than to come prying around into all
the quiet places to say, "This is my grandfather's land. What are _you_
doing here?"

At such thoughts as these a queer prickling sensation like a hot shiver
would run over him from neck to heel, and his eyes would gloom sullenly.
There would be another word to put with that; a word of his own
choosing. No matter if her grandfather, the terrifying Major, did own
the fields and the wood and the stream: God was greater than Major
Dabney, and had he not often heard his mother say on her knees that the
fervent, effectual prayer of the righteous availeth much? If it should
avail even a little, there would be no catastrophe, no disputed
sovereignty of the woods, the fields and the creek.

It was in the middle of a sultry afternoon in the hotter half of
August, two weeks or such a matter after the Great Southwestern Railway
had given up the fight for Paradise Valley to run its line around the
encompassing hills, that Thomas Jefferson was cast alive into the pit of
burnings.

He made sure he should always remember his latest glimpse of the
pleasant, homely earth. He was sitting idly on the porch step, letting
his gaze go adrift over the nearer green-clad hills to the purple deeps
of the western mountain, already steeped in shadow. The pike was
deserted, and the shrill hum of the house-flies played an insistent tune
in which the low-pitched boom of a bumblebee tumbling awkwardly among
the clover heads served for an intermittent bass.

Suddenly into the hot silence came the quick _cloppity-clop_ of
galloping hoofs. Thomas Jefferson's heart was tender on that side of it
which was turned toward the dumb creatures, and his thought was
instantly pitiful and indignant. Who would be cruel enough to gallop a
horse in such weltering weather?

The unspoken query had its answer when Major Dabney's fleet saddle
stallion thundered up to the gate in a white nimbus of dust, and the
Major flung himself from the saddle and called loudly for Mistress
Gordon. Thomas Jefferson sprang up hastily to forward the cry, fear
clutching at his heart; but the Major was before him in the wide passage
opening upon the porch.

"My deah Mistress Gordon! We are in a world of trouble at the
manor-house! Little Ardea, my grand-daughteh, was taken sick last night,
and to-day she's out of huh head--think of it, _out of huh head!_ I'm
riding hotfoot for Doctah Williams, but Lord of Heaven! it'll be nigh
sundown befo' I can