"The blacksmith?" I asked, a good deal surprised. "I'm afraid I don't see what you mean. I don't even know him."
The deacon grinned down on me from his height, and made me a characteristic retort.
"He doesn't look as if he'd kept awake nights on that account."
The blacksmith's jolly round face and twinkling eyes as I had seen him on the street now and then came up before my mind, and I felt the full force of the deacon's irony. I told him that he was impertinent, and asked why he named Mr. Turner.
"Because," he answered, seriously, "what you want is for the folks that haven't any books at home and don't have a chance to read to get interested in the reading-room. If Cy Turner takes hold of it, he'll do more than anybody else in town could do to make it go among just those folks. He's shrewd and good-natured, and everybody that knows him likes him. He'll have all the boys in the reading-room if he has to take them there by the collar, and if he does they'll think it's fine."
I could see at once the wisdom of the deacon's idea. I asked how Tom and the blacksmith would work together, and was assured that Mr. Turner has a most unlimited admiration for Tom, so that the two would agree perfectly. I made up my mind on the spot, and decided to go at once to interview the blacksmith, from whose shop I could hear above the whirring of the mill the blows on the anvil. I had no time on the little way from the mill to the blacksmith shop to consider what I should say to Mr. Turner, and I passed the time in hoping there would be no men about. It made no difference; he was so straightforward and simple, so kindly and human, that I felt at ease with him from the first. He was luckily alone, so I walked in boldly as if I were in the habit of visiting the forge every day of my life. He looked surprised to see me, but not in the least disconcerted. The self-respecting coolness of a New England workingman is something most admirable. Mr. Turner was smutty and dressed in dirty clothes, leather apron and all, but his manners were as good as those of the best gentleman in the land. There is something noble in a country where a common workingman will meet you with no servility and without any self-consciousness. I liked Mr. Turner from the moment I saw his face and heard his voice, rich and cheery, and I was won by his merry eyes, which had all the time a twinkling suggestion of a smile ready to break out on the slightest occasion. I went straight to my errand, and nothing could have been better than the way in which he received my proposition. He had no false modesty, and no over-assurance. He evidently knew that he could do what was required, he was undisguisedly pleased to be asked, and he was troubled by no doubts about social proprieties or improprieties.
"I suppose Mr. Webbe will do most of what work there is to do," I said, "but he will be an easy person to work with on a committee, I should think."
"Yes, marm, he will," the blacksmith responded heartily. "There ain't a squarer fellow alive than Tom Webbe. Tom's been a bit wild, perhaps; but he's an awful good fellow just the same, if you know him. I'm pleased to be on the committee with him, Miss Privet; and I'll do my best. I think the boys'll do about as I want 'em to."
I had only to see Mr. Turner to understand why Deacon Daniel had chosen him. I think the committee—but "oh, good gracious mercy me," as the old woman in the story says, it just occurs to me that I have not said a word to Tom about the whole business!
September 28. It is strange that my only difficulty in arranging about the reading-room should come from Tom, on whom I had counted as a matter of course; but it is fortunate that I had assumed he would serve, for this is what made him consent. When I saw him to-day, and told him what I had done, he at first said he could not possibly have anything to do with the whole matter.