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Joel read the letter aloud, something–some sturdy uprightness of his own, no doubt–blinding him to its significance.

“Will you read it ag’in, neighbor? I’m not over-quick.”

The man’s voice was a revelation full of an unutterable hurt, like the cry of some dumb wounded thing.

And Joel read it again, choking with indignation now at every word.

“Thank ye, neighbor. I’ll trouble you to write a line thankin’ him; that’s all.”

He got up heavily, staggering a little as he crossed the floor, and went out into the yellow sunlight. There was the long, sun-kissed slope, the huge pile of twisted roots, the rude shanty with its clambering vines. The humming of bees in the sage went on drowsily. Life, infinitely shrunken, was life still. A more cultured grief might have swooned or cried out. This man knew no such refuge; even the poor relief of indignation was denied to him. None of the thousand wild impulses that come to men smitten like him flitted across his clouded brain. He only knew to take up his burden dumbly and go on. If he had been wiser, could he have known more?

No one spoke of the blow that had fallen upon him. The sympathy that met him came in the warmer clasp of hard hands and the softening of rough voices, none the worse certainly for its quietness. Alone with her husband, however, good Mrs. Brandt’s wrath bubbled incessantly.

“It’s a crying, burning, blistering shame, Joel, that’s what it is. I s’pose it’s the Lord’s doings, but I can’t see through it.”

“If the Lord’s up to that kind o’ business, Barbara, I don’t see no further use fer the devil,” was the dry response.

These plain, honest folk never dreamed of intruding upon their neighbor’s grief with poor suggestions of requital. Away in the city across the mountains men babbled of remedies at law. But this man’s hurt was beyond the jurisdiction of any court. Day by day the hollow cough grew more frequent, and the awkward step slower. Nobody asked him to quit his work now. Even Mrs. Brandt shrank from the patient misery of his face when idle. He came into her kitchen one evening, choosing the old quiet corner, and following her with his eyes silently.

“Is there anything lackin’, Brice?” The woman came and stood beside him, the great wave of pity in her heart welling up to her voice and eyes.

“Nothin’, ma’am, thank ye. I’ve been thinkin’,” he went on, speaking more rapidly than was his wont, “an’ I dunno. You’ve knowed uv people gettin’ wrong in their minds, I s’pose. They wuz mostly smart, knowin’ chaps, wuzn’t they?” the low, monotonous voice growing almost sharp with eagerness. “I reckon you never knowed of any one not over-bright gittin’ out of his head, ma’am?”

“I wouldn’t talk o’ them things, Brice. Just go on and do your best, and if there’s any good, or any right, or any justice, you’ll come out ahead; that’s about all we know, but it’s enough if we stick to it.”

“I reckon you’re right, ma’am. ‘Pears sometimes, though, as ef anything ‘ud be better ‘n the thinkin’.”

IV.

It all came to an end one afternoon. Brice was at work on the ditch again, preferring the cheerful companionship of Joel and Bert Fox to his own thoughts, and Mrs. Brandt was alone in her kitchen. Two shadows fell across the worn threshold, and a weak, questioning voice brought the good woman to her door instantly.

“Good-day to you, ma’am. Is there a man named Brice livin’ nigh here anywhere?”

It was a woman’s voice,–a woman with some bits of tawdry ornament about her, and a round-eyed boy clinging bashfully to her skirts.

Mrs. Brandt brought them into the house, urging the stranger to rest a bit and get her breath.

“Thank you, ma’am; I’d like to be movin’ on. Do you know if he’s well,–the man Brice? We’re his wife an’ boy.”

The woman told her story presently, when Mrs. Brandt had induced her to wait there until the men came home,–told it with no unnecessary words, and her listener made no comment.