The Storyteller.

New Zealand Tablet, Issue 41, 11 February 1898, Page 23

The Storyteller.

JOSEPH TALLY'S SECRET.

" I'VE stood it just as long as I've a mind to ; and this day sees an end on it, or my name ain't Tally ?" declared Mrs. Tally, and smoothed out the folds of the capacious mantle she wore, with a trembling hand that bespoke a highly wrought up condition of mind. "You've always had a deal of patience. 'Liza ?"' queried rather than asserted Miss Amelia May. " Patience '" vociferated Mr*. Tally, — " patience ' I should say I have. But the time have arrove when it ceases to be a virtue. Thirty odd year ago, when I marry Joe Tally, I did so with my eyes open. ' He's a good-natured fellow, Joe is,' says Father Morgan to me. 'An' he's easy to lead ; but you'll never drive him,' he says. Now, 'Melia, you for one knows I ain't no woman to drive no one. Just so long's a person does reasonable an' peaceable, I lets 'em alone. But when things goes on as the've been agoin' on up to Tally Corners farm, an' I does myself clean out talkin' in season an' out season an' nothin' come of it, — then Father Morgan or no Father Morgan, unless things is to go to rack and ruin complete, I'm bound to have the whip hand !" One almost heard the crack of the whip. Little Miss Amelia jumped in her chair as Mrs. Tally finished what, even if it did lack the dignity, had all the distinctness of a pronunciamento. " What is it, 'Liza, Mr. Tally is doin' now that's so upset you ?" asked Miss Amelia, timidly. " Upset me, 'Melia !" exclaimed Mrs. Tally, in reproach. "I'm not upset ; for there ain't no woman more resigned to such as befall her than me. Oh, no ! it ain't upsetness, but I've got my feelin's as is in nature ; an' I'm that hurted I can feel the heart within me bleedin'. For it's a terrible thing, 'Melia, for a woman to know her husband's got no manner of confidence in her, an' has secrets an' mysteries an' carryin's on." " Good sense*, 'Liza | what has Joe been doin' ?" exclaimed Miss Amelia, a touch of asperity in what was usually a gentle voice. '• It do alarm me to see you so excited, 'Melia I" said Mrs. Tally, in a pacific tone of voice maddening under the circumstances. '• Calm yourself, an' I'll tell you all about it. I don't mind relatin' to you, for I know 'twon't go no further." Here Mrs. Tally paused so long and assumed so exasperating an air of placid dignity, sitting enveloped in her quilted silk hood and mantle, in an upright armchair, that Miss Amilia burst out : '■ It ain't that cabinet again, I hope ; is it, 'Liza ?"' " No," responded Mrs. Tally, slowly, "it ain't no cabinet. I allow I did want a cabinet for the parlor, with glass doors an' shelves for to make a display of them stones an curiosities Mary's husband sent us from Colarado. But I'm reasonable ; and the way farm truck's been goin' late years, an money that scarce, I give into Mr. Tally when he say he couldn't afford no such fandangoes, not to speak of the expense 'twould be to get it from Louisville, where I did see a beauty of a one. as I told you when Lizzie an' her husband smt us that invite to spend a fortnight with them ; an' puttin' the tickets in the letter — which was a kind thing to do, an' no expense to us, — or me an' Mr. Tally never could have gone ; for, though the girls is married well, we want to leave them when we draw the breath somethin' better than a tarni with a mortgage on it." Remembering the excitement that had been created at Tally Corners Farm by Mr. Tally's obstinate refusal to gratify his wife's taste for a handsomely carved cabinet, Miss Amelia could only stare at her friend in amazement. Well, if "tweren't the cabinet, what was it, ' Liza ?" sheasked, finally. Mrs. Tally turned about in her chair to gaze at the bunches of dried grasses in vases on Miss Amelia's mantelpiece. " You do get your timothies a beautiful red,'' she said. Now Mary's married, there ain't no djeing of grasses up to the Comer I*.1 *. Mary was a great hand at it ; an' the last she did have kept splendid — but you was askin' me about Mr. Tally — ', " You was offering to tell me, 'Liza, ' corrected Miss Amelia. Well, have it your own way. 'Melia," acquiesced Mrs. Tally ; " but I've my doubts about tellin' of the misdoin's of a husband ; even though I know you never repeats, an' that you're true to me. You've heard tell of the Jesse Jameses, 'Melia ?" "In the name of sense, what do you mean, 'Liza !" exclaimed Miss Amelia, her hands upraised. " I mean what I says — no more an' no loss," replied Mrs. Tally, lugubriously. '• He took to goin' out at nights a month or more ago : an' at first I suspicioned he went to the tavern. I tried followin' of him ; but there's that number of turns an' twists 'tween the Corners an' Oatton that I'd always lose track of him ; an', then, I hadn't no excuse to make to go clean to the tavern — " " Hut Joe in rrr was a dnnkin man," interrupted Miss Amelia. " He never were, but there's no knowin' what a man'll take to, an' there's notrustin' them," replied Mrs. Tally. " Anyhow, I made my inquiries ; an' 'tweren't to the tavern he went ; an' well it were, 'stead of the blood-curdlin" thing it is." She paused to wipe her eyes, and Miss Amelia cried out : " What notion have you took to have, 7^-liza Tally !" •' Well it wou d be tor me it it were notions I took, .4-melia May !" retorted Mrs. Tally. •' About two weeks ago," she continued' leaning forward and sinking her voice, " I wanted something down in the toolhouse where he does his carpenterin', an' went down to get it; an' lo an' behold ! the place was all locked up, — a thiDg that never took place atore since 1 first set foot in Tally Corners Farm ! He was in Oatton, an' when he returned — which he did in time for supper, expectin' fritters, which I did promise, but which he did not get, — I was made so feeble by the surprise of what I discovered I forgot 'em. ' What's the tool-house locked up for ?' I demanded ; ' an' me a-wanting to get in Ihere all day !' An' I gave him a piece

of my mmd — not quarrellin', but gentle like. Would you believe it ? he just sniggered, an' told me I'd have to keep out the tool-house some time to come ; an', tryin' to laugh it off, said he was Bluebeard, an' that was where I could not enter. That set me thinkin' ; an' I did what I never could abide to do ; made a pertence of bein' satisfied, an' set him out as good a supper as I could lay hands to ; an' for days after I tried flatterin' ways to make him confess an' tell me the truth." " You do store up trouble for yourself, 'Liza," said Miss Amelia, as Mrs. Tally drew a long breath. You think so, 'Melia. 'cause you don't know the worst," hissed Mrs. Tally. " Last Monday noon," she went on in a whisper, and drew her chair closer to Miss Amelia, " Launy Spencc — an' you know h is character — was over to the Corners to pay for a cow he bought. ' What you haulm' like coffins t'other night ? he asks ; an' it is true he was out one night after twelve. No sooner did Launy speak than he gives him a wink, and Launy begins a-praisin' my light bread ; for, much again my will an' desirements, he was a-settin' at my table a-gorgin' hisself. I said nothin', but I kept a-puttin' together what he said about lockin' up the tool-house an' what Launy said, an' him a-winkin' an' bein' so secret, — it's enough to set me crazy !" she cried. Mis 3 Amelia eyed Mrs. Tally with as much sternness as was compatible with her gentle nature. " We were girls together, Eliza," she ventured after a moment. Mrs. Tally nodded a tearful assent. " You married as good a man as is to be found ; an' me — well, I'm a old maid," declared Miss Amelia, bravely "The salt of the earth ! " interjected Mrs. Tally. " Never mind me," said Miss Amelia, not to be turned from her purpose by flattery. '' It's yourself I'm talkin' about. An' seem' how you've been blessed in a good husband, ain't you makin' a fool of yourself destroyin' his happiness, to say nothin' of your own ? Ain't Mr. Tally a right to lock up what's his'n 1 An' you know you don't believe no such things of him as you was hintin' — makin' comparisons with Jesse Jameses an' such."

With a little shudder of impatient disgust, Miss Amelia finished what was the strongest statement of facts it had ever occurred to her to make ; and, alarmed at her temerity, she waited the result of her exercise of free speech. She had not long to wait.

''You're worse than Father Morgan!" shouted Mrs. Tally, jumping up from her chair and flinging back the quilted mantle from her shoulders. "And if such be your opinions of me, the least we have to do in the way of neighbouring the better ; an' so I'm goin'."

She was out of the house before Miss Amelia revived from the shock of this assault. Hurrying after her, Miss Amelia called out just as Mrs. Tally entered her buggy, waiting at the door : " 'Liza ! 'Liza ! don't leave me in anger."

"Me in anger ! " exclaimed the outraged Mrs. Tally. "As to who's given cause for anger, answer to your own conscience, Amelia May ! she added ; and whipping up her horse, drove away, leaving Miss Amelia to stand disconsolate on her doorstep till the cold December air roused her to a consciousness of her position. Oatton and the country thereabouts were settled by one of those bands of Maryland Catholics whose descendants have spread themselves throughout the southwest, carrying the faith with them wherever they went, keeping its light burning in most adverse circumstances, and getting little human credit for so doing.

In all that country there was no more thrifty housewife than Mrs. Tally, though there were many women of a more genial nature. Of her children, but three had lived beyond childhood. These three were girls, well married ; thritty like their mother, in temperament like their father. This last was fortunate for their husbands, said those who were not admirers of Mrs. Tally's energetic and inquisitive genius. And they were many ; for Miss Amelia May was almost alone in esteeming Mrs. Tally at her proper worth, — making every allowance for her whims and fancies ; laying much of Eliza Tally's contrariness- of spirit at the door of the disappointment she had in the death of her only son — named Joe, for his father.

It Mrs. Tally was nervous, energetic, and inquisitive, her husband was phlegmatic, persevering, and utterly indifferent about what he considered no concern of his And to the fact of his want of appreciation of the tortures of baffled curiosity is to be attributed the other fact of his cruelty in having a secret from his wife.

It was nightfall when Mrs. Tally drove up to the door of Tally Corners Farm, and handed over the horse and buggy to a coloured man who did chores about the place. Hurriedly assuming a house dress, she made her way to the kitchen, where Mr. Tally sat before the open fireplace reading the county paper. Laying down the newspaper when his wife entered, he remarked that she had been out for a drive, and that it was one of the coldest Decembers he had ever known. Bustling about in her preparations for supper, Mrs. Tally vouchsafed no reply to either of these remarks; and, rising from his chair, Mr. Tally stretched himself and jingled the keys in his trousers' pocket. Mrs. Tally bit her lips in vexation of spirit. One of those jingled keys was the key of the tool-house, and she wrongfully believed it had been jingled to vex her. She was in a mood, however, for heaping up coals of fire.

" We're goin' to have batter-cakes for supper," she said, with an assumption of sprightliness.

" Nothin' so good as batter-cakes, plenty of eggs in 'em, of a winter night," laughed Mr. Tally.

He might have a secret from her, but she was not going to let him dictate to her the manner of making batter-cakes, and three of the eggs she had laid out were restored to the crockery jar in the pantry. Mr. Tally eyed the restoration ruefully.

When supper was over, Mr. Tally said he must " rig up a bit " ; for there was a meeting of the Temperance Society in the church schoolhouse last night. '■ I'll ride over on the bay mare, an' be back afore eleven, he said.

Mrs. Tally, though bubbling over with speech, preserved silence. She believed in. temperance, but not in temperance societies.

" They only take the men from their homes," she was wont to say. " Women can easily be temperance, an' no need of societies an' runnin' about." Mrs. Tally's vision of the doings of women was circumscribed to her own particular locality. In a little while Mr. Tally returned to the kitchen arrayed in a well-worn suit of broadcloth, the ends of his black silk tie hanging loose. Then it was, while she tied his cravat, that Mrs. Tally spoke. " When in the name of time are you goin' to get a new suit ? " she exclaimed, eyeing him over. " Them clothes ain't respecttul to go with me to Mass : an' you with one daughter married to a civil engineer, an' another to a wholesale merchant, an' another to a United States representative of Congress." " I reckon these'll have to do for this winter," replied Mr. Tally, shamefaced in his manner. " What goes of your money, now the mortgage's all paid, I don't know," Mrs. Tally went on to say. "That was a tax ana wearin' of body an' mind ; but it's done for, an' I declare I don't know where the money go ; I know I don't spend it." " Well, never mind. I'll see about some new clothes," promised Mr. Tally, and hurried from the room. But his wife caught up with him in the passage-way leading out doors. " You're not goin' yet ! " she cried, catching hold of the sleeve of his coat. "I've got that to ?ay to you that won't keep no longer." She spoke in a voice broken by passion, and the man stood helpless before her ; his perplexed face taking on strange expressions from the flaring light of the kitchen fire shed into the passage way. " Why, 'Liza, what do ail you ?" he stammered. Before company he addressed her as Mrs. Tally ; when things ran smoothly or when they were in distress he called her " wife " ; but when she was in one of her moods it was always 'Liza. " Don't you try to brazen it out. You know what it is, an' it's got to end right now," she declaimed. " I want to know what folks mean by their speech of your haulm" coffins at night ; I want to know what takes you out nights when you oughter be in bed — I ain't speakin of temp'rance meetin's ; I mean the night you was out nigh on to daybreak. I want to know why the tool-house is locked up." Mr. Tally leaned against the wall and shook with silent laughter. " You laugh at me ! " she cried ; and a red hand, broadened by many churnings, was upraised. Before the blow could fall he had caught her wrists and held her gently, but with a force she was unable to resist. "Thanks be to God, you didn't!"' he ejaculated. "Could we ever again have spoke of Joe if you'd hit his father .' "' Cowed by his words, and frightened at her betiayal of self, she let him lead her back to the kiichen and &it her down in the chair always reserved for her use. in a sheltered corner of the fireplace Then, standing before her, he took a key from out his trousers' pocket and spoke thus (and if his vocabulary was small, there wasa homely dignity in the manner in \\ hich he delivered his thoughts) : "I knowed your desirements to know lor what 1 locked the tool-house up ; but I had no forknow lodge or conceit that it was a-wearin' on you, 'Liza. If I told you, no one would bo sorrier nor yourself ; but I'm goin' to put this here key on the mantelpiece, nn' I ain't goin' to forbid you to make u?e on it ; but I ask you not to. Howsoever, //'your fcm ale di'spc-ilion^ so far overcome you, I won't hold on to it again you ; hut you 11 be a sorry woman lor h;uin" given way to your 1 eel in'- 5 . 1 seiwcl s'lmoihin' was the niaiter endurin' of supper : an", had 1 knowed it vsould a come to hittm . I'd a put this hero key -where I puN it now afore this." lie laid the shining brass key on the mantelpiece find continued : "There ii be! But afore I go — an' I must go quick, or 111 he there time to come back— don't you, ' Liza, tor jour pcacj of mind lay hand on that key." Her heart misgave her when '■he looked on the saddened face of her husband ; but she did not speak or uio\ c till she heard the outer door close and the order he g.ue for the hay mare to be brought out to him ; then a gleam of triumph lit up her countenance, ami &he muttered : " I knowed I'd yet the whip-hand ' " Strange to relate, Mrs Tally never loved her husband more dearly than she did at that moment ; and for that moment all thought of the tool-house keypassed from her mind. Rising from her chair, she went to a cupboard, and took from its topmost shelf — she had to climb on to a chair to reach it — a teapot that had been her mother's, and spread on a table its contents, consisting of little rolls of silver money. "Enough to buy him a complete new outfit, includin' hat an boots ; an' he ain't got the least idea I've been savin' it out of the butter money I Now we're square,"' her meditation continued, and she looked up at the shining key. " I'll tell him to-morrow, an' he can get 'em afore Christmas-." The money was counted over till a glance at the clock made her shuffle it hastily back in the teapot, which she carefully deposited in the place from whence it had been tak^n. I'or Mrs Tally had no idea of letting slip the opportunity an or Jed her to open the toolhouse ; and if she did not wish her husband to return before her uriosity had been gratified, she must make haste. A lantern containing a lighted candle in one hand, the brass key grasped in the other, Mrs Tally stole out of the house, and over the path across the farm-yard to the tool-house. It was a starry night, crisp and cold; and Mrs Tally shivered — partly because she was chilled, and partly because her uneasy conscience foreboded tiouhle. The door was hard to open, and creaked on its hinge.- when she pushed it back. Lifting the lantern above her head, she levied into the darkness of the tool-house, uttered a cry of dismay, and half fell, half seated herself on a trestle standing near the doorway. The lantern still grasped in her hand, she stared before her at the frame packing-cases that occupied almost all the spare lomn in the tool-house, and she was ashamed of herself —bitterly a-hnnud. She did not know what she had expected to find ; but surety it had not been the cabinet she covettd, the sections of which were visible through the interstices of the frame packing-cases !

Here, then, was the meaning of Joe's journey's at night. He had gone then to the freight depot to fetch and put in hiding this gift for his wife while she slept. This, then, was Joe's secret ; this the reason for his going about in shabby clothes ; this was why he had denied himself the trip to the State Fair. And she had denied him his Christmas surprise for her ; she had thought him stingy — she who had made so much to herself of the butter money ; 6he who had raited her hand to him. " Will God forgive me ? " she asked herself. She did not sit there long 1 , but rose and locked the door ; and, not in haste, but slowly and in pain of mind, went back to the kitchen to wait Joe's return. When he came in he found her sitting, with drooped head, the key held in her hand. " I seen it ! " she sobbed, and held out the key. " I can't never forgive myself." Joe sat down beside her and took her hand in his. " I won't deny as I wish you'd stood it out ; but its over an' done, wife," he said. '• Not till I tell you all ! " she cried ; and when she had ended her confession of the evil she had thought of him, she said : " h was the idea of your havin' a secret from me upset me ; an. Joe, I'm ashamed to tell you, but in mother's teapot there's that I've been a-savin' for you to get a new suit of clothes." " So you had a secret from me, wife ! " answered Joe, and he laughed. Mrs Tally laughed too ; but hers was only the ghost of a laugh. As the reformation of her temper, begun that night, rounds out, her laugh will acquire body. — Harold Dijon, in the Aye J/tiriu.