第27章 XI(2)

Waitstill's a sight han'somer, if the truth was told; but she's the sort of girl that's made for one man and the rest of em never look at her. The other one's cut out for the crowd, the more the merrier. She's a kind of man-trap, that girl is!--Do urge the horse a little mite, Bartholomew! It makes me kind o' hot to be passed by Deacon Baxter. It's Missionary Sunday, too, when he gen'ally has rheumatism too bad to come out."

"I wonder if he ever puts anything into the plate," said Mrs.

Day. "No one ever saw him, that I know of."

"The Deacon keeps the Thou Shalt Not commandments pretty well," w as Aunt Abby's terse response. "I guess he don't put nothin' i nto the plate, but I s'pose we'd ought to be thankful he don't take nothin' out. The Baptists are gettin' ahead faster than they'd ought to, up to the Mills. Our minister ain't no kind of a proselyter, Seems as if he didn't care how folks got to heaven so long as they got there! The other church is havin' a service this afternoon side o' the river, an' I'd kind o' like to go, except it would please 'em too much to have a crowd there to see the immersion. They tell me, but I don't know how true, that that Tillman widder woman that come here from somewheres in Vermont wanted to be baptized to-day, but the other converts declared THEY wouldn't be, if she was!"

"Jed Morrill said they'd have to hold her under water quite a spell to do any good," chuckled Uncle Bart from the front seat.

"Well, I wouldn't repeat it, Bartholomew, on the Sabbath day; not if he did say it. Jed Morrill's responsible for more blasphemious jokes than any man in Edgewood. I don't approve of makin' light of anybody's religious observances if they're ever so foolish," s aid Aunt Abby somewhat enigmatically. "Our minister keeps remindin' us that the Baptists and Methodists are our brethren, but I wish he'd be a little more anxious to have our S'ceity keep ahead of the others."

"Jed's 'bout right in sizin' up the Widder Tillman," was Mr.

Day's timid contribution to the argument." I ain't a readin' man, but from what folks report I should think she was one o' them critters that set on rocks bewilderin' an' bedevilin' men-folks out o' their senses--SYREENS, I think they call 'em; a reg'lar SYREEN is what that woman is, I guess!"

"There, there, Abel, you wouldn't know a syreen if you found one in your baked beans, so don't take away a woman's character on hearsay." And Mrs. Day, having shut up her husband as was her bounden duty as a wife and a Christian, tied her bonnet strings a little tighter and looked distinctly pleased with herself.

"Abel ain't startin' any new gossip," was Aunt Abby's opinion, as she sprung to his rescue. "One or two more holes in a colander don't make much dif'rence.--Bartholomew, we're certainly goin' to be late this mornin'; we're about the last team on the road"; and Aunt Abby glanced nervously behind. "Elder Boone ain't begun the openin' prayer, though, or we should know it. You can hear him pray a mile away, when the wind's right. I do hate to be late to meetin'. The Elder allers takes notice; the folks in the wing pews allers gapes an' stares, and the choir peeks through the curtain, takin' notes of everything you've got on your back. I h ope to the land they'll chord and keep together a little mite better 'n they've done lately, that's all I can say! If the Lord is right in our midst as the Bible says, He can't think much of our singers this summer!"

"They're improvin', now that Pliny Waterhouse plays his fiddle,"

Mrs. Day remarked pacifically. "There was times in the anthem when they kept together consid'able well last Sunday. They didn't always chord, but there, they chorded some!--we're most there now, Abby, don't fret! Cephas won't ring the last bell till he knows his own folks is crossin' the Common!"