“All right.” Mrs. Porter was turning away. “I'll try to keep them entertained till you come back.” IX BENEATH a big oak Pole stood holding his bridle-rein and waiting, his earnest gaze on the long road leading to Jeff Wade's farm. Suddenly he descried a cloud of dust far ahead, and chuckled. “He's certainly on time,” he mused. “He must 'a' had his hoss already hitched out in the thicket. Mel made good time, too. The dern scamp wants to see bloodshed. Mel's that sort. By gum! that hain't Wade; it's Mel hisse'f, an' he's certainly layin' the lash to his animal.” In a gallop, Jones bore down on him, riding as recklessly as a cowboy, his broad hat in one hand, a heavy switch in the other. He drew rein when he recognized Baker. “Did you deliver that message?” Pole questioned. “Oh yes, I finally got him alone; his wife seems to suspicion some'n, and she stuck to 'im like a leech. She's a jealous woman, Pole, an' I don't know but what she kinder thought Jeff was up to some o' his old shines. She's in a family-way, an' a little more cranky than common. He was a sorter tough nut before he married, you know, an' a man like that will do to watch.” “Well, what did he say?” Pole asked, as indifferently as his impatience would allow. “Why, he said, 'All hunkeydory.' The spring plan ketched him jest right. He said that _one_ thing--o' bloodyin' up the main street in town--had bothered him more than anything else. He admired it in Floyd, too. Jeff said: 'By gum! fer a town dude, that feller's got more backbone than I expected.. He's a foe wuth meetin', an' I reckon killin' 'im won't be sech a terrible disgrace as I was afeard it mought be.'” “But whar are you headin' fer in sech a rush?” Pole asked. Jones laughed slyly as he put his hat carefully on his shaggy head and pressed the broad brims up on the sides and to a point in front. “Why, Pole,” he answered, “to tell you the truth, I am headed fer that thar spring. I'm goin' to acknowledge to you that, as long as I've lived in this world, I hain't never been on hand at a shootin'-scrape. Mighty nigh every man I know has seed oodlin's of 'em, but my luck's been agin me. I was too young to be in the war, an' about the most excitin' thing I ever attended was a chicken-fight, and so I determined to see this through. I know a big rock jest above the spring, and I'm a-goin' to git thar in plenty o' time. You let me git kivered all but my eyes, an' I'll run the resk o' gettin' hit from thar up. Whar _you_ makin' fer, Pole?” “Me? Oh, I'm on the way home, Mel. I seed the biggest rattlesnake run across this road jest now I ever laid eyes on. I got down to settle his hash, but I didn't have anything to hit 'im with, an' I'm done stompin' on them fellers sence Tobe Baker, my cousin, over at Hillbend, got bliffed in the knee-j'int.”