Homespun Tales Part 25

"I will," she promised, "and no words can speak my grat.i.tude for what you have all done for me. Many a time it will come back to me and keep me from faltering."

She looked back at him from the open doorway, timidly.

"Don't forget us, Sue and me, altogether," she said, her eyes filling with tears. "Come to Farnham, if you will, and see if I am a credit to Shaker teaching! I shall never be here again, perhaps, and somehow it seems to me as if you, Elder Gray, with your education and your gifts, ought to be leading a larger life than this."

"I've hunted in the wild Maine forests, in my young days; I've speared salmon in her rivers and shot rapids ill a birchbark canoe," said the Elder, looking up from the pine table that served as a desk. "I've been before the mast and seen strange countries; I've fought Indians; I've faced perils on land and sea; but this Shaker life is the greatest adventure of all!"

"Adventure?" echoed Susanna, uncomprehendingly.

"Adventure!" repeated the Elder, smiling at his own thoughts. "Whether I fail, or whether I succeed, it's a splendid adventure in ethics."

Abby and Daniel looked at each other when Susanna pa.s.sed out of the office door.

"'They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us,'" he quoted quietly.

Abby wiped her eyes with her ap.r.o.n. "It's a hard road to travel sometimes, Daniel!" she said.

"Yee; but think where it leads, Abby, think where it leads! You're not going to complain of dust when you're treading the King's Highway!"

Susanna left the office with a drooping head, knowing the sadness that she had left behind. Brother Ansel sat under the trees near by, and his shrewd eye perceived the drift of coming events.

"Well, Susanna," he drawled, "you're goin' to leave us, like most o' the other 'jiners.' I can see that with one eye shut."

"Yes," she replied with a half smile; "but you see, Ansel, I 'jined'

John Hathaway before I knew anything about Shaker doctrines."

"Yee; but what's to prevent your onjinin' him? They used to tie up married folks in the old times so't they could n't move an inch. When they read the const.i.tution and bylaws over 'em they used to put in 'till death do us part.' That's the way my father was. .h.i.tched to his three wives, but death _did_ 'em part--fortunately for him!"

"'Till death us do part' is still in the marriage service," Susanna said, "and I think of it very often."

"I want to know if that's there yit!" exclaimed Ansel, with apparent surprise; "I thought they must be leavin' it out, there's so much onjinin' nowadays! Well, accordin' to my notions, if there is anything wuss 'n marriage, it's hevin' it hold till death, for then menfolks don't git any chance of a speritual life till afterwards. They certainly don't when they're being dragged down by women-folks an' young ones."

"I think the lasting part of the bargain makes it all the more solemn,"

Susanna argued.

"Oh, yes, it's solemn enough, but so's a prayer meetin', an' consid'able more elevatin' "; and here Ansel regarded the surrounding scenery with frowning disapproval, as if it left much to be desired.

"Don't you think that there are any agreeable and pleasant women, Ansel?" ventured Susanna.

"Land, yes; heaps of 'em; but they all wear Shaker bunnits!"

"I suppose you know more about the women in the outside world than most of the Brothers, on account of traveling so much?"

"I guess anybody 't drives a seed-cart or peddles stuff along the road knows enough o' women to keep clear of 'em. They 'll come out the kitchen door, choose their papers o' seasonin' an' bottles o' flavorin', worry you 'bout the price an' take the aidge off every dime, make up an'

then onmake their minds 'bout what they want, ask if it's pure, an' when by good luck you git your cart out o' the yard, they come runnin' along the road after ye to git ye to swap a bottle o' vanilla for some spruce gum an' give 'em back the change."

Susanna could not help smiling at Ansel's arraignment of her s.e.x. "Do you think they follow you for the pleasure of shopping, or the pleasure of your conversation, Ansel?" she asked slyly.

"A little o' both, mebbe; though the pleasure's all on their side,"

returned the unchivalrous Ansel. "But take them same women, cut their hair close to their heads (there's a heap o' foolishness in hair, somehow), purge 'em o' their vanity, so they won't be lookin' in the gla.s.s all the time, make 'em depend on one another for sa.s.siety, so they won't crave no conversation with menfolks, an' you git an article that's 'bout as good and 'bout as stiddy as a man!"

"You never seem to remember that men are just as dangerous to women's happiness and goodness as women are to men's," said Susanna, courageously.

"It don't seem so to me! Never see a man, hardly, that could stick to the straight an' narrer if a woman wanted him to go the other way. Weak an' unstable as water, menfolks are, an' women are pow'ful strong."

"Have your own way, Ansel! I'm going back to the world, but no man shall ever say I hindered him from being good. You'll see women clearer in another world."

"There'll be precious few of 'em to see!" retorted Ansel. "You're about the best o' the lot, but even you have a kind of a managin' way with ye, besides fillin' us all full o' false hopes that we'd gathered in a useful Believer, one cal'lated to spread the doctrines o' Mother Ann!"

"I know, I know, Ansel, and oh, how sorry I am! You would never believe how I long to stay and help you, never believe how much you have helped me! Goodbye, Ansel; you've made me smile when my heart was breaking. I shan't forget you!"

XII. The Hills of Home

Susanna had found Sue in the upper chamber at the Office Building, and began to make the simple preparations for her homeward journey. It was the very hour when John Hathaway was saying:--

"Set her place at hearth and board As it used to be."

Sue interfered with the packing somewhat by darting to and fro, bringing her mother sacred souvenirs given her by the Shaker sisters and the children--needle-books, pin-b.a.l.l.s, thimble-cases, packets of flower-seeds, polished pebbles, bottles of flavoring extract.

"This is for Fardie," she would say, "and this for Jack and this for Ellen and this for Aunt Louisa--the needle-book, 'cause she's so useful.

Oh, I'm glad we're going home, Mardie, though I do love it here, and I was most ready to be a truly Shaker. It's kind of pityish to have your hair s.h.i.+ngled and your stocking half-knitted and know how to say 'yee'

and then have it all wasted."

Susanna dropped a tear on the dress she was folding. The child was going home, as she had come away from it, gay, irresponsible, and merry; it was only the mothers who hoped and feared and dreaded. The very universe was working toward Susanna's desire at that moment, but she was all unaware of the happiness that lay so near. She could not see the freshness of the house in Farnham, the new bits of furniture here and there; the autumn leaves in her own bedroom; her worktable full of the records of John's sorrowful summer; Jack handsomer and taller, and softer, also, in his welcoming mood; Ellen rosy and excited. She did not know that Joel Atterbury had said to John that day, "I take it all back, old man, and I hope you'll stay on in the firm!" nor that Aunt Louisa, who was putting stiff, short-stemmed chrysanthemums in cups and tumblers here and there through the house, was much more flexible and human than was natural to her; nor that John, alternating between hope and despair, was forever humming:

"Set her place at hearth and board As it used to be: Higher are the hills of home, Bluer is the sea!"

It is often so. They who go weeping to look for the dead body of a sorrow, find a vision of angels where the body has lain.

"I hope Fardie 'll be glad to see us and Ellen will have gingerbread,"

Sue chattered; then, pausing at the window, she added, "I'm sorry to leave the hills, 'cause I 'specially like them, don't you, Mardie?"

"We are leaving the Shaker hills, but we are going to the hills of home," her mother answered cheerily. "Don't you remember the Farnham hills, dear?"

"Yes, I remember," and Sue looked thoughtful; "they were farther off and covered with woods; these are smooth and gentle. And we shall miss the lake, Mardie."

"Yes; but we can look at the blue sea from your bedroom window, Sue!"

"And we'll tell Fardie about Polly Reed and the little quail bird, won't we?"

"Yes; but he and Jack will have a great deal to say to us, and we must n't talk all the time about the dear, kind Shakers, you know!"

"You're all '_buts_,' Mardie!" at which Susanna smiled through her tears.