When she set out, in a day or two, it was with as high a hope as ever French peasant maid took on pilgrimage to Loretto. She hoped to be cured of all her spiritual ills, but how, she hardly knew. The trip was one they often made with horses, but Serene, going alone, took the new railroad that ran southward into the heart of the forests and the swamps. Her cousin Dan, with his colt and road-cart, met her at the clearing, where a shed beside a water-tank did duty for town and station, and drove her home. Her Aunt Mari was getting dinner, and, after removing her hat, Serene went out to the kitchen, and sat down on the settee. The day was stifling, and the kitchen was over-heated, but Aunt Mari was standing over the stove frying ham with unimpaired serenity. “Well, and so you thought it would be cooler down here, Serene? I’m real glad to see you, but I can’t promise much of nothin’ about the weather. We’ve suffered as much as most down here.” Serene saw her opportunity. “We heard your corn was worse than it is with us. What was there in that story, Aunt Mari, about the man who was paralyzed on a Sunday morning?” “Par’lyzed, child? I don’t know as I just know what you mean.” “But he lived real near here,” persisted Serene--“two miles south and three east of the station, they said. That would be just south of here. And we’ve heard a good deal about it. You must know, Aunt Mari.” “Must be old man Burley’s sunstroke. That’s the only thing that’s happened, and there was some talk about that. He’s a Dunkard, you know, and they are mightily set on their church. Week ago Sunday was their day for love-feast, and it was a hundred an’ seven in the shade. He hadn’t been feelin’ well, and his wife she just begged him not to go out; but he said he guessed the Lord couldn’t make any weather too hot for him to go to church in. So he just hitched up and started, but he got a sunstroke before he was half-way there, and they had to turn round and bring him home again. He come to all right, but he ain’t well yet. Some folks thinks what he said ’bout the weather was pretty presumpshus, but I dunno. Seems if he might use some freedom of speech with the Lord if anybody could, for he’s been a profitable servant. A good man has some rights. I don’t hold with gossipin’ ’bout such things, and callin’ on ’em ‘visitations’ when they happen to better folks than me--why, Serene! what’s the matter?” in a shrill crescendo of alarm, for the heat, the journey, and the disappointment had been too much for the girl. Her head swam as she grasped the gist of her aunt’s story, and perceived that upon this simple foundation must have been built the lurid tale which had drawn her here, and for the first time in her healthy, unemotional life she quietly fainted away.