“But now, Granny”—as the older woman sat staring moodily into the fire—“how come hit that yore Davy hain’t nuvver had no speakin’ yit down to the church house at the Creek? We’re jest perishin’ in here fer some right good preachin’. Onct in a while Preacher Bonnell he opens a meetin’ fer three or four days, an’ sometimes Old Man Parkins from up Redbird, he comes round here in his circuit. An’ thar’s a young man over in Leslie that they say is right promisin’, an’ he mought come over afore long. But thar hain’t been to say no religious awakenin’ in here, so to speak, fer a long time. An’ Davy—ye know he started out fer to be a preacher, him with his education an’ all. Why don’t he preach?”
“Yes, why don’t he?” demanded Granny Joslin savagely. “I taken that all up with Davy, an’ I kain’t do a damn thing with him. He says—well, what do you-all think he says to me?”
“I kain’t guess,” said Granny Williams. “He’s always been odd.”
“He says he ain’t good enough to preach!” exclaimed the fierce old woman who turned towards her. “He says, ‘I hain’t got my edication yit,’ says he to me.”
“Men is natural cantankerous,” said Granny Williams, nodding her head sagely. “Why the Lord made ‘em that way, the Lord only knows.”
“Davy won’t have no chance to preach anyhow if he goes to the war,” resumed Granny Joslin. “I reckon the school’ll all go to hell now. Has he said ary thing to ye about the school, Ma’am?” She turned suddenly now to Marcia Haddon.
“No,” rejoined that individual, somewhat startled; “nothing at all. I’ve not seen him for several days.”
“He tolt me ye was the wife of the man that owned the Company—an’ the Company owns all this land in here. Well, like I said, I reckon that school’ll have to go to hell now—an’ yit we certainly did need it—that school. Hit was—our school, the fustest in the Cumberlands.”
Marcia Haddon vouchsafed no comment, and presently old Granny Joslin rose.
“Well, I got to be gittin’ on, Sarah Alice,” said she to her friend. “I want to find Davy somewhar—I’ve brung him down some caraway cookies. He always liked ‘em. An’ I brung him a clean handkerchief—he’s got to have a heap of things if he’s a-goin’ off ter the war. I don’t know who them Dutch air—fer’s I know thar hain’t no Dutch in these mountings noways—but if we’ve got to lick ‘em, I reckon we’d just as well be about it. Damn ‘em anyways, whoever they air!” With which candid comment she hobbled on out the door, and never gave a parting glance as she faced up the street and started for her cabin home.