She was a much-suffering woman, inclined to melancholy; but there was a latent fire in her when she seemed most despondent, and she roused up now and spoke with passionate, flashing eyes:—
"Sence he got beat, town-meetin' day, he don't 'pear to take no comfort, 'thout 't is hatin' Judge Gingerford and spitin' niggers, as he calls us. He sent his hired man over agin this mornin', to say, if we wa'n't out of the house by Monday, 't would be pulled down on to our heads. Call that Christian, when he knows we can't git another house, there 's sich a s'picion agin people o' color?"
"'T wa'n't alluz so; 't wa'n't so in my day," said the old woman, pausing, as she was administering the gruel to Fessenden's with a spoon. "Here's gran'pa, he was a slave, and I was born a slave, in this here very State, as long ago as when they used to have slaves here, as I've told ye time and agin; though I don't clearly remember it, for I scacely ever knowed what bondage was, bless the Lord! But we allus foun' somebody to be kind to us, and got along,—for it did seem as though God kind o' looked arter us, and took keer on us, same as He did o' white folks. We've been carried through, somehow or 'nother; and I can't help thinkin' as how we shall be yit, spite o' Mr. Frisbie. S'pose God'll forgit us 'cause His grand church-folks do? S'pose all they can say'll pedijice Him?"
Having advanced this unanswerable question, she turned once more to her patient, who put up his head, and opened his mouth wide, to receive the great spoon.
"Lucky for them that can trust the Lord!" said Mrs. Williams, over her patching. "But if I was a man, I'm 'fraid I should put my trust in a good knife, and stan' by the ol' house when they come to pull it down! The fust man laid hands on 't 'ud git hurt, I'm dreffle 'fraid! Prayin' won't save it, you see!"
"Mr. Frisbie owns the house," observed Gentleman Bill, "and I wouldn't resort to violent measures to prevent him; though 't isn't possible for me to believe he'll be so unhuman as to demolish it before you find another."
"I'm inclined to think he will," answered Mr. Williams, calmly. "He's a rather determined man, William. But God won't quite forget us, I'm sartin sure. And we won't worry about the house till the time comes, anyhow. Le' 's see what the Good Book says to comfort us," he added, with a hopeful smile.
Unfortunately, the "Timberville Gazette" had not reached this benighted family; and not having the Judge's Address to read, Mr. Williams read the Sermon on the Mount.
Fessenden's listened with the rest. And alight, not of the understanding, but of the spirit, shone upon him. His intellect was too feeble, I think, to draw any very keen comparison between those houses where the "Timberville Gazette" was taken and read that evening and this lowly abode,—between the rich there, who had shut their proud, prosperous doors against him, and these poor servants of the Lord, who had taken him in and comforted him, though the hour was nigh when they, too, were to be driven forth shelterless in the wintry storms. The deep and affecting suggestiveness of that wide contrast his mind was, no doubt, too weak thoroughly to appreciate. Yet something his heart felt, and something his soul perceived; his pale and vacant face was illumined; and at the close of the reading he rose up. The coarse wrappings of his body fell away; and the muffling ignorance, the swaddling dulness, wherein that divine infant, the bright immortal spirit, was confined, seemed also to fall off. He lifted up his hands, spreading them as if dispensing blessings; and his countenance had a vague, smiling wonder in it, almost beautiful, and his voice, when he spoke, thrilled the ear.
"Praise the Lord! praise the Lord! for He will provide!