Chapter V: The Meeting

IT appeared that Mr. Bassett's prophecy was going to be fulfilled; so far, at least, as numbers were concerned. The children carried home the news that Miss Armstrong had the schoolhouse all swept out, instead of leaving it to be done at noon on Saturday; that she had helped to dust the desks and seats with her own hands, and had put flowers on the desk and in the fireplace, because she said the room ought to be made neat and pleasant for the service of God. Truth to tell, this idea, which would not be considered very original in many places, was one which had not found entrance to the minds of people in Oldham.

"She had better go and talk to Mr. Archimball, the sexton at the Corners," said Mrs. Gleason, when Agnes told her what Miss Armstrong had said. "I do hate to wear my black silk to church Sundays, because I get it just covered with dust. I believe I will go to Bible class this evening."

"Do," said Agnes. "I'll take care of the milk if you will."

"Oh, we can both go. It is only to have supper a little earlier. Set the table, and I'll have it ready directly."

"Won't you go to the class to-night, sister?" asked Faith Fletcher when she had put away the children's books, and put on their home aprons.

"How can I go?" asked Patience. "There is the milk to take care of, and the dishes to wash, and Eddy's new frock to finish so she can wear it on Sunday. It is easy to talk about going to class."

"Well, I can wash the dishes and take care of the milk as well as you, if you would only think so; and there will be time enough to finish Eddy's frock to-morrow. Besides, if she don't have it, she can wear her old one: it looks as well as it did last Sunday. Come, sister, do go for once. Mr. Bassett says he knows it will do you good."

"Yes, much he knows about my work."

"Well, there is one thing 'I' would like to know," said Faith, who was not easily put down when she once took a fit of "arguing," as her sister called it: "I should like to know where is the use of being a Christian when one does not get any comfort or help out of it. Seems to me, if I was a church-member, and professed to love the Lord better than any one else, I'd go where I was sure to meet Him, even if I had to put my dishes in cold water to soak, and didn't wash them till next morning."

"What a girl you are to talk!" said Patience, half vexed, half laughing. "It is a pity you were not a boy, so you could be a preacher. I suppose I ought to go sometimes, that's a fact."

"Mr. Bassett says it would do you good," persisted Faith. "He says, with all he has to do, he finds it a rest to go to the class. Come, sister, do try it for once. I'll put the children to bed, and do all the work, if you will."

"Don't you want to go yourself?"

"Yes, I should like it well enough, but I don't suppose we could both be spared. Pa couldn't put the twins to bed."

"What is that pa can't do?" asked Mr. Fletcher from the door. He was a tall, spare, elderly man, with a somewhat careworn, considerate face, grave but not unkindly, and with a sparkle of humor in it. "What is that you think pa can't do? Put the children to bed? He can do it as well as you or any old woman in Oldham; and if he should happen to stick the pins in with the heads west instead of east, sissy can alter 'em when she comes home. They won't disturb the balance of the solar system much for that time. Just run down and let in the cows, Faithie: they are mooing at the bars; and look on my work-bench, and see if I left my other glasses.

"The fact is, sister, Faith is more than half right," he added more seriously. "I don't like to say any thing that sounds like blaming you, considering all you do, but just look at it. You say you wish Faith cared more about religion, but how can you wonder that she thinks it a matter of no great consequence, after all, when she sees us let every thing come before it,—when she sees us, who, as she says, profess to love God, so wrapped up in the little things of this world that we haven't any time for His service? I must say, when I heard the child talking just now, I felt reproved."

"Oh, well, I'll go," said Patience in a somewhat aggrieved tone. "But I think it is rather hard on me, when I make a slave of myself for you and the children, to be called worldly and all that, as if I spent my whole time dressing and visiting, like Mary Blandy."

"In the first place, I didn't call you so, not as I remember," replied her father. "I said we were too much taken up with the things of the world, which I take to be all things that perish in the using, whether they be dresses, or rolls of butter, or bean-threshers. In the next place, daughter, we should none of us be slaves, but the Lord's free men and free women."

"Why don't you go yourself, then, pa, if we are going to do so much good by it?" asked Patience, already ashamed of her little burst of temper, which, in truth, was more nervous fatigue than any thing else.

"Because I think you need rest and refreshment rather more than I do, my daughter. A man's work is less tiring than a woman's, seeing he is out in the fresh air most of the time; at least, that is my opinion."

"Everybody isn't like you, pa," said poor Patience, who felt the moisture uncomfortably near her eyes. "Ezra makes more steps in a day when he is at home than you do in a week, though he is always saying, 'Oh, don't trouble yourself!'"

"Ezra is only a boy, but he is a pretty good boy, after all, and we are both prouder of him than a hen with one chicken," returned her father. "Come, sister, go to the class, and take Faith; and let me put the little ones to bed. Maybe the child might get just the word she needs."

"Well, I don't care if I do," said Patience; and she went.

The room at the red schoolhouse was really full,—an uncommon sight at any time, and especially in summer. All the Westons and Bassetts were there, of course, as well as Miss Celia and Miss Delia: these were the standbys always on hand. What a blessing it is that there are always a few such standbys belonging to every parish! Patience Fletcher came in with Faith, and sat down by the window. Then there were the Jewsbury girls, who did not often go to church even on Sunday; and old Miss Wright who eked out a scanty living by bleaching and trimming bonnets, and who had never been to church at Oldham since the last rector's sister bought her bonnet ready trimmed at Oldbury; and almost all the children of the school who were big enough to sit up till eight o'clock.

Just as it was time for the service to begin, there was a little movement at the door, and Mrs. Barbara Van Zandt came in, followed by her two young nieces, Miss Bogardus and Ida Van Zandt. Mrs. Van Zandt wore a large, soft white wrap, and had put a light, fleecy summer hood over the widow's cap she always wore. She was a very handsome old lady, with those bright-gray eyes which have a way of looking black from the dilation of the pupils, and which no age or sickness ever quenches. She was one of those people of whom one naturally says, on seeing them, "Who is that?" She accepted the chair set for her, with a kindly smile, and bent her head for a few moments in prayer. Ida and Amity slipped into seats beside Patience and Faith Fletcher.

"What a plain little body!" thought Patience. "Nobody would take her for a great heiress. But she looks good, as if one could depend on her."

"What a fine face, if it were not so tired and worn!" thought Amity. "She must be carrying a great weight, somehow. I wish one could do something to help her." And Amity did something for Patience then and there, though Patience never knew it.

The meeting was opened in the usual way. There was no rector in Oldham at present, so Mr. Weston read a part of the evening service, and gave out the hymn, "Jesus, lover of my soul." There was a little delay: the young man who usually started the hymn was not present. But in a moment, a new voice began the beautiful Spanish Hymn,—such a voice, for power and cultivation, as had never been heard in the red schoolhouse before. People almost held their breath to listen, and it seemed at first as if Ida would have all the singing to herself, but presently one and another joined in, till every one in the room was singing, children and all.

"Wasn't that lovely!" whispered Faith, getting hold of her sister's hand, and squeezing it.

Patience smiled, and returned the pressure; but she did not speak.

When the hymn was done, Mr. Weston read a part of the tenth chapter of St. John, and called upon Mr. Bassett to begin the lesson. Mr. Bassett had what he would have called a good common-school education. He knew Brown's Grammar from beginning to end, and could have parsed any sentence you liked to give him: but, like other people, when he was in earnest, he went back to his native idioms; and he was much in earnest to-night. He spoke of the Shepherd's love, not only for His obedient sheep, but for the others who were not of His fold,—for those who, ignorant and misled, had gone astray, and were lost on the dark mountains. He spoke of the duty of true disciples toward such lost lambs; and of how much might be done by kindness, and watchfulness of opportunities, to lead them back to the Shepherd's arms. There was just such a lost lamb—nay, the very one the good man had in his mind—listening under the window at that moment. Mr. Bassett did not know that, but the Shepherd did.

The children repeated their verses more or less correctly, and two or three, who had not learned any, determined to do so next time. Miss Armstrong repeated two verses of the old Scotch version of the twenty-third Psalm, "The Lord's my Shepherd; I'll not want." Miss Celia Claxton said a few words on her verse, "I will guide thee with mine eye" (Ps. xxxii. 8). She spoke of the service of God setting free from the corroding cares of this world, and how those who kept close enough to the Shepherd to see His face were spared many distressing doubts and perplexities, because His loving and warning glance made all things plain. Patience Fletcher repeated a verse from the one hundred and nineteenth Psalm, "My soul cleaveth unto the dust: quicken Thou me according to Thy word."

There was a little pause, and then Mrs. Van Zandt's voice was heard, a little tremulous with age,—

"Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Mrs. Van Zandt said a few words on the need and sweetness of rest, and the impossibility of finding it anywhere but in Christ, and then only by making a full surrender and consecration of the heart and all the powers to Him,—by ceasing from our own works, and doing all to Him. It was very simple and obvious, but it went home to more than one heart.

There were two more short addresses, and another hymn was sung,—

"Sun of my soul, thou Saviour dear."

Ida was a little shy of beginning this time, till Mr. Weston said, "Perhaps the young lady will start the tune again." When she raised her glorious voice once more, and every one joined with a hearty good-will refreshing to hear.

There was a collect, and then the class was dismissed.

People lingered for the usual neighborly greeting. And before the first one issued from the door, a little dark figure, which had been crouched under the window, rose, and sped away over the hill.

Miss Celia and Miss Delia had already called upon the new-comers. "They are really our cousins, you know, by way of the Rings and Butlers," they had said, in a kind of half apology, when questioned on the subject. The two sisters now shook hands with Mrs. Van Zandt and the young ladies, and Miss Delia remarked that she was glad to see them out.

"I never willingly miss such a service," said Mrs. Van Zandt. "I always feel, apart from the enjoyment, that one owes a duty to such an effort made in one's own neighborhood."

"I wish every one felt so," said Mr. Bassett. "I want to thank this young lady for helping us out in the singing."

"I am sure you are very welcome," replied Ida simply. "I am choir leader in our little mission chapel at the Works, so it comes quite natural to me. I really did it upon impulse the first time. But when I came to think, it seemed like 'taking on,' as the children say, for a stranger."

"I don't think one ever ought to feel like a stranger in the house of God," remarked Miss Celia. "We are all of one family there, you know, my dear."

"That is very true," said Ida.

"Well, Miss Armstrong, I told you we were going to have a good time," said the miller, as he locked the door, and gave Miss Armstrong the key. Then, as he walked homeward between his wife and Aunt Betsy, he added, "I feel to be thankful that our new neighbors turn out to be such good Christian folks, ready to take their share in our meeting."

"Well, I must say I think they took their full share to-night, and a little more," said Aunt Betsy, who had regarded the new-comers with suspicion and disfavor. "I don't think I care about having strangers from the city coming here and setting up to teach us,—folks whose fathers and grandfathers sat under old Dr. Munson. To see that old lady coming to meeting with that thing on her head like a heap of beaten-up white of egg! I'll be bound she would never think of wearing such a thing on Broadway. And that girl with her singing: of course it was very fine, but it was far too operatic and theatrical for my taste."

"How many operas and theatrical performances did you ever see, Aunt Betsy?" asked Mrs. Bassett, who had a tongue of her own, and did not stand as much in awe of the old lady as most of her neighbors.

"Come, come!" said Mr. Bassett. "Seems to me some of them fowls of the air that picked up the good seed in the parable have lit down among us. This isn't the spirit we should be in after such favor as has been shown us to-night. I was so glad to see Patience Fletcher out. Poor thing! She looks very tired."

"Well, she makes a great deal harder work of life than she needs to," said Mrs. Bassett. "She just makes herself a slave to the house and the children; and after all, she doesn't do any more for them than I do for mine."

"Not as much," said her husband.

"Well, I don't think she makes things as pleasant, if I say it that shouldn't. I had the twins down to spend the afternoon not long ago, and the poor things were afraid to make a natural motion, for fear of spoiling their clothes, till Myra dressed them up in some old things of Ben's and Sally's. For my part, I like to take the comfort of my children, and have them take comfort as we go along, instead of toiling and slaving to do some grand thing for them by and by, when maybe they won't want it. I guess I'll send up for them again to-morrow: it will take them off Faith's hands, and give her time to learn her Sunday school lesson in peace."

"And how about yours?" asked Aunt Betsy. "I should think you had enough on your hands now, with all them great tearing boys of yours."

"Oh, two or three children more or less don't matter at our house," answered Mrs. Bassett. "And as to the Sunday school lessons, Myra and I learn ours, and teach the children theirs, on Sunday afternoon; then we go over them again Saturday evening after tea, and so they are all ready for Sunday. Good-night, Aunt Betsy. Come down to-morrow, and I'll give you a green-currant pie."