Green Valley Part 30

That was the only fault one could find with a Green Valley Thanksgiving--that so many went away to spend the day.

But with Christmas it was different. Christmas in Green Valley was a home day. The town was full of visitors and sleigh bells and merry calls and walking couples. Everybody was waving Christmas presents or wearing them. For Green Valley believed in Christmas presents. Not the kind that make people he awake nights hating Christmas and that call for "do your shopping early" signs. But the old-fas.h.i.+oned kind of presents that are not stained with hate or worry or debt.

The giving of Christmas presents was the pleasantest kind of a game in Green Valley. Of course everybody knew everybody's needs so well that weeks before the gifts, wrapped in tissue paper, lay waiting in a trunk up in the attic. And as a general thing everybody was happy over what they got. No present cost much money but oh, what a world of thought and love and fun went into it. Nor was it hard for Green Valley folks to decide what to give.

When Dell Parsons saw her dearest friend admiring her asparagus fern she divided it in the fall and tended it carefully and sent it to Nan Turner on Christmas morning.

When folks found out that some time next spring Alice Sears might have a baby to dress they sent her ever so many lovely, soft little things so she would not have to worry or grieve because her first baby could not have its share of pretties.

As soon as Green Valley knew that Jocelyn Brownlee was engaged it sent her a tried and true poor-man's-wife cookbook, big gingham ap.r.o.ns, holders to keep her from burning her hands and samples of their best jellies, pickles and preserves.

And such a time as Green Valley grandmothers had weaving, knitting and crocheting beautiful rag rugs to match blue and white bathrooms, yellow and green kitchens, pink and cream bedrooms. And every year there was a large crop of home knitted mittens that Green Valley girls and boys wore with pride and comfort. No city pair of gloves ever equaled grandma's knitted ones that went very nearly to the elbow and were the only thing for skating and coasting.

Christmas was the time too when dreams came true. f.a.n.n.y Foster knew this when Christmas morning she opened a parcel and found a beautiful silk petticoat. No card came with it but f.a.n.n.y knew.

Hen Tomlins had a baby boy for his best Christmas gift. Agnes had always opposed all talk of adopting a baby, but this year that was her gift to Hen. And they were all happy about it.

Of course, even in Green Valley a certain amount of foolishness prevailed. Everybody smiled when a week before Christmas Jessie Williams said she had all her presents ready but Arthur's; that she was waiting for the next pay day to get his; that she believed she'd get him a new pink silk lamp shade but she knew beforehand he wouldn't be pleased and would only say that he wished to heaven she'd let him have the money.

Lutie Barlow was badly disappointed with the hundred and fifty dollar victrola her husband bought her. She said she wanted a red cow to match her Rhode Island Reds.

Perhaps no one in Green Valley was so generously remembered as the young minister. But though every one of the many gifts that came pleased him he was strangely unhappy and restless. Invitations as usual had poured in on him but he had chosen to spend the day with Grandma Wentworth. And yet, though he was glad to be with her, his thoughts strayed off to a certain gray day in the fall when he ran down a hill with a girl's hand in his. He remembered the surge of joy that had rushed through him when he got her safely into his storm-proof house and banged shut the door on the stormy world without.

He thought of the hour they spent in silence before the fire that roared exultantly as the storm tore with angry fingers at the doors and windows. That, he now felt, was the most perfect hour of his life.

His mind was struggling to understand these memories, these strange new emotions. He had a queer feeling that something wonderful was waiting just outside his reach, something was waiting for his recognition.

He was standing in Grandma Wentworth's dining room, looking out the window at the winter landscape. Grandma was in the kitchen seeing to the dinner, for she was to have quite a party--Roger and David, Mrs.

Brownlee and Jocelyn, Cynthia's son and his man Timothy.

Idly Cynthia's son watched the rest of the party coming through the little path that led to Grandma's door. He saw them all plainly through the curtains and plants that screened him. Jocelyn and David came last. David made a great to-do about stamping the snow off his feet, taking pains to stand between Jocelyn and the door. Then, just as Jocelyn was about to slip past him, the minister saw David reach out and sweep the girl into his arms. And Cynthia's son could not help but see the glory in the boy's eyes as the girl's wild-rose face turned up to meet her lover's kiss.

For blind seconds John Roger Churchill Knight crashed through s.p.a.ce.

And then the next minute he was living in a s.h.i.+ning world that was all roses and skylarks and dew. He laughed, for all at once he knew what ailed him; he knew that the wonderful, tantalizing something that had so steadily eluded him, tormented him was--just Nan, the girl of the gray day, the log fire and the storm.

He was the maddest, gladdest man in all Green Valley that day until he remembered that he had sent Nan no gift, not even a greeting or a word of thanks for the beautiful collie dog she had sent him. He stood in horrified amazement at his stupidity. Jocelyn had been showing them her new ring. And Nan, his sweetheart, had not even a Christmas card.

Cynthia's son went to the telephone but even as he raised the receiver he somehow guessed what the answer would be.

Nan's father answered.

"Why, John, she left on that 1:10 for Scranton, Pennsylvania. It's the first fool thing I have ever known her to do. Stayed right here till she'd given us our Christmas gifts and dinner and then off she went to see this old aunt in Scranton. Why, yes--you can send a telegram.

She'll get it when she arrives."

So it happened that when a tired, homesick, wretched girl reached her aunt's house in Scranton, Pennsylvania, she found the one gift for which her heart had cried all that long, long Christmas day. It was just a bit of yellow paper that said:

"oh gray day girl don't stay too long the fire is singing your chair is waiting and I have so much to tell you come home and forgive."

CHAPTER XXI

f.a.n.n.y'S HOUR

n.o.body had asked f.a.n.n.y to be a member of the Civic League but she was its most energetic promoter, its most zealous advocate. Never had she had such a cold weather opportunity.

f.a.n.n.y hated cold weather. It shut people up in houses, shut their mouths, their purses, their laughter. It made life grim and rather gray. f.a.n.n.y loved suns.h.i.+ne and open sunny roads. She tried to do her duty in winter as well as in summer but when the weather drops to ten or twenty below the sunniest of natures is bound to feel it.

But this winter Green Valley women were so stirred and roused that they thought of other things beside the price of coal and sugar and yarn.

The short winter days fairly flew. The Civic League was young but already it was laying out an ambitious spring programme. No mere man was a member but all the men had to do was to show a little attention to f.a.n.n.y Foster to know what was going on.

"We're going to set up a drinking fountain in the business square,"

f.a.n.n.y explained. "The men of this town have the hotel but the horses never did have a decent trough of clean water. And we're going to have a little low place fixed so's the dogs can get a drink too. This is to prevent hydrophobia.

"We've already started the boys to building bird houses so's to have them ready to put up the first thing in the spring. There'll be less killing of song birds with sling-shots, though of course there's never been much of that done in Green Valley.

"Then that crossing at West End is going to be attended to. There's been enough rubbers lost in that mudhole to about fill it, so it won't take much to fill it up. We're going to have a little bridge built over that ditch on Lane Avenue so's we women don't dislocate our joints jumping over it. But first the ditch is going to be deepened and cleaned so's it won't smell so unhealthy. When that's done the ladies aim to plant wild flowers along it, careless like, to make it look as if G.o.d had made it instead of lazy men.

"We're going to suggest that all buildings in the business section put out window boxes. We'll furnish the flowers. It will give a distinctive note of beauty to the town." f.a.n.n.y was carefully quoting Mrs. Brownlee.

"Billy Evans' wife promised to see to it that Billy painted the livery barn and there's a delegation of ladies appointed to wait on Mert Hagley and see if we can't get him to mend his sheds. They're so lopsided and rickety that Mrs. Brownlee says they're an eyesore and a menace to public safety.

"There's another delegation that's going to ask the saloon keeper to keep the bas.e.m.e.nt door shut when the trains come in so's to keep that beery and whisky smell out of the streets as much as possible while maybe visitors are walking about.

"We're going to send a special committee to see what the railroad will do about fixing up this old station or, better still, giving us a new one and beautifying its grounds.

"We're planning to see Colonel Stratton about starting up a club for the preservation of our wild flowers and Doc Philipps is to have charge of a fight on the moths and things that are eating and killing our fruit trees.

"The school buildings will be investigated and conditions noted. Doc Philipps says that if the heating plant and ventilation and light was tended to we wouldn't have so much sickness among the children or so many needing gla.s.ses.

"As soon as spring really comes the Woman's Civic League is going to start up a clean-up campaign. Of course, Green Valley never was a dirty town. Everybody likes to have their yard nice but there's considerable old faded newspaper and rusty tin cans lying along the roads farther out and in unnoticed corners that n.o.body's felt responsible for. That will all be attended to. We'll have no filth, no germs, no ugliness anywhere, Mrs. Brownlee says.

"And I've been appointed a committee of one to wait on Seth Curtis and call his attention to the careless way he leaves his horses standing about the town. Those horses are dangerous and getting uglier in temper every day. And Seth is just as bad."

This was only too true. Seth had grown bitter and even reckless of late. Ever since his quarrel with Ruth about Jim Tumley Seth had been boiling with temper. Old poisons that had spoiled his life in many ways and that he thought he had conquered crept back to tyrannize over him. Poor Seth had had so much discipline in his youth that the least hint of pressure threw him into a state of vicious rebellion. Seth had a fine mind, could think quicker and straighter to the point than a good many Green Valley men. But when that mind was clouded with anger and stubbornness Seth was a hopeless proposition. Ruth was his one star and even she, Seth felt, had set herself against him.

So Seth, who seldom had frequented the hotel, was there almost every day now when he should have been working. He even drank more than before. Not that he cared more for it but it was his way of showing independence.

So Seth was very ugly these days and his horses suffered as they had never suffered before. They too were growing ugly and vicious and so nervous that the least noise, the least stir, sent them into a quivering frenzy of fright.

Every one in Green Valley knew this and not a few men and women were worrying. Several men were making up their minds to speak sharply to Seth about it. But everybody smiled and even felt relieved when they heard that f.a.n.n.y had offered her services to the Civic League in this capacity. Green Valley knew Seth and knew f.a.n.n.y Foster. f.a.n.n.y would most certainly tell Seth about it. And everybody knew just how mad Seth would get. f.a.n.n.y would not of course accomplish much. But she would open up the subject, suffer the first violence of Seth's anger and so make it easier for some more competent person to take Seth to task and force him to be reasonable.

The minister had spoken to Seth long ago but though Seth listened quietly to the quiet words of the one man he had come to love in his queer fas.h.i.+on, he had set his jaw grimly at the end and said, "No, sir!

I've made up my mind not to stand this interference with my personal liberty and G.o.d Himself can't budge me!"

"Yes, He can, Seth. But don't let it go that far," Cynthia's son had begged.