“They have a good time with that car,” said Lockwood, assured now of a chilliness in his reception.
“Seems like that thar gas buggy is all they ever think about,” replied the old man, unbending slightly. “Hawses is plenty good enough fer me. I wouldn’t trade a good hawse fer the best engine-wagon the Yankees ever made. No, suh! Louise feels that way, too. She’s gone out ridin’ now—gone to visit Em’ly Smith.”
Lockwood seized this information with avidity. He knew where the Smiths lived, a couple of miles beyond the Atha store. He might contrive to meet her on her way back.
He was afraid to ask when she would return, and he was afraid of seeming to hurry away. He rolled a cigarette, keeping an eye on the road, and talking of casual matters. One of the chippers had been found dead in the woods, and Craig had insisted that Blue Bob leave the bayou. He passed these items of gossip along, but Henry did not seem greatly interested. He wriggled his toes and smoked his pipe, saying little. He was plainly uncomfortable, under some compulsion that restrained his normal geniality. It was a much too serious matter for Lockwood to feel entertained. Something had cooled old Power; there was a hostile influence at work. Had the boys reported to Hanna his comments on Pascagoula Oil?
“Won’t you stay an’ eat dinner with us?” said Henry perfunctorily, when Lockwood presently got up.
“Afraid I can’t. I just dropped in a minute—on my way to the post office.”
Henry did not ask him to come again, but merely nodded a brief farewell as Lockwood saluted him from the saddle and rode off.
CHAPTER X
TANGLED TRAILS
Perhaps Louise could tell him what had corrupted her father’s hospitable soul. He was scared by the sudden idea that perhaps the poison had entered her mind also. Perhaps she, too, would be cold and distant with him.
He began to be desperately afraid of missing her. It was his last chance, perhaps. He would shrink from visiting the house again. There was no horse ahead as he looked toward the store. The hot, sandy yellow road was empty but for a great gasoline truck trundling up the distant rise. He galloped down to the creek, through the shade and steamy dampness of the swamp, and up the slope. Negroes were chopping cotton in the fields under a broiling sun; they looked up lazily. A white man overseeing them on horseback waved a salutation to him. There was the usual knot of loafers on the gallery of Ferrell’s store, but Lockwood did not pull up. He rode on to the forking of the road, and looked up the way to Smith’s. The road was shady with a line of water-oaks on its south side, and was entirely lacking in life as far as he could see. He stood in the shadow of the trees for a few minutes, then turned back for a quarter mile in the opposite direction, not to look as though he awaited some one. He dawdled, riding as slowly as possible, and then returned to the corner.