Was that young Methodist minister crushed by my plainly intended
gauntlet flung down to him? He was not.
"I'm glad I came over in time to put Billy out of his misery," he
answered, smiling up at me with a quick comprehension that was enraging.
"I'm going to have informal services in the chapel to-night to try out
the acoustics before the contractor turns over the building. I am not
satisfied about the sounding board he has put in, and the only way is to
try it with at least part of the seats occupied. We'll sing a bit and
plan the dedication; not have a formal service. So then, Billy, you can
have your fox-trotting and a good time to all of you, bless you, my
children." As he spoke he smiled at the entire group with the most
delightful interest and pleasure. He was dressed in a straight black
coat with a plain silk vest cut around a white collar that buttoned in
the back, and his dull gold mane was brushed down sleek and close to his
beautiful head. Not a flash of expression in his strong face showed that
he felt any resentment or dismay at thus having some of his most
prominent church members backslide from his prayer meeting into a
fox-trot, and yet I knew--knew that he fully appreciated the situation
and laid the blame of it where the blame was due.
"Of course we will come to the services first--that is, if you--if you
don't object," Letitia said with her usual directness and lack of any
kind of finesse, thus bringing the situation to a decided head.
"Why not come over for the songs and then not stay for the conference?"
was the genial answer that positively astonished me, and as he spoke he
came up the steps and stood beside me. "Dabney and I found the first
Star of Bethlehem when we were weeding this afternoon. I brought it to
you carefully, and can I have a cup of that tea he has been trying to
make you serve for the last five minutes?" With these words the Reverend
Mr. Goodloe turned me around and sent me to the tea tray that Dabney
and Sallie had put on a table under the rose vine; but not before he had
taken up my hand, put the star flower in it and curled my fingers over
it. "I'll pass the muffins, Billy, and you take the cakes for Miss
Powers, and be more careful than you were last Sunday with my collection
plate for the poor." Billy feigned confusion, accepted the plate and was
just about to begin a defense, when a diversion occurred to stop him.
"There comes Mark and Mrs. Mark," he exclaimed, "but they have got an
offspring apiece in their embrace and several trailers. Somebody ought
to remonstrate with Nell Morgan or have the firmness to apply the
superfluous blind kitten treatment every spring. Three children are
patriotic, but five are populistic and ought to be frowned upon," and
Billy grumbled all the while the Morgans were flocking up the front
walk. When they came to the steps the Jaguar descended and held out his
clerically befrocked arms so that the gurgler from Mark's shoulder and
the giggler from Nell's arms both fell into his embrace at one time.
"You young marplots, you!" he said as the gurgler printed a wet kiss on
his left ear and regarded him with rapture while the small cooer,
proclaimed as feminine by neck and sleeve ribbons, cuddled against his
shoulder with soft confidence. "They're going to take you both down to
the river and drown you," he confided with a soft note in his voice that
was an answer to the coo.