But what it cost her to do this! To her excited fancy the commonest objects—innocent stumps, wayside bushes, fence-corner shadows—took on in the weird light grotesque shapes that filled her with fear and trembling. If she had a stretch of lonely woods to pass through she ran till the beating of her own heart fairly startled her. Was she out of sight of houses, she would quicken her steps and almost fly. When a house came in sight she walked more slowly; to be near people, even if they knew nothing of her, was something, and the barking of a dog was always a welcome sound. When she heard it she knew there was something living and awake, which lessened a little her feeling that she was a sort of wandering spirit, driven on and on in a dim world where, save for the uncanny night birds, nothing was astir but herself. Yes, Posey was afraid, at times desperately afraid, but she felt that every step was taking her farther from Mrs. Hagood, and for the sake of that she was willing both to dare much and to endure much. By and by, however, signs of the coming morning began to appear. First a faint line of light along the eastern sky, then lights were seen gleaming here and there in farmhouse windows, and curls of smoke rising from chimneys, in token that the world was rousing to the new day; once across the fields she heard a loud hearty voice calling, “Coo-boss, coo-boss,” to the cows in some out-of-sight pasture, and again she caught a distant glimpse of some boys with bags on their shoulders, evidently off for an early nutting expedition. Gradually these signs of life multiplied, the clouds grew more rosy, the trees, no longer vague, dark masses, showed their brilliant hues of red and gold; wayside objects lost their dim and spectral look; all the world was waking into the crisp brightness of a clear, fresh, autumn morning, sweet with the fruity smell of ripened orchards, and rich with the soft mellowness of the long summer time. With everything around her new and strange Posey had no idea how far she had come. This she did know, that the bundle and basket she carried were all the time growing heavier, that her aching feet dragged more and more slowly, and that she was so tired she could go only a little way without stopping to rest.