Shiner Gazette (Shiner, Tex.), Vol. 23, No. 26, Ed. 1 Thursday, March 9, 1916 Page: 3 of 8
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SYNOPSIS.
—5—
Juanita Holland, a Philadelphia young
woman of wealth, on her journey with
3ier guide, Good Anse Talbott, into the
heart of the Cumberlands to become a
teacher of the mountain children, faints
at the door of Fletch McNash’s cabin.
While resting there she overhears a talk
between Bad Anse Havey, chief of his
•clan, and one of his henchmen that ac-
quaints her with the Havey-McBriar feud.
Juanita has an unprofitable talk with Bad
Anse and they become antagonists. Cal
Douglas of the Havey clan is on trial in
Peril, for the murder of Noah Wyatt, a
McBriar. In the night Juanita hears
Jeudists ride past the McNash cabin
Juanita and Dawn McNash become
friends. Cal Douglas is acquitted. Nash
Wyattf attempts to kill him but is hlm-
iself killed by the Haveys. Juanita goes
to live with the Widow Everson, whose
boys are outside the feud. Milt McBriar,
bead of his clan, meets Bad Anse there
and disclaims responsibility for Wyatt’s
attempt to kill Douglas. They declare a
truce, under pressure from .Good Anse
Talbott. Juanita thinks she finds that
Bad Anse is opposing her efforts to buy
land and build a school. Milt McBriar
breaks the truce by having Fletch Mc-
Nash murdered. Jeb McNash begs Bad
Anse to tell him who killed his father,
but is not told. Juanita and1 Bad Anse
further misunderstand each other. Bad
Anse is bitter.
CHAPTER X—Continued.
"I’m grateful for this teacher’s
“ course,” said Juanita hotly, “and I’m
mot going home.”
Anse Havey went on:
“But I know that boy. I know that
I’d talked thataway he’d just about
have gone out in the la’rel an’ got
somebody. Hit might not ’a’ been the
Tight feller, and he might have found
-that out later. I reckon ye never had
a father murdered, dia ye?”
“Hardly,” answered the girl with a
scornful toss of her head. “You see, 1
wasn’t reared among gun-fighters.”
“Well, I have,” responded the man.
"I was in the legislature down at
Frankfort when it happened, a-helpin‘
to make the laws that govern this
state. I was fer them laws in theory—
hut when that word came I paired off
with a Republican, so’s not to lose my
vote on the floor, an’ I come back here
to these hills an’ got that feller. 1
reckon I ought to be ashamed to tell
ye that, but I’m so plumb ign'rant that
I can’t feel it. I knew how Jeb felt
an’ so I held him off with a promise to
... wait. Of course ye couldn’t accept the
■help of a man like that.”
' '"He turned and withdrew his hands
from his pockets.
"I’m through,” he added, “an’ I’m
©bleeged to ye fer harkenin’ to me.”
“There is something in your point
of view, Mr. Havey,” she acknowl-
edged. “But it is all based on twisted
and distorted principle.
“I don’t think myself a saint. I
guess I’m pretty weak. My first ap-
, peal to you was pure weakness. But
I stand for ideas that the world has
acknowledged to be right, and for that
reason I am going to win. That is
why, although I’m a girl, with none of
your physical power, and no gun-
fighters at my back, you are secretly
.afraid of me. That is why you are
^making unfair war on me. I stand for
the implacable force of civilization
;that must sooner or later sweep you
away and utterly destroy your domi-
nance.”
For the first time Bad Anse Havey’s
face lost its impassiveness. His eyes
clouded and became puzzled, surprised.
“I reckon I don’t hardly follow ye,”
the said. “If ye wants it to be enemies
all right, but I ain’t never made no
war on ye. I don’t make war on wom-
enfolks, an’ besides I wouldn’t make
a needless war nohow. All I’ve got to
do is to give ye enough rope an’ watch
ye hang yourself.”
“If you think that,” she demanded,
with a quick upljeaping of anger in her
pupils, “why did you feel it necessary
to prevent my buying land? Why do
you coerce your vassals, under fear of
death, to decline my offers? Why.
if my school means no menace, do you
refuse it standing room to start its
‘fight?”
The man’s pose stiffened.
“Who told ye I’d hindered anybody
from sellin’ ye land?”
“Wherever I inquire it is the same
thing. They must ask permission of
Bad Anse Havey before they can do
as they wish with their own.”
“By heaven, that’s another lie,” he
«aid shortly. “But 1 reckon ye believe
that. too. 1 did advise folks hereabouts
against sellin’ to strangers, but that
was afore ye come.”
He paced the length of the room a
while, then halted before her.
“Some of that property,” he went
■on, and this time his voice was pas-
sionate in its earnestness, “has enough
coal an’ timber on it to make its own-
ers rich some day. Have ye seen any
of the coal-minin’ sections of these
hills? , Well, go an’ have a look. Ye
won’t find any mountaineer richer fer
the development. Ye’ll find ’em plun
dered an’ cheated an’ robbed of their
homes by your civilized furriner. I’ve
done aimed ter pertect my' folks
against bein’ looted. 1 aims to go on
pertectin’ ’em.”
“Ignorance won’t protect them,” she
H
M
iff
there won’t be any Mc-Briars or
Haveys. We’ll all be mountaineers
standin’ together an’ holdin’ what God
.gave us. God knows I hate Milt Mc-
Briar an’ his tribe—hate 'em with all
the power of hatin’ that’s in me—an’
I’m a mountain man. But Milt’s peo-
ple an’ my people have one thing in
common. We’re mountain men, an’
these hills are ourn. We have the
same killin’ instinct when men seek to
rob us. We want to be let alone, an’
if w'e fight amongst ourselves it ain’t
nothin’ to the way we’ll fight, shoulder
to shoulder an’ back to back, against
the robbers from down below\”
The man paused, and as Juanita
looked into his blazing eyes she shud-
dered, for it seemed that the killing
instinct of which he spoke was burn-
ing there. She thought of nothing to
say, and he continued:
“It’s war betwen families now—but
when your people come—come to buy
for nothin’ and fatten on our starva-
tion, we men of the mountains will
forget that, an’ I reckon we’ll fight to-
gether like all damnation against the
rest. Thet’s why I’m counselin’ folks
not to sell heedless.”
“Then you did not forbid your peo-
ple to sell to me?” inquired the girl.
“Why, in heaven’s name, should I
make war on ye?” he suddenly de-
manded. “Does a man fight children?
We don’t fight the helpless up here in
the hills.”
“Possibly,” she suggested with a
trace' of irony, “when you learn that
I’m not so helpless you won’t be so
merciful.”
“We’ll wait till that time comes,”
said the man shortly. He paused for
a moment, then went on: “Helpless!
Why, heaven knows, ma’am, I pity ye.
Can’t ye see what odds ye’re contend-
in’ against? Can’t ye see that ye're
fightin’ God’s hills and sandstone an’
winds an’ thunder? Can’t ye see ye’re
tryin’ ter take out of men’s veins the
fire in their blood—the fire that's been
burnin’ there for two centuries? Ye’re
like a little child tryin’ ter pull down
a jail-house. Ye’re singin’ lullaby
songs to the thunder. Yes, I feel right
sorry fer ye, but 1. ain’t a-fightin’ ye.”
“I’m doing none of those things,”
she answered with a defiant blaze in
her eyes. “I’m only trying to show
these people that their ignorance is
not necessary; that it’s only part of a
scheme to keep- them vassals. You
talk about the wild, free spirit of the
mountain men. I think that free men
will listen to that argument.”
Anse laughed.
“Change ’em!” he repeated, disre-
garding the slur of her last speech.
“Why, if ye don’t give it up and go
back to your birds that pick at berries,
do you know what will happen to ye?
I’ll tell ye. Thar will be a change, but
it won’t be in us. It’ll be in you.
You’ll be mountainized.
“Ye can’t live where the storms
come from an’ where the rivers are
born an’ not have their spirit get into
your blood. Ye may think ye’re In
partners with God, but I reckon ye’ll
find the hills are bigger than you be.
How much land do ye need?”
“Why?”
“Because I aim to see ye get it. Ye
say I’m scaired of ye. I aim to show
ye how much I’m scaired. I aim to
-let ye go your own fool way an’ floun-
der in your own quicksand. An’ if
nobody won’t sell ye what ye want
let me know’ an’, by Almighty God, I’ll
make ye a free gift of a farm an’ I’ll
build your school myself. Thet’s how-
much I’m scaired of ye. I’ve tried to
be friends with ye, an’ ye won’t have
it. Now just go as fur as ye feels in-
clined an’ see how much I mind ye.”
He turned abruptly on his heel and
went out, quietly closing the door be-
hind him.
NLA
y|3S&-
Insisted.
“I told ye we was distrustful of fur-
riners,” went on Havey. “Some day
there’ll be a bigger >var here than the
Havey-McBriar war Ye’ve seen some-
thin’ of that. That other war will be
with your people, an’ when it comes
the girl, and with that he took it down
again and set it to his lips and blew.
A mellow’ sound, not loud, but far-
carrying, like the fox-hunter’s tally-ho,
floated over the vajley.
“Our house hain’t more than a
whoop an’ a holler away,” he said
awkwardly, “but when ye’re livin’ over
hyar by yoreself, ef ye ever wants any-
thing in ther nighttime, jest blow thet
horn.”
After she had almost burst her
cheeks with effort, he added: “Don’t
never blow this signal onless ye wants
ter raise merry hell.”
Then he imitated very low, through
pursed lips, three long blasts and
three short ones.
“What’s that signal?” she demand-
ed.
“Ye’ve heered the McBriar yell,” he
told her. “Thet horn calls ther Havey
rallyin’ signal. When thet goes out
every Havey thet kin tote a gun’s got
ter git up an’ come. Hit means war.”
“Thank you. Jerry. I won’t call the
Haveys to battle.”
The night after she had flung her
challenge down to Bad Anse Havey
Juanita stayed at the McNash cabin
to be with Dawn and the widow. The
next day she went with them to the
mountainside “buryin’-ground,” where
Good Anse performed the last rites for
the dead.
After it was all over, and it had been
decided that the widow was to take
the younger children up Meeting-
house fork to live with a brother, the
missionary and the teacher started
back. Jeb was to stay here alone to
run the farm, and when Juanita re-
turned to the ridge Dawn went with
her. '
They were passing a tumbling wa-
terfall, shrunken now to a trickling
rill, when Dawn broke the long silence.
“Wunst, when I -war a leetle gal,”
she said, “Unc' Perry war a-hiding. out
up thet branch from ther revenuers. 1
used ter fotch his victuals up thar ter
him.” .
Juanita turned suddenly with a
shocked expression. It was as if her
little songbird friend had suddenly and
violently reverted; as if the flower had
turned to poison weed. And as Jua-
nita looked Dawn’s eyes were blazing
and Dawn’s face was as dark as her
black hair—dark with the same ex-
pression which brooded on her broth-
er’s brow.
“What is it, dear?” Juanita asked,
and in tense and fiery voice the
younger girl exclaimed:
“I wishes I war a man. I wouldn’t
wait and set still like Jeb’s doin’. By
heaven, I’d git thet murderer. I’d cut
his heart outen his body.”
“I tole ye,” quietly commented
Brother Anse, “thet ther instinct’s in
ther blood. Anse Havey went down
ter Frankfort an’ set in ther. legislater
—hut he come back ther same man
thet went down. Somethin’ called
him. Somethin’ calls ter every moun-
tain man thet goes away, an’ he hark-
ens ter ther call.”
“Anse come back,” repeated Dawn
triumphantly. “An’ Anse is hyar. Ef
Jeb sets thar an’ don’t do nothin’, I
CHAPTER XI,
That summer Juanita's cabin rose
on the small patch of ground bought
from the Widow Everson, for in these
hills the raising of a house is a simple
thing which goes forward subject to
no delays of striking workmen or
balking contractors. The usual type,
with its single room, may be reared
in a few days by volunteers who turn
their labor into a frolic. She had owed
much to Jerry Everson and to Good
Anse Talbott, for had her building
force been solidly of Havey or Mc-
Briar complexion the school would
henceforth have stood branded, in na-
tive eyes, a feud institution.
But Good Anse and Jerry, wrho were
tolerated by both factions, and were
gifted with a rough-hewn diplomacy,
had known upon whom to call, even
while they had seemed to select at
random.
The cabin had been finished just be-
fore the news came of the death of
Fletch McNash. and Jerry Everson
had gone over with her to survey and
admire it.
As he stood under the newly laid
roof, sniffing the fresh, woody fra-
grance of the green timbers he pro-
duced from under his coat what looked
likd a giant powder-horn. He had
scraped and polished it until it shone
like varnish, and he hung it by its
leather thong above the hearth. !
“Who Told Vou I Hindered Anybody
From Selling You Land?”
reckon Anse Havey won’t hardly let
hit go by without doin’ nothin’. Thank
heaven, thar’s some men left in ther
hills like Anse Havey—but ef Jeb don’t
do nothin’ I’ll do hit myself.”
Again Juanita shuddered, but it was
not the time for argument, and so she
went on bitterly accusing Havey in
her heart for his wizard hold on these
people—a hold which incited them to
bloodshed as the fanatical priests of
the desert urge on their wild tribes-
men.
She did not know' that Bad Anse Ha-
vey went every few days over to the
desolated cabin and often persuaded
the boy to ride home with him and
spend a part of the time in his larger
brick house. She did not know that
Bad Anse was coming nearer to lying
than he had ever before come in with-
holding his strong suspicions from the
boy because of his unwillingness to
incite another tragedy.
So when one day a McBriar hench-
man by the name of Luke Thixton had
left the mountains and gone west, Anse
hoped that this man would stay away
for a long while, and he refrained from
mentioning to Jeb that now, when
the bird had flown, he knew definitely
of his guilt.
While Dawn, under the guidance of
her preceptress, was making the ac-
quaintance of a new and sweeter life,
whose influences fed her imagination
What is it for, Jerry?” demanded j and fired her quick ambition, her
brother was more solemnly being
'molded by the Havey chief.
The water-mill of old Bob McGreegor
was the nearest spot to the dwelling of
Bad Anse Havey where grist could be
ground to meal, and sometimes when
Jeb came over to the brick house he
would volunteer to throw upon his
shoulders the sack of corn and plod
with it up across the ridges. He would
sit there in the dusty old mill while
the slow wheel groaned and creaked
and the cumbersome millstones did
their slow stint of work.
So one day, toward the end of Au-
gust, Juanita, who had climbed up the
path to the poplar to look over her
battlefield and renew her vows, saw
Jeb sturdily plodding his way in long,
resolute strides through the woods
toward the mill, a heavy sack upon his
shoulders and a rifle swinging at his
side.
That day chance had it that no one
else had come to mill and Bob Mc-
Greegor had persuaded the boy to
drink from the “leetle blue kag” until
his mind was ripe for mischief. While
the mill slowly ground out his meal
Jeb McNash sat on a pile of rubbish
in the gloomy shack, nursing his
knees in interlocked fingers. Old Bob
drank and stormed and cursed the in-
ertia of the present generation. The
lad’s lean fingers tautened and gripped
thejpselves more tensely and his eyes
began to smolder and blaze with a
wicked light as he listened.
“Ye looks like a right stand-up sort
of a boy, Jeb,” growled the old fire-
eater who had set more than a few
couples at each other’s throats. “An’
I reckon hit’s all right, too, fer a fel-
ler ter bide his time, but hit ’pears ter
me like ther men of these days don’t
do nothin’ but bide thar time.”
“I won’t bide mine no longer than
what I has ter," snapped the boy
“Anse ’lows ter tell me when he finds
outi who hit war thet got my pap.
Thet’s all I needs ter know.”
Old Bob shook his head knowingly
and laughed in his tangled beard.
“I reckon Anse Havey’ll take his lei-
sure. He’s got other fish to fry. He’s
a-thinkin’ ’bout bigger things than yore
grievance, son.”
The boy rose, and his voice came
very quietly and ominously from sud-
denly whitened lips. “What does ye
mean by thet, Uncle Bob?”
“Mebby I don’t mean nothin’ much.
Then ergin mebby I could give ye a
pretty good idee who kilt yore pap.
Mebby 1 could tell ye ’bout a feller—
a feller thet hain’t fur removed from
Old Milt hisself—thet went snoopin'
crost ther ridge ther same day yore
pap died with a rifle-gun ’crost his
elbow and his pockets strutty with
ca’tridges.”
“Who war he?” came the tense de-
mand with the sudden snap of rifle-
fire. “Who war thet feller?”
Old Bob filled and lighted his pipe
with1, fingers that had grown' unsteady
from the ministration of the “leetle
blue kag.” He laughed again in a
drunken fashion.
“Ef Bad. Anse Havey don’t ’low ter
tell ye, son,” he artfully demurred, “I
reckon hit wouldn’t hardly be becomin’
fer me tfer name his name.”
The boy picked up his battered hat.
“Give me my grist,” he said shortly.
He stood by, breathing heavily but
silently while the sack was being tied,
then, putting it down by the door, he
wheeled and faced the older man.
“Now ye’re a-goin’ ter tell me what
I needs ter know,” he said quietly, “or
I’m a-goin’ ter kill ye whar ye stands.”
Uncle Bob laughed. He had meant
all the while to impart that succulent
bit of information, which was no infor-
mation at all, but mischief-making sus-
picion. He had held off only to infu-
riate and envenom the boy with the
cumulative force of climax.
“Hit warn’t nobody but—” After a
pause he went on, “but old Milt Mc-
Briar’s own son, Young Milt.”
“Thet’s all,” said Jeb soberly; "I’m
obleeged ter ye.”
He went out with the sack on his
shoulders and the rifle under his arm.
but when he had reached a place in
the' woods where a blind trail struck
back he deposited his sack carefully
under a ledge of overhanging rock, for
the clouds were mounting and banking
now in a threat of rain and it was not
his own meal, so he must be careful
of its safety.
Then he crossed the ridge until he
came to a point where the thicket
grew down close and tangled to the
road. He had seen Young Milt going
west along that road this morning and
by nightfall he would be riding back.
The gods of chance were playing into
his hand3.
So he lay down, closely hugging the
earth, and cocked his rifle.. For hours
he crouched there with unspeakable
patience, while his muscles cramped
and his feet and hands grew cold un-
der the pelting of a rain which was
strangely raw and chilling for the sea-
son. The sun sank in an angry bank
of thunder-heads and the west grew
lurid. The drenching downpour blind-
ed him and trickled down his spine un-
der his clothes, but at last he saw the
figure he awaited riding a horse he
knew. It was the same roan mare that
Bad Anse had restored to Milt Mc-
Briar.
When young Milt rode slowly by,
fifty yards away, with his mount at a
walk and his reins hanging, he was
untroubled by any anxiety, because he
was in his own territory and was at
heart fearless. The /older boy from
Tribulation felt his temples throb and
the rifle came slowly up and the one
eye which was not closed looked point
blank across immovable sights and
along a steady barrel into the placid
face of his intended victim.
He could see the white of Milt’s eye
and the ragged lock of hair under the
hat-brim which looked like a smudge
of soot across his brow. Then slowly i
Jeb McNash shook his head. A spasm
of battle went through him and shook
him like a convulsion to the soles of
his feet. He had but to crook his fin-
ger to appease his blood-lust—and
break his pledge.
“I done give Anse my hand ter bide
my time ’twell I war dead sartain,” he
told himself. “I hain’t quite dead sar-
tain,” he told himself. “I hain’t quite
dead sartain yit. I reckon I’ve got ter
wait a spell.”
He uncocked the rifle and the other
boy rode on, but young Jeb folded his
arms on the wet earth and buried his
face in them and sobbed, and it was
an hour later that he stumbled to his
feet and went groggily back, drunk
with bitterness and emotion, to-ward
the house of" Anse Havey. Yet when
he arrived after nightfall his tongue
told nothing and his features told less.
* * * * * * *
Juanita, living in the cabin she had
built with the girl who had become her
companion and satellite, making fre-
quent hard journeys to some house
which the shadow of illness had Jn-
vaded, found it hard to believe that
llils life had been hers only a few
months. Suspense seemed to stretch
The Rifle Came Slowly Up.
weeks to years, and she awoke each
new day braced to hear the news of
some fresh outbreak, and wondered
why she did not. A few neighborhood
children were already learning their
rudiments, and plans for more build-
ings were going forward.
Sometimes Jeb came over from the
brick house to see his sister, and on
the boy’s face was always a dark cloud
of settled resolve. If .Juanita never
questioned him on the topic that she
knew was nearest his heart it was be-
cause she realized that to do so would
be the surest way to estrange his
friendship and confidence.
In one thing she had gained a point.
She had bought as much property as
she should need. Back somewhere be-
hind the veil of mysteries Anse Havey
had pressed a button or spoken a word,
and all the hindrance that had lain
across her path straightway evaporat-
ed. Men had come to her, with no
further solicitation on her part, and
now it seemed that many were animat-
ed by a desire to turn an honest penny
by the sale of land. In every convey-
ance that was drawn—deeds of ninety-
nine-year lease instead of sale—she.
read a thrifty and careful knowledge
of land laws and reservation of min-
eral and timber rights which she
traced to the head of the clan.
As summer spent itself there was
opportunity for felling timber, and the
little sawmill down in the valley sent
up its drone and whine in proclama-
tion that her trees were being turned
into squared timbers for her buildings.
Once, when Milt McBriar rode up to
the sawmill, he found the girl sitting
there, her hands clasped on her knees,
gazing dreamily across the sawdust
and confusion of the place.
“Ye’re right smart interested in thet
thar woodpile, hain’t ye, ma’am?” he
inquired with a slow, benevolent smile
His kindliness of guise invited confi-
dence, arid there was no one else with-
in earshot, so the girl looked up, her
eyes a little misty and her voice im-
pulsive.
“Mr. McBriar,” she said, “every one
of those timbers means part of a
dream to me, and with every one of
them that is set in place will go a hope
and a prayer.”
He nodded sympathetically. "I reck-
on,” he said, “ye kin do right smart
good too.”
“Mr. McBriar,” she flashed at him in
point-blank questioning, “since I came
here I haVe tried to be of use in a
very simple and ineffective fashion. I
have done what little I could for the
sick and distressed, yet I am constant-
ly being warned that I’m not allowed
to’ carry on my work. Do you know of
any reason why I shouldn’t go ahead?”
He gazed at her for a moment, quiz-
zically, then shook his head..
“Oh, pshaw!” he exclaimed, “1
wouldn’t let no sich talk es thet fret
me none. Folks round hyar hain’t got
much ter do except ter gossip ’round.
Nobody hain’t a-goin’ ter hinder ye.
We hain’t such bad people, after all.”
After that she felt that from the Mc-
Briars she had gained official sanction,
and her resentment against Anse Ha-
vey grew because of his scornful un-
graciousness.
The last weeks of the summer were
weeks of drought and plague. Ordi-
narily, in the hills storms brew swiftly
and frequently and spend themselves
in violent outpourings and cannonad-
f ' V<v' : \ , . 4k
Ing of thunder, but that year th®
clouds seemed to have dried up, and
down in the tablelands of the Blue
Grass the crops were burned to worth-
less stalk and shrunken' ear. Even up
here, in the birthplace of waters, th^
corn was brown and sapless, so that
when a breeze strayed over the hill-
side fields they sent up a thirsty, dying
rasp of rattling whisper.
It was not only in the famished
forests and seared fields that the hot
breath of the plague breathed, carry-
ing death in its fetid nostrils. Back in
the cabins of the “branch-water folks,"
where little springs diminished and be-
came polluted, all those who were not
strong enough to throw off the touch
of the specter’s finger sickened and
died, and typhoid went in and out of
Havey shack and McBriar cabin whis-
pering, “a pest on both your houses.”
The widow McNash had not been
herself since the death of Fletch. She
who had once been so strong over her
drudgery, sat day long on the doorstep
of her brother’s hovel and, in the lan-
guage of her people, “jest sickened an’
pined away.”
So, as Juanita Holland and Good
Anse Talbott rode sweating mules
about the hills, receiving calls for help
faster than they could answer them,
they were n6t astonished to hear that
the widow was among the stricken.
Though they fought for her life, she
refused to fight herself, and once
again the Eastern girl stood with
Dawn in the brier-choked “buryin’-
ground,” and once more across an open
grave she met the eyes of the^ man
who stood for the old order.
But now she had learned to set a
lock on her lips and hold her counsel.
So, when she met Anse and Jeb after-
ward, she asked without rancor: “May
I take little Jesse back with me, too?
He’s too young,” she added, with just
a heartsick trace of her old defiance,
“to be useful to you, Mr. Havey. and
I’d like to teach him what I can."
Anse and Jeb conferred, and the
elder man came back and nodded hi3
head.
“Jesse can go back with ye,” he said.
“I’m still aimin’ to give ye all the rope
ye wants. When ye’ve had enough an'
quits, let me know, an’ I’ll take care of
Bietch’s children.”
And on her farm, as folks called
Juanita’s place, that September saw
many changes. Near the original
cabin was springing up a new struc-
ture, larger than any other house in
that neighborhood, except, possibly,
the strongholds of the chiefs, and as
it grew and began to take form it im-
parted an air of ordered trimness to
the countryside about it. It was fash-
ioned in such style as should be in
keeping with its surroundings and not
give too emphatic a note of alien
strangeness.
Juanita wished that her cabin could
house more occupants, for the plague
had left many motherless families,
and many children might hav^ come
into her fold. As it wras, she had sev-
eral besides the McNashes as her nu-
cleus, and while the weather held
good she was rushing her work of
timber-felling and building which the
winter would halt.
CHAPTER XII.
One day in early October young
Milt McBriar happened upon Dawn
and Juanita walking in the woods.
The gallant colors and the smoky
mists of autumn wrapped the forests
and brooded in the sky. An elixir
went into the blood with each deep-
drawn breath and set to stirring for-
gotten or hitherto unawakened emo-
tions. And in this heady atmosphere
of quickened pulses the McBriar boy
halted and gazed at the Havey girl.
Juanita saw Young Milt’s eyes flash
with an awakened spirit. She saw a
look in his face which she was woman
enough to interpret even before he
himself dreamed what its meaning
might be.
Dawn was standing with her head
up and her lids half closed looking
across the valley to the Indian sum-
mer haze that slept in smoky purple
on the ridges. She wore a dress of
red calico, and she had thrust in her
belt a few crimson leaves from a gum
tree and a few yellow ones from a pop-
lar.
Juanita Holland did not marvel at
the fascinated, almost rapt look that
came into Young Milt’s eyes, and
Young Milt, too, as he stood there in
the autumn woods, was himself no
mean figure. His lean body was
quick of movement and strong, and
his bronzed face wore the straight-
looking eyes that carried an assurance
of fearless honesty. He had been
away to Lexington to college and was
going back. The keen intelligence of
his face was marred by no note of
meanness, and now, as he looked at
the girl of the enemy, his shoulders
came unconsciously erect with some*
thing of the pride that shows in men
of wild blood when they feel in their
veins the strain of the chieftains.
But Dawn, after her first blush,
dropped her lids a little and tilted her
Ain, and without a word snubbed him
with the air of a Havey looking down
on a McBriar.
Milt met that gaze with a steady
one of his own and banteringly said:
“Dawn, ’pears like ye mought ’a’ got
tangled up with a rainbow.”
Her voice was cool as she retorted:
“1 reckon that’s better than gittlng
mixed up with some other things.”
“I was jes,t a-thinkin', es 1 looked at
ye,” went on the boy gravely, “thet
hit’s better then gittin’ mixed up with,
anything else ”
(TO BE CONTINUED.)
A man may deliver a convincing
barroom oration concerning a free
country, and then be required to put
his monfey on the counter before being
served.
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Habermacher, J. C. & Lane, Ella E. Shiner Gazette (Shiner, Tex.), Vol. 23, No. 26, Ed. 1 Thursday, March 9, 1916, newspaper, March 9, 1916; Shiner, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1142297/m1/3/?q=%22Places+-+United+States+-+Texas+-+Lavaca+County+-+Shiner%22: accessed July 9, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Shiner Public Library.