turned away quickly, and went across the cleared space to his horse and
buggy. Jake, who was lying on the ground with some other negroes, ran
forward and unfastened his horse, and gave him the reins.

"Want me to go back wid yer, Marse John?" he asked.

"No," answered Westerfelt, and he drove rapidly homeward. Reaching the
stable, he put up his horse, and went to the room over the office. He
sat down, took up an old newspaper, and tried to read it, but there
seemed to be something in the paling light on the bare fields outside
and the stillness of the empty building that oppressed him. He rose
and looked out of the window. Not a soul was in sight. The store and
the bar, with their closed shutters, looked as if they had not been
opened for a century. A brindled cow stood in the middle of the
street, jangling a discordant bell, and lowing dolefully. He rose,
went down-stairs, walked aimlessly about in the stable, and then went
up the street towards Bradley's. He wondered if Harriet had returned,
but as he passed the hotel he had not the courage to look in.

Every door of the Bradley house was closed. He tried all the windows,
but they were held down by sticks placed over the sashes on the inside.
Even the chickens and ducks in the back yard seemed to have fallen
under the spell of the unwonted silence. The scare-crow in the
cornfield beyond the staked-and-ridered rail fence looked like the
corpse of a human being flattened against the yellow sky.

He went out at the gate and turned up the Hawkbill road till he was
high enough to see the village street above the trees. Later he
noticed the vehicles beginning to come back from the camp-ground, and
he returned home by a short path through the fields. He reached the
Bradleys' just as Luke was helping his wife out of the spring-wagon at
the gate.

"We didn't fetch Mis' Dawson back," explained Mrs. Bradley. "She met
some old acquaintances--the Hambrights--an' they made 'er go home with
'em. Lawsy me, haven't I got a lots to tell you, though! You had as
well prepare fer a big surprise. You couldn't guess what tuk place out
thar atter you left ef you made a thousand dabs at it. Luke, go put up
the hoss. I want to talk to John, an' I don't want you to bother us
tell I'm through, nuther. You kin find plenty to do out at the barn
fer a few minutes."

Westerfelt followed her into the sitting-room and helped her kindle the
fire in the big chimney.

"Well, w