"Belle-Ann, ef yo' takes pertic'lar notice, every time Jutt Orlick cums t' Moon mountain somethin' alers happens--somethin' goes wrong. 'Peers like things starts back'ards." "I 'low he air a hoodoo," observed Belle-Ann: "but he do look soldierfied, don't he, Lem?" she added, with a subtle regard for Orlick's military aspect and his bombastic airs. Lem shot a jealous, reproachful look at the girl, turning sharply as she rose, and pointed down to a gap in the scrub timber, which was half lighted by the moon. They caught the fleeting shadow of a horseman mounting the trail to the cabin. "Hit's Orlick!" Lem announced. The sound of metallic hoof-strokes came rapid and distinct. When the rider had looped the spur they beheld the front of Orlick's horse coming head on up the moon-path, his hocks now in the air. As always, Orlick had flank-spurred his mount on the last lap, and the animal plunged, panting, to the horse-block, and brought up stiff-legged, with red-rimmed nostrils and distended jaws, fighting a cruel Spanish bit. Orlick rolled out of the Mexican saddle, laughed shortly, and drawled: "Howdy, yo'-all?" and smirked as he always did. "I hain't seen yo'-all in a coon's age, Lem," he added cordially, though his evil eyes were upon the girl as he extended his hand in greeting. Lem Lutts touched the outstretched hand briefly. Belle-Ann stood aloof with a look of suspicious admiration on her lovely countenance. "I hain't seen yo'-all 'bout much nuther," answered Lem, with a contemptuous scrutiny of Orlick's brave trappings. Orlick chuckled. "Yes--I'm gittin' over th' country a little nowadays. But, say, Lem, I cum up to tell ye thar's a stranger down at th' cypress cut what wants to come up. He's down yonder now a waitin'. He's got some business with the cap'n." Belle-Ann shrank away, shuddering. "I rec'on hit's Burton, th' ghost-man," she muttered under her breath. Always since that memorable day when she had knelt beside Maw Lutts' dead body in the yard did the coming of a stranger thrill her with a great fear--a fear that stirred the venom that already tenanted her heart; a vivific thing, spawned at the killing of Maw Lutts. Time had never healed this wound. Time had only nurtured its corrosive, growing poison. Time that came to others of mankind to succor and heal, had never assuaged Belle-Ann's heart-hurt. Struggle as she would to forget, she only remembered that she had struggled, and the aching grew on. It was a silent, self-contained suffering,--a hatred for the law that sneaked into their home and dealt death. This supernatural hulk, Burton, embodied the law. Burton, this lupine, leering lover of blood--this killer of women.