Scattergood Baines Part 61

"Was this here sister ever one of them actoresses?"

"Once, when I was sicker 'n usual ... it was awful costly. That time she was in a show, 'cause she got more money there. She got enough to pay for what I needed."

"Wear tights, sonny? Calc'late she wore tights?"

"Sure. She told me. She said to me it wasn't wearin' tights that done harm, and she could be jest as good in tights as wearin' a fur coat if her heart wasn't bad. That's what she said. Yes, sir, she said she wouldn't wear nothin' if it had to be done to git me medicine."

"Um!... What's this here sister's name?"

"Eva Hopkins."

Scattergood turned again toward the door. "Homer," he called, and Homer Locker entered, almost dragging Yvette by the arm.... The congregation heard one sound. It was a glad, childish cry. "Eva!... Eva!... Here I am."

Then it saw Yvette Hinchbrooke wrench free from Homer and run down the aisle to s.n.a.t.c.h the child from Scattergood's arms into her own.

Scattergood stood erect, looking from face to face in silence. It was a full minute before he spoke.

"There ..." he said. "You kin see the evil of pa.s.sin' jedgments. You kin see the evil of old coots traffickin' in rumors.... What you've heard the boy tell is all true.... That's the girl you was ready to tar and feather and run out of town.... Now what you think of yourselves?"

It was Deacon Pettybone, blinking a mist from his watery blue eyes, who arose to the moment. "Folks," he said, huskily, "I'm goin' to pa.s.s among you directly, carryin' the collection plate. 'Tain't fer furrin missions. It's fer that child yonder--to git them legs fixed.... And standin' here I want to acknowledge to sin in public. I been hard, and lackin' in charity. I been pa.s.sin' jedgments, contrairy to G.o.d's word. I been stiff-backed and obdurate, and I calc'late they's others a-sittin'

here that needs prayers for forgiveness.... Now I'm a-comin' with the plate. Them that hain't prepared to give to-night kin whisper to me what they'll give to-morrer--and have no fear of my forgittin' the amounts they pledge.... And I'm askin' forgiveness of the young woman and hopin'

she won't hold it ag'in' an old man--when she settles down here amongst us, like I hope she'll do."

"Like she's a-goin' to do," said Jason Locker, with a voice and air of pride. "Why, folks, that there gal is goin' to be my daughter-in-law!"

Scattergood patted Yvette on the back heavily, but jubilantly. "I've diskivered," he said, "that if you can't crack a hick'ry nut with a pad of b.u.t.ter, you better use a hammer.... Sometimes Coldriver's a nut needin' a sledge--but when it cracks it's full of meat."

CHAPTER XIV

HE TREATS AN ATTACK OF LIFE

Scattergood Baines lounged back in his armchair, reinforced by iron crosspieces to sustain his weight, and basked in the warmth from the Round Oak stove, heated to redness by the clean, dry maple within. He was drowsy. For the time he had ceased even to search for a scheme whereby he could rid his hardware stock of one dozen sixteen-pound sledge hammers acquired by him at a recent auction down in Tupper Falls.

His eyes were closed and his soul was at peace.

Somebody rattled the door k.n.o.b and then rapped on the door. This was so unusual a method of seeking entrance to a hardware store that Scattergood sat up abruptly, blinking.

"Wa-al," he said, tartly, "be you comin' in, or be you goin' to stand out there wagglin' that door k.n.o.b all day?"

"I'm coming in, Mr. Baines, as soon as I can contrive to open the door,"

replied a male voice, a voice that appeared incapable of expressing impatience; a gentle voice; the voice of a man who would dream dreams but perform few actions.

"Um!... It's you, hey? What d'you allus carry books under your arm for?

How d'you calculate to be able to open doors, with both hands full?"

The k.n.o.b turned at last, and Nahum Pound, long schoolmaster in the little district school on Hiper Hill, came in hesitatingly, clutching with each arm half a dozen books which struggled to escape with the ingenuity of inanimate objects. Nahum's hair was white; his face was vague--lovably vague.... A man of considerable, if confused, learning, he was.

"Well?" said Scattergood. "Got suthin' on to your mind? Commence unloadin' it before it busts your back."

"It's Sarah," said Nahum, helplessly.

"Um!... Sairy, eh? What's Sairy up to?"

"I don't seem to gather, Mr. Baines. She's--she's difficult. Something seems to be working in her head."

"Twenty-two, hain't she? Twenty-two?... Prob'ly a number of things a-workin' in her head. Got any special symptoms?"

"She--she wants to leave home, Mr. Baines." Nahum said this with mild amazement. His amazement would have been no greater--and not a whit less mild--had his daughter announced her intention to swim from New York to Liverpool, or to marry the chef of the Czar of Russia.

"Um!... Can't say's that's onnatural--so's to require callin' in a doctor. Live five mile from town, don't you? Nearest neighbor nigh on to a mile. Sairy gits to see company only about so often or not so seldom as that, eh?" Scattergood shut his eyes until there appeared at the corners of them a network of little wrinkles. "I'm a-goin' to astonish you, Nahum. This here hain't the first girl that ever come down with the complaint Sairy's got!... They's been sev'ral. Complaint's older 'n you or me.... Dum near as old as Deacon Pettybone. Uh-huh!... She's got a attack of life, Nahum, and the only cure for it ever discovered is to let her live.... Sairy's woke up out of childhood, Nahum. She's jest openin' her eyes. Perty soon she'll be stirrin' around brisk.... When you goin' to drive her in, Nahum? To-morrer?"

"You--you advise letting her do this thing?"

"When you goin' to fetch her in, Nahum?" Scattergood repeated.

"She said she was coming Monday."

"Um!... G'-by, Nahum." This was Scattergood's invariable phrase of dismissal, given to friend or enemy alike. It was characteristic of him that when he was through with a conversation he ended it--and left no doubt in anybody's mind that it _was_ ended. Nahum withdrew apologetically. Scattergood called after him, "Fetch her here--to me,"

he said, and, automatically, it seemed, reached for the laces of his shoes. A problem had been presented to him which required a deal of solving, and Scattergood could not concentrate with toes imprisoned in leather. He even removed the white woolen socks which Mandy, his wife, compelled him to wear in the winter season. Presently he was twiddling his pudgy toes and concentrating on Sarah Pound. He waggled his head.

"After livin' out there," he said to himself, "she'll think Coldriver's livin'--and so 'tis, so 'tis.... More sometimes 'n 'tis others.

Calculate this is like to be one of 'em...."

Scattergood was just thinking about dinner on Monday when Nahum Pound brought his daughter Sarah into the store. One glance at Sarah's face taught Scattergood that she was in suspicious, if not defiant, mood. If he had a doubt of the correctness of his observation, Sarah removed it efficiently.

"Scattergood Baines," she said, "if you think you're going to boss me like you do father, and everybody else in this town, you're mistaken. I won't have it.... Understand that, I won't have it."

Scattergood rubbed his chin and puffed out his fat cheeks, and smiled with deceiving mildness. "Sairy," he said, "you needn't to be scairt of my interferin' with you in your goin's and comin's. I'd sooner stick my hand into a kittle of b'ilin' pitch than to meddle with a young woman in your state of mind.... I hain't hankerin' to raise no blisters."

"I won't stay penned up 'way out there in the country another day. I've got a right to live. I've got a right to see folks and to go places, and--to--to live!"

"To be sure.... To be sure. Jest itchin' to kick the top bar off'n the pasture fence. Most certain you got a right to live, and n.o.body hain't goin' to hender you ... least of all me. But there's jest one observation I'd sort of like to let loose of, and that's this: Your life's a whole lot like one of your arms and legs--easy busted. To be sure, it kin be put in splints and mended up ag'in, but maybe you'll go limpy or knit crooked so's nothin' kin keep the busted place from showin'. Bearin' that in mind, if I was you, I wouldn't be too careless about scramblin' up into places where you was apt to git a fall.... I calc'late, Sairy, that it's better to miss the view than to fall out of the tree...."

"I'm going to see the view if I fall out of every tree I climb," Sarah said, hotly.

"Don't object if I find you a boardin' house?"

"I'm going to board with Grandma Penny that was--Mrs. s.p.a.ckles."

Scattergood nodded. "G'-by, Sairy.... G'-by, Nahum." He watched father and daughter leave the store with a twinkle in his eyes, not a twinkle of humor, but the twinkle that always came when his interest in life, always keen, was aroused to a point where it tingled. "Calc'late to be kep' busy--more 'n ordinary busy," he offered as an opinion to be digested by the Round Oak stove. Presently he added: "She's perty ...

and bein' perty is kind of a remarkable thing ... bein' perty and young.... Don't seem like G.o.d ought to hold folks accountable fer bein'

young, nor yet fer bein' good to look at ... but they's times when it seems like He does...." On his way back to the store after dinner, Scattergood stopped at the bank corner, hesitated a moment, and then mounted the stairs to the offices above. A door bearing the legend, "Robert Allen, Attorney at Law," admitted him to a large, bare office, such as one finds in such towns as Coldriver.

"Howdy, Bob?" said Scattergood.

"Good day, Mr. Baines," said the young man behind the desk, who had suddenly pretended to be very much occupied with important matters as his door opened.