Before going out he had put on his canvas shooting coat and a pair of
hobnailed leather hunting boots, laced for a little distance at the
front and sides. He visited the horses, standing disconsolate under an
open shed in the corral; he slopped, with constantly accruing masses of
sticky earth at his feet, to the chicken coop, into which he cast an
eye; he even took the kitchen pails and tramped down to the spring and
back. In the gulch he did not see or hear a living thing. A newly-born
and dirty little stream was trickling destructively through all manner
of shivering grasses and flowers. The water from Bennington's sleeves
ran down over the harsh canvas cuffs and turned his hands purple with
the cold. He returned to the cabin and changed his clothes.
The short walk had refreshed him, but it had spurred his impatience.
Outside, the world seemed to have changed. His experience with the
Hills, up to now, had always been in one phase of their beauty--that of
clear, bright sunshine and soft skies. Now it was as a different
country. He could not get rid of the feeling, foolish as it was, that
it was in reality different; and that the whole episode of the girl and
the rock was as a vision which had passed. It grew indistinct in the
presence of this iron reality of cold and wet. He could not assure
himself he had not imagined it all. Thus, belated, he came to thinking
of her again, and having now nothing else to do, he fell into daydreams
that had no other effect than to reveal to him the impatience which had
been, from the first, the real cause of his restlessness under the
temporary confinement. Now the impatience grew in intensity. He
resolved that if the morrow did not end the storm, he would tramp down
the gulch to make a call. All this time Aliris lay quite untouched.
The next day dawned darker than ever. After breakfast Old Mizzou, as
usual, went out to feed the horses, and Bennington, through sheer
idleness, accompanied him. They distributed the oats and hay, and then
stood, sheltered from the direct rain, conversing idly.
Suddenly the wind died and the rain ceased. In the place of the gloom
succeeded a strange sulphur-yellow glare which lay on the spirit with
almost physical oppression. Old Mizzou shouted something, and scrambled
excitedly to the house. Bennington looked about him bewildered.
Over back of the hill, dimly discernible through the trees, loomed the
black irregular shape of a cloud, in dismal contrast to the yellow
glare which now filled all the sky. The horses, frightened, crowded up
close to Bennington, trying to push their noses over his shoulder. A
number of jays and finches rushed down through the woods and darted
rapidly, each with its peculiar flight, toward a clump of trees and
bushes standing on a ridge across the valley.