He did not go down to supper. Toward bedtime, as he sat before his fire, he heard a slow, unfamiliar step mounting the stair. Not often in a year did he have the chance to recognize that step. His mother entered, holding a small iron stewpan, from under the cover of which steamed a sweet, spicy odor. "This will do your cold good," she said, tasting the stew out of a spoon which she brought in her other hand, and setting it down on the hot hearth. Then she stood looking a little fearfully at her son, who had not moved. Ah, that is woman's way! She incites men to a difficulty, and then appears innocently on the battle-field with bandages for the belligerents. How many of the quarrels of this world has she caused--and how few ever witnessed! David was sick in heart and body and kept his chair and made no reply. His mother suddenly turned, feeling a cold draft on her back, and observed the broken window-pane and the flapping sheet of paper. "There's putty and glass in the store-room: why don't you put that pane of glass in?" "I will sometime," said David, absently. She went over to his bed and beat up the bolster and made everything ready for him. "You ought to have clean sheets and pillow-cases," she remarked confidently; "the negroes are worthless. Good night," she said, with her hand on the door, looking back at him timidly. He sprang up and went over to her. "Oh, mother! mother! mother!" he cried, and then he checked the useless words that came rushing in a flood. "Good night! and thank you for coming. Good night! Be careful, I'll bring the candle, the stairway is dark. Good night!" "Oh, Gabriella! Gabriella!" he murmured as he went back to his table. He buried his head on his arms a moment, then, starting up, threw off his clothes, drank the mixture, and got into bed. XX At dead of night out in a lonely country, what sound freezes the blood like the quick cry of an animal seized and being killed? The fright, the pain, the despair: whosoever has heard these notes has listened to the wild death-music of Nature, ages old. On the still frozen air near two or three o'clock of next morning, such a cry rang out from inside the barn. There were the short rushes to and fro, round and round; then violent leapings against the door, the troughs, and sides of the stable; then mad plunging, struggling, panting; then a long, terrified, weakened wail, which told everything beyond the clearness of words.