“Tildy, I ain’t afeard ter die, and I’se lived out my time, but we-all’s folks wus buried ’spectable--buried in de grabe-yard at home. One cornder wus cut off for we-all in deir buryin’ groun’; my ole man, he’s buried dar, and Jerry, my son, he’s buried dar, and our white people thought a sight o’ we-all. Dey’ed want me sent right dar.” “Whar dey-all--your white folks?” asked Tildy, wistfully. “All daid but one--my chile, Miss Cheraky. I wus her black mammy, and she lub’d me--if she was here I’d----” She broke down, crying pitifully--lifting her arms caressingly, as though a baby were in them. Cherokee knew now that she would recognize her, so she came up close to her. “Yes, Mammy, you are right, our loved ones should rest together, I will see that you go back home.” “Oh, my chile!”--she caught her breath in a sob of joy, “God A’mighty bless you, God A’mighty bless you!” “Don’t excite yourself, I shall stay until you are well, or better.” Cherokee stooped and patted her tenderly. “My chile’s dun come to kyar ole mammy home,” she repeated again and again, until at last, exhausted from joy, she fell asleep. Tildy and the young white lady kept a still watch, broken only by stalled cattle that mooed forth plaintive pleadings. CHAPTER IX. A KENTUCKY STOCK FARM. Cheerless winter days were gone. Spring had grown bountiful at last, though long; like a miser “Had kept much wealth of bloom, Had hoarded half her treasures up in winter’s tomb.” But her penitence was wrought in raindrops ringed with fragile gold--the tears that April sheds. Now vernal grace was complete; the only thing to do was to go out in it, to rejoice in its depth of color, in its hours of flooded life, its passion pulse of growth. “Ashland,” that peerless Southern home, was set well in a forest lawn. The great, old-fashioned, deep-red brick house, with its broad verandas, outlined by long rows of fluted columns, ending with wing rooms, was half ivy-covered. A man came out upon the steps and looked across his goodly acres. Day-beams had melted the sheet of silvery dew. A south wind was asweep through fields of wheat, a shadow-haunted cloth of bearded gold, and blades of blue grass were all wind-tangled too. How the wind wallowed, and shook, with a petulant air, and a shiver as if in pain. The man looked away to the eastward, to where even rows of stalls lined his race-course--a kite-shaped track.