"I just don't know what to say, Uncle Tucker," she faltered, thus
failing him in his crisis more completely than she had the boy.
"The time for saying has passed, and I'm afraid to look forwards to
what we may have to do," answered Uncle Tucker quietly. "After Gid was
gone on up the road I walked over to Tilting Rock and sat down with my
pipe to think it all over. My eyes are a-getting kinder dim now, but
as far as I could see in most all directions was land that I had
always called mine since I come into a man's estate. And there is none
of it that has ever had a deed writ aginst it since that first Alloway
got it in a grant from Virginy. There is meadow land and corn
hillside, creeks for stock and woodlands for shelter, and the Alloways
before me have fenced it solid and tended it honest, with return
enrichment for every crop. And now it has come to me in my old age to
let it go into the hands of strangers--sold by my own flesh and blood
for a mess of pottage, he not knowing what he did I will believe, God
help me. I'm resting him and the judgment of him in the arms of Mercy,
but my living folks have got to have an earthly shelter. Can you see a
way, child? As I say, my eyes are a-getting dim."
"I can't see any other shelter than the Briars, Uncle Tucker, and
there isn't going to be any other," answered Rose Mary as she stroked
the old hat in her hand. "You know sometimes men run right against a
stone wall when a woman can see a door plainly in front of them both.
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