CHAPTER XIX.

 Would day-light never come was a speculation that lay upon my mind until it seemed to gather mold, like a rag in a damp cellar. But why should I long for the sun to rise to pour light upon the blood in the lane? And to myself I said that it would be better for me if darkness should remain forever upon the earth. But the hours were so tiresome and the world was so reproachfully still. I had thought that my reading had led me away from the superstitions of my negro ancestors; long ago I had thrown away the lucky bone taken from the head of a cat-fish; I had ceased to make a cross mark in the road and spit in it whenever I found that I had forgotten something and was forced to turn back; I did not believe that the hanging of a dead snake across the fence, belly up, would make it rain; I had laughed at old Steve when he told me that a horse's tooth, ground to powder and carried sewed up in a sack, would prevail against the tricks of the conjurer. But now I believed in it all and trembled at the awful consequences that a renegade scorn might[Pg 184] call upon me. With a cold sweat I remembered the words of a black hag who lived in a hovel at the edge of the town. On an occasion, not more than a month gone-by, she had taken offense at what she termed my uppishness; she crossed her crutches in front of me, cut a mysterious diagram in the air and swore that before the moon changed twice I should fall a victim to a blighting calamity. The moon had not changed twice and the calamity had fallen. I got up to look at the moon, to search for a confirming mark upon it, but through the windless night, dark clouds had floated and the sky was black. At the window I sat and gazed into the darkness toward the lane. A wind sprang up and was hoarse in the tree-tops. Rain would come and wash the blood away, but the body and the crying wound would be there at the coming of day. I wondered whither my Young Master could have gone and why he should have left me. Was it that he had gone thus early to the authorities to beg for my life? That were useless. Law and society must have my blood. On my side a ton of justice would be but a thistledown, blown by a baby's breath. And I gazed from the window toward the lane. Day-light could not be far away; it had already fallen upon the hilltops, I thought. Yes, the far-off sky was turning gray;[Pg 185] but nearer it was black with clouds. Strange that a storm should be gathering just at this time. The lighter it grew the nearer the clouds came. They split, one in the form of a great bird, sailing away; the other was a horse galloping madly, with a ribbon, a bridle-rein of lightning, flashing at its throat. The household was stirring. I heard Old Master go down the stairs; I heard old Steve calling the hogs. There was not to be a storm. The clouds were gone and the air was sultry. The horn was blown to call the negroes to breakfast. I heard horses galloping over the turn-pike. But the body in the lane had not been found. God, I could see it, lying near the fence! I heard someone coming and I crept back to bed and covered myself. Mr. Clem entered the room.