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to the practical crafts. There’s a purity about them that the higher arts lack. They turn the imagination to wholesome ends. Given your own susceptibilities, you could do worse than follow my example.”
    “I’m no artist,” Gideon said, stung again. “But I can’t agree that creating beauty, or seeking it, or contemplating it, leads to sin. If that is so, why do you hang a painting above your desk?”
    Hedge regarded him coldly. “You are no artist, Mr. Birdsall, and I hope you’ll agree that I am no Philistine. The painting is Sophy’s; I saw you looking at it earlier. She has some ability, I think, though this isn’t one of her better efforts. The sentiment behind it compensates for its shortcomings. She painted it for my birthday, and I display it to please her.”
    “I think it’s quite good. She’s taken such care with the details.” Remembering Sophy’s wish for a centerpiece for her garden, Gideon felt a sudden surge of tenderness for the fountain’s lack of scale. The Reverend would never see, as he did, that she had enhanced it in measure to her longing. “Mrs. Hedge believes Sophy has inherited your talents,” he said.
    “I haven’t discouraged her,” the parson said. “Quite the contrary. I’ve taught her what little I know, though it’s never enough for her. It’s in the blood, you see. For good or ill, the artistic strain runs in my family, a thin line, but persistent. Her mother was my only sister—a great favorite of mine. Mary was a blithe spirit, the bright star of our sober brood, always making up rhymes and songs and stories. I used to think she must be a changeling—that the midwife had spirited off the true Hedge and left this sunny creature instead.” He sighed. “She assumed all men were as open-hearted as she was. Far too fanciful for this hard world, and the world took advantage of her, as is its way. She didn’t tarry here for long.”
    Hedge paused, hand on chin, contemplating the painting. “Mary would have named her daughter for one of the Muses—I believe Calliope had been mentioned.” He raised his eyebrows. “When she died, the task fell to us. I never saw such a mite as that infant was! I tell you without exaggeration, my own were giants compared to her. The midwife doubted she would survive, but I sensed a will there, and my Consort, bless her, was untiring in her efforts. It was my idea to call the baby Sophia. I thought wisdom would be a tree of life to her, after such a precarious beginning. If my sister had possessed more of it, she might be among us still.” He turned to Gideon, his eyes misted over with an old sorrow. “Next month Sophy turns eighteen. A good girl, but flighty, and willful in her way. Time will tell whether the name has tempered her nature.”
    THEY WALKED BACK to the house in silence. Though Hedge had exhausted his store of words, he had endowed Gideon with a number of his written works as compensation: A discourse on “The Peculiar Nature of Time and Tense in Ancient Hebrew.” An essay roguishly titled “An Eye for an Eye: Some In-sights into the Function of the Letter Ayin .” And the only remaining copy of “The Blacksmith’s Lament: The Last Words of Abner Turnbull Upon the Occasion of his Execution for the Heinous Murder of His Wife (With Illustrations from Life).”
    Gideon was glad to be released from the study. This was his favorite time of day. Late-afternoon light glazed the fields and painted the yellow house a rich ochre—the color of blessing, he had always thought. The Hedge homestead looked as natural in this setting as if it had grown from seed, as cozily eternal as a village in a Dutch landscape.
    “The day has gotten away from us,” Hedge said, “pleasurable as it was. Will you take some supper before you go?”
    “I’ve imposed on your hospitality enough,” Gideon said quickly. “But if you can tolerate me a little longer, I’d like to see some of Micah’s handiwork. He has a quality that’s quite