When 'Bear Cat' Went Dry Part 11

He bent forward, lips parted and heart pounding--and her reply was an unsteady whisper.

"I hain't plumb dead sartain yit, Turner, but--but this mornin' I couldn't think of nothin' else but you."

"Blossom!" exclaimed the boy, his voice ringing with a solemn earnestness. "I don't want thet ye shall hev ter feel shame fer me--but----"

Once again the words refused to come. The girl had risen now and stood slender in the silver light, her lashes wet with tears. With that picture in his eyes it became impossible to balance the other problems of his life. So he straightened himself stiffly and turned his gaze away from her. He was seeing instead a picture of the squat shanty where the copper worm was at work in the shadow, and for him it was a picture of bondage.

So she waited, feeling some hint of realization for the struggle his eyes mirrored.

There would be many other wet nights up there, he reflected as his jaw set itself grimly; many nights of chilled and aching bones with that wild thirst creeping seductively, everpoweringly upon him out of the darkness. There would be the clutch of longing, strangling his heart and gnawing at his stomach.

But if he _did_ promise and failed, he could never again recover his self-respect. He would be doomed. With his face still averted, he spoke huskily and laboriously.

"I reckon thar hain't no way ter make ye understand, Blossom. I don't drink like some folks, jest ter carouse. I don't oftentimes want ter tech hit, but seems like sometimes I jest _has_ ter hev hit. Hit's most gin'rally when I'm plumb sick of livin' on hyar withouten no chance ter better myself."

Even in the moonlight she could see that his face was drawn and pallid.

Then abruptly he wheeled:

"Ther Stacys always keeps thar bonds. I reckons ye wants me ter give ye my hand thet I won't never tech another drop, Blossom, but I kain't do thet yit--I've got ter fight hit out fust an' be plumb dead sartain thet I could keep my word ef I pledged hit----"

Blossom heard her father calling her from the porch and as she seized the boy's arms she found them set as hard as rawhide.

"I understands, Turney," she declared hastily, "an'--an'--I'm a-goin'

ter be prayin' fer ye afore I lays down ternight!"

As Turner watched the preacher mount and ride away, his daughter walking alongside, he did not return to the house. He meant to fight it out in his own way. Last night when the hills had rocked to the fury of the storm--he had surrendered. To-night when the moonlit slopes drowsed in the quiet of silver mists, the storm was in himself. Within a few feet of the gate he took his seat at the edge of a thick rhododendron bush, where the shadow blotted him into total invisibility. He sat there drawn of face and his hands clenched and unclenched themselves.

He did not know it, but, in his silence and darkness, he was growing.

There was for him a touch of Golgotha in those long moments of reflection and something of that anguished concentration which one sees in Rodin's figure of "The Thinker"--that bronze man bent in the melancholy travail of the birth of thought.

When an hour later Kinnard Towers and his cortege trooped out of Lone Stacy's house, Jerry Henderson, willing to breathe the freshness of the night, strolled along.

The men with the rifles swung to their saddles and rode a few rods away, but Towers himself lingered and at last with a steady gaze upon the stranger he made a tentative suggestion.

"I don't aim ter discourage a man thet's got fine ideas, Mr. Henderson, but hev ye duly considered thet when ye undertakes ter wake up a country thet's been slumberin' as ye puts. .h.i.t, fer two centuries, ye're right apt ter find some sleepy-heads thet would rather be--left alone?"

"I'm not undertaking a revolution," smiled the new arrival. "I'm only aiming to show folks, by my own example, how to better themselves."

The man who stood as the sponsor of the old order mounted and looked down from his saddle.

"Hain't thet right smart like a doctor a-comin' in ter cure a man," he inquired dryly, "a-fore ther sick person hes sent fer him? Sometimes ther ailin' one moutn't take hit kindly."

"I should say," retorted Henderson blandly, "that it's more like the doctor who hangs out his s.h.i.+ngle--so that men can come if they like."

There was a momentary silence and at its end Towers spoke again with just a hint of the enigmatical in his voice.

"Ye spoke in thar of havin' personal knowledge thet ther railroad didn't aim ter come acrost Cedar Mounting, didn't ye?"

"Yes."

"Well now, Mr. Henderson--not meanin' ter dispute ye none--I don't feel so sartain about thet."

"I spoke from fairly definite information."

The man on horseback nodded.

"I aims ter talk pretty plain. We're a long ways behind ther times up hyar, an' thet means thet we likes ter sort of pa.s.s on folks thet comes ter dwell amongst us."

"I call that reasonable, Mr. Towers."

"I'm obleeged ter ye. Now jest let's suppose thet ther railroad _did_ aim ter come in atter all an' let's jest suppose for ther fun of ther thing, thet hit likewise aimed ter grab off all ther best coal an'

timber rights afore ther pore, ign'rant mountain-men caught on ter what war happenin'. In sich a case, ther fust step would be ter send a man on ahead, wouldn't hit--a mountain man, if possible--ter preach thet ther railroad didn't aim ter come? Thet would mean bargains, wouldn't hit?"

Jerry Henderson laughed aloud.

"Do you mean that you suspect me of such a mission?"

Glancing about to a.s.sure himself that no one heard except his single auditor, the erstwhile hirer of a.s.sa.s.sins bent over his saddle pommel.

Into the suavity of his voice had crept a new hardness and into the pale color of his eyes an ominous glint.

"Back in ther days of ther war with England, Mr. Henderson, I've heered tell thet our grandsires hed a flag with a rattlesnake on hit, an' ther words, 'Don't tread on me!' Some folks says we're right-smart like our grandsires back hyar in ther timber."

"If that's a threat, Mr. Towers," said Henderson steadily, "I make it a point never to understand them."

"An' I makes. .h.i.t a point never ter give them more then onct. I don't say I suspicions ye--but I do _p'intedly_ say this ter ye: Whatever yore real project air, afore ye goes inter hit too deep--afore ye invests all ye've got, an' all yore mother hes got an' all yore sister hes got, hit mout be right heedful ter ride over ter my dwellin'-house an' hev speech with me."

An indignant retort rose to Jerry's lips, but with diplomatic forbearance he repressed it.

"When I've been here a while, I guess your suspicions will be allayed without verbal a.s.surances, Mr. Towers."

"Even if ye only comes preachin' ther drivin' out of licker," said Towers slowly, "ye're treadin' on my friends. We suffers Sabbath talk like thet from preachers, but we don't relish hit on week-days from strangers. In thar a while back I listened. I seen ye an' Brother Fulkerson a-stirrin' up an' onsettlin' ther young folks. I kin feel ther restless things thet's a-ridin' in ther wind ter-night, Mr.

Henderson, an' hit hain't sca'cely right ter bring trouble on these folks thet's shelterin' ye."

Bear Cat Stacy, unseen but eagerly listening, felt a leaping of resentment in his veins. All the feudal instincts that had their currents there woke to wrath as he heard his hereditary enemy warning away his guest. It was the intolerable affront of a hint that the power of the Stacys had dwindled and waned until it could no longer secure the protection of its own roof-trees.

With the anger of Marmion for Angus, sternly repressed but forceful, Bear Cat suddenly stood out revealed in the moonlight. He had only to take a step, but the effect was precisely that of having been suddenly materialized out of nothingness, and when his voice announced him, even the case-hardened control of Kinnard Towers suffered a violent jolt of surprise.

"I reckon, Kinnard Towers," said the boy with a velvety evenness of voice, "ther day hain't hardly come yit when ther Stacys hes ter ask ye what visitors they kin take inter thar dwellin'-houses. I reckon mebby Mr. Henderson's ideas may suit some folks hyarabouts, even if they don't pleasure you none. So long as he aims ter tarry hyar, an' we aims ter enjoy him, ther man thet seeks ter harm him will hev ter come hyar an' git him."

Never since the fend had ended in a pact of peace, had two factional leaders come so near a rupture. Henderson could feel the ominous tensity in the air, but Towers himself only shook his head and laughed.

It was a good-humored laugh, since this was not the time for open enmity.

"Oh, pshaw, son! I reckon n.o.body don't aim no harm to Mr. Henderson. I jest knows this country an' he ought ter realize thet my counsel mout help him." There was a brief pause and then with an audacity of bantering Kinnard proceeded. "I've done heered thet ye tuck yore dram onct in a while yoreself--mebby you've got friends thet makes licker--an' you knows how they mout feel about too much talk."

Bear Cat Stacy stood with his shoulders drawn back and his eyes smoldering.

"Thet's my business," he retorted curtly, but the Quarterhouse baron went on with the same teasing smile.

"Mebby so, son, but hit kinderly 'peared like ter me thet Brother Fulkerson's gal war a-'lowin' thet hit war _her_ business, too. I overheered yore maw say somethin' 'bout yore drinkin' some last night an' I seed Blossom's purty eyes flash."