The moon sank lower, the sunset coals burned into swart cinders; the hosts of the dark marched in upon the still figure on the doorstone where Lance crouched motionless, his face drooped almost to the threshold, his arms flung forward till they touched the nodding weeds by the path. So an hour counted itself out, and there was no change in his posture, no lifting of the head. The little moon finally dropped down behind the hills; dew lay thick on the curls beside the great limestone slab. About ten o'clock a cloud blew in through the Gap, bearing a tiny shower of summer rain. Under the cool pattering that drenched his hair and garments. Lance stirred not at all; but all the noises of the July night were hushed by it, and in the chill which followed, he shivered. Deep in the night's silent heart, a bird cried out; Lance started and raised his face to the darkness with a sort of groan. "And this time she won't come back," he whispered. [277] CHAPTER XIX. CALLISTA CLEAVERAGE GOES HOME. CALLISTA reached her grandfather's gate when the old man was just finishing that last pipe he loved to smoke in his big hickory arm chair on the porch before he lay down for his night's rest. In the soft, summer night, beginning to be thick with stars, he was aware that whoever the newcomer was, it was someone well known to the dogs, for the chorus of greetings was distinctly friendly. Yet his keen old hunter's ears noticed the surprised yap of a younger hound born since Callista left the farm; and when his granddaughter emerged into the light of the doorway, he was scarcely surprised. "Good evenin', Gran'pappy. Where's Mother?" Callista greeted him. Before Ajax could answer her, his daughter-in-law came hurrying out crying, "Lord love yo' soul, honey! Did you git home at last to see yo' mammy that's--" Callista silenced her with a raised hand. "W'y, Callisty honey," ejaculated Mrs. Gentry, examining her anxiously, "is anything the matter with Lance?" A slight contraction passed across the visitor's [278] face, as they watched it, but she answered coldly, evenly, "I reckon there's nothing more the matter of Lance Cleaverage than there always has been. I've come home." Dead silence followed this statement. Then old Ajax knocked the ashes out of his pipe and slowly put it in his pocket. "Uh-huh," he agreed, "you've come home--and I always knowed you would." Octavia turned on him crying in a voice more tremulous with tears than anger, "Now, Pap Gentry--" But Callista interposed, with the faintest flicker of her old fire, "Let him have his say. I told you-all once, standin' right here on this porch, that I'd never come home to this house with empty hands--that I'd bring something. Well, I have. I've brought this child." Octavia was striving to take the baby from his mother's arms, to draw Callista into the house. At this she began to cry, "Make her hush, Pap Gentry," she pleaded. "Don't set there and let my gal talk that-a-way!"