How would she receive him?
Surely, in spite of his empty-handedness, she would greet him lovingly because of their long separation and the death of the child. Surely she would receive him lovingly because of the endless days that had divided them. Those days! Those days! But he refused to let his mind dwell on the deadly length of them. It might sadden again.
In the world, he reasoned, there were those two only, Celia and himself. Should they not cling together?
True, he would arrive empty-handed, but he could make a living for her and himself in the old town. He was not without friends there. There were those who had loved him in the olden time. They would give him work. They would help him build up his lost fortunes. He would spend his life in retrieving, in compensating to Celia for the foolish years that he had spent dreaming dreams.
In St. Louis he remained for weeks, working about the station in the effort to earn enough for his ride to Cincinnati. At length he succeeded, but on an emigrant train.
He rode for a day, looking out the window at the landscape swimming by rather than at his wild-eyed companions, crowded together like sheep. At the end of the day he arrived at Cincinnati.
And then Seth came into—into God's country.