There was a moment's pause--rather an awkward pause. Lescott's mind began piecing together fragments of conversation he had heard, until he had assembled a sort of mental jig-saw puzzle. The South-Hollman feud had been mentioned by the more talkative of his informers, and carefully tabooed by others--notable among them his host of last night. It now dawned on him that he was crossing the boundary and coming as the late guest of a Hollman to ask the hospitality of a South. "I didn't know whose house it was," he hastened to explain, "until I was benighted, and asked for lodging. They were very kind to me. I'd never seen them before. I'm a stranger hereabouts." Samson only nodded. If the explanation failed to satisfy him, it at least seemed to do so. "I reckon ye'd better let me holp ye up on thet old mule," he said; "hit's a-comin' on ter be night." With the mountaineer's aid, Lescott clambered astride the mount, then he turned dubiously. "I'm sorry to trouble you," he ventured, "but I have a paint box and some materials up there. If you'll bring them down here, I'll show you how to pack the easel, and, by the way," he anxiously added, "please handle that fresh canvas carefully--by the edge--it's not dry yet." He had anticipated impatient contempt for his artist's impedimenta, but to his surprise the mountain boy climbed the rock, and halted before the sketch with a face that slowly softened to an expression of amazed admiration. Finally, he took up the square of academy board with a tender care of which his rough hands would have seemed incapable, and stood stock still, presenting an anomalous figure in his rough clothes as his eyes grew almost idolatrous. Then, he brought the landscape over to its creator, and, though no word was spoken, there flashed between the eyes of the artist, whose signature gave to a canvas the value of a precious stone and the jeans-clad boy whose destiny was that of the vendetta, a subtle, wordless message. It was the countersign of brothers-in-blood who recognize in each other the bond of a mutual passion. The boy and the girl, under Lescott's direction, packed the outfit, and stored the canvas in the protecting top of the box. Then, while Sally turned and strode down creek in search of Lescott's lost mount, the two men rode up stream in silence. Finally. Samson spoke slowly and diffidently. "Stranger," he ventured, "ef hit hain't askin' too much, will ye let me see ye paint one of them things?" "Gladly," was the prompt reply. Then, the boy added covertly: "Don't say nothin' erbout hit ter none of these folks. They'd devil me."