Part 4

“But their idea of brotherhood is the highest kind of life!”

“The only fault I have to find with it is that it isn’t human,” he said, mildly. He had no desire to prove or disprove anything; Athalia was looking better, just because she was interested in something, and that was enough for Lewis. When she proposed to read a book on Shakerism aloud, he fell into her mood with what was, for him, enthusiasm; he declared he would like nothing better, and he put his daily paper aside without a visible regret.

“Well,” he admitted, “I must say there’s more to it than I supposed. They’ve studied the Prophecies; that’s evident. And they’re not narrow in their belief. They’re really Unitarians.”

“Narrow?” she said--“they are as wide as heaven itself! And, oh, the peace of it!”

“But they are NOT human,” he would insist, smiling; “no marriage--that’s not human, little Tay.”

It was not until two months later that he began to feel vaguely uneasy. “Yes; it’s interesting,” he admitted; “but nobody in these days would want to be a Shaker.” To which she replied, boldly, “Why not?”

That was all, but it was enough. Lewis Hall’s face suddenly sobered. He had not stumbled along behind her in all her emotional experiences without learning to read the guide-posts to her thought. “I hope she’ll get through with it soon,” he said to himself, with a worried frown; “it isn’t wholesome for a mind like ‘Thalia’s to dwell on this kind of thing.”

It was in November that she broke to him that she had written Eldress Hannah to ask if she might come and visit the community, and had been answered “Yee.”

Lewis was silent with consternation; he went out to the sawmill and climbed up into the loft to think it all out alone. Should he forbid it? He knew that was nonsense; in the first place, his conception of the relation of husband and wife did not include that kind of thing; but more than that, opposition would, he said to himself, “push her in.” Not into Shakerism; “‘Thalia couldn’t be a Shaker to save her life,” he thought, with an involuntary smile; but into an excited discontent with her comfortable, prosaic life. No; definite opposition to the visit must not be thought of--but he must try and persuade her not to go. How? What plea could he offer? His own loneliness without her he could not bring himself to speak of; he shrank from taking what seemed to him an advantage. He might urge that she would find it cold and uncomfortable in those old frame houses high up on the hills; or that it would be bad for her health to take the rather wearing journey at this time of year. But he knew too well how little effect any such prudent counsels would have. The very fact that her interest had lasted for more than three months showed that it had really struck roots into her mind, and mere prudence would not avail much. Still, he would urge prudence; then, if she was determined, she must go. “She’ll get sick of it in a fortnight,” he said; but for the present he must let her have her head, even if she was making a mistake. She had a right to have her head, he reminded himself--“but I must tell those people to keep her warm, she takes cold so easily.”

He got up and looked out of the window; below, in the race, there was a jam of logs, and the air was keen with the pungent smell of sawdust and new boards. The whir and thud of the machinery down-stairs sent a faint quiver through the planks under his feet. “The mill will net a good profit this year,” he said to himself, absently. “‘Thalia can have pretty nearly anything she wants.” And even as he said it he had a sudden, vague misgiving: if she didn’t have everything she wanted, perhaps she would be happier? But the idea was too new and too subtle to follow up, so the result of that troubled hour in the mill-chamber was only that he made no very resolute objection to Athalia’s acceptance of Eldress Hannah’s permission to come. It had been given grudgingly enough.

The family were gathered in the sitting-room; they had had their supper--the eight elderly women and the three elderly men, all that were left of the community. The room had the austere and shining cleanness which Athalia had called a perfume, but it was full of homely comfort. A blue-and-white rag carpet in the centre left a border of bare floor, painted pumpkin-yellow; there was a glittering airtight stove with isinglass windows that shone like square, red eyes; a gay patchwork cushion in the seat of a rocking-chair was given up to the black cat, whose sleek fur glistened in the lamplight. Three of the sisters knitted silently; two others rocked back and forth, their tired, idle hands in their laps, their eyes closed; the other three yawned, and spoke occasionally between themselves of their various tasks. Brother Nathan read his weekly FARMER; Brother William turned over the leaves of a hymn-book and appeared to count them with noiseless, moving lips; Brother George cut pictures out of the back of a magazine, yawning sometimes, and looking often at his watch. Into this quietness Eldress Hannah’s still voice came:

“I have heard from Lydia again.” There was a faint stir, but no one spoke. “The Lord is dealing with her,” Eldress Hannah said; “she is in great misery.”

Brother George nodded. “That is good; He works in a mysterious way--she’s real miserable, is she? Well, well; that’s good. The mercies of the Lord are everlasting,” he ended, in a satisfied voice, and began to read again.

“Amen!--amen!” said Brother William, vaguely.

“Poor Lydy!” Brother Nathan murmured.

“And I had another letter,” the Eldress proceeded, “from that young woman who came here in August--Athalia Hall; do you remember?--she asked two questions to the minute! She wants to visit us.”

Brother Nathan looked at her over his spectacles, and one of the sisters opened her eyes.

“I don’t see why she should,” Eldress Hannah added.

Two of the old brothers nodded agreement.

“The curiosity of the world’s people does not help their souls,” said one of the knitters.

“She thinks we walk in the Way to Peace,” said the Eldress.

“Yee; we do,” said Brother George.

“Shall I tell her ‘nay’?” the Eldress questioned, calmly.

“Yee,” said Brother George; and the dozing sisters murmured “Yee.”

“Wait,” said Brother Nathan; “her husband--HE has something to him. Let her come.”

“But if she visited us, how would that affect him?” Eldress Hannah asked, surprised into faint animation.

“If she was moved to stay it would affect him,” Brother Nathan said, dryly; “he would come, too, and there are very few of us left, Eldress. He would be a great gain.”

There was a long silence. Brother William’s gray head sagged on his shoulder, and the hymn-book slipped from his gnarled old hands. The knitting sisters began, one after another, to stab their needles into their balls of gray yarn and roll their work up in their aprons.