Putney stopped with his wife and boy and waited for Annie at the corner
of the street where their ways parted. She had eluded Lyra Wilmington in
coming down the aisle, and she had hurried to escape the sensation which
broke into eager talk among the people before they got out of church, and
which began with question whether one of the Gerrish children was sick, and
ended in the more satisfactory conviction that Mr. Gerrish was offended at
something in the sermon.
"Well, Annie," said Putney, with a satirical smile.
"Oh, Ralph--Ellen--what does it mean?"
"It means that Brother Gerrish thought Mr. Peck was hitting at him in
that talk about the large commerce, and it means business," said Putney.
"Brother Gerrish has made a beginning, and I guess it's the beginning of
the end, unless we're all ready to take hold against him. What are you
going to do?"
"Do? Anything! Everything! It was abominable! It was atrocious!" she
shuddered out with disgust. "How could he imagine that Mr. Peck would do
such a thing?"
"Well, he's imagined it. But he doesn't mean to stay out of church; he
means to put Brother Peck out."
"We mustn't let him. That would be outrageous."
"That's the way Ellen and I feel about it," said Putney; "but we don't know
how much of a party there is with us."
"But everybody--everybody must feel the same way about Mr. Gerrish's
behaviour? I don't see how you can be so quiet about it--you and Ellen!"
Annie looked from one to another indignantly, and Putney laughed.
"We're not _feeling_ quietly about it," said Mrs. Putney.
Putney took out a piece of tobacco, and bit off a large corner, and began
to chew vehemently upon it. "Hello, Idella!" he said to the little girl,
holding by Annie's hand and looking up intently at him, with childish
interest in what he was eating. "What a pretty dress you've got on!"
"It's mine," said the child. To keep."
"Is that so? Well, it's a beauty."
"I'm going to wear it all the time."
"Is that so? Well, now, you and Winthrop step on ahead a little; I want to
see how you look in it. Splendid!" he said, as she took the boy's hand and
looked back over her shoulder for Putney's applause. "Lyra tells us you've
adopted her for the time being, Annie. I guess you'll have your hands full.
But, as I was going to say, about feeling differently, my experience is
that there's always a good-sized party for the perverse, simply because
it seems to answer a need in human nature. There's a fascination in it;
a man feels as if there must be something in it besides the perversity,
and because it's so obviously wrong it must be right. Don't you believe
but what a good half of the people in church to-day are pretty sure that
Gerrish had a good reason for behaving indecently. The very fact that he
did so carries conviction to some minds, and those are the minds we have
got to deal with. When he gets up in the next Society meeting there's a
mighty great danger that he'll have a strong party to back him."