He came close to her and looked into her face, then into the face of the child, with a sharp questioning. She did not flinch, but answered his scrutiny clearly and proudly. Then, after a moment, she turned a disappointed look upon me, as though to say that I, a stranger, had read her aright at once, while this man held her afar in the cold courts of his judgment ere he gave her any welcome or said a word of pity. She sank back on the bench, and drew a hand with sorrowful slowness across her brow. He saw a ring upon her finger. He took her hand and said: "You are married, Agnes?" "My husband is dead, and the sister of this poor one also," she replied; and she fondled the child and raised her eyes to her brother's. His face now showed compassion. He stooped and kissed her cheek. And it seemed to me at that moment that she could not be gladder than I. "Agnes," he said, "can you forgive me?" "He was only a stock-rider," she murmured, as if to herself, "but he was well-born. I loved him. You were angry. I went away with him in the night . . . far away to the north. God was good--" Here she brushed her lips tenderly across the curls of the child. "Then the drought came and sickness fell and . . . death . . . and I was alone with my baby--" His lips trembled and his hand was hurting my arm, though he knew it not. "Where could I go?" she continued. Glenn answered pleadingly now: "To your unworthy brother, God bless you and forgive me, dear!--though even here at Winnanbar there is drought and famine and the cattle die." "But my little one shall live!" she cried joyfully. That night Glenn of Winnanbar was a happy man, for rain fell on the land, and he held his sister's child in his arms. ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS: It isn't what they do, it's what they don't do No, I'm not good--I'm only beautiful Should not make our own personal experience a law unto the world Undisciplined generosity Women don't go by evidence, but by their feelings You have lost your illusions You've got to be ready, that's all