"I understand you have mistreated my child."

"Mistreated Orlean!" I exclaimed. Then, looking into her eyes, I asked slowly, "Did Orlean tell you that?"

"No," she answered, looking away, "but my husband did."

Gradually, I learned from her, that the Reverend had circulated a report that Orlean was at death's door when he came to her bedside; if he had not arrived when he did, she would have died, and when she was well enough to travel, he brought her home.

It was at last clear to me, as I sat with bowed head and feeling bewildered and unable to speak. I recalled the words of Miss Ankin eighteen months before, "the biggest rascal in the Methodist church." I remembered the time I had called and saw him driving his wife, who was now sitting before me, and the rest of it. I saw all that he had done. He had abused this woman for thirty years, and here and now, out of spite and personal malice, because I had criticized the action of certain members of the race, and eulogized the work of Booker T. Washington, whom the elder, along with many of the older members of the ministry, hated and would not allow his name mentioned in his home, I was to lose my wife, to pay the penalty.

He had disliked me from the beginning, but there had been no way he could get even. He was "getting even," spiting me, securing my wife by coercion, and now spreading a report that I was mistreating her, in order to justify his action.

"Mrs. McCraline," I said, speaking in a firm tone, "Do you believe this?"

Evading the direct question, she answered:

"You should never have placed yourself or Orlean in such a position." And then I understood. When Orlean had written her mother of the coming of the child, Mrs. McCraline had not written or told the Reverend about it.

I now understood, further, that she never told him anything, and never gave him any information if she could avoid it. What my wife had told me was proving itself, that is, that they got along with her father by avoiding any friction. He could not be reasoned with, but I could not believe any man would be mean enough to deliberately break up a home, and that the home of his daughter, for so petty a reason. It became clear to me that he ruled by making himself so disagreeable, that everyone near gave in to him, to have peace.

He had only that morning gone to his work. On hearing me, Ethel came downstairs and called up Claves. A few minutes later her mother called me, saying Claves wanted to talk to me. When I took the receiver and called "hello," he answered like a crazy man. I said:

"What is the matter? I do not understand what you are talking about."