Amanda put a severe break upon her imperious spirit and said no more words in reply until at last Mrs. Thomas brought out her final taunt, that she had only run away for the purpose of getting Vivian to come after her and bring her back; and for this time she was mistaken. She would have to stay away a mighty long while if she waited for him to fetch her, and she'd be glad to creep home again by the time everybody cried shame upon her.
Then Amanda arose and stood before her adversary, tall and majestic, with her arms folded across her swelling chest, and her black brows bent in such a frown as made Jane Thomas' cowardly heart flutter, until she thought of the impossibility of a personal encounter with this woman, whom she would have given half her possessions to conquer and humiliate.
"I say to you here and now," said Amanda, using unconsciously an orotund quality of voice that, together with her pose, rendered her delivery so forceful that her words stamped themselves upon the memory of both her hearers: "I have left Vivian Thomas' roof forever. Spread the fact as fast as you please; gloat upon the scandal it will create in this gossiping little place, and tear my reputation to pieces as fast as you want to. No power under Heaven can make me look upon that man's face again, or pass a moment in his company!"
For a few seconds there was a hush in the air, as if a missile had been thrown, and an effect was looked for. People often experience this momentary apprehension when some peculiarly definite and emphatic stand has been taken by anyone; as if definiteness, in this changing world, was a crime to bring down punishment.
But effects rarely follow so swiftly as those that came upon the heels of Amanda's declaration. Hardly had her voice died away when her mother arose hastily, crying:
"Hark, what's that?"
There were sounds of dogs barking, voices exclaiming, and the quick, irregular gallop of a horse's feet coming up to the front porch. The three women stood looking at each other, when a wild figure with eyes starting out of its head, wool standing on end, and gown half torn from its back, burst into the room, and Admonia cried out in a hoarse voice:
"Mis' Mandy, Mis' Mandy! Fur de Lawd's sake, Mis' Mandy—Mr. Vivian done fell off'n he's horse inter Mowbry Gulch an' b'oke he's neck!"
III.