"Yes, sir; my horse left his'n half a length behind every time it hit the ground."
Ivans grunted. Evidently he had listened to recitals from the same source before, and was too tired for close attention; anyway, the remarks of this Truthful James drifted into a monologue, and finally into silence, and no sound of life was left in the house.
She had been reading a book Stuart had sent back to her by Hardy, the day he left. She wondered a little why, for he had never spoken of it to her. It was a novel, a late publication, and by an author whose name she had seen affixed to magazine work; and the charm in it was undeniable—the charm of quiet hearts and restful pictures, that proved the writer a lover of the tender, sympathetic tones of life, rather than the storms and battles of human emotions.
It held the girl with a puzzling, unusual interest—one that in spite of her would revert from the expressed thoughts on the paper to the personality of the man who had sent it to her, and she found in many instances, a mystifying likeness.
She sat there thinking drowsily over it, and filled with the conviction that it was really time to go to bed; but the big chair was so comfortable, and the little simmer of the burning wood was like a lullaby, and she felt herself succumbing, without the slightest rebellion, to the restful influence. She was aroused by the banging of a door somewhere, and decided that Andrews had at last returned; and remembering the number of things he had to bring in, concluded to go out and help him. Her impulse was founded as much on economy as generosity, for the late hour was pretty good proof that Andrews was comfortably drunk—also that breakages were likely to be in order.
It was cloudy—only the snow gave light; the air was not cold, but had in it the softness of rain. Over it she walked quickly, fully awakened by the thought of the coffee getting a bath of vinegar, or the mail mucilaged together with molasses.
"Oh, here you are at last!" she remarked, in that inane way people have when they care not whether you are here or in the other place. "You took your own time."
"Well, I didn't take any other fellow's!" returned the man from the dark corner where he was unsaddling the horse.
Andrews was usually very obsequious to Miss Rachel, and she concluded he must be pretty drunk.
"I came out to help you with the things," she remarked from her post in the door-way; "where are they?"