ernoon; and there was things said between 'em, as they worked,
as had to lay by for a settlin'. Kitty made things worse--silly girl
that she was--by coming round in her gay way with her rake, and smiling
at them both, so that it would have beat the Angel Gabriel to know which
of them it were she had a leaning to.

"Truth was, Kitty was back into childhood, out there in the hay--merry
and sweet as a rosebud she looked in her old faded bonnet. I see her
just as plain, this poor child--that did so much mischief without
meaning to hurt anybody. How was she to know that fierce fires of
jealous, passionate hatred were at work, kindled by her to flame that
sunshiny afternoon, as she danced along the meadow with her rake, happy
as the June day seemed long?

"No, sir, you need not be impatient, for the story is about done.

"The last load of hay was pitched as the glowing sun went down. The
thunderstorm had passed to the hills beyond, and on the horizon clouds
lay piled, purple black. The men come in to supper, and then went out
again. Kitty was busy with her dishes in the kitchen till dark; then
there come a flash of lightning, and a growlin' of thunder. The last
dish was put away, and so the girl went sauntering out, down to the bush
of cluster roses by the garden gate, where she could look over into the
barn-yard and call to the men still at work with the hay.

"Something took her farther--'twas as if a hand led her--and she crossed
the yard, and down the lane she went till she got to the meadow gate
that stood open as the men had left it after bringing that last heavy
wain through.

"The moon was up--a moon that drifted serenely through the banks of
clouds, ever upwards to the zenith.

"Sir, did you ever think--and being a stranger, sir, you must excuse the
question--did you ever think of the wicked deeds that moon has looked
upon since the creation of mortal man? Oh, yes, I know it, I know it
well; in God's sunlight, that sin would never have been committed; but
in the moonlight--the calm, still moonlight--passions rise to fever
heat, the blow is struck, and man turns away with the curse of Cain
written on his brow.

"Kitty, standing with her back against the gate, her eyes following the
flitting light across the meadow to the mill-race by the path beyond,
all at once felt her heart leap with nameless horror. Yet all she could
see was shadows, for the figures was out of sight. All she could see was
shadows--shadows