The old town clock was chiming two when Sargent finally passed the last cabin, and turned from the highway into the private road to the house. He had passed through the last hours dazed and only half understanding what was taking place about him. His return to consciousness, the horrible sight of Phelps' face mangled beyond recognition, the excitement and the questions of the crowd which had so quickly assembled, and his subsequent statement of the affair to the Sheriff—all these details were gone through much like some dream in which everything is half obscured and acted in without one's real volition.
Friends' greetings and hand-clasps he had received without one word, even when the physician had bound up his wound, an ugly gash on the head, caused by his fall against the bars, he had merely asked if he were free now to go his way.
The deathly stillness of the country, the wide gloom of the heavens, dotted with a dazzling brilliance of stars, the vague, motionless forests across the deserted fields, made the night seem to him a fit setting for the weird, strange spell into which he had sunk.
When he stood before the big gate and saw the house gleaming in the night brilliance, he started as if brought suddenly before something he had not expected. A light shone from the parlour window, an unprecedented thing at such an hour, yet it did not strike him as unusual.
Tying his horse at the gate, for it would be only two hours before he must return, he walked draggingly towards his room. There too was a light and a figure standing in the doorway.
"Thank gracious, youse done cum, Massa Sargent," Dicey exclaimed, running towards him. "Whar in de name ob de good Lawd has yer bin? Ole Miss and Lil Miss an' ev'ybody else done gone all ter pieces 'bout sumthin'. Ise bin smellin' er mouse but I cyant ketch him. Now—Massa Sargent, whut's er causin' all dis heah fuss?"
Sargent moved past the old woman, into his room. "I cannot talk now, Dicey," he said, going directly to a large armoire and unlocking it. "To-morrow—all of you will know."
"But ole Miss wants ter see yer to-night. She bin er pacin' up an' down, up an' down dat parloh flo' all night—a waitin' fer yer. Eber sence Massa Jervais wuz heah she ain' seem hab no peace ob min'! She done tole me ter watch fer yer and bring yer straight ter her—so cum 'long, right dis minit."
Sargent stared at her silently.
"You say Mr. Jervais has been here this evening."