ter with you, Job Taylor; you set right down and hear
what I've got to say. I've knelt and stood through enough o' your
long-winded prayers, and now it's my time to talk and yours to
listen.'

"And bless your life, if Job didn't set down as meek as Moses, and
Sally Ann lit right into him. And says she, 'I reckon you're afraid
I'll tell some o' your meanness, ain't you? And the only thing that
stands in my way is that there's so much to tell I don't know where to
begin. There ain't a woman in this church,' says she, 'that don't know
how Marthy scrimped and worked and saved to buy her a new set o'
furniture, and how you took the money with you when you went to
Cincinnata, the spring before she died, and come back without the
furniture. And when she asked you for the money, you told her that she
and everything she had belonged to you, and that your mother's old
furniture was good enough for anybody. It's my belief,' says she,
'that's what killed Marthy. Women are dyin' every day, and the
doctors will tell you it's some new-fangled disease or other, when, if
the truth was known, it's nothin' but wantin' somethin' they can't
git, and hopin' and waitin' for somethin' that never comes. I've
watched 'em, and I know. The night before Marthy died she says to me,
"Sally Ann," says she, "I could die a heap peacefuler if I jest knew
the front room was fixed up right with a new set of furniture for the
funeral."' And Sally Ann p'inted her finger right at Job and says she,
'I said it then, and I say it now to your face, Job Taylor, you killed
Marthy the same as if you'd taken her by the throat and choked the
life out of her.'

"Mary Embry, Job's sister-in-law, was settin' right behind me, and I
heard her say, 'Amen!' as fervent as if somebody had been prayin'. Job
set there, lookin' like a sheep-killin' dog, and Sally Ann went right
on. 'I know,' says she, 'the law gives you the right to your wives'
earnin's and everything they've got, down to the clothes on their
backs; and I've always said there was some Kentucky law that was made
for the express purpose of encouragin' men in their natural
meanness,--a p'int in which the Lord knows they don't need no
encouragin'. There's some men,' says she, 'that'll sneak behind the
'Postle Paul when they're plannin' any meanness against their wives,
and some that runs to the law, and you're one of the law kind. But
mark my words,' says she, 'one of these days, you men who've been
stealin' your