aithful colored woman could have
lived there so long a time with closed doors and shuttered windows.

When he passed into the main part of his home, and touched a door
or chair, a fine dust grated slightly under his fingers. Here was
confirmation, if further confirmation was needed. Dust on chairs
and tables and sofas in the house in which his mother was present.
Impossible! Such a thing could not occur with her there. It was not the
white dust of the road or fields, but the black dust that gathers in
closed chambers.

He went up to his mother's room, and, opening one of the shutters a few
inches, let in a little light. It was in perfect order. Everything
was in its place. Upon the dresser was a little vase containing some
shrivelled flowers. The water in the vase had dried up days ago, and the
flowers had dried up with it.

In this room and in all the others everything was arranged with order
and method, as if one were going away for a long time. Dick drew a chair
near the window, that he had opened slightly, and sat down. Much of
his fear for his mother disappeared. It was obvious that she and her
faithful attendant, Juliana, had gone, probably to be out of the track
of the armies or to escape plundering bands like Skelly's.

He wondered where she had gone, whether northward or southward. There
were many places that would gladly receive her. Nearly all the people in
this part of the state were more or less related, and with them the tie
of kinship was strong. It was probable that she would go north, or east.
She might have gone to Lexington, or Winchester, or Richmond, or even in
the hills to Somerset.

Well, he could not solve it. He was deeply disappointed because he had
not found her there, but he was relieved from his first fear that the
guerillas had come. He closed and fastened the window again, and then
walked all through the house once more. His eyes had now grown so used
to the darkness that he could see everything dimly. He went into his own
room. A picture of himself that used to hang on the wall now stood on
the dresser. He knew very well why, and he knew, too, that his mother
often passed hours in that room.

Below stairs everything was neatness and in order. He went into the
parlor, of which he had stood in so much awe, when he was a little
child. The floor was covered with an imported carpet, mingled brown and
red. A great Bible lay upon a small marble-topped table in the center
of the room. Two