And a white shoe
onto the wall. I expect it must be one o' hers she used to wear. It was
before I moved over from South side, but Mrs. Hikes says she had the
flightiest clothes when he was courtin' her. Her mother left her some
money, I guess, any way, 'n' there wasn't anything too rich, ner too
good, ner too foreign for her to wear. 'N' look at her now! Well, it's
'long toward tea-time. You look tired."
I was indeed very tired. I could not assimilate the strange impressions
I had received. That night the moon-light streamed broadly into my
window through the apple-boughs that showed black shadows on the floor.
About midnight I opened my eyes suddenly. Mrs. Libby in a much-frilled
night-dress was shaking my shoulder vigorously.
"You'll have to get up. Agnes Rayne's dyin', 'n' she's took a notion to
see you. They've sent Hikeses' boy after you; bleedin' at the lungs is
all I can get out of him. The Hikeses are all dumb as a stick of
cord-wood."
She sat down heavily on my bed, and put a pillow comfortably to her back
while I dressed. Hikeses' boy sat waiting for me in the porch whistling
under his breath. He was the tallest and lankiest of them all, and like
some ghostly cicerone, he never spoke, but led the way through the dewy
grass into the white, glorious moonlight, and kept a few yards ahead of
me in the dusty road until we reached the Rayne farmhouse.
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