CHAPTER VI.
The author of “Peaceful Repose” sez to me, and she looked pale and skairt; she had heard every word Josiah had said, and she wuz dretful skairt and shocked (not knowin' the ways of men, and not understandin', as I said prior and before, that in two hours' time he would be jest as good as the very best kind of pie, affectionate, and even spoony, if I would allow spoons, which I will not the most of the time). Wall, she proposed, Miss Fogg did, that she should ride back with the livery man. And though I urged her to stay till night, I couldn't urge her as hard as I would otherwise, for by that time the head of the procession of visitors had reached the door-step, and I had to meet 'em with smiles.
I smiled some, I thought I must. But they wuz curius smiles, very, strange-lookin' smiles, sort o' gloomy ones, and mournful lookin'. I have got lots of different smiles that I keep by me for different occasions, every woman has, and this wuz one of my most mournfulest and curiusest ones.
Wall, the author of “Wedlock's Peaceful and Perfect Repose” insisted on goin', and she went. And I sez to her as she went down the steps, “That if she would come up some other day when I didn't have quite so much work round, I would be as good as my word to her about hearin' her rehearse the lecture.”
But she said, as she hurried out to the gate, lookin' pale an' wan (as wan agin as she did when she came, if not wanner): “That she should make changes in it before she ever rehearsed it agin—deep changes!”
And I should dare to persume to say that she did. Though, as I say, she went off most awful sudden, and I hadn't seen nor heard from her sence till I got this letter.
Wall, jest as I got through with the authoresses letter, and Lodema Trumble's, Josiah Allen came. And I hurried up the supper. I got it all on the table while I wuz a steepin' my tea (it wuz good tea). And we sot down to the table happy as a king and his queen. I don't s'pose queens make a practice of steepin' tea, but mebby they would be better off if they did—and have better appetites and better tea. Any way we felt well, and the supper tasted good. And though Josiah squirmed some when I told him Lodema wuz approachin' and would be there that very night or the next day—still the cloud wore away and melted off in the glowin' mellowness of the hot tea and cream, the delicious oysters and other good things.
My pardner, though, as he often says, is not a epicack, still he duz enjoy good vittles dretful well and appreciates 'em. And I make a stiddy practice of doin' the best I can by him in this direction.
And if more females would foller on and cipher out this simple rule, and get the correct answer to it, the cramp in the right hands of divorce lawyers would almost entirely disappear.
For truly it seems that no human man could be more worrysome, and curius, and hard to get along with than Josiah Allen is at times; still, by stiddy keepin' of my table set out with good vittles from day to day, and year to year, the golden cord of affection has bound him to me by ties that can't never be broken into.
He worships me! And the better vittles I get, the more he thinks on me. For love, however true and deep it is, is still a tumultous sea; it has its high tides, and its low ones, its whirlpools, and its calms.
He loves me a good deal better some days than he does others; I see it in his mean. And mark you! mark it well, female reader, these days are the ones that I cook up sights and sights of good food, and with a cheerful countenance and clean apron, set it before him in a bright room, on a snowy table-cloth!
Great—great is the mystery of men's love.
I have often and often repeated this simple fact and truth that underlies married life, and believe me, dear married sisters, too much cannot be said about it, by those whose hearts beat for the good of female and male humanity—and it cannot be too closely followed up and practised by female pardners.
But I am a-eppisodin'; and to resoom.
Wall, Lodema Trumble arrove the next mornin' bright and early—I mean the mornin' wuz bright, not Lodema—oh no, fur from it; Lodema is never bright and cheerful—she is the opposite and reverse always.
She is a old maiden. I do think it sounds so much more respectful to call 'em so rather than “old maid” (but I had to tutor Josiah dretful sharp before I could get him into it).
I guess Lodema is one of the regular sort. There is different kinds of old maidens, some that could marry if they would, and some that would but couldn't. And I ruther mistrust she is one of the “would-but-couldn't's,” though I wouldn't dast to let her know I said so, not for the world.
Josiah never could bear the sight of her, and he sort o' blamed her for bein' a old maiden. But I put a stop to that sudden, for sez I:
“She hain't to blame, Josiah.”
And she wuzn't. I hain't a doubt of it.
Wall, how long she calculated to stay this time we didn't know. But we had our fears and forebodin's about it; for she wuz in the habit of makin' awful long visits. Why, sometimes she would descend right down onto us sudden and onexpected, and stay fourteen weeks right along—jest like a famine or a pestilence, or any other simely that you are a mind to bring up that is tuckerin' and stiddy.
And she wuz disagreeable, I'll confess, and she wuz tuckerin', but I done well by her, and stood between her and Josiah all I could. He loved to put on her, and she loved to impose on him. I don't stand up for either on 'em, but they wuz at regular swords' pints all the time a'most. And it come fearful tuff on me, fearful tuff, for I had to stand the brunt on it.
But she is a disagreeable creeter, and no mistake. She is one of them that can't find one solitary thing or one solitary person in this wide world to suit 'em. If the weather is cold she is pinin' for hot weather, and if the weather is hot she is pantin' for zero.
If it is a pleasant day the sun hurts her eyes, and if it is cloudy she groans aloud and says “she can't see.”
And no human bein' wuz ever known to suit her. She gets up early in the mornin' and puts on her specs, and goes out (as it were) a-huntin' up faults in folks. And she finds 'em, finds lots of 'em. And then she spends the rest of the day a-drivin' 'em ahead of her, and groanin' at 'em.
You know this world bein' such a big place and so many different sort o' things in it that you can generally find in it the perticuler sort of game you set out to hunt in the mornin'.
If you set out to hunt beauty and goodness, if you take good aim and are perseverin'—if you jest track 'em and foller 'em stiddy from mornin' till night, and don't get led away a-follerin' up some other game, such as meanness and selfishness and other such worthless head o' cattle—why, at night you will come in with a sight of good game. You will be a noble and happy hunter.
At the same time, if you hunt all day for faults you will come in at night with sights of pelts. You will find what you hunt for, track 'em right along and chase 'em down. Wall, Lodema never got led away from her perticuler chase. She just hunted faults from mornin' till night, and done well at it. She brought in sights of skins.
But oh! wuzn't it disagreeable in the extreme to Samantha, who had always tried to bend her bow and bring down Beauty, to have her familiar huntin' grounds turned into so different a warpath. It wuz disagreeable! It wuz! It wuz!
And then, havin' to stand between her and Josiah too, wuz fearful wearin' on me. I had always stood there in the past, and now in this visit it wuz jest the same; all the hull time, till about the middle of the fifth week, I had to stand between their two tongues—they didn't fight with their hands, but fit with their tongues, fearful.
CHAPTER VII.
But along about the middle of the fifth week I see a change. Lodema had been uncommon exasperatin', and I expected she would set Josiah to goin', and I groaned in spirit, to think what a job wuz ahead of me, to part their two tongues—when all of a sudden I see a curius change come over my pardner's face.
I remember jest the date that the change in his mean wuz visible, and made known to me—for it wuz the very mornin' that we got the invitation to old Mr. and Miss Pressley's silver weddin'. And that wuz the fifteenth day of the month along about the middle of the forenoon.
And it wuz not half an hour after Elnathen Pressley came to the door and give us the invitations, that I see the change in his mean.
And when I asked him about it afterwards, what that strange and curius look meant, he never hung back a mite from tellin' me, but sez right out plain:
“Mebby, Samantha, I hain't done exactly as I ort to by cousin Lodema, and I have made up my mind to make her a happy surprise before she goes away.”
“Wall,” sez I, “so do.”
I thought he wuz goin' to get her a new dress. She had been a-hintin' to him dretful strong to that effect. She wanted a parmetty, or a balzereen, or a circassien, which wuz in voge in her young days. But I wuz in hopes he would get her a cashmere, and told him so, plain.
But I couldn't get him to tell what the surprise wuz. He only sez, sez he:
“I am goin' to make her a happy surprise.”
And the thought that he wuz a-goin' to branch out and make a change, wuz considerable of a comfort to me. And I needed comfort—yes, indeed I did—I needed it bad. For not one single thing did I do for her that I done right, though I tried my best to do well by her.
But she found fault with my vittles from mornin' till night, though I am called a excellent cook all over Jonesville, and all round the adjoining country, out as far as Loontown, and Zoar. It has come straight back to me by them that wouldn't lie. But it hain't made me vain.
But I never cooked a thing that suited Lodema, not a single thing. Most of my vittles wuz too fresh, and then if I braced up and salted 'em extra so as to be sure to please her, why then they wuz briny, and hurt her mouth.
Why, if you'll believe it, I give her a shawl, made her a present of it; it had even checks black and white, jest as many threads in the black stripes as there wuz in the white, for I counted 'em.
And she told me, after she had looked it all over and said it wuz kinder thin and slazy, and checkered shawls had gone out of fashion, and the black looked some as if it would fade with washin', and the white wuzn't over clear, and the colors wuzn't no ways becomin' to her complexion, and etcetery, etcetery.
“But,” sez she, after she had got all through with the rest of her complaints—“if the white stripes wuz where the black wuz, and the black where the white wuz, she should like it quite well.” And there it wuz, even check, two and two. Wall, that wuz a sample of her doin's. If anybody had a Roman nose she wanted a Greecy one.
And if the nose wuz Greece, why then she wanted Rome.
Why, Josiah sez to me along about the third week, he said (to ourselves, in private), “that if Lodema went to Heaven she would be dissatisfied with it, and think it wuz livelier, and more goin' on down to the other place.” And he said she would get the angels all stirred up a findin' fault with their feathers.
I told him “I would not hear such talk.”
“Wall,” sez he, “don't you believe it?”
And I kinder turned him off, and wouldn't tell, and told him it wuz wicked to talk so.
“Wall,” sez Josiah, “you dassent say she wouldn't.”
And I dassent, though I wouldn't own it up to him, I dassent.
And if she kinder got out of other occupations for a minute durin' them first weeks she would be a quarrelin' with Josiah Allen about age.
I s'pose she and Josiah wuzn't far from the same age, for they wuz children together. But she wanted to make out she wuz young.
And she would tell Josiah that “he seemed jest like a father to her, and always had.” And sometimes when she felt the most curius, she would call him “Father,” and “Pa,” and “Papa.” And it would mad Josiah Allen so that I would have all I could do to quell him down.
Now I didn't feel so, I didn't mind it so much. Why, there would be days, when she felt the curiusest, that she would call me “Mother,” and “Ma,” and foller me round with foot-stools and things, when I went to set down, and would kinder worry over my fallin' off the back step, and would offer to help me up the suller stairs, and so forth, and watchin' over what I et, and tellin' me folks of my age ort to be careful, and not over-eat.
And Josiah asked me to ask her “How she felt about that time?” For she wuz from three to four years older than I wuz.
But I wouldn't contend with her, and the footstools come kinder handy, I had jest as lieve have 'em under my feet as not, and ruther. And as for rich vittles not agreein' with me, and my not over-eatin', I broke that tip by fallin' right in with her, and not cookin' such good things—that quelled her down, and gaulded Josiah too.
But, as I said, it riled Josiah the worst of anything to have Lodema call him father, for he wants to make out that he is kinder young himself.
And sez he to her one day, about the third week, when she was a-goin' on about how good and fatherly he looked, and how much he seemed like a parent to her, and always had, sez he: “I wonder if I seemed like a father to you when we wuz a-kickin' at each other in the same cradle?” Sez he: “We both used to nuss out of the same bottle, any way, for I have heard my mother say so lots of times. There wuzn't ten days' difference in our ages. You wuz ten days the oldest as I have always made out.”
She screamed right out, “Why, Josiah Allen, where is your conscience to talk in that way—and your heart?”
“In here, where everybody's is,” sez Josiah, strikin' himself with his right hand—he meant to strike against his left breast, but struck too low, kinder on his stomach.
And sez I, “That is what I have always thought, Josiah Allen. I have always had better luck reachin' your conscience through your stomach than in any other way. And now,” sez I coldly, “do you go out and bring in a pail of water.”
I used to get beat out and sick of their scufflin's and disagreein's, and broke 'em up whenever I could.
But oh! oh! how she did quarrel with Josiah Allen and that buzz saw scheme of his'n. How light she made of that enterprise, how she demeaned the buzz, and run the saws—till I felt that bad as I hated the enterprise myself, I felt that a variety of loud buzz saws would be a welcome relief from her tongue—from their two tongues; for as fur down as she would run them buzz saws, jest so fur would Josiah Allen praise 'em up.
She never agreed with Josiah Allen but in jest one thing while she was under his ruff. I happened to mention one day how extremely anxious I wuz to have females set on the Conference; and then, wantin' to dispute me, and also bein' set on that side, she run down the project, and called it all to nort—and when too late she see that she had got over on Josiah Allen's side of the fence.
But it had one good effect. When that man see she wuz there, he waded off, way out of sight of the project, and wouldn't mention it—it madded him so to be on the same side of the fence she wuz—so that it seemed to happen all for the best.
Why, I took her as a dispensation from the first, and drawed all sorts of morels from her, and sights of 'em—sights.
But oh, it wuz tuff on me, fearful tuff.
And when she calculated and laid out to make out her visit and go, wuz more than we could tell.
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