“What do you say to....”
She did not conclude her question. Her daughter was not there.
The old woman surveyed the room, looked into the kitchen, then returned to the room. Her daughter’s bonnet was not in its place. With quivering hands she opened the closet. The jacket was missing!
She had gone! And she had warned her daughter, it seemed, not to go out to-day,—that on the Sabbath of Repentance, at least, she might remain at home and not run off to that “Apostate,” the former student.
Her aged countenance became as dark as the sky without. And her heart grew as furious as the storm. She gazed about the room as if seeking to vent her rage,—strike somebody, break something.
“Oh, may she no longer be a daughter of mine!” escaped in angry outburst from her storming bosom, and she raised her hand to heaven.
She was not affrighted by the curse that her lips had uttered on this solemn Sabbath. At this moment she could curse and shriek the bitterest words. She could have seized her now by the hair, and slapped her face ruthlessly.
Suddenly she threw a shawl over her head and dashed out of the house.
She would hunt them both out and would visit an evil end upon both of them.
A flash of lightning rent the clouds, and was followed by reverberating thunder. Then flash upon flash of lightning and crash upon crash of thunder. One more blinding than the other, one louder than the other!