“Was it on business, grandfather?”

“‘Twas on yo’ business, Molly, an’ it eased my mind considerable about what’s to become of you when I’m dead an’ gone.  It seems old Mr. Jonathan arranged it all befo’ he died, an’ they’ve only been waitin’ till you came of age to let you into the secret.  He left enough money in the lawyer’s hands to make you a rich woman if you follow his wishes.”

“Did they tell you his wishes?” she asked, turning from Reuben to Spot as the blind dog fawned toward her.

“He wants you to live with Miss Kesiah and Mr. Jonathan when I’m taken away from you, honey, an’ you’re to lose all but a few hundred if you ever marry and leave ’em.  Old Mr. Jonathan had sharp eyes, an’ he saw I had begun to fail fast befo’ he died.  It’s an amazin’ thing to think that even after all the morality is wrung out of human natur thar’ll still be a few drops of goodness left sometimes at the bottom of it.”

“And if I don’t do as he wished?  What will come of it, then, grandfather?”

“Then the bulk goes to help some po’ heathens over yonder in China to the Gospel.  He was a strange man, was old Mr. Jonathan.  Thar warn’t never any seein’ through him, livin’ or dead.”

“Why did he ever come here in the beginning?  He wasn’t one of our people.”

“The wind blew him this way, pretty, an’ he was never one to keep goin’ against the wind.  When the last Jordan died childless an’ the place was put up to be sold, Mr. Jonathan read about it somewhar, an’ it looked to him as if all he had to do was to come down here an’ bury himself alive to git rid of temptation.  But the only way to win against temptation is to stand square an’ grapple with it in the spot whar it finds you, an’ he came to know this, po’ sinner, befo’ he was done with it.”

“He was a good soldier, wasn’t he?” asked Molly.

“So good a soldier that he could fight as well on one side as on t’other, an’ ’twas only an accident that sent him into the army with me instead of against me.  I remember his telling me once when I met him after a battle that ’twas the smell of blood, not the cause, that made him a fighter.  Thar’s many a man like that on both sides in every war, I reckon.”

“I wonder how you can be so patient when you think of him!” she said passionately as he stopped.

“You’ll understand better when you’re past seventy,” he answered gently.  “Thar’s a softness like a sort of green grass that springs up an’ covers you when you begin to git old an’ worn out.  I’ve got it an’ Spot’s got it—­you can tell by the way he won’t trouble to git mad with the chickens that come peckin’ around him.  As soon as it’s safely spread over you, you begin to see that the last thing to jedge anybody by is what you’ve known of the outside of ’em.”

“I can’t feel about him as you do, but I don’t mind takin’ his money as long as you share it,” returned the girl in a softer voice.