Part 20 (1/2)
I sat quiet a moment, thinking what I had better say. Mrs. Webbe was entirely conscientious about it all. She did not, I was sure, want baby, and she was sincere in saying that she was only trying to do her duty.
When I thought of Thomasine, however, as being made to serve as a living and visible cross for the good of Mrs. Webbe's soul, I could not bear it. Driven by that strong will over the th.o.r.n.y paths of her grandmother's theology, poor baby would be more likely to be brought to despair than to glory. It was of course right for Mrs. Webbe to wish to take baby, but it could not be right for me to permit her to do so. If my duty clashed with hers, I could not change on that account; but I wished to be as conciliatory as possible.
”Don't you think, Mrs. Webbe,” I asked, trying to look as sunny as a June day, ”that baby is rather young to get harm from me or my heresies?
Couldn't the whole matter at least be left till she is old enough to know the meaning of words?”
She looked at me with more determination than ever.
”Well, of course it's handsome of you to be willing to take care of Tom's baby, and of course you won't mind the expense; but you made him marry that girl, so it's only fair you should expect to take some of the trouble that's come of what you did.”
”You don't mean,” I burst out before I thought, ”that you wouldn't have had Tom marry her?”
”It's no matter now, as long as she didn't live,” Mrs. Webbe answered; ”though it isn't pleasant knowing that one of that Brownrig tribe married into our family.”
I had nothing to say. It would have hurt my pride, of course, had one of my kin made such a marriage, and I cannot help some secret feeling that Julia had forfeited her right to be treated like an honest girl; but there was baby to be considered. Besides this, the marriage was made, it seems to me, by Tom's taking the girl, not by the service at her deathbed. Mrs. Webbe and I sat for a time without words. I looked at the carpet, and was conscious that Mrs. Webbe looked at me. She is not a pleasant woman, and I have had times of wis.h.i.+ng she might be carried off by a whirlwind, so that Deacon Webbe and Tom might have a little peace; but I believe in her way she tries to be a good one. The trouble is that her way of being good seems to me to be a great deal more vicious than most kinds of wickedness. She uses her religion like a tomahawk, and whacks with it right and left.
”Look here,” she broke out at last, ”I don't want to be unpleasant, but it ain't a pleasant thing for me to come here anyway. I suppose you mean to be kind, but you'd be soft with baby. That's just what she mustn't have. She'd better be made to know from the very start what's before her.”
”What is before her?” I asked.
Mrs. Webbe flushed.
”I don't know as there's any use of my telling you if you don't see it yourself. She's got to fight her way through life against her inheritance from that mother of hers, and--and her father.”
She choked a little, and I could not help laying my hand on hers, just to show that I understood. She drew herself away, not unkindly, I believe, but because she is too proud to endure pity.
”She's got to be hardened,” she went on, her tone itself hardening as she spoke. ”From her cradle she's got to be set to fight the sin that's in her.”
I could not argue. I respected the sternness of her resolve to do her duty, and I knew that she was sacrificing much. Every smallest sight of the child would be an hourly, stinging humiliation to her pride, and perhaps, too, to her love. In her fierce way she must love Tom, so that his shame would hurt her terribly. Yet I could not give up my little soft, pink baby to live in an atmosphere of disapproval and to be disciplined in the rigors of a pitiless creed. That, I am sure, would never save her. Tom Webbe is a sufficient answer to his mother's argument, if she could only see it. If anything is to rescue Thomasine from the disastrous consequences of an unhappy heritage, it must be just pure love and friendliness.
”Mrs. Webbe,” I said, as firmly as I could, ”I think I know how you feel; but in any case I could not give up baby until I had seen Tom.”
A deeper flush came over the thin face, and a look which made me turn my eyes away, because I knew she would not wish me to see the pain and humiliation which it meant.
”Tom,” she began, ”Tom! He”--She broke off abruptly, and, rising, began to gather her shawl about her. ”Then you refuse to let me have her?” she ended.
”The baby's father should have something to say in the matter, it seems to me,” I told her.
”He has already decided,” she replied sternly, ”and decided against the child's good. He wants her to stay with you. I suppose,” she added, and I must say that her tone took a suggestion of spite, ”he thinks you'll get so interested in the baby as sometime”--
She did not finish, perhaps because I gave her a look, which, if it expressed half I felt, might well silence her. She moved quickly toward the door, and tightened her shawl with an air of virtuous determination.
”Well,” she observed, ”I have done my duty by the child. What the Lord let it live for is a mystery to me.”
She said not another word, not even of leave-taking, but strode away with something of the air of a brisk little prophetess who has p.r.o.nounced the doom of heaven on the unrighteous. It is a pity such people will make of religion an excuse for taking themselves so seriously. All the teachings of theology Mrs. Webbe turns into justifications of her prejudices and her hardness. The very thought of Thomasine under her rigorous rule makes me s.h.i.+ver. I wonder how her husband has endured it all these years. Saints.h.i.+p used to be won by making life as disagreeable as possible for one's self; but nowadays life is made sufficiently hard by others. If living with his wife peacefully, forbearingly, decorously, does not ent.i.tle Deacon Webbe to be considered a saint, it is time that new principles of canonization were adopted.
Heavens! What uncharitableness I am running into myself!
May 4. I told Aunt Naomi of Mrs. Webbe's visit, and her comments were pungent enough. It is wicked, perhaps, to set them down, but I have a vicious joy in doing it.