cheating me; I have placed a premium upon your worthlessness and
rascality. There is no good in you. Get off that place just as soon as
you can."

"John----"

"Don't call me John. You are a hypocrite and a deadbeat. Yes, you have
sung like a cricket and I have paid dearly for your music. Don't say a
word to me; don't open your lying mouth, but get out of this yard as
soon as your wretched legs can carry you, and get off that place at
once."

The Major turned his back upon him, and the old fellow tottered to the
gate. With an effort he scrambled upon his horse and was gone. He looked
back as if he expected to see a hand upraised, commanding him to stop;
he listened for a voice inviting him to return; but he saw no hand,
heard no voice, and onward down the road he went. In the highway he met
a man and the man spoke to him, but he replied not, neither did he lift
his heavy eyes, but rode onward, drooping over the horse's neck. He
passed the house of Wash Sanders, and from the porch the invalid hailed
him, but he paid no heed.

Upon reaching home, or the cypress log house which for him had so long
been a free and easy asylum, he feebly called a negro to take his horse.
Into the house he went, into the only habitable room. It was at best a
desolate abode; the walls were bare, the floor was rotting, but about
him he cast a look of helpless affection, at the bed, at a shelf whereon
a few books were piled. He opened a closet and took therefrom a faded
carpet-bag and into it he put Rousseau's Confessions, then an old book
on logic, and then he hesitated and looked up at the shelf. All were
dear to him, these thumbed and dingy books; many a time at midnight had
they supped with him beside the fire of muttering white-oak coals, and
out into the wild bluster of a storm had they driven care and
loneliness. But he could not take them all. Painfully he made his
selections, nearly filled his bag, leaving barely room for an old satin
waistcoat and two shirts; and these he stuffed in hastily. He put the
bag upon the bed, when with fumbling he had fastened it, and stood
looking about the room. Yes, that was all, all except a hickory walking
cane standing in a corner.

Onward again he went with his cane on his shoulder and his bag on his
back. At the bars down the lane a dog ran up to him. "Go to the house,
Jack," he said, and the dog understood him and trotted away, but in the
old man's voice he heard a suspicious note and he turne