'Charge It': Keeping Up With Harry

  XIII

  IN WHICH THE MINISTER GETS INTO LOVE AND TROUBLE

  "Cub resigned his place in my office next day, and confessed hispurpose, and I heard him with sober respect and tried in every properway to save him. It wouldn't work.

  "The lines of panic had left the face of Cub. The two-pound expressionhad departed from it. The faintness of chaperons would no longerimperil his comfort.

  "'A hundred and four pounds of candy and twenty suppers, and all fornothing!' I exclaimed. 'You ruin a girl's digestion and chuck herover. It isn't fair.'

  "'But, sir, I found that I didn't love her,' said Cub.

  "'What a waste of violets, confectionery, and crab-meat!'

  "'Yes, sir, in a way; but you see I had to have my training insociety,' Cub declared.

  "What was the use? Cub had no more humor than a sewing-machine.

  "'The wedding day drew on apace, and just before its arrival anotorious weekly in New York gave the lady a drubbing. Certaincircumstances that made her first marriage unhappy were plainly hintedat. The town shuddered with amazement. Cub stood pat, but theEpiscopal minister refused to marry them. The Baptist minister balked.It looked like a postponement, but the knot was tied, on scheduletime, by the Reverend Robert Knowles. That made no end of talk, and asmall party of insurgents left his church. Deacon Benson was on thepoint of pulling out, and swore so much about it that I advised him tohang on for his own sake.

  "'But there ain't much to hang on to,' said the Deacon.

  "'Mrs. Revere-Chalmers-Sayles held a mortgage on the property of theBaptist Society of Pointview, and asked me to foreclose it.

  "'I have another mortgage on the Congregational church, and they'rebehind in their interest, but I'm not going to push them,' she said tome.

  "So young Mr. Knowles had acted from motives of business prudence, andwas not much at fault. The old church had ceased to live within itsmeans and had entered the 'charge it' van, and was trying to serve twomasters.

  "Betsey and I paid both mortgages and threw them in the fire.

  "Young Mr. Knowles came to see us with Marie, and brought the thanksof the parish. They were a good-looking couple.

  "This minister of the First Congregational Church of Pointview nowaspired to be the prime minister of its first heiress. Theiracquaintance, which had begun in the arrangements for the servants'ball, had grown in warmth and intimacy as soon as Harry had gone.Robert began to take after Marie, with muffler open and all the gason. He was a swell of a parson--utterly damned with good-fortune. Hadan income from the estate of his father, a call from on high, a crestfrom Charlemagne, diplomas from college and the seminary, a finefigure, red cheeks, and 'heavenly eyes.' As to his fatal gift ofbeauty, the young ladies were of one mind. They agreed, also, aboutthe cut of his garments, that were changed several times a day.

  "A dashing, masculine, head-punching spirit might have saved him withall his ballast, but he didn't have it. The Reverend Robert was a goodfellow to everybody--a fairly sound-hearted, decent, handsome fellow,but not a man. To be that, one has to know things at firsthand--especially work and trouble. He was a second-hand, school-madethinker. His doctrines came out of the books, but his conduct wasmildly modern. He danced and smoked a little, and played bridge andgolf, and made his visits in a handsome motor-car.

  "Marie liked the young man, and she and her mother rode and trampedabout with him almost every day of that summer. Deacon Joe showedsigns of faintness when he spoke of him.

  "One day I went up to the Benson homestead and found the old mansitting on his piazza alone.

  "'Where's Marie?' I asked.

  "'Off knocking around with the minister,' said Deacon Joe, in a voicefrail with contempt.

  "'She might be in worse company,' I suggested.

  "'Maybe,' he snapped.

  "'What's the matter with the minister?'

  "'Nothing,' said the old man, with a chuckle. 'He's a completegentleman, complete! So plaguy beautiful that he's a kind of a girl'splaything. He couldn't milk a cow or dig a hill o' potatoes. Acts kindo' faint an' sickly to me.'

  "The Deacon thoughtfully stirred the roots of his beard with thefingers of his right hand, and went on with a squint and a feeble tonewhich he seemed to think best suited to his subject.

  "'Talks so low you can hardly hear him. I have to set with my hand tomy ear every Sunday to make out what he's sayin', an' he prays as ifhe had the lung fever. Talks o' hell as though it was a quart o' coldmolasses. That's one reason we ain't no respect for it in thiscommunity. Ay--'es! That's the reason.'

  "He squinted his face thoughtfully and resumed with more energy.

  "'I like to hear a man get up on his hind legs and holler as they usedto--by gravy! Ye can't scare anybody by whispers. Damn it, sir, whatwe need is an old-fashioned revival.'

  "The Deacon halted to take a chew of tobacco, and went on, with asorrowful calmness:

  "'Now this young feller don't want to give no credit to God--not abit--no, sir! Science has done everything. I've noticed it time an'ag'in. T'other Sunday he said that an angel spoke to Moses, an' theBible says, as plain as A B C, that God spoke to him. How can heexpect that God is going to bless his ministry, an' he never givin'Him any credit?'

  "'It's rather bad politics, anyhow,' I said.

  "'An' the church is goin' from bad to worse,' he complained. 'Theaverage attendance is about forty-seven, an' it used to be betweenfive an' six hundred, an' we are all taxed to death to keep it goin'.I have to pay three hundred a year for the privilege o' gittin' madevery Sunday. Two or three of us have got after him an' made himpromise to do better. Some awful free-minded folks have crept into thechurch, an' the fact is, we need their money,' Deacon Joe went on.'What the minister ought to do is stick to the old doctrines that aresafe an' sound. 'St'id o' that he's tryin' to sail 'twixt rock an'reef.'

  "'Between Scylla and Charybdis,' I suggested.

  "'Between Silly an' what?' the old man asked, as if in doubt of mymeaning.

  "We were interrupted by the arrival of the Reverend Robert with Marieand her mother, in his handsome landaulet. Marie asked me to go withher to gather wild flowers in a bit of woodland not far away. I went,and soon saw her purpose. She had had the 'jolliest, cutest letterfrom Harry' that she had ever read, and seemed to be in doubt as towhether she ought to let him write to her.

  "'Has your grandfather forbidden it?' I asked.

  "'No.'

  "'Then it's up to you,' I said.

  "'Do you think he cares for me?'

  "'I should think him a fool if he didn't,' I said, looking down intoher lovely dark eyes.

  "'But do you really and truly think that he cares for me?' sheinsisted.

  "'I suspect that he does.'

  "'Why?'

  "'A lawyer must not betray a confidence.'

  "'Do you like him?'

  "'Wait until his uneducation is completed, and I'll tell you. I ambeginning to have hope for Harry.'

  "'I'm sorry grandpapa is so hateful!' she exclaimed, with a sigh.

  "I stood up for the old man and asked:

  "'Do you like the Reverend Robert?'

  "'Very much! He's so good-looking, and has such beautiful thoughts!Have you heard him preach?'

  "'No.'

  "'We think his sermons are fine. Everybody likes them but grandpapa.He wants noise, you know--lung power and old theology. I hate it!'

  "'He doesn't take to Robert?'

  "'No; he calls him a calf. Nobody is good enough for me, you know.He'd like me to marry some man with a hoe, who would take me to churchand Sunday school every sabbath morning, and for a walk to thecemetery in the afternoon, and down to the prayer-meeting everyWednesday night, and on a journey from Genesis to Revelations once ayear. It's too much to expect of a human being. Then the hoes are inthe hands of Poles, Slavs, and Italians. So what am I to do?'

  "'Well, you are young--you can afford to wait a while,' I said.

  "'But not until I am old and all withered up. I am going to marry
theman I love within a year or so, if he has the good sense to ask me.Don't you ever go to church?'

  "'No,' I said.

  "'Why not?'

  "I tried to think. There were the ministers--two boys and three oldmen--dried beef and veal! Not to my knowledge had a single one of themever expressed an idea. They were seen, but not felt. The Church! Why,certainly, it was founded on the sweetness, strength, and sanity of agreat soul. I had almost forgotten that. It had grown feeble. It hadgot its fortunes entangled in psychological hair. It should have beencorrecting the follies of the people--their selfishness, their sinfulpride, their extravagance, their loss of honor and humanity. Had I notseen, in the case of Harry and his followers, how the Church hadfailed in its work? Ought it not to have sought and saved them longago--saved them from needless disaster? It should have been appealingto their consciences. If appeals had failed it should have stung themwith ridicule or raised a voice like that of Christ against thePharisees. The Church! Why, it was living, not in the present, but inthe past. Here in Pointview the Church itself had become one of thegreatest follies of the time.

  "'I want you to go next Sunday and hear Mr. Knowles, as a favor tome--won't you?' Marie asked.

  "'Yes,' I said. 'In the next five Sundays I shall go to everyProtestant church in Pointview. I want to know what they're doing. Ishall put aside my scruples and go.'"