and urged by him, she began to tell of
matters in her father's life, the old Hotel St. Louis life before hers
began--matters that gave to "The Clock in the Sky" and "The Angel of
the Lord" a personal interest beyond all academic values.

"We'll finish about that another time," she said, and with "another
time" singing in his heart like a taut wire he verily enjoyed the
rasping of the wicket's big lock as he turned away.

The week wore round. Except M. De l'Isle, kept away by a meeting of
the Athenee Louisianais, all were regathered; one thing alone delayed
the reading. Each of the three women had separately asked her father
confessor how far one might justly--well--lie--to those seeking the
truth only for cruel and wicked ends. But as no two had received the
same answer, and as Chester's uncle was gone to his reward--or
penalty--the question was early tabled. "Well," Mme. Castanado said:
"'And so we went--' in the coach. Go on, read."

XIII

And so we went, not through the town but around it.

My attendants were heavy with sleep. Seating Rebecca next me I called
Euonymus into the coach and let mother, son, and daughter slumber at
ease.

To the few persons we met I paraded my bonnet and curls. Some, in
Southern fashion, I questioned. I was a widow who had sold her
plantation in order to go and live with a widowed brother. Euonymus
too I showed off, who, waking at every halt, presented a face that
seemed any boy's rather than a runaway's. So natural to these Africans
was the supernatural that I could be one of the men who plucked Lot
from Sodom and yet a becurled widow.

When at noon, at a farmhouse, we had fed horses and dined, I at the
planter's board, my "slaves" under the house-grove trees, Euonymus took
the lines, and for five hours Luke slept inside. Then they changed
places again, and Euonymus and I, face to face, watched the long hot
day wane, and pass through gorgeous changes into twilight. Often I saw
questions in the young eyes that watched me so reverently, but I dared
not encourage them; dared not be a talkative angel. Also my brain had
its questions. How was I to get out of the most perilous trap into
which a sane man--if sane I was--ever thrust himself? There was no
sign that we were being pursued, but it was a harrowing puzzle how,
without drawing suspicion upon the runaways, to get them once more
separated from me and the coach while I should vanish as a lady and
reappear as