Produced by David Widger






'WAY DOWN IN LONESOME COVE

By Charles Egbert Craddock

1895


One memorable night in Lonesome Cove the ranger of the county entered
upon a momentous crisis in his life. What hour it was he could hardly
have said, for the primitive household reckoned time by the sun when it
shone, by the domestic routine when no better might be. It was late.
The old crone in the chimney-corner nodded over her knitting. In the
trundle-bed at the farther end of the shadowy room were transverse
billows under the quilts, which intimated that the small children were
numerous enough for the necessity of sleeping crosswise. He had smoked
out many pipes, and at last knocked the cinder from the bowl. The great
hickory logs had burned asunder and fallen from the stones that served
as andirons. He began to slowly cover the embers with ashes, that the
fire might keep till morning.

His wife, a faded woman, grown early old, was bringing the stone jar of
yeast to place close by the hearth, that it might not “take a chill” in
some sudden change of the night. It was heavy, and she bent in carrying
it. Awkward, and perhaps nervous, she brought it sharply against the
shovel in his hands.

The clash roused the old crone in the corner.

She recognized the situation instantly, and the features that sleep had
relaxed into inexpressiveness took on a weary apprehension, which they
wore like a habit. The man barely raised his surly black eyes, but his
wife drew back humbly with a mutter of apology.

The next moment the shovel was almost thrust out of his grasp. A tiny
barefooted girl, in a straight unbleached cotten night-gown and a quaint
little cotton night-cap, cavalierly pushed him aside, that she might
cover in the hot ashes a burly sweet-potato, destined to slowly roast by
morning. A long and careful job she made of it, and unconcernedly kept
him waiting while she pottered back and forth about the hearth. She
looked up once with an authoritative eye, and he hastily helped to
adjust the potato with the end of the shovel. And then he glanced at
her, incongruously enough, as if waiting for her autocratic nod of
approval. She gravely accorded it, and pattered nimbly across the
puncheon floor to the bed.

“Now,” he drawled, in gruff accents, “ef you-uns hev all had yer fill o'
foolin' with this hyar fire, I'll kiver it, like I hev started out ter
do.”

At this moment there was a loud trampling upon the porch without. The
batten door shook violently. The ranger sprang up. As he frowned the
hair on his scalp, drawn forward, seemed to rise like bristles.

“Dad-burn that thar fresky filly!” he cried, angrily. “Jes' brung her
noisy bones up on that thar porch agin, an' her huffs will bust spang
through the planks o' the floor the fust thing ye know.”

The narrow aperture, as he held the door ajar, showed outlined against
the darkness the graceful head of a young mare, and once more hoof-beats
resounded on the rotten planks of the porch.

Clouds were adrift in the sky. No star gleamed in the wide space high
above the sombre mountains. On every side they encompassed Lonesome
Cove, which seemed to have importunately thrust itself into the darkling
solemnities of their intimacy.

All at once the ranger let the door fly from his hand, and stood
gazing in blank amazement. For there was a strange motion in the void
vastnesses of the wilderness. They were creeping into view. How,
he could not say, but the summit of the great mountain opposite was
marvellously distinct against the sky. He saw the naked, gaunt, December
woods. He saw the grim, gray crags. And yet Lonesome Cove below and the
spurs on the other side were all benighted. A pale, flickering light
was dawning in the clouds; it brightened, faded, glowed again, and their
sad, gray folds assumed a vivid vermilion reflection, for there was a
fire in the forest below. Only these reactions of color on the clouds
betokened its presence and its progress. Sometimes a fluctuation of
orange crossed them, then a glancing line of blue, and once more that
living red hue which only a pulsating flame can bestow.

“Air it the comin' o' the Jedgmint Day, Tobe?” asked his wife, in a meek
whisper.

“I'd be afraid so if I war ez big a sinner ez you-uns,” he returned.

“The woods air afire,” the old woman declared, in a shrill voice.

“They be a-soakin' with las' night's rain,” he retorted, gruffly.

The mare was standing near the porch. Suddenly he mounted her and rode
hastily off, without a word of his intention to the staring women in the
doorway.

He left freedom of speech behind him. “Take yer bones along, then, ye
tongue-tied catamount!” his wife's mother apostrophized him, with all
the acrimony of long repression. “Got no mo' politeness 'n a settin'
hen,” she muttered, as she turned back into the room.

The young woman lingered wistfully. “I wisht he wouldn't go a-ridin' off
that thar way 'thout lettin' we-uns know whar he air bound fur, an' when
he'll kern back. He mought git hurt some ways roun' that thar fire--git
overtook by it, mebbe.”

“Ef he war roasted 'twould be mighty peaceful round in Lonesome,” the
old crone exclaimed, rancorously.

Her daughter stood for a moment with the bar of the door in her hand,
still gazing out at the flare in the sky. The unwonted emotion had
conjured a change in the stereotyped patience in her face--even anxiety,
even the acuteness of fear, seemed a less pathetic expression than that
meek monotony bespeaking a broken spirit. As she lifted her eyes to the
mountain one might wonder to see that they were so blue. In the many
haggard lines drawn upon her face the effect of the straight lineaments
was lost; but just now, embellished with a flush, she looked young--as
young as her years.

As she buttoned the door and put up the bar her mother's attention was
caught by the change. Peering at her critically, and shading her eyes
with her hand from the uncertain flicker of the tallow dip, she broke
out, passionately: “Wa'al, 'Genie, who would ever hev thought ez yer
cake would be _all_ dough? Sech a laffin', plump, spry gal ez ye useter
be--fur all the wort' like a fresky young deer! An' sech a pack o' men
ez ye hed the choice amongst! An' ter pick out Tobe Gryce an' marry him,
an' kem 'way down hyar ter live along o' him in Lonesome Cove!”

She chuckled aloud, not that she relished her mirth, but the
harlequinade of fate constrained a laugh for its antics. The words
recalled the past to Eugenia; it rose visibly before her. She had
had scant leisure to reflect that her life might have been ordered
differently. In her widening eyes were new depths, a vague terror, a
wild speculation, all struck aghast by its own temerity.

“Ye never said nuthin ter hender,” she faltered.

“I never knowed Tobe, sca'cely. How's enny-body goin' ter know a man
ez lived 'way off down hyar in Lonesome Cove?” her mother retorted,
acridly, on the defensive. “He never courted _me_, nohows. All the word
he gin me war, 'Howdy,' an' I gin him no less.”

There was a pause.

Eugenia knelt on the hearth. She placed together the broken chunks, and
fanned the flames with a turkey wing. “I won't kiver the fire yit,” she
said, thoughtfully. “He mought be chilled when he gits home.”

The feathery flakes of the ashes flew; they caught here and there in her
brown hair. The blaze flared up, and flickered over her flushed, pensive
face, and glowed in her large and brilliant eyes.

“Tobe said 'Howdy,'” her mother bickered on. “I knowed by that ez he hed
the gift o' speech, but he spent no mo' words on me.” Then, suddenly,
with a change of tone: “I war a fool, though, ter gin my cornsent ter
yer marryin' him, bein' ez ye war the only child I hed, an' I knowed I'd
hev ter live with ye 'way down hyar in Lonesome Cove. I wish now ez ye
hed abided by yer fust choice, an' married Luke Todd.”

Eugenia looked up with a gathering frown. “I hev no call ter spen'
words 'bout Luke Todd,” she said, with dignity, “ez me an' him are both
married ter other folks.”

“I never said ye hed,” hastily replied the old woman, rebuked and
embarrassed. Presently, however, her vagrant speculation went recklessly
on. “Though ez ter Luke's marryin', 'tain't wuth while ter set store on
sech. The gal he found over thar in Big Fox Valley favors ye ez close ez
two black-eyed peas. That's why he married her. She looks precisely like
ye useter look. An' she laffs the same. An' I reckon _she_ 'ain't hed
no call ter quit laffin', 'kase he air a powerful easy-goin' man.
Leastways, he useter be when we-uns knowed him.”

“That ain't no sign,” said Eugenia. “A saafter-spoken body I never seen
than Tobe war when he fust kem a-courtin' round the settlemint.”

“Sech ez that ain't goin' ter las' noways,” dryly remarked the
philosopher of the chimney-corner.

This might seem rather a reflection upon the courting gentry in general
than a personal observation. But Eugenia's consciousness lent it point.

“Laws-a-massy,” she said, “Tobe ain't so rampa-gious, nohows, ez folks
make him out. He air toler'ble peaceable, cornsiderin' ez nobody hev
ever hed grit enough ter make a stand agin him, 'thout 'twar the Cunnel
thar.”

She glanced around at the little girl's face framed in the frill of her
night-cap, and peaceful and infantile as it lay on the pillow.

“Whenst the Cunnel war born,” Eugenia went on, languidly reminiscent,
“Tobe war powerful outed 'kase she war a gal. I reckon ye 'members ez
how he said he hed no use for sech cattle ez that. An' when she tuk sick
he 'lowed he seen no differ. 'Jes ez well die ez live,' he said.
An' bein' ailin', the Cunnel tuk it inter her head ter holler. Sech
holler-in' we-uns hed never hearn with none o' the t'other chil'ren.
The boys war nowhar. But a-fust it never 'sturbed Tobe. He jes spoke out
same ez he useter do at the t'others, 'Shet up, ye pop-eyed buzzard!'
Wa'al, sir, the Cunnel jes blinked at him, an' braced herself ez stiff,
an' _yelled!_ I 'lowed 'twould take off the roof. An' Tobe said he'd
wring her neck ef she warn't so mewlin'-lookin' an' peaked. An' he tuk
her up an' walked across the floor with her, an' she shet up; an' he
walked back agin, an' she stayed shet up. Ef he sot down fur a mi nit,
she yelled so ez ye'd think ye'd be deef fur life, an' ye 'most hoped
ye would be. So Tobe war obleeged ter tote her agin ter git shet o' the
noise. He got started on that thar 'forced march,' ez he calls it, an'
he never could git off'n it. Trot he must when the Cunnel pleased. He
'lowed she reminded him o' that thar old Cunnel that he sarved under in
the wars. Ef it killed the regiment, he got thar on time. Sence then
the Cunnel jes gins Tobe her orders, an' he moseys ter do 'em quick, jes
like he war obleeged ter obey. I b'lieve he air, somehows.”

“Wa'al, some day,” said the disaffected old woman, assuming a port of
prophetic wisdom, “Tobe will find a differ. Thar ain't no man so headin'
ez don't git treated with perslimness by somebody some time. I knowed a
man wunst ez owned fower horses an' cattle-critters quarryspondin', an'
he couldn't prove ez he war too old ter be summonsed ter work on the
road, an' war fined by the overseer 'cordin' ter law. Tobe will git his
wheel scotched yit, sure ez ye air born. Somebody besides the Cunnel
will skeer up grit enough ter make a stand agin him. I dunno how other
men kin sleep o' night, knowin' how he be always darin' folks ter differ
with him, an' how brigaty he be. The Bible 'pears ter me ter hev Tobe in
special mind when it gits, ter mournin' 'bout'n the stiff-necked ones.”

*****

The spirited young mare that the ranger rode strove to assert herself
against him now and then, as she went at a breakneck speed along the
sandy bridle-path through the woods. How was she to know that the
white-wanded young willow by the way-side was not some spiritual
manifestation as it suddenly materialized in a broken beam from a rift
in the clouds? But as she reared and plunged she felt his heavy hand
and his heavy heel, and so forward again at a steady pace. The forests
served to screen the strange light in the sky, and the lonely road was
dark, save where the moonbeam was splintered and the mists loitered.

Presently there were cinders flying in the breeze, a smell of smoke
pervaded the air, and the ranger forgot to curse the mare when she
stumbled.

“I wonder,” he muttered, “what them no 'count half-livers o' town folks
hev hed the shiftlessness ter let ketch afire thar!”

As he neared the brink of the mountain he saw a dense column of smoke
against the sky, and a break in the woods showed the little town--the
few log houses, the “gyarden spots” about them, and in the centre of the
Square a great mass of coals, a flame flickering here and there, and two
gaunt and tottering chimneys where once the court-house had stood.
At some distance--for the heat was still intense--were grouped the
slouching, spiritless figures of the mountaineers. On the porches of the
houses, plainly visible in the unwonted red glow, were knots of women
and children--ever and anon a brat in the scantiest of raiment ran
nimbly in and out. The clouds still borrowed the light from below, and
the solemn, leafless woods on one side were outlined distinctly against
the reflection in the sky. The flare showed, too, the abrupt precipice
on the other side, the abysmal gloom of the valley, the austere
summit-line of the mountain beyond, and gave the dark mysteries of
the night a sombre revelation, as in visible blackness it filled the
illimitable space.

The little mare was badly blown as the ranger sprang to the ground. He
himself was panting with amazement and eagerness.

“The stray-book!” he cried. “Whar's the stray-book?”

One by one the slow group turned, all looking at him with a peering
expression as he loomed distorted through the shimmer of the heat above
the bed of live coals and the hovering smoke.

“Whar's the stray-book?” he reiterated, imperiously.

“Whar's the court-house, I reckon ye mean to say,” replied the
sheriff--a burly mountaineer in brown jeans and high boots, on which the
spurs jingled; for in his excitement he had put them on as mechanically
as his clothes, as if they were an essential part of his attire.

“Naw, I _ain't_ meanin' ter say whar's the courthouse,” said the ranger,
coming up close, with the red glow of the fire on his face, and his
eyes flashing under the broad brim of his wool hat. He had a threatening
aspect, and his elongated shadow, following him and repeating the
menace of his attitude, seemed to back him up. “Ye air sech a triflin',
slack-twisted tribe hyar in town, ez ennybody would know ef a spark
cotched fire ter suthin, ye'd set an' suck yer paws, an' eye it till
it bodaciously burnt up the court-house--sech a dad-burned lazy set o'
half-livers ye be! I never axed 'bout'n the court-house. I want ter know
whar's that thar stray-book,” he concluded, inconsequently.

“Tobe Gryce, ye air fairly demented,” exclaimed the register--a
chin-whiskered, grizzled old fellow, sitting on a stump and hugging his
knee with a desolate, bereaved look--“talkin' 'bout the _stray-book_,
an' all the records gone! What will folks do 'bout thar deeds, an'
mortgages, an' sech? An' that thar keerful index ez I had made--ez
straight ez a string--all cinders!”

He shook his head, mourning alike for the party of the first part and
the party of the second part, and the vestiges of all that they had
agreed together.

“An' ye ter kem mopin' hyar this time o' night arter the _stray-book!_”
 said the sheriff. “Shucks!” And he turned aside and spat disdainfully on
the ground.

“I want that thar stray-book!” cried Gryce, indignantly. “Ain't nobody
seen it?” Then realizing the futility of the question, he yielded to a
fresh burst of anger, and turned upon the bereaved register. “An' did
ye jes set thar an' say, 'Good Mister Fire, don't burn the records; what
'll folks do 'bout thar deeds an' sech?' an' hold them claws o' yourn,
an' see the court-house burn up, with that thar stray-book in it?”

Half a dozen men spoke up. “The fire tuk inside, an' the court-house war
haffen gone 'fore 'twar seen,” said one, in sulky extenuation.

“Leave Tobe be--let him jaw!” said another, cavalierly.

“Tobe 'pears ter be sp'ilin' fur a fight,” said a third, impersonally,
as if to direct the attention of any belligerent in the group to the
opportunity.

The register had an expression of slow cunning as he cast a glance up at
the overbearing ranger.

“What ailed the stray-book ter bide hyar in the court-house all night,
Tobe? Couldn't ye gin it house-room? Thar warn't no special need fur it
to be hyar.”

Tobe Gryce's face showed that for once he was at a loss. He glowered
down at the register and said nothing.

“Ez ter me,” resumed that worthy, “by the law o' the land my books war
obligated ter be thar.” He quoted, mournfully, “'Shall at all times be
and remain in his office.'”

He gathered up his knee again and subsided into silence.

All the freakish spirits of the air were a-loose in the wind. In fitful
gusts they rushed up the gorge, then suddenly the boughs would fall
still again, and one could hear the eerie rout a-rioting far off down
the valley. Now and then the glow of the fire would deepen, the coals
tremble, and with a gleaming, fibrous swirl, like a garment of flames,
a sudden animation would sweep over it, as if an apparition had passed,
leaving a line of flying sparks to mark its trail.

“I'm goin' home,” drawled Tobe Gryce, presently. “I don't keer a frog's
toe-nail ef the whole settle-mint burns bodaciously up; 'tain't nuthin
ter me. I hev never hankered ter live in towns an' git tuk up with town
ways, an' set an' view the court-house like the apple o' my eye. We-uns
don't ketch fire down in the Cove, though mebbe we ain't so peart ez
folks ez herd tergether like sheep an' sech.”

The footfalls of the little black mare annotated the silence of the
place as he rode away into the darkling woods. The groups gradually
disappeared from the porches. The few voices that sounded at long
intervals were low and drowsy. The red fire smouldered in the centre of
the place, and sometimes about it appeared so doubtful a shadow that it
could hardly argue substance. Far away a dog barked, and then all was
still.

Presently the great mountains loom aggressively along the horizon. The
black abysses, the valleys and coves, show dun-colored verges and grow
gradually distinct, and on the slopes the ash and the pine and the oak
are all lustrous with a silver rime. The mists are rising, the wind
springs up anew, the clouds set sail, and a beam slants high.

*****

“What I want ter know,” said a mountaineer newly arrived on the scene,
sitting on the verge of the precipice, and dangling his long legs over
the depths beneath, “air how do folks ez live 'way down in Lonesome
Cove, an' who nobody knowed nuthin about noways, ever git 'lected
ranger o' the county, ennyhow. I ain't s'prised none ter hear 'bout Tobe
Gryce's goin's-on hyar las' night. I hev looked fur more'n that.”

“Wa'al, I'll tell ye,” replied the register. “Nuthin' but favoritism
in the county court. Ranger air 'lected by the jestices. Ye know,” he
added, vainglorious of his own tenure of office by the acclaiming voice
of the sovereign people, “ranger ain't 'lected, like the register, by
pop'lar vote.”

A slow smoke still wreathed upward from the charred ruins of the
court-house. Gossiping groups stood here and there, mostly the
jeans-clad mountaineers, but there were a few who wore “store clothes,”
 being lawyers from more sophisticated regions of the circuit. Court
had been in session the previous day. The jury, serving in a criminal
case--still strictly segregated, and in charge of an officer--were
walking about wearily in double file, waiting with what patience they
might their formal discharge.

The sheriffs dog, a great yellow cur, trotted in the rear. When the
officer was first elected, this animal, observing the change in his
master's habits, deduced his own conclusions. He seemed to think the
court-house belonged to the sheriff, and thenceforward guarded the door
with snaps and growls; being a formidable brute, his idiosyncrasies
invested the getting into and getting out of law with abnormal
difficulties. Now, as he followed the disconsolate jury, he bore the
vigilant mien with which he formerly drove up the cows, and if a juror
loitered or stepped aside from the path, the dog made a slow detour as
if to round him in, and the melancholy cortege wandered on as before.
More than one looked wistfully at the group on the crag, for it was
distinguished by that sprightly interest which scandal excites so
readily.

“Ter my way of thinking” drawled Sam Peters, swinging his feet over the
giddy depths of the valley, “Tobe ain't sech ez oughter be set over the
county ez a ranger, noways. 'Pears not ter me, an' I hev been keepin' my
eye on him mighty sharp.”

A shadow fell among the group, and a man sat down on a bowlder hard by.
He, too, had just arrived, being lured to the town by the news of the
fire. His slide had been left at the verge of the clearing, and one of
the oxen had already lain down; the other, although hampered by the yoke
thus diagonally displaced, stood meditatively gazing at the distant blue
mountains. Their master nodded a slow, grave salutation to the group,
produced a plug of tobacco, gnawed a fragment from it, and restored it
to his pocket. He had a pensive face, with an expression which in a man
of wider culture we should discriminate as denoting sensibility. He had
long yellow hair that hung down to his shoulders, and a tangled yellow
beard. There was something at once wistful and searching in his gray
eyes, dull enough, too, at times. He lifted them heavily, and they had
a drooping lid and lash. There seemed an odd incongruity between this
sensitive, weary face and his stalwart physique. He was tall and well
proportioned. A leather belt girded his brown jeans coat. His great
cowhide boots, were drawn to the knee over his trousers. His pose, as he
leaned on the rock, had a muscular picturesque-ness.

“Who be ye a-talkin' about?” he drawled.

Peters relished his opportunity. He laughed in a distorted fashion, his
pipe-stem held between his teeth.

“_You-uns_ ain't wantin' ter swop lies 'bout sech ez him, Luke! We war
a-talkin' 'bout Tobe Gryce.”

The color flared into the new-comer's face. A sudden animation fired his
eye.

“Tobe Gryce air jes the man I'm always wantin' ter hear a word about.
Jes perceed with yer rat-killin'. I'm with ye.” And Luke Todd placed his
elbows on his knees and leaned forward with an air of attention.

Peters looked at him, hardly comprehending this ebullition. It was not
what he had expected to elicit. No one laughed. His fleer was wide of
the mark.

“Wa'al”--he made another effort--“Tobe, we war jes sayin', ain't fitten
fur ter be ranger o' the county. He be ez peart in gittin' ter own other
folkses' stray cattle ez he war in courtin' other folkses' sweetheart,
an', ef the truth mus' be knowed, in marryin' her.” He suddenly twisted
round, in some danger of falling from his perch. “I want ter ax one o'
them thar big-headed lawyers a question on a p'int o' law,” he broke
off, abruptly.

“What be Tobe Gryce a-doin' of now?” asked Luke Todd, with eager
interest in the subject.

“Wa'al,” resumed Peters, nowise loath to return to the gossip, “Tobe, ye
see, air the ranger o' this hyar county, an' by law all the stray horses
ez air tuk up by folks hev ter be reported ter him, an' appraised by two
householders, an' swore to afore the magistrate an' be advertised by the
ranger, an' ef they ain't claimed 'fore twelve months, the taker-up kin
pay into the county treasury one-haffen the appraisement an' hev the
critter fur his'n. An' the owner can't prove it away arter that.”

“Thanky,” said Luke Todd, dryly. “S'pose ye teach yer gran'mammy ter
suck aigs. I knowed all that afore.”

Peters was abashed, and with some difficulty collected himself.

“An' I knowed ye knowed it, Luke,” he hastily conceded. “But hyar be
what I'm a-lookin' at--the law 'ain't got no pervision fur a stray horse
ez kem of a dark night, 'thout nobody's percuremint, ter the ranger's
own house. Now, the p'int o' law ez I wanted ter ax the lawyers 'bout
air this--kin the ranger be the ranger an' the taker-up too?”

He turned his eyes upon the great landscape lying beneath, flooded
with the chill matutinal sunshine, and flecked here and there with
the elusive shadow's of the fleecy drifting clouds. Far away the long
horizontal lines of the wooded spurs, converging on either side of the
valley and rising one behind the other, wore a subdued azure, all unlike
the burning blue of summer, and lay along the calm, passionless sky,
that itself was of a dim, repressed tone. On the slopes nearer, the
leafless boughs, massed together, had purplish-garnet depths of color
wherever the sunshine struck aslant, and showed richly against the
faintly tinted horizon. Here and there among the boldly jutting gray
crags hung an evergreen-vine, and from a gorge on the opposite mountain
gleamed a continuous flash, like the waving of a silver plume, where a
cataract sprang down the rocks. In the depths of the valley, a field in
which crab-grass had grown in the place of the harvested wheat showed
a tiny square of palest yellow, and beside it a red clay road, running
over a hill, was visible. Above all a hawk was flying.

“Afore the winter fairly set in las' year,” Peters resumed, presently,
“a stray kem ter Tobe's house. He 'lowed ter me ez he fund her
a-standin' by the fodder-stack a-pullin' off'n it. An' he 'quired
round, an' he never hearn o' no owner. I reckon he never axed outside o'
Lonesome,” he added, cynically.

He puffed industriously at his pipe for a few moments; then continued:
“Wa'al, he 'lowed he couldn't feed the critter fur fun. An' he couldn't
work her till she war appraised an' sech, that bein' agin the law
fur strays. So he jes ondertook ter be ranger an' taker-up too--the
bangedest consarn in the kentry! Ef the leetle mare hed been wall-eyed,
or lame, or ennything, he wouldn't hev wanted ter be ranger an' taker-up
too. But she air the peartest little beastis--she war jes bridle-wise
when she fust kem--young an' spry!”

Luke Todd was about to ask a question, but Peters, disregarding him,
persisted:

“Wa'al, Tobe tuk up the beastis, an' I reckon he reported her ter
hisself, bein' the ranger--the critter makes me laff--an' he hed that
thar old haffen-blind uncle o' his'n an' Perkins Bates, ez be never
sober, ter appraise the vally o' the mare, an' I s'pose he delivered
thar certificate ter hisself, an' I reckon he tuk oath that she kem
'thout his procure_mint_ ter his place, in the presence o' the ranger.”

“I reckon thar ain't no law agin the ranger's bein' a ranger an' a
taker-up too,” put in one of the bystanders. “'Tain't like a sher'ff
's buyin' at his own sale. An' he hed ter pay haffen her vally into the
treasury o' the county arter twelve months, ef the owner never proved
her away.”

“Thar ain't no sign he ever paid a cent,” said Peters, with a malicious
grin, pointing at the charred remains of the court-house, “an' the
treasurer air jes dead.”

“Wa'al, Tobe hed ter make a report ter the jedge o' the county court
every six months.”

“The papers of his office air cinders,” retorted Peters.

“Wa'al, then,” argued the optimist, “the stray-book will show ez she war
reported an' sech.”

“The ranger took mighty partic'lar pains ter hev his stray-book in that
thar court-house when 'twar burnt.”

There was a long pause while the party sat ruminating upon the
suspicions thus suggested.

Luke Todd heard them, not without a thrill of satisfaction. He found
them easy to adopt. And he, too, had a disposition to theorize.

“It takes a mighty mean man ter steal a horse,” he said. “Stealin' a
horse air powerful close ter murder. Folkses' lives fairly depend on
a horse ter work thar corn an' sech, an' make a support fur em. I hev'
knowed folks ter kem mighty close ter starvin' through hevin thar horse
stole. Why, even that thar leetle filly of our'n, though she hedn't been
fairly bruk ter the plough, war mightily missed. We-uns hed ter make out
with the old sorrel, ez air nigh fourteen year old, ter work the crap,
an' we war powerful disappointed. But we ain't never fund no trace o'
the filly sence she war tolled off one night las' fall a year ago.”

The hawk floating above the valley and its winged shadow disappeared
together in the dense glooms of a deep gorge. Luke Todd watched them as
they vanished.

Suddenly he lifted his eyes. They were wide with a new speculation. An
angry flare blazed in them. “What sort'n beastis is this hyar mare ez
the ranger tuk up?” he asked.

Peters looked at him, hardly comprehending his tremor of excitement.
“Seems sorter sizable,” he replied, sibilantly, sucking his pipe-stem.

Todd nodded meditatively several times, leaning his elbows on his knees,
his eyes fixed on the landscape. “Hev she got enny particular marks, ez
ye knows on?” he drawled.

“Wa'al, she be ez black ez a crow, with the nigh fore-foot white. An'
she hev got a white star spang in the middle o' her forehead, an' the
left side o' her nose is white too.”

Todd rose suddenly to his feet. “By gum!” he cried, with a burst of
passion, “she air _my_ filly! An' 'twar that thar durned horse-thief of
a ranger ez tolled her off!”

*****

Deep among the wooded spurs Lonesome Cove nestles, sequestered from the
world. Naught emigrates thence except an importunate stream that forces
its way through a rocky gap, and so to freedom beyond. No stranger
intrudes; only the moon looks in once in a while. The roaming wind may
explore its solitudes; and it is but the vertical sunbeams that strike
to the heart of the little basin, because of the massive mountains that
wall it round and serve to isolate it. So nearly do they meet at the gap
that one great assertive crag, beetling far above, intercepts the view
of the wide landscape beyond, leaving its substituted profile jaggedly
serrating the changing sky. Above it, when the weather is fair, appear
vague blue lines, distant mountain summits, cloud strata, visions. Below
its jutting verge may be caught glimpses of the widening valley without.
But pre-eminent, gaunt, sombre, it sternly dominates “Lonesome,” and is
the salient feature of the little world it limits.

Tobe Gryce's house, gray, weather-beaten, moss-grown, had in comparison
an ephemeral, modern aspect. For a hundred years its inmates had come
and gone and lived and died. They took no heed of the crag, but never
a sound was lost upon it. Their drawling iterative speech the iterative
echoes conned. The ringing blast of a horn set astir some phantom chase
in the air. When the cows came lowing home, there were lowing herds
in viewless company. Even if one of the children sat on a rotting log
crooning a vague, fragmentary ditty, some faint-voiced spirit in the
rock would sing. Lonesome Cove?--home of invisible throngs!

As the ranger trotted down the winding road, multitudinous hoof-beats,
as of a troop of cavalry, heralded his approach to the little girl who
stood on the porch of the log-cabin and watched for him.

“Hy're, Cunnel!” he cried, cordially.

But the little “Colonel” took no heed. She looked beyond him at the
vague blue mountains, against which the great grim rock was heavily
imposed, every ledge, every waving dead crisp weed, distinct.

He noticed the smoke curling briskly up in the sunshine from the clay
and slick chimney. He strode past her into the house, as Eugenia,
with all semblance of youth faded from her countenance, haggard and
hollow-eyed in the morning light, was hurrying the corn-dodgers and
venison steak on the table.

Perhaps he did not appreciate that the women were pining with curiosity,
for he vouchsafed no word of the excitements in the little town; and he
himself was ill at ease.

“What ails the Cunnel, 'Genie?” he asked, presently, glancing up sharply
from under his hat brim, and speaking with his mouth full.

“The cat 'pears ter hev got her tongue,” said Eugenia, intending that
the “Colonel” should hear, and perhaps profit. “She ain't able ter talk
none this mornin'.”

The little body cast so frowning a glance upon them as she stood in
the doorway that her expression was but slightly less lowering than
her father's. It was an incongruous demonstration, with her infantile
features, her little yellow head, and the slight physical force she
represented. She wore a blue cotton frock, fastened up the back with
great horn buttons; she had on shoes laced with leather strings; one of
her blue woollen stockings fell over her ankle, disclosing the pinkest
of plump calves; the other stocking was held in place by an unabashed
cotton string. She had a light in her dark eyes and a color in her
cheek, and albeit so slight a thing, she wielded a strong coercion.

“Laws-a-massy, Cunnel!” said Tobe, in a harried manner, “couldn't ye
find me nowhar? I'm powerful sorry. I couldn't git back hyar no sooner.”

But not in this wise was she to be placated. She fixed her eyes upon
him, but made no sign.

He suddenly rose from his half-finished breakfast. “Look-a-hyar,
Cunnel,” he cried, joyously, “don't ye want ter ride the filly?--ye knew
ye hanker ter ride the filly.”

Even then she tried to frown, but the bliss of the prospect overbore
her. Her cheek and chin dimpled, and there was a gurgling display of two
rows of jagged little teeth as the doughty “Colonel” was swung to his
shoulder and he stepped out of the door.

He laughed as he stood by the glossy black mare and lifted the child
to the saddle. The animal arched her neck and turned her head and gazed
back at him curiously. “Hold on tight, Cunnel,” he said as he looked up
at her, his face strangely softened almost beyond recognition. And she
gurgled and laughed and screamed with delight as he began to slowly lead
the mare along.

The “Colonel” had the gift of continuance. Some time elapsed before she
exhausted the joys of exaltation. More than once she absolutely refused
to dismount. Tobe patiently led the beast up and down, and the
“Colonel” rode in state. It was only when the sun had grown high,
and occasionally she was fain to lift her chubby hands to her eyes,
imperiling her safety on the saddle, that he ventured to seriously
remonstrate, and finally she permitted herself to be assisted to the
ground. When, with the little girl at his heels, he reached the porch,
he took off his hat, and wiped the perspiration from his brow with his
great brown hand.

“I tell ye, jouncin' round arter the Cunnel air powerful hot work,” he
declared.

The next moment he paused. His wife had come to the door, and there was
a strange expression of alarm among the anxious lines of her face.

“Tobe,” she said, in a bated voice, “who war them men?”

He stared at her, whirled about, surveyed the vacant landscape, and once
more turned dumfound-ed toward her. “What men?” he asked.

“Them men ez acted so cur'ous,” she said. “I couldn't see thar faces
plain, an' I dunno who they war.”

“Whar war they?” And he looked over his shoulder once more.

“Yander along the ledges of the big rock. Thar war two of 'em, hidin'
ahint that thar jagged aidge. An' ef yer back war turned they'd peep out
at ye an' the Cunnel ridin'. But whenst ye would face round agin, they'd
drap down ahint the aidge o' the rock. I 'lowed wunst ez I'd holler ter
ye, but I war feared ye moughtn't keer ter know.” Her voice fell in its
deprecatory cadence.

He stodd in silent perplexity. “Ye air a fool, 'Genie, an' ye never seen
nuthin'. Nobody hev got enny call ter spy on me.”

He stepped in-doors, took down his rifle from the rack, and went out
frowning into the sunlight.

The suggestion of mystery angered him. He had a vague sense of impending
danger. As he made his way along the slope toward the great beetling
crag all his faculties were on the alert. He saw naught unusual when he
stood upon its dark-seamed summit, and he went cautiously to the
verge and looked down at the many ledges. They jutted out at irregular
intervals, the first only six feet below, and all accessible enough to
an expert climber. A bush grew in a niche. An empty nest, riddled by
the wind, hung dishevelled from a twig. Coarse withered grass tufted the
crevices.

Far below he saw the depths of the Cove--the tops of the leafless trees,
and, glimpsed through the interlacing boughs, the rush of a mountain
rill, and a white flash as a sunbeam slanted on the foam.

He was turning away, all incredulous, when with a sudden start he looked
back. On one of the ledges was a slight depression. It was filled with
sand and earth. Imprinted upon it was the shape of a man's foot.
The ranger paused and gazed fixedly at it. “Wa'al, by the Lord!” he
exclaimed, under his breath. Presently, “But they hev no call!” he.
argued. Then once more, softly, “By the Lord!”

The mystery baffled him. More than once that day he went up to the crag
and stood and stared futilely at the footprint. Conjecture had license
and limitations, too. As the hours wore on he became harassed by the
sense of espionage. He was a bold man before the foes he knew, but this
idea of inimical lurking, of furtive scrutiny for unknown purposes,
preyed upon him. He brooded over it as he sat idle by the fire. Once he
went to the door and stared speculatively at the great profile of the
cliff. The sky above it was all a lustrous amber, for the early sunset
of the shortest days of the year was at hand. The mountains, seen partly
above and partly below it, wore a glamourous purple. There were clouds,
and from their rifts long divergent lines of light slanted down upon the
valley, distinct among their shadows. The sun was not visible--only in
the western heavens was a half-veiled effulgence too dazzlingly white to
be gazed upon. The ranger shaded his eyes with his hand.

No motion, no sound; for the first time in his life the unutterable
loneliness of the place impressed him.

“'Genie,” he said, suddenly, looking over his shoulder within the cabin,
“be you-uns _sure_ ez they war--_folks?_”

“I dunno what you mean,” she faltered, her eyes dilated. “They _looked_
like folks.”

“I reckon they war,” he said, reassuring himself. “The Lord knows I hope
they war.”

*****

That night the wind rose. The stars all seemed to have burst from their
moorings, and were wildly adrift in the sky. There was a broken tumult
of billowy clouds, and the moon tossed hopelessly amongst them, a lunar
wreck, sometimes on her beam ends, sometimes half submerged, once more
gallantly struggling to the surface, and again sunk. The bare boughs of
the trees beat together in a dirgelike monotone. Now and again a leaf
went sibilantly whistling past. The wild commotion of the heavens and
earth was visible, for the night was not dark. The ranger, standing
within the rude stable of unhewn logs, all undaubed, noted how pale were
the horizontal bars of gray light alternating with the black logs of the
wall. He was giving the mare a feed of corn, but he had not brought his
lantern, as was his custom. That mysterious espionage had in some sort
shaken his courage, and he felt the obscurity a shield. He had brought,
instead, his rifle.

The equine form was barely visible among the glooms. Now and then,
as the mare noisily munched, she lifted a hoof and struck it upon the
ground with a dull thud. How the gusts outside were swirling up the
gorge! The pines swayed and sighed. Again the boughs of the chestnut-oak
above the roof crashed together. Did a fitful blast stir the door?

He lifted his eyes mechanically. A cold thrill ran through every fibre.
For there, close by the door, somebody--something--was peering through
the space between the logs of the wall. The face was invisible, but the
shape of a man's head was distinctly defined. He realized that it was no
supernatural manifestation when a husky voice began to call the mare, in
a hoarse whisper, “Cobe! Cobe! Cobe!” With a galvanic start he was about
to spring forward to hold the door. A hand from without was laid upon
it.

He placed the muzzle of his gun between the logs, a jet of red light was
suddenly projected into the darkness, the mare was rearing and plunging
violently, the little shanty was surcharged with roar and reverberation,
and far and wide the crags and chasms echoed the report of the rifle.

There was a vague clamor outside, an oath, a cry of pain. Hasty
footfalls sounded among the dead leaves and died in the distance.

When the ranger ventured out he saw the door of his house wide open, and
the firelight flickering out among the leafless bushes. His wife met him
halfway down the hill.

“Air ye hurt, Tobe?” she cried. “Did yer gun go off suddint?”

“Mighty suddint,” he replied, savagely.

“Ye didn't fire it a-purpose?” she faltered.

“Edzactly so,” he declared.

“Ye never hurt nobody, did ye, Tobe?” She had turned very pale. “I
'lowed it couldn't be the wind ez I hearn a-hollerin'.”

“I hopes an' prays I hurt 'em,” he said, as he replaced the rifle in the
rack. He was shaking the other hand, which had been jarred in some way
by the hasty discharge of the weapon. “Some dad-burned horse-thief war
arter the mare. Jedgin' from the sound o' thar running 'peared like to
me ez thar mought be two o' 'em.”

The next day the mare disappeared from the stable. Yet she could not be
far off, for Tobe was about the house most of the time, and when he and
the “Colonel” came in-doors in the evening the little girl held in her
hand a half-munched ear of corn, evidently abstracted from the mare's
supper.

“Whar be the filly hid, Tobe?” Eugenia asked, curiosity overpowering
her.

“Ax me no questions an' I'll tell ye no lies,” he replied, gruffly.

In the morning there was a fall of snow, and she had some doubt whether
her mother, who had gone several days before to a neighbor's on the
summit of the range, would return; but presently the creak of unoiled
axles heralded the approach of a wagon, and soon the old woman, bundled
in shawls, was sitting by the fire. She wore heavy woollen socks over
her shoes as protection against the snow. The incompatibility of the
shape of the hose with the human foot was rather marked, and as they
were somewhat inelastic as well, there was a muscular struggle to get
them off only exceeded by the effort which had been required to get them
on. She shook her head again and again, with a red face, as she bent
over the socks, but plainly more than this discomfort vexed her.

“Laws-a-massy, 'Genie! I hearn a awful tale over yander 'mongst them
Jenkins folks. Ye oughter hev married Luke Todd, an' so I tole ye
an' fairly beset ye ter do ten year ago. _He_ keered fur ye. An'
Tobe--shucks! Wa'al, laws-a-massy, child! I hearn a awful tale 'bout
Tobe up yander at Jenkinses'.”

Eugenia colored.

“Folks hed better take keer how they talk 'bout Tobe,” she said, with a
touch of pride. “They be powerful keerful ter do it out'n rifle range.”

With one more mighty tug the sock came off, the red face was lifted, and
Mrs. Pearce shook her head ruefully.

“The Bible say 'words air foolishness.' Ye dun-no what ye air talkin'
'bout, child.”

With this melancholy preamble she detailed the gossip that had arisen
at the county town and pervaded the country-side. Eugenia commented,
denied, flashed into rage, then lapsed into silence. Although it did not
constrain credulity, there was something that made her afraid when her
mother said:

“Ye hed better not be talkin' 'bout rifle range so brash, 'Genie,
nohows. They 'lowed ez Luke Todd an' Sam Peters kem hyar--'twar jes
night before las'--aimin' ter take the mare away 'thout no words an' no
lawin', 'kase they didn't want ter wait. Luke hed got a chance ter
view the mare, an' knowed ez she war hisn. An' Tobe war hid in the dark
beside the mare, an' fired at 'em, an' the rifle-ball tuk Sam right
through the beam o' his arm. I reckon, though, ez that warn't true, else
ye would hev knowed it.”

She looked up anxiously over her spectacles at her daughter.

“I hearn Tobe shoot,” faltered Eugenia. “I seen blood on the leaves.”

“Laws-a-massy!” exclaimed the old woman, irritably. “I be fairly feared
ter bide hyar; 'twouldn't s'prise me none ef they kem hyar an' hauled
Tobe out an' lynched him an' sech, an' who knows who mought git hurt in
the scrimmage?”

They both fell silent as the ranger strode in. They would need a braver
heart than either bore to reveal to him the suspicions of horse-stealing
sown broadcast over the mountain. Eugenia felt that this in itself was
coercive evidence of his innocence. Who dared so much as say a word to
his face?

The weight of the secret asserted itself, however. As she went about
her accustomed tasks, all bereft of their wonted interest, vapid
and burdensome, she carried so woe-begone a face that it caught his
attention, and he demanded, angrily,

“What ails ye ter look so durned peaked?”

This did not abide long in his memory, however, and it cost her a pang
to see him so unconscious.

She went out upon the porch late that afternoon to judge of the weather.
Snow was falling again. The distant summits had disappeared. The
mountains near at hand loomed through the myriads of serried white
flakes. A crow flew across the Cove in its midst. It heavily thatched
the cabin, and tufts dislodged by the opening of the door fell down upon
her hair. Drifts lay about the porch. Each rail of the fence was
laden. The ground, the rocks, were deeply covered. She reflected with
satisfaction that the red splotch of blood on the dead leaves was no
longer visible. Then a sudden idea struck her that took her breath
away. She came in, her cheeks flushed, her eyes bright, with an excited
dubitation.

Her husband commented on the change. “Ye air a powerful cur'ous critter,
'Genie,” he said: “a while ago ye looked some fower or five hundred
year old--now ye favors yerself when I fust kem a-courtin' round the
settlemint.”

She hardly knew whether the dull stir in her heart were pleasure or
pain. Her eyes filled with tears, and the irradiated iris shone through
them with a liquid lustre. She could not speak.

Her mother took ephemeral advantage of his softening mood. “Ye useter be
mighty perlite and saaft-spoken in them days, Tobe,” she ventured.

“I hed ter be,” he admitted, frankly, “'kase thar war sech a many o'
them mealy-mouthed cusses a-waitin' on 'Genie. The kentry 'peared ter me
ter bristle with Luke Todd; he 'minded me o' brumsaidge--_everywhar_ ye
seen his yaller head, ez homely an' ez onwelcome.”

“I never wunst gin Luke a thought arter ye tuk ter comin' round the
settlemint,” Eugenia said, softly.

“I wisht I hed knowed that then,” he replied; “else I wouldn't hev been
so all-fired oneasy an' beset I wasted mo' time a-studyin' 'bout ye an'
Luke Todd 'n ye war both wuth, an' went 'thout my vittles an' sot up o'
nights. Ef I hed spent that time a-moanin' fur my sins an' settin' my
soul at peace, I'd be 'quirin' roun' the throne o' Grace now! Young
folks air powerful fursaken fools.”

Somehow her heart was warmer for this allusion. She was more hopeful.
Her resolve grew stronger and stronger as she sat and knitted, and
looked at the fire and saw among the coals all her old life at the
settlement newly aglow. She was remembering now that Luke Todd had been
as wax in her hands. She recalled that when she was married there was a
gleeful “sayin'” going the rounds of the mountain that he had taken to
the woods with grief, and he was heard of no more for weeks. The gossips
relished his despair as the corollary of the happy bridal. He had had no
reproaches for her. He had only looked the other way when they met, and
she had not spoken to him since.

“He set store by my word in them days,” she said to herself, her lips
vaguely moving. “I misdoubts ef he hev furgot.”

All through the long hours of the winter night she silently canvassed
her plan. The house was still noiseless and dark when she softly opened
the door and softly closed it behind her.

It had ceased to snow, and the sky had cleared. The trees, all the
limbs whitened, were outlined distinctly upon it, and through the boughs
overhead a brilliant star, aloof and splendid, looked coldly down.
Along dark spaces Orion had drawn his glittering blade. Above the snowy
mountains a melancholy waning moon was swinging. The valley was full of
mist, white and shining where the light fell upon it, a vaporous purple
where the shadows held sway. So still it was! the only motion in all the
world the throbbing stars and her palpitating heart. So solemnly silent!
It was a relief, as she trudged on and on, to note a gradual change;
to watch the sky withdraw, seeming fainter; to see the moon grow filmy,
like some figment of the frost; to mark the gray mist steal on apace,
wrap mountain, valley, and heaven with mystic folds, shut out all vision
of things familiar. Through it only the sense of dawn could creep.

*****

She recognized the locality; her breath was short; her step quickened.
She appeared, like an apparition out of the mists, close to a fence, and
peered through the snow-laden rails. A sudden pang pierced her heart.

For there, within the enclosure, milking the cow, she saw, all blooming
in the snow--herself; the azalea-like girl she had been!

She had not known how dear to her was that bright young identity she
remembered. She had not realized how far it had gone from her. She felt
a forlorn changeling looking upon her own estranged estate.

A faint cry escaped her.

The cow, with lifted head and a muttered low of surprise, moved out of
reach of the milker, who, half kneeling upon the ground, stared with
wide blue eyes at her ghost in the mist.

There was a pause. It was only a moment before Eugenia spoke; it seemed
years, so charged it was with retrospect.

“I kem over hyar ter hev a word with ye,” she said.

At the sound of a human voice Luke Todd's wife struggled to her feet She
held the piggin with one arm encircled about it, and with the other
hand she clutched the plaid shawl around her throat. Her bright hair was
tossed by the rising wind.

“I 'lowed I'd find ye hyar a-milkin' 'bout now.”

The homely allusion reassured the younger woman.

“I hev ter begin toler'ble early,” she said. “Spot gins 'bout a gallon a
milkin' now.”

Spot's calf, which subsisted on what was left over, seemed to find it
cruel that delay should be added to his hardships, and he lifted up
his voice in a plaintive remonstrance. This reminded Mrs. Todd of his
existence; she turned and let down the bars that served to exclude him.

The stranger was staring at her very hard. Somehow she quailed under
that look. Though it was fixed upon her in unvarying intensity, it had
a strange impersonality. This woman was not seeing her, despite that
wide, wistful, yearning gaze; she was thinking of something else, seeing
some one else.

And suddenly Luke Todd's wife began to stare at the visitor very hard,
and to think of something that was not before her.

“I be the ranger's wife,” said Eugenia. “I kem over hyar ter tell ye he
never tuk yer black mare nowise but honest, bein' the ranger.”

She found it difficult to say more. Under that speculative, unseeing
look she too faltered.

“They tell me ez Luke Todd air powerful outed 'bout'n it. An' I 'lowed
ef he knowed from me ez 'twar tuk fair, he'd b'lieve me.”

She hesitated. Her courage was flagging; her hope had fled. The eyes of
the man's wife burned upon her face.

“We-uns useter be toler'ble well 'quainted 'fore he ever seen ye, an' I
'lowed he'd b'lieve my word,” Eugenia continued.

Another silence. The sun was rising; long liquescent lines of light of
purest amber-color were streaming through the snowy woods; the shadows
of the fence rails alternated with bars of dazzling glister; elusive
prismatic gleams of rose and lilac and blue shimmered on every
slope--thus the winter flowered. Tiny snow-birds were hopping about;
a great dog came down from the little snow-thatched cabin, and was
stretching himself elastically and yawning most portentously.

“An' I 'lowed I'd see ye an' git you-uns ter tell him that word from me,
an' then he'd b'lieve it,” said Eugenia.

The younger woman nodded mechanically, still gazing at her.

And was this her mission! Somehow it had lost its urgency. Where was its
potency, her enthusiasm? Eugenia realized that her feet were wet,
her skirts draggled; that she was chilled to the bone and trembling
violently. She looked about her doubtfully. Then her eyes came back to
the face of the woman before her.

“Ye'll tell him, I s'pose?”

Once more Luke Todd's wife nodded mechanically, still staring.

There was nothing further to be said. A vacant interval ensued. Then,
“I 'lowed I'd tell ye,” Eugenia reiterated, vaguely, and turned away,
vanishing with the vanishing mists.

Luke Todd's wife stood gazing at the fence through which the apparition
had peered. She could see yet her own face there, grown old and worn.
The dog wagged his tail and pressed against her, looking up and claiming
her notice. Once more he stretched himself elastically and yawned
widely, with shrill variations of tone. The calf was frisking about in
awkward bovine elation, and now and then the cow affectionately licked
its coat with the air of making its toilet. An assertive chanticleer was
proclaiming the dawn within the henhouse, whence came too an impatient
clamor, for the door, which served to exclude any marauding fox, was
still closed upon the imprisoned poultry. Still she looked steadily at
the fence where the ranger's wife had stood.

“That thar woman favors me,” she said, presently. And suddenly she burst
into tears.

Perhaps it was well that Eugenia could not see Luke Todd's expression as
his wife recounted the scene. She gave it truly, but without, alas! the
glamour of sympathy.

“She 'lowed ez ye'd b'lieve her, bein' ez ye use-ter be 'quainted.”

His face flushed. “Wa'al, sir! the insurance o' that thar woman!” he
exclaimed. “I war 'quainted with her; I war mighty well 'quainted with
her.” He had a casual remembrance of those days when “he tuk ter the
woods ter wear out his grief.”

“She never gin me no promise, but me an' her war courtin' some. Sech
dependence ez I put on her war mightily wasted. I dunno what ails the
critter ter 'low ez I set store by her word.”

Poor Eugenia! There is nothing so dead as ashes. His flame had clean
burned out. So far afield were all his thoughts that he stood amazed
when his wife, with a sudden burst of tears, declared passionately that
she knew it--she saw it--she favored Eugenia Gryce. She had found out
that he had married her because she looked like another woman.

“'Genie Gryce hev got powerful little ter do ter kem a-jouncin' through
the snow over hyar ter try ter set ye an' me agin one another,” he
exclaimed, angrily. “Stealin' the filly ain't enough ter sati'fy her!”

His wife was in some sort mollified. She sought to reassure herself.

“Air we-uns of a favor?”

“I dunno,” he replied, sulkily. “I 'ain't seen the critter fur nigh on
ter ten year. I hev furgot the looks of her. 'Pears like ter me,” he
went on, ruminating, “ez 'twar in my mind when I fust seen ye ez thar
war a favor 'twixt ye. But I misdoubts now. Do she 'low ez I hev hed
nuthin ter study 'bout sence?”

Perhaps Eugenia is not the only woman who overrates the strength of a
sentimental attachment. A gloomy intuition of failure kept her company
all the lengthening way home. The chill splendors of the wintry day
grated upon her dreary mood. How should she care for the depth and
richness of the blue deepening toward the zenith in those vast skies?
What was it to her that the dead vines, climbing the grim rugged crags,
were laden with tufts and corollated shapes wherever these fantasies
of flowers might cling, or that the snow flashed with crystalline
scintillations? She only knew that they glimmered and dazzled upon the
tears in her eyes, and she was moved to shed them afresh. She did not
wonder whether her venture had resulted amiss. She only wondered that
she had tried aught. And she was humbled.

When she reached Lonesome Cove she found the piggin where she had hid
it, and milked the cow in haste. It was no great task, for the animal
was going dry. “Their'n gins a gallon a milkin',” she said, in rueful
comparison.

As she came up the slope with the piggin on her head, her husband was
looking down from the porch with a lowering brow. “Why n't ye spen' the
day a-milkin' the cow?” he drawled. “Dawdlin' yander in the cow-pen till
this time in the mornin'! An' ter-morrer's Chrismus!”

The word smote upon her weary heart with a dull pain. She had no
cultured phrase to characterize the sensation as a presentiment, but
she was conscious of the prophetic process. To-night “all the mounting”
 would be riotous with that dubious hilarity known as “Chrismus in the
bones,” and there was no telling what might come from the combined orgy
and an inflamed public spirit.

She remembered the familiar doom of the mountain horse-thief, the men
lurking on the cliff, the inimical feeling against the ranger. She
furtively watched him with forebodings as he came and went at intervals
throughout the day.

Dusk had fallen when he suddenly looked in and beckoned to the
“Colonel,” who required him to take her with him whenever he fed the
mare.

“Let me tie this hyar comforter over the Cunnel's head,” Eugenia said,
as he bundled the child in a shawl and lifted her in his arms.

“Tain't no use,” he declared. “The Cunnel ain't travellin' fur.”

She heard him step from the creaking porch. She heard the dreary wind
without.

Within, the clumsy shadows of the warping-bars, the spinning-wheel,
and the churn were dancing in the firelight on the wall. The supper was
cooking on the live coals. The children, popping corn in the ashes, were
laughing; as her eye fell upon the “Colonel's” vacant little chair her
mind returned to the child's excursion with her father, and again she
wondered futilely where the mare could be hid. The next moment she was
heartily glad that she did not know.

It was like the fulfillment of some dreadful dream when the door opened.
A man entered softly, slowly; the flickering fire showed his shadow--was
it?--nay, another man, and still another, and another.

The old crone in the corner sprang up, screaming in a shrill, tremulous,
cracked voice. For they were masked. Over the face of each dangled a
bit of homespun, with great empty sockets through which eyes vaguely
glanced. Even the coarse fibre of the intruders responded to that
quavering, thrilling appeal. One spoke instantly:

“Laws-a-massy! Mis' Pearce, don't ye feel interrupted none--nor Mis'
Gryce nuther. We-uns ain't harmful noways--jes want ter know whar that
thar black mare hev disappeared to. She ain't in the barn.”

He turned his great eye-sockets on Eugenia. The plaid homespun mask
dangling about his face was grotesquely incongruous with his intent,
serious gaze.

“I dunno,” she faltered; “I dunno.”

She had caught at the spinning-wheel for support. The fire crackled. The
baby was counting aloud the grains of corn popping from the ashes. “Six,
two, free,” he babbled. The kettle merrily sang.

The man still stared silently at the ranger's wife. The expression in
his eyes changed suddenly. He chuckled derisively. The others echoed his
mocking mirth. “Ha! ha! ha!” they laughed aloud; and the eye-sockets in
the homespun masks all glared significantly at each other. Even the dog
detected something sinister in this laughter. He had been sniffing
about the heels of the strangers; he bristled now, showed his teeth, and
growled. The spokesman hastily kicked him in the ribs, and the animal
fled yelping to the farther side of the fireplace behind the baby, where
he stood and barked defiance. The rafters rang with the sound.

Some one on the porch without spoke to the leader in a low voice. This
man, who seemed to have a desire to conceal his identity which could not
be served by a mask, held the door with one hand that the wind might not
blow it wide open. The draught fanned the fire. Once the great bowing,
waving white blaze sent a long, quivering line of light through the
narrow aperture, and Eugenia saw the dark lurking figure outside. He had
one arm in a sling. She needed no confirmation to assure her that this
was Sam Peters, whom her husband had shot at the stable door.

The leader instantly accepted his suggestion. “Wa'al, Mis' Gryce, I
reckon ye dunno whar Tobe be, nuther?”

“Naw, I dunno,” she said, in a tremor.

The homespun mask swayed with the distortions of his face as he sneered:

“Ye mean ter say ye don't 'low ter tell us.”

“I dunno whar he be.” Her voice had sunk to a whisper.

Another exchange of glances.

“Wa'al, ma'am, jes gin us the favor of a light by yer fire, an' we-uns
'll find him.”

He stepped swiftly forward, thrust a pine torch into the coals, and with
it all whitely flaring ran out into the night; the others followed his
example; and the terror-stricken women, hastily barring up the door,
peered after them through the little batten shutter of the window.

*****

The torches were already scattered about the slopes of Lonesome Cove
like a fallen constellation. What shafts of white light they cast upon
the snow in the midst of the dense blackness of the night! Somehow they
seemed endowed with volition, as they moved hither and thither, for
their brilliancy almost cancelled the figures of the men that bore
them--only an occasional erratic shapeless shadow was visible. Now and
then a flare pierced the icicle-tipped holly bushes, and again there was
a fibrous glimmer in the fringed pines.

The search was terribly silent. The snow deadened the tread. Only the
wind was loud among the muffled trees, and sometimes a dull thud sounded
when the weight of snow fell from the evergreen laurel as the men
thrashed through its dense growth. They separated after a time, and
only here and there an isolated stellular light illumined the snow, and
conjured white mystic circles into the wide spaces of the darkness. The
effort flagged at last, and its futility sharpened the sense of injury
in Luke Todd's heart.

He was alone now, close upon the great rock, and looking at its jagged
ledges all cloaked with snow. Above those soft white outlines drawn
against the deep clear sky the frosty stars scintillated. Beneath were
the abysmal depths of the valley masked by the darkness.

His pride was touched. In the old quarrel his revenge had been hampered,
for it was the girl's privilege to choose, and she had chosen. He cared
nothing for that now, but he felt it indeed a reproach to tamely let
this man take his horse when he had all the mountain at his back. There
was a sharp humiliation in his position. He felt the pressure of public
opinion.

“Dad-burn him!” he exclaimed. “Ef I kin make out ter git a glimge o'
him, I'll shoot him dead--dead!”

He leaned the rifle against the rock. It struck upon a ledge. A metallic
vibration rang out. Again and again the sound was repeated--now loud,
still clanging; now faint, but clear; now soft and away to a doubtful
murmur which he hardly was sure that he heard. Never before had he
known such an echo. And suddenly he recollected that this was the great
“Talking Rock,” famed beyond the limits of Lonesome. It had traditions
as well as echoes. He remembered vaguely that beneath this cliff there
was said to be a cave which was utilized in the manufacture of saltpetre
for gunpowder in the War of 1812.

As he looked down the slope below he thought the snow seemed broken--by
footprints, was it? With the expectation of a discovery strong upon
him, he crept along a wide ledge of the crag, now and then stumbling and
sending an avalanche of snow and ice and stones thundering to the foot
of the cliff..He missed his way more than once. Then he would turn
about, laboriously retracing his steps, and try another level of the
ledges. Suddenly before him was the dark opening he sought. No creature
had lately been here. It was filled with growing bushes and dead leaves
and brambles. Looking again down upon the slope beneath, he felt very
sure that he saw footprints.

“The old folks useter 'low ez thar war two openings ter this hyar
cave,” he said. “Tobe Gryce mought hev hid hyar through a opening down
yan-der on the slope. But _I'll_ go the way ez I hev hearn tell on, an'
peek in, an' ef I kin git a glimge o' him, I'll make him tell me whar
that thar filly air,--or I'll let daylight through him, sure!”

He paused only to bend aside the brambles, then he crept in and took his
way along a low, narrow passage. It had many windings, but was without
intersections or intricacy. He heard his own steps echoed like a
pursuing footfall. His labored breathing returned in sighs from the
inanimate rocks. It was an uncanny place, with strange, sepulchral,
solemn effects. He shivered with the cold. A draught stole in from some
secret crevice known only to the wild mountain winds. The torch flared,
crouched before the gust, flared again, then darkness. He hesitated,
took one step forward, and suddenly--a miracle!

A soft aureola with gleaming radiations, a low, shadowy chamber, a beast
feeding from a manger, and within it a child's golden head.

His heart gave a great throb. Somehow he was smitten to his knees.
Christmas Eve! He remembered the day with a rush of emotion. He stared
again at the vouchsafed vision. He rubbed his eyes. It had changed.

Only hallucination caused by an abrupt transition from darkness to
light; only the most mundane facts of the old troughs and ash-hoppers,
relics of the industry that had served the hideous carnage of battle;
only the yellow head of the ranger's brat, who had climbed into one of
them, from which the mare was calmly munching her corn.

[Illustration: Yet this was Christmas Eve 201]

Yet this was Christmas Eve. And the Child did lie in a manger.

Perhaps it was well for him that his ignorant faith could accept the
illusion as a vision charged with all the benignities of peace on earth,
good-will toward men. With a keen thrill in his heart, on his knees he
drew the charge from his rifle, and flung it down a rift in the rocks.
“Chrismus Eve,” he murmured.

He leaned his empty weapon against the wall, and strode out to the
little girl who was perched up on the trough.

“Chrismus gift, Cunnel!” he cried, cheerily. “Ter-morrer's Chrismus.”

The echoes caught the word. In vibratory jubilance they repeated
it. “Chrismus!” rang from the roof, scintillating with calcspar;
“Chrismus!” sounded from the colonnade of stalactites that hung down to
meet the uprising stalagmites; “Chrismus!” repeated the walls incrusted
with roses that, shut in from the light and the fresh air of heaven,
bloomed forever in the stone. Was ever chorus so sweet as this?

It reached Tobe Gryce, who stood at his improvised corn-bin. With a
bundle of fodder still in his arms he stepped forward. There beside
the little Colonel and the black mare he beheld a man seated upon an
inverted half-bushel measure, peacefully lighting his pipe with a bunch
of straws which he kindled at the lantern on the ash-hopper.

The ranger's black eyes were wide with wonder at this intrusion, and
angrily flashed. He connected it at once with the attack on the stable.
The hair on his low forehead rose bristlingly as he frowned. Yet he
realized with a quaking heart that he was helpless. He, although the
crack shot of the county, would not have fired while the Colonel was
within two yards of his mark for the State of Tennessee.

He stood his ground with stolid courage--a target.

Then, with a start of surprise, he perceived that the intruder was
unarmed. Twenty feet away his rifle stood against the wall.

Tobe Gryce was strangely shaken. He experienced a sudden revolt of
credulity. This was surely a dream.

“Ain't that thar Luke Todd? Why air ye a-wait-in' thar?” he called out
in a husky undertone.

Todd glanced up, and took his pipe from his mouth; it was now fairly
alight.

“Kase it be Chrismus Eve, Tobe,” he said, gravely.

The ranger stared for a moment; then came forward and gave the fodder
to the mare, pausing now and then and looking with oblique distrust down
upon Luke Todd as he smoked his pipe.

“I want ter tell ye, Tobe, ez some o' the mounting boys air a-sarchin
fur ye outside.”

“Who air they?” asked the ranger, calmly.

His tone was so natural, his manner so unsuspecting, that a new doubt
began to stir in Luke Todd's mind.

“What ails ye ter keep the mare down hyar, Tobe?” he asked, suddenly.
“Tears like ter me ez that be powerful comical.”

“Kase,” said Tobe, reasonably, “some durned horse-thieves kem arter her
one night. I fired at t'em. I hain't hearn on 'em sence. An' so I jes
hid the mare.”

Todd was puzzled. He shifted his pipe in his mouth. Finally he said:
“Some folks 'lowed ez ye hed no right ter take up that mare, bein' ez ye
war the ranger.”

Tobe Gryce whirled round abruptly. “What war I a-goin' ter do, then?
Feed the critter fur nuthin till the triflin' scamp ez owned her kem
arter her? I couldn't work her 'thout takin' her up an' hevin her
appraised. Thar's a law agin sech. An' I couldn't git somebody ter toll
her off an' take her up. That ain't fair. What ought I ter hev done?”

“Wa'al,” said Luke, drifting into argument, “the town-folks 'low ez ye
hev got nuthin ter prove it by, the stray-book an' records bein' burnt.
The town-folks 'low ez ye can't prove by writin' an' sech ez ye
ever tried ter find the owner.” “The town-folks air fairly sodden in
foolishness,” exclaimed the ranger, indignantly.

He drew from his ample pocket a roll of ragged newspapers, and pointed
with his great thumb at a paragraph. And Luke Todd read by the light
of the lantern the advertisement and description of the estray printed
according to law in the nearest newspaper.

The newspaper was so infrequent a factor in the lives of the mountain
gossips that this refutation of their theory had never occurred to them.

The sheet was trembling in Luke Todd's hand; his eyes filled. The
cavern with its black distances, its walls close at hand sparkling with
delicate points of whitest light; the yellow flare of the lantern; the
grotesque shadows on the ground; the fair little girl with her golden
hair; the sleek black mare; the burly figure of the ranger--all the
scene swayed before him. He remembered the gracious vision that had
saluted him; he shuddered at the crime from which he was rescued. Pity
him because he knew naught of the science of optics; of the bewildering
effects of a sudden burst of light upon the delicate mechanism of the
eye; of the vagaries of illusion.

“Tobe,” he said, in a solemn voice--all the echoes were bated to awed
whispers--“I hev been gin ter view a vision this night, bein' 'twar
Chris-mus Eve. An' now I want ter shake hands on it fur peace.”

Then he told the whole story, regardless of the ranger's demonstrations,
albeit they were sometimes violent enough. Tobe sprang up with a snort
of rage, his eyes flashing, his thick tongue stumbling with the curses
crowding upon it, when he realized the suspicions rife against him at
the county town. But he stood with his clinched hand slowly relaxing,
and with the vague expression which one wears who looks into the past,
as he listened to the recital of Eugenia's pilgrimage in the snowy
wintry dawn. “Mighty few folks hev got a wife ez set store by 'em like
that,” Luke remarked, impersonally.

The ranger's rejoinder seemed irrelevant.

“'Genie be a-goin' ter see a powerful differ arter this,” he said, and
fell to musing.

Snow, fatigue, and futility destroyed the ardor of the lynching party
after a time, and they dispersed to their homes. Little was said of this
expedition afterward, and it became quite impossible to find a man
who would admit having joined it. For the story went the rounds of the
mountain that there had been a mistake as to unfair dealing on the part
of the ranger, and Luke Todd was quite content to accept from the county
treasury half the sum of the mare's appraisement--with the deduction
of the stipulated per cent.--which Tobe Gryce had paid, the receipt for
which he produced.

The gossips complained, however, that after all this was settled
according to law, Tobe wouldn't keep the mare, and insisted that Luke
should return to him the money he had paid into the treasury, half her
value, “bein' so brigaty he wouldn't own Luke Todd's beast. An' Luke
agreed ter so do; but he didn't want ter be outdone, so fur the keep o'
the filly he gin the Cunnel a heifer. An' Tobe war mighty nigh tickled
ter death fur the Cunnel ter hev a cow o' her own.”

And now when December skies darken above Lonesome Cove, and the snow in
dizzying whirls sifts softly down, and the gaunt brown leafless heights
are clothed with white as with a garment, and the wind whistles and
shouts shrilly, and above the great crag loom the distant mountains,
and below are glimpsed the long stretches of the valley, the two men
remember the vision that illumined the cavernous solitudes that night,
and bless the gracious power that sent salvation 'way down to Lonesome
Cove, and cherish peace and good-will for the sake of a little Child
that lay in a manger.