“Ye see,” continued the woman, her voice husky with feeling, “his daddy was—was one of them that was killed, an’ my boy came back to look once more on his poor dead face today. He said he’d colored his hair an’ changed his looks so no one would know him; but oh, they’d hang him—hang my boy!” she finished in a frenzy, wringing her hands and swaying her body from side to side.
Through the window Hustler Joe saw the figure of a man moving among the shadows of the trees near the house. The miner stepped close to the old woman and laid a light hand on her shoulder.
“Listen! I am going away for an hour. When I am out of sight, go out to the trees behind the house and call your boy in. I shall be gone and shall know nothing of it—you can trust me. Do you understand?”
A heartfelt “God bless you!” rang in his ears as he left the house and hurried away.
When he returned an hour later he found these words scrawled on a bit of brown wrapping-paper:
You treated me white. Thanks. You don’t know what you saved my mother. It would have broke her heart if they had strung me up. Thanks.
Hustler Joe stared fixedly at the note long after he had read it; then he tore the paper into tiny bits and dropped them into the fireplace. Very slowly he opened the traveling-bag and unpacked one by one the articles therein. When the bag was empty and the room restored to its spotless order, he drew a long breath.
“Yes, ’twould break her heart; she’s less miserable if I stay where I am,” he murmured. “Poor dear mother, she’s suffered enough through me already!”
VIII
The days that followed were busy ones for Ethel. Company made The Maples gay with fun and laughter; but Ethel did not drop her newly awakened interest in the miners. By her earnest persuasion Miss Fenno had agreed to lengthen her visit, the need of these same miners having been held up by the wary Ethel as good and sufficient reason for her remaining.