to lay in jail till Fall. If ye'll he'p
me, Uncle Dick, ye know Dan Hodges won't never fail ye."

"That's what I'm afeared on," Uncle Dick retorted, glumly. "I 'most
know 'twas you-all an' yer gang kilt thet-thar heifer o' mine in cold
blood. Now, the ole man ye've treated dirt is yer las' chance. Wall,
cuss ye! I'll come down t'-morrer an' bail ye out--not kase I love ye
any, but kase I'm again the revenuers. An' listen 'ere! I'm some old,
but I'm some spry yit, ye bet! You-all stop round these parts whar I
kin keep an eye on ye till Fall Cote. If ye don't, damn ye!--wall, my
ole rifle's bright an' 'iled, an' I'll git ye! Jest remember thet, Dan
Hodges: I'll git ye!" And with this grim warning, Uncle Dick slammed
the receiver on its hook, and stalked out of the store.

On the following day, he journeyed duly to North Wilkesboro', where,
despite the protest of his lawyer, he put up his land as security for
the appearance of the two malefactors. Uncle Dick was a consistent
conservative. Had the accident of birth made him an English squire, he
would have been a stanch Tory, would have held the King's commission
on the bench of justices, and would have administered the penalties of
the law with exceeding severity against poachers. Having been born in
the Blue Ridge Mountains, he staked his property in behalf of two
scoundrels, for the sake of an inherited feud against the Federal
authority.

Nevertheless, his personal distrust of the men he had thus relieved
was made manifest when, immediately after the commitment of the two
before the Commissioner, he betook himself to a hardware store, where
he bought a forty-one caliber Colt's revolver, with a holster and a
box of cartridges. He had given up the habitual carrying of weapons on
his seventy-fifth birthday, as unseemly and unnecessary for one of his
patriarchal years. Now, he reverted to the use as a measure of
prudence.

"The damned dawg's done me dirt, an' he hain't above doin' hit ag'in,"
he muttered, as he strapped the holster beneath his left arm.

To his womankind, Uncle Dick spoke of the affair casually, concealing
his apprehensions. Neither of the granddaughters ventured
remonstrance, though Alvira's pretty face was mutinous, and Plutina
felt a sickening sense of calamity rushing upon her. It seemed to her
the irony of fate that her own relation should thus interfere to
render abortive the effect she had risked so much to secure. She
realized, with a shrinki