The very next day after I gin the Elder such a talkin to, Cassandra and
Nathan Spooner come to our house a visitin, or that is, Nathan brought
Cassandra up as far as there for a drive, in the mornin’, and I made ’em
come in and stay to dinner, Cassandra not bein’ very strong. They have
got a young babe, a boy, five weeks old that very day. Wall, while they
was there, while I was a gettin’ dinner, I had a letter from Kitty.
Kitty had gone home two weeks before, unexpected. A letter bein’ had by
her from her mother, to that effect.
I never shall forget the day Kitty went. Never. Josiah had hitched up to
take her to say good bye to the children, and they hadn’t been gone
more’n several moments, when Kellup Cobb come. He had heerd the news of
her goin’ home, and he looked anxious and careworn. And his hair and
whiskers and eyebrows bein’ a sort of a dark mournful color that day,
made him look worse. He had been foolin’ with logwood and alum, and a
lot of such stuff.
He said, “he was fairly beat out a layin’ awake the night before.”
“What ails you?” says I. “What is the matter?”
“Wimmen is what ails me!” says he with a bitter look. “Wimmen is what is
the matter! Why,” says he, “wimmen make such fools of themselves about
me, that it is a wonder that I get any sleep at all; I shouldn’t,” says
he firmly, “I know I shouldn’t, if I didn’t get so sleepy and sort o’
drowse off.”
“Well,” says I reasonably, “I don’t s’pose we should any of us get much
sleep, if it wasn’t for that.”
Says he, speakin’ out firm and decided, “I want to do right. I want to
do the fair thing by wimmen. But there it is. How can I? Now here is
Kitty Smith goin off droopin’ and low-sperited, I s’pose, jest on my
account. And situated as I be, how be I goin’ to help myself, or chirk
her up before she goes?
“I think my eyes of that girl. And I jest about made up my mind, last
night, in the dead of night (for I don’t believe I slept a wink before
ten o’clock), I jest about made up my mind that marry her I would, and
let the rest of the wimmen live or die, jist as they was a mind to.
“Why, I think so much of that girl, that it jest about kills me to think
of her goin off home, as them without hope. But what can I do? I dassent
say right out that I will marry her, till I look round and see what
would foller. I want to see the doctor! I want to see what he thinks, if
he thinks the effects of such a terrible blow onto the fair sect would
be worse at this time of the year. It is a sickly time. Mebby they would
stand it better some other time of the year.
“But,” says he, “this I think I may safely promise you; this, I think,
will chirk her up a good deal: I will write to her. I will kinder watch
things, and enquire ’round, and see what I can do—see how they would
seem likely to stand it, and if I see it haint likely to kill ten or
fifteen, I will try to get round and marry her. You tell her so from me.
And tell her I will write to her, anyway. My very heart-strings seemed
wrapped round that girl,” says he, sithin’ hard, “and how I am a goin’
to stand it is more than I can tell, to think of her bein’ way off there
alone, a sufferin’ and droopin’ round, on my account.
“But this letter will probable be the greatest comfort she can have next
to havin’ me myself. You will be apt to write to her?” says he
anxiously.
“Yes,” says I, “most probable I shall.”
“Wall,” says he, “I will put in a letter with you when you write. It
haint the postage that is the stick with me, it haint the 3 cents I
mind. But if I can’t, after all my efforts, see my way clear to marry
her, it would seem more cruel and cold-blooded in me, to have gin her
the encouragement of sendin her a letter by myself, all stamped and paid
for by me, than it would to send it in with somebody else.” Says he,
“Don’t you think so?”
Says I in a sort of a blind way, “I think of a great many things that it
wouldn’t do to tell of.”
“Yes,” says he, “you probable pity me, and realize the situation I am
placed in, more than you feel free to tell. You probable think that
sympathy would break me down—make me feel worse.”
“Yes,” says I firmly, “I don’t feel free to tell my opinion of you. It
would be apt to make you feel worse.”
“You are a woman of principle, Josiah Allen’s wife, and a woman of
strong sense. You realize my situation—you feel for the condition of my
heart.”
“Yes, and your head too,” says I; “I realize jist what has ailed you,
ever sense you was born. But,” says I, wantin’ to turn the subject, for
I was sick of it, sick as a dog. Says I “you wuzn’t to meetin’ last
night wuz you?” Says I, “We wimmen talked it over after the meetin’, and
we are goin to take up a collection to make Miss Bamber a present of a
new black dress. We are goin’ to ask each church-member to give jest one
sixpence, and one sixpence apiece from the 250 members will get her a
good bumbazeen dress, or a very nice alpacka. And so,” says I, “I
thought I would ask you for your sixpence.”
Knowin’ it is Kellup’s duty to be tackled for the good of the
meetin-house, I will, no matter whether he will give anything or not, I
will insist on tacklin’ him.
Says I, “You know Miss Bamber has lost her mother-in-law and wants to
mourn for her—wants to the worst kind, and can’t.”
“Why can’t she mourn?” says Kellup.
“Why,” says I, “She can’t mourn, because she haint got no dress suitable
to mourn in, thats why Miss Bamber feels like death about it. She knows
it is her duty to mourn, and she wants to, like a dog, but can’t.”
Says Kellup, lookin stingy, awful unwillin’ to give anything, “She can
mourn jest as bad in one dress as another, or without any.”
“Wall,” says I reasonably, “So I think. But everybody has their little
different ways and excentricities, and it don’t look well for us to
meddle with ’em. Now that feller by the name of Procrustes, at Attica
village. Now, I always thought he went too far. He had a iron bedstead,
and he used to make everybody that traveled his way lay down on it, and
if their legs was too short, he would stretch ’em out to fit that
bedstead, and if they was too long, he would saw ’em off.”
Now Mr. Procrustes wuzn’t doin’ exactly the fair thing. What earthly
business was it of his, if other folks’es legs was too long to be
convenient, or too short? It wuzn’t his place to trim ’em off, or
stretch ’em.
And I always thought that if I had had business in his neighborhood, and
been travelin’ that way, and he had tried to fit me or Josiah to that
bedstead, why, I always thought he would have seen trouble. I should
have gin him a awful talkin’ to, and kicked.
Mr. Procrustes is dead. Yes, I believe old Thesius, a neighber of
his’en, killed him upon some mountain or other. I presume he got to
stretchin’ old Thesius’es legs out, or begun to saw ’em off, and got the
old man mad, and he jest laid to and killed him.
[Illustration: TAKIN’ A REEF.]
Yes, I believe old Mr. Procrustes hain’t livin’ at the present time, but
he left a large, a very large family. And every one of ’em inherits the
old gentleman’s traits and disposition. I have seen lots of ’em that, if
they dast, would have every leg in the world jest the length of their’n.
If they dast, they would tackle you in a minute with a saw or a
broad-axe.
“But I never felt that way. Now, as fur as my own feelin’s are
concerned, I think memories can haunt anybody, and hearts can ache jest
as severe under a white dress as a black one, and visey versey. Hearts
can beat gay and triumphant aginst bumbuzeen bodist waists and crape
trimmin’s. But Miss Bamber feels different. She feels that she can’t
mourn without certain conveniences. And feelin’ in that way, and feelin’
that it would be a duty and a privilege for her to mourn for her
mother-in-law, I say that woman shall have the wherewith to do it with.
I say she shall mourn if she wants to; she shall be helped to a black
dress. There hain’t a member of the meetin’-house but what can give a
six-pence without feelin’ it. We want to keep it all still from Miss
Bamber, and get it, and get it all made for her before she knows a thing
about it. And,” says I, “mebby you had better give me the six-pence
to-day, as we have got it about all collected, and want to get the dress
right away.”
Says he, “Hain’t there nobody else whose duty it is to get the dress?
Her relations? I should think it was their duty to help.”
Never did I ask a stingy human creeter for help for the poor, or help
for the meetin’-house, but what this argument was dragged up by ’em.
Tryin’ to shirk off their own duty onto somebody else.
“No,” says I, “her family is all dead. She hain’t got but one relation
in the world, and that is an aunt of her grandmother’s; and she is
supported by the town.”
“Wall,” says he, cheerfully, “mebby the town would feel like gettin’
this dress.”
I jest give him a look, and never said another word,—only jest that
look. But I s’pose that look spoke louder and awfuler than words, for he
hastened to say, in a apologizin’ way:
“I didn’t know but the town would want to—would feel it a privilege to—”
I still didn’t say nothin’, only jest that awful look. And agin he says,
in a apologizin’ way:
“I would advance the six-pence to you, I would try to raise it some way
for you, but the hard times we have had, and are havin’, have depressed
all sorts of business so, we have suffered terribly financially as well
as the other public. We have got a great deal of money to make out this
fall—over 10 dollars. Father hain’t a bit well; my health hain’t what it
once was; our expenses are enormious—taxes, household expenses,
clothin’; and takin’ all these things into consideration, together with
the public debt, the withdrawal of funds by foreign capitalists, the
almost total stagnation of public enterprize, the total lack of public
confidence, the total—”
Says I, “Put in total selfishness and total meanness, and keep your
six-pence.”