The Leatherwood God | Page 7

to him 'ceptun' the stranger himself; he
never took his eyes off Elder Grove; some thought he was tryun' to
charm him, like a snake does a bird; but it didn't faze the elder."
"Elder too old a bird?" the Squire suggested.
"Yes, I reckon he mought been," Sally innocently assented.
"And when he gave the benediction, the snorter disappeared in a flash,
with a strong smell of brimstone, I suppose?"
"Why, that was the thing of it, Squire. He just stayed, and shuck hands
with everybody, pleasant as a basket of chips; and he went home with
David Gillespie. He was just as polite to the poorest person there, but it
was the big bugs that tuck the most to him."
"Well," the Squire summed up, "I don't see but what your reports agree,
and I reckon there must be some truth in 'em. Who's that up there at the
pike-crossing?" He did not trouble himself to do more than frown
heavily in the attempt to make out the passer. Mrs. Reverdy jumped
from her chair and ran out to look.
"Well, as sure as I'm alive, if it ain't that Gillespie girl! I bet she'll know
all about it. I'll just ketch up with her and git the news out of her, if
there is any. Say, say, Jane!" she called to the girl, as she ran up the
road with the cow-like gait which her swirling skirt gave her. The girl
stopped for her; then in apparent haste she moved on again, and Sally
moved with her out of sight; her voice still made itself heard in uncouth
cries and laughter.
Braile called into the kitchen where Reverdy had remained in the
enjoyment of Mrs. Braile's patient hospitality, "Here's your chance,
Abel!"
"Chance?" Reverdy questioned back with a full mouth.
"To get that corn of yours ground, and beat Sally home."
"Well, Squire," Reverdy said, "I reckon you're right." He came out into
the open space where Braile sat. "Well, I won't fergit this breakfast
very soon," he offered his gratitude to Mrs. Braile over his shoulder, as
he passed through the door.
"You're welcome, Abel," she answered kindly, and when he had made
his manners to the impassive Squire and mounted his claybank and
thumped the horse into motion with his naked heels, she came out into
the porch and said to her husband, "I don't know as I liked your hinting

him out of the house that way."
Braile did not take the point up, but remained thoughtfully smiling in
the direction his guest had taken. "The idea is that most people marry
their opposites," he remarked, "and that gives the children the
advantage of inheriting their folly from two kinds of fools. But Abel
and Sally are a perfect pair, mental and moral twins; the only thing they
don't agree in is their account of what became of that snorting exhorter.
But the difference there isn't important. If an all-wise Providence has
kept them from transmitting a double dose of the same brand of folly to
posterity, that's one thing in favor of Providence." He took up his wife's
point now. "If I hadn't hinted him away, he'd have stayed to dinner; you
wouldn't have hinted him away if he'd stayed to supper."
"Well, are you going to have some breakfast?" his wife asked. "I'll get
you some fresh coffee."
"Well, I would like a little--with the head on--Martha, that's a fact.
Have I got time for another pipe?"
"No, I don't reckon you have," his wife said, and she passed into the
kitchen again, where she continued to make such short replies as
Braile's discourse required of her.
He knocked his pipe out on the edge of his still uptilted chair, as he
talked. "One fool like Abel I can stand, and I was just going to come in
when Sally came in sight; and then I knew that two fools like Abel
would make me sick. So I waited till the Creator of heaven and earth
could get a minute off and help me out. But He seemed pretty busy
with the solar system this morning, and I had about given up when He
sent that Gillespie girl in sight. I knew that would fetch Sally; but it
was an inspiration of my own to suggest Abel's chance to him; I don't
want to put that on your Maker, Martha."
"It was your inspiration to get him to stay in the first place," Mrs.
Braile said within.
"No, Martha; that was my unfailing obedience to the sacred laws of
hospitality; I _didn't_ expect to fall under their condemnation a second
time, though." Mrs. Braile did not answer, and by the familiar scent
from within, Braile knew that his coffee must be nearly ready.