IX
SO BUILD WE UP THE BEING THAT WE ARE
AUNT CORDELIA stood behind Emmy Lou who was seated at the piano with"Selections From the Operas, for Beginners," open on the rack. Shepaused in her counting. "Now try it again by yourself. You have to keeptime if you want harmony."
Harmony? The mind of the performer dwelt on the word as she started overagain. What is harmony?
Aunt Cordelia relaxing her attention for the moment turned to speak toUncle Charlie who was reading his paper by the droplight. "It's no easything to bring up a child, Charlie." As it happened, she was notreferring to the practicing. "Louise thinks Emmy Lou ought to beconfirmed. She says now that she is eleven years old she surely ought toknow where she stands."
It is no easy thing to be the child brought up either, as Emmy Lou onthe piano-stool could have rejoined. Life and Aunt Cordelia might perchher on the stool but, as events were proving, that did not make her amusician. Would going up the aisle of St. Simeon's to kneel at the rail,she had watched the confirmation class for some years now, make her----?
What was it supposed to make her? An Episcopalian? What is anEpiscopalian? Did she want to be one? Or did she want to be what Papais?
"Repeat, repeat," said Aunt Cordelia behind her. "Don't you see the dotsat the end of the passage?"
Emmy Lou repeated, came to the end of her selection, and, to the reliefof herself, at least, got down. She was thinking about Papa.
She had gathered from somewhere that when Mamma after marriage left herchurch and went with Papa to his church, there was feeling.
Emmy Lou adored Papa. Aunt Cordelia had a brother and two sisters to gowith her to St. Simeon's. Surely there should be someone to go withPapa? But where? What was he?
Emmy Lou had asked this question outright a good while ago. Papa waspaying her a visit at the time. Unknown to her he had looked over herhead at Aunt Cordelia and laid a finger on his lips. Considering theextent and the nature of his obligation to Aunt Cordelia, possibly hisidea was there must be no more feeling, though Emmy Lou could not knowthis.
Having thus communicated with Aunt Cordelia, he answered the question."Had my two grandfathers elected to be born on one side of the Tweedand not the other, I probably would have been an Episcopalian," he said.
"Tweedledee, in other words, instead of Tweedledum," said Uncle Charlie.
All of which meant that Papa was not an Episcopalian. What was he? EmmyLou, eight years old then and eleven now, was still asking the question.
At bedtime Aunt Cordelia spoke again about confirmation. "Think it overfor the rest of the week and then come tell me what you have decided."
Emmy Lou was glad to be alone in bed. At eleven there is need forconstant adjustment and readjustment of the ideas and also forpondering. The relations of one little girl to Heaven and of Heaven toone little girl call for pondering. People assort themselves intoEpiscopalians, Methodists, and the like. Rebecca Steinau is a Jew, KatieO'Brien is a Dominican, Aunt M'randy in the kitchen is anAfro-American, her insurance paper entitling her to one first-classburial says so. Mr. Dawkins' brother is a Canadian; Maud and AlbertEddie say their father sometimes is sorry he's not a Canadian, too.
Is each of these assortments a religion? Or all the assortmentsreligion? Has God a special feeling about having Emmy Lou anEpiscopalian when Papa is something else? Is it not strange that Henever, never speaks? In which case she could ask Him and He would tellher.
When Emmy Lou arrived at the grammar school the next morning, for she isthus far on the road of education now, Sadie and Hattie had something totell her.
There is a pupil in the class this year named Lorelei Ritter. Emmy Louhas heard it claimed by some that she can speak French, by others thatshe speaks German. The fact is self-evident that she speaks English.She is given to minding her own affairs and in other ways seemssufficient to herself. Miss Amanda, the teacher, is pronouncedly cold toher; they do not seem to get along.
"Where is the Rio de la Plata River, and how does it flow?" Miss Amandaasked her in the class only yesterday.
Lorelei had hesitated a moment. She was plainly bothered.
"I thought _Rio_ was river----?" she began, and stopped. Miss Amanda'sface was red.
"Go to your seat," she said.
For what? How had Lorelei offended? The class had no idea.
Miss Amanda had shown steady disapproval of Lorelei before this, andthis morning Sadie and Hattie knew why.
"A girl in a class upstairs told us," said Sadie. "Her name is SallyWhite and she lives near Lorelei. She says Miss Amanda lives next doorto Lorelei and they play the piano at Lorelei's house all day Sundaywith the windows wide open."
"Tunes," Sadie went on to qualify. "It isn't even as if it were hymns."
"Or voluntaries," said Hattie. Voluntaries were permitted at Hattie'schurch before service and Sadie did not approve of them.
Sadie was continuing. "Sally said the neighbors sent word to the Rittersthat it was a thing a Christian neighborhood couldn't and wouldn't putup with, but the Ritters go right on playing."
This was more painful to Emmy Lou than Sadie could know. Papa who comesto see her once a month keeps the piano open on Sunday, and plays whatSadie and Hattie differentiate as "tunes" as opposed to hymns andvoluntaries, often as not dashing into what he explains to Uncle Charlieis this or that from this or that new opera.
He plays at any and all times on Sunday, dropping his paper or magazineto stroll to the piano to pick and try, strum and hum, or jerking thestool into place, to fall into sustained, and to Emmy Lou who herself isstill counting aloud, breathless and incredible performance.
She is aware that Aunt Cordelia does not willingly consent to this useof the piano on Sunday, and she also is aware of a definite stand takenby Uncle Charlie in the matter, to which Aunt Cordelia reluctantlyyields.
In the past Papa has been Papa, personality with no detail, accepted andadored, just as Aunt Cordelia has been and is Aunt Cordelia, supreme andundisputed. But now Papa's personality is beginning to have its details.He still is Papa, but he is more. He is tall and slight and has quick,clever hands, and impatient motions of the head, together with oddlyregardful, considering, debating eyes, fixed on their object throughrimmed eye-glasses.
Papa is "brilliant," vague term appropriated from Uncle Charlie who saysso. If he were not a brilliant editor he would have been a brilliantmusician. Uncle Charlie says this also.
And today at school Emmy Lou hears from Sadie that piano playing onSunday is a thing a Christian neighborhood can't and won't put up with!
"Aren't the Ritters Christians?" she asked anxiously.
"How can they be when they play all day Sunday?" Sadie returned."Lorelei told Sally that her father, Signor Ritter, was _Fra Diavolo_ inan opera once. And Sally says they are proud of it and can't forget it.Every one of the family plays on some instrument and they take Sundaywhen they're all home to play _Fra Diavolo_ till the neighbors can'tstand it. Sally asked Lorelei what _Fra Diavolo_ means, and she saidBrother Devil."
This again was information more painful to Emmy Lou than Sadie couldknow. Papa on his visits, while dressing in the mornings, or later whenwandering about the house or running through the contents of some bookpicked up from the table, breaks into song, palpably familiar andfavored song even if absently and disjointedly rendered. Emmy Lou hasheard it often as not on Sunday. Uncle Charlie in speaking of it oncesaid it was "in vogue"--another term appropriated by Emmy Lou--when Papawas a young man studying in Paris.
The song favored thus ended with up-flung and gayly defiant notes andwords that said and resaid with emphatic and triumphant finality, "_FraDiavolo_"! Though what the words meant Emmy Lou had no idea until now.
"If the Ritters are not Christians, what are they?" she asked.
Sadie had information about this. "Sally says the neighbors say they areBohemians."
Unfortunately Emmy Lou has heard this term before, though she had notgrasped that it was a religion. Aunt Cordelia fr
equently worries overPapa.
"He's a regular Bohemian," she frets to Uncle Charlie.
Before school was dismissed on this same Friday, there were otherworries for Emmy Lou. When in time she arrived home, full of chagrin,Papa was there for his usual visit and wanted to hear about the chagrinand its cause.
Words are given out in class at grammar school, as Papa knows, to bedefined and illustrated by a sentence. One may be faithful to themeaning as construed from the dictionary, and lose out in class too.
"A girl in the class named Lorelei Ritter laughed at my sentence, andthen the rest laughed too."
"What was the word?" inquired Papa.
"Concomitant."
"And what did you say?"
"'A thing that accompanies.' He played the concomitant to her song."
Uncle Charlie shouted, but Papa's laugh was a little rueful. "Poorlittle mole working i' the dark. Will the light never break for her,Charlie, do you suppose?"
What did he mean, and why is he rueful? Is the trouble with her whowould give all she is or hopes to be in adoring offering to Papa? Canhe, even in the light of what she has heard today, be open to criticism?Certainly not. Papa may be a Bohemian, and a Bohemian may not be aChristian, but what he is that shall Emmy Lou be also.
To decide is to act. Papa went down town after dinner with UncleCharlie, and Emmy Lou took her place at the piano. Ordinarily she isloath to practice, going through the ordeal because Aunt Cordeliarequires it. But today she goes about it as a practical matter with adefinite purpose.
Papa brought her the "Selections From the Operas" some while back, withthe remark that a little change from exercises to melody might introducecheer into a melancholy business all around. But so far this had notbeen the result, "Selection No. 1--Sextette from Lucia," reducing her totears, and "Selection No. 2--I Dreamt That I Dwelt in Marble Halls,"doing almost as much for Aunt Cordelia.
But now that Emmy Lou had a purpose, the matter was different. There wasa table of contents to the "Selections From the Operas," and a certaintitle therein had caught her eye in the past. Seated on the piano-stool,leaning over the book on her lap, she passed her finger down the list.
Selection 13. She thought so. She found the page and replaced the openbook upon the rack. _Fra Diavolo_. She set to work. What Papa is thatwill she be also.
She desisted by and by long enough to go and ask a question of AuntCordelia.
"If I were to be confirmed at St. Simeon's could I practice myselections on Sunday?"
"Practice them on Sunday?" Aunt Cordelia had enough trouble getting herto practice on week-days to be outdone with the question. "Why do youask such a thing? You know you could not."
That night Emmy Lou asked Papa a question a little falteringly: "Are youa Bohemian?"
"Instead, the veriest drudge you ever knew," he said. "There's too muchon me, making a living for us both, to be so glorious a thing."
Then what was Papa?
She went around to ask a question of Sadie the next morning. She hadbeen to Sadie's church often enough to know that she liked to go. Theprayers were long but the singing was frequent and hearty. No one needmark the time at Sadie's church, the singing marking its own time warmlyand strongly until it seemed to swing and sway, and Sadie sang and EmmyLou sang and everybody sang, and Emmy Lou for one wasn't sure she didnot swing and sway too, and her heart was buoyant and warm. She lovedthe songs at Sadie's church; what matter if she did not know what theymeant?
"Oh, there's honey in the Rock, my brother, There's honey in the Rock for you, Leave your sins for the blood to cover, There is honey in the Rock for you, for you."
She could wish that Papa might be a Methodist. It hardly was likely, allthings considered, but one could make sure.
"Would 'Selections From the Operas' be allowed by your church onSunday?" she asked Sadie.
Sadie not only was horrified but, like Aunt Cordelia, was outdone. "Why,Emily Louise McLaurin, you know they would not be!" she saidindignantly.
Emmy Lou had no such desire for Papa to be a Presbyterian. She had beenwith Hattie often enough to know that the emphasis is all on the sermonthere. Hattie knew her feeling and when inviting her to go put theemphasis on the voluntary of which she was proud.
This very Saturday afternoon she came around full of information andenthusiasm. "Our soprano has done so well with her new teacher, he isgoing to play our organ tomorrow by request and she is going to sing asolo during the collection. I want you to come from Sunday school andgo."
She had other news. "I asked Lorelei Ritter yesterday after school ifshe was a Bohemian and she got mad. She said no, she wasn't, she was aBavarian."
Aunt Louise spoke to Aunt Cordelia that night. "Emmy Lou must decide inthe next day or two if she is going to enter the confirmation class thisyear; I have to report for her."
The next day was Sunday, and Emmy Lou heard Papa humming and singing inhis room as he dressed, _Fra Diavolo_ the burden of it.
The chimes at Sadie's church two squares away, were playing,
"How beauteous are their feet Who stand on Zion's hill, Who bring salvation on their tongues And words of peace reveal!"
From afar the triple bells of St. Simeon's flung their call on themorning air. Nor Methodist nor yet Episcopalian would be singing _FraDiavolo_ on Sunday morning as he dressed. What was Papa?
What was he? As he and Emmy Lou went down the stairs together tobreakfast, she caught his hand to her cheek in a sudden passion ofadoring. What Papa was, she would be!
She hurried from Sunday school around to Hattie's church on SwayneStreet. Hattie defended the absence of a bell by saying they didn't needa bell to tell them when to go to church; they knew and went.
It was a brick church, long built, and a trifle mossy as to itsfoundations, discreet in its architecture, and well-kept.
Hattie was waiting for Emmy Lou at the door. Her very hair-ribbons, aserviceable brown, exact and orderly, seemed to stand for steadiness andreliability in conviction.
What did Emmy Lou's blue hair-ribbons stand for? Blue is true, and shewould be true to whatever the conviction of Papa.
"The strange organist is going to play the voluntary too," Hattieexplained. "It's almost time for him to begin. Hurry."
As they went in, she told another thing: "Lorelei and her mother arehere, sitting in a back pew."
There were two points of cheer in the service at Hattie's church as EmmyLou saw it, the voluntary and the collection. She had referred to thislast as the offertory on a visit long ago, but never would make themistake again, so sharply had Hattie corrected her.
Hardly were they settled in their places in the pew with Hattie's fatherand mother, when a large man with black hair and shaggy brows made hisway to the organ in the loft behind the minister, and the voluntarybegan.
This the voluntary that along with hymns is advocated for Sundays? Thisthat stole over the keys hunting the melody, to find it here and loseit there, with a promise that baffled and a familiarity which eluded, toovertake it at length and proffer it in high and challenging measurethat said gayly and triumphantly above the thunderous beat supportingit, in all but words, _Fra Diavolo_!
Hattie's face was shining! And the faces of her mother, of her father,and of the congregation around, radiated approval and satisfaction!
And in time the soprano of Hattie's church arose in the loft above theminister, supported by the choir. It was the collection.
It was more. It was "Selection No. 1--Sextette from Lucia"! Though thewords did not say so!
Hattie, then, had not been blaming Lorelei but defending her? It wasSadie who disapproved of voluntaries and Lorelei?
Emmy Lou with heightened color, resolute face, and blue bows, arrivedat home. She went straight to Papa just returned from Uncle Charlie'soffice and strumming on the piano.
"You're a Presbyterian," she said.
"It sounds like an indictment," said Uncle Charlie. "But he will have toown up. Admit your gui
lt, Alec. How did you find it out?"
"Presbyterians play and sing 'Selections From the Operas' on Sunday, andso does he."
"You look ruffled, Alec," from Uncle Charlie, "But so does someone else.Your cheeks are hot," to Emmy Lou. "Something else is disturbing; outwith it."
"The girl named Lorelei Ritter who laughed at me Friday in class was atchurch and spoke to me coming out."
"What did she say?"
"She said did I know it was her father who played the concomitant to thesoprano's song?"
"Invite her round, and urge her to be friendly," begged Uncle Charliewhen he stopped shouting. "We need her badly. Besides I'm sure I'd liketo know her."
Aunt Cordelia came downstairs that night after seeing Emmy Lou to bed."Whatever is to be done with the child? Has she talked to you, Alec? Shesays she can't be confirmed because she is going to be a Presbyterian.And then she cried bitterly. They stand up to pray and sit down to sing,she told me desperately. That if it was right--which it wasn't, ofcourse,--she'd wish people didn't have to be Episcopalians or Bohemiansor Presbyterians, but just Christians. I told her I thought we woulddrop the question of confirmation until next year."
X
SO TRUTH BE IN THE FIELD
A YEAR later Sarah, the sister of Albert Eddie Dawkins, saw him throughthe six weeks of the confirmation class, up the aisle of St. Simeon'sand confirmed. The next day she started to England to visit her mother'speople who had prospered.
"In a way I can feel he is safe now," she said to Aunt Louise at Sundayschool on the day of his confirmation. "I wasn't easy about him before,if he is my brother. If he'll only go ahead now, he'll do."
Aunt Cordelia saw Emmy Lou through the same class of preparation, up theaisle and confirmed, and then came home and had a hearty cry. She whoalways claimed she was too busy seeing to meals, the house, and thosewithin it, to give way!
"I am sure she is where her mother would have her," she said to AuntLouise through her tears. "And her father would not hear to thealternative when I offered to discuss it. If only I can feel that intime she will be _what_ her mother would have her!"
This seemed to put the odium on Emmy Lou in the event of failure. Shewould be thirteen years old in another month, her cheek-line waschanging from round to oval, she was preparing for the high school, andher waist, according to Miss Anna Williams, the seamstress who made herconfirmation dress, is coming round to be a waist.
She looked in distress at Aunt Cordelia who was drying her eyes in vainsince the tears were continuing, and who seemed far from reassured thatshe will be what her mother would have her. There was nothing for it inthe face of the implication but for Emmy Lou to throw herself into AuntCordelia's lap and cry too. After which the atmosphere cleared, thenormal was resumed, and everybody felt better.
Sarah, who spoke with more flattering certainty about the future ofAlbert Eddie, wore her hair coiled on her head now, and her skirts werelong. Capable, dependable, and to the point as ever, she was a younglady.
When Aunt Cordelia, accompanied by Emmy Lou, went to do her marketingthe Saturday before Sarah left for England, her mother called her downto say good-bye.
"It's a long journey for you at eighteen, Sarah," said Aunt Cordelia,"and we will be glad when we hear you have reached its end safely."
"I can trust Sarah; I always could," said her mother. "If anything goeswrong she'll just have to remember what her grandmother, my mother, usedto say to her when she was a wee 'un, and prone to fret when matterssnarled and she found she couldn't right 'em, 'When you get to wit's endyou'll always find God lives there.'"
Aunt Cordelia shook hands with Sarah, but Emily Louise, as many personsnow called her, went up on her toes and kissed her.
"You must ask the prayers of the church for the preservation of all whotravel by land and by water," Aunt Cordelia said to Mrs. Dawkins, "andwe ourselves must remember her in our prayers. We will miss you, Sarah,in the singing of the hymns on special days and Wednesday evenings whenwe haven't a choir. I'm glad you went to the organist and had thoselessons. A fresh young voice, sweet and strong and sure, like yours, cangive great comfort and pleasure."
Hattie was a member of her church now, and Sadie of hers. Rosalie,Alice, and Amanthus were making ready for confirmation at St. Philip'swhich was high church. All had gone their ways, each to the portal ofher own persuasion, as it were, and knocked and said, "I am informedthat by this gate is the way thither."
And in answer the gate which is the way thither, according to theunderstanding of each, had opened and taken the suppliant in and closedbehind her.
Which, then, is the gate? And which the way? Each and all so sure?
Time was, before the eyes of Emmy Lou were opened, when she supposedthere was but one way. She even had pictured it, sweet and winding andalways upward.
This was at a time when Sarah gathering Maud and Albert Eddie and EmmyLou around her in the sitting-room above the grocery, about the hob,which is to say the grate, sang them hymns. It was from one of thesehymns that Emmy Lou had pictured the way.
By cool Siloam's shady rill How fair the lily grows, How sweet the breath beneath the hill Of Sharon's dewy rose.
According to Sarah's hymns there were two classes of travelers on thissweet and goodly way.
Children of the Heavenly King, As ye journey sweetly sing!
These Emmy Lou conceived of first. Later she saw others of whom Sarahsang, less buoyant, less tripping, but with upturned faces no lessexpectant.
And laden souls by thousands meekly stealing Kind Shepherd turn their weary steps to Thee.
Emmy Lou listening to Sarah's hymns even saw these welcomed.
Angels of Jesus, Angels of light, Singing to welcome The pilgrims of the night.
But that was time ago. There is no one and common road whose dust as itnears Heaven is gold and its pavement stars. Each knocks at the portalof his own persuasion and says, "I am informed that by this gate is theway thither."
But Albert Eddie, having entered his portal, was in doubt. "What is itshe wants me to do now I'm in?" he said to Emmy Lou, by "she" meaningSarah, and by "in," the church of his adoption. His question began in ahusky mutter of desperation and ended in a high treble of exasperation.Or was it merely that his voice was uncertain?
For to each age its phenomena, as inevitable as inexplicable. AlbertEddie's voice these days was undependable. Emmy Lou felt anuncharacteristic proneness to tears. Rosalie said it would be wisdomteeth next for everybody all round.
But if Albert Eddie seemed baffled and hazy as to what his duties werefollowing confirmation, Aunt Louise left no doubt with Emmy Lou. Theconfirmation had been in May, and now a week later lawns were green andlilacs and snowballs in bloom.
"Now that you are a member of the church you can't begin too soon totake your place and do your part," Aunt Louise told her. "The lawn feteis Thursday night on the Goodwins' lawn. I am going to give you tentickets to sell, and send ten by you to Albert Eddie since Sarah is nothere to give them to him."
Emmy Lou took the tickets prepared to do the best she could. She had hadexperience with them before. It is only your friends who take them ofyou, as a necessity and a matter of course, a recognized and expectedtax on friendship, as it were.
Associates who are not intimates decline. One named Lettie Grierson, indeclining Emmy Lou's tickets now, voiced it all.
"Why should I buy tickets from you? You never bought any from me."
Hattie took one and said she'd go home and get the money and bring itround.
When she arrived that afternoon she brought a message from home with themoney. "Mamma says to tell you our church is going to have a lecture onthe Holy Land on the twenty-fifth."
Sadie was present, having come to pay for her ticket. "Our Sunday schoolis going to have a boat excursion up the river in June. The tickets willbe twenty-five cents," she told Emmy Lou.
Rosalie arrived a bit later with the money for her ticket. "Alice an
dAmanthus can't go. They went to Lettie Grierson's church concert lastweek and I didn't. I can go if I may come and go with you from yourhouse."
These three tickets thus disposed of, Emmy Lou's own, and the threetaken by Uncle Charlie for the rest of the household made a fairlycreditable showing.
Albert Eddie had less luck. Maud, his sister, so he explained, had beenahead of him, and wherever he might have gone, she had been.
"Joe Kiffin, our driver, took one, though he won't go, and the other oneI've sold is for myself."
He seemed worried. "I tried," he said. "I promised Sarah I'd try everytime it was put up to me."
It was arranged that not only Rosalie but Hattie and Sadie should comeand go with Emmy Lou. When they arrived, on the day, about five o'clock,each had her ticket and her money.
A lawn fete for the church is no unmercenary matter. Your ticket onlyadmits you to the lantern-hung grounds, which is enough for you toexpect, and once within you have to buy your supper. That it is paid forand eaten largely by those whose homes have donated it has nothing to dowith the matter, Aunt Cordelia having been notified that hercontribution would be beaten biscuit, a freezer of ice-cream andchickens.
In this case there must be carfare also, the Goodwins and their lawnbeing half an hour's ride by street car from the center of things.
Aunt Cordelia came to the door with Emmy Lou to meet the three. "Goahead," she said. "Louise is already there and will look after you. Eatyour suppers when you prefer. Charlie and I will come later and bringyou home."
The four found Albert Eddie at the corner waiting for the car. His hairwas very, very smooth, and his Sunday suit was spick and span as ifSarah were home to see to it instead of well on her way to England, herrules and regulations evidently being of a nature to stay by one.
Perhaps it was an ordeal for Albert Eddie to have four girls descend onhim, for he turned red and cleared his throat as though forced intodeclaring himself in maintaining his ground. Emmy Lou was his friend,and ignoring the others he addressed her.
"Maud went ahead with some friends of her own," he explained. "She saidthey wouldn't want me."
The obvious thing was to ask him to go with them. Had Emily Louise beenspeaking for herself alone, she would have done so, Albert Eddie beingher friend and going to her Sunday school. On the other hand, his fatherkept a grocery at the corner just passed, and lived over it with hisfamily. He wasn't the friend of her three companions and he didn't goto their Sunday school. Emily Louise understood many things which EmmyLou wot not of. Would they want him?
Verging' on thirteen, one has heard this nature of thing and itsdistinctions discussed at home.
Aunt Louise objected to certain associates of Emily Louise not long ago."It's why I am and always have been opposed to the public school forher. She picks up with every class and condition."
"And why I have opposed your opposition," returned Uncle Charlie, "sinceit is her best chance in life to know every class and condition."
"I'm sure I don't know why she should," Aunt Louise had said.
"An argument in itself in that you _don't_ know," from Uncle Charlie.
Fortunately for Emily Louise in the present case of Albert Eddie, twelveverging on thirteen was yet democratic. "We'll all go together," saidHattie as a matter of course, and the others agreed.
Hattie, as ever, was marshal and spokesman. They boarded the car and satdown. "Fifty cents all around to begin with," she stated after fareswere paid and the common wealth displayed. "Five cents put in forcarfare. Forty-five cents left all around. Five cents to come home on,five cents to spend, and thirty-five cents for supper just makes it."
Church creeds and nomenclatures may vary but the laws of church fetesand fairs are the same. As the five left the car and approached theGoodwins' home, Whitney and Logan were patrolling the sidewalk outsidethe gate and the lantern-hung yard from whence arose the hustle andchatter of the lawn fete.
Logan wore a baker's cap and carried a tray hung from his neck and piledwith his wares, which a placard set there among proclaimed to be"Homemade Caramel Taffy, Five a Bag." Whitney was assisting Logan todispose of his wares.
The two stopped the five. "We haven't a show against the girls on theinside to sell anything," they said. "Buy from us."
"Five cents for a bag all around and forty cents left, five cents to gethome and thirty-five cents for supper," from Hattie the calculator, wholiked to keep things clear.
Five bags were being exchanged for five cents all around when an elderlygentleman came along. Negotiations with the five being held up while hewas pressed to buy candy, he brusquely replied that he had no change.
Neither had Logan or Whitney, business having been brisker than theyadmitted. But they did not let that deter them from cornering thegentleman into a showdown. Nor did a two-dollar bill, when produced,bother them.
Whitney had heard the financial status of the five just outlined byHattie, and did some creditable calculating himself. Like Hattie he wasgood at figures.
"You have five forties between you," he said. "You take the bill and letus have the change. You'll get it fixed all right when you get yoursuppers."
The party of five was loath but saw no way out of it. Held up, as itwere, they reluctantly gave over their forty cents around and pinnedtheir gazes anxiously on the two-dollar bill in the hand of the elderlygentleman.
He seemed no better pleased than they, showing indeed a degree of temperunbecoming under the circumstances and using language somewhat heatedfor a church fair.
"What in heaven's name do I want with caramel taffy without a tooth inmy head that's my own?"
He thrust the bill at Albert Eddie who took it hastily, and the fivemoved on.
"Who was it?" Sadie asked Emmy Lou and Albert Eddie, since this wastheir lawn fete. "He's coming in the gate behind us. Do you know?"
Unfortunately they did. It seemed to detract from that cordiality ofwelcome they would prefer to associate with their lawn fete.
"It's Mr. Goodwin," Emily Louise told them. "It's his house and yard. Hemust just be getting home."
One's friends are loyal. Hattie covered the silence. "His wife must havesaid they could have it here before she asked him. I've known it tohappen so before."
"We'll go get our suppers," said Albert Eddie anxiously. "That way we'lleach get our carfare back and it'll be off our minds."
They found Emmy Lou's Aunt Louise under a grape-arbor, dishing ice-creamfrom a freezer into saucers on the ground around it. A great manythings are in order at a church fete that would not be tolerated athome.
"Go get your suppers," she said to the group. "I'm busy and will be;don't depend on me for anything."
The party of five took their places about a table a few moments after.Two of them were familiar figures in the Big Room at St. Simeon's Sundayschool. The three young ladies who rushed up, tray in hand, to wait onthem, were far, far older--eminent representatives of that superiorcaste of St. Simeon's Sunday school, the Bible Class.
It was a friendly rivalry that was on among the three, each waitress ofthe evening endeavoring in her earnings to outstrip and eclipse allother waitresses and so carry off the glory of the occasion. In thepresent instance the swiss apron and cap with the yellow ribbons wonout, and the other two waitresses withdrew with laughter andrecrimination of a vigorous nature, leaving the party of fiveoverwhelmed by the notice from the surrounding tables and the publicitythus brought upon them.
The wearer of the swiss apron with the yellow ribbons was an arch andeasy person, overwhelming her five charges further with offhand andjocose remarks indicative of condescension as she brought five suppers,substantial, lemonade, ice cream and cake, put them down, and, as itwere, got through with it.
Even to the payment. And as Albert Eddie produced a two-dollar bill andshe took it, she was easily, superlatively, meaningly arch as she said,
"We don't give change at church fairs to gentlemen."
* * * * *
Uncle Charlie, with Aunt Cordelia, taking the party home, paideveryone's carfare but Albert Eddie's. When the time came for leavinghe could not be found.
"We lost him right after supper," Hattie explained.
"As soon as he heard us say you were coming to get us," from Emmy Lou.
"He didn't eat any supper, just pretended to," from Sadie. "He wastrying not to cry."
"Sadie!" from Rosalie.
"We never, never should tell it if he was," from Hattie.
"Logan and Whitney said he left early," said Rosalie, "that he told themhe would have to walk home."
Uncle Charlie deposited the members of the party at their several homesand then, being the editor of a newspaper, went back downtown.
Emmy Lou, oftener than she could enumerate, had waked in the past tohear him on his return in the late, or, to be exact, the early hours,stop at Aunt Cordelia's door with news that the world would hear thenext morning.
She waked at his return tonight. He did more than tap at Aunt Cordelia'sdoor, he went in. Hearing Aunt Cordelia cry out at his words, Emmy Louwent hurriedly pattering in from her adjoining room. As she entered, thedoor on the opposite side of the room opened and Aunt Louise came in,slipping on her bedroom wrapper.
The light was on and Aunt Cordelia was sitting up in bed with tearsrunning unrestrainedly down her face.
Uncle Charlie, about to explain to Aunt Louise, looked at Emmy Lou andhesitated.
"No, go on," Aunt Cordelia told him. "She is a big girl and must hearthese things from now on with the rest of us."
Uncle Charlie, reflective for a moment, seemed to conclude she was rightand went on.
"The ship on which Sarah Dawkins crossed foundered on the rocks off theIrish coast in a heavy sea this morning and went to pieces against thecliffs in the sight of shore. The dispatches report only three personssaved, and tell of a cook who went about with pots of coffee, and of agirl named Sarah Dawkins who gathered some children about her and whosevoice could be clearly heard by those on shore in the lulls of the stormsinging hymns to them to the end."
Something happened to Uncle Charlie's voice. After finding it he wenton. "I hurried right home. It's past twelve, Cordelia, but don't youthink you had better dress and let me take you up to Mrs. Dawkins atonce?"
Emmy Lou crept into Aunt Cordelia's bed as Uncle Charlie went out andAunt Cordelia got up and began to dress hastily.
Strange tremors were seizing Emmy Lou, but she must not weep, must notdetain or distract Aunt Cordelia. She was a big girl and must hear andbear these things now with the rest.
"The child, the poor, poor child, alone on that great ship without kithor kin!" said Aunt Cordelia as she fastened her collar, still weeping.Then she came and kissed Emmy Lou.
"I may be gone some time. Stay where you are and I'll leave the light."
Did the tears come before or after Aunt Louise kissed and soothed herand then went back to bed? Emmy Lou rather thought they came after shewas gone. And after the tumult of tears had spent themselves?
A picture arose in her mind, unbidden and unexpected, of Albert Eddie,hurt, mortified, and outraged, walking home block after block from thelawn fete because church fairs do not give any change.
"What is it she wants me to do now I'm in?" he had asked following hisconfirmation.
And what was it that Sarah did want of Albert Eddie? Sarah who saw himconfirmed and left next day? Sarah assembling the children on the shipand singing hymns to them to the end?
And suddenly Emmy Lou, twelve years old verging on thirteen, saw for thefirst time!
Sarah dependably mixing the Saturday baking in the crock, Sarah lookingafter her younger sister and brother as best she knew how, Sarah singinghymns to them sitting about the hob, which is the grate, was being madeinto that Sarah who could gather the children about her on the sinkingship and sing to them to the end. Not Sarah mixing the baking in thecrock, but Sarah _dependably_ mixing the baking in the crock. Hereincame the light.
And all the while Emmy Lou had thought the digit on the slate in its daywas the thing, and later the copybook, and only yesterday, theconjugation of the verb. Whereas Sarah now had shown her what nor home,nor school, nor Sunday school, nor confirmation class had made her see,that the faithfulness with which the digit is put on the slate, thescript in the copybook, and the conjugation of the verb on the tabletsof the mind, is the education and the thing!
This, then, is the gate? This the way that leads thither? The sweet andcommon road along which the children of the Heavenly King arejourneying? Faithful little Sister from the alley of so long ago, gentleand loving Izzy of that same far-gone day, Hattie helping a schoolmatecomrade over the hard places? This is the road whereon those older,laden souls are stealing? The road, if once gained by the pilgrim,whether he be Episcopalian, Bohemian, Presbyterian, or Afro-American, onwhich he will go straight onward. The path where, like bells at eveningpealing, the voice of Jesus sounds o'er land and sea.
Sea? Prayers of the church were asked that Sarah be preserved from theperils of land and water! And Sarah was lost!
Lost? Was Sarah lost?
"We'll miss your voice, so sweet and strong and true, in the hymns,"Aunt Cordelia had told Sarah.
Would her voice be missed? Her voice singing to the children to the end?It came with a flash of sudden comprehension to Emmy Lou, lying there inAunt Cordelia's big bed waiting for her return, that Sarah's voice wouldnot be missed but heard forever, singing hymns to the end to thoselittle children of the King.
"What does she want me to do now I'm in?" asked Albert Eddie. Sarah hadanswered him. Make himself ready for whatsoever part should be his.
"The child, the poor, poor child, alone on that great ship without kithor kin!" Aunt Cordelia had said, weeping.
Was she thus alone? "When you get to wit's end you will always find Godlives there," her grandmother had told her when she was a wee 'un. Hadnot Sarah given proof that when she got to wit's end God did live there?
Emmy Lou was weeping no longer. She lay still. A wonder and an awesuffused her. To the far horizon the landscape of life was irradiated.She was tranquil. The Silence had spoken at last.
* * * * *
Aunt Louise remarked to Aunt Cordelia a few days later, "Did I tell youthat we made a hundred and fifty dollars at the lawn fete?"
"By fair means or foul?" asked Uncle Charlie, overhearing. "I must say,Louise, in the name of the church I stand for, I don't like yourmethods."
Perhaps Uncle Charlie and Emily Louise were seeing the same thing,Albert Eddie, hurt, mortified, and outraged, walking home in the nightbecause St. Simeon's lawn fete didn't give change to gentlemen.
Aunt Cordelia spoke after Emmy Lou went up to bed. "She brought home herreport of the final examinations from school today. She got through!"
"By the skin of her teeth as usual?" from Uncle Charlie.
"Just that. She works so hard to so little end, Charlie. I don'tunderstand it. But at least she is always faithful."
Some said, John, print it; others said, Not so: Some said, It might do good; others said, No. --_The Pilgrim's Progress._
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Transcriber's Notes:
br />
Obvious punctuation errors repaired.
Repeated chapter titles were removed. Text uses both "Heaven" and"heaven," "Sally" and "Sallie." Text uses the archaic spelling of"strait" for "straight."
Page 125, "diagramed" changed to "diagrammed" (Bob diagrammed)
Page 170, "nebulae" changed to "nebulae" (of nebulae for support)
Page 292, "thereamong" changed to "there among" (placard set thereamong)
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