She had no time to organize a campaign, forced as she was to begin
fighting at once. Reaching wildly for any weapon at hand, she rushed to
the front, as grim-visaged a warrior as ever frightened a peaceable,
shiftless non-combatant "Joel Barney!" she cried, storming up his front
steps. "You're a trustee of the church, aren't you? Well, if you don't
vote against selling the church, I'll foreclose the mortgage on your house
so quick you can't wink. And you tell 'Lias Bennett that if he doesn't do
the same, I'll pile manure all over that field of mine near his place, and
stink out his summer renters so they'll never set foot here again."
She shifted tactics as she encountered different adversaries and tried no
blackmail on stubborn Miles Benton, whom she took pains to see the next
time he came back to Greenford for a visit. Him she hailed as the
Native-Born. "How would you like to have brazen models and nasty statues
made in the building where your own folks have always gone to church?"
But when the skirmish was over, she realized ruefully that the argument
which had brought her her hard-won victory had been the one which, for a
person of such very moderate means as hers, reflected the least hope for
future battles. At the last, in desperation, she had guaranteed in the
name of the Ladies' Aid Society that the church, except for the minister's
salary, should thereafter be no expense to the trustees. She had invented
that source of authority, remembering that Molly Leonard had said she
belonged to the Ladies' Aid Society, "and I can make Molly do anything,"
she thought, trusting Providence for the management of the others.
As a matter of fact, when she came to investigate the matter, she found
that Molly was now the sole remaining member. Her dismay was acute,
Molly's finances being only too well known to her, but she rallied
bravely. "They don't do much to a church that costs money," she thought,
and, when Molly went away, she made out her budget unflinchingly. Wood for
the furnace, kerosene for the lamps, wages to the janitor, repairs when
needed--"Well, Abigail Warner," she told herself, "it means nothing new
bought for the garden, and no new microscope--the roof to the library
costing more than they said 'twould and all."
But the joy of triumphant battle was still swelling her doughty old heart,
so that even these considerations did not damp her exultation over her
artist neighbor the next time he came to see her. He listened to her
boasting with his pleasant, philosophic smile, and, when she finished,
delivered himself of a quiet little disquisition or the nature of things
which was like ice-water in the face of the hot-blooded old fighter.
"My dear Miss Abigail, your zeal does your heart credit, and your
management of the trustees proves you an unsuspected diplomat; but as a
friend, and, believe me, a disinterested friend, let me warn you that you
are contending against irresistible forces. You can no more resuscitate
your old Greenford than you can any other dead body. You have kept the
church from my clutches, it is true, though for that matter I wouldn't
have offered to buy it if I hadn't thought no one cared about it--but what
do you mean to do with it now you have it? You cannot bring back the old
Greenford families from their well-paid work in Johnsonville to sit in
those rescued pews, or read in your deserted library, or send their
children to your empty schoolhouse. You tell me they are loyal to their
old home, and love to come back here for visits. Is that strange?
Greenford is a charming village set in the midst of beautiful mountains,
and Johnsonville is a raw factory town in a plain. But they cannot live on
picturesque scenery or old associations. The laws of economics are like
all other laws of nature, inevitable in their action and irresistible in--"
Miss Abigail gave the grampus snort which had been her great-grandfather's
war-cry. "Hoo! You're like all other book folks! You give things such long
names you scare yourselves! I haven't got anything to do with economics,
nor it with me. It's a plain question as to whether the church my
ancestors built and worshipped in is to be sold. There's nothing so
inevitable in _that_, let me tell you. Laws of nature--fiddlesticks! How
about the law of gravity? Don't I break that every time I get up gumption
enough to raise my hand to my head!"
Mr. Horton looked at the belligerent old woman with the kindest smile of
comprehension. "Ah, I know how hard it is for you. In another way I have
been through the same bitter experience. My home, my real home, where my
own people are, is out in a wind-swept little town on the Nebraska
prairies. But I cannot live there because it is too far from my world of
artists and art patrons. I tried it once, but the laws of supply and
demand work for all alike. I gave it up. Here I am, you see. You can't
help such things. You'd better follow on to Johnsonville now and not
embitter the last of your life with a hopeless struggle."
Miss Abigail fairly shouted at him her repudiation of his ideas. "Not
while there is a breath in me! My folks were all soldiers."
"But even soldiers surrender to overpowering forces."
"Hoo! Hoo! How do they know they're overpowering till they're overpowered!
How do they dare surrender till they're dead! How do they know that if
they hold out just a little longer they won't get reënforcements!"
Mr. Horton was a little impatient of his old friend's unreason. "My dear
Miss Abigail, you have brains. _Use_ them! What possible reinforcements
can you expect?"
The old woman opposed to his arguments nothing but a passionately bare
denial. "No! No! No! We're different! It's in your blood to give up
because you can reason it all out that you're beaten," She stood up,
shaking with her vehemence. "It's in my blood to fight and fight and
fight--"
"And then what?" asked the sculptor, as she hesitated.
"Go on fighting!" she cried.