“Jiminy Crack-corn an’ I don’t keer!” exclaimed Mink, doubling himself partly in a gesture of ecstasy, and partly to reach a silver coin that led a lonesome life in the depths of his long pocket. He handed it over, and slapped his leg with a sounding thwack. “I could shoot ye all off ’n the ground, an’ I kin git the fust an’ second ch’ice in two cracks.” Rood, in the doorway behind Price, regarded the transaction with disapproval. “I don’t b’lieve it’s ’cordin’ ter rules, Jerry,” he expostulated, “ter go roun’ an’ swap off yer chances arter ye paid fur ’em. I never seen it done afore, no-ways.” “Ye hold yer jaw!” said Price, imperious, though good-natured. “I hev shot fur beef ’fore ye war born!”—a diminutive marksman, were this statement to receive full credit, since he was but a year or two older than Rood. Irregular though it may have been, there was no appeal from the self-arrogated authority of Price, and his oft-reiterated formula as to his experience before his interlocutor’s birth had all the enlightened functions of precedent. Rood said no more, appreciating the futility of remonstrance. He stood, surly enough, in the doorway, listening absently to the garrulous clamor of the old miller, who was telling again and again of Mink’s iniquity in teaching Tad “five corn,” and of his threats against the mill. “I dare ye ter lay a finger on the mill!” he cried. “I’ll put ye in that thar hopper an’ grind every ounce o’ yer carcass ter minch meat.” Mink gave him no heed. He had joined the group of marksmen near the tree on which the targets were to be fixed. He was loading his gun, holding the ball in the palm of his hand, and pouring enough powder over it to barely cover it in a conical heap. He dexterously adjusted the “patching,” and as he rammed down the charge he paused suddenly. From a little log cabin on a rise hard by, a delicate spiral wreath of smoke curled up over the orchard, and airily defined itself against the mountain. Beside the rail fence a girl of fifteen was standing; sunny-haired, blue-eyed, barefooted, and slatternly. The peaches were ripe in the weighted trees above her head; he heard the chanting bees among them. The pig was grunting luxuriously among their roots and the fallen over-ripe fruit; for his driver, ’Gustus Tom, and the elder boy, Joseph, had gone down to the mill for a closer view of the shooting; the small girls who had mounted the fence being deterred from accompanying them by feminine decorum. The dogs appertaining to the place had also gone down to the mill, and were conferring with the followers of the contestants in the match. One, however, a gaunt and gray old hound, that had half climbed the fence, hesitated, his fore-paws resting on the topmost rail, a lean, eager curiosity on his grave, serious countenance, his neck stretched, his head close to the pretty head of the golden-haired maiden.