Page:Keeping the Peace.pdf/24

 was swift and graceful. Physically the children resembled him. Their mother's long horse face and protruding teeth would perish with her.

Having received James's message just as he was giving the final touch to the altar, the Reverend Mr. Eaton had come home at once. The faithful indeed might have seen their pastor flitting through the dusk at a gait which strongly resembled running. The Reverend Mr. Eaton would, as a matter of fact, have run his legs off at any time for the sake of peace.

Presently then, alert, quick stepping, unaffected and accompanied in an easy familiarity by his son James, the Reverend Mr. Eaton entered the room and perceived upon the instant that something peculiarly awful had happened and that he was going to be blamed for it.

He had a pair of very black and tragic eyes. In the lamplight, contrasting with his extraordinary white and smooth chin, they resembled pools of ink. His perceptions were very quick and from the group he missed, almost instantly, his son John.

Then Mr. Eaton said simply and quietly, "Where's John?" And the storm broke.

"Where indeed?" said Mrs. Eaton. "You may well ask. He has run away. He has run away from a mother who would have given her life for