After Many Years

by Carolyn Strom Collins

  “I hope you’ve got more in your head than you carry on your face,” she said when Dick was introduced.

  Having said that, however, she behaved herself quite well during supper.

  The bill of fare presented to us was surprisingly good and—what was still more surprising—quite fashionable. Charity must have studied household magazines to some effect. Everything was so delicious that we could not help but enjoy it, despite sundry disconcerting recollections of gossip concerning snakes and wash-pans. We had angel cake that night and, whatever it was mixed up in, it was toothsome. Salome, in particular, was much impressed by the “style” and menu. She never spoke quite so scornfully of them afterwards.

  “They may be lunatics, ma’am,” she said, as we went home. “But that silver was solid, ma’am, and that cloth was double damask and there was initials on the spoons. And when all’s said and done, ma’am, there’s family behind them whatever they’ve come to.”

  “I hope you got your craws full,” was Granny’s parting salutation.

  We all noticed how pretty and chipper Aunt Lily was that night. She was quite bright and animated. The reason therefore was disclosed soon after when Aunt Lily informed us that she was going to be married. She was very well satisfied about it, too, in spite of her tired heart and blighted life. We discovered that the bridegroom-elect was a common-place farmer living near the hotel.

  “He’s no beauty,” T. B. informed us, “and Granny twits Aunt Lily with it. But Aunt Lily says she’d marry him if he was as ugly as a gorilla because it is his soul she loves. I dunno nawthing about his soul, but he’s got the dough and he’s going to educate me. Aunt Lily told him she wouldn’t have him if he didn’t. I’m going to live with ’em, too. Say, won’t I be glad to get away from Granny’s tongue and Dorinda’s poetry? It makes me feel young again.”

  “How on earth will that woman ever keep a house, ma’am?” said Salome. “I pity that poor man.”

  “He is very well able to keep a servant,” I said, “and I have always had a suspicion that Aunt Lily is not by any means as die-away as her looks, Salome. The woman who arranged that supper table must have something of what you call ‘gumption.’ Anyhow, everybody is so well satisfied that it seems a pity to carp.”

  “O, I like the creature and I wish her well, ma’am,” Salome rejoined, with a toss of her head. “And I’m glad poor T. B is to have his chance. But say what you will, ma’am, George Black is marrying into a queer lot, and that is my final opinion, ma’am.”

  Aunt Lily meant to give up keeping a diary, so she informed me.

  “I shall not need it,” she said. “I can pour out my soul to my husband. I have put the past and all its sadness behind me. Will you help me select my bridal suit, Mrs. Bruce? I did want to be wedded in a sky-blue gown—the tint of God’s own heaven, Mrs. Bruce. But George says he would like a plain dark suit better and I believe that a wife should revere and obey her husband. I am no new woman, Mrs. Bruce, and I believe in the sacredness of the conjugal tie. The secret of life is devotion, Mrs. Bruce.”

  “I’m very glad you are taking T. B. with you,” I said.

  “I could not dream of leaving him behind, Mrs. Bruce. My heart is knit to his. I trust that in my home his surroundings will be more uplifting than they have hitherto been. In an atmosphere of calm and joy I feel sure that he will develop, Mrs. Bruce.”

  The next week Aunt Lily and T. B. went to the new atmosphere of calm and joy and we departed regretfully from the Tansy Patch. As we drove away in the still evening we heard “Paw” fiddling gloriously on his stoop. As we turned the corner of the road and passed the house Granny shook her stick at us with a parting malediction,

  “May your potatoes always be rotten,” she shrieked.

  But “Paw’s” fiddle followed us further than Granny’s howls, and our memories of our Tansy Patch neighbours were not unpleasant ones.

  “When all is said and done, ma’am,” was Salome’s summing up, “them lunatics were interesting.”

  Editors’ note: This story, with an illustration by Canadian artist E. J. Dinsmore, was found in Canadian Home Journal (August 1918) by Carolyn Strom Collins. A note at the beginning of the story implies that another of Montgomery’s stories, “The Cats of the Tansy Patch,” had been published in an earlier issue of Canadian Home Journal, however, that issue has not yet been found. Both of these stories are listed in the “Unverified Ledger Titles” section of the 1986 bibliography.

  Montgomery, with her two young sons—Chester, age six, and Stuart, age two and a half—had spent two months of the summer of 1918 in Prince Edward Island. Much to Montgomery’s relief, the Great War was coming to an end after four arduous years. She would later recount much of the war’s influence from the point of view of Canadians on the home front in Rilla of Ingleside (1920). Readers familiar with Rilla of Ingleside and other “Anne” books will notice a resemblance between “Salome Silversides” in this story and “Susan Baker,” the housekeeper at “Ingleside.”

  Just after “Our Neighbours at the Tansy Patch” was published, Montgomery finished her work on Rainbow Valley which would be published in 1919. Another new story, “Garden of Spices,” had been published earlier in 1918 and several of her stories and poems were republished that year.

  The Matchmaker

  (1919)

  “There is not a single baby in Lancaster,” said Mrs. Churchill. “There is not one young married couple in Lancaster. And what’s worse: nobody is getting married or has any notion of getting married. It’s a disheartening state of affairs.”

  Mrs. Churchill was talking to her friend, Mrs. Mildred Burnham, as they sat on her verandah in the clear, spring twilight. They were both middle-aged widows and had been chums since they had shared the same desk at school. Mrs. Burnham was a tall, thin lady, who admitted that she had a sensitive disposition. Mrs. Churchill, who was a large, placid, slow-moving person, never jarred on this sensitiveness; so they were very fond of each other.

  “Well,” said Mrs. Burnham, “all the people who have been married in Lancaster for the last ten years have gone away. Just now there doesn’t seem to be any candidates. What young folks there are hereabouts are too young—except Alden Churchill and this new niece of yours—what’s her name?”

  “Stella Chase.”

  “Now, if they would take a notion to each other?” suggested Mrs. Burnham.

  Mrs. Churchill gazed earnestly at the rose in her filet crochet. She had already made up her mind that her nephew Alden should marry her niece Stella, but matchmaking is something requiring subtlety and discretion, and there are things you do not tell, even to your intimate friend.

  “I don’t suppose there’s much chance of that,” she said, “and if they did it wouldn’t be any use. Mary will never let Alden marry as long a she can keep him from it; the property is hers until he marries and then it goes to him, you know. And as for Richard, he has never let poor Stella have a beau in her life. All the young men who ever tried to come to see her he simply terrified out of their senses with sarcasm. He is the most sarcastic creature you ever heard of. Stella can’t manage him—her mother before her couldn’t manage him. They didn’t know how. He goes by contraries, but neither of them ever seemed to catch on to that.”

  “I thought Miss Chase seemed very devoted to her father.”

  “O, she is. She adores him. He is a most agreeable man when he gets his own way about everything. He and I get on beautifully. I know the secret of coming it over him. I’m real glad they’ve moved up here from Chancy. They’re such company for me. Stella is a very sweet girl. I always loved her, and her mother was my favourite sister. Poor Loretta!”

  “She died young?”

  “Yes, when Stella was only eight. Richard brought Stella up himself I don’t wonder they’re everything to each other. But he should have more sense about Stella’s marrying. He must know he can’t live
forever—though to hear him talk you’d think he meant to; he’s an old man—he wasn’t young when he married. And what is Stella to do after he’s gone? Just shrivel up, I suppose.”

  “It’s a shame,” agreed Mrs. Burnham. “I don’t hold with old folks spoiling young folks’ lives like that.”

  “And Alden’s another whose life is going to be spoiled. Mary is determined he shan’t marry. Every time he’s gone about with a girl she puts a stop to it somehow.”

  “Do you s’pose it’s all her doings?” queried Mrs. Burnham, rather drily. “Some folks think Alden is very changeable. I’ve heard him called a flirt.”

  “Alden is handsome and the girls chase him,” cried Mrs. Churchill, up in arms against any criticism of her favourite. “I don’t blame him for stringing them along a bit and dropping them when he’s taught them a lesson. But there’s been one or two nice girls he really liked and Mary just blocked it every time. She told me so herself. Told me she went to the Bible—she’s always ‘going to the Bible,’ you know—and turned up a verse, and every time it was a warning against Alden getting married. I’ve no patience with her and her odd ways. Why can’t she go to church and be a decent creature like the rest of us in Lancaster? But no, she must set up a religion for herself, consisting of ‘going to the Bible.’ Last fall, when that valuable horse took sick—worth four hundred if he was a dollar—instead of sending for the Clancy vet as we all begged her to do, she ‘went to the Bible’ and turned up a verse: ‘The Lord gave and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.’ So send for the vet she would not, and the horse died. Fancy applying that verse in such a way! I call it irreverent.”

  Mrs. Churchill paused, being rather out of breath. Her sister-in-law’s vagaries always made her impatient.

  “Alden isn’t much like his mother,” said Mrs. Burnham.

  “Alden’s like his father—a finer man never stepped. Why he ever married Mary was something we could never fathom. Of course, she had lots of money but that wasn’t the reason. George was really in love with her. I don’t know how Alden stands his mother’s whims. He rather plumes himself on his liberal views—believes in evolution and that sort of stuff. Going, are you? What’s your hurry?”

  “Well,” sighed Mrs. Burnham, “I find that if I’m out in the dew much my neuralgia troubles me considerable. We’re getting old, Ellen.”

  “To be sure we are,” agreed Mrs. Churchill. “My rheumatism takes hold this spring, too, if I’m not mighty careful. Good-night. Mind the step.”

  Mrs. Churchill continued rocking on her verandah, crocheting and plotting. When her brother-in-law, Richard Chase, had moved from Clancy to Lancaster, Mrs. Churchill had been delighted. She was very fond of Stella and, as Clancy was ten miles away, she had never been able to see as much of her as she wished. And she had made up her mind that Stella and Alden Churchill must be married off to each other by hook or by crook. Stella was twenty-four and Alden was thirty and it was high time they were married, so Mrs. Churchill thought.

  “I’ve no doubt I can bring it about,” she said to herself. “But I’ll have to be careful; it would never do to let one of them suspect a thing. It’s going to mean a lot of trouble and bother, and some fibbing as well, I’m afraid. But it’s all in a good cause. Neither Alden nor Stella will ever get married to anybody if I don’t lend a hand, that’s certain. And they won’t take a fancy to each other without some help, that’s equally certain. Stella isn’t the kind of girl Alden thinks he fancies—he imagines he likes the high-coloured, laughing ones. But we’ll see, Ellen, we’ll see. I know how to deal with pig-headed people of all sorts.”

  Mrs. Churchill laughed comfortably. Then she decided she must get to work at once. Stella had been living in Lancaster for three weeks and the new minister was casting sheep’s eyes at her. Mrs. Churchill had caught him at it. She did not like him—he was too anemic and short-sighted—she was not going to help him to Stella. Besides, Alden, who hadn’t been dangling after any girls all winter, might begin at any moment. There was a new and handsome school-teacher down on the Base Line Road and spring was a dangerous time. If Alden began a new flirtation he would have no eyes for Stella.

  As yet, they were not even acquainted. The first thing to do was to have them meet each other. How was this to be managed? It must be brought about in some way absolutely innocent in appearance. Mrs. Churchill racked her kindly brains but could think of only one way. She must give a party and invite them both. She did not like the way. She was intensely proud of her beautiful, beautifully kept house with its nice furnishings and the old heirlooms that had come down to her through three generations. She hated the thought of its being torn up by preparations for a party and desecrated by a horde of young romps. The Lancaster boys and girls were such romps. But a good cause demands sacrifices. Mrs. Churchill sent out her invitation, alleging that she was giving the party as a farewell send-off for her cousin Alice’s daughter, Janet, who was going away to teach in the city. Janet, who hadn’t expected Aunt Ellen to come out like this, was rather pleased. But Mrs. Churchill’s other cousin, Elizabeth, two of whose daughters had gone away without any such farewell party, was bitterly jealous and offended, and never forgave Ellen.

  Mrs. Churchill cleaned her house from attic to cellar for the event and did all the cooking for the supper herself, help being impossible to get in Lancaster. She was woefully tired the night before the party. Every bone in her body ached, her head ached, her eyes ached. But instead of going to bed she sat out on the verandah, in the chilly spring night, and talked to Alden, who had dropped in, but would not go into the house. Mrs. Churchill was very anxious to have a talk with him, so she braved the damp and the chill.

  Alden sat on the verandah steps with his bare head thrown back against the post. He was, as his aunt had said, a very handsome fellow: tall, broad-shouldered, with a marble-white face that never tanned, and dead-black hair and eyes. He had a laughing, velvety voice which no girl could hear without a heart-beat, and a dangerous way of listening to a woman—any woman—as if she were saying something he had thirsted all his life to hear. He had gone to Midland Academy for three years and had thought of going to college. But his mother refused to let him go, alleging Biblical reasons, and Alden had settled down contentedly enough on the farm. He liked farming—it was free, out-of-doors, independent work—he had his mother’s knack of making money and his father’s attractive personality. It was no wonder he was considered a matrimonial prize.

  “Alden, I want to ask a favour of you,” said Mrs. Churchill. “Will you do it for me?”

  “Sure, Aunt Ellen,” he answered heartily. “Just name it. You know I’d do anything for you.” Alden was very fond of his Aunt Ellen and would really have done a good deal for her.

  “I’m afraid it will bore you,” said Mrs. Churchill anxiously. “But it’s just this: I want you to see that Stella Chase has a good time at the party to-morrow night. I’m so afraid she won’t. She doesn’t know the young people here, and they’re all so much younger than she is…at least the boys are. Ask her to dance and see that she isn’t left alone and out of things. She’s so shy with strangers. I do want her to have a good time.”

  “O, I’ll do my best,” said Alden readily.

  “But you mustn’t fall in love with her, you know,” said Mrs. Churchill, laughing carefully.

  “Have a heart, Aunt Ellen. Why not?”

  “I’m in earnest. It wouldn’t do at all, Alden.”

  “Why not?” persisted Alden.

  “Well—confidentially—I think the new minister has taken quite a shine to her.”

  “That conceited young ass!” exploded Alden, with unexpected warmth.

  Mrs. Churchill looked mile rebuke.

  “Why, Alden, he’s a very nice young man—so clever and well-educated. It’s only that kind of man who would have any chance at all with Stella’s father, you know.”

&nbs
p; “That so?” asked Alden, relapsing into his indifference.

  “Yes, and I don’t even know if he would. Richard thinks there’s nobody alive good enough for Stella. He simply wouldn’t let her look at a farmer like you. So I don’t want you to make trouble for yourself falling in love with a girl you could never get. I’m just giving you a friendly warning.”

  “O, thanks—thanks! What sort of a girl is she anyhow? Looks good?”

  “If you’d gone to church as often as you should, Alden, you’d have seen her before now. She’s not a beauty. Stella is my favorite niece but I can see what she lacks. She’s pale and delicate; she’d never do for a farmer’s wife. That’s why I’d like to see her and the minister make a match of it. To be sure, she’s too fond of dress—she’s positively extravagant. But they say Mr. Paxton has money of his own. To my thinking, it would be an ideal match, and that’s why I don’t want you to spoil it.”

  “Why didn’t you invite Paxton to your spree and tell him to give Stella a good time?” demanded Alden rather truculently.

  “You know I couldn’t ask the minster to a dance, Alden. Now, don’t be cranky, and do see that Stella has a nice time.”

  “O, I’ll see that she has a rip-roaring time. Good-night, Aunt Ellen.”

  Alden swung off abruptly. Left alone, Mrs. Churchill chuckled.

  “Now, if I know anything of human nature, that boy will sail right in to show me and Richard that he can get Stella if he wants her, in spite of us. And he rose right to my bait about the minster. I declare, it’s easy to manage men if you’re half cute. Dear me, this shoulder of mine is starting up. I suppose I’ll have a bad night.”

  She had a rather bad night, but the next evening she was a gallant and smiling hostess. Her party was a success. Everybody seemed to have a good time. Stella certainly had. Alden saw to that—almost too zealously for good form, his aunt thought. It was going a little too strong for a first meeting that after supper Alden should whisk Stella off to a dim corner of the verandah and keep her there for an hour. But on the whole, Mrs. Churchill was satisfied when she thought things over the next morning. To be sure, the parlor carpet had been practically ruined by two spilled saucerfuls of ice-cream, her grandmother’s Bristol glass candlesticks had been broken to smithereens, and one of the girls had upset a pitcherful of rainwater in the spare room which had soaked downwards and discoloured the dining-room ceiling in a tragic fashion, but on the credit side of the ledger was the fact that, unless all signs failed, Alden had fallen in love with Stella. Mrs. Churchill thought the balance was in her favor.