But concern for the fate of Josh and his friends occupied only a
secondary place in Miller's mind for the moment. His wife and child were
somewhere ahead of him. He pushed on. He had covered about a quarter of
a mile more, and far down the street could see the signs of greater
animation, when he came upon the body of a woman lying upon the
sidewalk. In the dusk he had almost stumbled over it, and his heart came
up in his mouth. A second glance revealed that it could not be his wife.
It was a fearful portent, however, of what her fate might be. The "war"
had reached the women and children. Yielding to a professional instinct,
he stooped, and saw that the prostrate form was that of old Aunt Jane
Letlow. She was not yet quite dead, and as Miller, with a tender touch,
placed her head in a more comfortable position, her lips moved with a
last lingering flicker of consciousness:--
"Comin', missis, comin'!"
Mammy Jane had gone to join the old mistress upon whose memory her
heart was fixed; and yet not all her reverence for her old mistress, nor
all her deference to the whites, nor all their friendship for her, had
been able to save her from this raging devil of race hatred which
momentarily possessed the town.
Perceiving that he could do no good, Miller hastened onward, sick at
heart. Whenever he saw a party of white men approaching,--these brave
reformers never went singly,--he sought concealment in the shadow of a
tree or the shrubbery in some yard until they had passed.
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