, and
the cares and anxieties of the morrow were for a time forgotten.

CHAPTER X. LITTLE POMP

There was a hurried good-by at the depot.

"Kiss the children for me, Mary," said her husband.

"You will write very soon?" pleaded Mrs. Frost.

"At the very first opportunity."

"All aboard!" shouted the conductor.

With a shrill scream the locomotive started.

Frank and his mother stood on the platform watching the receding train
till it was quite out of sight, and then in silence our young hero
assisted his mother into the carryall and turned the horse's head
homeward.

It was one of those quiet October mornings, when the air is soft and
balmy as if a June day had found its way by mistake into the heart of
autumn. The road wound partly through the woods. The leaves were still
green and abundant. Only one or two showed signs of the coming change,
which in the course of a few weeks must leave them bare and leafless.

"What a beautiful day!" said Frank, speaking the words almost
unconsciously.

"Beautiful indeed!" responded his mother. "On such a day as this the
world seems too lovely for war and warlike passions to be permitted to
enter it. When men might be so happy, why need they stain their hands
with each other's blood?"

Frank was unprepared for an answer. He knew that it was his father's
departure which led his mother to speak thus. He wished to divert her
mind, if possible.

Circumstances favored his design.

They had accomplished perhaps three-quarters of the distance home when,
as they were passing a small one-story building by the roadside, a
shriek of pain was heard, and a little black boy came running out of the
house, screaming in affright: "Mammy's done killed herself. She's mos'
dead!"

He ran out to the road and looked up at Mrs. Frost, as if to implore
assistance.

"That's Chloe's child," said Mrs. Frost. "Stop the horse, Frank; I'll
get out and see what has happened."

Chloe, as Frank very well knew, was a colored woman, who until a few
months since had been a slave in Virginia. Finally she had seized a
favorable opportunity, and taking the only child which the cruel slave
system had left her, for the rest had been sold South, succeeded in
making her way into Pennsylvania. Chance had directed her to Rossville,
where she had been permitted to occupy, rent free, an old shanty which
for some years previous had been uninhabited. Here she had supported
herself by taking in washing and