“I've been in Raleigh three days altogether,” answered Carrington, falling into step at his side, and they continued on across the meadow in silence.
“Do you observe the decorations of those refreshment booths?—the tasteful disposition of our national colors, sir?” the judge presently inquired.
Carrington smiled; he was able to follow his companion's train of thought.
They were elbowing the crowd now. Here were men from the small clearings in homespun and butternut or fringed hunting-shirts, with their women folk trailing after them. Here, too, in lesser numbers, were the lords of the soil, the men who counted their acres by the thousand and their slaves by the score. There was the flutter of skirts among the moving groups, the nodding of gay parasols that shaded fresh young faces, while occasionally a comfortable family carriage with some planter's wife or daughter rolled silently over the turf; for Boggs' race-track was a famous meeting-place where families that saw one another not above once or twice a year, friends who lived a day's hard drive apart even when summer roads were at their best, came as to a common center.
The judge's dull eye kindled, the haggard lines that had streaked his face erased themselves. This was life, opulent and full. These swift rolling carriages with their handsome women, these well-dressed men on foot, and splendidly mounted, all did their part toward lifting him out of his gloom. He settled his hat on his head with a rakish slant and his walk became a strut, he courted observation; he would have been grateful for a word, even a jest at his expense.
A cry from Hannibal drew his attention. Turning, he was in time to see the boy bound away. An instant later, to his astonishment, he saw a young girl who was seated with two men in an open carriage, spring to the ground, and dropping to her knees put her arms about the tattered little figure.
“Why, Hannibal!” cried Betty Malroy.
“Miss Betty! Miss Betty!” and Hannibal buried his head on her shoulder.
“What is it, Hannibal; what is it, dear?”
“Nothing, only I'm so glad to find you!”