I never credited him with being the man he is. I supposed he was a tramp somewhere – yes, I really did, Mrs. Lathrop, you may believe me or not, but that's just what I thought when I thought anything at all about him – which wasn't often.
"Everybody in the whole place is busy remembering pleasant things about him now. The minister's wife remembers his coming to a Christmas tree once a long time ago when they both was little; she says she hasn't thought of it in thirty years, but she remembers it as plain as day now, – he had on a coat and a little tie.
"And Gran'ma Mullins says she never will forget the day before he was born, for she went to town and dropped her little bead bag, and you know how much she thinks of her little bead bag now when the beads is all worn off, so you can think what store she set by it when the beads were still on, and so she was all back and forth along the road hunting for it the whole blessed afternoon, and when she found it and went home, she was tired, and she slept late next morning because her husband was out very late the night before, and when he slept late she always slept late, 'cause she said sleeping late was almost the only treat he ever give her, and, anyhow, when they did wake up and get up and get out, there was Jathrop, and she says she shall never forget her joy over having found the bead bag again.
"Mrs. Macy says she remembers the day he hid, and you thought he was in the cistern, and you was kneeling down looking in when he jumped out from behind the stove and give you such a start you went in head first.
"I remember that day myself, too – father was insisting he was paralyzed then, and mother and me wouldn't take his word for it, and we fully expected he'd race over and help haul you out, but all he said was, 'She'll have to manage the best she can – I'm paralyzed,' and we really began to believe him from then on.
"The minister says he shall always remember how well he looked when he put on long trousers; the minister's preparing a little paper on Jathrop to read at the Sunday-school annual, and he says he shall begin with the day he put on long trousers and then mark his rise step by step. The minister's so pleased over Jathrop's patting Brunhilde Susan on the head; he says there are pats and pats, but that pat that Jathrop give Brunhilde Susan was what he calls, in pure and Biblical simplicity, a pat."
Susan paused. Mrs. Lathrop just felt her diamond solitaires, glanced at the new kitchen range, and was silent.
"And then, Mrs. Lathrop, that dear blessed little Chinese angel – I tell you I shall never forget that boy. I liked his face when I first laid eyes on him, and when I thought he was Jathrop's lawful wife, I loved him as I'd loved even a Chinaman if he was your daughter; but when I saw him cleaning up my sink, polishing my pans, washing out my cupboards and all that, just the same as yours, then was when I see that a heathen Chinee has just the same right to go to heaven that anybody else has, and from then on I just trusted him completely and let him do every bit of the work till he left.
"I see now why everybody's so happy being a missionary if you can just get away and live with the Chinee. I'd have kept that boy if Jathrop hadn't wanted him – I'd have been very glad to; and it's awful to think we're keeping quiet, lovable natures like his from settling here. A girl might do much worse than marry that Chinese —very much worse. A very great deal worse. Though I suppose many would hesitate."
Mrs. Lathrop rose, went to the cupboard, took out a bottle of homemade gooseberry wine, poured out a little, and took a sip. She did not offer any to Susan.
"It'll do you good," said Susan encouragingly. "I don't like the taste myself, but it'll do you good. Besides, Mrs. Lathrop, you must begin to get used to it. When you go around with Jathrop in his private car, you'll have to drink wine, and if I was you, I'd stop tying a stocking around your neck nights, for you'll have to wear a very different cut of gowns soon. If Jathrop buys that yacht he's gone to look at, you'll have to wear a sailor blouse."
"Oh," said Mrs. Lathrop faintly, "oh, Susan, I – " Miss Clegg put her hastily back into her chair.
"Never mind if it does make your head go 'round a little, Mrs. Lathrop; you must learn how. It may be hard, but it'll make Jathrop happy, and now he's come back rich, that's what everybody wants to do.
"Mrs. Brown says next time he comes she's going to make him a jet-black pound-cake, and Mrs. Allen says she's going to work him a pincushion. She says it'll be a plain, simple token of affection, but those whom Fortune smiles on soon learn to know the true worth of a simple gift of purest love. She says no one has ever known how she loved Jathrop, 'cause she kept it to herself for fear you'd think she was after him for Polly."
Mrs. Lathrop rocked dreamily.
Susan rose to go.
"Don't – " said Mrs. Lathrop.
"I must," said Susan. "Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, think of his giving me those fifty shares of stock just on account of my long-suffering friendship for you. I declare he's a great character – that's all I can say.
"I always had a feeling he'd end in some unusual way; when they started to lynch him, I thought that was the way, but now I see that this was the way, and I thank heaven that I wasn't right the other time and am right this time. For human nature is human nature, Mrs. Lathrop, and people are always kinder to a woman whose son comes home from the Klondike a millionaire than they are if they had the bother of lynching him, no matter how much he may have deserved it."
Mrs. Lathrop continued to finger her solitaire earrings in happy silence. Miss Clegg, who never exhibited any tenderness toward anything, went over and arranged the fold-over of her friend's gold-embroidered, silk-quilted kimono.
"I'll be glad when your new hair gets here, Mrs. Lathrop," she said tenderly, "it'll make a different woman of you. It's astonishing what a little extra hair can do; I always feel that when I put on my wave.
"You and me will have to be getting used to all kinds of new things now. And that beautiful dream of mine letting us know he was coming. Mrs. Brown says Amelia says the Egyptians worshipped cats and used to pickle them when they died.
"It's astonishing how, if you know enough, you can see how any dream is full of meaning. There's Jathrop so fond of pickles, and you and me worshipping him. And he writing in every letter he has time to get somebody to write for him, 'How's Susan Clegg?'"
Mrs. Lathrop lapsed into beatific slumber. Susan Clegg went quietly home.
IV
SUSAN CLEGG AND THE OLIVE BRANCH
It was not in reason to suppose that the return of Jathrop Lathrop should continue to occupy wholly the attention of the community. Each week – even each day – brought its fresh interests. Not the least exciting of the provocative elements was borne back from the metropolis to which 'Liza Em'ly, that hitherto negatively regarded olive branch of the ministerial family, had but recently emigrated. 'Liza Em'ly, it was whispered one day, had written a book.
The Sewing Society, at its next meeting, discussed it, as a matter of course; and Susan Clegg, equally as a matter of course, promptly reported the proceedings to her friend and neighbor, Mrs. Lathrop.
"Well," she began, sitting down with the heavy thump of one who is completely and utterly overcome, "I give up. It's beyond me. I was to the Sewing Society, and it's beyond them all, too. The idea of 'Liza Em'ly's writing a book! No one can see how she ever come to think as she could write a book. No one can see where she got any ideas to put in a book. I don't know what any one thought she would do when she set out for the city to earn her own living, but there wasn't a soul in town as expected her to do it, let alone writing a book, too. I can't see whatever gives any one the idea of earning their living by writing books. Books always seem so sort of unnecessary to me, anyway – I ain't
