6. Music Lessons

Papa’s salary was $800 per annum and he had to go to the Leading Bank, on the first of each month, to get this $66.66; for the Treasurer of our church was also the Big Shot in the bank who seemed to enjoy the sensation of seeing his betters wag their tails and bark for their bones.

Incidentally, I knew later of a similar case where the minister, a rather sensitive fellow, was compelled to return to the bank two or three times for his pittance because Mr. Big was “in conference” and mustn’t be disturbed. As I have said, earlier in this document, I do not believe in hell; but sometimes I wonder. I might be mistaken about that. So, if you believe in hell, don’t let anything that I have said affect your faith.

My papa’s income also included the free use of a commodious parsonage on a shady street not far from the church. I do not recall any donation parties. That sort of thing was practiced only in country parishes, and we were now living in a town that wanted to be a city. It has been my observation that a town of 2000 people is more formal, at its top social level, than the typical midwestern city of 200,000.

Papa enjoyed his preaching here and his Sunday congregations grew. And he greatly appreciated the music which was provided by a male quartet. These four old cronies, then in their fifties, had furnished the special music, without compensation, for many years. After they had sung an anthem, always a cappella, and had resumed their chairs, each man reached into his vest pocket and brought up a little lozenge to nibble on.

I thought their close harmony was the most wonderful music to be had in a religious service. It was the first time I had ever heard any vocal counterpoint that was better than a screech: It was so melodious and reverent that it moved me to tears.

The ladies of our parish were prompt to call on Mama, but our parsonage was far from being the popular rendezvous and comfort station that we had maintained in Monroeville, and Mama missed the neighborly chats to which she had been accustomed. Her happy talent for making new friends had shone to much better advantage in the little village or in the open country where one didn’t leave an engraved card when paying a call, and didn’t have to decide whether to accept an invitation to join the Browning Society. When it came to the three R’s, Mama knew her way around, but what she didn’t know about the gifted Mr. Browning was comparable only to her experience with champagne and caviar. Mama was lonely and lost.

My sister was unhappy too. She was a young lady now. In Monroeville it hadn’t mattered so much that she was not permitted to dance. Plenty of seventeen-year-old girls belonged to churches that disapproved of dancing and card-playing: they disapproved of the theater, too, though that prohibition was of academic interest only, as there were no theaters. It was also customary for ministers and other persons of great rectitude to inveigh heavily against “dime novels.” I often wished I could see a “dime novel”: I wondered what there was about them that deserved all the mauling they received. I once asked Papa whether he thought it was wrong to read “dime novels,” and he didn’t know: he had never seen one.