ghtrobe clutched convulsively in one hand, opened the hall door.

The scene whirled before her like a frightful nightmare.

The fisher-girl turned and faced her.

"Yer Pappy air a-beatin' me ... I hev a-been stealin' milk."

Her words fell between little, broken gasps. They touched Frederick as
he never had been touched before. He stepped forward hastily to speak.

"I air a-needin' the milk," she explained, bowing her head before him.
"I has to have it!"

The infant rushed into Frederick's mind ... the squalid cabin, that
twisting thing, with thin, discolored veins. It had been for him that
Tess had stolen. Teola staggered toward her father, a cough racking the
emaciated frame. Minister Graves threw his arms about her.

"Go back! Go back quickly, child! You should not have ventured out of
bed. I will settle with the squatter."

"You whipped her!" breathed Teola.

"Yes, and will again, if I catch her stealing from my kitchen. Now,
miss, you can go home. Put down that milk; and, if I find you here in
the future, I shall put you behind the bars, with your father."

Frederick counted the beats of his heart through the blank silence. He
felt impelled to reach forward to Tessibel,--to say something to relieve
the white, tense face. His father was waiting for the squatter to take
her departure. But Tess remained with the pail in her hand.

Suddenly she lifted her streaming eyes to the minister's face.

"I has been beaten.... And I air a-feelin' so--bad! Air I to have the
milk? I needs it." Tess sobbed again, and continued, "I ain't a-carin'
so awful about the lickin' as I does about havin' the milk."

She came forward close to him, with searching sweetness in her gaze. The
Dominie drew back, fearing the soiled dress would touch him. The girl
was making the appeal to him alone, and a cloud of color gathered
slowly over his face under her steady eyes. He regained himself, and
replied,

"No, you can't have the milk, no matter how much you may need it."

"Some one'll die without it," she entreated again, lowering her voice,
throwing no glance at the silent boy or shivering girl.

"Then let them die," retorted the clergyman. "I do not believe
you--anyway!"

He was weakening a little, the attitude of his son and daughter striking
him almost to consent. Frederick's eyes were filled with hauteur unusual
to the boy, and Teola was clinging to his neck, weeping wildly. The
children had never approved of his persecution