With wonderment that grew, he followed her, and a swarm of happy-faced children went with them; children keen of eye and rosy of cheek, and when they had inspected together the buildings where the pupils were taught from books, and the dairies and gardens where they were taught by practice, the lady showed him into a log house as artistic and charming as a swiss chalet and said: "This will be your abiding place while you're here. I'll send one of the boys to see that you have everything you need--and later on I'll introduce you to a lady who is much interested in your plans for a school on Little Slippery and who can discuss the details." Left alone on the porch of his "pole-house," Bear Cat sat gazing upward to the American flag that floated from a tall staff before his door, and as he did so a small boy with clear and intelligent eyes came and said: "I've done been named ter look atter ye." In the young face was none of that somber shyness which shadows the faces of many mountain children. Turner put his hand on the boy's head. "Thank you, son," he said slowly. "Haven't I seen you before somewhar?" The boy laughed. "I remembers _you_" he asserted. "I seed ye when my paw was fotchin' me an' my brother an' sister over hyar. I'm Matthew Blakey's boy." "You had right-sore eyes then, didn't you?" The child laughed. "I did then--but I hain't now." After a moment's pause he added with a note of pride: "See thet flag? Hit's ther American flag an' hit's my job ter put hit up every day at sun-up an' take hit down at sun-set. I aims ter show ye right now how I does hit." Bear Cat met young women from Eastern colleges who had come here to aid in the work. In their presence he felt very uncouth and ignorant, but they did not suspect that inner admission. They saw a young man who reminded them of a bronze athlete, with clear and fearless eyes, touched with a dreamer's zeal, and in his manner they recognized a simple dignity and an inherent chivalry. CHAPTER XXVIII On the porch of Miss Pendleton's house that night, guitars were tinkling. From inside came the glow of shaded lamps softly amber--and outside along the hillsides where the whippoorwills called plaintively, slept a silver wash of moonlight. The stars were large and low-hanging and a pale mist tempered the slopes that rose in a nocturne of majesty and peace. Bear Cat Stacy sat there immersed in reverie. He was seeing such a school grow up on the spot where he had hoped to build a house for Blossom and himself--then that vision faded and his face grew set because the other and more personal picture had intervened--the picture of the dwelling-house to which he had looked forward. He did not notice that the guitars and the singing voices had come to silence, and that the white patches of the women's dresses had vanished from the shaded porch--he was looking out into the summer mists--and thinking his own thoughts.