"Ashamed of? Well, Rebecca, you certainly can talk like a fool when you put your mind on it." Mrs. Snell flushed. "Really! Indeed! So you think it's perfectly natural for a man to hide from his old friends all knowledge of his marriage--as he would a murder?" "Yes, if he wants to." "Well, I don't. And that's the difference. And we'll see what other people in this village are going to think about it." Mr. Snell stopped, laid a hand on his wife's arm and wheeled her about. He spoke in a low voice, but his words were metallic in their clearness. "Now look here, Rebecca Snell, you jest go slow on startin' that kind of talk. Dr. Alton's a good man. We are mighty lucky to have him in the old doctor's shoes. Longfields is a mighty small village for a man with such an education as he's got. And if it ever got to his ears that you'd been insultin' his dead wife's memory--well--you'll get jest exactly what you deserve, and I'll help give it to yer. I mean it. Now shut up." Mrs. Snell glanced at the light blue angry eyes now looking steadily into her own. Between those eyes and her own face, a long and bony finger, quivering with anger, was moving slowly, to and fro. It came very near her face. She blinked, tightened her lips and took a backward step. Then her husband, in a low voice, husky with rage, the vibrating finger almost touching her nose, spoke once more. "And you _stay_ shut up!" After a pause, just long enough for his message to be acknowledged by a nod of obedience he started on toward the church. Mrs. Snell followed after. In that congregation were persons who came to worship their Creator--the ostensible purpose of the gathering. Miss Susan Pendexter, on the other hand, a somewhat emotional spinster, came to worship the preacher, Rev. George Bentley Heywood. She was thrilled by the originality, the power and the beauty of the sermon which to his own wife seemed, as usual, prosy and commonplace. Many were present because afraid to stay away. Among these were the young men. Children, of course, were present under compulsion, accepting the sermon as a punishment.