that evening a wonderful thing happened to john. it was a moonlit night and cavanaugh took the two older whaleys down to see the progress on the new building. that left john and tilly on the veranda together. at first the poor boy's tongue was tied, but under the influence of tilly's calm self-possession he soon found himself conversing with her quite easily. there was a sort of commotion in the chicken-house near the barn and they started down there to see what had caused it. he had seen young men of the better class at ridgeville walking with young ladies, holding to their arms at night, and in no little perturbation he wondered if he ought to offer tilly his arm. he did not know, and he wondered what joel eperson would do in the circumstances. finally he plunged into the matter. "won't you take my arm?" he asked, so naturally that he was surprised at himself.
she did so, although the path was clear and the distance short, and the gentle pressure of her hand on his arm sent an inexplicable thrill through him. she even leaned slightly and confidently against his shoulder, and that, too, was a wonderful experience. he was filled with ecstatic emotion. he slowed down his step and clumsily adapted his long stride to her shorter one. there was a vast, swelling joy in his throat. at the barn-yard gate she released his arm and opened it, and at once he had a fear that he had made a mistake in not forestalling her. he was flooded with shame at the thought that joel eperson[pg 59] would have known what was proper and have acted quicker.
"excuse me," the poor fellow stammered, his eyes on hers. he had never used such words before and they sounded as strange to him as if they had belonged to a foreign tongue.
"excuse you, why?" she inquired, perplexed.
"because—because i didn't open the gate for you," he replied. "i wasn't thinking."
"oh, that doesn't matter," she answered, evidently pleased, and there was something in her eyes that he had never seen there before. her face seemed to fill with a warm light, and her pretty lips were slightly parted. they walked on. the chicken-house, a shack with a lean-to roof against the barn, was near and he stood by her as she looked in at the open door.
"one of the planks they roost on fell down," she explained. "too many of them got on it. they will huddle together, warm as it is."
"i can fix it," he proposed, "but i'd have to have a light."
tilly hesitated, looking again into the shack. there was a low chirping from the perches overhead.
"never mind to-night," she said. "they have found new places and will soon settle down."
she turned back, facing him, and slowly they started toward the house. this time she took his arm without being asked, and the act gave him additional delight. he allowed the natural weight of his arm to gently press her hand against his side and she did not resent it. in fact, he felt as if her touch was responsive. the moonlight fell on her bare head and played in her wonderful hair, upon which the moisture of the night was settling. half-way[pg 60] between the barn and the house there was an empty road-wagon. its massive tongue stood out straight a foot or so above the ground. to his wonderment, tilly sat down on it, thrusting her little feet out in front of her.
"let's sit here," she said. "they won't be back for some time yet."
he complied, his wonder and delight growing. they were silent. finally she spoke again.
"you are the strangest man i ever saw," she said, looking into his face with her calm, probing eyes.
"am i?" he asked. "why, how so?"
"i don't know," she made answer, thoughtfully, and she locked her little hands in her lap and looked down. "i can't make you out. you are so—so gentle and tender with me. you are a mystery, a deep mystery. you don't seem to take to women in general, and yet, and yet with me—" she sighed and broke off abruptly.
in his all but dazed delight he could not supply the words she had failed to summon, though he knew what he would have said could he but have untangled his enthralled tongue.
"oh, i'm no mystery!" he tried to laugh away his awkwardness. "i'm as plain as an old shoe; no frills about me. you ask the boys that work with me."
she was unconvinced. he saw her shake her wise little head and twist her fingers together as she answered:
"a girl i know who saw you on the platform that day said she'd bet you'd had an unfortunate love-affair. she said nothing else would make as—as fine a young man as you are shun all the girls like you do. she even hinted that maybe you were—were married down in georgia and for some reason or other was not telling it."[pg 61]
"oh no, i'm not married," he laughed. "gee! sam would think that is funny. me married!"
"then you have had a—a love-affair with some girl, and—"
"wrong again!" he laughed, deep in the throat of his ebullient joy. "i've just been a sort of stay-at-home, pretty busy, you know. i've had my hands full of night work, figuring, writing, and planning, and through the day i've been hard at it, as a general thing. no, i'm just, i reckon, not a natural ladies' man." how could he explain to her what he had never understood or even tried to fathom, the reason why he was different from other young men of his age whose manner of life he had only superficially observed?
tilly seemed still unconvinced. "that girl was sally teasdale," she went on. "she was here yesterday. you may remember her—the tall, dark-haired girl that sang in the choir that day and turned my music for me once. she is going to have a party at her house down the road wednesday night. she is—is dead set on having you there. she says all the girls want to get acquainted with you, and she—she wanted me to—to take you to it."
"to take me to it?" he repeated, hardly understanding what was really meant, for how could a young lady be asking him to a party at her house when no home of that sort had ever been open to him? how could that be true, and that another girl of tilly's social rank should really be inviting him to escort her?
"i see, you don't want to go," tilly said, with a touch of mild resentment. "well, that is for you to decide, and i would not have asked you but there was no way out of it. even mother advised me to mention it."
never had his confusion been greater. "why, i want[pg 62] to go!" he blurted out. "i don't see how you could doubt it. and you say that you will let me go along with you?"
"yes, but it was sally's idea; not mine," tilly urged. "don't think i go about inviting boys to take me places. you see, you are stopping at our house, and that is why sally mentioned it to me, but the fact that you pay us board doesn't give me the right to pull you into things you don't care for. you must be your own judge. no doubt you are frightfully tired at night, and if you have writing and figuring to do after work hours, why, it would be wrong of you to bother with a crowd of silly country girls that you never saw before."
"me tired? oh no! leave that out of the question," he warmly thrust in. "i've set up with the boys when they were sick all night long, and worked the next day without feeling it. what ails you? why don't you think i'd like to go with you? well, i would— i do want to go."
"well then, we'll go," tilly said. "i know you will like the girls—sally, especially, for she is crazy, simply crazy about you. huh! and you don't know it? why, she goes to town nearly every day just to pass the new court-house. shucks! she knows every layer of brick that goes in it, and every man by name that works under you."
"i think i remember the girl you mean." john was not absorbing the compliment. "she is a tall, dark girl, as straight as an indian squaw. she stopped one day and asked me some questions about the rooms on the lower floor. sam come and showed her around— i was too busy. sam's on the ladies' entertainment committee— i am not."[pg 63]
"she told me she had never met you." tilly leaned toward him as she spoke. she clasped her hands over her knee. she was staring steadily, her eyes flashing. "oh, my! what won't some girls do to get in with a new man? huh! she has failed to get at you in every other way and is now making a cat's-paw of me."
"i declare i don't know what you mean," john asserted, "but if you are in earnest—about the party, i mean—why, you can count me in. i've never been a party man—i wouldn't know what to do or say—but if you will go with me, i'll be ready long before you are, i'll bet you. i'll hire a horse and buggy at the livery-stable, and—"
"oh no, i seldom ride," tilly protested. "it is only about a mile and we can walk that far in pretty weather like this. they all live close about except joel eperson. he always drives in and brings his sister, martha jane."
"oh, so he's going—that feller is going!" john exclaimed in a crestfallen tone. "i see—i see—he's going."
"yes. he is sally's first cousin."
the uncouth mason sat silent. he folded his ponderous hands and scowled as he did when displeased with the work of a bungling assistant. tilly was covertly and studiously regarding his profile.
"why do you say it like that?" she inquired. "is there anything strange about joel going to a party?"
"strange? not if he knows you are to be there. does he?"
"i suppose he does think i may be there, but what of it—what of it?"
john turned and stared toward the house. it was as if he were trying to keep her from seeing the fierce expression he knew had clutched his face. tilly leaned closer to him.[pg 64] her shoulder touched his. she sat waiting for him to turn his head toward her again. presently he looked at her, his honest eyes holding a famished expression.
"what is there strange about joel going?" she asked, softly and all but propitiatingly.
"nothing strange about it—just the reverse," he sighed. "i've heard that he has been loving you ever since he was a little boy, and that he comes to see you every chance he gets. i've heard that your father doesn't like him. i see—his cousin has got this party up so you and he can—"
tilly sprang to her feet. john kept his seat, unaware that even rural courtesy demanded that he rise when she did. but tilly was no stickler for conventions. she was a working-girl; he was a laborer, and there was something to be fathomed in the man before her which lurked deep within him. she was angry, or perhaps only impatient, but the mood passed as if melting into the moonlight which laved her dainty form like some supernal fluid.
"what you said is not kind or just," she objected, sweetly. "you intimate that i'd meet joel somewhere against my father's wishes. i would not do so. i would not disobey my father or do anything on the sly that he would oppose."
in dumb, almost stupid alarm john sat staring up at her. he quaked under the sudden realization that he had offended her, and yet he had never apologized to any one in his life. the fine sense of that sort of restitution belonged to social paths john trott had never traversed. "excuse me," he might have said, as he had said at the gate, but somehow under her bent gaze he found himself unable to utter a word. it may have been the sheer blank look in his eyes, or the helpless twitching of his lips, that[pg 65] decided her, for she suddenly sat down by him again and leaned forward till their eyes met.
"you did not mean to say that i'd do anything underhand, i'm sure," she faltered. "i'm sure of it now."
"oh no," he slowly shook his head and seemed to swallow an emotional contraction in his throat. "i didn't mean any harm, but—but he will be there, you say? he'll be there?"
"yes, yes, of course," tilly responded. "i suppose he will bring martha jane. he usually does. but what of that?"
"he'll want to talk to you, i suppose?" john went on, his nether lip hanging limp, his gaze steady.
"why, yes—that is, maybe he will. sometimes couples walk about between the games and dances. i don't dance. my father and mother oppose it, and our church does not sanction it; but you dance, don't you?"
"no, i've never even been to a dance. i hardly know what they are like. the young folks at ridgeville have them often at their club and at the hotels and in their homes, but the boys are a lot of dudes that have nothing else to do, and i hate them. i've always had to work for a living and most of them are well off and look down on poor folks. people here treat a fellow like me different somehow."
"it seems very strange that you don't dance," tilly mused aloud, "especially when you don't belong to the church. how does it happen that you never joined?"
he shrugged and sniffed with uncurbed contempt, unaware of the fact that what he was saying was an unheard-of thing in tilly's circle. "i don't believe in them," he jerked out. "they are a bunch of close-fisted, grafting hypocrites. most of them haven't the brains of a gnat.[pg 66] i've helped build meeting-houses, run against the leaders, and know their private lives. they say they believe there is a god— i don't!"
tilly sighed unresentfully. "you will see it differently some day," she said. "will you do me a favor?"
"will i? try me," he laughed, and he sat eagerly waiting for her to continue.
in her earnestness she put her hand on his knee as she leaned closer to him. "then don't tell father how you feel about it—please don't. you don't know him. you can't imagine how furious that would make him. a man stopped at our house once to stay overnight. he was selling harvesting-machines, and after supper he and my father had an argument on the veranda. he said—the man said something like what you've just said to me, and father made him leave the house—made him pack up and leave at once, for father said it would be a sin for us to sleep under the same roof. mother did not object, either. she was glad to see him go. our preacher preached a sermon on it and said my father did right. i'm sorry you believe as you do, but won't you promise me not to say anything about it while you are here?"
"i'll promise you anything on earth you ask." john sat up straight. her little hand was still on his knee. he yearned to take it into his calloused grasp and fondle into it his assurances of compliance with her desires. "i don't object to any man's religion unless it rubs against my rights as a man," he went on. "these church folks here may be better than any i've run across, but down home the breed doesn't suit me. why, when i was a little fellow in the public school i've had them—women and men—invite other boys to go to christmas-tree parties, sunday-school festivals, or picnics, and leave[pg 67] me out. they would do it right before my face, as if i was the very dirt under their feet. a thing like that would be noticed by a little boy who wonders why he can't go along with the rest."
"i didn't know there were such church members as that anywhere," tilly said, thoughtfully. "oh, i see. i wonder if your folks are catholics?"
"no. my father is dead. my mother doesn't go to any church."
"oh, that's odd. not any at all?"
"no. i guess she is like me. she doesn't know any of the members or care a hill of beans about them. why did you ask if we were catholics?"
"because catholics are looked down on so much around here. if you had said you were one, i was going to ask you not to mention that to my father, either. the greatest trouble my family ever had came through the catholics. you see, i had a brother. he died five years ago. he was a professing member of our church, and father was awfully proud of him because he was a fine exhorter at revivals. when he wasn't more than sixteen my brother actually preached in public, though he wasn't ordained. they called him 'the boy wonder' and many people were converted under him."
"i've seen his sort," john said, reflectively. "they had one down our way, a sissy of a chap, that women fairly went crazy over, but you say your brother died."
"yes, but not before he caused us that great trouble," tilly went on. "it was this way. father's chief ambition was to have him preach, and when he was about twenty, and after father had saved and stinted to put him through the methodist seminary, an irish family moved here. they were catholics. there was a girl in the family, and[pg 68] in some way or other george got acquainted with her and got to visiting at her house. you know the catholics have no church here—there are so few of them—but at her house my brother met catholics who talked to him and gave him books to read. the truth is, he fell in love with the girl and our trouble began. she and her folks somehow convinced him that her religion was the oldest one—that it was really established by our lord, and that all the other denominations had shot off from it. george had the manhood to come to father and tell him what he believed and that he was going to join the catholics, so that he and the girl could marry according to catholic rites. i was too young to know what it was all about, but i was terrified by father's fury. he acted like a crazy man. he couldn't eat or sleep. he disowned my brother and drove him from home. george married the girl and they all moved away. by accident we heard that he had died of consumption away out west, and then a man—a catholic, some kin of george's wife—came to deliver some message george had sent from his death-bed. we were all sitting in the parlor. before father would let him say what the message was father asked the man if george died a catholic, and when the man said he did and that a priest had been called in, my father refused to hear the message and showed him the door. my mother seemed willing to listen to it, but she always obeys my father. they are almost exactly alike, and so she said nothing."
the gate latch clicked. voices were heard from the house. "they are back. i'll have to go in," tilly said, and she sighed as from weighty memories awakened by her recital.
john got up and tilly took his arm again. it seemed to him that her hold upon it was somehow insecure, and[pg 69] he took her hand and drew it higher up. he had never touched her hand till now, and, while it was rough from her accustomed toil, by contrast with his own brick-and-stone rasped palm, it felt as soft as velvet. there was a warm lack of resistance in it and he released it reluctantly. how glorious and bliss-drenching seemed the moonlight as it lay on the landscape! and it was not to end, he told himself. there was the party to look forward to. that would give him another chance to see her alone. he was a strong man, and yet he was all but swooning under emotions which he had never dreamed could exist.
"oh, there they are!" he heard mrs. whaley exclaiming.
tilly now released john's arm, stepped forward, and casually explained the mishap in the chicken-house.
"the same thing happened some time ago," mrs. whaley said, pleasantly, to john. "we've got too many chickens, anyway. i'm going to ship some of them off."
he told her awkwardly that he would send one of the carpenters up to repair the damage, and further showed his crudeness by adding that it should not cost her anything, all of which struck her as being quite gentlemanly of him, and proving his ability to command men who ranked lower than himself in the scale of his trade.
they all separated for the night and john went to his bed stirred by hopes and passions that kept sleep from his brain for hours.
