There was no time to ponder as to this, for now shouts sounded behind them. The crashing of glass and cries of fear came from the room where the women had been left. The men hurried thither, and as they gained the door, a black face appeared at the broken pane. Once more Eddring felt hesitation at what seemed simple murder, yet still his rifle was rising when he felt a sudden dizziness assail him. A long arm pushed him away. He saw the brown barrel of the squirrel rifle rising into line once more. The black at the window fell back, shot through the forehead. Sarah Ann handed Jim Bowles another bullet. "I always did love you, ol' man," said Sarah Ann, as he blew the smoke from the long barrel of his rifle before reloading. Eddring saw and heard thus much, but presently he sank half- unconscious, not knowing the puzzle of the shot which had struck him here so far toward the interior of the house. After a time the horror of it all drew to its climax and passed on. Buckner, the storekeeper, slipped down to the railroad station and set going an imperative clicking on the wire. Two hours later there came a special train, whose appearance put an end to the conflict. Dawn found the engine fuming at the station-house, and dawn saw the Big House still standing, charred a little at one corner, near which lay the body of the unfortunate who had sought to apply the brand. Eddring, still faint and dizzy, but not seriously hurt, sat at a little table opposite Colonel Blount, who, himself gray and gaunt, had paused for a time in his uneasy walk about the premises. A mocking-bird on the trellis without the door trilled its song high and sweet, as though the coming sunshine could reveal nothing of that which had been there. CHAPTER IX ON ITS MAJESTY'S SERVICE John Eddring, one morning, a month, or so after the Big House battle, sat in the offices devoted to the use of the division claim agent of the Y. Y. lines, whose headquarters were situated in a squat building around which went on the scattered industries of the city known as the industrial capital of a certain region of the South. Beyond these dingy confines might have been seen other structures yet more squat and dreary, from which issued the lines of iron rails which led out into the South, rails which even here paralleled the shores of the great river, as though dependent upon it for maintenance and guidance. The mighty flood, unmindful, swept toward the South, its tawny mane far out in midstream wrinkled by the breath of an up-stream air.