er, and Nannie sat sewing in the
little room adjoining the kitchen.

"You're late for supper," she said idly as he entered. "Sairy Jane's
gone to bed with a headache and ma's in a temper. I'll get you something
as soon as I've done this seam."

"I've had supper," he answered shortly, adding from force of habit,
"where's ma?"

Nannie motioned towards the kitchen and drew a little nearer the lamp,
while Nicholas left the room in search of his stepmother.

Marthy Burr, a pile of newly dug potatoes on the floor beside her, was
carefully sorting them before storing them for winter use. The sound
ones she laid in a basket at her right hand, those that were of
imperfect growth or showed signs of decay she threw into a hamper that
was kept in the kitchen closet.

"You ought to make Jubal do this," said Nicholas as he entered.

"I wouldn't trust the thickest skinned potato in the field in his
hands," returned Marthy sharply. "He an' yo' pa made out to store 'em
last year, an' when I went to look in the first barrel, the last one of
'em had rotted."

"Let them rot," said Nicholas harshly. "I be damned if I'd care. You
don't eat them, anyway."

"I reckon if I was a man I might consarn myself 'bout the things that
tickle my own palate--an' 'taters ain't one of 'em," was his
stepmother's retort. "But, being a woman, it seems I've got to spend my
life slavin' for other folks' stomachs. But you're yo' Uncle Nick Sales
all over again; 'Don't you get up befo' day to set that dough, Marthy,'
he'd say, but when the bread came on flat as a pancake, he'd look sourer
than all the rest."

"What was my Uncle Nick Sales like?" asked Nicholas indifferently. He
knew the name, but he had never heard the man's story.

"All book larnin' an' mighty little sense--just like you," replied his
stepmother with repressed pride in her voice. "Could read the Bible in
an outlandish tongue an' was too big a fool to come in out of the rain.
He used to sit up all night at his books--an' fall asleep the next day
at the plough. He was the wisest fool I ever see."

"Poor fool!" said Nicholas softly. It was the epitaph over the unmarked
grave of that other member of his race who had blazed the thorny path
before him. A strange, pathetic figure rose suddenly in his vision--a
man with a great brow and a twisted back, with brawny, knotted hands--an
unlearned student driving the plough, an ignorant philosopher dragging
the mire.

"Poor fool!" he said aga