"An' you men is goin' to stand that from the railroad? Why don't you make them pay for whut gits kilt?" "Well, now, Sar' Ann," said her husband, conciliatorily, "that's just whut I was goin' to say. The time the fust man come down through heah to talk about buildin' the railroad, he done said, like I tol' you Cunnel Blount said, that we might git some stock kilt fer a little while, till things kind o' got used to it, you know; but he 'lowed that the railroad would sort o' pay for anything that got kilt like, you know." "Pay! The railroad goin' to pay you!" Again the remorseless sunbonnet followed its victim and fixed him with its focus. "Pay you! I didn't notice no money layin' on the track where we come along this mawnin', did you? Yes, I reckon it's goin' to pay you, a whole heap!" The scorn of this utterance was limitless, and Jim Bowles felt his insignificance in the untenable position which he had assumed. "Well, I dunno," said he, vaguely, and sighed softly; all of which irritated Mrs. Bowles to such an extent that she flounced suddenly around to get a better gaze upon her master. In this movement, her foot struck the pail of milk which had been sitting near, and overturned it. "Jinny," she called out, "you, Jinny!" "Yassam," replied Jinny, from some place on the gallery. "Come heah," said Mrs. Bowles. "Git me another pail o' melk. I done spilled this one." "Yassam," replied Jinny, and presently returned with the refilled vessel. "Well, anyway," said Jim Bowles at length, rising and standing with hands in pockets, inside the edge of the shade line of the evergreens, "I heard that thah was a man come down through heah a few days ago. He was sort of takin' count o' the critters that done got kilt by the railroad kyahs." "That so?" said Sarah Ann, somewhat mollified. "I reckon so," said Jim Bowles. "I 'lowed I'd ast Cunnel Blount 'bout that sometime. 0' co'se it don't bring Muley back, but then---" "No, hit don't," said Sarah Ann, resuming her original position. "And our little Sim, he just loved that Muley cow, little Sim, he did," she mourned. "Say, Jim Bowles, do you heah me?"--this with a sudden flirt of the sunbonnet in an agony of actual fear. "Why, Jim Bowles, do you know that ouah little Sim might be a-playin' out thah in front of ouah house, on to that railroad track, at this very minute? S'pose, s'posen--along comes that thah railroad train! Say, man, whut you standin' there in that thah shade fer? We got to go! We got to git home! Come right along this minute, er we may be too late."