"I'm afraid you will have only too much to do," he said. "There is a great deal of quarreling among the mill-owners, and constant disagreements between the hands."
"Well," Gifford answered, smiling, and straightening his broad shoulders, "if there is work to do, I am glad I am here to do it. But I'm not hopeless for the life it indicates, when you say there's much to be done. The struggle for personal rights and advantages is really, you know, the desire for the best, and a factor in civilization. A generation or two hence, the children of these pushing, aggressive fathers will be fine men."
John shook his head sadly. "Ah, but the present evil?"
But Gifford answered cheerfully, "Oh, well, the present evil is one stage of development; to live up to the best one knows is morality, and the preservation of self is the best some of these people know; we can only wait hopefully for the future."
"Morality is not enough," John said gently. "Morality never saved a soul, Mr. Woodhouse."
But Helen laughed gayly: "John, dear, Gifford doesn't understand your awful Presbyterian doctrines, and there is no use trying to convert him."
Gifford smiled, and owned good-naturedly that he was a heathen. "But I think," he said, "the thing which keeps the town back most is liquor."
"It is, indeed," John answered, eagerly. "If it could be banished!"
"High license is the only practical remedy," said Gifford, his face full of interest; but John's fell.
"No, no, not that; no compromise with sin will help us. I would have it impossible to find a drop of liquor in Lockhaven."
"What would you do in case of sickness?" Gifford asked curiously.
"I wouldn't have it used."
"Oh, John, dear," Helen protested, "don't you think that's rather extreme? You know it's life or death sometimes: a stimulant has to be used, or a person would die. Suppose I had to have it?"
His face flushed painfully. "Death is better than sin," he said slowly and gently; "and you, if you——I don't know, Helen; no one knows his weakness until temptation comes." His tone was so full of trouble, Gifford, feeling the sudden tenderness of his own strength, said good-naturedly, "What do you think of us poor fellows who confess to a glass of claret at dinner?"
"And what must he have thought of the dinner-table at the rectory?" Helen added.
"I don't think I noticed it," John said simply. "You were there."
"There, Helen, that's enough to make you sign the pledge!" said Gifford.
He watched them walking down the street, under the arching ailantus, their footsteps muffled by the carpet of the fallen blossoms; and there was a thoughtful look on his face when he went into his office, and, lighting his lamp, sat down to look over some papers. "How is that going to come out?" he said to himself. "Neither of those people will amend an opinion, and Ward is not the man to be satisfied if his wife holds a belief he thinks wrong." But researches into the case of McHenry v. Coggswell put things so impractical as religious beliefs out of his mind.
As for John and Helen, they walked toward the parsonage, and Gifford, and his future, and his views of high license were forgotten, as well as the sudden pain with which John had heard his wife's careless words about his "awful doctrines."
"It is very pleasant to see him so often," John said, "but how good it is to have you all to myself!"
Helen gave him a swift, glad look; then their talk drifted into those sweet remembrances which happy husbands and wives know by heart: what he thought when he first saw her, how she wondered if he would speak to her. "And oh, Helen," he said, "I recollect the dress you wore—how soft and silky it was, but it never rustled, or gleamed; it rested my eyes just to look at it."
A little figure was coming towards them down the deserted street, with a jug clasped in two small grimy hands.
"Preacher!" cried a childish voice eagerly, "good-evenin', preacher."
John stopped and bent down to see who it was, for a tangle of yellow hair almost hid the little face.
"Why, it is Molly," he said, in his pleasant voice. "Where have you been, my child? Oh, yes, I see—for dad's beer?"
Molly was smiling at him, proud to be noticed. "Yes, preacher," she answered, wagging her head. "Good-night, preacher." But they had gone only a few steps when there was a wail. Turning her head to watch him out of sight, Molly had tripped, and now all that was left of the beer was a yellow scum of froth on the dry ground. The jug was unbroken, but the child could find no comfort in that.
"I've spilt dad's beer," she said, sobbing, and sinking down in a forlorn heap on the ground.
John knelt beside her, and tried to comfort her. "Never mind; we'll go and tell dad it was an accident."
But Molly only shook her head. "No," she said, catching her breath, as she tried to speak, "'t won't do no good. He'll beat me. He's getting over a drunk, so he wanted his beer, and he'll lick me."
John looked down sadly at the child for a moment. "I will take you home, Helen, and then I will go back with Molly."
"Oh," Helen answered quickly, "let me go with you?"
"No," John replied, "no, dear. You heard what Molly said? I—I cannot bear that your eyes should see—what must be seen in Tom Davis's house to-night. We will go to the parsonage now, and then Molly and I will tell dad about the beer." He lifted the child gently in his arms, and stooped again for the pitcher. "Come, Helen," he said, and they went towards the parsonage. Helen entered reluctantly, but without a protest, and then stood watching them down the street. The little yellow head had fallen on John's shoulder, and Molly was almost asleep.
Tom Davis's house was one of a row near the river. They had been built on piles, so as to be out of the way of the spring "rise," but the jar and shock of the great cakes of ice floating under them when the river opened up had given them an unsteady look, and they leaned and stumbled so that the stained plastering had broken on the walls, and there were large cracks by the window frames. The broken steps of Molly's home led up to a partly open door. One panel had been crushed in in a fight, and the knob was gone, and the door-posts were dirty and greasy. The narrow windows were without shutters, and only a dingy green paper shade hid the room within.
Molly opened her sleepy eyes long enough to say, "Don't let dad lick me!"
"No, little Molly," John said, as he went into the small entry, and knocked at the inner door. "Don't be afraid."
"Come in," a woman's voice answered.
Mrs. Davis was sitting by the fireless stove, on which she had placed her small lamp, and she was trying by its feeble light to do some mending. Her face had that indifference to its own hopelessness which forbids all hope for it. She looked up as they entered.
"Oh, it's the preacher," she said, with a flickering smile about her fretful lips; and she rose, brushing some lifeless strands of hair behind her ears, and pulling down her sleeves, which were rolled above her thin elbows.
"Molly has had an accident, Mrs. Davis," John explained, putting the child gently down, and steadying her on her uncertain little feet, until her eyes were fairly opened. "So I came home with her to say how it happened."
"She spilt the beer, I reckon," said Mrs. Davis, glancing at the empty jug John had put on the table. "Well, 't ain't no great loss. He's asleep, and won't know nothing about it. He'll have forgot he sent her by mornin'." She jerked her head towards one side of the room, where her husband was lying upon the floor. "Go get the preacher a chair, Molly. Not that one; it's got a leg broke. Oh, you needn't speak low," she added, as John thanked the child softly; "he won't hear nothing before to-morrow."
The lumberman lay in the sodden sleep with which he ended a spree. He had rolled