第52章

The rest of Sister Soulsby was undoubtedly subordinated in interest to those eyes of hers.Sometimes her face seemed to be reviving temporarily a comeliness which had been constant in former days; then again it would look decidedly, organically, plain.It was the worn and loose-skinned face of a nervous, middle-aged woman, who had had more than her share of trouble, and drank too much tea.She wore the collar of her dress rather low;and Theron found himself wondering at this, because, though long and expansive, her neck certainly showed more cords and cavities than consorted with his vague ideal of statuesque beauty.Then he wondered at himself for thinking about it, and abruptly reined up his fancy, only to find that it was playing with speculations as to whether her yellowish complexion was due to that tea-drinking or came to her as a legacy of Southern blood.

He knew that she was born in the South because she said so.

From the same source he learned that her father had been a wealthy planter, who was ruined by the war, and sank into a premature grave under the weight of his accumulated losses.

The large dark rings around her eyes grew deeper still in their shadows when she told about this, and her ordinarily sharp voice took on a mellow cadence, with a soft, drawling accent, turning U's into O's, and having no R's to speak of.Theron had imbibed somewhere in early days the conviction that the South was the land of romance, of cavaliers and gallants and black eyes flashing behind mantillas and outspread fans, and somehow when Sister Soulsby used this intonation she suggested all these things.

But almost all her talk was in another key--a brisk, direct, idiomatic manner of speech, with an intonation hinting at no section in particular.It was merely that of the city-dweller as distinguished from the rustic.

She was of about Alice's height, perhaps a shade taller.

It did not escape the attention of the Wares that she wore clothes of a more stylish cut and a livelier arrangement of hues than any Alice had ever dared own, even in lax-minded Tyre.

The two talked of this in their room on Friday night;and Theron explained that congregations would tolerate things of this sort with a stranger which would be sharply resented in the case of local folk whom they controlled.

It was on this occasion that Alice in turn told Theron she was sure Mrs.Soulsby had false teeth--a confidence which she immediately regretted as an act of treachery to her sex.

On Saturday afternoon, toward evening, Brother Soulsby arrived, and was guided to the parsonage by his wife, who had gone to the depot to meet him.They must have talked over the situation pretty thoroughly on the way, for by the time the new-comer had washed his face and hands and put on a clean collar, Sister Soulsby was ready to announce her plan of campaign in detail.

Her husband was a man of small stature and, like herself, of uncertain age.He had a gentle, if rather dry, clean-shaven face, and wore his dust-colored hair long behind.His little figure was clad in black clothes of a distinctively clerical fashion, and he had a white neck-cloth neatly tied under his collar.

The Wares noted that he looked clean and amiable rather than intellectually or spiritually powerful, as he took the vacant seat between theirs, and joined them in concentrating attention upon Mrs.Soulsby.

This lady, holding herself erect and alert on the edge of the low, big easy-chair had the air of presiding over a meeting.

"My idea is," she began, with an easy implication that no one else's idea was needed, "that your Quarterly Conference, when it meets on Monday, must be adjourned to Tuesday.

We will have the people all out tomorrow morning to love-feast, and announcement can be made there, and at the morning service afterward, that a series of revival meetings are to be begun that same evening.

Mr.Soulsby and I can take charge in the evening, and we'll see to it that THAT packs the house--fills the church to overflowing Monday evening.Then we'll quietly turn the meeting into a debt-raising convention, before they know where they are, and we'll wipe off the best part of the load.Now, don't you see," she turned her eyes full upon Theron as she spoke, "you want to hold your Quarterly Conference AFTER this money's been raised, not before.""I see what you mean," Mr.Ware responded gravely.

"But--"

"But what!" Sister Soulsby interjected, with vivacity.

"Well," said Theron, picking his words, "in the first place, it rests with the Presiding Elder to say whether an adjournment can be made until Tuesday, not with me.""That's all right.Leave that to me," said the lady.

"In the second place," Theron went on, still more hesitatingly, "there seems a certain--what shall I say?--indirection in--in--""In getting them together for a revival, and springing a debt-raising on them?" Sister Soulsby put in.

"Why, man alive, that's the best part of it.You ought to be getting some notion by this time what these Octavius folks of yours are like.I've only been here two days, but I've got their measure down to an allspice.

Supposing you were to announce tomorrow that the debt was to be raised Monday.How many men with bank-accounts would turn up, do you think? You could put them all in your eye, sir--all in your eye!""Very possibly you're right," faltered the young minister.

"Right? Why, of course I'm right," she said, with placid confidence."You've got to take folks as you find them; and you've got to find them the best way you can.One place can be worked, managed, in one way, and another needs quite a different way, and both ways would be dead frosts--complete failures--in a third."Brother Soulsby coughed softly here, and shuffled his feet for an instant on the carpet.His wife resumed her remarks with slightly abated animation, and at a slower pace.