frien's mought
rush in on we-uns whilst we hedn't no use o' our shootin'-irons. An'
suddint--ye can't hear nuthin' but jes' a owel hoot-in' in the woods, or
old Pa'son Bates's dogs a-howlin' acrost the Cove. An' we go out with
a lantern, an' thar's jes' a pool o' blood in the dooryard, an' bloody
tracks down ter the laurel."

"Eveliny gone!" cried the old man, smiting his hands together; "my
leetle darter! The only one ez never gin me enny trouble. I couldn't hev
made out ter put up with this hyar worl' no longer when my wife died ef
it hedn't been fur Eveliny. Boys war wild an' mischeevious, an' folks
outside don't keer nuthin' 'bout ye--ef they _war_ ter 'lect ye ter
office 'twould be ter keep some other feller from hevin' it, 'kase they
'spise him more'n ye. An' hyar she's runned off an' married old Tom
Kittredge's gran'son, Josiah Kittredge's son--when our folks 'ain't
spoke ter none o' 'em fur fifty year--Josiah Kittredge's son--ha! ha!
ha!" He laughed aloud in tuneless scorn of himself and of this freak
of froward destiny and then fell to wringing his hands and calling upon
Evelina.

The flare from the great chimney-place genially played over the huddled
confusion of the room and the brown logs of the wall, where the gigantic
shadows of the three men mimicked their every gesture with grotesque
exaggeration. The rainbow yarn on the warping bars, the strings of
red-pepper hanging from the ceiling, the burnished metallic flash from
the guns on their racks of deer antlers, served as incidents in the
monotony of the alternate yellow flicker and brown shadow. Deep under
the blaze the red coals pulsated, and in the farthest vistas of the fire
quivered a white heat.

"Old Tom Kittredge," the father resumed, after a time, "he jes' branded
yer gran'dad's cattle with his mark; he jes' cheated yer gran'dad, my
dad, out'n six head o' cattle."

"But then," said the warlike Timothy, not willing to lose sight of
reprisal even in vague reminiscence, "he hed only one hand ter rob with
arter that, fur I hev hearn ez how when gran'dad got through with him
the doctor hed ter take his arm off."

"Sartainly, sartainly," admitted the old man, in quiet assent. "An'
Josiah Kittredge he put out the eyes of a horse critter o' mine right
thar at the court-house door--"

"Waal, arterward, we-uns fired his house over his head," put in Tim.

"An' Josiah Kittredge an' me," the old man went on, "we-uns clinched
every time we met in this m