ou'll be a Shaker, and they'll take you for a saint; but anyway
you'll have had your life."

"You are right, Hetty," said Susanna, quietly; "but oh! my dear, the
world outside isn't such a Paradise for young girls like you, motherless
and fatherless and penniless. You have a good home here; can't you learn
to like it?"

"Out in the world people can do as they like and nobody thinks of
calling them wicked!" sobbed Hetty, flinging herself down, and putting
her head in Susanna's aproned lap. "Here you've got to live like an
angel, and if you don't, you've got to confess every wrong thought
you've had, when the time comes."

"Whatever you do, Hetty, be open and aboveboard; don't be hasty and
foolish, or you may be sorry forever afterwards."

Hetty's mood changed again suddenly to one of mutiny, and she rose to
her feet.

"You have n't got any right to interfere with me anyway, Susanna; and if
you think it's your duty to tell tales, you'll only make matters worse";
and so saying she took her basket and fled across the fields like a
hunted hare.

That evening, as Hetty left the infirmary, where she had been sent
with a bottle of liniment for the nursing Sisters, she came upon Nathan
standing gloomily under the spruce trees near the back of the building.
It was eight o'clock and quite dark. It had been raining during the late
afternoon and the trees were still dripping drearily. Hetty came upon
Nathan so suddenly, that, although he had been in her thoughts, she gave
a frightened little cry when he drew her peremptorily under the shadow
of the branches. The rules that govern the Shaker Community are very
strict, but in reality the true Believer never thinks of them as rules,
nor is trammeled by them. They are fixed habits of the blood, as common,
as natural, as sitting or standing, eating or drinking. No Brother is
allowed to hold any lengthy interview with a Sister, nor to work, walk,
or drive with her alone; but these protective customs, which all are
bound in honor to keep, are too much a matter of everyday life to be
strange or irksome.

"I must speak to you, Hetty," whispered Nathan. "I cannot bear it any
longer alone. What shall we do?"

"Do?" echoed Hetty, trembling.

"Yes, _do_." There was no pretense of asking her if she loved or
suffered, or lived in torture and suspense. They had not uttered a word
to each other, but their eyes had "shed meanings."

"You know we can't go on like this," he continued rapid