frozen water. Waldstricker had not come. Tess crept into bed sighing
with relief. Andy rolled himself in his blankets and slept.

The morning arrived crisply cold, bleakly grey. Tess shivered as she
broke the ice for water. Would this day bring Waldstricker? Then, as
that harrowing thought flitted through her mind, another exultant,
smiling flash took its place. Tessibel's head reared with a proud
uplift. No human power could set aside the majestic promise of Heaven
that she might stay in the hut. Smilingly, she opened the shanty door
and cheerfully answered the dwarf's, "How d'y' do, brat dear?"

But the next few hours were laden with a sense of approaching calamity,
that sense which ties the tongue in apprehension. Andy was perched on
the ladder while Tess sat just below in the wooden rocker.

Suddenly, from far up the lane, the sound of wheels grating on the snow,
could be heard plainly. Both man and girl stared white-faced at each
other for perhaps thirty seconds.

"They're comin', but they can't take ye, Brat," muttered Andy. "You'll
stay in this shanty the same 's if you was nailed to the floor."

Then, he sought his place under the straw tick, and as nearer and louder
came the clatter of the horses hoofs, the more quiet grew the Skinner
hut.

Tessibel stood in the middle of the kitchen, her hand pressing down the
beatings of her heart. Somebody was approaching! There were footsteps on
the dry snow!

Directly the crunching sound ceased, a loud knock fell on the door.
Tessibel lifted the bar, and at her faint, "Come in," the door flung
back on its hinges and Ebenezer Waldstricker stepped over the threshold.
Another man, seemingly by common consent, waited outside. Waldstricker
came to a halt at the sight of the squatter girl. Even in her mourning,
and ashen pale, she looked glorious. Her burnished, unmanageable hair
clung like a golden mantle about her. She had lifted heavy lashes and
was looking him straight in the face.

Ebenezer, suddenly, felt a wild desire to strike, but he dared not touch
her, nor dared he go forward one step. Her advancing motherhood crowned
her with unapproachable dignity, and the man muttered an imprecation
under his breath. To have her appear in court so austerely lovely would
be to lose his case. He had expected she would plead, cry, perhaps
scream. What should he say to break that steady calm? He did not know
what a day and night of communion with the Infinite had done for the