Tess of the Storm Country Part 20

"Well, about women having the privilege of speaking in meetings."

Bill shook his head, and Graves resumed:

"Well, I'm changing my mind ... I'm going to stop this nonsense."

The rich man sat up and the druggist, scenting a religious rumpus, drew his stool nearer. Bill coughed loudly.

"Those women," continued Graves, "have had their own way too long ... I shall put a stop to it immediately."

Bill Hopkins wondered what was coming. It behooved him to wait and see; so he settled back with his head bowed and his piercing eyes directed steadily upon the pastor. A dark flush mounted to the minister's face.

He had expected that such condescension to an ex-member would be received with enthusiasm. As no other of the "Ameners" offered a word, Graves continued:

"Next thing that we know, the women will be coming into the church with uncovered heads. I wonder I've stood it so long."

Still Bill did not speak. He could remember that when the dispute had been at its height these had not been the sentiments of Pastor Graves.

In fact, when a delegation had gone to the parsonage to demand obedience to the const.i.tution of the church, the Dominie had replied that the ladies had come out victorious in the matter, and that it was an old-fas.h.i.+oned idea to forbid the women to speak or pray in public if they so wished; and the crest-fallen delegates had gone away from the rectory, and Bill Hopkins, with several others, from the church.

Seeing that not one of the respectable "Ameners" was going to help him, the Dominie sputtered out his wrath in another direction.

"If Young had kept his hands off that Skinner business, there wouldn't have been the slightest chance of the fisherman winning out."

"Ah! here's where the shoe pinches," thought Hopkins; "the parson needs help to wrest Skinner's squatter rights from him."

But he did not voice his thoughts.

"I guess that's right, Dominie," were his spoken words. "Skinner didn't have many friends in the court until that girl came in. She certainly did make a change in the ideas of most people in this town."

"Fools! to let a child like that break up the dignity of a court-room."

Graves settled back angrily in his chair. He had lost in the game he was about to play with Bill Hopkins--lost before the game had begun.

"Skinner can thank his kid for his life, nevertheless," interjected Jones, "for another jury will never convict him.

"Think not?" queried the druggist.

Bates' question remained unanswered, for Dominie Graves turned the subject again.

"Bill, if I come out strong in the church and give you your own way in the disputed question, then you must do something for me. I'll speak to you later about it."

"Pretty far along in the day," was Bill's answer, "but as you please, Dominie. I don't know what you want, but most of your friends will stick by you if the church is run on its old plan and according to the creed and the Bible."

When Minister Graves walked home he felt that in spite of family differences he had scored a point in getting from Hopkins a tacit consent to come back into his congregation.

CHAPTER XVI

When the family gathered about the table the next morning in the rectory, the Dominie told his wife solemnly that he wished to talk with her after the children had gone to school. Breakfast over, he broached the subject of the women talking in prayer meeting, Mrs. Graves listening eagerly. As the pastor's wife she had done the best in her power; but her power had been weak, and the stronger ones in the congregation had ridden over her convictions and teachings.

There was Augusta Hall, the beautiful wife of one of the deacons who had demanded that she be allowed to voice her sentiments in public; and other women had followed her lead, although it had been absolutely against the tenets of the church.

This woman was in Mrs. Graves' mind, when the Dominie brought down his hand upon the table, saying he had decided to stop once and for all the nonsense in his church, which was keeping the best of his members away.

Mrs. Graves breathed Mrs. Hall's name meekly to her husband.

"She can leave the church," growled Graves. "In my mind it's almost sacrilegious for women to dare to go so far that some of the best of its members will leave a well-regulated church. Maria, you must talk to Mrs.

Hall and bring her to reason."

"If you can't succeed," replied Mrs. Graves, "how do you expect me to?

You're her pastor."

"I will go and talk to her first, then you follow close upon my heels, Maria, and between us both, we will get Bill Hopkins and Carey back among us. If they come the rest will."

Late in the afternoon Mrs. Graves put on her bonnet, and, with a sigh, tied the strings under her withered chin. In the very moment when the congregation had at last become reconciled to the privileges extended to its female members, another church war was to be fought. But the little woman dared not refuse her husband's command, so she climbed the long hill toward the south and timidly rang the bell marked "Hall."

Her husband would have been there and gone, for the afternoon was well toward its close.

As the servant ushered her in, Mrs. Graves heard loud voices coming from the drawing-room, and instantly recognized one of them as the clergyman's.

"It's all very well, Mrs. Hall," he was saying, "for the women to work if they can do it without showing too much authority, but, my dear lady, I have been studying into this matter and it is positively against the Scriptural injunction for women to speak in church."

"Where did you read that?" asked Mrs. Hall, handing the Dominie a Bible, which he did not take in his half-extended fingers.

"I know, and you know where it is without looking," said he sharply.

"There is a command from Paul that all women should keep silent in the church in the presence of men."

"Paul was an old bachelor," irreverently answered Mrs. Hall. "What did he know about women and their needs?"

"He received the commandments from G.o.d," replied the pastor gravely.

"Not that one, and what's more, I am going to talk all I want to, and if there is a man who does not want to hear, let him go away until he either changes his mind or desires to take things as they are.... Why!

the women have been speaking in our church for over a year."

At this juncture, Mrs. Graves walked in, pale and weary. She dropped weakly into a chair.

"Your husband has just informed me," snapped Mrs. Hall, her beautiful face flus.h.i.+ng as she spoke, "that we are not to speak any more at the church meetings. Do you approve of that, Mrs. Graves? I'm sure--"

"Like all dutiful and obedient wives," came the sharp interruption from the minister, without giving his sorry-looking spouse a chance to speak, "my wife thinks as I do. Mrs. Hall, allow me to entreat you to follow the dictates of your conscience, and obey your husband always."

"My husband gives me my own way," answered Mrs. Hall with a toss of her head.

"There he is wrong, but I shall leave you to talk things over with my wife. On Sunday I shall make it the theme of my sermon and I hope before Wednesday, my dear Mrs. Hall, that you and some others will look upon the matter in a different light."

The Dominie wended his way toward the business quarter of the city and turned into the Gas Company's office. Inquiring for Mr. Hall, he was ushered into a private room marked "President," and heartily greeted one of the deacons of his church.

"Anything wrong?" asked Hall, noticing the expression upon his pastor's face.