"

The sun made one of its perceptible drops, just as though its setting
was a matter of notches. A little cool breeze came up to meet them
from the creek bottom as they moved slowly downward.

"Why couldn't you get me something to do in Louisville? How about the
Plow Company? They must employ a great many men." He laughed a bit
shrilly. "I've always thought I would like to live in Louisville."

Joe was aghast. He felt as if it might be some old lady demanding of
him pink tights and a place in the front row of the ballet. However,
he checked the exclamation that rose to his lips. But for a moment he
did not know what to say. Uncle Buzz--wanting to go to work at
Bromley's!--An ancient and decrepit Whittington!

"But you've been here so long, Uncle Buzz!" he managed at length.

"So I have. All the more reason. I'm getting in a rut. Besides, I'm
getting tired of Burrus. Narrow-minded scoundrel! He throws out hints
about Zeke bringing me my whiskey over from Fillmore. As if it were
any of his business!" He subsided and silently contemplated the depths
of Burrus' degradation.

Joe laughed softly and at the same time felt the sharp little warning
edge of an intuition. Uncle Buzz was slipping, and he knew it.

"I wouldn't be in a hurry," he suggested at length, "Bromley's is full
up. All those men coming back from the army, you know--I'll keep an
eye open for you if you want me." It was most incongruous, the
patronizing air that had crept into his voice, the tone that
invariably greets the unemployed, wherever or whoever he be.

Uncle Buzz brightened. "Do," he said.

They drove through the gate and up to the house. Aunt Loraine
profusely reproached her husband for not advising her of Joseph's
arrival. "It's a shame. Here at the last minute. You might have at
least sent me word, Bushrod."

"We had to go out in the country," Uncle Buzz replied with decision.

And so they supped meagrely on fried chicken and rice and gravy and
hot biscuits and coffee. And afterward they sat in the high-ceilinged
back parlour, in candlelight, and watched the glow die from the
western sky. And Aunt Loraine asked him about the "season" in
Louisville, and once she asked him about Mary Louise. And bye-and-bye
Uncle Buzz began to nod just like a sleepy little boy, and with the
prospect of a long, well-filled to-morrow, Joe suggested that they go
to bed. And then there was a moment's pausing upon the threshold of a
yawning black door beyond