"I don't think you ought to act the way you do, Elick, just because you don't like Mr. Turnbull; it ain't right." The man dropped his chin doggedly, and fed himself without lifting his elbows from the table. "I can't always manage to be at home when folks come a-visiting," he said in his gruff, tangled voice. "You was at church on Sabbath when Mr. Turnbull gave out the pastoral visitations: he knew that as well as I did. I couldn't say a word to-day. I just had to set here and take it." "No, you didn't, Matilda: you didn't have to stay any more than I did." "Elick!" The woman's voice had a sharp reproof in it. He had touched the Calvinistic quick. She might not reverence the man, but the minister was sacred. "Well, I can't help it," persisted her husband obstinately. "You can take what you please off him. I don't want him to say anything to me." "Oh, he didn't _say_ anything, Elick. What was there to say?" "He doesn't gener'ly keep still because he has nothin' to say." The man gave a muffled, explosive laugh, and pushed back his chair. Mrs. Randall's eyelids reddened. She laid down her work and got up. "I guess I'll take off this dress before I clear up the things," she said, in a voice of temporary defeat. Her husband picked up the empty water-pail as he left the kitchen, and filled it at the well. When he brought it back there was no one visible. "Need any wood, Tildy?" he called toward the bedroom where she was dressing. "No, I guess not." The voice was indistinct, but she might have had her skirt over her head. Alex made a half-conciliatory pause. He preferred to know that she was not crying. "How you been feelin' to-day?" "Middlin'." She was not crying. The man gave his trousers a hitch of relief, and went back to his work. There had been a scandal in Alex Randall's early married life. The scattered country community had stood aghast before the certainty of his guilt, and there had been a little lull in the gossip while they waited to see what his wife would do. Matilda Hazlitt had been counted a spirited girl before her marriage, and there were few of her neighbors who hesitated to assert that she would take her baby and go back to her father's house. It had been a nine-days' wonder when she had elected to believe in her husband. The injured girl had been an adopted member of the elder Randall's household, half servant, half daughter, and it was whispered that her love for Alex was older than his marriage. Just how much of the neighborhood talk had reached Matilda's ears no one knew. The girl had gone away, and the community had accepted Alex Randall for his wife's sake, but not unqualifiedly.