DO not defend Miss Mahala. I hope it is understood that I do not defend her.
But all the same, I never had any sympathy with the Jeannie Deans sort of people who would risk their sisters' lives rather than their own little paltering souls.
Miss Mahala had great sorrows in her life; she had also had great and troublous joys. But now her interests were reduced to such as she found in a general oversight of the settlement. She did not regard herself as Elder Perry's coadjutor, but she filled much the same office, as the elder was wont to remark to his wife. When he first came to the scattered parish she instructed him in the varying idiosyncrasies there; and ever since she had been not only his curate, but his conscience. He learned to know his people and love them every one, but Miss Mahala knew their fathers and their grandfathers, had seen most of them the day they were born, and could tell to a nicety what strains of inheritance they carried and what might be expected of them. She had been down in Salt Water when the elder married his wife there, and she knew of certain things in Mrs. Perry's ancestry that probably Mrs. Perry did not know herself; and when the Perry children came into the world one after another, Miss Mahala had vivid apprehensions, only quieted by the thought of Mrs. Perry's angelic personality. And yet she knew that a many-colored ray may fall through a crystal and leave it white and limpid as spring water. However, life with the elder might have nullified all the colored ray, she fancied. Yet she watched Una and St. John and Luke and Steve and the twins and at last little Peace with an anxiety that would have disturbed their father and mother had they known of it.
Miss Mahala's worst fears began to be confirmed when one day she found St. John Perry red-handed, or rather green-handed, in her herb-garden, the plot of ground where grew her dill and savory and sweet basil and lavender and thyme and their congeners, many of which she had brought in from wood and field, and nurtured, and which she gathered and sold, or from which she incanted simples to be administered to those in need of them.
What was Johnny Perry doing in her garden? The answer was here. Both of his hands were full of her precious mint—that mint which was to have been distilled into extract and oil, but which lads liked to chew, and the possession of which was a kind of wealth. And her pennyroyal, moreover, to be smoked in old corn-cobs behind the barn! You may be sure the surprised Johnny was dealt with, and stripped of his spoils that they might be thrown into Miss Mahala's small still. But presently she softened. Poor little lad! she thought; he was no worse than other boys. What boy wouldn't take a sprig of pennyroyal if he came across it! She called after him and gave him back the treasure; and proud and happy he went off, feeling, after all, an honest boy, and ready to trade with boys less fortunate. "Jes' thin's that grow in the fields, free to all," said Johnny to himself.
The incident remained in Miss Mahala's inner consciousness, but without much emphasis. It was restored to life, however, when one August afternoon, a year later, she saw St. John Perry under the August pippin-tree, his pockets bulging and his hat full of the delicious yellow spheres.
"Johnny! Again!" she cried.
"I ain't never took any before. I thought you'd jest as lieves I hed one o' yer apples," whimpered Johnny.
"So I would if you ast," she replied. "How many you took?"
Johnny showed his hat. "That all?"
Johnny nodded. "Turn your pockets out." Johnny squirmed; but Miss Mahala's hand was a compelling one. Pockets and the bulge of his jacket brought to light a dozen pippins. "You come into the house with me!" Johnny squirmed again; but Miss Mahala's eye was as compelling as her hand.
"I didn't know you was a thief, Johnny," said Miss Mahala, sadly.
"I ain't," said Johnny.
"And an impenitent thief at that. Do you know what became of the impenitent thief?"
"I don't care! He wouldn't let me have any!"
"Who? The impenitent thief?"
"I mean daddy wouldn't. He wouldn't let me have one of the sweetings."
"They ain't ripe. They'll be better eatin' come a week after to-morrow."
"He won't give me any then. They're for sick folks, he says."
"Your father's a presiding elder, and it ain't fit and proper for you to call him 'he' that way."
"You mean I should call him 'she,' Miss Mahaly?" asked Johnny, lifting his great, innocent-looking blue eyes, and quite willing to change the question.
"I'm afraid you're a bad boy, St. John."
"P'r'aps I be," said St. John, indifferently.