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Several times he slipped out into the road beyond the cow-lot to try to get a chance to play with Johnny who was only about a year older than he, but could do so many things which Tommy could not do that he quite envied him.
Down in the back yard the chickens were flapping their wings and crowing lustily. Through the dingy glass she could see the cow-lot, the sagging roof of the wagon-shed, the barn, the ricks of hay, and the bare branches of the apple-trees still holding a few late apples. Her shoes were wet with dew and her dress and shawl hung limply about her.
"He hasn't said a word; but I have been over to a neighbor's this afternoon, and while I was there, I saw you and a roan horse go into our cow-lot. A little while afterward old Swanson rode up and told us about a Yankee horse-thief who was going through the country, trying to reach Springfield. That shows how fast news travels these times. And that isn't all I know," she added, nodding at Rodney.
Henley watched him remount and ride away, his legs swinging back and forth against the flanks of the animal. He heard little Joe calling to Dixie from the kitchen-door, and from the cow-lot her clear answering "Whooee!" which came again in a softer echo from the nearest hill. "I wonder what she is thinking?" he mused, the hot blood from his surcharged heart tingling through his entire body.
On the other side of the cow-lot, where the stables stood, was a road which ran down the hill and across the stream and beyond the woods, and on the other side of this road near the bottom of the hill was the little house in which lived Johnny Stout and his mother.
The ground is bein' mapped off in great shape. He's had grass sowed all over it and laid out avenues and sidewalks, and thar's some talk of a fountain. "That Dixie Hart's a corker. She's not mealy-mouthed about anything. The day before the funeral Hettie was talkin' to her at the cow-lot, and axed Dixie if she was goin' to take it in.
In a second he was out in the yard and made a dash for the cow-lot, and there, sure enough, was Johnny waiting for him at the gate in the cow-pasture with a curious little peaked cap on his head and his coat collar turned up around his chin and tied with a great red comforter, so that only his eyes and nose peeped over it.
The men don't want you to get up-to-date. Up-to-date women don't hop out of bed on a cold, frosty morning and make a blazing fire for their lords and masters to dress by. Up-to-date women are not willing to stand shoe-mouth deep in mud in a cow-lot milching a cow and holding off a calf while their husbands are swapping tales at the cross-roads store." A laugh started and swept over the room.
"By all means," Henley answered, ambiguously, and he joined Wrinkle on the grass and they walked down the path together to the pigpen in a corner of the rail-fenced cow-lot.
He used to keep it hid in a ol' Testament, in a holler tree behind the cow-lot, an' used to slip out an' look at it when he 'lowed he wasn't watched. Sally, I never once mentioned it to him. I seed what had been done couldn't be undone, but the Lord on High knows well enough how I suffered.
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