Elder Skates arose, trembling. "Vesty," said he, with unnatural quickness of tone; "will you start 'Rifted Rock'?"
The blue, handsome eyes were on her mercilessly—she was suffocating besides with a wild desire to laugh, her breath coming short and quick. She gave one agonized look at Brother Skates, and then, lifted her eyes to the window.
The clouds were sad and grand; there was a bird flying to them.
She fixed her eyes there, and her voice flowed out of her:
"'Softly through the storm of life,
Clear above the whirlwind's cry,
O'er the waves of sorrow, steals
The voice of Jesus, "It is I."'"
The music in her throat had trembled at first like the bird's flight, winging as it soared, but now all that was over; her uplifted face was holy, grave:
"'In the Rifted Rock I'm resting.'"
******
Elder Cossey forgot his wrath in mysterious deep movings of compunction. Fluke, who had entered, was soft, reverent, his fingers twitching for his violin. Even so, I thought, as I listened, it may be will sound to us some voice from the other shore, when we put out on the dark river.
"Vesty," said a mite of a girl, coming up to her after meeting, "Evelin wants to know if you can set up with Clarindy to-night. She 's been took again."