Distrust not, O reader! This is _verbatim et literatim_ a copy.
In front of the "store" was a hay-scale, across the way a tavern, and,
at respectful distances along the street, white or red houses, with the
inevitable front-door, south-door, kitchen-and shed-floor, lilacs and
altheas before the windows, fennel, tiger-lilies, sweet-brier, and
Bar_gun_dy rosebushes, with red "pinies" and livid hydrangeas, or now
and then a mat of stonecrop and "voilets" along the posy-bed that edged
cabbage and potato-plots, while, without the fence, Bouncing-Bets
adorned the road-side, or blue sea-pinks from the pasture-lot strayed
beyond its rails.
Nothing happened in Deerfield; so nothing happened to "'Tenty Scran',"
as the school-children nicknamed her. She earned her living now at
tailoring and dress-making; for Miss 'Viny was much "laid up with
rheumatiz," and could not go about as was her wont. Also, the art and
mystery of housekeeping became familiar to the child, and economy of
the domestic sort was a virtue she learned unconsciously by continual
practice. She went to church on Sundays in a clean calico frock and a
white cape, sat in the singers' seat and uplifted her voice in Lenox and
Mear, Wells and Bethesda, shared her fennel with the children in the
gallery, looked out the text in her Bible, and always thought Parson
Goodyear's sermon was intended for her good, and took it in accordingly.
I should like to say that 'Tenty Scran' was pretty; in fact, I have
always regarded it as one of the chief pleasures of a literary calling,
that you are not obliged to take people as they are, but can make them
to order, since it takes no more pen-scratches to describe luxuriant
curls and celestial eyes and roseate lips than it does to set forth much
less lovely things; but when it comes to stubborn facts, why, there you
have to come down to this world, and proceed accordingly,--so I must
say 'Tenty was not handsome. She had fresh rosy cheeks and small brown
eyes, hair to match the eyes, a nose undeniably pug, a full, wide mouth,
and strong, white teeth,--fortunately, since every one showed when she
laughed, and she laughed a great deal. Then she had a dumpy figure, and
good large hands and feet, a look of downright honesty and good-temper,
and a nice, clear voice in speech or singing, though she only sang
hymns. But for all this, every-body in Deerfield liked 'Tenty Scran';
old and young, men and maidens, all had a kindly welcome for her; and
though Aunt 'Viny did not say much, she felt the more.
But "everybody has their sorrers," as Hannah-Ann Hall remarked, in one
of her "'Cademy" compositions, and 'Tenty came to hers when she was
about twenty-two. Miss Lovina was almost bed-ridden with the rheumatism
that year, and 'Tenty had to come back twice a day from her work to see
to her, so that she made it up by staying evenings, against her usual
rules. Now about the middle of that May, Doctor Parker's scapegrace son
Ned came home from sea,--a great, lazy, handsome fellow, who had run
away from Deerfield in his fifteenth year, because it was so "darned
stupid," to use his own phrase. Doctor Parker was old, and Mrs. Parker
was old, too, but she called it nervous; and home was stupider than ever
to Ned, particularly as he had broken his ankle and was laid on the sofa
for a good six weeks at least. About the second of those weeks, Content
Scranton came to "do over" Mrs. Parker's summer-gowns, and put her caps
together after their semi-annual starching.
Of course 'Tenty sat in the "keeping-room," where the old sofa was;
and of course Ned had nothing better to do than to watch the gay, good
little bee at her toil, hear her involuntary snatches of hymn-singing,
laugh at her bright simplicity, and fall in love with her,
sailor-fashion,--"here to-day, and gone tomorrow."
'Tenty stayed a long time at Mrs. Parker's that summer; she seemed to
get on so slowly with her work, but, as Mrs. Parker said,--
"Why, the fact of it is, 'Tenty is so handy and so spry, I can't see
how to spare her. Ed'ard, he wants a sight of waitin' on; and I am so
nervous, and husband is afflicted with neuralogy, beside that he is
considerable in years, so we can't be around as we used to be; and
'Tenty steps about and gets Ed'ard his books, and his victuals, and
fixes his pillows, and keeps the light out of his eyes, so't he isn't
contented a moment of time without she's right there."
And while Mrs. Parker was conveying these ideas to Miss 'Viny, they were
being illustrated in her own house after this fashion:--
"'Tenty," (three weeks had abolished the Miss,) "won't you give me that
blue book off the shelf?"
'Tenty sprang up and handed the book, and went to her work again,
beginning under her breath to hum
"Sweet fields beyond"----
"Dear me! this pillow has slipped away. 'Tenty, won't you fix it?"
Jump the second;--the pillow is put straight under Ned's dark curls,
though he is so helpless she has to raise his head with one arm and
arrange the cushion with the other; then the seam and hymn recommence.
"Sweet fields beyond the swelling"---
"I wish I had a drink of cold water."
Jump the third;--'Tenty finishes her hymn on the way to the well, and
brings the water, and holds the invalid up to drink it, and then the
pillows fall again, and the book slips down, and everything goes wrong
and has to be re-arranged, and at length 'Tenty goes back to her place
by the window quite indisposed to sing, but glowing with a new, shy
pleasure, for Ned had looked up at her with those great gray eyes that
said so much more than his lips did, and laid his cheek against the
stubbed hand that arranged his pillows, and said,--"Oh, 'Tenty! how good
you are!" in tones that meant, "and how I love you!" as well, though he
did not say it.
So matters progressed from day to day, Ned needing more and more care,
till he made his first progress across the room with a cane and the
help of 'Tenty's shoulder; after which experiment he began to recover
rapidly, impelled by the prospect of getting away from that house and
being free to go where he chose again.
For 'Tenty had ceased to amuse or interest him as much as she had done;
six weeks had done away with the novelty of her deepening color and shy
dropping eyes; beside, she laughed less, almost ceased to sing, sighed
softly, and looked quiet and grave, instead of gay and unconscious.
It was the old fable of sport to the boys and death to the frogs. She
thought he was in earnest; he knew he was amusing himself.
Miss 'Viny noticed the change in her darling, but she was a woman who
had acquired wisdom by experience, and she said nothing; she only grew
more exacting of 'Tenty's presence, wanted her earlier in the evening,
found fault with her food, and behaved generally so unlike her usual
stern patience, that Content was really roused out of her dreaminess to
wonder what ailed Aunt 'Viny.
As soon as Ned Parker was able to get out of doors again, he was heard
of in every house in the village, making himself agreeable after his
own fashion,--drinking hard cider with the old farmers, praising their
wives' gingerbread and spruce-beer, holding skeins for the girls, going
on picnics, huckleberryings, fishing-excursions, apple-bees, riding Old
Boker, his father's horse, bare-backed down the street, playing ball
on the green, and frequenting singing-school with one pretty girl and
another, till all Deerfield shook its head and remarked that "That 'ere
Ned Parker was a master-hand for carryin' on." And 'Tenty sewed harder
than ever.
What makes me always put love into a story, Aunt Grundy? Why, because
love is popular; because nine-tenths of the people who read smile to see
the first and faintest hint of the tender passion in what they read;
because a story without love is like bricks without straw; because
a life without it is a life no doubt comfortable to lead, but
uninteresting to hear. Love is your only democrat; Ethelinda in Fifth
Avenue, glittering with the clear splendor of diamonds, and rustling
like a white-birch-swamp with pale silks, gleaming through the twilight
before an opera, and looking violets at Sydney Hamilton over the top
of her inlaid fan, is no more thrilled and rapt and tortured by the
Disturber in Wings, than Biddy in the kitchen, holding tryst with her
"b'y" at the sink-room window. Thousands of years ago, Theseus left
Ariadne tearing the ripples of her amber-bright hair, and tossing her
white arms with the tossing surf, in a vain agony of distraction and
appeal: poets have sung the flirtation, painters have painted it; the
story is an eternal legend of pain and passion, illuminated with lucent
tints of age and the warm South, outlined with the statuesque purity of
classic scenery and classic diction: but I myself never for a moment
believed that Ariadne was a particle more unhappy or pitiable than
Nancy Bunker, our seamstress, was, when Hiram Fenn went West to peddle
essences, and married a female Hoosier whose father owned half a
prairie. They would by no means make as lovely a picture; for Nancy's
upper jaw projects, and she has a wart on her nose, very stiff black
hair, and a shingle figure, none of which adds grace to a scene; and
Hiram went off in the Slabtown stage, with a tin-box on his knees,
instead of in a shell-shaped boat with silken sails; but I know Nancy
reads love-stories with great zest, and I know she had a slow fever
after Hiram was married. For, after all, love is the same thing ever
since Paradise,--the unwearying tradition, the ever new presence, the
rapture or the anguish unspeakable; and while 'Tenty Scran' sat and
sewed at Squire Hall's new linen pantaloons, she set every stitch with a
sigh, and sewed on every button with a pang that would have made Ariadne
put both arms round her, and kiss her long and close, a sister in
bonds,--though purple robes with jewelled borders, crescented pearls,
and armlets of gold, would not have been at all congruous hugging a
sixpenny calico with a linen collar.
Not that Ned neglected 'Tenty; he could not follow her about from house
to house, and she had done sewing for his mother, and in the evening
Aunt 'Viny always needed her. But more than once he joined her after
church, walked home to the door with her, and cheered her simple soul
with his familiar looks and tones, and words of praise that made
Adriadne Scran' think Theseus Parker a little more than mere man,
something altogether adorable. However, she knew he was having a very
good time when he didn't see her at all. The real reason why she ached
and sighed over Squire Hall's pantaloons was, that she heard Ned in the
next room helping Hannah-Ann Hall pack up the dinner for their grand
Snake Hill picnic, and diverting the same Hannah-Ann with such wit and
humor and frolic, that she declared several times she should split, and
begged him not to be so funny.
Now 'Tenty never had a pleasant day, unless Ned was with her,--it had
got as far as that; and the idea that he could and did enjoy himself so
thoroughly and heartily without her was a dull pang that ate into her
soul continually, and made her forlorn. Oh, these women! these pitiful
creatures! not magnanimity enough in a whole race of them to be visible
to the naked eye! jealous dogs-in-the-manger! If they weren't useful
domestically, I should vote for having them exterminated from this great
generous world, and give place to some better institution, which no
doubt could be got up by the india-rubber companies or the scientific
conventions. But as Alphonso of Castile did not make the world, one must
take it as it is; and I will say, for the encouragement of philosophers,
that I have known one magnanimous woman, and she a beautiful woman,
moreover.
So 'Tenty sewed, and ached, and made Aunt 'Viny's bed and her gruel,
read her Bible and prayed for Ned Parker, and thought she was growing
very old, till one night he asked her to go to singing-school with him;
whereupon she put on a pink calico dress, and began to recover her youth
most wonderfully.
They went to Master Solon's singing-school, it is true; but they never
got home to Aunt 'Viny's till half past nine, and 'Tenty never could
remember what tunes they sang; and the singers in church next Sunday
asked her why she didn't come in when she got as far as the door, and
'Tenty said she thought the benches were all full! Truth, stern tutor
of the historian, compels me to confess that 'Tenty and Ned Parker were
sitting on the meeting-house steps most of that evening, in a touching
attitude; for Ned was telling her how his ship had come into port and
was going to sail again for South America, and he had an offer to join
her as second mate; so he had got to say goodbye to his kind little
nurse, and so forth and so on, with admonitions never to forget him,
and how he never should forget her, and here was a little locket; and
finally, sobered by her stifled sobs, Ned bent down his handsome head,
and said, softly,--
"Won't you kiss me for good-bye, 'Tenty?"
Dear me! of course she kissed him, and thought how good he was to kiss
her, and told him so. Whereupon he got better and better; and when the
sexton came to ring the bell for nine o'clock, they only just heard his
steps in time to steal away unobserved through the starry darkness, and
go round past the pine-grove. So reaching home at the aforesaid late
hour, where Mr. Ned became good again when he stooped to unlatch the
gate, 'Tenty looked so fresh and rosy and sweet when she came in, that
Aunt 'Viny growled to herself, found fault with her gruel, scolded at
the blanket, tipped over the teacup, and worried 'Tenty back into stern
reality, till the girl stole off to her bed. Not to sleep,--oh, no!
Waste such sweetness on sleep? Never! She lay there, broad awake, and
thought it all over, and how very nice it was to have anybody love her
so much, and how she should like to be handsome and smart and worthy so
much honor, till the cock crowed for dawn, and then she fell asleep,
nowise daunted by the recollection that Ned had said nothing to her
except that she was as sweet as a ripe blackberry and as pretty as a
daisy; for to her innocent logic actions spoke louder than words, and
she knew that anybody who did so (?) must love her enough to marry her.
So Ned sailed for Valparaiso, and 'Tenty stayed at home. Aunt 'Viny got
no better in all those winter-snows and blows; they are not favorable to
rheumatism, these New-England airs; so 'Tenty had enough to do; but she
was happy and contented. And winter crept by and merged into spring,
and spring into autumn, before Deerfield heard any news of Ned Parker;
though, in the mean time, one report after another of his being engaged
to various girls, at length settling with marked weight on Hannah-Ann
Hall, spread over the village and was the theme of Sunday-noon
gossips and sewing-society meetings, greatly to 'Tenty's contempt and
amusement,--though the contempt was too bitter and the amusement too
tremulous to be pleasant. For did not she know better? People don't kiss
people when they don't like them: a self-evident proposition, but one
that required some assertion and repetition to weigh its right weight in
her mind.
Poor little 'Tenty! In that cold November there came a letter to Doctor
Parker just as he was getting out of his gig, after a round of visits.
The postmaster, going home to dinner, handed it to him, and, going back
from dinner, was called in to lift him up-stairs to his bed. Ned Parker
had been wrecked off the Horn, the crew took to their boats, and only
one boat, with one surviving man to tell the tale, was picked up by a
whaler coming back to New Bedford from the Pacific; all the rest were
gone. Doctor Parker was old and feeble; this only child was all he had;
paralysis smote his body when the smitten mind bowed before that dire
knowledge, and he never looked up again. Content would have given
anything to go and nurse him; but she, too, was stunned, and in the
whirl of that great grief even Aunt 'Viny's demands were no more to her
than a dull mechanic routine that she could hardly force her trembling
steps to carry through. So she stayed at home, sewing all day and crying
all night, and looking generally miserable, though she said nothing; for
whom could she speak to? Aunt 'Viny had resolutely kept her suspicions
about Ned Parker to herself, though well she knew who had walked home
from meeting with 'Tenty in those pleasant autumn Sundays now gone,
pleasure and all. But Miss 'Viny believed in silence on such matters,
and had held her peace; now it was too late to break it. Nor was 'Tenty
disposed to tell her anything; for it occurred for the first time to her
innocent soul that she had nothing to tell. So they both went on their
way, with secret pity and still endurance.
After a brief illness of three days, poor old Doctor Parker's weary
soul and body gave out; he died on a Thursday afternoon, and, in
country-fashion, it was proposed to bury him on Sunday, from the church.
Sunday came, cold and raw and blustering. 'Tenty took her usual seat in
the gallery, but took it early, that she might see the "mourners" come
in and fill the front pews kept for them. She wiped away the tears from
her eyes, and looked on with a feeling of half envy, thinking of the son
to whom no funeral honors should ever now be paid, slumbering in the
cruel seas that break and roar about the Horn. She counted the bearers,
all known faces; she watched Parson Goodyear into the pulpit; she saw
Mrs. Parker on her brother's arm. But there was one other veiled female
figure, shrouded also in black, whose presence she could no way account
for; and when Parson Goodyear made his first long prayer, and sent up an
earnest petition for the doubly bereaved woman before him, what did he
mean by adding,--"And Thine other handmaid, in the bloom of her years
bereaved of hope and promise,--her whom Thou hast afflicted from afar
off, and made a widow before Thee"? What _did_ it mean? 'Tenty's
breath fluttered, and she turned cold. Just at that moment, one of her
neighbors murmured under her bonnet,--"That's Hanner-Ann, next to Miss
Parker; only to think how sly she's kep' it a hull year! And she engaged
to Ed'ard all that time! I wouldn't never ha' believed it, ef she hadn't
had his letters to show for't, an' a gold watch he gin her; an' Miss
Parker says she's knowed it all the time."
Little more did 'Tenty know of psalm or sermon; some whirling sounds
passed her, and then a rush of people. She was last to leave the church;
and when she got home, and went to make Miss 'Viny's tea, as she tilted
the long well-sweep down and up to draw her pail of water, she looked
earnestly down the depths of crystal, as if to see what lay below, then
quietly opened her left hand above it;--something bright fell, dashed
the clear drops from a fern that grew half-way down, tinkled against a
projecting stone, made a little splash, and was gone. 'Tenty took up her
pail and went into the shed; and Ned Parker's locket lies at the bottom
of the well, for all I know, to this day. Thenceforth 'Tenty cried no
more; though for many weeks she was grave, wretched, pining.
Winter set in with furious storms and heavy snows, but, strange to say,
Aunt 'Viny grew better; she could sit up; at length could move about;
and at last, one night when she sat by the fire knitting, suddenly
looked up at 'Tenty and said,--
"You haven't seen Miss Parker lately, have you, Content?"
'Tenty shivered a little.
"No, I have not, Aunt 'Viny."
"Well, it appears as though you should go and see her; she's a weakly
woman, but she can set her back up dreadful against the Lord's doings,
and I don't know but what such kind of people need comfortin' more 'n
others. It's a world full o' gales, this is, and everybody hasn't learnt
the grass's lesson, to bend when the wind blows."
"The Lord sends the wind, Aunt 'Viny."
"The Lord sends everything, only folks don't allow it; they'd ruther lay
it to the door of man, so's to feel free to worry. But the worst thing
He ever does send to people is their own way, 'Tenty; and you'll know it
before you die."
'Tenty turned away to her work, hardly convinced by Miss 'Viny's wisdom,
and inwardly thinking she should like to try her own way for all
that. However, 'Tenty suffered far less than she might have done, for
indignation helped her; the feeling that Ned Parker had deliberately
amused himself with her, while she was in mortal earnest, had lowered
him not a little from his height. Then Aunt 'Viny's care diverted her
sad thoughts from herself, by sending her upon daily errands to the poor
and the sick, so that 'Tenty's pleasant face and voice became the hope
of the hour to more than one poverty-stricken or dying woman; and so her
own grief, measured by theirs, shrank and withdrew itself day by day,
and became something she could now and then forget. And more than all,
her naturally sweet temperament and healthy organization helped her to
recover.
Myriads have died of a broken heart, no doubt, but it was
physiologically broken; grief torments into sleeplessness, sleeplessness
destroys the appetite, then strength goes, the circulation fails, and
any latent evil lurking in the constitution springs on the helpless and
willing victim and completes its work. This is a shockingly unromantic
and material view to take of the matter, and brings to nought poems by
the hundred and novels by the thousand; but is it not, after all, more
true to God and human nature to believe in this view than to think He
made men or women to be the sport of passion and circumstance, even to
their destruction?
'Tenty Scran' was too healthy to break her heart,--and too unselfish; so
she gradually recovered her bright bloom, and went to her work, and took
care of Aunt 'Viny, as energetically and gayly as ever. Hannah-Ann Hall
married a lawyer from Meriden, and moved away, quite consoled for Ned,
within three years; but 'Tenty favored no lovers, though one or two
approached her. There are some--women who are like the aloe,--their life
admits of but one passion. It comes late and lasts long, but never is
repeated; the bloom dies out of its resplendence and odor, but no second
flowering replaces it. She was one of these. But what one man lost in
her love, a thousand of her fellow-creatures gained. 'Tenty was the
Deerfield blessing, though she never knew it herself. All the sick
wanted her; all the children pulled at her gown, and smiled at her from
their plays; her heart and her hands were so full, no regret found place
to nestle there, and silence brooded dove-like over that sorrowful time
gone by.
After a while, some ten years after Ned Parker's death, Miss 'Viny
took to her bed again,--this time never to rise. Slow consumption had
fastened on her, and she knew well what was before her, for so had her
mother died; but no saint was ever more patient than she. 'Tenty was
the best of nurses, and had even learned to speak of her aunt's death
without a tremor in her voice, the last triumph of her unselfishness;
for Miss 'Viny could bear no agitation, and yet needed to speak of the
event she neither dreaded nor desired.
"'Tenty," said she, one day, "I feel a sight easier to leave you than if
you'd married Ned Parker."
"Why, Aunty?" said Content, a light blush only testifying her surprise
at this address.
"Because he was a selfish feller; he always was. I believe some women
are better off to marry, though I can't say but what I believe a single
state is as good; but a woman that gets a real lazy, selfish feller gets
pretty near the worst thing there is. I seemed kind of hard, 'Tenty,
them days, but I had feelin' enough."
"I don't doubt but what you had, Aunt 'Viny; only one can't see far
ahead, you know, when it rains. I'm sure I've been as happy as a clam
these last six years, and I don't calculate to resk that by gettin'
married, never. Besides, I've learned what you used to call the grass's
lesson, pretty well."
Here Parson Goodyear interrupted the conversation, and it never was
resumed; for the week after, Miss 'Viny died, and Content was left alone
in her little house, "to battle with the world," as people say. But no
conflict ensued, since it takes two to make a quarrel, and 'Tenty was
on good terms with the Deerfield world. So she lived on, peaceful and
peace-making, till forty found her as comely and as happy as ever, a
source of perpetual wonder to the neighbors, who said of her, "She has
got the dreadfullest faculty of gettin' along I ever see," and thereby
solved the problem, for all except one, and that other one 'Tenty's
opposite in every trait, Miss Mehitable Hall, Hannah-Ann's older sister,
an old maid of the straitest sect, and one who was nowise sustained
under the inflictions of life by the consciousness of enough money to
support her, and friends to care for her approaching age.
It was Miss Hitty Hall's delight to be miserable: rather an Irish
expression, but the only one that suits her case. One bright October
afternoon she came over to see Content, bringing her blue knitting, sure
symptom of a visitation. 'Tenty welcomed her with her usual cordial
homeliness, gave her the easiest chair she had, and commenced
hospitalities.
"Do lay off your things, Miss Hall, and set awhile; I haven't seen you
for quite a spell."
"Well, I don't really know how to," replied Miss Hitty. "I don't know
but what everything will go to rack while I'm away. My help is dreadful
poor,--I can't calculate for her noway. I shouldn't wonder if she was
settin' in the keepin'-room this minute, looking at my best books."
"Oh, I guess not, Miss Hitty. Now do let me take off your bunnet, and
make yourself easy. Bridget can't do much harm, and you're such a
stranger."
"Well, I don't know but what I will,--there! Don't put yourself out for
me, 'Tenty,--I'll set right here. Dear me! what a clever house this is!
A'n't you lonesome? I do think it's dreadful to be left all alone in
this wicked world; it appears as though I couldn't endure it noways,
sometimes."
"Why, Miss Hitty! I'm sure you're extreme well off. Supposing, now, you
had married a poor man, and had to work all your life,--or a cross man,
always a-findin' fault, or"----
"Well, that's a consideration, re'lly.--Now there's Hanner-Ann's
husband,--he's always nag-naggin' at her for something she's done or
ha'n't done, the whole enduring time. She's real ailing, and he ha'n't
no patience,--but then he's got means, and she wants for nothing. She
had, to say, seven silk dresses, when I was there last time, and things
to match,--that's something.--But I'm sure you have to work as hard as
though you was a minister's wife, 'Tenty. I don't see how you do keep
up."
"Oh, I like work, Miss Hitty. It kind of keeps my spirits up; and all
the folks in Deerfield are as clever to me as though I belonged to 'em.
I have my health, and I don't want for anything. I think I'm as well off
as the Queen."
"You haven't had no great of troubles," groaned Miss Hitty. "I've
suffered so many 'flictions I'm most tired out; them is what wears on
people, 'flictions by death."
"I don't know," meekly answered 'Tenty; "I've had some, but I haven't
laid 'em up much. I felt bad while they lasted; but I knew other folks's
was so much worse, I was kind of shy about feelin' too bad over my
troubles."
"Well, you've got a real faculty at takin' things easy; now I'm one of
the feelin' kind. I set down often and often to knit, and get a-thinkin'
over times back, and things people said and did years ago, and how bad
I felt, till I feel jest so ag'in, and I get a-cryin' till it seems as
though I should screech right out, and I can't sleep, nor I can't do
nothing."
"A'n't you borrowin' trouble a little bit, Miss Hitty? I've kind of
figured it out that it's best to let the things that's dead and done for
stay so. I don't know as we've got any call to remember 'em. 'The Lord
requireth that which is past,' it says in the Bible; and I've always
looked upon that as a kind of a hint to men that it wa'n't their
business, but the Lord's."
"Oh, it's all very well to talk, 'Tenty Scranton!--talk, do!--but
'tisn't so mighty easy to practise on't."
"Why, now, I think it's the easiest way, by a sight, Miss Hitty. I
didn't mean to cast it up against you, for I know it's partly natur',
but I do think folks can help natur' more'n they're generally willing
to allow. I know it does seem as if you couldn't help thinkin' about
troubles sometimes, and it's quite a chore to keep bright; but then it
seems so much more cheery not to be fretted over things you can't help,
and it is such a sight pleasanter for everybody else! I declare, it does
seem jest as though the Lord had made this world for folks to have a
good time in, only they don't all know how, and I always feel a call to
help 'em."
"You're a master-piece to talk, 'Tenty,--but it don't make the
difference with me it does with some folks; it seems as if I should ha'
had a better time almost any way beside my way. I get more and more
failin' every day,--I'm pretty near gone now. I don't know but what
I shall die any time. I suffer so with rheumatiz, and I'm troubled
considerable with a risin' of the lungs; and sometimes I do think I've
got a spine in my back, it aches and creaks so nights."
"Why, I was thinking, since you set here, Miss Hitty, how spry you be,
and you've got a real 'hullsome look to your face; I should say you'd
grown fat."
"Fat!" exclaimed the indignant spinster; "about as fat as a hen's
forehead! Why, Content Scranton! I'm dreadful poor,--poor as Job's
turkey; why, my arms is all bones and sinners."
"You don't say so! I guess that's knitting, Miss Hitty; you do knit
beautiful. Is that worsted or cotton you're at now?"
Praise allayed Miss Hitty's wounded self-pity. She grew amiable under
its slow-dropping dews always, as 'Tenty knew.
"Oh, this a'n't anything to boast of. I call this common knitting; it's
a pair of socks I promised Miss Warner for her boy. Speakin' of her boy
Ned makes me think;--have you heared the news, 'Tenty?"
"No, I haven't heared any."
"Well, it's jest like a story-book. Ned Parker,--he't was Doctor
Parker's son, an' promised to our Hanner-Ann,--he's turned up, it
appears. He wa'n't drownded, but he was washed ashore, and the Indians
they took him, and he wasn't able to get away for ten year; then a
whaler's crew catched sight of him, havin' slopped there, for water,
and took him aboard, and he's been the world over since. He calculated
everybody to Deerfield was dead and married, so he didn't come back; but
now he is a-comin' back, for he's lost a leg, and he's got some money,
and they say he is a-goin' to settle down here."
"Has he come yet, Miss Hitty?"
"No, they're expectin' of him to Miss Warner's every day;--you know she
was Miss Parker's half-brother's wife."
"Yes, I have heared she was. But, Miss Hitty, don't roll up your work."
"Oh, I must be a-goin',--it's time; my help will be standin' on her head
by this time, like enough. I don't see but what one Irish girl is about
as confinin' as seven children, I'm sure."
With which despairing remark, Miss Hitty put on her shawl and calash and
departed; while Content filled her teakettle and prepared for supper.
But while the kettle boiled, she sat down by the window, and thought
about Miss Hitty's news. Her first feeling was one of surprise at
herself, a sort of sad surprise, to feel how entirely the love that once
threatened to wreck her life had died out of it. Hard, indeed, it is to
believe that love can ever die! The young girl clings passionately even
to her grief, and rejects as an insult the idea that such deep regret
can become less in all a lifetime,--that love, immortal, vital,
all-pervading, can perish from its prime, and flutter away into dust
like the dead leaves of a rose. Yet is it not the less true. Time, cold
reason, bitter experience, all poison its life-springs; respect, esteem,
admiration, all turn away from a point that offers no foothold for their
clinging; and she who weeps to-day tears hot as life-blood ten years
hereafter may look with cool distaste at the past passion she has calmly
weighed and measured, and thank God that her wish failed and her
hope was cut down. Yet there is a certain price to pay for all such
experience, to such a heart as sat in the quieted bosom of Content. Had
it been possible for her to love again, she would have felt the change
in her nature far less; but with the stream, the fountain also had
dried, and she was conscious that an aridness, unpleasant and unnatural,
threatened to desolate her soul, and her conflict with this had been the
hardest battle of all. It is so hard to love voluntarily,--to satisfy
one's self with minor affections,--to know that life offers no more its
grandest culmination, its divinest triumph,--to accept a succession of
wax-lights because the sun and the day can return no more,--above all,
to feel that the capacity of receiving that sunlight is fled,--that, so
far, one's own power is eternally narrowed, like the loss of a right
hand or the blinding of a right eye! Patience endures it, but even
patience weeps to think how the fair intent of the Maker is marred,--to
see the mutilated image, the brokenness of perfection!
Not that 'Tenty was conscious of all these ideas. They simplified
themselves to her simple nature in a brief soliloquy, as she sat looking
at the splendid haze of October, glorifying the scarlet maples and
yellow elms of Deerfield Street, now steeped in a sunset of purpled
crimson that struck its level rays across the sapphire hill-tops
and transfigured briefly that melancholy earth dying into winter's
desolations.
"Well, it is curious to think I ever cared so much for anybody as I did
for Ned Parker! poor, selfish cre'tur', just playing with me for fun,
as our kitty does with a mouse! and I re'lly thought he was a fine man!
Live and learn, I declare for't! He let me know what kind of cre'turs
men are, though. I haven't had to be pestered with one all my life, I'm
thankful: that's one good thing to come out of evil. I don't know but
what I should like to feel as wide awake again as I did then; but
'tisn't worth the price."
Saying which, Miss 'Tenty brewed her tea, spread her bread and butter,
and with a bit of cheese made her savory meal, cleared it away, washed
the dishes, and resumed her work as peacefully as if her life had been
all as serene as today.
Ned Parker did come back to Deerfield, and settled there,--a coarse,
red-faced, stout, sailor-like man, with a wooden leg. Ten years in
Patagonia and ten years of whaling had not improved his aspect or his
morals. He swore like a pirate, chewed, smoked a pipe, and now and then
drank to excess; and by way of elegant diversion to these amusements,
fell in love with Content Scranton! Her trim figure, her bright,
cheerful face, her pretty, neat little house and garden, the rumored
"interest-money," that was the fruit of years of hard work and saving,
all attracted this lazy, selfish man, who, remembering his youth,
fancied he had only to ask, to receive; and was struck with astonishment
to hear,--
"No, thank you," in a very calm, clear tone, answered to his
proposition.
"Good Lord! you women are queer craft! I swear, I thought you'd lay to
when I h'isted signals; I ha'n't forgot past times and the meetin'-house
steps, if you have, 'Tenty Scranton."
"You've forgotten Hannah-Ann Hall, I guess," retorted the indignant
little woman.
Ned Parker swore a great oath; he _had_ forgotten that passage,--though
only for a moment.
"Look here!" said 'Tenty, coloring with quiet wrath. "I cannot be
friendly, even, with a man that talks that way. You had your sport,
makin' believe you liked me, and I didn't know better than to believe
you was an honest man. I did think a sight of you then, Ed'ard Parker. I
a'n't ashamed to own it. I had reason to,--for your actions was louder
than words. But when I come to know you hadn't meant nothing by all your
praises and kisses and fine words, except just to have your own fun
while you stayed, no matter what become of me, I see, after I'd got the
tears out of my eyes, what kind of a self-seekin', mean, paltry man it
was that could carry on so with an innocent young girl, and I hadn't no
more respect for you than I have for a potato-peeling. I've lived to
bless the Lord that kept me from you, and I a'n't going to take my
blessings back. It's because I do remember them times that I say No,
now. Your locket is at the bottom of our well; but any love I had with
it is drowned deeper, down to the bottom of nothing. I wish you well,
and to mend your ways; but I don't want to see you here, never!"
After this pungent dismission, nothing was left for Ned Parker but to
hobble from the house, cursing to himself for shame, while 'Tenty buried
her face in her apron and cried as bitterly as if fifteen, instead of
fifty, assailed her with its sorrows.
Why did she cry? Who knows? Perhaps, if you, my dear friend, longing for
the face that bloomed, the lips that kissed, the eyes that smiled for
you, years ago, should suddenly be confronted by those features, after
years of death and decay had done their ghastly work on them, bones
grinning from their clinging morsels of clay, you, too, might hide your
head and cry with terror and disgust and regret. And again you might
not. As I said before, who knows?
But after this, Content subsided into her peaceful routine. Ned Parker
drank himself into delirium-tremens, spent all his money, and came upon
the town. But at that juncture, the Reverend Everett Goodyear, Parson
Goodyear's son and successor, interfered in his behalf, hired a room
and a nurse for him, and had him taken care of in the most generous and
faithful way for the remaining year-and-a-half of his life. Mr. Goodyear
said he was acting for Parker's friends; some said he had a rich uncle,
who was moved to compassion at last; some thought it was Hannah-Ann
Hall; but only one person knew, and she said nothing.
The day Ned Parker died, the young minister stepped in to see 'Tenty
Scran', and told her he was gone. Content did not cry nor smile.
"I'm glad he's rested," said she; "though I haven't no certainty about
his state hereafter."
"You must leave that with the Lord, Miss Content," said Mr. Goodyear.
"You have done what was right; you can't think He will do less."
"That's a fact; and now I expect my last trouble is over."
"But it has taken almost all your money," hesitatingly replied the
minister.
"Well, that's the least of my concerns, Mr. Goodyear," smiled 'Tenty.
"I'm spared my hands yet, and I sha'n't want for nothing while they
last. When I get helpless, I expect the Lord will take care of me. I
sha'n't worry about it till it comes."
"That is philosophy, certainly," said Mr. Goodyear.
"I don't know as it's that; but I guess it's six of common-sense and
half-a-dozen of religion; I always thought they was near about the same
thing. Fact is, people don't die of troubles in this world; they die of
frettin' at 'em, only they don't seem to know it."
"According to that rule, you won't die this long time, Miss 'Tenty,"
said the minister, unable to resist a smile.
"Well, I don't know, Sir. I guess I shall live as long as I want to; and
I expect I shall die content. I a'n't troubled."
"Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth," murmured Mr.
Goodyear, as he walked away.
* * * * *