By Shore and Sedge | Page 6

such energy that at the end
of ten minutes he reappeared at the door with an armful of cut boughs
and chips, which he quietly deposited behind the stove. Observing that
he was still standing as if looking for something, the widow lifted her
eyes and said, "Ef it's the bucket, I reckon ye'll find it at the spring,
where one of them foolish Filgee boys left it. I've been that tuckered
out sens sundown, I ain't had the ambition to go and tote it back."
Without a word Gideon repaired to the spring, filled the missing bucket,
replaced the hoop on the loosened staves of another he found lying
useless beside it, and again returned to the house. The widow once
more pointed to the chair, and Gideon sat down. "It's quite a spell sens
you wos here," said the Widow Hiler, returning her foot to the
cradle-rocker; "not sens yer was ordained. Be'n practicin', I reckon, at
the meetin'."
A slight color came into his cheek. "My place is not there, Sister Hiler,"
he said gently; "it's for those with the gift o' tongues. I go forth only a
common laborer in the vineyard." He stopped and hesitated; he might
have said more, but the widow, who was familiar with that kind of
humility as the ordinary perfunctory expression of her class, suggested
no sympathetic interest in his mission.
"Thar's a deal o' talk over there," she said dryly, "and thar's folks ez
thinks thar's a deal o' money spent in picnicking the Gospel that might
be given to them ez wish to spread it, or to their widows and children.
But that don't consarn you, Brother Gideon. Sister Parsons hez money

enough to settle her darter Meely comfortably on her own land; and I've
heard tell that you and Meely was only waitin' till you was ordained to
be jined together. You'll hev an easier time of it, Brother Gideon, than
poor Marvin Hiler had," she continued, suppressing her tears with a
certain astringency that took the place of her lost pride; "but the Lord
wills that some should be tried and some not."
"But I am not going to marry Meely Parsons," said Gideon quietly.
The widow took her foot from the rocker. "Not marry Meely!" she
repeated vaguely. But relapsing into her despondent mood she
continued: "Then I reckon it's true what other folks sez of Brother Silas
Braggley makin' up to her and his powerful exhortin' influence over her
ma. Folks sez ez Sister Parsons hez just resigned her soul inter his
keepin'."
"Brother Silas hez a heavenly gift," said the young man, with gentle
enthusiasm; "and perhaps it may be so. If it is, it is the Lord's will. But I
do not marry Meely because my life and my ways henceforth must lie
far beyond her sphere of strength. I oughtn't to drag a young
inexperienced soul with me to battle and struggle in the thorny paths
that I must tread."
"I reckon you know your own mind," said Sister Hiler grimly. "But
thar's folks ez might allow that Meely Parsons ain't any better than
others, that she shouldn't have her share o' trials and keers and crosses.
Riches and bringin' up don't exempt folks from the shadder. I married
Marvin Hiler outer a house ez good ez Sister Parsons', and at a time
when old Cyrus Parsons hadn't a roof to his head but the cover of the
emigrant wagon he kem across the plains in. I might say ez Marvin
knowed pretty well wot it was to have a helpmeet in his ministration, if
it wasn't vanity of sperit to say it now. But the flesh is weak, Brother
Gideon." Her influenza here resolved itself into unmistakable tears,
which she wiped away with the first article that was accessible in the
work-bag before her. As it chanced to be a black silk neckerchief of the
deceased Hiler, the result was funereal, suggestive, but practically
ineffective.
"You were a good wife to Brother Hiler," said the young man gently.
"Everybody knows that."
"It's suthin' to think of since he's gone," continued the widow, bringing
her work nearer to her eyes to adjust it to their tear- dimmed focus. "It's

suthin' to lay to heart in the lonely days and nights when thar's no man
round to fetch water and wood and lend a hand to doin' chores; it's
suthin' to remember, with his three children to feed, and little Selby, the
eldest, that vain and useless that he can't even tote the baby round while
I do the work of a hired man."
"It's a hard trial, Sister Hiler," said Gideon, "but the Lord has His
appointed time."
Familiar as consolation by vague quotation was to Sister Hiler, there
was an occult sympathy