"I wished I knowed," cried Mr. Doggett, sorely puzzled as to the proper course of action. "Maybe I'd jest better go on over thar, anyway! Poor Louizy, ef hit's _so_, she's pestered might' night' to death! Jest knock me up a plateful o' victuals, Ann, and I'll throw on a clean shirt, and jerk on my Sunday clothes, and Joey, he can take me to the train. I'll jest stay a day er two, and the boys kin keep an eye on the plowin' and thengs ontel I git back." Mrs. Doggett had made a fire in her stove, and cut a strip of bacon, before she thought to ask, "How do people travel 'thout money, Eph?" Mr. Doggett's jaw fell. "I plumb fergot I never had nothin' left from the terbaccer! And now, what am I to do? I sorter hate to ask Mr. Castle to advance me any now, this early, on another crop that I might not git to raise." Mr. Brock looked out of the window in a sudden strong interest in a bird in a willow on the creek's bank, so that Mr. Doggett's look of appeal was lost to him. Mr. Lindsay unfolded a worn leather pocket-book. "How much will your 'round trip ticket come to, Uncle Eph? I guess I can fix you up." Within twenty minutes from the time of the reception of Mr. Brock's ill tidings, Big Money was making quick application of his hoofs to the turnpike leading to the railroad station from which Mr. Doggett was to take the train. Rain set in on the morning after Mr. Doggett's departure on his visit of consolation, and for a week, fell heavily at intervals, precluding all possibility of plowing. In the afternoon sunshine of the eighth day, Mr. Doggett returned, and walked home from the station, his face rivalling the sun in its good cheer. Crossing a rye field, he came suddenly upon Mr. Lindsay, tacking slats upon a strip of wire fencing,--an accommodation job, he had taken for the man for whom he had been stripping tobacco. "I thought you had gone off for good, Uncle Eph," he greeted Mr. Doggett, as warm, and blowing with exercise, his shoes and the bottoms of his Sunday pantaloons muddy from road splashes, Mr. Doggett seated himself on a weather-beaten "drag," lying alongside the fence. "How's your sister's man got?" "He wuz as well as common when I left. He brung me to the train," answered Mr. Doggett. "You don't say!" Mr. Lindsay dropped his hammer. "I 'lowed he'd be dead of blood poison by now, maybe, with his arms shot off that a way." Mr. Doggett grinned blithely. "He's all thar, Mr. Lindsay! Hain't nary bit o' him missin', so fur as I could see, from his scelp lock, clean down to his frost-bit toe-nail. Yes, sir, he's all thar. You see, he wuzn't never shot at, let alone bein' hit. Hit wuz all a made-up tale! "Hancock says that the Equity men thar says that Terbaccer Company that buys all our terbaccer, jest hires some sassy, no-count fellers that hain't easy onless they're a lyin', to write made-up news. Yes, sir, them's the fellers that's a puttin' in more'n three thirds o' the killin's and barn-burnin's.