want to take it easy before a fire on a cold day, an' I slid my feet
into my shoes as quick as I could an' went out an' took a look. Shore
enough, thar wusn't a bit o' smoke about the cabin. So I tol' Clariss'
to run down an' see what wus wrong, but she wouldn't budge out o' her
tracks. You see, she ain't never felt right about the way she used to
do the old woman, an' I reckon she wus afeerd her dead body would do a
sight more accusin'--I dunno, she wouldn't go a step fer some reason ur
other, but she stood thar twistin' 'er hands an' cryin' an' beggin' me
to do her duty. I tol' 'er the last time I wus thar the ol' huzzy
wouldn't so much as notice me, an' that I'd had 'nough trouble lookin'
atter my own pore kin without galivantin' about atter my kin by a'
unfortunate marriage, but nothin' would do 'er but fer me to go, so I
did, an' found the old woman had run clean off. Well, when I told
Clariss' that, she mighty nigh had a fit. She swore she had driv her
sister desperate by her conduct in the past an' that 'er body would be
found as stiff as a bar o' iron in the woods some'rs whar she wus
tryin' to keep warm. So the long an' short of it wus that me 'n' my
hoss had to start out."

"And you have found her?" asked the young man, now thoroughly concerned.

"You bet I did, after scourin' the entire face of creation. I traced
'er frum one old acquaintance to another, till last night I run up on
'er over at Bill Wyman's, ten miles down the valley. It was ten
o'clock when I got thar, an' as cold as a cake o' ice in the small o'
yore back. I called Bill out in his shift on the porch. I was mighty
nigh friz, an' I reckon he soon got that away, fer he kept dancin'
about fust on one foot an' then on another, while we talked. He
admitted she wus thar, but he wouldn't let me stay all night, although
I offered to plank down the usual price fer man an' beast. She'd been