The Call of the Cumberlands

"No!" For an instant Purvy's voice rose out of its weakness to its old

staccato tone of command, a tone which brought obedience. "If I get

well, I have other plans. Never mind what they are. That's my business.

If I don't die, leave him alone, until I give other orders." He lay

back and fought for breath. The nurse came over with gentle insistence,

ordering quiet, but the man, whose violent life might be closing, had

business yet to discuss with his confidential vassals. Again, he waved

her back.

"If I get well," he went on, "and Samson South is killed meanwhile, I

won't live long either. It would be my life for his. Keep close to him.

The minute you hear of my death--get him." He paused again, then

supplemented, "You two will find something mighty interestin' in my

will."

It was afternoon when Purvy reached the hospital, and, at nightfall of

the same day, there arrived at his store's entrance, on stumbling, hard

-ridden mules, several men, followed by two tawny hounds whose long ears

flapped over their lean jaws, and whose eyes were listless and tired,

but whose black muzzles wrinkled and sniffed with that sensitive

instinct which follows the man-scent. The ex-sheriff's family were

instituting proceedings independent of the Chief's orders. The next

morning, this party plunged into the mountain tangle, and beat the

cover with the bloodhounds in leash.

The two gentle-faced dogs picked their way between the flowering

rhododendrons, the glistening laurels, the feathery pine sprouts and

the moss-covered rocks. They went gingerly and alertly on ungainly,

cushioned feet. Just as their masters were despairing, they came to a

place directly over the store, where a branch had been bent back and

hitched to clear the outlook, and where a boot heel had crushed the

moss. There one of them raised his nose high into the air, opened his

mouth, and let out a long, deep-chested bay of discovery.