His wife, Lettice, how young she was smiling at
him from the sunny grass! She walked happily
toward him, with her shawl about her shoulders,
but she didn't reach him; she was sitting in the rocking
chair on the porch... the day faded, she was
singing a little throaty song, sewing upon a little
square of white -- she was gone as swiftly, as utterly,
as a shadow. The shape of Meta Beggs, animated
with incomprehensible gestures, took its place in the
procession of his memories. She, grimacing, came
alike to naught, vanished. All stopped for a moment
and then disappeared, leaving no trace behind.

He mechanically arrested the horses before the
isolated buildings that formed the midday halt.

Buckley Simmons, crouching low over the table,
consumed his dinner with formless, guttural approbation.
The place above his forehead, where he
had been struck by the stone, was puckered and
dark. He raised his eyes -- the unquenchable hatred
of Gordon Makimmon flared momentarily on his
vacuous countenance like the flame of a match lit
in the wind.

Once more on the road the rain stopped, the cold
increased; high above the earth the masses of cloud
gathered wind-herded in the south. The dripping
from the trees ceased, the black branches took on a
faint glitter; the distant crash of a falling limb
sounded from the woods.

[[357]]

p356 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p357w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p358

v?