"But you must remember how she was born," said Martha Crothers.
"Why, HOW?”
"She was Bessy Talbot from up west. Her father's house caught fire one night and in all the fuss and upheaval Bessy was born ... OUT IN THE GARDEN ... under the stars.”
"How romantic!" said Myra Murray.
"Romantic! I call it barely RESPECTABLE.”
"But think of being born under the stars!" said Myra dreamily.
"Why, she ought to have been a child of the stars ... sparkling ... beautiful ... brave ... true ... with a twinkle in her eyes.”
"She was all that," said Martha, "whether the stars were accountable for it or not. And a hard time she had in Lowbridge where they thought a minister's wife should be all prunes and prisms. Why, one of the elders caught her dancing around her baby's cradle one day and he told her she ought not to rejoice over her son until she found out if he was ELECTED or not.”
"Talking of babies, do you know what Mary Anna said the other day, 'Ma,' she said, 'do QUEENS have babies?'“
"That must have been Alexander Wilson," said Mrs. Allan. "A born crab if ever there was one. He wouldn't allow his family to speak a word at meal-times, I've heard. As for laughing ... there never was any done in HIS house.”
"Think of a house without laughter!" said Myra.
"Why, it's ... SACRILEGIOUS.”
"Alexander used to take spells when he wouldn't speak to his wife for three days at a time," continued Mrs. Allan. "It was such a relief to her," she added.
"Alexander Wilson was a good honest business man at least," said Mrs. Grant Clow stiffly. The said Alexander was her fourth cousin and the Wilsons were clannish. "He left forty thousand dollars when he died.”
"Such a pity he had to LEAVE it," said Celia Reese.
"His brother Jeffry didn't leave a cent," said Mrs. Clow. "He was the ne'er-do-well of that family, I must admit. Goodness knows HE did enough laughing. Spent everything he earned ... hail-fellow- well-met with everyone ... and died penniless. What did HE get out of life with all his flinging about and laughing?”
"Not much perhaps," said Myra, "but think of all he put into it.
He was always GIVING ... cheer, sympathy, friendliness, even money. He was rich in friends at least and Alexander never had a friend in his life.”
"Jeff's friends didn't bury him," retorted Mrs. Allan. "Alexander had to do that ... and put up a real fine tombstone for him, too.
It cost a hundred dollars.”
"But when Jeff asked him for a loan of one hundred to pay for an operation that might have saved his life, didn't Alexander refuse it?" asked Celia Drew.
"Come, come, we're getting too uncharitable," protested Mrs. Carr.
"After all, we don't live in a world of forget-me-nots and daisies and everyone has some faults.”
"Lem Anderson is marrying Dorothy Clark today," said Mrs. Millison, thinking it was high time the conversation took a more cheerful line. "And it isn't a year since he swore he would blow out his brains if Jane Elliott wouldn't marry him.”
"Young men do say such odd things," said Mrs. Chubb. "They've kept it very close ... it never leaked out till three weeks ago that they were engaged. I was talking to his mother last week and she never hinted at a wedding so soon. I am not sure that I care much for a woman who can be such a Spinx.”
"I am surprised at Dorothy Clark taking him," said Agatha Drew.
"I thought last spring that she and Frank Clow were going to make a match of it.”
"I heard Dorothy say that Frank was the best match but she really couldn't abide the thought of seeing that nose sticking out over the sheet every morning when she woke up.”
Mrs. Elder Baxter gave a spinsterish shudder and refused to join in the laughter.
"You shouldn't say such things before a young girl like Edith,” said Celia, winking around the quilt.
"Is Ada Clark engaged yet?" asked Emma Pollock.
"No, not exactly," said Mrs. Milison. "Just hopeful. But she'll land him yet. Those girls all have a knack of picking husbands.
Her sister Pauline married the best farm over the harbour.”
"Pauline is pretty but she is full of silly notions as ever," said Mrs. Milgrave. "Sometimes I think she'll never learn any sense.”
"Oh, yes, she will," said Myra Murray. "Some day she will have children of her own and she will learn wisdom from them ... as you and I did.”
"Where are Lem and Dorothy going to live?" asked Mrs. Meade.
"Oh, Lem has bought a farm at the Upper Glen. The old Carey place, you know, where poor Mrs. Roger Carey murdered her husband.”
"Murdered her husband!”
"Oh, I'm not saying he didn't deserve it, but everybody thought she went a little too far. Yes--weed-killer in his teacup ... or was it his soup? Everybody knew it but nothing was ever done about it.
The spool, please, Celia.”
"But do you mean to say, Mrs. Millison, that she was never tried ... or punished?" gasped Mrs. Campbell.
"Well, nobody wanted to get a neighbour into a scrape like that.
The Careys were well connected in the Upper Glen. Besides, she was driven to desperation. Of course nobody approves of murder as a habit but if ever a man deserved to be murdered Roger Carey did.
She went to the States and married again. She's been dead for years. Her second outlived her. It all happened when I was a girl. They used to say Roger Carey's ghost WALKED.”
"Surely nobody believes in ghosts in this enlightened age," said Mrs. Baxter.
"Why aren't we to believe in ghosts?" demanded Tillie MacAllister.
"Ghosts are interesting. I KNOW a man who was haunted by a ghost that always laughed at him ... sneering like. It used to make him so mad. The scissors, please, Mrs. MacDougall.”
The little bride had to be asked for the scissors twice and handed them over blushing deeply. She was not yet used to being called Mrs. MacDougall.
"The old Truax house over harbour was haunted for years ... raps and knocks all over the place ... a most mysterious thing," said Christine Crawford.
"All the Truaxes had bad stomachs," said Mrs. Baxter.
"Of course if you don't believe in ghosts they can't happen," said Mrs. MacAllister sulkily. "But my sister worked in a house in Nova Scotia that was haunted by chuckles of laughter.”
"What a jolly ghost!" said Myra. "I shouldn't mind that.”
"Likely it was owls," said the determinedly sceptical Mrs. Baxter.
"MY mother seen angels around her deathbed," said Agatha Drew with an air of plaintive triumph.
"Angels ain't ghosts," said Mrs. Baxter.
"Speaking of mothers, how is your Uncle Parker, Tillie?" asked Mrs.
Chubb.
"Very poorly by spells. We don't know what is going to come of it.
It's holding us all up ... about our winter clothes, I mean. But I said to my sister the other day when we were talking it over, 'We'd better get black dresses anyhow,' I said, 'and then it's no matter what happens.'“
"Do you know what Mary Anna said the other day? She said, 'Ma, I'm going to stop asking God to make my hair curly. I've asked Him every night for a week and He hasn't done a thing.'“
"I've been asking Him something for twenty years," bitterly said Mrs. Bruce Duncan, who had not spoken before or lifted her dark eyes from the quilt. She was noted for her beautiful quilting ... perhaps because she was never diverted by gossip from setting each stitch precisely where it should be.
A brief hush fell over the circle. They could all guess what she had asked for ... but it was not a thing to be discussed at a quilting. Mrs. Duncan did not speak again.