a defiance which was evidently the
result of a late domestic wrangle.

"I've got one man on my hands," she began in a shrill voice, "an' he's as
much as I can 'tend to, an' a long sight mo' than I care to 'tend to. He
never had the spunk to fight anythin' except his wife, but I reckon he's
better off now than them that had; it's the coward that gets the best of
things in these days."

"Shut up thar, you hussy!" growled a voice from the kitchen, and a fat man
with bleared eyes slouched to the doorway. "I reckon if you want a supper
you can work for it," he remarked, taking a wad of tobacco from his mouth
and aiming it deliberately at one of the ailanthus shoots. "You split up
that thar pile of logs back thar an' Sally'll cook yo' supper. Thar ain't
another house inside of a good ten miles, so you'd better take your chance,
I reckon."

"That's jest like you, Tom Bates," retorted the woman passionately. "Befo'
you'd do a lick of honest work you'd let the roof topple plum down upon our
heads."

For an instant Dan's glance cut the man like a whip, then crossing to the
woodpile, he lifted the axe and sent it with a clean stroke into a hickory
log.

"We can't starve, Big Abel," he said coolly, "but we are not beggars yet by
a long way."

"Go 'way, Marse Dan," protested the negro in disgust. "Gimme dat ar axe en
set right down and wait twel supper. You're des es white es a sheet dis
minute."

"I've got to begin some day," returned Dan, as the axe swung back across
his shoulder. "I'll pay for my supper and you'll pay for yours, that's
fair, isn't it?--for you're a free man now."

Then he went feverishly to work, while Big Abel sat grumbling on the
doorstep, and the farmer, leaning against the lintel behind him, watched
the lessening pile with sluggish eyes.

"You be real careful of this wood, Sally, an' it ought to last twel
summer," he observed, as he glanced to where his wife stood wringing out
the clothes. "If you warn't so wasteful that last pile would ha' held out
twice as long."

Dan chopped steadily for an hour, and then giving the axe to Big Abel, went
into the little kitchen to eat his supper. The woman served him sullenly,
placing some sobby biscuits and a piece of cold bacon on his plate, and
pouring out a glass of buttermilk with a vicious thrust of the pitcher.
When he asked if there was a shelter close at hand where he might sleep,
she replied sourly that she reckoned the barn was good enough if he ch