"Yes, sir, he does. He's right over there milkin'." "I'll go over there an--" "Don't b'lieve I would. It's darn muddy over there. It's been turrible rainy. He'll be done in a minute, anyway." "Very well; I'll wait." As he waited, he could hear a woman's fretful voice and the impatient jerk and jar of kitchen things, indicative of ill-temper or worry. The longer he stood absorbing this farm-scene, with all its sordidness, dullness, triviality, and its endless drudgeries, the lower his heart sank. All the joy of the home-coming was gone, when the figure arose from the cow and approached the gate, and put the pail of milk down on the platform by the pump. "Good-evening," said Howard, out of the dusk. Grant stared a moment. "Good-evening." Howard knew the voice, though it was older and deeper and more sullen. "Don't you know me, Grant? I am Howard." The man approached him, gazing intently at his face. "You are?" after a pause. "Well, I'm glad to see you, but I can't shake hands. That damned cow had laid down in the mud." They stood and looked at each other. Howard's cuffs, collar, and shirt, alien in their elegance, showed through the dusk, and a glint of light shot out from the jewel of his necktie, as the light from the house caught it at the right angle. As they gazed in silence at each other, Howard divined something of the hard, bitter feeling that came into Grant's heart, as he stood there, ragged, ankle-deep in muck, his sleeves rolled up, a shapeless old straw hat on his head. The gleam of Howard's white hands angered him. When he spoke, it was in a hard, gruff tone, full of rebellion. "Well, go in the house and set down. I'll be in soon's I strain the milk and wash the dirt off my hands." "But mother--" "She's 'round somewhere. Just knock on the door under the porch round there." Howard went slowly around the corner of the house, past a vilely smelling rain-barrel, toward the west. A gray-haired woman was sitting in a rocking-chair on the porch, her hands in her lap, her eyes fixed on the faintly yellow sky, against which the hills stood, dim purple silhouettes, and on which the locust trees were etched as fine as lace. There was sorrow, resignation, and a sort of dumb despair in her attitude. Howard stood, his throat swelling till it seemed as if he would suffocate. This was his mother--the woman who bore him, the being who had taken her life in her hand for him; and he, in his excited and pleasurable life, had neglected her! He stepped into the faint light before her. She turned and looked at him without fear. "Mother!" he said. She uttered one little, breathing, gasping cry, called his name, rose, and stood still. He bounded up the steps, and took her in his arms. "Mother! Dear old mother!" In the silence, almost painful, which followed, an angry woman's voice could be heard inside: "I don't care! I ain't goin' to wear myself out fer him. He c'n eat out here with us, or else--"