After a while she began to cry, not passionately, but in a slow, cold, bitter way, as though even the relief of tears were denied her.
In the midst of her misery, thoughts of anxiety began to obtrude themselves. Suppose Jerry had let the fire go out. If he had, the baby would surely take his death of cold. Or he might have fallen head first into the slop bucket. Suppose Jerry had left Billy alone in the kitchen and he got to playing with matches or to poking bits of stick into the fire to set the ends burning. He could easily set fire to the house. And if anything happened to them it would be all her doing, because she had gone away and left them.
She began to shiver and became aware that her feet were like lumps of ice. She got up and turned hastily toward home. Looking about she was astonished to find how far she had come. As she hurried homeward her anxiety increased. Her heart began to beat fast and she stumbled over clods and bits of underbrush. The afternoon was fast drawing in to night.
When at last she reached the house and opened the kitchen door, the room was almost in darkness. Jerry was sitting by the table with the baby on his lap feeding him warm milk and corn cake. Billy was sitting on the floor eating some of the same mixture from a bowl. The room was frowsy and unswept. The washing was just as she had left it.
She had come back half prepared to be friendly with Jerry. But the look of aggrieved and self-righteous accusation that he cast at her as she opened the door was quite enough to kill feelings that at best were only struggling for existence. Her anger rose again as if it had never died. She returned his glance with a long, hard, black, piercing look and went to light the lamp. His sense of injury was changed into uneasiness and a vague anxiety. He would not admit it to himself; but he was afraid of her.
Silently she fried the corn cakes and some liver from the hogs that had been killed that day. When they had eaten and she was clearing the table, Jerry spoke.
"Lizzie May was here," he said, clearing his throat. "I had to tell her you'd stepped over to see Hat Wolf. She don't seem to know what to do with herse'f, poor gal. She feels dreadful about Dan."
"The more fool she. She dunno when she's well off," she answered brutally in a harsh, grating voice, and went on clearing the table, slapping the plates together viciously. Her own words shocked her; then she felt defiantly glad that she had said them.
He started, where he sat by the stove, and looked at her in astonishment. As she went on silently about her work, he kept glancing at her askance, questioningly, and with a vague uneasiness.