Ethelyn's Mistake

by Mary Jane Holmes

While rejoicing and thanking God for the change, which she felt was wholly sincere, Mrs. Markham had deeply deplored the pertinacity with which Andy had clung to his resolve to join "Mr. Townsend's church or none." She did not doubt Mr. Townsend's piety or Andy's either, but she doubted the Episcopalians generally because they did not require more than God himself requires, and it hurt her sore that Andy should go with them rather than to her church across the brook, where Father Aberdeen preached every Sunday against the pride, and pomp, and worldliness generally of his Episcopal brethren. Andy believed in Mr. Townsend, and in time he came to believe heart and soul in the church doctrines as taught by him, and the beautiful consistency of his daily life was to his mother like a constant and powerful argument in favor of the church to which he belonged, while to his brothers it was a powerful argument in favor of the religion he professed.

That Andy Markham was a Christian no one doubted. It showed itself in every act of his life; it shone in his beaming, good-natured face, and made itself heard in the touching pathos of his voice, when he repeated aloud in his room the prayers of his church, saying to his mother, when she objected that his prayers were made up beforehand: "And for the land's sake, ain't the sams and hims, which are nothing but prayers set to music, made up beforehand? A pretty muss you'd have of it if everybody should strike out for himself, a singin' his own words just as they popped into his head."

Mrs. Markham was not convinced, but she let Andy alone after that, simply remarking that "the prayer-book would not always answer the purpose; there would come a time when just what he wanted was not there."

Andy was willing to wait till that time came, trusting to Mr. Townsend to find for him some way of escape; and so the matter dropped, and he was free to read his prayers as much as he pleased. He had heard from Richard that his new sister was of his way of thinking--that though not a member of the church except by baptism, she was an Episcopalian, and would be married by that form.

It was strange how Andy's great, warm heart went out toward Ethelyn after that. He was sure to like her; and on the evening of the bridal, when the clock struck nine, he had taken his tallow candle to his room, and opening his prayer-book at the marriage ceremony, had read it carefully through, even to the saying: "I, Richard, take thee, Ethelyn," etc., kneeling at the proper time, and after he was through even venturing to improvise a prayer of his own, in which he asked, not that Ethelyn might be happy with his brother--there was no doubt on that point, for Richard was perfect in his estimation--but that "old Dick" might be happy with her--that he, Andy, might do his whole duty by her, and that, if it was right to ask it, she might bring him something from that famous Boston, which seemed to him like a kind of paradise, and also that she need not at once discover that he did not know as much as "old Dick."

This was Andy's prayer, which he had confessed to Mr. Townsend; and now, all shaven and shorn, with his best Sunday coat and a large bandanna in his hand, he came in to greet his sister. It needed but a glance for Ethelyn to know the truth, for Andy's face told what he was; but there was something so kind in his expression and so winning in his voice, as he called her "Sister Ethie," that she unbent to him as she had unbent to no one else; and when he stooped to kiss her, she did not draw back as she had from James and John, but promptly put up her lips, and only winced a very little at the second loud, hearty smack which Andy gave her, his great mouth leaving a wet spot on her cheek, which she wiped away with her handkerchief.

Richard had dreaded the meeting between his polished wife and his simple brother more than anything else, and several times he had tried to prepare Ethelyn for it, but he could not bring himself to say, "Andy is foolish"; for when he tried to do it Andy's pleading face came up before him just as it looked on the morning of his departure from home in June, when Andy had said to him: "Don't tell her what a shaller critter I am. Let her find it out by her learning."

So Richard had said nothing particular of Andy, and now he watched him anxiously, to see the impression he was making, and, as he saw Ethelyn's manner, marveling greatly at this new phase in her disposition. She did not feel half so desolate after seeing Andy, and she let him hold her hand, which he stroked softly, admiring its whiteness, and evidently comparing it with his own. All the Markhams had large hands and feet, just as they were all good-looking. Even Andy had his points of beauty, for his soft brown hair was handsomer, if possible, than Richard's, and more luxuriant, while many a city dandy might have coveted his white, even teeth, and his dark eyes were very placid and gentle in their expression.

"Little sister" he called Ethelyn, who though not very short in stature, seemed to him so much younger than he had expected Dick's wife to be that he applied the term "little" as he would to anything which he wished to pet.

Ethelyn's hat was laid aside by this time, and the basquine, too, which Andy thought the prettiest coat he had ever seen, and which Eunice, who was bidden to carry Ethelyn's things away, tried on before the glass in Ethelyn's chamber, as she did also the hat, deciding that Melinda Jones could make her something like them out of a gray skirt she had at home and one of Tim's palm-leaf hats.