! eh--oh--J-u-n-e!" That was a queer name for the mountains, and
the fisherman wondered if he had heard aright--June.

The little girl gave a shrill answering cry, but she did not move.

"Thar now!" she said.

"Who's that--your Mammy?"

"No, 'tain't--hit's my step-mammy. I'm a goin' to ketch hell now." Her
innocent eyes turned sullen and her baby mouth tightened.

"Good Lord!" said the fisherman, startled, and then he stopped--the
words were as innocent on her lips as a benediction.

"Have you got a father?" Like a flash, her whole face changed.

"I reckon I have."

"Where is he?"

"Hyeh he is!" drawled a voice from the bushes, and it had a tone that
made the fisherman whirl suddenly. A giant mountaineer stood on the bank
above him, with a Winchester in the hollow of his arm.

"How are you?" The giant's heavy eyes lifted quickly, but he spoke to
the girl.

"You go on home--what you doin' hyeh gassin' with furriners!"

The girl shrank to the bushes, but she cried sharply back:

"Don't you hurt him now, Dad. He ain't even got a pistol. He ain't no--"

"Shet up!" The little creature vanished and the mountaineer turned to
the fisherman, who had just put on a fresh minnow and tossed it into the
river.

"Purty well, thank you," he said shortly. "How are you?"

"Fine!" was the nonchalant answer. For a moment there was silence and a
puzzled frown gathered on the mountaineer's face.

"That's a bright little girl of yours--What did she mean by telling you
not to hurt me?"

"You haven't been long in these mountains, have ye?"

"No--not in THESE mountains--why?" The fisherman looked around and was
almost startled by the fierce gaze of his questioner.

"Stop that, please," he said, with a humourous smile. "You make me
nervous."

The mountaineer's bushy brows came together across the bridge of his
nose and his voice rumbled like distant thunder.

"What's yo' name, stranger, an' what's yo' business over hyeh?"

"Dear me, there you go! You can see I'm fishing, but why does everybody
in these mountains want to know my name?"

"You heerd me!"

"Yes." The fisherman turned again and saw the giant's rugged face stern
and pale with open anger now, and he, too, grew suddenly serious.

"Suppose I don't tell you," he said gravely. "What--"

"Git!" said the mountaineer, with a move of one huge hairy hand up the
mountain. "An' git quick!"

The fisherman never moved and there was the click of a shell thrown
into