XIII.
In the latter part of the summer of 1826,—a reasonable time having now elapsed since the death of poor Rachel,—the gossips of Ashfield began to discuss the lonely condition of their pastor, in connection with any desirable or feasible amendment of it. The sin of such gossip—if it be a sin—is one that all the preaching in the world will never extirpate from country towns, where the range of talk is by the necessity of the case exceedingly limited. In the city, curiosity has an omnivorous maw by reason of position, and finds such variety to feed upon that it is rarely—except in the case of great political or public scandal—personal in its attentions; and what we too freely reckon a perverted and impertinent country taste is but an ordinary appetite of humanity, which, by the limitation of its feeding-ground, seems to attach itself perversely to private relations.
There were some invidious persons in the town who had remarked that Miss Almira Tourtelot had brought quite a new fervor to her devotional exercises in the parish within the last year, as well as a new set of ribbons to her hat; and two maiden ladies opposite, of distinguished pretensions and long experience of life, had observed that the young Reuben, on his passage back and forth from the Elderkins, had sometimes been decoyed within the Tourtelot yard, and presented by the admiring Dame Tourtelot with fresh doughnuts. The elderly maiden ladies were perhaps uncharitable in their conclusions; yet it is altogether probable that the Deacon and his wife may have considered, in the intimacy of their fireside talk, the possibility of some time claiming the minister as a son-in-law. Questions like this are discussed in a great many families even now.
Dame Tourtelot had crowned with success all her schemes in life, save one. Almira, her daughter, now verging upon her thirty-second year, had long been upon the anxious-seat as regarded matrimony; and with a sentimental turn that incited much reading of Cowper and Montgomery and (if it must be told) "Thaddeus of Warsaw," the poor girl united a sickly, in-door look, and a peaked countenance, which had not attracted wooers. The wonderful executive capacity of the mother had unfortunately debarred her from any active interest in the household; and though the Tourtelots had actually been at the expense of providing a piano for Almira, (the only one in Ashfield,)—upon which the poor girl thrummed, thinking of "Thaddeus," and, we trust, of better things,—this had not won a roseate hue to her face, or quickened in any perceptible degree the alacrity of her admirers.
Upon a certain night of later October, after Almira has retired, and when the Tourtelots are seated by the little fire, which the autumn chills have rendered necessary, and into the embers of which the Deacon has cautiously thrust the leg of one of the fire-dogs, preparatory to a modest mug of flip, (with which, by his wife's permission, he occasionally indulges himself,) the good dame calls out to her husband, who is dozing in his chair,—
"Tourtelot!"
But she is not loud enough.
"Tourtelot! you're asleep!"
"No," says the Deacon, rousing himself,—"only thinkin'."
"What are you thinkin' of, Tourtelot?"
"Thinkin'—thinkin'," says the Deacon, rasped by the dame's sharpness into sudden mental effort,—"thinkin', Huldy, if it isn't about time to butcher: we butchered last year nigh upon the twentieth."
"Nonsense!" says the dame; "what about the parson?"
"The parson? Oh! Why, the parson'll take a side and two hams."
"Nonsense!" says the dame, with a great voice; "you're asleep, Tourtelot. Is the parson goin' to marry, or isn't he? that's what I want to know"; and she rethreads her needle.
(She can do it by candle-light at fifty-five, that woman!)
"Oh, marry!" replies the Deacon, rousing himself more thoroughly,—"waäl, I don't see no signs, Huldy. If he doos mean to, he's sly about it; don't you think so, Huldy?"
The dame, who is intent upon her sewing again,—she is never without her work, that woman!—does not deign a reply.
The Deacon, after lifting the fire-dog, blowing off the ashes, and holding it to his face to try the heat, says,—
"I guess Almiry ha'n't much of a chance."
"What's the use of your guessin'?" says the dame; "better mind your flip."
Which the Deacon accordingly does, stirring it in a mild manner, until the dame breaks out upon him again explosively:—
"Tourtelot, you men of the parish ought to talk to the parson; it a'n't right for things to go on this way. That boy Reuben is growin' up wild; he wants a woman in the house to look arter him. Besides, a minister ought to have a wife; it a'n't decent to have the house empty, and only Esther there. Women want to feel they can drop in at the parsonage for a chat, or to take tea. But who's to serve tea, I want to know? Who's to mind Reuben in meetin'? He broke the cover off the best hymn-book in the parson's pew last Sunday. Who's to prevent him a-breakin' all the hymn-books that belong to the parish? You men ought to speak to the parson; and, Tourtelot, if the others won't do it, you must."
The Deacon was fairly awake now. He pulled at his whiskers deprecatingly. Yet he clearly foresaw that the emergency was one to be met; the manner of Dame Tourtelot left no room for doubt; and he was casting about for such Scriptural injunctions as might be made available, when the dame interrupted his reflections in more amiable humor,—
"It isn't Almiry, Samuel, I think of, but Mr. Johns and the good of the parish. I really don't know if Almiry would fancy the parson; the girl is a good deal taken up with her pianny and books; but there's the Hapgoods, opposite; there's Joanny Meacham"——
"You'll never make that do, Huldy," said the Deacon, stirring his flip composedly; "they're nigh on as old as parson."
"Never you mind, Tourtelot," said the dame, sharply; "only you hint to the parson that they're good, pious women, all of them, and would make proper ministers' wives. Do you think I don't know what a man is, Tourtelot? Humph!" And she threads her needle again.
The Deacon was apt to keep in mind his wife's advices, whatever he might do with Scripture quotations. So when he called at the parsonage, a few days after,—ostensibly to learn how the minister would like his pork cut,—it happened that little Reuben came bounding in, and that the Deacon gave him a fatherly pat upon the shoulder.
"Likely boy you've got here, Mr. Johns,—likely boy. But, Parson, don't you think he must feel a kind o' hankerin' arter somebody to be motherly to him? I 'most wonder that you don't feel that way yourself, Mr. Johns."
"God comforts the mourners," said the clergyman, seriously.
"No doubt, no doubt, Parson; but He sometimes provides comforts ag'in which we shet our eyes. You won't think hard o' me, Parson, but I've heerd say about the village that Miss Meacham or one of the Miss Hapgoods would make an excellent wife for the minister."
The parson is suddenly very grave.
"Don't repeat such idle gossip, Deacon. I'm married to my work. The Gospel is my bride now."
"And a very good one it is, Parson. But don't you think that a godly woman for helpmeet would make the work more effectooal? Miss Meacham is a pattern of a person in the Sunday school. The women of the parish would rather like to find the doors of the parsonage openin' for 'em ag'in."
"That is to be thought of certainly," said the minister, musingly.
"You won't think hard o' me, Mr. Johns, for droppin' a word about this matter?" says the Deacon, rising to leave. "And while I think on 't, Parson, I see the sill under the no'theast corner o' the meetin'-house has a little settle to it. I've jest been cuttin' a few sticks o' good smart chestnut timber; and if the Committee thinks best, I could haul down one or two on 'em for repairs. It won't cost nigh as much as pine lumber, and it's every bit as good."
Even Dame Tourtelot would have been satisfied with the politic way of the Deacon, both as regarded the wife and the prospective bargain. The next evening the good woman invited the clergyman—begging him "not to forget the dear little boy"—to tea.
This was by no means the first hint which the minister had had of the tendency of village gossip. The Tew partners, with whom he had fallen upon very easy terms of familiarity,—both by reason of frequent visits at their little shop, and by reason of their steady attendance upon his ministrations,—often dropped hints of the smallness of the good man's grocery account, and insidious hopes that it might be doubled in size at some day not far off.
Squire Elderkin, too, in his bluff, hearty way, had occasionally complimented the clergyman upon the increased attendance latterly of ladies of a certain age, and had drawn his attention particularly to the ardent zeal of a buxom, middle-aged widow, who lived upon the skirts of the town, and was "the owner," he said, "of as pretty a piece of property as lay in the county."
"Have you any knack at farming, Mr. Johns?" continued he, playfully.
"Farming? why?" says the innocent parson, in a maze.
"Because I am of opinion, Mr. Johns, that the widow's little property might be rented by you, under conditions of joint occupancy, on very easy terms."
Such badinage was so warded off by the ponderous gravity which the parson habitually wore, that men like Elderkin loved occasionally to launch a quiet joke at him, for the pleasure of watching the rebound.
When, however, the wide-spread gossip of the town had taken the shape (as in the talk of Deacon Tourtelot) of an incentive to duty, the grave clergyman gave to it his undivided and prayerful attention. It was over-true that the boy Reuben was running wild. No lad in Ashfield, of his years, could match him in mischief. There was surely need of womanly direction and remonstrance. It was eminently proper, too, that the parsonage, so long closed, should be opened freely to all his flock; and the truth was so plain, he wondered it could have escaped him so long. Duty required that his home should have an established mistress; and a mistress he forthwith determined it should have.
Within three weeks from the day of the tea-drinking with the Tourtelots, the minister suggested certain changes in the long-deserted chamber which should bring it into more habitable condition. He hinted to his man Larkin that an additional fire might probably be needed in the house during the latter part of winter; and before January had gone out, he had most agreeably surprised the delighted and curious Tew partners with a very large addition to his usual orders,—embracing certain condiments in the way of spices, dried fruits, and cordials, which had for a long time been foreign to the larder of the parsonage.
Such indications, duly commented on, as they were most zealously, could not fail to excite a great buzz of talk and of curiosity throughout the town.
"I knew it," says Mrs. Tew, authoritatively, setting back her spectacles from her postal duties;—"these 'ere grave widowers are allers the first to pop off, and git married."
"Tourtelot!" said the dame, on a January night, when the evidence had come in overwhelmingly,—"Tourtelot! what does it all mean?"
"D'n' know," says the Deacon, stirring his flip,—"d'n' know. It's my opinion the parson has his sly humors about him."
"Do you think it's true, Samuel?"
"Waäl, Huldy,—I du."
"Tourtelot! finish your flip, and go to bed; it's past ten."
And the Deacon went.