“We-is-kill’-fo-dy-sake-all-de-day-long,” wailed the old woman.
“Yo’ honin’ to hyar me speechify ’bout de Pearly Gates, an’ yo’ kaint negotiate froo yo’ own gate at night! We was shapen in iniquity an’ bawned in sin! Dere’s no cullud man is puffick! Dere’s no white man is puffick!” Several of the forward sitters screwed round in their seats to regard Peter Parker with chastened triumph, and the Reverend Romeo announced the collection. In order to praise the liberal and shame the stingy, the names of contributors and their contributions would be read aloud. The choir sang meltingly above the noise of shuffling feet and clinking coins, and the ancient crone announced that she wished to stand on the sea of glass, harping on the harps of God. The clerks stood forward and read the result of the harvest.—“An’ tain dolluh from de white gennelmun!” There was a rustle of gratification, and then an aggrieved rumble from the rear, and a hasty addition. “An’ B’rer Napoleon Butler, tain cents!”
There was a vehement hymn to conclude. “Wash me,” the dusky congregation sang, “and I shall be whiter than snow!” Ah, that was like them, the visitor considered. Not snow-white, after a life of ebony, but whiter than snow!
(Thus young Mr. Peter Parker of Pasadena, unaware that the exuberance of language was the Psalmist’s and not their own.)
Taking a cordial farewell of Miss Jennings at the Bella Vista, he thanked her warmly for the big little idea she had given him. He would take pains to observe the young woman.
“Yeah—you never noticed her till I called your attention to her, did you, old dear?” she derided him. “So’s your old man! Well, go to it, Peter Piper! Snappy days!”
CHAPTER XV
Mrs. Eugenia Parker receives that lowest form of human expression, an anonymous letter, and pays the doctor’s daughter a call.
MRS. EUGENIA PARKER arrived at the Bella Vista with that lowest form of human expression, an anonymous letter, in her neat pigskin portfolio.
It had reached her just as she was closing a convention in Chicago, and she had caught the first possible train. It was clearly typed on a sheet of plain white paper, and was brief and unemotional.
“Your son,” it began abruptly, “is making a fool of himself over a mill girl. It is the talk of the town. For her sake, and for his safety, you had better call him home.”