These
feelings mingled in the back of his consciousness; his active thoughts
were all directed toward the time when, with the rifle, the obligation
that he had picked up practically from his dead father's hand, he would
walk up to the Hatburn place and take full payment for Allen's injury
and their paternal loss.
He felt uneasily that he should have gone before this--at once; but
there had been a multitude of small duties connected with the funeral,
intimate things that could not be turned over to the kindest neighbors;
and the ceremony itself, it seemed to him, should be attended by
dignity and repose.
Now, however, it was over; and only his great duty remained, filling
the entire threshold of his existence. He had no plan; only a necessity
to perform. It was possible that he would fail--there were four
Hatburns; and that chance depressed him. If he were killed there was no
one else, for Allen could never take another step. That had been
disclosed by the most casual examination of his injury. Only himself,
David, remained to uphold the pride of the Kinemons.
He gazed covertly at his mother; she must not, certainly, be warned of
his course; she was a woman, to be spared the responsibility borne by
men. A feeling of her being under his protection, even advice, had
grown within him since he had discovered the death in the stable shed.
This had not changed his aspect of blossoming youth, the intense blue
candor of his gaze; he sat with his knees bent boyishly, his immature
hands locked behind his head.
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