VI
Radbourn was thinking about him, two days after, as he sat in his friend Judge Brown's law office, poring over a volume of law. He saw that Bacon's treatment had been heroic; he couldn't get the pitiful confusion of the preacher's face out of his mind. But, after all, Bacon's seizing of just that instant was a stroke of genius.
Some one touched him on the arm and he turned.
"Why—Elder—Mr. Pill, how de do? Sit down. Draw up a chair."
There was trouble in the preacher's face. "Can I see you, Radbourn, alone?"
"Certainly; come right into this room. No one will disturb us there."
"Now, what can I do for you?" he said, as they sat down.
"I want to talk to you about—about religion," said Pill, with a little timid pause in his voice.
Radbourn looked grave. "I'm afraid you've come to a dangerous man."
"I want you to tell me what you think. I know you're a student. I want to talk about my case," pursued the preacher, with a curious hesitancy. "I want to ask a few questions on things."
"Very well; sail in. I'll do the best I can," said Radbourn.
"I've been thinking a good deal since that night. I've come to the conclusion that I don't believe what I've been preaching. I thought I did, but I didn't. I don't know what I believe. Seems as if the land had slid from under my feet. What am I to do?"
"Say so," replied Radbourn, his eyes kindling. "Say so, and get out of it. There's nothing worse than staying where you are. What have you saved from the general land-slide?"
Pill smiled a little. "I don't know."
"Want me to cross-examine you and see, eh? Very well, here goes." He settled back with a smile. "You believe in square dealing between man and man?"
"Certainly."
"You believe in good deeds, candor, and steadfastness?"
"I do."
"You believe in justice, equality of opportunity, and in liberty?"
"Certainly I do."
"You believe, in short, that a man should do unto others as he'd have others do unto him; think right and live out his thoughts?"
"All that I steadfastly believe."
"Well, I guess your land-slide was mostly imaginary. The face of the eternal rock is laid bare. You didn't recognize it at first, that's all. One question more. You believe in getting at truth?"
"Certainly."
"Well, truth is only found from the generalizations of facts. Before calling a thing true, study carefully all accessible facts. Make your religion practical. The matter-of-fact tone of Bacon would have had no force if you had been preaching an earnest morality in place of an antiquated terrorism."
"I know it, I know it," sighed Pill, looking down.
"Well, now go back and tell 'em so. And then, if you can't keep your place preaching what you do believe, get into something else. For the sake of all morality and manhood, don't go on cursing yourself with hypocrisy."
Mr. Pill took a chew of tobacco rather distractedly, and said:—
"I'd like to ask you a few questions."
"No, not now. You think out your present position yourself. Find out just what you have saved from your land-slide."
The elder man rose; he hardly seemed the same man who had dominated his people a few days before. He turned with still greater embarrassment.
"I want to ask a favor. I'm going back to my family. I'm going to say something of what you've said, to my congregation—but—I'm in debt—and the moment they know I'm a backslider, they're going to bear down on me pretty heavy. I'd like to be independent."
"I see. How much do you need?" mused Radbourn.
"I guess two hundred would stave off the worst of them."
"I guess Brown and I can fix that. Come in again to-night. Or no, I'll bring it round to you."
The two men parted with a silent pressure of the hand that meant more than any words.
When Mr. Pill told his wife that he could preach no more, she cried, and gasped, and scolded till she was in danger of losing her breath entirely. "A guinea-hen sort of a woman" Councill called her. "She can talk more an' say less 'n any woman I ever see," was Bacon's verdict, after she had been at dinner at his house. She was a perpetual irritant.
Mr. Pill silenced her at last with a note of impatience approaching a threat, and drove away to the Corners to make his confession without her. It was Saturday night, and Elder Wheat was preaching as he entered the crowded room. A buzz and mumble of surprise stopped the orator for a few moments, and he shook hands with Mr. Pill dubiously, not knowing what to think of it all, but as he was in the midst of a very effective oratorical scene, he went on.
The silent man at his side felt as if he were witnessing a burlesque of himself as he listened to the pitiless and lurid description of torment which Elder Wheat poured forth,—the same figures and threats he had used a hundred times. He stirred uneasily in his seat, while the audience paid so little attention that the perspiring little orator finally called for a hymn, saying:—
"Elder Pill has returned from his unexpected absence, and will exhort in his proper place."
When the singing ended, Mr. Pill rose, looking more like himself than since the previous Sunday. A quiet resolution was in his eyes and voice as he said:—
"Elder Wheat has more right here than I have. I want 'o say that I'm going to give up my church in Douglass and—" A murmur broke out, which he silenced with his raised hand. "I find I don't believe any longer what I've been believing and preaching. Hold on! let me go on. I don't quite know where I'll bring up, but I think my religion will simmer down finally to about this: A full half-bushel to the half-bushel and sixteen ounces to the pound." Here two or three cheered. "Do unto others as you'd have others do unto you." Applause from several, quickly suppressed as the speaker went on, Elder Wheat listening as if petrified, with his mouth open.
"I'm going out of preaching, at least for the present. After things get into shape with me again, I may set up to teach people how to live, but just now I can't do it. I've got all I can do to instruct myself. Just one thing more. I owe two or three of you here. I've got the money for William Bacon, James Bartlett, and John Jennings. I turn the mare and cutter over to Jacob Bensen, for the note he holds. I hain't got much religion left, but I've got some morality. That's all I want to say now."
When he sat down there was a profound hush; then Bacon arose.
"That's man's talk, that is! An' I jest want 'o say, Andrew Pill, that you kin jest forgit you owe me anything. An' if ye want any help come to me. Y're jest gittun' ready to preach, 'n' I'm ready to give ye my support."
"That's the talk," said Councill. "I'm with ye on that."
Pill shook his head. The painful silence which followed was broken by the effusive voice of Wheat:—
"Let us pray—and remember our lost brother."
* * *
The urgings of the people were of no avail. Mr. Pill settled up his affairs and moved to Cresco, where he went back into trade with a friend, and for three years attended silently to his customers, lived down their curiosity, and studied anew the problem of life. Then he moved away, and no one knew whither.
One day last year Bacon met Jennings on the road.
"Heerd anything o' Pill lately?"
"No, have you?"
"Waal, yes. Brown told me he ran acrost him down in Eelinoy, doun' well, too."
"In dry goods?"
"No, preachun'."
"Preachun'?"
"So Brown said. Kind of a free-f'r-all church, I reckon, from what Jedge told me. Built a new church; fills it twice a Sunday. I'd like to hear him, but he's got t' be too big a gun f'r us. Ben studyun', they say; went t' school."
Jennings drove sadly and thoughtfully on.
"Rather stumps Brother Jennings," laughed Bacon, in a good-humored growl.
* * *
A DAY OF GRACE
Sunday is the day for courtship on the prairie. It has also the piety of cleanliness. It allows the young man to get back
to a self-respecting sweetness of person, and enables the girls to look as nature intended, dainty and sweet as posies.
The change from everyday clothing on the part of young workmen like Ben Griswold was more than change; it approached transformation. It took more than courage to go through the change,—it required love.
Ben arose a little later on Sunday morning than on weekdays, but there were the chores to do as usual. The horses must be watered, fed, and curried, and the cows were to milk, but after breakfast Ben threw off the cares of the hired hand. When he came down from the little garret into which the hot August sun streamed redly, he was a changed creature. Clean from tip to toe, newly shaven, wearing a crackling white shirt, a linen collar and a new suit of store clothes, he felt himself a man again, fit to meet maidens.
His partner, being a married man, was slouching around in his tattered and greasy brown denim overalls. He looked at Ben and grinned.
"Got a tag on y'rself?"
"No, why?"
"Nobod'y know ye, if anything happened on the road. There's thirty dollars gone to the dogs." He sighed. "Oh, well, you'll get over that, just as I did."
"I hope I won't get over liking to be clean," Ben said a little sourly. "I won't be back to milk."
"Didn't expect ye. That's the very time o' day the girls are purtiest,—just about sundown. Better take Rock. I may want the old team myself."
Ben hitched up and drove off in the warm bright morning, with wonderful elation, clean and self-respecting once more. His freshly shaven face felt cool, and his new suit fitted him well. His heart took on a great resolution, which was to call upon Grace.
The thought of her made his brown hands shake, and he remembered how many times he had sworn to visit her, but had failed of courage, though it seemed she had invited him by word and look to do so.
He overtook Milton Jennings on his way along the poplar-lined lane.
"Hello, Milt, where you bound?"
Milton glanced up with a curious look in his laughing eyes. From the pockets of his long linen duster he drew a handful of beautiful scarlet and yellow Siberian crab-apples.
"See them crabs?"
"Yes, I see 'em."
Milton drew a similar handful out of his left pocket. "See those?"
"What y' going to do with 'em?"
"Take 'em home again."
Something in Milton's voice led him to ask soberly:—
"What did you intend doing with 'em?"
"Present 'em to Miss Cole."
"Well, why didn't y' do it?"
Milton showed his white teeth in a smile that was frankly derisive of himself.
"Well, when I got over there I found young Conley's sorrel hitched to one post and Walt Brown's gray hitched to the other. I went in, but I didn't stay long; in fact, I didn't sit down. I was afraid those infernal apples would roll out o' my pockets. I was afraid they'd find out I brought 'em over there for Miss Cole, like the darn fool I was."
They both laughed heartily. Milton was always as severe upon himself as upon any one else.
"That's tough," said Ben, "but climb in, and let's go to Sunday-school."
Milton got in, and they ate the apples as they rode along.
The Grove schoolhouse was the largest in the township, and was the only one with a touch of redeeming grace. It was in a lovely spot; great oaks stood all about, and back of it the woods grew thick, and a clear creek gurgled over its limestone bed not far away.
To Ben and Milton there was a wondrous charm about the Grove schoolhouse. It was the one place where the boys and girls met in garments disassociated from toil. Sundays in summer, and on winter nights at lyceums or protracted meetings, the boys came to see the girls in their bright dresses, with their clear and (so it seemed) scornful bright eyes.
All through the service Ben sat where he could see Grace by turning his head, but he had not the courage to do so. Once or twice he caught a glimpse of the curve of her cheek and the delicate lines of her ear, and a suffocating throb came into his throat.
He wanted to ask her to go with him down to Cedarville to the Methodist camp-meeting, but he knew it was impossible. He could not even say "good day" when she took pains to pass near him after church. He nodded like a great idiot, all ease and dignity lost, his throat too dry and hot to utter a sound.
He cursed his shyness as he went out after his horse. He saw her picking her dainty way up the road with Conrad Sieger walking by her side. What made it worse for Ben was a dim feeling that she liked him, and would go with him if he had the courage to ask her.
"Well, Ben," said Milton, "it's settled, we go to Rock River to-night to the camp-meeting. Did you ask Grace?"
"No, she's going with Con. It's just my blasted luck."
"That's too bad. Well, come with us. Take Maud."
As he rode away Ben passed Grace on the road.
"Going to the camp-meeting, Con?" asked Milton, in merry voice.
"I guess so," said Conrad, a handsome, but slow-witted German.
As they went on Ben could have wept. His keener perception told him there was a look of appeal in Grace's upturned eyes.
He made a poor companion at dinner, and poor plain Maud knew his mind was elsewhere. She was used to that and accepted it with a pathetic attempt to color it differently.
They got away about five o'clock.
Ben drove the team, driving took his mind off his weakness and failure; while Milton in the seclusion of the back seat of the carryall was happy with Amelia Turner.
It was growing dark as they entered upon the curving road along the river which was a relief from the rectangular and sun-smitten roads of the prairie. They lingered under the great oaks and elms which shaded them. It would have been perfect Ben thought, if Grace had been beside him in Maud's place.
He wondered how he should manage to speak to Grace. There was a time when it seemed easier. Now the consciousness of his love made the simplest question seem like the great question of all.
Other teams were on the road, some returning, some going. A camp-meeting had come to be an annual amusement, like a circus, and young people from all over the country drove down on Sundays, as if to some celebration with fireworks.
"There's the lane," said Milton. "See that team goin' in?"
Ben pulled up and they looked at it doubtfully. It looked dangerously miry. It was quite dark now and Ben said:—
"That's a scaly piece of road."
"Oh, that's all right. Hark!"
As they listened they could hear the voice of the exhorter nearly a mile away. It pushed across the cool spaces with a wild and savage sound. The young people thrilled with excitement.
Insects were singing in the grass. Frogs with deepening chorus seemed to announce the coming of night, and above these peaceful sounds came the wild shouts of the far-off preacher, echoing through the cool green arches of the splendid grove.
The girls became silent, as the voice grew louder.
Lights appeared ahead, and the road led up a slight hill to a gate. Ben drove on under a grove of oaks, past dimly lighted tents, whose open flaps showed tumbled beds and tables laden with crockery. Heavy women were moving about inside, their shadows showing against the tent walls like figures in a pantomime.
The young people alighted in curious silence. As they stood a moment, tying the team, the preacher lifted his voice in a brazen, clanging, monotonous reiteration of worn phrases.
"Come to the Lord! Come now! Come to the light! Jesus will give it! Now is the appointed time,—come to the light!"
From a tent near by arose the groaning, gasping, gurgling scream of a woman in mortal agony.
"O my God!"
It was charged with the most piercing distress. It cut to the heart's palpitating centre like a poniard thrust. It had murder and outrage in it.
The girls clutched Ben and Milton. "Oh, let's go home!"
"No, let's go and see what it all is."
The girls hung close to the arms of the young
men and they went down to the tent and looked in.
It was filled with a motley throng of people, most of them seated on circling benches. A fringe of careless or scoffing onlookers stood back against the tent wall. Many of them were strangers to Ben.
Occasionally a Norwegian farm-hand, or a bevy of young people from some near district, lifted the flap and entered with curious or laughing or insolent faces.
The tent was lighted dimly by kerosene lamps, hung in brackets against the poles, and by stable lanterns set here and there upon the benches.
Ben and Milton ushered the girls in and seated them a little way back. The girls smiled, but only faintly. The undertone of women's cries moved them in spite of their scorn of it all.
"What cursed foolishness!" said Ben to Milton.
Milton smiled, but did not reply. He only nodded toward the exhorter, a man with a puffy jumble of features and the form of a gladiator, who was uttering wild and explosive phrases.
"Oh, my friends! I bless the Lord for the SHALL in the word. You SHALL get light. You SHALL be saved. Oh, the SHALL in the word! You SHALL be redeemed!"
As he grew more excited, his hoarse voice rose in furious screams, as if he were defying hell's legions. Foam lay on his lips and flew from his mouth. At every repetition of the word "shall" he struck the desk a resounding blow with his great palm.
"He's a hard hitter," said Milton.
At length he leaped, apparently in uncontrollable excitement, upon the mourners' bench, and ran up and down close to the listening, moaning audience. He walked with a furious rhythmic, stamping action, like a Sioux in the war dance. Wild cries burst from his audience, antiphonal with his own.
"He 'SHALL' send light!"
"Send Thy arrows, O Lord."
"O God, come!"
"He 'SHALL' keep His word!"
One old negro woman, fat, powerful, and gloomy, suddenly arose and uttered a scream that had the dignity and savagery of a mountain lion's cry. It rang far out into the night.
The exhorter continued his mad, furious, thumping, barbaric walk.
Behind him a row of other exhorters sat, a relay ready to leap to his aid. They urged on the tumult with wild cries.
Other Main-Travelled Roads Page 5