Chapter V: Part 5

“My account--nothing!” was her scornful ejaculation. “You were just filled with curiosity, for one thing, and a desire to hear from Joe, for another--don’t deny it! And not speaking a word to me for a whole month, and talking of church discipline! Huh!”

Abner had risen to his feet and affected a dignity it was obvious he did not altogether feel.

“Well, mother,” he said, in a conciliatory tone, but with the masculine reluctance to owning himself in the wrong clearly apparent; “well, mother, I guess we haven’t either of us done anything we want to talk about before folks. It looks as if the devil was in the thing, anyway, as I told you at first. I guess we’d better say nothing about the matter to any one--to any one, not even to Joe.”

She looked at him intently and reflected for a moment, then laughed a little, not being without humor.

“I guess so, too,” she said.

And she never did mention the affair to any one but Joe, who, of course, told his wife.

AN ITINERANT PAIR

Were you ever at Michigan City, in Indiana? Stop! Let me put the question more carefully. Were you ever compelled to wait for a train at Michigan City? The first inquiry sounds innocent enough, but a Hoosier would detect a covert insult in it. Why? Because one of the three state penitentiaries is situated there and is the town’s chief distinction to the outside public. A native of the state living elsewhere can conceive of no reason why a man should voluntarily take up his residence in the place, or even why he should “stop off,” except to visit some erring and unfortunate relative. Hence, to avoid trouble, those persons in search of local information do well to be on their guard.

I had passed through, many times, on my way to and from Chicago, but until this trip had never taken closer observations than through the car windows. To-day the “lightning express” on the Michigan Central road was three hours too early for the one train that in those days--some years ago now--daily jogged along down the road leading south. What should I do with the time? I looked into the waiting-room of the station. No passenger had left the train but myself, and the place was empty save for an old couple, who had evidently just come in from the country.

I went out and explored the town. Up one street and down another I strolled, until the circuit was made. In every direction was sand--mountains of sand, valleys of sand. It was in drifts upon the sidewalks, in hillocks in the streets. The houses were built upon it. Many dwellings leaned from the perpendicular at various angles, according to their age, the shifty foundations had so worn away and blown away. Though it was a bright April day but few people were on the street, and these seemed in haste to disappear as soon as seen. It may have been a biased imagination that saw this, or the cause may have been the chill lake wind.

Was it fancy, too, that made the women and children, visible here and there at the windows, seem to draw back, as if to hide? The scattering tufts of grass in the front yards seemed to have given over the ambition to cover the earth with green, and were creeping under the sand. Did I imagine a burden in the air, as of grief or guilt? The shadow of the prison seemed to hover over the place. It grew oppressive.

In desperation, I resolved to climb the nearest sand-hill and view the world from that eminence. Perhaps I might find an elevation of spirits when I could survey the prospect from above. Were not poets always telling us to commune with nature, and thereby escape from fret and care; to seek the solitude of a height and see the earth grow fair beneath our feet, the mists and clouds melt into sunlight? Laboriously I crept and scrambled up the slippery side of that miserable hill. From the foot it had not looked far to the summit--perhaps not over one hundred feet--nor yet steep; but with each step forward and each slip back it seemed to grow, until, when half way up I stopped to breathe, it loomed above me like a mountain. Out to the north was Lake Michigan, blue and cold. Far distant could be seen the smoke of steamers; nearer, the white wings of sail-boats; but all were outward bound.

Along the shore the sand dunes stretched for miles. Once, long ago, the lake is said to have covered this ground. Having been given up by water, the earth had not had thrift to reclaim the waste. Even the idle train of vagrant weeds had not wandered in to hide the barrenness. Beyond the town rose the grim, bare walls of the prison. Hundreds of men inside were wearing out the long hours of weary days in toil that was heavy and bitter, because it was enforced. Deprived of freedom of will, of liberty of body, without hope for the future, they waited--for what? For release from bondage, to spend the remnant of their lives as Ishmaelites, followed in the world by sneers and suspicion, or received, if at all, with a virtuous condescension no easier to bear. Probably they deserved their fate. Some of those men had stolen, some had forged, some had murdered; and the way of the transgressor was hard, we were told. It was right that they should suffer, then; but we Pharisees, were we without sin, that we should cast a stone? Had we not done those things that we should not, left undone that which we should? Perhaps, my friend, you took advantage of a man’s need and made an unrighteous profit. Did you not foreclose a mortgage and distress a debtor, when you could have waited? Perhaps you did not love your neighbor, or, may be, you loved his wife too well. Such things had been known. Perhaps--but the catalogue was long. Because the law had not touched us, were we to proscribe those on whom its finger was laid? Life was bitter at best. What were we, good Lord, that we should take all the sweet of existence from any man?

This little sermon I preached to myself, for lack of a better audience; but the wind was too keen to encourage moralizing. What should I gain by climbing to the top of this hill? Each step higher would only show a wider sweep of desolation. Why should I emulate the young man of Alpine fame? He was a foolish youth and came to an untimely end. I had no ambition; besides I had brought no banner to plant at the top to commemorate my deed. It was a gloomy world. Nothing was worth while. I would go down.

The descent was rapid and undignified. Eyes, ears and clothing were full of sand. To such irritation of mind had I come that I felt ready for reckless deeds, but I swallowed wrath and sand together and walked on.

Suddenly, in a sunny corner, between a pile of railroad ties and another of fragrant pine lumber, I came upon the old couple whom I had seen at the station. There they were--she with a napkin spread upon her lap and nibbling daintily at a bit of cake; he helping himself freely to sandwiches or chicken, now from the lap that served as table, now from the basket at their feet. Involuntarily, I paused; perhaps, to apologize for the intrusion, perhaps, attracted by the people themselves, or drawn, maybe (who knows?) by the luncheon. Who can tell afterward just how an acquaintance began? In ten minutes we were chatting briskly, and I was cheerfully helping to empty that lunch basket. I think the wife opened the conversation by saying that they had seen me climb the hill, and only wished themselves a little younger, that they might do the same.

No one is so charming to a traveler as a woman, young or old, who knows when and how to dispense with formality, and talk kindly, yet with dignity, to a stranger. It is a rare grace, however, I have come to know.

If my old lady whom I met that day on the sand told too much of her own story, it was not her fault, but mine. I asked questions now and then to lead her on. As we talked about the weather, of the trains, of the time--drifting along in the shallows of conversation as strangers do--I became slowly conscious of a something out of the common in the manner of these old people. Just what it was was hard to define. There was nothing at all remarkable in their personal appearance. He was tall, spare, with a mild, benevolent face, and it needed only one glance to be assured that he was a minister of the Gospel. A Presbyterian minister I would have said, judging from a certain stiffness of carriage and gentle dignity, as well as from the extreme neatness of his well-worn garments. With a little surprise, I learned that he was, as he put it, “the Lord’s servant in the Methodist vineyard”--Methodists of the old school whom I had heretofore met being noticeable rather for a carelessness of dress and a soldierly bearing, as of those who had conquered men. His wife was a slender, nervous little body; one of the women who in these days are called “delicate” and of whom little is expected; one of those who, when the tests of life come, sometimes develop a power of endurance, mental and physical, marvelous to see.

“No, we don’t live here,” she said. “We have been spending a day in the country with some old friends, but we came up to see a young man who is in prison for murder. He was a school-mate of our son Gabriel, and had the making of a man; but he took a wild and reckless turn as he grew up, and never got on the right track again till now.”

“You smile,” said the old minister; “but you know that building is a place of bondage and of punishment for breaking our laws only, and not God’s laws. If a man steal, we shut him up to teach him that he shall not touch our property; but, unless he repent of his sin, I hold that the Lord will punish him still, the same as if we had let him go free. This boy drank to excess, he quarreled, and the jury found that he had killed a man. For the sake of his dead mother and of our son, who is dead and had loved him, we came to see if we could help him on the way to be forgiven; and the good God has blessed us. We found him wretched and without hope. We could give no comfort; we could only pray for help, and the comfort came. Before we came away he began to feel that there was mercy waiting for him. A little light shone out of the darkness; just a glimpse of the glory beyond. It is not for me to say that he was more guilty than another; but we all have need of grace. Cynthy and I pray that the little grain of faith in that boy’s heart may take deep root, until he can bear his punishment with patience; until he can say with humility, ‘Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.’”

“It made my heart ache to leave him,” said Mother Ellis (I knew her pet name must be “Mother,” it fitted so well); “but God, who has been so good to us, has pity for him.”

There was no want of reverence in this continual allusion to the Almighty; no cant, no grating familiarity. This old couple talked of Him as of a revered friend, with whom they had constant intercourse and in whom they had utter faith. Their simplicity was unworldly and beautiful.

“The folks down to Freedom, where we’ve been living lately, wanted us to go to Chicago and see the sights, while we were so near; but John and I we’re too anxious to get home.” Here she looked at John and blushed, and he took her hand in his. They were like a pair of young lovers. It was curious.

Presently she went on, with a contented sigh, as if the little by-play needed some explanation:

“You see, John and I, we’re going home--to a home of our own--for the first time in our lives, though we’ve been married forty years come June. Forty years! It’s a long time, looking at it some ways; but again it only seems a little while since we were young and lived ’way back in York state. Those hills and woods were pretty to look at. I’ve never seen their like since. Maybe it’s wicked, but I always think o’ the hills ’round the New Jerusalem as being like those about the head-waters o’ the Allegheny. Like as not, though, the New York hills have been cleared and ‘improved’ till they’re bare enough and ugly; but I’ve no fine words to tell ye how they used to look to me. I’ve learned now to see beauty in a level country; but it took a long while. When we first came to Indiana, John and I, seemed as if I couldn’t any way get used to the low land. Do you remember Chestnut Hill, John, over toward Cattaraugus? If I were one o’ the painter folks I could make a picture of it now. There was a tall, dead tree at the very top, with two branches reaching out like arms, making a cross that could be seen for miles. When I was young and foolish, I used to wish I were a Roman Catholic, that I might go and pray at the foot of that tree rather than in church.”

“I don’t remember about the hills being so pretty--’bout the same as others, I guess,” said unpoetical John; “but I reck’lect the road through the pine woods. Do you, Cynthy?”

Again the faded eyes of both brightened with love that is ever young. Again came the blush on the wife’s wrinkled cheek, and this time John’s feeble arm went around her waist. There was silence for a little space; but I doubt not the air was filled with the fragrance of the pine forest, that their ears heard the murmur of the trees. Once more they listened with their hearts to the words of long ago, which had made that woodland path so fair a memory.

“When I first knew John he taught our district school, and used to come to my Uncle Isaac’s pretty often. Teachers boarded around in those days, and I did think he took his turn at Uncle’s pretty often. I knew he was a pious young man, who’d had a call to be a preacher, and, like a silly girl, was a little afraid of him and didn’t want to see him. He stayed all summer when there was no school, helping my uncle and the neighbors in haying and harvest, studying between times. In those days the best of men worked in the harvest-field. Before early apples were ripe I mistrusted what was keeping him, and somehow I had got all over being afraid of him. I had found out that he was an orphan, like myself, and had no home. I was only _staying_ with Uncle Isaac, and it must have been that which made my mind turn toward him. But he never said anything, John didn’t; only kept hanging ’round and looking as if he wanted to speak. John was bashful; but, though I’ve heard o’ men too bashful to ask a girl to marry ’em, I never knew one, and I guess John ’u’d a plucked up courage after awhile, even if the revival hadn’t come. ’Long in October Brother Duzan came along through that region, and held meetings that were powerfully blessed. It was early in the season for a revival; but everybody turned out to the meetings at our school-house. I had never experienced religion then, though Uncle Isaac often made me the subject of prayer. I was giddy and thoughtless, and, like many another, I couldn’t or, rather, wouldn’t see how good the Lord was to me.

“Well, I went with the rest to the meetings; but my heart was hard. Seemed as if it grew harder the more the brethren and sisters prayed and exhorted, though all the young folks I knew were going forward to the mourners’ bench and were being converted. One night Brother Duzan preached his dreadful sermon on future punishment of the godless, that he always kept for the crowning effort. He told, in awful words, how the unconverted sinner would finally suffer and burn in endless torment, and everybody was crying and groaning but myself. That threat couldn’t soften me then, and I’m free to confess has no effect now. Then John, he led in prayer. His voice was so soft and gentle that it hushed the excitement. He besought the tender Shepherd, who loved all His sheep, to look with special care upon the playful lambs, whose willful feet refused to follow whither they were led; to draw them back with merciful hands before they should learn, too late, that only the narrow, rocky path led to the green pastures that were beside still waters.

“I knew he prayed for me, and my heart was melted then; and, for fear the tears would come, I slipped out of the door, while the rest were on their knees. But John saw me--though how he could, with his back turned, I never knew--and I didn’t get far into the pine woods alone. He began where the prayer had stopped. ‘The Lord was waiting,’ he said, ‘for me to stretch out my hands, and He would take me into the blessed fold.’ And I? What should I do but cry, as a woman always does when she should not. Then John, to comfort me, began to tell how God loved me; and from that, some way, it was easy to say how--well, no, John, I shan’t tell what you said then, and don’t you, either. I kind o’ forgot for a minute that we were not alone, and was thinking out loud, I guess. I hope our friend will excuse me, for when she comes to be old such places in her life will stand out clear in her memory, where many another important thing has faded away.

“The next night I went to meeting, and made a profession of religion. What could I do but praise the Lord for being so good to me, who was so undeserving. Had he not given me John, and what was I that such a blessing should be mine?”

Here, the mild eye of Reverend John looked at me over his wife’s head with a mischievous twinkle. As she went on, however, his face resumed its serenity.

“We have lived many years since then. Sometimes the way has been rough and hard. We have had trials and losses; but mercy and goodness have followed us, for we have borne the burdens together. I can confess now, though I never said so to John, that one of the heaviest crosses of my life has been the wish for a home. When we were married, I knew that I was taking an itinerant Methodist preacher for better or worse (it has always been the better, never the worse, John); but I could not know till I had tried it what a wandering, unsettled life it was. Different in the early days from now, too. When we came out here, it was looked upon as more of an undertaking than going to Europe now. There were no railroads then running here and there across the country; so we came by water on a flat-boat to Pittsburgh and in a steamboat from there. Stopped at Cincinnati to see the sights. It was a fine city then, but they say it’s grown since.

“Daughter, a volume would not hold our experience of forty years. We have been sojourners, never long in one place. It’s only of late years, you know, that Methodist ministers are allowed to labor more than two years in one church. Then there was the loneliness; for sometimes John would be gone on the circuit, away from his family for weeks at a time. I could not go, because of the children. We have been here and there, here and there, and used to live in pretty wild places, with few neighbors.”

John took up the thread here: “I never was what is called a popular preacher,” he said, with a gentle smile. “I tried to do my duty--the Lord knows that; but the people would sometimes grow anxious about building up the church, and would want a man who could bring in large accessions to the membership. I tried to win souls to the Master, with His help; but, though I trust my sheaves will contain more than weeds, the harvest in my field has been less abundant than in many. The elders and bishops are judges of men, and they stationed me where I could do best, no doubt. Latterly, some have told me that people nowadays do not like to hear so much about Christ and Him crucified, that they prefer the religion of humanity, and that I should adapt my style to the times; but it is too late. I am too old to learn a new religion or to sugar-coat or rarefy the old one. It was a lack of faith, I fear, that caused a disappointment when they sent me to an obscure corner, a by-way, as sometimes they did. It was all the Master’s vineyard, and I should have worked without a murmur; but I thought too much, perhaps, about the little earthly reward and that I could make no provision for old age. We knew the Lord had always been good to us, Cynthy. We should have trusted Him in this, for He had never failed us and He never will. ‘Underneath us are the everlasting arms.’”

“Yes,” said Cynthy, “the Lord has provided for us. We are to have a home of our own in our old age; a home where our children can come to visit us or to stay. As I said, I couldn’t complain. It was the will of Heaven that we should live as sojourners. We could not set our hearts upon this house or that tree, as people will. The room where the son died or the daughter married could not be kept sacred, for we must leave them; the roses and the vines which we might plant would grow to gladden other eyes than ours. Such worldly affections do not seem wrong; but they might have been a snare to us. For a year or two John has been so afflicted with rheumatism that he could not go about, and has been put on the superannuated list.

“If you know anything about Methodists, you know they do not contribute to the fifth collection as liberally as to some others, and the fund for worn out ministers is small. I suppose they do not realize the needs of any one so near them. We have always lived on a little--no one knows so well as a Methodist preacher’s family how to make much out of nothing; but of late we have been sore pressed. Our children--only five are living out of ten--are scattered far and wide. Two are missionaries in India; two are teaching in the south, and our oldest son, a farmer in Texas, is the only one who is at all forehanded. He has wanted us to make our home with him; but we couldn’t quite make up our minds. Seemed as if we couldn’t quite give up to go so far and get used to new things and a new country. Old people get dreadful set in their ways, you know.

“It had got to look, though, as if the Lord meant that we should go, and we were beginning to make our plans and to talk of a few farewell visits we must make.

“We have some old friends we should want to see once more, and we must take another look at the graves where our children were laid at rest. It had come to be about settled that we were to go. The Gosport Howitzer had mentioned it in its personal column, saying we should be greatly missed, when a letter came telling us the Widow Green up at Arcady had died and left us her property. We’d been up to see Mrs. Green not long before, and she talked then of leaving what she had to the Foreign Missionary Society, and we never once thought of her mentioning us in her will. But she did leave us the home. Not much, maybe you’d say--its only a little cottage and an acre o’ ground; but it’s a home, for all that, an’ I’ve wanted one for so many years.

“We regret the Widow Green, of course. She was a good Christian woman, though a trifle irritable; but she’d been bedridden and so afflicted for many a day that it was her desire to go whenever the call should come. We shall have no care for ourselves the rest of our days, for the future is provided for. We are such weak creatures that faith is not always strong enough to take no thought for the morrow. We want a sign--something we can see and touch.

“Is it wrong, I wonder, to think so much about worldly things? I have planned how every room shall look. I have seeds of all the flowers I can find like the ones that grew in the yard when I was a girl. We shan’t have very much money; but, with our share of the Retired Preachers’ Fund and with our garden, we shall have enough. I’m spry if I be old, and always had a knack at making things grow. John’s a master hand to work in the garden, too, when he’s well. I tell John (don’t laugh at a foolish old woman)--I tell John that this is like a wedding journey. We traveled a long way when we were married; but we didn’t reach the home for forty years. John is as anxious to get there as I, but is more sensible and not so impatient. We are going to stop at Kokomo to-night with Brother and Sister Roberts, and in the morning we shall go on home to Arcady. Home! How sweet the word sounds, John!”

There had been a movement of freight cars in our vicinity for some minutes; distant whistles of locomotives echoed around, and John had become restless. He rose stiffly, but eagerly. “Cynthy, I think it must be near time for our train; it would never do for us to miss this one, or we shouldn’t get home till to-morrow night. Let us go.”

I left them on the car, with hope and expectation in their faces, and said farewell as to old friends. “Come and see us in our home, my daughter,” was their last word. “May the Lord bless you as he has blessed us, and good-bye!”

As I waited yet a little for my train the benediction seemed to linger. The boats were coming gayly in to shore now; the western sun shone with a warm glow upon the distant prison windows; school children laughed and shouted as if care and crime were not. Truly, the world had not all gone wrong. There was hope yet, and life was worth living after all.

* * * * *

A year later, in the station at Indianapolis, I caught a glimpse of the two kind old faces once more. The eagerness had gone out of them; there was peace and resignation instead of hope. They looked out of a car that was westward bound. A farmer, standing at my elbow, told the story.

“Father Ellis? Yes. Him and his wife is goin’ West, to jine their son ’at has a cattle ranch some’rs in Texas. One o’ these yer onlucky Methodis’ preachers, the old man is. Preached around on circuits in Indianny fer a matter o’ thirty or forty year. Married an’ had right smart o’ children, of course, as his perfession allays does. How they managed to scratch along an’ raise them young-uns on the skimped wages Methodist preachers do get beats me. Seems ’sef people like them ort to be fed by the ravens, as Elisha was, or some sech way; or their meal-bar’ls filled up, like the widder Cruse’s. How’s’ever, I s’pose some way’s allays pervided. In this case the old man had got past his preachin’ days, an’ not a nickel saved fer old age, when old Mis Green, at Arcady, north o’ hyer, up an’ died, an’ left him her little jag o’ proputty. Not worth much, to be sure; but a right snug little home.

“With this an’ what he’d get from the superannuated fund, they was fixed to inch along comfortable to the end o’ their days. But law! what does the old fellow do, when they hadn’t got more’n fairly settled, but go security fer Jim Jeffries, out Cicero road! Anybody with a grain o’ business sense ’ud a knowed it was flyin’ in the face o’ Providence, for Jeffries allays was slack an’ shif’less an’ ’twan’t noways likely’t he’d be able to meet them notes; an’ he didn’t nuther, an’ Father Ellis he hed to pay the debt, but it took all they was. So hyer they be, all tore up by the roots, so to speak. Doggoned pity, I say.”

I went aboard the car to speak a word of greeting. The aisle was blocked by a small woman, with a large basket, and by a young miss who exchanged farewell giggles with a departing friend, interspersed with messages to their respective beaux. While I waited just behind them, the old wife’s voice reached me, soft and clear, amid all the confusion. I listened, and I turned away, sure that they needed no comfort I could offer.

“The Lord has been very good to us, John. I can see now that my heart was set too much on worldly things, and it was best they should be taken away. The Lord doeth that which is good, John. He has left us each other.”

“Yes, Cynthy, He has said: ‘I am with thee and will keep thee in all places whither thou shalt go.’ We are old, my dear, and night will soon pass forever into the dawn of eternal day. May we enter together into the land that is no longer very far off. Let us pray, love, that death shall not part us; that, still together, when the morning is come, we may open our eyes in the Heavenly Kingdom, where a place is prepared for us.”

A MOVEMENT IN ART

It was Sunday forenoon, and Lodilla Jackson was engaged in “doing up” the morning’s work. She had washed the breakfast dishes, put the kitchen in order, made the beds, helped get her young brother and sister off to Sunday-school and her mother started to church, and had got the dinner well under way. Lodilla worked during the week in the establishment of a manufacturing chemist, or, as the place was otherwise known, a patent-medicine factory, where she pasted labels on bottles and pill-boxes, afterwards putting these articles in elaborately printed wrappers. Sunday was her “off” day, but she usually spent the first half of it in the manner described in order to relieve her mother, who was also a hard-working woman, as widows with children and little money are apt to be. She was twenty years old, and a good girl. Ever since she was fourteen she had been earning money, and, with the help of her mother, her brother two years younger, and, now, of a younger sister who answered to the call of “H-e-r-e, C-a-s-h,” in a dry goods shop, had almost succeeded in clearing their little house of the mortgage that encumbered it when her father died. Almost, but not quite. There was still necessity for frugality and self-denial, and little chance for indulgence in the vanities and luxuries in which girls delight. Nevertheless, Lodilla was not downcast or unhappy; far from it. She looked forward confidently to the time when debt would cease to be a burden, and, meanwhile, planned a little for that happy day.

This morning, while the corned beef and cabbage boiled merrily on the stove and the molasses cake browned in the oven, she opened the parlor door, and, dust-cloth in hand, gazed meditatively about that retreat. The room had been a source of great comfort to her mother and herself. Its possession seemed to them a visible token of their respectable social standing. It was not every one of their neighbors on the quiet little South-side Indianapolis street who could afford a parlor. A good many of the people in their part of town lived in houses so small, or had families so large, that not a corner of their establishments could be spared for company uses exclusively. Or, sometimes, when the extra room was there, the occupant of the house could not afford the necessary outlay for suitable furniture.

The fittings for the Jackson parlor had been bought when the paternal Jackson was alive and in the enjoyment of health and good wages. The selection of this furniture had been the outcome of much thought, consultation and financial calculation on the part of the two older members of the family, Lodilla at that time being of an age when her opinion on such matters was not influential. There, as the foundation of the outfit, was the ingrain carpet, with a green and black vine of most luxuriant growth meandering over its bright red ground. There, against the widest wall space, was a haircloth sofa, now worn to a gloss that rivaled the Russia-iron stove, and with a lumpiness of surface and weakness of springs unknown to it when new. The stove, an upright cylinder, decorated with much nickel-plating, was regarded when purchased as a great ornament to the room, and, although now adapted to the use of natural gas instead of the coal for which it was originally meant, was still held in much esteem in the household. There were several cane-seated chairs, a table which held a large glass lamp, and, on a shelf underneath, the family Bible. The crowning glory of the room was the small cabinet organ in one corner. Lodilla, at an early age, had learned to play “by ear” a few simple tunes and accompaniments, and when the family and their visitors gathered there on Sunday afternoons and sang “Shall We Gather at the River,” “Hold the Fort,” “Whiter than Snow,” “In the Sweet Bye and Bye,” and other “gospel hymns,” Mrs. Jackson, for one, felt that she enjoyed many blessings, while the pleasure felt by all in the music would certainly have been far less intense at a symphony concert.

But it was not on any of these pieces of furniture that Lodilla was looking with some discontent visible in her face; it was upon the more decorative features of the apartment. Over the high wooden mantel hung a crayon portrait of her departed father, enlarged to a head of life size from a tintype of thumb-nail proportions by one of those mysterious processes practiced by peripatetic artisans. Her father had been gone too long for her to feel any deep personal sentiment in regard to him, but the picture was invested with the interest of a sacred relic, and she had no thought of disturbing it. On the wall, over the sofa, hung that pair of chromos, “Wide Awake” and “Fast Asleep,” which, when, as newspaper prizes, they found places in a multitude of homes years ago, were so universally characterized as “perfectly lovely.” Lodilla was a trifle tired of these pictures, not because she detected any lack of artistic merit, but because she did not think the chubby little girl portrayed in them a pretty child. Still, she did not at this time cherish any designs against them.

Her eyes moved slowly along the row of photographs of various sizes resting on the mantel, from there passed to the framed marriage certificate of her parents hanging above the cabinet organ in a line with the framed certificates of baptism of herself and her brother and sister, then wandered from these to a large “memorial piece,” framed in black and hanging in the place of honor between the windows, and rested there with especial dissatisfaction. This piece, which was printed in very black inks, with very deep shadows and very white high lights, represented a marble tombstone of dazzling whiteness, a willow tree and a kneeling widow, who had evidently come to weep, but had changed her mind and was looking up with ecstatic gaze at an angel with powerful wings bearing the astral body of the occupant of the grave up to a heaven beyond a flock of woolly clouds. Printed on scrolls in the corners were sundry comforting texts, and below, the full name of the deceased Jackson, engrossed in an ornamental, Spencerian hand. This remarkable work of art was kindly furnished to the widow for $2.75--$1.25 off for an immediate sale--by the agent of an enterprising engraving firm soon after her husband’s death.

“I do wish, ma,” said Lodilla to her mother, who entered just then, “I do wish I had a photograph album--one like Nell Abbott’s, a big plush-covered one. It would be so stylish on the table, and, besides, is so much better for keeping photographs than setting them around on things. And, ma--”

Here Lodilla hesitated and blushed a little.

“Ma, Joe--Mr. Little--is getting his pictures taken--great big cabinets--and if he gives me one it would be nice to have a place to put it. He just admires Nell’s album; told her he thought every family ought to have one.”

It will be observed that Lodilla, capable young woman that she was, was not quite up to date in this matter, but in her behalf it must be said that she had not had the advantage of association with young society women, who claim to lead in fads and fashions of this sort, and who abandoned the album as a drawing-room ornament some time since. Her ideas as to the desirability of the article had been gathered from visits to the homes of her friends, who were still in the plush album and chromo stage of development. She had also gone with her mother on one occasion to carry a basket of mended clothing to a bachelor apartment, where, in the common sitting-room of the half dozen young men, the center-table held six large family albums arranged about the lamp, and presumably containing likenesses of the relatives, sweethearts and favorite actresses of the respective owners. Lodilla, who was much impressed with the luxury of other fittings of this room, felt that the albums were the crowning touch of elegance, and had longed for one ever since. She had particularly desired one since Joe Little, brakeman on the Big Four railroad, had loomed on her social horizon. She wanted his picture, and fancied that he would be the more willing to bestow it if she had a suitable casket for the treasure. She was an unsophisticated girl, you see, unaware that no man needs encouragement to his vanity beyond the mere willingness on the part of a young woman to accept a likeness of himself.

Mrs. Jackson, who, mother-like, would have been glad to gratify all her daughter’s tastes, looked a little troubled.

“I don’t see, Dilly,” she said hesitatingly, “I don’t see how we can afford one now.”

“Of course not, ma; of course not,” said Lodilla, with a sudden return to cheerfulness. “I know we can’t afford it yet a while, and I’m not grumbling. Don’t you think it. I was just wishing and talking, and that don’t hurt, you know. But some day, ma, I’m going to have that album, and some day I’m going to buy some pictures and get you to put the memorial piece and the certificates in your bedroom. They’ve hung where they are so long I’d like a change, and the parlor needs a little freshening up and more style.”

Her mother sighed a little, without looking at all sad. Her grief for the departed Jackson was so mitigated by time that the sighs brought by allusions to him were more from habit than emotion, and no longer indicated the least depression of spirits.

“I always liked that memorial,” she said. “It’s so sort of satisfactory. That angel who’s carrying your pa is so big and strong that you can easy enough see how he can do it. He looks so substantial. The Widow Thomas, she has one where the angel’s just starting down after Thomas--a little, thin, weakly angel you can see through, and you know the old man must have weighed two hundred and fifty pounds if he did one. Of course, we don’t suppose his spirit was heavy, but, somehow, there don’t seem to be a fitness in sending such a puny messenger after him. It seems a pity to put that memorial out of sight in the bedroom, but young folks must have their way, I reckon. You don’t think of taking the chromos down, do you?” she asked, anxiously. “Your pa gave them to me before we was married, and people come from all around to see them, and everybody said they were just the finest pictures that had ever been seen in Cherry Corners. Old Mr. Van Lew offered ten dollars for them, because Little Wide Awake looked so much like his grand-daughter, Lucy Ann Rodibaugh. But I wouldn’t a’ taken twice that then.”

Dilly assured her mother that she had no intention of removing “Wide Awake” and “Fast Asleep,” and hastened to look after her dinner.

The cabbage which had boiled so long and steadily, was tender, the potatoes mealy, the corned beef just as it should be, the molasses cake light and sweet and delicious--just the cake that children remember all their lives as the kind mother used to make, a memory which causes them, when they are old, to wonder why no one else can ever make as good.

And if you think the family gathered around that board and partaking of that frugal fare were not as happy as it is often given to people to be in this rather pleasant world, then you know little of the rewards of honest toil, of the delights of home provided, and its comforts earned and paid for by the efforts of all; you have forgotten the eager appetite of healthy youth, which gives the plainest food a zest that a Lucullus feast could not offer now. And if you think Miss Lodilla, with her narrow life, her daily labor and her simple hopes and ambitions, was wasting time or energy in repinings at her lot, or fancied herself in any respect ill-used by fate, then you little understand the serene independence of the self-reliant, self-supporting American girl, who, confident of her ability to provide for herself, envies no one.

Lodilla, in her neat black skirt and shirt waist, in summer--oh, the ever-useful, universal shirt waist!--and her trim cloth jacket over the waist in winter, wended her way back and forth each day between home and factory, making one of the great army of working women, but having her own little plans and cares apart from such associations, and her maidenly dreams, just as other girls do with more time for dreams--just as all girls do while life is young and love is sweet. Joe Little, the big, fair-haired brakeman, figured a good deal in these meditations. He came to see her now and then, when he had no “run” to make, but it was always on a week-day evening. Sunday evenings he spent with Nellie Abbott, Lodilla’s dearest friend. That is, she had been her nearest and most confidential friend, the girl to whom she had confided all her little secrets, but lately the intimacy had waned somewhat, and perhaps Joe Little had, unconsciously to himself, something to do with the coolness. These ardent friendships between girls are so apt to die a sudden death when an attractive young man comes on the scene.

Joe Little had first met both the girls at a church strawberry festival, but had seemed to give preference to Nellie. The chief sign of his favor was the fact that his calls upon her were made on Sunday nights, and in their social circle this meant more serious intentions than an ordinary week-night visit. He was a musician of local repute, being known as a “boss fiddler,” and this accomplishment gave him welcome admission to the best society of the neighborhood. Nellie, being something of a coquette, did not appear to care especially for him, and, for that matter, neither did Lodilla--she was too fully a woman for that--but she did care, and was learning to think about him more and more.

“I really don’t think Nell’s prettier than I am,” she would say to herself, looking anxiously in the glass. “Nell’s got a real good complexion, lots better than mine, but her nose is pug and her eyes are squinty. They are; she can’t deny it, and they do say cross-eyed people get to have bad tempers, even if they don’t begin with them. Nell’s awful peppery sometimes now when things don’t go her way. It can’t be her looks; it must be other things. She’s got a piano and can play the ‘Maiden’s Prayer,’ ‘The Brook,’ ‘The Gussie Waltz’ and a lot of pieces, and he likes music so. And she’s got a photograph album, and, oh dear!”

You people who accept the assurances of novelists and cheap critics that women with the smallest claims to comeliness--and where is she who has none?--are satisfied with themselves, and unable to recognize the charms of their rivals--you merely show your ignorance. The normal girl is distinctly aware of her own defects, and as keenly conscious of the other girl’s especial attractions. She recognizes, with a pang at her heart, the captivating effect of the little curl on her rival’s white neck, the dimple in her chin, of the long lashes, under which she glances so bewitchingly. She may honestly wonder why the man in the case is so stupid and blind as not to detect that other girl’s faults of character which are so clear to her, but she never undervalues the outward allurements.

Strawberry time and its festivals were now long past, and early winter was here, but Joe Little showed no signs of change in his fancy for Nellie Abbott, except that his calls at the Widow Jackson’s were rather less frequent than they had been. Lodilla began to have little heartaches, and if she cried when her sister was asleep and she could smother her sobs in the pillow, it would not be at all surprising. But if anybody guessed her sadness and its cause it was only her mother, and mothers never betray such secrets.

She worked as industriously as ever over her bottles and pill-boxes, chattered as gayly with her companions as usual, and loitered before the shop windows during the noon hour with the natural and wholesome curiosity of a healthy young woman. Love, of the lurid, all-absorbing kind we read about, that takes the appetite, banishes sleep and destroys other interests of life, is less frequent than the variety which permits other sentiments to exist simultaneously and allows the sufferer intervals of comparative comfort and cheer.

One evening Mr. Little dropped in unexpectedly and brought his fiddle--he did not call it a violin. He did not tell Lodilla that he had intended to go to Nellie’s, but from across the street had chanced to see William Marvin, freight conductor on his road, enter before him and receive a warm greeting from the young lady. He “never could abide Bill Marvin,” and wouldn’t spend an hour in the same room if he could help it.

Lodilla made herself particularly agreeable that evening. She begged him to play for her, and he did play the “Wrecker’s Daughter,” “Fisher’s Hornpipe,” “Drunkard’s Heecups”--a tune in which the plunking of the strings gives the realistic effect of hiccoughs--the “Arkansaw Traveler” and a Strauss Waltz. At least these are what he told her they were, and she thanked him and praised him and said she loved the fiddle, and could never grow tired of it; and then she sang all her songs to the cabinet organ accompaniment with its undertone of wheezy groans, suggestive of misery in its inside, and never before had she put such feeling and earnestness into tunes or words. And, after the visitor had been served with doughnuts and a big glass of unfermented grape juice that ma put up herself, he went home, well pleased with himself and all the world, Lodilla included. She was happy, but not confident. She had still an oppressive fear of her rival.

The very next day she was drawn by irresistible attraction into a crowd in front of a big Washington street shoe-shop, and stood there with fascinated eyes watching a man in the window who painted a beautiful landscape while you waited. There he stood, painting clouds, trees, rivers and river banks, grassy knolls, mossy dells and gray rocks with lightning swiftness--laying on one color and then another, and bringing out marvelous effects before you fairly knew what he had intended.

A yellow circular thrust into her hand by a boy informed her that she could have one of these works of art free of cost if she would purchase a pair of shoes in the shop--the frame only being charged for.

A sudden ambition filled her mind. She had the money in her pocket for a pair of shoes and meant to buy them that very afternoon. Why not purchase them here instead of at the little shop on the side street, which she had always patronized? They might cost a little more here, but then, just for once, and with this prize in view, she might surely venture the additional outlay. The frame was extra, but she would take a ninety-eight-cent one and save the amount after awhile out of the price of her winter gown. Without giving herself time to reconsider, she bought the shoes, selected the picture she had seen painted, or one precisely like it, and went her way, feeling the fearful joy of a wish gratified at the cost of wild extravagance.

The purchase created a sensation at home, and though the careful mother shook her head doubtfully over the investment of so much money for purely decorative purposes, she did not remonstrate, but joined with the rest of the family in admiring the new possession.

“You see, ma,” said Lodilla, with intent to justify herself, “you see, hand-painted pictures are the thing now-days; everybody says so, and they cost like everything. Nell says her uncle’s sister-in-law in Chicago paid twenty-five dollars for a painting not more than ten inches across, and Joe Little, he told me about a five-hundred-dollar picture he’d seen a man carrying home on the train one day, and there wasn’t a thing to it but two or three sheep and a dog on a side-hill. And just think! This didn’t cost a cent without the frame.”

The next day was Sunday, and frequent were Lodilla’s visits to the parlor to look at her treasure hanging in state between the windows, in place of the memorial piece, now retired to the privacy of ma’s bedroom. That night who should come but Joe Little to ask her to go to church. She accepted the invitation with sedate dignity, but with secret joy. Sunday night! That meant so much.

Nellie Abbott was there with the freight conductor, whom Lodilla mentally classified at once as “perfectly horrid,” and was instantly convinced that her old friend was consumed with envy of her superior good fortune in securing the handsome and altogether more desirable escort. Filled with which thought, she smiled with great sweetness on Miss Nellie.

After services were over Joe came in with intent to sit by the sheet-iron cylinder and enjoy an hour of social converse. Lodilla wished her new art acquisition to dawn upon him unannounced, and sat in tremulous expectation of his verdict. Finally, after talk about the weather, ma’s cold, the new choir and various neighborhood topics had begun to languish, Mr. Little’s glance chanced to fall upon the picture. He rose slowly and stood before it, inspecting it closely with a critical eye; then he made a telescope of his hands and viewed it from a more distant standpoint. Then he said impressively: