suddenly flashed into fiery indignation.

"Judith Taylor," she said sharply, "how can you suggest such a wicked
thing? Why, I would--I would--DIE before I would accept a penny for
doing such a thing!"

And it was Judy, now, who stood silent and abashed before the aroused
Auntie Sue.

"Don't ever speak of such a thing again!" continued the old lady.
"And remember, we must be more careful than ever, now, not to let any
one--not a soul--know that Mr.--Mr.--Burns is in the house, or that we
ever saw him!"

"That there deteckertive man said as how the feller's name was Brian
Kent, didn't be?" muttered the sullen Judy.

"I don't care what the detective man said!" retorted Auntie Sue. "I am
telling you that his name is Brian Burns, and you had better remember
it! You had better remember, too, that if anybody ever finds out the
truth about him, you and I will go right along to jail with him!"

"Yes, ma'm; I sure ain't aimin' ter forgit that," replied the humbled
Judy; and she slouched away to the kitchen.

Auntie Sue went to the door of Brian Kent's room. But, with her
hand outstretched toward the latch, she hesitated. Had he heard? The
Sheriff's voice had been so loud. She feared to enter, yet she knew that
she must. At last, she knocked timidly, and, when there was no answer,
knocked again, louder. Cautiously, she opened the door.

The man lay with his face to the wall,--to all appearances fast asleep.

She tiptoed to the bed, and stood looking down upon the stranger
for whom, without a shadow of reason,--one would have said,--she had
violated one of the most deeply rooted principles of her seventy years.

To Auntie Sue, daughter of New England Puritanism, and religious to
the deeps of her being, a lie was abhorrent,--and she had
lied,--deliberately, carefully, and with painstaking skill she had lied.
She had not merely evaded the truth; she had lied,--and that to save a
man of whom she knew nothing except that he was a fugitive from the law.
And the strangest thing about it was this, that she was glad. She could
not feel one twinge of regret for her sin. She could not even feel that
she had, indeed, sinned. She had even a feeling of pride and triumph
that she had lied so successfully. She was troubled, though, about this
new and wholly unexpected development in her life. It had been so easy
for her. She had lied so naturally, so instinctively.

She remembered how she had spoken to Brian Kent of the river and of