KATY FINDS A NEW AIM IN LIFE
IT was on Tuesday evening that Grandmother Gaumer was smitten and Alvin
Koehler whistled in the garden. On Wednesday Millerstown flocked to the
Gaumer house with inquiries and gifts. They all saw Grandmother Gaumer,
according to Millerstown's custom in sickness, then they went down to
the kitchen to hear from Bevy an account of this amazing seizure. Sarah
Ann Mohr, who was one of grandmother's oldest friends, brought fresh pie
and many tears. Susannah Kuhns promised fresh bread in the afternoon,
and Sarah Knerr carried off the washing.
Then Sarah Ann, accustomed to hear with admiration and wonder the
problems which Katy put to a puzzled Mr. Carpenter, and expecting, with
the rest of the community, that she would bring extraordinary honor to
Millerstown, asked Bevy Schnepp a question.
"My mom was taken that a way," she explained, tearfully. "For seven
years she laid and didn't speak and toward the end she hadn't her mind
any more. Who will take care of gran'mom? Will Edwin and Sally move home
or will they get some one from outside?"
Bevy stood beside the sink, her arms akimbo.
"Gran'mom isn't sure to lie seven years," said she. Bevy had in her
possession the seventh book of Moses, which contained many powerful
prescriptions; she meant to see what pow-wowing could do before she
despaired of Grandmother Gaumer. "But if she does lay, Edwin won't come
home and they won't get anybody from outside. It was never yet a Gaumer
what had to be taken care of by one from outside. Katy will take care of
her gran'mom."
"Katy will take care of her gran'mom!" repeated Sarah Ann. "But she
won't be well till [by] September! How will Katy then be educated?
Carpenter has learned her everything he knows in this world. I could
easy hear that!"
"Katy does not think of education," answered Bevy. "She thinks of
nothing but her gran'mom. She is with her night and day."
Solemnly Sarah Ann and Bevy regarded one another. Then solemnly they
nodded.
"That is what I said to Millerstown!" Thus Sarah Ann in triumph. "There
are those in Millerstown who will have it that Katy will let her
gran'mom stick. There are those in Millerstown who say that when people
get education, they get crazy. Did she cry, Bevy?"
"Not that I saw," answered Bevy, proudly. "Or that any one else saw, I
guess."
"I will tell Millerstown," Sarah Ann made ready to depart. "It is three
places where I will stop already on my way home."
Ponderously, satisfied with her darling, Sarah Ann moved through the
door.
Among the numerous visitors was Essie Hill, who had recently experienced
the sudden and violent change of heart which admitted her to full
membership in the Improved New Mennonite Church. She wore now a little
short back sailor like the older women, with an inscription across the
front to the effect that she was a worker in the vineyard. Essie was
sincere; she was good, but Katy hated her. When she told Essie, not
without a few impertinent embroideries, that her grandmother was asleep,
Essie departed with a quiet acceptance of the rebuff which no
Millerstonian would have endured without resentment. Essie's placid
soul, however, was not easily disturbed. She performed her duty in
offering to sit by Grandmother Gaumer and to read and pray with her;
further she was not obligated.
Katy heard no more Alvin's clear whistle in the garden. She said to
herself, in a moment of physical and mental depression, that he might
easily have made a way to see her by coming with the rest of Millerstown
to inquire for the invalid; then she reminded herself that the Koehlers
went nowhere, had no friends.
"He is ashamed of his pop," said Katy to herself. "His pop is a black
shame to him."
On Thursday she left her grandmother while she went on an errand to the
store and her eyes searched every inch of Main Street and the two
shorter streets which ran into it. But Alvin was nowhere to be seen. She
answered shortly the questions about her grandmother, put to her by the
storekeeper and by all other persons whom she met, and returned to the
house in despair.
"If I could only see him," she cried to herself. "If I could only talk
to him a little!"
On Sunday evening Bevy drove her out, almost by force, to the front
porch. Bevy's preacher was again holding services in the next village,
and Bevy was therefore free to care for the invalid. She had sought all
the week an opportunity to sit by Grandmother Gaumer and to repeat the
pow-wow rhymes which she firmly believed would help her. Now, sitting at
the head of the bed in the dusk, she made passes in the air with her
hands and motions with her lips. When she was certain that Grandmother
Gaumer slept, she slid down to her hands and knees and crept three times
round the bed, repeating the while some mystic rhyme. In reality,
Grandmother Gaumer did not sleep, but lay amusedly conscious of the
administrating of Bevy's therapeutic measures.
Meanwhile Katy was not alone. Had Bevy suspected the company into which
she was sending her beloved, it is probable that one spring would have
carried her down the steps, and another to the porch.
Katy sat for a long time on the step with her chin in her hands. She was
thin, her eyes were unnaturally large, the hard work of nursing had worn
her out. Her gaze searched the street, and she shrank into the shadow of
the honeysuckle vine when couples paraded slowly by, arm in arm.
"I have nobody," mourned Katy, weakly, to herself. "Nobody in all the
world but my gran'mom, and she cannot even speak to me."
After a long time Katy's sharp gaze detected a lurking figure across the
street. Her heart throbbed, she leaned forward out of the shadow of the
vine. Then she called a soft "Alvin!"
Alvin came promptly across and Katy made room for him beside her. He
wore his new red tie, but his face as the light from the street lamp
fell upon it was far from happy.
"Is your gran'mom yet sick?" he asked.
"Yes." Katy could answer only in a monosyllable. Alvin was here, he sat
beside her, the skirt of her dress rested against him.
"I was here once in the garden, and I whistled for you. I did not know
your gran'mom was sick."
"I heard it, but I couldn't come." The two voices had all the tones of
deep tragedy. "It was when my gran'mom was first taken sick." Katy felt
suddenly tired and weak, but she was very happy. She noticed now the
odor of honeysuckle and the sweeter jasmine out on the garden wall. It
was a beautiful world.
After a long time Alvin spoke again, still unhappily.
"David Hartman is going away to school."
Katy's heart gave a jealous throb. It was not fair for any one to have
an education when she could not.
"He is going right away to the real college."
"He cannot!" said Katy. "He cannot pass the examination. He is no
farther than I and I couldn't get in the real college. I guess we have
catalogues that tell about it!"
"But there is a young fellow here to teach him this summer, so he can
get in. His mother is willing for him to go. Some say that David has
already his own money. It costs a lot of money to get such a young man.
He gets more than Carpenter got, they say. He is living at the hotel
because it is too clean at the Hartmans' for strangers. David goes to
him at the hotel. They say he will learn to be a lawyer so that he can
take care of his money. And the tailor"--the spaces between Alvin's
words grew wider and wider, his voice rose and fell almost as though he
were chanting--"the tailor is making new clothes for him, and his mom
bought him a trunk in Allentown!"
"So!" said Katy, scornfully, the blood beating in her temples. She did
not envy David his clothes, but she envied him his learning. Katy was
desperately tired; a noble resolve, though persisted in bravely, does
not keep one constantly cheerful and courageous.
"And he sits on the porch in the evenings sometimes with Essie Hill."
"He has good company! It is queer for such an educated one to like such
a dumb one! Perhaps Essie will get him to convert himself. She was here
to get me to convert myself. She says it is while I am wicked that this
trouble comes upon me. She wanted to sit by my gran'mom and talk about
my gran'mom's sins, and I told her my gran'mom hadn't as many sins in
her whole life as she had already." Katy could not suppress a giggle.
"That settled her. I wouldn't even let her go up. I wanted to choke
her."
Again Katy sat silently. Alvin was here, she was consuming the time in
foolish talk; at any minute Bevy might descend from above or they might
be interrupted by a visitor. Alvin moved uneasily. Perhaps he, too, felt
this talk to be foolish. The light fell full upon his red tie and the
beautiful line of his young throat. A more mature and experienced person
than Katy Gaumer would have been certain that there must be good in a
creature so beautiful.
"David can go to college," he said mournfully. "But I cannot go
anywhere, not even to the normal school where I could learn to be a
teacher. I thought I would surely get that much of an education, but
there is no hope for me."
Katy turned and looked at him. "Why no hope?"
"Why, they say in Millerstown that you are not going to school. You said
that when you went to school you would find a way for me to go. But if
you are not going, then there is no one to help me. And pop"--Alvin's
lapses into the vernacular were frequent--"pop gets worse and worse. He
is going very fast behind. He is getting so he has queer ideas. He was
making him shoelaces with the ravelings of the carpet. And he thinks
there is now a woman with horns after him. He talks about it all the
time. I have nothing in this world. When he was so bad I came to tell
you. It was then I whistled."
"You do not need any one at the school to help you," said Katy in a
clear voice. "If I am not going, I can all the better help you to go;
don't you see that, Alvin? If you are going to teach, you do not have to
pay anything except for board and room. I have two hundred dollars in
the bank, and I can lend you some to begin with and then you can get
something to do. I will give you fifty dollars"--poor Katy planned as
though she had thousands. "There is a little hole round the corner of
the house in the wall, where Bevy used to put the cakes for me. There I
will put the money for you, Alvin."
Alvin's lips parted. He felt not so much gratitude as amazement.
"Aren't you going to school _ever_?"
Katy did not answer.
"Millerstown will be crazy when it finds I am going away!" cried Alvin
with delight.
"They must never know how you go!" said Katy in alarm. "You must not
tell them how you go!"
"They think my father has money." Here was a solution. "They do not know
he has given it all to detectives. They think he has it hidden away.
Millerstown is very dumb."
"You must get a catalogue from the school, Alvin, and you must send in
your name. That is the first."
"I will," promised Alvin. "I will do it right away. It is a loan, Katy,
and I will pay it back. It will not be hard to earn the money to pay it
back!"
The sound of a descending footstep on the stairway frightened them, as
though they had been plotting evil. Alvin went swiftly and quietly out
the brick walk, and Katy sat still. When Bevy came to the kitchen door,
Katy sat on the lowest step, where Bevy had left her, her elbows on her
knees, her chin in her hands.
"You are not to come in yet," said Bevy. "I just came to get a drink.
Your gran'mom is sleeping."
"Yes, well," answered Katy, keeping her voice steady by great effort.
She did not wish to move. She wished to think and think. If Alvin had
omitted an expression of thanks, she held no grudge against him, had
not, indeed, even observed the omission. Here was an outlet from prison;
here was something to be, to do! She would cheerfully have earned by the
labor of her hands enough to send Alvin Koehler to school. After such a
foolish, generous pattern was Katy made in her youth; thus, lightly,
with a beating, happy heart, did she put herself in bondage.
"I will educate Alvin," said Katy. "If I cannot do one thing, I can do
another."
Alvin Koehler climbed the hill. His heart did not throb as rapidly as
Katy's, but Alvin, too, was very happy. Alvin was not yet possessed by
an overwhelming desire for an education; but he saw a new suit and at
least three neckties. Above that delectable goal, his ambition did not
rise.
When he reached the little white house on the hillside and lifted the
latch of the door, he could not get in. After he had pounded and called,
his terror growing each moment greater, he tried the window. From there
his father's strong hands pushed him so suddenly that he fell on his
back into the soft soil of the garden. Poor William Koehler had come to
confuse the woman with horns with his harmless son.
Terrified, Alvin retraced his steps to the village and sought the
squire. In the morning, the squire, with gentle persuasion, carried poor
William to the county home. There William was kept at first in a cell,
with a barred window; then he was allowed to work in the fields under
guard. Gradually, the woman with horns vanished; his work with his
familiar tools and with the plants which he loved seemed to have a
healing effect. He grew more and more quiet; presently he ceased to pray
aloud in his frantic way. He said after a while that God had told him to
be quiet. He seemed to have forgotten his home, his child, his old life,
even his enemy.