“Me to take possession by daylight next Friday mornin’, if the world don’t come to an end Thursday night?” “_Yes_,” replied Solomon, hurling the word at his brother like a stone. Simeon got up and buttoned his coat over his lean chest. “Well,” said he, “I’ve had pretty hard luck. I’ve lost three wives, and I’ve been burnt out twice, an’ the last house ain’t none too tight. I’ll move right in here next Friday mornin’ at daylight. Mebbe I’ll get married again.” “Much good will the heaping up of barns an’ storehouses do when you hear the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Thou fool, this night shall thy soul be required of thee,’” returned his brother; but he spoke the fervid words with a certain feebleness. All his life since he was a boy had Solomon Lennox toiled and saved to own this noble farm. The bare imagination of giving it up to another cost him much, although he firmly believed that in a week’s space it would be only a modicum of the blackened ashes of a world. He stood the test of his faith, but he felt the scorch of sacrificial flame. “It ain’t me that’s the fool,” said Simeon, shrugging himself into his great-coat. “I ain’t goin’ to hang back with my soul when it’s required of me, but I ain’t goin’ to keep chuckin’ of it in the face of the Lord afore He’s ready for it, like some folks I know. Them’s the fools. When’ll you be down to Lawyer Bascombe’s to-morrow, Solomon, to deed away these barns an’ storehouses that you ’ain’t no more use for?” “I’ll be down there at nine o’clock to-morrow mornin’.” “All right; you can count on me,” said Simeon. He went out, and Solomon bolted the door after him promptly. But he had no sooner returned to the kitchen than there came a sharp tap on the window, and there was Simeon’s hard leering old face pressed against the pane. “You’ll--have--to--fetch Sophy Anne down there to-morrow,” he called. “She’ll--have to sign that deed too, or it won’t stan’.” “All right,” shouted Solomon, and the face at the window, with a parting nod, disappeared. Lawyer Bascombe’s office was in the centre of the village, over the store. A steep flight of stairs at the right of the store led to it. Up these stairs, at nine o’clock the next morning, climbed Solomon Lennox and his wife Sophia Anne, with pale devoted faces, and signed away all their earthly goods as an evidence of their faith. In some way the matter had become known in the village. When Solomon and Sophia Anne came down the stairs there was quite a crowd before the door, standing back with awed curiosity to let them pass. Simeon Lennox did not leave at once after the signing of the deed. When he appeared in the doorway with a roll of paper in his hand the crowd had dispersed.