“No!”
“Will Brother Tom be up thar? Up thar?”—the swift arm of the preacher shot upward—“when Gabriel blows his trump?”
“Eh, Lord, Brother Tom will be up thar!” shouted an old woman.
“Amen!” boomed from the throat of everyone.
As it often happened, Tom’s widow had long since re-wed, but neither she nor her second mate were in the least dismayed. They wept and wailed with fervor, “He’ll be thar! He’ll be thar!”
“Yes,” boomed the preacher once more, “Brother Tom will be thar when Gabriel blows his trump!”
Then abruptly in a very calm voice, not at all like that in which he had shouted, the preacher lined the hymn:
| Arise, my soul, and spread thy wings, A better portion trace. |
Having intoned the two lines the flock took up the doleful dirge.
So they went on until the hymns were finished.