“Don’t be oncharitable, Jonas.  Brother Goshorn is a mighty sincere man.”

“So he is, but his bein’ sincere don’t do me no good.  He wanted you to advise me to jine the Methodist class as a way of gittin’ out of the difficulty.  And you was too good a Christian to ask me to change fer any sech reason, knowin’ I wouldn’t be fit for you ef I did.”

Cynthy Ann was silent.  She would have liked to have Jonas join the church with her, but if he had done it now she herself would have doubted his sincerity.

“Now, looky here, Cynthy, ef you’ll say you don’t love me, and never can, I’ll leave you to wunst, and fly away and mourn like a turtle-dove.  But so long as it’s nobody but Goshorn, I’m goin’ to stay and litigate the question till the Millerite millennium comes.  I appeal to Caeesar or somebody else.  Neither Brother Goshorn nor Brother Hall knows enough to settle this question.  I’m agoin’ to the persidin’ elder.  And you can’t try a man and hang him and then send him to the penitentiary fer the rest of his born days without givin’ him one chance to speak fer hisself agin the world and everybody else.  I’m goin’ to see the persidin’ elder myself and plead my own cause, and ef he goes agin me, I’ll carry it up to the bishop or the archbishop or the nex’ highest man in the heap, till I git plum to the top, and ef they all go agin me, I’ll begin over agin at the bottom with Brother Goshorn, and keep on till I find a man that’s got common-sense enough to salt his religion with.”

CHAPTER XXXII.

JULIA’S ENTERPRISE.

4 August was very sick at the castle.  This wag the first news of his return that reached Julia through Jonas and Cynthy Ann.

But in my interest in Jonas and Cynthy Ann, of whom I think a great deal, I forgot to say that long before the events mentioned in the last chapter, Humphreys had been suddenly called away from his peaceful retreat in the hill country of Clark township.  In fact, the “important business,” or “the illness of a friend,” whichever it was, occurred the very next day after Norman Anderson’s father returned from Louisville, and reported that he had secured for his son an “outside situation,” that is to say, a place as a collector.

When he had gone, Jonas remarked to Cynthy Ann, “Where the carcass is, there the turkey-buzzards is gethered.  That shinin’ example of early piety never plays but one game.  That is, fox-and-geese.  He’s gone after a green goslin’ now, and he’ll find him when he’s fattest.”

But the gentle singing-master had come back from his excursion, and was taking a profound interest in the coming end of the world.  Jonas observed that it “seemed like as ef he hed charge of the whole performance, and meant to shet up the sky like a blue cotton umbrell.  He’s got a single eye, and it’s the same ole game.  Fox and geese always, and he’s the fox.”

Humphreys still lived at Samuel Anderson’s, still devoted himself to pleasing Mrs. Abigail, still bowed regretfully to Julia, and spoke caressingly to Betsey Malcolm at every opportunity.