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+A Knight of the Cumberland
+
+by John Fox Jr.
+
+September, 1995  [Etext #324]
+
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+
+A KNIGHT OF THE CUMBERLAND
+
+BY
+JOHN FOX, JR.
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+                                             
+I.   The Blight in the Hills
+II.  On the Wild Dog's Trail
+III. The Auricular Talent of the Hon.Samuel Budd
+IV.  Close Quarters
+V.   Back to the Hills
+VI.  The Great Day
+VII. At Last--The Tournament
+VIII.The Knight Passes
+
+
+
+A KNIGHT OF THE CUMBERLAND
+
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+THE BLIGHT IN THE HILLS
+
+High noon of a crisp October day,
+sunshine flooding the earth with
+the warmth and light of old wine and,
+going single-file up through the jagged
+gap that the dripping of water has worn
+down through the Cumberland Mountains
+from crest to valley-level, a gray horse
+and two big mules, a man and two young
+girls.  On the gray horse, I led the
+tortuous way.  After me came my small
+sister--and after her and like her, mule-
+back, rode the Blight--dressed as she
+would be for a gallop in Central Park or
+to ride a hunter in a horse show.
+
+I was taking them, according to
+promise, where the feet of other women than
+mountaineers had never trod--beyond the
+crest of the Big Black--to the waters of
+the Cumberland--the lair of moonshiner
+and feudsman, where is yet pocketed a
+civilization that, elsewhere, is long ago
+gone.  This had been a pet dream of the
+Blight's for a long time, and now the
+dream was coming true.  The Blight was
+in the hills.
+
+
+Nobody ever went to her mother's
+house without asking to see her even when
+she was a little thing with black hair,
+merry face and black eyes.  Both men and
+women, with children of their own, have
+told me that she was, perhaps, the most
+fascinating child that ever lived.  There
+be some who claim that she has never
+changed--and I am among them.  She
+began early, regardless of age, sex or
+previous condition of servitude--she
+continues recklessly as she began--and none
+makes complaint.  Thus was it in her own
+world--thus it was when she came to
+mine.  On the way down from the North,
+the conductor's voice changed from a
+command to a request when he asked
+for her ticket.  The jacketed lord of the
+dining-car saw her from afar and advanced
+to show her to a seat--that she
+might ride forward, sit next to a shaded
+window and be free from the glare of the
+sun on the other side.  Two porters made
+a rush for her bag when she got off the
+car, and the proprietor of the little hotel
+in the little town where we had to wait
+several hours for the train into the mountains
+gave her the bridal chamber for an
+afternoon nap.  From this little town to
+``The Gap'' is the worst sixty-mile ride,
+perhaps, in the world.  She sat in a dirty
+day-coach; the smoke rolled in at the
+windows and doors; the cars shook and
+swayed and lumbered around curves and
+down and up gorges; there were about
+her rough men, crying children, slatternly
+women, tobacco juice, peanuts, popcorn
+and apple cores, but dainty, serene and as
+merry as ever, she sat through that ride
+with a radiant smile, her keen black eyes
+noting everything unlovely within and the
+glory of hill, tree and chasm without. 
+Next morning at home, where we rise
+early, no one was allowed to waken her
+and she had breakfast in bed--for the
+Blight's gentle tyranny was established on
+sight and varied not at the Gap.
+
+When she went down the street that
+day everybody stared surreptitiously and
+with perfect respect, as her dainty black
+plumed figure passed; the post-office clerk
+could barely bring himself to say that there
+was no letter for her.  The soda-fountain
+boy nearly filled her glass with syrup before
+he saw that he was not strictly minding
+his own business; the clerk, when I
+bought chocolate for her, unblushingly
+added extra weight and, as we went back,
+she met them both--Marston, the young
+engineer from the North, crossing the
+street and, at the same moment, a drunken
+young tough with an infuriated face reeling
+in a run around the corner ahead of
+us as though he were being pursued. 
+Now we have a volunteer police guard
+some forty strong at the Gap--and from
+habit, I started for him, but the Blight
+caught my arm tight.  The young
+engineer in three strides had reached the
+curb-stone and all he sternly said was:
+
+``Here!  Here!''
+
+The drunken youth wheeled and his
+right hand shot toward his hip pocket. 
+The engineer was belted with a pistol, but
+with one lightning movement and an
+incredibly long reach, his right fist caught
+the fellow's jaw so that he pitched
+backward and collapsed like an empty bag. 
+Then the engineer caught sight of the
+Blight's bewildered face, flushed, gripped
+his hands in front of him and simply
+stared.  At last he saw me:
+
+``Oh,'' he said, ``how do you do?''
+and he turned to his prisoner, but the
+panting sergeant and another policeman--
+also a volunteer--were already lifting him
+to his feet.  I introduced the boy and the
+Blight then, and for the first time in my
+life I saw the Blight--shaken.  Round-
+eyed, she merely gazed at him.
+
+``That was pretty well done,'' I said.
+
+``Oh, he was drunk and I knew he
+would be slow.''  Now something curious
+happened.  The dazed prisoner was on
+his feet, and his captors were starting with
+him to the calaboose when he seemed suddenly
+to come to his senses.
+
+``Jes wait a minute, will ye?'' he said
+quietly, and his captors, thinking perhaps
+that he wanted to say something to me,
+stopped.  The mountain youth turned a
+strangely sobered face and fixed his blue
+eyes on the engineer as though he were
+searing every feature of that imperturbable
+young man in his brain forever.  It
+was not a bad face, but the avenging
+hatred in it was fearful.  Then he, too,
+saw the Blight, his face calmed magically
+and he, too, stared at her, and turned away
+with an oath checked at his lips.  We went
+on--the Blight thrilled, for she had heard
+much of our volunteer force at the Gap
+and had seen something already.  Presently
+I looked back.  Prisoner and captors
+were climbing the little hill toward the
+calaboose and the mountain boy just then
+turned his head and I could swear that his
+eyes sought not the engineer, whom we
+left at the corner, but, like the engineer,
+he was looking at the Blight.  Whereat I
+did not wonder--particularly as to the
+engineer.  He had been in the mountains for
+a long time and I knew what this vision
+from home meant to him.  He turned up
+at the house quite early that night.
+
+``I'm not on duty until eleven,'' he
+said hesitantly, `` and I thought I'd----''
+
+``Come right in.''
+
+I asked him a few questions about
+business and then I left him and the Blight
+alone.  When I came back she had a Gatling
+gun of eager questions ranged on him
+and--happy withal--he was squirming no
+little.  I followed him to the gate.
+
+``Are you really going over into those
+God-forsaken mountains?'' he asked.
+
+``I thought I would.''
+
+``And you are going to take HER?''
+
+``And my sister.''
+
+``Oh, I beg your pardon.''  He strode
+away.
+
+``Coming up by the mines?'' he called
+back.
+
+``Perhaps will you show us around?''
+
+``I guess I will,'' he said emphatically,
+and he went on to risk his neck on a ten-
+mile ride along a mountain road in the
+dark.
+
+``I LIKE a man,'' said the Blight.  ``I
+like a MAN.''
+
+Of course the Blight must see everything,
+so she insisted on going to the police
+court next morning for the trial of the
+mountain boy.  The boy was in the witness
+chair when we got there, and the
+Hon. Samuel Budd was his counsel.  He
+had volunteered to defend the prisoner, I
+was soon told, and then I understood. 
+The November election was not far off and
+the Hon. Samuel Budd was candidate for
+legislature.  More even, the boy's father
+was a warm supporter of Mr. Budd and
+the boy himself might perhaps render good
+service in the cause when the time came--
+as indeed he did.  On one of the front
+chairs sat the young engineer and it was
+a question whether he or the prisoner saw
+the Blight's black plumes first.  The eyes
+of both flashed toward her simultaneously,
+the engineer colored perceptibly and
+the mountain boy stopped short in speech
+and his pallid face flushed with unmistakable
+shame.  Then he went on:  ``He had
+liquered up,'' he said, ``and had got tight
+afore he knowed it and he didn't mean
+no harm and had never been arrested
+afore in his whole life.''
+
+``Have you ever been drunk before?''
+asked the prosecuting attorney severely. 
+The lad looked surprised.
+
+``Co'se I have, but I ain't goin' to agin
+--leastwise not in this here town.''  There
+was a general laugh at this and the aged
+mayor rapped loudly.
+
+``That will do,'' said the attorney.
+
+The lad stepped down, hitched his chair
+slightly so that his back was to the Blight,
+sank down in it until his head rested on
+the back of the chair and crossed his legs. 
+The Hon. Samuel Budd arose and the
+Blight looked at him with wonder.  His
+long yellow hair was parted in the middle
+and brushed with plaster-like precision
+behind two enormous ears, he wore spectacles,
+gold-rimmed and with great staring
+lenses, and his face was smooth and
+ageless.  He caressed his chin ruminatingly
+and rolled his lips until they settled into a
+fine resultant of wisdom, patience, toleration
+and firmness.  His manner was profound
+and his voice oily and soothing.
+
+``May it please your Honor--my young
+friend frankly pleads guilty.''  He paused
+as though the majesty of the law could ask
+no more.  ``He is a young man of naturally
+high and somewhat--naturally, too,
+no doubt--bibulous spirits.  Homoepathically--
+if inversely--the result was logical. 
+In the untrammelled life of the liberty-
+breathing mountains, where the stern spirit
+of law and order, of which your Honor is
+the august symbol, does not prevail as it
+does here--thanks to your Honor's wise
+and just dispensations--the lad has, I
+may say, naturally acquired a certain
+recklessness of mood--indulgence which,
+however easily condoned there, must here be
+sternly rebuked.  At the same time, he
+knew not the conditions here, he became
+exhilarated without malice, prepensey or
+even, I may say, consciousness.  He would
+not have done as he has, if he had known
+what he knows now, and, knowing, he will
+not repeat the offence.  I need say no
+more.  I plead simply that your Honor
+will temper the justice that is only yours
+with the mercy that is yours--only.''
+
+His Honor was visibly affected and to
+cover it--his methods being informal--he
+said with sharp irrelevancy:
+
+``Who bailed this young feller out last
+night?''  The sergeant spoke:
+
+``Why, Mr. Marston thar''--with
+outstretched finger toward the young
+engineer.  The Blight's black eyes leaped
+with exultant appreciation and the engineer
+turned crimson.  His Honor rolled his
+quid around in his mouth once, and peered
+over his glasses:
+
+``I fine this young feller two dollars and
+costs.''  The young fellow had turned
+slowly in his chair and his blue eyes blazed
+at the engineer with unappeasable hatred. 
+I doubt if he had heard his Honor's
+voice.
+
+``I want ye to know that I'm obleeged
+to ye an' I ain't a-goin' to fergit it; but
+if I'd a known hit was you I'd a stayed
+in jail an' seen you in hell afore I'd a been
+bounden to ye.''
+
+``Ten dollars fer contempt of couht.'' 
+The boy was hot now.
+
+``Oh, fine and be--'' The Hon. Samuel
+Budd had him by the shoulder, the boy
+swallowed his voice and his starting tears
+of rage, and after a whisper to his Honor,
+the Hon. Samuel led him out.  Outside,
+the engineer laughed to the Blight:
+
+``Pretty peppery, isn't he?'' but the
+Blight said nothing, and later we saw the
+youth on a gray horse crossing the bridge
+and conducted by the Hon. Samuel Budd,
+who stopped and waved him toward the
+mountains.  The boy went on and across
+the plateau, the gray Gap swallowed him.
+That night, at the post-office, the Hon.
+Sam plucked me aside by the sleeve.
+
+``I know Marston is agin me in this
+race--but I'll do him a good turn just the
+same.  You tell him to watch out for that
+young fellow.  He's all right when he's
+sober, but when he's drunk--well, over in
+Kentucky, they call him the Wild Dog.''
+
+
+Several days later we started out through
+that same Gap.  The glum stableman
+looked at the Blight's girths three times,
+and with my own eyes starting and my
+heart in my mouth, I saw her pass behind
+her sixteen-hand-high mule and give him a
+friendly tap on the rump as she went by. 
+The beast gave an appreciative flop of one
+ear and that was all.  Had I done that,
+any further benefit to me or mine would
+be incorporated in the terms of an insurance
+policy.  So, stating this, I believe I
+state the limit and can now go on to say
+at last that it was because she seemed to
+be loved by man and brute alike that a
+big man of her own town, whose body,
+big as it was, was yet too small for his
+heart and from whose brain things went
+off at queer angles, always christened her
+perversely as--``The Blight.''
+
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+ON THE WILD DOG'S TRAIL
+
+So up we went past Bee Rock, Preacher's
+Creek and Little Looney, past
+the mines where high on a ``tipple'' stood
+the young engineer looking down at us,
+and looking after the Blight as we passed
+on into a dim rocky avenue walled on each
+side with rhododendrons.  I waved at him
+and shook my head--we would see him
+coming back.  Beyond a deserted log-
+cabin we turned up a spur of the mountain. 
+Around a clump of bushes we came on
+a gray-bearded mountaineer holding his
+horse by the bridle and from a covert high
+above two more men appeared with
+Winchesters.  The Blight breathed forth an
+awed whisper:
+
+``Are they moonshiners?''
+
+I nodded sagely, ``Most likely,'' and
+the Blight was thrilled.  They might have
+been squirrel-hunters most innocent, but
+the Blight had heard much talk of moonshine
+stills and mountain feuds and the
+men who run them and I took the risk of
+denying her nothing.  Up and up we went,
+those two mules swaying from side to side
+with a motion little short of elephantine
+and, by and by, the Blight called out:
+
+``You ride ahead and don't you DARE
+look back.''
+
+Accustomed to obeying the Blight's
+orders, I rode ahead with eyes to the front. 
+Presently, a shriek made me turn suddenly. 
+It was nothing--my little sister's mule had
+gone near a steep cliff--perilously near, as
+its rider thought, but I saw why I must not
+look back; those two little girls were riding
+astride on side-saddles, the booted little
+right foot of each dangling stirrupless--a
+posture quite decorous but ludicrous.
+
+``Let us know if anybody comes,'' they
+cried.  A mountaineer descended into sight
+around a loop of the path above.
+
+``Change cars,'' I shouted.
+
+They changed and, passing, were grave,
+demure--then they changed again, and
+thus we climbed.
+
+Such a glory as was below, around and
+above us; the air like champagne; the sunlight
+rich and pouring like a flood on the
+gold that the beeches had strewn in the
+path, on the gold that the poplars still
+shook high above and shimmering on the
+royal scarlet of the maple and the sombre
+russet of the oak.  From far below us to far
+above us a deep curving ravine was slashed
+into the mountain side as by one stroke of
+a gigantic scimitar.  The darkness deep
+down was lighted up with cool green,
+interfused with liquid gold.  Russet and
+yellow splashed the mountain sides beyond
+and high up the maples were in a shaking
+blaze.  The Blight's swift eyes took all in
+and with indrawn breath she drank it all
+deep down.
+
+An hour by sun we were near the top,
+which was bared of trees and turned into
+rich farm-land covered with blue-grass. 
+Along these upland pastures, dotted with
+grazing cattle, and across them we rode
+toward the mountain wildernesses on the
+other side, down into which a zigzag path
+wriggles along the steep front of Benham's
+spur.  At the edge of the steep was a
+cabin and a bushy-bearded mountaineer,
+who looked like a brigand, answered my
+hail.  He ``mought'' keep us all night,
+but he'd ``ruther not, as we could git a
+place to stay down the spur.''  Could we
+get down before dark?  The mountaineer
+lifted his eyes to where the sun was breaking
+the horizon of the west into streaks
+and splashes of yellow and crimson.
+
+``Oh, yes, you can git thar afore
+dark.''
+
+Now I knew that the mountaineer's idea
+of distance is vague--but he knows how
+long it takes to get from one place to
+another.  So we started down--dropping at
+once into thick dark woods, and as we
+went looping down, the deeper was the
+gloom.  That sun had suddenly severed all
+connection with the laws of gravity and
+sunk, and it was all the darker because
+the stars were not out.  The path was
+steep and coiled downward like a wounded
+snake.  In one place a tree had fallen
+across it, and to reach the next coil of the
+path below was dangerous.  So I had the
+girls dismount and I led the gray horse
+down on his haunches.  The mules refused
+to follow, which was rather unusual.  I
+went back and from a safe distance in the
+rear I belabored them down.  They cared
+neither for gray horse nor crooked path,
+but turned of their own devilish wills
+along the bushy mountain side.  As I ran
+after them the gray horse started calmly
+on down and those two girls shrieked with
+laughter--they knew no better.  First one
+way and then the other down the mountain
+went those mules, with me after them,
+through thick bushes, over logs, stumps
+and bowlders and holes--crossing the path
+a dozen times.  What that path was there
+for never occurred to those long-eared
+half asses, whole fools, and by and by,
+when the girls tried to shoo them down
+they clambered around and above them
+and struck the path back up the mountain. 
+The horse had gone down one way, the
+mules up the other, and there was no
+health in anything.  The girls could not
+go up--so there was nothing to do but go
+down, which, hard as it was, was easier
+than going up.  The path was not visible
+now.  Once in a while I would stumble
+from it and crash through the bushes to
+the next coil below.  Finally I went down,
+sliding one foot ahead all the time--knowing
+that when leaves rustled under that
+foot I was on the point of going astray. 
+Sometimes I had to light a match to
+make sure of the way, and thus the ridiculous
+descent was made with those girls in
+high spirits behind.  Indeed, the darker,
+rockier, steeper it got, the more they
+shrieked from pure joy--but I was anything
+than happy.  It was dangerous.  I
+didn't know the cliffs and high rocks
+we might skirt and an unlucky guidance
+might land us in the creek-bed far down. 
+But the blessed stars came out, the moon
+peered over a farther mountain and on
+the last spur there was the gray horse
+browsing in the path--and the sound of
+running water not far below.  Fortunately
+on the gray horse were the saddle-bags of
+the chattering infants who thought the
+whole thing a mighty lark.  We reached
+the running water, struck a flock of geese
+and knew, in consequence, that humanity
+was somewhere near.  A few turns of the
+creek and a beacon light shone below. 
+The pales of a picket fence, the cheering
+outlines of a log-cabin came in view and
+at a peaked gate I shouted:
+
+``Hello!''
+
+You enter no mountaineer's yard without
+that announcing cry.  It was mediaeval,
+the Blight said, positively--two lorn
+damsels, a benighted knight partially stripped
+of his armor by bush and sharp-edged
+rock, a gray palfrey (she didn't mention
+the impatient asses that had turned homeward)
+and she wished I had a horn to
+wind.  I wanted a ``horn'' badly enough
+--but it was not the kind men wind.  By
+and by we got a response:
+
+``Hello!'' was the answer, as an opened
+door let out into the yard a broad band of
+light.  Could we stay all night?  The
+voice replied that the owner would see
+``Pap.''  ``Pap'' seemed willing, and the
+boy opened the gate and into the house
+went the Blight and the little sister. 
+Shortly, I followed.
+
+There, all in one room, lighted by a
+huge wood-fire, rafters above, puncheon
+floor beneath--cane-bottomed chairs and
+two beds the only furniture-``pap,''
+barefooted, the old mother in the chimney-
+corner with a pipe, strings of red pepper-
+pods, beans and herbs hanging around and
+above, a married daughter with a child at
+her breast, two or three children with yellow
+hair and bare feet all looking with
+all their eyes at the two visitors who had
+dropped upon them from another world. 
+The Blight's eyes were brighter than
+usual--that was the only sign she gave
+that she was not in her own drawing-
+room.  Apparently she saw nothing
+strange or unusual even, but there was
+really nothing that she did not see or hear
+and absorb, as few others than the Blight
+can.
+
+Straightway, the old woman knocked
+the ashes out of her pipe.
+
+``I reckon you hain't had nothin' to
+eat,'' she said and disappeared.  The old
+man asked questions, the young mother
+rocked her baby on her knees, the children
+got less shy and drew near the fireplace,
+the Blight and the little sister exchanged
+a furtive smile and the contrast of the
+extremes in American civilization, as shown
+in that little cabin, interested me mightily.
+
+``Yer snack's ready,'' said the old
+woman.  The old man carried the chairs
+into the kitchen, and when I followed the
+girls were seated.  The chairs were so low
+that their chins came barely over their
+plates, and demure and serious as they were
+they surely looked most comical.  There
+was the usual bacon and corn-bread and
+potatoes and sour milk, and the two girls
+struggled with the rude fare nobly.
+
+After supper I joined the old man and
+the old woman with a pipe--exchanging
+my tobacco for their long green with more
+satisfaction probably to me than to them,
+for the long green was good, and strong
+and fragrant.
+
+The old woman asked the Blight and
+the little sister many questions and they, in
+turn, showed great interest in the baby in
+arms, whereat the eighteen-year-old mother
+blushed and looked greatly pleased.
+
+``You got mighty purty black eyes,''
+said the old woman to the Blight, and not
+to slight the little sister she added, `` An'
+you got mighty purty teeth.''
+
+The Blight showed hers in a radiant
+smile and the old woman turned back to her.
+
+``Oh, you've got both,'' she said and
+she shook her head, as though she were
+thinking of the damage they had done.
+It was my time now--to ask questions.
+
+They didn't have many amusements on
+that creek, I discovered--and no dances. 
+Sometimes the boys went coon-hunting and
+there were corn-shuckings, house-raisings
+and quilting-parties.
+
+``Does anybody round here play the
+banjo?''
+
+``None o' my boys,'' said the old woman,
+``but Tom Green's son down the creek
+--he follers pickin' the banjo a leetle.''
+``Follows pickin' ''--the Blight did not
+miss that phrase.
+
+``What do you foller fer a livin'?'' the
+old man asked me suddenly.
+
+``I write for a living.''  He thought a
+while.
+
+``Well, it must be purty fine to have a
+good handwrite.''  This nearly dissolved
+the Blight and the little sister, but they
+held on heroically.
+
+``Is there much fighting around here?''
+I asked presently.
+
+``Not much 'cept when one young feller
+up the river gets to tearin' up things.  I
+heerd as how he was over to the Gap last
+week--raisin' hell.  He comes by here on
+his way home.''  The Blight's eyes opened
+wide--apparently we were on his trail. 
+It is not wise for a member of the police
+guard at the Gap to show too much
+curiosity about the lawless ones of the
+hills, and I asked no questions.
+
+``They calls him the Wild Dog over
+here,'' he added, and then he yawned
+cavernously.
+
+I looked around with divining eye for
+the sleeping arrangements soon to come,
+which sometimes are embarrassing to
+``furriners'' who are unable to grasp at
+once the primitive unconsciousness of the
+mountaineers and, in consequence, accept a
+point of view natural to them because
+enforced by architectural limitations and a
+hospitality that turns no one seeking
+shelter from any door.  They were, however,
+better prepared than I had hoped for. 
+They had a spare room on the porch and
+just outside the door, and when the old
+woman led the two girls to it, I followed
+with their saddle-bags.  The room was
+about seven feet by six and was windowless.
+
+``You'd better leave your door open a
+little,'' I said, ``or you'll smother in
+there.''
+
+``Well,'' said the old woman, `` hit's all
+right to leave the door open.  Nothin's
+goin' ter bother ye, but one o' my sons is
+out a coon-huntin' and he mought come in,
+not knowin' you're thar.  But you jes'
+holler an' he'll move on.''  She meant
+precisely what she said and saw no humor
+at all in such a possibility--but when the
+door closed, I could hear those girls
+stifling shrieks of laughter.
+
+Literally, that night, I was a member
+of the family.  I had a bed to myself
+(the following night I was not so fortunate)--
+in one corner; behind the head of
+mine the old woman, the daughter-in-law
+and the baby had another in the other
+corner, and the old man with the two boys
+spread a pallet on the floor.  That is the
+invariable rule of courtesy with the
+mountaineer, to give his bed to the stranger and
+take to the floor himself, and, in passing,
+let me say that never, in a long experience,
+have I seen the slightest consciousness--
+much less immodesty--in a mountain cabin
+in my life.  The same attitude on the part
+of the visitors is taken for granted--any
+other indeed holds mortal possibilities of
+offence--so that if the visitor has common
+sense, all embarrassment passes at once. 
+The door was closed, the fire blazed on
+uncovered, the smothered talk and laughter
+of the two girls ceased, the coon-hunter
+came not and the night passed in peace.
+
+It must have been near daybreak that I
+was aroused by the old man leaving the
+cabin and I heard voices and the sound of
+horses' feet outside.  When he came back
+he was grinning.
+
+``Hit's your mules.''
+
+``Who found them?''
+
+``The Wild Dog had 'em,'' he said.
+
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+THE AURICULAR TALENT OF THE
+HON. SAMUEL BUDD
+
+Behind us came the Hon. Samuel
+Budd.  Just when the sun was slitting
+the east with a long streak of fire, the
+Hon. Samuel was, with the jocund day,
+standing tiptoe in his stirrups on the misty
+mountain top and peering into the ravine
+down which we had slid the night before,
+and he grumbled no little when he saw
+that he, too, must get off his horse and
+slide down.  The Hon. Samuel was ambitious,
+Southern, and a lawyer.  Without
+saying, it goes that he was also a
+politician.  He was not a native of the
+mountains, but he had cast his fortunes in the
+highlands, and he was taking the first step
+that he hoped would, before many years,
+land him in the National Capitol.  He
+really knew little about the mountaineers,
+even now, and he had never been among
+his constituents on Devil's Fork, where he
+was bound now.  The campaign had so far
+been full of humor and full of trials--not
+the least of which sprang from the fact
+that it was sorghum time.  Everybody
+through the mountains was making sorghum,
+and every mountain child was eating molasses.
+
+Now, as the world knows, the straightest
+way to the heart of the honest voter is
+through the women of the land, and the
+straightest way to the heart of the women
+is through the children of the land; and
+one method of winning both, with rural
+politicians, is to kiss the babies wide and
+far.  So as each infant, at sorghum time,
+has a circle of green-brown stickiness about
+his chubby lips, and as the Hon. Sam was
+averse to ``long sweetenin' '' even in his
+coffee, this particular political device just
+now was no small trial to the Hon. Samuel
+Budd.  But in the language of one of his
+firmest supporters Uncle Tommie Hendricks:
+
+``The Hon. Sam done his duty, and he
+done it damn well.''
+
+The issue at stake was the site of the
+new Court-House--two localities claiming
+the right undisputed, because they were
+the only two places in the county where
+there was enough level land for the Court-
+House to stand on.  Let no man think this
+a trivial issue.  There had been a similar
+one over on the Virginia side once, and
+the opposing factions agreed to decide the
+question by the ancient wager of battle,
+fist and skull--two hundred men on each
+side--and the women of the county with
+difficulty prevented the fight.  Just now,
+Mr. Budd was on his way to ``The
+Pocket''--the voting place of one faction
+--where he had never been, where the
+hostility against him was most bitter, and,
+that day, he knew he was ``up against''
+Waterloo, the crossing of the Rubicon,
+holding the pass at Thermopylae, or any
+other historical crisis in the history of
+man.  I was saddling the mules when the
+cackling of geese in the creek announced
+the coming of the Hon. Samuel Budd,
+coming with his chin on his breast-deep
+in thought.  Still his eyes beamed cheerily,
+he lifted his slouched hat gallantly to the
+Blight and the little sister, and he would
+wait for us to jog along with him.  I told
+him of our troubles, meanwhile.  The
+Wild Dog had restored our mules and
+the Hon. Sam beamed:
+
+``He's a wonder--where is he?''
+
+``He never waited--even for thanks.''
+
+Again the Hon. Sam beamed:
+
+``Ah! just like him.  He's gone ahead
+to help me.''
+
+``Well, how did he happen to be here?''
+I asked.
+
+``He's everywhere,'' said the Hon. Sam.
+
+``How did he know the mules were
+ours?''
+
+``Easy.  That boy knows everything.''
+
+``Well, why did he bring them back
+and then leave so mysteriously?''
+
+The Hon. Sam silently pointed a finger
+at the laughing Blight ahead, and I looked
+incredulous.
+
+``Just the same, that's another reason I
+told you to warn Marston.  He's already
+got it in his head that Marston is his
+rival.''
+
+``Pshaw!'' I said--for it was too
+ridiculous.
+
+``All right,'' said the Hon. Sam placidly.
+
+``Then why doesn't he want to see
+her?''
+``How do you know he ain't watchin'
+her now, for all we know?  Mark me,''
+he added, ``you won't see him at the
+speakin', but I'll bet fruit cake agin
+gingerbread he'll be somewhere around.''
+
+So we went on, the two girls leading
+the way and the Hon. Sam now telling
+his political troubles to me.  Half a
+mile down the road, a solitary horseman
+stood waiting, and Mr. Budd gave a low
+whistle.
+
+``One o' my rivals,'' he said, from the
+corner of his mouth.
+
+``Mornin','' said the horseman; ``lemme
+see you a minute.''
+
+He made a movement to draw aside,
+but the Hon. Samuel made a counter-
+gesture of dissent.
+
+``This gentleman is a friend of mine,''
+he said firmly, but with great courtesy,
+``and he can hear what you have to say
+to me.''
+
+The mountaineer rubbed one huge hand
+over his stubbly chin, threw one of his
+long legs over the pommel of his saddle,
+and dangled a heavy cowhide shoe to and
+fro.
+
+``Would you mind tellin' me whut pay
+a member of the House of Legislatur' gits
+a day?''
+
+The Hon. Sam looked surprised.
+
+``I think about two dollars and a half.''
+
+``An' his meals?''
+
+``No!'' laughed Mr. Budd.
+
+``Well, look-ee here, stranger.  I'm a
+pore man an' I've got a mortgage on my
+farm.  That money don't mean nothin' to
+you--but if you'll draw out now an' I
+win, I'll tell ye whut I'll do.''  He paused
+as though to make sure that the sacrifice
+was possible.  ``I'll just give ye half of
+that two dollars and a half a day, as shore
+as you're a-settin' on that hoss, and you
+won't hav' to hit a durn lick to earn it.''
+
+I had not the heart to smile--nor did
+the Hon. Samuel--so artless and simple
+was the man and so pathetic his appeal.
+
+``You see--you'll divide my vote, an'
+ef we both run, ole Josh Barton'll git it
+shore.  Ef you git out o' the way, I can
+lick him easy.''
+
+Mr. Budd's answer was kind,
+instructive, and uplifted.
+
+``My friend,'' said he, ``I'm sorry, but
+I cannot possibly accede to your request
+for the following reasons:  First, it would
+not be fair to my constituents; secondly, it
+would hardly be seeming to barter the
+noble gift of the people to which we both
+aspire; thirdly, you might lose with me
+out of the way; and fourthly, I'm going
+to win whether you are in the way or
+not.''
+
+The horseman slowly collapsed while
+the Hon. Samuel was talking, and now he
+threw the leg back, kicked for his stirrup
+twice, spat once, and turned his horse's
+head.
+
+``I reckon you will, stranger,'' he said
+sadly, ``with that gift o' gab o' yourn.''
+He turned without another word or nod of
+good-by and started back up the creek
+whence he had come.
+
+``One gone,'' said the Hon. Samuel
+Budd grimly, ``and I swear I'm right
+sorry for him.''  And so was I.
+
+An hour later we struck the river, and
+another hour upstream brought us to where
+the contest of tongues was to come about. 
+No sylvan dell in Arcady could have
+been lovelier than the spot.  Above the
+road, a big spring poured a clear little
+stream over shining pebbles into the river;
+above it the bushes hung thick with autumn
+leaves, and above them stood yellow
+beeches like pillars of pale fire.  On both
+sides of the road sat and squatted the
+honest voters, sour-looking, disgruntled--a
+distinctly hostile crowd.  The Blight and
+my little sister drew great and curious
+attention as they sat on a bowlder above the
+spring while I went with the Hon. Samuel
+Budd under the guidance of Uncle Tommie
+Hendricks, who introduced him right
+and left.  The Hon. Samuel was cheery,
+but he was plainly nervous.  There were
+two lanky youths whose names, oddly
+enough, were Budd.  As they gave him
+their huge paws in lifeless fashion, the
+Hon. Samuel slapped one on the shoulder,
+with the true democracy of the politician,
+and said jocosely:
+
+``Well, we Budds may not be what you
+call great people, but, thank God, none
+of us have ever been in the penitentiary,''
+and he laughed loudly, thinking that he
+had scored a great and jolly point.  The
+two young men looked exceedingly grave
+and Uncle Tommie panic-stricken.  He
+plucked the Hon. Sam by the sleeve and
+led him aside:
+
+``I reckon you made a leetle mistake
+thar.  Them two fellers' daddy died in the
+penitentiary last spring.''  The Hon. Sam
+whistled mournfully, but he looked game
+enough when his opponent rose to speak
+--Uncle Josh Barton, who had short,
+thick, upright hair, little sharp eyes, and a
+rasping voice.  Uncle Josh wasted no time:
+
+``Feller-citizens,'' he shouted, ``this
+man is a lawyer--he's a corporation
+lawyer''; the fearful name--pronounced
+``lie-yer''--rang through the crowd like a
+trumpet, and like lightning the Hon. Sam
+was on his feet.
+
+``The man who says that is a liar,'' he
+said calmly, `` and I demand your authority
+for the statement.  If you won't give
+it--I shall hold you personally responsible,
+sir.''
+
+It was a strike home, and under the
+flashing eyes that stared unwaveringly,
+through the big goggles, Uncle Josh halted
+and stammered and admitted that he
+might have been misinformed.
+
+``Then I advise you to be more careful,''
+cautioned the Hon. Samuel sharply.
+
+``Feller-citizens,'' said Uncle Josh, ``if
+he ain't a corporation lawyer--who is this
+man?  Where did he come from?  I have
+been born and raised among you.  You all
+know me--do you know him?  Whut's he
+a-doin' now?  He's a fine-haired furriner,
+an' he's come down hyeh from the settlemints
+to tell ye that you hain't got no man
+in yo' own deestrict that's fittin' to
+represent ye in the legislatur'.  Look at him--
+look at him!  He's got FOUR eyes!  Look
+at his hair--hit's PARTED IN THE MIDDLE!''
+There was a storm of laughter--Uncle
+Josh had made good--and if the Hon.
+Samuel could straightway have turned
+bald-headed and sightless, he would have
+been a happy man.  He looked sick with
+hopelessness, but Uncle Tommie
+Hendricks, his mentor, was vigorously
+whispering something in his ear, and gradually
+his face cleared.  Indeed, the Hon. Samuel
+was smilingly confident when he rose.
+
+Like his rival, he stood in the open road,
+and the sun beat down on his parted yellow
+hair, so that the eyes of all could
+see, and the laughter was still running
+round.
+
+``Who is your Uncle Josh?'' he asked
+with threatening mildness.  ``I know I was
+not born here, but, my friends, I couldn't
+help that.  And just as soon as I could
+get away from where I was born, I came
+here and,'' he paused with lips parted and
+long finger outstretched, `` and--I--came
+--because--I WANTED--to come--and NOT
+because I HAD TO.''
+
+Now it seems that Uncle Josh, too, was
+not a native and that he had left home
+early in life for his State's good and for his
+own.  Uncle Tommie had whispered this,
+and the Hon. Samuel raised himself high
+on both toes while the expectant crowd, on
+the verge of a roar, waited--as did Uncle
+Joshua, with a sickly smile.
+
+``Why did your Uncle Josh come
+among you?  Because he was hoop-poled
+away from home.''  Then came the roar--
+and the Hon. Samuel had to quell it with
+uplifted hand.
+
+``And did your Uncle Joshua marry a
+mountain wife?  No I He didn't think
+any of your mountain women were good
+enough for him, so he slips down into the
+settlemints and STEALS one.  And now,
+fellow-citizens, that is just what I'm here for
+--I'm looking for a nice mountain girl,
+and I'm going to have her.''  Again the
+Hon. Samuel had to still the roar, and then
+he went on quietly to show how they must
+lose the Court-House site if they did not
+send him to the legislature, and how, while
+they might not get it if they did send him,
+it was their only hope to send only him. 
+The crowd had grown somewhat hostile
+again, and it was after one telling period,
+when the Hon. Samuel stopped to mop his
+brow, that a gigantic mountaineer rose in
+the rear of the crowd:
+
+``Talk on, stranger; you're talking
+sense.  I'll trust ye.  You've got big
+ears!''
+
+Now the Hon. Samuel possessed a
+primordial talent that is rather rare in these
+physically degenerate days.  He said nothing,
+but stood quietly in the middle of the
+road.  The eyes of the crowd on either
+side of the road began to bulge, the lips
+of all opened with wonder, and a simultaneous
+burst of laughter rose around the
+Hon. Samuel Budd.  A dozen men sprang
+to their feet and rushed up to him--looking
+at those remarkable ears, as they
+gravely wagged to and fro.  That settled
+things, and as we left, the Hon. Sam was
+having things his own way, and on the
+edge of the crowd Uncle Tommie Hendricks
+was shaking his head:
+
+``I tell ye, boys, he ain't no jackass
+even if he can flop his ears.''
+
+At the river we started upstream, and
+some impulse made me turn in my saddle
+and look back.  All the time I had had an
+eye open for the young mountaineer whose
+interest in us seemed to be so keen.  And
+now I saw, standing at the head of a gray
+horse, on the edge of the crowd, a tall
+figure with his hands on his hips and looking
+after us.  I couldn't be sure, but it
+looked like the Wild Dog.
+
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+CLOSE QUARTERS
+
+Two hours up the river we struck
+Buck.  Buck was sitting on the
+fence by the roadside, barefooted and hatless.
+
+``How-dye-do?'' I said.
+
+``Purty well,'' said Buck.
+
+``Any fish in this river?''
+
+``Several,'' said Buck.  Now in mountain
+speech, ``several'' means simply ``a
+good many.''
+
+``Any minnows in these branches?''
+
+``I seed several in the branch back o'
+our house.''
+
+``How far away do you live?''
+
+``Oh, 'bout one whoop an' a holler.''  If
+he had spoken Greek the Blight could not
+have been more puzzled.  He meant he
+lived as far as a man's voice would carry
+with one yell and a holla.
+
+``Will you help me catch some?''
+Buck nodded.
+
+``All right,'' I said, turning my horse up
+to the fence.  ``Get on behind.''  The
+horse shied his hind quarters away, and I
+pulled him back.
+
+``Now, you can get on, if you'll be
+quick.''  Buck sat still.
+
+``Yes,'' he said imperturbably; ``but I
+ain't quick.''  The two girls laughed
+aloud, and Buck looked surprised.
+
+Around a curving cornfield we went,
+and through a meadow which Buck said
+was a ``nigh cut.''  From the limb of a
+tree that we passed hung a piece of wire
+with an iron ring swinging at its upturned
+end.  A little farther was another tree and
+another ring, and farther on another and
+another.
+
+``For heaven's sake, Buck, what are
+these things?''
+
+``Mart's a-gittin' ready fer a tourneyment.''
+
+``A what?''
+
+``That's whut Mart calls hit.  He was
+over to the Gap last Fourth o' July, an' he
+says fellers over thar fix up like Kuklux and
+go a-chargin' on hosses and takin' off them
+rings with a ash-stick--`spear,' Mart
+calls hit.  He come back an' he says he's
+a-goin' to win that ar tourneyment next
+Fourth o' July.  He's got the best hoss up
+this river, and on Sundays him an' Dave
+Branham goes a-chargin' along here a-picking
+off these rings jus' a-flyin'; an' Mart
+can do hit, I'm tellin' ye.  Dave's mighty
+good hisself, but he ain't nowhar 'longside
+o' Mart.''
+
+This was strange.  I had told the Blight
+about our Fourth of July, and how on the
+Virginia side the ancient custom of the
+tournament still survived.  It was on the
+last Fourth of July that she had meant to
+come to the Gap.  Truly civilization was
+spreading throughout the hills.
+
+``Who's Mart?''
+
+``Mart's my brother,'' said little Buck.
+
+``He was over to the Gap not long ago,
+an' he come back mad as hops--''  He
+stopped suddenly, and in such a way that
+I turned my head, knowing that caution
+had caught Buck.
+
+``What about?''
+
+``Oh, nothin','' said Buck carelessly;
+``only he's been quar ever since.  My sisters
+says he's got a gal over thar, an'
+he's a-pickin' off these rings more'n ever
+now.  He's going to win or bust a belly-
+band.''
+
+``Well, who's Dave Branham?''
+
+Buck grinned.  ``You jes axe my sister
+Mollie.  Thar she is.''
+
+Before us was a white-framed house of
+logs in the porch of which stood two stalwart,
+good-looking girls.  Could we stay
+all night?  We could--there was no
+hesitation--and straight in we rode.
+
+``Where's your father?''  Both girls
+giggled, and one said, with frank unembarrassment:
+
+``Pap's tight!''  That did not look
+promising, but we had to stay just the
+same.  Buck helped me to unhitch the
+mules, helped me also to catch minnows,
+and in half an hour we started down the
+river to try fishing before dark came. 
+Buck trotted along.
+
+``Have you got a wagon, Buck?''
+
+``What fer?''
+
+``To bring the fish back.''  Buck was
+not to be caught napping.
+
+``We got that sled thar, but hit won't
+be big enough,'' he said gravely.  ``An'
+our two-hoss wagon's out in the cornfield. 
+We'll have to string the fish, leave 'em in
+the river and go fer 'em in the mornin'.''
+
+``All right, Buck.''  The Blight was
+greatly amused at Buck.
+
+Two hundred yards down the road
+stood his sisters over the figure of a man
+outstretched in the road.  Unashamed,
+they smiled at us.  The man in the road
+was ``pap''--tight--and they were trying
+to get him home.
+
+We cast into a dark pool farther down
+and fished most patiently; not a bite--not
+a nibble.
+
+``Are there any fish in here, Buck?''
+
+``Dunno--used ter be.''  The shadows
+deepened; we must go back to the house.
+
+``Is there a dam below here, Buck?''
+
+``Yes, thar's a dam about a half-mile
+down the river.''
+
+I was disgusted.  No wonder there were
+no bass in that pool.
+
+``Why didn't you tell me that before?''
+
+``You never axed me,'' said Buck placidly.
+
+I began winding in my line.
+
+``Ain't no bottom to that pool,'' said
+Buck.
+
+Now I never saw any rural community
+where there was not a bottomless pool, and
+I suddenly determined to shake one tradition
+in at least one community.  So I took
+an extra fish-line, tied a stone to it, and
+climbed into a canoe, Buck watching me,
+but not asking a word.
+
+``Get in, Buck.''
+
+Silently he got in and I pushed off--to
+the centre.
+
+``This the deepest part, Buck?''
+
+``I reckon so.''
+
+I dropped in the stone and the line
+reeled out some fifty feet and began to coil
+on the surface of the water.
+
+``I guess that's on the bottom, isn't it,
+Buck?''
+
+Buck looked genuinely distressed; but
+presently he brightened.
+
+``Yes,'' he said, `` ef hit ain't on a turtle's back.''
+
+Literally I threw up both hands and
+back we trailed--fishless.
+
+``Reckon you won't need that two-hoss
+wagon,'' said Buck.
+``No, Buck, I think not.''  Buck looked
+at the Blight and gave himself the pleasure
+of his first chuckle.  A big crackling, cheerful
+fire awaited us.  Through the door I
+could see, outstretched on a bed in the next
+room, the limp figure of ``pap'' in alcoholic
+sleep.  The old mother, big, kind-
+faced, explained--and there was a heaven
+of kindness and charity in her drawling
+voice.
+
+``Dad didn' often git that a-way,'' she
+said; ``but he'd been out a-huntin' hawgs
+that mornin' and had met up with some
+teamsters and gone to a political speakin'
+and had tuk a dram or two of their mean
+whiskey, and not havin' nothin' on his
+stummick, hit had all gone to his head. 
+No, `pap' didn't git that a-way often, and
+he'd be all right jes' as soon as he slept it
+off a while.''  The old woman moved
+about with a cane and the sympathetic
+Blight merely looked a question at her.
+
+``Yes, she'd fell down a year ago--and
+had sort o' hurt herself--didn't do nothin',
+though, 'cept break one hip,'' she added, in
+her kind, patient old voice.  Did many
+people stop there?  Oh, yes, sometimes fifteen
+at a time--they ``never turned nobody
+away.''  And she had a big family,
+little Cindy and the two big girls and Buck
+and Mart--who was out somewhere--and
+the hired man, and yes--``Thar was another
+boy, but he was fitified,'' said one
+of the big sisters.
+
+``I beg your pardon,'' said the
+wondering Blight, but she knew that phrase
+wouldn't do, so she added politely:
+
+``What did you say?''
+
+``Fitified--Tom has fits.  He's in a
+asylum in the settlements.''
+
+``Tom come back once an' he was all
+right,'' said the old mother; ``but he
+worried so much over them gals workin' so
+hard that it plum' throwed him off ag'in,
+and we had to send him back.''
+
+``Do you work pretty hard?'' I asked
+presently.  Then a story came that was full
+of unconscious pathos, because there was
+no hint of complaint--simply a plain
+statement of daily life.  They got up before
+the men, in order to get breakfast ready;
+then they went with the men into the fields
+--those two girls--and worked like men. 
+At dark they got supper ready, and after
+the men went to bed they worked on--
+washing dishes and clearing up the kitchen. 
+They took it turn about getting supper,
+and sometimes, one said, she was ``so
+plumb tuckered out that she'd drap on the
+bed and go to sleep ruther than eat her
+own supper.''  No wonder poor Tom had
+to go back to the asylum.  All the
+while the two girls stood by the fire
+looking, politely but minutely, at the two
+strange girls and their curious clothes and
+their boots, and the way they dressed their
+hair.  Their hard life seemed to have hurt
+them none--for both were the pictures of
+health--whatever that phrase means.
+
+After supper ``pap'' came in, perfectly
+sober, with a big ruddy face, giant frame,
+and twinkling gray eyes.  He was the man
+who had risen to speak his faith in the
+Hon. Samuel Budd that day on the size of
+the Hon. Samuel's ears.  He, too, was
+unashamed and, as he explained his plight
+again, he did it with little apology.
+
+``I seed ye at the speakin' to-day.  That
+man Budd is a good man.  He done somethin'
+fer a boy o' mine over at the Gap.'' 
+Like little Buck, he, too, stopped short. 
+``He's a good man an' I'm a-goin' to help
+him.''
+
+Yes, he repeated, quite irrelevantly, it
+was hunting hogs all day with nothing to
+eat and only mean whiskey to drink. 
+Mart had not come in yet--he was
+``workin' out'' now.
+
+``He's the best worker in these
+mountains,'' said the old woman; ``Mart works
+too hard.''
+
+The hired man appeared and joined us
+at the fire.  Bedtime came, and I whispered
+jokingly to the Blight:
+
+``I believe I'll ask that good-looking
+one to `set up' with me.''  ``Settin' up''
+is what courting is called in the hills.  The
+couple sit up in front of the fire after
+everybody else has gone to bed.  The man
+puts his arm around the girl's neck and
+whispers; then she puts her arm around his
+neck and whispers--so that the rest may
+not hear.  This I had related to the Blight,
+and now she withered me.
+
+``You just do, now!''
+
+I turned to the girl in question, whose
+name was Mollie.  ``Buck told me to ask
+you who Dave Branham was.''  Mollie
+wheeled, blushing and angry, but Buck had
+darted cackling out the door.  ``Oh,'' I
+said, and I changed the subject.  ``What
+time do you get up?''
+
+``Oh, 'bout crack o' day.''  I was tired,
+and that was discouraging.
+
+``Do you get up that early every morning?''
+
+``No,'' was the quick answer; ``a
+mornin' later.''
+
+A morning later, Mollie got up, each
+morning.  The Blight laughed.
+
+Pretty soon the two girls were taken into
+the next room, which was a long one, with
+one bed in one dark corner, one in the
+other, and a third bed in the middle.  The
+feminine members of the family all followed
+them out on the porch and watched
+them brush their teeth, for they had never
+seen tooth-brushes before.  They watched
+them prepare for bed--and I could hear
+much giggling and comment and many
+questions, all of which culminated, by and
+by, in a chorus of shrieking laughter. 
+That climax, as I learned next morning,
+was over the Blight's hot-water bag. 
+Never had their eyes rested on an article
+of more wonder and humor than that
+water bag.
+
+By and by, the feminine members came
+back and we sat around the fire.  Still
+Mart did not appear, though somebody
+stepped into the kitchen, and from the
+warning glance that Mollie gave Buck
+when she left the room I guessed that the
+newcomer was her lover Dave.  Pretty
+soon the old man yawned.
+
+``Well, mammy, I reckon this stranger's
+about ready to lay down, if you've got a
+place fer him.''
+
+``Git a light, Buck,'' said the old
+woman.  Buck got a light--a chimneyless,
+smoking oil-lamp--and led me into the
+same room where the Blight and my little
+sister were.  Their heads were covered
+up, but the bed in the gloom of one corner
+was shaking with their smothered laughter. 
+Buck pointed to the middle bed.
+
+``I can get along without that light,
+Buck,'' I said, and I must have been
+rather haughty and abrupt, for a stifled
+shriek came from under the bedclothes in
+the corner and Buck disappeared swiftly. 
+Preparations for bed are simple in the
+mountains--they were primitively simple
+for me that night.  Being in knickerbockers,
+I merely took off my coat and
+shoes.  Presently somebody else stepped
+into the room and the bed in the other
+corner creaked.  Silence for a while. 
+Then the door opened, and the head of the
+old woman was thrust in.
+
+``Mart!'' she said coaxingly; ``git up
+thar now an' climb over inter bed with
+that ar stranger.''
+
+That was Mart at last, over in the
+corner.  Mart turned, grumbled, and, to my
+great pleasure, swore that he wouldn't. 
+The old woman waited a moment.
+
+``Mart,'' she said again with gentle
+imperiousness, `` git up thar now, I tell ye
+--you've got to sleep with that thar
+stranger.''
+
+She closed the door and with a snort
+Mart piled into bed with me.  I gave him
+plenty of room and did not introduce
+myself.  A little more dark silence--the
+shaking of the bed under the hilarity
+of those astonished, bethrilled, but
+thoroughly unfrightened young women in the
+dark corner on my left ceased, and again
+the door opened.  This time it was the
+hired man, and I saw that the trouble was
+either that neither Mart nor Buck wanted
+to sleep with the hired man or that neither
+wanted to sleep with me.  A long silence
+and then the boy Buck slipped in.  The
+hired man delivered himself with the
+intonation somewhat of a circuit rider.
+
+``I've been a-watchin' that star thar,
+through the winder.  Sometimes hit moves,
+then hit stands plum' still, an' ag'in hit gits
+to pitchin'.''  The hired man must have
+been touching up mean whiskey himself. 
+Meanwhile, Mart seemed to be having
+spells of troubled slumber.  He would
+snore gently, accentuate said snore with a
+sudden quiver of his body and then wake
+up with a climacteric snort and start that
+would shake the bed.  This was repeated
+several times, and I began to think of the
+unfortunate Tom who was ``fitified.'' 
+Mart seemed on the verge of a fit himself,
+and I waited apprehensively for each
+snorting climax to see if fits were a family
+failing.  They were not.  Peace overcame
+Mart and he slept deeply, but not I.  The
+hired man began to show symptoms.  He
+would roll and groan, dreaming of feuds,
+_quorum pars magna fuit_, it seemed, and
+of religious conversion, in which he feared
+he was not so great.  Twice he said aloud:
+
+``An' I tell you thar wouldn't a one of
+'em have said a word if I'd been killed
+stone-dead.''  Twice he said it almost
+weepingly, and now and then he would
+groan appealingly:
+
+``O Lawd, have mercy on my pore
+soul!''
+
+Fortunately those two tired girls slept--
+I could hear their breathing--but sleep
+there was little for me.  Once the troubled
+soul with the hoe got up and stumbled out
+to the water-bucket on the porch to soothe
+the fever or whatever it was that was
+burning him, and after that he was quiet. 
+I awoke before day.  The dim light at the
+window showed an empty bed--Buck and
+the hired man were gone.  Mart was slipping
+out of the side of my bed, but the
+girls still slept on.  I watched Mart, for
+I guessed I might now see what, perhaps,
+is the distinguishing trait of American
+civilization down to its bed-rock, as you
+find it through the West and in the Southern
+hills--a chivalrous respect for women. 
+Mart thought I was asleep.  Over in the
+corner were two creatures the like of which
+I supposed he had never seen and would
+not see, since he came in too late the night
+before, and was going away too early now
+--and two angels straight from heaven
+could not have stirred my curiosity any
+more than they already must have stirred
+his.  But not once did Mart turn his eyes,
+much less his face, toward the corner where
+they were--not once, for I watched him
+closely.  And when he went out he sent
+his little sister back for his shoes, which
+the night-walking hired man had
+accidentally kicked toward the foot of the
+strangers' bed.  In a minute I was out
+after him, but he was gone.  Behind me
+the two girls opened their eyes on a room
+that was empty save for them.  Then the
+Blight spoke (this I was told later).
+
+``Dear,'' she said, ``have our room-
+mates gone?''
+
+Breakfast at dawn.  The mountain girls
+were ready to go to work.  All looked
+sorry to have us leave.  They asked us to
+come back again, and they meant it.  We
+said we would like to come back--and we
+meant it--to see them--the kind old
+mother, the pioneer-like old man, sturdy
+little Buck, shy little Cindy, the elusive,
+hard-working, unconsciously shivery Mart,
+and the two big sisters.  As we started
+back up the river the sisters started for the
+fields, and I thought of their stricken
+brother in the settlements, who must have
+been much like Mart.
+
+Back up the Big Black Mountain we
+toiled, and late in the afternoon we were
+on the State line that runs the crest of the
+Big Black.  Right on top and bisected by
+that State line sat a dingy little shack, and
+there, with one leg thrown over the pommel
+of his saddle, sat Marston, drinking
+water from a gourd.
+
+``I was coming over to meet you,'' he
+said, smiling at the Blight, who, greatly
+pleased, smiled back at him.  The shack
+was a ``blind Tiger'' where whiskey could
+be sold to Kentuckians on the Virginia side
+and to Virginians on the Kentucky side. 
+Hanging around were the slouching figures
+of several moonshiners and the villainous
+fellow who ran it.
+
+``They are real ones all right,'' said
+Marston.  ``One of them killed a revenue
+officer at that front door last week, and
+was killed by the posse as he was trying
+to escape out of the back window.  That
+house will be in ashes soon,'' he added. 
+And it was.
+
+As we rode down the mountain we told
+him about our trip and the people with
+whom we had spent the night--and all the
+time he was smiling curiously.
+
+``Buck,'' he said.  ``Oh, yes, I know
+that little chap.  Mart had him posted
+down there on the river to toll you to his
+house--to toll YOU,'' he added to the
+Blight.  He pulled in his horse suddenly,
+turned and looked up toward the top of
+the mountain.
+
+``Ah, I thought so.''  We all looked
+back.  On the edge of the cliff, far upward,
+on which the ``blind Tiger'' sat was
+a gray horse, and on it was a man who,
+motionless, was looking down at us.
+
+``He's been following you all the way,''
+said the engineer.
+
+``Who's been following us?'' I asked.
+
+``That's Mart up there--my friend and
+yours,'' said Marston to the Blight.  ``I'm
+rather glad I didn't meet you on the other
+side of the mountain--that's `the Wild
+Dog.' ''  The Blight looked incredulous, but
+Marston knew the man and knew the horse.
+
+So Mart--hard-working Mart--was
+the Wild Dog, and he was content to do
+the Blight all service without thanks,
+merely for the privilege of secretly seeing
+her face now and then; and yet he would
+not look upon that face when she was a
+guest under his roof and asleep.
+
+Still, when we dropped behind the two
+girls I gave Marston the Hon. Sam's
+warning, and for a moment he looked
+rather grave.
+
+``Well,'' he said, smiling, ``if I'm
+found in the road some day, you'll know
+who did it.''
+
+I shook my head.  ``Oh, no; he isn't
+that bad.''
+
+``I don't know,'' said Marston.
+
+
+The smoke of the young engineer's coke
+ovens lay far below us and the Blight had
+never seen a coke-plant before.  It looked
+like Hades even in the early dusk--the
+snake-like coil of fiery ovens stretching up
+the long, deep ravine, and the smoke-
+streaked clouds of fire, trailing like a
+yellow mist over them, with a fierce white
+blast shooting up here and there when the
+lid of an oven was raised, as though to add
+fresh temperature to some particular male-
+factor in some particular chamber of torment. 
+Humanity about was joyous, however. 
+Laughter and banter and song came
+from the cabins that lined the big ravine
+and the little ravines opening into it.  A
+banjo tinkled at the entrance of ``Possum
+Trot,'' sacred to the darkies.  We moved
+toward it.  On the stoop sat an ecstatic
+picker and in the dust shuffled three
+pickaninnies--one boy and two girls--the
+youngest not five years old.  The crowd
+that was gathered about them gave way
+respectfully as we drew near; the little
+darkies showed their white teeth in jolly
+grins, and their feet shook the dust in
+happy competition.  I showered a few
+coins for the Blight and on we went--into
+the mouth of the many-peaked Gap.  The
+night train was coming in and everybody
+had a smile of welcome for the Blight--
+post-office assistant, drug clerk, soda-water
+boy, telegraph operator, hostler, who came
+for the mules--and when tired, but happy,
+she slipped from her saddle to the ground,
+she then and there gave me what she
+usually reserves for Christmas morning,
+and that, too, while Marston was looking
+on.  Over her shoulder I smiled at him.
+
+
+That night Marston and the Blight sat
+under the vines on the porch until the late
+moon rose over Wallens Ridge, and, when
+bedtime came, the Blight said impatiently
+that she did not want to go home.  She
+had to go, however, next day, but on the
+next Fourth of July she would surely come
+again; and, as the young engineer mounted
+his horse and set his face toward Black
+Mountain, I knew that until that day, for
+him, a blight would still be in the hills.
+
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+BACK TO THE HILLS
+
+Winter drew a gray veil over the
+mountains, wove into it tiny
+jewels of frost and turned it many times
+into a mask of snow, before spring broke
+again among them and in Marston's
+impatient heart.  No spring had ever been
+like that to him.  The coming of young
+leaves and flowers and bird-song meant but
+one joy for the hills to him--the Blight
+was coming back to them.  All those weary
+waiting months he had clung grimly to his
+work.  He must have heard from her
+sometimes, else I think he would have gone
+to her; but I knew the Blight's pen was
+reluctant and casual for anybody, and,
+moreover, she was having a strenuous winter at
+home.  That he knew as well, for he took
+one paper, at least, that he might simply
+read her name.  He saw accounts of her
+many social doings as well, and ate his
+heart out as lovers have done for all time
+gone and will do for all time to come.
+
+I, too, was away all winter, but I got
+back a month before the Blight, to learn
+much of interest that had come about.
+The Hon. Samuel Budd had ear-wagged
+himself into the legislature, had moved
+that Court-House, and was going to be
+State Senator.  The Wild Dog had confined
+his reckless career to his own hills
+through the winter, but when spring came,
+migratory-like, he began to take frequent
+wing to the Gap.  So far, he and Marston
+had never come into personal conflict,
+though Marston kept ever ready for him,
+and several times they had met in the road,
+eyed each other in passing and made no
+hipward gesture at all.  But then Marston
+had never met him when the Wild Dog was
+drunk--and when sober, I took it that the
+one act of kindness from the engineer
+always stayed his hand.  But the Police
+Guard at the Gap saw him quite often--
+and to it he was a fearful and elusive
+nuisance.  He seemed to be staying
+somewhere within a radius of ten miles, for
+every night or two he would circle about
+the town, yelling and firing his pistol, and
+when we chased him, escaping through the
+Gap or up the valley or down in Lee. 
+Many plans were laid to catch him, but all
+failed, and finally he came in one day and
+gave himself up and paid his fines.  Afterward
+I recalled that the time of this
+gracious surrender to law and order was
+but little subsequent to one morning when
+a woman who brought butter and eggs to
+my little sister casually asked when that
+``purty slim little gal with the snappin'
+black eyes was a-comin' back.''  And the
+little sister, pleased with the remembrance,
+had said cordially that she was coming
+soon.
+
+Thereafter the Wild Dog was in town
+every day, and he behaved well until one
+Saturday he got drunk again, and this
+time, by a peculiar chance, it was Marston
+again who leaped on him, wrenched his
+pistol away, and put him in the calaboose. 
+Again he paid his fine, promptly visited a
+``blind Tiger,'' came back to town, emptied
+another pistol at Marston on sight and fled
+for the hills.
+
+The enraged guard chased him for two
+days and from that day the Wild Dog was
+a marked man.  The Guard wanted many
+men, but if they could have had their
+choice they would have picked out of the
+world of malefactors that same Wild Dog.
+
+Why all this should have thrown the
+Hon. Samuel Budd into such gloom I could
+not understand--except that the Wild Dog
+had been so loyal a henchman to him in
+politics, but later I learned a better reason,
+that threatened to cost the Hon. Sam much
+more than the fines that, as I later learned,
+he had been paying for his mountain
+friend.
+
+Meanwhile, the Blight was coming from
+her Northern home through the green lowlands
+of Jersey, the fat pastures of Maryland,
+and, as the white dresses of schoolgirls
+and the shining faces of darkies thickened
+at the stations, she knew that she was
+getting southward.  All the way she was
+known and welcomed, and next morning
+she awoke with the keen air of the distant
+mountains in her nostrils and an expectant
+light in her happy eyes.  At least the light
+was there when she stepped daintily from
+the dusty train and it leaped a little, I
+fancied, when Marston, bronzed and flushed,
+held out his sunburnt hand.  Like a convent
+girl she babbled questions to the little
+sister as the dummy puffed along and she
+bubbled like wine over the midsummer
+glory of the hills.  And well she might, for
+the glory of the mountains, full-leafed,
+shrouded in evening shadows, blue-veiled
+in the distance, was unspeakable, and
+through the Gap the sun was sending his
+last rays as though he, too, meant to take a
+peep at her before he started around the
+world to welcome her next day.  And she
+must know everything at once.  The
+anniversary of the Great Day on which all men
+were pronounced free and equal was only
+ten days distant and preparations were
+going on.  There would be a big crowd of
+mountaineers and there would be sports
+of all kinds, and games, but the tournament
+was to be the feature of the day.
+
+``A tournament?''  ``Yes, a tournament,''
+repeated the little sister, and Marston was
+going to ride and the mean thing would
+not tell what mediaeval name he meant to
+take.  And the Hon. Sam Budd--did the
+Blight remember him?  (Indeed, she did)
+--had a ``dark horse,'' and he had bet
+heavily that his dark horse would win
+the tournament--whereat the little sister
+looked at Marston and at the Blight and
+smiled disdainfully.  And the Wild Dog--
+DID she remember him?  I checked the
+sister here with a glance, for Marston
+looked uncomfortable and the Blight saw
+me do it, and on the point of saying
+something she checked herself, and her face, I
+thought, paled a little.
+
+That night I learned why--when she
+came in from the porch after Marston was
+gone.  I saw she had wormed enough of
+the story out of him to worry her, for her
+face this time was distinctly pale.  I would
+tell her no more than she knew, however,
+and then she said she was sure she had seen
+the Wild Dog herself that afternoon,
+sitting on his horse in the bushes near a
+station in Wildcat Valley.  She was sure
+that he saw her, and his face had
+frightened her.  I knew her fright was for
+Marston and not for herself, so I laughed
+at her fears.  She was mistaken--Wild
+Dog was an outlaw now and he would not
+dare appear at the Gap, and there was no
+chance that he could harm her or Marston. 
+And yet I was uneasy.
+
+It must have been a happy ten days for
+those two young people.  Every afternoon
+Marston would come in from the mines
+and they would go off horseback together,
+over ground that I well knew--for I had
+been all over it myself--up through the
+gray-peaked rhododendron-bordered Gap
+with the swirling water below them and the
+gray rock high above where another such
+foolish lover lost his life, climbing to get
+a flower for his sweetheart, or down the
+winding dirt road into Lee, or up through
+the beech woods behind Imboden Hill, or
+climbing the spur of Morris's Farm to
+watch the sunset over the majestic Big
+Black Mountains, where the Wild Dog
+lived, and back through the fragrant, cool,
+moonlit woods.  He was doing his best,
+Marston was, and he was having trouble
+--as every man should.  And that trouble
+I knew even better than he, for I had once
+known a Southern girl who was so tender
+of heart that she could refuse no man who
+really loved her she accepted him and
+sent him to her father, who did all of her
+refusing for her.  And I knew no man
+would know that he had won the Blight
+until he had her at the altar and the priestly
+hand of benediction was above her head.
+
+Of such kind was the Blight.  Every
+night when they came in I could read the
+story of the day, always in his face and
+sometimes in hers; and it was a series of
+ups and downs that must have wrung the
+boy's heart bloodless.  Still I was in good
+hope for him, until the crisis came on the
+night before the Fourth.  The quarrel was
+as plain as though typewritten on the face
+of each.  Marston would not come in that
+night and the Blight went dinnerless to bed
+and cried herself to sleep.  She told the
+little sister that she had seen the Wild Dog
+again peering through the bushes, and that
+she was frightened.  That was her
+explanation--but I guessed a better one.
+
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+THE GREAT DAY
+
+It was a day to make glad the heart of
+slave or freeman.  The earth was cool
+from a night-long rain, and a gentle breeze
+fanned coolness from the north all day
+long.  The clouds were snow-white, tumbling,
+ever-moving, and between them the
+sky showed blue and deep.  Grass, leaf,
+weed and flower were in the richness that
+comes to the green things of the earth just
+before that full tide of summer whose
+foam is drifting thistle down.  The air was
+clear and the mountains seemed to have
+brushed the haze from their faces and
+drawn nearer that they, too, might better
+see the doings of that day.
+
+From the four winds of heaven, that
+morning, came the brave and the free.  Up
+from Lee, down from Little Stone Gap,
+and from over in Scott, came the valley-
+farmers--horseback, in buggies, hacks,
+two-horse wagons, with wives, mothers,
+sisters, sweethearts, in white dresses,
+flowered hats, and many ribbons, and
+with dinner-baskets stuffed with good
+things to eat--old ham, young chicken,
+angel-cake and blackberry wine--to be
+spread in the sunless shade of great
+poplar and oak.  From Bum Hollow
+and Wildcat Valley and from up the
+slopes that lead to Cracker's Neck came
+smaller tillers of the soil--as yet but
+faintly marked by the gewgaw trappings
+of the outer world; while from beyond
+High Knob, whose crown is in cloud-land,
+and through the Gap, came the mountaineer
+in the primitive simplicity of home
+spun and cowhide, wide-brimmed hat and
+poke-bonnet, quaint speech, and slouching
+gait.  Through the Gap he came in two
+streams--the Virginians from Crab Orchard
+and Wise and Dickinson, the Kentuckians
+from Letcher and feudal Harlan,
+beyond the Big Black--and not a man
+carried a weapon in sight, for the stern
+spirit of that Police Guard at the Gap
+was respected wide and far.  Into the
+town, which sits on a plateau some twenty
+feet above the level of the two rivers that
+all but encircle it, they poured, hitching
+their horses in the strip of woods that runs
+through the heart of the place, and broad
+ens into a primeval park that, fan-like,
+opens on the oval level field where all
+things happen on the Fourth of July. 
+About the street they loitered--lovers hand
+in hand--eating fruit and candy and drinking
+soda-water, or sat on the curb-stone,
+mothers with babies at their breasts and
+toddling children clinging close--all
+waiting for the celebration to begin.
+
+It was a great day for the Hon. Samuel
+Budd.  With a cheery smile and beaming
+goggles, he moved among his constituents,
+joking with yokels, saying nice things to
+mothers, paying gallantries to girls, and
+chucking babies under the chin.  He felt
+popular and he was--so popular that he
+had begun to see himself with prophetic eye
+in a congressional seat at no distant day;
+and yet, withal, he was not wholly happy.
+
+``Do you know,'' he said, ``them fellers
+I made bets with in the tournament got together
+this morning and decided, all of 'em,
+that they wouldn't let me off?  Jerusalem,
+it's most five hundred dollars!''  And,
+looking the picture of dismay, he told me
+his dilemma.
+It seems that his ``dark horse'' was
+none other than the Wild Dog, who had
+been practising at home for this tournament
+for nearly a year; and now that the
+Wild Dog was an outlaw, he, of course,
+wouldn't and couldn't come to the Gap. 
+And said the Hon. Sam Budd:
+
+``Them fellers says I bet I'd BRING IN a
+dark horse who would win this tournament,
+and if I don't BRING him in, I lose just the
+same as though I had brought him in and
+he hadn't won.  An' I reckon they've got
+me.''
+
+``I guess they have.''
+
+``It would have been like pickin' money
+off a blackberry-bush, for I was goin' to let
+the Wild Dog have that black horse o'
+mine--the steadiest and fastest runner in
+this country--and my, how that fellow can
+pick off the rings!  He's been a-practising
+for a year, and I believe he could run the
+point o' that spear of his through a lady's
+finger-ring.''
+
+``You'd better get somebody else.''
+
+``Ah--that's it.  The Wild Dog sent
+word he'd send over another feller, named
+Dave Branham, who has been practising
+with him, who's just as good, he says, as he
+is.  I'm looking for him at twelve o'clock,
+an' I'm goin' to take him down an' see
+what he can do on that black horse o' mine. 
+But if he's no good, I lose five hundred,
+all right,'' and he sloped away to his duties. 
+For it was the Hon. Sam who was master
+of ceremonies that day.  He was due now
+to read the Declaration of Independence in
+a poplar grove to all who would listen; he
+was to act as umpire at the championship
+base-ball game in the afternoon, and he
+was to give the ``Charge'' to the assembled
+knights before the tournament.
+
+At ten o'clock the games began--and I
+took the Blight and the little sister down
+to the ``grandstand''--several tiers of
+backless benches with leaves for a canopy
+and the river singing through rhododendrons
+behind.  There was jumping broad
+and high, and a 100-yard dash and hurdling
+and throwing the hammer, which the
+Blight said were not interesting--they
+were too much like college sports--and she
+wanted to see the base-ball game and the
+tournament.  And yet Marston was in
+them all--dogged and resistless--his teeth
+set and his eyes anywhere but lifted toward
+the Blight, who secretly proud, as I believed,
+but openly defiant, mentioned not
+his name even when he lost, which was
+twice only.
+
+``Pretty good, isn't he?'' I said.
+
+``Who?'' she said indifferently.
+
+``Oh, nobody,'' I said, turning to smile,
+but not turning quickly enough.
+
+``What's the matter with you?'' asked
+the Blight sharply.
+
+``Nothing, nothing at all,'' I said, and
+straightway the Blight thought she wanted
+to go home.  The thunder of the Declaration
+was still rumbling in the poplar grove.
+
+``That's the Hon. Sam Budd,'' I said.
+
+``Don't you want to hear him?''
+
+``I don't care who it is and I don't
+want to hear him and I think you are
+hateful.''
+
+Ah, dear me, it was more serious than I
+thought.  There were tears in her eyes, and
+I led the Blight and the little sister home--
+conscience-stricken and humbled.  Still I
+would find that young jackanapes of an
+engineer and let him know that anybody who
+made the Blight unhappy must deal with
+me.  I would take him by the neck and
+pound some sense into him.  I found him
+lofty, uncommunicative, perfectly alien to
+any consciousness that I could have any
+knowledge of what was going or any right
+to poke my nose into anybody's business--
+and I did nothing except go back to lunch
+--to find the Blight upstairs and the little
+sister indignant with me.
+
+``You just let them alone,'' she said severely.
+
+``Let who alone?'' I said, lapsing into
+the speech of childhood.
+
+``You--just--let--them--alone,'' she
+repeated.
+
+``I've already made up my mind to
+that.''
+
+``Well, then!'' she said, with an air of
+satisfaction, but why I don't know.
+
+I went back to the poplar grove.  The
+Declaration was over and the crowd was
+gone, but there was the Hon. Samuel
+Budd, mopping his brow with one hand,
+slapping his thigh with the other, and all
+but executing a pigeon-wing on the turf. 
+He turned goggles on me that literally
+shone triumph.
+
+``He's come--Dave Branham's come!''
+he said.  ``He's better than the Wild Dog. 
+I've been trying him on the black horse
+and, Lord, how he can take them rings off! 
+Ha, won't I get into them fellows who
+wouldn't let me off this morning!  Oh, yes,
+I agreed to bring in a dark horse, and I'll
+bring him in all right.  That five hundred
+is in my clothes now.  You see that point
+yonder?  Well, there's a hollow there and
+bushes all around.  That's where I'm going
+to dress him.  I've got his clothes all
+right and a name for him.  This thing
+is a-goin' to come off accordin' to Hoyle,
+Ivanhoe, Four-Quarters-of-Beef, and all
+them mediaeval fellows.  Just watch me!''
+
+I began to get newly interested, for that
+knight's name I suddenly recalled.  Little
+Buck, the Wild Dog's brother, had
+mentioned him, when we were over in the
+Kentucky hills, as practising with the Wild
+Dog--as being ``mighty good, but nowhar
+'longside o' Mart.''  So the Hon. Sam
+might have a good substitute, after all, and
+being a devoted disciple of Sir Walter, I
+knew his knight would rival, in splendor,
+at least, any that rode with King Arthur
+in days of old.
+
+The Blight was very quiet at lunch, as
+was the little sister, and my effort to be
+jocose was a lamentable failure.  So I gave
+news.
+
+``The Hon. Sam has a substitute.''  No
+curiosity and no question.
+
+``Who--did you say?  Why, Dave
+Branham, a friend of the Wild Dog. 
+Don't you remember Buck telling us about
+him?''  No answer.  ``Well, I do--and,
+by the way, I saw Buck and one of the big
+sisters just a while ago.  Her name is
+Mollie.  Dave Branham, you will recall, is
+her sweetheart.  The other big sister had
+to stay at home with her mother and little
+Cindy, who's sick.  Of course, I didn't ask
+them about Mart--the Wild Dog.  They
+knew I knew and they wouldn't have liked
+it.  The Wild Dog's around, I understand,
+but he won't dare show his face.  Every
+policeman in town is on the lookout for
+him.''  I thought the Blight's face showed
+a signal of relief.
+
+``I'm going to play short-stop,'' I added.
+
+``Oh!'' said the Blight, with a smile,
+but the little sister said with some scorn:
+
+``You!''
+
+``I'll show you,'' I said, and I told the
+Blight about base-ball at the Gap.  We
+had introduced base-ball into the region
+and the valley boys and mountain boys,
+being swift runners, throwing like a rifle
+shot from constant practice with stones,
+and being hard as nails, caught the game
+quickly and with great ease.  We beat them
+all the time at first, but now they were
+beginning to beat us.  We had a league
+now, and this was the championship game
+for the pennant.
+
+``It was right funny the first time we
+beat a native team.  Of course, we got
+together and cheered 'em.  They thought we
+were cheering ourselves, so they got red in
+the face, rushed together and whooped it
+up for themselves for about half an hour.''
+
+The Blight almost laughed.
+
+``We used to have to carry our guns
+around with us at first when we went to
+other places, and we came near having
+several fights.''
+
+``Oh!'' said the Blight excitedly.  ``Do
+you think there might be a fight this afternoon?''
+
+``Don't know,'' I said, shaking my head. 
+``It's pretty hard for eighteen people to
+fight when nine of them are policemen and
+there are forty more around.  Still the
+crowd might take a hand.''
+
+This, I saw, quite thrilled the Blight and
+she was in good spirits when we started out. 
+
+``Marston doesn't pitch this afternoon,''
+I said to the little sister.  ``He plays first
+base.  He's saving himself for the
+tournament.  He's done too much already.'' 
+The Blight merely turned her head while I
+was speaking.  ``And the Hon. Sam will
+not act as umpire.  He wants to save his
+voice--and his head.''
+
+The seats in the ``grandstand'' were in
+the sun now, so I left the girls in a
+deserted band-stand that stood on stilts under
+trees on the southern side of the field, and
+on a line midway between third base and
+the position of short-stop.  Now there is
+no enthusiasm in any sport that equals the
+excitement aroused by a rural base-ball
+game and I never saw the enthusiasm of
+that game outdone except by the excitement
+of the tournament that followed that afternoon. 
+The game was close and Marston
+and I assuredly were stars--Marston one
+of the first magnitude.  ``Goose-egg'' on
+one side matched ``goose-egg'' on the
+other until the end of the fifth inning, when
+the engineer knocked a home-run.  Spectators
+threw their hats into the trees, yelled
+themselves hoarse, and I saw several old
+mountaineers who understood no more of
+base-ball than of the lost _digamma_ in Greek
+going wild with the general contagion. 
+During these innings I had ``assisted'' in
+two doubles and had fired in three ``daisy
+cutters'' to first myself in spite of the
+guying I got from the opposing rooters.
+
+``Four-eyes'' they called me on account of
+my spectacles until a new nickname came
+at the last half of the ninth inning,
+when we were in the field with the score
+four to three in our favor.  It was then
+that a small, fat boy with a paper megaphone
+longer than he was waddled out
+almost to first base and levelling his
+trumpet at me, thundered out in a sudden
+silence:
+
+``Hello, Foxy Grandpa!''  That was
+too much.  I got rattled, and when there
+were three men on bases and two out, a
+swift grounder came to me, I fell--catching
+it--and threw wildly to first from my
+knees.  I heard shouts of horror, anger,
+and distress from everywhere and my own
+heart stopped beating--I had lost the
+game--and then Marston leaped in the
+air--surely it must have been four feet--
+caught the ball with his left hand and
+dropped back on the bag.  The sound of
+his foot on it and the runner's was almost
+simultaneous, but the umpire said Marston's
+was there first.  Then bedlam!  One
+of my brothers was umpire and the captain
+of the other team walked threateningly
+out toward him, followed by two of
+his men with base-ball bats.  As I started
+off myself towards them I saw, with the
+corner of my eye, another brother of mine
+start in a run from the left field, and I
+wondered why a third, who was scoring,
+sat perfectly still in his chair, particularly
+as a well-known, red-headed tough from
+one of the mines who had been officiously
+antagonistic ran toward the pitcher's box
+directly in front of him.  Instantly a dozen
+of the guard sprang toward it, some man
+pulled his pistol, a billy cracked straightway
+on his head, and in a few minutes
+order was restored.  And still the brother
+scoring hadn't moved from his chair, and
+I spoke to him hotly.
+
+``Keep your shirt on,'' he said easily,
+lifting his score-card with his left hand and
+showing his right clinched about his pistol
+under it.
+
+``I was just waiting for that red-head to
+make a move.  I guess I'd have got him
+first.''
+
+I walked back to the Blight and the
+little sister and both of them looked very
+serious and frightened.
+
+``I don't think I want to see a real fight,
+after all,'' said the Blight.  ``Not this
+afternoon.''
+
+It was a little singular and prophetic,
+but just as the words left her lips one of
+the Police Guard handed me a piece of
+paper.
+
+``Somebody in the crowd must have
+dropped it in my pocket,'' he said.  On the
+paper were scrawled these words:
+
+``_Look out for the Wild Dog!_''
+
+I sent the paper to Marston.
+
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+AT LAST--THE TOURNAMENT
+
+At last--the tournament! 
+Ever afterward the Hon. Samuel
+Budd called it ``The Gentle and
+Joyous Passage of Arms--not of Ashby--
+but of the Gap, by-suh!'' The Hon.
+Samuel had arranged it as nearly after Sir
+Walter as possible.  And a sudden leap it
+was from the most modern of games to a
+game most ancient.
+
+No knights of old ever jousted on a
+lovelier field than the green little valley toward
+which the Hon. Sam waved one big hand. 
+It was level, shorn of weeds, elliptical
+in shape, and bound in by trees that ran
+in a semicircle around the bank of the river,
+shut in the southern border, and ran back
+to the northern extremity in a primeval
+little forest that wood-thrushes, even then,
+were making musical--all of it shut in by
+a wall of living green, save for one narrow
+space through which the knights were to
+enter.  In front waved Wallens' leafy
+ridge and behind rose the Cumberland
+Range shouldering itself spur by spur, into
+the coming sunset and crashing eastward
+into the mighty bulk of Powell's Mountain,
+which loomed southward from the
+head of the valley--all nodding sunny
+plumes of chestnut.
+
+The Hon. Sam had seen us coming from
+afar apparently, had come forward to meet
+us, and he was in high spirits.
+
+``I am Prince John and Waldemar and
+all the rest of 'em this day,'' he said, ``and
+`it is thus,' '' quoting Sir Walter, ``that
+we set the dutiful example of loyalty to the
+Queen of Love and Beauty, and are ourselves
+her guide to the throne which she
+must this day occupy.''  And so saying,
+the Hon. Sam marshalled the Blight to a
+seat of honor next his own.
+
+``And how do you know she is going to
+be the Queen of Love and Beauty?'' asked
+the little sister.  The Hon. Sam winked at
+me.
+
+``Well, this tournament lies between
+two gallant knights.  One will make her
+the Queen of his own accord, if he wins,
+and if the other wins, he's got to, or I'll
+break his head.  I've given orders.''  And
+the Hon. Sam looked about right and left
+on the people who were his that day.
+
+``Observe the nobles and ladies,'' he
+said, still following Sir Walter, and waving
+at the towns-people and visitors in the
+rude grandstand.  ``Observe the yeomanry
+and spectators of a better degree
+than the mere vulgar''--waving at the
+crowd on either side of the stand--``and
+the promiscuous multitude down the river
+banks and over the woods and clinging to
+the tree-tops and to yon telegraph-pole. 
+And there is my herald''--pointing to the
+cornetist of the local band--``and wait--
+by my halidom--please just wait until you
+see my knight on that black charger o'
+mine.''
+
+The Blight and the little sister were
+convulsed and the Hon. Sam went on:
+
+``Look at my men-at-arms''--the
+volunteer policemen with bulging hip-pockets,
+dangling billies and gleaming shields of
+office--``and at my refreshment tents behind''
+--where peanuts and pink lemonade
+were keeping the multitude busy--``and
+my attendants''--colored gentlemen with
+sponges and water-buckets--``the armorers
+and farriers haven't come yet.  But my
+knight--I got his clothes in New York--
+just wait--Love of Ladies and Glory to
+the Brave!''  Just then there was a
+commotion on the free seats on one side of
+the grandstand.  A darky starting, in all
+ignorance, to mount them was stopped and
+jostled none too good-naturedly back to the
+ground.
+
+``And see,'' mused the Hon. Sam, ``in
+lieu of the dog of an unbeliever we have a
+dark analogy in that son of Ham.''
+
+The little sister plucked me by the sleeve
+and pointed toward the entrance.  Outside
+and leaning on the fence were Mollie, the
+big sister, and little Buck.  Straightway I
+got up and started for them.  They hung
+back, but I persuaded them to come, and
+I led them to seats two tiers below the
+Blight--who, with my little sister, rose
+smiling to greet them and shake hands--
+much to the wonder of the nobles and
+ladies close about, for Mollie was in brave
+and dazzling array, blushing fiercely, and
+little Buck looked as though he would die
+of such conspicuousness.  No embarrassing
+questions were asked about Mart or
+Dave Branham, but I noticed that Mollie
+had purple and crimson ribbons clinched
+in one brown hand.  The purpose of
+them was plain, and I whispered to the
+Blight:
+
+``She's going to pin them on Dave's
+lance.''  The Hon. Sam heard me.
+
+``Not on your life,'' he said
+emphatically.  ``I ain't takin' chances,'' and he
+nodded toward the Blight.  ``She's got to
+win, no matter who loses.''  He rose to his
+feet suddenly.
+
+``Glory to the Brave--they're comin'! 
+Toot that horn, son,'' he said; ``they're
+comin','' and the band burst into
+discordant sounds that would have made the
+``wild barbaric music'' on the field of
+Ashby sound like a lullaby.  The Blight
+stifled her laughter over that amazing
+music with her handkerchief, and even the
+Hon. Sam scowled.
+
+``Gee!'' he said; ``it is pretty bad, isn't
+it?''
+
+``Here they come!''
+
+The nobles and ladies on the
+grandstand, the yeomanry and spectators of
+better degree, and the promiscuous multitude
+began to sway expectantly and over the hill
+came the knights, single file, gorgeous in
+velvets and in caps, with waving plumes
+and with polished spears, vertical, resting
+on the right stirrup foot and gleaming in
+the sun.
+
+``A goodly array!'' murmured the
+Hon. Sam.
+
+A crowd of small boys gathered at the
+fence below, and I observed the Hon.
+Sam's pockets bulging with peanuts.
+
+``Largesse!'' I suggested.
+
+``Good!'' he said, and rising he
+shouted:
+
+``Largessy! largessy!'' scattering
+peanuts by the handful among the scrambling
+urchins.
+
+Down wound the knights behind the
+back stand of the base-ball field, and then,
+single file, in front of the nobles and ladies,
+before whom they drew up and faced,
+saluting with inverted spears.
+
+The Hon. Sam arose--his truncheon a
+hickory stick--and in a stentorian voice
+asked the names of the doughty knights
+who were there to win glory for themselves
+and the favor of fair women.
+
+Not all will be mentioned, but among
+them was the Knight of the Holston--
+Athelstanic in build--in black stockings,
+white negligee shirt, with Byronic collar,
+and a broad crimson sash tied with a
+bow at his right side.  There was the
+Knight of the Green Valley, in green
+and gold, a green hat with a long white
+plume, lace ruffles at his sleeves, and
+buckles on dancing-pumps; a bonny fat
+knight of Maxwelton Braes, in Highland
+kilts and a plaid; and the Knight at
+Large.
+
+``He ought to be caged,'' murmured the
+Hon. Sam; for the Knight at Large wore
+plum-colored velvet, red base-ball stockings,
+held in place with safety-pins, white
+tennis shoes, and a very small hat with a
+very long plume, and the dye was already
+streaking his face.  Marston was the last
+--sitting easily on his iron gray.
+
+``And your name, Sir Knight?''
+
+``The Discarded,'' said Marston, with
+steady eyes.  I felt the Blight start at my
+side and sidewise I saw that her face was
+crimson.
+
+The Hon. Sam sat down, muttering, for
+he did not like Marston:
+
+``Wenchless springal!''
+
+Just then my attention was riveted on
+Mollie and little Buck.  Both had been
+staring silently at the knights as though
+they were apparitions, but when Marston
+faced them I saw Buck clutch his sister's
+arm suddenly and say something excitedly
+in her ear.  Then the mouths of both tightened
+fiercely and their eyes seemed to be
+darting lightning at the unconscious knight,
+who suddenly saw them, recognized them,
+and smiled past them at me.  Again Buck
+whispered, and from his lips I could make
+out what he said:
+
+``I wonder whar's Dave?'' but Mollie
+did not answer.
+
+``Which is yours, Mr. Budd?'' asked
+the little sister.  The Hon. Sam had
+leaned back with his thumbs in the arm-
+holes of his white waistcoat.
+
+``He ain't come yet.  I told him to come
+last.''
+
+The crowd waited and the knights
+waited--so long that the Mayor rose in his
+seat some twenty feet away and called out:
+
+``Go ahead, Budd.''
+
+``You jus' wait a minute--my man
+ain't come yet,'' he said easily, but from
+various places in the crowd came jeering
+shouts from the men with whom he had
+wagered and the Hon. Sam began to look
+anxious.
+
+``I wonder what is the matter?'' he
+added in a lower tone.  ``I dressed him
+myself more than an hour ago and I told
+him to come last, but I didn't mean for
+him to wait till Christmas--ah!''
+
+The Hon. Sam sank back in his seat
+again.  From somewhere had come suddenly
+the blare of a solitary trumpet that
+rang in echoes around the amphitheatre of
+the hills and, a moment later, a dazzling
+something shot into sight above the mound
+that looked like a ball of fire, coming in
+mid-air.  The new knight wore a shining
+helmet and the Hon. Sam chuckled at the
+murmur that rose and then he sat up
+suddenly.  There was no face under
+that helmet--the Hon. Sam's knight was
+MASKED and the Hon. Sam slapped his
+thigh with delight.
+
+``Bully--bully!  I never thought of it
+--I never thought of it--bully!''
+
+This was thrilling, indeed--but there
+was more; the strange knight's body was
+cased in a flexible suit of glistening mail,
+his spear point, when he raised it on high,
+shone like silver, and he came on like a
+radiant star--on the Hon. Sam's charger,
+white-bridled, with long mane and tail and
+black from tip of nose to tip of that tail
+as midnight.  The Hon. Sam was certainly
+doing it well.  At a slow walk the stranger
+drew alongside of Marston and turned his
+spear point downward.
+
+``Gawd!'' said an old darky.  ``Ku-
+klux done come again.''  And, indeed, it
+looked like a Ku-klux mask, white,
+dropping below the chin, and with eye-
+holes through which gleamed two bright
+fires.
+
+The eyes of Buck and Mollie were
+turned from Marston at last, and open-
+mouthed they stared.
+
+``Hit's the same hoss--hit's Dave!''
+said Buck aloud.
+
+``Well, my Lord!'' said Mollie simply.
+
+The Hon. Sam rose again.
+
+``And who is Sir Tardy Knight that
+hither comes with masked face?'' he asked
+courteously.  He got no answer.
+
+``What's your name, son?''
+
+The white mask puffed at the wearer's
+lips.
+
+``The Knight of the Cumberland,'' was
+the low, muffled reply.
+
+``Make him take that thing off!''
+shouted some one.
+
+``What's he got it on fer?'' shouted
+another.
+
+``I don't know, friend,'' said the Hon.
+Sam; ``but it is not my business nor prithee
+thine; since by the laws of the tournament
+a knight may ride masked for a specified
+time or until a particular purpose is
+achieved, that purpose being, I wot, victory
+for himself and for me a handful of
+byzants from thee.''
+
+``Now, go ahead, Budd,'' called the
+Mayor again.  ``Are you going crazy?''
+
+The Hon. Sam stretched out his arms
+once to loosen them for gesture, thrust
+his chest out, and uplifted his chin:  ``Fair
+ladies, nobles of the realm, and good
+knights,'' he said sonorously, and he raised
+one hand to his mouth and behind it spoke
+aside to me:
+
+``How's my voice--how's my voice?''
+
+``Great!''
+His question was genuine, for the mask
+of humor had dropped and the man was
+transformed.  I knew his inner seriousness,
+his oratorical command of good English,
+and I knew the habit, not uncommon
+among stump-speakers in the South, of
+falling, through humor, carelessness, or for
+the effect of flattering comradeship, into
+all the lingual sins of rural speech; but I
+was hardly prepared for the soaring flight
+the Hon. Sam took now.  He started with
+one finger pointed heavenward:
+
+     ``The knights are dust
+       And their good swords are rast;
+       Their souls are with the saints, we trust.
+
+
+``Scepticism is but a harmless phantom
+in these mighty hills.  We BELIEVE that with
+the saints is the GOOD knight's soul, and if,
+in the radiant unknown, the eyes of those
+who have gone before can pierce the little
+shadow that lies between, we know that the
+good knights of old look gladly down on
+these good knights of to-day.  For it is
+good to be remembered.  The tireless
+struggle for name and fame since the sunrise
+of history attests it; and the ancestry
+worship in the East and the world-wide
+hope of immortality show the fierce hunger
+in the human soul that the memory of it
+not only shall not perish from this earth,
+but that, across the Great Divide, it shall
+live on--neither forgetting nor forgotten. 
+You are here in memory of those good
+knights to prove that the age of chivalry
+is not gone; that though their good swords
+are rust, the stainless soul of them still
+illumines every harmless spear point before
+me and makes it a torch that shall reveal,
+in your own hearts still aflame, their
+courage, their chivalry, their sense of
+protection for the weak, and the honor in
+which they held pure women, brave men,
+and almighty God.
+
+``The tournament, some say, goes back
+to the walls of Troy.  The form of it
+passed with the windmills that Don
+Quixote charged.  It is with you to keep
+the high spirit of it an ever-burning vestal
+fire.  It was a deadly play of old--it is a
+harmless play to you this day.  But the
+prowess of the game is unchanged; for the
+skill to strike those pendent rings is no less
+than was the skill to strike armor-joint,
+visor, or plumed crest.  It was of old an
+exercise for deadly combat on the field of
+battle; it is no less an exercise now to you
+for the field of life--for the quick eye, the
+steady nerve, and the deft hand which shall
+help you strike the mark at which, outside
+these lists, you aim.  And the crowning
+triumph is still just what it was of old--
+that to the victor the Rose of his world--
+made by him the Queen of Love and
+Beauty for us all--shall give her smile and
+with her own hands place on his brow a
+thornless crown.''
+
+Perfect silence honored the Hon. Samuel
+Budd.  The Mayor was nodding vigorous
+approval, the jeering ones kept still,
+and when after the last deep-toned word
+passed like music from his lips the silence
+held sway for a little while before the
+burst of applause came.  Every knight had
+straightened in his saddle and was looking
+very grave.  Marston's eyes never left the
+speaker's face, except once, when they
+turned with an unconscious appeal, I
+thought, to the downcast face of Blight--
+whereat the sympathetic little sister seemed
+close to tears.  The Knight of the
+Cumberland shifted in his saddle as though he
+did not quite understand what was going
+on, and once Mollie, seeing the eyes
+through the mask-holes fixed on her,
+blushed furiously, and little Buck grinned
+back a delighted recognition.  The Hon.
+Sam sat down, visibly affected by his own
+eloquence; slowly he wiped his face and
+then he rose again.
+
+``Your colors, Sir Knights,'' he said,
+with a commanding wave of his truncheon,
+and one by one the knights spurred forward
+and each held his lance into the
+grandstand that some fair one might tie
+thereon the colors he was to wear.  Marston,
+without looking at the Blight, held his
+up to the little sister and the Blight
+carelessly turned her face while the demure
+sister was busy with her ribbons, but I noticed
+that the little ear next to me was tingling
+red for all her brave look of unconcern. 
+Only the Knight of the Cumberland sat
+still.
+
+``What!'' said the Hon. Sam, rising to
+his feet, his eyes twinkling and his mask
+of humor on again; ``sees this masked
+springal''--the Hon. Sam seemed much
+enamored of that ancient word--``no maid
+so fair that he will not beg from her the
+boon of colors gay that he may carry them
+to victory and receive from her hands a
+wreath therefor?''  Again the Knight of
+the Cumberland seemed not to know that
+the Hon. Sam's winged words were meant
+for him, so the statesman translated them
+into a mutual vernacular.
+
+``Remember what I told you, son,'' he
+said.  ``Hold up yo' spear here to some
+one of these gals jes' like the other fellows
+are doin','' and as he sat down he tried
+surreptitiously to indicate the Blight with
+his index finger, but the knight failed to see
+and the Blight's face was so indignant
+and she rebuked him with such a knife-like
+whisper that, humbled, the Hon. Sam collapsed
+in his seat, muttering:
+
+``The fool don't know you--he don't
+know you.''
+
+For the Knight of the Cumberland had
+turned the black horse's head and was riding,
+like Ivanhoe, in front of the nobles
+and ladies, his eyes burning up at them
+through the holes in his white mask. 
+Again he turned, his mask still uplifted, and
+the behavior of the beauties there, as on
+the field of Ashby, was no whit changed: 
+``Some blushed, some assumed an air of
+pride and dignity, some looked straight
+forward and essayed to seem utterly
+unconscious of what was going on, some drew
+back in alarm which was perhaps affected,
+some endeavored to forbear smiling and
+there were two or three who laughed
+outright.''  Only none ``dropped a veil over
+her charms'' and thus none incurred the
+suspicion, as on that field of Ashby, that
+she was ``a beauty of ten years' standing''
+whose motive, gallant Sir Walter supposes
+in defence, however, was doubtless ``a
+surfeit of such vanities and a willingness
+to give a fair chance to the rising beauties
+of the age.''  But the most conscious of the
+fair was Mollie below, whose face was
+flushed and whose brown fingers were
+nervously twisting the ribbons in her lap,
+and I saw Buck nudge her and heard him
+whisper:
+
+``Dave ain't going to pick YOU out, I
+tell ye.  I heered Mr. Budd thar myself
+tell him he HAD to pick out some other
+gal.''
+
+``You hush!'' said Mollie indignantly.
+
+It looked as though the Knight of the
+Cumberland had grown rebellious and
+meant to choose whom he pleased, but on
+his way back the Hon. Sam must have
+given more surreptitious signs, for the
+Knight of the Cumberland reined in before
+the Blight and held up his lance to her. 
+Straightway the colors that were meant for
+Marston fluttered from the Knight of the
+Cumberland's spear.  I saw Marston bite
+his lips and I saw Mollie's face aflame with
+fury and her eyes darting lightning--no
+longer at Marston now, but at the Blight. 
+The mountain girl held nothing against the
+city girl because of the Wild Dog's infatuation,
+but that her own lover, no matter
+what the Hon. Sam said, should give his
+homage also to the Blight, in her own
+presence, was too much.  Mollie looked
+around no more.  Again the Hon. Sam
+rose.
+
+``Love of ladies,'' he shouted,
+``splintering of lances!  Stand forth, gallant
+knights.  Fair eyes look upon your deeds! 
+Toot again, son!''
+
+Now just opposite the grandstand was a
+post some ten feet high, with a small beam
+projecting from the top toward the spectators. 
+From the end of this hung a wire,
+the end of which was slightly upturned in
+line with the course, and on the tip of this
+wire a steel ring about an inch in diameter
+hung lightly.  Nearly forty yards below
+this was a similar ring similarly arranged;
+and at a similar distance below that was
+still another, and at the blast from the
+Hon. Sam's herald, the gallant knights
+rode slowly, two by two, down the lists to
+the western extremity--the Discarded
+Knight and the Knight of the Cumberland,
+stirrup to stirrup, riding last--where they
+all drew up in line, some fifty yards beyond
+the westernmost post.  This distance
+they took that full speed might be attained
+before jousting at the first ring, since the
+course--much over one hundred yards long
+--must be covered in seven seconds or less,
+which was no slow rate of speed.  The
+Hon. Sam arose again:
+
+``The Knight of the Holston!''
+
+Farther down the lists a herald took up
+the same cry and the good knight of
+Athelstanic build backed his steed from the line
+and took his place at the head of the
+course.
+
+With his hickory truncheon the Hon.
+Sam signed to his trumpeter to sound the
+onset.
+
+``Now, son!'' he said.
+
+With the blare of the trumpet Athelstane
+sprang from his place and came up
+the course, his lance at rest; a tinkling
+sound and the first ring slipped down the
+knight's spear and when he swept past the
+last post there was a clapping of hands, for
+he held three rings triumphantly aloft. 
+And thus they came, one by one, until each
+had run the course three times, the Discarded
+jousting next to the last and the
+Knight of the Cumberland, riding with a
+reckless Cave, Adsum air, the very last.  At
+the second joust it was quite evident that
+the victory lay between these two, as they
+only had not lost a single ring, and when
+the black horse thundered by, the Hon. Sam
+shouted ``Brave lance!'' and jollied his
+betting enemies, while Buck hugged himself
+triumphantly and Mollie seemed temporarily
+to lose her chagrin and anger in
+pride of her lover, Dave.  On the third
+running the Knight of the Cumberland
+excited a sensation by sitting upright,
+waving his lance up and down between the
+posts and lowering it only when the ring
+was within a few feet of its point.  His
+recklessness cost him one ring, but as the
+Discarded had lost one, they were still
+tied, with eight rings to the credit of each,
+for the first prize.  Only four others were
+left--the Knight of the Holston and the
+Knight of the Green Valley tying with
+seven rings for second prize, and the fat
+Maxwelton Braes and the Knight at Large
+tying with six rings for the third.  The
+crowd was eager now and the Hon. Sam
+confident.  On came the Knight at Large,
+his face a rainbow, his plume wilted and
+one red base-ball stocking slipped from its
+moorings--two rings!  On followed the fat
+Maxwelton, his plaid streaming and his kilts
+flapping about his fat legs--also two rings!
+
+``Egad!'' quoth the Hon. Sam.  ``Did
+yon lusty trencherman of Annie Laurie's
+but put a few more layers of goodly flesh
+about his ribs, thereby projecting more his
+frontal Falstaffian proportions, by my halidom,
+he would have to joust tandem!''
+
+On came Athelstane and the Knight of
+the Green Valley, both with but two rings
+to their credit, and on followed the
+Discarded, riding easily, and the Knight of the
+Cumberland again waving his lance between
+the posts, each with three rings on
+his spear.  At the end the Knight at Large
+stood third, Athelstane second, and the
+Discarded and the Knight of the Cumberland
+stood side by side at the head of the
+course, still even, and now ready to end the
+joust, for neither on the second trial had
+missed a ring.
+
+The excitement was intense now.  Many
+people seemed to know who the Knight of
+the Cumberland was, for there were shouts
+of ``Go it, Dave!'' from everywhere; the
+rivalry of class had entered the contest and
+now it was a conflict between native and
+``furriner.''  The Hon. Sam was almost
+beside himself with excitement; now and
+then some man with whom he had made
+a bet would shout jeeringly at him and the
+Hon. Sam would shout back defiance.  But
+when the trumpet sounded he sat leaning
+forward with his brow wrinkled and his
+big hands clinched tight.  Marston sped
+up the course first--three rings--and there
+was a chorus of applauding yells.
+
+``His horse is gittin' tired,'' said the
+Hon. Sam jubilantly, and the Blight's face,
+I noticed, showed for the first time faint
+traces of indignation.  The Knight of the
+Cumberland was taking no theatrical
+chances now and he came through the
+course with level spear and, with three
+rings on it, he shot by like a thunderbolt.
+
+``Hooray!'' shouted the Hon. Sam.
+``Lord, what a horse!''  For the first time
+the Blight, I observed, failed to applaud,
+while Mollie was clapping her hands and
+Buck was giving out shrill yells of
+encouragement.  At the next tilt the Hon.
+Sam had his watch in his hand and when
+he saw the Discarded digging in his spurs
+he began to smile and he was looking at
+his watch when the little tinkle in front told
+him that the course was run.
+
+``Did he get 'em all?''
+
+``Yes, he got 'em all,'' mimicked the
+Blight.
+
+``Yes, an' he just did make it,'' chuckled
+the Hon. Sam.  The Discarded had
+wheeled his horse aside from the course to
+watch his antagonist.  He looked pale and
+tired--almost as tired as his foam-covered
+steed--but his teeth were set and his face
+was unmoved as the Knight of the
+Cumberland came on like a demon, sweeping
+off the last ring with a low, rasping oath
+of satisfaction.
+
+``I never seed Dave ride that-a-way
+afore,'' said Mollie.
+
+``Me, neither,'' chimed in Buck.
+
+The nobles and ladies were waving
+handkerchiefs, clapping hands, and shouting. 
+The spectators of better degree were
+throwing up their hats and from every part
+of the multitude the same hoarse shout of
+encouragement rose:
+
+``Go it, Dave!  Hooray for Dave!''
+while the boy on the telegraph-pole was
+seen to clutch wildly at the crossbar on
+which he sat--he had come near tumbling
+from his perch.
+
+The two knights rode slowly back to the
+head of the lists, where the Discarded
+was seen to dismount and tighten his
+girth.
+
+``He's tryin' to git time to rest,'' said
+the Hon. Sam.  ``Toot, son!''
+
+``Shame!'' said the little sister and the
+Blight both at once so severely that the
+Hon. Sam quickly raised his hand.
+
+``Hold on,'' he said, and with hand still
+uplifted he waited till Marston was
+mounted again.  ``Now!''
+
+The Discarded came on, using his spurs
+with every jump, the red of his horse's
+nostrils showing that far away, and he swept
+on, spearing off the rings with deadly
+accuracy and holding the three aloft, but
+having no need to pull in his panting steed,
+who stopped of his own accord.  Up went
+a roar, but the Hon. Sam, covertly glancing
+at his watch, still smiled.  That watch he
+pulled out when the Knight of the Cumberland
+started and he smiled still when
+he heard the black horse's swift, rhythmic
+beat and he looked up only when that
+knight, shouting to his horse, moved his
+lance up and down before coming to the
+last ring and, with a dare-devil yell, swept
+it from the wire.
+
+``Tied--tied!'' was the shout; ``they've
+got to try it again! they've got to try it
+again!''
+
+The Hon. Sam rose, with his watch in
+one hand and stilling the tumult with the
+other.  Dead silence came at once.
+
+``I fear me,'' he said, ``that the good
+knight, the Discarded, has failed to make
+the course in the time required by the laws
+of the tournament.''  Bedlam broke loose
+again and the Hon. Sam waited, still
+gesturing for silence.
+
+``Summon the time-keeper!'' he said.
+
+The time-keeper appeared from the
+middle of the field and nodded.
+
+``Eight seconds!''
+``The Knight of the Cumberland wins,''
+said the Hon. Sam.
+
+The little sister, unconscious of her own
+sad face, nudged me to look at the Blight
+--there were tears in her eyes.
+
+
+Before the grandstand the knights
+slowly drew up again.  Marston's horse
+was so lame and tired that he dismounted
+and let a darky boy lead him under the
+shade of the trees.  But he stood on foot
+among the other knights, his arms folded,
+worn out and vanquished, but taking his
+bitter medicine like a man.  I thought
+the Blight's eyes looked pityingly upon
+him.
+
+The Hon. Sam arose with a crown of
+laurel leaves in his hand:
+
+``You have fairly and gallantly won,
+Sir Knight of the Cumberland, and it is
+now your right to claim and receive from
+the hands of the Queen of Love and
+Beauty the chaplet of honor which your
+skill has justly deserved.  Advance, Sir
+Knight of the Cumberland, and dismount!''
+
+The Knight of the Cumberland made no
+move nor sound.
+
+``Get off yo' hoss, son,'' said the Hon.
+Sam kindly, ``and get down on yo' knees
+at the feet of them steps.  This fair young
+Queen is a-goin' to put this chaplet on your
+shinin' brow.  That horse'll stand.''
+
+The Knight of the Cumberland, after a
+moment's hesitation, threw his leg over the
+saddle and came to the steps with a slouching
+gait and looking about him right and
+left.  The Blight, blushing prettily, took
+the chaplet and went down the steps to
+meet him.
+
+``Unmask!'' I shouted.
+
+``Yes, son,'' said the Hon. Sam, ``take
+that rag off.''
+
+Then Mollie's voice, clear and loud,
+startled the crowd.  ``You better not,
+Dave Branham, fer if you do and this
+other gal puts that thing on you, you'll
+never--''  What penalty she was going to
+inflict, I don't know, for the Knight of the
+Cumberland, half kneeling, sprang suddenly
+to his feet and interrupted her.
+``Wait a minute, will ye?'' he said almost
+fiercely, and at the sound of his voice
+Mollie rose to her feet and her face
+blanched.
+
+``Lord God!'' she said almost in
+anguish, and then she dropped quickly to her
+seat again.
+
+The Knight of the Cumberland had
+gone back to his horse as though to get
+something from his saddle.  Like lightning
+he vaulted into the saddle, and as the black
+horse sprang toward the opening tore his
+mask from his face, turned in his stirrups,
+and brandished his spear with a yell of
+defiance, while a dozen voices shouted:
+
+``The Wild Dog!''  Then was there
+an uproar.
+
+``Goddle mighty!'' shouted the Hon.
+Sam.  ``I didn't do it, I swear I didn't
+know it.  He's tricked me--he's tricked
+me!  Don't shoot--you might hit that
+hoss!''
+
+There was no doubt about the Hon.
+Sam's innocence.  Instead of turning over
+an outlaw to the police, he had brought
+him into the inner shrine of law and order
+and he knew what a political asset for his
+enemies that insult would be.  And there
+was no doubt of the innocence of Mollie
+and Buck as they stood, Mollie wringing
+her hands and Buck with open mouth and
+startled face.  There was no doubt about
+the innocence of anybody other than Dave
+Branham and the dare-devil Knight of the
+Cumberland.
+
+Marston had clutched at the Wild Dog's
+bridle and missed and the outlaw struck
+savagely at him with his spear.  Nobody
+dared to shoot because of the scattering
+crowd, but every knight and every mounted
+policeman took out after the outlaw and
+the beating of hoofs pounded over the
+little mound and toward Poplar Hill. 
+Marston ran to his horse at the upper end,
+threw his saddle on, and hesitated--there
+were enough after the Wild Dog and his
+horse was blown.  He listened to the yells
+and sounds of the chase encircling Poplar
+Hill.  The outlaw was making for Lee. 
+All at once the yells and hoof-beats seemed
+to sound nearer and Marston listened,
+astonished.  The Wild Dog had wheeled
+and was coming back; he was going to
+make for the Gap, where sure safety lay. 
+Marston buckled his girth and as he sprang
+on his horse, unconsciously taking his spear
+with him, the Wild Dog dashed from the
+trees at the far end of the field.  As
+Marston started the Wild Dog saw him, pulled
+something that flashed from under his coat
+of mail, thrust it back again, and brandishing
+his spear, he came, full speed and
+yelling, up the middle of the field.  It was
+a strange thing to happen in these modern
+days, but Marston was an officer of the
+law and was between the Wild Dog and
+the Ford and liberty through the Gap, into
+the hills.  The Wild Dog was an outlaw. 
+It was Marston's duty to take him.
+
+The law does not prescribe with what
+weapon the lawless shall be subdued, and
+Marston's spear was the only weapon he
+had.  Moreover, the Wild Dog's yell was
+a challenge that set his blood afire and
+the girl both loved was looking on.  The
+crowd gathered the meaning of the joust--
+the knights were crashing toward each
+other with spears at rest.  There were a
+few surprised oaths from men, a few low
+cries from women, and then dead silence
+in which the sound of hoofs on the hard
+turf was like thunder.  The Blight's face
+was white and the little sister was gripping
+my arm with both hands.  A third horseman
+shot into view out of the woods at
+tight angles, to stop them, and it seemed
+that the three horses must crash together
+in a heap.  With a moan the Blight buried
+her face on my shoulder.  She shivered
+when the muffled thud of body against
+body and the splintering of wood rent the
+air; a chorus of shrieks arose about her,
+and when she lifted her frightened face
+Marston, the Discarded, was limp on the
+ground, his horse was staggering to his
+feet, and the Wild Dog was galloping past
+her, his helmet gleaming, his eyes ablaze,
+his teeth set, the handle of his broken
+spear clinched in his right hand, and blood
+streaming down the shoulder of the black
+horse.  She heard the shots that were sent
+after him, she heard him plunge into the
+river, and then she saw and heard no
+more.
+
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+THE KNIGHT PASSES
+
+A telegram summoned the Blight
+a home next day.  Marston was in
+bed with a ragged wound in the shoulder,
+and I took her to tell him good-by.  I left
+the room for a few minutes, and when I
+came back their hands were unclasping, and
+for a Discarded Knight the engineer surely
+wore a happy though pallid face.
+
+That afternoon the train on which we
+left the Gap was brought to a sudden halt
+in Wildcat Valley by a piece of red flannel
+tied to the end of a stick that was
+planted midway the track.  Across the
+track, farther on, lay a heavy piece of
+timber, and it was plain that somebody
+meant that, just at that place, the train
+must stop.  The Blight and I were seated
+on the rear platform and the Blight was
+taking a last look at her beloved hills. 
+When the train started again, there was
+a cracking of twigs overhead and a
+shower of rhododendron leaves and
+flowers dropped from the air at the feet
+of the Blight.  And when we pulled away
+from the high-walled cut we saw, motionless
+on a little mound, a black horse,
+and on him, motionless, the Knight of the
+Cumberland, the helmet on his head (that
+the Blight might know who he was, no
+doubt), and both hands clasping the
+broken handle of his spear, which rested
+across the pommel of his saddle.  Impulsively
+the Blight waved her hand to him
+and I could not help waving my hat; but
+he sat like a statue and, like a statue, sat
+on, simply looking after us as we were
+hurried along, until horse, broken shaft,
+and shoulders sank out of sight.  And thus
+passed the Knight of the Cumberland with
+the last gleam that struck his helmet,
+spear-like, from the slanting sun.
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+
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