Deep Summer by Gwen Bristow Page B

coffin of cypress wood, and the next day the rector of St. Margaret’s came for the funeral. Walter Purcell came, and several other friends her father had made, bringing gardenias and white roses to lay on the coffin. Judith looked around for Philip. She had been so occupied during the day that she had lost sight of him, but she thought he was somewhere about the place. But he was not here, and she hoped her father in his grief had not noticed it. Caleb had, for he whispered a query to her. She could only shake her head and say she did not know.
    The rector came and stood by the coffin. He began to read.
    “I am the resurrection and the life; he that believeth on me, though he were dead, yet shall he live, and he that liveth and believeth on me shall never die.”
    The slaves carried the coffin out and put it on a cart. Judith got into the wagon with the others, and they followed the coffin down the long uneven trail to the yard of the little log chapel. The sun was setting, throwing long thin shadows across the grave as the slaves lowered the coffin and the rector flung in the first handful of earth. Mark stood by the grave, his head lowered, so still that Judith and Caleb did not dare speak to him, even when the coffin was covered. The darkness rushed up. It was very quiet.
    There was a sharp noise in the silence, the sound of a cart creaking over the shaky road. They turned and tried to see, for there were not many people out after dark. The wagon came straight into the churchyard with noisy irreverence, but not until it was almost upon them did Judith see that Philip was driving, with his boy Josh by him on the seat. She dropped Caleb’s arm and ran to him, but Philip hardly noticed her; he was busy helping Josh unload something from the back of the wagon. They set it on the ground, and Philip went up to Mark.
    “Here it is, sir,” said Philip.
    Mark started. He alone of them all had paid little attention to Philip’s arrival.
    “What?” he asked after an instant, as though only just realizing that he had been spoken to.
    “A stone, sir,” Philip said.
    With an exclamation Mark dropped to his knees and felt of the dark lump on the ground. The rector’s servant was holding a lantern. Judith took it from him. She had not seen a stone since she came to Louisiana. But this was a stone, unevenly rectangular, and cut into its side were crude letters that in spite of their irregularity could be read.
    “Catherine, wife of Mark Sheramy. Died August 21, 1774.”
    She flung her arms around Philip and began to sob. The tears that had refused to come yesterday and today poured out of her, bringing a curiously tender relief, because Philip had not forsaken them, but had somehow managed to bring the single material consolation that could have eased her father’s sorrow.
    It was days before he would confess to Judith where he had got the stone and then only on her promise that she would never tell her father. He had stolen it, he said. The French and Spanish ships that came to New Orleans to buy raw materials brought very little merchandise with them, for there were not many families who could afford to buy manufactured goods from Europe, so the larger ships filled their holds with rocks for ballast on the outgoing trip. The rocks they discarded on the wharfs of New Orleans, not realizing their value in a country made of mud, and the city government took possession and used them for cobbling the marshy streets.
    Only a day or two ago Philip had heard that a rich planter near Baton Rouge had ordered for a great price a few of these French stones to pave a walk from his gate to his house, and the stone-laden boat was docked at Dalroy. So Philip went down to find the boat, adroitly made the boatmen drunk and helped himself to a stone. Judith, who still believed thievery a deadly sin, could not help forgiving him.
    Philip took her back to Ardeith the first week in September. Mark came out to the wagon to tell her goodbye. Philip