thing; it didn't matter, though, she'd get along somehow, she guessed--
here they were startled by the sound of a door opening. Loo glided
quickly round the corner of the stoop, and entered the house. Bancroft
following her heard the back door shut, and some one go down the steps.
He could not help looking to see who was on foot at such an untimely
hour, and to his surprise perceived the Elder in a night-shirt, walking
with bare feet towards the stables through the long grass already stiff
with frost. Before the white figure had disappeared Bancroft assured
himself that Loo had gone up to bed the front way. Curiosity conquering
his first impulse, which had been to follow her example, he went after
the Elder, without, however, intending to play the spy. When he had
passed through the stables and got to the top of the slope overlooking
the creek, he caught sight of the Elder twenty yards away at the water's
edge. In mute surprise he watched the old man tie his night-shirt up
under his armpits, wade into the ice-cold water, kneel down, and begin
what was evidently meant to be a prayer. His first words were
conventional, but gradually his earnestness and excitement overcame his
sense of the becoming, and he talked of what lay near his heart in
disjointed phrases.

"That young man to-day jes' jumped on me! He told me I'd plagued them
cattle half to death, and I'd acted lies and cheated Ramsdell out of
three hundred dollars. 'Twas all true. I s'pose I did plague the cattle,
though I've often been as thirsty as they were--after eatin' salt pork
and workin' all day in the sun. I didn't think of hurtin' them when I
salted the floor. But I did act to deceive Ramsdell, and I reckon I made
nigh on three hundred dollars out of the deal. 'Twas wrong. But, O
God!"--and unconsciously the old man's voice rose--"You know all my
life. You know everythin'. You know I never lied or cheated any one fer
myself. I've worked hard and honest fer more'n forty years, and always