Part 3 (1/2)
His tone carried conviction. After a while grat.i.tude again stirred her into speech.
”I'm afraid you find it awfully hard holding up the umbrella.”
He gave a glance downward at her as she toiled by his side. ”Why you're most blown away as it is. You couldn't get along without the umbrellar.”
Regarding her attentively for a minute, he added, ”Emmar will be vexed when she hears that your dress got so splashed.”
They were both bending somewhat forward against the wind; the road beneath them was glistening with standing water. When they pa.s.sed by the woods the trees were creaking and cracking, and over the meadows hung s.h.i.+fting veils of clouds and rain.
”I guess I'd better not take you farther than Sharon Peck's. Your folks would be pretty mad if you walked through the village with Joe Smith.”
The lines round Susannah's mouth strengthened themselves; she felt herself superior to those whose att.i.tude of mind he had thus described.
”You have been very kind to come with me. I'd like better to go home than stop, if it isn't too far.”
”I guess not. If you'd lived here longer you'd know that there was all manner of evil said about me, and the worst of it is that some of it's true. I've been a pretty low sort of fellow, and I hain't got any education to speak of.”
She looked up at him in astonishment; the expression of his face was peaceful and kindly. ”Then why do you go about preaching and saying--”
”I hain't got nothing to do with that at all. If an angel comes from heaven and gives me a partic'lar revelation, calling me by name, namely, 'Joseph Smith, Junior,' tain't for me to say he's made a mistake and come to the wrong man, though goodness knows I hev said it to the Lord often enough; but now I've come to see that it's my business just to do what I'm told. But as to the low ways I hed--why, I've repented and give them up, and as to the education, I'm trying to get that, but it won't come in a minute.”
Her conscience was not at rest; to be silent was like telling a lie, and from motives of fear, too! At length she burst out, ”I don't believe you ever saw an angel, Mr. Smith. I think it's very wicked of you to have made it up, and about the gold Bible too.”
They were still half a mile from the nearest house. Susannah gasped.
When she had spoken her defiance she realised that if she had nothing worse to fear, she at least deserved to be left alone among the raging elements. She staggered somewhat, expecting a rebuff.
”I guess you'd better take my arm,” he said. ”It ain't no sort of a day for a woman to be out.”
When she hesitated, flushed and frightened, a smile came for the first time across his face. ”You're almost beat back by the wind. It won't hurt you to grip hold of my sleeve, you know, even if I am a thundering big liar. I don't know as I can expect you to believe anything else.
Emmar didn't for a long time, but then, after a spell, she gave up all the comforts of her father's house just to stand by me, and no one's ever had a word to say against Emmar.”
They stopped at a farmhouse on the outskirts of the village.
Smith had said to Susannah, ”There's a gentleman I know stopping at Sharon Peck's. I'll pa.s.s the umbrellar on to him, and he'll take you home. He's been a Quaker, but I guess you'll find him a pretty nice young gentleman. Mrs. Peck, she isn't to home.”
He left Susannah standing upon the lee side of a wooden house amid treeless fields. The eaves sheltered her. She stooped down and with both hands wrung the water from her skirts. She was busy over this when the promised escort joined her.
The remnants of his forsaken Quakerism hung around him; his coat was buff, his hat straight in the brim, his manner prim, and when he spoke it was in the speech of his people. His complexion was very light, hair, eyebrows and lashes, and the down on his chin--almost flaxen; his face was browned by exposure to the weather, but so well formed that Susannah found him very good to look upon, the features pointed and delicate, but not without strength.
”Thou wilt walk as far as thy home with me?” he asked.
He held Smith's huge umbrella, but he did not hold it with the same strength, nor did he show the same skill in keeping it against the wind.
He spoke as they walked. ”Thou hast walked a long way. Art weary?”
”Yes--no--I don't know.” What did it matter whether she was tired or not? Baffled curiosity was exciting her. ”You are a stranger here. Are you a friend of the Smiths?”
”I have experienced the great benefit of being acquainted with the prophet for the last fourteen days.”
”But he's not a prophet,” said Susannah resentfully.