an.

"But you had a lot of them," said Frank.

"I had fifty." Buckley looked sternly at Frank, and continued: "Half of
them have been stolen by you Yankee thieves. And you know it."

"Stolen! If that isn't too bad!" exclaimed Frank. "I am sure I have never
had one of them. Are you certain they have been stolen? I heard a gobbler
over in the woods here, as I came along."

"You did?" said the man.

Frank thought it only a very white lie he was telling, having heard, at
all events, a very good imitation of a gobbler. He repeated roundly his
assertion. The man regarded him with a steady scowling scrutiny for near
a minute, his surly lips apart, his hands thrust into his pockets. Frank,
who could speak the truth with as clear and beautiful a brow as ever was
seen, could not help wincing a little under the old fellow's slow,
sullen, suspicious observation.

"Boy," said the man, without taking his hands from his pockets, "you're a
lying to me!"

"Very well," said Frank, turning on his heel, "if you think so, then I
suppose it isn't your turkey."

"And what are you going to do about it?" said the man.

"The federal army," said Frank, with a smile, "has need of that turkey. I
shall take him, and settle with the owner when he turns up."

And he walked off. The man was evidently more than half convinced there
was a turkey in the woods--probably one that had escaped when a part of
his flock was stolen.

"Toby," said he, "fetch my gun."

The old negro trotted into the house, and trotted out again, bringing a
double-barrelled shot-gun, which Frank did not like the looks of at all.

"There's some Yankee trick here," said the secessionist, cocking the
piece, and carefully putting a cap on each barrel; "but I reckon they'll
find me enough for 'em. Toby, you stay here with the dog, and take care
of things. Now, boy, march ahead there, and show me that gobbler."

The old negro grinned. So did his master, in a way Frank did not fancy.
It was a morose, menacing, savage grin--a very appropriate prelude, Frank
thought, to a shot from behind out of that two-barrelled fowling-piece.
But it was too late now to retreat. So, putting on a bold and confident
air, he started for the woods, followed by the grim man with the gun.

His sensations by the way were not greatly to be envied. He had never
felt, as he afterwards expressed it, so _streaked_ in his life. By that
term I suppose he alluded to those peculiar thrills which sometime