For five or six weeks in the early spring it was his custom to forge his daily chain of miles and, when the end was reached, climb contentedly aboard a train and be transported, often by arduous means, to the city where millions of men walk with a definite aim in view. He liked the spring of the year. He liked the rains and the winds of early spring. They meant the beginning of things to him.
He was rich. Perhaps not as riches are measured in these Midas-like days, but rich beyond the demands of avarice. His legacy had been an ample one. The fact that he worked hard at his profession from one year's end to the other,--not excluding the six weeks devoted to these mentally productive jaunts,--is proof sufficient that he was not content to subsist on the fruits of another man's enterprise. He was a worker. He was a creator, a builder and a destroyer. It was part of his ambition to destroy in order that he might build the better.
The first fortnight of a proposed six weeks' jaunt through Upper New England terminated when he laid aside his heavy pack in the little bed-room at Hart's Tavern. Cock-crow would find him ready and eager to begin his third week. At least, so he thought. But, truth is, he had come to his journey's end; he was not to sling his pack for many a day to come.
After setting the mind of the landlord at rest, Barnes declined Mr. Rushcroft's invitation to "quaff" a cordial with him in the tap-room, explaining that he was exceedingly tired and intended to retire early (an announcement that caused unmistakable distress to the actor, who held forth for some time on the folly of "letting a thing like that go without taking it in time," although it was not made quite clear just what he meant by "thing"). Barnes was left to infer that he considered fatigue a malady that ought to be treated.
Instead of going up to his room immediately, however, he decided to have a look at the weather. He stepped out upon the wet porch and closed the door behind him. The wind was still high; the lantern creaked and the dingy sign that hung above the steps gave forth raucous, spasmodic wails as it swung back and forth in the stiff, raw wind. Far away to the north lightning flashed dimly; the roar of thunder had diminished to a low, half-hearted growl.
His uneasiness concerning the young woman of the cross-roads increased as he peered at the wall of blackness looming up beyond the circle of light. He could not see the towering hills, but memory pictured them as they were revealed to him in the gathering darkness before the storm. She was somewhere outside that sinister black wall and in the smothering grasp of those invisible hills, but was she living or dead? Had she reached her journey's end safely? He tried to extract comfort from the confidence she had expressed in the ability and integrity of the old man who drove with far greater recklessness than one would have looked for in a wild and irresponsible youngster.