At a turn in the road where a little grove began he got off his wheel
and seeking a sheltered spot dropped down under a tree to read his
papers. His quick eye searched through the County paper first for the
sensational account of the murder, and a gray look settled over his pug
countenance as he read. So might a mother have regarded her child in
deep trouble, or a lover his beloved. Billy's spirit was bowed to the
depths. When he had devoured every word he flung the paper aside
wrathfully, and sat up with a kind of hopeless gesture of his hard
young hands. "Aw Gee!" he said aloud, and suddenly he felt a great wet
blob rolling down his freckled cheek. He smashed it across into his
hair with a quick slash of his dirty hand as if it had been a mosquito
annoying him, and lest the other eye might be meditating a like trick
he gave that a vicious dab and hauled out the other paper, more as a
matter of form than because he had a deep interest in it. All through
the description of those wonderful Shafton jewels, and the mystery that
surrounded the disappearance of the popular young man, Billy could see
the word "murder" dancing like little black devils in and out among the
letters. The paragraph about Mrs. Shafton's collapse held him briefly: "Aw, gee!" he could see pink tears everywhere. He supposed he ought to
do something about that. For all the world like Aunt Saxon! He seemed
to sense her youth through the printed words as he had once sensed Mrs.
Carter's. He saw her back in school, pretty and little. Rich women were
always pretty and little to his mind, pretty and little and helpless
and always crying. It was then that the thought was born that made him
look off to the hills and ponder with drawn brows and anxious mien. He
took it back to his home with him and sat moodily staring at the lilac
bushes, and gave Aunt Saxon another bad day wondering what had come to
Willie. She would actually have been glad to hear him say: "I gotta
beat it! I gotta date with tha fellas!"
That evening the rumor crept back to Sabbath Valley from who knows
where that Dolph was dead and Mark Carter had run away!