"It haves t' do," says she, "with Judith."
"An' what's that?"
She whispered.
"For shame!" I cried.
"Ay, but," says she, "you isn't a woman!"
"'Tis gossips' employment, woman!"
"'Tis a woman's wish t' know," she answered.
The thing concerned Judith: I was angered....
* * * * *
And now the door was shut in my face. 'Twas opened--closed again. The
fool fled past me to his own place--scared off by the footsteps of
Death, in the way of all fools. I was in haste--all at once--upon the
road from Whisper Cove to Twist Tickle in a screaming gale of wind and
rain. I was in Judith's service: I made haste. 'Twas a rough road, as
I have said--a road scrambling among forsaken hills, a path made by
chance, narrow and crooked, wind-swept or walled by reaching alders
and spruce limbs, which were wet and cold and heavy with the drip of
the gale. Ah, but was I not whipped on that night by the dark and the
sweeping rain and the wind on the black hills and the approach of
death? I was whipped on, indeed! The road was perverse to hurrying
feet: 'twas ill going for a crooked foot; but I ran--splashing through
the puddles, stumbling over protruding rock, crawling over the
hills--an unpitying course. Why did the woman cry out for my uncle?
What would she confide? Was it, indeed, but the name of the man? Was
it not more vital to Judith's welfare, imperatively demanding
disclosure? I hastened. Was my uncle at home? For Elizabeth's peace at
this dread pass I hoped he had won through the gale. In rising anxiety
I ran faster. I tripped upon a root and went tumbling down Lovers'
Hill, coming to in a muddy torrent from Tom Tulk's Head. Thereafter--a
hundred paces--I caught sight of the lights of the Twist Tickle
meeting-house. They glowed warm and bright in the scowling night that
encompassed me....
* * * * *
'Twas district-meeting time at Twist Tickle. The parsons of our Bay
were gathered to devise many kindnesses for our folk--the salvation of
souls and the nourishment of bodies and the praise of the God of us
all. 'Twas in sincerity they came--there's no disputing it--and in
loving-kindness, however ingenuously, they sought our welfare. When I
came from the unkind night into the light and warmth of that plain
temple, Parson Lute, of Yellow Tail Tickle, whom I knew and loved, was
seeking to persuade the shepherds of our souls that the spread of
saving grace might surely be accomplished, from Toad Point to the
Scarlet Woman's Head, by means of unmitigated doctrine and more artful
discourse. He was a youngish man, threadbare and puckered of
garment--a quivering little aggregation of bones and blood-vessels,
with a lean, lipless, high-cheeked face, its pale surface splashed
with freckles; green eyes, red-rimmed, the lashes sparse and white;
wide, restless nostrils. "Brethren," said he, with a snap of the
teeth, his bony hand clinched and shaking above his gigantic head,
"con-_vict_ 'em! Anyhow. In any way. By any means. _Save_ 'em! That's
what we want in the church. Beloved," he proceeded, his voice dropping
to a hissing whisper, "save 'em. _Con_-vict 'em!" His head shot
forward; 'twas a red, bristly head, with the hair growing low on the
brow, like the spruce of an overhanging cliff. "It's the only _way_,"
he concluded, "to save 'em!" He sat down. "I'm hungry for souls!" he
shouted from his seat, as an afterthought; and 'twas plain he would
have said more had not a spasmodic cough put an end to his ecstasy.
"Praise God!" they said.
"'Low I got a cold," Parson Lute gasped, his voice changed now by the
weakness of an ailing man.