her calico dress and lifting light
tendrils of hair from her forehead and neck. In the southwest the
lightning flashed fiercely and there came a crash of thunder. Vinie
uttered a startled cry, clapped her hands to her ears, and ran into the
house.

Rand rode through a portion of the main street of Charlottesville. He
kept the pace of a man who wishes to be at home before the rain falls,
but his manner of going showed no undue haste and no trepidation. Faces
at doors and windows, men gathered before the Eagle and the post-office,
greeted him. He answered each salute in kind, and at the Eagle drew rein
long enough to reply to the inevitable questions as to Richmond and the
trial, and to agree that the rain was needed, since the main road, from
Bates's Mill on, was nothing but a trough of dust.

"That's so," chimed in one. "If it wasn't so rough, the river road would
be pleasanter travelling. There's the first drop!"

Rand looked up at the clouds. "I'll gallop on, gentlemen. A rain is
coming that will lay the dust."

Once upon the road to Roselands, neither horse nor mare was spared. Rand
travelled at speed beneath an inky sky. At the turn to Greenwood he
looked once toward the distant house, half hidden by mighty oaks. It was
no more than once. He had a vision of a riderless horse, tearing away
from a stream, through the woods, and he thought, "How soon?" He drew a
difficult breath, and he put for a moment his hand before his eyes, then
spurred Selim on, and in a little while came within sight of his own
gates.

CHAPTER XXXI

HUSBAND AND WIFE

As he rode up the drive, he saw Jacqueline waiting for him, a gleam of
white upon the grey doorstone, beyond the wind-tossed beech. He
dismounted, sent Young Isham around with the horses, and walked across
the burned grass. She met him with outstretched arms, beneath the beech
tree. "Lewis, Lewis!"

He held her to him, bent back her face, kissed her brow and eyes and
mouth. There was a wild energy in clasp and touch. "You love me still?"
he cried. "That's true--that's true, Jacqueline?"

"You know--you know it's true! I was born only to love you--and I
thought that you would never come!"

The thunder crashed above them, and the advance of the rain was heard
upon the beech leaves. "Come indoors--come out of the storm!" She drew
his hand that she held to her and laid it on her bosom. "Oh, welcome
home, my dear!"

They went together into the house and into their