"Yes, ma'm; I sure ain't aimin' ter forgit that," replied the humbled
Judy; and she slouched away to the kitchen.

Auntie Sue went to the door of Brian Kent's room. But, with her
hand outstretched toward the latch, she hesitated. Had he heard? The
Sheriff's voice had been so loud. She feared to enter, yet she knew that
she must. At last, she knocked timidly, and, when there was no answer,
knocked again, louder. Cautiously, she opened the door.

The man lay with his face to the wall,--to all appearances fast asleep.

She tiptoed to the bed, and stood looking down upon the stranger
for whom, without a shadow of reason,--one would have said,--she had
violated one of the most deeply rooted principles of her seventy years.

To Auntie Sue, daughter of New England Puritanism, and religious to
the deeps of her being, a lie was abhorrent,--and she had
lied,--deliberately, carefully, and with painstaking skill she had lied.
She had not merely evaded the truth; she had lied,--and that to save a
man of whom she knew nothing except that he was a fugitive from the law.
And the strangest thing about it was this, that she was glad. She could
not feel one twinge of regret for her sin. She could not even feel that
she had, indeed, sinned. She had even a feeling of pride and triumph
that she had lied so successfully. She was troubled, though, about this
new and wholly unexpected development in her life. It had been so easy
for her. She had lied so naturally, so instinctively.

She remembered how she had spoken to Brian Kent of the river and of
life. She saw, now, that the river symbolized not only life as a whole,