for twice-told tales--"kase--kase the
guide war--war--myself."

The clear twilight fell full on his amazed, upturned face and the storm
of fury it concentrated.

"What did you do it fur?" he thundered, "you limb o' perdition!"

"Jes' ter help him some. He--he--he--would hev been capshured."

He would indeed! The guerilla was very terrible to look upon as his brow
corrugated, and his upturned eyes, with the light of the sky within
them, flashed ominously.

"You little she-devil!" he cried, and then speech seemed to fail him.

She had begun to shiver and shed tears and emit little gusts of quaking
sobs.

"Oh, I be so feared----" she whimpered. "But--but--you mustn't
hang--_nobody else_ on s'picion!"

There was a vague change in the expression of his face. He still stood
beside the saddle, with the reins over his arm, while the horse threw
his head almost to the ground and again tossed it aloft in his impatient
weariness of the delay.

"An' now you are captured yourself," he said, sternly. "You are
accountable fur your actions."

She burst into a paroxysm of sobs. "I never went ter tell! I meant ter
keep the secret! The folks in the Cove dun'no' nuthin'. But--oh, ye
_mustn't_ s'picion nobody else--ye _mustn't_ hang nobody else!"

Once more that indescribable change upon his face.

"You showed him the way to this pass yourself? Tell the truth!"

"He war ridin' his horse-critter--'tain't ez fast, nor fine, nor fat ez
yourn."

He stroked the glossy mane with a sort of mechanical pride.

"And so he went plumb through the cave?"

"An' all the troop--they kindled pine-knots fur torches."

He glanced about him at the convenient growths.

"And they came out all safe in Greenbrier?" He winced. How the lost
opportunity hurt him!

"Yessir. In Greenbrier Cove."

"Did he pay you in gold?" sneered Ackert. "Or in greenbacks? Or mebbe in
Cornfed money?"

"I wouldn't hev his gold." She drew herself up proudly, though the tears
were still coursing down her cheeks. "So he gin me a present--a whole
passel o' coffee in my milk-piggin." Then to complete a candid
confession she detailed the disposition she had made of this rare and
precious luxury at the rebel smallpox camp.

His eyes seemed to dilate as they gazed up at her. "Jesus Gawd!" he
exclaimed, with uncouth profanity. But the phrase was unfamiliar to her,
and she caught at it with a meaning all her own.

"That's jes' it! Folks in gineral don't think o' _th