ike walking against a wind, that you
can't push aside. You women, you just guess how I felt then! You just
guess! You want your husband. It was the same with me. I want George.
But he wouldn't listen to me no more."

The woman seemed to sink, to shrivel, under the weight of her
recollection. Finding her not a monster but a woman after all, her two
hearers were moved to another slight token of sympathy. They were
"guessing," as she commanded. But still, with a kind of weary
magnanimity, she waved them back, away from the things she had yet to
make clear.

"But one day I saw it. One day I saw something. I came home with my
berries, and George was there. His breath was funny, and he talked
funny, and walked funny. I'd seen people in the village that way.
But--my mother was that way, too. She looked funny--had very red cheeks,
and talked very fast. Very foolish. And her breath was the same as
George's. And she laughed and laughed at me, and made fun of me.

"I said nothing. But I didn't sleep that night. I wondered what would
happen. Many days I thought of what was happening. Then I knew. My
mother was trying to get George away from me. That was what had
happened.

"Another day I came back with my berries, and my mother was not there.
Neither was George there. So! She had taken George away. My George.
Well! I set out to look. No rest for me till I find them. I knew pretty
well where they might be. I started for George's little brick house down
in the hollow. That's where he had taken to living--hunting and fishing.
It was late--the brick house was far away--I was very tired. But I went.
And--"

She had been speaking more rapidly. Here she stopped to breathe, to
swallow, to collect herself for the final plunge.

"I heard a runaway horse. 'George's horse!' I said. 'George is coming
back to me, after all! George is coming back to me! She can't keep him!'
And, yes, it was George's horse. But nobody on him. I was so scared I
could hardly stand. Something had happened to George. Only then did I
know how much I wanted him--when something had happened to him. I almost
fell down in the road, but I crawled on. And presently I came to him, to
George. He was walking in the road, limping and stumbling and
rolling--all muddy--singing to himself. He didn't know me at first. I
ran to him--to my George. And he grabbed me, and stumbled, and fell. And
he grabbed my ankle. 'Come to me, li'l' one!' he said. 'Damn the old
hag!' he said.