Winning His Way

by Charles Carleton Coffin

CHAPTER VI.

PAUL'S FRIENDS.

For five months Paul had been leader of the choir, and so faithfully were his duties performed, so excellent his drill, and so good his taste and mature his judgment, so completely were the choir under his control, that the ministers from the surrounding parishes, when they exchanged with Rev. Mr. Surplice, said, "What glorious singing they have at New Hope!" It was so good, that people who never had been in the habit of attending church hired pews,—not that they cared to hear Mr. Surplice preach and pray, but it was worth while to hear Azalia Adams and Daphne Dare sing a quartette with Paul and Hans, and the whole choir joining in perfect time and in sweetest harmony.

Paul believed that a thing worth doing at all was worth doing well. His heart was in his work. It was a pleasure to sing. He loved music because it made him happy, and he felt also that he and Azalia and Daphne and all the choir were a power for good in the community to make men better. Farmer Harrow, who used to work at haying on Sunday, said it was worth a bushel of turnips any time to hear such sweet singing. So his hired man and horses had rest one day in seven, and he became a better man.

In the calm moonlight nights Paul often lay wide awake, hour after hour, listening with rapture to the sweet music which came to him from the distant woods, from the waterfall, from the old maple in front of the house, when the leaves, tinged with gorgeous hues, were breaking one by one from the twigs, and floating to the ground, from the crickets chirping the last lone songs of the dying year, and from the robins and sparrows still hovering around their summer haunts. It was sweet to think of the pleasant hours he had passed with Azalia and Daphne, and with all the choir; and then it was very pleasant to look into the future, and imagine what bliss there might be in store for him;—a better home for his mother in her declining years,—a better life for himself. He would be a good citizen, respected and beloved. He would be kind to all. He wished that all the world might be good and happy. When he became a man, he would try and make people good. If everybody was as good as Azalia, what a glorious world it would be! She was always good, always cheerful. She had a smile for everybody. Her life was as warm and sunny and golden as the October days, and as calm and peaceful as the moonlight streaming across his chamber. Sweet it was to think of her,—sweeter to see her; sweetest of all to stand by her side and unite his voice to hers, and feel in his soul the charm of her presence. In his dreams he sometimes heard her and sat by her side.

Sometimes, while thus lying awake, watching the stars as they went sailing down the western sky, his thoughts went beyond the present into the unseen future, whither his father and grandfather had gone. They sang when on earth, and he thought of them as singing in heaven. Sometimes he gazed so long and steadily toward the heavenly land, that his eyes became dim with tears, so sweet and yet so sad the sounds he seemed to hear,—so near and yet so far away that land.

So the days went by, and the calm and peaceful nights, bringing him to October,—the glorious harvest month.

And now suddenly people looked shyly at him. There were mysterious whisperings and averted faces. He met Squire Capias one morning on the street. "Good morning," said Paul; but the lawyer walked on without reply. He passed Miss Dobb's house. She sat by the front window, and glared at him savagely; and yet she seemed to smile, but her countenance was so thin, wrinkled, and sharp, and her eyes so fierce, her smile so fiendish, that it put him in mind of a picture he once saw in a horrible story-book, which told of a witch that carried off little children and ate them for breakfast. Paul thought that Miss Dobb would like to pick his bones. But he went on to his work, rejoicing that there were not many Miss Dobbs in the world.

While hard at it with his paint-brush, Mr. Ketchum entered. He was a tall, stout man, with black, bushy whiskers, and so strong that he could take a barrel of cider on his knees and drink out of the bunghole. He was a sheriff. The rowdies who fell into his hands said it was no use to try to resist Mr. Ketchum, for he once seized a stubborn fellow by the heels, and swung him round as he would a cat by the tail, till the fellow lost his breath and was frightened half out of his wits.