I
“THE most delightful thing about our engagement is
that everybody is so pleased with it.” Amy Townsend said this,
smiling down at her lover, who, full length on the grass beside
her, leaned on his elbow, watching her soft hair blowing across her
forehead, and the color of the sun flickering through the shadows,
hot on her cheek; for she had closed her fluffy white parasol and
taken off her hat here under an oak-tree on the grassy bank of the
river.
“I should have thought that the fact that we were pleased ourselves
was a trifle more important,” he suggested. But Miss Townsend paid
no attention to his interruption.
“You know, generally, when people get engaged, there are always
people who exclaim: either the man is too good for the girl (and
you are too good for me, Billy!), or the girl is too good for the
man”--
“She is; there is no question about that,” the man interrupted.
“Be quiet!” the other commanded. “But in our case, everybody
approves. You see, in the first place, you are a Parson, and I’m a
Worker. That’s what they call me,--the old ladies,--‘a Worker.’ And
of course that’s a most appropriate combination to start with.”
“Well, the old ladies will discover that my wife isn’t going to
run their committees for them,” the parson said emphatically.
“Besides, if I’m a Parson, you’re a Person! How do the old ladies
bear it, that I haven’t any ancestors, and used to run errands in a
tin-shop? _I_’m a Worker, literally enough.”
“You are a goose!” she told him calmly. “Don’t keep interrupting
me, Billy. What do ancestors amount to? I admit I’m glad that none
of mine were hanged (so far as I know), or that they didn’t run off
with other people’s money--or wives. (I’d mind the wives less than
the money, I must confess. I suppose you think that’s very mediæval
in me?) But what credit is their good behavior to me? You are a
credit to your people, whoever they were; and my own belief is that
they were Princes!”
She had such a charming way of flinging up her head and looking
down at him sidewise, that he was willing to have had any kind of
ancestors, only to catch that look of joyous pride; and in his own
joyousness he was impelled to try to take her hand in his: but her
fingers were laced about her knee, and she shook her head.
“Stop! I’m talking seriously; you mustn’t be silly. You must
listen to the other reasons why we are approved of: First, you
are a Parson, and I’m a Worker. Secondly, you are forty-two,
and ‘it’s high time’--high time, sir!--‘for you to be married’;
and I’m twenty-seven--and, really, you know, ‘my chances are
lessening’--(that’s what they say, my dear); and I ‘hardly deserve,
after all these years’”--
“And offers?” suggested her lover.
“After all these _years_, Billy,--not to get a crooked stick in the
end.”
“I am not crooked, I will admit,” he said.
“Thirdly,” she proceeded, “you are very good-looking, and all the
old Tabbies say that a handsome minister ought to be married.”
“The old Tabbies might find something better to talk about,” he
said, his face hardening. “Oh, Amy, that’s the kind of thing
that makes a man cringe!--I mean a minister. Here is this great,
serious, strenuous matter of living--the consciousness of God;
that’s what living is in its highest expression. And to further
that consciousness is the divinest human passion. A man tries to do
it, gives his life to it, and immediately he is food for chattering
old women! They gossip about his affairs, or his clothes, or his
looks, even!” William West sat up, his face stirred with anger and
pity. “But I suppose I must admit that the Parsons bring it on
themselves to some extent,” he ended, with a sigh; “we don’t mingle
enough with men; they distrust us, and think we talk twaddle about
overcoming temptations we know nothing about. So, being shut out
from masculine living, we do haunt tea-tables, and gabble about
vestments. I suppose there’s no doubt of it. Amy, I believe that
the old hunting, swearing parsons of three generations ago were of
more real value in the world than the harmless creatures that we
have now!”
He had a certain stern way of thrusting out his lower lip when he
was very much in earnest, and drawing his strong brows together; an
impatient fire sprang into his beautiful dark eyes. He turned and
looked at her, claiming her understanding.
“Yes,” she said; “yes, it is so. The belittling of the profession
of the ministry is a dreadful thing--a shameful thing. I once
heard a man say that ‘Elderly unmarried women always had to have
something to fuss over and coddle, something to lead around by
a blue ribbon. Sometimes it was a poodle; sometimes it was a
clergyman.’ And there’s truth in it, Billy.”
“There is,” he said grimly.
“Well, dear,” she reassured him, smiling, “your distinguished
rudeness to the ladies of your congregation has at least protected
you from the blue ribbon.”
He began to protest, but the talk slipped back into their own
affairs, and somehow he succeeded in getting her hand, and by and
by they were silent, just for happiness, and because it was sunset,
and the river was flickering with light, and there was a faint stir
of leaves overhead. They were to be married in a fortnight, and
they were going to have all their lives together to say how good
life was, so there was no need to talk now.
As the girl had said, it really was a very satisfactory match.
William West was a man whom every one honored, and many loved.
For fifteen years he had been settled in Mercer; first as an
assistant to old Mr. Brown, and then as rector of the church.
But he had taken his place in the community as a man of strong
judgment and high character; perhaps as a citizen, rather than as
a minister. Men felt that he was a man before he was a clergyman;
not knowing that his calling had given him his highest manhood. He
was singularly devoid of clerical affectation; consequently the
influence of his own reverence was not vitiated by a suspicion of
his common sense. In fact, his sanity in matters religious, joined
to his knowledge of human nature, made him a man of importance in
affairs municipal and social. That he had lived to be forty-two,
and had not married, was from no asceticism; he was a very human
person, and fully intended to have a wife; only, she must be just
what he wanted. And so far, that “not impossible She” who was to
possess his heart had never appeared. When she did, he recognized
her immediately, and would have proposed to her the next day, had
not a feeling of diffidence as to her sentiments deterred him for
nearly two weeks. At the end of that time, he told her--ah, well,
never mind what he told her! She, at least, will never forget the
passion of that claiming.
Amy Townsend had come to spend the winter in Mercer, with a cousin.
Of course, the first Sunday she went to St. James’s, as everybody
who was anybody did. When she came home, her eyes were keen with
interest.
“Do tell me about him, Cousin Kate,” she said. “I never heard that
sort of preaching; what does it mean? Is he a real person, or is he
just clever?” Mrs. Paul laughed.
“Wait till you meet him! you’ll see.”
But she also added to herself, “Wait till he meets you!” For Mrs.
Paul was one of those courageous women who rush in where angels
fear to tread; she was a match-maker.
“Is he married?” the girl asked, naturally enough; but blushed
furiously the next instant, which made her angry.
“No; but it is not for lack of opportunity,” said Mrs. Paul dryly.
“I declare, Amy, women are dreadful fools, sometimes! I should
think a clergyman wouldn’t marry, out of sheer disgust for their
silliness.”
“Oh, he’s run after, is he?” Miss Townsend said coldly.
“Well, I must admit he’s very attractive,” Mrs. Paul began,
remembering her scheme, and retreating a little,--for nothing will
put a girl against a man sooner than to know he is “run after.”
Then she told his story: the boy had been a waif. (“His mother was
respectable, I think,” said Mrs. Paul, “but nobody knows anything
about the father.”) He had had that dreariest sort of childhood
which knows no other home than an institution. Then, somehow,
“quite like a story-book,” Mrs. Paul said, a gentleman took an
interest in him, and began to help him in one way or another.
“It was that zoölogical man, Professor Wilson; you know who I
mean?” Mrs. Paul explained. “He looked after him. At first he put
him in a tinshop, if you please, as errand-boy,--fancy! this man
with the ‘grand manner.’”
“Oh, I supposed he was a gentleman,” Amy Townsend said.
“Amy, you are a snob,” her cousin answered hotly. “He is.”
Mrs. Paul was so annoyed that she ended the story of Mr. West’s
career very briefly. “Professor Wilson offered either to start him
in business or put him through college; he chose to go to college.”
“That was rather fine,” Miss Townsend agreed.
“Fine? It just showed what sort of a man he was!” cried Mrs. Paul.
“He worked his way to some extent; that is, he was Professor
Wilson’s secretary, and he did a lot of tutoring. Professor Wilson
left him a good deal of money, but he gave away nearly half of it
at once, John says. Quite remarkable for a young man. Well, that’s
all; you see what he is to-day--a gentleman and a scholar: John
says there is no man in Mercer who has the influence that he has.”
Miss Townsend, in spite of her careful indifference, was
interested. And later, when Rev. William West met her, he, too, was
“interested;” and all fell out as the most experienced romancer
could desire.
Amy had a little money, much charm, a certain distinction that
answered for beauty, and a very true nature; there was, perhaps, a
certain hard integrity about her, but her impulses were gracious.
Also, as the old ladies said, she was a “worker.” She found life
too interesting not to meddle with it.
So it had come to pass that these two, who, as Mrs. Paul said,
“were made for each other,” were going to be married.
* * * * *
“Just think, in two weeks!” he said, as they sat there under the
oak, the blossoming grass knee-deep about them, and the air sweet
with clover. “Amy, it does not seem as if I had been alive until
now.”
“I wonder, does it go on getting--nicer?” she asked him, a little
shyly; “everything seems to be better, and more worth while.”
“I understand,” he said.
And they were silent for awhile, because understanding is enough,
when people are in love. Then the girl’s gayety began to sparkle
out.
“Billy, Cousin Kate says if I’m not careful I’ll get to be a
managing Parsoness; she says I must devote myself to you, not to
your poor people.”
“Mrs. Paul has given a great deal of good advice in her day,” the
Rev. Billy remarked meditatively, “and I really think very little
harm has come from it.”
“She advised your being called to Mercer,” Amy retorted. “Did you
know that?”
“Know it? My dear child! how often have I dined at the Pauls’? Just
so often have I heard it.”
“Now, Billy, that’s not very nice in you.”
“I but stated a fact; and I have a high regard for Mrs. Paul. Only,
when I think how many girls she has tried to make marry me!--but
they would none of them look at me.”
“And in two weeks the opportunity will be gone,” she jeered.
“Poor girls!” the minister commiserated; and was reproved for
vanity. Indeed, just because happiness is so serious a thing, they
became very frivolous, these two, sitting watching the sunset,
and the river. Amy told him a funny story about the parish; he
responded by another concerning Tom Reilly, a policeman; which
reminded Amy to tell him that poor Tom had had an accident, and
hurt his hand.
“But it was very stupid in him,” she added, with a little of that
resentful goodness that one sees sometimes in women. “I’m not at
all sorry for him, because he deserved it. He had been drinking,
and as he went stumbling out of a car, he crushed his hand in the
door.”
Her lover was not to be lured into professional comments; he
only muttered, “_Mauvais quart d’heure_”--which made her say
indignantly: “Now, Billy, really, that is _too_ much!” and insist
that they should go home immediately. “I cannot descend to such
levels,” she told him; and was very stern and forbidding when,
looking to the right and left, and seeing no man, he begged to be
allowed to kiss her.
But this was all froth. Beneath, in the man’s life, were the great
tides of love, moving, noiseless and unchangeable, from out the
depths of his soul. In the girl’s life it was all shine and perfume
and glitter, like flowers blossoming on a rock; beneath, in her
heart, was the solid ground of reverence and faith.