A figure appeared in the doorway. It was his mother, and she was coming to search for him.
"Here I am, mother!" he cried out, gently, as she advanced through the darkness; "look out and don't get your feet wet."
She chuckled childishly as she stepped across the brook on the largest stones. When she reached him she put her hand on his arm and laughed: "La me, boy, a little wet won't hurt me—I'm used to a good soakin' mighty nigh every drenchin' rain. I slept with a stream of it tricklin' through the roof on my back one night, an' I've milched the cows in that thar lot when the mire was shoe-mouth deep in January. I 'lowed I'd find you out here. You used to be a mighty hand to sneak off to yoreself to study, and you are still that away. But you are different in some things, too. You don't talk our way exactly, an' I reckon that's what aggravates Mark. He was goin' on jest now about yore stuck-up way o' eatin with yore pocket-handkerchief spread out in yore lap."
King looked past her at the full moon rising above the trees on the mountain-top.
"Mother," said he, abruptly, and he put his arm impulsively around her neck, and his eyes filled—"mother, I can't stay here but a few days. I have work to do in Atlanta. Your health is bad, and you are not comfortable; the others are strong and can stand it, but you can't. Come down there with me for a while, anyway. I'll put you under a doctor and bring back your health."
She looked up into his eyes steadily for a moment, then she slapped him playfully on the breast and drew away from him. "How foolish you talk fer a grown-up man!" she laughed; "why, you know I can't leave Mark and the children. He'd go stark crazy 'thout me around to grumble at, an' then the rest ud be without my advice an' counsel. La me, what makes you think I ain't comfortable? This cabin is a sight better 'n the last one we had, an' drier an' a heap warmer inside when fire-wood kin be got. Hard times like these now is likely to come at any time an' anywhar. It strikes rich an' pore alike. Thar's Dickerson offerin' that fine old farm, with all the improvements, fer a mere song to raise money to go into business whar he kin hope to pay out o' debt. They say now that the place—lock, stock, and barrel—kin be had fer ten thousand. Why, when you was a boy he would have refused twenty. Now, ef we-all had it instead o' him, Mark an' Jake could make it pay like rips, fer they are hard workers."
"You think they could, mother?" His heart bounded suddenly, and he stood staring thoughtfully into her eyes.
"Pay?—of course they could. Fellers that could keep a roof over a family's head on what they've had to back 'em could get rich on a place like that. But, la me, what's the use o' pore folks thinkin' about the property o' the rich an' lucky? It's like dreamin' you are a queen at night an' wakin' up in hunger an' rags."
"I remember the farm and the old house very well," King remarked, reflectively, the queer light still in his earnest eyes.
"The old one! Huh, Dickerson got on a splurge the year you left, an' built a grand new one with some money from his wife's estate. He turned the old one into a big barn an' stable an' gin. You must see the new house 'fore you go away, Luke. It's jest splendid, with green blinds to the winders, a fancy spring-house with a tin rooster on top that p'ints the way the wind blows, and on high stilts like thar's a big tank and a windmill to keep the house supplied with water. I hain't never been in it, but they say they've got wash-tubs long enough to lie down in handy to every sleepin'-room, and no end of fancy contraptions."