"He's a good old man," said Peter Stock. "He works day and night--and refuses to call it work. Just think of having a servant with a God like Father Fontanel's to make work easy!" "He's even a little bit sorry for Pelée," Charter said. "I'm never quite the same in Saint Pierre. Many times up in the States, I ask myself, if it isn't largely in my mind about Father Fontanel's spirit and his effect upon me. It isn't. Stronger than ever it came to me this morning. You know him?" He turned the last to the woman. "Yes, I found him down on the water-front----" "And brought him to me," said Mr. Stock, and added: "You know what bothered me about priests so long--they seem to have it all settled between them that theirs is the only true Air-line Limited to God. Fontanel's down in the lowlands, where life is pent and cruel, where there are weak sisters and little ones who have to be helped over hard ways--that's what gets Peter Stock." "You don't know how good that is to hear," Paula said softly. "I have thought it, too, about some men in holy orders--black figures moving along in a 'grim, unfraternal' Indian file, with their eyes so occupied in keeping their feet from breaking fresh ground--that it seems they must sometimes lose the Summit." Charter looked from one to the other. Peter Stock regarded their plates. Paula made a quick pretense of eating, and was grateful when Charter broke the silence: "Yes, Father Fontanel has found one of the trails to the Top--one of the happy ones. Sometimes I think there are just as many trails, as an ant could find to the top of an apple. Wayfarers go a-singing on Father Fontanel's trail--eyes warm with soft skies and untellable dreams. It's a way of fineness and loving-kindness----" Mr. Stock had risen from the table and moved to a window which faced the North. All was vague about them. Paula had been carried by Charter's voice toward far-shining mountains.... In the silence, she met the strange, steady eyes of _the boy_, and looked away to find that the room had darkened. "It is getting dark," he said. She would have said it, if he hadn't. The mountain rumbled. "The North is a mass of swirling grays and blacks," Peter Stock announced from the window. "It isn't a thunderstorm----" A sharp detonation cleaved the darkening air, and from the rear of the house the answer issued--quavering cries of children, sharp calling of mothers, and the sullen undertone of men. A subdued drumming came from the North now, completing the tossing currents of sound about the house. The dismal bellowing of cattle and the stamping of ponies was heard from the barns. All this was wiped out by a series of terrific crashes, and the floor stirred as if intaking a deep breath. The dining-room filled with a crying, crouching gray-lipped throng of servants. A deluge of ash complicated the half-night outside, and the curse of sulphur pressed down. Paula arose. Charter had taken his place close beside her, but spoke no word.