Mrs. Wilson Woodrow

“ Against the rough, stone chimney of the bare, clean room leaned a slight, listless girl in the uniform of the Salvation Army. "I wish it would stop," she said, glancing nervously toward an old man who sat huddled on a low stool before the stove, and with restless fingers turned the leaves of the Bible on his knee. "It's sure to bring on one of his spells. I've seen it comin' ever since the wind began to blow."
"Oh, yes; alvays," was the phlegmatic response of Mrs. Landvetter, as she adjusted the pins in the lace pillow in her lap. ”

“ Men don't know what temptation is. When the devil gets after me, he keeps whisperin' of pretty things. He tries to get me into the stores, just to see 'em an' finger 'em." She laughed triumphantly. "He had me so tight, he didn't want to give me up, did he, Mr. Campbell?"
But Campbell paid no heed to their talk; his thoughts were occupied with the plaint to which Mrs. Landvetter had given utterance. Having laid bare to her the anguish of his soul, he assumed that her secret despair had risen up and answered it. ”

“ It is sometimes very long before she comes," with a kind of patient pathos. "I tried also to discuss it with Mrs. Landvetter; but the meesteries are withheld from her. Still, what can you expect?" shaking his head commiseratingly; "she has had her sorrows, and they have made her hard." He gazed fixedly at the stove for a moment and coughed once or twice. "She has asked me to peddle her laces through the mountains," with shamefaced apology, looking eagerly at Ethel to see how she would take the news.
"I know. She spoke to me about it too, Mr. Campbell ”

“ He lost himself in haggard reverie. "Aye, that was it," with passionate conviction, "we were too happy—we had turned our thoughts from God.—We had forgotten—it had been raining for a week—but the creek had kept its banks.
"Ethel, listen, listen," clutching her arm with tense fingers, as the wind again shrieked about the cabin. "The wind was like that—we paid no heed. Ruth stirred the parritch for our supper—there came a mighty roaring like that of the sea—it was a' dark in a moment. The teembers o' the cabin strained and snapped—and—we were a' oot i' the cold, cold water. ”

“ You just see a little half-cracked, withered stump of a man, don't you, like most folks does around here? But, if he'd wrestled for your soul like he done for mine, you'd see Christ's messenger same as I do. And he shan't go for to peddle." She turned toward the gate.
"But, Ethel, yet," exclaimed her landlady, snatching at her gown. "T'ink how goot it vould be for him. Dose vimmens dat he shows de laces to, dey look after him some. ”

“ Her sleek, scant hair was drawn tightly back and twisted into a knot the size of a hickory-nut, and her whole appearance, as that of her kitchen, suggested an unceasing effort on her part to combine the maximum of specklessness with the minimum of adornment. ”

“ This in hand, his habit was to roam over the mountains, led, as he conceived, by a mysterious power to selected spots; pausing there, he would repeat the various formulae of numbers which he considered by some law of correspondence sympathetic to the ore he sought.
If gold lay in the rock under his feet, the wire, upon the repetition of the gold number, would bend from the vertical position in which he held it until it touched the earth. ”

“ Dey gif him a bed und a meal now und den. He can't look after hisself."
"That is so," admitted Ethel with reluctance, "an' maybe I will ask him to help you out. Mind, I ain't promisin', though; I got to think it over."
"I haf so mooch laces," continued Mrs. Landvetter, although her listener had departed, "ten yards in de pineapple pattern, und twelve in de roses point, und eight in de flur de lisses, und mooch odders. I t'ink I make dat old man sell dem, all right," with an emphatic nod of the head.
But Campbell rebelled vigorously, when notified of her project for making him useful. ”

“ But I guess if I could fall so low as to steal what I collected for the Army, I needn't let a little thing like a lie stick in my throat." She dropped her face in her hands. "I've tried to raise myself, I've tried to be somebody ”