The woman shifted the baby from her arms to her gaunt right hip. Her eyes glistened and her thin lips quivered. “You'll think I'm silly, Miss Ethel.” She steadied her voice with an effort. “I break down an' cry ever' time I tell this. I believe people can cry for joy the same as for grief if it hits 'em just right. I took Paul to the door, an' went in to fix Dave up a little--to give 'im a clean shirt an' the like. An' all that time Dave was crazy to ask what Paul wanted, but was afraid Paul would hear 'im, an' so I saw him starin' at me mighty pitiful. I wanted to tell him that Paul was friendly, but I didn't know how to manage it. I winked at 'im, an' tried to let 'im see by my cheerfulness that it was all right with Paul, but Dave couldn't understand me. Somehow he thought Paul might still remember the old fuss, an' he was in an awful stew till Paul come in. But he wasn't in doubt long, Miss Ethel. Paul come in totin' little Phil in his arms--he'd been playin' with the child outside--an' shuck hands with Dave, an' set down by the bed in the sweetest, plainest way you ever saw. He kept rubbin' Phil's dirty legs--jest wouldn't let me take him, an' begun to laugh an' joke with Dave over old boyhood days. Well, I simply stood there an' wondered. I've seen humanity in as many shapes as the average mountain woman o' my age an' sort, I reckon, but I never, never expected to meet a man like Paul Rundel in this life. He seemed to lift me clean to the clouds, as he talked to Dave about the foolishness of bein' blue an' givin' up to a sickness like his'n. Then like a clap o' thunder from a clear sky he told Dave in an off-hand way, as if it wasn't nothin' worth mentionin', that he wanted 'im to hurry an' git well because he had a job for 'im bossin' the hands at the shingle-mill. Miss Ethel, if the Lord had split the world open an' I saw tongues o' fire shootin' up to the skies I wouldn't 'a' been more astonished. “'Do you really mean that, Paul?' I heard Dave ask; an' then I heard Paul say, I certainly do, Dave, an' you won't have to wait till you are plumb well, either, for you kin do that sort o' work just settin' around keepin' tab on things in general.' An' so, Miss Ethel, that's why Dave's gittin' well so fast. It ain't the medicine; it's the hope an' joy that Paul Rundel put in 'im. They say Paul has got some new religion or other, an' I thank God he has found it. Love for sufferin' folks fairly leaks out of his face an' eyes. Before he left he had every child we have up in his lap, a-tellin' 'em tales about giant-killers an' hobgoblins an' animals that could talk, an' when he went off he left Dave cryin' like his heart was breakin'.” Ethel walked slowly homeward. From a small, gray cloud in the vast blue overhead random drops of rain were falling upon the hot dust of the road. As she neared the house she saw her mother waiting for her at the front gate with a letter in her hand.