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They did, too, all but one, an', although they had a chance to nail him, they let him alone." "Why was he let off?" queried Hamilton. "I reckon it was because he had a young wife an' a little child," the old man answered. "Now Jim Beaupoint, the one that had been away, he come home after a while, an' hadn't happened to hear about the wipin' out o' the Calverns.
When Johnny Calvern was about nineteen he got married, an' a few days befo' the time when he would be twenty-one, he rode up to the Beaupoint place, an' tol' the ol' man that he was willin' to let the feud rest another ten years, because of his wife an' little baby, but that he would be ready to resume shootin' at that time." "But he had no real grudge against the Beaupoints had he, Uncle Eli?
"Reloadin' his rifle, Jim Beaupoint rode slowly to whar Hez Calvern was lyin', when suddenly, from a clump o' bushes close by, there come a rifle shot, an' the rider got the bullet in his chest. Befo' fallin' from the saddle, however, the young fellow fired at the bushes from which smoke was driftin', an' a shrill scream told him that the sharpshooter was a woman."
Jed Beaupoint was a squar' man, cl'ar through. An' he said to the boy he tol' me the story himself 'Johnny Calvern, thar's yo' farm an' yo' rifle. Now, if yo're willin', I'll see that thar's no trouble until yo're twenty-one, an' then yo' c'n go huntin' revenge if yo've a mind to, or, if you're willin', we'll call the trouble off now, an' thar won't be any need o' rakin' it up again."
On the day he was fourteen year old, Jed Beaupoint that was the father called the lad, told him the whole story, give him a new rifle an' a powder horn, an' handed over the little bag o' coin that represented thirteen years o' work on the Calvern holdin'." "There certainly couldn't be anything squarer than that!" exclaimed Hamilton. "And he gave the boy the farm, too?" "Every inch of it.
However, ol' Jed Beaupoint didn't mind; he agreed to another ten years' truce, an' all went on peacefully as befo'. Durin' those ten years, however, Johnny's wife died, an' he got married again, this time to the sister o' a wanderin' preacher, a girl who had once lived in cities, an' she soon showed him that the ol' feud business must be forgotten.
One day Dandie Beaupoint found a little girl that had hurt herself, an' he picked her up in his arms an' was carryin' her home when one o' the Calvern boys shot him in his tracks. One o' the Beaupoint brothers was away at the time, but the others felt that the Calverns hadn't b'n playin' fair, an' they reckoned to lay them all out.
"And the youngster?" "They took the boy, too, an' reared him the bes' they knew how, jes' the same as one o' their own. One o' the Beaupoint boys went an' lived on the Calvern place, an' worked it, worked it fair an' squar', an' put aside every cent that come out o' the farm. For thirteen years the Beaupoints looked after the farm an' reared the boy.
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