God Almighty meant her to have. Larning is woman's curse. Give 'em
larning, I've always held, and you've headed 'em for perdition."

But Priscilla won him gradually, after he had become accustomed to her
disturbing voice. He would not have her touch him physically. She seemed
to rouse in him a strange unrest when she came near him, but eventually
he accepted her as a diversion and utilized her for his own hidden need.

One day, with a hint of spring in the air, he reached out a lean hand
toward the window near which Jean had placed him, and said:

"Woman, are you here?"

"Jean's gone--erranding." The old mother-word attracted Glenn's
attention.

"Eh?" he questioned.

"To the village. I'm waiting until she comes back. Can I do anything for
you, sir?"

"No. Is--is it a sunny day?"

"Glorious. The ice is melting now--in the shady places."

"I thought I felt the warmth. 'Tis cold and drear sitting forever in
darkness."

"I am sure it must be--terrible."

But Glenn resented pity.

"God's will is never terrible!" he flung back. Then:

"Are you one--who got larning?"

"I--learned to read, sir."

"And much--good it's done you--the larning! I warrant ye'd be better off
without it. Women are. Good women are content with God's way. My wife
was. Always willing, was she, to follow. God was enough for her--God and
me!"

"I wonder!"

"Eh? What was that?"

"Nothing, sir. May I read to you?"

"Is the Book there?"

"Right here on the stand. What shall I read?"

"There's one verse as haunts me at times; find it in Acts--the
seventeenth, I think--and along about the twenty-third verse. I used to
conjure what it might mean more than was good for me. It haunts me now,
though I ain't doubting but what the meaning will come to me, some day.
Them as sits in darkness often gets spiritual leadings."

And Priscilla read:

"'For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with
this inscription, To the Unknown God. Whom, therefore, ye ignorantly
worship, him I declare unto you?'"

A silence fell between the old, blind father and the stranger-girl
looking yearningly into his face.

"I've conned it this way and that," Glenn said, with his oratorical
manner claiming him. "It might be that some worship an Unknown God and
the true God might pass by and set things straight. There be altars and
altars, and sometimes even my God seems----"

"An Unknown God?" Priscilla asked tenderly. "That must be such a l