The Dowry of Miss Lydia Clark

by Lawana Blackwell

  The shopkeeper’s walruslike mustache twitched. “A what?”

  “You know, one o’ those real bright people.”

  “I see. But what you mean to say is a genial.”

  “I do?”

  Tapping a temple, Mr. Trumble explained, “I’ve read through Mr. Johnson’s dictionary twice now, so’s it’s all stored up here to stay.”

  Harold walked across the lane to chat with Mr. Pool’s gardener, Abe Worthy, for a little while, hoping Mrs. Clark would come along. But then Abe started acting as though he wanted to get back to work, so Harold gave up and went back to the wagon. He wondered if he should drive down Walnut Tree Lane past the Clark cottage, but as everyone in town knew he had no reason to do so, he decided against it. Empty milk cans rattled about in the wagon bed as the team neared the Bryce. He happened to look to his right and saw Lester Meeks standing near an oak at the edge of the green. A girl sat near him on the ground, her arms wrapped around the head she had propped against her knees. Pulling Dan and Bob’s reins, Harold hopped down from the wagon.

  “What happened?” He recognized that the girl was Phoebe. Her shoulders shook like she was weeping, and Lester’s face was pinched up like he was about to do the same.

  “She tripped over a root.”

  “A root, huh?” Harold squatted on the ground beside the girl and touched her shoulder. “Let’s have a look, Phoebe.”

  She raised a teary face and blinked her red eyes at him. “I’m not hurt, Mr. Sanders.”

  “Billy Casper laughed at her when she fell,” Lester explained, pointing off down the green.

  “He did, huh?” Raising himself on his haunches, Harold spotted a boy running away from them in the direction of the town hall. “You’d better keep running!” he yelled, shaking a fist. He turned back to the girl and pulled a wrinkled bandana from his pocket. “This ain’t too dirty. Blow yer nose.”

  He waited for her to obey, then asked, “Where are your spectacles, Phoebe?”

  “Right here.” Sheepishly she took them from the pocket of her pinafore.

  “Well, put ’em on.”

  “Are you going to tell Mother?”

  Harold tucked the bandana back into his pocket and rubbed his chin. “Well, that’s something I’ve got to study on. Seems like she’d want to know her daughter is dangerin’ her life every time she steps out the door. Why are you so all-fired intent on not wearing ’em?”

  Bottom lip trembling, she answered, “I didn’t want to be laughed at.”

  “Is that so? And what was that Casper boy doin’, exactly?”

  “Laughing,” she mumbled.

  “Fancy that.”

  He discovered that the children were on their way to Trumbles with a list of goods to have delivered. “You might as well get them now,” Harold told them. “Seein’ as there’s room in my wagon.”

  Their list was small compared to Sanders standards, and soon he had their sacks of flour and oats, matches, pail of lard, tins of tea and treacle, and a card of sewing pins in the back of the wagon. He allowed them to sit on either side of him on the way home because they were both small enough to fit, and he expected they might like to learn to drive. Dan and Bob didn’t care who sat at the reins anyway. After they crossed the Bryce and he had taken the reins from Lester to give Phoebe a turn, he said to her, “Seems like the people you’re so worried about laughing at you ain’t so nice. Why would you take a chance on doing yourself harm just so’s mean people won’t laugh?”

  “Because it hurts when they laugh,” Phoebe sniffed, sitting stiffly.

  “Worse than tripping over a root?”

  She opened her mouth to answer, but no sound came out. And presently she smiled. “No, sir.”

  “Besides, you look real bright with those spectacles on.”

  “I do?”

  “Like that lady at the Larkspur who writes all those books. You don’t see her tripping over roots.”

  “I wonder what would happen if Billy laughed at her?” Lester asked from his left.

  Harold grinned. “Well, he oughter not, if he’s got any sense. She could just give his name to somebody in one of her books. Somebody ugly, with big warts all over his face.”

  “Or maybe one big one on the tip of his nose!” Lester chimed in with a chuckle that shook his whole body.

  “And green teeth?” Phoebe offered with eyes still on the reins.

  “Green as grass!” Harold agreed.

  Trudy was sitting on the stoop, playing with a doll, when the horses stopped in the drive. She ran out to greet them, saying her mother and Mark were fixing the door of the hay barn. Harold cocked his head. Sure enough, he heard the sound of a hammer. He gave the lighter items to the three children, then hefted the two sacks across his shoulders and picked up the lard bucket. When the groceries were in the kitchen, he slapped his hands together to get rid of the flour that had sifted through the sack and said, “I s’pose I should see if your mother needs some help.”

  Out in the barnyard, Mrs. Meeks was holding a board crosswise against the loose planks of the barn door, while Mark held the hammer. With one sweep of his eyes, Harold counted four bent nails. They were miserable carpenters. He would have laughed if they weren’t a poor woman and boy trying to do a man’s work. But he cleared his throat instead. “Hullo?”

  They both turned their heads to look at him. Strands of brown hair had worked themselves away from the knot above Mrs. Meeks’ collar, and sweat beaded her face. “Mr. Sanders?” she said.

  “I gave Phoebe and Lester a ride home,” he explained in case she was wondering.

  She smiled and thanked him. Then she flinched as Mark swung the hammer.

  “Bent again!” the boy cried in disgust.

  “You’re holding it too far away from the nail. And you should be hammering from the other side.” Harold held out his hand. “Why don’t you let me show you?”

  Mark looked hurt as he handed over the hammer, so Harold winked at him. “I didn’t even learn how to use a saw ’til I was bigger than you.” He didn’t think it needful to add that a saw was much more difficult to use than a hammer, which he had learned how to use at about age six. It worked, for Mark smiled.

  “Now, why don’t you go on inside and tend to your groceries,” Harold said to Mrs. Meeks.

  “But we’re keeping you from your own chores…”

  “Now, don’t be worryin’ about that,” Harold told her, although he indeed did have chores waiting. “We men’ll have this fixed in no time.”

  “No time” took two hours, much longer than he had anticipated. But the door was as sturdy as a new one. For a few minutes Harold and Mark stood there and admired their work. Then Harold said he had to go. “My papa will be mad as—”

  Remembering the tender years of his helper, he bit off the next word and replaced it with “ a goose with its bill caught in the corn crib.”

  Mark laughed. “That’s mad, huh, Mr. Sanders?”

  Smiling, Harold warmed to the subject. “Or mebbe he’ll be madder than a mule chewing on hornets.”

  The boy held his sides. Between chortles, he offered, “Mad as a dog with fleas?”

  Harold didn’t think that was as funny as his jokes, but he laughed to be polite. “Tell your mother good-day for me,” he said as he handed the hammer back to the boy. But he had no sooner reached the wagon when Mrs. Meeks came out of the cottage. She had refastened her hair and changed her clothes, and thanked him with such gratitude in her expression that Harold felt ten feet tall.

  “You’ll stay for supper, won’t you?” she asked. “I’ve fresh bread and butter, and a fine cabbage soup with some of the ham you gave us.”

  With a glance at the orange sky to the west, Harold had to shake his head. “Thank you, but I’ve got to get back.”

  “Some other time, then,” she told him with an understanding smile.

  “Yes, some other time.” He was just about to hop up into the driver’s seat when he told himself that late was
late, and no matter what time he showed up back at home, his papa was likely to raise a fuss. Maybe his family had already had supper, and Mrs. Winters wasn’t happy about stragglers—even those bringing coffee beans. If he was going to be in trouble, he might as well have food in his belly. He turned around and gave her a sheepish shrug.

  “I do admire a hearty cabbage soup, ma’am. Next to fresh bread with butter, that’s my most favorite food in the world.”

  He didn’t intend to stay so long, but after the meal the children sat with him at the table and laughed at his jokes while Mrs. Meeks smiled and cleaned the kitchen. Stars were already starting to show themselves in the dusky sky by the time he left.

  To Harold’s utter surprise, his papa only stopped his whittling long enough to send him a curious look as he came through the doorway. He prepared for bed with the same glow of happiness he had felt before. Not only had he turned a good deed—more than one, actually, because seeing about Phoebe and Lester in town counted—but he had also had a good time. The Meeks looked up to him, something few others in Gresham did. And Papa hadn’t yelled at him for missing chores.

  “What are you grinnin’ at?” Dale asked suspiciously just before Harold snuffed the candle out. “Did that schoolmistress decide she likes you after all?”

  “No.” But his smile did not leave as he pulled the covers about his shoulders in the darkness. Maybe all this happiness he was having lately was a sign that his luck was about to take a turn for the better. Just maybe it meant that Miss Clark would change her mind as well.

  As his family dressed for church on Sunday morning, Andrew walked over to the vicarage an hour earlier than usual. Mr. Sykes and Mrs. Bartley had insisted he not be present when the new pulpit was delivered the evening before. He suspected their reason was due to the same superstition that forbade the groom to see the bride on a wedding day. As much as he disliked superstition, there were times when a vicar just had to be agreeable, and this was one of them.

  His breath caught in his throat as he walked up the aisle, for the rich oak glowed like honey in the light slanting through the stainedglass windows. Carved into the front panel was a scene of Christ at prayer in the garden of Gethsemane. Andrew walked close enough to run his hand over wood as smooth as glass. “Thank you, Father,” he prayed, his words echoing softly in the quiet sanctuary. Won’t the congregation rejoice to have such beauty in front of them every Sunday? Another thought made him smile. But they still have to contend with my tired old face.

  He turned at the sound of the heavy front door closing. In from the vestibule walked Mr. and Mrs. Hayes. Not this morning, of all mornings! Andrew groaned to himself. But courtesy compelled him to call out, “Good morning.”

  “Good morning, Vicar,” Mr. Hayes greeted him. At his side, his wife smiled pleasantly. The effect was astonishing, for it wiped ten years from her face. They were halfway up the aisle when Andrew noticed they were holding hands.

  “My sister sends me a special wood polish from London,” Mrs. Hayes explained as they stopped in front of him. Her husband handed her the cloth bag he held in his other hand, and she took a cloth and white jar from it. “I thought it might need touching up a bit after being moved.”

  Staring up at the pulpit, Mr. Hayes blew out his cheeks. “It’s beautiful, ain’t it?”

  “Beautiful,” his wife agreed, then gave Andrew a sheepish look. “Truth is, Vicar, I couldn’t wait to see it. I shouldn’t have mentioned such to Luther, because he pampers me so.”

  “Well, you deserve it,” Mr. Hayes told her.

  Andrew smiled and told the two that he would see them in a little while. “Mrs. Phelps may need my help in the vicarage.”

  “Oh dear.” Mrs. Hayes stopped rubbing the cloth in the open jar. “You wanted to be here alone. We’ve gone and ruined your morning.”

  “Actually, Mrs. Hayes,” Andrew told her, “you’ve gone and made my morning even better.”

  Harold’s good fortune changed for the worse on Sunday. And he had no warning, for the morning was as nice as the night before had been. Mrs. Winters cooked his eggs just the way he liked them and even smiled and thanked him for getting the coffee in town. The sun shone brightly, but the air was not so hot as to make his tweed coat give him a sweat. While he waited at the side of Saint Jude’s, a yellow chiff-chaff sang sweetly to him from the branch of a yew tree, sounding like a little bell and fluttering like a leaf in the wind.

  The change happened as he was driving the Meeks family home, after passing Miss Clark and her parents on the green. In the wagon bed, Trudy sat on the supply box and tugged on the back of his sleeve. “Wasn’t the new pulpit nice, Mr. Sanders?”

  Harold, who had just finished telling Mrs. Meeks about the chiff-chaff, angled his head to hear the girl better. “The what?”

  “Vicar Phelps’s new pulpit.”

  “It’s not just the vicar’s, Trudy,” Mark said from behind.

  That made it a little clearer. Harold reckoned they were talking about something the vicar wore, like a new suit. Maybe his clothes belonged to the church, just like the vicarage did. He twisted his head around to wink at Trudy. “I don’t care what he wears, as long as he preaches those good sermons.”

  The children laughed, which told him he had given the right answer. But when he tried to help Mrs. Meeks from the wagon in front of the cottage, she shook her head and sent the children on inside. They did so quietly, each turning back to look at him before disappearing through the doorway. Only when the door closed did Mrs. Meeks turn to him. Her brown eyes wore a look that Harold didn’t understand.

  “Is there something wrong?” he asked.

  But instead of answering, she said in a quiet voice, “You’ve been pretending to go to church, haven’t you?”

  “I go to church.”

  “Inside, I mean.”

  A lie rose to his lips, but he was unable to force it out. “Well, not inside.”

  “Why, Mr. Sanders?”

  He tried to say Miss Clark’s name. However, just like the lie, it wouldn’t form on his tongue. So in all truthfulness he said, “I like helping you and the children.”

  A sad smile drained the brightness from her face. “You’re not a believer, are you?”

  It was a question, but she said it like she already knew the answer. And Mercy had preached religion to him enough so that he understood what she was talking about.

  “I’m aiming to be one day, Mrs. Meeks,” he told her.

  “I see.” Again he saw the sad smile as she folded her work-worn hands over the cloth reticule in her lap. “You’ve been kind to us, Mr. Sanders, and I thank you for that. But we can’t ride with you anymore. And please don’t offer my children rides or come to visit.”

  “But why? The children are fond of me.”

  “And that’s why, Mr. Sanders.”

  “I don’t understand. Ain’t it good for them to have a man about once in a while, with their papa being taken from them and all?”

  She shook her head and stared down at her folded hands. “Not if he’s someone their mother can’t consider marryin’. They talk about you all the time. If you come around too much, they’re going to get attached to you, and it’s going to break their hearts.”

  This didn’t make any sense. Who said anything about marrying Mrs. Meeks? Then it dawned upon Harold that she was thinking that all the attention he was giving her family was because he wanted to court her. Of course!

  “But why wouldn’t you want to marry me?” he asked. Not that he wanted her to, because his heart belonged to Miss Clark. He just needed to know. “Because I don’t go to church?”

  “Because you’re not a believer and don’t go to church,” she said softly, then looked up at him again. Tears were gathered in her eyelashes. “You’re a good man, Mr. Sanders. But the Scriptures say a believer shouldn’t marry a person who isn’t a believer. God’s been so good to my family. The least I can do is obey. And my children should have a father who’ll set a good exampl
e by goin’ to church.”

  With that, she picked up her reticule. Harold had no choice but to help her down from the wagon. He glanced toward the cottage and saw three heads duck from a window. An odd thickness came to the back of his throat. “Well…I…uh…h-hope you’ll tell me…if you ever need anything,” he stammered, shifting his weight on his feet.

  “Thank you, Mr. Sanders.”

  Then to his surprise, she came toward him and planted a quick kiss upon his cheek. “I’ll pray for you every day,” she said as she stepped backward, tears still shining in her eyes.

  “Uh, thank you.”

  And there was nothing left to do but leave. He swung back into the wagon and picked up the reins. His heart was so heavy that he whistled a tune to try to cheer himself up, but it only made him feel worse. It was the first time a woman had ever kissed him, and he could still feel her lips softly upon his cheek as he neared home.

  “Wasn’t that a moving sermon?” Mrs. Durwin asked at the Larkspur’s dining table that same afternoon as the lodgers sat down to a lunch of boiled mutton with caper sauce, roast parsnips, and rhubarb dumplings.

  “It was,” Miss Somerville agreed.

  Mr. Clay, cutting his mutton with a knife, said, “Sermon? My eyes were so drawn by the pulpit that I forgot to listen.”

  “Oh, Mr. Clay,” Mrs. Durwin said with an affectionate smile. “You did no such thing.”

  Jacob tore off a piece of his bread and wished the conversation would change to something else. The sermon had indeed been moving, but it moved his conscience in a painful direction. For the subject was hypocrisy. As an illustration, the vicar used Ananias and his wife Sapphira’s pretending to give to God all of the money they had received for a piece of land, when actually they kept some back. Their sin was not in holding some back—for as Saint Peter told them, the land was theirs to do with as they wished—but in lying about it so that others would think well of them.

  He looked across at Eugenia and winced inwardly while returning her smile. It was ironic that Vicar Phelps had chosen that particular subject, for Jacob had been in torment over his own hypocrisy ever since Friday evening, when Miss Somerville made her stunning confession in the hall. How serene the newest lodger looked now!