account of our gittin' this cyarpet, they'll be saved
anyhow, so Parson Page says. And if we send the money and they do hear
the gospel, like as not they won't repent, and then they're certain to
be damned. And it seems to me as long as we ain't sure what they'll
do, we might as well keep the money and git the cyarpet. I never did
see much sense anyhow,' says she, 'in givin' people a chance to damn
theirselves.'

"Well, we decided to take Sally Ann's advice, and we was talkin' about
app'intin' a committee to go to town the follerin' Monday and pick out
the cyarpet, when all at once 'Lizabeth Taylor--she was our
treasurer--she spoke up, and says she, 'There ain't any use app'intin'
that committee. The money's gone,' she says, sort o' short and quick.
'I kept it in my top bureau drawer, and when I went for it yesterday,
it was gone. I'll pay it back if I'm ever able, but I ain't able now.'
And with that she got up and walked out o' the room, before any one
could say a word, and we seen her goin' down the road lookin' straight
before her and walkin' right fast.

"And we--we set there and stared at each other in a sort o' dazed way.
I could see that everybody was thinkin' the same thing, but nobody
said a word, till our minister's wife--she was as good a woman as ever
lived--she says, '_Judge not_.'

"Them two words was jest like a sermon to us. Then Sally Ann spoke up
and says: 'For the Lord's sake, don't let the men folks know anything
about this. They're always sayin' that women ain't fit to handle
money, and I for one don't want to give 'em any more ground to stand
on than they've already got.'

"So we agreed to say nothin' about it, and all of us kept our promise
except Milly Amos. She had mighty little sense to begin with, and
havin' been married only about two months, she'd about lost that
little. So next mornin' I happened to meet Sam Amos, and he says to
me, 'Aunt Jane, how much money have you women got to'rds the new
cyarpet for the church?' I looked him square in the face, and I says,
'Are you a member of the Ladies' Mite Society of Goshen church, Sam
Amos? For if you are, you already know how much money we've got, and
if you ain't, you've got no business knowin'. And, furthermore,' says
I, 'there's some women that can't keep a secret and a promise, and
some that can, and _I_ can.' And that settled _him_.

"Well, 'Lizabeth never showed her face outside her door for more'n a
month afterwards, and a more piti