“Yo’ done promised—­an’ it eased Zalie at the end.”

Angela reached for the child—­she was calm and self-possessed at last.  This was not the first child she had rescued.

“It is—­a girl?” she asked, lifting the tiny form.

“Hit’s a girl.  Give hit a chance.”

“I will.”  Then Angela wrapped the child in the old quilt and turned toward the door.

“Will you wait until I return?” she paused to ask, but Becky, her eyes on that picture of the Good Shepherd, replied: 

“No—­I don let go!”

With that she passed as noiselessly from the room as if she were but a shadow sinking into the darkness outside.

Angela went upstairs and knocked at Sister Constance’s door.  Sister Constance was alert at once.  Every faculty of hers was trained to respond intelligently to taps on the door in the middle of the night.

“This is—­a child—­a mountain child,” whispered Sister Angela.  “It has been left here.  Take it into the west wing and tell no one of its presence until we know whether it will be claimed!”

“Very well, Sister.”  Constance folded the child to her ample breast; the maternal in her gave the training she had received a divine quality.  The baby stirred, stretched out its little limbs, and opened its vague, sleep-filled eyes as if at last something worthy of response had appealed to it.

Sister Angela stood in the cold, dark hall listening, and when the door of the west wing chamber closed, she felt, once more, secure.  Sister Angela was never able to describe afterward the state of mind that made the happenings of the next few hours seem like flaming pillars against a dead blur of sensation.

There was the sound of wheels.  That set every nerve tense.

Meredith was in her arms—­clinging, sobbing, and repeating: 

“He must never have my child, Sister.  Promise, promise!”

“I promise, my darling.  I promise.”  Angela heard herself saying the words as if they proceeded from the lips of a stranger.

“Has Doris come?”

“Not yet.  She will be here soon.”

“I can trust you and Doris.  Doris knows.  And now—­I let go!”

Where had Sister Angela heard those words before?  They went whirling through her brain as if on a mighty wheel.

“I have—­let go!”

Then followed terrible hours in the guest chamber with Sister Constance repeating over and over:  “It is a perfectly plain case.  All is well.”

Finally, there was quiet, and then that cry that has power to move the world’s heart, a plaintive wail weighted with relinquishment and—­acceptance.  Meredith’s little daughter was born just as the clock below chimed four.

“I will take it to the west wing,” Constance said.  “Call me if you need me.”

But everything seemed settling into calm, and Meredith fell asleep looking as she used to look in the old days before she had been forced outside the gates.  At daylight she opened her eyes.