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Layson's blood and breeding told, in this emergency. He did not flinch a whit. "I'm ready," he said calmly. "I'm not afraid to die, though it's hard to meet death at the hands of a coward." "Coward!" said the mountaineer, amazed. "You call me that?" "The man who shoots another in cold blood, giving him no chance for his life, deserves no better name." This appealed to Lorey.
"What have you got to do with it?" he angrily demanded. She was not impressed by his quick show of temper. "Reckon I've got as much to do with it as you hev," she replied. "Joe Lorey wouldn't never plan to burn a helpless dumb critter. He ain't no such coward." "Who else had a call to do it?" said the old man, placed, unexpectedly, on the defensive. "Who else war an enemy of Mr. Layson's?"
"I know what th' mountings think o' revenuers, an' I reckon, from yer handlin' o' that rifle, that you're no friend o' Layson's." Joe, full of the fierce bitterness of his resentment, was ready to confide in anyone his hatred of the "furriner" who had come up and won the girl he loved. He let the barrel of his rifle slip between his fingers till its stock was resting on the ground.
It was rather that he did not wish further to risk his liberty until he had had opportunity to glance along the gleaming barrel of his rifle as it was pointed at Frank Layson's heart. After the men had gone he went back to his still to view the ruins they had left behind them. His wrath was terrible.
Almost instantly old Neb recognized the silhouette of Layson's figure there against the fire-light from within. "Marse Frank!" he cried. "Marse Frank!" Layson, startled by the unexpected sound of the familiar voice there in the wilderness, rushed from the door, took Neb's trembling hand and led him to the cabin. "Neb, old Neb!" he cried. "By all that's wonderful! How did you get here alone?
He saw them at their work, and the spectacle made him feel inferior, which had never happened in his free, untrammeled life of mountain independence before. There were a dozen men about the work of the same type as Layson's, and their calm cocksureness as they directed all these mysteries amazed him, overwhelmed him, made him feel a sense of littleness and unimportance which was maddening.
He wondered, now, if he had not killed him, outright, for Frank's head had struck the ground with a terrific impact. But Layson's nostrils soon began to dilate and contract with a spasmodic breathing. He still lived. Rendered careless by the excitement of the moment, Joe again yielded to the habit engendered by much solitude and spoke his thoughts aloud.
"I hates him as I hates but one man in th' world!" he said, with bitter emphasis. "Who's that?" said Holton, thoughtlessly, although, an instant afterward, he was sorry that he had pursued the subject. "Lem Lindsay," Lorey answered; "him as killed my father. Frank Layson's come between me an' Madge Brierly, an' he's got to cl'ar my tracks!"
After the visiting party had gone down from Layson's camp, and, in course of time, Layson himself had followed them because of the approach of the great race which was to make or mar his fortunes, the man breathed easier, although their coming and the subsequent events had made, he knew, impressions on his life which never could be wiped away.
Holton, quick to see the possibility of gaining an advantage, realizing from the young man's tone that he was certainly no friend of Layson's, guessing, with quick cunning, at what the situation was, decided that the thing for him to do was to reveal the fact that, in his heart, he, also, hated Layson. "So ye took me for a revenuer or Frank Layson, eh?" said he.
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