Theo Waddington; a novel

Front matter

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Part I

To you your father should be as a god;

One that composed your beauties ; yea, and one To whom you are but as form in wax,

By him imprinted, and within his power To leave the figure, or disfigure it.

— Shakespeare: Mid. iV. Dream.

Chapter I

M y father, who even in the prime of life was not very modern in his views, held to the old-fashioned belief, that in the household, “discipline should be maintained”, and that children should in all things unquestioningly obey their parents — especially their father. There was no dogma of his Presbyterian creed which he believed more firmly ; and, naturally, we were all made to feel it, from my mother down to my youngest brother Ambrose, aged eleven. Indeed, I think the latter often felt it very deeply. But none of us ever demurred. We never thought of doing such a monstrous thing. The government, although perhaps not absolutely severe, was very strict and quite unfailing.

We were a very prim family, externally we were all moulded after one model — that model being my father’s ideal of a dutiful child. We all walked the same chalkmark. Woe to him who stepped aside from the prescribed track ! He was speedily and with small ceremony brought back into the way he should have trod.

My father was a large man — quite ponderous, in fact, and he had very big, strong white hands which to my childish imagination bore an expression as unmistakable as that of his face ; for those hands had been instrumental in guiding my rebellious infant steps into the proper, well-worn path which was being dutifully followed by the four elder brothers and sisters who had preceded me therein ; and they were still often employed in maintaining discipline. Then, what caresses they often bestowed upon my hair and cheek and upon those of my sisters and brothers and mother ! And should I ever forget how those cool, firm fingers had soothed away the pain in my fevered head, once when I had been ill } So they bore to my imagination not only an expression of strength and decision and even of possible severity, but also of love and gentleness. The strength and decision I honored. The love and gentleness I almost worshipped. The severity, I — well, I shall not say how I felt about that — my father’s children were yoked creatures in those days and were not at all supposed to have any private opinions.

‘‘You’re the most sot-down-on children I ever seen,” a new housemaid once confidentially asserted to me. “You ain’t got no minds of your own. You seem like you was all made of putty. There’s not one of you that seems to have the spirit of your papa. You all seem to take after your mamma — especially you three girls. Why, there’s six of you children, all together, and you never make no noise through the house.”

“Papa can’t stand a noisy house, Jane,” I had replied in my very grave, little manner. “He can’t write his sermons unless everything is quiet. Noise excites him.”

“Well, he himself is blustery and lively and noisy enough when he comes out of his study. He seems a

THEO WADDtNGTON'

awful kind-hearted, jolly man, and I can’t see why you’ns all seem so sorter sot-down-on.”

But Jane had not been with us long before she, too, had come under the inevitable, but indefinable influence which so certainly controlled every member of our household ; she grew, in a short time, to stand in awe of the very knob on the door of my father’s study.

This peculiar domination was not confined within the narrow limits of our family circle. It extended over the entire congregation of which my father was pastor. He would brook no opposition to his will. He would not be foiled in any of his wishes. His people and even his church officers, knew it, and meekly submitted to his way; for they loved and respected him. He had. a great warm heart, a tenderness and a sympathy which would force itself through his sternest moods, which colored even his most eloquent discourses on doom eternal, and which endeared him alike to young and old. He acted in his ofifice of pastor very like a. strict schoolmaster; but his congregation never resented his exercise of authority. They liked it. Delinquents were flattered by his interest in them. The faithful were rewarded by his warm approval. Vigor, sincerity and decision marked his every act and word. Every one honored him because every one knew that he preached nothing which he did not with all his heart and soul endeavor to practise; and which, I must add, he did not endeavor to make everybody else practise — especially those of his own household — regardless of the fact that to some are given one talent, to some five, and to some ten.

Another secret of - his popularity with his flock was his ability to be entertaining in company. His power of mimicry, his sense of humor and his drollery, made it difficult at times for him to remain entirely serious even while conducting the services of the church. Did any of his children inherit his witty faculty, they never presumed to display it in his presence. If they had ever done so, I think it would have surprised him very much.

Here are a few pages from a note-book or diary which I began to keep when I was a mere child — a little girl of thirteen years :

<‘We have all' just come up stairs from family worship, and have each gone to his or her own bedroom. That is our custom. We always do go straight to our bedrooms after evening prayers. Ours is a very orderly household — oh, very! It is even systematic. Papa wishes it to be so, and whatever papa wishes is always done. He said in his sermon, last Sunday morning, that in these modern days there is ‘ a lamentable falling off in family government’, and that in most homes the father is no longer ‘the head of the, house’. I felt rather self-conscious and uncomfortable while papa was saying that, and I turned my eyes just a little to see if anyone was looking toward our pew. And yes, there was that young law student (who came to our city only a few months ago, and who boards across the street from our house) staring straight at us, with a twinkle in his eyes, as though he wanted to smile. He is a very daring young man. He made papa angry, one day, by telling him that he did not think he would join the Presbyterian Church until a few things in the creed had been changed. He must have a great deal of courage to have been able to say that to papa. I can’t help admiring courage, even though it is misdirected.

“Just now, instead of sitting here writing in my note-book, I ought to be getting ready for bed. That is what papa supposes I am doing. I usually do just what is expected of me, but this evening I feel so very wide awake and restless — I know I could not sleep if I were in bed. So I mean to sit up and write for a while. I am so glad I have a room to myself. Amy, my elder sister, who is fifteen years old, used to room with me. But I begged mamma one day at the breakfast table to let her occupy another room, as I wanted to enjoy a little privacy, sometimes. When I said that, they all smiled — every one in the family except papa, and he laughed outright and declared I was ‘a quaint, old-fashioned little woman ’.

“‘And what do you want with a little privacy.^’ he asked. ‘ What do you propose to do with it } ’

“‘One can think better when one . is alone, papa,’ I answered.

“‘And what weighty thinking do you have to do.^’

“‘I think about many things,’ I said, hesitatingly, for I was guiltily conscious that some of my secret thoughts would not have met his approval; ‘chiefly about the things that I read.’

“‘Theo is only thirteen,’ remarked mamma. ‘But she reads more books than Amy or even than Lila. And she does use such old language (so many long words, you know), for a child of her years ! ’

“‘Yes, she is our precocious child, I suspect,’ papa said, ‘although she is by no means the best looking.’

“‘No, she.is such a brown little thing,’ mamma agreed. ‘Her eyes and her forehead are her only redeeming features. She doesn’t take with strangers as Amy and

Lila do. She is so serious and quiet and demure. In : some respects she is old beyond her years. In others /v she will always be a baby.’ |

“ ‘ Let her have a room to herself, mamma, if she wants it,’ was papa’s final comment ; and I left the breakfast table elated at the success of my proposal. My pleasure was not, however, expressed by any noisy demonstrations. : No one in our house is ever noisy, except papa. [

“And so now I have a room to myself. The happiest hours I spend are those in which I am shut up alone in | this cosey sanctum. I and my note-book and my little ■ bedroom have many a secret confidence. Amy and Lila : and Joe and Ambrose, and even my big brother Harold, ^ who is twenty-one and is studying for the ministry, andj who Jane once said was ‘the most sot-down-on of all of us’ (herself included), have begun to be a little curious: to know what I do when I am shut up alone in my room for hours together. j.

“ I have placed my little writing table near the window and directly under the gas burner. I keep my note-book locked up in the drawer of it. If any member of our; family should ever discover that I keep a note-book, L should — well, I should, as Joe says, ‘go off and die’.'^ That’s slang. Joe never uses slang before papa; but hei whispers it to me, sometimes, and I am very sorry to say. I rather like it. Good behavior is so monotonous when you keep it up all the time. I can think of nothing that is more monotonous. That is why I like my note-book.i I just talk right out in this little book, as though I were* not at all ‘sot-down-on’, as Jane very vulgarly says.^ Indeed, if it were not for my note-book, I think I should suffocate sometimes. There are some days when I feel

1:3 as though I should stifle ; and the only thing that relieves me is to lock myself in my room, and tell everything that I feel and think, to my little book. It is very sly of me to keep this note-book. Papa has no idea that I have secret thoughts. My father is very clever, I know; all his large congregation think him so. And yet I believe he sometimes makes mistakes. He seems to think that the eternal life is the whole life. Now if Joe should hear me say that, he would laugh and call me ‘an old-fashioned little kid’. Joe and Amy are twins. I think I love Joe better than any of my brothers and sisters, although I am pretty sure papa thinks he is the least dutiful of all of us. But Joe and I are really very congenial — only he doesn’t love to read so much as I do. But, as I was saying, papa supposes that because we are all in the habit of doing exactly as he wishes us to do, that we are the very best children in the world. But I am quite sure that I live two lives — one before my father’s eye, and another entirely shut up in myself which nobody knows anything about — not even Joe, though I talk to him more than to any of the others. My father has no idea that I have private opinions about things, I am so quiet and unobtrusive.

“I do not believe that my brothers and sisters live two lives as I do. Joe, of course, does to a certain extent, but not so much as I do. As I grow older I think I become more and more double. Where it will end I cannot foretell. But my brothers and sisters are quite contented ; they are used to doing just what is expected of them, and they don’t seem to find it irksome at all. I don’t think one of them keeps a note-book. They can get along quite well without one. They all think me a little queer.

I don’t enjoy the things that interest them. I just hate to study catechism, although, of course, I never tell any-| one so. I don’t like to embroider and mend and dust and all those things. I dislike above all things to have] to go into the parlor when church-members call. I ami afraid Joe and I are a little misanthropic, for we have, confided to each other, that we think many people, and' especially the ladies who call at our house, are very tire-' some. But Lila, who is quite tall and pretty and stylish,? is always very glad to see company ; and Amy loves tol study catechism and do her duty; and Harold, who, as It have said, is studying for the ministry, likes nothing^ better than to read large books by Jonathan Edwards.” \ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^

I wrote no more in my precious note-book that night.J Looking back now from a distance of many years I can| clearly recall the incidents of the remainder of thatjj evening.

My writing fever was suddenly interrupted by a knockjj at my door — a quick, decided knock that was unmistak-J able; there was but one hand in the family that wouldfi knock with such firmness and decision as that. It was a| very great shock to me. My poor little heart leaped into| my throat and beat so violently, that for a moment l| could scarcely breathe ; and as I lifted my eyes from m3i note-book, I was horrified to discover by the small clock which stood on my bureau, that it was nearly midnight !

I was supposed to have been in bed at half-past nine.

‘‘Who is it.^” I faintly called, knowing perfectly well who it was, but wishing to gain a little time. I dashedf the note-book into the table drawer, locked it and put thel lo

“Theo! What are you doing?” called a voice without, in a tone as startling as the decided knock.

“I’m — I’m sleeping, papa!”

“ Open your door ! ”

I was very philosophical even at that age. Be-thinking me that the very worst he could do would be to slay me, and that we must all die some time, I gulped down my heart into the place where it belonged, and calmly opened the door.

There stood my father, tall and ponderous, clad in a long, black dressing-gown.

“Theo!” he exclaimed, not sternly, but in a tone of vigorous decision ; he was not angry, only very determined ; and he never spoke in an angry or loud tone even in his greatest impatience. “What! You are not even undressed ? What does this mean ? ”

I could think of no suitable answer, so I only stood still and looked up at him gravely, not feeling very much alarmed, since I had, before opening the door, resigned myself even to death itself.

“Answer me, Theo. What have you been doing?”

“I’ve been — thinking. I was just about to go to bed.”

“Well, I should hope so!” he exclaimed, biting his lip to conceal a smile — at which I felt encouraged.

“If you indulge in meditation at this rate, Theo, you can’t be allowed to room alone. Are you sure you have not been reading?” he asked, looking at me keenly.

“No, papa. I’ve not been reading.”

“Well, then, get to bed just as quickly as you can! I am very much displeased to find you up so late. Remember, if this thing occurs again, you will have to room with one of your sisters. Now don’t cry, don’t cry,” he added hastily, as he observed the tears swell up into my eyes. For I was extremely sensitive. I loved my father passionately, and the slightest censure from him hurt my feelings very much. He rarely reproved me ; indeed he did not often have occasion to do so.

Don’t cry, my little girl,” he said, tenderly, as he laid his hand on my shoulder ; for he seldom could withstand feminine tears. “Good-night, and get to bed at once.”

“Yes, papa,” I dutifully replied. And then he went away. When he had gone, I sat down on the side of my bed and began to undo my black hair, which I wore in a long plait down my back ; and while thus engaged I meditated earnestly upon the horrible possibility of some time having my note-book discovered by my father.

“ Suppose I had forgotten to lock my door this evening, and he had walked in and found me writing ! ” I suggested to myself. “ Or suppose I had not had presence of mind enough to put my book out of sight before answering his knock ! He would certainly have insisted upon seeing what it was that I had been writing. And then then I should have been lost! For I could never bear to have any one see it, least of all papa. And I am sure if he ever found it, I should not be able to prevent his reading it. I should be covered with shame if he did I read it. I wonder why.?” ?

I could not understand why then, but I know, now. I ^ had learned to hide before my family everything that I | felt and thought, and so it had come to seem like a shame I

and a disgrace to have anyone look upon my inner life

my real, true life ; for I had begun to realize that the other the eternal — was largely a form and a sham.

TNEO U'ADDIJVG TON-

CHAPTER II A FEW more leaves from my note-book

“It is a dreary, drizzling afternoon. Amy and I have said all our lessons to brother Harold and are now free to do as we please until tea-time. So I have shut myself up alone in my own dear little room, to write in my note-book. How I love to be alone ! Solitude is very precious.

“ I see that Mr. Rushrnore, the young law student who boards across the street, is sitting at the front window of his second floor room. I notice that he stares over here a great deal. Every day he sits at his front window and writes and reads almost as much as I do. I wonder if he keeps a note-book. I often meet his eye when I happen to glance up from my writing.

“This morning at the breakfast table, papa remarked, 'Mr. Rushrnore is a fine young fellow, but he has fallen into sad errors — despite the fact that his parents and all his family are the strictest sort of Presbyterians. On account of his family, whom I know very well, I feel that I I must take some interest in him ; and also, because

j he often comes to our church with his uncle. Judge

Canfield.’

“I think Mr. Rushrnore provokes papa very much sometimes, and puzzles him, too. Often, when I see him come out of the house and walk down the street, I think he looks almost as strong and manly as my father does. How odd it would be if my eldest brother Harold were like that ! If he were, papa and he would not get along very well. I remember one day when Harold ventured to offer some objection to one of the stories in the Bible, papa said to him, very sternly —

“‘You must no more question the authority of the Bible, than you question my authority in this house ! ’ “Mr. Rushmore has very black eyes, and he has an expression in them which makes me suspect that he thinks things out for himself. I wish I were wise enough to do that. So many things puzzle me, especially about religion. It seems so stupid to try to believe whatever you’re told without ever trying to understand it. It really does not seem honest to yourself. Lately so many new thoughts have come into my mind that I feel quite bewildered about some things. I think I shall tell a few of them to Harold. He is studying theology and may be able to explain them to me. I should not like to ask papa about them. He might get excited — as Joe says he always does when he talks to Mr. Rushmore.”

Here is another page written the next day.

“A very interesting thing happened to me to-day. Interesting things don’t often happen in our house, for we are a very quiet, orderly family — all of us except papa, who is always energetic and lively.

“Just before luncheon, I went over to Miss Appell’s to borrow a book from her library. I chose ‘Jane Eyre ’. I’ve read it twice, but I never tire of it, and mean to read it again. If I could know the author of that book, I should love her. I feel that I should be able to talk 'to lU

her quite freely. I have never known anyone to whom I can talk, as I talk to you, my little note-book.

“Well, after luncheon, I sat clown by my bedroom window and read in ‘Jane Eyre’, until Harold rang the bell in the library to summon Amy and me to our lessons, which we recite to him every day (for he goes to the Theological Seminary only in the morning). As I was leaving my room to go down stairs to him, I saw a letter lying on the floor, near the door. I picked it up. The envelope bore no address. I did not stop to examine it further, but put it in my pocket and hurried away to my lessons.

“When Harold was through with us and I had come up stairs to my room again, I took out the envelope, and drew from it a very fat letter.

“‘Can it be intended for me.^’ I wondered; ‘and who can have thrown it on the floor of my room } ’

“^‘Dear Damon,’ it began; and it was signed, ‘As ever, your Pythias.’

“‘I’m 'afraid it isn’t meant for me; but I can’t tell, until I’ve read it,’ I said to myself.

“ I found some things in that letter which made quite an impression on me. I shall copy parts of it into this note-book, before returning it to the one who I’m sure must have written it.

“ I have decided that I myself must have carried it into my room, between the pages of ‘Jane Eyre’, for Miss I Appell is very generous and neighborly, and lends her j books to other people, besides me.

“‘Dear Damon: Tuesday afternoon, after adjournment of court. Weather, ‘fair to middling’, as the old women say around here. Place, my own room in my boarding-house. Monotony broken only by the whirl of a pen and an occasional glance at a brown little face at a window opposite — a quaint, prim child with very large, dark eyes whom I have lately taken to watching with interest and curiosity — the youngest daughter of that Rev. Dr. Waddington I have several times mentioned in my letters to you. She is just about the age of my little sister Edith, for whom I often become abominably homesick. Among the many tiresome things of my life in this prosy town, is the fact that I’ve not made the acquaintance of a single child, and I sometimes get quite hungry for some little one to pet. Before you write again go over to see how my small nephew is getting on, will you 'i

“‘I am invited out a great deal, here — tennis parties, dances, etc. Young men are scarce in these parts, and so I’m in a fair way to be spoiled by the dear, fond girls. Damon, my chum, what wouldn’t I give for some sensible, congenial girl friend, who would make me forget, at least somewhat, how I miss the home folks. But in society, one never can get at the real mind and heart of a girl, even assuming the large supposition that she has a mind j and heart to get at. ■

“‘Wish you could hear some of the absurd provincial- | isms around here. There are glaring errors in the converse of men and women in York, that are inexcusable except in people of the lowest sort. My physician gave me some medicine, one day, with this verbal direction: “To be taken every two hours without you’re sleeping”.

I was annoyed, for he is by no means an illiterate fellow. You remember that mole on my chin.? It has taken to developing of late, at a great rate — according to the Darwinism law of <‘the survival of the fittest”, I presume.

“‘While I was sitting at this window, a while ago, a Presbyterian Elder and his little son drove up to Dr. Waddington’s door; he alighted and rang, but no one came out ; he banged, he thumped, he pounded on the door with his riding-whip ; but no response. At last he handed his son out of the carriage, gave him a pot of flowers and a parcel containing, I suppose, “strawberrybutter-r-r”, as these Pennsylvanians would say, and sent him in to the side entrance. The boy delivered his wares and came back to the carriage, unaccompanied by any of the Waddington family. I wonder what they were all doing. Am I not a connoisseur in the art of gossiping I think Pa Waddington was probably whipping Joe. Ma was crying. Harold^as teaching Amy and Theo. Lila was embroidering, and Ambrose was studying his Sunday School lesson. Of course I don’t know. “It’s not for me to say as shouldn’t, not being on the grounds ” (to use the York style of phraseology). But things pointed that way. For Pa came out shortly after, cane in hand, looking like Pompey when he flogged the Hottentots. Mamma didn’t appear, (doth a woman flaunt her tears T) Joe came out looking volumes — at least I think so, for if my story be authentic he ought to have felt volumes. Theo appeared at her window looking like a good girl who had said her lessons to brother Harold, and was at peace with papa, and didn’t pity Joe because he ought to have known that he should not have done it. Elder brother Harold sat down by the library window, with a volume of Jonathan Edwards, most likely, thinking as he turned the pages, “ Nice girl, that little Theo. I’m glad

I insisted upon obedience from her from the first — it’s so much better than if she wouldn’t listen.”

“ ‘ I fear I bore you, my Damon ; but just now there is nothing in York which interests me so much as this very clerical family across the street. They all have such a squelched aspect, as though they had every one been flattened into the same mould. Dr. Waddington is, however, an odd, interesting character. He preaches and believes the orthodoxy of thirty years ago, and backs it up with so much Scripture and so much real eloquence, that his congregation are always quite convinced. His reading is entirely confined to Presbyterian works of theology and The Presbyterian Monthly'". He called on me when I first came to this town and asked me to take a catechism class in the Sunday School. ‘^Not until the creed is considerably revised,” I replied; and then we “had it” at a great rate. He was scandalized at hearing some of my views in reference to his blessed Jonathan Edwards. With a deep sigh and look averted, he exclaimed from the depths of his bigoted soul, ‘^Poor young man ! I hope you may be forgiven ! ” I got myself into difficulties by trying to persuade him that if I had naught but that to be forgiven, I should be a happy spirit. I was told once for all and .most decidedly, that “unless we believe all that is between the lids of the Book, it is hard for us to be forgiven ; and as for Jews, Catholics, Heathens and others, it is a pity for them, poor souls, but they can’t enter the kingdom”.

“ ‘ So I found it useless to argue with him, especially as I became excited and forgot occasionally the respect due to my seniors.

“‘Before he took his leave, he prayed for me, with great earnestness, as one who had “followed cunningly devised fables and the sophistries of men

“ ‘ I would not take the trouble to mention all this, only I do think the man has some good parts. He is a man, you know, and commands one’s respect; and he is a perfect gentleman. He is very eloquent, and has some natural gifts — a sympathetic heart which attracts like a magnet ; an enthusiastic, imaginative nature which makes him quite fascinating at times ; a splendid physique, which one can’t help admiring ; a sense of humor and a most original drollery which are quite irresistible. I must own I like him — I can’t help it; and I believe, in my heart, that he likes and respects me, too. You see he is quite unused to being opposed or contradicted. He can’t get over it that I am not afraid of him. It’s the best thing in the world for him, that I have crossed his path ; he needs to be defied by some one ; he needs to learn that there are other minds and other wills in the world besides his own.