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The Guardian Angel, a novel by Oliver Wendell Holmes |
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CHAPTER XIV. FLANK MOVEMENT |
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_ CHAPTER XIV. FLANK MOVEMENT Miss Cynthia Badlam was in the habit of occasionally visiting the Widow Hopkins. Some said but then people will talk, especially in the country, where they have not much else to do, except in haying-time. She had always known the widow, long before Mr. Gridley came there to board, or any other special event happened in her family. No matter what people said. Miss Badlam called to see Mrs. Hopkins, then, and the two had a long talk together, of which only a portion is on record. Here are such fragments as have been preserved. "What would I do about it? Why, I'd put a stop to such carry'n's on, mighty quick, if I had to tie the girl to the bedpost, and have a bulldog that world take the seat out of any pair of black pantaloons that come within forty rod of her,--that's what I'd do about it! He undertook to be mighty sweet with our Susan one while, but ever sence he's been talkin' religion with Myrtle Hazard he's let us alone. Do as I did when he asked our Susan to come to his study,--stick close to your girl and you 'll put a stop to all this business. He won't make love to two at once, unless they 're both pretty young, I 'll warrant. Follow her round, Miss Cynthy, and keep your eyes on her." "I have watched her like a cat, Mrs. Hopkins, but I can't follow her everywhere,--she won't stand what Susan Posey 'll stand. There's no use our talking to her,--we 've done with that at our house. You never know what that Indian blood of hers will make her do. She's too high-strung for us to bit and bridle. I don't want to see her name in the paper again, alongside of that" (She did not finish the sentence.) "I'd rather have her fished dead out of the river, or find her where she found her uncle Malachi!" "You don't think, Miss Cynthy, that the man means to inveigle the girl with the notion of marryin' her by and by, after poor Mrs. Stoker's dead and gone?" "The Lord in heaven forbid!" exclaimed Miss Cynthia, throwing up her hands. "A child of fifteen years old, if she is a woman to look at!" "It's too bad,--it's too bad to think of, Miss Cynthy; and there's that poor woman dyin' by inches, and Miss Bathsheby settin' with her day and night, she has n't got a bit of her father in her, it's all her mother,--and that man, instead of bein' with her to comfort her as any man ought to be with his wife, in sickness and in health, that's what he promised. I 'm sure when my poor husband was sick.... To think of that man goin' about to talk religion to all the prettiest girls he can find in the parish, and his wife at home like to leave him so soon,--it's a shame,--so it is, come now! Miss Cynthy, there's one of the best men and one of the learnedest men that ever lived that's a real friend of Myrtle Hazard, and a better friend to her than she knows of,--for ever sence he brought her home, he feels jest like a father to her,--and that man is Mr. Gridley, that lives in this house. It's him I 'll speak to about the minister's carry'in's on. He knows about his talking sweet to our Susan, and he'll put things to rights! He's a master hand when he does once take hold of anything, I tell you that! Jest get him to shet up them books of his, and take hold of anybody's troubles, and you'll see how he 'll straighten 'em out." There was a pattering of little feet on the stairs, and the two small twins, "Sossy" and "Minthy," in the home dialect, came hand in hand into the room, Miss Susan leaving them at the threshold, not wishing to interrupt the two ladies, and being much interested also in listening to Mr. Gifted Hopkins, who was reading some of his last poems to her, with great delight to both of them. The good woman rose to take them from Susan, and guide their uncertain steps. "My babies, I call 'em, Miss Cynthy. Ain't they nice children? Come to go to bed, little dears? Only a few minutes, Miss Cynthy." She took them into the bedroom on the same floor, where they slept, and, leaving the door open, began undressing them. Cynthia turned her rocking-chair round so as to face the open door. She looked on while the little creatures were being undressed; she heard the few words they lisped as their infant prayer, she saw them laid in their beds, and heard their pretty good-night. A lone woman to whom all the sweet cares of maternity have been denied cannot look upon a sight like this without feeling the void in her own heart where a mother's affection should have nestled. Cynthia sat perfectly still, without rocking, and watched kind Mrs. Hopkins at her quasi parental task. A tear stole down her rigid face as she saw the rounded limbs of the children bared in their white beauty, and their little heads laid on the pillow. They were sleeping quietly when Mrs. Hopkins left the room for a moment on some errand of her own. Cynthia rose softly from her chair, stole swiftly to the bedside, and printed a long, burning kiss on each of their foreheads. When Mrs. Hopkins came back, she found the maiden lady sitting in her place just as she left her, but rocking in her chair and sobbing as one in sudden pangs of grief. "It is a great trouble, Miss Cynthy," she said,--"a great trouble to have such a child as Myrtle to think of and to care for. If she was like our Susan Posey, now!--but we must do the best we can; and if Mr. Gridley once sets himself to it, you may depend upon it he 'll make it all come right. I wouldn't take on about it if I was you. You let me speak to our Mr. Gridley. We all have our troubles. It is n't everybody that can ride to heaven in a C-spring shay, as my poor husband used to say; and life 's a road that 's got a good many thank-you-ma'ams to go bumpin' over, says he." Miss Badlam acquiesced in the philosophical reflections of the late Mr. Ammi Hopkins, and left it to his widow to carry out her own suggestion in reference to consulting Master Gridley. The good woman took the first opportunity she had to introduce the matter, a little diffusely, as is often the way of widows who keep boarders. "There's something going on I don't like, Mr. Gridley. They tell me that Minister Stoker is following round after Myrtle Hazard, talking religion at her jest about the same way he'd have liked to with our Susan, I calculate. If he wants to talk religion to me or Silence Withers,--well, no, I don't feel sure about Silence,--she ain't as young as she used to be, but then ag'in she ain't so fur gone as some, and she's got money,--but if he wants to talk religion with me, he may come and welcome. But as for Myrtle Hazard, she's been sick, and it's left her a little flighty by what they say, and to have a minister round her all the time ravin' about the next world as if he had a latch-key to the front door of it, is no way to make her come to herself again. I 've seen more than one young girl sent off to the asylum by that sort of work, when, if I'd only had 'em, I'd have made 'em sweep the stairs, and mix the puddin's, and tend the babies, and milk the cow, and keep 'em too busy all day to be thinkin' about themselves, and have 'em dress up nice evenin's and see some young folks and have a good time, and go to meetin' Sundays, and then have done with the minister, unless it was old Father Pemberton. He knows forty times as much about heaven as that Stoker man does, or ever 's like to,--why don't they run after him, I should like to know? Ministers are men, come now; and I don't want to say anything against women, Mr. Gridley, but women are women, that's the fact of it, and half of 'em are hystericky when they're young; and I've heard old Dr. Hurlbut say many a time that he had to lay in an extra stock of valerian and assafaetida whenever there was a young minister round,--for there's plenty of religious ravin', says he, that's nothin' but hysterics." [Mr. Fronde thinks that was the trouble with Bloody Queen Mary, but the old physician did not get the idea from him.] "Well, and what do you propose to do about the Rev. Joseph Bellamy Stoker and his young proselyte, Miss Myrtle Hazard?" said Mr. Gridley, when Mrs. Hopkins at last gave him a chance to speak. "Mr. Gridley,"--Mrs. Hopkins looked full upon him as she spoke,--"people used to say that you was a good man and a great man and one of the learnedest men alive, but that you didn't know much nor care for much except books. I know you used to live pretty much to yourself when you first came to board in this house. But you've been very good to my son; ... and if Gifted lives till you ... till you are in ... your grave ... he will write a poem--I know he will--that will tell your goodness to babes unborn." [Here Master Gridley groaned, and repeated to himself silently, "Scindentur vestes gemmae frangentur et aurum, All this inwardly, and without interrupting the worthy woman's talk.] "And if ever Gifted makes a book,--don't say anything about it, Mr. Gridley, for goodness' sake, for he wouldn't have anybody know it, only I can't help thinking that some time or other he will print a book,--and if he does, I know whose name he'll put at the head of it,--'Dedicated to B. G., with the gratitude and respect--' There, now, I had n't any business to say a word about it, and it's only jest in case he does, you know. I'm sure you deserve it all. You've helped him with the best of advice. And you've been kind to me when I was in trouble. And you've been like a grandfather" [Master Gridley winced,--why could n't the woman have said father?--that grand struck his ear like a spade going into the gravel] "to those babes, poor little souls! left on my door-step like a couple of breakfast rolls,--only you know it's the baker left then. I believe in you, Mr. Gridley, as I believe in my Maker and in Father Pemberton,--but, poor man, he's old, and you won't be old these twenty years yet." [Master Gridley shook his head as if to say that was n't so, but felt comforted and refreshed.] "You've got to help Myrtle Hazard again. You brought her home when she come so nigh drowning. You got the old doctor to go and see her when she come so nigh being bewitched with the magnetism and nonsense, whatever they call it, and the young doctor was so nigh bein' crazy, too. I know, for Nurse Byloe told me all about it. And now Myrtle's gettin' run away with by that pesky Minister Stoker. Cynthy Badlam was here yesterday crying and sobbing as if her heart would break about it. For my part, I did n't think Cynthy cared so much for the girl as all that, but I saw her takin' on dreadfully with my own eyes. That man's like a hen-hawk among the chickens, first he picks up one, and then he picks up another. I should like to know if nobody but young folks has souls to be saved, and specially young women!" "Tell me all you know about Myrtle Hazard and Joseph Bellamy Stoker," said Master Gridley. Thereupon that good lady related all that Miss Badlam had imparted to her, of which the reader knows the worst, being the interview of which the keen spinster had been a witness, having followed them for the express purpose of knowing, in her own phrase, what the minister was up to. It is not to be supposed that Myrtle had forgotten the discreet kindness of Master Gridley in bringing her back and making the best of her adventure. He, on his part, had acquired a kind of right to consider himself her adviser, and had begun to take a pleasure in the thought that he, the worn-out and useless old pedant, as he had been in the way of considering himself, might perhaps do something even more important than his previous achievement to save this young girl from the dangers that surrounded her. He loved his classics and his old books; he took an interest, too, in the newspapers and periodicals that brought the fermenting thought and the electric life of the great world into his lonely study; but these things just about him were getting strong hold on him, and most of all the fortunes of this beautiful young woman. How strange! For a whole generation he had lived in no nearer relation to his fellow-creatures than that of a half-fossilized teacher; and all at once he found himself face to face with the very most intense form of life, the counsellor of threatened innocence, the champion of imperilled loveliness. What business was it of his? growled the lower nature, of which he had said in "Thoughts on the Universe,"--"Every man leads or is led by something that goes on four legs." Then he remembered the grand line of the African freedman, that makes all human interests everybody's business, and had a sudden sense of dilatation and evolution, as it were, in all his dimensions, as if he were a head taller, and a foot bigger round the chest, and took in an extra gallon of air at every breath, Then--you who have written a book that holds your heart-leaves between its pages will understand the movement--he took down "Thoughts on the Universe" for a refreshing draught from his own wellspring. He opened as chance ordered it, and his eyes fell on the following passage: "The true American formula was well phrased by the late Samuel Patch, the Western Empedocles, 'Some things can be done as well as others.' A homely utterance, but it has virtue to overthrow all dynasties and hierarchies. These were all built up on the Old-World dogma that some things can NOT be done as well as others." "There, now!" he said, talking to himself in his usual way, "is n't that good? It always seems to me that I find something to the point when I open that book. 'Some things can be done as well as others,' can they? Suppose I should try what I can do by visiting Miss Myrtle Hazard? I think I may say I am old and incombustible enough to be trusted. She does not seem to be a safe neighbor to very inflammable bodies?" Myrtle was sitting in the room long known as the Study, or the Library, when Master Byles Gridley called at The Poplars to see her. Miss Cynthia, who received him, led him to this apartment and left him alone with Myrtle. She welcomed him very cordially, but colored as she did so,--his visit was a surprise. She was at work on a piece of embroidery. Her first instinctive movement was to thrust it out of sight with the thought of concealment; but she checked this, and before the blush of detection had reached her cheek, the blush of ingenuous shame for her weakness had caught and passed it, and was in full possession. She sat with her worsted pattern held bravely in sight, and her cheek as bright as its liveliest crimson. "Miss Cynthia has let me in upon you," he said, "or I should not have ventured to disturb you in this way. A work of art, is it, Miss Myrtle Hazard?" "Only a pair of slippers, Mr. Gridley,--for my pastor." "Oh! oh! That is well. A good old man. I have a great regard for the Rev. Eliphalet Pemberton. I wish all ministers were as good and simple and pure-hearted as the Rev. Eliphalet Pemberton. And I wish all the young people thought as much about their elders as you do, Miss Myrtle Hazard. We that are old love little acts of kindness. You gave me more pleasure than you knew of, my dear, when you worked that handsome cushion for me. The old minister will be greatly pleased,--poor old man!" "But, Mr. Gridley, I must not let you think these are for Father Pemberton. They are for--Mr. Stoker." "The Rev. Joseph Bellamy Stoker! He is not an old man, the Rev. Joseph Bellamy Stoker. He may perhaps be a widower before a great while.--Does he know that you are working those slippers for him?" "Dear me! no, Mr. Gridley. I meant them for a surprise to him. He has been so kind to me, and understands me so much better than I thought anybody did. He is so different from what I thought; he makes religion so perfectly simple, it seems as if everybody would agree with him, if they could only hear him talk." "Greatly interested in the souls of his people, is n't he?" "Too much, almost, I am afraid. He says he has been too hard in his sermons sometimes, but it was for fear he should not impress his hearers enough." "Don't you think he worries himself about the souls of young women rather more than for those of old ones, Myrtle?" There was something in the tone of this question that helped its slightly sarcastic expression. Myrtle's jealousy for her minister's sincerity was roused. "How can you ask that, Mr. Gridley? I am sure I wish you or anybody could have heard him talk as I have. There is no age in souls, he says; and I am sure that it would do anybody good to hear him, old or young." "No age in souls,--no age in souls. Souls of forty as young as souls of fifteen; that 's it." Master Gridley did not say this loud. But he did speak as follows: "I am glad to hear what you say of the Rev. Joseph Bellamy Stoker's love of being useful to people of all ages. You have had comfort in his companionship, and there are others who might be very glad to profit by it. I know a very excellent person who has had trials, and is greatly interested in religious conversation. Do you think he would be willing to let this friend of mine share in the privileges of spiritual intercourse which you enjoy?" There was but one answer possible. Of course he would. "I hope it is so, my dear young lady. But listen to me one moment. I love you, my dear child, do you know, as if I were your own--grandfather." (There was moral heroism in that word.) "I love you as if you were of my own blood; and so long as you trust me, and suffer me, I mean to keep watch against all dangers that threaten you in mind, body, or estate. You may wonder at me, you may sometimes doubt me; but until you say you distrust me, when any trouble comes near you, you will find me there. Now, my dear child, you ought to know that the Rev. Joseph Bellamy Stoker has the reputation of being too fond of prosecuting religious inquiries with young and handsome women." Myrtle's eyes fell,--a new suspicion seemed to have suggested itself. "He wanted to get up a spiritual intimacy with our Susan Posey,--a very pretty girl, as you know." Myrtle tossed her head almost imperceptibly, and bit her lip. "I suppose there are a dozen young people that have been talked about with him. He preaches cruel sermons in his pulpit, cruel as death, and cold-blooded enough to freeze any mother's blood if nature did not tell her he lied, and then smooths it all over with the first good-looking young woman he can get to listen to him." Myrtle had dropped the slipper she was working on. "Tell me, my dear, would you be willing to give up meeting this man alone, and gratify my friend, and avoid all occasion of reproach?" "Of course I would," said Myrtle, her eyes flashing, for her doubts, her shame, her pride, were all excited. "Who is your friend, Mr. Gridley?" "An excellent woman,--Mrs. Hopkins. You know her, Gifted Hopkins's mother, with whom I am residing. Shall the minister be given to understand that you will see him hereafter in her company?" Myrtle came pretty near a turn of her old nervous perturbations. "As you say," she answered. "Is there nobody that I can trust, or is everybody hunting me like a bird?" She hid her face in her hands. "You can trust me, my dear," said Byles Gridley. "Take your needle, my child, and work at your pattern,--it will come out a rose by and by. Life is like that, Myrtle, one stitch at a time, taken patiently, and the pattern will come out all right like the embroidery. You can trust me. Good-by, my dear." "Let her finish the slippers," the old man said to himself as he trudged home, "and make 'em big enough for Father Pemberton. He shall have his feet in 'em yet, or my name is n't Byles Gridley!" _ |
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