"Oh--Flent's dead then?" inquired Sylvane on a falling note, searching the faces before him in the dusk. "Will you lead us to whar Lance is at, or will you not?" demanded Beason monotonously, dropping the flimsy pretense that they had any knowledge of the fugitive's hiding place. "I'll go with you to Pappy," Sylvane compromised. "Whatever Pappy says will be right." So they all turned and went together to the old Cleaverage place, the boy on his laden mule riding in their midst. They found Kimbro at home sick. He got up, trembling, from his bed and dressed himself. "Gentlemen," he said to them, appearing in their midst, humbled, broken, but still self-respecting, "I wish my son Lance would surrender himself up to the law--yes, I do. His health is giving way under what he has to endure. But lead you to him I will not, without I first get his consent to do so. If you have a mind to stay here--and if you will give me yo' word of honor not to foller nor watch me, Sheriff Beason--I will go myself and see what he has to say; and I'll come back and tell you." Beason held a prolonged whispered consultation [375] with his three men. At the end of it he turned and said to the father half surlily, "Go ahead, I give you my word to neither foller nor watch." The men sprawled themselves about Roxy Griever's hearthstone, warming luxuriously, dreading to go forth again into the raw February weather. Roxy followed her father to the door. "Pappy," she pleaded, clinging to his arm. "Hit'll be the death of you to go abroad this-a-way, sick like you air, and all." "No, Roxana--no, daughter," Kimbro replied, drawing her gently out to the porch, whence they could see Sylvane getting a saddle on to Satan. "I feel as though I might be greatly benefited if only this matter of Lance's can be fixed up. I consider that they trust me more than another when they consent to let me go this way." Roxy's eye rolled toward the doorway and dwelt upon the officers of the law who were to remain her guests till her father's return. Across her mind came dim visions of heroic biblical women who had offered deadly hospitality to such. Step by step she followed Kimbro to the gate, whispering, "Don't you git Lance to give himself up, Pappy--don't do it. You tell him Sylvane is a-goin' to fetch extra ammunition from Hepzibah, and if he can hold out till Spring, these fellers [376] is bound to git tired and turn loose the job. He can slip away then; or they'll be wore out, an' ready to make some sort o' terms with the boy." "Daughter," said the old man, softly, "your brother would be dead before Spring." "Well, he'll shore die," cried the poor woman, in a sort of piercing whisper, "ef they take him down to jail in the settlement. Pappy, you know Lance ain't never goin' to live--_in the jail!_" And Kimbro left her sobbing at the gate, as he rode away on the black horse, his frail, drooping figure a pathetic contrast to the young animal's mettlesome eagerness. [377]