that flight of +stairs and looked steadily at her husband. Seth stopped in the middle +of a word. + +"Seth Curtis," Ruth's face was as white as Fanny's and her voice rang +out like a silver bell, "Seth Curtis, you will apologize, ask +forgiveness of Fanny Foster, who is my friend and an old schoolmate, or +before God and these people I will disown you as my husband and the +father of my children. Fanny Foster never had an apple or a goody in +her lunch in the old school days that she didn't share it with +somebody. She has never had a dollar or a joy that she hasn't divided. +No one in Green Valley ever had a pain or a sorrow that she did not +make it hers and try to help in some way. And in all the world there +can be no more willing hands than hers." + +The silver voice stopped, choked with sobs, and Ruth's eyes, looking +down on the shrunken, bowed figure of Green Valley's gossip, brimmed +over with tears. + +Seth, sober now, stared at his wife, at the broken, crushed Fanny, at +the crowd that stood waiting in still misery. + +Ruth walked down to Fanny and flung her arms about her. Fanny patted +her friend's shoulder softly and tried to comfort not herself but Ruth. +"There, there, Ruthie, don't, don't take on so. Remember, you're +nursing a baby and it might make him sick. It's all right, +everything's all right. Only," Fanny's voice was dull and colorless +and she never once raised her head, "only I wish John wouldn't hear of +this. I've been such a disappointment to John without--this." + +Though she spoke only to Ruth everybody heard. It was the first and +only favor Fanny Foster had ever asked of Green Valley. And Green +Valley, as it watched Ruth lead her away, swore that if possible John +should not hear. + +But John did hear three days later. And then the quiet man whose +patience had made people think him a fool let loose the stored-up +bitterness of years. He who in the beginning should and could have +saved his girl wife with love and firmness now judged and rejected her +with the terrible wrath, the cold merciless justice of a man slow to +anger or to judge. + +It was springtime and Grandma, sitting in her kitchen, heard and wept +for Fanny. The windows at the Foster house were open and John talked +for all the world to hear. His name had been dragged through the +gutter and he was past caring for appearances. Grandma writhed under +the words that were more cruel than a lash. At the end John Foster +swore that so long as he lived he would never speak to Fanny. And +Grandma shivered, for she knew John Foster. + +For days not even Grandma saw Fanny. Then she saw her washing windows, +scrubbing the porch steps, hanging up clothes. There came from the +Foster house the whir of a sewing machine, the fragrant smell of fresh +bread. The children came out with faces shining as the morning, hair +as smooth as silk, shoes polished. And Grandma knew that if John +Foster found a speck of dirt in his house he would have to look for it +with a microscope. But there was a kind of horror in the eyes of +Fanny's children. They didn't play any more or run away but of their +own accord stayed home to fetch and carry for the strange mother who +was now always there, who never sang, never spoke harshly to them, who +worked bitterly from morning till night. + +Every spring Fanny Foster used to flit through Green Valley streets +like a chattering blue-jay. But now nobody saw her, only now and then +at night, slinking along through the dark. And many a kindly heart +ached for her, remembering how Fanny loved the sunshine and laughter. + +But at last the spring grew too wonderful to resist. Even Fanny's numb +heart and flayed spirit was warmed with the golden heat. She had some +money that she wanted to deposit in the bank for John. For Fanny was +saving now as only Fanny knew how when she set her mind to it. And she +had set not only her mind but her very soul on making good. Every +cruel taunt had left a ghastly wound and only work of the hardest kind +could ease the hurt. + +Fanny walked through the streets as though she had just recovered from +a long illness. Everybody who saw her hurried out to greet her and +talk but she only smiled in a pitiful sort of way and hastened on. It +was nearly noon and she wanted to avoid the midday bustle and the +crowds of children. She had set out the children's dinner but she +hoped to get back before they reached home. + +She came out of the bank and stood on the bank steps. She looked down +the streets. Nobody was about and so against her will her eyes turned +to the spot where she had been so pitilessly pilloried a month before. + +As then, Seth's team was standing in front of the hotel. Little Billy +Evans was climbing into the big wagon. She watched the child in a kind +of stupor. She knew he ought not to do that. Seth's horses were not +safe for a grown-up, much less a child. She wondered where Seth was or +Billy Evans or Hank. She wondered if she'd better have them telephone +to Billy from the bank and have him get little Billy. She half turned +to do that and then out of the hotel door Jim Tumley came reeling and +singing. Only his voice was a maudlin screech. Little Billy had by +this time gotten into the wagon, pulled the whip from its socket, and +just as Jim came staggering up, touched the more nervous of the two +horses with it. And then it happened--what Green Valley had been +dreading for months. + +When men heard the commotion and turned to look they saw Seth's horses +tearing madly round the hotel corner. Little Billy Evans was rattling +around in the wagon box like a cork on the water and Fanny Foster, +swaying like a reed, was hanging desperately to the horses' heads. + +Hank Lolly was pitching hay into the barn loft. He saw, jumped and +then lay still with a broken leg. Seth saw and Billy Evans and scores +of other men, and they all ran madly to help. But the terrified +animals waited for no man. And then from the throats of the running +crowd a groan broke, for the school doors opened and into the spring +sunshine and the arms of certain death the little first and second +graders came dancing. + +The school building hid the danger from the children and they did not +comprehend the hoarse shouts of warning. But Fanny heard, heard the +childish laughter and the screams of horror. She knew those horses +must not turn that corner. Her feet swung against the shafts. Her +heel caught for a minute and she jerked with all her might. The mad +creatures swerved and dashed themselves and her against a telegraph +pole. + +When they picked up little Billy and Fanny they were both unconscious. +One of Billy's little arms was broken, so violently had he been flung +about and against the iron bars of the scat. Fanny's injuries were +more serious. + +They took her home to her spotless house with the children's dinner set +out on the red tablecloth in the kitchen. The pussy willows the +children had brought her the day before were in a vase in the center. +Her husband came home and spoke to her but she neither saw him nor +heard. They gave him a blood-stained bank book with his name on it. + +And so she lay for days and sometimes Doc Philipps thought she would +live and at other times he was sure she couldn't; but if she lived he +knew that she would never again flit like vagrant sunshine through +Green Valley streets. She would spend the rest of her days in a wheel +chair or on crutches. + +When they got courage finally to tell her, Fanny only smiled and said +nothing. But she ate less and smiled more and steadily grew weaker and +weaker and as steadily refused to see her husband. + +"No," she said quietly, "there's nothing I want to see John about and +there's nothing for him to see me about any more. I guess," she smiled +at the gruff old doctor, "you're about the only man I can stand the +sight of or who would put up with me." + +"Fanny," Doc Philipps told her, "if you don't buck up and get well, if +you die on my hands, it will be the first mean thing you ever did." + +"Oh, well--it would be the last," laughed Fanny. + +"Fanny, don't you know that Seth Curtis and nearly all the town comes +here at least once a day? How do you suppose John and Seth and the +rest of us will feel if you just quit and go?" + +And then in bitterness of heart Fanny answered. + +"Oh, I'm tired of living, of being snubbed and made fun of. I'm past +caring how anybody else will feel. I tell you I'm a misfit. God never +took pains to finish me. I've been a miserable failure, no good to +anybody. My children will be better off without me. John said so." + +"My God!" groaned the old doctor, "did John say that?" He knew now +that no medicine that he could give, no skill of his would mend a heart +bruised like that. + +"Yes--he said that--and a whole lot more. Said I've eternally +disgraced him and dragged him down and will land him in jail or the +poorhouse. And I guess maybe it's so. Only all the time he was +talking I kept thinking how he teased me to marry him. I really liked +Bud Willis over in Elmwood better, in a way, than I did John. And I +meant to marry Bud. He wasn't as good a boy as John, but he was so +jolly and we'd have had such a good time together that I'd never have +got mixed up in any mess like this. Maybe we would have ended in the +poorhouse but we'd have had a good time going, and I bet Bud and I +would have found something to laugh at even when we got there. Oh, I'm +glad it's over. Don't think I'm afraid to die. I kind of hate to +leave Robbie. Robbie's like me. And some day somebody'll tell him +what a fool he is--like they told me. I wish I could warn him or learn +him not to care. But, barring Robbie, I'm not afraid to go. But I'd +be afraid to live. To live all the rest of my days on my back or in a +chair--I--who was made to go? John can't abide me well and able to +work. He'd hate the sight of me useless. No, sir! There's nothing +nor nobody I'd sit in a chair for all the rest of my life." + +"Yes, there is--Peggy." + +John spoke from the shadowy doorway, for the dusk had fallen. + +"You will do it for me, girl. I'll get you the nicest chair and the +prettiest crutches. And when you are tired of them I'll carry you +about in my arms. And you'll never again--I swear it--be sorry that +you didn't marry Bud Willis." + +The spring twilight filled the room. Through it the doctor tiptoed to +the door and left these two to build a new world out of the fragments +and blunders of the old. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +BEFORE THE DAWN + +"I wonder if Fanny's sacrifice isn't enough to drive the evil thing out +of our lives and out of Green Valley forever. Seems as if everybody +ought to vote the saloon out now," said Grandma Wentworth to Cynthia's +son a couple of weeks later, when the whole town was celebrating +because Fanny Foster had sat up for the first time in her chair that +day. + +After all, John didn't buy Fanny her chair. Seth Curtis wanted to do +it all himself but Green Valley wouldn't let him. It was a wonderful +chair. You could lower it to different heights and it was full of all +manner of attachments to make the invalid forget her helplessness. Of +course Fanny was still too weak to use these but she knew about them +and seemed pleased, even said she believed that when she got the hang +of it she could get about the house and yard and might even venture +into the streets in time. + +And early in the morning of the day she was to get up Doc Philipps +drove up in his buggy with what seemed like a young garden tucked +inside it. Fanny's garden and borders had been sadly neglected during +her sickness. The doctor had had John clean the whole thing up and +then he came with his arms and buggy full of blossoming tulips, +hyacinths and every bloom that was in flower then and would bear +transplanting. And for hours he and John worked to make a little +fairyland for Fanny. + +"My God, John, I couldn't mend her body--nobody could. But between us +we have got to mend her spirit." And the old doctor blew his nose hard +to hide the trembling of his chin. + +But no chair, no amount of tulips and hyacinths, could make up to Fanny +the loss of her body. And Green Valley knew this. So Green Valley was +talking more seriously than ever of driving out from among them the +thing that was pushing Jim Tumley into a drunkard's grave, that was +estranging hitherto happy wives and husbands and maiming innocent men, +women and children. Little Billy was all right again but he was now a +timid youngster and inclined to be jumpy at sight of a smartly trotting +horse. Hank Lolly's leg was healed up but Doc said he would always +limp a bit. Seth and his wife had made up, of course, but neither of +them could ever efface from their hearts and memories the cruel scenes +that had marred their life this past year. + +Seth no longer went near the saloon. He had paid dearly for his +stubbornness and would continue to pay to the end of his days. Billy +Evans had swung around and was fighting the saloon now with a grimness +that was terrible in one so easy-going and liberal as Billy. + +But nothing seemingly could convert George Hoskins. And so long as +George Hoskins was against a measure its passage was a hopeless matter, +for men like George always have a host of followers. + +George was a huge man whose mind worked slowly. When he first heard +the talk about the town going dry he laughed--and that was enough. No +one argued the matter with him for no one relished the thought of an +argument with George. And only the minister had dared to mention Jim +Tumley. In his big way George loved little Jim, but since his wife had +sickened George spent every spare minute in her sick room and so +witnessed none of the scenes that were rousing Green Valley folks into +open rebellion against the evil that enslaved them. + +George belonged to the old school that declared that to mind one's own +business was the highest duty of man. No one in Green Valley, not even +Cynthia's son, could make the huge man understand that he in a sense +was little Jim's keeper; that since Jim could not save himself the +strong men of the community would have to do it for him. George +wondered at the seriousness with which the thing was discussed. He +treated it as a joke. And this attitude was doing more harm than if he +had been bitterly hostile to the idea. + +The Civic League was counting the votes, wondering if Green Valley +could go dry over George Hoskins' head. But Grandma Wentworth was +hoping for one more miracle before election day. + +"Something'll happen to swing George into line. We Green Valley people +have always done everything together. It would spoil things to have +one half the town fighting the other half. We must do this thing with +everybody's consent or it will do no good. So let's hope for a +miracle." + +And then the whole thing was wiped out of everybody's mind by the death +of Mary Hoskins. It was over at last and nobody but the doctor knew +how hard the big man had fought for his wife's life. So nobody quite +guessed the bitterness of the big man's grief. But everybody had heard +that Mary's last words were a plea to have little Jim sing her to her +last sleep and resting-place. And George had promised that Jim would +sing. + +Jim had been drinking so steadily of late that he was a wreck. People +wondered if he could sing. When they told him his sister was dead he +laughed miserably and said nothing. No one was surprised when the hour +for the funeral services arrived to find Jim missing. Messengers had +to be sent out. They searched the town but could find no trace of Jim. +For an hour Green Valley waited in that still home. Then the +undertaker from Elmwood whispered something to the crushed, terrified +giant who stood staring at the dead face of his wife like a soul in +torment. + +Mary Hoskins left her home without the song George had promised her. + +At the grave there was another, a more terrible wait. + +"My God--wait! They'll find him. God, men--wait--wait! I can't bury +her, without Jim's song. I promised her--I tell you I promised--oh, my +God--it was the last thing she wanted--and I promised." + +So Green Valley waited, with horror in its eyes and the bitterness of +death in its heart. As the minutes dragged women began to sob +hysterically, in nervous terror. Men looked at the yawning grave, the +waiting coffin, the low-dropping sun and mumbled strange prayers. + +Through a mist of tears the waiting watchers saw Hank Lolly and Billy +Evans pass through the cemetery gate, dragging something between them. +It was something that laughed and sobbed and gibbered horribly. Hank +and Billy tried to hold the ghastly thing erect between them but it +slipped from their trembling hands and lay, a twitching heap, at the +head of the open grave. + +That was Green Valley's darkest hour. And after that came the dawn. +The following week Green Valley men walked quietly to the polls and as +one man voted the horror out of their lives. The day after little Jim +went off to take the Keeley cure. And then for two long weeks Green +Valley was still with the stillness of exhaustion. + +Spring deepened and brought with it all the old gladness and a new +sweet peace, a peace such as Green Valley had never known. Gardens +began to bloom again and streets rippled with the laughter of +neighboring men and women. Life swung back to normal. Only the hotel +stood silent, a still vacant-eyed reminder of past pain. Nobody +mentioned it. Every one tried to forget it. But so long as it stood +there, a specter within its heart, Green Valley could not forget. It +was said that Sam Ellis had put it up for sale. But who would buy the +huge place? + +Then it was that Green Valley's three good little men came forward. +Joe Gans, the socialist barber, was spokesman. He presented a plan +that made Green Valley catch its breath. + +Why--said the three good little men--could not Green Valley buy the +hotel for its own use? Why not remodel it, make a Community House of +it? Why not move Joshua Stillman's wonderful library out of the little +dark room into which it was packed and spread it out in a big sunny +place, with comfortable chairs and rockers and a couple of nice long +reading tables? Why not fix a place for the young people to dance in +and have their parties? Why not have a real assembly hall--a big +enough and proper place to hold political meetings and all indoor +celebrations? Why not have pool, billiards, a bowling alley? Why not +have a manual-training room for Hen Tomlins and his boys? Why not have +a sewing room and cooking for the girls? + +Oh, it was a glorious plan and Green Valley listened as a child does to +a fairy tale. Of course it couldn't really be done, many people said, +but--oh, my--if it only could! + +But the three good little men had no sooner explained their fairy dream +than things began to happen. Cynthia's son came forward with the first +payment on the property. Colonel Stratton, Joshua Stillman, Reverend +Campbell offered to take care of other payments. Jake Tuttle +telephoned in from his farm that he was in on it. The Civic League +offered to do all the cleaning, the furnishing, to give pictures, +curtains, potted plants. The church societies offered to make money +serving chicken dinners on the hotel veranda to motorists who, now that +Billy Evans had a garage, came spinning along thick as flies. Nan +Ainslee's father, besides contributing to the purchasing fund, offered +to provide the library furniture, the billiard and pool tables. Seth +Curtis and Billy Evans not only gave money but offered to do all the +hauling. That shamed the masons and carpenters into giving their +Saturday afternoons for repair work. And after them came the painters +and decorators, with Bernard Rollins at their head. So in the end +every soul in Green Valley gave something and so the dream came true, +as all dreams must when men and women get together and work +whole-heartedly for the common good. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +FANNY COMES BACK + +"If only I felt the way I look. If only my feelings had been smashed +too," sobbed Fanny to the doctor that first week that she sat up in her +chair. "But I'm just the same inside that I always was and I want to +go and see and hear things." + +So the old doctor, who knew how much more real were the ills of the +spirit than any hurts of the flesh, dropped a word here and there and +now no days passed that Fanny did not have callers, did not in some way +get messages, the vagrant scraps and trifles of news that, so valueless +in themselves, yet were to Fanny the lovely bits of fabric out of which +she pieced a laughing tale of life. + +Outwardly Fanny was changed. She was pale and quiet and her thick +lovely hair was always smooth now and glossy and carefully dressed. It +was the one thing she still could do for herself and she did it with a +pitiful care. She looked ten years younger, in a way. And her house +was spick and span at ten o'clock every morning now. From her chair +she directed the children and because in all Green Valley there was no +woman who knew better how work ought to be done it was well done. And +then came the long empty hours when she sat, as she was sitting now, in +her chair on the sunny side of the house where she could look at her +little sea of tulips and hyacinths and drink in their perfume. + +She had been trying to crochet but had dropped her needle. It lay in +the grass at her feet. She could see it but she could not pick it up. +She had not as yet acquired the skill and the inventive faculty of an +invalid. + +And so she sat there, staring at the bit of glistening steel as wave +after wave of bitterness swept over her. Her tragedy was still so new +that she could feel it with every breath. Every hour she was reminded +of her loss by a thousand little things like this crochet hook. She +was forced to sit still, her busy hands idle in her lap, while spring +was calling, calling everywhere. She told herself, with a mad little +laugh, that she would never again pick up anything; never again would +she run through her neighbors' gates, tap on their doors and visit them +in their kitchens. Never again could she hurry up the spring street +with the south wind caressing her cheek. No more would she gad about +to learn the doings of her little world. Would it come to talk to her, +to make her laugh now that she was helpless? Was she never to hear the +music of living? Was she to lose her knack of making people laugh? To +lose her place in life--to live and yet be forgotten--would she have to +face that? + +These were some of the thoughts that were torturing poor Fanny that +day. And then she gave a cry, for around the corner of the house came +Nanny Ainslee in just the same old way. Grandma Wentworth and the +minister were just behind her. + +They stared lovingly at each other, the girl who was as lovely as life +and love and springtime could make her, and the woman whom the game had +broken. Then Nanny spoke--not to the broken body of Fanny Foster but +to the gipsy, springtime spirit of Fanny. + +"I only just came home, Fanny. I went through town and saw pretty +nearly everybody, and every soul tried to tell me a little something. +But it's all a jumble. So, Fanny Foster, I want you to begin with +Christmas Day and tell me all that's happened in Green Valley while +I've been away." + +Never a word of her accident, never so much as a glance of pity at the +wonderful chair. Just the old Nan Ainslee asking the old Fanny Foster +for Green Valley news. + +In the scarred soul of Fanny Foster, down under the bitterness and +crumbled pride, something stirred, something that Fanny thought was +dead forever. + +Then Nanny spoke again. + +"I have come to tell you that I am to be married to John Roger +Churchill Knight. I have told no one but you and Grandma. I have +promised to marry him in June, so I haven't much time to get ready. +I'm hoping, Fanny, that you will come and help out." + +At that, of a sudden all the old-time zest for living, the joy of +seeing, hearing and doing, surged to Fanny's very throat and force of +habit brought the words. + +"Oh, land alive, Nanny," fairly gurgled the old Fanny, "such a time as +we've had in Green Valley! It was that awful cold spell after +Christmas that began it. Old man Pelley died--of complications--and +everybody thought Mrs. Dudley would sing hymns of praise in public, +they'd fought so about their chickens. But I declare if she didn't cry +about the hardest at the funeral and even blamed herself for +aggravating him. + +"Of course him dying left old Mrs. Pelley alone in a big house, and her +being pretty feeble, she felt that Harry and Ivy ought to come and live +with her. Well,--Ivy went--but she vowed that there were two things +she would do, mother-in-law or no mother-in-law. She said she'd put as +many onions in her hamburger steak and Irish stew as she pleased--you +know Mrs. Pelley can't stand onions--and she'd have a fire in the +fireplace as often as the fancy struck her. Everybody thought there'd +be an awful state of things--but land--now that Mrs. Pelley has got +used to the open fire you can't drive her away from it with a stick and +she don't seem to bother her head about Ivy's cooking and last week she +actually ate three helpings of hamburger steak that Ivy said was just +reeking with onions. + +"A body's never too old to learn, I suppose. There's Henry Rawlins +suddenly took the notion to quit smoking. Ettie'd been at him for +twenty-five years with twenty good reasons to quit, but no. And all of +a sudden--when Ettie's give up hope and not mentioned it for a couple +of months--he up and quits and won't even tell why. Ettie's +worried--says he's eating himself out of house and home and wants to +sleep about twenty-four hours a day. + +"Talking about houses makes me think that the Stockton girls are having +their house painted by a man with a wooden leg. Billy Evans picked him +up somewhere and Seth Curtis was telling me how he came to lose that +leg. Seems like he was prospecting somewheres in Montana, got drunk, +froze it, gangrene set in and they had to amputate. They say he's a +mighty smart man too. Maybe John'll get him to paint our house when +he's through at the Stocktons. + +"Talk about physical deformities! Eva Collins has got it into her head +that she's too fat entirely and she's been dieting and rolling and +taking all sorts of exercises religiously. Seems she got so set on +being thin that she practices these exercises whenever she happens to +think of it and wherever she happens to be. She happened to be right +under the lights three or four times and so she smashed them, globes +and all. Bill says she'd better reduce in the barn or else let him +charge admission for a rolling performance to pay for the broken lights. + +"So there's Eva trying to thin off and they say Mert Hagley's swollen +all out of shape, having been stung almost to death by his own bees. +Of course, nobody's sympathizing overmuch with Mert. He was so afraid +of losing a swarm of bees that he forgot to be cautious and there he is +laid out. But it isn't the bee stings that hurt him so much. Mary's +been willed a good farm and a big lump of cash by some aunt that died a +month ago and hated Mert like poison. And the thing's just gone to +Mary's head. + +"She's gone into the city on regular spending sprees and Mert's wild. +He can't touch the farm and he's afraid Mary'll have that lump of money +all spent before he gets out of bed. Everybody's hoping she will and +advising her to buy every blessed thing she ever had a hankering for +and things she never even heard of. Mrs. Brownlee, the president of +the Civic League, even told her to buy a dish-washing machine, and +heavens, if Mary didn't go right down and buy it. Doc Philipps advised +her to buy herself the very best springs and mattress on the +market--that it would help her back to sleep decently of nights. She's +having hot-water heat put in and is going to do her washing with an +electric washer. Seth Curtis put her up to that. And as soon as Mert +gets better she's going visiting her sister in Colorado. She says +she'll likely die of homesickness but that she's just got to go off +somewhere to get used to and learn to wear properly all the new clothes +she's got. + +"Well, Mary's buying all these labor-saving machines got the whole town +to thinking and spending. Dick's put in a new cash register they say +is nice enough to have in the parlor. It made Jessie Williams buy a +lot of new silver that she didn't need no more than a cat needs a +match-box. But she got it and she gave a luncheon the other day to +some of the South End crowd and tried to get just about all that silver +on the table, I guess. Of course, it looked mighty nice but when the +women came to eat they didn't know what to do with it. They got pretty +miserable, all sticking to just the one knife and fork and spoon. And +Jessie got so rattled that she just about forgot to use the stuff too. +And finally old Mrs. Vingie, that Jessie asked just to have the news +spread, got up mad as a hornet and marched out, saying she was too old +to be insulted. + +"Until a week ago Bessie Williams wouldn't speak to Alex. You know her +hair's got awful white this last year and of course, her being kind of +stout, she does look older than Al. But she says that's no reason why, +when a peddler comes to the door with anything, Al needs to let the man +think she's his mother. + +"Mrs. Jerry Dustin's been to see Uncle Tony's portraiture hanging in +the art gallery. She says it's so lifelike it made her cry. And she's +awful happy about Peter. Peter's been posing for a picture for Bernard +Rollins and while he was in the studio he got to fooling with the +paints and brushes, and lo and behold, if he didn't daub up something +that looked like his mother's face when she's smiling. They say +Rollins jumped he was so surprised and he put the boy through some +paces and swore he'd make a better artist out of him than he was +himself. So there you are, and now Mrs. Dustin is dreaming of Peter in +Italy, Peter in Rome, Peter everywhere in creation, and her tagging +along with his brushes and dust rags. So she's happy. + +"And Milly Sears is house-cleaning like mad, for both the boys are +coming home from the ends of the earth to visit. And Alice is putting +off the christening of her baby boy until they come. She was here to +show me the baby the other day. It's a darling. Jocelyn Brownlee came +with her and brought me samples of all her wedding dresses, wedding +gown and all. As soon as the dressmaker is through I'm to go over and +see the whole trousseau. + +"There, I nearly forgot the best thing of all. It's about Sam Bobbins. +My! Here we've all been pitying Sam and Fortune's just kicked in his +door and walked in. You remember of course about Sam and his fighting +roosters? Well, Sam went off for Thanksgiving to his sister's and +while he was gone something ate up his prize stock. Must have been a +skunk, Frank Burton says. Well, they say that Sam's heart was just +about broken. Not just because his stock was gone but more because he +couldn't think of another thing to turn his hand to. + +"Well, he got through the winter some way and then, while he was +sitting in the train one day coming home, he overheard two men talking +about turtles going up. Must have been two hotel men. Anyway, that +gave Sam an idea and he started right in wading through Petersen's +slough for turtles. Why, he pulled up barrels of them, and would you +believe it, they sold in the city for real money! Sam went +crazy--about as crazy as Mary Hagley got over her luck. And then along +came rheumatism and knocked Sam flat, just when he was doing so well. +Everybody said it was just poor Sam's luck. So there was Sam sick +abed, thinking about those turtles moving off somewheres else maybe, or +somebody else getting rich on them. + +"And all the time he lay in bed groaning Sam's wife went around the +house doing the same. Only her trouble wasn't turtles but corsets. +Seems like Sam always promised Dudy that if he made any money she was +to have plenty to spend. Well, he treated her mighty handsome about +that turtle money. Dudy had the sense to take all he gave her and she +vowed that for once in her life she'd get herself a corset that was +comfortable. + +"Well, Nanny, heavens only knows how many brands she tried but none of +them seemed built for her. Some pinched her here and others squeezed +her there and she was as full of misery as Sam was of rheumatism. Sam +finally took notice and just to keep his mind off his own troubles he +got to watching her suffering for breath and a nice shape. + +"Now you know Sam's always thought the world of Dudy. So one day, when +she was getting ready to go to the Civic League meeting to read a paper +on the best ways of getting rid of flies and nearly crying because she +couldn't get herself to look right, Sam said, half joking, 'By gum, +Dudy, I'll _make_ you a corset that will fit you.' + +"Well, sir, the thing stuck in his mind and grew and grew, and heavens +to Betsey, if Sam didn't really make a corset, even helping Dudy with +some of the sewing. + +"Dudy wore it and took everybody's breath away, she looked so nice and +could breathe without puffing and laugh as much as she pleased. The +women got to talking about it and mentioned it to Mrs. Brownlee. And +mind you, Mrs. Brownlee went to Sam and asked him had he patented the +thing. And when he said no she went to a woman lawyer friend of hers +and she got Sam a patent, and first thing Green Valley knew here come +three big corset men to town, all of them offering to buy Dudy's +home-made corset. So Sam Bobbins has got his fortune and nobody's +begrudging it to him. The whole town is mighty proud of Sam, I tell +you. + +"Good land--it must be four o'clock, for here come the children! +My--Nanny, but it's good to have you home again!" + +"Well," smiled Grandma, as she watched the spring twilight sift down +over Green Valley that evening, "I've always said that this town was +full of folks who make you cry one minute and laugh the next." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +HOME AGAIN + +It had pleaded for forgiveness and an early homecoming, that little +yellow slip that Nanny Ainslee treasured so. But the bluebirds were +darting through leafy bowers and the ploughed, furrowed fields lay +smoking in the spring sunshine before Nan came back. + +A week after her arrival in Scranton the old aunt had been taken sick, +and it was months before the old soul was herself again. Nan stayed +through it all. But the day came when she was free to go back to the +little home town where the cloud shadows were rippling over low, +dimpling hills, already gay with the gold of wild mustard and the +tender blues and greens of a new glad spring. + +She came home one evening when Green Valley lay wrapped in a warm, +thick, fragrant mist. So no one saw her step off the train straight +into the arms of Cynthia's son. And nobody heard the quivering joy of +his one cry at the sight of her. + +"Nan!" + +Slowly, as in a dream, they walked through their fragrant, misty world +to where, in a deep, old hearth, a fire sang of love and home, dreams +and eternal happiness; where an armchair waited with its mate and an +old clock ticked on the stairs. + +Oh, that first perfect hour beside his fire! He had pleaded so hard +for it in all his letters. So she gave it to him, knowing that for +them both no hour could ever again be just like that. + +She sat and listened to the wonder of his love; then, frightened at the +might of it, the lovely reverence of it, crept into his arms for sweet +comfort. And he held her in awe and wonder against his heart, kissed +the quivering lips and knew such joy as angels might envy. Then he +took her to her father. + +The next day, in the shy sunshine of a perfect day, they went hand in +hand to their knoll to look once more upon their valley town and talk +over all of life from the first hour of meeting. + +And when they had satisfied the hunger for understanding the miracle +that had befallen them he told her of all that had happened in the +months that she had been away. How Jim Tumley slipped beyond the love +and help of them all. How Mary Hoskins grew weaker and weaker. How +the Civic League struggled and the three good little men dreamed and +planned. How Fanny Foster came to pay the great price for Green +Valley's salvation. How in death gentle Mary Hoskins paid too. He +explained why Seth Curtis was a gentler man and why John Foster hurried +home each day to laugh and talk with his crippled wife. He told her of +that awful day that had crushed George Hoskins so that he went about a +broken, shrunken man, praying and searching for peace through service. +It was George who bought the beautiful new piano for the Community +House, who was paying for little Jim's cure. + +And then because the girl he loved was sobbing over the sins and +sorrows of the little town that lay in the sunshine below them, he told +her about the baby boy that Hen Tomlins had gotten for Christmas and +how happy the little man was making toys for the toddler who followed +him about from morning till night. And because her eyes were still wet +with tears he laughed teasingly and said: + +"And I never knew that I loved you until I saw David Allan kiss his +sweetheart." + +Of course, at that she sat up very straight and wanted to know all +about it. + +"I suppose you expect me to wait a whole proper year for my wedding +day," he sighed after a little. + +"I think we ought to. And I couldn't possibly be ready before then." + +"Do you mean to tell me that it takes a whole year to make a wedding +dress?" + +And then the cruelty that lies in every woman made her shake her head +and say, "No--that isn't why nice folks wait a whole year. They wait +to give each other plenty of time to change their minds." + +"Nan!" + +And she saw then by his hurt white face that, man grown though he was, +with a genius for handling other men, he would always be a child in +some things. He never would or could understand trifling in any form, +having all a child's honesty and directness. And she knew that she, +more than any one else, would always have the power to hurt him. + +"Nan," he asked slowly, "did you go to Scranton because you thought I +might ask before you were ready?" + +She laughed tenderly. + +"Oh--Dear Heart--no. I went to Scranton because I was afraid I might +propose before you were ready." + +But he never quite understood that and she didn't expect him to. +However, if she thought she had won, she was mistaken. The persistency +in matters of love that is the heritage of all men made him say +carelessly a half hour later: + +"Oh, well--I suppose waiting a year is the best, the wise thing to do. +But why must I be the only one to obey the law? Nobody else is waiting +a year. All the other men are marrying their sweethearts in June. +There's David and Jocelyn, Max Longman and Clara, Steve and Bonnie, +Dolly Beatty and Charlie Peters. And only last week Grandma Wentworth +got a letter from out West saying some chap is coming from the very +wilds to marry Carrie. He's hired the reception hall of the Community +House so that Carrie may have a proper wedding in case her folks refuse +to give their blessing. So I'm going to marry all those chaps and then +calmly go on just being engaged myself." + +All of a sudden Nan saw why Seth Curtis gave in and joined the church, +why Hank Lolly forgot his fears and came to the services, why the +poolroom man gave up his business and was now a respected automobile +man and mechanic; why the former saloon keeper was the happy owner of a +stock farm; why Frank Burton no longer bragged about being an atheist +but went to church with Jennie; why Mrs. Rosenwinkle no longer argued +about the flatness of the earth. + +He was always doing this to every one, this boy from India; always +making people see how ridiculous and petty were the man-made +conventions and human notions and stubbornness when looked at in the +light of common sense and sincerity. + +"Oh, well," Nan gave in with a laugh that was half a sob, "I may as +well be a June bride with the rest. And now, John Roger Churchill +Knight, take me down to see my town. I want to see all the new +gardens, the new babies, the new spring hats and dress patterns. + +"I want to see Ella Higgins' tulips and forget-me-nots and attend Uncle +Tony's open-air meeting. I want to have an ice-cream soda at Martin's +and wave my hand at John Gans while he's shaving a customer. I want to +see all the store windows, especially Joe Baldwin's. I want to shake +hands with Billy Evans and Hank Lolly and hug little Billy. + +"I want to go to the post-office for my mail when everybody else is +getting theirs. I want to know if the bank is still there and if the +bluebirds and flickers are as thick as ever in Park Lane. I want to +hear Green Valley women calling to each other from their back yards and +see them leaning over the fences to visit--and giving each other clumps +of pansies, and golden glow and hollyhocks. I want to see Mrs. Jerry +Dustin's smile and ask her when I can see Uncle Tony's 'portraiture' at +the Art Institute. I want to see the boys' bare feet kicking up the +dust and their hands hitching up their overall straps and hear them +whistling to each other and giving their high signs. I'm longing to +know who's had their house repainted and where the new houses are going +up. + +"But--oh--most of all, I want to hear Green Valley folks say with their +eyes and hands and voice--'Hello, Nanny Ainslee, when did _you_ get +back' and 'My, Nanny, it's good to see and have you home again.' So, +John Roger Churchill Knight, take me down to see my home town--Green +Valley at springtime." + +They went down through Green Valley streets where the spring sunshine +lay warm and golden. They greeted Green Valley men and women and were +greeted as only Green Valley knows how to greet those it loves. + +Though they said not a word, all Green Valley read their secret in +their eyes, heard it in the rich deep note of the boy's voice, in +Nanny's lilting laugh. + +And having made the rounds the boy and girl naturally came to Grandma +Wentworth's gate. They walked through the gay front garden, followed +the little gravel path around the house, and found Grandma standing +among her fragrant herbs and healing grasses. + +They came to her hand in hand and said not a word. And Grandma raised +her head and looked at them. Then her eyes filled and her lips +quivered tenderly and the two, both motherless, knew that they had a +mother's blessing. + +It was so restful, that back yard of Grandma's, as the three sat there, +talking quietly and happily. And the world seemed strangely full of a +golden peace. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GREEN VALLEY*** + + +******* This file should be named 18801.txt or 18801.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/8/0/18801 + + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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