"Pap, yo' breakfast is gettin' stone cold."
"Do you have to go to the mill right now?" inquired the older man,
timorously. He was already under the domination of this swifter, bolder,
more fiery spirit.
"No, I don't have to go anywhere that I don't want to. I've got business
with a certain party up this-a-way, and when I git to the mill I'll
be there."
He turned and hurried swiftly up the minor slope that led to the big
Hardwick home, Pap's fascinated eyes following him as long as he was in
sight. As the young fellow strode along he was turning in his mind Lydia
Sessions's promise to talk to him this morning about Johnnie.
"But she'll be in bed and asleep, I reckon, at this time of day," he
ruminated. "The good Lord knows I would if I had the chance like
she has."
As he came in sight of the Hardwick house, he checked momentarily.
Standing at the gate, an astonishing figure, still in her evening frock,
looking haggard and old in the gray, disillusioning light of early
morning, was Lydia Sessions. Upstairs, her white bed was smooth; its
pillows spread fair and prim, unpressed by any head, since the maid had
settled them trimly in place the morning before; but the long rug which
ran from her dressing table to the window might have told a tale of
pacing feet that passed restlessly from midnight till dawn; the mirror
could have disclosed the picture of a white, anxious, and often angry
face that had stared into it as the woman paused now and again to
commune with the real Lydia Sessions.
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