"What did the preacher have to say?" she asked.
"Well--" Tom was trying to remember. "What he said sort of got lost in
the way he was saying it. How some of those preachers do hop and skip
about!"
"I like to hear a preacher who acts like he's fighting bees," said Abe.
Sarah nodded. The description fitted the preacher "like his own
moccasin," she said.
"You menfolks wait outside," she added. "Soon as the gals and I get the
dishes done, we'll be out to hear Abe preachify."
[Illustration]
The afternoon was warm. Sarah fanned herself with her apron as she sat
down at one end of a fallen log near the door. The rest of the family
lined up beside her. Abe stood before them, his arms folded, as he
repeated the sermon he had heard that morning. Now and then he paused
and shook his finger in the faces of his congregation. He pounded with
one fist on the palm of his other hand.
"Brethern and sisters," said Abe, "there ain't no chore too big for the
Lord, no chore too small. The Good Book says He knows when a sparrow
falls. Yet He had time to turn this great big wilderness into this here
land where we have our homes.
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