“I’d be bound fur you, ’Liphalet: it’s a shame, you a-goin’ ag’in’ me, after all I’ve done to make Freddie material fit for the Lord’s use. Jest think what you’ll have to answer fur, a-helpin’ this unruly boy to shirk his dooty.”
“I ain’t a-goin’ ag’in’ you, Hester. You’re my wife, an’ I ’low ’at your jedgment’s purty sound on most things. I ain’t a-goin’ ag’in’ you at all, but—but—I was jest a-wonderin’.”
The old man brought out the last words slowly, meditatively. He was “jest a-wonderin’.” His wife, though, never wondered.
“Mind you,” she went on, “I say to you, Freddie, and to yore uncle ’Liphalet too, ef he upholds you, that it ain’t me you’re a-rebellin’ against. It’s yore dooty an’ the will o’ God that you’re a-fightin’. It’s easy enough to rebel against man; but do you know what you’re a-doin’ when you set yourself up against the Almighty? Do you want to do that?”
“Yes,” came the boy’s answer like a flash. He was stung and irritated into revolt, and a torrent of words poured from his lips unrestrained. “I’m tired of doing right. I’m tired of being good. I’m tired of obeying God—”
“Freddie!” But over the dam the water was flowing with irresistible force. The horror of his guardian’s face and the terrible reproach in her voice could not check the boy.
“Everything,” he continued, “that I have ever wanted to do since I can remember has been bad, or against my duty, or displeasing to God. Why does He frown on everything I want to do? Why do we always have to be killing our wishes on account of duty? I don’t believe it. I hate duty. I hate obedience. I hate everything, and I won’t obey—”
“Freddie, be keerful: don’t say anything that’ll hurt after yore mad spell’s over. Don’t blaspheme the Lord A’mighty.”
’Liphalet Hodges’ voice was cool and tender and persuasive. He laid his hand on the boy’s shoulder, while his wife sat there motionless, white and rigid with horror.
The old man’s words and his gentle touch had a wonderful effect on the boy; they checked his impassioned outburst; but his pent-up heart was too full. He burst into tears and rushed headlong from the house.
For a time he walked aimlessly on, his mind in a tumult of rage. Then he began to come to himself. He saw the people as they passed him. He had eyes again for the street, and he wondered where he was going. He felt an overwhelming desire to talk to someone and to get sympathy, consolation, and perhaps support. But whither should he turn? If ’Liphalet Hodges had been at the old house, his steps would naturally have bent in that direction; but this refuge was no longer his. Then his mind began going over the people whom he knew, and no name so stuck in his fancy as that of Elizabeth. It was a hard struggle. He was bashful. Any other time he would not have done it, but now his great need created in him an intense desperation that made him bold. He turned and retraced his steps toward the Simpson house.
Elizabeth was leaning over the gate. The autumn evening was cool: she had a thin shawl about her shoulders. She was humming a song as Fred came up. His own agitation made her seem irritatingly calm. She opened the gate and made room for him at her side.
“You seem dreadfully warm,” she said, “and here I was getting ready to go in because it is so cool.”
“I’ve been walking very fast,” he answered, hesitatingly.
“Don’t you think you’d better go in, so as not to take cold?”
“Oh, I don’t care if I do take cold.” The speech sounded rude. Elizabeth looked at him in surprise.
“What’s the matter with you?” she asked.
“I’m mad; that’s what’s the matter.”
“Oh, Fred, you shouldn’t get mad: you know it’s wrong.”
He put up his hand as if she had struck him. “Wrong! wrong! It seems I can’t hear anything else but that word. Everything is wrong. Don’t say any more about it. I don’t want to hear the word again.”
Elizabeth did not know what to make of his words, so she said nothing, and for a while they stood in strained silence. After a while he said, “Aunt Hester wants me to be a preacher.”
“I am so glad to hear that,” she returned. “I think you’ll make a good one.”
“You too!” he exclaimed, resentfully. “Why should I make a good one? Why need I be one at all?”
“Oh, because you’re smart, and then you’ve always been good.”
The young man was suddenly filled with disdain. His anger returned. He felt how utterly out of accord he was with everyone else. “Don’t you think there is anything else required besides being ‘smart’ and ‘good’?” He himself would have blushed at the tone in which he said this, could he have recognised it. “I’m smart because I happened to pass all my examinations. I got through the high school at eighteen: nearly everyone does the same. I’m good because I have never had a chance to be bad: I have never been out of Aunt Hester’s sight long enough. Anybody could be good that way.”
“But then older people know what is best for us, Fred.”
“Why should they? They don’t know what’s beating inside of us away down here.” The boy struck his breast fiercely. “I don’t believe they do know half the time what is best, and I don’t believe that God intends them to know.”
“I wouldn’t talk about it, if I were you. I must go in. Won’t you come in with me?”
“Not tonight,” he replied. “I must be off.”
“But papa might give you some advice.”
“I’ve had too much of it now. What I want is room to breathe in once.”
“I don’t understand you.”
“I know you don’t; nobody does, or tries to. Go in, Lizzie,” he said more calmly. “I don’t want you to catch cold, even if I do. Good night.” And
