Read Ebook: Isis unveiled Volume 1 (of 2) Science A master-key to mysteries of ancient and modern science and theology by Blavatsky H P Helena Petrovna

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"Terr'ble light minded as you can tell to look at her," said Solomon Hatch, "she's soft enough, so my wife says, where sick folks an' children an' animals are consarned, but she acts as if men war born without common feelin's of natur an' didn't come inside the Commandments. It's beyond me how a kind-hearted woman can be so unmerciful to an entire sex."

"Had it been otherwise 'twould have been downright disproof of God's providence and the bond of matrimony," responded old Adam.

"True, true, Mr. Doolittle," admitted Solomon, somewhat abashed. "Thar ain't any in these parts as can equal you on the Scriptures, as I've said over an' over agin. It's good luck for the Almighty that He has got you on His side, so to speak, to help Him confound His enemies."

"Thar're two sides to that, I reckon, seein' I confound not only His enemies, but His sarvents. Sech is the shot an' shell of my logic that the righteous fall before it as fast as the wicked--faster even I might say if I war speakin' particular. Have you marked how skeery Mr. Mullen has growed about meetin' my eyes over the rail of the pulpit? Why, 'twas only yesterday that I brought my guns to bear on the resurrection of the body, an' blowed it to atoms in his presence. 'Now thar's Reuben Merryweather who buried one leg at Manassas, Mr. Mullen,' I said as pleasant an' natchel as if I warn't about to confound him, 'an' what I'd like to have made clear an' easy to me, suh, is what use the Almighty is goin' to make of that odd leg on the Day of Jedgment? Will he add a new one onto Reuben,' I axed, 'when, as plain as logic will have it, it won't be a resurrection, but a creation, or will he start that leg a-trampin' by itself all the way from Manassas to jine the other at Old Church?' The parson had been holdin' pretty free all the mornin' with nobody daring to contradict him, and a man more taken aback by the power of logic my sight never lit on. 'Spare me, Mr. Doolittle,' was all he said, never a word mo'. 'Spare me, Mr. Doolittle.'"

"Ah, a tough customer you are," commented Solomon, "an' what answer did you make to that, suh?"

Old Adam's pipe returned to his mouth, and he puffed slowly a minute. "'Twas a cry for mercy, Solomon, so I spared him," he responded.

The wagon had reached the well, and without stopping, the large white-and-red oxen moved on into the turnpike. Bending from her high seat, Molly Merryweather smiled at the miller, who made a single stride toward her. Then her glance passed to the stranger, and for an instant she held his gaze with a pair of eyes that appeared to reflect his in shape, setting and colour. In the man's face there showed perplexity, admiration, ironic amusement; in the girl's there was a glimmer of the smile with which she had challenged the adoring look of the miller.

The flush left the features of young Revercomb, and he turned back, with a scowl on his forehead, while old Adam cackled softly over the stem of his pipe.

"Wiles come as natchel to women as wickedness to men, young Adam," he said. "The time to beware of 'em is in yo' youth befo' they've bewitched yo'. Why, 'tis only since I've turned ninety that I've trusted myself to think upon the sex with freedom."

"I'm bewarin'," replied his son, "but when Molly Merryweather widens her eyes and bites her underlip, it ain't in the natur of man or beast to stand out agin her. Why, if it had been anybody else but the rector I could have sworn I saw him squeezin' her hand when he let down the bars for her last Sunday."

"It's well knowed that when he goes to upbraid her for makin' eyes at him durin' the 'Have mercy on me,' he takes a mortal long time about the business," responded Solomon, "but, good Lord, 'tain't fur me to wish it different, seein' it only bears out all I've argured about false doctrines an' evil practice. From the sprinklin' of the head thar's but a single step downward to the holdin' of hands."

"Well, I'm a weak man like the rest of you," rejoined young Adam, "an' though I'm sound on the doctrines--in practice I sometimes backslide. I'm thankful, however, it's the lesser sin an' don't set so heavy on the stomach."

"Ah, it's the light women like Molly Merryweather that draws the eyes of the young," lamented old Adam.

"A pretty bit of vanity, is she?" inquired the stranger lightly, and fell back the next instant before the vigorous form of the miller, who swung round upon him with the smothered retort, "That's a lie!" The boyish face of the young countryman had paled under his sunburn and he spoke with the suppressed passion of a man who is not easily angered and who responds to the pressure of some absorbing emotion.

"Lord, Lord, Abel, Mr. Jonathan warn't meanin' no particular disrespect, not mo' was I," quavered old Adam.

"You're too pipin' hot, miller," interposed Solomon. "They warn't meanin' any harm to you nor to the gal either. With half the county courtin' her it ain't to be expected that she'd go as sober as a grey mare, is it?"

"Well, they're wastin' their time," retorted the miller, "for she marries me, thank God, this coming April."

Turning away the next instant, he vaulted astride the bare back of the mare, and started at a gallop in the direction of the turnpike.

"I'll be blessed if that little gal of Reuben Merryweather's ain't his religion," commented young Adam.

"An' he's of the opinion that he's going to marry her this comin' spring," cackled Solomon. "Well, I could be namin' two or three others of the same mind, if I'd take the trouble. It's all sensible enough to lambaste the women when they don't pick up every virtue that we throw away, but what's to be expected of 'em, I ax, when all the men sence Adam have been praisin' the sober kind of gal while they was runnin' arter the silly? Thar're some among 'em, I reckon, as have reasoned out to themselves that a man's pursuit speaks louder in the years, arter all, than his praise. Now, thar's a fine, promisin' farmer, like the miller gone runnin' loose, mo's the pity."

"A kind heart at bottom," said old Adam, "but he's got a deal of larnin' to do befo' he'll rest content to bide along quietly in the same world with human natur."

"Oh, he's like the Revercombs from the beginnin'," protested Solomon, "slow an' peaceable an' silent until you rouse 'em, but when they're once roused, they're roused beyond God or devil."

"Is this young Cain or Abel the head of the family?" inquired the stranger.

"Bless you, no, Mr. Jonathan, he ain't the head--for thar's his brother Abner still livin'--but, head or tail, he's the only part that counts, when it comes to that. Until the boy grew up an' took hold of things, the Revercombs warn't nothin' mo' than slack fisted, out-at-heel po' white trash, as the niggers say, though the old man, Abel's grandfather, al'ays lays claim to bein' connected with the real Revercombs, higher up in the State--However that may be, befo' the war thar warn't no place for sech as them, an' 'tis only since times have changed an' the bottom begun to press up to the top that anybody has heerd of 'em. Abel went to school somehow by hook or crook an' got a good bit of book larnin', they say, an' then he came back here an' went to turnin' up every stone an' stick on the place. He ploughed an' he sowed an' he reaped till he'd saved up enough to buy that piece of low ground betwixt his house and the grist-mill. Then Ebenezer Timberlake died of the dropsy an' the first thing folks knew, Abel had moved over and turned miller. All the grain that's raised about here now goes to his mill, an' they say he'll be throwin' out the old and puttin' in new-fangled machinery befo' the year is up. He's the foremost man in these parts, suh, unless you war to come to Jordan's Journey to live like yo' uncle."

"To live like my uncle," repeated the young man, with an ironic intonation that escaped the ears of old Adam. "But what of the miller's little sweetheart with the short hair and the divine smile? Whose daughter is she?"

Old Adam's thin lips flattened until a single loosened tooth midway of his lower gum wagged impishly back and forth. His face, sunburned and frosted like the hardened rind of some winter fruit, revealed the prominent bones of the skull under the sunken flesh. One of his gnarled old hands, trembling and red, clutched the clay bowl of his pipe; the other, with the callous skin of the palm showing under the bent fingers, rested half open on the leather patch that covered the knee of his overalls. A picture of toilworn age, of the inevitable end of all mortal labour, he had sat for hours in the faint sunshine, smiling with his sunken, babyish mouth at the brood of white turkeys that crowded about the well.

"Well, she's Reuben Merryweather's granddaughter, suh," replied Solomon in the place of the elder. "He was overseer at Jordan's Journey, you know, durin' the old gentleman's lifetime, after the last Jordan died and the place was bought by yo' uncle. Ah, 'twas different, suh, when the Jordans war livin'!"

Some furtive malice in his tone caused the stranger to turn sharply upon him.

"The girl's mother--who was she?" he asked.

"Janet Merryweather, the prettiest gal that ever set foot on these roads. Ah, 'twas a sad story, was hers, an' the less said about it, the soonest forgotten. Thar was some folks, the miller among 'em, that dropped dead out with the old minister--that was befo' Mr. Mullen's time--for not wantin' her to be laid in the churchyard. A hard case, doubtless, but a pious man such as I likes to feel sartain that however much he may have fooled along with sinful women in this world, only the most respectable of thar sex will rise around him at the Jedgment."

"And the father?" inquired the stranger, with a sound as if he drew in his breath sharply.

"Accordin' to the Law an' the Prophets she hadn't any. That may be goin' agin natur, suh, but 'tis stickin' close to Holy Writ an' the wisdom of God."

To this the young man's only response was a sudden angry aversion that showed in his face. Then lifting his horse's head from the trodden grass by the well, he sprang into the saddle, and started, as the miller had done, over the three roads into the turnpike. Remembering as he passed the gate posts that he had spoken no parting word to the group under the mulberry tree, he raised himself in his stirrups, and called back "Good day to you. Many thanks," in his pleasant voice.

IN WHICH DESTINY WEARS THE COMIC MASK

Putting his horse to a canter, Mr. Jonathan Gay rode through the old gate into the turnpike. His still indignant look was fixed on the heavy wheelruts ahead, while his handsome though fleshy figure inclined slightly forward in the saddle after a foreign fashion. Seen close at hand his face, which was impressive at a distance, lost a certain distinction of contour, as though the marks of experience had blurred, rather than accentuated, the original type. The bones of forehead and nose still showed classic in outline, but in moulding the mouth and chin nature had not adhered closely to the aristocratic structure beneath. The flesh sagged a little in places; the brow was a trifle too heavy, the jaw a trifle too prominent, the lips under the short dark moustache were a trifle too full. Yet in spite of this coarseness of finish, his face was well coloured, attractive, and full of generous, if whimsical, humour. A judge of men would have seen in it proof that Mr. Gay's character consisted less in a body of organized tendencies than in a procession of impulses.

White with dust the turnpike crawled straight ahead between blood-red clumps of sumach and bramble on which the faint sunlight still shone. At intervals, where the dripping from over-hanging boughs had worn the road into dangerous hollows, boles of young saplings had been placed cross-wise in a corduroy pattern, and above them clouds of small belated butterflies drifted in the wind like blown yellow rose leaves. On the right the thin corn shocks looked as if they were sculptured in bronze, and amid them there appeared presently the bent figure of a harvester, outlined in dull blue against a sky of burnt orange. From the low grounds beside the river a mist floated up, clinging in fleecy shreds to the short grass that grew in and out of the bare stubble. The aspect of melancholy, which was depressing even in the broad glare of noon, became almost intolerable under the waning light of the afterglow. Miles of loneliness stretched on either side of the turnpike, which trailed, without fork or bend, into the flat distance beyond the great pine at the bars.

For the twentieth time since he had left the tavern, Mr. Gay, whose habit it was to appear whimsical when he felt despondent, declared to himself that he'd be damned if the game was worth half what the candle was likely to cost him. Having arrived, without notable misadventure, at the age of thirty, he had already reduced experience to a series of episodes and had embraced the casual less as a pastime than as a philosophy.

As he approached the blazed pine, a spot of darkness, which he had at first mistaken for a small tree, detached itself from the surrounding shadows, and assumed gradually a human shape. His immediate impression was that the shape was a woman and that she was young. With his next breath he became aware that she was also beautiful. In the fading light her silhouette stood out as distinctly against the mellow background of the sky, as did the great pine which marked the almost obliterated path over the fields. Her dress was the ordinary calico one, of some dull purplish shade, worn by the wives and daughters of the neighbouring farmers; and on her bare white arm, with its upturned sleeve, she carried a small split basket half filled with persimmons. She was of an almost pure Saxon type--tall, broad-shouldered, deep-bosomed, with a skin the colour of new milk, and soft ashen hair parted smoothly over her ears and coiled in a large, loose knot at the back of her head. As he reached her she smiled faintly and a little brown mole at the corner of her mouth played charmingly up and down. After the first minute, Gay found himself fascinated by this single imperfection in her otherwise flawless features. More than her beauty he felt that it stirred his blood and aroused in him the physical tenderness which he associated always with some vague chivalrous impulse.

She moved slightly when he dismounted beside her, and a number of small splotches of black circling around her resolved themselves into a bodyguard of little negroes, clad in checked pinafores, with the scant locks wrapped tightly with crimson cotton.

"May I let down the bars for you?" he asked, turning to look into her face with a smile, "and do you take your collection of piccaninnies along for protection or for amusement?"

"Grandma doesn't like me to go out alone, sir--so many dreadful things happen," she answered gently, with an utter absence of humour. "I can't take anybody who is at work, so I let the little darkies come. Mary Jo is the oldest and she's only six."

"Is your home near here?"

"I live at the mill. It's a mile farther on, but there is a short cut."

"Then you are related to the miller, Mr. Revercomb--that fine looking chap I met at the ordinary?"

"He is my uncle. I am Blossom Revercomb," she answered.

"Blossom? It's a pretty name."

Her gaze dwelt on him calmly for and instant, with the faintest quiver of her full white lids, which appeared to weigh heavily on her rather prominent eyes of a pale periwinkle blue.

"My real name is Keren-happuch," she said at last, after a struggle with herself, "grandma bein' a great Scripture reader, chose it when I was born--but they call me Blossom, for short."

"And am I permitted, Miss Keren-happuch, to call you Blossom?"

Again she hesitated, pondering gravely.

"Mary Jo, if you unwrap your hair your mother will whip you," she said suddenly, and went on without a perceptible change of tone, "Keren-happuch is an ugly name, and I don't like it--though grandma says we oughtn't to think any of the Bible names ugly, not even Gog. She is quite an authority on Scripture, is grandma, and she can repeat the first chapter in Chronicles backward, which the minister couldn't do when he tried."

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