THE SINGING
“Say,” said Hi as he and Jim washed their faces and gave an extra fine
brushing to their hair, “ain’t I the lucky one though, going off like
this with you-all? I don’t see how it comes your pa and ma are so good
to me and Zalie.”
“Comes natural to them,” growled Jim, much embarrassed by this praise of
the persons he loved best. “They’re even good to me.”
“Get out!” cried Hi, sprinkling some water on Jim’s clean waist.
“Here you, if you think so much of my ma, what are you spoiling all her
work for?” shouted Jim. “You need a little learning, that’s what you
need!”
The next moment the two boys had gripped and were rolling on the floor
together. Mrs. McBirney heard the rumpus and came running, but her
gentle voice could barely make itself heard as the two boys threshed
around on the floor, and it took Thomas McBirney’s strong hand and firm
voice to bring them to their feet again, half laughing and half angry,
and red as turkey cocks.
“A likely way to begin the Sabbath,” pa reproved them. “Brush yourselves
off now, and get calmed down before we start. It will be a pleasant
sight, seeing you two standing up hymn-singing, after the way you’ve been
carrying on.”
However, when fifteen minutes later the party started off down the
mountain side, the two boys looked like perfect models. Hi was allowed
to sit on the front seat with pa; Jim, Azalea and Mrs. McBirney sat
behind. Ma wore her one white dress and her black bonnet with the green
ribbon, and Azalea had on her new white dress with the cat stitching in
blue; and her white hat with its blue ribbons was the very hat of hats
for her to wear. Pa McBirney felt secretly proud of his family, but it
wouldn’t have been his way to give them a notion of that. However, ma,
who knew most of the things that pa thought, could tell that he was well
pleased. He showed Hi all the landmarks—the little broken branches that
looked like two birds sitting side by side on a gaunt live-oak limb that
reached over their path; the “cannon,” a huge prone log which had once
fallen across the road, and had been sawed in such a manner that it
looked like a gigantic gun ready to be fired at them; the “haunted house”
where a family of white-faced, queer folk lived, who ran in and drew down
the shades when they saw anyone coming; and the “spy glass,” a curious
opening through miles of woodland, through which a person could look down
the mountain side and away across the valley, where the cotton and the
corn grew in their rich fields and the silver streams wound in and out.
“I tell you, we that live in a place like this are likely to forget our
blessings,” remarked Mr. McBirney. “Every way you turn, it’s sightly and
a comfort to the eye. If I had to live where it was all dirt and noise
and folks crowding on top of one another, seems like I’d want to die.”
“Wouldn’t you, just!” murmured ma sympathetically.
“But here we are, off pleasuring, on as pretty a day as God ever dropped
down on his footstool.”
Ma agreed with him, and began to “tune up,” as pa put it, humming under
her breath. She had her old song book in her hand—the book with the
square notes, such as the mountain people always used at their
“singings.” She explained to Azalea that the shape of the notes
indicated their names. For example, no matter what key “do” might be in,
it could be told for “do” by its shape. “Sol” would have another shape;
“re” yet another. In this manner no one need be confused by four or even
six sharps.
“And it’s a custom with us, Azalea,” she explained, “to sing the tune
through by note first. After we’ve done that, and everybody has got the
tune fixed in his head, so to speak, we go through and sing the words.”
“You’ll have to tell Hi about the singing,” said Azalea.
“It seems mighty queer to me how you-all don’t know about singings,” ma
replied. “It ain’t nothing but all the folks getting together and
singing. They do it once a year you know—come from all over the
countryside. There now, look yonder! See them wagons coming from all
parts? They’re all off for Rutherford Plain where the old Friendly
Meeting House is. That was built before the war, all of great oak beams
and boards, and it don’t belong to no one denomination, but folks of
whatever belief meet there and give praise and worship.”
“Ain’t it nice?” sighed Azalea contentedly. It was very sweet to her to
be riding along there, the daughter of people who were so much thought of
as the McBirneys—she who had been a wanderer, and often a hungry,
neglected child, in clothes she was ashamed of, and the companion of
people she had been unable to respect. Everyone had a pleasant word for
Ma and Pa McBirney, and almost everyone seemed to know about her and to
ask if she was their new daughter. They said they were pleased to meet
her, and when they knew about Hi—and the McBirneys were quick to
tell—they said they were pleased to meet him too, and that they’d like
mighty well to do him a good turn if the chance offered. There was so
much talking of this kind to do, that after all, Hi did not get his
description of the singing, and it was only when he had reached the grove
around Friendly Church that he began to understand what a happy occasion
it really was.
Wagons by the twenties stood about, their horses unhitched and tied
beneath the trees. Men, women and children were gathered in groups,
talking and laughing. The heavy barred doors of the old church were
swung wide, and the ivy and crimson creeper peeped in at its open
windows. The boys helped pa unhitch and were ready when the deep-toned
bell sounded, to go with the others into the church.
The bare yet homely interior was stained a deep reddish brown by time,
and the wide-swung casements let in the sky of the fair summer day.
Elder Miles stood in the pulpit for a few minutes, to ask a blessing on
the gathering, and then a hook-nosed, slender, restless old man with a
voice like a silver trumpet got up and called for volunteers for the
first singing. He said he thought it would be better to have the
middle-aged folks at the first table, so to speak, and that the young
folks could wait for second helping.
With that, men and women arose in various parts of the room and went
forward. Their weather-colored, work-worn faces were lighted with smiles
as they went down the aisle, nodding to acquaintances shyly, and taking
their places in the seats which had been arranged just below the pulpit.
There seemed to be no need to inquire which was soprano, alto, tenor or
bass. They had met together for years, and knew each other’s voices
well. There were only two who hesitated as if not quite sure where to
go, and Azalea, seeing them, was surprised to see that it was Mrs. Carson
and a tall handsome man, with a touch of gray in his hair, whom she took
at once to be Carin’s father. The hook-nosed man came forward to inquire
politely as to their voices, and after shaking hands with them, placed
them among the sopranos and the tenors.
Then a fresh-faced young woman seated herself at the organ, and in a
moment the chorus of voices broke on Azalea’s ear. It was not the way
she had expected it to be—that music. It was sad, although full of
worship and trust. The voices wavered curiously, and seemed to flutter
on the notes something as a flag flutters in the wind. Perhaps the alto
and the bass were a little too strong for the more musical parts; but at
any rate, at first, the little girl was disappointed. Then, someway, she
began to like it. She felt the tears come stinging to her eyes, though
she could not have told why, and a lump gathered in her throat. She
forgot the men and women and the haggard old meeting house, forgot the
sound of the pines without and the humming of the bees; and she seemed
for a moment—a wonderful moment—to be in mid-air like a bird, and to hear
a strange, sad, holy song coming up to her from men and women who toiled,
and hoped, and loved, and suffered, down on the earth.
Some one offered her a hymn book, and the strange moment passed, and she
was able to follow the hymns. They had noble words to them, and her
heart seemed to grow bigger as she read them. Such words suited her—fed
something in her that was hungry and cried for food. She began to
understand why it was that Pa and Ma McBirney were so good. They had
been taught these words from the time that they were children. They had
grown up with these beautiful thoughts in their hearts.
After a time the young people were called for, and the older ones took
their seats. The young wives went and their brown-faced husbands, and
the fresh-faced, wistful girls, and the boys with their bright eyes.
Azalea loved to look at them, they seemed so strong and contented. She
liked the bright frocks of the girls, and the way their hair was braided,
and though she tried to think of other things, she fell to picturing a
green lawn frock she would have some day when she made money for herself,
and the figured sash—green leaves on a white ground—she would wear with
it.
Just then, the man who was sitting next Azalea arose and went over by the
window, and a moment later some one slipped down into the place he had
left and gave Azalea’s hand a squeeze. Azalea turned her head as quick
as a frightened bird, and there sat Carin Carson, smiling at her as if
they were old friends.
“I was so glad when I saw you here,” she whispered. “Isn’t it a pity
they don’t ask the children to sing? I just love to sing, don’t you?”
Azalea shook her head. She had sung many a time for the people who came
to the show, but she had hated the silly songs she was made to sing, and
as she thought of them now she blushed.
“I don’t believe I really can sing,” she whispered back. “I could once,
but my voice is spoiled. I sang too loud, and now it’s all rough and
horrid.”
“I don’t believe it,” returned her friend. “Your voice is so pleasant
when you speak that I don’t see how it can be horrid when you sing. I’m
to have a singing teacher come to the house twice a week, and I wish
you’d come down some time and have her hear you. Perhaps you sing a
great deal better than you think you do.”
“No, no,” whispered Azalea, shaking her head. “I do everything wrong!”
Carin laughed under her breath and gave her friend’s hand another
squeeze. She was thinking that Azalea was the prettiest girl in the
place, but she had been taught that it was not nice to pay people
compliments, and so she said nothing of what was in her mind. But she
decided that she would enjoy Azalea’s society for that day, and when the
singing adjourned for the people to eat their lunch, Carin insisted that
the McBirneys and her people should eat together. So, by dint of urging
and introducing, she finally had the pleasure of seeing her father and
mother and Mr. and Mrs. McBirney seated together beneath the shade of
some glorious tulip trees, spreading their luncheons out on one table
cloth.
Mr. and Mrs. Carson were people who had traveled in many foreign places,
and had heard and seen much that was most beautiful and wonderful in the
world, but their ways were so simple and hearty that neither Mary nor
Thomas McBirney felt abashed with them. In fact, the Carsons were
ignorant of many things in the country round about them, and they asked
questions as if they were children. The McBirneys answered them
politely, though they really couldn’t help wondering how it was that such
learned people didn’t know ginseng when they saw it, or that they hadn’t
heard about the asbestos mines in the neighborhood, or didn’t understand
how to trap the rabbits that spoiled the gardens.
Azalea was fascinated with the free ways all these Carsons had. They
seemed to say whatever came into their heads, and they laughed outright
in such a hearty and happy way that those who heard them had to laugh
too. Mr. Carson kept running through the hymn tunes he had heard, though
he did it in a quiet, charming way, not at all as if he wished to attract
attention, but as if he felt himself among friends who would allow him to
follow his impulses. He was, of course, different from all of the other
men there, yet he had a way of making it seem as if they did him a favor
when they were friendly with him, and Azalea heard him heartily thanking
the hook-nosed man—Mr. Pickett, his name was—for having asked him and
Mrs. Carson to sing.
“I never quite had a chance to sing as much as I wanted to,” he said
laughingly. “I sing when I get up, and when I’m in my bath tub, and when
I walk and when I ride. If my wife would let me I’d sing at the table,
particularly when I see my favorite kind of custard pie coming on—but
though I’ve done my best, I’ve not had my sing out yet.”
“Well, if you live down this way long enough, sir,” answered Mr. Pickett,
“we’ll try to satisfy you yet.”
Mr. Pickett said there would be quite a long recess before the singing
“took up” again, so Azalea and Carin wandered away in the woods together.
Azalea couldn’t help feeling just a trifle awkward and shy with this
graceful girl, whose clothes seem to move with a mysterious rustle, and
who was like a flower, giving out faint odors of violet as she walked.
Her laugh was gay, but soft, and every word she spoke seemed to have
another accent than that to which Azalea was used. Azalea wondered how
she could be so well pleased with a simple girl like herself, and with
all these hard-working folk, and she tried to say something of the kind,
but she could find no fit words. So they talked about the woods, and
about the sort of picnics they liked, and about how afraid they were—or
weren’t—of thunder storms.
As they went on, they came to a beautiful hollow in the woods. There was
soft, very green grass in the bottom of this cup-shaped place, and ferns
and delicate vines grew on the sides.
“What a lovely, lovely place!” cried Carin, clasping her hands. “Fit for
the fairy queen, isn’t it, Azalea?”
“Do you believe in fairies?” asked Azalea almost indignantly.
“Believe in them?” repeated Carin. “I believe in whatever I want to
believe in. Don’t you think it’s fun to believe in fairies?”
“What’s the use of believing in a thing that isn’t true?”
“Oh, well,” said Carin, sighing, as if she found it rather hard to bridge
the distance between Azalea’s mind and her own, “some thoughts are for
use and some are for fun. My shoes are for use, but my gold beads are
for fun. Ideas are like that too. I know the earth turns over and makes
day and night; I play there are fairies just to suit myself. It’s like
trimming on a dress—thoughts of that kind. You like trimming on a dress,
don’t you, Azalea?”
But Azalea’s answer was a low cry.
“Don’t move, Carin! Don’t move! Oh, Carin, the snake!”
Carin looked and saw. Before her, coiled and ready for its wicked
spring, was a snake with a gleaming, splendid skin, green and brown and
iridescent tints, in diamond shaped pattern, and on the summer air was a
dry, curious rattle that told both the girls its alarming story. Carin
said nothing for the second or two in which she realized her danger, and
she seemed only to half hear Azalea’s sharp cry:
“Now, jump to one side, Oh, quick!”
But she had no time to obey, for at that instant, a shot rang on the air,
and the wicked head of the serpent drooped.
“Oh, Oh!” screamed Azalea, more terrified now that the danger was over
than she had been before. And “Oh,” sighed Carin softly, and slid down
to the ground and sat there, very white, with one hand to her lips.
“It’s all right, honey bird, all right,” cried a voice near them. “That
there sarpent can’t do you no manner of harm now. You jest sit still a
minute or two and get over your scare, and then I’ll escort you back to
your folks.”
Carin and Azalea both turned and looked into the eyes of a wonderful old
man—looked into eyes, large, dark, and soft, half hidden beneath bushy
eyebrows, and set beneath a beetling brow. His hair was iron-gray,
curling and thick, and it stood up on his head in such a way as to make
him look two or three inches taller than he really was, and that was
quite unnecessary, for he stood, as he was quick to declare, six feet and
four inches in his stocking feet. He was very thin, and when he walked
he seemed on the point of falling to pieces, because he had what is known
as double joints, so that his arms and legs swung about in almost any way
he wished to have them, and his head turned about with wonderful ease on
his long neck.
He stooped now and it was an amazing thing to see him do it—and picked up
a fiddle which he had laid against the trunk of a tree.
“It certainly was a mighty convenient thing, having that gun along,” he
said. “Old brother sarpent, he never would have waited for me to get
after him with a stick. A bullet was the only thing that could put him
out of business, and I wa’n’t sure I could hit him at that
distance—couldn’t have, I reckon, if the case hadn’t been so pressing.”
Carin got up and ran toward him with her hands outstretched.
“Thank you! Thank you, sir!” she said, in that pretty eager way of hers.
“I know what you’ve done for me, and I must take you to see my papa and
mamma. Why, it was wonderful! I’ll never forget it as long as I live.”
“Steady on, steady on,” said the man. “Knocking the head off a tarnation
rascal like that is no new business with me. Glad, though, to have
served you, little miss.”
He bowed low, and the girls watched him, fascinated.
“I didn’t hear you playing this morning, sir,” went on Carin. “Weren’t
you in at the Singing? I should think they’d love to have you play.”
“My innings are coming, Miss Honey Bird,” replied the man smiling.
“There ain’t been a singing at Friendly Church for thirty years that
hain’t had old Haystack Thompson there, a fiddling. But I was late
getting here to-day. I’ve been farming it away up on Rabbit Nose
Mountain, and I had to hoof it down here. I started early enough, but I
got lazy like and laid down and dozed off. When I woke, the sun was high
overhead and I just piked along, but even then I found myself late.”
“You will play, though, won’t you, sir?”
“You bet I will, Miss Honey Bird. And I pray the Lord will keep a guard
over my bow and hold it down to hymn tunes. If so be, that thar bow
should get Old Nick in it, as I’ve known it to do afore now, I might have
the whole kit and boodle footing the Highland fling or the Virginia reel
right there on the floor of the meeting house.”
Carin laughed merrily.
“Oh, do come along quick and meet papa,” she said. “You’ll be such good
friends.” She ran ahead in her eagerness, urging “Haystack Thompson” to
follow.
It had not been necessary for her to ask why he had this curious name,
for she knew very well that it had been given to him because of his wild
crop of hair, which did indeed look like a stack of hay after a bad
windstorm.
“I’d no idea that Azalea and I had come so far,” she said to her new
friend. “We wandered on and on, talking, and when we came to that lovely
hollow we couldn’t keep out of it.”
They were getting to the clearing, and they could see the people moving
toward the church. Mr. Thompson caught a glimpse of Mr. Pickett, and the
two musicians greeted each other like long-lost brothers, and walked
toward the meeting house in great enthusiasm, making an odd pair, for Mr.
Pickett, for all of his air of importance, reached no higher than Mr.
Thompson’s shoulder. Carin found her father just as he was going in the
door and dragged him back to meet her new acquaintance; and a moment
later, everyone had seen “Old Haystack” and was clamoring for his music.
Mr. Thompson was given the post of honor, and there he stood, towering up
toward the pointed roof, his faded fiddle in his hand, tears in his eyes,
smiling at his old friends.
He tuned up carefully, and ran his bow lovingly across the string a few
times, then gave a shake to the “haystack” and began to play “Old
Hundred.” At first it was as if a deep voice, full of love of God and
life were singing; then as if a chorus of children’s voices sang it in
joy; then as if the wind called it to the sea and the sea answered; then
as if the hills shouted it and the voices of all living things joined in.
Carin found herself on her feet—found herself, indeed, wishing that she
could fly. For a moment it seemed as if she were flying, but when she
looked about her, she saw that she was not, but was standing singing at
the top of her lungs with all the others. And then for an hour, while
the tall, gaunt fiddler drew his music from his instrument, and the
people followed him as if they had one voice, Carin forgot everything in
the world except the music. But suddenly it ended. The fiddler played
some minor theme which no one knew, and which was born in his brain that
moment. All the people took it for the note of parting and filed out of
the church. And once out, they seemed in little mood to talk. They had
been too deeply moved for that. They preferred to get in their vehicles
and drive off into the silence of the lonely mountain roads. Carin,
certainly, was glad that she could snuggle in the back seat of their
surrey with her mother, and sit there in quiet. She was strangely tired,
and wanted nothing in the world except to rest, and she thought, in the
back of her mind, that probably Azalea was feeling the same way. That
made her wonder how it was that she had not seen Azalea after they all
went back into the church, and she was just going to speak to her mother
about it, when Mrs. McBirney came running toward them with a white face.
“We can’t find Azalea anywhere,” she cried. “We’ve looked everywhere—pa
and Jim and Hi, and Mr. Pickett and lots of others. We can’t find her
anywhere!”