Peace in Friendship Village

"Good heavens!" he says. "You don't think she's that bad off?"

" – if anything should happen," I went on, calm, "I didn't want to have myself to blame for not having spoke up in time. Now," says I, brisk, "you were just going downtown. And I've got a taste of jell I want to take over to her. So I won't keep you."

He got up, looking so near like a tree that's had its roots hacked at that I 'most could have told him that I didn't mean the kind of death he was thinking of at all. But I didn't say anything more. And he thanked me, humble and grateful and scared, and went off downtown. He looked over to the cottage, though, when he shut my gate – I noticed that. She wasn't anywhere in sight. Nor she wasn't when I stepped up onto her porch in a minute or two with a cup-plate of my new quince jell that I wanted her to try.

"Hello," I says in the passage. "Anybody home?"

There was a little shuffle and she came out of the dining-room. There was a mark all acrost her cheek, and I judged she'd been lying on the couch out there crying.

"Get a teaspoon," says I, "and come taste my new receipt."

She came, lack-luster, and like jell didn't make much more difference than anything else. We sat down, cozy, in the hammock, me acting like I'd forgot everything in the world about what had gone before. I rattled on about the new way to make my jell and then I set the sample on the sill behind the shutter and I says:

"I just had Mr. Groom come over to fix the latch on my closet-door. I dunno what was wrong with it – when I shut it tight it went off like a gun in the middle of the night. Mr. Groom fixed it in just a minute."

"Oh, he did," says she, about like that.

"He's awful handy with tools," I says. And she didn't say anything. And then says I:

"Mrs. Bride, we're old friends by now, ain't we?"

"Why, yes," says she, "and good friends, I hope."

"That's what I hope," I says. "And now," I went on, "I hope you won't think I'm interfering too much, but I want to speak to you serious about your husband."

"My husband?" says she, short.

I went on, never noticing. "I don't know whether you've took it in, but there seems to be something wrong with him."

"What do you mean?" she says, looking at me.

"Well, sir," I says, "I ain't sure. I can't tell just how wrong it is. But something is ailing him."

"Why, I haven't noticed anything," she says, and come over to a chair nearer to me.

"You don't mean," I says, "that you don't notice the change there's been in him?" – I didn't say in how long – "the lines in his face and how different he acts?"

"Oh, no," she says. "Why, surely not!"

"Surely yes," says I. "It strikes me – it struck me over there to-night – that something is the matter —serious."

"Oh, don't say that," she says. "You frighten me."

"I'm sorry for that," says I. "But it's better to be frightened too soon than too late. And if anything should happen I wouldn't want to think – "

"Oh!" she says, sharp, "what do you think could happen?"

" – I wouldn't want to think," I went on, "that I had suspicioned and hadn't warned you."

"But what can I do – " she began.

"You can watch out," I says, "now that you know. Folks get careless about their near and dear – that's all. They don't notice that anything's the matter till it's too late."

"Oh, dear!" she says. "Oh, if anything should happen to Harry, why, Miss Marsh – "

"Exactly," says I.

We talked on a little while till I heard what I was waiting for – him coming up the street. I noticed that he hadn't been gone downtown long enough to buy a match.

"I'm going over to Miss Matey's for some pie-plant," I says. "Her second crop is on. Can I go through your back gate? Maybe I'll come back this way."

When I went around their house I saw that she was still standing on the porch and he was coming in the gate. And I never looked back at all – bad as I wanted to.

It was deep dusk when I came back. The air was as gentle as somebody that likes you when they're liking you most.

When I came by the end of the porch I heard voices, so I knew that they were talking. And then I caught just one sentence. You'd think I could have been contented to slip through the front yard and leave them to work it out. But I wasn't. In fact I'd only just got the stage set ready for what I meant to do.

I walked up the steps and laid my pie-plant on the stoop.

"I'm coming in," I says.

They got up and said the different things usual. And I went and sat down.

"You'll think in a minute," says I, "that I owe you both an apology. But I don't."

"What for, dear?" Mrs. Bride says, and took my hand.

I'm an old woman and I felt like their mother and their grandmother. But I felt a little frightened too.

"Is either of you sick?" I says.

Both of them says: "No, I ain't." And both of them looked furtive and quick at the other.

"Well," I says, "mebbe you don't know it. But to-day both of you has had the symptoms of coming down with something. Something serious."

They looked at me, puzzled.

"I noticed it in Mrs. Bride this morning," I says, "when she came over to my house. She looked white, and like all the life had gone out of her. And she didn't sing once all day, nor do any work. Then I noticed it in you to-night," I says to him, "when you walked looking down, and came acrost the street lack-luster, and like nothing mattered so much as it might have if it had mattered more. And so I done the natural thing. I told each of you about something being the matter with the other one. Something serious."

I stood up in front of them, and I dunno but I felt like a fairy godmother that had something to give them – something priceless.

"When two folks," I says, "speak cross to each other and can't give in, it's just as sure a disease as – as quinsy. And it'll be fatal, same as a fever can be. You can hate the sight of me if you want to, but that's why I spoke out like I done."

I didn't dare look at them. I began just there to see what an awful thing I had done, and how they were perfectly bound to take it. But I thought I'd get in as much as I could before they ordered me off the porch.

"I've loved seeing you over here," I says. "It's made me young again. I've loved watching you say good-by in the mornings, and meet again evenings. I've loved looking out over here to the light when you sat reading, and I could see your shadows go acrost the curtains sometimes, when I sat rocking in my house by myself. It's all been something I've liked to know was happening. It seemed as if a beautiful, new thing was beginning in the world – and you were it."

All at once I got kind of mad at the two of them.

"And here for a little tinkering matter about screens for the parlor, you go and spoil all my fun by not speaking to each other!" I scolded, sharp.

It was that, I think, that turned the tide and made them laugh. They both did laugh, hearty – and they looked at each other and laughed – I noticed that. For two folks can not look at each other and laugh and stay mad same time. They can not do it.

I went right on: "So," I says, "I told you each the truth, that the other one was sick. So you were, both of you. Sick at heart. And you know it."

He put out his hand to her.

"I know it," he says.

"I know too," says she.

"Land!" says I, "you done that awful pretty. If I could give in that graceful about anything I'd go round giving in whether I'd said anything to be sorry for or not. I'd do it for a parlor trick."

"Was it hard, dear?" he says to her. And she put up her face to him just as if I hadn't been there. I liked that. And it made me feel as much at home as the clock.

He looked hard at me.

"Truly," he says, "didn't you mean she looked bad?"

"I meant just what I said," says I. "She did look bad. But she don't now."

"And you made it all up," she says, "about something serious being the matter with him – "

"Made it up!" says I. "No! But what ailed him this morning doesn't ail him now. That's all. I s'pose you're both mad at me," I says, mournful.

He took a deep breath. "Not when I'm as thankful as this," he says.

"And me," she says. "And me."

I looked around the little garden of the Henslows' cottage, with the moon behaving as if everything was going as smooth as glass – don't you always notice that about the moon? What grand manners it's got? It never lets on that anything is the matter.

He threw his arm across her shoulder in that gesture of comradeship that is most the sweetest thing they do.

They got up and came over to me quick.

"We can't thank you – " she says.

"Shucks," I says. "I been wishing I had something to give you. I couldn't think of anything but vegetables. Now mebbe I've give you something after all – providing you don't go and forget it the very next time," I says, wanting to scold them again.

They walked to the gate with me. The night was black and pale gold, like a great soft drowsy bee.

"You know," I says, when I left them, "peace that we talk so much about – that isn't going to come just by governments getting it. If people like you and me can't keep it – and be it – what hope is there for the nations? We are 'em!"

I'd never thought of it before. I went home saying it over. When I'd put my pie-plant down cellar I went in my dark little parlor and sat down by the window and rocked. I could see their light for a little while. Then it went out. The cottage lay in that hush of peace of a hot summer night. I could feel the peacefulness of the village.

"If only we can get enough of it," I says. "If only we can get enough of it – "

DREAM

When a house in the neighborhood has been vacant for two years, and all of a sudden the neighborhood sees furniture being moved into that house, excitement, as Silas Sykes says, reigns supreme and more than supreme.

And so it did in Friendship Village when the Oldmoxon House got a new tenant, unbeknownst. The excitement was specially strained because the reason Oldmoxon House had stood vacant so long was the rent. And whoever had agreed to the Twenty Dollars was going to be, we all felt, and as Mis' Sykes herself put it, "a distinct addition to Friendship Village society."

It was she gave me the news, being the Sykeses are the Oldmoxon House's nearest neighbors. I hurried right over to her house – it was summer-warm and you just ached for an excuse to be out in it, anyway. We drew some rockers onto her front porch where we could get a good view. The Oldmoxon double front doors stood open, and the things were being set inside.

"Serves me right not to know who it is," says Mis' Sykes. "I see men working there yesterday, and I never went over to inquire what they were doing."

"A body can't do everything that's expected of them," says I, soothing.

"Won't it be nice," says Mis' Sykes, dreamy, "to have that house open again, and folks going and coming, and maybe parties?" It was then the piano came out of the van, and she gave her ultimatum. "Whoever it is," she says, pointing eloquent, "will be a distinct addition to Friendship Village society."

There wasn't a soul in sight that seemed to be doing the directing, so pretty soon Mis' Sykes says, uneasy:

"I don't know – would it seem – how would it be – well, wouldn't it be taking a neighborly interest to step over and question the vans a little?"

And we both of us thought it would be in order, so we did step right over to inquire.

Being the vans had come out from the City, we didn't find out much except our new neighbor's name: Burton Fernandez.

"The Burton Fernandezes," says Mis' Sykes, as we picked our way back. "I guess when we write that name to our friends in our letters, they won't think we live in the woods any more. Calliope," she says, "it come to me this: Don't you think it would be real nice to get them up a reception-surprise, and all go there some night as soon as they get settled, and take our own refreshments, and get acquainted all at once, instead of using up time to call, individual?"

"Land, yes," I says, "I'd like to do that to every neighbor that comes into town. But you – " says I, hesitating, to her that was usually so exclusive she counted folks's grand-folks on her fingers before she would go to call on them, "what makes you – "

"Oh," says Mis' Sykes, "you can't tell me. Folks's individualities is expressed in folks's furniture. You can't tell me that, with those belongings, we can go wrong in our judgment."

"Well," I says, "I can't go wrong, because I can't think of anything that'd make me give them the cold shoulder. That's another comfort about being friends to everybody – you don't have to decide which ones you want to know."

"You're so queer, Calliope," says Mis' Sykes, tolerant. "You miss all the satisfaction of being exclusive. And you can't afford not to be."

"Mebbe not," says I, "mebbe not. But I'm willing to try it. Hang the expense!" says I.

Mis' Sykes didn't waste a day on her reception-surprise. I heard of it right off from Mis' Holcomb and Mis' Toplady and two-three more. They were all willing enough, not only because any excitement in the village is like a personal present to all of us, but because Mis' Sykes was interested. She's got a real gift for making folks think her way is the way. She's a real leader. Everybody wears a straw hat contented till, somewheres near November, Mis' Sykes flams out in felt, and then you begin right off to feel shabby in your straw, though new from the store that Spring.

"It does seem like rushing things a little, though," says Mis' Holcomb to me, very confidential, the next day.

"Not for me," I says. "I been vaccinated."

"What do you mean?" says she.

"Not even the small-pox can make me snub them," I explains.

"Yes, but Calliope," says Mis' Toplady in a whisper, "suppose it should turn out to be one of them awful places we read about. They have good furniture."

"Well," says I, "in that case, if thirty to forty of us went in with our baskets, real friendly, and done it often enough, I bet we'd either drive them out or turn them into better neighbors. Where's the harm?"

"Calliope," says Mame Holcomb, "don't you draw the line nowheres?"

"Yes," I says, mournful. "Them on Mars won't speak to me – yet. But short of Mars – no. I have no lines up."

We heard from the servant that came down on Tuesday and began cleaning and settling, that the family would arrive on Friday. We didn't get much out of him – a respectable-seeming colored man but reticent, very. The fact that the family servant was a man finished Mis' Sykes. She had had a strong leaning, but now she was bent, visible. And with an item that appeared Thursday night in the Friendship Village Evening Daily, she toppled complete.

"Professor and Mrs. Burton Fernandez," the Supper Table Jottings said, "are expected Friday to take possession of Oldmoxon House, 506 Daphne street. Professor Fernandez is to be engaged for some time in some academic and scholastic work in the City. Welcome, Neighbors."

"Let's have our reception-surprise for them Saturday night," says Mis' Sykes, as soon as she had read the item. "Then we can make them right at home, first thing, and they won't need to tramp into church, feeling strange, Next-day morning."

"Go on – do it," says I, affable.

Mis' Sykes ain't one to initiate civic, but she's the one to initiate festive, every time.

Mis' Holcomb and Mis' Toplady and me agreed to bake the cakes, and Mis' Sykes was to furnish the lemonade, being her husband keeps the Post-office store, and what she gets, she gets wholesale. And Mis' Sykes let it be known around that on Saturday night we were all to drop into her house, and go across the street together, with our baskets, to put in a couple of hours at our new neighbors', and make them feel at home. And everybody was looking forward to it.

I've got some hyacinth bulbs along by my side fence that get up and come out, late April and early May, and all but speak to you. And it happened when I woke up Friday morning they looked so lovely, I couldn't resist them. I had to take some of them up, and set them out in pots and carry them around to a few. About noon I was going along the street with one to take to an old colored washerwoman I know, that never does see much that's beautiful but the sky; but when I got in front of Oldmoxon House, a thought met me.

"To-day's the day they come," I said to myself. "Be kind of nice to have a sprig of something there to welcome them."

So my feet turned me right in, like your feet do sometimes, and I rang the front bell.

"Here," says I, to that colored servant that opened the door, "is a posy I thought your folks might like to see waiting for them."

He started to speak, but somebody else spoke first.

"How friendly!" said a nice-soft voice – I noticed the voice particular. "Let me thank her."

There came out from the shadow of the hall, a woman – the one with the lovely voice.

"I am Mrs. Fernandez – this is good of you," she said, and put out her hands for the plant.

I gave it to her, and I don't believe I looked surprised, any more than when I first saw the pictures of the Disciples, that the artist had painted their skin dark, like it must have been. Mrs. Fernandez was dark too. But her people had come, not from Asia, but from Africa.

Like a flash, I saw what this was going to mean in the village. And in the second that I stood there, without time to think it through, something told me to go in, and try to get some idea of what was going to be what.

"May I come inside now I'm here?" I says.

She took me into the room that was the most settled of any. The piano was there, and a good many books on their shelves. As I remember back now, I must just have stood and stared at them, for impressions were chasing each other across my head like waves on a heaving sea. No less than that, and mebbe more.

"I was trying to decide where to put the pictures," she said. "Then we shall have everything settled before my husband gets home to-morrow."

We talked about the pictures – they were photographs of Venice and of Spain. Then we talked about the garden, and whether it was too late for her to plant much, and I promised her some aster plants. Then I saw a photograph of a young girl – it was her daughter, in Chicago University, who would be coming home to spend the Summer. Her son had been studying to be a surgeon, she said.

"My husband," she told me, "has some work to do in the library in the City. We tried to live there – but we couldn't bear it."

"I'm glad you came here," I told her. "It's as nice a little place as any."

"I suppose so," she says only. "As nice as – any."

I don't think I stayed half an hour. But when I came out of there I walked away from Oldmoxon House not sensing much of anything except a kind of singing thanksgiving. I had never known anything of her people except the kind like our colored wash-woman. I knew about the negro colleges and all, but I guess I never thought about the folks that must be graduating from them. I'd always thought that there might be somebody like Mis' Fernandez, sometime, a long way off, when the Lord and us his helpers got around to it. And here already it was true of some of them. It was like seeing the future come true right in my face.

When I shut the gate of Oldmoxon House, I see Mis' Sykes peeking out her front door, and motioning to me. And at the sight of her, that I hadn't thought of since I went into that house, I had all I could do to keep from laughing and crying together, till the street rang with me. I crossed over and went in her gate; and her eye-brows were all cocked inquiring to take in the news.

"Go on," she says, "and tell me all there is to tell. Is it all so – the name – and her husband – and all?"

"Yes," I says, "it's all so."

"I knew it when I see her come," says Mis' Sykes. "Her hat and her veil and her simple, good-cut black clothes – you can't fool me on a lady."

"No," I says. "You can't fool me, either."

"Well now," says Mis' Sykes, "there's nothing to hinder our banging right ahead with our plan for to-morrow night, is there?"

"Nothing whatever," I says, "to hinder me."

Mis' Sykes jerked herself around and looked at me irritable.

"Why don't you volunteer?" says she. "I hate to dig the news out of anybody with the can-opener."

I'd have given a good deal to feel that I didn't have to tell her, but just let her go ahead with the reception surprise. I knew, though, that I ought to tell her, not only because I knew her through and through, but because I couldn't count on the village. We're real democratic in the things we know about, but let a new situation stick up its head and we bound to the other side, automatic.

"Mis' Sykes," I says, "everything that we'd thought of our new neighbor is true. Also, she's going to be a new experience for us in a way we hadn't thought of. She's dark-skinned."

"A brunette," says Mis' Sykes. "I see that through her veil – what of it?"

"Nothing – nothing at all," says I. "You noticed then, that she's colored?"

I want to laugh yet, every time I think how Mis' Postmaster Sykes looked at me.

"Colored!" she says. "You mean – you can't mean – "

"No," I says, "nothing dangerous. It's going to give us a chance to see that what we've always said could be true sometime, away far off, is true of some of them now."

Mis' Sykes sprang up and began walking the floor.

"A family like that in Oldmoxon House – and my nearest neighbors," says she, wild. "It's outrageious – outrageious."

I don't use my words very good, but I know better than to say "outrageious." I don't know but it was her pronouncing it that way, in such a cause, that made me so mad.

"Mis' Sykes," I says, "Mis' Fernandez has got a better education than either you or I. She's a graduate of a Southern college, and her two children have been to colleges that you and I have never seen the inside of and never will. And her husband is a college professor, up here to study for a degree that I don't even know what the letters stands for. In what," says I, "consists your and my superiority to that woman?"

"My gracious," says Mis' Sykes, "ain't you got no sense of fitness to you. Ain't she black?"

"Her skin ain't the same color as ours, you're saying," I says. "Don't it seem to you that that reason had ought to make a cat laugh?"

Mis' Sykes fair wheeled on me. "Calliope Marsh," says she, "the way you set your opinions against established notions is an insult to your kind."

"Established notions," I says over after her. "'Established notions.' That's just it. And who is it, of us two, that's being insulting to their kind now, Mis' Sykes?"

She was looking out the window, with her lips close-pressed and a thought between her narrowed eye-lids.

"I'll rejoin 'em – or whatever it is you call it," she says. "I'll rejoin 'em from living in that house next to me."

"Mis' Sykes!" says I. "But their piano and their book-cases and their name are just the same as yesterday. You know yourself how you said folks's furniture expressed them. And it does – so be they ain't using left-overs the way I am. I tell you, I've talked with her, and I know. Or rather I kept still while she told me things about Venice and Granada where she'd been and I hadn't. You've got all you thought you had in that house, and education besides. Are you the Christian woman, Mis' Sykes, to turn your nose up at them?"

"Don't throw my faith in my face," says she, irritable.

"Well," I says, "I won't twit on facts. But anybody'd think the Golden Rule's fitted neat onto some folks to deal with, and is left flap at loose ends for them that don't match our skins. Is that sense, or ain't it?"

"It ain't the skin," she says. "Don't keep harping on that. It's them. They're different by nature."

Then she says the great, grand motto of the little thin slice of the human race that's been changed into superiority.

"You can't change human nature!" says she, ticking it out like a clock.

"Can't you?" says I. "Can't you? I'm interested. If that was true, you and I would be swinging by our tails, this minute, sociable, from your clothes-line."