Pippin; A Wandering Flame. Richards Laura Elizabeth Howe
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room, then he slammed the window and run off. I was too mad to move for a minute, and then before I could get the window open, there was a woman standin' by me – a tall woman she was, in a white gown. She just looked at me and says she, 'Why, it's a boy! Oh, your poor mother!' That took me kind of sudden, because I hadn't no mother, so to say – and I guess she see the way I felt. I believe she would have let me off, but just then her husband came in, and – well, it wasn't to be expected he would look at it any such way. So I was run in, and I got three years."
"In Shoreham?"
"In Shoreham! P'raps you know the place, sir?" Pippin's eyes lightened inquiringly.
The stranger shook his head. "I never was in it, but I've seen some that have been – and more that ought to be. Pretty hard place, I'm told!"
"It used to be!" said Pippin. "They tell tales – and there's things still that don't seem to belong, someway, to the Lord's world. Left-over barber – barberries – no! barbarisms, Elder Hadley calls 'em. That's it, barbarisms! Him and the Old Man – that's the Warden, sir – are doin' of 'em away as fast as they can, but you can't clean a ward with one pail of water. And there's old crooks that wouldn't understand; they – I dono – " Pippin shook his curly head, and was silent, seeing visions. His companion jogged him with his elbow. The story was proving interesting.
"You say you found the Lord there; or the Lord found you! How was that?"
"I found Him!" Pippin laughed joyously. "He didn't find me, and reason good: He never lost me. He knowed where I was all the time. I'll cut it as short as I can. The first year I was no good. I was mad, and I stayed mad: there was nobody I inclined to chum up with. There was some kind o' made up to me, but I didn't take to 'em someway. They was dirty, too. One thing I'll always lay kind to the Honey Boys, they was clean. Brought up clean, you see; learned to wash, and brush their hair, and that; mothers learned 'em. Green grass! and think o' their – Well, anyhow, I took to that like a cat to cream; I've never been dirty since, nor I can't abide dirty folks. I just grouched off by myself, and planned what I'd do when my time was up; nobody thought I was any good, and I wasn't. All I thought of was how to get out, and then get back at Chunky – he was the Dago guy I was tellin' about. I'd study over it all day long. I wouldn't kill him, I thought, just smash his face (good-lookin' guy, great on the girls, an' they on him), or break his back so he'd never walk again, or —I'm tellin' you this because I am ashamed to tell it, and because I want you should know what the Lord raised me up out of. I tell you I'd sit there after workin' hours, hunched up in my cheer, never speakin' to a soul, just feelin' him under my hands, feelin' his flesh go soft and his bones crunch – "
Pippin stopped abruptly, flushing scarlet. "Lord, forgive me!" he said simply.
"Amen! – Well?" The gray-haired man was looking expectantly at him. "Go on, young feller! You can't stop there." Pippin gave a gulp and went on.
"The chaplain used to come and see me once or twice a week, and he give me papers to read – nice papers they was, too; I liked 'em – and said I was in a bad way and didn't I repent, and I said no, I didn't, and he'd shake his head and say, 'Hardened! hardened!' kind of sad, and go away. He'd ben there a long time, and it had soaked into him, as you may say. He'd lost his spring, if ever he had any. Well! come one day – I'll never forget that day! bright, sunshiny day it was, just like this – I went to chapel as usual. I liked to go to chapel, 'count of the singin'. I'd rather sing than eat, any day. I never noticed the words, you understand, but I liked the tunes, and I sang out good whenever I got a chance. So I went in with the rest, like a sheep, and sat down, never lookin' up. I'd got a piece of string, and a feller had showed me a new knot, and I sat tyin' it, waitin' for the singin'. I never took no notice of anything else. Then a voice spoke, and I jumped, and looked up. It was a strange voice, and a strange man. Tall and well set up, he was, kind o' sandy hair and beard, and eyes that looked right through you and counted the buttons on the back of your shirt. Yes, and his voice went through you, too; it wasn't loud nor yet sharp, but you couldn't help but listen. 'The Lord is here!' he said. He let that sink in a minute; then, 'Right here,' he said, 'in this chapel. And what's more, you left Him behind you in your cell. And what's more, you'll find Him there when you go back. You can't get away from Him!' I can't tell you all he said, but every word come straight as a rifle bullet. I wasn't the only one that sat up, I tell ye! 'Twas different talk from what we was used to. He spoke about ten minutes, and it didn't seem three; then he stops short and says, 'That's enough. Now let's sing! Hymn 464!' Well, there was some sung, like me, because they liked it, and there was a few here and there was professors, but half of 'em didn't pay no attention special, just sat there. After the first verse he held up his hand. 'I said sing!' says he. 'And when I say sing I mean sing! Never mind whether you know how or not; make a noise! I ain't goin' to sing alone!'
"Gorry! I can see him now, standin' there with his head up, clappin' two hymn books together to beat the time and singin' away for all he was worth. In two minutes every man in the place was singin', or crowin', or gruntin', or makin' what kind of noise was give him to make. Yes, sir! that was Elder Hadley all over. I let out my voice to the last hole; I expect I bellered like a bull, for he looked at me kind o' quick; then in another minute he looked again, and that time he saw all there was to see. I felt it crinkle down to my toes, so to say. Bimeby, as we were goin' out, after service, he come down and shook hands with us all, every man Jack, and said somethin' pleasant. Come to me, he looks me right through again, and says he, 'Well, boy, what are you doin' here?' I choked up, and couldn't say a word. It wasn't so much what he said, mind you, as the way he said it. Why, you was a real person, and he cared; you bet he cared! Well, sir, 'twould take the day to tell what that man did for me. He told me that 'twas true, the Lord was there. And that – that He cared too. It took a long time to get that into my head. I'd been kicked about from one gutter to another; nobody ever had cared – except old Granny Faa; she give me snuff sometimes, when she was sober, and she kep' Bashford off me as much as she could – but still —
"Well! I'll bile it down. Come one day, somethin' started me wrong; I don't know what it was. My head ached, and the mush was burnt, and I didn't give a tinker's damn for anything or anybody. I did what I had to, and then I sat down and just grouched, the way I told you. Crooks is childish, as I said; maybe other folks is too, I dono. Well! So Elder Hadley come along, and he says, 'Hello, Pippin! What's the matter? You look like you'd been frostbit!' he says. I tried to fetch a grin, but it wouldn't come. 'Nothin' doin', Elder!' I says.
"'What's the matter?' he says again, his kind way.
"'Hell's the matter!' I says. I used language, them days; never have since, but I did then.
"He sits down and looks me over careful. 'What's "hell"?' he says.
"'Everything's hell!' I says: and then I biled over, and I guess that mush was burnt all right. He listened quiet, his head kind o' bent down. At last he says, 'How about takin' the Lord into this, and askin' Him to help?'
"'Nothin' doin'!' I says. 'There's no Lord in mine!'
"'Stop that!' says he. I looked up; and his eyes was like on fire, but yet they was lovin' too, and – I dono – somethin' in his look made me straighten up and hold up my head. 'None of that talk!' he said. 'That's no talk for God's boy. Now, hark to me! You like me, don't you, Pippin?'
"'You bet I like you, Elder!' I says. 'There's nothin' doin' in your line here, but you bet I like you. You've treated me white, and you're a gentleman besides.'
"'Now,' he says, slow and careful, 'what you like in me is just the little bit of God that's in me. The little bit that's in you finds the little bit that's in me, do you see? And likes it, because they belong together. There's another bit in the Warden, and another in Tom Clapp there, though I'll own he doesn't look it (and he didn't); and there's a bit in everybody here and elsewhere. And that's not all! Go you out into that field yonder and sit there for an hour, and you'll find other little bits, see if you don't! And see if they don't fit together.'
"He pointed out of the window to a field a little ways off: I could see the buttercups shinin' in it from where I sat. I stared at him. 'Go along!' says he. 'What do you mean?' I says. 'I mean go!' he says. 'I've the Warden's leave for you whenever I see fit, and I see fit now.' I looked at him, and