at the door to survey the gathering with vacant
astonishment.

Burleson paid for the knife, bought a dozen stamps, tasted the cheese
and ordered a whole one, selected three or four barrels of apples, and
turned on his heel with a curt good-night.

"Say!" broke out old man Storm as he reached the door; "you wasn't
plannin' to hev the law on Abe, was you?"

"About that grass fire?" inquired Burleson, wheeling in his tracks. "Oh
no; Abe lost his temper and his belt. Any man's liable to lose both.
By-the-way"--he came back slowly, buttoning his gloves--"about this
question of the game--it has occurred to me that it can be adjusted very
simply. How many men in this town are hunters?"

Nobody answered at first, inherent suspicion making them coy. However,
it finally appeared that in a community of twenty families there were
some four of nature's noblemen who "admired to go gunnin' with a
smell-dog."

"Four," repeated Burleson. "Now just see how simple it is. The law
allows thirty woodcock, thirty partridges, and two deer to every hunter.
That makes eight deer and two hundred and forty birds out of the
preserve, which is very little--if you shoot straight enough to get your
limit!" he laughed. "But it being a private preserve, you'll do your
shooting on Saturdays, and check off your bag at the gate of the
lodge--so that you won't make any mistakes in going over the limit." He
laughed again, and pointed at a lean hound lying under the counter.

"Hounds are barred; only 'smell-dogs' admitted," he said. "And"--he
became quietly serious--"I count on each one of you four men to aid my
patrol in keeping the game-laws and the fire-laws and every forest law
on the statutes. And I count on you to take out enough fox and mink
pelts to pay me for my game--and you yourselves for your labor; for
though it is my game by the law of the land, what is mine is no source
of pleasure to me unless I share it. Let us work together to keep the
streams and coverts and forests well stocked. Good-night."

About eleven o'clock that evening Abe Storm slunk into the store, and
the community rose and fell on him and administered the most terrific
beating that a husky young man ever emerged from alive.

III

In October the maple leaves fell, the white birches showered the
hill-sides with crumpled gold, the ruffed grouse put on its downy
stockings, the great hare's flanks became patched with white. Cold was
surely coming; somewhere behind the b