CHAPTER XV
BY WAY OF CONTRAST
"I wish't you could stay to supper!" said Mary Sands.
"I wish't I could!" said Calvin. "I want you to understand that right enough; and I guess you do!" he added, with a look that brought the color into Mary's wholesome brown cheek. "But they plead with me kind o' pitiful, and – honest, I'm sorry for them two women, Miss Hands. They don't seem to be real pop'lar with the neighbors – I don't know just how 'tis, but so 'tis, – and they kind o' look to me, you see. You understand how 'tis, don't you, Mary – I would say Miss Hands?"
"I expect I do, Mr. Parks!" said Mary gently, yet with some significance.
Calvin looked down at her, and his heart swelled. An immense wave of tenderness seemed to flow from him, enfolding the little woman as she stood there, so neat and trim in her blue cashmere dress, her pretty head bent, the light playing in the waves of her pretty hair.
"For two cents and a half," Calvin Parks said silently, "I'd pick you up and carry you off this minute of time. You're my woman, and don't you forget it!" Then he spoke aloud, and his voice sounded strange in his ears.
"You and the boys," he said, "are always askin' me for stories. If – if I should come and tell you a story some day – the very first day I had a right to – that the boys warn't goin' to hear, nor anybody else but just you – would you listen to it, Miss Hands?"
Mary's head bent still lower, and she examined the hem of her apron critically. "I expect I would, Mr. Parks!" she said softly.
But when Calvin had driven off, chirrupping joyfully to the brown horse, Mary's little brown hands came together with a clasp, and she looked anxiously after him.
"If they don't get you away from me!" she said. "Oh! my good, kind, – there! stupid dear, if they don't get you away from me!"
"Hossy," said Calvin; "do you feel good? Do you? Speak up!"
The brown horse shook his head as the whip cracked past his ear, and whinnied reproachfully.
"Sho!" said Calvin. "You don't mean that. I know it's a mite late, but we'll get there, and you're sure of a good supper, whatever I be. But we've had us a great day, little hossy! we've had us a great day. Them two poor old mis'able lobster-claws is j'ined together, and betwixt the two they'll make a pretty fair lobster, take and humor 'em, and kind of ease 'em along till they get used to each other again. And they ain't the only ones that's feelin' good, little hossy; no siree and the bob-cat's tail! You take them four good-lookin' legs of your'n round the Lord's earth, and if you find a happier man than little Calvin is to-night, I'll give you a straw bunnet for Easter. Put that in your – well, not exactly pipe and smoke it – say nose-bag and smell it! Gitty up, you little hossy!" He flourished the whip round the head of the brown horse, who, catching the holiday spirit, flung up his heels incontinent, and broke into a canter even as his master broke into song.
"Now Renzo had a feedle,
That's what Renzo had, tiddy hi!
'Twas humped up in the meedle,
So haul the bowline, haul!
He played a tune, and the old cow died,
And the skipper and crew jumped over the side,
And swum away on the slack of the tide,
So haul the bowline, haul!"
The moon came up over the great snow-fields, and the world from ghostly white flashed into silver and ebony. The "orbéd maiden" seemed to smile on Calvin Parks as he jogged along the white road; perhaps in all her sweep of vision she may have seen few things pleasanter than this middle-aged lover.
"Looks real friendly, don't she?" said Calvin. "And no wonder! Christmas night, and a prospect like this; it's what I call sightly! I wish't I had my little woman along to see it with me; don't you, hossy? What say? You speak up now, when I talk to you about a lady! Where's your manners?"
The whip cracked like a pistol shot, and the brown horse flung up his heels again from sheer good will, and whinnied his excuses.
"Now you're talkin'!" said Calvin Parks. "And you'd better, little hossy. I want you to understand right now that if you warn't the hossy you are – and if two-three other things were as they ain't – summer instead of winter, for one of 'em – it ain't ridin' I'd be takin' that little woman, no sir! I'd get her aboard the Mary Sands, and we'd go slippin' down along shore, coastwise, seein' the country slidin' past, and hear the water lip-lappin', and the wind singin' in the riggin,' – what? I tell you! there'd be a pair of vessels if ever the Lord made one and man the other.
"Sho! seein' in that paper that Cap'n Bates was leavin' the Mary and goin' aboard a tug has got me worked up, kind of. If it warn't that I had sworn off rovin' and rollin' for ever more – I tell you! Jerusalem! but I'd like to hear the Mary talkin' once more – never was a vessel had a pleasanter way of speakin' – there again they're alike, them two. Take her with all sails drawin', half a gale o' wind blowin', and if she don't sing, that schooner, then I never heard singin,' that's all. And even in a calm, just lying rollin' on a long swell, and she'll say 'Easy does it! easy does it! breeze up soon, and Mary knows it!' and the water lip-lappin', and the sails playin' 'Isick and Josh, Isick and Josh,' – great snakes! Gitty up, hossy, or I shall take the wrong turn and drive to Bath instead of Tinkham."
Spite of moonlight and good spirits, the way was long, and it was near nine o'clock when Calvin drove in at the Widow Marlin's gateway. He whistled, a cheerful and propitiatory note, as he drove past the house to the barn.
"Presume likely they'll be put out some at me bein' late," he said; "but you shall have your supper first, hossy, don't you be afeared! They can't no more than kill me, anyway, and I don't know as they'd find it specially easy to-night."
The house was ominously silent as Calvin entered. The kitchen was empty, and he opened the door of the sitting-room, but paused on the threshold. Miss Phrony Marlin was sitting in the corner, weeping ostentatiously, with loud and prolonged sniffs. Her mother, a little withered woman like crumpled parchment, cowered witch-like over the air-tight stove, and looked at Calvin and then at her daughter, but said nothing.
"Excuse me!" said Calvin, stepping back. "I'll go into the kitchen. I didn't know; no bad news, I hope, Mis' Marlin?"
"She's all broke up!" said the old woman.
"So I see. Anything special happened?"
"Oh! you cruel man!" moaned Miss Phrony from the corner.
"Who?" said Calvin. "Me? Now what a way to talk! What's the matter, Miss Phrony? What have I done? Why, I haven't been here since breakfast time."
"That's it!" said the widow. "She's ben lookin' for you all afternoon, and she had extry victuals cooked for you, and you never come."
"Now ain't that a sight!" said Calvin cheerily. "Why, I told you I'd most likely be late, don't you rec'lect I did? We've been a long ways to-day, hossy and me have. How about them victuals, now? I could eat a barn door, seem's though."
"How long was you at them Sillses?" demanded Miss Phrony, wiping her eyes elaborately. "You didn't keep them waitin', I'll be bound."
"Why, I took dinner with 'em," said Calvin, indulgently. "I told you I was goin' to, you know. Gorry! you wouldn't have wanted me here to dinner if you'd seen the way I ate. How was your chicken, old lady? He looked like a good one. I picked out the best nourished one I could find."
"I wish't those folks was dead, and you too, and me, and everybody!" broke out Miss Phrony suddenly.
"Sho!" said Calvin Parks. "The whole set out, eh? Now I am surprised at you. Just think what all them funerals would come to; why, we should have to call on the town, certin we should. Come now, Miss Phrony, cheer up! I'll go and get my own supper, if you'll tell me what to get."
"The Lord will provide!" piped up the old woman shrilly.
"I don't doubt it," said Calvin Parks. "I'll kind o' look round, though; I don't want to give no trouble."
"If you'll set down, Cap'n Parks," said Miss Phrony majestically, "I'll get your supper."
Once more wiping her eyes, she sailed out of the room. Calvin looked after her meditatively. "I didn't think of her scarin' up a tantrum," he said, "or mebbe I'd have hastened more. I dono, though. Christmas Day, appears as though a man had a right to his time, don't it? Not that I ain't sorry to have discumbobberated her, for I am. I'd like to see everybody well content to-night, same as I be."
"She says you're breakin' her heart!" said the old woman, her black eyes fixed on him.
"Sho! now what a way that is to talk! Why, s'pose I hadn't come home at all; s'pose I'd stopped to supper, as they asked me to; you'd have saved victuals then, don't you see? I wish't I had now!" he added reflectively. "I never thought of her cookin' anything special."
"Supper's ready!" sighed Miss Phrony from the doorway.
In the kitchen a cloth, not too clean, was laid, and on it, with much parade of knife and fork, appeared a very dry knuckle of ham, a plate of yellow soda biscuit, and a pallid and flabby pie. Spite of himself, Calvin's cheery face fell as he looked on this banquet; but he sat down, and attacked the ham-bone manfully.
"How are ye, old feller?" he said. "I certinly thought I'd seen the last of you, but you come of a long-lived stock, that's plain. Could I have a drop of tea, Miss Phrony? Seems' though something hot would help this spread on its downward way. Fire out? Well, never mind! I'll get along."
"I had the spasms come on so bad," said Miss Phrony, "along about eight o'clock, when I give you up, my stren'th went from me, and I couldn't heave the wood to keep the fire up. I had coffee for you, but it's cold. Would you like some?"
"I guess not!" said Calvin, recalling the coffee at breakfast. "I'll do first-rate. Well! did you try on your tippet, what? real becomin', was it?"
Miss Phrony's face softened, and she gave him a languishing glance – with one eye, the other trying to see what it was like, with little success.
"'Tis elegant!" she said. "'Tis the handsomest ever I saw. I've put it away – for the future!"
"Sho!" said Calvin. "You don't want to do that. You want to wear it to meetin' next Sunday, Miss Phrony. Any one oughtn't to wait too long to look handsome, you know, fear they mightn't get round to it."
"Oh! not next Sunday, Cap'n Parks!" cried Miss Phrony, with another languishing glance. "That is too suddin! The Sunday after, p'raps, if you will have it so."
"Just as you say!" said Calvin, struggling with a specially dry chip of ham. "The sooner the better, Miss Phrony, if things is as you said."
"Have some pie!" cried the lady with sudden tenderness. "Do! I made it o' purpose for you, Cap'n!"
"Did!" said Calvin, and he eyed the pie gravely. "Well, just a leetle portion, Miss Phrony! I made a hearty dinner, and – mince, is it, or – or what?" he added, after the first mouthful. "I don't seem to recognize the flavor."
"It's Pie-fillene!" said Miss Phrony complacently. "I got a sample package when I was over to the Corners, and I saved it for you."
"Now that was real thoughtful of you!" said Calvin.
"Do you like it?" asked the maiden coyly.
"It's consid'able different from mince!" said Calvin. "Yes, it is a remarkable pie," he added, after a second bite; "no two ways about that. I never tasted one like it. Do you s'pose I could have just a mite of butter on this biscuit, Miss Phrony?"
Miss Phrony assented, and went into the pantry. Then, with one swift, stealthy motion, Calvin Parks transferred the portion of pie from his plate to the stove, replaced the stove-cover noiselessly, and was in his seat and gazing placidly at his empty plate before Miss Phrony appeared with the butter.
"Why, you've eat your pie real speedy!" she cried joyfully.
"It's all gone!" said Calvin soberly. "Not a mite left. No – no thank you, not another morsel! but it certinly is a remarkable pie. Now if you'll excuse me, I'll go in and have a pipe with the old lady."
"So do!" said Miss Phrony graciously. "I'll be in as soon as I've done the dishes, Cap'n."
"Don't hasten!" said Calvin Parks earnestly.
Old Mrs. Marlin was still cowering over the stove, her fingers spread like a bird's claws.
"Did you like your supper, Cap'n?" she asked, as Calvin entered.
"That's what!" replied Calvin enigmatically.
"It's all dust and ashes!" said the old lady unexpectedly.
"Well!" said Calvin. "I dono as I'd go so fur as that, quite, but it was undeniable dry."
"Jesus'll kerry me through!" the widow went on, rocking herself back and forth. "Dust and ashes, and Jordan rollin' past, rollin' past!" Her eyes glittered, and her voice rose in a sing-song whine.
"Hold on there, old lady," said Calvin Parks. "Come out o' that now, and let's be sociable Christmas night. I dono as you'd think it right and proper to allow of me smokin', what?"
The glitter died out of the old lady's eyes; she stopped rocking, and cackled gleefully; this time-worn joke never failed to delight her. With eager, trembling fingers she brought out a cob pipe from a corner behind the stove, and handed it to Calvin, who filled it from his own pouch and returned it to her. Then he lighted his own pipe, and soon they were puffing in concert. In the pantry close by Miss Phrony was rattling dishes; they sounded like dry bones.
"There!" said Calvin comfortably. "Now you feel better, don't you, old lady?"
The old lady nodded like a Salem mandarin.
"Jordan ain't rollin' so fast now, is it?"
"Nothin' like!" said the old lady.
"Then, since we're all comfortable and peaceful," said Calvin, "I've half a mind to tell you something, old lady."
He paused and seemed to listen; his next words were spoken silently.
"What say? Oh, you go along! I tell you I've got to tell some one, or I shall bust. I can't fetch hossy into the settin'-room, can I? 'Tis betwixt sawdust and kindlin's with these two, but yet I like the old one best."
Then he spoke aloud. "Yes, ma'am! I reelly have – a half a mind to tell you something. Some time or other – not right away, you needn't go thinkin' that, but when I get round to it, you understand – I am thinkin' of – of changin' my condition."
The widow uttered an exclamation, and fixed her beady eyes on him eagerly. The rattling of dishes in the pantry stopped suddenly.
"Yes!" Calvin went on, musing over his pipe. "I've been a rover and a rambler all my life. Old Ma Sill used to say it, and it's true. When I was at sea I'd hanker for the shore, and sim'lar the other way round. Take last night, now – but no need to go into that. Fact is, it ain't only a woman needs a home of her own," he went on, half to himself. "A man needs it too; his own place and his own folks; yes, sir! And come to find them folks at long last, and find 'em better than what he thought the world contained, why, what I say is, it's a pity if he can't scare up a place. What say, old lady? Ain't that about the way it looked to you and Cap'n along back? You poor old dried up stockfish," he added to himself, "I s'pose you was young once, though no one would suspicion it to look at you."
"Dust and ashes!" said the old woman. "Dust and ashes! Jesus'll kerry me through."
"I shouldn't wonder!" said Calvin Parks. And just then Miss Phrony Marlin came in from the pantry with shining eyes.
CHAPTER XVI
TOIL AND TROUBLE
"Happy New Year!" said Calvin Parks. "Happy New Year, Mr. Cheeseman! Happy New Year, Lonzo! happy New Year, the whole concern!"
"Humph!" said Mr. Ivory Cheeseman.
"If this ain't a pretty day to start the new year with, then I never see one, that's all," Calvin went on. "Crisp and clear, everything cracklin' with frost. Hossy's got a white mustash on him like a general. How's trade, Mr. Cheeseman?"
"Humph!" said Mr. Cheeseman again.
Calvin looked at him. The old gentleman's alert cheerfulness was gone; his aspect was grim, and the glance that met Calvin's was stern enough.
"What's wrong, sir?" Calvin inquired solicitously. "Ain't you feelin' well? You don't seem like yourself."
"I ain't!" said Mr. Cheeseman briefly.
"I want to know!" said Calvin, with an inflection of sympathetic inquiry. "Is it anything you feel disposed to mention, Mr. Cheeseman, or do I intrude?"
"It's something I've got to mention!" said Mr. Cheeseman.
He looked at Calvin again, and meeting his glance of open wonder, his own softened as if in spite of himself.
"Step inside, Mr. Parks!" he said, gravely. "I guess we've got to have a little talk. Lonzo, you might run on home if you're a mind to; that's a good son!"
In the warm, cosy kitchen, where the little stove still glowed like a friendly demon, the old man took his customary seat, and Calvin Parks, his brown eyes very round and large, sat down beside him. There was a moment's silence; then —
"Friend Parks," said Mr. Cheeseman, "I've taken a great interest in you ever since you first come to my store. You've been a man I liked, and a man I trusted; and I've tried to help you when and how I could."
"I should say you had!" said Calvin warmly. "You've been the best friend ever I had, Mr. Cheeseman, except one, and I want you to understand that I appreciate it, sir."
"I've tried," Mr. Cheeseman repeated, "partly on the accounts just mentioned, and partly because I understood you was wishful to marry a lady that is well spoken of by all, and that you appeared to set store by. That's so, ain't it?"
"That's so!" said Calvin briefly.
"Well, now!" the old man continued. "Havin' so helped, and so understood, it ain't real pleasant to me to hear all round that you are goin' to marry another woman."
"What!" Calvin Parks sprang from his seat, and seemed to fill the little room. "Say that again! Me marry another woman? What do you mean, sir?"
"Easy there!" said the old man fretfully. "Don't set down in the butter-scotch; it's just behind ye. It's all over town that you are goin' to marry Phrony Marlin a week from Sunday."
He looked up, and after one glance at Calvin, rose hurriedly in his turn.
"There, friend Parks! there! don't say a word! I see by your face it ain't true, and I ask your pardon. Set down, son!"
But Calvin Parks still towered up among the rafters, and his brown eyes blazed down on the old candy-maker.
"It's a lie!" he said simply. "Don't tell me you believed it, Mr. Cheeseman; don't!"
The old man groaned. "I'm a woodenhead, friend Parks; a plumb, dum old woodenhead!" he said; "but I won't add another lie to that one. I did believe it, and I've been half sick about it all day. I won't say another word till you set down, except to ask your pardon again. I'm an old man, Calvin," he added, with a piteous quaver in his voice, "and I regard you as a son, sir!"
Calvin sat down instantly, and laid his hand on the old man's arm for a moment.
"That's all right, Mr. Cheeseman!" he said briefly but kindly. "We'll forget that part. Now let's get on to the rest on't."
Mr. Cheeseman drew a long breath that was almost a sob, and his frosty blue eyes were dim for a moment. He wiped them quietly with a blue cotton handkerchief.
"I thank you, sir!" he said. "Well, I found the whole street buzzin' with it yesterday. They said you gave her a fur tippet. How was that, friend Calvin?"
"I did!" Calvin's brown face flushed.
"I just plain fool did. She as good as asked me for it, Mr. Cheeseman, and what could I do? If ever I gredged money in my life 'twas that, and me turnin' every cent twice to make it go further. But when she went on about her brown keeters, and the doctor sayin' she must wrop her throat up, and if only she could have a fur tippet it might save her life – and goin' so fur as to name the special one she wanted in Hoskins's window – and Christmas time and all, and nobody seemin' to have any feelin' for them two forlorn creatur's – Mr. Cheeseman, if you're a woodenhead, I'm a sheep's-head, that's all there is to it. So that started the talk, did it? What in caniption makes folks want to talk I don't know!" he broke out. "Darn their hides!"
"That started it!" said Mr. Cheeseman; "and she has seen to it that the talk went on. She was in town all day yesterday, flyin' round like a hen with her head cut off – "
"She'd look a sight better with hers that way!" said Calvin sotto voce.
"Buyin' this and that, and givin' folks to understand 'twas her weddin' things. I don't know as she used them precise words, but I do know she said to Hoskins – she was in there gettin' some dress goods, and he told me himself – 'I'll take the blue,' she says, "for Cap'n Parks admires blue, and I have to dress to please him now!' she says."
Calvin Parks groaned. A vision rose before him of Mary Sands in her blue dress, with the sun shining on her hair.
"Then she went to Jinny Bascom's," the old man went on, "and bought her a bunnet. Where she got the money I don't know, nor Jinny didn't. I guess she nor the old woman ever spent more than fifty cents at a time in their lives before; but she got a ten dollar bunnet, no two ways about that; and she was a caution gettin' it, by all accounts. Jinny has always knowed Phrony; every one round about Cyrus knows them two and their goin's on. Lived mostly on grocery samples and borrowed garden truck till you come to board with 'em; and I don't believe they've fed you high enough to hurt you any, have they?"
"Well! I don't know as I've been in any real danger of apoplexy from over-eatin'," said Calvin slowly; "but I ain't made no complaint."
"I know you ain't!" said Mr. Cheeseman. "That's one thing has made folks anxious. You mustn't take it amiss, friend Calvin. You are well liked all round the neighborhood; and folks will talk about what interests them, sir, it's the natur' of human bein's so to do. Well, about this bunnet. Jinny showed her a quiet, decent article, suitable to her years and appearance; but she tossed her head up, and says she, 'I guess not!' she says. 'Show me a bridal bunnet, please, Miss Bascom!' Well, Jinny Bascom runs mostly to eyes and ears, any way of it, and you may suppose that was nuts to her. So she fetched out a white bunnet, and says, 'You goin' to be married, Phrony?' Phrony she tosses her head again, and simpers up. 'I ain't sayin' anything yet,' she says, 'nor yet I don't want it should be said till after a week from next Sunday; but if you should see me then in this bunnet, you can draw your own conclusions!' she says. Then she begun to turn her ridic'lous old head this way and that before the glass. 'Cap'n Parks likes a handsome bunnet!' she says. 'He wouldn't wish for me to wear any other;' and goes on like that till Jinny had all she could do to keep her face straight. Now you know, friend Calvin, that was pretty straight talk, and Jinny Bascom wasn't one to keep it to herself; so you can't wonder it got about, can you?"
"Not a mite!" said Calvin moodily.
"But you could wonder at my bein' taken in by it," Mr. Cheeseman went on, "and I wonder myself. But I was startled, you see, and took aback, and – well, that's all over. Now, what are you goin' to do about this, friend Parks?"
Calvin rose again, running his fingers through his thick brown hair as he did so, and seeming to draw himself up to a portentous height.
"I – don't – know, Mr. Cheeseman!" he said slowly. "I've got to study over it a bit. I can't say right away just what I shall do."
"You won't – " Mr. Cheeseman began; but broke off suddenly, and looked anxiously at Calvin.
"Won't what? Marry Phrony Marlin? I will not! You may lay out your stock on that. I think I'll be goin' now, Mr. Cheeseman. That my butter-scotch? I'll take it right along, if you say so."
Mr. Cheeseman rose, and began packing the butter-scotch, glancing anxiously now and then at Calvin, who stood lost in thought, his hand still in his brown locks.
"I'll stop the talk in the street, Calvin," he said solicitously. "That I can do, and will before an hour's over. But isn't there something else I can do? I'd take it as a kindness if you'd let me help you, any way, shape or manner that you can think of."
"I guess not, sir!" said Calvin; "full as much obliged to you, though. I guess I've got to work this out for myself. I've got a long route to-day, all round by Tupham and the Corners, and I'll study it out as I go along. I've got to think of – of the woman I hope to marry, God bless her, and yet I've got to think of them two poor misfortunate creatur's that haven't a friend in the world as I know of except me. And as for the talk," he added, "well, – yes! if you'll stop that I'll be greatly obliged to you. But do it as easy as you can, Mr. Cheeseman! Just say it ain't so, you know, or she was jokin', or like that; let her off as easy as you can, poor creatur'. I don't think she's just right in her mind. Why, she can't be! There! now I'll be ramblin' along."
He started to leave the kitchen, but the old candy-maker caught his sleeve eagerly.
"Friend Calvin," he said, "how did the Christmas trade come out? You haven't told me a word."
"That so?" said Calvin. "This confounded rinktum put it out of both our heads, I expect. Why, I done first-rate, Mr. Cheeseman; first-rate! I've got five hundred dollars laid by now, sir; and as I reckon it out that's enough to start out on, with a good route, doin' well. What say?"
"Full enough!" said Mr. Cheeseman heartily. "I wish you joy, friend Calvin! Have you got it in the bank?"
Calvin's face fell slightly.
"Not yet," he said. "I only got my full sum made up last night; 'twarn't convenient for some to pay cash, you know, and to-day's bank holiday. But to-morrow mornin', Mr. Cheeseman, at nine o'clock, you look out and you'll see little Calvin on them bank steps over yonder, with his wallet in his hand; and then, Mr. Cheeseman, – then's my time!"
Mr. Cheeseman looked after him as he drove slowly away, his head bent in thought, a very different Calvin Parks from the one who had burst in so joyously an hour before with his New Year greeting.
"He's a good feller!" said the old gentleman. "I never see a better feller than that. I hope he'll come through all right; but there's just one thing troubles me, and yet I couldn't feel to say it to him. Where did Phrony Marlin get that money?