road he kem."

She knit off her needle while, with his head still bent forward,
Nehemiah Yerby sourly eyed her, feeling himself a loser with Brother
Vickers, in that he did not have the reverend man's incumbency as a
grievance.

"He 'pears ter me ter see mo' pleasure in religion 'n penance, ennyhow,"
he observed, bitterly. "An' the Lord knows the bes' of us air sinners."

"An' he laughs loud an' frequent--mightily like a sinner," she agreed.
"An' whenst he prays, he prays loud an' hearty, like he jes expected
ter git what he axed fur sure's shootin.' Some o' the breth-erin'
sorter taxed him with his sperits, an' he 'lowed he couldn't holp but
be cheerful whenst he hed the Lord's word fur it ez all things work
tergether fur good. An' he laffed same ez ef they hedn't spoke ter him
serious."

"Look at that, now!" exclaimed Nehemiah. "An' that thar man ez good ez
dead with the heart-disease."

Laurelia's eyes were suddenly arrested by his keen, pinched, lined face.
What there was in it to admonish her she could hardly have said, nor how
it served to tutor her innocent craft.

"I ain't so sure 'bout Brother Vickers bein' so wrong," she said,
slowly. "He 'lowed ter me ez I hed spent too much o' my life
a-sorrowin', 'stiddier a-praisin' the Lord for his mercies." Her face
twitched suddenly; she could not yet look upon her bereavements as
mercies. "He 'lowed I would hev been a happier an' a better 'oman ef I
hed took the evil ez good from the Lord's hand, fur in his sendin' it's
the same. An' I know that air a true word. An' that's what makes me 'low
what he said war true 'bout'n that fiddle; that I ought never ter hev
pervented the boy from playin' 'round home an' sech, an' 'twarn't no sin
but powerful comfortable an' pleasurable ter set roun' of a cold winter
night an' hear him play them slow, sweet, dyin'-away chunes--" She
dropped her hands, and gazed with the rapt eyes of remembrance through
the window at the sunset clouds which, gathering red and purple and gold
on the mountain's brow, were reflected roseate and amethyst and amber at
the mountain's base on the steely surface of the river. "Brother Vickers
'lowed he never hearn sech in all his life. It brung the tears ter his
eyes--it surely did."

"He'd a heap better be weepin' fur them black sheep o' his congregation
an' fur Lee-yander's short-comin's, fur ez fur ez I kin hear he air
about ez black a sheep ez most pastors want ter wrestle with fur the
turnin' a