them talking as they had
not talked in twenty years. Their sluggish brains were heated by it,
their sleeping hearts quickened.

People were of the undivided opinion that Isom had caught Joe robbing
him, and that Joe had shot him in the fear of punishment for the theft.
Perhaps it is because chivalry is such a rare quality among the business
activities of this life, that none of them believed he was shielding
Isom's wife, and that he was innocent of any wrong himself. They did not
approve the attempt of the coroner to drag her into it. The shrewd
insight of the little man cost him a good many votes that day.

Joe Newbolt could very well be a robber, they said, for all his life had
prepared him for a fall before the temptation of money. He could very
well be a robber, indeed, and there was no room for him to turn out
anything nobler, for wasn't he the pore folks' boy?

Ollie was almost as short in her realization of what Joe had done for
her as those who knew nothing at all of his motive of silence. In the
relief of her escape from public disclosure of her intrigue with Morgan,
she enjoyed a luxurious relaxation. It was like sleep after long
watching.

She did not understand the peril in which Joe stood on her account, nor
consider that the future still held for both of them a trial which would
test Joe's strength as the corrosive tooth of acid challenges the purity
of gold. It was enough for her that sunny afternoon, and sufficient to
her shallow soul, to know that she was safe. She lay warm and restful in
her bed while the neighbor women set the house to rights, and the men
moved Isom's body into the parlor to wait for the coffin which Sol
Greening had gone after to the county-seat.

Ollie watched the little warm white clouds against the blue of the
October sky, and thought of the fleecy soft things which a mother loves
to swaddle her baby in; she watched the shadow of falling leaves upon
the floor, blowing past her window on the slant sunbeams.

She was safe!

Joe was accused, but she seemed to hold that a trivial incident in an
exciting day. It would pass; he would clear himself, as he deserved to
be cleared, and then, when Morgan came back for her and carried her away
into his world, everything would be in tune.

Perhaps it was because she knew that Joe was innocent that his
accusation appeared so untenable and trivial to her. At any rate, the
lawyers over at Shelbyville--wasn't their cunning known around t