"Exactly--and they have followed their noses here." The Lexington man
found the embarrassment of his position growing as the colloquy
proceeded. "I want to ask you whether, if these dogs want to cross your
fence, I have your permission to let them?"
The cabin in the yard was utterly quiet. There was no hint of the
seven or eight men who rested on their arms behind its half-open door.
The master of the house crossed the stile, the low sun shining on his
shock of gray hair, and stood before the man-hunter. He spoke so that
his voice carried to the waiting group in the road.
"Ye're plumb welcome ter turn them dawgs loose, an' let 'em ramble,
stranger. Nobody hain't a-goin' ter hurt 'em. I sees some fellers out
thar with ye thet mustn't cross my fence. Ef they does"--the voice rang
menacingly--"hit'll mean that they're a-bustin' the truce--an' they
won't never go out ag'in. But you air safe in hyar. I gives yer my hand
on thet. Ye're welcome, an' yore dawgs is welcome. I hain't got nothin'
'gainst dawgs thet comes on four legs, but I shore bars the two-legged
kind."
There was a murmur of astonishment from the road. Disregarding it,
Spicer South turned his face toward the house.
"You boys kin come out," he shouted, "an' leave yore guns inside."
The leashes were slipped from the dogs. They leaped forward, and made
directly for Samson, who sat as unmoving as a lifeless image on the top
step of the stile. Up on the hillside the fingernails of Sally Miller's
clenched hands cut into the flesh, and the breath stopped between her
parted and bloodless lips. There was a half-moment of terrific
suspense, then the beasts clambered by the seated figure, passing on
each side and circled aimlessly about the yard--their quest unended.
They sniffed indifferently about the trouser legs of the men who
sauntered indolently out of the door. They trotted into the house and
out again, and mingled with the mongrel home pack that snarled and
growled hostility for this invasion. Then, they came once more to the
stile. As they climbed out, Samson South reached up and stroked a tawny
head, and the bloodhound paused a moment to wag its tail in friendship,
before it jumped down to the road, and trotted gingerly onward.
"I'm obliged to you, sir," said the man from the Bluegrass, with a
voice of immense relief.
The moment of suspense seemed past, and, in the relief of the averted
clash, the master of hounds forgot that his dogs stood branded as false
trailers. But, when he rejoined the group in the road, he found himself
looking into surly visages, and the features of Jim Hollman in
particular were black in their scowl of smoldering wrath.