Carley Farnsworth never did anything by halves. His methods were those of one engaged in killing snakes. When he undertook the accomplishment of a purpose he tirelessly left nothing undone that might in the smallest degree assist in that accomplishment.

In this case he appealed personally and quietly to all the planters in the district to aid in the choice of a man of their own class to represent them in the upper house of the Legislature, instead of a shifty lawyer of "insecure antecedents, unripened position, and as yet unproved character." That was the careful phrase he had framed for use while trudging down the mountain, and he used it so effectively that he soon had a score of the most influential names in all that region appended to his announcement of Boyd Westover's candidacy.

But he was not satisfied with that. He reminded the two store keepers at the Court House that Westover's constituency represented in a large degree the purchasing capacity of the region, and the two store keepers, alert to conserve their own interests, not only signed the nomination announcement, but secured a number of other and humbler signatures, and made of their stores a species of campaigning centres in Westover's interest, thus giving a needed flavor of democracy to the aristocratic appeal to the planters to "choose for their senator a man whose character, attainments and social position render him fitly representative of the district and its people."

Carley Farnsworth was a doctor in large practice. As such he was versed in what he called "the gospel of keeping the mouth shut." Accordingly he made his preliminary canvas silently, secretly and with so little ostentation that neither Webb nor any of his friends dreamed of what was going on. Their first intimation of it was the discovery one morning that the nominating placards were posted on the court house doors, all over the fronts of all the blacksmiths' and wheelrights' shops, on all the school houses, on the posts of every gate that was licensed to obstruct a public road, and upon every conspicuous tree in the piedmont part of the Senate district.

For Carley Farnsworth had adopted Judy Peters's view of "drymatic effect," and had had all his placards posted between midnight and morning of a single day.

The dramatic effect was instantly apparent. All tongues were set wagging and before another night came everybody in the region round about knew that Boyd Westover was a candidate for the Senate, nominated in his absence and supported by many of the most influential men in the community.

What it meant, nobody knew, and everybody asked everybody else. Those who asked Carley Farnsworth got for reply:

"Oh, it is only that some of us think we ought to have a fitter man than Webb to represent us in the Senate, and we've nominated Westover without his knowledge or consent."

"But where is he?" was sure to be the next question. "Is he afraid to face the public?"

"No," Carley answered in every case. "If you get it into your head that Boyd Westover is afraid of anything or anybody, you'll be as badly mistaken as if you'd burnt your boots. He's away on a hunting and fishing expedition, just now, and he knows nothing of his nomination. When we notify him of it he'll be here to face anything or anybody, and in the meanwhile there are some others of us who are prepared to do any 'facing' that may be necessary."

This last utterance was intended to check unfavorable references to Boyd Westover's unfortunate experience, and it was in the main effective. For Carley Farnsworth, small as he was, had a reputation as a fighting force of no mean pretensions. Three times he had met antagonists on the duelling field. On one of those occasions he had seriously wounded his foe, and then had tenderly cared for him, nursing him back to health in his own house. On the two other occasions his antagonists had apologized. In still another case Carley had shown a loftier courage. After accepting a challenge he had said to his seconds:

"I am satisfied that I'm in the wrong in this matter. I was entirely sincere in making the charge for which I am challenged, but I made it upon misinformation, and I am prepared to withdraw and apologize for it. Communicate that decision to my antagonist. If he still wants a shot at me, he can have it of course."

Such was Carley Farnsworth, and in view of the veiled warning his words gave, it was felt that an extreme discretion in discussing matters pertaining to Westover's candidacy was, to say the least, desirable.

Yet Webb and his friends felt that something must be done to stem the tide created by the Westover nomination. The names appended to it were those of such men that their support of any candidacy in opposition, seriously imperilled Webb's chance of election, which until then had been regarded as a foregone conclusion that needed no looking after.

"Something must be done," and the fact that Colonel Conway's signature was conspicuously absent from the nomination paper, suggested the nature of that "something." It was known that The Oaks and Wanalah were adjoining plantations; that the Conways and the Westovers had been the closest intimates for generations; that Colonel Conway had wearied all ears with his eulogiums of Westover's gallantry in rescuing his daughter in time of peril. Why then was Colonel Conway's name absent from a list that it should naturally have headed? Was it that he believed in Westover's guilt in spite of the revealed facts, as some others professed to do? Or was there truth in the rumor, which was vaguely floating about, that Westover had jilted Colonel Conway's daughter?

That last suggestion was quickly negatived in all well ordered minds by the certain knowledge that if Westover or any other man on earth had been guilty of such offence toward a daughter of the house of Conway, the head of that house would have horse-whipped the offender in public and at the point of a pistol.

Nevertheless there remained the fact that Colonel Conway's name did not appear among those nominating Boyd Westover, and that fact greatly encouraged Webb and his adherents when they found that they must fight tooth and nail for an election which they had deemed secure beyond the necessity of endeavor of any sort. They set to work, not so much to find out the reason for Colonel Conway's refusal of his name, as to insinuate conjectural solutions of that riddle that might be hurtfully whispered into doubting ears.

"There must be something wrong in that quarter."

"It isn't easy to explain."

"Of course Colonel Conway has his reasons, even if he doesn't give them."

"If there wasn't something wrong, why didn't Colonel Conway put his name first on the list?"

These, and like things could be said without incurring a challenge from Carley Farnsworth's wrath, and they were diligently and hurtfully said; hurtfully because in that community the least suspicion that a man had been other than chivalrous in his treatment of a woman was damning beyond the possibility of forgiving.

This thing troubled Carley Farnsworth more than he liked to admit even to himself. A good many signatures had been denied to his nominating paper on the sole ground that Colonel Conway had refused to sign it, and the absence of his signature was the one effective plea of Webb and his followers.

When Carley Farnsworth had gone to Colonel Conway to ask his aid, the sturdy old planter had replied:

"I have reasons of my own for not signing your paper, Dr. Farnsworth. Please do not ask me what they are."

To that there was no possible response. The request with which the Colonel concluded his reply made a peremptory end of the conversation so far as that subject was concerned, and so Carley Farnsworth talked of crops and the curing of hams instead.

But Carley Farnsworth felt that this doubt, this question, this suspicion, was a seriously undermining influence in his campaign for his friend, which there was no means of meeting in Boyd Westover's absence. For, in whispers and by questions that could not be challenged as assertions, Webb and his followers were suggesting that Colonel Conway was only waiting for Westover's return before making public the reasons that impelled him to withhold his approval of his neighbor's candidacy, and that the fear of Colonel Conway's wrath was the real reason for Boyd Westover's continued absence.

Carley's first impulse was to write to Judy Peters, telling her that Boyd's presence was necessary and giving her the reasons. But upon reflection he decided that this was a case in which Judy's objection to "puttin' things down in writin'" was peculiarly applicable and valid. So he sought converse with Edgar Coffey, who, under Judy's instructions, was "a hangin' round" the lower parts of the district, and confided to him the urgent and explanatory message he wished Judy to receive.

On receipt of the message, Judy acted promptly, but in her own way. To Edgar Coffey she said:

"You go home now, an' look after things there. You's got nine good hogs to kill this fall an' your wife's a feedin' 'em on apples. Your wife's purty, Edgar, an' her ways is pleasin', but she ain't got the sense she was borned with. She mixes the strippin's with the milk jes' as ef strippin's wa'n't purty nigh the same as cream, an' she hitches a horse to the body of a tree, 'stead of a swingin' limb, so's the beast can break the halter an' go home, leavin' her to walk. She done that at church only two weeks ago come nex' Sunday. An' now she's a feedin' hogs on apples when she orter be a givin' 'em corn to harden the meat fer killin' time. So you better go home an' fix things. I'll ten' to the rest."

Edgar was grievously disappointed. He had confidently hoped to be himself Judy's messenger to Boyd Westover, but Judy was much too sagacious to permit that.

"Boyd'll ax questions," she reflected, "'cause he'll be full o' wonderment 'bout this here thing, an' Edgar mout let the right answers slip out. Theonidas can't do that, 'cause he don't know nothin' 'bout the answers."

She expected Theonidas to visit her that evening to secure a bag of corn meal that she knew he and Boyd sorely needed. She would send her message by Theonidas, therefore, and would leave the message to take the place of the meal.

It was supper time when Theonidas arrived, bringing a wild turkey gobbler and a dozen squirrels on his back.

"Them's all right," said Judy, feeling of the game. "Tell Boyd he'd orter 'a' saved 'em to take to Wanalah to-morrow. He'll be a entertainin' folks there an' it 'ud 'a' been handy to have some game in the house."

"He ain't a thinkin' o' comin' down the mounting yit," replied the boy in open eyed wonder.

"I know he ain't," Judy replied. "But when you git back up there to-night—an' you's a goin' to start back soon's you git yer supper—he'll be a thinkin' about it, an' 'twon't take much thinkin' to set them legs o' his'n a movin'. You come an' git your supper, an' then mosey up the mounting as fast as yer feet kin foller one another. An' you're to tell Boyd that they's the devil to pay an' no funds, down Wanalah way. Tell him I says he's got to git down thar' quick an' face the music."

"What's it all about, Mammy?" asked Theonidas with not unnatural curiosity.

"That ain't none o' your business," Judy replied, "an' ef you don't know nothin' you can't git it wrong in tellin' it. You jes' say what I's tole you to say, an' by midnight he'll be a stumblin' down the mounting to find out what's the matter. But tell him—now mind, Theonidas, an' listen to what I's a sayin'—" for the boy was reaching across the table for a second helping of some dish he specially relished, and Judy feared that he was not attending to her instructions—"listen to what I's a sayin'—"

"I's is a listenin', Mammy," the boy replied. "I's heard every word."

"Is you? Then what was it I said last?" she demanded.

"You said as how that by midnight he'd be a stumblin' down the mounting to find out what's the matter."

"Right you is!" said Judy approvingly. "Now that's business, an' so is what I'm a goin' to say. You is to tell him not to come near Judy Peters's place. Tell him they's reasons. Tell him to go down t'other road Arricktown way. It's shorter an' quicker, but tell him they's reasons besides the shortness an' quickness. An' when you's tole him all that tell him your Mammy says he kin count on her tell death! That'll cheer him up, like."

When William Wilberforce Webb found that he had to fight for an election which he had supposed to be securely his by virtue of his regular nomination as the candidate of the dominant party, he hastily called his friends and advisers together for consultation.

In the course of the discussion it was decided that the weak spot in Webb's campaign lay in his neglect to do anything to secure the mountain vote.

"We'll divide about even down here," said the shrewdest politician among Webb's following. "You see the whole Democratic vote is just so much withdrawn from Westover's strength among the planters, and the Democrats seem to be in earnest this year. That leaves us with a small but secure majority in this part of the district. The decision will rest with the mountain vote, and so far as I can see we've done nothing to secure that."

"I haven't thought it necessary," answered Webb, "until now. You see the mountain people have seemed entirely indifferent, and they seem so now. As they gave me a big majority at the last election, I have reckoned upon party lines to give me a like majority this time."

"Have you seen Judy Peters?" asked one of the advisers.

"No. I have taken the mountain vote for granted, as about three-fourths Whig and one-fourth Democratic. You see none of us expected this intrusion of Boyd Westover into the campaign."

"No, none of us expected it," answered another, "but we've run up against the unexpected, and we've got to meet it. Webb, you've got to go up and see Judy Peters. If you please her she'll settle the election out of hand, but if you offend her, then God save us, for no lesser power can!"

"I'll go," answered Webb, "but I really don't think it necessary. I had a talk with Edgar Coffey the other day—in fact I had him dine with me at the hotel—and he assured me that Judy Peters was taking no interest in the campaign. He said Judy cares so little about it that even he hadn't heard an expression of opinion from her lips. So I have taken the normal Whig majority in the mountains for granted."

Thereupon "Foggy"—he had some other name but nobody ever remembered it—arose and walked twice across the floor before speaking. He was barkeeper, constable, jailor, livery man, faro dealer, hound-master, money lender, note shaver, and pretty nearly everything else that was disreputable, whether official or unofficial, at the county seat, and in his various capacities he was rightly supposed to know politics and men as nobody else in the county did. At last he turned to Webb and asked:

"Was it yesterday or the day before, that you were born? Because if it was longer ago than yesterday there really can be no excuse for your faith in Edgar Coffey. Don't you know he was never caught telling the truth but once in his life, and that time he was talking in his sleep after too heavy a load of apple jack, and took it all back as soon as he waked up? Now my advice to you is to get your walking boots on as quick as ever you can, and go up to Judy Peters's for a consultation as to the mountain vote. And you want to mind your eye with Judy, for if you offend her your goose is cooked and your cake's dough."

In accordance with this suggestion, Webb prepared himself for a journey up the mountain road, but as he had a speaking engagement to keep, he could not make the proposed visit until a day later. In the meanwhile, and by way of placation, he sent a messenger with a note to Judy, in which he wrote:

"I feel that I have neglected my duty in not visiting you before, but I have had my days and nights so full of work that it has really seemed impossible until now. I am going up to-morrow to enjoy one of your matchless suppers and have a talk with you about whatever interests you. As for my campaign for the Senate, I know your loyalty too well to doubt that it has your approval; and now that the intrusion of a third candidate has rendered the result somewhat insecure in the piedmont part of the district, I hope to interest you so far that you will help me stir up a rousing vote in the mountains."

Judy's sole comment on the letter was:

"They'll be a rousin' vote in the mountings sure enough."

Then she turned to Sapphira and with a relish in her tone, said:

"Say, Sapphiry, you an' me's got to lay ourselves out on tomorry night's supper. They's a candidate a comin'."

"Is he one you's a goin' to 'lect?"

"Yes—to stay at home. But may be you's noticed, Sapphiry, that whenever I picks out a shoat to be turned into victuals next day, I always gives that shoat fust chanst at the buttermilk, an' see to it as how he kin jes' lay down all night, 'longside o' more corn 'n he could eat in a week. They ain't much difference 'twix' candidates an' shoats I reckon,—leastways some candidates. So you an' me's jes' got to git up a supper fer to-morry night sich as the candidate never seen in his life before. You go to the smoke house an' git the ham that hangs wrong end up on the third row o' hooks, three hams from the left end. Wash it an' put it on to bile right away so's that it'll have time to git firm cold. They's half a shoat in the spring house, an' we'll wring the necks o' some fryin'-size chickens to-night so's to have 'em ready. To-morry's the reg'lar twice a week churnin' day, so's that they'll be fresh butter an' plenty o' buttermilk ef the candidate happens to like buttermilk. I'll set a bakin' o' bread to-morry mornin' so's we kin have a hot loaf fer supper. As fer beat biscuit an' batter bread, we kin make 'em when the time comes. Say, Sapphiry, le's surprise the candidate!"

Judy uttered that sentence with enthusiasm and with a smile on her face. A happy thought had come to her.

"Tain't hog-killin' time yit, nor yit 'twon't be fer more'n a month to come, an' so nobody ain't seen no sassage sence last winter. Le's make some, out'n the trimmin's o' that half a shoat! You an' me kin chop it an' season it to-night an' it'll be extry superfine by supper time to-morrow."

"Well, you certainly is a layin' yourself out fer that there candidate, Mammy," said Sapphira in admiration of her mother's enthusiasm. "Is you a goin' to give him a chanst at your old peach and honey?"

"What! peach an' honey fer that miserable wild mustard patch of a candidate? Well, not ef I see it fust. Apple jack he'll drink, an' it'll come out o' that there bar'l as was made out o' last year's windfalls an' cullin's, at that. They ain't no fine flavor to that slop, but it'll make drunk come just the same, an' I reckon that's all a half breed like Webb's got any call to expect o' liquor. The best o' victuals ain't none too good fer anybody as sets down to Judy Peters's table, but politeness an' liquor goes by favor, an' I ain't got no favor to spare fer that doggoned counterfeit-copper cuss, Webb."

When Webb appeared, he found Judy arrayed in colors that the lilies of the field never dared assume and that Solomon in all his glory did not dream of. She had even put on her bracelets and her breast pin of green glass, simulating a setting of emeralds. She had borrowed Sapphira's earrings—great golden hoops that had cost a dollar and a quarter—and was wearing them in honor of the occasion.

Her gorgeousness of adornment and the barbaric lavishness of the supper she served him, convinced Webb at the outset that her favor was altogether his, that the mountain vote was secure, and that in spite of all alarms his triumphant election was as certain as any human event could be. Perhaps Judy had intended to create that impression on his mind. Certainly she did nothing to correct or remove it, and by the time supper was over Webb was so well satisfied with things as they were that he did not hesitate to indulge freely in the apple jack that Judy set out for his consumption.

When she had got his tongue "loosened up" to her liking, and not till then, she brought the conversation around to subjects connected with the political campaign. Webb had not ventured to introduce those subjects earlier. His instinct was keen enough to realize that in Judy Peters's house Judy Peters was herself the director of the conversation, and he had heard, till the fact was deeply impressed on his mind, that the person who forced the talk into channels of his own choosing was pretty sure to find himself snubbed and snuffed out by some caustic and high-flavored utterance of her majesty the Queen of the Mountains.

"Tell me 'bout your campaign, William Wilberforce Webb," she said after he had had a third or fourth helping of apple jack. Then she changed her mind—or perhaps the change had been in her mind all the while—and said: "No, don't bother 'bout that yit. Tell me, instid o' that, what you's a luggin' all that name around for. I s'pose when you was a boy they called you jes' Billy Webb. Why ain't that a good 'nough name for you now? You see us folks up here in the mountings ain't got much respec' nor patience like with names bigger'n the men what wears 'em. They was wunst a feller come up here what called hisself James Augustus de Forrest Hyde, an' we run him out'n the mountings. He come back arter a while a callin' hisself plain Jim Hyde, an' he's been a breedin' mules successful, like, ever since. You see when he fust come he brought more name along than he could tote, an' that's jest what you's a doin' with your William Wilberforce Webb. It sounds well down 'mong the stuck ups, but 'tain't no go up here in the mountings. Us folks likes somethin' plainer—somethin' like Boyd Westover."

"Of course you're right, Judy," answered Webb flinching a little at the name of his antagonist, "but when a man's parents have given him a long name what's he to do but wear it? A man's name's a part of him."

"Yes, an' it's that part us folks up here in the mountings don't like. It's the fool part. Why ain't 'W. W. Webb' a good enough name fer a one-horse vehicle like you?"

It was the epithet rather than the question that staggered Webb, but that it did stagger him was indicated to Judy's shrewd observation by the fact that he took three deep draughts of the apple brandy before answering. At last he said:

"Well, you see, Judy—"

"No, I don't see," she interrupted, "an' you ain't a goin' to make me see sense in a thing what ain't got no sense in it."

"I was going to say—" he began again.

"Yes, I know you was. Never mind a sayin' it. Listen to me. Ef I'm to help you in your canvass up here in the mountings, you's got to shorten your name somehow. Mind I don't say I's a goin' to help you,"—Judy's sturdy love of truth in the abstract prompted this qualification of what was essentially a lie in the concrete—"but ef I'm to help you, you's got to give me a shorter name 'n William Wilberforce Webb to call you by. You see every time I try to say anything 'bout you my mouth gits so choked up, like, with that durned worm fence of a name that the rest o' the words won't come out nohow."

"I'm sorry, Judy, awfully sorry that my name offends you. Just call me Billy hereafter."

"That's all right for me," answered Judy, "but you was enominated by the name of William Wilberforce Webb, an that's the way it'll be wrote on the pollin' books. How's the folks up here in the mountings to know as how Billy Webb an' William Wilberforce Webb is the same feller? The two don't sound much alike. Howsomever we'll try an' manage that. Now tell me 'bout how things is a goin' down plantation ways."

In the embarrassment created by Judy's critical reflections upon his name, Webb had filled his large tumbler again with the insidious intoxicant, forgetting to add water, and had taken several swigs of the "reverend spirits," which is what Virginians always called undiluted brandy or whiskey. Judy had observed the fact but had not discouraged it. Her son, Daniel Webster, was at home that night to put Webb to bed if need be, and meanwhile she wanted to find out from Webb's indiscretion what she had no hope of learning in any other way, namely, "all about the gal that's mixed up in the matter."

To that end she interrupted Webb many times, checking his tendency to indulge in generalities and holding him down to facts. He told her how greatly Boyd Westover's intrusive nomination had disturbed what had promised to be a "walk-over campaign"; how the refusal of Colonel Conway to sign Boyd's nomination paper was exciting suspicion, and much else of interest to which Judy paid no heed. She harked back instead to the Conway matter.

"What was the matter with Conway?" she asked. "Has him an' young Westover had any fallin' out?"

Webb had attained that condition of alcoholic indiscretion in which the impulse is to be confidential and to say things far better left unsaid. He unbosomed himself.

"Well, you see, Judy," he said, "there are some things we don't mention, but you're a friend of mine, Judy, and you're entitled to my confidence. You see it's this way. The talk is that Boyd Westover and Colonel Conway's daughter Margaret were engaged to be married, when Westover committed—or was accused of committing the crime of which he was convicted and for which he was sentenced to the penitentiary. Some say she stood by him and he threw her over; some suggest that he couldn't explain things to her satisfaction—that she asked him questions he couldn't answer; some say he went back to Wanalah eager to marry the girl, and she threw him over because she didn't believe in his innocence. You see, Judy, he is, after all's said and done, only a pardoned criminal, and his pardon was based only on the confession of a poor demented fellow who has since been sent to Staunton as a lunatic. Anyhow it's plain that Colonel Conway believes Boyd Westover to be guilty, just as I do and as a good many other folks down our way do. If he isn't guilty, why's he hiding himself? Why don't he come into the district and face the music, instead of leaving that little monkey, Carley Farnsworth, to do everything for him? You never saw Carley Farnsworth, did you, Judy? Of course you didn't. Well, he's a little jackanapes of a doctor that's equally ready to give his blue pills by the mouth or at the point of a pistol. Boyd Westover has put him forward to overawe and intimidate everybody; but the Democrats will hold their vote this year and with your help, Judy, we'll make this election memorable."

"I don't know jest what that last word means, Billy, but after what you's been a tellin' me you kin bet your next winter's meat I'll have a hand in this here 'lection."

Judy never made promises that she did not fulfil. But if a candidate misinterpreted the phrases she used in making promises, she stoutly held that the fault was his and not hers.

"My words is good for what they call fer," she was accustomed to say, "but good money don't stand fer no counterfeits."

When she had got all she wanted out of Webb, she sent that worthy to bed, satisfied in his soul with things as they were, and as confident of the mountain vote in his behalf as of the excellence of Judy's cookery and the exhilaration that resided in her apple jack.

Judy was right in her reckoning as to the effect of her blind message upon the mood and movements of Boyd Westover. It was not far from midnight when Theonidas reported what his mother had said, and although the night was one of extreme darkness and a drizzling rain was falling, Boyd Westover set out at once to stumble down the precipitous mountain path to the scarcely less precipitous mountain road three miles away, and thence down, down, down, to whatever level the road might ultimately reach.

As he had never journeyed over that road before, and as its perils by night were very real and very great, Theonidas besought him to postpone the start until the dawn, but he refused to heed, and bidding the boy transfer the camp equipments to Judy Peters's house, to await orders, set off with the energy of a madman. Yet he had never been saner in all his life or in better condition to meet difficulty.

The delphic character of Judy's message left him, of course, in doubt as to the occasion of the talk about himself and to his detriment in his own neighborhood, but from the first he had not a shadow of doubt as to the substance and subject of that talk. He knew without telling that his fellow men had found some occasion—he could not guess what—for discussing his character and conduct and for recalling to his disadvantage his conviction of crime, his pardon and all the rest of it.

But he faced this sort of thing now in very different mood from that which had been his a few weeks before. Where before his impulse had been to shrink away from the horror, his mood now was to seek it out, to dare it, to defy it, to fight it with all the determination of a vigorous manhood aroused to self defence and not averse to vengeance. Where before he had instinctively sought solitude as a refuge, his impulse now was to seek the haunts of his fellow men, to challenge the criticism that had before so appalled him, to face the world with head erect and dare Fate to meet him hand to hand, foot to foot, eye to eye in combat.

The simple fact was that he had ceased to be morbid. In his life up there among the mountain tops he had regained his health of mind and body. In his contests with Nature's forces and his triumph over them in a thousand petty ways, he had become normal again. He was no longer the introspective, morbidly self-conscious victim of adverse circumstance that Judy Peters had found him to be, but a strong man rejoicing in his strength, a Westover of Wanalah who shrank from no danger and blanched in no foe's presence. He tramped down the mountain through six or seven hours of darkness in eager quest of those malignities from which he had before sought escape in a refuge of solitude. He wanted now to hear and combat the criticism from the very thought of which he had before been moved to flee in something like terror.

It was in this mood that he encountered the first news of what had happened. It presented itself in the shape of one of Carley Farnsworth's nominating placards, tacked to the great hewn log posts of a gate that spanned the road, and Westover, after nearly twenty miles of tramping, came upon it about sunrise. He could not imagine what to make of it, and after a minute's consideration he dismissed it as somebody's practical joke—a part perhaps of that "devil to pay" in his own neighborhood of which Judy Peters had sent him warning.

But as he continued his journey he found the thing repeated on every gatepost, on every conspicuous tree by the roadside, and all over the front of a blacksmith's shop which he had to pass.

There was nobody in the shop to answer questions at that early hour, but at that point the road forked, one arm of it leading to Wanalah and the other to Chinquapin Knob, the home of Carley Farnsworth. It was only three miles from that point to Wanalah, and it was full five miles to Chinquapin Knob, but, weary as his legs ought to have been and were not, after his twenty odd miles of tramping over rough roads, he turned his face not toward Wanalah but in the opposite direction, resolving to take breakfast with Carley Farnsworth at Chinquapin Knob. He quickened his pace too, after a glance at his watch.

"It's half-past six," he said to himself, "and Carley has the barbaric habit of breakfasting at eight. I must do the five miles in an hour and a half, if I don't want a breakfast of leftovers, and this morning I don't."

As he trudged on up a glutinous red clay hill road, it began to rain again in dismal fashion, but the fact did not depress him.

"It'll make the clay road soapy," he reflected, "so I must put a little more vim into my leg motions if I'm to do the trick on time."

With that he added ten or a dozen steps per minute to his pace and thought no more about the matter.

Boyd Westover was himself again. That was all.

Tree after tree, as he passed on, confronted him with a repetition of the announcement that "We the undersigned, deeming it desirable that," etc., etc., "hereby nominate Boyd Westover, Esq., of Wanalah, for election as the representative of this Senate district in the upper house of the Legislature, and we appeal to the pride and patriotism of our friends, fellow citizens and neighbors," and so on to the end of the chapter of Carley Farnsworth's free flowing rhetoric. Westover did not pause to look at any of them. There was no need. He had already learned what the placards proclaimed, and he had already observed the conspicuous absence of Colonel Conway's name from the list of those who thus urged his election. He could no more guess the meaning of its absence than others had been able to do, but he was not surprised by the fact. In view of Colonel Conway's failure to call upon him during the days of his late stay at Wanalah, he would have been astonished if that gentleman's name had appeared on the paper. But his mood was not now what it had been before. He was no longer disposed to be submissive even to Fate, or to reconcile himself to its unjust decrees. As he strode onward at the pace he had set himself he reflected:

"Of course Colonel Conway was under no obligation to call upon me, except the obligation of old friendship, and that he was free to regard as cancelled, if he chose. And of course he was under no obligation to sign that nominating paper, if he did not wish. But he knew that his failure to call upon me was a conspicuous neglect to which others would attach importance, and he knew that his refusal to sign the paper would be everywhere interpreted as an accusation that must put shame upon me. I have a right to demand a greater explicitness of accusation, and I will. His silence does me a greater hurt than any other man's utterance could. I have a right to challenge it on the ground of its injustice. I have a right to insist that he shall speak, and I will make that demand and enforce it."

Obviously Boyd Westover had recovered his vigor and was again fit to call himself by the name his forebears had borne for generations past—Westover of Wanalah—a name which in that community had always stood for virility, courage and uncompromising honor; a name that had meant secure peace to those who deserved peace and quick war to those who were hostilely disposed; a name that had always represented what is best in manhood, both in its tenderly forbearing gentleness of impulse and its relentless strength of purpose.

As he approached Chinquapin Knob the evidences of his candidacy rapidly multiplied. The outer gate of Carley Farnsworth's plantation was plastered all over with the nomination placards, and as the house came into view Boyd saw a great flagstaff there carrying in the breeze three long tailed streamers on which, as he presently made out, were inscribed the legends:

"For Senator—Boyd Westover!"

"Vote for a Gentleman!"

"Westover of Wanalah!"

"I don't understand it," Westover reflected as he climbed the last hill and saw by a glance at his watch that he was a quarter of an hour ahead of his scheduled time, "I don't understand it, but obviously I'm a candidate for Senator and with equal obviousness I'm in for a fight if I am to win. So much the better. I don't care a fig about the Senatorship, but I'll enjoy the fight. I'm in the mood for it. And besides I like to win the game, whatever the stake may be. I'll fight for this election as I never fought for anything before in my life. I wonder who the other fellow is, anyhow—my opponent?"

Clearly his twenty-five mile walk, made between midnight and breakfast time, had not robbed Boyd Westover of any of the vigor of mind and temper that were his by inheritance and that the mountains had given back to him.

"I'm almost famished," he said to himself. "It suddenly occurs to me that I was out after a catamount last night and forgot all about my supper. I wonder if Carley has a roe herring for my breakfast. Anyhow he'll have a lot of other good things."

As he finished his wondering he entered the house grounds at Chinquapin Knob, and Carley Farnsworth, who was smoking his before-breakfast pipe in the porch, caught sight of him.

Their greetings and questions were like shots from a rapid fire gun, an implement of slaughter which had not then been invented by the devilish ingenuity of greed in the service of murder.

Out of the cross fire Carley Farnsworth managed to extract the information that his friend had been tramping since midnight with a stomach empty since noon of the preceding day.

"Good!" he exclaimed. "Excellent! You're altogether fit. You're in shape or you never could have done that. But I won't answer any question you can conceivably ask"—for Boyd had already begun a clamorous catechism as to what it all meant—"until we've had breakfast and a pipe. Enos!" addressing a negro boy, "go to the kitchen and tell Elsie there'll be a lot of trouble at Chinquapin Knob if breakfast isn't on the table in five minutes,—do you hear?"

"Now tell me, Carley, what all this means," pleaded Westover.

"I'll do nothing of the kind until after breakfast," answered the other. "I'm a doctor you know, and I have the honor to be the family physician at Wanalah. By the way, Boyd, you've got three cases of typhoid in your lower quarters, and as I suspected the well I've ordered it filled up, and the negroes down there are carrying their water half a mile or so. That isn't what I wanted to talk about. As your family physician I have your health in charge. You're in superb condition now, and it's my business to keep you so. You've made a long tramp on an empty stomach—a very unwise thing to do, but as a doctor I'm used to that sort of thing. There wouldn't be any serious work for us doctors to do, if people generally were wise. But you've made a tremendous draft upon your bank account of vigor, and it is time for you to make a deposit to keep the account good. You need breakfast, before you burden your mind even with anything I have to say. And by the way, Johnny is bringing in the breakfast two whole minutes before the time. There's the loaf of hot light bread, and the roe herrings and the biscuits and the batter bread. There's a cold ham on the dresser and the batter cakes or waffles or something of that kind will come in later. Kizzy, my housekeeper, is making the coffee; she always does that the last thing in order that it may be fresh. She frequently utters the dictum, 'Coffee ain't no good ef you don't drink it while the aromatics is in it.' I don't know where she got that word, but there is always a supply of delicious 'aromatics' in Kizzy's coffee. Come. Here's a cold jowl if you care for it, and there's sausage before you, and liver and chidlings—you see I killed half my hogs the other day. Eat your breakfast and make it a good one. If you don't I'll refuse to tell you any of the interesting things you're so anxious to hear about."

When the breakfast was over and, with long-stemmed pipes alight, the two friends foregathered in front of a blazing fire—for the drizzling autumn day was chill—Westover again demanded to know "what all this thing means."

"You must have seen some of the placards?"

"Some of them? It seems to me that all the woods have been papered with them. But what does it mean?"

"Oh, that's obvious enough. It means that a goodly number of your neighbors and friends have nominated you for Senator, moved thereto by a conviction that the intelligence and character of the district deserve a better representative than William Wilberforce Webb."

Farnsworth was careful not to suggest Judy Peters's initiative or interest in the matter. That was a secret between him and her.

The mention of Webb's name as that of his opponent, started Westover out of his chair, and as he stood upon the hearth he said, in tones that were kept in subjection by sheer force of a resolute will:

"Oh, then it is Webb I'm running against. That puts a new face on the affair. I like that. Against him I'll make a whirlwind campaign. But how on earth did that fellow manage to secure a nomination by so respectable a party as the Whigs?"

"Chiefly by general neglect. He worked for the nomination and all the rest of us let it go to him by default. That's the substance of the story."

"Well," answered Westover, "the news that he is my opponent gives me a new and eager interest in the campaign. We'll get up squirrel stews and barbecues, late as the season is, and militia musters and every other kind of thing that draws men together, and I'll make my little, red hot speech at all of them. Is there anything in sight?"

"Nothing available, so far as your presence is concerned. This is Court day, of course, and I'm going to make a speech—"

"So am I," interjected Westover.

"But how can you? You've tramped all night and I've ordered a bath and a bed for you."

"Thank you sincerely. I'll enjoy the bath and the bed some other time. To-day I'm going to the Court House with you. I'll ride one of your plugs, if you don't mind, and may be you'll send a boy over to Wanalah with a note to my overseer. I want him to send a horse to the Court House to meet me—a real horse that I'll have a fight with every time I come to a gate."

Carley Farnsworth did not answer immediately. Instead he walked into the dining room under pretence of refilling his pipe—really for the sake of a good chuckle over his friend's condition.

"He's as fit as a fiddle," he said to himself. "He's full of vigor and full of fight. He's Westover of Wanalah again, and that's what I've been working for. That mountain air, and the hunting and fishing and rough tramping have done more for him than all the calomel, quinine and strychnine I've got in my saddle bags could do. It's great! And we'll crown the cure—Judy and I—by making him Senator. Really Judy is a great diagnostician in her way. It was she who found out what was the matter with Boyd and prescribed the remedy. I used to think she had only one medicine, that apple jack was her panacea. I know better now."

Then, with his pipe refilled, he returned to the parlor only to find it empty. Going to the porch he saw Westover astride a three-year-old filly that had been turned loose to graze in the house grounds. Without saddle or bridle the young man was gaily cavorting on the spirited mare's back and rapidly reconciling her to control of his will.

"Well, certainly he's fit," muttered the little doctor. "There aren't many men in Virginia who would prefer that sort of thing to a comfortable bed after an all night's tramp down a mountain side, over the roughest roads that adverse natural conditions, supplemented by the evil ingenuity of road supervisors, ever managed to create. Houp la! I'll dismiss him as cured. But we'll go on and elect him."

Then, as the negro boy for whom he had sent appeared, Farnsworth called out:

"I say, Boyd, I've a boy waiting for you here. Come and give him instructions."

And when Westover reached the steps, his host added:

"Sam may as well bring your horse to the Court House himself. It is hardly at all out of his way in coming back. So give him your instructions."

"Very well. Go to my overseer, Sam, and tell him to send Rob Roy to me by you. And mind you, you are to lead him. If you try to ride him he'll pitch you head first into the deepest mud puddle he can find, and then he'll go galloping home again. Tell the overseer to put the double-bitted snaffle and curb bridle on him and the lightest flat saddle in the stables. And mind, Sam, keep the stirrups crossed over the saddle. If you don't, Rob Roy will mount himself and ride away heaven knows where."

"Yes, sir," answered Sam. "I hear, an' I'll be keerful. I prides myself on ridin' anything they is short'n a hurricane, but I's contumaciously opposed to gittin' on the back o' that there Rob Roy o' yourn. He's wuss'n a hurricane an' a' earthquake an' a 'clipse o' de moon all put togedder. Dat's my jedgment o' his pussonal character generally. He's wuss now, o' course."

"Why, Sam?"

"'Cause he's done been stabled up fer free or four months, now, 'thout no exercise 'ceptin' bein' led to de branch fer water."

"Do you know that, Sam? Have they kept that horse—"

"Yes, sir, I knows it. Yo' see dey ain't nobody on Wanalah plantation dat dares git on dat dar hoss's back, an' 'taint much fun to exercise a hoss by leadin' of him. 'Sides dat—"

Sam faltered, and his master interposed:

"Go on—'sides what."

"Well, 'taint nothin', sir."

"All right. I like to hear about nothings. Who is she, Sam?"

"Who's who, Mastah?"

"Why, the girl you've been courting over at Wanalah? Of course I know you've been stealing a mule out of the stables and riding over there every night for a month without asking my permission. But I don't know who the girl is or whether she's worthy of you, Sam."

"'Fore de Lawd, Mastah, I ain't—"

"Don't forswear yourself, Sam. I know all about it. I visit my stables every night, and I've missed you and the mule. I don't mind, only, if you had asked me, I'd have let you have a better mule and a saddle. Never mind that now. Take the mare Medora, and get away from here. Bring your Mas' Boyd's horse to the Court House, and mind you, don't stop at Wanalah to sweetheart with Patty Jane—for you see after all I know all about this thing."

"And Sam, tell my body servant to send me some clothes by you," added Westover.

When the boy had gone, in some confusion over what seemed to him his master's supernatural knowledge of things he had carefully guarded against discovery, Farnsworth explained to his companion:

"I always take pains to know what goes on on the plantation, and I never mention it except in sensational ways, calculated to impress the African mind with the conviction that as a doctor I am possessed of strange, occult powers of discovery against which it is useless to practise the ordinary arts of concealment. It's a handy way to keep things in order on a plantation, the master of which has to attend to a medical practice. Now we must be off. Here are our horses. I've assigned to your use the maddest piece of horseflesh I possess. It's a mare that broke my overseer's arm a year ago, and when harnessed to a vehicle for purposes of subjugation and discipline kicked the vehicle into kindling wood and scrap iron and then kept on kicking till there was nothing left on her but a collar. She'd have kicked that off too, I reckon, if it had been behind her shoulders. She has been a good deal tamed since then, but she still has spirit enough to satisfy any reasonable rider. You, of course, are unreasonable. What's your fancy anyhow, Boyd, for riding cataclysms and cyclones instead of serious-minded animals that know their business and do it docilely?"

"Oh I don't know. I like struggle, contest, and all that. I like to match my wits against brute strength. I like—well I suppose I like a fight."

As he spoke the two mounted.

"There's no trace of neurasthenia in him, anyhow," thought Farnsworth. Aloud he said:

"All that is very fortunate, for just now you've got all the fight ahead of you that any reasonable person of fighting temperament could desire."

"Tell me all about it, Carley. I've been trying to worm the facts out of you ever since I got to Chinquapin Knob."

"Oh, the thing's simple enough. You see Webb hates you of course, and he's afraid of you. When he secured the regular nomination he thought he had his fox by the tail. There was only the Democratic candidate, Sam Butler, opposing him, and of course in so strong a Whig district as this is, that candidacy didn't count. But when we nominated you as an independent Whig, things began to cloud up in Webb's sky. He got ugly, but—well, he was made to understand that there were limits to what it would be safe to say about you."

"I understand, Carley," said Boyd, grasping his hand warmly; "I understand, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for a friendship that has no bottom so far as plummet line can discover. But all that's my job now. Go on, I want to hear."

"Well, he hasn't dared say a thing in any open fashion, but there are a lot of his followers whom no gentleman can afford to honor by slapping their jaws or kicking them off the steps of a barroom, and through them Webb has managed to circulate insinuations."

"Of what sort?" asked Westover quickly.

"It isn't easy to pin them down to a definition. They have mainly taken the form of questions. 'Where is Boyd Westover, anyhow? Why doesn't he present himself to the people he asks to vote for him? What's he afraid of? Why didn't his oldest and best friend Colonel Conway sign the paper nominating him? Does Colonel Conway doubt his innocence after all? Isn't he satisfied with the other fellow's confession? Or does he think the confession of a lunatic insufficient?' These are some of the questions set afloat, nobody knows how or by whom."

"What are the others?" demanded Westover with set teeth and a jaw that seemed to have added to its massiveness by reason of the determination of the mind behind it. "Go on. Tell me the whole story. I want to know just what I have got to fight."

"That's right, and I'll be with you in the fight. We'll run these questions down till we make it unsafe to ask them. I've already made a good many people quit asking them by notifying them that I should treat any repetition of the questions as an assertion for which the questioner could be and should be and would be held responsible; confound that grammar rule about can and will and could and should and would, I never could remember it, but I've given notice to all and singular that I recognize no distinction between insinuation and assertion in such a case as this, and that—oh, well, you know what a notice of that kind suggests."

"Oh, yes, I know, and I thank you. But you're evading my question, Carley. What is the other insinuation? I quite understand that you shrink from mentioning it, but you must. I have a right to demand that much from a friendship so loyal as yours has proved itself to be. Go on. Tell me the worst."

"I will. But the thing has been so subtilely put forth that I've found it impossible even to find anybody who has asked the question. Indeed everybody who has helped to circulate the slander has done so not by asking if there was truth in it but by declaring his utter disbelief in it. I never knew anything so cleverly managed in my life, or anything so malignant."

"You haven't yet told me what the scandal was," said Boyd, with lips so tightly compressed that the purple had all gone out of them.

"In substance it amounted to this, that you had in some way treated Colonel Conway's daughter with unchivalrous disrespect—that you had put some unforgivable slight upon her—nobody suggests what. In fact the thing is so vague and shadowy and unsubstantial that it is difficult even to define it. But Colonel Conway's refusal to join with us in nominating you has lent a sort of color to it, and this thing, utterly unsubstantial as it is, has done more than all else to embarrass our campaign. In your absence it has been impossible to meet it and throttle it, for nobody but you could have a shadow of authority to question Colonel Conway on such a subject."

"I understand," answered Boyd; "I'll deal with that matter in a way that will satisfy myself at any rate, and possibly my friends also. Thank you for all. I know the situation now, and knowing it, I think I know how to meet it."

As he said this the pair were entering the Court House village, and their road took them within a few feet of the house and law office of Sam Butler, the Democratic candidate for Senator. As they passed, Butler stepped out into the porch accompanied by Edgar Coffey, and engaged in the earnest end of a conversation. They could not avoid hearing Coffey say:

"Well, that's what Judy tole me to tell you, an' ef you do as she says, she'll take keer o' the rest."

Neither Westover nor Farnsworth said a word until they had passed well beyond hearing. Then Westover exclaimed:

"I wonder what on earth that means! Surely Judy Peters isn't going to throw the mountain vote for him."

"Very certainly not," answered Farnsworth, but he said nothing of his visit to the Queen of the Mountains or of her initiative in Boyd Westover's nomination.

"No," answered Westover, recalling Judy's last message to himself, "that isn't even one of the possibilities." But he did not explain the grounds of his confidence.

After a little, as the two rode into the stable yard of the hotel to put up their horses, Westover said:

"Nevertheless I'd give something handsome to know what that meant."

"So would I," answered Farnsworth.

They were destined to find out, before the campaign ended, but not yet.

Court Day in old Virginia was an institution. It happened once a month and it served all the purposes of club, exchange, political assemblage, muster, and social meeting time. Pretty nearly the whole adult male population of the county was sure to be present at the county seat on that day, so that the Virginian who wanted to see anybody, whether to collect a note or give one, to make a contract or to cancel one, to arrange a religious meeting or a barbecue, to trade horses or to exchange views concerning the latest philosophy, to make speeches or to listen to them, was sure to find present the people who were in any way related to the matter he had in hand. Those leisurely folk never thought of bothering themselves to visit anybody on business. Whatever the business was, it could wait until Court Day, and it did.

Sometimes there was political speaking or the like on Court Day, but not always. The orators had need of an audience, and if there was anything of interest going on in Court, everybody was sure to be there and the orators had nobody to address.

It was so on this occasion. It was a quarterly Court—a grand jury term of the County Court—and there was a murder trial of sensational character in progress. As a result everybody who could find a square foot of space within the Court room, in which to bestow his person, sought place there the moment the Court opened, and held it tenaciously throughout the session. The struggle for place was all the greater because Jack Towns, just returned from his Rocky Mountain trip, was present as attorney and counsellor for the accused man, and Jack Towns's eloquence was something that everybody wanted to hear. Besides that, his skill in confusing a witness and reducing him to pulp was something that nobody wanted to miss. Jack was a lawyer whose equipment lacked little of perfection. His learning was adequate, his sagacity almost preternatural, and when he had a case to conduct the Commonwealth's Attorney was in a tremor of blue funk from the beginning, the Judge was alertly mindful lest his judgment should be unduly swayed by persuasive eloquence, and the populace was in the humor that possesses an audience when a great star and a great company are to present a great drama or tragedy or comedy as the case may be.

Jack was too deeply engaged with "the work of saving a human life," as he said, to talk for more than half a minute with Westover, when the two met at the stables of the inn.

"I'm going to Wanalah for the night," he said. "Then and there we can talk. At present I have only time to tell you that you are, three times over, the richest man in Virginia and that your wealth includes a practically limitless supply of ready money. I haven't time now to tell you more, but I tell you this in the interest of your campaign. Give all the jamborees you think of; let the money flow like water, and I'll take care of the results."

"But, Jack, I'm not buying my election, and—"

"Of course not. I understand all that. I only want you to know that for legitimate expense your bank account is ample. Now I must go. I've a human life in my hands. I'll be with you at Wanalah to-night. Go home when you get ready. I'll be there when I can. So long."[1]

[1] The expression "so long," as here used, is not an anachronism. It was in use in Virginia, and in well nigh universal use in South Carolina before the war. Its adoption at the North came much later, I believe. Mr. James Russell Lowell once suggested to me that it might be a corruption of "salaam."—Author.]

In Virginia in those old, sunny days, hospitality was taken for granted in that confident fashion, and the welcome always justified the assumption.

But before the court was opened, and during its noon recess, which was shortened to three-quarters of an hour because of the importance of the case at bar, Boyd Westover found it difficult to move about, because of the besetting eagerness of his friends to greet him. In answer to questions he frequently repeated a little impromptu speech.

"I was in utter ignorance of my nomination until I saw placards this morning. I haven't even yet found out what it means, and I really care nothing for the place. I'd far rather stay at Wanalah and look after my affairs. But as my friends have nominated me I'm a candidate and I shall stay in the race till the polls close on election day. I learn that some persons—I don't know who—have been suggesting things to my detriment. I am here to ask about that, to challenge every insinuation against my character and every criticism of my conduct. I stand ready to answer. I ask only that those who seek to injure me shall come out into the open, make themselves known and put their accusations into definite form so that they may be met and either refuted or established. I don't relish attacks in the dark or from behind masks, and I am going to make known my opinion of the sneaks and cowards who make such attacks. I'm going to attend every gathering of my fellow citizens between now and election day, and at every one of them I'm going to challenge any and every body as I do now, who has aught to say against my character or my conduct to say it openly like a man. If any one does that, I shall reply in such fashion as I think appropriate in each case. I stand before the community as Westover of Wanalah, a man conscious of his own rectitude and prepared to vindicate the honor of the name he bears at all times, against all comers and at all hazards. That is all I have to say, and it ought to be enough to satisfy honorable men and to silence sneaks and slanderers."

So far as the men of honest mind who were gathered together that day were concerned, this challenge seemed abundantly satisfying. Many who had entertained doubts because of the candidate's absence, abandoned their doubts and frankly declared their purpose to support Westover at the election. As for Webb and his friends, they found themselves sorely embarrassed. Their opportunity had lain in Westover's unexplained absence. His appearance now, and his frank and manly challenge, robbed them of their weapons and their ammunition. They dared not say aught that might be construed into an accusation, and if any of them insinuated aught to Westover's discredit he was sure of a peremptory challenge to say just what he meant.

It was obvious to Webb and his supporters that something must be done to meet and neutralize the effect of Boyd Westover's presence and defiance. They still had "regularity" behind them. Webb was the regularly nominated candidate of the Whig party, strongly dominant in that region, and presumably he would receive the regular party vote. Then, too, as he explained to his partisans, most of the Democrats, who would of course support their own party candidate, were men friendly to Westover, whose votes were so many subtracted from the support that would otherwise be his.

"I regard Sam Butler's candidacy as a thing altogether in my interest," he said confidently, "and then," he jubilantly added, "I have satisfactory assurance that the whole mountain vote will be mine, and so I regard my election as a foregone conclusion, a triumphant assurance of a future that holds human affairs securely within its grasp."

That was a phrase dear to Webb's soul. He had spent half a night in concocting it and committing it to memory. "You know I've been up in the mountains, and I've been royally entertained by Her Majesty the Queen."

"Has she definitely promised you the mountain vote?" asked one who had a passion for exactitude.

"Practically, yes. You know Judy Peters talks in parables and never commits herself; but a wink is as good as a nod to a blind horse, and her parting words to me left nothing of assurance to be desired. Now what I want to say is this: My election is secure, but I want my constituency to include as large a proportion of the planters, men of my own class, as possible, and so I have accepted Sam Butler's challenge to meet him and divide time at the Barbecue he's going to give over at Fighting Creek, the day after to-morrow. I suppose Westover will be there by Sam's invitation, and between Sam and me he won't be left a leg to stand on."

"Well, may be so," muttered Foggy, whose experience in politics had bred chronic scepticism in his mind; "but Boyd Westover has been talkin' right out in meetin' to-day, an' besides—"

"What is it, Foggy?"

"Well, Jack Towns is here, you know, an' if he happens to make a speech over there he'll tangle you up like a fish-line after you've caught an eel on it."

"I'm not afraid of him," answered Webb, confidently.

"So much the worse," muttered Foggy. "Maybe he wouldn't do you up so badly if you were properly afraid of him. However, we must take things as we find 'em, and candidates likewise, and I'll be over at Fighting Creek with a lot o' fellows to shout for you, Webb."

When Court opened and everybody made a rush for places in the court house, Boyd strolled over to the inn whose proprietor insisted upon calling it a hotel, and, going to the room he had taken there for the day, threw himself upon the bed for a sleep of two or three hours. At the end of that time he arose refreshed, took a cold sponge bath, and proceeded to change his rough mountain costume for the more conventional garments his body servant had sent him from Wanalah. After the fashion of the time and country, these consisted of a "pleated bosom" shirt, a damask silk vest, a long tailed broadcloth coat, a pair of "doe-skin" trousers, white socks with silken clocks, and a pair of "low quarter" shoes with broad silken ties. It was certain that before mounting his horse again for the journey to Wanalah, Boyd Westover would shed the shoes at any rate and don his high-topped boots instead, but for the present he felt a social obligation upon him to dress conventionally; for he had found at the hotel a note from Major Magister, the leader of the bar, saying:

"Of course you'll dine with me at four o'clock, Westover. The Judge will be present, and I hope Jack Towns and the Commonwealth's Attorney also, prepared to reconcile the differences created by this trial, and become friends again. But none of these is what I mean when I say 'of course' you'll dine with me. The 'of course' takes the much more pleasing form of a charming young gentlewoman from Boston,—Miss Millicent Danvers,—to whom we all want to show every possible attention, and especially to introduce you as a typical young gentleman of Virginia. She is with us only for the day. So don't send any excuses, but come in your own proper person."

Remembering that Boyd Westover was a gallant, hot-blooded young Virginian, and that it had been many moons since he had enjoyed association with young women of his class and caste, it is easy to understand the eagerness with which he welcomed this opportunity to "get himself civilized again," as he framed the thought in his mind.

"From Boston?" he reflected. "I suppose she'll have gold-rimmed spectacles and talk philosophy. I never met a Boston girl, so this will be a new experience. After all, I suppose women are very much alike, no matter where they come from. Doubtless this one has pulses, just as other girls have, and perhaps I shall be able to put my finger on them. At any rate it will interest me to try. My opportunities promise to be good. Major Magister and the Judge and Jack Towns and the Commonwealth's Attorney are sure to fall foul of each other over abstruse law points that the rest of us know nothing about, and that will leave mine hostess and the Boston maid to me."

It was in this mood of pleasurable but by no means enthusiastic anticipation that Westover entered the home of his host, half an hour after the jury had returned a verdict of "not guilty," in the case of Jack Towns's client—a verdict that was based rather upon the absence of evidence that Jack Towns had succeeded in excluding than upon the evidence actually presented at the trial.

When his hostess presented him to Millicent Danvers, Westover could scarcely believe that this was the young woman he had been invited to meet. He had constructed a portrait of her in his imagination and she did not satisfy any of the details of the picture. He had expected to find her tall, bony, Roman-nosed, and sallow. She was instead of moderate height, plump, with delicately moulded Grecian features, and a complexion of pink and white that had no suggestion of sallowness in it. He had expected spectacles; instead he found a pair of gray-blue eyes that looked into his own with candor and fearless trustfulness, like those of a child of four or five years of age, and yet with the confidence and courage that come only of good breeding allied to perfect innocence. He had prepared himself to meet an aggressive, self assertive manner; instead he found all the shyness of young girlhood, all the modesty of maiden inexperience, allied with a frank, self-respecting truthfulness that was fearless because of its confidence of right intent.

They talked, of course, about the young woman's impressions of Virginia.

"It is lovely," she said. "You know it is all a surprise, an astonishment to me."

"How so? Would you mind explaining that?"

"I cannot exactly explain it. You see it's like a pleasant dream. You know it made you happy while you were dreaming it, and you know it makes you happy after you're awake, but you can't tell just what it was you dreamed or just why it made you happy. It is so elusive that you can't grasp it and put it into words. I'm still dreaming Virginia, and I know I shall never be able to tell anybody why the dream is so delicious. I try to think it out sometimes, but I can't. Whenever I make up my mind that it is because of this thing or that, I say 'No, that isn't it.' I suppose it's a thousand little things put together. But tell me about this election of yours. I'm talking too much about myself and my thoughts."

"No, you are not. The election doesn't interest me, and what you've been saying does. Go on, please. You had more in your mind."

"How can you know that?" she asked in genuine surprise.

"Because you spoke of 'a thousand little things.' I wish you would tell me about a dozen of them, or even half a dozen."

With a world of childlike seriousness in her wide open eyes the girl responded:

"I suppose I ought not to have said a thousand. That was an exaggeration, and exaggeration is as bad as any other kind of fibbing, isn't it?"

"In some cases, yes—in some, no. Certainly it was not so in this case. Your phrase carried to my mind precisely the thought you had in your own, and so it was perfectly truthful."

"I'm glad you think so. I try always to tell the truth."

"So I should imagine. Now will you not go on and tell me some of the things that please you in our Virginia life? Is it so different from your life up North? You see I have never been North."

"Oh, yes, so different! I think most of us up North are good people, just as I suppose most people are everywhere. But there's a difference—a something, I don't know just what. Yes, I do, too, in part at least, though I'm not sure I can put it into words. We live within ourselves, and you don't. We love our friends and are kind to them, but we aren't close to them, as people down here are. It is because we are shy, I suppose. Our attitude toward money values is different. I don't know that our people care more about money than you do, but—well, we take it into account as you do not. But that isn't what I mean. There is a certain graciousness in your ways of living, a warmth, a color—I don't know what to call it—that fascinates me. We are scrupulously polite to each other; you are cordially courteous instead. I suppose that too is because we are shyer than you are. We shrink from self revelation as you do not. I think we are really as warm-hearted as you Virginians are, but we are more reserved."

"You are doubtless right. I've observed that temperamental peculiarity in the Northern men I've met. At the University there was a young man from Boston who became my chum under rather peculiar circumstances, and I studied him closely. Because of a certain delicacy of constitution which rendered your Boston winters dangerous to his health, he was sent to the University of Virginia instead of Harvard. He didn't know our ways, and as a 'Yankee'—you know how unjustly that word has come to have evil significance with us—he was a good deal shunned, and things were said, and—well, it so came about that he and I became chums and occupied a room together on the lawn."

"Yes, I know," she answered dreamily, as if recalling a story. "But you are suppressing the truth, Mr. Westover."

In an astonishment that well nigh made him spring from his chair, he asked:

"How do you know that?"

"Our hostess is rising," she replied with a calm dignity that was fascinating to the young man. "We ladies must leave you gentlemen to your wine and cigars."

"I do not take wine," he replied, "and as for cigars I shall gladly give them up in favor of a further conversation with you. If you permit, I will quit the table with you."