were seventeen
and eighteen, and "not such babies either; if they insisted on fighting
they had to take what they got and not send their sister to talk and
abuse a man about it afterward." And the weight of opinion was that,
"that Vashti Mills was gettin' too airified and set up anyways."

All this reached Mrs. Stanley, and was no doubt sweet to her ears. She
related it in her drawling voice to Darby as he sat in the door one
evening, but it did not seem to have much effect on him; he never
stirred or showed by word or sign that he even heard her, and finally,
without speaking, he rose and lounged away into the woods. The old woman
gazed after him silently until he disappeared, and then gave a look
across to where the Mills cabin peeped from among the pines, which was
full of hate.

*****

The fish-fry at which Darby Stanley had first fought the Mills boys and
then pulled one of them out of the river, had been given by one of the
county candidates for election as delegate to a convention which was to
be held at the capital, and possibly the division of sentiment in
the district between the Millses and Little Darby was as much due to
political as to personal feeling; for the sides were growing more and
more tightly drawn, and the Millses, as usual, were on one side and
Little Darby on the other; and both sides had strong adherents. The
question was on one side, Secession, with probable war; and on the
other, the Union as it was. The Millses were for the candidate who
advocated the latter, and Little Darby was for him who wanted secession.
Both candidates were men of position and popularity, the one a young man
and the other older, and both were neighbors.

The older man was elected, and shortly the question became imminent,
and all the talk about the Cross-roads was of war. As time had worn on,
Little Darby, always silent, had become more and more so, and seemed to
be growing morose. He spent more and more of his time in the woods or
about the Cross-roads, the only store and post-office near the district
where the little tides of the quiet life around used to meet. At length
Mrs. Stanley considered it so serious that she took it upon herself to
go over and talk to her neighbor, Mrs. Douwill, as she generally did on
matters too intricate and grave for the experience of the district. She
found Mrs. Douwill, as always, sympathetic and kind, and though she
took back with her not much enlightenment as to the cause of her