ter thet, nuther," he
added, with a smile.

"I 'member once a big bull tried t' find out the kind o' works I
hed in me. 'T wa'n' no moose--jest a common ord'nary
three-year-ol' bull."

"Hurt you?" I queried.

"No; 't hurt 'im." said he, soberly. "Sp'ilt 'im, es ye might say.
Could n't never bear the sight uv a man efter thet. Seem so he did
n't think he wus fit t' be seen. Nobody c'u'd ever git 'n a mild
o' th' poor cuss. Hed t' be shot."

"What happened?"

"Hed a stout club 'n my hand," said he. "Got holt uv 'is tail, an'
begun a-whalin' uv 'im. Run 'im down a steep hill, an' passin' a
tree, I tuk one side an' he t' other. We parted there fer the las'
time."

He looked off at the sky a moment.

Then came his inevitable addendum, which was: "I hed a dam sight
more tail 'an he did, thet 's sartin."

About ten o'clock we came in sight of our old home. Then we
hurried our horses, and came up to the door with a rush. A
stranger met us there.

"Are you Captain Bell?" said he, as I got off my horse.

I nodded.

"I am one of your father's tenants," he went on. "Ride over the
ridge yonder about half a mile, and you will see his house." I
looked at D'ri and he at me. He had grown pale suddenly, and I
felt my own surprise turning into alarm.

"Are they well?" I queried.

"Very well, and looking for you," said he, smiling.

We were up in our saddles, dashing out of the yard in a jiffy.
Beyond the ridge a wide mile of smooth country sloped to the river
margin. Just off the road a great house lay long and low in fair
acres. Its gables were red-roofed, its walls of graystone half
hidden by lofty hedges of cedar. We stopped our horses, looking
off to the distant woods on each side of us.

"Can't be," said D'ri, soberly, his eyes squinting in the sunlight.

"Wonder where they live," I remarked.

"All looks mighty cur'us," said he. "'Tain' no way nat'ral."

"Let's go in there and ask," I suggested.

We turned in at the big gate and rode silently over a driveway of
smooth gravel to the door. In a moment I heard my father's hearty
hello, and then my mother came out in a better gown than ever I had
seen her wear. I was out of the saddle and she in my arms before a
word was spoken. My father, hardy old Yankee, scolded the stamping
horse, while I knew well he was only upbraiding his own weakness.

"Come, Ray; come, Darius," said my mother, as she wiped her eyes;
"I will show you the new house.