old gentleman wants," pointing at the instant to the venerable figure of Father Kroom, who sat erect and motionless on his horse under the shadow of a giant oak standing just outside the little gate.

Moran at once arose and advanced to the fence, urging the aged figure to alight and come in. "No, thank ye, I have just been to town and rode this fur outen my way to ax how the old lady-that's your mother-is to-day."

Archie thanked him from his heart for his kind interest; but informed him of Dr. Givens' opinion before given the reader. "Pity, pity," said Gilbert Kroom; "thar's not another sich a woman in the county. Allus good to poor folks and not above speaking to the wust of 'em. I've knowed her ever since she was a gal-in my way, you understand—and I tell ye, Mr. Archie, thar's more than you will miss her. But maybe it's not as bad as the Doctor thinks. The Speerses had powerful constitutions— long-lived set, all of 'em. Old Dave, that's your granddaddy,

must 'a bin nigh onto ninety when he died. And doctors don't know much more than other folks to my opinion. I never had one about me in my life, and I'm eighty odd and can do a pooty fair day's work yit."

"I suppose so, sir," said Moran. man for one of your years. tance, and in the night it change your mind and alight. would be glad to entertain mother's illness will in no way prevent your being properly cared for."

"You are a remarkable

Can travel alone, I see, a long diswill be this time, unless you will I will have your horse put up and you. The house is large and

66

No, thank you, my friend. The old man could n't think of it -not now, any way. I've staid here afore now in your daddy's time. I know I'd be welcome; but I don't mind riding at night, and every foot of the road from here home is jist like the path to the spring to me.

"I kin go anywhere; why, I got a summins to-day from that fellow Maloney that the Ku Klux whipped last fall (you mind the night as we was at the tavern together), to go to Mun

gumry Court next month, and I'm gwine too, but not to tell what he'specks me to say.

"I heerd 'em say in town he had a summins for you, too; but Lawyer Foley would n't let him come out here to sarve it, being as the old lady was so low."

"I can't imagine for what purpose he wishes to summon me,” answered Moran, greatly provoked by the intelligence and feeling his ire rise against the low-born Irishman. "I know absolutely nothing about the details of the affair except from hearsay.”

66

'Oh, they 'll have proof enough without you, or me either," said old Kroom. "Bart Swazey has puked the whole bizness and gone back on 'em,-Colwood bound over Jeff and young Holt in town to-day on his evydence. That's what I kum to town fur

to go Jeff's security."

"You don't tell me so," cried Moran; "and young Holt, too,

you say

66

?"

Yes, sir-ree, they got him shore. You see Bart wuz drunk that night, and the evydence wuz that he took one squad and went 'round and whooped Maloney, and Holt took the other fellows and beat up the nigger preacher Mike Hanes, what's a County Commissioner over white folks.

"Well, as I waz saying, Bart he wuz drunk, and arter the raid was over he left the crowd and went towards Jim Murph's house (he know'd Jim wa'n't at home) and he wuz so drunk that he fell off his horse and lay side the big road not a hundred yards from the house till broad daylight. Well, in the mornin' Murph's wife comes along with another woman and wakes Bart up, and hides his old Ku Klux trappins in the woods and kivers 'em up with leaves, and takes Bart about half dead to the house.

"Well, when the excitement got up last week about puttin' down the night-riders, this other woman comes to town and tells Colwood all about Murph's wife and Bart, and Colwood sot down and drawed a warrant for Bart, and Bart kum in and betrayed the whole bizness, jist like the d-d Judas Iscariot what he is, to save his own neck."

"Well," said Moran, "if that is so, I know they can have no use for me, for though I witnessed the procession of riders, as you will remember, from the porch of the hotel, yet Swazey was the only man whom I could in any wise identify, and you say he has confessed. That, I think, will let me out. I do not want to go to Montgomery."

66 Yes; but I want you to go," said old Kroom; "you got Jeff outen that other scrape and I want you to git him outen this one. I've got money and I expeck to spend it. I hired Foley today to 'pear for Jeff, and Foley said you'd git your license for lawin' 'tween this and Court and that you could 'pear with him. He 'lowed as you was radikil in your notions it would help Jeff more than he could help him. That's jist what he said." "Jeff is a Republican, too, Mr. Kroom. I don't think it would be fortunate for him to be defended in such a scrape by me," replied Moran. "You must understand that this comes from no wish of mine to shirk responsibility or to get out of doing an old friend like you a favor. I really believe it to be best for your son that I should not appear for him. Colonel Foley told you truly about my application for license. I shall be examined in Montgomery between this and the session of the U. S. Court you speak of. Of course I hope to be licensed, and it is flattering to know that I would have a client so soon after coming to the bar; but believe me, it would look very odd to see a Republican lawyer appearing for a Republican Ku Klux in the very first case of the kind that will come up under the late Enforcement Act."

"Well," said Gilbert Kroom, "Jeff 's no Republican to hurt, jist at this time. He'll never git over Man'l's deth in the wurld, and though I never giv a Democrat vote in my life, I'm agoin' for Foley for Judge this next eleckshun, and if he don't put that d-d Maloney in the penitentiary for stealing the schoolchildren's money, you may have my old hat. Oh, it's jist as shure as shootin'," and there was wrath and indignation and the joyful hope of final reform in the Kroom countenance as these words were pronounced.

At this juncture Laura Foley came to the edge of the piazza and called out to Moran that Dr. Givens wished to see him.

Bidding Gilbert Kroom good-bye and promising to consult with Colonel Foley about Jeff's case, he returned to his seat on the porch, where he found Dr. Givens trying to get the proper focal centre of the field-glass for his aged eye, and expressing himself as unable to accomplish the task.

The kind old physician then told him very gently and gravely that he had ordered his horse in order to go back to Dunham, that Mrs. Moran was completely paralyzed, that all hope was at an end, and that his dear mother could not possibly survive the night that was then coming on.

CHAPTER XIX.

THE CLOUD BLACKENS AND BURSTS.

She was past all help of medicines now.

The frame-work of clay which held in that finely-strung soul was fast breaking up. The struggle was a fearful one to look upon, especially when the gazer was the only being on earth who carried in full current her bluest of blue blood and wore on his brow a kindred stamp of that matronly sweetness which illumined her own.

The dear old silver-gray tresses were struggling disorderly from the edges of the bed-cap which covered the pretty head.

Though the tongue was paralyzed there were fierce moans at intervals as the horrid softening of the brain went on, and the good Doctor, wishing his patient to pass away in perfect consciousness, had forbidden the further use of opiates to relieve the few hours of suffering that were left her to bear.

The steel-blue eyes read every countenance aright.

They dwelt on her old friend, the Rector's wife, with loving

tenderness; they passed to the man of God who stood at the foot of her bed, with respect in their every glance and with a quiet confidence in the genuineness of his profession and its teachings.

Miss Ann Duval and young Laura Foley; old black Jim, for many years her coachman; and a mulatto girl Alice, who had been her constant nurse since the nervous shock on that illstarred night had unstrung forever the fibre of her life,—all caught with eagerness the several lessons of love her dying eyes were uttering.

But they were oftenest fixed on Archie, who hung just over her pillow, and there was an unutterable look of anxiety in the dilated pupils. The poor arms, now robbed of all their sweet and perfectly bedded flesh, would reach every few minutes for his neck and the longed-for and oft-bestowed touch of his fresh lips.

And then the fierce moaning of her ceaseless pain would begin again, from which there was no respite save when her son, taking the Bible that lay on her bed, would read in quivering tone, but with all the earnestness of his soul, passages which he knew to be favorites with her, and which she had in years gone made him memorize on blessed Sabbaths that would never come again. Among these passages the fifty-first of David's Psalms, and the "Let not your hearts be troubled” chapter in John, were gone over and over during the still watches of the night, and it was a pleasure inexpressible to all of the little band to know from her expression that she understood every line, precept, and promise, and that there was no fear with her from any of the holy warnings which they contained.

After midnight the Rector read appropriate prayers from that noble liturgy which, for three centuries and in every clime, has solaced the last hours of the English-speaking races.

Then came a few hours' sleep, the result of perfect exhaustion, during which the little party, with freely mingled tears, went over in a low hush of words the most lovable episodes of her life, and told of the mass of letters which every mail