The Court of Boyville

by William Allen White

Even while Piggy Pennington and Bud Perkins were sitting at dusk on the back-porch steps of the Pennington house, eating turkey-wings which Mrs. Pennington had given to them, and devouring ham sandwiches which Piggy had taken from the big platterful in the pantry, looking the hired girl boldly in the face as he did it, even then the preparations for the Pennington entertainment were progressing indoors. The parlor, the sitting-room, and the dining-room, which had been decorated during the warm afternoon with borrowed palms and with roses from the neighbor's vines, were being ventilated. Windows were rising, and doors opening. The velvety air of May was fluttering everywhere. And there was so much life in it, that when Mrs. Pennington saw the two boys pass out of the alley gate, she saw the Perkins boy grab her son's hat and run away whooping, while Piggy followed, throwing clods at his companion's legs and feet. She thought, as she turned to her turkey-slicing, that the Perkins child was not taking his father's death "very hard." But she did not know that the boyish whoop was the only thing that saved him from sobbing, as he left the home where he saw such a contrast to his own. How could a woman carrying the responsibilities of the social honor of the Methodist church in Willow Creek have time to use her second sight?

The guests at the Pennington house that evening divided the honors equally between the new preacher, for whom the party was made, and Miss Morgan, whose last niece had married and left her but two days before. Most of the guests had met the new preacher; but none of them—save one or two of her intimate friends—could know how the lonely little old woman was faring in the cottage whence one by one her adopted birds had flown. They called her "little Miss Morgan" in the town, and the story of her life of devotion to her brothers' and sisters' children was familiar to every one about her. For ten years she had lived in Willow Creek caring for her brothers' orphans. She came to the community from the East, and found what she brought—culture, friends, and kindness at every turn. The children whom she had cared for had grown up, filed through the town's real estate college, and then mating had left the little spinster alone.

At the Penningtons' that evening she was cheerful enough—so cheerful, indeed, in her little bird-like way, that many of those who talked with her fancied that the resourceful little body was beyond the reach of petty grief. The modest, almost girlish smile beamed through the wrinkles of fifty autumns as brightly that evening at the Penningtons' as the town had ever seen it. From her place in a high-backed chair in the corner, Miss Morgan, in her shy, self-deprecatory way, shed her faint benediction about her as she had done for a decade. There was a sweetness in Miss Morgan's manner that made the old men gallant to her in a boyish way; and the wives, who loved her, were proud of their husbands' chivalry. During the evening at the Penningtons' the conversation found much of its inspiration in the Memorial Day services on the morrow and in anecdotes about the thriftlessness of Calhoun Perkins. Memorial Day was one of the holidays which Miss Morgan kept in her heart. Then she decorated each year a lover's grave—a grave she had never seen. The day had been sacred in her heart to the memory of a spring night, and the moon and the lilacs and the blue uniform of a soldier. Upon other days she waved this memory away with a gay little sigh, and would have none of it. But on Memorial Day she bade the vision come into her heart and bide a while.

But she did not open the door there at the party. They said to one another, going home that night: "Well, I don't see's she minds it a bit. Isn't that pluck for you—not lonesome, not grumpy—just the same little body she was when we first saw her. Well—I know one thing—I couldn't do it."

As for Miss Morgan, while she was walking home that night, she was thinking of the women of her age whom she had just left; the romance seemed to be gone completely from their lives, their faces seemed a trifle hard to her, and she was wondering if life would have gone so with her if there had been no Shiloh.

The town clock in the schoolhouse was tolling eleven, as Miss Morgan turned the key in the front door. The night was starry and inviting, and as her house stood among the trees, somewhat back from the street, Miss Morgan did not feel afraid to sit in a porch chair, refreshing herself, before going indoors. The wind brought the odor of the lilacs from the bush at the house corner, and the woman sat drinking in the fragrance. She saw a pair of lovers strolling by, who did not observe her. She could hear the murmur of their voices; she did not try to catch their words. She sat silently dreaming and wondering. Again and again her eyes went to the stars in a vain questioning, and her lips moved. Maybe she was asking "where," maybe she was asking "why." As the moments slipped by, the years fell away from her. She had carried her little romance in her heart unsullied by reality. To-night the talk of Memorial Day had brought it all back, and the thrill of other days returned with the odor of the lilacs. She yielded to a vague, crazy notion, and in an impulsive, girlish run she went to the corner of the porch and broke a sprig from the lilac-tree.

Then with a short sigh, that had just the hint of a smile in it, she took the lilac sprig into the house. Perhaps she fancied that no one would see the flowers but she. Maybe the oppressive stillness of the empty house burdened her. Certainly something was heavy upon her, for there was no smile in the sigh that came deeply from her heart, as she locked the door. It must have seemed lonely for Miss Morgan, coming from the crowded parlor, and the questions that her friends asked about her plans may have followed her. Perhaps it was the answer to these questions that kept her awake. She sat by her window and went over and over again the question, what should she do. The wedding that had so recently livened the cottage kept coming to the little old woman's mind, and with it came the bride. When the other children had gone away, Miss Morgan let them go with her blessing, and was glad of their good fortunes. But this last child to go had been Miss Morgan's pet. As the lonely spinster sat there she recalled how the child had been moulded by her; how she had fancied the child's heart was hers, cherishing in it the ideals, the sentiment, the tendernesses that the older heart had held sacred for a lifetime. Miss Morgan recalled how she and the girl had mingled their tears over the first long dress that their hands made, knowing, each of them, that it meant the coming of the parting. As she looked into the awful vistas of the stars, the woman knew that she was one of God's creatures, all alone—without one soul that she might even signal to.

The word "alone" came to her so strangely that she repeated it in a whisper. Its sound touched some string within her bosom, and she put her head upon the open window sill and wept, sobbing the word "alone" until sleep soothed her.