There was a certain measure of reassurance in his eyes as he returned her smile. But when he had sat down across the table from his father, where she could not see his face, he became sober and very thoughtful. He was considering the matter of Dane Semler.
IV
FIRST word of the tragedy came to Will Bissell’s store at seven o’clock in the evening of the next day but one; and the manner of the coming was this:
The day had been lowering and sultry; such a day as Fraternity was accustomed to expect in mid-August, when the sun was heavy on the land and the air was murky with sea fogs blown in from the bay. A day when there seemed to be a malignant spirit in the very earth itself; a day when to work was torment, and merely to move about was sore discomfort. A day when dogs snarled at their masters, and masters cursed at their dogs; when sullen passions boiled easily to the surface, and tempers were frayed to the last splitting strand.
No breath of air was stirring as the evening came down. The sun had scarce shown itself all day; the coming of night was indicated only by a growing obscurity, by a thickening of the murky shadows in the valleys and the gray clouds that hid the hills. Men slighted their evening chores, did them hurriedly or not at all, and made haste to get into the open air. From the houses of the village they moved toward Will’s store; and some of them stopped on the bridge above the brook, as though the sound of running water below them had some cooling power; and some climbed the little slope and sat on the high steps of the store. They talked little or none, spoke in monosyllables when they spoke at all. They were too hot and weary and uncomfortable for talking.
No one seemed to be in any hurry. The men moved slowly; the occasional wagon or buggy that drove into town came at a walk; even the automobiles seemed to move with a sullen reluctance. So it was not surprising that the sound of a horse’s running feet coming along the Liberty road should quickly attract their ears.
They heard it first when the horse topped the rise above the mill, almost a mile away. The horse was galloping. The sounds were hushed while the creature dipped into a hollow, and rang more loudly when it climbed a nearer knoll and came on across the level meadow road toward the town. The beat of its hoofs was plainly audible; and men asked each other whose horse it was, and what the hurry might be; and one or two, more energetic than the rest, stood up to get a glimpse of the road by which the beast was coming.
Just before it came into their sight they heard it stop galloping and come on at a trot; and a moment later horse and rider came in sight, and every man saw who it was.
Jean Bubier exclaimed, “It is M’sieu’ Semler.”
And Judd echoed, “Dane Semler. In a hell of a hurry, too.”