Gene! He would do that too, now, if Nelly asked
him.

The resonant winter note rang out loud, strange in that sultry summer
air. She looked from afar at the tree, holding its mighty crest high
above the tiny house, high above the tiny human beings who had doomed
it. So many winters, so many summers, so many suns and moons and rains
and snows had gone to make it what it was. Like the men who had planted
it and lived beneath its shade, it had drawn silently from the depths of
the earth and the airy treasures of the sky food to grow strong and live
its life. And now to be killed in an hour, in attempted expiation of a
deed for which it bore no guilt!

Marise was coming closer now. The axe-strokes stopped for a moment as
though the chopper drew breath. The silence was heavy over the
breathless summer field.

But by the time she had arrived at the back door of the house, the
axe-blows were renewed, loud, immediate, shocking palpably on her ear.
She knocked, but knew that the ringing clamor of the axe drowned out the
sound. Through the screen-door she saw old Mrs. Powers, standing by the
table, ironing, and stepped in. The three children were in the pantry,
beyond, Ralph spreading some bread and butter for his little brother and
sister. Ralph was always good to the younger children, although he was
so queer and un-childlike! Nelly was not there. Mrs. Powers looked up at
Marise, and nodded. She looked disturbed and absent. "We're at it, you
see," she said, jerking her head back towards the front of the house. "I
told you 'bout 'Gene's sayin' he'd gi'n in to Nelly about the big pine."

Marise made a gesture of dismay at this confirmation. The old woman went
on, "Funny thing . . . I ain't a Powers by birth, Lord knows, and I never
thought I set no store by their old pine tree. It always sort o' riled
me, how much 'Gene's father thought of it, and 'Gene after him . . . sort
of silly, seems like. But just now when we was all out there, and 'Gene
heaved up his axe and hit the first whack at it . . . well, I can't tell
you . . . it give me a turn most as if he'd chopped right into _me_
somewhere. I got up and come into the house, and I set to ironin', as
fast as I could clip it, to keep my mind off'n it. I made the children
come in too, because it ain't no place for kids around, when a tree
that size comes down."

Marise demurred, "'Gene is such a fine chopper, he knows to a hair where
he'll lay it, of course."

"Well, even s