Lige chuckled as they left the kitchen. "I guess you didn't try too hard
to shut that door, Harkless," he said, and then, when they came into the
lighted room, "Why, where is Harkless?" he asked. "Didn't he come with
us from the kitchen?"
"No," answered Helen, faintly; "he's gone." She sank upon the sofa and
drew her hand across her eyes as if to shade them from too sudden light.
"Gone!" The judge dropped his book and stared across the table at the
girl. "Gone! When?"
"Ten minutes--five--half an hour--I don't know. Before the storm
commenced."
"Oh!" The old gentleman appeared to be reassured. "Probably he had work to
do and wanted to get in before the rain."
But Lige Willetts was turning pale. He swallowed several times with
difficulty. "Which way did he go? He didn't come around the house; we were
out there till the storm broke."
"He went by the orchard gate. When he got to the road he turned that way."
She pointed to the west.
"He must have been crazy!" exclaimed the judge. "What possessed the
fellow?"
"I couldn't stop him. I didn't know how." She looked at her three
companions, slowly and with growing terror, from one face to another.
Minnie's eyes were wide and she had unconsciously grasped Lige's arm; the
young man was looking straight before him; the judge got up and walked
nervously back and forth. Helen rose to her feet swiftly and went toward
the old man, her hands pressed to her bosom.
"Ah!" she cried out, sharply, "I had forgotten that! You don't think
they--you don't think----"
"I know what I think," Lige broke in; "I think I'd ought to be hanged for
letting him out of my sight. Maybe it's all right; maybe he turned and
started right back for town--and got there. But I had no business to leave
him, and if I can I'll catch up with him yet." He went to the front door,
and, opening it, let in a tornado of wind and flood of water that beat him
back; sheets of rain blew in horizontally, in spite of the porch beyond.
Briscoe followed him. "Don't be a fool, Lige," he said. "You hardly expect
to go out in that." Lige shook his head; it needed them both to get the
door closed. The young man leaned against it and passed his sleeve across
his wet brow. "I hadn't ought to have left him."
"Don't scare the girls," whispered the other; then in a louder tone: "All
I'm afraid of is that he'll get blown to pieces or catch his death of
cold. That's all there is to worry about. Those scalawags wouldn't try it
again so soon after last night. I'm not bothering about that; not at all.
That needn't worry anybody."