"But we would not touch his money, would we, Cynthia? nor have anything to do with any kin of his, would we?"

"No, no, Aunt Ann."

"Then----" and now Ann Walden bent close and whispered: "then have nothing to do with her--at Trouble Neck! She comes with money; with a hope of forgiveness--but we do not forgive such things, do we, Cynthia, and we Waldens cannot be bought?"

"No, no!"

"When you see her, tell her so! Tell her to keep away--we do not believe her; we do not want her!"

The flowers on the pretty girlish head were already wilted in the heat of the morning and something more vital and spiritual had faded and drooped in Cynthia Walden's soul. She looked old and haggard as she rose up and drew a long breath like one who had drunk a deep draught too hastily. Even the yearning for love had departed--unless God were good to her she would sink rapidly down, from now on, to the common level.

"I'll tell her, Aunt Ann," she said nonchalantly. "I'm right glad you let me know." Then she wandered aimlessly back to the library and over to the fireplace. Dejected and shrinking, she raised her eyes humbly to her "Biggest of Them All" and deep in her soul sank the truth that she, Cynthia Walden, once so gay and proud, was not the equal of Sandy Morley! If he were brave and fine enough he might help her from very pity--but if she were worthy, she must not permit him to do so.

Then it was that the first wave of actual soul-loneliness enveloped the girl, and when youth recognizes such desolation something overpowers it that no older person can ever understand.

And that very afternoon the great storm came that swept away so much and opened the way to more.

It was four o'clock on that same day that Liza Hope passed Stoneledge on the way down to the store. Liza was always just getting over having a baby or just about to have one and her condition was now of the latter character. Poor, misshapen, down-trodden creature! She accepted her fate indifferently, not because she was hard or bitter, but because she had never had a vision of anything else.

She paused near the chicken house where old Lily Ivy was hovering over a belated brood whose erratic mother had mistaken the season of the year.

"Howdy, Ivy! You-all has a right smart lot of fowls--but ain't it a mighty bad time to hatch?"

"Dis yere hen allus was a fool hen," Ivy vouchsafed, "givin' trouble an' agony to us-all."

"Does you-all like her the best?"

This question brought Ivy to her feet with a stare.

"The little doctor she done say as how we-all loves best the baby-things what be right techersome. She be right, too, I reckon.

Them babies o' mine what died, and po' lil' Sammy what ain't clear in his mind, is mighty nigh to me. I ain't never thought 'bout sich till she cum. She steps up to my cabin now an' again an' her and me talks.

The Cup-o'-Cold-Water Lady I calls her, an' nights I lie an' think on her, an' she comes an' brings my daid babies to me in dreams-like, an'

then I reach out for Sammy, an' I feel right comforted."

Ivy came close to her caller now and looked into the weary, sunken eyes compassionately. Her contempt of the po' white trash faded before the pathetic desolateness of Liza's glance.

"Liza Hope," she said, fixing the roving stare by her tone, "how be you going to face this winter? You be as fool-like as dis yere old hen-hussy. All your chillens was born during respectable times o'

year. What you-all goin' to do wid no wood-pile, no nothin', an' a baby comin' long in the black time of winter?"

Liza faced her accuser blankly as if she had nothing whatever to do with the matter.

"I ain't no wise 'sponsible," she faltered; "de good Lord He knows I ain't hankerin' after no mo' calls and troubles. But the Cup-o'-Water Lady don' promise to come to me in my hour an' bide till I pass through my trial. Seems like I can bear it now when I think o' that. Some say they-all don't believe her is kin to Parson Starr as was, but I does.

The Lord He don't make two sich-like less He uses the same mixin's. I knows, I do!"

Ivy started back. Oddly enough this was the first time she had heard the connection between Starr and the newcomer. She had taken for granted the rumour that had reached her concerning Marcia Lowe, and she had disapproved keenly of the call that young woman had made upon her mistress recently, but now, as Liza spoke, sudden recollection startled her. If the stranger were what Liza suggested, why then Ann Walden's condition might be accounted for! The surprise of this new thought turned Ivy giddy, but it also caused her to change the subject of conversation.

"When yo' come back from de sto'," she said with frigid dignity, "stop to de' rear do'. I has some corn bread an' bacon what you can carry 'long wid yo', an' an ole ironin' blanket fo' coverin'."

Liza muttered her thanks and shuffled on, her distorted figure casting a weird shadow as the blazing sun struck across her path as she entered The Way.

It was five o'clock when the reddish sunlight suddenly was blotted out by a huge black cloud. An ominous hush came with the shadows, and with instinctive fear and caution Ann Walden, in the living-room, closed the windows and doors. Cynthia, who was passing through the hall, ran upstairs to do the same, and then returned and stood listlessly by her aunt near the window looking out over the garden place, the little brook, which divided it from the pasture lot below, and the two cows huddling under a clump of trees beside the tiny bridge which spanned the stream.

"I--don't like the look of the sky," Ann Walden murmured; "I reckon it's going to be a mighty bad storm. Seems like the seasons get twisted these-er-days. Now if it was spring----" She did not finish her sentence, for a wave of wind brought the lagging storm on its breast; a blinding flash of lightning and a crash of thunder set it free and then the deluge descended. A wall, seemingly tangible, descended from the clouds to the earth--everything was blotted out.

"Good Lord-a'mighty!" Ivy dashed in from the kitchen, a grayness showing through the black of her skin; "I mus' save dem cows. I jes'

mus'--God help me!" She ran through the room to the front hall, pulling her skirt over her head as she ran.

"Ivy, I forbid you leaving the house!"

The black woman paused, for even in that moment of excitement tradition held her--the servant was stopped by the mistress' voice, but too long had Ivy stood for higher things to renounce them now. She had stood between her loved ones and starvation; she had always kept the worst from them and she must continue to do so.

"Miss Ann, honey," she said in her soft, old drawl, "dem cattle down by de Branch is all that stan's 'twixt us-all and we-all becoming white trash! I jis' got-ter go, chile!"

Then before Ann Walden could speak again the woman was gone! They watched her beating her way through the wall of rain, without speaking; with every emotion gripped and silenced by fear and horror the two at the living-room window waited. They saw her reach the little foot-bridge; they saw her pause and hold to the railing as if for breath and then--there was nothing! The place where old Ivy had stood was empty. The cows, too, were going fast and helplessly away on a sea of troubled water.

Shock numbs the brain and stays suffering, but presently, like a frightened child rousing from sleep, Ann Walden turned to Cynthia.

"Ivy," she panted. "Ivy, where is she?"

Cynthia could not answer. She tried, but speech failed her. With large, fixed eyes she continued to stare at the blank space where once the little bridge had stood. What had happened was too awful for her comprehension. Then in the drear dimness of the room a hideous laugh rang out.

"Don't! don't, Aunt Ann!" Words came desperately now to the child; "oh! I'm so afraid!"

But again and again the laugh sounded.

"We-all are poor white trash! poor white trash! ha! ha! ha!"

Cynthia shrank from Ann Walden. What had happened she could not know, but of a sudden the old woman became a stranger, a stranger to be cared for and guarded--one to defend.

"Come," whispered Cynthia, "come away--dear--it's all right! Come, come!"

Alternately laughing and sobbing, Ann Walden followed the guiding of the hand upon her arm; she permitted herself to be placed on the ragged sofa on the opposite side of the room.

"Poor white trash!"

And there Tod Greeley and Liza Hope found them hours after. Cynthia, beside the prostrate woman, was crooning as to a baby, and over and over the desperate old voice wailed:

"We-all are poor white trash!"

CHAPTER VII

When Sandy had departed down The Way he felt weak and stricken. All the fervour and exhilaration were gone; there was no turning back, and he could not stand still. The walk to The Forge could easily be made before morning, with time to sleep on the way, so there was nothing to do but forget his misery and travel on. The storm, too, emphasized the necessity for this. On beyond there was a deserted cabin by the trail; he could sleep there in comparative comfort; under the falling roof there surely must be one dry spot large enough to shelter a thin, tired boy.

A crash of thunder caused Sandy to rush forward. He had the childish fear that many country children have of the extremes of Nature, and superstition swayed his every thought. Gathering his loose coat about him and clutching his money close, he made for The Way, and ran with all the strength remaining in him, for the deserted cabin.

Flash and splintering noise surrounded him. His eyes were blinded by the blue-red lightning; his ears were aching from the thunder's shock.