CHAPTER XLII
The house that Aunt Jed had left to Natalie stood on the lip of a vastbasin. From its veranda one looked down into a peaceful cup of life. Thevariegated green of the valley proclaimed to the wandering eye,
"All sorts are here that all the earth yields! Variety without end."
There was a patchwork of fields bordered with gray stone walls, of straybits of pasture, of fallow meadow and glint of running water, ofwoodland, orchard, and the habitations of man made still by distance.
Aunt Jed's house was not on the highway. The highway was miles off, andcut the far side of the basin in a long, straight slant. On that gash ofwhite one could see occasional tiny motor-cars hurrying up and down liketoys on a taut string. Only one motor, a pioneer car, had struggled upthe road that led past Natalie's door, and immediately after, thatdetour had been marked as impassable on all the best maps.
In fact, the road up to Aunt Jed's looked more like a river-bed than aroad. It had a gully and many "thank-you-ma'ams." It was plentifullysown with pebbles as big as your head and hard as flint, which gave titfor tat to every wheel that struck them. Every time Mrs. Leightonventured in Natalie's cart--and it was seldom indeed except to go tochurch--she would say, "We really must have this road fixed."
But Natalie would only laugh and say,
"Not a bit of it. I like it that way."
Natalie had bought for a song a little mare named Gipsy. Nobody, man orwoman, could drive Gip; she just went. Whoever rode, held on and prayedfor her to stop. Gip hated that road down into the valley. If she couldhave gone from top to bottom in one jump, she would have done it. As itwas, she did the next best thing. What made you love Gip was that shecame up the hill almost as fast as she went down.
Soon after Gip became Natalie's, she awoke to find herself famous froman attempt to pass over and through a stalled motor-car. After that thefarmers used to keep an eye out for her, especially on Sundays, and giveher the whole road when they saw her coming. Ann Leighton said it wasundignified to go to church like that, to which Natalie replied:
"Think what it's doing for your color, Mother. Besides, think of church.You must admit that church here has gone a bit tough. I really couldn'tstand it except sandwiched between two slices of Gip."
Aunt Jed's house--nobody ever called it anything else--was typical ofthe old New England style, except that a broad veranda had been added tothe length of the front by the generation that had outraged custom andreduced the best parlor and the front door to everyday uses. This musthave happened many years before Natalie's advent, for a monster climbingrose of hardy disposition had more than half covered the veranda beforeshe came.
The house itself was of clapboards painted white, and stood four square;its small-paned windows, flanked with green shutters, blinking towardthe west. It had a very prim air, said to have been absorbed from AuntJed, and seemed to be eternally trying to draw back its skirts fromcontact with the interloping veranda and the rose-tree, which, towardthe end of the flowering season, certainly gave it a mussed appearance.At such times, if the great front door was left open on a warm day, thehouse took on a look of open-mouthed horror, which immediately relapsedto primness once the door was closed.
Natalie was the discoverer of this evidence of personality. Sittingunder the two giant elms that were the sole ornament of the soft oldlawn, she suddenly caught the look on the face of the house, and calledout:
"Mother, come here! Come quickly!" as though the look couldn't possiblylast through Mrs. Leighton's leisurely approach.
"What is it, dear?" asked Mrs. Leighton.
"Why, the house!" said Natalie. "Look at it. It's horrified atsomething. I think it must be the mess the roses have made. Can't yousee what it's saying? It's saying, 'Well, I never!'"
Mrs. Leighton laughed.
"It does look sort of funny," she said.
Just then old mammy put her gray head out of the door to hear what thetalk was about. She wore glasses, as becoming to her age, but peeredover them when she wanted to see anything.
"What youans larffin' abeout?" she demanded.
"We're laughing at the house," cried Natalie. "It's got its mouth openand the funniest look on its face. Come and see."
"Mo' nonsense," grunted mammy and slammed the door.
Then it was that the house seemed to withdraw suddenly into the primnessof virginal white paint.
"That's what it wanted," cried Natalie, excitedly--"just to get itsmouth shut. O Mother, isn't it an old _dear_?"
Stub Hollow had looked upon the new arrivals at Aunt Jed's as summerpeople until they began to frequent Stub Hollow's first and onlyPresbyterian church. Natalie, who like all people of charm, was manyyears younger inside than she was out, immediately perceived that theintroduction of mammy in her best Sunday turban into that congregationwould do a great deal toward destroying its comatose atmosphere. Likemany another New England village church, Stub Hollow's needed a jar andneeded it badly. But it wasn't the church that got the jar.
Upon the introduction of Gip into the family circle, it was concededthat there was no longer any reason why mammy should resign the benefitsof communal worship. Consequently, with many a grunt,--for good food andbetter air had well nigh doubled her proportions,--mammy climbed fromthe veranda to the back seat of the cart and filled it. For a moment itseemed doubtful whether mammy or Gip would hold the ground, but Gipfinally won out by clawing rapidly at the pebbly road and getting theadvantage of the down grade.
Neither Natalie nor Mrs. Leighton ever knew just where it was they lostmammy, but it couldn't have been far from the gate; for just as theywere dipping into the wood half-way down the hill, Mrs. Leightonhappened to glance back, missed mammy, and saw her stocky form waddlingacross the lawn toward the back of the house. Mrs. Leighton was alsoyoung inside. She said nothing.
When finally they drew up, with the assistance of three broad-shoulderedswains, at the church, Natalie looked back and gasped,
"Mammy! Mother, where's mammy?"
"You don't suppose she could have got off to pick flowers, do you?"asked Mrs. Leighton, softly.
"Why, _Mother_!" cried Natalie. "Do you know that mammy may be _killed_?We'll have to go straight back."
"No, we won't," said Mrs. Leighton, flushing at her levity before thevery portals of the church. "She's all right. I looked back, and saw hercrossing the lawn."
"Even so," said Natalie, severely, "I'm surprised at _you_." Then shelaughed.
Church seemed very long that day, but at last they were out in thesunshine again and Gip was given her full head. No sooner had Zeke, thehired man, seized the bit than Natalie sprang from the cart and rushedto the kitchen. She found mammy going placidly about her business.
"Doan' yo' talk to me, chile," she burst out at sight of Natalie. "Doan'yo' dast talk to me!"
Natalie threw her arms about her.
"You poor mammy," she murmured. "Aren't you hurt?"
"Hurt!" snorted mammy. "Yo' mammy mought 'a' been killed ef she didn'carry her cushions along wif 'er pu'sson."