Sally stood silently at his side, and her cheeks flushed as the tears
crept into her eyes; but her hand stole through the thick mane of hair,
fast turning from iron-gray to snow-white.
Spicer South watched the fattening hog that rubbed its bristling side
against the rails stacked outside the fence, and then said, with an
imperious tone that did not admit of misconstruction: "But, Sally, the boy's done started out on his own row. He's got ter
hoe hit. Mebby he'll come back--mebby not! Thet's as the Lord wills.
Hit wouldn't do us no good fer him to come withouten he come willin'ly.
The meanest thing ye could do ter me--an' him--would be ter send fer
him. Ye mustn't do hit. Ye mustn't!"
"All right, Unc' Spicer. I hain't a-goin' ter do hit--leastways, not
yit. But I'm a-goin' ter come over hyar every day ter see ye."
"Ye can't come too often, Sally, gal," declared the old clansman,
heartily.
* * * * * Wilfred Horton found himself that fall in the position of a man whose
course lies through rapids, and for the first time in his life his
pleasures were giving precedence to business. He knew that his
efficiency would depend on maintaining the physical balance of perfect
health and fitness, and early each morning he went for his gallop in
the park. At so early an hour, he had the bridle path for the most part
to himself. This had its compensations, for, though Wilfred Horton
continued to smile with his old-time good humor, he acknowledged to
himself that it was not pleasant to have men who had previously sought
him out with flatteries avert their faces, and pretend that they had
not seen him.
Horton was the most-hated and most-admired man in New York, but the
men who hated and snubbed him were his own sort, and the men who
admired him were those whom he would never meet, and who knew him only
through the columns of penny papers. Their sympathy was too remote to
bring him explicit pleasure. He was merely attempting, from within,
reforms which the public and the courts had attempted from without.
But, since he operated from within the walls, he was denounced as a
Judas. Powerful enemies had ceased to laugh, and begun to conspire. He
must be silenced! How, was a mooted question. But, in some fashion, he
must be silenced. Society had not cast him out, but Society had shown
him in many subtle ways that he was no longer her favorite. He had
taken a plebeian stand with the masses. Meanwhile, from various
sources, Horton had received warnings of actual personal danger. But at
these he had laughed, and no hint of them had reached Adrienne's ears.