Sunny Slopes Part 3

"Baby Con."

When Carol read that letter she cried, and rubbed her face against her husband's shoulder,--regardless of the dollar powder on his black coat.

"A teeny bit for father," she explained, "for all his girls are gone.

And a little bit for Fairy, but she has Gene. And quite a lot for Larkie, but she has Jim and Violet." And then, clasping her arm about his shoulders, which, despite her teasing remonstrance, he allowed to droop a little, she cried exultantly: "But not one bit for me, for I have you, and Connie is a poor, poverty-stricken, wretched little waif, with nothing in the world worth having, only she doesn't know it yet."

CHAPTER IV

A WOMAN IN THE CHURCH

And there was a woman in the church.

There always is,--one who stands apart, distinct, different,--in the community but not with it, in the church but not of it.

The woman in David's church was of a languorous, sumptuous type, built on generous proportions, with a ma.s.s of dark hair waving low on her forehead, with dark, straight-gazing, deep-searching eyes, the kind that impel and hold all truanting glances. She was slow in movement, suggesting a beautiful and commendable laziness. In public she talked very little, laughing never, but often smiling,--a curious smile that curved one corner of her lip and drew down the tip of one eye. She had been married, but no one knew anything about her husband. She was a member of the church, attended with most scrupulous regularity, a.s.sisted generously in a financial way, was on good terms with every one, and had not one friend in the congregation. The women were afraid of her. So were the men. But for different reasons.

Those who would ask questions of her, ran directly against the concrete wall of the crooked smile, and turned away abashed, unsatisfied.

Carol was very shy with her. She was not used to the type. There had been women in her father's churches, but they had been of different kinds. Mrs. Waldemar's straight-staring eyes embarra.s.sed her. She listened silently when the other women talked of her, half admiringly, half sneeringly, and she grew more timid. She watched her fascinated in church, on the street, whenever they were thrown together. But one deep look from the dark eyes set her a-flush and rendered her tongue-tied.

Mrs. Waldemar had paid scant attention to David before the advent of Carol, except to follow his movements with her eyes in a way of which he could not remain unconscious. But when Carol came, entered the demon of mischief. Carol was young, Mrs. Waldemar was forty. Carol was lovely, Mrs. Waldemar was only unusual. Carol was frank as the sunshine, Mrs. Waldemar was mysterious. What woman on earth but might wonder if the devoted groom were immune to luring eyes, and if that lovely bride were jealous?

So she talked to him after church. She called him on the telephone for directions in the Bible study she was taking up. She lounged in her hammock as he returned home from pastoral calls, and stopped him for little chats. David was her pastor, she was one of his flock.

But Carol screwed up her face before the mirror and frowned.

"David," she said to herself, when a glance from her window revealed David leaning over Mrs. Waldemar's hammock half a block away, doubtless in the scriptural act of explaining an intricate pa.s.sage of Revelation to the dark-eyed sheep,--"David is as good as an angel, and as innocent as a baby. Two very good traits of course, but dangerous, tre-men-dous-ly dangerous. Goodness and innocence make men wax in women's hands." Carol, for all her youth, had acquired considerable shrewdness in her life-time acquaintance with the intricacies of parsonage life.

She looked from her window again. "There's the--the--the dark-eyed Jezebel." She glanced fearfully about, to see if David might be near enough to hear the word. What on earth would he think of the manse lady calling one of his sheep a Jezebel? "Well, David," she said to herself decidedly, "G.o.d gave you a wife for some purpose, and I'm slick if I haven't much brains." And she shook a slender fist at her image in the mirror and went back to setting the table.

David was talkative that evening. "You haven't seen much of Mrs.

Waldemar, have you, dear? People here don't think much Of her. She is very advanced,--too advanced, of course. But she is very broad, and kind. She is well educated, too, and for one who has had no training, she grasps Bible truths in a most remarkable way. She has never had the proper guidance, that's the worst of it. With a little wise direction she will be a great addition to our church and a big help in many ways."

Carol lowered her lashes reflectively. She was wondering how much of this "wise direction" was going to fall to her precious David?

"I imagine our women are a little jealous of her, and that blinds them to her many fine qualities."

Carol agreed, with a certain lack of enthusiasm, and David continued with evident relish.

"Some of her ideas are dangerous, but when she is shown the weakness of her position she will change. She is not one of that narrow school who holds to a fallacy just because she accepted it in the beginning. The elders objected to her teaching a cla.s.s in Sunday-school because they claimed her opinions would prove menacing to the young and uninformed.

And it is true. She is dangerous company for the young right now. But she is starting out along better lines and I think will be a different woman."

"Dangerous for the young." The words repeated themselves in Carol's mind. "Dangerous for the young." Carol was young herself. "Dangerous for the young."

The next afternoon, Carol arrayed herself in her most girlishly charming gown, and with a smile on her lips, and trepidation in her heart, she marched off to call on her Jezebel. The Jezebel was surprised, no doubt of that. And she was pleased. Every one liked Carol,--even Jezebels. And Mrs. Waldemar was very much alone. However much a woman may revel in the admiration of men, there are times when she craves the confidence of at least one woman. Mrs. Waldemar led Carol up-stairs to a most seductively attractive little sitting-room, and Carol sat at her feet, as it were, for two full hours.

Then she tripped away home, more than ever aware of the wonderful charm of Mrs. Waldemar, but thanking G.o.d she was young.

When David came in to dinner, a radiant Carol awaited him. In the ruffly white dress, with its baby blue ribbons, and with a wide band of the same color in her hair, and tiny curls cl.u.s.tering about her pink ears, she was a very infant of a minister's wife.

David took her in his arms appreciatively. "You little baby," he said adoringly, "you look younger every day. Will you ever grow up? A minister's wife! You look more like a little girl's baby doll."

Carol giggled, and rumpled up his hair; When she took her place at the table she artfully snuggled low in her chair, peeping roguishly at him from behind the wedding-present coffee urn.

"David," she began, as soon as he finished the blessing, "I've been thinking all day of what you said about Mrs. Waldemar, and I've been ashamed of myself. I really have avoided her. She is so old, and clever, and I am such a goose, and people said things about her, and--but after last night I was ashamed. So to-day I went to see her, all alone by myself, without a gun or anything to protect me."

David laughed, nodding at her approvingly. "Good for you, Carol," he cried in approbation. "That was fine. How did you get along?"

"Just grand. And isn't she interesting? And so kind. I believe she likes me. She kept me a long time and made me a cup of tea, and begged me to come again. She nearly hypnotized me, I am really infatuated with her. Oh, we had a lovely time. She is different from us, but it does us good to mix with other kinds, don't you think so? I believe she did me good. I feel very emanc.i.p.ated to-night."

Carol tossed her blue-ribboned, curly head, and the warm approval in David's eyes cooled a little.

"What did she have to say?" he asked curiously.

"Oh, she talked a lot about being broad, and generous, and not allowing environment to dwarf one. She thinks it is a shame for a--a--girl of my--well, she called it my 'divine sparkle,' and she said it was a compliment,--anyhow, she said it was a shame I should be confined to a little half-souled bunch of Presbyterians in the Heights. She has a lot of friends down-town, advanced thinkers, she calls them,--a poet, and some authors, and artists, and musicians,--folks like that. They have informal meetings every week or so, and she is going to take me.

She says I will enjoy them and that they will adore me."

Carol's voice swelled with triumph, and David's approval turned to ice.

"She must have liked me or she wouldn't have been so friendly. She laughed at the Heights,--she called it a 'little, money-saving, heart-squeezing, church-bound neighborhood.' She said I must study new thoughts and read the new poetry, and run out with her to grip souls with real people now and then, to keep my star from tarnishing. I didn't understand all she said, but it sounded irresistible. Oh, she was lovely to me."

"She shouldn't have talked to you like that," protested David quickly.

"She is not fair to our people. She can not understand them because they live sweet, simple lives where home and church are throned. New thought is not necessary to them because they are full of the old, old thought of training their babies, and keeping their homes, and worshiping G.o.d. And I know the kind of people she meets down-town,--a sort of high-cla.s.s Bohemia where everybody flirts with everybody else in the name of art. You wouldn't care for it."

Carol adroitly changed the subject, and David said no more.

The next day, quite accidentally, she met Mrs. Waldemar on the corner and they had a soda together at the drug store. That night after prayer-meeting David had to tarry for a deacons' meeting, and Carol and Mrs. Waldemar sauntered off alone, arm in arm, and waited in Mrs.

Waldemar's hammock until David appeared.

And David did not see anything wonderful in the dark, deep eyes at all,--they looked downright wicked to him. He took Carol away hurriedly, and questioned her feverishly to find out if Mrs. Waldemar had put any fresh nonsense into her pretty little head.

Day after day pa.s.sed by and David began going around the block to avoid Mrs. Waldemar's hammock. Her advanced thoughts, expressed to him, old and settled and quite mature, were only amusing. But when she poured the vials of her emanc.i.p.ation on little, innocent, trusting Carol,--it was--well, David called it "pure down meanness." She was trying to make his wife dissatisfied with her environment, with her life, with her very husband. David's kindly heart swelled with unaccustomed fury.

Carol always a.s.sured him that she didn't believe the things Mrs.

Waldemar said,--it was interesting, that was all, and curious, and gave her new things to think about. And minister's families must be broad enough to make Christian allowance for all.

But, curiously enough, she grew genuinely fond of Mrs. Waldemar. And Mrs. Waldemar, in grat.i.tude for the girlish affection of the little manse lady, left David alone. But one day she took Carol's dimpled chin in her hand, and turned the face up that she might look directly into the young blue eyes.

"Carol," she said, smiling, "you are a girlie, girlie wife, with dimples and curls and all the baby tricks, but you're a pretty clever little lady at that. You were not going to let your darling old David get into trouble, were you? And quite right, my dear, quite right.

And between you and me, I like you far, far better than your husband."

She smiled the crooked smile and pinched Carol's crimson cheek. "The only way to keep hubby out of danger is to tackle it yourself, isn't it? Oh, don't blush,--I like you all the better for your little trick."