The Call of the Cumberlands

Except for those two reports there was no sound. Samson stood still,

anticipating an uproar of alarm. Now, he should doubtless have to pay

with his life for both the deaths which would inevitably and logically

be attributed to his agency. But, strangely enough, no clamor arose.

The shot inside had been muffled, and those outside, broken by the

intervening store, did not arouse the house. Purvy's bodyguard had been

sent away by Hollis on a false alarm. Only the "womenfolks" and

children remained indoors, and they were drowning with a piano any

sounds that might have come from without. That piano was the chief

emblem of Purvy's wealth. It represented the acme of "having things

hung up"; that ancient and expressive phrase, which had come down from

days when the pioneers' worldly condition was gauged by the hams

hanging in the smokehouse and the peppers, tobacco and herbs strung

high against the rafters.

Now, Samson South stood looking down, uninterrupted, on what had been

Aaron Hollis as it lay motionless at his feet. There was a powder-

burned hole in the butternut shirt, and only a slender thread of blood

trickled into the dirt-grimed cracks between the planks. The body was

twisted sidewise, in one of those grotesque attitudes with which a

sudden summons so frequently robs the greatest phenomenon of all its

rightful dignity. The sun was gilding the roadside clods, and

burnishing the greens of the treetops. The breeze was harping sleepily

among the branches, and several geese stalked pompously along the

creek's edge. On the top of the stockade a gray squirrel, sole witness

to the tragedy, rose on his haunches, flirted his brush, and then, in a

sudden leap of alarm, disappeared.

Samson turned to the darkened doorway. Inside was emptiness, except

for the other body, which had crumpled forward and face down across the

counter. A glance showed that Jesse Purvy would no more fight back the

coming of death. He was quite unarmed. Behind his spent body ranged

shelves of general merchandise. Boxes of sardines, and cans of peaches

were lined in homely array above him. His lifeless hand rested as

though flung out in an oratorical gesture on a bolt of blue calico.

Samson paused only for a momentary survey. His score was clean. He

would not again have to agonize over the dilemma of old ethics and new.

To-morrow, the word would spread like wildfire along Misery and

Crippleshin, that Samson South was back, and that his coming had been

signalized by these two deaths. The fact that he was responsible for

only one--and that in self-defense--would not matter. They would prefer

to believe that he had invaded the store and killed Purvy, and that

Hollis had fallen in his master's defense at the threshold. Samson went

out, still meeting no one, and continued his journey.