“Philip Overton.”
Uncle Phil did see Carson, as he proposed doing; and as a result of the conference, a delegation of the leading men in the Unitarian Church called upon him the next morning, to know if it was true that he had abjured their faith, and was going to be confirmed at St. Jude’s, and build a church in Rocky Point, and pay the minister himself. They had heard all this, and a great deal more; and unwilling to lose so profitable and prominent a member from their own numbers, they came to expostulate and reason with him, and if necessary use harsher and severer language,—which they did before they were through with him. For Uncle Phil owned to the chapel arrangement, and said he thought it well enough for a man of his years to be thinking about leaving behind him some monument by which he should be remembered; otherwise, who would think of the old codger, Phil Overton, three months after he was dead.
Then Squire Gardiner suggested that their own church needed repairing, and that a new and handsome organ would be quite as fitting a monument, and do quite as much toward wafting one to heaven as the building of an Episcopal chapel, and introducing into their midst an entirely new element, which would make fools of all the young people, and set the girls to making crosses and working altar-cloths. For his part, he would advise Mr. Overton to think twice, before committing himself to such folly.
Uncle Phil replied that “he didn’t want any advice,—he knew his own business; and as to repairing the church, he wouldn’t say but what he would give as much toward that as anybody else; but he’d ‘be darned’ if he’d buy an organ for them to fight over, as to who should or shouldn’t play it, and how much they should have a Sunday. A choir was a confounded nuisance, anyway,—always in hot water, and he didn’t mean to have any in his chapel. No, sir! he’d have boys, as they did over to St. Jude’s.”
“Ha, a Ritualist, hey?” and one of the number drew back from him, as if he had had the small-pox, asking how long since he had become a convert to that faith, and when he met with a change?
Uncle Phil told him it was “none of his business;” and after a few more earnest words, said, “the whole posse might go to thunder, and he would build as many churches as he pleased, and run ’em ritual, if he wanted to, for all of anybody.”
This was all the satisfaction the Unitarians got; while the Orthodox, who, like their neighbors, rebelled against the introduction of the Episcopal element into their midst, fared still worse, for the old man swore at them; and when one of them asked “how soon he intended to be confirmed?” vowed “he would be the very first chance he got, so as to spite ’em.”
Uncle Phil was hardly a fit candidate for confirmation, but the lion was roused in him, and the chapel was now so sure a thing, that before the first of June, the site was all marked out, and men engaged to do the mason-work.
Edna’s school was still a success, and Edna herself was very happy in her work and her home. She heard from Maude frequently, and the letters were prized according to the amount of gossip they contained concerning Leighton Place and its inmates. Roy had written a few lines acknowledging the receipt of the fifty dollars, and asking her, as a favor, not to think of paying him any more.
“I’d so much rather you would not,” he wrote; “I do not need the money, and it pains me to think of my little sister working so hard, and wearing out her young life, which should be happy, and free from care. Don’t do it, Edna, please; and I so much wish you would let me know where you are, so that I might come and see you, and sometime, perhaps, bring you to Leighton, where your home ought to be. Write to me, won’t you, and tell me more of yourself, and believe me always,