Treasure Valley Part 18

"Ah'm willin' to take ye ony day, Weeliam. Ah'd like to see the wumman that'd get the upper hand o' me. Jist name yer bet, man."

"Hoots! toots!" cried Uncle Hughie in his stateliest manner. "Indeed, it is surely not making a bet on a lady you will be, whatever!"

"I'll tell ye!" cried Spectacle John, his eyes twinkling. "If you an'

the Dook gets to argifyin', or gets into any difference, an' she gets the best o' the bargain, you'll promise William and all of us here that you'll go back to church and tell the minister you was a darn fool for the way you acted."

Sandy McQuarry's bristling brows came together, "Ah'll take ye!" he cried, slapping his knee fiercely. "Ah'd be a fool onyway, if Ah let a wumman scare me the way you did, John. Ah, ha! Here's his reverence now, comin' to tell ye about Muskoky, very like. Ah'll jist be biddin'

ye a good-evenin'." He tramped down the steps as the tall form of the minister came into the ring of light.

"Fine night," remarked each of the company in turn.

"We would jist be talkin' about the play-net Mars a minute ago, indeed," said Uncle Hughie Cameron, striving to cover Sandy's retreat.

"Yes, yes," said the minister with a sigh. "Astronomy's a wonderful subject--wonderful. The more we learn of the Creator's works, the more we wonder at His greatness and goodness."

"Eh! eh! it will jist be fearsome, indeed!" cried Uncle Hughie. "How far, now, would you be saying the sun is from us, Silas--ninety--now what would it be?"

"Ninety-five million mile!" declared the astronomer impressively.

"There's a fine day's walk for ye!"

"Ninety-five million!" cried the blacksmith, astounded. "Are ye sure it's not feet ye mean, Si?" he asked hopefully.

"No--miles," was the inexorable answer. "Lord love ye, man! it's a good thing. If she was any nearer she'd burn us all to a frazzle!"

"Eh, now, ain't that a caution!" cried Jake Sawyer, with the air of one who has just had a narrow escape from destruction.

"Astronomy's a orful subject," continued Silas. "I sometimes wish I 'adn't meddled with the thing. It makes me feel like nothing--like a worm o' the dust."

"'When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers,'" quoted the minister, "'the moon and the stars which Thou hast ordained, what is man, that Thou art mindful of him or the son of man that Thou visitest him?'"

"That's it! that's jist it!" cried Silas. "The Psalmist knew! 'E must 'a' 'ad a telescope. D'ye think 'e 'ad?"

"Hoots!" cried Uncle Hughie. "How could the buddie? an' he would be livin' away back in the times when n.o.body even knew"--he added in a loud tone--"that the world was round." But Spectacle John had disappeared indoors, and the minister added:

"Yes, we have a great many advantages that the Psalmist never had, and the greatest is the knowledge that we need not be afraid. For He became flesh and dwelt among us, you know, Silas." A reverent silence fell over the little group.

At the farther end of the veranda a door led into the lamp-lit parlor.

It was open, and from it now burst the opening notes of a rousing chorus. In Elmbrook there were fashions in songs, just as there were in the sopranos' hats. The former varied, not with the season, but with the sentiments of the people. One winter the Methodists held revival meetings for two months in the schoolhouse, and for nearly a year after it was considered very worldly to sing anything but hymns.

The other extreme was reached one fall when Hank Winters came home for a visit from the States, and set all the village singing "c.o.o.n songs."

This spring, and during the past winter, the rousing, Salvation Army variety of hymn was greatly in vogue. The opening chorus for the concert was of this kind, a stirring sort of semi-religious song, called "The King's Highway." It was with this the chorus now burst forth into tumultuous harmony:

"_Wherever you may be, Whatever you may see, That would lead you into evil, Say you nay, say you nay, Be sure you take no heed, They're trying to mislead; Just keep along the middle Of the King's highway!_"

The verse was no extraordinary feat, but in the chorus the ba.s.s singers had a part calling for marvelous dexterity and tremendous speed. For, while the ladies sang leisurely, "Just keep along the middle of the King's Highway," the gentlemen were expected to get over about four times the s.p.a.ce in the same time. They had to repeat the self-same warning a half dozen times, with sundry advices and variations concerning the turning to the right of the King's Highway and the left of the King's Highway, so many, and so complicated, that they arrived at the end gasping for breath. Spectacle John warned the sopranos again and again to go slowly, so as to admit of their overworked followers getting in all their parts about the middle, left and right.

But Ella Anne Long was the real leader, and would wait for no man. She hastened along the King's Highway at such a pace that it was beyond the powers of human breath to keep up with her. Pete McQuarry declared that it kept a fellow puffing just to stay anywheres on the King's Highway, without bothering about the middle; and Davy Munn did not even attempt the feat, but sang the air an octave lower.

They were scampering through the song for the third time when there was a stir at the door, and a group of four entered: Elsie Cameron and her brother Malcolm, with the minister's daughter and--actually--the busy doctor himself. It was the first time Elsie had attended one of the musical gatherings since her return, but she took her old place as simply and naturally as though she had never left it. Malcolm went over to the corner where the husky young Englishman stood, alone and unheard, and gave him some a.s.sistance with the tenor, while the doctor joined the other young men, and sang ba.s.s like a native.

They weathered through "The King's Highway" again, and sang a temperance anthem, and several other choruses, and then they all sat around the room, on the red and green plush chairs, and took a rest while Ella Anne and her mother pa.s.sed around raspberry vinegar and layer-cake.

Spectacle John was just calling them all to order again for another chorus when the minister put his head in at the door. Marjorie was to get her hat, as they must be going in a moment, he announced, happily unconscious of the scorching glance from the region of the tenors, and would Elsie sing "Abide With Me" before he left?

The girl arose and went to the organ. Since her home-coming she had been regarded with some disapproval in Elmbrook social circles because of the promptness with which she answered an invitation to sing. It was considered much more genteel and modest to at first disclaim positively all musical ability, and to yield only after much importuning. Every one felt that, though Elsie had been away in the city, she ought to show a little backwardness.

"_Abide with me! fast falls the eventide, The darkness deepens. Lord, with me abide._"

She sang, as she always did, with her heart as well as her voice. The song hushed the gay chatter in the room; it pa.s.sed out to the group on the veranda, and their conversation ceased; it floated through the open windows and rang across the darkly luminous water of the pond. And there it reached the ear of a man with whom only despair and loss had been abiding, and who was fighting a losing battle with these dark companions. The sound of the old hymn, that had been his children's lullaby, arrested John McIntyre on the brink of self-destruction:

"Swift to its close ebbs out life's little day, Earth's joys grow dim, its glories pa.s.s away, Change and decay in all around I see, O Thou, who changest not, abide with me!"

A trembling weakness seized him. He shrank back against the heap of logs. He seemed to have no power against the imperative sweetness of that voice. It called him away, it called him up. He clutched the rough bark of a log, and stood listening till the song swept on to its triumphant ending:

"_Heaven's morning breaks and earth's vain shadows flee, In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me!_"

The last echo died away in the shadow of the willows. John McIntyre stood a moment, dazed by the glimpse into the depths to which his despair had brought him. He glanced down at the dark water and shuddered, then staggered weakly to his old place at the mill door, and sank in the sawdust. Something, not a prayer, but nearer it than anything he had uttered for years, burst from him--the name of his Maker, spoken unwittingly, in an abandon of weakness. "My G.o.d!" he whispered shakingly. The strength of desperation which had driven him on was gone, but his despair remained. And so he lay, spent and weak, in utter blackness of soul, not knowing that the prayer of the song had been answered, and that, though he knew Him not in the darkness, his Father was abiding with him still.

CHAPTER X

THE SECRET OF THE BLUE SILK GOWN

O love, can the tree lure the summer bird Again to the bough where it used to sing, When never a throat in the autumn is heard, And never the glint of a vagrant wing?

--ARTHUR STRINGER.

The autumn days came, and all the landscape within the range of Granny Long's telescope turned golden with its wealth of harvest. The apples dropped, rosy-cheeked, from the orchard trees, the corn and the pumpkins ripened in the garden. All day the binder sang in the yellow fields, and at night a great harvest moon hung alone in the violet heavens. As soon as the first blue haze of autumn settled over the ravine the mill closed, and the men scattered to work in the fields, or at threshing-bees, or went farther north to the winter lumber camps.

John McIntyre did not leave, as people had expected. He remained in his old shanty by the Drowned Lands, harvesting his little crop of potatoes, or laying up his stock of winter wood from the adjacent swamp. The village saw him only on the rare occasions when he came up to the flour-mill or store for provisions. But he did not live a solitary life, for the eldest Sawyer orphan had now become his chum and confidant, and would have gone down to visit him almost every evening, even if old Hughie Cameron had reversed proceedings and paid him to stay away.

When the silent, dark man was removed from the village, and there was no likelihood of encountering him on the street in the evening, Dr.

Gilbert Allen experienced a feeling of relief. Every time he met the man's disdainful gaze, the remembrance of his accusation returned, and with it a feeling of self-abas.e.m.e.nt. He longed to vindicate himself, to put it beyond the range of possibility that any man could say he had been dishonest. But that meant a great sacrifice, one that Gilbert was not yet prepared to make.

When the first chill of the waning year came the doctor had a new patient. All summer Miss Arabella Winters' health had been steadily failing. She never complained, nor did she seem to have any disease, but just pined quietly away. Susan scolded and petted and doctored her, and made her wear flannel on her chest, but all to no avail. Miss Arabella, in her gentle, un.o.btrusive fashion, grew steadily worse. She seemed to have lost not only the power, but the desire, to get better.

Elsie Cameron had long noted the change in her friend, and strove in every way to arouse her. One day she organized a nutting party down into Treasure Valley, a still, smoky autumn day, when the rainbow leaves floated down and rested lightly upon the earth with a fairy touch. The orphans came, of course, and they flew up and down the hill, gathering hazelnuts and red berries and scarlet leaves, while Miss Arabella strayed here and there, her arms full of purple asters, until the look of hopelessness left her eyes and her face took on a pretty pink flush. But the twins strayed away, and before they were found the amethyst mists of the autumn evening were filling the valley.

Miss Arabella took a severe cold, and the next day she went to bed.

Mrs. Winters scolded the whole picnic party, Arabella most of all; and having used all her medical skill upon her to no avail, she grew alarmed, and called in Dr. Allen.

He came to see the quiet, patient little woman nearly every day for a week, and at the end of that time was forced to confess that she was growing steadily worse, and that there was something wrong with her that quite baffled his skill.