Charlotte part 3
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"Lottie," Minnie Brown told Charlotte Larson, "I've seen the new preacher." As Minnie's father was an important man in the Oriskany Methodist Episcopal church, Minnie had helped the new preacher's family move in every July for the past three years.
"So?"
"He's young. And single. And he looks dreamy."
Charlotte wondered what a single preacher would do in the parsonage. It was larger than the house which accommodated her family of six and their maid of all work. Rev. Woods had shut up some rooms; and he had been married, though his children were long grown.
Charlotte waited until Sunday to see the preacher. Daniel Osborne was young, and he preached loud sermons. He concentrated less on sin than on salvation. After harvest was in, she found what he planned to do with the parsonage. He asked the young people to visit him Sunday evenings. A few families, like the Browns, actually lived in the village, but most of the children would have to borrow the family buggy to get there.
The evenings were fun, though. Rev. Osborne started them off with a prayer and some hymns, but he felt comfortable with secular songs after that. He served (soft) cider or hot chocolate depending on the weather. Only for the worst weather of winter did he cancel those evenings.
Some boys took to giving rides to girls. Rev. Osborne said that this was generous of them, and made no other comment when he performed weddings for two of those couples. Charlotte, however, had no special boy; besides, the Larson buggy usually held her younger brother, Will, and sometimes her sister, Alice, as well. John was too young.
At first, Rev. Osborne played his own piano for those evenings. When the Deetman children came down with chicken pox, Dr. Jenkins quarantined the whole family. Since Mrs. Deetman couldn't play the piano for church, Charlotte was pressed into service. She played for Sarah Deetman's funeral, too; Mrs. Deetman couldn't be expected to play then. George and Hannah recovered, though, and Mrs. Deetman took her usual place at the piano.
"Charlotte," Rev. Osborne said that Sunday evening, "I think I have inflicted my playing on this group enough times. I didn't know you played so well. Could you play for us?" So she played for the youth group. Some of the songs were chosen by those in attendance, but Rev. Osborne took to consulting her after service about what would be suitable and what various people liked.
"Lucky Lottie," said Minnie. "I wish Rev. Osborne wanted to talk with me. Don't you think he looks dreamy?" Charlotte blushed. She thought Reverend Osborne looked dreamy, and sounded dreamy -- especially when he sang.
For that matter, he sometimes appeared in her dreams, but she couldn't talk about those to Minnie. She couldn't talk about them to anybody. In those dreams, Dan Osborne sometimes kissed her.
Minnie could talk about her pash for Reverend Osborne; she had talked a dozen times about her pash for one boy or another. Charlotte daren't mention her emotions concerning Daniel Osborne. They were exclusive to him, and deep, and totally hopeless.
For he was going away that summer. He was a Methodist traveling preacher, and they would never see him again. She was close to crying over that every day, and she did cry the first time one of her friends played James Kerrigan's new song, "Bright Mohawk Valley." She took the sheet and read the words until they burned into her mind.
"There is a new song out about our valley," she told her father. "Can we buy it?"
"Maybe some time. Let's see how we stand after harvest."
"Now. Please, please."
"You have more than enough piano music," her mother said. "If you have to play more songs, learn some more from the hymnal."
"I know many hymns already. I played for the church when Mrs. Deetman couldn't."
"And we were proud of her, Charles," her mother said suddenly. "Could we afford the new sheet music now?"
"If both of you are determined."
The lyrics were every bit as appropriate as she had thought it was, and every bit as sad. "From this valley, they say you are going," she sang when her chores were done. "I shall miss your bright eyes and sweet smile." Then she cried.
"Crying when you are singing ruins your voice," her father said suddenly. She hadn't heard him come in, but dusk was showing outside the windows. "Train yourself to sing without crying." How she could sing that song without crying, she couldn't imagine.
Only her brother, Will, helped her father with plowing, but all of them worked the land during planting season. Once the potatoes were safely in the ground, Charlotte's chores included hoeing and weeding. She had less time to practice the piano, but she took what time she could to practice singing "Bright Mohawk Valley" without crying.
Reverend Osborne's time was coming to an end. "One more Sunday between this one and Annual Conference," he told her while her family waited in the buggy after church. "I want the last youth fellowship to be something special. Can you think of a favorite song for each of your friends?"
She felt daring. "Or maybe one song for Margaret and George."
He laughed. "That's a wedding my successor will perform. You know, being a minister provides many pleasures, aside from serving the Lord. But it provides sorrows as well. Every year, a minister leaves people he cares about dearly. It is even worse on his family."
It was no easier on the congregation, either. She would never see him again. She took the bit in her teeth. "Next week will be special for everybody. Could I play a special song tonight?"
"If you wish. A hymn?"
"A popular song."
She took the sheet music for "Bright Mohawk Valley" with her to the parsonage. Even though they knew the next week would be special, all the young people were in attendance.
They sang hymns and then popular songs. "The last song," Reverend Osborne announced, "is 'Auld Lang Syne.' Before that, Charlotte has a song. Do we sing along, or is this a solo?"
"A solo, if I may."
"You may."
She fumbled the music onto the piano and blushed, but it was too late for second thoughts. "From this valley, they say you are going," she sang, "We will miss your bright eyes and sweet smile..." She managed to keep any sob out of her voice, but she was afraid to turn around at the end because she could feel the tears on her cheeks.
"Well," Reverend Osborne said, "Charlotte and I have something to discuss. Peter, could you drop Will and Sarah at their house on the way to yours?"
"Yessir."
Nobody mentioned "Auld Lang Syne." Everybody went out.
"Charlotte," he said.
"Reverend Osborne." Now her voice did show that she was crying.
"'Dan, ' please."
"Dan," she sobbed. She had dreamed of calling him "Dan."
"Please look at me."
She turned around on the piano stool. He went down on his knees in front of her. "I think I told you that the life of a minister's family has difficulties. They leave friends every year, and the minister's wife learns that the women in the church all know precisely how she should act -- sometimes different groups of women know she should act in contradictory ways.
"So I'm asking you to take on a hard task, but..."
"But?" Did he mean what she thought he meant?
"But would you marry me?"
"Yes. Oh yes." He stood and lifted her into his arms. His kiss was every bit as exciting as she had dreamed it would be. His hug was even more exciting.
He stepped back from her sometime afterwards. "We should tell your parents," he said.
He drove the buggy back. She sat beside him looking totally proper, but her mind was churning from memories of the kiss.
"Reverend Osborne," her mother greeted him as they walked in the kitchen.
"Charles, Bertha," he began.
"Just a moment Reverend," her mother said. "Will, go up to bed."
"But..." said Will.
"Now!" said her father.
Will scooted upstairs. He'd be listening by the grillwork which let hot air from the kitchen warm the rooms. Charlotte had done that often enough.
"Charles, Bertha," Dan began again. "I have asked Charlotte to do me the honor of becoming my wife."
"Are you sure," her father asked, "that the asking went in that direction?"
Charlotte was shocked; nobody else seemed to be.
"I am quite sure," Dan responded. "However, she has done me the signal honor of accepting."
"When do you two plan to have the wedding?" her mother asked.
"We haven't progressed to that question. I must, however, go to annual conference in a little more than a week. After that I will go to a new church. I will prepare a place for her there, and return for the wedding."
"There is no hurry, then?" her father asked.
"Well," Charlotte said. "I am in a hurry."
"I am, too," Dan said. "But there are constraints. I expect the bishop will want to perform the service. If he isn't able, then the new preacher here will do that. But I would like to give the bishop the opportunity. That means letting him set the schedule. I'm sorry; but, as I told Charlotte, being a preacher's wife means letting others set your schedule."
"That," her father said, "is fine."
"Charles," her mother said, "would you drive the preacher back?"
"I can walk," Dan said.
"If you did," her father said, "I would hear about it for a year, and not only from Bertha. Come out with us Charlotte, and wave us good bye." On the porch, he continued, "Excuse me for a moment." He disappeared in the direction of the outhouse.
Dan swept her into another kiss. It was exciting as before, but they were merely holding hands when they heard the outhouse door slam open. The sound surprised Charlotte, because the only time she had heard a similar sound was when there was a high wind from the West. The wind that night was slight and, if anything, from the northeast.
When she had waved them good bye, her mother was standing on the porch beside her. "Come with me," she said. They walked out to a fence and sat on the bottom rail side by side. "I don't want Will and the others overhearing this."
Then she laid out the duties of a wife. Charlotte wasn't totally innocent. She had seen animals, after all, and she knew about girls who had needed to get married. "Anyway," her mother finished, "you might think it strange, at first. But it grows pleasant later. And it is part of being a wife, part of being a woman."
"Very well, mother, I will do my duty." Actually, if the kisses were part of it, she thought that it might grow pleasant quite soon. Not soon enough, of course. The wedding would be months away.
"Would Charlotte Larson come forward," Dan said at the end of the service Sunday. When she did, "I want you all to know that Charlotte has done me the honor of accepting my proposal of matrimony. I thought that I would never see any of your faces again, but -- God willing -- I shall see most of you one more time. And I shall see Charlotte as long as we both shall live."
He took the train out the next day, and kissed her in broad daylight on the platform in front of a dozen people.
She had that memory for the next months, that memory and a few letters. But she didn't have time to moon over either. She was busy on the farm by day and finishing off her trousseau by lamplight. Dan's new church was way over in Cortland. He wrote a full description of the parsonage.
The wedding was scheduled for after the harvest. Finally, the day arrived. Dan came on the Tuesday night train and lodged with the Browns. She would not see him until the evening wedding. The bishop arrived Wednesday morning; Reverend Springer, the new preacher, put him up in the parsonage.
The wedding was lovely, and Dan spoke his vows with a strong voice. She choked hers out through tears. Her mother was crying worse than she was. "You may," the bishop finally said, "kiss the bride." This kiss was even more thrilling than the previous ones had been.
When Mrs. Deetman came to congratulate them afterward, Dan fished in his pocket. "I want to thank you for your fine playing," he said and held out a five-dollar gold piece.
"The charge," Mrs. Deetman said, "is the same as the charge for Sarah's funeral." She put her hands behind her back.
"Funerals are different," Dan said. "I charge for performing weddings."
"Sarah would come back from her grave to haunt me if I charged for playing at Lottie's wedding." When Dan put the coin back in his pocket, Mrs. Deetman hugged Charlotte.
"You were not supposed to deal with the congregation after I was appointed," Reverend Springer said.
"And here I am taking the loveliest one away." Dan laughed with Reverend Springer. Then she and Dan had to hurry to the train station.
The trip took all night, including an hour waiting for the connection. Dan asked her about her summer for the first part of the trip, but -- when she ran out -- he soon fell asleep. They had breakfast on the train while it was still moving. This felt strange to Charlotte, but Dan and the other passengers seemed to accept it as normal. When they got to Cortland, a Mr. Ward, one of Dan's new parishioners, was waiting for them with a cart. He and Dan loaded it with Dan's valise and her trunks.
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