Panchronicon

Steele MacKaye Harold

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pubOne.info thank you for your continued support and wish to present you this new edition. The two sisters were together in their garden.

Informations

• Publié par: Pub One Info
• Date de parution: 23 octobre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9782819915133
• Langue: English

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CHAPTER I
THE THEORY OF COPERNICUS DROOP
The two sisters were together in their garden.
Rebecca Wise, turned forty and growing slightly grayat the temples, was moving slowly from one of her precious plantsto the next, leaning over each to pinch off a dead leaf or countthe buds. It was the historic month of May, 1898, and May is theparadise of flower lovers.
Phoebe was eighteen years younger than her sister,and the beauty of the village. Indeed, many declared their beliefthat the whole State of New Hampshire did not contain herequal.
She was seated on the steps of the veranda thatskirted the little white cottage, and the absent gaze of her frankblue eyes was directed through the gate at the foot of the littlepath bordered by white rose-bushes. In her lap was a bundle ofpapers yellowed by age and an ivory miniature, evidently taken fromthe carved wooden box at her side.
Presently Rebecca straightened her back with aslight grimace and looked toward her sister, holding hermold-covered hands and fingers spread away from her. "Well," sheinquired, "hev ye found anythin'?"
Phoebe brought her gaze back from infinity andreplied: "No, I ain't. Only that one letter where Isaac Burtonwrites her that the players have come to town." "I don't see whatgood them letters'll do ye in the Shakespeare class, then."
Rebecca spoke listlessly – more interested in hergarden than in her sister's search. "I don't know," Phoeberejoined, dreamily. "It's awful funny – but whenever I take outthese old letters there comes over me the feelin' that I'm 'way offin a strange country – and I feel like somebody else."
Rebecca looked up anxiously from her work. "Themsort o' philanderin' notions are foolish, Phoebe," she said, andflicked a caterpillar over the fence.
Phoebe gave herself a little shake and began to tieup the papers. "That's so," she replied. "But they will come when Iget these out, an' I got 'em out thinkin' the' might be somethin'about Shakespeare in 'em for our class."
She paused and looked wistfully at the lettersagain. "Oh!" she cried, "how I do wonder if he was among thoseplayers at the Peacock Inn that day! You know 'players' is whatthey called play-actors in those days, and he was a play-actor,they say." "Did he live very far back, then?" said Rebecca, wishingto appear interested, but really intent upon a new sprout at thefoot of the lilac-bush. "Yes, three hundred years ago. Three ofthese letters has a date in 1598 exactly."
There was a long silence, and at length Rebeccalooked up from the ground to ascertain its cause. She frowned anddrew her aching back stiffly straight again. "Everlastin'ly lookin'at that pictur'!" she exclaimed. "I declare to goodness, PhoebeWise, folks'll think you're vain as a pouter pigeon."
Phoebe laughed merrily, tossed the letters into thebox and leaped to her feet. The miniature at which she had beengazing was still in her hands. "Folks'll never see me lookin' atit, Rebecca – only you," she said.
Then with a coaxing tone and looking with appealingarchness at her sister, she went on: "Is it really like me,Rebecca? Honest true?"
The elder woman merely grunted and moved on to thenext bed, and Phoebe, with another laugh, ran lightly into thehouse.
A few moments later she reappeared at the front doorwith consternation on her face. "Land o' goodness, Rebecca!" shecried, "do you know what time it is? Near onto one o'clock, an'I've got to be at the Shakespeare class at half past. We'll have todish up dinner right this minute, and I don't see how I can changemy dress after it an' help with the dishes too."
She whisked into the house again, and Rebeccafollowed her as rapidly as possible.
She was very proud of her baby sister, proud of herhaving been "clear through high school," and proud of her eminencein the local literary society. There was certainly somethinginspiring in having a sister who was first corresponding secretaryof the Women's Peltonville Association for the Study ofShakespearian History and Literature; and it was simply wonderfulhow much poetry she could repeat from the pages of her favoriteauthor.
Peltonville Center, New Hampshire, was one of thosegroups of neatly kept houses surrounding a prettily shaded,triangular common which seem to be characteristic of New England.Standing two miles from the nearest railway station, this littlesettlement possessed its own combined store and post-office, fromwhose narrow veranda one might watch the rising generation playingSaturday base-ball on the grassy triangle.
The traditional old meeting-house stood on theopposite side of the common, facing the store. The good old days ofbrimstone theology were past, and the descendants of the godlyPuritans who raised this steeple "in the fear of the Lord," beingnow deprived of their chief source of fear, found Sunday meetings abore, and a village pastor an unnecessary luxury.
Indeed, there seemed little need of pastoraladmonition in such a town as Peltonville Center. There was a grimlycommonplace and universal goodness everywhere, and the village wasonly saved from unconsciousness of its own perfection by theindividual shortcomings of one of its citizens. Fortunately for thegeneral self-complacence, however, the necessary revealing contrastwas found in him.
Copernicus Droop was overfond of the bottle, and inspite of the prohibition laws of his State, he proved himself ablessed example and warning by a too frequent and unmistakableintoxication in public. He was gentle and even apologetic in hiscups, but he was clearly a "slave of rum" and his mission wastherefore fulfilled.
On this first of May, 1898, a number of idle youngmen sat in a row on the edge of the store veranda. Some werewhittling, some making aimless marks in the dust with a stick. Allleaned limply forward, with their elbows on their knees.
It was clearly not a Sunday, for the meeting-housewas open, and from time to time, one or perhaps two young womentogether passed into the cool and silent room. The loungers at thestore let none escape their notice, and the name of each damsel waspassed down the line in an undertone as its owner entered thechurch.
A lantern-jawed young farmer at the end of the rowslowly brushed the shavings from his clothes and remarked: "Thet'sthe secon' meetin' of the Shekspeare class this month, ain't it?""Yep, an' there'll be two more afore the summer boarders comes up –– "
The second speaker would have continued, but he washere interrupted by a third, who whispered loudly: "Say, fellers,there goes Copernicus."
All eyes were raised and unanimously followed theshabby figure which had just emerged from behind the church and nowstarted into the road leading away from the common toward thenorth. "Walks pretty straight fer him, don't he?" snickered thefirst speaker. "He's not ben tight fer two days." "Bet ye ajack-knife he'll be spreein' it fer all he's wuth to-morrow."
Fortunately these comments did not reach the ears oftheir object, who, all unconscious of the interest which heinspired, made good his way at a fairly rapid pace.
Presently he stopped.
With muslin skirts swaying, hair rumpled, and fairyoung face flushed with exertion, Phoebe Wise was hurrying towardthe common. She was almost running in her haste, for she was lateand the Shakespeare class was a momentous institution. "Oh, say,Cousin Phoebe," was the man's greeting, "can you tell me ef yersister's to home?"
The young girl came to a sudden full stop in hersurprise. This cousinly greeting from the village reprobate was asexciting and as inexplicable as it was unheard of. "Why, Mr.Droop!" she exclaimed, "I – I – I s'pose so."
The truth was the truth, after all. But it was hardon Rebecca. What could this man want with her sister?
Droop nodded and passed on. "Thank ye. Don't stopfer me," he said.
Phoebe moved forward slowly, watching Copernicusover her shoulder. She noted his steady steps and pale face and,reassured, resumed her flying progress with redoubled vigor. Afterall, Rebecca was forty-two years old and well able to take care ofherself.
Meanwhile, Rebecca Wise, having carefully wrung outher dishcloth, poured out the water and swept the little sink, wasslowly untying her kitchen apron, full of a thankful sense of thequiet hour before her wherein to knit and muse beside the frontwindow of her little parlor.
In the centre of this room there stood a wide, roundtable, bearing a large kerosene-lamp and the week's mending. At theback and opposite the two windows stood the well-blacked, shiny,air-tight stove. Above this was a wooden mantel, painted to imitatemarble, whereon were deposited two photographs, four curiousChinese shells, and a plaster cross to which there clung a veryplaster young woman in scant attire, the whole being marked "Rockof Ages" in gilt letters at the base.
Horse-hair furniture in all the glory of endless"tidies" was arranged against walls bedight with a rainbow-likewilderness of morning-glories. The ceiling was of white plaster,and the floor was painted white and decked here and there withknitted rag-carpets, on whose Joseph's-coated surfaces Rebeccaloved to gaze when in retrospective mood. In those humblefloor-coverings her knowing eyes recognized her first clockedstockings and Phoebe's baby cloak. There was her brother Robert'swool tippet embalmed in loving loops with the remnants of hiswife's best Sunday-go-to-meetin' ribbons. These two had long beendead, but their sister's loving eyes recreated them in rag-carpetdreams wherein she lived again those by-gone days.
Rebecca had just seated herself and was unrollingher work, when her eyes caught a glimpse of a man's form throughthe window. He had passed into her gate and was approaching thedoor. She leaned forward for a good look and then dropped back intoher chair with a gasp of surprise. "Copernicus Droop!" sheexclaimed, "did you ever!"
She sat in rigid astonishment until she heard histimid knock, followed by the sound of shoes