A LADY OF POWERS
Superficially and distantly considered, the woman from whom even J.
Rodney Potts must flee in terror would not be of a sort to excite the
imagination pleasurably. A less impulsive man than Solon Denney might
have found cause for misgiving in this circumstance of Potts's prompt
exodus. In the immediate flush of his triumph, however, the editor of
the _Argus_ had no leisure for negative reflections, and when misgiving
did at last find root in his mind, the time had come for him to receive
the lady. But Solon Denney was not the man to betray it if a doubting
heart beat within his breast. To the town that now lavished admiration
upon him, dubbing him "Boss" without ulterior implications, he was
confidence itself, and rife with prophecies of benefit to be derived by
our public from the advent of Mrs. Aurelia Potts. With a gallant show of
anticipation, a sprig of geranium in his lapel, he set out for the train
on that fateful morning, while Little Arcady awaited his return with a
cordial curiosity.
It was a gray day of damp air and a dull, thick sky bearing down upon
the earth--a day conducive to forebodings. But Solon Denney's spirit, to
the best of Little Arcady's belief, soared aloft to realms of pure
sunlight.
My knowledge of subsequent events that day was gained partly by word of
mouth and partly by observations which I was permitted to make.
To the hotel Solon conducted his charges, handing them from the 'bus
with a flourish that seemed to confer upon them the freedom of the city.
From shop doors and adjacent street corners the most curious among us
beheld a tall, full-figured woman of majestic carriage, with a high,
noble forehead and a face that seemed to register traces of some
thirty-five earnest but not unprofitable years. Even in the quick glance
she bestowed up and down Washington Street before the hotel swallowed
her up, her quality was to be noted by the discerning,--the quality of a
commander, of one born to prevail. The flash of her gray-green eye was
interested but unconcerned. Complemented by the marked auburn of her
plenteous hair, the eyes were masterful, advertising most legibly the
temperament of a capable ruler. The subdued, white-faced boy of twelve,
with hair like his mother's, who trotted closely at her heels was, for
the moment, a negligible factor.
An hour later I entered the sanctum of the _Argus_, to find its owner
alone before his littered table. Upon his usually careless face was the
most profoundly thoughtful look I had ever known him wear. Open before
him was that week's _Argus_, but his eyes narrowed to its neat columns
only at intervals. For the most part his gaze plunged far into virgin
realms of meditation. It was only after several reminding coughs that I
succeeded in recalling him from afield; and even then the deeply
thoughtful look remained to estrange his face from me.
"Say, Cal, do you believe in _powers_?"
"What kind of powers?"
"Well, I don't know--every kind--just _powers_--mystic, occult powers."
"I don't care to commit myself without more details," I answered with a
caution that seemed to be needed.
"Well, sir, that woman has 'em--she has _powers_--she certainly has.
There is something in her eye that paralyzes the will; you look at her
and you say yes to anything she suggests."
"For example--"
"Well, I've just agreed with her that the _Argus_ isn't what it ought to
be."
I gasped. This indeed savored of the blackest magic.
"What did she _do_ to you?"
"Just looked at me, that's all,--and took it for granted."
"Heavens! You're shivering!"
"You _wait_--wait till she talks to you! She's promised to give me a
little book," he went on dejectedly, "'One Hundred Common Errors in
Writing and Speaking,' and she says the split infinitive is a crime in
this nineteenth century. But, say, this paper would never get to press
if I took time to unsplit all my infinitives."
"Well, put Billy Durgin to work on her case right away," I said to cheer
him. "If the woman talks like that, I'll bet Billy can find some good
reason why she ought to push on after the Colonel."
Again his deeply thoughtful gaze bore upon me.
"I'm puzzled," he said,--"honestly puzzled. I don't know whether she'll
be good for this town or not. She may in a way--and in a way she may
not. She will be disturbing,--I can see that already,--but she is
stimulating. She may stir us up to nobler endeavors."
"Did she say so?"
"Well--uh--something of the sort. I believe that _was_ the expression
she used. I'll tell you what you do. You come along with me and see the
lady right now. They've had dinner by this time."
Together we went and were presently climbing the stairs that led to the
second floor of the City Hotel.
Mrs. Potts received us graciously. Upon me she bestowed a glance of
friendly curiosity, as does a kind physician who waits to be told of
symptoms before prescribing. Upon Solon she bent a more knowing look, as
upon one whose frailties have already been revealed. She gave us chairs
and she talked. Little Roscoe Potts writhed near by upon an ottoman and
betrayed that he, too, could talk when circumstances were kindly. The
detail of their personalities, salient in that first moment, was that
Heaven had denied them both the gift of reticence.
"Yes--I've been telling Mr. Denney--I feel that there is a work here for
me," she began briskly. "I felt it strongly when I perused the columns
of the newspaper which Mr. Denney was thoughtful enough to send me."
Solon's eyes uneasily sought the cabbage-like flowers in the faded
carpet of the room.
"And I feel it more strongly now that I have ventured among you,"
continued the lady, glowing upon us both.
"I have long suspected that it was a regrettable waste of energy to send
missionaries into heathen parts of the globe when there remain so many
unenlightened corners in our own land. It almost seems now as if I had
been guided here. It is true that my husband has gone, but that shall
not distress me. Rodney is a drifter--I may say a natural-born drifter,
and I cannot undertake to follow him. I shall remain here. I have been
guided--" determination gleamed in her gray-green eyes,--"I shall remain
here and teach these poor people to make something of themselves."
Solon drew a long breath. My own echoed it. Hereupon little Roscoe broke
into a high-pitched recitative.
"We are now in the great boundless West, a land of rough but
kind-hearted and worthy folk, and abounding with instructive sights and
scenes which are well calculated--"
"My son," interrupted his mother, "kindly tell the gentlemen what should
be your aim in life."
"To strive to improve my natural gifts by reading and conversation,"
answered Roscoe, in one swift breath.
"Very good--_ver-ry_ good--but for the present you may _listen_. Now,
Mr. Denney--" she turned to Solon with the latest _Argus_ in her
hand,--"perusing your sheet, my eye lights upon this sentence:--"
"'Lige Brackett Sundayed in our midst. He reports a busy time of Fall
ploughing over Bethel way.'
"Why 'Sundayed,' Mr. Denney?" She smiled brightly, almost archly, at
Solon. "I dare say you would not employ 'Mondayed' or 'Tuesdayed' or
'Wednesdayed.' You _see_? The term is what we may call a vulgarism--you
perceive that, do you not?--likewise 'in our midst,' which is not
accurate, of course, and which would be indelicate if it were. Now I let
my eye descend the column to your account of a certain social function.
You say, 'The table fairly groaned with the weight of good things, and a
good time was had by all present.' Surely, Mr. Denney, you are a man not
without culture and refinement. Had you but taken thought, you could as
well have said that 'An elegant collation was served, the menu including
many choice delicacies, and the affair was widely pronounced to be most
enjoyable.'"
Solon's frightened eyes besought me, but I could not help him, and again
he was forced to meet the kindly, almost whimsically accusing gaze of
the censor, who was by no means done with him.
"Again I read here, 'The graveyard fence needs repairing badly.' Do you
not see, Mr. Denney, how far more refined it were to say 'God's acre,'
or 'the marbled city of the dead'? I now turn from mere solecisms to the
broader question of taste. Under the heading 'Hanged in Carroll County,'
I read an item beginning, 'At eight-thirty, A.M., last Friday the soul
of Martin G. Buckley, dressed in a neat-fitting suit of black, with a
low collar and black cravat, was ushered into the presence of his God.'
Pardon me, but do we not find here, if we read closely, an attempt to
blend the material with the spiritual with a result that we can only
designate as infelicitous?"
Solon was writhing after the manner of uneasy little Roscoe. The bland
but inexorable regard of his inquisitor had subdued him beyond retort.
"I might, again, call your attention to this item." And she did, reading
with well-trained inflection:--
"'Kye Mayabb from south of town and Sym Pleydell, who rents the Clemison
farm, met up in front of Barney Skeyhan's place last Saturday afternoon
and started to settle an old grudge, while their respective better
halves looked on from across the street. Kye had Sym down and was doing
some good work with his right, when his wife called to him, "Now, Kye
Mayabb, you come right away from there before you get into trouble."
Whereupon the valiant better half of him who was being beaten to death
called out cheerily, "Don't let him scare you, Sym!" The boys made it
up afterward, but our little street was quite lively for a time.'
"Now as to that," went on Mrs. Potts, affecting to deliberate, "could we
not better have described that as 'a disgraceful street brawl'? And yet
I find no word of deprecation. It is told, indeed, with a regrettable
flippancy. Flippancy, I may note again, mars the following item: 'They
tell a good story of old Sarsius Lambert over at Bethel. His wife was
drowned a couple of weeks ago, and Link Talbot went to break the news to
the old man. "Uncle Sarsh," says Link, "your wife is drowned. She fell
in at the ford, and an hour later they found her two miles down-stream."
"Two miles an hour!" said Uncle Sarsius, in astonishment. "Well, well,
she floated down quite lively, didn't she?"'
"You will pardon me, I trust," said Mrs. Potts, "if I say it would have
been better to speak of the grief-stricken husband and to conclude with
a fitting sentiment such as 'the proudest monuments to the sleeping dead
are reared in the hearts of the living.'"
"I'll put it in next week," ventured Solon, meekly. "I didn't think of
it at the time."
"Ah, but one should _always think_, should one not?" asked Mrs. Potts,
almost sweetly. "By thinking, for example, you could elevate your sheet
by eliminating certain misapplied colloquialisms. Here I read: 'The rain
last week left the streets in a frightful state. The mud simply won't
jell.'"
Shame mantled the brow of Solon Denney.
"In short," concluded Mrs. Potts, "I regret to say that your paper is
not yet one that I could wish to put into the hands of my little
Roscoe."
Little Roscoe coughed sympathetically and remarked, before he lost his
chance for a word: "The boy of to-day is the man of to-morrow. Parents
cannot be too careful about what their little ones will read during the
long winter evenings that will soon be upon us." He coughed again when
he had finished.
"The press is a mighty lever of civilization," continued the mother,
with an approving glance at her boy, "and you, Mr. Denney, should feel
proud indeed of your sacred mission to instruct and elevate these poor
people. Of course I shall have other duties to occupy my time--"
Solon had glanced up brightly, but gloom again overspread his face as
she continued:--
"Yet I shall make it not the least of my works--if a poor weak woman may
so presume--to help you in correcting certain faults of style and taste
in your sheet, for it goes each week into many homes where the light
must be sorely needed, and surely you and I would not be adequately
sensible of our responsibilities if we continued to let it go as it is.
_Would_ we?" And again she glowed upon Solon with the condescending
sweetness of a Sabbath-school teacher to the littlest boy in her class.
But now we both breathed more freely, for she allowed the wretched
_Argus_ to drop from her disapproving fingers, and began to ask us
questions, as to a place of worship, a house suitable for residence
purposes, a school for little Roscoe, and the nature of those clubs or
societies for mental improvement that might exist among us. And she
asked about Families. We were obliged to confess that there were no
Families in Little Arcady, in the true sense of the term, though we did
not divine its true sense until she favored us with the detail that her
second cousin had married a relative of the Adams family. We said
honestly that we were devoid of Families in that sense. None of us had
ever been able to marry an Adams. No Adams with a consenting mind--not
even a partial Adams--had ever come among us.
Still, Mrs. Potts wore her distinction gracefully, and was even a little
apologetic.
"In Boston, you know, we rather like to know 'who's who,' as the saying
is."
"Out here," said Solon, "we like to know what's what." He had revived
wonderfully after his beloved _Argus_ was dropped. But at his retort the
lady merely elevated her rather fine brows and remarked, "Really, Mr.
Denney, you speak much as you write--you must not let me forget to give
you that little book I spoke of."
As we went down the stairs Solon placed "One Hundred Common Errors in
Speaking and Writing" close under his arm, adroitly shielding the title
from public scrutiny. We stood a moment in the autumn silence outside
the hotel door, watching a maple across the street, the line of its
boughs showing strong and black amid its airy yellow plumage. The still
air was full of leaves that sailed to earth in leisurely sadness. We
were both thoughtful.
"Mrs. Potts is a very alert and capable woman," I said at last, having
decided that this would be the most suitable thing to say.
"I tell you she has _powers_," said Solon, in a tone almost of awe.
"She will teach you to make something of yourself," I hazarded.
"One minute she makes me want to fight, and the next I surrender," he
answered pathetically.
We separated on this, Solon going toward the _Argus_ office with slow
steps and bowed head, while I went thoughtfully abroad to ease my nerves
by watching the splendid death of summer. Above the hills, now royally
colored, as by great rugs of brown and crimson velvet flung over their
flanks, I seemed to hear the echoes of ironic laughter--the laughter of
perverse gods who had chosen to avenge the slight put upon an inferior
Potts.