In the short dusk of a Friday afternoon in March Joe Morrow came toward
home from the village school pleasantly concerned with plans for the
week-end holiday. There was a hint of spring in the air, and the hard
crust of the winter's snow had begun to soften. At the top of the last
rise out of the village he passed Roscoe Sweetman's farm, and it seemed
to the boy that the burly Mr. Sweetman, busy outside the barn, turned and
looked after him as he passed. From there a section of the road spread
out before him--the deserted, abandoned Farley place and, beyond that,
the rock-and-timber house which Frederick Wingate had built and in which
he painted pictures that were sent to art dealers in New York. Queer
pictures, the village said--pictures of queer blurs and shadows, pictures
in which men did not look like men nor did horses look like horses.
Frederick Wingate, according to village suspicion, was slightly mad.
But Joe Morrow's thoughts were far removed from men who might be mad.
Sometimes, if you were lucky, you found an apple imprisoned under the
snow--a late windfall that was almost a ball of liquid cider. He swung
off the road and, back in the Farley orchard, rooted diligently.
Presently, triumphant, he gave a shout. He had found not one apple, but
two. He bit through the skin, and the cold, imprisoned juices oozed into
his mouth. When the fruit was sucked dry he tossed it aside and bit into
the second. And only then did he notice how much the day had darkened.
And suddenly, for no reason at all, he was filled with a creeping,
apprehensive dread. His eyes, startled, rested on the house where Matt
Farley had once lived, and he forgot to suck nectar through the punctured
hole in the apple. Often, since the house had been abandoned, he had
romped around the wide porches and climbed over the heavy railings. But
now, in the gathering gloom, the structure had ceased to be friendly and
inviting. Against the darkening sky this old friend of a house had all at
once become a threatening, nameless thing--a monster of lightless
windows, and locked doors, and stark, inner silence. The boy, uneasy,
began to move toward the road. Without warning he broke into a run as
though peril clutched at his heels.
Back on the road he felt safe. Outside the house of Frederick Wingate two
men stood talking; he saw, with surprise, that one of them was Mr.
Sweetman. A little while ago the farmer had been working at his own barn,
and he was not the type given to hurry. Why, then, had he hurried over
here? The boy was conscious, as he approached, that the talking stopped.
Roscoe Sweetman called in his slow, heavy, rumbling voice:
"Why were you running, Joe?"