she sat stone-still. Old
Joel passed her on the way to the barn. Several times the old mother
walked to the door behind her, and each time starting to speak, stopped
and turned back, but the girl neither saw nor heard them. Jack trotted
by, whimpering. He sat down in front of her, looking up at her unseeing
eyes, and it was only when he crept to her and put his head in her lap,
that she put her arms around him and bent her own head down; but no
tears came.

CHAPTER 17.

CHADWICK BUFORD, GENTLEMAN

And so, returned to the Bluegrass, the midsummer of that year, Chadwick
Buford gentleman. A youth of eighteen, with the self-possession of a
man, and a pair of level, clear eyes, that looked the world in the face
as proudly as ever but with no defiance and no secret sense of shame It
was a curious story that Chad brought back and told to the Major, on
the porch under the honeysuckle vines, but it seemed to surprise the
Major very little: how old Nathan had sent for him to come to his
death-bed and had told Chad that he was no foundling; that one of his
farms belonged to the boy; that he had lied to the Major about Chad's
mother, who was a lawful wife, in order to keep the land for himself;
how old Nathan had offered to give back the farm, or pay him the price
of it in livestock, and how, at old Joel's advice he had taken the
stock and turned the stock into money. How, after he had found his
mother's grave, his first act had been to take up the rough bee-gum
coffin that held her remains, and carry it down the river, and bury her
where she had the right to lie, side by side with her grandfather and
his--the old gentleman who slept in wig and peruke on the
hill-side--that her good name and memory should never again suffer
insult from any living tongue. It was then that Major took Chad by the
shoulders roughly, and, with tears in his eyes, swore that he would
have no more nonsense from the boy; that Chad was flesh of his flesh
and bone of his bone; that he would adopt him and make him live where
he belonged, and break his damned pride. And it was then that Chad told
him how gladly he would come, now that he could bring him an
untarnished name. And the two walked together down to the old family
graveyard, where the Major said that the two in the mountains should be
brought some day and where the two brothers who had parted nearly
fourscore years ago could, side by side, await Judgment Day.

When they went back into the hou