Then Jinnie started to repeat a few verses Lafe had taught her. She couldn't tell exactly where they were in the Bible, but the promise in them had always made her own burdens lighter, and since seeing Lafe daily, she had partially come back to her former trust. "'The Lord is my Shepherd,'" she droned sleepily. Then on and on until she came to, "'Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,'" and Peg broke into a sob. "'I will fear no evil,'" soothed Jinnie, amid the roaring of the wind and the crackling of the thunder over the hill. "'For thou art with me,'" she finished brokenly. "He's the one I was talking about, Peggy. He'll help us all if we can believe and be----" Then she quickly ended, "Happy in Spite." Peg continued to sob. One arm was across her baby boy protectingly, and the other hand Jinnie held in hers. "Somehow things seem easier, Peggy, when you hold your head up high, and believe everything'll come all right.... Lafe said so; that's why he started the club." "I wisht I could think that way. I'm near dead," groaned the woman. Jinnie smoothed the soft, grey-streaked hair. "Wouldn't you like to come into the club, dear?" she faltered, scarcely daring to put the question. "Then you'll be happy with us all--with Lafe and Bobbie and--and----" Jinnie wanted to say another name, but doubted its wisdom--and then abruptly it came; "and Jinnie," she finished. Peggy almost sat up in bed. "Darlin'," she quivered. "Darlin' girl, I've been cussed mean to Lafe an' you. I've told you many a time with my own mouth I hated you, but God knows, an' Lafe knows, I loved you the minute I set eyes on you." She dropped back on the pillow and continued, "If you'll take me in your club, an' learn me how to believe, I'll try; I swear I will." For a long time Jinnie sat crooning over and over the verses she'd learned from Lafe, and bye-and-bye she heard Peg breathing regularly and knew she slept. Then she settled herself in the chair, and sweet, mysterious dreams came to her through the storm. CHAPTER XXXVIII THE STORY OF A BIRD Lafe Grandoken, in his wheel chair, sat under the barred prison window, an open Bible on his knees. Slowly the shadows were falling about him, and to the man every shade had an entity of its own. First there trooped before him all the old memories of the many yesterdays--of Peg--his little dead lad--and Jinnie. And lastly, ghostlike, came the shattered hopes of to-morrow, and with these he groaned and shivered.