There was a revival in progress at the colored Methodist church.  Aunt Milly was as energetic in her religion as in other respects, and had not missed a single one of the meetings.  She returned at nightfall from her visit to the country and prepared a frugal supper.  Uncle Wellington did not eat as heartily as usual.  Aunt Milly perceived his want of appetite, and spoke of it.  He explained it by saying that he did not feel very well.

“Is you gwine ter chu’ch ter-night?” inquired his wife.

“I reckon I ‘ll stay home an’ go ter bed,” he replied.  “I ain’t be’n feelin’ well dis evenin’, an’ I ‘spec’ I better git a good night’s res’.”

“Well, you kin stay ef you mineter.  Good preachin’ ’u’d make you feel better, but ef you ain’t gwine, don’ fergit ter tote in some wood an’ lighterd ‘fo’ you go ter bed.  De moon is shinin’ bright, an’ you can’t have no ’scuse ‘bout not bein’ able ter see.”

Uncle Wellington followed her out to the gate, and watched her receding form until it disappeared in the distance.  Then he re-entered the house with a quick step, and taking a hatchet from a corner of the room, drew the chest from under the bed.  As he applied the hatchet to the fastenings, a thought struck him, and by the flickering light of the pine-knot blazing on the hearth, a look of hesitation might have been seen to take the place of the determined expression his face had worn up to that time.  He had argued himself into the belief that his present action was lawful and justifiable.  Though this conviction had not prevented him from trembling in every limb, as though he were committing a mere vulgar theft, it had still nerved him to the deed.  Now even his moral courage began to weaken.  The lawyer had told him that his wife’s property was his own; in taking it he was therefore only exercising his lawful right.  But at the point of breaking open the chest, it occurred to him that he was taking this money in order to get away from aunt Milly, and that he justified his desertion of her by the lawyer’s opinion that she was not his lawful wife.  If she was not his wife, then he had no right to take the money; if she was his wife, he had no right to desert her, and would certainly have no right to marry another woman.  His scheme was about to go to shipwreck on this rock, when another idea occurred to him.

“De lawyer say dat in one sense er de word de ole ‘oman is my wife, an’ in anudder sense er de word she ain’t my wife.  Ef I goes ter de Norf an’ marry a w’ite ’oman, I ain’t commit no brigamy, ’caze in dat sense er de word she ain’t my wife; but ef I takes dis money, I ain’t stealin’ it, ’caze in dat sense er de word she is my wife.  Dat ’splains all de trouble away.”