to the second floor. Winthrop ascended, entered an open door, and knocked at the first portal. But there was no reply to his demands, and, as the other rooms in sight were evidently untenanted, he returned to the street and addressed himself to a youth who sat on an empty box under the wooden[57] awning of the store below. The youth was in his shirt-sleeves and was eating sugar-cane, but at Winthrop’s greeting he rose to his feet, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and answered courteously:

[56]

[57]

“Waynewood is about three-quarters of a mile, sir,” he replied to the stranger’s inquiry. “Right down this street, sir, until you cross the bridge over the branch. Then it’s the first place.”

He was evidently very curious about the questioner, but strove politely to restrain that curiosity until the other had moved away along the street.

The street upon which Winthrop now found himself ran at right angles with that up which he had proceeded from the station. Like that, it was shaded from side to side by water-oaks and bordered by gardens. But the gardens were larger, less flourishing, and the houses behind them smaller and less tidy. He concluded that this was an older part of the village. Several carriages passed him, and once he paused in the shade to watch the slow approach[58] and disappearance of a creaking two-wheeled cart, presided over by a white-haired old negro and drawn by a pair of ruminative oxen. It was in sight quite five minutes, during which time Winthrop leaned against the sturdy bole of an oak and marvelled smilingly.

[58]

“And in New York,” he said to himself, “we swear because it takes us twenty minutes to get to Wall Street on the elevated!”

He went on, glad of the rest, passing from sunlight to shadow along the uneven sidewalk and finally crossing the bridge, a tiny affair over a shallow stream of limpid water which trickled musically over its bed of white sand. Beyond the bridge the sidewalk ceased and he went on for a little distance over a red clay road, rutted by wheels and baked hard by the sun. Then a picket fence which showed evidence of having once been whitewashed met him and he felt a sudden stirring within him. This was Waynewood, doubtless, and it belonged to him. The thought was somehow a very pleasant one. He wondered why.[59] He had possessed far more valuable real estate in his time but he couldn’t recollect that he had ever 

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