"George got up twice in the night, but all was quiet. He even walked round the house an' stood under the winder, hopin', as he told me afterwards, to see her shadder on the curtain. The second time he went out, he saw her pull aside the square of cotton an' look out. It was nigh mornin' then and the lamp still burnin'. 'Bout half after five he crept out in his stockin' feet, milked, an' turned the cows out; then he come back, laid down, an' just after daybreak shet his eyes fer the first time. "When he woke it was 'bout eight o'clock, an' still nary a sound in the house, fer Keziah had n't nothin' on her mind, 'cause mother took it all off. Again he slipped out of doors an' see a dull red spot on the curtain; it looked as if the light was burnin'. He thought she 'd fallen asleep. On thet, he creeps up the back stairs an' looks inter the chamber. There was mother stretched out on the cot unconscious, her face as white an' drawn as the square of cotton beside it. Job was breathin' heavy in the bed; the lamp was smellin' with the vilest smell and--Happy was gone." "Gone!" Jamie echoed. "Yes, gone fer good--an' ter this day I can't quite make up my mind whether I 've fergiven her or not. "Mother come to in something less than half an hour and before the doctor got there. We braced her up with a pint of strong coffee, an', natcherly, she could n't remember nothing after she 'd took the catnip tea--_and_ the laudanum. "George rode right an' left, to get track of her, or rather them, fer we all knew there was a man in the case after what we see. He telegraphed ter them big cities, an' hired detectives fer the dirty work; but they could n't get no clew. The folks at the Crick House said there 'd been a man there sketching but they had n't seen him sence Sunday night, when he left on foot. The gal, they said, had n't been near the house, an' Seth White told mother, it was he give her the brandy himself; so you can make what you can of it. "'I 'm her husband, an' she belongs ter me,' was all George would say, when we tried to make him give her up an' git a bill of divorce. "Wal," said Cale sententiously, looking hard at the Doctor, "there 's two ways of lookin' at thet, but it took him some time ter see it; an' it war n't till he 'd travelled fer four months, east, north, south, an' west as fur as the Rockies, thet he come home an' settled down to farmin' again; but it would n't work. He war n't the same man; lost his interest, an' was lettin' things go ter the dogs. He never took ter drink, thet I know of. But there war n't no use talking ter him. He was his own master an' would n't be interfered with. "It might have been nine months after he 'd come home, mebbe 't was a year, I don't remember, when he come to me one day with a telegram in his hand--it had come up on the stage--an' handed it to me with the face of a man ready ter face death or of a dead man jest come ter life, I could n't say which.