parently without an emotion of sympathy or interest. They
were there, it seemed, to see what new caper the townspeople had
concluded to cut, to regard it solemnly, and to regret it with grave
faces when the lights were out and the fantastic procession had drifted
away to the village.

The organ in the little church was a fine instrument, though a small
one. It had belonged to the little preacher's wife, and he had given it
to the church. To his mind, the fact that she had used it sanctified it,
and he had placed it in the church as a part of the sacrifice he felt
called on to make in behalf of his religion. Helen played it with
uncommon skill--a skill born of a passionate appreciation of music in
its highest forms. The Rev. Mr. Hill listened like one entranced, but
Helen played unconscious of his admiration. On the outskirts of the
congregation she observed Mrs. Stucky, and by her side a young man with
long, sandy hair, evidently uncombed, and a thin stubble of beard. Helen
saw this young man pull Mrs. Stucky by the sleeve, and direct her
attention to the organ. Instead of looking in Helen's direction, Mrs.
Stucky fixed her eyes on the face of the young man and held them there;
but he continued to stare at the organist. It was a gaze at once
mournful and appealing--not different in that respect from the gaze of
any of the queer people around him, but it affected Miss Eustis
strangely. To her quick imagination, it suggested loneliness, despair,
that was the more tragic because of its isolation. It seemed to embody
the mute, pent-up distress of whole generations. Somehow Helen felt
herself to be playing for the benefit of this poor creature. The echoes
of the wedding-march sounded grandly in the little church, then came a
softly played interlude, and finally a solemn benediction, in which
solicitude seemed to be giving happiness a sweet warning. As the
congregation filed out of the church, the organ sent its sonorous echoes
after the departing crowd--echoes that were taken up by the whispering
and sighing pines, and borne far into the night. Mrs. Stucky did not go
until after the lights were out; and then she took her son by the hand,
and the two went to their lonely cabin not far away. They went in, and
soon had a fire kindled on the hearth. No word had passed between them;
but after a while, when Mrs. Stucky had taken a seat in the corner, and
lit her pipe, she exclaimed:

"Lordy! what a great big gob of a man! I dunne