Coming back to the house she had an uneasy feeling that
she was doing something wrong. Then she remembered Edythe,
dry-eyed and pale, and her fears vanished. Pearl had
recited once at a Band of Hope meeting a poem of her own
choosing--this was before the regulations excluding
secular subjects became so rigid. Pearl's recitation
dealt with a captive knight who languished in a mouldy
prison. He begged a temporary respite--his prayer was
heard--a year was given him. He went back to his wife
and child and lived the year in peace and happiness. The
hour came to part, friends entreated--wife and child
wept--the knight alone was calm.
He stepped through the casement, a proud flush on his
cheek, casting aside wife, child, friends. "What are wife
and child to the word of a knight?" he said. "And behold
the dawn has come!"
Pearl had lived the scene over and over; to her it stood
for all that was brave and heroic. Coming up through the
weeds that day, she was that man. Her step was proud,
her head was thrown back, her brown eyes glowed and
burned; there was strength and grace in every motion.
When Tom Motherwell furtively left his father's house,
and made his way to the little grove where his best
clothes were secreted, his movements were followed by
two anxious brown eyes that looked out of the little
window in the rear of the house.
The men came in from the barn, and the night hush settled
down upon the household.
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