hind the wagon there was a young
man and a pretty girl in a nice new buggy and a frisky young horse
hitched to it, and the horse was prancin' and tryin' to get by the
ox-team, but there wasn't room enough to pass on either side of the
road."

She paused and looked inquiringly at Mrs. Martin to see if the meaning
of the allegory was plain to her. But Mrs. Martin's face expressed only
perplexity and distress.

"Don't you see," said Mrs. Williams persuasively, "that you and me are
just like that old ox-team? There's happiness up the road for Henry and
Anna Belle, but we're blockin' the way, and they can't get by us. Now,
what are we goin' to do about it?"

This direct question was very disconcerting to gentle Mrs. Martin. A
flush rose to her face, and she clasped and unclasped her hands in
nervous embarrassment.

"Why--I'm sure--I don't know--I never thought about it," she stammered.

The guest did not press the question. Instead, she settled herself more
comfortably in her chair, waved her palm-leaf fan, and went calmly on
with her monologue. Apparently Mrs. Williams was merely a fat,
middle-aged woman making a morning call on a friend, but in reality she
was an ambassador from the court of a monarch by whose power the world
is said to go round, a diplomat in whose diplomacy the destinies of two
human beings were involved. Her words had been carefully chosen before
setting out on her envoy, and she was craftily following a line of
thought leading up to a climax beyond which lay either victory or
defeat. That climax was at hand, but she was not yet ready for it. There
was some preliminary work to be done, a certain mental impression to be
made on her hearer, before she dared "put it to the touch."

"I don't know how it is with you, Mrs. Martin," she continued, "but I'm
not one of the kind that thinks children are made for the comfort and
convenience of their parents. I've been hearin' sermons all my life
about the duty of children to their parents, and I never heard one about
the duty of parents to their children." She broke off with a reminiscent
laugh.

"That reminds me of my Uncle Nathan, and what he said to the preacher
once. You know, Uncle Nathan wasn't a church member, and he had his own
way of lookin' at religious matters and he was mighty free-spoken. Well,
one day the preacher was makin' a pastoral call at Mother's, and he
asked for a glass of water, and when Mother brought it to him and he'd
drunk it, h