less suns of the August valleys. He was as seasoned,
as tough, as choice old hickory, and had pale,
blue eyes in which the flame of religious fervor, of
incandescent zeal, were scarcely dimmed.

A long supper table was spread in a room where a
sideboard supported a huge silver-plated pitcher
swung on elaborately engraved supports, a dozen
blue glasses traced with gold, and a plate that pictured
in a grey, blurred fashion the Last Supper.
The gathering ranged variously from the aged circuit
rider to the minister's next but one to the youngest:
he had fourteen children, of which nine were
ravenously present. The oldest girl at the table, a
possible sixteen years, had this defiant detachment
under her immediate charge, acquitting herself notably
by a constant stream of sharp negations opposed
to a varied clamor of proposals, attempted forages
upon the heaped plates, sly reprisals, and a
sustained, hysterical note which threatened at any
time, and in any youthful individual, to burst into
angry wails.

Opposite Gordon Makimmon sat a slight, feminine
figure, whom he recognized as the teacher of the
past season's local school. She had a pallid face,
which she rarely raised, compressed lips, and hands
which attracted Gordon by reason of their white deftness,
the precise charm of their pointed fingers.
During a seemingly interminable grace, pronounced

[[130]]

p129 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p130w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p131

v?