Hawaii - James Michener [90]
Mrs. Bromley fell back in her damasked chair, then collected herself and called a servant. "Go fetch Mr. Bromley immediately," she ordered.
"I did not come here to talk to your husband," Eliphalet protested.
"It is my husband, not God, who is Jerusha's father," Abigail replied.
"Blasphemy!"
"No, love!"
The brother and sister sat in hateful silence until Charles Bromley, rotund, jovial, successful and overfed, came into the room. "Family fight?" he asked robustly.
"My brother Eliphalet . . ."
"I know who he is, dear. Just call him Phet." He laughed and added, "I've found in these matters that if you can get the litigants to start off on an informal basis it's so much better. If you call a man 'My brother Eliphalet,' why, out of self-respect you've almost got to wind up in court. What r'ya up to, Phet?"
"A fine young man in the divinity school at Yale College is about to depart as a missionary to Owhyhee . . ."
"Where's Owhyhee?"
"Near Asia."
"Chinese?"
"No. Owhyheean."
"Never heard of it."
"And he was much impressed with what I had to say about my niece Jerusha."
"How did her name come up?" Bromley asked suspiciously.
"It's humiliating," Abigail sniffed. "Eliphalet's going around peddling our daughter. To get her married."
"I think it's very generous of him, Abby," Bromley exploded. "God knows I haven't had much success peddling her. One week she's in love with a sailor, whom she hasn't seen for three years. Abby, did that sailor ever even kiss her?"
"Charles!"
"And the next week she's in love with God and self-punishment on some distant island. Frankly, Phet, if you could find her a good husband I'd be obliged. I could then spend my efforts on her two sisters."
"The young man of whom I speak is Abner Hale," Thorn said stiffly. "Here's what his professors think of him. I visited his home . . ."
"Oh, Eliphalet!" his sister protested.
"In the guise of satisfying myself as to his Christian upbringing."
"And was it a good Christian home?" Bromley inquired.
"It was," Eliphalet replied. "In every respect."
Charles Bromley paced the handsomely decorated room for several moments, and then said unexpectedly, "If you say it was a good Christian home, Phet, I'm sure it must have been horrible indeed. I can see young Abner Hale right now. Skinny, bad complexion, eyes ruined through too much study, sanctimonious, dirty fingernails, about six years retarded in all social graces. And yet, do you know, as I watch life go past here in Walpole, it's often those boys who in the long run turn out to be the best husbands."
In spite of himself, Reverend Thorn always admired the acuity of his brother-in-law's mind, so now he added what he had never intended saying: "Charles and Abigail, this young man is all the things Charles has just predicted. But he's also a dedicated man, extremely honest with himself, and one who is going to grow in grace. I wouldn't want him as a son-in-law now, but in ten years he'll be the best husband a woman could have."
"Is he as tall as Jerusha?" Abigail asked.
"Not quite, and he's a year younger."
Mrs. Bromley began to cry, but her gruff husband joshed her. "You know how it is, Phet! This sailor that Jerusha fell in love with . . . Some ridiculous dance here in Walpole . . . He's a cousin of the Lowells, I think . . . I've always thought it was her mother who fell most completely in love that night. These tall men with commanding eyes!" He patted his own rotund belly and coaxed his wife away from her tears.
"It amounts to this," Eliphalet said bluntly. "You have a daughter and I have a niece. We both love her very much. She's twenty-two, and she grows more confused each day. We must find her a husband. We must help her choose a way of life. I offer both."
"And I appreciate the offer,"