A picture as definite as if it were the reality of pigments and canvas glowed suddenly before his contemplation,--the red walls of his den a-flicker in the flare of the furnace fire, the burnished gleam of the copper, the burly forms of the tubs of mash, familiars of the brown gloom, and the circle of faces, definite with those sharply marked shadows and striking high lights that a strong artificial glow elicits from the darkness. For his life he could not repress a long-drawn sigh, and then he shifted his position and cleared his throat raucously. But the picture, like many another masterpiece of the painter Memory, was not on general exhibition. For all its close detail and strong salience and brilliant reality of hue, it was invisible to Kenniston. As to the regretful sigh, fat men are often wont to sigh for very fatness, and it passed without significance. After a meditative pause, "Did it ever occur to you that this Larrabee is a crank," asked Kenniston, "what you call, and very aptly, touched-in-the-head?" "Who? Larrabee?" exclaimed Taft vehemently, all alert once more, his eyes on fire, his angry breath quick. "He's smart ez the very devil! Don't you let him pull the wool over yer eyes with the lunacy purtense." Rodolphus Ross gave a final rasping clatter of the poker between the bars; then flung it, resounding, down upon the floor. He rose to his feet, stamping with first one and then the other to shake out his trousers from their persistent kneed effect, and, turning to Taft, he said, with an off-hand manner, "Now, look-a-hyar, Prize Beef, when did ye an' this sca'ce buzzard Lar'bee meet the last time?" The "Prize Beef" apparently perceived no sort of offense in this form of address. "I ain't viewed him in--I dunno when. I 'lowed he hed lef' the kentry till he war up at my store, a few nights ago. I warn't thar, but my leetle gal, she seen him." The sly, predatory look was in Rodolphus Ross's eyes. He lifted his knee and smote it as if he had discovered a very apt coincidence. Taft hesitated; then he said, "Ye'd better go up yander an' talk ter my leetle darter 'bout'n it." He hesitated once more. He feared that Copley might be inadequate to the situation, but, with his ever alert suspicions, he would doubtless fly at the very sight of a stranger; and as to Sis, he could rely upon Rodolphus Ross's address and manner to arouse the enmity of old Mrs. Jiniway's disciple in etiquette, and he knew of old that Sis was wont to give her adversary no quarter. A dozen of such as Rodolphus Ross would hardly be a handful for Sis. He would learn naught from her which he wanted to know. "Take my mare out thar, bein' ready saddled," he said hospitably. "I'll wait hyar till ye kem back."