mself to me in
the body of a woman." His voice dropped and he began to
whisper. "I did not understand," he said. "What I took
to be a trial of my soul was only a preparation for a
new and more beautiful fervor of the spirit. God has
appeared to me in the person of Kate Swift, the school
teacher, kneeling naked on a bed. Do you know Kate
Swift? Although she may not be aware of it, she is an
instrument of God, bearing the message of truth."

Reverend Curtis Hartman turned and ran out of the
office. At the door he stopped, and after looking up
and down the deserted street, turned again to George
Willard. "I am delivered. Have no fear." He held up a
bleeding fist for the young man to see. "I smashed the
glass of the window," he cried. "Now it will have to be
wholly replaced. The strength of God was in me and I
broke it with my fist."

THE TEACHER

Snow lay deep in the streets of Winesburg. It had
begun to snow about ten o'clock in the morning and a
wind sprang up and blew the snow in clouds along Main
Street. The frozen mud roads that led into town were
fairly smooth and in places ice covered the mud. "There
will be good sleighing," said Will Henderson, standing
by the bar in Ed Griffith's saloon. Out of the saloon
he went and met Sylvester West the druggist stumbling
along in the kind of heavy overshoes called arctics.
"Snow will bring the people into town on Saturday,"
said the druggist. The two men stopped and discussed
their affairs. Will Henderson, who had on a light
overcoat and no overshoes, kicked the heel of his left
foot with the toe of the right. "Snow will be good for
the wheat," observed the druggist sagely.

Young George Willard, who had nothing to do, was glad
because he did not feel like working that day. The
weekly paper had been printed and taken to the post
office Wednesday evening and the snow began to fall on
Thursday. At eight o'clock, after the morning train had
passed, he put a pair of skates in his pocket and went
up to Waterworks Pond but did not go skating. Past the
pond and along a path that followed Wine Creek he went
until he came to a grove of beech trees. There he built
a fire against the side of a log and sat down at the
end of the log to think. When the snow began to fall
and the wind to blow he hurried about getting fuel for
the fire.

The young reporter was thinking of Kate Swift, who had
once been his school teacher. On the evening before he
had gone to her house to