ning hungrily to Helen's words, and sometimes even
smiling through her tears. The hardship of loss to herself and her
children was not even thought of; there was only intense relief from
horrible fear; she did not even stop to pity Tom for the pain of death;
coming out of that nightmare of hell, she could only rejoice.

The early sunset flashed a sudden ruddy light through the window in the
front room, making a gleaming bar on the bare whitewashed wall, and
startling Helen with the lateness of the hour.

"I must go now," she said, rising. "I will come again to-morrow."

Mrs. Davis rose, too, lifting her tear-stained face, with its trembling
smile, towards her deliverer. "Won't you come in the other room a
minute?" she said. "I want to show you the coffin. I got the best I
could, but I didn't have no pride in it. It seems different now."

They went in together, Mrs. Davis crying quietly. Tom's face was hidden,
and a fine instinct of possession, which came with the strange uplifting
of the moment, made his wife shrink from uncovering it.

She stroked the varnished lid of the coffin, with her rough hands, as
tenderly as though the poor bruised body within could feel her touch.

"How do you like it?" she asked anxiously. "I wanted to do what I could
fer Tom. I got the best I could. Mr. Ward give me some money, and I
spent it this way. I thought I wouldn't mind going hungry, afterwards.
You don't suppose,"--this with a sudden fear, as one who dreads to fall
asleep lest a terrible dream may return,--"you don't suppose I'll forget
these things you've been tellin' me, and think _that_ of Tom?"

"No," Helen answered, "not if you just say to yourself that I told you
what Mr. Dean said was not true. Never mind if you cannot remember the
reasons I have given you,--I'll tell them all to you again; just try and
forget what the elder said."

"I will try," she said; and then wavering a little, "but the preacher,
Mrs. Ward?"

"The preacher," Helen answered bravely, "will think this way, too, some
day, I know." And then she made the same excuse for him which she had
given Alfaretta, with the same pang of regret.

"Yes, ma'am," the woman said, "I see. I feel now as though I could love
God real hard 'cause He's good to Tom. But Mrs. Ward, the preacher must
be wonderful good, fer he can think God would send my Tom to hell, and
yet he can love Him! I couldn't do it."

"Oh, he is good!" Helen cried, with a great leap of her heart.