The Call of the Cumberlands

But, before going home, she set down her bucket by the stream, and,

with a quick glance toward the house to make sure that she was not

observed, climbed through the brush, and was lost to view. She followed

a path that her own feet had made, and after a steep course upward,

came upon a bald face of rock, which stood out storm-battered where a

rift went through the backbone of the ridge. This point of vantage

commanded the other valley. From its edge, a white oak, dwarfed, but

patriarchal, leaned out over an abrupt drop. No more sweeping or

splendid view could be had within miles, but it was not for any reason

so general that Sally had made her pilgrimage. Down below, across the

treetops, were a roof and a chimney from which a thread of smoke rose

in an attenuated shaft. That was Spicer South's house, and Samson's

home. The girl leaned against the gnarled bowl of the white oak, and

waved toward the roof and chimney. She cupped her hands, and raised

them to her lips like one who means to shout across a great distance,

then she whispered so low that only she herself could hear: "Hello, Samson South!"

She stood for a space looking down, and forgot to laugh, while her

eyes grew religiously and softly deep, then, turning, she ran down the

slope. She had performed her morning devotions.

That day at the house of Spicer South was an off day. The kinsmen who

had stopped for the night stayed on through the morning. Nothing was

said of the possibility of trouble. The men talked crops, and tossed

horseshoes in the yard; but no one went to work in the fields, and all

remained within easy call. Only young Tamarack Spicer, a raw-boned

nephew, wore a sullen face, and made a great show of cleaning his rifle

and pistol. He even went out in the morning, and practised at target

-shooting, and Lescott, who was still very pale and weak, but able to

wander about at will, gained the impression that in young Tamarack he

was seeing the true type of the mountain "bad-man." Tamarack seemed

willing to feed that idea, and admitted apart to Lescott that, while he

obeyed the dictates of the truce, he found them galling, and was

straining at his leash.

"I don't take nothin' offen nobody," he sullenly confided. "The

Hollmans gives me my half the road."

Shortly after dinner, he disappeared, and, when the afternoon was well

advanced, Samson, too, with his rifle on his arm, strolled toward the

stile. Old Spicer South glanced up, and removed his pipe from his mouth

to inquire: "Whar be ye a-goin'?"