"Is he comin'?"
She did not answer. Instead, she got up slowly from her place by the fire and took another chair, far away in the gloom, where hardly a glimmer of light reached to her and there she let her head rest, as if exhausted, against the back of the seat.
"He promised," said Buck Daniels, striving desperately to keep his voice cheerful, "and he never busts his promises."
"Ay," said the old man, "he promised to be back—but he ain't here."
"If he started after the storm," said Buck Daniels.
"He didn't start after the storm," announced the oracle. "He was out in it."
"What was that," cried Buck Daniels sharply.
"The wind," said Kate, "for it's rising. It will be a cold night, to-night."
"And he ain't here," said the old man monotonously.
"Ain't there things that might hold him up?" asked Buck, with a touch of irritation.