When Moses saw Mr. Laine hurrying from one side of his bedroom to the other, opening bureau drawers and closet doors and throwing things on floor and bed in an excited haste never seen before, he was convinced that something was the matter with his master’s mind.  It had happened very suddenly.  He had eaten his dinner, but eaten so little that Caddie, the cook, was in angry tears.  For days her finest efforts had been ignored, and temptation after temptation, triumphs of skill on her part, had come back barely tasted, and, what was worse, with no comment made upon them.  Praise had hitherto never been withheld, and to please him no labor was too great, no time too precious to be expended; but if this was what she was to get—­ Caddie was Irish, and she threw birds and sweetbreads in the slop-can and slammed the door in Moses’s face.

“No, siree!  I ain’t a-goin’ to let white folks’ eatin’s go in black folks’ stomachs, that I ain’t!” she said, and shook both fists up at the ceiling.  “Pigs can have it first; there’s some reason for pigs, but that nigger man Moses!” Her nose went up, her head went back, and she wept aloud.  The work of her hands was as naught.  She would die and be buried before Moses should have it!

At his coffee Laine had asked for his mail, asked it to get Moses out of the room.  A creature who smiled always was not always to be endured, and to-night he was in no mood for smiles.

Moses brought two letters.  “These is all,” he said.

Laine waved him out and opened the top one, which was from Dorothea.  What a queer propensity the child had for writing!  Elbow on the table and cigar in hand, he began to read indifferently; but in a moment his hand stiffened and his face whitened to the lips, and, half aloud, he read it again.

Dear uncle Winthrop,—­I forgot to tell you something the other night.  I told you once that Cousin Claudia’s sweetheart was that Washington man.  He isn’t.  I asked her and she said he wasn’t.  I asked her if she was going to marry him and she said she was not.  I don’t like to say things that aren’t true and that’s why I’m telling you.  Miss Robin French thinks she knows everything.  We are going away to-morrow.

  Your loving niece,
    Dorothea.

P. S.—­When a lady gets married she has to go away with a man, don’t she?  That’s why she isn’t going to get married.  She says she loves Elmwood better than any kind of man she’s seen yet.  I’m so glad, aren’t you?

  D.

For half a moment longer Laine stared at the paper in his hand, then, with the cigar, it fell to the floor, and he lifted his head as if for breath.  Something had snapped, something that had been tense and tight, and his throat seemed closing.  Presently his face dropped in his arms.  What a fool he had been!  He had let the prattle of a child torture and torment him and keep him silent, and now she was gone.  After a while he raised his head and wiped his hands, which were moist; and, as he saw the writing on the letter beside him, his heart gave a click so queer that he looked around to see if the door was shut.  Quickly he opened the envelope and tried to read:  he couldn’t see; the words ran into each other, and, going over to a side light, he held the paper close to it.