Somewhere in her inherited Puritan nature was a vague conviction that it was wrong, and it seemed even to find an echo in the warning of the preacher: this was what she was "pining for.""I don't know," she stammered. "I must ask auntie; I shouldn't like to leave her; and there's the chapel.""Isn't that revivalist preacher enough to run it for a while?" said her companion, half-sneeringly.
The remark was not a tactful one.
"Mr. Seabright hasn't been here for a month," she answered somewhat quickly. "But he's coming next Sunday, and I'm glad of it. He's a very good man. And there's nothing he don't notice. He saw how silly it was to stick the chapel into the very heart of the woods, and he told them so.""And I suppose he'll run up a brand-new meeting-house out on the road," said Braggs, smiling.
"No, he's going to open up the woods, and let the sun and light in, and clear out the underbrush.""And what's that for?"
There was such an utter and abrupt change in the speaker's voice and manner--which until then had been lazily fastidious and confident--that Cissy was startled. And the change being rude and dictatorial, she was startled into opposition. She had wanted to say that the improvement had been suggested by HER, but she took a more aggressive attitude.
"Brother Seabright says it's a question of religion and morals.
It's a scandal and a wrong, and a disgrace to the Word, that the chapel should have been put there."Don Eliseo's face turned so white and waxy that Cissy would have noticed it had she not femininely looked away while taking this attitude.
"I suppose that's a part of his sensation style, and very effective," he said, resuming his former voice and manner. "I must try to hear him some day. But, now, in regard to your coming here, of course I shall consult your aunt, although I imagine she will have no objection. I only wanted to know how YOU felt about it."He again laid his hand on hers.
"I should like to come very much," said Cissy timidly; "and it's very kind of you, I'm sure; but you'll see what auntie says, won't you?" She withdrew her hand after momentarily grasping his, as if his own act had been only a parting salutation, and departed.
Aunt Vashti received Cissy's account of her interview with a grim satisfaction. She did not know what ideas young gals had nowadays, but in HER time she'd been fit to jump outer her skin at such an offer from such a good man as Elisha Braggs. And he was a rich man, too. And ef he was goin' to give her an edication free, it wasn't goin' to stop there. For her part, she didn't like to put ideas in young girls' heads,--goodness knows they'd enough foolishness already; but if Cissy made a Christian use of her gifts, and 'tended to her edication and privileges, and made herself a fit helpmeet for any man, she would say that there were few men in these parts that was as "comf'ble ketch" as Lish Braggs, or would make as good a husband and provider.
The blood suddenly left Cissy's cheeks and then returned with uncomfortable heat. Her aunt's words had suddenly revealed to her the meaning of the uneasiness she had felt in Braggs's house that morning--the old repulsion that had come at his touch. She had never thought of him as a suitor or a beau before, yet it now seemed perfectly plain to her that this was the ulterior meaning of his generosity. And yet she received that intelligence with the same mixed emotions with which she had received his offer to educate her. She did not conceal from herself the pride and satisfaction she felt in this presumptive selection of her as his wife; the worldly advantages that it promised; nor that it was a destiny far beyond her deserts. Yet she was conscious of exactly the same sense of wrong-doing in her preferences--something that seemed vaguely akin to that "conviction of sin" of which she had heard so much--as when she received his offer of education. It was this mixture of fear and satisfaction that caused her alternate paling and flushing, yet this time it was the fear that came first.
Perhaps she was becoming unduly sensitive. The secretiveness of her sex came to her aid here, and she awkwardly changed the subject. Aunt Vashti, complacently believing that her words had fallen on fruitful soil, discreetly said no more.
It was a hot morning when Cissy walked alone to chapel early next Sunday. There was a dry irritation in the air which even the northwest trades, blowing through the seaward gorge, could not temper, and for the first time in her life she looked forward to the leafy seclusion of the buried chapel with a feeling of longing.
She had avoided her youthful escort, for she wished to practice alone for an hour before the service with the new harmonium that had taken the place of the old accordion and its unskillful performer. Perhaps, too, there was a timid desire to be at her best on the return of Brother Seabright, and to show him, with a new performance, that the "heavenly gift" had not been neglected.
She opened the chapel with the key she always carried, "swished"away an intrusive squirrel, left the door and window open for a moment, until the beating of frightened wings against the rafters had ceased, and, after carefully examining the floor for spiders, mice, and other creeping things, brushed away a few fallen leaves and twigs from the top of the harmonium. Then, with her long curls tossed over her shoulders and hanging limply down the back of her new maple-leaf yellow frock,--which was also a timid recognition of Brother Seabright's return,--and her brown eyes turned to the rafters, this rustic St. Cecilia of the Coast Range began to sing.