“The furrin womern over to Granny Williams’ house is name Haddon,” said she after a time, “but her man, he hain’t here no more now.”
“Isn’t here! Has he been here? When did he leave?” It was the younger woman who spoke again.
“He lef’ a while back.”
“Where did he go? Do you know?”
“No, I don’t. The Lord only knows whar he went, but he’s daid all right. Up yander on the hill is whar he’s buried at. His womern has been stayin’ on here fer a little while yit, over to Granny Williams’, like I done tolt ye.”
Her close scrutiny saw consternation upon the faces of both the newcomers.
“But—you don’t mean Mr. Haddon—you don’t mean that Mr. James Haddon—he isn’t dead, is he?”
“He sartinly is,” replied Granny Joslin. “He was drownded down to the Narrers while he was a-comin’ in here. They had a boat an’ they come up from Windsor. Davy—that’s my grandson—saved the corp, and he had a moughty hard time doin’ it, too, let me tell ye. He liken to have drownded hisself. But Davy, he fotched the corp, anyways.”
The two strangers looked at one another, horrified.
“We heard he came in that way,” began the younger woman. “You see, we knew him very well. We wired to New York—don’t you see, he was our partner, the backer of our company, as they say—we had a theatrical company on the road. Well, they told us he had started in for this place here. Then we didn’t get any more word from his office. We weren’t so far away from here by rail, so we started over—of course, if we’d come in the same way he did we would have heard of it—but we didn’t. You see, Mr. Haddon was in business with us. Dead?—why—why—what’ll we do?”