The bystanders, several comprehending, stood rigid. Pole Baker stared. Wade raised his revolver, aimed steadily at the mark and fired three shots in quick succession. “Thar!” said the marksman, with grim triumph, “as bad as my sight is, I kin see ’em from here.” “By gum, they are thar!” exclaimed Peters, with a strange look into Pole Baker’s set face. “They are thar, Pole.” “You bet they are thar, an’ some’ll be in another spot ’fore long,” said Wade. “Now, Peters, you go in the house an’ bring me my account. I’ve got the money.” Wonderingly the clerk obeyed. Pole went into the store behind him, and, as Peters stood at the big ledger figuring, Pole stepped up to Nelson Floyd, who sat near a window in the rear with a newspaper in front of him. “Did you hear all that, Nelson?” the farmer asked. “Did I? Of course I did; wasn’t it intended for—?” The young merchant glanced furtively at Peters and paused. His handsome, dark face was set as from some inward struggle. There was a pause. Peters went toward the front, a written account drying in the air as he waved it to and fro. “I was about to ask you if—?” the young merchant started to say, but he was interrupted by Baker. “Hush, listen!” There was the sound of clinking coin on the counter below. The bell on the cash-drawer rang as the clerk put the money away. “Thar, I’m even with this dirty shebang!” It was Jeff Wade’s raised voice. “An’ I kin act when the proper time comes. Oh, you all know what I’m talkin’ about! Nobody kin hide a thing in these mountains. But you’ll all understand it better ef it ever comes into yore families. I never had but one little sister—she was all the Lord ever allowed me to have. Well, she was married not more’n a month ago, an’ went off to Texas with a man who believes in ’er an’ swears he will make her a good husband an’ protector. But no sooner was the pore little thing gone than the talk set in. It was writ out to her, an’ she writ back to me to stop it. She admitted it was true, but wouldn’t lay the blame. Folks say they know, but they won’t talk. They are afeared o’ the influence o’ money an’ power, I reckon, but it will git out. I have my suspicions, but I’m not dead sure, but I will be, an’ what I done fer that scrap o’ paper I will do fer that man, ef God don’t paralyze this right arm. Ef the black-hearted devil is within the sound o’ my voice at this minute, an’ stays still, he’s not only the thief of a woman’s happiness, but he’s wuss than a coward. He’s a sneakin’ son——” Nelson Floyd, his face rigid, sprang up and went into Joe Peters’s little bedroom, which was cut off in one corner of the store. Opening the top drawer of an old bureau, he took out a revolver. Turning, he met the stalwart form of Pole Baker in the doorway.