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So they sat in a diffident silence that stretched itself to greater awkwardness, until at last Dorothy rose abruptly to her feet and Thornton feared that she meant to take flight. "'Pears like ter me," she asserted, suddenly, "hit's nigh suffocatin' hot in hyar." "I war jest a-studyin' erbout thet myself," affirmed Maggard whose quickness of uptake was more eager than truthful.
Fed and refreshed, "Peanuts" Causey started on again and before he had been long gone Bas Rowlett appeared and sent his long halloo ahead of him in announcement of his coming. "I jist lowed I'd ride over an' see could I tender ye any neighbourly act," he began affably and Maggard laughed. "Thet thar's right clever of ye," he declared.
But in a deserted cabin where once two shadowy figures had met to arrange the assassination of Cal Maggard three figures came separately now on a night when the moon was dark, and having assured themselves that they had not been seen gathering there, they indulged themselves in the pallid light of a single lantern for their deliberations.
"Thet rifle-gun balances up right nice," he approved, then seeing a red squirrel that sat chattering on a walnut tree far beyond the road he squinted over the sights and questioned musingly, "I wonder now, could I knock thet boomer outen thet thar tree over yon." "Not skeercely, I reckon. Hit's a kinderly long, onhandy shot," answered Maggard, "but ye mout try, though."
Cal Maggard had some things to say and if his power of speech forsook him before he finished it was better not to make the start. These chances he was calculating, and after Rowlett had turned his back, the man in the bed opened his eyes and experimented with the one word, "Bas!"
"Hit war right then I looked out an' seed ye," she said, simply, "an' 'peared like ye'd plum bodily walked outen them pages of handwrite. Thet's why I asked whether yore folks didn't dwell hyar onc't. Mebby we mout be kin." Cal Maggard shook his head. "My folks moved away to Virginny so fur back," he informed her, "thet hit's apt ter be right distant kinship."
Hit's all right fer hawgs ter fatten but hit don't become a man none. Myself I disgusts gutty fellers." Cal Maggard had drawn out his pipe and was slowly filling it. As though the thought were an amusing one he inquired drawlingly: "Be he one of ther fellers thet seeks ter wed Harper's gal, too?" At that question Rowlett snorted his disdain. "Him? Thet tub of fat-meat?
The blossom had passed from the laurel and rhododendron and the June freshness had freckled into rustiness before the day came when Dorothy Harper and Cal Maggard were to be married, and as yet the man had not been able to walk beyond the threshold of the house, and to the people of the neighbourhood his face had not become familiar.
"Some person's done fixed hisself a nestie hyar ter spy on yore dwellin' house," he confidently asserted, then as he stood studying the spot he reached into the matted tangle and drew out a hand closed on some small object. For a moment he held it open before his own eyes, then tossed over to Maggard a broken peanut shell.
When two setters, trained to perfect team work, come unexpectedly upon the quail scent in stubble, that one which first catches the nostril-warning becomes rigid as though a breath had petrified him and at once his fellow drops to the stiff posture of accord. So now, as if one hand had pulled two strings, Cal Maggard and Bas Rowlett ceased to be upright animals.
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