"So the railroads are going to hurt the steamboats?" she presently said.

"No, I didn't say that. I was thinking of the flatboats that have already been hurt by the steamers," he replied. Now to the western mind the river-men typified all that was reckless and wild. It was their carousals that gave an evil repute to such towns as Natchez. But this particular river-man looked harmless. "Carrington is my name, Miss Malroy," he added.

No more was said just then, for Betty became reserved and he did not attempt to resume the conversation. A day later they rumbled into Washington, and as Betty descended from the coach, Carrington stepped to her side.

"I suppose you'll stop here, Miss Malroy?" he said, indicating the tavern before which the stage had come to a stand. "Yes," said Betty briefly.

"If I can be of any service to you—" he began, with just a touch of awkwardness in his manner.

"No, I thank you, Mr. Carrington," said Betty quickly.

"Good night... good-by," he turned away, and Betty saw his tall form disappear in the twilight.



CHAPTER VII. THE FIGHT AT SLOSSON'S TAVERN

Murrell had ridden out of the hills some hours back. He now faced the flashing splendors of a June sunset, but along the eastern horizon the mountains rose against a somber sky. Night was creeping into their fastnesses. Already there was twilight in those cool valleys lying within the shadow of mighty hills. A month and more had elapsed since Bob Yancy's trial. Just two days later man and boy disappeared from Scratch Hill. This had served to rouse Murrell to the need of immediate action, but he found, where Yancy was concerned, Scratch Hill could keep a secret, while Crenshaw's mouth was closed on any word that might throw light on the plans of his friend.

"It's plain to my mind, Captain, that Bladen will never get the boy. I reckon Bob's gone into hiding with him," said the merchant, with spacious candor.

The fugitives had not gone into hiding, however; they had traversed the state from east to west, and Murrell was soon on their trail and pressing forward in pursuit. Reaching the mountains, he heard of them first as ten days ahead of him and bound for west Tennessee, the ten days dwindled to a week, the week became five days, the five days three; and now as he emerged from the last range of hills he caught sight of them. They were half a mile distant perhaps, but he was certain that the man and boy he saw pass about a turn in the road were the man and boy he had been following for a month.

He was not mistaken. The man was Bob Yancy and the boy was Hannibal. Yancy had acted with extraordinary decision. He had sold his few acres at Scratch Hill for a lump sum to Crenshaw—it was to the latter's credit that the transaction was one in which he could feel no real pride as a man of business—and just a day later Yancy and the boy had quitted Scratch Hill in the gray dawn, and turned their faces westward. Tennessee had become their objective point, since here was a region to which they could fix a name, while the rest of the world was strange to them. As they passed the turn in the road where Murrell had caught his first sight of them, Yancy glanced back at the blue wall of the mountains where it lay along the horizon.

"Well, Nevvy," he said, "we've put a heap of distance between us and old Scratch Hill; all I can say is, if there's as much the other side of the Hill as there is this side, the world's a monstrous big place fo' to ramble about in." He carried his rifle and a heavy pack. Hannibal had a much smaller pack and his old sporting rifle, burdens of which his Uncle Bob relieved him at brief intervals.

For the past ten days their journey had been conducted in a leisurely fashion. As Yancy said, they were seeing the world, and it was well to take a good look at it while they had a chance. He was no longer fearful of pursuit and his temperament asserted itself—the minimum of activity sufficed. Usually they camped just where the night overtook them; now and then they varied this by lodging at some tavern, for since there was money in his pocket, Yancy was disposed to spend it. He could not conceive that it had any other possible use.

Suddenly out of the silence came the regular beat of hoofs. These grew nearer and nearer, and at last when they were quite close, Yancy faced about. He instantly recognized Murrell and dropped his rifle into the crook of his arm. The act was instinctive, since there was no reason to believe that the captain had the least interest in the boy. Smilingly Murrell reined in his horse.

"Why—Bob Yancy!" he cried, in apparent astonishment.

"Yes, sir—Bob Yancy. Does it happen you are looking fo' him, Captain?" inquired Yancy.

"No—no, Bob. I'm on my way West. Shake hands." His manner was frank and winning, and Yancy met it with an equal frankness.

"Well, sir, me and my nevvy are glad to meet some one we've knowed afore. The world are a lonesome place once you get shut of yo'r own dooryard," he said. Murrell slipped from his saddle and fell into step at Yancy's side as they moved forward.

"They were mightily stirred up at the Cross Roads when I left, wondering what had come of you," he observed.

"When did you quit there?" asked Yancy.

"About a fortnight ago," said Murrell. "Every one approves of your action in this matter, Yancy," he went on.

"That's kind of them," responded Yancy, a little dryly. There was no reason for it, but he was becoming distrustful of Murrell, and uneasy.

"Bladen's hurt himself by the stand he's taken it this matter," Murrell added.

They went forward in silence, Yancy brooding and suspicious. For the last mile or so their way had led through an unbroken forest, but a sudden turn in the road brought them to the edge of an extensive clearing. Close to the road were several buildings, but not a tree had been spared to shelter them and they stood forth starkly, the completing touch to a civilization that was still in its youth, unkempt, rather savage, and ruthlessly utilitarian. A sign, the work of inexpert hands, announced the somewhat dingy structure of hewn logs that stood nearest the roadside a tavern. There was a horse rack in front of it and a trampled space. It was flanked by its several sheds and barns on one hand and a woodpile on the other. Beyond the woodpile a rail fence inclosed a corn-field, and beyond the barns and sheds a similar fence defined the bounds of a stumpy pasture-lot.

From the door of the tavern the figure of a man emerged. Pausing by the horse rack he surveyed the two men and boy, if not with indifference, at least with apathy. Just above his head swung the sign with its legend, "Slosson—Entertainment"; but if he were Slosson, one could take the last half of the sign either as a poetic rhapsody on the part of the painter, or the yielding to some meaningless convention, for in his person, Mr. Slosson suggested none of those qualities of brain or heart that trenched upon the lighter amenities of life. He was black-haired and bull-necked, and there was about him a certain shagginess which a recent toilet performed at the horse trough had not served to mitigate.

"Howdy?" he drawled.

"Howdy?" responded Mr. Yancy.

"Shall you stop here?" asked Murrell, sinking his voice. Yancy nodded. "Can you put us up?" inquired Murrell, turning to the tavern-keeper.

"I reckon that's what I'm here for," said Slosson. Murrell glanced about the empty yard. "Slack," observed Slosson languidly. "Yes, sir, slack's the only name for it." It was understood he referred to the state of trade. He looked from one to the other of the two men. As his eyes rested on Murrell, that gentleman raised the first three fingers of his right hand. The gesture was ever so little, yet it seemed to have a tonic effect on Mr. Slosson. What might have developed into a smile had he not immediately suppressed it, twisted his bearded lips as he made an answering movement. "Eph, come here, you!" Slosson raised his voice. This call brought a half-grown black boy from about a corner of the tavern, to whom Murrell relinquished his horse.

"Let's liquor," said the captain over his shoulder, moving off in the direction of the bar.

"Come on, Nevvy!" said Yancy following, and they all entered the tavern.

"Well, here's to the best of good luck!" said Murrell, as he raised his glass to his lips.

"Same here," responded Yancy. Murrell pulled out a roll of bills, one of which he tossed on the bar. Then after a moment's hesitation he detached a second bill from the roll and turned to Hannibal.

"Here, youngster—a present for you;" he said good-naturedly. Hannibal, embarrassed by the unexpected gift, edged to his Uncle Bob's side.

"Ain't you-all got nothing to say to the gentleman?" asked Yancy.

"Thank you, sir," said the boy.

"That sounds a heap better. Let's see—why, if it ain't ten dollars—think of that!" said Yancy, in surprise.

"Let's have another drink," suggested Murrell.

Presently Hannibal stole out into the yard. He still held the bill in his hand, for he did not quite know how to dispose of his great wealth. After debating this matter for a moment he knotted it carefully in one corner of his handkerchief. But this did not quite suit him, for he untied the knot and looked at the bill again, turning it over and over in his hand. Then he folded it carefully into the smallest possible compass and once more tied a corner of his handkerchief about it, this time with two knots instead of one; these he afterward tested with his teeth.

"I 'low she won't come undone now!" he said, with satisfaction. He stowed the handkerchief away in his trousers pocket, ramming it very tight with his fist. He was much relieved when this was done, for wearing a care-free air he sauntered across the yard and established himself on the top rail of the corn-field fence.

The colored boy, armed with an ax, appeared at the woodpile and began to chop in the desultory fashion of his race, pausing every few seconds to stare in the direction of his white compatriot, who met his glance with reserve. Whereupon Mr. Slosson's male domestic indulged in certain strange antics that were not rightly any part of woodchopping. This yet further repelled Hannibal.

"The disgustin' chattel!" he muttered under his breath, quoting his Uncle Bob, with whom, in theory at least, race feeling was strong. Yancy appeared at the door of the bar and called to him, and as the boy slid from the fence and ran toward him across the yard, the Scratch Hiller sauntered forth to meet him.

"I reckon it's all right, Nevvy," he said, "but we don't know nothing about this here Captain Murrell—as he calls himself—though he seems a right clever sort of gentleman; but we won't mention Belle Plain." With this caution he led the way into the tavern and back through the bar to a low-ceilinged room where Murrell and Slosson were already at table. It was intolerably hot, and there lingered in the heavy atmosphere of the place stale and unappetizing odors. Only Murrell attempted conversation and he was not encouraged; and presently silence fell on the room except for the rattle of dishes and the buzzing of flies. When they had finished, the stale odors and the heat drove them quickly into the bar again, where for a little time Hannibal sat on Yancy's knee, by the door. Presently he slipped down and stole out into the yard.

The June night was pulsing with life. Above him bats darted in short circling flights. In the corn-field and pasture-lot the fireflies lifted from their day-long sleep, showing pale points of light in the half darkness, while from some distant pond or stagnant watercourse came the booming of frogs, presently to swell into a resonant chorus. These were the summer night sounds he had known as far back as his memory went.

In the tavern the three men were drinking—Murrell with the idea that the more Yancy came under the influence of Slosson's corn whisky the easier his speculation would be managed. Mr. Yancy on his part believed that if Murrell went to bed reasonably drunk he would sleep late and give him the opportunity he coveted, to quit the tavern unobserved at break of day. Gradually the ice of silence which had held them mute at supper, thawed. At first it was the broken lazy speech of men who were disposed to quiet, then the talk became brisk—a steady stream of rather dreary gossip of horses and lands and negroes, of speculations past and gone in these great staples.

Hannibal crossed to the corn-field. There, in the friendly gloom, he examined his handkerchief and felt of the rolled-up bill. Then he made count of certain silver and copper coins which he had in his other pocket. Satisfied that he had sustained no loss, he again climbed to the top rail of the fence where he seated himself with an elbow resting on one knee and his chin in the palm of his hand.

"I got ten dollars and seventy cents—yes, sir—and the clostest shooting rifle I ever tossed to my shoulder." He seemed but small to have accomplished such a feat. He meditated for a little space. "I reckon when we strike the settlements again I should like to buy my Uncle Bob a present." With knitted brows he considered what this should be, canvassing Yancy's needs. He had about decided on a ring such as Captain Murrell was wearing, when he heard the shuffling of bare feet over the ground and a voice spoke out of the darkness.

"When yo' get to feelin' like sleep, young boss, Mas'r Slosson he says I show yo' to yo' chamber." It was Slosson's boy Eph.

"Did you-all happen to notice what they're doing in the tavern now?" asked Hannibal.

"I low they're makin' a regular hog-killin' of it," said Eph smartly. Hannibal descended from the fence.

"Yes, you can show me my chamber," he said, and his tone was severe. What a white man did was not a matter for a black man to criticize. They went toward the open door of the tavern. Mr. Slosson's corn whisky had already wrought a marked transformation in the case of Slosson himself. His usually terse speech was becoming diffuse and irrelevant, while vacant laughter issued from his lips. Yancy was apparently unaffected by the good cheer of which he had partaken, but Murrell's dark face was flushed. The Scratch Hiller's ability to carry his liquor exceeded anything he had anticipated.

"You-all run along to bed, Nevvy," said Yancy, as Hannibal entered the room. "I'll mighty soon follow you."

Eph secured a tin candle-stick with a half-burnt candle in it and led the way into the passage back of the bar.

"Mas'r Slosson's jus' mo' than layin' back!" he said, as he closed the door after them.

"I reckon you-all will lay back, too, when you get growed up," retorted Hannibal.

"No, sir, I won't. White folks won't let a nigger lay back. Onliest time a nigger sees co'n whisky's when he's totin' it fo' some one else."

"I reckon a nigger's fool enough without corn whisky," said Hannibal. They mounted a flight of stairs and passed down a narrow hall. This brought them to the back of the building, and Eph pushed open the door on his right.

"This heah's yo' chamber," he said, and preceding his companion into the room, placed the candle on a chair.

"Well—I low I clean forgot something!" cried Hannibal.

"If it's yo' bundle and yo' gun, I done fotched 'em up heah and laid 'em on yo' bed," said Eph, preparing' to withdraw.

"I certainly am obliged to you," said Hannibal, and with a good night, Eph retired, closing the door after him, and the boy heard the patter of his bare feet as he scuttled down the hall.

The moon was rising and Hannibal went to the open window and glanced out. His room overlooked the back yard of the inn and a neglected truck patch. Starting from a point beyond the truck patch and leading straight away to the woodland beyond was a fenced lane, with the corn-field and the pasture-lot on either hand. Immediately below his window was the steeply slanting roof of a shed. For a moment he considered the night, not unaffected by its beauty, then, turning from the window, he moved his bundle and rifle to the foot of the bed, where they would be out of his way, kicked off his trousers, blew out the candle and lay down. The gossip of the men in the bar ran like a whisper through the house, and with it came frequent bursts of noisy laughter. Listening for these sounds the boy dozed off.

Yancy had become more and more convinced as the evening passed that Murrell was bent on getting him drunk, and suspicion mounted darkly to his brain. He felt certain that he was Bladen's agent. Now, Mr. Yancy took an innocent pride in his ability to "cool off liquor." Perhaps it was some heritage from a well living ancestry that had hardened its head with Port and Madeira in the days when the Yancys owned their acres and their slaves. Be that as it may, he was equal to the task he had set himself. He saw with satisfaction the flush mount to Murrell's swarthy cheeks, and felt that the limit of his capacity was being reached. Mr. Slosson had become a sort of Greek chorus. He anticipated all the possible phases of drunkenness that awaited his companions. He went from silence to noisy mirth, when his unmeaning laughter rang through the house; he told long witless stories as he leaned against the bar; he became melancholy and described the loss of his wife five years before. From melancholy he passed to sullenness and seemed ready to fasten a quarrel on Yancy, but the latter deftly evaded any such issue.

"What you-all want is another drink," he said affably. "With all you been through you need a tonic, so shove along that extract of cornshucks and molasses!"

"I'm a rip-staver," said Slosson thickly. "But I've knowed enough sorrow to kill a horse."

"You have that look. Captain, will you join us?" asked Yancy. Murrell shook his head, but he made a significant gesture to Slosson as Yancy drained his glass.

"Have a drink with me!" cried Slosson, giving way to drunken laughter.

"Don't you reckon you'll spite yo' appetite fo' breakfast, neighbor?" suggested Yancy.

"Do you mean you won't drink with me?" roared Slosson.

"The captain's dropped out and I 'low it's about time fo' these here festivities to come to an end. I'm thinking some of going to bed myself," said Yancy. He kept his eyes fixed on Murrell. He realized that if the latter could prevent it he was not to leave the bar. Murrell stood between him and the door; more than this, he stood between him and his rifle, which leaned against the wall in the far corner of the room. Slosson roared out a protest to his words. "That's all right, neighbor," retorted Yancy over his shoulder, "but I'm going to bed." He never shifted his glance from Murrell's face. Scowling now, the captain's eyes blazed back their challenge as he thrust his right hand under his coat. "Fair play—I don't know who you are, but I know what you want!" said Yancy, the light in his frank gray eyes deepening. Murrell laughed and took a forward step. At the same moment Slosson snatched up a heavy club from back of the bar and dealt Yancy a murderous blow. A single startled cry escaped the Scratch Hitler; he struck out wildly as he lurched toward Murrell, who drew his knife and drove it into his shoulder.

Groping wildly, Yancy reached his rifle and faced about. His scalp lay open where Slosson's treacherous blow had fallen and his face was covered with blood; even as his fingers stiffened they found the hammer, but Murrell, springing forward, kicked the gun out of his hands. Dashing the blood from his eyes, Yancy threw himself on Murrell. Then, as they staggered to and fro, Yancy dully bent on strangling his enemy, Slosson—whom the sight of blood had wonderfully sobered—rushed out from the bar and let loose a perfect torrent of blows with his club. Murrell felt the fingers that gripped him grow weak, and Yancy dropped heavily to the floor.

How long the boy slept he never knew, but he awoke with a start and a confused sense of things. He seemed to have heard a cry for help. But the tavern was very silent now. The distant murmur of voices and the shouts of laughter had ceased. He lifted himself up on his elbow and glanced from the window. The heavens were pale and gray. It was evidently very late, probably long after midnight but where was his Uncle Bob?

He sank back on his pillow intent and listening. What he had heard, what he still expected to hear, he could not have told, but he was sure he had been roused by a cry of some sort. A chilling terror that gripped him fast and would not let him go, mounted to his brain. Once he thought he heard cautious steps beyond his door. He could not be certain, yet he imagined the bull-necked landlord standing with his ear to some crack seeking to determine whether or not he slept. His thin little body grew rigid and a cold sweat started from him. He momentarily expected the latch to be lifted, then in the heavy silence he caught the sound of some stealthy movement beyond the lath and plaster partition, and an instant later an audible footfall. He heard the boards creak and give, as the person who had been standing before his door passed down the hall, down the stairs, and to the floor below.

Limp and shivering, he drew his scanty covering tight about him. In the silence that succeeded, he once more became aware of the tireless chorus of the frogs, the hooting of the owls, and the melancholy and oft-repeated call of the whippoorwill. But where was his Uncle Bob? Why didn't he come to bed? And whose was that cry for help he had heard? Memories of idle tales of men foully dealt with in these lonely taverns, of murderous landlords, and mysterious guests who were in league with them, flashed through his mind.

Murrell had followed them for this—and had killed his Uncle Bob, and he would be sent back to Bladen! The law had said that Bladen could have him and that his Uncle Bob must give him up. The law put men in prison—it hanged them sometimes—his Uncle Bob had told him all about it—by the neck with ropes until they were dead! Maybe they wouldn't send him back; maybe they would do with him what they had already done with his Uncle Bob; he wanted the open air, the earth under his feet, and the sky over his head. The four walls stifled him. He was not afraid of the night, he could run and hide in it—there were the woods and fields where he would be safe.

He slid from the bed, and for a long moment stood cold and shaking, his every sense on the alert. With infinite caution he got into his trousers and again paused to listen, since he feared his least movement might betray him. Reassured, he picked up his battered hat from the floor and inch by inch crept across the squeaking boards to the window. When the window was reached he paused once more to listen, but the quiet that was everywhere throughout the house gave him confidence. He straddled the low sill, and putting out his hand gripped the stock of his rifle and drew that ancient weapon toward him. Next he secured his pack, and was ready for flight.

Encumbered by his belongings, but with no mind to sacrifice them, he stepped out upon the shed and made his way down the slant of the roof to the eaves. He tossed his bundle to the ground and going down on his knees lowered his rifle, letting the muzzle fall lightly against the side of the shed as it left his hand, then he lay flat on his stomach and, feet first, wriggled out into space. When he could no longer preserve his balance, he gave himself a shove away from the eaves and dropped clear of the building.

As he recovered himself he was sure he heard a door open and close, and threw himself prone on the ground, where the black shadow cast by the tavern hid him. At the same moment two dark figures came from about a corner of the building. He could just distinguish that they carried some heavy burden between them and that they staggered as they moved. He heard Slosson curse drunkenly, and a whispered word from Murrell. The two men slowly crossed the truck patch, and the boy's glance followed them, his eyes starting from his head. Just at the mouth of the lane they paused and put down their burden; a few words spoken in a whisper passed between them and they began to drag some dark thing down the lane, their backs bent, their heads bowed and the thing they dragged bumping over the uneven ground.

They passed out of sight, and breathless and palsied, Hannibal crept about a corner of the tavern. He must be sure! The door of the bar stood open; the lamps were still burning, and the upturned chairs and a broken table told of the struggle that had taken place there. The boy rested his hand on the top step as he stared fearfully into the room. His palm came away with a great crimson splotch. But he was not satisfied yet. He must be sure—sure! He passed around the building as the men had done and crossed the truck patch to the mouth of the lane. Here he slid through the fence into the corn-field, and, well sheltered, worked his way down the rows. Presently he heard a distant sound—a splash—surely it was a splash—.

A little later the men came up the lane, to disappear in the direction of the tavern. Hannibal peered after them. His very terrors, while they wrenched and tortured him, gave him a desperate kind of courage. As the gloom hid the two men, he started forward again; he must know the meaning of that sound—that splash, if it was a splash. He reached the end of the cornfield, climbed the fence, and entered a deadening of slashed and mutilated timber. In the long wet grass he found where the men had dragged their burden. He reached down and swept his hand to and fro—once—twice—the third time his little palm came away red and discolored.

There was the first pale premonition of dawn in the sky, and as he hurried on the light grew, and the black trunks of trees detached themselves from the white mist that filled the woods and which the dawn made visible. There was light enough for him to see that he was following the trail left by the men; he could distinguish where the dew had been brushed from the long grass. Advancing still farther, he heard the clear splash of running water, an audible ripple that mounted into a silver cadence. Day was breaking now. The lifeless gray along the eastern horizon had changed to orange. Still following the trail, he emerged upon the bank of the Elk River, white like the woods with its ghostly night sweat.

The dull beat of the child's heart quickened as he gazed out on the swift current that was hurrying on with its dreadful secret. Then the full comprehension of his loss seemed to overwhelm him and he was utterly desolate. Sobs shook him, and he dropped on his knees, holding fast to the stock of his rifle.

"Uncle Bob—Uncle Bob, come back! Can't you come back!" he wailed miserably. Presently he staggered to his feet. Convulsive sobs still wrenched his little body. What was he to do? Those men—his Uncle Bob's murderers—would go to his room; they would find his empty bed and their search for him would begin! Not for anything would he have gone back through the corn-field or the lane to the road. He had the courage to go forward, but not to retrace his steps; and the river, deep and swift, barred his path. As he glanced about, he saw almost at his feet a dug-out, made from a single poplar log. It was secured to an overhanging branch by a length of wild grape-vine. With one last fearful look off across the deadening in the direction of the tavern, he crept down to the water's edge and entered the canoe. In a moment, he had it free from its lashing and the rude craft was bumping along the bank in spite of his best efforts with the paddle. Then a favoring current caught it and swept it out toward the center of the stream.

It was much too big and clumsy for him to control without the stream's help, though he labored doggedly with his paddle. Now he was broadside to the current, now he was being spun round and round, but always he was carried farther and farther from the spot where he had embarked. He passed about a bend; and a hundred yards beyond, about a second bend; then the stream opened up straight before him a half-mile of smooth running water. Far down it, at the point where the trees met in the unbroken line of the forest and the water seemed to vanish mysteriously, he could distinguish a black moving object; some ark or raft, doubtless.

In the smoother water of the long reach, Hannibal began to make head against the flood. The farther shore became the nearer, and finally he drove the bow of his canoe up on a bit of shelving bank, and seizing his pack and rifle, sprang ashore. Panting and exhausted, he paused just long enough to push the canoe out into the stream again, and then, with his rifle and pack in his hands, turned his small tear-stained face toward the wooded slope beyond. As he toiled up it in the wide silence of the dawn, a mournful wind burst out of the north, filling the air about him with withered leaves and the dead branches of trees.



CHAPTER VIII. ON THE RIVER

Betty stood under a dripping umbrella in the midst of a drenching downpour, her boxes and trunks forming a neat pyramid of respectable size beside her. She was somewhat perturbed in spirit, since they contained much elaborate finery all in the very latest eastern fashion, spoils that were the fruit of a heated correspondence with Tom, who hadn't seemed at all alive to the fact that Betty was nearly eighteen and in her own right a young woman of property. A tarpaulin had been thrown over the heap, and with one eye on it and the other on the stretch of yellow canal up which they were bringing the fast packet Pioneer, she was waiting impatiently to see her belongings transferred to a place of safety.

Just arrived by the four-horse coach that plyed regularly between Washington and Georgetown, she had found the long board platform beside the canal crowded with her fellow passengers, their number augmented by those who delight to share vicariously in travel and to whom the departure of a stage or boat was a matter of urgent interest requiring their presence, rain or shine. Suddenly she became aware of a tall, familiar figure moving through the crowd. It was Bruce Carrington. At the same moment he saw her, and with a casual air that quite deceived her, approached; and Betty, who had been feeling very lonely and very homesick, was somehow instantly comforted at sight of him. She welcomed him almost as a friend.

"You're leaving to-night?" he asked.

"Yes—isn't it miserable the way it rains? And why are they so slow—why don't they hurry with that boat?"

"It's in the last lock now," explained Carrington.

"My clothes will all be ruined," said Betty. He regarded the dress she wore with instant concern. "No—I mean the things in my trunks; this doesn't matter," and Betty nodded toward the pile under the steaming tarpaulin. Carrington's dark eyes opened with an expression of mild wonder. And so those trunks were full of clothes—Oh, Lord!—he looked down at the flushed, impatient face beside him with amusement.

"I'll see that they are taken care of," he said, for the boat was alongside the platform now; and gathering up Betty's hand luggage, he helped her aboard.

By the time they had reached Wheeling, Betty had quite parted with whatever superficial prejudice she might have had concerning river-men. This particular one was evidently a very nice river-man, an exception to his kind. She permitted him to assume the burden of her plans, and no longer scanned the pages of her Badger's and Porter's with a puckered brow. It reposed at the bottom of her satchel. He made choice of the steamer on which she should continue her journey, and thoughtfully chose The Naiad—a slow boat, with no reputation for speed to sustain. It meant two or three days longer on the river, but what of that? There would be no temptation in the engine-room to attach a casual wrench or so to the safety-valve as an offset to the builder's lack of confidence in his own boilers. He saw to it that her state-room was well aft—steamers had a trick of blowing up forward.

Ne had now reached a state of the utmost satisfaction with himself and the situation. Betty was friendly and charming. He walked with her, and he talked with her by the hour; and always he was being entangled deeper and deeper in the web of her attraction. "When alone he would pace the deck recalling every word she had spoken. There was that little air of high breeding which was Betty's that fascinated him. He had known something of the other sort, those who had arrived at prosperity with manners and speech that still reflected the meaner condition from which they had risen.

"I haven't a thing to offer her—this is plain madness of mine!" he kept telling himself, and then the expression of his face would become grim and determined. No more of the river for him—he'd get hold of some land and go to raising cotton; that was the way money was made.

Slow as The Naiad was, the days passed much too swiftly for him. When Memphis was reached their friendly intercourse would come to an end. There would be her brother, of whom she had occasionally spoken—he would be pretty certain to have the ideas of his class.

As for Betty, she liked this tall fellow who helped her through the fatigue of those long days, when there was only the unbroken sweep of the forest on either hand, with here and there a clearing where some outrageous soul was making a home for himself. The shores became duller, wilder, more uninteresting as they advanced, and then at last they entered the Mississippi, and she was almost home.

Betty was not unexcited by the prospect. She would be the mistress of the most splendid place in West Tennessee. She secretly aspired to be a brilliant hostess. She could remember when the doors of Belle Plain were open to whoever had the least claim to distinction—statesmen and speculators in land; men who were promoting those great schemes of improvement, canals and railroads; hard-featured heroes of the two wars with England—a diminishing group; the men of the modern army, the pathfinders, and Indian fighters, and sometimes a titled foreigner. She wondered if Tom had maintained the traditions of the place. She found that Carrington had heard of Belle Plain. He spoke of it with respect, but with a noticeable lack of enthusiasm, for how could he feel enthusiasm when he must begin his chase after fortune with bare hands?—he suffered acutely whenever it was mentioned. The days, like any other days, dwindled. The end of it all was close at hand. Another twenty-four hours and Carrington reflected there would only be good-by to say.

"We will reach New Madrid to-night," he told her. They were watching the river, under a flood of yellow moonlight.

"And then just another day—Oh, I can hardly wait!" cried Betty delightedly. "Soon I shall hope to see you at Belle Plain, Mr. Carrington," she added graciously.

"Thank you, your—your family—" he hesitated.

"There's only just Tom—he's my half-brother. My mother was left a widow when I was a baby. Later, some years after, she married Tom's father."

"Oh—then he's not even your half-brother?"

"He's no relation at all—and much older. When Tom's father died my mother made Tom, manager, and still later he was appointed my guardian."

"Then you own Belle Plain?" and Carrington sighed.

"Yes. You have never seen it?—it's right on the river, you know?" then Betty's face grew sober: "Tom's dreadfully queer—I expect he'll require a lot of managing!"

"I reckon you'll be equal to that!" said-Carrington, convinced of Betty's all-compelling charm.

"No, I'm not at all certain about Tom—I can see where we shall have serious differences; but then, I shan't have to struggle single-handed with him long; a cousin of my mother's is coming to Belle Plain to make her home with me—she'll make' him behave," and Betty laughed maliciously. "It's a great nuisance being a girl!"

Then Betty fell to watching for the lights at New Madrid, her elbows resting on the rail against which she was leaning, and the soft curve of her chin sunk in the palms of her hands. She wondered absently what Judith would have said of this river-man. She smiled a little dubiously. Judith had certainly vindicated the sincerity of her convictions regarding the importance of family, inasmuch as in marrying Ferris she had married her own second cousin. She nestled her chin a little closer in her palms. She remembered that they had differed seriously over Mr. Yancy's defiance, of the law as it was supposed to be lodged in the sacred person of Mr. Bladen's agent, the unfortunate Blount. Carrington, with his back against a stanchion, watched her discontentedly.

"You'll be mighty glad to have this over with, Miss Malroy—" he said at length, with a comprehensive sweep toward the river.

"Yes—shan't you?" and she opened her eyes questioningly.

"No," said Carrington with a short laugh, drawing a chair near hers and sitting down.

Betty, in surprise, gave him a quick look, and then as quickly glanced away from what she encountered in his eyes. Men were accustomed to talk sentiment to her, but she had hoped—well, she really had thought that he was, superior to this weakness. She had enjoyed the feeling that here was some one, big and strong and thoroughly masculine, with whom she could be friendly without—she took another look at him from under the fringe of her long lashes. He was so nice and considerate—and good looking—he was undeniably this last. It would be a pity! And she had already determined that Tom should invite him to Belle Plain. She didn't mind if he was a river-man—they could be friends, for clearly he was such an exception. Tom should be cordial to him. Betty stared before her, intently watching the river. As she looked, suddenly pale points of light appeared on a distant headland.

"Is that New Madrid?—Oh, is it, Mr. Carrington?"' she cried eagerly.

"I reckon so," but he did not alter his position.

"But you're not looking!"

"Yes, I am—I'm looking at you. I reckon you'll think me crazy, Miss Malroy-presumptuous and all that but I wish Memphis could be wiped off the map and that we could go on like this for ever!—no, not like this but together—you and I," he took a deep breath. Betty drew a little farther away, and looked at him reproachfully; and then she turned to the dancing lights far down the river. Finally she said slowly:

"I thought you were—different."

"I'm not," and Carrington's hand covered hers.

"Oh—you mustn't kiss my hand like that—"

"Dear—I'm just a man—and you didn't expect, did you, that I could see you this way day after day and not come to love you?" He rested his arm across the back of her chair and leaned toward her.

"No—no—" and Betty moved still farther away.

"Give me a chance to win your love, Betty!"

"You mustn't talk so—I am nothing to you—"

"Yes, you are. You're everything to me," said Carrington doggedly.

"I'm not—I won't be!" and Betty stamped her foot.

"You can't help it. I love you and that's all there is about it. I know I'm a fool to tell you now, Betty, but years wouldn't make any difference in my feeling; and I can't have you go, and perhaps never see you again, if I can help it. Betty—give me a chance—you don't hate me—"

"But I do—yes, I do—indeed—"

"I know you don't. Let me see you again and do what I can to make you care for me!" he implored. But he had a very indignant little aristocrat to deal with. She was angry with him, and angry with herself that in spite of herself his words moved her. She wouldn't have it so! Why, he wasn't even of her class—her kind! "Betty, you don't mean—" he faltered.

"I mean—I am extremely annoyed. I mean just what I say." Betty regarded him with wrathful blue eyes. It proved too much for Carrington. His arm, dropped about her shoulders.

"You shall love me—" She was powerless in his embrace. She felt his breath on her cheek, then he kissed her. Breathless and crimson, she struggled and pushed him from her. Suddenly his arms fell at his side; his face was white. "I was a brute to do that!—Betty, forgive me! I am sorry—no, I can't be sorry!"'

"How do you dare! I hope I may never see you again—I hate you—" said Betty furiously, tears in her eyes and her pulses still throbbing from his fierce caress.

"Do you mean that?" he asked slowly, rising.

"Yes—yes—a million times, yes!"

"I don't believe you—I can't—I won't!" They were alongside the New Madrid wharf now, and a certain young man who had been impatiently watching The Naiad's lights ever since they became visible crossed the gang-plank with a bound.

"Betty—why in the name of goodness did you ever, choose this tub?—everything on the river has passed it!" said the newcomer. Betty started up with a little cry of surprise and pleasure.

"Charley!"

Carrington stepped back. This must be the brother who had come up the river from Memphis to meet her—but her brother's name was Tom! He looked this stranger—this Charley—over with a hostile eye, offended by his good looks, his confident manner, in which he thought he detected an air of ownership, as if—certainly he was holding her hands longer than was necessary! Of course, other men were in love with her, such a radiant personality held its potent attraction for men, but for all that, she was going to belong to him—Carrington! She did like him; she had shown it in a hundred little ways during the last week, and he would give her up to no man—give her up?—there wasn't the least tie between them—except that kiss—and she was furious because of it. There was nothing for him to do but efface himself. He would go now, before the boat started—and an instant later, when Betty, remembering, turned to speak to him, his place by the rail was deserted.



CHAPTER IX. JUDGE SLOCUM PRICE

On that day Hannibal was haunted by the memory of what he had heard and seen at Slosson's tavern. More than this, there was his terrible sense of loss, and the grief he could not master, when his thin, little body was shaken by sobs. Marking the course of the road westward, he clung to the woods, where his movements were as stealthy as the very shadows themselves. He shunned the scattered farms and the infrequent settlements, for the fear was strong with him that he might be followed either by Murrell or Slosson. But as the dusk of evening crept across the land, the great woods, now peopled by strange shadows, sent him forth into the highroad. He was beginning to be very tired, and hunger smote him with fierce pangs, but back of it all was his sense of bitter loss, his desolation, and his loneliness.

"I couldn't forget Uncle Bob if I tried—" he told himself, with quivering lips, as he limped wearily along the dusty road, and the tears welled up and streaked his pinched face. Now before him he saw the scattered lights of a settlement. All his terrors, the terrors that grouped themselves about the idea of pursuit and capture, rushed back upon him, and in a panic he plunged into the black woods again.

But the distant lights intensified his loneliness. He had lived a whole day without food, a whole day without speech. He began to skirt the settlement, keeping well within the thick gloom of the woods, and presently, as he stumbled forward, he came to a small clearing in the center of which stood a log dwelling. The place seemed deserted. There was no sign of life, no light shone from the window, no smoke issued from the stick-and-mud chimney.

Tilted back in a chair by the door of this house a man was sleeping. The hoot of an owl from a near-by oak roused him. He yawned and stretched himself, thrusting out his fat legs and extending his great arms. Then becoming aware of the small figure which had stolen up the path as he slept and now stood before him in the uncertain light, he fell to rubbing his eyes with the knuckles of his plump hands. The pale night mist out of the silent depths of the forest had assumed shapes as strange.

"Who are you?" he demanded, and his voice rumbled thickly forth from his capacious chest. The very sound was sleek and unctuous.

"I'm Hannibal," said the small figure. He was meditating flight; he glanced over his shoulder toward the woods.

"No, you ain't. He's been dead a thousand years, more or less. Try again," recommended the man.

"I'm Hannibal Wayne Hazard," said the boy. The man quitted his chair.

"Well—I am glad to know you, Hannibal Wayne Hazard. I am Slocum Price—Judge Slocum Price, sometime major-general of militia and ex-member of congress, to mention a few of those honors my fellow countrymen have thrust upon me." He made a sweeping gesture with his two hands outspread and bowed ponderously.

The boy saw a man of sixty, whose gross and battered visage told its own story. There was a sparse white frost about his ears; and his eyes, pale blue and prominent, looked out from under beetling brows. He wore a shabby plum-colored coat and tight, drab breeches. About his fat neck was a black stock, with just a suggestion of soiled linen showing above it. His figure was corpulent and unwieldy.

The man saw a boy of perhaps ten, barefoot, and clothed in homespun shirt and trousers. On his head was a ruinous hat much too large for him, but which in some mysterious manner he contrived to keep from quite engulfing his small features, which were swollen and tear-stained. In his right hand he carried a bundle, while his left clutched the brown barrel of a long rifle.

"You don't belong in these parts, do you?" asked the judge, when he had completed his scrutiny.

"No, sir," answered the boy. He glanced off down the road, where lights were visible among the trees. "What town is that?" he added.

"Pleasantville—which is a lie—but I am neither sufficiently drunk nor sufficiently sober to cope with the possibilities your question offers. It is a task one should approach only after extraordinary preparation," and the sometime major-general of militia grinned benevolently.

"It's a town, ain't it?" asked Hannibal doubtfully. He scarcely understood this large, smiling gentleman who was so civilly given to speech with him, yet strangely enough he was not afraid of him, and his whole soul craved human companionship.

"It's got a name—but you'll excuse me, I'd much prefer not to tell you how I regard it—you're too young to hear. But stop a bit—have you so much as fifty cents about you?" and the judge's eyes narrowed to a slit above their folds of puffy flesh. Hannibal, keeping his glance fixed on the man's face, fell back a step. "I can't let you go if you are penniless—I can't do that!" cried the judge, with sudden vehemence. "You shall be my guest for the night. They're a pack of thieves at the tavern," he lowered his voice. "I know 'em, for they've plucked me!" To make sure of his prey, he rested a fat hand on the boy's shoulder and drew him gently but firmly into the shanty. As they crossed the threshold he kicked the door shut, then with flint and steel he made a light, and presently a candle was sputtering in his hands. He fitted it into the neck of a tall bottle, and as the light flared up the boy glanced about him.

The interior was mean enough, with its rough walls, dirt floor and black, cavernous fireplace. A rude clapboard table did duty as a desk, a fact made plain by a horn ink-well, a notary's seal, and a rack with a half-dozen quill pens. Above the desk was a shelf of books in worn calf bindings, and before it a rickety chair. A shakedown bed in one corner of the room was tastefully screened from the public gaze by a tattered quilt.

"Boy, don't be afraid. Look on me as a friend," urged the judge, who towered above him in the dim candle-light. "Here's comfort without ostentation. Don't tell me you prefer the tavern, with its corrupt associations!" Hannibal was silent, and the judge, after a brief moment of irresolution, threw open the door. Then he bent toward the small stranger, bringing his face close to the child's, while his thick lips wreathed themselves in a smile ingratiatingly genial. "You can't look me squarely in the eye and say you prefer the tavern to these scholarly surroundings?" he said banteringly.

"I reckon I'll be glad to stop," answered Hannibal. The judge clapped him playfully on the back.

"Such confidence is inspiring! Make yourself perfectly at home. Are you hungry?"

"Yes, sir. I ain't had much to eat to-day," replied Hannibal cautiously.

"I can offer you food then. What do you say to cold fish?" the judge smacked his lips to impart a relish to the idea. "I dare swear I can find you some corn bread into the bargain. Tea I haven't got. On the advice of my physician, I don't use it. What do you say—shall we light a fire and warm the fish?"

"I 'low I could eat it cold."

"No trouble in the world to start a fire. All we got to do is to go out, and pull a few palings off the fence," urged the judge.

"It will do all right just like it is," said Hannibal.

"Very good, then!" cried the judge gaily, and he began to assemble the dainties he had enumerated. "Here you are!" he cleared his throat impressively, while benignity shone from every feature of his face. "A moment since you allowed me to think that you were solvent to the extent of fifty cents—" Hannibal looked puzzled. The judge dealt him a friendly blow on the back, then stood off and regarded him with a glance of great jocularity, his plump knuckles on his hips and his arms akimbo. "I wonder"—and his eyes assumed a speculative squint "I wonder if you could be induced to make a temporary loan of that fifty cents? The sum involved is really such a ridiculous trifle I don't need to point out to you the absolute moral certainty of my returning it at an early date—say to-morrow morning; say to-morrow afternoon at the latest; say even the day after at the very outside. Meantime, you shall be my guest. The landlady's son has found my notarial seal an admirable plaything—she has had to lick the little devil twice for hooking it—my pens and stationery are at your disposal, should you desire to communicate to absent friends; you can have the run of my library!" the judge fairly trembled in his eagerness. It was not the loss of his money that Hannibal most feared, and the coin passed from his possession into his host's custody. As it dropped into the latter's great palm he was visibly moved. His moist, blue eyes became yet more watery, while his battered old face assumed an expression indicating deep inward satisfaction. "Thank you, my boy! This is one of those intrinsically trifling benefits which, conferred at the moment of acute need, touch the heart and tap the unfailing springs of human gratitude—I must step down to the tavern—when I return, please God, we shall know more of each other." While he was still speaking he had produced a jug from behind the quilt that screened his bed, and now, bareheaded, and with every indication of haste, took himself off into the night.

Left alone, Hannibal gravely seated himself at the table. What the judge's larder lacked in variety it more than made up for in quantity, and the boy was grateful for this fact. He was half famished, and the coarse, abundant food was of the sort to which he was accustomed. Presently he heard the judge's heavy, shuffling step as he came up the path from the road, and a moment later his gross bulk of body filled the doorway. Breathing hard and perspiring, the judge entered the shanty, but his eagerness, together with his shortness of breath, kept him silent until he had established himself in his chair beside the table, with the jug and a cracked glass at his elbow. Then, bland and smiling, he turned toward his guest.

"Will you join me?" he asked.

"No, sir. Please, I'd rather not," said Hannibal.

"Do you mean that you don't like good liquor?" demanded the judge. "Not even with sugar and a dash of water?—say, now, don't you like it that way, my boy?"

"I ain't learned to like it no ways," said Hannibal.

"You amaze me—well—well—the greater the joy to which you may reasonably aspire. The splendid possibilities of youth are yours. My tenderest regards, Hannibal!" and he nodded over the rim of the cracked glass his shaking hand had carried to his lips. Twice the glass was filled and emptied, and then again, his roving, watery eyes rested meditatively on the child, who sat very erect in his chair, with his brown hands crossed in his lap. "Personally, I can drink or not," explained the judge. "But I hope I am too much a man of the world to indulge in any intemperate display of principle." He proved the first clause of his proposition by again filling and emptying his glass. "Have you a father?" he asked suddenly. Hannibal shook his head. "A mother?" demanded the judge.

"They both of them done died years and years ago," answered the boy. "I can't tell you how long back it was, but I reckon I don't know much about it. I must have been a small child."

"Ho—a small child!" cried the judge, laughing. He cocked his head on one side and surveyed Hannibal Wayne Hazard with a glance of comic seriousness. "A small child and in God's name what do you call yourself now? To hear you talk one would think you had dabbled your feet in the Flood!"

"I'm most ten," said Hannibal, with dignity.

"I can well believe it," responded the judge. "And with this weight of years, where did you come from and how did you get here?"

"From across the mountains."

"Alone?"

"No, sir. Mr. Yancy fetched me—part way." The boy's voice broke when he spoke his Uncle Bob's name, and his eyes swam with tears, but the judge did not notice this.

"And where are you going?"

"To West Tennessee."

"Have you any friends there?"

"Yes, sir."

"You've money enough to see you through?" and what the judge intended for a smile of fatherly affection became a leer of infinite cunning.

"I got ten dollars."

"Ten dollars—" the judge smacked his lips once. "Ten dollars" he repeated, and smacked his lips twice. There was a brief silence, in which he seemed to give way to pleasant reveries.

From beyond the open door of the shanty came a multitude of night sounds. The moon had risen, and what had been a dusty country road was now a streak of silver in the hot light. The purple flush on the judge's face, where the dignity that belonged to age had gone down in wreck, deepened. The sparse, white frost above his ears was damp with sweat. He removed his stock, opened his shirt at the neck, and cast aside his coat; then he lighted a blackened pipe, filled his glass, and sank back in his chair. The long hours of darkness were all before him, and his senses clothed themselves in rich content. Once more his glance rested on the boy. Here, indeed, was a guest of whom one might make much and not err—he felt all the benevolence of his nature flow toward him. Ten dollars!

"Certainly the tavern would have been no place for you! Well, thank God, it wasn't necessary for you to go there. You are more than welcome here. I tell you, when you know this place as I know it, you'll regard every living soul here with suspicion. Keep 'em at arm's length!" he sank his voice to an impressive whisper. "In particular, I warn you against a certain Solomon Mahaffy. You'll see much of him; I haven't known how to rebuff the fellow without being rude—he sticks to me like my shadow. He's profited by my charity and he admires my conversation and affects my society, but don't tell him you have so much as a rusty copper, for he will neither rest nor eat nor sleep until he's plucked you—tell him nothing—leave him to me. I keep him—there—" the judge extended his fat hands, "at arm's length. I say to him metaphorically speaking—'so close, but no closer. I'll visit you when sick, I'll pray with you when dying, I'll chat with you, I'll eat with you, I'll smoke with you, and if need be, I'll drink with you—but be your intimate? Never! Why? Because be's a damned Yankee! These are the inextinguishable feelings of a gentleman. I am aware they are out of place in this age, but what's bred in the bone will show in the flesh. Who says it won't, is no gentleman himself and a liar as well! My place in the world was determined two or three hundred years ago, and my ancestors spat on such cattle as Mahaffy and they were flattered by the attention!" The judge, powerfully excited by his denunciation of the unfortunate Mahaffy, quitted his chair and, lurching somewhat as he did so, began to pace the floor.

"Take me for your example, boy! You may be poor, you may possibly be hungry you'll often be thirsty, but through it all you will remain that splendid thing—a gentleman! Lands, niggers, riches, luxury, I've had 'em all; I've sucked the good of 'em; they've colored my blood, they've gone into the fiber of my brain and body. Perhaps you'll contend that the old order is overthrown, that family has gone to the devil? You are right, and there's the pity of it! Where are the great names? A race of upstarts has taken their place—sons of nobody—nephews of nobody—cousins of nobody—I observe only deterioration in the trend of modern life. The social fabric is tottering—I can see it totter—" and he tottered himself as he said this.

The boy had watched him out of wide eyes, as ponderous and unwieldy he shuffled back and forth in the dim candlelight; now shaking his head and muttering, the judge dropped into his chair.

"Well, I'm an old man-the spectacle won't long offend me. I'll die presently. The Bench and Bar will review my services to the country, the militia will fire a few volleys at my graveside, here and there a flag will be at half-mast, and that will be the end—" He was so profoundly moved by the thought that he could not go on. His voice broke, and he buried his face in his arms. A sympathetic moisture had gathered in the child's eyes. He understood only a small part of what his host was saying, but realized that it had to do with death, and he had his own terrible acquaintance with death. He slipped from his chair and stole to the judge's side, and that gentleman felt a cool hand rest lightly on his arm.

"What?" he said, glancing up.

"I'm mighty sorry you're going to die," said the boy softly.

"Bless you, Hannibal!" cried the judge, looking wonderfully cheerful, despite his recent bitterness of spirit. "I'm not experiencing any of the pangs of mortality now. My dissolution ain't a matter of to-night or to-morrow—there's some life in Slocum Price yet, for all the rough usage, eh? I've had my fun—I could tell you a thing or two about that, if you had hair on your chin!" and the selfish lines of his face twisted themselves into an exceedingly knowing grin.

"You talked like you thought you were going to die right off," said Hannibal gravely, as he resumed his chair. The judge was touched. It had been more years than he cared to remember since he had launched a decent emotion in the breast of any human being. For a moment he was silent, struck with a sense of shame; then he said:

"You are sure you are not running away, Hannibal? I hope you know that boys should always tell the truth—that hell has its own especial terrors for the boy who lies? Now, if I thought the worst of you, I might esteem it my duty to investigate your story." The judge laid a fat forefinger against the side of his nose, and regarded him with drunken gravity. Hannibal shook with terror. This was what he had feared. "That's one aspect of the case. Now, on the other hand, I might draw up a legal instrument which could not fail to be of use to you on your travois, and would stop all questions. As for my fee, it would be trifling, when compared with the benefits I can see accruing to you."

"No, I ain't running away. I ain't got no one to run away from," said the boy chokingly. He was showing signs of fatigue. His head drooped and he met the judge's glance with tired, sleepy eyes. The latter looked at him and then said suddenly:

"I think you'd better go to bed."

"I reckon I had," agreed Hannibal, slipping from his chair.

"Well, take my bed back of the quilt. You'll find a hoe there. You can dig up the dirt under the shuck tick with it—which helps astonishingly. What would the world say if it could know that judge Slocum Price makes his bed with a hoe! There's Spartan hardihood!" but the boy, not knowing what was meant by Spartan hardihood, remained silent. "Nearing threescore years and ten, the allotted span as set down by the Psalmist—once man of fashion, soldier, statesman and lawgiver—and makes his bed with a hoe! What a history!" muttered the judge with weary melancholy, as one groping hand found the jug while the other found the glass. There was a pause, while he profited by this fortunate chance. "Well, take the bed," he resumed hospitably.

"I can sleep most anywhere. I ain't no ways particular," said Hannibal.

"I say, take the bed!" commanded the judge sternly. And Hannibal quickly retired behind the quilt. "Do you find it comfortable?" the judge asked, when the rustling of the shuck tick informed him that the child had lain down.

"Yes, sir," said the boy.

"Have you said your prayers?" inquired the judge.

"No, sir. I ain't said 'em yet."

"Well, say them now. Religion is as becoming in the young as it is respectable in the aged. I'll not disturb you to-night, for it is God's will that I should stay up and get very drunk."



CHAPTER X. BOON COMPANIONS

Some time later the judge was aware of a step on the path beyond his door, and glancing up, saw the tall figure of a man pause on his threshold. A whispered curse slipped from between his lips. Aloud he said:

"Is that you, Mr. Mahaffy?" He got no reply, but the tall figure, propelled by very long legs, stalked into the shanty and a pair of keen, restless eyes deeply set under a high, bald head were bent curiously upon him.

"I take it I'm intruding," the new-comer said sourly.

"Why should you think that, Solomon Mahaffy? When has my door been closed on you?" the judge asked, but there was a guilty deepening of the flush on his face. Mr. Mahaffy glanced at the jug, at the half-emptied glass within convenient reach of the judge's hand, lastly at the judge himself, on whose flame-colored visage his eyes rested longest.

"I've heard said there was honor among thieves," he remarked.

"I know of no one better fitted to offer an opinion on so delicate a point than just yourself, Mahaffy," said the judge, with a thick little ripple of laughter.

But Solomon Mahaffy's long face did not relax in its set expression.

"I saw your light," he explained, "but you seem to be raising first-rate hell all by yourself."

"Oh, be reasonable, Solomon. You'd gone down to the steamboat landing," said the judge plaintively. By way of answer, Mahaffy shot him a contemptuous glance. "Take a chair—do, Solomon!" entreated the judge.

"I don't force my society on any man, Mr. Price," said Mahaffy, with austere hostility of tone. The judge winced at the "Mr." That registered the extreme of Mahaffy's disfavor.

"You feel bitter about this, Solomon?" he said.

"I do," said Mahaffy, in a tone of utter finality.

"You'll feel better with three fingers of this trickling through your system," observed the judge, pushing a glass toward him.

"When did I ever sneak a jug into my shanty?" asked Mahaffy sternly, evidently conscious of entire rectitude in this matter.

"I deplore your choice of words, Solomon," said the judge. "You know damn well that if you'd been here I couldn't have got past your place with that jug! But let's deal with conditions. Here's the jug, with some liquor left in it—here's a glass. Now what more do you want?"

"Have I ever been caught like this?" demanded Mahaffy.

"No, you've invariably manifested the honorable disabilities of a gentleman. But don't set it all down to virtue. Maybe you haven't had the opportunity, maybe the temptation never came and found you weak and thirsty. Put away your sinful pride, Solomon—a sot like you has no business with the little niceties of selfrespect."

"Do I drink alone?" insisted Mahaffy doggedly.

"I never give you the chance," retorted his friend. Mr. Mahaffy drew near the table. "Sit down," urged the judge.

"I hope you feel mean?" said Mahaffy.

"If it's any satisfaction to you, I do," admitted the judge.

"You ought to." Mahaffy drew forward a chair. The judge filled his glass. But Mr. Mahaffy's lean face, with its long jaws and high cheek-bones, over which the sallow skin was tightly drawn, did not relax in its forbidding expression, even when he had tossed off his first glass.

"I love to see you in a perfectly natural attitude like that, Solomon, with your arm crooked. What's the news from the landing?"

Mahaffy brought his fist down on the table.

"I heard the boat churning away round back of the bend, then I saw the lights, and she tied up and they tossed off the freight. Then she churned away again and her lights got back of the trees on the bank. There was the lap of waves on the shore, and I was left with the half-dozen miserable loafers who'd crawled out to see the boat come in. That's the news six days a week!"

By the river had come the judge, tentatively hopeful, but at heart expecting nothing, therefore immune to disappointment and equipped for failure. By the river had come Mr. Mahaffy, as unfit as the judge himself, and for the same reason, but sour and bitter with the world, believing always in the possibility of some miracle of regeneration.

Pleasantville's weekly paper, The Genius of Liberty, had dwelt at length upon those distinguished services judge Slocum Price had rendered the nation in war and peace, the judge having graciously furnished an array of facts otherwise difficult of access. That he was drunk at the time had but added to the splendor of the narrative. He had placed his ripe wisdom, the talents he had so assiduously cultivated, at the services of his fellow citizens. He was prepared to represent them in any or all the courts. But he had remained undisturbed in his condition of preparedness; that erudite brain was unconcerned with any problem beyond financing his thirst at the tavern, where presently ingenuity, though it expressed itself with a silver tongue, failed him, and he realized that the river's spent floods had left him stranded with those other odds and ends of worthless drift that cumbered its sun-scorched mud banks.

Something of all this passed through his mind as he sat there sodden and dreamy, with the one fierce need of his nature quieted for the moment. He had been stranded before, many times, in those long years during which he had moved steadily toward a diminishing heritage; indeed, nothing that was evil could contain the shock of a new experience. He had fought and lost all his battles—bitter struggles to think of even now, after the lapse of years, and the little he had to tell of himself was an intricate mingling of truth and falsehood, grotesque exaggeration, purposeless mendacity.

He and Mahaffy had met exactly one month before, on the deck of the steamer from which they had been put ashore at the river landing two miles from Pleasantville. Mahaffy's historic era had begun just there. Apparently he had no past of which he could be brought to speak. He admitted having been born in Boston some sixty years before, and was a printer by trade; further than this, he had not revealed himself, drunk or sober.

At the judge's elbow Mr. Mahaffy changed his position with nervous suddenness. Then he folded his long arms.

"You asked if there was any news, Price; while we were waiting for the boat a raft tied up to the bank; the fellow aboard of it had a man he'd fished up out of the river, a man who'd been pretty well cut to pieces."

"Who was he?" asked the judge.

"Nobody knew, and he wasn't conscious. I shouldn't be surprised if he never opens his lips again. When the doctor had looked to his cuts, the fellow on the raft cast off and went on down the Elk."

It occurred to the judge that he himself had news to impart. He must account for the boy's presence.

"While you've been taking your whiff of life down at the steamboat landing, Mahaffy, I've been experiencing a most extraordinary coincidence." The judge paused. By a sullen glare in his deep-sunk eyes Mr. Mahaffy seemed to bid him go on. "Back east—" the judge jerked his thumb with an indefinite gesture "back east at my ancestral home—" Mahaffy snorted harshly. "You don't believe I had an ancestral home?—well, I had! It was of brick, sir, with eight Corinthian columns across the front, having a spacious paneled hall sixty feet long. I had the distinguished honor to entertain General Andrew Jackson there."

"Did you get those dimensions out of the jug?" inquiry Mahaffy, with a frightful bark that was intended for a sarcastic laugh.

"Sir, it is not in your province to judge me by my present degraded associates. Near the house I have described—my father's and his father's before him, and mine now—but for the unparalleled misfortunes which have pursued me—lived a family by the name of Hazard. And when I went to the war of '12—"

"What were you in that bloody time, a sutler?" inquired Mahaffy insultingly.

"No, sir—a colonel of infantry!—I say, when I went to the war, one of these Hazards accompanied me as my orderly. His grandson is back of that curtain now—asleep—in my bed!" Mahaffy put down his glass.

"You were like this once before," he said darkly. But at that instant the shuck tick rattled noisily at some movement of the sleeping boy. Mahaffy quitted his chair, and crossing the room, drew the quilt aside. A glance sufficed to assure him that in part, at least, the judge spoke the truth. He let the curtain fall into place and resumed his chair.

"He's an orphan, Solomon; a poor, friendless orphan. Another might have turned him away from his door—I didn't; I hadn't the heart to. I bespeak your sympathy for him."

"Who is he?" asked Mahaffy.

"Haven't I just told you?" said the judge reproachfully. Mahaffy laughed.

"You've told me something. Who is he?"

"His name is Hannibal Wayne Hazard. Wait until he wakes up and see if it isn't."

"Sure he isn't kin to you?" said Mahaffy.

"Not a drop of my blood flows in the veins of any living creature," declared the judge with melancholy impressiveness. He continued with deepening feeling, "All I shall leave to posterity is my fame."

"Speaking of posterity, which isn't present, Mr. Price, I'll say it is embarrassed by the attention," observed Mahaffy.

There was a long silence between them. Mr. Mahaffy drank, and when he did not drink he bit his under lip and studied the judge. This was always distressing to the latter gentleman. Mahaffy's silence he could never penetrate. What was back of it—judgment, criticism, disbelief—what? Or was it the silence of emptiness? Was Mahaffy dumb merely because he could think of nothing to say, or did his silence cloak his feelings-and what were his feelings? Did his meditations outrun his habitually insulting speech as he bit his under lip and glared at him? The judge always felt impelled to talk at such times, while Mahaffy, by that silence of his, seemed to weigh and condemn whatever he said.

The moon had slipped below the horizon. Pleasantville had long since gone to bed; it was only the judge's window that gave its light to the blackness of the night. There was a hoofbeat on the road. It came nearer and nearer, and presently sounded just beyond the door. Then it ceased, and a voice said:

"Hullo, there!" The judge scrambled to his feet, and taking up the candle, stepped, or rather staggered, into the yard. Mahaffy followed him.

"What's wanted?" asked the judge, as he lurched up to horse and rider, holding his candle aloft. The light showed a tail fellow mounted on a handsome bay horse. It was Murrell.

"Is there an inn hereabouts?" he asked.

"You'll find one down the road a ways," said Mahaffy. The judge said nothing. He was staring up at Murrell with drunken gravity.

"Have either of you gentlemen seen a boy go through here to-day? A boy about ten years old?" Murrell glanced from one to the other. Mr. Mahaffy's thin lips twisted themselves into a sarcastic smile. He turned to the judge, who spoke up quickly.

"Did he carry a bundle and rifle?" he asked. Murrell gave eager assent.

"Well," said the judge, "he stopped here along about four o'clock and asked his way to the nearest river landing." Murrell gathered up his reins, and then that fixed stare of the judge's seemed to arrest his attention.

"You'll know me again," he observed.

"Anywhere," said the judge.

"I hope that's a satisfaction to you," said Murrell.

"It ain't—none whatever," answered the judge promptly. "For I don't value you—I don't value you that much!" and he snapped his fingers to illustrate his meaning.



CHAPTER XI. THE ORATOR OF THE DAY

"Hannibal!" the judge's voice and manner were rather stern. "Hannibal, a man rode by here last night on a big bay horse. He said he was looking for a boy about ten years old—a boy with a bundle and rifle." There was an awful pause. Hannibal's heart stood still for a brief instant, then it began to beat with terrific thumps against his ribs. "Who was that man, Hannibal?"

"I—please, I don't know—" gasped the child.

"Hannibal, who was that man?" repeated the judge.

"It were Captain Murrell." The judge regarded him with a look of great steadiness. He saw his small face go white, he saw the look of abject terror in his eyes. The judge raised his fist and brought it down with a great crash on the table, so that the breakfast dishes leaped and rattled. "We don't know any boy ten years old with a rifle and bundle!" he said.

"Please—you won't let him take me away, judge I want to stop with you!" cried Hannibal. He slipped from his chair, and passing about the table, seized the judge by the hand. The judge was visibly affected.

"No!" he roared, with a great oath. "He shan't have you—I'll see him in the farthest corner of hell first! Is he kin to you?"

"No," said Hannibal.

"Took you to raise, did he—and abused you—infernal hypocrite!" cried the judge with righteous wrath.

"He tried to get me away from my Uncle Bob. He's been following us since we crossed the mountains."

"Where is your Uncle Bob?"

"He's dead." And the child began to weep bitterly. Much puzzled, the judge regarded him in silence for a moment, then bent and lifted him into his lap.

"There, my son—" he said soothingly. "Now you tell me when he died, and all about it."

"He were killed. It were only yesterday, and I can't forget him! I don't want to—but it hurts—it hurts terrible!" Hannibal buried his head in the judge's shoulder and sobbed aloud. Presently his small hands stole about the judge's neck, and that gentleman experienced a strange thrill of pleasure.

"Tell me how he died, Hannibal," he urged gently. In a voice broken by sobs the child began the story of their flight, a confused narrative, which the judge followed with many a puzzled shake of the head. But as he reached his climax—that cry he had heard at the tavern, the men in the lane with their burden—he became more and more coherent and his ideas clothed themselves in words of dreadful simplicity and directness. The judge shuddered. "Can such things be?" he murmured at last.

"You won't let him take me?"

"I never unsay my words," said the judge grandly. "With God's help I'll be the instrument for their destruction." He frowned with a preternatural severity. Eh—if he could turn a trick like that, it would pull him up! There would be no more jeers and laughter.

What credit and standing it would give him! His thoughts slipped along this fresh channel. What a prosecution he would conduct—what a whirlwind of eloquence he would loose! He began to breathe hard. His name should go from end to end of the state! No man could be great without opportunity—for years he had known this—but here was opportunity at last! Then he remembered what Mahaffy had told him of the man on the raft. This Slosson's tavern was probably on the upper waters of the Elk. Yancy had been thrown in the river and had been picked up in a dying condition. "Hannibal," he said, "Solomon Mahaffy, who was here last night, told me he saw down at the river landing, a man who had been fished up out of the Elk—a man who had been roughly handled."

"Were it my Uncle Bob?" cried Hannibal, lifting a swollen face to his.

"Dear lad, I don't know," said the judge sympathetically. "Some people on a raft had picked him up out of the river. He was unconscious and no one knew him. He was apparently a stranger in these parts."

"It were Uncle Bob! It were Uncle Bob—I know it were my Uncle Bob! I must go find him!" and Hannibal slipped from the judge's lap and ran for his rifle and bundle.

"Stop a bit!" cried the judge. "He was taken on past here, and he was badly injured. Now, if it was your Uncle Bob, he'll come back the moment he is able to travel. Meantime, you must remain under my protection while we investigate this man Slosson."

But alas—that thoroughfare which is supposed to be paved exclusively with good resolutions, had benefited greatly by Slocum Price's labors in the past, and he was destined to toil still in its up-keep. He borrowed the child's money and spent it, and if any sense of shame smote his torpid conscience, he hid it manfully. Not so Mr. Mahaffy; for while he profited by his friend's act, he told that gentleman just what he thought of him with insulting candor. On the eighth day there was sobriety for the pair. Deep gloom visited Mr. Mahaffy, and the judge was a prey to melancholy.

It was Saturday, and in Pleasantville a jail-raising was in progress. During all the years of its corporate dignity the village had never boasted any building where the evil-doer could be placed under restraint; hence had arisen its peculiar habit of dealing with crime; but a leading citizen had donated half an acre of ground lying midway between the town and the river landing as a site for the proposed structure, and the scattered population of the region had assembled for the raising. Nor was Pleasantville unprepared to make immediate use of the jail, since the sheriff had in custody a free negro who had knifed another free negro and was awaiting trial at the next term of court.

"We don't want to get there too early," explained the judge, as they quitted the cabin. "We want to miss the work, but be on hand for the celebration."

"I suppose we may confidently look to you to favor us with a few eloquent words?" said Mr. Mahaffy.

"And why not, Solomon?" asked the judge.

"Why not, indeed!" echoed Mr. Mahaffy.

The opportunity he craved was not denied him. The crowd was like most southwestern crowds of the period, and no sooner did the judge appear than there were clamorous demands for a speech. He cast a glance of triumph at Mahaffy, and nimbly mounted a convenient stump. He extolled the climate of middle Tennessee, the unsurpassed fertility of the soil; he touched on the future that awaited Pleasantville; he apostrophized the jail; this simple structure of logs in the shadow of the primeval woods was significant of their love of justice and order; it was a suitable place for the detention of a citizen of a great republic; it was no mediaeval dungeon, but a forest-embowered retreat where, barring mosquitoes and malaria, the party under restraint would be put to no needless hardship; he would have the occasional companionship of the gentlemanly sheriff; his friends, with such wise and proper restrictions as the law saw fit to impose, could come and impart the news of the day to him through the chinks of the logs.

"I understand you have dealt in a hasty fashion with one or two horse-thieves," he continued. "Also with a gambler who was put ashore here from a river packet and subsequently became involved in a dispute with a late citizen of this place touching the number of aces in a pack of cards. It is not for me to criticize! What I may term the spontaneous love of justice is the brightest heritage of a free people. It is this same commendable ability to acquit ourselves of our obligations that is making us the wonder of the world! But don't let us forget the law—of which it is an axiom, that it is not the severity of punishment, but the certainty of it, that holds the wrong-doer in check! With this safe and commodious asylum the plow line can remain the exclusive aid to agriculture. If a man murders, curb your natural impulse! Give him a fair trial, with eminent counsel!" The judge tried not to look self-conscious when he said this. "If he is found guilty, I still say, don't lynch him! Why? Because by your hasty act you deny the public the elevating and improving spectacle of a legal execution!" When the applause had died out, a lank countryman craning his neck for a sight of the sheriff, bawled out over the heads of the crowd:

"Where's your nigger? We want to put him in here!"

"I reckon he's gone fishin'. I never seen the beat of that nigger to go fishin'," said the sheriff.

"Whoop! Ain't you goin' to put him in here?" yelled the countryman.

"It's a mighty lonely spot for a nigger," said the sheriff doubtingly.

"Lonely? Well, suppose he ups and lopes out of this?"

"You don't know that nigger," rejoined the sheriff warmly. "He ain't missed a meal since I had him in custody. Just as regular as the clock strikes he's at the back door. Good habits—why, that darky is a lesson to most white folks!"

"I don't care a cuss about that nigger, but what's the use of building a jail if a body ain't goin' to use it?"

"Well, there's some sense in that," agreed the sheriff.

"There's a whole heap of sense in it!"

"I suggest"—the speaker was a young lawyer from the next county—"I suggest that a committee be appointed to wait on the nigger at the steamboat landing and acquaint him with the fact that with his assistance we wish completely to furnish the jail."

"I protest—" cried the judge. "I protest—" he repeated vigorously. "Pride of race forbids that I should be a party to the degradation of the best of civilization! Is your jail to be christened to its high office by a nigger? Is this to be the law's apotheosis? No, sir! No nigger is worthy the honor of being the first prisoner here!" This was a new and striking idea. The crowd regarded the judge admiringly. Certainly here was a man of refined feeling.

"That's just the way I feel about it," said the sheriff. "If I'd athought there was any call for him I wouldn't have let him go fishing, I'd have kept him about."

"Oh, let the nigger fish—he has powerful luck. What's he usin', Sheriff; worms or minnies?"

"Worms," said the sheriff shortly.

Presently the crowd drifted away in the direction of the tavern. Hannibal meantime had gone down to the river. He haunted its banks as though he expected to see his Uncle Bob appear any moment. The judge and Mahaffy had mingled with the others in the hope of free drinks, but in this hope there lurked the germ of a bitter disappointment. There was plenty of drinking, but they were not invited to join in this pleasing rite, and after a period of great mental anguish Mahaffy parted with the last stray coin in the pocket of his respectable black trousers, and while his flask was being filled the judge indulged in certain winsome gallantries with the fat landlady.

"La, Judge Price, how you do run on!" she said with a coquettish toss of her curls.

"That's the charm of you, ma'am," said the judge. He leaned across the bar and, sinking his voice to a husky whisper, asked, "Would it be perfectly convenient for you to extend me a limited credit?"

"Now, Judge Price, you know a heap better than to ask me that!" she answered, shaking her head.

"No offense, ma'am," said the judge, hiding his disappointment, and with Mahaffy he quitted the bar.

"Why don't you marry the old girl? You could drink yourself to death in six months," said Mahaffy. "That would be a speculation worth while—and while you live you could fondle those curls!"

"Maybe I'll be forced to it yet," responded the judge with gloomy pessimism.

With the filling of Mahaffy's flask the important event of the day was past, and both knew it was likely to retain its preeminence for a terrible and indefinite period; a thought that enriched their thirst as it increased their gravity while they were traversing the stretch of dusty road that lay between the cavern and the judge's shanty. When they had settled themselves in their chairs before the door, Mahaffy, who was notably jealous of his privileges, drew the cork from the flask and took the first pull at its contents. The judge counted the swallows as registered by that useful portion of Mahaffy's anatomy known as his Adam's apple. After a breathless interval, Mahaffy detached himself from the flask and civilly passing the cuff of his coat about its neck, handed it over to the judge. In the unbroken silence that succeeded the flask passed swiftly from hand to hand, at length Mahaffy held it up to the light. It was two-thirds empty, and a sigh stole from between his thin lips. The judge reached out a tremulous hand. He was only too familiar with his friend's distressing peculiarities.

"Not yet!" he begged thickly.

"Why not?" demanded Mahaffy fiercely. "Is it your liquor or mine?" He quitted his chair end stalked to the well where he filled the flask with water. Infinitely disgusted, the judge watched the sacrilege. Mahaffy resumed his chair and again the flask went its rounds.

"It ain't so bad," said the judge after a time, but with a noticeable lack of enthusiasm.

"Were you in shape to put anything better than water into it, Mr. Price?" The judge winced. He always winced at that "Mr."

"Well, I wouldn't serve myself such a trick as that," he said with decision. "When I take liquor, it's one thing; and when I want water, it's another."

"It is, indeed," agreed Mahaffy.

"I drink as much clear water as is good for a man of my constitution," said the judge combatively. "My talents are wasted here," he resumed, after a little pause. "I've brought them the blessings of the law, but what does it signify!"

"Why did you ever come here?" Mahaffy spoke sharply.

"I might ask the same question of you, and in the same offensive tone," said the judge.

"May I ask, not wishing to take a liberty, were you always the same old pauper you've been since I've known you?" inquired Mahaffy. The judge maintained a stony silence.

The heat deepened in the heart of the afternoon. The sun, a ball of fire, slipped back of the tree-tops. Thick shadows stole across the stretch of dusty road. Off in the distance there was the sound of cowbell. Slowly these came nearer and nearer—as the golden light slanted, sifting deeper and deeper into the woods.

They could see the crowd that came and went about the tavern, they caught the distant echo of its mirth.

"Common—quite common," said the judge with somber melancholy.

"I didn't see anything common," said Mahaffy sourly. "The drinks weren't common by a long sight."

"I referred to the gathering in its social aspect, Solomon," explained the judge; "the illiberal spirit that prevailed, which, I observe, did not escape you."

"Skunks!" said Mahaffy.

"Not a man present had the public spirit to set 'em up," lamented the judge. "They drank in pairs, and I'd blistered my throat at their damn jail-raising! What sort of a fizzle would it have been if I hadn't been on hand to impart distinction to the occasion?"

"I don't begrudge 'em their liquor," said Mahaffy with acid dignity.

"I do," interrupted the judge. "I hope it's poison to 'em.

"It will be in the long run, if it's any comfort to you to know it."

"It's no comfort, it's not near quick enough," said the judge relentlessly. The sudden noisy clamor of many voices, highpitched and excited, floated out to them under the hot sky. "I wonder—" began the judge, and paused as he saw the crowd stream into the road before the tavern. Then a cloud of dust enveloped it, a cloud of dust that came from the trampling of many pairs of feet, and that swept toward them, thick and impenetrable, and no higher than a tall man's head in the lifeless air. "I wonder if we missed anything," continued the judge, finishing what he had started to say.

The score or more of men were quite near, and the judge and Mahaffy made out the tall figure of the sheriff in the lead. And then the crowd, very excited, very dusty, very noisy and very hot, flowed into the judge's front yard. For a brief moment that gentleman fancied Pleasantville had awakened to a fitting sense of its obligation to him and that it was about to make amends for its churlish lack of hospitality. He rose from his chair, and with a splendid florid gesture, swept off his hat.