rt. He fired t' barn an' made
off, an' his father never tried to follow him. But from that day to
this we've never heard one word of our lad.

"I can hear them beasts roaring with pain in the night yet, but you
know, miss, that was soon over, an' they got their release. But it's
different wi' us. We aren't beasts. Greenwood could bear pain. He
made nought o' the blow, though it was a savage 'un, but it was the
thought of it 'at hurt him, an' the thought of him 'at did it, an'
wondering what had come of him. Pain's nought; any woman can bide
pain--an' God knows 'at we have to do, oft enough--but when your soul
gets hurt there's no putting any ointment on _it_, an' there's no
doctor in t' world can do you any good.

"God? Oh yes, miss, I know, but I don't understand. I believe
Greenwood did, an' he went home peaceful, if not happy; an' I'm not
murmuring. I believe the Lord 'll work it all out i' time, but it's a
puzzle. I should ha' lost heart an' hope but for Greenwood; but I'm
goin' to hold on for his sake an' Jane's--an' for our Joe's."

As I walked home the lingering sun cast long, black shadows athwart the
snow, but the shadows were only on the surface, and did not soil the
purity of the mantle which God had thrown over the earth.

CHAPTER X

INTRODUCES WIDOW ROBERTSHAW

I have been having quite an exciting time lately. If you have never
lived in a small hamlet of a hundred souls or thereabouts, with smaller
tributary hamlets dropped down in the funniest and most unlikely places
within easy walking distance, you do not know how very full of
excitement life can be. Why, when I was living at No. 8 nobody
displayed very much emotion when the jeweller at the end of the street
suffered "the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune" as the result of
the undesired patronage of connoisseurs in diamonds; and even when we
learned that the poor man had been found gagged and bound to his office
chair and more dead than alive, the languid interest of the company was
sufficiently expressed in the "Hard luck!" of the gentlemen, and the
"What a shame!" of the ladies.

"That's the fire-engine," someone would remark, as the horses dashed
past to the clang of the warning bell; but we sent up our plates for a
second helping of boiled mutton with never a thought as to the
destination and fate of the brave fellows who might be about to risk
their lives in a grim struggle with flame and smoke.

Murders and ass