Laicus; Or, the Experiences of a Layman in a Country Parish Part 22

MY husband wants me to write an account of the donation we gave our new minister. He wants it to put in his book.

"Why, John," said I, "I can't write anything for a book. I never wrote anything for print in my life. You mustn't think I am clever because you are."

"My dear Jennie," said he, "there is no magic in print. Write just such an account as you wrote your mother. If you had that letter you could not do better than give me that to put in."

"I can't possibly write, John. I would indeed if I could."

"Then," said John, "it can't go in at all. For I was not here. I cannot describe it."

He was so earnest about it I finally had to yield. He says I always have my own way. I didn't this time I am sure. There is only one thing that reconciles me to it. I do not believe the publishers will print it. I told John I wouldn't trust my writing to his judgment. I wouldn't you know, of course because he would be sure to say it was good. So we agreed to leave it to the publishers. If they don't like this chapter they are going to leave it out. John is going to leave them to read the proof, and we shan't either of us know till the book is published whether "our donation party" gets in or not. I confess to a little hope it will get in.

Let me see how it happened. Oh! this was the way: Maurice was at our house the Sunday he supplied our pulpit. He told my husband that he thought he should accept our call. But he said he didn't think the parsonage would do him any good. He wanted to go to housekeeping, but he had not the money to furnish it with, and he would not run in debt.

That set me thinking. I talked the matter over with Miss Moore and found she was quite of my mind; and the week after, we got Maurice's letter accepting the call, we proposed to the ladies at the sewing society to undertake to furnish the parsonage. The idea took at once. In fact the having a parsonage is a new thing at Wheathedge, and we feel a little pride in having it respectable, you know; at least so as not to be a disgrace to the church. Mrs. Goodsole thought it doubtful about raising the money, and Mrs. Hardcap said that "her husband wasn't in favor of the parsonage nohow, and she didn't believe would think much of fixin' of it up;" but Miss Moore replied to Mrs. Goodsole that she could try at any rate, and to Mrs.

Hardcap that she would be responsible that Mr. Hardcap would do his share; a remark which to some of us seemed a bold one, but which pleased Mrs. Hardcap for all that.

Mr. Hardcap, I believe, means well, though to some of us his ideas do seem very contracted, sometimes. But my husband says that narrow men are needed as well as broad ones, and that if there were no Mr.

Hardcap to count the cost of every venture before it was undertaken, the church would have been bankrupt long before this time.

We appointed committees that evening; one to raise the money-of course Miss Moore was at the head of that--one to furnish the kitchen, one to furnish the parlor and bed-room, (as I knew the bride, I was put on that committee,) and one to provide a supper.

Some of the ladies wanted to have a grand reception. They said it would be a good thing to surprise the new pastor with a house-warming. Mrs. Hardcap proposed that the sewing society meet there that afternoon. But Miss Moore objected strongly. She said it would cost nearly as much to provide a supper for the whole congregation as to furnish a good bed-room set. I think, though, it was really little Miss Flidgett who put a quietus on that plan.

"Why," said she in an injured tone, "I want to be there and see how they like it."

n.o.body dared advocate the plan after that speech. I really think that they all felt very much the same way, however.

The next day some of us met at the parsonage to take a survey. Last year the house was without a tenant, and it had come to be in rather a dilapidated condition. The fence gate was off the hinges. The garden was over-grown with weeds. The sink in the kitchen was badly rotted. One of the parlor blinds was off. There was a bad leak over the back porch, and the plastering looked just ready to fall, and the whole looked dingy,--it needed outside painting sadly.

"We needn't let these things go so," said Miss Moore. "The landlord must put the house to rights."

So off we posted to the landlord, who is a queer, crusty old bachelor, who has, I verily believe, a kind heart, and does a good deal of good in his own fas.h.i.+on; but his fas.h.i.+on is never like any one else's. Not a thing could Miss Moore get out of him. He had rented the house as it stood, he said. If the trustees didn't like it they needn't have taken it. They paid little enough rent to repair it themselves. He had nothing more to do except to get his rent regularly, and that she might depend he would do.

Miss Moore returned somewhat disappointed, but nothing daunted. "So much the better," said she. "It will give Mr. Hardcap a chance to do something."

"How about the painting?" said Mrs. Wheaton. "It ought to be painted."

Miss Moore shook her head. "So it ought," she said, "and so I told Mr. Quirk; but he won't do anything,--and we can't afford to paint it; we shouldn't have money left for furnis.h.i.+ng."

So we took the measure of the floors for the carpets, settled on what furniture we would get, and adjourned.

Next week I went down to New York and called on the young lady to whom Maurice is engaged. Her home is in New York, or rather it was there; for to my thinking a wife's home is always with her husband; and I never like to hear a wife talking of "going home" as though home could be anywhere else than where her husband and her children are. Maurice and Helen were to be married two weeks from the following Friday, for Maurice proposed to postpone their wedding trip till his next summer's vacation; and Helen, like the dear, sensible girl she is, very readily agreed to that plan. In fact I believe she proposed it. She had some shopping to do before the wedding, and I had some to do on my own account, and we went together. I invented a plan of refurnis.h.i.+ng my parlor. I am afraid I told some fibs, or at least came dreadfully near it. I told Helen I wanted her to help me select the carpet; and though she had no time to spare, she was very good-natured, and did spare the time. We ladies had agreed-not without some dissent-to get a Brussels for the parlor, as the cheapest in the end, and I made Helen select her own pattern, without any suspicion of what she was doing, and incidentally got her taste on other carpets, too, so that really she selected them herself without knowing it. Deacon Goodsole recommended me to go for furniture to Mr. Kabbinett, a German friend of his, and Mrs. Goodsole and I found there a very nice parlor set, in green rep, made of imitation rosewood, which he said would wear about as well as the genuine article, and which we both agreed looked nearly as well. We would rather have bought the real rosewood, but that we could not afford. Mr. Kabbinett made us a liberal discount because we were buying for a parsonage. We got an extension table and chairs for the dining-room, (but we had to omit a side-board for the present), and a very pretty oak set for the chamber. We did not buy anything but a carpet for the library, for Mr. Laicus said no one could furnish a student's library for him. He must furnish it for himself.

When we got back to Wheathedge, Tuesday afternoon, we found the parsonage undergoing transformations so great that you would hardly know it. Miss Moore had got Mr. Hardcap, sure enough, to repair it.

She had agreed to pay for the material, and he was to furnish the labor. The fence was straightened, and the gate re-hung, and the blinds mended up, and Mr. Hardcap was on the roof patching it where it leaked or threatened to. Deacon Goodsole had a bevy of boys from the Sabbath-school at work in the garden under his direction. If there is anything the Deacon takes a pride in, next to his horse, it is his garden, and he said that the parson should have a chance for the best garden in town. Great piles of weeds stood in the walk. Two boys were spading up; another was planting; a fourth was wheeling away the weeds; and still another was bringing manure from the Deacon's stable. Miss Moore was setting out some rose-bushes before the door; and the Deacon himself, with his coat off, was tr.i.m.m.i.n.g and tying up a rather dilapidated looking grape-vine over a still more dilapidated grape arbor.

The next morning, about eleven o'clock, little Miss Flidgett came running into our house, without ever knocking, in the greatest possible excitement.

"Mrs. Laicus," said she, "the painters have come."

"The painters!" said I. "What painters?"

"Why didn't you order them?" said she.

"They are painting the parsonage. I supposed of course you ordered them."

It was very evident that she did not suppose anything of the kind, but was dying of curiosity to know who did. I confess I had some curiosity to know myself. So I put on my bonnet and shawl, and ran over with her to find out about it. Sure enough the painters were there, three or four of them, with their ladders up against the side of the house, and the parsonage already beginning to change color under their hands. Some of the ladies were in the kitchen supervising the repairs of the sink, and the putting up of some shelves in the pantry, but they knew nothing about the painters. I asked one of the hands, at work on the front door, who sent him.

"The boss, ma'am," he replied, very promptly.

"And who is the boss?" said I.

"Mr. Glazier, ma'am."

Mr. Glazier is the painter himself, the head-man. So I was no better off than before. I was afraid Mrs. Wheaton had ordered them, and I knew our funds were getting low, for we had overrun our estimate for carpets; and I have the greatest horror of running in debt. So I resolved to go right over to Mrs. Wheaton's and get at the bottom of the mystery. But Mrs. Wheaton knew nothing of the matter. We were both sure Miss Moore would not have ordered them, and I was returning as wise as I started, when, as I pa.s.sed the parsonage, I saw Mr. Glazier and Mr. Quirk in the yard, talking together. So I turned in to ask Mr. Glazier about it. As I pa.s.sed up the walk Mr.

Quirk called out to me.

"You ladies are in possession, I see," said he. "You mean to make the parson comfortable and contented if you can."

"Yes, Sir," said I, "though we are not responsible for the greatest improvement, the painting. I think Mr. Glazier must be responsible for that himself. I can't find any one that ordered it done."

I thought that would bring the information, and it did.

"Oh! that's Mr. Quirk's orders," said he.

"Yours?" said I turning to the crusty old landlord who wouldn't do anything.

He nodded. I think he enjoyed my perplexity. I spoke on the impulse of the moment. If I had given it a second thought I should not have done it; and yet I am not sorry I did.

"Mr. Quirk," said I, "my husband was right and I was wrong. We ladies thought very hard of you that you would not do anything toward repairing the parsonage. For one I want to apologize."

"Judge not, that ye be not judged," said the old man; and he turned on his heel and went away. He is the queerest man I ever saw.

I wish you could have seen that parsonage last Friday, the day that Mr. Mapleson and his wife were to arrive. The walks were trim. The plot before the piazza had been new sodded. The grapevine was already putting out new buds as if it felt the effect of the Deacon's tender care. There was not a weed to be seen. The beds, with their rich, black loam turned up to the sun, had a beauty of their own, which only one who loves to dig among flowers as much as I do can appreciate. Mr. Glazier had made the dingy old house look like a new one. After all there is nothing I like better for a cottage than pure white with green blinds. Inside we had a lovely carpet on the parlor, and the new set of imitation rosewood. A beautiful bouquet from Mrs. Wheaton's garden stood in the bay window, which looks out upon the river. My girl, lent for the occasion, was in the kitchen; and in the dining-room there was supper spread just for two, with cake, preserves, and pies enough in the closet (every body in the parish had sent in supper for that evening) to keep the parson supplied for a month at least. I was the last to leave the house, and I did not leave it till I heard the whistle of the train. Then I ran over to Miss Moore's little cottage, which is right across the way. Her parlor window was full of ladies peering out, first and foremost of whom was little Miss Flidgett, who thus gratified her wish to see how they would take it.

The Deacon, who was fixing something about the stable, was almost caught. But he heard the carriage-wheels just in time to run into the shed, and I could see him there holding the door open a crack and peering out to see what pa.s.sed. Even dignified Mrs. Wheaton could not resist the temptation to be pa.s.sing along, accidentally of course, just as the parson drove up. Mr. Wheaton had called for them at the depot. It was arranged (with them, that is) that he was to take them right to our house, and they were to stay there till they could decide whether to board or keep house. He proposed to them, however, according to pre-arrangement, to stop a minute at the parsonage on the way. "Mrs. Mapleson," he said, "can see what it is and how she likes the house, and the location; and besides I have an errand to do at the store."

We saw him get out and hand them out. Just then Mrs. Wheaton pa.s.sed by, and he introduced her to them. Mrs. Wheaton took a seat in the now vacant carriage to go with her husband to the store; and Mr. and Mrs. Mapleson went up the walk. We saw them go in and shut the door.

In a moment they came out again. Maurice looked up and down the street in perplexity; then he stepped back a few paces and looked up at the house. His wife stood meanwhile on the door-step. Suddenly she beckoned to him, and pointed out something on the side of the door just over the bell-handle. They had discovered the little silver plate on which was engraved "Rev. Maurice Mapleson." At that moment the expressman drove up with their trunks. Maurice settled with him, looked up and down the street as if looking for Mr.

Wheaton, who did not make his appearance as you may believe; and then parson, wife, and trunks all went into the house together, and we dispersed.

As to the Deacon, he had to climb out of a back window into an ally that runs behind the house in order to get out of his position without being discovered.

And that is the way we gave our donation party in Wheathedge.