when, the next day, the county paper contained, in addition to
the column-and-a-half description of the funeral, the more formal
announcement of the death of "Mrs. Sallie Atherly, wife of the late
Philip Atherly, second son of Sir Ashley Atherly, of England," criticism
and comment broke out. The old pioneers of Rough and Ready felt that
they had been imposed upon, and that in some vague way the unfortunate
woman had made them the victims of a huge practical joke during all
these years. That she had grimly enjoyed their ignorance of her position
they did not doubt. "Why, I remember onct when I was sorter bullyraggin'
her about mixin' up my duds with Doc Simmons's, and sendin' me Whiskey
Dick's old rags, she turned round sudden with a kind of screech, and ran
out into the brush. I reckoned, at the time, that it was either 'drink'
or feelin's, and could hev kicked myself for being sassy to the
old woman, but I know now that all this time that air critter--that
barrownet's daughter-in-law--was just laughin' herself into fits in the
brush! No, sir, she played this yer camp for all it was worth, year in
and out, and we just gave ourselves away like speckled idiots! and now
she's lyin' out thar in the bone yard, and keeps on p'intin' the joke,
and a-roarin' at us in marble."
Even the later citizens in Atherly felt an equal resentment against her,
but from different motives. That her drinking habits and her powerful
vocabulary were all the effect of her aristocratic alliance they never
doubted. And, although it brought the virtues of their own superior
republican sobriety into greater contrast, they felt a scandal at having
been tricked into attending this gilded funeral of dissipated rank.
Peter Atherly found himself unpopular in his own town. The sober who
drank from his free "Waterworks," and the giddy ones who imbibed at
his "Gin Mill," equally criticised him. He could not understand it; his
peculiar predilections had been accepted before, when they were mere
presumptions; why should they not NOW, when they were admitted facts?
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