[CHAPTER VI.]
OLD CHARLIE BRINGS BACK JOE.
On the day Joe left home his mother put his room in order for him as usual, and placed on the table a little bouquet of red and white geraniums and verbenas. She could not believe that he would be gone over night, and she knew that when he came he would be tired, broken, repentant, and grateful for the least mark of tenderness.
She delayed supper beyond the hour, in the hope that he might come. Even after the others had forced themselves to eat, she set aside enough for Joe.
She went many times to the east window to look down the road for him, and sent Jennie to the top of the hill to see if she could discover in the distance a boy riding toward her on a gray horse.
But Jennie, whose eyes had been full of tears all day, came back at dusk to say that she had seen nothing. Then she went weeping to bed.
The next day came, and many days thereafter; but Joe’s room was still vacant, and Old Charlie’s stall was still empty.
Farmer Gaston’s grief was less touching than his wife’s perhaps, but it was really as deep as hers. The habitual sternness of his face was tempered with the lines of sorrow.
He had made no effort to find the horse. There was no doubt in his mind that Joe had taken him; but he did not care to bring the boy into deeper disgrace by making public search.
Mr. Gaston sometimes wondered if he had taken the right course with Joe. His theory had been that the more strictly a boy was held to his work and duty as a boy, the more earnestly would he follow both as a man.