So that was what kept them apart!

Sister Angela drew back. For a moment she did not understand; then she smiled and bent nearer.

"You think us Catholics? We are not; but if we were it would be just the same. We are friendly women who really want to be neighbourly and helpful."

"You all tote a cross!" Becky was interested.

"Yes. We bear the cross--it is a symbol of what we try to do--you need not be afraid of us, and if there is ever a time when you need us--come to Ridge House."

After that Becky had apparently disappeared, but often and often when the night was stormy, or dark, she had walked stealthily down the trail and taken her place by the windows of Ridge House. She knew the sunny, orderly kitchen in which such strange food was prepared; she knew the long, narrow dining room with its quaint carvings and painted words on walls and fireplace; she knew the tiny room where the Sisters knelt and sang. One or two of the tunes ran in Becky's brain like haunting undercurrents; but best of all, Becky knew the living room upon whose generous hearth the fire burned from early autumn until the bloom of dogwood, azalea, and laurel filled the s.p.a.ce from which the ashes were reluctantly swept. Every rug and chair and couch was familiar to the burning eyes. The rows of bookshelves, the long, narrow table and--The Picture on the Wall!

To that picture Becky went now. She had never been able to see it distinctly from any window. It was the Good Shepherd. The n.o.ble, patient face bent over the child on the man's breast had power to still Becky's distraught mind. She could not understand, but a groping of that part of her that could still feel and suffer reached the underlying suggestion of the artist. Here was someone who was doing what, in a vague and bungling way, Becky herself had always wanted to do--shield the young, helpless thing that belonged to her.

The old face twitched and the soiled, crinkled arms--so empty and yearning--hugged the trembling body. And so Sister Angela found her.

The three years since Angela had seen Becky Adams had taught her much of her people--she called them _her_ people, now.

"I am so glad to see you, Aunt Becky," she said, smiling and pointing to a chair by the hearth, quite in an easy way. "Are you tired after your long walk?"

"Sorter." Becky came over to the chair and sank into it. Then she said abruptly: "Zalie's gone!"

The brief statement had power to visualize the young creature as Angela had once seen her: pretty as the flower whose name she bore, a little shy thing with hungry, half-afraid eyes.

"Is she--dead?" Sister Angela's gaze grew deep and sympathetic.

"Not 'zactly--not daid--jes now." Poor Becky, breaking through her own reserve and agony, made a pitiful appeal.

"She has--gone away? With whom?" Sister Angela began to comprehend and she lowered her voice, bending toward Becky.

"She ain't gone with any one--she didn't have ter--but she'll fotch up with someone fore long. She's gone to larn--she got the call, same as all her kin--it's the curse!"

Now that the wall of reserve was down the pent waters rushed through and they came on the fanciful, dramatic words peculiar to Becky and her kind. Angela did not interrupt--she waited while the old, stifled voice ran on:

"I had to larn, and I went far and saw sights, and when it was larned I c.u.m back, with Zalie's mother rolled up like she was a bundle. The old cabin was empty 'cept for wild things as found shelter there--me and her settled down and no one found out for some time, and then it didn't matter!

"Zalie's mother, she had to larn and she went with a man as helped her larn powerful quick. He don killed my gal by his ways an' he left her to die. It was a stranger as brought Zalie to me, and then I set myself to the task of keeping her from the curse--but she got the call and she went! I can see her"--here the strange eyes looked as the eyes of a seer look--they were following the girl on the "larnin' way"; the tired voice trailed sadly--"I can see how she went. It was nearing morning and all the moonlight that the night had left was piled like mist down in the Gap. Her head was up and she had her hands out--sorter feelin', feelin', and she would laugh--oh! she would laugh--and then she'd catch the scent, and be off! Oh! my Gawd, my Gawd!"

Becky swayed back and forth and moaned softly as one does who has emptied his soul and waits.

Sister Angela got up and bent over the old woman, her thin white hand on the crouching back.

"When did this happen?" she asked.

"Mos' a year back!"

"And you have only come now to tell me? Why did you wait?"

"Twasn't no use coming before--but now, I 'low she's coming back, same as all us does, after the larnin'! I had a vision las' night--and this morning--I saw The Ship on the Rock--she'll come!"

Again the old woman's eyes were lifted and she peered into the depths of the fire.

"I seed Zalie las' night! She come with hit."

"With what?" Sister Angela had that peculiar p.r.i.c.king sensation of the skin caused by tense nerves.

"With hit. Her young-un! That's what larnin' means to us-all. Hit! After that, nothin' counts one way or 'other. Zalie spoke in her vision--clear like she was in the flesh. She don made me understand that I mus' give hit a chance; break the curse--there is only one way!"

"What way, Becky?" Angela was whispering as if she and the old woman near her were conspiring together.

"Hit mus' go where no one knows--no one ever can know. It's the knowin'

that d.a.m.ns us-all. Folks knowin' an' expectin'--an' helpin' the curse.

Hit's got to start fresh an' no one knowin'."

Becky's voice was sepulchral.

"You mean," Angela asked, "that if Zalie comes back with a child that you want me to take it, find a home for it--where no one will ever know?"

"You-all don promised to help me," Becky pleaded, for she caught the doubting tone in Angela's voice; "you-all ain't goin' back on that, air yo'?"

The burning eyes fell upon the cross at Angela's side.

"No," she said. "No. Becky, I promise to help you. But suppose Zalie, should she have a child, refused to give it up?"

Becky's face quivered.

"She won't las', Zalie won't." The stricken voice was as confident as if Zalie already lay dead. "Zalie ain't got stayin' powers, she ain't. She don have fever an' what-all--an' she won't las' long--she'll go on The Ship! But if you-all hide hit--so The Ship can't take hit--if you-all give hit hit's chance--then the curse will be broke."

There was pleading, renunciation, and command in the guttural voice:

"Becky, I will promise to help you. If there is a child and you renounce all claim to it, I will find a home for it. It shall have its chance.

And now sit here and rest--I am going to bring some food to you."

Sister Angela arose and pa.s.sed from the room. The doing of the kindly, commonplace thing restored her to her usual calm.

She was not gone long, but when she returned, bearing the tray, Becky had departed and the chair in which she had sat was still swaying.

CHAPTER III

"_I brushed all obstructions from my doorsill and stepped into the road._"

It was just after sunset the following day when Jed turned from the Big Road into the River Road and thanked G.o.d that the next five miles could be made before early darkness set in.

Beside him sat Meredith Thornton, white lipped and wide-eyed, and her aristocratic bags rattled around in the s.p.a.ce behind.

The smile with which Meredith had faced her past three years lingered still on the set mouth--the smile was for Jed.