the locked wheel aided the distance to mask
the incongruous sound.

"What ailed you-uns ter name _me_ as the corpus, 'Gene Barker?" demanded
Walter Wyatt, when he had regained the capacity of coherent speech.

"Oh, I hed ter do suddint murder on somebody," declared the driver, all
bluff and reassured and red-faced again, "an' I couldn't think quick
of nobody else. Besides, I helt a grudge agin' you fer not stuffin' mo'
straw 'twixt them jimmyjohns in the coffin-box."

"That's a fac'. Ye air too triflin' ter be let ter live, Watt," cried
one of their comrades. "I hearn them jugs clash tergether in the
coffin-box when 'Gene checked the team up suddint, I tell you. An' them
men sure 'peared ter me powerful suspectin'."

"_I_ hearn the clash of them jimmyjohns," chimed in the driver. "I
really thunk my hour war come. Some informer must hev set them men ter
spyin' round fer moonshine."

"Oh, surely nobody wouldn't dare," urged one of the group, uneasily; for
the identity of an informer was masked in secrecy, and his fate, when
discovered, was often gruesome.

"They couldn't hev noticed the clash of them jimmyjohns, nohow,"
declared the negligent Watt, nonchalantly. "But namin' _me_ fur the dead
one! Supposin' they air revenuers fur true, an' hed somebody along, hid
out in the bresh, ez war acquainted with me by sight----"

"Then they'd hev been skeered out'n thar boots, that's all," interrupted
the self-sufficient 'Gene. "They would hev 'lowed they hed viewed
yer brazen ghost, bold ez brass, standin' at the head of yer own
coffin-box."

"Or mebbe they mought hev recognized the Wyatt favor, ef they warn't
acquainted with _me_," persisted Watt, with his unique sense of injury.

Eugene Barker defended the temerity of his inspiration. "They would hev
jes thought ye war kin ter the deceased, an' at-tendin' him ter his long
home."

"'Gene don't keer much fur ye ter be alive nohow, Watt Wyatt," one of
the others suggested tactlessly, "'count o' Minta Elladine Biggs."

Eugene Barker's off-hand phrase was incongruous with his sudden gravity
and his evident rancor as he declared: "_I_ ain't carin' fur sech ez
Watt Wyatt. An' they _do_ say in the cove that Minta Elladine Biggs hev
gin him the mitten, anyhow, on account of his gamesome ways, playin'
kyerds, a-bet-tin' his money, drinkin' apple-jack, an' sech."

The newly constituted ghost roused himself with great vitality as if
to retort floutingly; but as he turned, his