"Ah, I see, I see, I see!" Ann muttered, as if to herself, her slow, thoughtful glance on her broad lands, which stretched out through the murky atmosphere. "It’s wonderful how much your life is like mine used to be. The other night, lying in bed, I got to studying over it all, and it suddenly flashed on me that maybe it is the divine intention that I was to travel that rough road so I’d know how to lead you, that was to come on later, over the pits I stumbled in. And with that thought I felt a strange sort of peaceful contentment come over me. You see, I’m nearly always in a struggle against my inclination to treat Jane Hemingway’s daughter half decent, and such thoughts as those kind o’ ease my pride. If the Lord is making me pity you and like you, maybe it’s the devil that is trying to pull me the other way. That’s why I’m afraid I won’t do to trust, wavering about like I am. In this fight I haven’t the slightest idea which influence is going to win in the end. In a tight pinch I may be tempted to use our very friendship to get even with your mammy. When she faces me with that confident look in her eye and that hateful curl to her lip, I loose my grip on all that’s worth a red cent in me." "You couldn’t do a wrong thing to save your life," said Virginia, putting out her hand and taking that of her companion. "Don’t you bet too high stakes on that," Ann replied, deeply touched. "I’m no saint. Right now I’m at daggers’ points with nearly every neighbor I’ve got, and even my own child over the mountain. How I ever got this way with you is a mystery to me. You certainly were the last one I’d ’a’ lifted a finger to help, but now—well, well—I reckon I’d worry a lots if you met with any further misfortune. But you are keeping back something, child. Did Langdon Chester seem to think that other ’_somebody_' could possibly be Luke King?" Virginia flushed and nodded. "He seemed to think so, Mrs. Boyd." Ann sighed. She was still holding Virginia’s hand, and she now began timidly to caress it as it lay on her knee.