Page:Emma Speed Sampson--The shorn lamb.djvu/230

226 in her hands and she kept rolling it around and working at it kind of like the sculptors I used to know in New York do when they are modeling something."

"You mean a makin' a graben image?"

"Perhaps!"

"Well, Gawd help us, then!" Great tears rolled down the wrinkled cheeks of the old woman.

"Why, Aunt Pearly Gates, what on earth is the matter?"

"Nothin', chil', nothin' 'tall. I's jes' a ol' Afgan fool when all is tol'. I tries ter be a Christian ooman an' a true believer an' mos' the time I feels the love er the Almighty an' his blessed Son enfoldin' me. I says ober ter myse'f: 'He what dwelleth in the secret places er the Mos' High shall abide under the shadow er the Almighty.' An' then that part what somehow kinder seems lak it wa' writ 'special fer me: 'He shall cover thee with His feathers an' under His wings shalt thou trus'.' I reckon I takes on when I hears 'bout Aunt Peachy 'cause I wa' brung up ter be scairt er her. She been a weavin' her spells in this county fer mo'n a hun'erd years. My mammy befo' me wa' scairt er her an' my gran'mammy befo' her, though Aunt Peachy wa'n't mo'n a lil' black slip er a