“Well,” and the old man smiled, and winked at the lawyer, “I 'll give you both all the advice I kin. Now, the Shoal River stock is a good thing right now; but ef the mill was to ketch on fire an' burn down thar'd be a loss. Then as fer timber-land, it ain't easy to sell, but it mought take a start before another flood. I say it mought, an' then agin it moughtn't. The mill mought burn, an' then agin it moughtn't. Now, ef you-uns kin be helped by this advice you are welcome to it free o' charge. Not changin' the subject, did you-uns know Mrs. Richardson's heffer's got a calf? I reckon she won't borrow so much milk after hers gits good.” Trabue smiled broadly as the gaunt man withdrew; but his amusement was short-lived, for Mrs. Bishop began to cry, and she soon rose in despair and left the room. Alan stood for a moment looking at the unmoved face of his father, who had found something in the last clause of the document which needed explanation; then he, too, went out. II [Illustration: 9017] LAN found his uncle on the back porch washing his face and hands in a basin on the water-shelf. The young man leaned against one of the wooden posts which supported the low roof of the porch and waited for him to conclude the puffing, sputtering operation, which he finally did by enveloping his head in a long towel hanging from a wooden roller on the weather-boarding. “Well,” he laughed, “yore uncle Ab didn't better matters in thar overly much. But what could a feller do? Yore pa's as bull-headed as a young steer, an' he's already played smash anyway. Yore ma's wastin' breath; but a woman seems to have plenty of it to spare. A woman' s tongue's like a windmill--it takes breath to keep it a-goin', an' a dead calm ud kill her business.” “It's no laughing matter, Uncle Ab,” said Alan, despondently. “Something must have gone wrong with father's judgment. He never has acted this way before.”