, like it war a
tail of a kite."

Meredith managed to give a weak laugh and, as the wagon hit another
hump, she edged toward Jed. After a few moments he felt her head against
his shoulder--from suffering and exhaustion she fell into a brief and
troubled sleep.

Like one carved from rock, Jed held his position while a reverent
expression grew upon his face.

The glow showed yellow through the western sky, The Gap was growing
purplish and dim, and just then, across a foot bridge over the river, a
hurrying, bent form appeared. It swayed perilously--Jed heard a muttered
curse.

"Gawd A'mighty," he breathed, "it's ole Aunt Becky come back to add to
trubble after us-all hopin' she was daid--or something."

Becky was coming toward the road, bending over the bundle she bore; she
paused, looked down, and then darted ahead right in the path of the
horses. They reared and something snapped.

Meredith awoke and sat up with a cry.

"What is the matter?" she asked. "An accident?"

"'Tain't nothin' so bad as an accident, ma'am," Jed reassured her, "but
I don't take no chances with Lincoln's hind hoofs, ma'am, an' somethin'
done cracked in dat quarter."

The pause gave Aunt Becky time to reach Ridge House and play her part in
the scheme of things.

Panting and well nigh exhausted, the old woman staggered on and was
thankful to see at her journey's end that but one light shone in the
quiet house. The light was in the living room where Angela sat alone
waiting for Meredith Thornton. She had quite forgotten, in her growingly
anxious hours, all about poor Becky and her sorrows. So now, when the
long window, opening on the west porch, swayed inward, she started up
with outstretched arms--and confronted Becky.

"I've brung hit!" Becky staggered to a chair, uninvited, and sat down
with her burden, wrapped in a dirty, old quilt, upon her knees.

Angela sat down also--she was speechless and frightened. She watched the
old woman unfold the coverings, and she saw the form of a sleeping
new-born baby exposed to the heat and light of the fire. She tried to
say something, to get control of herself, but she only succeeded in
bending nearer the apparition.

"Zalie she cum las' night like I told you she would. She's daid
now--Zalie is. I don buried her at sun-up--an' I want it tole--if it
ever is tole--that the child was buried long o' Zalie. She done planned
while she was a-dying.

"I told her what you-all promised an' she went real