afternoon set apart for the Indian dance. The bonfire in the field behind
the magazine had been kindled; the Nottoways and Meherrins were waiting,
still as statues, for the gathering of their audience. Before the dance
the great white father was to speak to them; the peace pipe, also, was to
be smoked. The town, gay of mood and snatching at enjoyment, emptied its
people into the sunny field. Only they who could not go stayed at home.
Those light-hearted folk, ministers to a play-loving age, who dwelt in the
house by the bowling green or in the shadow of the theatre itself, must
go, at all rates. Marcia and Lucia, Syphax, Sempronius, and the African
prince made off together, while the sons of Cato, who chanced to be twin
brothers, followed with a slower step. Their indentures would expire next
month, and they had thoughts, the one of becoming an overseer, the other
of moving up country and joining a company of rangers: hence their
somewhat haughty bearing toward their fellow players, who--except old
Syphax, who acted for the love of it--had not even a bowing acquaintance
with freedom.

Mr. and Mrs. Stagg saw their minions depart, and then themselves left the
little white house in Palace Street. Mistress Deborah was with them, but
not Audrey. "She can't abide the sight of an Indian," said the minister's
wife indifferently. "Besides, Darden will be here from the church
presently, and he may want her to write for him. She and Peggy can mind
the house."

The Capitol clock was telling five when Haward entered the garden by the
Nicholson Street gate. There had arisen a zephyr of the evening, to loosen
the yellow locust leaves and send them down upon the path, to lay cool
fingers upon his forehead that burned, and to whisper low at his ear.
House and garden and silent street seemed asleep in the late sunshine,
safe folded from the storm of sound that raged in the field on the border