She stretched to her tiptoes to peer over the misty spot and checked the road again. No sign of Henry. When he first slipped out, without angry words or slammed doors, her shame and pride had pronounced him weak. With the passage of time, his meekness turned to strength against the memory of her railing fit. She traded her nightdress and shawl for the torn dress and boots and set out to find him. She soon learned he didn’t ride away, because Dandy stood in his stall munching hay. The indisputable sight of the big gray mule meant the wagon would be in its place. Though Henry’s rage may have given him the strength to pull it, he’d lack the inclination. He wasn’t in the fields. She roamed the yard and peered in every direction, at first sashaying in a casual way, stealing furtive glances in case he lurked somewhere and watched. The longer she searched, the more scared she became, fear turning her easy sway into determined strides. Though it made no sense, he had vanished. Unless the Lord had come for his children and left her to stew in her sins, Henry had departed the place on foot–walked when he had a perfectly fine means of transportation lollygagging in the barn.
