Westerfelt stood alone on the sidewalk. Everybody went to see Wambush locked up except Harriet and her mother. They instantly came out to Westerfelt. Harriet picked up a folded piece of letter paper.

"Did you drop this?" she asked.

He did not reply, but took the paper absently and thrust it into his coat pocket. It had fallen from Wambush's pocket. He was very white and leaned heavily against a sycamore-tree.

"Oh, he's cut your coat; look!" Harriet cried.

Still he did not speak. He looked down at the slit in the cloth and raised his hand towards it, but his arm fell limply and he swayed from side to side.

"Are you hurt?" asked Mrs. Floyd, anxiously.

"I think not," he said; "but maybe I am, a little."

Harriet opened his coat and screamed, "Oh, mother, he's cut! Look at the blood!"

He tried to button his coat, but could not use his fingers. "Only a scratch," he said.

"But your clothes are wet with blood," Harriet insisted, as she pointed to his trousers.

He stooped and felt them. They were damp and heavy. Then he raised his heel in his right boot, and let it down again.

"It's full," he said, with a sickly smile. "I reckon I have lost some blood. Why—why, I didn't feel it."

Martin Worthy, the storekeeper, ran across from the jail ahead of the others. Hearing Westerfelt's remark, he cried:

"My Lord! you must go inside an' lie down; fix a place, Miss Harriet, an' send fer a doctor, quick!"

Harriet ran into the house, and Mrs. Floyd and Worthy supported Westerfelt between them into a room adjoining the parlor. They made him lie on a bed, and Worthy opened his waistcoat and shirt.

"Good gracious, it's runnin' like a wet-weather spring," he said. "Have you sent fer a doctor?" he asked as Harriet came in.

"Yes; Dr. Lash, but he may not be at his office."

"Send for Dr. Wells," he ordered a man at the door. "That's right," he added to Harriet, who had knelt by the bed and was holding the lips of the wound together, "keep the cut closed as well as you kin! I'll go tell 'im to use my hoss."

As he went out there was a clatter of feet on the veranda. The people were returning from the jail. Westerfelt opened his eyes and looked towards the door.

"They'll crowd in here," said Harriet to her mother. "Shut the door; don't let anybody in except Mr. Bradley."

Mrs. Floyd closed the door in the face of the crowd, asking them to go outside, but they remained in the hall, silent and awed, waiting for news of the wounded man. Mrs. Floyd admitted Luke Bradley.

"My heavens, John, I had no idea he got such a clean sweep at you!" he said, as he approached the bed. "Ef I'd a-knowed this I'd 'a' killed the dirty scamp!"

"I'm all right," replied Westerfelt; "just a little loss of blood." But his voice was faint and his eyelids drooped despite his effort to keep them open. Worthy rapped at the door and was admitted.

"Doc Lash has rid out to Widow Treadwell's," he announced. "He's been sent fer, an' ort ter git heer before long. It'll take a hour to git Wells, even ef he's at home."

Harriet Floyd glanced at her mother when she heard this. Her knees ached and her fingers felt stiff and numb, but she dared not stir.

Once Westerfelt opened his eyes and looked down at her.

"Do I hurt you?" she asked, softly.

"Not a bit." He smiled, and his eyes lingered on her face till their lids dropped over them.



Chapter VII

Dr. Lash came a little earlier than he was expected. The wound was not really a fatal one, he said, but if Miss Harriet had not been so attentive and skilful in keeping the cut closed, the man would have bled to death.

Westerfelt dropped to sleep, and when he awoke it was night. A lamp, the light of which was softened by a pink shade, stood on a sewing-machine near the fireplace. At first he could not recall what had happened nor where he was, and he felt very weak and sleepy. After awhile, however, he became conscious of the fact that he was not alone. A slight figure was moving silently about the room, now at the fireplace, again at a table where some lint, bandages, and phials had been left. The figure approached his bed cautiously. It was Harriet Floyd. When she saw that he was awake, she started to move away, but he detained her.

"I'm a lot of trouble for a new boarder," he said, smiling. "This is my first day, and yet I've turned your house into a fortification and a hospital."

"You are not a bit of trouble; the doctor said let you sleep as much as possible."

"I don't need sleep; I've been hurt worse than this before."

She put her hand on his brow. "It'll make you feverish to talk, Mr. Westerfelt; go to sleep."

"Did they jail Wambush?"

"Yes."

"Toughest customer I ever tackled." He laughed, dryly.

She made no reply. She went to the fire and began stirring the contents of a three-legged pot on the coals. To see her better, he turned over on his side. The bed slats creaked.

"Oh!" she exclaimed, running to him, "you'll break the stitches, and bleed again. Don't move that way."

He raised the blanket and looked down at his wound.

"I reckon they are holding all right, though I did feel a little twinge."

"You have not had any dinner or supper," she went on. "Dr. Lash said if you wanted anything I might give you some gruel and milk. I've made it, and it is keeping warm at the fire. Will you take some?"

"No, I thank you; I can wait till breakfast. Then I'll set up at the table and eat a square meal; somehow, I'm not hungry. Wambush objected mightily to being jailed, didn't he?"

"You ought not to wait till breakfast," she said, looking at the fire; "you'd better let me give you some of this gruel."

"All right; you are the doctor."

She dipped up some of the gruel in a bowl, and, adding some milk to it, came back to him. But she was confronted by a difficulty. He could not eat gruel and milk from a spoon while lying on his back. He saw this, and put his hands on either side of him and started to sit up.

"Oh, don't!" she cried, setting the bowl on the floor and gently pushing him back on his pillow; "you must not!"

He laughed. "Just like a woman. You surely don't think I'm going to lie here for a week, like a sick cat, for such a little scratch. I've lost some blood, that's all." And before she could prevent it, he had drawn himself up and was smiling broadly.

"I can't look after sick folks," she said, in despair. "The doctor will blame me."

"I heard him say if you hadn't held my cut so well I'd have bled to death."

"Anybody else could have done it."

"Nobody else didn't."

"Do you want the gruel? Take it quick, and lie down again; you'll lose strength sitting up."

"You'll have to feed me," he said, opening his mouth. "I'm too blamed weak to sit up without propping with my hands, and they don't seem very good supports. Look how that one is wobbling."

She sat down on the edge of the bed, and without a word placed the bowl in her lap and her arm round him. Then neither spoke as she filled the spoon and held it to his lips. She felt him trying to steady his arms to keep his weight from her.

"It's really good," he said, as she filled the spoon the second time, "I had no idea I was so hungry; you say you made it?"

"Yes; there now, I'll have to wipe your chin; you ought not to talk when you are eating."

For several minutes neither spoke. He finished the bowl of gruel and lay down again.

"I feel as mean as a dog," he said, as she rose and drew the cover over him; "here I am being nursed by the very fellow's sweetheart I tried my level best to do up."

She turned and placed the bowl on the table, and then went to the fire.

"I heard you were his girl last night," he went on. "Well, I'm glad I didn't kill him. I wouldn't have tried in anything but self-defence, for even if he did use a gun and knife, when I had none, he's got bulldog pluck, and plenty of it. Do you know, I felt like mashing the head of that sheriff for beating him like he did."

She sat down before the fire, but soon rose again. "If I stay here," she said, abruptly, and rather sharply, "you'll keep talking, and not sleep at all. I'm going into the next room—the parlor. If you want anything, call me and I'll come."

A few minutes after she left him he fell asleep. She put a piece of wood on the fire in the next room and sat down before it. She had left the door of his room ajar, and a ray of light from his lamp fell across the dark carpet and dimly illuminated the room. The hours passed slowly. No one in the house was astir. No sound came from the outside save the dismal barking of a dog down the road. She was fatigued and almost asleep, when she was suddenly roused by a far-off shout.

"Whoopee! Whoopee!"

It seemed to come from the road leading down from the loftiest mountain peak. She held her breath and listened.

"Whoopee! Whoopee!" It was nearer. Then she heard the steady tramp of horses' hoofs. She rose and went to the window, moving softly, that her ear might not lose any of the sounds. She raised the window cautiously and looked out. The moon was shining brightly, and down the street beyond the livery-stable she saw a body of horsemen.

"Great Heavens!" she exclaimed; "it's the 'Whitecaps'!"

She drew back behind the curtains as the horsemen rode up to the hotel and stopped. There were twenty or more, and each wore a white cap, a white mask, and a white sheet over the body.

"Thar's whar the scrimmage tuck place," explained some one in a muffled voice, and a white figure pointed to the spot where Westerfelt and Wambush had fought. "We must hurry an' take 'im out, an' have it over."

Harriet Floyd heard some one breathing behind her. It was Westerfelt. His elbow touched her as he leaned towards the window and peered out. "Oh, it's you!" she cried. "Go back to bed, you—"

He did not seem to hear her. The moonlight fell on his face. It was ghastly pale. He suddenly drew back beside her to keep from being observed by the men outside. His lips moved, but they made no sound.

"Go back to bed," she repeated. She put out her hand and touched him, but she did not look at him, being unable to resist the fascination of the sight in the street.

"What do they want?" he whispered. He put his hand on an old-fashioned what-not behind him, and the shells and ornaments on it began to rattle.

"I don't know," she said; "don't let 'em see you; you couldn't do anything against so many. They are a band sworn to protect one another."

"His friends?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Ah, I see." He glanced at the two doors, one opening into the hall, the other into his room, and then he swayed and clutched the curtain.

She caught his arm and braced him up. "Oh, you must go lie down; you'll—"

A noise outside drew her back to the window. The band was crossing the street to the jail.

"What are they going to do?" He steadied himself, resting his hand on her shoulder, and looked through a pane above her head.

"To take Toot out."

"An' then he'll lead them, won't he?"

"I don't know! I reckon so—oh, I can't tell!" She faced him for an instant, a look of helpless indecision in her eyes; then she turned again to the window.

"I'll go slip on my coat," he said. "I—I'm cold. I'd better get ready. You see, he may want to—call me out. I wish I had a gun—or something."

She made no answer, and he went into his room. He turned up the lamp, but quickly lowered it again. He found his coat on a chair and put it on. He wondered if he were actually afraid. Surely he had never felt so before; perhaps his mind was not right—his wound and all his mental trouble had affected his nerves, and then a genuine thrill of horror went over him. Might not this be the particular form of punishment Providence had singled out for the murderer of Sally Dawson—might it not be the grewsome, belated answer to her mother's prayer?

Just then Harriet entered the room softly and turned his light down still lower.

"Stay back here," she said, her tone almost a command.

"Why?"

"If they get Toot out, it would be just like him to try to— You—you are not strong enough to get out of their way. Oh, I don't know what to do!" She went back to the window in the next room. He followed her, and stood by her side.

The white figures had dismounted at the jail. They paused at the gate a moment, then filed into the yard and stood at the door. The leader rapped on it loudly.

"Hello in thar, Tarpley Brown, show yorese'f!" he cried.

There was a silence for a moment. In the moonlight the body of men looked like a snowdrift against the jail. The same voice spoke again:

"Don't you keep us waitin' long, nuther, Tarp. You kin know what sort we are by our grave-clothes ef you'll take the trouble to peep out o' the winder."

"What do you-uns want?" It was the quavering voice of the jailer, from the wing of the house occupied by him and his family.

His voice roused a sleeping infant, and it began to cry. The cry was smothered by some one's hand over the child's mouth.

"You know what we-uns want," answered the leader. "We come after Toot Wambush; turn 'im out, ef you know what's good fer you."

"Gentlemen, I'm a sworn officer of the law, I—"

"Drap that! Open that cell door, ur we'll put daylight through you."

This was followed by the low, pleading voice of the jailer's wife, begging her husband to comply with the demand, and the wailing of two or three children.

"Wait, then!" yielded the jailer. Westerfelt heard a door slam and chains clank and rattle on the wooden floor; a bolt was slid back, the front door opened, and the white drift parted to receive a dark form.

"Whar's my hoss?" doggedly asked Toot Wambush.

"Out thar hitched to the fence," answered the leader.

"You-uns was a hell of a time comin'," retorted Wambush.

"Had to git together; most uv us never even heerd uv yore capture tell a hour by sun. Huh, you'd better thank yore stars we re'ched you when we did."

The band filed out of the gate and mounted their horses. Toot Wambush was a little in advance of the others. He suddenly turned his horse towards the hotel.

Westerfelt instinctively drew back behind the curtain, Harriet caught his arm and clung to it.

"Go to your room!" she whispered. "You'd better; you must not stay here." He seemed not to hear; he leaned forward and peered again through the window. The leader and Wambush had just reined their horses in at the edge of the sidewalk.

"Come on, Toot; whar you gwine?" asked the leader.

"I want to take that feller with us; I'll never budge 'thout him, you kin bet your bottom dollar on that."

"He's bad hurt—'bout ter die; don't be a fool!"

"Huh! Doc Lash sent me word he was safe. I didn't hurt 'im; but he did me; he damaged my feelings, and I want to pay 'im fer it. Are you fellers goin' back on me?"

"Not this chicken," a voice muttered, and a white form whipped his horse over to Wambush's. "I'm with you," said another. Then there was a clamor of voices, and all the gang gathered round Wambush. He chuckled and swore softly. "That's the stuff!" he said. "Them's Cohutta men a-talkin'; you kin bet yore sweet life."

Harriet turned to Westerfelt. "They are drinking," she said. "Haven't you got a pistol?"

"No."

"You stay here then; don't let them see you; I'm going up-stairs and speak to Toot from the veranda. It's the only chance. Sh!"

She did not wait for a reply, but opened the door noiselessly and went out into the hall. He heard the rustle of her skirts as she went up the stairs. A moment later the door leading to the veranda on the floor above opened with a creak, and she appeared over the heads of the band.

"Toot! Toot Wambush!" she called out in a clear, steady voice. "I want to speak to you!"

Wambush, in a spirit of bravado, had just ridden on to the veranda, and could hear nothing above the thunderous clatter of his horse's hoofs on the floor.

"Here, thar, you jail-bird, yore wanted!" cried out the leader. "Stop that infernal racket!"

"What is it?" asked Wambush, riding back among his fellows.

"Toot Wambush!" Harriet repeated.

He looked up at her. "What do you want?" he asked, doggedly, after gazing up at her steadily for a moment.

"Get away as fast as you can," she replied. "His wound has broke again. He's bleeding to death!"

"Well, that's certainly good news!" Wambush did not move.

"You'd better go," she urged. "It will be wilful murder. You made the attack. He was unarmed, and you used a pistol and a knife. Do you want to be hung?"

He sat on his horse silent and motionless, his face upraised in the full moonlight. There was no sound except the champing of bits, the creaking of saddles.

"Come on, Toot," urged the leader in a low tone. "You've settled yore man's hash; what more do you want? We've got you out o' jail, now let us put you whar you'll be safe from the law."

Wambush had not taken his eyes from the girl. He now spoke as if his words were meant for her only.

"If I go," he said, "will you come? Will you follow me? You know I'm not a-goin' to leave 'thout you, Harriet."

It seemed to Westerfelt that she hesitated before speaking, and at that moment a realization of what she had become to him and what she doubtless was to Wambush came upon him with such stunning force that he forgot even his peril in contemplating what seemed almost as bad as death.

"This is no time nor place to speak of such things," he heard the girl say, finally. "Go this minute and save yourself while you can."

"Hold on, Harriet!" Wambush cried out, as she was moving away. Westerfelt could no longer see her, and then he heard her close the door and start down-stairs.

"Come on, Toot"—the leader whipped his horse up against that of Wambush.

Some of the others had already started away.

Toot did not move. He was still looking at the spot where Harriet Floyd had stood.

"It simply means the halter, you blamed fool!"

Wambush stared into the mask of the speaker, and then reluctantly rode away.



Chapter VIII

When Harriet returned she found Westerfelt lying face downward on the floor. In his fall he had unconsciously clutched and torn down the curtain, and like a shroud it lay over him. She was trying to raise him, when the door opened and her mother appeared.

"What's the matter, Harriet?"

"He has fainted—I don't know, he may be dead. Look, mother!"

Mrs. Floyd raised Westerfelt's head and turned his face upward.

"No, he's still breathing." She opened his shirt hastily. "His wound has not broken; we must get him to bed again. How did he happen to be here?"

"He got up as soon as the Whitecaps came; I couldn't persuade him to go back."

"We must carry him to the bed," said Mrs. Floyd. As they started to raise him, Westerfelt opened his eyes, took a long breath, and sat up. Without a word he rose to his feet, and between them was supported back to his bed.

"His feet are like ice," said Mrs. Floyd, as she tucked the blankets round him. "Why did you let him stand there?"

"It wasn't her fault, Mrs. Floyd," explained Westerfelt, with chattering teeth. "I knew they meant trouble, and thought I ought to be ready."

"You ought to have stayed in bed." Her eyes followed Harriet to the fireplace. "No, daughter," she said, "go lie down; I'll stay here."

"I'd rather neither of you would sit up on my account," protested Westerfelt; "I'm all right; I'll sleep like a log till breakfast. I don't want to be such a bother."

"You ain't a bit of trouble," replied Mrs. Floyd, in a tone that was almost tender. "We are only glad to be able to help. When I saw that cowardly scamp draw his pistol and knife on you, I could 'a' killed him. I've often told Harriet—"

"Mother, Mr. Westerfelt doesn't care to hear anything about him." Harriet turned from the fire and abruptly left the room. Mrs. Floyd did not finish what she had started to say. Westerfelt looked at her questioningly and then closed his eyes. She went to the fireplace and laid a stick of wood across the andirons, and then sat down and hooded her head with a shawl.

When Westerfelt awoke it was early dawn. The outlines of the room and the different objects in it were indistinct. At the foot of his bed he noticed something which resembled a heap of clothing on a chair. He looked at it steadily, wondering if it could be part of the strange dreams which had beset him in sleep. As the room gradually became lighter, he saw that it was a woman. Mrs. Floyd, he thought—but no, the figure was slighter. It was Harriet. She had taken her mother's place just before daybreak. Her head hung down, but she was not asleep. Presently she looked up, and catching his eyes, rose and came to him.

"How do you feel now?" She touched his forehead with her soft, cool hand.

"I'm all right; I'll be up to breakfast."

"No, you won't; you must not; it would kill you."

"Pshaw! That pin-scratch?" He playfully struck his breast near the wound. "He'd have to cut deeper and rip wider to do me up."

She stifled a cry and caught his hand.

"You must not be so foolish." She started to turn away, but his fingers closed over hers.

"I'm sorry. I'll mind what you say, because you've been so good to me. It seems mighty queer—Toot Wambush's girl takin' care of the very man he tried to wipe off of the face of creation. No wonder he—"

She twisted her hand from his clasp. "Why do you say I'm his girl?"

"Because they all do, I reckon; ain't you? Last night I heard him ask you to follow him."

"You never heard me say I would, did you?"

"No, but—"

"Well, then!" She went to the fireplace. He could not see her, but heard her stirring the fire with a poker, and wondered if her movement was that of anger or agitation, For several minutes neither of them spoke; then she came to him suddenly.

"I forgot," she said; "here's a newspaper and a letter. Will Washburn left them for you." She gave them to him and went to the window and raised the shade, flooding the room with the soft yellowing light from the east. Then she resumed her seat at the fire.

He opened his letter. The handwriting was very crude, and he did not remember having seen it before. Looking at the bottom of the last page, he saw that it was signed by Sue Dawson—Sally Dawson's mother. It was not dated, and began without heading of any kind. It ran thus:

"So you left this place fur new pastures. But I Will be sworn you went off cause you could not see the sun ashinin on my Childs grave nor meet her old broke down mother face to face. I have wanted to meet you ever since she died, but I helt in. The reason I sent you word not to come to the Funeral was cause I knowed ef I saw you thar I would jump right up before the people and drag you with yore yaller Pumpkin face full of gilt right up to her Box an make you look at yore work. It was not out of respect fur yore feelings that I did not, nuther, fur I dont respect you as much as I do a decent egg-suckin dog, but I was afraid folks would suspicion the pore Child's secret, the secret that me an you an nobody else knows, that she took her own life to git out of the misery you put her in. She did not want them to know, an they shall not; besides, thar are Folks in this cussed Settlement mean enough to begrudge her the grave Lot she has becase of what she was driv to.

"Thar is one thing I want you to stop. I dont want you to hire Peter Slogan with Blood money, nur nobody else, to haul wood fur me. I knowed you did send a load, fur he is too lazy to think of anybody but hisself without thar was money in it. I accused him of it after I had toted the last Stick back to yore land whar he got it. He tried to deny it, but I saw the lie in his face an shamed it. Dont you bother about me. I will live a powerful sight longer than you want me to before I am through with You. You will never forgit how Sally died, ef you did not look at her pore little face in death nur help the neighbors fill her grave up.

"John Westerfelt, you killed my Child as deliberately as ef you had choked the life out of her with yore Bare hands. You hung after her night and Day, even after she had been cautioned that you was fickle, an then when you got her whole soul an hart you deliberately left her an begun flyin around Liz Lithicum. I know yore sort. It is the runnin after a thing that amuses you, an as soon as you get it you turn agin it an spurn it under foot an laugh at it when it strugles in pain. Lawsy me. God Almighty dont inflict good men with that Disease, but you will have it nawin at yore Hart tel you run across some huzzy that will rule you her way. Beware, John Westerfelt, you will want to marry before long; you are a lonely, selfish Man, an you will want a wife an childern to keep you company an make you forget yore evil ways, but it is my constant prayer that you will never git one that loves you. I am prayin for that very thing and I believe it will come. John Westerfelt, I am yore Enemy—I am that ef it drags me into the Scorchin flames of hell.

"SUE DAWSON."

He refolded the letter, put it with quivering fingers back into its envelope, and then opened the newspaper and held it before his eyes. There was a clatter of dishes and pans in the back part of the house. A negro woman was out in the wood-yard, picking up chips and singing a low camp-meeting hymn. Now and then some one would tramp over the resounding floor, through the hall to the dining-room.

Harriet went to the door and closed it. Then she turned to him. The paper had slipped from his fingers and lay across his breast.

"What shall I get for your breakfast?" she asked. She moved round on the other side of the bed, wondering if it was the yellow morning light or his physical weakness that gave his face such a depressed, ghastly look.

"What did you say?" He stared at her absently.

"What would you like for breakfast?"

He looked towards his coat that hung on the foot of his bed.

"Don't bother about me; I'm going to get up."

"No, you must not." She caught his wrist. "Look how you are quivering; you ought not to have tried to read."

He raised the paper again, but it shook so that its rustling might have been heard across the room. She took it from him, and laid it on a chair by the bed. She looked away; the corners of his mouth were drawn down piteously and his lips were twitching.

"Please hand me my coat," he said.

"You are not going to get up?" She sat down on the bed and put her hand on his brow. Her face was soft and pleading. It held a sweetness, a womanly strength he longed to lean upon.

He caught her hand and held it nervously.

"I don't believe I've got a single friend on earth," he said. "I don't deserve any; I'm a bad man."

"Don't talk that way," she replied. There was something in his plaintive tone that seemed to touch her deeply, for she took his hand in both of hers and pressed it.

"I don't want to die, for your sake," he said, "for if I was to go under, it would be awkward for your—your friend. He might really have to swing for it."

She released his hand suddenly, a pained look in her face. "Did you want to put your letter in your coat pocket?" she asked.

"Yes."

She took the coat from a chair, gave it to him, and then went back to the fireplace. He thrust his hand into the pocket and took out Sally Dawson's last letter, and put it and her mother's into the same envelope. As he was putting them away he found in the same pocket a folded sheet of paper. He opened it. It was a letter from John Wambush to his son Toot. Then Westerfelt remembered the paper Harriet had picked up and given him in the street after the fight. Hardly knowing why he did so, he read it. It was as follows:

"DEAR TOOT,—Me an yore mother is miserable about you. We have prayed for yore reform day and night, but the Lord seems to have turned a deef ear to our petitions. We hardly ever see you now an we are afraid you are goin to git into serious trouble. We want you to give up moonshinin, quit drinkin an settle down. We both think if you would jest git you a good wife you would act better. I wish you would go an marry that girl at the hotel—you know who I mean. I am as sorry for her as I ever was for anybody, for she dont think you love her much. She told me all about it the night the revenue men give you sech a close shave. I was standin on the hotel porch when you driv the wagon up with the whiskey barrel on it an I heerd them a-lopin along the road after you. I thought it was all up with you for I knowed they could go faster than you. Then I seed her run out on the back porch an help you roll the whiskey in the kitchen an close the door. An when the officers com up you was a-settin on the empty wagon talkin to her as if nothin had happened. I heard all the lies she told em about seein another wagon go whizzin down the road an I thought it was a great pity for her to do it, but she was doin it for a man she loved an I wouldent hold that agin her. A woman that loves as hard as she does would do a sight wuss than that if it was necessary. After you loaded the whiskey back on the wagon and got away to the woods, I went round an told her what I had seed an she bust out cryin an throwed her arms round my neck an said she loved you better than she did her own life an that she never would love any other man as long as breeth was in her body. Son, that night she come as nigh beggin me to git you to marry her as a proud girl could, an when I left I promised her I would talk to you about it. She's a good girl, Toot, and it would make a man of you to marry her. I like her mighty well an so does yore mother. Please do come out home soon. It looks like a pity for you to be away so much when it worries yore ma like it does.

"Yore affectionate father,

"JOHN WAMBUSH."

Westerfelt folded the letter deliberately, and then in a sudden spasm of jealous despair he crumpled it in his hand. He turned his head on the side and pressed down his pillow that he might see Harriet as she sat by the fire. The red firelight shone in her face. She looked tired and troubled.

"Poor girl!" he murmured. "Poor girl! Oh, God, have mercy on me! She loves him—she loves him!"

She looked up and caught his eyes. "Did you want anything?" she asked.

He gave the letter to her. "Burn it, please. I wish I had not read it."

She took it to the fire. The light of the blazing paper flashed on the walls, and then went out.

He remained so silent that she thought he was sleeping, but when she rose to leave the room she caught his glance, so full of dumb misery that her heart sank. She went to her mother in the kitchen. Mrs. Floyd was polishing a pile of knives and forks, and did not look up until Harriet spoke.

"Mother," she said, "I am afraid something has gone wrong with Mr. Westerfelt."

"What do you mean?" asked the old lady in alarm.

"I don't know, but he got a letter this morning, and after he read it he seemed changed and out of heart. He gave it to me to burn, and I never saw such a desperate look on a human face. I know it was the letter, because before he read it he was so—so different."

"Well," said Mrs. Floyd, "it may be only some business matter that's troubling him. Men have all sorts of things to worry about. As for me, I've made a discovery, Harriet, at least I think I have."

"Why, mother!"

Mrs. Floyd put the knives and forks into the knife-box.

"Hettie Fergusson was here just now," she said.

"This early!" exclaimed Harriet, incredulously. "Why, mother, where did she spend the night?"

"At home; that's the curious part about it; she has walked all that three miles since daylight, if she didn't get up before and start through the dark. I never could understand that girl. All the time she was working here she puzzled me. She was so absent-minded, and would jump and scream almost when the door would open. I am glad we didn't need her help any longer. Sometimes I wish she had never come to the hotel."

Harriet stared wonderingly at her mother; then she said:

"Did she want to help us again?"

Mrs. Floyd laughed significantly.

"That's what she pretended she wanted, but she didn't have no more idea of working here than I have of flying through the air at this minute. Harriet, she is dead crazy in love with Toot Wambush. That is the truth about it."

"Why, mother, I can't believe it!" cried Harriet, her brow wrinkling in perplexity. "He hardly ever went with her or talked to her."

"He took her out home with him in a buggy six or seven times to my knowledge," declared Mrs. Floyd, "and there's no telling how often he saw her at home. He is awfully thick with her father. I never was fooled in a woman; she is in love with him, and right now she is worried to death about him. She couldn't hide her anxiety, and asked a good many round-about questions about where he was gone to, and if we knew whether the sheriff was hunting for him now, and if we thought Mr. Westerfelt would prosecute him."

Harriet laughed. "Well, I never dreamt there was a thing between those two. When he asked her to go with him in his buggy out home, I thought it was because she lived on the road to his father's, and that he just did it to accommodate her, and—"

"Oh, I've no doubt that is what he did it for, darling, but she was falling in love with him all the time, and now that he is in trouble, she can't hide it. Do you know her conduct this morning has set me to thinking? The night you and I spent over at Joe Long's I heard Wambush came very near being arrested with a barrel of whiskey he was taking to town, and that he managed to throw the officers off his track while he was talking to Hettie in our back yard. Do you know it ain't a bit unlikely that she helped him play that trick somehow? They say he was laughing down at the store after that about how he gave them the slip. I'll bet she helped him."

"If she is in love with him she did, I reckon," returned Harriet, wisely. "I wish he was in love with her. He is getting entirely too troublesome."

"He'll never care a snap for her as long as you are alive," retorted the old lady. "I'm sorry now that I ever let you go with him so much. He seems to be getting more and more determined to make you marry him whether or no. He is jealous of Mr. Westerfelt." Mrs. Floyd lowered her voice. "If he hadn't been, he wouldn't have fought him as he did. That is at the bottom of it, daughter, and now that he is a regular outlaw I am awfully uneasy. If I ever get a chance, I'm going to convince him that it is useless for him to worry you as he does. I'd rather see you in your grave than married to a man like that."



Chapter IX

It was a week before John Westerfelt was strong enough to leave his room in the hotel. Inflammation of his wound had set in, and at one time his condition was thought to be quite critical.

One day Luke Bradley came in his buggy to drive him out to his house.

"Marthy won't heer to a refusal," he said. "She's powerful' troubled. She 'lowed ef we'd 'a' made you stay with us you'd not 'a' been apt to 'a' met Wambush that day, an' 'a' been laid up like this. She's jest dyin' to git to cook things fer you an' doctor you up."

"I'll go and stay a day, anyway," promised Westerfelt. He glanced at Harriet Floyd, who stood behind the curtains looking out of the window. "I don't need any finer treatment than I've had, Luke. Miss Harriet's been better than a sister to me. She saved my life the other night, too. If she hadn't interfered that gang would have nabbed me as sure as preaching, and I was unarmed and too weak to stand rough handling."

Harriet came from the window. She took the roll of blankets that Bradley had brought and held one of them before the fire.

"It's chilly out to-day," she said. "You'd better wrap him up well, Mr. Bradley."

Bradley did not reply. He heard a noise outside, and went out hastily to see if his horse was standing where he had left him. Westerfelt dragged himself from his chair and stood in front of the fire. He had grown thinner during his confinement, and his clothes hung loosely on him.

"You have been good to me," he repeated, in a low tone, "and I wish I could do something to pay you back." She said nothing. She bent over and felt the blanket to see if it were scorching, and then turned the other side to the fire.

"Mrs. Bradley is a fine nurse," she said, presently. "She'll take good care of you. Besides, she has a better claim on you than we—mother and I—have; she has known you longer."

"I'll tell you the truth," he answered, after studying her face for a moment in silence. "I'd really be willing to get hurt over again for an excuse to live here like I have. I am the loneliest man that was ever born—lonely is no name for it. In the dead hours of the night I suffer agonies—you see, I am not a good sleeper. I have been as near insanity as any man that ever lived out of an asylum. But I have been mighty nearly free from all that since you began to nurse me. I wish to God it could go on forever—forever, do you understand?—but it can't—it can't. I have my troubles and you have yours—that is," he added, quickly, as she shot a sudden glance of inquiry at him, "I reckon you have troubles, most girls do."

"Yes, I have my troubles, Mr. Westerfelt," she said, simply. "Sometimes I think I cannot bear mine, but I do."

He said nothing, but his eyes were upon her almost with a look of fear. Was she about to tell him frankly of her love for Wambush?

She rolled up one of the blankets and put it on the rug in front of the fire, and held up another to be warmed. He thought he had never seen a face so full of sweet, suffering tenderness. His heart bounded suddenly with a thought so full of joy that he could hardly breathe. She had driven the outlaw from her heart and already loved him; she had learned to love him since he had been there. He could see it, feel it in her every tender word and act, and he—God knew he loved her—loved her with his whole wearied soul. Then the thought of her appeal to old John Wambush and the lies she had told that night to save her lover struck him like a blow in the face, and he felt himself turning cold all over in the embrace of utter despair. "No, no, no!" he said, in his heart, "she's not for me! I could never forget that—never! I've always felt that the woman I loved must never have loved before, and Wambush—ugh!"

She raised her great eyes to his in the mellow firelight, and then, as if puzzled by his expression, calmly studied his face.

"You are not going back to that room over the stable, are you?" she questioned.

"Yes, to-morrow night."

"Don't do it—it is not comfortable; it is awfully roomy and bare and cold."

"Oh, I am used to that. Many a time I've slept out in the open air on a frosty night, with nothing round me but a blanket."

"You could occupy this room whenever it suited you; it is seldom used. I heard mother say yesterday that she wished you would."

"I'd better stay there," he answered, moved again by her irresistible solicitude, and that other thing in her tone to which he had laid claim and hugged to his bruised heart. He felt an almost uncontrollable desire to raise her in his arms, to unbosom his anguish to her, and propose that they both fight their battles of forgetfulness side by side, but he shrank from it. The thought of Wambush was again upon him like some rasping soul-irritant.

"No, no; I'm going back to the stable," he said, fiercely. "I will not stay here any longer—not a day longer!"

He saw her start, and then she put down the blanket and stood up. "I do not understand you at all, sometimes" she faltered, "not at all."

"But I understand you, God knows," he returned, bitterly. "Harriet, little, suffering, wronged woman, I know something about you. I know what has been worrying you so much since I came here."

She started and an awful look crept into her face.

"Oh, Mr. Westerfelt, do you?"

"Yes, I know it—that's enough now; let's agree never again to speak of it. I don't want to talk about it, and I reckon you don't. Anyway, it can't be helped."

"No, it can't be helped." Her lips began to twitch and quiver, and her eyes went down.

"I understand it all now," she added. "And I don't blame you. I told mother yesterday that I thought you might suspect—"

"Your mother knows then?"

"Yes, of course," raising her eyes in surprise.

For a moment they were silent. Westerfelt leaned against the mantel-piece; he had never felt such utter despair. It was like being slowly tortured to death to hear her speaking so frankly of the thing which he had never been able to contemplate with calmness.

"So you see now that I'd better go back to the stable, don't you?" he asked, gloomily.

"I suppose so," she said. "I suppose you mean that—" but she was unable to formulate what lay in her confused mind. Besides, Luke Bradley was coming in. They heard his heavy tread on the veranda.

"Well, come on, John, ef you are ready," he called out. "That blamed nag o' mine won't stand still a minute."

When Westerfelt had been driven away, and Harriet had watched him out of sight down the road, she came back to the fire and sat down in the chair Westerfelt had used during his convalescence. She kept her eyes fixed on the coals till her mother entered the room.

"I reckon he thought funny that I didn't come in to tell him good-bye," she said, with a knowing little laugh; "but I'll be bound he was glad I didn't. Even Mr. Bradley had the good sense to go outside."

"Mother, what are you talking about?"

"You know mighty well what I mean," returned Mrs. Floyd, with a smile. "I know Mr. Westerfelt is dead in love with you, and goodness knows you couldn't fool me about how you feel if you tried. I was a girl once."

"Mother," said Harriet, "I never want you to mention him to me again," and she put her hands over her face and began to cry softly.

"Why, what is the matter, dear?" the old woman sat down near her daughter, now alarmed by her conduct. Harriet stared her mother in the face. "He knows all about it, mother—he knows I am not your child, that nobody knows where I came from. Oh, mother, I can't stand it—I simply cannot. I wanted him to know, and yet when he told me he knew, it nearly killed me."

Mrs. Floyd turned pale. "There must be some mistake," she said; "no one here knows it—and only one or two up in Tennessee."

"There is no mistake," sighed the girl. "He told me the other day that he had relatives in Tennessee. Oh, mother, more people know it than you think. I have always felt that they knew. So many have noticed that you and I do not look alike."

Mrs. Floyd's eyes were moist and her face was wrung with sympathy. She put her arms around the girl and drew her to her breast. "I ought never to have told you," she said; "but the lawyers knew it, and when your papa's estate was wound up it had to be told to a few. I thought you would soon forget it, but you have never stopped thinking about it. You are entirely too sensitive, too—"

"Mother, you don't know anything about it," said Harriet. "When you told me I was not your child I actually prayed to die. It has been the only real trouble I ever had. I never see poor, worthless people without thinking that I may be closely related to them, and since Mr. Westerfelt has been here and told me about his aristocratic relatives and his old family, I have been more unhappy than ever. I was going to tell him some day, but he saved me the trouble."

"I can't imagine how he knew it," gave in Mrs. Floyd, thoughtfully. "Perhaps he has had some dealings with our lawyers, though they promised not to speak of it. I thought when we moved down here among strangers you'd quit troubling about that. You know you are as good as anybody else, so what is the good of worrying? You make me very unhappy, Harriet. I feel almost as if I did wrong to bring you up. But you know I love you just the same as if you was my own child, don't you?"

"Yes, and I love you as if you were my own mother. I love you more, too, when I am in trouble, though I reckon I don't show it; but, mother, I am dying to know something about my own flesh and blood. I'd rather know that my blood was good than have all the wealth of the earth. You have let enough out to show me that I must have had very, very poor parents."

"I simply said that when they left you at my house you had on rather cheap clothing, but you know that was just after the war, when nobody could dress their children much."

"But they deserted me," said Harriet; "they could not have been very honorable. I reckon Mr. Westerfelt knows all about it."

"Well, he won't think any the less of you if he does," said Mrs. Floyd. "He looks like a born gentleman to me. You will never see a man like him turning against a girl for something she can't help. You ought not to say your parents were not honorable; they may have left you, thinking it would be best for you. We were considered pretty well off then."

Harriet made no reply for several minutes, and then she said:

"I think Mr. Westerfelt is the best man I ever knew, but he must be like his father some, and he told me that his father, who was a captain in the army, refused to ever see his daughter again who married the son of his overseer. She moved to Texas, and died out there. Mother, the legitimate daughter of an overseer would stand higher in any Southern community than—" At this point a sob broke in her voice, and the girl could go no further. Mrs. Floyd rose and kissed her on the cheek. "I see," she said, "that as long as you keep talking about this you will search and search for something to worry about. I'm glad Mr. Westerfelt knows about it, though, for he would have to be told some day, and now he knows what to count on. I'll bet you anything he keeps on loving you, and—"

"Oh, mother," broke in Harriet, "I don't think he lo—cares that much for me; I really do not."



Chapter X

"By George!" exclaimed Bradley, as they drove away, "you certainly lit on your feet when you struck that house. It looks like it 'ud pay you to git stabbed every day in the week; it's paid the community, the Lord knows, fer it is shet of the biggest dare-devil that wus ever in it. The ol' lady seems to have about as bad a case on you as the gal. I've been thar a time or two to ax about you, an' I never seed the like o' stirrin' round fixin' things they 'lowed would suit yore taste."

"They have been mighty good to me, indeed," answered the young man, simply. "I don't think I could have had such thoughtful attention, even at home."

"I don't like fer anything to puzzle me," said Luke, with a little laugh, "an' I'll swear Miss Harriet's a riddle. I would a-swore on the stand a week ago that she wus as big a fool about Wambush as a woman kin git to be, but now—well, I reckon she's jest like the rest. Let the feller they keer fer git a black eye an' have bad luck, an' they'll sidle up to the fust good-lookin' cuss they come across. A man that reads novels to git his marryin' knowledge frum is in pore business; besides the book hain't writ that could explain a woman unless it is the Great Book, an' it wouldn't fit no woman o' this day an' time."

"You think, then, Luke," said Westerfelt, "that a good woman—a real good woman—could love twice in—in a short space of time?"

"Gewhillikins! What a question; they kin love a hundred times before you kin say Jack Robinson with yore mouth open. When you git married, John, you must make up your mind that yo're marryin' fer some'n else besides dern foolishness. The Bible says the prime intention of the business wus to increase an' multiply; ef you an' yore wife ever git to multiplyin', you an' her won't find much time to suck thumbs an' talk love an' pick flowers an' press 'em in books an' the like. Folks may say what they damn please about women lovin' the most; it's the feller mighty nigh ever' whack that acts the fool. I was plumb crazy about Marthy, an' used to be afeerd she wus so fur gone on me that she wouldn't take a sufficient supply o' victuals to keep up 'er strength. That wus when I was courtin' of 'er an' losin' sleep, an' one thing or other. After we wus married, though, me an' 'er mother come to words one day about a shoat pig she claimed had her mark on its yeer an' was penned up with mine, an' she up an' told me out o' spite that the very night before me 'n' Marthy got married, Ward Billingsley wus thar at the house tryin' to get 'er to run off with him, an' that Marthy come as nigh as pease a-doin' of it. Her maw said she'd a-gone as shore as preachin' ef she'd a-had a dress fitten to take the trip on the train in. I reckon it wus every word the truth, fer to this day Marthy won't deny it; but it don't make a bit of difference to me now. Marthy would a-done as well by Ward as she did by me, I reckon. When women once git married they come down to hard-pan like a kickin' mule when it gits broke to traces."

Westerfelt drew the blankets closer about him. The road had taken a sharp turn round the side of a little hill, and the breeze from the wide reach of level valley lands was keen and piercing. Bradley's volubility jarred on him. It brought an obnoxious person back, and roughly, into the warm memory of Harriet Floyd's presence, and gentle, selfless tenderness. He ground his teeth in agony. He had just been debating in his mind the possibility of his being, in consideration of his own mistakes, able to take the girl, in her new love, into his heart and hold her there forever, but if she loved Wambush, as, of course, she once did, might she not later love some other man—or might she not even think—remember—Wambush?

"Great God!" He uttered the words aloud, and Bradley turned upon him in surprise.

"What's the matter?"

"Nothing," said Westerfelt; "my wound twinged just a little, that is all."

"I was driving too fast over these rocks anyway," said Bradley, solicitously.

The horse stopped at a clear mountain stream that leaped in a succession of waterfalls down the sheer hill-side into the valley. Bradley got out to loosen the bridle to allow the animal to drink, and stood with one foot on the shore and the other on a brown stone in the water. Try as he would, Westerfelt could not banish Harriet from his mind. Her sweet personality seemed to be trying to defend itself against the unworthy thoughts which fought for supremacy in his mind. He thought of her wonderful care of him in his illness; her unfailing tenderness and sympathy when he was suffering; her tears—yes, he was sure he had detected tears in her eyes one day when the doctor was giving him unusual pain in dressing his wound. Ah, how sweet that was to remember! and yet the same creature had loved a man no higher than Wambush; had even sobbed out a confession of her love in the arms of his father. Such was the woman, but he loved her with the first real love of his life.

The next day but one, Westerfelt, feeling sufficiently strong, was driven by Washburn down to the livery-stable, where he sat in the warm sunshine against the side of the house. While sitting there watching the roads which led down to the village from the mountains, he was surprised to see Peter Slogan ride up on his bony bay horse and alight.

"Howdy' do, John?" he said. "I wus jest passin' on my way home an' thought I'd halt an' ax about that cut o' yore'n."

"Oh, I'm doing pretty well, Peter," answered Westerfelt, as he extended his hand without rising. "But I didn't know that you ever got this far from home."

"Hain't once before, since I went to fight the Yanks," grinned Slogan. "Seems to me I've rid four hundred an' forty-two miles on that churndasher thar. My legs is one solid sore streak from my heels up, an' now it's beginnin' to attact my spine-bone. I'm too ol' an' stiff to bear down right in the stirrups, I reckon."

"What has brought you over here?" asked Westerfelt, with a smile.

Slogan took out his clay pipe with its cane stem and knocked it on the heel of his boot, then he put it into his mouth and blew through it till the liquid nicotine cracked audibly. "I've been huntin'," he said, dryly. "In my day an' time I've been on all sorts o' hunts, from bear an' deer down to yaller-hammers, but I waited till I wus in my sixty-fifth year—goin' on sixty-six—'fore I started out huntin' fer a dad-blasted woman."

"A woman!" exclaimed the listener.

"You could guess who it wus ef you'd make a stab ur two at it," Slogan made answer, as he scratched a match and began to smoke. "Day before yesterday Clariss' went out in the yard to rake up a apron o' chips, an' happened to take notice that thar wusn't a sign o' smoke comin' out o' the old woman's chimney. It was cold enough to freeze hard boiled eggs, an' she 'lowed some'n had gone wrong down at the cabin, so she run in whar I wus, skeerd into kinniptions. 'Mr. Slogan,' sez she, 'I believe sister's friz in 'er bed, ur dropped off sudden, fer as shore as yore a-smokin' in that cheer, thar ain't a speck o' fire in 'er chimney.' Well, I wus in my stockin' feet, like I ginerally am when I want to take it easy before a fire on a cold day, an' I slid my feet into my shoes as quick as I could an' went out an' took a look. Shore enough, thar wusn't a bit o' smoke about the cabin. So I tol' Clariss' to run down an' see what wus wrong, but she wouldn't budge out o' her tracks. You see, she ain't never felt right about the way she used to do the old woman, an' I reckon she wus afeerd her dead body would do a sight more accusin'—I dunno, she wouldn't go a step fer some reason ur other, but she stood thar twistin' 'er hands an' cryin' an' beggin' me to do her duty. I tol' 'er the last time I wus thar the ol' huzzy wouldn't so much as notice me, an' that I'd had 'nough trouble lookin' atter my own pore kin without galivantin' about atter my kin by a' unfortunate marriage, but nothin' would do 'er but fer me to go, so I did, an' found the old woman had run clean off. Well, when I told Clariss' that, she mighty nigh had a fit. She swore she had driv her sister desperate by her conduct in the past an' that 'er body would be found as stiff as a bar o' iron in the woods some'rs whar she wus tryin' to keep warm. So the long an' short of it wus that me 'n' my hoss had to start out."

"And you have found her?" asked the young man, now thoroughly concerned.

"You bet I did, after scourin' the entire face of creation. I traced 'er frum one old acquaintance to another, till last night I run up on 'er over at Bill Wyman's, ten miles down the valley. It was ten o'clock when I got thar, an' as cold as a cake o' ice in the small o' yore back. I called Bill out in his shift on the porch. I was mighty nigh friz, an' I reckon he soon got that away, fer he kept dancin' about fust on one foot an' then on another, while we talked. He admitted she wus thar, but he wouldn't let me stay all night, although I offered to plank down the usual price fer man an' beast. She'd been talkin' to him, I could see that, fer he up an' said some'n about folks bein' churched in his settlement fer the mistreatment o' widows, but he'd admit, he said, that he wusn't posted on the manners an' customs uv all the places over beyant the mount'in; he reckoned the nigher people got to the railroad the furder they wus from the cross. I tried to reason with 'im, but he said ef I wanted to argue my case, I'd better come round in the summer.

"Thar wusn't any other house nigher'n six miles, an' so I made me a fire in a little cove by the road, an' set over it an' thought, mostly about women, all night. I've heerd preachers say a man oughtn't to think too much about women anyway, but I reckon I backslid last night, fer I thought hard about mighty nigh ever' woman I ever seed or heerd of."

"How has Mrs. Dawson been getting on since I left?" ventured Westerfelt.

"Just about as bad as she knowed how, I reckon, John. After you left, she seemed to take 'er spite out on Lizzie Lithicum. Liz never could pass anywhar nigh 'er without havin' the old cat laugh out loud at 'er. Liz has been goin' with that cock-eyed Joe Webb a good deal—you know he's jest about the porest ketch anywhars about, an' that seemed to tickle Mis' Dawson mightily. I reckon somebody told 'er some'n Liz said away back when you fust started to fly around 'er. I axed Clem Dill ef he knowed anything about it, an' Clem 'lowed Liz had kind o' made fun o' Sally about you gittin' tired uv 'er, an' one thing ur other. I dunno; I cayn't keep up with sech things. I jest try to find 'em out once in awhile because Clariss' is sech a hand to want to know. When she gits to rantin' about anythin' I've done—ur hain't done—all I got to do to shet 'er up is to start to tell 'er some'n somebody's has said about somebody else, an' she gits 'er cheer. So I try to keep a stock o' things on hand. Clem Dill's afeerd o' Mis' Dawson now. I was in the store one day about a week ago, an' she come in to swap a pair o' wool socks she had knit fer coffee, an' Clem 'lowed, jest to pass the time, while he wus at the scales, he'd ax 'er what ailed her an' Lizzie, anyway. But I reckon Clem has quit axin' fool questions, fer she turned on 'im like a tiger-cat. Sez she:

"'Liz Lithicum dared to say my child made a fool o' herse'f about John Westerfelt. That's exactly what Liz an' other folks sez about yore wife. I don't see what right you have to ax me sech a question.' Well, sir, Clem was so much set back 'at he couldn't hardly speak, an' he spilled a scoop o' coffee on the counter 'fore he could get it into the old woman's poke. After she had gone out, laughin' in her sneakin' way, Clem come back whar I wus at by the stove an' set down an' spit about two dozen times. Arter 'while he axed me ef I'd ever heerd the talk about his wife, an' I eased him all I could, but, lawsy me, you ort ter see 'im hop up an' bow an' scrape when old Sue comes in the store now. Clem ain't a jealous man—I reckon he's been married too long for that. In my courtin' days I used to be jealous actually of Clariss's own daddy, but now I make a habit o' invitin' the preacher to our house every third Sunday so I kin git a decent meal an' set an' smoke in the kitchen. John, you don't seem to be any nigher marryin' now than you wus awhile back."

Westerfelt smiled, but made no reply.

"Well, you'd better keep on a-thinkin' it over," counselled Slogan, as he took the saddle and blanket from his horse and examined a rubbed spot on the animal's back; "thar's a heap more fun marryin' in a body's mind than before a preacher; the law don't allow a feller but one sort of a wife, but a single man kin live alone, an' fancy he's got any kind he wants, an' then she won't be eternally a-yellin' to 'im to fetch in fire-wood. A young feller kin make a woman a sight more perfect than the Creator ever did, an' He's had a sight o' practice. I reckon the Lord made 'em like they are to keep men humble and contrite an' to show up to advantage His best work on t'other shore. But so long, John, I must be goin'."



Chapter XI

It was a dark night two weeks later. Westerfelt, quite recovered from his illness, was returning from a long ride through the mountains, where he had been in search of a horse that had strayed from the stable.

The road along the mountain-side was narrow and difficult to follow. At times he was obliged to ascend places so steep that he had to hold to the mane of his horse to keep from falling off.

At the foot of a mountain about two miles from Cartwright, he heard voices ahead of him. He stopped, peered through the foliage, and, a few paces farther on, saw a wagon containing a couple of barrels. Near it stood two men in slouched hats and jeans clothing.

"Thought shore I heerd some'n," said one of them.

"Which away?" asked the other.

"Sounded to me like a hoss up on the mount'in."

There was a silence for a moment, then the first voice said:

"No, not that away. Listen! It's somebody comin' up the road on foot. I reckon it's a friend, but I don't take no resks."

The two men stepped quickly to the wagon and took out a couple of rifles. Then they stood motionless behind the wagon and horse. Westerfelt heard the regular step of some one coming up the road.

"Hello thar!" cried one of the men at the wagon.

"Hello!" was the answer.

"Stand in yore tracks! What's the password?"

"Joe Dill's good 'nough pass-word fer me; I don't try to keep up with all the pop-doodle you fellers git up."

"Joe Dill will do in this case, bein' as yore a good liquor customer. What'll you have, Joseph?"

"A gallon o' mash—this jug jest holds that amount up to the neck. Gi'me a swallow in a cup, I'm as dry as powder. What do you-uns mean by bein' in the business ef you cayn't send out a load oftener'n this? I'll start to 'stillin' myse'f. I know how the dang truck's made; nothin' but corn-meal an' water left standin' till it rots, an'—"

"Revenue men's as thick through heer as flies in summer-time," broke in the man at the faucet. "Sh! what's that?"

Westerfelt's horse had stepped on a dry twig. There was silence for a moment, then Dill laughed softly.

"Nothin' but a acorn drappin'. You fellers is afeerd o' yore shadders; what does the gang mean by sendin' out sech white-livered chaps?" The only sound for a moment was the gurgling of the whiskey as it ran into the jug. "How's Toot like his isolation?" concluded Dill, grunting as he lifted the jug down from the wagon.

"It's made a wuss devil 'n ever out'n 'im," was the answer. "He don't do a blessed thing now but plot an' plan fer revenge. He's beginnin' to think that hotel gal's gone back on 'im an' tuk to likin' the feller he fit that day. My Lord, that man'll see the day he'll wish he'd never laid eyes on Wambush."

"I hain't in entire sympathy with Toot." It was Dill's voice. "That is to say, not entire!"

"Well, don't say so, ef you know what's good fer you."

"Oh, it's a free country, I reckon."

"Don't you believe it!"

"What's Toot gwine to do?"

"I don't know, but he'll hatch out some'n."

Westerfelt's horse had been standing on the side of a little slope, and the soft earth suddenly gave way beneath his hind feet, and in regaining a firm footing he made a considerable noise. There was nothing now for Westerfelt to do but to put a bold face on the matter.

"Get up," he said, guiding his horse down towards the men.

"Halt!" commanded one of the moonshiners. All three of them were now huddled behind the wagon.

"Hello!" answered Westerfelt, drawing rein; "I'm lookin' for an iron gray, flea-bitten horse that strayed away from the livery-stable this morning; have you fellows seen anything of him?"

"No, I hain't." This in a dogged tone from a slouched hat just above a whiskey barrel.

There was a pause.

"I don't think anybody could have taken him," continued Westerfelt, pleasantly.

"Hain't seed 'im." The speaker struck the wagon-bed with his rifle as he was trying to put it down behind the barrels without being seen.

"The left hand road leads to town, I believe?" said Westerfelt, riding away.

"Yes, but take the right at the next fork."

About half a mile farther on he saw two horsemen, approaching. When quite near they stopped.

"Howdy' do?" said one, eying Westerfelt suspiciously.

"How are you?" answered Westerfelt.

"We are revenue men; we're after a couple o' men and a wagon loaded with whiskey. Seen anything of them?"

Westerfelt was silent. The revenue officer who had spoken rested his elbow on his thigh and leaned towards him.

"Looky' here," he said, deliberately; "we don't know one another, but there may be no harm in tellin' you if you try to throw us off the track you lay yoreself liable to complicity. We've had about as much o' that sort o' treatment round heer as we are going to put up with."

"I'm not on the witness-stand," said Westerfelt, pleasantly; "I'm only looking for a stray horse."

"Let's go on," said the other Officer to his companion. "We are on the right road; he's seed 'em ur he'd a-denied it. Let's not lose time."

"I'm with you," was the reply; then to Westerfelt: "You are right, you hain't on the witness-stand, but ef we wanted to we could mighty easy arrest you on suspicion and march you back to jail to be questioned by the inspectors."

Westerfelt smiled, "You'd have to feed me at the expense of the government, and I'm as hungry as a bear; I've been out all day, and haven't had a bite since breakfast."

The revenue men laughed. "We know who you are," said the one that had spoken first, "an' we know our business, too; so long!"

Two hours later, as Westerfelt was about to go to bed in his room over the stable, he heard a voice calling down-stairs. He went to the window and looked out. Below he saw four men, two saddle horses, and a horse and wagon. He heard Washburn open the office door and ask:

"What do you folks want?"

"Want to put up our beasts an' this hoss an' wagon," was the reply. "We've got some gentlemen heer we're gwine to jail till mornin'."

"All right. I'll slide open the doors as soon as I git my shoes on. I wus in bed."

"We'll have to leave these barrels o' rotgut with you."

"All right. Plenty o' room." Westerfelt came down-stairs just as Washburn opened the big doors.

"Hello!" said the revenue officer who had addressed him on the mountain; "you see we made quick time; we found 'em right whar you left 'em."

"I see."

Washburn, who was under the skirt of a saddle unbuckling a girth, glanced at Westerfelt in surprise as he lifted the saddle from the horse and carried it into the stable. The two moonshiners exchanged quick glances and sullenly muttered something to each other. Westerfelt, intent on getting the business over that he might go to bed, failed to observe these proceedings. When the officers had taken their prisoners on towards the jail, Washburn, who, with a lantern, was putting the horses into stalls, turned to Westerfelt.

"My Lord! Mr. Westerfelt," he said, "I hope you didn't give them fellers away."

"Never dreamt of such a thing. What do you mean?"

"I 'lowed you had by what that feller said just now."

"What did he say?"

"Why, he said they'd ketched the men right whar you left 'em, an'—"

"Well, what of that?" Westerfelt spoke impatiently. "I did pass the whiskey wagon. The revenue men asked me if I'd seen them, and I simply refused to answer. They didn't get anything out of me."

"That's just what I'd 'a' done, but I wish you'd 'a' set yorese'f right jest now, fer them fellers certainly think you give 'em away, an' they'll tell the gang about it."

"Well, I didn't, so what does it matter?"

Washburn took out the bowl of his lantern and extinguished the light as they entered the office.

"It makes a man mighty unpopular in the Cohutta Valley to interfere with the moonshiners," he answered. "Whiskey-makin' is agin the law, but many a family gits its livin' out o' the stuff, an' a few good citizens keep the'r eyes shet to it. You see, Mr. Westerfelt, the gang may be a little down on you anyway sence your difficulty with Wambush. Did you know that he wus a sort of a ring-leader amongst 'em?"

"Yes."

"Well, you mark my word, that feller'd swear his chances of heaven away to turn them mount'in men agin you."

"Most of them are good-hearted fellows" replied Westerfelt. "They won't harm me."

Washburn sat down on his bed, pulled off his shoes, and dropped them on the puncheon floor.

"But he's got the'r ear, an' you hain't, Mr. Westerfelt. He'd grab at a chance like this an' you'd never be able to disprove anything. Toot's got some unprincipled friends that 'ud go any length to help him in rascality."

The next morning before the revenue men had left with their prisoners and the confiscated whiskey for the town where the trial before an inspector was to take place, a number of mountaineers had gathered in the village. They stood about the streets in mysterious groups and spoke in undertones, and now and then a man would go to the jail window and confer with the prisoners through the bars. Several men had been summoned to attend the trial as witnesses, and others went out of curiosity or friendship for the accused.

That evening, as John Westerfelt was passing through the hall of the hotel to the dining-room, he met Harriet Floyd. She started when she saw him, and he thought she acted as if she wanted to speak to him, but just then some other boarders entered, and she turned from him abruptly. She sat opposite him at the table a few moments later, but she did not look in his direction.

On his return to the stable after supper, Washburn gave him a letter. He recognized Sue Dawson's handwriting on the envelope.

"Is it a order?" asked Washburn, thinking it concerned the business.

"No, no; from a—a friend." Westerfelt lighted a candle at the wick of Washburn's lantern and went up to his room. He put the candle on a little table and sat down by it.

"I'll never read another line from that woman," he said. "I can't. She'll run me crazy! I've suffered enough."

He threw the letter unopened on the table, and clasped his hands over his knee and sat motionless for several minutes. Then he picked up the letter and held one corner of it in the candle-flame. It ignited, and the blue blaze began to spread over the envelope. Suddenly he blew it out and tore the letter open. The margin of the paper was charred, but the contents were intact. It ran:

"JOHN WESTERFELT,—I heard you Come Nigh meeting yore Death. The Lord let you live to make you Suffer. The worst pain is not in the body But in the Soul. You will likely live a long time and never git over yore guilty suffering. The Report has gone out that some gal over thar tuk care of you while you wus down in Bed. Well, it would be jest like you to try yore skill on her. God Help her. I dont know her, nor nothin about her, but she ort ter be warned. Ef she loved you with all Her soul you would pick a Flaw somehow. Mark my words. You will live to See Awful Shapes when nobody else does. Yore Hell Has begun. It will Go on for everlastin and everlastin.

"SUE DAWSON."

He put the letter into his pocket and went to the window and drew down the shade. Then he locked the door and placed the candle on the mantel-piece and stood an open book before it, so that his bed was in the shadow. He listened to hear if Washburn was moving below, then knelt by the bed and covered his face with his hands. He tried to pray, but could think of no words to express his desires. He had never been so sorely tried. Even if he could school himself to forgetting Harriet's old love and the act of deceitfulness into which her love had drawn her, could he ever escape Mrs. Dawson's persecutions? Would she not, even if he won and married Harriet, pursue and taunt him with the girl's old love, as she had Clem Dill? And how could he stand that—he, whose ideal of woman and woman's constancy had always been so high?

He rose, sat on the edge of the bed, and clasped his hands between his knees. The room was in darkness except the spot of light on the wall behind the book. Below he heard the horses crunching their corn and hay. He took from his pocket Sue Dawson's letters and the one from Sally and wrapped them in a piece of paper. Then he looked about for a place to hide them. In a corner overhead he saw a jutting rafter, and behind it a dark niche where the shingles sloped to the wall. It was too high for him to reach from the floor, so he placed the table beneath the spot, and, mounting it, pushed the packet tightly into the corner. Then he stepped down and removed the table, cautiously, that Washburn might not hear him, and sat on the bed again. He remained there motionless for twenty minutes. Suddenly a rat ran across the floor with a scrap of paper in its mouth. He stared at the place where the rat had disappeared as if bewildered, then rose, placed the table back against the wall, secured the packet, and put it into his pocket.



Chapter XII

Westerfelt knew he could not sleep, and, seeing the moonlight shining through his window, he decided to take a walk. He went below. Washburn sat in a little circle of candle-light mending a piece of harness.

"Has the hack come in yet?" asked Westerfelt, remembering that he had paid little attention to business that day.

"Yes," answered Washburn; "it's down at the store unloadin' the mail."

"I thought I heard it turn the corner. Any passengers?"

"No; Buck said a family, one woman and five children, wus ready to start by the Cohutta road to Royleston, but the report about the Whitecaps t'other night skeerd 'em out of it, so they went by train to Wilks, an' through that way. This outlawin' will ruin the country ef it hain't stopped; nobody'll want to settle heer."

"I'll be back soon," said Westerfelt, and he went out.

The November air was dry and keen as he walked briskly towards the mountains. The road ran through groves of stunted persimmon and sassafras bushes, across swift-bounding mountain streams, and under natural arbors of wild grapes and muscadine vines. In a few minutes Westerfelt reached the meeting-house on a little rise near the roadside.

It had never been painted, but age and the weather had given it the usual grayish color. Behind it, enclosed by a rail fence, was the graveyard. The mounds had sunk, the stones leaned earthward, and the decaying trellises had been pulled down by the vines which clambered over them.

It was a strange thing for Westerfelt to do, but, seeing the door open, he went into the church. Two windows on each side let in the moonlight. The benches were unpainted, and many of them had no backs.

Westerfelt stood before the little pulpit for a moment and then turned away. Outside, the road gleamed in the moonlight as it stretched on to the village. A glimpse of the graveyard through the window made him shudder. It reminded him of a grave he had never seen save in his mind. It was past midnight. He would go back to his bed, though he felt no inclination to sleep.

As he approached the stable, walking in the shadow of the trees on the side of the street, he saw a woman come out of the blacksmith's shop opposite the stable. For a moment she paused, her face raised towards the window of his room, and then retreated into the shop.

It was Harriet Floyd. He stepped behind a tree and watched the door of the shop. In a moment she reappeared and looked up towards his window again. He thought she might be waiting to see him, so he moved out into the moonlight and advanced towards her.

"Oh, it's you!" she exclaimed, excitedly. "I've been waiting to see you. I—I must tell you something, but it won't do to stand here; somebody will see us. Can't we?—come in the shop a minute."

Without speaking, and full of wonder, he followed her into the dark building. She led him past piles of old iron, wagon-tires, ploughshares, tubs of black water, anvils, and sledges to the forge and bellows at the back of the shop. She waited for a moment for him to speak, but he only looked at her questioningly, having almost steeled his heart against her.

"I come to warn you," she began, awkwardly, her eyes raised to his. "Toot Wambush has prejudiced the Whitecaps against you. He has convinced them that you reported the moonshiners. They are coming to-night to take you out. The others don't mean to kill you; they say it's just to whip you, and tar and feather you, and drive you out of the place, but he—Toot Wambush—will kill you if he can. He would not let you get away alive. He has promised the others not to use violence, but he will; he hates you, and he wants revenge. He'll do it and make the others share the responsibility with him—that's his plan."

He put his hand on the bellows-pole; the great leather bag rattled and gasped, and a puff of ashes rose from the forge.

"How do you happen to know this?" he asked, coldly. She shrank from him, and stared at him in silence.

"How do you know it?" he repeated, his tone growing fierce.

She drew the shawl with which she had covered her head more closely about her shoulders.

"Toot hinted at it himself," she said, slowly.

"When?"

"About an hour ago."

"You met him?"

"Yes."

"Are you a member of his gang?"

"Mr. Westerfelt," shrinking from him, "do—do you mean to insult me?"

"Would he have told you if he had thought you would give him away?"

"I reckon not—why, no."

"Then he considers you in sympathy with his murderous plans."

"I don't know, but I want you to keep out of his way. You must—oh, Mr. Westerfelt, you must go! Don't stand here; they are coming down the Hawkbill road directly. You could ride off towards Dartsmouth and easily get away, if you will hurry."

"I see," he answered, with a steady stare of condemnation; "you want to keep him from committing another crime—a more serious one."

She looked at him an instant as if puzzled, and then said:

"I want to keep him from killing you."

"Do you think he would take advantage of a helpless man?"

"I know it, Mr. Westerfelt; oh, I know he would!"

"Then you acknowledge he is a coward, and yet you—my God, what sort of a creature are you?"

She continued to stare at him wonderingly, as if half afraid. She moved suddenly into a moonbeam that streamed through a broken shingle in the roof. Her face was like white marble. In its terrified lines and angles he read nothing but the imprint of past weakness where he should have seen only pleading purity—the purity of a child cowed and awed by the object of a love so powerful, so self-sacrificing that she made no attempt to understand it. She had always felt her inferiority to others, and now that she loved her ideal of superiority she seemed to expect ill-treatment—even contempt—at his hands.

He looked away from her. The begrimed handle of the bellows creaked and swung as he leaned on it. He turned suddenly and impulsively grasped her hands.

"You are a good girl," he cried; "you have been the best friend I ever had. If I don't treat you better, it is on account of my awful nature. I can't control it when I think of that villain."

"He has treated you very badly," she said, slowly, in a voice that faltered.

"Where did you meet him and when?" he asked, under his breath. "God knows I thought you were done with him."

"He came right to the house just after dark," returned Harriet. "Mother let him come in; she wanted to talk to him."

"Did he come to get you to go away with him, Harriet?"

"Yes, Mr. Westerfelt."

"And why didn't you go?"

"Oh, how can you ask such a question," she asked, "when you know—" She broke off suddenly, and then, seeing that he was silent, she added: "Mr. Westerfelt, sometimes I am afraid, really afraid, your sickness has affected your mind, you speak so strange and harsh to me. Surely I do not deserve such cruelty. I am just a woman, and a weak one at that; a woman driven nearly crazy through troubling about you." She raised a corner of her shawl to her eyes.

He saw her shoulders rise with a sob, then he caught her hands. "Don't—don't cry, little girl. I'd give my life to help you. Oh yes, do let me hold your hands, just this once; it won't make any difference."

She did not attempt to withdraw her hands from his passionate, reckless clasp, and, now more trustingly, raised her eyes to his.

"Sometimes I think you really love me," she faltered. "You have made me think so several times."

"I'm not ashamed of it," he said. "I've had fancies for women, but I have never felt this way before. It seems to me if I was to live a thousand years I'd never, never feel that you was like other women. Maybe you love me real deep, and maybe you just fancy me, but I'll never want any other human being like I want you. I have been a bad man—a careless, thoughtless man. Ever since I was a boy I have played with love. I was playing with fire—the fire of hell, Harriet—and I got burnt. In consequence of what I've done I suffer as no mortal ever suffered. Repentance brings contentment to some men, but they are not built like me. I don't do anything from morning to night but brood and brood over my past life."

"I thought you had had some trouble," she returned, sympathetically.

"Why did you think so?" he asked.

"You talked when you were out of your head. That's why I first took pity on you. I never saw a man suffer in mind as you did. You rolled and tumbled the first two or three nights and begged for forgiveness; often you spoke so loud I was afraid others in the house would hear."

He opened his palms before her. "These hands are soaked in human blood—innocent human blood," he said, tragically. "I don't deny it; if it would do a particle of good I'd tell every soul on earth. I won a good girl's love, and when I got tired of her and left her she killed herself to escape the misery I put her in. I was unworthy of her, but she didn't know it, or want to know it. Nobody knows she took her own life except me and her mother, and it has ruined her life—taken away her only comfort in old age and made her my mortal enemy. She never gives me a minute's rest—she reminds me constantly that I'll never get forgiveness and never be happily married, and she is right—I never shall. My wicked nature demands too much of a woman. I can love, and do love, with all my soul, but my pride cannot be subdued. I—"

"I understand, Mr. Westerfelt" she broke in, quickly. "Don't bring up that subject again. What you said when I last saw you was enough. It almost kept me from coming to-night, but it was my duty; but you do not have to say any more about that." She took a step backward and stood staring at him in mute misery. She had never felt that she was worthy of him, in a way, but his cold reference—as she understood it—to her misfortune released a spring of resentment she hardly knew was wound in her breast.

"Forgive me," he pleaded, trying to regain her hands. "I'll never mention it again. I promise you that—never again."

"It's all right," she answered, softening under his passionate gaze. "But it would be kind of you to avoid mentioning what I cannot help."

He was about to reply, but there was a sound of barking dogs from the mountain. "Go quick!" She caught her breath. "Don't wait! That may be them now. Don't let them kill you."

He did not stir. "You'd better go home," he said, calmly. "I don't care a straw what becomes of me. I've had enough of the whole business. I have got as much right to live as anybody else, and I will not be driven from pillar to post by a gang of outlaws, headed by a coward." He drew a revolver, and, half cocking it, carelessly twirled the cylinder with his thumb. "I've got five thirty-two-caliber shots here, and I think I can put some of them where they ought to go."

She pushed the revolver down with her hand. "No, no!" she cried, "you must not be reckless."

"I am a pretty good shot," he went on, bitterly, "and Toot Wambush shall be my first target, if I can pick him out. Then the rest may do what they like with me. You go home. It will do you no good to be seen with me."

She caught his arm. "If you don't go, I'll stay right here with you. Hush! Listen! What was—? Great Heavens, they are coming. Go! Go!"

She glided swiftly to the door, and he followed her. Coming along the Hawkbill road, about an eighth of a mile distant, they saw a body of horsemen, their heads and shoulders dressed in white. His revolver slipped from his fingers and rang on a fallen anvil. He picked it up mechanically, still staring into the moonlight. Again he wondered if he were afraid, as he was that night at the hotel.

"Run! get out a horse," she cried. "Mr. Washburn is there; he will help you! Go quick, for God's sake! I shall kill myself if they harm you." He stared at her an instant, then he put his revolver into his belt.

"All right, then, to oblige you; but you must hurry home!" He hastened across the street and rapped on the office door.

"Who's thar?" called out Washburn from his bed.

"Me—Westerfelt."

There was a sound of bare feet on the floor inside and the door opened.

"What's up?" asked Washburn, sleepily.

"I want my horse; there's a gang of Whitecaps coming down the Hawkbill, and it looks like they are after me."

"My God!" Washburn began fumbling along the wall. "Where's the matches? Here's one!" He scratched it and lighted his lantern. "I'll git yore hoss. Stand heer, Mr. Westerfelt, an' ef I ain't quick enough make a dash on foot fer that strip o' woods over thar in the field. The fences would keep 'em from followin', an' you might dodge 'em."

When Washburn had gone into the stable, Westerfelt looked towards Harriet. She had walked only a few yards down the street and stood under the trees. He stepped out into the moonlight and signalled her to go on, but she refused to move. He heard Washburn swearing inside the stable, and asked what the matter was.

"I've got the bridles all tangled to hell," he answered.

"Hurry; anything will do!"

The Whitecaps had left the mountain-side and were now in sight on the level road. A minute more and Westerfelt would be a captive. He might get across the street unnoticed and hide himself in the blacksmith's shop, but they would be sure to look for him there. If he tried to go through the fields they would see him and shoot him down like a rabbit.

"Heer you are; which door, back or front?" cried Washburn.

"Front, quick! I've got to run for it! I'm a good mind to stand and make a fight of it."

"Oh no; hell, no! Mr. Westerfelt."

Washburn slid the big door open and kicked the horse in the stomach as he led him out.

"Git up, quick! They are at the branch. Blast it, they heerd the door—they've broke into a gallop!"

As Westerfelt put his foot into the stirrup he saw Harriet Floyd glide out of sight into the blacksmith's shop. She had determined not to desert him. As he sprang up, the girth snapped, and the saddle and blanket fell under his feet.

"God, they are on us!" gasped Washburn. One of the gang raised a shout, and they came on with increased speed.