Unleavened Bread | Page 7

whom now there are
seven bridges of iron. There were but two bridges then, one of wood,
and journeys across them had not yet been revealed to philanthropic
young women eager to do good.
Selma's house lay well to the south-west of Central Avenue, far enough
removed from the River Drive and the Flagg mansion to be humble and
yet near enough to be called looking up. Their row was complete and

mainly occupied, but the locality was a-building, and in the process of
making acquaintance. So many strangers had come to Benham that
even Babcock knew but few of their neighbors. Without formulating
definitely how it was to happen, Selma had expected to be received
with open arms into a society eager to recognize her salient qualities.
But apparently, at first glance, everybody's interest was absorbed by the
butcher and grocer, the dressmaker and the domestic hearth. That is, the
other people in their row seemed to be content to do as they were doing.
The husbands went to town every day -- town which lay in the murky
distance -- and their wives were friendly enough, but did not seem to be
conscious either of voids in their own existence or of the privilege of
her society. To be sure, they dressed well and were suggestive in that,
but they looked blank at some of her inquiries, and appeared to feel
their days complete if, after the housework had been done and the battle
fought with the hired girl, they were able to visit the shopping district
and pore over fabrics, in case they could not buy them. Some were
evidently looking forward to the day when they might be so fortunate
as to possess one of the larger houses of the district a mile away, and
figure among what they termed "society people." There were others
who, in their satisfaction with this course of life, referred with a touch
of self-righteousness to the dwellers on the River Drive as deserving
reprobation on account of a lack of serious purpose. This criticism
appealed to Selma, and consoled her in a measure for the half
mortification with which she had begun to realize that she was not of so
much account as she had expected; at least, that there were people not
very far distant from her block who were different somehow from her
neighbors, and who took part in social proceedings in which she and
her husband were not invited to participate. Manifestly they were
unworthy and un-American. It was a comfort to come to this
conclusion, even though her immediate surroundings, including the
society of those who had put the taunt into her thoughts, left her
unsatisfied.
Some relief was provided at last by her church. Babcock was by birth
an Episcopalian, though he had been lax in his interest during early
manhood. This was one of the matters which he had expected marriage
to correct, and he had taken up again, not merely with resignation but

complacency, the custom of attending service regularly. Dr. White had
been a controversial Methodist, but since his wife's death, and
especially since the war, he had abstained from religious observances,
and had argued himself somewhat far afield from the fold of orthodox
belief. Consequently Selma, though she attended church at Westfield
when her father's ailments did not require her presence at home, had
been brought up to exercise her faculties freely on problems of faith
and to feel herself a little more enlightened than the conventional
worshipper. Still she was not averse to following her husband to the
Rev. Henry Glynn's church. The experience was another revelation to
her, for service at Westfield had been eminently severe and unadorned.
Mr. Glynn was an Englishman; a short, stout, strenuous member of the
Church of England with a broad accent and a predilection for ritual, but
enthusiastic and earnest. He had been tempted to cross the ocean by the
opportunities for preaching the gospel to the heathen, and he had fixed
on Benham as a vineyard where he could labor to advantage. His
advent had been a success. He had awakened interest by his fervor and
by his methods. The pew taken by Babcock was one of the last
remaining, and there was already talk of building a larger church to
replace the chapel where he ministered. Choir boys, elaborate
vestments, and genuflections, were novelties in the Protestant worship
of Benham, and attracted the attention of many almost weary of plainer
forms of worship, especially as these manifestations of color were
effectively supplemented by evident sincerity of spirit on the part of
their pastor. Nor were his energy and zeal confined to purely spiritual
functions. The scope of his church work was practical and social. He
had organized from the congregation societies of various