I almost dropped the piece of ham I was conveying to my mouth. Had Reuben betrayed me! What did this talk of "mother" and "Salome" mean? When he first spoke the word "mother," I had paid no particular attention to it; but when coupled with that other name, it took a deeper meaning.
"I—I—I understood you had no children," I said, trying to conceal my dismay by bending over my plate.
"Quite true, quite true, Stone. We've never had a child born to us. I got in the habit of calling the boss mother, from S'lome."
"Who is Salome?" I asked, but my voice was so weak that it scarcely conveyed the question.
"Bless me! didn't Walker tell you? I'll wring the rascal's neck for forgettin' S'lome. Why, man, she's the pride of this farm, and the queen of every heart on it! S'lome? Who's S'lome? Ask any nigger or dog in the county, and they'll tell you. She's our 'dopted daughter, man, off to Bellwood for her second year, and'll be home the fifth of June, God bless her!"
VII
Like most country folks, my new friends went to bed shortly after sundown. About nine o'clock, I took my pipe and my tobacco-pouch, and crept noiselessly out to the front porch. I had noticed a quaint settee there upon my arrival that morning, and I had no trouble in finding it now, for a ghostly moonlight had settled over everything. My mind was confronted by a question of decidedly more moment than any under which it had at any time before labored, and I had to think it out before I could sleep. If my cherished and faithful pipe, together with solitude and the wondrous silence of a night in spring, could not bring a solution to me, then the question was certainly beyond me.
"—And'll be home the fifth of June, God bless her!"