Page 174 (1/2)

But they had much to say to each other, and, finally, Samson broke the

silence: "Did ye think I wasn't a-comin' back, Sally?" he questioned, softly

At that ue had ever

fashioned s war on

crude idioot, as she answered: "Ye done said ye was comin'" Then, she added a happy lie: "I knowed

plumb shore ye'd do hit"

After a while, she dreay, and said, slowly: "Saun ready fer ye Ye said ye'd

need it bad when ye come back, an' I've took care of it"

She stood there holding it, and her voice dropped almost to a whisper

as she added: "It's been a lot of comfort to me sometimes, because it was your'n I

knew if ye stopped keerin' feras I had it, I--" She broke off, and the fingers of one hand

touched the weapon caressingly

The ood-

by He recognized in the very gesture hich she stroked the old

walnut stock the pathetic heart-hunger of a nature which had been

denied the fulfill on

an inani

of the mother instinct for a child Now, thank God, her life should

never lack anything that a flood-tide of love could bring to it He