XXII

It was late in October that the twins were born, a boy and a girl, and

Margaret did not rise from her bed for a month. It was six weeks

before she got downstairs.

Long before the trained nurse left her, she realized what, before her

confinement, she had dimly foreseen, the struggle to the death which

she would certainly have with Jennie's strong prejudices in favour of

old-fashioned country methods of taking care of a baby. It was only

the doctor's powers of persuasion that induced the nurse, harassed

beyond endurance by Jennie's interference with her methods, to remain

with her patient until she was no longer needed.

"You poor thing, you certainly are up against it!" was her parting bit

of sympathy to Margaret. "She'll kill off those precious twinlets for

you, or she'll kill _you_. _One_ of you has got to die! The woman's a

holy terror, my dear! And the other one, that wears Mother Hubbards

and Kate Greenaways and Peter Thompsons and Heaven knows what, she's

nearly as bad as her sister about these babies. _I_ don't know what

you're going to do! You may be able to protect them when you're _with_

them; but you've got to get out _some_times for an airing without

dragging the baby-coach along, and those two"--indicating, with a twirl

of her thumb, the twins' redoubtable aunts--"will certainly kill off

your babies for you while you're out."

"If you're sure of that I'll never _go_ out."

"And you can't look for your husband to help you any," continued the

nurse. "Crazy as he is over the twinnies, he'll _help_ the old ladies

kill them off, because he thinks their ancient ideas are right. The

old ladies, for that matter, are nearly as crazy over the babies as he

is. You'd think nobody but Mr. Danny Leitzel had ever _had_ twins

before. I never saw such a looney lot of people. But it's their love

for those children that's going to make them kill them, for it does

beat all the way you can't knock a new idea into any of them."

In the very hour of the nurse's departure, Jennie, supported by Sadie

as always, swooped down upon Margaret to insist, with the triple force

of conviction, of tyranny, and of her love for Danny's precious babies,

that they be brought up as she knew how babies should be, and not by

the murderous modern methods of exposing them to the night air, of

bathing them all over every day even in winter, of feeding them, even

up to the age of one year, on nothing but milk, of taking them outdoors

every day in winter as well as in summer.

"Many's the little green mound in the cemetery that hadn't _ought_ to

be there!" Sadie sentimentally warned Margaret. "So you let _us_ teach

you how to take care of Danny's babies!"

Well, the conflict or convictions between the mother, on the one side,

and the aunts and the father on the other, was not settled in a day,

nor yet in a week. It was, indeed, prolonged to the inevitable end.

But while the strife and tumult of battle raged, the mother's will was

carried out, at the cost to her of a nervous energy she was in no wise

strong enough to expend.

The fact that the twins thrived wonderfully under Margaret's régime did

not in the least modify the Leitzels' prejudice against it. Daniel

could not help believing profoundly in the wisdom of his sisters, since

they had made such a success of _him_. And never once in his life had

he failed to "come out on top" when following their advice. He admired

and respected them; and he felt as much affection for them as he was

capable of feeling for any one. So that, with his loyalty to them

challenged by that force which to most men is the strongest in

life--the love of a woman--the atmosphere of his home was, just at

present, rather uncomfortably surcharged.

But in spite of this and of his actual bewilderment at the continued

obstinacy of a wife who, though tenderly beloved, indulged, and petted,

dared to stand out against not only his sisters but against himself,

Daniel was so radiantly proud and happy at finding himself the father

of a son and daughter at one stroke that he discussed with every one he

met the charms, the characteristics, the food, and the habits of his

offspring; told his colleagues in business what food-formula agreed

with his girl baby, who was being brought up on the bottle, the mother

being able to nurse only one child and that one being, of course, by

his wish, the boy; delivered to every one who would hear him his views

on Modern Fallacies in the Care of Infants; and invited the opinions

even of his employees as to suitable or desirable names for the

daughter, the son being of course Daniel, Junior.

It was one mild day in January, when, after a siege of more than

usually bitter opposition on Jennie's part to the twins being kept on

the piazza all the morning, Margaret found herself, during the

afternoon, in a blessed solitude in the family sitting-room, Jennie and

Sadie having gone out calling. So tired and heartsick was she that she

did not even feel any desire to call up Catherine and ask her to share

her few hours of freedom from interference and fear of harm to her

babies. The twins were again healthily sleeping on the porch outside

the sitting-room and Margaret gave herself up to the sweet peace of

this respite, reading, dreaming, resting, when presently the door-bell

rang, and a moment later Emmy ushered into the sitting-room a feeble

old woman dressed in the plain religious habit of the Mennonites.

Margaret instantly knew who the visitor was, and as she went to her,

took her two hands in both her own, kissed her and looked down into the

motherly old face with its expression of childlike innocence and

sweetness, she was thankful that the rest of the family was not at home

and that she could for a little while bask in the warmth of this kindly

human countenance.

When she had made her visitor comfortable in Danny's big easy-chair

before the fire and had had Emmy bring in some hot tea and toast, the

old woman's beaming gratitude betrayed how unlooked-for were such

attentions in this home of her step-children.

"I'll soon get my breath," she feebly said as she sipped her tea. "I

do get out of puff so quick, still, since my lungs took so bad this

fall."

"It was really too much of a trip for you to take, and all alone," said

Margaret solicitously. "I was just this very day deciding that I would

go out to see you some time this week, if I could manage it. It's very

hard for me to get away or I should have been to see you before this."

"Well, my dear, what brang me in to-day was that I just had to see

Danny and the girls on a little business, and so my neighbour fetched

me in in his automobile. I couldn't spare the money to come by train.

But," she said tremulously, "he made his automobile go so unmannerly

fast, I didn't have no pleasure. He said he ain't commonly got the

fashion of going so fast, but, you see, he raced another automobile.

He took me along for kindness, but indeed I'm sorry to say I didn't

enjoy myself."

"It was a strain on you, I can see," said Margaret sympathetically.

"But the tea's making me feel all right again," said Mrs. Leitzel

reassuringly. "It's wonderful kind of you to give it to me; but I

didn't want to make no bother. I seen Danny down at his office, and

when he told me the girls wasn't home this after, I came up here on the

chanct of seein' you alone, and them dear little twinses! Indeed I

felt I _got_ to see them two twin babies before I died a'ready. You

see I knowed by your nice letters to me that you'd treat me kind, and

indeed I had afraid to try to go back home alone on the train; I

conceited that mebby _you'd_ take me to the depot," she said with timid

wistfulness, "and put me on the right train, and then I wouldn't have

been so afraid. Danny thinks I went straight off home by myself. But

indeed I didn't darst to."

"Of course I'll take care of you. But you must not think of leaving

before to-morrow when you've had a chance to get thoroughly rested."

"Oh, but, my dear," said Mrs. Leitzel nervously, "Danny give me the

money to pay my way back home and he thinks I went. And you see, it

would put the girls out to have to make up the spare bed just for _me_."

"But who could be more important than you--you who took care of them

all when they were children? Indeed I shan't let you go a step to-day."

"Did _they_ tell you I took care of them, my dear?" asked Mrs. Leitzel,

puzzled. "Because they never talked to me that way. And Danny tried

to show me this after, when I put it to him that now I couldn't hold

out no longer to support myself gardening on the old place--he said I

hadn't no claim on him. I don't know," she added sadly, "what I'll do.

I'm too old and feeble to work any more, my dear. God knows I would if

I could. I'd work for all of them as well as for myself, the way I

used to, if I had strength to. But I come in to-day to tell Danny that

at last I'm done out. Yes, the doctor says I got tendencies and things

and that I got to be awful careful."

"'Tendencies?'" asked Margaret.

"He says I got somepin stickin' in me."

"Something sticking in you! Do you mean that you swallowed a bone or

something?"

"No, my dear, I didn't swallow nothin'. I got a tendency stickin' in

me that might give pneumonia. So I come to ask Danny to-day if--if he

couldn't mebby spare me something," she faltered, "to live on for the

little time I got left, so that"--a childlike fear in her aged eyes--"I

don't have to go to the poorhouse!"

"When you told Danny all this," asked Margaret, laying her hand on Mrs.

Leitzel's, "he said you had no claim on him?"

The old woman's lips quivered and she pressed them together for an

instant before she answered.

"He told me he'd talk it all over oncet with Hiram and the girls.

But," she shook her head, "I'm afraid Hiram's less merciful than any of

my children and he'll urge 'em to put me to such a home for paupers;

and, oh, Margaret--dare I call you Margaret?"

"What else would you call your son's wife, dearie?"

"I have so glad Danny has such a sweet wife! I wouldn't of believed

_he'd_ marry a lady that would be so nice and common to me. It wonders

me! I can't hardly believe it!"

"But you are good to _me_, making me that lovely quilt and the baby

socks. I use the quilt all the time and one of the twins is wearing

the socks _now_. How could even Hiram be hard to _you_?"

"But Hiram and the others is wery different to what you are." Mrs.

Leitzel shook her head. "Danny says if he did pay me a little to live

on, Hiram would have awful cross at him. You see, my dear, the reason

I ain't got anything saved, as they think I had ought to have, is that

I never could make enough off of the wegetables I raised in the

backyard to keep myself and pay for all the repairs on the old place,

for all I done a good bit; enough anyhow to keep the old place from

fallin' in on me. I don't know how I'd of lived all these years if it

hadn't of been for the kindness of my neighbours. And now Danny says

if I can't keep myself at _all_ no more----" Again she pressed her

lips together for an instant. "He don't see nothing for it but that I

go to a old woman's home. He calls it a old woman's home, but he means

the poorhouse."

"Mother," said Margaret, clasping the hand she held, "I wish you would

tell me the whole story of your life with Daniel and Hiram and 'the

girls.' Begin, please, away back at 'Once upon a time.'"

Mrs. Leitzel smiled as she looked gently and gratefully upon Daniel's

young wife who wasn't too proud to call her "Mother."

"Well, my dear, I married John Leitzel when Danny was only six months

old, because them children needed a mother. John drank hard and it was

too much for them young folks to earn the living and keep house and

take care of a baby. I married John because I pitied 'em all and so's

I could take hold and help. Jennie was fifteen, Sadie ten, and Hiram

five, and then the baby, Danny. I sent the three older ones to school

and I took in washings and kep' care of the baby and did the

housekeeping and the sewing. I kep' Jennie in school till she could

pass the County Superintendent's examination a'ready and get such a

certificate you mind of, and get elected to teach the district school.

And with all my hard work, I kep' her dressed as well as I otherwise

could. For I was always handy with the needle and Jennie and Sadie was

always so fond for the clo'es. Well, when at last Jennie come home

with her certificate to teach, my but we was all proud! Indeed, I

wasn't more proud when Hiram got his paper that he was now a real

preacher--sich a seminary preacher, mind you!--though that was a long

time afterward. Well, I thought it would go easier for me, mebby, when

Jennie got her school. But you see, she had so ambitious to dress nice

and do for Danny (he was such a smart little fellah) that I had still

to take in washings and go out by the day to work. Hiram he worked the

little farm we had and I helped him, too, in the busy seasons to save

the cost of a hired man, for our place had such a heavy mortgage that

the interest took near all we could scrape together. Yes, for nine

years and a half we struggled along like that, and then at last John

died. And mind you, the wery next month after he died, we all of a

suddint found coal on our land! Yes, who'd ever of looked for such an

unexpected ewent as that! Ain't?"

"To whom did the land belong?" asked Margaret.

"It had belonged to my husband's first wife, but she had willed it over

to him before she died. So it was hisn."

"Oh, but, my dear, then you were entitled to one third of it, if you

didn't sign away your rights."

"Indeed, no, I didn't sign nothing. Leave me tell you something, my

dear: John on his deathbed he thanked me for all I done and his dying

orders to me was, 'Don't you never leave Jennie and the rest get you to

sign away your rights in the farm that you worked so hard to keep in

the family. If it wasn't for you,' he said, 'we would of been sold out

of here long ago, and the children all bound out and me in the

poorhouse! And if I had the money for a lawyer, I'd sign the whole

farm over to you before I die.' 'No, John,' I said, 'that wouldn't be

right, neither, to give it to me over your children's heads.' 'Well,

anyway,' he says, 'it's too late now, so you just pass me your solemn

promise on my deathbed that you'll never leave 'em persuade you to sign

nothing without you first leave one of your Mennonite brethren look it

over and say you ain't signin' away your rights.' So I passed my

promise and I've kep' it, though it has certainly went hard for me to

keep it. Danny worried me often a'ready these thirty years back, to

sign a paper, and it used to make him wonderful put out when I had to

tell him, still, that I'd sign if he'd leave one of our Mennonite

brethren read it first and say if I was breakin' my word to John or no.

Danny always said he didn't want our affairs made so public and the

Mennonite brother would have too much to say. So then I had to say I

couldn't sign it; I couldn't break my word to John on his deathbed.

Many's the time I was sorry I passed that promise to John--they all

have so cross at me because I won't sign nothin'. You see, they always

was generous to me, giving me the house and backyard to live in without

rent. But to be sure I couldn't break my word to my dying man!"

Margaret saw that there had been no self-interest in her refusal to

sign away her rights, but that the binding quality of a deathbed

promise was to her a fetish, a superstition. And it was this, no

doubt, that Catherine had meant in speaking of her "breast-plate of

righteousness," her conscientious devotion to her solemn vow had

shielded her from the snare of the fowler; from "the greed of the

vulture," Catherine had said.

"And lately," Mrs. Leitzel continued her story, "Danny didn't bother me

no more to sign nothing. But to-day," she concluded, suddenly looking

very weak and helpless, as she leaned far back in her chair, "to-day he

ast me again, and he said it couldn't make no matter to me now when I

was so near my end, and if I'd sign a paper he'd not leave the others

put me to the poorhouse. But I told him if I was so soon to come

before my Maker, I darsent go with a broken promise on my soul. If

only I hadn't never passed that promise, my dear! John meant it in

kindness to me, but you see," she suddenly sobbed, "it's sendin' me to

the poorhouse to end my days!"

"Oh, but my dear!" exclaimed Margaret, her face flushed with

excitement, "why didn't you, from the very first, get your one third

interest in those coal lands? You were and are entitled to it!"

"Well," said Mrs. Leitzel, "right in the beginning when they first

found the coal, they got me to say I'd be satisfied to take the house

and backyard for my share; not to keep, of course, but to live on for

the rest of my life; and seeing the land had been their own mother's,

that was a lot more'n I had the right to look for. To be sure," she

gently explained, "you couldn't expect your step-children to care for

you as your own flesh and blood might."

"You cared for them as though they were your own flesh and blood. Tell

me, you did not sign an agreement, did you, to accept the house and

backyard in lieu of your one third interest in the estate?"

"No, for that would of been breakin' the promise I passed to John. For

you see, Danny never _would_ leave one of the brethren look over the

paper he wanted me to sign, and say whether I could do it without

breakin' my word. So I never signed nothing."

"Then the only thing you need to establish your absolute right in one

third of the income of the coal lands (now enjoyed by your

step-children and excluding you) is the proof that the title to those

lands was vested absolutely in your husband at the time of his death.

If it wasn't, you have no case. If it was, you've plenty of money!

You see, my brother-in-law is a lawyer and I've imbibed a little bit of

legal knowledge. But I have an intimate friend, Miss Catherine

Hamilton, who knows nearly as much law as Daniel does and I'll get her

to look up the court-house records for your husband's title to that

land, and _then_, my dear, if we find it---- Oh, my stars!"

"But, Margaret," the old woman protested fearfully, "you'll get 'em all

down on you if you go and do somepin like _that_!"

"You see," Margaret gravely explained, "_I_ am living on this money

which belongs to you, and my children will be living on it, inheriting

it. I couldn't bear that, of course."

"Do you mean," faltered Mrs. Leitzel, "you think they _cheated_ me?

There's others tried to hint that to me and I wouldn't never listen to

it. Why, Hiram's a Christian minister and they're all church members

and professin' Christians! They wouldn't _steal_, my dear--and from an

old woman like me!"

"It's been done, however, by church members and professing Christians.

We'll investigate it, my dear," Margaret firmly repeated.

"But I wouldn't want to be the cause of you and Danny's fallin' out,

little girl! That I certainly wouldn't. And, dear me!--if you got

Jennie down on you yet!"

"She couldn't be much more down on me than she is. And during all

these years, you know, _you've_ stood up to them for the sake of a

sacred promise. I hope I haven't less courage."

"Don't you think Danny's too smart a lawyer, my dear, for you to get

'round him?" Mrs. Leitzel anxiously tried to avert the disaster which

Margaret's suggestion surely presaged.

"My brother-in-law is a smart lawyer, too. I'll write to him this very

night, put the case to him (omitting names) and ask his advice. Oh,"

she suddenly lowered her voice, "here come 'the girls.' Do not breathe

a word of what I've said to you!"

"Oh, no, indeed I won't. I know how cross they'd have at me! My

dear," she added, clinging to Margaret's hand, "stay by me, will you?

Please! Jennie and Sadie won't like it so well that I come. I

conceited I'd get away before they got back, and they're likely to

scold me some, my dear, and----"

Margaret stooped over her impulsively and kissed her forehead. "Come

out to the porch with me and see the babies." When a moment later

Jennie and Sadie came into the room they saw, through the long French

window opening on to the porch, their step-mother bending over the

sleeping infants in the big double coach, and Margaret standing at her

side, her arm about her waist.