alone. If she was
obdurate in her anxiety, he always asked her in a gloomy, low voice to
go away and leave him to suffer in silence and alone in the darkness
without food. He had known this maneuvering to result even in pie.

But what was the meaning of the long pause and the stillness? Had his
old and valued ruse betrayed him? As the truth sank into his mind, he
supremely loathed life, the world, his mother. Her heart was beating
back the besiegers; he was a defeated child.

He wept for a time before deciding upon the final stroke. He would run
away. In a remote corner of the world he would become some sort of
bloody-handed person driven to a life of crime by the barbarity of his
mother. She should never know his fate. He would torture her for years
with doubts and doubts, and drive her implacably to a repentant grave.
Nor would Aunt Martha escape. Some day, a century hence, when his
mother was dead, he would write to his Aunt Martha, and point out her
part in the blighting of his life. For one blow against him now he
would, in time, deal back a thousand--aye, ten thousand.

[Illustration: "Some Sort of Bloody-Handed Person"]

He arose and took his coat and cap. As he moved stealthily towards the
door he cast a glance backward at the pickle. He was tempted to take
it, but he knew that if he left the plate inviolate his mother would
feel even worse.

A blue snow was falling. People, bowed forward, were moving briskly
along the walks. The electric lamps hummed amid showers of flakes. As
Horace emerged from the kitchen, a shrill squall drove the flakes
around the corner of the house. He cowered away from it, and its
violence illumined his mind vaguely in new directions. He deliberated
upon a choice of remote corners of the globe. He found that he had no
plans which were definite enough in a geographical way, but without
much loss of time he decided upon California. He moved briskly as far
as his mother's front gate on the road to California. He was off at
last. His success was a trifle dreadful; his throat choked.

[Illustration: "People, Bowed Forward"]

But at the gate he paused. He did not know if his journey to
California would be shorter if he went down Niagara Avenue or off
through Hogan Street. As the storm was very cold and the point was
very important, he decided to withdraw for reflection to the
wood-shed. He entered the dark shanty, and took seat upon the old
chopping-block upon which he was supposed t