Gold and Incense Part 2

"No, Jennifer; we must have it down among the subscriptions, and it ought really to head the list. I will call it _Anonymous_, you know."

"Oh, that's much too fine a name for Jennifer Petch. Call it '_Gold and Incense_.' I _do_ know what that do mean, if anybody else don't," and Jennifer laughed again.

And so it was entered, and so it was duly announced. Jennifer blushed and laughed so much when it was read that any suspicious person might have found out her secret after all. But no one dreamed that this was Jennifer's a.s.sumed name.

It was not long before her good friend met with Jennifer again.

"I can't get over that half-sovereign of yours, Jennifer," he began. "I am really quite curious to know how you managed it. You will tell me, won't you?"

"Well, I s'pose I must," said Jennifer shyly; "but I meant to keep it all to myself, you know. n.o.body knows about it but you."

"Well, then, I may know all, mayn't I?"

Little by little it all came out. And this was Jennifer's story:

"Well, it was the day after the meeting that I was singing to myself the words,--

"Kings shall fall down before Him, And gold and incense bring,"

when it seemed to me like as if I could see them coming like Solomon in all his glory, and laying down their gifts at His dear feet; but, there, you will be getting all my secret out of me. It must come, I s'pose.

Well, the tune and the words were sort of ringing in my head when I turned round out of the wind for to--to---- You mustn't be hard on me.

It was to take a _pinch of snuff_."

"Oh, Jennifer!"

"It was only a penn'orth a week, sir," she pleaded, "And it did seem to sharpen me up a bit out in the cold. Well, while I was taking it I laughed to myself. 'That's the nearest to _incense_ that I can think of,' I said. 'I will give that to the Lord.' And, bless you, sir, would you believe it? I got to turning round out of the wind to make believe I had it, and it did every bit so well.

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"The next Sat.u.r.day, instead of giving the penny to a neighbour to get the snuff into market, I put the penny into an old broken teapot, and put it on top of the dresser, and I said, 'There's a nest egg, then.'

Well, I quite longed for the next Sat.u.r.day to come, and then there was a penny more. And in three weeks there was a threepenny bit. I did think that was a prettier colour for the Lord, but, bless you, I liked the three pennies better.

"That tiny little threepenny bit in that great teapot! I was most ready to cry for it in there all by its lonely little self. I couldn't help thinking about it till it came to be almost like when I had to leave the baby home and couldn't think of anything else, and thought I heard it a-crying whenever so much as a lamb would bleat or a horniwink go crying overhead.[A]

[A] A horniwink is in that dialect a green plover or lapwing.

"My heart sort of went out to the poor little threepenny bit. 'You shall have company, my dear,' I said to myself, 'that you shall, before very long.'

"That night when I got home I was just going to get my cup o' tea, when it came to my mind, 'There's company for the poor little thing.' At first I tried to put away the thought, for I did dearly love my cup o'

tea. Coming home tired and wet and cold, it was wonderful how it used to cheer and refresh a body. So I tried to think of something else. But the more I tried the more I couldn't. At last I sat down by the bit of fire and had it out with myself before I went to bed.

"'You know,' I said to myself, 'a penny a week--what's that? Why, a whole year will only come to less than a crown piece. Gold and incense indeed, they are a long way off at that rate.' Then I got down the broken teapot and looked in. I had to turn it round and round before I could so much as see it. And when I did I was fair ashamed of myself.

'Poor little thing,' I said, 'and to think that you must wait three weeks for company! No, you shan't.'

"Well, I put it back again and then screwed up my courage to see what I could make believe for tea. At last I thought I would toast some crusties till they were nice and brown. Then I would pour the boiling water on them. 'The colour will be right enough,' I said, 'but what about the taste, I wonder? However, taste as they mind to, there's threepence a week!' So I went to bed, and that night I dreamed that the broken teapot was so full of sovereigns that I was quite frightened and woke all of a tremble.

"I dare say it didn't taste exactly right at the first going off. But very soon I came to like it just as well. And I really do believe, after all said and done, 'tis more strengthener and more nourishinger than the tea.

"So the next Sat.u.r.day, instead of asking a neighbour to bring home an ounce of tea, I put the threepenny bit in the broken teapot. And there was fourpence a week. And I changed it into a shilling; and then it grew into a half-crown; and last of all it came to _half a sovereign_.

"I was glad to have a bit of that colour. It was years since I had so much as seen one of them. 'Tis the only colour that is good enough for Him. And I haven't done yet, please G.o.d. In eight months' time there will be another, and that will make a whole sovereign. It isn't like doing the thing at all to do it by halves. That is what I have set my heart upon. That will be '_Gold and Incense--One Pound_.'"

Chapter IV

For days after hearing it her good friend could think of nothing but Jennifer's story. His own gifts to the new chapel and that of the others seemed poor and little beside her offering--it was the mite which was more than they all had given. He felt that he could not rest until he had found for her something better than the ill-paid toil in the fields.

As he rode on his way he chanced to see a notice announcing the sale of a coppice of some twenty acres, freehold. Here was the opportunity of serving Jennifer, and at once he made haste to avail himself of it. The bit of ground was bought, coppice and all. Then he made his way to her house.

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It was seldom that any one pa.s.sed her cottage, and when he saw it he was distressed and ashamed that he had not done anything for her before.

Jennifer had just got home, tired and wet and cold. He came into the cheerless place and sat down.

"I had no idea that your cottage was in such a wretched state, Jennifer; I wonder you could live in it," he began.

"Well, 'tis wonderful how comfortable we do get on in it, sir." And Jennifer spoke as cheerfully as ever. "I s'pose if it was better we should have to pay more, so we must set one thing against another, you know."

"Well, I am going to build you another--a new one; I have made up my mind to that. And look, Jennifer, you shall have it for your own as soon as I can get it up, and you can pay me for it."

"I daresay, sir," laughed Jennifer, and she wondered that her friend could seem to joke on such a subject.

"But I mean it," said he, "and, of course, I am going to put you in the way to do it."

"Thank you, sir," said Jennifer, quite unable to see any meaning in the promise. "You see, there's the Guardians, what will they say and all if I do go living in a fine new house?"

"The Guardians! Oh, you must go and tell them that you don't want any more of their money or their loaf either."

"But, sir," said Jennifer, trying to laugh, yet almost too bewildered to succeed, "half crowns and loaves of bread won't grow out of a new house any more than an old one, you know."

"Well, Jennifer, that is what I have come to see you about. Your boys are growing up quite big lads now. What are you going to do with them?

What are they--twelve or thirteen years old at least?"

"Just about, sir. I have given them so much head learning as I can. I suppose they must be going out for to do something; but there, 'tis terrible hard for to think about their going away."

"Oh, but I don't think they need go away, Jennifer. I have come to tell you that I have bought that piece of coppice over there. Now, what I have been thinking is this. You and your boys can cut it all down, and make up the f.a.ggots with the underwood, and sell it for what it will fetch. That shall go toward the new cottage. And when the land is cleared I will let it to you, and the boys can turn it into potato ground."

Poor Jennifer sat down without a word. She could not take it all in so suddenly and it bewildered her. Clinging to the old ways of her life, and satisfied with the simple round, she shrank from so large a venture, involving so many changes.

"Well, what do you say?" asked her friend, somewhat disappointed that she did not see all the advantages which were so plain to him.

"I don't know what to say, sir. 'Tis very kind of you. But----"

"But what, Jennifer?"

"I was going to say, if you don't mind, I should like one day more in the fields to think it all over. 'Tis a wonderful place for thinking about anything. And n.o.body but the heavenly Father to talk to."