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No doubt he feels reason for gratitude; but how many men does one know who can be truly grateful? That's what I like in Mr. Lashmar; he has character as well as intellect." "But how do you mean, Mrs. Toplady?" inquired May, losing something of her polish in curiosity. "Why should my aunt have wanted him to marry Miss Bride?" "Ah, that I don't know.
But in little ways, an' because it was secunt nature, just helpin', helpin', helpin' ... Mis' Holcomb-that-was-Mame-Bliss, Liddy Ember, Abagail Arnold an' her husband, that was alive then, hurryin' to open the home bakery to catch the funeral trade on the funeral's way back, Amanda an' Timothy Toplady rattlin' by in the wagon an' 'most likely scrappin' over the new springs ... an' all of 'em salt good at heart.
At nine o'clock next morning, Lashmar and Constance sat down to breakfast alone. Mrs. Toplady rarely showed herself much before noon. "If the sky clears," said Constance, "Lady Ogram will drive at eleven, and you are invited to accompany her." "And you?" asked Dyce. "I have work for two or three hours." Lashmar chipped at an egg, a thoughtful smile upon his countenance.
It is only fair to notice these facts, because his controversial writings might convey a very different impression of the character of the man. Toplady is described by his biographer as 'the legitimate successor of Hervey. There are certain points of resemblance between the two men.
Toplady had observed that May's tone in speaking of Lashmar lacked something of its former vivacity. The change had been noticeable since the announcement of the philosopher's betrothal. More than that; the decline of interest was accompanied by a tendency to speak of Lashmar as though pityingly, or perhaps even slightingly; and this it was that manifested itself in May's last remark.
Such a one was Adam of Winteringham, the author of a once very popular devotional book, entitled 'Private Thoughts, and his friend and neighbour Archdeacon Bassett of Glentworth. Such a one was Augustus Toplady, about whom enough has been said in connection with the Calvinistic controversy.
But how, I wondered, as my guests assembled, could one "think hard" of any one in Friendship, and especially of the little circle to which I belonged: My dear Mis' Amanda Toplady, Mis' Photographer Sturgis, Mis' Holcomb-that-was-Mame-Bliss, who, since our Thanksgiving, seemed, as Calliope put it, to have "got good with the universe again"; the Liberty sisters, for that day once more persuaded from their seclusion, and Mis' Postmaster Sykes, with, we sometimes said, "some right to hev her peculiarities if ever anybody hed it."
She did not at once show Lashmar the letter; she awaited a moment when he was lulled by physical comfort into a facile and sanguine humour. "Mrs. Toplady must have been in a hurry when she wrote this," was her remark, as, with seeming carelessness, she produced the letter. "Of course she has an enormous correspondence. I shall hear again from her, no doubt, before long."
'Not much, s'e, 'but I guess it's got such a head-start the whol' thing'll go like a shell. An' when we got to the top o' the bank on the other side o' the track, we see it was that way the poorhouse'd got such a head-start burnin' that nothin' could save it, though Timothy Toplady, that was town marshal an' chairman o' the county board, an' Silas Sykes an' Eppleby Holcomb, that was managers o' the poorhouse, an' some more, went puffin' past us, yellin', 'Put it out run fer water why don't you do suthin'? an' like that, most beside theirselves.
The lamps of the village began to signal, lights dotted the fields and gathered in a cosey blur in the valley, and half a mile to westward the headlight that marked the big Toplady barn and the little Toplady house shone out as if some one over there were saying something. "You live here in Friendship?" the girl demanded abruptly. I could show her my house a little way before us.
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