The morrow came in a cloud.  The light lacked the sunshine.  The listless air lacked the wind.  Still and sombre, the woods touched the murky, motionless sky.  All the universe seemed to hold a sullen pause.  Time was afoot—­it always is—­but Birt might not know how it sped; no shadows on the spent tan this dark day!  Over his shoulder he was forever glancing, hoping that Nate would presently appear from the woods.  He saw only the mists lurking in the laurel; they had autumnal presage and a chill presence.  He buttoned his coat about him, and the old mule sneezed as he jogged round the bark-mill.

Jubal Perkins and a crony stood smoking much of the time to-day in the door of the house, looking idly out upon the brown stretch of spent bark, and the gray, weather-beaten sheds, and the dun sky, and the shadowy, mist-veiled woods.  The tanner was a tall, muscular man, clad in brown jeans, and with boots of a fair grade of leather drawn high over his trousers.  As he often remarked, “The tanyard owes me good foot-gear—­ef the rest o’ the mounting hev ter go barefoot.”  The expression of his face was somewhat masked by a heavy grizzled beard, but from beneath the wide brim of his hat his eyes peered out with a jocose twinkle.  His mouth seemed chiefly useful as a receptacle for his pipe-stem, for he spoke through his nose.  His voice was strident on the air, since he included in the conversation a workman in the shed, who was scraping with a two-handled knife a hide spread on a wooden horse.  This man, whose name was Andrew Byers, glanced up now and then, elevating a pair of shaggy eyebrows, and settled the affairs of the nation with diligence and despatch, little hindered by his labors or the distance.

Birt took no heed of the loud drawling talk.  In moody silence he drove the mule around and around the bark-mill.  The patient old animal, being in no danger of losing his way, closed his eyes drowsily as he trudged, making the best of it.

“I’ll git ez mild-mannered an’ meek-hearted ez this hyar old beastis, some day, ef things keep on ez disapp’intin’ ez they hev been lately,” thought Birt, miserably.  “They do say ez even he used ter be a turrible kicker.”

Noon came and went, and still the mists hung in the forest closely engirdling the little clearing.  The roofs glistened with moisture, and the eaves dripped.  A crow was cawing somewhere.  Birt had paused to let the mule rest, and the raucous sound caused him to turn his head.  His heart gave a bound when he saw that on the other side of the fence the underbrush was astir along the path which wound through the woods to the tanyard.  Somebody was coming; he hoped even yet that it might be Nate.  He eagerly watched the rustling boughs.  The crow had flown, but he heard as he waited a faint “caw! caw!” in the misty distance.  Whoever the newcomer might be, he certainly loitered.  At last the leaves parted, and revealed--Rufe.