rit."

"Ye mean that he air like the headless man from Haytes, and the squaw
with her burnt brat?"

They were both down beside the babe again, Tess eying the mother
eagerly.

"Oh, no, Tess! Those are but superstitions. This is the truth. No matter
how little the child is, he won't go to a holy place if he isn't
baptized."

"Air the Huly Ghost livin' only in the church?"

"Yes, He doesn't stay anywhere else."

"Who says it air true?"

"God."

"Your brother's God?"

"Yes."

"Then, of course, it air so. Why didn't ye say so before? Could the brat
be sprinkled this comin' Sunday?"

"Yes; yes, it is baptismal Sunday. Deacon Hall's new baby is to be
baptized, and lots of others, too!"

"Then yer brat air goin' to be sprinkled with 'em," decided Tessibel.

"Tess!" gasped Teola. "How? How?... I should die if I had to take him to
the church."

"I takes him," replied Tess grimly. "I takes him, and I says to yer
pappy, 'Dominie, I knows that ye don't like me nor my Daddy, but here
air a brat what air sick to death.... He can't find God by hisself
'cause he air too little, and God won't try and find him if he ain't
sprinkled. Will ye do it?'"

Teola shifted her position, and looked into the squatter's face. It was
gleaming with heavenly resolve and uplifted faith.

"Tess, would you dare?" gasped she.

"Yep! The little brat has to go. I takes him."

The fisher-girl clambered to her feet, and shoved another log into the
stove.

"It air a chilly night," she commented, "and the ghosts air a-howling
like mad, 'cause Ma Moll's been here. She can raise spirits any time of
night."

Teola evidently did not hear. Her eyes were fixed upon the face of the
babe, her mouth twitching nervously at the corners. She wondered
silently what her father would say when Tess presented the child for
baptism on Sunday morning. She could imagine her own happiness after it
was all over. She thought she would get better for a time. She
remembered how her mother had worried over her cough, how her father had
advised with the best doctors of the city; but they had gravely shaken
their heads, saying that the girl might grow out of it; they hoped she
would. But day by day she had seen herself growing more and more
slender, more and more fragile-looking. And, as Teola knelt over the
child in the flickering candlelight, Tess shivered superstitiously. The
young mother was so white that the squatter could almost have imagined
her one of M