T was just at the break of day the following morning. Major Warren, who had not retired until late the night before in his perturbed state of mind over the calamity which hovered in the air, was sleeping lightly, when he was awakened by the almost noiseless presence of some one in his room. Sitting up in bed he stared through the half darkness at a form which towered straight and still between him and the open window through which the first touches of the new day were stealing. “Who's there?” he demanded, sharply.

“It's me, Marse William—Lewis.”

“Oh, you!” The Major put his feet down to the rug at the side of his bed, still not fully awake. “Well, is it time to get up? Anything—wrong? Oh, I remember now—Pete!”

A groan from the great chest of the negro set the air to vibrating, but he said nothing, and the old gentleman saw the bald pate suddenly sink.

“Oh, Lewis, I hope—” Major Warren paused, unable to continue, so vast and grewsome were the fears his servant's attitude had inspired. The old negro took a step or two forward and then said: “Oh, marster, dey done tuck 'im out las' night—dey tuck my po' boy—” A great sob rose in old Lewis's breast and burst on his lips.

“Really, you don't mean it—you can't, after—”

“Yasser, yasser; he daid, marster. Pete done gone! Dey killed 'im las' night, Marse William.”

“But—but how do you know?”

“I des dis minute seed Jake Tobines; he slipped up ter my house en called me out. Jake lives back 'hind de jail, Marse William, en when de mob come him en his wife heard de racket en slipped out in de co'n-patch ter hide. He seed de gang, marster, wid his own eyes, en heard um ax fer de boy. At fus Marse Barrett refused ter give 'im up, but dey ordered fire on 'im en he let um have de keys. Jake seed um fetch Pete out, en heard 'im beggin' um ter spar' his life, but dey drug 'im off.”

There was silence broken only by the old negro's sobs and the smothered effort he was making to restrain his emotion.

“And mammy,” the Major began, presently; “has she heard?”

“Not yit, marster, but she is awake—she been awake all night long—on her knees prayin' most er de time fer mercy—she was awake when Jake come en she knowed I went out ter speak ter 'im, en when I come back in de house, marster, she went in de kitchen. I know what she done dat fur—she didn't want ter know, suh, fer certain, ef I'd heard bad news or not. I wanted ter let 'er know, but I was afeared ter tell 'er, en come away. I loves my wife, marster—I—I loves her mo' now dat Pete's gone dan ever befo'. I loves 'er mo' since she been had ter suffer dis way, en, marster, dis gwine ter kill 'er. It gwine ter kill Lindy, Marse William.”

“What's the matter, father?” It was Helen Warren's voice, and with a look of growing terror on her face she stood peering through the open doorway. The Major ejaculated a hurried and broken explanation, and with little, intermittent gasps of horror the young lady advanced to the old negro.

“Does Mam' Linda know?” she asked, her face ghastly and set in sculptural rigidity.

“Not yet, missy, not yet—it gwine ter kill yo' ol' mammy, child.”

“Yes, it may,” Helen said, an odd, alien quality of resignation in her voice. “I suppose I'd better go and break it to her. Father, Pete was innocent, absolutely innocent. Carson Dwight assured me of it. He was innocent, and yet—oh!”

With a shudder she turned back to her room across the hall. In the stillness the sound of the match she struck to light her lamp was raspingly audible. Without another word, and wringing the extended hand of his wordless master, Lewis crept down the stairs and out into the pale light of early morning. Like an old tree fiercely beaten by a storm, he leaned towards the earth. He looked about him absently for a moment, and then sat down on the edge of the veranda floor and lowered his head to his brown, sinewy hands.

A negro woman with a milk-pail on her arm came up the walk from the gate and started round the house to the kitchen door, but seeing him she stopped and leaned over him. “Is what Jake done say de trufe?” she asked.

“Yassum, yassum, it done over, Mary Lou—done over,” Lewis said, looking up at her from his blearing eyes; “but ef you see Lindy don't let on ter her yit. Young miss gwine ter tell 'er fust.”

“Oh, my Lawd, it done over, den!” the woman said, shudderingly; “it gwine ter go hard with Mam' Lindy, Unc' Lewis.”

“It gwine ter kill 'er, Mary Lou; she won't live dis week out. I know 'er. She had ernough dis life wid all she been thoo fur 'erself en her white folks, in bondage en out, en' dis gwine ter settle 'er. I don't blame 'er. I'm done thoo myse'f. Ef de Lawd had spar' my child, I wouldn't er ax mo', but, Mary Lou, I hope I ain't gwine ter stay long. I'll hear dat po' boy beggin' fer mercy every minute while I live, en what I want mo' of it fur? Shucks! no, I'm raidy—en, 'fo' God, I wish dey had er tuck us all three at once. Dat ud 'a' been some comfort, but fer Pete ter be by hisse'f beggin' um ter spar' 'im—all by hisse'f, en me 'n his mammy—”

The old man's head went down and his body shook with sobs. The woman looked at him a moment, and then, wiping her eyes on her apron, she went on her way.

A few minutes later, just as the red sun was rising in a clear sky and turning the night's moisture into dazzling gems on the grass and leaves of trees and shrubbery, like the beneficent smile of God upon a pleasing world, Helen descended the stairs. She had the sweet, pale face of a suffering nun as she paused, looked down on the old servant, and caught his piteous and yet grateful, upturned glance.

“I'm going to her now, Uncle Lewis,” she said. “I want to be the first to tell her.”

“Yes, you mus' be de one,” Lewis sighed, as he rose stiffly; “you de onliest one.”

He shambled along in her wake, his old hat, out of respect for her presence, grasped in his tense hand. As they drew near the little sagging gate at the cottage there was a sound of moving feet within, and Linda stood in the doorway shading her eyes from the rays of the sun with her fat hand. To the end of her life Helen had the memory of the old woman's face stamped on her brain. It was a yellow mask, which might have belonged to a dead as well as a living creature, behind which the lights of hope and shadows of despair were vying with each other for supremacy. In no thing pertaining to the situation did the pathos so piteously lie as in the fact that Linda was deliberately playing a part—fiercely acting a rÔle that would fit itself to that for which the agony of her soul was pleading. She was trying to smile away the shadows her inward fears, her racial intuition were casting on her face.

“Mighty early fer you ter come, honey,” she said; “but I reckon you is worried 'bout yo' ol' mammy.”

“Yes, it's early for me to be up,” Helen said, avoiding the wavering glance that seemed in reality to be avoiding the revelation of hers. “But I saw Uncle Lewis and thought I'd come back with him.”

“You hain't had yo' breakfast yit, honey, I know,” said Linda, reaching for a chair half-heartedly and placing it for her young mistress, and then her eyes fell on her husband's bareheaded, bowed attitude as he stood at the gate, and something in it, through her sense of sight, gave her a deadening blow. For an instant she almost reeled; she drew a deep breath, a breath that swelled out her great, motherly bosom, then with her hands hanging limply at her side, she stood in front of Helen. For a moment she did not speak, and then, with her face on fire, her great, somnolent eyes ablaze, she suddenly bent down and put her hands on Helen's knees and said: “Looky here, honey, I've been afraid of it all night long, an' I've fit it off an' fit it off, an' I got up dis mawnin' fightin' it off, but ef you come here so early 'ca'se—ef you come here ter tell me dat my child—ef you come here—ef you come here—gre't God on high, it ain't so! it cayn't be dat way! Look me in de eyes, honey, I'm raidy en waitin' fer you ter give it de lie.”

For one moment she glared at Helen as the girl sat white and quivering, her glance on the floor, and then she uttered a piercing scream like that of a frightened beast, and grasping the hand of her husband, who was now by her side, she pointed a finger of stone at Helen. “Look! Look, Lewis; my Gawd, she ain't lookin' at me! Look at me, honey chile; look at me! D' you hear me say—” She stood firmly for an instant and then she reeled into her husband's arms.

“She daid; whut I tol you? Missy, yo' ol' mammy daid,” and lifting his wife in his arms he bore her to the bed in the corner of the room. “Yes, she done daid,” he groaned, as he straightened up.

“No, she's only fainted,” said Helen; “bring me the camphor, quick!”