{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_31122/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_31122","id":"gutenberg_31122","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31122","summary":null,"tags":["Category: American Literature","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Short Stories","Cumberland Mountains -- Fiction","Mountain life -- Fiction","Tennessee -- Social life and customs -- Fiction"],"text":"Produced by David Edwards and the Online Distributed\nProofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was\nproduced from images generously made available by The\nInternet Archive)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n                  THE MYSTERY OF WITCH-FACE MOUNTAIN\n\n                       CHARLES EGBERT CRADDOCK\n\n\n\n\n                      THE MYSTERY OF WITCH-FACE\n                               MOUNTAIN\n\n                          AND OTHER STORIES\n\n                                  BY\n\n                       CHARLES EGBERT CRADDOCK\n\n\n                         BOSTON AND NEW YORK\n                    HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY\n                    The Riverside Press, Cambridge\n                                 1895\n\n\n\n\n                           Copyright, 1895,\n                         BY MARY N. MURFREE.\n\n                        _All rights reserved._\n\n          _The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. S. A._\n\n           Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton & Co.\n\n\n\n\n                              CONTENTS.\n\n\n                                                          PAGE\n        THE MYSTERY OF WITCH-FACE MOUNTAIN                   1\n        TAKING THE BLUE RIBBON AT THE COUNTY FAIR          165\n        THE CASTING VOTE                                   200\n\n\n\n\n                  THE MYSTERY OF WITCH-FACE MOUNTAIN.\n\n\nI.\n\nThe beetling crags that hang here and there above the gorge hold in\ntheir rugged rock sculpture no facial similitudes, no suggestions. The\njagged outlines of shelving bluffs delineate no gigantic profile\nagainst the sky beyond. One might seek far and near, and scan the vast\nslope with alert and expectant gaze, and view naught of the semblance\nthat from time immemorial has given the mountain its name. Yet the\nimagination needs but scant aid when suddenly the elusive simulacrum\nis revealed to the eye. In a certain slant of the diurnal light, even\non bright nights at the full of the moon, sometimes in the uncanny\nelectric flicker smitten from a storm-cloud, a gigantic peaked\nsinister face is limned on the bare, sandy slope, so definite, with\nsuch fixity of lineament, that one is amazed that the perception of it\ncame no earlier, and is startled when it disappears.\n\nDisappearing as completely as a fancy, few there are who have ever\nseen it who have not climbed from the herder's trail across the\nnarrow wayside stream and up the rugged mountain slopes to the spot\nwhere it became visible. There disappointment awaits the explorer. One\nfinds a bare and sterile space, from which the hardy chickweed can\nscarcely gain the sustenance for timorous sproutings; a few\noutcropping rocks; a series of transverse gullies here and there,\nwashed down to deep indentations; above the whole a stretch of burnt,\nbroken timber that goes by the name of \"fire-scald,\" and is a relic of\nthe fury of the fire which was \"set out\" in the woods with the mission\nto burn only the leaves and undergrowth, and which, in its\nundisciplined strength, transcended its instructions, as it were, and\ndestroyed great trees. And this is all. But once more, at a coigne of\nvantage on the opposite side of the gorge, and the experience can be\nutilized in differentiating the elements that go to make up the weird\npresentment of a human countenance. It is the fire-scald that suggests\nthe great peaked brown hood; the oblong sandy stretch forms the pallid\nface; the ledges outline the nose and chin and brow; the eyes look out\nfrom the deep indentations where the slope is washed by the currents\nof the winter rains; and here and there the gullies draw heavy lines\nand wrinkles. And when the wind is fresh and the clouds scud before\nit, in the motion of their shadows the face will seem to mow at the\nobserver, until the belief comes very readily that it is the exact\ncounterpart of a witch's face.\n\nAlways the likeness is pointed out and insisted on by the denizens of\nWitch-Face Mountain, as if they had had long and intimate acquaintance\nwith that sort of unhallowed gentry, and were especially qualified to\npronounce upon the resemblance.\n\n\"Ain't it jes' like 'em, now? Ain't it the very moral of a witch?\"\nConstant Hite demanded, one gusty day, when the shadows were a-flicker\nin the sun, and the face seemed animated by the malice of mockery or\nmirth, as he pointed it out to his companion with a sort of triumph in\nits splenetic contortions.\n\nHe was a big, bluff fellow, to whose pride all that befell him seemed\nto minister. He was proud of his length of limb, and his hundred and\neighty pounds of weight, and yet his slim appearance. \"Ye wouldn't\nbelieve it now, would ye?\" he was wont to say when he stepped off the\nscales at the store of the hamlet down in the Cove. \"It's solid meat\nan' bone an' muscle, my boy. Keep on the friendly side of one hunderd\nan' eighty,\" with a challenging wink. He was proud of his bright brown\neyes, and his dark hair and mustache, and smiling, handsome face, and\nhis popularity among the class that he was pleased to denominate \"gal\ncritters.\" He piqued himself upon his several endowments as a hardy\nwoodsman, his endurance, his sylvan craft, his pluck, and his luck and\nhis accurate aim. The buck--all gray and antlered, for it was\nAugust--that hung across the horse, behind the saddle, gave token of\nthis keen exactitude in the tiny wound at the base of the ear, where\nthe rifle-ball had entered to pierce the brain; it might seem to the\ninexpert that death had come rather from the gaping knife-stroke\nacross the throat, which was, however, a mere matter of butcher-craft.\nHe was proud of the good strong bay horse that he rode, which so\neasily carried double, and proud of his big boots and long spurs; and\nhe scorned flimsy town clothes, and thought that good home-woven blue\njeans was the gear in which a man who was a man should clothe himself\nwithal. He glanced more than once at the different toggery of his\ncompanion, evidently a man of cities, whom he had chanced to meet by\nthe wayside, and with whom he had journeyed more than a mile.\n\nHe had paused again and again to point out the \"witch-face\" to the\nstranger, who at first could not discern it at all, and then when it\nsuddenly broke upon him could not be wiled away from it. He\ndismounted, hitching his horse to a sapling, and up and down he\npatrolled the rocky mountain path to study the face at various angles;\nConstant Hite looking on the while with an important placid\nsatisfaction, as if he had invented the illusion.\n\n\"Some folks, though, can't abide sech ez witches,\" he said, with a\ntolerant smile, as if he were able to defy their malevolence and make\nlight of it. \"Ye see that cabin on the spur over yander around the\nbend?\" It looked very small and solitary from this height, and the\nrail fences about its scanty inclosures hardly reached the dignity of\nsuggesting jackstraws. \"Waal, the Hanways over thar hev a full view of\nthe old witch enny time she will show up at all. Folks in the\nmountings 'low the day be onlucky when she appears on the slope thar.\nThe old folks at Hanway's will talk 'bout it cornsider'ble ef ye set\n'em goin'; they hev seen thar time, an' it rests 'em some ter tell\n'bout'n the spites they hev hed that they lay ter the witch-face.\"\n\nThe ugly fascination of the witch-face had laid hold, too, on the\nstranger. Twice he had sought to photograph it, and Constant Hite had\nwatched him with an air of lenient indulgence to folly as he pottered\nabout, now adjusting his camera, now changing his place anew.\n\n\"And I believe I have got the whole amount of nothing at all,\" he said\nat last, looking up breathlessly at the mountaineer. Albeit the wind\nwas fresh and the altitude great, the sun was hot on the unshaded red\nclay path, and the nimble gyrations of the would-be artist brought\nplentiful drops to his brow. He took off his straw hat, and mopped his\nforehead with his handkerchief, while he stared wistfully at the siren\nof his fancy, grimacing maliciously at him from the slope above. \"If\nthe confounded old woman would hold still, and not disappear so\nsuddenly at the wrong minute, I'd have had her charming physiognomy\nall correct. I believe I've spoiled my plates,--that's all.\" And once\nmore he mopped his bedewed forehead.\n\nHe was a man of thirty-five, perhaps, of the type that will never look\nold or grow perceptibly gray. His hair was red and straight, and cut\nclose to his head. He had a long mustache of the same sanguine tint.\nThe sun had brought the blood near the surface of his thin skin, and\nhe looked hot and red, and thoroughly exasperated. His brown eyes were\ndisproportionately angry, considering the slight importance of his\nenterprise. He was evidently a man of keen, quick temper, easily\naroused and nervous. His handsome, well-groomed horse was fractious,\nand difficult for so impatient a rider to control. His equestrian\noutfit once more attracted the covert glance of Con Hite, whose\nexperience and observation could duplicate no such attire. He was\ntall, somewhat heavily built, and altogether a sufficiently stalwart\nspecimen of the genus \"town man.\"\n\n\"I'll tell you what I'll do!\" he exclaimed suddenly. \"I'll sketch the\nwhole scene!\"\n\n\"Now you're shoutin',\" said Con Hite capably, as if he had always\nadvocated this method of solving the difficulty. His interlocutor\ncould not for a moment have dreamed that he had never before seen a\ncamera, had never heard of a photograph, had not the least idea of\nwhat the process of sketching might be which he so boldly approved;\nnay, the very phrase embodying his encouragement of the project was\nforeign to his vocabulary,--a bit of sophisticated slang which he had\nadopted from his companion's conversation, and readily assimilated.\n\n\"You stay just where you are!\" cried the stranger, his enthusiasm\nrising to the occasion; \"just that pose,--that pose precisely.\"\n\nHe ran swiftly across the path to remove the inefficient camera from\nthe foreground, and in a moment was seated on a log by the wayside,\nhis quick eye scanning the scene: the close file of the ranges about\nthe horizon, one showing above another, and one more faintly blue\nthan another, for thus the distance was defined; then the amphitheatre\nof the Cove, the heavy bronze-green slopes of the mountains, all with\nripple marks of clear chrome-green ruffling in the wake of the wind;\nin the middle distance the still depths of the valley below, with\nshadows all a-slumber and silent, and on the projecting spur the\nquiet, lonely little house, so slight a suggestion of the presence of\nman amidst the majestic dominance of nature; here, to the right,\nacross the savage gorge, with its cliffs and with its currents in the\ndeep trough, the nearest slope of the mountain, with the great gaunt\nbare space showing that face of ill omen, sibylline, sinister,\ndefinite indeed,--he wondered how his eyes were holden that he should\nnot have discerned it at once; and in the immediate foreground the\nequestrian figure of the mountaineer, booted and spurred, the very\n\"moral,\" as Hite would have called it, of an athlete, with his fine\nerect pose distinct against the hazy perspective, his expression of\nconfident force, the details of his handsome features revealed by the\nbrim of his wide black hat turned up in front.\n\n\"It's a big subject, I know; I can't get it all in. I shall only\nsuggest it. Just keep that pose, will you? Hold the horse still.\n'Stand the storm, it won't be long!'\" the artist said, smiling with\nrenewed satisfaction as his pencil, not all inapt, went briskly to\nwork on the horizontal lines of the background.\n\nBut it was longer than he had thought, so still sat the contemplative\nmountaineer, so alluring were the details of the landscape. The\nenthusiasm of the amateur is always a more urgent motive power than\nthe restrained and utilitarian industry of the professional.\n\nFew sworn knights of the crayon would have sat sketching so long in\nthat temperature as he did, with the sun blazing through his straw hat\nand his blood mustering under his thin skin; but he stopped at a point\nshort of sunstroke, and it was with a tumultuous sense of success that\nhe at last arose, and, with the sketch-book still open, walked across\nthe road and laid it on the pommel of the mountaineer's saddle.\n\nConstant Hite took it up suspiciously and looked at it askance. It is\nto be doubted if ever before he had seen a picture, unless perchance\nin the primary reading-book of his callow days at the public school,\nspasmodically opened at intervals at the \"church house\" in the Cove.\nHe continued to gravely gaze at the sketch, held sideways and almost\nreversed, for some moments.\n\n\"Bless Gawd! hyar's Whitefoot's muzzle jes' ez nat'ral--an'\n_Me_--waal, sir! don't _I_ look proud!\" he cried suddenly, with a note\nof such succulent vanity, so finely flavored a pride, that the\nstranger could but laugh at the zest of his triumph.\n\n\"Do you see the witch-face?\" he demanded.\n\n\"Hesh! hesh!\" cried the mountaineer hilariously. \"Don't 'sturb me\n'bout yer witch-face. Ef thar ain't the buck,--yes, toler'ble\nfat,--an' with all his horns! An' look at my boot,--actially the spur\non it! An' my hat turned up;\" he raised his flattered hand to the brim\nas if to verify its position.\n\n\"You didn't know you were so good looking, hey?\" suggested the amused\ntown man.\n\n\"My Lord, naw!\" declared Hite, laughing at himself, yet laughing\ndelightedly. \"I dunno _how_ the gals make out to do without me at\nall!\"\n\nThe pleased artist laughed, too. \"Well, hand it over,\" he said, as he\nreached out for the book. \"We must be getting out of this sun. I'm not\nused to it, you see.\"\n\nHe put his foot in the stirrup as he spoke, and as he swung himself\ninto the saddle the mountaineer reluctantly closed and relinquished\nthe book. \"I'd like ter see it agin, some time or other,\" he observed.\n\nHe remembered this wish afterward, and how little he then imagined\nwhere and in what manner he was destined to see it again.\n\nThey rode on together into the dense woods, leaving the wind and the\nsunshine and the flying clouds fluctuating over the broad expanse of\nthe mountains, and the witch-face silently mowing and grimacing at the\nworld below, albeit seen by no human being except perchance some\ndweller at the little house on the spur, struck aghast by this\nunwelcome apparition evoked by the necromancy of the breeze and the\nsheen and the shadow, marking this as an unlucky day.\n\n\"That's right smart o' a cur'osity, ain't it?\" said Constant Hite\ncomplacently, as they jogged along. \"When the last gover'mint survey\nfellers went through hyar, they war plumb smitten by the ole 'oman,\nan' spent cornsider'ble time a-stare-gazin' at her. They 'lowed they\nhed never seen the beat.\"\n\n\"What was the survey for?\" asked the town man, with keen mundane\ninterest.\n\nConstant Hite was rarely at a loss. When other men were fain to come\nto a pause for the lack of information, the resources of his agile\nsubstitutions and speculations were made manifest. \"They war jes'\nrunnin' a few lines hyar an' thar,\" he said negligently. \"They lef'\nsome tall striped poles planted in the ground, red an' sich colors,\nter mark the way; an' them mounting folks over yander in the\nfurderest coves,--they air powerful ahint the times,--they hed never\nhearn o' sech ez a survey, noway, an' the poles jes' 'peared ter them\nsprung up thar like Jonah's gourd in a single night, ez ef they kem\nfrom seed; an' the folks, they 'lowed 't war the sign o' a new war.\"\nHe laughed lazily at the uninstructed terrors of the unsophisticated\ndenizens of the \"furderest coves.\" \"They'd gather around an'\nstare-gaze at the poles, an' wonder if they'd hev ter fight the Rebs\nagin; them folks is mos'ly Union.\" Then his interest in the subject\nquickening, \"Them survey fellers, they ondertook, too, ter medjure the\ntallness o' some o' the mountings fur the gover'mint. Now what good is\nthat goin' ter do the Nunited States?\" he resumed grudgingly. \"The\nmountings kin be medjured by the eye,--look a-yander.\" He pointed with\nthe end of his whip at a section of the horizon, visible between the\nfringed and low-swaying boughs of hemlock and fir as the trail swept\ncloser to the verge of the range, on which was softly painted, as on\nivory and with an enameled lustre, two or three great azure domes,\nwith here and there the high white clouds of a clear day nestling\nflakelike on the summits. \"They air jes' all-fired high, an' that's\nall. Do it make 'em seem enny taller ter say they air six thousand or\nseben thousand feet? Man ain't used ter medjurin' by the thousand\nfeet. When he gits ter the ground he goes by the pole. I dunno how\nhigh nor how long a thousand feet air. The gover'mint jes' want ter\nspend a leetle money, I reckon. It 'pears toler'ble weak-kneed in its\nmind, wunst in a while. But ef it wants ter fool money away, it's\nmighty well able ter afford sech. It hev got a power o' ways a-comin'\nat money,--we all know that, we all know that.\"\n\nHe said this with a gloomy inflection and a downward look that might\nhave implied a liability for taxes beyond his willingness to pay. But,\nbarring the assessment on a small holding of mountain land, Constant\nHite seemed in case to contribute naught to his country's exchequer.\n\n\"It needs all it can get, now,\" replied the stranger casually, but\ndoubtless from a sophisticated knowledge, as behooved a reader of the\njournals of the day, of the condition of the treasury.\n\nHe could not account for the quick glance of alarm and enmity which\nthe mountaineer cast upon him. It roused in him a certain constraint\nwhich he had not experienced earlier in their chance association. It\ncaused him to remember that this was a lonely way and a wild country.\nHe was an alien to the temper and sentiment of the people. He felt\nsuddenly that sense of distance in mind and spirit which is the true\nisolation of the foreigner, and which even an identity of tongue and\nkindred cannot annul. Looking keenly into the mountaineer's\nhalf-averted, angry, excited face, he could not for his life discern\nhow its expression might comport with the tenor of the casual\nconversation which had elicited it. He did not even dimly surmise that\nhis allusion to the finances of the government could be construed as a\njustification of the whiskey tax, generally esteemed in the mountains\na measure of tyrannous oppression; that from his supposititious\nadvocacy of it he had laid himself liable to the suspicion of being\nhimself of the revenue force,--his mission here to spy out\nmoonshiners; that his companion's mind was even now dwelling anew, and\nwith a rueful difference, on that masterly drawing of himself in the\nstranger's sketch-book.\n\n\"But what do that prove, though?\" Hite thought, a certain hope\nspringing up with the joy of the very recollection of the simulacrum\nof the brilliant rural coxcomb adorning the page. \"Jes' that me is\n_Me_. All he kin say 'bout me air that hyar I be goin' home from\nhuntin' ter kerry my game. _That_ ain't agin the law, surely.\"\n\nThe \"revenuers,\" he argued, too, never rode alone, as did this man,\nand spies and informers were generally of the vicinage. The stranger\nwas specially well mounted, and as his puzzled cogitation over the\nsignificant silence that had supervened between them became so marked\nas to strike Hite's attention, the mountaineer sought to nullify it by\nan allusion to the horse. \"That feller puts down his feet like a\nkitten,\" he said admiringly. \"I never seen nuthin' ez wears shoes so\nsupple. Shows speed, I s'pose? Built fur it.\"\n\n\"Makes pretty fair time,\" responded the stranger without enthusiasm.\nThe doubt, perplexity, and even suspicion which his companion's manner\nhad evoked were not yet dissipated, and the allusion to the horse, and\nthe glow of covetous admiration in Hite's face as his eyes dwelt upon\nthe finely fashioned creature so deftly moving along, brought suddenly\nto his mind sundry exploits of a gang of horse-thieves about these\ncoves and mountains, detailed in recent newspapers. These rumors had\nbeen esteemed by urban communities in general as merely sensational,\nand had attracted scant attention. Now, with their recurrence to his\nrecollection, their verisimilitude was urged upon him. The horse he\nrode was a valuable animal, and moreover, here, ten or twenty miles\nfrom a habitation, would prove a shrewd loss indeed. Nevertheless, it\nwas impossible to shake off or evade his companion; the wilderness,\nwith its jungle of dense rhododendron undergrowth on either side of\nthe path, was impenetrable. There was no alternative practicable. He\ncould only go on and hope for the best.\n\nA second glance at the mountaineer's honest face served in some sort\nas reassurance as to the probity of his character. Gradually a vivid\ninterest in the environment, which had earlier amazed and amused\nConstant Hite, began to be renewed. The stranger looked about to\nidentify the growths of the forest with a keen, fresh enthusiasm, as\nif he were meeting old friends. Once, with a sudden flush and an\nintent eye, he flung the reins to the man whom he had half suspected\nof being a horse-thief ten minutes before, to hastily dismount and\nuproot a tiny wayside weed, which he breathlessly and triumphantly\nexplained to the wondering mountaineer was a rare plant which he had\nnever seen; he carefully bestowed it between the leaves of his\nsketch-book before he resumed the saddle, and Hite was moved to ask,\n\"How d' ye know its durned comical name, ef ye never seen it afore? By\nGosh! it's got a name longer 'n its tap-root!\"\n\nThe town man only laughed a trifle at this commentary upon the\nbotanical Latin nomenclature, and once more he was leaning from his\nsaddle, peering down the aisles of the forest with a smiling,\nexpectant interest, as if they held for him some enchantment of which\nduller mortals have no ken. A brown geode, picked up in the channel of\na summer-dried stream, showed an interior of sparkling quartz crystal,\nwhen a blow had shattered it, which Hite had never suspected, often as\nhe had seen the rugged spherical stones lying along the banks. All the\nrocks had a thought for the stranger, close to his heart and quick on\nhis tongue, and as Hite, half skeptical, half beguiled, listened, his\nsuspicion of the man as a \"revenuer\" began to fade.\n\n\"The revenuers ain't up ter no sech l'arnin' ez this,\" he said to\nhimself, with a vicarious pride. \"The man, though he never war in the\nmountings afore, knows ez much about 'em ez ef he hed bodaciously\nbuilt 'em. Fairly smelt that thar cave over t' other side the ridge\njes' now, I reckon; else how'd he know 't war thar?\"\n\nA certain hollow reverberation beneath the horse's hoofs had caught\nhis companion's quick ear. \"Have you ever been in this cave\nhereabout?\" he had asked, to Hite's delighted amazement at this\nbrilliant feat of mental jugglery, as it seemed to him.\n\nEven the ground, when the repetitious woods held no new revelation of\ntree or flower, or hazy, flickering insect dandering through the\nyellow sunshine and the olive-tinted shadow and the vivid green\nfoliage, the very ground had a word for him.\n\n\"This formation here,\" he said, leaning from his saddle to watch the\npath slipping along beneath his horse's hoofs, like the unwinding of\ncoils of brown ribbon, \"is like that witch-face slope that we saw\nawhile ago. It seems to occur at long intervals in patches. You see\ndown that declivity how little grows, how barren.\"\n\nThe break in the density of the woods served to show the mountains,\nblue and purple and bronze, against the horizon; an argosy of white\nclouds under full sail; the Cove, shadowy, slumberous, so deep down\nbelow; and the oak leaves above their heads, all dark and sharply\ndentated against the blue.\n\nHite had suddenly drawn in his horse. An eager light was in his eye, a\nnew idea in his mind. He felt himself on the verge of imminent\ndiscovery.\n\n\"Now,\" said he, lowering his voice mysteriously, and laying his hand\non the bridle of the other's horse,--and so far had the allurements of\nscience outstripped merely mundane considerations that the stranger's\nrecent doubts and anxieties touching his animal were altogether\nforgotten, and he was conscious only of a responsive expectant\ninterest,--\"air thar ennything in that thar 'formation,' ez ye calls\nit ez could gin out fire?\"\n\n\"No, certainly not,\" said the man of science, surprised, and marking\nthe eager, insistent look in Hite's eyes. Both horses were at a\nstandstill now. A jay-bird clanged out its wild woodsy cry from the\ndense shadows of a fern-brake far in the woods on the right, and they\nheard the muffled trickling of water, falling on mossy stones hard by,\nfrom a spring so slight as to be only a silver thread. The trees far\nbelow waved in the wind, and a faint dryadic sibilant singing sounded\na measure or so, and grew fainter in the lulling of the breeze, and\nsunk to silence.\n\n\"Ennyhow,\" persisted Hite, \"won't sech yearth gin out light\nsomehows,--in some conditions sech ez ye talk 'bout?\" he added\nvaguely.\n\n\"Spontaneously? Certainly not,\" the stranger replied, preserving his\nerect pose of inquiring and expectant attention.\n\n\"Why, then the mounting's 'witched sure enough,--that's all,\" said\nHite desperately. He cast off his hold on the stranger's horse, caught\nup his reins anew, and made ready to fare onward forthwith.\n\n\"Does fire ever show there?\" demanded his companion wonderingly.\n\n\"It's a plumb meracle, it's a plumb mystery,\" declared Constant Hite,\nas they went abreast into the dense shadow of the closing woods. \"I\nasked ye this 'kase ez ye 'peared ter sense so much in rocks, an'\nweeds, an' birds, an' sile, what ain't revealed ter the mortal eye in\ngineral, ye mought be able ter gin some nateral reason fur that thar\nsile up thar round the old witch-face ter show fire or sech. But it's\nbeyond yer knowin' or the knowin' o' enny mortal, I reckon.\"\n\n\"How does the fire show?\" persisted the man of science, with keen and\nattentive interest. \"And who has seen it?\"\n\n\"Stranger,\" said Hite, lowering his voice, \"I hev viewed it, myself.\nBut fust it war viewed by the Hanways,--them ez lives in that house on\nthe spur what prongs out o' the range nigh opposite the slope o' the\nWitch-Face. One dark night,--thar war no moon, but thar warn't no\nstorm, jes' a dull clouded black sky, ez late August weather will show\nwhenst it be heavy an' sultry,--all of a suddenty, ez the Hanway\nfambly war settin' on the porch toler'ble late in the night, the air\nbein' close in the house, the darter, Narcissa by name, she calls out,\n'Look! look! I see the witch-face!' An' they all start up an' stare\nover acrost the deep black gorge. An' thar, ez true ez life, war the\nwitch-face glimmerin' in the midst o' the black night, and agrinnin'\nat 'em an' a-mockin' at 'em, an' lighted up ez ef by fire.\"\n\n\"And did no one discover the origin of the fire?\" asked the stranger.\n\n\"Thar war no fire!\" Constant Hite paused impressively. Then he went on\nimpulsively, full of his subject: \"Ben Hanway kem over ter the\nstill-house arter me, an' tergether we went ter examinate. But the\nbresh is powerful thick, an' the way is long, an' though we seen a\nflicker wunst or twict ez we-uns pushed through the deep woods, 't war\ndaybreak 'fore we got thar, an' nare sign nor smell o' fire in all the\nwoods could we find; nare scorch nor singe on the ground, not even a\nburnt stick or chunk ter tell the tale; everythin' ez airish an' cool\nan' jewy an' sweet ter the scent ez a summer mornin' is apt ter be.\"\n\n\"How often has this phenomenon occurred?\" said the stranger coolly,\nbut with a downcast, thoughtful eye and a pursed-up lip, as if he were\nless surprised than cogitating.\n\n\"Twict only, fur we hev kep' an eye on the old witch, Ben an' me. Ben\nwants a road opened out up hyar, stiddier jes' this herder's trail\nthrough the woods. Ben dunno how it mought strike folks ef they war\nter know ez the witch-face hed been gin over ter sech cur'ous ways\nall of a suddenty. They mought take it fur a sign agin the road, sech\nez b'lieves in the witch-face givin' bad luck.\" After a pause, \"Then\n_I_ viewed it wunst,--wunst in the dead o' the night. I war goin' home\nfrom the still, an' I happened ter look up, an' I seen the\nwitch-face,--the light jes' dyin' out, jes' fadin' out. She didn't hev\ntime ter make more 'n two or three faces at me, an' then she war gone\nin the night. It's a turr'ble-lookin' thing at night, stranger. So ye\ncan't tell what makes it,--the sile, or what?\"\n\nHe turned himself quite sideways as he spoke, one hand on the carcass\nof the deer behind the saddle, the other on his horse's neck, the\nbetter to face his interlocutor and absorb his scientific\nspeculations. And in that moment an odd idea occurred to him,--nay, a\nconviction. He perceived that his companion knew and understood the\norigin of the illumination; and more,--that he would not divulge it.\n\n\"The soil? Assuredly not the soil,\" the stranger said mechanically. He\nwas looking down, absorbed in thought, secret, mysterious, yet not\ndevoid of a certain inexplicable suggestion of triumph; for a subtle\ncloaked elation, not unlike a half-smile, was on his face, although\nits intent, persistent expression intimated the following out of a\ncareful train of ideas.\n\n\"Then what is it?\" demanded Hite arrogantly, as if he claimed the\nright to know.\n\n\"I really couldn't undertake to say,\" the stranger responded, his\ndefinite manner so conclusive an embargo on further inquiries that\nHite felt rising anew all his former doubts of the man, and his fears\nand suspicions as to the errand that had brought him hither.\n\nCould it be possible, he argued within himself, that to the agency of\n\"revenuers\" was due that mysterious glow, more brilliant than any\nordinary fire, steady, suffusive, continuous, rising in the dark\nwilderness, in the deep midnight, to reveal that ominous face\noverlooking all the countryside, with subtle flickers of laughter\nrunning athwart its wonted contortions, more weird and sinister in\nthis ghastly glare than by day? And what significance might attend\nthese strange machinations? Revolving the idea, he presently shook his\nhead in conclusive negation as he rode along. The approach of raiders\nwas silent and noiseless and secret. Whatever the mystery might\nportend it was not thus that they would advertise their presence,\npromoting the escape of the objects of their search. Hite's open and\ncandid mind could compass no adequate motive for concealment in all\nthe ways of the world but the desire to evade the revenue law, or to\npractice the shifts and quirks necessary to the capture of the wary\nand elusive moonshiner. Nevertheless, it was impossible, on either of\nthese obvious bases, to account for the fact of something withheld in\nthe stranger's manner, some secret exultant knowledge of the\nphenomenon which baffled the mountaineer's speculation. Hite, all\nunaware that in his impulsive speech he had disclosed the fact of his\nhazardous occupation, began to feel that, considering his liability to\nthe Federal law for making brush whiskey, he had somewhat transcended\nthe limit of his wonted hardihood in so long bearing this stranger\ncompany along the tangled ways of the herder's trail through the\nwilderness. \"He _mought_ be a revenuer arter all, an' know all about\nme. The rest o' the raiders mought be a-waitin' an' a-layin' fur me at\nenny turn,\" he reflected. \"Leastwise he knows a deal more'n he's\na-goin' ter tell.\"\n\nHe drew up his horse as they neared an open bluff where the beetling\nrocks jutted out like a promontory above the sea of foliage below.\nThey might judge of the long curvature of the conformation of the\nrange just here, for on the opposite height was visible at intervals\nthe road they had traveled, winding in and out among the trees,\nascending the mountain in serpentine coils; they beheld the Cove\nbeneath from a new angle, and further yet the barren cherty slope on\nwhich, despite the distance, the witch-face could still be discerned\nby eyes practiced in marking its lineaments, trained to trace the\npopular fantasy. The stranger caught sight of it at the same moment\nthat Hite lifted his hand toward it.\n\n\"Thar it is!\" Hite exclaimed, \"fur all the Cove's a shadder, an' fur\nall the wind's a breath.\"\n\nFor clouds had thickened over the sky, and much of the world was gray\nbeneath, and the scene had dulled in tint and spirit since last they\nhad had some large outlook upon it. Only on the slopes toward the east\ndid the sunshine rest, and in the midst of a sterile, barren slant it\nflickered on that semblance of ill omen.\n\n\"An onlucky day, stranger,\" Hite said slowly.\n\nThe man of science had drawn in his restive horse, and had turned with\na keen, freshened interest toward the witch-face. It was with a look\nof smiling expectancy that he encountered the aspect of snarling\nmockery, half visible or half imaginary, of that grim human\nsimilitude. The mountaineer's brilliant dark eyes dwelt upon him\ncuriously. However, if he had forborne from prudential motives from\nearlier asking the stranger's name and vocation, lest more than a\ncasual inquisitiveness be thereby implied, exciting suspicion, such\nqueries were surely not in order at the moment of departure. For Hite\nhad resolved on parting company. \"An onlucky day,\" he reiterated, \"an\nonlucky day. An' this be ez far ez we spen' it tergether. I turn off\nhyar.\"\n\nSo ever present with him was his spirituous conscience--it could\nhardly be called a bad conscience--that he half expected his companion\nto demur, and the posse of a deputy marshal to spring up from their\nambush in the laurel about them. But the stranger, still with a flavor\nof preoccupation in his manner, only expressed a polite regret to say\nfarewell so early, and genially offered to shake hands. As with\ndifficulty he forced his horse close to the mountaineer's saddle, Hite\nlooked at the animal with a touch of disparagement. \"That thar beastis\nhev got cornsider'ble o' the devil in him; he'll trick ye some day; ye\nbetter look out. Waal, far'well stranger, far'well.\"\n\nThe words had a regretful cadence. Whether because of the unwonted\ninterest which the stranger had excited, or the reluctance to\nrelinquish his curiosity, still ungratified, or the pain of parting to\nan impressionable nature, whose every emotion is acute, Hite hesitated\nwhen he had gone some twenty yards straight up the slope above,\npushing his horse along a narrow path through the jungle of the\nlaurel, and turned in his saddle to call out again, \"Far'well!\"\n\nThe stranger, still at the point where Hite had quitted him, waved his\nhand and smiled. The jungle closed about the mountaineer, once more\npushing on, and still the smiling eyes dwelt on the spot where he had\ndisappeared. \"Farewell, my transparent friend,\" the stranger said,\nwith a half-laugh. \"I hope the day is not unlucky enough to put a\ndeputy marshal on your track.\" And with one more glance at the\nwitch-face, he gathered the reins in his hand and rode on alone along\nthe narrow tangled ways of the herder's trail.\n\nNow and again, as the day wore on, Constant Hite was seized with a\nsense of something wanting, and he presently recognized the deficit as\nthe expectation of the ill fortune which should befall the time, and\nwhich still failed to materialize. So strong upon him was the\npersuasion of evil chances rife in the air to-day that he set himself\nas definitely to thwart and baffle them as if rationally cognizant of\ntheir pursuit. He would not return to his wonted vocation at the\ndistillery, but carried his venison home, where his father, a very old\nman, with still the fervors of an aesthetic pride, pointed out with\napprobation the evidence of a fair shot in the wound at the base of\nthe buck's ear, and his mother, active, wiry, practical-minded, noted\nthe abundance of fat. \"He fed hisself well whilst he war about it,\"\nshe commented, \"an' now he'll feed us well. What diff'unce do it make\nwhether Con's rifle-ball hit whar he aimed ter do or no, so he fetched\nhim down somewhar?\"\n\nThe afternoon passed peacefully away. It seemed strangely long. The\nsun, barring a veiled white glister in a clouded gray sky, betokening\nthe solar focus, disappeared; the wind fell; the very cicadae, so loud\nin the latter days of August, were dulled to long intervals of\nsilence; in the distance, a tree-toad called and called, with\nplaintive iteration, for rain. \"Ye'll git it, bubby,\" Con addressed\nthe creature, as he stood in the cornfield--a great yellow\nstretch--pulling fodder, and binding the long pliant blades into\nbundles. The clouds still thickened; the heat grew oppressive; the\nlong rows of the corn were motionless, save the rustling of the blades\nas Hite tore them from the stalk. Even his mother's spinning-wheel,\nwont to briskly whir through the long afternoons, from the window of\nthe little cabin on the rise, grew silent, and his father dozed\nbeneath the gourd vines on the porch.\n\nThe sun went down at last, and the gray day imperceptibly merged into\nthe gray dusk. Then came the lingering darkness, with a flicker of\nfireflies and broad wan flares of heat lightning. Con woke once in the\nnight to hear the rain on the roof. The wind was blaring near at hand.\nIn its large, free measures, like some deliberate adagio, there was\nnaught of menace; but when he slept again, and awoke to hear its voice\nanew, his heart was plunging with sudden fright. A human utterance was\nin its midst,--a human voice calling his name through the gusty night\nand the sibilant rush of the rain from the eaves. He listened for a\nmoment at the roof-room window. He recognized with a certain relief\nthe tones of the constable of the district. He opened the shutter.\n\nA new day was near to breaking. He saw the wan sky above the periphery\nof dense dark woods about the clearing. A brown dusk obscured the\nfamiliar landmarks, but beneath a gnarled old apple-tree by the gate\nseveral men were dimly suggested, and another, more distinct, by the\nwood-pile, was in the act of gathering a handful of chips to throw at\nthe shutter again. He desisted as he marked the face at the window.\n\n\"Kem down,\" he said gruffly, clearing his throat in embarrassment.\n\"Kem down, Constant. No use roustin' out the old folks.\"\n\n\"What do you want?\" asked Hite in a low voice, his heart seeming to\nstand still in suspense.\n\nThe constable hesitated. The cold rain dashed into Hite's face. The\nrail fences, in zigzag lines, were coming into view. A mist was\nfloating white against the dark densities of the woods. He heard the\nwater splashing from the eaves heavily into the gullies below, and\nthen the constable once more raucously cleared his throat.\n\n\"Thar's a man,\" he drawled, \"a stranger hyarabouts, killed yestiddy in\nthe bridle-path. The cor'ner hev kem, an' he 'lows ye know suthin'\n'bout'n it, Constant,--'bout'n the killin' of him. I be sent ter fetch\nye.\"\n\n\nII.\n\nA chimney, half of stone, half of clay and stick, stood starkly up in\nthe gray rain and the swooping, shifting gray fog. It marked the site\nof a cabin burned long ago, and in such melancholy wise as it might it\ntold of the home that had been. Now and again far-away lightning\nflashed on its fireless hearth; a vacant bird's-nest in a cranny\nduplicated the suggestions of desertion; the cold mist crept in and\ncurled up out of the smokeless flue with a mockery of semblance. The\nfire that had wrought its devastating will in the black midnight in\nthe deep wilderness, so far from rescue or succor, had swiftly burned\nout its quick fury, and was sated with the humble household\nbelongings. The barn, rickety, weather-beaten, deserted, and vacant,\nstill remained,--of the fashion common to the region, with a loft\nabove, and an open wagonway between the two compartments below,--and\nit was here that the inquest was held. It was near the scene of the\ntragedy, and occasionally a man would detach himself from the slow,\ndawdling, depressed-looking group of mountaineers who loitered in the\nopen space beneath the loft, and traverse the scant distance down the\nbridle-path to gaze at the spot where the stranger's body had lain,\nwhence it had been conveyed to the nearest shelter at hand, the old\nbarn, where the coroner's jury were even now engaged in their\ndeliberations. Sometimes, another, versed in all the current rumors,\nwould follow to point out to the new-comer the details, show how the\nrain had washed the blood away, and fearfully mark the tokens of\nfrantic clutches at the trees as the man had been torn from his horse.\nThe animal had vanished utterly; even the prints of his hoofs were\nsoon obliterated by the torrents and the ever-widening puddles. And\nthus had arisen the suspicion of ambush and foul play, and the\nimplication of the mysterious gang of horse-thieves, whose rumored\nexploits seemed hardly so fabulous with the disappearance of the\nanimal and the violent death of the rider in evidence. The locality\noffered no other suggestion, and it was but a brief interval before\nthe way would be retraced by the awe-stricken observer, noting with a\ndeep interest impossible hitherto all the environment: the stark\nchimney of the vanished house, monumental in the weed-grown waste;\nthe dripping forest; the roof of the barn, sleek and shining, and with\nrain pouring down the slant of its clapboards and splashing from its\neaves; the groups of horses hitched to the scraggy apple-trees of the\ndeserted homestead; and here and there the white canvas cover of an\nox-wagon, with its yoke of steers standing with low-hung heads in the\ndownpour. The pallid circling mists enveloped the world, and limited\nthe outlook to a periphery of scant fifty paces; occasionally becoming\ntenuous, as if to suggest the dark looming of the mountain across the\nnarrow valley, and the precipice close at hand behind the building,\nthen once more intervening, white and dense of texture, forming a\nbackground which imparted a singular distinctness to the figures\ngrouped in the open space of the barn beneath the shadowy loft.\n\nThe greater number of the gathering had been summoned hither by a\nsheer curiosity as coercive as a subpoena, but sundry of the group\nwere witnesses, reluctant, anxious, with a vague terror of the law,\nand an ignorant sense of an impending implication that set both craft\nand veracity at defiance. They held their heads down ponderingly, as\nthey stood; perhaps rehearsing mentally the details of their meagre\nknowledge of the event, or perhaps canvassing the aspect of certain\npoints which might impute to them blame or arouse suspicion, and\nendeavoring to compass shifty evasions, to transform or suppress them\nin their forthcoming testimony. At random, one might have\ndifferentiated the witnesses from the mass of the ordinary mountaineer\ntype by the absorbed eye, or the meditative moving lip unconsciously\nforming unspoken words, or the fallen dismayed jaw as of the victim of\ncircumstantial evidence. It was a strange chance, the death that had\nmet this casual wayfarer at their very doors, and one might not know\nhow the coroner would interpret it. His power to commit a suspect\nadded to his terrors, and gave to the capable, astute official a\nmundane formidableness that overtopped the charnel-house flavor of his\nmore habitual duties. He was visible through the unchinked logs of the\nlittle room where the inquest was in progress, barely spacious enough\nto contain the bier, the jury, and the witness under examination; and\nyet so great was the sound of the rain outside and the stir of the\nassemblage that little or naught was overheard without.\n\nNow and again the waiting witnesses looked with doubt and curiosity\nand suspicion at a new-comer, with an obvious disposition to hope and\nbelieve that others knew more of the matter than they, and thus were\nmore liable to accusation. Occasionally, a low-toned, husky query\nwould be met by a curt rejoinder suggesting a cautious reticence and a\nrising enmity, blockading all investigation save the obligatory\ninquisition of a coroner's jury. An object of ever-recurrent scrutiny\nwas a stranger in the vicinity, who had been subpoenaed also. The\nfacial effect of culture and sophistication was illustrated in his\ninexpressive, controlled, masklike countenance. He was generally known\nas the \"valley man with the lung complaint,\" who had built a cabin on\nthe mountain during the summer, banished hither by the advice of his\nphysician for the value to the lungs of the soft, healing air. He wore\na brown derby hat, a fawn-colored suit, and a brown overcoat, with the\ncollar upturned. He was blond and young, and so impassive was his\nsober, decorous aspect that the aptest detective could have discerned\nnaught of significance as he stood, quite silent and composed, in the\ncentre of the place where it was dry, exempt from the gusts of rain\nthat the wind now and again flung in spray upon the outermost members\nof the group, one hand in the pocket of his trousers, the other\ntoying with a cigar which so far he held unlighted.\n\nOf the two women present, one, seated upon the beam of a broken\nplough, refuse of the agricultural industry long ago collapsed here,\nwas calmly smoking her pipe,--a wrinkled, unimpressed personality, who\nhad seen many years, and whose manner might imply that all these\nchances of life and death came in the gross, and that existence was a\nmedley at best. The other, a witness, was young. More than once the\n\"valley man\" cast a covert glance at her as, clad in a brown homespun\ndress, she leaned against the log wall, her face, which was very pale,\nhalf turned toward it, as if to hide the features already much\nobscured by the white sunbonnet drawn far over it. One arm was lifted,\nand her hand was passed between the unchinked logs in a convulsive\ngrasp upon them. Her figure was tall and slender, and expressive in\nits rigid constraint; it was an attitude of despair, of repulsion, of\nfear. It might have implied grief, or remorse, or anxiety. Often the\neyes of the prescient victims of circumstantial evidence rested\ndubiously upon her. To the great majority of men, the presence of\nwomen in affairs of business is an intrusive evil of times out of\njoint. Now, since matters of life and liberty were in the balance, the\nprimitive denizens of Witch-Face Mountain felt that the admission of\nNarcissa Hanway's testimony to consideration and credibility evinced\nan essential defect in the law of the land, and the fallibility of all\nhuman reasoning. What distorted impression might not so appalling an\nevent make upon one so young, so feminine, so inexperienced! What\nexaggerated wild thing might she not say, unintentionally inculpating\nhalf Witch-Face Mountain in robbery and murder!\n\nConstant Hite, as he bluffly entered the passageway, his head up, his\neyes wide and bright, his vigorous step elastic and light, gave no\ntoken of the spiritual war he had waged as he came. Already he felt in\ngreat jeopardy. On account of his illicit vocation he could ill abide\nthe scrutiny of the law. With scant proof, he argued, a moonshiner\nmight be suspected of highway robbery and murder. As he had journeyed\nhither with the constable and his fellows, who conserved the air of\ndisinterested spectators, but who he knew had been summoned to aid the\nofficer in case he should evade or delay, when he would have been\nforthwith arrested, he had been sorely tempted to deny having ever\nseen the stranger, in whose company he had spent an hour or so of the\nprevious day. He had been able to put the lie from him with a normal\nmoral impulse. He did not appreciate the turpitude of perjury. He\nesteemed it only a natural lie invested with pomp and circumstance;\nand the New Testament on which he should be sworn meant no more to his\nunlettered conscience than the horn-book, since he knew as little of\nits contents. But a lie is a skulking thing, and he had scant affinity\nwith it.\n\nHe thought, with a sort of numb wonderment, that it was strange he\nshould feel no more compassion for the object stretched out here,\ndumb, dead, bruised, and bloody, which so short a space since he had\nseen full of life and interest, animated by a genial courtesy and\ngraced with learning and subtle insight; now so unknowing, so\nunlettered, so blind! Whither went this ethereal investiture of\nlife?--for it was not mere being; one might exist hardily enough\nwithout it. Did the darkness close over it, too, or was it not the\ngerm of the soul, the budding of that wider knowledge and finer\naspiration to flower hereafter in rarer air? He did not know; he only\nvaguely cared, and he reproached himself dully that he cared no more.\nFor he--his life was threatened! With the renewal of the thought he\nexperienced a certain animosity toward the man that he should not have\nknown enough to take better care of himself. Why must he needs die\nhere, in this horrible unexplained way, and leave other men, chance\nassociates, to risk stretching hemp for murder? He felt his strong\nlife beating in his throat almost to suffocation at the mere\nsuggestion. Again the lie tempted him, to be again withstood; and as\nhe strode into the room upon the calling of his name, he saw how\nfutile, how flimsy, was every device, for, fluttering in the coroner's\nhand, he recognized the sketch of the \"Witch-Face\" which the dead man\nhad made, and the masterly drawing of his own imposing figure in the\nforeground. He had forgotten it utterly for the time being. In the\nsurprise and confusion that had beset him, it had not occurred to him\nto speculate how he had chanced to be subpoenaed, how the idea could\nhave occurred to the coroner that he knew aught of the stranger. As he\nstood against the batten door, the pale light from the interstices of\nthe unchinked logs, all the grayer because it alternated with the\nsombre timbers, falling upon his face and figure, his hat upturned in\nfront, revealing his brow with a forelock of straight black hair, his\nbrilliant dark eyes, and his distinctly cut definite features, the\nsketch-book was swiftly passed from one to another of the jury,\nreluctantly relinquished here and there, and more than once eliciting\nhalf-smothered exclamations of delighted wonder from the\nunsophisticated mountaineers, as they glanced back and forth from the\nman leaning against the door to the counterfeit presentment on the\npaper.\n\nConstant Hite experienced a glow of vicarious pride as he remembered\nthe satisfaction that the artist had taken in the sketch, and he\nwished that that still thing on the bier could know how his work, most\nwonderful it seemed, was appreciated. And then, with a swift revulsion\nof feeling, he realized that it was this which had entrapped him; this\nbit of paper had brought him into fear and trouble and risk of his\nlife. The man might be of the revenue force. He might have encountered\nother moonshiners, and thus have come to his violent death. If this\nwere his vocation, it brought Hite into dark suspicion by virtue of\nthe fact, known to a few of the neighborhood, that he himself was a\ndistiller of brush whiskey. No one else had seen the stranger till the\nfinding of the body. He gathered this from the trend of the inquiry\nafter the formal preliminary queries. The seven men, as they sat\ntogether on a bench made by passing a plank between the logs of the\nwall diagonally across the corner of the room, chewed meditatively\ntheir quids of tobacco, and now and then spat profusely on the ground,\ntheir faces growing more perplexed and graver as the examination\nprogressed.\n\nWhen Hite disclosed the circumstance that on the previous day he had\nencountered a \"stranger man\" near the \"Witch-Face,\" there was a\npalpable sensation among them. They glanced at one another meaningly,\nand a sudden irritation was perceptible in the coroner's manner as he\nsat in a rickety chair near the improvised bier. He was a citizen of\nthe valley region, a trifle more sophisticated than the jury, and\ndisposed to seriously deprecate the introduction of any morbid or\nsuperstitious element into so grave a matter. He had a bald head, a\nlean face, the bones very clearly defined about the temple and cheek\nand jaw, a scanty grizzled beard; and he was dressed somewhat farmer\nfashion, in blue jeans, with his boots drawn high over his trousers,\nbut with a stiffly starched white shirt,--the collar and cravat in\nevidence, the cuffs, however, vanished up the big sleeves of his coat.\n\n\"The exact place of the meeting is not material,\" he said frowningly.\n\nBut Hite's mercurial interest in the drawing had revived anew.\n\n\"Thar she be,\" he exclaimed, so suddenly that the jury started with a\ncommon impulse, \"the ole witch-face,\"--he pointed at the sketch in the\ncoroner's hand,--\"a mite ter the east an' a leetle south in the\npictur', ez nat'ral ez life!\"\n\nOne of the jurymen asked to see the sketch again. Evidently, in the\nhasty delineation of the contours of the slope they had not noticed\nthe gigantic grimacing countenance which they all knew so well; the\npicturesque figure of the mountaineer in the foreground had so\nimpressed the stranger that it was much more nearly complete than the\nlandscape, being definite in every detail, and fully shaded. The book\nwas handed along the row of men, each recognizing the semblance, once\npointed out, with a touch of dismayed surprise that alarmed the\ncoroner for the sanity of the verdict; his rational estimate rated\nspells and bewitchments and omens as far less plausible agencies in\ndisaster than horse-thieves, highwaymen, and moonshiners.\n\n\"Look at the face of the deceased,\" he said, with a sort of spare\nenunciation, coercive somehow in its inexpressiveness. \"Ye are sure ye\nnever viewed that man afore yestiddy?\"\n\n\"I hev said so an' swore it,\" said Hite, a trifle nettled.\n\n\"Ye rode in comp'ny a hour or mo' an' never asked his name?\"\n\n\"I never axed him no questions, nor he me,\" replied Hite, \"'ceptin'\n'bout'n the witch-face. He was powerful streck by that. An' I tole him\n't war a onlucky day.\"\n\nThe jury, a dreary row of unkempt heads, and bearded anxious faces,\nand crouching shoulders askew, cleared their throats, and two\nuncrossed and recrossed their legs, the plank seat creaking ominously\nwith the motion under their combined weight. A shade of disappointment\nwas settling on the coroner's face. This was slight information indeed\nfrom the only person who had seen the man alive. There was silence for\na moment. The splashing of the rain on the roof became drearily\naudible in the interval. The stir of the group in the space outside\nwas asserted anew, with their low-toned fitful converse; a\nblack-and-white ox in the weed-grown garden emitted a deep, depressed\nlow of remonstrance against the rain, and the irking of the yoke, and\nthe herbage just beyond his reach. The jurymen might see him through\nthe logs, and now and again one of them mechanically ducked his head\nto look out upon the dismal aspect of the chimney and orchard, round\nwhich so many horses and wagons had not gathered since the daughter of\nthe house was long ago married here. There was a sprinkle of gray in\nhis hair, and he remembered the jollities of the wedding,--incongruous\nrecollection,--and once more he looked at the stark figure, its face\ncovered with a white cloth, which had been done in a sentiment of\natonement for the unseemly publicity of its fate.\n\nIn sparsely settled communities, death, being rare, retains much of\nthe terror which custom lessens in the dense crowds of cities. There\ndeath is met at every corner. It goes on 'Change. It sits upon the\nbench. It is chronicled in the columns of every newspaper. Daily its\nbells toll. Its melancholy pageantry traverses the streets of wealthy\nquarters, and it stalks abroad hourly in the slums, and few there are\nwho gaze after it. But here it comes so seldom that its dread features\nare not made smug by familiarity. When Hite was told to look again at\nthe face and see if memory might not have played him false, to make\nsure he had never seen the man before yesterday, he hesitated, and\nadvanced with such reluctance, and started back, dropping the cloth,\nwith such swift repulsion, that the coroner, habituated to such\nmatters, gazed at him with a doubtful scrutiny.\n\n\"Oh, he looked nowise like that,\" he exclaimed in a raised, nervous\nvoice that caught the attention of the crowd outside, and resulted in\na sudden cessation of stir and colloquy, \"though it's him, sure\nenough! And,\" with a burst of regret, \"he war a mighty pleasant man!\"\n\nThe coroner, intentionally taking him at a disadvantage, asked\nabruptly, \"What do you work at mostly?\"\n\nHite turned shortly from the bier. \"I farms some,\" he hesitated; \"dad\nbein' mos'ly out o' the field, nowadays, agin' so constant.\"\n\n\"What do you work at mostly?\" reiterated the official.\n\nHite divined his suspicion. Some flying rumor had doubtless come to\nhis ears, how credible, how unimpugnable, the moonshiner could not\ntell. Nevertheless, his loyalty to that secret vocation of his had\nbecome a part of his nature, so continuous were its demands upon his\ncourage, his strategy, his foresight, his industry. It was tantamount\nto his instinct of self-defense. He held his head down, with his\nexcited dark eyes looking up from under his brows at the coroner. But\nhe would not speak. He would admit naught of what was evidently known.\n\n\"Warn't ye afeard he might be a revenuer?\" suggested the officer.\n\n\"I never war afeard, so ter say, o' one man at a time,\" Hite ventured.\n\n\"Didn't ye think he might take a notion that you were a moonshiner?\"\n\n\"He never showed no suspicion o' me, noways,\" replied Hite warily. \"We\nrid tergether free an' favored. He 'peared a powerful book-l'arned\nman,--like no revenuer ever I see.\"\n\n\"Where did you part company?\"\n\nHite sought to identify the spot by description; and then he was\nallowed to pass out, his spirits flagging with the ordeal, and with\nthe knowledge that his connection with the manufacture of brush\nwhiskey was suspected by the coroner's jury, suggesting an adequate\nmotive on his part for waylaying a stranger supposed to be of the\nrevenue force. He felt the dash of the rain in his face as he stood\naside to make way for the \"valley man with the lung complaint,\" who\nwas passing into the restricted apartment; and despite his whirl of\nanxiety and excitement and regret and resentment, he noted with a\ntouch of surprise the cool unconcern of the man's face and manner,\nalbeit duly grave and adjusted to the decorums of the melancholy\noccasion.\n\nHe was sworn, and gave his name as Alan Selwyn. The jury listened with\ninterest to his fluent account of his occupation in the valley, which\nhad been mercantile, of his temporary residence here for a bronchial\naffection; and when he was asked to identify the man who had so\nmysteriously come to his death, they marked his quick, easy stride as\nhe crossed the room, with his hat in his hand, and his unmoved\ncountenance as he looked fixedly down into the face of the dead. He\nremained a longer interval than was usual with the witnesses, as if to\nmake sure. Then, still quite businesslike and brisk, he stated that he\ncould not identify him, having certainly never seen him before.\n\n\"The only papers which he had on him,\" said the coroner, watching the\neffect of his words, \"were two letters addressed to you.\"\n\nThe young man started in palpable surprise. As he looked at the\nexterior of the letters, which were stamped and postmarked, he\nobserved that they must have been taken out of the post-office\nat Sandford Cross-Roads, to expedite their delivery; the\npostmaster doubtless consenting to this request on the part\nof so reputable-looking a person or a possible acquaintance.\n\n\"Were you expecting a visitor?\" asked the coroner.\n\n\"Not at all,\" responded the puzzled witness.\n\nHe was requested to open the letters, read and show them. But he\nwaived this courtesy, asking the coroner to open and read them to the\njury. They were of no moment, both on matters of casual business, and\nMr. Alan Selwyn was dismissed; the coroner blandly regretting that, in\nview of his malady, he had been required to come out in so chilly a\nrain.\n\nNotwithstanding his composure he was in some haste to be gone. He went\nquickly through the crowd, drawing down his hat over his brow, and\ndeftly buttoning his overcoat across his chest and throat. He had\nreached his horse, and had placed one foot in the stirrup, when,\nchancing to glance back over his shoulder, he saw Narcissa Hanway's\nwhite, flowerlike face, her bonnet pushed far back on her tawny yellow\nhair, both arms outstretched in a gesture of negation and repulsion\ntoward the apartment where the jury sat, while a dark-haired, slow man\nurged her forward, one hand on her shoulder, and the old mountain\nwoman followed with insistence and encouragement. He hesitated for a\nmoment; then putting spurs to his horse, he rode off swiftly through\nthe slanting lines of rain.\n\n\nIII.\n\nA sense of helplessness in the hands of fate is in some sort conducive\nto courage. Doubtless many an act of valor which has won the world's\napplause was precipitated in a degree by desperation and the lack of\nan alternative. The appearance of stolidity with which the cluster of\nwitnesses--those whose testimony was yet to be given as well as those\nwho had told the little they knew--noted the uncontrolled agitation,\nthe wild eyes, the hysteric sobs, with which Narcissa Hanway was\nushered into the contracted apartment where the inquest was in\nprogress, had no correlative calmness of mind or heart. What haphazard\naccusation might not result from her fear, or her desire to shield\nanother, or the mere undisciplined horror of the place and the fact!\nWhen one dreads the sheer possibilities, the extremes of terror are\nreached. More than one of the bearded, unkempt, hardy mountaineers,\ntrudging back and forth in the sheltered space beneath the loft,\nsteadily chewing their quids of tobacco and eying the rain, would have\nfled incontinently, had there been any place to run to out of reach of\nthe constable, who was particularly brisk to-day, participating in\nexercises of so unusual an interest. The girl's brother, standing\nbeside the door after she had passed within, was unconscious of a\ncertain keen covert scrutiny of which he was the subject. He had a\nsquare determined face, dark hair, slow gray eyes, and a tall powerful\nframe; he held his head downward, his hand on the door, his even teeth\nset in the intensity of his effort to distinguish the voices within.\nThere had been some secret speculation as to whether the man were\naltogether unknown to the brother and sister, such deep feeling she\nhad evinced, such coercion he had exerted to induce her to give her\ntestimony. Still, the girl was a mere slip of a thing, unused to\nhorrors; and as to recalcitrant witnesses, they all knew the jail had\na welcome for the silent until such time as they might find a voice.\nNevertheless, though his urgency had been in the stead of the\nconstable's stronger measures, they eyed him askance as he stood and\nsought to listen, with his hand on the door. The old woman turned\naround, her arms falling to her sides with a sort of flounce of\ntriumph, her eyes twinkling beneath the shining spectacles set upon\nher brow among the limp ruffles of her thrust-back sunbonnet, a laugh\nof satisfaction widening her wrinkled face. \"Thar now!\" she chuckled,\n\"Nar'sa jes' set it down she _wouldn't_ testify, an' crossed her heart\nan' hoped she'd fall dead fust. But, Ben, we beat her that time!\" and\nshe chuckled anew.\n\nThe man answered not a word, and listened to the tumult within.\n\nIt is seldom, doubtless, that the patience of a coroner's jury is\nsubjected to so strong a strain. But the information which had so far\nbeen elicited was hardly more than the bare circumstance which the\nbody presented,--a man had ridden here, a stranger, and he was dead.\nIf the girl knew more than this, it would necessitate some care in the\nexamination to secure the facts. She was young, singularly willful and\nirresponsible, and evidently overcome by grief, or fear, or simply\nhorror. When she was asked to look at the face of the stranger, she\nonly caught a glimpse of it, as if by accident, and turned away,\npulling her white bonnet down over her face, and declaring that she\nwould not. \"I hev viewed him wunst, an' I won't look at him again,\"\nshe protested, with a burst of sobs.\n\n\"Now set down in this cheer, daughter, an' tell us what ye know about\nit all,--easy an' quiet,\" said the coroner in a soothing, paternal\nstrain.\n\n\"Oh, nuthin', nuthin'!\" exclaimed the girl, throwing herself into the\nchair in the attitude of an abandonment of grief.\n\n\"Air ye cryin' 'kase ye war 'quainted with him ennywise?\" demanded one\nof the jurymen, with a quickening interest. He was a neighbor; that\nis, counting as propinquity a distance of ten miles.\n\nThe girl lifted her head suddenly. \"I never seen him till yestiddy,\"\nshe protested steadily. \"I be a heap apter ter weep 'kase my\n'quaintances _ain't_ dead!\" She gave him a composed, sarcastic smile,\nthen fell to laughing and crying together.\n\nTo the others the discomfiture of their _confrere_ was the first touch\nof comedy relief in the tragic situation. They cast at one another a\nglance of appreciation trenching on a smile, and the abashed\nquestioner drew out a plug of tobacco, and with a manner of\npreoccupation gnawed a bit from it; then replaced it in his pocket,\nwith a physical contortion which caused the plank on which the jury\nwere seated to creak ominously, to the manifest anxiety of the\nworthies ranged thereon.\n\n\"How did you happen to see the man?\" he asked, as if he had perceived\nno significance in her previous answer.\n\n\"'Kase I didn't happen ter be blind,\" her half-muffled voice replied.\nHer arm was thrown over the back of the chair, and her face was hidden\non her elbow.\n\nThe coroner interposed quickly: \"Where were you goin', an' what did\nyou see?\"\n\nShe sobbed aloud for a moment. Then ensued an interval of silence.\nSuddenly the interest of the subject seemed to lay hold upon her, and\nshe began to speak very rapidly, lifting her white tear-stained face,\nand pushing her bonnet back on her rough curling auburn hair:--\n\n\"I war a-blackberryin', thar bein' only a few lef' yit, an' I went fur\nan' furder yit from home; an' ez I kem out'n the woods over yon,\" half\nrising, and pointing with a free gesture, \"I viewed--or yit I _'lowed_\nI viewed--the witch-face through a bunch o' honey locust, the leaves\nbein' drapped a'ready, they bein' always the fust o' the year ter git\nbare. An' stiddier leavin' it be, I sot my bucket o' berries at the\nfoot o' a tree', an started down the slope todes the bluff, ter make\nsure an' view it clar o' the trees.\" The girl paused, her eyes\nwidening, her voice faltering, her breath coming fast. \"An' goin'\nswift, some hawgs, stray, half grown, 'bout twenty shoats feedin' in\nthe woods--my rustlin' in the bushes skeered 'em I reckon--they sot\nout to run, possessed by the devil, like them the Scriptur' tells\nabout.\" She paused again, panting, her hand to her heart.\n\nThe disaffected juryman turned to one side, recrossing his legs, and\nspitting disparagingly on the ground. \"She can't swear them hawgs war\npossessed by the devil,\" he said in a low tone to his next neighbor.\n\n\"Oh, why not,\" exclaimed the girl, \"when we know so many men air\npossessed by the devil,--why not them shoats, bein' jes' without\nclothes, an' without the gift o' speech to mark the diff'unce!\"\n\nShe paused again, and the coroner, standing a trifle back of her\nchair, shook his head at the obstructive juryman, and asked her in a\ncommonplace voice what the hogs had to do with it.\n\n\"That's what I wanter know!\" she cried, half turning in her chair to\nlook up at him. \"I started 'em, an' I be at the bottom o' it all, ef\nit's like I think,--_me_, yearnin' ter look at the old witch-face! The\nhawgs run through the woods like fire on dry grass, an' I be 'feared\nthey skeered the stranger man's horse--he had none whenst I seen him,\nthough. I hearn loud talkin', or hollerin', a cornsiderable piece off,\nan' then gallopin' hoofs\"--\n\n\"More horses than one, do you think?\" demanded the coroner.\n\n\"Oh, how kin I swear to that? I seen none. Fur when I got thar, this\nman war lyin' in the herder's trail, bruised and bloody--oh, like ye\nsee--an' his eyes opened; an' he gin a sort o' gasp whenst I tuk his\nhan'--an' he war dead. An' I skeered the hawgs, an' they skeered his\nhorse, an' he killed him; an' I be 'sponsible fur it all, an' I wisht\nye'd hang me fur it quick, an' be done with it!\"\n\nShe burst into sobs once more, and hid her face on her arm on the back\nof the chair. Then, suddenly lifting her head, she resumed: \"I jes'\ncalled and called Ben, an' bein' he hain't never fur off, he hearn me,\nan' kem. An' then he rid fur the neighbors, an' kem down the valley\narter you-uns,\" with a side glance at the coroner. \"An' he lef' me a\nshootin'-iron, in case of a fox, or a wolf, or suthin' kem along.\n'Bout sunset the neighbors kem. An' till then I sot thar keepin'\nwatch, an' a-viewin' the witch-face 'crost the Cove, plumb till the\nsun went down.\"\n\nShe bowed her head again on her arm, and a momentary silence ensued.\nThen the coroner, clearing his throat, said reassuringly, \"Thar ain't\nnuthin' in the witch-face, nohow. It's jes' a notion. Man and boy, I\nhave knowed that hillside fur forty year, an' I never could see no\nwitch-face; it's been p'inted out ter me a thousand times.\"\n\nShe looked at him in dumb amazement for a moment; then broke out,\n\"Waal, what would ye think ef ye hed seen, like me, the witch-face\nshining in the darkest night, nigh on ter midnight, like the ole 'oman\nhad lighted her a candle somewhars,--jes' shinin', an' grinnin', an'\nmockin', plain ez daybreak? That's what _I_ hev viewed--an' I 'low ter\nview it agin--oh, I do, I do!\"\n\nHe looked at her hard, but he did not say what he thought, and the\nfaces of the jurymen, which had implied a strong exception to his\ndeclaration of skepticism touching the existence of the ominous facial\noutline on the hillside, underwent a sudden change of expression. She\nwas hardly responsible, they considered, and her last incredible\nassertion had gone far to nullify the effect of her previous\ntestimony. She was overcome by the nervous shock, or had told less\nthan she knew and was still concealing somewhat, or was so credulous\nand plastic and fanciful as to be hardly worthy of belief. She was\ndismissed earlier than she had dared to hope: and with this\ndeterioration of the testimony of the witness who was nearest the time\nand place of the disaster, the jury presently went to work to evolve\nout of so slender a thread of fact and so knotty a tangle of\npossibility their verdict.\n\nFor a long time, it seemed to the curious without, and to the\nagitated, nervous witnesses peering through the unchinked logs of the\nwall, they sat on their comfortless perch, half crouching forward, and\nchewed, and discussed the testimony. There were frequent intervals of\nsilence, and in one of these Con Hite was disturbed to see the sketch\nof the \"witch-face\" once more passed from hand to hand. They grew to\nhave a harried, baited look; and after a time, the rain having\nslackened, they came out in a body, and walked to and fro quite\nsilently in the clearing, chewing their quids and their knotty\nproblem, with apparently as much chance of getting to the completion\nof the one as of the other. They were evidently refreshed, however, by\nthe change of posture and scene, for they soon resumed the subject and\nwere arguing anew as they paused upon the bluff, their gestures\nwonderfully distinct, drawn upon the sea of mist that filled the\nvalley below and the air above. It revealed naught of the earth, save\nhere and there a headland, as it were, thrusting out its dark, narrow,\nattenuated demesne into the impalpable main. Further and further one\nmight mark this semblance of a coast-line as the vapor grew more\ntenuous, till far away the series of shadowy gray promontories\nalternating with the colorless inlets was as vague of essence as the\nland of a dream. Near at hand, a cucumber-tree, with its great broad\ngreen leaves and its deep red cones, leaning over the rocks, and\nspanning this illusive gray landscape from the zenith to the immediate\nforeground, gave the only touch of color to the scenic simulacrum in\nmany a gradation of neutral tone. The jurymen hovered about under the\nboughs for a time, and then came back, still harassed and anxious, to\ntheir den, with perhaps some new question of doubt. For those without\ncould perceive that once more they were crowding about the bier and\ntalking together in knots. Again they called in the country physician\nwho had testified earlier, an elderly personage, singularly long and\nthin and angular, but who had a keen, intent, clever face and the\naccent of an educated man. He seemed to reiterate some information in\na clear, concise manner, and when he came out it was evident that he\nconsidered his utility here at an end, for he made straight for his\nhorse and saddle.\n\nA sudden sensation supervened among the outsiders,--a flutter, and\nthen a breathless suspense; for within the inclosure, barred with the\nheavy shadows of the logs of the walls alternating with the misty\nintervals, could be seen the figures of the seven, successively\nstooping at the foot of the bier to sign each his name to the\ninquisition at last drawn up.\n\nOne by one they came slowly out, looking quite exhausted from their\nlong restraint, the unwonted mental exercitations, and the nervous\nstrain. Then it was developed, to the astonishment and disappointment\nof the little crowd, tingling with excitement and anxiety, that this\ndocument simply set forth the fact that at an inquisition holden on\nWitch-Face Mountain, Kildeer County, before Jeremiah Flaxman, coroner,\nupon the body of an unknown man, there lying dead, the jurors whose\nnames were subscribed thereto, upon their oaths, did say that he came\nto his death from concussion of the brain consequent upon being thrown\nor dragged from his horse by means or by persons to the jury unknown.\n\nThere was a palpable dismay on Constant Hite's expressive face. He had\nhoped that the verdict might be death by accident. Others had expected\nthe implication of horse-thieves, of whose existence the jury being of\nthe neighborhood were well advised, and the disappearance of the man's\nhorse might well suggest this explanation. The coroner would return\nthis inquisition to the criminal court together with a list of the\nmaterial witnesses. Thus the matter was left as undecided as before\nthe inquest, the jeopardy, the terrors of circumstantial evidence, all\nstill impending, dark with doom, like the black cloud which visibly\novershadowed the landscape.\n\n\nIV.\n\nSince the knight-errantry of wolf and bear and catamount and fox has\nscant need of milestones, or signposts, or ferries, or the tender\niteration of road-taxes, the casual glance might hardly perceive the\nnecessity of opening a thoroughfare through this wilderness, for these\nfreebooters seemed likely to be its chief beneficiaries. A more rugged\ndistrict could not be found in all that massive upheaval of rocks and\ntangled wooded fastnesses stretching from the northeast to the\nsouthwest some twenty miles, and known as Witch-Face Mountain; a more\nscantily populated region than its slopes and adjacent coves scarcely\nexists in the length and breadth of the State of Tennessee. The\nphysical possibilities were arrayed against the project, so steep was\nthe comblike summit on either side, so heavy and tortuous the\noutcropping rock that served as the bony structure of the great\nmountain mass. True, the river pierced it, the denudation of solid\nsandstone cliffs, a thousand feet in height, betokening the untiring\nenergy of the eroding currents of centuries agone. This agency,\nhowever, man might not summon to his aid, being \"the act of God,\"\nto use the pious language of the express companies to describe\ncertain contingencies for which they very properly decline the\nresponsibility. Against the preemptions of the gigantic forests and\nthe gaunt impassable crags and the abysmal river might be enlisted\nonly such enterprise as was latent in the male inhabitants of the\nvicinity over eighteen years of age and under fifty, thus subject to\nthe duty of working on the public roads. Nevertheless, the county\ncourt had, in a moment of sanguine exuberance, entertained and granted\nan application from the adjacent landowners to order a jury of view to\nlay out a public road and to report at the next quarterly session.\n\nPrecursors of the jury of view in some sort two young people might\nhave seemed, one afternoon, a fortnight, perhaps, after the inquest,\nas they pushed through the woody tangles to the cliffs high above the\nriver, the opposite bank of which was much nearer than the swirling\ncurrents, crystal brown in the romantic shadows below. They walked in\nsingle file, the jury of view in their minds, and now and then\nreferred to in their sparse speech.\n\n\"Mought make it along hyar, Ben.\" The girl, in advance, paused,\nbareheaded, each uplifted hand holding out a string of her white\nsunbonnet, which, thus distended, was poised, winglike, behind the\nrough tangle of auburn hair and against the amber sky. She turned as\nshe spoke, to face her companion, taking a step or two backward as she\nawaited his answer.\n\n\"Look out how ye air a-walkin', Narcissa! Ye'll go over the bluff\nback'ards, fust thing ye know,\" the man called out eagerly, and with a\nbreak of anxiety in his voice.\n\nShe stretched the sunbonnet still wider with her upreaching arms, and\nwith a smile of tantalizing glee, showing her white teeth and\nnarrowing her brown eyes, she continued to walk backward toward the\nprecipice,--with short steps, however; cautious enough, doubtless, but\ncalculated to alarm one whose affection had given much acuteness to\nfear.\n\nStill at too great a distance for interference, Ben affected\nindifference. \"We-uns'll hev the coroner's jury hyar agin, afore the\njury o' view, ef ye keep on; an' ye ain't got on yer bes' caliker\ncoat, noways.\"\n\nHe climbed swiftly up the ascent and joined her, out of breath and\nwith an angry gleam in his eyes. But she had turned her face and steps\nin the opposite direction, the mirth of the situation extinguished for\nthe present.\n\n\"Quit talkin' that-a-way 'bout sech turr'ble, turr'ble things!\" she\ncried petulantly, making a motion as if to strike him, futile at the\ndistance, and with her frowning face averted.\n\n\"Sech ez yer new coat? I 'lowed 't war the apple o' yer eye,\" he\nrejoined with a feint of banter.\n\nShe held her face down, with her features drawn and her eyes half\nclosed, rejecting the vision of recollection as if it were the sight\nitself. \"I can't abide the name o' cor'ner's jury,--I never wants ter\nhear it nor see it agin! I never shall furgit how them men all looked\na-viewin' the traveler's body what I fund dead in the road; they\nlooked like jes' so many solemn, peekin', heejus black buzzards\ncrowdin' aroun' the corpse; then a-noddin' an' a-whisperin' tergether,\nan' a-findin' of a verdic' ez they called it. They fund nuthin' at\nall. 'T war _me_ ez done the findin'. I fund the man dead in the road.\nAn' _I_ ain't a-goin' ter be a witness no mo'. Nex' time the law wants\nme fur a witness I'll go ter jail; it's cheerfuller, a heap, I'll\nbet!\"\n\nAs she still held her head down, her bonnet well on it now, her face\nwith its _riant_ cast of features incongruously woebegone,\novershadowed by the tragedy she recounted even more definitely than by\nthe brim of her headgear or the first gray advance of the dusk, he\nmade a clumsy effort to divert her attention.\n\n\"I 'lowed ye war mightily in favor of juries; ye talk mighty nigh all\nday 'bout the jury of view.\"\n\n\"I want a road up hyar,\" she exclaimed vivaciously, raising her eyes\nand her joyous transfigured face, \"a reg'lar county road! In the fall\no' the year the folks would kem wagonin' thar chestnuts over ter sell\nin town, an' camp out. An' all the mounting would go up an' down it\npast our big gate ter the church house in the Cove. I'd never want ter\nhear no mo' preachin'. I'd jes' set on our front porch, an' look, an'\nlook, an' look!\"\n\nShe cast up her great bright eyes with as vivid and immediate an\nirradiation as if the brilliant procession which she pictured deployed\neven now, chiefly in ox-wagons, before them. She caught off her bonnet\nfrom her head,--it seemed a sort of moral barometer; she never wore it\nwhen the indications of the inner atmosphere set fair. She swung it\ngayly by one string as she walked and talked; now and again she held\nthe string to her lips and bit it with her strong, even teeth,\nreckless of the havoc in the clumsy hem.\n\n\"Then county court days,--goin' to county court, an' comin' from\ncounty court,--sech passels an' passels o' folks! I wisht we-uns hed\nit afore the jury o' view kem, so we-uns mought view the jury o'\nview.\"\n\n\"It's along o' the jury o' view ez we-uns will git the road,--ef we do\ngit it,\" the young man said cautiously.\n\nIt was one of his self-imposed duties to moderate, as far as he might,\nhis sister's views, to temper her enthusiasms and abate her various\nand easily excited anger. He had other duties toward her which might\nbe said to have come to him as an inheritance.\n\n\"Ben's the boy!\" his consumptive mother had been wont to say; \"he's\nsorter slow, but mighty sure. 'Brag is a good dog, but Hold-Fast is a\nbetter.' Ef he don't sense nare 'nother idee in this life, he hev got\nter l'arn ez it's his business ter take keer o' Nar'sa. Folks say\nNar'sa be spoiled a'ready. So be, fur whilst Ben be nuthin' but a boy\nhe'll l'arn ter do her bid, an' watch over her, an' wait on her, an'\nkeer for her, an' think she be the top o' creation. It'll make her\nproud an' headin', I know,--she'll gin her stepmammy a sight o'\ntrouble, an' I ain't edzactly lamentin' 'bout'n that,--but Ben'll take\nkeer o' her all her life, an' good keer, havin' been trained ter it\nfrom the fust.\"\n\nBut his mother had slept many a year in the little mountain graveyard,\nand her place was still empty. The worldly wise craft of the simple\nmountain woman, making what provision she might for the guardianship\nof her daughter, was rendered of scant effect, since her husband did\nnot marry again. The household went on as if she still sat in her\naccustomed place, with not one deficiency or disaster that might have\nserved in its simple sort as a memorial,--so little important are we\nin our several spheres, so promptly do the ranks of life close up as\nwe drop dead from their alignment.\n\nThe panoply against adversity with which Narcissa had been accoutred\nby a too anxious mother, instead of being means of defense, had become\nopportunities of oppression. Her brother's affectionate solicitude and\nsubmissiveness were accepted as her bounden due, as the two grew\nolder; her father naturally adapted himself to the predominant\nsentiment of the household; and few homes can show a tyrant more\narrogant and absolute than the mountain girl whose mother had so\npredicted for her much hardship and harshness, and a troubled and\nsubordinate existence.\n\nIt was with that instinct to guard her from all the ills of life,\ngreat and small, that Ben sought to prepare her for a possible\ndisappointment now.\n\n\"Mought n't git the road through, nohow, when all's said,\" he\nsuggested.\n\n\"What fur not?\" she exclaimed, bringing her dark brows together above\neyes that held a glitter of anger.\n\n\"Waal, some o' the owners won't sign the application, an' air goin'\nter fight it in the Court.\"\n\nShe put her bonnet on, and looked from under its brim up at the amber\nsky. It was growing faintly green near the zenith, toward which the\nlofty topmost plumes of the dark green pines swayed. The great growths\nof the forest rose on every side. There was no view, no vista, save\nthe infinitely repeated umbrageous tangle beneath the trees, where\ntheir boles stood more or less distinct or dusky till merged\nindefinitely into shadow and distance. Looking down into the river,\none lost the sense of monotony. The ever-swirling lines of the current\ndrew mystic scrolls on that wonderfully pellucid brown surface,--so\npellucid that from the height above she could see a swiftly darting\nshadow which she knew was the reflection of a homeward-bound hawk in\nthe skies higher yet. Leaves floated in a still, deep pool, were\ncaught in a maddening eddy, and hurried frantically away, unwilling,\nfrenzied, helpless, unknowing whither, never to return,--allegory of\nmany a life outside those darkling solemn mountain woods, and of some,\nperhaps, in the midst of them. The reflection of the cliffs in the\nnever still current, of the pines on their summits, of the changing\nsky growing deeper and deeper, till its amber tint, erstwhile so\ncrystalline, became of a dull tawny opaqueness, she marked absently\nfor a while as she cogitated on his answer.\n\n\"What makes 'em so contrairy, Ben?\" she asked at last.\n\n\"Waal, old man Sneed 'lows thar'll be a power o' cattle-thievin', with\nthe road so open an' convenient. An' Jeremiah Sayres don't want ter\npay no road-taxes. An' Silas Boyd 'lows he don't want ter be obligated\nter work on no sech rough road ez this hyar one air obleeged ter be;\nan' I reckon, fust an' last, it _will_ take a power o' elbow grease.\"\n\nHe paused, and looked about him at the great shelving masses of rock\nand the steep slants, repeated through leagues and leagues of mountain\nwilderness. Then seating himself on one of the ledges of the cliff,\nhis feet dangling unconcernedly over the abysses below, he continued:\n\"An' Con Hite,--he's agin it, too.\"\n\nShe lifted her head, with a scornful rising flush.\n\n\"Con Hite dunno _what_ he wants; _he_ ain't got a ounce o' jedgmint.\"\n\n\"Waal, one thing he _don't_ want is a road. He be 'feared it'll go too\nclose ter the still, an' the raiders will nose him out somehows. Now\nhe be all snug in the bresh, an' the revenuers none the wiser.\"\n\n\"An' Con none the wiser, nuther,\" she flouted. \"The raiders hev smoked\nout 'sperienced old mountain foxes a heap slyer'n Con be. He ain't\ngot the gift. He can't hide nuthin'. I kin find out everythin' he\nknows by jes' lookin' in his eye.\"\n\n\"That's just 'kase he's fool enough ter set a heap o' store by ye,\nNar'sa. He ain't so easy trapped.\"\n\n\"Fool enough fur ennythin',\" she retorted.\n\n\"An' then thar 's old Dent Kirby. He 'lows the road will be obligated\nter pass by the witch-face arter it gits over yander nigh ter the\nvalley, whar the ruver squeezes through the mounting agin. He be\nalways talkin' 'bout signs an' spells an' sech, an' he 'lows the very\nlook o' the witch-face kerries bad luck, an' it'll taint all ez goes\nfor'ard an' back'ard a-nigh it.\"\n\n\"Ben,\" said the girl in a low voice, \"do you-uns b'lieve ef thar war\npassin' continual on a sure enough county road that thar cur'ous white\nlight would kem on the old witch's face in the night-time? Ain't that\na sort'n spell fur the dark an' the lonesomeness ter tarrify a few\nquaking dwellers round about? Surely many folks comin' an' goin'\nwouldn't see sech. Ghostful things ain't common in a crowd.\" She moved\na little nearer her brother, and laid a hand on his shoulder.\n\n\"Some folks can't see the witch-face at all, noways,\" he replied\nstolidly. \"I hearn the coroner 'low he couldn't.\"\n\nNarcissa spoke with sudden asperity: \"I reckon he hev got sense enough\nter view a light whenst it shines inter his eyes. He 'pears ter be\nfeeble-minded ginerally, and mought n't be able ter pick out the favor\no' the features on the hillside, but surely he'd blink ef a light war\nflickered inter his eyeballs.\"\n\nThe road was her precious scheme, and she steadfastly believed that\nwith the order of the worshipful Quarterly County Court declaring it\nopen, with a duly appointed overseer and a gang of assigned work-hands\nand the presidial fostering care of a road commissioner, the haggard\nold semblance must needs desist from supernatural emblazonment in the\nawe-stricken nights, and that logic and law would soon serve to\nexorcise its baleful influence.\n\nHer mien grew graver as she reflected on the resume of objections to\nthe project. Her white bonnet threw a certain white reflection on her\nflushed face. Her eyes were downcast as she looked at the river below,\nthe long lashes seeming almost to touch her cheek. She scarcely moved\nthem as she turned her gaze upon her brother, who was still seated on\nthe verge of the cliff.\n\n\"Waal, sir, I wonder that the pore old road petition hed life enough\nin it ter crawl ter the court-house door. With all them agin it, thar\nain't nobody ter be fur it, sca'cely.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes,\" he admitted. \"Them air fur it ez b'lieves highways improves\nproputty, an' hev got land lyin' right alongside whar the road is axed\nter be run; them ez ain't got proputty alongside ain't nigh so\nanxious. But that thar strange valley man ez they say hev got a lung\ncomplaint, he won't sign nuther. He owns the house he built up thar on\nthe flat o' the mounting an' cornsider'ble land, though he don't keep\nno stock nor nuthin'. 'Lows the air be soft an' good for the lung\ncomplaint. He 'lows he hev been tryin' ter git shet o' the railroads\nan' dirt roads an' human folks, an' he s'posed he _hed_ run ter the\njumpin'-off place, the e-ends o' the yearth; but hyar kems the road\no' civilization a-pursuin' him like the sarpient o' the Pit, with\nthe knowledge o' good an' evil,--a grain o' wheat an' a bushel o'\nchaff,--an' he reckons he'll hev ter cut an' run again.\"\n\nNarcissa's lips parted slightly. She listened in amazement to this\nstrange account of an aversion to that gay world in processional,\nchiefly in white-covered wagons, which she longed to see come down the\ncounty road.\n\n\"He be a powerful queer man,\" said Ben slowly, \"this hyar Alan\nSelwyn.\"\n\nAnd she felt that this was true.\n\nShe sat down beside her brother on the rock, and together they looked\ndown meditatively on the river. It was reddening now with the\nreflection of the reddening clouds. The water, nevertheless, asserted\nitself. Lengths of steely brilliancy showed now and again amidst the\nroseate suffusion, and anon spaces glimmered vacant of all but a dusky\nbrown suggestion of depth and a liquid lustre.\n\n\"Nar'sa,\" he said at last in a low voice, \"ye know they 'lowed that\nthe traveler what war killed, some say by his runaway horse, war\na-comin' ter see _him_,--this Alan Selwyn.\"\n\nThe white bonnet seemed to focus and retain the lingering light in the\nlandscape. Without its aid he might hardly have made shift to see her\nface.\n\n\"They 'lowed they knowed so by the papers the traveler had on him,\nthough this Selwyn 'lowed _he_ couldn't identify the dead man,\" he\ncontinued after a pause.\n\nShe gazed wonderingly at him, then absently down at the sudden\nscintillating white glitter of the reflection of the evening star in\nthe dusky red water. It burned with a yet purer, calmer radiance in\nthe roseate skies. She felt the weight of the darkening gloom,\ngathering beneath the trees around her, as if it hung palpably on her\nshoulders.\n\n\"Waal,\" he resumed, \"I b'lieve ef that thar traveler had been able ter\nspeak ter ye when ye fund him, like ye said he tried ter do, I\nb'lieve he would hev tole ye suthin' 'bout that thar valley man.\n_He_'s enough likelier ter hev bed suthin' ter do with the suddint\ntakin' off o' the feller than Con Hite.\"\n\nHer face was suddenly aghast. \"Who says Con Hite-- Why?\" She paused,\nher voice failing.\n\n\"Waal, ye know Con be a-moonshinin' again, an' some 'lows ez this\nhyar traveler warn't a traveler at all, but a revenuer,--strayed off\nsomehows from the rest o' 'em.\"\n\n\"Oh, how I wish he'd stop moonshinin' an' sech!\"\n\nShe moved so suddenly on the edge of the precipice, as she lifted her\nhands and drew down her sunbonnet over her face, that Ben's glance was\nfull of terror.\n\n\"Move back a mite, Nar'sa; ye'll go over the bluff, fust thing ye\nknow! Yes, Con's mighty wrong ter be moonshinin'. The law is the right\nthing. It purtects us. It holps us all. We-uns owe it obejiunce, like\nI hearn a man say in a speech down yander in\"--\n\n\"The law!\" cried Narcissa, with scorn. \"Con Hite kin tromp on the\nrevenue law from hyar ter the witch-face, fur all I keer. Purtects! I\npity a man ez waits fur the law ter purtect him; it's a heap apter ter\ngrind him ter pomace. _I_ mind moonshinin' 'kase it's dangersome fur\nthe moonshiners. The law--I don't count the fibble old law!\"\n\nShe sat brooding for a time, her face downcast. Then she spoke in a\nlow voice:--\n\n\"Whyn't ye find out, Ben? What ails ye ter be so good-fur-nuthin'?\nThar be other folks beside Con ez air law-breakers.\" She edged nearer\nto him, laying her hand on his arm. \"Ye've got to find out, Ben,\" she\nsaid insistently. \"Keep an eye on that thar valley man, an' find out\nall 'bout'n him. Else the killin' 'll be laid ter Con, who never done\nnuthin' hurtful ter nobody in all his life.\"\n\n\"The idee jes' streck me ter-day whenst I viewed him along about that\nroad. Whenst that thar dead man tuk yer han' an' tried ter find a word\nof speech-- Why, hullo, Narcissa!\"\n\nWith a short cry she had struggled to her feet. The gathering gloom,\nthe recollection of the tragedy, the association of ideas, bore too\nheavily on her nerves. She struck petulantly at his astounded face.\n\n\"Why air ye always remindin' me?\" she exclaimed, with a sharp\nupbraiding note. And then she began to cry out that she could see\nagain the coroner's jury pressing close about the corpse, with a keen\nravenous interest like the vile mountain vultures, and then\ncolloguing together aside, and nodding their heads and saying they had\nfound their verdict, when they had found nothing, not even the poor\ndead man; and she saw them here, and she saw them there, and\neverywhere in the darkling mountain woods, and she would see them\neverywhere as long as she should live, and she wished with all her\nheart that they were every one at the bottom of the black mountain\nriver.\n\nAnd the slow Ben wondered, as he sought to soothe her and take her\nhome, that a woman should be so sensitive to the mention of one dead\nman, and yet given to such wishes of the wholesale destruction of the\nharmless coroner's jury, because their appearance struck her amiss,\nand they collogued together, and nodded their heads unacceptably, and\nfound their verdict.\n\n\nV.\n\nExcept in so far as his sedulously cultivated fraternal sentiments\nwere concerned, the peculiar domestic training to which Ben Hanway had\nbeen subjected had had slight effect in softening a somewhat hard and\nstern character. To continue the canine simile by which his mother had\ndescribed him, his gentleness and watchful care toward his sister were\nnot more reassuring to the public at large than is the tender loyalty\nof a guard-dog toward the infant of a house which claims his fealty;\nthat the dog does not bite the baby is no fair augury that he will not\nbite the peddler or the prowler. The fact that the traveler had borne\nletters addressed to Alan Selwyn, and no other papers, and yet Alan\nSelwyn could not or would not identify him, had already furnished\nHanway with an ever-recurrent subject of cogitation. It had been the\npresumption of the coroner's jury, since confirmed by inquiry of the\npostmaster, that, going for some purpose to Alan Selwyn's lodge in the\nwilderness, the unknown traveler had, in passing, called for his\nprospective host's mail at the Cross-Roads, some fifteen miles distant\nand the nearest post-office, such being the courtesy of the region. A\nvisitor often insured a welcome by thus voluntarily expediting the\ndelivery of the mail some days, or perhaps some weeks, before its\nrecipient could have hoped to receive it otherwise. Hanway had long\nbeen cognizant of this habit of the Cross-Roads postmaster to accede\nto such requests on the part of reputable people, but he was reminded\nforcibly of it the next morning. A neighbor, homeward bound from a\nvisit to the valley, had paused at Hanway's house to leave a letter,\nwith which he had charged himself, addressed to Selwyn.\n\n\"I 'lowed ye mought be ridin' over thar some day, bein' ez ye air\ntoler'ble nigh neighbors,\" he said.\n\nAnd Hanway the more willingly undertook the delivery of the missive\nsince it afforded him a pretext for the reconnoissance which he had\nalready contemplated.\n\nRain-clouds had succeeded those fine aerial flauntings of the sunset\nsplendors, and he set out in the pervasive drizzle of a gray day. Torn\nand ragged with the rain and the gusts, the white mist seemed to come\nto meet him along the vistas of the dreary dripping woods. The tall\ntrees that shut off the sky loomed loftily through it. Sometimes, as\nthe wind quickened, it deployed in great luminously white columns,\nfollowing the invisible curves of the atmospheric current; and anon,\nin flaky detached fragments, it fled dispersed down the avenues like\nthe scattered stragglers of a routed army. The wind was having the\nbest of the contest; and though it still rained when he reached the\nvicinity of Alan Selwyn's lonely dwelling, the mist was gone, the\nclouds were all resolved into the steady fall of the torrents, and the\nlittle house on the slope of the mountain and all its surroundings\nwere visible.\n\nA log cabin it was, containing two rooms and the unaccustomed luxury\nof glass windows; so new that the hewn cedar logs had not yet\nweathered to the habitual dull gray tone, but glowed jauntily red as\nthe timbers alternated with the white and yellow daubing. A stanch\nstone chimney seemed an unnecessary note of ostentation, since the\nmore usual structure of clay and sticks might serve as well. It\nreminded Ben Hanway that its occupant was not native to the place, and\nwhetted anew his curiosity as he looked about, the reins on his\nhorse's neck in his slow approach. It was a sheltered spot; the great\nmountain's curving summit rose high toward the north and west above\nthe depression where the cabin stood; across the narrow valley a still\nmore elevated range intercepted the east wind. Only to the south was\nthe limited plateau open, sloping down to great cliffs, giving upon a\nvast expanse of mountain and valley and plain and far reaches of\nundulating country, promising in fair weather high, pure, soft air, a\ntempered gentle breeze, and the best that the sun can do.\n\nHe noted the advantages of the situation in reference to the \"lung\ncomplaint,\" feeling a loser in some sort; for he had begun to suspect\nthat the consumptive tendencies of the stranger were a vain pretense,\nassumed merely to delude the unwary. He could not have doubted long,\nfor when he dismounted and hitched his horse to the rail fence he\nheard the door of the house open, and as its owner, standing on the\nthreshold in the wind and the gusty rain, called out to him a\nwelcoming \"Hello,\" the word was followed by a series of hacking coughs\nwhich told their story as definitely as a medical certificate.\n\nBen Hanway was not a humane man in any special sense, but he was\nconscious of haste in concluding the tethering of the animal and in\nstriding across the vacant weed-grown yard striped with the\never-descending rain.\n\n\"Ye'd better git in out'n all this wind an' rain,\" he said in his\nrough voice. \"A power o' dampness in the air.\"\n\n\"No matter. There's no discount on me. Don't take cold nowadays. I've\ngot right well here already.\"\n\nThe passage-way was dark, but the room into which Ben was ushered,\nillumined by two opposite windows, was as bright as the day would\nallow. A roaring wood fire in the great chimney-place reinforced the\npallid gray light with glancing red and yellow fluctuations. The\napartment was comfortable enough, although its uses were evidently\nmultifarious,--partly kitchen, and dining-room, and sitting-room. Its\nfurniture consisted of several plain wooden chairs, a table and\ncrockery, a few books on a shelf, a lounge in the corner, and a rifle,\nafter the manner of the mountaineers, over the mantelpiece. Upon the\nshelf a cheap clock ticked away the weary minutes of the lonely hours\nof the long empty days while the valley man abode here, exiled from\nhome and friends and his accustomed sphere, and fought out that\nhopeless fight for his life.\n\nBen Hanway gave him a keen, covert stare, as he slowly and clumsily\naccepted the tendered chair and his host threw another log on the\nfire. Hanway had seen him previously, when Selwyn testified before the\ncoroner's jury, but to-day he impressed his visitor differently. He\nwas tall and slight, twenty-five years of age, perhaps, with light\nbrown hair, sleek and shining and short, a quick blue eye, a fair\ncomplexion with a brilliant flush, and a long mustache. But the\nbizarre effect produced by this smiling apparition in the jaws of\ndeath seemed to Hanway's limited experience curiously enhanced by his\nattire. Its special peculiarity was an old smoking-jacket, out at the\nelbows, ragged at the cuffs, and frayed at the silk collar; Hanway had\nnever before seen a man wear a red coat, or such foot-gear as the\nslipshod embroidered velvet slippers in which he shuffled to a chair\nand sat down, tilted back, with his hands in the pockets of his gray\ntrousers. To be sure, he could but be grave when testifying before a\ncoroner's jury, but Hanway was hardly prepared for such exuberant\ncheerfulness as his manner, his attire, and his face seemed to\nindicate.\n\n\"Ain't ye sorter lonesome over hyar?\" he ventured.\n\n\"You bet your sweet life I am,\" his host replied unequivocally. A\nshade crossed his face, and vanished in an instant. \"But then,\" he\nargued, \"I didn't have such a soft thing where I was. I was a\nclerk--that is, a bookkeeper--on a salary, and I had to work all day,\nand sometimes nearly all night!\"\n\nHe belittled his former vocation with airy contempt, as if he did not\nyearn for it with every fibre of his being,--its utility, its\ncompetence, its future. The recollection of the very feel of the fair\nsmooth paper under his hand, the delicate hair-line chirography\ntrailing off so fast from the swift pen, could wring a pang from him.\nHe might even have esteemed an oath more binding sworn on a ledger\nthan on the New Testament.\n\n\"And we were a small house, anyway, and the salary was no great\nshakes,\" he continued jauntily, to show how little he had to regret.\n\n\"An' now ye ain't got nuthin' ter do but ter read yer book,\" said the\nmountaineer acquiescently, realizing, in spite of his clumsy mental\nprocesses, how the thorn pierced the bosom pressed against it.\n\nSelwyn followed his guest's glance to the shelf of volumes with an\nunaffected indifference.\n\n\"Yes, but I don't care for it. I wish I did, since I have the time.\nBut the liking for books has to be cultivated, like a taste for beer;\nthey are both a deal too sedative for me!\" The laugh that ensued was\nchoked with a cough, and the tactless Hanway was moved to expostulate.\n\n\"I wonder ye ain't 'feared ter be hyar all by yerse'f hevin' the lung\ncomplaint.\"\n\n\"Why, man alive, I'm well, or so near it there's no use talking. I\ncould go home to-morrow, except, as I have had the house built, I\nthink I'd better stay the winter in it. But before the cold weather\ncomes on they are going to send up a darky to look after me. I only\nhope _I_ won't have to wait on _him_,--awful lazy nigger! He used to\nbe a porter of ours. Loafing around these woods with a gun on his\nshoulder, pretending to hunt, will be just about his size. He's out of\na job now, and comes cheap. I couldn't afford to pay him wages all the\ntime, but winter is winter.\"\n\nHe was silent a moment, gazing into the fire; then Hanway, gloomily\nbrooding and disturbed, for the conversation had impressed him much as\nif it had been post-mortem, so immediate seemed his companion's doom,\nfelt Selwyn's eye upon him, as if his sentiment were so obvious that\nthe sense of sight had detected it.\n\n\"You think I'm going to die up here all by myself. Now I tell you, my\ngood fellow, dying is the very last thing that I expect to do.\"\n\nHe broke out laughing anew, and this time he did not cough.\n\nHanway could not at once cover his confusion. He looked frowningly\ndown at the steam rising from his great cowhide boots, outstretched as\nthey dried in the heat of the fire, and slowly shifted them one above\nthe other. The flush on his sunburned cheek rose to the roots of his\ndark hair, and overspread his clumsy features. His appearance did not\ngive token of any very great delicacy of feeling, but he regretted his\ntransparency, and sought to nullify it.\n\n\"Not that,\" he said disingenuously; \"but bein' all by yerse'f, I\nwonder ye ain't willin' fur the county road ter be put through. 'T\nwould run right by yer gate, an' ye could h'ist the winder an' talk to\nthe folks passin'. Ye wouldn't be lonely never.\"\n\nFor the first time Selwyn looked like a man of business. His eyes grew\nsteady. His face was firm and serious and non-committal. He said\nnothing. Hanway cleared his throat and crossed his legs anew. The\nthought of his true intention in coming hither, not his ostensible\nerrand, had recurred more than once to his mind,--to lay bare the\nsecret touching the visitor to Selwyn's remote dwelling, whom he could\nnot or would not identify; and if there were aught amiss, as the\nmountaineer suspected, to take such action thereupon as in the\nfullness of his own good judgment seemed fit. But since the man was\nevidently so sharp, Hanway had hitherto feared even indirectly to\ntrench upon it; here, however, the opening was so natural, so\npropitious, that he was fain to take advantage of it.\n\n\"An' see,\" he resumed, \"what dangers kem o' hevin' no road. That thar\nman what war killed las' month, ef we hed hed a reg'lar county road,\nworked on an' kep' open, stiddier this hyar herder's trail, this-a-way\nan' that, he could hev rid along ez free an' favored, an'\"--\n\n\"Why,\" Selwyn broke in, \"the testimony was to the effect that he was\nriding a young, skittish horse, which was startled by stray hogs\nbreaking at a dead run through the bushes, and that the horse bolted\nand ran away. And the man died from concussion of the brain. That\nwould have happened if we had had a road of the first class, twenty\nfeet wide, instead of this little seven-foot freak you all are so\nmashed on.\"\n\nHis face had not lost a tinge of its brilliant color. His animated\neyes were still fired by that inward flame that was consuming his\nyears, his days, even his minutes, it might seem. His hands, fine,\nwhite, and delicate, were thrust jauntily into the pockets of his red\njacket, and Hanway felt himself no nearer the heart of the mystery\nthan before. The subject, evidently, was not avoided, held naught of\nmenace. He went at it directly.\n\n\"Seems strange he war a-comin' ter visit you-uns, an' hed yer mail in\nhis pocket, an' ye never seen him afore,\" he hazarded, \"nor knowed who\nhe war.\"\n\n\"But I have found out since,\" Selwyn said, his clear eyes resting on\nhis visitor without the vestige of an affrighted thought. \"He was Mr.\nKeith, a chemist from Glaston; he was quite a notable authority on\nmatters of physical science generally. I had written to him\nabout--about some points of interest in the mountains, and as he was\nat leisure he concluded to come and investigate--and--take a holiday.\nHe didn't let me know, and as I had never seen him I didn't at first\neven imagine it was he.\"\n\nThere was a silence. Selwyn's blue eyes dwelt on the fast-descending\nlines of rain that now blurred all view of the mountains; the globular\ndrops here and there adhering to the pane, ever dissolving and ever\nrenewed, obscured even the small privilege of a glimpse of the\ndooryard. The continual beat on the roof had the regularity and the\ntireless suggestion of machinery.\n\n\"How did ye find out?\" demanded Hanway, his theory evaporating into\nthin air.\n\n\"Why, as he didn't reply to my letter about a matter of such\nimportance\"--he checked himself suddenly, then went on more\nslowly--\"it occurred to me that he might have decided to come, and\nmight have been the man who was killed. So I wrote to his brother. He\nhad not been expected at home earlier. His brother doesn't incline to\nthe foul-play theory. The horse he rode is a wild young animal that\nhas run away two or three times. He had been warned repeatedly against\nriding that horse, but he thought him safe enough. The horse has\nreturned home,--got there the day my letter was received. So the\nbrother and an officer came and exhumed the body: he was buried, you\nknow, after the inquest, over in the little graveyard yonder on the\nslope of the mountain.\"\n\nSelwyn shivered slightly, and the fine white hands came out of the\ngaudy red pockets, and fastened the frogs beneath the lapels across\nhis chest, to draw the smoking-jacket closer.\n\n\"Great Scott! what a fate,--to be left in that desolate\nburying-ground! Death is death, there.\"\n\n\"Death is death anywhar,\" said the mountaineer gloomily.\n\n\"No. Get you a mile or two of iron fence, and stone gates, and lots of\nsculptured marble angels around, and death is peace, or rest, or\nheaven, or paradise, according to your creed and the taste of the\nsubject; but here you are done for and dead.\"\n\nHanway, in the limited experience of the mountaineer, could not follow\nthe theory, and he forbore to press it further.\n\n\"Well,\" Selwyn resumed, \"they took him home, and I was glad to see him\ngo. I was glad to see them filling that hole up. I took a pious\ninterest in that. I should have felt it was waiting for me. I shoveled\nsome of the earth back myself.\"\n\nThe wind surged around the house, and shook the outer doors. The rain\ntrampled on the roof like a squadron of cavalry. With his fate\nstanding ever behind him, almost visibly looking over his shoulder,\nalthough he saw it not, the valley man was a pathetic object to the\nmountaineer. Hanway's eyes were hot and burned as he looked at him; if\nhe had been but a little younger, they might have held tears. But\nHanway had passed by several years his majority, and esteemed himself\nexempt from boyish softness.\n\nSelwyn shook off the impression with a shiver, and bent forward to\nmend the fire.\n\n\"Where were you yesterday?\" he asked, seeking a change of subject.\n\n\"At home sowin' turnip seed, mos'ly. I never hearn nuthin' 'bout'n it\nall.\"\n\nSelwyn threw himself back in his chair, his brow corrugated\nimpatiently at this renewal of the theme, and in the emergency he even\nresorted to the much-mooted point of the thoroughfare.\n\n\"I suppose all the family there are dead gone on that road?\" he sought\nto make talk.\n\n\"Dad an' aunt M'nervy don't keer one way nor another, but my sister\nair plumb beset fur the jury of view to put it through.\"\n\n\"Why?\" Selwyn had a mental vision of some elderly, thrifty mountain\ndame with a long head turned toward the enhancement of the values of a\nleague or so of mountain land.\n\nHanway, slow and tenacious of impressions, could not so readily rouse\na vital interest in another subject. He still gazed with melancholy\neyes at the fire, and his heart felt heavy and sore.\n\n\"Waal,\" he answered mechanically, \"she 'lows she wants ter see the\nfolks go up an' down, an' up an' down.\"\n\nSelwyn's blue eyes opened. \"Folks?\" he asked wonderingly. The rarest\nof apparitions on Witch-Face Mountain were \"folks.\"\n\nHanway roused himself slightly, and raucously cleared his throat to\nexplain.\n\n\"She 'lows thar'll be cornsider'ble passin'. Folks, in the fall o' the\nyear, mought be a-wagonin' of chestnuts over the mounting an' down ter\nColb'ry; an' thar's the Quarterly Court days; some attends, leastwise\nthe jestices; an' whenst they hev preachin' in the Cove; an' wunst in\na while thar _mought_ be a camp-meetin'. She sets cornsider'ble store\non lookin' at the folks ez will go up an' down.\"\n\nThere was a swift movement in the pupils of the valley man's eyes. It\nwas an expression closely correlated to laughter, but the muscles of\nhis face were still, and he remained decorously grave.\n\nThere was some thought in his mind that held him doubtful for a\nmoment. His craft was cautious of its kind, and his manner was quite\nincidental as he said, \"And the others of the family?\"\n\n\"Thar ain't no others,\" returned Hanway, stolidly unmarking.\n\n\"Oh, so you are the eldest?\"\n\n\"By five year. Narcissa ain't more 'n jes' turned eighteen.\"\n\nThe valley man's face was flushed more deeply still; his brilliant\neyes were elated.\n\n\"_Narcissa!_\" he cried, with the joy of delighted identification.\n\"She is the girl, then, that testified at the inquest. _Narcissa!_\"\n\nHanway lifted his head, with a strong look of surly objection on his\nheavy features. Selwyn noted it with a glow of growing anger. He felt\nthat he had said naught amiss. People could not expect their sisters\nto escape attracting notice, especially a sister with a remarkable\nname and endowed with a face like this one's.\n\n\"Narcissa,--that's an odd name,\" he said, partly in bravado, and\npartly in justification of the propriety of his previous mention of\nher. \"I knew a man once named Narcissus. Must be the feminine of\nNarcissus. Good name for her, though.\" The recollection of the white\nflower-like face, the corolla of red-gold hair, came over him. \"Looks\njust like 'em.\"\n\nHanway, albeit all alert now, descried in this naught more poetical\nthan the fact that Selwyn considered that his sister resembled a man\nof his acquaintance. As for that fairest of all spring flowers, it had\nnever gladdened the backwoods range of his vision.\n\nThe exclusive tendency of the human mind is tested by this discovery\nof a casual resemblance to a stranger. One invariably sustains an\naffront at its mention. Whatever one's exterior may be, it possesses\nthe unique merit of being one's own, and the aversion to share its\ntraits with another, and that other a stranger, is universal. In this\ninstance the objection was enhanced by the fact that the stranger was\na man; _ergo_, in Hanway's opinion, more or less clumsy and burly and\nugly; the masculine type of his acquaintance presenting to his mind\nfew of the superior elements of beauty. He resented the liberty the\nstranger took in resembling Narcissa, and he resented still more\nSelwyn's effrontery in discovering the likeness.\n\n\"Not ez much alike ez two black-eyed peas, now. I reckon not,--I\nreckon not,\" he sneered, as he rose to bring his visit to an end.\n\nHis host's words of incipient surprise were checked as Hanway slowly\ndrew forth from his pocket a letter.\n\n\"Old man Binney war at the Cross-Roads Sad'day, an' he fotched up some\nmail fur the neighbors. He lef' this letter fur you-uns at our house,\n'lowin' ez I would fetch it over.\"\n\nSelwyn sat silent for a moment. He felt that severe reprehension and\ndistrust which a man of business always manifests upon even the most\ntrifling interference with his vested rights in his own mail matter.\nThe rural method of aiding in distributing the mail was peculiarly\nunpalatable to him. He much preferred that his letters should lie in\nthe post-office at the Cross-Roads until such time as it suited his\nconvenience to saddle his horse and ride thither for them. The\npostmaster, on the contrary, seized the opportunity whenever\nresponsible parties were \"ridin' up inter the mounting\" to entrust to\nthem the neighborhood mail, thus expediting its delivery perhaps by\nthree weeks, or even more, and receiving in every instance the\nbenediction of his distant beneficiaries of the backwoods.\n\n\"I'll write to the postmaster this very day!\" Selwyn thought, as he\ntore the envelope open and mastered its contents at a swift glance. A\nhalf-suppressed but delighted excitement shone suddenly in his eyes,\nand smoothed every line of agitation and anxiety from his brow.\n\n\"I'm a thousand times obliged to you for bringing it,\" he exclaimed,\n\"and for staying awhile and talking! I wish you would come again. But\nI'm coming to see you, to return your call.\" He laughed gayly at the\nsophisticated phrase. \"Coming soon.\"\n\nHanway's growl of pretended pleasure in the prospect was rendered\nnearly inarticulate by the thought of Narcissa. He had not anticipated\na return of the courtesy. He had no welcome for this stranger, and\nsomehow he felt that he did not altogether understand Narcissa at\ntimes; that she had flights of fancy which were beyond him, and took a\nmischievous pleasure in tantalizing him, and was freakish and hard to\ncontrol.\n\nMoreover, under the influence of this reaction of feeling, a modicum\nof his doubts of Selwyn had revived. Not that he suspected him, as\nheretofore, but a phrase that had earlier struck his attention came\nback to him. Selwyn had written, he said, to the traveler to come and\n\"investigate,\" and he had hesitated and chosen his phrases, and half\ndiscarded them, and slurred over his statement. What was there to\n\"investigate\" in the mountains? What prospect of profit worth a long,\nlonely journey and a risk that ended in death? The capture of\nmoonshiners was said to be a paying business, and an informer also\nreaped a reward. Hanway wondered if Con Hite could be the point of\n\"investigation,\" if the dead man were indeed of the revenue force.\n\n\"Oh, you needn't shut the door on me,\" Selwyn said, as they stood\ntogether in the passage, and Hanway, with his instinct to cut him off,\nhad made a motion to draw the door after him; \"this mountain air is so\nbland, even when it is damp.\" He paused on the dripping threshold,\nwith his hands in the pockets of his red jacket, and surveyed with\nsmiling complacence the forlorn, weeping day, and the mountains\ncowering under their misty veil, and the sodden dooryard, and the\nwild rocks and chasms of the gorge, adown the trough of which a stream\nunknown to the dry weather was tumbling with a suggestion of flight\nand trouble and fear in its precipitancy. \"I'm well, well as a bear;\nand I'm getting fat as a bear, doing nothing. Feel my arm. I'm just\nfollowing the example of the bears about this time of the\nyear,--hibernating, going into winter quarters. I'm going to get this\nplace into good shape to sell some day. I have bought that land over\nthere all down the gorge from Squire Helm; and last July I bought all\nthat slope at the tax sale, but that is subject to redemption; and\nthen I am trying to buy in the rear of my wigwam, too,--a thousand\nacres.\"\n\n\"Ye kin sell it higher ef the road goes through,\" said Hanway\ndoubtfully.\n\nIt seemed very odd that the man who protested that his stay in the\nmountains was so temporary, and whose stay in the world was evidently\nso short, should spend his obviously scanty substance in purchase\nafter purchase of the worthless mountain wilderness. To be sure, the\nland was cheap, but it cost something. And Hanway looked again at the\nfrayed cuffs and elbows of the red smoking-jacket. In his infrequent\nvisits to Colbury, he had noted the variance of the men's costumes\nwith the mountain standard of dress. He saw naught like this, but he\nknew that if ever the sober burghers lent themselves to this sort of\nfantastic toggery, it was certainly whole.\n\n\"Say, my friend, what day does the jury of view hold forth?\" Selwyn\ncalled out after the slouching figure, striped with the diagonal lines\nof rain and flouted by the wind, tramping across the weeds of the yard\nto his horse.\n\n\"Nex' Chewsday week,\" Hanway responded hoarsely.\n\n\"Well, if this weather holds out, it is to be hoped that the gentlemen\nof the jury are web-footed!\" Selwyn exclaimed.\n\nHe shut the door, and as he went back to his lonely hearth his eyes\nfell upon the letter lying on the table.\n\n\"Now,\" he said as he took it again in his hand, \"if fate should truly\ncut such a caper as to make my fortune in this forlorn exile, I could\nfind it in my heart to laugh the longest and the loudest at the joke.\"\n\n\nVI.\n\nIf it had been within the power of the worshipful Quarterly County\nCourt to issue a mandamus to compel fair weather on that notable\nTuesday when the jury of view were to set forth, the god of day could\nscarcely have obeyed with more alacrity that peremptory writ once\npoetically ranked as \"one of the flowers of the crown.\" The burnished\nyellow sunshine had a suggestion of joyous exuberance in its wide\nsuffusions. Even the recurrent fluctuations of shadow but gave its\npervasive sheen the effect of motion and added embellishment. The\nwind, hilarious, loud, piping gayly a tuneful stave, shepherded the\nclouds in the fair fields of the high sky, driving the flocculent\nwhite masses here and there as listed a changing will. The trees were\nred and yellow, the leaves firm, full-fleshed, as if the ebbing sap of\nsummer still ran high in every fibre; their tint seemed no hectic\ndying taint, but some inherent chromatic richness. Fine avenues the\neye might open amongst the rough brown boles that stood in dense\nranks, preternaturally dark and distinct, washed by the recent rains,\nand thrown into prominence by the masses of yellow and red leaves\ncarpeting the ground, and the red and yellow boughs hanging low above.\nThey dispensed to the light, clarified air an aromatic richness that\nthe lungs rejoiced to breathe, and all their flare of color might have\nseemed adequate illumination of their demesne without serving writs of\nmandamus on the sun; and indeed, the Quarterly County Court was fain\nto concern itself with far lesser matters, and wield slighter weapons.\nThe jury of view, in a close squad, ambling along at an easy gait,\nmounted on nags as diverse in appearance, age, and manner as the\nriders, sufficiently expressed its authority and their own diligence\nin its behests, and their spirits had risen to the propitious aspect\nof the weather and the occasion. Their advent into this secluded\nregion of the district--for to secure a strict impartiality they were\nnot of the immediate neighborhood, and had no interest which could be\naffected by their report--was not hailed with universal satisfaction.\n\n\"Jes' look at 'em, now,\" said old man Binney, as he stood in his door,\nleaning on his stick, to watch them pass,--\"a jury o' view. An' who\never viewed a jury a-horseback afore? An' thar ain't but seben on\n'em!\"--laboriously counting, \"five, six, seben. Thar's _twelve_ men on\na sure enough jury! I counted the panel ez hung Ezekiel Tilbuts fur\na-murderin' of his wife. I war thar in town whenst they fetched in\nthar verdic'. I dunno what the kentry be a-comin' ter! Shucks! I ain't\na-goin' ter abide by the say-so o' no sech skimpy jury ez this hyar.\nI'll go ter town an' see old Lawyer Gryce 'bout it, fust.\"\n\nAnd with this extremest threat of vengeance he brought his stick down\non the floor with so vigorous a thump that it had a certain profane\neffect; then having from under his bushy gray eyebrows gazed at the\ndiminishing group till it was but a dim speck in the distance, he went\nin muttering, banging the door as if to shut out and reject the sight.\nHis objection might have been intensified had he known that the days\nwere at hand when legislative wisdom would still further reduce this\nengine of the law, making it consist of one road commissioner and two\nfreeholders, the trio still pridefully denominated a \"jury of view.\"\n\nOthers, however, favoring the enterprise, cheerfully fell into the\nline of march; and as the way lengthened the cavalcade grew, mustering\nrecruits as it went.\n\nDisputatious voices suddenly sounded loud on the clear air in front of\nthem, mingled with the thud of horses' hoofs, the jingle of spurs, and\nnow and again the whinny of a colt; and at the intersection of the\ntrail with a narrow winding path there rode into view old \"Persimmon\"\nSneed,--as he was sometimes disrespectfully nicknamed, owing to a\njuvenile and voracious fondness for the most toothsome delicacy of\nautumn woods,--arguing loudly, and with a lordly intolerance of\ncontradiction, with two men who accompanied him, while his sleek\nclaybank mare also argued loudly with her colt. She had much ado to\npace soberly forward, even under the coercion of whip and spur, while\nher madcap scion galloped wildly ahead or lagged far in the rear, and\nmade now and then excursions into the woods, out of sight, to gratify\nsome adolescent curiosity, or perhaps, after the fashion of other and\nhuman adolescents, to relish the spectacle of the maternal anxiety.\nEver and anon the sound of the mare's troubled call rang on the air.\nThen the colt would come with a burst of speed, a turbulent rush, out\nof the underbrush, and, with its keen head-tones of a whinny, all\nfunnily treble and out of tune, dash on in advance. The rider of this\npreoccupied steed was a grizzled, lank, thin-visaged mountaineer, with\na tuft of beard on his chin, but a shaven jowl, where, however, the\nblack-and-gray stubble of several days' avoidance of the razor put\nforth unabashed. He shook his finger impressively at the jury of view\nas he approached them.\n\n\"Ef ye put this hyar road through my land,\" he said solemnly, \"I'll be\nteetotally ruinationed. The cattle-thievin' that'll go on, with the\nwoods so open an' the road so convenient, an' yit no travel sca'cely,\nwill be a scandal ter the jay-bird. I won't hev so much lef' ez the\nhorn of a muley cow!\"\n\nAnd with this extreme statement he whirled his horse and rode on at\nthe head of the cavalcade in dignified silence. He was not a dweller\nin the immediate vicinity, but hailed from the Cove,--a man of\nsubstance and a large cattle-owner, pasturing his herds, duly branded,\non a tract of unfenced wilderness, his mountain lands, where they\nroamed in the safe solitudes of those deep seclusions during the\nsummer, and were rounded up, well fattened, and driven home at the\napproach of winter. He was the typical man of convictions, one who\nentertains a serious belief that he possesses a governing conscience\ninstead of an abiding delight in his own way. He had a keen eye, with\nan upward glance from under the brim of his big wool hat, and he\nlooked alert to descry any encroachment on his vested rights to\nprescribe opinion. The jury of view were destined to find it a\ndoubtful boon that the road law interposed no insurmountable obstacle\nto prevent their hearing thus informally the views of those\ninterested.\n\nPersimmon Sneed's deep feeling on the subject had been evinced by his\ndispensing with the customary salutations, and one of the jury of\nview, with a mollifying intention, observed that they would use their\nbest judgment to promote the interests of all parties.\n\n\"Ai-yi!\" said Persimmon Sneed, ruefully shaking his head. \"But s'pose\nye hev got mighty pore jedgmint? Ye'll be like mos' folks I know, ef\nye hev. I'd ruther use my own best jedgmint, a sight.\"\n\nAt which another of the jury suavely remarked that they would seek to\nbe impartial.\n\n\"That's jes' what I kem along fur,\" exclaimed Persimmon Sneed\ntriumphantly,--\"ter show ye edzac'ly whar the bull's eye be. Thar\nain't no use fur this road, an' ye air bound ter see it ef ye ain't\nnowise one-sided and partial.\"\n\nThe jury relapsed into silence and rode steadily on.\n\nThe true raw material of contradiction lay in three younger men among\nthe spectators, contumacious, vehement, and, albeit opposed to the\nroad, much inclined to spoke the wheel of old Persimmon Sneed, however\nthat wheel might revolve.\n\n\"I got caught on a jury in a criminal case with him wunst,\" Silas\nBoyd, a heavy, thick-set, tall young fellow with a belligerent eye and\na portentously square jaw, said _sotto voce_ to his next comrade. \"I\nhev sarved on a jury with him,--locked up fur a week 'thout no\nverdic'. He ain't got no respec' fur no other man's say-so. An' he\ntalks 'bout _his_ oath ez ef he war the only man in Tennessee ez ever\nwar swore on the 'Holy Evangelists o' Almighty Gawd' in the\ncourt-house. He fairly stamped on my feelin's, in that Jenkins case,\nter make me agree with him; but I couldn't agree, an' it hung the\njury, ez they say. I wisht they hed hung the foreman! By Hokey, I\ndespise a hard-headed, 'pinionated man.\"\n\n\"Look at his back,\" rejoined Jeremiah Sayres, a man of theory, who had\na light undecided tint of hair and beard and scraggy mustache, and a\nblond complexion burned a permanent solid red by the summer sun. \"I'd\nknow his dispositions by his back.\" He waved his hand at the brown\njeans coat that draped a spare and angular but singularly erect back,\nwhich scarcely seemed to move in response to the motions of the mare\npacing briskly along. \"What sorter back is that fur a man risin' fifty\nyear old?--straight ez a ramrod, an' ez stiff. But, Silas, ef ever ye\ngit the better o' him, ye hev got ter break it.\"\n\n\"I hearn his third wife married him ter git rid o' him,\" put in Peter\nSims, given to gossip. \"She 'lowed he warn't nigh so tarrifyin' 'roun'\nhis own house, a-feedin' the peegs, an' ploughin' an' cuttin' wood,\nan' sech, _occupied somehows_, ez he war a-settin' up in his Sunday\nbest at her house, with nuthin' ter do, allowin' she _hed_ ter marry\nhim, whether or not, 'kase he wouldn't hev 'No' fur a answer.\"\n\n\"An' look at it now!\" exclaimed Silas Boyd, unexpectedly reinforced by\nthe matrimonial phase of the question. \"That thar man hev bodaciously\nargued an' contradicted two wimmin out'n this vale o' tears. An'\neverybody knows it takes a power o' contradiction to out-do a woman.\nHe oughter be indicted for cold-blooded murder! That's what!\" He\nnodded vindictively at the straight jeans-clad back in advance of him.\n\nOver and again the party called a halt, to push about in search of a\npracticable seven-foot passage amongst crags and chasms, and to\ncontend with the various insistence touching devious ways preferred by\nthe honorary attendants, who often seemed to forget that they\nthemselves were not in the exercise of a delegated jury duty. Tangles\nimpeded, doubts beset them, although the axe by which the desired\nroute had been blazed out aforetime by the petitioners had been\nzealous and active; but the part of a pioneer in a primeval wilderness\nis indeed the threading of a clueless labyrinth, and both sun and\ncompass were consulted often before the continued direction of the\nroad could be determined and located.\n\nIn such cases, to the lovers of the consistent in character, the\nrespective traits of old Persimmon Sneed and Silas Boyd were displayed\nin all their pristine value; for although their interests were\nidentical, both being opposed to the opening of the road, the\ndictatorial arrogations of the elder man and the pugnacious\npersistence of the younger served to antagonize them on many a minor\npoint in question, subsidiary to the main issue, as definitely as if\nthey were each arrayed against the other, instead of both being in\narms under the \"No Road\" banner.\n\n\"Mighty nigh ez interestin' ez a dog-fight,\" said Jeremiah Sayres in\nan aside to one of the jury.\n\nMidday found them considerably advanced on their way, but brought to a\nhalt by an insistence on the part of Silas Boyd that the road should\nbe diverted from a certain depression showing marshy tendencies to a\nrugged slope where the footing was dry but difficult.\n\n\"That's under water more 'n haffen the winter, I'll take my\neverlastin' oath. Ef the road runs thar, that piece will take enough\nmendin' in a season ter keep up ten mile o' dry road,\" he argued\nvehemently.\n\n\"Water ain't dangersome, nowise,\" retorted the elderly Persimmon, with\na snarling smile. \"Healthier 'n whiskey, my frien',--_heap_ healthier\n'n whiskey.\"\n\nBoyd's serious countenance colored darkly red with wrath. Among the\naggressive virtues of old Persimmon Sneed were certain whiskey-proof\ntemperance principles, the recollection of which was peculiarly\nirritating to Silas Boyd, known to be more than ordinarily susceptible\nto proof whiskey.\n\n\"I be a perfessin' Baptis', Mr. Sneed,\" he retorted quickly. \"I got no\nobjection ter water, 'ceptin' fur the onregenerate an' spurners o'\nsalvation.\"\n\nNow Persimmon Sneed had argued the plan of atonement on every possible\nbasis known to his extremely limited polemical outlook, and could\nagree with none. If any sect of eclectics had been within his reach,\nhe would most joyfully have cast his spiritual fortunes with them, for\nhe felt himself better than very many conspicuous Christians; and as\nhe would have joyed in a pose of sanctity, the reproach of being a\nmember of no church touched him deeply.\n\n\"I ain't no ransomed saint, I know,\" he vociferated,--\"I ain't no\nransomed saint! But ef the truth war known, ye ain't got no religion\nnuther! That leetle duckin' ez ye call 'immersion' jes' diluted the\n'riginal sin in ye mighty leetle. Ye air a toler'ble strong toddy o'\niniquity yit. That thar water tempered the whiskey ye drink mighty\nleetle,--mighty leetle!\"\n\nThe Christian grace of Silas Boyd was put to a stronger test than it\nmight have been deemed capable of sustaining. But Sneed was a far\nolder man, and as nothing short of breaking his stiff neck might\nsuffice to tame him, Silas Boyd summoned his self-control, and held\nhis tingling hands, and gave himself only to retort.\n\n\"I wouldn't take that off'n ye, Mr. Sneed, 'ceptin' I be a perfessin'\nmember, an' pity them ez is still in the wiles an' delusions o'\nSatan.\"\n\nWhat might have ensued in the nature of counterthrust, as Persimmon\nSneed heard himself called by inference an object of pity, the\nsubsidiary group were spared from learning, for at that moment the\nsound of steps heralded an approach, and Ben Hanway came into the\ncircle, and sought to claim the attention of the party, inviting them\nto dine and pass the nooning hour at his house. His countenance was\nadjusted to the smile of hospitality, but it wore the expression like\na mask, and he seemed ill at ease. He had been contending all the\nmorning with Narcissa's freakishness, which he thought intensified by\nthe presence of the valley man, who was returning the civility of that\nill-omened visit, and who, by reason of the abnormal excitements of\nthe day, had been received with scant formality, and was already upon\nthe footing of a familiar friend. Selwyn stood smilingly in the way\nhard by, speaking to those of the men as they passed who gave his\npresence the meed of a start and a stare of blank surprise, or a curt\nnod. Narcissa lingered in the background, beneath a great oak; her\nchin was a little lifted with a touch of displeasure; the eyelids\ndrooped over her brown eyes; her hands, with her wonted careless\ngesture and with a certain mechanical effort to dispel embarrassment,\nwere raised to the curtain of her white sunbonnet, and spread its\nfolds wingwise behind her auburn hair. Sundry acquaintances among the\nhonorary attendants paused to greet her pleasantly as they passed, but\nold Sneed's disapprobation of a woman's appearance on so public an\noccasion was plainly expressed on his features. For all the Turks are\nnot in Turkey. She followed with frowning, disaffected eyes the\nprocession of men and horses and dogs and colts wending up to the\ninvisible house hidden amongst the full-leaved autumn woods.\n\n\"Well, that's the jury of view; and what do you think of them?\" asked\nSelwyn, watching too, but smilingly, the cavalcade.\n\n\"Some similar ter the cor'ner's jury. But _they_ hed suthin' ter look\ntormented an' tribulated 'bout,\" said the girl, evidently disappointed\nto find the jury of view not more cheerful of aspect. \"But mebbe\nconversin' a passel by the way with old Persimmon Sneed is powerful\ndepressin' ter the sperits.\"\n\nSelwyn's face grew grave at the mention of the coroner's jury.\n\n\"I'm afraid that poor fellow missed something good,\" he said.\n\nStill holding out her sunbonnet in wide distention, she slowly set\nforth along the path, not even turning back, for sheer perversity, as\nshe saw Ben look anxiously over his shoulder to descry if she followed\nin the distance.\n\n\"Thar ain't much good in life nohow. Things seem set contrariwise.\"\nThen, after a moment, and turning her eyes upon him, for she had an\nalmost personal interest in the man whose tragic fate she had first of\nall discovered, \"What sorter good thing did he miss?\" she asked, as\nshe settled her sunbonnet soberly on her head.\n\n\"Well\"--Selwyn began; then he hesitated. He had spoken rather than\nthought, for he thought little, and he was not used to keeping\nsecrets. Moreover, despite his courageous disbelief in his coming\nfate, he must have had some yearnings for sympathy; the iron of his\nexile surely entered his soul at times. The girl, so delicately\nframed, so flower-like of face, seemed alien to her rude surroundings\nand the burly, heavy, matter-of-fact folk about her. Her spirituelle\npresence did away in a measure with the realization of her\nlimitations, her ignorance, and the uncouth surroundings. Even her\ndress seemed to him hardly amiss, for there then reigned a fleeting\nmetropolitan fashion of straight full flowing skirts and short waists\nand closely fitting sleeves,--a straining after picture-like effects\nwhich Narcissa's attire accomplished without conscious effort, the\ncostume of the mountain women for a hundred years or more. The\nsunbonnet itself was but the defensive appurtenance of many a Southern\ncity girl, when a-summering in the country, who esteems herself the\npossessor of a remarkably beautiful complexion, and heroically\nproposes to conserve it. Unlike the men, Narcissa's personality did\nnot suggest the distance between them in sophistication, in culture,\nin refinement, in the small matters of external polish. She seemed not\nso far from his world, and it was long since he had walked fraternally\nby the side of some fair girl, and talked freely of himself, his\nviews, his plans, his vagaries, as men, when very young, are wont to\ndo, and as they rarely talk to one another. He had so sedulously\nsought to content himself with the conditions of his closing existence\nthat the process of reconciling the habit of better things was lost in\nsimple acceptance. He was still young, and the sun shone, and the air\nwas clear and pure and soft, and he walked by the side of a girl, fair\nand good and not altogether unwise, and he was happy in the blessings\nvouchsafed.\n\nAfter a moment he replied: \"Well, I thought he might have made a lot\nof money. I thought I might go partners with him. I had written to\nhim.\"\n\nHer face did not change; it was still grave and solicitous within the\nwhite frame of her sunbonnet, but its expression did not deepen. She\ndid not pity the dead man because he died without the money he had\nhad a chance to make. She evidently had not even scant knowledge of\nthat most absorbing passion, the love of gain, and she did not value\nmoney.\n\n\"Somehow whenst folks dies by accident, it 'pears ter me a\nmistake--somehows--ez ef they war choused out'n time what war laid off\nfur them an' their'n by right.\" Evidently she did not lack\nsensibility.\n\n\"Yes,\" he rejoined, \"and you know money makes a lot of difference in\npeople's lives there in the valley towns. Lord knows, 't would in\nmine.\"\n\nHe swung his riding-whip dejectedly to and fro in his hand as he\nspoke, and she pushed back her sunbonnet to look seriously at him. He\nwas a miracle of elegance in her estimation, but the fawn-colored suit\nwhich he wore owed its nattiness rather to his own symmetry than the\ncut or the cloth, and he had worn it a year ago. His immaculate linen,\nsomewhat flabby,--for the mountain laundress is averse to starch,--had\nbeen delicately trimmed by a deft pair of scissors around the raveling\nedges of the cuffs and collar, and showed rather what it had been than\nwhat it was. His straw hat was pushed a trifle back from his face, in\nwhich the sunburn and the inward fire competed to lay on the tints.\nShe did not see how nor what he lacked. Still, if he wanted it, she\npitied him that he did not have it.\n\n\"Waal, can't you-uns make it, the same way?\"\n\nShe asked this sympathetically. She was beginning to experience a\ncertain self-reproach in regard to him, and it gave her unwonted\ngentleness. She felt that she had been too quick to suspect. Since\nBen's report of the reconnoitring interview on which she had sent him\nin Con Hite's interest, she had dismissed the idea that Selwyn was in\naught concerned with the traveler's sudden and violent death; and she\ndid not incline easily to the substituted suspicion that the dead man\nwas a \"revenuer,\" and that Selwyn had written to him to recommend the\ninvestigation of Con Hite, whose implication in moonshining he had\nsome cause to divine.\n\nNarcissa had marked with displeasure Ben's surly manner to the valley\nman, connecting it with these considerations, and never dreaming that\nit was her acquaintance which her brother grudged the stranger.\n\n\"I ought never ter hev set Ben after him,\" she thought ruefully.\n\"He'll hang on ter him like a bulldog.\" But aloud she only said, \"You\nkin make the money all the same.\"\n\n\"Oh, I'll try, like a little man!\" he exclaimed, rousing himself to\nrenewed hope. \"I have written to another scientific fellow, and he\nhas promised to come and investigate. I hope to Heaven he won't break\nhis neck, too.\"\n\nShe also marked the word \"investigate,\" which had so smitten Ben's\nattention, and marveled what matter it might be in the mountains worth\ninvestigating, and promissory of gain, if not the still-hunt, as it\nwere, of the wily moonshiners. But yet her faith in Selwyn's motives\nand good will, so suddenly adopted, held fast.\n\n\"Con Hite mus' l'arn ter look out fur hisse'f,\" she thought fretfully,\nfor she could not discern into what disastrous swirl she might be\nguiding events as she took the helm. \"He's big enough, the Lord\nknows.\"\n\nThe little log cabin on the slope of the ascent had come into sight.\nThey had followed but slowly; the horses were already tethered to\nthe rails of the fence, and the jury of view and its escort had\ndisappeared within. A very spirited fracas was in progress between the\nvisiting dogs and the inhospitable home canines, and once Ben appeared\nin the passageway and hoarsely called his hounds off.\n\n\"I ain't a-goin' ter hurry,\" Narcissa remarked cavalierly. \"Let\nBen an' aunt Minervy dish up an' wait on 'em. They won't miss me.\nThar's nuthin' in this worl' a gormandizin' man kin miss at\nmeal-times,--'ceptin' teeth.\"\n\nSelwyn made no comment on this touch of reprisal in Narcissa's manner.\nIf old Persimmon Sneed had deemed her coming forth to meet them\nsuperfluous, she in her own good judgment could deem her presence at\ntable an empty show.\n\n\"I ain't a-goin' in,\" she continued. \"Ye kin go,\" she added, with a\nhasty afterthought. \"Thar's a cheer sot ter the table fur you-uns. I'm\ngoin' ter bide hyar. They 'll git done arter a while.\"\n\nShe sat languidly down on a step of a stile that went over the fence\nat a considerable distance from the house, and Selwyn, protesting that\nhe wanted no dinner, established himself on the protruding roots of a\ngreat beech-tree that, like gigantic, knuckled, gnarled fingers,\nvisibly took a great grasp of the earth before sinking their tips far\nout of sight beneath. The shade was dense; the sound of water\ntrickling into the rude horse-trough on the opposite side of the path\nthat was to be a road was delicious in its cool suggestion, for the\nlandscape, far, far to see, blazed as with the refulgence of a summer\nsun. The odor of the apple orchard, heavily fruited, was mellow on the\nair, and the red-freighted boughs of an old winesap bent above the\ngirl's head as she sat with her elbow on her knee and her chin in her\nhand. She gazed dreamily away at those vividly blue ranges, whither\none might fancy summer had fled, so little affinity had their aspect\nwith the network of intermediate brown valleys, and nearer garnet\nslopes, and the red and yellow oak boughs close at hand, hanging above\nthe precipice and limiting the outlook.\n\n\"Yes,\" he said, after a moment's cogitation, while he absently turned\na cluster of beech-nuts in his hands, \"I'll try it, for keeps, you may\nbet,--if you were a betting character. There's lots of good things\ngoing in these mountains; that is, if a fellow had the money to get\n'em out.\"\n\nHe looked up a trifle drearily from under the brim of his straw hat at\nthe smiling summertide of those blue mountains yonder. Oh, fair and\nfeigning prospect, what wide and alluring perspectives! He drew a long\nsigh. Is it better to know so surely that winter is a-coming?\n\n\"An' the sense, too,\" remarked Narcissa, her eyes still dreamily\ndwelling on the distance.\n\nHe roused himself. The unconsciously flattering inference was too\nslight not to be lawfully appropriated.\n\n\"Yes, the sense and the enterprise. Now, these mountaineers,\"--he\nspoke as if she had no part among them, forgetting it, indeed, for the\nmoment,--\"they let marble and silver and iron, and gold too, all sorts\nof natural wealth, millions and millions of the finest hard-wood\ntimber, lie here undeveloped, without making the least effort to\nrealize on it, without lifting a finger. They have got no enterprise\nin the world, and they are the most dilatory, slowest gang I ever ran\nacross in my life.\"\n\nA dimple deepened in the soft fairness of her cheek under the white\nsunbonnet.\n\n\"They got enterprise enough ter want a road,\" she drawled, fixing her\neyes upon him for a moment, then reverting to her former outlook.\n\nHe was a trifle embarrassed, and lost his balance.\n\n\"Oh, _I_'ll want a road, too, after a while,\" he returned. \"All in\ngood time.\" He laughed as if to himself, a touch of mystery in his\ntone, and he took off his hat and jauntily fanned himself.\n\n\"Sorter dil'tory yerse'f now; 'pears ter be a ketchin' complaint, like\nthe measles.\"\n\nPerhaps she secretly resented the reflection on the mountaineers, for\nthere was a certain bellicose intention in her eye, a disposition to\npush him to his last defenses.\n\n\"No; but a body would think a fellow might get enough intelligent\ncooperation in any promising matter from right around here without\ncorresponding all over the country. And the mountaineers don't know\nanything, and they don't want to learn anything. Now,\" convincingly,\n\"what would any of those fellows in there say if I should tell them\nthat I could take a match \"--he pulled a handful of lucifers from, his\npocket--\"and set a spring afire?\"\n\nShe gazed at him in dumb surprise.\n\n\"They'd say I was lying, I reckon,\" he hazarded. With an ebullition of\nlaughter, he hastily scrambled to his feet and unhitched his horse;\nthen, as he put his foot in the stirrup, he paused and added, \"Or\nelse, 'Better leave it be, sonny,'\" with the effrontery of mimicry.\n\"'Mought set the mounting afire.'\"\n\nHe forthwith swung himself into the saddle, and, with a jaunty wave of\nthe hand in adieu, fared forth homeward, leaving her staring after him\nin wide-eyed amazement.\n\n\nVII.\n\nThe love of contention served, in the case of old Persimmon Sneed, in\nthe stead of industry, of rectitude, of perseverance, of judgment, of\nevery quality that should adorn a man. So eager was he to be off and\nat the road again that he could scarcely wait to swallow his\nrefection. All the charms of the profusely spread board had not\navailed to decoy him from the subject, and the repast of the devoted\njury of view was seasoned with his sage advice and vehement argument\nagainst the project, which its advocates, fully occupied, failed for\nthe nonce to combat. Now and again Mrs. Minerva Slade sought to\ninterpose in their behalf, and many a tempting trencher was thrust to\nhis elbow to divert the tenor of his discourse. But despite his\nyouthful vulnerability to the dainty which had won him his sobriquet,\nPersimmon Sneed's palate was not more susceptible to the allurements\nof flattery than his hard head or his obdurate heart. There was,\nhowever, at intervals, a lively clatter of his knife and fork, and\nsome redoubtable activity on the part of his store teeth, frankly\nfalse, and without doubt the only false thing about him. Then he\nhustled up the jury of view and their _confreres_ to the resumption of\ntheir duties, and was the first man to put foot in stirrup. Certain\nother mountaineers would fain have lingered, as was manifest by the\ntriangular slices of \"apple custard pie\" in their hands, as they\nstood, still munching, on the porch, watching the departing jury of\nview with their active and aged precursor, and by their loitering\nfarewells and thanks to Aunt Minerva Slade. A beaming countenance did\nshe wear this day. She had cooked to some cheerful purpose. Not one\nfailure had marred the _menu_, in testimony of which, as she afterward\nremarked, \"I never seen scraps so skimpy.\" Her spectacles reflected\nthe bland light of the day as smilingly as the eyes above which they\nwere poised, as she stood in the doorway, and with fluttering\ngraciousness received the homage of her beneficiaries.\n\n\"That youngest one, Con Hite, was sorter mild-mannered an' meek,\" she\nafterward said, often recounting the culinary triumphs of the great\nday, \"an' I misdoubts but he hed the deespepsy, fur he war the only\none ez didn't pitch in an' eat like he war tryin' to pervide fur a\nweek's fastin'. I reckon they all knowed what sort'n pitiful table\nthey sets out at Mis' Cornely Hood's, t'other side the mounting, whar\nthey expected ter stop fur supper, an' war a-goin' ter lay up suthin'\nagin destitution.\"\n\nFor an hour, perhaps, before reaching Hanway's, Con Hite had ridden\nwith the jury of view. He had not much expectation of influencing the\nfate of the road in any respect by his presence, but he felt it was a\nmatter of consistency to appear with the others of the opposition. He\ndesired, too, to publicly urge, as his reason for objecting to the\nproject, the insufficiency of hands in so sparsely populated a region\nto make a road and keep it in repair; lest another reason, the wish to\npreserve the seclusion so dear to the moonshiner, be attributed to\nhim. This matter of policy had been made very palatable by the\nprobability that he would see Narcissa, and it was with a deep\ndisappointment that he beheld Selwyn beside her, and received only a\nslight movement of her drooping eyelids as a token of recognition and\nwelcome. He had been minded to dismount and walk with her, but his\nheart burned with resentment. Of what worth now were all his buoyant\nanticipations, while she was listening to the sugared flatteries of\nthe \"town cuss\"? He had this subject for cogitation, while, in a\nstifling room, he was regaled with hard cider and apple-jack by no\nmore fascinating Hebe than old Mrs. Slade, with her withered sallow\nskin, her excited, anxious eye, her fluttered, tremulous, skinny\nfingers, her hysteric cap with its maddeningly flying strings, and her\nwonderfully swift venerable scamper in and out of the kitchen.\n\nCon Hite was the last to go. He led his horse down to the\nwatering-trough, oblivious of the stream, with its ample supply, a\nhundred yards or so further on and in full view; and as he stood\nthere, with his hand on the animal's shoulder, he turned his eyes,\nsomewhat wistful, though wont to be so bold and bright, upon Narcissa,\nstill seated on the stile. Her own brown long-lashed eyes had a\nfar-away look in them. They evidently passed him over absently, and\nfollowed the squad of men swiftly trotting adown the road, all in good\nheart and good temper again, to take up their duty where they had\nlaid it down. No faint vestige of a dimple was now in her daintily\nwhite cheek.\n\n\"Ye be powerful sparin' o' speech ter-day,\" he remarked.\n\nHer eyes did not move from the distant landscape. \"Folks ez hev got\nnuthin' ter say would do well ter say it.\"\n\nHe flushed. \"Ye hed mo' ter say ter the stranger-man.\"\n\n\"Don't see him so powerful frequent. When a thing is sca'ce, it's apt\nter be ch'ice,\" she retorted.\n\nShe experienced a certain satisfaction in her acridity. For his sake,\nlest suspicion befall him, she had sought to inaugurate an\ninvestigation--nay, a persecution--of this man, and he a stranger; and\nbut that circumstance was kind to him, her effort might have resulted\ncruelly. And now that she had done so much for Con Hite, it was her\npleasure to take it out on him, as the phrase goes. All unaware of\nthis curious mental attitude, he winced under her satire.\n\n\"Waal, I kin make myself sca'ce, too,\" he said, an impulse of pride\nsurging in his heart.\n\n\"It mought be better fur ye,\" she replied indifferently.\n\nHis momentary independence left him suddenly.\n\n\"Narcissa,\" he said reproachfully, \"ye didn't always talk this way ter\nme.\"\n\n\"That ain't news ter me. Ben 'lows ez I talk six ways fur Sunday.\"\n\n\"Ye dunno how I feel, not knowin' how ye be set towards me, an'\nhevin' ter see ye so seldom, a-workin' all the time down yander,\na-moonshinin'\"--\n\n\"I wouldn't talk 'bout it so turr'ble loud.\" She glanced\napprehensively over her shoulder. \"An' ye'd better quit it, ennyhows.\"\n\n\"Ye 'lows it be wrong,\" he said, his bold bright eyes all softened as\nhe looked at her, \"bein' agin the law?\"\n\n\"I ain't keerin' fur the law. Ef the truth war knowed, the law is\naimin' ter git all the benefit o' whiskey bein' drunk itself. That's\nwhar the law kems in. I only keer fur\"--She stopped abruptly. She had\nnearly revealed to him that she cared only lest some disaster come to\nhim in his risky occupation; that she would like him to be ploughing\nin a safe level field at the side of a cabin, where she might sit by\nthe window and sew, and look out and see that no harm befell this big\nbold man, six feet two inches high. \"Con Hite!\" she exclaimed, her\nface scarlet, \"I never see a body ez hard-hearted an' onmerciful ez\nye air. Whyn't ye water that sufferin' beast, ez air fairly honing\nter drink? Waal,\" she continued, after a pause in which he\ndemonstrated the axiom that one may lead a horse to water, but cannot\nmake him drink, \"then whyn't ye go? I ain't got time ter waste, ef ye\nhev.\"\n\nShe rose as if for departure, and he put his foot in the stirrup. \"I\nwish ye wouldn't be so harsh ter me, Narcissa,\" he said meekly.\n\n\"Waal, thar be a heap o' saaft-spoken gals ter be hed fur the askin'.\nYe kin take yer ch'ice.\"\n\nAnd with this he was fain to be content, as he mounted and rode\nreluctantly away.\n\nShe sat down again, and was still for a long time after the last echo\nof his horse's hoofs had died on the air. Her thoughts did not follow\nhim, however. They turned again with renewed interest to the\nfair-haired young stranger. Somehow she was ill at ease and vaguely\ndisillusioned. She watched mechanically, and with some unaccustomed\ntouch of melancholy, the burnished shimmering golden haze gradually\ninvest far blue domes and their purple slopes, and the brown valleys,\nand the rugged rocky mountains nearer, with a certain idealized\nslumberous effect like the landscape of a dream. In these still spaces\nnaught moved now save the imperceptible lengthening of the shadows. It\nhad never occurred to her to deem the scene beautiful; it was the\nfamiliar furniture of her home. Upon this her eyes had first opened.\nShe had never thought to compare it to aught else,--to the suffocating\nexperience of one visit to the metropolitan glories of the little town\nin the flat woods known as Colbury. It had seemed, indeed, magnificent\nto her ignorance, and the temerity of the architecture of a two-story\nhouse had struck her aghast. She had done naught but wonder and stare.\nThe trip had been a great delight, but she had never desired to linger\nor to dwell there. Certain sordid effects came over her; reminiscences\nof the muddy streets, the tawdry shops, the jostling, busy-eyed\npeople.\n\n\"Ain't this ez good?\" she said to herself, as the vast scene suddenly\nfluctuated beneath a flare of wind amidst the sunshine, and light,\ndetached white flakes of cloud went winging athwart the blue sky;\ntheir shadows followed them fast across the sunlit valley,--only their\ndark and lifeless semblances, like the verbal forms of some white\nillumined thought that can find no fit expression in words. The breath\nof the pines came to her, the sound of the water, the sudden fanfare\nof the unseen wind in the sky heralding the clouds. \"Ain't this ez\ngood?\" she said again, with that first deadly, subtle distrust of the\nthings of home, that insidious discontent so fatal to peace. He\nevidently did not deem it as good, and the obvious fact rankled in\nher. The mountain men, and their lack of enterprise, and their\ndrawling speech which he had mimicked,--they too shared his\ndisparagement; and she was conscious that she herself did not now\nthink so well of them,--so conscious that she made a loyal struggle\nagainst this sentiment.\n\n\"So shif'less, so thrif'less,\" she echoed his words. \"An' I dunno ez\n_I_ ever viewed a waste-fuller critter'n this hyar very Mister Man.\"\nShe stooped down, gathering together the handful of matches that\nSelwyn had inadvertently pulled from his pocket with the one which he\nhad used in illustrating his suggestion of setting the waters of a\nspring afire. \"Ef he keeps on ez wasteful ez this, he'll get out o'\nmatches whar he lives over yander; an' I misdoubts ef, smart ez he\n'lows he be, he could kindle the wood ter cook his breakfus' by a\nflint rock,--ef he air so boastful ez ter 'low ez he kin set spring\nwater afire.\"\n\nShe made the matches into a compact little budget and slipped them\ninto her pocket, and as she rose and looked about uncertainly, she\nheard her aunt Minerva calling to her from the house that it was high\ntime to go and drive up the cows.\n\nAunt Minerva had not bethought herself to summon the girl to dinner.\nThe whole world seemed surfeited to her, so had dinner occupied her\nday. Narcissa herself, under the stress of the abnormal excitements,\nfelt no lack as she slowly trod the familiar paths in search of the\nbovine vagrants.\n\nHer thoughts bore her company, and she was far from home when the\naspect of the reddening sun smote her senses. She stood and watched\nthe last segment of the vermilion sphere sink down out of sight, and,\nas she turned, the October dusk greeted her on every side. The\nshadows, how dense in the woods; the valleys, darkling already! Only\non the higher eastern slopes a certain red reflection spoke of the\nvanishing day. She looked vainly as yet for some faint silvery\nsuffusion which might herald the rising of the moon; for it was to be\na bright night. She was glad of the recollection. She had not hitherto\nrealized it, but she was tired. She would rest for a little while, and\nthus refreshed she would be the sooner home. She sat down on a ledge\nof the outcropping rock and looked about her. The spot was unfamiliar,\nbut in the far stretch of the darkening scene she identified many a\nwell-known landmark. There was the gleaming bend of the river in the\nvalley, lost presently amidst the foliage of its banks; and here was\nan isolated conical peak on a far lower level than the summit of the\nrange, and known as Thimble Mountain; and nearer still, across a\nnarrow bight of the Cove, was a bare slope. As she glanced at it she\nhalf rose from her place, for there was the witch-face, twilight on\nthe grim features, yet with the aid of memory so definitely discerned\nthat they could hardly have been more distinct by noonday,--a face of\ninexplicably sinister omen. \"Oh, why did I see it to-day!\" she\nexclaimed, the presage of ill fortune strong upon her, with that\ngrisly mask leering at her from across the valley. But the day was\nwell-nigh gone; only a scant space remained in which to work the evil\nintent of fate. She seated herself anew, for in the shadowy labyrinth\nof the woods her path could scarcely be found. She must needs wait for\nthe moon.\n\nShe wondered, as she sat and gazed about, how far she might be from\nthat new dwelling where he lived who so scorned the mountain, and who\nowed to it his every breath. There was no sound, no suggestion of\nhuman habitation. The shadowy woods stood dense about the little open\nledgy space on three sides; toward the very verge of the mountain the\nrocks grew shelving and precipitous, and beyond the furthest which she\ncould see, the gray edge of which cut sharply against the base of a\ndistant dun-tinted range, she knew the descent was abrupt to the\ndepths of the valley. Looking up, she beheld the trembling lucid\nwhiteness of a star; now and again the great rustling boughs of an\noak-tree swayed beneath it, and then its glister was broken and\ndeflected amidst the crisp autumnal leaves, but still she saw it\nshine. It told, too, that there was water near; she caught its radiant\nmultiplied reflection, like a cluster of scintillating white gems, on\nthe lustrous dark surface of a tiny pool, circular and rock-bound,\nclose beneath the ledge on which she sat. She leaned over, and saw in\nits depths the limpid fading red sky, and the jagged brown border of\nthe rocks, and a grotesque moving head, which she recognized, after a\nplunge of the heart, as her own sunbonnet. She drew back in dismay;\nshe would have no more of this weird mirror of the rocks and woods,\nand looked up again at the shining of the star amidst the darkening\nshadows of the scarlet oak. How tall that tree was, how broad of\ngirth! And how curiously this stranger talked! What was there to do\nwith all these trees! Would he cut down all the trees on the mountain?\nA sudden doubt of his sanity crossed her mind. It was the first, and\nher heart stood still for a moment. But as she slowly canvassed the\nidea, it accounted for much otherwise impossible to comprehend: his\nevident poverty and his efforts toward the purchase of lands; his\nillness and his bluff insistence on his strength; his wild talk of\nenterprise and his mysterious intimations of phenomenal opportunities.\nConfirmations of the suspicion crowded upon her; above all, the mad\nboast that with a match he could set the waters of a spring afire.\n\nWith a sad smile at the fatuity of the thing, in her idle waiting she\ndrew one of his matches from her pocket; then she struck it briskly on\nthe rugged rock, and cast it, blazing lightly, into the bubbling\nwaters of the spring.\n\nThe woods, the rocks, the black night, the fleering, flouting\nwitch-face, all with an abrupt bound sprang into sudden visibility. A\npyramid of yellow flame was surging up from the bubbling surface of\nthe water. Long, dark, slim shadows were speeding through the woods,\nwith strange slants of yellow light; the very skies were a-flicker.\nShe cowered back for a moment, covering her face with her hands. Then,\naffrighted at her own sorceries, she fled like a deer through the\nwilderness.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nOne by one, as the afternoon wore on, the spectators began to desert\nthe jury of view, their progress over the mountain being slower than\nhad been anticipated. So often, indeed, did insoluble difficulties\narise touching the location of the road and questions of dispute that\nit might be wondered that the whole body did not perish by faction.\nAfter the party had passed the boundary line of Persimmon Sneed's\ntract, where he seemed to consider the right of eminent domain merged\nin nothingness in comparison to his lordly prerogatives as owner in\nfee simple, he ceased to urge as heretofore. He dictated boldly to the\njury. He rode briskly on in advance, as if doing the honors of his\nestate to flattered guests, now and again waving his hand to\nillustrate his proposition, his keen, high-pitched voice overcoming in\nits distinct utterance the sound of hoofs and spurs, and the\nmonotonous bass contradictions proffered by Silas Boyd.\n\nAnd the jury of view, silent and circumspect, rode discreetly on.\n\nPersimmon Sneed's mare seemed as fresh as himself, and when he would\nturn, as he often did, to face the fatigued, wilted, overwhelmed jury\njogging along on their jaded steeds, tired out with the long day's\njaunt and the rough footing, the mare would move swiftly backward in a\nmanner that would have done credit to the manege of a circus. And at\nthis extreme advantage Persimmon Sneed and his raised adjuring\nforefinger seemed impossible to be gainsaid. His arguments partook of\nthe same unanswerable character.\n\n\"Ye don't see none o' my cattle, do ye?\" He waved his hand toward the\nwoods flecked with the long slantings of the sun. \"I hev got more 'n a\nhunderd head grazin' right hyar in the bresh. Cattle-thieves could\ncall an' salt 'em easy enough, but they couldn't drive 'em off through\nthe laur'l thar; it's thick ez hell!\" pointing to the dense jungle.\n\"But ef we-uns hed this hyar road what ye air aimin' ter lay off, why,\na leetle salt an' a leetle drivin' an' a moonlight night would gather\n'em, an' the whole herd would be in Georgy by daybreak. I wouldn't hev\nthe hawn of a muley cow lef'. Now, ez it be, them cattle air ez safe\nfrom sight ez ef I hed swallowed 'em!\" And he whirled again, and led\nthe column.\n\nThe jury of view rode disconsolately on.\n\nThey experienced a temporary relief when they had passed the confines\nof his tract,--for it was across but a protruding tongue of the main\nbody of his land that the road was expected to run,--and entered upon\nthe domain of the \"valley man with the lung complaint;\" for this\ndiverted Persimmon Sneed to the more amiable task of narrating how the\nstranger had sought to buy land of him, and the high prices he had\nscornfully refused, the adaptability of his land to his own especial\nneeds being so phenomenally apt.\n\nA sudden query from Silas Boyd rendered their respite short: \"What's\nthat man Selwyn want so much land fur, ennyhows? He hev been tryin'\nter buy all that 'crost the gorge, too.\" He waved his hand toward the\ngloomy woods darkening on the opposite slope.\n\n\"Ter graze cattle, o' course,\" promptly surmised Persimmon Sneed.\n\"Jes' look at my fine chance o' yearlin's, a-layin' on fat an' bone\nan' muscle every day, with no expense nor attendance, an' safe an'\nsound an' sure. An' now,\" he cried suddenly, and the shuddering jury\nsaw the collocation of ideas as it bore down upon them, and Persimmon\nSneed swiftly turned, facing them, while the mare nimbly essayed a\n_passado_ backward, \"ye air talkin' 'bout changin' all this,\nruinationin' the vally o' my land ter me. Ye 'low ye want ter permote\nthe interus' o' the public! Waal,\" raising an impressive forefinger,\n\"ain't _I_ the public?\"\n\nNo one ventured a reply.\n\nThe jury of view rode desperately on.\n\nThey had presently more cause for depression of spirit. It began to be\nevident that with the dusk some doubt had arisen in the minds of the\nmountaineers of the party as to the exact trend of the herder's trail.\nThe doubt intensified, until further progress proved definitively that\nthe indistinct trail was completely lost. Darkness came on apace; the\ntangled ways of the forest seemed momently more tortuous; wolves were\nnot rare in the vicinity; rumors of a gang of horse-thieves were rife.\n\nAfter much discussion, the jury of view agreed that they would go no\nfurther at present, but wait for the rising of the moon, on the theory\nthat it would then be practicable to make their way to the Hood cabin,\non the other side of the mountain, which was their immediate goal, and\nwhich they had expected to reach by sunset; unaware that in their\ndevious turnings they had retraced several miles of their course, and\nwere now much nearer Selwyn's dwelling in the woods than the terminus\nof their route.\n\nDespite their uncertainty and anxiety, the rest was grateful. The\nshades of night were cool and refreshing after the glare of the day,\nas they sat smoking on the rocks about the verge of the mountain. The\nhorses had been unsaddled, and were picketed in an open glade at a\nlittle distance: in recurrent pauses in the talk, the sound of their\ngrazing on the scanty grass came to the ear; all else was silence save\nthe tinkling of a mountain rill,--a keen detached appoggiatura rising\noccasionally above the monody of its murmurous flow,--and the\nmelancholy chiming of some lingering cicada, the latest spared of the\nfrost.\n\nThe night was as yet very dark; the stars were dull in a haze, the\nvalley was a vague blur; even the faces of the men could not be dimly\ndistinguished. Strange, then, that an added visibility suddenly\ninvested the woods and the sky-line beyond a dense belt of timber.\n\n\"'Pears ter me toler'ble early fur the moon,\" observed one of the men.\n\"She's on the wane now, too.\"\n\n\"'Tain't early, though,\" replied the sullen bass voice of Silas Boyd\nfrom the darkness; it was lowered, that the others might not hear.\n\"That thar old perverted Philistine of a Persimmon Sneed kep' us\ndanderin' roun' hyar till mighty nigh eight o'clock, I'll bet,\na-persistin' an' a-persistin' he knowed the road, when he war plumb\nlost time we got on that cowpath. An' the jury o' view, they hed ter\ntake Persimmon Sneed's advice, he bein' the oldest, an' wait _hyar_\nfur the risin' moon. Persimmon Sneed will repent he picked out this\nspot,--he'll repent it sure!\"\n\nThis dictum was only the redundancy of discontent; but when, in the\nlight of subsequent events, it was remembered, and special gifts of\ndiscernment were attributed to Silas Boyd, he did not disclaim them,\nfor he felt that his words were surely inspired by some presentiment,\nso apt were they, and so swiftly did the fulfillment follow the\nprophecy.\n\nThere was a sudden stir among the group. The men were getting quickly\nto their feet, alert, tense, with broken whispers and bated breath.\nFor there, on a bare slope, viewed diagonally across the gorge and\nillumined with a wavering pallor, the witch-face glared down at them\nfrom the dense darkness of the woods. The quick chilly repulsion of\nthe strangers as they gazed spellbound at the apparition was\noutmatched by the horror of those who had known the fantasy from\nchildhood;--never thus had they beheld the gaunt old face! What\nstrange unhallowed mystery was this, that it should smile and grimace\nand mock at them from out the shadowy night, with flickers of light as\nof laughter running athwart its grisly lineaments? What evil might it\nportend? They all stood aghast, watching this pallid emblazonment of\nthe deep night.\n\n\"Boys,\" said old Dent Kirby tremulously, \"thar's suthin' powerful\ncur'ous 'bout this 'speriunce. That thar light war never kindled in\nheaven or yearth.\"\n\n\"Let's go!\" cried Jeremiah Sayres. \"We hev got ter git out'n this\nsomehows.\"\n\n\"Go whar?\" croaked Silas Boyd, his deep bass voice lowered to a\nwhisper. \"I be 'feard ter quit the trail furder. 'Pinnock's Mis'ry' be\nhyar-abouts somewhar, a plumb quicksand, what a man got into an'\nfloundered an' sank, an' floundered agin, an' whenst they fund him his\nhair war white an' his mind deranged. Or else we-uns mought run off'n\na bluff somewhar, an' git our necks bruk.\"\n\nNow Persimmon Sneed was possessed of a most intrusive curiosity, and\nhe was further endowed with a sturdy courage.\n\n\"I'll jes' step off a leetle way to'des that light, an' view whar it\nkems from,\" he observed coolly. \"The woods air too wet to burn.\"\n\nHe would not listen to protest.\n\n\"The witch-face ain't never blighted me none,\" he rejoined stoutly as\nhe set forth.\n\n\nIX.\n\nThe thick tangled mass of the undergrowth presently intervened, so\nthat, as he broke his way through it, he wondered that its bosky\ndimness should be so visible beneath the heavy shadows of the great\ntrees looming high overhead. Once he stopped dubiously; the glow\nevidently came rather from below than above. It is too much to say\nthat a thrill of fear tried the fibres of Persimmon Sneed's obdurate\nold heart. But he listened for a moment to hear, perchance, the sound\nof voices from the group he had left, or the champing of the picketed\nsteeds. He was an active man, and had come fast and far since quitting\nhis companions. Not even a vague murmur rose from the silent autumnal\nwoods. The stillness was absolute. As he moved forward once more, the\nimpact of his foot upon the rain-soaked leaves, the rustle of the\nboughs as he pressed among them, the rise and fall of his own\nbreathing, somewhat quicker than its wont, served to render\nappreciable to Persimmon Sneed the fact that he possessed nerves which\nwere more susceptible to a quaver of doubt than that redoubtable\nendowment called his hard head.\n\n\"Somebody hev jes' sot out fire in the woods,--though powerful wet,\"\nhe muttered, his intellectual entity seeking to quiet that inward\nflutter of his mere bodily being. \"But I'm a-goin' on,\" he protested\nobstinately, \"ef it be bodaciously kindled by the devil!\"\n\nAnd as he spoke, his heart failed, his limbs seemed sinking beneath\nhim, his pulses beat tumultuously for a moment, and then were\nabruptly still; he had emerged from the woods in a great flickering\nglare which pervaded an open, rocky space shelving to a precipice, and\nbeheld a tall, glowing yellow flame rising unquenched from the\nilluminated surface of a bubbling mountain spring. His senses reeled;\na myriad of tawny red and yellow flashes swayed before his dazzled\neyes. He had heard all his life of the wild freaks of the witches in\nthe woods. Had he chanced on their unhallowed pastimes in the\nsolitudes of these untrodden mountain wildernesses? Was this\nmiraculous fire, blazing from the depths of the clear water,\nnecromancy, the work of the devil?\n\nThe next moment his heart gave a great throb. He found his voice in a\nwild halloo. Among the fluttering shadows of the trees he had caught\nsight of the figure of a man, and, a thousand times better, of a face\nthat he knew. The man was approaching the fire, with a stare of blank\namazement and fear as his distended eyes beheld the phenomenon of the\nblazing spring. Their expression changed instantly upon the sound. His\nface was all at once alert, grave, suspicious, a prosaic anxiety\nobliterating every trace of superstitious terror. His right hand was\nlaid upon his hip in close proximity to a pistol-pocket, and Persimmon\nSneed remembered suddenly that his own pistol was in its holster on\nhis saddle, he could not say how far distant in these wild, trackless\nwoods, and that this man was a notorious offender against the law,\nsundry warrants for his arrest for horse-stealing having been issued\nat divers times and places. There had been much talk of an organized\nband who had assisted in these and similar exploits in secluded\ndistricts of the county, but Persimmon Sneed had given it scant\ncredence until he beheld several armed men lagging in the rear, their\namazed, uncouth faces, under their broad-brimmed hats, all weird and\nunnatural in the pervasive yellow glow. They had, evidently, been led\nto the spot by the strange flare in the heart of the woods; but Nick\nPeters could well enough pretermit his surprise and whatever spiritual\nterrors might assail him till a more convenient season for their\nindulgence. A more immediate danger menaced him than the bodily\nappearance of the devil, which he had momently expected as he gazed at\nthe flaming water. He had seen the others of his own party\napproaching, and he walked quickly across the clear space to Persimmon\nSneed. He was a little, slim, wiry man, with light, sleek hair, pink\ncheeks, high cheek-bones, and a bony but blunt nose. He had a light\neye, gray, shallow, but inscrutable, and there was something feline in\nhis aspect and glance, at once smooth and caressing and of latent\nfierceness.\n\n\"Why, Mr. Persimmon Sneed,\" he exclaimed in a voice as bland as a\nsummer's day, \"how did you-uns an' yer frien's do sech ez that?\" and\nhe pointed at the flaring pyramid on the surface of the water.\n\nPersimmon Sneed, in his proclivity to argument, forgot his lack of a\npistol and his difficult position, unarmed and alone.\n\n\"I'll hev ye ter remember I hev no dealin's with the devil. I dunno\nhow that water war set afire, nor my friends nuther,\" he said stiffly.\n\n\"Whar air they?\"\n\nNick Peters's keen, discerning eye had been covertly scanning the\nflickering shadows and the fluctuating slants of yellow light about\nthem. Now he boldly threw his glance over his shoulder.\n\nPersimmon Sneed caught himself sharply.\n\n\"They ain't hyar-abouts,\" he said gruffly, on his guard once more.\n\nA look of apprehension crossed the horse-thief's face. The denial was\nin the nature of an affirmation to his alert suspicion; for it is one\nof the woes of the wicked that, knowing no truth themselves, they\ncannot recognize it in others, even in a transient way, as a chance\nacquaintance. He must needs have heed. A number of men, doubtless,\nwell armed, were in the immediate vicinity. As he whirled himself\nlightly half around on his spurred heel, his manner did not conform to\nhis look.\n\n\"Did you-uns an' them kem all the way from the valley ter view the\nblazin' spring?\" he asked. \"Looks some like hell-fire,\" he added\nincidentally, and with the tone of one familiar with the resemblance\nhe descried.\n\n\"Naw; we-uns never hearn on it afore; I jes' run on it accidental,\"\nSneed replied succinctly, hardly daring to trust himself to an\nunnecessary word; for the staring men that had gathered at a\nrespectful distance about the blazing spring numbered nine or ten, and\nan ill-advised tongue might precipitate an immediate attack on the\ndismounted, unarmed group awaiting his return at the verge of the\nbluff. A genuine thrill of terror shook him as he realized that at any\nmoment he might be followed by men as ill prepared as he to cope with\nthe horse-thief's gang.\n\n\"I see ye rid,\" said Nick Peters, observing his acquaintance's spurs.\n\"Yer frien's rid, too, I s'pose?\"\n\nPersimmon Sneed, desirous of seeming unsuspicious, merely nodded. He\nseemed as suspicious, in fact, as watchful, as stanch, as ready to\nspring, as a leopard in a cage. His thin lips were set, his alert\neyes keen, his unshaven, stubbly jaws rigid, his whole body at a high\ntension. The man of quicker perceptions was first to drop the\ntransparent feint, but only to assume another.\n\n\"Now, Mr. Sneed,\" he said, with an air of reproach and upbraiding, \"do\nye mean ter tell me ez ye hev kem up hyar with the sheriff or dep'ty\nter nose me out; me, who hev got no home,--folks burned my house ter\nthe yearth, namin' _me_ 'horse-thief' an' sech,--nor frien's, nor\nmeans, nor havin's, plumb run ter groun' like a fox or sech?\"\n\n\"Ef ye did\"--said a gigantic ruffian who had come up, backed by a\nshadow twice his size, and stood assisting at the colloquy, looking\nover the shoulder of his wiry little chief. He left the sentence\nunfinished, a significant gesture toward the handle of the pistol in\nhis belt rendering the omission of slight moment.\n\n\"Some o' them boys war wondering ef that fire out'n the water would\nburn,\" observed a fat, greasy, broad-faced lout, with a foolish,\nbrutal grin. \"It mought make out ter singe this stranger's hair an'\nhide, ef we war ter gin him a duckin' thar.\"\n\n\"Air ye a-huntin' of me, too, Mr. Sneed,--ye that war 'quainted with\nme in the old times on Tomahawk Creek?\" Peters reiterated his demand\nin a plaintive, melodramatic tone, which titillated his fancy,\nsomehow, and, like virtue, was its own exceeding great reward; for\nboth he and Persimmon Sneed knew right well that their acquaintance\namounted only to a mere facial recognition when they had chanced to\npass on the country road or the village street, years before.\nNevertheless, under the pressure of the inherent persuasiveness of the\nsuggested retribution, Persimmon Sneed made haste to aver that his\nerrand in the mountains was in no sense at the sheriff's instance. And\nso radical and indubitable were his protestations that Nick Peters was\nconstrained to discard this fear, and demand, \"What brung ye ter\nWitch-Face Mounting then, Mr. Sneed?\"\n\n\"Waal, some fellows war app'inted by the county court ter view the\nroad an' report on it,\" said Persimmon, \"an' I kem along ter see how\nit mought affect my interust.\"\n\nHow far away, how long ago, how infinitely unimportant, seemed all\nthose convolutions of trail and argument in which he had expended the\nfinest flowers of his contradictory faculties, the stanch immobility\nof his obstinacy, his unswerving singleness of purpose in seeing only\none side of a question, this afternoon, a few short hours since! The\nmutability of the affairs of the most immutable of human beings!\n\nThis reflection was cut short by observing the stare of blank\namazement on Nick Peters's face. \"Road!\" he said. \"Thar ain't no\nroad.\"\n\n\"They air app'inted ter lay out an' report on openin' one,\" explained\nPersimmon Sneed.\n\nEvidently Nick Peters's experience of the law was in its criminal\nrather than in its civil phases, but the surprise died out of his\nface, and he presently said, with a beguiling air of frankness, \"Now,\nMr. Sneed, ye see this happens right in my way of trade. Jes' tell me\nwhar them loafers air, an' how many horses they hev got along, an'\nI'll gin ye the bes' beastis I hev got ter ride, an' a pair o'\nshootin'-irons and set ye in the valley road on the way home. Ye kin\nsay ye war lost from them.\"\n\nIt is true that in this moment Persimmon Sneed remembered each of his\ncontumacious comrades, and saw that they outnumbered by one the\nhorse-thief's gang; he realized that they were out of leading-strings,\nand amply capable of taking care of themselves. He had that wincing\nterror which an unarmed man experiences at the sight of\n\"shootin'-irons\" in the grasp of other and antagonistic men. More than\nall, he looked at those hell-lighted flames, as he esteemed them,\nrising out of the lustrous water, and believed the jocose barbarity of\nthe threat of the brutal henchman might be serious earnest in its\nexecution.\n\nBut the jury of view and their companions were all unprepared for\nmolestation in such wise as menaced them. He reflected anew upon their\ndismounted condition, the horses hitched at a distance, the saddles\nscattered on the ground in the darkness, with the holsters buckled to\nthem and the pistols within. A sudden attack meant a successful\nrobbery and perchance bloodshed.\n\n\"I'll die fust!\" he said loudly, and he had never looked more\npainfully obstinate. \"I'll die fust!\" He lifted his quivering hand and\nshook it passionately in the air. \"I ain't no ransomed saint, an' I\nknow it, but afore I'll betray that thar jury o' view what's been\napp'inted by the county court ter lay off the damned road, I'll die\nfust! I ain't no ransomed saint, I ain't, but I'll _die_ fust! I ain't\nno ransomed\"--\n\n\"Stop, boys, stop!\" cried the wiry little horse-thief, as the others\ngathered about Sneed with threatening eyes and gestures, while he\nvociferated amongst them, as lordly as if he were in his oft-time\npreeminence as the foreman of a jury. Nick Peters's face had changed.\nThere was a sudden fear upon it, uncomprehended by Persimmon Sneed. It\ndid not occur to him until long afterward that he had for the first\ntime used the expression \"a jury of view,\" and that the horse-thief's\nfamiliarity with the idea of a jury was only in the sense of twelve\nmen.\n\nPeters spoke aside to the others, only a word or so, but there was\namongst them an obvious haste to get away, of which Persimmon Sneed\nwas cognizant, albeit his head was swimming, his breath short, his\neyes dazzled by the fire which he feared. His understanding, however,\nwas blunted in some sort, it seemed to him, for he could make no sense\nof Nick Peters's observation as he took him by the arm, although\nafterward it became plain enough.\n\n\"Ye'll hev ter go an' 'bide along o' we-uns fur awhile, Mr. Sneed,\" he\nsaid, choking with the laughter of some occult happy thought. \"Ye\nain't a ransomed saint yit, but ye will be arter awhile, I reckon, ef\nye live long enough.\"\n\nTheir shadows skulked away as swiftly as they themselves, even more\nfurtively, running on ahead, in great haste to be gone. The\nfire-light slanted through the woods in quick, elusive fluctuations,\never dimmer, ever recurrently flaring, and when the jury of view and\ntheir companions, alarmed by the long absence of Persimmon Sneed,\nfollowed the strange light through the woods to the brink of the\nburning spring, they found naught astir save the vagrant shadows of\nthe great boles of the trees, no longer held to their accustomed\norbit, but wandering through the woods with a large freedom.\n\nThat this fire, blazing brilliantly on the surface of the clear spring\nwater, was kindled by supernatural power was not for a moment doubted\nby the mountaineers who had never before heard of such a phenomenon,\nand the spiriting away of Persimmon Sneed they promptly ascribed to\nthe same agency. With these thoughts upon them, they did not linger\nlong at the spot where he had met so mysterious a fate. Their ringing\nhalloos, with which the woods were enlivened, took on vaguely appalled\ncadences; the echoes came back to them like mocking shouts; and they\nwere glad enough to ride away at last through the quiet moonlit\nglades, their faltering voices silent, leaving that mystic fire slowly\ndying where it had blazed so long on the face of the water.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nA more extended search, later, resulting as fruitlessly, the idea that\nPersimmon Sneed had been in some way lured bodily within the grasp of\nthe devil prevailed among the more ignorant people of the community;\nthey dolorously sought to point the moral how ill the headstrong fare,\nand speculated gloomily as to the topic on which he had ventured to\nargue with Satan, who in rage and retaliation had whisked him away.\nBut there was a class of citizens in Colbury who hearkened with elated\nsentiments to this story of the burning spring. A company of\ncapitalists was promptly organized, every inch of attainable land on\nthe mountain was quietly bought, and machinery for boring for oil was\nalready at the spring when the news was brought to Selwyn by Hanway,\nwho, not having seen the young stranger for the past week or so,\nfeared he was ill. The flakes of the first snow of the season were\nwhirling past the windows--no more on autumn leaves they looked, no\nmore on far-off bare but azure mountains, feigning summer. The distant\nranges were ghostly white. The skeleton woods near at hand were stark\nand black, and trembled with sudden starts, and strove wildly with the\nwinds, and were held in an inexorable fate, and cried and groaned\naloud.\n\nHanway was right in his surmise, for Selwyn was ill, and lay on the\nlounge wheeled up to the fire. His cheeks seemed still touched with\ncolor, the reflection from the ragged red smoking-jacket which he\nwore, but a sort of smitten pallid doom was on his brow and in his\neyes. His gaze dwelt insistently on the doctor, the tall, thin\npractitioner of the surrounding country, who had just finished an\nexamination and was slowly returning his spectacles to their case as\nhe stood before the fire. It seemed as if the patient expected him to\nspeak, but he said nothing, and looked down gravely into the red\ncoals.\n\nThen it was that Hanway narrated the sensation of the neighborhood. It\nroused Selwyn to a frenzy of excitement; his disjointed, despairing\nexclamations, in annotation, as it were, of the story, disclosed his\nown discovery of the oil, his endeavors to secure the opinion of an\nexpert as to its value, his efforts to buy up the land, his reasons\nfor opposing the premature opening of a road which might reveal the\npresence of the oil springs, when the law discriminating in favor of\noil works and similar interests would later make the way thither a\npublic thoroughfare at all events. He cried out upon his hard fate,\nwhen money might mean life to him; upon the bitter dispensation of the\nmysterious kindling of those hidden secluded waters to blazon his\nsecret to the world, to enrich others through his discovery which\nshould have made him so rich.\n\nThe dry, spare tone of the physician interrupted,--a trite phrase\ninterdicting agitation.\n\n\"Why, doctor,\" said Selwyn, suddenly comprehending, \"you think my\npresent wealth will last out my time!\"\n\nOnce more the physician looked silently into the fire. He had seen a\ngreat deal of dying, but he had lived a quiet ascetic life, which made\nhis sensibilities tender, and he did not get used to death. \"I wish\nyou would stay with him, if you can,\" he said to Hanway at the outer\ndoor. \"It will be a very short time now.\"\n\nIt was even shorter than they thought. The snow, falling then, had not\ndisappeared from the earth when the picks of the grave-diggers cleft\nthrough the clods in the secluded little mountain burying-ground. It\nwas easier work than they had anticipated, although the earth was\nfrozen; and the grave was almost prepared when they realized that the\nground had been broken before, and that here was the deserted\nresting-place of the stranger who had come so far to see him. Hanway\nremembered Selwyn's words, his aversion to the idea that the spot was\nawaiting him, but the dark November day was closing in, the storm\nclouds were gathering anew, so they left him there, and this time the\ngrave held its tenant fast.\n\n\nX.\n\nOne day a letter was mailed in Colbury by an unknown hand, addressed\nto Mrs. Persimmon Sneed and it fared deliberately by way of Sandford\nCross-Roads to its destination. It awoke there the wildest excitement\nand delight, for although it brazenly asserted that Mr. Persimmon\nSneed was in the custody of the writer, and that he would be returned\nsafely to his home only upon the payment of one hundred dollars in a\nmysterious manner described,--otherwise the writer would not answer\nfor consequences,--it gave assurance that he was alive and well, and\nmight even hope to see friends and home and freedom once more. In vain\nthe sheriff of the county expostulated with Mrs. Sneed, representing\nthat the law was the proper liberator of Persimmon Sneed, and that the\npayment of money would encourage crime. The contradictory man's wife\nwas ready to commit crime, if necessary, in this cause, and would have\ncheerfully cracked the bank in Colbury. And certainly this seemed\nalmost unavoidable at one time, for to possess herself of this sum of\nher husband's hoard his signature was essential. The poor woman, in\nher limp sunbonnet and best calico dress, clung to the grating of the\nteller's window, and presented in futile succession her husband's\nbank-book, his returned checks, and even his brand-new check-book,\neach with a gush of tears, while the perplexed official remonstrated,\nand explained, and rejected each persuasion in turn, passing them all\nback beneath the grating, and alas! keeping the money on his side of\nthose inexorable bars. It seemed to poor Mrs. Sneed that the bank was\nof opinion that Persimmon corporally was of slight consequence, the\ninstitution having the true value of the man on deposit. To\naccommodate matters, however, and that the poor woman should not be\nweeping daily and indefinitely on the maddened teller's window, an\nintermediary money-lender was found, who, having vainly sought to\ninduce the bank to render itself responsible, then Mrs. Sneed, who had\nnaught of her own, then a number of friends, who deemed the whole\nenterprise an effort at robbery and seemed to consider Persimmon a\ngood riddance, took heart of grace and made the plunge at a rate of\ninterest which was calculated to cloy his palate forever after. The\nmoney forthwith went a roundabout way according to the directions of\nthe letter.\n\nIt came to its destination in this wise.\n\nCon Hite's distilling enterprise was on so small a scale that one\nmight have imagined it to be altogether outside the purview of the\nlaw, which, it is said, does not take note _de minimis_. One of those\ngrottoes under a beetling cliff, hardly caves, called in the region\n\"rock houses,\" sufficed to contain the small copper and its\nappurtenances, himself and his partner and the occasional jolly guest.\nIt was approached from above rather than from below, by a winding way,\nbeside the cliff between great boulders, which was so steep and\nbrambly and impracticable that it was hardly likely to be espied by\n\"revenuers.\" The rock house opened on space. Beyond the narrow path at\nits entrance the descent was sheer to the bottom of the gorge below.\n\nIn this stronghold, one night, Con Hite sat gloomy and depressed\nbeside the little copper still for the sake of which he risked so\nmuch. It held all it could of singlings, and it seemed to him a cheery\nsight in the shadowy recesses of the rock house. He regarded it with\nmingled pride and affection, often declaring it \"the smartest still of\nits capacity in the world.\" To him it was at once admirable as an\nobject of art and a superior industrial agent.\n\n\"An' I dunno why Narcissa be so set agin it,\" he muttered. \"But for it\nI wouldn't hev money enough ter git a start in this world. My mother\nan' she couldn't live in the same house whenst we git married.\" He\nmeditated for a moment, and shook his head in solemn negation, for his\nmother was constructed much after the pattern of Narcissa herself.\n\"An' _I_ wouldn't live a minit alongside o' Ben Hanway ef I war\nNar'sa's husband. Ben wouldn't let me say my soul's my own. I be\n'bleeged ter mak the money fur a start o' cattle an' sech myse'f, an'\nhev a house an' home o' my own.\"\n\nAnd then he took the pipe from his mouth and sighed. For even his care\nseemed futile. It was true that the fair-haired young stranger was\ndead, and he had a pang of self-reproach whenever he thought of his\njealousy, as if he had wished him ill. But she had worn a cold white\nunresponsive face when he had seen her last; she did not listen to\nwhat he said, her mind evidently elsewhere. She looked at him as if\nshe did not see him. She did not think of him. He was sure that this\nwas not caprice. It was some deep absorbing feeling in which he had no\nshare.\n\nThe moon, like some fair presence, looked in at the broad portal.\nOutside, the white tissues of her misty diaphanous draperies trailed\nalong the dark mountain slopes beneath the dim stars as she wended\nwestward. Afar down the gorge one might catch glimpses of a glossy\nlustre where the evergreen laurel, white with frost, moved in the\nautumn wind. He lifted his head to mark its melancholy cadence, and\nwhile he listened, the moonlight was suddenly crowded from the door as\nthree men rushed in, half helping and half constraining a fourth man\nforward.\n\n\"Durn my boots ef I didn't furgit the password!\" cried Nick Peters\nwith his little falsetto laugh, that seemed keyed for a fleer,\nalthough it was most graciously modulated now. \"Ye mought hev shot us\nfur revenuers.\"\n\n\"I mought hev shot ye fur wuss,\" Con Hite growled, rising slowly from\nhis chair, his big dark eyes betokening his displeasure. \"I dunno how\n_ye_ ever kem ter know this place.\"\n\n\"It'll go no furder, Con, I'll swear,\" said the horse-thief, lifting\nhis hand to Hite's shoulder, and affecting to see in his words an\nappeal for secrecy. \"This,\" he added blandly, \"is Mr. Persimmon Sneed,\nez hev been a-visitin' me. Lemme make ye acquainted.\"\n\nHe seemed to perceive nothing incongruous in the fact that Mr.\nPersimmon Sneed should be blindfolded. But as Con Hite looked at the\nelder man, standing helpless, his head held slightly forward, the\nsight apparently struck his risibilities, and his wonted geniality\nrose to the occasion.\n\n\"An' do Mr. Persimmon Sneed always wear blinders?\" he asked, with a\nguffaw.\n\nPeters seemed immeasurably relieved by the change of tone.\n\n\"Whilst visitin' me, he do,\" he remarked. \"Mr. Persimmon hev got sech\na fine mem'ry fur localities, ye see.\"\n\nHite with a single gesture pulled off the bandage. \"Waal, let him look\nabout him hyar. I s'pose ye hev ter be more partic'lar 'n me 'count o'\nthat stranger man's horse.\"\n\nPeters changed countenance, his attention riveted. \"What horse?\" he\ndemanded.\n\n\"The horse of the man ez war kilt,--ye know folks hev laid that job\nter you-uns. Jerry,\" turning aside to his colleague, who had done\nnaught but stare, \"whar's yer manners? Why n't ye gin the comp'ny a\ndrink?\"\n\nHite shoved the chair in which he had been seated to Persimmon Sneed,\nwho was lugubriously rubbing his eyes, and flung himself down on a\nboulder lying almost outside of the recess in the moonlight, his long\nbooted and spurred legs stretching far across the entrance. His hat on\nthe back of his head, its brim upturned, revealed his bluff open\nface--it held no craft surely; he hardly seemed to notice how\ninsistently Peters pressed after him, unmindful of his henchmen and\nJerry imbibing appreciatively the product of the cheerful little\ncopper still.\n\n\"But I never done sech ez that,\" protested Peters. \"I always stop\nshort o' bloodshed. I never viewed the man's beastis, ye'll bear me\nwitness, Con.\"\n\n\"Me?\" said Con, with a laugh. \"I dunno nuthin' 'bout yer doin's.\nWhar's Mr. Sneed's horse?\"\n\n\"Never seen him,--never laid eyes on him! How folks kin hev the heart\nter 'cuse me of sech doin's ez I never done!\" he lifted his eyes as if\nappealing to heaven.\n\n\"The killin' 's the wust; an' Mr. Sneed's critter bein' gone too\nmought make folks lay it ter ye fur sure,\" persisted Hite.\n\n\"I ain't seen Mr. Sneed's horse. Mr. Sneed--ye wouldn't b'lieve it ter\nlook at him, but he's a ransomed saint! ha! ha! The money fur him\nwill be fotched hyar ter yer still. I sent fur it ter kem by Jake\nGlenn; he knows ye, an' ye know him.\"\n\nCon Hite's open brow did not cloud. If there were any significance\nperceptible in the fact that Mr. Persimmon Sneed, with so fine a head\nfor locality, should be able to identify only the still among his\nvarious shelters during his \"visit\" to Nick Peters, Con Hite made no\nsign.\n\n\"Lord, how glad I'll be ter git rid o' him!\" Peters said in an\nundertone to Hite. \"He hev mighty nigh argufied me ter death,--'bout\nsperits, an' witches, an' salvation, an' law, an' craps, an'\nhorse-flesh, an' weather signs. I be sorter 'feard his wife won't pay\nnuthin' ter git him again. He 'pears sorter under the weather now, or\neavesdroppin' or suthin'. The money 'll pay me mighty pore fur my\ntrouble. Thar--what's that?\"\n\nHe paused to listen; there was a sound other than the tinkling of the\nlittle rill near at hand or the blare of the autumn wind. A stone came\nrolling down the path, dislodged by a cautious step,--then another.\nHite drew a revolver from his pocket, and, holding it in his right\nhand, stepped out on the rugged little parapet and stood there, with\nthe depths of the gorge below him, looking up the ascent with the\nmoonlight in his face. He spoke in a low voice to some one\napproaching, and was answered in the same tone. He stepped back to\ngive the new-comer space to enter, and as Jake Glenn came in held out\nhis hand for the package the messenger bore.\n\n\"Let's see it, Nick,\" he said, tearing it open; \"it's the money sure\nenough.\"\n\nOld Persimmon Sneed turned his head with a certain alert interest.\nPerhaps he himself had doubted whether his wife would think him worth\nthe money. There was a general flutter of good-natured gratulation,\nand it seemed at the moment only some preposterous mistake that Con\nHite should put it into Persimmon Sneed's lean paw and close his\ntrembling fingers over it.\n\n\"Now, scoot!\" he bawled out at the top of his voice, the little den\nringing with the echoes of his excitement, a second revolver drawn in\nhis left hand. \"I'll gin ye a day's start o' these fellers.\" He\npresented the muzzle of one pistol to Peters's head, and with the\nother he covered one of the two henchmen in the recess of the little\nrock house. The other sprang up from a barrel where he sat wiping his\nmouth with the back of his hand; but Jerry, suddenly realizing the\nsituation, put out a dexterous foot, and the horse-thief fell full\nlength upon the floor, his pistol discharging as he went down. In the\nclamor of the echoes, and the smoke and the flare, Persimmon Sneed\ndisappeared, hearing as he went a wild protest, and a nimbleness of\nargument second hardly to his own, as Nick Peters cried out that he\nwas robbed, his hard earnings were wrested from him, the money was\nhis, paid him as a price, and Con Hite had let Mr. Persimmon Sneed run\noff with it, allowing him nothing for his trouble.\n\n\"It war his money,\" Con Hite averred, when they had grown calmer, and\nJake Glenn had returned from a reconnoissance with the news that\nHite's father had lent the fleeing Persimmon a horse, and he was by\nthis time five miles away in the Cove. \"_He_ could have paid you for\nyer trouble in ketchin' him ef he had wanted ter.\"\n\n\"It war _not_ his money,\" protested Peters, with tears in his eyes.\n\"It war sent ter me willingly, fur a valid consideration, an' ye let\nhim hev the money, an' his wife hev got the valid consideration--an'\nhyar I be lef' with the bag ter hold!\"\n\nIt may be that Peters had absorbed some of the craft of argument by\nmere propinquity to Persimmon Sneed, or that Con Hite's conscience was\nunduly tender, for he long entertained a moral doubt touching his\ncourse in this transaction,--whether he had a right to pay the ransom\nmoney which Nick Peters had extorted from Persimmon Sneed's wife to\nPersimmon Sneed himself, thereby defrauding Nick Peters of the fruit\nof his labor. Perhaps this untoward state of dubitation came about\nfrom Narcissa's scornful comment.\n\n\"Ye mought hev known that old man Persimmon Sneed would have made off\nwith the money,\" she said, remembering his reproving glare at her. \"I\nwouldn't hev trested him with a handful o' cornfield peas.\"\n\n\"But I expected him ter make off with it,\" protested the amazed Con;\n\"that's why I gin it ter him.\"\n\n\"Then ye air jes' ez bad ez he is,\" she retorted coldly.\n\nAnd thus it was he examined his conscience.\n\nPersimmon Sneed had no doubts whatever as to the ownership of the\nmoney in his pocket, when one fine morning he walked into his own\ndoor, as dictatorial, as set in his own opinion as ever; the only\nchange to be detected in his manners and conversation thereafter was\nthe enigmatical assertion at times that he was a \"ransomed saint,\"\nfollowed by a low chuckle of enjoyment. Those who heard this often\nmade bold to say to one another that he \"didn't act like it,\" and this\nopinion was shared by the sheriff who futilely sought some information\nfrom him touching the lair of the horse-thieves, looking to brilliant\nexploits of capture. Such details as he could secure were so uncertain\nand contradictory as to render him suspicious that the truth was\npurposely withheld.\n\n\"Ye oughter remember these men air crim'nal offenders agin the law,\nMr. Sneed,\" he said.\n\n\"Mebbe so,\" assented Persimmon Sneed, \"mebbe so;\" but the situation of\nCon Hite's still was the only locality which he had visited of which\nhe was sure, and in gratitude to his rescuer he held his peace.\n\nThat he was not so softened to the world at large was manifested in\nthe fact that he threatened to plead usury against the money-lender,\nand forthwith brought him down with a run to the beggaries of the\nlegal rate. He was wont, moreover, to go to the teller of the bank at\nColbury and demand of that distracted man such of his papers as were\nfrom time to time lost or mislaid, having learned from his wife that\nshe had made the official the custodian of his valuables, these being\nhis bank-book, the ancient returned checks, and the unused check-book.\n\nThe points which he had so laboriously made plain to the jury of view\nproved a total loss of perspicacious reasoning, for the land was\nforthwith condemned and the road opened, any oil-boring company being\nallowed by law a right of way thirty feet wide. The heavy hauling of\nthe oil company had already made a tolerable wagon track, and the\npassing back and forth of the men and teams and machinery added an\nelement of interest and excitement to the thoroughfare such as\nNarcissa's wildest dreams had never prefigured. She had no heart for\nit now. When the creak of wheels on the frozen ground, and the cries\nof the drivers, and the thud of the hoofs of the straining four-horse\nteams heralded an approach, she was wont to draw close the batten\nshutter of the window and sit brooding over the fire, staring with\nmoody eyes into the red coals, where she saw much invisible to the\nsimple Ben. He knew vaguely that her grief was for the fair-haired\nstranger, but he could not dream in what remorseful wise. She had not\nfailed to perceive her own agency in the betrayal of his secret, when\nthe story of the discovery of the oil was blazoned to all the world by\nthose mystically flaring waters in the deeps of the mountain night. It\nwas she who had idly kindled them; she who had robbed him of his\nrights, of the wealth that these interlopers were garnering. She had\nsent him to his grave baffled, beaten, forlorn, wondering at the\nmystery of the hand that out of the dark had smitten him. She kept her\nown counsel. Her white face grew set and stern. Her words were few.\nShe had no tears. And Ben, who found his tyrant only the harder and\nthe colder, scarcely remonstrated, and could only marvel when one\nkeen, chill afternoon she sprang up, throwing her brown shawl over her\nhead, and declared that she was going to the oil wells to see for\nherself what progress was making there.\n\nAll sylvan grace had departed from the spot. As the two stood on the\nverge of the clear space, now gashed deep in every direction in the\nwoods and larger by a hundred acres, grim derricks rose sharply\noutlined against the wintry sky. It was barred with strata of gray\nclouds in such sombre neutrality of tint that one, in that it was less\ngloomy than the others, gave a suggestion of blue. Patches of snow lay\nabout the ground. Cinders and smoke had blackened them here and there.\nThe steam-engine, with its cylindrical boiler, seemed in the dusk some\nuncanny monster that had taken up its abode here, and rejoiced in the\ndesolation it had wrought, and lived by ill deeds. It was letting off\nsteam, and now and then it gave a puffing sigh as if it were tired\nafter its day's work. The laborers were of a different type from the\nhomely neighbors, and returned the contempt with which the\nmountaineers gazed upon them. Great piles of wood showed how the\nforests were being rifled for fuel. Many trees had been felled in\nprovident foresight, and lay along the ground in vast lengths,\nawaiting the axe; so many that adown the avenues thus opened toward\nthe valley a wan glimmering caught the girl's eye, and she recognized\nthe palings of the little mountain graveyard.\n\nShe clutched her brother's arm and pointed to it. Her eyes grew\ndilated and wild, her face was pale and drawn; her hand trembled as\nshe held it out.\n\n\"Ye see, Ben, he's close enough ter view it all--an' mebbe he\ndoes--an' he knows now who he hev got ter thank fur it all--an' I\nwisht he war hyar, whar I am, an' I war thar, whar he is.\"\n\nHer brother thought for the moment that she was raving. The next she\ncaught her shawl over her head, hoodwise, the wind tossing her bright\nhair, and declared that she was cold, and upbraided him for bringing\nher on this long, chilling tramp, and protested that she would come\nnever again.\n\nHe came often afterward. The spot seemed to have a fascination for\nhim. And within sound of the cheerful hubbub and busy whir of the\nindustry he would lean over the palings and look at the grave, covered\nsometimes with a drift of leaves, and sometimes with a drift of snow,\nand think of the two men that it had successively housed, and nurse\nhis grudge against the company. With an unreasoning hatred of it,\nHanway felt that both were victims of the great strong corporation\nthat was to reap the value of the discovery which was not its own save\nby accident. He could not appraise the justice of the dispensation by\nwhich the keen observation of the one man, and the science and\nexperience that the other had brought to the enterprise, should fall\nso far short of achievement, while an idle story, the gossip of the\nday, should fill the hands of those who were strangers to the very\nthought. He grudged every augury of success; he welcomed every detail\nof difficulty. As time went on, the well was said to be of\nintermittent flow, and new borings resulted in naught but vast floods\nof sulphur water. Finally, when the admitted truth pervaded the\ncommunity,--that the oil was practically exhausted, that it had long\nsince ceased to pay expenses, that the company was a heavy loser by\nthe enterprise,--he was as a man appeased.\n\nThe result was succeeded by a change in Narcissa so radical and\nimmediate that Constant Hite could but perceive the fact that it was\ninduced by the failure and abandonment of the work. She grew placid as\nof yore, and was softened, and now and again the gentle melancholy\ninto which she fell suggested sad and reminiscent pleasure rather than\nthe remorseful and desperate sorrow that she had known. He began to\nrealize that it was no sentimental and love-stricken grief she had\nfelt for Selwyn, but a sympathy akin to his own and to her brother's;\nand since the disappointment of the hope of fortune must needs have\ncome to Selwyn at last, they made shift to resign themselves, and were\nwont to talk freely of the dead with that affectionate and immediate\ninterest which seems to prolong the span of a mortal's day on earth,\nlike the tender suffusive radiance of the afterglow of a sunken sun.\n\nThe road fell quickly into disuse after the abandonment of the work.\nIn the storms of winter, trees were uprooted and thrown athwart the\nway; overhanging rocks, splitting in the freeze, precipitated\nobstructive avalanches upon the dim serpentine convolutions; the wind\npiled drifts of dead leaves above the turns; and in the spring grass\nbegan to grow in the tracks of the wheels.\n\nIt held no woeful memories now for Narcissa. She loved to sit on the\nstep of the stile and watch through the leafless sunlit trees the\nsilver haze shimmering in the valley, where the winter wheat was all\nof an emerald richness, and the blue mountains afar off so near akin\nto the aspect of heaven that one might hardly mark where the horizon\nline merged the sweet solitudes of earth into the solitary sky. Many\na day, the spring, loitering along the shadow-flecked vistas, with the\nred maple-blooms overhead and violets underfoot, was the only traveler\nto be seen on the deserted road. And the pensive dusk was wont to\ndeepen into the serene vernal night, sweet with the scent of the\nbudding wild cherry, and astir with timorous tentative rustlings as of\nhalf-fledged breezes, and illumined only with the gentle lustre of the\nwhite stars; for never again was the darkness emblazoned with that\nhaggard incandescence so long the mystery of Witch-Face Mountain.\n\n\n\n\nTAKING THE BLUE RIBBON AT THE COUNTY FAIR.\n\n\nJenks Hollis sat on the fence. He slowly turned the quid of tobacco in\nhis cheek, and lifting up his voice spoke with an oracular drawl:--\n\n\"Ef he kin take the certif'cate it's the mos' ez he kin do. He ain't\nnever a-goin' ter git no premi-_um_ in this life, sure 's ye air a\nborn sinner.\"\n\nAnd he relapsed into silence. His long legs dangled dejectedly among\nthe roadside weeds; his brown jeans trousers, that had despaired of\never reaching his ankles, were ornamented here and there with\nill-adjusted patches, and his loose-fitting coat was out at the\nelbows. An old white wool hat drooped over his eyes, which were fixed\nabsently on certain distant blue mountain ranges, that melted tenderly\ninto the blue of the noonday sky, and framed an exquisite mosaic of\npoly-tinted fields in the valley, far, far below the grim gray crag on\nwhich his little home was perched.\n\nDespite his long legs he was a light weight, or he would not have\nchosen as his favorite seat so rickety a fence. His interlocutor, a\nheavier man, apparently had some doubts, for he leaned only slightly\nagainst one of the projecting rails as he whittled a pine stick, and\nwith his every movement the frail structure trembled. The log cabin\nseemed as rickety as the fence. The little front porch had lost a\npuncheon here and there in the flooring--perhaps on some cold winter\nnight when Hollis's energy was not sufficiently exuberant to convey\nhim to the wood-pile; the slender posts that upheld its roof seemed\nhardly strong enough to withstand the weight of the luxuriant vines\nwith their wealth of golden gourds which had clambered far over the\nmoss-grown clapboards; the windows had fewer panes of glass than rags;\nand the chimney, built of clay and sticks, leaned portentously away\nfrom the house. The open door displayed a rough, uncovered floor; a\nfew old rush-bottomed chairs; a bedstead with a patch-work calico\nquilt, the mattress swagging in the centre and showing the badly\narranged cords below; strings of bright red pepper hanging from the\ndark rafters; a group of tow-headed, grave-faced, barefooted children;\nand, occupying almost one side of the room, a broad, deep,\nold-fashioned fireplace, where winter and summer a lazy fire burned\nunder a lazy pot.\n\nNotwithstanding the poverty of the aspect of the place and the evident\nsloth of its master, it was characterized by a scrupulous cleanliness\nstrangely at variance with its forlorn deficiencies. The rough floor\nwas not only swept but scoured; the dark rafters, whence depended the\nflaming banners of the red pepper, harbored no cobwebs; the grave\nfaces of the white-haired children bore no more dirt than was\nconsistent with their recent occupation of making mudpies; and the\nsedate, bald-headed baby, lying silent but wide-awake in an uncouth\nwooden cradle, was as clean as clear spring water and yellow soap\ncould make it. Mrs. Hollis herself, seen through the vista of opposite\nopen doors, energetically rubbing the coarse wet clothes upon the\nresonant washboard, seemed neat enough in her blue-and-white checked\nhomespun dress, and with her scanty hair drawn smoothly back from her\nbrow into a tidy little knot on the top of her head.\n\nSpare and gaunt she was, and with many lines in her prematurely old\nface. Perhaps they told of the hard fight her brave spirit waged\nagainst the stern ordering of her life; of the struggles with\nsqualor,--inevitable concomitant of poverty,--and to keep together the\nsouls and bodies of those numerous children, with no more efficient\nassistance than could be wrung from her reluctant husband in the\nshort intervals when he did not sit on the fence. She managed as well\nas she could; there was an abundance of fine fruit in that low line of\nfoliage behind the house--but everybody on Old Bear Mountain had fine\nfruit. Something rarer, she had good vegetables--the planting and\nhoeing being her own work and her eldest daughter's; an occasional\nshallow furrow representing the contribution of her husband's plough.\nThe althea-bushes and the branches of the laurel sheltered a goodly\nnumber of roosting hens in these September nights; and to the pond,\nwhich had been formed by damming the waters of the spring branch in\nthe hollow across the road, was moving even now a stately procession\nof geese in single file. These simple belongings were the trophies of\na gallant battle against unalterable conditions and the dragging,\ndispiriting clog of her husband's inertia.\n\nHis inner life--does it seem hard to realize that in that uncouth\npersonality concentred the complex, incomprehensible, ever-shifting\nemotions of that inner life which, after all, is so much stronger, and\ndeeper, and broader than the material? Here, too, beat the hot heart\nof humanity--beat with no measured throb. He had his hopes, his\npleasure, his pain, like those of a higher culture, differing only in\nobject, and something perhaps in degree. His disappointments were\nbitter and lasting; his triumphs, few and sordid; his single\naspiration--to take the premium offered by the directors of the\nKildeer County Fair for the best equestrian.\n\nThis incongruous and unpromising ambition had sprung up in this wise:\nBetween the country people of Kildeer County and the citizens of the\nvillage of Colbury, the county-seat, existed a bitter and deeply\nrooted animosity manifesting itself at conventions, elections for the\nlegislature, etc., the rural population voting as a unit against the\ntown's candidate. On all occasions of public meetings there was a\nstruggle to crush any invidious distinction against the \"country\nboys,\" especially at the annual fair. Here to the rustics of Kildeer\nCounty came the tug of war. The population of the outlying districts\nwas more numerous, and, when it could be used as a suffrage-engine,\nall-powerful; but the region immediately adjacent to the town was far\nmore fertile. On those fine meadows grazed the graceful Jersey; there\ngamboled sundry long-tailed colts with long-tailed pedigrees; there\ngreedy Berkshires fattened themselves to abnormal proportions; and the\nmerinos could hardly walk, for the weight of their own rich wardrobes.\nThe well-to-do farmers of this section were hand-in-glove with the\ntown's people; they drove their trotters in every day or so to get\ntheir mail, to chat with their cronies, to attend to their affairs in\ncourt, to sell or to buy--their pleasures centred in the town, and\nthey turned the cold shoulder upon the country, which supported them,\nand gave their influence to Colbury, accounting themselves an\nintegrant part of it. Thus, at the fairs the town claimed the honor\nand glory. The blue ribbon decorated cattle and horses bred within ten\nmiles of the flaunting flag on the judges' stand, and the foaming\nmountain-torrents and the placid stream in the valley beheld no\ncerulean hues save those of the sky which they reflected.\n\nThe premium offered this year for the best rider was, as it happened,\na new feature, and excited especial interest. The country's blood was\nup. Here was something for which it could fairly compete, with none of\nthe disadvantages of the false position in which it was placed. Hence\na prosperous landed proprietor, the leader of the rural faction,\ndwelling midway between the town and the range of mountains that\nbounded the county on the north and east, bethought himself one day of\nJenkins Hollis, whose famous riding had been the feature of a certain\ndashing cavalry charge--once famous, too--forgotten now by all but the\nmen who, for the first and only time in their existence, penetrated\nin those war days the blue mountains fencing in their county from the\nouter world, and looked upon the alien life beyond that wooded\nbarrier. The experience of those four years, submerged in the whirling\nrush of events elsewhere, survives in these eventless regions in a\ndreamy, dispassionate sort of longevity. And Jenkins Hollis's feat of\nriding stolidly--one could hardly say bravely--up an almost sheer\nprecipice to a flame-belching battery came suddenly into the landed\nmagnate's recollection with the gentle vapors and soothing aroma of a\nmeditative after-dinner pipe. Quivering with party spirit, Squire\nGoodlet sent for Hollis and offered to lend him the best horse on the\nplace, and a saddle and bridle, if he would go down to Colbury and\nbeat those town fellows out on their own ground.\n\nNo misgivings had Hollis. The inordinate personal pride characteristic\nof the mountaineer precluded his feeling a shrinking pain at the\nprospect of being presented, a sorry contrast, among the well-clad,\nwell-to-do town's people, to compete in a public contest. He did not\nappreciate the difference--he thought himself as good as the best.\n\nAnd to-day, complacent enough, he sat upon the rickety fence at home,\noracularly disparaging the equestrian accomplishments of the town's\nnoted champion.\n\n\"I dunno--I dunno,\" said his young companion doubtfully. \"Hackett sets\nmighty firm onto his saddle. He's ez straight ez any shingle, an' ez\ntough ez a pine-knot. He come up hyar las' summer--war it las' summer,\nnow? No, 't war summer afore las'--with some o' them other Colbury\nfolks, a-fox-huntin', an' a-deer-huntin, an' one thing an' 'nother. I\nseen 'em a time or two in the woods. An' he kin ride jes' ez good\n'mongst the gullies and boulders like ez ef he had been born in the\nhills. He ain't a-goin' ter be beat easy.\"\n\n\"It don't make no differ,\" retorted Jenks Hollis. \"He'll never git no\npremi-_um_. The certif'cate's good a-plenty fur what ridin' he kin\ndo.\"\n\nDoubt was still expressed in the face of the young man, but he said no\nmore, and, after a short silence, Mr. Hollis, perhaps not relishing\nhis visitor's want of appreciation, dismounted, so to speak, from the\nfence, and slouched off slowly up the road.\n\nJacob Brice still stood leaning against the rails and whittling his\npine stick, in no wise angered or dismayed by his host's unceremonious\ndeparture, for social etiquette is not very rigid on Old Bear\nMountain. He was a tall athletic fellow, clad in a suit of brown\njeans, which displayed, besides the ornaments of patches, sundry deep\ngrass stains about the knees. Not that piety induced Brice to spend\nmuch time in the lowly attitude of prayer, unless, indeed, Diana might\nbe accounted the goddess of his worship. The green juice was pressed\nout when kneeling, hidden in some leafy, grassy nook, he heard the\ninfrequent cry of the wild turkey, or his large, intent blue eyes\ncaught a glimpse of the stately head of an antlered buck, moving\nmajestically in the alternate sheen of the sunlight and shadow of the\noverhanging crags; or while with his deft hunter's hands he dragged\nhimself by slow, noiseless degrees through the ferns and tufts of rank\nweeds to the water's edge, that he might catch a shot at the feeding\nwild duck. A leather belt around his waist supported his powder-horn\nand shot-pouch,--for his accoutrements were exactly such as might have\nbeen borne a hundred years ago by a hunter of Old Bear Mountain,--and\nhis gun leaned against the trunk of a chestnut-oak.\n\nAlthough he still stood outside the fence, aimlessly lounging, there\nwas a look on his face of a half-suppressed expectancy, which rendered\nthe features less statuesque than was their wont--an expectancy that\nshowed itself in the furtive lifting of his eyelids now and then,\nenabling him to survey the doorway without turning his head. Suddenly\nhis face reassumed its habitual, inexpressive mask of immobility, and\nthe furtive eyes were persistently downcast.\n\nA flare of color, and Cynthia Hollis was standing in the doorway,\nleaning against its frame. She was robed, like September, in brilliant\nyellow. The material and make were of the meanest, but there was a\ncertain appropriateness in the color with her slumberous dark eyes and\nthe curling tendrils of brown hair which fell upon her forehead and\nwere clustered together at the back of her neck. No cuffs and no\ncollar could this costume boast, but she had shown the inclination to\nfinery characteristic of her age and sex by wearing around her throat,\nwhere the yellow hue of her dress met the creamy tint of her skin, a\nrow of large black beads, threaded upon a shoe-string in default of an\nelastic, the brass ends flaunting brazenly enough among them. She held\nin her hand a string of red pepper, to which she was adding some newly\ngathered pods. A slow job Cynthia seemed to make of it.\n\nShe took no more notice of the man under the tree than he accorded to\nher. There they stood, within twelve feet of each other, in utter\nsilence, and, to all appearance, each entirely unconscious of the\nother's existence: he whittling his pine stick; she, slowly, slowly\nstringing the pods of red pepper.\n\nThere was something almost portentous in the gravity and sobriety of\ndemeanor of this girl of seventeen; she manifested less interest in\nthe young man than her own grandmother might have shown.\n\nHe was constrained to speak first. \"Cynthy\"--he said at length,\nwithout raising his eyes or turning his head. She did not answer; but\nhe knew without looking that she had fixed those slumberous brown eyes\nupon him, waiting for him to go on. \"Cynthy\"--he said again, with a\nhesitating, uneasy manner. Then, with an awkward attempt at raillery,\n\"Ain't ye never a-thinkin' 'bout a-gittin' married?\"\n\nHe cast a laughing glance toward her, and looked down quickly at his\nclasp-knife and the stick he was whittling. It was growing very\nslender now.\n\nCynthia's serious face relaxed its gravity. \"Ye air foolish, Jacob,\"\nshe said, laughing. After stringing on another pepper-pod with great\ndeliberation, she continued: \"Ef I war a-studyin' 'bout a-gittin'\nmarried, thar ain't nobody round 'bout hyar ez I'd hev.\" And she added\nanother pod to the flaming red string, so bright against the yellow of\nher dress.\n\nThat stick could not long escape annihilation. The clasp-knife moved\nvigorously through its fibres, and accented certain arbitrary clauses\nin its owner's retort. \"Ye talk like,\" he said, his face as\nmonotonous in its expression as if every line were cut in marble--\"ye\ntalk like--ye thought ez how I--war a-goin' ter ax ye--ter marry me. I\nain't though, nuther.\"\n\nThe stick was a shaving. It fell among the weeds. The young hunter\nshut his clasp-knife with a snap, shouldered his gun, and without a\nword of adieu on either side the conference terminated, and he walked\noff down the sandy road.\n\nCynthia stood watching him until the laurel-bushes hid him from sight;\nthen sliding from the door-frame to the step, she sat motionless, a\nbright-hued mass of yellow draperies and red peppers, her slumberous\ndeep eyes resting on the leaves that had closed upon him.\n\nShe was the central figure of a still landscape. The mid-day sunshine\nfell in broad effulgence upon it; the homely, dun-colored shadows had\nbeen running away all the morning, as if shirking the contrast with\nthe splendors of the golden light, until nothing was left of them\nexcept a dark circle beneath the wide-spreading trees. No breath of\nwind stirred the leaves, or rippled the surface of the little pond.\nThe lethargy of the hour had descended even upon the towering\npine-trees, growing on the precipitous slope of the mountain, and\nshowing their topmost plumes just above the frowning, gray\ncrag--their melancholy song was hushed. The silent masses of dazzling\nwhite clouds were poised motionless in the ambient air, high above the\nvalley and the misty expanse of the distant, wooded ranges.\n\nA lazy, lazy day, and very, very warm. The birds had much ado to find\nsheltering shady nooks where they might escape the glare and the heat;\ntheir gay carols were out of season, and they blinked and nodded under\ntheir leafy umbrellas, and fanned themselves with their wings, and\ntwittered disapproval of the weather. \"Hot, hot, red-hot!\" said the\nbirds--\"broiling hot!\"\n\nNow and then an acorn fell from among the serrated chestnut leaves,\nstriking upon the fence with a sounding thwack, and rebounding in the\nweeds. Those chestnut-oaks always seem to unaccustomed eyes the\ncreation of Nature in a fit of mental aberration--useful freak! the\nmountain swine fatten on the plenteous mast, and the bark is highly\nesteemed at the tan-yard.\n\nA large cat was lying at full length on the floor of the little porch,\nwatching with drowsy, half-closed eyes the assembled birds in the\ntree. But she seemed to have relinquished the pleasures of the chase\nuntil the mercury should fall.\n\nClose in to the muddiest side of the pond over there, which was all\nsilver and blue with the reflection of the great masses of white\nclouds, and the deep azure sky, a fleet of shining, snowy geese was\nmoored, perfectly motionless too. No circumnavigation for them this\nhot day.\n\nAnd Cynthia's dark brown eyes, fixed upon the leafy vista of the road,\nwere as slumberous as the noontide sunshine.\n\n\"Cynthy! whar _is_ the gal?\" said poor Mrs. Hollis, as she came around\nthe house to hang out the ragged clothes on the althea-bushes and the\nrickety fence. \"Cynthy, air ye a-goin' ter sit thar in the door all\nday, an' that thar pot a-bilin' all the stren'th out 'n that thar\ncabbige an' roas'in'-ears? Dish up dinner, child, an' don't be so slow\nan' slack-twisted like yer dad.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nGreat merriment there was, to be sure, at the Kildeer Fair grounds,\nsituated on the outskirts of Colbury, when it became known to the\nconvulsed town faction that the gawky Jenks Hollis intended to compete\nfor the premium to be awarded to the best and most graceful rider. The\ncontests of the week had as usual resulted in Colbury's favor; this\nwas the last day of the fair, and the defeated country population\nanxiously but still hopefully awaited its notable event.\n\nA warm sun shone; a brisk autumnal breeze waved the flag flying from\nthe judges' stand; a brass band in the upper story of that structure\nthrilled the air with the vibrations of popular waltzes and marches,\nsomewhat marred now and then by mysteriously discordant bass tones;\nthe judges, portly, red-faced, middle-aged gentlemen, sat below in\ncane-bottom chairs critically a-tilt on the hind legs. The rough\nwooden amphitheatre, a bold satire on the stately Roman edifice, was\nfilled with the denizens of Colbury and the rosy rural faces of the\ncountry people of Kildeer County; and within the charmed arena the\ncompetitors for the blue ribbon and the saddle and bridle to be\nawarded to the best rider were just now entering, ready mounted, from\na door beneath the tiers of seats, and were slowly making the tour of\nthe circle around the judges' stand. One by one they came, with a\ncertain nonchalant pride of demeanor, conscious of an effort to\ndisplay themselves and their horses to the greatest advantage, and yet\na little ashamed of the consciousness. For the most part they were\nyoung men, prosperous looking, and clad according to the requirements\nof fashion which prevailed in this little town. Shut in though it was\nfrom the pomps and vanities of the world by the encircling chains of\nblue ranges and the bending sky which rested upon their summits, the\nfrivolity of the mode, though somewhat belated, found its way and\nruled with imperative rigor. Good riders they were undoubtedly,\naccustomed to the saddle almost from infancy, and well mounted. A\ncertain air of gallantry, always characteristic of an athletic\nhorseman, commended these equestrian figures to the eye as they slowly\ncircled about. Still they came--eight--nine--ten--the eleventh, the\nlong, lank frame of Jenkins Hollis mounted on Squire Goodlet's \"John\nBarleycorn.\"\n\nThe horsemen received this ungainly addition to their party with\npolite composure, and the genteel element of the spectators remained\nsilent too from the force of good breeding and good feeling; but the\n\"roughs,\" always critically a-loose in a crowd, shouted and screamed\nwith derisive hilarity. What they were laughing at Jenks Hollis never\nknew. Grave and stolid, but as complacent as the best, he too made the\nusual circuit with his ill-fitting jeans suit, his slouching old wool\nhat, and his long, gaunt figure. But he sat the spirited \"John\nBarleycorn\" as if he were a part of the steed, and held up his head\nwith unwonted dignity, inspired perhaps by the stately attitudes of\nthe horse, which were the result of no training nor compelling reins,\nbut the instinct transmitted through a long line of high-headed\nancestry. Of a fine old family was \"John Barleycorn.\"\n\nA deeper sensation was in store for the spectators. Before Jenkins\nHollis's appearance most of them had heard of his intention to\ncompete, but the feeling was one of unmixed astonishment when entry\nNo. 12 rode into the arena, and, on the part of the country people,\nthis surprise was supplemented by an intense indignation. The twelfth\nman was Jacob Brice. As he was a \"mounting boy,\" one would imagine\nthat, if victory should crown his efforts, the rural faction ought to\nfeel the elation of success, but the prevailing sentiment toward him\nwas that which every well-conducted mind must entertain concerning the\nindividual who runs against the nominee. Notwithstanding the fact that\nBrice was a notable rider, too, and well calculated to try the mettle\nof the town's champion, there arose from the excited countrymen a\nkeen, bitter, and outraged cry of \"Take him out!\" So strongly does the\npartisan heart pulsate to the interests of the nominee! This frantic\npetition had no effect on the interloper. A man who has inherited half\na dozen violent quarrels, any one of which may at any moment burst\ninto a vendetta,--inheriting little else,--is not easily dismayed by\nthe disapprobation of either friend or foe. His statuesque features,\nshaded by the drooping brim of his old black hat were as calm as ever,\nand his slow blue eyes did not, for one moment, rest upon the excited\nscene about him, so unspeakably new to his scanty experience. His\nfine figure showed to great advantage on horseback, despite his\nuncouth, coarse garb; he was mounted upon a sturdy, brown mare of\nobscure origin, but good-looking, clean-built, sure-footed, and with\nthe blended charm of spirit and docility; she represented his whole\nestate, except his gun and his lean, old hound, that had accompanied\nhim to the fair, and was even now improving the shining hour by\nquarreling over a bone outside the grounds with other people's\nhandsomer dogs.\n\nThe judges were exacting. The riders were ordered to gallop to the\nright--and around they went. To the left--and there was again the\nspectacle of the swiftly circling equestrian figures. They were\nrequired to draw up in a line, and to dismount; then to mount, and\nagain to alight. Those whom these manoeuvres proved inferior were\ndismissed at once, and the circle was reduced to eight. An exchange of\nhorses was commanded; and once more the riding, fast and slow, left\nand right, the mounting and dismounting were repeated. The proficiency\nof the remaining candidates rendered them worthy of more difficult\nordeals. They were required to snatch a hat from the ground while\nriding at full gallop. Pistols loaded with blank cartridges were fired\nbehind the horses, and subsequently close to their quivering and\nsnorting nostrils, in order that the relative capacity of the riders\nto manage a frightened and unruly steed might be compared, and the\ncriticism of the judges mowed the number down to four.\n\nFree speech is conceded by all right-thinking people to be a blessing.\nIt is often a balm. Outside of the building and of earshot the\ndefeated aspirants took what comfort they could in consigning, with\ngreat fervor and volubility, all the judicial magnates to that torrid\nregion unknown to polite geographical works.\n\nOf the four horsemen remaining in the ring, two were Jenkins Hollis\nand Jacob Brice. Short turns at full gallop were prescribed. The\nhorses were required to go backward at various gaits. Bars were\nbrought in and the crowd enjoyed the exhibition of the standing-leap,\nat an ever-increasing height and then the flying-leap--a tumultuous\nconfused impression of thundering hoofs and tossing mane and grim\ndefiant faces of horse and rider, in the lightning-like moment of\npassing. Obstructions were piled on the track for the \"long jumps,\"\nand in one of the wildest leaps a good rider was unhorsed and rolled\non the ground while his recreant steed that had balked at the last\nmoment scampered around and around the arena in a wild effort to find\nthe door beneath the tiers of seats to escape so fierce a\ncompetition. This accident reduced the number of candidates to the two\nmountaineers and Tip Hackett, the man whom Jacob had pronounced a\nformidable rival. The circling about, the mounting and dismounting,\nthe exchange of horses were several times repeated without any\napparent result, and excitement rose to fever heat.\n\nThe premium and certificate lay between the three men. The town\nfaction trembled at the thought that the substantial award of the\nsaddle and bridle, with the decoration of the blue ribbon, and the\nintangible but still precious secondary glory of the certificate and\nthe red ribbon might be given to the two mountaineers, leaving the\ncrack rider of Colbury in an ignominious lurch; while the country\nparty feared Hollis's defeat by Hackett rather less than that Jenks\nwould be required to relinquish the premium to the interloper Brice,\nfor the young hunter's riding had stricken a pang of prophetic terror\nto more than one partisan rustic's heart. In the midst of the\nperplexing doubt, which tried the judges' minds, came the hour for\ndinner, and the decision was postponed until after that meal.\n\nThe competitors left the arena, and the spectators transferred their\nattention to unburdening hampers, or to jostling one another in the\ndining-hall.\n\nEverybody was feasting but Cynthia Hollis. The intense excitement of\nthe day, the novel sights and sounds utterly undreamed of in her\nformer life, the abruptly struck chords of new emotions suddenly set\nvibrating within her, had dulled her relish for the midday meal; and\nwhile the other members of the family repaired to the shade of a tree\noutside the grounds to enjoy that refection, she wandered about the\n\"floral hall,\" gazing at the splendors of bloom thronging there, all\nso different from the shy grace, the fragility of poise, the delicacy\nof texture of the flowers of her ken,--the rhododendron, the azalea,\nthe Chilhowee lily,--yet vastly imposing in their massed exuberance\nand scarlet pride, for somehow they all seemed high colored.\n\nShe went more than once to note with a kind of aghast dismay those\ntrophies of feminine industry, the quilts; some were of the \"log\ncabin\" and \"rising sun\" variety, but others were of geometric\nintricacy of form and were kaleidoscopic of color with an amazing\nlabyrinth of stitchings and embroideries--it seemed a species of\neffrontery to dub one gorgeous poly-tinted silken banner a quilt. But\nalready it bore a blue ribbon, and its owner was the richer by the\nprize of a glass bowl and the envy of a score of deft-handed\ncompetitors. She gazed upon the glittering jellies and preserves,\nupon the biscuits and cheeses, the hair-work and wax flowers, and\npaintings. These latter treated for the most part of castles and seas\nrather than of the surrounding altitudes, but Cynthia came to a pause\nof blank surprise in front of a shadow rather than a picture which\nrepresented a spring of still brown water in a mossy cleft of a rock\nwhere the fronds of a fern seemed to stir in the foreground. \"I hev\nviewed the like o' that a many a time,\" she said disparagingly. To her\nit hardly seemed rare enough for the blue ribbon on the frame.\n\nIn the next room she dawdled through great piles of prize fruits and\nvegetables--water-melons unduly vast of bulk, peaches and pears and\npumpkins of proportions never seen before out of a nightmare, stalks\nof Indian corn eighteen feet high with seven ears each,--all\napparently attesting what they could do when they would, and that all\nthe enterprise of Kildeer County was not exclusively of the feminine\npersuasion.\n\nFinally Cynthia came out from the midst of them and stood leaning\nagainst one of the large pillars which supported the roof of the\namphitheatre, still gazing about the half-deserted building, with the\nsmouldering fires of her slumberous eyes newly kindled.\n\nTo other eyes and ears it might not have seemed a scene of tumultuous\nmetropolitan life, with the murmuring trees close at hand dappling the\nfloor with sycamore shadows, the fields of Indian corn across the\nroad, the exuberant rush of the stream down the slope just beyond, the\nfew hundred spectators who had intently watched the events of the day;\nbut to Cynthia Hollis the excitement of the crowd and movement and\nnoise could no further go.\n\nBy the natural force of gravitation Jacob Brice presently was walking\nslowly and apparently aimlessly around to where she was standing. He\nsaid nothing, however, when he was beside her, and she seemed entirely\nunconscious of his presence. Her yellow dress was as stiff as a board,\nand as clean as her strong, young arms could make it; at her throat\nwere the shining black beads; on her head she wore a limp, yellow\ncalico sunbonnet, which hung down over her eyes, and almost obscured\nher countenance. To this article she perhaps owed the singular purity\nand transparency of her complexion, as much as to the mountain air,\nand the chiefly vegetable fare of her father's table. She wore it\nconstantly, although it operated almost as a mask, rendering her more\neasily recognizable to their few neighbors by her flaring attire than\nby her features, and obstructing from her own view all surrounding\nscenery, so that she could hardly see the cow, which so much of her\ntime she was slowly poking after.\n\nShe spoke unexpectedly, and without any other symptom that she knew of\nthe young hunter's proximity. \"I never thought, Jacob, ez how ye would\nhev come down hyar, all the way from the mountings, to ride agin my\ndad, an' beat him out'n that thar saddle an' bridle.\"\n\n\"Ye won't hev nothin' ter say ter me,\" retorted Jacob sourly.\n\nA long silence ensued.\n\nThen he resumed didactically, but with some irrelevancy, \"I tole ye\nt'other day ez how ye war old enough ter be a-studyin' 'bout gittin'\nmarried.\"\n\n\"They don't think nothin' of ye ter our house, Jacob. Dad 's always\na-jowin' at ye.\" Cynthia's candor certainly could not be called in\nquestion.\n\nThe young hunter replied with some natural irritation: \"He hed better\nnot let me hear him, ef he wants to keep whole bones inside his skin.\nHe better not tell me, nuther.\"\n\n\"He don't keer enough 'bout ye, Jacob, ter tell ye. He don't think\nnothin' of ye.\"\n\nLove is popularly supposed to dull the mental faculties. It developed\nin Jacob Brice sudden strategic abilities.\n\n\"Thar is them ez does,\" he said diplomatically.\n\nCynthia spoke promptly with more vivacity than usual, but in her\ncustomary drawl and apparently utterly irrelevantly:--\n\n\"I never in all my days see no sech red-headed gal ez that thar Becky\nStiles. She's the red-headedest gal ever I see.\" And Cynthia once more\nwas silent.\n\nJacob resumed, also irrelevantly:--\n\n\"When I goes a-huntin' up yander ter Pine Lick, they is mighty perlite\nter me. They ain't never done nothin' agin me, ez I knows on.\" Then,\nafter a pause of deep cogitation, he added, \"Nor hev they said nothin'\nagin me, nuther.\"\n\nCynthia took up her side of the dialogue, if dialogue it could be\ncalled, with wonted irrelevancy: \"That thar Becky Stiles, she's got\nthe freckledest face--ez freckled ez any turkey-aig\" (with an\nindescribable drawl on the last word).\n\n\"They ain't done nothin' agin me,\" reiterated Jacob astutely, \"nor\nsaid nothin' nuther--none of 'em.\"\n\nCynthia looked hard across the amphitheatre at the distant Great Smoky\nMountains shimmering in the hazy September sunlight--so ineffably\nbeautiful, so delicately blue, that they might have seemed the ideal\nscenery of some impossibly lovely ideal world. Perhaps she was\nwondering what the unconscious Becky Stiles, far away in those dark\nwoods about Pine Lick, had secured in this life besides her freckled\nface. Was this the sylvan deity of the young hunter's adoration?\n\nCynthia took off her sunbonnet to use it for a fan. Perhaps it was\nwell for her that she did so at this moment; it had so entirely\nconcealed her head that her hair might have been the color of Becky\nStiles's, and no one the wiser. The dark brown tendrils curled\ndelicately on her creamy forehead; the excitement of the day had\nflushed her pale cheeks with an unwonted glow; her eyes were alight\nwith their newly kindled fires; the clinging curtain of her bonnet had\nconcealed the sloping curves of her shoulders--altogether she was\nattractive enough, despite the flare of her yellow dress, and\nespecially attractive to the untutored eyes of Jacob Brice. He\nrelented suddenly, and lost all the advantages of his tact and\ndiplomacy.\n\n\"I likes ye better nor I does Becky Stiles,\" he said moderately. Then\nwith more fervor, \"I likes ye better nor any gal I ever see.\"\n\nThe usual long pause ensued.\n\n\"Ye hev got a mighty cur'ous way o' showin' it,\" Cynthia replied.\n\n\"I dunno what ye 're talkin' 'bout, Cynthy.\"\n\n\"Ye hev got a mighty cur'ous way o' showin' it,\" she reiterated, with\nrenewed animation--\"a-comin' all the way down hyar from the mountings\nter beat my dad out'n that thar saddle an' bridle, what he's done sot\nhis heart onto. Mighty cur'ous way.\"\n\n\"Look hyar, Cynthy.\" The young hunter broke off suddenly, and did not\nspeak again for several minutes. A great perplexity was surging this\nway and that in his slow brains--a great struggle was waging in his\nheart. He was to choose between love and ambition--nay, avarice too\nwas ranged beside his aspiration. He felt himself an assured victor in\nthe competition, and he had seen that saddle and bridle. They were on\nexhibition to-day, and to him their material and workmanship seemed\nbeyond expression wonderful, and elegant, and substantial. He could\nnever hope otherwise to own such accoutrements. His eyes would never\nagain even rest upon such resplendent objects, unless indeed in\nHollis's possession. Any one who has ever loved a horse can appreciate\na horseman's dear desire that beauty should go beautifully\ncaparisoned. And then, there was his pride in his own riding, and his\nanxiety to have his preeminence in that accomplishment acknowledged\nand recognized by his friends, and, dearer triumph still, by his\nenemies. A terrible pang before he spoke again.\n\n\"Look hyar, Cynthy,\" he said at last; \"ef ye will marry me, I won't\ngo back in yander no more. I'll leave the premi-_um_ ter them ez kin\ngit it.\"\n\n\"Ye're foolish, Jacob,\" she replied, still fanning with the yellow\ncalico sunbonnet. \"Ain't I done tole ye, ez how they don't think\nnothin' of ye ter our house? I don't want all of 'em a-jowin' at me,\ntoo.\"\n\n\"Ye talk like ye ain't got good sense, Cynthy,\" said Jacob irritably.\n\"What's ter hender me from hitchin' up my mare ter my uncle's wagon\nan' ye an' me a-drivin' up hyar to the Cross-Roads, fifteen mile, and\ngit Pa'son Jones ter marry us? We'll get the license down hyar ter the\nCourt House afore we start. An' while they'll all be a-foolin' away\nthar time a-ridin' round that thar ring, ye an' me will be a-gittin'\nmarried.\" Ten minutes ago Jacob Brice did not think riding around that\nring was such a reprehensible waste of time. \"What's ter hender? It\ndon't make no differ how they jow then.\"\n\n\"I done tole ye, Jacob,\" said the sedate Cynthia, still fanning with\nthe sunbonnet.\n\nWith a sudden return of his inspiration, Jacob retorted, affecting an\nair of stolid indifference: \"Jes' ez _ye_ choose. I won't hev ter ax\nBecky Stiles twict.\"\n\nAnd he turned to go.\n\n\"I never said no, Jacob,\" said Cynthia precipitately. \"I never said ez\nhow I wouldn't hev ye.\"\n\n\"Waal, then, jes' come along with me right now while I hitch up the\nmare. I ain't a-goin' ter leave yer a-standin' hyar. Ye're too\nskittish. Time I come back ye'd hev done run away I dunno whar.\" A\nmoment's pause and he added: \"Is ye a-goin' ter stand thar all day,\nCynthy Hollis, a-lookin' up an' around, and a-turnin' yer neck fust\nthis way and then t'other, an' a-lookin' fur all the worl' like a wild\nturkey in a trap, or one o' them thar skeery young deer, or sech\nsenseless critters? What ails the gal?\"\n\n\"Thar'll be nobody ter help along the work ter our house,\" said\nCynthia, the weight of the home difficulties bearing heavily on her\nconscience.\n\n\"What's ter hender ye from a-goin' down thar an' lendin' a hand every\nwunst in a while? But ef ye're a-goin' ter stand thar like ye hedn't\nno more action than a--a-dunno-what,--jes' like yer dad, I ain't. I'll\njes' leave ye a-growed ter that thar post, an' I'll jes' light out\nstiddier, an' afore the cows git ter Pine Lick, I'll be thar too. Jes'\nez ye choose. Come along ef ye wants ter come. I ain't a-goin' ter ax\nye no more.\"\n\n\"I'm a-comin',\" said Cynthia.\n\nThere was great though illogical rejoicing on the part of the country\nfaction when the crowds were again seated, tier above tier, in the\namphitheatre, and the riders were once more summoned into the arena,\nto discover from Jacob Brice's unaccounted-for absence that he had\nwithdrawn and left the nominee to his chances.\n\nIn the ensuing competition it became very evident to the not\naltogether impartially disposed judges that they could not, without\nincurring the suspicions alike of friend and foe, award the premium to\ntheir fellow-townsman. Straight as a shingle though he might be, more\nprepossessing to the eye, the ex-cavalryman of fifty battles was far\nbetter trained in all the arts of horsemanship.\n\nA wild shout of joy burst from the rural party when the most portly\nand rubicund of the portly and red-faced judges advanced into the ring\nand decorated Jenkins Hollis with the blue ribbon. A frantic\nantistrophe rent the air. \"Take it off!\" vociferated the bitter town\nfaction--\"take it off!\"\n\nA diversion was produced by the refusal of the Colbury champion to\nreceive the empty honor of the red ribbon and the certificate. Thus\ndid he except to the ruling of the judges. In high dudgeon he faced\nabout and left the arena, followed shortly by the decorated Jenks,\nbearing the precious saddle and bridle, and going with a wooden face\nto receive the congratulations of his friends.\n\nThe entries for the slow mule race had been withdrawn at the last\nmoment; and the spectators, balked of that unique sport, and the fair\nbeing virtually over, were rising from their seats and making their\nnoisy preparations for departure. Before Jenks had cleared the\nfair-building, being somewhat impeded by the moving mass of humanity,\nhe encountered one of his neighbors, a listless mountaineer, who spoke\non this wise:--\n\n\"Does ye know that thar gal o' yourn--that thar Cynthy?\"\n\nMr. Hollis nodded his expressionless head--presumably he did know\nCynthia.\n\n\"Waal,\" continued his leisurely interlocutor, still interrogative,\n\"does ye know Jacob Brice?\"\n\nIll-starred association of ideas! There was a look of apprehension on\nJenkins Hollis's wooden face.\n\n\"They hev done got a license down hyar ter the Court House an' gone\na-kitin' out on the Old B'ar road.\"\n\nThis was explicit.\n\n\"Whar's my horse?\" exclaimed Jenks, appropriating \"John Barleycorn\" in\nhis haste. Great as was his hurry, it was not too imperative to\nprevent him from strapping upon the horse the premium saddle, and\ninserting in his mouth the new bit and bridle. And in less than ten\nminutes a goodly number of recruits from the crowd assembled in\nColbury were also \"a-kitin'\" out on the road to Old Bear, delighted\nwith a new excitement, and bent on running down the eloping couple\nwith no more appreciation of the sentimental phase of the question and\nthe tender illusions of love's young dream than if Jacob and Cynthia\nwere two mountain foxes.\n\nDown the red-clay slopes of the outskirts of the town \"John\nBarleycorn\" thunders with a train of horsemen at his heels. Splash\ninto the clear fair stream whose translucent depths tell of its\nbirthplace among the mountain springs--how the silver spray showers\nabout as the pursuers surge through the ford leaving behind them a\nfoamy wake!--and now they are pressing hard up the steep ascent of the\nopposite bank, and galloping furiously along a level stretch of road,\nwith the fences and trees whirling by, and the September landscape\nflying on the wings of the wind. The chase leads past fields of\ntasseled Indian corn, with yellowing thickly swathed ears, leaning\nheavily from the stalk; past wheat-lands, the crops harvested and the\ncrab-grass having its day at last; past \"woods-lots\" and their black\nshadows, and out again into the September sunshine; past rickety\nlittle homes, not unlike Hollis's own, with tow-headed children,\nexactly like his, standing with wide eyes, looking at the rush and\nhurry of the pursuit--sometimes in the ill-kept yards a wood-fire is\nburning under the boiling sorghum kettle, or beneath the branches of\nthe orchard near at hand a cider-mill is crushing the juice out of the\nred and yellow, ripe and luscious apples. Homeward-bound prize cattle\nare overtaken--a Durham bull, reluctantly permitting himself to be led\ninto a fence corner that the hunt may sweep by unobstructed, and\nturning his proud blue-ribboned head angrily toward the riders as if\nindignant that anything except him should absorb attention; a gallant\nhorse, with another floating blue streamer, bearing himself as\nbecometh a king's son; the chase comes near to crushing sundry\ngrunting porkers impervious to pride and glory in any worldly\ndistinctions of cerulean decorations, and at last is fain to draw up\nand wait until a flock of silly over-dressed sheep, running in frantic\nfear every way but the right way, can be gathered together and guided\nto a place of safety.\n\nAnd once more, forward; past white frame houses with porches, and\nvine-grown verandas, and well-tended gardens, and groves of oak and\nbeech and hickory trees--\"John Barleycorn\" makes an ineffectual but\ngallant struggle to get in at the large white gate of one of these\ncomfortable places, Squire Goodlet's home, but he is urged back into\nthe road, and again the pursuit sweeps on. Those blue mountains, the\nlong parallel ranges of Old Bear and his brothers, seem no more a\nmisty, uncertain mirage against the delicious indefinable tints of the\nhorizon. Sharply outlined they are now, with dark, irregular shadows\nupon their precipitous slopes which tell of wild ravines, and\nrock-lined gorges, and swirling mountain torrents, and great,\nbeetling, gray crags. A breath of balsams comes on the freshening\nwind--the lungs expand to meet it. There is a new aspect in the scene;\na revivifying current thrills through the blood; a sudden ideal beauty\ndescends on prosaic creation.\n\n\"'Pears like I can't git my breath good in them flat countries,\" says\nJenkins Hollis to himself, as \"John Barleycorn\" improves his speed\nunder the exhilarating influence of the wind. \"I'm nigh on to\nsifflicated every time I goes down yander ter Colbury\" (with a jerk of\nhis wooden head in the direction of the village).\n\nLong stretches of woods are on either side of the road now, with no\nsign of the changing season in the foliage save the slender, pointed,\nscarlet leaves and creamy plumes of the sourwood, gleaming here and\nthere; and presently another panorama of open country unrolls to the\nview. Two or three frame houses appear with gardens and orchards, a\nnumber of humble log cabins, and a dingy little store, and the\nCross-Roads are reached. And here the conclusive intelligence meets\nthe party that Jacob and Cynthia were married by Parson Jones an hour\nago, and were still \"a-kitin',\" at last accounts, out on the road to\nOld Bear.\n\nThe pursuit stayed its ardor. On the auspicious day when Jenkins\nHollis took the blue ribbon at the County Fair and won the saddle and\nbridle he lost his daughter.\n\nThey saw Cynthia no more until late in the autumn when she came,\nwithout a word of self-justification or apology for her conduct, to\nlend her mother a helping hand in spinning and weaving her little\nbrothers' and sisters' clothes. And gradually the _eclat_ attendant\nupon her nuptials was forgotten, except that Mrs. Hollis now and then\nremarks that she \"dunno how we could hev bore up agin Cynthy's\na-runnin' away like she done, ef it hedn't a-been fur that thar saddle\nan' bridle an' takin' the blue ribbon at the County Fair.\"\n\n\n\n\nTHE CASTING VOTE.\n\n\nI.\n\nAn election of civil and judicial officers was impending in Kildeer\nCounty when a comet appeared in the July sky, a mysterious, aloof,\nuncanny presence, that invaded the night and the stereotyped routine\nof nature with that gruesome effect of the phenomenal which gives to\nthe mind so definite a realization of how dear and secure is the\nprosaic sense of custom.\n\nAll the lenses of the great observatories of the world had, in a\nmanner, sought to entertain the strange visitant of the heavens. The\nlearned had gone so far as to claim its acquaintance, to recognize it\nas the returning comet of a date long gone by. It even carried amidst\nits shining glories, along the far unimagined ways of its orbit, the\nname of a human being--of the man who had discovered it on its former\nvisit, for thus splendidly does astronomy honor its votaries. Less\nscientific people regarded it askance as in some sort harbinger of\nwoe, and spoke of presage, recalling other comets, and the commotions\nthat came in their train--from the Deluge, with the traditional\ncometary influences rife in the breaking up of \"the fountains of the\ngreat deep,\" to the victories of Mohammed II. and the threatened\noverthrow of Christendom, and even down to our own war of 1812.\nOthers, again, scorned superstition, and entertained merely practical\nmisgivings concerning the weight, density, and temperature of the\ncomet, lest the eccentric aerial wanderer should run amuck of the\nearth in some confusion touching the right of way through space.\n\nMeanwhile, it grew from the semblance of a vaporous tissue--an\nilluminated haze only discernible through the telescope, the private\nview of the favored few--till it gradually became visible to the\nunassisted eye of the _profanum vulgus_, and finally it flamed across\nthe darkling spaces with its white crown of glory, its splendid\nwing-like train, and its effect of motion as of a wondrous flight\namong the stars--and all the world, and, for aught we know, many\nworlds, gazed at it.\n\nOnly in some great desert, the vast stretches of unsailed seas, or the\ndepths of uninhabited forests, were its supernal splendors unnoted. It\nsunk as wistful, as tremulous, a reflection in a lonely pool in the\ndense mountain wilds as any simple star, a familiar of these haunts,\nthat had looked down to mark its responsive image year after year,\nfor countless ages, whenever the season brought it, in its place in\nthe glittering mail of the Archer, or among the jewels of the Northern\nCrown, once more to the spot it had known and its tryst with its fair\nsemblance in the water.\n\nThe great silver flake which the comet struck out upon the serene\nsurface lay glinting there among the lesser stellar reflections, when\na man, kneeling in a gully of the steep bank sloping to the \"salt\nlick,\" leaned forward suddenly to gaze at it; then, with a gasp,\nturned his eyes upward to that flaming blade drawn athwart the\npeaceful sky. He did not utter a sound. The habit of silence essential\nto the deer-hunter kept its mechanical hold upon his nerves. Only the\nhand with which he grasped the half-exposed roots of a great\nsycamore-tree, denuded in some partial caving of the bank long ago,\nrelaxed and trembled slightly.\n\nHe was a man of scant and narrow experience, his world the\nimpenetrable mountain wilderness, and, though seemingly the pupil of\nnature, versed in the ways of beast and bird, the signs of the clouds,\nthe seasons of bourgeoning and burr, it was but of casual external\naspects. He knew naught of its wondrous history, its subtler\nsignificance, its strange record--the flood-tides registered on that\ncliff beyond the laurel; the reptilian trail in the ledge beneath the\nbutt of his rifle, the imprint still fast in the solid rock, albeit\nthe species extinct; the great bones of ancient unknown beasts sunk in\nthe depressions of this saline quagmire, which herds of them had once\nfrequented for the salt, as did of late the buffalo, and now the\ntimorous deer, wont to come, like shadows wavering in the wind, to\nlick the briny earth. The strange, glinting blade overhead had no\nclaim on his recognition as the \"comet of Aristotle,\" or the\n\"evil-disposed comet\" personified by the Italians as Sir Great-Lance,\n_il Signor Astone_, or Halley's comet, or Donati's. Self is the centre\nof the solar system with many souls, and around this point do all its\nincidents revolve. For _him_ that wondrous white fire was kindled in\nthe skies, for _him_, in special relation to his small life, to the\nwish nearest his hot human heart, to the clumsy scheme dear to his\nslow, crude brain. He thought it a warning then: and later he thought\nthis still.\n\nSome vague stir--the wind perhaps, or perhaps a light-footed\ndryad--flitted past and was gone. The surface of the \"lick\" rippled\nwith her footprints, and was smooth again. All the encompassing masses\nof trees and undergrowth about the place were densely black and\nopaque, giving the sense of absolute solidity and weight, except upon\nthe verges, which were somehow shaded off into a cloudy brown against\nthe translucent dove-tinted tissues in which the night seemed\nenveloped and obscured save for the white gleaming of the stars. This\nwas the clear color that the brackish water wore as it reflected the\nnight. It reflected suddenly a face--a face with a long velvety\nmuzzle, a pair of spreading antlers, and dark eyes, gentle, timorous,\nliquidly bright. The water stirred with a sibilant lapping sound as\nthe buck's tongue licked at the margin. Once he held up his head to\nlisten, with his hoof lifted, then he bent again to the ripples. There\nwas slight relation between him, the native of these woods, and that\nwayward waif of the skies; but among the unnumbered influences and\nincidents of its course it served to save that humble sylvan life for\na space. The hunter neither saw nor heard.\n\nIt was only when the deer with a sudden snort and a precipitate bound\nfled crashing through the laurel that Walter Hoxon became aware of his\npresence, and of the stealthy approach that had alarmed him. The\napproach was stealthy no longer. A quick, nervous tread, a rustling of\nthe boughs, and as the hunter rose to his feet his elder brother\nemerged from the undergrowth, taller than he as they stood together on\nthe margin of the lick, more active, sinewy, alert.\n\n\"Whyn't ye take a shot at him, Wat?\" cried Justus Hoxon tumultuously.\n\"I'll be bound ye war nappin',\" he added in keen rebuke.\n\nA pause, then Walter Hoxon pulled himself together and retorted:--\n\n\"Nappin'!\" in scornful falsetto. \"How _could_ I get a shot, with ye\na-trompin' up ez n'isy ez a herd o' cattle?\"\n\nThe reproach evidently struck home, for the elder said nothing. With\nthe thoroughness characteristic of the habitual liar, Walter proceeded\nto add circumstance to his original statement.\n\n\"I seen the buck whenst he fust kem sidlin' an' slippin' up ter the\nwater, oneasy an' onsartain from the fust minute. I hed jes' sighted\nmy rifle. An' hyar ye kem, a-bulgin' out o' the lau'l, an' sp'iled my\nshot.\" As the verisimilitude of his representations bore upon him, he\nunconsciously assumed the sentiments natural to the situation\nsimulated. \"Who tole ye ez I war hyar, anyhows?\" he demanded angrily.\n\n\"'Dosia,\" replied Justus Hoxon in a mild tone. Then, with an effort at\nexculpation, \"I 'lowed ye'd be keen--plumb sharp set--fur news 'bout\nthe prospec's o' the 'lection. An' she 'lowed ez ye hed kem down hyar\nhopin' ter git a deer. 'T war The'dosia.\"\n\nAt the name the other had turned slightly away and looked down, a\ngesture that invidious daylight might have interpreted as anxiety, or\nfaltering, or at the least replete with consciousness. But even if\nopen to observation, it could scarcely have signified aught to Justus\nHoxon, wrapped in his own thoughts, and in his absorbing interest in\nthe events of the day. His mental attitude was so apparent to his\nbrother, albeit his form was barely distinguishable as they stood\ntogether by the salt lick, that Wat ventured a question--a bold one,\nit seemed to him, and he felt a chill because of its temerity.\n\n\"Glad ter see ye, I s'pose?\"\n\n\"Plumb tickled ter death,\" exclaimed Justus, his laughing voice full\nof reminiscent enthusiasm. \"Thar war a big crowd at the Cross-Roads\nter hear the speakin', an' a toler'ble gatherin' at Sycamore Gap.\nEverybody inquired partic'lar arter ye, an' whenst I tole 'em ye war\ntuk sick, an' couldn't be thar, an' I war 'lectioneerin' in yer place,\nthey shuck han's, an' shuck han's. One ole man--ole Sam Coggins, up\nter Sims's Mill--says ter me, he says, 'I dunno yer brother, Justus\nHoxon; but blister my boots, ef I don't vote fur anybody ez air kin\nter you-uns, an' ez ye hev set yer heart on 'lectin' ter office.' An'\nthe way folks inquired arter ye, an'\"--\n\n\"I ain't talkin' 'bout the 'lection,\" Wat broke in brusquely. \"I war\naxin' 'bout 'Dosia. She war\"--he hesitated--\"liable ter be glad ter\nsee ye, I reckon.\"\n\nThere was a note of surprise in his brother's voice from which Wat\nshrank in sudden alarm. \"Oh, _'Dosia_! Course she war glad. I seen her\njes' now, an' she told me ez ye hed kem down ter the lick ter git a\nshot at the deer, bein' ez she hed 'lowed the venison war powerful\ngood 'bout now. I never stayed but a minute. I says, ''Dosia, ye an'\nme hev got the rest o' our lives ter do our courtin' in, but this\n'lection hev got ter be tended ter _now_, kase ef Wat ain't 'lected\nit'll set him back all his life. Some folks 'low ez 't ain't perlite\nan' respec'ful, nohow, fur pore folks like we-uns ter run fur office,\nlike ez ef we war good ez anybody.' An' 'Dosia she jes' hustled me\nout'n the house. 'G'long! G'long! Do _everything_ 'bout'n the\n'lection! Turn every stone! Time enough fur courtin' arterward! Time\nenough!'\"\n\nOnce more Justus laughed contentedly.\n\nThe man beside him stirred uneasily, then broke out irritably: \"Waal,\n_I'm_ powerful tired o' this 'lection foolishness, fur one. I wisht I\nhed never let ye push an' boost me inter it. I reckon them war right\nez 'lowed pore folks like we-uns ain't fit ter run fur office, an'\nain't goin' ter git 'lected. I'd never hev dreamt o' sech ef it\nhedn't been fur you-uns--never in this worl'.\" Walter's voice sunk\nmoodily, and he had a flouting gesture as he turned aside.\n\nA vicarious ambition is the most ungrateful of passions. There was\nsomething more than anger, than eager affection, than urgent reproach,\nthan prescient alarm, albeit all rang sharply forth, in his brother's\nvoice raised to reply; it was a keen note of helplessness, from which\nWalter's nerves recoiled with a sense of pain, so insistently\nclamorous it was.\n\n\"How kin ye say that!\" cried Justus. \"Fur ye ter stan' thar, ready ter\nthrow away all yer good chances, jes' kase ye hev got the rheumatics\nan' don't feel like viewin' the people--though it 'pears like ye air\nwell enough ter go huntin' of deer of a damp night at a salt lick! An'\nthen, kase a mean-spirited half-liver flings dirt on ye an' yer\nfambly, fur ye ter sit down on a low stool, an' fill yer mouth with\nmud, an' 'low this air plenty good enough fur we-uns! 'Pore folks\nain't fit ter git 'lected ter office!'\" with scornful iteration. \"My\nLord! this hyar is a democratic kentry!\" with an echo from the stump\nspeeches of the day. \"Leastwise the folks yander at Sycamore Gap\n'peared ter think so. This hyar Tom Markham he war speakin' on the\nissues o' the day, an' bein' he's a frien' o' Sheriff Quigley's, he\ntuk a turn at me an' you-uns, o' course. Tole the folks how my dad an'\nmam died whenst I war twelve year old, an' how the only reason the\nfambly warn't sent ter the pore-house war kase the county folks war\ndil'tory, an' put it off, till they 'lowed our own house war pore\nenough. An' then he sot out ter be mighty funny, an' mocked the way I\nuseter call the t'other chil'n 'Fambly,' sech ez--'Fambly, kem ter\ndinner, Fambly!' 'Shet up yer cryin', Fambly!' An' then he tole how I\ncooked--gathered all sorts o' yarbs an' vegetables tergether an' sot a\npot ter bile, an' whenever 'Fambly' war hongry 'Fambly' tuk a snack,\nan' gracefully eat out'n the pot with thar fingers. An' sometimes\n'Fambly' war moved ter wash thar clothes, an' they all repaired ter\nthe ruver-bank, an' rubbed out thar rags, an' hung 'em on the bushes\nter dry--an', duty done, 'Fambly' went a-wadin'. Everybody jes' laffed\nan' laffed!\"\n\nThere was a strained tone in his voice, not far foreign to a sob, as\nhe repeated these derisive flouts at his early and forlorn estate.\n\n\"An' now,\" resuming their rehearsal, \"this enlightened constituency\nwas asked ter bestow on a scion o' this same 'Fambly'--ignorant,\nscrub, pauper--an office of great importance to the people, that\nneeded to fill it a man o' eddication an' experiunce, varsed in the\nways o' the world--asked to bestow the office o' sheriff o' the county\non a man who war so obviously incomp'tent an' illit'rate that he\ndarsn't face the people ter make his perposterous demand!\"\n\nThe wind came and went. The darkling bushes bowed and bent again. The\nleaves took up their testimony in elusive, sibilant mutterings. Justus\nHoxon's eyes were cast upward for a moment, as he watched a massive\nbough of an oak-tree sway against the far sky, shutting off the stars,\nwhich became visible anew as the elastic branch swung back once more.\nOnly the pallor of his face and a certain lustrous liquid gleam\nbetokening his eyes were distinguishable to his brother, who\nnevertheless watched him with anxiety and quickened breathing as he\nwent on:--\n\n\"That thar feller hed sca'cely stepped down off'n that thar stump\nafore I war on ter it. I asked fur a few minutes' attention, an'\n'lowed, I did, that Mr. Markham's account o' the humble beginnin's of\nme an' 'Fambly' war accurate an' exac'. (Everybody hed looked fur me\nter deny it, or ter git mad, or suthin', an' they war toler'ble\ns'prised.) 'Fambly' _did_ eat out'n the pot permiscuous, an' made a\nmighty pore dinner thar many a day. An' 'Fambly' washed thar clothes\nez described, infrequent enough, an' no doubt war ez ragged an' dirty\nez they war hongry. But, I said, Mr. Markham hedn't told the haffen o'\nit. Cold winter nights, when the snow sifted in through the cracks,\nan' the wind blew in the rotten old door, 'Fambly' liked ter hev friz\nter death. They hed the pneumonia, an' whoopin'-cough, an' croup; an'\nin summer, bein' a perverse set o' brats, 'Fambly' hed fever an' ager,\nan' similar ailments common ter the young o' the human race, _the same\nez ef 'Fambly' war folks_! 'T war 'stonishin', kem ter think of it,\nhow 'Fambly' hed the insurance ter grow up ter _look_ like folks, let\nalone settin' out ter run fur office; an' ef God hedn't raised 'em up\nsome mighty good frien's in this county, I reckon thar wouldn't be\nmuch o' 'Fambly' left. Some folks 'low ez Providence hev got mighty\nleetle jedgmint in worldly affairs, an' this mus' be one o' the\nstrikin' instances of it. These frien's gin the bigges' boy work ter\ndo, an' that holped ter keep 'Fambly's' bodies an' souls tergether. I\nreckon, says I, that I hev ploughed in the fields o' haffen the men in\nour deestric'; I hev worked in the tan-yard; I hev been striker in the\nblacksmith shop; an' all the time that pot, aforesaid, b'iled at home,\nan' 'Fambly' tuk thar dinner thar constant, _with_ thar fingers, _ez\naforesaid_. But 'Fambly' warn't so durned ragged, nuther. Good\nneighbors gin 'em some clothes wunst in a while, an' l'arned the gals\nter sew an' cook some. An' thar kem ter be a skillet an' a fryin'-pan\non the h'a'th ter holp the pot out. Why, 'Fambly' got so prosperous\nthat one day, whenst a' ole, drunken, cripple, ragged man war passin',\nthey enj'yed themselves mightily, laffin' at somebody po'rer than\nthemselves. An' ole Pa'son Tyson war goin' by in his gig, an' _he_ tuk\nnote o' the finger o' scorn, an' he stopped. He said mighty leetle,\nbut he tuk the trouble ter cut a stout hickory sprout, an' he gin\n'Fambly' a good thrashin' all roun'. It lasted 'Fambly' well. They\nain't laffed at 'God's pore' sence! Waal, 'Fambly' 's takin' up too\nmuch o' this enlightened assembly's attention. Enough to tell what's\nkem o' 'Fambly.' The oldes' gal went ter free school, l'arned ter\nread, write, an' cipher, an' married Pa'son Tyson's son, ez air a\nminister o' the gospel a-ridin' a Methodis' circuit in north Georgy\nnow. An' the second gal\"--his voice faltered--\"_she_ went ter free\nschool, l'arned mo' still o' readin' an' writin' an' cipherin', an'\ntaught school two year down on Bird Creek, an' war goin' ter be\nmarried ter a good man, well-ter-do, who had built her a house, not\nknowin' ez God hed prepared her a mansion in the skies. She is livin'\n_thar_ now! An' las', the Benjamin o' all the tribe, kems my brother\nWalter. _He_ went ter school; kin read, write, an' cipher; he's been\ntaught ez much ez any man ez ever held the office he axes ter be\n'lected ter, an' air thoroughly competent. Fac' is, gentlemen, thar's\nnothin' lef' ter show fur the humble 'Fambly' Mr. Markham's be'n\ntellin' 'bout, but me. I never went ter school, 'ceptin' in yer\nfields. I l'arned ter cure hides, an' temper steel, an' shoe\nhorse-critters, so that pot mought be kep' a-b'ilin', an' 'Fambly'\nmought dine accordin' to thar humble way in them very humble days that\nsomehow, gentlemen, I ain't got an' can't git the grace ter be 'shamed\nof yit.\"\n\nHe paused abruptly as he concluded the recital of his speech, and\nwiped his face with the back of his hand. \"I wisht ye could hev hearn\nthem men cheer. They jes' hollered tharse'fs hoarse. They shuck hands\ntill they mighty nigh yanked my arm out'n its socket.\" With the\nrecollection, he rubbed his right arm with a gesture of pain.\n\nSomething there was in the account of this ovation that smote upon the\nyounger brother's sense of values, and he hastened to take possession\nof it.\n\n\"Oh, I knowed I war powerful pop'lar in the Sycamore Gap deestric',\"\nhe said, dropping his lowering manner, that had somehow been\nperceptible in the darkness, and wagging his head from side to side\nwith a gesture of great security in the affections of Sycamore Gap.\n\"Sycamore Gap's all right, I know; I'll poll a big majority thar,\nsure.\"\n\n\"I reckon ye will; but I warn't so sure o' that at fust,\" replied the\nelder. \"They 'peared ter me at fust ter be sorter set ag'in\nus--leastwise _me_, though arter a while I could hardly git away from\n'em, they war so durned friendly.\"\n\nWalter cast a keen look upon him; but he evidently spoke from his\nsimple heart, and was all unaware that he was personally the source of\nthis sudden popularity in Sycamore Gap--his magnetism, his unconscious\neloquence, and his character as shown in the simple and forlorn annals\nof \"Fambly.\" And yet he was not crudely unthinking. He perceived the\nincongruity of his brother's successive standpoints.\n\n\"I dunno how ye kin purtend ter be so all-fired sure o' Sycamore Gap,\"\nhe said suddenly. \"'T ain't five minutes sence ye war 'lowin' ez pore\nfolks couldn't git 'lected ter office, an' ye wished ye hed hed\nnothin' ter do with sech, an' 't war me ez bed jes' pushed an' boosted\nye inter it.\"\n\nThe resources of subterfuge are well-nigh limitless. Walter Hoxon was\nan adept in utilizing them. He had seen a warning in the skies, and it\nhad struck terror and discouragement to his heart; but not to his\npolitical prospects had he felt its application. Other schemes,\ndeeper, treacherous, secret, seemed menaced, and his conscience, or\nthat endowment to quake with the fear of requital that answers for\nconscience in some ill-developed souls, was set astir. Nevertheless,\nthe election might suffice as scapegoat.\n\n\"Look a-yander, Justus,\" he said suddenly, pointing with the muzzle of\nhis gun at the brilliant wayfarer of the skies, as if he might in\nanother moment essay a shot. \"That thar critter means mischief, sure\nez ye air born.\"\n\nThe other stepped back a pace or two, and lifted his head to look.\n\n\"The comic?\" he demanded. Walter's silence seemed assent.\n\"Laws-a-massy, ye tomfool,\" Justus cried, \"let it be a sign ter them\nez run ag'in' ye! Count the comic in like a qualified voter--it kem\nhyar on account o' the incumbent's incompetence in office. Signs! Rolf\nQuigley is sign enough,--if ye want signs in 'lections,--with money,\nan' frien's, an' a term of office, an' the reg'lar nominee o' the\nparty, an' ye jes' an independent candidate. No star a-waggin' a tale\naroun' the sky air haffen ez dangerous ter yer 'lection ez him. An'\nhe ain't lookin' at no comic! He looked this evenin' like he'd put his\nfinger in his mouth in one more minute, plumb 'shamed ter his\nboot-sole o' the things Markham hed said. An' Markham he kem up ter me\nbefore a crowd o' fellers, an' says, says he: 'Mr. Hoxon, I meant no\nreflections on yer fambly in alludin' ter its poverty, an' I honor ye\nfur yer lifelong exertions in its behalf. I take pride, sir, in makin'\nthis apology.' An' I says: 'I be a' illit'rate, humble man, Mr.\nMarkham; but I will venture the liberty to tell ye ez ye mought take\nmo' pride in givin' no occasion fur apologies ter poverty.' Them\nfellers standin' aroun' jes' laffed. I knowed he didn't mean a word he\nsaid then, but war jes' slickin' over the things he _hed_ said on\nQuigley's account, kase the crowd seemed ter favor me. I say, comic!\nLet Rolf Quigley take the comic fur a sign.\"\n\nIt is easy to pluck up fears that have no root. \"Oh, I be goin' ter\n'lectioneer all the same ez ever. Whar 's the nex' place we air bound\nfur?\"\n\nWalter put his hand on his brother's shoulder as he asked the\nquestion, and in the eager unfolding of plans and possibilities the\ntwo, as Justus talked, made their way along the deer-path beside the\nsalt lick, leaving the stars coldly glittering on the ripples, with\nthat wonderful streak of white fire reflected among them; leaving,\ntoo, the vaguely whispering woods, communing with the wind as it came\nand went; reaching the slope of the mountain at last, where was\nperched, amid sterile fields and humble garden-patch, the little cabin\nin which \"Fambly\" had struggled through its forlorn youth to better\ndays.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe door was closed after this. A padlock knocked against it when the\nwind blew, as if spuriously announcing a visitor. The deceit failed of\neffect, for there was no inmate left, and the freakish gust could only\ntwirl the lock anew, and go swirling down the road with a rout of dust\nin a witches' dance behind it. The passers-by took note of the\ndeserted aspect of things, and knew that the brothers were absent\nelectioneering, and wondered vaguely what the chances might be. This\npassing was somewhat more frequent than was normal along the road; for\nwhen the mists that had hung about the mountains persistently during a\nwarm, clammy, wet season had withdrawn suddenly, and one night\nrevealed for the first time the comet fairly ablaze in the sky, a\ndesire to hear what was said and known about it at the Cross-Roads and\nthe settlement and the blacksmith shop took possession of the\ndenizens of the region, and the coteries of amateur astronomers at\nthese centres were added to daily. Some remembered a comet or two in\npast times, and if the deponent were advanced in years his hearers\nwere given to understand that the present luminary couldn't hold a\ntallow dip to the incandescent terrors he recollected. There were\nutilitarian souls who were disquieted about the crops, and anxiously\nexamined growing ears of corn, expecting to find the comet's influence\ntucked away in the husks. Some looked for the end of the world; those\nmost obviously and determinedly pious took, it might seem, a certain\nunfraternal joy in the contrast of their superior forethought, in\nbeing prepared for the day of doom, with the uncovenanted estate of\nthe non-professor. A revival broke out at New Bethel; the number of\nmourners grew in proportion as the comet got bigger night by night.\nSmall wonder that as evening drew slowly on, and the flaring,\nassertive, red west gradually paled, and the ranges began to lose\nsemblance and symmetry in the dusk, and the river gloomed benighted in\nthe vague circuit of its course, and a lonely star slipped into the\nsky, darkening, too, till, rank after rank, and phalanx after phalanx,\nall the splendid armament of night had mustered, with that great,\nglamourous guidon in the midst--small wonder that the ignorant\nmountaineer looked up at the unaccustomed thing to mark it there, and\nfear smote his heart.\n\nAt these times certain of the little sequestered households far among\nthe wooded ranges got them within their doors, as if to place between\nthem and the uncanny invader of the night, and the threatening\ninfluences rife in the very atmosphere, all the simple habitudes of\nhome. The hearthstone seemed safest, the door a barrier, the home\ncircle a guard. Others spent the nocturnal hours in the dooryard or on\nthe porch, marking the march of the constellations, and filling the\ntime with vague speculations, or retailing dreadful rumors of strange\nhappenings in the neighboring coves, and wild stories of turmoil and\nmisfortune that comets had wrought years ago.\n\nIt was at one of these makeshift observatories that Justus Hoxon\nstopped the first evening after his electioneering tour in the\ninterest of his brother. The weather had turned hot and fair; a\ndrought, a set-off to the surplusage of recent rain, was in progress;\nthe dooryard on the high slope of the mountain, apart from its\navailability for the surveillance of any eccentric doings of the\ncomet, was an acceptable lounging-place for the sake of the air, the\ndew, the hope of a vagrant breeze, and, more than all, the ample\n\"elbow-room\" which it offered the rest of the family while he talked\nwith Theodosia Blakely. The rest of the family--unwelcome\nwights!--were not disposed to make their existence obtrusive; on the\ncontrary, they did much to further his wishes, even to the sacrifice\nof personal predilection. Mrs. Blakely, her arms befloured, her hands\nin the dough, had observed him at the gate, while she stood at the\nbiscuit-block in the shed-room, and although pining to rush forth and\nask the latest news from the settlement and the comet, she only called\nout in a husky undertone: \"'Dosia, 'Dosia, yander's Justus a-kemin' in\nthe gate! Put on yer white apern, chile.\"\n\nBecause she had been adjured to put on her white apron, Theodosia did\nnot put it on. She advanced to the window, about which grew, with its\ngraceful habit, a hop-vine. A little slanting roof was above the\nlintel, a mere board or so, with a few warped shingles; but it made a\ngentle shadow, and Theodosia thought few men besides the one at the\ngate would have failed to see her there. He lingered a little, turning\nback to glance over the landscape, and then he deflected his course\ntoward a rough bench that was placed in a corner of the rail fence,\nthrew himself upon it, and fanned himself with his broad-brimmed hat.\n\n\"The insurance o' the critter! I'm a mind ter leave ye a-settin' thar\nby yerse'f till ye be wore out waitin',\" she muttered.\n\nShe hesitated a moment, then took her sunbonnet and went out to meet\nhim.\n\nThe scene was like some great painting, with this corner in the\nforeground left unfinished, so minute was the detail of the distance,\nso elaborate and perfect the coloring of the curves of purple, and\namethyst, and blue mountains afar off, rising in tiers about the\ncup-shaped valley. Above it hung a tawny tissue of haze, surcharged\nwith a deeply red, vinous splendor, as if spilled from the stirrup-cup\nof the departing sun. He was already out of sight, spurring along\nunknown ways. The sky was yellow here and amber there, and a pearly\nflake, its only cloud, glittered white in the midst. Up the hither\nslope the various green of the pine and the poplar, the sycamore and\nthe sweet-gum, was keenly differentiated, but where the rail fence\ndrew the line of demarkation, Art seemed to fail.\n\nA crude wash of ochre had apparently sufficed for the dooryard; no\nweed grew here, no twig. It was tramped firm and hard by the feet of\ncow, and horse, and the peripatetic children, and poultry. The cabin\nwas drawn in with careless angles and lines by a mere stroke or two;\nand surely no painter, no builder save the utilitarian backwoodsman,\nwould have left it with no relief of trees behind it, no vineyard, no\ngarden, no orchard, no background, naught; in its gaunt simplicity and\nugliness it stood against its own ill-tended fields flattening away in\nthe rear.\n\nSuch as it was, however, it satisfied all of Justus Hoxon's sense of\nthe appropriate and the picturesque when Theodosia Blakely stepped out\nfrom the door and came slowly to meet him. The painter's art, if she\nwere to be esteemed part of the foreground, might have seemed redeemed\nin her. Her dress was of light blue homespun; her sunbonnet of deep\nred calico, pushed back, showed her dark brown hair waving upward in\nheavy undulations from her brow, her large blue eyes with their thick\nblack lashes, her rich brunette complexion, her delicate red lips cut\nin fine lines, and the gleam of her teeth as she smiled. She had a\nstring of opaque white, wax-like beads around the neck of her dress,\nand the contrast of the pearly whiteness of the bauble with the creamy\nwhiteness and softness of her throat was marked with much finish. Her\nfigure was hardly of medium height, and, despite the suppleness of\nyouth, as \"plump as a partridge,\" according to the familiar saying.\nThe clear iris of her eyes gave an impression of quick shifting, and\nby them one could see her mood change as she approached.\n\nShe looked at him intently, speculatively, a sort of doubtful\ncuriosity furtively suggested in her expression; but there was naught\nsubtle or covert in the gaze that met hers--naught but the frankest\npleasure and happiness. He did not move, as she advanced, nor offer\nformal greeting; he only smiled, secure, content, restful, as she came\nup and sat down on the end of the bench. The children, playing noisily\nin the back yard on the wood-pile, paused for a moment to gaze with\ncallow interest at them; but the spectacle of \"The'dosia's sweetheart\"\nwas too familiar to be of more than fleeting diversion, and they\nresorted once more to their pastime. Mrs. Blakely too, who with\nrolling-pin in her hand had turned to gaze out of the window, went\nback to rolling out the dough vigorously, with only the muttered\ncomment, \"Wish The'dosia didn't know how much I'd like that man fur a\nson-in-law, then she'd be willin' ter like him better herse'f.\"\n\nHe was unconscious of them all, as he leaned his elbow on the\nprojecting rails of the fence at their intersection close at hand.\n\n\"Hev ye hed yer health, The'dosia?\" he said.\n\n\"Don't I look like it?\" she replied laughingly.\n\nThere was something both of cordiality and coquetry in her manner. Her\nlarge eyes narrowed as she laughed, and albeit they glittered between\ntheir closing lids, the expression was not pleasant. Levity did not\nbecome her.\n\n\"Yes, ye do,\" he said seriously. \"Ye 'pear ter be real thrivin' an'\npeart an' healthy.\"\n\nHis look, his words, were charged with no sort of recognition or value\nof her beauty: clearly her challenge had fallen to the ground\nunnoticed.\n\n\"He'd like me jes' ez well ef I war all pitted up with the smallpox,\nor ez freckled ez a tur-r-key-aig,\" she thought, flushing with\nirritation.\n\nBeauty is jealous of preeminence, and would fain have precedence even\nof love. She could take no sort of satisfaction in a captive that her\nbright eyes had not shackled. Somehow this love seemed to flout, to\ndiminish, her attractions. It was like an accident. She could account\nfor his subjection on no other grounds. As she sat silent, grave\nenough now and very beautiful, gazing askance and troubled upon him,\nhe went on:--\n\n\"I war so oneasy an' beset lest suthin' hed happened on the mounting,\nwhilst I war away, ter trouble you-uns or some o' yer folks. I never\nhed time ter study much 'bout sech in the day, but I dreamt 'bout ye\nin the night, an' _all night_,\"--he laughed a little,--\"all sort'n\nmixed up things. I got ter be a plumb Joseph fur readin' dreams--only\nI could read the same one forty diff'rent ways, an' every way made me\na leetle mo' oneasy than the t'other one. I s'pose ye hev been perlite\nenough ter miss me a leetle,\" he concluded.\n\nShe flashed her great eyes at him with a pretended stare of surprise.\n\"My--no!\" she exclaimed. \"We-uns hev hed the comet ter keep us\ncomp'ny--we ain't missed nobody!\"\n\nHe laughed a little, as at a repartee, and then went on:--\n\n\"Waal, the comic war a-cuttin' a pretty showy figger down yander at\nColbury. 'Ston-ishin' how much store folks do 'pear ter set on it!\nThey hed rigged up some sort'n peepin'-glass in the Court-House yard,\nan' thar war mighty nigh the whole town a-squinchin' up one eye ter\nexaminate the consarn through it--all the court off'cers,\n'torney-gin'ral, an' sech, an' old Doctor Kane an' Jedge Peters,\nbesides a whole passel o' ginerality folks. They 'lowed the glass made\nit 'pear bigger.\"\n\n\"Did it?\" she asked, with sudden interest.\n\n\"Bless yer soul, chile, _I_ didn't hev time ter waste on it. Jedge\nPeters he beckoned ter me, an' 'lowed he'd interjuce me ter it; but I\n'lowed the comic outside war plenty big enough fur me. 'Jedge,' I\nsays, 'my mission hyar air ter make onnecessary things seem _small_,\nnot magnified. That's why I'm continually belittlin' Rolf Quigley. Wat\nkin go on lookin' cross-eyed at the stars, ef so minded, but I be\nbound ter tend ter the 'lection.' An' the jedge laffed and says:\n'Justus, nex' time I want ter git 'lected ter office, I'm goin' ter\ngit _ye_ ter boost me in. Ye hev got it a sight mo' at heart than yer\nbrother.' Fur thar war Wat, all twisted up at the small e-end o' the\ntellingscope, purtendin' ter be on mighty close terms with the comic,\nthough lots o' other men said it jes' dazed thar eyes, an' they\ncouldn't see _nuthin'_ through it, an' mighty leetle arterward through\nsightin' so long one-eyed.\"\n\n\"Waal, how's the prospects fur the 'lection?\" she asked.\n\n\"Fine! Fine!\" he answered with gusto. \"Folks all be so frien'ly\neverywhar ter we-uns.\"\n\nHe leaned his shoulder suddenly back against the rough rails of the\nfence. His hat was in his hand. His hair, fine, thin, chestnut-brown,\nand closely clinging about his narrow head, was thrown back from his\nforehead. His clear blue eyes were turned upward, with the light of\nreminiscence slowly dawning in them. It may have been the reflection\nof the dazzling flake of cloud, it may have been some mental\nillumination, but a sort of radiance was breaking over the keen,\nirregular lines of his features, and a flush other than the floridity\nof a naturally fair complexion was upon his thin cheek and hollow\ntemple.\n\n\"O The'dosia,\" he cried, \"I can't holp thinkin', hevin' so many\nfrien's nowadays,--whenst it's 'Hail!' hyar, an' 'Howdy!' thar, an' a\nclap on the shoulder ter the east, an' a 'How's yer health?' ter the\nwest, an' a handshake ter the north, an' 'Take a drink?' ter the\nsouth, from one e-end o' the county ter the t'other,--how I fared\nwhenst I hed jes' _one_ frien' in the worl', an' that war yer mother!\nAn' how she looked the fust day she stood in the door o' my cabin up\nthar--kem ter nuss Elmiry through that spell she hed o' the scarlet\nfever. An' arterward she says ter me: 'Ye do manage s'prisin', Justus;\nan' I be goin' ter save ye some gyardin seed out'n my patch this year,\nan' ef ye'll plough my patch I'll loan ye my horse-critter ter plough\nyour'n. An' the gals kin kem an' l'arn ter sew an' churn, an' sech,\nlong o' 'Dosia.' An' how they loved ye, 'Dosia--special Elmiry!\"\n\nHis eyes filled with sudden tears. They did not fall; they were\nabsorbed somehow as he resumed:--\n\n\"Sech a superflu'ty o' frien's nowadays! Ef 't warn't they'd count fur\nall they're wuth in the ballot-box, I'd hev no use fur 'em. I kin\nsca'cely 'member thar names. But then I hed jes' _one_--jes' _one_ in\nall the worl'--yer mother! Bless her soul!\" he concluded\nenthusiastically.\n\nHe was still and reflective for a moment. Then he made a motion as\nthough he would take one of Theodosia's hands. But she clasped both of\nthem demurely behind her.\n\n\"I don't hold hands with no man ez blesses another 'oman's soul by the\nhour,\" she said, with an affectation of primness.\n\nThere may have been something more serious in her playful rebuff, but\nin the serenity of his perfect security he did not feel it or gauge\nits depth.\n\nA glimpse of her mother at the window added its suggestion--a lean,\nsallow, lined face, full of anxious furrows, with a rim of scanty\ngray-streaked hair about the brow, with spectacles perched above, and\nbeneath the flabby jaw a scraggy, wrinkled neck.\n\n\"An' she's so powerful pretty!\" Theodosia exclaimed, with an\nirreverent burst of laughter, \"I don't wonder ye feel obligated ter\nbless her soul.\"\n\n\"She 'pears plumb beautiful to my mind,\" he said unequivocally,--\"all\nof a piece with her beautiful life.\"\n\nTheodosia was suddenly grave, angered into a secret, sullen\nirritation. These were words she loved for herself: it was but lately\nshe had learned so to prize them. Her eyes were as bright as a deer's!\nHad not some one protested this, with a good round rural oath as\nattestation? Her hair on the back of her head, and its shape to the\nnape of her neck, were so beautiful--she had never seen it: how could\nshe say it wasn't? Her chin and her throat--well, if people could\nthink snow was a prettier white, he wouldn't give much for _their_\nhead-stuffin'. And her blush! her blush! It was her own fault. He\nwould not have taken another kiss if she had not blushed so at the\nfirst that he must needs again see her cheek glow like the wild rose.\n\nThese were echoes of a love-making that had lately taken hold of her\nheart, that had grown insistently sweet and dear to her, that had\nestablished its sway impetuously, tyrannically, over her life, that\nhad caused her to seem more to herself, and as if she were infinitely\nmore to her new lover.\n\nShe wondered how she could ever have even tolerated this dullard, with\nhis slow, measured preference, his unquestioning security of her\nheart, his doltish credulity in her and her promise, his humble\ngratitude to her mother,--who had often enough, in good sooth, got\nfull value in return for aught she gave,--who appeared \"beautiful\" to\nhis mind. She broke forth abruptly, her cheeks flushing, her eyes\nbrave and bright, the subject nearest her heart on her lips, in the\nsudden influx of courage set astir by the mere contemplation of it.\n\n\"Waal now, tell 'bout Wat--how he enj'ys bein' a candidate, an' sech.\"\nThen, with a tremor because of her temerity: \"I have hearn o' that\nthar beautisome old 'oman a time or two afore, but Wat ez a candidate\nair sorter fraish an' new.\"\n\nHe turned his clear, unsuspicious eyes upon her. He had replaced his\nwide wool hat on his head, and he leaned forward, resting his cheek on\nhis hand and his elbow on his knee. He aimlessly flicked his long\nspurred boot, as he talked, with a willow wand which he carried in\nlieu of horsewhip.\n\n\"Waal, Wat is some similar ter a balky horse. He don't seem ter sense\na word I say, nor ter be willin' ter do a thing I advise, nor even ter\ntake heart o' grace 'bout bein' 'lected, till we gets out 'mongst\nfolks, an' _thar_ handshakin's and frien'liness seems ter hearten up\nthe critter. I hev jes' hed ter baig an' baig, an' plead an' plead,\nwith that boy 'bout this an' that an' t'other, till I wouldn't go\nthrough ag'in what I _hev_ been through ter git 'lected doorkeeper o'\nheaven. But,\" with a sudden change of tone and a flush of pride,\n\"The'dosia, ye dunno what a' all-fired pretty speaker Wat hev got ter\nbe. Jes' stan's up ez straight an' smilin' afore all the crowd, an'\njes' tells off his p'ints, one, two, three, ez nip! An' the crowd\nalways cheers an' cheers--jes' bawls itse'f hoarse. Whenever thar's a\nchance ter speak, Wat jes' leaves them t'other candidates nowhar.\"\n\nAh, Theodosia's beauty well deserved the guerdon of sweet words. She\nmight have been pictured as a thirsting Hebe. She had a look of\nquaffing some cup of nectar, still craving its depths, so immediate a\njoy, so intense a light, were in her widely open eyes; her lips were\nparted; the spray of blackberry leaves that she held near her cheek\ndid not quiver, so had her interest petrified every muscle. She was\nleaning slightly forward; her red sunbonnet had fallen to the ground,\nand the wind tossed her dark brown hair till the heavy masses, with\ntheir curling ends disheveled, showed tendrils of golden hue. Her\nround, plump arm was like ivory. The torn sleeve fell away to the\nelbow, and her mother, glancing out of the window, took remorseful\nheed of it, and wished that she herself had set a stitch in it.\n\n\"The'dosia shows herself so back'ard 'bout mendin', an' sech--she air\nenough ter skeer any man away. An' Justus knows jes' what sech\nlaziness means. Kin mend clothes hisse'f ez good ez the nex' one, an'\nuseter do it too, strong an' taut, with a double thread, whenst the\nfambly war leetle chil'n an' gin ter bustin' out'n thar gear.\"\n\nBut Justus took no note of the significance of the torn sleeve.\n\n\"Why, 'Dosia,\" he went on, \"everybody 'lowed ez Wat's speeches seemed\nter sense what the people wanted ter hear. Him an' me we'd talk it\nover the night before, an' Wat he'd write down what we said on paper\nan' mem'rize it; an' the nex' day, why, folks that wouldn't hev\nnuthin' ter say ter him afore he spoke would be jes' aidgin' up\nthrough the crowd ter git ter shake han's with him.\"\n\nShe smiled with delight at the picture. If it were sweet to him to\npraise, how sweet it was to her to listen! \"Tell on!\" she said softly.\n\nHer interest flattered him; it enriched the reminiscence, dear though\nhis memory held it. He had no doubt as to the unity of feeling with\nwhich they both regarded the incidents he chronicled. He went on with\nthe certainty of responsive sentiment, the ease, the serenity of a man\nwho opens his heart to the woman he loves.\n\n\"Why, 'Dosia,\" he said, \"often, often if it hed n't been fur the\nfolks, I could hev run up an' dragged him off'n the rostrum an' hugged\nhim fur pride, he looked so han'some an' spoke so peart! An' ter think\n't war jes' our leetle Wat--the Fambly's leetle Wat--growed up ter be\nsech a man! Ye'll laff at me--other folks did--whenst I tell ye that\nag'in an' ag'in I jes' cotch' myse'f cheerin' with the loudest. I\ncould n't holp it.\"\n\n\"He'll be 'lected, Justus?\" she breathlessly inquired, and yet\nimperatively, as if, even though she asked, she would brook no denial.\n\n\"Oh, they all say thar's no doubt--no doubt at all.\"\n\nShe drew a long breath of contentment, of pleasure. She leaned back,\nsilent and reflective, against the rail fence behind the bench, her\neyes fixed, absorbed, following the outline of other scenes than the\none before them, which indeed left no impression upon her senses,\nscenes to come, slowly shaping the future. All trace of the red glow\nof the sun had departed from the landscape. No heavy, light-absorbing,\nsad-hued tapestries could wear so deep a purple, such sombre\nsuggestions of green, as the circling mountains had now assumed: they\nwere not black, and yet such depths of darkness hardly comported with\nthe idea of color. The neutral tints of the sky were graded more\ndefinitely, with purer transparency, because of the contrast. The\nfine grays were akin to pearl color, to lavender, even, in approaching\nthe zenith, to the palest of blue--so pale that the white glitter of a\nstar alternately appeared and was lost again in its tranquil\ninexpressiveness. The river seemed suddenly awake; its voice was\nlifted loud upon the evening air, a rhythmic song without words. The\nfrogs chanted by the waterside. Fireflies here and there quivered\npalely over the flat cornfields at the back of the house. There was a\nlight within, dully showing through the vines at the window.\n\n\"An' then, 'Dosia,\" said Justus softly, \"when the 'lection is over,\nit's time fur ye an' me ter git married.\"\n\nShe roused herself with an obvious effort, and looked\nuncomprehendingly at him for a moment, as if she hardly heard.\n\n\"The las' one o' Fambly will be off my han's then. Fambly will hev\nbeen pervided fur--every one, Wat an' all. I hev done my bes' fur\nFambly, an' I dunno but I hev earned the right ter think some fur\nmyse'f now.\"\n\nHe would not perhaps have arrogated so much, except to the woman by\nwhom he believed himself beloved. She said nothing, and he went on\nslowly, lingering upon the words as if he loved the prospect they\nconjured up.\n\n\"We-uns will hev the gyardin an' orchard, an' pastur' an' woods-lot\nan' fields, ter tend ter, an' the cows an' bees, an' the mare an'\nfilly, an' peegs an' poultry, ter look arter. An' the house air all\ntight, the roof an' all in good repair, an' we-uns will have it all\nter ourselves.\"\n\nShe turned upon him with sudden interest.\n\n\"What will kem o' Wat?\"\n\n\"Oh, he mus' live in town whilst sher'ff, bein' off'cer o' the court\nan' official keeper o' jail, though he kin app'int a jailer.\"\n\n\"Live in Colbury!\" she exclaimed in wonderment.\n\nJustus laughed in triumph. \"Oh, I tell ye, Wat's 'way up in the\npictur's! He'll be a reg'lar town man 'fore long, I reckon, dandified\nan' sniptious ez the nex' one, marryin' one o' them finified town gals\nez wear straw hats stiddier sunbonnets,--though they _do_ look ter be\nabout ez flimsy an' no-'count cattle ez any I ever see,\" the sterling\nrural standpoint modifying his relish of Walter's frivolous worldly\nopportunities.\n\nShe tossed her head in defiance of some sudden unspoken thought. As\nshe lifted her eyes, fired by pride, she saw the comet all a-glitter\nin the darkening sky.\n\nShe hardly knew that he had seized her hand; but his importunity must\nbe answered.\n\n\"D'rec'ly after the 'lection--'lection day, 'Dosia?\" he urged.\n\n\"Ain't ye got no jedgmint,\" she temporized, laughing unmirthfully,\n\"axin' sech a question ez that under that onlucky comet!\"\n\n\"I hev been waitin' so long, 'Dosia!\"\n\nIt was the first suggestion of complaint she had ever heard from him.\n\n\"Then ye air used ter waitin', an' 't won't kill ye ter wait a leetle\nlonger. I'll let ye know 'lection day.\"\n\n\nII.\n\nIt was a hot day in the little valley town, the first Thursday in\nAugust, the climax of a drought, with the sun blazing down from dawn\nto dusk, and not a cloud, not a vagrant mist, not even the stir of the\nimpalpable ether, to interpose. The mountains that rimmed the horizon\nall around Colbury shimmered azure, through the heated air. No wind\ncame down those darker indentations that marked ravines. A dazzling,\nstifling stillness reigned; yet now and again an eddying cloud of dust\nwould spring up along the streets, and go whirling up-hill and down,\npausing suddenly, and settling upon the overgrown shrubbery in the\npretty village yards, or on white curtains hanging motionless at the\nwindows of large, old-fashioned frame houses. Even the shade was hot\nwith a sort of closeness unknown in the open air, yet as it dwindled\nto noontide proportions some alleviation seemed withdrawn; and though\nthe mercury marked no change, all the senses welcomed the\npost-meridian lengthening of the images of bough and bole beneath the\ntrees, and the fantastic architecture of the shadows of chimney and\ngable and dormer-window, elongated out of drawing, stretching across\nthe grassy streets and ample gardens. There among the grape trellises,\nand raspberry bushes, and peach and cherry trees, the locusts chirred\nand chirred a tireless, vibrating panegyric on hot weather. The birds\nwere hushed; sometimes under a clump of matted leaves one of the\nfeathered gentry might be seen with wings well held out from his\npanting sides. The beautiful green beetle, here called the \"June-bug,\"\nhovered about the beds of thyme, its jeweled, enameled green body and\nits silver gauze wings flashing in the sun, although June was far down\nthe revolving year. Blue and lilac lizards basked in the garden walks,\nwhich were cracked by the heat. Little stir was in the streets; the\nlanguid business of a small town was transacted if absolute need\nrequired, and postponed if a morrow would admit of contemplation. The\nvoters slowly repaired to the polls with a sense of martyrdom in the\ncause of party, and the election was passing off in a most orderly\nfashion, there being no residuum of energy in the baking town to\nrender it disorderly or unseemly. Often not a human being was to be\nseen, coming or going.\n\nTo Theodosia it was all vastly different from the picture she had\nprojected of Colbury with an election in progress. In interest,\nmovement, populousness, it did not compare with a county-court day,\nwhich her imagination had multiplied when she estimated the relative\nimportance of the events. She had made no allowance for the absence of\nthe country people, specially wont to visit the town when the\nquarterly court was in session, but now all dutifully in place voting\nin their own remote districts. The dust, the suffocating heat, the\nstale, vapid air, the indescribable sense of a lower level--all these\naffected her like a veritable burden, accustomed as she was to the\nlight and rare mountain breeze, to the tempered sun, the mist, and the\ncloud. The new and untried conditions of town life trammeled and\nconstrained her. She had a certain pride, and she feared she\ncontinually offended against the canons of metropolitan taste. In\nevery passing face she saw surprise, and she fancied contempt. In\nevery casual laugh she heard ridicule. Her brain was a turmoil of\nconflicting anxieties, hopes, resolutions, and in addition these\nexternal demands upon her attention served to intensify her absorbing\nemotions and to irritate her nerves rather than to divert or soothe\nthem. She had escaped from the relative at whose house she was making\na visit, craftily timed to include election day, on the plea that she\nwished to see something of the town. \"Ye don't live up on the\nmounting, Cousin Anice, 'mongst the deer, an' b'ar, an' fox, like me,\"\nshe had said jestingly, \"or ye'd want ter view all the town ye kin.\"\nAnd once outside the shabby little palings, she returned no more for\nhours.\n\nAlong the scorching streets she wandered, debating within herself\nanxious questions which, she felt, affected all her future, and\nunfitting herself still further to reach that just and wise conclusion\nshe desired to compass. She could not altogether abstract her mind,\ndespite the interests which she had at stake. She noticed that her\nunaccustomed feet stumbled over the flag-stones of the pavement--\"Fit\nfur nothin' but followin' the plough!\" she muttered in irritation. She\nhesitated at the door of a store, then sidled sheepishly in, tearing\nher dress on a nail in a barrel set well in the corner and out of the\nway.\n\nBut while looking over the pile of goods which she had neither the\nwish nor the money to purchase, she could have sunk with shame with\nthe sudden thought that perhaps it was not the vogue in Colbury to\nkeep a clerk actively afoot to while away the idle time of a\ndesperately idle woman. She could not at once decide how she might\nbest extricate herself, and for considerable time the empty show of an\nimpending purchase went on.\n\n\"I'll--I'll kem an' see 'bout'n it ter-morrer,\" she faltered at last.\n\"Much obleeged.\"\n\n\"No trouble to show goods,\" said the martyr of the counter, politely.\nIn truth he had in the course of his career shown them as futilely to\nwomen who were much older and far, far uglier, and contemplating\npurchase as remotely.\n\nShe went out scarlet, slow, tremulous, and walking close into the wall\nlike an apprehensive cat, looking now and again over her shoulder. She\nwondered if he laughed when he was alone.\n\nHer shadow was long now as it preceded her down the street, lank,\nawkward, clumsy. She took note of the late hour which it intimated,\nand followed the extravagant, lurching caricature of herself to her\ncousin's house, a little unpainted, humble building set far back in\nthe yard, against the good time coming when a more ornate structure\nshould be prefixed. The good time seemed still a long way off. Her\ncousin's ironing-board was on the porch, and presently a lean,\nelderly, active woman whisked out, her flat-iron in her hand.\n\n\"Cousin Anice,\" called Theodosia from the gate, \"how's the 'lection\nturned out?\"\n\nCousin Anice paused to put her finger in her mouth; thus moistened,\nshe touched it to the flat-iron, which hissed smartly, and which she\napplied then to the apron on the board.\n\n\"Laws-a-massy! chile, the polls is jes' closed, an' all the country\ndeestric's ter be hearn from. We won't know till ter-morrer--till late\nter-night, nohow.\"\n\nTheodosia leaned against the gate. How could she wait! How could she\nendure the suspense! She thought of Justus, and of her promise to fix\nthe date of the wedding on election day, but only as an additional\nfactor of trouble in her own anxiety and indecision.\n\n\"Wat's been hyar ez cross ez two sticks,\" said Mrs. Elmer. She paused\nto hold up the apron, exquisitely white, and sheer, and stiff, and to\ngaze with critical professional eyes upon it; she was what is known as\na \"beautiful washer and ironer,\" although otherwise not comely. \"Wat's\nbeat plumb out o' sight, ef the truth war knowed, I reckon. He 'lows\nhe's powerful 'feared. Ef't war Justus, now, _he'd_ hev been 'lected\nsure. Justus is a mighty s'perior man; pity he never hed no\neddication. He could hev done anything--sharp ez a brier. Yes; Wat's\nbeat, I reckon.\"\n\nIn the instant Theodosia's heart sank. But she turned from the\npalings, and sauntered resolutely on. It well behooved her to take\ncounsel with herself. \"I mought hev made a turr'ble, turr'ble\nmistake,\" she muttered. She was sensible of a sharp pang pervading her\nconsciousness. Nevertheless, judgment clamored for recognition.\n\n\"Everybody gins Justus a good name, better'n Wat,\" she argued. \"An' ef\nWat _ain't_ 'lected\"--\n\nShe walked down the street with a freer step, her head lifted, her\nself-respect more secure. With the possible collapse of her prospect\nof living in Colbury, and her ambition to adjust herself to the\nexigent demands of its more ornate civilization, her natural untrained\ngrace was returning to her. She felt that she was certainly stylish\nenough for the hills, where she was likely to live all her days, and\nwith this realization she quite unconsciously seemed easy enough,\nunconstrained enough, graceful enough, to pass muster in a wider\nsphere. Her heart was beating placidly now with the casting away of\nthis new expectation that had made all its pulses tense. The still air\nwas cooler, or at least darker. A roseate suffusion was in the sky,\nalthough a star twinkled there. More people were in the streets; doors\nand windows were open, and faces appeared now and again among the\nvines and curtains. As she hesitated on the street corner, two young\ngirls in white dresses and with fair hair passed her. She watched them\nwith darkening brow as they drew hastily together, and suddenly she\noverheard the half-smothered exclamation which had a dozen times\nto-day barely escaped her ears.\n\n\"What a pretty, pretty girl! Oh, my! how pretty, how pretty!\"\n\nTheodosia stood like one bewitched; a light like the illumination of\njewels was in her sapphire eyes; the color surged to her cheek; she\nlifted up her head on its round, white throat; her lips curved. \"Oh,\npoor fool!\" she thought in pity for herself, for this was what the\nColbury people had been saying all day in their swift, recurrent\nglances, their half-masked asides, their furtive turning to look after\nher. And she--to have given herself a day of such keen misery\nunconscious of their covert encomiums!\n\n\"I live up thar in the wilderness till I jes' don't sense nothin',\"\nshe said.\n\nAll the wilting prospects of life were refreshed as a flower in the\nperfumed dew-fall. She felt competent, able to cope with them all; her\nrestored self-confidence pervaded her whole entity, spiritual and\nmaterial. She walked back with an elastic step, a breezy, debonair\nmanner, and she met Justus Hoxon at the gate of her cousin's yard with\na jaunty assurance, and with all the charm of her rich beauty in the\nascendant.\n\nHe would fain have detained her in the twilight. \"What's that ye\npromised to tell me 'lection day?\"\n\n\"I 'lowed the day Wat war 'lected,\" she temporized, laying her hand on\nthe gate, which his stronger hand kept still closed.\n\n\"Waal, this is the day Wat is 'lected.\"\n\nShe drew back. Even in the dim light he could see her blue eyes\nwidening with inquiry as she looked at him.\n\n\"I 'lowed the returns warn't all in,\" she said doubtfully.\n\n\"They ain't, but enough hev kem in sence the polls closed ter gin him\na thumpin' majority. He's safe.\" The tense ring of triumph was in his\nvoice.\n\nThe scene was swimming before her; she was dazed by the sudden\nalternations of hope and despair, of decision and counter-decision, by\nthe seeming instability of all this. Once more she thought, in a\ntremble, and with a difference, of the mistake she might have made.\nShe held to the gate to keep her feet, no longer to open it.\n\n\"What did ye promise ter tell me 'lection day?\" he demanded once\nmore, clasping her hand as it lay on the palings.\n\n\"'Lection day?\" she said with a forced laugh--\"'t ain't e-ended yit.\nAn',\" with a sudden resolution of effecting a diversion--\"afore it\n_is_ e-ended I want ter git a peep through that thar thing they call a\ntellingscope, ef they let women folks look through it.\"\n\nHe was instantly intent.\n\n\"Laws-a-massy, yes!\" he exclaimed. \"I seen Mis' Dr. Kane and Mis'\nJedge Peters, an' thar darters, an' a whole passel o' women folks over\nthar one night las' week. The young folks jes' amble up an' down the\ncourt-house yard, bein' moonlight, like a lot o' young colts showin'\nthar paces. An' even ef they ain't thar ter-night, I'll take ye over\nthar arter supper, with yer cousin Anice ter keep ye in countenance.\"\n\nBut after supper there was a sufficiency of fluttering white dresses\nastir in the court-house yard, and now and again crossing the wide,\nill-paved street thither, to warrant Theodosia in dispensing with her\ncousin's company, much to that sophisticated worthy's relief.\n\n\"I hev seen all Colbury's got ter show,\" she said with sated pride.\n\"An' bein' ez I hev hed a hard day's ironin', I hev got a stitch in my\nside.\"\n\n\"I'd onderstan' that better if ye hed hed a hard day's sewin',\" said\nJustus. He was in high feather, eager, jubilant, drinking in all the\nrich and subtle flavors of success with the gusto of personal triumph.\n\n\"He air prouder'n Wat,\" more than one observer opined.\n\nThere was another fine exhibition of pride on display in the\ncourt-house yard that evening. One might have inferred that Dr. Kane\nhad made the comet, from his satisfaction in its proportions, his\naccurate knowledge and exposition of its history, its previous\nappearances, and when its coming again might be expected. He was the\nprincipal physician of the place, and the little telescope was his\nproperty, and he had thus generously loaned it to the public with the\nhope of illuminating the general ignorance by a nearer view of the\nstarry heavens, while it served his own and his neighbors' interest in\nthe nightly progress of the great comet. Total destruction had been\nprophesied as the imminent fate of the telescope, but it had so far\njustified its owner's confidence in the promiscuous politeness of\nKildeer County, and had been a source of infinite pleasure to the\ncountry folks from the coves and mountains, who had never before seen,\nnor in good sooth heard of, such an instrument. For weeks past almost\nall night curious groups took possession of it at intervals, and\ndoubtless it did much to enlarge their idea of science and knowledge\nof celestial phenomena, for often Dr. Kane's idle humor induced him to\nstand by and explain the various theories touching comets,--their\nvelocity, their substance or lack of substance, their recurrence,\ntheir status in the astral economy,--and cognate themes. As he was a\nman of very considerable reading and mental qualifications, of some\nmeans for the indulgence of his taste, and a good deal of leisure, the\nsynopsis of astronomical science presented in the successive\nexpositions was very well worth listening to, especially by the more\nignorant of the community, who were thus enlightened as to facts\nhitherto foreign even to their wildest imaginings.\n\nBut following hard on every benefaction is the trail of ingratitude,\nand certain of the irreverent in the crowd found a piquant zest in\nsecret derision of the doctor, who sometimes did, in truth, present\nthe air of a showman with a panorama. More especially was this the\ncase when his enthusiasm waxed high, and his satisfaction in the\nglories of the comet partook of a positive personal pride.\n\n\"What's he goin' ter do about it?\" demanded one grinning rustic of\nanother on the outskirts of the crowd.\n\n\"Put salt on its tail,\" responded his interlocutor.\n\nOthers affected to believe that the doctor was performing a great feat\nwith the long bow, especially in the tremendous measurements of which\nhe seemed singularly prodigal. A reference to the height of the\nmountains of the moon as compared with the neighboring ranges elicited\na whispered hope that the roads were better there than those of the\nGreat Smoky; and an inquiry concerning the probable fate of the comet\nprovoked a speculation that when he was done with it he would sell it\nat public outcry to the highest bidder at the east door of the\ncourt-house.\n\nClose about the stand, however, the crowd took on something of the\ndemeanor of a literary society. Discussions were in order, questions\nasked and answered, authorities quoted and refuted: the other\nphysician, who practiced much in consultation with Dr. Kane, two or\nthree clergymen, several of the officers of the court, and a number of\nlawyers, all taking part. The more youthful members of the gathering\naffected the role of peripatetic philosophers, and sauntered to and\nfro, arm in arm, in the light of the waxing moon.\n\nThe big black shadows of the giant oaks were all dappled with silver\nas the beams pierced the foliage and fell to the ground below; only\nthe cornice of the building threw an unbroken image, massive and\nsombre, on the sward. The low clustering roofs of the town had a thin\nbluish haze hovering about them, and were all softly and blurringly\nimposed on the vaguely blue sky and the dim hills beyond. Among them a\nvertical silver line glinted, sharply metallic,--the steeple of a\nchurch. Here and there a yellow light gleamed from a lamp within a\nwindow. No sound came from the streets; all the life of the place\nseemed congregated here.\n\nThere was a continual succession of postulants to gaze through the\ntelescope, some gravely curious, some stolidly iconoclastic and\nincredulous, others with covert levity, and still others,\nself-conscious, solicitous, secretly determined to affect to see all\nthat other people could see, lest some subtle incapacity, some\nflagrant rusticity, be inferred from failure. These last were hasty\nobservers, scarcely waiting to adjust the eye to the lens, fluttered,\nand prolific of inapt exclamations, which too often betrayed the\nsuperficial character of the investigation. To this class did\nTheodosia belong.\n\n\"Plumb beautiful!\" she murmured under her breath, after a momentary\ncontact of her dazzled eye with the brass rim of the telescope.\n\n\"Try ag'in, 'Dosia!\" exclaimed Justus, aghast at this perfunctory\ndismissal of the comet, as she turned to go away.\n\nShe winced a little from his voice, clear, vibrant and urgent, for\nJustus had no solicitude concerning the superior canons of Colbury\ntouching etiquette, and suffered none of her anxieties. She caught Dr.\nKane's eyes fixed upon him as she moved hastily away, and then he came\nup beside Justus, who stood near the telescope.\n\n\"Let me explain the thing to you, Hoxon,\" he said. \"Try a peep\nyourself.\"\n\nJustus glanced after her. Walter had joined her--not so soon, however,\nbut that she heard a half-suppressed criticism on her lover as he\nturned to the telescope and Dr. Kane's exposition.\n\n\"Pity he's got no education--smart fellow, but can't even read and\nwrite.\"\n\n\"Smart\" enough to be an apt pupil. The others pressed close around,\nlistening to the measured voice of the physician and the quick,\npertinent questions of the star-gazer.\n\nIt is as an open scroll, that magnificent, wonder-compelling cult of\nthe skies, not the sealed book of other sciences. Since the days of\nthe Chaldean, all men of receptive soul in solitary places, the\nsailor, the shepherd, the hunter, or the hermit, whether of the\nwilderness of nature or the isolation of crowds, have read there of\nthe mystery of the infinite, of the order and symmetry of the plan of\ncreation, of the proof of the existence of a God, who controls the\nsweet influences of Pleiades and makes strong the bands of Orion. The\nunspeakable thought, the unformulated prayer, the poignant sense of\nindividual littleness, of atomic unimportance, in the midst of the\nvast scheme of the universe, inform every eye, throb in every breast,\nwhether it be of the savant, with all the appliances of invention to\nbring to his cheated senses the illusion of a slightly nearer\napproach, or of the half-civilized llanero of the tropic solitudes,\nwhose knowledge suffices only to note the hour by the bending of the\ngreat Southern Cross. It is the heritage of all alike.\n\nFor Justus Hoxon, who had followed the slow march of the stars through\nmany a year in the troubled watches of the night, when anxiety and\nforeboding could make no covenant with sleep, there was, in one sense,\nlittle to learn. He knew them all in their several seasons, the time\nof their rising, when they came to the meridian, and when they were\nengulfed in the west, till with another year they sparkled on the\neastern rim of the sky. He listened to Dr. Kane's explanation of this\nwith an air of acceptance, but he hardly heeded the detail of their\ndistance from the earth and from one another--he knew that they were\nfar,--and he shook his head over speculations as to their physical\ncondition, vegetation, and inhabitation. \"Ye ain't got no sort o'\nmeans o' knowin' sech, Doctor,\" he said reprehensively, gauging the\ndepths of the ignorance of the wise man.\n\nHe heard their names with alert interest, and repeated them swiftly\nafter his mentor to set them in his memory. \"By George!\" he cried\ndelightedly, \"I hed no idee they hed names!\"\n\nAnd as the amateur astronomer, pleased with so responsive a glow,\nbegan the tracing of the fantastic imagery of the constellations,\ndetailing the story of each vague similitude, he marked the sudden\ndawn of a certain enchantment in his interlocutor's mind, the first\nsubtle experience of the delights of the ideal and the resources of\nfable. It exerted upon Dr. Kane a sort of fascinated interest, the\nobservation of this earliest exploration of the realms of fancy by so\nkeen and receptive an intelligence. The comet, the telescope, the\ncrowd, were forgotten, as with Hoxon at his elbow he made the tour of\nthe court-house yard, from point to point, wherever the best\nobservation might be had of each separate sidereal etching on the deep\nblue. For a time the crowd casually watched them with a certain\ngood-natured ridicule of their absorption, and the telescope\nmaintained its interest to the successive wights who peered through at\nthe comet still splendidly ablaze despite the light of the gibbous\nmoon. The ranks of young people promenaded up and down the brick walks\nand the grassy spaces. Elder gossips sat on the court-house steps, or\nstood in groups, and discussed the questions of the day. Gradually\ndisintegration began. The clangor of the gate rose now and then as\nhomeward-bound parties passed through, becoming constantly more\nfrequent. Still the shifting back and forth of the thinning ranks of\nthe peripatetic youth went on, and laughter and talk resounded from\nthe court-house steps. At intervals the telescope was deserted; the\nmotionless trees were bright with the moon and glossy with the dew.\nThe voice of guard-dogs was now and again reverberated from the hills.\nThe languid sense of a late hour had dulled the pulses, and when\nJustus Hoxon turned back to earth it was to an almost depopulated\nscene, the realization of the approach of midnight, and the sight of\nTheodosia sitting alone in the moonlight on the steps of the east door\nof the court-house, waiting for him with a touching patience, as it\nseemed to him at the moment.\n\n\"Air you-uns waitin' fur me, 'Dosia, all by yerse'f?\" he demanded\nhastily, with a contrite intonation.\n\n\"I _'pear_ to be all by myse'f,\" she said, with a playful feigning of\nuncertainty, glancing about her. She gave a forced laugh, and the\nconstraint in her tone struck his attention.\n\n\"I 'lowed ez Wat war with ye,\" he said apologetically. \"Air ye ready\nter go over ter yer cousin Anice's now?\"\n\nHe was standing leaning against one of the columns of the portico, his\nface half in the shadow of his hat and half in the moonlight.\n\nShe sat still upon the steps, looking up at him, her upturned eyes\ntaking an appealing expression from her lowly attitude. She was silent\nfor a moment, as if at a loss. Then suddenly her eyes fell.\n\n\"'Pears ter me ter be right comical ter hev ter remind _ye_ o' what\n_I_ promised ter tell ye 'lection day,\" she said.\n\n\"Why, 'Dosia,\" he broke in vehemently, \"I hev axed ye twice ter-day,\nan' I didn't ax ye jes' now 'kase ye hed been hyar so long alone, an'\nI wanted ter take ye ter yer cousin Anice's ef so be ye wanted ter\ngo.\" He stopped for a moment. Then, with a change of tone, \"Ye can't\nmake out ez I hev been anything but hearty in lovin' ye--nearly all\nyer life long!\" His voice rang out with a definite note of conviction,\nof assertion.\n\nReproach was an untenable ground. She desisted from the effort. Her\neyes wandered down the street that lay shadowy with gable, and\ndormer-window, and long chimneys, in sharp geometric figures in the\nmoonshine, alternating with the deeper shadow of the trees. There were\nno lights save a twinkle here and there in an upper window.\n\nA flush rose to his pale cheeks. His heart was beating fast with heavy\npresage. He hesitated to demand his fate at so untoward a moment. He\ntook off his hat, mechanically fanning with its broad brim, and gazing\nabout him at the slowly dulling splendor of the moonlight as the disk\ntended further and further toward the west. The stars were brightening\ngradually, and within the range of his vision flared the great comet,\nevery moment the lustre of its white fire intensifying. He only saw;\nhe did not note. His every faculty was concentrated on the girl's\ndrawling voice as she began again, hesitating, and evidently at a\nloss.\n\n\"Waal, I hate ter tell ye, Justus, but I hev ter do it, an'\nI mought ez well the day that I promised ter set _the day_.\nIt's--it's--_never_! I ain't goin' ter marry ye at all!\"\n\nHe recoiled as from a blow. And yet he could not accept the fact.\n\n\"The'dosia,\" he said, \"air ye mad with me 'kase ye 'low I forgot ye\nthis evenin'?\"\n\nTheodosia had recovered her poise. Now that she had begun she felt\nsuddenly fluent. It did not accord with her estimate of her own\nattractions to dismiss a lover because he had forgotten her. She began\nto find a relish in the situation, and sought to adjust its details\nmore accurately to her preferences.\n\n\"Justus, I know ye never furgot me fur one minute. I kin find no fault\nwith yer likin' fur me.\"\n\nShe had never seen a stage. She had never heard of a theatre, but she\nwas posing and playing a part as definitely as if it graced the\nboards.\n\nHe detected a certain spurious note in her voice. It bewildered him.\nHe stared silently at her.\n\n\"I can't marry you-uns. I never kin.\"\n\n\"Why?\" he demanded in a measured tone. \"How kem ye hev changed yer\nmind? Ye hev told me often that ye would.\"\n\n\"W-a-al,\" she drawled, looking away at the skies, her unthinking eyes\narrested, too, by the blazing comet, \"I _did_ 'low wunst I would. But\na man with eddication would suit me bes', an' ye hain't got none.\"\n\n\"No more hev ye,\" he argued warmly. He was clinging for dear life to\nhis vanishing hope of happiness. He did not realize depreciation in\nhis words--only the facts that made them suited to each other. \"Ye\nknow ye _wouldn't_ take l'arnin' at school--an' I _couldn't_ git it;\n'pears ter me we air 'bout ekal.\"\n\n\"It air a differ in a 'oman,\" said Theodosia, quickly. \"A 'oman hev\ngot no call to be l'arned like a man.\"\n\nThis very subordinate view failed in this instance of the satisfaction\nit is wont to give to the masculine mind.\n\n\"Waal, ye didn't git enough l'arnin' ter hurt ye,\" he retorted. Then,\nrelenting, he added, \"But I don't find no fault with ye fur that\nnuther.\"\n\nThe color flared into her face. How she resented his clemency to her\nignorance! She still sat in her lowly posture on the step, leaning her\nbare head against the column of the porch, for her bonnet lay on the\nfloor beside her; but there was a suggestion of self-assertion in her\nvoice.\n\n\"I ain't expectin' ter live all my days in the woods, like a deer or\nsuthin' wild. I expec' ter live in town with eddicated folks, ez be\nlooked up ter, an' respected by all, an' kin make money, an' hev a\nsure-enough house.\" Her ambitious eyes swept the shadowy gables down\nthe street.\n\nHe broke out laughing; his voice was softer; his face relaxed.\n\n\"Laws-a-massy! Dosia,\" he exclaimed, \"yer head's plumb turned by one\nday's roamin' round town. Ye won't be in sech a hurry ter turn me off\nwhenst we git back ter the mountings.\"\n\n\"I ain't goin' back ter the mountings!\" she cried; \"I be a-goin' ter\nmarry a town man ez hev got position, an' eddication, an' place.\" She\npaused, stung by the fancied incredulity in his eyes. \"Why not? Ain't\nI good-lookin' enough?\"\n\nShe had risen to her feet; her eyes flashed upon him; her beautiful\nface wore a look of pride. It might have elicited from another man a\nprotest of its beauty. He stared at her with an expression of alarm\nthat was almost ghastly.\n\n\"Other men like me fur my looks, ef ye don't, Justus Hoxon,\" she said\nin indignation.\n\n\"Ef they jes' likes ye fur yer looks they won't like ye long,\" Hoxon\nsaid severely. \"I'll like ye when yer brown head is ez white ez\ncotton--ez much ez I like ye now--more!--_more_, I'll be bound! O\n'Dosia,\" with a sudden renewal of tenderness, \"don't talk this hyar\ncur'ous way! I dunno what's witched ye. But let's go home ter the\nmountings, ter yer mother, an' see ef she can't straighten out any\ntangle yer feelin's hev got inter.\"\n\nIt needed only this--the allusion to her commonplace mother, the\nrecollection of the forlorn little mountain home, the idea of her\nmother's insistent championship of Justus Hoxon--to bring the avowal\nso long trembling on her lips.\n\n\"I won't! I ain't likin' ye nowadays, Justus Hoxon, nor fur a long\ntime past. I ain't keerin' nothin' 'bout ye.\"\n\nThere was something in her tone that carried conviction.\n\n\"Air ye in earnest?\" he said, appalled.\n\n\"Dead earnest.\"\n\nHe gazed at her in the ever dulling light, that yet was clear enough\nto show every lineament--even the long black eyelashes that did not\ndroop or quiver above her great blue eyes.\n\n\"Then thar's no more to be said.\" He spoke in a changed voice, calm\nand clear, and she stared at him in palpable surprise. She had\nexpected an outburst of reproach, of beseechings, of protestation. She\nhad braced herself to meet it, and she felt the reaction. She was\nhardly capable of coping with seeming indifference. It touched her\npride. She missed the tribute of the withheld pleadings. She sought to\nrouse his jealousy.\n\n\"It's another man I like,\" she said, \"better--oh, a heap better--than\nyou-uns.\"\n\n\"That's all right, then.\"\n\nHe wondered to hear the words so glibly enunciated. His lips seemed to\nhim stiff, petrifying. He looked very white about them. She did not\nheed. She was angered, wounded, perplexed, by his acquiescence, his\ncalmness, his taciturnity. A wave of anxiety that was half regret\nwent over her. She felt lost in the turmoil of these complex emotions.\nWith that destructive impulse to hurl down, to tear, to strike, that\nis an element of a sort of blind irritation, she went on tumultuously:\n\n\"He is a man ez hev got eddication, an' a place, an' a fine chance an'\nshow in life--it's--it's--yer brother Walter.\"\n\nHer aim was true that time. Her shaft struck in the very core of his\nheart: but the satisfaction of this knowledge was denied her. He\nlooked very white, it is true, but the pale moonlight was on his face;\nand he only said in an undertone:\n\n\"Walter!\"\n\nShe laughed aloud, a sort of mockery of glee. She had expected to\nenjoy the revelation, and her laughter was an incident of the scene as\nshe had planned it.\n\n\"We war a-courtin' consider'ble o' the time whilst ye war off\nelectioneerin',\" she said, with the side glance of her old coquetry.\n\nShe saw his long shadow on the pavement bend forward and recoil\nsuddenly. She did not look at him.\n\n\"An' so ter-night,\" she went on briskly,--she had truly thought it a\nvery good joke,--\"whilst you-uns war a-star-gazing an' sech, Wat an'\nme jes stepped inter the register's office thar, an' the Squair\nmarried us. We 'lowed ye didn't see nothin' of it through the\ntellingscope, did ye? So Wat said I must tell ye, ez _he_ didn't want\nter tell ye.\"\n\nShe could not see his face, the light was dulling so, and he had\nreplaced his wide hat. There was a moment's silence. Then his voice\nrang out quite strong and cheerful, \"Why, then thar's no more to be\nsaid.\"\n\nHe stood motionless an instant longer. Then suddenly he turned with a\nwave of his hand that was like a gesture of farewell, and she marked\nhow swiftly his shadow seemed to slink from before him as he walked\naway, and passed the corner of the house, and disappeared from view.\n\nShe gazed silently after him for a moment. Then, leaning against the\ncolumn, she burst into a tumult of tears.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nDaylight found Justus Hoxon far on the road to the mountains. In the\nmany miles, as he fared along, his thoughts could hardly have been\npleasant company. As he sought to discover fault or flaw in himself,\nsearch as he might, he could find naught that might palliate the\nflippant faithlessness of his beloved, or the treachery of his\nbrother. His ambition might have been too worldly a thing, but not a\npulse of that most vital emotion beat for himself. He realized it\nnow--he realized his life in looking back upon this completed episode,\nas he might have done in the hour of death. He had so expended himself\nin the service of others that there was naught left for him. He had no\ngratulation in it, no sense of the virtue of unselfishness, no\npreception of achievement; it only seemed to him that his was the most\nflagrant folly that ever left a man in the world, but with no place in\nit. A sorry object for pride he seemed to himself, but he quivered,\nand scorched, and writhed in its hot flames. His one object was to\ntake himself out of the sight and sound of Colbury, till he might have\ncounsel within himself, and perfect his scheme of revenge--not upon\nthe woman. Poor Theodosia, with her limitations, could hardly have\nconceived how she had shattered the ideal to which her image had\nconformed in his mind, as she had stood on the porch and vaunted her\nbeauty, and her belief in its power, and her pitiful ambitions. The\nwoman was heartily welcome to the lot she had chosen. But the\ntreacherous man,--it was not in Justus Hoxon's scheme of things to\nreceive a blow and return nothing. A \"hardy fighter\" he was esteemed,\nalbeit his prowess was eclipsed by his more peaceful virtues. This,\nhowever, should be returned in kind. He would make no attack to be put\nin the wrong, arrested, perhaps, after the Colbury interpretation of\nassault and battery. But Walter had many a weak point in his armor,\nglaringly apparent now to the once fond brother.\n\nOnly a surly, bitter word he had for greeting to the few neighbors\nwhom he met, and who went their way in the conviction that his brother\nhad lost his election; for none ascribed any emotion of Justus Hoxon's\nto his own sake.\n\nHe reached in the evening the little cabin where the padlock hung on\nthe door, and the heavy, untrodden dust of the drought lay without;\nand so it was that the old days when \"Fambly\" had struggled through\ntheir humble experiences came back to him with that incomparable\nsweetness of the irrevocable past. Hardships! How could there be, with\nfond faith in one another, and in all the world! Poverty--so rich they\nwere in love! Life, after all, is more than meat, and there is no\nhunger like that of a famished heart. He reviewed that forlorn,\nanxious, struggling orphanage, transfigured in the subtle glow of\nregretful, loving memory, as one might gaze into the rich glamours of\na promised land. Alas, that our promised land should be so often the\nland we made haste to leave! As he sat down on the step he saw the\nragged cluster of children troop down the road from twenty years\nagone, almost as if he actually beheld them, himself at the head. He\ncould still feel their plump palms clinging to his hand at the first\nsuggestion of danger. He had led them a right thorny path, each to a\nsuccessful goal. And now could he turn against \"Fambly\"? Should he\ndenounce the treachery of one of the little group that he could see\nhuddling together for warmth on the meagre hearthstone, while outside\nthe snows of a long-vanished winter were a-whirl? Should he pull down\nthe temple on Walter's success--the pride of them all? He remembered\nhow his sisters, with that feminine necessity of hero-worship in their\nuntaught little hearts, had clung about Walter. He remembered too that\nalmost every thought of his own life had been given to this man, who\nhad ruthlessly and secretly robbed him of all that was dear to him,\nand in such wise as to hold him up to ridicule, a scoffing jest, a\nvery good joke! So Walter considered it, and so doubtless would all\nColbury. It would have surprised Walter, but his sometime mentor's\ncheek burned with shame for him.\n\nNo; the claims of \"Fambly\" were paramount. He gave it precedence, as\nin the old days he had denied himself when \"Fambly\" dined at the\nskillet, and the bone and the broken bit he took for his share. He\ncould not bring discredit upon it. He would not lift his hand against\nit. It was the object of a lifelong allegiance, and he only marveled\nthat, since the uses of the loyalty were at an end, the empty life\nshould go on. He gazed mechanically at the padlock as he sat there\nwith his dreary thoughts, remembering with what different heart he had\nturned the key. Ah, Happiness--to pass out from a door, and knock\nthere never again!\n\nHe rose at last, his burden adjusted to his strength. He had never\nworked for thanks. It hardly mattered to him now how his efforts were\nrequited. And though he encountered treachery at close quarters,--of\nhis own household,--it was not in his heart to be a traitor to\n\"Fambly\" and its obvious interests. So he too went out from the door\nin the footprints of Happiness--likewise to return no more.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWalter Hoxon had not altogether ill-gauged the general proclivity to\ndeem all fair in love or war. He was accounted to have performed\nsomething of a feat in the clever outwitting of his unsuspecting\nrival, and to the minds of the many there was an element of the\nromantic in this hasty wedding of the damsel of his choice almost\nunder the eyes of the expectant bridegroom. He had added to the\nprestige of success in politics the lustre of valiance in the lists of\nlove, and he encountered laughing congratulations from his friends\nand political supporters, which served much to reassure him and to\nbanish a vague and subtle anxiety as to public opinion that had begun\nto gnaw at his heart. They all seemed to think he had done a very fine\nthing, and that it was a very good joke, and he was soon most jauntily\nof their persuasion. He could not know that here and there people were\nsaying to one another, aside, the words he had feared to hear in\nreproach--that the swain whom he and his lady-love had conspired to\ndupe was his brother, who had done everything for him--had, as a mere\nchild, encountered and vanquished poverty, had clothed and educated\nthis man and his sisters, had served his every interest with a perfect\nself-abnegation all his life; that it was his brother who had won his\nelection, being a man of much influence and untaught eloquence, and of\ngreat native tact and intelligence; that the secrecy, the conspiracy,\nand the publicity of the dramatic denouement, in lieu of an open\nrivalry, rendered it a case of the most flagrant ingratitude, and\nargued much unworthiness in the people's choice.\n\nBut suddenly a doubt began to prevail as to whether he were the\npeople's choice. In the returns from the farthest districts, not heard\nfrom till quite late in the day, in which Walter Hoxon had felt\nsecure, Quigley developed unexpected strength. In great perturbation\nWalter swiftly patrolled the town in search of Justus; unprecedented\ndevelopments were imminent, and he hardly dared face the emergency\nwithout his valiant backer at hand. Justus had disappeared as utterly\nas if the night had swallowed him up.\n\n\"Consarn the tormentin' critter!\" exclaimed Walter, mopping his brow\nas he stood at the little gate of Mrs. Elmer's yard, returning\nthither, after his fruitless searching, in the hope of finding his\nbrother among the familiar faces. \"Mad ez a hornet, I'll be bound, an'\nlef' me in the lurch. Beat arter all, I'll bet!\"\n\nTheodosia listened, tremulous, aghast. All the fine prospects that had\nseemed so near, into whose charming perspectives she might in another\nmoment have stepped as actually as upon that path to the gate, were\ndrawing away, dissolving, as tenuous, as intangible, as those morning\nsunlit mists shifting and rising from before the massive blue ranges\nof the Great Smoky Mountains, and dallying with the distances into\ninvisibility.\n\n\"I tole ye ag'in an' ag'in ye bes' not be _too sure_,\" she said, a sob\nin her throat, with an obvious disposition to wreak her disappointment\nupon him.\n\nIt was crushed in the moment.\n\nHe turned a frowning face full upon her. \"Hold yer jaw!\" he cried\nviolently. \"Ef 't warn't for you-uns I'd hev Justus hyar, an' I'll be\nbound _he_ could fix it. Ye miserable deceitful critter--settin' two\nown brothers at loggerheads! I'll take no word from _you-uns_--sure!\"\n\nHe shook his head indignantly at her, clapped his hat upon it, and\nturned desperately away as a man came running up. \"Have ye found\nJustus?\" Wat exclaimed.\n\n\"Justus? No. But they say it's a tie--a tie!\"\n\nFor the news was already bruited throughout the town--in a ferment of\nexcitement, because of the closeness of the contest--that the two\ncandidates, racing gallantly neck and neck, had come under the wire\ntogether with not so much as the point of a nose to distinguish the\nwinner.\n\nWalter stood still for a moment, his dark eyes dilated with eagerness\nand anxiety. Suddenly he leaned back against the gate-post with a deep\nsigh of relief and relaxation.\n\n\"Then it's all right,\" he exclaimed breathlessly. \"The coroner's my\nfrien', ef I ain't got another in the worl'. Old Beckett will stan' by\nme, _sure_!\"\n\nAs the coroner held the election, the sheriff himself being a\ncandidate, it was his duty to give the casting vote. This\nprolongation of the jeopardy of the result heightened the popular\ninterest, the more as the officer did not immediately decide upon his\naction in the matter.\n\n\"I want a leetle time ter think it over--a leetle time fur the casting\nvote,\" he said, as he gnawed at a plug of tobacco, then crossed his\nponderous legs while he leaned back in a splint-bottomed chair in the\nregister's office.\n\nHe was a tall, portly man, with a large, round imperious face,\nthatched heavily with iron-gray hair. He wore no beard, and was\ndressed in brown jeans, which imparted a certain sallowness to his\ndark complexion. He had small gray eyes, at once shrewd and\ngood-natured, but his manner was bluff, imperative, and all the\njudiciary of the State could hardly have compassed an expression of a\ngreater sense of importance.\n\nHe was observed with much interest by a number of men who lounged\nabout the room. A tense sub-current of curiosity underlay the suspense\nnatural to the occasion, for it was well known to the gossips about\nthe court-house that he and the sheriff had not been on the best of\nterms; when their official functions had happened to bring them into\ncontact they had clashed smartly, and the county rang with their\nfeuds. His course was obvious to all--his hesitation only an\naffectation, lest a too vehement animosity be imputed to him.\n\n\"Poor Quigley's cake is dough,\" observed one of the incumbent's\nfriends in an undertone, standing with his hands in his pockets, and\ngazing through the long dark vista of the hall out of the door into\nthe sunlight's glow, as it fell upon the few houses and the great\nstretch of arable land beyond. A horizontal shadow of a cloud lay at\nits extremity, as definite as a material barrier, and far above it\nrose tiers of green and bronze hills like a moulding to the base of\nthe lapis-lazuli-tinted mountains.\n\n\"This never happened in this county before,\" said the register,\nglancing up from a big book in which he was copying the doings of \"the\nparty of the first part\" and \"the party of the second part\"--the\nfamiliar spirits of his den.\n\n\"Why, no!\" exclaimed the coroner, with a pleased laugh. \"To me the\ncastin' vote is ez _phee_-nomenal an' ez astonishin' ez the comet.\" He\nchuckled--the fat man's unctuous laugh. \"Something like the comet,\ntoo: it has its place in the legal firmament, but 't ain't often\nnecessary to use it.\"\n\n\"That war a toler'ble funny tale 'bout the comet they air a-tellin'\nroun' town,\" observed a young countryman pausing in front of the two,\nhis hands in his pockets, his hat on the back of his red head, a wide\ngrin of enjoyment on his freckled face,--\"about the feller that hed\nhis sweetheart a-courtin' out hyar in the yard last night, an' tuk ter\nlookin' at the comet through the spy-glass, an' whilst he war busy\na-star-gazin' the comet, another feller stepped up with the Squair,\nan' married his gal--ha! ha! ha!\"\n\nBeckett looked up interested. Incongruously enough a vein of romance\nran through the massive strata of conceit, and intolerance, and\nvainglory, and pertinacity, and pugnacity that made up the very\ndefinite structure of his nature. He dearly loved a lover. He was as\nsentimental as a girl of eighteen, and he melted instantly into\nsuavest amenities at the first intimation of a love-story in abeyance.\n\n\"I ain't heard 'bout that,\" he said in a mellifluous voice.\n\"Ye know I was tucked up in yonder\"--he jerked his thumb over\nhis shoulder--\"tendin' to the countin' of the votes, bein'\nreturnin'-officer. Who married?\"\n\n\"Why this hyar Walter Hoxon--him ez is candidate fur sher'ff,\"\nsaid the red-haired interlocutor, widening his grin.\n\nBeckett elevated his heavy, grizzled eyebrows. A sudden, secret,\nimportant look, as if he were colloguing with some one vanquished in\nargument, crossed his face. He nodded once or twice, but only said\nacquiescently: \"Ah--ha! Ah--ha! Toler'ble enterprisin'. Run fur office\nan git married 'lection day.\"\n\nHe smiled broadly. Any innovation on the stereotyped methods appealed\nto him with the grace and relish of a new metre to a neophytic\nrhymester.\n\n\"Wat's a nice boy, a mighty good boy, too,\" he went on, with his oily\nvoice quite soft. \"Run mighty well in this 'lection, too. He's a\nmighty smart, good boy.\"\n\nHe nodded his big head approvingly. \"I don't wonder he cut the t'other\nfeller out. Mighty fine feller Wat is.\"\n\n\"Well, now,\" said the register, suddenly putting his pen behind his\near, and leaving the party of the first part and the party of the\nsecond part to their own devices, \"I'm blest if I don't think Justus\nis worth a hundred of Wat, lock, stock, an' barrel.\"\n\nOnce more the grizzled eyebrows went up toward the iron-gray thatch of\nthe coroner's forehead. \"_Justus!_ I'm free ter say I dunno nobody\nequal ter Justus. I hev known Justus sence he war knee-high ter a\npa'tridge--the way he did keer fur them chil'n, an' brung 'em up ter\nbe equal ter anybody in the lan'! An' smart--_smart_ ain't the word\nfur him! Ef he hed education he could do anything; but he hed ter\nstan' back an' let the t'other chil'n git it. Whar would Wat be ef 't\nwarn't fur Justus?\"\n\n\"That's what makes me say 't was a mighty mean trick he played on\nJustus,\" the register broke in.\n\n\"Who? How?\" demanded the coroner.\n\n\"Why, Justus was the t'other feller. Wat an' the girl never let _him_\nhave an inklin' of it. They just fooled him along, believin' she was\ngoin' ter marry _him_. An' las' night when it was reported all over\ntown that Wat was elected, an' Justus took time from electioneerin'\nfur his brother to breathe, they tolled him out to look at the comet,\nan' slipped off an' married.\"\n\nThe man of sentiment, with the election in his hand, sat looking\nloweringly about him. His satisfaction was wilted; his fat hung\nflabbily on his big bones; his small eyes were hard and cold.\n\n\"Waal,\" he said, rising at last, \"these extry an' occasional\nopportunities like comets an' castin' votes oughter be took full\nadvantage of--full advantage of; no doubt about that.\"\n\nAnd thus it was that the casting vote tipped the scale in favor of the\nincumbent.\n\n\"He's ez hard-headed, an' _ty_rannical, an' _per_verse, an'\ncantankerous a critter ez ever lived, with no feelin's, nor softness,\nnor perliteness in him--but he's a square man. He'll do the _fair_\nthing--every time,\" the coroner said in explanation.\n\nAnd so he braced himself for another term of official wrangling.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nPoor Theodosia! She never forgot that return home, through all the\ndust of the drought and the glare of the midsummer sun. Even to\nherself her nature seemed too small for the magnitude of the various\nanguish which she was called upon to endure. The sharp alternations of\ncertainty and doubt which she had undergone seemed slight, seemed\nnaught, in comparison with the desolate finality of despair, the fang\nof hopeless regret, and the dread of the veiled future with which she\nhad made no covenant of expectation or preparation, that preyed upon\nevery plodding step as she went. Her anxiety as to the wisdom of her\ncourse was not assuaged by the aghast dismay of her mother's face,\nwhen she reached the little house overlooking the encircling\nmountains,--as still, as meditative, as majestically unmoved, as if no\nmore troublous world existed,--and unfolded the story of her visit to\nColbury. She felt for the first time in her life how Justus Hoxon's\nfriend merited his confidence. Her mother had no reproaches, no\nsarcasms, no outbursts of grief. She addressed herself to the support\nand the comforting of her daughter, but with so evident a hopelessness\nand an expectation of bitter things to come that the girl burst out\nsobbing afresh.\n\n\"D' ye think Wat air so wuthless ez all that!\"\n\nThe discipline of life began for her here. As the price of his\npolitical defeat, Walter had scant relish for the triumph he had\nscored in love. He was surly, taciturn, or else loud with reproaches\nand criminations, which grew more vehement and contumelious if she\nanswered, seeking to exculpate or justify herself; and if she were\nsilent, her submission seemed to exasperate him and to develop a\ncrafty ingenuity in finding fault. He brooded grimly on his brother's\nprobable exultation when he should return and hear the news of the\ncasting vote. To fortify himself for the encounter he spent much time\nat the still, and his drunken, reasonless wrath was even more\nformidable to the object of his displeasure than his sober, surly\nresentment against her as the cause of all his disasters. But Justus\ndid not come. Walter began to doubt if the news of the untoward result\nof the election, in which he had spent all his energies, had reached\nhim. He also began to desire, contradictorily enough, that his brother\nshould know it. For although Justus must needs recognize it as a\nmortal blow to his dearest foe, it had the capacity of doing much\nexecution in its recoil. Justus had had the election so greatly at\nheart; he had struggled, and planned, and managed with such\npreternatural activity and tact and energy from the first, that it\nwould smite him hard to know that it was all in vain. And then his\nvicarious ambitions, his pride, his pleasure, in the elevation of\n\"Fambly\"! Walter cast about futilely for an assurance that he might\nhave the satisfaction of reducing all this. He knew that Justus, in\nhis mistaken certainty of the result of the election, would not ask\nfor information, and that he could not read the newspapers. A\nletter--even if there were any remote presumption as to his\naddress--would lie indefinitely in the mail, and find its way at last\nto the Dead Letter Office.\n\nWalter realized after a time that Justus intended to return no\nmore--the woman he loved was his brother's wife. Justus had probably\nput the breadth of the State between them, Walter sneeringly\nconcluded.\n\nHe made haste to quarrel with his wife's mother, in his perverse\nrelish of aught that might give Theodosia pain, and they quitted her\nhome and took up their residence in the house in which Theodosia had\nonce expected to live, the scene of the early struggles of \"Fambly.\"\n\nTheodosia's beauty could hardly be said to fade; it disappeared in the\noverblowing. She grew very fat and unwieldy as the years wore on; her\nface broadened, her florid complexion degenerated into a mottled red\nand purple. She was no prettier than her mother had been when she\nridiculed her lover's eulogy of her mother's spiritual beauty. She had\na hard life with her drunken, idle, slothful husband, who habitually\nimputed to her agency every evil that had ever befallen him, holding\nit to excuse him from all exertion to better their very poor estate,\nand whose affection had been easily kindled by her beauty and as\neasily extinguished.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nJustus, self-exiled from the mountains, tramped the valley roads,\nhardly caring whither, and drifted finally to the outskirts of one of\nthe large manufacturing towns of Tennessee. He worked for some seasons\ndoggedly, drudgingly, on a farm near by, but found a sort of\nentertainment in the sights and sounds within the city limits, as\nhaving no association with the past which his memory dreaded. He\nprospered in some sort, for although he was ignorant of all methods of\nskilled labor, fidelity is an art with so few proficients that friends\nand opportunities were not lacking. His progress was somewhat\nhampered, however, despite his evident intelligence, by a doubt which\nprevailed concerning his mental balance. He was often observed to\nstand and gaze smilingly, fondly, after any group of ragged, dirty\nchildren; he, although of the poorest, was profuse in gratuities to\nany callow beggar who did not know enough of the world's ways to\nexpect nothing of such as he, as did the older ones. He could not\nread, but he bought newspapers from the smallest of the guild of\nnewsboys, and meditatively turned the sheets in his hand, and then\nsoftly and slowly tore them to bits. And these things created a doubt\nof his sanity, for who could know how \"Fambly\" looked at him from the\npinched face of every poor, and cold, and hungry child?\n\nAt last, despite this unsuspected drawback, a congenial occupation\ncame to him. He was night watchman at a great factory, and as he\npaced, all solitary, back and forth in the yard, he was wont to note\nthe stars as the infallible seasons brought them into place; and he\nbegan to remember their names, and to trace the strange configuration\nof the constellations, and to con again the stories woven into their\nshining meshes which he heard at the time that the great comet blazed\namong them.\n\nAnd this is his never failing interest--dark summer nights, when the\nGalaxy opens a broad avenue of constellated light across the heavens,\nseeming a veritable road, as if it might be the way to God's throne,\nbeaten hard and bright by the feet of saints and martyrs; or when the\nmoon is full, and autumnal glamours reign, and only the faint sidereal\noutlines prevail; or when winter winds are high, and the snow lies on\nslanting roofs, and spires gleam with icicles, and Orion draws his\nscintillating blade; or when, all bedight in scarlet, \"Arcturus and\nhis sons\" are guided into the vernal sky.\n\n\n\n\n                               BOOKS BY\n                      \"Charles Egbert Craddock.\"\n                          (MARY N. MURFREE.)\n\n\n    IN THE TENNESSEE MOUNTAINS. Short Stories. 16mo, $1.25.\n\n    DOWN THE RAVINE. For Young People. Illustrated. 16mo, $1.00.\n\n    THE PROPHET OF THE GREAT SMOKY MOUNTAINS. A Novel. 16mo, $1.25.\n\n    IN THE CLOUDS. A Novel. 16mo, $1.25.\n\n    THE STORY OF KEEDON BLUFFS. For Young People. 16mo, $1.00.\n\n    THE DESPOT OF BROOMSEDGE COVE. A Novel. 16mo, $1.25.\n\n    WHERE THE BATTLE WAS FOUGHT. A Novel. 16mo, $1.25.\n\n    HIS VANISHED STAR. A Novel. 16mo, $1.25.\n\n    THE MYSTERY OF WITCH-FACE MOUNTAIN. 16mo, $1.25.\n\n\n                    HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY,\n                         BOSTON AND NEW YORK.","title":"The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain, and Other Stories","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":61809}