Heaven to Betsy / Betsy in Spite of Herself

by Maud Hart Lovelace

  “Why, of course, they’re in love. They’re married, aren’t they?” asked Betsy.

  “It isn’t the same thing, you know,” smiled Julia. But Betsy thought she was just being cynical as she had been about Chauncey Olcott.

  “Married for twenty years! I should think they would be in love,” Betsy muttered indignantly.

  When they started home the sun was getting low, and in withdrawing it seemed to take with it all the brightness of the landscape. The girls were grateful for the warmth of their fall coats and snuggled together under the buggy robes.

  Now it was Mr. Ray’s turn to talk about his youth.

  His father and mother had come to Iowa from Canada, he said, going as far as Chicago by train and the rest of the way behind oxen in a covered wagon. His mother had had eleven children out there on the prairies. She had been poor, and had died in her early forties. Yet she had left her mark on every child, of the ten who had lived.

  She had been a school teacher in Canada, and there were always books in the little farmhouse. She had talked to her children as she washed and ironed, baked and scrubbed, about the value of an education. She had implanted in every one of them a yearning for an education, and they had not been satisfied with the little country school house. There was an academy in the town nearby and to this she and her husband had managed to send the older children in turn.

  “After she died we older children tried to help the younger ones to get an education,” Mr. Ray said.

  There was no Protestant church out there on the prairie, although the Catholics had one.

  “The Catholics have set us a good example,” Grandma Ray had said. She asked her boy Bob to drive her around the neighborhood so that she might raise a fund for a church. Mr. Ray could still remember, he said, the arguments she advanced.

  “You want a church here when your children marry, don’t you?” “You want a funeral sermon when you die.”

  “You don’t want your children to grow up like Indians, do you?” she’d ask the atheists. Some of the farmers really were atheists, Mr. Ray said.

  Grandpa Ray had headed the list of donations with one hundred dollars. It was a great deal for him to give, Mr. Ray went on, a poor man with eleven children. Some men gave fifty, some twenty-five, some ten, five, some just a dollar.

  “One man, I remember,” Mr. Ray said chuckling, “said he couldn’t spare even a dollar. He was one of the atheists. Mother looked at his litter of pigs.

  “‘How about one of those pigs, Henry Hogan,’ she asked, ‘so that your children can grow up in a civilized community?’

  “She looked so little and spunky sitting there on the wagon seat. He gave her the pig,” Mr. Ray ended.

  “Do any of us look like her, Papa?” Julia asked.

  “Margaret does, a little. She was small and dark—she was Welsh, you know—and she had big eyes like Margaret’s.”

  Margaret sat straighter than ever with pride.

  “Did she get the church, Papa?” asked Betsy. She knew the answer. They all knew the story, but they liked to hear it through.

  “She did,” said Mr. Ray. “It was the first Protestant church in that part of Iowa. It had a steeple, it was painted white, it stood under two pines out on the prairie. It’s standing there still, and my mother is buried in the churchyard. We’ll all go down to see it some day.”

  After a moment Julia asked hesitantly, “Was it a Baptist Church, Papa?”

  “All the Protestant denominations worshiped there,” he answered.

  “Episcopalians, too?”

  “They would have if there had been any around, I suppose. But there weren’t any high falutin’ Episcopalians out there on the prairie. My mother was a Baptist, and that’s why I’m a Baptist.”

  Betsy swallowed hard and spoke. “Is that a good reason for being a Baptist?” she asked.

  “Why, come to think of it, I don’t know that it is,” Mr. Ray replied. “And I don’t even know that I made a true statement. Probably I’m a Baptist because I like to be a Baptist. I certainly wouldn’t like to be getting up and down all the time the way the Episcopalians do.”

  “Neither would I,” said Margaret. She volunteered, “Mrs. Wheat is a Baptist. Her husband is a deacon. I watched her wash the communion cups one day.”

  Julia and Betsy said nothing.

  The conversation had brought them to the top of the hill overlooking Deep Valley. The valley was full of mist through which the lights of the town were shining.

  “Home already,” said Mr. Ray.

  “The ride went quickly.”

  “There’s nothing like a story for passing the time.”

  “I’m starving, I’m famished,” said Mrs. Ray. “And how I want a good cup of coffee!”

  The girls cried out that they were hungry too.

  “I’ll rustle up some sandwiches in a jiffy,” Mr. Ray said.

  “Let’s build a fire in the fireplace,” said Mrs. Ray. “And get the lights turned on. The house always looks so dark and cheerless when everyone’s away. But perhaps Anna will have come in ahead of us.”

  They drove down High Street, and as the house came into sight Mr. Ray exclaimed, “By George, Anna did get in ahead of us! I thought her Charley kept her out late on Sunday nights.”

  “She’s in all right,” said Mrs. Ray. “Look at the lights!”

  Lights were blazing all over the house.

  “Doesn’t she ever think of the gas bill?” grumbled Mr. Ray.

  They stopped in front of the house, and instead of taking Old Mag to her barn, Mr. Ray went in with the others to see what was up.

  At the front door the smell of coffee greeted them, savory and strong. The music room was empty. A fire was crackling in the dining room grate. And as the surprised Rays moved toward the dining room, a trio of voices broke into song. They were masculine voices, one deeper than the rest.

  “Here comes the bride, here comes the bride…”

  “For Heavens’ sake!” cried Mrs. Ray, rushing ahead.

  The table was set, not too elegantly. Tony, Cab and Herbert were dressed out in Anna’s kitchen aprons. Tony was waving a knife.

  “Fried egg sandwiches coming up,” he said. “Do you like your eggs flopped or unflopped? Speak quick.”

  “Flopped,” said Mr. Ray. “Two of them.”

  “Flopped.” “Flopped.” “Unflopped.” “Unflopped.”

  Julia, without stopping to take off her tam and coat, went to the piano. Everyone sang together, “Here comes the bride.”

  15

  Halloween

  AT ONE OF THE LATE October football games Larry sprained his ankle. He was laid up for several days, and the girls went to his house after school with fudge and candy kisses.

  Carney had been planning a Halloween party for The Crowd, but when she found that Larry couldn’t come she decided to invite only girls. Betsy, Tacy, Bonnie, Winona and Alice! It was to be a sheet-and-pillow-case party.

  After supper on Halloween Mr. Ray and Anna brought into the kitchen the ash cans and everything movable from outside the house. Windows and doors were locked. Deep Valley boys weren’t well behaved on Halloween.

  Julia was going to a dance, but before she put on her own party dress she helped Betsy into the sheet and pillow case. Shouting “boo” at Margaret, Betsy started off for Carney’s.

  For a week the weather had been stormy. Wind and rain had stripped the trees and made sodden masses of the leaves. But tonight a white merry moon sailed in a freshly washed sky and caused the damp sidewalks to shine.

  Groups of children were already roaming the streets. Feeling safe in her disguise, Betsy booed at them and waved her sheeted arms. She didn’t see Cab, or anyone she knew. The boys, she had heard, were indignant at their exclusion from the party, but Betsy thought a hen party was the best kind on Halloween. Undoubtedly they would try in magic ways to peer into the future. Betsy shivered and hoped that the omens for her would point to Tony.

  Not that she was a
nxious to get married. Far from it! She had been almost appalled, when she started going around with Carney and Bonnie, to discover how fixed and definite their ideas of marriage were. They both had cedar hope chests and took pleasure in embroidering their initials on towels to lay away. Each one had picked out a silver pattern and they were planning to give each other spoons in these patterns for Christmases and birthdays. When Betsy and Tacy and Tib talked about their future they planned to be writers, dancers, circus acrobats. Betsy certainly had no wish at all to settle down, but just the same she hoped she would see Tony’s face if she walked down the cellar steps backward holding a mirror tonight.

  Two sheeted figures approached the Sibley house just as she did, and at the door each one secretly showed her face to Mrs. Sibley. She was too wise to admit masked figures indiscriminately. For some time after entering, the ghosts talked in sepulchral voices, trying to conceal their true identities, but at last with uproarious laughter they threw back their pillow cases.

  At the end of the Sibleys’ hall were dining room and kitchen. At the right in a row were front parlor, back parlor, and a library. The rooms could be closed off with folding doors, but they were all open tonight. There was no light except from grinning jack-o’-lanterns in the corners and a fireplace blazing in the library.

  The shades in all the rooms were closely drawn. When tappings on the windows began the girls raised one shade a trifle and saw a jack-o’-lantern peering in, but later there was almost continuous tapping and they pulled the shade down.

  “Probably the boys,” said Bonnie.

  “They’re furious that they’re not invited,” Carney agreed. “Herbert came down before supper and teased like a baby to be allowed to come.”

  “He only wanted to gaze on his Bonnie,” Betsy said. “He knew she would make an elegant ghost.”

  While they were bobbing for apples in the kitchen the front doorbell rang violently. Mrs. Sibley answered it and came back laughing.

  “Three ghosts,” she said, “tried to make me believe they had been invited. But they couldn’t fool me. I have boys of my own.”

  They drenched themselves bobbing for apples; then there was an hilarious struggle to take a bite from an apple suspended in a doorway. After such routine Halloween amusements, Mrs. Sibley withdrew.

  “You know where the refreshments are, Caroline. Have a good time,” she said, and went upstairs to join Mr. Sibley.

  “We have a freezer full of ice cream in the woodshed, so don’t eat too much popcorn,” Carney warned. Waving the popcorn shaker, she led the way to the library.

  Betsy loved the Sibleys’ library, even more than the Andrews’ library although it didn’t have so many books. It had the fireplace, and a window seat full of cushions and Mr. Sibley’s armchair. This was a tremendous black leather-covered armchair, deep and soft with pillowy arms. It swung on a patent rocker so that it could be luxuriously tilted, and there was a footstool in front.

  The girls made a rush for it, and Winona got it, and Tacy piled on top of Winona, and Betsy on top of Tacy, and Alice on top of Betsy, and Bonnie on top of Alice. But Bonnie scrambled off to help Carney with the corn.

  Tapping began now on the library windows but the girls wouldn’t raise the shades.

  “Those ghosts had better go home,” said Carney. She didn’t take much interest in the prowling boys, since Larry was not among them.

  When the corn was popped and buttered, more apples were brought out, and the girls started peeling them and throwing the peelings around. The peelings were supposed to make letters, and the letters were supposed to represent the initials of future husbands. Future husbands were very important that night. Betsy flung her peeling but it didn’t look like a T. It was hard to get a straight letter like T out of a crooked peeling. They began the time-honored game of snapping apples.

  One girl snapped another’s apple while saying the name of a possible future husband. The owner ate the apple and then counted the seeds to the accompaniment of the magic rhyme:

  “One I love

  Two I love,

  Three I love I say;

  Four I love with all my heart,

  Five I cast away.

  Six he loves,

  Seven she loves,

  Eight they both love,

  Nine he comes,

  Ten he tarries,

  Eleven he courts and

  Twelve he marries.”

  If there were more than twelve seeds, you started over again with “One I love.”

  Bonnie snapped Carney’s apple…for Larry, of course. Betsy snapped Winona’s Teddy Roosevelt, which brought roars of laughter. One apple was snapped for Hank Weed, senior captain of the football team. Another was snapped John Drew, the actor.

  Tacy snapped Betsy’s.

  “Um, let’s see!” Trust Tacy not to betray Betsy’s feelings. “Oh…Tony,” she said in an offhand way.

  Betsy gobbled the apple, counted the seeds feverishly, chanting:

  “One I love,

  Two I love…”

  There were sixteen seeds, so it came out, “Four I love with all my heart.”

  “Hi, girls! Betsy loves Tony with all her heart.”

  It was the usual cry, but Winona happened to be looking at Betsy. And Betsy blushed such a rosy red that it could be discerned even by firelight.

  “Betsy’s blushing!” Winona shouted. “Betsy loves Tony…”

  Betsy leaned over to pommel her, and it caused an uproar that ended the apple snapping.

  “Come on now,” said Carney. “We’re going to walk down the cellar steps backward and settle this matter of our future husbands.”

  They took turns, and each girl returned to the kitchen shrieking. When Betsy’s turn came she discovered why. Carney had placed a particularly hideous jack-o’-lantern just where it would grimace into the mirror on the lowest step. This was fun but Betsy felt disappointed.

  Refreshments came next. Mrs. Sibley had left the dining room table all ready, the girls discovered peeking in. It was decorated with fruit and colored leaves and in the center was a Halloween cake, frosted with orange.

  “It has favors in it,” Bonnie said. “A penny, a thimble, a button, a boat, a key and a ring.”

  “Betsy’ll get the ring, I’ll bet,” teased Winona, dancing about.

  “Don’t be silly.”

  “Betsy loves Tony!”

  “Come along and help me bring in the ice cream,” Carney said. “Mamma made it herself, and I turned the freezer for absolutely hours. It’s yummy.”

  “I hope the woodshed was locked up tight,” remarked Alice.

  “Don’t worry. We locked and double locked it.” Carney lighted a candle and led the way.

  But when they opened the woodshed door, even the flickering light of the candle revealed disaster. The outside door stood open. The wind blew the candle out, but Carney was already screaming, “The ice cream’s gone! The ice cream’s gone!” She ran outdoors, her long white draperies fluttering behind her.

  The other five followed. Like six ungainly white birds they flapped about the Sibiey lawn. Soon there were nine white birds.

  “I’ve caught Herbert,” shouted Winona clutching the tallest. The rest of the girls bore down upon him. Star of the scrub football team Herbert might be, but they forced him to the ground.

  “Tell us where our ice cream is! Tell us where our ice cream is!” Six girls sat on him to enforce the demand.

  “Cab! Tony!” moaned Herbert.

  Two sheeted figures tried to pull six sheeted figures from Herbert’s struggling body. A magnificent free-for-all fight was impeded by sheets which sent more than one tangled warrior to the ground.

  “We won’t tell you where the ice cream is unless we can have some!” roared Cab.

  “All right,” said Carney, yielding suddenly. “Come on in.” And the boys dragged the ice cream freezer out from under a denuded lilac bush.

  “How did you get in anyway?” Carney was asking. “I locked th
at door myself.”

  “The spirits let us in,” said Tony in his deep voice.

  “The strong right arm of Humphreys,” Herbert said.

  “And his little friend Edwards,” added Cab.

  They all trooped through the woodshed to the kitchen where the boys dished out ice cream while the girls put their hair to rights. Then they gathered around the dining room table where the candles had now been lighted.

  Everyone was still breathless. The boys told how they had found a crack beneath one of the shades around the window seat, and by standing on a barrel had managed to look in.

  “We saw you snapping apples,” Tony said.

  “Betsy loves you with all her heart, Tony,” Winona called down the table.

  Tony turned his head and looked at Betsy.

  “Can I help it if someone snaps my apple for you instead of John Drew?” asked Betsy. She spoke with commendable lightness but she felt a hot wave creeping into her face.

  “Betsy’s blushing!” cried Herbert. “Look at her blush!”

  “Why, Betsy, I thought you loved me!” said Cab.

  Tony said nothing but the expression in his eyes made Betsy tingle. She was glad when Carney distracted his attention by finding the thimble in her cake.

  “You’re going to be an old maid,” everyone shouted.

  “I am not!”

  “Wait ’til Larry hears this!”

  The excitement had barely died down when Bonnie created more.

  “Girls! Here’s a mystery. There are nine of us at the table, and nine places set, but Carney only expected to serve six.”

  “O di immortales!” cried Carney.

  “Ghosts did it,” said Herbert, grinning.

  “I sneaked in and did it while you were snapping apples,” said Cab.

  “But you couldn’t have!” cried Carney. “It’s set so artistically. No one could have done it but mother. When you called at the front door she told you to come around to the back door later. She unlocked that woodshed door for you.

  “Mother!” Carney called, jumping up and running out into the hall.

  Mr. and Mrs. Sibley leaned over the banisters, laughing.