To that picture Becky went now. She had never been able to see it distinctly from any window. It was the Good Shepherd. The noble, patient face bent over the child on the man's breast had power to still Becky's distraught mind. She could not understand, but a groping of that part of her that could still feel and suffer reached the underlying suggestion of the artist. Here was someone who was doing what, in a vague and bungling way, Becky herself had always wanted to do--shield the young, helpless thing that belonged to her. The old face twitched and the soiled, crinkled arms--so empty and yearning--hugged the trembling body. And so Sister Angela found her. The three years since Angela had seen Becky Adams had taught her much of her people--she called them _her_ people, now. "I am so glad to see you, Aunt Becky," she said, smiling and pointing to a chair by the hearth, quite in an easy way. "Are you tired after your long walk?" "Sorter." Becky came over to the chair and sank into it. Then she said abruptly: "Zalie's gone!" The brief statement had power to visualize the young creature as Angela had once seen her: pretty as the flower whose name she bore, a little shy thing with hungry, half-afraid eyes. "Is she--dead?" Sister Angela's gaze grew deep and sympathetic. "Not 'zactly--not daid--jes now." Poor Becky, breaking through her own reserve and agony, made a pitiful appeal. "She has--gone away? With whom?" Sister Angela began to comprehend and she lowered her voice, bending toward Becky. "She ain't gone with any one--she didn't have ter--but she'll fotch up with someone fore long. She's gone to larn--she got the call, same as all her kin--it's the curse!" Now that the wall of reserve was down the pent waters rushed through and they came on the fanciful, dramatic words peculiar to Becky and her kind. Angela did not interrupt--she waited while the old, stifled voice ran on: "I had to larn, and I went far and saw sights, and when it was larned I cum back, with Zalie's mother rolled up like she was a bundle. The old cabin was empty 'cept for wild things as found shelter there--me and her settled down and no one found out for some time, and then it didn't matter! "Zalie's mother, she had to larn and she went with a man as helped her larn powerful quick. He don killed my gal by his ways an' he left her to die. It was a stranger as brought Zalie to me, and then I set myself to the task of keeping her from the curse--but she got the call and she went! I can see her"--here the strange eyes looked as the eyes of a seer look--they were following the girl on the "larnin' way"; the tired voice trailed sadly--"I can see how she went. It was nearing morning and all the moonlight that the night had left was piled like mist down in the Gap. Her head was up and she had her hands out--sorter feelin', feelin', and she would laugh--oh! she would laugh--and then she'd catch the scent, and be off! Oh! my Gawd, my Gawd!"