T was the second Sunday in July, and a bright, clear day. In that mountainous region the early mornings of dry summer days are delightfully cool and balmy. Abner Daniel was in his room making preparations to go to meeting at Rock Crest Church. He had put on one of his best white shirts, black silk necktie, doeskin trousers, flowered waistcoat, and long frock-coat, and was proceeding to black his shoes. Into an old pie-pan he raked from the back of the fireplace a quantity of soot and added to it a little water and a spoonful of sorghum molasses from a jug under his bed, stirring the mixture into a paste. This he applied to his shoes with a blacking-brush, rubbing vigorously until quite a decent gloss appeared. It was a thing poverty had taught him just after the war, and to which he still resorted when he forgot to buy blacking.

On his way to church, as he was crossing a broom-sedge field and steering for the wood ahead of him, through which a path made a short cut to Rock Crest Church, he overtook Pole Baker swinging along in his shirt-sleeves and big hat.

“Well, I 'll be bungfuzzled,” Abner exclaimed, “ef you hain't got on a clean shirt! Church?”

“Yes, I 'lowed I would, Uncle Ab. I couldn't stay away. I told Sally it ud be the biggest fun on earth. She's a-comin' on as soon as she gits the childern ready. She's excited, too, an' wants to see how it 'll come out. She's as big a believer in you as I am, mighty nigh, an' she 'lowed, she did, that she'd bet you'd take hair an' hide off'n that gang 'fore they got good started.”

Abner raised his shaggy eyebrows. If this was one of Pole's jokes it failed in the directness that usually characterized the jests of the ex-moonshiner.

“I wonder what yo' re a-drivin' at, you blamed fool,” he said, smiling in a puzzled fashion.

Pole was walking in front, and suddenly wheeled about. He took off his hat, and, wiping the perspiration from his high brow with his forefinger, he cracked it into the broom-sedge like a whip.

“Looky' heer, Uncle Ab,” he laughed, “what you givin' me?”

“I was jest tryin' to find out what you was a-givin' me,” retorted the rural philosopher, a dry note of rising curiosity dominating his voice.

They had reached a rail fence which separated the field from the wood, and they climbed over it and stood in the shade of the trees. Pole stared at the old man incredulously. “By hunkley, Uncle Ab, you don't mean to tell me you don't know what that passle o' hill-Billies is a-goin' to do with you this mornin' at meetin'?”

Abner smiled mechanically. “I can't say I do, Pole. I'm at the fust of it, if thar is to be any—”

Pole slapped his thigh and gave vent to a loud guffaw that rang through the trees and was echoed back from a hidden hill-side.

“Well, what they are a-goin' to do with you 'll be a God's plenty. They are a-goin' to walk yore log, ur make you do it on all fours so they kin see you. You've made it hot fer them an' they are a-goin' to turn t'other cheek an' git a swipe at you. They are a-goin' to show you whar you come in—ur, ruther, whar you go out.”

Abner's face was a study in seriousness. “You don't say!” he muttered. “I did notice that brother Dole kinder give our house a wide berth last night. I reckon he sorter hated to eat at the same table with a feller he was goin' to hit at to-day. Yes, Dole is at the bottom of it. I know in reason I pushed 'im too fur the last time he was heer, but when he rears back an' coughs up sanctimony like he was literally too full of it fer comfort, I jest cayn't hold in. Seems to me I kin jest close my eyes an' hit some spot in 'im that makes 'im wiggle like a tadpole skeered in shallow water. But maybe I mought 'a' got a better mark to fire at; fer this 'll raise no end of a rumpus, an' they may try to make me take back water, but I never did crawfish. I couldn't do that, Pole. No siree, I—I can' t crawfish.”

Abner was a special object of regard as he and Pole emerged from the wood into the opening in front of the little unpainted meeting-house, where the men stood about among the buggies and horses, whittling, gossiping, and looking strange and fresh-washed in their clean clothes. But it was noticeable that they did not gather around him as had been their habit. His standing in that religious community was at stake; his continued popularity depended on the result of that day's investigation. Pole could afford to stand by him, and he did. They sat down on a log near the church door and remained silent till the cast-iron bell in the little belfry, which resembled a dog-kennel, was rattled vigorously as an announcement that the service was about to begin. They all scurried in like sheep. Abner went in last, with slow dignity and deliberation, leaving Pole in a seat near the door.

He went up the narrow aisle to his accustomed seat near the long-wood stove. Many eyes were on his profile and the back of his neck. Dole was seated in the arm-chair behind the preacher's stand, but somehow he failed to look at Abner as he entered, or even after he had taken his seat. He seemed busy making notes from the big Bible which lay across his lap. Abner saw Bishop and his wife come in and sit down, and knew from the glances they gave him that they had heard the news. Mrs. Bishop looked keenly distressed, but Bishop seemed to regard the matter only as a small, buzzing incident in his own troubled career. Besides, Abner was no blood relative of his, and Bishop had enough to occupy him in looking after the material interests of his own family without bothering about the spiritual welfare of a connection by marriage.

Dole stood up and announced a hymn, and read it from beginning to end in a mellow, sonorous voice. The congregation, all eying Abner, rose and sang it energetically; even Abner, who sang a fair bass of the rasping, guttural variety, popular in the mountains, found himself joining in, quite unconcerned as to his future right to do so. After this, Dole led in prayer, standing with both hands resting on the crude, unpainted stand, the sole ornament of which was a pitcher of water, a tumbler, and a glass lamp with a green paper shade on it. Abner remarked afterwards that Dole, in this prayer, used the Lord as a cat's-paw to hit at him. Dole told the Lord a few things that he had never had the courage to tell Daniel. Abner was a black sheep in a flock earnestly striving to keep itself white—a thing in human shape that soiled that with which it came in contact. He had the subtle tongue of the serpent that blasted the happiness of the primeval pair in the Garden of Eden. Under the cloak of wit and wisdom he was continually dropping poison into the beverages of earnest folk who had not the religious courage to close their ears. As a member of a consecrated body of souls, it was the opinion of many that Abner was out of place, but that was to be decided after careful investigation in the Lord's presence and after ample testimony pro and con had been submitted. Any one wishing to show that the offending member had a right to remain in good standing would be gladly listened to, even prayerfully. On the other hand, such members as had had their religious sensibilities wounded should feel that a most sacred duty rested on them to speak their minds. All this Dole said he trusted the Lord would sanction and bless in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Saviour and Director of all men.

Dole then started another hymn, and when it had been sung he announced that no sermon would be preached that day, as the important business in hand would consume all available time before the dinner-hour. Then he courageously faced Abner. His countenance was pale and determined, his tone perfunctory and sharp as a knife.

“I reckon, brother Daniel,” he said, “that you have a idee who I've been talkin' about?”

Abner was slightly pale, but calm and self-possessed. The light of merriment, always kindled by contact with Dole, danced in his eyes. “I kinder 'lowed I was the one,” he said, slowly, “an' I'm sorter curis to see who' ll speak an' what they 'll say. I 'll tell you now I ain't a-goin' to do myse'f jestice. I 'ain't been to a debatin' club sence I was a boy, but I 'll do my best.”

Dole stroked his beard and consulted a scrap of paper in the palm of his hand. “Brother Throg-martin,” he called out, suddenly, and a short, fat man on a bench behind Abner rose and cleared his throat.

“Now, brother Throgmartin,” went on the preacher, “jest tell some o' the things you've heerd brother Daniel say that struck you as bein' undoctrinal an' unbecomin' a member of this body.”

“Well, sir,” Throgmartin began, in a thin, high voice that cut the profound silence in the room like a rusty blade, “I don't raily, in my heart o' hearts, believe that Ab—brother Daniel—has the right interpretation of Scriptur'. I remember, after you preached last summer about the sacred teachin' in regard to future punishment, that Ab—brother Daniel—an' me was walkin' home together. Ever' now an' then he'd stop in the road an' laugh right out sudden-like over what you'd contended.”

“Oh, he did, did he?” Dole's face hardened. He couldn't doubt that part of the testimony, for it was distinctly Abner's method.

“Yes, sir,” responded Throgmartin, sternly, “he 'lowed what you'd said was as funny to him as a circus clown's talk, an' that it was all he could do to hold in. He 'lowed ef you was to git up in a Darley church with sech talk as that they'd make you preach to niggers. He 'lowed he didn't believe hell was any hot place nohow, an' that he never could be made to believe that the Lord ud create folks an' then barbecue 'em alive through all eternity. He said it sorter turned his stomach to see jest a little lamb roasted at a big political gatherin', an' that no God he believed in would institute sech long torture as you spoke about when you brought up the mustard-seed p'int.”

“He deliberately gives the lie to Holy Scripture, then,” said Dole, almost beside himself with rage. “What else did he say of a blasphemous nature?”

“Oh, I hardly know,” hesitated the witness, his brow wrinkled thoughtfully.

“Well,” snarled Dole, “you hain't told half you said to me this mornin' on the way to meetin'. What was his remark about the stars havin' people on 'em ever' bit an' grain as worthy o' salvation as us all?”

“I disremember his exact words. Perhaps Ab—brother Daniel—will refresh my memory.” Throg-martin was gazing quite respectfully at the offender. “It was at Billy Malone's log-rollin', you know, Ab; me 'n' you'd eat a snack together, an' you said the big poplar had strained yore side an' wanted to git it rubbed.”

Abner looked straight at Dole. The corners of his big, honest mouth were twitching defiantly.

“I said, I think,” he answered, “that no matter what some folks mought believe about the starry heavens, no man ever diskivered a big world with a tail to it through a spy-glass without bein' convinced that thar was other globes in the business besides jest this un.”

Dole drew himself up straight and gazed broadly over his congregation. He felt that in the estimation of unimaginative, prosaic people like his flock Abner's defence would certainly fall.

“Kin I ax,” he asked, sternly, “how you happen to think like you do?”

Abner grasped the back of the bench in front of him and pulled himself up, only to sink back hesitatingly into his seat. “Would it be out o' order fer me to stand?” he questioned.

Dole spread a hard, triumphant smile over the congregation. “Not at all, if it will help you to give a sensible answer to my question.”

“Oh, I kin talk settin',” retorted the man on trial. “I jest didn't know what was right an' proper, an' I 'lowed I could hit that spit-box better standin' than I kin over brother Tarver's legs.”

The man referred to quickly slid along the bench, giving Abner his place near the aisle, and Abner calmly emptied his mouth in the wooden box filled with sawdust and wiped his lips.

“I hardly know why I think like I do about other worlds,” he answered, slowly, “unless it's beca'se I've always had the notion that the universe is sech a powerful, whoppin' big thing. Most folks believe that the spot they inhabit is about all thar is to creation, anyway. That's human natur'. About the biggest job I ever tackled was to drive a hungry cow from bad grass into a good patch. She wants to stay thar an' eat, an' that's about the way it is with folks. They are short-sighted. It makes most of 'em mad to tell 'em they kin better the'r condition. I've always believed that's the reason they make the bad place out so bad; they've made up the'r minds to live thar, an' they ain't a-goin' to misrepresent it. They are out o' fire-wood in this life an' want to have a good sweat in the next.”