VII


The cabin of the Reverdys stood on a byway beyond the Gillespies. Sally
had joined the girl on her way out of the Temple, and was prancing beside
her as they went homeward together. "Oh, ain't it just great? I feel like
as if I could fly. I never seen the Power in Leatherwood like it was
to-night. He's _sent_; you can tell that as plain as the nose on your
face. How happy I do feel! I believe in my heart I got salvation this
minute. Don't you feel the Spirit any? But you was always such a still
girl! I did like the way the women folks was floppun' all round. _I_
say, if you feel the Power workun' in you, show it, and help the others to
git it. What do you s'pose he meant by your paw's needun' him?"

"I don't know. Perhaps _he_ will," the girl answered briefly.

"Goun' to tell him? Well, that's right, Janey. I kep' wonderun' why he
didn't come to-night. If Abel hadn't be'n so beat out with his work at the
Cross Roads to-day, you bet I'd 'a' made _him_ come; but he said I'd
git enough glory for both. I believe his talkun' with Squire Braile don't
do him no good. You b'lieve Washington and Jefferson was friends with Tom
Paine? The Squire says they was, but I misdoubt it, myself; I always hearn
them two was good perfessun' Christians. Kind o' lonesome along here where
the woods comes so close't, ain't it? Say, Janey: I wisht you'd come a
little piece with me, though I don't suppose the bad spirits would dast to
come around a body right on the way home from the Temple this way--"

They had reached the point where Sally must part with the girl, who
stopped to lift the top rail of the bars to the lane leading from the road
to her father's cabin. She let it drop again. "Why, I'll go the whole way