The girls in school or helping with the housework; the boys in
the mines. Don't step out till after supper. Then look out! The young
bucks shake a heel and the girls put on their lipstick. Them that can't
afford a permanent go around all day with their hair done up in
curlycues till they look a match for Shirley Temple by the time they get
here of a night. Times has surely changed."

A bus whizzed by and disappeared beyond the bend of the road.

"Times has changed," Tennis repeated slowly as his gaze sought the
hillside where Devil Anse lay buried. "I wonder what Pa would a-thought
of my place," he said with conscientious wistfulness. His eyes swept now
the interior of the Silver Moon Tavern. "This couldn't a-been in Pa's
young days. Nor womenfolks couldn't a-been so free. Such as this
couldn't a-been, no more than their ways then could stand today." The
son of Devil Anse leaned over the bar and said in a strangely hushed
voice, "Woman, I've heard tell that you have a hankerin' for curiosities
and old-timey things. I keep a few handy so's I don't get above my
raisin'." He reached under the counter. "Here, woman, heft this!" He
placed in my hands Devil Anse's long-barreled gun. "Scrutinize them
notches on the barrel. That there first one is Harmon McCoy. Year of
sixty-three," he said bluntly.

While I hefted the gun, Tennis brought out a crumpled shirt. "Them holes
is where the McCoys stobbed Uncle Ellison and there's the stain of his
gorm."

The gruesome sight of the blood-stained garment slashed by the McCoys
completely unnerved me. I dropped the gun.

Instantly a door opened behind Tennis and a young lad rushed in. He took
in the situation at a glance and swiftly appraised my five-foot height.
"Pa," he turned to Tennis Hatfield, "you've scared this little critter
out of a year's growth. And she ain't got none to spare."

Seeing that all was well he backed out of the door he had entered, and
Tennis went on to say that his young son had quit college to join the
army. "He'll be leaving soon for training camp. That is, if he can quit
courting Nellie McCoy long enough over in Seldom Seen Hollow. 'Pon my
soul, I never saw two such turtledoves in my life. She's pretty as a
picture and I've told her that whether or not her and Tennis Junior
every marry there's always a place for her here with us. A pretty girl
in a pretty frock is mighty handy to wait table." Again the wideflung
hands of the proprietor of the Silver Mo