Maria Thompson Daviess

“ You'll find most Providence women in that tag-gang, I'm thinking; but let's do our part in whooping on the other sisters that have got wrongs to right."
"I suppose the world really has done women injustice in lots of ways," said the singer lady plaintively, for she had very lately, for the first time in her life, felt the sit-still-and-hold-your-hands-while-he-rides-away grind, and it had struck in deep.
"Yes, I suppose so," answered Mother Mayberry, as she picked up little Hoover, who was nodding like a top-heavy petunia in a breeze, and stretched him across her lap for a nap. ”

“ With which she left the girl and the tot to resume their watch down the Road for a horse and rider due in not over two hours' time.
And indeed the last of old June's days seemed in danger of dripping away from her in tears of farewell. Rain clouds hung low over Harpeth Hills and drifted down to the very top of Providence Nob. A steady downpour had begun in the night and held on into the day and seemed to increase in volume as the hours wore away. The tall maples were standing depressed-boughed and dripping and the poplar leaves hung sodden and wet, refusing a glimpse of their silver lining. ”

“ A world of music lovers awaited the result. He had been obliged to send out two Press bulletins as to her condition within the week—and she sat on the steps in the twilight humming Teether Pike to sleep, shut in by the Harpeth Hills with only him to fight her fight for her. He almost groaned aloud with the pain of it, when into his consciousness came Mother Mayberry's placid voice shooing the Pike children home with promises and admonitions. A line from Doctor Stein's letter flashed into his mind: "And first and above all I want your mother to put heart and hope into the girl." ”

“ CHAPTER X THE SONG OF THE MASTER'S GRAIL
"In all my long life it have never been gave to me to see anything like Deacon Bostick and his Providence children," said Mother Mayberry, as she stood on the end of the porch with the singer girl's hand in hers. "He are a-setting on his bench under the tree right by her window, like he always did to listen for her, and every child in the Road is a-huddled up against him like a forlorn lot of little motherless chickens. He have got little Bettie and Martin Luther on his knees and the rest are just crowded up all around him. ”

“ Do you reckon she'll be satisfied to take Sam Mosbey when she comes again? I'm sorry for her."
"So am I, Eliza," laughed Miss Wingate softly, as the rose blush stole up over her cheeks, "but I don't believe she'll need Mr. Mosbey. Don't you suppose she—that—is—there must be some one down in the City whom she likes a lot."
"Yes'm, I reckon they is. Then I'll just take Sam myself when I grow up if nobody else wants him," answered Eliza comfortably. ”

“ Go around there and give that message to Doctor Tom yourself. I don't take no stock in such doctoring as he does to the Squire these days."
"Isn't it too bad for Mrs. Tutt to feel that way and miss the wedding?" asked Miss Wingate with a trace of the same exasperation in her voice that had sounded in Mother Mayberry's tones.
"It are that," answered Mother regretfully. "Looks like religion oughter be tooken as a cooling draft to the soul and not stuck on life like a fly blister. But I think we can kinder fix Mis' Tutt some. ”

“ Do you suppose for all the wide world I would throw away what I have found here in Providence under Harpeth Hills—my Mother and you? Ah, Tom, I'll be good, I'll go to Italy and India with you! I'll—I'll 'do for' you just the best I can!"
"But, dear, it isn't right at all," whispered the young Doctor to the back of the singer lady's head, as he laid his cheek against the dark braids. "Your voice belongs to the world—there must be no giving it up. ”

“ Better hurry the shirts and pack up your own fluff."
"But I'm not going a step or a wave," answered the singer girl defiantly. "I'm too busy here now. I don't ever intend to leave Mother as long as I live. I don't see how you can even suggest such a thing to me."
"Do you know what leaving Mother is like?" asked the young Doctor, as he looked down on her with tenderness in his gray eyes and Mother Mayberry's own quizzical smile on his lips. "It's like going to sleep at night with a last look at Providence Nob,—you wake up in the morning and find it more there than ever. ”

“ Her future is so brilliant and I—I—"
"Son," said Mother Mayberry with the banter all gone from her rich voice and the love fairly radiating from her face as she laid a tender hand on the singer lady's dark head on her shoulder, "I don't have to ask my honey-bird the choice she have made. A woman don't want to wear her life-work like no jewelry harness nor yet no sacrificial garment, but she loves to clothe herself in it like it were a soft-colored, homespun dress to cover the pillow of her breast and the cradle of her arms to hold the tired folks against. ”

“ And in accordance with his threat the Doctor disposed of the rest of the food and stood with the empty pan in his hand. And, like the well-trained flock of biddies that they were, all the rest of the hen mothers clucked and cajoled their fluffy little families into their accustomed shelters and began to dispose of their suppers with contented clucks and cheeps. Only Mrs. Spangles stood afar and eyed the only vacant coop with evident disdain.
"I don't know what to do," murmured Miss Wingate pleadingly. But the Doctor stood firm, and regarded her with maliciously delighted eyes. ”

“ You know she thinks they have been only preliminary treatments and you have heard her laugh as I held her white throat in my hands. She believes completely in the outcome. God, to think I have failed her—HER!"
"Yes, Tom, He knows—and Mother understands," his Mother answered gently.
"And she must be told right away," said the Doctor as he rose and walked to the window. "It is only fair. Shall I or you tell her? Choose, Mother, what will be best for her! But can she stand it?" ”

“ Mayberry, as she rinsed her hands in the wash-pan on the shelf under tin cedar bucket, "Tom is just as helpless with the chickens at setting time as a presiding elder is at a sewing circle; can't use a needle, too stiff to jine the talk and only good when it comes to the eating, from broilers to frying size. Just go on and mix the biscuits with faith, honey-bird, for I mistrust I won't be back for quite a spell." ”

“ And the great breath that Doctor Thomas Mayberry of Providence drew might have cracked the breast of a giant. In this world no record is kept of the great moments when a private individual's universe collides with his far star and of the crash that ensues. ”

“ I'm so glad she's a-bringing her sewing to set a spell. Come in, Bettie, here's a rocker a-holding out arms to you!" Little Hoover was as usual bobbing in Bettie's arms and he gurgled at the sight of Teether Pike as if in joy at this encounter with his side partner and when deposited upon the floor beside him made a brotherly grab at one of young Pike's pink feet in the most manifest interest. ”

“ Here I put myself to all manner of troubles to go out into the big world to get a real managing wife for Tom Mayberry and I might just as well have set cross-handed and waited for Susie Pike or little Bettie to grow up to the spoiling of him. I thought seeing that you'd been raised with a silver spoon in your mouth and handed life on a fringed napkin, so to speak, you would make him stand around some, but for all I can see you're going to make another Providence wife. Ain't you got none of the suffering-women new notions at all? ”

“ In her soul she was realizing fully the influence the lovely woman had thrown over the hearts of the simple Providence folk and the greatness of her own nature was making her understand something of the loss to those of the outer world whom the great singer would be no longer able to call within the spell of her wonderful voice. ”

“ But when a woman's heart is very young and tender, and attuned to that of another which is throbbing emotionally close by, her own feelings are apt to rise in a tidal wave of tears, regardless of consequences; and as Buck Peavey choked off a sob, Pattie turned and buried her head on her father's arm. ”

“ And don't you never forget that you are the apple-core of your Mother Mayberry's heart and she's a-going to hold you to her tender, even unto them Glory days we've been a-planning for, with Death here in the midst of Life. ”

“ Come visiting soon, Miss Elinory, for I've got something to show you that are too foolish to speak about to Mis' Mayberry." And the widow gave a delicious little giggle as she lifted the sleeping baby from Mother Mayberry's lap and started down the steps.
"Dearie me, Bettie," answered Mother with a laugh, "don't you know that poking up a woman's curiosity is mighty apt to start a yaller jacket to buzzing? I'll be by your house sometime before sundown myself."
"Some women's ship of life is a steamboat that stops to take on passengers at every landing. ”

“ We'll be just behind you. Now, Martin Luther, take Bettie by the hand and don't go too fast!"
"A little fun poked at the right time will settle most man conniptions," she added, in an aside to the relieved and admiring singer lady, as they prepared to follow in the wake of the bridal train.
And among all the weddings over all the land, that fill to a joyous overflowing almost every hour of the month of June, none could have been more lovely or happier than that of pretty Bettie Pratt, and the embarrassed but adoring Mr. Hoover on Providence Road. ”

“ Hoover have got the whole seventeen sticking in his craw at the thought, and I'm downright sorry for him."
"Yes, Bettie, men have got sensitive gullets when it comes to swollering a joke on theyselves," said Mother Mayberry, as she joined in the widow's merry laugh at the plight of the embarrassed widower. "Looks like when we all can trust Mr. Hoover to be so good and kind to you and your children, after he have done waded into the marrying of you, we oughter find some way to save his feelings from being mortified. Can't you hatch out a idea, Elinory?" ”

“ The little Pikes had established themselves firmly in the heart of this new friend, and she found herself in an attitude of critical partisanship.
"I reckon Miss Prissy is what you call a kinder crank," answered Mother Mayberry as she paused at the foot of the steps. "A married woman have got to be the hub of a family-wheel, but a old maid can be the outside crank that turns the whole contraption backwards if she has a mind to. I wish Miss Prissy had a little more understanding of the children, 'cause the rub all comes on Mis' Pike, and she's fair wore out with it. ”

“ Tom Mayberry is a good man and I borned, nursed and raised him, but I won't answer for him about no co'ting conniptions. A man lover are a shy bird and they can't nothing but a true mate keep him steady on any limb. You ain't showed a single symptom of managing Tom yet, but somehow I've got confidence in you if you just keep your head now."
"But what can the matter be?" demanded Miss Wingate in a voice that shook with positive terror.
"Well," answered Mother Mayberry slowly, "I sorter sense the trouble and I'll tell you right out and out for your good. ”

“ She even had a queer little thrill of pleasure at the thought of performing such superhuman tasks for what was to be her individual responsibility among Providence men along the Road. The certainty that she would never be allowed to perform such offices at machine and tub actually depressed her, for the thought had brought a primitive sense of possession that she was loath to dismiss; the passion for service to love being an instinct that sways the great lady and her country sister alike. ”

“ Friends is one kind of treasure you don't want to lay up in Heaven."
"I spend most of my time thinking about folks' accidents and hurts and pains," answered Mrs. Peavey in all truth. "Miss Elinory, did you gargle your throat with that slippery-ellum tea I thought about to make for you last week?"
"Yes, Mrs. Peavey, I did," answered Miss Wingate quickly, for she had performed that nauseous operation actuated by positive fear of Mrs. Peavey if she should discover a failure to follow her directions.
"It'll cure you, maybe," answered the gratified neighbor. ”

“ Good-by!"
"They ain't nothing in this world so comforting to a woman as good feeling with her sisters, one and all," Mother Mayberry said as she watched the last switch of the widow's skirt. "Mother, wife and daughter love is a institution, but real sistering is a downright covenant. Me and Bettie have held one betwixt us these many a year. But you and me have both put a slight on the kitchen since Cindy got back. Let's go see if dinner ain't most on the table." ”

“ But if you're going to ride over to Flat Rock this evening you'd better go on and get back in time for some riz biscuits as Elinory is a-making for you this blessed minute."
"She's not making them for me," answered the young Doctor with the color rising under his clear, tanned skin up to his very forelock. As he spoke he busied himself with bridling his restless young mare.
"Of course she is," answered his mother serenely. "Women don't take no interest in cooking unless they's a man to eat the fixings. ”

“ Honey-fuzzle are a mighty satisfying diet, though light, for a growed man. Reckon we can persuade him to try a couple of slices of old ham onct in a while so as to give a few broilers time to get legs long enough to fry?"
"We can try," answered the singer lady in a doubtful tone of voice, for the Doctor's penchant for young chicken was very decided.
"Dearie me, it do beat all how some plans of life fall down in the oven," said the Doctor's mother, as she eyed Miss Wingate with her most quizzical smile quirking up the corners of her humorous mouth. ”

“ And you can trust a country child to see further and hear more than any other animal on earth. I wouldn't trust Tom to go to town now without coming back pop-eyed over the ottermobiles," and Mother Mayberry laughed at her own fling at the sophisticated young Doctor. Another dart of agony entered the soul of the singer lady and this time the vision of the girl and the peony was placed in a big, red motor-car—why red she didn't know, except the intensity of her feelings seemed to call for that color. ”

“ People in the big cities can crowd up and keep care of one another, but out here we are all just in the hollow of His hand. Here comes Mis' Peavey. I asked her to go along to the funeral with me and you. It are most time now."
"Howdy, all," said Mrs. Peavey in an utterly gray tone of voice. "Mis' Mayberry, that Circuit Rider have never come from Bolivar yet. Do you reckon his horse have throwed him or is it just he don't care for us Providence folks and don't think it worth his while to come say the words over Sister Bostick?" ”

“ But a-talking here have made me sprout a idea: 'Liza Pike have blazed the trail for us, bless her little heart! Her mother don't never cook a single thing that 'Liza haven't got a dish handy to beg some for the Deacon and Mis' Bostick. And she don't stop at her own cook stove, but she's always here looking into what Cindy cooks with an eye to the old folk's sweet-tooths or chicken-hankers. I know, too, she gets what she wants from you for them, so there is our leading. ”