Chapter 16

When Eleanor Prency heard that her lover had not only been converted but was taking an active part in the special religious meetings, she found herself in what the old women of the vicinity called a "state of mind." She did not object to young men becoming very good; that is, she did object to any young man of whom she happened to be very fond becoming very bad. But it seemed to her that there was a place where the line should be drawn, and that Reynolds Bartram had overstepped it. That he might sometime join the church was a possibility to which she had previously looked forward with some pleasurable sense of anticipation. She belonged to the church herself, so did her father and mother, and she had long been of the opinion that a little religion was a very good thing for a young man who was in business and subject to temptation. But, as she regarded the events of the past few evenings as reported by people who had been to the meetings, she became more than ever of the opinion that a little religion would go a long way, and that Reynolds Bartram had more than was necessary.

To add to her annoyance, some of her intimate acquaintances who knew that if the two young people were not engaged they certainly were very fond of each other, and who regarded the match as a matter of course in the near future, began to twit her on the possibility of her lover becoming a minister should he go on in his present earnest course of trying to save lost souls. The more they talked about her, in her presence, as a minister's wife, the less she enjoyed the prospect. Minister's wives in Bruceton were sometimes pretty, but they never dressed very well, and Miss Eleanor was sure, from what she saw of their lives, that they never had any good times.

Fuel was added to the fire of her discontent when her mother announced one morning that Jane Kimper had arrived and would assist the couple at their sewing. To Eleanor, Jane represented the Kimper family, the head of which was the cause of Reynolds Bartram's extraordinary course. Eleanor blamed Sam for all the discomfort to which she had been subjected on account of Bartram's religious aspirations, and she was inclined to visit upon the new seamstress the blame for all the annoyances from which she had suffered.

Like a great many other girls who are quite affectionate daughters, she neglected to make a confidante of her mother; and Mrs. Prency was therefore very much surprised, on entering the room after a short shopping-tour, to discover the two young women in utter silence, Eleanor looking greatly vexed and the new sewing-woman very much distressed about something. The older lady endeavored to engage the couple in conversation. After waiting a little while for the situation to make itself manifest, but getting only very short replies, she left the room and made an excuse to call her daughter after her.

"My dear child, what is the matter? Doesn't Jane know how to sew?"

"Yes," said Eleanor, "I suppose so; but she knows how to talk, too, and she has done it so industriously and made me feel so uncomfortable that I have not had any opportunity to examine her sewing."

"My daughter, what can she have said to annoy you so much?"

"Oh," exclaimed Eleanor, savagely snatching to pieces a bit of delicate silk she held in her hand, "what every one else is talking about. What does any one in this town have to talk about just now, I wonder, except Reynolds Bartram and the church? Why is it that they all think it necessary to come and talk to me about it? I am sure I am not specially interested in church work, and I don't believe any one who has talked to me about it is, but I hear nothing else from morning till night when any visitor comes in. I was congratulating myself that I had an excuse to-day, so that I need not see any one who might call, but that dreadful girl is worse than all the rest put together. She seems to think, as her folks at home haven't anything else to talk about, and as her father is so delighted at the 'blessed change,' as she expresses it, that has come over Bartram, that I should feel just as happy about it."

"Well, daughter, don't you?"

"No, mother, I don't. I suppose it's perfectly dreadful in me to say so, but I don't feel anything of the kind. It's just horrid; and I wish you and father would take me away for a little while, or else let me go off on a visit. People talk as if Ray belonged entirely to me,--as if I had something to do about it; and you know perfectly well I haven't."

"Well, dear, is that any reason why you should be jealous of poor Sam Kimper?"

"Jealous!" exclaimed Eleanor, her eyes flashing: "he is the worst enemy I ever had. I haven't had so much annoyance and trouble in all my life as have come to me during the past two or three days through that wretched man. I wish him almost any harm. I even wish he had never gone to the penitentiary"

Mrs. Prency burst out laughing. The young woman saw the blunder she had committed, and continued, quickly,--

"I mean that I wish he had never got out again. The idea of a fellow like that coming back to this town and talking and working on people's sympathies in such a way as to carry intelligent people right off their feet! Here you and father have been talking about him at the table almost every day for a long time!"

"Well, daughter, you seemed interested in everything we said, and thought he might do a great deal of good if he were sincere and remained true to his professions."

"Great deal of good? Yes; but, of course, I supposed he'd do it among his own set of people. I had no idea that he was going to invade the upper classes of society and make a guy out of the very young man that--"

Then Eleanor burst into tears.

"My dear child," said the mother, "you are making altogether too much of very little. Of course, it's impossible that everybody in the town sha'n't be surprised at the sudden change that has come over Mr. Bartram, but it ought to comfort you to know that all the better people in the town are very glad to learn of it, and that his example is making them very much ashamed of themselves, and that, instead of the meetings being conducted almost entirely by him and Sam Kimper, hereafter--"

"Him and Sam Kimper! Mother! the idea of mentioning the two persons in the same day!--in the same breath! How can you?"

"Well, dear, they will no longer manage the meetings by themselves, but a number of the older citizens, who have generally held aloof from such affairs, have resolved that it is time for them to do something, so Reynolds will very soon be a less prominent figure, and I trust you will hear less about him. But don't--I beg of you, don't visit your displeasure on that poor girl. You can't imagine that she had anything to do with her father's conversion, can you, still less with that of Mr. Bartram? Now, do dry your eyes and try to come back to your work and be cheerful. If you can't do more, you at least can be human. Don't disgrace your parentage, my dear. _She_ has not even done that as yet."

Then Mrs. Prency returned to the sewing-room and chatted a little while with the new seamstress about the work in hand. Eleanor joined them in a few moments, and the mental condition of the atmosphere became somewhat less cloudy than before, when suddenly a stupid servant, who had only just been engaged and did not entirely know the ways of the house, ushered directly into the sewing-room Mr. Reynolds Bartram.

Eleanor sprang to her feet, spreading dress-goods, and needles, and spools of silk, and thread, and scissors, and thimbles, all over the floor. Jane looked up timidly for an instant, and bent her head lower over her work. But Mrs. Prency received him as graciously as if she were the Queen of England sitting upon her throne, with her royal robes upon her.

"I merely dropped in to see the judge, Mrs. Prency. I beg pardon for intruding upon the business of the day."

"I don't suppose he is at home," said the lady. "You have been at the office?"

"Yes, and I was assured he was here. I was anxious to see him at once. I suspect I have a very heavy case on my hands, Mrs. Prency. What do you suppose I have agreed to do? I have promised, actually promised, to persuade him to come down to the church this evening and take part in the meetings."

Eleanor, who had just reseated herself, flashed an indignant look at him. The young man saw it; but if the spirit of regeneration had worked upon him to a sufficient extent to make him properly sensitive to the looks and manners of estimable young women, he showed no sign of it at the moment.

"I am sure I wish you well in your effort," said the judge's wife; "and, if it is of any comfort to you, I promise that I will do all in my power to assist you."

Then Eleanor's eyes flashed again, as she said,--

"Mother, the idea of father--"

"Well?"

"The idea of father taking part in such work!"

"Do you know of any one, daughter, whose character more fully justifies him in doing so? If you do, I shall not hesitate to ask Mr. Bartram to act as substitute until some one else can be found."

Then Eleanor's eyes took a very different expression, and she began to devote herself intensely to her sewing.

"If you are very sure," said Bartram, "that your husband is not at home, I must seek him elsewhere, I suppose. Good day! Ah, I beg pardon. I did not notice--I was not aware that it was you, Miss Kimper. I hope if you see your father to-day you will tell him that the good work that he began is progressing finely, and that you saw me in search to-day of Judge Prency to help him on with his efforts down at the church."

And then, with another bow, Bartram left the room.

If poor Jane could have been conscious of the look that Eleanor bent upon her at that instant, she certainly would have been inclined to leave the room and never enter it again. But she knew nothing of it, and the work went on amid oppressive silence. Mrs. Prency had occasion to leave the room for an instant soon after, and Jane lifted her head and said,--

"Who would have thought, Miss, that that young man was going to be so good, and all of a sudden, too?"

"He always was good," said Eleanor, "that is, until now."

"I'm sorry I mentioned it, ma'am, but I s'pose he won't be as wild as he and some of the young men about this town have been."

"What do you mean by wild? Do you mean to say that he ever was wild in any way?"

"Oh, perhaps not," said the unfortunate sewing-girl, wishing herself anywhere else as she tried to find some method of escaping from the unfortunate remark.

"What do you mean, then? Tell me: can't you speak?"

"Oh, only you know, ma'am, some of the nicest young men in town come down to the hotel nights to chat, and they take a glass of wine once in a while, and smoke, and have a good time, and--"

Eleanor looked at Jane very sharply, but the sewing-girl's face was averted, so that questioning looks could elicit no answers. Eleanor's gaze, however, continued to be fixed. She was obliged to admit to herself, as she had said to her mother several days before, that Jane had a not unsightly face and quite a fine figure. She had heard that there were sometimes "great larks," as the young men called them, at the village hotel, and she wondered how much the underlings of the establishment could know about them, and what stories they could tell. Jane suddenly became to her more interesting than she had yet been. She wondered what further questions to ask, and could not think of any that she could put into words. Finally, she left the room, sought her mother, and exclaimed,--

"Mother, I'm not going to marry Reynolds Bartram. If hotel servants know all about his goings-on evenings, what stories may they not tell if they choose? That sort of people will say anything they can of him. I don't suppose they know the difference between the truth and a lie; at least they never do when we hire them."

The mother looked at the daughter tenderly and shrewdly. Then she smiled, and said,--

"Daughter, I can see but one way for you to relieve your mind on that subject."

"What is that?" asked the daughter.

"It is only this: convert Jane."