Other Main-Travelled Roads

by Garland, Hamlin

  The teams arrived splashed with mud, the women blue with cold under their scanty cotton-quilt lap robes, their hats set awry by the wind. They scurried into the house, to sit and shiver in the best room, where all the chairs that could contrive to stand erect, and all of any sort that could be borrowed, were crammed in together to seat the women folks.

  The men drove out to the barn, and having blanketed their teams with lap robes, picked their way through the slush of the yard over to the lee side of the haystack, where the pale sun occasionally shone.

  They spoke of "diseased" Williams, as if Diseased were his Christian name. They whittled shingles or stalks of straw as they talked.

  Sooner or later, after each new arrival, they branched off upon politics, and the McKinley Bill was handled gingerly. If any one, in his zeal, raised his voice above a certain pitch, some one said "Hish!" and the newcomer's voice sank again to that abnormal quiet which falls now and again on these loud-voiced folk of the wind and open spaces.

  The boys hung around the kitchen and smoke-house, playing sly jokes upon each other in order to provoke that explosion of laughter so thoroughly enjoyed by those who can laugh noiselessly.

  A snort of this sort brought Deacon Williams out to reprimand them, "Boys, boys, you should have more respect for the dead."

  The preacher came. The choir raised a wailing chant for the dead, but the group by the haystack did not move.

  Occasionally they came back, after talking about seeding and the price of hogs, to the discussion of the dead man's affairs.

  "I s'pose his property will go to Emmy and Serry, half and half."

  "I expec' so. He always said so, an' John wa'n't a man to whiffle about every day."

  "Well, Emmy won't make no fuss, but if Ike don't git more'n his half, I'll eat the greaser."

  "Who's ex-ecutor?"

  "Deacon Williams, I expect."

  "Well, the Deacon's a slick one," some one observed, as if that were an excellent quality in an executor.

  "They ain't no love lost between Bill Gray and Harkey, I don't expect."

  "No, I don't think they is."

  "Ike don't seem to please people. It's queer, too. He tries awful hard."

  The voice of the preacher within, raised to a wild shout, interrupted them.

  "The Elder's gettin' warmed up," said one of the story-tellers, pausing in his talk. "And so I told Bill if he wanted the cord-wood—"

  The sun shone warmer, and the chickens caw-cawed feebly. The colts whinnied, and a couple of dogs rolled and tumbled in wild frolic, while the voice of the preacher sounded dolefully or in humming monotone.

  Meanwhile, in the house, in the best room and in the best seats near the coffin, the women, in their black, worn dresses, with wrinkled, sallow faces and gnarled hands, sat shivering. Theirs was to be the luxury of the ceremony.

  The carpet was damp and muddy, the house was chill, and the damp wind filled them all with ague; but they had so much to see and talk about, that time passed rapidly. Each one entering was studied critically to see whether dress and deportment were proper to the occasion or not, and if one of the girls smiled a little as she entered, some one was sure to whisper:—

  "Heartless thing, how can she?"

  There were a few young men, only enough to help out on the singing, and they remained mainly in the kitchen where they were seen occasionally in anxious consultation with Deacon Williams.

  The girls looked serious, but a little sly, as if they could smile if the boys looked their way or if one of the old women should cough her store teeth out.

  Upstairs the family were seated in solemn silence, the two nieces, Emma and Sarah, and Emma's husband, Harkey, and Sarah's children—deceased Williams had no wife. These people sat in stony immobility, except when Harkey looked at his watch, and said:—

  "Seem slow gitten here."

  Occasionally women came up the stairway and flung themselves upon the necks of the mourning nieces, who submitted to it without apparent disgust or astonishment, and sank back into the same icy calm after their visitors had "straightened their things," and retired to the reserved seats below.

  Deacon Williams, small, quick, with sunny blue-gray eyes belying the gloomy curve of his mouth, was everywhere; arranging for bearers, selecting hymns, conferring with the family, keeping abstracted old women off the seats reserved for the mourners, and maintaining an anxious lookout for the minister.

  The Deacon was a distant relative of the dead man, and it was generally admitted that he "would have a time of it" in administering upon the estate.

  At last the word was whispered about that the Elder was coming. Word was sent to the smoke-house and to the haystack to call the stragglers in. They came slowly, and finding the rooms all filled considered themselves absolved from a disagreeable duty, and went back to the sunny side of the haystack, where they smoked their pipes in ruminative enjoyment.

  The Elder, upon entering, took his place beside the coffin, the foot of which he used for a pulpit on which to lay his Bible and his hymn-book. A noise of whispering, rustling, scraping of feet arose as some old men crowded in among the women, and then the room became silent.

  The Elder took his seat and glanced round upon them all with solemn unrecognizing severity, while the mourners came down the creaking pine stairway in proper order of procedure.

  Everybody noticed the luxury of new dresses on the nieces and the new suits on the children. Everybody knew the feeling which led to these extravagances. Death, after all, was a majestic visitor, and money was not to stand in the way of a decent showing. Some of the girls smiled slyly at Isaac's gloves, which were too small and would go only halfway on, a fact he tried to conceal by keeping his hands folded. Each boy was provided with a large new stiff cotton handkerchief, which occupied immense space in outside pockets, crumpled as they were into a rustling ball with cruel salient angles like a Chinese puzzle.

  The Elder had attended two funerals that week, and like a jaded actor came lamely to his work. His prayer was not entirely satisfactory to the older people, they had expected a "little more power."

  He was a thin-faced man, with weak brown eyes and a mouth like a gopher, that is, with very prominent upper teeth. His black coat was worn and shiny, and hung limply, as if at some other period he had been fatter, or as if it had belonged to some other man.

  The choir with instinctive skill had selected a wailing hymn, only slightly higher in development than the chant of the Indians, sweet, plaintive at times, barbaric in its moving cadences. They sang it well, in meditative march, looking out of the windows during its interminable length.

  Then the Elder read some passages of the Scripture in his "funeral voice," which was entirely different from his "marriage voice" and his "Sunday voice." It had deep cadences in it and chanting inflections, not unlike the negro preachers or the keeners at Irish wakes.

  Then he gave out the hymn, which all joined in singing, rising to their feet with much trouble. After they had settled down again he took out a large carefully ironed handkerchief and laid it on the coffin as who should say, "If you have tears, prepare to shed them now."

  The absurdity of all this did not appear to his listeners, though they well knew he cared very little about the dead man, who was a very retiring person.

  The Elder on his part understood that his audience was before him for the pleasure of weeping, for the delight of seeing agonized faces and hearing wild grief-laden wailing. They were there to feel the delicious creeping thrill of horror and fear, roused by the presence of the corpse and the near shadow of the hovering angel of death.

  The Elder led off by some purely perfunctory remarks about the deceased, about his kindness, and his honesty. This caused the nieces to wipe away a sparse tear or two, and he was encouraged as if by slight applause. He developed as usual the idea that in the midst of life we are in death, that no man can tell when his time will come. He told two or three grewsome stories of sudden death. His voice now rose in a wi
ld chant now sank to a hoarse whisper.

  The blowing of noses, low sobbings, and fervent amens from the old men thickened encouragingly, and he entered upon more impassioned flights. His voice, naturally sonorous, deepened in powerful song till the men seated comfortably on their haunches out by the haystack could plainly hear his words. "Oh, my brethren, what will you do in that last day?"

  Sarah's boys, without in the least understanding what it all meant, began to weep also and to use their handkerchiefs, so smooth and shining they were useless as so much legal-cap writing paper.

  Their misery would have been enhanced had they known that out in the wagon-shed under cover of the Elder's voice the other boys were having a game of mummelly peg in the warm, dry ground. Their fresh young souls laughed at death as the early robins out in the hedge near by defied the winds of March.

  Having harrowed the poor sensation-loving souls as thoroughly as could be desired, the Elder began the process of "letting them down easy." He remembered that the Lord was merciful; that the deceased could approach him with confidence; that there was a life beyond the tomb, a life of eternal rest (the allurement of all hard-working humanity).

  Slowly the snuffling and sobbing ceased, the handkerchiefs took longer and longer intervals of rest, and when in conclusion the preacher said, "Let us pray," the old men looked at each other with fervent satisfaction. "It's been a blessed time—a blessed time!"

  The pretty girl who sang the soprano looked very interesting with her wet eyelashes, the tears stopped halfway in their course down her rounded cheek. The closing hymn promised endless peace and rest, but was voiced in the same tragic and hopeless music with which the service opened.

  Deacon Williams came out to say, "All parties desiring to view the remains, will now have an opportunity." He had the hospitable tone of a host inviting his guests in to dinner.

  Viewing the remains was considered a religious duty, and the men from outside, and even the boys from behind the smoke-house, felt constrained to come in and pass in shuddering horror before the still face whose breath did not dim the glass above it. Most of them hurried by the box with only a swift side glance down at the strange thing within.

  Then the bearers lifted the coffin and slipped it into the platform-spring wagon, which was backed up to the door. The other teams loaded up, and the procession moved off, down the perilously muddy road toward the village burying-ground.

  In this way was John Williams, a hard-working, honorable Welshman, buried. His death furnished forth a sombre, dramatic entertainment such as he himself had ceremoniously attended many times. The funeral trotters whom he had seen at every funeral in the valley were now in at his death, and would be at each other's death, until the black and yellow earth claimed them all.

  A ceremony almost as interesting to the gossips as the burial was the reading of the will, to which only the family were invited. After the return of Emma, her husband, and Sarah from the cemetery, Deacon Williams read the dead man's bequests, seated in the best room, which was still littered with chairs and damp with mud.

  The will was simple and not a surprise to any one. It gave equal division of all the property to the nieces.

  "Well, now, when'll we have the settlement?" asked the Deacon.

  "Just's you say, Deacon," said Emma, meekly.

  "Suit yourself," said Harkey; "only it 'ad better come soon. Sooner the better—seedin's coming on."

  "Well, to-morrow is Friday, why not Saturday?"

  "All right, Saturday." All agreed.

  As Harkey drove off down the road he said to his wife: "The sooner we have it, the fewer things 'll git carried off. The Deacon don't favor me none, and Bill Gray is sweet on Serry, and he'll bear watchin'."

  The Deacon on his part took his chin in his fist and looked after Harkey. "Seemed a little bit anxious, 'cordin' to my notion," he said, with a smile.

  II

  Saturday was deliciously warm and springlike, the hens woke in the early dawn with a jocund note in their throats, and the young cattle frisked about the barn-yard, moved to action by the electrical influences of the south wind.

  "Clear as a bell overhead," Deacon Williams said.

  But Jack Dunlap, Sarah's hand, said, "Nobody travels that way."

  Long before dawn the noise of the melting water could be heard running with musical tinkle under the ice. The ponds crashed and boomed in long reverberating explosions, as the sinking water heaved it up and let it fall with crackling roar; flights of ducks flashed over, cackling breathlessly as they scurried straight into the north.

  Deacon and Sarah arrived early and took possession, for Sarah was to have the eighty which included the house. They were busy getting things ready for the partition. The Deacon, assisted by Jack, the hired man, was busy hauling the machinery out of the shed into the open air, while Sarah and a couple of neighbors' girls, with skirts tucked up and towels on their heads, were scouring up pots and pans and dusting furniture in the kitchen.

  The girls, strong and handsome in their unsapped animal vigor, enjoyed the innocent display of their bare arms and petticoats.

  People from Sand Lake passing by wondered what was going on. Gideon Turner had the courage to pull up and call out, for the satisfaction of his wife:—

  "What's going on here this fine morning?"

  "Oh, we're goin' to settle up the estate!" said Sarah. "Why! how de do, Mrs. Turner?"

  "W'y, it's you, is it, Serry?"

  "Yes; it's me,—what they is left of me. I been here sence six o'clock. I'm getting things ready for the division. Deacon Williams is the ex-ecutor, you know."

  "Aha! Less see, you divide equally, I hear."

  "Near's we can get at it. Uncle left me the house eighty, and the valley eighty to Emmy. Deacon's goin' to parcel out the belongin's."

  Turner looked sly. "How'd Harkey feel?"

  Sarah smiled. "I don't know and care less. He'll make trouble if he can, but I don't see how he can. He agreed to have the Deacon do the dividin', and he'll have to stand by it so far as I can see."

  Mrs. Turner looked dubious. "Well, you know Ike Harkey. He looks as though sugar wouldn't melt in his mouth, but I tell you I'd hate to have dealin's with him."

  Turner broke in: "Well, we must be movin'. I s'pose you'll move right in?"

  "Yes. Just as soon's as this thing's settled."

  "Well, good-by. Come up."

  "You come down."

  Sarah was a heavy, good-natured woman, a widow with "a raft of children." Probably for that reason her uncle had left her the house, which was large and comfortable. As she stood looking down the road, one of the girls came out to the gate. She was a plump, strong creature, a neighbor's girl who had volunteered to help.

  "Anybody coming?"

  "Yes. I guess—no, it's going the other way. Ain't it a nice day?"

  That was as far as she could carry the utterance of her feeling, but all the morning she had felt the wonderful power of the air. The sun had risen incredibly warm. The wind was in the south, and the crackling, booming roar of ice in the ponds and along the river was like winter letting go its iron grip upon the land. Even the old cows shook their horns, and made comical attempts to frisk with the yearlings. Sarah knew it was foolish, but she felt like a girl that morning—and Bill was coming up the road.

  In the midst of the joy of the spring day stood the house, desolate and empty, out of which its owner had been carried to a bed in the cold, clinging clay of the little burying-ground.

  The girls and Sarah worked swiftly, brushing, cleaning, setting aside, giving little thought to even the beauty of the morning, which entered their blood unconsciously.

  "Well, how goes it?" asked a quick, jovial voice.

  The girls gave screams of affected fright.

  "Why, Deacon! You nearly scared the life out of us."

  Deacon Williams was always gallant.

  "I didn't know I was given to scaring the ladies," he said. "Well, who's here?"

  "Nobod
y but us so far."

  "Hain't seen nothing o' Harkey?"

  "Not a thing. He sent word he'd be on hand, though."

  "M—, well, we've got the machinery invoiced. Guess I'll look around and kind o' get the household things in my mind's eye," said the Deacon, taking on the air of a public functionary.

  "All right. We'll have everything ready here in a few minutes."

  They returned to work, dusting and scrubbing. The girls with their banter put death into the background as an obscure and infrequent incident of old age.

  Sarah again studied the road down the Coolly.

  "Well there! I see a team coming up the Coolly now; wonder if it's Emmy."

  "Looks more like Bill Gray's team," said one of the girls, looking slyly at Sarah, who grew very red.

  "Oh, you're too sharp, ain't you?"

  It was perfectly ridiculous (to the young people) to see these middle-aged lovers courting like sixteen-year-olds, and they had no mercy on either Bill or Sarah.

  Bill drove up in leisurely way, his horses steaming, his wagon-wheels loaded with mud. Mrs. Gray was with him, her jolly face shining like the morning sun.

  "Hello, folkses, are you all here?"

  "Good morning, Mrs. Gray," said the Deacon, approaching to help her out. "Hello, Bill, nice morning."

  Bill looked at Sarah for a moment. "Bully good," he said, leaving his mother to scramble down the wagon-wheel alone—at least so far as he was concerned, but the Deacon stood below courageously.

  Mrs. Gray cried out in her loud good humor: "Look out, Deacon, don't git too near me—if I should fall on you there wouldn't be a grease spot left. There! I'm all right now," she said, having reached ground without accident. She shook her dress and looked briskly around. "Wal, what you done, anyway? Emmy's folks come yet?"

  "No, but I guess that's them comin' now. I hope Ike won't come, though."

  Mrs. Gray stared at the Deacon. "Why not?"

  "Well, he's just sure to make a fuss," said Jack, "he's so afraid he won't get his share."

  Bill chewed on a straw and looked at Sarah abstractedly.

  "Well, what's t' be done?" inquired Mrs. Gray, after a pause.