The Preacher tried to comfort Tom, who stared at him as though he did not recognise him at first, and then slowly began, “Go away, Preacher, I don’t want to see or talk to you now. It’s all a swindle and a lie. There is no God!” “Tom, Tom!” groaned the Preacher. “I tell you I mean it,” he continued. “I don’t want any more of God or His heaven. I don’t want to see God. For if I should see Him, I’d shake my fist in His face and ask him where His almighty power was when my poor little baby was screamin’ for help while that damned black beast was tearin’ her to pieces! Many and many a time I’ve praised God when I read the Bible there where it said, not a sparrow falleth to the ground without His knowledge, and the very hairs of our head are numbered. Well, where was He when my little bird was flutterin’ her broken bleedin’ wings in the claws of that stinkin’ baboon,--damn him to everlastin’ hell!--It’s all a swindle I tell you!” The Preacher was watching him now with silent pity and tenderness. “What a lie it all is!” Tom repeated. “Scratch my name off the church roll. I ain’t got many more days here, but I won’t lie. I’m not a hypocrite. I’m going to meet God cursin’ Him to His face!” The Preacher slipped his arm around the old soldier’s neck, and smoothed the tangled hair back from his forehead as he said brokenly, “Tom, I love you! My whole soul is melted in sympathy and pity for you!” The stricken man looked up into the face of his friend, saw his tears and felt the warmth of his love flood his heart, and at last he burst into tears. “Oh! Preacher, Preacher! you’re a good friend I know, but I’m done, I can’t live any more! Every minute, day and night, I ’ll hear them awful screams--her a callin’ me for help! I can see her lyin’ out there in the woods all night alone moanin’ and bleedin’!” His breast heaved and he paused as if in reverie. And then he sprang up, his face livid and convulsed with volcanic passions, that half strangled him while he shrieked, “Oh! if I only had him here before me now, and God Almighty would give me strength with these hands to tear his breast open and rip his heart out!--I--could--eat--it--like--a--wolf!” * * * * * When they reached the cemetery the next day and the body was about to be lowered into the grave, Tom suddenly spied old Uncle Reuben Worth leaning on his spade by the edge of the crowd. Uncle Reuben was the grave digger of the town and the only negro present. “Wait!” said Tom raising his hand. “Don’t put her in that grave! A nigger dug it. I can’t stand it.” He turned to a group of old soldier comrades standing by and said, “Boys, humour an old broken man once more. You ’ll dig another grave for me, won’t you? It won’t take long. The folks can go home that don’t want to stay. I ain’t got no home to go to now but this graveyard.” His comrades filled up the grave that Uncle Reuben had dug, and opened a new one on the other side of the graves where slept his other loved ones.