THE COST OF KINDNESS

By JEROME K. JEROME
"Kindness," argued little Mrs. Pennycoop, "costs nothing."

"And, speaking generally, my dear, is valued precisely at cost price,"
retorted Mr. Pennycoop, who, as an auctioneer of twenty years'

experience, had enjoyed much opportunity of testing the attitude of
the public towards sentiment.

"I don't care what you say, George," persisted his wife; "he may be a
disagreeable, cantankerous old brute--I don't say he isn't. All the

same, the man is going away, and we may never see him again."
"If I thought there was any fear of our doing so," observed Mr.

Pennycoop, "I'd turn my back on the Church of England to-morrow and
become a Methodist."

"Don't talk like that, George," his wife admonished him, reprovingly;
"the Lord might be listening to you."

"If the Lord had to listen to old Cracklethorpe He'd sympathize with
me," was the opinion of Mr. Pennycoop.

"The Lord sends us our trials, and they are meant for our good,"
explained his wife. "They are meant to teach us patience."

"You are not churchwarden," retorted her husband; "you can get away
from him. You hear him when he is in the pulpit, where, to a certain

extent, he is bound to keep his temper."
"You forget the rummage sale, George," Mrs. Pennycoop reminded him;

"to say nothing of the church decorations."
"The rummage sale," Mr. Pennycoop pointed out to her, "occurs only

once a year, and at that time your own temper, I have noticed--"
"I always try to remember I am a Christian," interrupted little Mrs.

Pennycoop. "I do not pretend to be a saint, but whatever I say I am
always sorry for it afterwards--you know I am, George."

"It's what I am saying," explained her husband. "A vicar who has
contrived in three years to make every member of his congregation hate

the very sight of a church--well, there's something wrong about it
somewhere."

Mrs. Pennycoop, gentlest of little women, laid her plump and still
pretty hands upon her husband's shoulders. "Don't think, dear, I

haven't sympathized with you. You have borne it nobly. I have
marvelled sometimes that you have been able to control yourself as you

have done, most times; the things that he has said to you."
Mr. Pennycoop had slid unconsciously into an attitude suggestive of

petrified virtue, lately discovered.
"One's own poor self," observed Mr. Pennycoop, in accents of proud

humility--"insults that are merely personal one can put up with.
Though even there," added the senior churchwarden, with momentary

descent towards the plane of human nature, "nobody cares to have it
hinted publicly across the vestry table that one has chosen to collect

from the left side for the express purpose of artfully passing over
one's own family."

"The children have always had their three-penny-bits ready waiting in
their hands," explained Mrs. Pennycoop, indignantly.

"It's the sort of thing he says merely for the sake of making a
disturbance," continued the senior churchwarden. "It's the things he

does I draw the line at."
"The things he has done, you mean, dear," laughed the little woman,

with the accent on the "has." "It is all over now, and we are going
to be rid of him. I expect, dear, if we only knew, we should find it

was his liver. You know, George, I remarked to you the first day that
he came how pasty he looked and what a singularly unpleasant mouth he

had. People can't help these things, you know, dear. One should look
upon them in the light of afflictions and be sorry for them."

"I could forgive him doing what he does if he didn't seem to enjoy
it," said the senior churchwarden. "But, as you say, dear, he is

going, and all I hope and pray is that we never see his like again."
"And you'll come with me to call upon him, George," urged kind little

Mrs. Pennycoop. "After all, he has been our vicar for three years,
and he must be feeling it, poor man--whatever he may pretend--going

away like this, knowing that everybody is glad to see the back of
him."

"Well, I sha'n't say anything I don't really feel," stipulated Mr.
Pennycoop.

"That will be all right, dear," laughed his wife, "so long as you
don't say what you do feel. And we'll both of us keep our temper,"

further suggested the little woman, "whatever happens. Remember, it
will be for the last time."

Little Mrs. Pennycoop's intention was kind and Christianlike. The
Rev. Augustus Cracklethorpe would be quitting Wychwood-on-the-Heath

the following Monday, never to set foot--so the Rev. Augustus
Cracklethorpe himself and every single member of his congregation

hoped sincerely--in the neighbourhood again. Hitherto no pains had
been taken on either side to disguise the mutual joy with which the

parting was looked forward to. The Rev. Augustus Cracklethorpe, M.A.,
might possibly have been of service to his Church in, say, some

East-end parish of unsavoury reputation, some mission station far
advanced amid the hordes of heathendom. There his inborn instinct of

antagonism to everybody and everything surrounding him, his
unconquerable disregard for other people's views and feelings, his

inspired conviction that everybody but himself was bound to be always
wrong about everything, combined with determination to act and speak

fearlessly in such belief, might have found their uses. In
picturesque little Wychwood-on-the-Heath, among the Kentish hills,

retreat beloved of the retired" target="_blank" title="a.退休的；通职的">retiredtradesman, the spinster of moderate
means, the reformed Bohemian developing latentinstincts towards

respectability, these qualities made only for scandal and disunion.
For the past two years the Rev. Cracklethorpe's parishioners, assisted

by such other of the inhabitants of Wychwood-on-the-Heath as had
happened to come into personal contact with the reverend gentleman,

had sought to impress upon him, by hints and innuendoes difficult to
misunderstand, their cordial and daily-increasing dislike of him, both

as a parson and a man. Matters had come to a head by the
determinationofficially announced to him that, failing other

alternatives, a deputation of his leading parishioners would wait upon
his bishop. This it was that had brought it home to the Rev. Augustus

Cracklethorpe that, as the spiritual guide and comforter of
Wychwood-on-the Heath, he had proved a failure. The Rev. Augustus had

sought and secured the care of other souls. The following Sunday
morning he had arranged to preach his farewellsermon, and the

occasion promised to be a success from every point of view.
Churchgoers who had not visited St. Jude's for months had promised

themselves the luxury of feeling they were listening to the Rev.
Augustus Cracklethorpe for the last time. The Rev. Augustus

Cracklethorpe had prepared a sermon that for plain speaking and
directness was likely to leave an impression. The parishioners of St.

Jude's, Wychwood-on-the-Heath, had their failings, as we all have.
The Rev. Augustus flattered himself that he had not missed out a

single one, and was looking forward with pleasurable anticipation to
the sensation that his remarks, from his "firstly" to his "sixthly and

lastly," were likely to create.
What marred the entire business was the impulsiveness of little Mrs.

Pennycoop. The Rev. Augustus Cracklethorpe, informed in his study on
the Wednesdav afternoon that Mr. and Mrs. Pennycoop had called,

entered the drawing-room a quarter of an hour later, cold and severe;
and, without offering to shake hands, requested to be informed as

shortly as possible for what purpose he had been disturbed. Mrs.
Pennycoop had had her speech ready to her tongue. It was just what it

should have been, and no more.
It referred casually, without insisting on the point, to the duty

incumbent upon all of us to remember on occasion we were Christians;
that our privilege it was to forgive and forget; that, generally

speaking, there are faults on both sides; that partings should never
take place in anger; in short, that little Mrs. Pennycoop and George,