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+Project Gutenberg's The Young Mountaineers, by Charles Egbert Craddock
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Young Mountaineers
+       Short Stories
+
+Author: Charles Egbert Craddock
+
+Illustrator: Malcolm Fraser
+
+Release Date: January 15, 2007 [EBook #20365]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YOUNG MOUNTAINEERS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Dave Macfarlane and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: HE WAS PALLID AND PANTING]
+
+
+
+
+THE YOUNG MOUNTAINEERS
+
+_SHORT STORIES_
+
+BY
+
+CHARLES EGBERT CRADDOCK
+
+
+WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY MALCOLM FRASER
+
+[Illustration]
+
+BOSTON AND NEW YORK
+HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY
+The Riverside Press, Cambridge
+1897
+
+Copyright, 1897,
+BY MARY N. MURFREE.
+
+
+_All rights reserved_.
+
+_The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. S. A._
+Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton and Company.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS                                            PAGE
+
+
+THE MYSTERY OF OLD DADDY'S WINDOW                      1
+'WAY DOWN IN POOR VALLEY                              26
+A MOUNTAIN STORM                                      63
+BORROWING A HAMMER                                    83
+THE CONSCRIPTS' HOLLOW                               103
+A WARNING                                            172
+AMONG THE CLIFFS                                     186
+IN THE "CHINKING"                                    208
+ON A HIGHER LEVEL                                    230
+CHRISTMAS DAY ON OLD WINDY MOUNTAIN                  245
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS                               PAGE
+
+
+HE WAS PALLID AND PANTING   (see page 221)     _Frontispiece._
+TOGETHER THEY WENT OVER THE CLIFF                     48
+HOW LONG WAS IT TO LAST                              190
+IN THE MIDST OF THE TORRENT                          242
+
+
+
+
+THE MYSTERY OF OLD DADDY'S WINDOW
+
+
+Picture to yourself a wild ravine, gashing a mountain spur, and with
+here and there in its course abrupt descents. One of these is so deep
+and sheer that it might be called a precipice.
+
+High above it, from the steep slope on either hand, beetling crags jut
+out. Their summits almost meet at one point, and thus the space below
+bears a rude resemblance to a huge window. Through it you might see the
+blue heights in the distance; or watch the clouds and sunshine shift
+over the sombre mountain across the narrow valley; or mark, after the
+day has faded, how the great Scorpio draws its shining curves along the
+dark sky.
+
+One night Jonas Creyshaw sat alone in the porch of his log cabin, hard
+by on the slope of the ravine, smoking his pipe and gazing meditatively
+at "Old Daddy's Window." The moon was full, and its rays fell aslant on
+one of the cliffs, while the rugged face of the opposite crag was in the
+shadow.
+
+Suddenly he became aware that something was moving about the precipice,
+the brink of which seems the sill of the window. Although this precipice
+is sheer and insurmountable, a dark figure had risen from it, and stood
+plainly defined against the cliff, which presented a comparatively
+smooth surface to the brilliant moonlight.
+
+Was it a shadow? he asked himself hastily.
+
+His eyes swept the ravine, only thirty feet wide at that point, which
+lies between the two crags whose jutting summits almost meet above it to
+form Old Daddy's Window.
+
+There was no one visible to cast a shadow.
+
+It seemed as if the figure had unaccountably emerged from the sheer
+depths below.
+
+Only for a moment it stood motionless against the cliff. Then it flung
+its arms wildly above its head, and with a nimble spring
+disappeared--upward.
+
+Jonas Creyshaw watched it, his eyes distended, his face pallid, his pipe
+trembling in his shaking hand.
+
+"Mirandy!" he quavered faintly.
+
+His wife, a thin, ailing woman with pinched features and an uncertain
+eye, came to the door.
+
+"Thar," he faltered, pointing with his pipe-stem--"jes' a minit ago--I
+seen it!--a ghost riz up over the bluff inter Old Daddy's Window!"
+
+The woman fell instantly into a panic.
+
+"'Twarn't a-beckonin', war it? 'Twarn't a-beckonin'? 'Kase ef it war,
+ye'll hev ter die right straight! That air a sure sign."
+
+A little of Jonas Creyshaw's pluck and common sense came back to him at
+this unpleasant announcement.
+
+"Not on _his_ say-so," he stoutly averred. "I ain't a-goin' ter do the
+beck nor the bid of enny onmannerly harnt ez hev tuk up the notion ter
+riz up over the bluff inter Old Daddy's Window, an' sot hisself ter
+motionin' ter me."
+
+He rose hastily, knocked the ashes out of his pipe, and followed his
+wife into the house. There he paused abruptly.
+
+The room was lighted by the fitful flicker of the fire, for the nights
+were still chilly, and an old man, almost decrepit, sat dozing in his
+chair by the hearth.
+
+"Mirandy," said Jonas Creyshaw in a whisper, "'pears like ter me ez
+father hed better not be let ter know 'bout'n that thar harnt. It mought
+skeer him so ez he couldn't live another minit. He hev aged some
+lately--an' he air weakly."
+
+This was "Old Daddy."
+
+Before he had reached his thirtieth year, he was thus known, far and
+wide.
+
+"He air the man ez hev got a son," the mountaineers used to say in
+grinning explanation. "Ter hear him brag 'bout'n that thar boy o' his'n,
+ye'd think he war the only man in Tennessee ez ever hed a son."
+
+Throughout all these years the name given in jocose banter had clung to
+him, and now, hallowed by ancient usage, it was accorded to him
+seriously, and had all the sonorous effect of a title.
+
+So they said nothing to Old Daddy, but presently, when he had hobbled
+off to bed in the adjoining shed-room, they fell to discussing their
+terror of the apparition, and thus it chanced that the two boys, Tad and
+Si, first made, as it were, the ghost's acquaintance.
+
+Tad, a stalwart fellow of seventeen, sat listening spellbound before the
+glowing embers. Si, a wiry, active, tow-headed boy of twelve, perched
+with dangling legs on a chest, and looked now at the group by the fire,
+and now through the open door at the brilliant moonlight.
+
+"Waal, sir," he muttered, "I'll hev ter gin up the notion o' gittin'
+that comical young ow_el_, what I hev done set my heart onto. 'Kase ef I
+war ter fool round Old Daddy's Window, _now_, whilst I war a-cotchin' o'
+the ow_el_, the ghost mought--cotch--_Me!_"
+
+A sorry ghost, to be sure, that has nothing better to do than to "cotch"
+_him!_ But perhaps Si Creyshaw is not the only one of us who has an
+inflated idea of his own importance.
+
+He was greatly awed, and he found many suggestions of supernatural
+presence about the familiar room. As the fire alternately flared and
+faded, the warping-bars looked as if they were dancing a clumsy measure.
+The handle of a portly jug resembled an arm stuck akimbo, and its cork,
+tilted askew, was like a hat set on one side; Si fancied there was a
+most unpleasant grimace below that hat. The churn-dasher, left upon a
+shelf to dry, was sardonically staring him out of countenance with its
+half-dozen eyes. The strings of red pepper-pods and gourds and herbs,
+swinging from the rafters, rustled faintly; it sounded to Si like a
+moan.
+
+He wished his father and mother would talk about some wholesome subject,
+like Spot's new calf, for instance, instead of whispering about the
+mystery of Old Daddy's Window.
+
+He wished Tad would not look, as he listened, so much like a ghost
+himself, with his starting eyes and pale, intent face. He even wished
+that the baby would wake up, and put some life into things with a good
+healthy, rousing bawl.
+
+But the baby slept peacefully on, and after so long a time Si Creyshaw
+slept too.
+
+With broad daylight his courage revived. He was no longer afraid to
+think of the ghost. In fact, he experienced a pleased importance in
+giving Old Daddy a minute account of the wonderful apparition, for he
+_felt_ as if he had seen it.
+
+"'Pears ter me toler'ble comical, gran'dad, ez they never tole ye a word
+'bout'n it all," he said in conclusion. "Ye mought hev liked ter seen
+the harnt. Ef he war 'quainted with ye when he lived in this life, he
+mought hev stopped an' jowed sociable fur a spell!"
+
+How brave this small boy was in the cheerful sunshine!
+
+Old Daddy hardly seemed impressed with the pleasure he had missed in
+losing a sociable "jow" with a ghostly crony. He sat silent, blinking
+in the sunshine that fell through the gourd-vines which clambered about
+the porch where Si had placed his chair.
+
+"'Twarn't much of a sizable sperit," Si declared; he seemed courageous
+enough now to measure the ghost like a tailor. "It warn't more'n four
+feet high, ez nigh ez dad could jedge. Toler'ble small fur a harnt!"
+
+Still the old man made no reply. His wrinkled hands were clasped on his
+stick. His white head, shaded by his limp black hat, was bent down close
+to them. There was a slow, pondering expression on his face, but an
+excited gleam in his eye. Presently, he pointed backward toward a little
+unhewn log shanty that served as a barn, and rising with unwonted
+alacrity, he said to the boy,--
+
+"Fotch me the old beastis!"
+
+Silas Creyshaw stood amazed, for Old Daddy had not mounted a horse for
+twenty years.
+
+"Studyin' 'bout'n the harnt so much hev teched him in the head," the
+small boy concluded. Then he made an excuse, for he knew his
+grandfather was too old and feeble to safely undertake a solitary jaunt
+on horse-back.
+
+"I war tole not ter leave ye fur a minit, gran'dad. I war ter stay nigh
+ye an' mind yer bid."
+
+"That's my bid!" said the old man sternly. "Fotch the beastis."
+
+There was no one else about the place. Jonas Creyshaw had gone fishing
+shortly after daybreak. His wife had trudged off to her sister's house
+down in the cove, and had taken the baby with her. Tad was ploughing in
+the cornfield on the other side of the ravine. Si had no advice, and he
+had been brought up to think that Old Daddy's word was law.
+
+When the old man, mounted at last, was jogging up the road, Tad chanced
+to come to the house for a bit of rope to mend the plough-gear. He saw,
+far up the leafy vista, the departing cavalier. He cast a look of amazed
+reproach upon Si. Then, speechless with astonishment, he silently
+pointed at the distant figure.
+
+Si was a logician.
+
+"I never lef' _him_," he said. "He lef' _me_."
+
+"Ye oughter rej'ice in yer whole bones while ye hev got 'em," Tad
+returned, with withering sarcasm. "When dad kems home, some of 'em 'll
+git bruk, sure. Warn't ye tole not ter leave him fur _nuthin'_, ye
+triflin' shoat!"
+
+"He lef' _me_!" Si stoutly maintained.
+
+Meantime, Old Daddy journeyed on.
+
+Except for the wonderful mountain air, the settlement, three miles
+distant, had nothing about it to indicate its elevation. It was far from
+the cliffs, and there was no view. It was simply a little hollow of a
+clearing scooped out among the immense forests. When the mountaineers
+clear land, they do it effectually. Not a tree was left to embellish the
+yards of any of the four or five little log huts that constituted the
+hamlet, and the glare was intense.
+
+As six or eight loungers sat smoking about the door of the store, there
+was nothing to intercept their astonished view of Old Daddy when he
+suddenly appeared out of the gloomy forest, blinking in the sun and bent
+half double with fatigue.
+
+Even the rudest and coarsest of these mountaineers accord a praiseworthy
+deference to the aged among them. Old Daddy was held in reverential
+estimation at home, and was well accustomed to the respect shown him
+now, when, for the first time in many years, he had chosen to jog
+abroad. They helped him to dismount, and carried him bodily into the
+store. After he had tilted his chair back against the rude counter, he
+looked around with an important face upon the attentive group.
+
+"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,--"my son air the strongest man
+ever seen, sence Samson!"
+
+"I hev always hearn that sayin', Old Daddy," acquiesced an elderly
+codger, who, by reason of "rheumatics," made no pretension to muscle.
+
+A gigantic young blacksmith looked down at his corded hammer-arm, but
+said nothing.
+
+A fly--several flies--buzzed about the sorghum barrel.
+
+"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,--"my son air the bes' shot on
+this hyar mounting."
+
+"That's a true word, Old Daddy," assented the schoolmaster, who had
+ceased to be a Nimrod since devoting himself to teaching the young idea
+how to shoot.
+
+The hunters smoked in solemn silence.
+
+The shadow of a cloud drifted along the bare sandy stretch of the
+clearing.
+
+"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,--"my son hev got the peartest
+boys in Tennessee."
+
+"I'll gin ye that up, Old Daddy," cheerfully agreed the miller, whose
+family consisted of two small "daughters."
+
+The fathers of other "peart boys" cleared their throats uneasily, but
+finally subsided without offering contradiction.
+
+A jay-bird alighted on a blackberry bush outside, fluttered all his
+blue and white feathers, screamed harshly, bobbed his crested head, and
+was off on his gay wings.
+
+"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,--"my son hev been gifted with the
+sight o' what no other man on this mounting hev ever viewed."
+
+The group sat amazed, expectant. But the old man preserved a stately
+silence. Only when the storekeeper eagerly insisted, "What hev Jonas
+seen? what war he gin ter view?" did Old Daddy bring the fore legs of
+the chair down with a thump, lean forward, and mysteriously pipe out
+like a superannuated cricket,--
+
+"My son,--my son hev seen a harnt, what riz up over the bluff
+a-purpose!"
+
+"Whar 'bouts?" "When?" "Waal, sir!" arose in varied clamors.
+
+So the proud old man told the story he had journeyed three laborious
+miles to spread. It had no terrors for him, so completely was fear
+swallowed up in admiration of his wonderful son, who had added to his
+other perfections the gift of seeing ghosts.
+
+The men discussed it eagerly. There were some jokes cracked--as it was
+still broad noonday--and at one of these Old Daddy took great offense,
+more perhaps because the disrespect was offered to his son rather than
+to himself.
+
+"Jes' gin Jonas the word from me," said the young blacksmith, meaning no
+harm and laughing good-naturedly, "ez I kin tell him percisely what
+makes him see harnts; it air drinkin' so much o' this onhealthy whiskey,
+what hain't got no tax paid onto it. I looks ter see him jes'
+a-staggerin' the nex' time I comes up with him."
+
+Old Daddy rose with affronted dignity.
+
+"My son," he declared vehemently,--"my son ain't gin over ter drinkin'
+whiskey, tax or no tax. An' he ain't got no call ter stagger--_like some
+folks!_"
+
+And despite all apology and protest, he left the house in a huff.
+
+His old bones ached with the unwonted exercise, and were rudely enough
+jarred by the rough roads and the awful gaits of his ancient steed. The
+sun was hot, and so was his heart, and when he reached home, infinitely
+fatigued and querulous, he gave his son a sorry account of his reception
+at the store. As he concluded, saying that five of the men had sent word
+that they would be at Jonas Creyshaw's house at moon-rise "ter holp him
+see the harnt," his son's brow darkened, and he strode heavily out of
+the room.
+
+He usually exhibited in a high degree the hospitality characteristic of
+these mountaineers, but now it had given way to a still stronger
+instinct.
+
+"Si," he said, coming suddenly upon the boy, "put out right now fur
+Bently's store at the settle_mint_, an' tell them sneaks ez hang round
+thar ter sarch round thar own houses fur harnts, ef they hanker ter see
+enny harnts. Ef they hev got the insurance ter kem hyar, they'll see
+wusser sights 'n enny harnts. Tell 'em I ain't a-goin' ter 'low no man
+ter cross my doorstep ez don't show Old Daddy the right medjure o'
+respec'. They'd better keep out'n my way ginerally."
+
+So with this bellicose message Si set out. But an unlucky idea occurred
+to him as he went plodding along the sandy road.
+
+"Whilst I'm a-goin' on this hyar harnt's yerrand"----The logical Si
+brought up with a shiver.
+
+"I went ter say--whilst I'm a-goin' on this hyar yerrand fur the
+harnt"----This was as bad.
+
+"Whilst," he qualified once more, "I'm a-goin' on this hyar yerrand
+_'bout'n_ the harnt, I mought ez well skeet off in them deep woods a
+piece ter see ef enny wild cherries air ripe on that tree by the spring.
+I'll hev plenty o' time."
+
+But even Si could not persuade himself that the cherries were ripe, and
+he stood for a moment under the tree, staring disconsolately at the
+distant blue ridges shimmering through the heated air. The sunlight was
+motionless, languid; it seemed asleep. The drowsy drone of insects
+filled the forest. As Si threw himself down to rest on the rocky brink
+of the mountain, a grasshopper sprang away suddenly, high into the air,
+with an agility that suggested to him the chorus of a song, which he
+began to sing in a loud and self-sufficient voice:--
+
+  "The grasshopper said--'Now, don't ye see
+  Thar's mighty few dancers sech ez me--
+    Sech ez _me_!--Sech ez ME!'"
+
+This reminded Si of his own capabilities as a dancer. He rose and began
+to caper nimbly, executing a series of steps that were singularly swift,
+spry, and unexpected,--a good deal on the grasshopper's method. His
+tattered black hat bobbed up and down on his tow head; his brown jeans
+trousers, so loose on his lean legs, flapped about hilariously; his bare
+heels flew out right and left; he snapped his fingers to mark the time;
+now and then he stuck his arms akimbo, and cut what he called the
+"widgeon-ping." But his freckled face was as grave as ever, and all the
+time that he danced he sang:--
+
+  "In the middle o' the night the rain kem down,
+  An' gin the corn a fraish start out'n the ground,
+  An' I thought nex' day ez I stood in the door,
+  That sassy bug mus' be drownded sure!
+  But thar war Goggle-eyes, peart an' gay,
+  Twangin' an' a-tunin' up--'Now, dance away!
+  Ye may sarch night an' day ez a constancy
+  An' ye won't find a fiddler sech ez me!
+    Sech ez _me_!--Sech ez ME!'"
+
+As he sank back exhausted upon the ground, a new aspect of the scene
+caught his attention.
+
+Those blue mountains were purpling--there was an ever-deepening flush in
+the west. It was close upon sunset, and while he had wasted the time,
+the five men to whom his father had sent that stern message forbidding
+them to come to his house were perhaps on their way thither, with every
+expectation of a cordial welcome. There might be a row--even a
+fight--and all because he had loitered.
+
+How he tore out of the brambly woods! How he pounded along the sandy
+road! But when he reached the settlement close upon nightfall, the
+storekeeper's wife told him that the men had gone long ago.
+
+"They war powerful special ter git off early," she added, "'kase they
+wanted ter be thar 'fore Old Daddy drapped off ter sleep. Some o' them
+foolish, slack-jawed boys ter the store ter-day riled the old man's
+feelin's, an' they 'lowed ter patch up the peace with him, an' let him
+an' Jonas know ez they never meant no harm."
+
+This suggestion buoyed up the boy's heart to some degree as he toiled
+along the "short cut" homeward through the heavy shades of the gloomy
+woods and the mystic effects of the red rising moon. But he was not
+altogether without anxiety until, as he drew within sight of the log
+cabin on the slope of the ravine, he heard Old Daddy piping pacifically
+to the guests about "my son," and Jonas Creyshaw's jolly laughter.
+
+The moon was golden now; Si could see its brilliant shafts of light
+strike aslant upon the smooth surface of the cliff that formed the
+opposite side of Old Daddy's Window. He stopped short in the deep shadow
+of the more rugged crag. The vines and bushes that draped its many
+jagged ledges dripped with dew. The boughs of an old oak, which grew
+close by, swayed gently in the breeze. Hidden by its huge hole, Si cast
+an apprehensive glance toward the house where his elders sat.
+
+Certainly no one was thinking of him now.
+
+"This air my chance fur that young ow_el_--ef ever," he said to himself.
+
+The owl's nest was in the hollow of the tree. The trunk was far too
+bulky to admit of climbing, and the lowest branches were well out of the
+boy's reach. Some thirty feet from the ground, however, one of the
+boughs touched the crag. By clambering up its rugged, irregular ledges,
+making a zigzag across its whole breadth to the right and then a similar
+zigzag to the left, Si might gain a position which would enable him to
+clutch this bough of the tree. Thence he could scramble along to the
+owl's stronghold.
+
+He hesitated. He knew his elders would disapprove of so reckless an
+undertaking as climbing about Old Daddy's Window, for in venturing
+toward its outer verge, a false step, a crumbling ledge, the snapping of
+a vine, would fling him down the sheer precipice into the depths below.
+
+His hankering for a pet owl had nevertheless brought him here more than
+once. It was only yesterday evening--before he had heard of the ghost's
+appearance, however--that he had made his last futile attempt.
+
+He looked up doubtfully. "I ain't ez strong ez--ez some folks," he
+admitted.
+
+"But then, come ter think of it," he argued astutely, "I don't weigh
+nuthin' sca'cely, an' thar ain't much of me ter hev ter haul up thar."
+
+He flung off his hat, he laid his wiry hands upon the wild grape-vines,
+he felt with his bare feet for the familiar niches and jagged edges, and
+up he went, working steadily to the right, across the broad face of the
+cliff.
+
+Its heavy shadow concealed him from view. Only one ledge, at the extreme
+verge of the crag, jutted out into the full moonbeams. But this, by
+reason of the intervening bushes and vines, could not be seen by those
+who sat in the cabin porch on the slope of the ravine, and he was glad
+to have light just here, for it was the most perilous point of his
+enterprise. By deft scrambling, however, he succeeded in getting on the
+moonlit ledge.
+
+"I clumb like a painter!" he declared triumphantly.
+
+He rested there for a moment before attempting to reach the vines high
+up on the left hand, which he must grasp in order to draw himself up
+into the shadowy niche in the rock, and begin his zigzag course back
+again across the face of the cliff to the projecting bough of the tree.
+
+But suddenly, as he still stood motionless on the ledge in the full
+radiance of the moon, the clamor of frightened voices sounded at the
+house. Until now he had forgotten all about the ghost. He turned,
+horror-stricken.
+
+There was the frightful thing, plainly defined against the smooth
+surface of the opposite cliff--some thirty feet distant--that formed the
+other side of Old Daddy's Window.
+
+And certainly there are mighty few dancers such as that ghost! It lunged
+actively toward the precipice. It suddenly dashed wildly back--gyrating
+continually with singularly nimble feet, flinging wiry arms aloft and
+maintaining a sinister silence, while the frightened clamor at the house
+grew ever louder and more shrill.
+
+Several minutes elapsed before Si recognized something peculiarly
+familiar in the ghost's wiry nimbleness--before he realized that the
+shadow of the cliff on which he stood reached across the ravine to the
+base of the opposite cliff, and that the figure which had caused so much
+alarm was only his own shadow cast upon its perpendicular surface.
+
+He stopped short in those antics which had been induced by mortal
+terror; of course, his shadow, too, was still instantly. It stood upon
+the brink of the precipice which seems the sill of Old Daddy's Window,
+and showed distinctly on the smooth face of the cliff opposite to him.
+
+He understood, after a moment's reflection, how it was that as he had
+climbed up on the ledge in the full moonlight his shadow had seemed to
+rise gradually from the vague depths below the insurmountable
+precipice.
+
+He sprang nimbly upward to seize the vines that shielded him from the
+observation of the ghost-seers on the cabin porch, and as he caught them
+and swung himself suddenly from the moonlit ledge into the gloomy shade,
+he noticed that his shadow seemed to fling its arms wildly above its
+head, and disappeared upward.
+
+"That air jes' what dad seen las' night when I war down hyar afore,
+a-figurin' ter ketch that thar leetle ow_el_," he said to himself when
+he had reached the tree and sat in a crotch, panting and excited.
+
+After a moment, regardless of the coveted owl, he swung down from branch
+to branch, dropped easily from the lowest upon the ground, picked up his
+hat, and prepared to skulk along the "short cut," strike the road, and
+come home by that route as if he had just returned from the settlement.
+
+"'Kase," he argued sagely, "ef them skeered-ter-death grown folks war
+ter find out ez _I_ war the _harnt_--I mean ez the _harnt_ war
+_me_--ennyhow," he concluded desperately, "I'd KETCH it--sure!"
+
+So impressed was he with this idea that he discreetly held his tongue.
+
+And from that day to this, Jonas Creyshaw and his friends have been
+unable to solve the mystery of Old Daddy's Window.
+
+
+
+
+'WAY DOWN IN POOR VALLEY
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+There was the grim Big Injun Mountain to the right, with its bare,
+beetling sandstone crags. There was the long line of cherty hills to the
+left, covered by a dark growth of stunted pines. Between lay that
+melancholy stretch of sterility known as Poor Valley,--the poorest of
+the several valleys in Tennessee thus piteously denominated, because of
+the sorry contrast which they present to the rich coves and fertile
+vales so usual among the mountains of the State.
+
+How poor the soil was, Ike Hooden might bitterly testify; for ever since
+he could hold a plough he had, year after year, followed the old
+"bull-tongue" through the furrows of the sandy fields which lay around
+the log cabin at the base of the mountain. In the intervals of
+"crappin'" he worked at the forge with his stepfather, for close at
+hand, in the shadow of a great jutting cliff, lurked a dark little
+shanty of unhewn logs that was a blacksmith's shop.
+
+When he first began this labor, he was, perhaps, the youngest striker
+that ever wielded a sledge. Now, at eighteen, he had become expert at
+the trade, and his muscles were admirably developed. He was tall and
+robust, and he had never an ache nor an ill, except in his aching heart.
+But his heart was sore, for in the shop he found oaths and harsh
+treatment, and even at home these pursued him; while outside, desolation
+was set like a seal on Poor Valley.
+
+One drear autumnal afternoon, when the sky was dull, a dense white mist
+overspread the valley. As Ike plodded up the steep mountain side, the
+vapor followed him, creeping silently along the deep ravines and chasms,
+till at length it overtook and enveloped him. Then only a few feet of
+the familiar path remained visible.
+
+Suddenly he stopped short and stared. A dim, distorted something was
+peering at him from over the top of a big boulder. It was moving--it
+nodded at him. Then he indistinctly recognized it as a tall, conical
+hat. There seemed a sort of featureless face below it.
+
+A thrill of fear crept through him. His hands grew cold and shook in his
+pockets. He leaned forward, gazing intently into the thick fog.
+
+An odd distortion crossed the vague, featureless face--like a leer,
+perhaps. Once more the tall, conical hat nodded fantastically.
+
+"Ef ye do that agin," cried Ike, in sudden anger, all his pluck coming
+back with a rush, "I'll gin ye a lick ez will weld yer head an' the
+boulder together!"
+
+He lifted his clenched fist and shook it.
+
+"Haw! haw! haw!" laughed the man in the mist.
+
+Ike cooled off abruptly. He had been kicked and cuffed half his life,
+but he had never been laughed at. Ridicule tamed him. He was ashamed,
+and he remembered that he had been afraid, for he had thought the man
+was some "roamin' harnt."
+
+"I dunno," said Ike sulkily, "ez ye hev got enny call ter pounce so
+suddint out'n the fog, an' go ter noddin' that cur'ous way ter folks ez
+can't half see ye."
+
+"I never knowed afore," said the man in the mist, with mock apology in
+his tone and in the fantastic gyrations of his nodding hat, "ez it air
+you-uns ez owns this mounting." He looked derisively at Ike from head to
+foot. "Ye air the biggest man in Tennessee, ain't ye?"
+
+"Naw!" said Ike shortly, feeling painfully awkward, as an overgrown boy
+is apt to do.
+
+"Waal, from yer height, I mought hev thunk ye war that big Injun that
+the old folks tells about," and the stranger broke suddenly into a
+hoarse, quavering chant:--
+
+  "'A red man lived in Tennessee,
+      Mighty big Injun, sure!
+  He growed ez high ez the tallest tree,
+  An' he sez, sez he, "Big Injun, me!"
+      Mighty big Injun, sure!'"
+
+"Waal, waal," in a pensive voice, "so ye ain't him? I'm powerful glad ye
+tole me that, sonny, 'kase I mought hev got skeered hyar in the woods by
+myself with that big Injun."
+
+He laughed boisterously, and began to sing again:--
+
+  "'Settlers blazed out a road, ye see,
+      Mighty big Injun, sure!
+  He combed thar hair with a knife. Sez he,
+  "It's combed fur good! Big Injun, me!"
+      Mighty big Injun, sure!'"
+
+He broke out laughing afresh, and Ike, abashed and indignant, was about
+to pass on, when the man gayly balanced himself on one foot, as if he
+were about to dance a grotesque jig, and held out at arm's length a big
+silver coin.
+
+It was a dollar. That meant a great deal to Ike, for he earned no money
+he could call his own.
+
+"Free an' enlightened citizen o' these Nunited States," the man
+addressed him with mock solemnity, "I brung this dollar hyar fur
+you-uns."
+
+"What air ye layin' off fur me ter do?" asked Ike.
+
+The man grew abruptly grave. "Jes' stable this hyar critter fur a night
+an' day."
+
+For the first time Ike became aware of a horse's flank, dimly seen on
+the other side of the boulder.
+
+"Ter-morrer night ride him up ter my house on the mounting. Ye hev hearn
+tell o' me, hain't ye, Jedge? My name's Grig Beemy. Don't kem till
+night, 'kase I won't be thar till then. I hev got ter stop
+yander--yander"--he looked about uncertainly, "yander ter the sawmill
+till then, 'kase I promised ter holp work thar some. I'll gin ye the
+dollar now," he added liberally, as an extra inducement.
+
+"I'll be powerful glad ter do that thar job fur a dollar," said Ike,
+thinking, with a glow of self-gratulation, of the corn which he had
+raised in his scanty leisure on his own little patch of ground, and
+which he might use to feed the animal.
+
+"But hold yer jaw 'bout'n it, boy. Yer stepdad wouldn't let the beastis
+stay thar a minute ef he knowed it, 'kase--waal--'kase me an' him hev
+hed words. Slip the beastis in on the sly. Pearce Tallam don't feed an'
+tend ter his critters nohow. I hev hearn ez his boys do that job, so he
+ain't like ter find it out. On the sly--that's the trade."
+
+Ike hesitated.
+
+Once more the man teetered on one foot, and held out the coin
+temptingly. But Ike's better instincts came to his aid.
+
+"That barn b'longs ter Pearce Tallam. I puts nuthin' thar 'thout his
+knowin' it. I ain't a fox, nur a mink, nur su'thin wild, ter go skulkin'
+'bout on the sly."
+
+Then he pressed hastily on out of temptation's way.
+
+"Haw! haw! haw!" laughed the man in the mist.
+
+There was no mirth in the tones now; his laugh was a bitter gibe. As it
+followed Ike, it reminded him that the man had not yet moved from beside
+the boulder, or he would have heard the thud of the horse's hoofs.
+
+He turned and glanced back. The opaque white mist was dense about him,
+and he could see nothing. As he stood still, he heard a muttered oath,
+and after a time the man cleared his throat in a rasping fashion, as if
+the oath had stuck in it.
+
+Ike understood at last. The man was waiting for somebody. And this was
+strange, here in the thick fog on the bleak mountainside. But Ike said
+to himself that it was no concern of his, and plodded steadily on, till
+he reached a dark little log house, above which towered a flaring yellow
+hickory tree.
+
+Within, ranged on benches, were homespun-clad mountain children. A
+high-shouldered, elderly man sat at a table near the deep fireplace,
+where a huge backlog was smouldering. Through the cobwebbed window-panes
+the mists looked in.
+
+Ike did not speak as he stood on the threshold, but his greedy glance at
+the scholars' books enlightened the pedagogue. "Do you want to come to
+school?" he asked.
+
+Then the boy's long-cherished grievance burst forth. "They hev tole me
+ez how it air agin the law, bein' ez I lives out'n the _dee_stric'."
+
+The teacher elevated his grizzled eyebrows, and Ike said, "I kem hyar
+ter ax ye ef that be a true word. I 'lowed ez mebbe my dad tole me that
+word jes' ter hender me, an' keep me at the forge. It riles me powerful
+ter hev ter be an ignorunt all my days."
+
+To a stranger, this reflection on his "dad" seemed unbecoming. The
+teacher's sympathy ebbed. He looked severely at the boy's pale, anxious
+face, as he coldly said that he could teach no pupils who resided
+outside his school district, except out of regular school hours, and
+with a charge for tuition.
+
+Ike Hooden had no money. He nodded suddenly in farewell, the door
+closed, and when the schoolmaster, in returning compassion, opened it
+after him, and peered out into the impenetrable mist, the boy was
+nowhere to be seen. He had taken his despair by the hand, and together
+they went down, down into the depths of Poor Valley.
+
+He stood so sorely in need of a little kindness that he felt grateful
+for the friendly aspect of his stepbrother, whom he met just before he
+reached the shop.
+
+"'Pears like ye air toler'ble late a-gittin' home, Ike," said Jube. "I
+done ye the favior ter feed the critters. I 'lowed ez ye would do ez
+much fur me some day. I'll feed 'em agin in the mornin', ef ye'll forge
+me three lenks ter my trace-chain ter-night, arter dad hev gone home."
+
+Now this broad-faced, sandy-haired, undersized boy, who was two or three
+years younger than Ike, and not strong enough for work at the anvil, was
+a great tactician. It was his habit, in doing a favor, rigorously to
+exact a set-off, and that night when the blacksmith had left the shop,
+Jube slouched in.
+
+The flare of the forge-fire illumined with a fitful flicker the dark
+interior, showing the rod across the corner with its jingling weight of
+horseshoes, a ploughshare on the ground, the barrel of water, the low
+window, and casting upon the wall a grotesque shadow of Jube's dodging
+figure as he began to ply the bellows.
+
+Presently he left off, the panting roar ceased, the hot iron was laid on
+the anvil, and his dodging image on the wall was replaced by an immense
+shadow of Ike's big right arm as he raised it. The blows fell fast; the
+sparks showered about. All the air was ajar with the resonant clamor of
+the hammer, and the anvil sang and sang, shrill and clear. When the iron
+was hammered cold, Jube broke the momentary silence.
+
+"I hev got," he droned, as if he were reciting something made familiar
+by repetition, "two roosters, 'leven hens, an' three pullets."
+
+There was a long pause, and then he chanted, "One o' the roosters air a
+Dominicky."
+
+He walked over to the anvil and struck it with a small bit of metal
+which he held concealed in his hand.
+
+"I hev got two shoats, a bag o' dried peaches, two geese, an' I'm
+tradin' with mam fur a gayn-der."
+
+He quietly slipped the small bit of shining metal in his pocket.
+
+"I hev got," he droned, waxing very impressive, "a red heifer."
+
+Ike paused meditatively, his hammer in his hand. A new hope was dawning
+within him. He knew what was meant by Jube, who often recited the list
+of his possessions, seeking to rouse enough envy to induce Ike to
+exchange for the "lay out" his interest in a certain gray mare.
+
+Now the mare really belonged to Ike, having come to him from his
+paternal grandfather. This was all of value that the old man had left;
+for the deserted log hut, rotting on another bleak waste farther down in
+Poor Valley, was worth only a sigh for the home that it once
+was,--worth, too, perhaps, the thanks of those it sheltered now, the rat
+and the owl.
+
+The mare had worked for Pearce Tallam in the plough, under the saddle,
+and in the wagon all the years since. But one day, when the boy fell
+into a rage,--for he, too, had a difficult temper,--and declared that
+he would sell her and go forth from Poor Valley never to return, he was
+met by the question, "Hain't the mare lived off'n my fields, an' hain't
+I gin ye yer grub, an' clothes, an' the roof that kivers ye?"
+
+Thus Pearce Tallam had disputed his right to sell the mare. But it had
+more than once occurred to him that the blacksmith would not object to
+Jube's buying her.
+
+Hitherto Ike had not coveted Jube's variegated possessions. But now he
+wanted money for schooling. It was true he could hardly turn these into
+cash, for in this region farm produce of every description is received
+at the country stores in exchange for powder, salt, and similar
+necessities, and thus there is little need for money, and very little is
+in circulation.
+
+Still, Ike reflected that he might now and then get a small sum at the
+store, or perhaps the schoolmaster might barter "l'arnin'" for the
+heifer or the shoats.
+
+His hesitation was not lost upon Jube, who offered a culminating
+inducement to clinch the trade. He suddenly stood erect, teetered
+fantastically on one foot, as if about to begin to dance, and held out a
+glittering silver dollar.
+
+The hammer fell from Ike's hands upon the anvil. "'Twar ye ez Grig
+Beemy war a-waitin' fur thar on the mounting in the mist!" he cried out,
+recognizing the man's odd gesture, which Jube had unconsciously
+imitated.
+
+Doubtless the dollar was offered to Jube afterward, exactly as it had
+been offered to him. And Jube had taken it. The imitative monkey thrust
+it hastily into his pocket, and came down from his fantastic toe, and
+stood soberly enough on his two feet.
+
+"Grig Beemy gin ye that thar dollar," said Ike.
+
+Jube sullenly denied it. "He never, now!"
+
+"His critter hev got no call ter be in dad's barn."
+
+"His critter ain't hyar," protested Jube. "This dollar war gin me in
+trade ter the settle_mint_."
+
+Ike remembered the queer gesture. How could Jube have repeated it if he
+had not seen it? He broke into a sarcastic laugh.
+
+"That's how kem ye war so powerful 'commodatin' ez ter feed the
+critters. Ye 'lowed ez I wouldn't see the strange beastis, an' then tell
+dad. Foolin' me war a part o' yer trade, I reckon."
+
+Jube made no reply.
+
+"Ef ye war ez big ez me, or bigger, I'd thrash ye out'n yer boots fur
+this trick. Ye don't want no lenks ter yer chain. Ye jes' want ter be
+sure o' keepin' me out'n the barn. Waal--thar air yer lenks."
+
+He caught up the tongs and held the links in the fire with one hand
+while he worked the bellows with the other. Then he laid them red-hot
+upon the anvil. His rapid blows crushed them to a shapeless mass. "And
+now--thar they ain't."
+
+Jube did not linger long. He was in terror lest Ike should tell his
+father. But Ike did not think this was his duty. In fact, neither boy
+imagined that the affair involved anything more serious than stabling a
+horse without the knowledge of the owner of the shelter.
+
+When Ike was alone a little later, an unaccustomed sound caused him to
+glance toward the window.
+
+Something outside was passing it. His position was such that he could
+not see the object itself, but upon the perpendicular gray wall of the
+crag close at hand, and distinctly defined in the yellow flare that
+flickered out through the window from the fire of the forge, the
+gigantic shadow of a horse's head glided by.
+
+He understood in an instant that Jube had slipped the animal out of the
+barn, and was hiding him in the misty woods, expecting that Ike would
+acquaint his father with the facts. He had so managed that these facts
+would seem lies, if Pearce Tallam should examine the premises and find
+no horse there.
+
+All the next day the white mist clung shroud-like to Poor Valley. The
+shadows of evening were sifting through it, when Ike's mother went to
+the shop, much perturbed because the cow had not come, and she could not
+find Jube to send after her.
+
+"Ike kin go, I reckon," said the blacksmith.
+
+So Ike mounted his mare and set out through the thick white vapor. He
+had divined the cause of Jube's absence, and experienced no surprise
+when on the summit of the mountain he overtook him, riding the strange
+horse, on his way to Beemy's house.
+
+"I s'pose that critter air yourn, an' ye mus' hev bought him fur a pound
+o' dried peaches, or sech, up thar ter the settle_mint_," sneered Ike.
+
+Jube was about to reply, but he glanced back into the dense mist with a
+changing expression.
+
+"Hesh up!" he said softly. "What's that?"
+
+It was the regular beat of horses' hoofs, coming at a fair pace along
+the road on the summit of the mountain. The riders were talking
+excitedly.
+
+"I tell ye, ef I could git a glimpse o' the man ez stole that thar
+horse, it would go powerful hard with me not to let daylight through
+him. I brung this hyar shootin'-iron along o' purpose. Waal, waal,
+though, seein' ez ye air the sheriff, I'll hev ter leave it be ez
+you-uns say. I wouldn't know the man from Adam; but ye can't miss the
+critter,--big chestnut, with a star in his forehead, an'"--
+
+Something strange had happened. At the sound of the voice the horse
+pricked up his ears, turned short round in the road, and neighed
+joyfully.
+
+The boys looked at each other with white faces. They understood at last.
+Jube was mounted on a stolen horse within a hundred yards of the
+pursuing owner and the officers of the law. Could explanations--words,
+mere words--clear him in the teeth of this fact?
+
+"Drap out'n the saddle, turn the critter loose in the road, an' take ter
+the woods," urged Ike.
+
+"They'll sarch an' ketch me," quavered Jube.
+
+He was frantic at the idea of being captured on the horse's back, but if
+it should come to a race, he preferred trusting to the chestnut's four
+legs rather than to his own two.
+
+Ike hesitated. Jube had brought the difficulty all on himself, and
+surely it was not incumbent on Ike to share the danger. But he was
+swayed by a sudden uncontrollable impulse.
+
+"Drap off'n the critter, turn him loose, an' I'll lope down the road a
+piece, an' they'll foller me, in the mist."
+
+He might have done a wiser thing. But it was a tough problem at best,
+and he had only a moment in which to decide.
+
+In that swift, confused second he saw Jube slide from the saddle and
+disappear in the mist as if he had been caught up in the clouds. He
+heard the horse's hoofs striking against the stones as he trotted off,
+whinnying, to meet his master. There was a momentary clamor among the
+men, and then with whip and spur they pressed on to capture the supposed
+malefactor.
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+All at once it occurred to Ike, as he galloped down the road, that when
+they overtook him, they would think that he was the thief, and that he
+had been leading the horse. He had been so strong in his own innocence
+that the possibility that they might suspect him had not before entered
+his mind.
+
+He had intended only to divert the pursuit from Jube, who, although free
+from any great wrong-doing, was exposed to the most serious
+misconstruction. The knowledge of the pursuers' revolvers had made this
+a hard thing to do, but otherwise he had not thought of himself, nor of
+what he should say when overtaken.
+
+They would question him; he must answer. Would they believe his story?
+Could he support it? Grig Beemy of course would deny it. And Jube--had
+he not known how Jube could lie? Would he not fear that the truth might
+somehow involve him with the horse-thief?
+
+Ike, with despair in his heart, urged his mare to her utmost speed,
+knowing now the danger he was in as a suspected horse-thief. Suddenly,
+from among his pursuers, a tiny jet of flame flared out into the dense
+gray atmosphere, something whizzed through the branches of the trees
+above his head, and a sharp report jarred the mists.
+
+Perhaps the officer fired into the air, merely to intimidate the
+supposed criminal and induce him to surrender. But now the boy could not
+stop. He had lost control of the mare. Frightened beyond measure by the
+report of the pistol, she was in full run.
+
+On she dashed, down sharp declivities, up steep ascents, and then away
+and away, with a great burst of speed, along a level sandy stretch.
+
+The black night was falling like a pall upon the white, shrouded day.
+Ike knew less where he was than the mare did; he was trusting to her
+instinct to carry him to her stable. More than once the low branches of
+a tree struck him, almost tearing him from the saddle, but he clung
+frantically to the mane of the frightened animal, and on and on she
+swept, with the horsemen thundering behind.
+
+He could hear nothing but their heavy, continuous tramp. He could see
+nothing, until suddenly a dim, pure light was shining in front of him,
+on his own level, it seemed. He stared at it with starting eyeballs. It
+cleft the vapors,--they were falling away on either side,--and they
+reflected it with an illusive, pearly shimmer.
+
+In another moment he knew that he was nearing the abrupt precipice, for
+that was the moon, riding like a silver boat upon a sea of mist, with a
+glittering wake behind it, beyond the sharply serrated summit line of
+the eastern hills.
+
+He could no longer trust to the mare's instinct. He trusted to
+appearances instead. He sawed away with all his might on the bit,
+striving to wheel her around in the road.
+
+She resisted, stumbled, then fell upon her knees among a wild confusion
+of rotting logs and stones that rolled beneath her, as, snorting and
+angry, she struggled again to her feet. Once more Ike pulled her to the
+left.
+
+There was a great displacement of earth, a frantic scramble, and
+together they went over the cliff.
+
+The descent was not absolutely sheer. At the distance of twelve or
+fourteen feet below, a great bulging shelf of rock projected. They fell
+upon this. The boy had instantly loosed his hold of the reins, and
+slipped away from the prostrate animal. The mare, quieted only for a
+moment by the shock, sprang to her feet, the stones slipped beneath her,
+and she went headlong over the precipice into the dreary depths of Poor
+Valley.
+
+The pursuers heard the heavy thud when she struck the ground far below.
+They paused at the verge of the crag, and talked in eager, excited
+tones. They did not see the boy, as he sat cowering close to the cliff
+on the ledge below.
+
+Ike listened in great trepidation to what they were saying; he
+experienced infinite surprise when presently one of them mentioned Grig
+Beemy's name.
+
+[Illustration: TOGETHER THEY WENT OVER THE CLIFF]
+
+So they knew who had stolen the horse! It was little consolation to Ike,
+with his mare lying dead at the foot of the cliff, to reflect that if he
+had had the courage to face the emergency, and rely upon his innocence,
+his story would only have confirmed their knowledge of the facts.
+
+Although the master of the horse did not know the thief "from Adam,"
+Beemy had been seen with the animal and recognized by others, who,
+accompanying the sheriff and the owner, had traced him for two days
+through many wily doublings in the mountain fastnesses.
+
+They now concluded to press on to Beemy's house. Ike knew they would
+find him there waiting for Jube and the horse. Beemy had feared that he
+would be followed, and this was the reason that he had desired to rid
+himself of the animal for a day and night, until he could make sure and
+feel more secure.
+
+As the horsemen swept round the curve, Ike remembered how close was the
+road to the cliff. If he had only given the mare her head, she would
+have carried him safely around it. But there she lay dead, way down in
+Poor Valley, and he had lost all he owned in the world.
+
+Night had come, and in the dense darkness he did not dare to move. Only
+a step away was the edge of the precipice, over which the mare had
+slipped, and he could not tell how dangerous was the bluff he must climb
+to regain the summit. He felt he must lie here till dawn.
+
+He was badly jarred by his fall. Time dragged by wearily, and his
+bruises pained him. He knew at length that all the world slept,--all but
+himself and some distant ravening wolf, whose fierce howl ever and anon
+set the mists to shivering in Poor Valley where he prowled. This
+blood-curdling sound and his bitter thoughts were but sorry company.
+
+After a long time he fell asleep. Fortunately, he did not stir. When he
+regained consciousness and a sense of danger, he found still around him
+that dense white vapor, through which the pale, drear day was slowly
+dawning. Above his head was swinging in the mist a cluster of
+fox-grapes, with the rime upon them, and higher still he saw a quivering
+red leaf.
+
+It was the leaf of a starveling tree, growing out of a cleft where there
+was so little earth that it seemed to draw its sustenance from the rock.
+It was a scraggy, stunted thing, but it was well for him that it had
+struck root there, for its branches brushed the solid, smooth face of
+the cliff, which he could not have surmounted but for them and the
+grape-vine that had fallen over from the summit and entangled itself
+among them.
+
+As he climbed the tree, he felt it quake over the abysses, which the
+mists still veiled. He had a sense of elation and achievement when he
+gained the top, and it followed him home. There it suddenly deserted
+him.
+
+He found Pearce Tallam in a frenzy of rage at the discovery, which he
+had made through Jube's confession, that a stolen horse had been stabled
+on his premises. Despite his tyranny and his fierce, rude temper, he
+was an honest man and of fair repute. Although he realized that neither
+boy knew that the animal had been stolen, he gave Jube a lesson which he
+remembered for many a long day, and Ike also came in for his share of
+this muscular tuition.
+
+For in the midst of the criminations and recriminations, the violent
+blacksmith caught up a horseshoe and flung it across the shop, striking
+Ike with a force that almost stunned him. He was a man in strength, and
+it was hard for him not to return the blow; but he only walked out of
+the shop, declaring that he would stay for no more blows.
+
+"Cl'ar out, then!" called out Pearce Tallam after him. "I don't keer ef
+ye goes fur good."
+
+He met, at the door of the dwelling, a plaintive reproach from his
+mother. "'Count o' ye not tellin' on Jube, he mought hev been tuk up fur
+a horse-thief. I dunno what I'd hev done 'thout him," she added, "'long
+o' raisin' the young tur-r-keys, an' goslin's, an' deedies, an' sech; he
+hev been a mighty holp ter me. He air more of a son ter me than my own
+boy."
+
+She did not mean this, but she had said it once half in jest, half in
+reproach, and then it became a formula of complaint whenever Ike
+displeased her.
+
+Now he was sore and sensitive. "Take him fur yer son, then!" he cried.
+"I'm a-goin' out'n Pore Valley, ef I starves fur it. I shows my face
+hyar no more."
+
+As he shouldered his gun and strode out, he noted the light of the
+forge-fire quivering on the mist, but he little thought it was the last
+fire that Pearce Tallam would ever kindle there.
+
+He glanced back again before the dense vapor shut the house from view.
+His mother was standing in the door, with her baby in her arms, looking
+after him with a frightened, beseeching face. But his heart was hardened
+and he kept on,--kept on, with that deft, even tread of the mountaineer,
+who seems never to hurry, almost to loiter, but gets over the ground
+with surprising rapidity.
+
+He left the mists and desolation of Poor Valley far behind, but not that
+frightened, beseeching face. He thought of it more often when he lay
+down under the shelter of a great rock to sleep than he did of the howl
+of the wolf which he had heard the night before, not far from here.
+
+Late the next afternoon he came upon the outskirts of a village. He
+entered it doubtfully, for it seemed metropolitan to him, unaccustomed
+as he was to anything more imposing than the cross-roads store. But the
+first sound he heard reassured him. It was the clear, metallic resonance
+of an anvil, the clanking of a sledge, and the clinking of a
+hand-hammer.
+
+Here, at the forge, he found work. It had been said in Poor Valley that
+he was already as good a blacksmith even as Pearce Tallam. He had great
+natural aptitude for the work, and considerable experience. But his
+wages only sufficed to pay for his food and lodging. Still, there was a
+prospect for more, and he was content.
+
+In his leisure he made friends among those of his own age, who took him
+about the town and enjoyed his amazement. He examined everything wrought
+in metal with such eager interest, and was so outspoken about his
+ambition, that they dubbed him Tubal-cain.
+
+He was struck dumb with amazement when, for the first time in his life,
+he saw a locomotive gliding along the rails, with a glaring headlight
+and a cloud of flying sparks. Once, when it was motionless on the track,
+they talked to the engineer, who explained "the workings of the
+critter," as Ike called it.
+
+The boy understood so readily that the engineer said, after a time,
+"You're a likely feller, for such a derned ignoramus! Where have you
+been hid out, all this time?"
+
+"Way down in Pore Valley," said Ike very humbly.
+
+"He's concluded to be a great inventor," said one of his young friends,
+with a merry wink.
+
+"He's a mighty artificer in iron," said the wit who had named him
+Tubal-cain.
+
+The engineer looked gravely at Ike. "Why, boy," he admonished him, "the
+world has got a hundred years the start of you!"
+
+"I kin ketch up," Ike declared sturdily.
+
+"There's something in grit, I reckon," said the engineer. Then his
+wonderful locomotive glided away, leaving Ike staring after it in silent
+ecstasy, and his companions dying with laughter.
+
+He started out to overtake the world at a night-school, where his mental
+quickness contrasted oddly with his slow, stolid demeanor. He worked
+hard at the forge all day; but everybody was kind.
+
+Outside of Poor Valley life seemed joyous and hopeful; progress and
+activity were on every hand; and the time he spent here was the happiest
+he had ever known,--except for the recollection of that frightened,
+beseeching face which had looked out after him through the closing
+mists.
+
+He wished he had turned back for a word. He wished his mother might know
+he was well and happy. He began to feel that he could go no further
+without making his peace with her. So one day he left his employer with
+the promise to return the following week, "ef the Lord spares me an'
+nuthin' happens," as the cautious rural formula has it, and set out for
+his home.
+
+The mists had lifted from it, but the snow had fallen deep. Poor Valley
+lay white and drear--it seemed to him that he had never before known how
+drear--between the grim mountain with its great black crags, its chasms,
+its gaunt, naked trees, and the long line of flinty hills, whose stunted
+pines bent with the weight of the snow.
+
+There was no smoke from the chimney of the blacksmith's shop. There were
+no footprints about the door. An atmosphere charged with calamity seemed
+to hang over the dwelling. Somehow he knew that a dreadful thing had
+happened even before he opened the door and saw his mother's mournful
+white face.
+
+She sprang up at the sight of him with a wild, sobbing cry that was half
+grief, half joy. He had only a glimpse of the interior,--of Jube,
+looking anxious and unnaturally grave; of the listless children, grouped
+about the fire; of the big, burly blacksmith, with a strange, deep
+pallor upon his face, and as he shifted his position--why, how was that?
+
+The boy's mother had thrust him out of the door, and closed it behind
+her. The jar brought down from the low eaves a few feathery flakes of
+snow, which fell upon her hair as she stood there with him.
+
+"Don't say nuthin' 'bout'n it," she implored. "He can't abide ter hear
+it spoke of."
+
+"What ails dad's hand?" he asked, bewildered.
+
+"It's gone!" she sobbed. "He war over ter the sawmill the day ye
+lef'--somehow 'nuther the saw cotched it--the doctor tuk it off."
+
+"His right hand!" cried Ike, appalled.
+
+The blacksmith would never lift a hammer again. And there the forge
+stood, silent and smokeless.
+
+What this portended, Ike realized as he sat with them around the fire.
+Their sterile fields in Poor Valley had only served to eke out their
+subsistence. This year the corn-crop had failed, and the wheat was
+hardly better. The winter had found them without special provision, but
+without special anxiety, for the anvil had always amply supplied their
+simple needs.
+
+Now that this misfortune had befallen them, who could say what was
+before them unless Ike would remain and take his stepfather's place at
+the forge? Ike knew that this contingency must have occurred to them as
+well as to him. He divined it from the anxious, furtive glances which
+they one and all cast upon him from time to time,--even Pearce Tallam,
+whose turn it was now to feel that greatest anguish of calamity,
+helplessness.
+
+But must he relinquish his hopes, his chance of an education, that
+plucky race for which he was entered to overtake the world that had a
+hundred years the start of him, and be forever a nameless, futureless
+clod in Poor Valley?
+
+His mother had the son she had chosen. And surely he owed no duty to
+Pearce Tallam. The hand that was gone had been a hard hand to him.
+
+He rose at length. He put on his leather apron. "Waal--I mought ez well
+g' long ter the shop, I reckon," he remarked calmly. "'Pears like thar's
+time yit fur a toler'ble spot o' work afore dark."
+
+It was a hard-won victory. Even then he experienced a sort of
+satisfaction in knowing that Pearce Tallam must feel humiliated and of
+small account to be thus utterly dependent for his bread upon the boy
+whom he had so persistently maltreated. In his pale face Ike saw
+something of the bitterness he had endured, of his broken spirit, of his
+humbled pride.
+
+The look smote upon the boy's heart. There was another inward struggle.
+Then he said, as if it were a result of deep cogitation,--
+
+"Ye'll hev ter kem over ter the shop, dad, wunst in a while, ter advise
+'bout what's doin'. 'Pears ter me like mos' folks would 'low ez a boy
+no older 'n me couldn't do reg'lar blacksmithin' 'thout some sperienced
+body along fur sense an' showin'."
+
+The man visibly plucked up a little. Was he, indeed, so useless? "That's
+a fac', Ike," he said gently. "I reckon ye kin make out
+toler'ble--cornsiderin'. But I'll be along ter holp."
+
+After this Ike realized that he had been working with something tougher
+than iron, harder than steel,--his own unsubdued nature. He traced an
+analogy from the forge; and he saw that those strong forces, the fires
+of conscience and the coercion of duty, had wrought the stubborn metal
+of his character to a kindly use.
+
+Gradually the relinquishment of his wild, vague ambition began to seem
+less bitter to him; for it might be that these were the few things over
+which he should be faithful,--his own forge-fire and his own fiery
+heart. And so he labors to fulfill his trust.
+
+The spring never comes to Poor Valley. The summer is a cloud of dust.
+The autumn shrouds itself in mist. And the winter is snow. But poverty
+of soil need not imply poverty of soul. And a noble manhood may nobly
+exist "'Way Down in Poor Valley."
+
+
+
+
+A MOUNTAIN STORM
+
+
+"Ef the filly war bridle-wise"--
+
+"The filly _air_ bridle-wise."
+
+A sullen pause ensued, and the two brothers looked angrily at each
+other.
+
+The woods were still; the sunshine was faint and flickering; the low,
+guttural notes of a rain-crow broke suddenly on the silence.
+
+Presently Thad, mechanically examining a bridle which he held in his
+hand, began again in an appealing tone: "'Pears like ter me ez the filly
+air toler'ble well bruk ter the saddle, an' she would holp me powerful
+ter git thar quicker ter tell dad 'bout'n that thar word ez war fotched
+up the mounting. They 'lowed ez 'twar jes' las' night ez them revenue
+men raided a still-house, somewhar down thar in the valley, an' busted
+the tubs, an' sp'iled the coppers, an' arrested all the moonshiners ez
+war thar. An' ef they war ter find out 'bout'n this hyar still-house
+over yander in the gorge, they'd raid it, too. An' thar be dad," he
+continued despairingly, "jes' sodden with whiskey an' ez drunk ez a
+fraish b'iled ow_el_, an' he wouldn't hev the sense nor the showin' ter
+make them off'cers onderstand ez he never hed nothin' ter do with the
+moonshiners--'ceptin' ter go ter thar still-house, an' git drunk along
+o' them. An' I dunno whether the off'cers would set much store by that
+sayin' ennyhow, an' I want ter git dad away from thar afore they kem."
+
+"I don't believe that thar word ez them men air a-raidin' round the
+mountings no more 'n _that_!" and Ben kicked away a pebble
+contemptuously.
+
+Thad was in a quiver of anxiety. While Ben indulged his doubts, the
+paternal "B'iled Ow_el_" might at any moment be arrested on a charge of
+aiding and abetting in illicit distilling.
+
+"Ye never b'lieve nothin' till ye see it--ye sateful dunce!" he
+exclaimed excitedly.
+
+Thus began a fraternal quarrel which neither forgot for years.
+
+Ben turned scarlet. "Waal, then, jes' leave my filly in the barn whar
+she be now; ye kin travel on Shank's mare!"
+
+Thad started off up the steep slope. "Ef ye ain't a-hankerin' fur me ter
+ride that thar filly, ez air ez bridle-wise ez ye be, jes' let's see ye
+kem on, an'--hender!"
+
+"I hopes she'll fling ye, an' ye'll git yer neck bruk," Ben called out
+after him.
+
+"I wish ennything 'ud happen, jes' so be I mought never lay eyes on ye
+agin," Thad declared.
+
+As he glanced over his shoulder, he saw that his brother was not
+following, and when he reached the flimsy little barn, there was nothing
+to prevent him from carrying out his resolution.
+
+Nevertheless, he hesitated as he stood with the door in his hand. A
+clay-bank filly came instantly to it, but with a sudden impulse he
+closed it abruptly, and set out on foot along a narrow, brambly path
+that wound down the mountain side.
+
+He had descended almost to its base before the threatening appearance of
+the sky caught his attention. A dense black cloud had climbed up from
+over the opposite hills, and stretched from their jagged summits to the
+zenith. There it hung in mid-air, its sombre shadow falling across the
+valley, and reaching high up the craggy slope, where the boy's home was
+perched. The whole landscape wore that strange, still, expectant aspect
+which precedes the bursting of a storm.
+
+Suddenly a vivid white flash quivered through the sky. The hills,
+suffused with its ghastly light, started up in bold relief against the
+black clouds; even the faint outlines of distant ranges that had
+disappeared with the strong sunlight reasserted themselves in a pale,
+illusive fashion, flickering like the unreal mountains of a dream about
+the vague horizon. A ball of fire had coursed through the air, striking
+with dazzling coruscations the top of a towering oak, and he heard,
+amidst the thunder and its clamorous echo, the sharp crash of riving
+timber.
+
+All at once he had a sense of falling, a sudden pain shot through him,
+darkness descended, and he knew no more.
+
+When he gradually regained consciousness, it seemed that a long time had
+elapsed since he was trudging down the mountain side. He could not
+imagine where he was now. He put out his hand in the intense darkness
+that enveloped him, and felt the damp mould beside him,--above--below.
+
+For one horrible instant he recalled a sickening story of a man who was
+negligently buried alive. He had always believed that this was only a
+fireside fiction invented in the security of the chimney corner; but was
+it to have a strange confirmation in his own fate? He was pierced with
+pity for himself, as he heard the despair in his voice when he sent
+forth a wild, hoarse cry. What a cavernous echo it had!
+
+Again and again, after his lips were closed, that voice of anguish rang
+out, and then was silent, then fitfully sounded once more on another
+key. He strove to rise, but the earth on his breast resisted. With a
+great effort he finally burst through it; he felt the clods tumbling
+about him; he sat upright; he rose to his full height; and still all was
+merged in the densest darkness, and, when he stretched up his arms as
+high as he could reach, he again felt the damp mould.
+
+The truth had begun vaguely to enter his mind even before, in shifting
+his position, he caught sight of a rift in the deep gloom, some fifteen
+feet above his head. Then he realized that at the moment of the flash of
+lightning, unmindful of his footing, he had strayed aside from the path,
+stumbled, fallen, and, as it chanced, was received into one of those
+unsuspected apertures in the ground which are common in all cavernous
+countries, being sometimes the entrance to extensive caves, and which
+are here denominated "sink-holes."
+
+These cavities were exceedingly frequent in the valley, on the boundary
+of which Thad lived, and his familiarity with them did away for the
+moment with all appreciation of the perplexity and difficulty of the
+situation. He laughed aloud triumphantly.
+
+Instantly these underground chambers broke forth with wild, elfish
+voices that mimicked his merriment till it died on his lips. He
+preferred utter loneliness to the vague sense of companionship given by
+these weird echoes. Somehow the strangeness of all that had happened to
+him had stirred his imagination, and he could not rid himself of the
+idea that there were grimacing creatures here with him, whom he could
+not see, who would only speak when he spoke, and scoffingly iterate his
+tones.
+
+He was faint, bruised, and exhausted. He had been badly stunned by his
+fall; but for the soft, shelving earth through which he had crashed, it
+might have been still worse. He could scarcely move as he began to
+investigate his precarious plight. Even if he could climb the
+perpendicular wall above his head, he could not thence gain the
+aperture, for, as his eyes became more accustomed to the darkness, he
+discovered that the shape of the roof was like the interior of a roughly
+defined dome, about the centre of which was this small opening.
+
+"An' a human can't walk on a ceilin' like a fly," he said
+discontentedly.
+
+"Can't!" cried an echo close at hand.
+
+"Fly!" suggested a distant mocker.
+
+Thad closed his mouth and sat down.
+
+He had moved very cautiously, for he knew that these sink-holes are
+often the entrance of extensive caverns, and that there might be a deep
+abyss on any side. He could do nothing but wait and call out now and
+then, and hope that somebody might soon take the short cut through the
+woods, and, hearing his voice, come to his relief.
+
+His courage gave way when he reflected that the river would rise with
+the heavy rain which he could hear steadily splashing through the
+sink-hole, and for a time all prudent men would go by the beaten road
+and the ford. No one would care to take the short cut and save three
+miles' travel at the risk of swimming his horse, for the river was
+particularly deep just here and spanned only by a footbridge, except,
+perhaps, some fugitive from justice, or the revenue officers on their
+hurried, reckless raids. This reminded him of the still-house and of
+"dad" there yet, imbibing whiskey, and sharing the danger of his chosen
+cronies, the moonshiners.
+
+Ben, at home, would not have his anxiety roused till midnight, at least,
+by his brother's failure to return from the complicated feat of decoying
+the drunkard from the distillery. Thad trembled to think what might
+happen to himself in the interval. If the volume of water pouring down
+through the sink-hole should increase to any considerable extent, he
+would be drowned here like a rat. Was he to have his wish, and see his
+brother never again?
+
+And poor Ben! How his own cruel, wicked parting words would scourge him
+throughout his life,--even when he should grow old!
+
+Thad's eyes filled with tears of prescient pity for his brother's
+remorse.
+
+"Ef ennything war ter happen hyar, sure enough, I wish he mought always
+know ez I don't keer nothin' now 'bout'n that thar sayin' o' his'n," he
+thought wistfully.
+
+He still heard the persistent rain splashing outside. The hollow,
+unnatural murmur of a subterranean stream rose drearily. Once he sighed
+heavily, and all the cavernous voices echoed his grief.
+
+When that terrible flash of lightning came, Ben was still on the slope
+of the mountain where his brother had left him. The next moment he heard
+the wild whirl of the gusts as they came surging up the valley. He saw
+the frantic commotion of the woods on distant spurs as the wind
+advanced, preceded by swirling columns of dust which carried myriads of
+leaves, twigs, and even great branches rent from the trees, as evidence
+of its force.
+
+Ben turned, and ran like a deer up the steep ascent. "It'll blow
+that thar barn spang off'n the bluff, I'm thinkin'--an' the
+filly--Cobe--Cobe!" he cried out to her as he neared the shanty.
+
+He stopped short, his eyes distended. The door was open. There was no
+hair nor hoof of the filly within. He could have no doubt that his
+brother had actually taken his property for this errand against his
+will.
+
+"That thar boy air no better 'n a low-down horse-thief!" he declared
+bitterly.
+
+The gusts struck the little barn. It careened this way and that, and
+finally the flimsy structure came down with a crash, one of the boards
+narrowly missing Ben's head as it fell. He had a hard time getting to
+the house in the teeth of the wind, but its violence only continued a
+few minutes, and when he was safe within doors he looked out of the
+window at the silent mists, beginning to steal about the coves and
+ravines, and at the rain as it fell in serried columns. Long after dark
+it still beat with unabated persistence on the roof of the log cabin,
+and splashed and dripped with a chilly, cheerless sound from the low
+eaves. Sometimes a drop fell down the wide chimney, and hissed upon the
+red-hot coals, for Ben had piled on the logs and made a famous fire. He
+could see that his mother now and then paused to listen in the midst of
+her preparations for supper. Once as she knelt on the hearth, and
+deftly inserted a knife between the edges of a baking corn-cake and the
+hoe, she looked up suddenly at Ben without turning the cake. "I hearn
+the beastis's huff!" she said.
+
+Ben listened. The fire roared. The rain went moaning down the valley.
+
+"Ye never hearn nothin'," he rejoined.
+
+Nevertheless, she rose and opened the door. The cold air streamed in.
+The firelight showed the mists, pressing close in the porch,
+shivering, and seeming to jostle and nudge each other as they peered in,
+curiously, upon the warm home-scene, and the smoking supper, and the
+hilarious children, as if asking of one another how they would like to
+be human creatures, instead of a part of inanimate nature, or at best
+the elusive spirits of the mountains.
+
+There was nothing to be seen without but the mists.
+
+"Thad tuk the filly, ye say fur true?" she asked, recurring to the
+subject when supper was over.
+
+Ben nodded. "I hopes ter conscience she'll break his neck," he declared
+cruelly.
+
+His mother took instant alarm. She turned and looked at him with a face
+expressive of the keenest anxiety. "'Pears like to me ez the only reason
+Thad kin be so late a-gittin' back air jes' 'kase it air a toler'ble
+aggervatin' job a-fotchin' of dad home," she said, striving to reassure
+herself.
+
+"That air a true word 'bout'n dad, ennyhow," Ben assented bitterly.
+
+His old grandfather suddenly lifted up his voice.
+
+"This night," said the graybeard from out the chimney corner,--"this
+night, forty years ago, my brother, Ephraim Grimes, fell dead on this
+cabin floor, an' no man sence kin mark the cause."
+
+A pause ensued. The rain fell. The pallid, shuddering mists looked in at
+the window.
+
+"Ye ain't a-thinkin'," cried the woman tremulously, "ez the night air
+one app'inted fur evil?"
+
+The old man did not answer.
+
+"This night," he croaked, leaning over the glowing fire, and kindling
+his long-stemmed cob-pipe by dexterously scooping up with its bowl a
+live coal,--"this night, twenty-six years ago, thar war eleven sheep o'
+mine--ez war teched in the head, or somehows disabled from good
+sense--an' they jumped off'n the bluff, one arter the other, an' fell
+haffen way down the mounting, an' bruk thar fool necks 'mongst the
+boulders. They war dead. Thar shearin's never kem ter much account
+nuther. 'Twar powerful cur'ous, fust an' last."
+
+The woman made a gesture of indifference. "I ain't a-settin' of store by
+critters when humans is--is--whar they ain't hearn from."
+
+But Ben was susceptible of a "critter" scare.
+
+"I hope, now," he exclaimed, alarmed, "ez that thar triflin' no-'count
+Thad Grimes ain't a-goin' ter let my filly lame herself, nor nothin',
+a-travelin' with her this dark night, ez seems ter be a night fur things
+ter happen on ennyhow. Oh, shucks! shucks!" he continued impatiently,
+"I jes' feels like thar ain't no use o' my tryin' ter live along."
+
+Three of the children who habitually slept in the shed-room had started
+off to go to bed. As they opened the connecting door, there suddenly
+resounded a wild commotion within. They shrieked with fright, and banged
+the door against a strong force which was beginning to push from the
+other side.
+
+The old grandfather rose, pale and agitated, his pipe falling from his
+nerveless clasp.
+
+"This night," he said, with white lips and mechanical utterance,--"this
+night"--
+
+"Satan is in the shed-room!" shouted the three small boys, as they held
+fast to the door with a strength far beyond their age and weight.
+Nevertheless, they were hardly able to cope with the strength on the
+other side of the door, and it was alternately forced slightly ajar, and
+then closed with a resounding slam. Once, as the firelight flickered
+into the dark shed-room, the ignorant, superstitious mountaineers had a
+fleeting glimpse of an object there which convinced them: they beheld
+great gleaming, blazing eyes, a burnished hoof, and--yes--a flirting
+tail.
+
+"I believe it is Satan himself!" cried Ben, with awe in his voice.
+
+In the wild confusion and bewilderment, Ben was somehow vaguely aware
+that Satan had often been in the shed-room before,--in the antechamber
+of his own heart. Whenever this heart of his was full of unkindness, and
+hardened against his brother, although those better fraternal instincts
+which he kept repressed and dwarfed might repudiate this cruelty under
+the pretext that he did not really mean it, still the great principle of
+evil was there in the moral shed-room, clamoring for entrance at the
+inner doors. And this, we may safely say, may apply to wiser people than
+poor Ben.
+
+In the midst of the general despair and fright, something suddenly
+whinnied. At the sound the three small boys fell in a limp, exhausted
+heap on the floor, and, as the door no longer offered resistance, the
+unknown visitor pranced in: it was the filly, snorting and tossing her
+mane, and once more whinnying shrilly for her supper.
+
+In a moment Ben understood the whole phenomenon. Thad had left the barn
+door unfastened, and, when that terrible flash of lightning came and the
+wind arose, the frightened animal had instantly fled to the house for
+safety. She had doubtless pushed open the back door of the shed-room
+easily enough, but it had closed behind her, and she had remained there
+a supperless prisoner.
+
+The small boys picked themselves up from among the filly's hoofs, with
+disconnected exclamations of "Wa-a-a-l, sir!" while Ben led the animal
+out, with a growing impression that he would try to "live along" for a
+while, at all events.
+
+He had led Satan out of the moral shed-room, as well. The reappearance
+of the filly without Thad had raised a great anxiety about his brother's
+continued absence. All at once he began to feel as if those brutal
+wishes of his were prophetic,--as if they were endowed with a malignant
+power, and could actually pursue poor Thad to some violent end. He did
+not understand now how he could have framed the words.
+
+When a fellow really likes his brother,--and most fellows do,--there is
+scant use or grace or common-sense in keeping up, from mere
+carelessness, or through an irritable habit, a continual bickering, for
+these germs of evil are possessed of a marvelous faculty for growth, and
+some day their gigantic deformities will confront you in deeds of which
+you once believed yourself incapable.
+
+Ben's hands were trembling as he folded a blanket, and laid it on the
+animal's back to serve instead of a saddle.
+
+"I'm a-goin' ter the still-house ter see ef Thad ever got thar," he
+said, when his mother appeared at the door.
+
+He added, "I'm a-gittin' sorter skeered ez su'thin' mought hev happened
+ter him."
+
+His grandfather hobbled out into the little porch. "Them roads air
+turrible rough fur that thar filly, ez ain't fairly broke good yit, nor
+used ter travel," he suggested.
+
+"I'd gin four hunderd fillies, ef I hed 'em, jes' ter know that thar boy
+air safe an' sound," Ben declared, as he mounted.
+
+He took the short cut, judging that, at the point where it crossed the
+river, the stream was still fordable. When he heard his brother's
+piteous cries for help, he quaked to think what might have happened to
+Thad if he had not recognized the presence of Satan in the moral
+shed-room, and summarily ejected him. The rainfall had been sufficient
+to aggregate considerable water in the gullies about the sink-hole, and
+these, emptying into the cavity and sending a continuous stream over the
+boy, had served to chill him through and through, and he had a pretty
+fair chance of being drowned, or dying from cold and exhaustion. Ben
+pressed on to the still-house at the best speed he could make, and such
+of the moonshiners as were half sober came out with ropes and a barrel,
+which they lowered into the cavity. Thad managed to crawl into the
+barrel, and, after several ineffectual attempts, he was drawn up through
+the sink-hole.
+
+There was no formal reconciliation between the two boys. It was enough
+for Ben to feel Thad's reluctance to unloose his eager clutch upon his
+brother's arms, even after he had been lifted out upon the firm ground.
+And Thad knew that that complicated sound in Ben's throat was a sob,
+although, for the sake of the men who stood by, he strove to seem to be
+coughing.
+
+"Right smart of an idjit, now, ain't ye?" demanded Ben, hustling back,
+so to speak, the tears that sought to rise in his eyes.
+
+"Waal, stranger, how's yer filly?" retorted Thad, laughing in a gaspy
+fashion.
+
+There was a tone of forgiveness in the inquiry. The answer caught the
+same spirit.
+
+"Middlin',--thanky,--jes' middlin'," said Ben.
+
+And then they and "dad" fared home together by the light of the
+moonshiners' lantern.
+
+
+
+
+BORROWING A HAMMER
+
+
+On a certain bold crag that juts far over a steep wooded mountain slope
+a red light was seen one moonless night in June. Sometimes it glowed
+intensely among the gray mists which hovered above the deep and sombre
+valley; sometimes it faded. Its life was the breath of the bellows, for
+a blacksmith's shop stands close beside the road that rambles along the
+brink of the mountain. Generally after sunset the forge is dark and
+silent. So when three small boys, approaching the log hut through the
+gloomy woods, heard the clink! clank! clink! clank! of the hammers, and
+the metallic echo among the cliffs, they stopped short in astonishment.
+
+"Thar now!" exclaimed Abner Ryder desperately; "dad's at it fur true!"
+
+"Mebbe he'll go away arter a while, Ab," suggested Jim Gryce, another
+of the small boys. "Then that'll gin us our chance."
+
+"Waal, I reckon we kin stiffen up our hearts ter wait," said Ab
+resignedly.
+
+All three sat down on a log a short distance from the shop, and
+presently they became so engrossed in their talk that they did not
+notice when the blacksmith, in the pauses of his work, came to the door
+for a breath of air. They failed to discreetly lower their voices, and
+thus they had a listener on whose attention they had not counted.
+
+"Ye see," observed Ab in a high, shrill pipe, "dad sets a heap o' store
+by his tools. But dad, ye know, air a mighty slack-twisted man. He gits
+his tools lost" (reprehensively), "he wastes his nails, an' then he
+'lows ez how it war _me_ ez done it."
+
+He paused impressively in virtuous indignation. A murmur of surprise and
+sympathy rose from his companions. Then he recommenced.
+
+"Dad air the crankiest man on this hyar mounting! He won't lend me none
+o' his tools nowadays,--not even that thar leetle hammer o' his'n. An'
+I'm obleeged ter hev that thar leetle hammer an' some nails ter fix a
+box fur them young squir'ls what we cotched. So we'll jes' hev ter go
+ter his shop of a night when he is away, an'--an'--an' borry it!"
+
+The blacksmith, a tall, powerfully built man, of an aspect far from
+jocular, leaned slightly out of the door, peering in the direction where
+the three tow-headed urchins waited. Then he glanced within at a leather
+strap, as if he appreciated the appropriateness of an intimate relation
+between these objects. But there was no time for pleasure now. He was
+back in his shop in a moment.
+
+His next respite was thus entertained:--
+
+"What makes him work so of a night?" asked Jim Gryce.
+
+"Waal," explained Ab in his usual high key, "he rid ter the settle_mint_
+this mornin'; he hev been a-foolin' round thar all day, an' the crap air
+jes' a-sufferin' fur work! So him an' Uncle Tobe air layin' thar ploughs
+in the shop now, kase they air goin' ter run around the corn
+ter-morrer. Workin', though, goes powerful hard with dad enny time. I
+tole old Bob Peachin that, when I war ter the mill this evenin'. Him an'
+the t'other men thar laffed mightily at dad. An' I laffed too!"
+
+There was an angry gleam in Stephen Ryder's stern black eyes as he
+turned within, seized the tongs, and thrust a piece of iron among the
+coals, while Tobe, who had been asleep in the window at the back of the
+shop, rose reluctantly and plied the bellows. The heavy panting broke
+forth simultaneously with the red flare that quivered out into the dark
+night. Presently it faded; the hot iron was whisked upon the anvil,
+fiery sparks showered about as the rapid blows fell, and the echoing
+crags kept time with rhythmic beats to the clanking of the sledge and
+the clinking of the hand-hammer. The stars, high above the
+far-stretching mountains, seemed to throb in unison, until suddenly the
+blacksmith dealt a sharp blow on the face of the anvil as a signal to
+his striker to cease, and the forge was silent.
+
+As he leaned against the jamb of the door, mechanically adjusting his
+leather apron, he heard Ab's voice again.
+
+"Old Bob say he ain't no 'count sca'cely. He 'lowed ez he had knowed him
+many a year, an' fund him a sneakin', deceivin' critter."
+
+The blacksmith was erect in a moment, every fibre tense.
+
+"That ain't the wust," Ab gabbled on. "Old Bob say, though't ain't known
+ginerally, ez he air gin ter thievin'. Old Bob 'lowed ter them men,
+hangin' round the mill, ez he air the biggest thief on the mounting!"
+
+The strong man trembled. His blood rushed tumultuously to his head, then
+seemed to ebb swiftly away. That this should be said of him to the
+loafers at the mill! These constituted his little world. And he valued
+his character as only an honest man can. He was amazed at the boldness
+of the lie. It had been openly spoken in the presence of his son. One
+might have thought the boy would come directly to him. But there he sat,
+glibly retailing it to his small comrades! It seemed all so strange
+that Stephen Ryder fancied there was surely some mistake. In the next
+moment, however, he was convinced that they had been talking of him, and
+of no one else.
+
+"I tole old Bob ez how I thought they oughtn't ter be so hard on him, ez
+he warn't thar to speak for hisself."
+
+All three boys giggled weakly, as if this were witty.
+
+"But old Bob 'lowed ez ennybody mought know him by his name. An' then he
+told me that old sayin':--
+
+  'Stephen, Stephen, so deceivin',
+  That old Satan can't believe him!'"
+
+Here Ben Gryce broke in, begging the others to go home, and come to
+"borry" the hammer next night. Ab agreed to the latter proposition, but
+still sat on the log and talked. "Old Bob say," he remarked cheerfully,
+"that when he do git 'em, he shakes 'em--shakes the life out'n 'em!"
+
+This was inexplicable. Stephen Ryder pondered vainly on it for an
+instant. But the oft-reiterated formula, "Old Bob say," caught his
+ears, and he was absorbed anew in Ab's discourse.
+
+"Old Bob say ez my mother air one of the best women in this world. But
+she air so gin ter humoring every critter a-nigh her, an' tends ter 'em
+so much, an' feeds 'em so high an' hearty, ez they jes' gits good fur
+nothin' in this world. That's how kem she air eat out'n house an' home
+now. Old Bob say ez how he air the hongriest critter! Say he jes'
+despise ter see him comin' round of meal times. Old Bob say ef he hev
+got enny good lef' in him, my mother will kill it out yit with
+kindness."
+
+The blacksmith felt, as he turned back into the shop and roused the
+sleepy-headed striker, that within the hour all the world had changed
+for him. These coarse taunts were enough to show in what estimation he
+was held. And he had fancied himself, in countrified phrase, "respected
+by all," and had been proud of his standing.
+
+So the bellows began to sigh and pant once more, and kept the red light
+flaring athwart the darkness. The people down in the valley looked up at
+it, glowing like a star that had slipped out of the sky and lodged
+somehow on the mountain, and wondered what Stephen Ryder could be about
+so late at night. When he left the shop there was no sign of the boys
+who had ornamented the log earlier in the evening. He walked up the road
+to his house, and found his wife sitting alone in the rickety little
+porch.
+
+"Hev that thar boy gone ter bed?" he asked.
+
+"Waal," she slowly drawled, in a soft, placid voice, "he kem hyar
+'bout'n haffen hour ago so nigh crazed ter go ter stay all night with
+Jim an' Benny Gryce ez I hed ter let him. Old man Gryce rid by hyar in
+his wagon on his way home from the settle_mint_. So Ab went off with the
+Gryce boys an' thar gran'dad."
+
+Thus the blacksmith concluded his tools were not liable to be "borrowed"
+that night. He had a scheme to insure their safety for the future, but
+in order to avoid his wife's remonstrances on Ab's behalf, he told her
+nothing of it, nor of what he had overheard.
+
+Early the next morning he set out for the mill, intending to confront
+"old Bob" and demand retraction. The road down the deep, wild ravine was
+rugged, and he jogged along slowly until at last he came within sight of
+the crazy, weather-beaten old building tottering precariously on the
+brink of the impetuous torrent which gashed the mountain side. Crags
+towered above it; vines and mosses clung to its walls; it was a dank,
+cool, shady place, but noisy enough with the turmoil of its primitive
+machinery and the loud, hoarse voices of the loungers striving to make
+themselves heard above the uproar. There were several of these idle
+mountaineers aimlessly strolling among the bags of corn and wheat that
+were piled about. Long, dusty cobwebs hung from the rafters. Sometimes a
+rat, powdered white with flour and rendered reckless by high living,
+raced boldly across the floor. The golden grain poured ceaselessly
+through the hopper, and leaning against it was the miller, a tall,
+stoop-shouldered man about forty years of age, with a floury smile
+lurking in his beard and a twinkle in his good-humored eyes overhung by
+heavy, mealy eyebrows.
+
+"Waal, Steve," yelled the miller, shambling forward as the blacksmith
+appeared in the doorway. "Come 'long in. Whar's yer grist?"
+
+"I hev got no grist!" thundered Steve, sternly.
+
+"Waal--ye're jes' ez welcome," said the miller, not noticing the rigid
+lines of the blacksmith's face, accented here and there by cinders, nor
+the fierceness of the intent dark eyes.
+
+"I reckon I'm powerful welcome!" sneered Stephen Ryder.
+
+The tone attracted "old Bob's" attention. "What ails ye, Steve?" he
+asked, surprised.
+
+"I'm a deceivin', sneakin' critter--hey," shouted the visitor, shaking
+his big fist; he had intended to be calm, but his long-repressed fury
+had found vent at last.
+
+The miller drew back hastily, astonishment and fear mingled in a pallid
+paste, as it were, with the flour on his face.
+
+The six startled on-lookers stood as if petrified.
+
+"Ye say I'm a thief!--a thief!--a thief!"
+
+With the odious word Ryder made a frantic lunge at the miller, who
+dodged his strong right arm at the moment when his foot struck against a
+bag of corn lying on the floor and he stumbled. He recovered his
+equilibrium instantly. But the six bystanders had seized him.
+
+"Hold him hard, folkses!" cried honest Bob Peachin. "Hold hard! I'll
+tell ye what ails him--though ye mustn't let on ter him--he air teched
+in the head!"
+
+He winked at them with a confidential intention as he roared this out,
+forgetting in his excitement that mental infirmity does not impair the
+sense of hearing. This folly on his part was a salutary thing for
+Stephen Ryder. It calmed him instantly. He felt that he had need for
+caution. A fearful vista of possibilities opened before him. He
+remembered having seen in his childhood a man reputed to be suddenly
+bereft of reason, but who he believed was entirely sane, bound hand and
+foot, and every word, every groan, every effort to free himself,
+accounted the demonstration of a maniac. This fate was imminent for him.
+They were seven to one. He trembled as he felt their hands pressing upon
+the swelling muscles of his arms. With an abrupt realization of his
+great strength, he waited for a momentary relaxation of their clutch,
+then with a mighty wrench he burst loose from them, flung himself upon
+his mare, and dashed off at full speed.
+
+He did no work that afternoon, although the corn was "suffering." He sat
+after dinner smoking his pipe on the porch of his log cabin, while he
+moodily watched the big shadow of the mountain creeping silently over
+the wooded valley as the sun got on the down grade. Deep glooms began to
+lurk among the ravines of the great ridge opposite. The shimmering blue
+summits in the distance were purpling. A redbird, alert, crested, and
+with a brilliant eye, perched idly on the vines about the porch, having
+relinquished for the day the job of teaching a small, stubby imitation
+of himself to fly. The shocks of wheat in the bare field close by had
+turned a rich red gold in the lengthening rays before Stephen Ryder
+realized that night was close at hand.
+
+All at once he heard a discordant noise which he knew that Ab Ryder
+called "singing," and presently the boy appeared in the distance, his
+mouth stretched, his tattered hat stuck on the back of his tow-head, his
+bare feet dusty, his homespun cotton trousers rolled up airily about his
+knees, his single suspender supporting the structure. His father laughed
+a little at sight of him, rather sardonically it must be confessed, and
+saying to his wife that he intended to go to the shop for a while, he
+rose and strolled off down the road.
+
+When supper was over, however, Ab was immensely relieved to see that
+his father had no idea of continuing his work. Consequently the usual
+routine was to be expected. Generally, when summoned to the evening
+meal, the blacksmith hastily plunged his head in the barrel of water
+used to temper steel, thrust off his leather apron, and went up to the
+house without more ado. He smoked afterward, and lounged about, enjoying
+the relaxation after his heavy work. He did not go down to lock the shop
+until bed-time, when he was shutting up the house, the barn, and the
+corn-crib for the night. In the interval the shop stood deserted and
+open, and this fact was the basis of Ab's opportunity. To-night there
+seemed to be no deviation from this custom. He ascertained that his
+father was smoking his pipe on the porch. Then he went down the road and
+sat on the log near the shop to wait for the other boys who were to
+share the risks and profits of borrowing the hammer.
+
+All was still--so still! He fancied that he could hear the tumult of the
+torrent far away as it dashed over the rocks. A dog suddenly began to
+bark in the black, black valley--then ceased. He was vaguely over-awed
+with the "big mountings" for company and the distant stars. He listened
+eagerly for the first cracking of brush which told him that the other
+boys were near at hand. Then all three crept along cautiously among the
+huge boles of the trees, feeling very mysterious and important. When
+they reached the rude window, Ab sat for a moment on the sill, peering
+into the intense blackness within.
+
+"It air dark thar, fur true, Ab," said Jim Gryce, growing faint-hearted.
+"Let's go back."
+
+"Naw, sir! Naw, sir!" protested Ab resolutely. "I'm on the borry!"
+
+"How kin we find that thar leetle hammer in sech a dark place?" urged
+Jim.
+
+"Waal," explained Ab, in his high key, "dad air mightily welded ter his
+cranky notions. An' he always leaves every tool in the same place
+edzactly every night. Bound fur me!" he continued in shrill exultation
+as he slapped his lean leg, "I know whar that thar leetle hammer air
+sot ter roost!"
+
+He jumped down from the window inside the shop, and cut a wiry caper.
+
+"I'm a man o' bone and muscle!" he bragged. "Kin do ennything."
+
+The other boys followed more quietly. But they had only groped a little
+distance when Jim Gryce set up a sharp yelp of pain.
+
+"Shet yer mouth--ye pop-eyed catamount!" Ab admonished him. "Dad will
+hear an'--ah-h-h!" His own words ended in a shriek. "Oh, my!"
+vociferated the "man of bone and muscle," who was certainly, too, a man
+of extraordinary lung-power. "Oh, my! The ground is hot--hot ez iron!
+They always tole me that Satan would ketch me--an' oh, my! now he hev
+done it!"
+
+He joined the "pop-eyed catamount" in a lively dance with their bare
+feet on the hot iron bars which were scattered about the ground in every
+direction. These were heated artistically, so that they might not really
+scorch the flesh, but would touch the feelings, and perhaps the
+conscience. As the third boy's scream rent the air, and told that he,
+too, had encountered a torrid experience, Ab Ryder became suddenly aware
+that there was some one besides themselves in the shop. He could see
+nothing; he was only vaguely conscious of an unexpected presence, and he
+fancied that it was in the corner by the barrel of water.
+
+All at once a gruff voice broke forth. "I'm on the borry!" it remarked
+with fierce facetiousness. "I want ter borry a boy--no! a man o' bone
+an' muscle--fur 'bout a minit and a quarter!" A strong arm seized Ab by
+his collar. He felt himself swept through the air, soused head foremost
+into the barrel of water, then thrust into a corner, where he was
+thankful to find there was no more hot iron.
+
+"I want to borry another boy!" said the gruff voice. And the "pop-eyed
+catamount" was duly ducked.
+
+"'Twould pleasure me some ter borry another!" the voice declared with
+grim humor. But Ben was the youngest and smallest, and only led into
+mischief by the others. They never knew that the blacksmith relented
+when his turn came, and that he got a mere sprinkle in comparison with
+their total immersion.
+
+Then Stephen Ryder set out for home, followed by a dripping procession.
+"I'll l'arn ye ter 'borry' my tools 'thout leave!" he vociferated as he
+went along.
+
+When they had reached the house, he faced round sternly on Ab. "Whyn't
+ye kem an' tell me ez how the miller say I war a sneakin', deceivin'
+critter, an'--an'--an' a thief!"
+
+His wife dropped the dish she was washing, and it broke unheeded upon
+the hearth. Ab stretched his eyes and mouth in amazement.
+
+"Old Bob Peachin never tole me no sech word sence I been born!" he
+declared flatly.
+
+"Then what ailed ye ter go an' tell sech a lie ter Gryce's boys las'
+night jes' down thar outside o' the shop?" Stephen Ryder demanded.
+
+Ab stared at him, evidently bewildered.
+
+"Ye tole 'em," continued the blacksmith, striving to refresh his memory,
+"ez Bob Peachin say ez how ye mought know I war deceivin' by my bein'
+named Stephen--an' that I war the hongriest critter--an'"--
+
+"'Twar the t-a-a-a-rrier!" shouted Ab, "the little rat tarrier ez we war
+a-talkin' 'bout. He hev been named Steve these six year, old Bob say. He
+gimme the dog yestiddy, 'kase I 'lowed ez the rats war eatin' us out'n
+house an' home, an' my mother hed fed up that old cat o' our'n till he
+won't look at a mice. Old Bob warned me, though, ez Steve, _the
+tarrier_, air a mighty thief an' deceivin' ginerally. Old Bob say he
+reckons my mother will spile the dog with feedin' him, an' kill out what
+little good he hev got lef' in him with kindness. But I tuk him, an'
+brung him home ennyhow. An' las' night arter we hed got through talkin'
+'bout borryin' (he looked embarrassed) the leetle hammer, we tuk to
+talkin' 'bout the tarrier. An' yander he is now, asleep on the
+chil'ren's bed!"
+
+A long pause ensued.
+
+"M'ria," said the blacksmith meekly to his wife, "hev ye tuk notice how
+the gyarden truck air a-thrivin'? 'Pears like ter me ez the peas air
+a-fullin' up consider'ble."
+
+And so the subject changed.
+
+He had it on his conscience, however, to explain the matter to the
+miller. For the second time old Bob Peachin, and the men at the mill,
+"laffed mightily at dad." And when Ab had recovered sufficiently from
+the exhaustion attendant upon borrowing a hammer, he "laffed too."
+
+
+
+
+THE CONSCRIPTS' HOLLOW
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+"I'm a-goin' ter climb down ter that thar ledge, an' slip round ter the
+hollow whar them conscripts built thar fire in the old war times."
+
+Nicholas Gregory paused on the verge of the great cliff and cast a
+sidelong glance at Barney Pratt, who was beating about among the red
+sumach bushes in the woods close at hand, and now and then stooping to
+search the heaps of pine needles and dead leaves where they had been
+blown together on the ground.
+
+"Conscripts!" Barney ejaculated, with a chuckle. "That's precisely what
+them men war determinated _not_ ter be! They war a-hidin' in the
+mountings ter git shet o' the conscription."
+
+"Waal, I don't keer ef _ye_ names 'em 'conscripts' or no," Nicholas
+retorted loftily. "That's what other folks calls 'em. I'm goin' down ter
+the hollow, whar they built thar fire, ter see ef that old missin'
+tur-r-key-hen o' our'n hain't hid her nest off 'mongst them dead chunks,
+an' sech."
+
+"A tur-r-key ain't sech a powerful fool ez that," said Barney, coming to
+the edge of the precipice and looking over at the ledge, which ran along
+the face of the cliff twenty feet below. "How'd she make out ter fotch
+the little tur-r-keys up hyar, when they war hatched? They'd fall off'n
+the bluff."
+
+"A tur-r-key what hev stole her nest away from the folks air fool enough
+fur ennything," Nicholas declared.
+
+Perhaps he did not really expect to find the missing fowl in such an
+out-of-the-way place as this, but being an adventurous fellow, the sight
+of the crag was a temptation. He had often before clambered down to the
+ledge, which led to a great niche in the solid rock, where one night
+during the war some men who were hiding from the conscription had
+kindled their fire and cooked their scanty food. The charred remnants of
+logs were still here, but no one ever thought about them now, except the
+two boys, who regarded them as a sort of curiosity.
+
+Sometimes they came and stared at them, and speculated about them, and
+declared to each other that _they_ would not consider it a hardship to
+go a-soldiering.
+
+Then Nick would tell Barney of a wonderful day when he had driven to the
+county town in his uncle's wagon. There was a parade of militia there,
+and how grand the drum had sounded! And as he told it he would shoulder
+a smoke-blackened stick, and stride about in the Conscripts' Hollow, and
+feel very brave.
+
+He had no idea in those days how close at hand was the time when his own
+courage should be tried.
+
+"Kem on, Barney!" he urged. "Let's go down an' sarch fur the tur-r-key."
+
+But Barney had thrown himself down upon the crag with a long-drawn sigh
+of fatigue.
+
+"Waal," he replied, in a drowsy tone, "I dunno 'bout'n that. I'm sorter
+banged out, 'kase I hev had a powerful hard day's work a-bilin' sorghum
+at our house. I b'lieves I'll rest my bones hyar, an' wait fur ye."
+
+As he spoke, he rolled up one of the coats which they had both thrown
+off, during their search for the nest on the summit of the cliff, and
+slipped it under his head. He was far the brighter boy of the two, but
+his sharp wits seemed to thrive at the expense of his body. He was small
+and puny, and he was easily fatigued in comparison with big burly Nick,
+who rarely knew such a sensation, and prided himself upon his toughness.
+
+"Waal, Barney, surely ye air the porest little shoat on G'liath
+Mounting!" he exclaimed scornfully, as he had often done before. But he
+made no further attempt to persuade Barney, and began the descent alone.
+
+It was not so difficult a matter for a sure-footed mountaineer like
+Nick to make his way down to the ledge as one might imagine, for in a
+certain place the face of the cliff presented a series of jagged edges
+and projections which afforded him foothold. As he went along, too, he
+kept a strong grasp upon overhanging vines and bushes that grew out
+from earth-filled crevices.
+
+He had gone down only a short distance when he paused thoughtfully.
+"This hyar wind air blowin' powerful brief," he said. "I mought get
+chilled an' lose my footin'."
+
+He hardly liked to give up the expedition, but he was afraid to continue
+on his way in the teeth of the mountain wind, cold and strong in the
+October afternoon. If only he had his heavy jeans coat with him!
+
+"Barney!" he called out, intending to ask his friend to throw it over to
+him.
+
+There was no answer.
+
+"That thar Barney hev drapped off ter sleep a'ready!" he exclaimed
+indignantly.
+
+He chanced to glance upward as he was about to call again. There he saw
+a coat lying on the edge of the cliff, the dangling sleeve fluttering
+just within his reach. When he dragged it down and discovered that it
+was Barney's instead of his own, he was slightly vexed, but it
+certainly did not seem a matter of great importance.
+
+"That boy hev got _my_ coat, an' this is his'n. But law! I'd ruther
+squeeze myself small enough ter git inter his'n, than ter hev ter yell
+like a catamount fur an hour an' better ter wake him up, an' make him
+gimme mine."
+
+He seated himself on a narrow projection of the crag, and began to
+cautiously put on his friend's coat. He had need to be careful, for a
+precarious perch like this, with an unmeasured abyss beneath, the far
+blue sky above, the almost inaccessible face of a cliff on one side, and
+on the other a distant stretch of mountains, is not exactly the kind of
+place in which one would prefer to make a toilet. Besides the dangers of
+his position, he was anxious to do no damage to the coat, which although
+loose and baggy on Barney, was rather a close fit for Nick.
+
+"I ain't used ter climbin' with a coat on, nohow, an' I mus' be mighty
+keerful not ter bust Barney's, 'kase it air all the one he hev got," he
+said to himself as he clambered nimbly down to the ledge.
+
+Then he walked deftly along the narrow shelf, and as he turned abruptly
+into the immense niche in the cliff called the Conscripts' Hollow, he
+started back in sudden bewilderment. His heart gave a bound, and then it
+seemed to stand still.
+
+He hardly recognized the familiar place. There, to be sure, were the
+walls and the dome-like roof, but upon the dusty sandstone floor were
+scattered quantities of household articles, such as pots and pails and
+pans and kettles. There was a great array of brogans, too, and piles of
+blankets, and bolts of coarse unbleached cotton and jeans cloth.
+
+"Waal, sir!" he exclaimed, as he gazed at them with wild,
+uncomprehending eyes.
+
+Then the truth flashed upon him. A story had reached Goliath Mountain
+some weeks before, to the effect that a cross-roads store, some miles
+down the valley, had been robbed. The thieves had escaped with the
+stolen goods, leaving no clue by which they might be identified and
+brought to justice.
+
+Nick saw that he had made a discovery. Here it was that the robbers had
+contrived to conceal their plunder, doubtless intending to wait until
+suspicion lulled, when they could carry it to some distant place, where
+it could safely be sold.
+
+Suddenly a thought struck him that sent a shiver through every fibre of
+his body. This store was robbed in a singular manner. No bolt was
+broken,--no door burst open. There was a window, however, that lacked
+one pane of glass. The aperture would not admit a man's body. It was
+believed that the burglars had passed a boy through it, who had handed
+out the stolen goods.
+
+And now, Nick foolishly argued, if any one should discover that _he_
+knew where the plunder was hidden, they would believe that _he_ was that
+boy who had robbed the store!
+
+He began to resolve that he would say nothing about what he had
+seen,--not even to Barney. He thought his safety lay in his silence.
+Still, he did not want his silence to be to the advantage of wicked men,
+so he tried to persuade himself that the burglars would soon be traced
+and captured without the information which he knew it was his duty to
+give. "Ter be sartain, the officers will kem on this place arter a
+while," he said meditatively.
+
+Then he shook his head doubtfully. The crag was far from any house, and
+except the dwellers on Goliath Mountain, few people knew of this great
+niche in it. "They war sly foxes what stowed away thar plunder hyar!" he
+exclaimed in despair.
+
+Often, when Nick had before stood in the Conscripts' Hollow, he had
+imagined that he would make a good soldier. But his idea of a soldier
+was a fine uniform, and the ra-ta-ta of martial music. He had no
+conception of that high sense of duty which nerves a man to face danger;
+even now he did not know that he was a coward as he faltered and feared
+in the cause of right to encounter suspicion.
+
+Courage!--Nick thought that meant to crack away at a bear, if you were
+lucky enough to have the chance; or to kill a rattlesnake, if you had a
+big heavy stone close at hand; or to scramble about among crags and
+precipices, if you felt certain of the steadiness of your head and the
+strength of your muscles. But he did not realize that "courage" could
+mean the nerve to speak one little word for duty's sake.
+
+He would not speak the word,--he had determined on that,--for might they
+not think that _he_ was the boy who had robbed the store?
+
+He was quivering with excitement when he turned and began to walk along
+the ledge toward those roughly hewn natural steps by which he had
+descended. He knew that his agitation rendered his footing insecure. He
+was afraid of falling into the depths beneath, and he pressed close
+against the cliff.
+
+On the narrow ledge, hardly two yards distant from the Conscripts'
+Hollow, a clump of blackberry bushes was growing from a crevice in the
+rock. They had never before given him trouble; but now, as he brushed
+hastily past, they seemed to clutch at him with their thorny branches.
+
+As he tore away from them roughly, he did not observe that he had left a
+fragment of his brown jeans clothing hanging upon the thorns, as a
+witness to his presence here close to the Conscripts' Hollow, where the
+stolen goods lay hidden. There was a coarse, dark-colored horn button
+attached to the bit of brown jeans, which was a three-cornered scrap of
+his coat. No! of _Barney's_ coat. And was it to be a witness against
+poor Barney, who had not gone near the Conscripts' Hollow, but was lying
+asleep on the summit of the crag, supposing he had his own coat under
+his own head?
+
+He did not discover his mistake until some time afterward, for when Nick
+had slowly and laboriously climbed up the steep face of the cliff, he
+stripped off his friend's torn coat before he roused him. Barney was
+awakened by having his pillow dragged rudely from under his head, and
+when at last he reluctantly opened his eyes on the hazy yellow
+sunlight, and saw Nick standing near on the great gray crag, he had no
+idea that this moment was an important crisis in his life.
+
+The wind was coming up the gorge fresh and free; the autumnal foliage,
+swaying in it, was like the flaunting splendors of red and gold banners;
+the western ranges had changed from blue to purple, for the sun was
+sinking.
+
+"It's gittin' toler'ble late, Barney," said Nick. "Let's go." He had on
+his own coat now, and he was impatient to be off.
+
+"Did ye find the tur-r-key's nest in the Conscripts' Hollow?" asked
+Barney, with a lazy yawn, and still flat on his back.
+
+"No," said Nick curtly.
+
+Then it occurred to him that it would be safer if his friend should
+think he had not been in the Hollow. "No," he reiterated, after a pause,
+"I didn't go down ter the ledge arter all."
+
+He had begun to lie,--where would it end?
+
+"Whyn't you-uns go?" demanded Barney, surprised.
+
+"The wind war blowin' so powerful brief," Nick replied without a qualm.
+"So I jes' s'arched fur a while in the woods back thar a piece."
+
+In a moment more, Barney rose to his feet, picked up his coat, and put
+it on. He did not notice the torn place, for the garment was old and
+worn, and had many ragged edges. It lacked, however, but one button, and
+that missing button was attached to the triangular bit of brown jeans
+that fluttered on the thorny bush close to the Conscripts' Hollow.
+
+All unconscious of his loss, he went away in the rich autumnal sunset,
+leaving it there as a witness against him.
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+After this, Nicholas Gregory was very steady at his work for a while. He
+kept out of the woods as much as possible, and felt that he knew more
+already than was good for him. Above all, he avoided that big sandstone
+cliff and the Conscripts' Hollow, where the goods lay hidden.
+
+He heard no more of the search that had been made for the burglars and
+their booty, and he congratulated himself on his caution in keeping
+silent about what he had found.
+
+"Now, ef it hed been that thar wide-mouthed Barney, stid o' me, he'd hev
+blabbed fust thing, an' they'd all hev thunk ez he war the boy what them
+scoundrels put through the winder ter steal the folkses' truck. They'd
+hev jailed him, I reckon."
+
+He had begun to forget his own part in the wrong-doing,--that his
+silence was helping to screen "them scoundrels" from the law.
+
+This state of mind continued for a week, perhaps. Then he fell to
+speculating about the stolen goods. He wondered whether they were all
+there yet, or whether the burglars had managed to carry them away. His
+curiosity grew so great that several times he was almost at the point of
+going to see for himself; but one morning, early, when an opportunity
+to do so was suddenly presented, his courage failed him.
+
+His mother had just come into the log cabin from the hen-house with a
+woe-begone face.
+
+"I do declar'!" she exclaimed solemnly, "that I'm surely the
+afflictedest 'oman on G'liath Mounting! An' them young fall tur-r-keys
+air so spindlin' an' delikit they'll be the death o' me yit!"
+
+They were so spindling and delicate that they were the death of
+themselves. She had just buried three, and her heart and her larder were
+alike an aching void.
+
+"Three died ter-day, an' two las' Wednesday!" As she counted them on her
+fingers she honored each with a shake of the head, so mournful that it
+might be accounted an obituary in dumb show. "I hev had no sort'n luck
+with this tur-r-key's brood, an' the t'other hev stole her nest away,
+an' I hev got sech a mean no-'count set o' chillen they can't find her.
+Waal! waal! waal! this comin' winter the Lord'll be _obleeged_ ter
+pervide."
+
+This was washing-day, and as she began to scrub away on the noisy
+washboard, a sudden thought struck her. "Ye told me two weeks ago an'
+better, Nick, that ye hed laid off ter sarch the Conscripts' Hollow; ye
+'lowed ye hed been everywhar else. Did ye go thar fur the tur-r-key?"
+
+She faced him with her dripping arms akimbo.
+
+Nick's face turned red as he answered, "That thar tur-r-key ain't a-nigh
+thar."
+
+"What ails ye, Nick? thar's su'thin' wrong. I kin tell it by yer looks.
+Ye never hed the grit ter sarch thar, I'll be bound; did ye, now?"
+
+Nick could not bring himself to admit having been near the place.
+
+"No," he faltered, "I never sarched thar."
+
+"Ye'll do it now, though!" his mother declared triumphantly. "I'm afeard
+ter send Jacob on sech a yerrand down the bluffs, kase he air so little
+he mought fall; but he air big enough ter go 'long an' watch ye go down
+ter the Hollow--else ye'll kem back an' say ye hev sarched thar, when
+ye ain't been a-nigh the bluff."
+
+There seemed for a moment no escape for Nick. His mother was looking
+resolutely at him, and Jacob had gotten up briskly from his seat in the
+chimney-corner. He was a small tow-headed boy with big owlish eyes, and
+Nick knew from experience that they were very likely to see anything he
+did _not_ do. He must go; and then if at any time the stolen goods
+should be discovered, Jacob and his mother, and who could say how many
+besides, would know that he had been to the Conscripts' Hollow, and must
+have seen what was hidden there.
+
+In that case his silence on the subject would be very suspicious. It
+would seem as if he had some connection with the burglars, and for that
+reason tried to conceal the plunder.
+
+He was saying to himself that he would not go--and he must! How could he
+avoid it? As he glanced uneasily around the room, his eyes chanced to
+fall on a little object lying on the edge of the shelf just above the
+washtub. He made the most of the opportunity. As he slung his hat upon
+his head with an impatient gesture, he managed to brush the shelf with
+it and knock the small object into the foaming suds below.
+
+His mother sank into a chair with uplifted hands and eyes.
+
+"The las' cake o' hop yeast!" she cried. "An' how air the bread ter be
+raised?"
+
+To witness her despair, one would think only jack-screws could do it.
+
+"Surely I _am_ the afflictedest 'oman on G'liath Mounting! An'
+ter-morrer Brother Pete's wife an' his gals air a-comin', and I hed laid
+off ter hev raised bread."
+
+For "raised bread" is a great rarity and luxury in these parts, the
+nimble "dodgers" being the staff of life.
+
+"I never went ter do it," muttered Nick.
+
+"Waal, ye kin jes' kerry yer bones down the mounting ter Sister
+Mirandy's house, an' ax her ter fotch me a cake o' her yeast when she
+kems up hyar ter-day ter holp me sizin' yarn. Arter that I don't keer
+what ye does with yerself. Ef ye stays hyar along o' we-uns, ye'll haul
+the roof down nex', I reckon. 'Pears like ter me ez boys an' men-folks
+air powerful awk'ard, useless critters ter keep in a house; they oughter
+hev pens outside, I'm a-thinkin'."
+
+She had forgotten about the turkey, and Nick was glad enough to escape
+on these terms.
+
+It was not until after he had finished his errand at Aunt Mirandy's
+house that he chanced to think again of the Conscripts' Hollow. As he
+was slowly lounging back up the mountain, he paused occasionally on the
+steep slope and looked up at the crags high on the summit, which he
+could see, now and then, diagonally across a deep cove.
+
+When he came in sight of the one which he had such good reason to
+remember, he stopped and stood gazing fixedly at it for a long time,
+wondering again whether the robbers had yet carried off their plunder
+from its hiding-place.
+
+He was not too distant to distinguish the Conscripts' Hollow, but from
+his standpoint, he could not at first determine where was the ledge. He
+thought he recognized it presently in a black line that seemed drawn
+across the massive cliff.
+
+But what was that upon it? A moving figure! He gazed at it spell-bound
+for a moment, as it slowly made its way along toward the Hollow. Then he
+wanted to see no more; he wanted to know no more. He turned and fled at
+full speed along the narrow cow-path among the bushes.
+
+Suddenly there was a rustle among them. Something had sprung out into
+the path with a light bound, and as he ran, he heard a swift step behind
+him. It seemed a pursuing step, for, as he quickened his pace, it came
+faster too. It was a longer stride than his; it was gaining upon him. A
+hand with a grip like a vise fell upon his shoulder, and as he was
+whirled around and brought face to face with his pursuer, he glanced up
+and recognized the constable of the district.
+
+This was a tall, muscular man, dressed in brown jeans, and with a bushy
+red beard. He knew Nick well, for he, too, was a mountaineer.
+
+"Ye war a-dustin' along toler'ble fast, Nicholas Gregory," he exclaimed;
+"but nothin' on G'liath Mounting kin beat me a-runnin' 'thout it air a
+deer. Ye'll kem along with me now, and stir yer stumps powerful lively,
+too, kase I hain't got no time ter lose."
+
+"What am I tuk up fur?" gasped Nick.
+
+"S'picious conduc'," replied the man curtly.
+
+Nick knew no more now than he did before. The officer's next words made
+matters plainer. "Things look mightily like ye war set hyar ter watch
+that thar ledge. Ez soon ez ye seen our men a-goin' ter the Conscripts'
+Hollow ter sarch fur that thar stole truck, ye war a-goin' ter scuttle
+off an' gin the alarm ter them rascally no-'count burglars. I saw ye and
+yer looks, and I suspicioned some sech game. Ye don't cheat the law in
+_this_ deestrick--not often! Ye air the very boy, I reckon, what
+holped ter rob Blenkins's store. Whar's the other burglars? Ye'd better
+tell!"
+
+"I dunno!" cried Nick tremulously. "I never had nothin' ter do with
+'em."
+
+"Ye hev told on yerself," the man retorted. "Why did ye stand a-gapin'
+at the Conscripts' Hollow, ef ye didn't know thar was suthin special
+thar?"
+
+Nick, in his confusion, could invent no reply, and he was afraid to tell
+the truth. He looked mutely at the officer, who held his arm and looked
+down sternly at him.
+
+"Ye air a bad egg,--that's plain. I'll take ye along whether I ketches
+the other burglars or no."
+
+They toiled up the steep ascent in silence, and before very long were on
+the summit of the mountain, and within view of the crag.
+
+There on the great gray cliff, in the midst of the lonely woods, were
+several men whom Nick had never before seen. Their busy figures were
+darkly defined against the hazy azure of the distant ranges, and as they
+moved about, their shadows on the ground seemed very busy too, and
+blotted continually the golden sunshine that everywhere penetrated the
+thinning masses of red and bronze autumn foliage.
+
+A wagon, close at hand, was already half full of the stolen goods, and a
+number of men were going cautiously up and down the face of the cliff,
+bringing articles, or passing them from one to another.
+
+"Well, this _is_ a tedious job!" exclaimed the sheriff, John Stebbins by
+name. He was a quick-witted, good-natured man, but being active in
+temperament, he was exceedingly impatient of delay. "How long did it
+take 'em to get all those heavy things down into the Conscripts'
+Hollow,--hey, bub?" he added, appealing to Nick, who had been brought to
+his notice by the constable. It was terrible to Nick that they should
+all speak to him as if he were one of the criminals. He broke out with
+wild protestations of his innocence, denying, too, that he had had any
+knowledge of what was hidden in the Conscripts' Hollow.
+
+"Then what made ye run, yander on the slope, when ye seen thar war
+somebody on the ledge?" demanded the constable.
+
+Nick had a sudden inspiration. "Waal," he faltered, with an explanatory
+sob, which was at once ludicrous and pathetic, "I war too fur off ter
+make out fur sure what 'twar on the ledge. 'Twar black-lookin', an' I
+'lowed 'twar a b'ar."
+
+All the men laughed at this.
+
+"I sot out ter run ter Aunt Mirandy's house ter borry Job's gun ter kem
+up hyar, an' mebbe git a crack at him," continued Nick.
+
+"That doesn't seem unnatural," said the sheriff. Then he turned to the
+constable. "This ain't enough to justify us in holding on to the boy,
+Jim, unless we can fix that scrap with the button on him. Where is it?"
+
+"D'ye know whose coat this kem off'n?" asked the constable, producing a
+bit of brown jeans, with a dark-colored horn button attached to it.
+"How'd it happen ter be stickin' ter them blackberry-bushes on the
+ledge?"
+
+Nick recognized it in an instant. It was Barney Pratt's button, and a
+bit of Barney Pratt's coat. But he knew well enough that he himself must
+have torn it when he wore it down to the Conscripts' Hollow.
+
+He realized that he should have at once told the whole truth of what he
+knew about the stolen goods. He was well aware that he ought not to
+suffer the suspicion which had unjustly fallen upon him to be unjustly
+transferred to Barney, who he knew was innocent.
+
+But he was terribly frightened, and foolishly cautious, and he did not
+care for justice, nor truth, nor friendship, now. His only anxiety was
+to save himself.
+
+"That thar piece o' brown jeans an' that button kem off'n Barney Pratt's
+coat. I'd know 'em anywhar," he answered, more firmly than before. He
+noted the fact that the searching eyes of both officers were fixed upon
+his own coat, which was good and whole, and lacked no buttons. He had
+not even a twinge of conscience just now. In his meanness and cowardice
+his heart exulted, as he saw that suspicion was gradually lifting its
+dark shadow from him. He cared not where it might fall next.
+
+"We'll have to let you slide, I reckon," said the sheriff. "But what
+size is this Barney Pratt?"
+
+"He air a lean, stringy little chap," said Nick.
+
+"Is that so?" said the sheriff. "Well, this is a bit of his coat and his
+button; and they were found on the ledge, close to the Conscripts'
+Hollow where the plunder was hid; and he's a small fellow, that maybe
+could slip through a window-pane. That makes a pretty strong showing
+against him. We'll go for Barney Pratt!"
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+Barney Pratt expected this day to be a holiday. Very early in the
+morning his father and mother had jolted off in the wagon to attend the
+wedding of a cousin, who lived ten miles distant on a neighboring
+mountain, and they had left him no harder task than to keep the
+children far enough from the fire, and his paralytic grandmother close
+enough to it.
+
+This old woman was of benevolent intentions, although she had a stick
+with which she usually made her wants known by pointing, and in her
+convulsive clutch the stick often whirled around and around like the
+sails of a windmill, so that if Barney chanced to come within the circle
+it described, he got as hard knocks from her feeble arm as he could have
+had in a tussle with big Nick Gregory.
+
+He was used to dodging it, and so were the smaller children. Without any
+fear of it they were all sitting on the hearth at the old woman's
+feet,--Ben and Melissa popping corn in the ashes, and Tom and Andy
+watching Barney's deft fingers as he made a cornstalk fiddle for them.
+
+Suddenly Barney glanced up and saw his grandmother's stick whirling over
+his head. Her eyes were fastened eagerly upon the window, and her lips
+trembled as she strove to speak.
+
+"What d'ye want, granny?" he asked.
+
+Then at last it came out, quick and sharp, and in a convulsive
+gasp,--"Who air all that gang o'folks a-comin' yander down the road?"
+
+Barney jumped up, threw down the fiddle, and ran to the door with the
+children at his heels. There was a quiver of curiosity among them, for
+it was a strange thing that a "gang o'folks" should be coming down this
+lonely mountain road.
+
+They went outside of the log cabin and stood among the red sumach bushes
+that clustered about the door, while the old woman tottered after them
+to the threshold, and peered at the crowd from under her shaking hand as
+she shaded her eyes from the sunlight.
+
+Presently a wagon came up with eight or ten men walking behind it, or
+riding in it in the midst of a quantity of miscellaneous articles of
+which Barney took no particular notice. As he went forward, smiling in
+a frank, fearless way, he recognized a familiar face among the crowd. It
+was Nick Gregory's, and Barney's smile broadened into a grin of pleasure
+and welcome.
+
+Then it was that Nick's conscience began to wake up, and to lay hold
+upon him.
+
+As the sheriff looked at Barney he hesitated. He balanced himself
+heavily on the wheel, instead of leaping quickly down as he might have
+done easily enough, for he was a spare man and light on his feet. Nick
+overheard him speak in a low voice to the constable, who stood just
+below.
+
+"_That_ ain't the fellow, is it, Jim?"
+
+"That's him, percisely," responded Jim Dow.
+
+"He don't _look_ like it," said Stebbins, jumping down at last, but
+still speaking under his breath.
+
+"Waal, thar ain't no countin' on boys by the _outside_ on 'em," returned
+the constable emphatically; he had an unruly son of his own.
+
+The sheriff walked up to Barney.
+
+"You're Barney Pratt, are you? Well, youngster, you'll come along with
+us."
+
+There was silence for a moment. Barney stared at him in amaze. Not until
+he had caught sight of the constable, whom he knew in his official
+character, did he understand the full meaning of what had been said. He
+was under arrest!
+
+As he realized it, everything began to whirl before him. The yellow
+sunshine, the gorgeously tinted woods, the blue sky, and the silvery
+mists hovering about the distant mountains, were all confusedly mingled
+in his failing vision.
+
+He looked as if he were about to faint. But in a few minutes he had
+partially recovered himself.
+
+"I dunno what this air done ter me fur," he said tremulously, glancing
+up at the officer whose hand was on his shoulder.
+
+"Hain't ye been doin' nothin' mean lately?" demanded Jim Dow sternly.
+
+Barney shook his head.
+
+"Let's see ef this won't remind ye," said the constable, producing the
+bit of jeans and the button.
+
+As Nick watched Barney turning the piece of cloth in his hand and
+examining the button, he felt a terrible pang of remorse. But he was
+none the less resolved to keep the freedom from danger which he had
+secured at the expense of his friend. To explain would be merely to
+exchange places with Barney, and he was silent.
+
+"This hyar looks like a scrap o' my coat," said Barney, utterly unaware
+of the significance of his words. As he fitted it into the jagged edges
+of the garment, the officers watched the proceeding closely. "'Pears
+like ter me ez it war jerked right out thar--yes--kase hyar air the
+missin' button, too."
+
+His air of unconsciousness puzzled the sheriff. "Do you know where you
+lost this scrap?" he asked.
+
+"Somewhars 'mongst the briers in the woods, I reckon," replied Barney.
+
+"No; you tore it on a blackberry bush on the ledge of a bluff; it was
+close to the Conscripts' Hollow, where some burglars have hidden stolen
+plunder. I found the scrap and the button there myself."
+
+Barney felt as if he were dreaming. How should his coat be torn on that
+ledge, where he had not been since the cloth was woven!
+
+The next words almost stunned him.
+
+"Ye see, sonny," said the constable, "we believes ye're the boy what
+holped to rob Blenkins's store by gittin' through a winder-pane an'
+handin' out the stole truck ter the t'other burglars. Ye hev holped
+about that thar plunder somehows,--else this hyar thing air a liar!" and
+he shook the bit of cloth significantly.
+
+"We'd better set out, Jim," said Stebbins, turning toward the wagon.
+"We'll pass Blenkins's on the way, and we'll stop and see if this chap
+can slip through the window-pane. If he can't, it's a point in his
+favor, and if he can, it's a point against him. As we go, we can try to
+get him to tell who the other burglars are."
+
+"Kem on, bubby; we can't stand hyar no longer, a-wastin' the time an'
+a-burnin' of daylight," said the constable.
+
+Barney seemed to have lost control of his rigid limbs, and he was
+half-dragged, half-lifted into the wagon by the two officers. The crowd
+began to fall back and disperse, and he could see the group of
+"home-folks" at the door. But he gave only one glance at the little log
+cabin, and then turned his head away. It was a poor home, but if it had
+been a palace, the pang he felt as he was torn from it could not have
+been sharper.
+
+In that instant he saw granny as she stood in the doorway, her head
+shaking nervously and her stick whirling in her uncertain grasp. He knew
+that she was struggling to say something for his comfort, and he had a
+terrible moment of fear lest the wagon should begin to move and her
+feeble voice be lost in the clatter of the wheels. But presently her
+shrill tones rang out, "No harm kin kem, sonny, ter them ez hev done no
+harm. All that happens works tergether fur good, an' the will o' God."
+
+Little breath as she had left, it had done good service to-day,--it had
+brought a drop of balm to the poor boy's heart. He did not look at her
+again, but he knew that she was still standing in the doorway among the
+clustering red leaves, whirling her stick, and shaking with the palsy,
+but determined to see the last of him.
+
+And now the wagon was rolling off, and a piteous wail went up from the
+children, who understood nothing except that Barney was being carried
+away against his will. Little four-year-old Melissa--she always seemed a
+beauty to Barney, with her yellow hair, and her blue-checked cotton
+dress, and her dimpled white bare feet--ran after the wagon until the
+tears blinded her, and she fell in the road, and lay there in the dust,
+sobbing.
+
+Then Barney found his voice. His father and mother would not return
+until to-morrow, and the thought of what might happen at home, with
+nobody there but the helpless old grandmother and the little children,
+made him forget his own troubles for the time.
+
+"Take good keer o' the t'other chillen, Andy!" he shouted out to the
+next oldest boy, thus making him a deputy-guardian of the family, "an'
+pick Melissy up out'n the dust, an' be sure ye keeps granny's cheer
+close enough ter the fire!"
+
+Then he turned back again. He could still hear Melissa sobbing. He
+wondered why the two men in the wagon looked persistently in the
+opposite direction, and why they were both so silent.
+
+The children stood in the road, watching the wagon as long as they could
+see it, but Nick had slunk away into the woods. He could not bear the
+sight of their grief. He walked on, hardly knowing where he went. He
+felt as if he were trying to get rid of himself. He appreciated fully
+now the consequences of what he had done. Barney, innocent Barney, would
+be thrust into jail.
+
+He began to see that the most terrible phase of moral cowardice is its
+capacity to injure others, and he could not endure the thought of what
+he had brought upon his friend. Soon he was saying to himself that
+something was sure to happen to prevent them from putting Barney in
+prison,--he shouldn't be surprised if it were to happen before the wagon
+could reach the foot of the mountain.
+
+In his despair, he had flung himself at length upon the rugged, stony
+ground at the base of a great crag. When this comforting thought of
+Barney's release came upon him, he took his hands from his face, and
+looked about him. From certain ledges of the cliff above, the road which
+led down the valley was visible at intervals for some distance. There he
+could watch the progress of the wagon, and see for a time longer what
+was happening to Barney.
+
+There was a broad gulf between the wall of the mountain and the crag,
+which, from its detached position and its shape, was known far and wide
+as the "Old Man's Chimney."
+
+It loomed up like a great stone column, a hundred feet above the wooded
+slope where Nick stood, and its height could only be ascended by
+dexterous climbing.
+
+He went at it like a cat. Sometimes he helped himself up by sharp
+projections of the rock, sometimes by slipping his feet and hands into
+crevices, and sometimes he caught hold of a strong bush here and there,
+and gave himself a lift. When he was about forty feet from the base, he
+sat down on one of the ledges, and turning, looked anxiously along the
+red clay road which he could see winding among the trees down the
+mountain's side.
+
+No wagon was there.
+
+His eyes followed the road further and further toward the foot of the
+range, and then along the valley beyond. There, at least two miles
+distant, was a small moving black object, plainly defined upon the red
+clay of the road.
+
+Barney was gone! There was no mistake about it. They had taken him away
+from Goliath Mountain! He was innocent, and Nick knew it, and Nick had
+made him seem guilty. There was no one near him now to speak a good word
+for him, not even his palsied old grandmother.
+
+It all came back upon Nick with a rush. His eyes were blurred with
+rising tears. Unconsciously, in his grief, he made a movement forward,
+and suddenly clutched convulsively at the ledge.
+
+He had lost his balance. There was a swift, fantastic whirl of vague
+objects before him, then a great light seemed flashing through his very
+brain, and he knew that he was falling.
+
+He knew nothing else for some time. He wondered where he was when he
+first opened his eyes and saw the great stone shaft towering high above,
+and the tops of the sun-gilded maples waving about him.
+
+Then he remembered and understood. He had fallen from that narrow ledge,
+hardly ten feet above his head, and had been caught in his descent by
+the far broader one upon which he lay.
+
+"It knocked the senses out'n me fur a while, I reckon," he said to
+himself. "But I hev toler'ble luck now, sure ez shootin', kase I mought
+hev drapped over this ledge, an' then I'd hev been gone fur sartain
+sure!"
+
+His exultation was short-lived. What was this limp thing hanging to his
+shoulder? and what was this thrill of pain darting through it?
+
+He looked at it in amazement. It was his strong right
+arm--broken--helpless.
+
+And here he was, perched thirty feet above the earth, weakened by his
+long faint, sore and bruised and unnerved by his fall, and with only his
+left arm to aid him in making that perilous descent.
+
+It was impossible. He glanced down at the sheer walls of the column
+below, shook his head, and lay back on the ledge. Reckless as he was, he
+realized that the attempt would be fatal.
+
+Then came a thought that filled him with dismay,--how long was this to
+last?--who would rescue him?
+
+He knew that a prolonged absence from home would create no surprise. His
+mother would only fancy that he had slipped off, as he had often done,
+to go on a camp-hunt with some other boys. She would not grow uneasy for
+a week, at least.
+
+He was deep in the heart of the forest, distant from any dwelling. No
+one, as far as he knew, came to this spot, except himself and Barney,
+and their errand here was for the sake of the exhilaration and the
+hazard of climbing the crag. It was so lonely that on the Old Man's
+Chimney the eagles built instead of the swallows. His hope--his only
+hope--was that some hunter might chance to pass before he should die of
+hunger.
+
+The shadow of the great obelisk shifted as the day wore on, and left him
+in the broad, hot glare of the sun. His broken arm was fevered and gave
+him great pain. Now and then he raised himself on the other, and looked
+down wistfully at the cool, dusky depths of the woods. He heard
+continually the impetuous rushing of a mountain torrent near at hand;
+sometimes, when the wind stirred the foliage, he caught a glimpse of the
+water, rioting from rock to rock, and he was oppressed by an intolerable
+thirst.
+
+Thus the hours lagged wearily on.
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+When the wagon was rolling along the road in the valley, Barney at first
+kept his eyes persistently fastened upon the craggy heights and the red
+and gold autumnal woods of Goliath Mountain, as the mighty range
+stretched across the plain.
+
+But presently the two men began to talk to him, and he turned around in
+order to face them. They were urging him to confess his own guilt and
+tell who were the other burglars, and where they were. But Barney had
+nothing to tell. He could only protest again and again his innocence.
+The men, however, shook their heads incredulously, and after a while
+they left him to himself and smoked their pipes in silence.
+
+When Barney looked back at the mountains once more, a startling change
+seemed to have been wrought in the landscape. Instead of the frowning
+sandstone cliffs he loved so well, and the gloomy recesses of the woods,
+there was only a succession of lines of a delicate blue color drawn
+along the horizon. This was the way the distant ranges looked from the
+crags of his own home; he knew that they were the mountains, but which
+was Goliath?
+
+Suddenly he struck his hands together, and broke out with a bitter cry.
+
+"I hev los' G'liath!" he exclaimed. "I dunno whar I live! An' whar _is_
+Melissy?"
+
+A difficult undertaking, certainly, to determine where among all those
+great spurs and outliers, stretching so far on either hand, was that
+little atom of dimpled pink-and-white humanity known as "Melissy."
+
+The constable, being a native of these hills himself, knew something by
+experience of the homesickness of an exiled mountaineer,--far more
+terrible than the homesickness of low-landers; he took his pipe
+promptly from between his lips, and told the boy that the second blue
+ridge, counting down from the sky, was "G'liath Mounting," and that
+"Melissy war right thar somewhar."
+
+Barney looked back at it with unrecognizing eyes,--this gentle, misty,
+blue vagueness was not the solemn, sombre mountain that he knew. He
+gazed at it only for a moment longer; then his heart swelled and he
+burst into tears.
+
+On and on they went through the flat country. The boy felt that he could
+scarcely breathe. Even tourists, coming down from these mountains to the
+valley below, struggle with a sense of suffocation and oppression; how
+must it have been then with this half-wild creature, born and bred on
+those breezy heights!
+
+The stout mules did their duty well, and it was not long before they
+were in sight of the cross-roads store that had been robbed. It was a
+part of a small frame dwelling-house, set in the midst of the yellow
+sunlight that brooded over the plain. All the world around it seemed to
+the young backwoodsman to be a big cornfield; but there was a garden
+close at hand, and tall sunflowers looked over the fence and seemed to
+nod knowingly at Barney, as much as to say they had always suspected
+him of being one of the burglars, and were gratified that he had been
+caught at last.
+
+Poor fellow! he saw so much suspicion expressed in the faces of a crowd
+of men congregating about the store, that it was no wonder he fancied he
+detected it too in inanimate objects.
+
+Of all the group only one seemed to doubt his guilt. He overheard
+Blenkins, the merchant, say to Jim Dow,--
+
+"It's mighty hard to b'lieve this story on this 'ere boy; he's a manly
+looking, straight-for'ard little chap, an' he's got honest eyes in his
+head, too."
+
+"He'd a deal better hev an honest heart in his body," drawled Jim Dow,
+who was convinced that Barney had aided in the burglary.
+
+When they had gone around to the window with the broken pane, Barney
+looked up at it in great anxiety. If only it should prove too small for
+him to slip through! Certainly it seemed very small.
+
+He had pulled off his coat and stood ready to jump.
+
+"Up with you!" said Stebbins.
+
+The boy laid both hands on the sill, gave a light spring, and went
+through the pane like an eel.
+
+"That settles it!" he heard Stebbins saying outside. And all the idlers
+were laughing because it was done so nimbly.
+
+"That boy's right smart of a fool," said one of the lookers-on. "Now, if
+that had been me, I'd hev made out to git stuck somehows in that winder;
+I'd have scotched my wheel somewhere."
+
+"Ef ye hed, I'd have dragged ye through ennyhow," declared Jim Dow, who
+had no toleration of a joke on a serious subject. "This hyar boy air a
+deal too peart ter try enny sech fool tricks on _Me_!"
+
+Barney hardly knew how he got back into the wagon; he only knew that
+they were presently jolting along once more in the midst of the yellow
+glare of sunlight. It had begun to seem that there was no chance for
+him. Like Nick, he too had madly believed, in spite of everything, that
+something would happen to help him. He could not think that, innocent as
+he was, he would be imprisoned. Now, however, this fate evidently was
+very close upon him.
+
+Suddenly Jim Dow spoke. "I s'pose ye war powerful disapp'inted kase ye
+couldn't git yerself hitched in that thar winder; ye air too well used
+to it,--ye hev been through it afore."
+
+"I hev never been through it afore!" cried Barney indignantly.
+
+"Well, well," said Stebbins pacifically, "it wouldn't have done you any
+good if you hadn't gone through the pane just now. I'd have only thought
+you were one of those who stood on the outside. You see, the _main_
+point against you is that scrap of your coat and your button found right
+there by the Conscripts' Hollow,--though, of course, your going through
+the window-pane so easy makes it more complete."
+
+Barney's tired brain began to fumble at this problem,--how did it
+happen?
+
+He had not been on the ledge nor at the Conscripts' Hollow for six
+months at least. Yet there was that bit of his coat and his button found
+on the bush close at hand only to-day.
+
+Was it possible that he could have exchanged coats by mistake with Nick
+the last afternoon that they were on the crag together?
+
+"Did Nick wear _my_ coat down on the ledge, I wonder, an' git it tored?
+Did Nick see the plunder in the Conscripts' Hollow, an' git skeered, an'
+then sot out ter lyin' ter git shet o' the blame?"
+
+As he asked himself these questions, he began to remember, vaguely,
+having seen, just as he was falling asleep, his friend's head slowly
+disappearing beneath the verge of the crag.
+
+"Nick started down ter the ledge, anyhow," he argued.
+
+Did he dream it, or was it true, that when Nick came back he seemed at
+first strangely agitated?
+
+All at once Barney exclaimed aloud,--
+
+"This hyar air a powerful cur'ous thing 'bout'n that thar piece what war
+tored out'n my coat!"
+
+"What's curious about it?" asked Stebbins quickly.
+
+Jim Dow took his pipe from his mouth, and looked sharply at the boy.
+
+Barney struggled for a moment with a strong temptation. Then a nobler
+impulse asserted itself. He would not even attempt to shield himself
+behind the friend who had done him so grievous an injury.
+
+He _knew_ nothing positively; he must not put his suspicions and his
+vague, half-sleeping impressions into words, and thus possibly criminate
+Nick.
+
+He himself felt certain now how the matter really stood,--that Nick had
+no connection whatever with the robbery, but having accidentally
+stumbled upon the stolen goods, he had become panic-stricken, had lied
+about it, and finally had saved himself at the expense of an innocent
+friend.
+
+Still, Barney had no _proof_ of this, and he felt he would rather suffer
+unjustly himself than unjustly throw blame on another.
+
+"Nothin', nothin'," he said absently. "I war jes' a-studyin' 'bout'n it
+all."
+
+"Well, I wouldn't think about it any more just now," said good-natured
+Stebbins. "You look like you had been dragged through a keyhole instead
+of a window-pane. This town we're coming to is the biggest town you ever
+saw."
+
+Barney could not respond to this attempt to divert his attention. He
+could only brood upon the fact that he was innocent, and would be
+punished as if he were guilty, and that it was Nick Gregory, his chosen
+friend, who had brought him to this pass.
+
+He would not be unmanly, and injure Nick with a possibly unfounded
+suspicion, but his heart burned with indignation and contempt when he
+thought of him. He felt that he would go through fire and water to be
+justly revenged upon him.
+
+He determined that, if ever he should see Nick again, even though years
+might intervene, he would tax him with the injury he had wrought, and
+make him answer for it.
+
+Barney clenched his fists as he looked back at the ethereal blue shadows
+that they said were the solid old hills.
+
+Perhaps, however, if he had known where, in the misty uncertainty that
+enveloped Goliath Mountain, Nick Gregory was at this moment,--far away
+in the lonely woods, helpless with his broken arm, perched high up on
+the "Old Man's Chimney,"--Barney might have thought himself the more
+fortunately placed of the two.
+
+Before he was well aware of it, the wagon was jolting into the town. He
+took no notice of how much larger the little village was than any he had
+ever seen before. His attention was riveted by the faces of the people
+who ran to the doors and windows, upon recognizing the officers, to
+stare at him as one of the burglars.
+
+When the wagon reached the public square, a number of men came up and
+stopped it.
+
+Barney was surprised that they took so little notice of him. They were
+talking loudly and excitedly to the officers, who grew at once loud and
+excited, too.
+
+The boy roused himself, and began to listen to the conversation. The
+burglars had been captured!--yes, that was what they were saying. The
+deputy-sheriff had nabbed the whole gang in a western district of the
+county this morning early, and they were lodged at this moment in jail.
+Barney's heart sank. Would he be put among the guilty creatures? He
+flinched from the very idea.
+
+Suddenly, here was the deputy-sheriff himself, a young man, dusty and
+tired with his long, hard ride, but with an air of great satisfaction in
+his success. He talked with many quick gestures that were very
+expressive. Sometimes he would leave a sentence unfinished except by a
+brisk nod, but all the crowd caught its meaning instantly. This
+peculiarity gave him a very animated manner, and he seemed to Barney to
+enjoy being in a position of authority.
+
+He pressed his foaming horse close to the wagon, and leaning over,
+looked searchingly into Barney's face.
+
+The poor boy looked up deprecatingly from under his limp and drooping
+hat-brim.
+
+All the crowd stood in silence, watching them. After a moment of this
+keen scrutiny, the deputy turned to the constable with an interrogative
+wave of the hand.
+
+"This hyar's the boy what war put through the winder-pane ter thieve
+from Blenkins," said Jim Dow. "Thar's consider'ble fac's agin him."
+
+"You mean well, Jim," said the deputy, with a short, scornful laugh.
+"But your performance ain't always equal to your intentions."
+
+He lifted his eyebrows and nodded in a significant way that the crowd
+understood, for there was a stir of excitement in its midst; but poor
+Barney failed to catch his meaning. He hung upon every tone and gesture
+with the intensest interest. All the talk was about him, and he could
+comprehend no more than if the man spoke in a foreign language.
+
+Still, he gathered something of the drift of the speech from the
+constable's reply.
+
+"That thar boy's looks hev bamboozled more'n one man ter-day, jes' at
+fust," Jim Dow drawled. "_Looks_ ain't nothin'."
+
+"I'd believe 'most anything a boy with a face on him like that would
+tell me," said the deputy. "And besides, you see, one of those scamps,"
+with a quick nod toward the jail, "has turned State's evidence."
+
+Barney's heart was in a great tumult. It seemed bursting. There was a
+hot rush of blood to his head. He was dizzy--and he could not
+understand!
+
+State's evidence,--what was that? and what would that do to him?
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+Barney observed that these words produced a marked sensation. The crowd
+began to press more closely around the deputy-sheriff's foaming horse.
+
+"Who hev done turned State's evidence?" asked Jim Dow.
+
+"Little Jeff Carew,--you've seen that puny little man a-many a
+time--haven't you, Jim? He'd go into your pocket."
+
+"He would, I know, powerful quick, ef he thunk I hed ennything in it,"
+said Jim, with a gruff laugh.
+
+"I didn't mean that, though it's true enough. I only went ter say that
+he's small enough to go into any ordinary-sized fellow's pocket. Some of
+the rest of them wanted to turn State's evidence, but they weren't
+allowed. They were harder customers even than Jeff Carew,--regular old
+jail-birds."
+
+Barney began to vaguely understand that when a prisoner confesses the
+crime he has committed, and gives testimony which will convict his
+partners in it, this is called turning "State's evidence."
+
+But how was it to concern Barney?
+
+An old white-haired man had pushed up to the wagon; he polished his
+spectacles on his coat-tail, then put them on his nose, and focused them
+on Barney. Those green spectacles seemed to the boy to have a solemnly
+accusing expression on their broad and sombre lenses. He shrank as the
+old man spoke,--
+
+"And is this the boy who was slipped through the window to steal from
+Blenkins?"
+
+"No," said the deputy, "this ain't the boy."
+
+Barney could hardly believe his senses.
+
+"Fact is," continued the deputy, with a brisk wave of his hand, "there
+wasn't any boy with 'em,--so little Jeff Carew says. _He_ jumped through
+the window-pane _himself_. We wouldn't believe that until we measured
+one there at the jail of the same size as Blenkins's window-glass, and
+he went through it without a wriggle."
+
+Barney sprang to his feet.
+
+"Oh, tell it ter me, folkses!" he cried wildly; "tell it ter me,
+somebody! Will they keep me hyar all the same? An' when will I see
+G'liath Mounting agin, an' be whar Melissy air?"
+
+He had burst into tears, and there was a murmur of sympathy in the
+crowd.
+
+"Oh, that lets you out, I reckon, youngster," said Stebbins. "I'm glad
+enough of it for one."
+
+The old man turned his solemnly accusing green spectacles on Stebbins,
+and it seemed to Barney that he spoke with no less solemnly accusing a
+voice.
+
+"He ought never to have been let in."
+
+Stebbins replied, rather eagerly, Barney thought, "Why, there was enough
+against that boy to have clapped him in jail, and maybe convicted him,
+if this man hadn't turned State's evidence."
+
+"We hed the fac's agin him,--dead agin him," chimed in Jim Dow.
+
+"That just shows how much danger an innocent boy was in; it seems to me
+that somebody ought to have been more careful," the old man protested.
+
+"That's so!" came in half a dozen voices from the crowd.
+
+Barney was surprised to see how many friends he had now, when a moment
+before he had had none. But he ought to have realized that there is a
+great difference between _being_ a young martyr, and _seeming_ a young
+thief.
+
+"I want to see the little fellow out of this," said the old man with the
+terrible spectacles.
+
+He saw him out of it in a short while.
+
+There was an examination before a magistrate, in which Barney was
+discharged on the testimony of Jeff Carew, who was produced and swore
+that he had never before seen the boy, that he was not among the gang of
+burglars who had robbed Blenkins's store and dwelling-house, and that he
+had had no part in helping to conceal the plunder. In opposition to
+this, the mere finding of a scrap of Barney's coat close to the
+Conscripts' Hollow seemed now of slight consequence, although it could
+not be accounted for.
+
+When the trial was over, the old man with the green spectacles took
+Barney to his house, gave him something to eat, and saw him start out
+homeward.
+
+As Barney plodded along toward the blue mountains his heart was very
+bitter against Nick Gregory, who had lied and thrown suspicion upon him
+and brought him into danger. Whenever he thought of it he raised his
+clenched fist and shook it. He was a little fellow, but he felt that
+with the strength of this grievance he was more than a match for big
+Nick Gregory. He would force him to confess the lies that he had told
+and his cowardice, and all Goliath Mountain should know it and despise
+him for it.
+
+"I'll fetch an' kerry that word to an' fro fur a thousand mile!" Barney
+declared between his set teeth.
+
+Now and then a wagoner overtook him and gave him a ride, thus greatly
+helping him on his way. As he went, there was a gradual change in the
+blue and misty range that seemed to encircle the west, and which he
+knew, by one deep indentation in the horizontal line of its summit, was
+Goliath Mountain. It became first an intenser blue. As he drew nearer
+still, it turned a bronzed green. It had purpled with the sunset before
+he could distinguish the crimson and gold of its foliage and its
+beetling crags. Night had fallen when he reached the base of the
+mountain.
+
+There was no moon; heavy clouds were rolling up from the horizon, and
+they hid the stars. Nick Gregory, lying on the ledge of the "Old Man's
+Chimney," thirty feet above the black earth, could not see his hand
+before his face. The darkness was dreadful to him. It had closed upon a
+dreadful day. The seconds were measured by the throbs and dartings of
+pain in his arm. He was almost exhausted by hunger and thirst. He
+thought, however, that he could have borne it all cheerfully, but for
+the sharp remorse that tortured him for the wrong he had done to his
+friend, and his wild anxiety about Barney's fate. Nick felt that he,
+himself, was on trial here, imprisoned on this tower of stone, cut off
+from the world, from everything but his sternly accusing conscience and
+his guilty heart.
+
+For hours he had heard nothing but the monotonous rushing of the water
+close at hand, or now and then the shrill, quavering cry of a distant
+screech-owl, or the almost noiseless flapping of a bat's wings as they
+swept by him.
+
+He had hardly a hope of deliverance, when suddenly there came a new
+sound, vague and indistinguishable. He lifted himself upon his left
+elbow and listened again. He could hear nothing for a moment except his
+own panting breath and the loud beating of his heart. But there--the
+sound came once more. What was it? a dropping leaf? the falling of a
+fragment of stone from the "Chimney"? a distant step?
+
+It grew more distinct as it drew nearer; presently he recognized
+it,--the regular footfall of some man or boy plodding along the path.
+That path!--a recollection flashed through his mind. No one knew that
+short cut up the mountain but him and Barney; they had worn the path
+with their trampings back and forth from the "Old Man's Chimney."
+
+He thought he must be dreaming, or that he had lost his reason; still he
+shouted out, "Hold on, thar! air it ye, Barney?"
+
+The step paused. Then a reply came in a voice that he hardly recognized
+as Barney's; it was so fierce, and so full of half-repressed anger.
+
+"Yes, it air Barney,--ef _ye_ hev any call ter know."
+
+"How did ye git away, Barney?--how did ye git away?" exclaimed Nick,
+with a joyous sense of relief.
+
+"A _thief's_ word cl'ared me!"
+
+This bitter cry came up to Nick, sharp and distinct, through the dark
+stillness. He said nothing at the moment, and presently he heard Barney
+speak again, as he stood invisible, and enveloped in the gloom of the
+night, at the foot of the mighty column.
+
+"'Twar my bes' frien' ez sunk me deep in trouble. But the _thief_, he
+fished me up. He 'lowed ter the jestice ez I never holped him ter steal
+nothin' nor ter hide it arterward, nuther."
+
+Nick said not a word. The hot tears came into his eyes. Barney, he
+thought, could feel no more bitterly toward him than he felt toward
+himself.
+
+"How kem my coat ter be tored down thar on the ledge, close ter the
+Conscripts' Hollow, whar I hain't been sence the cloth war wove?"
+
+There was a long pause.
+
+"I wore it thar, Barney, 'stid o' mine," Nick replied at last. "I never
+knowed, at fust, ez I hed tored it. I was so skeered when I seen the
+stole truck, I never knowed nothin'."
+
+"An' then ye spoke a lie! An' arterward, ye let the folks think ez 'twar
+me ez hed tored that coat close by the Conscripts' Hollow!"
+
+"I was skeered haffen ter death, Barney!"
+
+Nick was very contemptible in his falsehood and cowardice,--even in his
+repentance and shame and sorrow. At least, so the boy thought who stood
+in the darkness at the foot of the great column. Suddenly it occurred to
+Barney that this was a strange place for Nick to be at this hour of the
+night. His indignation gave way for a moment to some natural curiosity.
+
+"What air ye a-doin' of up thar on the Old Man's Chimney?" he asked.
+
+"I kem up hyar this mornin' early, ter watch the wagon a-takin' ye off.
+Then I fell and bruk my arm, an' I can't git down 'thout bein' holped a
+little."
+
+There was another silence, so intense that it seemed to Nick as if he
+were all alone again in the immensity of the mountains, and the black
+night, and the endless forests. He had expected an immediate proffer of
+assistance from Barney. He had thought that his injured friend would
+relent in his severity when he knew that he had suffered too; that he
+was in great pain even at this moment.
+
+But not a word came from Barney.
+
+"I hed laid off ter ax ye ter holp me a little," Nick faltered meekly,
+making his appeal direct.
+
+There was no answer.
+
+It was so still that the boy, high up on the sandstone pillar, could
+hear the wind rising among the far spurs west of Goliath. The foliage
+near at hand was ominously quiet in the sultry air. Once there was a
+flash of lightning from the black clouds, followed by a low muttering
+of thunder. Then all was still again,--so still!
+
+Nick raised himself upon his left arm, and leaned cautiously over the
+verge of the ledge, peering, with starting eyes, into the darkness, and
+hoping for another flash of lightning that he might see below for an
+instant. A terrible suspicion had come to him. Could Barney have slipped
+quietly away, leaving him to his fate?
+
+He could see nothing in the impenetrable gloom; he could hear nothing in
+the dark stillness.
+
+Barney had not yet gone, but he was saying to himself, as he stood at
+the foot of the great obelisk, that here was his revenge, far more
+complete than he had dared even to hope.
+
+He could measure out his false friend's punishment in any degree he
+thought fit. He could leave him there with his broken arm and his pangs
+of hunger for another day. He deserved it,--he deserved it richly. The
+recollection was still very bitter to Barney of the hardships he had
+endured at the hands of this boy, who asked him now for help. Why did he
+not refuse it? Why should he not take the revenge he had promised
+himself?
+
+And then he knew there was danger in now trying to climb the jagged
+edges of the Old Man's Chimney. His nerves were shaken by the
+excitements of the day; he was fagged out by his long tramp; the wind
+was beginning to surge among the trees; it might blow him from his
+uncertain foothold. But when it gained more strength, might it not drive
+Nick, helpless with his broken arm, from that high ledge?
+
+As this thought crossed his mind, he tore off his hat, coat, and shoes,
+and desperately began the ascent. He thought he knew every projection
+and crevice and bush so well that he might have found his way
+blindfolded, and guided by the sense of touch alone. But he did not lack
+for light. Before he was six feet up from the ground, the clouds were
+rent by a vivid flash, and an instantaneous peal of thunder woke all
+the echoes. This was the breaking of the storm; afterward, there was a
+continuous pale flickering over all the sky, and at close intervals,
+dazzling gleams of lightning darted through the rain, which was now
+falling heavily.
+
+"I'm a-comin', Nick!" shouted Barney, through the din of the elements.
+
+Somehow, as he climbed, he felt light-hearted again. It seemed to him
+that he had left a great weight at the foot of the gigantic sandstone
+column. Could it be that bitter revenge he had promised himself? He had
+thought only of Nick's safety, but he seemed to have done himself a
+kindness in forgiving his friend,--the burden of revenge is so heavy!
+His troubles were already growing faint in his memory,--it was so good
+to feel the rain splashing in his face, and his rude playfellow, the
+mountain wind, rioting around him once more. He was laughing when at
+last he pulled himself up, wet through and through, on the ledge beside
+Nick.
+
+"It's airish up hyar, ain't it?" he cried.
+
+"Barney," said Nick miserably, "I dunno how I kin ever look at ye agin,
+squar' in the face, while I lives."
+
+"Shet that up!" Barney returned good-humoredly. "I don't want ter ever
+hear 'bout'n it no more. I'll always know, arter this, that I can't
+place no dependence in ye; but, law, ye air jes' like that old gun o'
+mine; sometimes it'll hang fire, an' sometimes it'll go off at
+half-cock, an' ginerally it disapp'ints me mightily. But, somehows, I
+can't determinate to shoot with no other one. I'll hev ter feel by ye
+jes' like I does by that thar old gun."
+
+The descent was slow and difficult, and very painful to Nick, and
+fraught with considerable danger to both boys. They accomplished it in
+safety, however, and then, with Barney's aid, Nick managed to drag
+himself through the woods to the nearest log cabin, where his arm was
+set by zealous and sympathetic amateurs in a rude fashion that probably
+would have shocked the faculty. They had some supper here, and an
+invitation to remain all night; but Barney was wild to be at home, and
+Nick, in his adversity, clung to his friend.
+
+The rain had ceased, and they had only half a mile further to go.
+Barney's heart was exultant when he saw the light in the window of his
+home, and the sparks flying up from the chimney. He had some curiosity
+to know how the family circle looked without him.
+
+"Ye wait hyar, Nick, a minute, an' I'll take a peek at 'em afore I
+bounce in 'mongst 'em," he said. "I'm all eat up ter know what Melissy
+air a-doin' 'thout me."
+
+But the sight smote the tears from his eyes when he stole around to the
+window and glanced in at the little group, plainly shown in the flare
+from the open fire.
+
+Granny looked ten years older since morning. The three small boys,
+instead of popping corn or roasting apples and sweet potatoes, as was
+their habit in the evenings, sat in a dismal row, their chins on their
+freckled, sunburned hands, and their elbows on their knees, and gazed
+ruefully at the fire. And Melissy,--why, there was Melissy, a little
+blue-and-white ball curled up on the floor. Asleep? No. Barney caught
+the gleam of her wide-open blue eyes; but he missed something from
+them,--the happy expression that used to dwell there.
+
+He went at the door with a rush. And what an uproar there was when he
+suddenly sprang in among them! Melissy laughed until she cried. Granny
+whirled and whirled her stick, and nodded convulsively, and gasped out
+eager questions about the trial and the "jedge." The little boys jumped
+for joy until they seemed strung on wire.
+
+Soon they were popping corn and roasting apples once more. The flames
+roared up the chimney, and the shadows danced on the wall, and as the
+hours wore on, they were all so happy that when midnight came, it caught
+them still grouped around the fire.
+
+
+
+
+A WARNING
+
+
+It was night on Elm Ridge. So black, so black that the great crags and
+chasms were hidden, the forest was lost in the encompassing gloom, the
+valley and the distant ranges were gone,--all the world had disappeared.
+
+There was no wind, and the dark clouds above the dark earth hung low and
+motionless. Solomon Grow found it something of an undertaking to grope
+his way back from the little hut of unhewn logs, where he had stabled
+his father's horse, to the door of the cabin and the home-circle within.
+
+He fumbled for the latchstring, and pulling it carelessly, the door flew
+open suddenly, and he almost fell into the room.
+
+"Why d' ye come a-bustin' in hyar that thar way, Sol?" his mother
+demanded rather tartly. "Ef ye hed been raised 'mongst the foxes, ye
+couldn't show less manners."
+
+"Door slipped out'n my hand," said Sol, a trifle sullenly.
+
+"Waal--air ye disabled anywhar so ez ye can't shet it, eh?" asked his
+father, with a touch of sarcasm.
+
+Sol shut the door, drew up an inverted tub, seated himself upon it, and
+looked about, loweringly. He thought he had been needlessly affronted.
+Still, he held his peace.
+
+Within, there was a great contrast to the black night outside. The ash
+and hickory logs in the deep fireplace threw blue and yellow flames high
+up the wide stone chimney. The flickering light was like some genial,
+cheery smile forever coming and going.
+
+It illumined the circle about the hearth. There sat Sol's mother, idle
+to-night, for it was Sunday. His grandmother, too, was there, so old
+that she seemed to confirm the story told of these healthy mountains, to
+the effect that people are obliged to go down in the valley to die, else
+they would live forever.
+
+There was Sol's father, a great burly fellow, six feet three inches in
+height, still holding out his hands to the blaze, chilled through and
+through by his long ride from the church where he had been to hear the
+circuit-rider preach on "Forgiveness of Injuries."
+
+He was beginning now to quarrel vehemently with his brother-in-law,
+Jacob Smith, about the shabby treatment he had recently experienced in
+the non-payment of work,--for work in this country is a sort of
+circulating medium; a man will plough a day for another man, on
+condition that the favor is rigorously reciprocated.
+
+Jacob Smith had been to the still, and apparently had imbibed the spirit
+there prevailing, to more effect than Sol's father had absorbed the
+spirit that had been taught in church.
+
+In plain words, Jacob Smith was very drunk, and very quarrelsome, and
+very unreasonable. The genial firelight that played upon his bloated
+face played also over objects much pleasanter to look upon,--over the
+strings of red pepper-pods hanging from the rafters; over the bright
+variegations of color in the clean patchwork quilt on the bed; over the
+shining pans and pails set aside on the shelf; over the great, curious
+frame of the warping-bars, rising up among the shadows on the other side
+of the room, the equidistant pegs still holding the sized yarn that
+Solomon's mother had been warping, preparatory to weaving.
+
+On the other side of the room, too, was a little tow-headed child
+sitting in a cradle, which, small as he was, he had long ago outgrown as
+a bed.
+
+It was only a pine box placed upon rude rockers, and he used it for a
+rocking-chair. His bare, fat legs hung out on one side of the box, and
+as he delightedly rocked back and forth, his grotesque little shadow
+waved to and fro on the wall, and mocked and flouted him.
+
+What he thought of it, nobody can ever know; his grave eyes were fixed
+upon it, but he said nothing, and the silent shadow and substance swayed
+joyously hither and thither together.
+
+The quarrel between the two men was becoming hot and bitter. One might
+have expected nothing better from Jacob Smith, for when a man is drunk,
+the human element drops like a husk, and only the unreasoning brute is
+left.
+
+But had John Grow forgotten all the good words he had heard to-day from
+the circuit-rider? Had they melted into thin air during his long ride
+from the church? Were the houseless good words wandering with the rising
+wind through the unpeopled forest, seeking vainly a human heart where
+they might find a lodgment?
+
+The men had risen from their chairs; the drunkard, tremulous with anger,
+had drawn a sharp knife. John Grow was not so patient as he might have
+been, considering the great advantage he had in being sober, and the
+good words with which he had started out from the "meet'n'-house."
+
+He laid his heavy hand angrily upon the drunken man's shoulder.
+
+In another moment there would have been bloodshed. But suddenly the
+dark shadows at the other end of the room swayed with a strange motion;
+a great creaking sound arose, and the warping-bars tottered forward and
+fell upon the floor with a crash.
+
+The wranglers turned with anxious faces. No one was near the bars, it
+seemed that naught could have jarred them; but there lay the heavy frame
+upon the floor, the pegs broken, and the yarn twisted.
+
+"A warning!" cried Sol's mother. "A warning how you-uns spen' the
+evenin' o' the Lord's Day in yer quar'lin', an' fightin', an' sech. An'
+ye, John Grow, jes' from the meet'n'-house!"
+
+She did not reproach her brother,--nobody hopes anything from a
+drunkard.
+
+"A sign o' bad luck," said the grandmother. "It 'minds me o' the time
+las' winter that the wind blowed the door in, an' straight arter that
+the cow died."
+
+"Them signs air ez likely ter take hold on folks ez on cattle," said
+Jacob Smith, half-sobered by the shock.
+
+There was a look of sudden anxiety on the face of Solomon's mother. She
+crossed the room to the youngster rocking in the cradle.
+
+"Come, Benny," she said, "ye oughter go ter bed. Ye air wastin' yer
+strength sittin' up this late in the night. An' ye war a-coughin' las'
+week. Ye must go ter bed."
+
+Benny clung to his unique rocking-chair with a sturdy strength which
+promised well for his muscle when he should be as old as his great,
+strong brother Solomon. He had been as quiet, hitherto, as if he were
+dumb, but now he lifted up his voice in a loud and poignant wail, and
+after he was put to bed, he resurrected himself from among the
+bedclothes, ever and anon, with a bitter, though infantile, jargon of
+protest.
+
+"I'm fairly afeard o' them bars," said Mrs. Grow, looking down upon the
+prostrate timbers. "It's comical that they fell down that-a-way. I hopes
+'tain't no sign o' bad luck. I wouldn't hev nothin' ter happen fur
+nothin'. An' Benny war a-coughin' las' week."
+
+She had not even the courage to put her fear into words. And she
+tenderly admonished tow-headed Benny, who was once more getting out of
+bed, to go to sleep and save his strength, and remember how he was
+coughing last week.
+
+"He hed a chicken-bone acrost his throat," said his father. "No wonder
+he coughed."
+
+Solomon rose and went out into the black night,--so black that he could
+not distinguish the sky from the earth, or the unobstructed air from the
+dense forest around.
+
+He walked about blindly, dragging something heavily after him. The
+weight of concealment it was. He knew something that nobody knew
+besides.
+
+At the critical moment of the altercation, he had stepped softly among
+the shadows to the warping-bars,--a strong push had sent the great frame
+crashing down. He was back in an instant among the others, and by reason
+of the excitement his agency in the sensation was not detected.
+
+Like his biblical namesake, Solomon was no fool. Had he been reared in a
+cultivated community, with the advantages of education, he might have
+been one of the bright young fellows who manage other young fellows, who
+control debating societies, who are prominent in mysterious
+associations, the secret of which is at once guarded and represented by
+a Cerberus of three Greek letters.
+
+But, wise as he was, Solomon was not a prophet. He had intended only to
+effect a diversion, and stop the quarrel. He had had no prevision of the
+panic of superstition that he had raised in the minds of these simple
+people; for the ignorant mountaineer is a devout believer in signs and
+warnings.
+
+As Solomon wandered about outside, he heard his father stumbling from
+the door of the house to the barn to see if aught of evil had come to
+the cow or the horse. He knew how his grandmother's heart was wrung with
+fear for her heifer, and he could hardly endure to think of his mother's
+anxieties about Benny.
+
+No prophetic eye was needed to foresee the terrors that would beset her
+in the days to come, when she would walk back and forth before the
+bars, warping the yarn to be woven into cloth for his and Benny's
+clothes; how she would regard the harmless frame as an uncanny thing,
+endowed with supernatural powers, and look askance at it, and shrink
+from touching it; how she would watch for the sign to come true, and
+tremble lest it come.
+
+He turned about, dragging and tugging this weight of concealment after
+him, reëntered the house, and sat down beside the fire.
+
+His uncle Jacob Smith had gone to his own home. The others were telling
+stories, calculated to make one's hair stand on end, about signs and
+warnings, and their horrible fulfillment.
+
+"Granny," said Solomon suddenly.
+
+"Waal, sonny?" said his grandmother.
+
+When the eyes of the family group were fixed upon him, Solomon's courage
+failed.
+
+"Nothin'," he said hastily. "Nothin' at all."
+
+"Why, what ails the boy?" exclaimed his mother.
+
+"I tell ye now, Solomon," said his grandmother, with an emphatic nod,
+"ye hed better respec' yer elders,--an' a sign in the house!"
+
+Solomon slept little that night. Toward day he began to dream of the
+warping-bars. They seemed to develop suddenly into an immense animated
+monster, from which he only escaped by waking with a sudden start.
+
+Then he found that a great white morning, full of snow, was breaking
+upon the black night. And what a world it was now! The mountain was
+graced with a soft white drapery; on every open space there were vague
+suggestions of delicate colors: in this hollow lay a tender purple
+shadow; on that steep slope was an elusive roseate flush, and when you
+looked again, it was gone, and the glare was blinding.
+
+The bare black branches of the trees formed strangely interlaced
+hieroglyphics upon the turquoise sky. The crags were dark and grim,
+despite their snowy crests and the gigantic glittering icicles that here
+and there depended from them. A cascade, close by in the gorge, had
+been stricken motionless and dumb, as if by a sudden spell; and still
+and silent, it sparkled in the sun.
+
+The snow lay deep on the roof of the log cabin, and the eaves were
+decorated with shining icicles. The enchantment had followed the zigzag
+lines of the fence, and on every rail was its embellishing touch.
+
+All the homely surroundings were transfigured. The potato-house was a
+vast white billow, the ash-hopper was a marble vase, and the
+fodder-stack was a great conical ermine cap, belonging to some mountain
+giant who had lost it in the wind last night.
+
+"I mought hev knowed that we-uns war a-goin' ter hev this spell o'
+weather by the sign o' the warpin'-bars fallin' las' night," said John
+Grow, stamping off the snow as he came in from feeding his horse.
+
+"I hope 'tain't no worse sign," said his wife. "But I misdoubts." And
+she sighed heavily.
+
+"'Tain't no sign at all," said Solomon suddenly. He could keep his
+secret no longer. "'Twar me ez flung down them warpin'-bars."
+
+For a moment they all stared at him in silent amazement.
+
+"What fur?" demanded his father at last. "Just ter enjye sottin' 'em up
+agin? I'll teach ye ter fling down warpin'-bars!"
+
+"Waal," said the peacemaker, hesitating, "it 'peared ter me ez Uncle
+Jacob Smith war toler'ble drunk,--take him all tergether,--an' ez he hed
+drawed a knife, I thought that ye an' him hed 'bout quar'led enough. An'
+so I flung down the warpin'-bars ter git the fuss shet up."
+
+"Waal, sir!" exclaimed his grandmother, red with wrath. "Ez ef _my_ son
+couldn't stand up agin all the Smiths that ever stepped! Ye must fling
+down the warpin'-bars an' twist the spun-truck--fur Jacob Smith!"
+
+"Look-a-hyar, Sol," said his father gruffly, "'tend ter yerself, an' yer
+own quar'ls, arter this, will ye!"
+
+Then, with a sudden humorous interpretation of the incident, he broke
+into a guffaw. "I hev lived a consider'ble time in this tantalizin'
+world, an' ez yit I dunno ez I hev hed any need o' Sol ter pertect
+_me_."
+
+But Sol had unburdened his mind, and felt at ease again; not the less
+because he knew that but for his novel method of making peace, there
+might have been something worse than a sign in the house.
+
+
+
+
+AMONG THE CLIFFS
+
+
+It was a critical moment. There was a stir other than that of the wind
+among the pine needles and dry leaves that carpeted the ground.
+
+The wary wild turkeys lifted their long necks with that peculiar cry of
+half-doubting surprise so familiar to a sportsman, then all was still
+for an instant.
+
+The world was steeped in the noontide sunlight, the mountain air
+tasted of the fresh sylvan fragrance that pervaded the forest, the
+foliage blazed with the red and gold of autumn, the distant Chilhowee
+heights were delicately blue.
+
+That instant's doubt sealed the doom of one of the flock. As the turkeys
+stood in momentary suspense, the sunlight gilding their bronze feathers
+to a brighter sheen, there was a movement in the dense undergrowth. The
+flock took suddenly to wing,--a flash from among the leaves, the sharp
+crack of a rifle, and one of the birds fell heavily over the bluff and
+down toward the valley.
+
+The young mountaineer's exclamation of triumph died in his throat. He
+came running to the verge of the crag, and looked down ruefully into the
+depths where his game had disappeared.
+
+"Waal, sir," he broke forth pathetically, "this beats my time! If my
+luck ain't enough ter make a horse laugh!"
+
+He did not laugh, however. Perhaps his luck was calculated to stir only
+equine risibility. The cliff was almost perpendicular; at the depth of
+twenty feet a narrow ledge projected, but thence there was a sheer
+descent, down, down, down, to the tops of the tall trees in the valley
+far below.
+
+As Ethan Tynes looked wistfully over the precipice, he started with a
+sudden surprise. There on the narrow ledge lay the dead turkey.
+
+The sight sharpened Ethan's regrets. He had made a good shot, and he
+hated to relinquish his game. While he gazed in dismayed meditation, an
+idea began to kindle in his brain. Why could he not let himself down to
+the ledge by those long, strong vines that hung over the edge of the
+cliff?
+
+It was risky, Ethan knew,--terribly risky. But then,--if only the vines
+were strong!
+
+He tried them again and again with all his might, selected several of
+the largest, grasped them hard and fast, and then slipped lightly off
+the crag.
+
+He waited motionless for a moment. His movements had dislodged clods of
+earth and fragments of rock from the verge of the cliff, and until these
+had ceased to rattle about his head and shoulders he did not begin his
+downward journey.
+
+Now and then as he went he heard the snapping of twigs, and again a
+branch would break, but the vines which supported him were tough and
+strong to the last. Almost before he knew it he stood upon the ledge,
+and with a great sigh of relief he let the vines swing loose.
+
+"Waal, that warn't sech a mighty job at last. But law, ef it hed been
+Peter Birt stid of me, that thar wild tur-r-key would hev laid on this
+hyar ledge plumb till the Jedgmint Day!"
+
+He walked deftly along the ledge, picked up the bird, and tied it to one
+of the vines with a string which he took from his pocket, intending to
+draw it up when he should be once more on the top of the crag. These
+preparations complete, he began to think of going back.
+
+He caught the vines on which he had made the descent, but before he had
+fairly left the ledge, he felt that they were giving way.
+
+He paused, let himself slip back to a secure foothold, and tried their
+strength by pulling with all his force.
+
+Presently down came the whole mass in his hands. The friction against
+the sharp edges of the rock over which they had been stretched with a
+strong tension had worn them through. His first emotion was one of
+intense thankfulness that they had fallen while he was on the ledge
+instead of midway in his precarious ascent.
+
+"Ef they hed kem down whilst I war a-goin' up, I'd hev been flung plumb
+down ter the bottom o' the valley, 'kase this ledge air too narrer ter
+hev cotched me."
+
+He glanced down at the sombre depths beneath. "Thar wouldn't hev been
+enough left of me ter pick up on a shovel!" he exclaimed, with a tardy
+realization of his foolish recklessness.
+
+The next moment a mortal terror seized him. What was to be his fate? To
+regain the top of the cliff by his own exertions was an impossibility.
+
+He cast his despairing eyes up the ascent, as sheer and as smooth as a
+wall, without a crevice which might afford a foothold, or a shrub to
+which he might cling.
+
+His strong head was whirling as he again glanced downward to the
+unmeasured abyss beneath. He softly let himself sink into a sitting
+posture, his heels dangling over the frightful depths, and addressed
+himself resolutely to the consideration of the terrible danger in which
+he was placed.
+
+[Illustration: HOW LONG WAS IT TO LAST]
+
+Taken at its best, how long was it to last? Could he look to any human
+being for deliverance? He reflected with growing dismay that the place
+was far from any dwelling, and from the road that wound along the ridge.
+
+There was no errand that could bring a man to this most unfrequented
+portion of the deep woods, unless an accident should hither direct some
+hunter's step.
+
+It was quite possible, nay, probable, that years might elapse before the
+forest solitude would again be broken by human presence.
+
+His brothers would search for him when he should be missed from
+home,--but such boundless stretches of forest! They might search for
+weeks and never come near this spot. He would die here, he would
+starve,--no, he would grow drowsy when exhausted and fall--fall--fall!
+
+He was beginning to feel that morbid fascination that sometimes seizes
+upon those who stand on great heights,--an overwhelming impulse to
+plunge downward. His only salvation was to look up. He would look up to
+the sky.
+
+And what were these words he was beginning to faintly remember? Had not
+the circuit-rider said in his last sermon that not even a sparrow falls
+to the ground unmarked of God? There was a definite strength in this
+suggestion. He felt less lonely as he stared resolutely at the big blue
+sky. There came into his heart a sense of encouragement, of hope.
+
+He would keep up as long and as bravely as he could, and if the worst
+should come,--was he indeed so solitary? He would hold in remembrance
+the sparrow's fall.
+
+He had so nerved himself to meet his fate that he thought it was a fancy
+when he heard a distant step. But it did not die away, it grew more and
+more distinct,--a shambling step, that curiously stopped at intervals
+and kicked the fallen leaves.
+
+He sought to call out, but he seemed to have lost his voice. Not a sound
+issued from his thickened tongue and his dry throat. The step came
+nearer. It would presently pass. With a mighty effort Ethan sent forth a
+wild, hoarse cry.
+
+The rocks reverberated it, the wind carried it far, and certainly there
+was an echo of its despair and terror in a shrill scream set up on the
+verge of the crag. Then Ethan heard the shambling step scampering off
+very fast indeed.
+
+The truth flashed upon him. It was some child, passing on an
+unimaginable errand through the deep woods, frightened by his sudden
+cry.
+
+"Stop, bubby!" he shouted; "stop a minute! It's Ethan Tynes that's
+callin' of ye. Stop a minute, bubby!"
+
+The step paused at a safe distance, and the shrill pipe of a little boy
+demanded, "Whar is ye, Ethan Tynes?"
+
+"I'm down hyar on the ledge o' the bluff. Who air ye ennyhow?"
+
+"George Birt," promptly replied the little boy. "What air ye doin' down
+thar? I thought it war Satan a-callin' of me. I never seen nobody."
+
+"I kem down hyar on vines arter a tur-r-key I shot. The vines bruk, an'
+I hev got no way ter git up agin. I want ye ter go ter yer mother's
+house, an' tell yer brother Pete ter bring a rope hyar fur me ter climb
+up by."
+
+Ethan expected to hear the shambling step going away with a celerity
+proportionate to the importance of the errand. On the contrary, the step
+was approaching the crag.
+
+A moment of suspense, and there appeared among the jagged ends of the
+broken vines a small red head, a deeply freckled face, and a pair of
+sharp, eager blue eyes. George Birt had carefully laid himself down on
+his stomach, only protruding his head beyond the verge of the crag, that
+he might not fling away his life in his curiosity.
+
+"Did ye git it?" he asked, with bated breath.
+
+"Git what?" demanded poor Ethan, surprised and impatient.
+
+"The tur-r-key--what ye hev done been talkin' 'bout," said George Birt.
+
+Ethan had lost all interest in the turkey. "Yes, yes; but run along,
+bub. I mought fall off'n this hyar place,--I'm gittin' stiff sittin'
+still so long,--or the wind mought blow me off. The wind is blowin'
+toler'ble brief."
+
+"Gobbler or hen?" asked George Birt eagerly.
+
+"It air a hen," said Ethan. "But look-a-hyar, George, I'm a-waitin' on
+ye, an' ef I'd fall off'n this hyar place, I'd be ez dead ez a door-nail
+in a minute."
+
+"Waal, I'm goin' now," said George Birt, with gratifying alacrity. He
+raised himself from his recumbent position, and Ethan heard him
+shambling off, kicking every now and then at the fallen leaves as he
+went.
+
+Presently, however, he turned and walked back nearly to the brink of the
+cliff. Then he prostrated himself once more at full length,--for the
+mountain children are very careful of the precipices,--snaked along
+dexterously to the verge of the crag, and protruding his red head
+cautiously, began to parley once more, trading on Ethan's necessities.
+
+"Ef I go on this yerrand fur ye," he said, looking very sharp indeed,
+"will ye gimme one o' the whings of that thar wild tur-r-key?"
+
+He coveted the wing-feathers, not the joint of the fowl. The "whing" of
+the domestic turkey is used by the mountain women as a fan, and is
+considered an elegance as well as a comfort. George Birt aped the
+customs of his elders, regardless of sex,--a characteristic of very
+small boys.
+
+"Oh, go 'long, bubby!" exclaimed poor Ethan, in dismay at the
+dilatoriness and indifference of his unique deliverer. "I'll give ye
+both o' the whings." He would have offered the turkey willingly, if
+"bubby" had seemed to crave it.
+
+"Waal, I'm goin' now."
+
+George Birt rose from the ground and started off briskly, exhilarated by
+the promise of both the "whings."
+
+Ethan was angry indeed when he heard the boy once more shambling back.
+Of course one should regard a deliverer with gratitude, especially a
+deliverer from mortal peril; but it may be doubted if Ethan's gratitude
+would have been great enough to insure that small red head against a
+vigorous rap, if it had been within rapping distance, when it was once
+more cautiously protruded over the verge of the cliff.
+
+"I kem back hyar ter tell ye," the doughty deliverer began, with an air
+of great importance, and magnifying his office with an extreme relish,
+"that I can't go an' tell Pete 'bout'n the rope till I hev done kem back
+from the mill. I hev got old Sorrel hitched out hyar a piece, with a bag
+o' corn on his back, what I hev ter git ground at the mill. My mother
+air a-settin' at home now a-waitin' fur that thar corn-meal ter bake
+dodgers with. An' I hev got a dime ter pay at the mill; it war lent ter
+my dad las' week. An' I'm afeard ter walk about much with this hyar
+dime; I mought lose it, ye know. An' I can't go home 'thout the meal;
+I'll ketch it ef I do. But I'll tell Pete arter I git back from the
+mill."
+
+"The mill!" echoed Ethan, aghast. "What air ye doin' on this side o' the
+mounting, ef ye air a-goin' ter the mill? This ain't the way ter the
+mill."
+
+"I kem over hyar," said the little boy, still with much importance of
+manner, notwithstanding a slight suggestion of embarrassment on his
+freckled face, "ter see 'bout'n a trap that I hev sot fur squir'ls. I'll
+see 'bout my trap, an' then I hev ter go ter the mill, 'kase my mother
+air a-settin' in our house now a-waitin' fur meal ter bake corn-dodgers.
+Then I'll tell Pete whar ye air, an' what ye said 'bout'n the rope. Ye
+must jes' wait fur me hyar."
+
+Poor Ethan could do nothing else.
+
+As the echo of the boy's shambling step died in the distance, a
+redoubled sense of loneliness fell upon Ethan Tynes. But he endeavored
+to solace himself with the reflection that the important mission to the
+squirrel-trap and the errand to the mill could not last forever, and
+before a great while Peter Birt and his rope would be upon the crag.
+
+This idea buoyed him up as the hours crept slowly by. Now and then he
+lifted his head and listened with painful intentness. He felt stiff in
+every muscle, and yet he had a dread of making an effort to change his
+constrained position. He might lose control of his rigid limbs, and fall
+into those dread depths beneath.
+
+His patience at last began to give way. His heart was sinking. His
+messenger had been even more dilatory than he was prepared to expect.
+Why did not Pete come? Was it possible that George had forgotten to tell
+of his danger?
+
+The sun was going down, leaving a great glory of gold and crimson clouds
+and an opaline haze upon the purple mountains. The last rays fell on the
+bronze feathers of the turkey still lying tied to the broken vines on
+the ledge.
+
+And now there were only frowning masses of dark clouds in the west; and
+there were frowning masses of clouds overhead.
+
+The shadow of the coming night had fallen on the autumnal foliage in the
+deep valley; in the place of the opaline haze was only a gray mist.
+
+And now came, sweeping along between the parallel mountain ranges, a
+sombre rain-cloud. The lad could hear the heavy drops splashing on the
+treetops in the valley, long, long before he felt them on his head.
+
+The roll of thunder sounded among the crags. Then the rain came down
+tumultuously, not in columns, but in livid sheets. The lightnings rent
+the sky, showing, as it seemed to him, glimpses of the glorious
+brightness within,--too bright for human eyes.
+
+He clung desperately to his precarious perch. Now and then a fierce rush
+of wind almost tore him from it. Strange fancies beset him. The air was
+full of that wild symphony of nature, the wind and the rain, the pealing
+thunder, and the thunderous echo among the cliffs, and yet he thought he
+could hear his own name ringing again and again through all the tumult,
+sometimes in Pete's voice, sometimes in George's shrill tones.
+
+He became vaguely aware, after a time, that the rain had ceased, and the
+moon was beginning to shine through rifts in the clouds.
+
+The wind continued unabated, but, curiously enough, he could not hear it
+now. He could hear nothing; he could think of nothing. His consciousness
+was beginning to fail.
+
+George Birt had indeed forgotten him,--forgotten even the promised
+"whings." Not that he had discovered anything so extraordinary in his
+trap, for his trap was empty, but when he reached the mill, he found
+that the miller had killed a bear and captured a cub, and the orphan,
+chained to a post, had deeply absorbed George Birt's attention.
+
+To sophisticated people, the boy might have seemed as grotesque as the
+cub. George wore an unbleached cotton shirt. The waistband of his baggy
+jeans trousers encircled his body just beneath his armpits, reaching to
+his shoulder-blades behind, and nearly to his collar-bone in front. His
+red head was only partly covered by a fragment of an old white wool hat;
+and he looked at the cub with a curiosity as intense as that with which
+the cub looked at him. Each was taking first lessons in natural history.
+
+As long as there was daylight enough left to see that cub, did George
+Birt stand and stare at the little beast. Then he clattered home on old
+Sorrel in the closing darkness, looking like a very small pin on the top
+of a large pincushion.
+
+At home, he found the elders unreasonable,--as elders usually are
+considered. Supper had been waiting an hour or so for the lack of meal
+for dodgers. He "caught it" considerably, but not sufficiently to impair
+his appetite for the dodgers. After all this, he was ready enough for
+bed when small boy's bedtime came. But as he was nodding before the
+fire, he heard a word that roused him to a new excitement.
+
+"These hyar chips air so wet they won't burn," said his mother. "I'll
+take my tur-r-key whing an' fan the fire."
+
+"Law!" he exclaimed. "Thar, now! Ethan Tynes never gimme that thar wild
+tur-r-key's whings like he promised."
+
+"Whar did ye happen ter see Ethan?" asked Pete, interested in his
+friend.
+
+"Seen him in the woods, an' he promised me the tur-r-key whings."
+
+"What fur?" inquired Pete, a little surprised by this uncalled-for
+generosity.
+
+"Waal,"--there was an expression of embarrassment on the important
+freckled face, and the small red head nodded forward in an explanatory
+manner,--"he fell off'n the bluffs arter the tur-r-key whings--I mean,
+he went down to the ledge arter the tur-r-key, and the vines bruk an' he
+couldn't git up no more. An' he tole me that ef I'd tell ye ter fotch
+him a rope ter pull up by, he would gimme the whings. That happened
+a--leetle--while--arter dinner-time."
+
+"Who got him a rope ter pull up by?" demanded Pete.
+
+There was again on the important face that indescribable shade of
+embarrassment. "Waal,"--the youngster balanced this word judicially,--"I
+forgot 'bout'n the tur-r-key whings till this minute. I reckon he's thar
+yit."
+
+"Mebbe this hyar wind an' rain hev beat him off'n the ledge!" exclaimed
+Pete, appalled, and rising hastily. "I tell ye now," he added, turning
+to his mother, "the best use ye kin make o' that thar boy is ter put him
+on the fire fur a back-log."
+
+Pete made his preparations in great haste. He took the rope from the
+well, asked the crestfallen and browbeaten junior a question or two
+relative to locality, mounted old Sorrel without a saddle, and in a few
+minutes was galloping at headlong speed through the night.
+
+The rain was over by the time he had reached the sulphur spring to
+which George had directed him, but the wind was still high, and the
+broken clouds were driving fast across the face of the moon.
+
+When he had hitched his horse to a tree, and set out on foot to find the
+cliff, the moonbeams, though brilliant, were so intermittent that his
+progress was fitful and necessarily cautious. When the disk shone out
+full and clear, he made his way rapidly enough, but when the clouds
+intervened, he stood still and waited.
+
+"I ain't goin' ter fall off'n the bluff 'thout knowin' it," he said to
+himself, in one of these eclipses, "ef I hev ter stand hyar all night."
+
+The moonlight was brilliant and steady when he reached the verge of the
+crag. He identified the spot by the mass of broken vines, and more
+indubitably by Ethan's rifle lying upon the ground just at his feet. He
+called, but received no response.
+
+"Hev Ethan fell off, sure enough?" he asked himself, in great dismay and
+alarm. Then he shouted again and again. At last there came an answer,
+as though the speaker had just awaked.
+
+"Pretty nigh beat out, I'm a-thinkin'!" commented Pete. He tied one end
+of the cord around the trunk of a tree, knotted it at intervals, and
+flung it over the bluff.
+
+At first Ethan was almost afraid to stir. He slowly put forth his hand
+and grasped the rope. Then, his heart beating tumultuously, he rose to
+his feet.
+
+He stood still for an instant to steady himself and get his breath.
+Nerving himself for a strong effort, he began the ascent, hand over
+hand, up, and up, and up, till once more he stood upon the crest of the
+crag.
+
+And, now that all danger was over, Pete was disposed to scold. "I'm
+a-thinkin'," said Pete severely, "ez thar ain't a critter on this hyar
+mounting, from a b'ar ter a copper-head, that could hev got in sech a
+fix, 'ceptin' ye, Ethan Tynes."
+
+And Ethan was silent.
+
+"What's this hyar thing at the e-end o' the rope?" asked Pete, as he
+began to draw the cord up, and felt a weight still suspended.
+
+"It air the tur-r-key," said Ethan meekly.
+
+"I tied her ter the e-end o' the rope afore I kem up."
+
+"Waal, sir!" exclaimed Pete, in indignant surprise.
+
+And George, for duty performed, was remunerated with the two "whings,"
+although it still remains a question in the mind of Ethan whether or not
+he deserved them.
+
+
+
+
+IN THE "CHINKING"
+
+
+Not far from an abrupt precipice on a certain great mountain spur there
+stands in the midst of the red and yellow autumn woods a little log
+"church-house." The nuts rattle noisily down on its roof; sometimes
+during "evenin' preachin'"--which takes place in the afternoon--a
+flying-squirrel frisks near the window; the hymns echo softly, softly,
+from the hazy sunlit heights across the valley.
+
+"That air the doxol'gy," said Tom Brent, one day, pausing to listen
+among the wagons and horses hitched outside. He was about to follow home
+his father's mare, that had broken loose and galloped off through the
+woods, but as he glanced back at the church, a sudden thought struck
+him. He caught sight of the end of little Jim Coggin's comforter
+flaunting out through the "chinking,"--as the mountaineers call the
+series of short slats which are set diagonally in the spaces between the
+logs of the walls, and on which the clay is thickly daubed. This work
+had been badly done, and in many places the daubing had fallen away.
+Thus it was that as Jim Coggin sat within the church, the end of his
+plaid comforter had slipped through the chinking and was waving in the
+wind outside.
+
+Now Jim had found the weather still too warm for his heavy jeans jacket,
+but he was too cool without it, and he had ingeniously compromised the
+difficulty by wearing his comforter in this unique manner,--laying it on
+his shoulders, crossing it over the chest, passing it under the arms,
+and tying it in a knot between the shoulder-blades. Tom remembered this
+with a grin as he slyly crept up to the house, and it was only the work
+of a moment to draw that knot through the chinking and secure it firmly
+to a sumach bush that grew near at hand.
+
+It never occurred to him that the resounding doxology could fail to
+rouse that small, tow-headed, freckle-faced boy, or that the
+congregation might slowly disperse without noticing him as he sat
+motionless and asleep in the dark shadow.
+
+The sun slipped down into the red west; the blue mountains turned
+purple; heavy clouds gathered, and within three miles there was no other
+human creature when Jim suddenly woke to the darkness and the storm and
+the terrible loneliness.
+
+Where was he? He tried to rise: he could not move. Bewildered, he
+struggled and tugged at his harness,--all in vain. As he realized the
+situation, he burst into tears.
+
+"Them home-folks o' mine won't kem hyar ter s'arch fur me," he cried
+desperately, "kase I tole my mother ez how I war a-goin' ter dust down
+the mounting ter Aunt Jerushy's house ez soon ez meet'n' war out an'
+stay all night along o' her boys."
+
+Still he tried to comfort himself by reflecting that it was not so bad
+as it might have been. There was no danger that he would have to starve
+and pine here till next Sunday, for a "protracted meeting" was in
+progress, service was held every day, and the congregation would return
+to-morrow, which was Thursday.
+
+His philosophy, however, was short-lived, for the sudden lightning rent
+the clouds, and a terrific peal of thunder echoed among the cliffs.
+
+"The storm air a-comin' up the mounting!" he exclaimed, in vivacious
+protest. "An' ef this brief wind war ter whurl the old church-house
+off'n the bluff an' down inter the valley whar-r--would--I--be?"
+
+All at once the porch creaked beneath a heavy tread. A clumsy hand was
+fumbling at the door. "Strike a light," said a gruff voice without.
+
+As a lantern was thrust in, Jim was about to speak, but the words froze
+upon his lips for fear when a man strode heavily over the threshold and
+he caught the expression of his face.
+
+It was an evil face, red and bloated and brutish. He had small,
+malicious, twinkling eyes, and a shock of sandy hair. A suit of
+copper-colored jeans hung loosely on his tall, lank frame, and when he
+placed the lantern on a bench and stretched out both arms as if he were
+tired, he showed that his left hand was maimed,--the thumb had been cut
+off at the first joint.
+
+A thickset, short, swaggering man tramped in after him.
+
+"Waal, Amos Brierwood," he said, "it's safes' fur us ter part. We
+oughter be fur enough from hyar by daybreak. Divide that thar traveler's
+money--hey?"
+
+They carefully closed the rude shutters, barred the door, and sat down
+on the "mourners' bench," neither having noticed the small boy at the
+other end of the room.
+
+Poor Jim, his arms akimbo and half-covered by his comforter, stuck to
+the wall like a plaid bat,--if such a natural curiosity is
+imaginable,--feverishly hoping that the men might go without seeing him
+at all.
+
+For surely no human creature could be more abhorrent, more incredibly
+odious of aspect, than Amos Brierwood as he sat there, his red, brutish
+face redder still with a malign pleasure, his malicious eyes gloating
+over the rolls of money which he drew from a pocket-book stolen from
+some waylaid traveler, snapping his fingers in exultation when the
+amount of the bills exceeded his expectation.
+
+The leaves without were fitfully astir, and once the porch creaked
+suddenly. Brierwood glanced at the door sharply,--even fearfully,--his
+hand motionless on the rolls of money.
+
+"Only the wind, Amos, only the wind!" said the short, stout man
+impatiently.
+
+But he, himself, was disquieted the next moment when a horse neighed
+shrilly.
+
+"That ain't my beastis, Amos, nor yit your'n!" he cried, starting up.
+
+"It air the traveler's, ye sodden idjit!" said Brierwood, lifting his
+uncouth foot and giving him a jocose kick.
+
+But the short man was not satisfied. He rose, went outside, and Jim
+could hear him beating about among the bushes. Presently he came in
+again. "'Twar the traveler's critter, I reckon; an' that critter an'
+saddle oughter be counted in my sheer."
+
+Then they fell to disputing and quarreling,--once they almost
+fought,--but at length the division was made and they rose to go. As
+Brierwood swung his lantern round, his malicious eyes fell upon the poor
+little plaid bat sticking against the wall.
+
+He stood in the door staring, dumfounded for a moment. Then he clenched
+his fist, and shook it fiercely. "How did ye happen ter be hyar this
+time o' the night, ye limb o' Satan?" he cried.
+
+"Dunno," faltered poor Jim.
+
+The other man had returned too. "Waal, sir, ef that thar boy hed been a
+copper-head now, he'd hev bit us, sure!"
+
+"_He mought do that yit_," said Amos Brierwood, with grim significance.
+"He hev been thar all this time,--'kase he air tied thar, don't ye see?
+An' he hev _eyes_, an' he hev _ears_. What air ter hender?"
+
+The other man's face turned pale, and Jim thought that they were afraid
+he would tell all he had seen and heard. The manner of both had changed,
+too. They had a skulking, nervous way with them now in place of the
+coarse bravado that had characterized them hitherto.
+
+Amos Brierwood pondered for a few minutes. Then he sullenly demanded,--
+
+"What's yer name?"
+
+"It air Jeemes Coggin," quavered the little boy.
+
+"Coggin, hey?" exclaimed Brierwood, with a new idea bringing back the
+malicious twinkle to his eyes. He laughed as though mightily relieved,
+and threw up his left hand and shook it exultingly.
+
+The shadow on the dark wall of that maimed hand with only the stump of a
+thumb was a weird, a horrible thing to the child. He had no idea that
+his constant notice of it would stamp it in his memory, and that
+something would come of this fact. He was glad when the shadow ceased to
+writhe and twist upon the wall, and the man dropped his arm to his side
+again.
+
+"What's a-brewin', Amos?" asked the other, who had been watching
+Brierwood curiously.
+
+They whispered aside for a few moments, at first anxiously and then with
+wild guffaws of satisfaction. When they approached the boy, their manner
+had changed once more.
+
+"Waal, I declar, bubby," said Brierwood agreeably, "this hyar fix ez ye
+hev got inter air sateful fur true! It air enough ter sot enny boy on
+the mounting cat-a-wampus. 'Twar a good thing ez we-uns happened ter kem
+by hyar on our way from the tan-yard way down yander in the valley whar
+we-uns hev been ter git paid up fur workin' thar some. We'll let ye out.
+Who done yer this hyar trick?"
+
+"Dunno--witches, I reckon!" cried poor Jim, bursting into tears.
+
+"Witches!" the man exclaimed, "the woods air a-roamin' with 'em this
+time o' the year; bein', ye see, ez they kem ter feed on the mast."
+
+He chuckled as he said this, perhaps at the boy's evident terror,--for
+Jim was sorrowfully superstitious,--perhaps because he had managed to
+cut unnoticed a large fragment from the end of the comforter. This he
+stuffed into his own pocket as he talked on about two witches, whom he
+said he had met that afternoon under an oak-tree feeding on acorns.
+
+"An' now, I kem ter remind myself that them witches war inquirin' round
+'bout'n a boy--war his name Jeemes Coggin? Le''s see! That boy's name
+_war_ Jeemes Coggin!"
+
+While Jim stood breathlessly, intently listening, Brierwood had twisted
+something into the folds of his comforter so dexterously that unless
+this were untied it would not fall; it was a silk handkerchief of a
+style never before seen in the mountains, and he had made a knot hard
+and fast in one corner.
+
+"Thar, now!" he exclaimed, holding up the fragment of knitted yarn, "I
+hev tore yer comforter. Never mind, bubby, 'twar tore afore. But it'll
+do ter wrop up this money-purse what b'longs ter yer dad. He lef' it
+hid in the chinking o' the wall over yander close ter whar I war sittin'
+when I fust kem in. I'll put it back thar, 'kase yer dad don't want
+nobody ter know whar it air hid."
+
+He strode across the room and concealed the empty pocket-book in the
+chinking.
+
+"Ef ye won't tell who teched it, I'll gin a good word fur ye ter them
+witches what war inquirin' round fur ye ter-day."
+
+Jim promised in hot haste, and then, the rain having ceased, he started
+for home, but Brierwood stopped him at the door.
+
+"Hold on thar, bub. I kem mighty nigh furgittin' ter let ye know ez I
+seen yer brother Alf awhile back, an' he axed me ter git ye ter go by
+Tom Brent's house, an' tell Tom ter meet him up the road a piece by that
+thar big sulphur spring. Will ye gin Tom that message? Tell him Alf said
+ter come quick."
+
+Once more Jim promised.
+
+The two men holding the lantern out in the porch watched him as he
+pounded down the dark road, his tow hair sticking out of his tattered
+black hat, the ends of his comforter flaunting in the breeze, and every
+gesture showing the agitated haste of a witch-scared boy. Then they
+looked at each other significantly, and laughed loud and long.
+
+"He'll tell sech a crooked tale ter-morrer that Alf Coggin an' his dad
+will see sights along o' that traveler's money!" said Brierwood,
+gloating over his sharp management as he and his accomplice mounted
+their horses and rode off in opposite directions.
+
+When Jim reached Tom Brent's house, and knocked at the door, he was so
+absorbed in his terrors that, as it opened, he said nothing for a
+moment. He could see the family group within. Tom's father was placidly
+smoking. His palsied "gran'dad" shook in his chair in the chimney-corner
+as he told the wide-eyed boys big tales about the "Injuns" that harried
+the early settlers in Tennessee.
+
+"Tom," Jim said, glancing up at the big boy,--"Tom, thar's a witch
+waitin' fur ye at the sulphur spring! Go thar, quick!"
+
+"Not ef I knows what's good fur me!" protested Tom, with a great
+horse-laugh. "What ails ye, boy? Ye talk like ye war teched in the
+head!"
+
+"I went ter say ez Alf Coggin air thar waitin' fur ye," Jim began again,
+nodding his slandered head with great solemnity, "an' tole me ter tell
+ye ter kem thar quick."
+
+He took no heed of the inaccuracy of the message; he was glancing
+fearfully over his shoulder, and the next minute scuttled down the road
+in a bee-line for home.
+
+Tom hurried off briskly through the woods. "Waal, sir! I'm mighty nigh
+crazed ter know what Alf Coggin kin want o' me; goin' coon-huntin',
+mebbe," he speculated, as he drew within sight of an old
+lightning-scathed tree which stood beside the sulphur spring and
+stretched up, stark and white, in the dim light.
+
+The clouds were blowing away from a densely instarred sky; the moon was
+hardly more than a crescent and dipping low in the west, but he could
+see the sombre outline of the opposite mountain, and the white mists
+that shifted in a ghostly and elusive fashion along the summit. The
+night was still, save for a late katydid, spared by the frost, and
+piping shrilly.
+
+He experienced a terrible shock of surprise when a sudden voice--a voice
+he had never heard before--cried out sharply, "Hello there! Help! help!"
+
+As he pressed tremulously forward, he beheld a sight which made him ask
+himself if it were possible that Alf Coggin had sent for him to join in
+some nefarious work which had ended in leaving a man--a stranger--bound
+to the old lightning-scathed tree.
+
+Even in the uncertain light Tom could see that he was pallid and
+panting, evidently exhausted in some desperate struggle: there was blood
+on his face, his clothes were torn, and by all odds he was the angriest
+man that was ever waylaid and robbed.
+
+"Ter-morrer he'll be jes' a-swoopin'!" thought Tom, tremulously untying
+the complicated knots, and listening to his threats of vengeance on the
+unknown robbers, "an' every critter on the mounting will git a clutch
+from his claws."
+
+And in fact, it was hardly daybreak before the constable of the
+district, who lived hard by in the valley, was informed of all the
+details of the affair, so far as known to Tom or the "Traveler,"--for
+thus the mountaineers designated him, as if he were the only one in the
+world.
+
+By reason of the message which Jim had delivered, and its strange
+result, they suspected the Coggins, and as they rode together to the
+justice's house for a warrant, this suspicion received unexpected
+confirmation in a rumor that they found afloat. Every man they met
+stopped them to repeat the story that Coggin's boy had told somebody
+that it was his father who had robbed the traveler, and hid the empty
+pocket-book in the chinking of the church wall. No one knew who had set
+this report in circulation, but a blacksmith said he heard it first from
+a man named Brierwood, who had stopped at his shop to have his horse
+shod.
+
+It was still early when they reached Jim Coggin's home; the windows and
+doors were open to let out the dust, for his mother was just beginning
+to sweep. She had pushed aside the table, when her eyes suddenly
+distended with surprise as they fell upon a silk handkerchief lying on
+the floor beside it. The moment that she stooped and picked it up, the
+strange gentleman stepped upon the porch, and through the open door he
+saw it dangling from her hands.
+
+He tapped the constable on the shoulder.
+
+"That's my property!" he said tersely.
+
+The officer stepped in instantly. "Good-mornin', Mrs. Coggin," he said
+politely. "'T would pleasure me some ter git a glimpse o' that
+handkercher."
+
+"Air it your'n?" asked the woman wonderingly. "I jes' now fund it, an' I
+war tried ter know who had drapped it hyar."
+
+The officer, without a word, untied the knot which Amos Brierwood had
+made in one corner, while the Coggins looked on in open-mouthed
+amazement. It contained a five-dollar bill, and a bit of paper on which
+some careless memoranda had been jotted down in handwriting which the
+traveler claimed as his own.
+
+It seemed a very plain case. Still, he got out of the sound of the
+woman's sobs and cries as soon as he conveniently could, and sauntered
+down the road, where the officer presently overtook him with Alf and his
+father in custody.
+
+"Whar be ye a-takin' of us now?" cried the elder, gaunt and haggard, and
+with his long hair blowing in the breeze.
+
+"Ter the church-house, whar yer boy says ye hev hid the traveler's
+money-purse," said the officer.
+
+"_My boy_!" exclaimed John Coggin, casting an astounded glance upon his
+son.
+
+Poor Alf was almost stunned. When they reached the church, and the men,
+after searching for a time without result, appealed to him to save
+trouble by pointing out the spot where the pocket-book was concealed, he
+could only stammer and falter unintelligibly, and finally he burst into
+tears.
+
+"Ax the t'other one--the leetle boy," suggested an old man in the crowd.
+
+Alf's heart sank--sank like lead--when Jim, suddenly remembering the
+promised "good word" to the witches, piped out, "I war tole not ter tell
+who teched it,--'kase my dad didn't want nobody ter know 'twar hid
+thar."
+
+John Coggin's face was rigid and gray.
+
+"The Lord hev forsook me!" he cried. "An' all my chillen hev turned
+liars tergether."
+
+Then he made a great effort to control himself.
+
+"Look-a-hyar, Jim, ef ye hev got the truth in ye,--speak it! Ef ye know
+whar I hev hid anything,--find it!"
+
+Jim, infinitely important, and really understanding little of what was
+going on, except that all these big men were looking at him, crossed the
+room with as much stateliness as is compatible with a pair of baggy
+brown jeans trousers, a plaid comforter tied between the shoulder-blades
+in a big knot, a tow-head, and a tattered black hat; he slipped his
+grimy paw in the chinking where Amos Brierwood had hid the pocket-book,
+and drew it thence, with the prideful exclamation,--
+
+"B'longs ter my dad!"
+
+The officer held it up empty before the traveler,--he held up, too, the
+bit of comforter in which it was folded, and pointed to the small boy's
+shoulders. The gentleman turned away, thoroughly convinced. Alf and his
+father looked from one to the other, in mute despair. They foresaw many
+years of imprisonment for a crime which they had not committed.
+
+The constable was hurrying his prisoners toward the door, when there was
+a sudden stir on the outskirts of the crowd. Old Parson Payne was
+pushing his way in, followed by a tall young man, who, in comparison
+with the mountaineers, seemed wonderfully prosperous and well-clad, and
+very fresh and breezy.
+
+"You're all on the wrong track!" he cried.
+
+And his story proved this, though it was simple enough.
+
+He was sojourning in the mountains with some friends on a "camp-hunt,"
+and the previous evening he had chanced to lose his way in the woods.
+When night and the storm came on, he was perhaps five miles from camp.
+He mistook the little "church-house" for a dwelling, and dismounting, he
+hitched his horse in the laurel, intending to ask for shelter for the
+night. As he stepped upon the porch, however, he caught a glimpse,
+through the chinking, of the interior, and he perceived that the
+building was a church. There were benches and a rude pulpit. The next
+instant, his attention was riveted by the sight of two men, one of whom
+had drawn a knife upon the other, quarreling over a roll of money. He
+stood rooted to the spot in surprise. Gradually, he began to understand
+the villainy afoot, for he overheard all that they said to each other,
+and afterward to Jim. He saw one of the men cut the bit from the
+comforter, wrap the pocket-book in it, and hide it away, and he
+witnessed a dispute between them, which went on in dumb show behind the
+boy's back, as to which of two bills should be knotted in the
+handkerchief which they twisted into the comforter.
+
+The constable was pressing him to describe the appearance of the
+ruffians.
+
+"Why," said the stranger, "one of them was long, and lank, and
+loose-jointed, and had sandy hair, and"--He paused abruptly, cudgeling
+his memory for something more distinctive, for this description would
+apply to half the men in the room, and thus it would be impossible to
+identify and capture the robbers.
+
+"He hedn't no thumb sca'cely on his lef' hand," piped out Jim, holding
+up his own grimy paw, and looking at it with squinting intensity as he
+crooked it at the first joint, to imitate the maimed hand.
+
+"No thumb!" exclaimed the constable excitedly. "Amos Brierwood fur a
+thousand!"
+
+Jim nodded his head intelligently, with sudden recollection. "That air
+the name ez the chunky man gin him when they fust kem in."
+
+And thus it was that when the Coggins were presently brought before the
+justice, they were exonerated of all complicity in the crime for which
+Brierwood and his accomplice were afterward arrested, tried, and
+sentenced to the State Prison.
+
+Jim doubts whether the promised "good word" was ever spoken on his
+behalf to the witches, who were represented as making personal inquiries
+about him, because he suspects that the two robbers were themselves the
+only evil spirits roaming the woods that night.
+
+
+
+
+ON A HIGHER LEVEL
+
+
+As Jack Dunn stood in the door of his home on a great crag of Persimmon
+Ridge and loaded his old rifle, his eyes rested upon a vast and imposing
+array of mountains filling the landscape. All are heavily wooded, all
+are alike, save that in one the long horizontal line of the summit is
+broken by a sudden vertical ascent, and thence the mountain seems to
+take up life on a higher level, for it sinks no more and passes out of
+sight.
+
+This abrupt rise is called "Elijah's Step,"--named, perhaps, in honor of
+some neighboring farmer who first explored it; but the ignorant boy
+believed that here the prophet had stepped into his waiting fiery
+chariot.
+
+He knew of no foreign lands,--no Syria, no Palestine. He had no dream of
+the world that lay beyond those misty, azure hills. Indistinctly he had
+caught the old story from the nasal drawl of the circuit-rider, and he
+thought that here, among these wild Tennessee mountains, Elijah had
+lived and had not died.
+
+There came suddenly from the valley the baying of a pack of hounds in
+full cry, and when the crags caught the sound and tossed it from
+mountain to mountain, when more delicate echoes on a higher key rang out
+from the deep ravines, there was a wonderful exhilaration in this sylvan
+minstrelsy. The young fellow looked wistful as he heard it, then he
+frowned heavily.
+
+"Them thar Saunders men hev gone off an' left me," he said reproachfully
+to some one within the log cabin. "Hyar I be kept a-choppin' wood an' a
+pullin' fodder till they hev hed time ter git up a deer. It 'pears ter
+me ez I mought hev been let ter put off that thar work till I war
+through huntin'."
+
+He was a tall young fellow, with a frank, freckled face and auburn hair;
+stalwart, too. Judging from his appearance, he could chop wood and pull
+fodder to some purpose.
+
+A heavy, middle-aged man emerged from the house, and stood regarding his
+son with grim disfavor. "An' who oughter chop wood an' pull fodder but
+ye, while my hand air sprained this way?" he demanded.
+
+That hand had been sprained for many a long day, but the boy made no
+reply; perhaps he knew its weight. He walked to the verge of the cliff,
+and gazed down at the tops of the trees in the valley far, far below.
+
+The expanse of foliage was surging in the wind like the waves of the
+sea. From the unseen depths beneath there rose again the cry of the
+pack, inexpressibly stirring, and replete with woodland suggestions. All
+the echoes came out to meet it.
+
+"I war promised ter go!" cried Jack bitterly.
+
+"Waal," said his mother, from within the house, "'tain't no good nohow."
+
+Her voice was calculated to throw oil upon the troubled waters,--low,
+languid, and full of pacifying intonations. She was a tall, thin woman,
+clad in a blue-checked homespun dress, and seated before a great
+hand-loom, as a lady sits before a piano or an organ. The creak of the
+treadle, and the thump, thump of the batten, punctuated, as it were, her
+consolatory disquisition.
+
+Her son looked at her in great depression of spirit as she threw the
+shuttle back and forth with deft, practiced hands.
+
+"Wild meat air a mighty savin'," she continued, with a housewifely
+afterthought. "I ain't denyin' that."
+
+Thump, thump, went the batten.
+
+"But ye needn't pester the life out'n yerself 'kase ye ain't a-runnin'
+the deer along o' them Saunders men. It 'pears like a powerful waste o'
+time, when ye kin take yer gun down ter the river enny evenin' late,
+jes' ez the deer air goin' ter drink, an' shoot ez big a buck ez ye hev
+got the grit ter git enny other way. Ye can't do nothin' with a buck but
+eat him, an' a-runnin' him all around the mounting don't make him no
+tenderer, ter my mind. I don't see no sense in huntin' 'cept ter git
+somethin' fitten ter eat."
+
+This logic, enough to break a sportsman's heart, was not a panacea for
+the tedium of the day, spent in the tame occupation of pulling fodder,
+as the process of stripping the blades from the standing cornstalks is
+called.
+
+But when the shadows were growing long, Jack took his rifle and set out
+for the profit and the pleasure of still-hunting. As he made his way
+through the dense woods, the metallic tones of a cow-bell jangled on the
+air,--melodious sound in the forest quiet, but it conjured up a scowl on
+the face of the young mountaineer.
+
+"Everything on this hyar mounting hev got the twistin's ter-day!" he
+exclaimed wrath-fully. "Hyar is our old red cow a-traipsing off ter Andy
+Bailey's house, an' thar won't be a drap of milk for supper."
+
+This was a serious matter, for in a region where coffee and tea are
+almost unknown luxuries, and the evening meal consists of such
+thirst-provoking articles as broiled venison, corn-dodgers, and sorghum,
+one is apt to feel the need of some liquid milder than "apple-jack,"
+and more toothsome than water, wherewith to wet one's whistle.
+
+In common with everything else on the mountain, Jack, too, had the
+"twistin's," and it was with a sour face that he began to drive the cow
+homeward. After going some distance, however, he persuaded himself that
+she would leave the beaten track no more until she reached the cabin. He
+turned about, therefore, and retraced his way to the stream.
+
+There had been heavy rains in the mountains, and it was far out of its
+banks, rushing and foaming over great rocks, circling in swift
+whirlpools, plunging in smooth, glassy sheets down sudden descents, and
+maddening thence in tumultuous, yeasty billows.
+
+An old mill, long disused and fallen into decay, stood upon the brink.
+It was a painful suggestion of collapsed energies, despite its
+picturesque drapery of vines. No human being could live there, but in
+the doorway abruptly appeared a boy of seventeen, dressed, like Jack, in
+an old brown jeans suit and a shapeless white hat.
+
+Jack paused at a little distance up on the hill, and parleyed in a
+stentorian voice with the boy in the mill.
+
+"What's the reason ye air always tryin' ter toll off our old red muley
+from our house?" he demanded angrily.
+
+"I ain't never tried ter toll her off," said Andy Bailey. "She jes' kem
+ter our house herself. I dunno ez I hev got enny call ter look arter
+other folkses' stray cattle. Mind yer own cow."
+
+"I hev got a mighty notion ter cut down that thar sapling,"--and Jack
+pointed to a good-sized hickory-tree,--"an' wear it out on ye."
+
+"I ain't afeard. Come on!" said Andy impudently, protected by his
+innocence, and the fact of being the smaller of the two.
+
+There was a pause. "Hev ye been a-huntin'?" asked Jack, beginning to be
+mollified by the rare luxury of youthful and congenial companionship;
+for this was a scantily settled region, and boys were few.
+
+Andy nodded assent.
+
+Jack walked down into the rickety mill, and stood leaning against the
+rotten old hopper. "What did ye git?" he said, looking about for the
+game.
+
+"Waal," drawled Andy, with much hesitation, "I hain't been started out
+long." He turned from the door and faced his companion rather
+sheepishly.
+
+"I hopes ye ain't been poppin' off that rifle o' your'n along that
+deer-path down in the hollow, an' a-skeerin' off all the wild critters,"
+said Jack Dunn, with sudden apprehension. "Ef I war ez pore a shot ez ye
+air, I'd go a-huntin' with a bean-pole instead of a gun, an' leave the
+game ter them that kin shoot it."
+
+Andy was of a mercurial and nervous temperament, and this fact perhaps
+may account for the anomaly of a mountain-boy who was a poor shot. Andy
+was the scoff of Persimmon Ridge.
+
+"I hev seen many a gal who could shoot ez well ez ye kin,--better,"
+continued Jack jeeringly. "But law! I needn't kerry my heavy bones down
+thar in the hollow expectin' ter git a deer ter-day. They air all off in
+the woods a-smellin' the powder ye hev been wastin'."
+
+Andy was pleased to change the subject. "It 'pears ter me that that thar
+water air a-scuttlin' along toler'ble fast," he said, turning his eyes
+to the little window through which the stream could be seen.
+
+It _was_ running fast, and with a tremendous force. One could obtain
+some idea of the speed and impetus of the current from the swift
+vehemence with which logs and branches shot past, half hidden in foam.
+
+The water looked black with this white contrast. Here and there a great,
+grim rock projected sharply above the surface. In the normal condition
+of the stream, these were its overhanging banks, but now, submerged,
+they gave to its flow the character of rapids.
+
+The old mill, its wooden supports submerged too, trembled and throbbed
+with the throbbing water. As Jack looked toward the window, his eyes
+were suddenly distended, his cheek paled, and he sprang to the door
+with a frightened exclamation.
+
+Too late! the immense hole of a fallen tree, shooting down the channel
+with the force and velocity of a great projectile, struck the tottering
+supports of the crazy, rotting building.
+
+It careened, and quivered in every fibre; there was a crash of falling
+timbers, then a mighty wrench, and the two boys, clinging to the
+window-frame, were driving with the wreck down the river.
+
+The old mill thundered against the submerged rocks, and at every
+concussion the timbers fell. It whirled around and around in eddying
+pools. Where the water was clear, and smooth, and deep, it shot along
+with great rapidity.
+
+The convulsively clinging boys looked down upon the black current, with
+its sharp, treacherous, half-seen rocks and ponderous driftwood. The
+wild idea of plunging into the tumult and trying to swim to the bank
+faded as they looked. Here in the crazy building there might be a
+chance. In that frightful swirl there lurked only a grim certainty.
+
+The house had swung along in the middle of the stream; now its course
+was veering slightly to the left. This could be seen through the window
+and the interstices of the half-fallen timbers.
+
+The boys were caged, as it were; the doorway was filled with the heavy
+debris, and the only possibility of escape was through that little
+window. It was so small that only one could pass through at a
+time,--only one could be saved.
+
+Jack had seen the chance from far up the stream. There was a stretch of
+smooth water close in to the bank, on which was a low-hanging
+beech-tree,--he might catch the branches.
+
+They were approaching the spot with great rapidity. Only one could go.
+He himself had discovered the opportunity,--it was his own.
+
+Life was sweet,--so sweet! He could not give it up; he could not now
+take thought for his friend. He could only hope with a frenzied
+eagerness that Andy had not seen the possibility of deliverance.
+
+In another moment Andy lifted himself into the window. A whirlpool
+caught the wreck, and there it eddied in dizzying circles. It was not
+yet too late. Jack could tear the smaller, weaker fellow away with one
+strong hand, and take the only chance for escape. The shattered mill was
+dashing through the smoother waters now; the great beech-tree was
+hanging over their heads; an inexplicable, overpowering impulse mastered
+in an instant Jack's temptation.
+
+"Ketch the branches, Andy!" he cried wildly.
+
+His friend was gone, and he was whirling off alone on those cruel,
+frantic waters. In the midst of the torrent he was going down, and down,
+and down the mountain.
+
+Now and then he had a fleeting glimpse of the distant ranges. There was
+"Elijah's Step," glorified in the sunset, purple and splendid, with red
+and gold clouds flaming above it. To his untutored imagination they
+looked like the fiery chariot again awaiting the prophet.
+
+The familiar sight, the familiar, oft-repeated fancy, the recollection
+of his home, brought sudden tears to his eyes. He gazed wistfully at the
+spot whence he believed the man had ascended who left death untasted,
+and then he went on in this mad rush down to the bitterness of death.
+
+Even with this terrible fact before him, he did not reproach himself
+with his costly generosity. It was strange to him that he did not regret
+it; perhaps, like that mountain, he had suddenly taken up life on a
+higher level.
+
+The sunset splendor was fading. The fiery chariot was gone, and in its
+place were floating gray clouds,--the dust of its wheels, they seemed.
+The outlines of "Elijah's Step" were dark. It looked sad, bereaved. Its
+glory had departed.
+
+Suddenly the whole landscape seemed full of reeling black shadows,--and
+yet it was not night. The roar of the torrent was growing faint upon
+his ear, and yet its momentum was unchecked. Soon all was dark and all
+was still, and the world slipped from his grasp.
+
+[Illustration: IN THE MIDST OF THE TORRENT]
+
+"They tell me that thar Jack Dunn war mighty nigh drownded when them men
+fished him out'n the pond at Skeggs's sawmill down thar in the valley,"
+said Andy Bailey, recounting the incident to the fireside circle at his
+own home. "They seen them rotten old timbers come a-floatin' ez
+peaceable on to the pond, an' then they seen somethin' like a human
+a-hangin' ter 'em. The water air ez still ez a floor thar, an' deep an'
+smooth, an' they didn't hev no trouble in swimmin' out to him. They
+couldn't bring him to, though, at fust. They said in a little more he
+would hev been gone sure! Now"--pridefully--"ef he hed hed the grit ter
+ketch a tree an' pull out, like I done, he wouldn't hev been in sech a
+danger."
+
+Andy never knew the sacrifice his friend had made. Jack never told him.
+Applause is at best a slight thing. A great action is nobler than the
+monument that commemorates it; and when a man gives himself into the
+control of a generous impulse, thenceforward he takes up life on a
+higher level.
+
+
+
+
+CHRISTMAS DAY ON OLD WINDY MOUNTAIN
+
+
+The sun had barely shown the rim of his great red disk above the sombre
+woods and snow-crowned crags of the opposite ridge, when Rick Herne, his
+rifle in his hand, stepped out of his father's log cabin, perched high
+among the precipices of Old Windy Mountain. He waited motionless for a
+moment, and all the family trooped to the door to assist at the
+time-honored ceremony of firing a salute to the day.
+
+Suddenly the whole landscape catches a rosy glow, Rick whips up his
+rifle, a jet of flame darts swiftly out, a sharp report rings all around
+the world, and the sun goes grandly up--while the little tow-headed
+mountaineers hurrah shrilly for "Chris'mus!"
+
+As he began to re-load his gun, the small boys clustered around him,
+their hands in the pockets of their baggy jeans trousers, their heads
+inquiringly askew.
+
+"They air a-goin' ter hev a pea-fow_el_ fur dinner down yander ter
+Birk's Mill," Rick remarked.
+
+The smallest boy smacked his lips,--not that he knew how pea-fowl
+tastes, but he imagined unutterable things.
+
+"Somehows I hates fur ye ter go ter eat at Birk's Mill, they air sech a
+set o' drinkin' men down thar ter Malviny's house," said Rick's mother,
+as she stood in the doorway, and looked anxiously at him.
+
+For his elder sister was Birk's wife, and to this great feast he was
+invited as a representative of the family, his father being disabled by
+"rheumatics," and his mother kept at home by the necessity of providing
+dinner for those four small boys.
+
+"Hain't I done promised ye not ter tech a drap o' liquor this Chris'mus
+day?" asked Rick.
+
+"That's a fac'," his mother admitted. "But boys, an' men-folks
+ginerally, air scandalous easy ter break a promise whar whiskey is in
+it."
+
+"I'll hev ye ter know that when I gin my word, I keeps it!" cried Rick
+pridefully.
+
+He little dreamed how that promise was to be assailed before the sun
+should go down.
+
+He was a tall, sinewy boy, deft of foot as all these mountaineers are,
+and a seven-mile walk in the snow to Birk's Mill he considered a mere
+trifle. He tramped along cheerily enough through the silent solitudes of
+the dense forest. Only at long intervals the stillness was broken by the
+cracking of a bough under the weight of snow, or the whistling of a gust
+of wind through the narrow valley far below.
+
+All at once--it was a terrible shock of surprise--he was sinking! Was
+there nothing beneath his feet but the vague depths of air to the base
+of the mountain? He realized with a quiver of dismay that he had
+mistaken a huge drift-filled fissure, between a jutting crag and the
+wall of the ridge, for the solid, snow-covered ground. He tossed his
+arms about wildly in his effort to grasp something firm. The motion only
+dislodged the drift. He felt that it was falling, and he was going
+down--down--down with it. He saw the trees on the summit of Old Windy
+disappear. He caught one glimpse of the neighboring ridges. Then he was
+blinded and enveloped in this cruel whiteness. He had a wild idea that
+he had been delivered to it forever; even in the first thaw it would
+curl up into a wreath of vapor, and rise from the mountain's side, and
+take him soaring with it--whither? How they would search these bleak
+wintry fastnesses for him,--while he was gone sailing with the mist!
+What would they say at home and at Birk's Mill? One last thought of the
+"pea-fow_el_," and he seemed to slide swiftly away from the world with
+the snow.
+
+He was unconscious probably only for a few minutes. When he came to
+himself, he found that he was lying, half-submerged in the great drift,
+on the slope of the mountain, and the dark, icicle-begirt cliff towered
+high above. He stretched his limbs--no bones broken! He could hardly
+believe that he had fallen unhurt from those heights. He did not
+appreciate how gradually the snow had slidden down. Being so densely
+packed, too, it had buoyed him up, and kept him from dashing against the
+sharp, jagged edges of the rock. He had lost consciousness in the jar
+when the moving mass was abruptly arrested by a transverse elevation of
+the ground. He was still a little dizzy and faint, but otherwise
+uninjured.
+
+Now a great perplexity took hold on him. How was he to make his way back
+up the mountain, he asked himself, as he looked at the inaccessible
+cliffs looming high into the air. All the world around him was
+unfamiliar. Even his wide wanderings had never brought him into this
+vast, snowy, trackless wilderness, that stretched out on every side. He
+would be half the day in finding the valley road that led to Birk's
+Mill. He rose to his feet, and gazed about him in painful indecision.
+The next moment a thrill shot through him, to which he was
+unaccustomed. He had never before shaken except with the cold,--but this
+was fear.
+
+For he heard voices! Not from the cliffs above,--but from below! Not
+from the dense growth of young pines on the slope of the mountain,--but
+from the depths of the earth beneath! He stood motionless, listening
+intently, his eyes distended, and his heart beating fast.
+
+All silence! Not even the wind stirred in the pine thicket. The snow lay
+heavy among the dark green branches, and every slender needle was
+encased in ice. Rick rubbed his eyes. It was no dream. There was the
+thicket; but whose were the voices that had rung out faintly from
+beneath it?
+
+A crowd of superstitions surged upon him. He cast an affrighted glance
+at the ghastly snow-covered woods and sheeted earth. He was remembering
+fireside legends, horrible enough to raise the hair on a sophisticated,
+educated boy's head; much more horrible, then, to a young backwoodsman
+like Rick. On this, the most benign day that ever dawns upon the world,
+was he led into these endless wastes of forest to be terrified by the
+"harnts"?
+
+Suddenly those voices from the earth again! One was singing a drunken
+catch,--it broke into falsetto, and ended with an unmistakable hiccup.
+
+Rick's blood came back with a rush.
+
+"I hev never hearn tell o' the hoobies gittin' boozy!" he said with a
+laugh. "That's whar they hev got the upper-hand o' humans."
+
+As he gazed again at the thicket, he saw now something that he had been
+too much agitated to observe before,--a column of dense smoke that rose
+from far down the declivity, and seemed to make haste to hide itself
+among the low-hanging boughs of a clump of fir-trees.
+
+"It's somebody's house down thar," was Rick's conclusion. "I kin find
+out the way to Birk's Mill from the folkses."
+
+When he neared the smoke, he paused abruptly, staring once more.
+
+There was no house! The smoke rose from among low pine bushes. Above
+were the snow-laden branches of the fir.
+
+"Ef thar war a house hyar, I reckon I could see it!" said Rick
+doubtfully, infinitely mystified.
+
+There was a continual drip, drip of moisture all around. Yet a thaw had
+not set in. Rick looked up at the gigantic icicles that hung to the
+crags and glittered in the sun,--not a drop trickled from them. But this
+fir-tree was dripping, dripping, and the snow had melted away from the
+nearest pine bushes that clustered about the smoke. There was heat below
+certainly, a strong heat, and somebody was keeping the fire up steadily.
+
+"An' air it folkses ez live underground like foxes an' sech!" Rick
+exclaimed, astonished, as he came upon a large, irregularly shaped rift
+in the rocks, and heard the same reeling voice from within, beginning to
+sing once more. But for this bacchanalian melody, the noise of Rick's
+entrance might have given notice of his approach. As it was, the
+inhabitants of this strange place were even more surprised than he,
+when, after groping through a dark, low passage, an abrupt turn brought
+him into a lofty, vaulted subterranean apartment. There was a great
+flare of light, which revealed six or seven muscular men grouped about a
+large copper vessel built into a rude stone furnace, and all the air was
+pervaded by an incomparably strong alcoholic odor. The boy started back
+with a look of terror. That pale terror was reflected on each man's
+face, as on a mirror. At the sight of the young stranger they all sprang
+up with the same gesture,--each instinctively laid his hand upon the
+pistol that he wore.
+
+Poor Rick understood it all at last. He had stumbled upon a nest of
+distillers, only too common among these mountains, who were hiding from
+the officers of the Government, running their still in defiance of the
+law and eluding the whiskey-tax. He realized that in discovering their
+stronghold he had learned a secret that was by no means a safe one for
+him to know. And he was in their power; at their mercy!
+
+"Don't shoot!" he faltered. "I jes' want ter ax the folkses ter tell me
+the way ter Birk's Mill."
+
+What would he have given to be on the bleak mountain outside!
+
+One of the men caught him as if anticipating an attempt to run. Two or
+three, after a low-toned colloquy, took their rifles, and crept
+cautiously outside to reconnoitre the situation. Rick comprehended their
+suspicion with new quakings. They imagined that he was a spy, and had
+been sent among them to discover them plying their forbidden vocation.
+This threatened a long imprisonment for them. His heart sank as he
+thought of it; they would never let him go.
+
+After a time the reconnoitring party came back.
+
+"Nothin' stirrin'," said the leader tersely.
+
+"I misdoubts," muttered another, casting a look of deep suspicion on
+Rick. "Thar air men out thar, I'm a-thinkin', hid somewhar."
+
+"They air furder 'n a mile off, ennyhow," returned the first speaker.
+"We never lef' so much ez a bush 'thout sarchin' of it."
+
+"The off'cers can't find this place no-ways 'thout that thar chap fur a
+guide," said a third, with a surly nod of his head at Rick.
+
+"We're safe enough, boys, safe enough!" cried a stout-built, red-faced,
+red-bearded man, evidently very drunk, and with a voice that rose into
+quavering falsetto as he spoke. "This chap can't do nothin'. We hev got
+him bound hand an' foot. Hyar air the captive of our bow an' spear,
+boys! Mighty little captive, though! hi!" He tried to point jeeringly at
+Rick, and forgot what he had intended to do before he could fairly
+extend his hand. Then his rollicking head sank on his breast, and he
+began to sing sleepily again.
+
+One of the more sober of the men had extinguished the fire in order that
+they should not be betrayed by the smoke outside to the revenue officers
+who might be seeking them. The place, chilly enough at best, was growing
+bitter cold. The strange subterranean beauty of the surroundings, the
+limestone wall and arches, scintillating wherever they caught the
+light; the shadowy, mysterious vaulted roof; the white stalactites that
+hung down thence to touch the stalagmites as they rose up from the
+floor, and formed with them endless vistas of stately colonnades, all
+were oddly incongruous with the drunken, bloated faces of the
+distillers. Rick could not have put his thought into words, but it
+seemed to him that when men had degraded themselves like this, even
+inanimate nature is something higher and nobler. "Sermons in stones"
+were not far to seek.
+
+He observed that they were making preparations for flight, and once more
+the fear of what they would do with him clutched at his heart. He was
+something of a problem to them.
+
+"This hyar cub will go blab," was the first suggestion.
+
+"He will keep mum," said the vocalist, glancing at the boy with a
+jovially tipsy combination of leer and wink. "Hyar is the persuader!" He
+rapped sharply on the muzzle of his pistol. "This'll scotch his wheel."
+
+"Hold yer own jaw, ye drunken 'possum!" retorted another of the group.
+"Ef ye fire off that pistol in hyar, we'll hev all these hyar rocks"--he
+pointed at the walls and the long colonnades--"answerin' back an'
+yelpin' like a pack o' hounds on a hot scent. Ef thar air folks outside,
+the noise would fotch 'em down on us fur true!"
+
+Rick breathed more freely. The rocks would speak up for him! He could
+not be harmed with all these tell-tale witnesses at hand. So silent now,
+but with a latent voice strong enough for the dread of it to save his
+life!
+
+The man who had put out the fire, who had led the reconnoitring party,
+who had made all the active preparations for departure, who seemed, in
+short, to be an executive committee of one,--a long, lazy-looking
+mountaineer, with a decision of action in startling contrast to his
+whole aspect,--now took this matter in hand.
+
+"Nothin' easier," he said tersely. "Fill him up. Make him ez drunk ez a
+fraish b'iled ow_el_. Then lead him to the t'other eend o' the cave,
+an' blindfold him, an' lug him off five mile in the woods, an' leave him
+thar. He'll never know what he hev seen nor done."
+
+"That's the dinctum!" cried the red-bearded man, in delighted approval,
+breaking into a wild, hiccupping laugh, inexpressibly odious to the boy.
+Rick had an extreme loathing for them all that showed itself with
+impolitic frankness upon his face. He realized as he had never done
+before the depths to which strong drink will reduce men. But that the
+very rocks would cry out upon them, they would have murdered him.
+
+In the preparations for departure all the lights had been extinguished,
+except a single lantern, and a multitude of shadows had come thronging
+from the deeper recesses of the cave. In the faint glimmer the figures
+of the men loomed up, indistinct, gigantic, distorted. They hardly
+seemed men at all to Rick; rather some evil underground creatures,
+neither beast nor human.
+
+And he was to be made equally besotted, and even more helpless than
+they, in order that his senses might be sapped away, and he should
+remember no story to tell. Perhaps if he had not had before him so vivid
+an illustration of the malign power that swayed them, he might not have
+experienced so strong an aversion to it. Now, to be made like them
+seemed a high price to pay for his life. And there was his promise to
+his mother! As the long, lank, lazy-looking mountaineer pressed the
+whiskey upon him, Rick dashed it aside with a gesture so unexpected and
+vehement that the cracked jug fell to the floor, and was shivered to
+fragments.
+
+Rick lifted an appealing face to the man, who seized him with a strong
+grip. "I can't--I won't," the boy cried wildly. "I--I--promised my
+mother!"
+
+He looked around the circle deprecatingly. He expected first a guffaw
+and then a blow, and he dreaded the ridicule more than the pain.
+
+But there were neither blows nor ridicule. They all gazed at him,
+astounded. Then a change, which Rick hardly comprehended, flitted across
+the face of the man who had grasped him. The moonshiner turned away
+abruptly, with a bitter laugh that startled all the echoes.
+
+"_I--I_ promised _my_ mother, too!" he cried. "It air good that in her
+grave whar she is she can't know how I hev kep' my word."
+
+And then there was a sudden silence. It seemed to Rick, strangely
+enough, like the sudden silence that comes after prayer. He was
+reminded, as one of the men rose at length and the keg on which he had
+been sitting creaked with the motion, of the creaking benches in the
+little mountain church when the congregation started from their knees.
+And had some feeble, groping sinner's prayer filled the silence and the
+moral darkness!
+
+The "executive committee" promptly recovered himself. But he made no
+further attempt to force the whiskey upon the boy. Under some whispered
+instructions which he gave the others, Rick was half-led, half-dragged
+through immensely long black halls of the cave, while one of the men
+went before, carrying the feeble lantern. When the first glimmer of
+daylight appeared in the distance, Rick understood that the cave had an
+outlet other than the one by which he had entered, and evidently miles
+distant from it. Thus it was that the distillers were well enabled to
+baffle the law that sought them.
+
+They stopped here and blindfolded the boy. How far and where they
+dragged him through the snowy mountain wilderness outside, Rick never
+knew. He was exhausted when at length they allowed him to pause. As he
+heard their steps dying away in the distance, he tore the bandage from
+his eyes, and found that they had left him in the midst of the wagon
+road to make his way to Birk's Mill as best he might. When he reached
+it, the wintry sun was low in the western sky, and the very bones of the
+"pea-fow_el_" were picked.
+
+On the whole, it seemed a sorry Christmas Day, as Rick could not know
+then--indeed, he never knew--what good results it brought forth. For
+among those who took the benefit of the "amnesty" extended by the
+Government to the moonshiners of this region, on condition that they
+discontinue illicit distilling for the future, was a certain long, lank,
+lazy-looking mountaineer, who suddenly became sober and steady and a
+law-abiding citizen. He had been reminded, this Christmas Day, of a
+broken promise to a dead mother, and this by the unflinching moral
+courage of a mere boy in a moment of mortal peril. Such wise, sweet,
+uncovenanted uses has duty, blessing alike the unconscious exemplar and
+him who profits by the example.
+
+
+The Riverside Press
+
+CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS, U. S. A.
+ELECTROTYPED AND PRINTED BY
+H. O. HOUGHTON AND CO.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Young Mountaineers, by Charles Egbert Craddock
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+<pre>
+
+Project Gutenberg's The Young Mountaineers, by Charles Egbert Craddock
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Young Mountaineers
+       Short Stories
+
+Author: Charles Egbert Craddock
+
+Illustrator: Malcolm Fraser
+
+Release Date: January 15, 2007 [EBook #20365]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YOUNG MOUNTAINEERS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Dave Macfarlane and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+
+<p><a name="illus-001" id="illus-001"></a></p>
+<div class="figcenter">
+             <img   src="images/img001.jpg" width="329" height="550"
+             alt="HE WAS PALLID AND PANTING" /><br />
+         <b>HE WAS PALLID AND PANTING see page <a href='#pallid'><b>221</b></a></b>
+    </div>
+
+
+
+<h1>THE YOUNG MOUNTAINEERS</h1>
+
+<h3><i>SHORT STORIES</i></h3>
+
+<h3>BY</h3>
+
+<h2>CHARLES EGBERT CRADDOCK</h2>
+
+
+<h4>WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY</h4>
+<h4>MALCOLM FRASER</h4>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 119px;">
+
+<img src="images/img-002-a.jpg" alt="logo" title="" />
+</div>
+
+
+<h4>BOSTON AND NEW YORK</h4>
+<h4>HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY</h4>
+<h4>The Riverside Press, Cambridge</h4>
+<h4>1897</h4>
+
+<h5>Copyright, 1897,</h5>
+<h5><span class="smcap">By</span> MARY N. MURFREE.</h5>
+
+
+<h5><i>All rights reserved</i>.</h5>
+
+<h5><i>The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. S. A.</i></h5>
+<h5>Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton and Company.</h5>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS</h2>
+
+
+
+
+<div class='centered'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary="CONTENTS">
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#THE_MYSTERY_OF_OLD_DADDYS_WINDOW"><span class="smcap">The Mystery of Old Daddy's Window</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#WAY_DOWN_IN_POOR_VALLEY"><span class="smcap">'Way Down in Poor Valley</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 2em;"><a href="#CHAPTER_I"><span class="smcap">Chapter I</span></a></span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 2em;"><a href="#CHAPTER_II"><span class="smcap">Chapter II</span></a></span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#A_MOUNTAIN_STORM"><span class="smcap">A Mountain Storm</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#BORROWING_A_HAMMER"><span class="smcap">Borrowing a Hammer</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#THE_CONSCRIPTS_HOLLOW"><span class="smcap">The Conscripts' Hollow</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 2em;"><a href="#TCH_Chapter_1"><span class="smcap">Chapter I</span></a></span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 2em;"><a href="#TCH_Chapter_2"><span class="smcap">Chapter II</span></a></span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 2em;"><a href="#TCH_Chapter_3"><span class="smcap">Chapter III</span></a></span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 2em;"><a href="#TCH_Chapter_4"><span class="smcap">Chapter IV</span></a></span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 2em;"><a href="#TCH_Chapter_5"><span class="smcap">Chapter V</span></a></span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#A_WARNING"><span class="smcap">A Warning</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#AMONG_THE_CLIFFS"><span class="smcap">Among the Cliffs</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#IN_THE_CHINKING"><span class="smcap">In the "Chinking"</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#ON_A_HIGHER_LEVEL"><span class="smcap">On a Higher Level</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#CHRISTMAS_DAY_ON_OLD_WINDY_MOUNTAIN"><span class="smcap">Christmas Day on Old Windy Mountain</span></a></td></tr>
+</table></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</h2>
+
+
+<div class='centered'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary="ILLUSTRATIONS">
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#illus-001"><span class="smcap">He was Pallid and Panting</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#illus-056"><span class="smcap">Together they went over the Cliff</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#illus-200"><span class="smcap">How Long was it to Last</span></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><a href="#illus-254"><span class="smcap">In the Midst of the Torrent</span></a></td></tr>
+</table></div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><br /><br /><a name="THE_YOUNG_MOUNTAINEERS" id="THE_YOUNG_MOUNTAINEERS"></a>THE YOUNG MOUNTAINEERS<br /><br /></h2>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><br /><a name="THE_MYSTERY_OF_OLD_DADDYS_WINDOW" id="THE_MYSTERY_OF_OLD_DADDYS_WINDOW"></a>THE MYSTERY OF OLD DADDY'S WINDOW</h2>
+
+
+<p>Picture to yourself a wild ravine, gashing a mountain spur, and with
+here and there in its course abrupt descents. One of these is so deep
+and sheer that it might be called a precipice.</p>
+
+<p>High above it, from the steep slope on either hand, beetling crags jut
+out. Their summits almost meet at one point, and thus the space below
+bears a rude resemblance to a huge window. Through it you might see the
+blue heights in the distance; or watch the clouds and sunshine shift
+over the sombre mountain across the narrow valley; or mark, after the
+day has faded, how the great Scorpio draws its shining curves along the
+dark sky.</p>
+
+<p>One night Jonas Creyshaw sat alone in the porch of his log cabin, hard
+by on the slope of the ravine, smoking his pipe and gazing meditatively
+at "Old Daddy's Window." The moon was full, and its rays fell aslant on
+one of the cliffs, while the rugged face of the opposite crag was in the
+shadow.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly he became aware that something was moving about the precipice,
+the brink of which seems the sill of the window. Although this precipice
+is sheer and insurmountable, a dark figure had risen from it, and stood
+plainly defined against the cliff, which presented a comparatively
+smooth surface to the brilliant moonlight.</p>
+
+<p>Was it a shadow? he asked himself hastily.</p>
+
+<p>His eyes swept the ravine, only thirty feet wide at that point, which
+lies between the two crags whose jutting summits almost meet above it to
+form Old Daddy's Window.</p>
+
+<p>There was no one visible to cast a shadow.</p>
+
+<p>It seemed as if the figure had unaccountably emerged from the sheer
+depths below.</p>
+
+<p>Only for a moment it stood motionless against the cliff. Then it flung
+its arms wildly above its head, and with a nimble spring
+disappeared&mdash;upward.</p>
+
+<p>Jonas Creyshaw watched it, his eyes distended, his face pallid, his pipe
+trembling in his shaking hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Mirandy!" he quavered faintly.</p>
+
+<p>His wife, a thin, ailing woman with pinched features and an uncertain
+eye, came to the door.</p>
+
+<p>"Thar," he faltered, pointing with his pipe-stem&mdash;"jes' a minit ago&mdash;I
+seen it!&mdash;a ghost riz up over the bluff inter Old Daddy's Window!"</p>
+
+<p>The woman fell instantly into a panic.</p>
+
+<p>"'Twarn't a-beckonin', war it? 'Twarn't a-beckonin'? 'Kase ef it war,
+ye'll hev ter die right straight! That air a sure sign."</p>
+
+<p>A little of Jonas Creyshaw's pluck and common sense came back to him at
+this unpleasant announcement.</p>
+
+<p>"Not on <i>his</i> say-so," he stoutly averred. "I ain't a-goin' ter do the
+beck nor the bid of enny onmannerly harnt ez hev tuk up the notion ter
+riz up over the bluff inter Old Daddy's Window, an' sot hisself ter
+motionin' ter me."</p>
+
+<p>He rose hastily, knocked the ashes out of his pipe, and followed his
+wife into the house. There he paused abruptly.</p>
+
+<p>The room was lighted by the fitful flicker of the fire, for the nights
+were still chilly, and an old man, almost decrepit, sat dozing in his
+chair by the hearth.</p>
+
+<p>"Mirandy," said Jonas Creyshaw in a whisper, "'pears like ter me ez
+father hed better not be let ter know 'bout'n that thar harnt. It mought
+skeer him so ez he couldn't live another minit. He hev aged some
+lately&mdash;an' he air weakly."</p>
+
+<p>This was "Old Daddy."</p>
+
+<p>Before he had reached his thirtieth year, he was thus known, far and
+wide.</p>
+
+<p>"He air the man ez hev got a son," the mountaineers used to say in
+grinning explanation. "Ter hear him brag 'bout'n that thar boy o' his'n,
+ye'd think he war the only man in Tennessee ez ever hed a son."</p>
+
+<p>Throughout all these years the name given in jocose banter had clung to
+him, and now, hallowed by ancient usage, it was accorded to him
+seriously, and had all the sonorous effect of a title.</p>
+
+<p>So they said nothing to Old Daddy, but presently, when he had hobbled
+off to bed in the adjoining shed-room, they fell to discussing their
+terror of the apparition, and thus it chanced that the two boys, Tad and
+Si, first made, as it were, the ghost's acquaintance.</p>
+
+<p>Tad, a stalwart fellow of seventeen, sat listening spellbound before the
+glowing embers. Si, a wiry, active, tow-headed boy of twelve, perched
+with dangling legs on a chest, and looked now at the group by the fire,
+and now through the open door at the brilliant moonlight.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, sir," he muttered, "I'll hev ter gin up the notion o' gittin'
+that comical young ow<i>el</i>, what I hev done set my heart onto. 'Kase ef I
+war ter fool round Old Daddy's Window, <i>now</i>, whilst I war a-cotchin' o'
+the ow<i>el</i>, the ghost mought&mdash;cotch&mdash;<i>Me!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>A sorry ghost, to be sure, that has nothing better to do than to "cotch"
+<i>him!</i> But perhaps Si Creyshaw is not the only one of us who has an
+inflated idea of his own importance.</p>
+
+<p>He was greatly awed, and he found many suggestions of supernatural
+presence about the familiar room. As the fire alternately flared and
+faded, the warping-bars looked as if they were dancing a clumsy measure.
+The handle of a portly jug resembled an arm stuck akimbo, and its cork,
+tilted askew, was like a hat set on one side; Si fancied there was a
+most unpleasant grimace below that hat. The churn-dasher, left upon a
+shelf to dry, was sardonically staring him out of countenance with its
+half-dozen eyes. The strings of red pepper-pods and gourds and herbs,
+swinging from the rafters, rustled faintly; it sounded to Si like a
+moan.</p>
+
+<p>He wished his father and mother would talk about some wholesome subject,
+like Spot's new calf, for instance, instead of whispering about the
+mystery of Old Daddy's Window.</p>
+
+<p>He wished Tad would not look, as he listened, so much like a ghost
+himself, with his starting eyes and pale, intent face. He even wished
+that the baby would wake up, and put some life into things with a good
+healthy, rousing bawl.</p>
+
+<p>But the baby slept peacefully on, and after so long a time Si Creyshaw
+slept too.</p>
+
+<p>With broad daylight his courage revived. He was no longer afraid to
+think of the ghost. In fact, he experienced a pleased importance in
+giving Old Daddy a minute account of the wonderful apparition, for he
+<i>felt</i> as if he had seen it.</p>
+
+<p>"'Pears ter me toler'ble comical, gran'dad, ez they never tole ye a word
+'bout'n it all," he said in conclusion. "Ye mought hev liked ter seen
+the harnt. Ef he war 'quainted with ye when he lived in this life, he
+mought hev stopped an' jowed sociable fur a spell!"</p>
+
+<p>How brave this small boy was in the cheerful sunshine!</p>
+
+<p>Old Daddy hardly seemed impressed with the pleasure he had missed in
+losing a sociable "jow" with a ghostly crony. He sat silent, blinking
+in the sunshine that fell through the gourd-vines which clambered about
+the porch where Si had placed his chair.</p>
+
+<p>"'Twarn't much of a sizable sperit," Si declared; he seemed courageous
+enough now to measure the ghost like a tailor. "It warn't more'n four
+feet high, ez nigh ez dad could jedge. Toler'ble small fur a harnt!"</p>
+
+<p>Still the old man made no reply. His wrinkled hands were clasped on his
+stick. His white head, shaded by his limp black hat, was bent down close
+to them. There was a slow, pondering expression on his face, but an
+excited gleam in his eye. Presently, he pointed backward toward a little
+unhewn log shanty that served as a barn, and rising with unwonted
+alacrity, he said to the boy,&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Fotch me the old beastis!"</p>
+
+<p>Silas Creyshaw stood amazed, for Old Daddy had not mounted a horse for
+twenty years.</p>
+
+<p>"Studyin' 'bout'n the harnt so much hev teched him in the head," the
+small boy concluded. Then he made an excuse, for he knew his
+grandfather was too old and feeble to safely undertake a solitary jaunt
+on horse-back.</p>
+
+<p>"I war tole not ter leave ye fur a minit, gran'dad. I war ter stay nigh
+ye an' mind yer bid."</p>
+
+<p>"That's my bid!" said the old man sternly. "Fotch the beastis."</p>
+
+<p>There was no one else about the place. Jonas Creyshaw had gone fishing
+shortly after daybreak. His wife had trudged off to her sister's house
+down in the cove, and had taken the baby with her. Tad was ploughing in
+the cornfield on the other side of the ravine. Si had no advice, and he
+had been brought up to think that Old Daddy's word was law.</p>
+
+<p>When the old man, mounted at last, was jogging up the road, Tad chanced
+to come to the house for a bit of rope to mend the plough-gear. He saw,
+far up the leafy vista, the departing cavalier. He cast a look of amazed
+reproach upon Si. Then, speechless with astonishment, he silently
+pointed at the distant figure.</p>
+
+<p>Si was a logician.</p>
+
+<p>"I never lef' <i>him</i>," he said. "He lef' <i>me</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Ye oughter rej'ice in yer whole bones while ye hev got 'em," Tad
+returned, with withering sarcasm. "When dad kems home, some of 'em 'll
+git bruk, sure. Warn't ye tole not ter leave him fur <i>nuthin'</i>, ye
+triflin' shoat!"</p>
+
+<p>"He lef' <i>me</i>!" Si stoutly maintained.</p>
+
+<p>Meantime, Old Daddy journeyed on.</p>
+
+<p>Except for the wonderful mountain air, the settlement, three miles
+distant, had nothing about it to indicate its elevation. It was far from
+the cliffs, and there was no view. It was simply a little hollow of a
+clearing scooped out among the immense forests. When the mountaineers
+clear land, they do it effectually. Not a tree was left to embellish the
+yards of any of the four or five little log huts that constituted the
+hamlet, and the glare was intense.</p>
+
+<p>As six or eight loungers sat smoking about the door of the store, there
+was nothing to intercept their astonished view of Old Daddy when he
+suddenly appeared out of the gloomy forest, blinking in the sun and bent
+half double with fatigue.</p>
+
+<p>Even the rudest and coarsest of these mountaineers accord a praiseworthy
+deference to the aged among them. Old Daddy was held in reverential
+estimation at home, and was well accustomed to the respect shown him
+now, when, for the first time in many years, he had chosen to jog
+abroad. They helped him to dismount, and carried him bodily into the
+store. After he had tilted his chair back against the rude counter, he
+looked around with an important face upon the attentive group.</p>
+
+<p>"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,&mdash;"my son air the strongest man
+ever seen, sence Samson!"</p>
+
+<p>"I hev always hearn that sayin', Old Daddy," acquiesced an elderly
+codger, who, by reason of "rheumatics," made no pretension to muscle.</p>
+
+<p>A gigantic young blacksmith looked down at his corded hammer-arm, but
+said nothing.</p>
+
+<p>A fly&mdash;several flies&mdash;buzzed about the sorghum barrel.</p>
+
+<p>"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,&mdash;"my son air the bes' shot on
+this hyar mounting."</p>
+
+<p>"That's a true word, Old Daddy," assented the schoolmaster, who had
+ceased to be a Nimrod since devoting himself to teaching the young idea
+how to shoot.</p>
+
+<p>The hunters smoked in solemn silence.</p>
+
+<p>The shadow of a cloud drifted along the bare sandy stretch of the
+clearing.</p>
+
+<p>"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,&mdash;"my son hev got the peartest
+boys in Tennessee."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll gin ye that up, Old Daddy," cheerfully agreed the miller, whose
+family consisted of two small "daughters."</p>
+
+<p>The fathers of other "peart boys" cleared their throats uneasily, but
+finally subsided without offering contradiction.</p>
+
+<p>A jay-bird alighted on a blackberry bush outside, fluttered all his
+blue and white feathers, screamed harshly, bobbed his crested head, and
+was off on his gay wings.</p>
+
+<p>"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,&mdash;"my son hev been gifted with the
+sight o' what no other man on this mounting hev ever viewed."</p>
+
+<p>The group sat amazed, expectant. But the old man preserved a stately
+silence. Only when the storekeeper eagerly insisted, "What hev Jonas
+seen? what war he gin ter view?" did Old Daddy bring the fore legs of
+the chair down with a thump, lean forward, and mysteriously pipe out
+like a superannuated cricket,&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"My son,&mdash;my son hev seen a harnt, what riz up over the bluff
+a-purpose!"</p>
+
+<p>"Whar 'bouts?" "When?" "Waal, sir!" arose in varied clamors.</p>
+
+<p>So the proud old man told the story he had journeyed three laborious
+miles to spread. It had no terrors for him, so completely was fear
+swallowed up in admiration of his wonderful son, who had added to his
+other perfections the gift of seeing ghosts.</p>
+
+<p>The men discussed it eagerly. There were some jokes cracked&mdash;as it was
+still broad noonday&mdash;and at one of these Old Daddy took great offense,
+more perhaps because the disrespect was offered to his son rather than
+to himself.</p>
+
+<p>"Jes' gin Jonas the word from me," said the young blacksmith, meaning no
+harm and laughing good-naturedly, "ez I kin tell him percisely what
+makes him see harnts; it air drinkin' so much o' this onhealthy whiskey,
+what hain't got no tax paid onto it. I looks ter see him jes'
+a-staggerin' the nex' time I comes up with him."</p>
+
+<p>Old Daddy rose with affronted dignity.</p>
+
+<p>"My son," he declared vehemently,&mdash;"my son ain't gin over ter drinkin'
+whiskey, tax or no tax. An' he ain't got no call ter stagger&mdash;<i>like some
+folks!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>And despite all apology and protest, he left the house in a huff.</p>
+
+<p>His old bones ached with the unwonted exercise, and were rudely enough
+jarred by the rough roads and the awful gaits of his ancient steed. The
+sun was hot, and so was his heart, and when he reached home, infinitely
+fatigued and querulous, he gave his son a sorry account of his reception
+at the store. As he concluded, saying that five of the men had sent word
+that they would be at Jonas Creyshaw's house at moon-rise "ter holp him
+see the harnt," his son's brow darkened, and he strode heavily out of
+the room.</p>
+
+<p>He usually exhibited in a high degree the hospitality characteristic of
+these mountaineers, but now it had given way to a still stronger
+instinct.</p>
+
+<p>"Si," he said, coming suddenly upon the boy, "put out right now fur
+Bently's store at the settle<i>mint</i>, an' tell them sneaks ez hang round
+thar ter sarch round thar own houses fur harnts, ef they hanker ter see
+enny harnts. Ef they hev got the insurance ter kem hyar, they'll see
+wusser sights 'n enny harnts. Tell 'em I ain't a-goin' ter 'low no man
+ter cross my doorstep ez don't show Old Daddy the right medjure o'
+respec'. They'd better keep out'n my way ginerally."</p>
+
+<p>So with this bellicose message Si set out. But an unlucky idea occurred
+to him as he went plodding along the sandy road.</p>
+
+<p>"Whilst I'm a-goin' on this hyar harnt's yerrand"&mdash;&mdash;The logical Si
+brought up with a shiver.</p>
+
+<p>"I went ter say&mdash;whilst I'm a-goin' on this hyar yerrand fur the
+harnt"&mdash;&mdash;This was as bad.</p>
+
+<p>"Whilst," he qualified once more, "I'm a-goin' on this hyar yerrand
+<i>'bout'n</i> the harnt, I mought ez well skeet off in them deep woods a
+piece ter see ef enny wild cherries air ripe on that tree by the spring.
+I'll hev plenty o' time."</p>
+
+<p>But even Si could not persuade himself that the cherries were ripe, and
+he stood for a moment under the tree, staring disconsolately at the
+distant blue ridges shimmering through the heated air. The sunlight was
+motionless, languid; it seemed asleep. The drowsy drone of insects
+filled the forest. As Si threw himself down to rest on the rocky brink
+of the mountain, a grasshopper sprang away suddenly, high into the air,
+with an agility that suggested to him the chorus of a song, which he
+began to sing in a loud and self-sufficient voice:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">"The grasshopper said&mdash;'Now, don't ye see</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Thar's mighty few dancers sech ez me&mdash;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Sech ez <i>me</i>!&mdash;Sech ez <span class="smcap">Me</span>!'"</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>This reminded Si of his own capabilities as a dancer. He rose and began
+to caper nimbly, executing a series of steps that were singularly swift,
+spry, and unexpected,&mdash;a good deal on the grasshopper's method. His
+tattered black hat bobbed up and down on his tow head; his brown jeans
+trousers, so loose on his lean legs, flapped about hilariously; his bare
+heels flew out right and left; he snapped his fingers to mark the time;
+now and then he stuck his arms akimbo, and cut what he called the
+"widgeon-ping." But his freckled face was as grave as ever, and all the
+time that he danced he sang:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">"In the middle o' the night the rain kem down,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">An' gin the corn a fraish start out'n the ground,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">An' I thought nex' day ez I stood in the door,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That sassy bug mus' be drownded sure!</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">But thar war Goggle-eyes, peart an' gay,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Twangin' an' a-tunin' up&mdash;'Now, dance away!</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Ye may sarch night an' day ez a constancy</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">An' ye won't find a fiddler sech ez me!</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Sech ez <i>me</i>!&mdash;Sech ez <span class="smcap">Me</span>!'"</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>As he sank back exhausted upon the ground, a new aspect of the scene
+caught his attention.</p>
+
+<p>Those blue mountains were purpling&mdash;there was an ever-deepening flush in
+the west. It was close upon sunset, and while he had wasted the time,
+the five men to whom his father had sent that stern message forbidding
+them to come to his house were perhaps on their way thither, with every
+expectation of a cordial welcome. There might be a row&mdash;even a
+fight&mdash;and all because he had loitered.</p>
+
+<p>How he tore out of the brambly woods! How he pounded along the sandy
+road! But when he reached the settlement close upon nightfall, the
+storekeeper's wife told him that the men had gone long ago.</p>
+
+<p>"They war powerful special ter git off early," she added, "'kase they
+wanted ter be thar 'fore Old Daddy drapped off ter sleep. Some o' them
+foolish, slack-jawed boys ter the store ter-day riled the old man's
+feelin's, an' they 'lowed ter patch up the peace with him, an' let him
+an' Jonas know ez they never meant no harm."</p>
+
+<p>This suggestion buoyed up the boy's heart to some degree as he toiled
+along the "short cut" homeward through the heavy shades of the gloomy
+woods and the mystic effects of the red rising moon. But he was not
+altogether without anxiety until, as he drew within sight of the log
+cabin on the slope of the ravine, he heard Old Daddy piping pacifically
+to the guests about "my son," and Jonas Creyshaw's jolly laughter.</p>
+
+<p>The moon was golden now; Si could see its brilliant shafts of light
+strike aslant upon the smooth surface of the cliff that formed the
+opposite side of Old Daddy's Window. He stopped short in the deep shadow
+of the more rugged crag. The vines and bushes that draped its many
+jagged ledges dripped with dew. The boughs of an old oak, which grew
+close by, swayed gently in the breeze. Hidden by its huge hole, Si cast
+an apprehensive glance toward the house where his elders sat.</p>
+
+<p>Certainly no one was thinking of him now.</p>
+
+<p>"This air my chance fur that young ow<i>el</i>&mdash;ef ever," he said to himself.</p>
+
+<p>The owl's nest was in the hollow of the tree. The trunk was far too
+bulky to admit of climbing, and the lowest branches were well out of the
+boy's reach. Some thirty feet from the ground, however, one of the
+boughs touched the crag. By clambering up its rugged, irregular ledges,
+making a zigzag across its whole breadth to the right and then a similar
+zigzag to the left, Si might gain a position which would enable him to
+clutch this bough of the tree. Thence he could scramble along to the
+owl's stronghold.</p>
+
+<p>He hesitated. He knew his elders would disapprove of so reckless an
+undertaking as climbing about Old Daddy's Window, for in venturing
+toward its outer verge, a false step, a crumbling ledge, the snapping of
+a vine, would fling him down the sheer precipice into the depths below.</p>
+
+<p>His hankering for a pet owl had nevertheless brought him here more than
+once. It was only yesterday evening&mdash;before he had heard of the ghost's
+appearance, however&mdash;that he had made his last futile attempt.</p>
+
+<p>He looked up doubtfully. "I ain't ez strong ez&mdash;ez some folks," he
+admitted.</p>
+
+<p>"But then, come ter think of it," he argued astutely, "I don't weigh
+nuthin' sca'cely, an' thar ain't much of me ter hev ter haul up thar."</p>
+
+<p>He flung off his hat, he laid his wiry hands upon the wild grape-vines,
+he felt with his bare feet for the familiar niches and jagged edges, and
+up he went, working steadily to the right, across the broad face of the
+cliff.</p>
+
+<p>Its heavy shadow concealed him from view. Only one ledge, at the extreme
+verge of the crag, jutted out into the full moonbeams. But this, by
+reason of the intervening bushes and vines, could not be seen by those
+who sat in the cabin porch on the slope of the ravine, and he was glad
+to have light just here, for it was the most perilous point of his
+enterprise. By deft scrambling, however, he succeeded in getting on the
+moonlit ledge.</p>
+
+<p>"I clumb like a painter!" he declared triumphantly.</p>
+
+<p>He rested there for a moment before attempting to reach the vines high
+up on the left hand, which he must grasp in order to draw himself up
+into the shadowy niche in the rock, and begin his zigzag course back
+again across the face of the cliff to the projecting bough of the tree.</p>
+
+<p>But suddenly, as he still stood motionless on the ledge in the full
+radiance of the moon, the clamor of frightened voices sounded at the
+house. Until now he had forgotten all about the ghost. He turned,
+horror-stricken.</p>
+
+<p>There was the frightful thing, plainly defined against the smooth
+surface of the opposite cliff&mdash;some thirty feet distant&mdash;that formed the
+other side of Old Daddy's Window.</p>
+
+<p>And certainly there are mighty few dancers such as that ghost! It lunged
+actively toward the precipice. It suddenly dashed wildly back&mdash;gyrating
+continually with singularly nimble feet, flinging wiry arms aloft and
+maintaining a sinister silence, while the frightened clamor at the house
+grew ever louder and more shrill.</p>
+
+<p>Several minutes elapsed before Si recognized something peculiarly
+familiar in the ghost's wiry nimbleness&mdash;before he realized that the
+shadow of the cliff on which he stood reached across the ravine to the
+base of the opposite cliff, and that the figure which had caused so much
+alarm was only his own shadow cast upon its perpendicular surface.</p>
+
+<p>He stopped short in those antics which had been induced by mortal
+terror; of course, his shadow, too, was still instantly. It stood upon
+the brink of the precipice which seems the sill of Old Daddy's Window,
+and showed distinctly on the smooth face of the cliff opposite to him.</p>
+
+<p>He understood, after a moment's reflection, how it was that as he had
+climbed up on the ledge in the full moonlight his shadow had seemed to
+rise gradually from the vague depths below the insurmountable
+precipice.</p>
+
+<p>He sprang nimbly upward to seize the vines that shielded him from the
+observation of the ghost-seers on the cabin porch, and as he caught them
+and swung himself suddenly from the moonlit ledge into the gloomy shade,
+he noticed that his shadow seemed to fling its arms wildly above its
+head, and disappeared upward.</p>
+
+<p>"That air jes' what dad seen las' night when I war down hyar afore,
+a-figurin' ter ketch that thar leetle ow<i>el</i>," he said to himself when
+he had reached the tree and sat in a crotch, panting and excited.</p>
+
+<p>After a moment, regardless of the coveted owl, he swung down from branch
+to branch, dropped easily from the lowest upon the ground, picked up his
+hat, and prepared to skulk along the "short cut," strike the road, and
+come home by that route as if he had just returned from the settlement.</p>
+
+<p>"'Kase," he argued sagely, "ef them skeered-ter-death grown folks war
+ter find out ez <i>I</i> war the <i>harnt</i>&mdash;I mean ez the <i>harnt</i> war
+<i>me</i>&mdash;ennyhow," he concluded desperately, "I'd <span class="smcap">ketch</span> it&mdash;sure!"</p>
+
+<p>So impressed was he with this idea that he discreetly held his tongue.</p>
+
+<p>And from that day to this, Jonas Creyshaw and his friends have been
+unable to solve the mystery of Old Daddy's Window.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="WAY_DOWN_IN_POOR_VALLEY" id="WAY_DOWN_IN_POOR_VALLEY"></a>'WAY DOWN IN POOR VALLEY</h2>
+
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I</h2>
+
+
+<p>There was the grim Big Injun Mountain to the right, with its bare,
+beetling sandstone crags. There was the long line of cherty hills to the
+left, covered by a dark growth of stunted pines. Between lay that
+melancholy stretch of sterility known as Poor Valley,&mdash;the poorest of
+the several valleys in Tennessee thus piteously denominated, because of
+the sorry contrast which they present to the rich coves and fertile
+vales so usual among the mountains of the State.</p>
+
+<p>How poor the soil was, Ike Hooden might bitterly testify; for ever since
+he could hold a plough he had, year after year, followed the old
+"bull-tongue" through the furrows of the sandy fields which lay around
+the log cabin at the base of the mountain. In the intervals of
+"crappin'" he worked at the forge with his stepfather, for close at
+hand, in the shadow of a great jutting cliff, lurked a dark little
+shanty of unhewn logs that was a blacksmith's shop.</p>
+
+<p>When he first began this labor, he was, perhaps, the youngest striker
+that ever wielded a sledge. Now, at eighteen, he had become expert at
+the trade, and his muscles were admirably developed. He was tall and
+robust, and he had never an ache nor an ill, except in his aching heart.
+But his heart was sore, for in the shop he found oaths and harsh
+treatment, and even at home these pursued him; while outside, desolation
+was set like a seal on Poor Valley.</p>
+
+<p>One drear autumnal afternoon, when the sky was dull, a dense white mist
+overspread the valley. As Ike plodded up the steep mountain side, the
+vapor followed him, creeping silently along the deep ravines and chasms,
+till at length it overtook and enveloped him. Then only a few feet of
+the familiar path remained visible.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly he stopped short and stared. A dim, distorted something was
+peering at him from over the top of a big boulder. It was moving&mdash;it
+nodded at him. Then he indistinctly recognized it as a tall, conical
+hat. There seemed a sort of featureless face below it.</p>
+
+<p>A thrill of fear crept through him. His hands grew cold and shook in his
+pockets. He leaned forward, gazing intently into the thick fog.</p>
+
+<p>An odd distortion crossed the vague, featureless face&mdash;like a leer,
+perhaps. Once more the tall, conical hat nodded fantastically.</p>
+
+<p>"Ef ye do that agin," cried Ike, in sudden anger, all his pluck coming
+back with a rush, "I'll gin ye a lick ez will weld yer head an' the
+boulder together!"</p>
+
+<p>He lifted his clenched fist and shook it.</p>
+
+<p>"Haw! haw! haw!" laughed the man in the mist.</p>
+
+<p>Ike cooled off abruptly. He had been kicked and cuffed half his life,
+but he had never been laughed at. Ridicule tamed him. He was ashamed,
+and he remembered that he had been afraid, for he had thought the man
+was some "roamin' harnt."</p>
+
+<p>"I dunno," said Ike sulkily, "ez ye hev got enny call ter pounce so
+suddint out'n the fog, an' go ter noddin' that cur'ous way ter folks ez
+can't half see ye."</p>
+
+<p>"I never knowed afore," said the man in the mist, with mock apology in
+his tone and in the fantastic gyrations of his nodding hat, "ez it air
+you-uns ez owns this mounting." He looked derisively at Ike from head to
+foot. "Ye air the biggest man in Tennessee, ain't ye?"</p>
+
+<p>"Naw!" said Ike shortly, feeling painfully awkward, as an overgrown boy
+is apt to do.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, from yer height, I mought hev thunk ye war that big Injun that
+the old folks tells about," and the stranger broke suddenly into a
+hoarse, quavering chant:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">"'A red man lived in Tennessee,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Mighty big Injun, sure!</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">He growed ez high ez the tallest tree,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">An' he sez, sez he, "Big Injun, me!"</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Mighty big Injun, sure!'"</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, waal," in a pensive voice, "so ye ain't him? I'm powerful glad ye
+tole me that, sonny, 'kase I mought hev got skeered hyar in the woods by
+myself with that big Injun."</p>
+
+<p>He laughed boisterously, and began to sing again:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">"'Settlers blazed out a road, ye see,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Mighty big Injun, sure!</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">He combed thar hair with a knife. Sez he,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">"It's combed fur good! Big Injun, me!"</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Mighty big Injun, sure!'"</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>He broke out laughing afresh, and Ike, abashed and indignant, was about
+to pass on, when the man gayly balanced himself on one foot, as if he
+were about to dance a grotesque jig, and held out at arm's length a big
+silver coin.</p>
+
+<p>It was a dollar. That meant a great deal to Ike, for he earned no money
+he could call his own.</p>
+
+<p>"Free an' enlightened citizen o' these Nunited States," the man
+addressed him with mock solemnity, "I brung this dollar hyar fur
+you-uns."</p>
+
+<p>"What air ye layin' off fur me ter do?" asked Ike.</p>
+
+<p>The man grew abruptly grave. "Jes' stable this hyar critter fur a night
+an' day."</p>
+
+<p>For the first time Ike became aware of a horse's flank, dimly seen on
+the other side of the boulder.</p>
+
+<p>"Ter-morrer night ride him up ter my house on the mounting. Ye hev hearn
+tell o' me, hain't ye, Jedge? My name's Grig Beemy. Don't kem till
+night, 'kase I won't be thar till then. I hev got ter stop
+yander&mdash;yander"&mdash;he looked about uncertainly, "yander ter the sawmill
+till then, 'kase I promised ter holp work thar some. I'll gin ye the
+dollar now," he added liberally, as an extra inducement.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll be powerful glad ter do that thar job fur a dollar," said Ike,
+thinking, with a glow of self-gratulation, of the corn which he had
+raised in his scanty leisure on his own little patch of ground, and
+which he might use to feed the animal.</p>
+
+<p>"But hold yer jaw 'bout'n it, boy. Yer stepdad wouldn't let the beastis
+stay thar a minute ef he knowed it, 'kase&mdash;waal&mdash;'kase me an' him hev
+hed words. Slip the beastis in on the sly. Pearce Tallam don't feed an'
+tend ter his critters nohow. I hev hearn ez his boys do that job, so he
+ain't like ter find it out. On the sly&mdash;that's the trade."</p>
+
+<p>Ike hesitated.</p>
+
+<p>Once more the man teetered on one foot, and held out the coin
+temptingly. But Ike's better instincts came to his aid.</p>
+
+<p>"That barn b'longs ter Pearce Tallam. I puts nuthin' thar 'thout his
+knowin' it. I ain't a fox, nur a mink, nur su'thin wild, ter go skulkin'
+'bout on the sly."</p>
+
+<p>Then he pressed hastily on out of temptation's way.</p>
+
+<p>"Haw! haw! haw!" laughed the man in the mist.</p>
+
+<p>There was no mirth in the tones now; his laugh was a bitter gibe. As it
+followed Ike, it reminded him that the man had not yet moved from beside
+the boulder, or he would have heard the thud of the horse's hoofs.</p>
+
+<p>He turned and glanced back. The opaque white mist was dense about him,
+and he could see nothing. As he stood still, he heard a muttered oath,
+and after a time the man cleared his throat in a rasping fashion, as if
+the oath had stuck in it.</p>
+
+<p>Ike understood at last. The man was waiting for somebody. And this was
+strange, here in the thick fog on the bleak mountainside. But Ike said
+to himself that it was no concern of his, and plodded steadily on, till
+he reached a dark little log house, above which towered a flaring yellow
+hickory tree.</p>
+
+<p>Within, ranged on benches, were homespun-clad mountain children. A
+high-shouldered, elderly man sat at a table near the deep fireplace,
+where a huge backlog was smouldering. Through the cobwebbed window-panes
+the mists looked in.</p>
+
+<p>Ike did not speak as he stood on the threshold, but his greedy glance at
+the scholars' books enlightened the pedagogue. "Do you want to come to
+school?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>Then the boy's long-cherished grievance burst forth. "They hev tole me
+ez how it air agin the law, bein' ez I lives out'n the <i>dee</i>stric'."</p>
+
+<p>The teacher elevated his grizzled eyebrows, and Ike said, "I kem hyar
+ter ax ye ef that be a true word. I 'lowed ez mebbe my dad tole me that
+word jes' ter hender me, an' keep me at the forge. It riles me powerful
+ter hev ter be an ignorunt all my days."</p>
+
+<p>To a stranger, this reflection on his "dad" seemed unbecoming. The
+teacher's sympathy ebbed. He looked severely at the boy's pale, anxious
+face, as he coldly said that he could teach no pupils who resided
+outside his school district, except out of regular school hours, and
+with a charge for tuition.</p>
+
+<p>Ike Hooden had no money. He nodded suddenly in farewell, the door
+closed, and when the schoolmaster, in returning compassion, opened it
+after him, and peered out into the impenetrable mist, the boy was
+nowhere to be seen. He had taken his despair by the hand, and together
+they went down, down into the depths of Poor Valley.</p>
+
+<p>He stood so sorely in need of a little kindness that he felt grateful
+for the friendly aspect of his stepbrother, whom he met just before he
+reached the shop.</p>
+
+<p>"'Pears like ye air toler'ble late a-gittin' home, Ike," said Jube. "I
+done ye the favior ter feed the critters. I 'lowed ez ye would do ez
+much fur me some day. I'll feed 'em agin in the mornin', ef ye'll forge
+me three lenks ter my trace-chain ter-night, arter dad hev gone home."</p>
+
+<p>Now this broad-faced, sandy-haired, undersized boy, who was two or three
+years younger than Ike, and not strong enough for work at the anvil, was
+a great tactician. It was his habit, in doing a favor, rigorously to
+exact a set-off, and that night when the blacksmith had left the shop,
+Jube slouched in.</p>
+
+<p>The flare of the forge-fire illumined with a fitful flicker the dark
+interior, showing the rod across the corner with its jingling weight of
+horseshoes, a ploughshare on the ground, the barrel of water, the low
+window, and casting upon the wall a grotesque shadow of Jube's dodging
+figure as he began to ply the bellows.</p>
+
+<p>Presently he left off, the panting roar ceased, the hot iron was laid on
+the anvil, and his dodging image on the wall was replaced by an immense
+shadow of Ike's big right arm as he raised it. The blows fell fast; the
+sparks showered about. All the air was ajar with the resonant clamor of
+the hammer, and the anvil sang and sang, shrill and clear. When the iron
+was hammered cold, Jube broke the momentary silence.</p>
+
+<p>"I hev got," he droned, as if he were reciting something made familiar
+by repetition, "two roosters, 'leven hens, an' three pullets."</p>
+
+<p>There was a long pause, and then he chanted, "One o' the roosters air a
+Dominicky."</p>
+
+<p>He walked over to the anvil and struck it with a small bit of metal
+which he held concealed in his hand.</p>
+
+<p>"I hev got two shoats, a bag o' dried peaches, two geese, an' I'm
+tradin' with mam fur a gayn-der."</p>
+
+<p>He quietly slipped the small bit of shining metal in his pocket.</p>
+
+<p>"I hev got," he droned, waxing very impressive, "a red heifer."</p>
+
+<p>Ike paused meditatively, his hammer in his hand. A new hope was dawning
+within him. He knew what was meant by Jube, who often recited the list
+of his possessions, seeking to rouse enough envy to induce Ike to
+exchange for the "lay out" his interest in a certain gray mare.</p>
+
+<p>Now the mare really belonged to Ike, having come to him from his
+paternal grandfather. This was all of value that the old man had left;
+for the deserted log hut, rotting on another bleak waste farther down in
+Poor Valley, was worth only a sigh for the home that it once
+was,&mdash;worth, too, perhaps, the thanks of those it sheltered now, the rat
+and the owl.</p>
+
+<p>The mare had worked for Pearce Tallam in the plough, under the saddle,
+and in the wagon all the years since. But one day, when the boy fell
+into a rage,&mdash;for he, too, had a difficult temper,&mdash;and declared that
+he would sell her and go forth from Poor Valley never to return, he was
+met by the question, "Hain't the mare lived off'n my fields, an' hain't
+I gin ye yer grub, an' clothes, an' the roof that kivers ye?"</p>
+
+<p>Thus Pearce Tallam had disputed his right to sell the mare. But it had
+more than once occurred to him that the blacksmith would not object to
+Jube's buying her.</p>
+
+<p>Hitherto Ike had not coveted Jube's variegated possessions. But now he
+wanted money for schooling. It was true he could hardly turn these into
+cash, for in this region farm produce of every description is received
+at the country stores in exchange for powder, salt, and similar
+necessities, and thus there is little need for money, and very little is
+in circulation.</p>
+
+<p>Still, Ike reflected that he might now and then get a small sum at the
+store, or perhaps the schoolmaster might barter "l'arnin'" for the
+heifer or the shoats.</p>
+
+<p>His hesitation was not lost upon Jube, who offered a culminating
+inducement to clinch the trade. He suddenly stood erect, teetered
+fantastically on one foot, as if about to begin to dance, and held out a
+glittering silver dollar.</p>
+
+<p>The hammer fell from Ike's hands upon the anvil. "'Twar ye ez Grig
+Beemy war a-waitin' fur thar on the mounting in the mist!" he cried out,
+recognizing the man's odd gesture, which Jube had unconsciously
+imitated.</p>
+
+<p>Doubtless the dollar was offered to Jube afterward, exactly as it had
+been offered to him. And Jube had taken it. The imitative monkey thrust
+it hastily into his pocket, and came down from his fantastic toe, and
+stood soberly enough on his two feet.</p>
+
+<p>"Grig Beemy gin ye that thar dollar," said Ike.</p>
+
+<p>Jube sullenly denied it. "He never, now!"</p>
+
+<p>"His critter hev got no call ter be in dad's barn."</p>
+
+<p>"His critter ain't hyar," protested Jube. "This dollar war gin me in
+trade ter the settle<i>mint</i>."</p>
+
+<p>Ike remembered the queer gesture. How could Jube have repeated it if he
+had not seen it? He broke into a sarcastic laugh.</p>
+
+<p>"That's how kem ye war so powerful 'commodatin' ez ter feed the
+critters. Ye 'lowed ez I wouldn't see the strange beastis, an' then tell
+dad. Foolin' me war a part o' yer trade, I reckon."</p>
+
+<p>Jube made no reply.</p>
+
+<p>"Ef ye war ez big ez me, or bigger, I'd thrash ye out'n yer boots fur
+this trick. Ye don't want no lenks ter yer chain. Ye jes' want ter be
+sure o' keepin' me out'n the barn. Waal&mdash;thar air yer lenks."</p>
+
+<p>He caught up the tongs and held the links in the fire with one hand
+while he worked the bellows with the other. Then he laid them red-hot
+upon the anvil. His rapid blows crushed them to a shapeless mass. "And
+now&mdash;thar they ain't."</p>
+
+<p>Jube did not linger long. He was in terror lest Ike should tell his
+father. But Ike did not think this was his duty. In fact, neither boy
+imagined that the affair involved anything more serious than stabling a
+horse without the knowledge of the owner of the shelter.</p>
+
+<p>When Ike was alone a little later, an unaccustomed sound caused him to
+glance toward the window.</p>
+
+<p>Something outside was passing it. His position was such that he could
+not see the object itself, but upon the perpendicular gray wall of the
+crag close at hand, and distinctly defined in the yellow flare that
+flickered out through the window from the fire of the forge, the
+gigantic shadow of a horse's head glided by.</p>
+
+<p>He understood in an instant that Jube had slipped the animal out of the
+barn, and was hiding him in the misty woods, expecting that Ike would
+acquaint his father with the facts. He had so managed that these facts
+would seem lies, if Pearce Tallam should examine the premises and find
+no horse there.</p>
+
+<p>All the next day the white mist clung shroud-like to Poor Valley. The
+shadows of evening were sifting through it, when Ike's mother went to
+the shop, much perturbed because the cow had not come, and she could not
+find Jube to send after her.</p>
+
+<p>"Ike kin go, I reckon," said the blacksmith.</p>
+
+<p>So Ike mounted his mare and set out through the thick white vapor. He
+had divined the cause of Jube's absence, and experienced no surprise
+when on the summit of the mountain he overtook him, riding the strange
+horse, on his way to Beemy's house.</p>
+
+<p>"I s'pose that critter air yourn, an' ye mus' hev bought him fur a pound
+o' dried peaches, or sech, up thar ter the settle<i>mint</i>," sneered Ike.</p>
+
+<p>Jube was about to reply, but he glanced back into the dense mist with a
+changing expression.</p>
+
+<p>"Hesh up!" he said softly. "What's that?"</p>
+
+<p>It was the regular beat of horses' hoofs, coming at a fair pace along
+the road on the summit of the mountain. The riders were talking
+excitedly.</p>
+
+<p>"I tell ye, ef I could git a glimpse o' the man ez stole that thar
+horse, it would go powerful hard with me not to let daylight through
+him. I brung this hyar shootin'-iron along o' purpose. Waal, waal,
+though, seein' ez ye air the sheriff, I'll hev ter leave it be ez
+you-uns say. I wouldn't know the man from Adam; but ye can't miss the
+critter,&mdash;big chestnut, with a star in his forehead, an'"&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Something strange had happened. At the sound of the voice the horse
+pricked up his ears, turned short round in the road, and neighed
+joyfully.</p>
+
+<p>The boys looked at each other with white faces. They understood at last.
+Jube was mounted on a stolen horse within a hundred yards of the
+pursuing owner and the officers of the law. Could explanations&mdash;words,
+mere words&mdash;clear him in the teeth of this fact?</p>
+
+<p>"Drap out'n the saddle, turn the critter loose in the road, an' take ter
+the woods," urged Ike.</p>
+
+<p>"They'll sarch an' ketch me," quavered Jube.</p>
+
+<p>He was frantic at the idea of being captured on the horse's back, but if
+it should come to a race, he preferred trusting to the chestnut's four
+legs rather than to his own two.</p>
+
+<p>Ike hesitated. Jube had brought the difficulty all on himself, and
+surely it was not incumbent on Ike to share the danger. But he was
+swayed by a sudden uncontrollable impulse.</p>
+
+<p>"Drap off'n the critter, turn him loose, an' I'll lope down the road a
+piece, an' they'll foller me, in the mist."</p>
+
+<p>He might have done a wiser thing. But it was a tough problem at best,
+and he had only a moment in which to decide.</p>
+
+<p>In that swift, confused second he saw Jube slide from the saddle and
+disappear in the mist as if he had been caught up in the clouds. He
+heard the horse's hoofs striking against the stones as he trotted off,
+whinnying, to meet his master. There was a momentary clamor among the
+men, and then with whip and spur they pressed on to capture the supposed
+malefactor.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II</h2>
+
+
+<p>All at once it occurred to Ike, as he galloped down the road, that when
+they overtook him, they would think that he was the thief, and that he
+had been leading the horse. He had been so strong in his own innocence
+that the possibility that they might suspect him had not before entered
+his mind.</p>
+
+<p>He had intended only to divert the pursuit from Jube, who, although free
+from any great wrong-doing, was exposed to the most serious
+misconstruction. The knowledge of the pursuers' revolvers had made this
+a hard thing to do, but otherwise he had not thought of himself, nor of
+what he should say when overtaken.</p>
+
+<p>They would question him; he must answer. Would they believe his story?
+Could he support it? Grig Beemy of course would deny it. And Jube&mdash;had
+he not known how Jube could lie? Would he not fear that the truth might
+somehow involve him with the horse-thief?</p>
+
+<p>Ike, with despair in his heart, urged his mare to her utmost speed,
+knowing now the danger he was in as a suspected horse-thief. Suddenly,
+from among his pursuers, a tiny jet of flame flared out into the dense
+gray atmosphere, something whizzed through the branches of the trees
+above his head, and a sharp report jarred the mists.</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps the officer fired into the air, merely to intimidate the
+supposed criminal and induce him to surrender. But now the boy could not
+stop. He had lost control of the mare. Frightened beyond measure by the
+report of the pistol, she was in full run.</p>
+
+<p>On she dashed, down sharp declivities, up steep ascents, and then away
+and away, with a great burst of speed, along a level sandy stretch.</p>
+
+<p>The black night was falling like a pall upon the white, shrouded day.
+Ike knew less where he was than the mare did; he was trusting to her
+instinct to carry him to her stable. More than once the low branches of
+a tree struck him, almost tearing him from the saddle, but he clung
+frantically to the mane of the frightened animal, and on and on she
+swept, with the horsemen thundering behind.</p>
+
+<p>He could hear nothing but their heavy, continuous tramp. He could see
+nothing, until suddenly a dim, pure light was shining in front of him,
+on his own level, it seemed. He stared at it with starting eyeballs. It
+cleft the vapors,&mdash;they were falling away on either side,&mdash;and they
+reflected it with an illusive, pearly shimmer.</p>
+
+<p>In another moment he knew that he was nearing the abrupt precipice, for
+that was the moon, riding like a silver boat upon a sea of mist, with a
+glittering wake behind it, beyond the sharply serrated summit line of
+the eastern hills.</p>
+
+<p>He could no longer trust to the mare's instinct. He trusted to
+appearances instead. He sawed away with all his might on the bit,
+striving to wheel her around in the road.</p>
+
+<p>She resisted, stumbled, then fell upon her knees among a wild confusion
+of rotting logs and stones that rolled beneath her, as, snorting and
+angry, she struggled again to her feet. Once more Ike pulled her to the
+left.</p>
+
+<p>There was a great displacement of earth, a frantic scramble, and
+together they went over the cliff.</p>
+
+<p>The descent was not absolutely sheer. At the distance of twelve or
+fourteen feet below, a great bulging shelf of rock projected. They fell
+upon this. The boy had instantly loosed his hold of the reins, and
+slipped away from the prostrate animal. The mare, quieted only for a
+moment by the shock, sprang to her feet, the stones slipped beneath her,
+and she went headlong over the precipice into the dreary depths of Poor
+Valley.</p>
+
+<p>The pursuers heard the heavy thud when she struck the ground far below.
+They paused at the verge of the crag, and talked in eager, excited
+tones. They did not see the boy, as he sat cowering close to the cliff
+on the ledge below.</p>
+
+<p>Ike listened in great trepidation to what they were saying; he
+experienced infinite surprise when presently one of them mentioned Grig
+Beemy's name.</p>
+
+<p><a name="illus-056" id="illus-056"></a></p>
+<div class="figcenter">
+             <img   src="images/img056.jpg" width="356" height="550"
+             alt="TOGETHER THEY WENT OVER THE CLIFF" /><br />
+         <b>TOGETHER THEY WENT OVER THE CLIFF</b>
+    </div>
+
+<p>So they knew who had stolen the horse! It was little consolation to Ike,
+with his mare lying dead at the foot of the cliff, to reflect that if he
+had had the courage to face the emergency, and rely upon his innocence,
+his story would only have confirmed their knowledge of the facts.</p>
+
+<p>Although the master of the horse did not know the thief "from Adam,"
+Beemy had been seen with the animal and recognized by others, who,
+accompanying the sheriff and the owner, had traced him for two days
+through many wily doublings in the mountain fastnesses.</p>
+
+<p>They now concluded to press on to Beemy's house. Ike knew they would
+find him there waiting for Jube and the horse. Beemy had feared that he
+would be followed, and this was the reason that he had desired to rid
+himself of the animal for a day and night, until he could make sure and
+feel more secure.</p>
+
+<p>As the horsemen swept round the curve, Ike remembered how close was the
+road to the cliff. If he had only given the mare her head, she would
+have carried him safely around it. But there she lay dead, way down in
+Poor Valley, and he had lost all he owned in the world.</p>
+
+<p>Night had come, and in the dense darkness he did not dare to move. Only
+a step away was the edge of the precipice, over which the mare had
+slipped, and he could not tell how dangerous was the bluff he must climb
+to regain the summit. He felt he must lie here till dawn.</p>
+
+<p>He was badly jarred by his fall. Time dragged by wearily, and his
+bruises pained him. He knew at length that all the world slept,&mdash;all but
+himself and some distant ravening wolf, whose fierce howl ever and anon
+set the mists to shivering in Poor Valley where he prowled. This
+blood-curdling sound and his bitter thoughts were but sorry company.</p>
+
+<p>After a long time he fell asleep. Fortunately, he did not stir. When he
+regained consciousness and a sense of danger, he found still around him
+that dense white vapor, through which the pale, drear day was slowly
+dawning. Above his head was swinging in the mist a cluster of
+fox-grapes, with the rime upon them, and higher still he saw a quivering
+red leaf.</p>
+
+<p>It was the leaf of a starveling tree, growing out of a cleft where there
+was so little earth that it seemed to draw its sustenance from the rock.
+It was a scraggy, stunted thing, but it was well for him that it had
+struck root there, for its branches brushed the solid, smooth face of
+the cliff, which he could not have surmounted but for them and the
+grape-vine that had fallen over from the summit and entangled itself
+among them.</p>
+
+<p>As he climbed the tree, he felt it quake over the abysses, which the
+mists still veiled. He had a sense of elation and achievement when he
+gained the top, and it followed him home. There it suddenly deserted
+him.</p>
+
+<p>He found Pearce Tallam in a frenzy of rage at the discovery, which he
+had made through Jube's confession, that a stolen horse had been stabled
+on his premises. Despite his tyranny and his fierce, rude temper, he
+was an honest man and of fair repute. Although he realized that neither
+boy knew that the animal had been stolen, he gave Jube a lesson which he
+remembered for many a long day, and Ike also came in for his share of
+this muscular tuition.</p>
+
+<p>For in the midst of the criminations and recriminations, the violent
+blacksmith caught up a horseshoe and flung it across the shop, striking
+Ike with a force that almost stunned him. He was a man in strength, and
+it was hard for him not to return the blow; but he only walked out of
+the shop, declaring that he would stay for no more blows.</p>
+
+<p>"Cl'ar out, then!" called out Pearce Tallam after him. "I don't keer ef
+ye goes fur good."</p>
+
+<p>He met, at the door of the dwelling, a plaintive reproach from his
+mother. "'Count o' ye not tellin' on Jube, he mought hev been tuk up fur
+a horse-thief. I dunno what I'd hev done 'thout him," she added, "'long
+o' raisin' the young tur-r-keys, an' goslin's, an' deedies, an' sech; he
+hev been a mighty holp ter me. He air more of a son ter me than my own
+boy."</p>
+
+<p>She did not mean this, but she had said it once half in jest, half in
+reproach, and then it became a formula of complaint whenever Ike
+displeased her.</p>
+
+<p>Now he was sore and sensitive. "Take him fur yer son, then!" he cried.
+"I'm a-goin' out'n Pore Valley, ef I starves fur it. I shows my face
+hyar no more."</p>
+
+<p>As he shouldered his gun and strode out, he noted the light of the
+forge-fire quivering on the mist, but he little thought it was the last
+fire that Pearce Tallam would ever kindle there.</p>
+
+<p>He glanced back again before the dense vapor shut the house from view.
+His mother was standing in the door, with her baby in her arms, looking
+after him with a frightened, beseeching face. But his heart was hardened
+and he kept on,&mdash;kept on, with that deft, even tread of the mountaineer,
+who seems never to hurry, almost to loiter, but gets over the ground
+with surprising rapidity.</p>
+
+<p>He left the mists and desolation of Poor Valley far behind, but not that
+frightened, beseeching face. He thought of it more often when he lay
+down under the shelter of a great rock to sleep than he did of the howl
+of the wolf which he had heard the night before, not far from here.</p>
+
+<p>Late the next afternoon he came upon the outskirts of a village. He
+entered it doubtfully, for it seemed metropolitan to him, unaccustomed
+as he was to anything more imposing than the cross-roads store. But the
+first sound he heard reassured him. It was the clear, metallic resonance
+of an anvil, the clanking of a sledge, and the clinking of a
+hand-hammer.</p>
+
+<p>Here, at the forge, he found work. It had been said in Poor Valley that
+he was already as good a blacksmith even as Pearce Tallam. He had great
+natural aptitude for the work, and considerable experience. But his
+wages only sufficed to pay for his food and lodging. Still, there was a
+prospect for more, and he was content.</p>
+
+<p>In his leisure he made friends among those of his own age, who took him
+about the town and enjoyed his amazement. He examined everything wrought
+in metal with such eager interest, and was so outspoken about his
+ambition, that they dubbed him Tubal-cain.</p>
+
+<p>He was struck dumb with amazement when, for the first time in his life,
+he saw a locomotive gliding along the rails, with a glaring headlight
+and a cloud of flying sparks. Once, when it was motionless on the track,
+they talked to the engineer, who explained "the workings of the
+critter," as Ike called it.</p>
+
+<p>The boy understood so readily that the engineer said, after a time,
+"You're a likely feller, for such a derned ignoramus! Where have you
+been hid out, all this time?"</p>
+
+<p>"Way down in Pore Valley," said Ike very humbly.</p>
+
+<p>"He's concluded to be a great inventor," said one of his young friends,
+with a merry wink.</p>
+
+<p>"He's a mighty artificer in iron," said the wit who had named him
+Tubal-cain.</p>
+
+<p>The engineer looked gravely at Ike. "Why, boy," he admonished him, "the
+world has got a hundred years the start of you!"</p>
+
+<p>"I kin ketch up," Ike declared sturdily.</p>
+
+<p>"There's something in grit, I reckon," said the engineer. Then his
+wonderful locomotive glided away, leaving Ike staring after it in silent
+ecstasy, and his companions dying with laughter.</p>
+
+<p>He started out to overtake the world at a night-school, where his mental
+quickness contrasted oddly with his slow, stolid demeanor. He worked
+hard at the forge all day; but everybody was kind.</p>
+
+<p>Outside of Poor Valley life seemed joyous and hopeful; progress and
+activity were on every hand; and the time he spent here was the happiest
+he had ever known,&mdash;except for the recollection of that frightened,
+beseeching face which had looked out after him through the closing
+mists.</p>
+
+<p>He wished he had turned back for a word. He wished his mother might know
+he was well and happy. He began to feel that he could go no further
+without making his peace with her. So one day he left his employer with
+the promise to return the following week, "ef the Lord spares me an'
+nuthin' happens," as the cautious rural formula has it, and set out for
+his home.</p>
+
+<p>The mists had lifted from it, but the snow had fallen deep. Poor Valley
+lay white and drear&mdash;it seemed to him that he had never before known how
+drear&mdash;between the grim mountain with its great black crags, its chasms,
+its gaunt, naked trees, and the long line of flinty hills, whose stunted
+pines bent with the weight of the snow.</p>
+
+<p>There was no smoke from the chimney of the blacksmith's shop. There were
+no footprints about the door. An atmosphere charged with calamity seemed
+to hang over the dwelling. Somehow he knew that a dreadful thing had
+happened even before he opened the door and saw his mother's mournful
+white face.</p>
+
+<p>She sprang up at the sight of him with a wild, sobbing cry that was half
+grief, half joy. He had only a glimpse of the interior,&mdash;of Jube,
+looking anxious and unnaturally grave; of the listless children, grouped
+about the fire; of the big, burly blacksmith, with a strange, deep
+pallor upon his face, and as he shifted his position&mdash;why, how was that?</p>
+
+<p>The boy's mother had thrust him out of the door, and closed it behind
+her. The jar brought down from the low eaves a few feathery flakes of
+snow, which fell upon her hair as she stood there with him.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't say nuthin' 'bout'n it," she implored. "He can't abide ter hear
+it spoke of."</p>
+
+<p>"What ails dad's hand?" he asked, bewildered.</p>
+
+<p>"It's gone!" she sobbed. "He war over ter the sawmill the day ye
+lef'&mdash;somehow 'nuther the saw cotched it&mdash;the doctor tuk it off."</p>
+
+<p>"His right hand!" cried Ike, appalled.</p>
+
+<p>The blacksmith would never lift a hammer again. And there the forge
+stood, silent and smokeless.</p>
+
+<p>What this portended, Ike realized as he sat with them around the fire.
+Their sterile fields in Poor Valley had only served to eke out their
+subsistence. This year the corn-crop had failed, and the wheat was
+hardly better. The winter had found them without special provision, but
+without special anxiety, for the anvil had always amply supplied their
+simple needs.</p>
+
+<p>Now that this misfortune had befallen them, who could say what was
+before them unless Ike would remain and take his stepfather's place at
+the forge? Ike knew that this contingency must have occurred to them as
+well as to him. He divined it from the anxious, furtive glances which
+they one and all cast upon him from time to time,&mdash;even Pearce Tallam,
+whose turn it was now to feel that greatest anguish of calamity,
+helplessness.</p>
+
+<p>But must he relinquish his hopes, his chance of an education, that
+plucky race for which he was entered to overtake the world that had a
+hundred years the start of him, and be forever a nameless, futureless
+clod in Poor Valley?</p>
+
+<p>His mother had the son she had chosen. And surely he owed no duty to
+Pearce Tallam. The hand that was gone had been a hard hand to him.</p>
+
+<p>He rose at length. He put on his leather apron. "Waal&mdash;I mought ez well
+g' long ter the shop, I reckon," he remarked calmly. "'Pears like thar's
+time yit fur a toler'ble spot o' work afore dark."</p>
+
+<p>It was a hard-won victory. Even then he experienced a sort of
+satisfaction in knowing that Pearce Tallam must feel humiliated and of
+small account to be thus utterly dependent for his bread upon the boy
+whom he had so persistently maltreated. In his pale face Ike saw
+something of the bitterness he had endured, of his broken spirit, of his
+humbled pride.</p>
+
+<p>The look smote upon the boy's heart. There was another inward struggle.
+Then he said, as if it were a result of deep cogitation,&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Ye'll hev ter kem over ter the shop, dad, wunst in a while, ter advise
+'bout what's doin'. 'Pears ter me like mos' folks would 'low ez a boy
+no older 'n me couldn't do reg'lar blacksmithin' 'thout some sperienced
+body along fur sense an' showin'."</p>
+
+<p>The man visibly plucked up a little. Was he, indeed, so useless? "That's
+a fac', Ike," he said gently. "I reckon ye kin make out
+toler'ble&mdash;cornsiderin'. But I'll be along ter holp."</p>
+
+<p>After this Ike realized that he had been working with something tougher
+than iron, harder than steel,&mdash;his own unsubdued nature. He traced an
+analogy from the forge; and he saw that those strong forces, the fires
+of conscience and the coercion of duty, had wrought the stubborn metal
+of his character to a kindly use.</p>
+
+<p>Gradually the relinquishment of his wild, vague ambition began to seem
+less bitter to him; for it might be that these were the few things over
+which he should be faithful,&mdash;his own forge-fire and his own fiery
+heart. And so he labors to fulfill his trust.</p>
+
+<p>The spring never comes to Poor Valley. The summer is a cloud of dust.
+The autumn shrouds itself in mist. And the winter is snow. But poverty
+of soil need not imply poverty of soul. And a noble manhood may nobly
+exist "'Way Down in Poor Valley."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="A_MOUNTAIN_STORM" id="A_MOUNTAIN_STORM"></a>A MOUNTAIN STORM</h2>
+
+
+<p>"Ef the filly war bridle-wise"&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The filly <i>air</i> bridle-wise."</p>
+
+<p>A sullen pause ensued, and the two brothers looked angrily at each
+other.</p>
+
+<p>The woods were still; the sunshine was faint and flickering; the low,
+guttural notes of a rain-crow broke suddenly on the silence.</p>
+
+<p>Presently Thad, mechanically examining a bridle which he held in his
+hand, began again in an appealing tone: "'Pears like ter me ez the filly
+air toler'ble well bruk ter the saddle, an' she would holp me powerful
+ter git thar quicker ter tell dad 'bout'n that thar word ez war fotched
+up the mounting. They 'lowed ez 'twar jes' las' night ez them revenue
+men raided a still-house, somewhar down thar in the valley, an' busted
+the tubs, an' sp'iled the coppers, an' arrested all the moonshiners ez
+war thar. An' ef they war ter find out 'bout'n this hyar still-house
+over yander in the gorge, they'd raid it, too. An' thar be dad," he
+continued despairingly, "jes' sodden with whiskey an' ez drunk ez a
+fraish b'iled ow<i>el</i>, an' he wouldn't hev the sense nor the showin' ter
+make them off'cers onderstand ez he never hed nothin' ter do with the
+moonshiners&mdash;'ceptin' ter go ter thar still-house, an' git drunk along
+o' them. An' I dunno whether the off'cers would set much store by that
+sayin' ennyhow, an' I want ter git dad away from thar afore they kem."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't believe that thar word ez them men air a-raidin' round the
+mountings no more 'n <i>that</i>!" and Ben kicked away a pebble
+contemptuously.</p>
+
+<p>Thad was in a quiver of anxiety. While Ben indulged his doubts, the
+paternal "B'iled Ow<i>el</i>" might at any moment be arrested on a charge of
+aiding and abetting in illicit distilling.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye never b'lieve nothin' till ye see it&mdash;ye sateful dunce!" he
+exclaimed excitedly.</p>
+
+<p>Thus began a fraternal quarrel which neither forgot for years.</p>
+
+<p>Ben turned scarlet. "Waal, then, jes' leave my filly in the barn whar
+she be now; ye kin travel on Shank's mare!"</p>
+
+<p>Thad started off up the steep slope. "Ef ye ain't a-hankerin' fur me ter
+ride that thar filly, ez air ez bridle-wise ez ye be, jes' let's see ye
+kem on, an'&mdash;hender!"</p>
+
+<p>"I hopes she'll fling ye, an' ye'll git yer neck bruk," Ben called out
+after him.</p>
+
+<p>"I wish ennything 'ud happen, jes' so be I mought never lay eyes on ye
+agin," Thad declared.</p>
+
+<p>As he glanced over his shoulder, he saw that his brother was not
+following, and when he reached the flimsy little barn, there was nothing
+to prevent him from carrying out his resolution.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless, he hesitated as he stood with the door in his hand. A
+clay-bank filly came instantly to it, but with a sudden impulse he
+closed it abruptly, and set out on foot along a narrow, brambly path
+that wound down the mountain side.</p>
+
+<p>He had descended almost to its base before the threatening appearance of
+the sky caught his attention. A dense black cloud had climbed up from
+over the opposite hills, and stretched from their jagged summits to the
+zenith. There it hung in mid-air, its sombre shadow falling across the
+valley, and reaching high up the craggy slope, where the boy's home was
+perched. The whole landscape wore that strange, still, expectant aspect
+which precedes the bursting of a storm.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly a vivid white flash quivered through the sky. The hills,
+suffused with its ghastly light, started up in bold relief against the
+black clouds; even the faint outlines of distant ranges that had
+disappeared with the strong sunlight reasserted themselves in a pale,
+illusive fashion, flickering like the unreal mountains of a dream about
+the vague horizon. A ball of fire had coursed through the air, striking
+with dazzling coruscations the top of a towering oak, and he heard,
+amidst the thunder and its clamorous echo, the sharp crash of riving
+timber.</p>
+
+<p>All at once he had a sense of falling, a sudden pain shot through him,
+darkness descended, and he knew no more.</p>
+
+<p>When he gradually regained consciousness, it seemed that a long time had
+elapsed since he was trudging down the mountain side. He could not
+imagine where he was now. He put out his hand in the intense darkness
+that enveloped him, and felt the damp mould beside him,&mdash;above&mdash;below.</p>
+
+<p>For one horrible instant he recalled a sickening story of a man who was
+negligently buried alive. He had always believed that this was only a
+fireside fiction invented in the security of the chimney corner; but was
+it to have a strange confirmation in his own fate? He was pierced with
+pity for himself, as he heard the despair in his voice when he sent
+forth a wild, hoarse cry. What a cavernous echo it had!</p>
+
+<p>Again and again, after his lips were closed, that voice of anguish rang
+out, and then was silent, then fitfully sounded once more on another
+key. He strove to rise, but the earth on his breast resisted. With a
+great effort he finally burst through it; he felt the clods tumbling
+about him; he sat upright; he rose to his full height; and still all was
+merged in the densest darkness, and, when he stretched up his arms as
+high as he could reach, he again felt the damp mould.</p>
+
+<p>The truth had begun vaguely to enter his mind even before, in shifting
+his position, he caught sight of a rift in the deep gloom, some fifteen
+feet above his head. Then he realized that at the moment of the flash of
+lightning, unmindful of his footing, he had strayed aside from the path,
+stumbled, fallen, and, as it chanced, was received into one of those
+unsuspected apertures in the ground which are common in all cavernous
+countries, being sometimes the entrance to extensive caves, and which
+are here denominated "sink-holes."</p>
+
+<p>These cavities were exceedingly frequent in the valley, on the boundary
+of which Thad lived, and his familiarity with them did away for the
+moment with all appreciation of the perplexity and difficulty of the
+situation. He laughed aloud triumphantly.</p>
+
+<p>Instantly these underground chambers broke forth with wild, elfish
+voices that mimicked his merriment till it died on his lips. He
+preferred utter loneliness to the vague sense of companionship given by
+these weird echoes. Somehow the strangeness of all that had happened to
+him had stirred his imagination, and he could not rid himself of the
+idea that there were grimacing creatures here with him, whom he could
+not see, who would only speak when he spoke, and scoffingly iterate his
+tones.</p>
+
+<p>He was faint, bruised, and exhausted. He had been badly stunned by his
+fall; but for the soft, shelving earth through which he had crashed, it
+might have been still worse. He could scarcely move as he began to
+investigate his precarious plight. Even if he could climb the
+perpendicular wall above his head, he could not thence gain the
+aperture, for, as his eyes became more accustomed to the darkness, he
+discovered that the shape of the roof was like the interior of a roughly
+defined dome, about the centre of which was this small opening.</p>
+
+<p>"An' a human can't walk on a ceilin' like a fly," he said
+discontentedly.</p>
+
+<p>"Can't!" cried an echo close at hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Fly!" suggested a distant mocker.</p>
+
+<p>Thad closed his mouth and sat down.</p>
+
+<p>He had moved very cautiously, for he knew that these sink-holes are
+often the entrance of extensive caverns, and that there might be a deep
+abyss on any side. He could do nothing but wait and call out now and
+then, and hope that somebody might soon take the short cut through the
+woods, and, hearing his voice, come to his relief.</p>
+
+<p>His courage gave way when he reflected that the river would rise with
+the heavy rain which he could hear steadily splashing through the
+sink-hole, and for a time all prudent men would go by the beaten road
+and the ford. No one would care to take the short cut and save three
+miles' travel at the risk of swimming his horse, for the river was
+particularly deep just here and spanned only by a footbridge, except,
+perhaps, some fugitive from justice, or the revenue officers on their
+hurried, reckless raids. This reminded him of the still-house and of
+"dad" there yet, imbibing whiskey, and sharing the danger of his chosen
+cronies, the moonshiners.</p>
+
+<p>Ben, at home, would not have his anxiety roused till midnight, at least,
+by his brother's failure to return from the complicated feat of decoying
+the drunkard from the distillery. Thad trembled to think what might
+happen to himself in the interval. If the volume of water pouring down
+through the sink-hole should increase to any considerable extent, he
+would be drowned here like a rat. Was he to have his wish, and see his
+brother never again?</p>
+
+<p>And poor Ben! How his own cruel, wicked parting words would scourge him
+throughout his life,&mdash;even when he should grow old!</p>
+
+<p>Thad's eyes filled with tears of prescient pity for his brother's
+remorse.</p>
+
+<p>"Ef ennything war ter happen hyar, sure enough, I wish he mought always
+know ez I don't keer nothin' now 'bout'n that thar sayin' o' his'n," he
+thought wistfully.</p>
+
+<p>He still heard the persistent rain splashing outside. The hollow,
+unnatural murmur of a subterranean stream rose drearily. Once he sighed
+heavily, and all the cavernous voices echoed his grief.</p>
+
+<p>When that terrible flash of lightning came, Ben was still on the slope
+of the mountain where his brother had left him. The next moment he heard
+the wild whirl of the gusts as they came surging up the valley. He saw
+the frantic commotion of the woods on distant spurs as the wind
+advanced, preceded by swirling columns of dust which carried myriads of
+leaves, twigs, and even great branches rent from the trees, as evidence
+of its force.</p>
+
+<p>Ben turned, and ran like a deer up the steep ascent. "It'll blow that
+thar barn spang off'n the bluff, I'm thinkin'&mdash;an' the
+filly&mdash;Cobe&mdash;Cobe!" he cried out to her as he neared the shanty.</p>
+
+<p>He stopped short, his eyes distended. The door was open. There was no
+hair nor hoof of the filly within. He could have no doubt that his
+brother had actually taken his property for this errand against his
+will.</p>
+
+<p>"That thar boy air no better 'n a low-down horse-thief!" he declared
+bitterly.</p>
+
+<p>The gusts struck the little barn. It careened this way and that, and
+finally the flimsy structure came down with a crash, one of the boards
+narrowly missing Ben's head as it fell. He had a hard time getting to
+the house in the teeth of the wind, but its violence only continued a
+few minutes, and when he was safe within doors he looked out of the
+window at the silent mists, beginning to steal about the coves and
+ravines, and at the rain as it fell in serried columns. Long after dark
+it still beat with unabated persistence on the roof of the log cabin,
+and splashed and dripped with a chilly, cheerless sound from the low
+eaves. Sometimes a drop fell down the wide chimney, and hissed upon the
+red-hot coals, for Ben had piled on the logs and made a famous fire. He
+could see that his mother now and then paused to listen in the midst of
+her preparations for supper. Once as she knelt on the hearth, and
+deftly inserted a knife between the edges of a baking corn-cake and the
+hoe, she looked up suddenly at Ben without turning the cake. "I hearn
+the beastis's huff!" she said.</p>
+
+<p>Ben listened. The fire roared. The rain went moaning down the valley.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye never hearn nothin'," he rejoined.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless, she rose and opened the door. The cold air streamed in.
+The firelight showed the mists, pressing close in the porch,
+shivering, and seeming to jostle and nudge each other as they peered in,
+curiously, upon the warm home-scene, and the smoking supper, and the
+hilarious children, as if asking of one another how they would like to
+be human creatures, instead of a part of inanimate nature, or at best
+the elusive spirits of the mountains.</p>
+
+<p>There was nothing to be seen without but the mists.</p>
+
+<p>"Thad tuk the filly, ye say fur true?" she asked, recurring to the
+subject when supper was over.</p>
+
+<p>Ben nodded. "I hopes ter conscience she'll break his neck," he declared
+cruelly.</p>
+
+<p>His mother took instant alarm. She turned and looked at him with a face
+expressive of the keenest anxiety. "'Pears like to me ez the only reason
+Thad kin be so late a-gittin' back air jes' 'kase it air a toler'ble
+aggervatin' job a-fotchin' of dad home," she said, striving to reassure
+herself.</p>
+
+<p>"That air a true word 'bout'n dad, ennyhow," Ben assented bitterly.</p>
+
+<p>His old grandfather suddenly lifted up his voice.</p>
+
+<p>"This night," said the graybeard from out the chimney corner,&mdash;"this
+night, forty years ago, my brother, Ephraim Grimes, fell dead on this
+cabin floor, an' no man sence kin mark the cause."</p>
+
+<p>A pause ensued. The rain fell. The pallid, shuddering mists looked in at
+the window.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye ain't a-thinkin'," cried the woman tremulously, "ez the night air
+one app'inted fur evil?"</p>
+
+<p>The old man did not answer.</p>
+
+<p>"This night," he croaked, leaning over the glowing fire, and kindling
+his long-stemmed cob-pipe by dexterously scooping up with its bowl a
+live coal,&mdash;"this night, twenty-six years ago, thar war eleven sheep o'
+mine&mdash;ez war teched in the head, or somehows disabled from good
+sense&mdash;an' they jumped off'n the bluff, one arter the other, an' fell
+haffen way down the mounting, an' bruk thar fool necks 'mongst the
+boulders. They war dead. Thar shearin's never kem ter much account
+nuther. 'Twar powerful cur'ous, fust an' last."</p>
+
+<p>The woman made a gesture of indifference. "I ain't a-settin' of store by
+critters when humans is&mdash;is&mdash;whar they ain't hearn from."</p>
+
+<p>But Ben was susceptible of a "critter" scare.</p>
+
+<p>"I hope, now," he exclaimed, alarmed, "ez that thar triflin' no-'count
+Thad Grimes ain't a-goin' ter let my filly lame herself, nor nothin',
+a-travelin' with her this dark night, ez seems ter be a night fur things
+ter happen on ennyhow. Oh, shucks! shucks!" he continued impatiently,
+"I jes' feels like thar ain't no use o' my tryin' ter live along."</p>
+
+<p>Three of the children who habitually slept in the shed-room had started
+off to go to bed. As they opened the connecting door, there suddenly
+resounded a wild commotion within. They shrieked with fright, and banged
+the door against a strong force which was beginning to push from the
+other side.</p>
+
+<p>The old grandfather rose, pale and agitated, his pipe falling from his
+nerveless clasp.</p>
+
+<p>"This night," he said, with white lips and mechanical utterance,&mdash;"this
+night"&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Satan is in the shed-room!" shouted the three small boys, as they held
+fast to the door with a strength far beyond their age and weight.
+Nevertheless, they were hardly able to cope with the strength on the
+other side of the door, and it was alternately forced slightly ajar, and
+then closed with a resounding slam. Once, as the firelight flickered
+into the dark shed-room, the ignorant, superstitious mountaineers had a
+fleeting glimpse of an object there which convinced them: they beheld
+great gleaming, blazing eyes, a burnished hoof, and&mdash;yes&mdash;a flirting
+tail.</p>
+
+<p>"I believe it is Satan himself!" cried Ben, with awe in his voice.</p>
+
+<p>In the wild confusion and bewilderment, Ben was somehow vaguely aware
+that Satan had often been in the shed-room before,&mdash;in the antechamber
+of his own heart. Whenever this heart of his was full of unkindness, and
+hardened against his brother, although those better fraternal instincts
+which he kept repressed and dwarfed might repudiate this cruelty under
+the pretext that he did not really mean it, still the great principle of
+evil was there in the moral shed-room, clamoring for entrance at the
+inner doors. And this, we may safely say, may apply to wiser people than
+poor Ben.</p>
+
+<p>In the midst of the general despair and fright, something suddenly
+whinnied. At the sound the three small boys fell in a limp, exhausted
+heap on the floor, and, as the door no longer offered resistance, the
+unknown visitor pranced in: it was the filly, snorting and tossing her
+mane, and once more whinnying shrilly for her supper.</p>
+
+<p>In a moment Ben understood the whole phenomenon. Thad had left the barn
+door unfastened, and, when that terrible flash of lightning came and the
+wind arose, the frightened animal had instantly fled to the house for
+safety. She had doubtless pushed open the back door of the shed-room
+easily enough, but it had closed behind her, and she had remained there
+a supperless prisoner.</p>
+
+<p>The small boys picked themselves up from among the filly's hoofs, with
+disconnected exclamations of "Wa-a-a-l, sir!" while Ben led the animal
+out, with a growing impression that he would try to "live along" for a
+while, at all events.</p>
+
+<p>He had led Satan out of the moral shed-room, as well. The reappearance
+of the filly without Thad had raised a great anxiety about his brother's
+continued absence. All at once he began to feel as if those brutal
+wishes of his were prophetic,&mdash;as if they were endowed with a malignant
+power, and could actually pursue poor Thad to some violent end. He did
+not understand now how he could have framed the words.</p>
+
+<p>When a fellow really likes his brother,&mdash;and most fellows do,&mdash;there is
+scant use or grace or common-sense in keeping up, from mere
+carelessness, or through an irritable habit, a continual bickering, for
+these germs of evil are possessed of a marvelous faculty for growth, and
+some day their gigantic deformities will confront you in deeds of which
+you once believed yourself incapable.</p>
+
+<p>Ben's hands were trembling as he folded a blanket, and laid it on the
+animal's back to serve instead of a saddle.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm a-goin' ter the still-house ter see ef Thad ever got thar," he
+said, when his mother appeared at the door.</p>
+
+<p>He added, "I'm a-gittin' sorter skeered ez su'thin' mought hev happened
+ter him."</p>
+
+<p>His grandfather hobbled out into the little porch. "Them roads air
+turrible rough fur that thar filly, ez ain't fairly broke good yit, nor
+used ter travel," he suggested.</p>
+
+<p>"I'd gin four hunderd fillies, ef I hed 'em, jes' ter know that thar boy
+air safe an' sound," Ben declared, as he mounted.</p>
+
+<p>He took the short cut, judging that, at the point where it crossed the
+river, the stream was still fordable. When he heard his brother's
+piteous cries for help, he quaked to think what might have happened to
+Thad if he had not recognized the presence of Satan in the moral
+shed-room, and summarily ejected him. The rainfall had been sufficient
+to aggregate considerable water in the gullies about the sink-hole, and
+these, emptying into the cavity and sending a continuous stream over the
+boy, had served to chill him through and through, and he had a pretty
+fair chance of being drowned, or dying from cold and exhaustion. Ben
+pressed on to the still-house at the best speed he could make, and such
+of the moonshiners as were half sober came out with ropes and a barrel,
+which they lowered into the cavity. Thad managed to crawl into the
+barrel, and, after several ineffectual attempts, he was drawn up through
+the sink-hole.</p>
+
+<p>There was no formal reconciliation between the two boys. It was enough
+for Ben to feel Thad's reluctance to unloose his eager clutch upon his
+brother's arms, even after he had been lifted out upon the firm ground.
+And Thad knew that that complicated sound in Ben's throat was a sob,
+although, for the sake of the men who stood by, he strove to seem to be
+coughing.</p>
+
+<p>"Right smart of an idjit, now, ain't ye?" demanded Ben, hustling back,
+so to speak, the tears that sought to rise in his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, stranger, how's yer filly?" retorted Thad, laughing in a gaspy
+fashion.</p>
+
+<p>There was a tone of forgiveness in the inquiry. The answer caught the
+same spirit.</p>
+
+<p>"Middlin',&mdash;thanky,&mdash;jes' middlin'," said Ben.</p>
+
+<p>And then they and "dad" fared home together by the light of the
+moonshiners' lantern.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="BORROWING_A_HAMMER" id="BORROWING_A_HAMMER"></a>BORROWING A HAMMER</h2>
+
+
+<p>On a certain bold crag that juts far over a steep wooded mountain slope
+a red light was seen one moonless night in June. Sometimes it glowed
+intensely among the gray mists which hovered above the deep and sombre
+valley; sometimes it faded. Its life was the breath of the bellows, for
+a blacksmith's shop stands close beside the road that rambles along the
+brink of the mountain. Generally after sunset the forge is dark and
+silent. So when three small boys, approaching the log hut through the
+gloomy woods, heard the clink! clank! clink! clank! of the hammers, and
+the metallic echo among the cliffs, they stopped short in astonishment.</p>
+
+<p>"Thar now!" exclaimed Abner Ryder desperately; "dad's at it fur true!"</p>
+
+<p>"Mebbe he'll go away arter a while, Ab," suggested Jim Gryce, another
+of the small boys. "Then that'll gin us our chance."</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, I reckon we kin stiffen up our hearts ter wait," said Ab
+resignedly.</p>
+
+<p>All three sat down on a log a short distance from the shop, and
+presently they became so engrossed in their talk that they did not
+notice when the blacksmith, in the pauses of his work, came to the door
+for a breath of air. They failed to discreetly lower their voices, and
+thus they had a listener on whose attention they had not counted.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye see," observed Ab in a high, shrill pipe, "dad sets a heap o' store
+by his tools. But dad, ye know, air a mighty slack-twisted man. He gits
+his tools lost" (reprehensively), "he wastes his nails, an' then he
+'lows ez how it war <i>me</i> ez done it."</p>
+
+<p>He paused impressively in virtuous indignation. A murmur of surprise and
+sympathy rose from his companions. Then he recommenced.</p>
+
+<p>"Dad air the crankiest man on this hyar mounting! He won't lend me none
+o' his tools nowadays,&mdash;not even that thar leetle hammer o' his'n. An'
+I'm obleeged ter hev that thar leetle hammer an' some nails ter fix a
+box fur them young squir'ls what we cotched. So we'll jes' hev ter go
+ter his shop of a night when he is away, an'&mdash;an'&mdash;an' borry it!"</p>
+
+<p>The blacksmith, a tall, powerfully built man, of an aspect far from
+jocular, leaned slightly out of the door, peering in the direction where
+the three tow-headed urchins waited. Then he glanced within at a leather
+strap, as if he appreciated the appropriateness of an intimate relation
+between these objects. But there was no time for pleasure now. He was
+back in his shop in a moment.</p>
+
+<p>His next respite was thus entertained:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"What makes him work so of a night?" asked Jim Gryce.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal," explained Ab in his usual high key, "he rid ter the settle<i>mint</i>
+this mornin'; he hev been a-foolin' round thar all day, an' the crap air
+jes' a-sufferin' fur work! So him an' Uncle Tobe air layin' thar ploughs
+in the shop now, kase they air goin' ter run around the corn
+ter-morrer. Workin', though, goes powerful hard with dad enny time. I
+tole old Bob Peachin that, when I war ter the mill this evenin'. Him an'
+the t'other men thar laffed mightily at dad. An' I laffed too!"</p>
+
+<p>There was an angry gleam in Stephen Ryder's stern black eyes as he
+turned within, seized the tongs, and thrust a piece of iron among the
+coals, while Tobe, who had been asleep in the window at the back of the
+shop, rose reluctantly and plied the bellows. The heavy panting broke
+forth simultaneously with the red flare that quivered out into the dark
+night. Presently it faded; the hot iron was whisked upon the anvil,
+fiery sparks showered about as the rapid blows fell, and the echoing
+crags kept time with rhythmic beats to the clanking of the sledge and
+the clinking of the hand-hammer. The stars, high above the
+far-stretching mountains, seemed to throb in unison, until suddenly the
+blacksmith dealt a sharp blow on the face of the anvil as a signal to
+his striker to cease, and the forge was silent.</p>
+
+<p>As he leaned against the jamb of the door, mechanically adjusting his
+leather apron, he heard Ab's voice again.</p>
+
+<p>"Old Bob say he ain't no 'count sca'cely. He 'lowed ez he had knowed him
+many a year, an' fund him a sneakin', deceivin' critter."</p>
+
+<p>The blacksmith was erect in a moment, every fibre tense.</p>
+
+<p>"That ain't the wust," Ab gabbled on. "Old Bob say, though't ain't known
+ginerally, ez he air gin ter thievin'. Old Bob 'lowed ter them men,
+hangin' round the mill, ez he air the biggest thief on the mounting!"</p>
+
+<p>The strong man trembled. His blood rushed tumultuously to his head, then
+seemed to ebb swiftly away. That this should be said of him to the
+loafers at the mill! These constituted his little world. And he valued
+his character as only an honest man can. He was amazed at the boldness
+of the lie. It had been openly spoken in the presence of his son. One
+might have thought the boy would come directly to him. But there he sat,
+glibly retailing it to his small comrades! It seemed all so strange
+that Stephen Ryder fancied there was surely some mistake. In the next
+moment, however, he was convinced that they had been talking of him, and
+of no one else.</p>
+
+<p>"I tole old Bob ez how I thought they oughtn't ter be so hard on him, ez
+he warn't thar to speak for hisself."</p>
+
+<p>All three boys giggled weakly, as if this were witty.</p>
+
+<p>"But old Bob 'lowed ez ennybody mought know him by his name. An' then he
+told me that old sayin':&mdash;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">'Stephen, Stephen, so deceivin',</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That old Satan can't believe him!'"</span><br /></p>
+
+<p>Here Ben Gryce broke in, begging the others to go home, and come to
+"borry" the hammer next night. Ab agreed to the latter proposition, but
+still sat on the log and talked. "Old Bob say," he remarked cheerfully,
+"that when he do git 'em, he shakes 'em&mdash;shakes the life out'n 'em!"</p>
+
+<p>This was inexplicable. Stephen Ryder pondered vainly on it for an
+instant. But the oft-reiterated formula, "Old Bob say," caught his
+ears, and he was absorbed anew in Ab's discourse.</p>
+
+<p>"Old Bob say ez my mother air one of the best women in this world. But
+she air so gin ter humoring every critter a-nigh her, an' tends ter 'em
+so much, an' feeds 'em so high an' hearty, ez they jes' gits good fur
+nothin' in this world. That's how kem she air eat out'n house an' home
+now. Old Bob say ez how he air the hongriest critter! Say he jes'
+despise ter see him comin' round of meal times. Old Bob say ef he hev
+got enny good lef' in him, my mother will kill it out yit with
+kindness."</p>
+
+<p>The blacksmith felt, as he turned back into the shop and roused the
+sleepy-headed striker, that within the hour all the world had changed
+for him. These coarse taunts were enough to show in what estimation he
+was held. And he had fancied himself, in countrified phrase, "respected
+by all," and had been proud of his standing.</p>
+
+<p>So the bellows began to sigh and pant once more, and kept the red light
+flaring athwart the darkness. The people down in the valley looked up at
+it, glowing like a star that had slipped out of the sky and lodged
+somehow on the mountain, and wondered what Stephen Ryder could be about
+so late at night. When he left the shop there was no sign of the boys
+who had ornamented the log earlier in the evening. He walked up the road
+to his house, and found his wife sitting alone in the rickety little
+porch.</p>
+
+<p>"Hev that thar boy gone ter bed?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal," she slowly drawled, in a soft, placid voice, "he kem hyar
+'bout'n haffen hour ago so nigh crazed ter go ter stay all night with
+Jim an' Benny Gryce ez I hed ter let him. Old man Gryce rid by hyar in
+his wagon on his way home from the settle<i>mint</i>. So Ab went off with the
+Gryce boys an' thar gran'dad."</p>
+
+<p>Thus the blacksmith concluded his tools were not liable to be "borrowed"
+that night. He had a scheme to insure their safety for the future, but
+in order to avoid his wife's remonstrances on Ab's behalf, he told her
+nothing of it, nor of what he had overheard.</p>
+
+<p>Early the next morning he set out for the mill, intending to confront
+"old Bob" and demand retraction. The road down the deep, wild ravine was
+rugged, and he jogged along slowly until at last he came within sight of
+the crazy, weather-beaten old building tottering precariously on the
+brink of the impetuous torrent which gashed the mountain side. Crags
+towered above it; vines and mosses clung to its walls; it was a dank,
+cool, shady place, but noisy enough with the turmoil of its primitive
+machinery and the loud, hoarse voices of the loungers striving to make
+themselves heard above the uproar. There were several of these idle
+mountaineers aimlessly strolling among the bags of corn and wheat that
+were piled about. Long, dusty cobwebs hung from the rafters. Sometimes a
+rat, powdered white with flour and rendered reckless by high living,
+raced boldly across the floor. The golden grain poured ceaselessly
+through the hopper, and leaning against it was the miller, a tall,
+stoop-shouldered man about forty years of age, with a floury smile
+lurking in his beard and a twinkle in his good-humored eyes overhung by
+heavy, mealy eyebrows.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, Steve," yelled the miller, shambling forward as the blacksmith
+appeared in the doorway. "Come 'long in. Whar's yer grist?"</p>
+
+<p>"I hev got no grist!" thundered Steve, sternly.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal&mdash;ye're jes' ez welcome," said the miller, not noticing the rigid
+lines of the blacksmith's face, accented here and there by cinders, nor
+the fierceness of the intent dark eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon I'm powerful welcome!" sneered Stephen Ryder.</p>
+
+<p>The tone attracted "old Bob's" attention. "What ails ye, Steve?" he
+asked, surprised.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm a deceivin', sneakin' critter&mdash;hey," shouted the visitor, shaking
+his big fist; he had intended to be calm, but his long-repressed fury
+had found vent at last.</p>
+
+<p>The miller drew back hastily, astonishment and fear mingled in a pallid
+paste, as it were, with the flour on his face.</p>
+
+<p>The six startled on-lookers stood as if petrified.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye say I'm a thief!&mdash;a thief!&mdash;a thief!"</p>
+
+<p>With the odious word Ryder made a frantic lunge at the miller, who
+dodged his strong right arm at the moment when his foot struck against a
+bag of corn lying on the floor and he stumbled. He recovered his
+equilibrium instantly. But the six bystanders had seized him.</p>
+
+<p>"Hold him hard, folkses!" cried honest Bob Peachin. "Hold hard! I'll
+tell ye what ails him&mdash;though ye mustn't let on ter him&mdash;he air teched
+in the head!"</p>
+
+<p>He winked at them with a confidential intention as he roared this out,
+forgetting in his excitement that mental infirmity does not impair the
+sense of hearing. This folly on his part was a salutary thing for
+Stephen Ryder. It calmed him instantly. He felt that he had need for
+caution. A fearful vista of possibilities opened before him. He
+remembered having seen in his childhood a man reputed to be suddenly
+bereft of reason, but who he believed was entirely sane, bound hand and
+foot, and every word, every groan, every effort to free himself,
+accounted the demonstration of a maniac. This fate was imminent for him.
+They were seven to one. He trembled as he felt their hands pressing upon
+the swelling muscles of his arms. With an abrupt realization of his
+great strength, he waited for a momentary relaxation of their clutch,
+then with a mighty wrench he burst loose from them, flung himself upon
+his mare, and dashed off at full speed.</p>
+
+<p>He did no work that afternoon, although the corn was "suffering." He sat
+after dinner smoking his pipe on the porch of his log cabin, while he
+moodily watched the big shadow of the mountain creeping silently over
+the wooded valley as the sun got on the down grade. Deep glooms began to
+lurk among the ravines of the great ridge opposite. The shimmering blue
+summits in the distance were purpling. A redbird, alert, crested, and
+with a brilliant eye, perched idly on the vines about the porch, having
+relinquished for the day the job of teaching a small, stubby imitation
+of himself to fly. The shocks of wheat in the bare field close by had
+turned a rich red gold in the lengthening rays before Stephen Ryder
+realized that night was close at hand.</p>
+
+<p>All at once he heard a discordant noise which he knew that Ab Ryder
+called "singing," and presently the boy appeared in the distance, his
+mouth stretched, his tattered hat stuck on the back of his tow-head, his
+bare feet dusty, his homespun cotton trousers rolled up airily about his
+knees, his single suspender supporting the structure. His father laughed
+a little at sight of him, rather sardonically it must be confessed, and
+saying to his wife that he intended to go to the shop for a while, he
+rose and strolled off down the road.</p>
+
+<p>When supper was over, however, Ab was immensely relieved to see that
+his father had no idea of continuing his work. Consequently the usual
+routine was to be expected. Generally, when summoned to the evening
+meal, the blacksmith hastily plunged his head in the barrel of water
+used to temper steel, thrust off his leather apron, and went up to the
+house without more ado. He smoked afterward, and lounged about, enjoying
+the relaxation after his heavy work. He did not go down to lock the shop
+until bed-time, when he was shutting up the house, the barn, and the
+corn-crib for the night. In the interval the shop stood deserted and
+open, and this fact was the basis of Ab's opportunity. To-night there
+seemed to be no deviation from this custom. He ascertained that his
+father was smoking his pipe on the porch. Then he went down the road and
+sat on the log near the shop to wait for the other boys who were to
+share the risks and profits of borrowing the hammer.</p>
+
+<p>All was still&mdash;so still! He fancied that he could hear the tumult of the
+torrent far away as it dashed over the rocks. A dog suddenly began to
+bark in the black, black valley&mdash;then ceased. He was vaguely over-awed
+with the "big mountings" for company and the distant stars. He listened
+eagerly for the first cracking of brush which told him that the other
+boys were near at hand. Then all three crept along cautiously among the
+huge boles of the trees, feeling very mysterious and important. When
+they reached the rude window, Ab sat for a moment on the sill, peering
+into the intense blackness within.</p>
+
+<p>"It air dark thar, fur true, Ab," said Jim Gryce, growing faint-hearted.
+"Let's go back."</p>
+
+<p>"Naw, sir! Naw, sir!" protested Ab resolutely. "I'm on the borry!"</p>
+
+<p>"How kin we find that thar leetle hammer in sech a dark place?" urged
+Jim.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal," explained Ab, in his high key, "dad air mightily welded ter his
+cranky notions. An' he always leaves every tool in the same place
+edzactly every night. Bound fur me!" he continued in shrill exultation
+as he slapped his lean leg, "I know whar that thar leetle hammer air
+sot ter roost!"</p>
+
+<p>He jumped down from the window inside the shop, and cut a wiry caper.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm a man o' bone and muscle!" he bragged. "Kin do ennything."</p>
+
+<p>The other boys followed more quietly. But they had only groped a little
+distance when Jim Gryce set up a sharp yelp of pain.</p>
+
+<p>"Shet yer mouth&mdash;ye pop-eyed catamount!" Ab admonished him. "Dad will
+hear an'&mdash;ah-h-h!" His own words ended in a shriek. "Oh, my!"
+vociferated the "man of bone and muscle," who was certainly, too, a man
+of extraordinary lung-power. "Oh, my! The ground is hot&mdash;hot ez iron!
+They always tole me that Satan would ketch me&mdash;an' oh, my! now he hev
+done it!"</p>
+
+<p>He joined the "pop-eyed catamount" in a lively dance with their bare
+feet on the hot iron bars which were scattered about the ground in every
+direction. These were heated artistically, so that they might not really
+scorch the flesh, but would touch the feelings, and perhaps the
+conscience. As the third boy's scream rent the air, and told that he,
+too, had encountered a torrid experience, Ab Ryder became suddenly aware
+that there was some one besides themselves in the shop. He could see
+nothing; he was only vaguely conscious of an unexpected presence, and he
+fancied that it was in the corner by the barrel of water.</p>
+
+<p>All at once a gruff voice broke forth. "I'm on the borry!" it remarked
+with fierce facetiousness. "I want ter borry a boy&mdash;no! a man o' bone
+an' muscle&mdash;fur 'bout a minit and a quarter!" A strong arm seized Ab by
+his collar. He felt himself swept through the air, soused head foremost
+into the barrel of water, then thrust into a corner, where he was
+thankful to find there was no more hot iron.</p>
+
+<p>"I want to borry another boy!" said the gruff voice. And the "pop-eyed
+catamount" was duly ducked.</p>
+
+<p>"'Twould pleasure me some ter borry another!" the voice declared with
+grim humor. But Ben was the youngest and smallest, and only led into
+mischief by the others. They never knew that the blacksmith relented
+when his turn came, and that he got a mere sprinkle in comparison with
+their total immersion.</p>
+
+<p>Then Stephen Ryder set out for home, followed by a dripping procession.
+"I'll l'arn ye ter 'borry' my tools 'thout leave!" he vociferated as he
+went along.</p>
+
+<p>When they had reached the house, he faced round sternly on Ab. "Whyn't
+ye kem an' tell me ez how the miller say I war a sneakin', deceivin'
+critter, an'&mdash;an'&mdash;an' a thief!"</p>
+
+<p>His wife dropped the dish she was washing, and it broke unheeded upon
+the hearth. Ab stretched his eyes and mouth in amazement.</p>
+
+<p>"Old Bob Peachin never tole me no sech word sence I been born!" he
+declared flatly.</p>
+
+<p>"Then what ailed ye ter go an' tell sech a lie ter Gryce's boys las'
+night jes' down thar outside o' the shop?" Stephen Ryder demanded.</p>
+
+<p>Ab stared at him, evidently bewildered.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye tole 'em," continued the blacksmith, striving to refresh his memory,
+"ez Bob Peachin say ez how ye mought know I war deceivin' by my bein'
+named Stephen&mdash;an' that I war the hongriest critter&mdash;an'"&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"'Twar the t-a-a-a-rrier!" shouted Ab, "the little rat tarrier ez we war
+a-talkin' 'bout. He hev been named Steve these six year, old Bob say. He
+gimme the dog yestiddy, 'kase I 'lowed ez the rats war eatin' us out'n
+house an' home, an' my mother hed fed up that old cat o' our'n till he
+won't look at a mice. Old Bob warned me, though, ez Steve, <i>the
+tarrier</i>, air a mighty thief an' deceivin' ginerally. Old Bob say he
+reckons my mother will spile the dog with feedin' him, an' kill out what
+little good he hev got lef' in him with kindness. But I tuk him, an'
+brung him home ennyhow. An' las' night arter we hed got through talkin'
+'bout borryin' (he looked embarrassed) the leetle hammer, we tuk to
+talkin' 'bout the tarrier. An' yander he is now, asleep on the
+chil'ren's bed!"</p>
+
+<p>A long pause ensued.</p>
+
+<p>"M'ria," said the blacksmith meekly to his wife, "hev ye tuk notice how
+the gyarden truck air a-thrivin'? 'Pears like ter me ez the peas air
+a-fullin' up consider'ble."</p>
+
+<p>And so the subject changed.</p>
+
+<p>He had it on his conscience, however, to explain the matter to the
+miller. For the second time old Bob Peachin, and the men at the mill,
+"laffed mightily at dad." And when Ab had recovered sufficiently from
+the exhaustion attendant upon borrowing a hammer, he "laffed too."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="THE_CONSCRIPTS_HOLLOW" id="THE_CONSCRIPTS_HOLLOW"></a>THE CONSCRIPTS' HOLLOW</h2>
+
+<h2><a name="TCH_Chapter_1" id="TCH_Chapter_1"></a>CHAPTER I</h2>
+
+
+<p>"I'm a-goin' ter climb down ter that thar ledge, an' slip round ter the
+hollow whar them conscripts built thar fire in the old war times."</p>
+
+<p>Nicholas Gregory paused on the verge of the great cliff and cast a
+sidelong glance at Barney Pratt, who was beating about among the red
+sumach bushes in the woods close at hand, and now and then stooping to
+search the heaps of pine needles and dead leaves where they had been
+blown together on the ground.</p>
+
+<p>"Conscripts!" Barney ejaculated, with a chuckle. "That's precisely what
+them men war determinated <i>not</i> ter be! They war a-hidin' in the
+mountings ter git shet o' the conscription."</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, I don't keer ef <i>ye</i> names 'em 'conscripts' or no," Nicholas
+retorted loftily. "That's what other folks calls 'em. I'm goin' down ter
+the hollow, whar they built thar fire, ter see ef that old missin'
+tur-r-key-hen o' our'n hain't hid her nest off 'mongst them dead chunks,
+an' sech."</p>
+
+<p>"A tur-r-key ain't sech a powerful fool ez that," said Barney, coming to
+the edge of the precipice and looking over at the ledge, which ran along
+the face of the cliff twenty feet below. "How'd she make out ter fotch
+the little tur-r-keys up hyar, when they war hatched? They'd fall off'n
+the bluff."</p>
+
+<p>"A tur-r-key what hev stole her nest away from the folks air fool enough
+fur ennything," Nicholas declared.</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps he did not really expect to find the missing fowl in such an
+out-of-the-way place as this, but being an adventurous fellow, the sight
+of the crag was a temptation. He had often before clambered down to the
+ledge, which led to a great niche in the solid rock, where one night
+during the war some men who were hiding from the conscription had
+kindled their fire and cooked their scanty food. The charred remnants of
+logs were still here, but no one ever thought about them now, except the
+two boys, who regarded them as a sort of curiosity.</p>
+
+<p>Sometimes they came and stared at them, and speculated about them, and
+declared to each other that <i>they</i> would not consider it a hardship to
+go a-soldiering.</p>
+
+<p>Then Nick would tell Barney of a wonderful day when he had driven to the
+county town in his uncle's wagon. There was a parade of militia there,
+and how grand the drum had sounded! And as he told it he would shoulder
+a smoke-blackened stick, and stride about in the Conscripts' Hollow, and
+feel very brave.</p>
+
+<p>He had no idea in those days how close at hand was the time when his own
+courage should be tried.</p>
+
+<p>"Kem on, Barney!" he urged. "Let's go down an' sarch fur the tur-r-key."</p>
+
+<p>But Barney had thrown himself down upon the crag with a long-drawn sigh
+of fatigue.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal," he replied, in a drowsy tone, "I dunno 'bout'n that. I'm sorter
+banged out, 'kase I hev had a powerful hard day's work a-bilin' sorghum
+at our house. I b'lieves I'll rest my bones hyar, an' wait fur ye."</p>
+
+<p>As he spoke, he rolled up one of the coats which they had both thrown
+off, during their search for the nest on the summit of the cliff, and
+slipped it under his head. He was far the brighter boy of the two, but
+his sharp wits seemed to thrive at the expense of his body. He was small
+and puny, and he was easily fatigued in comparison with big burly Nick,
+who rarely knew such a sensation, and prided himself upon his toughness.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, Barney, surely ye air the porest little shoat on G'liath
+Mounting!" he exclaimed scornfully, as he had often done before. But he
+made no further attempt to persuade Barney, and began the descent alone.</p>
+
+<p>It was not so difficult a matter for a sure-footed mountaineer like
+Nick to make his way down to the ledge as one might imagine, for in a
+certain place the face of the cliff presented a series of jagged edges
+and projections which afforded him foothold. As he went along, too, he
+kept a strong grasp upon overhanging vines and bushes that grew out
+from earth-filled crevices.</p>
+
+<p>He had gone down only a short distance when he paused thoughtfully.
+"This hyar wind air blowin' powerful brief," he said. "I mought get
+chilled an' lose my footin'."</p>
+
+<p>He hardly liked to give up the expedition, but he was afraid to continue
+on his way in the teeth of the mountain wind, cold and strong in the
+October afternoon. If only he had his heavy jeans coat with him!</p>
+
+<p>"Barney!" he called out, intending to ask his friend to throw it over to
+him.</p>
+
+<p>There was no answer.</p>
+
+<p>"That thar Barney hev drapped off ter sleep a'ready!" he exclaimed
+indignantly.</p>
+
+<p>He chanced to glance upward as he was about to call again. There he saw
+a coat lying on the edge of the cliff, the dangling sleeve fluttering
+just within his reach. When he dragged it down and discovered that it
+was Barney's instead of his own, he was slightly vexed, but it
+certainly did not seem a matter of great importance.</p>
+
+<p>"That boy hev got <i>my</i> coat, an' this is his'n. But law! I'd ruther
+squeeze myself small enough ter git inter his'n, than ter hev ter yell
+like a catamount fur an hour an' better ter wake him up, an' make him
+gimme mine."</p>
+
+<p>He seated himself on a narrow projection of the crag, and began to
+cautiously put on his friend's coat. He had need to be careful, for a
+precarious perch like this, with an unmeasured abyss beneath, the far
+blue sky above, the almost inaccessible face of a cliff on one side, and
+on the other a distant stretch of mountains, is not exactly the kind of
+place in which one would prefer to make a toilet. Besides the dangers of
+his position, he was anxious to do no damage to the coat, which although
+loose and baggy on Barney, was rather a close fit for Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't used ter climbin' with a coat on, nohow, an' I mus' be mighty
+keerful not ter bust Barney's, 'kase it air all the one he hev got," he
+said to himself as he clambered nimbly down to the ledge.</p>
+
+<p>Then he walked deftly along the narrow shelf, and as he turned abruptly
+into the immense niche in the cliff called the Conscripts' Hollow, he
+started back in sudden bewilderment. His heart gave a bound, and then it
+seemed to stand still.</p>
+
+<p>He hardly recognized the familiar place. There, to be sure, were the
+walls and the dome-like roof, but upon the dusty sandstone floor were
+scattered quantities of household articles, such as pots and pails and
+pans and kettles. There was a great array of brogans, too, and piles of
+blankets, and bolts of coarse unbleached cotton and jeans cloth.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, sir!" he exclaimed, as he gazed at them with wild,
+uncomprehending eyes.</p>
+
+<p>Then the truth flashed upon him. A story had reached Goliath Mountain
+some weeks before, to the effect that a cross-roads store, some miles
+down the valley, had been robbed. The thieves had escaped with the
+stolen goods, leaving no clue by which they might be identified and
+brought to justice.</p>
+
+<p>Nick saw that he had made a discovery. Here it was that the robbers had
+contrived to conceal their plunder, doubtless intending to wait until
+suspicion lulled, when they could carry it to some distant place, where
+it could safely be sold.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly a thought struck him that sent a shiver through every fibre of
+his body. This store was robbed in a singular manner. No bolt was
+broken,&mdash;no door burst open. There was a window, however, that lacked
+one pane of glass. The aperture would not admit a man's body. It was
+believed that the burglars had passed a boy through it, who had handed
+out the stolen goods.</p>
+
+<p>And now, Nick foolishly argued, if any one should discover that <i>he</i>
+knew where the plunder was hidden, they would believe that <i>he</i> was that
+boy who had robbed the store!</p>
+
+<p>He began to resolve that he would say nothing about what he had
+seen,&mdash;not even to Barney. He thought his safety lay in his silence.
+Still, he did not want his silence to be to the advantage of wicked men,
+so he tried to persuade himself that the burglars would soon be traced
+and captured without the information which he knew it was his duty to
+give. "Ter be sartain, the officers will kem on this place arter a
+while," he said meditatively.</p>
+
+<p>Then he shook his head doubtfully. The crag was far from any house, and
+except the dwellers on Goliath Mountain, few people knew of this great
+niche in it. "They war sly foxes what stowed away thar plunder hyar!" he
+exclaimed in despair.</p>
+
+<p>Often, when Nick had before stood in the Conscripts' Hollow, he had
+imagined that he would make a good soldier. But his idea of a soldier
+was a fine uniform, and the ra-ta-ta of martial music. He had no
+conception of that high sense of duty which nerves a man to face danger;
+even now he did not know that he was a coward as he faltered and feared
+in the cause of right to encounter suspicion.</p>
+
+<p>Courage!&mdash;Nick thought that meant to crack away at a bear, if you were
+lucky enough to have the chance; or to kill a rattlesnake, if you had a
+big heavy stone close at hand; or to scramble about among crags and
+precipices, if you felt certain of the steadiness of your head and the
+strength of your muscles. But he did not realize that "courage" could
+mean the nerve to speak one little word for duty's sake.</p>
+
+<p>He would not speak the word,&mdash;he had determined on that,&mdash;for might they
+not think that <i>he</i> was the boy who had robbed the store?</p>
+
+<p>He was quivering with excitement when he turned and began to walk along
+the ledge toward those roughly hewn natural steps by which he had
+descended. He knew that his agitation rendered his footing insecure. He
+was afraid of falling into the depths beneath, and he pressed close
+against the cliff.</p>
+
+<p>On the narrow ledge, hardly two yards distant from the Conscripts'
+Hollow, a clump of blackberry bushes was growing from a crevice in the
+rock. They had never before given him trouble; but now, as he brushed
+hastily past, they seemed to clutch at him with their thorny branches.</p>
+
+<p>As he tore away from them roughly, he did not observe that he had left a
+fragment of his brown jeans clothing hanging upon the thorns, as a
+witness to his presence here close to the Conscripts' Hollow, where the
+stolen goods lay hidden. There was a coarse, dark-colored horn button
+attached to the bit of brown jeans, which was a three-cornered scrap of
+his coat. No! of <i>Barney's</i> coat. And was it to be a witness against
+poor Barney, who had not gone near the Conscripts' Hollow, but was lying
+asleep on the summit of the crag, supposing he had his own coat under
+his own head?</p>
+
+<p>He did not discover his mistake until some time afterward, for when Nick
+had slowly and laboriously climbed up the steep face of the cliff, he
+stripped off his friend's torn coat before he roused him. Barney was
+awakened by having his pillow dragged rudely from under his head, and
+when at last he reluctantly opened his eyes on the hazy yellow
+sunlight, and saw Nick standing near on the great gray crag, he had no
+idea that this moment was an important crisis in his life.</p>
+
+<p>The wind was coming up the gorge fresh and free; the autumnal foliage,
+swaying in it, was like the flaunting splendors of red and gold banners;
+the western ranges had changed from blue to purple, for the sun was
+sinking.</p>
+
+<p>"It's gittin' toler'ble late, Barney," said Nick. "Let's go." He had on
+his own coat now, and he was impatient to be off.</p>
+
+<p>"Did ye find the tur-r-key's nest in the Conscripts' Hollow?" asked
+Barney, with a lazy yawn, and still flat on his back.</p>
+
+<p>"No," said Nick curtly.</p>
+
+<p>Then it occurred to him that it would be safer if his friend should
+think he had not been in the Hollow. "No," he reiterated, after a pause,
+"I didn't go down ter the ledge arter all."</p>
+
+<p>He had begun to lie,&mdash;where would it end?</p>
+
+<p>"Whyn't you-uns go?" demanded Barney, surprised.</p>
+
+<p>"The wind war blowin' so powerful brief," Nick replied without a qualm.
+"So I jes' s'arched fur a while in the woods back thar a piece."</p>
+
+<p>In a moment more, Barney rose to his feet, picked up his coat, and put
+it on. He did not notice the torn place, for the garment was old and
+worn, and had many ragged edges. It lacked, however, but one button, and
+that missing button was attached to the triangular bit of brown jeans
+that fluttered on the thorny bush close to the Conscripts' Hollow.</p>
+
+<p>All unconscious of his loss, he went away in the rich autumnal sunset,
+leaving it there as a witness against him.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="TCH_Chapter_2" id="TCH_Chapter_2"></a>CHAPTER II</h2>
+
+
+<p>After this, Nicholas Gregory was very steady at his work for a while. He
+kept out of the woods as much as possible, and felt that he knew more
+already than was good for him. Above all, he avoided that big sandstone
+cliff and the Conscripts' Hollow, where the goods lay hidden.</p>
+
+<p>He heard no more of the search that had been made for the burglars and
+their booty, and he congratulated himself on his caution in keeping
+silent about what he had found.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, ef it hed been that thar wide-mouthed Barney, stid o' me, he'd hev
+blabbed fust thing, an' they'd all hev thunk ez he war the boy what them
+scoundrels put through the winder ter steal the folkses' truck. They'd
+hev jailed him, I reckon."</p>
+
+<p>He had begun to forget his own part in the wrong-doing,&mdash;that his
+silence was helping to screen "them scoundrels" from the law.</p>
+
+<p>This state of mind continued for a week, perhaps. Then he fell to
+speculating about the stolen goods. He wondered whether they were all
+there yet, or whether the burglars had managed to carry them away. His
+curiosity grew so great that several times he was almost at the point of
+going to see for himself; but one morning, early, when an opportunity
+to do so was suddenly presented, his courage failed him.</p>
+
+<p>His mother had just come into the log cabin from the hen-house with a
+woe-begone face.</p>
+
+<p>"I do declar'!" she exclaimed solemnly, "that I'm surely the
+afflictedest 'oman on G'liath Mounting! An' them young fall tur-r-keys
+air so spindlin' an' delikit they'll be the death o' me yit!"</p>
+
+<p>They were so spindling and delicate that they were the death of
+themselves. She had just buried three, and her heart and her larder were
+alike an aching void.</p>
+
+<p>"Three died ter-day, an' two las' Wednesday!" As she counted them on her
+fingers she honored each with a shake of the head, so mournful that it
+might be accounted an obituary in dumb show. "I hev had no sort'n luck
+with this tur-r-key's brood, an' the t'other hev stole her nest away,
+an' I hev got sech a mean no-'count set o' chillen they can't find her.
+Waal! waal! waal! this comin' winter the Lord'll be <i>obleeged</i> ter
+pervide."</p>
+
+<p>This was washing-day, and as she began to scrub away on the noisy
+washboard, a sudden thought struck her. "Ye told me two weeks ago an'
+better, Nick, that ye hed laid off ter sarch the Conscripts' Hollow; ye
+'lowed ye hed been everywhar else. Did ye go thar fur the tur-r-key?"</p>
+
+<p>She faced him with her dripping arms akimbo.</p>
+
+<p>Nick's face turned red as he answered, "That thar tur-r-key ain't a-nigh
+thar."</p>
+
+<p>"What ails ye, Nick? thar's su'thin' wrong. I kin tell it by yer looks.
+Ye never hed the grit ter sarch thar, I'll be bound; did ye, now?"</p>
+
+<p>Nick could not bring himself to admit having been near the place.</p>
+
+<p>"No," he faltered, "I never sarched thar."</p>
+
+<p>"Ye'll do it now, though!" his mother declared triumphantly. "I'm afeard
+ter send Jacob on sech a yerrand down the bluffs, kase he air so little
+he mought fall; but he air big enough ter go 'long an' watch ye go down
+ter the Hollow&mdash;else ye'll kem back an' say ye hev sarched thar, when
+ye ain't been a-nigh the bluff."</p>
+
+<p>There seemed for a moment no escape for Nick. His mother was looking
+resolutely at him, and Jacob had gotten up briskly from his seat in the
+chimney-corner. He was a small tow-headed boy with big owlish eyes, and
+Nick knew from experience that they were very likely to see anything he
+did <i>not</i> do. He must go; and then if at any time the stolen goods
+should be discovered, Jacob and his mother, and who could say how many
+besides, would know that he had been to the Conscripts' Hollow, and must
+have seen what was hidden there.</p>
+
+<p>In that case his silence on the subject would be very suspicious. It
+would seem as if he had some connection with the burglars, and for that
+reason tried to conceal the plunder.</p>
+
+<p>He was saying to himself that he would not go&mdash;and he must! How could he
+avoid it? As he glanced uneasily around the room, his eyes chanced to
+fall on a little object lying on the edge of the shelf just above the
+washtub. He made the most of the opportunity. As he slung his hat upon
+his head with an impatient gesture, he managed to brush the shelf with
+it and knock the small object into the foaming suds below.</p>
+
+<p>His mother sank into a chair with uplifted hands and eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"The las' cake o' hop yeast!" she cried. "An' how air the bread ter be
+raised?"</p>
+
+<p>To witness her despair, one would think only jack-screws could do it.</p>
+
+<p>"Surely I <i>am</i> the afflictedest 'oman on G'liath Mounting! An'
+ter-morrer Brother Pete's wife an' his gals air a-comin', and I hed laid
+off ter hev raised bread."</p>
+
+<p>For "raised bread" is a great rarity and luxury in these parts, the
+nimble "dodgers" being the staff of life.</p>
+
+<p>"I never went ter do it," muttered Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, ye kin jes' kerry yer bones down the mounting ter Sister
+Mirandy's house, an' ax her ter fotch me a cake o' her yeast when she
+kems up hyar ter-day ter holp me sizin' yarn. Arter that I don't keer
+what ye does with yerself. Ef ye stays hyar along o' we-uns, ye'll haul
+the roof down nex', I reckon. 'Pears like ter me ez boys an' men-folks
+air powerful awk'ard, useless critters ter keep in a house; they oughter
+hev pens outside, I'm a-thinkin'."</p>
+
+<p>She had forgotten about the turkey, and Nick was glad enough to escape
+on these terms.</p>
+
+<p>It was not until after he had finished his errand at Aunt Mirandy's
+house that he chanced to think again of the Conscripts' Hollow. As he
+was slowly lounging back up the mountain, he paused occasionally on the
+steep slope and looked up at the crags high on the summit, which he
+could see, now and then, diagonally across a deep cove.</p>
+
+<p>When he came in sight of the one which he had such good reason to
+remember, he stopped and stood gazing fixedly at it for a long time,
+wondering again whether the robbers had yet carried off their plunder
+from its hiding-place.</p>
+
+<p>He was not too distant to distinguish the Conscripts' Hollow, but from
+his standpoint, he could not at first determine where was the ledge. He
+thought he recognized it presently in a black line that seemed drawn
+across the massive cliff.</p>
+
+<p>But what was that upon it? A moving figure! He gazed at it spell-bound
+for a moment, as it slowly made its way along toward the Hollow. Then he
+wanted to see no more; he wanted to know no more. He turned and fled at
+full speed along the narrow cow-path among the bushes.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly there was a rustle among them. Something had sprung out into
+the path with a light bound, and as he ran, he heard a swift step behind
+him. It seemed a pursuing step, for, as he quickened his pace, it came
+faster too. It was a longer stride than his; it was gaining upon him. A
+hand with a grip like a vise fell upon his shoulder, and as he was
+whirled around and brought face to face with his pursuer, he glanced up
+and recognized the constable of the district.</p>
+
+<p>This was a tall, muscular man, dressed in brown jeans, and with a bushy
+red beard. He knew Nick well, for he, too, was a mountaineer.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye war a-dustin' along toler'ble fast, Nicholas Gregory," he exclaimed;
+"but nothin' on G'liath Mounting kin beat me a-runnin' 'thout it air a
+deer. Ye'll kem along with me now, and stir yer stumps powerful lively,
+too, kase I hain't got no time ter lose."</p>
+
+<p>"What am I tuk up fur?" gasped Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"S'picious conduc'," replied the man curtly.</p>
+
+<p>Nick knew no more now than he did before. The officer's next words made
+matters plainer. "Things look mightily like ye war set hyar ter watch
+that thar ledge. Ez soon ez ye seen our men a-goin' ter the Conscripts'
+Hollow ter sarch fur that thar stole truck, ye war a-goin' ter scuttle
+off an' gin the alarm ter them rascally no-'count burglars. I saw ye and
+yer looks, and I suspicioned some sech game. Ye don't cheat the law in
+<i>this</i> deestrick&mdash;not often! Ye air the very boy, I reckon, what
+holped ter rob Blenkins's store. Whar's the other burglars? Ye'd better
+tell!"</p>
+
+<p>"I dunno!" cried Nick tremulously. "I never had nothin' ter do with
+'em."</p>
+
+<p>"Ye hev told on yerself," the man retorted. "Why did ye stand a-gapin'
+at the Conscripts' Hollow, ef ye didn't know thar was suthin special
+thar?"</p>
+
+<p>Nick, in his confusion, could invent no reply, and he was afraid to tell
+the truth. He looked mutely at the officer, who held his arm and looked
+down sternly at him.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye air a bad egg,&mdash;that's plain. I'll take ye along whether I ketches
+the other burglars or no."</p>
+
+<p>They toiled up the steep ascent in silence, and before very long were on
+the summit of the mountain, and within view of the crag.</p>
+
+<p>There on the great gray cliff, in the midst of the lonely woods, were
+several men whom Nick had never before seen. Their busy figures were
+darkly defined against the hazy azure of the distant ranges, and as they
+moved about, their shadows on the ground seemed very busy too, and
+blotted continually the golden sunshine that everywhere penetrated the
+thinning masses of red and bronze autumn foliage.</p>
+
+<p>A wagon, close at hand, was already half full of the stolen goods, and a
+number of men were going cautiously up and down the face of the cliff,
+bringing articles, or passing them from one to another.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, this <i>is</i> a tedious job!" exclaimed the sheriff, John Stebbins by
+name. He was a quick-witted, good-natured man, but being active in
+temperament, he was exceedingly impatient of delay. "How long did it
+take 'em to get all those heavy things down into the Conscripts'
+Hollow,&mdash;hey, bub?" he added, appealing to Nick, who had been brought to
+his notice by the constable. It was terrible to Nick that they should
+all speak to him as if he were one of the criminals. He broke out with
+wild protestations of his innocence, denying, too, that he had had any
+knowledge of what was hidden in the Conscripts' Hollow.</p>
+
+<p>"Then what made ye run, yander on the slope, when ye seen thar war
+somebody on the ledge?" demanded the constable.</p>
+
+<p>Nick had a sudden inspiration. "Waal," he faltered, with an explanatory
+sob, which was at once ludicrous and pathetic, "I war too fur off ter
+make out fur sure what 'twar on the ledge. 'Twar black-lookin', an' I
+'lowed 'twar a b'ar."</p>
+
+<p>All the men laughed at this.</p>
+
+<p>"I sot out ter run ter Aunt Mirandy's house ter borry Job's gun ter kem
+up hyar, an' mebbe git a crack at him," continued Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"That doesn't seem unnatural," said the sheriff. Then he turned to the
+constable. "This ain't enough to justify us in holding on to the boy,
+Jim, unless we can fix that scrap with the button on him. Where is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"D'ye know whose coat this kem off'n?" asked the constable, producing a
+bit of brown jeans, with a dark-colored horn button attached to it.
+"How'd it happen ter be stickin' ter them blackberry-bushes on the
+ledge?"</p>
+
+<p>Nick recognized it in an instant. It was Barney Pratt's button, and a
+bit of Barney Pratt's coat. But he knew well enough that he himself must
+have torn it when he wore it down to the Conscripts' Hollow.</p>
+
+<p>He realized that he should have at once told the whole truth of what he
+knew about the stolen goods. He was well aware that he ought not to
+suffer the suspicion which had unjustly fallen upon him to be unjustly
+transferred to Barney, who he knew was innocent.</p>
+
+<p>But he was terribly frightened, and foolishly cautious, and he did not
+care for justice, nor truth, nor friendship, now. His only anxiety was
+to save himself.</p>
+
+<p>"That thar piece o' brown jeans an' that button kem off'n Barney Pratt's
+coat. I'd know 'em anywhar," he answered, more firmly than before. He
+noted the fact that the searching eyes of both officers were fixed upon
+his own coat, which was good and whole, and lacked no buttons. He had
+not even a twinge of conscience just now. In his meanness and cowardice
+his heart exulted, as he saw that suspicion was gradually lifting its
+dark shadow from him. He cared not where it might fall next.</p>
+
+<p>"We'll have to let you slide, I reckon," said the sheriff. "But what
+size is this Barney Pratt?"</p>
+
+<p>"He air a lean, stringy little chap," said Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"Is that so?" said the sheriff. "Well, this is a bit of his coat and his
+button; and they were found on the ledge, close to the Conscripts'
+Hollow where the plunder was hid; and he's a small fellow, that maybe
+could slip through a window-pane. That makes a pretty strong showing
+against him. We'll go for Barney Pratt!"</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="TCH_Chapter_3" id="TCH_Chapter_3"></a>CHAPTER III</h2>
+
+
+<p>Barney Pratt expected this day to be a holiday. Very early in the
+morning his father and mother had jolted off in the wagon to attend the
+wedding of a cousin, who lived ten miles distant on a neighboring
+mountain, and they had left him no harder task than to keep the
+children far enough from the fire, and his paralytic grandmother close
+enough to it.</p>
+
+<p>This old woman was of benevolent intentions, although she had a stick
+with which she usually made her wants known by pointing, and in her
+convulsive clutch the stick often whirled around and around like the
+sails of a windmill, so that if Barney chanced to come within the circle
+it described, he got as hard knocks from her feeble arm as he could have
+had in a tussle with big Nick Gregory.</p>
+
+<p>He was used to dodging it, and so were the smaller children. Without any
+fear of it they were all sitting on the hearth at the old woman's
+feet,&mdash;Ben and Melissa popping corn in the ashes, and Tom and Andy
+watching Barney's deft fingers as he made a cornstalk fiddle for them.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly Barney glanced up and saw his grandmother's stick whirling over
+his head. Her eyes were fastened eagerly upon the window, and her lips
+trembled as she strove to speak.</p>
+
+<p>"What d'ye want, granny?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>Then at last it came out, quick and sharp, and in a convulsive
+gasp,&mdash;"Who air all that gang o'folks a-comin' yander down the road?"</p>
+
+<p>Barney jumped up, threw down the fiddle, and ran to the door with the
+children at his heels. There was a quiver of curiosity among them, for
+it was a strange thing that a "gang o'folks" should be coming down this
+lonely mountain road.</p>
+
+<p>They went outside of the log cabin and stood among the red sumach bushes
+that clustered about the door, while the old woman tottered after them
+to the threshold, and peered at the crowd from under her shaking hand as
+she shaded her eyes from the sunlight.</p>
+
+<p>Presently a wagon came up with eight or ten men walking behind it, or
+riding in it in the midst of a quantity of miscellaneous articles of
+which Barney took no particular notice. As he went forward, smiling in
+a frank, fearless way, he recognized a familiar face among the crowd. It
+was Nick Gregory's, and Barney's smile broadened into a grin of pleasure
+and welcome.</p>
+
+<p>Then it was that Nick's conscience began to wake up, and to lay hold
+upon him.</p>
+
+<p>As the sheriff looked at Barney he hesitated. He balanced himself
+heavily on the wheel, instead of leaping quickly down as he might have
+done easily enough, for he was a spare man and light on his feet. Nick
+overheard him speak in a low voice to the constable, who stood just
+below.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>That</i> ain't the fellow, is it, Jim?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's him, percisely," responded Jim Dow.</p>
+
+<p>"He don't <i>look</i> like it," said Stebbins, jumping down at last, but
+still speaking under his breath.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, thar ain't no countin' on boys by the <i>outside</i> on 'em," returned
+the constable emphatically; he had an unruly son of his own.</p>
+
+<p>The sheriff walked up to Barney.</p>
+
+<p>"You're Barney Pratt, are you? Well, youngster, you'll come along with
+us."</p>
+
+<p>There was silence for a moment. Barney stared at him in amaze. Not until
+he had caught sight of the constable, whom he knew in his official
+character, did he understand the full meaning of what had been said. He
+was under arrest!</p>
+
+<p>As he realized it, everything began to whirl before him. The yellow
+sunshine, the gorgeously tinted woods, the blue sky, and the silvery
+mists hovering about the distant mountains, were all confusedly mingled
+in his failing vision.</p>
+
+<p>He looked as if he were about to faint. But in a few minutes he had
+partially recovered himself.</p>
+
+<p>"I dunno what this air done ter me fur," he said tremulously, glancing
+up at the officer whose hand was on his shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>"Hain't ye been doin' nothin' mean lately?" demanded Jim Dow sternly.</p>
+
+<p>Barney shook his head.</p>
+
+<p>"Let's see ef this won't remind ye," said the constable, producing the
+bit of jeans and the button.</p>
+
+<p>As Nick watched Barney turning the piece of cloth in his hand and
+examining the button, he felt a terrible pang of remorse. But he was
+none the less resolved to keep the freedom from danger which he had
+secured at the expense of his friend. To explain would be merely to
+exchange places with Barney, and he was silent.</p>
+
+<p>"This hyar looks like a scrap o' my coat," said Barney, utterly unaware
+of the significance of his words. As he fitted it into the jagged edges
+of the garment, the officers watched the proceeding closely. "'Pears
+like ter me ez it war jerked right out thar&mdash;yes&mdash;kase hyar air the
+missin' button, too."</p>
+
+<p>His air of unconsciousness puzzled the sheriff. "Do you know where you
+lost this scrap?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Somewhars 'mongst the briers in the woods, I reckon," replied Barney.</p>
+
+<p>"No; you tore it on a blackberry bush on the ledge of a bluff; it was
+close to the Conscripts' Hollow, where some burglars have hidden stolen
+plunder. I found the scrap and the button there myself."</p>
+
+<p>Barney felt as if he were dreaming. How should his coat be torn on that
+ledge, where he had not been since the cloth was woven!</p>
+
+<p>The next words almost stunned him.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye see, sonny," said the constable, "we believes ye're the boy what
+holped to rob Blenkins's store by gittin' through a winder-pane an'
+handin' out the stole truck ter the t'other burglars. Ye hev holped
+about that thar plunder somehows,&mdash;else this hyar thing air a liar!" and
+he shook the bit of cloth significantly.</p>
+
+<p>"We'd better set out, Jim," said Stebbins, turning toward the wagon.
+"We'll pass Blenkins's on the way, and we'll stop and see if this chap
+can slip through the window-pane. If he can't, it's a point in his
+favor, and if he can, it's a point against him. As we go, we can try to
+get him to tell who the other burglars are."</p>
+
+<p>"Kem on, bubby; we can't stand hyar no longer, a-wastin' the time an'
+a-burnin' of daylight," said the constable.</p>
+
+<p>Barney seemed to have lost control of his rigid limbs, and he was
+half-dragged, half-lifted into the wagon by the two officers. The crowd
+began to fall back and disperse, and he could see the group of
+"home-folks" at the door. But he gave only one glance at the little log
+cabin, and then turned his head away. It was a poor home, but if it had
+been a palace, the pang he felt as he was torn from it could not have
+been sharper.</p>
+
+<p>In that instant he saw granny as she stood in the doorway, her head
+shaking nervously and her stick whirling in her uncertain grasp. He knew
+that she was struggling to say something for his comfort, and he had a
+terrible moment of fear lest the wagon should begin to move and her
+feeble voice be lost in the clatter of the wheels. But presently her
+shrill tones rang out, "No harm kin kem, sonny, ter them ez hev done no
+harm. All that happens works tergether fur good, an' the will o' God."</p>
+
+<p>Little breath as she had left, it had done good service to-day,&mdash;it had
+brought a drop of balm to the poor boy's heart. He did not look at her
+again, but he knew that she was still standing in the doorway among the
+clustering red leaves, whirling her stick, and shaking with the palsy,
+but determined to see the last of him.</p>
+
+<p>And now the wagon was rolling off, and a piteous wail went up from the
+children, who understood nothing except that Barney was being carried
+away against his will. Little four-year-old Melissa&mdash;she always seemed a
+beauty to Barney, with her yellow hair, and her blue-checked cotton
+dress, and her dimpled white bare feet&mdash;ran after the wagon until the
+tears blinded her, and she fell in the road, and lay there in the dust,
+sobbing.</p>
+
+<p>Then Barney found his voice. His father and mother would not return
+until to-morrow, and the thought of what might happen at home, with
+nobody there but the helpless old grandmother and the little children,
+made him forget his own troubles for the time.</p>
+
+<p>"Take good keer o' the t'other chillen, Andy!" he shouted out to the
+next oldest boy, thus making him a deputy-guardian of the family, "an'
+pick Melissy up out'n the dust, an' be sure ye keeps granny's cheer
+close enough ter the fire!"</p>
+
+<p>Then he turned back again. He could still hear Melissa sobbing. He
+wondered why the two men in the wagon looked persistently in the
+opposite direction, and why they were both so silent.</p>
+
+<p>The children stood in the road, watching the wagon as long as they could
+see it, but Nick had slunk away into the woods. He could not bear the
+sight of their grief. He walked on, hardly knowing where he went. He
+felt as if he were trying to get rid of himself. He appreciated fully
+now the consequences of what he had done. Barney, innocent Barney, would
+be thrust into jail.</p>
+
+<p>He began to see that the most terrible phase of moral cowardice is its
+capacity to injure others, and he could not endure the thought of what
+he had brought upon his friend. Soon he was saying to himself that
+something was sure to happen to prevent them from putting Barney in
+prison,&mdash;he shouldn't be surprised if it were to happen before the wagon
+could reach the foot of the mountain.</p>
+
+<p>In his despair, he had flung himself at length upon the rugged, stony
+ground at the base of a great crag. When this comforting thought of
+Barney's release came upon him, he took his hands from his face, and
+looked about him. From certain ledges of the cliff above, the road which
+led down the valley was visible at intervals for some distance. There he
+could watch the progress of the wagon, and see for a time longer what
+was happening to Barney.</p>
+
+<p>There was a broad gulf between the wall of the mountain and the crag,
+which, from its detached position and its shape, was known far and wide
+as the "Old Man's Chimney."</p>
+
+<p>It loomed up like a great stone column, a hundred feet above the wooded
+slope where Nick stood, and its height could only be ascended by
+dexterous climbing.</p>
+
+<p>He went at it like a cat. Sometimes he helped himself up by sharp
+projections of the rock, sometimes by slipping his feet and hands into
+crevices, and sometimes he caught hold of a strong bush here and there,
+and gave himself a lift. When he was about forty feet from the base, he
+sat down on one of the ledges, and turning, looked anxiously along the
+red clay road which he could see winding among the trees down the
+mountain's side.</p>
+
+<p>No wagon was there.</p>
+
+<p>His eyes followed the road further and further toward the foot of the
+range, and then along the valley beyond. There, at least two miles
+distant, was a small moving black object, plainly defined upon the red
+clay of the road.</p>
+
+<p>Barney was gone! There was no mistake about it. They had taken him away
+from Goliath Mountain! He was innocent, and Nick knew it, and Nick had
+made him seem guilty. There was no one near him now to speak a good word
+for him, not even his palsied old grandmother.</p>
+
+<p>It all came back upon Nick with a rush. His eyes were blurred with
+rising tears. Unconsciously, in his grief, he made a movement forward,
+and suddenly clutched convulsively at the ledge.</p>
+
+<p>He had lost his balance. There was a swift, fantastic whirl of vague
+objects before him, then a great light seemed flashing through his very
+brain, and he knew that he was falling.</p>
+
+<p>He knew nothing else for some time. He wondered where he was when he
+first opened his eyes and saw the great stone shaft towering high above,
+and the tops of the sun-gilded maples waving about him.</p>
+
+<p>Then he remembered and understood. He had fallen from that narrow ledge,
+hardly ten feet above his head, and had been caught in his descent by
+the far broader one upon which he lay.</p>
+
+<p>"It knocked the senses out'n me fur a while, I reckon," he said to
+himself. "But I hev toler'ble luck now, sure ez shootin', kase I mought
+hev drapped over this ledge, an' then I'd hev been gone fur sartain
+sure!"</p>
+
+<p>His exultation was short-lived. What was this limp thing hanging to his
+shoulder? and what was this thrill of pain darting through it?</p>
+
+<p>He looked at it in amazement. It was his strong right
+arm&mdash;broken&mdash;helpless.</p>
+
+<p>And here he was, perched thirty feet above the earth, weakened by his
+long faint, sore and bruised and unnerved by his fall, and with only his
+left arm to aid him in making that perilous descent.</p>
+
+<p>It was impossible. He glanced down at the sheer walls of the column
+below, shook his head, and lay back on the ledge. Reckless as he was, he
+realized that the attempt would be fatal.</p>
+
+<p>Then came a thought that filled him with dismay,&mdash;how long was this to
+last?&mdash;who would rescue him?</p>
+
+<p>He knew that a prolonged absence from home would create no surprise. His
+mother would only fancy that he had slipped off, as he had often done,
+to go on a camp-hunt with some other boys. She would not grow uneasy for
+a week, at least.</p>
+
+<p>He was deep in the heart of the forest, distant from any dwelling. No
+one, as far as he knew, came to this spot, except himself and Barney,
+and their errand here was for the sake of the exhilaration and the
+hazard of climbing the crag. It was so lonely that on the Old Man's
+Chimney the eagles built instead of the swallows. His hope&mdash;his only
+hope&mdash;was that some hunter might chance to pass before he should die of
+hunger.</p>
+
+<p>The shadow of the great obelisk shifted as the day wore on, and left him
+in the broad, hot glare of the sun. His broken arm was fevered and gave
+him great pain. Now and then he raised himself on the other, and looked
+down wistfully at the cool, dusky depths of the woods. He heard
+continually the impetuous rushing of a mountain torrent near at hand;
+sometimes, when the wind stirred the foliage, he caught a glimpse of the
+water, rioting from rock to rock, and he was oppressed by an intolerable
+thirst.</p>
+
+<p>Thus the hours lagged wearily on.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="TCH_Chapter_4" id="TCH_Chapter_4"></a>CHAPTER IV</h2>
+
+<p>When the wagon was rolling along the road in the valley, Barney at first
+kept his eyes persistently fastened upon the craggy heights and the red
+and gold autumnal woods of Goliath Mountain, as the mighty range
+stretched across the plain.</p>
+
+<p>But presently the two men began to talk to him, and he turned around in
+order to face them. They were urging him to confess his own guilt and
+tell who were the other burglars, and where they were. But Barney had
+nothing to tell. He could only protest again and again his innocence.
+The men, however, shook their heads incredulously, and after a while
+they left him to himself and smoked their pipes in silence.</p>
+
+<p>When Barney looked back at the mountains once more, a startling change
+seemed to have been wrought in the landscape. Instead of the frowning
+sandstone cliffs he loved so well, and the gloomy recesses of the woods,
+there was only a succession of lines of a delicate blue color drawn
+along the horizon. This was the way the distant ranges looked from the
+crags of his own home; he knew that they were the mountains, but which
+was Goliath?</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly he struck his hands together, and broke out with a bitter cry.</p>
+
+<p>"I hev los' G'liath!" he exclaimed. "I dunno whar I live! An' whar <i>is</i>
+Melissy?"</p>
+
+<p>A difficult undertaking, certainly, to determine where among all those
+great spurs and outliers, stretching so far on either hand, was that
+little atom of dimpled pink-and-white humanity known as "Melissy."</p>
+
+<p>The constable, being a native of these hills himself, knew something by
+experience of the homesickness of an exiled mountaineer,&mdash;far more
+terrible than the homesickness of low-landers; he took his pipe
+promptly from between his lips, and told the boy that the second blue
+ridge, counting down from the sky, was "G'liath Mounting," and that
+"Melissy war right thar somewhar."</p>
+
+<p>Barney looked back at it with unrecognizing eyes,&mdash;this gentle, misty,
+blue vagueness was not the solemn, sombre mountain that he knew. He
+gazed at it only for a moment longer; then his heart swelled and he
+burst into tears.</p>
+
+<p>On and on they went through the flat country. The boy felt that he could
+scarcely breathe. Even tourists, coming down from these mountains to the
+valley below, struggle with a sense of suffocation and oppression; how
+must it have been then with this half-wild creature, born and bred on
+those breezy heights!</p>
+
+<p>The stout mules did their duty well, and it was not long before they
+were in sight of the cross-roads store that had been robbed. It was a
+part of a small frame dwelling-house, set in the midst of the yellow
+sunlight that brooded over the plain. All the world around it seemed to
+the young backwoodsman to be a big cornfield; but there was a garden
+close at hand, and tall sunflowers looked over the fence and seemed to
+nod knowingly at Barney, as much as to say they had always suspected
+him of being one of the burglars, and were gratified that he had been
+caught at last.</p>
+
+<p>Poor fellow! he saw so much suspicion expressed in the faces of a crowd
+of men congregating about the store, that it was no wonder he fancied he
+detected it too in inanimate objects.</p>
+
+<p>Of all the group only one seemed to doubt his guilt. He overheard
+Blenkins, the merchant, say to Jim Dow,&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It's mighty hard to b'lieve this story on this 'ere boy; he's a manly
+looking, straight-for'ard little chap, an' he's got honest eyes in his
+head, too."</p>
+
+<p>"He'd a deal better hev an honest heart in his body," drawled Jim Dow,
+who was convinced that Barney had aided in the burglary.</p>
+
+<p>When they had gone around to the window with the broken pane, Barney
+looked up at it in great anxiety. If only it should prove too small for
+him to slip through! Certainly it seemed very small.</p>
+
+<p>He had pulled off his coat and stood ready to jump.</p>
+
+<p>"Up with you!" said Stebbins.</p>
+
+<p>The boy laid both hands on the sill, gave a light spring, and went
+through the pane like an eel.</p>
+
+<p>"That settles it!" he heard Stebbins saying outside. And all the idlers
+were laughing because it was done so nimbly.</p>
+
+<p>"That boy's right smart of a fool," said one of the lookers-on. "Now, if
+that had been me, I'd hev made out to git stuck somehows in that winder;
+I'd have scotched my wheel somewhere."</p>
+
+<p>"Ef ye hed, I'd have dragged ye through ennyhow," declared Jim Dow, who
+had no toleration of a joke on a serious subject. "This hyar boy air a
+deal too peart ter try enny sech fool tricks on <i>Me</i>!"</p>
+
+<p>Barney hardly knew how he got back into the wagon; he only knew that
+they were presently jolting along once more in the midst of the yellow
+glare of sunlight. It had begun to seem that there was no chance for
+him. Like Nick, he too had madly believed, in spite of everything, that
+something would happen to help him. He could not think that, innocent as
+he was, he would be imprisoned. Now, however, this fate evidently was
+very close upon him.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly Jim Dow spoke. "I s'pose ye war powerful disapp'inted kase ye
+couldn't git yerself hitched in that thar winder; ye air too well used
+to it,&mdash;ye hev been through it afore."</p>
+
+<p>"I hev never been through it afore!" cried Barney indignantly.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, well," said Stebbins pacifically, "it wouldn't have done you any
+good if you hadn't gone through the pane just now. I'd have only thought
+you were one of those who stood on the outside. You see, the <i>main</i>
+point against you is that scrap of your coat and your button found right
+there by the Conscripts' Hollow,&mdash;though, of course, your going through
+the window-pane so easy makes it more complete."</p>
+
+<p>Barney's tired brain began to fumble at this problem,&mdash;how did it
+happen?</p>
+
+<p>He had not been on the ledge nor at the Conscripts' Hollow for six
+months at least. Yet there was that bit of his coat and his button found
+on the bush close at hand only to-day.</p>
+
+<p>Was it possible that he could have exchanged coats by mistake with Nick
+the last afternoon that they were on the crag together?</p>
+
+<p>"Did Nick wear <i>my</i> coat down on the ledge, I wonder, an' git it tored?
+Did Nick see the plunder in the Conscripts' Hollow, an' git skeered, an'
+then sot out ter lyin' ter git shet o' the blame?"</p>
+
+<p>As he asked himself these questions, he began to remember, vaguely,
+having seen, just as he was falling asleep, his friend's head slowly
+disappearing beneath the verge of the crag.</p>
+
+<p>"Nick started down ter the ledge, anyhow," he argued.</p>
+
+<p>Did he dream it, or was it true, that when Nick came back he seemed at
+first strangely agitated?</p>
+
+<p>All at once Barney exclaimed aloud,&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"This hyar air a powerful cur'ous thing 'bout'n that thar piece what war
+tored out'n my coat!"</p>
+
+<p>"What's curious about it?" asked Stebbins quickly.</p>
+
+<p>Jim Dow took his pipe from his mouth, and looked sharply at the boy.</p>
+
+<p>Barney struggled for a moment with a strong temptation. Then a nobler
+impulse asserted itself. He would not even attempt to shield himself
+behind the friend who had done him so grievous an injury.</p>
+
+<p>He <i>knew</i> nothing positively; he must not put his suspicions and his
+vague, half-sleeping impressions into words, and thus possibly criminate
+Nick.</p>
+
+<p>He himself felt certain now how the matter really stood,&mdash;that Nick had
+no connection whatever with the robbery, but having accidentally
+stumbled upon the stolen goods, he had become panic-stricken, had lied
+about it, and finally had saved himself at the expense of an innocent
+friend.</p>
+
+<p>Still, Barney had no <i>proof</i> of this, and he felt he would rather suffer
+unjustly himself than unjustly throw blame on another.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothin', nothin'," he said absently. "I war jes' a-studyin' 'bout'n it
+all."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I wouldn't think about it any more just now," said good-natured
+Stebbins. "You look like you had been dragged through a keyhole instead
+of a window-pane. This town we're coming to is the biggest town you ever
+saw."</p>
+
+<p>Barney could not respond to this attempt to divert his attention. He
+could only brood upon the fact that he was innocent, and would be
+punished as if he were guilty, and that it was Nick Gregory, his chosen
+friend, who had brought him to this pass.</p>
+
+<p>He would not be unmanly, and injure Nick with a possibly unfounded
+suspicion, but his heart burned with indignation and contempt when he
+thought of him. He felt that he would go through fire and water to be
+justly revenged upon him.</p>
+
+<p>He determined that, if ever he should see Nick again, even though years
+might intervene, he would tax him with the injury he had wrought, and
+make him answer for it.</p>
+
+<p>Barney clenched his fists as he looked back at the ethereal blue shadows
+that they said were the solid old hills.</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps, however, if he had known where, in the misty uncertainty that
+enveloped Goliath Mountain, Nick Gregory was at this moment,&mdash;far away
+in the lonely woods, helpless with his broken arm, perched high up on
+the "Old Man's Chimney,"&mdash;Barney might have thought himself the more
+fortunately placed of the two.</p>
+
+<p>Before he was well aware of it, the wagon was jolting into the town. He
+took no notice of how much larger the little village was than any he had
+ever seen before. His attention was riveted by the faces of the people
+who ran to the doors and windows, upon recognizing the officers, to
+stare at him as one of the burglars.</p>
+
+<p>When the wagon reached the public square, a number of men came up and
+stopped it.</p>
+
+<p>Barney was surprised that they took so little notice of him. They were
+talking loudly and excitedly to the officers, who grew at once loud and
+excited, too.</p>
+
+<p>The boy roused himself, and began to listen to the conversation. The
+burglars had been captured!&mdash;yes, that was what they were saying. The
+deputy-sheriff had nabbed the whole gang in a western district of the
+county this morning early, and they were lodged at this moment in jail.
+Barney's heart sank. Would he be put among the guilty creatures? He
+flinched from the very idea.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly, here was the deputy-sheriff himself, a young man, dusty and
+tired with his long, hard ride, but with an air of great satisfaction in
+his success. He talked with many quick gestures that were very
+expressive. Sometimes he would leave a sentence unfinished except by a
+brisk nod, but all the crowd caught its meaning instantly. This
+peculiarity gave him a very animated manner, and he seemed to Barney to
+enjoy being in a position of authority.</p>
+
+<p>He pressed his foaming horse close to the wagon, and leaning over,
+looked searchingly into Barney's face.</p>
+
+<p>The poor boy looked up deprecatingly from under his limp and drooping
+hat-brim.</p>
+
+<p>All the crowd stood in silence, watching them. After a moment of this
+keen scrutiny, the deputy turned to the constable with an interrogative
+wave of the hand.</p>
+
+<p>"This hyar's the boy what war put through the winder-pane ter thieve
+from Blenkins," said Jim Dow. "Thar's consider'ble fac's agin him."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean well, Jim," said the deputy, with a short, scornful laugh.
+"But your performance ain't always equal to your intentions."</p>
+
+<p>He lifted his eyebrows and nodded in a significant way that the crowd
+understood, for there was a stir of excitement in its midst; but poor
+Barney failed to catch his meaning. He hung upon every tone and gesture
+with the intensest interest. All the talk was about him, and he could
+comprehend no more than if the man spoke in a foreign language.</p>
+
+<p>Still, he gathered something of the drift of the speech from the
+constable's reply.</p>
+
+<p>"That thar boy's looks hev bamboozled more'n one man ter-day, jes' at
+fust," Jim Dow drawled. "<i>Looks</i> ain't nothin'."</p>
+
+<p>"I'd believe 'most anything a boy with a face on him like that would
+tell me," said the deputy. "And besides, you see, one of those scamps,"
+with a quick nod toward the jail, "has turned State's evidence."</p>
+
+<p>Barney's heart was in a great tumult. It seemed bursting. There was a
+hot rush of blood to his head. He was dizzy&mdash;and he could not
+understand!</p>
+
+<p>State's evidence,&mdash;what was that? and what would that do to him?</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="TCH_Chapter_5" id="TCH_Chapter_5"></a>CHAPTER V</h2>
+
+
+<p>Barney observed that these words produced a marked sensation. The crowd
+began to press more closely around the deputy-sheriff's foaming horse.</p>
+
+<p>"Who hev done turned State's evidence?" asked Jim Dow.</p>
+
+<p>"Little Jeff Carew,&mdash;you've seen that puny little man a-many a
+time&mdash;haven't you, Jim? He'd go into your pocket."</p>
+
+<p>"He would, I know, powerful quick, ef he thunk I hed ennything in it,"
+said Jim, with a gruff laugh.</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't mean that, though it's true enough. I only went ter say that
+he's small enough to go into any ordinary-sized fellow's pocket. Some of
+the rest of them wanted to turn State's evidence, but they weren't
+allowed. They were harder customers even than Jeff Carew,&mdash;regular old
+jail-birds."</p>
+
+<p>Barney began to vaguely understand that when a prisoner confesses the
+crime he has committed, and gives testimony which will convict his
+partners in it, this is called turning "State's evidence."</p>
+
+<p>But how was it to concern Barney?</p>
+
+<p>An old white-haired man had pushed up to the wagon; he polished his
+spectacles on his coat-tail, then put them on his nose, and focused them
+on Barney. Those green spectacles seemed to the boy to have a solemnly
+accusing expression on their broad and sombre lenses. He shrank as the
+old man spoke,&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"And is this the boy who was slipped through the window to steal from
+Blenkins?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," said the deputy, "this ain't the boy."</p>
+
+<p>Barney could hardly believe his senses.</p>
+
+<p>"Fact is," continued the deputy, with a brisk wave of his hand, "there
+wasn't any boy with 'em,&mdash;so little Jeff Carew says. <i>He</i> jumped through
+the window-pane <i>himself</i>. We wouldn't believe that until we measured
+one there at the jail of the same size as Blenkins's window-glass, and
+he went through it without a wriggle."</p>
+
+<p>Barney sprang to his feet.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, tell it ter me, folkses!" he cried wildly; "tell it ter me,
+somebody! Will they keep me hyar all the same? An' when will I see
+G'liath Mounting agin, an' be whar Melissy air?"</p>
+
+<p>He had burst into tears, and there was a murmur of sympathy in the
+crowd.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, that lets you out, I reckon, youngster," said Stebbins. "I'm glad
+enough of it for one."</p>
+
+<p>The old man turned his solemnly accusing green spectacles on Stebbins,
+and it seemed to Barney that he spoke with no less solemnly accusing a
+voice.</p>
+
+<p>"He ought never to have been let in."</p>
+
+<p>Stebbins replied, rather eagerly, Barney thought, "Why, there was enough
+against that boy to have clapped him in jail, and maybe convicted him,
+if this man hadn't turned State's evidence."</p>
+
+<p>"We hed the fac's agin him,&mdash;dead agin him," chimed in Jim Dow.</p>
+
+<p>"That just shows how much danger an innocent boy was in; it seems to me
+that somebody ought to have been more careful," the old man protested.</p>
+
+<p>"That's so!" came in half a dozen voices from the crowd.</p>
+
+<p>Barney was surprised to see how many friends he had now, when a moment
+before he had had none. But he ought to have realized that there is a
+great difference between <i>being</i> a young martyr, and <i>seeming</i> a young
+thief.</p>
+
+<p>"I want to see the little fellow out of this," said the old man with the
+terrible spectacles.</p>
+
+<p>He saw him out of it in a short while.</p>
+
+<p>There was an examination before a magistrate, in which Barney was
+discharged on the testimony of Jeff Carew, who was produced and swore
+that he had never before seen the boy, that he was not among the gang of
+burglars who had robbed Blenkins's store and dwelling-house, and that he
+had had no part in helping to conceal the plunder. In opposition to
+this, the mere finding of a scrap of Barney's coat close to the
+Conscripts' Hollow seemed now of slight consequence, although it could
+not be accounted for.</p>
+
+<p>When the trial was over, the old man with the green spectacles took
+Barney to his house, gave him something to eat, and saw him start out
+homeward.</p>
+
+<p>As Barney plodded along toward the blue mountains his heart was very
+bitter against Nick Gregory, who had lied and thrown suspicion upon him
+and brought him into danger. Whenever he thought of it he raised his
+clenched fist and shook it. He was a little fellow, but he felt that
+with the strength of this grievance he was more than a match for big
+Nick Gregory. He would force him to confess the lies that he had told
+and his cowardice, and all Goliath Mountain should know it and despise
+him for it.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll fetch an' kerry that word to an' fro fur a thousand mile!" Barney
+declared between his set teeth.</p>
+
+<p>Now and then a wagoner overtook him and gave him a ride, thus greatly
+helping him on his way. As he went, there was a gradual change in the
+blue and misty range that seemed to encircle the west, and which he
+knew, by one deep indentation in the horizontal line of its summit, was
+Goliath Mountain. It became first an intenser blue. As he drew nearer
+still, it turned a bronzed green. It had purpled with the sunset before
+he could distinguish the crimson and gold of its foliage and its
+beetling crags. Night had fallen when he reached the base of the
+mountain.</p>
+
+<p>There was no moon; heavy clouds were rolling up from the horizon, and
+they hid the stars. Nick Gregory, lying on the ledge of the "Old Man's
+Chimney," thirty feet above the black earth, could not see his hand
+before his face. The darkness was dreadful to him. It had closed upon a
+dreadful day. The seconds were measured by the throbs and dartings of
+pain in his arm. He was almost exhausted by hunger and thirst. He
+thought, however, that he could have borne it all cheerfully, but for
+the sharp remorse that tortured him for the wrong he had done to his
+friend, and his wild anxiety about Barney's fate. Nick felt that he,
+himself, was on trial here, imprisoned on this tower of stone, cut off
+from the world, from everything but his sternly accusing conscience and
+his guilty heart.</p>
+
+<p>For hours he had heard nothing but the monotonous rushing of the water
+close at hand, or now and then the shrill, quavering cry of a distant
+screech-owl, or the almost noiseless flapping of a bat's wings as they
+swept by him.</p>
+
+<p>He had hardly a hope of deliverance, when suddenly there came a new
+sound, vague and indistinguishable. He lifted himself upon his left
+elbow and listened again. He could hear nothing for a moment except his
+own panting breath and the loud beating of his heart. But there&mdash;the
+sound came once more. What was it? a dropping leaf? the falling of a
+fragment of stone from the "Chimney"? a distant step?</p>
+
+<p>It grew more distinct as it drew nearer; presently he recognized
+it,&mdash;the regular footfall of some man or boy plodding along the path.
+That path!&mdash;a recollection flashed through his mind. No one knew that
+short cut up the mountain but him and Barney; they had worn the path
+with their trampings back and forth from the "Old Man's Chimney."</p>
+
+<p>He thought he must be dreaming, or that he had lost his reason; still he
+shouted out, "Hold on, thar! air it ye, Barney?"</p>
+
+<p>The step paused. Then a reply came in a voice that he hardly recognized
+as Barney's; it was so fierce, and so full of half-repressed anger.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, it air Barney,&mdash;ef <i>ye</i> hev any call ter know."</p>
+
+<p>"How did ye git away, Barney?&mdash;how did ye git away?" exclaimed Nick,
+with a joyous sense of relief.</p>
+
+<p>"A <i>thief's</i> word cl'ared me!"</p>
+
+<p>This bitter cry came up to Nick, sharp and distinct, through the dark
+stillness. He said nothing at the moment, and presently he heard Barney
+speak again, as he stood invisible, and enveloped in the gloom of the
+night, at the foot of the mighty column.</p>
+
+<p>"'Twar my bes' frien' ez sunk me deep in trouble. But the <i>thief</i>, he
+fished me up. He 'lowed ter the jestice ez I never holped him ter steal
+nothin' nor ter hide it arterward, nuther."</p>
+
+<p>Nick said not a word. The hot tears came into his eyes. Barney, he
+thought, could feel no more bitterly toward him than he felt toward
+himself.</p>
+
+<p>"How kem my coat ter be tored down thar on the ledge, close ter the
+Conscripts' Hollow, whar I hain't been sence the cloth war wove?"</p>
+
+<p>There was a long pause.</p>
+
+<p>"I wore it thar, Barney, 'stid o' mine," Nick replied at last. "I never
+knowed, at fust, ez I hed tored it. I was so skeered when I seen the
+stole truck, I never knowed nothin'."</p>
+
+<p>"An' then ye spoke a lie! An' arterward, ye let the folks think ez 'twar
+me ez hed tored that coat close by the Conscripts' Hollow!"</p>
+
+<p>"I was skeered haffen ter death, Barney!"</p>
+
+<p>Nick was very contemptible in his falsehood and cowardice,&mdash;even in his
+repentance and shame and sorrow. At least, so the boy thought who stood
+in the darkness at the foot of the great column. Suddenly it occurred to
+Barney that this was a strange place for Nick to be at this hour of the
+night. His indignation gave way for a moment to some natural curiosity.</p>
+
+<p>"What air ye a-doin' of up thar on the Old Man's Chimney?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"I kem up hyar this mornin' early, ter watch the wagon a-takin' ye off.
+Then I fell and bruk my arm, an' I can't git down 'thout bein' holped a
+little."</p>
+
+<p>There was another silence, so intense that it seemed to Nick as if he
+were all alone again in the immensity of the mountains, and the black
+night, and the endless forests. He had expected an immediate proffer of
+assistance from Barney. He had thought that his injured friend would
+relent in his severity when he knew that he had suffered too; that he
+was in great pain even at this moment.</p>
+
+<p>But not a word came from Barney.</p>
+
+<p>"I hed laid off ter ax ye ter holp me a little," Nick faltered meekly,
+making his appeal direct.</p>
+
+<p>There was no answer.</p>
+
+<p>It was so still that the boy, high up on the sandstone pillar, could
+hear the wind rising among the far spurs west of Goliath. The foliage
+near at hand was ominously quiet in the sultry air. Once there was a
+flash of lightning from the black clouds, followed by a low muttering
+of thunder. Then all was still again,&mdash;so still!</p>
+
+<p>Nick raised himself upon his left arm, and leaned cautiously over the
+verge of the ledge, peering, with starting eyes, into the darkness, and
+hoping for another flash of lightning that he might see below for an
+instant. A terrible suspicion had come to him. Could Barney have slipped
+quietly away, leaving him to his fate?</p>
+
+<p>He could see nothing in the impenetrable gloom; he could hear nothing in
+the dark stillness.</p>
+
+<p>Barney had not yet gone, but he was saying to himself, as he stood at
+the foot of the great obelisk, that here was his revenge, far more
+complete than he had dared even to hope.</p>
+
+<p>He could measure out his false friend's punishment in any degree he
+thought fit. He could leave him there with his broken arm and his pangs
+of hunger for another day. He deserved it,&mdash;he deserved it richly. The
+recollection was still very bitter to Barney of the hardships he had
+endured at the hands of this boy, who asked him now for help. Why did he
+not refuse it? Why should he not take the revenge he had promised
+himself?</p>
+
+<p>And then he knew there was danger in now trying to climb the jagged
+edges of the Old Man's Chimney. His nerves were shaken by the
+excitements of the day; he was fagged out by his long tramp; the wind
+was beginning to surge among the trees; it might blow him from his
+uncertain foothold. But when it gained more strength, might it not drive
+Nick, helpless with his broken arm, from that high ledge?</p>
+
+<p>As this thought crossed his mind, he tore off his hat, coat, and shoes,
+and desperately began the ascent. He thought he knew every projection
+and crevice and bush so well that he might have found his way
+blindfolded, and guided by the sense of touch alone. But he did not lack
+for light. Before he was six feet up from the ground, the clouds were
+rent by a vivid flash, and an instantaneous peal of thunder woke all
+the echoes. This was the breaking of the storm; afterward, there was a
+continuous pale flickering over all the sky, and at close intervals,
+dazzling gleams of lightning darted through the rain, which was now
+falling heavily.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm a-comin', Nick!" shouted Barney, through the din of the elements.</p>
+
+<p>Somehow, as he climbed, he felt light-hearted again. It seemed to him
+that he had left a great weight at the foot of the gigantic sandstone
+column. Could it be that bitter revenge he had promised himself? He had
+thought only of Nick's safety, but he seemed to have done himself a
+kindness in forgiving his friend,&mdash;the burden of revenge is so heavy!
+His troubles were already growing faint in his memory,&mdash;it was so good
+to feel the rain splashing in his face, and his rude playfellow, the
+mountain wind, rioting around him once more. He was laughing when at
+last he pulled himself up, wet through and through, on the ledge beside
+Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"It's airish up hyar, ain't it?" he cried.</p>
+
+<p>"Barney," said Nick miserably, "I dunno how I kin ever look at ye agin,
+squar' in the face, while I lives."</p>
+
+<p>"Shet that up!" Barney returned good-humoredly. "I don't want ter ever
+hear 'bout'n it no more. I'll always know, arter this, that I can't
+place no dependence in ye; but, law, ye air jes' like that old gun o'
+mine; sometimes it'll hang fire, an' sometimes it'll go off at
+half-cock, an' ginerally it disapp'ints me mightily. But, somehows, I
+can't determinate to shoot with no other one. I'll hev ter feel by ye
+jes' like I does by that thar old gun."</p>
+
+<p>The descent was slow and difficult, and very painful to Nick, and
+fraught with considerable danger to both boys. They accomplished it in
+safety, however, and then, with Barney's aid, Nick managed to drag
+himself through the woods to the nearest log cabin, where his arm was
+set by zealous and sympathetic amateurs in a rude fashion that probably
+would have shocked the faculty. They had some supper here, and an
+invitation to remain all night; but Barney was wild to be at home, and
+Nick, in his adversity, clung to his friend.</p>
+
+<p>The rain had ceased, and they had only half a mile further to go.
+Barney's heart was exultant when he saw the light in the window of his
+home, and the sparks flying up from the chimney. He had some curiosity
+to know how the family circle looked without him.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye wait hyar, Nick, a minute, an' I'll take a peek at 'em afore I
+bounce in 'mongst 'em," he said. "I'm all eat up ter know what Melissy
+air a-doin' 'thout me."</p>
+
+<p>But the sight smote the tears from his eyes when he stole around to the
+window and glanced in at the little group, plainly shown in the flare
+from the open fire.</p>
+
+<p>Granny looked ten years older since morning. The three small boys,
+instead of popping corn or roasting apples and sweet potatoes, as was
+their habit in the evenings, sat in a dismal row, their chins on their
+freckled, sunburned hands, and their elbows on their knees, and gazed
+ruefully at the fire. And Melissy,&mdash;why, there was Melissy, a little
+blue-and-white ball curled up on the floor. Asleep? No. Barney caught
+the gleam of her wide-open blue eyes; but he missed something from
+them,&mdash;the happy expression that used to dwell there.</p>
+
+<p>He went at the door with a rush. And what an uproar there was when he
+suddenly sprang in among them! Melissy laughed until she cried. Granny
+whirled and whirled her stick, and nodded convulsively, and gasped out
+eager questions about the trial and the "jedge." The little boys jumped
+for joy until they seemed strung on wire.</p>
+
+<p>Soon they were popping corn and roasting apples once more. The flames
+roared up the chimney, and the shadows danced on the wall, and as the
+hours wore on, they were all so happy that when midnight came, it caught
+them still grouped around the fire.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="A_WARNING" id="A_WARNING"></a>A WARNING</h2>
+
+
+<p>It was night on Elm Ridge. So black, so black that the great crags and
+chasms were hidden, the forest was lost in the encompassing gloom, the
+valley and the distant ranges were gone,&mdash;all the world had disappeared.</p>
+
+<p>There was no wind, and the dark clouds above the dark earth hung low and
+motionless. Solomon Grow found it something of an undertaking to grope
+his way back from the little hut of unhewn logs, where he had stabled
+his father's horse, to the door of the cabin and the home-circle within.</p>
+
+<p>He fumbled for the latchstring, and pulling it carelessly, the door flew
+open suddenly, and he almost fell into the room.</p>
+
+<p>"Why d' ye come a-bustin' in hyar that thar way, Sol?" his mother
+demanded rather tartly. "Ef ye hed been raised 'mongst the foxes, ye
+couldn't show less manners."</p>
+
+<p>"Door slipped out'n my hand," said Sol, a trifle sullenly.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal&mdash;air ye disabled anywhar so ez ye can't shet it, eh?" asked his
+father, with a touch of sarcasm.</p>
+
+<p>Sol shut the door, drew up an inverted tub, seated himself upon it, and
+looked about, loweringly. He thought he had been needlessly affronted.
+Still, he held his peace.</p>
+
+<p>Within, there was a great contrast to the black night outside. The ash
+and hickory logs in the deep fireplace threw blue and yellow flames high
+up the wide stone chimney. The flickering light was like some genial,
+cheery smile forever coming and going.</p>
+
+<p>It illumined the circle about the hearth. There sat Sol's mother, idle
+to-night, for it was Sunday. His grandmother, too, was there, so old
+that she seemed to confirm the story told of these healthy mountains, to
+the effect that people are obliged to go down in the valley to die, else
+they would live forever.</p>
+
+<p>There was Sol's father, a great burly fellow, six feet three inches in
+height, still holding out his hands to the blaze, chilled through and
+through by his long ride from the church where he had been to hear the
+circuit-rider preach on "Forgiveness of Injuries."</p>
+
+<p>He was beginning now to quarrel vehemently with his brother-in-law,
+Jacob Smith, about the shabby treatment he had recently experienced in
+the non-payment of work,&mdash;for work in this country is a sort of
+circulating medium; a man will plough a day for another man, on
+condition that the favor is rigorously reciprocated.</p>
+
+<p>Jacob Smith had been to the still, and apparently had imbibed the spirit
+there prevailing, to more effect than Sol's father had absorbed the
+spirit that had been taught in church.</p>
+
+<p>In plain words, Jacob Smith was very drunk, and very quarrelsome, and
+very unreasonable. The genial firelight that played upon his bloated
+face played also over objects much pleasanter to look upon,&mdash;over the
+strings of red pepper-pods hanging from the rafters; over the bright
+variegations of color in the clean patchwork quilt on the bed; over the
+shining pans and pails set aside on the shelf; over the great, curious
+frame of the warping-bars, rising up among the shadows on the other side
+of the room, the equidistant pegs still holding the sized yarn that
+Solomon's mother had been warping, preparatory to weaving.</p>
+
+<p>On the other side of the room, too, was a little tow-headed child
+sitting in a cradle, which, small as he was, he had long ago outgrown as
+a bed.</p>
+
+<p>It was only a pine box placed upon rude rockers, and he used it for a
+rocking-chair. His bare, fat legs hung out on one side of the box, and
+as he delightedly rocked back and forth, his grotesque little shadow
+waved to and fro on the wall, and mocked and flouted him.</p>
+
+<p>What he thought of it, nobody can ever know; his grave eyes were fixed
+upon it, but he said nothing, and the silent shadow and substance swayed
+joyously hither and thither together.</p>
+
+<p>The quarrel between the two men was becoming hot and bitter. One might
+have expected nothing better from Jacob Smith, for when a man is drunk,
+the human element drops like a husk, and only the unreasoning brute is
+left.</p>
+
+<p>But had John Grow forgotten all the good words he had heard to-day from
+the circuit-rider? Had they melted into thin air during his long ride
+from the church? Were the houseless good words wandering with the rising
+wind through the unpeopled forest, seeking vainly a human heart where
+they might find a lodgment?</p>
+
+<p>The men had risen from their chairs; the drunkard, tremulous with anger,
+had drawn a sharp knife. John Grow was not so patient as he might have
+been, considering the great advantage he had in being sober, and the
+good words with which he had started out from the "meet'n'-house."</p>
+
+<p>He laid his heavy hand angrily upon the drunken man's shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>In another moment there would have been bloodshed. But suddenly the
+dark shadows at the other end of the room swayed with a strange motion;
+a great creaking sound arose, and the warping-bars tottered forward and
+fell upon the floor with a crash.</p>
+
+<p>The wranglers turned with anxious faces. No one was near the bars, it
+seemed that naught could have jarred them; but there lay the heavy frame
+upon the floor, the pegs broken, and the yarn twisted.</p>
+
+<p>"A warning!" cried Sol's mother. "A warning how you-uns spen' the
+evenin' o' the Lord's Day in yer quar'lin', an' fightin', an' sech. An'
+ye, John Grow, jes' from the meet'n'-house!"</p>
+
+<p>She did not reproach her brother,&mdash;nobody hopes anything from a
+drunkard.</p>
+
+<p>"A sign o' bad luck," said the grandmother. "It 'minds me o' the time
+las' winter that the wind blowed the door in, an' straight arter that
+the cow died."</p>
+
+<p>"Them signs air ez likely ter take hold on folks ez on cattle," said
+Jacob Smith, half-sobered by the shock.</p>
+
+<p>There was a look of sudden anxiety on the face of Solomon's mother. She
+crossed the room to the youngster rocking in the cradle.</p>
+
+<p>"Come, Benny," she said, "ye oughter go ter bed. Ye air wastin' yer
+strength sittin' up this late in the night. An' ye war a-coughin' las'
+week. Ye must go ter bed."</p>
+
+<p>Benny clung to his unique rocking-chair with a sturdy strength which
+promised well for his muscle when he should be as old as his great,
+strong brother Solomon. He had been as quiet, hitherto, as if he were
+dumb, but now he lifted up his voice in a loud and poignant wail, and
+after he was put to bed, he resurrected himself from among the
+bedclothes, ever and anon, with a bitter, though infantile, jargon of
+protest.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm fairly afeard o' them bars," said Mrs. Grow, looking down upon the
+prostrate timbers. "It's comical that they fell down that-a-way. I hopes
+'tain't no sign o' bad luck. I wouldn't hev nothin' ter happen fur
+nothin'. An' Benny war a-coughin' las' week."</p>
+
+<p>She had not even the courage to put her fear into words. And she
+tenderly admonished tow-headed Benny, who was once more getting out of
+bed, to go to sleep and save his strength, and remember how he was
+coughing last week.</p>
+
+<p>"He hed a chicken-bone acrost his throat," said his father. "No wonder
+he coughed."</p>
+
+<p>Solomon rose and went out into the black night,&mdash;so black that he could
+not distinguish the sky from the earth, or the unobstructed air from the
+dense forest around.</p>
+
+<p>He walked about blindly, dragging something heavily after him. The
+weight of concealment it was. He knew something that nobody knew
+besides.</p>
+
+<p>At the critical moment of the altercation, he had stepped softly among
+the shadows to the warping-bars,&mdash;a strong push had sent the great frame
+crashing down. He was back in an instant among the others, and by reason
+of the excitement his agency in the sensation was not detected.</p>
+
+<p>Like his biblical namesake, Solomon was no fool. Had he been reared in a
+cultivated community, with the advantages of education, he might have
+been one of the bright young fellows who manage other young fellows, who
+control debating societies, who are prominent in mysterious
+associations, the secret of which is at once guarded and represented by
+a Cerberus of three Greek letters.</p>
+
+<p>But, wise as he was, Solomon was not a prophet. He had intended only to
+effect a diversion, and stop the quarrel. He had had no prevision of the
+panic of superstition that he had raised in the minds of these simple
+people; for the ignorant mountaineer is a devout believer in signs and
+warnings.</p>
+
+<p>As Solomon wandered about outside, he heard his father stumbling from
+the door of the house to the barn to see if aught of evil had come to
+the cow or the horse. He knew how his grandmother's heart was wrung with
+fear for her heifer, and he could hardly endure to think of his mother's
+anxieties about Benny.</p>
+
+<p>No prophetic eye was needed to foresee the terrors that would beset her
+in the days to come, when she would walk back and forth before the
+bars, warping the yarn to be woven into cloth for his and Benny's
+clothes; how she would regard the harmless frame as an uncanny thing,
+endowed with supernatural powers, and look askance at it, and shrink
+from touching it; how she would watch for the sign to come true, and
+tremble lest it come.</p>
+
+<p>He turned about, dragging and tugging this weight of concealment after
+him, re&euml;ntered the house, and sat down beside the fire.</p>
+
+<p>His uncle Jacob Smith had gone to his own home. The others were telling
+stories, calculated to make one's hair stand on end, about signs and
+warnings, and their horrible fulfillment.</p>
+
+<p>"Granny," said Solomon suddenly.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, sonny?" said his grandmother.</p>
+
+<p>When the eyes of the family group were fixed upon him, Solomon's courage
+failed.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothin'," he said hastily. "Nothin' at all."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, what ails the boy?" exclaimed his mother.</p>
+
+<p>"I tell ye now, Solomon," said his grandmother, with an emphatic nod,
+"ye hed better respec' yer elders,&mdash;an' a sign in the house!"</p>
+
+<p>Solomon slept little that night. Toward day he began to dream of the
+warping-bars. They seemed to develop suddenly into an immense animated
+monster, from which he only escaped by waking with a sudden start.</p>
+
+<p>Then he found that a great white morning, full of snow, was breaking
+upon the black night. And what a world it was now! The mountain was
+graced with a soft white drapery; on every open space there were vague
+suggestions of delicate colors: in this hollow lay a tender purple
+shadow; on that steep slope was an elusive roseate flush, and when you
+looked again, it was gone, and the glare was blinding.</p>
+
+<p>The bare black branches of the trees formed strangely interlaced
+hieroglyphics upon the turquoise sky. The crags were dark and grim,
+despite their snowy crests and the gigantic glittering icicles that here
+and there depended from them. A cascade, close by in the gorge, had
+been stricken motionless and dumb, as if by a sudden spell; and still
+and silent, it sparkled in the sun.</p>
+
+<p>The snow lay deep on the roof of the log cabin, and the eaves were
+decorated with shining icicles. The enchantment had followed the zigzag
+lines of the fence, and on every rail was its embellishing touch.</p>
+
+<p>All the homely surroundings were transfigured. The potato-house was a
+vast white billow, the ash-hopper was a marble vase, and the
+fodder-stack was a great conical ermine cap, belonging to some mountain
+giant who had lost it in the wind last night.</p>
+
+<p>"I mought hev knowed that we-uns war a-goin' ter hev this spell o'
+weather by the sign o' the warpin'-bars fallin' las' night," said John
+Grow, stamping off the snow as he came in from feeding his horse.</p>
+
+<p>"I hope 'tain't no worse sign," said his wife. "But I misdoubts." And
+she sighed heavily.</p>
+
+<p>"'Tain't no sign at all," said Solomon suddenly. He could keep his
+secret no longer. "'Twar me ez flung down them warpin'-bars."</p>
+
+<p>For a moment they all stared at him in silent amazement.</p>
+
+<p>"What fur?" demanded his father at last. "Just ter enjye sottin' 'em up
+agin? I'll teach ye ter fling down warpin'-bars!"</p>
+
+<p>"Waal," said the peacemaker, hesitating, "it 'peared ter me ez Uncle
+Jacob Smith war toler'ble drunk,&mdash;take him all tergether,&mdash;an' ez he hed
+drawed a knife, I thought that ye an' him hed 'bout quar'led enough. An'
+so I flung down the warpin'-bars ter git the fuss shet up."</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, sir!" exclaimed his grandmother, red with wrath. "Ez ef <i>my</i> son
+couldn't stand up agin all the Smiths that ever stepped! Ye must fling
+down the warpin'-bars an' twist the spun-truck&mdash;fur Jacob Smith!"</p>
+
+<p>"Look-a-hyar, Sol," said his father gruffly, "'tend ter yerself, an' yer
+own quar'ls, arter this, will ye!"</p>
+
+<p>Then, with a sudden humorous interpretation of the incident, he broke
+into a guffaw. "I hev lived a consider'ble time in this tantalizin'
+world, an' ez yit I dunno ez I hev hed any need o' Sol ter pertect
+<i>me</i>."</p>
+
+<p>But Sol had unburdened his mind, and felt at ease again; not the less
+because he knew that but for his novel method of making peace, there
+might have been something worse than a sign in the house.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="AMONG_THE_CLIFFS" id="AMONG_THE_CLIFFS"></a>AMONG THE CLIFFS</h2>
+
+
+<p>It was a critical moment. There was a stir other than that of the wind
+among the pine needles and dry leaves that carpeted the ground.</p>
+
+<p>The wary wild turkeys lifted their long necks with that peculiar cry of
+half-doubting surprise so familiar to a sportsman, then all was still
+for an instant.</p>
+
+<p>The world was steeped in the noontide sunlight, the mountain air
+tasted of the fresh sylvan fragrance that pervaded the forest, the
+foliage blazed with the red and gold of autumn, the distant Chilhowee
+heights were delicately blue.</p>
+
+<p>That instant's doubt sealed the doom of one of the flock. As the turkeys
+stood in momentary suspense, the sunlight gilding their bronze feathers
+to a brighter sheen, there was a movement in the dense undergrowth. The
+flock took suddenly to wing,&mdash;a flash from among the leaves, the sharp
+crack of a rifle, and one of the birds fell heavily over the bluff and
+down toward the valley.</p>
+
+<p>The young mountaineer's exclamation of triumph died in his throat. He
+came running to the verge of the crag, and looked down ruefully into the
+depths where his game had disappeared.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, sir," he broke forth pathetically, "this beats my time! If my
+luck ain't enough ter make a horse laugh!"</p>
+
+<p>He did not laugh, however. Perhaps his luck was calculated to stir only
+equine risibility. The cliff was almost perpendicular; at the depth of
+twenty feet a narrow ledge projected, but thence there was a sheer
+descent, down, down, down, to the tops of the tall trees in the valley
+far below.</p>
+
+<p>As Ethan Tynes looked wistfully over the precipice, he started with a
+sudden surprise. There on the narrow ledge lay the dead turkey.</p>
+
+<p>The sight sharpened Ethan's regrets. He had made a good shot, and he
+hated to relinquish his game. While he gazed in dismayed meditation, an
+idea began to kindle in his brain. Why could he not let himself down to
+the ledge by those long, strong vines that hung over the edge of the
+cliff?</p>
+
+<p>It was risky, Ethan knew,&mdash;terribly risky. But then,&mdash;if only the vines
+were strong!</p>
+
+<p>He tried them again and again with all his might, selected several of
+the largest, grasped them hard and fast, and then slipped lightly off
+the crag.</p>
+
+<p>He waited motionless for a moment. His movements had dislodged clods of
+earth and fragments of rock from the verge of the cliff, and until these
+had ceased to rattle about his head and shoulders he did not begin his
+downward journey.</p>
+
+<p>Now and then as he went he heard the snapping of twigs, and again a
+branch would break, but the vines which supported him were tough and
+strong to the last. Almost before he knew it he stood upon the ledge,
+and with a great sigh of relief he let the vines swing loose.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, that warn't sech a mighty job at last. But law, ef it hed been
+Peter Birt stid of me, that thar wild tur-r-key would hev laid on this
+hyar ledge plumb till the Jedgmint Day!"</p>
+
+<p>He walked deftly along the ledge, picked up the bird, and tied it to one
+of the vines with a string which he took from his pocket, intending to
+draw it up when he should be once more on the top of the crag. These
+preparations complete, he began to think of going back.</p>
+
+<p>He caught the vines on which he had made the descent, but before he had
+fairly left the ledge, he felt that they were giving way.</p>
+
+<p>He paused, let himself slip back to a secure foothold, and tried their
+strength by pulling with all his force.</p>
+
+<p>Presently down came the whole mass in his hands. The friction against
+the sharp edges of the rock over which they had been stretched with a
+strong tension had worn them through. His first emotion was one of
+intense thankfulness that they had fallen while he was on the ledge
+instead of midway in his precarious ascent.</p>
+
+<p>"Ef they hed kem down whilst I war a-goin' up, I'd hev been flung plumb
+down ter the bottom o' the valley, 'kase this ledge air too narrer ter
+hev cotched me."</p>
+
+<p>He glanced down at the sombre depths beneath. "Thar wouldn't hev been
+enough left of me ter pick up on a shovel!" he exclaimed, with a tardy
+realization of his foolish recklessness.</p>
+
+<p>The next moment a mortal terror seized him. What was to be his fate? To
+regain the top of the cliff by his own exertions was an impossibility.</p>
+
+<p>He cast his despairing eyes up the ascent, as sheer and as smooth as a
+wall, without a crevice which might afford a foothold, or a shrub to
+which he might cling.</p>
+
+<p>His strong head was whirling as he again glanced downward to the
+unmeasured abyss beneath. He softly let himself sink into a sitting
+posture, his heels dangling over the frightful depths, and addressed
+himself resolutely to the consideration of the terrible danger in which
+he was placed.</p>
+
+<p><a name="illus-200" id="illus-200"></a></p>
+<div class="figcenter">
+             <img   src="images/img200.jpg" width="340" height="550"
+             alt="HOW LONG WAS IT TO LAST" /><br />
+         <b>HOW LONG WAS IT TO LAST</b>
+    </div>
+
+
+
+<p>Taken at its best, how long was it to last? Could he look to any human
+being for deliverance? He reflected with growing dismay that the place
+was far from any dwelling, and from the road that wound along the ridge.</p>
+
+<p>There was no errand that could bring a man to this most unfrequented
+portion of the deep woods, unless an accident should hither direct some
+hunter's step.</p>
+
+<p>It was quite possible, nay, probable, that years might elapse before the
+forest solitude would again be broken by human presence.</p>
+
+<p>His brothers would search for him when he should be missed from
+home,&mdash;but such boundless stretches of forest! They might search for
+weeks and never come near this spot. He would die here, he would
+starve,&mdash;no, he would grow drowsy when exhausted and fall&mdash;fall&mdash;fall!</p>
+
+<p>He was beginning to feel that morbid fascination that sometimes seizes
+upon those who stand on great heights,&mdash;an overwhelming impulse to
+plunge downward. His only salvation was to look up. He would look up to
+the sky.</p>
+
+<p>And what were these words he was beginning to faintly remember? Had not
+the circuit-rider said in his last sermon that not even a sparrow falls
+to the ground unmarked of God? There was a definite strength in this
+suggestion. He felt less lonely as he stared resolutely at the big blue
+sky. There came into his heart a sense of encouragement, of hope.</p>
+
+<p>He would keep up as long and as bravely as he could, and if the worst
+should come,&mdash;was he indeed so solitary? He would hold in remembrance
+the sparrow's fall.</p>
+
+<p>He had so nerved himself to meet his fate that he thought it was a fancy
+when he heard a distant step. But it did not die away, it grew more and
+more distinct,&mdash;a shambling step, that curiously stopped at intervals
+and kicked the fallen leaves.</p>
+
+<p>He sought to call out, but he seemed to have lost his voice. Not a sound
+issued from his thickened tongue and his dry throat. The step came
+nearer. It would presently pass. With a mighty effort Ethan sent forth a
+wild, hoarse cry.</p>
+
+<p>The rocks reverberated it, the wind carried it far, and certainly there
+was an echo of its despair and terror in a shrill scream set up on the
+verge of the crag. Then Ethan heard the shambling step scampering off
+very fast indeed.</p>
+
+<p>The truth flashed upon him. It was some child, passing on an
+unimaginable errand through the deep woods, frightened by his sudden
+cry.</p>
+
+<p>"Stop, bubby!" he shouted; "stop a minute! It's Ethan Tynes that's
+callin' of ye. Stop a minute, bubby!"</p>
+
+<p>The step paused at a safe distance, and the shrill pipe of a little boy
+demanded, "Whar is ye, Ethan Tynes?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm down hyar on the ledge o' the bluff. Who air ye ennyhow?"</p>
+
+<p>"George Birt," promptly replied the little boy. "What air ye doin' down
+thar? I thought it war Satan a-callin' of me. I never seen nobody."</p>
+
+<p>"I kem down hyar on vines arter a tur-r-key I shot. The vines bruk, an'
+I hev got no way ter git up agin. I want ye ter go ter yer mother's
+house, an' tell yer brother Pete ter bring a rope hyar fur me ter climb
+up by."</p>
+
+<p>Ethan expected to hear the shambling step going away with a celerity
+proportionate to the importance of the errand. On the contrary, the step
+was approaching the crag.</p>
+
+<p>A moment of suspense, and there appeared among the jagged ends of the
+broken vines a small red head, a deeply freckled face, and a pair of
+sharp, eager blue eyes. George Birt had carefully laid himself down on
+his stomach, only protruding his head beyond the verge of the crag, that
+he might not fling away his life in his curiosity.</p>
+
+<p>"Did ye git it?" he asked, with bated breath.</p>
+
+<p>"Git what?" demanded poor Ethan, surprised and impatient.</p>
+
+<p>"The tur-r-key&mdash;what ye hev done been talkin' 'bout," said George Birt.</p>
+
+<p>Ethan had lost all interest in the turkey. "Yes, yes; but run along,
+bub. I mought fall off'n this hyar place,&mdash;I'm gittin' stiff sittin'
+still so long,&mdash;or the wind mought blow me off. The wind is blowin'
+toler'ble brief."</p>
+
+<p>"Gobbler or hen?" asked George Birt eagerly.</p>
+
+<p>"It air a hen," said Ethan. "But look-a-hyar, George, I'm a-waitin' on
+ye, an' ef I'd fall off'n this hyar place, I'd be ez dead ez a door-nail
+in a minute."</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, I'm goin' now," said George Birt, with gratifying alacrity. He
+raised himself from his recumbent position, and Ethan heard him
+shambling off, kicking every now and then at the fallen leaves as he
+went.</p>
+
+<p>Presently, however, he turned and walked back nearly to the brink of the
+cliff. Then he prostrated himself once more at full length,&mdash;for the
+mountain children are very careful of the precipices,&mdash;snaked along
+dexterously to the verge of the crag, and protruding his red head
+cautiously, began to parley once more, trading on Ethan's necessities.</p>
+
+<p>"Ef I go on this yerrand fur ye," he said, looking very sharp indeed,
+"will ye gimme one o' the whings of that thar wild tur-r-key?"</p>
+
+<p>He coveted the wing-feathers, not the joint of the fowl. The "whing" of
+the domestic turkey is used by the mountain women as a fan, and is
+considered an elegance as well as a comfort. George Birt aped the
+customs of his elders, regardless of sex,&mdash;a characteristic of very
+small boys.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, go 'long, bubby!" exclaimed poor Ethan, in dismay at the
+dilatoriness and indifference of his unique deliverer. "I'll give ye
+both o' the whings." He would have offered the turkey willingly, if
+"bubby" had seemed to crave it.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, I'm goin' now."</p>
+
+<p>George Birt rose from the ground and started off briskly, exhilarated by
+the promise of both the "whings."</p>
+
+<p>Ethan was angry indeed when he heard the boy once more shambling back.
+Of course one should regard a deliverer with gratitude, especially a
+deliverer from mortal peril; but it may be doubted if Ethan's gratitude
+would have been great enough to insure that small red head against a
+vigorous rap, if it had been within rapping distance, when it was once
+more cautiously protruded over the verge of the cliff.</p>
+
+<p>"I kem back hyar ter tell ye," the doughty deliverer began, with an air
+of great importance, and magnifying his office with an extreme relish,
+"that I can't go an' tell Pete 'bout'n the rope till I hev done kem back
+from the mill. I hev got old Sorrel hitched out hyar a piece, with a bag
+o' corn on his back, what I hev ter git ground at the mill. My mother
+air a-settin' at home now a-waitin' fur that thar corn-meal ter bake
+dodgers with. An' I hev got a dime ter pay at the mill; it war lent ter
+my dad las' week. An' I'm afeard ter walk about much with this hyar
+dime; I mought lose it, ye know. An' I can't go home 'thout the meal;
+I'll ketch it ef I do. But I'll tell Pete arter I git back from the
+mill."</p>
+
+<p>"The mill!" echoed Ethan, aghast. "What air ye doin' on this side o' the
+mounting, ef ye air a-goin' ter the mill? This ain't the way ter the
+mill."</p>
+
+<p>"I kem over hyar," said the little boy, still with much importance of
+manner, notwithstanding a slight suggestion of embarrassment on his
+freckled face, "ter see 'bout'n a trap that I hev sot fur squir'ls. I'll
+see 'bout my trap, an' then I hev ter go ter the mill, 'kase my mother
+air a-settin' in our house now a-waitin' fur meal ter bake corn-dodgers.
+Then I'll tell Pete whar ye air, an' what ye said 'bout'n the rope. Ye
+must jes' wait fur me hyar."</p>
+
+<p>Poor Ethan could do nothing else.</p>
+
+<p>As the echo of the boy's shambling step died in the distance, a
+redoubled sense of loneliness fell upon Ethan Tynes. But he endeavored
+to solace himself with the reflection that the important mission to the
+squirrel-trap and the errand to the mill could not last forever, and
+before a great while Peter Birt and his rope would be upon the crag.</p>
+
+<p>This idea buoyed him up as the hours crept slowly by. Now and then he
+lifted his head and listened with painful intentness. He felt stiff in
+every muscle, and yet he had a dread of making an effort to change his
+constrained position. He might lose control of his rigid limbs, and fall
+into those dread depths beneath.</p>
+
+<p>His patience at last began to give way. His heart was sinking. His
+messenger had been even more dilatory than he was prepared to expect.
+Why did not Pete come? Was it possible that George had forgotten to tell
+of his danger?</p>
+
+<p>The sun was going down, leaving a great glory of gold and crimson clouds
+and an opaline haze upon the purple mountains. The last rays fell on the
+bronze feathers of the turkey still lying tied to the broken vines on
+the ledge.</p>
+
+<p>And now there were only frowning masses of dark clouds in the west; and
+there were frowning masses of clouds overhead.</p>
+
+<p>The shadow of the coming night had fallen on the autumnal foliage in the
+deep valley; in the place of the opaline haze was only a gray mist.</p>
+
+<p>And now came, sweeping along between the parallel mountain ranges, a
+sombre rain-cloud. The lad could hear the heavy drops splashing on the
+treetops in the valley, long, long before he felt them on his head.</p>
+
+<p>The roll of thunder sounded among the crags. Then the rain came down
+tumultuously, not in columns, but in livid sheets. The lightnings rent
+the sky, showing, as it seemed to him, glimpses of the glorious
+brightness within,&mdash;too bright for human eyes.</p>
+
+<p>He clung desperately to his precarious perch. Now and then a fierce rush
+of wind almost tore him from it. Strange fancies beset him. The air was
+full of that wild symphony of nature, the wind and the rain, the pealing
+thunder, and the thunderous echo among the cliffs, and yet he thought he
+could hear his own name ringing again and again through all the tumult,
+sometimes in Pete's voice, sometimes in George's shrill tones.</p>
+
+<p>He became vaguely aware, after a time, that the rain had ceased, and the
+moon was beginning to shine through rifts in the clouds.</p>
+
+<p>The wind continued unabated, but, curiously enough, he could not hear it
+now. He could hear nothing; he could think of nothing. His consciousness
+was beginning to fail.</p>
+
+<p>George Birt had indeed forgotten him,&mdash;forgotten even the promised
+"whings." Not that he had discovered anything so extraordinary in his
+trap, for his trap was empty, but when he reached the mill, he found
+that the miller had killed a bear and captured a cub, and the orphan,
+chained to a post, had deeply absorbed George Birt's attention.</p>
+
+<p>To sophisticated people, the boy might have seemed as grotesque as the
+cub. George wore an unbleached cotton shirt. The waistband of his baggy
+jeans trousers encircled his body just beneath his armpits, reaching to
+his shoulder-blades behind, and nearly to his collar-bone in front. His
+red head was only partly covered by a fragment of an old white wool hat;
+and he looked at the cub with a curiosity as intense as that with which
+the cub looked at him. Each was taking first lessons in natural history.</p>
+
+<p>As long as there was daylight enough left to see that cub, did George
+Birt stand and stare at the little beast. Then he clattered home on old
+Sorrel in the closing darkness, looking like a very small pin on the top
+of a large pincushion.</p>
+
+<p>At home, he found the elders unreasonable,&mdash;as elders usually are
+considered. Supper had been waiting an hour or so for the lack of meal
+for dodgers. He "caught it" considerably, but not sufficiently to impair
+his appetite for the dodgers. After all this, he was ready enough for
+bed when small boy's bedtime came. But as he was nodding before the
+fire, he heard a word that roused him to a new excitement.</p>
+
+<p>"These hyar chips air so wet they won't burn," said his mother. "I'll
+take my tur-r-key whing an' fan the fire."</p>
+
+<p>"Law!" he exclaimed. "Thar, now! Ethan Tynes never gimme that thar wild
+tur-r-key's whings like he promised."</p>
+
+<p>"Whar did ye happen ter see Ethan?" asked Pete, interested in his
+friend.</p>
+
+<p>"Seen him in the woods, an' he promised me the tur-r-key whings."</p>
+
+<p>"What fur?" inquired Pete, a little surprised by this uncalled-for
+generosity.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal,"&mdash;there was an expression of embarrassment on the important
+freckled face, and the small red head nodded forward in an explanatory
+manner,&mdash;"he fell off'n the bluffs arter the tur-r-key whings&mdash;I mean,
+he went down to the ledge arter the tur-r-key, and the vines bruk an' he
+couldn't git up no more. An' he tole me that ef I'd tell ye ter fotch
+him a rope ter pull up by, he would gimme the whings. That happened
+a&mdash;leetle&mdash;while&mdash;arter dinner-time."</p>
+
+<p>"Who got him a rope ter pull up by?" demanded Pete.</p>
+
+<p>There was again on the important face that indescribable shade of
+embarrassment. "Waal,"&mdash;the youngster balanced this word judicially,&mdash;"I
+forgot 'bout'n the tur-r-key whings till this minute. I reckon he's thar
+yit."</p>
+
+<p>"Mebbe this hyar wind an' rain hev beat him off'n the ledge!" exclaimed
+Pete, appalled, and rising hastily. "I tell ye now," he added, turning
+to his mother, "the best use ye kin make o' that thar boy is ter put him
+on the fire fur a back-log."</p>
+
+<p>Pete made his preparations in great haste. He took the rope from the
+well, asked the crestfallen and browbeaten junior a question or two
+relative to locality, mounted old Sorrel without a saddle, and in a few
+minutes was galloping at headlong speed through the night.</p>
+
+<p>The rain was over by the time he had reached the sulphur spring to
+which George had directed him, but the wind was still high, and the
+broken clouds were driving fast across the face of the moon.</p>
+
+<p>When he had hitched his horse to a tree, and set out on foot to find the
+cliff, the moonbeams, though brilliant, were so intermittent that his
+progress was fitful and necessarily cautious. When the disk shone out
+full and clear, he made his way rapidly enough, but when the clouds
+intervened, he stood still and waited.</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't goin' ter fall off'n the bluff 'thout knowin' it," he said to
+himself, in one of these eclipses, "ef I hev ter stand hyar all night."</p>
+
+<p>The moonlight was brilliant and steady when he reached the verge of the
+crag. He identified the spot by the mass of broken vines, and more
+indubitably by Ethan's rifle lying upon the ground just at his feet. He
+called, but received no response.</p>
+
+<p>"Hev Ethan fell off, sure enough?" he asked himself, in great dismay and
+alarm. Then he shouted again and again. At last there came an answer,
+as though the speaker had just awaked.</p>
+
+<p>"Pretty nigh beat out, I'm a-thinkin'!" commented Pete. He tied one end
+of the cord around the trunk of a tree, knotted it at intervals, and
+flung it over the bluff.</p>
+
+<p>At first Ethan was almost afraid to stir. He slowly put forth his hand
+and grasped the rope. Then, his heart beating tumultuously, he rose to
+his feet.</p>
+
+<p>He stood still for an instant to steady himself and get his breath.
+Nerving himself for a strong effort, he began the ascent, hand over
+hand, up, and up, and up, till once more he stood upon the crest of the
+crag.</p>
+
+<p>And, now that all danger was over, Pete was disposed to scold. "I'm
+a-thinkin'," said Pete severely, "ez thar ain't a critter on this hyar
+mounting, from a b'ar ter a copper-head, that could hev got in sech a
+fix, 'ceptin' ye, Ethan Tynes."</p>
+
+<p>And Ethan was silent.</p>
+
+<p>"What's this hyar thing at the e-end o' the rope?" asked Pete, as he
+began to draw the cord up, and felt a weight still suspended.</p>
+
+<p>"It air the tur-r-key," said Ethan meekly.</p>
+
+<p>"I tied her ter the e-end o' the rope afore I kem up."</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, sir!" exclaimed Pete, in indignant surprise.</p>
+
+<p>And George, for duty performed, was remunerated with the two "whings,"
+although it still remains a question in the mind of Ethan whether or not
+he deserved them.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="IN_THE_CHINKING" id="IN_THE_CHINKING"></a>IN THE "CHINKING"</h2>
+
+
+<p>Not far from an abrupt precipice on a certain great mountain spur there
+stands in the midst of the red and yellow autumn woods a little log
+"church-house." The nuts rattle noisily down on its roof; sometimes
+during "evenin' preachin'"&mdash;which takes place in the afternoon&mdash;a
+flying-squirrel frisks near the window; the hymns echo softly, softly,
+from the hazy sunlit heights across the valley.</p>
+
+<p>"That air the doxol'gy," said Tom Brent, one day, pausing to listen
+among the wagons and horses hitched outside. He was about to follow home
+his father's mare, that had broken loose and galloped off through the
+woods, but as he glanced back at the church, a sudden thought struck
+him. He caught sight of the end of little Jim Coggin's comforter
+flaunting out through the "chinking,"&mdash;as the mountaineers call the
+series of short slats which are set diagonally in the spaces between the
+logs of the walls, and on which the clay is thickly daubed. This work
+had been badly done, and in many places the daubing had fallen away.
+Thus it was that as Jim Coggin sat within the church, the end of his
+plaid comforter had slipped through the chinking and was waving in the
+wind outside.</p>
+
+<p>Now Jim had found the weather still too warm for his heavy jeans jacket,
+but he was too cool without it, and he had ingeniously compromised the
+difficulty by wearing his comforter in this unique manner,&mdash;laying it on
+his shoulders, crossing it over the chest, passing it under the arms,
+and tying it in a knot between the shoulder-blades. Tom remembered this
+with a grin as he slyly crept up to the house, and it was only the work
+of a moment to draw that knot through the chinking and secure it firmly
+to a sumach bush that grew near at hand.</p>
+
+<p>It never occurred to him that the resounding doxology could fail to
+rouse that small, tow-headed, freckle-faced boy, or that the
+congregation might slowly disperse without noticing him as he sat
+motionless and asleep in the dark shadow.</p>
+
+<p>The sun slipped down into the red west; the blue mountains turned
+purple; heavy clouds gathered, and within three miles there was no other
+human creature when Jim suddenly woke to the darkness and the storm and
+the terrible loneliness.</p>
+
+<p>Where was he? He tried to rise: he could not move. Bewildered, he
+struggled and tugged at his harness,&mdash;all in vain. As he realized the
+situation, he burst into tears.</p>
+
+<p>"Them home-folks o' mine won't kem hyar ter s'arch fur me," he cried
+desperately, "kase I tole my mother ez how I war a-goin' ter dust down
+the mounting ter Aunt Jerushy's house ez soon ez meet'n' war out an'
+stay all night along o' her boys."</p>
+
+<p>Still he tried to comfort himself by reflecting that it was not so bad
+as it might have been. There was no danger that he would have to starve
+and pine here till next Sunday, for a "protracted meeting" was in
+progress, service was held every day, and the congregation would return
+to-morrow, which was Thursday.</p>
+
+<p>His philosophy, however, was short-lived, for the sudden lightning rent
+the clouds, and a terrific peal of thunder echoed among the cliffs.</p>
+
+<p>"The storm air a-comin' up the mounting!" he exclaimed, in vivacious
+protest. "An' ef this brief wind war ter whurl the old church-house
+off'n the bluff an' down inter the valley whar-r&mdash;would&mdash;I&mdash;be?"</p>
+
+<p>All at once the porch creaked beneath a heavy tread. A clumsy hand was
+fumbling at the door. "Strike a light," said a gruff voice without.</p>
+
+<p>As a lantern was thrust in, Jim was about to speak, but the words froze
+upon his lips for fear when a man strode heavily over the threshold and
+he caught the expression of his face.</p>
+
+<p>It was an evil face, red and bloated and brutish. He had small,
+malicious, twinkling eyes, and a shock of sandy hair. A suit of
+copper-colored jeans hung loosely on his tall, lank frame, and when he
+placed the lantern on a bench and stretched out both arms as if he were
+tired, he showed that his left hand was maimed,&mdash;the thumb had been cut
+off at the first joint.</p>
+
+<p>A thickset, short, swaggering man tramped in after him.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, Amos Brierwood," he said, "it's safes' fur us ter part. We
+oughter be fur enough from hyar by daybreak. Divide that thar traveler's
+money&mdash;hey?"</p>
+
+<p>They carefully closed the rude shutters, barred the door, and sat down
+on the "mourners' bench," neither having noticed the small boy at the
+other end of the room.</p>
+
+<p>Poor Jim, his arms akimbo and half-covered by his comforter, stuck to
+the wall like a plaid bat,&mdash;if such a natural curiosity is
+imaginable,&mdash;feverishly hoping that the men might go without seeing him
+at all.</p>
+
+<p>For surely no human creature could be more abhorrent, more incredibly
+odious of aspect, than Amos Brierwood as he sat there, his red, brutish
+face redder still with a malign pleasure, his malicious eyes gloating
+over the rolls of money which he drew from a pocket-book stolen from
+some waylaid traveler, snapping his fingers in exultation when the
+amount of the bills exceeded his expectation.</p>
+
+<p>The leaves without were fitfully astir, and once the porch creaked
+suddenly. Brierwood glanced at the door sharply,&mdash;even fearfully,&mdash;his
+hand motionless on the rolls of money.</p>
+
+<p>"Only the wind, Amos, only the wind!" said the short, stout man
+impatiently.</p>
+
+<p>But he, himself, was disquieted the next moment when a horse neighed
+shrilly.</p>
+
+<p>"That ain't my beastis, Amos, nor yit your'n!" he cried, starting up.</p>
+
+<p>"It air the traveler's, ye sodden idjit!" said Brierwood, lifting his
+uncouth foot and giving him a jocose kick.</p>
+
+<p>But the short man was not satisfied. He rose, went outside, and Jim
+could hear him beating about among the bushes. Presently he came in
+again. "'Twar the traveler's critter, I reckon; an' that critter an'
+saddle oughter be counted in my sheer."</p>
+
+<p>Then they fell to disputing and quarreling,&mdash;once they almost
+fought,&mdash;but at length the division was made and they rose to go. As
+Brierwood swung his lantern round, his malicious eyes fell upon the poor
+little plaid bat sticking against the wall.</p>
+
+<p>He stood in the door staring, dumfounded for a moment. Then he clenched
+his fist, and shook it fiercely. "How did ye happen ter be hyar this
+time o' the night, ye limb o' Satan?" he cried.</p>
+
+<p>"Dunno," faltered poor Jim.</p>
+
+<p>The other man had returned too. "Waal, sir, ef that thar boy hed been a
+copper-head now, he'd hev bit us, sure!"</p>
+
+<p>"<i>He mought do that yit</i>," said Amos Brierwood, with grim significance.
+"He hev been thar all this time,&mdash;'kase he air tied thar, don't ye see?
+An' he hev <i>eyes</i>, an' he hev <i>ears</i>. What air ter hender?"</p>
+
+<p>The other man's face turned pale, and Jim thought that they were afraid
+he would tell all he had seen and heard. The manner of both had changed,
+too. They had a skulking, nervous way with them now in place of the
+coarse bravado that had characterized them hitherto.</p>
+
+<p>Amos Brierwood pondered for a few minutes. Then he sullenly demanded,&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"What's yer name?"</p>
+
+<p>"It air Jeemes Coggin," quavered the little boy.</p>
+
+<p>"Coggin, hey?" exclaimed Brierwood, with a new idea bringing back the
+malicious twinkle to his eyes. He laughed as though mightily relieved,
+and threw up his left hand and shook it exultingly.</p>
+
+<p>The shadow on the dark wall of that maimed hand with only the stump of a
+thumb was a weird, a horrible thing to the child. He had no idea that
+his constant notice of it would stamp it in his memory, and that
+something would come of this fact. He was glad when the shadow ceased to
+writhe and twist upon the wall, and the man dropped his arm to his side
+again.</p>
+
+<p>"What's a-brewin', Amos?" asked the other, who had been watching
+Brierwood curiously.</p>
+
+<p>They whispered aside for a few moments, at first anxiously and then with
+wild guffaws of satisfaction. When they approached the boy, their manner
+had changed once more.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, I declar, bubby," said Brierwood agreeably, "this hyar fix ez ye
+hev got inter air sateful fur true! It air enough ter sot enny boy on
+the mounting cat-a-wampus. 'Twar a good thing ez we-uns happened ter kem
+by hyar on our way from the tan-yard way down yander in the valley whar
+we-uns hev been ter git paid up fur workin' thar some. We'll let ye out.
+Who done yer this hyar trick?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dunno&mdash;witches, I reckon!" cried poor Jim, bursting into tears.</p>
+
+<p>"Witches!" the man exclaimed, "the woods air a-roamin' with 'em this
+time o' the year; bein', ye see, ez they kem ter feed on the mast."</p>
+
+<p>He chuckled as he said this, perhaps at the boy's evident terror,&mdash;for
+Jim was sorrowfully superstitious,&mdash;perhaps because he had managed to
+cut unnoticed a large fragment from the end of the comforter. This he
+stuffed into his own pocket as he talked on about two witches, whom he
+said he had met that afternoon under an oak-tree feeding on acorns.</p>
+
+<p>"An' now, I kem ter remind myself that them witches war inquirin' round
+'bout'n a boy&mdash;war his name Jeemes Coggin? Le''s see! That boy's name
+<i>war</i> Jeemes Coggin!"</p>
+
+<p>While Jim stood breathlessly, intently listening, Brierwood had twisted
+something into the folds of his comforter so dexterously that unless
+this were untied it would not fall; it was a silk handkerchief of a
+style never before seen in the mountains, and he had made a knot hard
+and fast in one corner.</p>
+
+<p>"Thar, now!" he exclaimed, holding up the fragment of knitted yarn, "I
+hev tore yer comforter. Never mind, bubby, 'twar tore afore. But it'll
+do ter wrop up this money-purse what b'longs ter yer dad. He lef' it
+hid in the chinking o' the wall over yander close ter whar I war sittin'
+when I fust kem in. I'll put it back thar, 'kase yer dad don't want
+nobody ter know whar it air hid."</p>
+
+<p>He strode across the room and concealed the empty pocket-book in the
+chinking.</p>
+
+<p>"Ef ye won't tell who teched it, I'll gin a good word fur ye ter them
+witches what war inquirin' round fur ye ter-day."</p>
+
+<p>Jim promised in hot haste, and then, the rain having ceased, he started
+for home, but Brierwood stopped him at the door.</p>
+
+<p>"Hold on thar, bub. I kem mighty nigh furgittin' ter let ye know ez I
+seen yer brother Alf awhile back, an' he axed me ter git ye ter go by
+Tom Brent's house, an' tell Tom ter meet him up the road a piece by that
+thar big sulphur spring. Will ye gin Tom that message? Tell him Alf said
+ter come quick."</p>
+
+<p>Once more Jim promised.</p>
+
+<p>The two men holding the lantern out in the porch watched him as he
+pounded down the dark road, his tow hair sticking out of his tattered
+black hat, the ends of his comforter flaunting in the breeze, and every
+gesture showing the agitated haste of a witch-scared boy. Then they
+looked at each other significantly, and laughed loud and long.</p>
+
+<p>"He'll tell sech a crooked tale ter-morrer that Alf Coggin an' his dad
+will see sights along o' that traveler's money!" said Brierwood,
+gloating over his sharp management as he and his accomplice mounted
+their horses and rode off in opposite directions.</p>
+
+<p>When Jim reached Tom Brent's house, and knocked at the door, he was so
+absorbed in his terrors that, as it opened, he said nothing for a
+moment. He could see the family group within. Tom's father was placidly
+smoking. His palsied "gran'dad" shook in his chair in the chimney-corner
+as he told the wide-eyed boys big tales about the "Injuns" that harried
+the early settlers in Tennessee.</p>
+
+<p>"Tom," Jim said, glancing up at the big boy,&mdash;"Tom, thar's a witch
+waitin' fur ye at the sulphur spring! Go thar, quick!"</p>
+
+<p>"Not ef I knows what's good fur me!" protested Tom, with a great
+horse-laugh. "What ails ye, boy? Ye talk like ye war teched in the
+head!"</p>
+
+<p>"I went ter say ez Alf Coggin air thar waitin' fur ye," Jim began again,
+nodding his slandered head with great solemnity, "an' tole me ter tell
+ye ter kem thar quick."</p>
+
+<p>He took no heed of the inaccuracy of the message; he was glancing
+fearfully over his shoulder, and the next minute scuttled down the road
+in a bee-line for home.</p>
+
+<p>Tom hurried off briskly through the woods. "Waal, sir! I'm mighty nigh
+crazed ter know what Alf Coggin kin want o' me; goin' coon-huntin',
+mebbe," he speculated, as he drew within sight of an old
+lightning-scathed tree which stood beside the sulphur spring and
+stretched up, stark and white, in the dim light.</p>
+
+<p>The clouds were blowing away from a densely instarred sky; the moon was
+hardly more than a crescent and dipping low in the west, but he could
+see the sombre outline of the opposite mountain, and the white mists
+that shifted in a ghostly and elusive fashion along the summit. The
+night was still, save for a late katydid, spared by the frost, and
+piping shrilly.</p>
+
+<p>He experienced a terrible shock of surprise when a sudden voice&mdash;a voice
+he had never heard before&mdash;cried out sharply, "Hello there! Help! help!"</p>
+
+<p>As he pressed tremulously forward, he beheld a sight which made him ask
+himself if it were possible that Alf Coggin had sent for him to join in
+some nefarious work which had ended in leaving a man&mdash;a stranger&mdash;bound
+to the old lightning-scathed tree.</p>
+
+<p>Even in the uncertain light Tom could see that he was <a name="pallid" id="pallid"></a>pallid and
+panting, evidently exhausted in some desperate struggle: there was blood
+on his face, his clothes were torn, and by all odds he was the angriest
+man that was ever waylaid and robbed.</p>
+
+<p>"Ter-morrer he'll be jes' a-swoopin'!" thought Tom, tremulously untying
+the complicated knots, and listening to his threats of vengeance on the
+unknown robbers, "an' every critter on the mounting will git a clutch
+from his claws."</p>
+
+<p>And in fact, it was hardly daybreak before the constable of the
+district, who lived hard by in the valley, was informed of all the
+details of the affair, so far as known to Tom or the "Traveler,"&mdash;for
+thus the mountaineers designated him, as if he were the only one in the
+world.</p>
+
+<p>By reason of the message which Jim had delivered, and its strange
+result, they suspected the Coggins, and as they rode together to the
+justice's house for a warrant, this suspicion received unexpected
+confirmation in a rumor that they found afloat. Every man they met
+stopped them to repeat the story that Coggin's boy had told somebody
+that it was his father who had robbed the traveler, and hid the empty
+pocket-book in the chinking of the church wall. No one knew who had set
+this report in circulation, but a blacksmith said he heard it first from
+a man named Brierwood, who had stopped at his shop to have his horse
+shod.</p>
+
+<p>It was still early when they reached Jim Coggin's home; the windows and
+doors were open to let out the dust, for his mother was just beginning
+to sweep. She had pushed aside the table, when her eyes suddenly
+distended with surprise as they fell upon a silk handkerchief lying on
+the floor beside it. The moment that she stooped and picked it up, the
+strange gentleman stepped upon the porch, and through the open door he
+saw it dangling from her hands.</p>
+
+<p>He tapped the constable on the shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>"That's my property!" he said tersely.</p>
+
+<p>The officer stepped in instantly. "Good-mornin', Mrs. Coggin," he said
+politely. "'T would pleasure me some ter git a glimpse o' that
+handkercher."</p>
+
+<p>"Air it your'n?" asked the woman wonderingly. "I jes' now fund it, an' I
+war tried ter know who had drapped it hyar."</p>
+
+<p>The officer, without a word, untied the knot which Amos Brierwood had
+made in one corner, while the Coggins looked on in open-mouthed
+amazement. It contained a five-dollar bill, and a bit of paper on which
+some careless memoranda had been jotted down in handwriting which the
+traveler claimed as his own.</p>
+
+<p>It seemed a very plain case. Still, he got out of the sound of the
+woman's sobs and cries as soon as he conveniently could, and sauntered
+down the road, where the officer presently overtook him with Alf and his
+father in custody.</p>
+
+<p>"Whar be ye a-takin' of us now?" cried the elder, gaunt and haggard, and
+with his long hair blowing in the breeze.</p>
+
+<p>"Ter the church-house, whar yer boy says ye hev hid the traveler's
+money-purse," said the officer.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>My boy</i>!" exclaimed John Coggin, casting an astounded glance upon his
+son.</p>
+
+<p>Poor Alf was almost stunned. When they reached the church, and the men,
+after searching for a time without result, appealed to him to save
+trouble by pointing out the spot where the pocket-book was concealed, he
+could only stammer and falter unintelligibly, and finally he burst into
+tears.</p>
+
+<p>"Ax the t'other one&mdash;the leetle boy," suggested an old man in the crowd.</p>
+
+<p>Alf's heart sank&mdash;sank like lead&mdash;when Jim, suddenly remembering the
+promised "good word" to the witches, piped out, "I war tole not ter tell
+who teched it,&mdash;'kase my dad didn't want nobody ter know 'twar hid
+thar."</p>
+
+<p>John Coggin's face was rigid and gray.</p>
+
+<p>"The Lord hev forsook me!" he cried. "An' all my chillen hev turned
+liars tergether."</p>
+
+<p>Then he made a great effort to control himself.</p>
+
+<p>"Look-a-hyar, Jim, ef ye hev got the truth in ye,&mdash;speak it! Ef ye know
+whar I hev hid anything,&mdash;find it!"</p>
+
+<p>Jim, infinitely important, and really understanding little of what was
+going on, except that all these big men were looking at him, crossed the
+room with as much stateliness as is compatible with a pair of baggy
+brown jeans trousers, a plaid comforter tied between the shoulder-blades
+in a big knot, a tow-head, and a tattered black hat; he slipped his
+grimy paw in the chinking where Amos Brierwood had hid the pocket-book,
+and drew it thence, with the prideful exclamation,&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"B'longs ter my dad!"</p>
+
+<p>The officer held it up empty before the traveler,&mdash;he held up, too, the
+bit of comforter in which it was folded, and pointed to the small boy's
+shoulders. The gentleman turned away, thoroughly convinced. Alf and his
+father looked from one to the other, in mute despair. They foresaw many
+years of imprisonment for a crime which they had not committed.</p>
+
+<p>The constable was hurrying his prisoners toward the door, when there was
+a sudden stir on the outskirts of the crowd. Old Parson Payne was
+pushing his way in, followed by a tall young man, who, in comparison
+with the mountaineers, seemed wonderfully prosperous and well-clad, and
+very fresh and breezy.</p>
+
+<p>"You're all on the wrong track!" he cried.</p>
+
+<p>And his story proved this, though it was simple enough.</p>
+
+<p>He was sojourning in the mountains with some friends on a "camp-hunt,"
+and the previous evening he had chanced to lose his way in the woods.
+When night and the storm came on, he was perhaps five miles from camp.
+He mistook the little "church-house" for a dwelling, and dismounting, he
+hitched his horse in the laurel, intending to ask for shelter for the
+night. As he stepped upon the porch, however, he caught a glimpse,
+through the chinking, of the interior, and he perceived that the
+building was a church. There were benches and a rude pulpit. The next
+instant, his attention was riveted by the sight of two men, one of whom
+had drawn a knife upon the other, quarreling over a roll of money. He
+stood rooted to the spot in surprise. Gradually, he began to understand
+the villainy afoot, for he overheard all that they said to each other,
+and afterward to Jim. He saw one of the men cut the bit from the
+comforter, wrap the pocket-book in it, and hide it away, and he
+witnessed a dispute between them, which went on in dumb show behind the
+boy's back, as to which of two bills should be knotted in the
+handkerchief which they twisted into the comforter.</p>
+
+<p>The constable was pressing him to describe the appearance of the
+ruffians.</p>
+
+<p>"Why," said the stranger, "one of them was long, and lank, and
+loose-jointed, and had sandy hair, and"&mdash;He paused abruptly, cudgeling
+his memory for something more distinctive, for this description would
+apply to half the men in the room, and thus it would be impossible to
+identify and capture the robbers.</p>
+
+<p>"He hedn't no thumb sca'cely on his lef' hand," piped out Jim, holding
+up his own grimy paw, and looking at it with squinting intensity as he
+crooked it at the first joint, to imitate the maimed hand.</p>
+
+<p>"No thumb!" exclaimed the constable excitedly. "Amos Brierwood fur a
+thousand!"</p>
+
+<p>Jim nodded his head intelligently, with sudden recollection. "That air
+the name ez the chunky man gin him when they fust kem in."</p>
+
+<p>And thus it was that when the Coggins were presently brought before the
+justice, they were exonerated of all complicity in the crime for which
+Brierwood and his accomplice were afterward arrested, tried, and
+sentenced to the State Prison.</p>
+
+<p>Jim doubts whether the promised "good word" was ever spoken on his
+behalf to the witches, who were represented as making personal inquiries
+about him, because he suspects that the two robbers were themselves the
+only evil spirits roaming the woods that night.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="ON_A_HIGHER_LEVEL" id="ON_A_HIGHER_LEVEL"></a>ON A HIGHER LEVEL</h2>
+
+
+<p>As Jack Dunn stood in the door of his home on a great crag of Persimmon
+Ridge and loaded his old rifle, his eyes rested upon a vast and imposing
+array of mountains filling the landscape. All are heavily wooded, all
+are alike, save that in one the long horizontal line of the summit is
+broken by a sudden vertical ascent, and thence the mountain seems to
+take up life on a higher level, for it sinks no more and passes out of
+sight.</p>
+
+<p>This abrupt rise is called "Elijah's Step,"&mdash;named, perhaps, in honor of
+some neighboring farmer who first explored it; but the ignorant boy
+believed that here the prophet had stepped into his waiting fiery
+chariot.</p>
+
+<p>He knew of no foreign lands,&mdash;no Syria, no Palestine. He had no dream of
+the world that lay beyond those misty, azure hills. Indistinctly he had
+caught the old story from the nasal drawl of the circuit-rider, and he
+thought that here, among these wild Tennessee mountains, Elijah had
+lived and had not died.</p>
+
+<p>There came suddenly from the valley the baying of a pack of hounds in
+full cry, and when the crags caught the sound and tossed it from
+mountain to mountain, when more delicate echoes on a higher key rang out
+from the deep ravines, there was a wonderful exhilaration in this sylvan
+minstrelsy. The young fellow looked wistful as he heard it, then he
+frowned heavily.</p>
+
+<p>"Them thar Saunders men hev gone off an' left me," he said reproachfully
+to some one within the log cabin. "Hyar I be kept a-choppin' wood an' a
+pullin' fodder till they hev hed time ter git up a deer. It 'pears ter
+me ez I mought hev been let ter put off that thar work till I war
+through huntin'."</p>
+
+<p>He was a tall young fellow, with a frank, freckled face and auburn hair;
+stalwart, too. Judging from his appearance, he could chop wood and pull
+fodder to some purpose.</p>
+
+<p>A heavy, middle-aged man emerged from the house, and stood regarding his
+son with grim disfavor. "An' who oughter chop wood an' pull fodder but
+ye, while my hand air sprained this way?" he demanded.</p>
+
+<p>That hand had been sprained for many a long day, but the boy made no
+reply; perhaps he knew its weight. He walked to the verge of the cliff,
+and gazed down at the tops of the trees in the valley far, far below.</p>
+
+<p>The expanse of foliage was surging in the wind like the waves of the
+sea. From the unseen depths beneath there rose again the cry of the
+pack, inexpressibly stirring, and replete with woodland suggestions. All
+the echoes came out to meet it.</p>
+
+<p>"I war promised ter go!" cried Jack bitterly.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal," said his mother, from within the house, "'tain't no good nohow."</p>
+
+<p>Her voice was calculated to throw oil upon the troubled waters,&mdash;low,
+languid, and full of pacifying intonations. She was a tall, thin woman,
+clad in a blue-checked homespun dress, and seated before a great
+hand-loom, as a lady sits before a piano or an organ. The creak of the
+treadle, and the thump, thump of the batten, punctuated, as it were, her
+consolatory disquisition.</p>
+
+<p>Her son looked at her in great depression of spirit as she threw the
+shuttle back and forth with deft, practiced hands.</p>
+
+<p>"Wild meat air a mighty savin'," she continued, with a housewifely
+afterthought. "I ain't denyin' that."</p>
+
+<p>Thump, thump, went the batten.</p>
+
+<p>"But ye needn't pester the life out'n yerself 'kase ye ain't a-runnin'
+the deer along o' them Saunders men. It 'pears like a powerful waste o'
+time, when ye kin take yer gun down ter the river enny evenin' late,
+jes' ez the deer air goin' ter drink, an' shoot ez big a buck ez ye hev
+got the grit ter git enny other way. Ye can't do nothin' with a buck but
+eat him, an' a-runnin' him all around the mounting don't make him no
+tenderer, ter my mind. I don't see no sense in huntin' 'cept ter git
+somethin' fitten ter eat."</p>
+
+<p>This logic, enough to break a sportsman's heart, was not a panacea for
+the tedium of the day, spent in the tame occupation of pulling fodder,
+as the process of stripping the blades from the standing cornstalks is
+called.</p>
+
+<p>But when the shadows were growing long, Jack took his rifle and set out
+for the profit and the pleasure of still-hunting. As he made his way
+through the dense woods, the metallic tones of a cow-bell jangled on the
+air,&mdash;melodious sound in the forest quiet, but it conjured up a scowl on
+the face of the young mountaineer.</p>
+
+<p>"Everything on this hyar mounting hev got the twistin's ter-day!" he
+exclaimed wrath-fully. "Hyar is our old red cow a-traipsing off ter Andy
+Bailey's house, an' thar won't be a drap of milk for supper."</p>
+
+<p>This was a serious matter, for in a region where coffee and tea are
+almost unknown luxuries, and the evening meal consists of such
+thirst-provoking articles as broiled venison, corn-dodgers, and sorghum,
+one is apt to feel the need of some liquid milder than "apple-jack,"
+and more toothsome than water, wherewith to wet one's whistle.</p>
+
+<p>In common with everything else on the mountain, Jack, too, had the
+"twistin's," and it was with a sour face that he began to drive the cow
+homeward. After going some distance, however, he persuaded himself that
+she would leave the beaten track no more until she reached the cabin. He
+turned about, therefore, and retraced his way to the stream.</p>
+
+<p>There had been heavy rains in the mountains, and it was far out of its
+banks, rushing and foaming over great rocks, circling in swift
+whirlpools, plunging in smooth, glassy sheets down sudden descents, and
+maddening thence in tumultuous, yeasty billows.</p>
+
+<p>An old mill, long disused and fallen into decay, stood upon the brink.
+It was a painful suggestion of collapsed energies, despite its
+picturesque drapery of vines. No human being could live there, but in
+the doorway abruptly appeared a boy of seventeen, dressed, like Jack, in
+an old brown jeans suit and a shapeless white hat.</p>
+
+<p>Jack paused at a little distance up on the hill, and parleyed in a
+stentorian voice with the boy in the mill.</p>
+
+<p>"What's the reason ye air always tryin' ter toll off our old red muley
+from our house?" he demanded angrily.</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't never tried ter toll her off," said Andy Bailey. "She jes' kem
+ter our house herself. I dunno ez I hev got enny call ter look arter
+other folkses' stray cattle. Mind yer own cow."</p>
+
+<p>"I hev got a mighty notion ter cut down that thar sapling,"&mdash;and Jack
+pointed to a good-sized hickory-tree,&mdash;"an' wear it out on ye."</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't afeard. Come on!" said Andy impudently, protected by his
+innocence, and the fact of being the smaller of the two.</p>
+
+<p>There was a pause. "Hev ye been a-huntin'?" asked Jack, beginning to be
+mollified by the rare luxury of youthful and congenial companionship;
+for this was a scantily settled region, and boys were few.</p>
+
+<p>Andy nodded assent.</p>
+
+<p>Jack walked down into the rickety mill, and stood leaning against the
+rotten old hopper. "What did ye git?" he said, looking about for the
+game.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal," drawled Andy, with much hesitation, "I hain't been started out
+long." He turned from the door and faced his companion rather
+sheepishly.</p>
+
+<p>"I hopes ye ain't been poppin' off that rifle o' your'n along that
+deer-path down in the hollow, an' a-skeerin' off all the wild critters,"
+said Jack Dunn, with sudden apprehension. "Ef I war ez pore a shot ez ye
+air, I'd go a-huntin' with a bean-pole instead of a gun, an' leave the
+game ter them that kin shoot it."</p>
+
+<p>Andy was of a mercurial and nervous temperament, and this fact perhaps
+may account for the anomaly of a mountain-boy who was a poor shot. Andy
+was the scoff of Persimmon Ridge.</p>
+
+<p>"I hev seen many a gal who could shoot ez well ez ye kin,&mdash;better,"
+continued Jack jeeringly. "But law! I needn't kerry my heavy bones down
+thar in the hollow expectin' ter git a deer ter-day. They air all off in
+the woods a-smellin' the powder ye hev been wastin'."</p>
+
+<p>Andy was pleased to change the subject. "It 'pears ter me that that thar
+water air a-scuttlin' along toler'ble fast," he said, turning his eyes
+to the little window through which the stream could be seen.</p>
+
+<p>It <i>was</i> running fast, and with a tremendous force. One could obtain
+some idea of the speed and impetus of the current from the swift
+vehemence with which logs and branches shot past, half hidden in foam.</p>
+
+<p>The water looked black with this white contrast. Here and there a great,
+grim rock projected sharply above the surface. In the normal condition
+of the stream, these were its overhanging banks, but now, submerged,
+they gave to its flow the character of rapids.</p>
+
+<p>The old mill, its wooden supports submerged too, trembled and throbbed
+with the throbbing water. As Jack looked toward the window, his eyes
+were suddenly distended, his cheek paled, and he sprang to the door
+with a frightened exclamation.</p>
+
+<p>Too late! the immense hole of a fallen tree, shooting down the channel
+with the force and velocity of a great projectile, struck the tottering
+supports of the crazy, rotting building.</p>
+
+<p>It careened, and quivered in every fibre; there was a crash of falling
+timbers, then a mighty wrench, and the two boys, clinging to the
+window-frame, were driving with the wreck down the river.</p>
+
+<p>The old mill thundered against the submerged rocks, and at every
+concussion the timbers fell. It whirled around and around in eddying
+pools. Where the water was clear, and smooth, and deep, it shot along
+with great rapidity.</p>
+
+<p>The convulsively clinging boys looked down upon the black current, with
+its sharp, treacherous, half-seen rocks and ponderous driftwood. The
+wild idea of plunging into the tumult and trying to swim to the bank
+faded as they looked. Here in the crazy building there might be a
+chance. In that frightful swirl there lurked only a grim certainty.</p>
+
+<p>The house had swung along in the middle of the stream; now its course
+was veering slightly to the left. This could be seen through the window
+and the interstices of the half-fallen timbers.</p>
+
+<p>The boys were caged, as it were; the doorway was filled with the heavy
+debris, and the only possibility of escape was through that little
+window. It was so small that only one could pass through at a
+time,&mdash;only one could be saved.</p>
+
+<p>Jack had seen the chance from far up the stream. There was a stretch of
+smooth water close in to the bank, on which was a low-hanging
+beech-tree,&mdash;he might catch the branches.</p>
+
+<p>They were approaching the spot with great rapidity. Only one could go.
+He himself had discovered the opportunity,&mdash;it was his own.</p>
+
+<p>Life was sweet,&mdash;so sweet! He could not give it up; he could not now
+take thought for his friend. He could only hope with a frenzied
+eagerness that Andy had not seen the possibility of deliverance.</p>
+
+<p>In another moment Andy lifted himself into the window. A whirlpool
+caught the wreck, and there it eddied in dizzying circles. It was not
+yet too late. Jack could tear the smaller, weaker fellow away with one
+strong hand, and take the only chance for escape. The shattered mill was
+dashing through the smoother waters now; the great beech-tree was
+hanging over their heads; an inexplicable, overpowering impulse mastered
+in an instant Jack's temptation.</p>
+
+<p>"Ketch the branches, Andy!" he cried wildly.</p>
+
+<p>His friend was gone, and he was whirling off alone on those cruel,
+frantic waters. In the midst of the torrent he was going down, and down,
+and down the mountain.</p>
+
+<p>Now and then he had a fleeting glimpse of the distant ranges. There was
+"Elijah's Step," glorified in the sunset, purple and splendid, with red
+and gold clouds flaming above it. To his untutored imagination they
+looked like the fiery chariot again awaiting the prophet.</p>
+
+<p>The familiar sight, the familiar, oft-repeated fancy, the recollection
+of his home, brought sudden tears to his eyes. He gazed wistfully at the
+spot whence he believed the man had ascended who left death untasted,
+and then he went on in this mad rush down to the bitterness of death.</p>
+
+<p>Even with this terrible fact before him, he did not reproach himself
+with his costly generosity. It was strange to him that he did not regret
+it; perhaps, like that mountain, he had suddenly taken up life on a
+higher level.</p>
+
+<p>The sunset splendor was fading. The fiery chariot was gone, and in its
+place were floating gray clouds,&mdash;the dust of its wheels, they seemed.
+The outlines of "Elijah's Step" were dark. It looked sad, bereaved. Its
+glory had departed.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly the whole landscape seemed full of reeling black shadows,&mdash;and
+yet it was not night. The roar of the torrent was growing faint upon
+his ear, and yet its momentum was unchecked. Soon all was dark and all
+was still, and the world slipped from his grasp.</p>
+
+<p><a name="illus-254" id="illus-254"></a></p>
+<div class="figcenter">
+             <img   src="images/img254.jpg" width="351" height="550"
+             alt="IN THE MIDST OF THE TORRENT" /><br />
+         <b>IN THE MIDST OF THE TORRENT</b>
+    </div>
+
+
+<p>"They tell me that thar Jack Dunn war mighty nigh drownded when them men
+fished him out'n the pond at Skeggs's sawmill down thar in the valley,"
+said Andy Bailey, recounting the incident to the fireside circle at his
+own home. "They seen them rotten old timbers come a-floatin' ez
+peaceable on to the pond, an' then they seen somethin' like a human
+a-hangin' ter 'em. The water air ez still ez a floor thar, an' deep an'
+smooth, an' they didn't hev no trouble in swimmin' out to him. They
+couldn't bring him to, though, at fust. They said in a little more he
+would hev been gone sure! Now"&mdash;pridefully&mdash;"ef he hed hed the grit ter
+ketch a tree an' pull out, like I done, he wouldn't hev been in sech a
+danger."</p>
+
+<p>Andy never knew the sacrifice his friend had made. Jack never told him.
+Applause is at best a slight thing. A great action is nobler than the
+monument that commemorates it; and when a man gives himself into the
+control of a generous impulse, thenceforward he takes up life on a
+higher level.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHRISTMAS_DAY_ON_OLD_WINDY_MOUNTAIN" id="CHRISTMAS_DAY_ON_OLD_WINDY_MOUNTAIN"></a>CHRISTMAS DAY ON OLD WINDY MOUNTAIN</h2>
+
+
+<p>The sun had barely shown the rim of his great red disk above the sombre
+woods and snow-crowned crags of the opposite ridge, when Rick Herne, his
+rifle in his hand, stepped out of his father's log cabin, perched high
+among the precipices of Old Windy Mountain. He waited motionless for a
+moment, and all the family trooped to the door to assist at the
+time-honored ceremony of firing a salute to the day.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly the whole landscape catches a rosy glow, Rick whips up his
+rifle, a jet of flame darts swiftly out, a sharp report rings all around
+the world, and the sun goes grandly up&mdash;while the little tow-headed
+mountaineers hurrah shrilly for "Chris'mus!"</p>
+
+<p>As he began to re-load his gun, the small boys clustered around him,
+their hands in the pockets of their baggy jeans trousers, their heads
+inquiringly askew.</p>
+
+<p>"They air a-goin' ter hev a pea-fow<i>el</i> fur dinner down yander ter
+Birk's Mill," Rick remarked.</p>
+
+<p>The smallest boy smacked his lips,&mdash;not that he knew how pea-fowl
+tastes, but he imagined unutterable things.</p>
+
+<p>"Somehows I hates fur ye ter go ter eat at Birk's Mill, they air sech a
+set o' drinkin' men down thar ter Malviny's house," said Rick's mother,
+as she stood in the doorway, and looked anxiously at him.</p>
+
+<p>For his elder sister was Birk's wife, and to this great feast he was
+invited as a representative of the family, his father being disabled by
+"rheumatics," and his mother kept at home by the necessity of providing
+dinner for those four small boys.</p>
+
+<p>"Hain't I done promised ye not ter tech a drap o' liquor this Chris'mus
+day?" asked Rick.</p>
+
+<p>"That's a fac'," his mother admitted. "But boys, an' men-folks
+ginerally, air scandalous easy ter break a promise whar whiskey is in
+it."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll hev ye ter know that when I gin my word, I keeps it!" cried Rick
+pridefully.</p>
+
+<p>He little dreamed how that promise was to be assailed before the sun
+should go down.</p>
+
+<p>He was a tall, sinewy boy, deft of foot as all these mountaineers are,
+and a seven-mile walk in the snow to Birk's Mill he considered a mere
+trifle. He tramped along cheerily enough through the silent solitudes of
+the dense forest. Only at long intervals the stillness was broken by the
+cracking of a bough under the weight of snow, or the whistling of a gust
+of wind through the narrow valley far below.</p>
+
+<p>All at once&mdash;it was a terrible shock of surprise&mdash;he was sinking! Was
+there nothing beneath his feet but the vague depths of air to the base
+of the mountain? He realized with a quiver of dismay that he had
+mistaken a huge drift-filled fissure, between a jutting crag and the
+wall of the ridge, for the solid, snow-covered ground. He tossed his
+arms about wildly in his effort to grasp something firm. The motion only
+dislodged the drift. He felt that it was falling, and he was going
+down&mdash;down&mdash;down with it. He saw the trees on the summit of Old Windy
+disappear. He caught one glimpse of the neighboring ridges. Then he was
+blinded and enveloped in this cruel whiteness. He had a wild idea that
+he had been delivered to it forever; even in the first thaw it would
+curl up into a wreath of vapor, and rise from the mountain's side, and
+take him soaring with it&mdash;whither? How they would search these bleak
+wintry fastnesses for him,&mdash;while he was gone sailing with the mist!
+What would they say at home and at Birk's Mill? One last thought of the
+"pea-fow<i>el</i>," and he seemed to slide swiftly away from the world with
+the snow.</p>
+
+<p>He was unconscious probably only for a few minutes. When he came to
+himself, he found that he was lying, half-submerged in the great drift,
+on the slope of the mountain, and the dark, icicle-begirt cliff towered
+high above. He stretched his limbs&mdash;no bones broken! He could hardly
+believe that he had fallen unhurt from those heights. He did not
+appreciate how gradually the snow had slidden down. Being so densely
+packed, too, it had buoyed him up, and kept him from dashing against the
+sharp, jagged edges of the rock. He had lost consciousness in the jar
+when the moving mass was abruptly arrested by a transverse elevation of
+the ground. He was still a little dizzy and faint, but otherwise
+uninjured.</p>
+
+<p>Now a great perplexity took hold on him. How was he to make his way back
+up the mountain, he asked himself, as he looked at the inaccessible
+cliffs looming high into the air. All the world around him was
+unfamiliar. Even his wide wanderings had never brought him into this
+vast, snowy, trackless wilderness, that stretched out on every side. He
+would be half the day in finding the valley road that led to Birk's
+Mill. He rose to his feet, and gazed about him in painful indecision.
+The next moment a thrill shot through him, to which he was
+unaccustomed. He had never before shaken except with the cold,&mdash;but this
+was fear.</p>
+
+<p>For he heard voices! Not from the cliffs above,&mdash;but from below! Not
+from the dense growth of young pines on the slope of the mountain,&mdash;but
+from the depths of the earth beneath! He stood motionless, listening
+intently, his eyes distended, and his heart beating fast.</p>
+
+<p>All silence! Not even the wind stirred in the pine thicket. The snow lay
+heavy among the dark green branches, and every slender needle was
+encased in ice. Rick rubbed his eyes. It was no dream. There was the
+thicket; but whose were the voices that had rung out faintly from
+beneath it?</p>
+
+<p>A crowd of superstitions surged upon him. He cast an affrighted glance
+at the ghastly snow-covered woods and sheeted earth. He was remembering
+fireside legends, horrible enough to raise the hair on a sophisticated,
+educated boy's head; much more horrible, then, to a young backwoodsman
+like Rick. On this, the most benign day that ever dawns upon the world,
+was he led into these endless wastes of forest to be terrified by the
+"harnts"?</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly those voices from the earth again! One was singing a drunken
+catch,&mdash;it broke into falsetto, and ended with an unmistakable hiccup.</p>
+
+<p>Rick's blood came back with a rush.</p>
+
+<p>"I hev never hearn tell o' the hoobies gittin' boozy!" he said with a
+laugh. "That's whar they hev got the upper-hand o' humans."</p>
+
+<p>As he gazed again at the thicket, he saw now something that he had been
+too much agitated to observe before,&mdash;a column of dense smoke that rose
+from far down the declivity, and seemed to make haste to hide itself
+among the low-hanging boughs of a clump of fir-trees.</p>
+
+<p>"It's somebody's house down thar," was Rick's conclusion. "I kin find
+out the way to Birk's Mill from the folkses."</p>
+
+<p>When he neared the smoke, he paused abruptly, staring once more.</p>
+
+<p>There was no house! The smoke rose from among low pine bushes. Above
+were the snow-laden branches of the fir.</p>
+
+<p>"Ef thar war a house hyar, I reckon I could see it!" said Rick
+doubtfully, infinitely mystified.</p>
+
+<p>There was a continual drip, drip of moisture all around. Yet a thaw had
+not set in. Rick looked up at the gigantic icicles that hung to the
+crags and glittered in the sun,&mdash;not a drop trickled from them. But this
+fir-tree was dripping, dripping, and the snow had melted away from the
+nearest pine bushes that clustered about the smoke. There was heat below
+certainly, a strong heat, and somebody was keeping the fire up steadily.</p>
+
+<p>"An' air it folkses ez live underground like foxes an' sech!" Rick
+exclaimed, astonished, as he came upon a large, irregularly shaped rift
+in the rocks, and heard the same reeling voice from within, beginning to
+sing once more. But for this bacchanalian melody, the noise of Rick's
+entrance might have given notice of his approach. As it was, the
+inhabitants of this strange place were even more surprised than he,
+when, after groping through a dark, low passage, an abrupt turn brought
+him into a lofty, vaulted subterranean apartment. There was a great
+flare of light, which revealed six or seven muscular men grouped about a
+large copper vessel built into a rude stone furnace, and all the air was
+pervaded by an incomparably strong alcoholic odor. The boy started back
+with a look of terror. That pale terror was reflected on each man's
+face, as on a mirror. At the sight of the young stranger they all sprang
+up with the same gesture,&mdash;each instinctively laid his hand upon the
+pistol that he wore.</p>
+
+<p>Poor Rick understood it all at last. He had stumbled upon a nest of
+distillers, only too common among these mountains, who were hiding from
+the officers of the Government, running their still in defiance of the
+law and eluding the whiskey-tax. He realized that in discovering their
+stronghold he had learned a secret that was by no means a safe one for
+him to know. And he was in their power; at their mercy!</p>
+
+<p>"Don't shoot!" he faltered. "I jes' want ter ax the folkses ter tell me
+the way ter Birk's Mill."</p>
+
+<p>What would he have given to be on the bleak mountain outside!</p>
+
+<p>One of the men caught him as if anticipating an attempt to run. Two or
+three, after a low-toned colloquy, took their rifles, and crept
+cautiously outside to reconnoitre the situation. Rick comprehended their
+suspicion with new quakings. They imagined that he was a spy, and had
+been sent among them to discover them plying their forbidden vocation.
+This threatened a long imprisonment for them. His heart sank as he
+thought of it; they would never let him go.</p>
+
+<p>After a time the reconnoitring party came back.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothin' stirrin'," said the leader tersely.</p>
+
+<p>"I misdoubts," muttered another, casting a look of deep suspicion on
+Rick. "Thar air men out thar, I'm a-thinkin', hid somewhar."</p>
+
+<p>"They air furder 'n a mile off, ennyhow," returned the first speaker.
+"We never lef' so much ez a bush 'thout sarchin' of it."</p>
+
+<p>"The off'cers can't find this place no-ways 'thout that thar chap fur a
+guide," said a third, with a surly nod of his head at Rick.</p>
+
+<p>"We're safe enough, boys, safe enough!" cried a stout-built, red-faced,
+red-bearded man, evidently very drunk, and with a voice that rose into
+quavering falsetto as he spoke. "This chap can't do nothin'. We hev got
+him bound hand an' foot. Hyar air the captive of our bow an' spear,
+boys! Mighty little captive, though! hi!" He tried to point jeeringly at
+Rick, and forgot what he had intended to do before he could fairly
+extend his hand. Then his rollicking head sank on his breast, and he
+began to sing sleepily again.</p>
+
+<p>One of the more sober of the men had extinguished the fire in order that
+they should not be betrayed by the smoke outside to the revenue officers
+who might be seeking them. The place, chilly enough at best, was growing
+bitter cold. The strange subterranean beauty of the surroundings, the
+limestone wall and arches, scintillating wherever they caught the
+light; the shadowy, mysterious vaulted roof; the white stalactites that
+hung down thence to touch the stalagmites as they rose up from the
+floor, and formed with them endless vistas of stately colonnades, all
+were oddly incongruous with the drunken, bloated faces of the
+distillers. Rick could not have put his thought into words, but it
+seemed to him that when men had degraded themselves like this, even
+inanimate nature is something higher and nobler. "Sermons in stones"
+were not far to seek.</p>
+
+<p>He observed that they were making preparations for flight, and once more
+the fear of what they would do with him clutched at his heart. He was
+something of a problem to them.</p>
+
+<p>"This hyar cub will go blab," was the first suggestion.</p>
+
+<p>"He will keep mum," said the vocalist, glancing at the boy with a
+jovially tipsy combination of leer and wink. "Hyar is the persuader!" He
+rapped sharply on the muzzle of his pistol. "This'll scotch his wheel."</p>
+
+<p>"Hold yer own jaw, ye drunken 'possum!" retorted another of the group.
+"Ef ye fire off that pistol in hyar, we'll hev all these hyar rocks"&mdash;he
+pointed at the walls and the long colonnades&mdash;"answerin' back an'
+yelpin' like a pack o' hounds on a hot scent. Ef thar air folks outside,
+the noise would fotch 'em down on us fur true!"</p>
+
+<p>Rick breathed more freely. The rocks would speak up for him! He could
+not be harmed with all these tell-tale witnesses at hand. So silent now,
+but with a latent voice strong enough for the dread of it to save his
+life!</p>
+
+<p>The man who had put out the fire, who had led the reconnoitring party,
+who had made all the active preparations for departure, who seemed, in
+short, to be an executive committee of one,&mdash;a long, lazy-looking
+mountaineer, with a decision of action in startling contrast to his
+whole aspect,&mdash;now took this matter in hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothin' easier," he said tersely. "Fill him up. Make him ez drunk ez a
+fraish b'iled ow<i>el</i>. Then lead him to the t'other eend o' the cave,
+an' blindfold him, an' lug him off five mile in the woods, an' leave him
+thar. He'll never know what he hev seen nor done."</p>
+
+<p>"That's the dinctum!" cried the red-bearded man, in delighted approval,
+breaking into a wild, hiccupping laugh, inexpressibly odious to the boy.
+Rick had an extreme loathing for them all that showed itself with
+impolitic frankness upon his face. He realized as he had never done
+before the depths to which strong drink will reduce men. But that the
+very rocks would cry out upon them, they would have murdered him.</p>
+
+<p>In the preparations for departure all the lights had been extinguished,
+except a single lantern, and a multitude of shadows had come thronging
+from the deeper recesses of the cave. In the faint glimmer the figures
+of the men loomed up, indistinct, gigantic, distorted. They hardly
+seemed men at all to Rick; rather some evil underground creatures,
+neither beast nor human.</p>
+
+<p>And he was to be made equally besotted, and even more helpless than
+they, in order that his senses might be sapped away, and he should
+remember no story to tell. Perhaps if he had not had before him so vivid
+an illustration of the malign power that swayed them, he might not have
+experienced so strong an aversion to it. Now, to be made like them
+seemed a high price to pay for his life. And there was his promise to
+his mother! As the long, lank, lazy-looking mountaineer pressed the
+whiskey upon him, Rick dashed it aside with a gesture so unexpected and
+vehement that the cracked jug fell to the floor, and was shivered to
+fragments.</p>
+
+<p>Rick lifted an appealing face to the man, who seized him with a strong
+grip. "I can't&mdash;I won't," the boy cried wildly. "I&mdash;I&mdash;promised my
+mother!"</p>
+
+<p>He looked around the circle deprecatingly. He expected first a guffaw
+and then a blow, and he dreaded the ridicule more than the pain.</p>
+
+<p>But there were neither blows nor ridicule. They all gazed at him,
+astounded. Then a change, which Rick hardly comprehended, flitted across
+the face of the man who had grasped him. The moonshiner turned away
+abruptly, with a bitter laugh that startled all the echoes.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>I&mdash;I</i> promised <i>my</i> mother, too!" he cried. "It air good that in her
+grave whar she is she can't know how I hev kep' my word."</p>
+
+<p>And then there was a sudden silence. It seemed to Rick, strangely
+enough, like the sudden silence that comes after prayer. He was
+reminded, as one of the men rose at length and the keg on which he had
+been sitting creaked with the motion, of the creaking benches in the
+little mountain church when the congregation started from their knees.
+And had some feeble, groping sinner's prayer filled the silence and the
+moral darkness!</p>
+
+<p>The "executive committee" promptly recovered himself. But he made no
+further attempt to force the whiskey upon the boy. Under some whispered
+instructions which he gave the others, Rick was half-led, half-dragged
+through immensely long black halls of the cave, while one of the men
+went before, carrying the feeble lantern. When the first glimmer of
+daylight appeared in the distance, Rick understood that the cave had an
+outlet other than the one by which he had entered, and evidently miles
+distant from it. Thus it was that the distillers were well enabled to
+baffle the law that sought them.</p>
+
+<p>They stopped here and blindfolded the boy. How far and where they
+dragged him through the snowy mountain wilderness outside, Rick never
+knew. He was exhausted when at length they allowed him to pause. As he
+heard their steps dying away in the distance, he tore the bandage from
+his eyes, and found that they had left him in the midst of the wagon
+road to make his way to Birk's Mill as best he might. When he reached
+it, the wintry sun was low in the western sky, and the very bones of the
+"pea-fow<i>el</i>" were picked.</p>
+
+<p>On the whole, it seemed a sorry Christmas Day, as Rick could not know
+then&mdash;indeed, he never knew&mdash;what good results it brought forth. For
+among those who took the benefit of the "amnesty" extended by the
+Government to the moonshiners of this region, on condition that they
+discontinue illicit distilling for the future, was a certain long, lank,
+lazy-looking mountaineer, who suddenly became sober and steady and a
+law-abiding citizen. He had been reminded, this Christmas Day, of a
+broken promise to a dead mother, and this by the unflinching moral
+courage of a mere boy in a moment of mortal peril. Such wise, sweet,
+uncovenanted uses has duty, blessing alike the unconscious exemplar and
+him who profits by the example.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3>The Riverside Press</h3>
+
+<h5>CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS, U. S. A.</h5>
+
+<h5>ELECTROTYPED AND PRINTED BY</h5>
+
+<h5>H. O. HOUGHTON AND CO.</h5>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Young Mountaineers, by Charles Egbert Craddock
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+</body>
+</html>
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+Project Gutenberg's The Young Mountaineers, by Charles Egbert Craddock
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Young Mountaineers
+       Short Stories
+
+Author: Charles Egbert Craddock
+
+Illustrator: Malcolm Fraser
+
+Release Date: January 15, 2007 [EBook #20365]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YOUNG MOUNTAINEERS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Dave Macfarlane and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: HE WAS PALLID AND PANTING]
+
+
+
+
+THE YOUNG MOUNTAINEERS
+
+_SHORT STORIES_
+
+BY
+
+CHARLES EGBERT CRADDOCK
+
+
+WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY MALCOLM FRASER
+
+[Illustration]
+
+BOSTON AND NEW YORK
+HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY
+The Riverside Press, Cambridge
+1897
+
+Copyright, 1897,
+BY MARY N. MURFREE.
+
+
+_All rights reserved_.
+
+_The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. S. A._
+Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton and Company.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS                                            PAGE
+
+
+THE MYSTERY OF OLD DADDY'S WINDOW                      1
+'WAY DOWN IN POOR VALLEY                              26
+A MOUNTAIN STORM                                      63
+BORROWING A HAMMER                                    83
+THE CONSCRIPTS' HOLLOW                               103
+A WARNING                                            172
+AMONG THE CLIFFS                                     186
+IN THE "CHINKING"                                    208
+ON A HIGHER LEVEL                                    230
+CHRISTMAS DAY ON OLD WINDY MOUNTAIN                  245
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS                               PAGE
+
+
+HE WAS PALLID AND PANTING   (see page 221)     _Frontispiece._
+TOGETHER THEY WENT OVER THE CLIFF                     48
+HOW LONG WAS IT TO LAST                              190
+IN THE MIDST OF THE TORRENT                          242
+
+
+
+
+THE MYSTERY OF OLD DADDY'S WINDOW
+
+
+Picture to yourself a wild ravine, gashing a mountain spur, and with
+here and there in its course abrupt descents. One of these is so deep
+and sheer that it might be called a precipice.
+
+High above it, from the steep slope on either hand, beetling crags jut
+out. Their summits almost meet at one point, and thus the space below
+bears a rude resemblance to a huge window. Through it you might see the
+blue heights in the distance; or watch the clouds and sunshine shift
+over the sombre mountain across the narrow valley; or mark, after the
+day has faded, how the great Scorpio draws its shining curves along the
+dark sky.
+
+One night Jonas Creyshaw sat alone in the porch of his log cabin, hard
+by on the slope of the ravine, smoking his pipe and gazing meditatively
+at "Old Daddy's Window." The moon was full, and its rays fell aslant on
+one of the cliffs, while the rugged face of the opposite crag was in the
+shadow.
+
+Suddenly he became aware that something was moving about the precipice,
+the brink of which seems the sill of the window. Although this precipice
+is sheer and insurmountable, a dark figure had risen from it, and stood
+plainly defined against the cliff, which presented a comparatively
+smooth surface to the brilliant moonlight.
+
+Was it a shadow? he asked himself hastily.
+
+His eyes swept the ravine, only thirty feet wide at that point, which
+lies between the two crags whose jutting summits almost meet above it to
+form Old Daddy's Window.
+
+There was no one visible to cast a shadow.
+
+It seemed as if the figure had unaccountably emerged from the sheer
+depths below.
+
+Only for a moment it stood motionless against the cliff. Then it flung
+its arms wildly above its head, and with a nimble spring
+disappeared--upward.
+
+Jonas Creyshaw watched it, his eyes distended, his face pallid, his pipe
+trembling in his shaking hand.
+
+"Mirandy!" he quavered faintly.
+
+His wife, a thin, ailing woman with pinched features and an uncertain
+eye, came to the door.
+
+"Thar," he faltered, pointing with his pipe-stem--"jes' a minit ago--I
+seen it!--a ghost riz up over the bluff inter Old Daddy's Window!"
+
+The woman fell instantly into a panic.
+
+"'Twarn't a-beckonin', war it? 'Twarn't a-beckonin'? 'Kase ef it war,
+ye'll hev ter die right straight! That air a sure sign."
+
+A little of Jonas Creyshaw's pluck and common sense came back to him at
+this unpleasant announcement.
+
+"Not on _his_ say-so," he stoutly averred. "I ain't a-goin' ter do the
+beck nor the bid of enny onmannerly harnt ez hev tuk up the notion ter
+riz up over the bluff inter Old Daddy's Window, an' sot hisself ter
+motionin' ter me."
+
+He rose hastily, knocked the ashes out of his pipe, and followed his
+wife into the house. There he paused abruptly.
+
+The room was lighted by the fitful flicker of the fire, for the nights
+were still chilly, and an old man, almost decrepit, sat dozing in his
+chair by the hearth.
+
+"Mirandy," said Jonas Creyshaw in a whisper, "'pears like ter me ez
+father hed better not be let ter know 'bout'n that thar harnt. It mought
+skeer him so ez he couldn't live another minit. He hev aged some
+lately--an' he air weakly."
+
+This was "Old Daddy."
+
+Before he had reached his thirtieth year, he was thus known, far and
+wide.
+
+"He air the man ez hev got a son," the mountaineers used to say in
+grinning explanation. "Ter hear him brag 'bout'n that thar boy o' his'n,
+ye'd think he war the only man in Tennessee ez ever hed a son."
+
+Throughout all these years the name given in jocose banter had clung to
+him, and now, hallowed by ancient usage, it was accorded to him
+seriously, and had all the sonorous effect of a title.
+
+So they said nothing to Old Daddy, but presently, when he had hobbled
+off to bed in the adjoining shed-room, they fell to discussing their
+terror of the apparition, and thus it chanced that the two boys, Tad and
+Si, first made, as it were, the ghost's acquaintance.
+
+Tad, a stalwart fellow of seventeen, sat listening spellbound before the
+glowing embers. Si, a wiry, active, tow-headed boy of twelve, perched
+with dangling legs on a chest, and looked now at the group by the fire,
+and now through the open door at the brilliant moonlight.
+
+"Waal, sir," he muttered, "I'll hev ter gin up the notion o' gittin'
+that comical young ow_el_, what I hev done set my heart onto. 'Kase ef I
+war ter fool round Old Daddy's Window, _now_, whilst I war a-cotchin' o'
+the ow_el_, the ghost mought--cotch--_Me!_"
+
+A sorry ghost, to be sure, that has nothing better to do than to "cotch"
+_him!_ But perhaps Si Creyshaw is not the only one of us who has an
+inflated idea of his own importance.
+
+He was greatly awed, and he found many suggestions of supernatural
+presence about the familiar room. As the fire alternately flared and
+faded, the warping-bars looked as if they were dancing a clumsy measure.
+The handle of a portly jug resembled an arm stuck akimbo, and its cork,
+tilted askew, was like a hat set on one side; Si fancied there was a
+most unpleasant grimace below that hat. The churn-dasher, left upon a
+shelf to dry, was sardonically staring him out of countenance with its
+half-dozen eyes. The strings of red pepper-pods and gourds and herbs,
+swinging from the rafters, rustled faintly; it sounded to Si like a
+moan.
+
+He wished his father and mother would talk about some wholesome subject,
+like Spot's new calf, for instance, instead of whispering about the
+mystery of Old Daddy's Window.
+
+He wished Tad would not look, as he listened, so much like a ghost
+himself, with his starting eyes and pale, intent face. He even wished
+that the baby would wake up, and put some life into things with a good
+healthy, rousing bawl.
+
+But the baby slept peacefully on, and after so long a time Si Creyshaw
+slept too.
+
+With broad daylight his courage revived. He was no longer afraid to
+think of the ghost. In fact, he experienced a pleased importance in
+giving Old Daddy a minute account of the wonderful apparition, for he
+_felt_ as if he had seen it.
+
+"'Pears ter me toler'ble comical, gran'dad, ez they never tole ye a word
+'bout'n it all," he said in conclusion. "Ye mought hev liked ter seen
+the harnt. Ef he war 'quainted with ye when he lived in this life, he
+mought hev stopped an' jowed sociable fur a spell!"
+
+How brave this small boy was in the cheerful sunshine!
+
+Old Daddy hardly seemed impressed with the pleasure he had missed in
+losing a sociable "jow" with a ghostly crony. He sat silent, blinking
+in the sunshine that fell through the gourd-vines which clambered about
+the porch where Si had placed his chair.
+
+"'Twarn't much of a sizable sperit," Si declared; he seemed courageous
+enough now to measure the ghost like a tailor. "It warn't more'n four
+feet high, ez nigh ez dad could jedge. Toler'ble small fur a harnt!"
+
+Still the old man made no reply. His wrinkled hands were clasped on his
+stick. His white head, shaded by his limp black hat, was bent down close
+to them. There was a slow, pondering expression on his face, but an
+excited gleam in his eye. Presently, he pointed backward toward a little
+unhewn log shanty that served as a barn, and rising with unwonted
+alacrity, he said to the boy,--
+
+"Fotch me the old beastis!"
+
+Silas Creyshaw stood amazed, for Old Daddy had not mounted a horse for
+twenty years.
+
+"Studyin' 'bout'n the harnt so much hev teched him in the head," the
+small boy concluded. Then he made an excuse, for he knew his
+grandfather was too old and feeble to safely undertake a solitary jaunt
+on horse-back.
+
+"I war tole not ter leave ye fur a minit, gran'dad. I war ter stay nigh
+ye an' mind yer bid."
+
+"That's my bid!" said the old man sternly. "Fotch the beastis."
+
+There was no one else about the place. Jonas Creyshaw had gone fishing
+shortly after daybreak. His wife had trudged off to her sister's house
+down in the cove, and had taken the baby with her. Tad was ploughing in
+the cornfield on the other side of the ravine. Si had no advice, and he
+had been brought up to think that Old Daddy's word was law.
+
+When the old man, mounted at last, was jogging up the road, Tad chanced
+to come to the house for a bit of rope to mend the plough-gear. He saw,
+far up the leafy vista, the departing cavalier. He cast a look of amazed
+reproach upon Si. Then, speechless with astonishment, he silently
+pointed at the distant figure.
+
+Si was a logician.
+
+"I never lef' _him_," he said. "He lef' _me_."
+
+"Ye oughter rej'ice in yer whole bones while ye hev got 'em," Tad
+returned, with withering sarcasm. "When dad kems home, some of 'em 'll
+git bruk, sure. Warn't ye tole not ter leave him fur _nuthin'_, ye
+triflin' shoat!"
+
+"He lef' _me_!" Si stoutly maintained.
+
+Meantime, Old Daddy journeyed on.
+
+Except for the wonderful mountain air, the settlement, three miles
+distant, had nothing about it to indicate its elevation. It was far from
+the cliffs, and there was no view. It was simply a little hollow of a
+clearing scooped out among the immense forests. When the mountaineers
+clear land, they do it effectually. Not a tree was left to embellish the
+yards of any of the four or five little log huts that constituted the
+hamlet, and the glare was intense.
+
+As six or eight loungers sat smoking about the door of the store, there
+was nothing to intercept their astonished view of Old Daddy when he
+suddenly appeared out of the gloomy forest, blinking in the sun and bent
+half double with fatigue.
+
+Even the rudest and coarsest of these mountaineers accord a praiseworthy
+deference to the aged among them. Old Daddy was held in reverential
+estimation at home, and was well accustomed to the respect shown him
+now, when, for the first time in many years, he had chosen to jog
+abroad. They helped him to dismount, and carried him bodily into the
+store. After he had tilted his chair back against the rude counter, he
+looked around with an important face upon the attentive group.
+
+"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,--"my son air the strongest man
+ever seen, sence Samson!"
+
+"I hev always hearn that sayin', Old Daddy," acquiesced an elderly
+codger, who, by reason of "rheumatics," made no pretension to muscle.
+
+A gigantic young blacksmith looked down at his corded hammer-arm, but
+said nothing.
+
+A fly--several flies--buzzed about the sorghum barrel.
+
+"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,--"my son air the bes' shot on
+this hyar mounting."
+
+"That's a true word, Old Daddy," assented the schoolmaster, who had
+ceased to be a Nimrod since devoting himself to teaching the young idea
+how to shoot.
+
+The hunters smoked in solemn silence.
+
+The shadow of a cloud drifted along the bare sandy stretch of the
+clearing.
+
+"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,--"my son hev got the peartest
+boys in Tennessee."
+
+"I'll gin ye that up, Old Daddy," cheerfully agreed the miller, whose
+family consisted of two small "daughters."
+
+The fathers of other "peart boys" cleared their throats uneasily, but
+finally subsided without offering contradiction.
+
+A jay-bird alighted on a blackberry bush outside, fluttered all his
+blue and white feathers, screamed harshly, bobbed his crested head, and
+was off on his gay wings.
+
+"My son," shrilly piped out Old Daddy,--"my son hev been gifted with the
+sight o' what no other man on this mounting hev ever viewed."
+
+The group sat amazed, expectant. But the old man preserved a stately
+silence. Only when the storekeeper eagerly insisted, "What hev Jonas
+seen? what war he gin ter view?" did Old Daddy bring the fore legs of
+the chair down with a thump, lean forward, and mysteriously pipe out
+like a superannuated cricket,--
+
+"My son,--my son hev seen a harnt, what riz up over the bluff
+a-purpose!"
+
+"Whar 'bouts?" "When?" "Waal, sir!" arose in varied clamors.
+
+So the proud old man told the story he had journeyed three laborious
+miles to spread. It had no terrors for him, so completely was fear
+swallowed up in admiration of his wonderful son, who had added to his
+other perfections the gift of seeing ghosts.
+
+The men discussed it eagerly. There were some jokes cracked--as it was
+still broad noonday--and at one of these Old Daddy took great offense,
+more perhaps because the disrespect was offered to his son rather than
+to himself.
+
+"Jes' gin Jonas the word from me," said the young blacksmith, meaning no
+harm and laughing good-naturedly, "ez I kin tell him percisely what
+makes him see harnts; it air drinkin' so much o' this onhealthy whiskey,
+what hain't got no tax paid onto it. I looks ter see him jes'
+a-staggerin' the nex' time I comes up with him."
+
+Old Daddy rose with affronted dignity.
+
+"My son," he declared vehemently,--"my son ain't gin over ter drinkin'
+whiskey, tax or no tax. An' he ain't got no call ter stagger--_like some
+folks!_"
+
+And despite all apology and protest, he left the house in a huff.
+
+His old bones ached with the unwonted exercise, and were rudely enough
+jarred by the rough roads and the awful gaits of his ancient steed. The
+sun was hot, and so was his heart, and when he reached home, infinitely
+fatigued and querulous, he gave his son a sorry account of his reception
+at the store. As he concluded, saying that five of the men had sent word
+that they would be at Jonas Creyshaw's house at moon-rise "ter holp him
+see the harnt," his son's brow darkened, and he strode heavily out of
+the room.
+
+He usually exhibited in a high degree the hospitality characteristic of
+these mountaineers, but now it had given way to a still stronger
+instinct.
+
+"Si," he said, coming suddenly upon the boy, "put out right now fur
+Bently's store at the settle_mint_, an' tell them sneaks ez hang round
+thar ter sarch round thar own houses fur harnts, ef they hanker ter see
+enny harnts. Ef they hev got the insurance ter kem hyar, they'll see
+wusser sights 'n enny harnts. Tell 'em I ain't a-goin' ter 'low no man
+ter cross my doorstep ez don't show Old Daddy the right medjure o'
+respec'. They'd better keep out'n my way ginerally."
+
+So with this bellicose message Si set out. But an unlucky idea occurred
+to him as he went plodding along the sandy road.
+
+"Whilst I'm a-goin' on this hyar harnt's yerrand"----The logical Si
+brought up with a shiver.
+
+"I went ter say--whilst I'm a-goin' on this hyar yerrand fur the
+harnt"----This was as bad.
+
+"Whilst," he qualified once more, "I'm a-goin' on this hyar yerrand
+_'bout'n_ the harnt, I mought ez well skeet off in them deep woods a
+piece ter see ef enny wild cherries air ripe on that tree by the spring.
+I'll hev plenty o' time."
+
+But even Si could not persuade himself that the cherries were ripe, and
+he stood for a moment under the tree, staring disconsolately at the
+distant blue ridges shimmering through the heated air. The sunlight was
+motionless, languid; it seemed asleep. The drowsy drone of insects
+filled the forest. As Si threw himself down to rest on the rocky brink
+of the mountain, a grasshopper sprang away suddenly, high into the air,
+with an agility that suggested to him the chorus of a song, which he
+began to sing in a loud and self-sufficient voice:--
+
+  "The grasshopper said--'Now, don't ye see
+  Thar's mighty few dancers sech ez me--
+    Sech ez _me_!--Sech ez ME!'"
+
+This reminded Si of his own capabilities as a dancer. He rose and began
+to caper nimbly, executing a series of steps that were singularly swift,
+spry, and unexpected,--a good deal on the grasshopper's method. His
+tattered black hat bobbed up and down on his tow head; his brown jeans
+trousers, so loose on his lean legs, flapped about hilariously; his bare
+heels flew out right and left; he snapped his fingers to mark the time;
+now and then he stuck his arms akimbo, and cut what he called the
+"widgeon-ping." But his freckled face was as grave as ever, and all the
+time that he danced he sang:--
+
+  "In the middle o' the night the rain kem down,
+  An' gin the corn a fraish start out'n the ground,
+  An' I thought nex' day ez I stood in the door,
+  That sassy bug mus' be drownded sure!
+  But thar war Goggle-eyes, peart an' gay,
+  Twangin' an' a-tunin' up--'Now, dance away!
+  Ye may sarch night an' day ez a constancy
+  An' ye won't find a fiddler sech ez me!
+    Sech ez _me_!--Sech ez ME!'"
+
+As he sank back exhausted upon the ground, a new aspect of the scene
+caught his attention.
+
+Those blue mountains were purpling--there was an ever-deepening flush in
+the west. It was close upon sunset, and while he had wasted the time,
+the five men to whom his father had sent that stern message forbidding
+them to come to his house were perhaps on their way thither, with every
+expectation of a cordial welcome. There might be a row--even a
+fight--and all because he had loitered.
+
+How he tore out of the brambly woods! How he pounded along the sandy
+road! But when he reached the settlement close upon nightfall, the
+storekeeper's wife told him that the men had gone long ago.
+
+"They war powerful special ter git off early," she added, "'kase they
+wanted ter be thar 'fore Old Daddy drapped off ter sleep. Some o' them
+foolish, slack-jawed boys ter the store ter-day riled the old man's
+feelin's, an' they 'lowed ter patch up the peace with him, an' let him
+an' Jonas know ez they never meant no harm."
+
+This suggestion buoyed up the boy's heart to some degree as he toiled
+along the "short cut" homeward through the heavy shades of the gloomy
+woods and the mystic effects of the red rising moon. But he was not
+altogether without anxiety until, as he drew within sight of the log
+cabin on the slope of the ravine, he heard Old Daddy piping pacifically
+to the guests about "my son," and Jonas Creyshaw's jolly laughter.
+
+The moon was golden now; Si could see its brilliant shafts of light
+strike aslant upon the smooth surface of the cliff that formed the
+opposite side of Old Daddy's Window. He stopped short in the deep shadow
+of the more rugged crag. The vines and bushes that draped its many
+jagged ledges dripped with dew. The boughs of an old oak, which grew
+close by, swayed gently in the breeze. Hidden by its huge hole, Si cast
+an apprehensive glance toward the house where his elders sat.
+
+Certainly no one was thinking of him now.
+
+"This air my chance fur that young ow_el_--ef ever," he said to himself.
+
+The owl's nest was in the hollow of the tree. The trunk was far too
+bulky to admit of climbing, and the lowest branches were well out of the
+boy's reach. Some thirty feet from the ground, however, one of the
+boughs touched the crag. By clambering up its rugged, irregular ledges,
+making a zigzag across its whole breadth to the right and then a similar
+zigzag to the left, Si might gain a position which would enable him to
+clutch this bough of the tree. Thence he could scramble along to the
+owl's stronghold.
+
+He hesitated. He knew his elders would disapprove of so reckless an
+undertaking as climbing about Old Daddy's Window, for in venturing
+toward its outer verge, a false step, a crumbling ledge, the snapping of
+a vine, would fling him down the sheer precipice into the depths below.
+
+His hankering for a pet owl had nevertheless brought him here more than
+once. It was only yesterday evening--before he had heard of the ghost's
+appearance, however--that he had made his last futile attempt.
+
+He looked up doubtfully. "I ain't ez strong ez--ez some folks," he
+admitted.
+
+"But then, come ter think of it," he argued astutely, "I don't weigh
+nuthin' sca'cely, an' thar ain't much of me ter hev ter haul up thar."
+
+He flung off his hat, he laid his wiry hands upon the wild grape-vines,
+he felt with his bare feet for the familiar niches and jagged edges, and
+up he went, working steadily to the right, across the broad face of the
+cliff.
+
+Its heavy shadow concealed him from view. Only one ledge, at the extreme
+verge of the crag, jutted out into the full moonbeams. But this, by
+reason of the intervening bushes and vines, could not be seen by those
+who sat in the cabin porch on the slope of the ravine, and he was glad
+to have light just here, for it was the most perilous point of his
+enterprise. By deft scrambling, however, he succeeded in getting on the
+moonlit ledge.
+
+"I clumb like a painter!" he declared triumphantly.
+
+He rested there for a moment before attempting to reach the vines high
+up on the left hand, which he must grasp in order to draw himself up
+into the shadowy niche in the rock, and begin his zigzag course back
+again across the face of the cliff to the projecting bough of the tree.
+
+But suddenly, as he still stood motionless on the ledge in the full
+radiance of the moon, the clamor of frightened voices sounded at the
+house. Until now he had forgotten all about the ghost. He turned,
+horror-stricken.
+
+There was the frightful thing, plainly defined against the smooth
+surface of the opposite cliff--some thirty feet distant--that formed the
+other side of Old Daddy's Window.
+
+And certainly there are mighty few dancers such as that ghost! It lunged
+actively toward the precipice. It suddenly dashed wildly back--gyrating
+continually with singularly nimble feet, flinging wiry arms aloft and
+maintaining a sinister silence, while the frightened clamor at the house
+grew ever louder and more shrill.
+
+Several minutes elapsed before Si recognized something peculiarly
+familiar in the ghost's wiry nimbleness--before he realized that the
+shadow of the cliff on which he stood reached across the ravine to the
+base of the opposite cliff, and that the figure which had caused so much
+alarm was only his own shadow cast upon its perpendicular surface.
+
+He stopped short in those antics which had been induced by mortal
+terror; of course, his shadow, too, was still instantly. It stood upon
+the brink of the precipice which seems the sill of Old Daddy's Window,
+and showed distinctly on the smooth face of the cliff opposite to him.
+
+He understood, after a moment's reflection, how it was that as he had
+climbed up on the ledge in the full moonlight his shadow had seemed to
+rise gradually from the vague depths below the insurmountable
+precipice.
+
+He sprang nimbly upward to seize the vines that shielded him from the
+observation of the ghost-seers on the cabin porch, and as he caught them
+and swung himself suddenly from the moonlit ledge into the gloomy shade,
+he noticed that his shadow seemed to fling its arms wildly above its
+head, and disappeared upward.
+
+"That air jes' what dad seen las' night when I war down hyar afore,
+a-figurin' ter ketch that thar leetle ow_el_," he said to himself when
+he had reached the tree and sat in a crotch, panting and excited.
+
+After a moment, regardless of the coveted owl, he swung down from branch
+to branch, dropped easily from the lowest upon the ground, picked up his
+hat, and prepared to skulk along the "short cut," strike the road, and
+come home by that route as if he had just returned from the settlement.
+
+"'Kase," he argued sagely, "ef them skeered-ter-death grown folks war
+ter find out ez _I_ war the _harnt_--I mean ez the _harnt_ war
+_me_--ennyhow," he concluded desperately, "I'd KETCH it--sure!"
+
+So impressed was he with this idea that he discreetly held his tongue.
+
+And from that day to this, Jonas Creyshaw and his friends have been
+unable to solve the mystery of Old Daddy's Window.
+
+
+
+
+'WAY DOWN IN POOR VALLEY
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+There was the grim Big Injun Mountain to the right, with its bare,
+beetling sandstone crags. There was the long line of cherty hills to the
+left, covered by a dark growth of stunted pines. Between lay that
+melancholy stretch of sterility known as Poor Valley,--the poorest of
+the several valleys in Tennessee thus piteously denominated, because of
+the sorry contrast which they present to the rich coves and fertile
+vales so usual among the mountains of the State.
+
+How poor the soil was, Ike Hooden might bitterly testify; for ever since
+he could hold a plough he had, year after year, followed the old
+"bull-tongue" through the furrows of the sandy fields which lay around
+the log cabin at the base of the mountain. In the intervals of
+"crappin'" he worked at the forge with his stepfather, for close at
+hand, in the shadow of a great jutting cliff, lurked a dark little
+shanty of unhewn logs that was a blacksmith's shop.
+
+When he first began this labor, he was, perhaps, the youngest striker
+that ever wielded a sledge. Now, at eighteen, he had become expert at
+the trade, and his muscles were admirably developed. He was tall and
+robust, and he had never an ache nor an ill, except in his aching heart.
+But his heart was sore, for in the shop he found oaths and harsh
+treatment, and even at home these pursued him; while outside, desolation
+was set like a seal on Poor Valley.
+
+One drear autumnal afternoon, when the sky was dull, a dense white mist
+overspread the valley. As Ike plodded up the steep mountain side, the
+vapor followed him, creeping silently along the deep ravines and chasms,
+till at length it overtook and enveloped him. Then only a few feet of
+the familiar path remained visible.
+
+Suddenly he stopped short and stared. A dim, distorted something was
+peering at him from over the top of a big boulder. It was moving--it
+nodded at him. Then he indistinctly recognized it as a tall, conical
+hat. There seemed a sort of featureless face below it.
+
+A thrill of fear crept through him. His hands grew cold and shook in his
+pockets. He leaned forward, gazing intently into the thick fog.
+
+An odd distortion crossed the vague, featureless face--like a leer,
+perhaps. Once more the tall, conical hat nodded fantastically.
+
+"Ef ye do that agin," cried Ike, in sudden anger, all his pluck coming
+back with a rush, "I'll gin ye a lick ez will weld yer head an' the
+boulder together!"
+
+He lifted his clenched fist and shook it.
+
+"Haw! haw! haw!" laughed the man in the mist.
+
+Ike cooled off abruptly. He had been kicked and cuffed half his life,
+but he had never been laughed at. Ridicule tamed him. He was ashamed,
+and he remembered that he had been afraid, for he had thought the man
+was some "roamin' harnt."
+
+"I dunno," said Ike sulkily, "ez ye hev got enny call ter pounce so
+suddint out'n the fog, an' go ter noddin' that cur'ous way ter folks ez
+can't half see ye."
+
+"I never knowed afore," said the man in the mist, with mock apology in
+his tone and in the fantastic gyrations of his nodding hat, "ez it air
+you-uns ez owns this mounting." He looked derisively at Ike from head to
+foot. "Ye air the biggest man in Tennessee, ain't ye?"
+
+"Naw!" said Ike shortly, feeling painfully awkward, as an overgrown boy
+is apt to do.
+
+"Waal, from yer height, I mought hev thunk ye war that big Injun that
+the old folks tells about," and the stranger broke suddenly into a
+hoarse, quavering chant:--
+
+  "'A red man lived in Tennessee,
+      Mighty big Injun, sure!
+  He growed ez high ez the tallest tree,
+  An' he sez, sez he, "Big Injun, me!"
+      Mighty big Injun, sure!'"
+
+"Waal, waal," in a pensive voice, "so ye ain't him? I'm powerful glad ye
+tole me that, sonny, 'kase I mought hev got skeered hyar in the woods by
+myself with that big Injun."
+
+He laughed boisterously, and began to sing again:--
+
+  "'Settlers blazed out a road, ye see,
+      Mighty big Injun, sure!
+  He combed thar hair with a knife. Sez he,
+  "It's combed fur good! Big Injun, me!"
+      Mighty big Injun, sure!'"
+
+He broke out laughing afresh, and Ike, abashed and indignant, was about
+to pass on, when the man gayly balanced himself on one foot, as if he
+were about to dance a grotesque jig, and held out at arm's length a big
+silver coin.
+
+It was a dollar. That meant a great deal to Ike, for he earned no money
+he could call his own.
+
+"Free an' enlightened citizen o' these Nunited States," the man
+addressed him with mock solemnity, "I brung this dollar hyar fur
+you-uns."
+
+"What air ye layin' off fur me ter do?" asked Ike.
+
+The man grew abruptly grave. "Jes' stable this hyar critter fur a night
+an' day."
+
+For the first time Ike became aware of a horse's flank, dimly seen on
+the other side of the boulder.
+
+"Ter-morrer night ride him up ter my house on the mounting. Ye hev hearn
+tell o' me, hain't ye, Jedge? My name's Grig Beemy. Don't kem till
+night, 'kase I won't be thar till then. I hev got ter stop
+yander--yander"--he looked about uncertainly, "yander ter the sawmill
+till then, 'kase I promised ter holp work thar some. I'll gin ye the
+dollar now," he added liberally, as an extra inducement.
+
+"I'll be powerful glad ter do that thar job fur a dollar," said Ike,
+thinking, with a glow of self-gratulation, of the corn which he had
+raised in his scanty leisure on his own little patch of ground, and
+which he might use to feed the animal.
+
+"But hold yer jaw 'bout'n it, boy. Yer stepdad wouldn't let the beastis
+stay thar a minute ef he knowed it, 'kase--waal--'kase me an' him hev
+hed words. Slip the beastis in on the sly. Pearce Tallam don't feed an'
+tend ter his critters nohow. I hev hearn ez his boys do that job, so he
+ain't like ter find it out. On the sly--that's the trade."
+
+Ike hesitated.
+
+Once more the man teetered on one foot, and held out the coin
+temptingly. But Ike's better instincts came to his aid.
+
+"That barn b'longs ter Pearce Tallam. I puts nuthin' thar 'thout his
+knowin' it. I ain't a fox, nur a mink, nur su'thin wild, ter go skulkin'
+'bout on the sly."
+
+Then he pressed hastily on out of temptation's way.
+
+"Haw! haw! haw!" laughed the man in the mist.
+
+There was no mirth in the tones now; his laugh was a bitter gibe. As it
+followed Ike, it reminded him that the man had not yet moved from beside
+the boulder, or he would have heard the thud of the horse's hoofs.
+
+He turned and glanced back. The opaque white mist was dense about him,
+and he could see nothing. As he stood still, he heard a muttered oath,
+and after a time the man cleared his throat in a rasping fashion, as if
+the oath had stuck in it.
+
+Ike understood at last. The man was waiting for somebody. And this was
+strange, here in the thick fog on the bleak mountainside. But Ike said
+to himself that it was no concern of his, and plodded steadily on, till
+he reached a dark little log house, above which towered a flaring yellow
+hickory tree.
+
+Within, ranged on benches, were homespun-clad mountain children. A
+high-shouldered, elderly man sat at a table near the deep fireplace,
+where a huge backlog was smouldering. Through the cobwebbed window-panes
+the mists looked in.
+
+Ike did not speak as he stood on the threshold, but his greedy glance at
+the scholars' books enlightened the pedagogue. "Do you want to come to
+school?" he asked.
+
+Then the boy's long-cherished grievance burst forth. "They hev tole me
+ez how it air agin the law, bein' ez I lives out'n the _dee_stric'."
+
+The teacher elevated his grizzled eyebrows, and Ike said, "I kem hyar
+ter ax ye ef that be a true word. I 'lowed ez mebbe my dad tole me that
+word jes' ter hender me, an' keep me at the forge. It riles me powerful
+ter hev ter be an ignorunt all my days."
+
+To a stranger, this reflection on his "dad" seemed unbecoming. The
+teacher's sympathy ebbed. He looked severely at the boy's pale, anxious
+face, as he coldly said that he could teach no pupils who resided
+outside his school district, except out of regular school hours, and
+with a charge for tuition.
+
+Ike Hooden had no money. He nodded suddenly in farewell, the door
+closed, and when the schoolmaster, in returning compassion, opened it
+after him, and peered out into the impenetrable mist, the boy was
+nowhere to be seen. He had taken his despair by the hand, and together
+they went down, down into the depths of Poor Valley.
+
+He stood so sorely in need of a little kindness that he felt grateful
+for the friendly aspect of his stepbrother, whom he met just before he
+reached the shop.
+
+"'Pears like ye air toler'ble late a-gittin' home, Ike," said Jube. "I
+done ye the favior ter feed the critters. I 'lowed ez ye would do ez
+much fur me some day. I'll feed 'em agin in the mornin', ef ye'll forge
+me three lenks ter my trace-chain ter-night, arter dad hev gone home."
+
+Now this broad-faced, sandy-haired, undersized boy, who was two or three
+years younger than Ike, and not strong enough for work at the anvil, was
+a great tactician. It was his habit, in doing a favor, rigorously to
+exact a set-off, and that night when the blacksmith had left the shop,
+Jube slouched in.
+
+The flare of the forge-fire illumined with a fitful flicker the dark
+interior, showing the rod across the corner with its jingling weight of
+horseshoes, a ploughshare on the ground, the barrel of water, the low
+window, and casting upon the wall a grotesque shadow of Jube's dodging
+figure as he began to ply the bellows.
+
+Presently he left off, the panting roar ceased, the hot iron was laid on
+the anvil, and his dodging image on the wall was replaced by an immense
+shadow of Ike's big right arm as he raised it. The blows fell fast; the
+sparks showered about. All the air was ajar with the resonant clamor of
+the hammer, and the anvil sang and sang, shrill and clear. When the iron
+was hammered cold, Jube broke the momentary silence.
+
+"I hev got," he droned, as if he were reciting something made familiar
+by repetition, "two roosters, 'leven hens, an' three pullets."
+
+There was a long pause, and then he chanted, "One o' the roosters air a
+Dominicky."
+
+He walked over to the anvil and struck it with a small bit of metal
+which he held concealed in his hand.
+
+"I hev got two shoats, a bag o' dried peaches, two geese, an' I'm
+tradin' with mam fur a gayn-der."
+
+He quietly slipped the small bit of shining metal in his pocket.
+
+"I hev got," he droned, waxing very impressive, "a red heifer."
+
+Ike paused meditatively, his hammer in his hand. A new hope was dawning
+within him. He knew what was meant by Jube, who often recited the list
+of his possessions, seeking to rouse enough envy to induce Ike to
+exchange for the "lay out" his interest in a certain gray mare.
+
+Now the mare really belonged to Ike, having come to him from his
+paternal grandfather. This was all of value that the old man had left;
+for the deserted log hut, rotting on another bleak waste farther down in
+Poor Valley, was worth only a sigh for the home that it once
+was,--worth, too, perhaps, the thanks of those it sheltered now, the rat
+and the owl.
+
+The mare had worked for Pearce Tallam in the plough, under the saddle,
+and in the wagon all the years since. But one day, when the boy fell
+into a rage,--for he, too, had a difficult temper,--and declared that
+he would sell her and go forth from Poor Valley never to return, he was
+met by the question, "Hain't the mare lived off'n my fields, an' hain't
+I gin ye yer grub, an' clothes, an' the roof that kivers ye?"
+
+Thus Pearce Tallam had disputed his right to sell the mare. But it had
+more than once occurred to him that the blacksmith would not object to
+Jube's buying her.
+
+Hitherto Ike had not coveted Jube's variegated possessions. But now he
+wanted money for schooling. It was true he could hardly turn these into
+cash, for in this region farm produce of every description is received
+at the country stores in exchange for powder, salt, and similar
+necessities, and thus there is little need for money, and very little is
+in circulation.
+
+Still, Ike reflected that he might now and then get a small sum at the
+store, or perhaps the schoolmaster might barter "l'arnin'" for the
+heifer or the shoats.
+
+His hesitation was not lost upon Jube, who offered a culminating
+inducement to clinch the trade. He suddenly stood erect, teetered
+fantastically on one foot, as if about to begin to dance, and held out a
+glittering silver dollar.
+
+The hammer fell from Ike's hands upon the anvil. "'Twar ye ez Grig
+Beemy war a-waitin' fur thar on the mounting in the mist!" he cried out,
+recognizing the man's odd gesture, which Jube had unconsciously
+imitated.
+
+Doubtless the dollar was offered to Jube afterward, exactly as it had
+been offered to him. And Jube had taken it. The imitative monkey thrust
+it hastily into his pocket, and came down from his fantastic toe, and
+stood soberly enough on his two feet.
+
+"Grig Beemy gin ye that thar dollar," said Ike.
+
+Jube sullenly denied it. "He never, now!"
+
+"His critter hev got no call ter be in dad's barn."
+
+"His critter ain't hyar," protested Jube. "This dollar war gin me in
+trade ter the settle_mint_."
+
+Ike remembered the queer gesture. How could Jube have repeated it if he
+had not seen it? He broke into a sarcastic laugh.
+
+"That's how kem ye war so powerful 'commodatin' ez ter feed the
+critters. Ye 'lowed ez I wouldn't see the strange beastis, an' then tell
+dad. Foolin' me war a part o' yer trade, I reckon."
+
+Jube made no reply.
+
+"Ef ye war ez big ez me, or bigger, I'd thrash ye out'n yer boots fur
+this trick. Ye don't want no lenks ter yer chain. Ye jes' want ter be
+sure o' keepin' me out'n the barn. Waal--thar air yer lenks."
+
+He caught up the tongs and held the links in the fire with one hand
+while he worked the bellows with the other. Then he laid them red-hot
+upon the anvil. His rapid blows crushed them to a shapeless mass. "And
+now--thar they ain't."
+
+Jube did not linger long. He was in terror lest Ike should tell his
+father. But Ike did not think this was his duty. In fact, neither boy
+imagined that the affair involved anything more serious than stabling a
+horse without the knowledge of the owner of the shelter.
+
+When Ike was alone a little later, an unaccustomed sound caused him to
+glance toward the window.
+
+Something outside was passing it. His position was such that he could
+not see the object itself, but upon the perpendicular gray wall of the
+crag close at hand, and distinctly defined in the yellow flare that
+flickered out through the window from the fire of the forge, the
+gigantic shadow of a horse's head glided by.
+
+He understood in an instant that Jube had slipped the animal out of the
+barn, and was hiding him in the misty woods, expecting that Ike would
+acquaint his father with the facts. He had so managed that these facts
+would seem lies, if Pearce Tallam should examine the premises and find
+no horse there.
+
+All the next day the white mist clung shroud-like to Poor Valley. The
+shadows of evening were sifting through it, when Ike's mother went to
+the shop, much perturbed because the cow had not come, and she could not
+find Jube to send after her.
+
+"Ike kin go, I reckon," said the blacksmith.
+
+So Ike mounted his mare and set out through the thick white vapor. He
+had divined the cause of Jube's absence, and experienced no surprise
+when on the summit of the mountain he overtook him, riding the strange
+horse, on his way to Beemy's house.
+
+"I s'pose that critter air yourn, an' ye mus' hev bought him fur a pound
+o' dried peaches, or sech, up thar ter the settle_mint_," sneered Ike.
+
+Jube was about to reply, but he glanced back into the dense mist with a
+changing expression.
+
+"Hesh up!" he said softly. "What's that?"
+
+It was the regular beat of horses' hoofs, coming at a fair pace along
+the road on the summit of the mountain. The riders were talking
+excitedly.
+
+"I tell ye, ef I could git a glimpse o' the man ez stole that thar
+horse, it would go powerful hard with me not to let daylight through
+him. I brung this hyar shootin'-iron along o' purpose. Waal, waal,
+though, seein' ez ye air the sheriff, I'll hev ter leave it be ez
+you-uns say. I wouldn't know the man from Adam; but ye can't miss the
+critter,--big chestnut, with a star in his forehead, an'"--
+
+Something strange had happened. At the sound of the voice the horse
+pricked up his ears, turned short round in the road, and neighed
+joyfully.
+
+The boys looked at each other with white faces. They understood at last.
+Jube was mounted on a stolen horse within a hundred yards of the
+pursuing owner and the officers of the law. Could explanations--words,
+mere words--clear him in the teeth of this fact?
+
+"Drap out'n the saddle, turn the critter loose in the road, an' take ter
+the woods," urged Ike.
+
+"They'll sarch an' ketch me," quavered Jube.
+
+He was frantic at the idea of being captured on the horse's back, but if
+it should come to a race, he preferred trusting to the chestnut's four
+legs rather than to his own two.
+
+Ike hesitated. Jube had brought the difficulty all on himself, and
+surely it was not incumbent on Ike to share the danger. But he was
+swayed by a sudden uncontrollable impulse.
+
+"Drap off'n the critter, turn him loose, an' I'll lope down the road a
+piece, an' they'll foller me, in the mist."
+
+He might have done a wiser thing. But it was a tough problem at best,
+and he had only a moment in which to decide.
+
+In that swift, confused second he saw Jube slide from the saddle and
+disappear in the mist as if he had been caught up in the clouds. He
+heard the horse's hoofs striking against the stones as he trotted off,
+whinnying, to meet his master. There was a momentary clamor among the
+men, and then with whip and spur they pressed on to capture the supposed
+malefactor.
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+All at once it occurred to Ike, as he galloped down the road, that when
+they overtook him, they would think that he was the thief, and that he
+had been leading the horse. He had been so strong in his own innocence
+that the possibility that they might suspect him had not before entered
+his mind.
+
+He had intended only to divert the pursuit from Jube, who, although free
+from any great wrong-doing, was exposed to the most serious
+misconstruction. The knowledge of the pursuers' revolvers had made this
+a hard thing to do, but otherwise he had not thought of himself, nor of
+what he should say when overtaken.
+
+They would question him; he must answer. Would they believe his story?
+Could he support it? Grig Beemy of course would deny it. And Jube--had
+he not known how Jube could lie? Would he not fear that the truth might
+somehow involve him with the horse-thief?
+
+Ike, with despair in his heart, urged his mare to her utmost speed,
+knowing now the danger he was in as a suspected horse-thief. Suddenly,
+from among his pursuers, a tiny jet of flame flared out into the dense
+gray atmosphere, something whizzed through the branches of the trees
+above his head, and a sharp report jarred the mists.
+
+Perhaps the officer fired into the air, merely to intimidate the
+supposed criminal and induce him to surrender. But now the boy could not
+stop. He had lost control of the mare. Frightened beyond measure by the
+report of the pistol, she was in full run.
+
+On she dashed, down sharp declivities, up steep ascents, and then away
+and away, with a great burst of speed, along a level sandy stretch.
+
+The black night was falling like a pall upon the white, shrouded day.
+Ike knew less where he was than the mare did; he was trusting to her
+instinct to carry him to her stable. More than once the low branches of
+a tree struck him, almost tearing him from the saddle, but he clung
+frantically to the mane of the frightened animal, and on and on she
+swept, with the horsemen thundering behind.
+
+He could hear nothing but their heavy, continuous tramp. He could see
+nothing, until suddenly a dim, pure light was shining in front of him,
+on his own level, it seemed. He stared at it with starting eyeballs. It
+cleft the vapors,--they were falling away on either side,--and they
+reflected it with an illusive, pearly shimmer.
+
+In another moment he knew that he was nearing the abrupt precipice, for
+that was the moon, riding like a silver boat upon a sea of mist, with a
+glittering wake behind it, beyond the sharply serrated summit line of
+the eastern hills.
+
+He could no longer trust to the mare's instinct. He trusted to
+appearances instead. He sawed away with all his might on the bit,
+striving to wheel her around in the road.
+
+She resisted, stumbled, then fell upon her knees among a wild confusion
+of rotting logs and stones that rolled beneath her, as, snorting and
+angry, she struggled again to her feet. Once more Ike pulled her to the
+left.
+
+There was a great displacement of earth, a frantic scramble, and
+together they went over the cliff.
+
+The descent was not absolutely sheer. At the distance of twelve or
+fourteen feet below, a great bulging shelf of rock projected. They fell
+upon this. The boy had instantly loosed his hold of the reins, and
+slipped away from the prostrate animal. The mare, quieted only for a
+moment by the shock, sprang to her feet, the stones slipped beneath her,
+and she went headlong over the precipice into the dreary depths of Poor
+Valley.
+
+The pursuers heard the heavy thud when she struck the ground far below.
+They paused at the verge of the crag, and talked in eager, excited
+tones. They did not see the boy, as he sat cowering close to the cliff
+on the ledge below.
+
+Ike listened in great trepidation to what they were saying; he
+experienced infinite surprise when presently one of them mentioned Grig
+Beemy's name.
+
+[Illustration: TOGETHER THEY WENT OVER THE CLIFF]
+
+So they knew who had stolen the horse! It was little consolation to Ike,
+with his mare lying dead at the foot of the cliff, to reflect that if he
+had had the courage to face the emergency, and rely upon his innocence,
+his story would only have confirmed their knowledge of the facts.
+
+Although the master of the horse did not know the thief "from Adam,"
+Beemy had been seen with the animal and recognized by others, who,
+accompanying the sheriff and the owner, had traced him for two days
+through many wily doublings in the mountain fastnesses.
+
+They now concluded to press on to Beemy's house. Ike knew they would
+find him there waiting for Jube and the horse. Beemy had feared that he
+would be followed, and this was the reason that he had desired to rid
+himself of the animal for a day and night, until he could make sure and
+feel more secure.
+
+As the horsemen swept round the curve, Ike remembered how close was the
+road to the cliff. If he had only given the mare her head, she would
+have carried him safely around it. But there she lay dead, way down in
+Poor Valley, and he had lost all he owned in the world.
+
+Night had come, and in the dense darkness he did not dare to move. Only
+a step away was the edge of the precipice, over which the mare had
+slipped, and he could not tell how dangerous was the bluff he must climb
+to regain the summit. He felt he must lie here till dawn.
+
+He was badly jarred by his fall. Time dragged by wearily, and his
+bruises pained him. He knew at length that all the world slept,--all but
+himself and some distant ravening wolf, whose fierce howl ever and anon
+set the mists to shivering in Poor Valley where he prowled. This
+blood-curdling sound and his bitter thoughts were but sorry company.
+
+After a long time he fell asleep. Fortunately, he did not stir. When he
+regained consciousness and a sense of danger, he found still around him
+that dense white vapor, through which the pale, drear day was slowly
+dawning. Above his head was swinging in the mist a cluster of
+fox-grapes, with the rime upon them, and higher still he saw a quivering
+red leaf.
+
+It was the leaf of a starveling tree, growing out of a cleft where there
+was so little earth that it seemed to draw its sustenance from the rock.
+It was a scraggy, stunted thing, but it was well for him that it had
+struck root there, for its branches brushed the solid, smooth face of
+the cliff, which he could not have surmounted but for them and the
+grape-vine that had fallen over from the summit and entangled itself
+among them.
+
+As he climbed the tree, he felt it quake over the abysses, which the
+mists still veiled. He had a sense of elation and achievement when he
+gained the top, and it followed him home. There it suddenly deserted
+him.
+
+He found Pearce Tallam in a frenzy of rage at the discovery, which he
+had made through Jube's confession, that a stolen horse had been stabled
+on his premises. Despite his tyranny and his fierce, rude temper, he
+was an honest man and of fair repute. Although he realized that neither
+boy knew that the animal had been stolen, he gave Jube a lesson which he
+remembered for many a long day, and Ike also came in for his share of
+this muscular tuition.
+
+For in the midst of the criminations and recriminations, the violent
+blacksmith caught up a horseshoe and flung it across the shop, striking
+Ike with a force that almost stunned him. He was a man in strength, and
+it was hard for him not to return the blow; but he only walked out of
+the shop, declaring that he would stay for no more blows.
+
+"Cl'ar out, then!" called out Pearce Tallam after him. "I don't keer ef
+ye goes fur good."
+
+He met, at the door of the dwelling, a plaintive reproach from his
+mother. "'Count o' ye not tellin' on Jube, he mought hev been tuk up fur
+a horse-thief. I dunno what I'd hev done 'thout him," she added, "'long
+o' raisin' the young tur-r-keys, an' goslin's, an' deedies, an' sech; he
+hev been a mighty holp ter me. He air more of a son ter me than my own
+boy."
+
+She did not mean this, but she had said it once half in jest, half in
+reproach, and then it became a formula of complaint whenever Ike
+displeased her.
+
+Now he was sore and sensitive. "Take him fur yer son, then!" he cried.
+"I'm a-goin' out'n Pore Valley, ef I starves fur it. I shows my face
+hyar no more."
+
+As he shouldered his gun and strode out, he noted the light of the
+forge-fire quivering on the mist, but he little thought it was the last
+fire that Pearce Tallam would ever kindle there.
+
+He glanced back again before the dense vapor shut the house from view.
+His mother was standing in the door, with her baby in her arms, looking
+after him with a frightened, beseeching face. But his heart was hardened
+and he kept on,--kept on, with that deft, even tread of the mountaineer,
+who seems never to hurry, almost to loiter, but gets over the ground
+with surprising rapidity.
+
+He left the mists and desolation of Poor Valley far behind, but not that
+frightened, beseeching face. He thought of it more often when he lay
+down under the shelter of a great rock to sleep than he did of the howl
+of the wolf which he had heard the night before, not far from here.
+
+Late the next afternoon he came upon the outskirts of a village. He
+entered it doubtfully, for it seemed metropolitan to him, unaccustomed
+as he was to anything more imposing than the cross-roads store. But the
+first sound he heard reassured him. It was the clear, metallic resonance
+of an anvil, the clanking of a sledge, and the clinking of a
+hand-hammer.
+
+Here, at the forge, he found work. It had been said in Poor Valley that
+he was already as good a blacksmith even as Pearce Tallam. He had great
+natural aptitude for the work, and considerable experience. But his
+wages only sufficed to pay for his food and lodging. Still, there was a
+prospect for more, and he was content.
+
+In his leisure he made friends among those of his own age, who took him
+about the town and enjoyed his amazement. He examined everything wrought
+in metal with such eager interest, and was so outspoken about his
+ambition, that they dubbed him Tubal-cain.
+
+He was struck dumb with amazement when, for the first time in his life,
+he saw a locomotive gliding along the rails, with a glaring headlight
+and a cloud of flying sparks. Once, when it was motionless on the track,
+they talked to the engineer, who explained "the workings of the
+critter," as Ike called it.
+
+The boy understood so readily that the engineer said, after a time,
+"You're a likely feller, for such a derned ignoramus! Where have you
+been hid out, all this time?"
+
+"Way down in Pore Valley," said Ike very humbly.
+
+"He's concluded to be a great inventor," said one of his young friends,
+with a merry wink.
+
+"He's a mighty artificer in iron," said the wit who had named him
+Tubal-cain.
+
+The engineer looked gravely at Ike. "Why, boy," he admonished him, "the
+world has got a hundred years the start of you!"
+
+"I kin ketch up," Ike declared sturdily.
+
+"There's something in grit, I reckon," said the engineer. Then his
+wonderful locomotive glided away, leaving Ike staring after it in silent
+ecstasy, and his companions dying with laughter.
+
+He started out to overtake the world at a night-school, where his mental
+quickness contrasted oddly with his slow, stolid demeanor. He worked
+hard at the forge all day; but everybody was kind.
+
+Outside of Poor Valley life seemed joyous and hopeful; progress and
+activity were on every hand; and the time he spent here was the happiest
+he had ever known,--except for the recollection of that frightened,
+beseeching face which had looked out after him through the closing
+mists.
+
+He wished he had turned back for a word. He wished his mother might know
+he was well and happy. He began to feel that he could go no further
+without making his peace with her. So one day he left his employer with
+the promise to return the following week, "ef the Lord spares me an'
+nuthin' happens," as the cautious rural formula has it, and set out for
+his home.
+
+The mists had lifted from it, but the snow had fallen deep. Poor Valley
+lay white and drear--it seemed to him that he had never before known how
+drear--between the grim mountain with its great black crags, its chasms,
+its gaunt, naked trees, and the long line of flinty hills, whose stunted
+pines bent with the weight of the snow.
+
+There was no smoke from the chimney of the blacksmith's shop. There were
+no footprints about the door. An atmosphere charged with calamity seemed
+to hang over the dwelling. Somehow he knew that a dreadful thing had
+happened even before he opened the door and saw his mother's mournful
+white face.
+
+She sprang up at the sight of him with a wild, sobbing cry that was half
+grief, half joy. He had only a glimpse of the interior,--of Jube,
+looking anxious and unnaturally grave; of the listless children, grouped
+about the fire; of the big, burly blacksmith, with a strange, deep
+pallor upon his face, and as he shifted his position--why, how was that?
+
+The boy's mother had thrust him out of the door, and closed it behind
+her. The jar brought down from the low eaves a few feathery flakes of
+snow, which fell upon her hair as she stood there with him.
+
+"Don't say nuthin' 'bout'n it," she implored. "He can't abide ter hear
+it spoke of."
+
+"What ails dad's hand?" he asked, bewildered.
+
+"It's gone!" she sobbed. "He war over ter the sawmill the day ye
+lef'--somehow 'nuther the saw cotched it--the doctor tuk it off."
+
+"His right hand!" cried Ike, appalled.
+
+The blacksmith would never lift a hammer again. And there the forge
+stood, silent and smokeless.
+
+What this portended, Ike realized as he sat with them around the fire.
+Their sterile fields in Poor Valley had only served to eke out their
+subsistence. This year the corn-crop had failed, and the wheat was
+hardly better. The winter had found them without special provision, but
+without special anxiety, for the anvil had always amply supplied their
+simple needs.
+
+Now that this misfortune had befallen them, who could say what was
+before them unless Ike would remain and take his stepfather's place at
+the forge? Ike knew that this contingency must have occurred to them as
+well as to him. He divined it from the anxious, furtive glances which
+they one and all cast upon him from time to time,--even Pearce Tallam,
+whose turn it was now to feel that greatest anguish of calamity,
+helplessness.
+
+But must he relinquish his hopes, his chance of an education, that
+plucky race for which he was entered to overtake the world that had a
+hundred years the start of him, and be forever a nameless, futureless
+clod in Poor Valley?
+
+His mother had the son she had chosen. And surely he owed no duty to
+Pearce Tallam. The hand that was gone had been a hard hand to him.
+
+He rose at length. He put on his leather apron. "Waal--I mought ez well
+g' long ter the shop, I reckon," he remarked calmly. "'Pears like thar's
+time yit fur a toler'ble spot o' work afore dark."
+
+It was a hard-won victory. Even then he experienced a sort of
+satisfaction in knowing that Pearce Tallam must feel humiliated and of
+small account to be thus utterly dependent for his bread upon the boy
+whom he had so persistently maltreated. In his pale face Ike saw
+something of the bitterness he had endured, of his broken spirit, of his
+humbled pride.
+
+The look smote upon the boy's heart. There was another inward struggle.
+Then he said, as if it were a result of deep cogitation,--
+
+"Ye'll hev ter kem over ter the shop, dad, wunst in a while, ter advise
+'bout what's doin'. 'Pears ter me like mos' folks would 'low ez a boy
+no older 'n me couldn't do reg'lar blacksmithin' 'thout some sperienced
+body along fur sense an' showin'."
+
+The man visibly plucked up a little. Was he, indeed, so useless? "That's
+a fac', Ike," he said gently. "I reckon ye kin make out
+toler'ble--cornsiderin'. But I'll be along ter holp."
+
+After this Ike realized that he had been working with something tougher
+than iron, harder than steel,--his own unsubdued nature. He traced an
+analogy from the forge; and he saw that those strong forces, the fires
+of conscience and the coercion of duty, had wrought the stubborn metal
+of his character to a kindly use.
+
+Gradually the relinquishment of his wild, vague ambition began to seem
+less bitter to him; for it might be that these were the few things over
+which he should be faithful,--his own forge-fire and his own fiery
+heart. And so he labors to fulfill his trust.
+
+The spring never comes to Poor Valley. The summer is a cloud of dust.
+The autumn shrouds itself in mist. And the winter is snow. But poverty
+of soil need not imply poverty of soul. And a noble manhood may nobly
+exist "'Way Down in Poor Valley."
+
+
+
+
+A MOUNTAIN STORM
+
+
+"Ef the filly war bridle-wise"--
+
+"The filly _air_ bridle-wise."
+
+A sullen pause ensued, and the two brothers looked angrily at each
+other.
+
+The woods were still; the sunshine was faint and flickering; the low,
+guttural notes of a rain-crow broke suddenly on the silence.
+
+Presently Thad, mechanically examining a bridle which he held in his
+hand, began again in an appealing tone: "'Pears like ter me ez the filly
+air toler'ble well bruk ter the saddle, an' she would holp me powerful
+ter git thar quicker ter tell dad 'bout'n that thar word ez war fotched
+up the mounting. They 'lowed ez 'twar jes' las' night ez them revenue
+men raided a still-house, somewhar down thar in the valley, an' busted
+the tubs, an' sp'iled the coppers, an' arrested all the moonshiners ez
+war thar. An' ef they war ter find out 'bout'n this hyar still-house
+over yander in the gorge, they'd raid it, too. An' thar be dad," he
+continued despairingly, "jes' sodden with whiskey an' ez drunk ez a
+fraish b'iled ow_el_, an' he wouldn't hev the sense nor the showin' ter
+make them off'cers onderstand ez he never hed nothin' ter do with the
+moonshiners--'ceptin' ter go ter thar still-house, an' git drunk along
+o' them. An' I dunno whether the off'cers would set much store by that
+sayin' ennyhow, an' I want ter git dad away from thar afore they kem."
+
+"I don't believe that thar word ez them men air a-raidin' round the
+mountings no more 'n _that_!" and Ben kicked away a pebble
+contemptuously.
+
+Thad was in a quiver of anxiety. While Ben indulged his doubts, the
+paternal "B'iled Ow_el_" might at any moment be arrested on a charge of
+aiding and abetting in illicit distilling.
+
+"Ye never b'lieve nothin' till ye see it--ye sateful dunce!" he
+exclaimed excitedly.
+
+Thus began a fraternal quarrel which neither forgot for years.
+
+Ben turned scarlet. "Waal, then, jes' leave my filly in the barn whar
+she be now; ye kin travel on Shank's mare!"
+
+Thad started off up the steep slope. "Ef ye ain't a-hankerin' fur me ter
+ride that thar filly, ez air ez bridle-wise ez ye be, jes' let's see ye
+kem on, an'--hender!"
+
+"I hopes she'll fling ye, an' ye'll git yer neck bruk," Ben called out
+after him.
+
+"I wish ennything 'ud happen, jes' so be I mought never lay eyes on ye
+agin," Thad declared.
+
+As he glanced over his shoulder, he saw that his brother was not
+following, and when he reached the flimsy little barn, there was nothing
+to prevent him from carrying out his resolution.
+
+Nevertheless, he hesitated as he stood with the door in his hand. A
+clay-bank filly came instantly to it, but with a sudden impulse he
+closed it abruptly, and set out on foot along a narrow, brambly path
+that wound down the mountain side.
+
+He had descended almost to its base before the threatening appearance of
+the sky caught his attention. A dense black cloud had climbed up from
+over the opposite hills, and stretched from their jagged summits to the
+zenith. There it hung in mid-air, its sombre shadow falling across the
+valley, and reaching high up the craggy slope, where the boy's home was
+perched. The whole landscape wore that strange, still, expectant aspect
+which precedes the bursting of a storm.
+
+Suddenly a vivid white flash quivered through the sky. The hills,
+suffused with its ghastly light, started up in bold relief against the
+black clouds; even the faint outlines of distant ranges that had
+disappeared with the strong sunlight reasserted themselves in a pale,
+illusive fashion, flickering like the unreal mountains of a dream about
+the vague horizon. A ball of fire had coursed through the air, striking
+with dazzling coruscations the top of a towering oak, and he heard,
+amidst the thunder and its clamorous echo, the sharp crash of riving
+timber.
+
+All at once he had a sense of falling, a sudden pain shot through him,
+darkness descended, and he knew no more.
+
+When he gradually regained consciousness, it seemed that a long time had
+elapsed since he was trudging down the mountain side. He could not
+imagine where he was now. He put out his hand in the intense darkness
+that enveloped him, and felt the damp mould beside him,--above--below.
+
+For one horrible instant he recalled a sickening story of a man who was
+negligently buried alive. He had always believed that this was only a
+fireside fiction invented in the security of the chimney corner; but was
+it to have a strange confirmation in his own fate? He was pierced with
+pity for himself, as he heard the despair in his voice when he sent
+forth a wild, hoarse cry. What a cavernous echo it had!
+
+Again and again, after his lips were closed, that voice of anguish rang
+out, and then was silent, then fitfully sounded once more on another
+key. He strove to rise, but the earth on his breast resisted. With a
+great effort he finally burst through it; he felt the clods tumbling
+about him; he sat upright; he rose to his full height; and still all was
+merged in the densest darkness, and, when he stretched up his arms as
+high as he could reach, he again felt the damp mould.
+
+The truth had begun vaguely to enter his mind even before, in shifting
+his position, he caught sight of a rift in the deep gloom, some fifteen
+feet above his head. Then he realized that at the moment of the flash of
+lightning, unmindful of his footing, he had strayed aside from the path,
+stumbled, fallen, and, as it chanced, was received into one of those
+unsuspected apertures in the ground which are common in all cavernous
+countries, being sometimes the entrance to extensive caves, and which
+are here denominated "sink-holes."
+
+These cavities were exceedingly frequent in the valley, on the boundary
+of which Thad lived, and his familiarity with them did away for the
+moment with all appreciation of the perplexity and difficulty of the
+situation. He laughed aloud triumphantly.
+
+Instantly these underground chambers broke forth with wild, elfish
+voices that mimicked his merriment till it died on his lips. He
+preferred utter loneliness to the vague sense of companionship given by
+these weird echoes. Somehow the strangeness of all that had happened to
+him had stirred his imagination, and he could not rid himself of the
+idea that there were grimacing creatures here with him, whom he could
+not see, who would only speak when he spoke, and scoffingly iterate his
+tones.
+
+He was faint, bruised, and exhausted. He had been badly stunned by his
+fall; but for the soft, shelving earth through which he had crashed, it
+might have been still worse. He could scarcely move as he began to
+investigate his precarious plight. Even if he could climb the
+perpendicular wall above his head, he could not thence gain the
+aperture, for, as his eyes became more accustomed to the darkness, he
+discovered that the shape of the roof was like the interior of a roughly
+defined dome, about the centre of which was this small opening.
+
+"An' a human can't walk on a ceilin' like a fly," he said
+discontentedly.
+
+"Can't!" cried an echo close at hand.
+
+"Fly!" suggested a distant mocker.
+
+Thad closed his mouth and sat down.
+
+He had moved very cautiously, for he knew that these sink-holes are
+often the entrance of extensive caverns, and that there might be a deep
+abyss on any side. He could do nothing but wait and call out now and
+then, and hope that somebody might soon take the short cut through the
+woods, and, hearing his voice, come to his relief.
+
+His courage gave way when he reflected that the river would rise with
+the heavy rain which he could hear steadily splashing through the
+sink-hole, and for a time all prudent men would go by the beaten road
+and the ford. No one would care to take the short cut and save three
+miles' travel at the risk of swimming his horse, for the river was
+particularly deep just here and spanned only by a footbridge, except,
+perhaps, some fugitive from justice, or the revenue officers on their
+hurried, reckless raids. This reminded him of the still-house and of
+"dad" there yet, imbibing whiskey, and sharing the danger of his chosen
+cronies, the moonshiners.
+
+Ben, at home, would not have his anxiety roused till midnight, at least,
+by his brother's failure to return from the complicated feat of decoying
+the drunkard from the distillery. Thad trembled to think what might
+happen to himself in the interval. If the volume of water pouring down
+through the sink-hole should increase to any considerable extent, he
+would be drowned here like a rat. Was he to have his wish, and see his
+brother never again?
+
+And poor Ben! How his own cruel, wicked parting words would scourge him
+throughout his life,--even when he should grow old!
+
+Thad's eyes filled with tears of prescient pity for his brother's
+remorse.
+
+"Ef ennything war ter happen hyar, sure enough, I wish he mought always
+know ez I don't keer nothin' now 'bout'n that thar sayin' o' his'n," he
+thought wistfully.
+
+He still heard the persistent rain splashing outside. The hollow,
+unnatural murmur of a subterranean stream rose drearily. Once he sighed
+heavily, and all the cavernous voices echoed his grief.
+
+When that terrible flash of lightning came, Ben was still on the slope
+of the mountain where his brother had left him. The next moment he heard
+the wild whirl of the gusts as they came surging up the valley. He saw
+the frantic commotion of the woods on distant spurs as the wind
+advanced, preceded by swirling columns of dust which carried myriads of
+leaves, twigs, and even great branches rent from the trees, as evidence
+of its force.
+
+Ben turned, and ran like a deer up the steep ascent. "It'll blow
+that thar barn spang off'n the bluff, I'm thinkin'--an' the
+filly--Cobe--Cobe!" he cried out to her as he neared the shanty.
+
+He stopped short, his eyes distended. The door was open. There was no
+hair nor hoof of the filly within. He could have no doubt that his
+brother had actually taken his property for this errand against his
+will.
+
+"That thar boy air no better 'n a low-down horse-thief!" he declared
+bitterly.
+
+The gusts struck the little barn. It careened this way and that, and
+finally the flimsy structure came down with a crash, one of the boards
+narrowly missing Ben's head as it fell. He had a hard time getting to
+the house in the teeth of the wind, but its violence only continued a
+few minutes, and when he was safe within doors he looked out of the
+window at the silent mists, beginning to steal about the coves and
+ravines, and at the rain as it fell in serried columns. Long after dark
+it still beat with unabated persistence on the roof of the log cabin,
+and splashed and dripped with a chilly, cheerless sound from the low
+eaves. Sometimes a drop fell down the wide chimney, and hissed upon the
+red-hot coals, for Ben had piled on the logs and made a famous fire. He
+could see that his mother now and then paused to listen in the midst of
+her preparations for supper. Once as she knelt on the hearth, and
+deftly inserted a knife between the edges of a baking corn-cake and the
+hoe, she looked up suddenly at Ben without turning the cake. "I hearn
+the beastis's huff!" she said.
+
+Ben listened. The fire roared. The rain went moaning down the valley.
+
+"Ye never hearn nothin'," he rejoined.
+
+Nevertheless, she rose and opened the door. The cold air streamed in.
+The firelight showed the mists, pressing close in the porch,
+shivering, and seeming to jostle and nudge each other as they peered in,
+curiously, upon the warm home-scene, and the smoking supper, and the
+hilarious children, as if asking of one another how they would like to
+be human creatures, instead of a part of inanimate nature, or at best
+the elusive spirits of the mountains.
+
+There was nothing to be seen without but the mists.
+
+"Thad tuk the filly, ye say fur true?" she asked, recurring to the
+subject when supper was over.
+
+Ben nodded. "I hopes ter conscience she'll break his neck," he declared
+cruelly.
+
+His mother took instant alarm. She turned and looked at him with a face
+expressive of the keenest anxiety. "'Pears like to me ez the only reason
+Thad kin be so late a-gittin' back air jes' 'kase it air a toler'ble
+aggervatin' job a-fotchin' of dad home," she said, striving to reassure
+herself.
+
+"That air a true word 'bout'n dad, ennyhow," Ben assented bitterly.
+
+His old grandfather suddenly lifted up his voice.
+
+"This night," said the graybeard from out the chimney corner,--"this
+night, forty years ago, my brother, Ephraim Grimes, fell dead on this
+cabin floor, an' no man sence kin mark the cause."
+
+A pause ensued. The rain fell. The pallid, shuddering mists looked in at
+the window.
+
+"Ye ain't a-thinkin'," cried the woman tremulously, "ez the night air
+one app'inted fur evil?"
+
+The old man did not answer.
+
+"This night," he croaked, leaning over the glowing fire, and kindling
+his long-stemmed cob-pipe by dexterously scooping up with its bowl a
+live coal,--"this night, twenty-six years ago, thar war eleven sheep o'
+mine--ez war teched in the head, or somehows disabled from good
+sense--an' they jumped off'n the bluff, one arter the other, an' fell
+haffen way down the mounting, an' bruk thar fool necks 'mongst the
+boulders. They war dead. Thar shearin's never kem ter much account
+nuther. 'Twar powerful cur'ous, fust an' last."
+
+The woman made a gesture of indifference. "I ain't a-settin' of store by
+critters when humans is--is--whar they ain't hearn from."
+
+But Ben was susceptible of a "critter" scare.
+
+"I hope, now," he exclaimed, alarmed, "ez that thar triflin' no-'count
+Thad Grimes ain't a-goin' ter let my filly lame herself, nor nothin',
+a-travelin' with her this dark night, ez seems ter be a night fur things
+ter happen on ennyhow. Oh, shucks! shucks!" he continued impatiently,
+"I jes' feels like thar ain't no use o' my tryin' ter live along."
+
+Three of the children who habitually slept in the shed-room had started
+off to go to bed. As they opened the connecting door, there suddenly
+resounded a wild commotion within. They shrieked with fright, and banged
+the door against a strong force which was beginning to push from the
+other side.
+
+The old grandfather rose, pale and agitated, his pipe falling from his
+nerveless clasp.
+
+"This night," he said, with white lips and mechanical utterance,--"this
+night"--
+
+"Satan is in the shed-room!" shouted the three small boys, as they held
+fast to the door with a strength far beyond their age and weight.
+Nevertheless, they were hardly able to cope with the strength on the
+other side of the door, and it was alternately forced slightly ajar, and
+then closed with a resounding slam. Once, as the firelight flickered
+into the dark shed-room, the ignorant, superstitious mountaineers had a
+fleeting glimpse of an object there which convinced them: they beheld
+great gleaming, blazing eyes, a burnished hoof, and--yes--a flirting
+tail.
+
+"I believe it is Satan himself!" cried Ben, with awe in his voice.
+
+In the wild confusion and bewilderment, Ben was somehow vaguely aware
+that Satan had often been in the shed-room before,--in the antechamber
+of his own heart. Whenever this heart of his was full of unkindness, and
+hardened against his brother, although those better fraternal instincts
+which he kept repressed and dwarfed might repudiate this cruelty under
+the pretext that he did not really mean it, still the great principle of
+evil was there in the moral shed-room, clamoring for entrance at the
+inner doors. And this, we may safely say, may apply to wiser people than
+poor Ben.
+
+In the midst of the general despair and fright, something suddenly
+whinnied. At the sound the three small boys fell in a limp, exhausted
+heap on the floor, and, as the door no longer offered resistance, the
+unknown visitor pranced in: it was the filly, snorting and tossing her
+mane, and once more whinnying shrilly for her supper.
+
+In a moment Ben understood the whole phenomenon. Thad had left the barn
+door unfastened, and, when that terrible flash of lightning came and the
+wind arose, the frightened animal had instantly fled to the house for
+safety. She had doubtless pushed open the back door of the shed-room
+easily enough, but it had closed behind her, and she had remained there
+a supperless prisoner.
+
+The small boys picked themselves up from among the filly's hoofs, with
+disconnected exclamations of "Wa-a-a-l, sir!" while Ben led the animal
+out, with a growing impression that he would try to "live along" for a
+while, at all events.
+
+He had led Satan out of the moral shed-room, as well. The reappearance
+of the filly without Thad had raised a great anxiety about his brother's
+continued absence. All at once he began to feel as if those brutal
+wishes of his were prophetic,--as if they were endowed with a malignant
+power, and could actually pursue poor Thad to some violent end. He did
+not understand now how he could have framed the words.
+
+When a fellow really likes his brother,--and most fellows do,--there is
+scant use or grace or common-sense in keeping up, from mere
+carelessness, or through an irritable habit, a continual bickering, for
+these germs of evil are possessed of a marvelous faculty for growth, and
+some day their gigantic deformities will confront you in deeds of which
+you once believed yourself incapable.
+
+Ben's hands were trembling as he folded a blanket, and laid it on the
+animal's back to serve instead of a saddle.
+
+"I'm a-goin' ter the still-house ter see ef Thad ever got thar," he
+said, when his mother appeared at the door.
+
+He added, "I'm a-gittin' sorter skeered ez su'thin' mought hev happened
+ter him."
+
+His grandfather hobbled out into the little porch. "Them roads air
+turrible rough fur that thar filly, ez ain't fairly broke good yit, nor
+used ter travel," he suggested.
+
+"I'd gin four hunderd fillies, ef I hed 'em, jes' ter know that thar boy
+air safe an' sound," Ben declared, as he mounted.
+
+He took the short cut, judging that, at the point where it crossed the
+river, the stream was still fordable. When he heard his brother's
+piteous cries for help, he quaked to think what might have happened to
+Thad if he had not recognized the presence of Satan in the moral
+shed-room, and summarily ejected him. The rainfall had been sufficient
+to aggregate considerable water in the gullies about the sink-hole, and
+these, emptying into the cavity and sending a continuous stream over the
+boy, had served to chill him through and through, and he had a pretty
+fair chance of being drowned, or dying from cold and exhaustion. Ben
+pressed on to the still-house at the best speed he could make, and such
+of the moonshiners as were half sober came out with ropes and a barrel,
+which they lowered into the cavity. Thad managed to crawl into the
+barrel, and, after several ineffectual attempts, he was drawn up through
+the sink-hole.
+
+There was no formal reconciliation between the two boys. It was enough
+for Ben to feel Thad's reluctance to unloose his eager clutch upon his
+brother's arms, even after he had been lifted out upon the firm ground.
+And Thad knew that that complicated sound in Ben's throat was a sob,
+although, for the sake of the men who stood by, he strove to seem to be
+coughing.
+
+"Right smart of an idjit, now, ain't ye?" demanded Ben, hustling back,
+so to speak, the tears that sought to rise in his eyes.
+
+"Waal, stranger, how's yer filly?" retorted Thad, laughing in a gaspy
+fashion.
+
+There was a tone of forgiveness in the inquiry. The answer caught the
+same spirit.
+
+"Middlin',--thanky,--jes' middlin'," said Ben.
+
+And then they and "dad" fared home together by the light of the
+moonshiners' lantern.
+
+
+
+
+BORROWING A HAMMER
+
+
+On a certain bold crag that juts far over a steep wooded mountain slope
+a red light was seen one moonless night in June. Sometimes it glowed
+intensely among the gray mists which hovered above the deep and sombre
+valley; sometimes it faded. Its life was the breath of the bellows, for
+a blacksmith's shop stands close beside the road that rambles along the
+brink of the mountain. Generally after sunset the forge is dark and
+silent. So when three small boys, approaching the log hut through the
+gloomy woods, heard the clink! clank! clink! clank! of the hammers, and
+the metallic echo among the cliffs, they stopped short in astonishment.
+
+"Thar now!" exclaimed Abner Ryder desperately; "dad's at it fur true!"
+
+"Mebbe he'll go away arter a while, Ab," suggested Jim Gryce, another
+of the small boys. "Then that'll gin us our chance."
+
+"Waal, I reckon we kin stiffen up our hearts ter wait," said Ab
+resignedly.
+
+All three sat down on a log a short distance from the shop, and
+presently they became so engrossed in their talk that they did not
+notice when the blacksmith, in the pauses of his work, came to the door
+for a breath of air. They failed to discreetly lower their voices, and
+thus they had a listener on whose attention they had not counted.
+
+"Ye see," observed Ab in a high, shrill pipe, "dad sets a heap o' store
+by his tools. But dad, ye know, air a mighty slack-twisted man. He gits
+his tools lost" (reprehensively), "he wastes his nails, an' then he
+'lows ez how it war _me_ ez done it."
+
+He paused impressively in virtuous indignation. A murmur of surprise and
+sympathy rose from his companions. Then he recommenced.
+
+"Dad air the crankiest man on this hyar mounting! He won't lend me none
+o' his tools nowadays,--not even that thar leetle hammer o' his'n. An'
+I'm obleeged ter hev that thar leetle hammer an' some nails ter fix a
+box fur them young squir'ls what we cotched. So we'll jes' hev ter go
+ter his shop of a night when he is away, an'--an'--an' borry it!"
+
+The blacksmith, a tall, powerfully built man, of an aspect far from
+jocular, leaned slightly out of the door, peering in the direction where
+the three tow-headed urchins waited. Then he glanced within at a leather
+strap, as if he appreciated the appropriateness of an intimate relation
+between these objects. But there was no time for pleasure now. He was
+back in his shop in a moment.
+
+His next respite was thus entertained:--
+
+"What makes him work so of a night?" asked Jim Gryce.
+
+"Waal," explained Ab in his usual high key, "he rid ter the settle_mint_
+this mornin'; he hev been a-foolin' round thar all day, an' the crap air
+jes' a-sufferin' fur work! So him an' Uncle Tobe air layin' thar ploughs
+in the shop now, kase they air goin' ter run around the corn
+ter-morrer. Workin', though, goes powerful hard with dad enny time. I
+tole old Bob Peachin that, when I war ter the mill this evenin'. Him an'
+the t'other men thar laffed mightily at dad. An' I laffed too!"
+
+There was an angry gleam in Stephen Ryder's stern black eyes as he
+turned within, seized the tongs, and thrust a piece of iron among the
+coals, while Tobe, who had been asleep in the window at the back of the
+shop, rose reluctantly and plied the bellows. The heavy panting broke
+forth simultaneously with the red flare that quivered out into the dark
+night. Presently it faded; the hot iron was whisked upon the anvil,
+fiery sparks showered about as the rapid blows fell, and the echoing
+crags kept time with rhythmic beats to the clanking of the sledge and
+the clinking of the hand-hammer. The stars, high above the
+far-stretching mountains, seemed to throb in unison, until suddenly the
+blacksmith dealt a sharp blow on the face of the anvil as a signal to
+his striker to cease, and the forge was silent.
+
+As he leaned against the jamb of the door, mechanically adjusting his
+leather apron, he heard Ab's voice again.
+
+"Old Bob say he ain't no 'count sca'cely. He 'lowed ez he had knowed him
+many a year, an' fund him a sneakin', deceivin' critter."
+
+The blacksmith was erect in a moment, every fibre tense.
+
+"That ain't the wust," Ab gabbled on. "Old Bob say, though't ain't known
+ginerally, ez he air gin ter thievin'. Old Bob 'lowed ter them men,
+hangin' round the mill, ez he air the biggest thief on the mounting!"
+
+The strong man trembled. His blood rushed tumultuously to his head, then
+seemed to ebb swiftly away. That this should be said of him to the
+loafers at the mill! These constituted his little world. And he valued
+his character as only an honest man can. He was amazed at the boldness
+of the lie. It had been openly spoken in the presence of his son. One
+might have thought the boy would come directly to him. But there he sat,
+glibly retailing it to his small comrades! It seemed all so strange
+that Stephen Ryder fancied there was surely some mistake. In the next
+moment, however, he was convinced that they had been talking of him, and
+of no one else.
+
+"I tole old Bob ez how I thought they oughtn't ter be so hard on him, ez
+he warn't thar to speak for hisself."
+
+All three boys giggled weakly, as if this were witty.
+
+"But old Bob 'lowed ez ennybody mought know him by his name. An' then he
+told me that old sayin':--
+
+  'Stephen, Stephen, so deceivin',
+  That old Satan can't believe him!'"
+
+Here Ben Gryce broke in, begging the others to go home, and come to
+"borry" the hammer next night. Ab agreed to the latter proposition, but
+still sat on the log and talked. "Old Bob say," he remarked cheerfully,
+"that when he do git 'em, he shakes 'em--shakes the life out'n 'em!"
+
+This was inexplicable. Stephen Ryder pondered vainly on it for an
+instant. But the oft-reiterated formula, "Old Bob say," caught his
+ears, and he was absorbed anew in Ab's discourse.
+
+"Old Bob say ez my mother air one of the best women in this world. But
+she air so gin ter humoring every critter a-nigh her, an' tends ter 'em
+so much, an' feeds 'em so high an' hearty, ez they jes' gits good fur
+nothin' in this world. That's how kem she air eat out'n house an' home
+now. Old Bob say ez how he air the hongriest critter! Say he jes'
+despise ter see him comin' round of meal times. Old Bob say ef he hev
+got enny good lef' in him, my mother will kill it out yit with
+kindness."
+
+The blacksmith felt, as he turned back into the shop and roused the
+sleepy-headed striker, that within the hour all the world had changed
+for him. These coarse taunts were enough to show in what estimation he
+was held. And he had fancied himself, in countrified phrase, "respected
+by all," and had been proud of his standing.
+
+So the bellows began to sigh and pant once more, and kept the red light
+flaring athwart the darkness. The people down in the valley looked up at
+it, glowing like a star that had slipped out of the sky and lodged
+somehow on the mountain, and wondered what Stephen Ryder could be about
+so late at night. When he left the shop there was no sign of the boys
+who had ornamented the log earlier in the evening. He walked up the road
+to his house, and found his wife sitting alone in the rickety little
+porch.
+
+"Hev that thar boy gone ter bed?" he asked.
+
+"Waal," she slowly drawled, in a soft, placid voice, "he kem hyar
+'bout'n haffen hour ago so nigh crazed ter go ter stay all night with
+Jim an' Benny Gryce ez I hed ter let him. Old man Gryce rid by hyar in
+his wagon on his way home from the settle_mint_. So Ab went off with the
+Gryce boys an' thar gran'dad."
+
+Thus the blacksmith concluded his tools were not liable to be "borrowed"
+that night. He had a scheme to insure their safety for the future, but
+in order to avoid his wife's remonstrances on Ab's behalf, he told her
+nothing of it, nor of what he had overheard.
+
+Early the next morning he set out for the mill, intending to confront
+"old Bob" and demand retraction. The road down the deep, wild ravine was
+rugged, and he jogged along slowly until at last he came within sight of
+the crazy, weather-beaten old building tottering precariously on the
+brink of the impetuous torrent which gashed the mountain side. Crags
+towered above it; vines and mosses clung to its walls; it was a dank,
+cool, shady place, but noisy enough with the turmoil of its primitive
+machinery and the loud, hoarse voices of the loungers striving to make
+themselves heard above the uproar. There were several of these idle
+mountaineers aimlessly strolling among the bags of corn and wheat that
+were piled about. Long, dusty cobwebs hung from the rafters. Sometimes a
+rat, powdered white with flour and rendered reckless by high living,
+raced boldly across the floor. The golden grain poured ceaselessly
+through the hopper, and leaning against it was the miller, a tall,
+stoop-shouldered man about forty years of age, with a floury smile
+lurking in his beard and a twinkle in his good-humored eyes overhung by
+heavy, mealy eyebrows.
+
+"Waal, Steve," yelled the miller, shambling forward as the blacksmith
+appeared in the doorway. "Come 'long in. Whar's yer grist?"
+
+"I hev got no grist!" thundered Steve, sternly.
+
+"Waal--ye're jes' ez welcome," said the miller, not noticing the rigid
+lines of the blacksmith's face, accented here and there by cinders, nor
+the fierceness of the intent dark eyes.
+
+"I reckon I'm powerful welcome!" sneered Stephen Ryder.
+
+The tone attracted "old Bob's" attention. "What ails ye, Steve?" he
+asked, surprised.
+
+"I'm a deceivin', sneakin' critter--hey," shouted the visitor, shaking
+his big fist; he had intended to be calm, but his long-repressed fury
+had found vent at last.
+
+The miller drew back hastily, astonishment and fear mingled in a pallid
+paste, as it were, with the flour on his face.
+
+The six startled on-lookers stood as if petrified.
+
+"Ye say I'm a thief!--a thief!--a thief!"
+
+With the odious word Ryder made a frantic lunge at the miller, who
+dodged his strong right arm at the moment when his foot struck against a
+bag of corn lying on the floor and he stumbled. He recovered his
+equilibrium instantly. But the six bystanders had seized him.
+
+"Hold him hard, folkses!" cried honest Bob Peachin. "Hold hard! I'll
+tell ye what ails him--though ye mustn't let on ter him--he air teched
+in the head!"
+
+He winked at them with a confidential intention as he roared this out,
+forgetting in his excitement that mental infirmity does not impair the
+sense of hearing. This folly on his part was a salutary thing for
+Stephen Ryder. It calmed him instantly. He felt that he had need for
+caution. A fearful vista of possibilities opened before him. He
+remembered having seen in his childhood a man reputed to be suddenly
+bereft of reason, but who he believed was entirely sane, bound hand and
+foot, and every word, every groan, every effort to free himself,
+accounted the demonstration of a maniac. This fate was imminent for him.
+They were seven to one. He trembled as he felt their hands pressing upon
+the swelling muscles of his arms. With an abrupt realization of his
+great strength, he waited for a momentary relaxation of their clutch,
+then with a mighty wrench he burst loose from them, flung himself upon
+his mare, and dashed off at full speed.
+
+He did no work that afternoon, although the corn was "suffering." He sat
+after dinner smoking his pipe on the porch of his log cabin, while he
+moodily watched the big shadow of the mountain creeping silently over
+the wooded valley as the sun got on the down grade. Deep glooms began to
+lurk among the ravines of the great ridge opposite. The shimmering blue
+summits in the distance were purpling. A redbird, alert, crested, and
+with a brilliant eye, perched idly on the vines about the porch, having
+relinquished for the day the job of teaching a small, stubby imitation
+of himself to fly. The shocks of wheat in the bare field close by had
+turned a rich red gold in the lengthening rays before Stephen Ryder
+realized that night was close at hand.
+
+All at once he heard a discordant noise which he knew that Ab Ryder
+called "singing," and presently the boy appeared in the distance, his
+mouth stretched, his tattered hat stuck on the back of his tow-head, his
+bare feet dusty, his homespun cotton trousers rolled up airily about his
+knees, his single suspender supporting the structure. His father laughed
+a little at sight of him, rather sardonically it must be confessed, and
+saying to his wife that he intended to go to the shop for a while, he
+rose and strolled off down the road.
+
+When supper was over, however, Ab was immensely relieved to see that
+his father had no idea of continuing his work. Consequently the usual
+routine was to be expected. Generally, when summoned to the evening
+meal, the blacksmith hastily plunged his head in the barrel of water
+used to temper steel, thrust off his leather apron, and went up to the
+house without more ado. He smoked afterward, and lounged about, enjoying
+the relaxation after his heavy work. He did not go down to lock the shop
+until bed-time, when he was shutting up the house, the barn, and the
+corn-crib for the night. In the interval the shop stood deserted and
+open, and this fact was the basis of Ab's opportunity. To-night there
+seemed to be no deviation from this custom. He ascertained that his
+father was smoking his pipe on the porch. Then he went down the road and
+sat on the log near the shop to wait for the other boys who were to
+share the risks and profits of borrowing the hammer.
+
+All was still--so still! He fancied that he could hear the tumult of the
+torrent far away as it dashed over the rocks. A dog suddenly began to
+bark in the black, black valley--then ceased. He was vaguely over-awed
+with the "big mountings" for company and the distant stars. He listened
+eagerly for the first cracking of brush which told him that the other
+boys were near at hand. Then all three crept along cautiously among the
+huge boles of the trees, feeling very mysterious and important. When
+they reached the rude window, Ab sat for a moment on the sill, peering
+into the intense blackness within.
+
+"It air dark thar, fur true, Ab," said Jim Gryce, growing faint-hearted.
+"Let's go back."
+
+"Naw, sir! Naw, sir!" protested Ab resolutely. "I'm on the borry!"
+
+"How kin we find that thar leetle hammer in sech a dark place?" urged
+Jim.
+
+"Waal," explained Ab, in his high key, "dad air mightily welded ter his
+cranky notions. An' he always leaves every tool in the same place
+edzactly every night. Bound fur me!" he continued in shrill exultation
+as he slapped his lean leg, "I know whar that thar leetle hammer air
+sot ter roost!"
+
+He jumped down from the window inside the shop, and cut a wiry caper.
+
+"I'm a man o' bone and muscle!" he bragged. "Kin do ennything."
+
+The other boys followed more quietly. But they had only groped a little
+distance when Jim Gryce set up a sharp yelp of pain.
+
+"Shet yer mouth--ye pop-eyed catamount!" Ab admonished him. "Dad will
+hear an'--ah-h-h!" His own words ended in a shriek. "Oh, my!"
+vociferated the "man of bone and muscle," who was certainly, too, a man
+of extraordinary lung-power. "Oh, my! The ground is hot--hot ez iron!
+They always tole me that Satan would ketch me--an' oh, my! now he hev
+done it!"
+
+He joined the "pop-eyed catamount" in a lively dance with their bare
+feet on the hot iron bars which were scattered about the ground in every
+direction. These were heated artistically, so that they might not really
+scorch the flesh, but would touch the feelings, and perhaps the
+conscience. As the third boy's scream rent the air, and told that he,
+too, had encountered a torrid experience, Ab Ryder became suddenly aware
+that there was some one besides themselves in the shop. He could see
+nothing; he was only vaguely conscious of an unexpected presence, and he
+fancied that it was in the corner by the barrel of water.
+
+All at once a gruff voice broke forth. "I'm on the borry!" it remarked
+with fierce facetiousness. "I want ter borry a boy--no! a man o' bone
+an' muscle--fur 'bout a minit and a quarter!" A strong arm seized Ab by
+his collar. He felt himself swept through the air, soused head foremost
+into the barrel of water, then thrust into a corner, where he was
+thankful to find there was no more hot iron.
+
+"I want to borry another boy!" said the gruff voice. And the "pop-eyed
+catamount" was duly ducked.
+
+"'Twould pleasure me some ter borry another!" the voice declared with
+grim humor. But Ben was the youngest and smallest, and only led into
+mischief by the others. They never knew that the blacksmith relented
+when his turn came, and that he got a mere sprinkle in comparison with
+their total immersion.
+
+Then Stephen Ryder set out for home, followed by a dripping procession.
+"I'll l'arn ye ter 'borry' my tools 'thout leave!" he vociferated as he
+went along.
+
+When they had reached the house, he faced round sternly on Ab. "Whyn't
+ye kem an' tell me ez how the miller say I war a sneakin', deceivin'
+critter, an'--an'--an' a thief!"
+
+His wife dropped the dish she was washing, and it broke unheeded upon
+the hearth. Ab stretched his eyes and mouth in amazement.
+
+"Old Bob Peachin never tole me no sech word sence I been born!" he
+declared flatly.
+
+"Then what ailed ye ter go an' tell sech a lie ter Gryce's boys las'
+night jes' down thar outside o' the shop?" Stephen Ryder demanded.
+
+Ab stared at him, evidently bewildered.
+
+"Ye tole 'em," continued the blacksmith, striving to refresh his memory,
+"ez Bob Peachin say ez how ye mought know I war deceivin' by my bein'
+named Stephen--an' that I war the hongriest critter--an'"--
+
+"'Twar the t-a-a-a-rrier!" shouted Ab, "the little rat tarrier ez we war
+a-talkin' 'bout. He hev been named Steve these six year, old Bob say. He
+gimme the dog yestiddy, 'kase I 'lowed ez the rats war eatin' us out'n
+house an' home, an' my mother hed fed up that old cat o' our'n till he
+won't look at a mice. Old Bob warned me, though, ez Steve, _the
+tarrier_, air a mighty thief an' deceivin' ginerally. Old Bob say he
+reckons my mother will spile the dog with feedin' him, an' kill out what
+little good he hev got lef' in him with kindness. But I tuk him, an'
+brung him home ennyhow. An' las' night arter we hed got through talkin'
+'bout borryin' (he looked embarrassed) the leetle hammer, we tuk to
+talkin' 'bout the tarrier. An' yander he is now, asleep on the
+chil'ren's bed!"
+
+A long pause ensued.
+
+"M'ria," said the blacksmith meekly to his wife, "hev ye tuk notice how
+the gyarden truck air a-thrivin'? 'Pears like ter me ez the peas air
+a-fullin' up consider'ble."
+
+And so the subject changed.
+
+He had it on his conscience, however, to explain the matter to the
+miller. For the second time old Bob Peachin, and the men at the mill,
+"laffed mightily at dad." And when Ab had recovered sufficiently from
+the exhaustion attendant upon borrowing a hammer, he "laffed too."
+
+
+
+
+THE CONSCRIPTS' HOLLOW
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+"I'm a-goin' ter climb down ter that thar ledge, an' slip round ter the
+hollow whar them conscripts built thar fire in the old war times."
+
+Nicholas Gregory paused on the verge of the great cliff and cast a
+sidelong glance at Barney Pratt, who was beating about among the red
+sumach bushes in the woods close at hand, and now and then stooping to
+search the heaps of pine needles and dead leaves where they had been
+blown together on the ground.
+
+"Conscripts!" Barney ejaculated, with a chuckle. "That's precisely what
+them men war determinated _not_ ter be! They war a-hidin' in the
+mountings ter git shet o' the conscription."
+
+"Waal, I don't keer ef _ye_ names 'em 'conscripts' or no," Nicholas
+retorted loftily. "That's what other folks calls 'em. I'm goin' down ter
+the hollow, whar they built thar fire, ter see ef that old missin'
+tur-r-key-hen o' our'n hain't hid her nest off 'mongst them dead chunks,
+an' sech."
+
+"A tur-r-key ain't sech a powerful fool ez that," said Barney, coming to
+the edge of the precipice and looking over at the ledge, which ran along
+the face of the cliff twenty feet below. "How'd she make out ter fotch
+the little tur-r-keys up hyar, when they war hatched? They'd fall off'n
+the bluff."
+
+"A tur-r-key what hev stole her nest away from the folks air fool enough
+fur ennything," Nicholas declared.
+
+Perhaps he did not really expect to find the missing fowl in such an
+out-of-the-way place as this, but being an adventurous fellow, the sight
+of the crag was a temptation. He had often before clambered down to the
+ledge, which led to a great niche in the solid rock, where one night
+during the war some men who were hiding from the conscription had
+kindled their fire and cooked their scanty food. The charred remnants of
+logs were still here, but no one ever thought about them now, except the
+two boys, who regarded them as a sort of curiosity.
+
+Sometimes they came and stared at them, and speculated about them, and
+declared to each other that _they_ would not consider it a hardship to
+go a-soldiering.
+
+Then Nick would tell Barney of a wonderful day when he had driven to the
+county town in his uncle's wagon. There was a parade of militia there,
+and how grand the drum had sounded! And as he told it he would shoulder
+a smoke-blackened stick, and stride about in the Conscripts' Hollow, and
+feel very brave.
+
+He had no idea in those days how close at hand was the time when his own
+courage should be tried.
+
+"Kem on, Barney!" he urged. "Let's go down an' sarch fur the tur-r-key."
+
+But Barney had thrown himself down upon the crag with a long-drawn sigh
+of fatigue.
+
+"Waal," he replied, in a drowsy tone, "I dunno 'bout'n that. I'm sorter
+banged out, 'kase I hev had a powerful hard day's work a-bilin' sorghum
+at our house. I b'lieves I'll rest my bones hyar, an' wait fur ye."
+
+As he spoke, he rolled up one of the coats which they had both thrown
+off, during their search for the nest on the summit of the cliff, and
+slipped it under his head. He was far the brighter boy of the two, but
+his sharp wits seemed to thrive at the expense of his body. He was small
+and puny, and he was easily fatigued in comparison with big burly Nick,
+who rarely knew such a sensation, and prided himself upon his toughness.
+
+"Waal, Barney, surely ye air the porest little shoat on G'liath
+Mounting!" he exclaimed scornfully, as he had often done before. But he
+made no further attempt to persuade Barney, and began the descent alone.
+
+It was not so difficult a matter for a sure-footed mountaineer like
+Nick to make his way down to the ledge as one might imagine, for in a
+certain place the face of the cliff presented a series of jagged edges
+and projections which afforded him foothold. As he went along, too, he
+kept a strong grasp upon overhanging vines and bushes that grew out
+from earth-filled crevices.
+
+He had gone down only a short distance when he paused thoughtfully.
+"This hyar wind air blowin' powerful brief," he said. "I mought get
+chilled an' lose my footin'."
+
+He hardly liked to give up the expedition, but he was afraid to continue
+on his way in the teeth of the mountain wind, cold and strong in the
+October afternoon. If only he had his heavy jeans coat with him!
+
+"Barney!" he called out, intending to ask his friend to throw it over to
+him.
+
+There was no answer.
+
+"That thar Barney hev drapped off ter sleep a'ready!" he exclaimed
+indignantly.
+
+He chanced to glance upward as he was about to call again. There he saw
+a coat lying on the edge of the cliff, the dangling sleeve fluttering
+just within his reach. When he dragged it down and discovered that it
+was Barney's instead of his own, he was slightly vexed, but it
+certainly did not seem a matter of great importance.
+
+"That boy hev got _my_ coat, an' this is his'n. But law! I'd ruther
+squeeze myself small enough ter git inter his'n, than ter hev ter yell
+like a catamount fur an hour an' better ter wake him up, an' make him
+gimme mine."
+
+He seated himself on a narrow projection of the crag, and began to
+cautiously put on his friend's coat. He had need to be careful, for a
+precarious perch like this, with an unmeasured abyss beneath, the far
+blue sky above, the almost inaccessible face of a cliff on one side, and
+on the other a distant stretch of mountains, is not exactly the kind of
+place in which one would prefer to make a toilet. Besides the dangers of
+his position, he was anxious to do no damage to the coat, which although
+loose and baggy on Barney, was rather a close fit for Nick.
+
+"I ain't used ter climbin' with a coat on, nohow, an' I mus' be mighty
+keerful not ter bust Barney's, 'kase it air all the one he hev got," he
+said to himself as he clambered nimbly down to the ledge.
+
+Then he walked deftly along the narrow shelf, and as he turned abruptly
+into the immense niche in the cliff called the Conscripts' Hollow, he
+started back in sudden bewilderment. His heart gave a bound, and then it
+seemed to stand still.
+
+He hardly recognized the familiar place. There, to be sure, were the
+walls and the dome-like roof, but upon the dusty sandstone floor were
+scattered quantities of household articles, such as pots and pails and
+pans and kettles. There was a great array of brogans, too, and piles of
+blankets, and bolts of coarse unbleached cotton and jeans cloth.
+
+"Waal, sir!" he exclaimed, as he gazed at them with wild,
+uncomprehending eyes.
+
+Then the truth flashed upon him. A story had reached Goliath Mountain
+some weeks before, to the effect that a cross-roads store, some miles
+down the valley, had been robbed. The thieves had escaped with the
+stolen goods, leaving no clue by which they might be identified and
+brought to justice.
+
+Nick saw that he had made a discovery. Here it was that the robbers had
+contrived to conceal their plunder, doubtless intending to wait until
+suspicion lulled, when they could carry it to some distant place, where
+it could safely be sold.
+
+Suddenly a thought struck him that sent a shiver through every fibre of
+his body. This store was robbed in a singular manner. No bolt was
+broken,--no door burst open. There was a window, however, that lacked
+one pane of glass. The aperture would not admit a man's body. It was
+believed that the burglars had passed a boy through it, who had handed
+out the stolen goods.
+
+And now, Nick foolishly argued, if any one should discover that _he_
+knew where the plunder was hidden, they would believe that _he_ was that
+boy who had robbed the store!
+
+He began to resolve that he would say nothing about what he had
+seen,--not even to Barney. He thought his safety lay in his silence.
+Still, he did not want his silence to be to the advantage of wicked men,
+so he tried to persuade himself that the burglars would soon be traced
+and captured without the information which he knew it was his duty to
+give. "Ter be sartain, the officers will kem on this place arter a
+while," he said meditatively.
+
+Then he shook his head doubtfully. The crag was far from any house, and
+except the dwellers on Goliath Mountain, few people knew of this great
+niche in it. "They war sly foxes what stowed away thar plunder hyar!" he
+exclaimed in despair.
+
+Often, when Nick had before stood in the Conscripts' Hollow, he had
+imagined that he would make a good soldier. But his idea of a soldier
+was a fine uniform, and the ra-ta-ta of martial music. He had no
+conception of that high sense of duty which nerves a man to face danger;
+even now he did not know that he was a coward as he faltered and feared
+in the cause of right to encounter suspicion.
+
+Courage!--Nick thought that meant to crack away at a bear, if you were
+lucky enough to have the chance; or to kill a rattlesnake, if you had a
+big heavy stone close at hand; or to scramble about among crags and
+precipices, if you felt certain of the steadiness of your head and the
+strength of your muscles. But he did not realize that "courage" could
+mean the nerve to speak one little word for duty's sake.
+
+He would not speak the word,--he had determined on that,--for might they
+not think that _he_ was the boy who had robbed the store?
+
+He was quivering with excitement when he turned and began to walk along
+the ledge toward those roughly hewn natural steps by which he had
+descended. He knew that his agitation rendered his footing insecure. He
+was afraid of falling into the depths beneath, and he pressed close
+against the cliff.
+
+On the narrow ledge, hardly two yards distant from the Conscripts'
+Hollow, a clump of blackberry bushes was growing from a crevice in the
+rock. They had never before given him trouble; but now, as he brushed
+hastily past, they seemed to clutch at him with their thorny branches.
+
+As he tore away from them roughly, he did not observe that he had left a
+fragment of his brown jeans clothing hanging upon the thorns, as a
+witness to his presence here close to the Conscripts' Hollow, where the
+stolen goods lay hidden. There was a coarse, dark-colored horn button
+attached to the bit of brown jeans, which was a three-cornered scrap of
+his coat. No! of _Barney's_ coat. And was it to be a witness against
+poor Barney, who had not gone near the Conscripts' Hollow, but was lying
+asleep on the summit of the crag, supposing he had his own coat under
+his own head?
+
+He did not discover his mistake until some time afterward, for when Nick
+had slowly and laboriously climbed up the steep face of the cliff, he
+stripped off his friend's torn coat before he roused him. Barney was
+awakened by having his pillow dragged rudely from under his head, and
+when at last he reluctantly opened his eyes on the hazy yellow
+sunlight, and saw Nick standing near on the great gray crag, he had no
+idea that this moment was an important crisis in his life.
+
+The wind was coming up the gorge fresh and free; the autumnal foliage,
+swaying in it, was like the flaunting splendors of red and gold banners;
+the western ranges had changed from blue to purple, for the sun was
+sinking.
+
+"It's gittin' toler'ble late, Barney," said Nick. "Let's go." He had on
+his own coat now, and he was impatient to be off.
+
+"Did ye find the tur-r-key's nest in the Conscripts' Hollow?" asked
+Barney, with a lazy yawn, and still flat on his back.
+
+"No," said Nick curtly.
+
+Then it occurred to him that it would be safer if his friend should
+think he had not been in the Hollow. "No," he reiterated, after a pause,
+"I didn't go down ter the ledge arter all."
+
+He had begun to lie,--where would it end?
+
+"Whyn't you-uns go?" demanded Barney, surprised.
+
+"The wind war blowin' so powerful brief," Nick replied without a qualm.
+"So I jes' s'arched fur a while in the woods back thar a piece."
+
+In a moment more, Barney rose to his feet, picked up his coat, and put
+it on. He did not notice the torn place, for the garment was old and
+worn, and had many ragged edges. It lacked, however, but one button, and
+that missing button was attached to the triangular bit of brown jeans
+that fluttered on the thorny bush close to the Conscripts' Hollow.
+
+All unconscious of his loss, he went away in the rich autumnal sunset,
+leaving it there as a witness against him.
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+After this, Nicholas Gregory was very steady at his work for a while. He
+kept out of the woods as much as possible, and felt that he knew more
+already than was good for him. Above all, he avoided that big sandstone
+cliff and the Conscripts' Hollow, where the goods lay hidden.
+
+He heard no more of the search that had been made for the burglars and
+their booty, and he congratulated himself on his caution in keeping
+silent about what he had found.
+
+"Now, ef it hed been that thar wide-mouthed Barney, stid o' me, he'd hev
+blabbed fust thing, an' they'd all hev thunk ez he war the boy what them
+scoundrels put through the winder ter steal the folkses' truck. They'd
+hev jailed him, I reckon."
+
+He had begun to forget his own part in the wrong-doing,--that his
+silence was helping to screen "them scoundrels" from the law.
+
+This state of mind continued for a week, perhaps. Then he fell to
+speculating about the stolen goods. He wondered whether they were all
+there yet, or whether the burglars had managed to carry them away. His
+curiosity grew so great that several times he was almost at the point of
+going to see for himself; but one morning, early, when an opportunity
+to do so was suddenly presented, his courage failed him.
+
+His mother had just come into the log cabin from the hen-house with a
+woe-begone face.
+
+"I do declar'!" she exclaimed solemnly, "that I'm surely the
+afflictedest 'oman on G'liath Mounting! An' them young fall tur-r-keys
+air so spindlin' an' delikit they'll be the death o' me yit!"
+
+They were so spindling and delicate that they were the death of
+themselves. She had just buried three, and her heart and her larder were
+alike an aching void.
+
+"Three died ter-day, an' two las' Wednesday!" As she counted them on her
+fingers she honored each with a shake of the head, so mournful that it
+might be accounted an obituary in dumb show. "I hev had no sort'n luck
+with this tur-r-key's brood, an' the t'other hev stole her nest away,
+an' I hev got sech a mean no-'count set o' chillen they can't find her.
+Waal! waal! waal! this comin' winter the Lord'll be _obleeged_ ter
+pervide."
+
+This was washing-day, and as she began to scrub away on the noisy
+washboard, a sudden thought struck her. "Ye told me two weeks ago an'
+better, Nick, that ye hed laid off ter sarch the Conscripts' Hollow; ye
+'lowed ye hed been everywhar else. Did ye go thar fur the tur-r-key?"
+
+She faced him with her dripping arms akimbo.
+
+Nick's face turned red as he answered, "That thar tur-r-key ain't a-nigh
+thar."
+
+"What ails ye, Nick? thar's su'thin' wrong. I kin tell it by yer looks.
+Ye never hed the grit ter sarch thar, I'll be bound; did ye, now?"
+
+Nick could not bring himself to admit having been near the place.
+
+"No," he faltered, "I never sarched thar."
+
+"Ye'll do it now, though!" his mother declared triumphantly. "I'm afeard
+ter send Jacob on sech a yerrand down the bluffs, kase he air so little
+he mought fall; but he air big enough ter go 'long an' watch ye go down
+ter the Hollow--else ye'll kem back an' say ye hev sarched thar, when
+ye ain't been a-nigh the bluff."
+
+There seemed for a moment no escape for Nick. His mother was looking
+resolutely at him, and Jacob had gotten up briskly from his seat in the
+chimney-corner. He was a small tow-headed boy with big owlish eyes, and
+Nick knew from experience that they were very likely to see anything he
+did _not_ do. He must go; and then if at any time the stolen goods
+should be discovered, Jacob and his mother, and who could say how many
+besides, would know that he had been to the Conscripts' Hollow, and must
+have seen what was hidden there.
+
+In that case his silence on the subject would be very suspicious. It
+would seem as if he had some connection with the burglars, and for that
+reason tried to conceal the plunder.
+
+He was saying to himself that he would not go--and he must! How could he
+avoid it? As he glanced uneasily around the room, his eyes chanced to
+fall on a little object lying on the edge of the shelf just above the
+washtub. He made the most of the opportunity. As he slung his hat upon
+his head with an impatient gesture, he managed to brush the shelf with
+it and knock the small object into the foaming suds below.
+
+His mother sank into a chair with uplifted hands and eyes.
+
+"The las' cake o' hop yeast!" she cried. "An' how air the bread ter be
+raised?"
+
+To witness her despair, one would think only jack-screws could do it.
+
+"Surely I _am_ the afflictedest 'oman on G'liath Mounting! An'
+ter-morrer Brother Pete's wife an' his gals air a-comin', and I hed laid
+off ter hev raised bread."
+
+For "raised bread" is a great rarity and luxury in these parts, the
+nimble "dodgers" being the staff of life.
+
+"I never went ter do it," muttered Nick.
+
+"Waal, ye kin jes' kerry yer bones down the mounting ter Sister
+Mirandy's house, an' ax her ter fotch me a cake o' her yeast when she
+kems up hyar ter-day ter holp me sizin' yarn. Arter that I don't keer
+what ye does with yerself. Ef ye stays hyar along o' we-uns, ye'll haul
+the roof down nex', I reckon. 'Pears like ter me ez boys an' men-folks
+air powerful awk'ard, useless critters ter keep in a house; they oughter
+hev pens outside, I'm a-thinkin'."
+
+She had forgotten about the turkey, and Nick was glad enough to escape
+on these terms.
+
+It was not until after he had finished his errand at Aunt Mirandy's
+house that he chanced to think again of the Conscripts' Hollow. As he
+was slowly lounging back up the mountain, he paused occasionally on the
+steep slope and looked up at the crags high on the summit, which he
+could see, now and then, diagonally across a deep cove.
+
+When he came in sight of the one which he had such good reason to
+remember, he stopped and stood gazing fixedly at it for a long time,
+wondering again whether the robbers had yet carried off their plunder
+from its hiding-place.
+
+He was not too distant to distinguish the Conscripts' Hollow, but from
+his standpoint, he could not at first determine where was the ledge. He
+thought he recognized it presently in a black line that seemed drawn
+across the massive cliff.
+
+But what was that upon it? A moving figure! He gazed at it spell-bound
+for a moment, as it slowly made its way along toward the Hollow. Then he
+wanted to see no more; he wanted to know no more. He turned and fled at
+full speed along the narrow cow-path among the bushes.
+
+Suddenly there was a rustle among them. Something had sprung out into
+the path with a light bound, and as he ran, he heard a swift step behind
+him. It seemed a pursuing step, for, as he quickened his pace, it came
+faster too. It was a longer stride than his; it was gaining upon him. A
+hand with a grip like a vise fell upon his shoulder, and as he was
+whirled around and brought face to face with his pursuer, he glanced up
+and recognized the constable of the district.
+
+This was a tall, muscular man, dressed in brown jeans, and with a bushy
+red beard. He knew Nick well, for he, too, was a mountaineer.
+
+"Ye war a-dustin' along toler'ble fast, Nicholas Gregory," he exclaimed;
+"but nothin' on G'liath Mounting kin beat me a-runnin' 'thout it air a
+deer. Ye'll kem along with me now, and stir yer stumps powerful lively,
+too, kase I hain't got no time ter lose."
+
+"What am I tuk up fur?" gasped Nick.
+
+"S'picious conduc'," replied the man curtly.
+
+Nick knew no more now than he did before. The officer's next words made
+matters plainer. "Things look mightily like ye war set hyar ter watch
+that thar ledge. Ez soon ez ye seen our men a-goin' ter the Conscripts'
+Hollow ter sarch fur that thar stole truck, ye war a-goin' ter scuttle
+off an' gin the alarm ter them rascally no-'count burglars. I saw ye and
+yer looks, and I suspicioned some sech game. Ye don't cheat the law in
+_this_ deestrick--not often! Ye air the very boy, I reckon, what
+holped ter rob Blenkins's store. Whar's the other burglars? Ye'd better
+tell!"
+
+"I dunno!" cried Nick tremulously. "I never had nothin' ter do with
+'em."
+
+"Ye hev told on yerself," the man retorted. "Why did ye stand a-gapin'
+at the Conscripts' Hollow, ef ye didn't know thar was suthin special
+thar?"
+
+Nick, in his confusion, could invent no reply, and he was afraid to tell
+the truth. He looked mutely at the officer, who held his arm and looked
+down sternly at him.
+
+"Ye air a bad egg,--that's plain. I'll take ye along whether I ketches
+the other burglars or no."
+
+They toiled up the steep ascent in silence, and before very long were on
+the summit of the mountain, and within view of the crag.
+
+There on the great gray cliff, in the midst of the lonely woods, were
+several men whom Nick had never before seen. Their busy figures were
+darkly defined against the hazy azure of the distant ranges, and as they
+moved about, their shadows on the ground seemed very busy too, and
+blotted continually the golden sunshine that everywhere penetrated the
+thinning masses of red and bronze autumn foliage.
+
+A wagon, close at hand, was already half full of the stolen goods, and a
+number of men were going cautiously up and down the face of the cliff,
+bringing articles, or passing them from one to another.
+
+"Well, this _is_ a tedious job!" exclaimed the sheriff, John Stebbins by
+name. He was a quick-witted, good-natured man, but being active in
+temperament, he was exceedingly impatient of delay. "How long did it
+take 'em to get all those heavy things down into the Conscripts'
+Hollow,--hey, bub?" he added, appealing to Nick, who had been brought to
+his notice by the constable. It was terrible to Nick that they should
+all speak to him as if he were one of the criminals. He broke out with
+wild protestations of his innocence, denying, too, that he had had any
+knowledge of what was hidden in the Conscripts' Hollow.
+
+"Then what made ye run, yander on the slope, when ye seen thar war
+somebody on the ledge?" demanded the constable.
+
+Nick had a sudden inspiration. "Waal," he faltered, with an explanatory
+sob, which was at once ludicrous and pathetic, "I war too fur off ter
+make out fur sure what 'twar on the ledge. 'Twar black-lookin', an' I
+'lowed 'twar a b'ar."
+
+All the men laughed at this.
+
+"I sot out ter run ter Aunt Mirandy's house ter borry Job's gun ter kem
+up hyar, an' mebbe git a crack at him," continued Nick.
+
+"That doesn't seem unnatural," said the sheriff. Then he turned to the
+constable. "This ain't enough to justify us in holding on to the boy,
+Jim, unless we can fix that scrap with the button on him. Where is it?"
+
+"D'ye know whose coat this kem off'n?" asked the constable, producing a
+bit of brown jeans, with a dark-colored horn button attached to it.
+"How'd it happen ter be stickin' ter them blackberry-bushes on the
+ledge?"
+
+Nick recognized it in an instant. It was Barney Pratt's button, and a
+bit of Barney Pratt's coat. But he knew well enough that he himself must
+have torn it when he wore it down to the Conscripts' Hollow.
+
+He realized that he should have at once told the whole truth of what he
+knew about the stolen goods. He was well aware that he ought not to
+suffer the suspicion which had unjustly fallen upon him to be unjustly
+transferred to Barney, who he knew was innocent.
+
+But he was terribly frightened, and foolishly cautious, and he did not
+care for justice, nor truth, nor friendship, now. His only anxiety was
+to save himself.
+
+"That thar piece o' brown jeans an' that button kem off'n Barney Pratt's
+coat. I'd know 'em anywhar," he answered, more firmly than before. He
+noted the fact that the searching eyes of both officers were fixed upon
+his own coat, which was good and whole, and lacked no buttons. He had
+not even a twinge of conscience just now. In his meanness and cowardice
+his heart exulted, as he saw that suspicion was gradually lifting its
+dark shadow from him. He cared not where it might fall next.
+
+"We'll have to let you slide, I reckon," said the sheriff. "But what
+size is this Barney Pratt?"
+
+"He air a lean, stringy little chap," said Nick.
+
+"Is that so?" said the sheriff. "Well, this is a bit of his coat and his
+button; and they were found on the ledge, close to the Conscripts'
+Hollow where the plunder was hid; and he's a small fellow, that maybe
+could slip through a window-pane. That makes a pretty strong showing
+against him. We'll go for Barney Pratt!"
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+Barney Pratt expected this day to be a holiday. Very early in the
+morning his father and mother had jolted off in the wagon to attend the
+wedding of a cousin, who lived ten miles distant on a neighboring
+mountain, and they had left him no harder task than to keep the
+children far enough from the fire, and his paralytic grandmother close
+enough to it.
+
+This old woman was of benevolent intentions, although she had a stick
+with which she usually made her wants known by pointing, and in her
+convulsive clutch the stick often whirled around and around like the
+sails of a windmill, so that if Barney chanced to come within the circle
+it described, he got as hard knocks from her feeble arm as he could have
+had in a tussle with big Nick Gregory.
+
+He was used to dodging it, and so were the smaller children. Without any
+fear of it they were all sitting on the hearth at the old woman's
+feet,--Ben and Melissa popping corn in the ashes, and Tom and Andy
+watching Barney's deft fingers as he made a cornstalk fiddle for them.
+
+Suddenly Barney glanced up and saw his grandmother's stick whirling over
+his head. Her eyes were fastened eagerly upon the window, and her lips
+trembled as she strove to speak.
+
+"What d'ye want, granny?" he asked.
+
+Then at last it came out, quick and sharp, and in a convulsive
+gasp,--"Who air all that gang o'folks a-comin' yander down the road?"
+
+Barney jumped up, threw down the fiddle, and ran to the door with the
+children at his heels. There was a quiver of curiosity among them, for
+it was a strange thing that a "gang o'folks" should be coming down this
+lonely mountain road.
+
+They went outside of the log cabin and stood among the red sumach bushes
+that clustered about the door, while the old woman tottered after them
+to the threshold, and peered at the crowd from under her shaking hand as
+she shaded her eyes from the sunlight.
+
+Presently a wagon came up with eight or ten men walking behind it, or
+riding in it in the midst of a quantity of miscellaneous articles of
+which Barney took no particular notice. As he went forward, smiling in
+a frank, fearless way, he recognized a familiar face among the crowd. It
+was Nick Gregory's, and Barney's smile broadened into a grin of pleasure
+and welcome.
+
+Then it was that Nick's conscience began to wake up, and to lay hold
+upon him.
+
+As the sheriff looked at Barney he hesitated. He balanced himself
+heavily on the wheel, instead of leaping quickly down as he might have
+done easily enough, for he was a spare man and light on his feet. Nick
+overheard him speak in a low voice to the constable, who stood just
+below.
+
+"_That_ ain't the fellow, is it, Jim?"
+
+"That's him, percisely," responded Jim Dow.
+
+"He don't _look_ like it," said Stebbins, jumping down at last, but
+still speaking under his breath.
+
+"Waal, thar ain't no countin' on boys by the _outside_ on 'em," returned
+the constable emphatically; he had an unruly son of his own.
+
+The sheriff walked up to Barney.
+
+"You're Barney Pratt, are you? Well, youngster, you'll come along with
+us."
+
+There was silence for a moment. Barney stared at him in amaze. Not until
+he had caught sight of the constable, whom he knew in his official
+character, did he understand the full meaning of what had been said. He
+was under arrest!
+
+As he realized it, everything began to whirl before him. The yellow
+sunshine, the gorgeously tinted woods, the blue sky, and the silvery
+mists hovering about the distant mountains, were all confusedly mingled
+in his failing vision.
+
+He looked as if he were about to faint. But in a few minutes he had
+partially recovered himself.
+
+"I dunno what this air done ter me fur," he said tremulously, glancing
+up at the officer whose hand was on his shoulder.
+
+"Hain't ye been doin' nothin' mean lately?" demanded Jim Dow sternly.
+
+Barney shook his head.
+
+"Let's see ef this won't remind ye," said the constable, producing the
+bit of jeans and the button.
+
+As Nick watched Barney turning the piece of cloth in his hand and
+examining the button, he felt a terrible pang of remorse. But he was
+none the less resolved to keep the freedom from danger which he had
+secured at the expense of his friend. To explain would be merely to
+exchange places with Barney, and he was silent.
+
+"This hyar looks like a scrap o' my coat," said Barney, utterly unaware
+of the significance of his words. As he fitted it into the jagged edges
+of the garment, the officers watched the proceeding closely. "'Pears
+like ter me ez it war jerked right out thar--yes--kase hyar air the
+missin' button, too."
+
+His air of unconsciousness puzzled the sheriff. "Do you know where you
+lost this scrap?" he asked.
+
+"Somewhars 'mongst the briers in the woods, I reckon," replied Barney.
+
+"No; you tore it on a blackberry bush on the ledge of a bluff; it was
+close to the Conscripts' Hollow, where some burglars have hidden stolen
+plunder. I found the scrap and the button there myself."
+
+Barney felt as if he were dreaming. How should his coat be torn on that
+ledge, where he had not been since the cloth was woven!
+
+The next words almost stunned him.
+
+"Ye see, sonny," said the constable, "we believes ye're the boy what
+holped to rob Blenkins's store by gittin' through a winder-pane an'
+handin' out the stole truck ter the t'other burglars. Ye hev holped
+about that thar plunder somehows,--else this hyar thing air a liar!" and
+he shook the bit of cloth significantly.
+
+"We'd better set out, Jim," said Stebbins, turning toward the wagon.
+"We'll pass Blenkins's on the way, and we'll stop and see if this chap
+can slip through the window-pane. If he can't, it's a point in his
+favor, and if he can, it's a point against him. As we go, we can try to
+get him to tell who the other burglars are."
+
+"Kem on, bubby; we can't stand hyar no longer, a-wastin' the time an'
+a-burnin' of daylight," said the constable.
+
+Barney seemed to have lost control of his rigid limbs, and he was
+half-dragged, half-lifted into the wagon by the two officers. The crowd
+began to fall back and disperse, and he could see the group of
+"home-folks" at the door. But he gave only one glance at the little log
+cabin, and then turned his head away. It was a poor home, but if it had
+been a palace, the pang he felt as he was torn from it could not have
+been sharper.
+
+In that instant he saw granny as she stood in the doorway, her head
+shaking nervously and her stick whirling in her uncertain grasp. He knew
+that she was struggling to say something for his comfort, and he had a
+terrible moment of fear lest the wagon should begin to move and her
+feeble voice be lost in the clatter of the wheels. But presently her
+shrill tones rang out, "No harm kin kem, sonny, ter them ez hev done no
+harm. All that happens works tergether fur good, an' the will o' God."
+
+Little breath as she had left, it had done good service to-day,--it had
+brought a drop of balm to the poor boy's heart. He did not look at her
+again, but he knew that she was still standing in the doorway among the
+clustering red leaves, whirling her stick, and shaking with the palsy,
+but determined to see the last of him.
+
+And now the wagon was rolling off, and a piteous wail went up from the
+children, who understood nothing except that Barney was being carried
+away against his will. Little four-year-old Melissa--she always seemed a
+beauty to Barney, with her yellow hair, and her blue-checked cotton
+dress, and her dimpled white bare feet--ran after the wagon until the
+tears blinded her, and she fell in the road, and lay there in the dust,
+sobbing.
+
+Then Barney found his voice. His father and mother would not return
+until to-morrow, and the thought of what might happen at home, with
+nobody there but the helpless old grandmother and the little children,
+made him forget his own troubles for the time.
+
+"Take good keer o' the t'other chillen, Andy!" he shouted out to the
+next oldest boy, thus making him a deputy-guardian of the family, "an'
+pick Melissy up out'n the dust, an' be sure ye keeps granny's cheer
+close enough ter the fire!"
+
+Then he turned back again. He could still hear Melissa sobbing. He
+wondered why the two men in the wagon looked persistently in the
+opposite direction, and why they were both so silent.
+
+The children stood in the road, watching the wagon as long as they could
+see it, but Nick had slunk away into the woods. He could not bear the
+sight of their grief. He walked on, hardly knowing where he went. He
+felt as if he were trying to get rid of himself. He appreciated fully
+now the consequences of what he had done. Barney, innocent Barney, would
+be thrust into jail.
+
+He began to see that the most terrible phase of moral cowardice is its
+capacity to injure others, and he could not endure the thought of what
+he had brought upon his friend. Soon he was saying to himself that
+something was sure to happen to prevent them from putting Barney in
+prison,--he shouldn't be surprised if it were to happen before the wagon
+could reach the foot of the mountain.
+
+In his despair, he had flung himself at length upon the rugged, stony
+ground at the base of a great crag. When this comforting thought of
+Barney's release came upon him, he took his hands from his face, and
+looked about him. From certain ledges of the cliff above, the road which
+led down the valley was visible at intervals for some distance. There he
+could watch the progress of the wagon, and see for a time longer what
+was happening to Barney.
+
+There was a broad gulf between the wall of the mountain and the crag,
+which, from its detached position and its shape, was known far and wide
+as the "Old Man's Chimney."
+
+It loomed up like a great stone column, a hundred feet above the wooded
+slope where Nick stood, and its height could only be ascended by
+dexterous climbing.
+
+He went at it like a cat. Sometimes he helped himself up by sharp
+projections of the rock, sometimes by slipping his feet and hands into
+crevices, and sometimes he caught hold of a strong bush here and there,
+and gave himself a lift. When he was about forty feet from the base, he
+sat down on one of the ledges, and turning, looked anxiously along the
+red clay road which he could see winding among the trees down the
+mountain's side.
+
+No wagon was there.
+
+His eyes followed the road further and further toward the foot of the
+range, and then along the valley beyond. There, at least two miles
+distant, was a small moving black object, plainly defined upon the red
+clay of the road.
+
+Barney was gone! There was no mistake about it. They had taken him away
+from Goliath Mountain! He was innocent, and Nick knew it, and Nick had
+made him seem guilty. There was no one near him now to speak a good word
+for him, not even his palsied old grandmother.
+
+It all came back upon Nick with a rush. His eyes were blurred with
+rising tears. Unconsciously, in his grief, he made a movement forward,
+and suddenly clutched convulsively at the ledge.
+
+He had lost his balance. There was a swift, fantastic whirl of vague
+objects before him, then a great light seemed flashing through his very
+brain, and he knew that he was falling.
+
+He knew nothing else for some time. He wondered where he was when he
+first opened his eyes and saw the great stone shaft towering high above,
+and the tops of the sun-gilded maples waving about him.
+
+Then he remembered and understood. He had fallen from that narrow ledge,
+hardly ten feet above his head, and had been caught in his descent by
+the far broader one upon which he lay.
+
+"It knocked the senses out'n me fur a while, I reckon," he said to
+himself. "But I hev toler'ble luck now, sure ez shootin', kase I mought
+hev drapped over this ledge, an' then I'd hev been gone fur sartain
+sure!"
+
+His exultation was short-lived. What was this limp thing hanging to his
+shoulder? and what was this thrill of pain darting through it?
+
+He looked at it in amazement. It was his strong right
+arm--broken--helpless.
+
+And here he was, perched thirty feet above the earth, weakened by his
+long faint, sore and bruised and unnerved by his fall, and with only his
+left arm to aid him in making that perilous descent.
+
+It was impossible. He glanced down at the sheer walls of the column
+below, shook his head, and lay back on the ledge. Reckless as he was, he
+realized that the attempt would be fatal.
+
+Then came a thought that filled him with dismay,--how long was this to
+last?--who would rescue him?
+
+He knew that a prolonged absence from home would create no surprise. His
+mother would only fancy that he had slipped off, as he had often done,
+to go on a camp-hunt with some other boys. She would not grow uneasy for
+a week, at least.
+
+He was deep in the heart of the forest, distant from any dwelling. No
+one, as far as he knew, came to this spot, except himself and Barney,
+and their errand here was for the sake of the exhilaration and the
+hazard of climbing the crag. It was so lonely that on the Old Man's
+Chimney the eagles built instead of the swallows. His hope--his only
+hope--was that some hunter might chance to pass before he should die of
+hunger.
+
+The shadow of the great obelisk shifted as the day wore on, and left him
+in the broad, hot glare of the sun. His broken arm was fevered and gave
+him great pain. Now and then he raised himself on the other, and looked
+down wistfully at the cool, dusky depths of the woods. He heard
+continually the impetuous rushing of a mountain torrent near at hand;
+sometimes, when the wind stirred the foliage, he caught a glimpse of the
+water, rioting from rock to rock, and he was oppressed by an intolerable
+thirst.
+
+Thus the hours lagged wearily on.
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+When the wagon was rolling along the road in the valley, Barney at first
+kept his eyes persistently fastened upon the craggy heights and the red
+and gold autumnal woods of Goliath Mountain, as the mighty range
+stretched across the plain.
+
+But presently the two men began to talk to him, and he turned around in
+order to face them. They were urging him to confess his own guilt and
+tell who were the other burglars, and where they were. But Barney had
+nothing to tell. He could only protest again and again his innocence.
+The men, however, shook their heads incredulously, and after a while
+they left him to himself and smoked their pipes in silence.
+
+When Barney looked back at the mountains once more, a startling change
+seemed to have been wrought in the landscape. Instead of the frowning
+sandstone cliffs he loved so well, and the gloomy recesses of the woods,
+there was only a succession of lines of a delicate blue color drawn
+along the horizon. This was the way the distant ranges looked from the
+crags of his own home; he knew that they were the mountains, but which
+was Goliath?
+
+Suddenly he struck his hands together, and broke out with a bitter cry.
+
+"I hev los' G'liath!" he exclaimed. "I dunno whar I live! An' whar _is_
+Melissy?"
+
+A difficult undertaking, certainly, to determine where among all those
+great spurs and outliers, stretching so far on either hand, was that
+little atom of dimpled pink-and-white humanity known as "Melissy."
+
+The constable, being a native of these hills himself, knew something by
+experience of the homesickness of an exiled mountaineer,--far more
+terrible than the homesickness of low-landers; he took his pipe
+promptly from between his lips, and told the boy that the second blue
+ridge, counting down from the sky, was "G'liath Mounting," and that
+"Melissy war right thar somewhar."
+
+Barney looked back at it with unrecognizing eyes,--this gentle, misty,
+blue vagueness was not the solemn, sombre mountain that he knew. He
+gazed at it only for a moment longer; then his heart swelled and he
+burst into tears.
+
+On and on they went through the flat country. The boy felt that he could
+scarcely breathe. Even tourists, coming down from these mountains to the
+valley below, struggle with a sense of suffocation and oppression; how
+must it have been then with this half-wild creature, born and bred on
+those breezy heights!
+
+The stout mules did their duty well, and it was not long before they
+were in sight of the cross-roads store that had been robbed. It was a
+part of a small frame dwelling-house, set in the midst of the yellow
+sunlight that brooded over the plain. All the world around it seemed to
+the young backwoodsman to be a big cornfield; but there was a garden
+close at hand, and tall sunflowers looked over the fence and seemed to
+nod knowingly at Barney, as much as to say they had always suspected
+him of being one of the burglars, and were gratified that he had been
+caught at last.
+
+Poor fellow! he saw so much suspicion expressed in the faces of a crowd
+of men congregating about the store, that it was no wonder he fancied he
+detected it too in inanimate objects.
+
+Of all the group only one seemed to doubt his guilt. He overheard
+Blenkins, the merchant, say to Jim Dow,--
+
+"It's mighty hard to b'lieve this story on this 'ere boy; he's a manly
+looking, straight-for'ard little chap, an' he's got honest eyes in his
+head, too."
+
+"He'd a deal better hev an honest heart in his body," drawled Jim Dow,
+who was convinced that Barney had aided in the burglary.
+
+When they had gone around to the window with the broken pane, Barney
+looked up at it in great anxiety. If only it should prove too small for
+him to slip through! Certainly it seemed very small.
+
+He had pulled off his coat and stood ready to jump.
+
+"Up with you!" said Stebbins.
+
+The boy laid both hands on the sill, gave a light spring, and went
+through the pane like an eel.
+
+"That settles it!" he heard Stebbins saying outside. And all the idlers
+were laughing because it was done so nimbly.
+
+"That boy's right smart of a fool," said one of the lookers-on. "Now, if
+that had been me, I'd hev made out to git stuck somehows in that winder;
+I'd have scotched my wheel somewhere."
+
+"Ef ye hed, I'd have dragged ye through ennyhow," declared Jim Dow, who
+had no toleration of a joke on a serious subject. "This hyar boy air a
+deal too peart ter try enny sech fool tricks on _Me_!"
+
+Barney hardly knew how he got back into the wagon; he only knew that
+they were presently jolting along once more in the midst of the yellow
+glare of sunlight. It had begun to seem that there was no chance for
+him. Like Nick, he too had madly believed, in spite of everything, that
+something would happen to help him. He could not think that, innocent as
+he was, he would be imprisoned. Now, however, this fate evidently was
+very close upon him.
+
+Suddenly Jim Dow spoke. "I s'pose ye war powerful disapp'inted kase ye
+couldn't git yerself hitched in that thar winder; ye air too well used
+to it,--ye hev been through it afore."
+
+"I hev never been through it afore!" cried Barney indignantly.
+
+"Well, well," said Stebbins pacifically, "it wouldn't have done you any
+good if you hadn't gone through the pane just now. I'd have only thought
+you were one of those who stood on the outside. You see, the _main_
+point against you is that scrap of your coat and your button found right
+there by the Conscripts' Hollow,--though, of course, your going through
+the window-pane so easy makes it more complete."
+
+Barney's tired brain began to fumble at this problem,--how did it
+happen?
+
+He had not been on the ledge nor at the Conscripts' Hollow for six
+months at least. Yet there was that bit of his coat and his button found
+on the bush close at hand only to-day.
+
+Was it possible that he could have exchanged coats by mistake with Nick
+the last afternoon that they were on the crag together?
+
+"Did Nick wear _my_ coat down on the ledge, I wonder, an' git it tored?
+Did Nick see the plunder in the Conscripts' Hollow, an' git skeered, an'
+then sot out ter lyin' ter git shet o' the blame?"
+
+As he asked himself these questions, he began to remember, vaguely,
+having seen, just as he was falling asleep, his friend's head slowly
+disappearing beneath the verge of the crag.
+
+"Nick started down ter the ledge, anyhow," he argued.
+
+Did he dream it, or was it true, that when Nick came back he seemed at
+first strangely agitated?
+
+All at once Barney exclaimed aloud,--
+
+"This hyar air a powerful cur'ous thing 'bout'n that thar piece what war
+tored out'n my coat!"
+
+"What's curious about it?" asked Stebbins quickly.
+
+Jim Dow took his pipe from his mouth, and looked sharply at the boy.
+
+Barney struggled for a moment with a strong temptation. Then a nobler
+impulse asserted itself. He would not even attempt to shield himself
+behind the friend who had done him so grievous an injury.
+
+He _knew_ nothing positively; he must not put his suspicions and his
+vague, half-sleeping impressions into words, and thus possibly criminate
+Nick.
+
+He himself felt certain now how the matter really stood,--that Nick had
+no connection whatever with the robbery, but having accidentally
+stumbled upon the stolen goods, he had become panic-stricken, had lied
+about it, and finally had saved himself at the expense of an innocent
+friend.
+
+Still, Barney had no _proof_ of this, and he felt he would rather suffer
+unjustly himself than unjustly throw blame on another.
+
+"Nothin', nothin'," he said absently. "I war jes' a-studyin' 'bout'n it
+all."
+
+"Well, I wouldn't think about it any more just now," said good-natured
+Stebbins. "You look like you had been dragged through a keyhole instead
+of a window-pane. This town we're coming to is the biggest town you ever
+saw."
+
+Barney could not respond to this attempt to divert his attention. He
+could only brood upon the fact that he was innocent, and would be
+punished as if he were guilty, and that it was Nick Gregory, his chosen
+friend, who had brought him to this pass.
+
+He would not be unmanly, and injure Nick with a possibly unfounded
+suspicion, but his heart burned with indignation and contempt when he
+thought of him. He felt that he would go through fire and water to be
+justly revenged upon him.
+
+He determined that, if ever he should see Nick again, even though years
+might intervene, he would tax him with the injury he had wrought, and
+make him answer for it.
+
+Barney clenched his fists as he looked back at the ethereal blue shadows
+that they said were the solid old hills.
+
+Perhaps, however, if he had known where, in the misty uncertainty that
+enveloped Goliath Mountain, Nick Gregory was at this moment,--far away
+in the lonely woods, helpless with his broken arm, perched high up on
+the "Old Man's Chimney,"--Barney might have thought himself the more
+fortunately placed of the two.
+
+Before he was well aware of it, the wagon was jolting into the town. He
+took no notice of how much larger the little village was than any he had
+ever seen before. His attention was riveted by the faces of the people
+who ran to the doors and windows, upon recognizing the officers, to
+stare at him as one of the burglars.
+
+When the wagon reached the public square, a number of men came up and
+stopped it.
+
+Barney was surprised that they took so little notice of him. They were
+talking loudly and excitedly to the officers, who grew at once loud and
+excited, too.
+
+The boy roused himself, and began to listen to the conversation. The
+burglars had been captured!--yes, that was what they were saying. The
+deputy-sheriff had nabbed the whole gang in a western district of the
+county this morning early, and they were lodged at this moment in jail.
+Barney's heart sank. Would he be put among the guilty creatures? He
+flinched from the very idea.
+
+Suddenly, here was the deputy-sheriff himself, a young man, dusty and
+tired with his long, hard ride, but with an air of great satisfaction in
+his success. He talked with many quick gestures that were very
+expressive. Sometimes he would leave a sentence unfinished except by a
+brisk nod, but all the crowd caught its meaning instantly. This
+peculiarity gave him a very animated manner, and he seemed to Barney to
+enjoy being in a position of authority.
+
+He pressed his foaming horse close to the wagon, and leaning over,
+looked searchingly into Barney's face.
+
+The poor boy looked up deprecatingly from under his limp and drooping
+hat-brim.
+
+All the crowd stood in silence, watching them. After a moment of this
+keen scrutiny, the deputy turned to the constable with an interrogative
+wave of the hand.
+
+"This hyar's the boy what war put through the winder-pane ter thieve
+from Blenkins," said Jim Dow. "Thar's consider'ble fac's agin him."
+
+"You mean well, Jim," said the deputy, with a short, scornful laugh.
+"But your performance ain't always equal to your intentions."
+
+He lifted his eyebrows and nodded in a significant way that the crowd
+understood, for there was a stir of excitement in its midst; but poor
+Barney failed to catch his meaning. He hung upon every tone and gesture
+with the intensest interest. All the talk was about him, and he could
+comprehend no more than if the man spoke in a foreign language.
+
+Still, he gathered something of the drift of the speech from the
+constable's reply.
+
+"That thar boy's looks hev bamboozled more'n one man ter-day, jes' at
+fust," Jim Dow drawled. "_Looks_ ain't nothin'."
+
+"I'd believe 'most anything a boy with a face on him like that would
+tell me," said the deputy. "And besides, you see, one of those scamps,"
+with a quick nod toward the jail, "has turned State's evidence."
+
+Barney's heart was in a great tumult. It seemed bursting. There was a
+hot rush of blood to his head. He was dizzy--and he could not
+understand!
+
+State's evidence,--what was that? and what would that do to him?
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+Barney observed that these words produced a marked sensation. The crowd
+began to press more closely around the deputy-sheriff's foaming horse.
+
+"Who hev done turned State's evidence?" asked Jim Dow.
+
+"Little Jeff Carew,--you've seen that puny little man a-many a
+time--haven't you, Jim? He'd go into your pocket."
+
+"He would, I know, powerful quick, ef he thunk I hed ennything in it,"
+said Jim, with a gruff laugh.
+
+"I didn't mean that, though it's true enough. I only went ter say that
+he's small enough to go into any ordinary-sized fellow's pocket. Some of
+the rest of them wanted to turn State's evidence, but they weren't
+allowed. They were harder customers even than Jeff Carew,--regular old
+jail-birds."
+
+Barney began to vaguely understand that when a prisoner confesses the
+crime he has committed, and gives testimony which will convict his
+partners in it, this is called turning "State's evidence."
+
+But how was it to concern Barney?
+
+An old white-haired man had pushed up to the wagon; he polished his
+spectacles on his coat-tail, then put them on his nose, and focused them
+on Barney. Those green spectacles seemed to the boy to have a solemnly
+accusing expression on their broad and sombre lenses. He shrank as the
+old man spoke,--
+
+"And is this the boy who was slipped through the window to steal from
+Blenkins?"
+
+"No," said the deputy, "this ain't the boy."
+
+Barney could hardly believe his senses.
+
+"Fact is," continued the deputy, with a brisk wave of his hand, "there
+wasn't any boy with 'em,--so little Jeff Carew says. _He_ jumped through
+the window-pane _himself_. We wouldn't believe that until we measured
+one there at the jail of the same size as Blenkins's window-glass, and
+he went through it without a wriggle."
+
+Barney sprang to his feet.
+
+"Oh, tell it ter me, folkses!" he cried wildly; "tell it ter me,
+somebody! Will they keep me hyar all the same? An' when will I see
+G'liath Mounting agin, an' be whar Melissy air?"
+
+He had burst into tears, and there was a murmur of sympathy in the
+crowd.
+
+"Oh, that lets you out, I reckon, youngster," said Stebbins. "I'm glad
+enough of it for one."
+
+The old man turned his solemnly accusing green spectacles on Stebbins,
+and it seemed to Barney that he spoke with no less solemnly accusing a
+voice.
+
+"He ought never to have been let in."
+
+Stebbins replied, rather eagerly, Barney thought, "Why, there was enough
+against that boy to have clapped him in jail, and maybe convicted him,
+if this man hadn't turned State's evidence."
+
+"We hed the fac's agin him,--dead agin him," chimed in Jim Dow.
+
+"That just shows how much danger an innocent boy was in; it seems to me
+that somebody ought to have been more careful," the old man protested.
+
+"That's so!" came in half a dozen voices from the crowd.
+
+Barney was surprised to see how many friends he had now, when a moment
+before he had had none. But he ought to have realized that there is a
+great difference between _being_ a young martyr, and _seeming_ a young
+thief.
+
+"I want to see the little fellow out of this," said the old man with the
+terrible spectacles.
+
+He saw him out of it in a short while.
+
+There was an examination before a magistrate, in which Barney was
+discharged on the testimony of Jeff Carew, who was produced and swore
+that he had never before seen the boy, that he was not among the gang of
+burglars who had robbed Blenkins's store and dwelling-house, and that he
+had had no part in helping to conceal the plunder. In opposition to
+this, the mere finding of a scrap of Barney's coat close to the
+Conscripts' Hollow seemed now of slight consequence, although it could
+not be accounted for.
+
+When the trial was over, the old man with the green spectacles took
+Barney to his house, gave him something to eat, and saw him start out
+homeward.
+
+As Barney plodded along toward the blue mountains his heart was very
+bitter against Nick Gregory, who had lied and thrown suspicion upon him
+and brought him into danger. Whenever he thought of it he raised his
+clenched fist and shook it. He was a little fellow, but he felt that
+with the strength of this grievance he was more than a match for big
+Nick Gregory. He would force him to confess the lies that he had told
+and his cowardice, and all Goliath Mountain should know it and despise
+him for it.
+
+"I'll fetch an' kerry that word to an' fro fur a thousand mile!" Barney
+declared between his set teeth.
+
+Now and then a wagoner overtook him and gave him a ride, thus greatly
+helping him on his way. As he went, there was a gradual change in the
+blue and misty range that seemed to encircle the west, and which he
+knew, by one deep indentation in the horizontal line of its summit, was
+Goliath Mountain. It became first an intenser blue. As he drew nearer
+still, it turned a bronzed green. It had purpled with the sunset before
+he could distinguish the crimson and gold of its foliage and its
+beetling crags. Night had fallen when he reached the base of the
+mountain.
+
+There was no moon; heavy clouds were rolling up from the horizon, and
+they hid the stars. Nick Gregory, lying on the ledge of the "Old Man's
+Chimney," thirty feet above the black earth, could not see his hand
+before his face. The darkness was dreadful to him. It had closed upon a
+dreadful day. The seconds were measured by the throbs and dartings of
+pain in his arm. He was almost exhausted by hunger and thirst. He
+thought, however, that he could have borne it all cheerfully, but for
+the sharp remorse that tortured him for the wrong he had done to his
+friend, and his wild anxiety about Barney's fate. Nick felt that he,
+himself, was on trial here, imprisoned on this tower of stone, cut off
+from the world, from everything but his sternly accusing conscience and
+his guilty heart.
+
+For hours he had heard nothing but the monotonous rushing of the water
+close at hand, or now and then the shrill, quavering cry of a distant
+screech-owl, or the almost noiseless flapping of a bat's wings as they
+swept by him.
+
+He had hardly a hope of deliverance, when suddenly there came a new
+sound, vague and indistinguishable. He lifted himself upon his left
+elbow and listened again. He could hear nothing for a moment except his
+own panting breath and the loud beating of his heart. But there--the
+sound came once more. What was it? a dropping leaf? the falling of a
+fragment of stone from the "Chimney"? a distant step?
+
+It grew more distinct as it drew nearer; presently he recognized
+it,--the regular footfall of some man or boy plodding along the path.
+That path!--a recollection flashed through his mind. No one knew that
+short cut up the mountain but him and Barney; they had worn the path
+with their trampings back and forth from the "Old Man's Chimney."
+
+He thought he must be dreaming, or that he had lost his reason; still he
+shouted out, "Hold on, thar! air it ye, Barney?"
+
+The step paused. Then a reply came in a voice that he hardly recognized
+as Barney's; it was so fierce, and so full of half-repressed anger.
+
+"Yes, it air Barney,--ef _ye_ hev any call ter know."
+
+"How did ye git away, Barney?--how did ye git away?" exclaimed Nick,
+with a joyous sense of relief.
+
+"A _thief's_ word cl'ared me!"
+
+This bitter cry came up to Nick, sharp and distinct, through the dark
+stillness. He said nothing at the moment, and presently he heard Barney
+speak again, as he stood invisible, and enveloped in the gloom of the
+night, at the foot of the mighty column.
+
+"'Twar my bes' frien' ez sunk me deep in trouble. But the _thief_, he
+fished me up. He 'lowed ter the jestice ez I never holped him ter steal
+nothin' nor ter hide it arterward, nuther."
+
+Nick said not a word. The hot tears came into his eyes. Barney, he
+thought, could feel no more bitterly toward him than he felt toward
+himself.
+
+"How kem my coat ter be tored down thar on the ledge, close ter the
+Conscripts' Hollow, whar I hain't been sence the cloth war wove?"
+
+There was a long pause.
+
+"I wore it thar, Barney, 'stid o' mine," Nick replied at last. "I never
+knowed, at fust, ez I hed tored it. I was so skeered when I seen the
+stole truck, I never knowed nothin'."
+
+"An' then ye spoke a lie! An' arterward, ye let the folks think ez 'twar
+me ez hed tored that coat close by the Conscripts' Hollow!"
+
+"I was skeered haffen ter death, Barney!"
+
+Nick was very contemptible in his falsehood and cowardice,--even in his
+repentance and shame and sorrow. At least, so the boy thought who stood
+in the darkness at the foot of the great column. Suddenly it occurred to
+Barney that this was a strange place for Nick to be at this hour of the
+night. His indignation gave way for a moment to some natural curiosity.
+
+"What air ye a-doin' of up thar on the Old Man's Chimney?" he asked.
+
+"I kem up hyar this mornin' early, ter watch the wagon a-takin' ye off.
+Then I fell and bruk my arm, an' I can't git down 'thout bein' holped a
+little."
+
+There was another silence, so intense that it seemed to Nick as if he
+were all alone again in the immensity of the mountains, and the black
+night, and the endless forests. He had expected an immediate proffer of
+assistance from Barney. He had thought that his injured friend would
+relent in his severity when he knew that he had suffered too; that he
+was in great pain even at this moment.
+
+But not a word came from Barney.
+
+"I hed laid off ter ax ye ter holp me a little," Nick faltered meekly,
+making his appeal direct.
+
+There was no answer.
+
+It was so still that the boy, high up on the sandstone pillar, could
+hear the wind rising among the far spurs west of Goliath. The foliage
+near at hand was ominously quiet in the sultry air. Once there was a
+flash of lightning from the black clouds, followed by a low muttering
+of thunder. Then all was still again,--so still!
+
+Nick raised himself upon his left arm, and leaned cautiously over the
+verge of the ledge, peering, with starting eyes, into the darkness, and
+hoping for another flash of lightning that he might see below for an
+instant. A terrible suspicion had come to him. Could Barney have slipped
+quietly away, leaving him to his fate?
+
+He could see nothing in the impenetrable gloom; he could hear nothing in
+the dark stillness.
+
+Barney had not yet gone, but he was saying to himself, as he stood at
+the foot of the great obelisk, that here was his revenge, far more
+complete than he had dared even to hope.
+
+He could measure out his false friend's punishment in any degree he
+thought fit. He could leave him there with his broken arm and his pangs
+of hunger for another day. He deserved it,--he deserved it richly. The
+recollection was still very bitter to Barney of the hardships he had
+endured at the hands of this boy, who asked him now for help. Why did he
+not refuse it? Why should he not take the revenge he had promised
+himself?
+
+And then he knew there was danger in now trying to climb the jagged
+edges of the Old Man's Chimney. His nerves were shaken by the
+excitements of the day; he was fagged out by his long tramp; the wind
+was beginning to surge among the trees; it might blow him from his
+uncertain foothold. But when it gained more strength, might it not drive
+Nick, helpless with his broken arm, from that high ledge?
+
+As this thought crossed his mind, he tore off his hat, coat, and shoes,
+and desperately began the ascent. He thought he knew every projection
+and crevice and bush so well that he might have found his way
+blindfolded, and guided by the sense of touch alone. But he did not lack
+for light. Before he was six feet up from the ground, the clouds were
+rent by a vivid flash, and an instantaneous peal of thunder woke all
+the echoes. This was the breaking of the storm; afterward, there was a
+continuous pale flickering over all the sky, and at close intervals,
+dazzling gleams of lightning darted through the rain, which was now
+falling heavily.
+
+"I'm a-comin', Nick!" shouted Barney, through the din of the elements.
+
+Somehow, as he climbed, he felt light-hearted again. It seemed to him
+that he had left a great weight at the foot of the gigantic sandstone
+column. Could it be that bitter revenge he had promised himself? He had
+thought only of Nick's safety, but he seemed to have done himself a
+kindness in forgiving his friend,--the burden of revenge is so heavy!
+His troubles were already growing faint in his memory,--it was so good
+to feel the rain splashing in his face, and his rude playfellow, the
+mountain wind, rioting around him once more. He was laughing when at
+last he pulled himself up, wet through and through, on the ledge beside
+Nick.
+
+"It's airish up hyar, ain't it?" he cried.
+
+"Barney," said Nick miserably, "I dunno how I kin ever look at ye agin,
+squar' in the face, while I lives."
+
+"Shet that up!" Barney returned good-humoredly. "I don't want ter ever
+hear 'bout'n it no more. I'll always know, arter this, that I can't
+place no dependence in ye; but, law, ye air jes' like that old gun o'
+mine; sometimes it'll hang fire, an' sometimes it'll go off at
+half-cock, an' ginerally it disapp'ints me mightily. But, somehows, I
+can't determinate to shoot with no other one. I'll hev ter feel by ye
+jes' like I does by that thar old gun."
+
+The descent was slow and difficult, and very painful to Nick, and
+fraught with considerable danger to both boys. They accomplished it in
+safety, however, and then, with Barney's aid, Nick managed to drag
+himself through the woods to the nearest log cabin, where his arm was
+set by zealous and sympathetic amateurs in a rude fashion that probably
+would have shocked the faculty. They had some supper here, and an
+invitation to remain all night; but Barney was wild to be at home, and
+Nick, in his adversity, clung to his friend.
+
+The rain had ceased, and they had only half a mile further to go.
+Barney's heart was exultant when he saw the light in the window of his
+home, and the sparks flying up from the chimney. He had some curiosity
+to know how the family circle looked without him.
+
+"Ye wait hyar, Nick, a minute, an' I'll take a peek at 'em afore I
+bounce in 'mongst 'em," he said. "I'm all eat up ter know what Melissy
+air a-doin' 'thout me."
+
+But the sight smote the tears from his eyes when he stole around to the
+window and glanced in at the little group, plainly shown in the flare
+from the open fire.
+
+Granny looked ten years older since morning. The three small boys,
+instead of popping corn or roasting apples and sweet potatoes, as was
+their habit in the evenings, sat in a dismal row, their chins on their
+freckled, sunburned hands, and their elbows on their knees, and gazed
+ruefully at the fire. And Melissy,--why, there was Melissy, a little
+blue-and-white ball curled up on the floor. Asleep? No. Barney caught
+the gleam of her wide-open blue eyes; but he missed something from
+them,--the happy expression that used to dwell there.
+
+He went at the door with a rush. And what an uproar there was when he
+suddenly sprang in among them! Melissy laughed until she cried. Granny
+whirled and whirled her stick, and nodded convulsively, and gasped out
+eager questions about the trial and the "jedge." The little boys jumped
+for joy until they seemed strung on wire.
+
+Soon they were popping corn and roasting apples once more. The flames
+roared up the chimney, and the shadows danced on the wall, and as the
+hours wore on, they were all so happy that when midnight came, it caught
+them still grouped around the fire.
+
+
+
+
+A WARNING
+
+
+It was night on Elm Ridge. So black, so black that the great crags and
+chasms were hidden, the forest was lost in the encompassing gloom, the
+valley and the distant ranges were gone,--all the world had disappeared.
+
+There was no wind, and the dark clouds above the dark earth hung low and
+motionless. Solomon Grow found it something of an undertaking to grope
+his way back from the little hut of unhewn logs, where he had stabled
+his father's horse, to the door of the cabin and the home-circle within.
+
+He fumbled for the latchstring, and pulling it carelessly, the door flew
+open suddenly, and he almost fell into the room.
+
+"Why d' ye come a-bustin' in hyar that thar way, Sol?" his mother
+demanded rather tartly. "Ef ye hed been raised 'mongst the foxes, ye
+couldn't show less manners."
+
+"Door slipped out'n my hand," said Sol, a trifle sullenly.
+
+"Waal--air ye disabled anywhar so ez ye can't shet it, eh?" asked his
+father, with a touch of sarcasm.
+
+Sol shut the door, drew up an inverted tub, seated himself upon it, and
+looked about, loweringly. He thought he had been needlessly affronted.
+Still, he held his peace.
+
+Within, there was a great contrast to the black night outside. The ash
+and hickory logs in the deep fireplace threw blue and yellow flames high
+up the wide stone chimney. The flickering light was like some genial,
+cheery smile forever coming and going.
+
+It illumined the circle about the hearth. There sat Sol's mother, idle
+to-night, for it was Sunday. His grandmother, too, was there, so old
+that she seemed to confirm the story told of these healthy mountains, to
+the effect that people are obliged to go down in the valley to die, else
+they would live forever.
+
+There was Sol's father, a great burly fellow, six feet three inches in
+height, still holding out his hands to the blaze, chilled through and
+through by his long ride from the church where he had been to hear the
+circuit-rider preach on "Forgiveness of Injuries."
+
+He was beginning now to quarrel vehemently with his brother-in-law,
+Jacob Smith, about the shabby treatment he had recently experienced in
+the non-payment of work,--for work in this country is a sort of
+circulating medium; a man will plough a day for another man, on
+condition that the favor is rigorously reciprocated.
+
+Jacob Smith had been to the still, and apparently had imbibed the spirit
+there prevailing, to more effect than Sol's father had absorbed the
+spirit that had been taught in church.
+
+In plain words, Jacob Smith was very drunk, and very quarrelsome, and
+very unreasonable. The genial firelight that played upon his bloated
+face played also over objects much pleasanter to look upon,--over the
+strings of red pepper-pods hanging from the rafters; over the bright
+variegations of color in the clean patchwork quilt on the bed; over the
+shining pans and pails set aside on the shelf; over the great, curious
+frame of the warping-bars, rising up among the shadows on the other side
+of the room, the equidistant pegs still holding the sized yarn that
+Solomon's mother had been warping, preparatory to weaving.
+
+On the other side of the room, too, was a little tow-headed child
+sitting in a cradle, which, small as he was, he had long ago outgrown as
+a bed.
+
+It was only a pine box placed upon rude rockers, and he used it for a
+rocking-chair. His bare, fat legs hung out on one side of the box, and
+as he delightedly rocked back and forth, his grotesque little shadow
+waved to and fro on the wall, and mocked and flouted him.
+
+What he thought of it, nobody can ever know; his grave eyes were fixed
+upon it, but he said nothing, and the silent shadow and substance swayed
+joyously hither and thither together.
+
+The quarrel between the two men was becoming hot and bitter. One might
+have expected nothing better from Jacob Smith, for when a man is drunk,
+the human element drops like a husk, and only the unreasoning brute is
+left.
+
+But had John Grow forgotten all the good words he had heard to-day from
+the circuit-rider? Had they melted into thin air during his long ride
+from the church? Were the houseless good words wandering with the rising
+wind through the unpeopled forest, seeking vainly a human heart where
+they might find a lodgment?
+
+The men had risen from their chairs; the drunkard, tremulous with anger,
+had drawn a sharp knife. John Grow was not so patient as he might have
+been, considering the great advantage he had in being sober, and the
+good words with which he had started out from the "meet'n'-house."
+
+He laid his heavy hand angrily upon the drunken man's shoulder.
+
+In another moment there would have been bloodshed. But suddenly the
+dark shadows at the other end of the room swayed with a strange motion;
+a great creaking sound arose, and the warping-bars tottered forward and
+fell upon the floor with a crash.
+
+The wranglers turned with anxious faces. No one was near the bars, it
+seemed that naught could have jarred them; but there lay the heavy frame
+upon the floor, the pegs broken, and the yarn twisted.
+
+"A warning!" cried Sol's mother. "A warning how you-uns spen' the
+evenin' o' the Lord's Day in yer quar'lin', an' fightin', an' sech. An'
+ye, John Grow, jes' from the meet'n'-house!"
+
+She did not reproach her brother,--nobody hopes anything from a
+drunkard.
+
+"A sign o' bad luck," said the grandmother. "It 'minds me o' the time
+las' winter that the wind blowed the door in, an' straight arter that
+the cow died."
+
+"Them signs air ez likely ter take hold on folks ez on cattle," said
+Jacob Smith, half-sobered by the shock.
+
+There was a look of sudden anxiety on the face of Solomon's mother. She
+crossed the room to the youngster rocking in the cradle.
+
+"Come, Benny," she said, "ye oughter go ter bed. Ye air wastin' yer
+strength sittin' up this late in the night. An' ye war a-coughin' las'
+week. Ye must go ter bed."
+
+Benny clung to his unique rocking-chair with a sturdy strength which
+promised well for his muscle when he should be as old as his great,
+strong brother Solomon. He had been as quiet, hitherto, as if he were
+dumb, but now he lifted up his voice in a loud and poignant wail, and
+after he was put to bed, he resurrected himself from among the
+bedclothes, ever and anon, with a bitter, though infantile, jargon of
+protest.
+
+"I'm fairly afeard o' them bars," said Mrs. Grow, looking down upon the
+prostrate timbers. "It's comical that they fell down that-a-way. I hopes
+'tain't no sign o' bad luck. I wouldn't hev nothin' ter happen fur
+nothin'. An' Benny war a-coughin' las' week."
+
+She had not even the courage to put her fear into words. And she
+tenderly admonished tow-headed Benny, who was once more getting out of
+bed, to go to sleep and save his strength, and remember how he was
+coughing last week.
+
+"He hed a chicken-bone acrost his throat," said his father. "No wonder
+he coughed."
+
+Solomon rose and went out into the black night,--so black that he could
+not distinguish the sky from the earth, or the unobstructed air from the
+dense forest around.
+
+He walked about blindly, dragging something heavily after him. The
+weight of concealment it was. He knew something that nobody knew
+besides.
+
+At the critical moment of the altercation, he had stepped softly among
+the shadows to the warping-bars,--a strong push had sent the great frame
+crashing down. He was back in an instant among the others, and by reason
+of the excitement his agency in the sensation was not detected.
+
+Like his biblical namesake, Solomon was no fool. Had he been reared in a
+cultivated community, with the advantages of education, he might have
+been one of the bright young fellows who manage other young fellows, who
+control debating societies, who are prominent in mysterious
+associations, the secret of which is at once guarded and represented by
+a Cerberus of three Greek letters.
+
+But, wise as he was, Solomon was not a prophet. He had intended only to
+effect a diversion, and stop the quarrel. He had had no prevision of the
+panic of superstition that he had raised in the minds of these simple
+people; for the ignorant mountaineer is a devout believer in signs and
+warnings.
+
+As Solomon wandered about outside, he heard his father stumbling from
+the door of the house to the barn to see if aught of evil had come to
+the cow or the horse. He knew how his grandmother's heart was wrung with
+fear for her heifer, and he could hardly endure to think of his mother's
+anxieties about Benny.
+
+No prophetic eye was needed to foresee the terrors that would beset her
+in the days to come, when she would walk back and forth before the
+bars, warping the yarn to be woven into cloth for his and Benny's
+clothes; how she would regard the harmless frame as an uncanny thing,
+endowed with supernatural powers, and look askance at it, and shrink
+from touching it; how she would watch for the sign to come true, and
+tremble lest it come.
+
+He turned about, dragging and tugging this weight of concealment after
+him, reentered the house, and sat down beside the fire.
+
+His uncle Jacob Smith had gone to his own home. The others were telling
+stories, calculated to make one's hair stand on end, about signs and
+warnings, and their horrible fulfillment.
+
+"Granny," said Solomon suddenly.
+
+"Waal, sonny?" said his grandmother.
+
+When the eyes of the family group were fixed upon him, Solomon's courage
+failed.
+
+"Nothin'," he said hastily. "Nothin' at all."
+
+"Why, what ails the boy?" exclaimed his mother.
+
+"I tell ye now, Solomon," said his grandmother, with an emphatic nod,
+"ye hed better respec' yer elders,--an' a sign in the house!"
+
+Solomon slept little that night. Toward day he began to dream of the
+warping-bars. They seemed to develop suddenly into an immense animated
+monster, from which he only escaped by waking with a sudden start.
+
+Then he found that a great white morning, full of snow, was breaking
+upon the black night. And what a world it was now! The mountain was
+graced with a soft white drapery; on every open space there were vague
+suggestions of delicate colors: in this hollow lay a tender purple
+shadow; on that steep slope was an elusive roseate flush, and when you
+looked again, it was gone, and the glare was blinding.
+
+The bare black branches of the trees formed strangely interlaced
+hieroglyphics upon the turquoise sky. The crags were dark and grim,
+despite their snowy crests and the gigantic glittering icicles that here
+and there depended from them. A cascade, close by in the gorge, had
+been stricken motionless and dumb, as if by a sudden spell; and still
+and silent, it sparkled in the sun.
+
+The snow lay deep on the roof of the log cabin, and the eaves were
+decorated with shining icicles. The enchantment had followed the zigzag
+lines of the fence, and on every rail was its embellishing touch.
+
+All the homely surroundings were transfigured. The potato-house was a
+vast white billow, the ash-hopper was a marble vase, and the
+fodder-stack was a great conical ermine cap, belonging to some mountain
+giant who had lost it in the wind last night.
+
+"I mought hev knowed that we-uns war a-goin' ter hev this spell o'
+weather by the sign o' the warpin'-bars fallin' las' night," said John
+Grow, stamping off the snow as he came in from feeding his horse.
+
+"I hope 'tain't no worse sign," said his wife. "But I misdoubts." And
+she sighed heavily.
+
+"'Tain't no sign at all," said Solomon suddenly. He could keep his
+secret no longer. "'Twar me ez flung down them warpin'-bars."
+
+For a moment they all stared at him in silent amazement.
+
+"What fur?" demanded his father at last. "Just ter enjye sottin' 'em up
+agin? I'll teach ye ter fling down warpin'-bars!"
+
+"Waal," said the peacemaker, hesitating, "it 'peared ter me ez Uncle
+Jacob Smith war toler'ble drunk,--take him all tergether,--an' ez he hed
+drawed a knife, I thought that ye an' him hed 'bout quar'led enough. An'
+so I flung down the warpin'-bars ter git the fuss shet up."
+
+"Waal, sir!" exclaimed his grandmother, red with wrath. "Ez ef _my_ son
+couldn't stand up agin all the Smiths that ever stepped! Ye must fling
+down the warpin'-bars an' twist the spun-truck--fur Jacob Smith!"
+
+"Look-a-hyar, Sol," said his father gruffly, "'tend ter yerself, an' yer
+own quar'ls, arter this, will ye!"
+
+Then, with a sudden humorous interpretation of the incident, he broke
+into a guffaw. "I hev lived a consider'ble time in this tantalizin'
+world, an' ez yit I dunno ez I hev hed any need o' Sol ter pertect
+_me_."
+
+But Sol had unburdened his mind, and felt at ease again; not the less
+because he knew that but for his novel method of making peace, there
+might have been something worse than a sign in the house.
+
+
+
+
+AMONG THE CLIFFS
+
+
+It was a critical moment. There was a stir other than that of the wind
+among the pine needles and dry leaves that carpeted the ground.
+
+The wary wild turkeys lifted their long necks with that peculiar cry of
+half-doubting surprise so familiar to a sportsman, then all was still
+for an instant.
+
+The world was steeped in the noontide sunlight, the mountain air
+tasted of the fresh sylvan fragrance that pervaded the forest, the
+foliage blazed with the red and gold of autumn, the distant Chilhowee
+heights were delicately blue.
+
+That instant's doubt sealed the doom of one of the flock. As the turkeys
+stood in momentary suspense, the sunlight gilding their bronze feathers
+to a brighter sheen, there was a movement in the dense undergrowth. The
+flock took suddenly to wing,--a flash from among the leaves, the sharp
+crack of a rifle, and one of the birds fell heavily over the bluff and
+down toward the valley.
+
+The young mountaineer's exclamation of triumph died in his throat. He
+came running to the verge of the crag, and looked down ruefully into the
+depths where his game had disappeared.
+
+"Waal, sir," he broke forth pathetically, "this beats my time! If my
+luck ain't enough ter make a horse laugh!"
+
+He did not laugh, however. Perhaps his luck was calculated to stir only
+equine risibility. The cliff was almost perpendicular; at the depth of
+twenty feet a narrow ledge projected, but thence there was a sheer
+descent, down, down, down, to the tops of the tall trees in the valley
+far below.
+
+As Ethan Tynes looked wistfully over the precipice, he started with a
+sudden surprise. There on the narrow ledge lay the dead turkey.
+
+The sight sharpened Ethan's regrets. He had made a good shot, and he
+hated to relinquish his game. While he gazed in dismayed meditation, an
+idea began to kindle in his brain. Why could he not let himself down to
+the ledge by those long, strong vines that hung over the edge of the
+cliff?
+
+It was risky, Ethan knew,--terribly risky. But then,--if only the vines
+were strong!
+
+He tried them again and again with all his might, selected several of
+the largest, grasped them hard and fast, and then slipped lightly off
+the crag.
+
+He waited motionless for a moment. His movements had dislodged clods of
+earth and fragments of rock from the verge of the cliff, and until these
+had ceased to rattle about his head and shoulders he did not begin his
+downward journey.
+
+Now and then as he went he heard the snapping of twigs, and again a
+branch would break, but the vines which supported him were tough and
+strong to the last. Almost before he knew it he stood upon the ledge,
+and with a great sigh of relief he let the vines swing loose.
+
+"Waal, that warn't sech a mighty job at last. But law, ef it hed been
+Peter Birt stid of me, that thar wild tur-r-key would hev laid on this
+hyar ledge plumb till the Jedgmint Day!"
+
+He walked deftly along the ledge, picked up the bird, and tied it to one
+of the vines with a string which he took from his pocket, intending to
+draw it up when he should be once more on the top of the crag. These
+preparations complete, he began to think of going back.
+
+He caught the vines on which he had made the descent, but before he had
+fairly left the ledge, he felt that they were giving way.
+
+He paused, let himself slip back to a secure foothold, and tried their
+strength by pulling with all his force.
+
+Presently down came the whole mass in his hands. The friction against
+the sharp edges of the rock over which they had been stretched with a
+strong tension had worn them through. His first emotion was one of
+intense thankfulness that they had fallen while he was on the ledge
+instead of midway in his precarious ascent.
+
+"Ef they hed kem down whilst I war a-goin' up, I'd hev been flung plumb
+down ter the bottom o' the valley, 'kase this ledge air too narrer ter
+hev cotched me."
+
+He glanced down at the sombre depths beneath. "Thar wouldn't hev been
+enough left of me ter pick up on a shovel!" he exclaimed, with a tardy
+realization of his foolish recklessness.
+
+The next moment a mortal terror seized him. What was to be his fate? To
+regain the top of the cliff by his own exertions was an impossibility.
+
+He cast his despairing eyes up the ascent, as sheer and as smooth as a
+wall, without a crevice which might afford a foothold, or a shrub to
+which he might cling.
+
+His strong head was whirling as he again glanced downward to the
+unmeasured abyss beneath. He softly let himself sink into a sitting
+posture, his heels dangling over the frightful depths, and addressed
+himself resolutely to the consideration of the terrible danger in which
+he was placed.
+
+[Illustration: HOW LONG WAS IT TO LAST]
+
+Taken at its best, how long was it to last? Could he look to any human
+being for deliverance? He reflected with growing dismay that the place
+was far from any dwelling, and from the road that wound along the ridge.
+
+There was no errand that could bring a man to this most unfrequented
+portion of the deep woods, unless an accident should hither direct some
+hunter's step.
+
+It was quite possible, nay, probable, that years might elapse before the
+forest solitude would again be broken by human presence.
+
+His brothers would search for him when he should be missed from
+home,--but such boundless stretches of forest! They might search for
+weeks and never come near this spot. He would die here, he would
+starve,--no, he would grow drowsy when exhausted and fall--fall--fall!
+
+He was beginning to feel that morbid fascination that sometimes seizes
+upon those who stand on great heights,--an overwhelming impulse to
+plunge downward. His only salvation was to look up. He would look up to
+the sky.
+
+And what were these words he was beginning to faintly remember? Had not
+the circuit-rider said in his last sermon that not even a sparrow falls
+to the ground unmarked of God? There was a definite strength in this
+suggestion. He felt less lonely as he stared resolutely at the big blue
+sky. There came into his heart a sense of encouragement, of hope.
+
+He would keep up as long and as bravely as he could, and if the worst
+should come,--was he indeed so solitary? He would hold in remembrance
+the sparrow's fall.
+
+He had so nerved himself to meet his fate that he thought it was a fancy
+when he heard a distant step. But it did not die away, it grew more and
+more distinct,--a shambling step, that curiously stopped at intervals
+and kicked the fallen leaves.
+
+He sought to call out, but he seemed to have lost his voice. Not a sound
+issued from his thickened tongue and his dry throat. The step came
+nearer. It would presently pass. With a mighty effort Ethan sent forth a
+wild, hoarse cry.
+
+The rocks reverberated it, the wind carried it far, and certainly there
+was an echo of its despair and terror in a shrill scream set up on the
+verge of the crag. Then Ethan heard the shambling step scampering off
+very fast indeed.
+
+The truth flashed upon him. It was some child, passing on an
+unimaginable errand through the deep woods, frightened by his sudden
+cry.
+
+"Stop, bubby!" he shouted; "stop a minute! It's Ethan Tynes that's
+callin' of ye. Stop a minute, bubby!"
+
+The step paused at a safe distance, and the shrill pipe of a little boy
+demanded, "Whar is ye, Ethan Tynes?"
+
+"I'm down hyar on the ledge o' the bluff. Who air ye ennyhow?"
+
+"George Birt," promptly replied the little boy. "What air ye doin' down
+thar? I thought it war Satan a-callin' of me. I never seen nobody."
+
+"I kem down hyar on vines arter a tur-r-key I shot. The vines bruk, an'
+I hev got no way ter git up agin. I want ye ter go ter yer mother's
+house, an' tell yer brother Pete ter bring a rope hyar fur me ter climb
+up by."
+
+Ethan expected to hear the shambling step going away with a celerity
+proportionate to the importance of the errand. On the contrary, the step
+was approaching the crag.
+
+A moment of suspense, and there appeared among the jagged ends of the
+broken vines a small red head, a deeply freckled face, and a pair of
+sharp, eager blue eyes. George Birt had carefully laid himself down on
+his stomach, only protruding his head beyond the verge of the crag, that
+he might not fling away his life in his curiosity.
+
+"Did ye git it?" he asked, with bated breath.
+
+"Git what?" demanded poor Ethan, surprised and impatient.
+
+"The tur-r-key--what ye hev done been talkin' 'bout," said George Birt.
+
+Ethan had lost all interest in the turkey. "Yes, yes; but run along,
+bub. I mought fall off'n this hyar place,--I'm gittin' stiff sittin'
+still so long,--or the wind mought blow me off. The wind is blowin'
+toler'ble brief."
+
+"Gobbler or hen?" asked George Birt eagerly.
+
+"It air a hen," said Ethan. "But look-a-hyar, George, I'm a-waitin' on
+ye, an' ef I'd fall off'n this hyar place, I'd be ez dead ez a door-nail
+in a minute."
+
+"Waal, I'm goin' now," said George Birt, with gratifying alacrity. He
+raised himself from his recumbent position, and Ethan heard him
+shambling off, kicking every now and then at the fallen leaves as he
+went.
+
+Presently, however, he turned and walked back nearly to the brink of the
+cliff. Then he prostrated himself once more at full length,--for the
+mountain children are very careful of the precipices,--snaked along
+dexterously to the verge of the crag, and protruding his red head
+cautiously, began to parley once more, trading on Ethan's necessities.
+
+"Ef I go on this yerrand fur ye," he said, looking very sharp indeed,
+"will ye gimme one o' the whings of that thar wild tur-r-key?"
+
+He coveted the wing-feathers, not the joint of the fowl. The "whing" of
+the domestic turkey is used by the mountain women as a fan, and is
+considered an elegance as well as a comfort. George Birt aped the
+customs of his elders, regardless of sex,--a characteristic of very
+small boys.
+
+"Oh, go 'long, bubby!" exclaimed poor Ethan, in dismay at the
+dilatoriness and indifference of his unique deliverer. "I'll give ye
+both o' the whings." He would have offered the turkey willingly, if
+"bubby" had seemed to crave it.
+
+"Waal, I'm goin' now."
+
+George Birt rose from the ground and started off briskly, exhilarated by
+the promise of both the "whings."
+
+Ethan was angry indeed when he heard the boy once more shambling back.
+Of course one should regard a deliverer with gratitude, especially a
+deliverer from mortal peril; but it may be doubted if Ethan's gratitude
+would have been great enough to insure that small red head against a
+vigorous rap, if it had been within rapping distance, when it was once
+more cautiously protruded over the verge of the cliff.
+
+"I kem back hyar ter tell ye," the doughty deliverer began, with an air
+of great importance, and magnifying his office with an extreme relish,
+"that I can't go an' tell Pete 'bout'n the rope till I hev done kem back
+from the mill. I hev got old Sorrel hitched out hyar a piece, with a bag
+o' corn on his back, what I hev ter git ground at the mill. My mother
+air a-settin' at home now a-waitin' fur that thar corn-meal ter bake
+dodgers with. An' I hev got a dime ter pay at the mill; it war lent ter
+my dad las' week. An' I'm afeard ter walk about much with this hyar
+dime; I mought lose it, ye know. An' I can't go home 'thout the meal;
+I'll ketch it ef I do. But I'll tell Pete arter I git back from the
+mill."
+
+"The mill!" echoed Ethan, aghast. "What air ye doin' on this side o' the
+mounting, ef ye air a-goin' ter the mill? This ain't the way ter the
+mill."
+
+"I kem over hyar," said the little boy, still with much importance of
+manner, notwithstanding a slight suggestion of embarrassment on his
+freckled face, "ter see 'bout'n a trap that I hev sot fur squir'ls. I'll
+see 'bout my trap, an' then I hev ter go ter the mill, 'kase my mother
+air a-settin' in our house now a-waitin' fur meal ter bake corn-dodgers.
+Then I'll tell Pete whar ye air, an' what ye said 'bout'n the rope. Ye
+must jes' wait fur me hyar."
+
+Poor Ethan could do nothing else.
+
+As the echo of the boy's shambling step died in the distance, a
+redoubled sense of loneliness fell upon Ethan Tynes. But he endeavored
+to solace himself with the reflection that the important mission to the
+squirrel-trap and the errand to the mill could not last forever, and
+before a great while Peter Birt and his rope would be upon the crag.
+
+This idea buoyed him up as the hours crept slowly by. Now and then he
+lifted his head and listened with painful intentness. He felt stiff in
+every muscle, and yet he had a dread of making an effort to change his
+constrained position. He might lose control of his rigid limbs, and fall
+into those dread depths beneath.
+
+His patience at last began to give way. His heart was sinking. His
+messenger had been even more dilatory than he was prepared to expect.
+Why did not Pete come? Was it possible that George had forgotten to tell
+of his danger?
+
+The sun was going down, leaving a great glory of gold and crimson clouds
+and an opaline haze upon the purple mountains. The last rays fell on the
+bronze feathers of the turkey still lying tied to the broken vines on
+the ledge.
+
+And now there were only frowning masses of dark clouds in the west; and
+there were frowning masses of clouds overhead.
+
+The shadow of the coming night had fallen on the autumnal foliage in the
+deep valley; in the place of the opaline haze was only a gray mist.
+
+And now came, sweeping along between the parallel mountain ranges, a
+sombre rain-cloud. The lad could hear the heavy drops splashing on the
+treetops in the valley, long, long before he felt them on his head.
+
+The roll of thunder sounded among the crags. Then the rain came down
+tumultuously, not in columns, but in livid sheets. The lightnings rent
+the sky, showing, as it seemed to him, glimpses of the glorious
+brightness within,--too bright for human eyes.
+
+He clung desperately to his precarious perch. Now and then a fierce rush
+of wind almost tore him from it. Strange fancies beset him. The air was
+full of that wild symphony of nature, the wind and the rain, the pealing
+thunder, and the thunderous echo among the cliffs, and yet he thought he
+could hear his own name ringing again and again through all the tumult,
+sometimes in Pete's voice, sometimes in George's shrill tones.
+
+He became vaguely aware, after a time, that the rain had ceased, and the
+moon was beginning to shine through rifts in the clouds.
+
+The wind continued unabated, but, curiously enough, he could not hear it
+now. He could hear nothing; he could think of nothing. His consciousness
+was beginning to fail.
+
+George Birt had indeed forgotten him,--forgotten even the promised
+"whings." Not that he had discovered anything so extraordinary in his
+trap, for his trap was empty, but when he reached the mill, he found
+that the miller had killed a bear and captured a cub, and the orphan,
+chained to a post, had deeply absorbed George Birt's attention.
+
+To sophisticated people, the boy might have seemed as grotesque as the
+cub. George wore an unbleached cotton shirt. The waistband of his baggy
+jeans trousers encircled his body just beneath his armpits, reaching to
+his shoulder-blades behind, and nearly to his collar-bone in front. His
+red head was only partly covered by a fragment of an old white wool hat;
+and he looked at the cub with a curiosity as intense as that with which
+the cub looked at him. Each was taking first lessons in natural history.
+
+As long as there was daylight enough left to see that cub, did George
+Birt stand and stare at the little beast. Then he clattered home on old
+Sorrel in the closing darkness, looking like a very small pin on the top
+of a large pincushion.
+
+At home, he found the elders unreasonable,--as elders usually are
+considered. Supper had been waiting an hour or so for the lack of meal
+for dodgers. He "caught it" considerably, but not sufficiently to impair
+his appetite for the dodgers. After all this, he was ready enough for
+bed when small boy's bedtime came. But as he was nodding before the
+fire, he heard a word that roused him to a new excitement.
+
+"These hyar chips air so wet they won't burn," said his mother. "I'll
+take my tur-r-key whing an' fan the fire."
+
+"Law!" he exclaimed. "Thar, now! Ethan Tynes never gimme that thar wild
+tur-r-key's whings like he promised."
+
+"Whar did ye happen ter see Ethan?" asked Pete, interested in his
+friend.
+
+"Seen him in the woods, an' he promised me the tur-r-key whings."
+
+"What fur?" inquired Pete, a little surprised by this uncalled-for
+generosity.
+
+"Waal,"--there was an expression of embarrassment on the important
+freckled face, and the small red head nodded forward in an explanatory
+manner,--"he fell off'n the bluffs arter the tur-r-key whings--I mean,
+he went down to the ledge arter the tur-r-key, and the vines bruk an' he
+couldn't git up no more. An' he tole me that ef I'd tell ye ter fotch
+him a rope ter pull up by, he would gimme the whings. That happened
+a--leetle--while--arter dinner-time."
+
+"Who got him a rope ter pull up by?" demanded Pete.
+
+There was again on the important face that indescribable shade of
+embarrassment. "Waal,"--the youngster balanced this word judicially,--"I
+forgot 'bout'n the tur-r-key whings till this minute. I reckon he's thar
+yit."
+
+"Mebbe this hyar wind an' rain hev beat him off'n the ledge!" exclaimed
+Pete, appalled, and rising hastily. "I tell ye now," he added, turning
+to his mother, "the best use ye kin make o' that thar boy is ter put him
+on the fire fur a back-log."
+
+Pete made his preparations in great haste. He took the rope from the
+well, asked the crestfallen and browbeaten junior a question or two
+relative to locality, mounted old Sorrel without a saddle, and in a few
+minutes was galloping at headlong speed through the night.
+
+The rain was over by the time he had reached the sulphur spring to
+which George had directed him, but the wind was still high, and the
+broken clouds were driving fast across the face of the moon.
+
+When he had hitched his horse to a tree, and set out on foot to find the
+cliff, the moonbeams, though brilliant, were so intermittent that his
+progress was fitful and necessarily cautious. When the disk shone out
+full and clear, he made his way rapidly enough, but when the clouds
+intervened, he stood still and waited.
+
+"I ain't goin' ter fall off'n the bluff 'thout knowin' it," he said to
+himself, in one of these eclipses, "ef I hev ter stand hyar all night."
+
+The moonlight was brilliant and steady when he reached the verge of the
+crag. He identified the spot by the mass of broken vines, and more
+indubitably by Ethan's rifle lying upon the ground just at his feet. He
+called, but received no response.
+
+"Hev Ethan fell off, sure enough?" he asked himself, in great dismay and
+alarm. Then he shouted again and again. At last there came an answer,
+as though the speaker had just awaked.
+
+"Pretty nigh beat out, I'm a-thinkin'!" commented Pete. He tied one end
+of the cord around the trunk of a tree, knotted it at intervals, and
+flung it over the bluff.
+
+At first Ethan was almost afraid to stir. He slowly put forth his hand
+and grasped the rope. Then, his heart beating tumultuously, he rose to
+his feet.
+
+He stood still for an instant to steady himself and get his breath.
+Nerving himself for a strong effort, he began the ascent, hand over
+hand, up, and up, and up, till once more he stood upon the crest of the
+crag.
+
+And, now that all danger was over, Pete was disposed to scold. "I'm
+a-thinkin'," said Pete severely, "ez thar ain't a critter on this hyar
+mounting, from a b'ar ter a copper-head, that could hev got in sech a
+fix, 'ceptin' ye, Ethan Tynes."
+
+And Ethan was silent.
+
+"What's this hyar thing at the e-end o' the rope?" asked Pete, as he
+began to draw the cord up, and felt a weight still suspended.
+
+"It air the tur-r-key," said Ethan meekly.
+
+"I tied her ter the e-end o' the rope afore I kem up."
+
+"Waal, sir!" exclaimed Pete, in indignant surprise.
+
+And George, for duty performed, was remunerated with the two "whings,"
+although it still remains a question in the mind of Ethan whether or not
+he deserved them.
+
+
+
+
+IN THE "CHINKING"
+
+
+Not far from an abrupt precipice on a certain great mountain spur there
+stands in the midst of the red and yellow autumn woods a little log
+"church-house." The nuts rattle noisily down on its roof; sometimes
+during "evenin' preachin'"--which takes place in the afternoon--a
+flying-squirrel frisks near the window; the hymns echo softly, softly,
+from the hazy sunlit heights across the valley.
+
+"That air the doxol'gy," said Tom Brent, one day, pausing to listen
+among the wagons and horses hitched outside. He was about to follow home
+his father's mare, that had broken loose and galloped off through the
+woods, but as he glanced back at the church, a sudden thought struck
+him. He caught sight of the end of little Jim Coggin's comforter
+flaunting out through the "chinking,"--as the mountaineers call the
+series of short slats which are set diagonally in the spaces between the
+logs of the walls, and on which the clay is thickly daubed. This work
+had been badly done, and in many places the daubing had fallen away.
+Thus it was that as Jim Coggin sat within the church, the end of his
+plaid comforter had slipped through the chinking and was waving in the
+wind outside.
+
+Now Jim had found the weather still too warm for his heavy jeans jacket,
+but he was too cool without it, and he had ingeniously compromised the
+difficulty by wearing his comforter in this unique manner,--laying it on
+his shoulders, crossing it over the chest, passing it under the arms,
+and tying it in a knot between the shoulder-blades. Tom remembered this
+with a grin as he slyly crept up to the house, and it was only the work
+of a moment to draw that knot through the chinking and secure it firmly
+to a sumach bush that grew near at hand.
+
+It never occurred to him that the resounding doxology could fail to
+rouse that small, tow-headed, freckle-faced boy, or that the
+congregation might slowly disperse without noticing him as he sat
+motionless and asleep in the dark shadow.
+
+The sun slipped down into the red west; the blue mountains turned
+purple; heavy clouds gathered, and within three miles there was no other
+human creature when Jim suddenly woke to the darkness and the storm and
+the terrible loneliness.
+
+Where was he? He tried to rise: he could not move. Bewildered, he
+struggled and tugged at his harness,--all in vain. As he realized the
+situation, he burst into tears.
+
+"Them home-folks o' mine won't kem hyar ter s'arch fur me," he cried
+desperately, "kase I tole my mother ez how I war a-goin' ter dust down
+the mounting ter Aunt Jerushy's house ez soon ez meet'n' war out an'
+stay all night along o' her boys."
+
+Still he tried to comfort himself by reflecting that it was not so bad
+as it might have been. There was no danger that he would have to starve
+and pine here till next Sunday, for a "protracted meeting" was in
+progress, service was held every day, and the congregation would return
+to-morrow, which was Thursday.
+
+His philosophy, however, was short-lived, for the sudden lightning rent
+the clouds, and a terrific peal of thunder echoed among the cliffs.
+
+"The storm air a-comin' up the mounting!" he exclaimed, in vivacious
+protest. "An' ef this brief wind war ter whurl the old church-house
+off'n the bluff an' down inter the valley whar-r--would--I--be?"
+
+All at once the porch creaked beneath a heavy tread. A clumsy hand was
+fumbling at the door. "Strike a light," said a gruff voice without.
+
+As a lantern was thrust in, Jim was about to speak, but the words froze
+upon his lips for fear when a man strode heavily over the threshold and
+he caught the expression of his face.
+
+It was an evil face, red and bloated and brutish. He had small,
+malicious, twinkling eyes, and a shock of sandy hair. A suit of
+copper-colored jeans hung loosely on his tall, lank frame, and when he
+placed the lantern on a bench and stretched out both arms as if he were
+tired, he showed that his left hand was maimed,--the thumb had been cut
+off at the first joint.
+
+A thickset, short, swaggering man tramped in after him.
+
+"Waal, Amos Brierwood," he said, "it's safes' fur us ter part. We
+oughter be fur enough from hyar by daybreak. Divide that thar traveler's
+money--hey?"
+
+They carefully closed the rude shutters, barred the door, and sat down
+on the "mourners' bench," neither having noticed the small boy at the
+other end of the room.
+
+Poor Jim, his arms akimbo and half-covered by his comforter, stuck to
+the wall like a plaid bat,--if such a natural curiosity is
+imaginable,--feverishly hoping that the men might go without seeing him
+at all.
+
+For surely no human creature could be more abhorrent, more incredibly
+odious of aspect, than Amos Brierwood as he sat there, his red, brutish
+face redder still with a malign pleasure, his malicious eyes gloating
+over the rolls of money which he drew from a pocket-book stolen from
+some waylaid traveler, snapping his fingers in exultation when the
+amount of the bills exceeded his expectation.
+
+The leaves without were fitfully astir, and once the porch creaked
+suddenly. Brierwood glanced at the door sharply,--even fearfully,--his
+hand motionless on the rolls of money.
+
+"Only the wind, Amos, only the wind!" said the short, stout man
+impatiently.
+
+But he, himself, was disquieted the next moment when a horse neighed
+shrilly.
+
+"That ain't my beastis, Amos, nor yit your'n!" he cried, starting up.
+
+"It air the traveler's, ye sodden idjit!" said Brierwood, lifting his
+uncouth foot and giving him a jocose kick.
+
+But the short man was not satisfied. He rose, went outside, and Jim
+could hear him beating about among the bushes. Presently he came in
+again. "'Twar the traveler's critter, I reckon; an' that critter an'
+saddle oughter be counted in my sheer."
+
+Then they fell to disputing and quarreling,--once they almost
+fought,--but at length the division was made and they rose to go. As
+Brierwood swung his lantern round, his malicious eyes fell upon the poor
+little plaid bat sticking against the wall.
+
+He stood in the door staring, dumfounded for a moment. Then he clenched
+his fist, and shook it fiercely. "How did ye happen ter be hyar this
+time o' the night, ye limb o' Satan?" he cried.
+
+"Dunno," faltered poor Jim.
+
+The other man had returned too. "Waal, sir, ef that thar boy hed been a
+copper-head now, he'd hev bit us, sure!"
+
+"_He mought do that yit_," said Amos Brierwood, with grim significance.
+"He hev been thar all this time,--'kase he air tied thar, don't ye see?
+An' he hev _eyes_, an' he hev _ears_. What air ter hender?"
+
+The other man's face turned pale, and Jim thought that they were afraid
+he would tell all he had seen and heard. The manner of both had changed,
+too. They had a skulking, nervous way with them now in place of the
+coarse bravado that had characterized them hitherto.
+
+Amos Brierwood pondered for a few minutes. Then he sullenly demanded,--
+
+"What's yer name?"
+
+"It air Jeemes Coggin," quavered the little boy.
+
+"Coggin, hey?" exclaimed Brierwood, with a new idea bringing back the
+malicious twinkle to his eyes. He laughed as though mightily relieved,
+and threw up his left hand and shook it exultingly.
+
+The shadow on the dark wall of that maimed hand with only the stump of a
+thumb was a weird, a horrible thing to the child. He had no idea that
+his constant notice of it would stamp it in his memory, and that
+something would come of this fact. He was glad when the shadow ceased to
+writhe and twist upon the wall, and the man dropped his arm to his side
+again.
+
+"What's a-brewin', Amos?" asked the other, who had been watching
+Brierwood curiously.
+
+They whispered aside for a few moments, at first anxiously and then with
+wild guffaws of satisfaction. When they approached the boy, their manner
+had changed once more.
+
+"Waal, I declar, bubby," said Brierwood agreeably, "this hyar fix ez ye
+hev got inter air sateful fur true! It air enough ter sot enny boy on
+the mounting cat-a-wampus. 'Twar a good thing ez we-uns happened ter kem
+by hyar on our way from the tan-yard way down yander in the valley whar
+we-uns hev been ter git paid up fur workin' thar some. We'll let ye out.
+Who done yer this hyar trick?"
+
+"Dunno--witches, I reckon!" cried poor Jim, bursting into tears.
+
+"Witches!" the man exclaimed, "the woods air a-roamin' with 'em this
+time o' the year; bein', ye see, ez they kem ter feed on the mast."
+
+He chuckled as he said this, perhaps at the boy's evident terror,--for
+Jim was sorrowfully superstitious,--perhaps because he had managed to
+cut unnoticed a large fragment from the end of the comforter. This he
+stuffed into his own pocket as he talked on about two witches, whom he
+said he had met that afternoon under an oak-tree feeding on acorns.
+
+"An' now, I kem ter remind myself that them witches war inquirin' round
+'bout'n a boy--war his name Jeemes Coggin? Le''s see! That boy's name
+_war_ Jeemes Coggin!"
+
+While Jim stood breathlessly, intently listening, Brierwood had twisted
+something into the folds of his comforter so dexterously that unless
+this were untied it would not fall; it was a silk handkerchief of a
+style never before seen in the mountains, and he had made a knot hard
+and fast in one corner.
+
+"Thar, now!" he exclaimed, holding up the fragment of knitted yarn, "I
+hev tore yer comforter. Never mind, bubby, 'twar tore afore. But it'll
+do ter wrop up this money-purse what b'longs ter yer dad. He lef' it
+hid in the chinking o' the wall over yander close ter whar I war sittin'
+when I fust kem in. I'll put it back thar, 'kase yer dad don't want
+nobody ter know whar it air hid."
+
+He strode across the room and concealed the empty pocket-book in the
+chinking.
+
+"Ef ye won't tell who teched it, I'll gin a good word fur ye ter them
+witches what war inquirin' round fur ye ter-day."
+
+Jim promised in hot haste, and then, the rain having ceased, he started
+for home, but Brierwood stopped him at the door.
+
+"Hold on thar, bub. I kem mighty nigh furgittin' ter let ye know ez I
+seen yer brother Alf awhile back, an' he axed me ter git ye ter go by
+Tom Brent's house, an' tell Tom ter meet him up the road a piece by that
+thar big sulphur spring. Will ye gin Tom that message? Tell him Alf said
+ter come quick."
+
+Once more Jim promised.
+
+The two men holding the lantern out in the porch watched him as he
+pounded down the dark road, his tow hair sticking out of his tattered
+black hat, the ends of his comforter flaunting in the breeze, and every
+gesture showing the agitated haste of a witch-scared boy. Then they
+looked at each other significantly, and laughed loud and long.
+
+"He'll tell sech a crooked tale ter-morrer that Alf Coggin an' his dad
+will see sights along o' that traveler's money!" said Brierwood,
+gloating over his sharp management as he and his accomplice mounted
+their horses and rode off in opposite directions.
+
+When Jim reached Tom Brent's house, and knocked at the door, he was so
+absorbed in his terrors that, as it opened, he said nothing for a
+moment. He could see the family group within. Tom's father was placidly
+smoking. His palsied "gran'dad" shook in his chair in the chimney-corner
+as he told the wide-eyed boys big tales about the "Injuns" that harried
+the early settlers in Tennessee.
+
+"Tom," Jim said, glancing up at the big boy,--"Tom, thar's a witch
+waitin' fur ye at the sulphur spring! Go thar, quick!"
+
+"Not ef I knows what's good fur me!" protested Tom, with a great
+horse-laugh. "What ails ye, boy? Ye talk like ye war teched in the
+head!"
+
+"I went ter say ez Alf Coggin air thar waitin' fur ye," Jim began again,
+nodding his slandered head with great solemnity, "an' tole me ter tell
+ye ter kem thar quick."
+
+He took no heed of the inaccuracy of the message; he was glancing
+fearfully over his shoulder, and the next minute scuttled down the road
+in a bee-line for home.
+
+Tom hurried off briskly through the woods. "Waal, sir! I'm mighty nigh
+crazed ter know what Alf Coggin kin want o' me; goin' coon-huntin',
+mebbe," he speculated, as he drew within sight of an old
+lightning-scathed tree which stood beside the sulphur spring and
+stretched up, stark and white, in the dim light.
+
+The clouds were blowing away from a densely instarred sky; the moon was
+hardly more than a crescent and dipping low in the west, but he could
+see the sombre outline of the opposite mountain, and the white mists
+that shifted in a ghostly and elusive fashion along the summit. The
+night was still, save for a late katydid, spared by the frost, and
+piping shrilly.
+
+He experienced a terrible shock of surprise when a sudden voice--a voice
+he had never heard before--cried out sharply, "Hello there! Help! help!"
+
+As he pressed tremulously forward, he beheld a sight which made him ask
+himself if it were possible that Alf Coggin had sent for him to join in
+some nefarious work which had ended in leaving a man--a stranger--bound
+to the old lightning-scathed tree.
+
+Even in the uncertain light Tom could see that he was pallid and
+panting, evidently exhausted in some desperate struggle: there was blood
+on his face, his clothes were torn, and by all odds he was the angriest
+man that was ever waylaid and robbed.
+
+"Ter-morrer he'll be jes' a-swoopin'!" thought Tom, tremulously untying
+the complicated knots, and listening to his threats of vengeance on the
+unknown robbers, "an' every critter on the mounting will git a clutch
+from his claws."
+
+And in fact, it was hardly daybreak before the constable of the
+district, who lived hard by in the valley, was informed of all the
+details of the affair, so far as known to Tom or the "Traveler,"--for
+thus the mountaineers designated him, as if he were the only one in the
+world.
+
+By reason of the message which Jim had delivered, and its strange
+result, they suspected the Coggins, and as they rode together to the
+justice's house for a warrant, this suspicion received unexpected
+confirmation in a rumor that they found afloat. Every man they met
+stopped them to repeat the story that Coggin's boy had told somebody
+that it was his father who had robbed the traveler, and hid the empty
+pocket-book in the chinking of the church wall. No one knew who had set
+this report in circulation, but a blacksmith said he heard it first from
+a man named Brierwood, who had stopped at his shop to have his horse
+shod.
+
+It was still early when they reached Jim Coggin's home; the windows and
+doors were open to let out the dust, for his mother was just beginning
+to sweep. She had pushed aside the table, when her eyes suddenly
+distended with surprise as they fell upon a silk handkerchief lying on
+the floor beside it. The moment that she stooped and picked it up, the
+strange gentleman stepped upon the porch, and through the open door he
+saw it dangling from her hands.
+
+He tapped the constable on the shoulder.
+
+"That's my property!" he said tersely.
+
+The officer stepped in instantly. "Good-mornin', Mrs. Coggin," he said
+politely. "'T would pleasure me some ter git a glimpse o' that
+handkercher."
+
+"Air it your'n?" asked the woman wonderingly. "I jes' now fund it, an' I
+war tried ter know who had drapped it hyar."
+
+The officer, without a word, untied the knot which Amos Brierwood had
+made in one corner, while the Coggins looked on in open-mouthed
+amazement. It contained a five-dollar bill, and a bit of paper on which
+some careless memoranda had been jotted down in handwriting which the
+traveler claimed as his own.
+
+It seemed a very plain case. Still, he got out of the sound of the
+woman's sobs and cries as soon as he conveniently could, and sauntered
+down the road, where the officer presently overtook him with Alf and his
+father in custody.
+
+"Whar be ye a-takin' of us now?" cried the elder, gaunt and haggard, and
+with his long hair blowing in the breeze.
+
+"Ter the church-house, whar yer boy says ye hev hid the traveler's
+money-purse," said the officer.
+
+"_My boy_!" exclaimed John Coggin, casting an astounded glance upon his
+son.
+
+Poor Alf was almost stunned. When they reached the church, and the men,
+after searching for a time without result, appealed to him to save
+trouble by pointing out the spot where the pocket-book was concealed, he
+could only stammer and falter unintelligibly, and finally he burst into
+tears.
+
+"Ax the t'other one--the leetle boy," suggested an old man in the crowd.
+
+Alf's heart sank--sank like lead--when Jim, suddenly remembering the
+promised "good word" to the witches, piped out, "I war tole not ter tell
+who teched it,--'kase my dad didn't want nobody ter know 'twar hid
+thar."
+
+John Coggin's face was rigid and gray.
+
+"The Lord hev forsook me!" he cried. "An' all my chillen hev turned
+liars tergether."
+
+Then he made a great effort to control himself.
+
+"Look-a-hyar, Jim, ef ye hev got the truth in ye,--speak it! Ef ye know
+whar I hev hid anything,--find it!"
+
+Jim, infinitely important, and really understanding little of what was
+going on, except that all these big men were looking at him, crossed the
+room with as much stateliness as is compatible with a pair of baggy
+brown jeans trousers, a plaid comforter tied between the shoulder-blades
+in a big knot, a tow-head, and a tattered black hat; he slipped his
+grimy paw in the chinking where Amos Brierwood had hid the pocket-book,
+and drew it thence, with the prideful exclamation,--
+
+"B'longs ter my dad!"
+
+The officer held it up empty before the traveler,--he held up, too, the
+bit of comforter in which it was folded, and pointed to the small boy's
+shoulders. The gentleman turned away, thoroughly convinced. Alf and his
+father looked from one to the other, in mute despair. They foresaw many
+years of imprisonment for a crime which they had not committed.
+
+The constable was hurrying his prisoners toward the door, when there was
+a sudden stir on the outskirts of the crowd. Old Parson Payne was
+pushing his way in, followed by a tall young man, who, in comparison
+with the mountaineers, seemed wonderfully prosperous and well-clad, and
+very fresh and breezy.
+
+"You're all on the wrong track!" he cried.
+
+And his story proved this, though it was simple enough.
+
+He was sojourning in the mountains with some friends on a "camp-hunt,"
+and the previous evening he had chanced to lose his way in the woods.
+When night and the storm came on, he was perhaps five miles from camp.
+He mistook the little "church-house" for a dwelling, and dismounting, he
+hitched his horse in the laurel, intending to ask for shelter for the
+night. As he stepped upon the porch, however, he caught a glimpse,
+through the chinking, of the interior, and he perceived that the
+building was a church. There were benches and a rude pulpit. The next
+instant, his attention was riveted by the sight of two men, one of whom
+had drawn a knife upon the other, quarreling over a roll of money. He
+stood rooted to the spot in surprise. Gradually, he began to understand
+the villainy afoot, for he overheard all that they said to each other,
+and afterward to Jim. He saw one of the men cut the bit from the
+comforter, wrap the pocket-book in it, and hide it away, and he
+witnessed a dispute between them, which went on in dumb show behind the
+boy's back, as to which of two bills should be knotted in the
+handkerchief which they twisted into the comforter.
+
+The constable was pressing him to describe the appearance of the
+ruffians.
+
+"Why," said the stranger, "one of them was long, and lank, and
+loose-jointed, and had sandy hair, and"--He paused abruptly, cudgeling
+his memory for something more distinctive, for this description would
+apply to half the men in the room, and thus it would be impossible to
+identify and capture the robbers.
+
+"He hedn't no thumb sca'cely on his lef' hand," piped out Jim, holding
+up his own grimy paw, and looking at it with squinting intensity as he
+crooked it at the first joint, to imitate the maimed hand.
+
+"No thumb!" exclaimed the constable excitedly. "Amos Brierwood fur a
+thousand!"
+
+Jim nodded his head intelligently, with sudden recollection. "That air
+the name ez the chunky man gin him when they fust kem in."
+
+And thus it was that when the Coggins were presently brought before the
+justice, they were exonerated of all complicity in the crime for which
+Brierwood and his accomplice were afterward arrested, tried, and
+sentenced to the State Prison.
+
+Jim doubts whether the promised "good word" was ever spoken on his
+behalf to the witches, who were represented as making personal inquiries
+about him, because he suspects that the two robbers were themselves the
+only evil spirits roaming the woods that night.
+
+
+
+
+ON A HIGHER LEVEL
+
+
+As Jack Dunn stood in the door of his home on a great crag of Persimmon
+Ridge and loaded his old rifle, his eyes rested upon a vast and imposing
+array of mountains filling the landscape. All are heavily wooded, all
+are alike, save that in one the long horizontal line of the summit is
+broken by a sudden vertical ascent, and thence the mountain seems to
+take up life on a higher level, for it sinks no more and passes out of
+sight.
+
+This abrupt rise is called "Elijah's Step,"--named, perhaps, in honor of
+some neighboring farmer who first explored it; but the ignorant boy
+believed that here the prophet had stepped into his waiting fiery
+chariot.
+
+He knew of no foreign lands,--no Syria, no Palestine. He had no dream of
+the world that lay beyond those misty, azure hills. Indistinctly he had
+caught the old story from the nasal drawl of the circuit-rider, and he
+thought that here, among these wild Tennessee mountains, Elijah had
+lived and had not died.
+
+There came suddenly from the valley the baying of a pack of hounds in
+full cry, and when the crags caught the sound and tossed it from
+mountain to mountain, when more delicate echoes on a higher key rang out
+from the deep ravines, there was a wonderful exhilaration in this sylvan
+minstrelsy. The young fellow looked wistful as he heard it, then he
+frowned heavily.
+
+"Them thar Saunders men hev gone off an' left me," he said reproachfully
+to some one within the log cabin. "Hyar I be kept a-choppin' wood an' a
+pullin' fodder till they hev hed time ter git up a deer. It 'pears ter
+me ez I mought hev been let ter put off that thar work till I war
+through huntin'."
+
+He was a tall young fellow, with a frank, freckled face and auburn hair;
+stalwart, too. Judging from his appearance, he could chop wood and pull
+fodder to some purpose.
+
+A heavy, middle-aged man emerged from the house, and stood regarding his
+son with grim disfavor. "An' who oughter chop wood an' pull fodder but
+ye, while my hand air sprained this way?" he demanded.
+
+That hand had been sprained for many a long day, but the boy made no
+reply; perhaps he knew its weight. He walked to the verge of the cliff,
+and gazed down at the tops of the trees in the valley far, far below.
+
+The expanse of foliage was surging in the wind like the waves of the
+sea. From the unseen depths beneath there rose again the cry of the
+pack, inexpressibly stirring, and replete with woodland suggestions. All
+the echoes came out to meet it.
+
+"I war promised ter go!" cried Jack bitterly.
+
+"Waal," said his mother, from within the house, "'tain't no good nohow."
+
+Her voice was calculated to throw oil upon the troubled waters,--low,
+languid, and full of pacifying intonations. She was a tall, thin woman,
+clad in a blue-checked homespun dress, and seated before a great
+hand-loom, as a lady sits before a piano or an organ. The creak of the
+treadle, and the thump, thump of the batten, punctuated, as it were, her
+consolatory disquisition.
+
+Her son looked at her in great depression of spirit as she threw the
+shuttle back and forth with deft, practiced hands.
+
+"Wild meat air a mighty savin'," she continued, with a housewifely
+afterthought. "I ain't denyin' that."
+
+Thump, thump, went the batten.
+
+"But ye needn't pester the life out'n yerself 'kase ye ain't a-runnin'
+the deer along o' them Saunders men. It 'pears like a powerful waste o'
+time, when ye kin take yer gun down ter the river enny evenin' late,
+jes' ez the deer air goin' ter drink, an' shoot ez big a buck ez ye hev
+got the grit ter git enny other way. Ye can't do nothin' with a buck but
+eat him, an' a-runnin' him all around the mounting don't make him no
+tenderer, ter my mind. I don't see no sense in huntin' 'cept ter git
+somethin' fitten ter eat."
+
+This logic, enough to break a sportsman's heart, was not a panacea for
+the tedium of the day, spent in the tame occupation of pulling fodder,
+as the process of stripping the blades from the standing cornstalks is
+called.
+
+But when the shadows were growing long, Jack took his rifle and set out
+for the profit and the pleasure of still-hunting. As he made his way
+through the dense woods, the metallic tones of a cow-bell jangled on the
+air,--melodious sound in the forest quiet, but it conjured up a scowl on
+the face of the young mountaineer.
+
+"Everything on this hyar mounting hev got the twistin's ter-day!" he
+exclaimed wrath-fully. "Hyar is our old red cow a-traipsing off ter Andy
+Bailey's house, an' thar won't be a drap of milk for supper."
+
+This was a serious matter, for in a region where coffee and tea are
+almost unknown luxuries, and the evening meal consists of such
+thirst-provoking articles as broiled venison, corn-dodgers, and sorghum,
+one is apt to feel the need of some liquid milder than "apple-jack,"
+and more toothsome than water, wherewith to wet one's whistle.
+
+In common with everything else on the mountain, Jack, too, had the
+"twistin's," and it was with a sour face that he began to drive the cow
+homeward. After going some distance, however, he persuaded himself that
+she would leave the beaten track no more until she reached the cabin. He
+turned about, therefore, and retraced his way to the stream.
+
+There had been heavy rains in the mountains, and it was far out of its
+banks, rushing and foaming over great rocks, circling in swift
+whirlpools, plunging in smooth, glassy sheets down sudden descents, and
+maddening thence in tumultuous, yeasty billows.
+
+An old mill, long disused and fallen into decay, stood upon the brink.
+It was a painful suggestion of collapsed energies, despite its
+picturesque drapery of vines. No human being could live there, but in
+the doorway abruptly appeared a boy of seventeen, dressed, like Jack, in
+an old brown jeans suit and a shapeless white hat.
+
+Jack paused at a little distance up on the hill, and parleyed in a
+stentorian voice with the boy in the mill.
+
+"What's the reason ye air always tryin' ter toll off our old red muley
+from our house?" he demanded angrily.
+
+"I ain't never tried ter toll her off," said Andy Bailey. "She jes' kem
+ter our house herself. I dunno ez I hev got enny call ter look arter
+other folkses' stray cattle. Mind yer own cow."
+
+"I hev got a mighty notion ter cut down that thar sapling,"--and Jack
+pointed to a good-sized hickory-tree,--"an' wear it out on ye."
+
+"I ain't afeard. Come on!" said Andy impudently, protected by his
+innocence, and the fact of being the smaller of the two.
+
+There was a pause. "Hev ye been a-huntin'?" asked Jack, beginning to be
+mollified by the rare luxury of youthful and congenial companionship;
+for this was a scantily settled region, and boys were few.
+
+Andy nodded assent.
+
+Jack walked down into the rickety mill, and stood leaning against the
+rotten old hopper. "What did ye git?" he said, looking about for the
+game.
+
+"Waal," drawled Andy, with much hesitation, "I hain't been started out
+long." He turned from the door and faced his companion rather
+sheepishly.
+
+"I hopes ye ain't been poppin' off that rifle o' your'n along that
+deer-path down in the hollow, an' a-skeerin' off all the wild critters,"
+said Jack Dunn, with sudden apprehension. "Ef I war ez pore a shot ez ye
+air, I'd go a-huntin' with a bean-pole instead of a gun, an' leave the
+game ter them that kin shoot it."
+
+Andy was of a mercurial and nervous temperament, and this fact perhaps
+may account for the anomaly of a mountain-boy who was a poor shot. Andy
+was the scoff of Persimmon Ridge.
+
+"I hev seen many a gal who could shoot ez well ez ye kin,--better,"
+continued Jack jeeringly. "But law! I needn't kerry my heavy bones down
+thar in the hollow expectin' ter git a deer ter-day. They air all off in
+the woods a-smellin' the powder ye hev been wastin'."
+
+Andy was pleased to change the subject. "It 'pears ter me that that thar
+water air a-scuttlin' along toler'ble fast," he said, turning his eyes
+to the little window through which the stream could be seen.
+
+It _was_ running fast, and with a tremendous force. One could obtain
+some idea of the speed and impetus of the current from the swift
+vehemence with which logs and branches shot past, half hidden in foam.
+
+The water looked black with this white contrast. Here and there a great,
+grim rock projected sharply above the surface. In the normal condition
+of the stream, these were its overhanging banks, but now, submerged,
+they gave to its flow the character of rapids.
+
+The old mill, its wooden supports submerged too, trembled and throbbed
+with the throbbing water. As Jack looked toward the window, his eyes
+were suddenly distended, his cheek paled, and he sprang to the door
+with a frightened exclamation.
+
+Too late! the immense hole of a fallen tree, shooting down the channel
+with the force and velocity of a great projectile, struck the tottering
+supports of the crazy, rotting building.
+
+It careened, and quivered in every fibre; there was a crash of falling
+timbers, then a mighty wrench, and the two boys, clinging to the
+window-frame, were driving with the wreck down the river.
+
+The old mill thundered against the submerged rocks, and at every
+concussion the timbers fell. It whirled around and around in eddying
+pools. Where the water was clear, and smooth, and deep, it shot along
+with great rapidity.
+
+The convulsively clinging boys looked down upon the black current, with
+its sharp, treacherous, half-seen rocks and ponderous driftwood. The
+wild idea of plunging into the tumult and trying to swim to the bank
+faded as they looked. Here in the crazy building there might be a
+chance. In that frightful swirl there lurked only a grim certainty.
+
+The house had swung along in the middle of the stream; now its course
+was veering slightly to the left. This could be seen through the window
+and the interstices of the half-fallen timbers.
+
+The boys were caged, as it were; the doorway was filled with the heavy
+debris, and the only possibility of escape was through that little
+window. It was so small that only one could pass through at a
+time,--only one could be saved.
+
+Jack had seen the chance from far up the stream. There was a stretch of
+smooth water close in to the bank, on which was a low-hanging
+beech-tree,--he might catch the branches.
+
+They were approaching the spot with great rapidity. Only one could go.
+He himself had discovered the opportunity,--it was his own.
+
+Life was sweet,--so sweet! He could not give it up; he could not now
+take thought for his friend. He could only hope with a frenzied
+eagerness that Andy had not seen the possibility of deliverance.
+
+In another moment Andy lifted himself into the window. A whirlpool
+caught the wreck, and there it eddied in dizzying circles. It was not
+yet too late. Jack could tear the smaller, weaker fellow away with one
+strong hand, and take the only chance for escape. The shattered mill was
+dashing through the smoother waters now; the great beech-tree was
+hanging over their heads; an inexplicable, overpowering impulse mastered
+in an instant Jack's temptation.
+
+"Ketch the branches, Andy!" he cried wildly.
+
+His friend was gone, and he was whirling off alone on those cruel,
+frantic waters. In the midst of the torrent he was going down, and down,
+and down the mountain.
+
+Now and then he had a fleeting glimpse of the distant ranges. There was
+"Elijah's Step," glorified in the sunset, purple and splendid, with red
+and gold clouds flaming above it. To his untutored imagination they
+looked like the fiery chariot again awaiting the prophet.
+
+The familiar sight, the familiar, oft-repeated fancy, the recollection
+of his home, brought sudden tears to his eyes. He gazed wistfully at the
+spot whence he believed the man had ascended who left death untasted,
+and then he went on in this mad rush down to the bitterness of death.
+
+Even with this terrible fact before him, he did not reproach himself
+with his costly generosity. It was strange to him that he did not regret
+it; perhaps, like that mountain, he had suddenly taken up life on a
+higher level.
+
+The sunset splendor was fading. The fiery chariot was gone, and in its
+place were floating gray clouds,--the dust of its wheels, they seemed.
+The outlines of "Elijah's Step" were dark. It looked sad, bereaved. Its
+glory had departed.
+
+Suddenly the whole landscape seemed full of reeling black shadows,--and
+yet it was not night. The roar of the torrent was growing faint upon
+his ear, and yet its momentum was unchecked. Soon all was dark and all
+was still, and the world slipped from his grasp.
+
+[Illustration: IN THE MIDST OF THE TORRENT]
+
+"They tell me that thar Jack Dunn war mighty nigh drownded when them men
+fished him out'n the pond at Skeggs's sawmill down thar in the valley,"
+said Andy Bailey, recounting the incident to the fireside circle at his
+own home. "They seen them rotten old timbers come a-floatin' ez
+peaceable on to the pond, an' then they seen somethin' like a human
+a-hangin' ter 'em. The water air ez still ez a floor thar, an' deep an'
+smooth, an' they didn't hev no trouble in swimmin' out to him. They
+couldn't bring him to, though, at fust. They said in a little more he
+would hev been gone sure! Now"--pridefully--"ef he hed hed the grit ter
+ketch a tree an' pull out, like I done, he wouldn't hev been in sech a
+danger."
+
+Andy never knew the sacrifice his friend had made. Jack never told him.
+Applause is at best a slight thing. A great action is nobler than the
+monument that commemorates it; and when a man gives himself into the
+control of a generous impulse, thenceforward he takes up life on a
+higher level.
+
+
+
+
+CHRISTMAS DAY ON OLD WINDY MOUNTAIN
+
+
+The sun had barely shown the rim of his great red disk above the sombre
+woods and snow-crowned crags of the opposite ridge, when Rick Herne, his
+rifle in his hand, stepped out of his father's log cabin, perched high
+among the precipices of Old Windy Mountain. He waited motionless for a
+moment, and all the family trooped to the door to assist at the
+time-honored ceremony of firing a salute to the day.
+
+Suddenly the whole landscape catches a rosy glow, Rick whips up his
+rifle, a jet of flame darts swiftly out, a sharp report rings all around
+the world, and the sun goes grandly up--while the little tow-headed
+mountaineers hurrah shrilly for "Chris'mus!"
+
+As he began to re-load his gun, the small boys clustered around him,
+their hands in the pockets of their baggy jeans trousers, their heads
+inquiringly askew.
+
+"They air a-goin' ter hev a pea-fow_el_ fur dinner down yander ter
+Birk's Mill," Rick remarked.
+
+The smallest boy smacked his lips,--not that he knew how pea-fowl
+tastes, but he imagined unutterable things.
+
+"Somehows I hates fur ye ter go ter eat at Birk's Mill, they air sech a
+set o' drinkin' men down thar ter Malviny's house," said Rick's mother,
+as she stood in the doorway, and looked anxiously at him.
+
+For his elder sister was Birk's wife, and to this great feast he was
+invited as a representative of the family, his father being disabled by
+"rheumatics," and his mother kept at home by the necessity of providing
+dinner for those four small boys.
+
+"Hain't I done promised ye not ter tech a drap o' liquor this Chris'mus
+day?" asked Rick.
+
+"That's a fac'," his mother admitted. "But boys, an' men-folks
+ginerally, air scandalous easy ter break a promise whar whiskey is in
+it."
+
+"I'll hev ye ter know that when I gin my word, I keeps it!" cried Rick
+pridefully.
+
+He little dreamed how that promise was to be assailed before the sun
+should go down.
+
+He was a tall, sinewy boy, deft of foot as all these mountaineers are,
+and a seven-mile walk in the snow to Birk's Mill he considered a mere
+trifle. He tramped along cheerily enough through the silent solitudes of
+the dense forest. Only at long intervals the stillness was broken by the
+cracking of a bough under the weight of snow, or the whistling of a gust
+of wind through the narrow valley far below.
+
+All at once--it was a terrible shock of surprise--he was sinking! Was
+there nothing beneath his feet but the vague depths of air to the base
+of the mountain? He realized with a quiver of dismay that he had
+mistaken a huge drift-filled fissure, between a jutting crag and the
+wall of the ridge, for the solid, snow-covered ground. He tossed his
+arms about wildly in his effort to grasp something firm. The motion only
+dislodged the drift. He felt that it was falling, and he was going
+down--down--down with it. He saw the trees on the summit of Old Windy
+disappear. He caught one glimpse of the neighboring ridges. Then he was
+blinded and enveloped in this cruel whiteness. He had a wild idea that
+he had been delivered to it forever; even in the first thaw it would
+curl up into a wreath of vapor, and rise from the mountain's side, and
+take him soaring with it--whither? How they would search these bleak
+wintry fastnesses for him,--while he was gone sailing with the mist!
+What would they say at home and at Birk's Mill? One last thought of the
+"pea-fow_el_," and he seemed to slide swiftly away from the world with
+the snow.
+
+He was unconscious probably only for a few minutes. When he came to
+himself, he found that he was lying, half-submerged in the great drift,
+on the slope of the mountain, and the dark, icicle-begirt cliff towered
+high above. He stretched his limbs--no bones broken! He could hardly
+believe that he had fallen unhurt from those heights. He did not
+appreciate how gradually the snow had slidden down. Being so densely
+packed, too, it had buoyed him up, and kept him from dashing against the
+sharp, jagged edges of the rock. He had lost consciousness in the jar
+when the moving mass was abruptly arrested by a transverse elevation of
+the ground. He was still a little dizzy and faint, but otherwise
+uninjured.
+
+Now a great perplexity took hold on him. How was he to make his way back
+up the mountain, he asked himself, as he looked at the inaccessible
+cliffs looming high into the air. All the world around him was
+unfamiliar. Even his wide wanderings had never brought him into this
+vast, snowy, trackless wilderness, that stretched out on every side. He
+would be half the day in finding the valley road that led to Birk's
+Mill. He rose to his feet, and gazed about him in painful indecision.
+The next moment a thrill shot through him, to which he was
+unaccustomed. He had never before shaken except with the cold,--but this
+was fear.
+
+For he heard voices! Not from the cliffs above,--but from below! Not
+from the dense growth of young pines on the slope of the mountain,--but
+from the depths of the earth beneath! He stood motionless, listening
+intently, his eyes distended, and his heart beating fast.
+
+All silence! Not even the wind stirred in the pine thicket. The snow lay
+heavy among the dark green branches, and every slender needle was
+encased in ice. Rick rubbed his eyes. It was no dream. There was the
+thicket; but whose were the voices that had rung out faintly from
+beneath it?
+
+A crowd of superstitions surged upon him. He cast an affrighted glance
+at the ghastly snow-covered woods and sheeted earth. He was remembering
+fireside legends, horrible enough to raise the hair on a sophisticated,
+educated boy's head; much more horrible, then, to a young backwoodsman
+like Rick. On this, the most benign day that ever dawns upon the world,
+was he led into these endless wastes of forest to be terrified by the
+"harnts"?
+
+Suddenly those voices from the earth again! One was singing a drunken
+catch,--it broke into falsetto, and ended with an unmistakable hiccup.
+
+Rick's blood came back with a rush.
+
+"I hev never hearn tell o' the hoobies gittin' boozy!" he said with a
+laugh. "That's whar they hev got the upper-hand o' humans."
+
+As he gazed again at the thicket, he saw now something that he had been
+too much agitated to observe before,--a column of dense smoke that rose
+from far down the declivity, and seemed to make haste to hide itself
+among the low-hanging boughs of a clump of fir-trees.
+
+"It's somebody's house down thar," was Rick's conclusion. "I kin find
+out the way to Birk's Mill from the folkses."
+
+When he neared the smoke, he paused abruptly, staring once more.
+
+There was no house! The smoke rose from among low pine bushes. Above
+were the snow-laden branches of the fir.
+
+"Ef thar war a house hyar, I reckon I could see it!" said Rick
+doubtfully, infinitely mystified.
+
+There was a continual drip, drip of moisture all around. Yet a thaw had
+not set in. Rick looked up at the gigantic icicles that hung to the
+crags and glittered in the sun,--not a drop trickled from them. But this
+fir-tree was dripping, dripping, and the snow had melted away from the
+nearest pine bushes that clustered about the smoke. There was heat below
+certainly, a strong heat, and somebody was keeping the fire up steadily.
+
+"An' air it folkses ez live underground like foxes an' sech!" Rick
+exclaimed, astonished, as he came upon a large, irregularly shaped rift
+in the rocks, and heard the same reeling voice from within, beginning to
+sing once more. But for this bacchanalian melody, the noise of Rick's
+entrance might have given notice of his approach. As it was, the
+inhabitants of this strange place were even more surprised than he,
+when, after groping through a dark, low passage, an abrupt turn brought
+him into a lofty, vaulted subterranean apartment. There was a great
+flare of light, which revealed six or seven muscular men grouped about a
+large copper vessel built into a rude stone furnace, and all the air was
+pervaded by an incomparably strong alcoholic odor. The boy started back
+with a look of terror. That pale terror was reflected on each man's
+face, as on a mirror. At the sight of the young stranger they all sprang
+up with the same gesture,--each instinctively laid his hand upon the
+pistol that he wore.
+
+Poor Rick understood it all at last. He had stumbled upon a nest of
+distillers, only too common among these mountains, who were hiding from
+the officers of the Government, running their still in defiance of the
+law and eluding the whiskey-tax. He realized that in discovering their
+stronghold he had learned a secret that was by no means a safe one for
+him to know. And he was in their power; at their mercy!
+
+"Don't shoot!" he faltered. "I jes' want ter ax the folkses ter tell me
+the way ter Birk's Mill."
+
+What would he have given to be on the bleak mountain outside!
+
+One of the men caught him as if anticipating an attempt to run. Two or
+three, after a low-toned colloquy, took their rifles, and crept
+cautiously outside to reconnoitre the situation. Rick comprehended their
+suspicion with new quakings. They imagined that he was a spy, and had
+been sent among them to discover them plying their forbidden vocation.
+This threatened a long imprisonment for them. His heart sank as he
+thought of it; they would never let him go.
+
+After a time the reconnoitring party came back.
+
+"Nothin' stirrin'," said the leader tersely.
+
+"I misdoubts," muttered another, casting a look of deep suspicion on
+Rick. "Thar air men out thar, I'm a-thinkin', hid somewhar."
+
+"They air furder 'n a mile off, ennyhow," returned the first speaker.
+"We never lef' so much ez a bush 'thout sarchin' of it."
+
+"The off'cers can't find this place no-ways 'thout that thar chap fur a
+guide," said a third, with a surly nod of his head at Rick.
+
+"We're safe enough, boys, safe enough!" cried a stout-built, red-faced,
+red-bearded man, evidently very drunk, and with a voice that rose into
+quavering falsetto as he spoke. "This chap can't do nothin'. We hev got
+him bound hand an' foot. Hyar air the captive of our bow an' spear,
+boys! Mighty little captive, though! hi!" He tried to point jeeringly at
+Rick, and forgot what he had intended to do before he could fairly
+extend his hand. Then his rollicking head sank on his breast, and he
+began to sing sleepily again.
+
+One of the more sober of the men had extinguished the fire in order that
+they should not be betrayed by the smoke outside to the revenue officers
+who might be seeking them. The place, chilly enough at best, was growing
+bitter cold. The strange subterranean beauty of the surroundings, the
+limestone wall and arches, scintillating wherever they caught the
+light; the shadowy, mysterious vaulted roof; the white stalactites that
+hung down thence to touch the stalagmites as they rose up from the
+floor, and formed with them endless vistas of stately colonnades, all
+were oddly incongruous with the drunken, bloated faces of the
+distillers. Rick could not have put his thought into words, but it
+seemed to him that when men had degraded themselves like this, even
+inanimate nature is something higher and nobler. "Sermons in stones"
+were not far to seek.
+
+He observed that they were making preparations for flight, and once more
+the fear of what they would do with him clutched at his heart. He was
+something of a problem to them.
+
+"This hyar cub will go blab," was the first suggestion.
+
+"He will keep mum," said the vocalist, glancing at the boy with a
+jovially tipsy combination of leer and wink. "Hyar is the persuader!" He
+rapped sharply on the muzzle of his pistol. "This'll scotch his wheel."
+
+"Hold yer own jaw, ye drunken 'possum!" retorted another of the group.
+"Ef ye fire off that pistol in hyar, we'll hev all these hyar rocks"--he
+pointed at the walls and the long colonnades--"answerin' back an'
+yelpin' like a pack o' hounds on a hot scent. Ef thar air folks outside,
+the noise would fotch 'em down on us fur true!"
+
+Rick breathed more freely. The rocks would speak up for him! He could
+not be harmed with all these tell-tale witnesses at hand. So silent now,
+but with a latent voice strong enough for the dread of it to save his
+life!
+
+The man who had put out the fire, who had led the reconnoitring party,
+who had made all the active preparations for departure, who seemed, in
+short, to be an executive committee of one,--a long, lazy-looking
+mountaineer, with a decision of action in startling contrast to his
+whole aspect,--now took this matter in hand.
+
+"Nothin' easier," he said tersely. "Fill him up. Make him ez drunk ez a
+fraish b'iled ow_el_. Then lead him to the t'other eend o' the cave,
+an' blindfold him, an' lug him off five mile in the woods, an' leave him
+thar. He'll never know what he hev seen nor done."
+
+"That's the dinctum!" cried the red-bearded man, in delighted approval,
+breaking into a wild, hiccupping laugh, inexpressibly odious to the boy.
+Rick had an extreme loathing for them all that showed itself with
+impolitic frankness upon his face. He realized as he had never done
+before the depths to which strong drink will reduce men. But that the
+very rocks would cry out upon them, they would have murdered him.
+
+In the preparations for departure all the lights had been extinguished,
+except a single lantern, and a multitude of shadows had come thronging
+from the deeper recesses of the cave. In the faint glimmer the figures
+of the men loomed up, indistinct, gigantic, distorted. They hardly
+seemed men at all to Rick; rather some evil underground creatures,
+neither beast nor human.
+
+And he was to be made equally besotted, and even more helpless than
+they, in order that his senses might be sapped away, and he should
+remember no story to tell. Perhaps if he had not had before him so vivid
+an illustration of the malign power that swayed them, he might not have
+experienced so strong an aversion to it. Now, to be made like them
+seemed a high price to pay for his life. And there was his promise to
+his mother! As the long, lank, lazy-looking mountaineer pressed the
+whiskey upon him, Rick dashed it aside with a gesture so unexpected and
+vehement that the cracked jug fell to the floor, and was shivered to
+fragments.
+
+Rick lifted an appealing face to the man, who seized him with a strong
+grip. "I can't--I won't," the boy cried wildly. "I--I--promised my
+mother!"
+
+He looked around the circle deprecatingly. He expected first a guffaw
+and then a blow, and he dreaded the ridicule more than the pain.
+
+But there were neither blows nor ridicule. They all gazed at him,
+astounded. Then a change, which Rick hardly comprehended, flitted across
+the face of the man who had grasped him. The moonshiner turned away
+abruptly, with a bitter laugh that startled all the echoes.
+
+"_I--I_ promised _my_ mother, too!" he cried. "It air good that in her
+grave whar she is she can't know how I hev kep' my word."
+
+And then there was a sudden silence. It seemed to Rick, strangely
+enough, like the sudden silence that comes after prayer. He was
+reminded, as one of the men rose at length and the keg on which he had
+been sitting creaked with the motion, of the creaking benches in the
+little mountain church when the congregation started from their knees.
+And had some feeble, groping sinner's prayer filled the silence and the
+moral darkness!
+
+The "executive committee" promptly recovered himself. But he made no
+further attempt to force the whiskey upon the boy. Under some whispered
+instructions which he gave the others, Rick was half-led, half-dragged
+through immensely long black halls of the cave, while one of the men
+went before, carrying the feeble lantern. When the first glimmer of
+daylight appeared in the distance, Rick understood that the cave had an
+outlet other than the one by which he had entered, and evidently miles
+distant from it. Thus it was that the distillers were well enabled to
+baffle the law that sought them.
+
+They stopped here and blindfolded the boy. How far and where they
+dragged him through the snowy mountain wilderness outside, Rick never
+knew. He was exhausted when at length they allowed him to pause. As he
+heard their steps dying away in the distance, he tore the bandage from
+his eyes, and found that they had left him in the midst of the wagon
+road to make his way to Birk's Mill as best he might. When he reached
+it, the wintry sun was low in the western sky, and the very bones of the
+"pea-fow_el_" were picked.
+
+On the whole, it seemed a sorry Christmas Day, as Rick could not know
+then--indeed, he never knew--what good results it brought forth. For
+among those who took the benefit of the "amnesty" extended by the
+Government to the moonshiners of this region, on condition that they
+discontinue illicit distilling for the future, was a certain long, lank,
+lazy-looking mountaineer, who suddenly became sober and steady and a
+law-abiding citizen. He had been reminded, this Christmas Day, of a
+broken promise to a dead mother, and this by the unflinching moral
+courage of a mere boy in a moment of mortal peril. Such wise, sweet,
+uncovenanted uses has duty, blessing alike the unconscious exemplar and
+him who profits by the example.
+
+
+The Riverside Press
+
+CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS, U. S. A.
+ELECTROTYPED AND PRINTED BY
+H. O. HOUGHTON AND CO.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Young Mountaineers, by Charles Egbert Craddock
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