He went to the edge of the standing grass beyond the dooryard, and began sowing, broadcast, spikes, nails, bits of iron, intended to ruin the sickle blades of the mowers when they came to work. Even he thrust a spike or bolt here or there upright in the ground to catch a blade.
Mary Warren where she sat knew none of this, but she heard a sound presently which she could not mistake—the crackling of fire! The scent of it came to her nostrils. The man had fired the meager remnants of Sim Gage's hay stacks.
She heard next a shot or two, but could not tell what they meant. She could not know that he was firing into the dumb, gaunt cattle which hung about the ricks.
Then later she heard something which caused her very soul to shiver, made her blood run ice—the shrieking scream of a horse in death agony—the hoarser braying of a mule, both dying amid fire! She did not understand it, could not have guessed it; but he had set fire also to the stables. Brutal to the last extreme, he left the animals penned to die in the flames, and laughed at their agony.
Again and again the awful sounds came to her. She was hysterical when she heard his footstep approach once more, shrieked aloud for mercy. He mocked her.
"Stop it! Cut it out, I say. Come on now—do you want to stay here and burn up in the house?"
"I can't see—I'm blind," was all she could manage to say.
"Blind, huh?" He laughed now uproariously. "Well, it's a good thing you was blind, or else you might of seen Sim Gage! Did you ever see Sim? What made you come here? What did you come for?"
"I'm his housekeeper. He employed me——"
"Employed you? For what?—for housekeeping? It looks like it, don't it? Where did you come from, gal?"