Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards

“ James Mather is worth nothing at all that I can see, and is a nuisance besides."
"Oh, Mrs. Faulkner!" said Mrs. Appleby again.
As she stood perplexed, what was this vision that flashed suddenly before her eyes? Two brown, bright eyes in a face that seemed to smile all over, brow to chin; a musical voice saying,
"There's a kid I like! I could do something with that kid if I had him!"
"Dear! dear!" said Mrs. Appleby aloud. "I do wish he would!" and happening to glance out of the window, she saw Pippin entering the courtyard with Jimmy Mather beside him. ”

“ So name the day you can come over, Elder, and Mary and I will be there. The Lord is so good to me—I don't know why He is so good, except that He is good. And all my life long, sir, I'll try my best to make other folks happy, I sure will. So no more but thanking you Elder, because under the Lord you really done it all sir. With a grateful heart though faltering pen I beg to convey to you, reverend and highly respected Sir, the assurance of my being
Your most obedient humble servant
Pippin. ”

“ Wondering much, Mary peeped round the corner of the barn, and saw Pippin standing in the middle of the doorway. No one else was in sight, but his eyes, shining with angry light, were bent forward on something that he saw plain enough. Mary, this is a matter too hard for you. Were the chaplain here, he would know all about it. He might even smile, and murmur to himself, "Dominic!" or "Francis!" as the notion took him; for he knows that the mystic did not pass with the Middle Ages, but is to be found in the twentieth century as in the twelfth. ”

“ Mary sprang up, broad awake. Something was going on downstairs. Voices, low and angry, hasty steps—the house on fire? She was up in an instant, slipped on the blue kimono and over it a heavy cloak, ran down the back stairs just as John Aymer ran down the front. Opening opposite doors quietly, they came upon a strange sight.
In the middle of the kitchen was Pippin, at grips with another man of slighter build than himself; at one side stood a third man, older and heavier than either, watching the two. ”

“ These are Pippin and Mary; she in white, with white roses in her pretty hat, he—but no one could ever tell what Pippin had on.
At sight of him the chaplain looses his hold of the two boys. They make one bolt for the door, fall out of it together, wriggle up again, and rush like a double whirlwind to the gate, rolling under the wheels of the car, which has fortunately come to a standstill.
Pippin and Mary spring down. Seeing them, the cottage becomes all eyes, guests, helpers, delegates, crowding to the windows. Most of the women begin to cry. Foolish creatures! What is the matter with them? ”

“ I expect I can give satisfaction, knives, scissors, or tools; anything except razors; them I don't undertake. Like to have a look at the wheel, lady? She's a beaut, too—what I would say, Nipper is her name, not a female name, but all she's got—same as me."
"Nipper!" the girl paused a fraction of a second. It was as if some faint air stirred, not enough to ruffle ever so delicately the clear pool of memory; it passed and was gone. "'Tis a pretty wheel!" said Mary.
"Take it from me, lady, she's O.K., the Nipper is. Runs slick as greased lightning; I'd show you if you had a knife handy." ”

“ Appleby, she's mad with me! Yes, ma'am, she is so! She won't look at me, nor yet hardly speak to me, excep' kind of cool and polite, like you'd speak to a stranger. Why—" he sprang up and paced the room, light-foot, absorbed, lifting his chin a little, unconsciously, as he reached either wall of the room, like a woodland creature in a cage. "Why, Mrs. Appleby, I respect that young lady more than anybody in the world. We was friends, I want you to understand, till this come up, real good friends!" cried Pippin, clutching at his file and stabbing the air with it as he paced. ”

“ Brand was making a broom; Pippin, smoking his after-breakfast and before-departure pipe in the barn doorway, watched him with growing wonder and admiration. His fingers seemed almost to twinkle, they moved so fast, knotting, laying together, binding in the fragrant strands of broom corn.
"I've made many a broom!" Pippin went on. "I was counted a crackerjack at bindin'; but you work twice as fast blind as what I would seein'; that's what gets me!"
The blind man raised his head with a smile, his hands never ceasing their swift motion. ”

“ In return, you treat him like a dog! Instead of gratitude, you give him the cold shoulder. Shame on you, Mary Blossom! your conduct is heartless and wicked. You know Pippin loves you. You know there is no one in the world but you—"
He paused involuntarily, for Mary had risen and faced him, white as marble.
"No one but me?" she cried in a voice that shook with the cold passion of a sword. "I don't know what you mean, Mr. Hadley. Hasn't he got his family?"
"His family?" repeated the chaplain. ”

“ Dennis Cassidy, with a massive shove, sent Nosey staggering back, then thrust his finger into the narrow cavity and drew out, and held up—a little bow of blue ribbon.
It was at this instant, before any one had time to speak, that a firm, quick foot crunched on the gravel outside. Some one came up the step, and looking over the policeman's shoulder, stood in silent amazement. Pippin looked up, uttered a great cry, and sprang forward.
"Elder!" he cried. "Elder Hadley, sir! I'm straight! As God is above us in Heaven, sir! I'm straight." ”

“ Why, Pippin, a man may have feelings, even if his nose is crooked. If a pretty girl comes out to sit on her steps and look at the rising moon and think sweet, girl-moonlight thoughts, why—be reasonable, Pippin! Why should not Nosey Bashford like to watch her as well as you? ”

“ Pippin, sitting as near as he thought manners would allow, watched the flying fingers and glittering needles, and wished that he might be a sock, just for a minute, to feel how soft her hands would be. Now Mary's hands were not soft; she would have been ashamed if they had been: firm, strong little hands, used to work ever since she could remember.
The two had just been preparing Pippin's shakedown in the shed, she deprecating, fearing he would sleep but poorly on a straw mattress, he glowing with praise of as dandy an outfit as anyone would want to see. ”

“ The chaplain looked up with a grave nod of comprehension.
"Mary Blossom," John Aymer went on, "is a fine girl, and she's an ambitious girl. She has done well herself, got a first-rate education of its kind, made herself a first-rate all-round young woman, capable of doing—within limits—anything she sets her hand to. Now—she's as dead stuck on Pippin as he is on her—"
"John! What language! She adores him, if that is what you mean." ”

“ Elder Stebbins' discourse was rather long-winded and rambling, but when Pippin lost the thread, he would take refuge in a psalm, or recall one of Elder Hadley's brief, pistol-shot addresses, or think how the buttercups shone in the field that day he found the Lord. And here, too, he loved it all, every bit, and came home in a glow of happiness and fervor that was enough to make the dough rise at the sight of him. ”

“ Pippin, his head cocked much as the singer's was, noted each cadence, and when the music ceased, repeated it in a clear, mellow whistle. Robin, much intrigued, sang a third time, and a fourth, cocked his head still further and listened critically. Pippin replied more correctly than before; so it might have gone on indefinitely, but for an inquisitive crow who came bustling down to see what it was all about. Robin flew away scornfully, repudiating intercourse with crows; Pippin flirted his handkerchief and told the intruder to be off with himself for an old black juggins. ”

“ Pippin was like that, he thought. An Israelite without guile; the child of the slums, the young desperado; Pippin the Kid, alias Moonlighter, alias Jack-o'-lantern. Strange and true, and blessed! Out of the mouths of babes—gutter babes as well as those of Christian homes! But how absurd, how utterly unreasonable, this very crystalline quality made the boy! He had thought that once he found the girl, all would be plain sailing. He had actually expected Mary to start with him, hand in hand like two children, that very morning for Cyrus Poor Farm, thirty miles away. ”

“ Who had been in the barn this afternoon? He himself, Jacob, Pippin, and the child. No one else—except the little girl; Brand always called Flora May the little girl. She had been there, not half an hour ago; he had heard her step, had spoken to her, but she did not answer. In one of her odd spells, probably, poor child! But she could not reach the shelf, even if—
The supper table was less gay than usual that evening; silence prevailed instead of the usual cheerful chatter. A stranger, glancing round the table, would have seen for the most part faces absent or absorbed. ”

“ Nosey's nose is shockingly crooked, and his eyes are crooked, too, little and red and too near together; he is crooked inside and out, but he has his feelings, and it is well for you, Pippin, seeing that you are entirely unarmed, whereas Nosey is never without a sandbag or a brass knuckle or some such pretty trifle, that he does not know of your being only fifty feet away from him. ”

“ Baxter, as if he were reading the Declaration of Independence.
In they all come, Pippin and Mary leading off, the guests following in a joyous mob, the delegates bringing up the rear, smiling twice as hard as when they came. Most extraordinary occasion! Must remember all this to tell the wife. Most extraordinary people!
They have all got round the table, no one knows how. Pippin and Mary are standing, still hand in hand, all heaven in their faces. Pippin looks round, and his eyes fill with tears like all the rest. ”

“ Now behooves me hasten just a mite, if I'm goin' to get to Kingdom before sundown! He said 'twas about a mile further. Hello! What's goin' on here?"
Pippin was not to get to Kingdom before sundown. He stopped short. A man was lying beside the road, motionless, his feet in the ditch, his head on a tuft of grass: asleep, it seemed. An elderly man, gray and wizened, his face seamed with wrinkles of greed and cunning. Near him on the dusty grass lay a scissor-grinder's wheel. Pippin bent over him, looked, looked again, then knelt down in the dust.
"It's Nipper Crewe!" he said. "He's—no, he isn't! ”

“ Then, the seven minutes over that have made Pippin and Mary man and wife, what a rush of kisses, slaps on the back, handshakings, good wishes, congratulations! Amid all which Mrs. Baxter and Mrs. Bailey nod to each other and steal out, beckoning to their aids. "Dish up!" the word passes round, low and emphatic. The Baxters fly, the Baileys flutter, Mr. Wisk and his pointing nose get in everybody's way and narrowly escape upsetting Mr. Baxter as he comes proudly into the dining-room, carrying his life's masterpiece, the wedding cake. Such a cake! Frosting as many inches deep as frosting can be ”

“ Flora May!
There are two men in every one of us. I used to think there were ten in Pippin, but for one instant all ten were paralyzed, looking helplessly into the blue eyes that burned into his; then one of them woke, the one who would have been a physician if Pippin had been reared in a home instead of a cellar. ”

“ Mary turned in her bed, and a sigh that was almost a sob broke from her. She hated wicked people—yes, she hated them; and weak people, too, people who made others suffer just because they were too feeble to deny themselves the drink that was poison—
"I hate them!" said Mary aloud. Then she thought of Pippin, and blushed again. Pippin did not hate wicked or weak people. He seemed to love them. How was it? Mary, cool, kind, a little aloof, did not understand it. ”

“ Bailey. "Feeding the hens, I presume likely. I'll tell her good-by for you, Pippin!"
He shook hands with Old Man Blossom, who was only too eager to be friends. "I'm all friends, Pippin!" he cried in eager, quavering tones. "Honest I am! You find my little gal, and you can pray yourself black in the face and I won't say a word. It just took me that way, you know; you prayin' as slick as a Gospel shark, and Nipper's wheel out in the shed all the time—tee hee! You're smart, Pippin! Ain't any pious goin' to get round you, hey? 'Tother way round, hey? Gorry! that is rich!" ”

“ To the father of Buster, that expanse suggested but one thing in the world. Raising the peel, he brought it down with a resounding thwack which sent the boy flat on his face under the table and brought Mrs. Baxter shrieking from the shop.
"Elegant!" said Pippin. "Mr. Baxter, sir, that was simply elegant!"
An hour later the Red Ruffian, full, dry, and warm, a plaster over his injured nose, lay in Pippin's bed; and Pippin ("as per contract with the Elder," he told himself, "lettin' alone its bein' right and fittin' so to do") sat on the edge of the bed and looked for the grace of God. ”

“ But there was all the rest beside; trees still in their young, exquisite green, birds not in cages but flitting from branch to branch, singing, singing—
Flowers along the road: buttercups, Pippin's own flower that the Lord gave him that day; daisies, too; beautiful, wicked orange hawkweed, and good honest dandelions, each one a broad gold piece of Summer's coinage. Grass, too—gorry! 'twas in There ("There" was Shoreham) he got the habit of saying "Green grass!" ”

“ PIPPIN GOES TO CYRUS PIPPIN always looked back on the weeks he spent in Kingdom as one of his good times. Folks were so everlastingly good to him; they couldn't hardly have been better, he thought, not unless they had been your own. Mrs. Baxter, the baker's wife, was like—well, call it an aunt. Yes, she sure was like a good aunt, and equally so was her uncle; as for Buster, the boy—well, that was Pippin's moral of a boy. Buster would grow up a fine man, you see if he didn't. He'd better! As to looking for the grace of God like he promised Elder Hadley, why, he didn't have to. ”

“ Pippin flung a quick glance, saw two sharp noses proudly lifted, two pairs of eyes gleaming with satisfaction, while the serene dignity of the blind man's countenance proclaimed him third of the paying boarders.
"I've allers paid where I boarded!" said Miss Lucilla Pudgkins.
"I would scorn to do otherwise!" said Aunt Mandy Whetstone.
"And others that doesn't pay in money pays in help!" Jacob Bailey went on calmly; "so you see we're all comfortable! A little more of the ham, Pippin? Pass your plate!" ”

“ No distant vision this time, but the familiar scene on which he had just turned his back—forever, he and the Elder hoped. A long vaulted room, bare and bright; forty or fifty men at work making brooms; the clean, sweet smell of the broom corn almost driving out the prison smell—almost!—near the door, under the watchful eye of an official, two men working together, binding and clipping, himself and Pete. Pete was talking, as he had talked that last day they worked together. He knew Pippin was going out, and he, Pete, was in for life. ”

“ I know Pippin's good; it isn't him I'm afraid of. It's her. It isn't a father that poor thing wants, nor yet a brother!"
"Flora May's a good girl!" Jacob spoke as if in defense of the girl who so short a time ago had been his little pet, his pretty kitten-like child plaything. "She's always been a good innocent girl, Lucy."
"Oh, good!" Lucy Bailey, sixty years old, New England born and bred, made an almost impatient gesture. "Who's to say good or bad, when folks haven't their reason? ”