She followed him to the door. “Kiss me,
Laban!”
He put away the arms she lifted toward him. “No,”
he said, “I reckon it wouldn’t be right,”
and he turned and walked swiftly away, without looking
back.
The woman stood watching the man, as long as she could
see him, and long after, with her left hand lifted
to the jamb of the door, higher than her head.
Then from the distance where he passed from sight over
the brow of the hill, another figure of a man appeared,
and slowly made its way down to the cabin. As
she knew while he was still far off, it was Matthew
Braile who, as long as he sat in the seat of the scorner,
with his chair tilted against the wall, seemed a strong
middle-aged man; but when he descended from his habitual
place, with the crook of his stick, worn smooth by
use, in his hard palm, one saw that he was elderly
and stiff almost to lameness. He carried himself
with a forward droop, and his gaze bent ponderingly
on the ground, as if he were not meaning to look her
way, and would pass without seeing her.
“Squire Braile!” she called to him, and
as he straightened himself and turned round toward
her, she besought him, “Do you believe there’s
any God?”
“Oh!” he answered, and he smiled at the
challenge from the somewhat lonely elevation which
he knew the thoughts of his neighbors kept, aloof
from the sordid levels of politics and business.
“Why, Nancy, haven’t we got one, right
here in Leatherwood?”
“That’s what makes me think there ain’t
any, Squire Braile. If you’re not in too
much of a hurry, I wish you’d stop and talk to
me a minute. I’m in trouble.”
“Most women are; or men, for the matter of that.
What is it, Nancy? I’m rather stronger
on law than gospel; but if I can be any help, why you
know your Joey’s an old friend of mine, and
I’ll be glad to help you.”
He came toward her where she had stepped from the
threshold and sat crouched on the hewn log, and stood
looking down at her before he sank at her side.
“You may think it’s pretty strange, my
asking you for help. Won’t you set?
I can’t let you come inside because the baby’s
just got to sleep.”
“Well,” he assented, “if you’re
not afraid to be seen with such an infidel in the
full light of day,” he jested, confronting her
from the log where he sank. “What would
Brother Gillespie say?”
She ignored his kindly mockery, and again she began,
“What makes you believe there’s a God?
You don’t believe in the Bible?”
“Not altogether, Nancy.”
“Do you believe in the Bible God?”
“As much as the Bible’ll let me.”
“Then, do you believe in the miracles?”
“What are you after, Nancy Billings?”
“If you saw a miracle, would you believe it?”
“That would depend on who did it. Now,
I want you to let me do a little of the catechizing.
I’ve liked you and Laban ever since you came
to Leatherwood, and you know how your Joey has all
but brought my boy back to me. Well, do you
believe in God?”
