High Time Read Online Free PDF Page A

cigar!’
    ‘Does look kinda like him,’ Lily giggled.
    The ladies stared silently at the cherubs while Lily went to the car and came back carrying a huge picnic basket with double handles. In the other hand she carried a large cardboard suitcase and a canvas laundry bag.
    ‘These here oughta go right on the ice,’ she said, opening the picnic basket and removing the bottles of formula, boiled water, and orange juice. ‘The clean diapers is in the valise an’ the bag is for the dirty ones. Now, to heat the bottles, you just stand ’em up in a pan o’ warm water an’ let ’em…’
    ‘Aw, go teach your grandmother how to suck eggs!’ Mrs. Rasmussen grinned, shoving Lily out the door. Lily took one lingering glance at her progeny.
    ‘They ain’t bad! Honest, they ain’t!’
    ‘Do you suppose I dare pick one up?’ Miss Tinkham asked before the door of Lily’s jaloppy had slammed.
    ‘Let sleepin’ dogs lie!’ Mrs. Feeley advised grimly.
    ‘They’ll wake soon enough,’ Mrs. Rasmussen said from the icebox where she was putting away the twins’ food. ‘We might’s well lie down a minute till they do start howlin’—didn’t get near enough sleep last night! That was sure a pleasant girl, though. I like her hair.’
    ‘Yeup. One o’ them incendiary blondes! I feel kinda sorry for them little ole trollops—never had much chance. She’s sure a dope, foolin’ around with them other guys ’long as she has a steady feller. But they ain’t got no brains! Outa sight, outa mind!’ Mrs. Feeley yawned.
    Miss Tinkham stretched herself and said: ‘The immortal Robbie said,
     
    “Then gently scan your brother man,
    Still gentler sister woman,
    Ta da dee da, da da ta ta,
    To step aside is human,”’
     
    she finished triumphantly.
    ‘Who’s Robbie?’ Mrs. Feeley pricked up her ears at such a sensible-sounding poem.
    ‘Robert Burns, the great Scottish poet, the most tender and understanding songster of them all,’ Miss Tinkham replied.
    ‘It means you don’t should talk hard of nobody, don’t it?’ Mrs. Rasmussen added.
    ‘Oh dear! My memory is wretched these days! But he was a lovely man! Last night, when Darleen was telling us about her little temptations, I kept thinking of this poem. I do believe it will come back to me in time!’ Miss Tinkham wrinkled her brow and folded her lips tightly in concentration.
    ‘We sure wanna hear it, if you remember it…better’n the radio!’ Mrs. Feeley said.
    ‘It is from an address to the Unco’ Guid—that’s Scotch for rigidly righteous. It is about people who are too insipid and lacking in vitality to have any temptations sitting in judgment on warm-hearted, thoughtless people who are guided by their emotions,’ Miss Tinkham explained. All at once she had it:
     
    ‘Ye high exalted virtuous dames,
    Tied up in godly laces,
    Before ye give poor Frailty names,
    Suppose a change of cases;
    A dear-loved lad, convenience snug,
    A treacherous inclination—
    But let me whisper in your lug,
    Perhaps you’re no temptation!’
     
    Mrs. Feeley’s cackle rent the air.
    ‘Ain’t that somethin’! Gawd, did he get ’em told! Them ol’ busybodies was so ugly, wouldn’t nobody make a pass at ’em!’
    Miss Tinkham glowed. Darling Robbie with his never-failing appeal to the heart!
     
    ‘Then gently scan your brother man,
    Still gentler sister woman;
    Though they may go a little wrong.
    To step aside is human.
     
    One point must still be greatly dark.
    The moving why they do it:
    And just as lamely can you mark
    How far perhaps they rue it.
     
    Who made the heart, ’tis He alone
    Decidedly can try us,
    He knows each chord—its various tone;
    Each spring—its various bias:
    Then at the balance let’s be mute,
    We never can adjust it:
    What’s done we partly may compute,
    But know not what’s resisted.’
     
    Mrs. Rasmussen wiped her eyes. Then she blew her nose thoroughly and said: ‘Makes me feel like church at Easter. We didn’t mean no bad