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CHAPTER VII
HEPSEY GOES A-FISHING

Mrs. Burke seemed incapable of sitting still, with folded hands, for any length of time; and when the stress of her attention to household work, and her devotion to neighborly good deeds relaxed, she turned to knitting wash-rags as a sportsman turns to his gun, or a toper to his cups. She seemed to find more stimulus for thought and more helpful diversion in the production of one wash-rag than most persons find in a trip abroad.

One day, not very long after the eventful missionary 86 tea, she was sitting in her garden, and knitting more rapidly than usual, as she said to Maxwell:

“What’s been the matter with you these last few weeks? You’ve been lookin’ altogether too sober, and you don’t eat nothin’ to speak of. It must be either liver, or conscience, or heart.”

Secretly, she strongly suspected a cardiac affection, of the romantic variety. She intended to investigate.

Donald laughed as he replied:

“Perhaps it’s all three together; but I’m all right. There’s nothing the matter with me. Every man has his blue days, you know.”

“Yes, but the last month you’ve had too many; and there must be some reason for it. There’s nothin’ so refreshin’ as gettin’ away from your best friends, once in a while. I guess you need a change—pinin’ for the city, maybe. Sakes alive! I can’t see how folks can live that way—all crowded up together, like a lot of prisons.”

“You don’t care to visit in the city, then?”

“Not on your life!”

“But a change is good for everyone. Don’t you ever get away from Durford for a few weeks?”

“Not very often. What with decidin’ where to go, and fussin’ to get ready, and shuttin’ up the house, it’s more trouble than its worth. Then there’s so 87 many things to ’tend to when you get home.”

“But don’t you ever visit relatives?”

“Not on your life, unless I’m subpœna-ed by the coroner: though of course we do get together to celebrate a family funeral or a wedding now and then. Visitin’ is no joke, I tell you. No sir, I’m old enough to know when I’m well off, and home’s the best place for me. I want my own table, and my own bed when it comes night.” She paused, and then remarked meditatively:

“I went down to visit in New York once.”

“Didn’t you enjoy your visit?” Maxwell inquired. “New York’s my home-city.”

“Can’t say I did, awful much. You see, I was visitin’ Sally Ramsdale—Sally Greenway that was. They were livin’ in an apartment, ninth floor up. In the first place, I didn’t like goin’ up stairs in the elevator. I was so scared, I felt as if the end had come, and I was bein’ jerked to my reward in an iron birdcage with a small kid dressed in brass buttons. When I got into the hall it was about two feet wide and darker than Pharaoh’s conscience. It had a string of cells along the side, and one opened into a chimney, and the rest into nothin’ in particular. The middle cell was a dinin’ room where we ate when we could find the way to our mouths. Near as I can recollect, 88 you got into the parlor through the pantry, back of the servant’s room, by jumpin’ over five trunks. You ought to have seen my room. It looked just like a parlor when you first went in. There was somethin’ lookin’ like a cross between an upright piano and writin’ desk. Sally gave it a twist, and it tumbled out into a folding bed. The first night, I laid awake with my eyes on the foot of that bed expectin’ it to rise and stand me on my head; but it didn’t. You took the book of poems off the center table, gave it a flop, and it was a washstand. Everything seemed to shut up into something else it hadn’t ought to. It was a ‘now you see it, and now you don’t see it,’ kind of a room; and I seemed to be foldin’ and unfoldin’ most of the time. Then the ceilin’ was so low that you could hardly get the cover off the soap dish. I felt all the while as if I should smother. My! but I was glad to get home and get a breath of real air.”

“Yes,” Maxwell replied, “people live more natural and healthful lives in the country. The advantages of the city aren’t an unmixed blessing.”

“That’s true enough. That’s no way to live. Just think of havin’ no yard but a window box and a fire escape! I’d smother!

“We folks out here in the country ’aint enjoyin’ a lot of the refinements of city life; anyhow we get 89 along, and the funny part about it is,—it ’aint hard to do, either. In the first place we ’aint so particular, which helps a lot, and besides, as Jonathan Jackson used to say,—there’s compensations. I had one look at Fifth Avenue and I’m not sayin’ it wasn’t all I had heard it was; but if I had to look at it three hundred and sixty-five days a year I wouldn’t trade it for this.

“Why, some days it rains up here, but I can sit at my window and look down the valley, to where the creek runs through, and ’way up into the timber, and the sight of all those green things, livin’ and noddin’ in the rain is a long ways from being disheartenin’,—and when the sun shines I can sit out here, in my garden, with my flowers, and watch the boys playin’ down in the meadow, Bascom’s Holsteins grazin’ over there on the hill, and the air full of the perfume of growin’ things,—they ’aint got anything like that, in New York.”

For a time Mrs. Burke relapsed into silence, while Maxwell smoked his briar pipe as he lay on the grass near by. She realized that the parson had cleverly side-tracked her original subject of conversation, and as she glanced down at him she shook her head with droll deprecation of his guile.

When she first accused him of the blues, it was 90 true that Maxwell’s look had expressed glum depression. Now, he was smiling, and, balked of her prey, Mrs. Burke knitted briskly, contemplating other means drawing him from his covert. Her strategy had been too subtle: she would try a frontal attack.

“Ever think of gettin’ married, Mr. Maxwell?” she inquired abruptly.

For an instant Maxwell colored; but he blew two or three rings of smoke in the air, and then replied carelessly, as he plucked at the grass by his side:

“Oh, yes: every fellow of my age has fancied himself in love some time or other, I suppose.”

“Yes, it’s like measles, or whoopin’-cough; every man has to have it sometime; but you haven’t answered my question.”

“Well, suppose I was in love; a man must be pretty conceited to imagine that he could make up to a girl for the sacrifice of bringing her to live in a place like Durford. That sounds horribly rude to Durford, but you won’t misunderstand me.”

“No; I know exactly how you feel; but the average girl is just dyin’ to make a great sacrifice for some good-lookin’ young fellow, all the same.”

“Ah yes; the average girl; but–”

Maxwell’s voice trailed off into silence, while he 91 affected to gaze stonily into the blue deeps of the sky overhead.

Hepsey had thought herself a pretty clever fisherman, in her day; evidently, she decided, this particular fish was not going to be easy to land.

“Don’t you think a clergyman is better off married?” she asked, presently.

Donald knocked the ashes out of his pipe and put it in his pocket, clasped his hands across his knees, and smiled thoughtfully for a moment. There was a light in his eyes which was good to see, and a slight trembling of his lips before he ventured to speak. Then he sighed heavily.

“Yes, I do, on many accounts. But I think that any parson in a place like this ought to know and face all the difficulties of the situation before he comes to a definite decision and marries. Isn’t that your own view? You’ve had experience of married parsons here: what do you think?”

“Well, you see the matter is just like this: Every parish wants an unmarried parson; the vestry ’cause he’s cheap, every unmarried woman ’cause he may be a possible suitor; and it’s easier to run him than it is a married man. He may be decent, well-bred and educated. And he comes to a parcel of ignoramuses who think they know ten times as much as he does. 92 If he can’t earn enough to marry on, and has the good sense to keep out of matrimony, the people talk about his bein’ a selfish old bachelor who neglects his duty to society. He can’t afford to run a tumble-down rectory like ours. If in the face of all this he marries, he has to scrimp and stint until it is a question of buyin’ one egg or two, and lettin’ his wife worry and work until she’s fit for a lunatic asylum. No business corporation, not even a milk-peddlin’ trust, would treat its men so or expect good work from ’em. Then the average layman seldom thinks how he can help the parson. His one idea is to be a kicker as long as he can think of anything to kick about. The only man in this parish who never kicks is paralyzed in both legs. Yes sir; the parson of the country parish is the parish goat, as the sayin’ is.”

Mrs. Burke ceased her tirade, and after a while Maxwell remarked quietly:

“Mrs. Burke, I’m afraid you are a pessimist.”

“I’m no such thing,” she retorted hotly. “A pessimist’s a man that sees nothin’ but the bad, and says there’s no help for it and won’t raise a hand: he’s a proper sour-belly. An optimist’s a man that sees nothin’ but the good, and says everything’s all right; let’s have a good time. Poor fool! The practical man—anyway, the practical woman—sees both the 93 bad and the good, and says we can make things a whole lot better if we try; let’s take off our coats and hustle to beat the cars, and see what happens. The real pessimists are your Bascoms, and that kind: and I guess I pity him more than blame him: he seems as lonesome as a tooth-pick in a cider-barrel.”

“But I thought that Bascom was a wealthy man. He ought to be able to help out, and raise money enough so that the town could keep a parson and his wife comfortably.”

“Sure thing! But the church isn’t supported by tight-fisted wealthy people. It’s the hard-workin’ middle class who are willin’ to turn in and spend their last cent for the church. And don’t you get me started on Bascom as you value your life. Maybe I’ll swear a blue streak before I get through: not but what I suppose that even Bascom has his good points—like a porcupine. But a little emery paper on Bascom’s good points wouldn’t hurt ’em very much. They’re awful rusty.”

“Oh well! Money isn’t all there is in life,” soothed Maxwell, smiling.

“No, not quite; but it’s a mighty good thing to have in the house. You’d think so if you had to wear the same hat three summers. I’ve got to that time in my life where I can get along very well without 94 most of the necessities; but I must have a few luxuries to keep me goin’.”

“Then you think that a clergyman ought not to marry and bring his wife to a place like Durford?”

“I didn’t say anything of the sort. If you was to get married I’d see you through, if it broke my neck or Bascom’s.”

“Do you know, you seem to me a bit illogical?” remarked Maxwell mildly.

“Don’t talk to me about logic! The strongest argument is often the biggest lie. There are times in your life when you have to take your fate in both hands and shut your eyes, and jump in the dark. Maybe you’ll land on your feet, and maybe you—won’t. But you have got to jump just the same. That’s matrimony—common sense, idiocy, or whatever you choose to call it.... I never could tell which. It’s the only thing to do; and any man with a backbone and a fist won’t hesitate very long. If you marry, I’ll see you through; though of course you won’t stay here long, anyhow.”

“You’re awfully kind, Mrs. Burke,” Maxwell replied, “and I sha’n’t forget your promise—when the time comes for me to take the momentous step. But I think it would be the wisest thing for me to keep 95 my heart free for a while; or at any rate, not to get married.”

Mrs. Burke looked down at her rector, and smiled broadly at his clever evasion of the bait she had dangled before him so persistently.

“Well, do as you like; but that reminds me that when next you go to town you’ll need to get a new glass for that miniature of your sister. You must have dozed off with it in your hands last night and dropped it. I found it this morning on the floor alongside of your chair, with the glass broken.”

She rose triumphantly, as she knitted the last stitch of the wash-rag. “Excuse me—I must go and peel the potatoes for dinner.”

“I’d offer to contribute to the menu, by catching some fish for you; but I don’t think it’s a very good day for fishing, is it, Mrs. Burke?” asked Maxwell innocently.

CHAPTER VIII
AN ICEBOX FOR CHERUBIM

As we have seen, when Maxwell began his work in Durford, he was full of the enthusiasm of youth and inexperience. He was, however, heartily supported and encouraged in his efforts by all but Sylvester Bascom. Without being actively and openly hostile, the Senior Warden, under the guise of superior wisdom and a judicial regard for expediency, managed to thwart many of his projects. After each interview with Bascom, Maxwell felt that every bit of life and heart had been pumped out of him, and 97 that he was very young, and very foolish to attempt to make any change in “the good old ways” of the parish, which for so many years had stunted its growth and had acquired the immobility of the laws of the Medes and Persians.

But there was one parishioner who was ever ready to suggest new ventures to “elevate” the people, and to play the part of intimate friend and adviser to her good-looking rector, and that was Virginia Bascom. For some unknown reason “the people” did not seem to be acutely anxious thus to be elevated; and most of them seemed to regard Virginia as a harmless idiot with good intentions, but with positive genius for meddling in other people’s affairs. Being the only daughter of the Senior Warden, and the leading lady from a social standpoint, she considered that she had a roving commission to set people right at a moment’s notice; and there were comparatively few people in Durford on whom she had not experimented in one way or another. She organized a Browning club to keep the factory girls out of the streets evenings, a mothers’ meeting, an ethical culture society, and a craftman’s club, and, as she was made president of each, her time was quite well filled.

And now in her fertile brain dawned a brilliant idea, which she proceeded to propound to the rector. Maxwell 98 was non-committal, for he felt the matter was one for feminine judgment. Then she decided to consult Mrs. Burke—because, while Hepsey was “not in society,” she was recognized as the dominant personality among the women of the village, and no parish enterprise amounted to much unless she approved of it, and was gracious enough to assist. As Virginia told Maxwell, “Mrs. Burke has a talent of persuasiveness,” and so was “useful in any emergency.” If Mrs. Burke’s sympathies could be enlisted on behalf of the new scheme it would be bound to succeed.

As a matter of fact, Mrs. Burke had heard rumors of this new project of Virginia’s. It always went against the grain with Hepsey to say: “Don’t do it.” She was a firm believer in the teaching of experience: “Experience does it,” was her translation of the classic adage.

And so one morning found Virginia sitting opposite Mrs. Burke in the kitchen at Thunder Cliff, knitting her brows and poking the toe of her boot with the end of her parasol in an absent-minded way. This was symptomatic.

“Anything on your mind, Virginia? What’s up now?” Mrs. Burke began.

For a moment Virginia hesitated, and then replied: 99

“I am thinking of establishing a day-nursery to care for the babies of working women, Mrs. Burke.”

Mrs. Burke, with hands on her hips, gazed intently at her visitor, pushed up her under lip, scowled, and then observed thoughtfully:

“I wonder some one hasn’t thought of that before. Who’s to take care of the babies?”

“Mary Quinn and I, with the assistance of others, of course.”

“Are you sure that you know which is the business end of a nursing-bottle? Could you put a safety-pin where it would do the most good? Could you wash a baby without drownin’ it?”

“Of course I have not had much experience,” Virginia replied in a dignified and lofty way, “but Mary Quinn has, and she could teach me.”

“You’re thinkin’, I suppose, that a day-nursery would fill a long-felt want, or somethin’ like that. Who’s goin’ to pay the bills?”

“Oh, there ought to be enough progressive, philanthropic people in Durford to subscribe the necessary funds, you know. It is to be an auxiliary to the parish work.”

“Hm! What does Mr. Maxwell say?”

“Well, he said that he supposed that babies were 100 good things in their way; but he hadn’t seen many in the village, and he didn’t quite realize what help a day-nursery would be to the working women.”

“That doesn’t sound mighty enthusiastic. Maybe we might get the money; but who’s to subscribe the babies?”

“Why, the working women, of course.”

“They can’t subscribe ’em if they haven’t got ’em. There are mighty few kids in this town; and if you really want my candid opinion, I don’t think Durford needs a day-nursery any more than it needs an icebox for cherubim. But then of course that doesn’t matter much. When you goin’ to begin?”

“Next Monday. We have rented the store where Elkin’s grocery used to be, and we are going to fit it up with cribs, and all the most up-to-date conveniences for a sanitary day-nursery.”

“Hm! Well, I’ll do all I can to help you, of course. I suppose you’ll find babies pushin’ all over the sidewalk Monday mornin’, comin’ early to avoid the rush. Better get down as early as possible, Virginia.”

Virginia departed.

After the furnishing of the incipient nursery had been completed, and each little crib had a new unbreakable doll whose cheeks were decorated with 101 unsuckable paint, Virginia and Mary Quinn—invaluable in undertaking the spadework of all Virginia’s parish exploits—gave an afternoon tea to which all the subscribers and their friends were invited. But when everything was in readiness for patronage, what few working women there were in Durford, possessed of the right kind of babies, seemed strangely reluctant to trust their youthful offspring to the tender mercies of Virginia Bascom and Mary Quinn.

Consequently, the philanthropic movement, started under such favorable patronage, soon reached a critical stage in its career, and Mrs. Burke was called in to contribute some practical suggestions. She responded to the summons with all due promptness, and when she arrived at the nursery, she smilingly remarked:

“Hm! But where are the babies? I thought they would be swarming all over the place like tadpoles in a pool.”

“Well, you see,” Virginia began, her voice quivering with disappointment, “Mary Quinn and I have been sitting here four mortal days, and not a single infant has appeared on the scene. I must say that the working women of Durford seem strangely unappreciative of our efforts to help them.”

“Well,” Mrs. Burke responded, “I suppose day-nurseries 102 without babies are as incomplete as an incubator without eggs. But after all, it hardly seems worth while to go out and snatch nursing infants from their mother’s breasts just to fill a long-felt want, does it? Besides, you might get yourself into trouble.”

“I didn’t ask you to come and make fun of me,” Virginia replied touchily. “I wanted you to make some suggestions to help us out. If we don’t get any babies, we might just as well close our doors at once. I should be awfully mortified to have the whole thing a failure, after all we have done, and all the advertising we have had.”

Mrs. Burke sat down and assumed a very judicial expression.

“Well, Ginty dear, I’m awful sorry for you; I don’t doubt you done the best you could. It’d be unreasonable to expect you to collect babies like mushrooms in a single night. All true reformers are bound to strike snags, and to suffer because they aint appreciated in their own day and generation. It’s only after we are gone and others take our places that the things we do are appreciated. You’ll have to resign yourself to fate, Virginia, and wait for what the newspapers call ‘the vindicatin’ verdict of prosperity.’ Think of all the people that tried to do 103 things and didn’t do ’em. Now there’s the Christian martyrs–”

For some reason Virginia seemed to have a vague suspicion that Hepsey was still making fun of her; and being considerably nettled, she interjected tartly:

“I’m not working for the verdict of posterity, and I don’t care a flip for the Christian martyrs. I’m trying to conduct a day-nursery, here and now; we have the beds, and the equipment, and some money, and–”

“But you haven’t got the babies, Virginia!”

“Precisely, Mrs. Burke. It’s simply a question of babies, now or never. Babies we must have or close our doors. I must confess that I am greatly pained at the lack of interest of the community in our humble efforts to serve them.”

For some time Hepsey sat in silence; then she smiled as if a bright idea occurred to her.

“Why not borrow a few babies from the mothers in town, Virginia? You see, you might offer to pay a small rental by the hour, or take out a lease which could be renewed when it expired. What is lacking is public confidence in your enterprise. If you and Miss Quinn could be seen in the nursery windows dandlin’ a baby on each arm, and singin’ lullabies to ’em for a few days, it’d attract attention, inspire faith 104 in the timid, and public confidence would be restored. The tide of babies’d turn your way after a while, and the nursery would prove a howlin’ success.”

Virginia considered the suggestion and, after deep thought, remarked:

“What do you think we ought to pay for the loan of a baby per hour, Mrs. Burke?”

“Well, of course I haven’t had much experience rentin’ babies, as I have been busy payin’ taxes and insurance on my own for some years; then you see rents have gone up like everything lately. But I should think that ten cents an afternoon ought to be sufficient. I think I might be able to hunt up a baby or two. Mrs. Warren might lend her baby, and perhaps Mrs. Fletcher might add her twins. I’ll call on them at once, if you say so.”

Virginia looked relieved, and in a voice of gratitude responded:

“You are really very, very kind.”

“Well, cheer up, Virginia; cheer up. Every cloud has its silver linin’; and I guess we can find some babies somewhere even if we have to advertise in the papers. Now I must be goin’, and I’ll stop on the way and make a bid for the Fletcher twins. Good-by.”

When Nicholas Burke learned from his mother of 105 the quest of the necessary babies, he started out of his own motion and was the first to arrive on the scene with the spoils of victory, in the shape of the eighteen-months infant of Mrs. Thomas McCarthy, for which he had been obliged to pay twenty-five cents in advance, the infant protesting vigorously with all the power of a well developed pair of lungs. As Nickey delivered the goods, he remarked casually:

“Say, Miss Virginia, you just take the darn thing quick. He’s been howlin’ to beat the band.”

“Why, Nickey,” exclaimed Virginia, entranced, and gingerly possessing herself of James McCarthy, “however did you get him?”

“His ma wouldn’t let me have him at first; and it took an awful lot of jollyin’ to bring her round. Of course I didn’t mean to tell no lies, but I said you was awful fond of kids. I said that if you only had Jimmy, it would give the nursery a dandy send-off, ’cause she was so well known, and Mr. McCarthy was such a prominent citizen. When she saw me cough up a quarter and play with it right under her nose, I could see she was givin’ in; and she says to me, ‘Nickey, you can take him just this once. I’d like to help the good cause along, and Miss Bascom, she means well.’ Ma’s gettin’ after the Fletcher twins for you.” 106

James McCarthy was welcomed with open arms, was washed and dressed in the most approved antiseptic manner; his gums were swabed with boracic acid, and he was fed from a sterilized bottle on Pasteurized milk, and tucked up in a crib with carbolized sheets, and placed close to the window where he could bask in actinic rays, and inhale ozone to his heart’s content. Thus the passer-by could see at a glance that the good work had begun to bear fruit.

Mrs. Burke managed to get hold of the Fletcher twins, and as they both howled lustily in unison, all the time, they added much to the natural domesticity of the scene and seemed to invite further patronage, like barkers at a side-show. Mrs. Warren was also persuaded.

Although the village was thoroughly canvassed, Miss Bascom was obliged to content herself with the McCarthy baby and the Fletcher twins, and the Warren baby, until, one morning, a colored woman appeared with a bundle in her arms. As she was the first voluntary contributor of live stock, she was warmly welcomed, and a great fuss made over the tiny black infant which gradually emerged from the folds of an old shawl “like a cuckoo out of its cocoon,” as Mary Quinn remarked. This, of course, was very nice and encouraging, but most unfortunately, 107 when night came, the mother did not appear to claim her progeny, nor did she ever turn up again. Of course it was a mere oversight on her part, but Virginia was much disturbed, for, to her very great embarrassment, she found herself the undisputed possessor of a coal black baby. She was horrified beyond measure, and sent at once for Mrs. Burke.

“What shall I do, what shall I do, Mrs. Burke?” she cried. Mrs. Burke gazed musingly at the writhing black blot on the white and rose blanket, and suggested:

“Pity you couldn’t adopt it, Virginia. You always loved children.”

“Adopt it!” Virginia screamed hysterically. “What in the world can you be thinking of?”

“Well, I can’t think of anything else, unless I can persuade Andy Johnston, the colored man on the farm, to adopt it. He wouldn’t mind its complexion as much as you seem to.”

Virginia brightened considerably at this suggestion, exclaiming excitedly:

“Oh Mrs. Burke, do you really think you could?”

“Well, I don’t know. Perhaps so. At any rate, if we offer to help pay the extra expense, Mrs. Johnston might bring the baby up as her own. Then they can name it Virginia Bascom Johnston, you see.” 108

Virginia bit her lip, but she managed to control her temper as she exclaimed quite cheerfully:

“Mrs. Burke, you are so very kind. You are always helping somebody out of a scrape.”

“Don’t overpraise me, Virginia. My head’s easily turned. The teachin’s of experience are hard—but I guess they’re best in the end. Well, send the poor little imp of darkness round to me to-night, and I’ll see that it has good care.”

As a matter of fact, Hepsey had qualms of conscience as to whether she should not, at the outset, have discouraged the whole baby project; experience threatened to give its lesson by pretty hard knocks, on this occasion.

For though the immediate problem was thus easily solved, others presented themselves to vex the philanthropic Virginia.

When on the tenth day the rental for the Warren baby and the Fletcher twins fell due, and the lease of James McCarthy expired without privilege of renewal, the finances of the nursery were at a very low ebb. It certainly did not help matters much when, towards night, Mary Quinn called Virginia’s attention to the fact that there were unmistakable signs of a bad rash on the faces of the twins, and very suspicious spots on the cheeks of the Warren baby. Even the 109 antiseptic James McCarthy blushed like a boiled lobster, and went hopelessly back on his sterilized character. Of course the only thing to be done was to send at once for the doctor, and for the mothers of the respective infants. When the doctor arrived he pronounced the trouble to be measles; and when the mothers made their appearance, Virginia learned something of the unsuspected resources of the English language served hot from the tongues of three frightened and irate women. Finally the floor was cleared, and the place closed up for disinfection.

Just before she left, Virginia dropped into a chair and wept, quite oblivious of the well-meant consolations of Mary Quinn, sometime co-partner in “The Durford Day-Nursery for the Children of Working Women.”

“We’ve done the very best we could, Miss Bascom; and it certainly isn’t our fault that the venture turned out badly. Poor babies!”

At this the sobbing Virginia was roused to one last protest:

“Mary Quinn, if ever you say another word to me about babies, I’ll have you arrested. I just hate babies, and—and everything! Why, there comes Mr. Maxwell! Say, Mary, you just run and get me a wet towel to wipe my face with, while I hunt for my 110 combs and do up my back hair. And then if you wouldn’t mind vanishing for a while—I’m sure you understand—for if ever I needed spiritual consolation and the help of the church, it is now, this minute.”