THE SERENADE
A subject that never failed to arouse the sarcasm and the ire of Fairy
was that of the Slaughter-house Quartette. This was composed of four
young men--men quite outside the pale as far as the parsonage was
concerned--the disreputable characters of the community, familiar in the
local jail for frequent bursts of intoxication. They slouched, they
smoked, they lounged, they leered. The churches knew them not. They were
the slum element, the Bowery of Mount Mark, Iowa.
Prudence, in her day, had passed them by with a shy slight nod and a
glance of tender pity. Fairy and Lark, and even Connie, sailed by with
high heads and scornful eyes,--haughty, proud, icily removed. But Carol,
by some weird and inexplicable fancy, treated them with sweet and
gracious solicitude, quite friendly. Her smile as she passed was as
sweet as for her dearest friend. Her "Good morning,--isn't this glorious
weather?" was as affably cordial as her, "Breakfast is ready, papa!"
This was the one subject of dispute between the twins.
"Oh, please don't, Carol, it does make me so ashamed," Lark entreated.
"You mustn't be narrow-minded, Larkie," Carol argued. "We're minister's
girls, and we've got to be a good influence,--an encouragement to
the--er, weak and erring, you know. Maybe my smiles will be an
inspiration to them."
And on this point Carol stood firm even against the tears of her
precious twin.
One evening at the dinner table Fairy said, with a mocking smile, "How
are your Slaughter-house friends to-day, Carol? When I was at the
dentist's I saw you coming along, beaming at them in your own inimitable
way."
"Oh, they seemed all right," Carol answered, with a deprecating glance
toward her father and her aunt.
"I see by last night's paper that Guy Fleisher is just out after his
last thirty days up," Fairy continued solicitously. "Did he find his
incarceration trying?"
"I didn't discuss it with him," Carol said indignantly. "I never talk to
them. I just say 'Good morning' in Christian charity."
Aunt Grace's eyes were smiling as always, but for the first time Carol
felt that the smiles were at, instead of with, her.
"You would laugh to see her, Aunt Grace," Fairy explained. "They are
generally half intoxicated, sometimes wholly. And Carol trips by, clean,
white and shining. They are always lounging against the store windows or
posts for support, bleary-eyed, dissipated, swaggery, staggery. Carol
nods and smiles as only Carol can, 'Good morning, boys! Isn't it a
lovely day? Are you feeling well?' And they grin at her and sway
ingratiatingly against one another, and say, 'Mornin', Carol.' Carol is
the only really decent person in town that has anything to do with
them."
"Carol means all right," declared Lark angrily.
"Yes, indeed," assented Fairy, "They call them the Slaughter-house
Quartette, auntie, because whenever they are sober enough to walk
without police assistance, they wander through the streets slaughtering
the peace and serenity of the quiet town with their rendition of all the
late, disgraceful sentimental ditties. They are in many ways striking
characters. I do not wholly misunderstand their attraction for romantic
Carol. They are something like the troubadours of old--only more so."
Carol's face was crimson. "I don't like them," she cried, "but I'm sorry
for them. I think maybe I can make them see the difference between us,
me so nice and respectable you know, and them so--animalish! It may
arouse their better natures--I suppose they have better natures. I want
to show them that the decent element, we Christians, are sorry for them
and want to make them better."
"Carol wants to be an influence," Fairy continued. "Of course, it is a
little embarrassing for the rest of us to have her on such friendly
terms with the most unmentionable characters in all Mount Mark. But
Carol is like so many reformers,--in the presence of one great truth she
has eyes for it only, ignoring a thousand other, greater truths."
"I am sorry for them," Carol repeated, more weakly, abashed by the
presence of the united family. Fairy's dissertations on this subject had
usually occurred in private.
Mr. Starr mentally resolved that he would talk this over with Carol when
the others were not present, for he knew from her face and her voice
that she was really sensitive on the subject. And he knew, too, that it
is difficult to explain to the very young that the finest of ideas are
not applicable to all cases by all people. But it happened that he was
spared the necessity of dealing with Carol privately, for matters
adjusted themselves without his assistance.
The second night following was an eventful one in the parsonage. One of
the bishops of the church was in Mount Mark for a business conference
with the religious leaders, and was to spend the night at the parsonage.
The meeting was called for eight-thirty for the convenience of the
business men concerned, and was to be held in the church offices. The
men left early, followed shortly by Fairy who designed to spend the
evening at the Averys' home, testing their supply of winter apples. The
twins and Connie, with the newest and most thrilling book Mr. Carnegie
afforded the town, went up-stairs to lie on the bed and take turns
reading aloud. And for a few hours the parsonage was as calm and
peaceful as though it were not designed for the housing of merry
minister's daughters.
Aunt Grace sat down-stairs darning stockings. The girls' intentions had
been the best in the world, but in less than a year the family darning
had fallen entirely into the capable and willing hands of the gentle
chaperon.
It was half past ten. The girls had just seen their heroine rescued from
a watery grave and married to her bold preserver by a minister who
happened to be writing a sermon on the beach--no mention of how the
license was secured extemporaneously--and with sighs of gratified
sentiment they lay happily on the bed thinking it all over. And then,
from beneath the peach trees clustered on the south side of the
parsonage, a burst of melody arose.
"Good morning, Carrie, how are you this morning?"
The girls sat up abruptly, staring at one another, as the curious ugly
song wafted in upon them. Conviction dawned slowly, sadly, but
unquestionably.
The Slaughter-house Quartette was serenading Carol in return for her
winsome smiles!
Carol herself was literally struck dumb. Her face grew crimson, then
white. In her heart, she repeated psalms of thanksgiving that Fairy was
away, and that her father and the bishop would not be in until this
colossal disaster was over.
Connie was mortified. It seemed like a wholesale parsonage insult. Lark,
after the first awful realization, lay back on the bed and rolled
convulsively.
"You're an influence all right, Carol," she gurgled. "Will you listen to
that?"
For _Rufus Rastus Johnson Brown_ was the second choice of her cavaliers
below in the darkness.
"Rufus Rastus," Lark cried, and then was choked with laughter. "Of
course, it would be--proper if they sang hymns but--oh, listen!"
The rollicking strains of _Budweiser_ were swung gaily out upon the
night.
Carol writhed in anguish. The serenade was bad enough, but this
unmerciful mocking derision of her adored twin was unendurable.
Then the quartette waxed sentimental. They sang, and not badly, a few
old southern melodies, and started slowly around the corner of the
house, still singing.
It has been said that Aunt Grace was always kind, always gentle,
unsuspicious and without guile. She had heard the serenade, and promptly
concluded that it was the work of some of the high-school boys who were
unanimously devoted to Carol. She had a big box of chocolates up-stairs,
for Connie's birthday celebration. She could get them, and make
lemonade, and--
She opened the door softly and stepped out, directly in the path of the
startled youths. Full of her hospitable intent, she was not discerning
as parsonage people need to be.
"Come in, boys," she said cordially, "the girls will be down in a
minute."
The appearance of a guardian angel summoning them to Paradise could not
have confounded them more utterly. They stumbled all over one another
in trying to back away from her. She laughed softly.
"Don't be bashful. We enjoyed it very much. Yes, come right in."
Undoubtedly they would have declined if only they could have thought of
the proper method of doing so. As it was, they only succeeded in
shambling through the parsonage door, instinctively concealing their
half-smoked cigarettes beneath their fingers.
Aunt Grace ushered them into the pleasant living-room, and ran up to
summon her nieces.
Left alone, the boys looked at one another with amazement and with
grief, and the leader, the touching tenor, said with true musical
fervor, "Well, this is a go!"
In the meantime, the girls, with horror, had heard their aunt's
invitation. What in the world did she mean? Was it a trick between her
and Fairy? Had they hired the awful Slaughterers to bring this disgrace
upon the parsonage? Sternly they faced her when she opened their door.
"Come down, girls--I invited them in. I'm going to make lemonade and
serve my nice chocolates. Hurry down."
"You invited them in!" echoed Connie.
"The Slaughter-house Quartette," hissed Lark.
Then Aunt Grace whirled about and stared at them. "Mercy!" she
whispered, remembering for the first time Fairy's words. "Mercy! Is
it--that? I thought it was high-school boys and--mercy!"
"Mercy is good," said Carol grimly.
"You'll have to put them out," suggested Connie.
"I can't! How can I?--How did I know?--What on earth,--Oh, Carol
whatever made you smile at them?" she wailed helplessly. "You know how
men are when they are smiled at! The bishop--"
"You'll have to get them out before the bishop comes back," said Carol.
"You must. And if any of you ever give this away to father or Fairy
I'll--"
"You'd better go down a minute, girls," urged their aunt. "That will be
the easiest way. I'll just pass the candy and invite them to come again
and then they'll go. Hurry now, and we'll get rid of them before the
others come. Be as decent as you can, and it'll soon be over."
Thus adjured, with the dignity of the bishop and the laughter of Fairy
ever in their thoughts, the girls arose and went down, proudly, calmly,
loftily. Their inborn senses of humor came to their assistance when they
entered the living-room. The Slaughter boys looked far more slaughtered
than slaughtering. They sat limply in their chairs, nervously twitching
their yellowed slimy fingers, their dull eyes intent upon the worn spots
in the carpet. It was funny! Even Carol smiled, not the serene sweet
smile that melted hearts, but the grim hard smile of the joker when the
tables are turned! She flattered herself that this wretched travesty on
parsonage courtesy would be ended before there were any further
witnesses to her downfall from her proud fine heights, but she was
doomed to disappointment. Fairy, on the Averys' porch, had heard the
serenade. After the first shock, and after the helpless laughter that
followed, she bade her friends good night.
"Oh, I've just got to go," she said. "It's a joke on Carol. I wouldn't
miss it for twenty-five bushels of apples,--even as good as these are."
Her eyes twinkling with delight, she ran home and waited behind the
rose bushes until the moment for her appearance seemed at hand. Then she
stepped into the room where her outraged sisters were stoically passing
precious and luscious chocolates to tobacco-saturated youths.
"Good evening," she said. "The Averys and I enjoyed the concert, too. I
do love to hear music outdoors on still nights like these. Carol, maybe
your friends would like a drink. Are there any lemons, auntie? We might
have a little lemonade."
Carol writhed helplessly. "I'll make it," she said, and rushed to the
kitchen to vent her fury by shaking the very life out of the lemons. But
she did not waste time. Her father's twinkles were nearly as bad as
Fairy's own--and the bishop!
"I'd wish it would choke 'em if it wouldn't take so long," she muttered
passionately, as she hurried in with the pitcher and glasses, ready to
serve the "slums" with her own chaste hands.
She was just serving the melting tenor when she heard her father's voice
in the hall.
"Too late," she said aloud, and with such despair in her voice that
Fairy relented and mentally promised to "see her through."
Mr. Starr's eyes twinkled freely when he saw the guests in his home, and
the gentle bishop's puzzled interest nearly sent them all off into
laughter. Fairy had no idea of the young men's names, but she said,
quickly, to spare Carol:
"We have been serenaded to-night, Doctor--you just missed it. These are
the Mount Mark troubadours. You are lucky to get here in time for the
lemonade."
But when she saw the bishop glance concernedly from the yellow fingers
to the dull eyes and the brown-streaked mouth, her gravity nearly
forsook her. The Slaughterers, already dashed to the ground by
embarrassment, were entirely routed by the presence of the bishop. With
incoherent apologies, they rose to their unsteady feet and in a cloud of
breezy odors, made their escape.
Mr. Starr laughed a little, Aunt Grace put her arm protectingly about
Carol's rigid shoulders, and the bishop said, "Well, well, well," with
gentle inquiry.
"We call them the Slaughter-house Quartette," Fairy began cheerfully.
"They are the lower strata of Mount Mark, and they make the nights
hideous with their choice selection of popular airs. The parsonage is
divided about them. Some of us think we should treat them with proud and
cold disdain. Some think we should regard them with a tender, gentle,
er--smiling pity. And evidently they appreciated the smiles for they
gave us a serenade in return for them. Aunt Grace did not know their
history, so she invited them in, thinking they were just ordinary
schoolboys. It is home mission work run aground."
The bishop nodded sympathetically. "One has to be so careful," he said.
"So extremely careful with characters like those. No doubt they meant
well by their serenade, but--girls especially have to be very careful. I
think as a rule it is safer to let men show the tender pity and women
the fine disdain. I don't imagine they would come serenading your father
and me! You carried it off beautifully, girls. I am sure your father was
proud of you. I was myself. I'm glad you are Methodists. Not many girls
so young could handle a difficult matter as neatly as you did."
"Yes," said Mr. Starr, but his eyes twinkled toward Carol once more;
"yes, indeed, I think we are well cleared of a disagreeable business."
But Carol looked at Fairy with such humble, passionate gratitude that
tears came to Fairy's eyes and she turned quickly away.
"Carol is a sweet girl," she thought. "I wonder if things will work out
for her just right--to make her as happy as she ought to be. She's
so--lovely."