Ma Harris was John Crawford's "mother-in-law on his first wife's side", as Dave Amos phrased it, and it was the opinion of the neighbors that if John and his second wife had not been the best-natured people in the world, they never could have put up with Ma Harris and her "ways."
She had exercised a careful supervision over John's domestic affairs during the first wife's lifetime. When Sarah died, she redoubled her vigilance, and when his second marriage became an impending certainty, Ma Harris's presence and influence hung like a dark cloud over the future of the happy pair.
"There's only one thing I'm afraid of, Mary," said honest John. "I know you'll get along all right with me and the children, but I don't know about Ma Harris; I'm afraid she'll give you trouble."
"Don't you worry about that," said Mary cheerily. "I've never seen anybody yet that I couldn't get along with, and Ma Harris won't be the exception."
Popular sentiment declared that Ma Harris took her son-in-law's second marriage much harder than she had taken her daughter's death. Her lamentations were loudly and impartially diffused among her acquaintances; but it was evident that the sympathies of the community were not with John's "mother-in-law on his first wife's side."
"I reckon old Mis' Harris won't bother me again soon," said Maria Taylor. "She was over here yesterday with her handkerchief to her eyes, mournin' over John marryin' Mary Parrish, and I up and told her that she ought to be givin' thanks for such a stepmother for Sarah's children, John Crawford was too good a man, anyhow, to be wasted on a pore, shiftless creature like Sarah, and her death was nothin' but a blessin' to John and the children."
Ma Harris soon found that she had never given herself a harder task than when she undertook to find fault with John for his treatment of Mary, or with Mary for her treatment of the children. It vexed her soul on Sundays to see John ushering Mary into his pew as if she had been a princess, but what could she say? Did not all the inhabitants of Goshen know that John had carried "pore Sarah" into the church in his strong arms as long as she was able to be carried, and nursed her faithfully at home until the day of her death? Then the children fairly adored Mary; and Mary, being a genuine mother, and having none of her own, was free to spend all her love on John's little ones. Not only this, but she treated Ma Harris with such respect and kindness that complaint was well-nigh impossible. Altogether, Ma Harris began to realize that the way of the fault-finder is sometimes as hard as that of the transgressor.
"Well, Mary," she said, as she dropped heavily into a rocking-chair, "I heard yesterday that you had a new dressmakin' chart and all the neighbors was usin' it, and says I to Maria, 'I reckon Mary's forgot me, and I'll have to go up and remind her that Ma Harris is still in the land of the livin' and jest as much in need of clothes as some other folks.'" And she threw a withering glance in Sally's direction.
"Why, Ma Harris!" said Mary. "Didn't John give you my message? I sent you word about the chart last week, and I've been looking for you every day."
Ma Harris's face brightened, for Mary's words were as a healing balm to her wounded self-love.