true," he
admitted slowly. "Nobody else would a' gin ye th' word." The angry youth
paused in black, murderous thought. "He air a-comin' hyar, to-night," he
went on presently. "I heered him tell Madge Brierly that he war comin'
back, this evenin'. You better--maybe you had better git along." He had
no wish for witnesses to what he planned, now, to accomplish, when
Layson should come back to Madge, as he had promised, with the
engineer's report upon her coal lands.

Holton nodded, grimly satisfied that he had planted a suspicion which
might flower into his own revenge. That blow which Layson had delivered
on his face, in the old days, had left a scar upon his soul, and now
that the young man seemed likely to add to this unforgotten injury the
new one of retiring from the field as suitor for his daughter, and,
further, interfering with his plans to rob Madge Brierly of her coal
lands, his hatred of him had become intense, insatiable. What better
fortune could he wish than to pit this mountain youth, whom, also, for a
reason carried over from dark days in his past life, he hated, against
the young man from the bluegrass whom he hated no less bitterly?

"Go by _that_ path, thar," said Lorey, suddenly, and pointing, as Holton
started to return by the direct route he had followed as he came. "It
air round-about, but it'll lead you to th' valley. I'll run no risk o'
your warnin' him."

"Don't you be skeered," said Holton. "I'll keep mum, no matter what
happens."

With a grim smile he started down the path which the mountaineer had
pointed out.

"Laid his whip acrost my face!" he muttered as he went. "Trifled with my
gal! Him an' Ben Lorey's son--let 'em fight it out! I'm so much th'
better off."

And Lorey, slipping back into the shadow of a rock, after he had made
quite certain that the stranger was following his directions, was
reflecting, bitterly: "He's come atween me an' th' gal I love! He's put
th' revenoo hounds upon my track! Oh, if he had a dozen lives, I'd have
'em all!"

For ten alert and watchful minutes, which seemed to stretch to hours, he
crouched there, waiting, waiting, waiting, for the coming of the man he
hated. During five of these he listened to the sounds of Holton's
downward progress, brought to his keen ear on the soft breezes of the
young night. There came the crackling of a twig, the thud, thud, thud
of a dislodged stone bounding down the slope, the rustle of leaves as
the old man shuffled t