He stood aside, while his dignified parent got into the sleigh. 'Tilda Jane, from her high seat, looked around once. The lumber merchant and his son were down in a black valley of soft, smothering furs, Poacher was running agreeably behind, and Gippie was snug and warm in her lap.
No one spoke during the drive, and they glided swiftly through the snowy town. 'Tilda Jane had a confused vision of lighted shops with frosty windows, of houses with more sober illuminations, then suddenly they were stealing along the brink of a long and narrow snow-filled hollow. This was the Ciscasset River, still held by its winter covering. She thought she heard a murmur of "rotten ice" behind her as the lumber merchant addressed his son, and she was enough a child of the State to know that a reference to the breaking up of the ice in the river was intended.
Presently they dashed up a long avenue of leafless, hardwood trees to a big house on the hill. A hall door was thrown open, and within was a glimpse of paradise for the homeless orphan. Softly tinted lights in the background illuminated and made angelically beautiful the white dresses and glowing faces of a lady and three little girls who stood on the threshold with outstretched arms.
The father and son welcomed to these embraces had forgotten 'Tilda Jane, and as the sleigh slowly turned and went down the cold avenue, tears streamed silently down her cheeks.
"Where am I to take you?" suddenly asked the solemn coachman beside her.
"To Hobart Dillson's," she said, in a choking voice.
Nothing more was said, she saw nothing, heard nothing, felt nothing of her immediate surroundings. She had once been taken to a circus, and the picture now before her mind was that of a tiger pacing back and forth in his cage, growling in a low monotonous tone, always growling, growling at a miserable child shrinking outside.
"That there is Dillson's cottage, I think," said the coachman at last.
'Tilda Jane roused herself. Through her blurred vision a small house wavered at the end of a snowy path. She wiped her eyes hastily, thanked the man, and, slipping from her high seat, ran behind the sleigh and untied Poacher.
The man turned his sleigh and glided slowly out of sight. She stood watching him till he disappeared, then, followed by her two dogs went reluctantly up the path.