have been shut up and left to itself fifty years before, when the
minister died, so soon the grass grows up after men's footsteps have
worn it down, and the traces are lost of the daily touch and care of
their hands. The home lot was evidently part of a pasture, and the sheep
had nibbled close to the door-step, while tags of their long, spring
wool, washed clean by summer rains, were caught in the rose-bushes near
by.
It had been a very good house in its day, and had a dignity of its own,
holding its gray head high, as if it knew itself to be not merely a
farm-house, but a Parsonage. The roof looked as if the next winter's
weight of snow might break it in, and the window panes had been loosened
so much in their shaking frames that many of them had fallen out on the
north side of the house, and were lying on the long grass underneath,
blurred and thin but still unbroken. That was the last letter of the
house's death warrant, for now the rain could get in, and the crumbling
timbers must loose their hold of each other quickly. I had found a dry
corner of the old shed for the horse and left her there, looking most
ruefully over her shoulder after me as I hurried away, for the rain had
already begun to spatter down in earnest. I was not sorry when I found
that somebody had broken a pane of glass in the sidelight of the front
door, near the latch, and I was very pleased when I found that by
reaching through I could unfasten a great bolt and let myself in, as
perhaps some tramp in search of shelter had done before me. However, I
gave the blackened brass knocker a ceremonious rap or two, and I could
have told by the sound of it, if in no other way, that there was nobody
at home. I looked up to see a robin's nest on the cornice overhead, and
I had to push away the lilacs and a withered hop vine which were both
trying to cover up the door.
It gives one a strange feeling, I think, to go into an empty house so
old as this. It was so still there that the noise my footsteps made
startled me, and the floor creaked and cracked as if some one followed
me about. There was hardly a straw left or a bit of string or paper, but
the rooms were much worn, the bricks in the fire-places were burnt out,
rough and crumbling, and the doors were all worn smooth and round at the
edges. The best rooms were wainscoted, but up-stairs there was a long,
unfinished room with a little square window at each end, under the
sloping roof, and as I listened there to the rain I remembered that I
had once heard an old man say wistfully, that he had slept in just such
a "linter" chamber as this when he was a boy, and that he never could
sleep anywhere now so well as he used there while the rain fell on the
roof just over his bed.
Down-stairs I found a room which I knew must have been the study. It was
handsomely wainscoted, and the finish of it was even better than that of
the parlor. It must have been a most comfortable place, and I fear the
old parson was luxurious in his tastes and less ascetic, perhaps, than
the more puritanical members of his congregation approved. There was a
great fire-place with a broad hearth-stone, where I think he may have
made a mug of flip sometimes, and there were several curious, narrow,
little cupboards built into the wall at either side, and over the
fire-place itself two doors opened and there were shelves inside,
broader at the top as the chimney sloped back. I saw some writing on one
of these doors and went nearer to read it. There was a date at the top,
some time in 1802, and his reverence had had a good quill pen and ink
which bravely stood the test of time; he must have been a tall man to
have written so high. I thought it might be some record of a great storm
or other notable event in his house or parish, but I was amused to find
that he had written there on the unpainted wood some valuable recipes
for the medical treatment of horses. "It is Useful for a Sprain--and For
a Cough, Take of Elecampane"--and so on. I hope he was not a hunting
parson, but one could hardly expect to find any reference to the early
fathers or federal head-ship in Adam on the cupboard door. I thought of
the stories I had heard of the old minister and felt very well
acquainted with him, though his books had been taken down and his fire
was out, and he himself had gone away. I was glad to think what a good,
faithful man he was, who spoke comfortable words to his people and lived
pleasantly with them in this quiet country place so many years. There
are old people living who have told me that nobody preaches nowadays as
he used to preach, and that he used to lift his hat to everybody; that
he liked a good dinner, and always was kind to the poor.
I thought as I stood in the study, how many times he must have looked
out of the small-paned western windows across the fields, and how in his
later days he must have had a treasure of memories of the people who had
gone out of that room the better for his advice and consolation, the
people whom he had helped and taught and ruled. I could not imagine
that he ever angrily took his parishioners to task for their errors of
doctrine; indeed, it was not of his active youth and middle age that I
thought at all, but of the last of his life, when he sat here in the
sunshine of a winter afternoon, and the fire flickered and snapped on
the hearth, and he sat before it in his arm-chair with a brown old book
which he laid on his knee while he thought and dozed, and roused himself
presently to greet somebody who came in, a little awed at first, to talk
with him. It was a great thing to be a country minister in those old
days, and to be such a minister as he was; truly the priest and ruler of
his people. The times have changed, and the temporal power certainly is
taken away. The divine right of ministers is almost as little believed
in as that of kings, by many people; it is not possible for the
influence to be so great, the office and the man are both looked at with
less reverence. It is a pity that it should be so, but the conservative
people who like old-fashioned ways cannot tell where to place all the
blame. And it is very odd to think that these iconoclastic and
unpleasant new times of ours will, a little later, be called old times,
and that the children, when they are elderly people, will sigh to have
them back again.
I was very glad to see the old house, and I told myself a great many
stories there, as one cannot help doing in such a place. There must have
been so many things happen in so many long lives which were lived there;
people have come into the world and gone out of it again from those
square rooms with their little windows, and I believe if there are
ghosts who walk about in daylight I was only half deaf to their voices,
and heard much of what they tried to tell me that day. The rooms which
had looked empty at first were filled again with the old clergymen, who
met together with important looks and complacent dignity, and eager talk
about some minor point in theology that is yet unsettled; the awkward,
smiling couples, who came to be married; the mistress of the house, who
must have been a stately person in her day; the little children who,
under all their shyness, remembered the sugar-plums in the old parson's
pockets,--all these, and even the tall cane that must have stood in the
entry, were visible to my mind's eye. And I even heard a sermon from the
old preacher who died so long ago, on the beauty of a life well spent.
The rain fell steadily and there was no prospect of its stopping, though
I could see that the clouds were thinner and that it was only a shower.
In the kitchen I found an old chair which I pulled into the study, which
seemed more cheerful than the rest of the house, and then I remembered
that there were some bits of board in the kitchen also, and the thought
struck me that it would be good fun to make a fire in the old
fire-place. Everything seemed right about the chimney. I even went up
into the garret to look at it there, for I had no wish to set the
parsonage on fire, and I brought down a pile of old corn husks for
kindlings which I found on the garret floor. I built my fire carefully,
with two bricks for andirons, and when I lit it it blazed up gayly, I
poked it and it crackled, and though I was very well contented there
alone I wished for some friend to keep me company, it was selfish to
have so much pleasure with no one to share it. The rain came faster than
ever against the windows, and the room would have been dark if it had
not been for my fire, which threw out a magnificent yellow light over
the old brown wood-work. I leaned back and watched the dry sticks fall
apart in red coals and thought I might have to spend the night there,
for if it were a storm and not a shower I was several miles from home,
and a late October rain is not like a warm one in June to fall upon
one's shoulders. I could hear the house leaking when it rained less
heavily, and the soot dropped down the chimney and great drops of water
came down, too, and spluttered in the fire. I thought what a merry thing
it would be if a party of young people ever had to take refuge there,
and I could almost see their faces and hear them laugh, though until
that minute they had been strangers to me.
But the shower was over at last, and my fire was out, and the last pale
shining of the sun came into the windows, and I looked out to see the
distant fields and woods all clear again in the late afternoon light. I
must hurry to get home before dark, so I raked up the ashes and left my
chair beside the fire-place, and shut and fastened the front door after
me, and went out to see what had become of my horse, shaking the dust
and cobwebs off my dress as I crossed the wet grass to the shed. The
rain had come through the broken roof and poor Sheila looked anxious and
hungry as if she thought I might have meant to leave her there till
morning in that dismal place. I offered her my apologies, but she made
even a shorter turn than usual when I had mounted, and we scurried off
down the road, spattering ourselves as we went. I hope the ghosts who
live in the parsonage watched me with friendly eyes, and I looked back
myself, to see a thin blue whiff of smoke still coming up from the great
chimney. I wondered who it was that had made the first fire there,--but
I think I shall have made the last.
_Tom's Husband_
I shall not dwell long upon the circumstances that led to the marriage
of my hero and heroine; though their courtship was, to them, the only
one that has ever noticeably approached the ideal, it had many aspects
in which it was entirely commonplace in other people's eyes. While the
world in general smiles at lovers with kindly approval and sympathy, it
refuses to be aware of the unprecedented delight which is amazing to the
lovers themselves.
But, as has been true in many other cases, when they were at last
married, the most ideal of situations was found to have been changed to
the most practical. Instead of having shared their original duties, and,
as school-boys would say, going halves, they discovered that the cares
of life had been doubled. This led to some distressing moments for both
our friends; they understood suddenly that instead of dwelling in heaven
they were still upon earth, and had made themselves slaves to new laws
and limitations. Instead of being freer and happier than ever before,
they had assumed new responsibilities; they had established a new
household, and must fulfill in some way or another the obligations of
it. They looked back with affection to their engagement; they had been
longing to have each other to themselves, apart from the world, but it
seemed that they never felt so keenly that they were still units in
modern society. Since Adam and Eve were in Paradise, before the devil
joined them, nobody has had a chance to imitate that unlucky couple. In
some respects they told the truth when, twenty times a day, they said
that life had never been so pleasant before; but there were mental
reservations on either side which might have subjected them to the
accusation of lying. Somehow, there was a little feeling of
disappointment, and they caught themselves wondering--though they would
have died sooner than confess it--whether they were quite so happy as
they had expected. The truth was, they were much happier than people
usually are, for they had an uncommon capacity for enjoyment. For a
little while they were like a sail-boat that is beating and has to drift
a few minutes before it can catch the wind and start off on the other
tack. And they had the same feeling, too, that any one is likely to have
who has been long pursuing some object of his ambition or desire.
Whether it is a coin, or a picture, or a stray volume of some old
edition of Shakespeare, or whether it is an office under government or a
lover, when fairly in one's grasp there is a loss of the eagerness that
was felt in pursuit. Satisfaction, even after one has dined well, is not
so interesting and eager a feeling as hunger.
My hero and heroine were reasonably well established to begin with: they
each had some money, though Mr. Wilson had most. His father had at one
time been a rich man, but with the decline, a few years before, of
manufacturing interests, he had become, mostly through the fault of
others, somewhat involved; and at the time of his death his affairs were
in such a condition that it was still a question whether a very large
sum or a moderately large one would represent his estate. Mrs. Wilson,
Tom's step-mother, was somewhat of an invalid; she suffered severely at
times with asthma, but she was almost entirely relieved by living in
another part of the country. While her husband lived, she had accepted
her illness as inevitable, and rarely left home; but during the last few
years she had lived in Philadelphia with her own people, making short
and wheezing visits only from time to time, and had not undergone a
voluntary period of suffering since the occasion of Tom's marriage,
which she had entirely approved. She had a sufficient property of her
own, and she and Tom were independent of each other in that way. Her
only other stepchild was a daughter, who had married a navy officer, and
had at this time gone out to spend three years (or less) with her
husband, who had been ordered to Japan.
It is not unfrequently noticed that in many marriages one of the persons
who choose each other as partners for life is said to have thrown
himself or herself away, and the relatives and friends look on with
dismal forebodings and ill-concealed submission. In this case it was the
wife who might have done so much better, according to public opinion.
She did not think so herself, luckily, either before marriage or
afterward, and I do not think it occurred to her to picture to herself
the sort of career which would have been her alternative. She had been
an only child, and had usually taken her own way. Some one once said
that it was a great pity that she had not been obliged to work for her
living, for she had inherited a most uncommon business talent, and,
without being disreputably keen at a bargain, her insight into the
practical working of affairs was very clear and far-reaching. Her
father, who had also been a manufacturer, like Tom's, had often said it
had been a mistake that she was a girl instead of a boy. Such executive
ability as hers is often wasted in the more contracted sphere of women,
and is apt to be more a disadvantage than a help. She was too
independent and self-reliant for a wife; it would seem at first thought
that she needed a wife herself more than she did a husband. Most men
like best the women whose natures cling and appeal to theirs for
protection. But Tom Wilson, while he did not wish to be protected
himself, liked these very qualities in his wife which would have
displeased some other men; to tell the truth, he was very much in love
with his wife just as she was. He was a successful collector of almost
everything but money, and during a great part of his life he had been an
invalid, and he had grown, as he laughingly confessed, very
old-womanish. He had been badly lamed, when a boy, by being caught in
some machinery in his father's mill, near which he was idling one
afternoon, and though he had almost entirely outgrown the effect of his
injury, it had not been until after many years. He had been in college,
but his eyes had given out there, and he had been obliged to leave in
the middle of his junior year, though he had kept up a pleasant
intercourse with the members of his class, with whom he had been a great
favorite. He was a good deal of an idler in the world. I do not think
his ambition, except in the case of securing Mary Dunn for his wife, had
ever been distinct; he seemed to make the most he could of each day as
it came, without making all his days' works tend toward some grand
result, and go toward the upbuilding of some grand plan and purpose. He
consequently gave no promise of being either distinguished or great.
When his eyes would allow, he was an indefatigable reader; and although
he would have said that he read only for amusement, yet he amused
himself with books that were well worth the time he spent over them.
The house where he lived nominally belonged to his step-mother, but she
had taken for granted that Tom would bring his wife home to it, and
assured him that it should be to all intents and purposes his. Tom was
deeply attached to the old place, which was altogether the pleasantest
in town. He had kept bachelor's hall there most of the time since his
father's death, and he had taken great pleasure, before his marriage, in
refitting it to some extent, though it was already comfortable and
furnished in remarkably good taste. People said of him that if it had
not been for his illnesses, and if he had been a poor boy, he probably
would have made something of himself. As it was, he was not very well
known by the towns-people, being somewhat reserved, and not taking much
interest in their every-day subjects of conversation. Nobody liked him
so well as they liked his wife, yet there was no reason why he should be
disliked enough to have much said about him.
After our friends had been married for some time, and had outlived the
first strangeness of the new order of things, and had done their duty to
their neighbors with so much apparent willingness and generosity that
even Tom himself was liked a great deal better than he ever had been
before, they were sitting together one stormy evening in the library,
before the fire. Mrs. Wilson had been reading Tom the letters which had
come to him by the night's mail. There was a long one from his sister in
Nagasaki, which had been written with a good deal of ill-disguised
reproach. She complained of the smallness of the income of her share in
her father's estate, and said that she had been assured by American
friends that the smaller mills were starting up everywhere, and
beginning to do well again. Since so much of their money was invested in
the factory, she had been surprised and sorry to find by Tom's last
letters that he had seemed to have no idea of putting in a proper person
as superintendent, and going to work again. Four per cent. on her other
property, which she had been told she must soon expect instead of eight,
would make a great difference to her. A navy captain in a foreign port
was obliged to entertain a great deal, and Tom must know that it cost
them much more to live than it did him, and ought to think of their
interests. She hoped he would talk over what was best to be done with
their mother (who had been made executor, with Tom, of his father's
will).
Tom laughed a little, but looked disturbed. His wife had said something
to the same effect, and his mother had spoken once or twice in her
letters of the prospect of starting the mill again. He was not a bit of
a business man, and he did not feel certain, with the theories which he
had arrived at of the state of the country, that it was safe yet to
spend the money which would have to be spent in putting the mill in
order. "They think that the minute it is going again we shall be making
money hand over hand, just as father did when we were children," he
said. "It is going to cost us no end of money before we can make
anything. Before father died he meant to put in a good deal of new
machinery, I remember. I don't know anything about the business myself,
and I would have sold out long ago if I had had an offer that came
anywhere near the value. The larger mills are the only ones that are
good for anything now, and we should have to bring a crowd of French
Canadians here; the day is past for the people who live in this part of
the country to go into the factory again. Even the Irish all go West
when they come into the country, and don't come to places like this any
more."
"But there are a good many of the old work-people down in the village,"
said Mrs. Wilson. "Jack Towne asked me the other day if you weren't
going to start up in the spring."
Tom moved uneasily in his chair. "I'll put you in for superintendent, if
you like," he said, half angrily, whereupon Mary threw the newspaper at
him; but by the time he had thrown it back he was in good humor again.
"Do you know, Tom," she said, with amazing seriousness, "that I believe
I should like nothing in the world so much as to be the head of a large
business? I hate keeping house,--I always did; and I never did so much
of it in all my life put together as I have since I have been married. I
suppose it isn't womanly to say so, but if I could escape from the whole
thing I believe I should be perfectly happy. If you get rich when the
mill is going again, I shall beg for a housekeeper, and shirk
everything. I give you fair warning. I don't believe I keep this house
half so well as you did before I came here."
Tom's eyes twinkled. "I am going to have that glory,--I don't think you
do, Polly; but you can't say that I have not been forbearing. I
certainly have not told you more than twice how we used to have things
cooked. I'm not going to be your kitchen-colonel."
"Of course it seemed the proper thing to do," said his wife,
meditatively; "but I think we should have been even happier than we have
if I had been spared it. I have had some days of wretchedness that I
shudder to think of. I never know what to have for breakfast; and I
ought not to say it, but I don't mind the sight of dust. I look upon
housekeeping as my life's great discipline;" and at this pathetic
confession they both laughed heartily.
"I've a great mind to take it off your hands," said Tom. "I always
rather liked it, to tell the truth, and I ought to be a better
housekeeper,--I have been at it for five years; though housekeeping for
one is different from what it is for two, and one of them a woman. You
see you have brought a different element into my family. Luckily, the
servants are pretty well drilled. I do think you upset them a good deal
at first!"
Mary Wilson smiled as if she only half heard what he was saying. She
drummed with her foot on the floor and looked intently at the fire, and
presently gave it a vigorous poking. "Well?" said Tom, after he had
waited patiently as long as he could.
"Tom! I'm going to propose something to you. I wish you would really do
as you said, and take all the home affairs under your care, and let me
start the mill. I am certain I could manage it. Of course I should get
people who understood the thing to teach me. I believe I was made for
it; I should like it above all things. And this is what I will do: I
will bear the cost of starting it, myself,--I think I have money enough,
or can get it; and if I have not put affairs in the right trim at the
end of a year I will stop, and you may make some other arrangement. If I
have, you and your mother and sister can pay me back."
"So I am going to be the wife, and you the husband," said Tom, a little
indignantly; "at least, that is what people will say. It's a regular
Darby and Joan affair, and you think you can do more work in a day than
I can do in three. Do you know that you must go to town to buy cotton?
And do you know there are a thousand things about it that you don't
know?"
"And never will?" said Mary, with perfect good humor. "Why, Tom, I can
learn as well as you, and a good deal better, for I like business, and
you don't. You forget that I was always father's right-hand man after I
was a dozen years old, and that you have let me invest my money and some
of your own, and I haven't made a blunder yet."
Tom thought that his wife had never looked so handsome or so happy. "I
don't care, I should rather like the fun of knowing what people will
say. It is a new departure, at any rate. Women think they can do
everything better than men in these days, but I'm the first man,
apparently, who has wished he were a woman."