the little
whitewashed gate, but kept on to the log cabin on the edge of General
Battle's land, where Uncle Ish was passing his declining years in
poverty and independence. The cabin stood above a little gully which
skirted the dividing line of the pastures, facing, in its primitive
nudity, the level stretch of the shadowless highway. It was a rotting,
one-room dwelling, with a wide doorway opening upon a small, bare strip
of ground where a gnarled oak grew. In the rear there was a small
garden, denuded now of its modest vegetables, only the leafy foliage of
a late pea crop retaining a semblance of fruitfulness.

Nicholas went up the narrow path leading from the road to the hut, and
placed the bag on the smooth, round stone which served for a step. As he
did so, the doorway abruptly darkened, and a girl came from the interior
and paused with her foot upon the threshold. He saw, in an upward
glance, that it was Eugenia Battle, and, from the light wicker basket on
her arm, he inferred that, in the absence of Uncle Ish, she had been
engaged in supplying his simple wants. That the old negro was still
cared for by the Battles he was aware, though upon the means of his
livelihood Uncle Ish, himself, was singularly reticent.

As Eugenia saw him she flushed slightly, as one caught in a secret
charity, and promptly pointed to the bag of meal.

"Whose is that?"

He looked from the girl to the bag and back again, his own cheek
reddening. At the instant it occurred to him that it was a peculiar
greeting after a separation of years.

"It belongs to Uncle Ish," he answered, with unreasonable embarrassment.
"I believe your father gave it to him."

"He might have brought it home for him," was her comment, and
immediately:

"Where is he?"

"Uncle Ish? He's on the road."

Her next remark probed deeper, and he winced.

"What were you doing with it?"

Her gaze was warming upon him. He met it and laughed aloud.

"Toting it," he responded lightly.

She was still warming. He saw the glow kindle in her eyes and illumine
her sombre face; it was like the leaping of light to the surface. As she
stood midway of the entrance, in a frame of unpolished logs, her white
and black beauty against the smoky gloom of the interior, the red sunset
before her feet, he recalled swiftly an allegorical figure of Night he
had once seen in an old engraving. Then, before the charm of her smile,
the recollection passed as it had come.

"You may b