The Reverend Tommy was always at his ease with Mrs. Davis. She led him along paths which caused him no embarrassment. He knew that she looked up to him because of his education and his clerical dignity. On his side, he admired her rugged common sense, which put him at his ease, and banished the last atom of his “ladylike” bashfulness. Early in the winter he had been brought to realize the nature of his feeling for Mrs. Davis, by seeing Brother Silas Hamm, recently left a widower, and having ten children, making a decided stampede in the widow’s direction. Reverend Tommy was grieved. To be sure, she was old enough to be his mother, but she had many good points to be considered. She was a good worker, experienced in married life and ways of making a man comfortable. Then her savings must be considered. When Tommy reached this last point he always felt sure that she was the most desirable woman in the world for a young minister. He felt hopeful tonight, because he had seen Brother Hamm and his bride in church the Sunday before. Mrs. Davis opened the conversation by speaking of the bride and groom.
“Hamm and his bride looked mighty comfut’ble in chuch Sunday, didn’t they?”
“He did. I’m glad he’s settled again. It is not good for man to be alone.”
“ ’Deed I’m glad, too.”
“You—well, well, I’m real glad to hear you say it.”
“What for?” asked the widow coyly, looking down and playing with her fan.
“I—I didn’t know how you and Brother Hamm stood.”
“Stood! Well, I never.”
“I thought Brother Hamm had been trying to get you,” whispered Tommy, sitting closer and putting his arm across the back of her chair.
“Law suz, Mr. Jeems, how nervous you does make me. Do take yer arm away, everybody’ll be a-lookin’ at yer, honey. I’m ’sprised at yer thinkin’ I’d look at Hamm an’ all them chillun. Massy knows what the ’ooman he’s got’s gwine to do with ’em.” But she looked so mild and smiling that Tommy went into the seventh heaven of delight, and so lost his head that when he heard the call “Another couple wanted here!” he took Mrs. Davis on his arm and stood up on the floor, forgetful of the fact that he was within a few months of his ordination. A good-natured matron not connected with the church had volunteered to supply the lack of an orchestra. Waltzing was soon in full blast, and the demand on the ice-cream cans was filling Ma Smith’s heart with joy, tempered with inward stings of conscience and fear of the Steward’s Board. Dora was dancing assiduously and eating ice cream at John’s expense, he meantime saying that if she kept on she would turn into a frozen dainty, to say nothing of a frost in his pocketbook. Dora declared that it was for the good of the cause, and he’d “just got to stand it.” She was wildly happy because of the tender familiarity between her brother and her friend. A long-stemmed rose that Will wore in his buttonhole had been transferred to Sappho’s corsage. Dora smiled as she caught the half-puzzled, half-wondering expression on her mother’s face.
It was approaching twelve o’clock when it was proposed to wind up the festivities with the good old “Virginy” reel. Sam Washington was the caller, and did his work with the fancy touch peculiar to a poetic Southern temperament. He was shrewd and good-natured, and a bit of a wag. He knew all the secret sighings of the ladies and their attendant swains. A lively girl whom everyone called “Jinny,” remarked to Sam, referring to the fact that Sam was on probation: “Your class-leader won’t recommend you to the Board for membership after tonight.”
“Now, Jinny,” replied Sam, stopping in his business of arranging couples, “don’t make yourself obnoxious bringing up unpleasant subjects. I’ll take my medicine like a man when the time comes; but I’d bust, sho, if I didn’t git loose tonight. I’m in good company, too,” he grinned, nodding toward Reverend Tommy and Mrs. Davis, who were just taking their places on the floor. “If this is good for Tommy, it is good enough for me.”
All reserve was broken down the instant the familiar strains of the Virginia reel were heard. The dance was soon in full swing—an up-and-down, dead-in-earnest seeking for a good time, and a determination to have it if it was to be got. It was a vehement rhythmic thump, thump, thumpity thump, with a great stamping of the feet and cutting of the pigeon wing. Sam had provided himself with the lively Jinny for a partner, and was cutting grotesque juba figures in the pauses of the music, to the delight of the company. His partner, in wild vivacity, fairly vied with him in his efforts at doing the hoe-down and the heel-and-toe. Not to be outdone, the Rev. Tommy James and Mrs. Davis scored great hits in cutting pigeon wings and in reviving forgotten beauties of the “walk-round.” Tommy “allowed” he hadn’t enjoyed himself so much since he came up North.
“Yes,” said Sam, “this beats the cakewalk all holler. Now then, one more turn and we’re done. Forward on the head; balance yer partner; swing the next gent; swing that lady. Now swing yer rose, yer pretty rose, yer yaller rose of Texas. All promenade.”
Everybody declared it had been a wonderful evening. “Thank the Lord it’s over,” said Ma Smith to Mrs. Sarah Ann White, who was helping her in the kitchen.
“Well,” said the latter, pausing in her work with her arms akimbo, “sech sights as I’ve seen tonight I never would have believed. ’Phelia Davis, what ought ter be a mother in Jerusalem, kickin’ up her heels in your parlor like a colt in a cornfield; and that Tommy Jeems, no more fittin’ fer a minister than a suckin’ babe, a-traipsin’
