MR. SAWYER CALLS ON MISS PUTNAM.
Quincy had a double purpose in calling on Lindy; he actually wished to
see her, for they had not met since the concert, but his principal wish
was to meet a real old-fashioned country couple. To be sure, Deacon
Mason and his wife often dropped into the vernacular, but the Deacon was
a very dignified old gentleman and his wife was not a great talker. What
he desired was to find one of the old-fashioned style of country women,
with a tongue hung in the middle and running at both ends. His wish was
to be gratified.
When he clanged the old brass knocker on the door, Samanthy Green
answered the call.
"Is Miss Putnam at home?" asked Quincy politely.
"No, she ain't," said Samanthy, "but Mr. and Mrs. Putnam is. They're
allus to hum. They don't go nowheres from one year's end to t'other."
"I would like to see them," said Quincy.
"Yes, sir," said Samanthy, "walk right in."
She threw open the door of the sitting-room. "Here's a gentleman that
wants to see you, Mas' Putnam. Leastwise he asked for Lindy fust."
Samanthy left the room, slamming the door after her.
"My name is Sawyer," said Quincy, addressing the old lady and gentleman
who were seated in rocking chairs. "I met your daughter at the concert
given at the Town Hall New-Year's night."
Mrs. Putnam said, "Glad to see ye, Mr. Sawyer; have a chair."
As Quincy laid his hand upon the chair, the old gentleman called out in
a voice that would have startled a bull of Bashan, "What's his name,
Heppy?"
Mrs. Putnam answered in a shrill voice with an edge like a knife,
"Sawyer."
"Sawyer!" yelled the man. "Any relation to Jim Sawyer that got drunk,
beat his wife, starved his children, and finally ended up in the town
Poorhouse?"
Quincy shook his head and replied, "I think not. I don't live here; I
live in Boston."
"Du tell," said Mrs. Putnam. "How long you been here?"
Quincy replied that he arrived two days after Christmas.
"Where be you stoppin'?" asked Mrs. Putnam.
Quincy answered, "I am boarding at Deacon Mason's."
"He's a nice old gentleman," said Mrs. Putnam, "and Mrs. Mason's good as
they make 'em. Her daughter Huldy's a pert young thing, she's pretty and
she knows it."
Quincy remarked that he thought Miss Mason was a very nice young lady.
"Oh, yes," said Mrs. Putnam, "you young fellers never look more than
skin deep. Now the way she trifles with that young 'Zekiel Pettengill I
think's shameful. They ust to have a spat every week about something but
they allus made it up. But I heard Lindy say that after you come here,
'Zeke he got huffy and Huldy she got independent, and they hain't spoke
to each other nigh on two weeks."
This was a revelation to Quincy, but he was to hear more about it very
soon.
"How long be you goin' to stay, Mr. Sawyer?"
"I haven't decided," said Quincy.
"What's your business?" persisted Mrs. Putnam.
"I am a lawyer," replied Quincy.
Mrs. Putnam looked at him inquiringly and said, "Be n't you rather young
for a lawyer? How old be you, anyway?"
Quincy decided to take a good humored part in his cross examination and
said without a smile, "I am twenty-three years, two months, sixteen days
old."
"Be you?" exclaimed Mrs. Putnam. "I shouldn't have said you were a day
over nineteen."
Quincy never felt his youth so keenly before. He determined to change
the conversation.
"Did you attend the concert, Mrs. Putnam?"
"No," said she. "Pa and me don't go out much; he's deefer'n a stone post
and I've had the rheumatiz so bad in my knees for the last five years
that I can't walk without crutches;" and she pointed to a pair that lay
on the floor beside her chair.
During this conversation old Mr. Putnam had been eying Quincy very
keenly. He blurted out, "He's a chip of the old block, Heppy; he looks
just as Jim did when he fust came to this town. Did yer say yer had an
Uncle Jim?"
Quincy shook his head.
Mrs. Putnam turned to her husband and yelled, "Now you shet up, Silas,
and don't bother the young man. Jim Sawyer ain't nothin' to be proud of,
and I don't blame the young man for not ownin' up even if Jim is his
uncle."
Quincy made another attempt to change the conversation. "Your daughter
is a very fine singer, Mrs. Putnam."
"Well, I s'pose so," said she; "there's been enough money spent on her
to make suthin' of her. As for me I don't like this folderol singin'.
Why, when she ust to be practisin' I had to go up in the attic or else
stuff cotton in my ears. But my son, Jehoiakim Jones Putnam, he sot
everythin' by Lucinda, and there wasn't anythin' she wanted that she
couldn't have. He's dead now, but he left more'n a hundred thousand
dollars, that he made speculatin'."
"Then your daughter will be quite an heiress one of these days, Mrs.
Putnam?"
She answered, "She won't get none of my money. Jehoiakim left her all of
his'n, but before she got it she had to sign a paper, a wafer, I believe
they call it, if you're a lawyer you ought to know what it was, givin'
up all claim on my money. I made my will and the girl who'll get it
needs it and will make good use of it."
Quincy determined to get even with Mrs. Putnam for the questioning she
put him through, so he said, "Did you make your money speculating, Mrs.
Putnam?"
"No," said she, "pa made it by hard work on the farm; but he gave it all
to me more'n fifteen year ago, and he hasn't got a cent to his name.
He's just as bad off as Jim Sawyer. I feed him and clothe him and shall
have to bury him. I guess it seems kinder odd to ye, so I reckon I'll
have to tell ye the hull story. I've told it a dozen times, but I guess
it'll bear tellin' once more. You see my husband here, Silas Putnam, was
brought up religis and he's allus been a churchgoin' man. We were both
Methodists, and everythin' went all right till one day a Second Advent
preacher came along, and then things went all wrong. He canoodled my
husband into believin' that the end of the world was comin' and it was
his duty to give all his property away, so he could stand clean handed
afore the Lord. My dander riz when I heerd them makin' their plans, but
afore my husband got deef he was great on argifyin' and argumentin', and
I didn't stand much show against two on 'em; but when Silas told me he
was goin' to give his property away I sot up my Ebenezer, and I says,
'Silas Putnam, if you gives your property to any one you gives it to
me.' So after a long tussle it was settled that way and the lawyers drew
up the papers. The night afore the world was goin' to end he prayed all
night. You can imagine with that air voice of his'n I didn't sleep a
wink. When mornin' came--it was late in October and the air was pretty
sharp--Silas stopped prayin' and put on his white robe, which was a
shirt of hisn't I pieced out so it came down to his feet, and takin' a
tin trumpet that he bought over to Eastborough Centre, he went out,
climbed up on the barn, sot down on the ridgepole and waited for Kingdom
Come. He sot there and tooted all mornin' and 'spected the angel Gabriel
would answer back. He sot there and tooted all the arternoon till the
cows come home and the chickens went to roost. I had three good square
meals that day, but Silas didn't get a bite. 'Bout six o'clock I did
think of takin' him out some doughnuts, but then I decided if he was
goin' up so soon it was no use a wastin' em, so I put 'em back in the
pantry. He sot there and tooted all the evenin' till the moon come up
and the stars were all out, and then he slid down off'n the barn, and
barked both his shins doin' it, threw his trumpet into the pig pen, come
into the house and huddled up close to the fire. He didn't say nothin'
for a spell, but finally says he, 'I guess, Heppy, that feller made a
mistake in figurin' out the date.' 'I guess, Silas,' says I, 'that
you've made an all-fired fool of yerself. And if you don't go to bed
quick and take a rum sweat, I shall be a widder in a very short time,'
He was sick for more'n three weeks, but I pulled him through by good
nussin', and the fust day he was able to set up, I says to him, 'Now,
Silas Putnam, when I married ye forty-five year ago I promised to obey
ye, ye was allus a good perwider and I don't perpose to see yer want for
nothin', but ye have got to hold up yer right hand and swear to obey me
for the rest of yer nateral life,' and he did it. He got well, and he is
tougher'n a biled owl, if he is eighty-six. But the cold sorter settled
in his ears, and he's deef as an adder. Ef angel Gabriel blew his horn
now I'm afeared Silas wouldn't hear him."
During this long story Quincy had listened without a smile on his face,
but the manner in which the last remark was made was too much for him
and he burst into a loud laugh. Silas, who had been eying him, also gave
a loud laugh and said with his ponderous voice, "I guess Heppy's been
tellin' ye about my goin' up."
Quincy laughed again and Mrs. Putnam took part. He arose, told Mr. and
Mrs. Putnam he had enjoyed his visit very much, was very sorry Miss
Putnam was not at home, and said he would call again, with their kind
permission.
"Oh, drop in any time," said Mrs. Putnam; "we're allus to hum. You seem
to be a nice young man, but you're too young to marry. Why, Lindy's
twenty-eight, and I tell her she don't know enough to get married yet.
Ef you'll take a bit of advice from an old woman, let me say, 'less you
mean to marry the girl yourself, you'd better git away from Deacon
Mason's."
And with this parting shot ringing in his ears, he left the house and
made his way homeward.
In half an hour after Quincy's departure, Lindy Putnam entered the
sitting-room and facing her mother said with a voice full of passion,
"Samanthy says Mr. Sawyer called to see me."
Mrs. Putnam answered, "Well, ef ye wanted to see him so much why didn't
ye stay to hum?"
Lindy continued, "Well, I have told you a dozen times that when people
come to see me that you are not to invite them in."
"Wall, I didn't," said Mrs. Putnam. "When he found you wuz out he said
he wanted to see pa and me, and he stayed here more'n an hour."
"Yes," said Lindy, "no doubt you told him all about pa's turning Second
Advent and how much money I had, and you have killed all my chances."
"Well, I guess not," said Mrs. Putnam. "I told him about your brother
leavin' yer all his money, and I guess that won't drive him away."
Lindy continued, "Money don't count with him; they say his father is
worth more than a million dollars."
Mrs. Putnam answered, "Wall, I s'pose there's a dozen or so to divide it
among."
Lindy said, "Did you tell him who you were going to leave your money
to?"
"No, I didn't," replied Mrs. Putnam. "But I did tell him that you
wouldn't get a cent of it."
Lindy sobbed, "I think it is a shame, mother. I like him better than any
young man I have ever met, and now after what you have told me I sha'n't
see him again. I have a good mind to leave you for good and all and go
to Boston to live."
"Wall, you're your own mistress," replied Mrs. Putnam, "and I'm my own
mistress and pa's. Come to think on't, there was one thing I said to him
that might sot him against yer."
"What was that?" demanded Lindy fiercely.
"Wall," said Mrs. Putnam, "he said he was twenty-three, and I sort a
told him incidentally you was twenty-eight. You know yer thirty, and
p'raps he might object to ye on account of yer age."
This was too much for Lindy. She rushed out of the room and up to her
chamber, where she threw herself on her bed in a passion of tears.
"It's too bad," she cried. "I will see him again, I will find some way,
and I'll win him yet, even if I am twenty-eight."
Two days afterwards Hiram told Mandy that he heard down to Hill's
grocery that that city chap had two strings to his bow now. He was
courting the Deacon's daughter, but had been up to see Mr. and Mrs.
Putnam to find out how much money Lindy had in her own right, and to see
if there was any prospect of getting anything out of the old folks.