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Updated: May 18, 2025
He did not appear to know Isom, any more than Isom knew him, but there was the surliness of authority, the inhospitality of ownership, in Isom's mien, and it was the business of the man in the buggy to know men at a glance. He saw that Isom was the landlord, and he gave him a nod and smile. "I'd like to get shelter for my horse and buggy for the night, and lodging for myself," said he.
Twelve dollars had passed from the book agent's hands into Isom's, and Isom grinned over it as the easiest money that it ever had been his pleasure to collect. He put it away with his savings, which never had earned interest for a banker, and turned the care of the farm over to Joe. Jury service at the county seat was an uncertain thing.
"Sometimes the people we believe we know best turn out to be the ones we know least," said he. "Maybe we knew only one side of Isom's life. Every man has his secrets." "You mean to say there was another woman somewheres?" asked Sol, taking the scent avidly. The women against the wall joined Mrs. Greening in a virtuous, scandalized groan.
It was not a great amount of money, considering Isom's faculty for gaining and holding it. It was the general belief that he had ten, twenty, times that amount, besides his loans, hidden away, and the secret of his hiding-place had gone out of the world with Isom. Others said that he had put his money into lands, pointing to the many farms which he owned and rented in the county.
Isom's paleness was unnoticed in the dark. The old throbbing began to beat again at his temple; the old haze started from his eyes. "Hyeh's yer gun, Isom," he heard Steve saying next. The fire was blazing into his face. At the chimney-corner was the bent figure of old Daddy Marcum, and across his lap shone a Winchester.
"Don't you worry over me," he counseled kindly, "for I'll be all right at Isom's. Sunday I'll come home and see you. Now, you take a good sleep in the morning and don't bother." "I'll be up before you leave," said she, her eyes overflowing with tears. "Do you reckon I could lie and sleep and slumber when my last and only livin' one's goin' away to become a servant in the house of bondage?
They rode on a little way in silence, Sol being quite exhausted on account of his consuming surprise over what he believed himself to be finding out. Presently he returned to his prying, and asked: "Can Ollie come in for her dower rights in case the court lets Isom's will stand?"
She could not read his intention in his face, but his eyes were frowning under his gathered brows as he watched every move that old Isom made. He was leaning forward a little, his arms were raised, like a wrestler waiting for the clinch. Isom's face was as gray as ashes that have lain through many a rain.
I've heard ez how Aunt Sally Day's boy Ben, who was a-fishin' that evenin, says ez how he seed Isom's harnt a-floatin' across the river in it, without techin' a paddle." The Marcum laughed. "Idgits is thick over hyeh," he said. "Ben's a-gittin' wuss sence Isom was killed.
Joe, stunned by the sudden tragedy, stood for a moment as he had stopped when he laid his hand on Isom's shoulder. Ollie, on the other side of the fallen man, leaned over and peered into his face. In that moment a wild turmoil of hopes and fears leaped in her hot brain. Was it deliverance, freedom? Or was it only another complication of shame and disgrace?
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