s reaching
out to seize me."

"Martha, calm yourself," said Deems, taking Martha Sloan's shaking hand
in his. "That ain't right. You're sensible. You mustn't think so much of
it. You must keep your mind away."

"That's right, Martha," Mrs. Lennon said, as she helped Martha Sloan
into the house. "You mustn't keep thinking of Jim, and keep going up
there all the time. There's many things waiting for you at home, and
when you're through there why don't you come over to us?"

But Martha Sloan, either not hearing or not heeding the words of Deems
and his wife, sat huddled, nervously whispering, more to herself than to
her friends. "It's Jim. It's his hand reaching out to me. He took
Dorothy. He took Joseph, and he's reaching out now to me. He can't stand
having me living."

She was nervous and in the power of a fear that was stronger than her
will. She sat uneasily looking about her as if knowing that she was safe
in the house of friends, but as if feeling herself momentarily in the
presence of something strange and frightful. She cast frightened looks
about her, at the room, at Mrs. Lennon, and at Deems. She looked at them
in silence as if she did not know how to speak to them until, prompted
by great uneasiness, she spoke in a loud whisper, "Take me home. Take me
home, Deems. I want to get away."

Deems slipped into his coat, said to his wife, "I'll be back soon,"
then, helping Martha from the chair, walked out with her.

"Come now, Martha, you know us well enough. We're your friends, aren't
we? And we tell you there's nothing to fear. It's all your believing.
There's nothing after you. There's nothing you need fear."

"You don't know. It was he took my two children. He took Dorothy. When
they laid her out in the parlor, I could just see him standing at her
head. He was cruel when he lived. He beat them; Dorothy and Joseph, they
hated him. And when they laid out Joseph after his fall, when the bridge
gave way, Jim was standing by his head, and his eyes were laughing at me
like he'd say, 'I took him, but now there's you.' And he's trying for me
now."

Deems was pleased that she was speaking. He hoped that in conversing she
would find respite from her thoughts.

"No, Martha," he said, "that wasn't Jim took Dorothy and Joseph. You
know there's a God that gives and takes. Their years were run. Can't you
see, Martha?"

"It was Jim who took. He couldn't see them living. When he lived he
couldn't see them growing up