again, will you?
Then I shall be more able to talk to you quietly."

"Ay, that I will, ma'am." And Jael colored all over with surprise, and
such undisguised pleasure that Mrs. Little kissed her at parting.

She had been gone a considerable time, when Henry came back; he found
his mother seated at the table, eying his masterpiece with stern and
bitter scrutiny.

It was a picture, those two rare faces in such close opposition. The
carved face seemed alive; but the living face seemed inspired, and to
explore the other to the bottom with merciless severity. At such work
the great female eye is almost terrible in its power.

"It is lovely," said she. "It seems noble. I can not find what I know
must be there. Oh, why does God give such a face as this to a fool?"

"Not a word against her," said Henry. "She is as wise, and as noble, and
as good, as she is beautiful. She has but one fault; she loves another
man. Put her sweet face away; hide it from me till I am an old man, and
can bring it out to show young folks why I lived and die a bachelor.
Good-by, dear mother, I must saddle Black Harry, and away to my night's
work."

The days were very short now, and Henry spent two-thirds of his time
in Cairnhope Church. The joyous stimulus of his labor was gone but the
habit remained, and carried him on in a sort of leaden way. Sometimes he
wondered at himself for the hardships he underwent merely to make money,
since money had no longer the same charm for him; but a good workman is
a patient, enduring creature, and self-indulgence, our habit, is after
all, his exception. Henry worked heavily on, with his sore, sad heart,
as many a workman had done before him. Unfortunately his sleep began
to be broken a good deal. I am not quite clear whether it was the
after-clap of the explosion, or the prolonged agitation of his young
heart, but at this time, instead of the profound sleep that generally
rewards the sons of toil, he had fitful slumbers, and used to dream
strange dreams, in that old church, so full of gaunt sights and strange
sounds. And, generally speaking, however these dreams began, the figure
of Grace Carden would steal in ere he awoke. His senses, being only half
asleep, colored his dreams; he heard her light footstep in the pattering
rain, and her sweet voice in the musical moan of the desolate building;
desolate as his heart when he awoke, and behold it was a dream.

The day after Christmas-day began brightly, but was