He rose dizzy, bruised, and covered with dust. The team he held securely and soon quieted. The cause of the accident was plain; the right fore-wheel had come off, letting the front of the buggy drop. He unhitched the excited team from the carriage, drove them to the fence and tied them securely, then went back to find the wheel, and the burr whose failure to hold its place had done all the mischief. He soon had the wheel on, but to find the burr was a harder task. Back and forth he ranged, looking, scraping in the dust, searching the weeds. He knew that sometimes a wheel will run without the burr for many rods before coming off, and so each time he extended his search. He traversed the entire half mile several times, each time his rage and disappointment getting more bitter. He ground his teeth in a fever of vexation and dismay. He had a vision of Agnes waiting, wondering why he did not come. It was this vision that kept him from seeing the burr in the wheel-track, partly covered by a clod. Once he passed it looking wildly at his watch, which was showing nine o'clock. Another time he passed it with eyes dimmed with a mist that was almost tears of anger. There is no contrivance that will replace an axle-burr, and farm-yards have no unused axle-burrs, and so Will searched. Each moment he said: "I'll give it up, get onto one of the horses, and go down and tell her." But searching for a lost axle-burr is like fishing; the searcher expects each moment to find it. And so he groped, and ran breathlessly, furiously, back and forth, and at last kicked away the clod that covered it, and hurried, hot and dusty, cursing his stupidity, back to the team. It was ten o'clock as he climbed again into the buggy, and started his team on a swift trot down the road. What would she think? He saw her now with tearful eyes and pouting lips. She was sitting at the window, with hat and gloves on; the rest had gone, and she was waiting for him. But she'd know something had happened, because he had promised to be there at eight. He had told her what team he'd have. (He had forgotten at this moment the doubt and distrust he had given her on Monday.) She'd know he'd surely come. But there was no smiling or tearful face watching at the window as he came down the lane at a tearing pace, and turned into the yard. The house was silent, and the curtains down. The silence sent a chill to his heart. Something rose up in his throat to choke him. "Agnes!" he called. "Hello! I'm here at last!" There was no reply. As he sat there the part he had played on Monday came back to him. She may be sick! he thought, with a cold thrill of fear. An old man came around the corner of the house with a potato fork in his hands, his teeth displayed in a grin. "She ain't here. She's gone." "Gone!" "Yes--more'n an hour ago." "Who'd she go with?" "Ed Kinney," said the old fellow, with a malicious grin. "I guess your goose is cooked."