Story of Waitstill Baxter Part 26

MRS. MASON'S welcome to Waitstill was unexpectedly hearty--much heartier than it would have been Six months before, when she regarded Mrs.

Boynton as little less than a harmless lunatic, of no use as a neighbor; and when she knew nothing more of Ivory than she could gather by his occasional drive or walk past her door with a civil greeting. Rodman had been until lately the only member of the family for whom she had a friendly feeling; but all that had changed in the last few weeks, when she had been allowed to take a hand in the Boyntons' affairs. As to this newest development in the life of their household, she had once been young herself, and the veriest block of stone would have become human when the two lovers drove up to the door and told their exciting story.

Ivory made himself quickly at home, and helped the old lady to get a room ready for Waitstill before he drove back for a look at his mother and then on to carry out his impetuous and romantic scheme of routing out the town clerk and announcing his intended marriage. 345

Waitstill slept like the shepherd boy in "The Pilgrim's Progress," with the "herb called Heart's Ease" in her bosom. She opened her eyes next morning from the depths of Mrs. Mason's best feather bed, and looked wonderingly about the room, with all its unaccustomed surroundings.

She heard the rattle of fire-irons and the flatter of dishes below; the first time in all her woman's life that preparations for breakfast had ever greeted her ears when she had not been an active partic.i.p.ator in them.

She lay quite still for a quarter of an hour, tired in body and mind, but incredibly happy in spirit, marvelling at the changes wrought in her during the day preceding, the most eventful one in her history. Only yesterday her love had been a bud, so closely folded that she scarcely recognized its beauty or color or fragrance; only yesterday, and now she held in her hand a perfect flower. When and how had it grown, and by what magic process?

The image of Ivory had been all through the night in the foreground of her dreams and in her moments of wakefulness, both made blissful by the heaven of antic.i.p.ation that dawned upon her. Was ever man so wise, so tender and gentle, so strong, so comprehending? What mattered the absence of worldly goods, the presence of care and anxiety, when n woman had a steady hand to hold, a steadfast heart to trust, a man who would love her and stand by her, whate'er befell?

Then the face of Ivory's mother would swim into the mental picture; the pale face, as white as the pillow it lay upon; the face with its aureole of ashen hair, and the wistful blue eyes that begged of G.o.d and her children some peace before they closed on life.

The vision of her sister was a joyful one, and her heart was at peace about her, the plucky little princess who had blazed the way out of the ogre's castle.

She saw Patty clearly as a future fine lady, in velvets and satins and furs, bewitching every-body by her gay spirits, her piquant vivacity, and the loving heart that lay underneath all the nonsense and gave it warmth and color.

The remembrance of her father alone on the hilltop did indeed trouble Waitstill. Self-reproach, in the true sense of the word, she did not, could not, feel. Never since the day she was born had she been fathered, and daughterly love was absent; but she suffered when she thought of the fierce, self-willed old man, cutting himself off from all possible friends.h.i.+ps, while his vigor was being sapped daily and hourly by his terrible greed of money.

True housewife that Waitstill was, her mind reverted to every separate crock and canister in her cupboards, every article of her baking or cooking that reposed on the swing-sheh in the cellar, thinking how long her father could be comfortable without her ministrations, and so, how long he would delay before engaging the u inevitable housekeeper. She revolved the number of possible persons to whom the position would be offered, and wished that Mrs. Mason, who so needed help, might be the chosen one: but the fact of her having been friendly to the Boyntons would strike her at once from the list.

When she was thankfully eating her breakfast with Mrs. Mason a little later, and waiting for Ivory to call for them both and take them to the Boynton farm, she little knew what was going on at her old home in these very hours, when to tell the truth she would have liked to slip in, had it been possible, wash the morning dishes, skim the cream, do the week's churning, make her father's bed, and slip out again into the dear shelter of love that awaited her.

The Deacon had pa.s.sed a good part of the night in scheming and contriving, and when he drank his self-made cup of muddy coffee at seven o'clock next morning he had formed several plans that were to be immediately frustrated, had he known it, by the exasperating and suspicious nature of the ladies involved in them.

At eight he had left the house, started Bill Morrill at the store, and was on the road in search of vengeance and a housekeeper. Old Mrs.

Atkins of Deerwander sniffed at the wages offered. Miss Peters, of Union Falls, an aged spinster with weak lungs, had the impertinence to tell him that she feared she couldn't stand the cold in his house; she had heard he was very particular about the amount of wood that was burned.

A four-mile drive brought him to the village poetically named the Brick Kiln, where he offered to Mrs. Peter Upham an advance of twenty-five cents a week over and above the salary with which he had sought to tempt Mrs. Atkins. Far from being impressed, Mrs. Uphill, being of a high temper and candid turn of mind, told him she'd prefer to starve at home.

There was not another free woman within eight miles, and the Deacon was chafing under t e mortification of being continually obliged to state the reason for his needing a housekeeper. The only hope, it seemed, lay in going to Saco and hiring a stranger, a plan not at all to his liking, as it was sure to involve him in extra expense.

Muttering threats against the universe in general, he drove home by way of Milliken's Mills, thinking of the unfed hens, the unmilked cow, the unwashed dishes, the unchurned cream and above all of his unchastened daughters; his rage increasing with every step until it was nearly at the white heat of the night before.

A long stretch of hill brought the tired old mare to a slow walk, and enabled the Deacon to see the Widow Tillman clipping the geraniums that stood in tin cans on the shelf of her kitchen window.

Now, Foxwell Baxter had never been a village Lothario at any age, nor frequented the society of such. Of late years, indeed, he had frequented no society of any kind, so that he had missed, for instance, Abel Day's description of the Widow Tillman as a "reg'lar syreen," though he vaguely remembered that some of the Baptist sisters had questioned the authenticity of her conversion by their young and attractive minister.

She made a pleasant picture at the window; she was a free woman (a little too free, the neighbors would have said; but the Deacon didn't know that); she was a comparative newcomer to the village, and her mind had not been poisoned with feminine gossip--in a word, she was a distinctly hopeful subject, and, acting on a blind and sudden impulse, he turned into the yard, 'dung the reins over the mare's neck, and knocked at the back door.

"Her character 's no worse than mine by now if Aunt Abby Cole's on the road," he thought grimly, "an' if the Wilsons see my sleigh inside of widder's fence, so much the better; it'll give 'em a jog.--Good morning Mis' Tillman," he said to the smiling lady. "I'll come to the p'int at once. My youngest daughter has married Mark Wilson against my will, an'

gone away from town, an' the older one's chosen a husband still less to my likin'. Do you want to come and housekeep for me?"

"I surmised something was going on," re-turned Mrs. Tillman. "I saw Patty and Mark drive away early this morning, with Mr. and Mrs. Wilson wrapping the girl up and putting a hot soapstone in the sleigh, and consid'able kissing and hugging thrown in."

This knowledge added fuel to the flame that was burning fiercely in the Deacon's breast. "Well, how about the housekeeping he asked, trying not to show his eagerness, and not recognizing himself at all in the enterprise in which he found himself indulging.

"I 'm very comfortable here," the lady responded artfully, "and I don't know 's I care to make any change, thank you. I didn't like the village much at first, after living in larger places, but now I'm acquainted, it kind of gains on me."

Her reply was carefully framed, for her mind worked with great rapidity, and she was mistress of the situation almost as soon as she saw the Deacon alighting from his sleigh. He was not the sort of man to be a casual caller, and his manner bespoke an urgent errand. She had a pension of six dollars a month, but over and above that sum her living was precarious. She made coats, and she had never known want, for she was a master hand at dealing with the opposite s.e.x. Deacon Baxter, according to common report, had ten or fifteen thousand dollars stowed away in the banks, so the situation would be as simple as possible under ordinary circ.u.mstances; it was as easy to turn out one man's pockets as all-other's when he was a normal human being; but Deacon Baxter was a different proposition.

"I wonder how long he's likely to live," she thought, glancing at him covertly, out of the tail of her eye. "His evil temper must have driven more than one nail in his coffin. I wonder, if I refuse to housekeep, whether I 'll get--a better offer. I wonder if I could manage him if I got him! I'd rather like to sit in the Baxter pew at the Orthodox meeting-house after the way some of the Baptist sisters have snubbed me since I come here."

Not a vestige of these incendiary thoughts showed in her comely countenance, and her soul might have been as white as the high-bibbed ap.r.o.n that covered it, to judge by her genial smile.

"I'd make the wages fair," urged the Deacon, looking round the clean kitchen, with the break-fast-table sitting near the sunny window and the odor of corned beef and cabbage issuing temptingly from a boiling pot on the fire. "I hope she ain't a great meat-eater," he thought, "but it's too soon to cross that bridge yet a while."

"I've no doubt of it," said the widow, wondering if her voice rang true; "but I've got a pension, and why should I leave this cosy little home?

Would I better myself any, that's the question? I'm kind of lonesome here, that's the only reason I'd consider a move."

"No need o' bein' lonesome down to the Falls," said the Deacon. "And I'm in an' out all day, between the barn an' the store."

This, indeed, was not a pleasant prospect, but Jane Tillman had faced worse ones in her time.

"I'm no hand at any work outside the house," she observed, as if reflecting. "I can truthfully say I'm a good cook, and have a great faculty for making a little go a long ways." (She considered this a master-stroke, and in fact it was; for the Deacon's mouth absolutely watered at this apparently unconscious comprehension of his disposition.) "But I'm no hand at any ch.o.r.es in the barn or shed," she continued. "My first husband would never allow me to do that kind of work."

"Perhaps I could git a boy to help out; I've been kind o' thinkin' o'

that lately. What wages would you expect if I paid a boy for the rough work?" asked the Deacon tremulously. "Well, to tell the truth, I don't quite fancy the idea of taking wages. Judge d.i.c.kinson wants me to go to Alfred and housekeep for him, and I'd named twelve dollars a month. It's good pay, and I haven't said 'No'; but my rent is small here, I'm my own mistress, and I don't feel like giving up my privileges."

"Twelve dollars a month!" He had never thought of approaching that sum; and he saw the heap of unwashed dishes growing day by day, and the cream souring on the milk-pans. Suddenly an idea sprang full-born into the Deacon's mind (Jed Morrill's "Old Driver" must have been close at hand!). Would Jane Tillman marry him? No woman in the three villages would be more obnoxious to his daughters; that in itself was a distinct gain. She was a fine, robust figure of a woman in her early forties, and he thought, after all, that the hollow-chested, spindle-shanked kind were more ex-pensive to feed, on the whole, than their better-padded sisters. He had never had any difficulty in managing wives, and thought himself quite equal to one more bout, even at sixty-five, though he had just the faintest suspicion that the high color on Mrs. Tillman's prominent cheek-bones, the vigor shown in the coa.r.s.e black hair and handsome eyebrows, might make this task a little more difficult than his previous ones. But this fear vanished almost as quickly as it appeared, for he kept saying to himself: "A judge of the County Court wants her at twelve dollars a month; hadn't I better bid high an' git settled?

"If you'd like to have a home o' your own 'thout payin' rent, you've only got to say the word an' I'll make you Mis' Baxter," said the Deacon. "There'll be n.o.body to interfere with you, an' a handsome legacy if I die first; for none o' my few savin's is goin' to my daughters, I can promise you that!"

The Deacon threw out this tempting bait advisedly, for at this moment he would have poured his h.o.a.rd into the lap of any woman who would help him to avenge his fancied wrongs.

This was information, indeed! The "few savings" alluded to amounted to some thousands, Jane Tillman knew. Had she not better burn her s.h.i.+ps behind her, take the risks, and have faith in her own powers? She was getting along in ears, and her charms of person were lessening with every day that pa.s.sed over her head. If the Deacon's queer ways grew too queer, she thought an appeal to the doctor and the minister might provide a way of escape and a neat little income to boot; so, on the whole, the marriage, though much against her natural inclinations, seemed to be providentially arranged.

The interview that succeeded, had it been reported verbatim, deserved to be recorded in local history. Deacon Baxter had met in Jane Tillman a foeman more than worthy of his steel. She was just as crafty as he, and in generals.h.i.+p as much superior to him as Napoleon Bonaparte to Cephas Cole. Her knowledge of and her experiences with men, all very humble, it is true, but decidedly varied, enabled her to play on every weakness of this particular one she had in hand, and at the same time skilfully to avoided alarming him.

Heretofore, the women with whom the Deacon had come in contact had timidly steered away from the rocks and reefs in his nature, and had been too ignorant or too proud to look among them for certain softer places that were likely to be there--since man is man, after all, even when he is made on a very small pattern.

If Jane Tillman became Mrs. Baxter, she intended to get the whip hand and keep it; but nothing was further from her intention than to make the Deacon miserable if she could help it. That was not her disposition; and so, when the deluded man left her house, he had made more concessions in a single hour than in all the former years of his life.

His future spouse was to write out a little paper for his signature; just a friendly little paper to be kept quite private and confidential between themselves, stating that she was to do no work outside of the house; that her pension was to be her own; that she was to have five dollars in cash on the first of every month in lieu of wages; and that in ease of his death occurring first she was to have a third of his estate, and the whole of it if at the time of his decease he was still pleased with his bargain. The only points in this contract that the Deacon really understood were that he was paying only five dollars a month for a housekeeper to whom a judge had offered twelve; that, as he had expected to pay at least eight, he could get a boy for the remaining three, and so be none the worse in pocket; also, that if he could keep his daughters from getting his money, he didn't care a hang who had it, as he hated the whole human race with entire impartiality. If Jane Tillman didn't behave herself, he had pleasing visions of converting most of his fortune into cash and having it dropped off the bridge some dark night, when the doctor had given him up and proved to his satisfaction that death would occur in the near future.

All this being harmoniously settled, the Deacon drove away, and caused the announcement of his immediate marriage to be posted directly below that of Waitstill and Ivory Boynton.

"Might as well have all the fat in the fire to once," he chuckled.

"There won't be any house-work done in this part of the county for a week to come. If we should have more snow, n.o.body'll have to do any shovellin', for the women-folks'll keep all the paths in the village trod down from door to door, travellin' round with the news."

A "spite match," the community in general called the Deacon's marriage; and many a man, and many a woman, too, regarding the amazing publis.h.i.+ng notice in the frame up at the meeting-house, felt that in Jane Tillman Deacon Baxter had met his Waterloo.

"She's plenty good enough for him," said Aunt Abby Cole, "though I know that's a terrible poor compliment. If she thinks she'll ever break into s'ciety here at the Falls, she'll find herself mistaken! It's a mystery to me why the poor deluded man ever done it; but ain't it wonderful the ingenuity the Lord shows in punis.h.i.+n' sinners? I couldn't 'a' thought out such a good comeuppance myself for Deacon Baxter, as marryin' Jane Tillman! The thing that troubles me most, is thinkin' how tickled the Baptists'll be to git her out o' their meetin' an' into ourn!"

x.x.xV. TWO HEAVENS

AT the very moment that Deacon Baxter was I starting out on his quest for a housekeeper, Patty and Mark drove into the Mason dooryard and the sisters flew into each other's arms. The dress that Mark had bought for Patty was the usual charting and unsuitable offering of a man's spontaneous affection, being of dark violet cloth with a wadded cape lined with satin. A little brimmed hat of violet velvet tied under her chin with silk ribbons completed the costume, and before the youthful bride and groom had left the ancestral door Mrs. Wilson had hung her own ermine victorine (the envy of all Edgewood) around Patty's neck and put her ermine willow m.u.f.f into her new daughter's hands; thus she was as dazzling a personage, and as improperly dressed for the journey, as she could well be.