Full Ebook of Interpreting Religion Making Sense of Religious Lives 1St Edition Erin F Johnston Vikash Singh Eds Online PDF All Chapter
Full Ebook of Interpreting Religion Making Sense of Religious Lives 1St Edition Erin F Johnston Vikash Singh Eds Online PDF All Chapter
Full Ebook of Interpreting Religion Making Sense of Religious Lives 1St Edition Erin F Johnston Vikash Singh Eds Online PDF All Chapter
https://ebookmeta.com/product/the-religious-sense-new-revised-
edition-giussani/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/making-sense-of-pakistan-1st-
edition-farzana-shaikh/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/making-sense-of-cybersecurity-1st-
edition-thomas-kranz/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/making-sense-of-world-history-rick-
szostak/
Making Sense Of The Future 1st Edition Rick Szostak
https://ebookmeta.com/product/making-sense-of-the-future-1st-
edition-rick-szostak/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/making-sense-of-statistical-
mechanics-1st-edition-jean-bricmont/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/making-sense-of-
cybersecurity-1-converted-edition-thomas-kranz/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/making-sense-of-ai-our-algorithmic-
world-1st-edition-elliott-anthony/
https://ebookmeta.com/product/why-making-sense-of-god-s-will-1st-
edition-adam-hamilton/
INTERPRETIVE
LENSES
IN
SOCIOLOGY
Interpreting
Religion
Making Sense
of Religious Lives
Edited by
Erin F. Johnston
and Vikash Singh
INTERPRETING
RELIGION
Interpretive Lenses in
Sociology series
Series editors: Thomas DeGloma, Hunter College,
City University of New York, and Julie B. Wiest,
West Chester University of Pennsylvania
Interpreting Subcultures
Sense-Making From Insider and Outsider Perspectives
Edited by J. Patrick Williams
Positive Politics
Interpreting Right and Left Authoritarianism
Edited by Lynn S. Chancer and Neil McLaughlin
The right of Erin F. Johnston and Vikash Singh to be identified as editors of this work has been
asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved: no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or
otherwise without the prior permission of Bristol University Press.
Every reasonable effort has been made to obtain permission to reproduce copyrighted material. If,
however, anyone knows of an oversight, please contact the publisher.
The statements and opinions contained within this publication are solely those of the editors and
contributors and not of the University of Bristol or Bristol University Press. The University of
Bristol and Bristol University Press disclaim responsibility for any injury to persons or property
resulting from any material published in this publication.
vii
INTERPRETING RELIGION
Index 271
viii
List of Figures and Tables
Figures
9.1 Heritage spectrum –wide lens: practitioner spectrum across 216
the horizontal axis and institutional spectrum along the
vertical axis
9.2 Heritage spectrum for FPMT: practitioner spectrum across the 219
horizontal axis and institutional spectrum along the vertical axis
10.1 Variation across affiliated and unaffiliated respondents 238
10.2 Variation across nonreligious typologies, 2014 240
10.3 Variation across nonreligious typologies, 2016 240
Tables
9.1 The “who”: some terminologies for practitioners of 205
Buddhism outside Asia
9.2 The “what”: some terminologies for Buddhist institutions 210
and practices outside Asia
9.3 Heritage spectrum prime: parameters for practitioner axis 213
9.4 Heritage spectrum prime: parameters for practice/institution axis 214
10.1 Description of nonreligion measures 237
ix
Notes on Contributors
x
Notes on Contributors
xi
newgenprepdf
INTERPRETING RELIGION
xii
Series Editors’ Preface: Interpretive
Lenses in Sociology – On
the Multidimensional Foundations
of Meaning in Social Life
An extended series introduction is available for open access download at: bristoluniversitypress.
co.uk/interpretive-lenses-in-sociology.
xiii
INTERPRETING RELIGION
xiv
Series Editors’ Preface
xv
INTERPRETING RELIGION
In this inaugural volume, Erin F. Johnston and Vikash Singh present a collection
of essays that features different interpretive lenses that scholars use to elucidate
the meanings of religion in social life. As the collection makes evident, those
who study religion might focus on deeply engrained culture structures (as
manifest in collective stories of good and evil or in rituals separating the sacred
and the profane) that bind adherents together into a collective unit, or they
might view religious meaning as emergent in smaller groups, such as families
or local parishes, or as fundamentally arising from lived and embodied practices
that give significance to religious lives and religious selves. They might highlight
the nuances of daily religious life or the significance of religious meaning across
generations. They might also variously see religion as primarily an ideological
system that powerful actors use to dominate others and enforce social exclusion,
or alternatively as a vital means of resistance to power and domination,
depending on the angles from which they approach their cases. Above all,
however, contributors to this volume show how they combine various tools
in creative ways to reveal the meanings of religion in their cases. Exploring a
range of substantive topics and applying various methods, each contributor
provides their own valuable insights into the social foundations of religious
meaning, and the insights of each differ from the insights of the others. The
sheer diversity of the interpretive lenses illustrated in these pages highlights the
profound breadth and multifaceted character of the field. Thus, this volume
also uncovers new and rich frameworks for dialogue around the themes that
emerge from the ways these various authors reflect on their scholarship, as well
as the ways that Johnston and Singh tie the collection together with their keen
commentary. Scholars and students of religion working from any perspective
will find this book to be an important and refreshing statement on the ways
that we can explore and interpret the meanings of religion and understand
religious lives. We are thrilled to feature this important book as part of our
Interpretive Lenses in Sociology series.
Thomas DeGloma
Hunter College and the Graduate Center, CUNY
Julie B. Wiest
West Chester University of Pennsylvania
Notes
1
On the centrality of meaning in interpretive social analysis, see Reed’s (2011) important
work on interpretation and knowledge, especially his discussions of the “interpretive
epistemic mode” (pp. 89–121) and the “normative epistemic mode” (pp. 67–88).
2
See Reed (2011), especially on the “realist semiotic and the illusion of noninterpretation”
(p. 52).
3
Indeed, this is what Clifford Geertz (1973) meant when he called for “thick description”
in ethnographic analysis.
xvi
Series Editors’ Preface
4
Alfred Schütz ([1932] 1967, pp. 205–6; 1970, p. 273) recognized the layers of interpretation
we point to here when he argued, “The thought objects constructed by the social
scientist … have to be founded upon the thought objects constructed by the common-
sense thinking of [people], living their daily life within their social world. Thus, the
constructs of the social sciences are, so to speak, constructs of the second degree, namely
constructs of the constructs made by the actors on the social scene.” Geertz (1973, p. 9)
made a similar distinction when he argued “that what we call our data are really our
own constructions of other people’s constructions.” See also: Reed (2017, pp. 29–31) on
“interpreting interpretations.” Such a distinction also informs the fundamental premises
of psychoanalysis, as the analyst is always in the business of interpreting interpretations
and unpacking layers of symbolism.
5
See also: Tavory and Timmermans (2014), who advocate engaging the process of research
and interpretation armed with “multiple theoretical perspectives” (p. 35).
References
Garland, D. (2006) “Concepts of Culture in the Sociology of Punishment,”
Theoretical Criminology 10(4): 419–47.
Geertz, C. (1973) “Thick description: Toward an Interpretive Theory of
Culture,” in The Interpretation of Cultures, New York: Basic Books, pp. 3–30.
Reed, I.A. (2011) Interpretation and Social Knowledge: On the Use of Theory in
the Human Sciences, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Reed, I.A. (2017) “On the Very Idea of Cultural Sociology,” in C.E. Benzecry,
M. Krause, and I.A. Reed (eds) Social Theory Now, Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, pp. 18–41.
Schütz, A. (1967 [1932]) The Phenomenology of the Social World, Evanston,
IL: Northwestern University Press.
Schütz, A. (1970) On Phenomenology and Social Relations, Chicago: University
of Chicago Press.
Tavory, I. and Timmermans. S. (2014) Abductive Analysis: Theorizing
Qualitative Research, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
xvii
Introduction: Interpretive
Approaches in the Study
of Religion
Erin F. Johnston
The chapters in this volume cover a lot of ground. The authors draw from
different theoretical and methodological approaches and apply these varied
lenses to a range of empirical and substantive topics, from totalitarianism
in China to the religious beliefs and practices of descendants of Holocaust
survivors. However, what unites these studies is their interpretive approach
to the study of religion (see: Schwartz-Shea and Yanow, 2013; Yanow and
Schwartz-Shea, 2014 for useful overviews). Interpretive approaches are
centrally concerned with meaning and meaning-making; “Humans making
meanings out of the meaning-making of other humans … this is the heart of
what it means to be an interpretivist” (Pachirat, 2014). Interpretive scholars
document and analyze the meanings people give to objects, experiences,
events, actions, practices, and people (including themselves) as well as the
process of meaning-making –how meanings are constructed, established,
transmitted, debated, contested, and changed. Interpretive scholars also
examine the implications of meaning, documenting how and in what ways
meanings matter. Meaning, from this perspective, whether expressed via
discourse, ritual, or emotion, not only reflects but constitutes social realities
and social action. Finally, interpretive approaches share core assumptions
about meaning-making, analyzing meaning as intersubjective, relational, and
situated in particular communities and contexts. As a result, interpretively
inclined researchers emphasize the importance of scholarly reflexivity –a
commitment rooted in the acknowledgement that scholarly work is itself
an act of world-construction, one that intersects in myriad ways with the
interpretive work of the people and groups we study.
1
INTERPRETING RELIGION
2
Introduction
new possibilities for action at the individual and collective level, becoming
an important basis for the affirmation of queer Christians as full-fledged
members of the religious community. O’Brien’s analysis of the shifting
narrative options available to queer Christians vividly demonstrates the
“recursive relationship between the availability or source of scripts, self-
understanding, and self-presentation.”
Janet Jacobs’s chapter (Chapter 2) examines “spiritual worldviews and
ritual innovation” among descendants of Holocaust survivors. In doing so,
Jacobs positions religion not just as a vehicle for the memorialization of the
past or a mechanism in the transmission of trauma –but also as a means
through which the present and future are creatively reimagined. Drawing on
rich life history data, Jacobs explores how religion shapes and is shaped by
the realities of genocide and its associated trauma. Her research foregrounds
the family as a site of religious formation and the role of history, memory,
and trauma in shaping the dynamics of religious socialization. Jacobs shows
how religious traditions and historical events are refracted through familial
practices, relationships, and histories. Her work also, however, highlights “the
adaptive and creative religious responses” of descendants who not only draw
from but also modify the traditions and practices that marked their religious
upbringings. The ritual innovations she documents seek to both preserve
religious heritage and “move beyond a familial legacy of pain and suffering.”
In doing so, Jacobs’ chapter deftly captures the dynamic interplay between
stability and change, institutions and individuals, history and the present.
Interpretive approaches are sometimes pigeon-holed and straw-manned
as only interested in the (relatively inconsequential, so it is argued) realm
of the discursive –meanings that are conscious, explicit, and deliberative.
However, implicit, automatic, and “embodied” cognitions are themselves
acts of meaning-making, as much of interest to the interpretive scholar as
texts, narratives, and discourses. Automatic and habitual responses –such as
emotions and moral judgments –reflect deeply ingrained cultural schema
(Vaisey, 2009) and can be interpreted as evidence of meaning-in-action.
Moreover, the experiential/embodied and the conceptual/discursive are
not wholly separate but deeply intertwined. Interpretive scholars are well-
positioned to attend to the dynamic relationships between the explicit and
implicit, as Daniel Winchester’s chapter on enactive ethnography demonstrates
(Chapter 3; see also: Pagis, 2010; Winchester and Green, 2019).
Winchester argues that “doing it” –taking on the religious practices and
activities of those we seek to understand –can help researchers elucidate
the visceral nature and experience of religious practices for practitioners.
Religious people, after all, not only inhabit symbolic worlds but embodied
and sensual ones, as well (see also: Neitz and Spickard, 1990). And religious
practices not only reflect symbolic worlds –as texts to be read (Geertz,
1966) – but also shape meaning-making “below the level of explicit
3
INTERPRETING RELIGION
4
Introduction
5
INTERPRETING RELIGION
6
Introduction
material reality, call people to fulfill moral obligations and require acceptance
based on faith, then it’s a religion, consciously or not.” This chapter, like
Wang’s, convincingly demonstrates that the conceptual and interpretive
“tools in the repertoire of sociological inquiry of religion” (Wang) –such
as the sacred/profane, rituals and rites, and the transcendent –can help us
better understand seemingly secular ideological formations.
Beyond merely documenting homologies between religion and white
male ethnonationalism, Lundskow’s chapter also illustrates the very real
consequences of this ideology. Focusing on two key historical moments –US
reconstruction after its civil war, and the 20th century labor movement –
Lundskow examines how this “faith” has “thwarted racial reconciliation and
material social progress,” over and often against material interests. At both
historical moments, “many whites chose a violent white supremacy and a
majority chose to at least tolerate it, even if it meant lower income and quality
of life for themselves as well.” White male ethnonationalism, Lundskow
argues, “played the role of religion” by providing “religious validation” for
wealthy, white Americans to pursue “ever more wealth and power.” For
Lundskow, whiteness, like religion, provides “consolation,” a consolation
strong enough to justify “racist discrimination and violence” and preclude
the development “common human identity and socioeconomic progress for a
broad multitude.” Lundskow’s analysis positions white supremacy as religion –
an ideology that constructs the world and shapes action, in both explicit
(in discourse and narrative) and implicit (in emotion and experience) ways.
Wang’s chapter (Chapter 8) stakes out a different position regarding the
relationship between religion and secular ideologies. He argues that we
should discard the boundary between the religious and pseudo-religious
entirely and instead acknowledge that not only is “the religious social” but
“the social is religious.” His analysis of totalitarianism in China shows that
the modern state does not merely demonstrate homologies with religion but
is founded on secular theological concepts, a “miraculous founding gesture”
and worship of a charismatic leader. On the one hand, the new state is built
on the “traditional imaginary” of the Emperor and his minions. Yet, there
was also something new –the treatment of Mao as a god to be worshipped.
The Evil Others in this ideological formation are the small business people
and landowners who must be “purged” in the process of social change.
Ultimately, Wang argues that, “[m]odernity, despite its insistent rejection of
religion in the names of reason and science, has populated the world with
its own deities and created its own sphere of the sacred and the profane.”
His chapter traces the lingering vestiges of religion in the seemingly secular.
Regardless of their very distinctive differences in substantive focus,
theoretical frameworks, and/or methods deployed, each of the chapters in this
volume illustrates the core commitments that mark the interpretive approach.
The authors foreground meaning and meaning-making, and acknowledge
7
INTERPRETING RELIGION
Scholarship as interpretation
We also see in this volume the importance and centrality of reflexivity in
interpretive research. Each chapter reminds us of the need for close attention
to how we, as scholars, make sense of the people, events, and processes
we study. Scholarly work is itself an act of interpretation. Our data does
not “speak for itself ”: We must make sense of our observations and then
convey the meanings we find there to our often-varied audiences. And
ultimately, as Winchester argues in his chapter on enactive ethnography, no
matter how close we come to capturing the reality of religious lives, we are
always “translating religious actions, beliefs, and experiences into the secular
vernacular of our social science.” We are, as Winchester notes, “playing a
different kind of language game” than those whose lives we study.
The scholarly interpretive process often requires that we categorize and
classify what we observe, creating labels, names, and typologies out of the
people, events, objects, stories, and lives we study. Categories and concepts
are important foundations for understanding and knowledge, scholarly or
otherwise. Without shared categories (and shared definitions of them), we
can end up talking past one another and struggle to generate cumulative
knowledge. However, as several chapters in this volume show, acts of
classification are always fraught: categories are debated and contested among
scholars themselves, between scholars and those they seek to understand,
and within and between the communities they study. The disaggregation
of existing categories can move us toward greater accuracy and nuance in
our classifications, but questions will always arise about which dimensions
matter most and where and how to draw the boundaries between sub-groups.
The categories scholars use are not just matters of semantics. They have real
impact. Categories can easily mask or obscure reality as much as they reveal
it, changing the way we understand and see the world around us.
Evan Stewart’s chapter on nonreligion, for example, (Chapter 10)
asks: What does it mean to be “nonreligious”? In asking this question, Stewart
acknowledges the interpretive challenge faced by scholars: “nonreligious”
means different things to different people. The meaning of nonreligion
8
Introduction
varies at the individual level (What do people mean when they claim
“nonreligious” as an identity?) and the collective level (How are the
nonreligious or nonreligiosity understood in different communities and
societies?), as well as among scholars (How do scholars define the boundaries
and content of “nonreligion”? How do different definitions shape what
we think we know about this group?). Stewart shows, for example, that
claiming a nonreligious identity sometimes reflects an active rejection of
religion but in other cases it reflects a general indifference toward religion.
This distinction is substantively meaningful and important. Lumping these
two groups together may obscure important differences in their beliefs,
attitudes, and/or behaviors. The most common solution to this problem has
been disaggregation, as Stewart says: “splitting the broad category of ‘none’
or ‘nothing in particular’ into more finely grained categories of nonreligious
experiences and attitudes.” This strategy has generated a proliferation of
categories: “unchurched believers,” the “spiritual but nonreligious,” and
committed versus passive seculars.
As Stewart points out, however, the creation of new and ever more specific
categories always fails to capture some degree of complexity, generates the
possibility of mis-categorization and oversight, and can cause discordance
and confusion across studies and disciplines which use different systems of
classification. Stewart, however, proposes a way out: rather than measuring
differences in kind, he suggests that researchers measure differences in
magnitude along core dimensions of religion such as belief, behavior, and
belonging. The value of this proposal –to better “map the complexity” –
is demonstrated in Stewart’s empirical examples, which show the varied
combinations and degrees of secularity and nonreligion among those
who fall under the broad umbrella of the nonreligious (as well as those
who identify themselves as religious). He identifies different repertoires
of attitudes toward personal and public religion and maps those patterns
across categorical groupings. In doing so, Stewart finds that some people
who identify as “nonreligious” are more similar to the religiously affiliated
than to other religious “nones” (such as atheists and agnostics). The same
is true in reverse: Some respondents who identify as religious more closely
resemble the unaffiliated in their cultural repertoires.
Jessica Marie Falcone, like Stewart, begins from a place of dissatisfaction
with available scholarly categories; in this case, for identifying and studying
contemporary Buddhists and Buddhisms (Chapter 9). Falcone argues that
existing categories –such as ethnic versus elite, convert versus cradle,
Eastern versus Western –tend to conflate nationality with ethnicity and/
or ethnicity with religious heritage, and as a result, mask a good deal of
variation (and similarity) among practitioners within and across these groups.
They also, Falcone argues, write some people out of the story entirely.
For example, these categories fail to capture people of Asian heritage who
9
INTERPRETING RELIGION
were not enculturated as Buddhists but embrace the tradition later in life,
as well as white, US-born practitioners raised by Buddhist parents. Falcone
proposes a similar solution for overcoming this challenge as the one taken
by Stewart; she proposes a “heritage spectrum,” based on relative degrees
of enculturation (not ethnicity) and along which both practitioners and
traditions can be arrayed. The heritage spectrum, Falcone argues, is “a more
accurate, complex, and inclusive typology” that allows us to capture more
of the nuance and diversity in the life stories and trajectories of Buddhist
practitioners. Both Falcone and Stewart point us toward new approaches
to categorization and classification –approaches which strive to capture and
allow for complexity while also aiming to reduce the complexity enough
in order to communicate meaningful patterns of variations in ways that are
legible to others.
“Getting it right,” however, is not the only issue to consider when reflecting
on the scholarly categories we create. Hjelm’s chapter also reminds us that acts
of definition, classification, and categorization are bound up with power and
social stratification, an important consideration for scholars whose work often
requires creating categories and frameworks of interpretation that necessarily
constrain meaning. Here then, we must also consider how scholarly and “lay”
classifications intersect and interpenetrate in other ways. Falcone, drawing on
the writing of Ian Hacking (Hacking, 1986), acknowledges the potentially
constructive (rather than merely denotative) implications of scholarly
categories. In creating categories, we sometimes participate in the very act
of “making people up” (Hacking, 1986). Stewart, for example, relates that
when sharing his work on nonreligion, he often gets a similar response –
“That’s me!” Similarly, previous scholarly work on religious “nones” and
the “spiritual but not religious” have had the effect of popularizing these
categories, making them available and accessible to individuals who adopt
them as means of self-identification and self-understanding. Our work does
not merely document the world but actively participates in constructing it.
The dialogical relationship between scholar and subject or object of study
is a two-way street. We, too, as scholars and as people, are shaped by our
exposure to and immersion in other social worlds. Jodi O’Brien’s piece on
queer Christian lives vividly illustrates this dynamic interplay. O’Brien’s
chapter traces how her own self-understanding and interpretive frames have
been shaped and transformed by her scholarly work: in hearing the stories
of others, she “has been troubled into an immensely expanded awareness,”
encountering new possibilities for giving meaning to herself and others.
O’Brien’s chapter also acknowledges the ways in which her pre-existing
interpretive frameworks shaped what she chose to study, how she studied it,
and what she found. This constraining effect begins quite early in the research
process: what we find interesting and worthy of research is often rooted in
what piques our curiosity, what we find “puzzling.” For O’Brien, this was
10
Introduction
the lives and identities of those who identified as both queer and Christian, a
combination that she “personally couldn’t make sense of.” O’Brien’s scholarly
frameworks also shaped the questions she asked, leading to early “failures” as
her frameworks of meaning collided with those of the people she sought to
understand. O’Brien, drawing on symbolic interactionist theories of identity
and stigma, assumed that queer Christians were tasked with “managing” the
“double stigma” of being gay and Christian. Her interviewees, however,
pushed back against this framing, arguing that their identity was instead
defined by contradiction. This conflict of interpretive frameworks ultimately
enhanced O’Brien’s understanding of queer Christian lives. It also led her to
(re)consider her own relationship to religion and “the narrowness of [her]
coming out story.” Here, we see a scholar whose work models the kind of
self-consciously subjective stance that Weber saw as foundational to social
scientific research (Weber, 2017).
For others, like Winchester, being affected and transformed by the research
process is a self-conscious and deliberate strategy, a method and means for
understanding. Winchester argues that “doing it” –doing the things the
people we study do –can “unearth layers of religious meaning that would
otherwise remain hidden from view.” Winchester’s goal is to understand
and to explicate the religious worlds of those he practices alongside “from
within”: to better understand how participants experience these practices,
the meanings they give to practice, and the ways in which the corporal
experience and conceptual meanings are deeply intertwined. By enacting
key religious practices, Winchester learns something about what it feels
like to perform the salat (Islamic ritual prayer) or to fast in the Eastern
Orthodox tradition. Doing so provides Winchester important insights into
how those practices help constitute religious meanings and identities. As one
of his interlocutors informed him, the practice of salat does not mean you
are submitting to God, it is submission to God. By taking on this practice,
Winchester seeks to lessen “the interpretive, experiential, and epistemic
space between” himself and those he seeks to understand. In committing
to feeling the pangs of hunger or striving to reorganize his life around the
schedule of salat, Winchester shows how the researcher’s body becomes an
instrument of understanding and knowledge. If meaning is evident in and
intertwined with bodily experience, taking on practices that foster these
experiences can enhance our understanding. This methodological approach,
perhaps more than any other, brings the interpenetration of researcher and
researched into sharp relief. Of course, as Winchester acknowledges, the
lessening of this gap always remains incomplete.
Janet Jacobs, on the other hand, positions herself as both scholar and
witness –an empathetic listener and a “blank slate” on which memories of
the Holocaust and its traumas “are inscribed.” As a witness, Jacobs listens,
empathizes, and validates the stories of research participants. As a scholar,
11
INTERPRETING RELIGION
she aims to capture and convey the meanings and experiences of those she
spoke with, in ways that resonate with those whose stories she tells. Providing
space for these stories to be told and ensuring that those stories are heard
(through presentation and publication) provide witness to the trauma and
challenges these individuals have faced. Yet, just as the religious lives of her
respondents are refracted through familial relationships and histories, so too
are her respondents’ stories refracted through the interpretive lenses of the
author. As scholars, we, too, build symbolic worlds from the varied bits and
pieces we inherit.
Jacobs, Winchester, O’Brien, and Falcone primarily seek to understand
religious worlds “from within” –from the vantage point of the individuals
who inhabit them. They aim to build on and generate experience-n ear (Geertz,
1974) interpretive frameworks. Jessica Marie Falcone’s chapter, for example,
takes seriously the importance of accurately capturing and portraying the
diversity of experiences, identities, and forms of practice among modern
Buddhist practitioners. She strives to generate an interpretive framework
that “fits” with the self-understandings and varied life trajectories of those
she studies. She argues that as scholars, “it is our duty to critique ourselves
toward more perfect categories.” Her goal is to generate interpretive
frameworks that are not only “scholastically useful” but also culturally
contextualized and which “would not be deemed exclusionary by those
we hope to fairly represent in our writing.” Ultimately, Falcone argues for
a nuanced relationship between “emic” and “etic” perspectives: “The etic
vantage point of an anthropology of Buddhism must take into consideration
the emic realities of our interlocutors to ensure that our external, ‘expert’
terminologies are cohesive and true, as well as inoffensive and inclusive.”
Doing so reflects Falcone’s commitment to scholarship as critique: “Because
reframing toward inclusivity is part of a precise, careful scholarship.”
Scholarship acknowledges and bears witness, drawing attention to social
groups and experiences that may otherwise be overlooked.
Other interpretive scholars, however, generate more experience-distant
(Geertz, 1974) interpretations of social life –conceptualizations that do
not necessarily align and may even be actively contested by those who
are the object of study. This does not, however, negate the value (nor
the accuracy and/or usefulness) of the proffered interpretations. George
Lundskow, for example, argues that the actions of white individuals at key
moments in history are best understood as rooted in “the faith of white male
ethnonationalism.” The people whose actions he strives to understand may
(likely would?) disagree with his analysis. Yet, the job of the scholar is not
only to capture meanings from within but to document how actions and
events are shaped by forces and ideas that are not always available to conscious
reflection. From this perspective, “fit” with the experience and meanings
of those being studied is less important than the pragmatic usefulness of the
12
Introduction
scholar’s interpretive framework for “making sense” of the events and social
realities in question. As Hjelm argues, for some scholars, “The question then
is not about truthfulness [or resonance, as the case may be] but usefulness.”
The world constructing power of scholarship is no less evident in
studies that offer more experience-distant conceptualizations –such as
those of Hasnain, Wang, and Lundskow –even as reflexivity is less clearly
foregrounded. In each of these chapters, the authors select particular historical
moments for analysis. These moments are then made understandable in
relation to one another and, perhaps more importantly, in and through the
interpretive work of the authors, who foreground some aspects of these
moments and background others, placing these moments in conversation
with conceptual and theoretical frameworks in an attempt to “make sense” of
these events. Here, as in the other chapters, scholarship itself is clearly an act
of interpretation, one that can have effects beyond academic understanding.
Regardless of the author’s primary goals –whether it is to provide a
detailed description of the life worlds of those being studied from within or a
more experience-distant account of how ideologies shape history –scholarly
work is always rooted in acts of interpretation. The interpretive frameworks
scholars deploy and those which they develop can enable new forms of
understanding, but they also foreclose and constrain interpretive horizons.
Scholarly work implies or lends itself to particular “action orientations” (as
Titus Hjelm’s chapter defines it), whether intentionally or not. Interpretive
scholars, focused on the contextualization of meaning-making, are well-
positioned to acknowledge and analyze their own interpretive processes as
well as the dynamic interplay between scholarly and “lay” interpretations.
Ultimately, as the chapters in this volume show, the research process
mirrors, in many ways, our object of study: interpreting religion is itself an
unfolding, dynamic, and constitutive process which is generated through
both deliberative reflection and embodied understanding.
13
INTERPRETING RELIGION
14
Introduction
with these identities; they are more interested in how those identities are
constituted –how people make sense of themselves and when, whether,
and how possibilities for self-understanding change or evolve over time.
Religion, from the interpretive perspective, is neither dependent variable
nor independent variable (Yamane, 2000; Smilde and May, 2015) but rather
a process and a context –an array of practices, objects, places, institutions,
interpretive frameworks and cognitive schema, that are both constructed by
and construct religious lives.
The chapters in this volume demonstrate the breadth of interpretive
research on religion and make clear that interpretive studies continue
to enhance and enrich our understanding of religion and religious lives.
They show us that religious meanings are sometimes explicit, evident in
discourses, texts, and narratives as well as in rituals and practices (which
can themselves be ‘read’ as texts), and other times implicit, situated in the
pre-reflective realms of ideology, cultural schema, bodily habits, emotions,
and sensations. The contributing authors consider the religious meanings of
individuals (and how those meanings come to be “experientially persuasive”
[see Winchester]) as well as the varied meanings people, including scholars,
give to religious groups and to religion itself (see Hasnain, and Hjelm). They
variously foreground the importance of practice, discourse, and/or categories
in making sense of religion’s role in social life. These different starting
points lead the authors to ask different questions, use different methods,
and ultimately, come to different conclusions. The relative strengths (and
weaknesses) of these different approaches emerge in relation to the particular
cases and questions being asked. Each starting point, however, reminds us
that meaning and meaning-making are central to religious life and to our
(scholarly) understanding of it. This volume provides an orienting toolkit
for interpretive scholars who seek to make sense of religious life.
While the chapters in this volume demonstrate the continued value
of interpretive approaches in the study of religion, specifically, they
also demonstrate the impossibility of separating the religious from the
nonreligious, of attempting to silo social scientific work on religion as
something separate from the study of culture and society writ large. The
meanings of religion and religious identities are formed and reformed on
the public stage and the claims-making that occurs there is “eminently
political,” blurring the boundaries between religion and politics, identity
and interest (Hasnain). Religious meanings move beyond the boundaries of
formal religious spaces and institutions (Gould). Sacralization, it seems, can
occur anywhere –in soup kitchens (Bender, 2003), hospitals (Cadge, 2012),
at home, and in the workplace (Ammerman, 2013). Likewise, the forms
of meaning and practice that are often thought to mark “the religious” –
transcendence, charisma, ritual, calling, the sacred and profane –can be
fruitfully applied to help us better understand and make sense of events,
15
INTERPRETING RELIGION
groups, people, and processes that at first glance seem decidedly secular (see
Lundskow, and Wang). The “religious” itself is a category that creates and
serves as a symbolic foil to the secular and the nonreligious (Stewart). The
way in which those boundaries are constructed and enacted and the ways in
which they are transgressed (and to what effects) –including for example,
the silences evoked by religious presences as Gould so aptly shows us –are
all matters of import for interpretive scholars not only within but beyond
the study of religion (see Hjelm).
Ultimately, the chapters of this volume enrich our understanding of
social life in spaces far beyond religious institutions, and the insights
generated from them have much broader utility (see also: Guhin, 2014;
Winchester, 2016 on exporting findings from the sociology of religion).
O’Brien’s analysis of how queer Christians make sense of themselves
reveals broader patterns and insights into how individual and collective
meaning-making intersect and intertwine. Winchester’s study of religious
practice illuminates how shared meanings, religious or otherwise, become
“experientially persuasive” (see Winchester). The study of how “religion”
and the “religious” are constructed and deployed as categories, shaped
by power and generating both meaning and exclusion, can help inform
our understanding of how discourse constructs and reflects power,
inequality, and status in other social fields (see Hjelm in this volume; see
also: Taves and Bender, 2012). Interpretive approaches, united by their
focus on meaning and committed to documenting its indeterminacy,
contextualization, and relationship to social structure and power, lend
themselves to nuanced explanations and expanded notions of causality –
ones that are complex, contextualized, and constitutive. Often asking
“how” rather than what or why, interpretive approaches enable us to see the
dynamic and complicated interplay between stability and fluidity, tradition
and innovation, history and the present, as well as between structure and
agency, individual and collective, explicit and implicit, both within and
beyond “the religious proper.”
Note
1
The different approaches outlined are not mutually exclusive, as the chapters in this
volume demonstrate. They are separated here for the purposes of illustration.
References
Ammerman, N.T. (2013) Sacred Stories, Spiritual Tribes: Finding Religion in
Everyday Life, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Ammerman, N.T. (2016) “Lived Religion as an Emerging Field: An
Assessment of its Contours and Frontiers,” Nordic Journal of Religion and
Society, 29(02): 83–99.
16
Introduction
17
INTERPRETING RELIGION
18
1
19
INTERPRETING RELIGION
20
Making Sense of Queer Christian Lives
emerged in the past 20 years. Internet technology has also been a significant
driver in generating new directions and opening new possibilities for queer
Christians. But when I embarked on my original research journey, all this
was yet to come.
In this chapter, I describe some of the shifting narratives of self-
understanding that have emerged among queer Christians in the past two
decades, specifically, apologist and mosaic/radical inclusion scripts. These
narratives of reconciliation reflect sociohistorical contexts and are enacted
through individual engagement with specific reference groups that serve
to authorize or legitimate different ways to be queer and Christian. I also
explore briefly the recursive relationship between the availability or source of
scripts, self-understanding, and self-presentation. A central thread woven into
this chapter is a consideration of how my own self-understanding, and my
subsequent scholarship, have been shaped by this journey of self-articulation
through tension and contradiction.
Shifting narratives
Writing in the early 1980s about his patients and his own experiences,
psychotherapist John Fortunato observed that Christianity is a total meaning
system; it provides a complete ontology for understanding the world and one’s
place in it. According to this system, there is no place for the homosexual.
We are exiles who are “spun off” with no hope of redemption (Fortunato,
1982; and see: O’Brien, 2004). Fortunato describes this exile as the “gay
predicament.” One cannot be a good Christian and also be openly, actively
queer. Until recently, for those of us who came into self-understanding
through the script of Christianity, the realization that we might be sexually
or gender nonconforming presented an irreconcilable quandary –how are we
to know ourselves if our central system of meaning rejects us? When I began
my research in 1995, I was interested in how active, LGBTQ Christians
made sense of themselves and their place within a story in which they were,
according to the dominant narrative, utterly “spun off” from the possibility
of salvation (Fortunato, 1982).
My own interest was in understanding a self-conflict that I personally
couldn’t make sense of. The options for the young Christian coming out at
the time, as I was aware of them, included re-narrating religion as oppressive
and fleeing its binding chains, or remaining closeted and accepting the cloak
of shame imposed by the Christian narrative of homosexual acts as sin. In
Telling Sexual Stories sociologist Ken Plummer (1995) observes that coming
out stories are a discursive experience that provide camaraderie among people
whose queer lives often place them at odds with family and community.
Stories about the anguish of leaving religion and being abandoned by family
were a common part of my own coming out experience and served as an
21
INTERPRETING RELIGION
entrée into a new gay flock. Derisive, judgmental talk about those who stayed
in the church and remained closeted was common in cultivating new gay
friendships and served to establish a situated identity that acknowledged these
conflicting narrative boundaries. Within these “out” circles, there was a subset
of folk whose self-understanding remained deeply tied up with the anger and
pain of being ejected from their childhood galaxy of meaning. They became
the “anti-religion” activists, keeping the church firmly within their hearts
and minds, but as a symbol of fierce resistance. I was part of another subset
who wanted mostly just to move on and put religion behind us, to not let
it take up any more space in our self-story. Thus, when I encountered these
doubly proud queer Christians, I really had no idea how to make sense of
them; there was no place for them in my story.
In addition to my limited personal experience, my initial foray into the field
of queer Christianity was marked by illiteracy in the scholarship of religion.
The sociology of religion that I encountered in the early 1990s focused on
macro-level sociopolitical aspects of religion. Religiosity, or individual-
level experiences in faith-based communities was, like the sociology of
sexualities, marginal to mainstream sociology. I wrote an entire dissertation
on the Mormon “spirit of cooperation” without any formal training in
religiosity. I also neglected to note anywhere in that dissertation my own
cultural background as someone raised in Mormonism. This omission of
subject position would be unthinkable now, but at the time reflected the
stalwart discourse of researcher objectivity in which I had been trained
(O’Brien, 2009). Although it’s embarrassing to look back on now, I carried
two assumptions into my initial fieldwork that reflected this illiteracy: the
normative belief that religiosity is the equivalent of being conservative,
and the notion that my own religious background had no bearing on my
scholarly work.
My hubris and lack of insight rendered me ill-prepared to talk with the
first openly gay, actively Christian folks who agreed to be interviewed.
Using a narrative culled from the interpretive social psychological framework
I was using at the time, I asked subjects to explain how they “managed” the
“double stigma” of being gay and Christian (for example, Goffman, 1963).
The first three interviewees each expressed bewilderment at the question,
one even remarking, “I’m not sure what you mean by double stigma, but
if you mean this contradiction in my life, well, it defines me.” I knew after
those first interviews that I was missing something, that I wasn’t getting it.
Troubled, I backed away to grapple with my own sense that I was imposing
a narrative on these folks that simply didn’t make sense to them. These
reflections led me to consider, perhaps for the first time in my academic life,
my own relationship to religion and the narrowness of my own coming-out
story. From this inside-out place of reflection, I began to hear something
I’d been missing in my conversations with these gay Christians: I am the
22
Making Sense of Queer Christian Lives
23
INTERPRETING RELIGION
receive special love and acceptance. The queer Christians I met came to a
different realization, that of being called to live fully into their contradiction
as a kind of martyr or Christian soldier sent to force fellow Christians to
practice radical acceptance (O’Brien, 2004).
Although it wasn’t available to me at the time, sociologists Tom DeGloma
and Erin Johnston (2019) posit a process of “cognitive migration” that
usefully describes the journey undertaken by queer Christians, a journey
that includes an “awakening,” “self-actualization,” and a “quest.” The logic of
radical inclusivity is deeply embedded in Christian biblical (New Testament)
stories of Christ’s life among the margins of society. Interpreted this way,
queers are in company with lepers, and the poor, and mistreated as those
most deserving of Christ’s love and most emblematic of the gospels’ message.
Centering on this truth and recasting oneself as walking in the margins with
Jesus is a powerful awakening that serves as the basis for a cognitive migration
which is then actualized through confrontations with family and church
community members demanding that they recognize and affirm you as God’s
intended creation. This new self-understanding becomes increasingly more
articulated, and often more political, as individuals speak out against their
“exile” and develop a logic of radical inclusion grounded in principles of
Christian love and acceptance.
Queer Christians who remain in church communities that aren’t fully
welcoming describe a “calling” or quest to educate and move fellow Christians
toward compassion and reconciliation. Collectively, for congregations to
embrace this narrative of acceptance and affirmation requires grappling with
a long-standing tension that is a distinguishing characteristic of different
denominations: beliefs and practices centered in an unchanging biblical
authority (as interpreted by clergy), or a “living” theology that is moved by
the mysteries of God and centered in the practice of unconditional love. The
active presence of queer Christians claiming the position of God’s gift or
sign has forced congregations to wrestle with this tension directly. The result
has been an “open and affirming” movement whereby congregations have
explicitly rewritten their charters around a living, dynamic theology centered
in unconditional love. This movement has been driven by awakened queer
Christians whose self-actualization revolves around ongoing reconciliation
within their own church community and who see this “labor” of “troubling”
exclusionary Christian beliefs and practices as their quest (O’Brien, 2005).
Reconciliation scripts
The proliferation of the internet in the early 2000s ushered in a new day
for queer Christianity and coalesced a myriad of emergent reconciliation
stories into recognizable narrative fields. The seeds sown by early questioners-
turned-activists grew into a full-fledged social movement with the availability
24
Making Sense of Queer Christian Lives
Apologetics
Apologetic strategies argue that queer identity is not inherently sinful
and make the case for the inherent compatibility of LGBTQ people and
Christianity. The intended audience is fellow Christians who require a
biblically authorized identity as the basis for reconciliation. In other words,
this is an insider-focused logic of appeals whereby inclusion and belonging
are bestowed through the legitimating discourses of the dominant group.
Among congregations that accept the logic of a biblically legitimate queer
25
INTERPRETING RELIGION
26
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
"Can't stand them. I went to hear Lohengrin once, and came out
before the last act. I leave out Aida now, too. The good old-timers
suit me, old Trovatore and Martha, and some of the new ones aren't
bad, the ones with catchy music."
"You didn't like Aida?" Gwen fairly groaned.
"Bored me to death. Could hardly sit through it. I wouldn't have, only
the ladies I was with appeared to like it, so I stayed on their
account."
Gwen made no comment but opened the book she had brought, a
copy of Kipling. She had considered his masculine taste in making
the selection. "Now I'll read you my favorite 'Bell Buoy' right here
where we can get the sound of one. 'White Horses' is really my
favorite, but it is not in this volume. I'll read first and then you can
pick out something to read to me."
She opened the book and proceeded to read. Her listener sat with
hands behind his head and Gwen hoped he was impressed, for she
read well. "What do you think of it?" she asked as she closed the
book.
"Well, I can't make out exactly what he's driving at. I'm not a great
one for poetry. Once in a while you come across some rattling good
thing like 'Hans Breitmann's Party,' something that makes you laugh.
I don't mind that sort of poetry."
Gwen slipped the book behind her. "What do you like to read, Mr.
Mitchell?"
"Oh, I don't have much time to do more than run through the
newspapers, or a magazine sometimes when I'm on a train."
"But I thought all Bostonians were very intellectual." There was
disappointment in Gwen's tones at discovery of his especial taste in
literature. She had thought he might declare himself for history, at
least.
"Well, I suppose a good many Boston folks are intellectual. I don't
profess to be. Life's too short to spend over books. I enjoy this free
life," he stretched out his arms bared to the shoulders, "and I like
tennis and golf and that sort of thing, for exercise. I enjoy a nice light
opera with a lot of pretty girls in the chorus, or a good play, not too
tragic a one. I'm pretty fond of a horse and a boat. I shall have a
yacht up here next year, I think."
"A yacht would be lovely," said Gwen brightening. "You could go
cruising all around among the islands."
"Yes, and up the coast to Bar Harbor. Yes, a yacht would be jolly
good fun."
"Shall you be glad to get back to the city, or do you feel as if you
would like to stay up here forever living the free life?" queried Gwen.
"Not forever. Nobody would care to do that who'd ever lived in a city,
unless it were some queer freak like Mr. Williams."
"Don't call him a freak." Gwen spoke with some asperity.
"Well, he's an oddity, at least. I can't make him out. To be sure I don't
know him very well, but it strikes me as queer that a man should
want to live on this island. It's all very well for a summer holiday, but
in winter, no, thank you. Yes, I shall be glad to get back, to see the
fellows at the club, and to put on a different sort of rig from this. It
won't be bad to see the inside of a theatre, either, and go to a first-
class dinner, or a German."
Gwen smiled. She did not despise these things herself. "One looks
at life very differently in the city, doesn't one?" she remarked.
"Yes, there's the fun of it. When I do a thing I want to do it thoroughly.
When I'm at home I do as my neighbors do; when I am here I try to
follow the example of those around me."
"Sensible man! So we will not read any more. Come, let's go around
to the other side, and see what it looks like. We'd better not go back
through the woods, for after the sun goes down it gets pretty dark
and spooky in there, so we will go back by the road."
"You're not afraid? Not when I'm with you?" He spoke tenderly, and
more than ever Gwen declared for the road.
"Not afraid," she said, "but it takes longer, and I don't want to miss
my supper, nor do I want you to miss yours."
"A good substantial reason," returned Mr. Mitchell approvingly. "I
hope it will be a pleasant day to-morrow." He looked at the sky. "Are
you a good weather prophet, Miss Whitridge?"
"Not very, though I should say it would be warm. To-day is warmer
than any we have had for a long time. Any special reason to be
curious about the weather, Mr. Mitchell?"
"I promised Miss Fuller I'd row her over to Jagged Island. It's an
engagement of long standing, you know, and the time is getting
short."
"I remember you promised long ago. Shall you go fishing?"
"Perhaps we shall try our hands at it."
"Cap'n Ben says that the steamboats and launches are beginning to
scarcen the mackerel and that they are not so plentiful this year as
usual."
"Scarcen is a good word."
"So I think. I shall adopt it from henceforth. Cap'n 'Lias Hooper's
vessel, the Mary Lizzie, sails to-morrow," remarked Gwen casually,
"so yours will not be the only fishing expedition that goes out."
The sun was setting in a mass of rolling clouds. The air soft and
warm, even as it blew over stretches of water, was of a more
languorous quality than usual. The waves stole in gently, lapping the
stones with a placid murmur. The cove was as smooth as glass,
except where a boat, manned by two rowers, left a brilliant line of
ripples in its wake. The floors of the great chasms indenting the
shores, displayed long ropes of maroon-colored kelp where the tide
had gone out. The main land, beginning at the Neck, stretched its
curving fingers out into the quiet sea as if it would clutch the islands
beyond and draw them into safe keeping against a time when great
breakers should threaten them. Gwen and her companion stood
watching the sky till the sun disappeared behind the piled-up clouds,
which, showing golden edges, drifted off towards the horizon, finally
hiding the distant mountains from view. Retracing their steps the
man and maid went on down hill toward the road, and further to
where they must skirt Little Harbor. Just at this point Gwen gave a
quick glance toward a cottage close to the cove shore, and on the
porch caught sight of a man standing, with folded arms, looking out
upon the water. She gave a gentle sigh as she went through the little
gate on the opposite side of the way.
The next morning was balmy and still, only a slight breeze filled the
sails of Captain Hooker's fishing schooner which passed out of the
cove. Gwen standing on the rocks, watched it slipping slowly by.
Some one on the vessel blew a long blast upon a horn, and
presently, further on, a group of women gathered to watch the vessel
out of sight, and to wave farewell to those on board. In the group
Gwen distinguished Almira Green and Ora. She remembered that
Manny was going out to the Banks that day with the other fishermen.
"Poor little Ora!" said the girl to herself. "And poor Almira, too," she
added. "I am glad to have no lover who must follow the high seas."
She watched the vessel grow smaller and smaller, and presently her
attention was attracted to a smaller craft, a little row-boat moving
steadily toward Jagged Island. "I believe there are Ethel and Mr.
Mitchell!" she exclaimed. "Joy go with you, my dears! I am absolutely
convinced that I could not stand a man who preferred comic operas
to 'Aida,' and who had no soul above newspapers. You are quite
welcome, Ethel dear. I hope you are prepared with plenty of bait, and
will land your beautiful gold fish." She made a deep curtsey and
laughed. "I am sure he is just about as bony and unpalatable as any
other gold fish would be to me," she said to herself.
She turned her eyes from the small boat to another which had just
rounded the point, and was making toward one of the inner islands.
She looked at it attentively for a moment, then sprang over the rocks
toward the cottage, coming out directly with a pair of field glasses. "I
thought so," she murmured. "Everybody is going out to-day, it
appears. I was sure that was Cap'n Ben's boat. I wonder if he is
going off sketching. He is all alone." The "he" could scarcely apply to
Cap'n Ben. "He is sailing off toward Pond Island. He isn't going
there, I know; I suppose to some point further on. That's the third
boat to go out from here this morning. Dear me! I wonder what I shall
do to-day. It seems a wee bit lonely on the island. Bother! there
comes Miss Henrietta, skipping over the rocks like a hart upon the
mountains. I can't pretend not to see her."
Miss Henrietta, the youngest of the Gray sisters, had arrived at that
uncertain period of life when she hesitated to associate with women
older than herself for fear she might be supposed of the same age.
She, therefore, sought the society of those much younger, hoping to
be accredited with a like youthfulness. Gwen usually tried to avoid
her, not because she did not enjoy older companions, but because,
as she said, Miss Henrietta was the kind who took in at one glance
what you had on, and criticized it afterward. She was always very
ready with suggestion. "You would think," said Gwen to her aunt,
"that Miss Henrietta had a copyright on all possible suggestions, she
is so ready to make them and acts as if you had infringed her rights if
ever you present one of your own to her." To each other Ethel and
Gwen always spoke of Miss Henrietta as "Household Hints." So just
now, Gwen, waiting for Miss Henrietta to come up, knew a
suggestion would be ready, and so it was.
"I just thought I'd run over and tell you," said the elder lady, "that I
find tennis shoes injurious, and I suggest that you don't wear them."
"I haven't found them so," returned Gwen.
"But you will," insisted Miss Henrietta.
"I'll wait till I do," said Gwen a little shortly, but with a smile. "Were
you coming to Wits' End, Miss Henrietta?"
"No, I saw you out here and I thought I'd join you. One tires of one's
elders constantly, don't you think?"
"I never tire of Aunt Cam," replied Gwen, "and we see more of one
another at Wits' End than we do in the city."
"Couldn't you find a prettier name for your cottage?" asked Miss
Henrietta. "Why not call it Rock Rest, or something like that?"
"We don't want to be commonplace, and Wits' End just suits us."
"I see your friend Miss Fuller has gone off with our young man," said
Miss Henrietta, ignoring Gwen's reply. "She is quite a handsome girl.
What do you think of her character, Gwen? I wish some one would
tell her that a red jersey is not becoming."
"I think it is becoming." Gwen set aside the question.
"Oh, never, my dear, never. I don't see how you can think so. Then
she has such a fad for mushrooms; she is forever looking for them.
How she can like such things I cannot see.
"Dear me!" Gwen shook her head. "It is sad that one so young
should have such depraved tastes."
Miss Henrietta looked offended. "I see you are bound to disagree
with me," she said tartly. "By the way, why didn't you go to Jagged
Island with your friends?"
"Perhaps because I didn't want to, and perhaps for other reasons,"
returned Gwen noncommittally.
"Do you think it was quite the thing for them to go off alone in that
way? I am afraid your friend isn't very particular about the
proprieties."
"Why didn't you go, Miss Henrietta?"
"I had other things to do," said she bridling.
"For pity's sake go along and do them," rose to Gwen's lips, but she
said only, "I think we all have plenty to do up here, and that reminds
me I must finish a letter before I go for the mail. As Mr. Mitchell is
away to-day, perhaps you would like me to bring yours, too."
"Oh, if you will." The offer was smilingly accepted, and Gwen
returned to the cottage, leaving Miss Henrietta ready to swoop down
upon the Hardy girls who were coming along the rocks.
"What's the matter?" asked Miss Elliott as Gwen threw herself into a
chair. "You look as if some one had been rubbing you the wrong
way."
"Some one has been. I met Miss Henrietta out on the rocks just now.
She is so picky and so ready to condemn fads and fancies in others
when she is full of them herself. She asked me why I wore tennis
shoes; she found fault with Ethel for wearing red, and for liking to
hunt for mushrooms. She asked me what I thought of Ethel's
character, too. What business is it of hers what I think?"
"She was probably trying to find out if Ethel would make a suitable
wife for your millionaire, Gwen," Miss Elliott said laughing.
"My millionaire? I could never marry a man who reads only
newspapers, who can't appreciate good music, and doesn't know a
poor picture from a fine one."
"If those are your only objections, they don't seem very weighty
ones. He probably reads only newspapers because he is too busy a
man for anything else, and as for the other things, it may be only a
lack of opportunity for studying the best. He may be a very fine man
who would make an estimable husband, and yet not be a
connoisseur in art or music."
"Oh, dear, why is it that the men who would make estimable
husbands must so often be unattractive? I am afraid it isn't lack of
opportunity that's the matter with Cephas. It lies deeper than that.
But his deficiencies will never bother Ethel, so she shall have him. I
think they will suit one another admirably. Are you disappointed, Aunt
Cam, that you must forego his nephewly embraces, and that he is
not to call you 'my dear aunt'?"
"Nonsense, Gwen, of course not. I don't care a rap for him in any
capacity."
"But you think he will suit Ethel. You don't exactly approve of Ethel, I
am afraid."
"Not altogether. I like her. She is very agreeable, and even brilliant,
sometimes. She seems to be a person who has many engaging
charms but few sterling qualities. She has not a spiritualizing effect
upon one, and I am afraid her standards are decidedly of a material
order. I can fancy her quite satisfied without the ennobling things of
life."
"She has a sweet disposition, and she has beautiful theories," said
Gwen thoughtfully.
"But does she practise them?"
"Not when it is inconvenient. I am afraid she is rather a brilliant
butterfly, but she is vastly entertaining."
"What has become of your artist friend?" asked Miss Elliott suddenly.
Gwen immediately became very busy rearranging the pillow on the
divan. "Oh, he's around," she said with apparent indifference. "You
know his sister and the children have gone off for some weeks, so of
course I see nothing of them. I saw him yesterday out sketching. To-
day he has gone somewhere in a boat. Everyone has gone off in a
boat. Ethel and Mr. Mitchell are on their way to Jagged Island,
Manny Green is off for the Banks, and Mr. Hilary has gone up along
to some unknown spot. I am quite desolate without my playmates. I
think I shall have to hunt up Daddy Lu."
But Luther Williams had gone to his favorite haunt in Middle Bay,
Gwen discovered, for no one had seen him since morning. So the
girl returned to the house and busied herself with unimportant things
till it was time for the afternoon's mail. "I'll stop in to see Miss
Phosie," she said as she passed out, "so don't expect me right back,
Aunt Cam." She looked across to Jagged Island wondering if the two
who had rowed over that morning had yet returned. She looked
toward the north to see if Cap'n Ben's little boat were on its way
back, but except for a motor boat chugging along and some white
sails far off there were no vessels visible. So she turned toward the
cove and was soon in Miss Phosie's bright kitchen.
CHAPTER XIV
"THE CLOUDS YE SO MUCH DREAD"
Only Miss Phosie was at home, but she gave a smiling welcome to
her guest. "I see Ora has come back," said Gwen by way of opening
the conversation.
"Yes, she wanted to see Cap'n Hooper's vessel off, I s'pose. Anyway
she wasn't content to stay any longer."
"And Manny has really gone."
Miss Phosie nodded. "I'm happy to say he has. Maybe Ora'll take an
interest in something and somebody else, now. I was hoping she'd
feel inclined to stay at Bangor with her cousins, but here she was
back at the end of a week, and all the difference I can see is, she's
got a bigger lot of hair piled up over her forehead and a gayer hat."
Gwen smiled. She knew Miss Phosie must be more than usually
ruffled to criticize in such a manner. "Perhaps if she were to go away
to school she might forget about the boys here. She is too young to
have her head full of such things." Gwen spoke as one of vast
experience.
"That's what I told her grandpap," returned Miss Phosie, "but he can't
bear to think of her going away for as long as a whole winter. She's
his only grandchild, and he does set such store by her. Won't you
come into the settin'-room, Miss Whitridge, where sister is?"
"If you don't mind my staying here, I'd rather sit with you."
Miss Phosie looked pleased. "Well, that'll be nice," she said. "Two of
our boarders has left, and there ain't quite so much to do. The others
will be going before long, too, and then we can settle down to the old
ways."
"Dear me, when you talk about boarders leaving it makes me feel as
if the summer were nearly over," returned Gwen.
"But you cal'late to stay pretty late, don't you?"
"As late in October as we dare. I must be back by the twentieth."
"Then I hope we shall see more of you," replied Miss Phosie politely.
"Mr. Williams was saying the other day that after the boarders go we
always take more comfort in the cottagers. Them that come and go
just for one season you never feel much acquainted with, but with
them that owns property it's different. They belong here."
"We certainly feel as if we did," Gwen assured her. "I love every inch
of the island."
"That's what Mr. Williams says, and I guess that's why you and him
are such friends. He's real fond of it."
"Where is he to-day?"
"He's gone off in his boat alone. He likes to do that once in a while
and nobody asks him why or wherefore."
"You are very good to him, Miss Phosie. I think it is wonderful that he
should have found such a home here, when he just drifted in,
absolutely unknown, and seems to belong to no one."
"We cal'late he's been long enough in this house to belong to us,"
said Miss Phosie a little defiantly.
"Indeed I am sure he feels so. He has often told me that no sister
could do more than you for him. I know what it must mean to him for
I have very few relatives myself."
"That so?"
"Aunt Cam is my nearest and dearest. I have some distant cousins,
but that is all. I feel almost as if Mr. Williams were a relative. He has
been so kind to us."
"That's his way, though I must say you are the first of the newcomers
that he's taken any fancy to. He don't make much fuss about what he
does, but little things count, Miss Whitridge."
"They surely do. Did he look just as he does now when he first came
here, Miss Phosie?"
"Just about. He always wore his beard that way, close-cropped, and
a short mustache. He must have been considerable over thirty when
he came."
"And he just appeared that way, suddenly?"
Miss Phosie nodded. "Came over on a sailing vessel from the Neck.
There wasn't any steamboat then. Said he'd like a few days' fishing.
Had a grip-sack, but no other baggage. Father took him out, and
liked him from the first, though he was always very quiet and
reserved. Never had any family photographs about or nothing of that
kind, just a little old Bible with his initials on the back. I've looked at
it," Miss Phosie confessed, "but there's nothing on the inside page,
but 'To my little son from Mother.' We've never tried to pry into his
affairs. We didn't feel it would be friendly. He's a nice good man,
father says, and that's all we want to know."
Gwen felt herself properly reproved, and concluded it would be
better to change the subject. "How dark it is getting," she remarked,
"and I do believe that is thunder." She arose and went to the window.
Great masses of heavy clouds were overspreading the sky. The sea
was inky black, though along the horizon shone a line of silver. "Dear
me," exclaimed the girl, "there is a gust coming up, or, I should say, it
has arrived," for, as she spoke, the rain began to fall in big drops,
and a strong wind sent chips and leaves scudding across the grass.
"Land sakes! so it has," returned Miss Phosie, "and Mr. Williams is
out in it. I hope he won't attempt to cross."
"I am afraid Ethel and Mr. Mitchell are out in it, too."
"You don't say! When did they go?"
"They started for Jagged Island this morning. They rowed over.
There are—others out, too. Oh, I do hope they are all safe." A heavy
peal of thunder startled them, and vivid lightning cleaved the dense
clouds overhanging the island.
Ora, pale and frightened, rushed into the kitchen. "Oh, Aunt Phosie,"
she cried, "it's a dreadful storm, and the Mary Lizzie is out in it." She
burst into tears.
"There, child, there," said Miss Phosie soothingly. "Don't you be a
mite afraid about the Mary Lizzie. Her cap'n's weathered more than
one gale. It's the little boats that's in danger, not the big ones. Here's
Miss Whitridge has friends out, and she's not crying. You an island
girl, too."
"There's no one she loves that's in danger," sobbed Ora.
Gwen shuddered, and kept her eyes fixed upon the storm-swept sky.
It was a marvellously grand one. The centre of the storm seemed
directly overhead, where lightnings flashed and thunders rolled from
clouds of intense blackness. These grew in gradation of tone less
and less dense toward the edges where they dropped a wonderful
fringe over the brilliant silver which bordered the visible circle of the
earth. Upon the jagged sides of the dark and forbidding rocks leaped
angry, white-capped waves which rushed in from a sea as black as
the sky, only farther out within the line of dazzling silver shone fair
green islands, brilliant as emeralds upon the gleaming band.
"I must go out, and get a better view of it," said Gwen catching up
her cape.
"But it hasn't stopped raining," Miss Phosie warned her.
"It isn't pouring so hard, and it is such a marvellous sight. I don't care
if I do get wet. Besides, perhaps I can see if my friends are out."
"They'd have a pretty hard time in a little boat, in such weather," said
Miss Phosie, and Ora began to cry again. She turned her wet eyes
upon Gwen.
"May I go with you?" she asked meekly.
"Why, certainly," responded Gwen cordially. And in spite of Miss
Phosie's protestations they fared forth, across the wet grass, and on
to the rocks. The storm was passing over, and more gems of islands
were visible. The bordering band of silver widened. The black fringe
swept further and further across the land, and presently the sun
broke forth, though the angry waves still buffeted the passive rocks.
The two girls said not a word till they stood side by side on the cliff,
then Ora's eyes sought the distant horizon, while Gwen turned her
gaze northward. There was not a sail, not a dot, indicating a boat
upon the ruffled surface of the water.
"I hope, I hope everyone is safe," said Gwen breaking the silence. "It
was such a sudden sharp storm, but it was soon over. It seems to be
passing to the north. I don't believe it has gone out to sea at all, Ora,
and the Mary Lizzie is probably away beyond it."
"It's dreadful to be so frightened," responded Ora faintly. "I was
always afraid of thunder-storms, and when you have friends out you
are more afraid than ever."
"Yes, you are; I realize that." Gwen took Ora's hand and held it in a
warm clasp under the shelter of her cloak.
"They don't understand," said Ora responding to this sympathy.
"Nobody knows what I feel, for I sent him. I wanted him to go so as
to show everybody there was something in him."
Gwen gave the hand a little squeeze. "I can understand, Ora," she
said. "I know just how you feel. It is dreadful to say things that send a
friend away from you. I have done it, and I know."
Ora, in turn, gave the fingers that held hers a little pressure. The
child in her distress felt the need of a confidant. She wanted
sympathy and advice from some one young like herself, but some
one whose experience had given her judgment.
"Do you think," Gwen went on, still looking northward, "that anyone
would be liable to get so far out before the storm came up, that he
couldn't make a harbor?"
"He might," returned Ora doubtfully.
"But even if he were swamped, the boat would float, and the oars; he
could save himself."
"If he could swim, or he might even hold on and float, only there are
these cruel rocks."
"Ah me!" Gwen groaned. "Suppose he—they did start out, and could
not get back. I should never forgive myself."
"For what, Miss Gwen? Did you persuade them to go? Is it Mr.
Mitchell and Miss Fuller you mean?"
"Of course," replied Gwen hastily. "I suppose there is no use
standing here watching, and anyone starting now would be quite
safe, though it would be hard pulling. Ah, there's Mr. Williams! One
at least of our friends is safe. That argues well for the others."
Luther Williams in his sou'wester came up to them. "Miss Phosie told
me I should find you here," he said.
Gwen held out both hands. "I am so glad you are safe," she cried.
"Were you caught in the storm?"
"I was nearly home," he told her, "just coming into the cove, so I put
in there by Jo Thompson's, took shelter in his house, and walked
home from there."
"I hope every one else is as well off. Mr. Mitchell and Miss Fuller
started for Jagged Island this morning. They haven't come back, and
I see no signs of them."
"They're waiting for the sea to smooth down, I suppose. It will after a
while. It was a sharp blow while it lasted, but the wind is back in the
same old quarter, and they'll probably be coming along pretty soon.
Cap'n Ben's boat is out," he added abruptly.
"I know it, oh, I know it," Gwen whispered. "Dear Daddy Lu, can't you
do something?"
He patted her shoulder encouragingly. "I'll go up along, and see what
can be discovered. I shouldn't be surprised if he had put into Water
Cove, if he left Dorr's at all. He was going there sketching to-day,
and thought it would be handier to take his traps in a boat than to lug
them."
Gwen drew a sigh of relief. "It is a good thing to have met you. Have
you seen him lately?"
"Last evening."
"He seemed well?" The question was asked wistfully.
"Yes." It was not like Mr. Williams to do more than give the laconic
reply.
"Ora has been worrying, too," Gwen said in a low voice.
"She has no reason to."
"You are sure the storm went around."
"Yes, though they may get it out at sea later on."
"I will tell her you said there was no cause for worry." She turned to
the girl who stood a little way off. "They are getting the storm over
Bath way, Ora," she said. "We needn't be alarmed."
Ora turned a brighter face toward the girl. "I've been watching it," she
said. "I'm going to see Almira now. She must be lonely to-day." And
without further word she walked away.
Gold green were the islands now, sparkling were the dancing waves,
though over the arm of the mainland there still hung a pall of clouds,
and once in awhile there was a rumble of distant thunder. "It has
been a wonderful storm," Gwen told Mr. Williams, "and if no one is
the worse for it I shall be glad of its having come, for it gave us a
scene I can never forget; those great masses of inky clouds dropping
fringes all along their edges, and those brilliant, sun-touched islands
in a silver rim of sea, beyond the gloomy spaces. It seems almost
like a prophecy, Daddy Lu, as if one might say to one's self, no
matter how dark and terrible the present seems, there is sunlight
beyond, sunlight that will spread and spread till you stand in its glory,
as you and I are doing this minute."
His rare smile lighted up his face. "That is the way to talk," he said.
"Some may be wrecked in the gale, but the same storm brings great
good to others."
"Oh, don't say that. I don't like to think of wrecks, wrecked vessels or
wrecked lives."
"Even wrecked lives may not be lost ones. Sometimes a person may
buffet with the seas for a while and then find a harborage. After the
storm has passed sunlight may reach him, too."
"That's better. I feel more content with that view of it. Are you going
down along, and will you let me know if anything has happened?"
"I will let you know in any event, if you like."
"That's the dear man you always are. I think I'd better go home now
to Aunt Cam. She will be getting anxious about me, and I must find
out if the rain has been leaking in at that south window."
"Very well. As the Spanish say, Hasta luego."
"That's a sort of 'auf wiedersehen,' I suppose."
"About the same."
They parted and Gwen sprang over the soppy ground, reaching
Wits' End to find her aunt and Lizzie busy with cloths mopping up the
floor under a window in the living-room, through which the rain had
leaked. They had placed basins and buckets to catch the drip, but in
spite of all the floor had not escaped a puddle. "The hogshead is full
and we have caught a lot more water in the boiler and the tubs, so
we are well supplied," said Miss Elliott as Gwen entered.
"Good," cried Gwen. The value of rain water was not to be under-
estimated.
"Where have you been?" asked her aunt. "I hope you were under
shelter during that downpour."
"I was in Miss Phosie's kitchen at first," Gwen told her, "but it was so
glorious I had to go down to the rocks to watch it all."
"And in consequence no doubt your feet are sopping wet. I'll have a
fire made in the fireplace at once."
"No, please don't. The sun is shining hot on the back porch. I'll
change my shoes and wet skirt and sit out there."
"You'd better have a fire," persisted Miss Elliott, and had her way, for,
as Gwen said, "When Aunt Cam really determines to do a thing she
manages to carry her point. That is why she was such a success in
China. If she said a patient must swallow a pill he had to do it."
And therefore it was sitting by the open fire that Luther Williams
found the two a little later on. As he stood in the doorway in his
fisherman's garb, flannel shirt, trousers tucked into high boots, Miss
Elliott found no suggestion of that elusive likeness which had
puzzled her more than once. She welcomed him cordially. "Come
right in, Mr. Williams," she said. "What is the news?"
"I've come to report no wrecks so far as discovered," he told her.
"Your niece was afraid the storm might have done some serious
damage about here, but so far as we know all are safe. I looked off
toward Jagged Island just before I started, Miss Gwen, and I think
your friends are on their way. The sea has calmed down and they'll
have no trouble getting in."
"Ethel and Mr. Mitchell, Aunt Cam," Gwen explained. "They
happened to choose this of all days to go over, and I am afraid they
were drenched."
"There's a house over there, you know," volunteered Mr. Williams,
"and it's probable they took shelter there."
"No doubt they are safe then," returned Gwen, "and—and Cap'n
Ben's boat, Mr. Williams?"
"That's in too. The man who had it to-day had started, but he saw the
storm coming, and turned back in time. He waited till the storm was
over before he made a second venture, then he came only so far as
the upper end of the island where he left his boat and some of his
traps and footed it home."
Gwen was grateful for the generalization of the boat's occupant, but
she could not resist asking, "Did you see the storm-tossed mariner,
Mr. Williams?"
"No, but Cap'n Ben did, and he told me, so it's reliable information."
"Thank you, Daddy Lu," said Gwen with a flashing smile which was
answered by as bright a one.
Miss Elliott looked from one to the other. "There!" she exclaimed
suddenly, "I know who Mr. Williams reminds me of, Gwen. It is your
grandfather Whitridge. Do you happen to have any relatives of that
name, Mr. Williams?"
"Yes," he said after a pause, "I have some distant ones. My own
people are all dead, but I believe there were some of the Whitridge
line alive when I last heard."
"And you never told me you had relatives of my name," said Gwen
reproachfully. "Why, we might be kin ourselves."
"Do you chance to have any relatives by the name of Williams?"
asked the man steadily. He turned to Miss Elliott.
"No, not that I know of," she answered. "The connection is not on my
side of the house, you see. It was my sister, Gwen's mother, who
married a Whitridge. Those family likenesses are very puzzling," she
went on. "They crop up in the most surprising manner. You have
what I should call the Whitridge smile, and Gwen has the same."
"I am glad it is anything as pleasant as a smile," returned Mr.
Williams. "You say I resemble your niece's grandfather. Is the
gentleman still living?"
"Now, Daddy Lu, you know I told you I hadn't anyone but Aunt Cam,"
Gwen again spoke reproachfully. "If I had a grandfather I would
surely claim him."
"I beg your pardon," he said. "Sometimes families become
separated. He might be living in some distant place, you know. Did
your father resemble him?"
"Did he?" Gwen turned to her aunt.
"I never saw Gwen's father after he was grown," said Miss Elliott. "I
knew him only by repute, and by a photograph taken when he was
first married."
"He was a noble man," said Gwen proudly. "Wasn't he, Aunt Cam?"
"Yes, very noble," she returned, but she spoke sadly.
"He gave his life for another," Gwen put in eagerly.
Mr. Williams, standing rigidly upon the hearth, did not reply, but
looked fixedly in the fire.
"Don't you think that the noblest thing a man can do?" continued
Gwen.
"There is more than one way of giving a life, too," remarked Miss
Elliott, as if speaking to herself. "Sometimes one lays down his life
and the world does not know it. He does not have to die to do that."
Gwen looked at her in surprise. "What are you saying, Aunt Cam?
One doesn't have to die? What do you mean? But my father did die
for another, Mr. Williams. What do you mean, Aunt Cam?"
"Are there no deaths then but the giving up of one's last breath?"
inquired Miss Elliott. "Haven't you heard the expression, 'dead to the
world'? There was a man out in China who certainly laid down his
life. He is still upon this planet, but he has sacrificed everything,
home, love, all that was dear to him for the sake of others."
Gwen knew who this was. Had she not seen the little picture, her
aunt treasured, of a young ascetic with burning eyes and a firm
mouth? "Oh!" she said and looked satisfied at the explanation, as did
the man who turned his eyes from the fire to the woman and, to
Gwen's surprise, looked an intelligent sympathy.
CHAPTER XV
ON THE DECK OF THE DOMHEGAN
There was an air of suppressed gaiety and subdued exultation in
Ethel Fuller's manner when she met Gwen that evening at Cottage
Hall where a concert was going on. She was rather splendidly attired
for the occasion, and swept in alone. Mr. Mitchell arrived later with
his mother and two of the Misses Gray. Gwen made a place by her
side for Ethel. The music had not begun, for one of the singers was
rushing around trying to find an accompanist, the one expected
having failed him at the last moment.
"Did you have a dreadful time of it?" asked Gwen sympathetically as
Ethel seated herself. "Weren't you awfully scared when the storm
came up?"
"Not exactly scared," returned Ethel, "though it was rather frightful.
We took refuge in an out-building and didn't get wet at all."
"What would you have done if the storm had continued?"
"I'm sure I don't know. Fortunately that problem didn't have to be
faced."
"It was a gorgeous storm. I fairly revelled in it," said Gwen, "or I
should have if I hadn't been worried."
"About us?"
"Yes, and about all who were out on the water. Didn't you think it was
a splendid sight?"
"I am afraid I didn't think much about that part of it. We couldn't see
very well from where we were."
"Where were you?"
"In a barn, sitting on a sawhorse."
"And you weren't scared?"
Ethel smiled, a sort of retrospective smile which suggested pleasure
rather than fright. "Here comes Jack Lansdale with Flossy Fay," she
said. "I didn't know she had brains enough to grapple with his
accompaniments, but perhaps she is equal to them. Why didn't he
get Miss Caroline Drake?"
"Probably because Flossy was the more available. She looks as
pleased as Punch. Now they're going to begin."
Jack Lansdale had a fresh, unspoiled baritone voice of pleasant
quality. He was quite a shining light among a not inconsiderable
number of musical people. A genial, robust, dark-haired young man
was Jack, who was as much at home in sailing a yacht as in guiding
a dance, and who was as ready to go off for a tramp with a boon
companion as to sit on the rocks in the moonlight and pay
compliments to a pretty girl, consequently, as he was good-looking
as well as athletic he was in much demand. To his credit be it said
that he was most accommodating and seldom refused to sing when
an accompanist could be found, but this was holiday time and even
the most enthusiastic musician could not be expected always to be
ready for a day's sailing, to play accompaniments or dance music,
therefore it was sometimes rather difficult to find one willing to be
pressed into service. Flossy Fay, however, had assiduously charged
herself to learn his accompaniments, and had made such diligent
use of her hour at the piano in the hall that she felt herself equipped
to play the part of understudy when occasion should offer. This
evening it had arrived, and her triumph was complete, for what more
delightfully intimate than to follow a voice dependent upon her skill in
accompanying?
After Jack's first songs, came a violin solo, then there were more
songs. At the last moment, the missing pianist, Tom Belden, rushed
in ready to supersede Flossy at the piano, but she clung to her
rights, and the sturdy Tom retired to the back of the hall, to appear
later to help out with the dances.
One swift glance at a seat near the door showed Gwen that Kenneth
was in the audience, but he had disappeared by the time the chairs
were pushed back and the dancing had begun. As usual Mr. Mitchell
divided himself between Gwen and Ethel, though Gwen remembered
afterward that to her share had fallen fewer dances than usual, and
that Mr. Mitchell and Ethel had sat out more than one dance on the
porch. These little informal affairs always closed early and ten
o'clock saw the lanterns bobbing in various directions as the dancers
wended their way home over uneven paths. Usually a party of them
tarried for awhile at the ice-cream saloon, where delectable ices
were to be had, and where the sweets were highly approved. It was
a cosy little place, the "saloon" proper being divided from the small
shop by portieres of antique make and design, these being nothing
more nor less than hand-woven blue-and-white counterpanes,
heirlooms in the family of Timson. This evening, however, Gwen did
not join the other young people at the favorite resort but jogged
along with the Misses Gray. There was a trip to Portland to be
undertaken the next day, and she must be up and off betimes in
order to get through the day's shopping which had become a
necessity.
It was not an unpleasant duty to seek the tidy bright little city, which
always had the air of being freshly washed and dressed, for one
generally found some pleasant neighbor to chat with on the way, and
even the slow-going steamboat, winding in and out among the
islands of Casco Bay, was not a bad place to rest in after a day's
rushing about from shop to shop. If the weather were good there was
no more charming series of views than those in which fair islands,
rippling water, and distant wooded shores found a place. Sails made
rosy by the setting sun, golden gleams along sandy beaches, sun-
touched rocks, and emerald sea gave such color as delighted most
of those who sought these favored shores, and Gwen's was the
most ardently nature-loving soul among them.
She glanced over the assemblage of those who had congregated
upon the upper deck, but seeing no vacant place upon the side she
preferred, she went down stairs. The little cabin was full of shoppers
with baskets and bundles, women with babies, travellers with bags,
but she had no desire to stay cooped up within, so she stepped out
upon the little narrow deck usually unfrequented by passengers.
There were but three occupying chairs here; one was a stalwart man
surrounded by huge parcels, another was a portly woman who had
settled herself in the midst of a collection of bundles, boxes and
bags. Between these two, and quite aloof, sat Kenneth Hilary. A
vacant stool was between him and the portly woman. Gwen's mind
was quickly made up. She climbed over a huge coil of rope in her
way, circumnavigated, as well as she could, the collection of
bundles, boxes and bags, possessed herself of the vacant stool and
sat down, planting her own bag firmly in front of her. Then turning
around she said demurely, "Good evening, Mr. Hilary."