Morlene, who had manifested great self-control during the whole of the affecting scene, now arose and boldly faced Lemuel Dalton.
"Sir," said she, her eyes filled with tears, "it takes no prophet to foretell that terrible sorrows await you! He who ignores human emotions, will find many in this world more than a match for him at his own game! As for the money which you gave me, I shall not touch one penny of it. Really, I do not care to have my life linked by means of the smallest thread to a man who shall come forth from the 'mills of the gods' ground as you will be. You have not my anger, sir, but my most profound pity." So saying, she, too, left the room.
Lemuel Dalton was seized with a nameless, indefinable terror, that caused his blood to grow chill; and in that instant the consciousness came to him with the certainty of a revelation that Morlene had spoken the truth. But this feeling only remained for a few seconds. It was but a forerunner, years ahead of its time. He cast it off, seeking to assure himself that belief in a premonition was but an idle superstition. When he had fully recovered his composure he said:
"Now, I like that plucky spirit manifested by the girl. Give me, every time, the haughty sufferer, too proud to crouch beneath the lash even when its sting is keenest. I want none of your whining suppliants. A plague on these Negroes who meet injury with woe-begone expressions. That sort of thing tends to make the Anglo-Saxon chicken-hearted in dealing with them. The more a Negro whines and supplicates the worse I hate him. But I tell you I like the spirit of that girl." Such was Lemuel Dalton's soliloquy.
"But other tasks await me," he said. Taking a pistol from his hip pocket, he thoroughly examined it to see that it was in prime condition in every respect. Satisfied on this score, he put it back into the pocket from which he had taken it. Going out to the stable, he mounted his horse and rode away, taking the road that had been made to pass through and connect the several parts of the vast Dalton estate. On every side of him were tokens of what the forces of nature were doing for him. The earth holding in her bosom the roots of acres of Indian corn, was yielding up her substance that the grain might ripen unto harvest. The stalks were bravely bearing the swelling ears. The beautiful drooping blades drank in the contributions that the sun and the air had to bestow.
Thus all nature was at one working for the welfare of the future master of the Dalton place. But he had no eye for nature's loving panorama. A master passion had his soul within its grasp.
