The Mountain Girl. Erskine Payne

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      As David talked, the hard look which had been exorcised for a time by the gentle influence of that home, and more than all by the sight of Cassandra performing the gracious services of the household, settled again upon the youth's face. His lips were drawn, and his eyes ceased following Cassandra, and became fixed and narrowed on one spot.

      "You have come near losing that splendid eye of yours, do you know that, little chap?" Hoyle grinned. "It's a shame, you know. I have something up at the cabin would help to heal this, but – " he glanced about the room – "What are those dried herbs up there?"

      "Thar is witch hazel yandah in the cupboard. Cass, ye mount bile some up fer th' doctah," said the mother. "Tell th' doctah hu-come hit happened, son; you hain't afeared of him, be ye?" A trampling of horse's hoofs was heard outside. "Go up garret to your own place, Frale. What ye bid'n here fer?" she added, in a hushed voice, but the youth sat doggedly still.

      Cassandra went out and quickly returned. "It's your own horse, Frale. Poor beast! He's limping like he's been hurt. He's loose out there. You better look to him."

      "Uncle Carew rode him down an' lef' him, I reckon." Frale rose and went out, and David continued his care of the child.

      "How was it? Did your brother hurt you?"

      "Naw. He nevah hurted me all his life. Hit – war my own se'f – "

      Cassandra patted the child on his shoulder. "He can't beah to tell hu-come he is hurted this way, he is that proud. It was a mean, bad, coward man fetched him such a blow across the face. He asked little son something, and when Hoyle nevah said a word, he just lifted his arm and hit him, and then rode off like he had pleased himself." A flush of anger kindled in her cheeks. "Nevah mind, son. Doctah can fix you up all right."

      A sigh of relief trembled through the boy's lips, and David asked no more questions.

      "You hain't goin' to tie me up that-a-way, be you?" He pointed to the bed whereon his mother lay, and they all laughed, relieving the tension.

      "Naw," shrilled the mother's voice, "but I reckon doctah mount take off your hade an' set hit on straight agin."

      "I wisht he could," cried the child, no whit troubled by the suggestion. "I'd bar a heap fer to git my hade straight like Frale's." Just then his brother entered the room. "You reckon doctah kin take off my hade an' set hit straight like you carry yours, Frale?" Again they all laughed, and the big youth smiled such a sweet, infantile smile, as he looked down on his little brother, that David's heart warmed toward him.

      He tousled the boy's hair as he passed and drew him along to the chimney side, away from the doctor. "Hit's a right good hade I'm thinkin' ef hit be set too fer round. They is a heap in hit, too, more'n they is in mine, I reckon."

      "He's gettin' too big to set that-a-way on your knee, Frale. Ye make a baby of him," said the mother. The child made an effort to slip down, but Frale's arm closed more tightly about him, and he nestled back contentedly.

      So the evening passed, and Thryng retired early to the bed in the loom shed. He knew something serious was amiss, but of what nature he could not conjecture, unless it were that Frale had been making illicit whiskey. Whatever it was, he chose to manifest no curiosity.

      In the morning he saw nothing of the young man, and as a warm rain was steadily falling, he was glad to get the use of the horse, and rode away happily in the rain, with food provided for both himself and the beast sufficient for the day slung in a sack behind him.

      "Reckon ye'll come back hyar this evenin'?" queried the old mother, as he adjusted her bandages before leaving.

      "I'll see how the cabin feels after I have had a fire in the chimney all day."

      As he left, he paused by Cassandra's side. She was standing by the spout of running water waiting for her pail to fill. "If it happens that you need me for – anything at all, send Hoyle, and I'll come immediately. Will you?"

      She lifted her eyes to his gratefully. "Thank you," was all she said, but his look impelled more. "You are right kind," she added.

      Hardly satisfied, he departed, but turned in his saddle to glance back at her. She was swaying sidewise with the weight of the full pail, straining one slender arm as she bore it into the house. Who did all the work there, he wondered. That great youth ought to relieve her of such tasks. Where was he? Little did he dream that the eyes of the great youth were at that moment fixed darkly upon him from the small pane of glass set in under the cabin roof, which lighted Frale's garret room.

      David stabled the horse in the log shed built by Doctor Hoyle for his own beast, – for what is life in the mountains without a horse, – then lingered awhile in his doorway looking out over the billows of ranges seen dimly through the fine veil of the falling rain. Ah, wonderful, perfect world it seemed to him, seen through the veil of the rain.

      The fireplace in the cabin was built of rough stone, wide and high, and there he made him a brisk fire with fat pine and brushwood. He drew in great logs which he heaped on the broad stone hearth to dry. He piled them on the fire until the flames leaped and roared up the chimney, so long unused. He sat before it, delighting in it like a boy with a bonfire, and blessed his friend for sending him there, smoking a pipe in his honor. Among the doctor's few cooking utensils he found a stout iron tea-kettle and sallied out again in the wet to rinse it and fill it with fresh water from the spring. He had had only coffee since leaving Canada; now he would have a good cup of decent tea, so he hung the kettle on the crane and swung it over the fire.

      In his search for his tea, most of his belongings were unpacked and tossed about the room in wild disorder, and a copy of Marius the Epicurean was brought to light. His kettle boiled over into the fire, and immediately the small articles on his pine table were shoved back in confusion to make room for his tea things, his bottle of milk, his corn pone, and his book.

      Being by this time weary, he threw himself on his couch, and contentment began – his hot tea within reach, his door wide open to the sweetness of the day, his fire dancing and crackling with good cheer, and his book in his hand. Ah! The delicious idleness and rest! No disorders to heal – no bones to mend – no problems to solve; a little sipping of his tea – a little reading of his book – a little luxuriating in the warmth and the pleasant odor of pine boughs burning – a little dreamy revery, watching through the open door the changing lights on the hills, and listening to an occasional bird note, liquid and sweet.

      The hour drew near to noon and the sky lightened and a rift of deep blue stretched across the open space before him. Lazily he speculated as to how he was to get his provisions brought up to him, and when and how he might get his mail, but laughed to think how little he cared for a hundred and one things which had filled his life and dogged his days ere this. Had he reached Nirvana? Nay, he could still hunger and thirst.

      A footstep was heard without, and a figure appeared in his doorway, quietly standing, making no move to enter. It was Cassandra, and he was pleased.

      "My first visitor!" he exclaimed. "Come in, come in. I'll make a place for you to sit in a minute." He shoved the couch away from before the fire, and removing a pair of trousers and a heap of hose from one of his splint-bottomed chairs, he threw them in a corner and placed it before the hearth. "You walked, didn't you? And your feet are wet, of course. Sit here and dry them."

      She pushed back her sunbonnet and held out to him a quaint little basket made of willow withes, which she carried, but she took no step forward. Although her lips smiled a fleeting wraith of a smile that came and went in an instant, he thought her eyes looked troubled as she lifted them to his face.

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