That was certainly winter temperature; the snow lay like a heavy shroud on all the dead valley, but the strange blind instinct of a man who has lived close to the earth stirred within him.  He looked at the sky and the mountains and held up his bare palm.  “I shouldn’t be surprised if the spring break-up was near,” he said.  “I guess this is about the last winter day we’ll get.”

The church was icy cold, and he toiled in the cellar, stuffing wood into the flaming maw of the steam-heater, till it was time to ring the bell.  As he gave the last stroke, Deacon Bradley approached him.  “Jehiel, I’ve got a little job of repairing I want you should do at my store,” he said in the loud, slow speech of a man important in the community.  “Come to the store to-morrow morning and see about it.”  He passed on into his pew, which was at the back of the church near a steam radiator, so that he was warm, no matter what the weather was.

Jehiel Hawthorn went out and stood on the front steps in the winter sunshine and his heart swelled exultingly as he looked across at the deacon’s store.  “I wish I’d had time to tell him I’d do no repairs for him to-morrow, nor any time—–­that I’m going to travel and see the world.”

The last comers disappeared in the church and the sound of singing came faintly to Jehiel’s ears.  Although he was the sexton he rarely was in church for the service, using his duties as an excuse for absence.  He felt that it was not for him to take part in prayer and thanksgiving.  As a boy he had prayed for the one thing he wanted, and what had it come to?

A penetrating cold wind swept around the corner and he turned to go inside to see about the steam-pipes.  In the outer hall he noticed that the service had progressed to the responsive readings.  As he opened the door of the church the minister read rapidly, “Praised be the Lord who hath not given us over for a prey unto their teeth.”

The congregation responded in a timid inarticulate gabble, above which rose Deacon Bradley’s loud voice,—­“Our soul is escaped even as a bird out of the snare of the fowler.  The snare is broken and we are escaped.”  He read the responses in a slow, booming roar, at least half a sentence behind the rest, but the minister always waited for him.  As he finished, he saw the sexton standing in the open door.  “A little more steam, Jehiel,” he added commandingly, running the words on to the end of the text.

Jehiel turned away silently, but as he stumbled through the dark, unfinished part of the cellar he thought to himself, “Well, that’s the last time he’ll give me an order for one while!”

Then the words of the text he had heard came back to his mind with a half-superstitious shock at the coincidence.  He had forgotten all about that hidden part of the text-ornament.  Why, now that had come true!  He ought to have cut the stitches and torn off the old text last night.  He would, as soon as he went home.  He wished his sister were alive to know, and suddenly, there in the dark, he wondered if perhaps she did know.