ASAPH

About a hundred feet back from the main street of a village in New

Jersey there stood a very good white house. Half-way between it and

the sidewalk was a large chestnut-tree, which had been the pride of

Mr. Himes, who built the house, and was now the pride of Mrs. Himes,

his widow, who lived there.

Under the tree was a bench, and on the bench were two elderly men,

both smoking pipes, and each one of them leaning forward with his

elbows on his knees. One of these, Thomas Rooper by name, was a

small man with gray side-whiskers, a rather thin face, and very good

clothes. His pipe was a meerschaum, handsomely colored, with a long

amber tip. He had bought that pipe while on a visit to Philadelphia

during the great Centennial Exposition; and if any one noticed it

and happened to remark what a fine pipe it was, that person would be

likely to receive a detailed account of the circumstances of its

purchase, with an appendix relating to the Main Building, the Art

Building, the Agricultural Building, and many other salient points

of the great Exposition which commemorated the centennial of our

national independence.

The other man, Asaph Scantle, was of a different type. He was a

little older than his companion, but if his hair were gray, it did

not show very much, as his rather long locks were of a sandy hue and

his full face was clean shaven, at least on Wednesdays and Sundays.

He was tall, round-shouldered, and his clothes were not good,

possessing very evident claims to a position on the retired list.

His pipe consisted of a common clay bowl with a long reed stem.

For some minutes the two men continued to puff together as if they

were playing a duet upon tobacco-pipes, and then Asaph, removing his

reed from his lips, remarked, "What you ought to do, Thomas, is to

marry money."

"There's sense in that," replied the other; "but you wasn't the

first to think of it."

Asaph, who knew very well that Mr. Rooper never allowed any one to

suppose that he received suggestions from without, took no notice of

the last remark, but went on: "Lookin' at the matter in a friendly

way, it seems to me it stands to reason that when the shingles on a

man's house is so rotten that the rain comes through into every room

on the top floor, and when the plaster on the ceilin' is tumblin'

down more or less all the time, and the window-sashes is all loose,

and things generally in a condition that he can't let that house

without spendin' at least a year's rent on it to git it into decent

order, and when a man's got to the time of life--"

"There's nothin' the matter with the time of life," said Thomas;

"that's all right."

"What I was goin' to say was," continued Asaph, "that when a man

gits to the time of life when he knows what it is to be comfortable

in his mind as well as his body--and that time comes to sensible

people as soon as they git fairly growed up--he don't want to give

up his good room in the tavern and all the privileges of the house,

and go to live on his own property and have the plaster come down on

his own head and the rain come down on the coverlet of his own bed."

"No, he don't," said Thomas; "and what is more, he isn't goin' to do

it. But what I git from the rent of that house is what I have to

live on; there's no gittin' around that pint."

"Well, then," said Asaph, "if you don't marry money, what are you

goin' to do? You can't go back to your old business."

"I never had but one business," said Thomas. "I lived with my folks

until I was a good deal more than growed up; and when the war broke

out I went as sutler to the rigiment from this place; and all the

money I made I put into my property in the village here. That's what

I've lived on ever since. There's no more war, so there's no more

sutlers, except away out West where I wouldn't go; and there are no

more folks, for they are all dead; and if what Mrs. McJimsey says is

true, there'll be no more tenants in my house after the 1st of next

November. For when the McJimseys go on account of want of general

repairs, it is not to be expected that anybody else will come there.

There's nobody in this place that can stand as much as the McJimseys

can."

"Consequently," said Asaph, deliberately filling his pipe, "it

stands to reason that there ain't nothin' for you to do but marry

money."

Thomas Rooper took his pipe from his mouth and sat up straight.

Gazing steadfastly at his companion, he remarked, "If you think that

is such a good thing to do, why don't you do it yourself? There

can't be anybody much harder up than you are."

"The law's agin' my doin' it," said Asaph. "A man can't marry his

sister."

"Are you thinkin' of Marietta Himes?" asked Mr. Rooper.

"That's the one I'm thinkin' of," said Asaph. "If you can think of

anybody better, I'd like you to mention her."

Mr. Rooper did not immediately speak. He presently asked, "What do

you call money?"

"Well," said Asaph, with a little hesitation, "considerin' the

circumstances, I should say that in a case like this about fifteen

hundred a year, a first-rate house with not a loose shingle on it

nor a crack anywhere, a good garden and an orchard, two cows, a

piece of meadow-land on the other side of the creek, and all the

clothes a woman need have, is money."

Thomas shrugged his shoulders. "Clothes!" he said. "If she marries

she'll go out of black, and then she'll have to have new ones, and

lots of 'em. That would make a big hole in her money, Asaph."

The other smiled. "I always knowed you was a far-seein' feller,

Thomas; but it stands to reason that Marietta's got a lot of clothes

that was on hand before she went into mournin', and she's not the

kind of woman to waste 'em. She'll be twistin' 'em about and makin'

'em over to suit the fashions, and it won't be like her to be buyin'

new colored goods when she's got plenty of 'em already."

There was now another pause in the conversation, and then Mr. Rooper

remarked, "Mrs. Himes must be gettin' on pretty well in years."

"She's not a young woman," said Asaph; "but if she was much younger

she wouldn't have you, and if she was much older you wouldn't have

her. So it strikes me she's just about the right pint."

"How old was John Himes when he died?" asked Thomas.

"I don't exactly know that; but he was a lot older than Marietta."

Thomas shook his head. "It strikes me," said he, "that John Himes

had a hearty constitution and hadn't ought to died as soon as he

did. He fell away a good deal in the last years of his life."

"And considerin' that he died of consumption, he had a right to fall

away," said Asaph. "If what you are drivin' at, Thomas, is that

Marietta isn't a good housekeeper and hasn't the right sort of

notions of feedin', look at me. I've lived with Marietta just about

a year, and in that time I have gained forty-two pounds. Now, of

course, I ain't unreasonable, and don't mean to say that you would

gain forty-two pounds in a year, 'cause you ain't got the frame and

bone to put it on; but it wouldn't surprise me a bit if you was to

gain twenty, or even twenty-five, pounds in eighteen months, anyway;

and more than that you ought not to ask, Thomas, considerin' your

height and general build."

"Isn't Marietta Himes a good deal of a freethinker?" asked Thomas.

"A what?" cried Asaph. "You mean an infidel?"

"No," said Thomas, "I don't charge nobody with nothin' more than

there's reason for; but they do say that she goes sometimes to one

church and sometimes to another, and that if there was a Catholic

church in this village she would go to that. And who's goin' to say

where a woman will turn up when she don't know her own mind better

than that?"

Asaph colored a little. "The place where Marietta will turn up,"

said he, warmly, "is on a front seat in the kingdom of heaven; and

if the people that talk about her will mend their ways, they'll see

that I am right. You need not trouble yourself about that, Thomas.

Marietta Himes is pious to the heel."

Mr. Rooper now shifted himself a little on the bench and crossed one

leg over the other. "Now look here, Asaph," he said, with a little

more animation than he had yet shown, "supposin' all you say is

true, have you got any reason to think that Mrs. Himes ain't

satisfied with things as they are?"

"Yes, I have," said Asaph. "And I don't mind tellin' you that the

thing she's least satisfied with is me. She wants a man in the

house; that is nateral. She wouldn't be Marietta Himes if she

didn't. When I come to live with her I thought the whole business

was settled; but it isn't. I don't suit her. I don't say she's

lookin' for another man, but if another man was to come along, and

if he was the right kind of a man, it's my opinion she's ready for

him. I wouldn't say this to everybody, but I say it to you, Thomas

Rooper, 'cause I know what kind of a man you are."

Mr. Rooper did not return the compliment. "I don't wonder your

sister ain't satisfied with you," he said, "for you go ahead of all

the lazy men I ever saw yet. They was sayin' down at the tavern

yesterday--only yesterday--that you could do less work in more time

than anybody they ever saw before."

"There's two ways of workin'," said Asaph. "Some people work with

their hands and some with their heads."

Thomas grimly smiled. "It strikes me," said he, "that the most

head-work you do is with your jaws."

Asaph was not the man to take offence readily, especially when he

considered it against his interest to do so, and he showed no

resentment at this remark. "'Tain't so much my not makin' myself

more generally useful," he said, "that Marietta objects to; though,

of course, it could not be expected that a man that hasn't got any

interest in property would keep workin' at it like a man that has

got an interest in it, such as Marietta's husband would have; but

it's my general appearance that she don't like. She's told me more

than once she didn't so much mind my bein' lazy as lookin' lazy."

"I don't wonder she thinks that way," said Thomas. "But look here,

Asaph, do you suppose that if Marietta Himes was to marry a man, he

would really come into her property?"

"There ain't nobody that knows my sister better than I know her, and

I can say, without any fear of bein' contradicted, that when she

gives herself to a man the good-will and fixtures will be included."

Thomas Rooper now leaned forward with his elbows on his knees

without smoking, and Asaph Scantle leaned forward with his elbows on

his knees without smoking. And thus they remained, saying nothing to

each other, for the space of some ten minutes.

Asaph was a man who truly used his head a great deal more than he

used his hands. He had always been a shiftless fellow, but he was no

fool, and this his sister found out soon after she asked him to come

and make his home with her. She had not done this because she wanted

a man in the house, for she had lived two or three years without

that convenience and had not felt the need of it. But she heard that

Asaph was in very uncomfortable circumstances, and she had sent for

him solely for his own good. The arrangement proved to be a very

good one for her brother, but not a good one for her. She had always

known that Asaph's head was his main dependence, but she was just

beginning to discover that he liked to use his head so that other

people's hands should work for him.

"There ain't nobody comin' to see your sister, is there?" asked

Thomas, suddenly.

"Not a livin' soul," said Asaph, "except women, married folk, and

children. But it has always surprised me that nobody did come; but

just at this minute the field's clear and the gate's open."

"Well," said Mr. Rooper, "I'll think about it."

"That's right," said Asaph, rubbing his knees with his hands.

"That's right. But now tell me, Thomas Rooper, supposin' you get

Marietta, what are you goin' to do for me?"

"For you?" exclaimed the other. "What have you got to do with it?"

"A good deal," said Asaph. "If you get Marietta with her fifteen

hundred a year--and it wouldn't surprise me if it was eighteen

hundred--and her house and her garden and her cattle and her field

and her furniture, with not a leg loose nor a scratch, you will get

her because I proposed her to you, and because I backed you up

afterward. And now, then, I want to know what you are goin' to do

for me?"

"What do you want?" asked Thomas.

"The first thing I want," said Asaph, "is a suit of clothes. These

clothes is disgraceful."

"You are right there," said Mr. Rooper. "I wonder your sister lets

you come around in front of the house. But what do you mean by

clothes--winter clothes or summer clothes?"

"Winter," said Asaph, without hesitation. "I don't count summer

clothes. And when I say a suit of clothes, I mean shoes and hat and

underclothes."

Mr. Rooper gave a sniff. "I wonder you don't say overcoat," he

remarked.

"I do say overcoat," replied Asaph. "A suit of winter clothes is a

suit of clothes that you can go out into the weather in without

missin' nothin'."

Mr. Rooper smiled sarcastically. "Is there anything else you want?"

he asked.

"Yes," said Asaph, decidedly; "there is. I want a umbrella."

"Cotton or silk?"

Asaph hesitated. He had never had a silk umbrella in his hand in his

life. He was afraid to strike too high, and he answered, "I want a

good stout gingham."