The Brimming Cup

by Dorothy Canfield Fisher

"Yes, he has!" Mr. Bayweather unexpectedly put in. "And he's not the only person he torments about it. Only yesterday when he came down to the rectory to see some old deeds, didn't he expatiate on that subject and succeed in spoiling the afternoon. I had never been forced to think so much about it in all my life. He made me very uncomfortable, very! What's the use of going miles out of your way, I say, out of the station to which it has pleased God to place us? I believe in leaving such insoluble problems to a Divine Providence."

Marise was evidently highly amused by this exposition of one variety of ministerial principle, and looked up at Vincent over her fan, her eyes sparkling with mockery. He savored with an intimate pleasure her certainty that he would follow the train of her thought; and he decided to try to get another rise out of the round-eyed little clergyman. "Oh, if it weren't the Negro problem, Mr. Bayweather, it would be free-will or predestination, or capital and labor. Mr. Welles suffers from a duty-complex, inflamed to a morbid degree by a life-long compliance to a mediaeval conception of family responsibility."

Mr. Bayweather's eyes became rounder than ever at this, and Vincent went on, much amused, "Mr. Welles has done his duty with discomfort to himself so long that he has the habit. His life at Ashley seems too unnaturally peaceful to him. I'd just as soon he took it out with worrying about the Negroes. They are so safely far away. I had been on the point of communicating to him my doubts as to the civic virtues of the Martians, as a safety valve for him."

Marise laughed out, as round a peal as little Mark's, but she evidently thought they had gone far enough with their fooling, for she now brought the talk back to a safe, literal level by crying, "Well, there's one thing sure, Mr. Welles can't worry his head about any of the always-with-us difficulties of life, as long as he is dancing art Ashley quadrille."

Mr. Welles concurred in this with feeling. "I'd no idea I would ever experience anything so . . . so . . . well, I tell you, I thought I'd left fun behind me, years and years ago."

"Oh, what you've had is nothing compared to what you're going to have," Marise told him. "Just wait till old Nate strikes up the opening bars of 'The Whirlwind' and see the roof of the house fly off. See here," she laid her hand on his arm. "This is leap-year. I solemnly engage you to dance 'The Whirlwind' with me." She made the gesture of the little-boy athlete, feeling the biceps of one arm, moving her forearm up and down. "I'm in good health, and good muscle, because I've been out stirring up the asparagus bed with a spading-fork. I can shove you around as well as old Mrs. Powers, if I do say it who shouldn't."

Vincent looked down at her, bubbling with light-hearted merriment, and thought, "There is no end to the variety of her moods!"

She glanced up at him, caught his eyes on her and misinterpreted their wondering expression. "You think I'm just silly and childish, don't you?" she told him challengingly. "Oh, don't be such an everlasting adult. Life's not so serious as all that!"

He stirred to try to protest, but she went on, "It's dancing that sets me off. Nelly Powers and I are crazy about it. And so far as my observation of life extends, our dances here are the only social functions left in the world, that people really enjoy and don't go to merely because it's the thing to. It always goes to my head to see people enjoy themselves. It's so sweet."

Mr. Welles gave her one of his affectionate pats on her hand. Vincent asked her casually, "What's the idea of making a family party of it and bringing the children too?"