Chapter IX

Henley had been away nearly a year, his absence being protracted by various business enterprises. Letters to Jim Cahews in regard to the store, which Cahews was admirably managing, contained humorous accounts of the various deals which Henley had put through. At one time he had bought a roller-skating rink, which was sold by auction at a great sacrifice because the town was too small to support it. Henley had bid it in, packed it up, and shipped it to a thriving young city, advertised a big opening, and sold it for a handsome profit while the novelty was at its height. On another occasion he was the highest bidder on the scrap-iron in a stove-foundry which had been destroyed by fire, and he made a handsome "speck" through his ability to guess more nearly than any of his competitors the weight of the refuse. There was nothing he would not buy if the price was right, he wrote his clerk, except _tombstones_, and Cahews understood, and answered to the best of his ability and tact that the public had long since ceased to talk about that unfortunate little matter, and when Henley returned he would perhaps never hear it mentioned.

The stepfather-in-law had used less diplomacy in the account he had forwarded to Henley on the day following the great occasion. Wrinkle was as fond of writing as he was of talking, and he fairly basked in the sunshine of the letter he sent. He read it aloud to himself as he walked to Chester to post it, pausing now and then to scratch out a word or to add one with a pencil as the paper lay on his raised knee. This is the way it sounded to his pleased ears:

"DEAR ALF,--I take my pen in hand to address these few lines to you
to let you know that we are all well, and hope you are endowed with
the same and many like blessings. Nothin' unusual is goin' on here
right now. It is as quiet as the day after camp-meetin'. Dick's
funeral was preached yesterday. The weather was tiptop, and nothin'
was lackin' to make it a plumb success. Hettie got us out of bed
before a single streak of day had appeared. We put on our clothes
by pine-knots. The preacher she sent away off for, because she was
bound to git some'n extra, was installed at the hotel. He is a
wheel-hoss; he dressed as fine as a fiddle, with a plug-hat and
dashboard shoes, and had a long jimswinger coat that come to his
knees. The paper said he was the silver-tongued orator of the
entire Cherokee pulpit, and printed his picture, and said he'd been
paid a handsome figure by one of our wealthiest citizens to take
part in the memorable occasion. I cut the artickle out to send to
you, but forgot an' lit my pipe with it. I'll try to git another,
but they are hard to find, as all hands seem to be keepin' 'em for
future generations to look at. I seed ten men all readin' one at
the same time in a gang at the sawmill t'other day. They seemed to
consider it funny, but I didn't. I don't see how a thing as solemn
as that affair was could be funny.

"We et our breakfast by candle-light, and then set around and had
nothin' to do till startin'-time. We went in the two-seated
spring-wagon. I was the only one in our layout not draped from head
to foot in black. I couldn't see the women's faces, and as they
didn't say a word I couldn't estimate the extend of their grief. I
reckon you can guess, anyway. You know 'em. You never saw sech a
stream o' folks in all yore born days. You'd 'a' thought it was a
public hangin', and every livin' soul had to take a special peep at
us as we driv along. As well as I could make out through her veil,
Hettie seemed to like bein' so conspicuous, for she axed me to
drive slow an' go through the main street, which ain't the nighest
way to the church. When we got thar the house was packed as tight
as dry apples in a cider-press. But the front bench was all our'n.
Nobody dared take it, although more'n half of it was empty, an'
folks was settin' in the windows. I had trouble with Hettie, for
she made me throw my chaw o' tobacco away, and I found I was
settin' right over a wide crack in the floor, too. I wouldn't 'a'
damaged a thing, an' could 'a' done it without bein' seed.

"Then I made her as mad as Old Nick by a little mistake of mine.
While I was hitchin' up the wagon Old Bay bit a whoppin' big gap
out'n my straw hat, and it was so comical-lookin' that Ma told me
not to wear it. That was easy enough to say, but I didn't want to
go bareheaded, so I begun to look about the house for some'n to put
on, and hid away amongst Het's knickknacks I found a hat that used
to belong to Dick. It was jest my size, and so I put it on an'
thought no more about it till we was all settin' in church. It was
on my lap, and all at once I seed Hettie lift up her veil an'
squint at it; then she heaved a big groan and snatched it and put
it out o' sight. She'd have blessed me out on the spot, I reckon,
if the singers hadn't set in. I was a sight goin' home without a
thing on my head, but she wouldn't listen to reason, an' kept it
stuffed all in a wad under her arm. She said I had no feelin' or I
wouldn't have done sech an outrageous thing.

"The preacher was all right, but he'd bit off more than he could
chaw. It seems from report that he went around Chester to find out
statements that he could work in about Dick that would sound nice
and suitable; but for some reason or other--maybe because everybody
was so excited, and maybe because they was naturally backward
before sech a shinin' light--but, as I say, he run short on
information. When he come to that part of his talk he looked
actually teased. He floundered about considerable, an' drunk a lot
o' water, but he done the best he could. He said Dick was a devoted
husband and father, and got red when he corrected the last part,
and said a Divine Providence had seed fit to take 'im away purty
early in the game, and that the poor fellow hadn't really had a
chance to show what was in him. Looked like he was determined to
say some'n nice about Dick, so he gave a few backhanded licks at
the Republican party and the nigger-lovers of the North, an' wound
up by sayin' that the late lamented had been a stanch Democrat an'
worked at the poles as hard to overthrow graftin' and Yankee
oppression as any man in the fair Southland. He got through
somehow, but, betwixt me 'n you, Alf, I don't think Hettie thought
she got her full money's worth, for she was countin' on a wonderful
display of poetry and highfalutin' things that would be remembered
an' placed to her credit for a long time afterwards. He got his
foot in it several times. Once I heard Hettie sniff mighty nigh
loud enough for him to hear it. It was when he said life wasn't
what it was cracked up to be, nohow, and he didn't doubt that Dick
was a sight better off where he was at than here in this earthly
wrangle. I thought to myself, I wonder what Alf would say in his
far-off retreat to a statement of that sort.

"The marble monument looks all right in Welborne's new graveyard,
an' he has a right to be proud of his enterprise. The ground is
bein' mapped off in great shape. He's had grass sowed all over it
and laid out avenues and sidewalks, and thar's some talk of a
fountain.

"That Dixie Hart's a corker. She's not mealy-mouthed about
anything. The day before the funeral Hettie was talkin' to her at
the cow-lot, and axed Dixie if she was goin' to take it in. Dixie
quit milchin', and stood up straight and said: 'No, I've got better
sense, and you ought to be ashamed of yoreself. You've got a good
husband, and you don't appreciate him nigh enough.'

"I thought it was funny that Het didn't fly off the handle, but she
stood and tuck it, and seemed to be set back a peg or two. Me 'n
her went to the house together, an' I looked for her to rail out on
me, anyway, but she set on the porch like she had a lot to think
about till bed-time. I made up my mind then that Het jest loves to
do things that other folks don't approve of, an' that Dixie had set
'er to wonderin' if she hadn't gone a little bit too far.

"But the old gal is all right. She has tuck a new turn, as I wrote
you in my last. She keeps boarders in the two spare rooms mighty
nigh all the time, and she is figurin' expenses purty close.
Sometimes it is a rovin' peddler at day-rates or a fruit-tree agent
by the week. I can't say I like it overly much--though thar is
somebody to talk to at odd times when they are through work--for
she don't seem to feed quite as well when she's bein' paid as
before money begun to come in. She seems to want to lay up scads
for some reason or other; maybe it is to try to git back the cash
she has spent on her odd notion. I don't know, an' I ain't sure she
does herself, but she's as close as the bark on a tree. Jim says
she's runnin' a separate account at the store, an' makes 'im figure
everything she gets at bare cost in market--freight not included. I
heard her tellin' a lightnin'-rod peddler that that was where she
could cut under the Chester House, which didn't have no store nor
credit to speak of.

"Who do you think was here last week? Why, Ben Warren, Hettie's
bach' uncle. He stayed all night, an' occupied yore room. He says
he's got two thousand acres in his plantation over the mountain,
and the finest residence in the State--keeps a dozen hosses an' all
the old niggers that his daddy used to own. He's thirty-five, an'
still on the turf, but he told us he was at last engaged to a
Baltimore lady that he had been settin up to for lo these many
years. He's goin' to have us all spend a week over thar before
long. He thinks a lot of Het, an' wants her to fix up his house for
the bride. Het's lookin' forward to it. He couldn't stay over for
the funeral, but he said she was showin' by her act that women was
not forgetful of the past, and that it made him feel more secure in
the venture he was about to make. He'd been inclined to doubt
females to some extent, he said, and he was goin' to let Het's
conduct stand before him always as a proof of how deep a woman's
affections can be when they are tested.

"Now, take care of yourself, Alf, and come on home. These cool,
green mountains are good enough for any man, an' you know what is
said about a rollin' stone. So long. I sign myself, with my best
respects,

"Yours truly,
"JASON WRINKLE.

"_P. S._--The same old crowd of jolly loafers make the store
headquarters, and they are, if anything, worse 'n when you was the
king-bee o' the bunch. They git off a fresh joke on somebody every
day. I got off one on Jim that he didn't like a bit. Jim is still
holdin' on to old man Hardcastle's gal like grim death, an' in
order to cut a special dash he's got to sendin' his things to the
steam laundry at Carlton. T'other day at the post-office the nigger
that delivers for the Express Company, an' can't read, showed me
Jim's package of socks, drawers, shirts, an' the like, that had
just come, an' axed me who it was for. With as straight a face as
if I was lookin' a corpse in the eyes, I p'inted out Hardcastle's
house an' tol' 'im to take it thar. Then I writ with a pencil on
the kiver these words, 'Please restore missin' buttons and stitch
up holes.' Then what did I do but hike back to the store an' set
an' wait. Miss Julia sent the stuff a-whizzin' to Jim by a nigger
woman that works for her folks. The things was all tousled up in a
big basket, an' she fetched along a note that made Jim turn as
white as a cake o' tallow. He left me in charge an' run over an'
explained matters to the best of his ability, but it's the talk of
the town, an' not a soul has suspicioned me. If you don't want to
git knocked flat you'd better not mention a steam laundry in Jim's
presence.

"J. W."