"Wal, why don't ye go along an' see if the cat's kilt. It aint _here_." "No, I know _that_, but I have found something more important to 'tend to, and that's why I came up here, and it's something you ought to know about too: Old Baltie has tumbled down the bank at the place in the pasture where the fence is broken, and is in the ditch. I don't know how long he's been there, but he's all wet, and muddy and shivery and he can't get up. I came up to tell you, so's you could get a man to help you and go right down and get him out. I tried, but I wasn't strong enough, but he'll die if you don't go quick." Jean's eyes shone and her cheeks were flushed from excitement as she described Baltie's plight, and paused only because breath failed her. "Wal, 'spose he does; what then? What good is he to anybody? He's most twenty-five year old an' clear played-out. He'd better die; it's the best thing could happen." The shifty eyes had not rested upon the child while the man was speaking, but some powerful magnetism drew and held them to her deep blazing ones as the last word fell from his lips. He tried to withdraw them, ejected a mouthful of tobacco juice at one particular spot which from appearances had been so favored many times before, drew his hand across his mouth and then gave a self-conscious, snickering laugh. "I don't believe you understood what I said, did you?" asked Jean quietly. "I'm sure you didn't." "Oh yis I did. Ye said old Baltie was down in the ditch yonder and like ter die if I didn't git him out. Wal, that's jist 'zactly what I want him _to_ do, an' jest 'zactly what I turned him out inter that field fer him ter do, an' jist 'zactly what I hope he _will_ do 'fore morning. He's got the last ounce o' fodder I'm ever a'goin' ter give him, an' I aint never a'goin' ter let him inter my barns agin. Now put _that_ in yer pipe an' smoke it, an' then git out durned quick." Jabe Raulsbury had partially risen from his stool as he concluded this creditable tirade, and one hand was raised threateningly toward the little figure standing with her dripping umbrella just within the threshold of the barn door. That the burly figure did not rise entirely, and that his hand remained suspended without the threatened blow falling can perhaps best be explained by the fact that the child before him never flinched, and that the scorn upon her face was so intense that it could be felt. CHAPTER III The Spirit of Mad Anthony Jean Carruth stood thus for about one minute absolutely rigid, her face the color of chalk and her eyes blazing. Then several things happened with extreme expedition. The position of the closed umbrella in her hands reversed with lightning-like rapidity; one quick step _forward_, _not_ backward, was made, thus giving the intrepid little body a firmer foothold, and then crash! down came the gun-metal handle across Jabe Raulsbury's ample-sized nasal appendage.