Young Melchior Hammond from Millbrook visited the Ducats whenever he came to the glen, and that was as often as he could slip away from his father and his father's business. The senior Hammond was not only a storekeeper but a money-lender, and his methods were devious. Melchior became popular with the Ducats, despite his parentage. He was a simple youth, taking his character from the spindle side; and yet he was not without spirit, although not a "white-water boy." He disapproved of his father's dealings with the needy and easy; and when far enough away from home, particularly when in Piper's Glen, he was wont to state his disapproval frankly. He never came to the glen without a pocketful of cigars for old Hercules Ducat and old Archie McKim, and a box of candy for Flora Ducat; and he never refused to sit into a game of cards with Peter and Uncle Sam and Mark Ducat, though it was known to all that Amos Hammond looked upon a pack of cards as fifty-two admission tickets to hell. To be caught by his father in the act of ruffling a deck would cost Melchior his home and his inheritance, and yet the young man never refused to sit in at forty-fives or black-jack or poker under the Ducat roof, though he was seldom a winner. But he did not give all his time in Piper's Glen to the playing of cards. He devoted part of it to conversation with Flora. It was easy to see that Melchior Hammond, like several others of the young men of the district, thought Flora Ducat much to be admired. Also, her brother Mark was man to be cultivated. Title of Cock of the River was a revered one in that part of the country. CHAPTER IV THE ROAD TO PIPER'S GLEN Millbrook joins Racket River from the west, and the village of Millbrook lies about the junction of the two streams. The mill from which the brook derives its name was built by an early settler, generations ago, and is now no more than a broken wall of masonry on a bank, and a few slimy, silted timbers beneath the brown water showing where the dam has been. It had been a gristmill, but now no wheat is grown in that country and the settlers buy their flour in barrels from Amos Hammond and haul their buckwheat to Covered Bridge to be ground.