“Pore leetle gal,” the old man nodded understandingly. “You warn’t bigger’n Sudie, I reckon, time o’ the Amyx shootin’. ’Twar a shame ter saddle you with sech mem’ries. I never did hev much use fer sech doin’s, and I said so, but hit warn’t a grain o’ use. You might jest as well talk ter a passel of hounds arter a Bushy tail. But chirk up, you won’t see Jake in these parts agin. What we’re most consarned ’bout now is whar you’re goin’ ter keep school when the ugly weather comes on.” They had come to the parting of the ways, and here Talitha left the old man hobbling painfully toward his cabin. Si Quinn’s progress homeward was slow. He stopped now and then to regain his breath and chuckle feebly to himself. “I reckon she thinks I’ve a heart of stun ter take hit so ca’m, but I ’low Jake Simcox didn’t do sech a bad thing. Hit war worse fer hisself than fer Goose Creek. Law, what’ll the gal say when she hears of hit! I reckon I’d better be sendin’ fer them school fixin’s ter-morrow.” He had reached the cabin door, and now he shuffled inside, closing it carefully. Shadowed by pines, the place was always gloomy enough even at mid-day with the shutters thrown wide. Now he uncovered the coals on the hearth, laid on a few small sticks, and swung the battered old tea kettle over the blaze. Then he drew up his chair cosily before it, and thrusting his hand into his trousers’ pocket brought forth a small leather bag. From it he counted a number of bills, smoothing each one tenderly across his knee. “She shall hev ’em,” he said aloud. “I’ll do without somehow, and hit won’t be fer long. The old man’s nearin’ the end of the trail—” He glanced around uneasily, with a vague consciousness of something—he knew not what. In the far corner of the cabin a pair of eyes, bloodshot and wild, glared at him from under a thatch of red hair. The old man grasped the money. It disappeared in his shirt as he staggered to his feet and faced the intruder. “You needn’t be afeard, I ain’t goin’ ter tech hit.” The figure issued from the corner lamely. In the light it was still more forbidding. A bruise on the forehead made a disfiguring, parti-coloured lump on his otherwise pale, drawn face. “I ain’t teched a thing, not even a crumb, tho’ I’m ’most famished,” he growled. “Hush, you crazy loon!” Si Quinn raised a warning finger. “Aw, yes, I know,” sneered the young fellow recklessly. “The dogs air arter the wolf and they kin hev him.” He threw up his arms wildly. “Set down in thet cheer and be still,” commanded the old man. Jake dropped obediently into a seat. “I ’lowed you war out’n the kentry. Why didn’t you make tracks when you had a chanct?” “I did aim ter,” answered Jake Simcox, “but I fell, crawlin’ over thet ledge by the Gulch, and I didn’t know nothin’ till this mornin’. I could hear the men thrashin’ the bushes all ’round me, but I was jest out of sight of ’em. I wish fer the land they’d tuk me then and thar and done with hit.”