man not sure about his knees. When he had straightened himself, he put
on his hat, and eyed the minister sternly from beneath its brim.

"The Lord gives us crosses grievous to our natur'," he said, "an' we're
told to bear 'em cheerfully as long as they're on our backs; but there
ain't nothin' said agin our unloadin' 'em in the ditch the minute we git
the chance. I guess you won't last here more 'n a twelvemonth."

He pulled his soft and discolored old hat down over his brows with a
significantly hostile nod, and, turning, stumped toward the hall-door
without offering to shake hands.

The other trustees had risen likewise, in tacit recognition that the
meeting was over. Winch clasped the minister's hand in his own broad,
hard palm, and squeezed it in an exuberant grip. "Don't mind his little
ways, Brother Ware," he urged in a loud, unctuous whisper, with a
grinning backward nod: "he's a trifle skittish sometimes when you don't
give him free rein; but he's all wool an' a yard wide when it comes to
right-down hard-pan religion. My love to Sister Ware;" and he followed
the senior trustee into the hall.

Mr. Gorringe had been tying up his books and papers. He came now with
the bulky parcel under his arm, and his hat and stick in the other hand.
He could give little but his thumb to Theron to shake. His face wore
a grave expression, and not a line relaxed as, catching the minister's
look, he slowly covered his left eye in a deliberate wink.



"Well?--and how did it go off?" asked Alice, from where she knelt by the