THE RIGHT 
 
 OF THE 
 
 STRONGEST 
 
 FRANCES 
 NIMMO 
 GREENE
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 THE RIGHT 
 OF THE STRONGEST
 
 THE RIGHT 
 OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 BY 
 
 FRANCES NIMMO GREENE 
 
 "Daily injustice is done, and might 
 is the right of the strongest." 
 
 Longfellow. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER S SONS 
 1913
 
 COPVWGHT, 1913, BY 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER S SONS 
 
 Published April, 1913
 
 3513 
 
 THE RIGHT 
 OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 1523814
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 WHETHER to take the big road that wound round 
 the knob or the much shorter footpath across the 
 hill was the question. Mary Elizabeth stood at the 
 parting of the ways and pondered. Each route had 
 its drawbacks. The longer and more frequented 
 way had late arrival and a sharp scolding at the end, 
 while the path that would take her home in time 
 for supper led up the steep hill by the "ha nted 
 house" and down again through the dark-green twi 
 light of the pine forest beyond. 
 
 The girl stopped in her tracks and demanded an 
 explanation from^ herself. Was she, too, supersti 
 tious? Was she reverting to type? 
 
 With a quick, determined setting of the mouth, 
 she turned sharply to the left and took the way of 
 the haunted house and the dark forest. The steep 
 hill at the beginning of her elected route gave her 
 something on which to exercise her determination, 
 and in a short while she had won the sharp acclivity 
 and stood panting at the top. 
 
 The height gained, however, Mary Elizabeth 
 found herself in less haste to accomplish the rest of 
 the journey. She was all out of breath, she ex 
 plained to herself by way of apology, so she scared
 
 4 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 the brown lizards off the nearest log and sat down 
 a moment to rest. 
 
 It was the month and the hour in which the earth- 
 tints, from the dust of the wayside to the tops of 
 the tallest trees, blend in a yellow monochrome, and 
 the all-pervading sunlight turns to gold. It was the 
 season when, her year s tasks at an end, Nature 
 sinks back into a dreamy repose to peace and con 
 tentment and stillness in the arms of the living 
 God. 
 
 He was here, His feet were upon the mountains, 
 the very solitude and silence were eloquent of Him. 
 Here could linger no unsightly thing. The oak that 
 spread its branches over her, with its huge trunk 
 gnarled and twisted and misshapen, had taken on 
 an added dignity through its very deformity, the 
 tangle of muscadine vines beyond had caught a 
 wilder grace from the rending hand of a long-spent 
 storm, and all around, death and decay were trans 
 formed into things of beauty. 
 
 The girl sat for some minutes unwilling to stir, 
 and so quiet was the scene that the sudden barking 
 of a squirrel startled her like an irreverence, and she 
 unconsciously laid her finger on her lips as a few 
 half-dead leaves relinquished their precarious hold 
 on the bough above her, and dropped about her 
 with a sigh. 
 
 The spell was broken. Already the radiance was 
 fading out of the atmosphere, the golden hour had 
 turned to gray, and the shadows of night were lurk 
 ing in the deep wood places.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST $ 
 
 The girl started to her feet and with a quick step 
 resumed her way along the brown footpath. The 
 "ha nted house" was still to be passed, and this 
 was the very hour in which "White-face Silas" was 
 wont to walk. The place lay but a short distance 
 ahead of her now, and already its ghost-trees showed 
 white through the brown of the nearer woods here 
 a glint, and there a glint; and, after a few paces 
 more, spread out in full view the blasted grove 
 whose spectral tree-trunks sentinelled a scene of 
 desolation. Mary Elizabeth stopped short at the 
 verge of the haunted ground. The lines of deter 
 mination about her mouth had melted away. Mary 
 Elizabeth had reverted to type. 
 
 The forlorn yard-space stretched out in front of 
 her, but no soft pine-needles or drift of tinted leaves 
 drew a mantle of charity over it; only the weed- 
 stubble and fallen limbs of dead trees spread out 
 before her. Gone was the breathing beauty of the 
 living forest, the promise of peace in the silentness, 
 the spirit of God in the pulsing solitude. The place 
 was dead. The whole scene was dead, blasted, for 
 saken; for man and sin had desolated it, and neither 
 man nor God would tarry there. 
 
 A hundred yards in front of her, a little back 
 among the blasted trees, stood a crumbling log 
 cabin, dark, secretive, suggestive. The one window, 
 with its every tiny pane of glass battered out, gave 
 the house the look of a blinded thing. The front 
 steps were rotting where they stood, and the front 
 door, swinging precariously on one rusted hinge,
 
 6 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 might conceal any horrid thing. To the left was 
 the well-house, an added abhorrence, a place for 
 crawling, slimy things. One end of the rotting 
 rope still hung from the windlass over the rusty 
 wheel, but the bucket had long since broken away 
 and fallen, down, down, down Mary Elizabeth 
 started with a shudder as she fancied she heard it 
 still, bumping against the caving sides. Just be 
 yond the well-house, in plain view, was the covered 
 log pen in which Silas had kept his crazy father 
 until an ice storm on the mountain had set the old 
 man free forever. 
 
 For more years than anybody had thought to 
 compute, White-faced Silas had cursed this spot 
 with his living presence. He had "entered" the 
 land, it was said. Certainly he had built the log 
 house on it. If he had ever boasted a second name, 
 it had long since been buried beneath the contempt 
 of his familiar sobriquet. Where he came from, no 
 one knew. What his sins were, no one had been 
 able to reduce to a definite statement. As far as 
 Mary Elizabeth knew, he had lived alone except 
 for the questionable company of the maniac, and 
 had died by his own hand in the end, taking his 
 secrets with him. And they had found him a good 
 three days after the horrid deed, and had forthwith 
 cut him down from the rafter and carried him off to 
 the grave; but the nights were not many, so the story 
 went, before Silas was back again in his old haunts, 
 whiter than before. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth went over every detail of the
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 7 
 
 gruesome story in her own mind while she hesitated 
 to pursue a course that would, in its windings, bring 
 her much nearer to the half-open, secretive door. 
 And as she wavered and looked and listened, all at 
 once, a white hand grasped the sagging door from 
 the inside. The one rusty hinge uttered a harsh 
 protest. Something was dragging it open! He was 
 coming White-faced Silas was opening the door! 
 
 The girl staggered where she stood and laid frantic 
 hold of a dead tree for support, but she uttered never 
 a sound. The next instant, however, her vision 
 cleared, and she beheld on the threshold of the 
 haunted house a sunburned young man who was 
 very apparently alive throughout the whole six feet 
 of him. 
 
 Obviously he had not caught sight of her, for he 
 now stood with his hands in his pockets, whistling 
 with all his might; but his tune had lasted for only 
 a few sprightly strains, when he suddenly left the 
 rotting doorstep and strode across the yard-space 
 till he was within a few rods of where the astonished 
 girl stood. When about twenty paces from the 
 house, however, he paused and whirled in his tracks 
 to take a re-survey of the spot he had quitted. 
 
 From her position as looker-on the girl scanned 
 the stranger while he studied the premises. He was 
 well-built, well-dressed, and clean-shaven, and car 
 ried his head up; and he was so big and strong and 
 virile-looking that he didn t seem to comprehend in 
 his aggressively material self even the making of a 
 ghost.
 
 8 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 There was nothing in that broad-shouldered back 
 to make a girl afraid to pass within ten feet of it, so 
 Mary Elizabeth started with quick step, mindful 
 now that she must hasten on her journey. She hoped 
 to pass unseen, or thought she did; but the swish 
 of her skirts on the dry weeds announced her move 
 ments immediately, and caused the stranger to turn 
 quickly in her direction. The first look of keen 
 curiosity with which he swept her seemed to the self- 
 conscious girl to give place immediately to an ex 
 pression of something like astonishment. The next 
 moment he looked away as if unmindful of her 
 presence, but he removed his hat from his head and 
 stood with it in his hands till she had passed him. 
 
 As Mary Elizabeth left the haunted scene she car 
 ried with her four distinct impressions: The stranger 
 was instinctively courteous, his trousers were well 
 creased down the front, he was surprised at some 
 thing his second look had seen in her, and he was 
 looking after her as she walked away. 
 
 But in a short while she knew that she was out of 
 the range of his vision. Then it was that she remem 
 bered she was alone and far from home, and that 
 the night was creeping upon her. Her thoughts of 
 the stranger became less and less absorbing as she 
 penetrated farther into the twilight of the pine for 
 est and felt more and more the oppression of its 
 abiding loneliness. Here were no romping squir 
 rels to keep one company, no fluttering, falling leaves 
 to add a touch of cheerful color and sound to the 
 whole, no ghosts to be exorcised by interesting un-
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 9 
 
 knowns, no anything but solitude and the shadows 
 of coming night. The spirit of the hour and the 
 place was upon her; her nerves, so lately unstrung, 
 were tense and quivering again. A bend in the 
 descending path, and the girl stopped short. Some 
 fifty yards farther down the way, with his back 
 toward her, a negro sat on a stone by the wayside, 
 idly whittling a stick. No spirit of loneliness, no 
 menace of coming night, no ghost from beyond the 
 grave to face now! but 
 
 Without stopping for a moment to reflect that 
 here might be no danger, without making an in 
 stant s effort to rally her courage, the girl turned 
 in her tracks and fled along the way she had come 
 back to the white man s protection. 
 
 But as she came again in sight of the haunted 
 house she slackened her pace and tried to rally her 
 composure. As she had desperately hoped, the 
 stranger was still there. This time, he was trying 
 to set straight the sagging door, so he did not hear 
 her footfall till she was very near him. Admon 
 ished of her presence by the sound of her skirts on 
 the dead weed stubble again, he looked up quickly 
 and let fall the sagging door. A swift second glance, 
 and he was at her side, asking with concern: 
 
 "Why, what s the matter?" 
 
 "Nothing, nothing," the girl protested, uncon 
 scious that her white face gave the lie to her words; 
 "but it s so late so dark down there!" 
 
 "Who scared you?" he insisted. 
 
 "Oh, nobody, nobody at all; but the pines are
 
 io THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 lonesome and I thought maybe you wouldn t 
 mind " 
 
 "Why, I m delighted. The fact is I was about 
 to run, myself, I m that afraid of lonesomeness! 
 Wait till I get my hat, please, ma am." 
 
 The "please, ma am" condoned a something in his 
 reply that was not quite satisfactory to the girl, and 
 by the time that he had rescued his hat from a low- 
 hanging limb and returned to her, she was ready to 
 forget. 
 
 "Honor bright," was his challenge on returning, 
 "you did see somebody that scared you, didn t you?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Well, there s one thing you are not afraid of." 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "The old Bad Man that gets girls for telling what- 
 you-may-call- ems. " 
 
 Without more ado he quietly assumed leadership 
 and directed her steps over the now no longer 
 fearsome path as seemed best to himself. And 
 Mary Elizabeth followed where he led, paused for 
 the rough underbrush to be held back for her, and 
 allowed herself to be jumped across the deep places, 
 all the while wondering to what dim remoteness her 
 recent fears had fled. The spirit of loneliness had 
 deserted the green twilight, the darkness was not 
 half bad after all, and the lateness down there had 
 in some unaccountable way grown earlier. 
 
 "You are not native here," the stranger said with 
 conviction as he held a hawthorn spray aside for 
 her to pass.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST n 
 
 "Yes, I am." 
 
 He swept her from head to foot with a glance that 
 brought the warm blood to her cheeks, and then 
 added incisively: "Then this is the Looking-glass 
 House." 
 
 "Why?" she demanded, with an abortive attempt 
 to return the all but impertinent directness of his 
 glance. 
 
 "Because here I find myself required to believe 
 seven impossible things before breakfast, or, what 
 is just as hard, to believe one thing that is seven 
 times more incredible than anything else." 
 
 "I can t help what you think about it, it s true. 
 I belong to the hills but I wasn t reared here." 
 
 "Oh, that s the secret of it! Well, I fancy you 
 were quite a small baby when your parents took you 
 away." He was evidently curious about her history. 
 
 "No," the girl answered ingenuously, "I was ten 
 years old when I went to Mobile, and my father 
 and mother were dead." They walked on in silence 
 for a few rods, and then she resumed with a strange 
 frankness: "A gentleman one of these people we 
 call philanthropists came on a prospecting tour 
 through here about that time. He took me and 
 educated me for a missionary to my people. Then 
 he sent me back." 
 
 "He shouldn t have done it." The man spoke 
 with decision. 
 
 "Why," the girl replied with an enigmatic hard 
 ness in her voice, "when you pay your money for 
 anything, it s surely yours to do with as you please."
 
 12 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The man looked at her curiously and then asked: 
 "And are you going to stay here?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "How long?" 
 
 "Till I can pay back dollar for dollar of his spend 
 ing, and be quits with his solemn superiority!" she 
 suddenly flamed out. 
 
 There was silence between them for a few mo 
 ments, and then the girl burst out again impetu 
 ously: "But I don t want to! I don t want to be 
 good. I I " 
 
 The stranger shot a quick, doubting glance at 
 her, but the next instant the look in his eyes changed 
 to one of quiet kindliness as he finished her sentence 
 for her "You want to be young." 
 
 The conversation had shifted easily to a topic 
 that would have been held sacred from discussion 
 between those of nearer acquaintance. The intel 
 lectual currency of strangers is necessarily in big 
 denominations, lacking the small coin of the personal 
 and the commonplace. 
 
 The bend in the path disclosed no terrors this 
 time, though the negro was still sitting by the way 
 side, harmlessly whittling the time away. A re 
 spectful "good-evening" from him as they ap 
 proached brought him to the man s attention. When 
 they had passed, the stranger grew speculatively 
 silent and for some minutes let the girl talk on 
 unaided. At length he said, entirely irrelevantly: 
 
 "I thought there were no negroes in this part of 
 the country."
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 13 
 
 "Only a very few," she answered. 
 
 The pines were thinning out now, and the long 
 dip of the mountain valley was opening to view. 
 The girl hesitated, and stopped. 
 
 "I am not afraid now," she said; "you needn t 
 trouble to come any farther." 
 
 "You are not home yet?" 
 
 "No, but I m not afraid on the big road. Be 
 sides, it doesn t seem nearly so late, now that we are 
 out of the woods." 
 
 "We will go on," he said, with a quiet setting 
 aside of her decision. "The next time you pass my 
 house," he continued easily, "I hope you ll find 
 some of the bushes cleared out of your path." 
 
 "Your house?" 
 
 "The one up there that I was inspecting." 
 
 "But that house is " 
 
 "Yes, and I have taken it, ha nt and all." 
 
 "But you are not going to live there!" 
 
 "Indeed I am; I m going to move in as soon as 
 I can get it disinfected and cleaned up." 
 
 "You you -?" 
 
 The stranger removed his hat. "I am John Mar 
 shall, of Birmingham, and I too am serving a term 
 of exile. May I tell you that I am glad to find such 
 a denizen as you in this worse than Siberia? " 
 
 "My name is Mary Elizabeth Dale," answered 
 the girl with a frank, direct glance. "And since 
 you have to be exiled, I am glad that you are 
 here." 
 
 His hat was off again. "Thank you," he said.
 
 14 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The conversation drifted into an easier vein after 
 this, and they soon arrived at an isolated log cabin 
 which the girl had pointed out to him as "home." 
 Here, true to an inherited custom, the owner had 
 religiously cut away all sheltering trees, leaving his 
 dwelling exposed to the pitiless extremes of the suc 
 ceeding seasons. And here, as a consequence of 
 bad cultivation, the true soil had been washed away 
 and red gulleys had ploughed through the fair pros 
 pect, sapping the life of the fields. 
 
 They had reached the gulley where the front gate 
 should have stood, and the girl stopped and thanked 
 the stranger by way of dismissal. 
 
 "One moment," he delayed. "May I give you 
 some advice you seem to be sadly in need of?" 
 
 "Why, yes," wonderingly. 
 
 "You mustn t go along these country roads by 
 yourself. It isn t safe." Mary Elizabeth hesitated 
 in embarrassment, and he continued: "Do you often 
 go alone?" 
 
 "Not often," she answered; "some of the school 
 children are nearly always with me." 
 
 "You don t teach school?" There was a note of 
 sharp protest in the question. 
 
 "Yes, I do." 
 
 "Well, you don t look it" then, whimsically: 
 "Don t ever look it, hear!" But his face became 
 earnest as he urged: "You are going to take my 
 advice, aren t you?" 
 
 "As far as I can." 
 
 "But you must take it."
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 15 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth!" now came in sharp nasal tones 
 from the cabin. 
 
 "Yes, I m coming right now," answered the girl, 
 nervously. "Good-night, Mr. Marshall I ll try." 
 
 When Mary Elizabeth entered the cabin, the 
 board blinds had already been closed and a coal- 
 oil lamp was smoking on the supper table. A sour- 
 faced old woman, presiding over a huge dish of cold 
 pork and cow-peas, was flanked on each side by a 
 hairy, black-browed man. Farther down the table, 
 a little slim, yellowish, startled-looking girl dangled 
 a pair of ineffable legs from a high stool and crammed 
 cold corn-bread and molasses into her mouth with 
 both hands. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth took her place beside "Burster," 
 as the weird child was called, and watched the proc 
 ess of stuffing with interest. But in a few minutes 
 she looked up from the child with a start. One of 
 the men had precipitately shoved at her everything 
 on the table, and was regarding her solemnly with 
 great, prominent eyes, while his huge Adam s apple 
 played up and down his scraggy neck with emotion. 
 The others were feeding, in absolute disregard of her. 
 
 "Thank you, Babe, but I don t think I m hun 
 gry," she said. Then, catching the look of anxious 
 concern in his ox-like eyes, she added hastily: "Yes, 
 I ll take a glass of milk." 
 
 As she replaced the empty glass upon the table, 
 the girl gave an inward start and her erstwhile 
 speculative gaze suddenly widened. 
 
 "Bud," she exclaimed, addressing the surly man
 
 16 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 at her left, "Bud, when a house has been a long time 
 abandoned, how can a man get the right to take pos 
 session of it?" 
 
 Perhaps in her eagerness she failed to note that 
 her abrupt question brought every one of her listen 
 ers to silent attention. "Who would have the right 
 to give him permission?" she pressed. 
 
 The man addressed growled out an unintelligible 
 answer, but his gentler opposite interpreted: 
 
 "The owner, Ma y Lizbeth." 
 
 Dashed by the surliness of the morose Bud, the 
 girl was silent for some minutes, but then burst out 
 as with a sudden inspiration: 
 
 "Aunt Millie Babe wasn t there a disowned 
 child . connected in some way with the haunted 
 house? It seems to me that I remember hearing 
 a long time ago Say, did White-faced Silas have 
 
 She stopped short, for Bud had turned on her a 
 look which sent every vestige of color out of her 
 face. Aunt Millie advised her sharply to attend to 
 her own business. She looked to Babe for a gen 
 tle explanation, but he answered her never a word. 
 
 But alone in her little shed-room that night, Mary 
 Elizabeth utterly set at naught Aunt Millie s sharp 
 advice. The good-looking stranger loomed big in 
 the near perspective of her mental vision, and she 
 was surprised to reflect that all she had really learned 
 about him was that he was John Marshall of Bir 
 mingham, and that he had taken the haunted house 
 for an indefinite period. Who and what and why
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 17 
 
 he was, engaged her imagination through measure 
 less spaces of the dark time, but when she had taxed 
 her faculties to their utmost, she realized that she 
 had been utterly unable to make a place for him in 
 the economy of this narrow life here. There was 
 wasn t there a disowned child somewhere? She 
 must find out at once. But how? 
 
 Suddenly a bright idea came to her. She would 
 ride Sulphurina over to the store next Saturday and 
 ask Uncle Beck. Aunt Millie s snufT would be out 
 by that time and the old woman would be glad to 
 let her go. 
 
 That much settled, the girl made a strong effort 
 to compose herself to sleep, but other and more 
 serious thoughts, thoughts which had been persist 
 ently with her of late, refused to be silenced. Rec 
 ollections of the grave-eyed, reticent man who for 
 years had given her everything, except something 
 of himself, came back to haunt her. She had 
 thought of him often, lately, and those thoughts 
 had stirred something within her that was strangely 
 akin to pain. 
 
 To-night she was unaccountably troubled. For 
 the first time, she was unable to recall his stern 
 features in thinking of him. The eyes were there, 
 grave and unfathomable, but the face the man 
 was lost. This was unpleasant, and she made a 
 conscious effort to banish the impression, but all to 
 no purpose. The grave-eyed memory haunted her 
 last conscious moments, and lost itself only in the 
 oblivion of a dreamless sleep.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THE next Saturday found Mary Elizabeth thread 
 ing her way through the gold-and-red glory of a 
 crisp fall morning toward Uncle Beck and a solution 
 of her little mystery. Life was kind to-day. Sul- 
 phurina never once threatened to plant her forefeet 
 in balking protest, and the weather, the radiant sea 
 son, and all the scampering wood things seemed dis 
 posed to make things pleasant for the girl. Then, 
 some interesting disclosure must be awaiting her at 
 the end of her journey, for Uncle Beck would surely 
 tell her all about White-faced Silas, if she asked. 
 With the exception of the silent, worshipful Babe, 
 Uncle Beck was the one person who had been un 
 failingly kind to her since her return to her native 
 hills, and she knew that she could depend on him. 
 
 Now, "all about White-faced Silas" would, at 
 least it might, explain the stranger s reason for be 
 ing. If it did not, it would surely precipitate a 
 critical discussion of him, and she could listen and 
 learn much, without seeming to be unduly inter 
 ested in the new young man. 
 
 At this juncture, Sulphurina plodded around the 
 last bend in the road and, across the green tops of 
 a young red-oak thicket, the little, boxlike, un- 
 painted frame store stared at the girl with mouth 
 and eyes wide open. A rude interruption to the 
 day-dreams of Sulphurina effected a quick abridg- 
 
 18
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 19 
 
 ment of the remaining distance and landed Mary 
 Elizabeth at the shelf-like new-pine porch of the 
 district store. 
 
 The familiar Saturday loungers were already 
 there. Several young men were pitching horse 
 shoes in the dusty space in front and wrangling good- 
 naturedly at each successive throw. Some three 
 or four older men, stoop-shouldered, gaunt, and 
 tanned, stretched their thin jeans-covered legs on 
 the porch, and chewed and spat in solemn conclave. 
 The ubiquitous small boy, clad in blue "overalls" 
 which were patently over nothing in the world but 
 the boy, was arranging a fight between two cur 
 dogs on the steps. Uncle Beck, store-keeper and 
 postmaster and cross-roads wit, was dispensing gos 
 sip and hospitality to another group inside. 
 
 " Light an hitch, Ma y Lizbeth," he called out 
 cheerily as the girl rode up. "Come in, honey, 
 come in. Hold that thar hoss, Lena whar s your 
 manners this mornin ? Lord, but you re lookin 
 purty, gal. Ef I was about forty year younger, 
 Babe Davis would have to hump hisself, he would!" 
 
 When Mary Elizabeth entered, there was an un 
 easy, shuffling giving-back of the group inside, 
 accompanied by a round-robin stare and a sudden 
 cessation of talk. 
 
 A long, merry-eyed, bronze-faced man shambled 
 forward hospitably and answered the girl s cheery, 
 "How are you this morning, Uncle Beck?" with: 
 
 "Fine, honey, fine; ef I was any better I jes 
 couldn t stand hit."
 
 20 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 With a flourish of what stands for courtliness in 
 the hills, Uncle Beck "made her acquainted" with 
 the half-dozen others who responded to her greeting 
 with the shy but independent bearing that the girl 
 had come to recognize as characteristic. In that 
 one minute, however, it became apparent that a 
 segregating element had been introduced into the 
 erstwhile unified group, so Uncle Beck, after a few 
 more kindly phrases, introduced Mary Elizabeth to 
 his combination clerk-and-stable-boy as the "Queen 
 of Sheeby," with the order that she be given the 
 whole store, and himself set about repairing the 
 break in the flow of neighborhood gossip. He 
 draped his loose frame over a split-bottomed chair, 
 and soon had his little group talking easily, if more 
 quietly, again. This was just what the girl wished, 
 so she took a seat on a cracker-box, with her back 
 to the loungers, and examined bolt after bolt of 
 blue and red calico with lingering indecision, all 
 the while keeping her ears open and her understand 
 ing alert. 
 
 "No, sir-ee," it was Uncle Beck s voice speaking, 
 "he didn t bring His-High-an -Mightiness down here 
 to do his own pickin , but he jes sent that thar man 
 of his with a roll o money as big as my arm. An 
 ef you ll b lieve me, the feller come mighty nigh 
 buyin out my whole stock. Why, canned simmons 
 ain t no more to him than sweet pertaters, an he 
 jes perched hisse f a-straddle of a pile of our best 
 jeans breeches an waved his hand at the shelf o 
 peaches an pineapples an he says, says e, I ll take
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 21 
 
 all you got left of that thar swill, pardner. After I 
 had done got all his money, I passed a compliment 
 on him he didn t seem to predate." Uncle Beck 
 chuckled, and the expected question came: 
 
 "What dyousay?" 
 
 "Why, I up an says, says I, Sonny, you have 
 got a complishment what I ain t never met up with 
 before you air the fust mortal man I ever see 
 what could strut settin down! 
 
 After the slow, solemn chuckle had subsided, a 
 strange voice questioned: 
 
 "Wa-al, Beck, Minervy told me that she had 
 heerd that you said the feller s boss actually bought 
 curtains for his winders. Is that so?" 
 
 "So? Of course hit s so! By gum, didn t we 
 nearly have to tear up the whole establishment to 
 please him?" 
 
 "The man what hangs curtains to his winders 
 has got something to hide!" From the direction and 
 the timbre of the voice Mary Elizabeth judged that 
 the molasses barrel had delivered itself. 
 
 "You never said a truer word, Shan Thaggin," 
 put in another. "For my part I don t put any too 
 much trust in a man what can live in a ha nted 
 house. Seems like to me that this here neighbor 
 hood has had enough trouble along o that place o 
 Silas s, thout gittin mixed up with spicious char 
 acters nobody can t find out a durn thing about." 
 
 "Wa-al, I never was one to balk at a bridge when 
 I got to hit, but I don t cross beforehand, neither, 
 so I m for waitin till we git thar."
 
 22 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 There was a finality in Uncle Beck s tone that 
 caused Mary Elizabeth to fear he was about to 
 change the subject, so she turned around quickly 
 with the question: 
 
 "Uncle Beck, did White-faced Silas leave any 
 children?" 
 
 A second of dead silence threw the question into 
 bold relief, but the next minute Uncle Beck gathered 
 his long legs under him noisily, rose to his feet, and 
 walked squarely up to the questioning girl. 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, stick out your tongue. Ah, ha!" 
 after she had complied "jes what I lowed. 
 Hit s your liver, child. That s what s makin your 
 magination git the best of you. Now you go home, 
 and to-night you take an take a dost o calomel. 
 Jes about as much as you kin pile on a dime " A 
 smothered laugh from the others broke into Uncle 
 Beck s directions, and somebody called out: 
 
 "Ast Shan Thaggin how much!" 
 
 "Don t min them " Uncle Beck was answering 
 the sudden flush that overspread the girl s face. 
 "The joke s on Shan. That s him over thar on the 
 lasses bar l, leastways that s what s left of him. 
 The boys is laughin at him all on account of a per 
 fectly nachul mistake." Uncle Beck squared him 
 self about for a narrative, and the crowd smiled ex 
 pectantly all except the mossy-looking, bow-legged 
 figure on the molasses barrel. He dropped his head 
 sheepishly. 
 
 "You see hit was this a- way," continued the old 
 man after he had made sure of an attentive audi-
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 23 
 
 ence: "Shan had been mopin round here kinder 
 lopsided for weeks, an he got tur ble skeered he 
 had caught the blind staggers, so I up an diagnosed 
 him. I found hit to be a clear case o bile, so I told 
 him to take jes p intedly what I told you. Now 
 Shan didn t have no dime piece, but he had the 
 change for hit, an he follered the perscription ac- 
 cordin to the best of his lights." 
 
 "An they do say hit larnt him a lesson," broke 
 in one of the listeners. 
 
 "Wa-al, Shan ain t no scholard yit, but, by gosh, 
 he knows the diff rence tween a dime an two nickles, 
 all right! Say, Shan, hit ain t sence you took the 
 calomel that you fused to send Tony to look for a 
 bee-tree on the right-hand side o the big road cause 
 he was left-handed, is it?" 
 
 "Uncle Beck, you haven t answered my question 
 yet." Mary Elizabeth stepped forward, and pur 
 posely diverted the attention of the laughing group 
 from the shamefaced figure on the molasses barrel. 
 
 "Your question? Land save us! What ques 
 tion, child?" 
 
 "Did White-faced Silas leave any children?" 
 Again a momentary quiet fixed the group, then Uncle 
 Beck drawled with deliberation: 
 
 " Did White-face Silas leave any childern? you 
 say. Leave childern! Wa-al, child, all I got to say 
 is that the only offspring Silas was harborin endur- 
 in my knowledge of him was seven devils, an hit s 
 mostly considered hereabouts that he took them 
 with him when he left."
 
 24 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The unusual sound of a brisk, light step on the 
 porch attracted everybody s attention, and Mary 
 Elizabeth turned to see a smug-faced young man, 
 clad in an impertinently new "store-bought" suit 
 and wearing a bright-red tie, strut in. 
 
 "Well, old cuckle-burr, got anything fit for me to 
 eat this mornin ?" he demanded. 
 
 Uncle Beck grew reflective as a roll of bills was 
 ostentatiously spread out on the counter, but a 
 black-browed native plucked the store-keeper by the 
 coat and said distinctly: 
 
 "Beck, thar s a sack o new oats out thar on my 
 wagin." 
 
 The young man opened his mouth, but shut it 
 again, and turned to the proprietor, at the same 
 time laying a queer, antiquated-looking pistol on 
 the counter in front of him. 
 
 "I keep this as a kinder little souvenir," he said. 
 "My grandfather carried it in the war, and I always 
 like to show it to my friends." 
 
 Uncle Beck quieted the crowd with a swift glance, 
 and then said, with cheerful interest, as he adjusted 
 his spectacles and leaned over the weapon : 
 
 "Carried it in the war, did he? Lord, but hit 
 ain t no wonder we got licked ! Now, sonny, souve 
 nirs is valu ble an oughtn t to be left layin around. 
 You jes put this one back in your jeans hit ll be 
 safer." 
 
 The young bully caught the full meaning of the 
 other s straight look and followed his advice, if a 
 trifle slowly. Then the others began to talk among
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 25 
 
 themselves with quiet restraint, Mary Elizabeth 
 watching both groups with her heart in her mouth. 
 After about ten minutes bargaining, however, in 
 which he proved the mettle of both Uncle Beck s 
 and the stable-boy s patience, the aggressive new 
 comer grew loquacious again. 
 
 "What s them new-fangled lookin slats?" he de 
 manded, as a drove of lean, long-snouted hogs came 
 squealing up to the side door. 
 
 "Them, sonny? Them s razor-backs. We call 
 em that cause they re sharp enough to keep out o 
 trouble." 
 
 "And what in hell-and-high- water do you keep em 
 for?" He was plainly determined to be disagree 
 able. 
 
 Uncle Beck scratched the scant beard under his 
 chin, and replied with childlike blandness: 
 
 "We we keeps em to fight with, sonny." 
 
 "The distinguishin trait of a hog o that kind is 
 that he s middlin polite." It was the black-browed 
 native speaking again. Mary Elizabeth sent a 
 glance over the man s powerful frame and set face, 
 and decided that here was a man who would make 
 a dangerous enemy. 
 
 "Who is he?" she whispered to the boy. 
 
 "Who, him? That s Trav Williams, an he don t 
 take nothin off n nobody," was the comforting re 
 ply. 
 
 "Are you going to live here?" Mary Elizabeth 
 asked the question as an excuse to come forward and 
 stand between Trav Williams and the reckless new-
 
 26 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 comer, for there was ominous silence between them. 
 
 "What?" exclaimed the young fellow, taking her 
 in from head to foot with a stare of impertinent 
 approval. "No, ma am, I ll be through here to-mor 
 row then me for Birmingham, and the boss can 
 have the scenery to himself!" 
 
 "Is he lookin for trouble?" The query came 
 from Trav Williams. 
 
 "Well, don t you give yourself no uneasiness. If 
 he is, he s the stuff to find it all right, all right." 
 
 "Will you get my horse for me? I see she has 
 strayed off." 
 
 "Charmed, miss!" The bully forgot his brewing 
 quarrel in his gallantry, and was soon at cooling dis 
 tance, out in the open, leading the captured Sul- 
 phurina to the edge of the porch. 
 
 Uncle Beck followed Mary Elizabeth to her mount, 
 and as they went she whispered: 
 
 "Make him go home, hear!" 
 
 "I will, child, an you are wuth your weight in 
 Arbuckle s coffee." When she was comfortably 
 seated on Sulphurina s broad back with her foot in 
 the stirrup, she looked straight into the old man s 
 clear eyes and asked: 
 
 "Uncle Beck, what made you all look at each 
 other so quickly when I asked about White-faced 
 Silas?" 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth" and his tone was at once a 
 protest and a caress "hit weren t to say exactly 
 proper for a young woman to be astin questions 
 about ha nts."
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 27 
 
 The girl leaned forward and placed her hand firmly 
 on his shoulder. 
 
 "Don t you know you can t fool me?" she de 
 manded. 
 
 "La, honey, I ve fooled likelier gals than you." 
 Then seriously: "Now look a-here, Ma y Lizbeth, 
 you go home an stop maginin bout things you 
 ain t got nothin to do with. Ef White-face Silas 
 air a proper subject for you to be talkin bout, he 
 certainly ain t a popular one, so you keep your 
 mouth off n him. Child," he continued more gen 
 tly, "jes because your Uncle Beck don t want you 
 mixin up with things that wouldn t do you no good, 
 ain t no sign he wouldn t fight for you ef you needed 
 him." A laughing call from the store broke in, and 
 Uncle Beck dismissed her with: 
 
 "Good-by, gal; take care o yourself." 
 
 Sulphurina became brisk and cheerful as soon as 
 she was headed toward home, but her good spirits 
 were quickly dashed, for the young rider suddenly 
 took a crotchety notion and fairly dragged her into 
 a rocky bridle-path that led almost straight up the 
 flanking hill. "Stony Lonesome" was by no means 
 an easy ascent for an old mare to climb, nor did its 
 forest-clad sides offer any sort of trail that a young 
 woman riding alone should elect to follow; but 
 Mary Elizabeth had lost something the other day, 
 over the summit yonder, and she now suddenly 
 decided to go in quest of it. 
 
 Past the mountain crest and half-way down its 
 farther side, and the girl reined in her horse be-
 
 28 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 fore all she had ever known as "home." It was a 
 little tumbled-down, deserted log cabin clinging to 
 and subsiding against the gray, crumbling rocks of 
 the hillside, and nearly swallowed up by a rank 
 growth of heaven trees and pokeberry bushes. 
 Judging by appearances, it partly grew and partly 
 happened a sort of fungous thing, a product of the 
 gray rottenness all around. 
 
 How had the change been wrought? Once its 
 door-way was wide and welcoming, its black rafters 
 were high, high overhead. Once there was a sense 
 of bigness and dignity and freedom here. Now now 
 had the very portal shrunk? And could a man 
 stand upright beneath that low, mean roof? It 
 wasn t fair! It wasn t fair! Memory had broken 
 her promise. The very mountains they that erst 
 while stood for the sublime, the unattainable had 
 by some heartbreaking black magic been trans 
 formed into low, commonplace hills. Lost! Lost! 
 the illusions of childhood and never to be recalled ! 
 
 The girl urged her horse back along the path she 
 could no longer see, unmindful now whether Sul- 
 phurina stumbled over bowlders that might have 
 been avoided, or plunged knee-deep into leafy drifts 
 of color, nearly flinging her from the saddle. 
 
 She was young, and nobody had ever told her 
 that the only way to keep the past is to turn one s 
 back to it and resolutely face the future. 
 
 "Aren t you riding pretty recklessly?" 
 
 Mary Elizabeth hastily brushed the hot tears from 
 before her vision, and saw, sitting idly on a splendid
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 29 
 
 bay horse as if taking a survey of the scene, the 
 stranger tenant of the haunted house. 
 
 He was regarding her amusedly as Sulphurina 
 stumbled toward him, but a surer look into her face 
 seemed to embarrass him. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," he said courteously, as he 
 made room for her to pass. 
 
 Sulphurina pursued her stubborn way, headed 
 homeward now, and had gone several lengths beyond 
 him when the girl, realizing that she had not an 
 swered the stranger s question, looked back. 
 
 "May I come?" he asked, interpreting her back 
 ward glance, and the next minute he was riding 
 beside her. When he at last got his steed s mettle 
 some gait reined in to suit Sulphurina s plodding, 
 the stranger ventured, but with very apparent dif 
 fidence: 
 
 "Let me tell you something. I m going to rack 
 and ruin here with nothing to do. Now, if you 
 could manage to use me, if you would let me help 
 you in anything that troubled you, you know, it 
 would be a positive charity to me. It really would." 
 
 If he had said anything else under the sun, Mary 
 Elizabeth could have kept her grip, but everybody 
 had failed her this morning, and she dropped the 
 bridle on the horse s neck and covered her face with 
 her hands. 
 
 " Why, child, what is it? Don t, don t cry ! " He 
 laid one hand on Sulphurina s mane to stay her 
 straying steps and leaned forward toward the sob 
 bing girl.
 
 30 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "What is it?" he urged. 
 
 "Oh, nothing, nothing just everything" Mary 
 Elizabeth sobbed. 
 
 "Well, it s a burning shame, that s what it is. 
 The idea of condemning a girl like you to this! 
 And that s philanthropy ! If I had my way I d 
 string up every carping sentimentalist in the 
 bunch." 
 
 "Don t!" she suddenly surprised herself with. 
 "I mustn t let you talk that way. You don t ap 
 preciate you and I don t appreciate what he tried 
 to do!" 
 
 There was a slight surprise in the eyes of the stran 
 ger as he answered: 
 
 "Oh, well, if you say so. But you can t stand 
 this. It s inhuman, besides it isn t practicable, and 
 it isn t safe. The thing for you to do is to go home." 
 
 "I haven t any home." 
 
 "Yes, yes, I remember. But why not get you a 
 job within the limits of civilization?" 
 
 "Because, because, somehow I belong to Mr. Fen- 
 wick, and must do what he says till I can buy myself 
 back from him by paying him what he has spent 
 on me." 
 
 "Now, if you only had some piece of property 
 that would 
 
 The girl looked at him quickly, forgetful of her 
 wet lashes. 
 
 "There s a place here that was my father s," she 
 said. "I have always thought I would sell it and 
 pay Mr. Fenwick and be free of all this. But "
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 31 
 
 "Well, by George, there are possibilities here, do 
 you know! Where is the land? " 
 
 "Over there," and her face lighted with excited 
 expectancy as she pointed over the crest of the hill. 
 
 "Oh, beyond the ridge! Well, I m afraid not," 
 and the interest died out of his voice. He didn t 
 seem to see the look of heartbreak that swept over 
 
 her face at his answer, but, all the same, he took 
 
 . 
 the course that was best calculated to dispel it. 
 
 "Come," he suggested, "let s ride along the sum 
 mit. The scenery is quite pretty in places." If 
 his intention was to divert her, he succeeded flat 
 teringly as they threaded their way along the indis 
 tinct trail, and talked of many things. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth s long experience under the dragon- 
 like chaperonage of a girls boarding-school had but 
 served to heighten her natural curiosity in regard to 
 the proscribed sex, and she enjoyed to the full this 
 first perfectly free intercourse with a being who 
 seemed to take a firmer, more vital, hold than her 
 self on everything, and yet to be able to sympathize 
 with her. Mary Elizabeth decided that she liked 
 men. 
 
 "Look," he suddenly exclaimed, as they came out 
 on a bald knob that commanded a view of the whole 
 narrow valley. 
 
 "Beautiful, isn t it?" she assented. 
 
 "Oh, yes, quite pretty, but see that ridge over 
 yonder? Now follow that line of hills see? They 
 make a perfect cup of this vale of woe of ours; and 
 the only break in the rim at all is there to the left,
 
 32 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 where Deer Creek tumbles out into the world. By 
 George, it s the prettiest proposition I ever got my 
 hands on!" 
 
 The girl turned from the "pretty proposition" to 
 wonder at the change in the man. The quiet self- 
 possession, the almost cold reserve of his wonted 
 manner had vanished. If there had been anything 
 to cause excitement, Mary Elizabeth would have 
 suspected the stranger of some such emotion. His 
 cheek was flushed, his voice enthusiastic, his 
 eyes were shining like a prophet s at the thing he 
 saw. 
 
 Her gaze followed the direction of his powerful 
 outstretched arm again, and she said, wistfully: 
 
 "Yes, and it s so peaceful. They are happy there 
 because they have never been torn from their proper 
 setting. Peace like that ought to go undisturbed 
 forever." 
 
 "Are you talking about these blooming natives?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Well, excuse me! I d like to " he didn t say 
 what. 
 
 Suddenly the scene at the cross-roads store came 
 back to the girl, weighted with portentousness. 
 
 "Mr. Marshall," she broke in, "you gave me a 
 piece of advice the other day. I wonder if you ll 
 take a little from me." 
 
 "You didn t take mine." 
 
 "Why I " 
 
 "Resist the impulse!" he banteringly interrupted. 
 "Now, as a matter of fact, you have walked home
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 33 
 
 from school alone twice since then yesterday and 
 the day before." 
 
 "How do you know?" 
 
 "A friend of yours loafed around the vicinity of 
 the worst part of your route to see that the lone- 
 someness didn t get you." 
 
 A flush of pleasure crept up the girl s pale cheek. 
 This also was a nice characteristic of the proscribed 
 sex this instinct to protect. 
 
 "I didn t know that I had a friend," she said 
 softly. 
 
 "You have, or you haven t, as you yourself elect. 
 If you will take me on my own recommendation, I 
 shall appreciate being allowed to be your friend." 
 He was leaning toward her as he spoke. Mary 
 Elizabeth regarded him with open-eyed, frank specu 
 lation for a moment, then looked to the distant 
 hills for the inspiration of an answer. After some 
 embarrassing minutes, however, she turned to him, 
 still perplexed. 
 
 "I I beg your pardon, but there don t seem to 
 be any standards I can lay hold of," she returned. 
 "You see, I have been in a boarding-school all my 
 life, and, you know, this would be very improper 
 at the seminary." 
 
 "You roomed with the matron, didn t you?" 
 
 The girl s eyes questioned him again, then flashed 
 suddenly. 
 
 "No, I m not sissy, either, if I did room with Miss 
 Belle, and I m perfectly able to do my own thinking, 
 thank you!"
 
 34 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "Why, of course, of course!" He rubbed his 
 hand over his mouth thoughtfully, and veiled his 
 eyes from her indignant glance. Mary Elizabeth 
 had just decided that he was not smiling behind his 
 hand, when he said in a flattering, conciliating tone : 
 
 "If I had remembered the independence of your 
 people, I should have known that you would do 
 your own thinking." 
 
 A red glow spread over her smooth white skin, 
 and the girl said, with pleased, hesitating embar 
 rassment: 
 
 "I m sure it s all right for us to be friends." 
 
 "Thank you!" he said quickly, and she flushed 
 again with pleasure as he uncovered his head. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth suddenly remembered something. 
 "Since we are friends," she urged, "you ll listen to 
 my advice." Then, without any other preface, she 
 told him of the incident she had just witnessed at 
 the store, leaving out not a single detail, and warn 
 ing him against incurring the ill-will of the natives. 
 The man listened in grave, attentive silence, and 
 thanked her very genuinely, when she had finished. 
 
 "Who is that man?" she queried. 
 
 "Why, in real life he s my chauffeur. I brought 
 him here as man-of-all-work, but I seem to have 
 made a mistake." 
 
 "You certainly have, and the sooner you get rid 
 of him, the better it will be." 
 
 "He has already served notice on me that he s 
 going to leave to-morrow, and I shan t try to de 
 tain him."
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 35 
 
 "You ll miss him, won t you?" 
 
 "Yes, he s a fair cook, but I ve lived on light- 
 bread and ants before." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth was suddenly impelled to ask a 
 strangely frank question: 
 
 "You, yourself you are friendly to them, aren t 
 you?" 
 
 The girl shrank inwardly as he stripped the bright 
 leaves from a sumac bough with a sudden cut of his 
 riding- whip. 
 
 "I don t care that for them!" he said. "Say, 
 let s go to the falls, will you? There s a short cut 
 through here." 
 
 But the girl laid a quick hand on his bridle. 
 
 "No, no," she said with concern, "not that way; 
 that s the graveyard, and we d be sure to trample 
 some of the graves." 
 
 "And would that be bad luck ?" He smiled 
 teasingly. 
 
 "No, it would be desecration," she said. He 
 turned his horse s head and followed her down a 
 path of her own choosing. 
 
 At the crossing of another bridle-path they came 
 suddenly face to face with a rusty-looking native, 
 mounted on a "flea-bit" mule. It was Babe Davis. 
 Mary Elizabeth gave him a friendly greeting, but 
 he hardly murmured a response as he took the flank 
 ing bushes to let them pass. 
 
 "Your friend didn t seem very glad to see you," 
 remarked her companion, after they had passed. 
 "Look yonder. He has stopped stock-still to gaze
 
 36 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 after you!" But Mary Elizabeth didn t look, and 
 after a little, Babe Davis and the incident were far 
 behind them. 
 
 At the falls they dismounted, and John Marshall 
 tethered their horses to the bushes and began to 
 blaze their way to the best coign of vantage. Mary 
 Elizabeth found a strange new delight in his mas 
 culine attitude of eagerness to serve. It was fun 
 climbing down the cliff, supported at one moment 
 and lifted bodily down at the next, and arriving on 
 the table-rock fresh and unscratched, while this 
 creature who took everything on himself showed the 
 stain and strain of the double toil but actually seemed 
 to enjoy it. 
 
 "Don t you wish you were a girl?" she asked, 
 when he had safely landed her. 
 
 " Good Lord, no/" 
 
 He held her while she leaned far over the ledge 
 for a view of the falls. Directly beneath her gaze 
 the billowy white veil made a sheer drop of fifty 
 feet and seethed and boiled in the lake below. 
 
 "Oh, it s beautiful awful!" she exclaimed, re 
 treating. 
 
 "Twenty thousand horse-power at least." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth looked at him wonderingly, but 
 he failed to see the questioning surprise with which 
 she regarded him. He was leaning over the cataract 
 now, gazing down the ever-falling flood, and his eyes 
 were narrow and intent. After a little he turned 
 to her: 
 
 "Look there," he exclaimed, taking in with a
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 37 
 
 sweeping gesture the narrow chasm; "this is the 
 only break in the hill-line, and it could be dammed 
 for a song." 
 
 "Don t you admire beauty?" 
 
 He turned from contemplation of their surround 
 ings and swept her with a glance from her crown 
 of wind-blown curls to the bows on her shoes, and 
 back again to the level of her proud, shrinking 
 glance. 
 
 "Exceedingly!" he said with emphasis. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth all at once had a feeling that his 
 eyes were less courteous than the rest of him, and 
 she concluded she had been a little hasty in her de 
 cision about liking men. For the first time during 
 their interview, the girl realized that she was alone 
 in the woods with a perfectly strange man. With 
 a sudden accession of dignity she inquired the time. 
 ... It was one o clock an hour after Aunt Millie s 
 dinner time ! Mary Elizabeth paled. 
 
 "I must go home at once," she exclaimed. "Oh, 
 what made me do this! She ll be furious." 
 
 They made a hasty return to their horses, and 
 took the shortest way home. The stranger was so 
 attentive on the way, and so confessedly repentant 
 for having laid her liable to a berating from Aunt 
 Millie, that they were quite sympathetic friends be 
 fore the journey ended. As they came out into the 
 "big road," he said in the tone of one who is con 
 veying pleasant news: 
 
 "I m coming to visit the school soon." 
 
 "Oh, no you are not!" she protested. "I I
 
 38 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 mean please don t, I d be so embarrassed I don t 
 know how to teach." 
 
 "Then you need supervising." 
 
 "I don t care if I do. You shan t come, you 
 hear?" 
 
 "It s a public school." 
 
 "I know it is but " 
 
 "Well, I m one of the public." 
 
 "I don t care if you are, you haven t any children 
 to send to school." 
 
 "How do you know I haven t?" 
 
 Mary Elizabeth was left with her mouth open, 
 and the stranger was looking at her with a perfectly 
 grave face. An opportune bend in the road dis 
 closed the Davis cabin in the dim distance, and 
 Mary Elizabeth reined in her horse. 
 
 "Do you know," she said deprecatingly, "I be 
 lieve I d rather you wouldn t come any farther 
 these people are so so " 
 
 "The world we have always with us? Not here, 
 surely but if you d rather I wouldn t " His eyes 
 were frankly amused as he held his hat in his hand 
 and reined his horse back for her to pass; then he 
 turned rein and took a bridle-path that led sharply 
 to the left. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth and Sulphurina followed the main 
 woodland road with a stolid deliberateness, but 
 hardly a hundred or so yards had been accom 
 plished by the mare when her rider suddenly jerked 
 her back almost to her haunches. Something was 
 running through the underbrush!
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 39 
 
 Any horse in the world but Sulphurina would have 
 shied at this juncture, for the sharp crack of a 
 nearby rifle suddenly split the air, and the next 
 minute some half-dozen young men leaped, scram 
 bled, or fell over the rail fence that bounded one of 
 the flanking stretches of woodland, dragging what 
 Mary Elizabeth vaguely guessed to be instruments 
 for surveying. 
 
 " Over the fence is out !" laughed one of them. 
 "Gee, but I ll not give him another crack at me!" 
 
 " Duck! He s loading again!" exclaimed one of 
 them excitedly, and before the astonished girl could 
 realize what had happened, the whole party had 
 scurried across the road right in front of her, pitched 
 over the opposite fence, and lost themselves in an 
 overgrown ravine immediately beyond. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth startled Sulphurina into a hard 
 trot with a shower of cuts from her switch, for, from 
 out the bushes some distance up the opposing slope, 
 had looked the sinister face of Trav Williams.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 ON the Monday afternoon following her visit to 
 the store Mary Elizabeth took occasion to walk 
 home from school with the Thaggin children to see 
 what could be done toward getting parental co-op 
 eration in her struggles to control and teach them. 
 There were five of them, muddy-faced, but stub 
 bornly independent young souls withal. Mary Eliz 
 abeth, clear-faced, but stubborn and independent 
 in much the same degree, walked with them now, 
 and wondered if she could hope for help from the 
 mother of such a brood. 
 
 The girl was too young to see that the qualities 
 of character which made these children hard to con 
 quer were the very qualities which made her, the 
 teacher, determined to rule her little kingdom. She 
 was too inexperienced to realize that this spirit of 
 independence, so universally characteristic of the 
 hill type and, in these youngsters, so aggressively 
 insistent for positive expression, was the trait that, 
 within herself, willingly sacrificed the outward sem 
 blance of freedom to its substantial, ultimate tri 
 umph. 
 
 In order to win back her independence, she must 
 repay her benefactor, must "be even with him"; 
 and in spite of her wild, rebel heart, a higher some 
 thing within moved her to accede to his terms, if 
 
 40
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 41 
 
 with a grim submissiveness. She would not only 
 stay here until she had paid back every dollar that 
 she owed him, but she would do well the work to 
 which he had condemned her. And again there 
 stirred within her memory of him that indefinable 
 something that was strangely akin to pain. Then, 
 thanks to a drifting wood scent, the scene changed: 
 She was being lifted down to the table-rock again, 
 and the arms that held her were strong and reassur 
 ing. If there had been anything in that woodland 
 interview which had been unwelcome at the time, 
 that drifting scent of sweetgum failed to conjure it 
 up with the rest, and only the charm of the episode 
 remained. 
 
 But it had had its sequel, and the sequel didn t 
 turn out happily. Not even her sensitive imagina 
 tion had adequately pictured Aunt Millie s wrath 
 at her over-late home-coming. She had hoped des 
 perately that the old woman would not find out 
 where she had spent the morning, but hope had be 
 trayed her. Babe had asked at the supper table 
 whom it was she was riding to the falls with that 
 noon, and she had been forced to answer with the 
 name of the distrusted stranger. The girl turned 
 cold now as she recalled the effect of her words. 
 Bud had deliberately laid down the knife with which 
 he had been shovelling in his food and looked at her 
 so long and so searchingly that she had risen pre 
 cipitately and taken refuge in her own room where 
 only the tones of Aunt Millie s high-pitched, angry 
 voice could follow.
 
 42 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Suddenly the children opened full cry at sight of 
 home, and Mary Elizabeth came out of her bitter 
 reminiscences, back to the more cheerful present. 
 
 Judged by outward appearances, the Thaggin 
 home was a pleasant enough place to visit. They 
 had arrived at the bars now, and the children were 
 lowering them for the teacher to pass in. What 
 would have been a lawn of blue-grass in another stage 
 of civilization, was here a stretch of ripened corn and 
 pumpkins and cow-peas, but the prospect was not 
 unpleasing. 
 
 The promise of plenty lent a certain homely beauty 
 of its own to the surroundings, and a fresh coat of 
 whitewash on the big double log cabin differen 
 tiated it from the typical dwelling of those parts 
 and made it stand out in almost manorial dignity. 
 
 If the girl had been the Pied Piper of Hamelin, 
 she might have been prepared for the sudden irrup 
 tion of tow-headed youngsters which broke out all 
 over the place in celebration of her advent; but as 
 it was, she was fairly taken aback as some seven or 
 eight she had never before laid eyes on appeared on 
 the scene, calling variously to each other: 
 
 "Run here, Ginny, run!" 
 
 "Here s de teacher!" 
 
 "That s her, see her?" 
 
 In the tone of one calling off the dogs, a woman s 
 voice silenced the bedlam, and the next minute a 
 large, gingham-clad, uncorseted woman filled the 
 door-way. 
 
 "Come in, miss, come in," she said cordially.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 43 
 
 "You uns is the teacher, ain t you? Wa-al, I m 
 Mis Thaggin." 
 
 " Yes, I m Miss Dale, but I want to see Mrs. Thag 
 gin, please. May I?" 
 
 "That s me. I m her." Whereon Mary Eliza 
 beth was fain to accept the fact that the ample lady 
 before her was the mother of this large and enter 
 prising family of children, and not the virgin soul 
 her mispronunciation of her own title would seem 
 to indicate. Mary Elizabeth recalled the stupid, 
 ineffectual creature she had seen seated on Uncle 
 Beck s molasses barrel, and wondered and shud 
 dered that such a man should be the father of 
 children. 
 
 The room into which she was ushered was freshly 
 whitewashed inside, and the rough board floor was 
 clean. The two ample bedsteads, in opposite cor 
 ners, were provided with immense feather mat 
 tresses which had been beaten to a stiff froth, and 
 which now bellied out under flaming bed-quilts of 
 the basket and rising-sun patterns. From the pil 
 lows "Good-night" and "Good-morning" greeted 
 the visitor in tones of turkey-red. 
 
 A hollow cough from the chimney-side insinuated 
 a discord into the healthful harmony, and Mary 
 Elizabeth s attention was attracted to a slight wraith 
 of a woman who lay back limply in a homespun- 
 covered barrel chair, but who kept a pair of pierc 
 ingly bright eyes fixed inquiringly on her. 
 
 "That s Shan s ma; she s got the consumption," 
 said the one who had invited her in; and as the 
 girl went over to the sick woman and extended her
 
 44 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 hand kindly, the hostess added: "Ma, this is the 
 chillun s teacher." 
 
 Instantly the old face hardened. "Who? Her 
 that was ?" 
 
 "Hush, ma! What you want to be rakin up old 
 trouble for? " She shut up the old woman as effect 
 ually as if she had slapped her in the mouth, and 
 proceeded to dust with her apron a chair for the 
 visitor, while she asked: "How you an the chillun 
 gittin on?" 
 
 It was the cue Mary Elizabeth wanted, and with 
 only a fleeting wonder at the sick woman s porten 
 tous, if half-expressed, question, she turned to the 
 other. It was no easy matter to perform the mission 
 on which she had come, but it was one way of keep 
 ing faith with the grave-eyed memory that was now 
 almost ever-present with her, and Mary Elizabeth 
 went straight to the duty she saw before her. She 
 delivered a round, unvarnished tale of the various 
 shortcomings of the various young Thaggins, and 
 then outlined her hopes for them and her need of 
 parental help. 
 
 The mother of the children felt the sincerity of 
 the story and followed it with a mother s apprehen 
 sions and a mother s hopes. 
 
 "I want em to do right, Miss Dale," she said 
 when Mary Elizabeth had finished. "I can t make 
 out what makes em so pesky whether hit s jes 
 nach 1-born meanness or worms, but I ll wear em 
 all to a frazzle to-night an give em a copperas pill 
 apiece, an " 
 
 "They re very good chillun, considerin 1 " The
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 45 
 
 old woman stopped, but whether in apprehension of 
 another extinguishing "hush," or whether she had 
 finished her sentence, Mary Elizabeth was left to 
 guess. 
 
 "You, Tony! what you doin to that thar cat?" 
 the mother suddenly interjected as a feline screech 
 came from the back porch. 
 
 "I m turnin her a-loose, ma!" 
 
 "Wa-al, stop it this minute!" she bawled, from 
 sheer force of habit. In looking away to hide a 
 smile, Mary Elizabeth glanced out of the window to 
 where a bright-faced girl was ploughing a nearby patch. 
 
 "Who is that pretty girl out yonder?" she queried, 
 turning quickly to Mrs. Thaggin. 
 
 "That s my Sue, ma am. She s the oldes an 
 likelies one o the lot." 
 
 The teacher was interested at once. " Why don t 
 you send her to school, Mrs. Thaggin?" 
 
 "Why, she s been to school." 
 
 "When?" 
 
 "Sue went six weeks this summer. That was 
 before you come." 
 
 "Oh, yes, but six weeks is only a beginning. She 
 needs more." 
 
 "Sue s a very smart gal, considerinV This time 
 there was a plain period after the "considerin ." 
 
 But the younger woman was again speaking: 
 
 "Why, I couldn t spare Sue in the fall, ma am; 
 she s the best field-hand on the place. That s the 
 trouble bout this new-fangled law, miss. As long as 
 we had jes a six- weeks school in summer hit didn t
 
 46 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 pester nobody, an we didn t mind lettin the chil- 
 lun go. But seven months a-settin round in a 
 school-house doin nothin is jes ruination." 
 
 "A-1 arnin that the world turns round ever day, 
 an that thar lot gate a-facin the north for forty 
 year !" 
 
 "Hush, ma, now who said anything about the lot 
 gate? You air the beat nes " but such a violent 
 fit of coughing from the invalid set in, that the 
 daughter-in-law was fain to leave her arraignment 
 unfinished. 
 
 "What do you do for her?" asked the teacher, in 
 genuine sympathy. 
 
 "Nothin , miss; they ain t nothin to do for her. 
 She s jes perishin away. Shan throwed away a lot 
 o money buyin physic till the doctor told him she 
 couldn t git well; an then he seen hit were a pure 
 waste an stopped hit." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth caught her breath at the primi 
 tive, brutal philosophy, but she forced her voice to 
 be even as she asked: 
 
 "Yes, but doesn t it relieve her suffering some?" 
 
 "Hit sho do, miss," from the invalid "Dr. 
 Beach s Consumption Kyore." 
 
 "Hush, ma, hit didn t do nothin but make your 
 coughin easier! Shan ain t got money to burn." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth got up deliberately and walked 
 to the mantel-shelf. From among countless small 
 tools, out-of-date calendars, medicine phials, and 
 the like, she singled out an empty bottle labeled, 
 "Dr. Beach s Consumption Cure."
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 47 
 
 "Is this what helps you?" she asked directly of 
 the invalid. The old creature was coughing again, 
 but there was a ray of hope in her submerged black 
 eyes and she nodded affirmatively though her frame 
 shook. "I ll take this with me for the name, and 
 get you some more," said the girl, gently. 
 
 "La, miss " the younger woman was objecting 
 querulously, when she was suddenly quieted with: 
 
 "For God s sake let her!" The next moment the 
 hungry black eyes were searching the girl s face 
 again, distrustful, yet hoping desperately, too. 
 
 "Hit do be ra-al generous of you, miss " 
 
 A chord deep down in the girl s nature somewhere 
 snapped. "It is not I who am generous," she said. 
 "A man a very good man way off from here 
 will pay for it; he has already paid." She said 
 good-by hastily, and would have hurried on her 
 journey, but the younger Mrs. Thaggin followed 
 her out, ostensibly to let down the bars, but really 
 to get in a little more chat before letting the visitor 
 escape her. 
 
 "Have you uns heerd any talk over to Mis 
 Davis s about that thar strange young man what s 
 took up at the ha nted house?" she queried. 
 
 "Why, yes, some," replied the girl while her pulse 
 quickened; "but they don t seem to know anything 
 about him, for certain." 
 
 "No, an nobody don t; but Shan lowed they 
 was gittin onto him, he thought. Do you know," 
 and she lowered her voice to the tone of confidence, 
 "the men hereabouts thinks he s a counterfeiter!"
 
 48 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Mary Elizabeth s heart gave a great bound and 
 then stood still a moment, till the other added 
 "Yes, ma am, Shan heerd him with his own years 
 a-tellin that man of his n that he could coin money 
 here hand-over-fist." 
 
 The life swept back into the girl s face, and she 
 opened her lips to say that she knew the man and 
 that he was all right, when her fatal honesty stopped 
 her. In point of fact, she did not know anything 
 about him. Then a curious, sickening doubt of him 
 insinuated itself into her consciousness, and to es 
 cape the pain of it, she said irrelevantly: 
 
 "There are only about a half-dozen families living 
 here, aren t there?" 
 
 "Yes, miss, hit ain t what hit uster be. Onct 
 nearly the whole valley were took up with farms; 
 but lately in the last ten year or so most of the 
 neighbors here have sold out to strangers." 
 
 "Well, if the strangers make good neighbors " 
 
 "They haven t none of em showed up in these 
 parts at all after buyin , miss. None but that one 
 at Silas s. An ef they re all like him, hit s the Lord s 
 mercy they don t come." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth turned to go, but she hesitated 
 a moment, and then came back a step or two. 
 "Mrs. Thaggin," she said, "I m going to come 
 around again and talk to you about Sue, may I?" 
 The misty evening took on a grave and thought 
 ful look. 
 
 "Why, yes, miss, come whenever you kin," re 
 plied her hostess, hospitably.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 WHILE Mary Elizabeth and the wife of Shan 
 Thaggin talked together about the stranger in the 
 graying afternoon, the subject of their conversation 
 dismounted from his horse at the cross-roads store, 
 and, hunting-dog at heel, entered its hospitable 
 portal. 
 
 The place was quiet, almost deserted, for Mon 
 day afternoon was no time for farmers to loaf. The 
 stable-boy clerk was fulfilling the first of his offices 
 out in the tin-can district at the back of the store. 
 Only Uncle Beck remained to tell the story, and he 
 was plainly nodding over the latest edition of " Hos- 
 tetter s Almanac." 
 
 When John Marshall and his magnificent pointer 
 came in out of the crisping evening to share the 
 warmth of the little rusty stove, mine host at once 
 roused himself to the duties of his position. The 
 proffer of the surest-legged chair, a vigorous punch 
 ing down of ashes, and the right of way through a 
 large plug of tobacco at once showed that he was 
 thoroughly awake and on his job. 
 
 Both chair and tobacco were declined, however, 
 and the stranger stood leisurely by the counter while 
 he traded for some half-dozen articles in which he 
 evinced strangely little interest. Nevertheless, he 
 talked pleasantly enough about the weather, the 
 prospects for a cold winter, and about the neighbor- 
 
 49
 
 50 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 hood in general, saying some kindly things about 
 some of the people whom he had met here. It 
 seemed perfectly natural, after his desultory buying 
 was finished, that he and Uncle Beck should pull 
 up chairs to the glowing stove and drift into a little 
 neighborly gossip. 
 
 "A lot of waste land about here," the stranger 
 ventured, after he had duly asked about the con 
 dition of the store-keeper s crops; "I wonder you 
 don t get rid of some of it." 
 
 "Wa-al, land ain t apt to run off nowhar, an hit 
 don t git in nobody s way, so to speak," answered 
 the native. 
 
 "Yes, but money is right handy sometimes," 
 replied the stranger, "and maybe a little more of 
 that and a little less land would be right good for 
 some of you. Now I, for instance-," and he drew 
 his chair a trifle nearer that of his listener, "I, for 
 instance, happen to have a little more money than 
 I have any immediate use for, and to be really in 
 need of some good mountain land. I would take it 
 as a neighborly act if you would help me get some 
 good acreage here for a fair price. Do you happen 
 to know of any for sale, or any that the owner might 
 be induced to sell if a fair offer were made for it? " 
 
 "You can have anything I got, for the money." 
 
 "This building, for instance?" 
 
 "Wa-al, no. This here store ra-ally belongs to 
 Trav Williams. I m jes rentin from him. But 
 I ve got a farm over the ridge thar what s the best 
 corn land on the mountains "
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 51 
 
 I 
 
 " Over the ridge ? " quoted the stranger. Well, 
 I m more taken with the property here in the val 
 ley. I don t believe I care for that that lies out 
 side." 
 
 "Wa-al, that place what you air livin on " 
 
 "Yes?" said the stranger, and he leaned forward 
 slightly. 
 
 "Oh nothin nothin ," the old man replied, as 
 if he had suddenly changed his mind about something, 
 and he addressed himself to punching down the 
 ashes again. 
 
 "What about it?" the stranger s even voice in 
 sisted. 
 
 "Why, the owner ain t thinkin o sellin it. Be 
 sides, nothin good ain t never comin outen that 
 place." 
 
 For some reason the native did not follow the 
 subject further, and a few moments of silence en 
 sued between the two; then Uncle Beck said, ques- 
 tioningly: 
 
 "You seem to be doin your own tradin these days. 
 Your man with the swell red tie ain t been in to see 
 us of late." 
 
 "No," replied the other, "he was a quarrelsome 
 fellow and I didn t like his attitude toward my neigh 
 bors here, so I let him go. But how did you know 
 he was my man?" 
 
 "I seen him with him several times," he nodded 
 toward the pointer which had approached and now 
 stood looking worshipfully up into his master s eyes. 
 
 "Yes, I didn t like the association," the visitor
 
 52 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 said, whimsically, as he gently pulled the long brown 
 ears of the pointer. "Lightfoot is a gentleman," 
 he continued, patting the subject of his encomium 
 on the head, " and I don t like him to have any such 
 companions." 
 
 "You call him Lightfoot ?" 
 
 "You just ought to see him at work!" 
 
 "He s got fine eyes, stranger." 
 
 "Yes, yes, he has that! A friend of mine painted 
 him." 
 
 "Wa-al, by gum! What did you let him do him 
 that a-way for? The man ain t livin what could 
 play a mean trick on my Sloucher, an he s jes one 
 o these cur dogs at that." 
 
 "Oh, I mean he painted a picture to look like him. 
 No, indeed, the man that interferes with Lightfoot 
 will have two of us to lick, won t he, boy?" The 
 splendid creature seemed to understand and to agree 
 to the compact, for he pushed yet closer and laid 
 his head on his master s knee. 
 
 "I like to see a fellow that can look you in the eye 
 like this " the stranger spoke reflectively as if he 
 were thinking beyond his hearer. "That picture- 
 painting fellow says that there is bound to be some 
 thing wonderfully good in store for Lightfoot in his 
 next existence that there will have to be made up 
 to him then what his limitations have denied him 
 in this." 
 
 "Stranger, that sounds like Ma y Lizbeth." 
 
 "May who? Oh, you mean the little teacher 
 yes what about her?"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 53 
 
 "Why, Ma y Lizbeth she s got that notion bout 
 things bein made up to us, proned into her good 
 and strong. Hit wan t two days ago that she got 
 ra-al worked up a-talkin to me bout Jake Wind- 
 ham s peg-leg an a-sayin that when we was denied 
 blessin s here, we d git jes that much more after we 
 was dead an gone." The stranger was looking di 
 rectly at him as he spoke "An I up an told her," 
 continued the store-keeper, enjoying his new audi 
 ence, " that I didn t in no wise b lieve what she was 
 a-tellin me. Wa-al, at that she got kinder hurtlike, 
 an said she wouldn t a b lieved hit o me for all 
 the world like I had been stealin hogs! An she up 
 an ast me ef I didn t b lieve we was goin to have 
 our blessin s multiplied in heaven." The narrator 
 took his own time in the telling and chuckled de 
 liberately as he progressed. " An then I explained 
 to her that I didn t see how Jake could find a use 
 for three legs, even in heaven but Lord, stranger, 
 Ma y Lizbeth couldn t see a joke with one o them 
 surveyin spy-glasses." He was tilted back in his 
 chair laughing quizzically at his own wit and heartily 
 enjoying having the stranger laugh with him. The 
 mutual appreciation of the little touch of humor 
 swept away the cloud of constraint and reserve that 
 had hitherto hovered between them and the two 
 men suddenly found themselves on a new footing. 
 
 "We mustn t expect too much of women," said 
 the stranger after his hearty laugh had subsided. 
 Then he continued, as if a new thought had struck 
 him: "Speaking of surveyors, Mr. Logan, it seems
 
 54 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 that you people out here don t like them. I heard 
 that this man, Williams, chased a party of them off 
 his land with a gun the other day." 
 
 "That s the word that s been goin about, stran 
 ger, an I wouldn t be surprised ef hit was true. 
 Trav ain t the man to take nothin off n nobody, 
 you know." 
 
 "But you see," broke in the other, "it is a sort 
 of unwritten law of progress that surveyors may go 
 on any man s land." 
 
 "Hit may be a law of progress, mister, but hit 
 ain t Trav s law; an " here he gave a shrewd look 
 at the other under his heavy brows "an ef you 
 happen to have any interest in them surveyors 
 say friendly interest, bein all strangers here alike 
 I d advise em agin another move in that direc 
 tion. You kin even tell em that a certain simple- 
 minded old store-keeper says that hit don t make so 
 much diff rence bout breakin laws of progress an 
 even state laws in these parts, but hit wouldn t be 
 healthy for em to disregard none o Trav Williams s 
 rules an regulations." 
 
 "But will your public opinion support any such 
 dogged narrowness as that?" He either did not 
 catch or purposely disregarded the other s covert 
 suggestion. 
 
 "We uns air all hill-Billies together, stranger." 
 
 " But don t your people want development? Don t 
 they want railroads to come into this section, and 
 towns to be built here? Don t they want to see 
 factories put up ?"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 55 
 
 "Wa-al, I ain t heerd none of em expressin no 
 sich wants, stranger. Some of us wouldn t know 
 what to do with a town ef we had one, an as for 
 railroads why even a peg-leg will take a hill-Billy 
 as far from home as he s got any business a-goin ; 
 leastways, that s the way most of em looks at it." 
 
 "Well, you wouldn t mind telling me how you 
 happen to know that they feel this way, would you? " 
 
 "Change your mind an take a chaw, mister 
 you won t? Wa-al, ever man to his likens that s 
 our creed here. Now as to how I know, stranger, 
 I wasn t caught outen the woods for nothin , you 
 know. Sixty-nine year is a long enough time to 
 git one notion sot in your head, you see. Besides 
 that, I ve seen em tried. Thar ve been strangers 
 here before your time, mister, astin these self-same 
 questions. Thar ve been other men a-lookin for 
 much-needed lands valley lands preferred an 
 they, too, had more money than was quite comfort 
 able to keep." 
 
 "And your people went up outrageously on the 
 price of their lands, and then refused to sell. Didn t 
 they?" 
 
 "Why, who s been a-tellin you?" 
 
 "Nobody, but I ve traded for lands in hill dis 
 tricts myself." 
 
 "Oh, you have? Wa-al, you ain t quite right 
 bout this little siterwation here. A lot of our people 
 did sell some years ago, and moved over in Walker. 
 We heerd a lot o talk then bout how prosp rous this 
 region was a-goin to be ef we would all only give
 
 56 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 up an move off n the face o creation. Wa-al, some 
 of us wouldn t move. We thought that ef thar was 
 a good thing a-comin this way we d like to be on the 
 spot to welcome hit. That was nearly ten year ago, 
 stranger, an prosperity ain t showed up in these 
 diggin s yit. A lot o our neighbors air gone, but 
 their lands haven t never been in noways improved, 
 an the pine thickets air takin the valley, except 
 for the few spots that a half-dozen of us helt onto 
 agin the comin o progress." 
 
 The stranger seemed politely attentive, so he con 
 tinued: "Hit might interest you to know that I ve 
 had three offers for this property of Trav s here in the 
 last five year, an ever time money was no consid 
 eration. Ever time, too" here he looked directly 
 into the unflinching eyes of the stranger "I ve 
 offered to sell em my own place jest over the ridge 
 thar, an ever time hit didn t seem to exactly suit." 
 
 "Well, it might interest you to know, Mr. Logan, 
 that your experience with your property about here 
 isn t at all unusual at this day and time. There is 
 a wave of progress sweeping over Alabama that is 
 reaching to the most remote portions of it, and your 
 people need not suspect anything sinister just be 
 cause they are beginning to feel the influence of the 
 general industrial upheaval." At that moment a 
 booted and spurred mountaineer came rattling in 
 for some farm supplies, and the stranger rose to go. 
 "I should like to talk further with you about this 
 matter, some time, Mr. Logan," he said, holding out 
 his hand in a winningly friendly manner. "And,
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 57 
 
 say, if the little school-teacher holds out in her de 
 termination to give Windham an extra underpinning 
 in the next world, I believe I wouldn t interfere. 
 You have to humor women and children, you know." 
 The flattering reference to his pet joke, and the warm 
 handshake, brought out the invitation from the 
 store-keeper: 
 
 " Drap aroun to see me agin, Mr. Marshall. I like 
 to talk to you, sir, I like to talk to you."
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 IT was afternoon recess time of the next day, and 
 Mary Elizabeth had been called down to the school 
 spring to avert a tragedy "Billy Williams was going 
 to kill the spring lizard," was the exciting message 
 brought her. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth knew the terrible portent of such 
 a deed, for her own childhood was not too remote 
 for her to remember that in each spring there dwells 
 a sort of aquatic genius in the shape of a two-legged 
 lizard, to kill which were to cause the drying up of 
 the spring itself. 
 
 The young teacher reached the damp, shady dell 
 in time to save the patron lizard and the permanent 
 flow of the water. She was wise enough not to 
 smile, however, as she stopped the threatened van 
 dalism and dispersed the quarrelling children who, 
 shortly called away by another attraction, soon left 
 her to herself in the cool shadows. 
 
 After a minute or two she began to be glad that 
 she had come. Half of the recess time was yet un 
 spent, and this looked like an ideal place in which 
 to regain a composure that had suffered a most 
 unusual impairment that morning. 
 
 She had just preempted a good resting-place on a 
 big flat lime rock, however, when the soothing quiet 
 was broken in upon by the sound of heavy steps. 
 Sure that the ominous tread on the path behind her 
 
 58
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 59 
 
 was that of a detested visitor who had been at the 
 school all morning, the girl looked steadily in front 
 of her till some one actually sat down beside her, and 
 said, in a voice that she had come to listen for: 
 
 "A penny for your thoughts." 
 
 John Marshall was treated to a rare smile that 
 vanished almost as quickly as it came, and the girl 
 answered: 
 
 "I was thinking how much I should like to kill 
 the county superintendent of education." 
 
 " My ! But what a little savage it is ! " Her hand 
 was resting on the rock beside her, and he laid his 
 own down upon it. A swift, startled look from the 
 girl met an innocent, unsuspecting expression in his 
 eyes. Mary Elizabeth s own glance floundered 
 clearly he didn t realize his mistake, and she hated 
 to call his attention to it. His thoughts were so far 
 away, however, that it became plain she would have 
 to, so she drew her hand away while a red glow 
 mounted her pale cheek. "You you didn t no 
 tice." 
 
 "Was that your hand?" 
 
 "Yes, you a inadvertently " 
 
 "Oh, I beg ten thousand pardons. I m such an 
 absent-minded idiot! Won t you forgive me?" 
 
 Mary Elizabeth accepted his apologetic explana 
 tion with a sweet dignity, and soon they were talk 
 ing of other things. 
 
 "You want to kill the county superintendent of 
 education," he reminded her; "wouldn t you better 
 let me do it for you?"
 
 60 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "No, indeed! I want the exquisite pleasure my 
 self." 
 
 "All of which is perfectly natural, considering the 
 enormity of his offence by the way, what is his 
 offence?" 
 
 "He s visiting the school to-day." 
 
 "Capital!" 
 
 Mary Elizabeth looked at him with half-suspi 
 cion, and then continued : "He s a big, puffed-up igno 
 ramus that rides around the country pretending to 
 superintend the county schools when he hardly 
 knows how to read and write. He has criticised 
 every single thing I have done to-day" her lis 
 tener s countenance took on a genuine sympathy, 
 and the girl continued "I had a copy of the Sistine 
 Madonna and several illuminated mottoes on the 
 wall, and he took them all down and said I was 
 teaching the children to worship idols. When I 
 asked him to use his influence toward getting the 
 trustees to have the cracks in the wall stopped and 
 glass put hi the window so that the cold wind 
 wouldn t come through, he said I was pampering 
 the children." 
 
 The sound of a vigorously rung bell brought the 
 girl to her feet instantly. "There!" she exclaimed, 
 "recess is over, and Tony is ringing the bell." She 
 bade the stranger a quick good-by and hurried up 
 the path to the school-house only to find, on her ar 
 rival at the door, that he had followed close behind. 
 
 "I came to hold him for you while you killed 
 him," he explained.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 61 
 
 The children had crowded into the school-room 
 and were noisily disposing themselves on the rough 
 pine benches. 
 
 "Where s the victim?" inquired Marshall, putting 
 his head in the door and looking about vainly for 
 something that would answer to the description 
 given him by the indignant little teacher. 
 
 "Yonder he comes now," she said. 
 
 Marshall turned. A greasy, rusty, but pompous- 
 looking individual was approaching with as much 
 dignity as excessive rotundity would allow. 
 
 As Mary Elizabeth presented the school official 
 to the immaculately dressed stranger a look which 
 plainly spelled mortification clouded her earnest 
 eyes. 
 
 "Never mind," whispered the stranger, as the 
 two dropped respectfully behind the county super 
 intendent and entered the school-house in his wake, 
 "as a corpse he ll scrub up nicely." 
 
 The girl took her stand behind the pine table that 
 answered as teacher s desk, and tremblingly brought 
 the room to order. 
 
 The superintendent had ensconced himself in the 
 only chair in the room, so Marshall found himself a 
 place on the end of a little side bench near the teach 
 er s desk. From this coign of vantage his drag-net 
 glance swept the scene and gathered in even the 
 smallest details. It was a big room, the cracks be 
 tween the logs of which had never been thoroughly 
 chinked. The floor was rough and uneven, and rot 
 ting away in places. The one window was a sawed-
 
 62 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 out place in the logs, unglazed and with only a rough 
 board blind to shut out the blasts of winter. The 
 only arrangement for heating the room was a huge 
 black fireplace in a mud chimney at the far end. 
 There were no desks, and the children sat side by 
 side on rough pine benches. Marshall counted 
 them twenty-seven gaunt, blue-legged chickens of 
 the human breed they were but they were unin 
 teresting, so he turned his wandering gaze to the 
 teacher agaiil. 
 
 By this time the girl had herself and her charges 
 in hand. The majority of the children were put 
 to studying, and a class was called. It was the first 
 class in geography the first, last, and only class 
 in geography. Mary Elizabeth s spirits rose. The 
 lesson consisted of map questions, and both teacher 
 and pupils were especially good on map questions. 
 The subject was South America, but that didn t spell 
 anything. The submerged Atlantis or the Kingdom 
 of Heaven would have done just as well as long as 
 the questions were there in black and white and the 
 answering map was clear and definite in outline 
 and unencumbered by any complicating suggestions 
 of the real thing. 
 
 There was "head and foot" to the class. Accord 
 ing to custom, the teacher propounded a few ques 
 tions in review of the previous week s work before be 
 ginning the lesson of the day. Five of these were 
 eagerly picked off by the most pushing, the last one 
 of whom had duly nominated Washington as the cap 
 ital of the United States, when there really wasn t
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 63 
 
 any help for it, if a teacher wanted to be honest 
 Tony Thaggin s time came. 
 
 "And where is Washington, Tony?" Surely he 
 couldn t miss it! 
 
 "Dead," Tony answered, and there was a finality 
 in his tone that plainly indicated he didn t intend 
 to pursue his subject any further. 
 
 There was a dazed look in the boy s eyes as the 
 next chap below disputed his statement, claiming 
 that Washington was still cumbering the ground to 
 the extent of a goodly number of square miles some 
 where between Maryland and Virginia. Tony went 
 down sullenly. He was next to foot again. If he 
 heard his teacher s rather impatient explanation, 
 he appeared not to comprehend it. 
 
 The county superintendent seemed to see an op 
 portunity here, and broke in with a long-winded dis 
 quisition on Washington that seemed to pivot on cer 
 tain annual packages of seeds from the Department 
 of Agriculture. Mary Elizabeth and the stranger 
 looked at each other. There was desperation in the 
 eyes of one, and cynical amusement in the laugh 
 ing glance that answered. When the superintendent 
 had delivered himself of a climacteric burst of patriot 
 ism, Mary Elizabeth took up the map questions on 
 South America, and all went well until the foot of the 
 class was neared again. 
 
 "Tony, what cape is at the southern extremity 
 of South America?" The poor, sympathetic little 
 teacher all but told him in the look that she gave 
 him. " Hush, Jasper, hush! " this to the eager end- 
 man "Tony knows, too. Give him time."
 
 64 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Time! Tony dropped his lower jaw and stared 
 blankly in the face of his teacher. One, two, three 
 minutes passed, and the boy scratched one yellow 
 leg with the big toe of the other foot reflectively, 
 and thought, and thought, and thought. 
 
 The superintendent was gazing at Tony with 
 lofty disapproval; the stranger was watching with 
 half-closed eyes the flushed, anxious face of the girl 
 who was concentrating all her powers of suggestion 
 on the child. 
 
 "Why, you know, Tony!" this from the teacher 
 "Don t you remember what I kept you in on last 
 Friday?" But Tony didn t remember. "Think 
 hard, dear," she urged in her eager sympathy; then, 
 by way of desperate suggestion: "What do cows 
 have ?" 
 
 A flood of light broke over the dull, beclouded face. 
 
 "Calves!" exclaimed Tony, certain of himself for 
 the first time in his groping existence. 
 
 "Cape Horn!" screamed the end-man above the 
 uproar which followed. Tony went foot, but with 
 a sullen, savage protest about not having "missed." 
 
 The superintendent swelled with shocked and 
 portentous disapproval, but the stranger turned his 
 back on the group and pinned his attention to the 
 pine thicket in the near perspective. Mary Eliza 
 beth saw his broad shoulders shake unmistakably, 
 and hated men on the spot, but she rallied her out 
 ward composure heroically. The children were sent 
 back to their seats, and quiet was restored. 
 
 The hour for closing had come, and the teacher, 
 flushed and nervous, asked the superintendent if
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 65 
 
 there was anything else he had to say before the 
 pupils were dismissed. There was nothing in his 
 dull, heavy eyes to suggest that he ever would really 
 have anything else to say, but the look was decep 
 tive. The fat director of public education rose pon 
 derously to his feet again, and for fully twenty min 
 utes harangued his gaping, awe-inspired hearers 
 about their rights as American citizens and their re 
 sponsibilities as the fathers and mothers of countless 
 unborn generations. It certainly did sound scary 
 the way he put it; and he took a piece of chalk 
 and showed them by the simple combination of a 
 figure " i " and a whole charmstring of ciphers how 
 billions of people yet to come were going to be 
 ruined by the fact that "that one boy" (poor 
 Tony again) "wouldn t steddy what his teacher was 
 tryin to learn him." 
 
 At this juncture, one pitiful "I nurver now, nei 
 ther!" wailed through the room, and then Tony sub 
 sided into his coat-sleeve, crushed by the weight of 
 ruined generations. The next instant his teacher 
 was beside him on the bench, and her arm was over 
 his heaving shoulders. 
 
 "Of course you didn t, dear," she whispered into 
 his shock of colorless hair. Then she raised her 
 head and shot a look at the superintendent of pub 
 lic education that dared him and his unborn mill 
 ions to "Come on!" The look glanced off the 
 superintendent s ossified intelligence, but the man 
 beyond caught the splendid fire of it and kindled 
 in answer to it.
 
 66 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 But the superintendent had the last shot, and he 
 proceeded to hold out to his hearers the ultimate 
 hope that their young teacher would learn how to 
 learn them better when she found out what the 
 Lord created the hickory for. And he added the 
 severe admonition: 
 
 "An I don t want to hear o no pamperin o 
 children in this here great county of ours. What 
 our fathers an mothers was strong enough to stand, 
 we air strong enough to stand. Yes, boys an girls, 
 hit takes hardships to make real men, men what 
 kin hold high orfice. Why, jes look at me, I ain t 
 never had no pamperin !" 
 
 At this juncture the stranger slipped quietly out, 
 and the official mogul took a weighty and solemn 
 farewell of them, commending them, with certain 
 reservations, to the care of Providence. 
 
 A few minutes after the creaking of his buggy 
 wheels had died away in the distance, every child 
 was well on his homeward way, for the teacher dis 
 missed all of them, good, bad, and indifferent, at 
 the same time this afternoon. As the sound of the 
 last childish voice died away, Mary Elizabeth sank 
 down on the steps and dropped her head on her 
 arms. 
 
 "Say the word, and I ll go after him." The 
 stranger laid his hand gently on her arm as he spoke. 
 At the unexpected sound of his voice she looked up 
 quickly. Indignation and despair over what the 
 day had brought had marred the lines of her beauti 
 ful face and had deepened to black the sometime
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 67 
 
 violet of her eyes. He sat down on the step beside 
 her. " Child, you mustn t take things to heart this 
 way. Now what is there for you to worry so about? " 
 
 "That that old fat ignoramus can hardly read 
 and write " 
 
 "Well, I wouldn t bother about that." 
 
 "Yes, but he s superintendent of education for 
 this county, I tell you!" 
 
 "What do you care?" 
 
 The girl looked at him wonderingly. 
 
 "Why, don t you care?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "You don t care when you see these poor, igno 
 rant things go on the same way year after year, the 
 blind led by the blind?" 
 
 "I don t believe in the education of the masses." 
 
 The girl stared unbelievingly for a moment, and 
 then, all unconsciously to herself, moved farther 
 away from him. "But but," she almost gasped, 
 "you care when you see the people s money literally 
 thrown away, don t you?" 
 
 "Well, frankly, I m not interested in politics." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth s plans and specifications of a 
 man had been of her own making, uninfluenced by 
 any concrete example except the lofty one furnished 
 by her benefactor. The man of her designing had 
 been big, taking his citizenship from the world, and 
 making the big world-interests his own. He had 
 accepted the franchise as a solemn obligation. 
 
 But here was something new under her sun. She 
 was simply unable to account for it. Yet this new
 
 68 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 thing was a very positive quantity, and its strong, 
 virile personality was imminent and absorbing. 
 
 "Say, look here, I ve got a scheme on hand. 
 Come, let me show you," he exclaimed, and he lifted 
 her up by the arm, almost bodily, and led her back 
 into the deserted school-house. 
 
 "Now let me tell you. It is a shame for these 
 poor little devils to have to suffer in a shack like 
 this, and I m going to have it fixed up for them. 
 I ve got a couple of carpenters at work at my place, 
 and there s plenty of lumber over at the mill." 
 
 "You mean you are going to do it yourself?" 
 
 "Sure! Now if you can get your trustees to let 
 us, we ll make the place comfortable. Are the old 
 codgers apt to kick?" 
 
 "Why, no, of course not. But, they are not fond 
 of you did you know it? " 
 
 "I have very good reason to suspect it. I ll tell 
 you! Let them believe it s your guardian that s 
 doing it." 
 
 "But that would be deception, wouldn t it?" 
 
 The man turned from scanning the crude walls 
 and looked at her with a curious expression that she 
 could not interpret. The corners of his mouth 
 twitched. 
 
 "Oh, would it?" he said. 
 
 "Yes, I m sure it would. I ll just tell Uncle Beck 
 the truth and he ll manage it for us." 
 
 "Good enough. I don t apprehend any opposi 
 tion, though. I have somehow got the notion that 
 your hillite will take anything that comes his way.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 69 
 
 Now let s see what is to be done." He took out a 
 note-book and pencil. 
 
 "The cracks in the floor and in the walls should be 
 stopped," she ventured. 
 
 "Oh, we ll ceil and re-floor the whole business." 
 
 "But won t that cost a great deal?" 
 
 "Why, no. Then we must stop up that suck- 
 hole and put in a couple of windows with sashes. 
 You want one on each side, don t you? " 
 
 Mary Elizabeth fairly gasped at the bigness of 
 his plans. "No, no," she corrected, "if there are 
 to be windows, they must be in that wall so the 
 light will come over the children s shoulders." 
 
 "And, incidentally, be right in the teacher s eyes. 
 No, the windows are going to be put here and there." 
 
 "Oh, but the children s !" 
 
 "I m the one that s doing this. One good strong 
 door with glass in the upper half for more light," 
 he was making notes as he talked, "and a new roof, 
 new door-steps and, see here, we ll stop up the fire 
 place and put in a base-burner with a jacket around 
 it." Something in the girl s face made him hurry 
 on: "But the carpenters will need space to work 
 in. Do you think you can get your honorable trus 
 tees to give a week s holiday while the work is being 
 done?" 
 
 "Uncle Beck would be willing, I m sure, but I 
 wouldn t do it for the world. The children would 
 lose so much valuable time," she replied. "There s 
 a vacant cabin down the road a piece that we could 
 use while this was being fixed."
 
 70 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The stranger said something under his breath, 
 and Mary Elizabeth looked at him with a question 
 in her eyes, but he didn t repeat his exclamation. 
 
 "I m so glad you do care, after all," she said gen- 
 tly. 
 
 " Care ? For what?" 
 
 "For these poor people here." 
 
 "Oh! One never knows what one is going to care 
 for." 
 
 A whinny from the outside seemed to remind him 
 of something. 
 
 "Come out here, I ve something to show you," 
 he said. 
 
 In a few minutes they had the school-house closed, 
 and were making their way through the scrub thicket 
 to where he had left his horse. But the bay was 
 not alone. Tethered to a sapling near him was a 
 clean-limbed, restless little mare that was turning 
 and twisting her graceful neck in impatient protest 
 against the thing that restrained her. A lady s sad 
 dle was strapped upon her back, and all of her trap 
 pings were of the finest. 
 
 "Another!" she exclaimed, "why, you were com 
 plaining only the other day of having to play stable- 
 boy to one." 
 
 "Yes, but thanks to you, I have performed the 
 impossible have actually got one of these natives 
 to look after them for me." 
 
 "How thanks to me ?" 
 
 "One of your adoring pupils I told him you 
 wanted him to."
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 71 
 
 "You did? Which one?" 
 
 "That young naturalist that you turned down a 
 while ago because he answered your question." He 
 turned away and went up to the filly. 
 
 "This is Bonnie, " he said, by way of intro 
 duction, and he stroked the pretty creature s nose 
 in answer to her low, affectionate whinny. "I want 
 you two to know each other," he continued, as Mary 
 Elizabeth joined him in caressing the new-comer. 
 "Here, give her this," and he felt in his pocket and 
 laid several lumps of sugar in her hand. "You and 
 Donnie ought to get along nicely," he continued, 
 "you are both so so " 
 
 "So what, now?" she challenged, across Bonnie s 
 nose. 
 
 "Shall I say it?" he laughed back at her; "well, 
 then, so live and sensitive, and contrary." 
 
 The girl only smiled reservedly, and he added: 
 "The poor creature has been shut up in a city stable, 
 and I had her brought out for her health." 
 
 "And was the saddle not thriving either?" Mary 
 Elizabeth was looking at him across Bonnie s nose 
 again. 
 
 " I thought you might be good enough to help me 
 exercise her," he ventured, treading gingerly on the 
 uncertain ground. 
 
 "You should have asked me first." 
 
 "But you would have " 
 
 "Beclined to let you do it, of course." 
 
 "But it s done now. I really had to bring her, 
 and I just had the saddle shipped on a venture. 
 You wouldn t be "
 
 72 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 " Sensitive ? Contrary ?" she suggested. 
 
 "No. Much obliged for your help, but mean 
 is the word I m after. You won t be mean, now, will 
 you? After we have agreed to be friends?" The 
 girl did not answer him, but stood stroking the filly, 
 thoughtfully, while her mouth took on a proud re 
 serve. 
 
 Suddenly the man reverted to his old tactics with 
 her: 
 
 "Come, get up," he said peremptorily, and he 
 held a hand for her foot. 
 
 A little later they were threading the cool brown 
 woods together on a ride that proved to be but the 
 first of a long series.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE diaphanous layers of gray mist had not yet 
 lifted from "Bullus" Valley when Babe Davis, 
 mounted on his flea-bit mule, burst through the 
 dewy thicket that fringed the haunted premises of 
 White-faced Silas, and stopped in stupid wonder 
 at the scene. The underbrush had been cut away, 
 and the weed stubble levelled to the ground a most 
 unheard-of condition. On the roof of the cabin 
 were great yellow patches of new shingles, and all 
 about the place were glints of fresh pine boards 
 added to strengthen or to protect possibly to chal 
 lenge. The steps were new, the door hung straight, 
 and whole panes of glass filled the window-frame. 
 And there, sure enough, were the much-talked-of 
 curtains, symbol of mystery, interposed between 
 him and what lay within. 
 
 The sight was enough to make any man clutch 
 the shining rifle that lay across his saddle and set 
 firm his sagging jaw. For fully five minutes, the 
 hillite sat with his neck thrust forward drinking 
 in the offending details of the scene. Then he gave 
 vent to one dry, peremptory "Hulloa!" 
 
 Stoney Lonesome answered the challenge, but no 
 human voice replied. 
 
 "Hulloa, thar, I say ! Hulloa ! " 
 
 "Well, what is it?" John Marshall opened the 
 
 73
 
 74 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 cabin door and stood, coatless and dishevelled, on 
 the top step. "What can I do for you?" 
 
 "I come to see ef I wouldn t better do some thin* 
 for you, stranger." The man rode slowly forward, 
 his hands still on his rifle. "Thought mebbe as 
 how you d better be put on notice afore you went 
 too fur." 
 
 If the stranger caught the full suggestion of the 
 nervous finger-play on the long rifle-barrel or of the 
 surface shine of the ugly, prominent eyes, he made 
 no sign. He was in shirt-sleeves and clearly un 
 armed, but he folded his arms and answered, tartly: 
 
 "On notice about what?" 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth." 
 
 A quick intake of breath was the only sign that 
 escaped the man then he and the hillite fixed each 
 the other with one long, steady look. 
 
 "What about Mary Elizabeth?" Marshall asked 
 coldly. " Let s understand each other." 
 
 "That s what I come for, stranger. I thought as 
 how, knowin Ma y Lizbeth didn t have no father 
 nor no brothers nor nothin , you might be thinkin 
 she didn t have nobody to take her part, so I lowed 
 I d drap round an put you straight. I m here, 
 stranger, an I m a-goin to keep on bein here 
 see thep int?" 
 
 The eyes of the other man suddenly deepened to 
 intensity, but his voice was steady and even as he 
 replied: 
 
 "Yes, I see the point. But what I don t see is 
 why you think it necessary to tell me this."
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 75 
 
 "You been mighty free with your comp ny an 
 your money lately, mister, an M ay Lizbeth air 
 mighty onsuspectin -like. You see hit s this a-way 
 Ma y Lizbeth b longs here. True, she s got a lot 
 o book-larnin , but she ain t to blame for that; an 
 she s a good gal an a mighty innercent one in spite 
 of it. So, you see that, me bein from the same 
 folks, hit s up to me to see that no harm don t come 
 to her an , stranger, I m goin to do it!" 
 
 The maoK)n the door-step gave him a look which 
 he had not the imagination to interpret, then reached 
 back and pulled shut the door behind him as if 
 openly cutting off retreat. There was no mistaking 
 his meaning, however, when he folded his arms again 
 and said, emphatically: 
 
 "Bully for you!" Then he added in the tone of 
 a man speaking to a man who had the right to ques 
 tion "On my honor, I am playing fair with the 
 girl, and she doesn t need your protection from me." 
 
 He hesitated a moment as if making up his mind 
 how to proceed, and then said: "But she does need 
 you she needs us both. Your people here don t 
 trust her. You probably know that better than I 
 do. They don t like her, somehow, and they seem 
 to be growing more and more prejudiced against 
 her. They are unkind to her already, and they may 
 come to be worse. I say this to you frankly be 
 cause you have this morning proved your friendship 
 for the girl. I have been free with my money and 
 my company. I have been trying to give the child 
 a few comforts and a little pleasure because I saw
 
 76 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 how she needed them. Of course I have sought her 
 society because I enjoyed it; but I have deliberately 
 done it also because I felt that I could, in a measure, 
 take her mind off the unpleasant experiences she 
 so often encounters here. I felt that she needed 
 me " he took the full measure of the other man 
 with his eyes, and then added "And if I know any 
 thing about the meanness of this old world, she ll 
 need you and me, too, before we are many months 
 older. Here s my hand on it that we ll take care 
 of the girl." 
 
 He was weighed in the balance yet a moment 
 longer, and then his firm white hand was met by 
 the strong, horny grasp of the rustic, and the two 
 looked at each other though across the seeming 
 breadth of a civilization man and man equals! 
 
 After a moment of awkward silence, the hillite 
 asked, quietly: " You fixed up the school-house ? " 
 
 "For Mary Elizabeth." 
 
 " She thought you done it for the childern Ma y 
 Lizbeth is that proud!" 
 
 "I don t give a damn for the children." 
 
 "An you fetched that thar filly ?" 
 
 "For Mary Elizabeth. It is unsafe for her to 
 walk these country roads alone. I have sent the 
 mare to her night and morning for her trip to and 
 from school; but the boy, Tony Thaggin, whom I 
 hired to go errands, says that your mother gave her 
 blue blazes about it when he got there with the horse 
 yesterday morning. One of the things you can do 
 for the girl is to make your mother hold her tongue."
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 77 
 
 "Stranger, did you ever try anything like that?" 
 "Well, if I did, by George, I d succeed!" 
 "You ain t never tried hit! An while we re on 
 the subject, stranger, hit s been proned into me that 
 you d better send your readin books what you want 
 Ma y Lizbeth to read for you to the school-house. 
 Ma tuck them last ones away from Tony an burnt 
 em up. You see," he continued, lamely, for an 
 explanation was plainly due the stranger, "we-uns 
 were fetched up on the Bible an* the almanac, an 
 we ain t never thought hit right to be readin bout 
 things what ain t the truth. Of course, Ma y Liz 
 beth bein brung up difFrent, she don t know no 
 better." 
 
 "Of course not," assented the listener. "And 
 since we are speaking frankly to each other, I want 
 you to know that your mother ought to be made to 
 see that Mary Elizabeth is not very strong, and 
 that, being brought up differently, she can t stand 
 the heavy tasks your mother gives her. She told 
 me herself that Mrs. Davis wouldn t let her have 
 any water unless she drew it herself, and that the 
 well-bucket was so heavy it hurt her to pull it up." 
 "I ll draw hit for her," said the rustic softly. 
 Then, in a tone that partook at once of savagery and 
 resignation: "I know that ma s done got sanctifica- 
 tion, but she s the meanest white woman I ever seen 
 when she gits started on a body. She s mad with 
 Ma y Lizbeth b cause she don t do nothin but set 
 around an hear lessons outen a book. Of course 
 Ma y Lizbeth don t do no work, but she ain t to
 
 78 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 blame for it. She were brung up different, an she 
 don t know no better." 
 
 "Of course not," assented the stranger again, 
 "but you understand, and you won t let your mother 
 impose on her." Suddenly he laid his hand on the 
 mule s neck with the force of a slap: "Davis, what 
 is the foundation of this sneaking enmity against 
 the girl?" 
 
 After a moment of hesitation, the hillite said in a 
 tone which testified to the awfulness of the crime: 
 
 "For one thing, her pa informed!" 
 
 " Informed ? Oh, informed the revenue officers, 
 you mean?" 
 
 The other nodded. 
 
 "What became of him?" 
 
 "Hit ain t for me to say, stranger." 
 
 "How did she come to get the school here?" 
 
 "Beck Logan, him that s postmaster an keeps 
 the store, ranged hit all with the man that tuck 
 Ma y Lizbeth way from here an fetched her up. 
 Uncle Beck had tuck her to his house after hit all 
 happened, an kep her thar tell the stranger come 
 along an tuck a fancy to her. Then when the 
 stranger got tired of her an wanted to send her 
 back, Beck up an said she should come an welcome. 
 An he mounted his mule an carried the word to 
 all the neighbors that Ma y Lizbeth weren t to 
 blame for them that went before her, an they jes 
 nachully had to give her a square deal. Hit would 
 a-made your mouth water to hear him read the riot 
 act to ma. An the funny part of it was, he mars-
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 79 
 
 tered her an made her take Ma y Lizbeth to boa d 
 an promise to keep her own mouth shet." 
 
 "It would have been better for her to board 
 with the storekeeper, it seems to me." 
 
 "Wa-al, you see, hit s this a-way, Uncle Beck is 
 a widder man, an hit wouldn t a-been manners." 
 
 "Oh, I see. Well, is she making any headway 
 with the people, do you know? She doesn t seem 
 to think so." 
 
 "A little, stranger; Mis Thaggin is plumb car 
 ried away with her; but Shan an his ma is dead set 
 agin her. She s been ra-al good buyin medicine for 
 Gran ma Thaggin, but gran ma is awful sot in her 
 likes an onlikes, an she says she ain t to be bought 
 over that easy. Besides, Ma y Lizbeth told her 
 that a man way off somewhars had already done 
 paid for all she was able to do for people up here, 
 an gran ma has tuck a notion that Ma y Lizbeth 
 ain t even givin her rightful share." 
 
 "The infernal old hag! Look here, Davis, it s 
 just the girl s over-sensitive conscience that s mak 
 ing her do that way. She is evidently trying to pay 
 back to her own people what that guardian of hers 
 has done for her. He raised her with the one idea 
 of doing all she could for them, but he is not provid 
 ing her with a cent to spend on them. I got that 
 much out of her, myself. If Mary Elizabeth is buy 
 ing medicine for the old woman, she is paying for it 
 out of the money she makes herself." 
 
 "Now do tell!" 
 
 "How about the others?"
 
 8o THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "They are mostly agin her on account of what s 
 back of her, stranger, but of course hit don t put no 
 change on me. Then, they got all tore up about 
 her perscriptions on the wall of the school-house, 
 an they don t like some o the things she teaches. 
 But worse n that, stranger, Ma y Lizbeth s done 
 got her back up bout the county sup rintender s 
 not knowin enough to suit her, an she s been talkin 
 bout him scan lous. I heerd her with my own years, 
 tellin a crowd o men at all-day singin last Sunday 
 that Mr. Sykes couldn t sup rintend when he didn t 
 know nothin bout books an that in the face o 
 the fact that he s already been doin it for seven 
 teen year! Lord, hit s powerful hard to do any 
 thing with Ma y Lizbeth, or anything for her!" 
 
 The other man was silent for a few minutes. Once 
 or twice he looked as if he were about to say some 
 thing, and then he seemed to abandon the intention. 
 When he at length found voice, it was to say, simply: 
 
 "But her manners are so sweet and so sincere 
 that ought to win them." 
 
 "I don t know," the other replied, hopelessly. 
 "Some of em don t like her manners, neither. 
 Thar s Trav Williams jes nachully hates her for the 
 way she done him." 
 
 "Why, what did she do to him?" 
 
 "He says she p intedly turned her back on him 
 at the store one day an tuck sides with that man you 
 had here." 
 
 "That s a lie, of course!" 
 
 "I don t know, stranger, Ri Slaton seen it, an
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 81 
 
 what little he tells is apt to be true. Hit s mighty 
 like Ma y Lizbeth to act uppish when she don t like 
 you, an she s powerful fitful. Of course she ain t 
 to blame for it, though she don t know no better." 
 
 He was looking across and above the misty valley 
 to the sunlight on the hills beyond, and there was an 
 infinite hunger in his great, stupid eyes. After a 
 little he spoke again. 
 
 "Stranger," he said, hoarsely, and the fingers on 
 the rifle-barrel grew nervous again, "you air the 
 kind o folks she s been fetched up with, but you 
 ain t the same people, though. You ain t the same 
 blood, an you ain t from the same soil. I don t 
 know what you want a-foolin round Ma y Liz- 
 beth- 
 
 "I m afraid you don t understand me in spite of 
 my painstaking explanation." 
 
 "You love Ma y Lizbeth?" 
 
 "Why, no!" 
 
 The hillite surveyed him for fully a minute with 
 bewilderment written all over his features. "How 
 kin you he p it?" he questioned.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 IT was early Saturday morning, but Babe was 
 already back from the store, for the unexpected had 
 happened. A letter had come to Mary Elizabeth 
 and he had ridden at high speed to deliver it into 
 her hand. 
 
 If he had cherished the anticipation of standing 
 around and watching her eager face as she read it, 
 he soon found how vain are human hopes, for Mary 
 Elizabeth seized the letter with quick thanks, ran 
 into her own little room, and shut the door firmly 
 before she even looked at the "backing" of it. 
 
 Inside, with her back to the door, Mary Elizabeth 
 examined the address. Thank heaven! it was not 
 another long dissertation from Mr. Fenwick preach 
 ing duty to rebel youthfulness. No, it was a real 
 letter, it was from "one of the girls." 
 
 Long and hungrily did she linger over the few 
 scantily written pages which contained more of an 
 apology for not having written than any definite 
 news of the old school-girl life they both had left, 
 or of the brilliant, alluring career the young society 
 girl had entered upon. The letter ended with the 
 vague statement that there was an enclosure which 
 would doubtless prove of interest to the reader. 
 
 The enclosure now commended itself to Mary 
 Elizabeth s attention. She had laid it aside unno 
 ticed in her first eager haste for a breath of life from 
 
 82
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 83 
 
 the outside world, but she now took it up and un 
 folded it with growing interest. It was written in 
 a man s bold hand and on business stationery. It 
 ran: 
 
 DEAR FRED, 
 
 This is the third letter I have written to try to lure you to 
 the hills, but you ll come now, I m thinking. 
 
 I have found your violet-eyed, dark-haired, pale-faced 
 woman, and she is just what you have always held she would 
 be ravishingly beautiful. Do come up. If you could paint 
 her face and what lies beneath it, your fame would be assured. 
 But she isn t your Madonna, my boy, for she s got the devil s 
 own spirit lurking in the depths of her. Her people were f eud- 
 ists so is she, I suspect; and I have half a fancy that she is 
 the one I m going to have trouble with. But never mind 
 that. What I want to convince you of is that she is the model 
 you have been looking for. 
 
 Do you remember trying to make me understand you 
 fool poet-painter what a woman s spirit would blossom into 
 if the world influences were not allowed to enter in and render 
 it complex? You said she would be primal, but primally 
 pure. Well, I am beginning to understand, I think. If 
 you ll believe me, this hill-girl she claims to be native here, 
 but, by the eternal fitness of her clothes, she doesn t look it! 
 is the woman I told you would never exist. She has been 
 well educated but convent fashion and has an innocence 
 of the world that would make a long-clothes baby look like a 
 roue. You won t believe me when I tell you that I am being 
 good, but the fellow that would put a girl like that wise, would 
 pull up young cotton. It would be funny if it wasn t just a 
 little pitiful to see how absolutely ignorant she is of men and 
 of how to deal with them. She has never reached that most 
 ladylike and perfectly proper stage of being afraid of the big 
 masculine bugaboo, but harbors the gentle trustfulness of a 
 wild thing that has never been frightened.
 
 84 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 She is all your fancy painted her. You d say she is a white 
 hyacinth or some such rot; but she is just a slim girl beauty 
 with a woman in her eyes. The man who stirs her to her 
 depths is going to be gloriously happy, or gloriously the other 
 thing. 
 
 I ll meet you at Lawler, the nearest railroad station! 
 
 Besides, I need you, you selfish prig. I need some damned 
 idealist like you to keep me from wringing these natives 
 necks. They are giving my surveyors no end of trouble and 
 I m afraid will scare them entirely off the job. Only one of 
 the bunch has good titles, and I ve got that one on the string. 
 I am taking up all the tracts which I didn t already own by 
 having military bounty land-warrants located on them all, 
 that is, except one quarter-section block that could not be 
 covered by the warrants. I have regularly entered that, and 
 will make final proof now very shortly. 
 
 The natives are only squatting on the land, you see, their 
 forbears having conquered it from the Indians, and having 
 merely held it since by the right of the strongest without get 
 ting out government patents to it. I am expecting advices 
 from Washington soon as to the locating of the last warrants, 
 and the time will shortly be ripe for warning the hill-Billies 
 to move on and make way for progress. 
 
 I can t have the work commenced until the titles are all 
 secure, but that will be in a few weeks now, I hope. If you 
 should happen to recover from your squeamishness, I ll take 
 you in on the ground-floor yet and make you rich. In a few 
 years from now you will fish in a lake that fills a mountain 
 valley five miles long and furnishes twenty thousand horse 
 power for a thriving little manufacturing city on the plains 
 below. Isn t this worth hobnobbing with a white-faced 
 "ha nt" in a log 
 
 The sheet which should have followed had not 
 been enclosed, and Mary Elizabeth was left staring 
 at the one she held, in bewilderment.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST . 85 
 
 Not until she got to the mention of the "white- 
 faced ha nt" did she once guess the author. The 
 stranger, John Marshall, was the man who had 
 written it! But to whom? About what? A note 
 on the reverse page in the hand of her girl corre 
 spondent, unnoticed until now, said: "Fred Dear- 
 ing, an awfully talented young portrait-painter here, 
 showed me this. I was telling him what a pretty 
 model I thought you would make when he drew 
 this letter from his pocket and said that it was a 
 funny coincidence that two of his friends had found 
 for him the model he had been looking for, and at 
 about the same time. A few questions brought out 
 the fact or at least it looks to me like a fact that 
 you are the girl here described. I begged Fred for 
 the part of the letter that touched on you, to send 
 you. Do let me know if you are the girl, and who 
 on earth the man is you have captured! Fred says 
 he has no end of money." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth turned back quickly to read with 
 a fuller understanding. " She is just what you have 
 always held she would be ravishingly beautiful," 
 the stranger had written about her. She looked up 
 quickly into the little mirror which Babe had bought 
 for her, but glanced as quickly away from its imper 
 fect, slandering surface. "Ravishingly beautiful" 
 but what did he mean by the other? What did he 
 know of "what lay beneath" he, John Marshall, the 
 stranger? A flash of the spirit that he had divined, 
 repudiated his recognition of it, but the next minute 
 the girl smiled, for had he not called her "beautiful"?
 
 86 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The fleeting smile gave way to a rising flush as 
 she followed the lines further. What in the world 
 could the man be talking about now? She had 
 reached the "long-clothes baby" clause, and her eyes 
 were flashing but shamed. So it was "funny" and 
 "pitiful" how ignorant she was of men and how to 
 deal with them, was it? her cheeks were scorching 
 now. And what, what was it she had not had sense 
 enough to be afraid of? for he meant, of course, 
 that she didn t have any sense of propriety. She 
 had done something that wasn t proper and he was 
 laughing at and pitying her! She could not and 
 would not stand it! 
 
 "I need some damned idealist like you to keep 
 me from wringing these natives necks" Mary 
 Elizabeth was waking up now. These lines had 
 meant nothing to her at first, but now she suddenly 
 felt that they were weighted with a sinister mean 
 ing. "My surveyors"! The expression struck her, 
 and she read on avidly: "Only one of the bunch has 
 a good title, and I ve got that one on the string. 
 I am taking up all the tracts which I didn t already 
 own by having military bounty land-warrants lo 
 cated on them all, that is, except one quarter-sec 
 tion block that could not be covered by the war 
 rants. I have regularly entered that, and will make 
 final proof now very shortly." The girl suppressed 
 a cry as she read on: "They are only squatting 
 on the land, you see, their forbears having con 
 quered it from the Indians, and having merely held 
 it since by the right of the strongest without getting
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 87 
 
 out government patents to it. I am expecting ad 
 vices from Washington soon as to the locating of the 
 last warrants, and the time will shortly be ripe for 
 warning the hill-Billies to move on and make way 
 for progress." Mary Elizabeth crushed the paper 
 between her desperate fingers, and looked up quickly 
 with a smothered, "Help me!" 
 
 A grave-eyed memory answered her cry. 
 
 For the first time, the girl had turned to him, and 
 somehow, she suddenly felt him very near. He 
 would help. He would understand. In one of their 
 last talks together he had told her about a man who 
 had entered government land which the simple na 
 tives thought they owned, and what a fight he had 
 had to save it for the poor settlers. It had bored 
 her then, but it had impressed her, and now she 
 found herself striving to remember all the details 
 as he had related them. 
 
 She would write him at once, the girl determined, 
 and enclose him that letter. 
 
 But the letter was John Marshall s! The thought 
 came like an illumining flash, and the girl grew fixed 
 and still in the light of what it uncovered. The 
 letter was John Marshall s, and there was only one 
 thing to be done take it to him and tell him that 
 she had read it and knew him for what he was! 
 But maybe maybe and with the hope, some 
 thing that had been struck cold in her suddenly 
 flamed up again yes, maybe he could explain. Why, 
 of course he could explain! The girl seized her hat 
 and jacket, flung open the door which seemed to
 
 88 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 obtrude itself between her and what she desperately 
 hoped, and ran out into the morning freshness. 
 There was no one near to question her, and she was 
 soon out of sight, making her breathless way to the 
 haunted house. 
 
 It was ten o clock and after when she arrived, ex 
 hausted and white, at the renovated door-step of 
 the erstwhile ghostly place and knocked for admit 
 tance. She did not realize that she was leaning 
 against the door for support, after her hurried and 
 trying journey, till it suddenly gave way under an 
 opening hand and let her almost fall into the arms 
 of the man she was seeking. 
 
 "Why, child, what on earth " was his greeting, 
 and the very tones of his voice made the girl ashamed 
 that she had ever doubted him. 
 
 " Sit down," he exclaimed, and she was soon seated 
 in a big split-bottomed rocking-chair with her as 
 tonished host standing over her, deeply concerned. 
 
 "I ll tell you in a minute," she panted. 
 
 Marshall turned away, busying himself at a shiny 
 new tin safe for a minute, but soon returned to 
 her side with a glass of wine which he held to her 
 lips. 
 
 "Drink this," he said, "and then come out into 
 the fresh air and let s take a walk." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth drank as she was bidden, but 
 again rested her head on the chair-back and looked 
 about her. Everywhere were signs that money had 
 been freely spent in providing whatever of comforts 
 the region afforded, but beyond this the interior was
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 89 
 
 much like the rooms she saw every day. It was a 
 good, homey place to rest in when one was tired in 
 body and in spirit, and when one needed strength 
 to straighten out a disagreeable complication of cir 
 cumstances. 
 
 Marshall was still standing over her. He had for 
 gotten to put back the wine-glass. After a moment 
 he asked: 
 
 "Don t you feel like taking a walk now?" 
 
 "Oh, I can t go any further," she said wearily. 
 "Let me tell you all about it here while I rest, and 
 then I can go back." 
 
 He had taken an uneasy seat in front of her on 
 the edge of a table that stood against the wall, and 
 now regarded her with an inexplicable expression in 
 his deep eyes as he stroked his jaw perplexedly. 
 
 "You are not really as tired as you think," was 
 the audible conclusion he arrived at, " and we needn t 
 walk fast, you know. Come on and let s try it." 
 
 "You are not often inconsiderate," exclaimed the 
 quick-tempered girl; "I tell you I am tired to death, 
 and I am not going till I rest!" 
 
 John Marshall looked at her a minute like a man 
 who wanted to speak, then turned and went out on 
 the front steps, where he stood for some little time 
 gazing fixedly down the mountain road. After a 
 while he came back with a determined expression on 
 his face, and walked quietly up to her. 
 
 "You must come," he said. "You don t under 
 stand. I am looking for Shan Thaggin and his wife 
 about the matter of a land sale, and they must not
 
 90 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 find you here. They must not for your sake, child; 
 people gossip even in the backwoods." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth was on her feet in an instant with 
 the "long-clothes baby" clause of his letter suddenly 
 burnt into her understanding. 
 
 "I never thought I never thought for an in 
 stant " she protested, tears of shame filling the 
 violet depths of her eyes. 
 
 Three minutes afterward they were threading the 
 wood- way together, he a little in front talking cheerily 
 about the pretty weather, and she behind, silent, 
 with head down, like a child that had been punished. 
 A plunge or two through the pine thicket, and they 
 were out of sight of the haunted house and of the 
 mountain road that led to it. Here a big log was 
 soon singled out by the man and he turned reas 
 suringly to the silent girl behind him. 
 
 "See," he said, "here is a good place to rest, and 
 you can tell me all about it." When they were 
 seated side by side on the huge log, he said, in the 
 indulgent big-brother tone he had assumed toward 
 her of late: 
 
 "What s the trouble, little girl?" 
 
 "I got a letter this morning," began the girl with 
 her characteristic directness, "and it enclosed a let 
 ter from you to somebody. I have brought it to 
 you because it is yours, and because I want you to 
 tell me that it isn t trite." And she handed him his 
 letter. 
 
 Nothing perturbed, Marshall unfolded the sheet 
 and began to read. Mary Elizabeth could easily
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 91 
 
 follow, for he had taken his seat close beside her. 
 His quick eye scanned the first few lines "she is 
 just what you have always held she would be 
 ravishingly beautiful," she saw him read. 
 
 "But it is true!" he exclaimed, turning on her 
 suddenly a look that made her draw away. "Oh, 
 come back; I am not to blame for it, God made you," 
 and he took her by the arm to detain her as he re 
 turned to the letter. He looked at her once again 
 with a challenging, laughing, daring glance such as 
 he seldom gave her now. This time he was looking 
 to see just how much she understood of his more 
 intimate analysis of her, but the woman in her had 
 retired behind an all-obscuring veil, and her index- 
 finger pointed farther down the page: 
 
 "That," she said quietly, "what do you mean by 
 that?" 
 
 The man s face changed as he read. It darkened. 
 It took on a grim, set look. 
 
 "What do you mean by it?" came in startled ex 
 clamation from the girl who was watching every 
 shadow of change in his face. 
 
 The man quietly tore the missive into a hundred 
 little bits. "Just what it says," he answered slowly, 
 as he sprinkled the white fragments on the pine 
 straw under their feet. 
 
 "No!" There was the break of a heart in the 
 cry that escaped her, but the next moment she was 
 on her feet and the violet of her eyes had turned to 
 black. 
 
 " Yes," the man answered her. Then he caught
 
 92 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 her suddenly by the wrists. "Listen to me," he in 
 sisted, as she struggled to free herself from him. His 
 tightening grasp brought her face to face with him 
 and she looked him in the eyes. 
 
 "You are a scoun-drdl" she said. 
 
 Marshall drew back as if she had struck him. 
 He released her hands and rose to his feet. Mary 
 Elizabeth could never have imagined that look of 
 him the blue-white of his set features and the 
 blaze of his terrible eyes. 
 
 "You," he said slowly, "are a woman." 
 
 "Yes, but you will have men that you can fight. 
 And real men, too," she flashed back. "Don t 
 imagine because these poor things are grotesquely 
 ignorant that you ll have any easy time in robbing 
 them! The day is coming when you will find out 
 that it is as hard to take a log cabin from a real man 
 as it is to rob him of a landed estate." 
 
 He was standing his full six feet with his head up 
 and his straight look challenging her own, but he 
 made no move to interrupt her torrent of indigna 
 tion. 
 
 "Besides," the girl rushed on, "7 am here to see 
 that you don t drive them out of their homes. You 
 think I don t know anything about law, but I do. I 
 know that there is a way to thwart rascality like 
 this! I know where I can get the best lawyer in 
 this State and he can stop you, I can tell you, for he 
 has dealt with just such cases before. And I am 
 going to tell every man in this valley what you are 
 up to," and we will combine against you "
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 93 
 
 "You are going to tell these people what you have 
 found out?" The measured coldness of his voice 
 contrasted queerly with her high-pitched, excited 
 tones. 
 
 "Just as soon as I can get the word to them." 
 
 "And are you going to tell them how you found it 
 out?" 
 
 Something in his voice struck the girl quiet a 
 moment. 
 
 "You you oh, what do you mean?" she de 
 manded, half in fright. 
 
 "That you got your information through reading 
 a private letter that was not intended for your eyes? " 
 
 The girl steadied herself by the log that they had 
 quitted. 
 
 "Why why I you I will tell them!" The 
 stranger answered her never a word, but he was 
 looking straight into her eyes. "I I must tell 
 them," she wavered and then, pleadingly, "You 
 will let me tell them?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 Just at that moment the voices of the Thaggins, 
 man and wife, come on the matter of a land deal, 
 were heard beyond the pine thicket. 
 
 When Mary Elizabeth made her dazed way home 
 that morning, it was with the realization that her 
 lonely path was being guarded by Tony Thaggin 
 in the obscure distance. By whose orders he was 
 watching over her, she knew only too well, and 
 somehow the knowledge made the broken heart 
 within her throb with a yet keener anguish.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE next afternoon brought Mary Elizabeth an 
 other letter, and in a most unexpected way. Uncle 
 Beck had met Babe at church and had handed him 
 a letter that should have been delivered the day 
 before, but which had been overlooked. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth had done the unheard-of and un 
 forgivable thing of refusing to go to church that 
 morning, and had stayed at home and devoted three 
 solid hours of the Sabbath to writing her benefactor 
 for help and tearing up her mystifying missives as 
 soon as they were penned. And it was no easy task, 
 for she felt in honor bound not to disclose to him 
 what she had learned from Marshall s letter. At 
 length, however, she had succeeded in writing a let 
 ter which she was willing to send. It said simply: 
 
 DEAR GUARDIAN: 
 
 I want you to help me do something for somebody who 
 needs it very much. It may cost a great deal as much as 
 a hundred dollars, maybe. I am not at liberty to tell you 
 now just what it is, but the cause is deserving, and I know 
 you can trust me to tell you the truth. Won t you write me 
 the full details of that incident about the man s "entering" 
 another man s land? Tell me all about it, and how you saved 
 the land for the real owner. Write me this at once, please. 
 
 There is something down in the bottom of my heart that 
 I would like to say to you this morning, but I don t know how 
 
 94
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 95 
 
 to do it. I want to be really sure that it is there first. Please, 
 sir, don t forget about the hundred dollars, and write me 
 at once about the land matter. 
 
 Affectionately, 
 
 MARY ELIZABETH. 
 
 At last the letter was sealed and stamped and on 
 the little pine shelf under the looking-glass. Mary 
 Elizabeth looked at it with the feeling that she had 
 done all that was in her power so far. There really 
 was nothing else to be done unless she were to pray 
 that it bring the needed help. But the relations 
 between Mary Elizabeth and the Hearer of Prayer 
 had been strained for some time, and last night she 
 had taken Him to task for many things and had 
 told Him just what she thought of Him. Clearly 
 she couldn t expect anything of Him. But her 
 guardian would help her. And she set her white 
 teeth to stop the quiver of her chin, and went out to 
 join the family group, just returned from church. 
 
 Babe s unobtrusive brow had never been accused 
 of harboring anything of wisdom, but down in the 
 rugged breast of the man there was something which 
 stood as its equivalent. He did not give Mary 
 Elizabeth this second letter until he was able to do 
 so entirely unobserved. This was not till after din 
 ner was over and the girl had set out for the woods 
 in an effort to escape what she had battled with in 
 that little room throughout all her waking hours 
 since John Marshall had set his cowardly seal of 
 silence upon her lips. 
 
 "No go back," she said to Babe Davis in the
 
 96 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 tone one might have used to a faithful dog that was 
 following. "I want to be by myself." They were 
 down by the big gully, where he had followed to 
 give her the letter. With the wistful acquiescence 
 of the ever-faithful, the man obeyed, but he startled 
 her with the question: 
 
 "You ain t a-goin to walk with him, air you?" 
 
 "No!" vehemently. 
 
 "Well, don t," he said; "leastways, not fur." 
 Then he turned back, leaving her speechless with 
 astonishment that he, the erstwhile dumbly acqui 
 escent, had spoken to protest. 
 
 But Babe and his advice were left behind with the 
 sight of the little cabin, and Mary Elizabeth plunged 
 deeper and deeper into the woods, and at last found 
 for herself a shady seat on the pine-needles far from 
 every sight and sound except those of the living 
 forest. 
 
 She had already looked at the envelope. It was 
 directed in a man s hand but not his, and was post 
 marked "Mobile." A moment after she was seated 
 she had its one page unfolded before her. The com 
 munication ran: 
 
 Miss MARY E. DALE, 
 
 Pinetop, Ala. 
 DEAR MADAM: 
 
 It becomes my painful duty to inform you that your guar 
 dian or rather, the gentleman who acted as guardian to 
 you for a number of years dropped dead in his office on the 
 afternoon of the sixteenth, of heart failure. 
 
 You would have been informed of the sad news sooner, if 
 I had known your whereabouts. The deceased, as you prob-
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 97 
 
 ably know, was very unmethodical, and having no premoni 
 tion of death, took no steps to provide for the easy admin 
 istration of his affairs. It has been found, however, that 
 his debts are fully equal to his assets. He left no will, and 
 had no heirs. Permit me to say that I regret very much 
 your guardian did not leave you substantially provided for, 
 and that I will be glad to serve you in any way if you should 
 care to look further into his affairs. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 R. T. BOSTICK. 
 Bostick & Weaver, Att ys. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth looked up from the formal signa 
 ture in a dazed, helpless way. No, the sun had not 
 gone out, it was something else that had made the 
 world turn dark something which had no connec 
 tion with herself, which had no part in her desperate 
 schemes against the stranger, and no kinship what 
 ever with the graying skies above, the wind-swept, 
 brown-carpeted earth beneath, or aught of hill- 
 tragedy that lay between something which erased 
 all else and wrote across the face of everything: 
 "Whose arm raised that gray head from the dusty 
 office floor?" 
 
 The girl did not cry out, neither did she cast her 
 self down in despair upon the brown earth. It was 
 all so strange, so unreal, it simply could not be. She 
 sat very still there among the pine-needles and 
 looked into nothingness, utterly incapable of accept 
 ing the thing which had descended upon her. Again 
 she was striving, as on that memorable night, to 
 recall his features, and again only the quiet look of 
 him answered her summons to appear.
 
 9& THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The gray hours crept by, the sky darkened, and 
 the restless pines grew still; arid in the evening quiet, 
 came face to face the untamed spirit of the girl and 
 the memory of the man who had done his stumbling 
 best for her with the Hearer of Prayer to judge 
 between. But it was all so complex, so unreal, not 
 Mary Elizabeth could understand, nor could, per 
 haps, the grave-eyed memory only He could know 
 who was God at once of the fettered, struggling souls 
 of the living and the disembodied spirits of the dead. 
 
 But when Babe Davis came searching in the twi 
 light for her, the girl looked up at him with troubled, 
 mist-dimmed eyes and said: 
 
 "Babe, I have lost & friend" 
 
 Somewhere in that unmeasured stretch of pain 
 that links the death of a hopeless day to the dawn 
 of one that is still more hopeless, Mary Elizabeth 
 reached what she thought was the answer to her life 
 problem: She would pay back the debt she owed 
 him not to the last dollar, but to the last heart 
 throb of it by a life of service to her people.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE ha nted house was hiding its sinister reality 
 under a most cheery and healthful-looking disguise 
 that graying Monday afternoon. Not in all that 
 mountain valley was there to be found a more gen 
 erous fireplace filled with a more briskly crackling 
 fire. And not anywhere within those encircling hills 
 could be seen such another illumination as streamed 
 from the well-kept glass lamp through the open back 
 door to ensure that White-faced Silas was not shad 
 owing the stable wherein Tony was performing his 
 evening tasks. As a further provision against a 
 visit from the ousted ghostly tenant, John Marshall 
 walked heavily and whistled cheerily as he prepared 
 the evening meal inside, or as he every now and then 
 came to the open door to call encouragement to the 
 boy in the stable. 
 
 After a little, Tony came in and closed the rear 
 door behind him. 
 
 "You didn t beat me, you scoundrel," was the 
 man s hearty greeting to him. "Supper is ready to 
 put on the table, and it s bully!" The smoking 
 slices of country-cured ham on the broiler before 
 the big log fire, the brown hoe-cakes on the glowing 
 hearth, and the spitting and sputtering coffee near 
 by, offered themselves in enthusiastic support of 
 his claims. In a very short while the edibles were 
 
 99
 
 ioo THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 transferred to a rude pine table which had been 
 drawn up for the purpose, and man and boy drew up 
 their respective chairs opposite each other. 
 
 Tony made a long arm for the hoe-cakes before 
 he was fairly seated, but Marshall snatched the 
 plate away tentatively. 
 
 "Have you washed your hands?" he demanded. 
 On being answered in the affirmative, he poked the 
 hoe-cakes at the boy, but still hesitatingly. "I m 
 a good mind not to let you have any for not getting 
 us some fresh butter," he declared. Tony started 
 to protest, but the other stopped him impatiently 
 "Yes, I know all about the chestnuts, but they will 
 not answer. I ve told you that a dozen times. 
 Every time I start you out to forage for something 
 to eat you come back with a load of chestnuts or 
 chinquapins! Do I look like a squirrel?" 
 
 " I I I got your whiskey." 
 
 "Well, that s something like. Have a hoe-cake, 
 young moonshiner." 
 
 Then man and boy fell to right heartily, and in 
 all too short a time, physiologically reckoned, ate 
 their way through to the dallying, toying stage of 
 the process. 
 
 Marshall became reflective. Indeed, anybody 
 else but Tony might have seen, through the whole 
 evening, that there was something on the man s 
 mind. With the stirring of that something, the 
 cloaking cheeriness of his mood now dropped away 
 from him, and his strong face took on lines that 
 might have been the finger-marks of either a callous
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 101 
 
 hardness or a deep and hidden hurt. After some 
 moments of thought he asked: 
 
 " How did you get in so early this evening? Didn t 
 you go home with your teacher?" 
 
 "No oo." 
 
 "Well, why in thunder didn t you?" 
 
 "She wouldn t let me." 
 
 "Why didn t she let you? I ll bet you gave the 
 whole thing away!" 
 
 "Huh?" said the boy, beginning to lose his mental 
 
 oars. 
 
 (C 
 
 Tony, I ll shake you in a minute! What did she 
 say to you?" 
 
 " Oh, her? Why she said she said ef I was a-goin 
 to come home with her cause I loved her, I might 
 could come; but ef I was comin cause you sont 
 me, I shouldn t." 
 
 "Well, you told her you were going because you 
 loved her, of course?" 
 
 "Huh?" 
 
 Marshall looked up with a quick flash of temper, 
 but restrained himself and repeated his question 
 again and more deliberately. 
 
 "No," said Tony, after the import of the inquiry 
 had been dinned into him, "no, I told her you 
 sont me." 
 
 "Well, didn t I tell you not to!" The man 
 clutched the loaf of bread in one hand and a carving 
 knife in the other as if threatening to visit upon the 
 scapegoat loaf the wrath that he could ill contain. 
 
 "Teacher told me to always tell the truth."
 
 102 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The executioner paused, looked at the boy a few 
 minutes, and then quietly laid bread and knife down 
 upon the table. 
 
 There was a period of silence, and then Tony asked, 
 laconically: 
 
 "Howcome teacher didn t ride the mare to-day? " 
 
 "Teacher s tired of riding," savagely. 
 
 "Howcome she sont all them back to you?" he 
 indicated with a nod a pile of novels on the side 
 table. 
 
 "Teacher s tired of reading, you damned fool!" 
 
 Another silence in which both man and boy made 
 further headway in the viands, and then the former 
 asked: 
 
 "Tony, do people like the teacher better than they 
 used to?" 
 
 Tony thought a minute and then replied: "The 
 chilluns likes her." 
 
 "Yes, but the grown folks?" 
 
 Tony thought another minute and gravely shook 
 his head. " They sho don t, stranger." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "Idunno." 
 
 "Does Mr. Sykes, the superintendent, like her?" 
 
 "He hates her." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "Idunno." 
 
 Here the back-log dropped in two, and Marshall 
 busied himself for a space in ramming the noses of 
 the severed chunks together toward the front of 
 the dog-irons and heaving on another immense log
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 103 
 
 at the back. He seemed to enjoy stamping this into 
 conformity to the space to which he assigned it. 
 When he returned to his seat, he asked of the boy: 
 
 "How does she seem to-day?" 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 "The teacher. Is she is she sad?" 
 
 "No, mad." 
 
 "Oh!" 
 
 After Tony had braced up on another huge slice 
 of ham and a hunk of lightbread which he was left 
 to cut for himself, he asked, as if something were on 
 his mind: 
 
 "What s sad ? Is hit sorter sorry an droopy- 
 like?" 
 
 John Marshall s affirmative nod was accompanied 
 by a quick look of interest. 
 
 "Well," said the boy, who could think fairly con 
 secutively when not interfered with, "she was, to 
 say, more snappish than sorry when I told her you 
 said for me to go home with her; but she was sad 
 though awful sad onct." 
 
 "When?" 
 
 "When she told me what to tell Uncle Beck bout 
 that man dyin ." 
 
 "Whatman?" 
 
 "Huh?" 
 
 "What man was it that died, Tony?" 
 
 "Oh, somebody away from here. Somebody that 
 onct was good to her." 
 
 "The man that raised her?" 
 
 "Huh?"
 
 104 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "The rich man that took her away from here 
 when she was little and took care of her her guar 
 dian?" 
 
 "Guardeen yes that s what she called him. 
 He drapped dead t other day but he wasn t rich." 
 
 "How do you know?" the man was all interest. 
 He leaned forward slightly to get the boy s reply. 
 
 " Cause when I rid over to the store at big re 
 cess to tell Uncle Beck what she said I she a " 
 Tony was drifting again. 
 
 "What did you hear at the store?" Marshall 
 asked by way of bringing him back to his moor 
 ings. 
 
 "Oh, I heerd Mr. Davis a-tellin Uncle Beck bout 
 the man a-dyin , an he said he hadn t left teacher 
 a cent." 
 
 "Which Davis?" 
 
 "The one what s takin notice o teacher." 
 
 "Are you sure he said that?" 
 
 "Huh?" 
 
 "Are you sure he said that that man didn t leave 
 teacher a cent?" 
 
 "Yes, didn t I hear him with my own years?" 
 
 The man got up quickly from his chair and strode 
 the length of the room and then back again. "Poor 
 girl, what will she do?" he asked half aloud in his 
 solicitous musings; and then "Yes, by George, 
 I ll buy that place of hers! She must have the 
 money to get away from here!" 
 
 "Huh?" Tony asked in questioning answer to his 
 unconscious exclamation.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 105 
 
 "Oh, nothing," Marshall replied, impatiently. 
 "Fall to and wash up your dishes now, and get 
 along home." 
 
 It was "big recess" time of the following day, 
 and the children had just scattered to the sunny 
 stretches outside to eat their lunches. Mary Eliza 
 beth remained in the school-room, making the keen 
 little wind that was blowing her excuse to be alone 
 for a coveted hour. Morning had come with its 
 usual quota of troubles for the teacher, and this was 
 the first opportunity she had had to-day to take 
 stock of the wreckage left by the storm that had 
 swept over her. 
 
 Only last Saturday three days ago by the calen 
 dar that hung on the wall, but ages and ages past, 
 measured by the suffering that had been hers John 
 Marshall had been discovered by her to be engaged 
 in a villainy deep and mysterious; that night the 
 Hearer of Prayer had failed her and she had defied 
 Him to His face; and day before yesterday could 
 it be that it was only day before yesterday? there 
 had dropped out of reach of her tardy gratitude 
 forever the only thing in her life that had proven 
 worth while. Too vast for expression, the pain of 
 it all lay a dead weight on her aching heart as the 
 cruelly slow-paced minutes passed. 
 
 Then, almost mechanically, her glance took in the 
 new and hardly yet familiar details of the room in 
 which she sat. All about her were the comforts 
 which John Marshall had placed there for the sake
 
 io6 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 of the suffering children, yet John Marshall was even 
 then, perhaps, perfecting against them and theirs a 
 nefarious scheme which she, Mary Elizabeth, was for 
 bidden on her honor to disclose to them. It was in 
 tolerable something must be done, something that 
 would force the man to let her speak. She must see 
 him, she must find a way! 
 
 As if conjured up by her thoughts, John Marshall 
 at that moment entered the door of the school-room 
 in the wake of a courteous child who was showing 
 him in. The impatient usher did not wait to see that 
 the teacher rose to her feet but remained silent even 
 when the stranger, hat in hand, gave her a formal 
 greeting. 
 
 Perhaps the man s ill-concealed, shocked surprise 
 at the change in the girl s face kept him from noticing 
 her neglect to answer him, or, maybe, he purposely 
 ignored it. Anyway, there was no resentment in his 
 quiet, firm voice as he said: 
 
 "I have something of importance to say to you. 
 Sit down." 
 
 Though distinctly uncompromising, Mary Eliza 
 beth slipped into the chair that stood before the 
 teacher s desk and indicated a seat to the stranger. 
 A thoroughly awakened curiosity veiled in part the 
 deep indignation that was burning in her eyes. 
 
 "What is it?" she found herself saying. 
 
 "Do you remember that when I first met you, you 
 said that you owned a place over the ridge that used 
 to belong to your father, and that you wanted to sell 
 it?"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 107 
 
 "Yes," quietly, but her eyes were darkening omi 
 nously. 
 
 " Well, I have come this morning to tell you that if 
 you still want to sell, I will give you your cash price 
 for it." 
 
 "Do you take me for a child? For worse?" she 
 flashed out before his last sentence was well out of his 
 mouth. 
 
 "I don t understand you." 
 
 "You mean that you are counting on my not un 
 derstanding you ! So it s my place, is it, that is the 
 one of all the lot which the owner holds good titles 
 to? And / am the person that you have on the 
 string ? Did you think that I could forget the phras 
 ing of that infamous letter, and so soon as this?" 
 
 For fully a minute he did not speak; he was making 
 a visible effort to control himself, and Mary Elizabeth 
 was suddenly conscious of a queer little feeling of fear 
 at his power of self-repression. When Marshall did 
 speak, his voice was under his control. He picked 
 up a pencil that lay near and drew toward him a sheet 
 of paper. He was leaning toward her that he might 
 use part of the desk space for a hard surface upon 
 which to draw. 
 
 "If you will suspend judgment for a while," he 
 said through compressed lips, "I will show you what 
 I am doing here and prove to you that you are fight 
 ing windmills." He began to trace a crude drawing 
 on the paper. Mary Elizabeth s curious glance oscil 
 lated between the paper under his hand and the face 
 of the man, which was in profile toward her and quite
 
 io8 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 near. She caught herself marking the fine, strong 
 outline of the face, and feeling a keen interest, 
 through the oblique but near view she commanded, 
 in the fire that she had kindled in his eyes. 
 
 "To begin with," he said, "this valley that we are 
 living in is just a little concavity scooped out of the 
 top of one of the highest plateaus in the State. It is 
 surrounded by a ridge with only one break at the 
 falls that we visited together and contains a half- 
 dozen of the boldest springs in the country which to 
 gether furnish a remarkably fine supply of water. I 
 purpose to buy up this depressed region about five 
 miles in length dam the break at the falls, and con 
 vert the whole valley into a reservoir in which shall 
 be stored water for all- the-y ear-round usage." He 
 looked up into her face for a moment as if speculat 
 ing as to whether to proceed or not, and said, paren 
 thetically, " I am putting myself into your hands, you 
 see." Then he returned to his drawing, and con 
 tinued: "I expect to regulate this water-power and 
 use it to generate electric power which will supply all 
 the needs of a model manufacturing city to be located 
 twenty miles south of here where two prospective 
 railroads are to cross another already in operation, 
 and where materials are at hand for the manufacture 
 of steel. Now that is my nefarious scheme. This 
 place of yours that we are discussing is not in the 
 valley at all and is not in any way necessary to the 
 furtherance of our project. I need absolutely only 
 the land which I am to submerge, and a few acres 
 at the falls on which to locate a power plant. Your
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 109 
 
 father s place is two miles east of this spot." The 
 explanation finished, he moved a little away from her 
 and looked at her as if he expected her to understand. 
 
 "Then what do you want with it?" 
 
 She was sharp enough to see that her quick ques 
 tion disconcerted him in a degree. 
 
 "Why, I shall use it for the site of a workmen s 
 camp, I suppose." 
 
 " Mr. Marshall," said the girl, deliberately, and her 
 voice was strange to him as she answered him, "I 
 am not the same girl I was when I talked to you that 
 first morning. I am not now fighting to get rid of 
 the responsibility which has been laid upon me, and 
 I have found out somehow that there are debts which 
 cannot be paid in money. I am not the selfish 
 and cowardly girl I was that day. I am a woman, 
 and the woman in me is going to stand her ground." 
 The man drew a deep breath and the expression in his 
 eyes softened. "I am going to stand my ground 
 against you," she concluded, "and refuse your covert 
 bribe to silence." 
 
 Marshall rose from his chair. There was on his 
 face the look that had frightened her in that last 
 interview. 
 
 " I have no words with which to answer that from a 
 woman," he said. 
 
 He was going. He was moving toward the door. 
 Mary Elizabeth suddenly remembered that she had 
 determined to force him to release her from her obli 
 gation to her own sense of honor and let her make one 
 effort to save the homes of her people.
 
 no THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "Mr. Marshall." 
 
 He turned in his tracks and paused, but he did not 
 answer her. Mary Elizabeth rose and came a step 
 or two nearer him. 
 
 "On what conditions will you let me speak let 
 me tell what I read ?" 
 
 "On whatever conditions are imposed by your own 
 sense of honor," and he left her with never a look 
 backward. 
 
 "When air you a-goin to go way? " It was Tony 
 who had found her in her indignation and despair. 
 
 "I don t understand you, Tony. Go away from 
 the school-house, do you mean?" She was too 
 wrought up to wonder at his sudden presence. 
 
 "No, go way f m here way off an not come 
 back, mebbe?" 
 
 "Why, I am not going at all ever." 
 
 Heaven opened in the child s clouded face "Why, 
 he said you was." 
 
 "Who said I was?" the girl was fairly startled at 
 the guess she made. 
 
 "Mr. Marshall him what was in here to see you 
 jes now." 
 
 "Mr. Marshall said what, Tony? Think hard and 
 tell me the very words he said." 
 
 But Tony couldn t think. 
 
 "When was it, dear?" patiently. 
 
 "Las night." 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 "Up to his house."
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST in 
 
 "How did he come to say anything about me?" 
 
 "He was pestered cause I told him your guardeen 
 had done died an hadn t lef you no money." 
 
 "Oh, Tony!" 
 
 "Yes, he was pestered, too," he declared, protest 
 ing against what he took for scepticism in her face: 
 "He was awful pestered, cause he jumped up outen 
 his cheer an walked up an down the floor lookin 
 that worrited, an sayin an sayin " 
 
 " Saying what, Tony? " desperately. 
 
 Suddenly a ray of light came: "Poor girl, what will 
 she do?" the boy repeated mechanically, and all un 
 consciously imitating Marshall s very tone of voice. 
 Mary Elizabeth was very white and quiet when she 
 asked again: 
 
 "What was it Mr. Marshall said about my going 
 away?" 
 
 "Oh, yes" the light was coming steadier now 
 "he was a-talkin to hisse f-like, an he said he was 
 goin to buy sump n f m you so you might could have 
 the money to go way f m here teacher! teacher! 
 be you sick?"
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 MARY ELIZABETH had scarcely finished pinning a 
 note in Tony s jacket, when the door of the school- 
 house opened and admitted Uncle Beck. There was 
 a flutter of excitement among the kept-in children, 
 and the little teacher s face flushed with pleasure, for 
 in all that country around there was no one man so 
 much loved and esteemed, so always welcome, as the 
 genial, kindly store-keeper. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth knew that he was there in answer 
 to her unexpressed call for sympathy, so she hurried 
 through the penitential tasks she had imposed on 
 the kept-ins and sent them on their way rejoicing, 
 that she might have a long, undisturbed chat with 
 Uncle Beck. 
 
 When the door was shut on the last hurrying 
 urchin, she turned to the old man. Uncle Beck sat 
 poking the fire and punching down the ashes as if it 
 were his one business in life. 
 
 "Wa-al, Purty," he said cheerily as she took a seat 
 beside him, " the best thing to do for a man that s in 
 trouble is to feed him. You womenfolks ain t built 
 that way, but I lowed a little sump n sweet would 
 holp you up a bit." He was feeling in his great sag 
 ging pockets, and soon brought out two big red 
 apples and a generous package of stick candy. " You 
 always was crazy bout the pepperment kind cause 
 hit was striped," he reminded her. He searched
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 113 
 
 again and this time produced a yellow paper sack of 
 something. 
 
 " Guess what," he commanded. 
 
 "Tea-cakes scalloped tea-cakes," she exclaimed, 
 her eyes answering his expectant smile. 
 
 "Now ain t that like her!" he chuckled with de 
 light. 
 
 "Like who?" 
 
 "Like the little freckle-face gal what used to swing 
 her bare legs from my counter ^n give me orders 
 about the kind she wanted me settin up, too, mind 
 you! Like the little gal what went away from here 
 an never come back." 
 
 "But she did come back, Uncle Beck," and she 
 laid one hand on his rough shoulder. 
 
 "Whar s them freckles, I d like to know?" he de 
 manded with mock suspicion. 
 
 "I took them off." 
 
 "The name o nation!" 
 
 "Yes, I did," and she smiled at his undisguised 
 astonishment. "I put a strong medicine on my 
 face that took all the skin off, and the freckles came 
 with it." 
 
 "Nachully! But did you mean to do it?" 
 
 "Why, of course." 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, I always did sorter b lieve that 
 Providence was jes prankin with us when He made 
 women." He took the pointed chin of the girl be 
 tween his thumb and forefinger and raised her head 
 up for a better look into her face. "I wonder ef He 
 ra-ally did mean you to be took in earnest."
 
 114 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "My guardian took women in earnest. He took 
 me in terrible earnest." She looked past Uncle Beck 
 to the bleakness of the winter scene outside. 
 
 "I was mighty sorry to hear bout him a-dyin , 
 Ma y Lizbeth." He had warded off the painful 
 subject as long as he could, after the manner of men. 
 "He was mighty good to you, wa n t he?" 
 
 The girl s face paled. " I am just beginning to un 
 derstand how good," she said, quietly. 
 
 Uncle Beck got very busy punching down the 
 ashes again. When he straightened up he said in a 
 more cheerful tone: 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, hit ain t that I m uncarin when 
 I talk bout business so soon, but I m mighty anxious 
 to know how he left you pervided for. Babe Davis 
 said hit s your Uncle Beck what s astin the ques 
 tion, honey " 
 
 "He didn t have anything to leave, Uncle Beck. 
 But I can work, you know; I don t mind that." And 
 she smiled tenderly as she echoed the beloved so 
 briquet. 
 
 "Too bad, too bad," and he gave the ashes another 
 vigorous punching. 
 
 "If you don t stop that we won t have any fire 
 left!" said the girl firmly. The old man desisted 
 promptly, but he had got the courage he was playing 
 for. 
 
 "Honey," he said, looking at her gravely, "have 
 you got any money left? " 
 
 "Left from what?" 
 
 "Didn t he send you money regerlar?"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 115 
 
 "No, he offered to, but I told him I would make 
 my salary do, and would not be a burden to him any 
 longer. That pleased him very much. It was not 
 that he cared for money he gave away all he made 
 but he said that the struggle would develop me." 
 
 "Wa-al, he hadn t ought to " 
 
 "Yes, he ought, Uncle Beck." 
 
 "You ain t answered me, Ma y Lizbeth." 
 
 "Oh. I have a dollar and sixty cents, I think." 
 
 "You ain t got no other dependence but jes that 
 an what you git for teachin ?" 
 
 "Well, my salary is enough." 
 
 "Yes, a plenty for present purposes, child, but ef 
 anything should happen ef you was to be took bad 
 sick or anything like that " 
 
 "Oh, I d manage some way." 
 
 "You d come to me, I hope." 
 
 " I wouldn t go to anybody. I am going to be ab 
 solutely independent. And more than that, I am 
 going to pay to those who need it what Mr. Fenwick 
 spent on me. I feel now that that was really the way 
 he always intended to have me pay him." 
 
 The old man looked worried; but the gentle smile 
 was not long out of his eyes, and after a moment or 
 two he said, quizzically: 
 
 "You ve got what I call enlargement of con 
 science, Ma y Lizbeth. I hope it ain t ketchin ." 
 
 "Well, Uncle Beck, isn t it my duty to do what I 
 can?" 
 
 "Hit s your duty to do what you can, but not what 
 you can t, Ma y Lizbeth, thar s a diff rence be-
 
 n6 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 tween the two that some folks don t always appreci 
 ate. Now jes you go slow, honey; the responsibil 
 ity ain t all yourn." 
 
 The girl looked thoughtful for a moment but then 
 said with her old emphasis: 
 
 " As much of the responsibility is mine as I can pos 
 sibly cany, Uncle Beck; that is the faith he taught 
 me." 
 
 The old man had grown grave. He was visibly 
 troubled, and started to say something, but hesi 
 tated. The next moment he shifted to his placating 
 mood again and said: 
 
 "Wa-al, honey, we ll both of us know more when 
 we re older. But goin back to the subject of 
 freckles: I m pleased to know that you ve had some 
 little experience in skinnin people alive, b cause you 
 need it in your business." 
 
 "What do you mean, Uncle Beck?" 
 
 "I mean that you ve jes nachully got to take the 
 hide off n some o them big boys. You ve got to lick 
 em, gal, an the sooner you git down to it, the better 
 hit ll be for all concerned." 
 
 "You don t know what you re talking about, 
 Uncle Beck. You just ought to come and see how 
 well they mind me. Why, there s not a single one of 
 them that would deserve a punishment like that even 
 if it were right to give it to him." 
 
 "Sh-h-h, honey, don t you never let nobody but 
 your Uncle Beck hear you say a thing like that! 
 1 Right to give hit to him ! Why, child, you ll be 
 a-sayin sassafras tea ain t good for em next! Now
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 117 
 
 you don t understand me. Hit ain t any question 
 whether or not them hulkin fellers is doin any one 
 certified thing callin for a lickin . The real ques 
 tion is that you got to break their sperits, you got 
 to tromple on em a bit; hit s a good tonic for 
 em." 
 
 The girl looked at him quickly with reproach in her 
 glance. She didn t see the twinkle in his eyes for the 
 mist that rose in her own. 
 
 "Uncle Beck, I wouldn t have thought it of you!" 
 was all she could say. 
 
 The old man leaned forward and tapped her on the 
 wrist several times with the new plug of tobacco he 
 had taken from his pocket. 
 
 " See here, child," he said, very earnestly now, " hit 
 ain t me. Ef you ve got any patent way o makin a 
 man outen a boy thout lickin him, I m agreeable. 
 But the people ain t satisfied they ain t got much 
 faith in anything but the old reliable. Mister Sykes 
 has been spreadin hit around I m tellin you this 
 for your own good, Ma y Lizbeth that you let 
 Tony Thaggin miss an miss an miss, without ever 
 hittin him a lick for it. Understand, I don t b lieve 
 hit, child, but other people do." 
 
 "Uncle Beck, Tony isn t normally bright, you 
 know." The old man nodded slowly, and she con 
 tinued: "Tell me one thing: Is Mr. Sykes any sort of 
 judge of work like mine?" 
 
 "He s sup rintendent of schools for this county, 
 Ma y Lizbeth." 
 
 "Yes, but he won t be long!"
 
 n8 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "You goin to root him out, kitten?" 
 
 "I certainly am!" 
 
 "Go slow, honey, go slow." 
 
 "Well, Uncle Beck, answer me straight out now 
 do you think Mr. Sykes has any sense? " 
 
 The old man twirled his thumbs over each other 
 for a long time in silence. 
 
 "Do you?" demanded the girl again. 
 
 "Wa-al, I was jes tryin to make my choice o 
 conclusions," he drawled at last. " You see hit s this 
 way: Ef Sykes is a smart man, then I m a damn fool, 
 an ef he s a damn fool, I ve got the sense. I ll let 
 you know later what I decide. But he ain t no easy 
 mark, Ma y Lizbeth, don t git that into your head. 
 Only last week he kep a jury hung for forty-eight 
 hours an had a mistrial declared at last. He told me 
 in confidence that he turned down eleven of the con- 
 trariest men he ever sot his eyes on." The old man 
 waited a minute for an answering smile, then he 
 reached over and patted her gently on the head: 
 
 "Hit s time to laugh, Ma y Lizbeth!" 
 
 The girl smiled obediently, a little wonderingly, 
 perhaps, but still she smiled. That much conces 
 sion made, she reverted to her original contention: 
 
 " I want you to know that I appreciate your advice, 
 Uncle Beck, but I ll just have to use my own judg 
 ment in dealing with Mr. Sykes." 
 
 The county superintendent of education disposed 
 of, she abruptly revived a topic which the old man 
 fondly thought he had quashed as between them long 
 before.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 119 
 
 "Uncle Beck, why won t anybody ever talk to me 
 about White-faced Silas?" 
 
 "Why most prob ly cause thar ain t nothin to 
 say bout him, I reckon. What is it you partic lar 
 want to know?" 
 
 "Did he have a son, and disown him? Didn t 
 he?" 
 
 "No, he didn t." 
 
 "Are you sure?" 
 
 "Dead sure." 
 
 "Well that can t be it, then," musingly. Then 
 she said, as if to herself: "Yet the house belongs to 
 the heirs of the ghost." 
 
 "What you talkin bout, Ma y Lizbeth?" 
 
 "I was thinking about the stranger there now." 
 
 " Wa-al, you minded me so nice bout Mister Sykes, 
 I m goin to give you another piece of advice: Don t 
 think too much bout that stranger thar now. " 
 
 "Why?" she demanded, with her eyes steadily on 
 his own. 
 
 "I don t like him." 
 
 The girl s lips parted and then closed again in 
 silence. After a little she asked abruptly: "Uncle 
 Beck, how did he get possession of the haunted 
 house?" 
 
 Was it consternation that she surprised in his 
 kind old eyes? 
 
 "How how should I know?" he asked in return; 
 but he kept his eyes on hers as he answered: "I do 
 know one thing though, honey, an that is you d 
 better let that old place and ever thing connected
 
 with hit severely alone. Take my advice in this one 
 thing for a change." 
 
 "Well and you tell me this one thing for a 
 change : What makes Bud Davis hate me like he 
 does?" 
 
 "With my two eyes on the purty face of you, 
 child, I couldn t possible guess." 
 
 The old store-keeper suddenly found it necessary to 
 get up and go to the window to see if his horse was 
 still standing. 
 
 "Dan l is mighty onruly this cold weather," he 
 explained. 
 
 "Then it must be against your rules for Dan l to 
 go to sleep, for that s what he s doing every time I 
 see him," declared the girl with a quick touch of 
 temper. "No, it s just your way of putting me off 
 whenever I ask you anything." 
 
 The old man turned round suddenly, facing her, 
 but his back was to the strong light. 
 
 "Look here, gal, don t you dispute my word! In 
 p int of fact now, I ve always answered ever thing 
 you ast. You ve jes gone an got the notion into 
 your head that thar s a powerful myst ry bout that 
 old white-faced ha nt, an thar ain t. That s the 
 whole of it! Now, in the name o common sense, 
 what is hit you re a-drivin at?" 
 
 "Nothing," firmly and finally. 
 
 "Jes what I lowed!" 
 
 But in a moment or two he went over to the sulk 
 ing girl, and, taking his seat beside her, put his 
 kindly old hand on her brown hair. "Le s make up,
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 121 
 
 honey. Your Uncle Beck is jes plumb weak about 
 you, ef he does have to scold you sometimes." 
 
 The girl put one soft little hand on his own, and 
 the old man continued, with a smile: 
 
 "Speakin o quarrellin , Ma y Lizbeth, did you 
 ever hear bout the hard feelin s that was stirred up 
 here onct bout that coffin?" 
 
 "Why, what coffin, Uncle Beck?" 
 
 "The coffin Dilsey Sellers bought for her step 
 mother what was Melissa s second cousin," said the 
 old man, playing for her interest. "You see the 
 whole trouble was that Dilsey was a little too pre 
 vious, for the old lady wasn t good dead, though she 
 was mighty nigh onto hit. Hit was when the old 
 woman was at her sickest that Dilsey went to Simp- 
 kinsville to sell her cotton, an up an come back 
 with the coffin. Hit seems that Dilsey wa nt so 
 much to blame as you might think, for while she was 
 in town she seen a mighty takin show-winder whar 
 they was offerin coffins dirt-cheap, an besides, the 
 store-keeper told her that thar never was such another 
 cut in coffins sence the world begun an never would 
 be ag in, and that that was jes nachully her last 
 chance. So Dilsey got excited-like an bought one 
 of the onery things an come a-drivin home with hit 
 in the waggin. 
 
 "Wa-al, sir, old Mis Sellers was the maddest sick 
 oman you ever sot your two eyes on ! She told Dilsey 
 right up an down that she was a-goin to git well jes 
 to spite her; an she riz up from that bed, then an 
 thar, an never went back to hit except for to sleep 
 at night, an a mighty hard time they had a-gittin
 
 122 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 her to do that, at first. An ef you ll b lieve me, she 
 got plum well an fat so fat that she outgrowed the 
 coffin. When hit got to that pass, Dilsey stopped 
 speakin to her, an she had to go way over in Walker 
 to live with a grandchild o hers by her first hus 
 band." 
 
 "But what in the world did poor Dilsey do with 
 the coffin, Uncle Beck?" 
 
 "Kept hit, of course. Dilsey ain t rich enough to 
 th ow away seventeen dollars and ninety-eight cents. 
 Wa-al, she didn t have no place to put hit whar hit 
 wouldn t show hit s bull-necked self an skeer folks, 
 so she slid hit under the bed to keep her dirty clo es 
 in. They say Lil she s the blind one, you know 
 is might nigh crazy bout hits bein thar in the house, 
 an thinks she runs ag in hit ever way she turns. 
 When Dilsey starts to go off an leave Lil by herself 
 she leads her up to the bed an makes her stoop down 
 an put her hand on the coffin to show her that hit s 
 safe outen her way; but all the same, Lil says, Dilsey 
 ain t more n out o hearin before the thing gits out 
 in some way an is under her feet ag in." 
 
 "Oh, horrors! Why doesn t Dilsey throw the 
 awful old thing away? " the girl asked, aghast. 
 
 "Why, Dilsey can t afford hit. You see she s 
 a-keepin hit, lookin to the time when one o the 
 neighbors will need hit an she ll git her money back. 
 But la, honey! The presence o that thar coffin has 
 acted like a course o bitters to the whole passel of 
 us. We ve been the wellest bunch you ever sot eyes 
 on ever sence hits arrival amongst us all, that is, 
 except Grandma Thaggin, an she declares hit s too
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 123 
 
 short for her by a good three inches, ef Dilsey got 
 anything like a decent fit for her ma." 
 
 "And is it that which makes Dilsey so unpopular? " 
 Mary Elizabeth asked. 
 
 "Wa-al, Dilsey is one o them people that s born 
 unpop lar, honey, but of course this here coffin 
 scrape set her back still further. Hit s left her in 
 a delicate siterwation with the neighbors, so to speak. 
 You see the people, specially the smajl-sized ones, 
 can t help suspicionin her when she asts how they 
 feel, an thar air them what wouldn t eat a meal o 
 her victuals for the world." 
 
 "Uncle Beck, you don t treat the poor thing that 
 way, I know!" 
 
 "Lord no, child, I m a good six inches longer than 
 any Sellers I ever seen!" 
 
 The shadows had been charmed away from the 
 deep-blue eyes of the girl, so the old man gathered 
 his legs together and rose to go. 
 
 "Dan l is wakin up, so I ll have to be goin , 
 child." 
 
 As the girl rose to say good-by and stood for a 
 moment with both hands grasping the lapels of his 
 overcoat, he took a tender hold of each of her wrists 
 and looked deep into her eyes. 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth," he said with concern, "I m in 
 dead earnest bout this here school business. I want 
 you to ac harsher to them boys you kin do it all 
 right ef you jest let that thar temper go. An listen 
 to me: I want you to make up to Mister Sykes, you 
 jest can t afford to make a enemy out o him!"
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 WHEN John Marshall tethered his horse to a sap 
 ling near the school-house the next afternoon, he 
 found himself a few minutes early, for the children 
 were just then trooping down the steps and turning 
 faces north, east, south, and west toward home. 
 While waiting for them to disperse, the man took 
 from his pocket a little folded paper that Tony had 
 delivered to him the evening before, and unfolded it 
 and read again: 
 
 I hardly hope that you will respond to this, but I am very 
 anxious to see you, and wish you would come to the school 
 to-morrow at four o clock. 
 
 MARY ELIZABETH DALE. 
 
 He refolded and replaced the note as the last tow- 
 headed urchin decamped down the big road. 
 
 The teacher had come to the door to see the chil 
 dren off, and now stood on the threshold in the golden 
 rays of the declining sun an all-unconscious study 
 in the beautiful. The yellow radiance waked a deep 
 and glowing response from the heavier meshes of 
 her dark hair, and burnished to gold the crest of 
 every glossy wave, the airy spiral of every truant curl. 
 Her delicate lips were warmer to-day, and warmer 
 the light in her violet eyes. 
 
 The poet-painter would have sung or painted the 
 
 124
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 125 
 
 spirit incarnate in and dominating the beautiful self 
 of her as she shaded her eyes with one hand and 
 looked long and longingly adown the yellow distance 
 looked for one, only whose outward seeming she 
 felt could ever come again. 
 
 But John Marshall was neither poet nor painter. 
 He was just a man, and he saw with the eyes of a 
 man. A warm flush overspread his habitually cold 
 features, and a refining something smoothed away 
 the suggestion of cruelty which sometimes marred 
 the strong lines of his mouth. As he now came out 
 of the pine thicket which had hidden him from view 
 and presented himself before her, he looked much 
 like the man with whom she had spent many a hal 
 cyon afternoon exploring the radiant woodways and 
 whatever thoughtways a man and a maid may travel 
 together. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth did not extend her hand, and Mar 
 shall only removed his hat and answered formally her 
 own formal greeting as he followed her into the 
 school-house. 
 
 "I was afraid you wouldn t come," she said, sign 
 ing him to a chair near the glowing stove. 
 
 "You mean you knew that I would." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth looked at him quickly, but his eyes 
 had nothing to say to her. He stood waiting for her 
 to be seated. When the two had taken seats before 
 the comfortable fire, the girl said, but with very evi 
 dent hesitation: 
 
 "I did you an injustice yesterday." 
 
 Marshall turned and looked straight into her eyes.
 
 126 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 There was a question in his own, but he did not put 
 it into words. He waited for her to speak further. 
 
 "I didn t know then that that" he might 
 have helped her, but he didn t, not even when a 
 pained flush crept up from her slender throat, and big 
 threatening tears filled her deep eyes "I didn t 
 know then why you wanted to buy it!" 
 
 The man, who had been watching her every change 
 of expression, suddenly leaned forward for a keen look 
 into her face. 
 
 "What do you know now?" he asked. 
 
 "That you don t want it at all but are just trying 
 to give me the money so I can get out of all this." 
 
 Something in her voice seemed to unnerve him. 
 
 "Whoever said that told a falsehood!" he ex 
 claimed vehemently. 
 
 "Then you told one yourself." 
 
 "I never said that to a single soul. How on earth 
 did you get such a notion into your head?" 
 
 The girl had wiped away the too imminent tears 
 and was making a brave effort to meet his deeply 
 concerned eyes. 
 
 " Then that parrot Tony must have picked up what 
 was an unconscious exclamation with you, when he 
 told you the other night about Mr. Fenwick s death 
 and about his not having left me anything." 
 
 Marshall tried to break in, but she wouldn t let him. 
 "And yesterday, after after I had so misjudged 
 you, and let you go away, Tony came in and told 
 me what you had said and and I wrote you to 
 come. I I wanted to tell you I was sorry." Her
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 127 
 
 hands were over her face now but something shining 
 dropped from between her fingers. 
 
 The man watched the heaving of her bosom in des 
 peration. He put out his hand once as if to touch 
 the white fingers that were pressed to her eyes, but 
 he drew back, and ended, as he usually ended his 
 tense moods, by taking a quick turn up and down 
 the room. When he had spent his nervousness he 
 stopped behind the bench on which the girl was 
 seated and leaned over her with his arms extended 
 along the back of it as if to shelter her. 
 
 "Child," he said, "nothing, nothing in the world 
 is worth your tears. It s all right what you said 
 to me. I don t mind it a bit now. You just didn t 
 understand; and you don t understand other things 
 which have made you bitter against me. But some 
 day you will, and and then it will be all right be 
 tween us. Little girl " 
 
 Make me understand now ! There was passion 
 ate appeal in her voice as she answered him. A new 
 mood was upon her. She dried her eyes now and 
 flung back the tendril curls from her face. She was 
 leaning toward him, but the fading daylight and 
 flickering fire rendered uncertain the thing that was 
 deepest in her eyes. "Make me understand." One 
 restless little hand was on his coat-sleeve now, and 
 he was fain to answer its appeal. 
 
 "Why," he said uncertainly, "you know so little 
 of business methods I m afraid I can t." But the 
 appealing touch was still on his arm and he had to 
 make the effort. "Now this is the situation: The
 
 128 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 ancestors of these people took up their abode here 
 on lands which belonged to the Creek Indians but 
 which were shortly ceded by the Creeks to the gov 
 ernment. They did not establish legal claims to their 
 homesteads. And, still without legal claim, their 
 descendants have continued to squat on the land, 
 rent-free, and tax-free, vegetating here, and blocking 
 the advance of progress. Ten years ago I conceived 
 the project I explained to you yesterday of buying 
 up the whole tract from the natives. I did not then 
 know that a large part of the land was government 
 property, but I did know, however, that the titles to 
 some of the farms I bought were shaky. I was will 
 ing to risk something to get a foothold here, so I 
 traded through my agents with every property owner 
 who could be induced to sell, even buying shaky titles 
 with the hope of ultimately steadying them on their 
 legs. This trading had to be done quickly, because 
 it is characteristic of the hillite to take panic at any 
 sort of land trade. My agents had their orders to 
 buy outright all that could be bought, for the deeds 
 would be good at least as quitclaims, and would sat 
 isfy the people themselves, as well as put it out of 
 their power to balk the enterprise. I was going to 
 
 straighten out titles later " 
 
 The appealing touch was removed from his coat- 
 sleeve, and the man seemed to find it harder to con 
 tinue "But some of them did take panic in spite 
 of all our precautions, and refused point-blank to 
 sell at any price. This man, Bud Davis, gave my 
 agents a great deal of trouble, and was, together with
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 129 
 
 Trav Williams, finally instrumental in frightening 
 them away. Since that time I have put first one 
 agent and then another on the job, but only to have 
 each one come and merely take a look at the situa 
 tion and then show it a fair pair of heels. Lastly, I 
 came myself. Of course none of them connect me 
 with these earlier land deals as my name was kept 
 out of them and they have never seen me before." 
 
 The listening girl had straightened up, and the 
 little movement suddenly seemed to put her immeas 
 urably far away from him. The winter twilight was 
 creeping around them, and the dying fire no longer 
 lighted her fathomless eyes. 
 
 "Well," continued Marshall, with a deep-drawn 
 breath, "I soon found out that nearly all the land I 
 had been unable to get hold of was public land and 
 belonged to a tract that was open to entry. I then 
 set about buying up what is known as military- 
 bounty land warrants and having them located on 
 this land, paying the government the difference in the 
 values." And with a sudden tightening of the lips 
 he concluded: 
 
 " I am paying Uncle Sam and the warrant holders 
 for it, and the squatters may go hang. If they had 
 taken my offer, years ago, they would have got a fair 
 market price for what they hadn t the shadow of a 
 claim to." 
 
 "Make me understand." It was not the trem 
 bling lips that had spoken again, but only a pleading 
 gesture. The tone of the man s voice had changed 
 when he took up the story again:
 
 130 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "Where the titles were good, I paid all that they 
 were worth, and paid also, in some instances, extor 
 tionate prices for lands whose titles were not then 
 established. Some of these tracts I shall have paid 
 for twice once to the squatter claimant and once to 
 the warrant holders" and then with a reversion to 
 his old mood again "but that was because I was a 
 fool at first in my hurry to gain possession. If the 
 Davises and their ilk get anything out of me, I ll 
 know it." 
 
 "Do you really mean that you are going to 
 take these people s homes away from them?" She 
 seemed to speak to him from an infinitely remote 
 distance. 
 
 "No, I merely mean that I am going to buy from 
 the government property which belongs to it, and 
 then require the people who have had illegal enjoy 
 ment of it for generations to move off and make way 
 for civilization." 
 
 "But you are going to pay them for their lands?" 
 
 "No, I am going to pay the rightful owner for the 
 lands. These people had their chance to skin me, 
 but they have lost it." 
 
 "Yes, but who is the rightful owner? Who is the 
 rightful owner?" she urged desperately. "In the 
 last analysis, doesn t the land belong to the one who 
 conquers it conquers it from wild men and wild 
 nature?" 
 
 "Why," he replied, looking up quickly as if to as 
 sure himself that it was really this slim girl creature 
 that had challenged, "why, I suppose that in the last
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 131 
 
 analysis, land doesn t really belong to anybody, but 
 is the property of the race." 
 
 "Then by what right do you propose to usurp this 
 great tract of it?" 
 
 "By the right of the strongest, I suppose." 
 
 " The world even your world will never sanction 
 such a principle as this!" 
 
 "It countenances the practice every day." 
 
 "But if they if these people should prove the 
 stronger?" 
 
 "Then the world would roll comfortably over to 
 their side by a simple law of ethical gravitation pe 
 culiar to itself." 
 
 "And there is a chance for them?" The leaping 
 flame from a freshly fallen brand in the stove an 
 swered the spring of fire to the eyes of the girl. She 
 was leaning toward Marshall now with an appeal 
 that he could not withstand. 
 
 "Yes, there is one chance," he answered, slowly. 
 
 "What is it?" her lips were parted with expect 
 ancy. She all but laid her hand on his breast in her 
 eagerness for his reply. 
 
 Marshall looked deep into her eyes for a moment, 
 and then asked: 
 
 "Is this honorable warfare?" 
 
 The fire died out of the beautiful eyes as quickly 
 as it had kindled. The man looked troubled. 
 
 " Try to see it in the right light," he urged. " It is 
 the history of all progress that the weak, the inef 
 fectual, go down before it it is their punishment for 
 being ineffectual. No, hear me out," he protested,
 
 132 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 as her lips parted to interrupt. " This is an inevitable 
 change. These people must submit or break under 
 it. Those of them who have given way and accepted 
 the conditions of change will ultimately reap the ben 
 efits that follow as its natural results. Those who 
 oppose themselves to it must go down before it." 
 
 "But this is not an inevitable change/" the girl 
 pleaded. "Just suppose, for instance, that you were 
 to agree to what I beg of you and leave them undis 
 turbed, to work out for themselves a civilization which 
 would make, without breaking them." 
 
 But the man replied: "Even if I were to listen to 
 you, they would not then be left free, but would only 
 be the prey of the first exploiter who was not so weak 
 as to let a woman unman him. See here, these 
 people are not the owners of the lands. They them 
 selves are the usurpers, and they are in danger of 
 being dispossessed any day. Try to understand 
 that." If she made the effort she seemed not to have 
 succeeded, for she asked in the very next breath : 
 "But there is one way out of this, you said?" 
 "Yes, there is always one way in the hills." 
 The girl answered his quick, searching glance with 
 the reflective, questioning look of one who has failed 
 to comprehend, and then the man took up his theme 
 again. 
 
 "Look at the matter dispassionately for a moment. 
 These people have been here for generations, and 
 they have not in all that time worked out for them 
 selves any degree of civilization which is worth while. 
 You know that, yourself. Now what they need, and
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 133 
 
 what they must have, is a stimulus from the outside. 
 If they are forced out of their intrenchments here, 
 they will be brought into direct contact with modern 
 progress. A railroad centre, such as we purpose to 
 build about twenty miles south of here, will wake 
 up the whole district. Manufacturing plants will be 
 erected in which the people and their children can 
 find work. They will be brought into contact with 
 everything which educates which civilizes. Why, 
 it is the very best thing that could happen to 
 them!" 
 
 " Is this your motive or your excuse ? Mary Eliza 
 beth had a strange feeling that it was not herself 
 who had spoken, but that ever-present other. 
 
 For fully a minute, silence and a deepening twi 
 light intervened between questioner and questioned; 
 then John Marshall deliberately opened the door of 
 the heater, stirred the sluggish fire to flame again, 
 and turned for a sharp survey of the girl s face. 
 
 "Is it your motive or your excuse?" Mary Eliza 
 beth echoed. 
 
 "It is my justification," the man answered her. 
 
 "But your motive?" she urged. 
 
 "Have you any right to put that question?" 
 
 "If you haven t the courage to answer it, let s say 
 that I haven t the right." 
 
 Marshall s face was suddenly overspread with a 
 deep flush. "I am doing it for the money that is hi 
 it," he replied, defiantly. 
 
 "And the hearts that you break?" 
 
 "Business gives little consideration to broken
 
 134 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 hearts" and then, with a smile that made her 
 shrink inwardly, "but it often has to take broken 
 heads into its accounting." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth rose to her feet, and the visitor 
 was fain to follow her example. There was a long 
 silence between the two, and then the girl said, very 
 quietly: 
 
 "You have not made me understand." 
 
 "Well, why should you? Oh, I didn t mean that. 
 Little girl little woman I m not all brute! I 
 meant I meant good God! I don t mean any 
 thing but that I love you! I love you! Do you un 
 derstand that?" He would have caught her to him, 
 but the girl broke away, and stood trembling before 
 him with again the something in her eyes which the 
 firelight had not the power to interpret. 
 
 "I love you," he pleaded. "And I want to save 
 you from yourself. I want to save you from the 
 despair that your mistaken ideals will condemn you 
 to. You are trying to fight out single-handed the 
 battle of the ages, child. You are trying to settle, 
 with your woman s strength, a contest that involves 
 on the two sides of it the sum total of the fighting 
 strength of the race. Give it up, and let the victory 
 go, as victories always have gone, as they always will 
 go, to the strongest. Give it up, little girl, and let 
 me do the fighting for the two of us. I love you 
 darling, I love you! Come to me, believe in me 
 and trust to the future to understand!" 
 
 The flickering flame dropped low. The two of them 
 were face to face in the faintly illumined shadow.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 135 
 
 "Come!" he repeated and then yet again 
 "Come!" 
 
 The girl raised her head slowly and surrendered 
 her eyes to the summoning power of his own. She 
 took one trembling step forward in answer to the ap 
 peal of his outstretched arms, but all suddenly a 
 grave-eyed memory stepped between. 
 
 With a low cry Mary Elizabeth drew back and 
 covered her face with her hands. 
 
 Marshall dropped his arms at his sides as if he, 
 too, recognized that a something compelling had in 
 tervened. He stood very still watching her. After 
 a moment or two of silence he touched her on the 
 arm. 
 
 The girl looked up in answer. No, she was not 
 crying; the something in her eyes that she had mo 
 mentarily veiled from him was too big for tears. 
 
 The school-house door opened noisily on its hinges 
 and admitted the long, gaunt form of Babe Davis.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 DAYLIGHT and moonlight blended so softly, so per 
 fectly that Mary Elizabeth could not have told which 
 it was that best lighted her stumbling, unassisted 
 steps as she followed Babe Davis along a strange 
 short-cut home that evening, leaving Marshall to 
 pursue a widely deviating path alone. 
 
 There was light enough for the way that she had 
 chosen, but the way itself was hard, and was made 
 harder still by the realization that that other man 
 would have smoothed that other way for her unaccus 
 tomed feet. But here was light enough for her 
 progress a mingled, uncertain light, perhaps, but 
 still enough by which to go forward, so she followed 
 the man of her people. 
 
 As she walked on now in silence behind the tall, 
 rugged form of Babe Davis, Mary Elizabeth went 
 over and over again in her mind the meeting of the 
 two men. She could not explain it to herself, for 
 there seemed to be some sort of understanding be 
 tween them, whereas she had thought them strangers 
 to each other. 
 
 She reviewed the meeting in detail now with a con 
 scious effort to solve the enigma, recalling the princi 
 pals as she had seen them, face to face. She saw 
 again the dark look with which the rustic fixed the 
 other; and she saw, too, the level, open, unwaver- 
 
 136
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 137 
 
 ing gaze with which the stranger met that look as 
 he went straight up to Davis out into the fullest 
 light. 
 
 John Marshall had extended his hand to the in 
 truder, she remembered, and had spoken as to one 
 whom he knew well; but Babe had drawn back with 
 a growl, while for an instant there was lightning- 
 play across the surface of his obtruding eyes. 
 
 Then she herself had spoken to relieve the tense 
 ness of the situation, and Babe had explained that 
 he came to take her home because it was getting so 
 late. 
 
 And then it was that she had made plain her final 
 decision and answered with one little sentence all 
 that John Marshall had poured out to her. She 
 had paused a moment on the threshold and, looking 
 back at him, had said simply: 
 
 "I am going home. Good-by." 
 
 And here she was she and this type of her people 
 taking the rough way together by a light that was 
 uncertain at best. 
 
 And as she followed she asked: "Babe, why didn t 
 you shake hands with Mr. Marshall?" 
 
 Silence. 
 
 "Babe, why didn t you shake hands with Mr. 
 Marshall?" 
 
 "I dunno," with a growl. 
 
 "Babe, do you know anything against him?" she 
 queried. 
 
 A long silence, and then: "No." 
 
 "Then why didn t you shake hands with him?"
 
 138 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "Idunno." 
 
 Suddenly Babe came to a stand-still and slowly 
 removed his soft wool hat. 
 
 "What is it?" She came up beside him and saw 
 at his feet a little mound of earth. There was a 
 board standing about a foot high at one end. 
 
 "Who is it?" she changed her question to. 
 
 "My father." 
 
 "Why was he buried here, Babe, so far from the 
 others?" Mary Elizabeth looked away to where 
 she knew the graveyard to be located, some three 
 hundred yards down the valley. 
 
 "He said for us to put him here his conscience 
 was that tender " 
 
 "Uncle Beck told me that he was one of the best 
 men in all this region, Babe." 
 
 "Yes, yes, he was good. An he was quiet 
 an peaceablelike, an that kind You wouldn t 
 a- thought that " he paused with his eyes on the 
 mound. 
 
 "What, Babe?" 
 
 "He killed a man. That s why he wanted to be 
 put here, out in the field by hisself." 
 
 "Why, Babe, everybody says that he was so 
 gentle " 
 
 "That was the trouble. The other feller was cal- 
 culatin on his gentleness and taxed hit a little too 
 fur." 
 
 "What are all these rocks for?" she asked, retreat 
 ing from a subject that seemed too sacred. 
 
 "I been fetchin em here in my wheelborror, from
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 139 
 
 the cave, to build a wall about hit so nothin can t 
 tech hit. I can t stand him lyin out like this. You 
 see, ef I wall hit in good an strong, thar ain t nothin 
 can happen to hit." 
 
 " Unless the waters cover it ! " the girl s sympathetic 
 heart cried out within her. 
 
 Tired from her rough tramp, Mary Elizabeth sat 
 down on one of the big rocks that he had brought to 
 protect his dead from desecration, and Babe fol 
 lowed her example. 
 
 And there beside the grave of the man whose 
 patience had been taxed once a little too far, the girl 
 asked: 
 
 "Babe, how would you like to move away from 
 here?" 
 
 "I ain t never to find out how I d like hit." 
 
 "You are never going?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Have you ever thought how you would like living 
 in a city and working in a big factory, or something 
 like that?" 
 
 "Wa-al, he tried hit onct," and he looked at his 
 father s grave again, "an they ground the life and 
 spent outen him them what was on top an all 
 but starved him. So he come back here an went to 
 work on his own land ag in what his father had left 
 to him, an his father had left him" 
 
 "And he loved his land and took a pride in owning 
 it, and in the fact that his father had owned it before 
 him?" the girl questioned, eagerly, "and it was like 
 a part of himself, and stood for his manhood his 
 independence? "
 
 140 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The sluggish native fired at her quick sympathy, 
 and a deep emotion caused his scraggy throat to fill 
 as he answered: 
 
 "He used to say that thar weren t no other way 
 for a man to be a man! What s the matter, Ma y 
 Lizbeth?" 
 
 "Oh, nothing." 
 
 The next moment a loose stone, unsettled from 
 its position, rolled down from the heap and onto the 
 soft turf that covered the grave. Babe got up in 
 stantly to remove the desecrating bowlder, and for 
 some minutes busied himself piling up the stones that 
 lay scattered about. 
 
 The light was clearer now. What John Marshall 
 had called the prettiest proposition he had ever got 
 his hands on that peaceful mountain valley lay 
 under the moonlight, a stretch of darkling, shimmer 
 ing silver, with never a suggestion of tragedy in all 
 its length and breadth. A little around the slope 
 yonder slept the men who had conquered the wil 
 derness; and here before her, lifting great rocks 
 into place by the giant strength of his gnarled and 
 knotted muscles, was the scion of their hardihood 
 putting forth all the rugged physical strength that 
 was his, for the sake of a sentiment that burned 
 within him. 
 
 And as Mary Elizabeth watched the crude strength 
 of the man as she read again, by the soft but cer 
 tain light of the moon now high in the heavens, the 
 look of lofty independence that illumined his gro 
 tesque features she realized, all too poignantly, that 
 there was no other way for this man to be a man.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 141 
 
 For here only were industrial foes such as he could 
 grapple with and conquer; here only, for him, the 
 exercise of his masculine, dominant spirit of inde 
 pendence; here the honored footprints of his fore 
 fathers; and here his altar fires. 
 
 But this man must go down; and John Marshall 
 would say that it was his punishment for being "in 
 effectual." " Ineffectual ! " the phrase so almost con 
 vincing, when fresh from the lips that were touched 
 with cruelty, now re-echoed in the heart of the girl 
 with a different ring. "Ineffectual" to what end? 
 Perhaps to John Marshall s purpose of crushing the 
 many that he and his favored few might reap wealth 
 and power; but not ineffectual here in fulfilling 
 the divine purpose, the up-building of "charac 
 ter"! The last word seemed to be supplied to her 
 from without herself. It was as if he had said it 
 that memory of a man! 
 
 And he had said it. She remembered now the 
 words that he had spoken to her so many, many 
 months ago: "Not wealth, nor power, nor culture, 
 not religious conviction itself is worth while except 
 as it reacts on the character of its possessor." 
 
 When Babe Davis came back and resumed his seat 
 on the bowlder near her, he had suddenly become to 
 her at once the embodiment of the cause which she 
 was so fiercely championing, and the archetype of the 
 people whom it had become hers to defend. The 
 disaster which she knew this sweeping away of the 
 old order would wreak in the spirit of this man, was 
 magnified by its imminent nearness into disaster to
 
 142 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 all of the community who would be subjected to the 
 change; and his native nobility of character, by a 
 like nearness of perspective, became to her represen 
 tative of all her people, and the natural, typical 
 product of the life they lived. So when the big, 
 rough, but nobly gentle man took his seat a little 
 below her this time a little nearer to her feet the 
 girl had accepted the cup that seemed pressed to 
 her lips, and had determined to drink it to whatever 
 dregs of heart-break to herself lay in the last drops 
 of it. 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth," said her companion, in the tone 
 of one recalling another from sleep, " Ma y Lizbeth? " 
 
 "Yes, Babe." 
 
 "Be you a-goin to marry him?" 
 
 "No!" and then again and more emphatically, 
 "No!" 
 
 "For true, Ma y Lizbeth?" 
 
 "Don t we always speak the truth to each other, 
 Babe?" Mary Elizabeth did not see the deep swell 
 of his rugged breast; she only noted an added hesi 
 tation in his words as he asked again: 
 
 "How long air you goin to live here?" 
 
 "Always." 
 
 "I m mighty glad!" was the simple answer, but 
 the timbre of his deep, rough voice said: "Thank 
 God!" When he spoke again it was to ask, but still 
 hesitatingly: 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, how long did you go to school?" 
 
 "About ten years in all. But I didn t study like 
 I should have done. Why? "
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 143 
 
 "Could you a-learned what thai is in books 
 quicker, ef you had a-studied?" 
 
 "What I did learn, yes, in half the time." 
 
 "Wa-al, you was little, most of the time. Could 
 anybody what started with grown-up sense and 
 worked awful hard learn hit all all what you know 
 ra-al soon?" 
 
 "Why, yes, Babe, I don t know much." 
 
 "I m mighty glad." 
 
 "You are glad I don t know much?" 
 
 "No, I m glad I kin learn the books quick." 
 
 "Oh, Babe, do you want to study? Do you want 
 me to teach you?" 
 
 "That d depend." 
 
 "Depend?" 
 
 Mary Elizabeth saw his great hand touch timidly 
 and reverently the hem of her dress, and then he 
 said, this time with a mighty struggle: 
 
 "I I love you." 
 
 "Why, Babe!" 
 
 "Yes, I do, Ma y Lizbeth, I clare fore God I do." 
 
 "But, Babe " 
 
 "I ll learn all the books, Ma y Lizbeth, I ll learn 
 em ever one! An hit won t make no diff rence 
 tall to me bout your people bein " The man 
 caught himself abruptly and stopped. 
 
 "My people being what, Babe?" 
 
 " Bout your people bein bout your people 
 bein oh, bout em all bein dead, Ma y Lizbeth. 
 Hit wouldn t make no diff rence to me tall. An 
 I d "
 
 144 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "But, Babe, let me tell -- " 
 
 "Ain t we the same kind o folks? Ain t we had 
 the same bornin here? " he interrupted, feverishly. 
 
 "Yes, Babe, but - " 
 
 "But what?" 
 
 "I just couldn t." 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, I ll fetch all the water for you." 
 
 "Oh, I couldn t!" 
 
 "This is mine," he urged, comprehending in a 
 proud gesture the wide clearing in which they were; 
 "I d build you a house with my own hands on the 
 land that my father worked, and his father before 
 him." 
 
 "No, no, Babe!" 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, I wouldn t let ma an Bud set 
 they foot on the place, ef you didn t want em 
 to." 
 
 "You think you couldn t now, Ma y Lizbeth, but 
 after you d done larnt me the books hit would all be 
 even up between us an an mebbe - " 
 
 "Babe," she said, with a sudden fierce determining, 
 "Babe, you must give up this thought for always. 
 I can t marry anybody. I am going to devote my 
 life to doing the thing that I am here for. I am 
 going to do my duty by my people." 
 
 The girl started. Was it a hoarse, smothered sob 
 that she heard as he turned away? She laid both 
 hands on his shoulder. "Babe," she said tenderly. 
 
 But he drew away from the touch of her hands. 
 "I know what it is," he said, hoarsely; "you think I
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 145 
 
 can t learn books!" He got up and strode away 
 proudly, stopping shortly with arms folded, but with 
 his head bowed. Mary Elizabeth followed him with 
 hurried steps. She went straight up to him and 
 placed both hands on his arm. 
 
 "Babe," she said, pleadingly, "it isn t that, believe 
 me. You are the best and noblest man I know, 
 and you have the wisdom that counts the most. It 
 isn t that, Babe. It is " in his eyes still was hurt 
 beyond expressing, and the girl said, with sudden 
 desperation, "it s because my own heart is broken. 
 I love John Marshall and I have had to give him 
 up." 
 
 Dazed at first, and almost unhearing, the man re 
 garded her for a moment with an expression in the 
 density of which seemed to mingle flickerings of 
 mad triumph and a something more ignoble still; and 
 then an overwhelming tenderness, before which all 
 thought of self gave way, swept over his rugged face. 
 He was not awkward or self-conscious now as he 
 took both her cold little hands in his own in self- 
 forgetful pity. 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, honey, what s the trouble? 
 Don t he love you yet?" 
 
 "Yes, he loves me in his way." 
 
 The man kindled to fierceness in the space of a 
 moment: "An ain t his way the honest way?" he 
 demanded. 
 
 "Oh, yes, yes! It s not that. It s in his own 
 supremely selfish way. Not like you, Babe, not like 
 you!" The .moonlight did not show the sudden
 
 146 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 rebound to hope in the eyes of him as he answered, 
 eagerly: 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, ef you would only let me show 
 you how much 
 
 But the girl stopped him. "You can show me 
 how much, Babe, by believing what I tell you, and 
 by being to me what you have been from the first, 
 my trusted friend. Oh, Babe, I need you! I need 
 you as you were to me before. The others here hate 
 me, and they are making it cruelly hard for me oh, 
 you don t know how much I need a, friend!" 
 
 The strong grasp on her fingers grew infinitely 
 tender. "You ve got one, Ma y Lizbeth, right here. 
 I ain t never goin to pester you, honey, no more. I 
 ain t never goin to think about myse f ag in. I m 
 goin to think about you I m goin to think about 
 you." 
 
 The moon still afforded sufficient, if uncertain, 
 light to guide their footsteps as they made their way 
 home. And by the uncertain inner light that was 
 hers as they went, Mary Elizabeth thought out the 
 problem before her to its bitter conclusion : 
 
 John Marshall was a wicked man, and she had 
 been wicked to treat with him for even a minute, to 
 listen to his smooth "business" sophistries. She 
 owed it to her people never again to listen to his 
 specious arguments against their interests; she owed 
 it to herself never again to allow him to profane to 
 her the sacred name of love by protestations of his 
 wholly selfish passion. 
 
 The soft light of the waning moon rested upon
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 147 
 
 the girl s uplifted countenance like a benediction as 
 she finally determined to break off all intercourse 
 with John Marshall, now and forever; but a little 
 later, the one board shutter of the porch-room had 
 been drawn close, and Mary Elizabeth was face 
 downward in the black dark.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 THE next evening, when the lights blended to 
 gether again, hiding the margin where day slips into 
 night, John Marshall was far from the little school- 
 house where Mary Elizabeth had bidden him "good- 
 by," and well out of the life of which it was the 
 centre. He had ridden hard for the last two hours, 
 but now, his journey being practically accomplished, 
 he reined his horse into a walk, and relaxed his own 
 nerve tension. 
 
 The man was thinking thinking of a certain scene, 
 in a certain little school-room, where, between the 
 lights, a girl with wonderful eyes had all but come to 
 his arms. Yes, he could have sworn to it ! And then 
 something had come between them, and she had 
 dropped back and covered her eyes. And he had 
 not failed to catch the significance of her parting 
 words as she paused on the threshold and looked 
 back: "I am going home. Good-by." 
 
 Could he have been mistaken about that little 
 impulse forward? Had she really almost come to 
 him, or had the uncertain light only betrayed the 
 fierce hope that burned within him? Who could 
 say? 
 
 That little note of three lines which was now safely 
 stowed away in his innermost pocket that brief 
 answer to an impassioned letter he had sent her 
 
 148
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 149 
 
 almost with the coming light he repudiated as her 
 reply. It was the girl s fierce loyalty, her fanatical 
 idealism that had dictated: "I am grateful to you 
 for the friendship you have given me in the past, 
 but you must understand that for the future we are 
 enemies." The real self of the girl, the woman with 
 the warm light in her eyes and the tender curves 
 about her perfect mouth, the wonderfully appealing 
 creature that he had surprised in rare moments, had 
 had no part in the penning of those lines! He was 
 sure of it. Then why take that as his answer? 
 
 The sudden, determined setting of his mouth was 
 accompanied by a stinging cut to his mount, and the 
 next moment he was riding hard toward his objective. 
 
 A few rods more, and he was in sight of the camp- 
 fires of the men who were laying the foundations for 
 his model city. At first glimpse of the winking lights 
 from the dim distance, the whole man changed. A 
 fire, that had in it no part of tenderness nor yet of 
 passion, suddenly swept through his veins. Some 
 thing big possessed him something so big that for 
 the moment it left no space for any other feeling 
 whatsoever something which had in it the primal 
 love for adventure and exploration, the wild joy of 
 discovery, and the all-conquering, masculine passion 
 for creating, for achieving. 
 
 He was down in the plains now, nearly twenty 
 miles south of the little mountain cup known as 
 "Bullus Valley" down where two railroads, shortly 
 to be built, were to cross a grand-trunk line long in 
 operation; down where "the interests" were already
 
 150 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 building a three-million-dollar steel plant, and cotton 
 mills of gigantic proportions; down where he, John 
 Marshall, by the prophetic sense that had been 
 vouchsafed to him, had scooped the fallow acres for 
 a song, and with a company of other daring ex 
 ploiters was now building, right under the noses of 
 the interests, a model city to be the habitat of their 
 several thousand employees. And never yet had 
 such a city been builded, for it was to be a city ready- 
 made! There were to be ready-made streets; ready- 
 made parks and public squares and civic centres; 
 ready-made schools; ready-made homes; ready- 
 made car lines, banks, stores; and, thanks to Mar 
 shall again, minor industries, also ready-made. 
 
 Verily something big possessed him as he rode hard 
 toward the accomplishment of his purpose! His 
 purpose what was it? When the only woman in 
 his world had challenged him to put that purpose 
 into words, his powers of interpretation had failed 
 him, for there was no language common between 
 them that was adequate to express to a woman of 
 her type the moving spirit of a man of his. So, in 
 sheer defiance, he had answered her in the phrasing 
 with which the "rigid righteous" had already damned 
 the motives of his kind: "For the money that is in 
 it." And he had lied. 
 
 But he did not know that he had lied, or, rather, 
 he knew it only subconsciously. Because he was 
 keenly conscious of a lack in his scheme of a moral, 
 or a sentimental, purpose when he felt that she was 
 probing him for such, he had swung to the other
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 151 
 
 extreme in his statement possibly through the in 
 fluence of a strong mental suggestion from the woman 
 herself to whom everything was either positively 
 good or positively bad. 
 
 He ought to have known himself well enough to 
 realize that he did not care for the wealth which he 
 had already accumulated, that he even despised the 
 sordid power which it bought him among his own. 
 He ought to have known himself well enough to 
 realize that that force which made him, and others 
 like him, often brave even conscience for the sake of 
 gigantic achievement, was the same force that had 
 sent Columbus following the setting sun across a 
 trackless ocean to blaze a way for all that host of 
 big, brave men that were to follow and slay and 
 seize and build! 
 
 And oh, the glory of that building! The building 
 of huge and powerful cities, the building of colossal 
 fortunes, the building of gigantic business schemes, 
 the building of vast political influences! What mat 
 ter the cost in money, in men, and in the charac 
 ters of men! 
 
 John Marshall ought to have known that he was 
 the average American slightly enlarged. He ought 
 to have known that, superadded to the average 
 American s ruling passion to get the better of some 
 body somehow, he had an extra touch of the Anglo- 
 Saxon spirit of pioneer achievement, but with it a 
 lofty scorn of what that spirit brought beyond the 
 very joy of achieving. He ought to have realized 
 that to his slight enlargement over the type was due
 
 152 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 the fact that he could see farther than the average 
 that he had what men commonly call "vision," and 
 with it the unconquerable restlessness to hurry on to 
 the possibility sighted beyond. 
 
 If John Marshall had ever held in leash that rest 
 lessness long enough to come face to face with him 
 self and see what manner of man he was, he might 
 better have answered the challenge of the one woman 
 in his world. Instead of saying to her only, "I am 
 doing it for the money that is in it," he might have 
 added, "and for the striving that is in it, for the joy 
 of achieving that is in it. I am doing it in answer 
 to the age-old spirit of the conqueror that is within 
 me. It is my way of being a man." 
 
 And though the awakened conscience of the woman 
 would have sat in judgment and still condemned, 
 the sleeping instinct in the depths of her nature 
 would have stirred in sympathy; for, by the mystery 
 of life itself, there is no one quality in the man that 
 so unfailingly, so irresistibly, appeals to the woman 
 as that quality which, for want of a better term, 
 we call "force." 
 
 As John Marshall now neared the maze of unfilled 
 sewer-trenches, streets in process of asphalting, hills 
 being razed, and hollows being filled, upon which 
 rose, complete before his mind s eye, the city of his 
 hope, a summons came to him along the wind that 
 the man within him leaped to obey. The smell of 
 fried bacon on the cool, crisp air of evening announced 
 that supper was nearly ready at the camp, and the 
 boys would soon be falling to. Selim was dead tired,
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 153 
 
 but he was fain to respond to the urging of the 
 savagely hungry man who bestrode him, and the 
 two came into camp with a swing shortly thereafter. 
 
 Supper was not ready, after all, so Marshall put 
 in the time reviewing the ground asking questions, 
 giving orders, and commending and condemning, 
 alike with a hearty promptness. Foremen were in 
 terviewed at length, and he had a word or two with 
 even the humblest negro laborer. 
 
 His advent was the signal for a general thrill of 
 interest throughout the camp. "The Boss" was a 
 man feared and respected by his inferiors, and cor 
 dially liked by his equals for something within him 
 which, brutally put, was nothing more nor less than 
 a sublime faith in himself. The world took him at 
 his own evaluation of himself as the world takes 
 always men of his type. 
 
 The ground had been pretty thoroughly reviewed 
 by Marshall by the time supper was definitely an 
 nounced, and he carried to the long board, which 
 was surrounded by thirty other hungry men, an ap 
 petite unlessened by any disappointment over what 
 the day had wrought. 
 
 At table a surprise had been arranged for him; and, 
 all unknowing, he took the place assigned him with 
 out a glance at his nearest neighbor. When a wait 
 ing negro pulled out a stool for him, he promptly 
 occupied it and stabbed a slice of bacon through 
 and through with his fork before he realized that the 
 man to his right was laughing at him. 
 
 " Bearing!" and the fork dropped from Marshall s
 
 154 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 grasp as he shot out his hand. "Where in the devil 
 did you come from? By Jove, this is a surprise! 
 Howdy, howdy!" 
 
 "Why, Doc and I there s Doc over there on the 
 other side of you came up for a fishing spree." 
 
 Marshall was already shaking the hand of the 
 man on his left with a boyish exuberance that awak 
 ened surprise in the men around the table, and caused 
 the gray-haired patriarch of the engineering corps 
 who occupied the head of the board to remark: 
 
 "John, makes you think of old times, don t it? 
 Shall we let em loaf around here and eat up our 
 victuals?" 
 
 "Provided they ve left their paints and pills at 
 home-, Major," laughed Marshall. 
 
 "But they haven t," declared the old man. "The 
 doctor there has only just now been practising on 
 one of the best drivers in camp." 
 
 "White or black?" demanded Marshall. 
 
 "Black." 
 
 "Oh, well, one nigger more or less doesn t count," 
 declared Marshall, and the darkeys who were hurry 
 ing to and fro in waiting laughed immoderately. 
 
 During all the conversation, and furnishing a me 
 lodious accompaniment to it, there floated into the 
 tent from a little distance the sound of singing. 
 The negroes not in attendance on the table were 
 gathered together in a group and wherever there s 
 a group of darkeys, there s apt to be music too. 
 
 "Listen!" said the white-haired engineer. "They 
 are improvising." And he turned to the visitor:
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 155 
 
 "That s their way of telling us what they think of 
 us. They give us ginger-blue sometimes." Every 
 body paused a moment to listen, and there floated in 
 to them: 
 
 " T I d a-knowed de boss was so mean, 
 I never would a-left Saint Augustine!" 
 
 "You, Marshall! And your brag Florida niggers 
 at that!" a man across the board exclaimed, and they 
 all shouted with laughter, Marshall not less heartily 
 than the others. 
 
 "John," said the Major, when the song of the sati 
 rists had died away, "I m thinking about turning you 
 over to the doctor." 
 
 "What s the matter with me, please?" demanded 
 Marshall. 
 
 " That s what I want him to find out. Doctor," he 
 continued to the new-comer on Marshall s left, 
 "something s wrong with John s insides want you 
 to look into the subject." 
 
 " From the supper he s laying away, I d judge that 
 your statement is slightly premature," laughed the 
 young physician, "but what s got into John that " 
 
 "This among other things we order supplies for 
 him sometimes " said the Major, stopping him 
 with a gesture. Then he proceeded to read from a 
 paper that he had taken from his pocket and un 
 folded: 
 
 " Saturday, the seventh, five pounds chocolates; 
 five pounds crystallized fruit. Saturday, the four 
 teenth, two three-pound boxes best mixed candies.
 
 156 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Saturday, the twenty-first, three pounds candied 
 violets " the rest of the list was lost in a shout of 
 laughter which, dying away, left the Major explain 
 ing: 
 
 "Marshall gets his fancy groceries through us, and 
 that s a fair sample of his ordering for the last four 
 or five months. If there ain t something the matter 
 in one place or another with the insides of the 
 man who runs a menu like that, then I m no fit judge 
 of how to feed men, and you d better turn the com 
 missary over to somebody that knows the business." 
 
 The group rose, led by Marshall, who had turned 
 a bronze red but was laughing with the others. 
 For some minutes there was considerable confusion 
 in clearing off the supper things, dragging away the 
 tables bodily, and rearranging the camp-stools. 
 
 The big canopy tent under which they had eaten 
 usually served as mess-hall and general sitting- 
 room, too, and as soon as the supper dishes were 
 cleared away, the men drifted together in groups for 
 conversation. Marshall and the two new-comers, 
 together with the patriarch and a bottle-nosed man 
 whom they addressed as "Horton," formed a centre 
 round which the others disposed themselves. Dear- 
 ing had produced a slip of paper from somewhere, 
 and was seemingly idly marking on it as they talked. 
 
 In a little while joke and badinage evolved into 
 argument, and argument at length subsided into rem 
 iniscence, led by the loquacious Horton. The group 
 gradually grew more unified and gathered closer 
 around a little table that had been placed in their
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 157 
 
 midst to hold the cigars and liquors. Horton was 
 telling them about John Marshall s daring scheme in 
 the hills, and was describing the neighborhood of 
 "Bullus" Valley so graphically, that one young 
 fellow interrupted with: 
 
 "How do you know what it looks like?" 
 
 "How do I know?" said Horton, taking a new 
 lease on the general attention. "Why, I camped on 
 the trail of a holding up there once but I camped 
 off again! That was how Marshall, here, first got 
 the suggestion of his big reservoir scheme. I was 
 describing the peculiar topography of the country to 
 him, years ago, before he got onto this other idea 
 here, and he jumped at once to the conclusion that 
 he would turn the whole valley into a reservoir to 
 furnish some place somewhere with electric power." 
 
 "Let s see, that was ten brief years ago, wasn t 
 it?" laughed Bearing, between pencil strokes. One 
 of the surprises to the camp in the new-comer was 
 that he was not at all timid about prodding the 
 rather- to-be-feared Marshall. But when the quick 
 tempered leader only grinned at the dig, the listen 
 ers were distinctly disappointed, and one of them 
 said to the first speaker: 
 
 "Tell us how you came to camp off your trail, 
 Horton." 
 
 Marshall, who was sitting directly across the little 
 pine table from where Fred Bearing, to his certain 
 intuitive guess, was carefully sketching Horton s 
 bottle-nose on the leaf of a note-book, looked up 
 with interest. He had never heard the details of
 
 158 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Morton s trouble in the mountain, and he now felt 
 a sudden personal interest in them for reasons of his 
 own. 
 
 "Well," said the man appealed to, and he liked to 
 hear himself talk, "first one disagreeable little thing 
 and then another happened, but I passed them all 
 over till, one unusually dark night, a party of neigh 
 borly fellows dropped around to our place and 
 hanged the man I was bunking with." 
 
 "Good God!" Marshall burst out inadvertently, 
 and the crowd shouted with laughter again. The 
 doctor reached across the table with a show of feel 
 ing Marshall s pulse, but was warned off by a savage 
 gesture; but the patriarch presumed on a friendship 
 of long standing with: 
 
 "Johnny, my boy, you ll never make it! I m just 
 living to see you come flying down Swindle Hill in 
 the gray dawn some morning, the wreck and ruin 
 of your beautiful scheme behind you, with only your 
 faithful pajamas to bear you company!" 
 
 When the roar at his expense had somewhat abated, 
 Marshall rallied to the charge rather hotly: "Well, 
 if you ever see me coming down Swindle Hill in the 
 gray dawn, I ll not have on pajamas " 
 
 "Sure, and why should a man s progress be im 
 peded when he is in such a devil of a hurry! Just 
 take em off, John, the country s only sparsely set 
 tled hi between, and, besides, you re likely to get 
 an unusually early start " 
 
 "Damn it!" Marshall s fist split the frail pine 
 table in descending, but the next moment he joined
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 159 
 
 in the general laugh. "Look here, boys," he ex 
 claimed vehemently, "I m in this thing to win or 
 die in the attempt! Nothing on earth is going to 
 stop me but a rifle ball put where it will do the most 
 harm. When you see me coming down that hill in 
 defeat you may get ready to plant me, for I ll be a 
 dead one." 
 
 "I bid to be honorary pall-bearer " began one 
 young fellow, but he was interrupted by another 
 with: 
 
 " Honorary, the mischief! You ve got to help 
 tote the box!" 
 
 Bearing, who had risen from his seat with a 
 troubled expression in his eyes, silenced the young 
 sters with a quick look, and then drifted into a chair 
 beside the patriarch. The men were already talking 
 of other things, and Bearing seized the opportunity 
 to say quietly to the man with the gray beard: 
 
 "I m sorry you all goaded him into taking that 
 position. I came up here to try to make him give 
 up that reservoir scheme. You see, it isn t abso 
 lutely necessary to this project here, and he s more 
 than apt to get into serious trouble over it." 
 
 "You know Marshall, don t you?" the other re 
 plied. "Well, I don t have to tell you then that 
 you d better not urge that last reason if you really 
 want him to desist." 
 
 " Oh, I know him too well for that ! But I happen 
 to have what John calls sentimental scruples about 
 the project, and I am going to urge them again. He 
 has flatly refused to listen to me so far, but something
 
 160 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 he said in one of his recent letters led me to believe 
 that he might be getting a little dubious about the 
 matter, after all, so I packed my grip and came." 
 
 "Didn t sound much like a change of heart what 
 he said just now." 
 
 "No, but there s one good way to bring about a 
 change of heart in a man Remember those can 
 died violets? " 
 
 "Why, you don t tell me eh! Sure now? A 
 woman in the case? Lord, but I knew no man could 
 eat candy at that rate and live." 
 
 "He hasn t said so to me, but he keeps reverting 
 to some girl in his letters. Doesn t seem to be able 
 to get her off his mind. If the worst comes to the 
 worst, I may be able to influence him through her. 
 I mean to give her a dare, anyway." 
 
 "Well, well, to think of John Marshall of all men 
 in the world but they are all alike." 
 
 A sudden lull in the hum of voices left one of the 
 youngsters asking in a high key: 
 
 "Who on earth succeeded in heading Horton off 
 from finishing that story? " 
 
 "Horton ain t headed off," replied that gentleman 
 himself, and he cleared his throat for action. The 
 group came to attention. It was Marshall who gave 
 the raconteur the cue for resuming: "Start at the 
 beginning and let s have a connected narrative, 
 Horton," he suggested, with veiled interest in his 
 voice. 
 
 "Well, there really ain t so much to tell," began the 
 man addressed; "I went there about eleven years or
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 161 
 
 so ago to homestead a quarter on the slope of a ridge 
 called Stony Lonesome not in your valley, John," 
 and they all laughed again, "but just over the crest 
 of the ridge from it. They are not a bad lot those 
 hill people. On the contrary they ve got fine quali 
 ties. After you live with them a bit and ketch onto 
 their kinks, you find them a good sort. Well, the 
 only neighbor I had anywhere on this slope I was 
 tellin you about was a peculiar cove by the name 
 of Welchel Dale as handsome a fellow as you ever 
 set eyes on " Marshall leaned a little toward him 
 as he listened. "By-the-way, John, he was son-in- 
 law to that old ha nt you are keeping house with 
 right now." 
 
 The men who were watching Marshall s face sud 
 denly thanked their stars that the responsibility of 
 his perilous scheme did not rest on their shoulders. 
 For some reason he got up and changed his seat to 
 where he was a little apart from the others. His face 
 was now in shadow, but Bearing s eyes followed him, 
 and shifted from his shaded face to the narrator s, 
 and back again, as the story advanced: 
 
 "Well, Dale didn t seem to have any kinfolks at 
 all, but to be just drifting. He was hardly grown 
 when he ran away with and married the daughter of 
 that old Silas John told us about the other day. It 
 seems that the girl was spirited and disobedient, 
 anyway, and her marriage broke the old camel s 
 back, for he disowned her for good." 
 
 He cut another chew of tobacco, stretched his legs, 
 and continued deliberately: "Dale built a cabin
 
 1 62 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 on the quarter right next to the one I afterward 
 homesteaded. When I went there his wife had been 
 dead for some years, but he still lived alone except 
 for the company of his child. 
 
 "He was a queer fellow, Dale was, the queerest I 
 ever set eyes on. He s about the only man I ever 
 met who wouldn t lie at some time under some cir 
 cumstances; and nothing the others could offer 
 would induce him to enter any wild-cat scheme with 
 them. He simply kept his hands clean. Two of 
 them from over in the valley, a fellow named Trav 
 Williams and one they called Bud Davis, tried to 
 get him to go into the moonshine business with them, 
 but he refused. It made them mean mad, and they 
 went off and set up in the business without him." 
 
 The torches were burning lower; it was impossible 
 now for Dearing to see his friend s face. 
 
 "Well, about that time," continued Horton, "my 
 shack caught fire and burned down. Dale kindly 
 invited me over to stay with him, and I went; but I 
 hadn t been there many days before I saw that there 
 was goin to be trouble. The revenue officers raided 
 and destroyed the still of Davis and Williams and 
 captured both men. Well, that night, Dale come 
 home in a white rage he had the devil s own temper 
 and told me that the neighbors were sayin he had 
 informed on the arrested men. Now, in point of 
 fact, Dale and I both knew who the informer was a 
 miserable sneaking cur by the fantastic name of 
 Shan Thaggin. But it belonged to Dale s code of 
 honor not to peach, and of course I wasn t lookin
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 163 
 
 for trouble. After the trial the wretches got off 
 through a string of systematic neighborhood lies 
 Williams and Davis come home with the fell deter 
 mination of gettin even with poor Welchel. And 
 they did. They fixed it up for one of the neighbors 
 to ask an interview with me one night at his own 
 house, and while I was away, a party of unknowns 
 went to our cabin and carried Dale off to the woods. 
 It was told me on the dead quiet that when Dale 
 protested his innocence and let out that he knew who 
 the real informer was, his persecuters set about 
 makin him tell on the other man. It is said that 
 they strung him up several times to try to make him 
 tell, but that never a syllable could they get from 
 him. The last time they pulled him up, they kept 
 him hangin a little too long. It was up to them then 
 to justify themselves to their neighbors, so word was 
 spread around that Dale had confessed. That was 
 justification enough. Well, if you ll believe me, that 
 little kid of Welchel s slept through that visitation 
 and on through the night undisturbed. Early next 
 mornin an old man who kept the district store near 
 by come and took her to his house. But you needn t 
 be bothered about an adverse claim to that place, 
 Marshall" turning directly to him "that kid was 
 adopted by a rich man in south Alabama and could 
 buy and sell your little hill-top several times." 
 
 "What do you remember of the child?" Marshall 
 asked from the now deep shadow. 
 
 The narrator, whose mind was taken up with 
 Marshall s vital interest in the property he occupied,
 
 1 64 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 was not prepared for this question, and had to scratch 
 his head a moment and think. 
 
 "Why, I I don t know much. She was just a 
 kitten, you know. She had wonderful eyes, though, 
 I remember; and she d arch her back at you quick 
 as a flash if you trespassed on what she considered 
 her rights. She was high-minded like her daddy, 
 and a trifle high-handed, too, if I remember right. 
 But what do you want to know about her for?" 
 
 "What was her name?" 
 
 "Mary Mary oh, yes, Mary Elizabeth." 
 
 Marshall got up without comment, stretched him 
 self, and went out under the starlight. Fred Bearing 
 slipped out of the group and followed him in time to 
 see hun strike his hands together in time to hear 
 him, as he thought, exclaim under his breath: 
 
 " God ! What have I done ! " 
 
 But when Bearing came up to him and asked him 
 what the matter was, Marshall answered in a sur 
 prised tone: 
 
 "Why, nothing! What are you talking about?" 
 
 But Bearing laid his hand on his arm: "John," he 
 said, earnestly, "give this thing up." 
 
 "I ll not do it." 
 
 " It s a bad scheme, I tell you." 
 
 "Just what do you mean?" 
 
 "I mean that it s grasping it s unjust, inhuman, 
 to those poor devils up there." 
 
 "Bearing!" 
 
 "Ah, cut that, John! You need somebody to tell 
 you the truth!"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 165 
 
 Marshall did not speak for some moments, but 
 when he did it was to ask: "Do you think that a 
 half-dozen little mangy corn patches and as many 
 log cabins are worth the millions of dollars that they 
 are now keeping out of this section by the simple 
 fact of their being?" 
 
 But Bearing ignored the question. "How could 
 you get hold of such a big tract under the existing 
 law?" he asked. 
 
 "Bought up a number of military-bounty land 
 warrants, and had them all located here," replied the 
 other, growing calmer. He did not see the expres 
 sion of Fred Dearing s face, so he continued, in a 
 mollified tone: "If you ll remember, I bought out 
 most of the real land-owners all that would sell 
 years ago. There were only a half-dozen or so little 
 farms left. Of these only one is actually the property 
 of the present holder, and I think I see my way to 
 an early deal there, though I am going to have to 
 pay an outrageous price for the place. Now, if it 
 will make you feel any better on my account, I ll 
 tell you that I have always intended to take those of 
 the ousted tribe that are at all worth while, and pro 
 vide them with homes and with good employment 
 in some of our industrial plants. I have made up my 
 mind to give back to each one of them to such as 
 deserve it, I mean the full equivalent of the prop 
 erty which he will lose by me; and if another little 
 scheme of mine carries, I shouldn t wonder if they 
 don t get a lot more out of me than that. So cheer 
 up, old man, I haven t gone to the devil yet, eh?"
 
 1 66 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Bearing s shoulder proved rather stiffly unrespon 
 sive to the friendly little shake the speaker tried to 
 give it, and the shaken asked, coolly: 
 
 "What about the ones who are not worth while, 
 who don t deserve ?" 
 
 "Look here, Bearing, you heard Horton s story. 
 Well, that man Williams and that Bud Davis that 
 you heard him tell about men who have cheated 
 the penitentiary and the gallows, too, mind you are 
 the principal landholders in that class; and they and 
 their ilk can go to hell! They ve enjoyed the free 
 use of property that isn t theirs quite long enough. 
 There is a Davis, a brother of Horton s man, by 
 the way, that s a man. I m going to do something 
 nice for him. I m going to make him a handsome 
 present." 
 
 If Marshall looked for enthusiastic comment on 
 his beneficent plans, he was doomed to disappoint 
 ment, for Dearing changed the subject with: 
 
 "Thought I d ride over to your place and pay you 
 that visit you ve been insisting on having." 
 
 There was a distinct pause, and then Marshall said, 
 hesitatingly: 
 
 "Well you see I ll tell you, old man, I really 
 can t make you quite comfortable now. You can t 
 get anything to eat up there but walnuts and chest 
 nuts; and, besides, I have to be away a good deal. 
 Suppose you make your visit to me down here at the 
 camp. The boys will feed you high and make you 
 have a good time, and I ll be with you every few 
 days. I ve an excellent little saddle-horse up there
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 167 
 
 that I ll send down to be yours while you are here. 
 Old man, it sure will be good to have you," he added, 
 as if to throw in the touch of enthusiasm which the 
 first part of his reply most certainly lacked. 
 
 If Bearing noticed the lack of enthusiasm, or if 
 he felt any surprise or pique at having been thus 
 cordially invited to stay away from his friend s place 
 of habitation, the other had no way of knowing it, 
 for the night hid their faces, and Bearing s voice 
 was even and cheery as he replied: 
 
 "All right, I ll put up with the boys, then; but 
 you ll let me really see something of you, won t you? 
 You can t be so very busy." 
 
 "Why, yes, I ll be with you the biggest part of the 
 time, of course." Several of the others joined them 
 at this juncture, and the two friends had no further 
 opportunity for confidential talk that night. 
 
 When Bearing rolled out for breakfast the next 
 morning, he was told that Marshall had left before 
 sunrise on a freight-train going south, after having 
 given sweeping orders that he, Bearing, be shown 
 " the time of his life." 
 
 The patriarch, who had shared his tent with Mar 
 shall in order to allow Bearing one to himself, told 
 Bearing at breakfast, in an aside, that Marshall had 
 spent the greater part of the night pacing up and 
 down before the tent door.
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 THE hour for dismissal of school had come that 
 day, or, at least, so stated John Marshall s watch on 
 being appealed to for about the twentieth time; and 
 still its owner had not succeeded in obtaining an 
 interview with the little teacher. 
 
 Twice had Marshall essayed to see her, and twice 
 had he been repulsed: At two o clock, when, tired and 
 dusty from hours of hard riding, he had presented 
 himself at the school-house door and sent in a mes 
 sage, the teacher was reported "too busy" to see 
 him. At afternoon recess, when he had again asked 
 the favor of only a few words with her, she wrote on a 
 slip of paper which she sent out to him: "There is 
 nothing more to be said between us." 
 
 And so the hour of four o clock had come without 
 his having gained an interview with the girl, but it 
 found him still determined to see her. He was de 
 liberately waylaying her now, just at the fork of the 
 road where she was bound to pass on her homeward 
 journey. 
 
 The long vigil before the patriarch s tent last 
 night, the half-day of hard travel, and the hours of 
 impatient disappointment that had followed had 
 written themselves across the man s strong face, 
 and the lines about his hard mouth told the added 
 story that something had hurt him, and vitally. 
 
 168
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 169 
 
 He was afoot to-day, and he now walked up and 
 down the wooded stretch of the big road near the 
 fork in restless impatience always hurriedly, always 
 feverishly, always as if the act itself had in it some 
 thing of desperation. 
 
 At length, at a crucial point in his thinking, he 
 unconsciously transgressed the limit he had set for 
 himself and swung round the bend in the road, bring 
 ing himself suddenly face to face with the object of 
 his deep perturbation. 
 
 The girl all but screamed at the suddenness of his 
 appearance, but she recovered quickly and with a 
 flash of spirit, as Marshall stopped immediately in 
 front of her, purposely blocking her way. 
 
 "I have always assured myself that by instinct 
 you were a gentleman," she said. 
 
 "Well, to-day I m only a man. I must speak to 
 you just a moment, please there have been devel 
 opments in this land question that you must hear. 
 It is for your sake that I am forcing myself on 
 you." 
 
 The girl had turned away from him as he began 
 to speak, but now faced him again. "What is it?" 
 she asked, with quick apprehension. 
 
 "Why I let s walk on while I tell you." 
 
 "What is it you have found out?" the girl asked, 
 impatient to know the worst or the best of it. 
 
 "Last night," he began again, "I heard a man tell 
 a story that involved you and me, and your interests 
 and my interests. He had lived up here had stayed 
 at your father s house. He said this man said
 
 170 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 that the man we have always called White-faced 
 Silas was I really wouldn t tell you this if I didn t 
 have to was your grandfather." 
 
 "No!" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "He told you a falsehood!" 
 
 "No, he told me the truth. I have been to Mr. 
 Logan this morning to verify his statements." 
 
 "It isn t true, I tell you! I won t have it true!" 
 The girl turned on him as if to hold him personally 
 responsible for the story that he was telling her: 
 "What do you mean by coming to me with such a 
 statement as that? Even if it were true, how could 
 you?" 
 
 "I wouldn t hurt you for anything if I could help 
 it, but don t you see how this complicates things for 
 you and me? " 
 
 "I don t see anything except that I am Oh, I 
 knew that I came of poor and ignorant people, but 
 I thought I always thought that I could hold up 
 my head!" 
 
 "Why, you can. Nobody in all this countryside 
 has a better right to," and as they stopped, facing 
 each other, he told her the story of her father, the 
 man who had kept his hands clean of illicit business 
 and died for what he considered a point of honor. 
 He did not tell her how Welchel Dale had died, and 
 he purposely withheld the names of the men who 
 were responsible for his death. 
 
 "And I am his child?" she said, and her proud lips 
 quivered.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 171 
 
 "Yes, you are his child. I recognized you in the 
 description of him." 
 
 He had the satisfaction of seeing her troubled face 
 clear, in a degree, of the poignant pain his disclosure 
 had given her; and something intimately tender 
 trembled for a moment on his lips, when the girl 
 reminded him, coldly: 
 
 "You said there was something about this land 
 matter that I ought to know." 
 
 The warm flush that had sprung to his face receded. 
 "Why, don t you see what this brings about?" he 
 asked, lamely. 
 
 "Does it bring anything about?" 
 
 "Yes, it s your property I mean that it is prop 
 erty which you have the sentimental claim to that 
 I have taken possession of, and am living on now 
 it s- 
 
 "It s mine? That place is mine? And you have 
 at last decided to let me know that it is my titles 
 which are good No, no, I know better than that 
 I didn t mean that!" 
 
 He did not answer her but stood silent under her 
 charges. It was the girl herself who refuted them. 
 She came up to him, she put out her hand as if to 
 lay it on his arm, but she looked into the eyes of the 
 man and drew back. When she spoke again it was 
 with an effort: 
 
 "I know that you would not do me an injustice; 
 I have told myself over and over that you would, 
 but I don t believe it now. Don t, don t be hurt 
 with me." Her lips were threatening to tremble 
 again, and the man surrendered, unconditionally.
 
 172 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 " Oh, never mind about me. It is you who are to 
 be considered. What on earth are we going to do 
 about it? " 
 
 "Why, I don t have to tell you what I am going 
 to do." 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "I am going to keep my property to save these 
 others. I m sorry that it has to hurt you." But 
 even as she said it, a sickening doubt of him welled 
 up in her heart. 
 
 "But that is beyond your power." 
 
 "What do you mean?" 
 
 "Don t you see yet that this property about here 
 never did belong to the people? It s government 
 land." The girl was visibly hardening again, and 
 the desperation in the man s tone voiced his utter 
 hopelessness of convincing her. "The situation in a 
 nutshell is that your grandfather, more intelligent 
 than his neighbors, entered his land according to 
 law; but, for some reason, failed to make final proof 
 before his death. His heirs could, on the proper 
 showing, have completed the entry and obtained the 
 titles. You yourself might have done this if you 
 had known, if I had known, that you were this man s 
 heir." 
 
 "Why do you say might have done it? Why 
 can t I do it now?" The spirit of the hills was 
 challenging. 
 
 "You can t do it for the reason that the property 
 is absolutely mine." Could this be the same Mary 
 Elizabeth who five minutes ago was repentant for 
 having wounded him? But he made no sign as he
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 173 
 
 continued: "Finding this land registered as an 
 abandoned claim, I entered it. I have lived on it 
 only a few months, but I paid the difference in cash. 
 A week ago to-day I obtained the titles. I did not 
 know until last night that you were the heir of the 
 first claimant, and I came to you as soon as I heard 
 it." 
 
 "What for?" 
 
 " What for? Do you ask me that? " 
 
 "I certainly do." 
 
 "To pay you for what you have lost through me." 
 
 "But the property was not my grandfather s, you 
 say." 
 
 "No, the titles were in the government." 
 
 "Then you don t owe me anything." 
 
 "But you don t understand," the man protested. 
 
 "Yes, I do understand, perfectly. I understand 
 that something which might have been mine, if I 
 had known in time to secure it, is now yours because 
 I did not know. And I understand that if I had 
 secured this property, I could have saved these 
 people s homes for them and defeated your big in 
 dustrial scheme." 
 
 Did she really mean what her words implied? 
 The man asked himself the question, but in vain. 
 When he spoke again he was still debating her 
 deeper meaning : 
 
 "But you do not understand that the business 
 world grants a certain money value to claims like 
 yours. It will be really worth it to me to buy what 
 is called a quitclaim from you. You are just and
 
 174 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 fair to others; try, for once, to be just to me. Now 
 this property is not yours, but you stand deprived 
 by me of a certain claim to it which you might have 
 re-established. You might also have sold the claim, 
 unknowingly, to some other unknowing party, and 
 thus have realized on it." 
 
 "You want to pay me for what doesn t belong to 
 me? I m trying to follow you, but you ll forgive me 
 if I find it hard." 
 
 "If you will just take my word for it, I want to 
 pay you for something that is worth money to me." 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "Your willingness to surrender all claim to the 
 property, your agreement not to make trouble about 
 it, your good-will, as it is called hi law." 
 
 "But I am not willing to give up these claims that 
 you say I don t possess if through them I can make 
 trouble for you, and you haven t the money to buy 
 from me my good- will !" 
 
 Marshall despaired of getting her to comprehend 
 the legal significance of the term which she thus 
 seized upon and misinterpreted, but he decided to 
 make one more appeal to her, and he urged it very 
 sincerely: 
 
 "Now let me tell you something," he insisted. 
 "Put aside your prejudices for a moment, if you pos 
 sibly can, and consider this side of the proposition: 
 If you persist in your opposition to me, you are going 
 to stir up trouble here, trouble which can end in but 
 one thing injury to the people you are trying to 
 help. If you acquiesce in this arrangement with me,
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 175 
 
 and you should, you will furnish an example to these 
 people, and help them to make way cheerfully for a 
 prosperity which they and their children will have 
 the chance to share." 
 
 All at once the girl remembered a scene beside an 
 isolated grave when the twilight had shown her 
 things which the garish daylight of her every-day 
 life had but served to conceal. 
 
 "Don t," she protested to Marshall, passionately. 
 "Don t/" 
 
 "But, good God, I can t rob a woman!" he burst 
 out, with inadvertent desperation. 
 
 "There s a woman in every home that you are 
 planning to destroy," she replied. "It s curious, 
 isn t it, that men who will not hesitate to do injustice 
 to a number of women collectively, will indignantly 
 reject the idea of being unjust to a woman. What s 
 the psychology of it?" 
 
 "The psychology of my own particular part in it 
 is that I am a fool!" he exclaimed, with a sudden, 
 desperate welling up of the heart within him. " Oh, 
 don t be afraid, I m not going to make love to you 
 again! You are unjust to me, you know you are. 
 You who prate of justice for everybody else, set your 
 face steadily against me, right or wrong. You know 
 perfectly well that there could be to me no bitterness 
 comparable to doing you an injury and leaving it 
 unrepaired, yet you deliberately put me in this posi 
 tion. You know that I did not dream the property 
 was yours, and that I would have died rather than 
 take it knowingly. Yet now you refuse to let me 
 right the wrong I have done you!"
 
 176 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "But you said the property was not mine. How 
 could you rob me of what was not mine?" she inter 
 rupted. 
 
 "Why, if you had known it in time, you might 
 have contested my claim. You had, of course, only 
 one chance in many of winning in open contest 
 against me, but still that one chance was worth 
 something, and I have robbed you of that. It is 
 nothing but humanly right, and fair and just to me, 
 that you should let me make adequate restitution." 
 
 "That is so like you." 
 
 "What is?" 
 
 "That adequate restitution." 3 
 
 "Will you tell me what you mean?" 
 
 "Why, there are men who would have thought of 
 just plain restitution." 1 
 
 Mary Elizabeth was too angry now to see or care 
 for the hurt which her words inflicted, but she was 
 interested in seeing the man dive for something in 
 his innermost pocket with a savagery seemingly 
 totally unnecessary. 
 
 "What is it?" she asked, as a formidable-looking 
 paper was thrust into her hand. 
 
 "Just plain restitution." 1 
 
 "Please tell me what it is about." 
 
 " It is a deed from myself to yourself of the prop 
 erty I am living on now. It makes that property 
 yours beyond anybody s question. It was not yours 
 at first, but it is now. I entered the land fairly, and 
 subscribed to all the requirements made by the 
 government. I got full titles to it a week ago. 
 Last night I found out that it was your grandfather
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 177 
 
 who had all but completed claim before dying. I 
 hoped that you would let me pay you for the place 
 for reasons that we need not discuss now, but I was 
 so afraid that you would not, and was so certain 
 that I was not going to do you even a seeming in 
 justice, that I went to Simkinsville this morning, 
 and formally deeded the property to you. As long 
 as you hold that paper, neither I nor any other man 
 can disturb you in possession of the place." 
 
 "And you were probably certain, also, that I 
 would decline to accept this from you!" 
 
 Marshall looked her through and through, then 
 turned on his heel and left her standing with the 
 deed to the haunted house in her outstretched hand. 
 Scarcely had he taken the first half-dozen hurried 
 steps, however, when the girl began tearing the 
 formidable paper into bits. 
 
 At the first sound of the tearing, Marshall turned 
 quickly and sprang to her side to catch her hands 
 and stop her, but he was too late. The white frag 
 ments were already fluttering to earth as he grasped 
 her wrists. 
 
 "You you can t give me anything!" she stormed, 
 snatching away from his detaining grasp. "I know 
 you now. You ve been trying to buy me from the 
 first because you thought I had influence here, and 
 would help you cheat these people. That s what it 
 is! And I was weak enough to think that your 
 beautiful attentions were what they seemed, and I 
 trusted you when you betrayed my woman s heart 
 and told me "
 
 178 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "Don t say that to me, don t!" 
 
 But the girl s almost insane temper was now at 
 white heat. "Oh, but I know you, I tell you! And 
 I even see through this crowning act of yours you 
 knew that I wouldn t take it, but you thought I 
 wouldn t understand, that I would be grateful to 
 you so grateful that I wouldn t turn on you at a 
 crisis and tell what I know. You couldn t under 
 stand what it means to be bound by a sense of 
 honor!" 
 
 This time when he turned and left her he did not 
 come back.
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 "SISTER DAVIS, what on earth is the matter with 
 Ma y LizbethDale?" 
 
 It was Sunday afternoon at the Thaggin home, 
 and a half-dozen neighborhood gossips were gathered 
 together in the "big room" to discuss a momentous 
 happening. 
 
 Outside, on the porch, the men were taking the 
 keen fall air rather than brave the company of the 
 "sisteren" inside. It might have been the result of 
 the tradition-long division of the sheep from the 
 goats in their primitive little church that thus the 
 two sexes herded in separate groups all Sunday 
 long, or it might have been that the weekly shave 
 and bath took the hardihood out of these primitive 
 lords of creation much as a periodical plucking ren 
 ders timid and ashamed the geese that are plucked. 
 Certain it was that the lords in question hung around 
 on the edges of this Sunday afternoon conclave, and 
 echoed only weakly the gossip of the main group. 
 
 "What is the matter with Ma y Lizbeth Dale?" 
 The speaker was hurriedly untying her bonnet 
 strings, and the suppressed excitement in her ques 
 tion voiced the mood of the assemblage, the mem 
 bers of which were in the first plunge of deep debate. 
 
 "Dilsey Sellers, when you tell me what the matter 
 is with the whole rotten tribe she come from, I ll set 
 
 179
 
 i8o THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 you straight bout Ma y Lizbeth herself." Aunt 
 Millie Davis was rarely known to answer civilly, even 
 when a question was especially pleasing to her. 
 
 A hacking cough from the depths of a homespun- 
 covered barrel chair was followed by the eager but 
 quavering question: "What s she been up to now?" 
 
 "Hush, ma! Why can t you tend to your own 
 business?" the younger Mrs. Thaggin hastened to 
 put in, but the first speaker was not so easily silenced. 
 
 "Why, grandma, ef you ll b lieve me, Ma y 
 Lizbeth fused to come up to the communion table 
 this mornin , an when Brother Sykes went over to 
 her an exhorted her to come, she shrunk away from 
 him, horrified-like, an her eyes burnt like live coals! " 
 
 "Grandma, you ain t never seen the beat o that 
 look she give Brother Sykes," interpolated another. 
 
 "Hit s somethin on her conscience," exclaimed 
 the old lady; "she ain t been givin some people 
 what rightfully b longs to em." 
 
 "Hit s somethin on her conscience, all right," in 
 sinuated the first speaker. "Did you see him thar 
 that strange man? An for the first time in his life? 
 An did you see the way he watched her? The 
 wretch never shet his eyes in prayer a single time 
 for lookin at her; an when Brother Sykes tried to 
 make her see the error of her ways, he got up an 
 flung out o meetin ." 
 
 "She looked like a ha nt herself," put in another. 
 "I shouldn t wonder ef she hasn t been more n a 
 handful for you, Sister Davis. Beck Login is astin 
 a good deal of you,"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 181 
 
 "Ef you hadn t done got sanctification, you 
 wouldn t stand hit a minute, would you, Mis 
 Davis?" asked still another before the interrogated 
 could gather her wrath together. The last question 
 caused the wind of Aunt Millie s mood to whip 
 around to another quarter, and she folded her hands 
 resignedly, and lifted her eyes to the ceiling. A look 
 of disappointment crossed Dilsey Sellers s face. She 
 was anxious to hear Aunt Millie out while yet her 
 first mood was upon her, but the untimely reference 
 to that lady s state of sanctification threatened to 
 spoil it all. 
 
 "I kin bear anything the Lord sends, Viney," re 
 plied the old woman to the latest questioner, and a 
 murmur of unctuous approval went up from the 
 others which threatened to take all the snap out of 
 the situation. 
 
 "Yes, if the Lord sends hit" Dilsey was not to 
 be defeated "but thar s other powers at work. 
 Now I was jest a-thinkin how your Babe sot thar 
 this mornin a-starin across to the women s side o 
 the church, a-watchin ever bat of Ma y Lizbeth s 
 eyelids. I ve seen the day, Sister Davis, when your 
 boys was ra-al scornful-like to women, an when they 
 was that mannerly an shamefaceted they wouldn t 
 so much as glance over to whar the women set. 
 An I couldn t help rememberin Sallie an all the 
 trouble you had along o her an Bud, an a-won- 
 derin " 
 
 A very genuine sigh went up from the old woman. 
 "You re speakin the truth, now, Dilsey," she said,
 
 1 82 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 with sincere concern. "Hit looks like I m a-goin 
 to have trouble now for sure." 
 
 "That s jes what we all sensed, Mis Davis; Babe 
 sho is took with that gal. Is she brazen enough to 
 be a-settin up to him right thar under your nose?" 
 
 "She s brazen enough, for anything," snapped the 
 old woman; "but that ain t the worst of it" the 
 group leaned forward as a unit in breathless interest, 
 and the speaker continued "that ain t the worst of 
 it. Bud sees th ough her as clear as day, an he 
 ain t got no patience with her a tall. He s goin to 
 tell her what he thinks of her yet, in spite of all I kin 
 do; an when he does, that fool Babe is goin to up 
 an do somethin he hadn t ought to." 
 
 "Now ain t that awful!" 
 
 "La, Mis Davis! Babe ain t got nough suption 
 in him to make trouble, is he? When we was growin 
 up we used to say he didn t have right good wit" 
 Dilsey Sellers was getting even. 
 
 "Babe s got very good wit, considerin ! " 
 Grandma Thaggin caught her daughter-in-law s eye 
 and stopped, while Aunt Millie flashed back : "Babe s 
 got more sense than many that talks about him." 
 
 "An they do say that them quiet, stupid-like folks 
 is awful when you git em riled." Viney was doing 
 her groping best to pour oil on the troubled waters. 
 
 "Wa-al," said the old mother, with a glow of 
 pride, "as mean as he looks, I d ruther git Bud ra-al 
 deep stirred up any day than Babe. Y all don t 
 know Babe like I do!" 
 
 "Mis Davis," the younger Mrs. Thaggin had held
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 183 
 
 her peace up to this point, "I wouldn t be pestered 
 bout Babe an the teacher, ef I was you. The likes 
 of her ain t apt to be settlin down here for life. She 
 ain t beholden to none of us, you know, for the man 
 what raised her must a-had a lot o money." This 
 was a new and unwelcome note in the discussion, but 
 Mrs. Davis hastened to reverse its effect. 
 
 "Melissa Thaggin, don t you know that man 
 shifted her off on us cause he had done got tired of 
 her? An don t you know, furthermore, that he laid 
 down and died not long ago thout ever leavin her 
 a cent?" 
 
 "Why, no, Mis Davis, nobody ain t told me that." 
 
 "Wa-al, he did." 
 
 "Still," the younger Mrs. Thaggin insisted, "Ma y 
 Lizbeth ain t to say shifted off on nobody. She s 
 makin her own good money teachin , an she s payin 
 her boa d an washin ." 
 
 "Wa-al, I ain t heerd tell of their givin her the 
 school for life, Melissa, an I have heerd tell of Mr. 
 Sykes s bein awful displeased with her way of teach- 
 in it. Mr. Williams told my Bud no longer than 
 yestiddy that there ought to be a man teacher here 
 to whup the boys. You know whether Trav Wil- 
 liams s got influence here or not." Melissa Thaggin 
 was dumb with something more than surprise, but 
 the others voiced their approval of Trav Williams s 
 sentiments in monosyllabic exclamations. Then one 
 of them reverted to the original subject: 
 
 "How did she take the news of that man s dyin 
 an not leavin her all that money she thought she 
 was a-goin to git?"
 
 1 84 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "Took hit like anybody else with her smartness 
 would a-took hit. She knowed she was dependent 
 on us after that, an she jes nachully set to work 
 makin fair weather with us all right away. She told 
 Babe that she was goin to do her duty by us, an he 
 swallowed the bait, hook an all!" The old woman 
 cackled derisively as she continued: "An the fun of 
 hit is, she s even been a-makin up to me. Oh, she 
 was powerful high an mighty at fust, but this last 
 week she s been too good for anything. She actually 
 he ps with the dishes! I sont her to the well, yes- 
 tiddy, but that fool, Babe, took the bucket away 
 from her an drawed the water hisself." 
 
 "Wa-al, I d a-took Babe Davis to be more manlier 
 than to be doin women s work!" 
 
 "That s the trouble with you, Dilsey, ef you d 
 a-knowed anything about men, you d a-had one o 
 your own by this time. Now you kin take hit from 
 me that any man that s lovin a woman will draw 
 water for her tell he gits her." 
 
 There was an awkward silence for a minute, for 
 Dilsey Sellers s unmarried state was considered a 
 most delicate and deplorable circumstance. It was 
 the younger Mrs. Thaggin who kindly turned the 
 conversation: 
 
 " Surster is ra-al timid-like, ain t she, Mis Davis? 
 Come out from behind the bed, honey, an let me see 
 you in your shoes an stockin s." But the scared- 
 looking child only crowded up closer in her place of 
 refuge and put her finger in her mouth. 
 
 "That s Sallie in her," declared the grandmother. 
 "I never could learn her no manners. Jes let her
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 185 
 
 alone, Melissa, she ll perk up after while. She s 
 kinder mortified cause she s clean." All untaught, 
 Aunt Millie had grasped for herself the psychology 
 of the situation. On Saturday nights it was her 
 practice to "wash" Sister down to the substratum 
 of original sin. Mary Elizabeth spoke of the proc 
 ess as "bathing," but in spirit and in truth the 
 weekly rite that Aunt Millie performed on Sister 
 was exactly what the old woman called it, and the 
 ordeal always took something out of the child, tem 
 peramentally, that it took her nearly a whole week 
 to regain. 
 
 But Dilsey Sellers was opposed to allowing a child 
 to monopolize the attention of grown people; besides, 
 she was not yet ready to give up their most inter 
 esting topic of gossip. 
 
 "What about that strange man over to Silas s 
 place? He s been a-keepin sich steady comp ny 
 with Ma y Lizbeth he don t seem to be leavin her 
 much chance to make up to Babe." 
 
 "Who? him?" Aunt Millie sniffed like a war- 
 horse. " Lord, didn t you know he has done throwed 
 Ma y Lizbeth over? " The reply came like a bomb 
 shell, and a half-dozen exclamations followed in 
 rapid succession. 
 
 "Now ain t that like a man!" Dilsey was left say 
 ing. "Took up all her time tell he got tired of her, 
 an then throwed her away. But hit serves her right, 
 the shameless piece! Mis Thaggin, hit sho were a 
 blessin you didn t send Sue to school to her like she 
 come an begged you to. With little childern hit
 
 1 86 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 don so much matter, but Sue s ketchin on to things, 
 an that piece might a-been the ruination of her." 
 
 "Who are you old sisters scandalizin now?" 
 Uncle Beck Logan had momentarily detached him 
 self from his masculine companions, and poked his 
 head in the window. 
 
 "People ain t never scandalized tell they scan 
 dalize theyselves," snapped the last speaker; but 
 she didn t explain. 
 
 Aunt Millie was to the front in an instant. 
 
 "I was jes tellin em, Beck Login, how that pet 
 o yourn has done been give the go-by by that 
 stranger what y all can t find out nothin bout. She 
 ain t been loafin around the woods with him for a 
 week, an she has grieved herself plum sick on account 
 of hit." 
 
 The habitually kind smile died out of the man s 
 face. "Millie," he said grimly, looking straight into 
 the old woman s eyes, "ef sanctification were ketch 
 in , I d quarantine the neighborhood ag inst you." 
 
 "We women ain t sayin no more n you men air 
 thinkin ," ventured a sharp-nosed sister, who had 
 been silent till now. "Trav Williams has already 
 done told my Joshua what he thinks bout her." 
 
 "Trav Williams got crost-ways with Ma y Lizbeth 
 at the start, an he jes won t see things right." 
 
 "What did she fuse communion for, can you tell 
 us that?" It was another hitherto silent voice that 
 challenged. 
 
 "Mebbe she wasn t in love an charity with her 
 neighbors like the rest of you, an she was feard
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 187 
 
 she d git a mouthful o damnation." For fully a 
 minute the horrified listeners looked for the lightning 
 to strike Uncle Beck dead in his tracks for his sacri 
 lege, but after sixty seconds of clear skies they re 
 turned to the charge: 
 
 "Wa-al, whar s Ma y Lizbeth now? Hit s easy 
 to see she ain t here bein sociable with her neigh 
 bors," Dilsey Sellers asked. 
 
 "Wa-al, Dilsey," replied the old man with his 
 characteristic slowness, "Ma y Lizbeth weren t 
 raised up here, an she ain t learned that hit s part of 
 her Sunday duty to help scandalize other women; so 
 jest at present, she is readin to your blind sister what 
 you left all by herself. I stopped an passed the 
 time o the day with em when I come by." Uncle 
 Beck had stepped through the window, and now 
 stood with his gaunt figure drawn up to its full height. 
 He was looking straight at Dilsey. 
 
 "A readin book, I reckon!" sneered the other, in 
 a desperate attempt to recover; 
 
 "No, the Bible, Dilsey." 
 
 "Uncle Beck," the ample hostess put in uneasily, 
 "you lowed you was goin to tell me what to do for 
 that shoat what s done took sick. Can t you step 
 out to the lot an take a look at him? " The old man 
 hesitated. He seemed not to have finished what he 
 had to say, but he ended by following the younger 
 Mrs. Thaggin to the back lot. 
 
 "Uncle Beck," said the woman, resting her arms 
 on the fence of the hog-pen, but giving never a glance 
 at the shoat inside, " Uncle Beck, I m pestered bout 
 Ma y Lizbeth."
 
 1 88 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "So am I, Melissa." 
 
 "What you reckon she done that way this mornin 
 for?" 
 
 "Tut tut! Nothin serious! Like as not she 
 was mad at somethin MUlie Davis had said to her. 
 She s that sot in her principles that ef she d got her 
 temper up at anybody she wouldn t a-thought hit 
 right to commune." 
 
 "Uncle Beck, you always was consolin ." 
 
 "Wa-al, thar ain t much consolation to be got out 
 of the siterwation now, Melissa. Hit s mighty serious 
 that them women s tongues have got to waggin about 
 her. Can t you do somethin for her?" 
 
 "I ll make ma keep her mouth shet. An an 
 yes, I ll send Sue to school. That ll show people 
 where I stand. Uncle Beck Ma y Lizbeth is a 
 good girl, ain t she?" 
 
 "As good as they make em." 
 
 " Then I ll stand by her." 
 
 "You always was a good gal yourself, Melissa. 
 Say, why can t you take Ma y Lizbeth to boa d? I 
 couldn t he p overhearin what Mis Davis said bout 
 Bud an Babe bein sot ag inst each other about her. 
 Hit ain t right to bring trouble between them two." 
 
 "La! Uncle Beck, I d do it ef hit were jes only 
 me; but Shan he wouldn t low it. He s done been 
 sot ag inst her by ma, an he won t b lieve nothin 
 good of her. An you know how hectorin men air 
 what ain t right smart in their minds." 
 
 "Wa-al, wa-al, we ll have to do some other way," 
 he acquiesced, kindly. 
 
 "Uncle Beck, Mis Davis said jes now that the
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 189 
 
 trustees was talkin bout turnin Ma y Lizbeth 
 outen the school!" 
 
 The old man removed his spectacles, polished them 
 hard on his ostentatious Sunday handkerchief, and, 
 readjusting them on his nose, looked at the woman 
 with grave concern. 
 
 "I m one of the trustees, myself, Melissa, an I 
 ain t heerd of no dissatisfaction except from Mr. 
 Sykes." 
 
 "Aunt Millie seemed to think that Mr. Williams 
 was at the bottom of hit." 
 
 "Wa-al, wa-al, Trav can t for the life of him for 
 give Ma y Lizbeth for bein Welchel Dale s child," 
 he said, by way of reminiscence, "but I ll be at any 
 meetin they hold, an I promise you I ll make things 
 interestin ef they pester her. I m afeard I m goin 
 to have to read em the riot act ag in, Melissa. Lord, 
 Lord, but a man oughtn t to have to tell his neighbors 
 the truth more n onct in a lifetime!" 
 
 "Ain t that so, Uncle Beck!" 
 
 "Melissa, what s this bout Ma y Lizbeth an that 
 man Marshall?" 
 
 "I don t know nothin but what you heerd Aunt 
 Millie say bout his th owin off on her. But all the 
 neighbors has been talkin bout how much she s 
 been a-goin with him. My Tony says he keeps a 
 horse an saddle for her, an is always a-sendin her 
 candy an things what he has to have sont to him 
 from away from here. Of course, Uncle Beck, I 
 b lieve hit s all right so far as Ma y Lizbeth is 
 concerned, but I wouldn t trust that overbearin
 
 190 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 stranger no further than I could sling a wild-cat by 
 the tail." "An me neither, Melissa." 
 
 "Wa-al, anyhow, hit seems to be broke off now, 
 an I m glad of it." 
 
 "Yes, yes, that s good. Now ef you ll only sorter 
 take her under your wing all this talk will die down." 
 
 "Yes, but I m feard I won t be here long enough 
 to see to it." 
 
 "Melissa Thaggin, air you a-losin your mind?" 
 
 "No-o-o Uncle Beck, don t tell a soul, hear? but 
 Shan is bout to sell our place an move us all outen 
 the valley." 
 
 "The land o Goshen!" then suddenly "Who 
 to, Melissa?" 
 
 "That very same man. He s done offered Shan a 
 sight o money, an ef ma don t give trouble, we ll 
 close the trade. Shan s done told ma she s got to 
 put her cross mark to the papers, but she ain t 
 quite come round yit. Shee-e-e !" putting her 
 finger to her lips, "here come Shan an the others. 
 Don t say a word bout what I told you, hear? Mr. 
 Marshall made us promise to keep the trade on the 
 quiet tell we pick up an leave." 
 
 "I ll keep quiet, Melissa, but ef you know when 
 you air well off, you won t sign no papers to that 
 man tell he shows his hand. Somehow, I mistrust 
 all this secrecy."
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 THAT there was something in the wind that night 
 besides the wail of the dying forest and the sharp, 
 cold needles of rain, even the youngest Thaggin 
 could feel by the intuition of fear that was his; so 
 it was small wonder that he stayed awake till the 
 unearthly hour of seven o clock, and increased the 
 general hubbub by the size of his year-old voice. 
 
 Something was going to happen, that was plain. 
 The house had had an additional scrubbing and tidy- 
 ing-up, and Grandma and the mother had arrayed 
 themselves in their best linsey dresses. The lord 
 and master of the house had been importuned to don 
 his Sunday collar, but had flatly refused there was 
 a grain of comfort in that. From Sue to the baby 
 the children were keyed up to the highest pitch of 
 excitement. 
 
 But all things come to an end sooner or later; and 
 by half-past seven o clock the last young Thaggin 
 had been tucked away safe, the trundle-beds that 
 had been rolled out from under the beds of state, and 
 the boarded-up bunks against the side of one of the 
 shed rooms at the back, being full to the edges. 
 
 Quiet now reigned in the family circle. The 
 grandmother, who was used to being tucked away 
 with the children at sundown, plainly nodded in her 
 big chair in spite of the strenuous efforts that had 
 
 191
 
 192 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 been made to keep her "heartened up" against a 
 momentous happening. The wife of Shan Thaggin 
 plied her knitting-needles in silence, but there were 
 furrows of thinking on her erstwhile placid brow. 
 Shan sat with his legs stretched out at length, toast 
 ing the bottoms of his feet by the fire and vainly 
 attempting to warm the half -frozen heels of them. 
 
 But the comfort and quietude on the inside only 
 threw into sharp contrast the tempestuous bluster 
 without. November was howling across the stripped 
 fields, and fighting her way, with wind and rain, 
 through the opposing ranks of the forest. It was 
 black dark. 
 
 The old woman in the homespun-covered chair 
 nodded lower and lower, and after a while a dis 
 tinct snore was heard. The husband and wife looked 
 at each other across the little pine table and the fitful 
 firelight disclosed a question in the eyes of each. 
 
 "Will he come?" it asked. 
 
 "Listen at that rain, Shan," the wife said in half- 
 
 answer. 
 
 f( 
 
 The likes o him don t mind rain," the man re 
 plied. "Ef he wants to trade as bad as I think he 
 does, a shower o bull-frogs couldn t keep him away." 
 "What you goin to teU him?" 
 "I m a-goin to ast him more money." 
 "Lord, Shan, he s payin you twict as much as you 
 have been a-astin for hit, already!" 
 
 "Yes, but ef he comes out a night like this, hit ll 
 be a sign he wants the place bad enough to pay two 
 hunderd more. An you jes keep your mouth out
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 193 
 
 while he s here. I don t want any too much jaw 
 about hit, cause I want to make him think we re 
 keerless bout tradin . Jes treat hit all offhand-like, 
 you hear?" 
 
 "Of course," said the wife, sympathetically. 
 "An do you think you kin manage her?" with an 
 inclination of the head toward the nodding figure. 
 
 "He s a-goin to try his hand on her to-night. Ef 
 we can t make her sign, you ve got to!" 
 
 "Now look a-here, Shan, I ain t a-goin to hector 
 ma no more n I have to. I ve had a hard nough 
 time makin her keep her mouth shet about this to 
 the neighbors, an when hit comes to makin her put 
 her cross mark to them papers, you ve got to manage 
 hit yourself you an that devil-knows- who! Be 
 sides " 
 
 "Besides what?" sharply. But the woman kept 
 her peace. 
 
 "Besides what, I say?" the man snarled at her 
 across the table. 
 
 "Besides," she replied slowly, "I ain t right easy 
 in my mind bout this piece o business, nohow. I 
 ain t as much took up with the idea of the trade 
 as I was at first, an I don t see no use in a-draggin 
 ma all the way to town an layin her liable to ketch- 
 in her death o cold when she could jest as well sign 
 them papers here." 
 
 "Ain t I done told you that we got to have a wit 
 ness to the signin , an we don t want to let nobody 
 in these parts onto the trade?" the husband growled. 
 
 "Why can t you bring a witness from town?" the 
 woman asked.
 
 194 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "B cause he might talk too much to the folks he 
 met. I told you what Mr. Marshall said about hit." 
 
 "Wa-al, I don t prove of no such secrecy. I tell 
 you, Shan, hit don t look nachul for him to be so 
 skeered for his neighbors to know he s jes makin a 
 simple trade. There s somethin back of hit, an I 
 don t like hit." 
 
 "Now you jes let me ketch you tryin to back 
 down, will you?" 
 
 "No, I won t," she snapped back, all unafraid of 
 the threatening, evil look he shot at her; "I won t 
 b cause my word s done give. But don t you think 
 hit s b cause I m afeard of you, you little pusillan 
 imous There goes Sue in a nightmare ag in!" 
 The mother rose quickly and crossed the room to one 
 of the big feather-puffed beds, where the rosy-cheeked 
 Sue lay whimpering in her sleep. 
 
 "Hit s jes the kind o night that some folks thinks 
 witches rides in." The husband and father had 
 slouched across the room, and stood for a moment 
 contemplating his eldest-born. 
 
 "Witches the cat s foot! Hit s them green cab 
 bage stalks she s been a-eatin . I low I ll slap her 
 face bout em in the mornin ." But the touch was 
 not ungentle with which she shifted the position of 
 the dreaming girl. The mother s hands lingered a 
 little on the girl s forehead, brushing back the brown 
 tendrils that fell over it. The father waited a 
 moment, too. 
 
 "Shan," said the mother, "I m a-goin to send Sue 
 to school!" There was sharp challenge in the man 
 ner of her announcement.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 195 
 
 For some reason the man did not accept the chal 
 lenge. He seemed to be trying to avert a contest. 
 "Wa-al," he answered, evasively, "I ain t a-sayin 
 what I think bout Sue an schoolin , b cause my 
 mind is already done full of a bigger plan for her." 
 
 "What plan?" the mother demanded, coming 
 straight to the point. 
 
 "Well, me an Trav Williams was a-talkin to-day 
 bout how well growed up she was, an Trav told me 
 he had a-sort a-been takin notice of her hisself." 
 
 They were moving toward the fire, and the mother 
 suddenly sat down in a convenient chair, overcome 
 by the bigness of her husband s news. 
 
 "Now did anybody ever hear the beat o that!" 
 she exclaimed, but delighted pride wrote itself across 
 her every feature. 
 
 "He s got more land than anybody in the valley," 
 said her husband, warming up to his subject, "an 
 the storehouse is his n, an " 
 
 "An he s got a bran new buggy!" the wife put in. 
 
 " Yes n he s got money in hidin , too." 
 
 The mother looked across the room to where Sue s 
 apple cheeks reddened in the sudden flare of the fire 
 light, and a shade crossed her own glowing face. 
 "Shan," she said, doubtfully, "Sue s jes turned four 
 teen, an Mr. Williams is older n you by twelve 
 year." 
 
 "Dad bust his age! What s that got to do with 
 hit? Ain t I done told you he can buy an sell the 
 last one of us?" 
 
 "Yes," said the mother, lingeringly, "but "
 
 196 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 " But what? But what? " 
 
 "Oh, nothin but I was jes wishin he wa n t so 
 servigrous. Ef he were jes a little more peaceable- 
 like, an kind, you know " 
 
 "I know you ain t got a grain o sense!" 
 
 "I got a long sight more sense n you have! Of 
 course I ain t a-goin to stand in the child s way, 
 but I jes couldn t help ruminatin in my mind bout 
 Lizzie. Lord, Lord, an jes to think! Hit ain t 
 been but seven weeks, come a-Monday, sence I holp 
 wash Lizzie Williams and lay her out " 
 
 "Wa-al, a woman s as dead in seven weeks as 
 she ll ever be, ain t she? " 
 
 "Oh, she s dead enough all right. I was jes 
 a-thinkin how glad she was to die. Listen! Was 
 that somebody comin ? " The two listened intently, 
 but nothing was heard except the howling of the 
 November winds and the swish of the driving rain. 
 When the woman took up the thread of conversa 
 tion again, she had dropped back into her pleased, 
 contemplative mood verily, Lizzie Williams was as 
 dead as ever a woman gets to be ! 
 
 "Has Mr. Williams been a-talkin to Sue yet?" 
 she queried. 
 
 "Yes, comin home from meetin this mornin . 
 That s what he fetched her in his buggy for." 
 
 "An did Sue make up to him? Did he say?" 
 She was all excited interest. 
 
 The husband nodded an impressive affirmative. 
 The mere nodding of one s head isn t lying. Be 
 sides, Shan was resolved to compel the fearful and
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 197 
 
 cringing Sue to make good his words so shortly that 
 the thing was as good as done, already. The wife 
 bubbled over: 
 
 "Now ain t that nice! An did Mr. Williams say 
 when he thought they d better stand up before the 
 preacher?" 
 
 "Sunday after next." Shan s new-found dignity 
 came very near impressing his wife, and that is 
 saying a good deal for it. 
 
 "Wa-al, that settles her goin to school. I d 
 a-liked to commodate Uncle Beck an Ma y Lizbeth, 
 but of course hit s outen the question now." 
 
 "An what s Ma y Lizbeth got to do with hit, 
 I d like to know?" The man was suspicious in 
 stantly. 
 
 "Oh, nothin ," said the wife, retreating, "but she s 
 been so good to Tony an the others, I d a-liked to let 
 her try her hand on Sue." 
 
 "Good to Tony! She d a sight better lay the 
 hickory on him, like Mr. Sykes says. He s been thar 
 to see her teaching an he p intedly told us all at 
 meetin to-day that Ma y Lizbeth was jes nachully 
 pamperin them childern to death." 
 
 "Yes, I know, Shan, but you member we tried 
 Tony with that man teacher last summer, an he 
 had the boy shiverin an cringin like a houn dog. 
 Somehow, I can t think that s right." 
 
 "Wa-al, hit ain t your business to do the thinkin . 
 Hit s your doin s, too, that she hired Tony out to 
 hang round that place o Silas s what Christian peo 
 ple ought to keep off n." A sudden gust of wind
 
 198 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 whipped around the corner of the room with a wild 
 shriek, and the two started and looked at each other; 
 after a momentary hush, however, the wife found 
 her tongue. 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth never hired Tony to nobody," she 
 declared. "She jes said she d like for him to he p 
 Mr. Marshall, an Mr. Marshall told Tony what she 
 said, an Tony come to me bout hit." 
 
 "An 5 you hired him." 
 
 "Wa-al, ef I did, you git the money for hit, an 
 you make the man pay more n he s wuth, too!" 
 
 "You can t deny he spends a lot o time at that 
 thar place." 
 
 "Shan, nothin ain t goin to happen to Tony 
 along o that place." Was it the wind this time? 
 "He never goes in sight of hit unless Mr. Marshall 
 is right thar with him. Mr. Marshall hisself told 
 me hit were like nussin a sick baby to look after 
 Tony, he was that skeered." 
 
 "What I want to know is, what business is Ma y 
 Lizbeth got a-wantin to git he p for that man?" 
 
 There was a fine disgust mingled with a glimpse 
 of something higher in the look which the woman 
 gave him: "Lord, but hit s hard to have to be a 
 woman when a man won t be a man!" was her 
 answer to him, but it passed over his head. 
 
 "Ain t nobody ever told Ma y Lizbeth bout that 
 place yit?" he asked significantly. 
 
 "No, but you kin b lieve they will, they are that 
 sot agin her." 
 
 "Ain t it queerlike an creepy that she s gone an
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 199 
 
 got mixed up with hit?" Some placeless thing 
 shrieked again. 
 
 "How mixed up with hit ?" the wife demanded, 
 but her face had blanched. 
 
 "I seen what I seen." 
 
 "No you never, neither! I was on that waggin 
 with you, an I never seen her comin outen the 
 door with him. Besides that, we was way down 
 the fust bend o the road an you couldn t a-seen 
 that fur! An let me tell you somethin ," she 
 continued, "you ve got to git that off n ma s mind. 
 You had no business a-tellin her sich a tale an 
 takin up all o my time a-keepin her mouth shet 
 Sh-h-h!" 
 
 The beat of a horse s hoofs resounded outside, 
 and a man s "Hello" startled both to their feet. 
 The unusual sounds, the late hour, and the wild night, 
 blending with the eeriness of their conversation, 
 wrought into the moment a thrill of real terror. The 
 man pressed back against the mantel-shelf. It was 
 the woman who summoned courage to unbolt the 
 door and admit what the fates had sent. 
 
 With the water streaming from his mackintosh in 
 rivulets and red mud bespattering his great boots, 
 the stranger-tenant of the haunted house came in out 
 of the darkness to ihe glowing warmth of the log fire 
 inside. There were pleasant and courteous greetings 
 as the visitor divested himself of his raincoat and 
 stamped the red mud from his boots at the hos 
 pitable threshold. The noise and stir roused the old 
 crone by the fireside, and caused the apple-red cheeks
 
 200 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 of the momentarily awakened Sue to retire modestly 
 under the bed-quilt. 
 
 After having acquitted himself creditably in the 
 rite of the all-around handshake, a ceremony which 
 has with the hill people the solemnity of a covenant, 
 the stranger deliberately drew up a chair beside 
 Grandma Thaggin, and asked after her cough with 
 a deepness of concern that flattered the old crone into 
 almost instant capitulation. Grandma told him 
 literally all about it, for when her daughter-in-law 
 would have interfered, Marshall signalled to her to 
 let the old woman talk; so, for once since her son s 
 marriage, grandma was granted the right of unlim 
 ited self-expression. Since this visit of the stranger s 
 was primarily for the purpose of placating the old 
 lady, the younger woman was fain to give way, 
 though with deep misgivings. However, she seized 
 the first opportunity which offered itself after her 
 mother-in-law had diagnosed her malady to the mi 
 nutest detail, to remark: 
 
 "You don t let a bad night stop you from impor 
 tant business, do you, Mr. Marshall? " 
 
 "Well, the business didn t so much matter," he 
 replied in an off-hand way, "but I was afraid I d 
 keep you folks up, looking for me, and I knew that 
 your mother here ought not to have her rest broken." 
 The old woman s eyes sparkled with delight. For 
 the first time in her life-drama she was centre of the 
 stage. 
 
 "Now that were ra-al considerate of you, hit sho 
 were," she wheezed. "Shan lowed as how you
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 201 
 
 wouldn t come out in this pesky weather lessen you 
 wanted to trade mighty bad." Her daughter-in- 
 law s mute lips signalled "hush" to her from behind 
 the visitor s back. 
 
 "No-o-o," said the stranger, deliberately. "The 
 fact is, I have been hesitating myself lately. Mr. 
 Logan has offered me his farm, and since taking a 
 look at it, I am very much in the notion of buying it. 
 Logan has kept up his property so well." 
 
 "Thar ain t no better-kept farm in the country 
 than this one right here," declared the woman who 
 ten minutes before had thought she was not anxious 
 to trade, and she and her husband exchanged glances. 
 Shan got up and then sat down again. 
 
 "Oh, well, I as good as told you the other morn 
 ing that I would trade if we could get the titles 
 fixed all right, so I suppose I ll have to live up to 
 my promise." 
 
 "Did you find out what you wanted about them 
 papers? Was they all right?" Shan asked, eagerly 
 catching at renewed hope. 
 
 "Yes that is to say I guess we can fix it. Do 
 you still want to trade?" The stranger put the 
 query as if the whole affair were a matter of the 
 smallest personal concern to himself. 
 
 In answer to a desperate signal from his wife, 
 Thaggin replied in the affirmative. 
 
 "Ain t I a-goin to git nothin for puttin my cross 
 mark to them papers?" It was the old woman who 
 was eagerly questioning. 
 
 "Why," began Marshall, "half the proceeds"
 
 202 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 this time the signalled "hush" was directed at him, 
 and silenced him. A moment afterward, however, he 
 said, in reply to the repeated question: "Well, it is a 
 shame to ask you to take that long ride to town 
 without getting something nice for it. Now what 
 would you like to have?" 
 
 "Money!" 
 
 "Oh," and he laughed. "Well, bein s it s you/ 
 grandma, I ll give you two hundred silver dollars if 
 you ll sign those papers and not say a word about it 
 to anybody." And he added in an aside to Shan: 
 "I ll let you pay that, Thaggin, if you really want 
 to trade. I m going to take it on myself to see that 
 she gets enough out of this for her personal comfort. 
 Put that in your pipe and smoke it!" Then he 
 turned to the old woman again: "And if you are 
 right good and will get ready for the trip the first 
 fair day, we ll lay in a big stock of cough medicine 
 while we are in town as a present from me, you 
 understand." 
 
 "Now don t that look like Providence!" exclaimed 
 the old lady. "My medicine s done plum out, an 
 that triflin Ma y Lizbeth tended like she couldn t 
 buy me no more tell she drawed her next pay." 
 
 "Maybe she couldn t." It was the stranger who 
 spoke, but his voice had changed slightly. The 
 younger Mrs. Thaggin wondered if it were a trick 
 of the firelight that gave his cold eyes a momentary 
 hurt look. 
 
 "Mebbe she lied bout it, goin an comin ," 
 flashed the old woman. " She told me the fust time
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 203 
 
 I sot eyes on her that hit was already done paid 
 for!" 
 
 "Mrs. Thaggin," said the stranger, and this time 
 there was no note of placating in his stern voice, "I 
 know for a certainty that Miss Dale s guardian did 
 not supply her with any money at all, and that what 
 she spends on you or on anybody else is what she 
 makes herself. The man who educated her kept 
 telling her that she must pay back what he did for 
 her, and she has taken a notion to pay the debt by 
 giving the sum of it to you people here. That is 
 what she means when she says that anything she 
 does for you is already paid for. I suppose you 
 know that her guardian died not long ago without 
 leaving her anything, and that she now hasn t any 
 money at all except what she makes by teaching." 
 
 The green cabbage stalks got in another dig of 
 revenge on the slumbering Sue just at this moment, 
 and the mother s surveillance was momentarily 
 diverted from the old woman. Grandma saw her 
 opportunity, and leaned forward with a cunning, 
 hideous leer as she replied: 
 
 "Now you ain t a-foolin o me. You an me 
 know whar Ma y Lizbeth kin git all the money she 
 wants!" 
 
 "Where?" Marshall s sharp question brought 
 the daughter-in-law to her post again and made 
 even the phlegmatic Shan sit up suddenly, wide 
 awake. But it was too late grandma had taken 
 the bit between her teeth. 
 
 "Whar can she git all the money she wants?" she
 
 204 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 repeated to the electrified group. " Git it whar she 
 gits all her candy an goodies an that thar ridin 
 horse an " 
 
 "Shut that up, or by God! I ll " 
 
 Marshall had sprung to his feet and slung aside a 
 chair that intervened between himself and Shan 
 Thaggin. The other had started up, too, and was 
 cowering and shivering against the mantel-shelf. 
 
 "You answer me, you!" the terrible stranger 
 raged at him. "Does that woman know what she s 
 saying?" 
 
 "She knows what ever body in the neighborhood 
 is savin ," screamed the old woman, but this time 
 the daughter-in-law shut her up literally by clap 
 ping her strong hand over her mouth and holding it 
 there. 
 
 "I ain t got nothin tall to do with hit," chat 
 tered Thaggin between his uncontrollable teeth. 
 "Hit s all women s talk hit ain t none o me!" 
 
 "Well, by the Lord Harry, I ll give you something 
 to do with it!" Marshall was whiter than the shiv 
 ering creature before him, but with a whiteness that 
 augured ill for the thing that was in his path. "I ll 
 give you something to do with it! Now then! You 
 keep these women s mouths shut on that subject 
 or I ll beat you into a jelly! Understand? Don t 
 you ever let anybody hear again one breath from one 
 of them against that girl " 
 
 "La, mister!" the younger Mrs. Thaggin had 
 released her hold on the old woman s mouth to 
 throw herself between her cowering husband and
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 205 
 
 the enraged stranger "la, mister, Shan ain t been 
 sayin a thing! Please, sir, don t hurt him!" 
 
 Shan seized the circumstance of his wife s inter 
 vention to put temptation out of the stranger s way 
 by decamping through the back door into the rainy 
 darkness as fast as his wabbly legs would carry him. 
 With Shan out of harm s way, the old mother got 
 in a last shot: 
 
 "I know one mouth what you can t shet you 
 limb o Satan! Millie Davis won t be takin her 
 orders from you, an when she makes that gal move 
 outen her house like she says she s a-goin to, ever - 
 body in the countryside will know why!" 
 
 The younger woman clapped her hand over the 
 other s mouth again and looked up to see that the 
 stranger s face had grown ashen. He turned without 
 another word, flung on his raincoat, and strode out 
 of the door. Before he could release the lighted 
 lantern from the nail on which he had left it hanging 
 in the entry, however, Shan Thaggin s wife was by 
 his side. 
 
 "Mister," she said pleadingly, "I I don t want 
 you to think I been talkin bout Ma y Lizbeth! 
 Hit ain t b cause I m skeered o you that I say it. 
 I m jes mortal sorry for the child, an I know hit s all 
 black lies that they re a-tellin on her " 
 
 The man raised the lighted lantern to her face to 
 find that her eyes were streaming with tears. An 
 answering something softened the blaze of his own. 
 
 "They are all black lies they are telling on her," 
 he said, with visible emotion. "She is the purest 
 woman in the whole world!"
 
 206 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "I know it I know it " Melissa Thaggin was 
 saying to him, "an I done promised Uncle Beck 
 Login to befriend her but you see what I ve got 
 ag inst me " she was wiping away the tears as she 
 spoke. The stranger s eyes suddenly took on a re 
 flective expression. 
 
 "Why, you are the one that Babe Davis told me 
 was her friend," he said, kindly. "I m sorry for 
 your sake that I had to raise this devil s row to 
 night. But your husband will have to control his 
 mother s tongue, let him know that." 
 
 "I ll do hit, mister, I give you my word I will. 
 She ain t never to open her head ag inst Ma y Liz- 
 beth ag in while the world stands! An an say, 
 mister, the trade ain t off, is hit?" Something kin 
 dled in the man s eyes that as quickly died. His 
 face was uninterested as the woman pleaded fur 
 ther: "We done kinder made our plans, an we d 
 hate mighty bad to lose out now. Ef you jes 
 wouldn t pay no tention to ma, I d keep her shet 
 up, I sho would." 
 
 "Why," said the stranger, thoughtfully, "this 
 hasn t anything to do with the trade as far as I am 
 concerned, but it will surprise me if the old woman 
 can be persuaded to sign the deeds now." 
 
 "Leave that to me an Shan, mister." 
 
 "All right, I ll pay you your money when the 
 papers are signed every dollar of it cash, remember 
 that. But this talk about Mary Elizabeth has got 
 to stop, now and forever; keep that with you before 
 everything else. I don t want ever to hear another 
 breath of it. Understand?"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 207 
 
 The woman s eyes took on their scared look again, 
 and she protested: 
 
 "La, mister, you ain t a-goin to blame hit all on 
 us! I kin keep ma shet up like I told you, an 
 Shan s done got his dost; but you can t stop a whole 
 passel o women from talkin , you know that your- 
 se f." 
 
 His face went white again. "Mrs. Thaggin," he 
 said, in a moment, "why should they condemn that 
 child on such ridiculously slight evidence? Isn t it 
 that they are just prejudiced anyhow, and are glad 
 to seize on any story against her?" 
 
 "Of course, mister, that s exactly hit." 
 
 "Well, isn t there any way under the sun to sweep 
 away this old prejudice the foundation of all this 
 enmity? Wouldn t the people come to their senses 
 and judge her rightly if that could be done?" 
 
 Suddenly, with a grip that startled the woman, he 
 grasped her shoulder and exclaimed tensely: "Say, 
 if she were to do some great good thing for the peo 
 ple if she were to do something which proved that 
 her whole heart was with them against against me 
 and my interests against everything that I could 
 do to the contrary wouldn t that win them over to 
 her? Wouldn t it? Wouldn t that show them that 
 this infernal talk is a lie?" 
 
 "Why, sho, mister, but that ain t likely to hap 
 pen," and her eyes rilled with tears again. 
 
 But the man was for some reason intensely ex 
 cited. "Good-by," he exclaimed, as if some over 
 mastering impulse had seized his will and were
 
 208 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 driving him forward. "Good-by. Be good to her, 
 now, will you? Won t you be good to her?" 
 
 When John Marshall rode through the Thaggins 
 lowered bars that night and set his face against the 
 driving sleet and rain, one idea possessed him, and 
 only one. The hardening sleet beat against his 
 breast, but his heart was on fire. He took wind and 
 rain and ice-needles, head-on, realizing little and 
 fearing less the fury with which they opposed him, 
 for the storm that raged within him dwarfed their 
 angry onslaughts till he was scarcely conscious that 
 they assailed. The very play of the wild lightning 
 threatened in vain. 
 
 He did not think. He was too deeply stirred to 
 think, but every fibre of his being was sentient of 
 one great fact. 
 
 No, it was not the sudden blast right out of the 
 north that set his strong jaw with sinews of iron, that 
 sent that fierce riot through his veins; the night, 
 with its sleet and rain and wind and fire, was merely 
 an incident!
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 WINTER had smiled again. In the warmth of but 
 three fleeting hours of sunshine the sleet had gone 
 from the hills, the winds were still, and the bare, 
 brown bushes had begun to dream good resolutions 
 of turning over new leaves. 
 
 Only last night the north wind had swept the little 
 valley with a rain of ice; but this morning, if there 
 was any air at all astir, it was a tender breath right 
 out of the South. It was winter s day of atonement, 
 and nothing was lacking from the scene to make 
 amends for her cruelty of the night before. Even that 
 flock of gray doves, glinting across the landscape in 
 the shimmering sunlight, seemed offered as an earnest 
 of peace. 
 
 The Southern winter is a tricksy damsel and is lia 
 ble to do almost anything at any time. She has a way 
 of hitting you hard one day, and laughing at you the 
 very next pretending that she didn t mean it and is 
 hurt with you that you can t take a joke. It is a 
 favorite prank of hers to furnish out-of-door roses for 
 the Christmas table, then coat the ungathered buds 
 with ice on the twenty-sixth day of December; and 
 she has an infernal little way of coaxing out the peach 
 blossoms long before there is a shadow of excuse for 
 their appearance, and then nipping off the young 
 
 209
 
 210 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 fruit even before the small boy has had a chance at 
 it. When she is really spiteful, she sends the warm 
 sap surging up the young shrubs all out of season, 
 only to condemn the too trusting plants themselves 
 to an everlasting sleep in a shroud of snow and ice 
 when they are at her questionable mercy. 
 
 On this particular morning, however, she was 
 smiling, placating, trying to make friends. 
 
 But the dreaming stir in the brown woods, the 
 promise of spring in the air even the symbols of 
 peace themselves, softly lilting along the sunlight 
 were lost on the man who had breasted last night s 
 storm unheeding, and was now making his way, un 
 heeding still, to a fateful objective. 
 
 It was nine o clock and after when John Marshall 
 spurred his horse across the gully where the Davises 
 front gate should have stood, and rode up to the 
 front porch of the cabin home. 
 
 He did not dismount, but helloed lustily in con 
 formity to the custom of the hills. The door of the 
 little porch-room, which was slightly ajar, closed 
 softly and promptly he saw it because he had not 
 been able to keep his eyes off it. In a minute or two 
 an angry-eyed, hawk-featured old woman opened the 
 door of the main room and came out on the thresh 
 old. Her lips were parted to answer Marshall s 
 hail, but as soon as her piercing eyes ran him through, 
 she set her jaw in grim silence and waited for him to 
 speak. 
 
 "Is your son, Babe Davis, at home, madam?" 
 That the question was not what she expected showed
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 211 
 
 plainly in her hard old face. Taken by surprise, she 
 answered, but she bit off her reply till its briefness 
 amounted to an affront. 
 
 "Hebe." 
 
 "I want to see him on business; will you be kind 
 enough to tell him so?" 
 
 "He s over yander on the hill d arin up the new 
 ground, ef you ve got any business with him." And 
 she went in and slammed the door behind her. 
 Marshall turned his horse toward the open and gave 
 him such another impetus in the direction the woman 
 had pointed that the old racing blood in him leaped 
 in answer, and he took the long, low hill at a flying 
 run. 
 
 Both horse and rider were breathing hard when 
 they reached the summit, and stopped, almost too 
 suddenly, in a partially cleared field within twenty 
 feet of where a strong-limbed, rusty native was hew 
 ing away stoutly at a rotting stump. 
 
 "Hello, Davis!" 
 
 The man stopped in his work and came toward 
 him slowly, axe on shoulder. Marshall dismounted, 
 flung his bridle over the pommel of his saddle, and 
 gave Selim a slap that sent him cropping the dry 
 grass some yards away. 
 
 "You refused to shake hands with me when we 
 met last," said he. 
 
 "Yes," said the native. 
 
 "You didn t trust me." 
 
 "No-o-o yes " said the native. 
 
 "Davis," the other continued after a pause, "it
 
 212 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 is necessary for us to understand each other. I 
 told you once that I did not love Mary Elizabeth, 
 and it was true at the time I said it. But I" 
 and his strong face became drawn "I love her now. 
 I have told her so. I have offered her ease and 
 pleasure and wealth in exchange for what she con 
 siders her duty to you people here. She has re 
 fused me. I have at all times acted honorably to 
 ward her Do you believe that?" 
 
 The great expressionless eyes of the other had 
 dimmed. "Yes, stranger," he answered, simply; 
 "she lowed you had." 
 
 The stranger looked away across the seared fields 
 for a moment and then said: 
 
 "I m troubled, Davis." 
 
 "Is hit anything I kin holp you about, stranger?" 
 
 "You are the one who can help." 
 
 "Say the word." 
 
 "Davis, do you remember that morning when you 
 came gunning for me, and when I told you that Mary 
 Elizabeth would need us both some day?" 
 
 The pupils of the other man s eyes were enlarging; 
 he was looking John Marshall straight in the face. 
 
 "I remember." 
 
 "Well, that time has come." 
 
 "What you mean, mister? Say hit out." 
 
 He who had never before been squeamish in his 
 choice of words, now all suddenly seemed to find his 
 vocabulary failing him. "And you haven t heard 
 that lying report?" he asked in a moment. 
 
 The crimson blood crept slowly up the throat of
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 213 
 
 the rustic and spread over his sunburnt face, dye 
 ing it a yet deeper red. He gulped hard at a lump 
 in his throat as he answered: 
 
 "Yes, I heerd hit. I m jes layin low tell I kin 
 find the man what started hit. Did you want me 
 to holp you fix him?" 
 
 "If a man had started it, Davis" his clinched 
 fist emphasized his words on the top rail of the fence 
 by which they were standing "I wouldn t need any 
 help. But it s the women that are talking it. Shan 
 Thaggin s wife told me so herself. It was that old 
 she-devil there that let out the report to me. It 
 is all my fault," he continued, clearing his throat 
 vigorously; "it was my unheeding, selfish blindness 
 that brought this upon her. She s a baby she didn t 
 know. And I I blundered." 
 
 "You thought b cause you an her knowed the 
 books, stranger, an we didn t, hit didn t make no 
 diffence what we uns thought." 
 
 "I may have been fool enough to feel that, Davis, 
 but if I had ever thought the matter out, I would have 
 realized that your public opinion could change the 
 face of the whole world for her." 
 
 His strong, nervous hand was tearing at the split 
 rail as he continued: "You see, she thinks she is in 
 duty bound here, and that simply means that she 
 is going to stay. She is utterly dependent on your 
 people and at their mercy. She has no ties but these, 
 no chance of friends but such as she can make here. 
 And she has no means of support whatever but her 
 pitiful little wages."
 
 214 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 " She makes good money, stranger, an she s got a 
 good home for as long as she wants hit." 
 
 The stranger had turned away but now suddenly 
 faced about again. "Davis," he said, between set 
 teeth, "your mother is threatening to turn that child 
 out of doors, disgraced." 
 
 The ashen-gray of the other man s face was his 
 answer, and Marshall continued, a little quickly: 
 "But, after all, that may not occur. I believe, 
 I hope, that there will be some happenings here 
 which will put Mary Elizabeth right with your peo 
 ple. The danger is they may come too late to save 
 her " 
 
 " Too late? " the other interrupted, hoarsely. 
 
 " Too late to keep this thing from breaking her heart 
 from breaking her frail woman s spirit. Davis, 
 it s going to kill her to hear that slander!" 
 
 "Could you an me an a couple o guns cl ar up 
 the siterwation a bit, stranger?" 
 
 "No, we can t shoot women. And a move on our 
 part now would be the surest way of sending the 
 whole damnable story to her." 
 
 "Then, stranger, what must I holp you do?" 
 
 "Help me to keep her from knowing of this talk 
 till she is put right with the people and their infernal 
 gossip is swallowed up in gratitude. Silence that 
 mother and that brother of yours " 
 
 "You re a-talkin bout my mother an my brother, 
 stranger." 
 
 " I am talking for the girl who has no brother, and 
 to the man who, with his gun across his saddle,
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 215 
 
 warned me that he was going to stand to her in the 
 place of one." 
 
 The blood had receded from the face of the other 
 man, leaving it blue-white about his pinched nos 
 trils, but he looked John Marshall steadily in the eye 
 as he returned, quietly: "Say on, stranger." 
 
 Then Marshall told him Horton s camp story 
 about the death of Welchel Dale; but he saw no 
 surprise in the eyes of the man until he named the 
 murderers. 
 
 In the startled expression of the rustic, fear fol 
 lowed quickly on the heels of surprise, and then 
 conviction which, however, repudiated any forgive 
 ness for Marshall s having recited the unwelcome 
 truth suffused the whole. Marshall caught the look 
 and its meaning. 
 
 "Davis," he said with sudden emphasis, "if we 
 are to take care of Mary Elizabeth, we will have to 
 put ourselves and our personal feelings out of the 
 question. We must think only of her, and keep her 
 before us till we go to the bottom of this and learn 
 what to do for her. Mary Elizabeth," he continued 
 perhaps he repeated the name on purpose to exorcise 
 the demon he saw rise in the spotted face of the other 
 man " Mary Elizabeth, being the child of that man, 
 has inherited, so to speak, the hatred of both your 
 brother and Trav Williams. It must be that way, 
 for there is absolutely nothing in what the girl her 
 self has done to warrant their hate. Now this is 
 why I tell you an ugly truth about your own brother: 
 I know that when these people generally come to
 
 216 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 find out what Mary Elizabeth is doing for them 
 and they will find out, for she is going to tell them in 
 spite of me they will be crazy about her; but I am 
 not at all sure that Williams and Bud Davis will ever 
 cease to hate her. I hope that they will, but I am 
 doubtful. Now, if they do not, they are likely to 
 concoct some other devilish scheme against her even 
 if this one fails." 
 
 Babe Davis was struggling to speak, but his throat 
 and lips were dry. After an effort he said hoarsely: 
 
 "I ain t gone nowhar." 
 
 "No, nor I either. Now, see here, I m hoping that 
 when the truth is known everything will be all right, 
 and that this talk will die a natural death without 
 Mary Elizabeth s ever hearing it. But if it doesn t, 
 Davis, if it doesn t, that s what you and I have got 
 to take care of." 
 
 Again the name of Mary Elizabeth worked its 
 magic, and Babe replied: "I m ready, stranger, but 
 how?" 
 
 "God knows!" 
 
 "Ef Ma y Lizbeth wa n t so wilful " 
 
 "If she only wasn t!" 
 
 "We kin tell better when the time comes." 
 
 "Yes, yes, but in the meantime, can you handle 
 the situation there at home? Can you keep your 
 mother and Bud from telling her that damned 
 scandal? Nobody else is apt to repeat it to her." 
 
 "I ve kept em from blabbin it to her so fur, 
 stranger, but ma s bout to bust." 
 
 "Well, keep her quiet at any cost. And you,
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 217 
 
 Davis, when Mary Elizabeth tells what she knows 
 about me, make much of the fact that she has sided 
 with you all against me that s what is going to save 
 the situation, if anything can." 
 
 Something that had flickered once or twice in the 
 dull eyes of the rustic now struggled to light up 
 again as Marshall continued: "And don t let any 
 lingering memory of the fact that you and I have 
 a friendly agreement on this subject, make you spare 
 me any, in speaking of me to the others, if that will 
 help the child herself. It may be that the blacker 
 I am painted, the more they will realize what she is 
 struggling to do for them." 
 
 Selim had strayed up to within reach, and Marshall 
 laid hold of the bridle and put his foot in the stirrup. 
 As he drew himself up into the saddle, Babe Davis 
 asked, with his dull eyes alight now: 
 
 "Stranger, what in the hell have you been doin ?" 
 
 The stranger looked down at him with something 
 akin to regret in his fine eyes. "Something that 
 Mary Elizabeth has opposed me in every step of the 
 way, for your sakes," he replied. 
 
 "What?" 
 
 " Mary Elizabeth will tell you will tell you in spite 
 of me But say, Davis, haven t we got enough 
 of the man in us to stand together in befriending her, 
 even though we should be against each other in other 
 things?" 
 
 "Hit strikes me that we have, stranger." 
 
 "Then, no matter what else happens between us, 
 can I depend on you to join me if at any time there
 
 218 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 is anything we can do for her? And will you keep me 
 informed as to how things are going with her?" 
 
 "You kin depend on me." 
 
 "Davis, if she should need any money I " 
 
 "So could I, stranger, an I m closter to her than 
 you air." 
 
 There were several minutes of silence between them, 
 and then the stranger said, in a voice that had in it 
 a distinct note of sadness : 
 
 "Davis, I shall be sorry to lose your friendship." 
 
 And he turned his horse into the way that he had 
 come, and rode at an unsafe speed straight back to 
 the Davis cabin. 
 
 Arrived at the steps again, he did not hello, but 
 instead dismounted at the porch, and, presenting 
 himself at the door which the hawk-eyed old woman 
 had slammed against him less than an hour before, 
 knocked loudly for entrance. At a quavering " Come 
 in" from within, he pushed the sagging door open 
 and entered. 
 
 It was the first time that he had been inside the 
 cabin, and the strangeness of the place, and the seem 
 ing darkness of it for he had come in out of the 
 glare of the morning sunlight confused his sight for 
 a moment. 
 
 In the next, however, his vision cleared, and he 
 saw before him, backed against the side of the 
 large chimney-piece as if for support in face of his 
 effrontery, the girl who held, to every spark of chiv 
 alry within him, the most delicate, the most peculiar 
 claim.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 219 
 
 The light that struggled through the deep cabin 
 window fell directly upon her. It seemed to Mar 
 shall that she was more ethereal, more spiritually 
 beautiful than ever before; and he in all whose 
 universe was never a niche for haloed saints, sud 
 denly felt that he would like to concentrate the rays 
 behind her pure and perfect face. 
 
 That girl! And that story ! The man s blood 
 went booming and pounding through the brain of 
 him. It was a question whether he could command 
 the proper even calm of voice in speaking to her. 
 
 She was looking straight at him now. No, she had 
 not heard the story! 
 
 "I have come to tell you," he found himself saying 
 very gently, "that I release you from all obligation 
 to silence concerning anything that you have learned 
 about me or from me. It is not too late for you 
 to save the cause of your people; but to do it, you 
 will have to win them all to your side. You will 
 have to show them that your whole heart is with 
 them because because they are suspicious, you 
 know. Williams and Bud Davis, here, and Sykes 
 could help you most, if you would go at them right 
 if you would make friends with them." 
 
 "Oh, don t/" 
 
 The exclamation seemed to have slipped out un 
 awares. The girl who said it and the man who 
 heard it looked at each other. The triumphant joy 
 that he had expected to see spring to her eyes was 
 swallowed up in something that he did not under 
 stand.
 
 220 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Just then the sound of an opening door at the 
 back drew the girl s glance away, but Marshall did 
 not look around. He guessed shrewdly that some 
 one had opened the door to listen, so he pretended 
 not to hear the interruption. When he spoke, he 
 purposely raised his voice so that it could be dis 
 tinctly heard, and he chose his words with his mind 
 on the unseen listener. 
 
 "I am sorry that our pleasant little association is 
 at an end, Miss Dale, but since you choose to be a 
 friend to these people here instead of a friend to me, 
 of course as you wrote me yourself there is nothing 
 more to be said between us." He bowed courteously, 
 but distantly, and withdrew from the room. 
 
 He was descending the steps, Mary Elizabeth could 
 hear him as he went; he was mounting Selim now, for 
 the creaking of the saddle announced the fact; and 
 now he was riding away ! 
 
 Mary Elizabeth laid hold of the mantel-shelf, for 
 the floor beneath her was threatening to give way. 
 Aunt Millie came in from the back porch and looked 
 at her hard and long, but the girl scarcely gave her 
 a thought. Almost in a daze she slipped out of the 
 room, and sought refuge among the friendly pillows 
 of her own little bed where none could come and 
 stare curiously at her, where she could puzzle out 
 what had happened to her. 
 
 She was thinking of John Marshall and of what 
 he had said to her; but, strange to say, it was 
 no thought of the coveted privilege he had at last 
 granted that most engaged her. It was what he
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 221 
 
 had said in parting that filled all her conscious 
 thought. "Our pleasant little association," he had 
 called those idyllic days in which the world forget 
 ting they had spent hours and hours together with 
 nothing more to be desired, at least by one of them. 
 
 That there was "nothing more to be said between 
 them," was one thing for her to say; but for him to 
 accept it as a finality, for him to be willing to say it 
 for himself ! she told the rest to the pillow in which 
 she buried her face. 
 
 But after a time it came to pass that Mary Eliza 
 beth had to give account of herself. That was when, 
 the storm abated, she sat up on the side of the bed, 
 and, with her burning cheeks in her hands, demanded 
 an explanation from herself. 
 
 Why had the sunlight faded just because John 
 Marshall had accepted what she had been trying to 
 force on him ever since her eyes had been opened? 
 Why should she, who had never compromised with 
 dishonor, give one instant s further thought to him? 
 
 Why had he come to her with what he had 
 brought? And was it possible just Heaven, was it 
 possible that she did not wish to disclose his vil 
 lainy? that she was sorry he had given her permis 
 sion to speak? 
 
 Her head sank lower in her hands, but the crimson 
 of her burning cheeks crept out beyond her screening 
 fingers and tinged even her white forehead with the 
 color of shame. A shower of brown curls, released 
 by a falling comb, dropped about her bowed face 
 as if to hide from the eyes of honest day the face
 
 222 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 of a girl who was all but ready to betray her own 
 people who, down in the deepest depths of the false 
 heart of her, yearned to turn traitor to the cause 
 to which she had been consecrated by a memory 
 that would not die.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 WHEN Babe Davis returned from the new-ground 
 that day at noon, and Bud came back, black-browed 
 and ugly of mood, from an enforced working of the 
 county road, Mary Elizabeth had defeated the tempt 
 er, self, and was ready to go all the way to the duty 
 she saw before her. 
 
 But there was no thrill of triumph in the victory, 
 no promise of joy in the way that she took. It had 
 been forced upon her to sacrifice either the interests 
 of her people or the interests of the man she loved. 
 But he was wrong the man she loved was wrong. 
 And so it was that when the Davises, mother and 
 sons and elfish grandchild, were gathered together for 
 the noonday meal, a very white, a very wretched- 
 looking girl came in to them with the announcement 
 that she had bad news for them. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth did not sit down, but stood with 
 her back to the chimney, facing the group. The 
 others were seated around. Aunt Millie, who was 
 waiting for the hoe-cakes to brown before serving 
 dinner, stared at the girl with sinister speculation in 
 her mean old eyes, while Bud glowered that so much 
 attention should be accorded her, and "Surster" 
 sucked her thumb in round-eyed wonder. 
 
 But in the erstwhile stupidly passive face of Babe, 
 varying emotions were battling against each other. 
 
 223
 
 224 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Now red, now ashen, and gulping hard at an excite 
 ment that would not be swallowed, he looked from 
 the girl to the others, and back to the girl again. 
 
 "I want to tell you all something that I ve found 
 out," began Mary Elizabeth, and the red went out 
 of Babe s watching face. "This man, John Marshall, 
 has a scheme on foot to get possession of all the land 
 in this valley and then dam up the creek at the gap 
 and cover your farms with a big lake. He s the one 
 who has been doing all this buying for years, and he 
 now has the titles to nearly all the lands here." 
 
 Babe Davis s face became the picture of open- 
 mouthed, stupid bewilderment, and the steel of the 
 old woman s glance struck fire, but distinct relief was 
 brought to both when Bud spoke to the situation. 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth," he said, "ain t you got sense 
 enough to know that the law ain t a-goin to let him 
 destroy my property, an that I ain t, neither? He 
 might could buy up ever foot o land but this here, 
 an still not be able to put a scheme like that th ough. 
 Why, he d have to own all the land for that, an he 
 ain t likely to git this tell I m dead an rotten." 
 
 "Yes," the girl urged, the first tension of her mood 
 giving way before a rising flame of indignant loyalty 
 toward her own. "Yes, but he has found out that 
 nearly all of you have never got good titles to your 
 lands." 
 
 Bud Davis sat up with the growl of a wild beast. 
 
 "An how in the hell do you an him make that?" 
 
 "Why, why," said the girl, startled by his violence, 
 "these were all government lands at first, and people
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 225 
 
 have to get out patent papers to government lands 
 before they can hold them." 
 
 Every eye was upon her now. The listeners 
 leaned forward as if by a common impulse. Not a 
 sound was to be heard except the voice of the girl. 
 "These papers were never got out by our ancestors. 
 They merely took possession of the lands here so 
 this man says that we have ho right to them, that 
 they are still government property. And he is going 
 to buy them or has already bought them from the 
 United States government." 
 
 Then Mary Elizabeth unfolded at length the hate 
 ful story, dwelling on the facts that she thought 
 would be difficult for their understanding. 
 
 The hoe-cakes were burning on the hearth, but the 
 old woman s eyes were riveted on the narrator s face. 
 During the whole recital the two men kept their eyes 
 on her, breathless, unmoving; but when she ceased 
 speaking, Bud got up from his chair and kicked it 
 from him. Babe rose, too, brought to his feet by the 
 look with which his brother was now regarding the 
 girl. 
 
 "How come you know all this? " the black-browed, 
 elder man demanded. 
 
 Babe promptly crossed over and took his stand 
 between the infuriated questioner and the girl. 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, you don t have to answer that 
 ef you don t want to," he said to her, and then he 
 turned and looked straight into the face of his brother. 
 
 The old mother gave a little cry of fear, but Mary 
 Elizabeth was already saying steadily:
 
 226 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "But I want to answer it, Babe," and then to the 
 other: "I found out the main facts from a letter of 
 Mr. Marshall s and he told me the rest." 
 
 "How long have you knowed hit?" Bud asked, 
 with his eyes narrowing to a black line of hate. 
 
 "Oh, for several weeks," the girl answered, with 
 some consternation, "but I was in honor bound not 
 to tell." She waited a moment for him to question 
 further, and then asked: "Is there anything else you 
 want to know?" 
 
 "No, that s a plenty" the questioner answered. 
 
 Babe started, and shot a swift, apprehensive 
 glance into the eyes of the girl. But she evidently 
 had not caught the covert meaning in the reply, so 
 he turned to his brother again, this time to give him 
 a long, level look a look so piercing and so significant 
 that the other man s black gaze gradually sank before 
 it. And then Babe did the unheard-of thing in his 
 history, of giving an order in that house. Turning 
 upon the old woman who sat shivering before what 
 she saw, he said, peremptorily: 
 
 "Git up an put that dinner on the table!" The 
 order proved an escape-valve for the tenseness of 
 the situation. In a few minutes more their rela 
 tions had seemingly returned to the normal. Aunt 
 Millie had set about rescuing the hoe-cakes from the 
 burning, after having slapped Sister by way of re 
 lieving her feelings, and Mary Elizabeth was taking 
 up the turnip greens from a pot that stood on the 
 open hearth. Bud had gone out on the back porch 
 to wash his hands.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 227 
 
 Babe was left looking into the fire looking and 
 looking and looking for something that he did not 
 find. 
 
 When they were gathered together again around 
 the table, Mary Elizabeth related fully the details 
 of what she had learned, including an account of 
 Marshall s seizure of the haunted house. Then she 
 outlined to them her plan for saving the situation, 
 which was that they make common cause against 
 Marshall and fight him to the end of the law. And 
 she told them how her guardian, under what she 
 thought were similar circumstances, had saved the 
 land in a contest for the squatter settlers. 
 
 She was making the effort of her life to placate the 
 saturnine elder brother, for she felt the force of John 
 Marshall s advice on the subject, though she had no 
 way of guessing from what it sprang. But her every 
 advance, her every reference to her community of 
 interest with them, was repulsed by Bud Davis with 
 some manifestation of implacable hatred; and when 
 she assured him that she was going to throw her 
 whole heart into helping defeat Marshall s scheme, 
 he growled out something about their being able to 
 settle the matter without her meddling, and got up 
 noisily from the table. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth, hurt and bewildered, left the 
 room to shiver in the pale sunshine on the front steps, 
 and Babe made as though he would follow her, but 
 before he was well on his feet Bud was saying to their 
 mother: 
 
 "She s turned ag in him cause he s throwed her 

 
 228 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 off. You see she s been in with him. He told her all 
 about hit, hisself, an she kep hit all tell he give her 
 the go-by, an then she turned in to ruin him. 
 Purty tale bout that place o Silas s. She handed 
 hit over to him, that s what!" 
 
 Babe stopped long enough to say, quietly too 
 quietly for the girl on the front steps to hear: 
 
 "She ain t to be told that, understand?" When 
 he turned his blue-white face from them and went 
 out, closing the door behind him, the mother and the 
 son inside looked at each other. 
 
 Outside, Babe was taking a seat on the step be 
 side the bewildered girl, and was saying in a shaking 
 voice: 
 
 "You made a mistake, Ma y Lizbeth, you made a 
 mistake!" 
 
 "Oh, how, Babe?" 
 
 "You oughter told me or Uncle Beck, or somebody 
 like that, fust." 
 
 "But you surely want this man stopped, don t 
 you?" 
 
 "By God, yes!" he exclaimed with a flash. "But 
 Uncle Beck an me an some o the yuthers could 
 a-got the thing in hand before before well, no 
 matter now." And he rose to go to his work in 
 the new-ground. Mary Elizabeth accompanied him 
 part of the way that she might talk with him more 
 fully. 
 
 Almost the first sentence that passed his lips when 
 they were far enough away from the cabin to make 
 conversation safe, was to question why it was that
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 229 
 
 she had not been free to tell them of Marshall s 
 scheme sooner. 
 
 Then Mary Elizabeth told him the part of the 
 story that she had kept back from the others, of how 
 she had come to read the letter, of how Marshall had 
 kept her silent through her sense of honor, and of 
 how, to-day, barely two hours ago, he had come to 
 her and given her permission to tell to tell not only 
 what she had read in the letter, but all that he had 
 confided to her as well. And she told him also how 
 John Marshall had urged her to make friends with 
 Bud and with Trav Williams and Mr. Sykes. 
 
 They were some distance from the cabin, out be 
 yond a sheltering thicket, when the girl reached this 
 part of the story. Suddenly she faced him and put 
 one hand on the lapel of his coat to stop him. 
 
 "Babe," she exclaimed, "what I can t even make 
 a guess at is why Mr. Marshall came to me with that 
 permission." 
 
 All at once the groping, mystified look that made 
 its home in the great ox-like eyes of the man, gave 
 way to one of astounded speculation. 
 
 "By gum!" was all that escaped him. 
 
 "What, Babe, what?" 
 
 "Oh, nothin , nothin !" 
 
 "But it is something, Babe, what is it?" 
 
 "Nothin , nothin ," he put her off with. "Hit s 
 jes all so tur ble mixed." 
 
 Hereupon, Babe peremptorily sent her back to the 
 house with orders not to "pester" his mother and 
 Bud, but to go to her own room and stay there. Then
 
 230 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 he took his way straight out the new-ground road, 
 but looked back, now and again, to note her progress 
 homeward. 
 
 When the girl was well out of sight, however, the 
 man turned sharply to the left and went swinging 
 through the long, dry grass and low underbrush of an 
 adjacent field toward an objective that was most cer 
 tainly not the new-ground he was clearing. Half an 
 hour later he presented himself at the door of the 
 haunted house and knocked for admittance. 
 
 The door was opened promptly by John Marshall. 
 Something hung in his right hand at his side. The 
 rustic saw it. He showed two empty hands to Mar 
 shall, and the latter turned and tossed the shining 
 something over on the bed. 
 
 "Come in," he said, stepping aside and then 
 "Sit down." 
 
 The other obeyed mechanically, and Marshall 
 took a chair on the opposite side of the table which 
 had been drawn up near the fire. That the girl had 
 told her story was written all too grimly on Babe 
 Davis s face. 
 
 The two men sat in a strange silence for some 
 minutes, then Marshall said, with evident effort: 
 "Davis, I have never intended to do you a hard 
 ship. It has always been my plan to give you 
 something " 
 
 "Stranger," and a quiet, steady tap of a long, bony 
 ringer on the table between had something ominous 
 in its nervous repression, "stranger, the man ain t 
 livin what could give me a dollar, or take a foot of
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 231 
 
 land away from me. An that s all I ve got to say 
 about that part of hit now. We ll settle that between 
 us later, an settle hit for good an all. I I come 
 for sump n else." 
 
 "What?" Marshall was regarding him intently. 
 
 The other man turned squarely facing him, he laid 
 a tense hold on each side of the pine table, he all but 
 rose from his chair as he asked with repressed ex 
 citement: 
 
 " Did you let Ma y Lizbeth tell on you so she 
 might could make peace with our folks make the 
 folks b lieve in her so they would stop that damn 
 talk?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Did you tell me to run you down to the people 
 an paint you black so they would think the more of 
 her did you do that a-purpose for her?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "An did you know what hit all was bound to lead 
 to for you?" 
 
 They looked into each other s eyes and then both 
 glanced at the weapon Marshall had thrown on the 
 bed. 
 
 "I am not a fool," said the man questioned. 
 
 Babe Davis drew a long, deep breath. " Stranger," 
 he said, in slow incisive tones, "stranger, hit do 
 look like hit takes more n money an book learnin 
 to take the man out n a man!" 
 
 "We are all of us sad mixtures at best," was the 
 stranger s reply. There was another silence, and then 
 Marshall asked:
 
 232 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "How did the others take it? Did your brother 
 hear her when she told it?" 
 
 Babe Davis hesitated a moment, and then re 
 peated what Bud had said to their mother as he him 
 self had left the room. 
 
 Marshall s face blanched under the bronze of its 
 weather stains at the fiendish and unexpected misin 
 terpretation of the girl s act. "Good Lord, Davis, 
 what are we going to do with her?" he burst out. 
 
 "I ll take keer o Ma y Lizbeth," the other an 
 swered; "you ve got to git out o this." 
 
 "What do you mean?" 
 
 "You got to leave here, an that quick. I I 
 can t let you git in trouble after what you done for 
 Ma y Lizbeth." 
 
 "I m not going when she is in danger of persecu 
 tion." 
 
 The native looked up with a start at the quiet 
 finality of the voice. "But s pose sump n should 
 happen to you," he protested. 
 
 " See here, Davis, I m not exactly hankering after 
 getting shot, but I haven t got the slightest notion of 
 letting any two or three men I ever saw make me 
 turn tail and run when it s my business to stand my 
 ground. It s my business now to take care of that 
 child." 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth is ourn, stranger; you ain t re 
 sponsible 
 
 "She s mine to protect," the other interrupted 
 grimly, "and by the white soul of her, I m going to 
 do it!" He had risen and was now looking down on
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 233 
 
 Babe with his arms folded and his strong jaw set. 
 "And don t you be uneasy about me, Davis. I am 
 quite as capable of making things happen as even 
 Trav Williams, when the devil in me gets stirred 
 up." 
 
 The other rose too. He put on his old wool hat 
 and pulled it down carefully all around his head and 
 face. He buttoned up his threadbare coat and 
 moved toward the door, but there he stopped, hesi 
 tating. 
 
 "Stranger," he said slowly, "hit ain t no ques 
 tion of two or three others. Thar ain t a man in 
 this valley what wouldn t let daylight th ough you 
 for takin a chaw o terbacco way f m him when he 
 didn t want you to have it." 
 
 "But if I had paid for the tobacco, Davis, I d be 
 apt to take it whether he wanted me to or not." 
 
 The hillite gave him one of his black, ugly looks, 
 but by the time he had the door open, his mood was 
 tempered again. 
 
 "Mister," he said, "hit s proned into me that 
 you d better let me tell Ma y Lizbeth the whole 
 truth tell her what you done for her. Mebbe hit 
 would make her less servigrous to ards you, an that 
 would mebbe make things more easier on you." 
 
 John Marshall turned and looked in the fire. His 
 big chest swelled with a sudden spasm. A fierce 
 hope had sprung to his eyes. 
 
 When he turned again to his tempter, however, 
 the light of something unexplained had transfigured 
 his burning glance.
 
 234 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "No, Davis, no," he said finally. "She s a frail 
 little thing, and she would not be able to stand it 
 at least, not without help. You see," and his eyes 
 softened infinitely, "there is not a woman in all her 
 world here to take her in her arms and comfort her. 
 There s nobody who cares for her except us two big- 
 footed, blundering men, and we wouldn t answer to 
 help a girl bear up under a thing like that." 
 
 Babe Davis stood for some moments with his ar 
 rested hand on the latch, then the door closed on him 
 without another word between him and the stranger.
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 WHEN Babe Davis closed the door of the haunted 
 house between himself and the inexplicable stranger, 
 instinct, rather than reason, sent him, stumbling, 
 flying, panting, toward the cross-roads store. He 
 did not take time to go back home for his usual 
 Saturday companion, the flea-bit mule, but he 
 couldn t have told why. He avoided the highroads 
 of country travel and took the way that the crow 
 flies with much the same wild instinct. He did not 
 plan, he did not reason, he did not deliberate. He 
 was going straight to Beck Logan, but only his sub 
 conscious self and his God knew why. 
 
 And he might himself have been a "ha nt " that 
 walked those hills when at length, white-faced with 
 something more than fatigue, he broke out of the 
 scrub-oak thicket near the back of the store, and 
 stood stock-still for some minutes to get himself in 
 hand. He was going to have to face the congregated 
 men of the countryside, for this was Saturday after 
 noon; and he stopped to think now, for the first time. 
 
 The bluff that he put up in looking as if nothing 
 had happened failed miserably, however, for even he 
 could see that something in the look of him created 
 a sensation when at length he entered the store. 
 But the sensation was a suppressed one, for there 
 
 235
 
 236 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 was that in the look of Babe Davis that silenced gibe 
 and challenge, and sent the others in little segregated 
 groups, to wonder to each other in subdued tones. 
 
 "Sump n s happened over to the Davises , Ri 
 Slaton said in an aside to Trav Williams, and Trav 
 answered, uneasily: 
 
 "I wonder whar Bud s at." 
 
 That something had happened "over to the Da- 
 vises " was the conclusion to which the others 
 jumped, too. Indeed, it was what most of them had 
 been expecting, for Bud s hatred toward the school 
 teacher, and Babe s silent worship of her, had become 
 themes of current comment among them, while every 
 man there had heard the gossip about the girl and 
 the stranger. So when Babe deliberately drew Beck 
 Logan apart from them to the seclusion of the 
 boarded-off post-office corner and closed the dividing 
 door, there was nothing short of consternation 
 among them. 
 
 It was out of the question, now, for any of them to 
 leave; being neighbors to the Davises, they must 
 stay and see this thing out. Even the two loungers 
 from over the ridge foreigners, so to speak put 
 down the saddle-bags which they were in the act 
 of gathering up when the ghastly looking Babe came 
 into the company, and decided to rest a spell before 
 taking their departure. 
 
 It was but a poor attempt they all made at gen 
 eral conversation during that seemingly interminable 
 time in which the partition door of the post-office 
 corner remained shut against their excited curiosity.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 237 
 
 But all things come to those who wait long enough, 
 and just as the foreigners, despairing, were about to 
 give up resting and take their homeward way over 
 the distant ridge of hills, the long-watched partition 
 door opened. 
 
 Uncle Beck issued first, and there was a preternat- 
 urally calm, reassuring look on his shrewd old face; 
 but the countenance of Babe Davis, who followed in 
 his wake and stood silent beside him, gave the lie to 
 his cheerful effrontery. 
 
 "Boys," said Uncle Beck in a businesslike tone 
 and they closed around him in expectant quiet 
 "boys, thar s a little trouble a-brewin , an we ve 
 got to look into hit together. Now Babe, here, he s 
 oneasy; but I says to him, says I, Why, Babe, you 
 talk like the men in this here neighborhood was on- 
 reasonin childern, when they ve got a reputation all 
 over the country for bein fair-minded, thinkin , 
 high-toned men. Why, says I to Babe, didn t them 
 candidates that come th ough here last summer from 
 way down bout Mobile, say we was regyarded ever - 
 whar as bein the most level-headed men in the 
 State? Wa-al, says I to Babe, do you s pose for a 
 minute that men like that won t act up to the repu 
 tation they ve done made for theirselves? No, says 
 I, I m goin to put this matter right into their hands; 
 I m a-goin to tell em the whole truth, an let em 
 act together." 1 
 
 The assembled company stood up noticeably taller, 
 and there was a general modest clearing of throats; 
 but Babe Davis s mouth had dropped open, and he
 
 238 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 was regarding the storekeeper with an expression of 
 utter astonishment, as the old man continued: 
 
 " An more n that/ says I to Babe, ef they even 
 choose to send me to town to a lawyer to find out 
 exactly how this here muddle stands, I ll go without 
 a protest; b cause, says I, I know these men, an I 
 know they air a-goin to expect me to act with em 
 in what they decide, in their own good judgment, to 
 do. " 
 
 Babe Davis drew his coat-sleeve across his eyes as 
 if to clear his vision, and stared again at the store 
 keeper. 
 
 "What s the trouble, Beck? Le s have it," came 
 from one of the self-conscious, but impatient, listen 
 ers. There was an uneasy but quiet shifting hi the 
 crowd. They closed in a little more. They bent 
 forward slightly to hear Beck Logan s answer. 
 
 "Why," replied the old man in a tone of frank 
 confidence, "Ma y Lizbeth Dale has been playin a 
 sort o detective game all these months, an has got 
 onto sump n that seems to threaten our interests here. 
 She suspected this here man, Marshall, of under- 
 handedness from the very jump, an she made up 
 her mind to watch him. So she pretended to be 
 powerful friendly-like an sociable with him, jes to 
 git to keep her eye on him " The listeners looked 
 at each other with dawning wonder in their eyes. 
 Babe Davis sat down as suddenly as if his legs had 
 given way under him. 
 
 "Yes," said the old man, nodding his head and 
 smiling as if delighted at the idea, "that slip of a
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 239 
 
 gal! Would you a-thought she had it in her? But 
 that s the way with womenfolks you never can 
 calc late on what they air goin to do next!" 
 
 "What is that man Marshall up to?" one of them 
 interrupted with, and the growl with which the ques 
 tioning demand was accompanied ran through the 
 assemblage like a ground-swell. Men began to whis 
 per, each to each. Trav Williams, black-browed, 
 threatening, and uncommunicative, sat apart. The 
 old man saw that he must keep his reins well in hand. 
 
 "Wa-al," said he promptly, "that s what us men 
 have got to look into. You see, we can t afford to 
 take a woman s judgment bout things women not 
 bein smart in their minds like men. I m free to say 
 that Ma y Lizbeth Dale has got ra-al good wit for a 
 gal, but she has got things mixed, somehow, an 
 we ve got to take the clue that she has skeered up, 
 ontangle the mess she s made of hit, an see whar hit 
 leads." 
 
 "Yes, Beck, but what about Marshall?" another 
 demanded, and the question was instantly echoed in 
 several directions. 
 
 "Wa-al," said the old man calmly and almost 
 cheerfully, for he knew the men he was handling, 
 "wa-al, neighbors, John Marshall is mixed up with 
 a sale of gover ment lands, hereabouts, an I don t 
 like the looks of the story; though, of course, onless 
 you say I ve got to go to town to find out the truth, 
 I ll probably never know jes how hit is. Now he, 
 Marshall hisself, I mean, told Ma y Lizbeth a tale 
 about his doin s here that anybody but a woman
 
 240 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 would a-seen was a lie on the face of hit the very 
 idea! As if a man would fix up a plan that depended 
 on secrecy for its success an then go an tell hit to a 
 woman, an tell her to publish hit from the housetops, 
 besides!" 
 
 And then, without a glance toward Babe Davis, 
 who had been reduced to a state of hopeless bewilder 
 ment, and with his voice every now and then break 
 ing with laughter at the absurdity of the story, Uncle 
 Beck related to them what John Marshall had told 
 to Mary Elizabeth about his great reservoir scheme. 
 
 That laugh of the old storekeeper s saved John 
 Marshall s neck that day. 
 
 "Now, ain t hit like a woman to b lieve a cock an 
 bull story like that!" he would cackle. "As ef any 
 body out n a lunatic asylum would a-told a tale like 
 that an give her permission to tell us! By gad, 
 boys" the situation was a tense one and no man 
 knew it better than the storekeeper, who saw every 
 lightning glance that played about in that lowering 
 company and knew just what he had to laugh down 
 "by gad, boys, I m afeard I d a-mistrusted Ma y 
 Lizbeth, myself, ef John Marshall had a-told her 
 that story an ast her not to tdl. Much as I like the 
 gal, an y all know how I ve stood up to her I m 
 mightily afeard I d a-thought she had at one time 
 been in cahoots with Marshall" the old man was 
 playing his highest trump "ef she d a-said he told 
 her not to give his scheme away to us. But John Mar 
 shall told Babe hisself didn t he, Babe? that he 
 had done been up to Mis Davis s an give Ma y
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 241 
 
 Lizbeth permission to tell ever body what he told 
 her hisself bout his plans!" 
 
 Then Uncle Beck proceeded to narrate to them a 
 new and unique story of Mary Elizabeth s struggles 
 to outwit the mysterious stranger. And in that tell 
 ing he put the girl before them in a peculiarly tender 
 light. She belonged to them! In spite of her years 
 of absence from them, in spite of the strange and 
 estranging "raising" that had been hers, Mary Eliz 
 abeth had sided with her own when she might have 
 had money "big money" and more fine things 
 than that store would have held, if she had turned 
 traitor to her own people if she had married the 
 wicked stranger as he had time and again begged 
 her on his bended knees to do! And Mary Eliza 
 beth had suffered, too, for old Silas s place had been 
 taken from her. 
 
 But whenever the old man spoke of the stranger, 
 his manner was strained. It was not that he justified 
 in the slightest degree John Marshall s mysterious 
 wrong-doing, for he did not. But he spoke absolutely 
 without passion against this man about whom the 
 most inflaming stories were being circulated. And 
 only Babe Davis knew why, for Babe Davis had told 
 him, confidentially, who had released this story of 
 John Marshall s sin against them, for the telling, and 
 why. 
 
 "Beck Login, s pose this here tale about the 
 reservoy should happen to be true ? " Trav Williams 
 spoke for the first time, and there was instant dead 
 silence to hear the reply.
 
 242 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "Wa-al, s pose hit should be true," cheerfully 
 agreed the old man, "a smart man like you, Trav, 
 don t need me to tell you that in such a case the only 
 thing necessary to defeat Marshall s whole scheme 
 would be to establish titles to one single piece of 
 property in the valley." Some of the men had never 
 heard of "titles" before, and the old man had to 
 explain. 
 
 "Now," continued he, "don t ast me to s pose 
 that thar ain t nair one of you what s got a right to 
 his own land, cause my magination ain t equal to hit. 
 No, neighbors, I kin see th ough a mill-stone as well 
 as the man that made the hole in it; but ef hit ll make 
 Trav, here, any happier, I ll git busy an s pose that 
 John Marshall is fool enough to take us all into his 
 confidence in his schemes ag inst us. But even 
 s posin that, neighbors, I m here to tell you that the 
 quicker you do as was suggested an send somebody to 
 inquire into your titles, the better hit will be for you." 
 
 In the pandemonium of questions and invectives 
 which followed, the old man kept his characteristic, 
 slow smile in easy call, and answered everybody with 
 disarming frankness. He had drawn himself up to a 
 seat on the high counter now, and the relaxed and 
 careless attitude that he assumed was in its very self 
 soothing and reassuring to them. It was not the 
 first time that he had controlled them by his laughing 
 philosophy, and his past experience with them stood 
 him in good stead now. 
 
 "Yes," he would agree to one, "John Marshall s 
 up to sump n, an we ve got to find out what!"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 243 
 
 "No," he would declare to another, "men like 
 these ain t a-goin to listen to none o that! Men 
 that have made a reputation for theirselves all over 
 the State by their clear-headedness ain t a-goin to 
 bus loose an do sump n reckless an silly before they 
 make sure they air injured." 
 
 "Wa-al," he would concede to another, "sence 
 y all insist, I ll be the one to go an look into the 
 matter." 
 
 Now, in point of fact, no one as yet had insisted 
 on the old man s undertaking an investigation for 
 them. Indeed, no one had mentioned the idea but 
 himself. But the old man knew the power of sug 
 gestion, through the wisdom of years, and he kept 
 alluding to the idea which he himself had originally 
 advanced as to a desire that was native with his 
 hearers till it finally took root with them. 
 
 By the time that the others had talked off their 
 first repressed excitement and were ready to listen to 
 the old storekeeper again, there was the general 
 feeling throughout the company that somebody had 
 insisted on Uncle Beck s going to town to investi 
 gate the head and front of John Marshall s offending, 
 and that it was a very wise plan, especially in view 
 of the fact that they didn t really know that Mar 
 shall had offended, and also in consideration of the 
 State-wide reputation which was theirs to sustain. 
 In a few minutes they were discussing Uncle Beck s 
 visit to "town" as a foregone and definite conclu 
 sion; and when he told them about the "abstract 
 office " where one could find out all there was to know
 
 244 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 about lands, it was finally decided among them that 
 he must go at once. 
 
 The old man s stroke of state came, however, when 
 he explained that he just naturally had to have the 
 "smartest" and "likeliest" one of the bunch to go 
 with him to town and see the thing through. 
 
 "An when I say smartest an likeliest, " said 
 the shrewd old fellow, "y all know mighty well who I 
 mean." And his big hand descended on the shoulder 
 of Trav Williams, who still sat apart, uncompro 
 mising. 
 
 Trav s black brows cleared in spite of himself, but 
 he began, doggedly: 
 
 "I ain t got no time to go " 
 
 "Yes, you have, Trav Williams," it was Uncle 
 Beck again; " I ve knowed you fifty-six year, an I ve 
 never seen you yit when you didn t have time to do 
 your patriotic duty. Yes, boys, Trav says he ll go, 
 an go gladly, an that he ll git to the bottom of this 
 trouble for you, ef he has to run my damned old legs 
 off." 
 
 Trav couldn t help joining in the laugh that fol 
 lowed, and in a few minutes it was decided that the 
 two should leave that very afternoon to catch the 
 first train. 
 
 After arrangements had been agreed upon, and 
 the general feeling established that immediate and 
 decisive action was in progress, Uncle Beck got their 
 concerted attention again: 
 
 "Look a-here, boys," he said, "me an Trav ain t 
 a-goin to go nosin round an stirrin up trouble
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 245 
 
 for ourselves, mebbe, onless we kin feel that hit s 
 goin to be a ra-al benefit to y all. We ain t a-goin 
 lopin off on a errant like this for no thin . Y all have 
 got to promise us that you won t do nothin reckless 
 an foolish-like tell we have sifted this thing to the 
 bottom, or we won t budge a step will we, Trav?" 
 
 "No," said the man addressed, promptly, "ef we 
 air to take the matter in hand, hit must be in our 
 hands; an we don t want to be made fools of by 
 any interference." 
 
 There were hasty assurances of perfect quiescence 
 on the part of the others, for Trav had spoken with 
 finality; but Uncle Beck didn t rest until he had 
 called each man by name and made him promise not 
 to make any move in the premises until the two en 
 voys should return and point the way. 
 
 All he asked of them now, he explained, was for 
 them to keep the peace among themselves till he 
 and Trav could test the probability of the stranger s 
 threats, and could look into the matter of land titles. 
 They had promised, he reminded them, and he had 
 never known a hill-Billy to go back on a promise. 
 With this much clinched, he pointed out to them 
 that their agreement to remain hands off for a time 
 comprehended, in the spirit of it, the keeping in check 
 of the two who had not been there to join in the 
 compact. Bud Davis and Shan Thaggin were miss 
 ing. With this admonition in regard to them, the 
 old man dismissed the two absentees from considera 
 tion. He knew that Shan would never hurt anybody 
 unless by stumbling over him in full flight, and he
 
 246 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 shrewdly suspected Bud Davis s liver to be whiter 
 than his brutal violence of manner would seem to 
 indicate. At any rate, Bud would not be likely to 
 move till Trav Williams was free to act with him. 
 
 So it came about that Uncle Beck put the whole 
 valley under a peace bond, and deliberately removed 
 Trav Williams, the most violent of the number, 
 bodily from the scene. 
 
 But before Uncle Beck left, however, he found the 
 opportunity to say quietly to Babe Davis: 
 
 "I had to put hit that a- way, Babe. Ef I d a-told 
 em all o the truth, John Marshall s skin wouldn t 
 a-been whole tell sundown. On your life, now, 
 don t you give hit away to em that hit s ra-ally true 
 bout the fellow s damned rascality. Trav an me 
 will git a lawyer an block his game you needn t 
 fear bout that; but, like you, I want him to git off 
 with his life, an he s a-goin to do hit, ef I kin find 
 the way." 
 
 That very afternoon, after he had forced the ar 
 mistice, and while he was on his way to join Trav 
 Williams for the long ride to the nearest railroad 
 station, the old storekeeper met John Marshall, face 
 to face, on a bridle-path. 
 
 The stranger would have passed with a formal 
 "good-evening," but the native blocked his way. 
 The two men looked at each other. 
 
 "Mr. Marshall," said the old man, quietly, "hit s 
 proned into me that I ought to warn you to git 
 away from here. Ma y Lizbeth has done told the 
 people bout your plans, an you can guess the rest,
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 247 
 
 They ve promised to keep the peace for a few days, 
 but after that thar ain t no answerin for em." 
 
 The other man sat his horse in uncompromising 
 silence for a moment or two, and then asked, with a 
 distinct note of cynicism in his voice: 
 
 "And to what am I indebted for your confidence 
 and advice?" 
 
 "To the fact that you acted square to Ma y 
 Lizbeth," the old man replied, simply. "Babe 
 Davis told me all about hit, confidential." 
 
 The stranger removed his hat: "I am very much 
 obliged to you, Mr. Logan, for your kindness," he 
 replied with quick sincerity. 
 
 The sound of a horse s feet came to them from 
 beyond a turn in the path, and, with only a quick 
 look into each other s eyes, the two men simul 
 taneously gathered up rein and departed on their 
 separate ways. 
 
 The guardian spirit who watches over tempera 
 mentally combative men arranged to have the story 
 against Marshall made public on a Saturday so that 
 Uncle Beck s version would be sown broadcast before 
 another could be submitted, for the guardian spirit 
 of temperamentally combative men is a good sports 
 man and likes to give the quarry a chance for his 
 life. 
 
 It was this spirit that sent Babe Davis straight 
 from the interview with Marshall to the country store, 
 to be closeted with the old postmaster for a quarter 
 of an hour in the little post-office cupboard cor 
 ner, where the version of the story to be sown was
 
 248 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 hatched in the listener s scheming brain. And it was 
 this spirit who decreed that Uncle Beck, the most 
 beloved and revered man in the whole county, should 
 be the one to make public the story. Perhaps it 
 was this spirit guardian, too, who decreed that Bud 
 Davis should take on an extra load of moonshine 
 whiskey right after dinner, and lie drunk and asleep 
 across the foot of his bed while his brother forestalled 
 him in the telling of that marvellous story. 
 
 Late that same day, after Uncle Beck and Trav 
 were well on their way to the station, Bud Davis 
 put in an appearance at the store, to find, to his un 
 disguised rage, that he had been forestalled in re 
 porting the wonderful news. 
 
 The extra load of "moonshine" that had put him 
 heavily asleep and delayed his joining the usual 
 Saturday afternoon conclave at the store had worked 
 almost irremediable havoc with his plans. He ar 
 rived on the scene to find his prop and stay, Trav 
 Williams, spirited away by Uncle Beck, and the rest 
 of the fellows pledged to keep the peace for a space 
 and all of them feeling grateful toward Mary Eliza 
 beth. 
 
 It so happened that Babe had departed for home 
 shortly after Uncle Beck himself had taken his leave, 
 so when Bud arrived at the store, he had a clear 
 swing, as it were. It did not take him many minutes 
 to urge the truth of the story about John Marshall s 
 plans to seize their property, and to put his own 
 version of Mary Elizabeth s part in the affair before 
 the assembled valleyites in very glaring colors.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 249 
 
 When he was met with Uncle Beck s argument 
 that Marshall would never have given Mary Eliza 
 beth the right to tell that story if it had been true, 
 Bud at once declared that Marshall must then have 
 already succeeded in defrauding them, and have taken 
 that way of breaking the news to them; and he had 
 the satisfaction of seeing that he created a profound 
 sensation. But, whereas if he could have made the 
 initial statement to them he would probably have 
 carried all before him, he could now feel that it was 
 going to be almost impossible to remove the impres 
 sion that Uncle Beck had made on some of them, and 
 that even with those who were loud in their support 
 of him there were signs of disturbing mental reserva 
 tions. So, on the whole, Bud left the store that 
 evening feeling that the others had not given him 
 the support that his cause merited. 
 
 A night or two after that meeting, the stranger 
 tenant of the haunted house paid another call at the 
 Thaggin home under the cover of darkness, but this 
 time grandma was not kept "heartened up" to see 
 him. 
 
 Grandma was sick very sick she would not be 
 in the way much longer. It was a question of only a 
 few days now before Shan and Melissa Thaggin could 
 convey the little homestead place to John Marshall 
 for the dazzling price to which he had lately risen, 
 without going through the formality of having 
 grandma sign it with the sign of her cross. 
 
 Since the tempestuous interview with the stranger 
 in which grandma had inadvertently been allowed
 
 250 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 to open her mouth once too often, the old woman 
 had steadily refused to allow the sale to be made; 
 but her opposition had now ceased to disturb either 
 her son or her daughter-in-law. They were content 
 to wait. The flight of hours has little or no signifi 
 cance to the hillite, for his temperament has in it a 
 touch of that sublime indifference to the passage of 
 time that would seem to belong properly only to 
 Deity. 
 
 But the other party to the pending contract en 
 joyed no such static calm. Recent developments 
 made every moment count with him. To secure the 
 Thaggin farm had now come to mean the consumma 
 tion of the hopes and plans and ambitions of the best 
 ten years of his manhood. Every other coveted foot 
 of land was now in his grasp. But this one spot to 
 which the resident held titles had to be regularly con 
 veyed. It was the key to the situation. Its pur 
 chase meant success; its loss, disaster. 
 
 Only recently had Marshall come to realize how 
 much of himself he had given to the scheme, what 
 sacrifices he had made for it, what its success or its 
 failure would mean to his future. Looking back 
 now, he saw that from twenty-seven to thirty-seven 
 it had filled his years. It was not that the scheme 
 had taken much of his actual time, for it had not. 
 During all those years he had apparently been in the 
 very thick of life, taking his toll of ordinary pleasures 
 from it, and adding his share to its ordinary achieve 
 ments; but that was but the shadow of himself which 
 had played out that part on the dead level of the
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 251 
 
 commonplace, the real man had been apart with his 
 ambitions. 
 
 And what he had given to it was practically his 
 all, for he had sunk the best part of what he owned 
 in the furtherance of the project, and had, besides, 
 borrowed heavily for his model-city scheme with 
 this as his hope of ultimate solvency. Failure here 
 meant, practically, financial disaster. 
 
 But it meant more than financial disaster. It 
 meant he believed it his failure as a man. To 
 begin with, his reputation hung in the balance. 
 This project would stamp him either as a genius of 
 finance, or the wildest of dreamers; it meant the 
 world on his side, or the world against him. But it 
 had a grimmer meaning still, for it involved in its 
 consummation the demonstration of the man to 
 himself. 
 
 Years ago John Marshall had assured the man 
 within him that he possessed the ability to do big 
 things, to conquer obstinate things; but the man 
 within him had demanded proof. And through all 
 these long years he had been struggling to demon 
 strate what, in the pride of his youth, he had thought 
 ought to be accepted as a self-evident proposition. 
 And now, just as he was about to write Quod erat 
 demonstrandum, the Latin for "I told you so," and 
 close the book, came this unknown quantity, this 
 girl, and menaced his life problem with reduction to 
 absurdity. 
 
 Did he have it in him to succeed? He could dream 
 great things yes, but any man could dream!
 
 252 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Fred Bearing had once said to him that half of 
 life s great successes depend on their achievers will 
 ingness to disregard their cost to others. His words 
 came back to Marshall now, frequently. Well, in 
 this one case, at least, Fred s theory applied. As 
 long as he had disregarded the cost to others, just so 
 long had all gone well; it was when he refused to sac 
 rifice the girl to his project that his affairs had been 
 thrown into chaos with almost certain ruin ahead, if 
 not tragedy for himself. 
 
 But, after all, now was his real opportunity! To 
 snatch success from the jaws of defeat were to suc 
 ceed indeed! To precipitate chaos, to dare assassi 
 nation, and then to triumph what a chance for a 
 man to prove the mettle of the pasture in which he 
 was bred! His blood tingled at the thought that all 
 the odds were against him, and by his own doing, 
 too; and that now, if ever, he would silence all in 
 ward doubts as to his ability to do big things, and he 
 would prove to Fred Bearing that a man may force 
 success without the sacrifice of anybody who is fit to 
 survive. 
 
 And so, while giving Mary Elizabeth the chance 
 to prove to her people her loyalty to them against 
 him, in the desperate hope of re-establishing her with 
 them, he was doggedly pursuing his objective against 
 fearful odds of his own deliberate making. 
 
 So he went to the Thaggins that night to arrange 
 for the transfer of the property as soon as grandma 
 should be effectually silenced. And all arrangements 
 were satisfactorily completed. Explanations of their
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 253 
 
 last wild meeting were made in which Shan protested 
 his innocence of any intended harm to Mary Eliza 
 beth, and his willingness, in fact, his impatience, to 
 fight for her at the very first opportunity that offered; 
 and the stranger made graceful amends for his too 
 hasty judgment of him, taking good care, however, 
 to nail Shan to his vow of friendship to the girl. 
 
 Marshall left the Thaggin house that night with 
 out having found out, or without even having sus 
 pected, that Melissa Thaggin was being kept by her 
 husband in ignorance of his, Marshall s, proposed use 
 of the property. Melissa had been detained close at 
 home by her perfectly dutiful attendance on the sick 
 woman, and recent heavy rains and consequent bad 
 roads had discouraged visits from the neighbors. 
 Only Shan came and went, and Shan held his peace. 
 He had just about enough intelligence to guess what 
 might happen if Melissa were to find out that in sell 
 ing their property they would be selling their neigh 
 bors out of house and home, as well; so he determined 
 that she should be kept in ignorance till her name 
 was duly signed to the mysterious "papers." 
 
 The neighborhood was made up of many men of 
 many meannesses, but in all that valley there was 
 only one Shan Thaggin. 
 
 On the day following Marshall s second visit to the 
 Thaggins, Mary Elizabeth heard the first news of 
 grandma s serious illness; and as soon as she got 
 back from school that day, she borrowed Sulphurina, 
 and rode at once to the store to ask Uncle Beck to 
 "trust" her for a bottle of Dr. Beach s Consump-
 
 254 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 tion Cure. But Uncle Beck was gone. The stable- 
 boy clerk, however, was perfectly willing to charge 
 the medicine against the teacher s next pay-day, so 
 Mary Elizabeth took her way to grandma s through 
 the gray darkness of a rainy winter evening in the 
 hope that she was carrying the sufferer that which 
 would bring joy to her fading eyes. 
 
 But grandma slept through the short time that 
 she had to spend in her visit, so Mary Elizabeth and 
 the younger Mrs. Thaggin, together with Sue, talked 
 the time away in very earnest whispers. 
 
 And Mary Elizabeth was glad that it was so, for 
 she had something to say to the two which would 
 not remain unsaid. Only yesterday, she had heard of 
 the proposed sacrifice of the childish, innocent, con 
 fiding Sue to Trav Williams, and the woman s soul 
 within her had cried out against the sacrilege. 
 
 So in that interview she said to Melissa Thaggin 
 what only one true woman can say to another on 
 such a subject; and she said it without hesitation, 
 without fear. When she had finished speaking, there 
 was very little else to be charged against the char 
 acter of Trav Williams; and mother and daughter 
 had been made to view the girl s newly attained 
 womanhood with eyes from which the scales had been 
 stricken. Sue was crying on her mother s lap, and 
 the mother was making her a solemn promise. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth went from that interview without 
 having once mentioned John Marshall or his scheme. 
 True, her mind had been full of him on her ar 
 rival, but she shrank from mentioning the recent
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 255 
 
 sensational story about him for the reason that she 
 did not wish to seem to be bidding for praise on ac 
 count of the part she had played in it. Then, she 
 had been taken out of herself by her earnest fear for 
 poor little ignorant Sue; and Marshall was forgotten 
 until her attack on Trav Williams suddenly brought 
 to mind his admonition to her to make a friend of the 
 man. Then her fatal honesty got in her way again. 
 Fearful lest she should let this ulterior motive come 
 between her and this new thing that looked so much 
 like Duty, she said a great deal more against Trav 
 Williams than her actual knowledge of him justified. 
 
 And Mary Elizabeth departed in the growing dark, 
 and Melissa Thaggin was left beside the sick woman 
 to think it all over and to be dumbly grateful that 
 this girl had suddenly waked to virile strength and 
 self-consciousness the something in her that had been 
 struggling to assert itself against this outrage. Me 
 lissa knew now that she was unalterably against this 
 marriage, and she knew why, for Mary Elizabeth 
 had voiced for her, her dumb soul-protest against it, 
 and her awakened womanhood had cried a passion 
 ate "Amen." She would forbid the marriage, and 
 she would stand out against it, even as she had 
 promised her child. 
 
 And now, in view of the fact that she was going to 
 have to oppose herself to Trav Williams the hated, 
 the feared Melissa found comfort in remembering 
 that she and hers would soon move entirely out of the 
 neighborhood, and be far beyond the reach of its 
 petty hates. She was glad, too, of the proposed
 
 256 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 manner of their going, as decided on by Shan and the 
 stranger, though at first she had protested against it. 
 They were to keep their trade absolutely on the 
 quiet and move out of the valley under the cover of 
 darkness and secrecy so it had been arranged by 
 the two men. And speculating now on the wrath to 
 come of Trav Williams, Melissa Thaggin thanked 
 her kindly stars that she had been thus overruled in 
 the manner of their leaving by her lord and master.
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 ONE bleak morning, when the rains had ceased 
 through sheer exhaustion, the news was carried about 
 by a young Thaggin on horseback that grandma was 
 dead, and there would be a "settin -up" that night 
 at the Thaggin homestead. Every face in the val 
 ley waxed solemn at the announcement, and every 
 tongue grew glib with expressions of sympathy; but 
 all the same, a thrill of something that was not sor 
 row ran through the neighborhood. From end to 
 end it passed, and it came to a head in the cabin of 
 Dilsey Sellers and the blind Lil. 
 
 Of all the social functions of a backwoods settle 
 ment a "settin -up" is the most enjoyable. It has 
 the quilting bee and the picnic beat so far that there 
 is really no comparing them, and it can give even 
 the camp-meeting cards and spades and come out 
 ahead. Everybody goes to a settin -up, menfolks 
 and all, and nobody has to provide any of the victuals 
 except the bereaved, who always lays in a bountiful 
 supply. The settin -up has no religious responsibili 
 ties like the camp-meetin , and it is an all-night per 
 formance then, there s the corpse. 
 
 Yes, the neighborhood was thrilled; and as for Dil 
 sey why, Dilsey drew a long, injured sigh of relief 
 at the prospect of receiving justice at the hands of her 
 neighbors at last. It had all been very well for 
 
 257
 
 258 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Uncle Beck Logan to pat her on the back and ad 
 monish her not to let a coffin come between her and 
 her neighbors as long as she could help it, but Dilsey 
 had felt it this having to keep the thing month in 
 and month out, a-bankin up lint under the bed and 
 a-devilin Lil, and her blind, at that! 
 
 Grandma was dead. Those living nearest hurried 
 to the scene to "wash" and lay out the corpse, and 
 remained to help Melissa get ready for the supreme 
 function. All the neighbors, near and far, or at 
 least a representative from each household, found a 
 means of coming over some time during the day to 
 express sympathy with the Thaggins in their deep 
 bereavement. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth heard the news, and promptly 
 closed school out of respect. 
 
 John Marshall at the haunted house heard it, 
 somehow, and without a moment s delay rode hard 
 to the nearest railroad station and wired somebody 
 to "come at once." 
 
 Everybody heard it and got ready for the night 
 watch. 
 
 Scarcely had the winter twilight gathered her robes 
 about her and stolen into the west, before the guests 
 began to gather at the Thaggui home, to be received 
 at the threshold by certain other guests who had 
 been there all day helping, and who took charge of 
 the new-comers with a tingle of self-importance at 
 being "on the inside." 
 
 Everything was ready. The feather beds were 
 puffed up with pride at being decked out in two of
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 259 
 
 grandma s best quilts, and the red and white of the 
 hospitably inclined pillow-shams had been rendered 
 redder and whiter by another laundering that very 
 day. The whole room had been redded-up for the 
 occasion. 
 
 Grandma lay in state in the centre of the room on 
 a bier improvised from the borrowed door of the hen 
 house. Melissa s one pair of bleached sheets it was 
 the only time grandma had ever been allowed to 
 sleep between them draped the bier above and be 
 low the wasted alabaster figure. The top sheet was 
 turned back midway, that the arriving guests might 
 sate their morbid curiosity on the face of the dead. 
 A saucer of salt had been placed on the stomach of 
 the corpse to keep it from swelling. Thanks to Me 
 lissa, grandma was decked out in her best bib and 
 tucker. Shan had growled at the extravagance of 
 burying such good clothes, but for once Shan had 
 been overruled. Melissa had made up her mind to 
 give grandma a good send-off, and she had carried 
 her every point. There was the matter of the coins 
 on the eyes, for instance. Shan had actually been 
 mean enough to suggest that nickels would do the 
 work, but Melissa had put quarters there, and that in 
 the full knowledge that it would be unspeakably un 
 lucky to spend them after they had been dedicated 
 to such a use ! But the most thrilling thing of all was 
 when Melissa took Shan s white silk handkerchief 
 the one he had bought to stick out of his pocket when 
 they were married, and the very one he had "had 
 on" when their tintypes were taken together and
 
 260 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 sacrificed it, too. Bringing its neat catacornered 
 folds under the old woman s sagging jaw, Melissa 
 had knotted the long ends over her thin gray hair, 
 effectually shutting up grandma for the last time 
 and she tied it good and tight! 
 
 But Shan had one consolation he made up for 
 this prodigal waste of Melissa s by his trade for Dil- 
 sey Sellers s coffin. To begin with, Dilsey had bought 
 the thing on the bargain counter and had herself 
 got a sensational reduction on the first price of it; 
 in the second place, Shan beat Dilsey down shame 
 fully from the cost to herself on the plea that the 
 coffin was second-hand. But "shamefully" is per 
 haps too strong a term to use in the light of what 
 really transpired. The truth is, Dilsey tried to 
 make Shan pay the first cost of the coffin to herself, 
 plus the discount that the undertaker had made to 
 her, on the theory that this wasn t bargain day. 
 And she further contended that she ought to have 
 some return for housing it so long, and for all the 
 trouble she had had in keeping the peace between it 
 and Lil. 
 
 The two had wrangled a good three-quarters of an 
 hour over the trade Shan finding every conceivable 
 flaw in the casket from lack of durability to uncom 
 fortable knots in the padding, and beating Dilsey 
 down, down, down, till she struck what she thought 
 was bottom rock in the original seventeen dollars 
 and ninety-eight cents. When this point was 
 reached, Shan offered to close the trade for twelve 
 dollars, cash. Dilsey held out for her price as long
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 261 
 
 as she dared, and then named fourteen as the lowest 
 depths to which any woman with self-respect could 
 afford to fall. At this point Shan flung out of the 
 house with the last word, that when she got ready to 
 take twelve dollars for her old clothes-box, she could 
 come and tell him. But he went triumphing, never 
 theless. He knew perfectly well that he would be 
 saving money to meet Dilsey s price of fourteen dol 
 lars, and he intended fully to do this, if her self- 
 respect should refuse to slump further. In the mean 
 time, he had twelve hours before he would be forced 
 to come to terms with her. 
 
 After his sparring match with Dilsey, Shan had 
 taken a circuitous and sheltered ride through the 
 woods, and had brought up at the haunted house 
 with his limbs shaking and his teeth chattering, for 
 the black dark had crept out of its hiding-places and 
 enveloped the face of the hills. 
 
 The stranger had met him at the door and the two 
 had gone into the haunted house together, and shut 
 out the rest of the world from them for one long, 
 mysterious hour. 
 
 When Shan got home from his secret interview 
 with the stranger, he found that Dilsey and Lil Sel 
 lers had beaten him to his abiding-place. Dilsey had 
 come to say that on account of her step-mother s 
 being second cousin to Melissa, and on account of the 
 coffin s being originally bought for her the step 
 mother she would let Shan have it for twelve 
 dollars, though she still thought it no part of a Chris 
 tian to beat her down like that. In point of fact,
 
 262 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 however, Dilsey had come because she couldn t stay 
 away from the settin -up. And Lil had come because 
 she simply would not submit to being shut up alone 
 at night with what still lurked under the bed. 
 
 Dilsey and Shan met in the entry and had it out, 
 after which two kind neighbors were despatched with 
 the wagon to fetch the coffin. 
 
 The settin -up was in full swing. Nearly every 
 family in the valley had furnished at least one rep 
 resentative, and there were present, also, a few more 
 distant neighbors who had come from over the 
 ridge. 
 
 Everybody had duly said how "natural" grandma 
 looked but in God s mercy she didn t and they 
 had told each other, over and over, that there never 
 would be such another quilt-piecer while the world 
 stood. Grandma s notorious stubbornness had be 
 come "firmness," her vindictiveness of tongue, "out 
 spoke honesty," and her lifelong cupidity, a "thrifty 
 savin ness of nature that ought to be a lesson to 
 ever body." 
 
 When Shan arrived and passed through the big 
 room, the voices of the watchers grew low and rever 
 ent, but he paid no heed to his sympathizing friends 
 except to growl out some sort of greeting from under 
 the flapping eaves of his old wool hat. He did not 
 so much as glance at what lay in state in the centre 
 of the apartment, but skulked around it and disap 
 peared into the shed-room immediately in the rear. 
 Here he could hardly pass for the trundle-beds that 
 had been added to the other rude furniture of the
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 263 
 
 room, brought here to make .space in the death- 
 chamber. 
 
 A kerosene lamp on a tin rack at the side of the 
 room threw a dim, uncertain light over the faces of 
 the children who filled the beds to overflowing, and 
 who had dropped asleep clasped in each other s arms 
 for mortal terror of the thing that lay between the 
 comp ny sheets in the big room. Without a glance 
 at the children, Shan went out into the entry and 
 into the other front room in search of Melissa. Here 
 he found her with several other women loading a be 
 decked table with "nourishment" for the watchers. 
 And he stopped Melissa right in the middle of stack 
 ing up custards against the slicing of them, and drew 
 her into the shed-room kitchen for a long, whispered 
 interview. 
 
 In the big room, the talk had grown absorbing 
 again. The oldest inhabitant related how grandma 
 done her two twins them that died about the 
 flour-sack shirts she had made em with the red and 
 blue letters all down the front of em of how, when 
 the twins fought over the one that had the red let 
 ters on it, grandma jes nachully took both shirts to 
 the spring an washed all the letterin out. She was 
 a smart woman in her mind, and a firm-handed one, 
 grandma was. 
 
 There were other inhabitants, not so old, who re 
 membered like it was yesterday what a powerful 
 hand grandma used to be at meetin before she was 
 took down. Why, she shouted more fervent-like 
 even than Millie Davis herself, though it wouldn t do
 
 264 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 to say it to Millie! Then some iconoclast recalled 
 how Beck Logan, ridin by meetin one day with 
 Darius Slaton, had remarked, "Ri, ol Sister Thag- 
 gin s done treed the Lord agin, don t you hear her 
 yelpin ?" Everybody was properly horrified at the 
 iconoclast, and some one declared that Beck Logan 
 was a kind-hearted critter but the devil had a 
 mortgage on him, sure! 
 
 By eight o clock, however, the unwonted stir about 
 the house had quieted, and the settin -up had begun 
 to take on the real settin -up feeling. The three men 
 who were left, for two had gone for the coffin, had 
 been persuaded by the sisteren to lie down and rest 
 to make ready for their labors the next day. The 
 Thaggins were all tucked away in the shed-room and 
 in the smaller front room where the victuals were 
 spread, leaving the two beds in the death-chamber 
 to accommodate the watchers during alternate naps. 
 On the two beds now lay the menfolks, snoring great 
 heavy, reassuring snores, and leaving the coast de 
 lightfully clear for a quiet, gossipy dip by the sisteren. 
 They were gathered about the fire close together for 
 more reasons than the inclement weather afforded; 
 and they shivered every now and then for the same 
 several reasons. Grandma s dark-brown snuff -bottle 
 was passed ever and anon among them. Aunt Millie 
 Davis had come over very late and was now the cen 
 tre of the group. Bud, who had escorted her, was 
 among the sleepers. 
 
 Bud s version of the rumor about John Marshall 
 and Bud s idea of Mary Elizabeth s part in the drama
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 265 
 
 had just been given by old Sister Davis, and her 
 listeners were agape; there had been much of Uncle 
 Beck s influence in the story as they had first heard 
 it, but this was more to their taste. 
 
 "An you say she jes handed him that thar place o 
 Silas s? Land sakes! Viney, what was that?" It 
 was Dilsey that questioned, and the assembled com 
 pany demanded in one staccato stage whisper: 
 
 "What!" 
 
 "Sump n mo-oaned," whimpered the blind Lil, 
 and she pressed closer to her sister s side. 
 
 "Pshaw, hit s jes the wind!" exclaimed Aunt Mil 
 lie, impatient at the interruption of the main theme. 
 " Y all done got so you air skeered o the very men 
 tion o that old place!" 
 
 "I ain t afeard nor a-skeered," retorted Dilsey, 
 hotly, "I m jes pestered, for I ve done come to the 
 p int whar I almost b lieve hit s onlucky to talk 
 about hit. Aunt Millie, I I wisht you d a-let 
 that sheet stay turned down. Somehow I d ruther 
 see " 
 
 ov/w 
 
 "Thar ain t nothin under that sheet but what I 
 kivered up with hit, Dilsey." 
 
 "Wa-al, that s enough." And they all glanced 
 again at the something that lay covered before them 
 which, though covered, supported the draping 
 sheet here and there at little points of contact, giving 
 ghastly suggestions out of which the imagination 
 could easily construct the grewsome whole. 
 
 But the old woman reverted impatiently to Mary 
 Elizabeth again:
 
 266 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "An she s done got a notion that she can t eat 
 none o my victuals," she complained, treasuring 
 against the girl that sin as unpardonable. "She s 
 jes nachully nearly stopped eatin altogether, an 
 Babe s takin on bout hit tell I m plum shamed o 
 him." 
 
 "What s that!" the assembled company ex 
 claimed again, and with good reason. A long, low 
 wail had risen from somewhere and trembled along 
 the night. And for the space of that wailing, the 
 watchers by the dead were as fixed as gravestones; 
 but a familiar yap at the end of the long, low, horrible 
 sound brought life into them again. 
 
 "Ah-h-h that s Punchus Pilate a-howlin under 
 the house," explained some one. "That s the mean 
 est cur dog in the valley, an nobody but Shan Thag- 
 gin would have him skulkin round." 
 
 "Hit s a mighty bad sign when they howl round 
 dead folks like that," ventured another. "But 
 speakin o Ma y Lizbeth Lord, why don t that 
 dog hush? did anybody git out o Melissa what hit 
 was that grandma said bout the gal when she was 
 a-dyin ?" 
 
 "No, an they never will. But hit wa n t nothin 
 to Ma y Lizbeth s credit, you kin be mighty sure, 
 or Melissa d a-told hit with her very next breath 
 she s that crazy bout her. Melissa an Sue were the 
 only ones with grandma at the last, an only them 
 two knows. Sue started to let hit out this mornin 
 when I was a-dressin grandma, but Melissa made 
 her shet her mouth, double quick." It was one of
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 267 
 
 the nearest neighbors, the one who had reached the 
 scene of interest first, who answered. 
 
 "Dyin people knows," pronounced Aunt Millie 
 with slow, impressive emphasis. The others looked 
 at her and at each other with solemn, slow nods of 
 agreement. Mary Elizabeth s fate was sealed, and 
 sealed by that slight something that lay covered be 
 fore them. 
 
 Old Mrs. Davis suddenly leaned forward in a most 
 confidential attitude: 
 
 "I wouldn t have y all to let hit git back to Babe 
 for the world before hit comes off, but Bud an Trav 
 Williams have done agreed to turn Ma y Lizbeth 
 outen the school the first o the month. Thar s jes 
 three trustees in all, Beck Login bein the third, but 
 his vote don t count ef the other two air ag in him." 
 
 There were exclamations of surprise and approval, 
 but not one note of dissenting, unless, indeed, Pontius 
 Pilate s voice, now borne on the night again, were 
 raised in protest. 
 
 "But they ve done signed up with her for nine 
 months, ain t they, Aunt Millie?" Viney asked with 
 hesitation. 
 
 "The law says they kin turn em out for cause" 
 the old woman answered firmly. 
 
 The weird, ominous howl of the dog rose again. 
 Several looked toward the bed as if they would have 
 to wake the sleepers if this thing kept up. But one 
 of the number was just explaining that you can t 
 keep a dog from howling when there s death in the 
 air any more than you can keep a cat from scratching
 
 268 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 a corpse, when other sounds from the outer darkness 
 began to mingle with the plaint of Pontius Pilate. 
 At first they were weirdly indistinct sounds and might 
 portend anything. At length, however, they began 
 to gather definite meaning to themselves. And then 
 the sound of horses hoofs and of wheels became plain 
 enough to the most nervous and at last, voices. 
 The coffin! It had arrived! The sound of shuffling 
 feet on the porch outside told that something heavy 
 was being handled. And now the door was opening, 
 and a long, black something was being lifted in, feet 
 foremost ! If the thing had arrived of its own volition 
 it could not have scared them worse! 
 
 In a few minutes, however, a fairly normal state 
 of public mind had been established. Two tired, 
 half-frozen men were stamping their benumbed heels 
 on the wide stone hearth, and shaking the sleet from 
 their heavy jeans clothes; while the womenfolk, 
 cheered and reassured by their welcome presence, 
 gave back to allow them the benefit of the fire, and 
 plied them with a volley of questions. 
 
 The coffin had been deposited on chairs beside the 
 corpse, and the women had got familiar with it, and 
 were now examining it minutely through their spec 
 tacles to judge for themselves the equity of the trade 
 between Dilsey and Shan. Various were the con 
 clusions arrived at, but as Shan was absent and Dil 
 sey right there they all partook of a common bias. 
 
 The exception to the rule was, as usual, Aunt Millie 
 Davis. Dilsey had just detailed to them again the 
 ins and outs of the bargain, and explained how, on
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 269 
 
 account of the coffin s being a sort of tie between 
 herself and Melissa, she could afford to stretch her 
 self-respect to the extent of two dollars more, when 
 Aunt Millie remarked, incisively: 
 
 "Wa-al, you know, Dilsey, when all s said, the 
 coffin is second-handed; an Melissa told me that she 
 told you with her own mouth not to consider her 
 feelin s." 
 
 Pontius Pilate put in again at this juncture. He 
 seemed to be forcing his feelings on their considera 
 tion. A shiver ran through the crowd, but Dilsey 
 could not allow even this uncanny interlude to divert 
 her from the last word. 
 
 "Wa-al, Melissa s awful high an mighty about her 
 feelin s lately," she snapped. " She didn t uster give 
 herself no such airs before she got that orgin. I 
 could a-had a orgin, too, I kin tell her, ef I d a-been 
 willin to git Uncle Beck to take the wroppers off n 
 ever bar o soap he sold an save hit for me, lessen 
 the buyer kicked about hit!" 
 
 "La, Dilsey, ain t you got th ough with them soap 
 wroppers an that orgin yet!" asked another, wearily. 
 
 There was something of a suppressed flurry among 
 them when it came to getting grandma into Dilsey s 
 step-mother s coffin, and it looked for a little while 
 as if she were still not ready to relinquish her long 
 standing opposition to it. But a little coaxing and 
 a little crowding accomplished the work to the satis 
 faction at least of all who were on the outside, and a 
 general sigh of relief after tension was sent up. 
 
 After that somebody suggested that they wake
 
 270 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 up the others and go in and get a "bite o sump n 
 t eat" just to keep up their strength. The sugges 
 tion was acted on with alacrity, and the "bite" mul 
 tiplied itself manyfold under the temptation of 
 Melissa s bountiful supply of soda biscuits and fried 
 chicken and coffee. 
 
 Then they returned to the death-chamber again 
 and to the insistent wailing of Pontius Pilate, for he 
 had entrenched himself, so to speak, right under IT! 
 But this was becoming intolerable, and one of the 
 women exclaimed, impatiently: 
 
 "Lem, for goodness sakes, go out an do sump n 
 to that air dog!" 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "Anything!" 
 
 The time came, however, when not even Pontius 
 Pilate s unearthly wail, not the thing that they 
 were watching, could avail to keep open the heavy 
 eyes of the setters-up. 
 
 One after another they fell at their posts, and mid 
 night found them sound asleep in their chairs, dead 
 to the terrors that walked the night. 
 
 The next thing any of them knew, the morning 
 sunlight was streaming in the unshaded window, and 
 there were sounds of life in the other rooms. Then 
 all had much ado pretending that they had not 
 slept, but had just "rested" and kept quiet for the 
 sake of the Thaggins. And they told each other 
 what light sleepers they were, anyway, and how they 
 had counted the long hours of that awful night. And 
 then the breakfast bell rang.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 271 
 
 Melissa Thaggin never told them that she had 
 passed all about among them, nearly two hours 
 before, dressed, and about her day s work. Melissa 
 was a considerate woman, and besides, she had 
 "watched," herself. 
 
 After breakfast Mary Elizabeth came over she 
 had begged a ride on a passing wagon that was com 
 ing that way and asked if she couldn t do something 
 to relieve those who had been watching through the 
 night. Melissa met her in the entry when she came 
 in, and received her cordially; but when she ushered 
 her into the big room, a distinct chill fell upon the 
 group. If Mary Elizabeth noticed the coldness of 
 their greeting, however, she accepted it as one ex 
 pression of that quiet which is ever the tribute of 
 the living to the dead, and gave it no further 
 thought. 
 
 Melissa, anxious to fail naught in hospitality, in 
 sisted on having her see how "natural" grandma 
 looked, and uncovered before her the face of the 
 dead woman. But Mary Elizabeth suddenly put up 
 her hand to screen away the sight, and her face was 
 the color of marble as she turned quickly away and 
 walked to the fire. The "watchers," watching now 
 for sure, immediately read something sinister into 
 the occurrence. "She couldn t face grandma," they 
 told each other in whispers, and they recalled to each 
 other that white look of Silas s, and wrote down 
 Mary Elizabeth s exquisite, flawless skin on the 
 tablets of their memories against her. Uncle Beck 
 could have illuminated the latter subject if he had
 
 272 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 been there to tell the story of how Mary Elizabeth 
 had flayed herself alive to get rid of her freckles; 
 and the girl herself could have taken whatever 
 there was of the suspicious out of the situation if 
 she had told them that the heart within her was 
 aching because she had let grandma go for days 
 without her cough medicine before she could make 
 up her mind to ask credit at the cross-roads store. 
 
 And then the unexpected happened. All unan 
 nounced and unheralded, Uncle Beck and Trav Will 
 iams came driving up the wood road that skirted the 
 back of the main lot just behind the cow-pen, and 
 pulled up at the back steps, almost before anybody 
 saw them. The excitement was intense. First of 
 all, and outweighing all else, was the feeling that the 
 two men had brought back with them the news of 
 the fate of all that valley; and second but sub 
 conscious, and so, deeply instinctive was the un 
 accountable pride in what they had to spring on 
 the returning heroes. It was as if this ever-old, 
 ever-new wonder of Death, this mysteriously elating 
 thing, this thrillingly solemn and important thing, 
 in some way reflected credit on themselves. And, 
 indeed, they showed Uncle Beck and Trav what 
 they had in Dilsey s step-mother s coffin before a 
 single question was asked. 
 
 The two men stood for a moment uncovered before 
 what they saw, murmuring the things that have 
 been said under similar circumstances perhaps ever 
 since the very institution of death. 
 
 Then Uncle Beck raised his head, and, with a light
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 273 
 
 in his fine old eyes, said impressively: "Neighbors, 
 hit s all right. John Marshall can t make a lake 
 here big enough to wash his feet in." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth was beside the coffin so quickly 
 and so silently that the company gave a distinct 
 start. Her grasp was nervously laid on one of the 
 handles, she was leaning over the dead toward the 
 storekeeper. 
 
 "How, Uncle Beck, how ?" she breathed. 
 
 "Why," and, in answering Mary Elizabeth, he 
 addressed the whole breathlessly silent, listening 
 crowd "why, Shan Thaggin has got titles to this 
 place that air as good as gold, an tell Shan is willin 
 to sell his neighbors an his friends chances for the 
 price of one small farm, John Marshall won t be able 
 to flood a foot o the valley. You see, he d have to 
 own the whole space flooded, b cause the law wouldn t 
 allow him to ruin any other man s property." 
 
 "How bout him gittin titles to the other lands?" 
 asked one of the more intelligent. "Seems to me 
 we ain t out o the woods yit." 
 
 A shade passed over the old man s face. "Why," 
 he replied, "we don t know bout that yit, but ex 
 pect to hear shortly. But we don t b lieve a word of 
 hit. You see Trav an me would a-had to go clean 
 to Montgom ry to find out bout them lands what 
 they say air public lands. An when we lit on the 
 facts about this here place o Shan s, Trav s judg 
 ment was that that settled the whole matter. You 
 see he reasoned hit thiswise : the only thing that man 
 Marshall could possibly want with any of the lands
 
 274 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 was for his reservoy scheme. Ef that was blocked, 
 he d mighty soon pull up stakes an go back whar he 
 come from. That s the way Trav put hit down, an 
 he was satisfied as far as his own interests went. 
 But y all know how thoughtful Trav is of his neigh 
 bors. Wa-al, when I put hit to him how we d bet 
 ter send or go to Montgom ry an find out about 
 them other lands, he agreed at onct, an put his 
 hand in his own pocket for the advance fees. We 
 got our lawyer to promise to go jes as soon as he 
 could possibly git the time. I was for our goin on 
 to Montgom ry, ourselves, but Trav he couldn t see 
 hit that a-way. He lowed he could influence Shan, 
 ef influence was needed in a case like this, an the 
 lawyer could do the rest." 
 
 When Uncle Beck finished speaking, his listeners 
 were as silent as the figure in their midst, but every 
 eye was turned on Shan Thaggin, whose face had 
 suddenly grown drawn and pasty. One long, ago 
 nizing silence, and then Trav Williams s harsh and 
 grating voice demanded: 
 
 "How bout hit, Shan?" 
 
 " I I " the creature almost writhed as he 
 brought it out "I I do-d-done already sold I 
 d-d-didn t know " 
 
 Mary Elizabeth started back with a smothered 
 cry, and Trav Williams bored his right fist into the 
 palm of the other hand while his eyes narrowed to a 
 hideous line. Except for a horrified, incredulous in 
 take of breath, every other soul in the room stood 
 transfixed. All, that is, except the wife of the man
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 275 
 
 who held his neighbors in the hollow of his hand. 
 Melissa Thaggin looked her lord and master over, 
 from the crown of his cymling-shaped head to the 
 knees that were shaking under him, again, and yet 
 again; and with each look the woman grew visibly 
 taller and straighter. If anybody there had ever 
 doubted which was the better man of the two, he 
 never doubted again after seeing Melissa absolutely 
 blight the father of her children with the fire of her 
 splendid scorn. Having looked what she thought of 
 Shan, Melissa turned to the storekeeper. 
 
 "Uncle Beck," she asked, in clear and measured 
 tones, "a sale ain t a sale tell the wife s name is 
 signed to hit, is hit? " 
 
 All the fire of a quickly revivified hope was in 
 Uncle Beck s simple "No, Melissa." 
 
 "Then this place ain t sold, an hit ain t a-goin to 
 be sold I" 
 
 In the excitement that was precipitated, Shan 
 Thaggin escaped to the shed-room at the rear and 
 barred himself in against the scorn and reproach of 
 his neighbors, and Mary Elizabeth slipped out to the 
 deserted hearth in the other front room, to have it 
 out with the heart in her breast, which was trying to 
 smother her. 
 
 She had destroyed John Marshall s wonderful 
 scheme! She had quenched forever that splendid 
 fire that had been wont to blaze up within him at the 
 very mention of it. She had killed a vital part 
 of him his ambitions. And when the thought of 
 it all was too cruel to be borne longer, a lesser, but
 
 276 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 more pitiable regret welled up again, bringing the 
 tears that had been dried at their fountain-head by 
 that burning other sorrow: She had let grandma go 
 without her medicine! 
 
 Then Uncle Beck came in search of her, and found 
 her standing before the fire, blinking vainly to keep 
 back the tears. The old man watched her hi silence 
 for a few minutes to be sure of her mood. After a 
 little he crossed over to her and put his arm about 
 her waist: 
 
 "What s the matter, honey?" he asked tenderly. 
 
 The blue eyes overflowed. "Uncle Beck, I I 
 let her go without her cough medicine a long time, 
 just because I hated to ask you to credit me I I 
 didn t have any money left" she was crying on his 
 shoulder now, "and and I brought it at last, too 
 late!" 
 
 "Thar now, honey, don t cry. Hit was all right. 
 I fixed hit myself, for I sont the old sin the old 
 Christian a bottle the very day hit give out an 
 you told her you was busted. Shan was down to the 
 sto that very evenin , a-quar lin bout you deceivin 
 grandma, an I took in the siterwation an sont him 
 packin back with my compliments an the medicine. 
 I lowed that conscience o yourn would jump on 
 you some day, an I was layin for hit." 
 
 "Oh, Uncle Beck, you are the best 
 
 "Go slow, honey, go slow. Shan Thaggin paid 
 for that physic!" 
 
 "Why, how?" 
 
 "I put twict the price of hit onto the price of a
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 277 
 
 swingletree he bought that same day. I doubled hit 
 b cause I knowed he was a-goin to kick, an I d have 
 to leave myself a margin to fall. Shan r ared, o 
 course, an swore he hadn t heerd o no rise in 
 swingletrees, but I jes laid hit all on Wall Street 
 an knocked off from the price half of what I had 
 put onto hit on account o hits bein Shan, an me 
 bein so fond o him." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth was smiling through her tears. 
 "And how in the world did you come to lay it on 
 Wall Street, Uncle Beck?" 
 
 "Why, thar come a long-haired candidate a-speak- 
 in th ough here last summer, an he laid ever thing, 
 from eternal damnation to the boll weevil, on sump n 
 he called Wall Street, an he got Shan an some o 
 the others tur ble excited bout hit. So, you see, I 
 jes keeps Wall Street up my sleeve tell I need hit." 
 The old man smiled cunningly at his own finesse. 
 "You see, honey," he explained, "hit s my business 
 to beat em a-tradin ." 
 
 The two sat down by the fire for a talk, and Mary 
 Elizabeth gradually showed the old man everything 
 that was in her heart everything, except the picture 
 of a strong man s face, hurt to the quick, and the 
 pain it brought her. 
 
 But it was not until other subjects were exhausted 
 between them that Mary Elizabeth found heart to 
 ask the question that had been trying to force itself 
 to her lips ever since he entered. 
 
 "Uncle Beck, oughtn t you to have gone to Mont 
 gomery at once, and not waited on that lawyer?"
 
 278 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The old man took down his spectacles from where 
 they rested on his thin gray hair and adjusted them 
 to his eyes. He leaned toward her now with his 
 shrewd countenance keenly awake. 
 
 " Ma y Lizbeth," he said, " I was up a tree. Trav 
 wouldn t go, b cause he said he had to come back 
 an git his hands on that greased eel, Shan Thaggin, 
 as quick as possible; an I didn t dare to let Trav 
 git back here to Bud Davis thout me bein here to 
 keep him toned down, so I couldn t go by myself." 
 
 "Uncle Beck" and the name escaped her like a 
 suppressed cry, "is there is there danger to him?" 
 
 The old man started to say something while yet 
 his face was clouded, and then deliberately stopped, 
 smiled cheerily, and exclaimed: 
 
 "Lord he p that skeered face of you, ain t / here, 
 child?" 
 
 But Uncle Beck s cheeriness failed to reassure the 
 girl after she had passed from under the beneficence 
 of his comforting smile. 
 
 John Marshall was in danger in danger now of 
 worse than defeat! She knew it, for Uncle Beck had 
 as good as said it. And that was what Babe had 
 meant when he told her that she had made a mistake 
 in telling that story to Bud. Then Bud s evil face 
 came up before her, and following in its wake a troop 
 of evils that had not yet taken shape, and the girl, 
 through her sensitive fear, was face to face with the 
 overshadowing, menacing truth. 
 
 John Marshall was in danger and through her, 
 through what she had told! In spite of all their talk
 
 279 
 
 of lawyers, of justice through the courts, in spite of 
 Melissa s splendid self-sacrifice that had seemed to 
 be the final, determining stroke in the contest that 
 was being waged, danger was in the air. Uncle 
 Beck had been afraid to trust Trav Williams and 
 Bud together away from his own influence; and Babe 
 had lately come to be immersed in deep and troubled 
 thought. 
 
 There was something impending, something immi 
 nent, and she, Mary Elizabeth, had conjured that 
 something into being! 
 
 When the darkness came down about her that 
 night it somehow entered into the soul of her, and 
 there was no light anywhere, not even the remem 
 bered light of those grave and searching eyes. And 
 in vain seemed all her summoning. The guardian 
 spirit of the better self of her had withdrawn, she 
 knew not where. Why had he wrapped himself 
 away? 
 
 Could it be that she had blundered? As between 
 this man who sought to usurp and this race that had 
 usurped, as between the restless, burning, consuming 
 ambitions of the one and the vital traditions of the 
 other, where was the right? Could a system that 
 sacrificed even one any one to the good of the 
 many remain the outpost of man s search for justice? 
 
 If only the Hearer of Prayer cared!
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 THE loose dirt had hardly been shovelled in on 
 grandma before rumor threw discretion to the four 
 winds and went rioting up and down the valley : 
 
 The stranger had been defeated ignominiously 
 defeated, and Melissa Thaggin had told him with her 
 own mouth what she thought of him; Shan Thag 
 gin was but la! what could you expect of Shan 
 Thaggin? The stranger was going to leave right 
 away and take refuge in England or Memphis or 
 some other remote and obscure hiding-place; he was 
 plumb whipped out and scared to death, and he was 
 glad to get out of it all with a whole skin; important 
 news coming very, very soon from The Lawyer 
 rumor spoke of him as if there were only one of the 
 species; and enough more of the same tenor to defer 
 for a time the crisis that threatened. Just how far 
 the old storekeeper was responsible for these wild 
 statements only one man in that valley knew. 
 
 But Uncle Beck had no easy time of it to hold his 
 neighbors in the path of peace, even after they were 
 satisfied of John Marshall s defeat. The thirst to 
 "be even" with the man who had tried to defraud 
 them was scarcely to be controlled, and a lesser man 
 than the old storekeeper could not have done it. 
 
 He was playing for time. That the stranger would 
 fulfil the prophecies he had promulgated about him, 
 
 280
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 281 
 
 he did not doubt. He would leave, of course, now 
 that Mary Elizabeth had been put straight with her 
 people and the old man fondly hoped that she had, 
 for there was not in all that valley a man who had 
 the temerity to tell him how Aunt Millie Davis, to 
 gether with the implacable Bud, was persistently 
 discrediting his estimate of the girl to the people. 
 
 He was playing for time for John Marshall to 
 gather himself together and go in peace. 
 
 But the stranger at the haunted house made no 
 sign. The general public expected something vivid 
 and startling from him when Melissa Thaggin 
 blocked his ambitious project, but the general public 
 was disappointed. It seemed that he was to con 
 tinue to keep them in suspense. Instead of disap 
 pearing as if the earth had swallowed him up, as was 
 confidently expected, he continued to share the lodg 
 ing of Whitefaced Silas, and to come and go on his 
 big bay horse as was his wont. About the only 
 change that took place in him was, perhaps, due more 
 to a change in the imagination of the lookers-on than 
 in the man himself. The change in his on-lookers 
 but served to render him more mysterious, more in 
 ghoulish harmony with the place in which he had 
 ensconced himself, and more responsible with it for 
 past misfortunes and for evils yet to come. 
 
 They hated him to a man, and they grew more and 
 more restive in face of the increasing mystery that 
 was wrapping him about. 
 
 Uncle Beck had assured them that Marshall would 
 leave as soon as he could get himself and his affairs
 
 282 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 ready, because, his scheme being defeated, he could 
 have now no reason for staying. But it seemed to 
 be taking the stranger an unconscionable time to 
 get himself and his affairs ready, and there were 
 those who began to regret their promise of peace 
 to Beck Logan. 
 
 To Mary Elizabeth, the suspense occasioned by 
 John Marshall s delay in leaving was all but unbear 
 able. She, too, had expected him to go as soon as 
 he was assured of defeat, and his failure to do so 
 unleashed her wildest fears for him. She knew that 
 he despised the people there and chafed under his 
 narrow life among them. Then why didn t he go? 
 What could be keeping the man days and days 
 after Melissa Thaggin had herself pronounced to him 
 her ultimatum? Mary Elizabeth appealed to Babe 
 about it, and Babe promised her to warn Marshall. 
 She went to Uncle Beck with her fears, and asked 
 him if she wouldn t better see Marshall, herself, and 
 beg him to leave; but Uncle Beck lost his temper at 
 her and told her to keep away from the man. She 
 talked to Trav Williams, and to Bud and Aunt Mil 
 lie, and to Ri Slaton and anybody else who would 
 listen about the good qualities she had found in Mar 
 shall, reminding them how close she had been to him 
 and how well she knew him. She pleaded for peace 
 up and down the valley, with what success only 
 the low, insinuating glances exchanged behind her 
 back could rightly index. 
 
 The loose dirt had not had time to pack down 
 hard over grandma, nor the country roads to dry,
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 283 
 
 before Mary Elizabeth s interference between Trav 
 Williams and his coveted rosy-cheeked prey began 
 to bear fruit. 
 
 Brought to bay, Melissa Thaggin flatly refused to 
 marry her young daughter to the man; and, harried 
 by her opposers, all unintentionally let out the cause 
 of her change of heart. Mary Elizabeth had advised 
 her not to let this marriage be consummated because 
 Trav Williams was "old, hard, violent, mean," etc., 
 etc. Melissa confessed this to her enraged husband, 
 and the enraged husband communicated it at once to 
 Trav Williams. 
 
 But though Melissa was the immediate bar to the 
 fruition of his plans, Trav s wrath descended in full 
 violence on the head of Mary Elizabeth. Melissa 
 had always been in Trav s good graces, and lately 
 she had been set upon a pinnacle in his esteem. It 
 was Melissa who had defeated the hated stranger in 
 his project to bring their valley to ruin, for Melissa 
 had not only refused to sign her name to the trans 
 fer of her property for a price that was staggering 
 they had all heard the details by now but had 
 remained steadfast in her refusal. 
 
 With his hand forced by Melissa, Shan made the 
 best attempt of which he was capable to make his 
 acquiescence in his wife s determination not to sell 
 seem hearty and spontaneous. He had pretended 
 ignorance of the fact that his wife s signature was 
 necessary to make the transfer valid, and explained 
 that he had thought a verbal agreement, made be 
 tween the stranger and himself just before grand-
 
 284 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 ma s death, constituted a bona fide trade. And the 
 neighbors had outwardly accepted his explanation 
 for Melissa s sake. 
 
 But all the same, not Trav Williams nor any other 
 soul in that valley believed but that Melissa had to 
 fight their battle over every time she and her husband 
 were alone together. That Shan Thaggin would be 
 tray the last interest of the last one of them for a 
 price, not a mother s son of them doubted, so they 
 looked to Melissa as the savior of their earthly inter 
 ests. The big indefiniteness of the distant Lawyer s 
 performances was too much for most of them, and 
 public interest circled round and round the proposed 
 sale of the Thaggin farm till that came to be, prac 
 tically, the only question involved. 
 
 And so it happened that when Melissa took a stand 
 against Trav Williams in his suit for her daughter, 
 Trav was already so deeply prejudiced in her favor 
 that he simply refused to allow himself to feel hard 
 toward her, and heaped the blame of her opposition 
 on the head of a scape-goat he was only too glad to 
 load with it. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth had put a "spell" on Melissa, he 
 told himself, and she had poisoned Sue s mind against 
 him. Logically, Mary Elizabeth would have to be 
 driven out of the neighborhood before his, Trav s, 
 affairs could assume the normal again. So, Beck 
 Logan to the contrary notwithstanding, Mary Eliz 
 abeth would have to go. Trav told Bud Davis of 
 the determination at which he had arrived, and Bud 
 agreed heartily. Then they reminded each other that
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 285 
 
 they two together formed two-thirds of the school 
 board of trustees, and that they could, without the 
 consent of any other, expel the teacher from her po 
 sition "for cause." They told each other that they 
 had the cause. And they planned together to call 
 a meeting of the school board of trustees at some 
 time when the storekeeper would be unable to at 
 tend, and demand the resignation of the teacher by 
 the first of the next month. Then Trav told Bud 
 that it would be his, Bud s, place to see that the girl 
 be not allowed to remain under the protection of her 
 present shelter after their ultimatum should be pro 
 nounced. She must be "rooted out," he told Bud, 
 and there were to be no white livers shown hi the 
 whole affair. Then the man speaking and the man 
 listening each suddenly bethought him of a certain 
 gaunt, stupid, but dangerously quiet man who might 
 have something to say in the matter, but neither 
 called his name. 
 
 The two men thought themselves quite alone when 
 they discussed the matter, for they had sought the 
 back steps of Uncle Beck s store on which to hold 
 conclave; but there was a certain pile of empty boxes 
 near by, and behind it a certain boy who had an in 
 herited habit of slinking, so there were three, and, 
 in the long run, more than three, who knew of the 
 compact. 
 
 But there was a stage in the conversation in which 
 the heads of the two men were brought close together 
 and the boy behind the boxes could not, for the life of 
 him, make out what was being said. The name of
 
 286 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Marshall came to him once, distinctly, and his ex 
 cited apprehension helped him to hear it many times 
 again; but what they were saying about the stranger 
 that would demand such fierce gesticulating, his 
 feeble and overtaxed imagination failed to supply. 
 
 With the instinct of an animal to obey the hand 
 that feeds it, Tony Thaggin went straight to the 
 stranger with what he could remember of that whis 
 pered dialogue; and what he could remember in 
 cluded all that had been planned about driving the 
 little teacher out of school and out of home. He re 
 membered all that because he loved her and feared 
 for her. 
 
 In the meantime, Shan Thaggin was using every 
 possible means to counteract Mary Elizabeth s 
 influence on his daughter, and, inch by inch, Sue s 
 courage gave way before his burning abuse and 
 threatened physical cruelty, till one day, in a fit of 
 hysteria, she screamed out her acquiescence, and the 
 mother was left standing alone in her opposition to 
 the sacrifice of her child. 
 
 And this rout of Sue s open opposition proved seri 
 ous indeed for the mother. As long as Sue would 
 say that she would not marry the man, there was 
 really no way in which she could be forced by her 
 father to do it; but Sue had turned coward, and, 
 with chattering teeth, had promised everything that 
 her father dictated, while in secret she had clung 
 to her mother s skirts, declaring that she would 
 drown herself in the creek below the falls if Melissa 
 did not save her.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 287 
 
 Melissa felt the force of Trav Williams, too. Trav 
 had been monarch of all he surveyed for so long that 
 it had become a mental habit with her to concede to 
 him; and now that his terrible will power, backed 
 by his terrible prestige, was deliberately directed 
 against her, she found her position almost unten 
 able. 
 
 Of course, everybody in the valley knew of the 
 Williams-Thaggin complication, and discussed it 
 freely. Backwoods folk hold nothing private except 
 the schemes of one against the other. 
 
 Uncle Beck at the store heard it, over and over 
 again; but the only time in which he was known to 
 open his mouth on the subject was to send a message 
 to Mary Elizabeth by Babe to the effect that if she 
 didn t stop attending to other people s business for 
 them he was going to "whup" her. 
 
 But Uncle Beck s threat availed naught in the face 
 of her growing alarm for the man whose safety she 
 had jeopardized; and, for the time being, every other 
 heartache and every other apprehension seemed 
 swallowed up in the one great fear she might fail 
 to save him from their hate! Could she hope to 
 make these primitive creatures understand that in 
 defeating John Marshall s great project yes, some 
 how, sometime, it had become "great" to her they 
 were more than even with him cruelly more than 
 even? 
 
 So she talked to Bud and to Trav and to all the 
 rest about him for him because she had conjured 
 up this danger that was menacing him.
 
 288 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Why didn t he go? Was he going? He must, 
 and at once. Babe had promised to tell him his 
 danger, but could she depend on the effectiveness of 
 a warning from poor old Babe? 
 
 During these days of apprehension, she directed 
 her steps to and from school always along the path 
 that led over the hill by the haunted house and 
 down through the dark-green twilight of the pine 
 forest; she lingered on the way, she haunted the 
 wood places he and she had been wont to frequent 
 together, but no glimpse of the man was vouchsafed 
 to her. 
 
 She began to struggle to recall his every familiar 
 look and to wonder what change had been wrought 
 in each by this terrible catastrophe. 
 
 How was he surviving his mortification his de 
 spair? How was he bearing what she, Mary Eliza 
 beth, had brought down upon him this man who 
 was never so intensely awake as when he was 
 dreaming his big dream? How was he faring, now 
 that his dream was shattered? And where, oh God! 
 where was the peace that this triumph was to have 
 brought? 
 
 It was in search of the answer to her vain question 
 ing that Mary Elizabeth took her way one Saturday 
 morning, one cruelly bright Saturday morning, to 
 the man whose dream she had broken. She did not 
 allow herself to think of Uncle Beck and his orders. 
 She only knew that she must see John Marshall 
 again. Even his bitter reproaches or perhaps, his
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 289 
 
 erable not knowing. She must see him once more, 
 and then she must make him go. 
 
 The warm sunshine poured down on her head as if 
 in blessing, but she did not feel its beneficent touch, 
 nor respond to its bright reflection from the yellow 
 dust under her feet. A mocking-bird was singing 
 its heart out in the awakening forest, but she did 
 not hear. 
 
 She was going to the haunted house to tell John 
 Marshall she was going to tell him what? She 
 had a feeling a half -remembrance that she ought 
 not to go the man s place of habitation, but that 
 seemed to her now the only sure way of seeing him, 
 and see him she must. 
 
 But she did not get to the haunted house, for the 
 reason that she met John Marshall face to face at 
 the bend of the road just before she reached the 
 summit. 
 
 He was coming down the road at a swinging 
 gait, and stopped short to keep from running over 
 her, looming big and strong and aggressive before 
 her, with the look of virile health written all over 
 him. 
 
 No, he did not look crushed. He looked only a 
 good deal surprised, and vividly, warmly awake to 
 whatever it was that she had to say to him as she 
 deliberately stopped him on his way. There was no 
 "cold, unspeaking scorn" in the alert, intense and 
 was it alarmed? gaze with which he regarded her; 
 and the lips from which she had feared the bitterest 
 reproaches, parted in a kind
 
 290 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 " Good-morning." 
 
 "I was coming to see you," said the girl, uncon 
 scious that she had paled at his sudden appearance. 
 
 " You were I Why, what s happened? " 
 
 Was he scared? She would scarcely have thought 
 it of him. But his face had become instantly grave, 
 his eyes apprehensive. He was watching every 
 change in her face with an intensity that was 
 disturbing. And then 
 
 "Has anybody troubled you?" he surprised her 
 with. 
 
 "Why, no, there s nothing to trouble me, particu 
 larly; I wasn t thinking of myself." 
 
 "Oh," and his face changed again. This time he 
 looked unaccountably relieved, and his relief, like 
 his previous alarm, seemed out of all proportion to 
 the circumstances which had called it forth. Mary 
 Elizabeth was bewildered. 
 
 "Can t we go down to the spring?" she at length 
 asked, glancing down a sheltered by-path that 
 seemed to promise seclusion. "We can get a seat 
 on the rocks there. I have something to say to 
 you." 
 
 Marshall s glance followed her own, but he said 
 promptly: "It s better here in the sunshine. Shel 
 tered nooks are not very wholesome in the winter. 
 Hold on, and I ll get some pine straw and we can sit 
 right here by the roadside where it s warm and 
 sunny." 
 
 As it used to be in the first days of their friendship, 
 he made his way hers; and Mary Elizabeth, with her
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 291 
 
 heart now in her throat, watched him in silence as he 
 worked. In a short time she was enthroned on a soft 
 brown cushion where she could lean back comfortably 
 against a giant tree-trunk and run her restless little 
 hands constantly over the carpet of brown needles 
 that was spread around. 
 
 Marshall disposed himself on a flat lime rock at her 
 feet. He could not take his eyes off her. 
 
 If there is any one instinct in women that is abso 
 lutely unfailing, it is the instinct to appear as attrac 
 tive as possible to the men they are trying to break 
 of loving them ! Mary Elizabeth had assured herself 
 that she would not marry this man for anything in 
 the world that she wanted him to forget her. But, 
 she had deliberately donned for this interview the 
 very dress that he liked best. It was a slim, 
 inexpensive affair, but it exactly matched the color 
 of her eyes; and when she slipped down on the dark 
 pine straw and rested her head against the yet richer 
 brown of the great trunk, she looked as if she had 
 been painted into the landscape by an artist who 
 loved his theme. 
 
 "You wanted to tell me ?" suggested the man, 
 and his breath came deep and quick. 
 
 "I wanted to tell you," said the girl, finding it 
 hard to begin, "I wanted to tell you first that I am 
 sorry " 
 
 A dismaying change swept over his face, and 
 she hastened to explain "No, no, not that! I m 
 sorry that I had to do it, not sorry that I did it." 
 
 The warm, melting flush that had spread over the
 
 292 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 man s face receded instantly, leaving the eyes and 
 mouth hard. He looked away from her, and she 
 saw by a certain grim set of his side face that this 
 was to be her reply. Mary Elizabeth could not let 
 it go at this. 
 
 "But, but," she continued, uncertain of her 
 ground, "I am sorry for what I said to you when 
 you told me about that old house up there. I think 
 I knew even then that you were not dealing dishon 
 estly with me. It was my temper that got the best 
 of me." 
 
 She waited a moment in a silence that he made 
 no move to break, and then added: "Of course, 
 I know that you blame me for " 
 
 He turned to her suddenly, slightly pale, but with 
 himself well in hand. 
 
 "No, I don t blame you," he said quietly. "You 
 have been mistaken from first to last, but I suppose 
 it s your training that is to blame. You thought 
 that I was all bad and these people here all good 
 that I was all wrong, and they all right. You 
 thought that the clash between their interests and 
 mine was a clash between sordid commercialism and 
 exalted idealism, when it was only the world-old 
 cutthroat strife for mastery between man and man, 
 with pretty much the same sort of men on both 
 sides. You had the version of the histories and the 
 other story-books you didn t know how mixed are 
 the good and the bad, the honest and well the 
 unhonest in the best of us." 
 
 The girl shrank visibly, as if the cynicism of his
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 293 
 
 words and tone had dealt a personal hurt to her 
 self. 
 
 "But," she protested, "there is, there must be un 
 alloyed good somewhere. Haven t you ever found 
 it?" 
 
 He looked deep into her eyes for a moment and 
 then answered, slowly: 
 
 "Only in your heart." 
 
 "Dvtti" 
 
 "I answered your question." The man passed 
 his hand across his forehead, and his fingers shaded 
 slightly the fire that was burning in his eyes. 
 
 There was a longer period of silence between them 
 this time, and then the girl began, with the air of one 
 summoning courage for an ordeal: 
 
 "Don t make it hard for me to say what I really 
 came to say." 
 
 "Why, forgive me. What is it?" he asked. 
 
 "I wanted to tell you," she began again, "that in 
 the long, sleepless nights that I have passed since I 
 ruined your project, I I have somehow come to feel 
 that, after all, maybe it was not just the money 
 in it that mattered to you that maybe your big 
 dream was a vital part of yourself, and I had hurt 
 you through it more than I could know " 
 
 She stopped with the sentence unfinished, for 
 the man had turned quickly away so that she could 
 no longer see a line of his face. He was playing 
 with the pine straw, now, brushing it to and fro 
 with a stick he had picked up. He did not answer. 
 
 After a little the girl continued:
 
 294 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "And last night it came to me that now these peo 
 ple would love me and trust me for what I had done 
 for them, and that I could, as time went on, make 
 them love me more and more if I threw my whole 
 self into doing for them and that maybe, after a 
 while, I could get them to join you in doing what 
 you had dreamed of so long, and nobody s life tenets 
 would be violated. You see if I stay here and try 
 very, very hard- 
 Marshall turned abruptly to her. He had snapped 
 the idle stick in two and flung its fragments from him. 
 The lines that were now fast melting from his face 
 might very recently have meant heartache with 
 bitterness in it, but there was not a vestige of the 
 feeling in his voice as he interrupted her: 
 
 "For God s sake, put that out of your mind! 
 That is the very last thing in the world I d let you do. 
 I m licked, but I m not whining, and I sleep like a 
 Christian. And as for your throwing yourself into 
 
 the breach and " 
 
 "Yes, butlcould- 
 
 "Yes, but you couldn t, and you shall not! Un 
 derstand me once for all I don t mean to be harsh 
 with you but I m not going to allow you to even 
 attempt such a thing. You must believe me." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth started to interrupt, but he 
 stopped her almost peremptorily with: "See here, 
 I know this situation a thousand times better than 
 you do, and I know that these wretches haven t a 
 particle of gratitude toward you. They never have 
 loved you, and they never will; and they have
 
 295 
 
 distrusted you from first to last. The longer you 
 stay here, the more they will hate you. The fact of 
 the business is, you ve got to leave here, and you re 
 going before the first of next month." 
 
 "Who says so?" 
 
 "I say so," commandingly and then with infinite 
 pleading as the girl s spirit rose "Mary Elizabeth, 
 if you knew that you had hurt me vitally hurt me 
 beyond redeeming wouldn t you do this one thing 
 that I asked of you?" 
 
 "And have I hurt you so much?" 
 
 Only the sudden tightening of the lines about his 
 mouth answered her, but it was enough. 
 
 "I can t bear it," she sobbed, dropping her face 
 into her hands. 
 
 "Oh, don t, please don t," he pleaded; "I never 
 meant to let you know. I I only saw a weapon 
 that might make you go, and I was coward enough 
 to use it. Little girl, if the ruin of my hopes here 
 could eventuate in taking you out of what surrounds 
 you, I would have nothing to regret. Won t you go? 
 Won t you go?" 
 
 "I can t," she said; "don t you see that I can t?" 
 She had stopped crying now, and he compelled her 
 eyes to his own as he insisted: 
 
 " But why can t you? It s imperative, I tell you 
 you must." 
 
 "But I promised my guardian to stay here and 
 teach so that these children that are growing up 
 could be lifted out of their ignorance. No, listen to 
 me he said if that were to be done for one genera-
 
 296 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 tion by a person who was really fitted for and con 
 secrated to the work, that that would be doing it 
 for all the generations that would come after." 
 
 "But why couldn t the work be done by somebody 
 else? " he demanded. 
 
 "Because," answered the girl, maintaining herself 
 against his aggressiveness, "because well-equipped 
 teachers won t come to these districts. If I were to 
 give up the school here, there would be elected to it 
 some poorly equipped native teacher who would only 
 condemn them to continuing ignorance. And I 
 promised to stay. Don t you see how it is?" 
 
 "Yes, but " John Marshall closed his lips on the 
 sudden temptation to tell her that the school was 
 shortly to be taken from her. If he should tell her 
 that, he would have to tell her why, and he believed 
 that she could not bear it. His glance fell appre 
 hensively on her slight, frail form; he noted the trans 
 parency of her perfect skin and the shadows under 
 her violet eyes, and he somehow got the notion that 
 the spirit of the girl was frail and flowerlike too, for 
 all her store of passionate temper, and that a breath 
 too rude would snap it. 
 
 Tell that story to her? And he of all persons tell it? 
 It was out of all nature it couldn t be done. He 
 closed his lips, and told himself again that some other 
 way would be opened, changing his answer to 
 
 "Yes, but faith to a rash promise is madness." 
 
 The girl was ready for him : 
 
 "There are times when it may look like madness, 
 but it is always faith ," she said. "Besides, in this
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 297 
 
 case it most certainly is not madness. Just as he 
 said, I can t hope to do much for those that are 
 grown, but the children are in my hands. I can do 
 everything for them." 
 
 Marshall did not reply, and after a pause that 
 had gradually grown awkward, the girl ventured: 
 
 "I have been so puzzled, so astounded by some 
 thing, and I can t for the life of me make out a reason 
 for it. You came to me deliberately and gave me 
 permission to tell your secret broadcast while the 
 consummation of your scheme yet hung in the 
 balance. You, yourself, put it into my hands to 
 ruin you, when you knew that you could keep me 
 silent as long as you as long as you were willing 
 to do it. I can t make it out." 
 
 She waited a little, but Marshall did not seem 
 disposed to help her over the difficulty. He was 
 looking beyond her now, and a strange little feeling 
 of fear at the idea of how deep the depths of him 
 might be, came over her. But she ventured on, 
 fascinated: 
 
 "Why did you do it?" bringing his eyes back to 
 her own by the power of her gaze; "why did you 
 do it?" 
 
 "Because I love you!" he blazed out, seizing her 
 slender wrist and tightening his fingers about it till 
 the girl cried out in pain. The next moment he had 
 released her and was saying contritely: 
 
 "Forgive me!" 
 
 The girl rose quickly to her feet, and he followed 
 her as quickly.
 
 298 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "I I am sorry I let myself go like that, because I 
 so wanted to influence you. Please don t go yet," 
 he pleaded. "I so wanted to influence you against 
 trying to stay here to get you to go now I can get 
 you a place where you will be independent and still 
 be with the right sort of people" he was promising 
 wildly, and he knew it. "You won t be under any 
 obligation to me at all, and I won t force myself on 
 you against your will anywhere you may go. If 
 you ll only go, and go now 
 
 "But you know that I can t go ;" the girl was 
 looking impatiently down the way that he had 
 blocked to detain her. 
 
 "Then when you do go," and a look of pain came 
 into his eyes as he said it "won t you promise me 
 that when you do go, you will let me help you get a 
 situation somewhere else? Promise me that if you 
 decide to go you will send me word that you ll call 
 on me as on a friend to help you. Mary Elizabeth, 
 won t you do this for me?" 
 
 The girl was troubled and bewildered. 
 
 "After all that has passed between us," she said, 
 "and knowing as you do how I feel toward you, I 
 don t see how you could expect it and I don t see 
 why you should care whether I go or stay. I 
 don t see why you should care, after I have after 
 I have " 
 
 "After you have put yourself beyond my reach? 
 And is that your conception of love? I had thought 
 it out to a different conclusion; and I have a fancy 
 that not in the near future only, but through all the
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 299 
 
 years to come, I shall care whether you go or stay. 
 Darling! " 
 
 But the girl stopped him with a quick 
 
 "Don t!" and then: "I came here to-day to beg 
 you to leave to beg you to leave for my sake and 
 for your own." 
 
 "Why for your sake?" 
 
 "I I am wretched for fear that what I have done 
 may bring about more serious trouble for you. They 
 might they might " A sudden pallor said the 
 rest. 
 
 "Well, it wouldn t so much matter, now. But 
 don t carry me on your conscience, child, if they do 
 Oh, I why, don t take it that way! I was only 
 talking idly. There is not the slightest danger to 
 me in the world. Believe me, there isn t." 
 
 "WW/ you go?" 
 
 "On one condition," he answered. 
 
 "And that is ?" 
 
 "That you go with me. No, wait, you must hear 
 me out this time. I love you God, how I love 
 you! Only come with me, girl, and I ll go all the 
 way to anywhere ! Nothing on earth matters but 
 you. Nothing mattered but you when the test 
 came" then correcting, quickly, "I mean would 
 matter if the test should come. Don t go, don t. 
 Listen to me : I hold titles to every foot of land in 
 this valley now except Shan Thaggin s farm. The 
 land is mine to do what I will with. I will give to 
 every soul here the land that he thought he owned 
 and didn t, if you will be my wife."
 
 300 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The girl recoiled from him with a face that was now 
 deadly pale. 
 
 "The man I go with," she answered, "will do what 
 is right because it is right, and not for any lesser 
 reason!"
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 BABE DAVIS sat on an old rail fence and looked 
 across the valley. The mists were breaking away 
 now and were trailing their tattered skirts carelessly 
 across the tree-tops, but here and there a thin gray 
 shred of filmy vesture rested over some sheltered 
 nook like a carelessly flung cobweb. Now and again 
 the early morning sunlight struggled through. The 
 air was warm and cold in streaks, and the face of 
 the brown hills showed only half-hearted efforts to 
 turn green again. It was a misty, uncertain morn 
 ing, gray for the most part, but with here and there 
 a lance of sunshine, and here and there a promise of 
 unfolding. 
 
 Babe Davis sat on the old rail fence and looked 
 across the valley. The mists of uncertainty and 
 unknowing were trailing across the unawakened 
 mind of the man, but here and there the light was 
 struggling through. Babe was thinking. 
 
 He was perched upon the topmost rail with his 
 long, thin legs drawn up till his knees afforded a con 
 venient resting-place for his elbows. His huge, bony 
 shoulders were hooped over, and his scraggy neck 
 was thrust forward. His lower jaw had dropped 
 slightly, leaving the protruding teeth unprotected. 
 The great, ox-like eyes were pained now, with the 
 unwonted travail of thinking. 
 
 301
 
 302 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 What to do? What to do? The mists were trail 
 ing low. He would go to his brother and tell him 
 no yes he would go to his brother and tell him 
 that Welchel Dale was not the man who had in 
 formed on him, and that he therefore had no right 
 to be enemies with Mary Elizabeth. And then Bud 
 would no, Bud wouldn t, either and the land 
 scape clouded again. Bud wouldn t believe, because 
 he wouldn t want to. No, Bud wanted to believe 
 that Welchel Dale had informed on him. He had 
 probably wanted to, even before that awful night. 
 Bud would be mad to hear that Welchel hadn t 
 sinned against him. Besides, he wouldn t believe 
 it. You see, there was no proof at all to offer him. 
 The air was coming in chilly streaks now. If he 
 told Bud that John Marshall said so, it would just 
 connect Marshall and Mary Elizabeth still more 
 strongly in Bud s mind. Bud would think some 
 thing mean and low because Marshall knew about 
 Mary Elizabeth s father. And and yes, Bud 
 would get the notion that Mary Elizabeth somehow 
 knew about that terrible night and, God! how 
 he would hate her! And Bud would yes, he would 
 he would only hate the stranger the more for 
 seeming to know more than he had any business 
 to about things that everybody wanted forgotten. 
 And if Bud thought that John Marshall knew about 
 the fate of Welchel Dale, what dog s chance would 
 there be for the fellow? It was bad enough now, 
 even though that devilish scheme of Marshall s had 
 been brought to nothing. It wasn t fair to let a
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 303 
 
 fellow like that be shot down a fellow who was 
 deliberately facing just that for Mary Elizabeth. 
 No matter what he had tried to do, he hadn t suc 
 ceeded, and he was standing up to Mary Elizabeth 
 like a man! No, it would never do to tell Bud. 
 Better let it all drop, now that Marshall had been 
 stopped in his deviltry. But 
 
 Had Marshall been stopped ? 
 
 Melissa Thaggin had refused to sign the papers 
 that would give the man the right to open the flood 
 gates on them. But could Melissa stand out in face 
 of the odds against her? Did any woman in all 
 the world even beyond the ridge ever stand out 
 against her rightful master? Women were mostly 
 good, yes, Melissa was very good. But who ever 
 heard of depending on a woman to keep on siding 
 against her husband? It needed no shaft of light 
 to show Babe that Shan Thaggin was only pretend 
 ing to be supporting his neighbors against the 
 stranger. Babe s very instinct had told him from 
 the first where Shan s inclination lay. It was Melissa 
 who barred John Marshall s way. 
 
 By gad, something would have to be done to 
 change Shan before their homes would be safe! But 
 what? 
 
 The light at last! He would go to Thaggin with 
 what he had learned. Yes, he would tower over 
 that miserable cur of an informer and dare him, by 
 the memory of Welchel Dale s fate, to have one 
 other thing to do with John Marshall. Shan Thag 
 gin was the biggest coward that ever was born into
 
 304 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 the world. All he, Babe, would have to do would 
 be to tell Shan, up and down to his own face, that he 
 knew him to be the man who had informed on Bud 
 and Trav, and that if he ever dared to let John Mar 
 shall have one foot of his land, Trav and Bud should 
 know the whole truth. That would fix it. Shan 
 wouldn t dare to budge with that hanging over 
 him! 
 
 Babe Davis was slow to come to conclusions, but 
 prompt to act when he had at last made up his 
 mind. 
 
 The flea-bit mule was untethered from the fence 
 by which he grazed, and shortly thereafter Babe 
 drew rein at the cross-roads store, and inquired for 
 Shan Thaggin. Shan was not there. Indeed, the 
 old storekeeper reported, Shan had not herded with 
 his neighbors much of late he would probably be 
 found at home under Melissa s protection. 
 
 Shan was found at home, and when Babe called 
 him to the gate, Melissa followed anxiously in his 
 wake. 
 
 This would never do. It was not to say kind-like 
 to let Melissa know how low was the man she had 
 married. He must have it out with Shan alone. 
 
 Babe was not good at strategy, but after the 
 profuse howdys were over he made out to say, stum- 
 blingly: 
 
 "Shan, I I lowed I d come over an git a little 
 o* that seed corn o yourn, y all seem to have sich 
 good luck with your corn I got sump n to tell you, 
 private-like." He added the last in what he in-
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 305 
 
 tended for a whisper, but Melissa s sharp ears caught 
 what he said. 
 
 Melissa was a good, honest soul, but the word 
 "honorable" had never yet found a place in her 
 vocabulary. Besides, she had had to live with Shan 
 Thaggin. 
 
 "Babe," she said, as innocently as if she had never 
 heard a word in all her life, "Babe, light an hitch an 
 come in to the fire. Hit s a tur ble chilly mornin . 
 Come in an set a spell with Shan, while I take a turn 
 in the kitchen." 
 
 This seemed an opportunity, and Babe gladly ac 
 cepted her invitation. In a few minutes the two 
 men were seated comfortably before the fire with a 
 bag of seed corn between them. 
 
 Melissa went out and closed the door noisily be 
 hind her, and her heavy steps were unusually heavy 
 as she made her way to the kitchen, which was at 
 the back and on the other side of the house. No 
 sooner did she arrive in the kitchen, however, than 
 her steps suddenly became as light as a cat s, and 
 she turned in her tracks and made her way into the 
 shed back of the apartment in which the two men 
 were seated. It was the room in which the children 
 had slept when the settin -up was held, and it com 
 municated with the one in front. Melissa quickly 
 laid her ear to the crack of the door which sep 
 arated her from her husband and his guest. 
 
 "Shan Thaggin," she heard Babe say, and the 
 use of her husband s last name, together with an 
 abrupt scraping of the floor as if a chair had been
 
 306 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 shoved back, sent her heart pounding within her 
 breast "Shan Thaggin, I m sorry I couldn t a- 
 spoke to you on the outside, like I lowed to do." 
 
 "What you mean, Babe, what you doin that 
 a- way for?" 
 
 Melissa could not see through the crack, but she 
 knew by her husband s whining tone how he was 
 shrinking up before what she heard in the other 
 man s voice, and her cheeks flamed. 
 
 "To be a-skeered o Babe Davis!" she exclaimed 
 to herself, bitterly, and her fat hands were clinched 
 tight as she listened again. 
 
 "I lowed to have hit out on the outside, b cause 
 what I ve got to say to you is sump n you don t 
 want to hear." 
 
 "What ?" her husband s voice replied, waveringly. 
 There was a silence that was terrible to the listening 
 wife; and then, more terrible still, came: 
 
 " You, Shan Thaggin, air the man what informed 
 on Bud an Trav bout that thar still an you let 
 em hang Welchel Dale by the neck tell he was dead 
 for hit. You air a murderer, an worse you air a 
 informer!" Melissa s pounding heart stood still. 
 
 "I nurver neither I I " came in a faint echo 
 of what was once her husband s voice. 
 
 "Don t you lie to me! Don t you lie to me, Shan 
 Thaggin; I tell you I know /" 
 
 The wife s heart sent up a voiceless prayer that, 
 the next moment, seemed to be hurled back upon her 
 in mockery. 
 
 "Ba a be, do Trav know? Do Bud know?"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 307 
 
 Melissa slipped to the floor It was true I 
 
 The weight of her heavy body against the door 
 at which she had been listening burst it open, and 
 the mother of Shan Thaggin s children lay, sobbing, 
 across the threshold. 
 
 The two men the one standing, the other cower 
 ing in a homespun-covered barrel chair were struck 
 dumb. Babe Davis, who had been standing very 
 tall, suddenly laid hold of the mantel-shelf, and the 
 fierce, protruding eyes grew dim. The mists were 
 settling down again. 
 
 Babe Davis had seen men fight like beasts, and 
 suffer like them. He had known tragedy in her 
 wildest, most primitive undisguise. He had seen 
 all this and yet had kept his grip. But the sight 
 of a woman, sobbing, was too much for his hardi 
 hood. And that woman Melissa! Melissa, who had 
 in the old days always been friendly when other 
 girls laughed at him and ran away! He, Babe, had 
 told Melissa that Shan was an informer Shan, the 
 man she had lived with all these years as wife! 
 
 Babe Davis tried to speak. He tried to say some 
 thing, but he forgot what it was. Besides, his 
 throat was dry and throbbing. He had a miserable 
 feeling that he had not said what he had come to 
 say, but he couldn t remember now what it was. 
 So he ended by drawing his coat-sleeve across his 
 mist-dimmed eyes, and stumbling out of the house 
 with the feeling that he had blundered fearfully. 
 
 Inside the room he had quitted, the clock on the 
 little mantel-shelf ticked its very loudest as if to 
 make up for the dead silence which reigned between
 
 308 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 the semblance of a man that crouched beneath it and 
 the woman who lay prone on the floor with her eyes 
 covered as against the thing she was brought to face. 
 One, two, three minutes were ticked off with a fate 
 ful evenness of stroke, and then the cowering figure 
 in the homespun-covered chair cowered closer still, 
 for the woman was struggling slowly to her feet, she 
 was approaching to confront him! 
 
 "Well!" was all she said to him. 
 
 "Melissa, Me-lis-sa," he chattered, looking every 
 where but into her eyes, "Melissa, I I clar fore 
 God I never got no money for hit I I leastways 
 that deputy nurver give me nothin like twas wuth 
 I I " His teeth chattered away after his voice 
 had ceased. The woman stood looking him through. 
 
 "An you let em hang Welchel Dale for hit!" 
 
 "Why why why, Melissa, wouldn t you druther 
 they d a-hung Dale than me? Would you a-had me 
 die for a man what was most a rank stranger to you, 
 an me your own husband, too!" 
 
 " Shut up t" 
 
 The cringing wretch dodged and whimpered, but 
 after a few moments burst out: 
 
 "Melissa, Melissa, air you goin to let em hang 
 me, too?" He was clutching her skirts now, in a 
 wild fear. 
 
 The wife s face grew white as his own. The 
 instinct of the woman of the hills is to go all the 
 lengths for the man to whom she is mated. She 
 knows no other law. 
 
 "In the name o God," she cried out in her agony, 
 "how kin I he p hit, now!"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 309 
 
 "Oh, Melissa, ef you ll jes make Sue marry Trav, 
 hit 11 be all right. Trav ll let me alone then, an 
 what Trav does, Bud Davis does, too. Melissa, 
 please, please for God s sake, Melissa you don t 
 want po me hung, do you please " His teeth 
 went chattering the rest. 
 
 With a face of chalk, but with eyes on fire the 
 woman looked him over. 
 
 "Shan Thaggin," she said, and her voice shook, 
 "Shan Thaggin, before Sue should marry a man that 
 was low down and mean, I d take her down yonder 
 to the creek an drown her with my own two hands. 
 Do you hear that? I know what hit is God he p 
 me, I know what hit is to bear childern to a coward 
 an a liar an a brute, but Sue sha n t, Sue sha n t, 
 Sue sha n t." The woman was striking her hands 
 together till they hurt 
 
 The husband shivered afresh at every stroke of her 
 hands together; he made as though to grasp her 
 skirts again in his frenzy, but the woman warned 
 him off with a fierce gesture. 
 
 "Melissa! They ll be down on me to-night with 
 the dark he p me!" he cried. 
 
 In spite of her contempt of him, his appeal struck 
 her through again, for the instinct of the woman of 
 the hills was hers. 
 
 "Ef ef " she faltered, "ef you could take to the 
 woods " 
 
 "They d run me down, they d run me down!" he 
 wailed. 
 
 "Couldn t you git a good start of em, I d like 
 to know!" she flamed,
 
 310 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "But I m afeard o the woods, Melissa Welchel 
 Da-da-le the night I went to Silas s oh, I m 
 afeard o the woods!" 
 
 "You re afeard o Welchel Dale, an with good 
 cause. God knows, I d ha nt you too!" 
 
 "Melissa, ef, ef I might hide somewhar ef you 
 could let me down in the well tell night! Oh, Me 
 lissa, ef you only would, an go to Marshall an sign 
 them papers to git us the money, we could slip away 
 to-night an ketch the train an go thousands upon 
 top o thousands o miles away. All of us together 
 Melissa, won t you!" 
 
 "Hush, Shan, hush an let me think." 
 
 The woman turned away from his whining and 
 went over to the window. She stood for a long time 
 in silence looking out at nothing, and facing the 
 choice that she had to make. After a while, how 
 ever, her wide gaze became gradually focussed. 
 What she saw was the stout lateral limb of a tree 
 near by, that swayed in the rising wind for all the 
 world as if something heavy were suspended from 
 it. It groaned and creaked with the swaying. 
 
 "Quick, Shan! To the well!" she cried, as she 
 staggered toward him. 
 
 Late that afternoon, something else momentous 
 happened. The stranger tenant of the haunted 
 house walked into the cross-roads store, and, taking 
 a sweeping survey of the loungers assembled, asked 
 if either Trav Williams or Bud Davis were among 
 their number. 
 
 A bomb exploded in their midst could not have
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 311 
 
 created more astonishment. It was not that they 
 feared though, indeed, there was that in the keen 
 eyes of this virile-looking six-footer that spelled 
 trouble. It was rather unmixed astonishment that 
 made them give way before his aggressive assurance. 
 
 Somehow, he didn t look the part of a man who 
 was "plumb whipped out and scared to death," ready 
 to take refuge in whatever remote and obscure hid 
 ing-place would afford him shelter, as rumor had de 
 scribed him. He rather appeared dangerously mus 
 cular and well-fed as to the physical, and tempera 
 mentally ready for trouble as he stood his full height 
 among them and inquired for the two men of all 
 others he was supposed to wish least to encounter. 
 
 But the answer to his question was not tardy in 
 coming. A great, brutal, black-looking man came 
 forward promptly, saying: 
 
 "I m Trav Williams. Have you got anything to 
 say to me?" 
 
 "A little, but to the point," the stranger an 
 swered. "Where s Davis?" 
 
 "Come here, Bud, ain t nobody goin to bite 
 you!" It was Trav Williams who called, and in 
 answer Bud Davis came out from somewhere in the 
 rear of the crowd, muttering as he came. Suddenly, 
 but quietly and, it seemed, all unintentionally, the 
 store-keeper got mixed up with the group that had 
 now been given the centre of the stage. It seemed 
 that the old man s near-sighted curiosity made it 
 necessary for him to obtrude himself almost between 
 the stranger who had entered and the men for whom
 
 312 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 he was inquiring. So imminent was the old fellow s 
 intrusion, in fact, that the stranger unconsciously 
 put out his hand as if to bar him from coming be 
 tween. 
 
 " I haven t come here to make trouble, Mr. Logan," 
 he said, incisively, "I ve come to save these two men 
 trouble in the future." This sounded interesting, 
 and the crowd closed in. Marshall addressed his 
 next remarks to the assemblage rather than to 
 Williams and Davis. 
 
 "To begin with," he said, "I want to say to you all, 
 that this talk against the character of Miss Dale is an 
 unmitigated, damnable lie, from first to last, and that 
 it s time for it to stop. You men who have women 
 at home to protect I m speaking to you." The 
 shot went home the word "chivalry" had never 
 been spoken in that presence; nevertheless, the 
 men of the hills stood up straighter and looked at 
 the intruder with glances that were beginning to 
 clarify. 
 
 " It seems that I have laid the girl liable to criticism 
 by being too much with her," Marshall continued. 
 " The mistake was mine, but it was a natural mistake. 
 I was in love with her and wanted to marry her. I 
 naturally went with her as much as I could. When 
 my interest and your interests clashed, she sacrificed 
 me without hesitation for your sakes. This is the 
 truth, and it will prevail here among men who are 
 men right. As for you," and he turned on the men 
 he had summoned with a savagery that struck quiet 
 the whole company, "what I ve got to say to you is
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 313 
 
 that if you carry out what you have planned together, 
 secretly, against Mary Elizabeth Dale, I ll kill you 
 on sight and as soon as I can get to you." 
 
 With the quickness of a panther, the black-browed 
 native reached for his rifle which lay on the counter, 
 but a boyish-looking young fellow snatched it and 
 suddenly presented the muzzle of it to the owner s 
 face. Trav Williams stood petrified, looking into 
 the shining eyes of the boy along the shining rifle 
 barrel. 
 
 "Jim Blakey, did you 1 arn that at school?" one 
 of the astonished on-lookers exclaimed. 
 
 "No, by God!" shrieked the excited boy, "but ef 
 he s been a-schemin ag ins teacher, Pm goin to 
 know what he s up to. Say on, stranger, what s he 
 an Bud Davis been a-doin ?" 
 
 "Jimmy, boy, put down that thar gun hit might 
 go off an hurt somebody." But the old store 
 keeper s remonstrating hand was promptly shaken 
 off his arm. 
 
 "I m not a boy, " the youngster blazed, "I m a 
 man! Stand back, I tell you, ever one of you! 
 What about teacher, mister?" 
 
 "Young man," said Marshall to the raging boy 
 and the tone which he used to him and the look 
 which he gave him conferred the degree of Manhood 
 on the young fellow as surely as a solemn rite might 
 have done "young man, I m much obliged to you 
 for keeping me from being picked off before I have 
 had my say out. I appreciate it very much, but I d 
 rather you d put that down won t you? I ask it
 
 314 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 as a favor. No, a little farther off, over there 
 behind the counter thank you." 
 
 When Marshall turned again to Trav Williams it 
 was with the distinct feeling that more than Jimmy 
 Blakey wanted to hear what he had to say to the two 
 silent but infuriated men before him. 
 
 "What do you know bout me an Trav?" Bud 
 Davis challenged over Williams s shoulder. 
 
 "I know," said Marshall, looking not at Bud but 
 straight into the eyes of the man who would have 
 shot him, "I know that you two sat out yonder on 
 those back steps and planned together to hold a 
 meeting of the school board without Mr. Logan here 
 and turn the teacher out of her position, disgraced. 
 I know that you, Williams, said that you were going 
 to run her out of the neighborhood because she was 
 influencing Mrs. Thaggin against letting that four 
 teen-year-old child of hers marry you. I know that 
 you, Davis, promised to drive the teacher from your 
 mother s roof in order to help this man in his scheme 
 against her. I know that you planned together to 
 keep this to yourselves till you had succeeded, be 
 cause you knew that the men of this community 
 who put you on their school board and gave you 
 this power would not stand for anything so das 
 tardly!" 
 
 With the roar of a wild beast, Trav Williams 
 sprang at the throat of his accuser, but before he 
 could fasten his claw-like ringers on their coveted 
 prey, a half-dozen men had seized him and borne 
 him back till he was pinned against the counter.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 315 
 
 They were not assailing, they were merely detaining, 
 inquiring they wanted to know. 
 
 But Marshall flung off his coat and waved the 
 crowd back. 
 
 "Turn him loose!" he cried to the men who were 
 holding the purple-faced Trav, "turn him loose!" 
 
 "Don t do hit, boys, don t do hit," advised the 
 store-keeper, adjusting his spectacles carefully and 
 looking the two angry men over critically. "This 
 here stranger feller is too well-meanin t ward our 
 little hill gal to let him be et alive." 
 
 " Let him go," urged the stranger. " One of us has 
 got to lick the other, sooner or later. Get out of the 
 way there! All I ask is a fair fight!" 
 
 But the men who were interfering were not ready 
 for a fight till Trav had answered for himself the 
 stranger s charge against him, for there had been 
 that in Marshall s fearless statement and hi his 
 manly defence of the girl that carried conviction 
 home to them. They were a crude race, but a fair 
 and fearless one, and they wanted to hear this thing 
 out to the end. 
 
 But Marshall, cheated of his chance, was all the 
 madder, and, seeing Bud Davis edging away along 
 the counter, turned on him savagely: 
 
 " You! What are you going to do about it? 
 Nobody s holding you!" 
 
 Bud jumped violently, and then hastened to protest : 
 
 "Hit ain t true, thar ain t a word of hit true! Me 
 an Trav ain t never said a word about no sich 
 a-thing "
 
 3i6 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "You re a liar, we did say hit!" roared the panting 
 Trav. "Who s here to be skeered of, I d like to 
 know?" 
 
 An ominous growl ran through the assemblage, 
 and then the old store-keeper was speaking again a 
 little hastily this time: 
 
 "Boys, boys! Hit s all come about th ough a 
 mistake a perfec ly nachul mistake. Trav an* 
 Bud may a-been shootin off their jaw a little wild- 
 like, but that ain t enough to set neighbor ag in 
 neighbor. A mistake s a mistake " 
 
 "Whose mistake, Uncle Beck?" one of the men 
 who still held a grip on Trav Williams, inquired. 
 
 "Why," replied the old man, looking from Trav 
 to Bud and back again with a grimness in his erst 
 while kind old face that took Marshall aback, "why, 
 hit s Trav s an Bud s mistake I m two-thirds of 
 that thar school board!" 
 
 "Mr. Williams! Mr. Williams! Billy s done been 
 bit by a rattlesnake!" Some one came crying across 
 the open, and the next moment one of the younger 
 Thaggins dashed into the store with a repetition of 
 the wild news. 
 
 In an instant the crowd was thrown into confusion. 
 The father, released now, rushed from the store, fol 
 lowed by every man in it, including John Marshall. 
 
 It was the work of a few minutes only to bandage 
 the little fellow s leg above the wound, and then the 
 father sprang on his horse, and, taking the injured 
 child in his arms, started on a mad ride to the coun 
 try doctor. As Trav dashed out of sight, and the
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 317 
 
 sympathetic crowd turned their faces toward the 
 store again, it was noticeable that Bud Davis and 
 Bud Davis s horse were missing. 
 
 "Went to holp Trav, mebbe," was the store 
 keeper s comment. 
 
 On the steps he stopped Marshall the others had 
 already gone in. 
 
 "Stranger," he said, and Marshall noticed for the 
 first time, and with a queer little pang at the dis 
 covery, that he was an old man "stranger, hit s 
 proned into me that you d better be movin on an 
 leave us to talk this matter over without you." 
 
 "If you say so all right. But tell those two men 
 for me that I mean exactly what I said I m going 
 to kill the first one of them that moves against Mary 
 Elizabeth. And wait a minute," crowding a green 
 back into the store-keeper s hand, "give this to 
 Jimmy Blakey for me, won t you?" 
 
 Early the next morning, two covered mule-wagons 
 came creaking into the camp, and slowed up in a 
 cleared space where a group of men stood discussing 
 the work projected for the day, and listening for the 
 sound of the breakfast bell. But the not unusual 
 occurrence of the arrival of country wagons among 
 them excited little more than passing glances from 
 the men; and they stood talking together till the 
 two vehicles, suddenly halted before them, burst 
 into bloom as it were with the tawny heads of a 
 dozen or more children. Out front, out behind, and 
 all down the sides where convenient rents in the can-
 
 318 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 vas covers afforded peepholes, startled-looking faces 
 appeared in curious, scared wonder. 
 
 "Look, Dearing," laughed one of the now inter 
 ested group. "How s that for a study?" 
 
 " Holy smoke ! " called another, " are you an orphan 
 asylum on wheels? Or have you got something 
 packed away there in the shape of two or three pairs 
 of parents?" 
 
 "Make it four or five pairs, Doc; you always did 
 expect too much of people." 
 
 The red-cheeked girl who was driving the lead 
 wagon grew redder-cheeked still, and the lop-sided 
 boy who held the lines over the second pair of mules 
 slunk further to one side and hung his head at the 
 challenge. 
 
 It was Fred Dearing who left the laughing 
 company and came up to the lead wagon, saying 
 kindly: 
 
 "Can we do anything for you?" 
 
 As he spoke, a ruddy-faced, rotund woman brushed 
 aside a bunch of curious children and peered out 
 the front of the wagon. 
 
 "Do air one o you-uns know whar Mr. Horton s 
 at? " she inquired loud enough for all to hear. 
 
 "Camped off his trail!" howled one very young 
 fellow. 
 
 "Horton!" 
 
 "Horton!!" 
 
 "Horton/" 
 
 The large bottle-nosed man who shoved his way 
 through their midst paid no more attention to their
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 319 
 
 gibes than if they had been so many flies buzzing 
 about his ears. 
 
 "I m Mr. Horton, ma am; what can I do for 
 you?" 
 
 "Mr. Marshall s done wrote you a letter an told 
 me to give hit to you," came the unexpected reply, 
 and she handed the letter to the man to whom it was 
 addressed. 
 
 Instantly the badinage ceased. Fred Dealing 
 was not the only man there who entertained grave 
 fears for the situation in the hills. They closed 
 around the recipient of the letter, curious to hear 
 the news; but their grave faces lighted appreciably 
 as Horton, recognizing their uneasiness intuitively, 
 read aloud: 
 
 "Feed this bunch and see them on the seven o clock local. 
 You d better get some of the boys to help you, as none of 
 them, except the man, has ever seen a train, and you may 
 have trouble. Please treat them kindly, and do what you 
 can to reassure them. Hold wagons and teams. Oblige, 
 Marshall." 
 
 " Man? where in the mischief is the man?" asked 
 one; but as none of the new-comers replied, and as 
 no man appeared, they soon forgot the reference, 
 and fell to wondering among themselves if it could 
 be possible that John Marshall had clinched his proj 
 ect at last and had forthwith set about transport 
 ing the natives. Fred Bearing stood apart with a 
 serious countenance, while Horton gave orders that 
 the hillites be served with breakfast in a double-
 
 320 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 quick, and detailed a negro to flag the southbound 
 train. 
 
 When a steaming breakfast was spread for them 
 on a convenient lumber pile, the large woman and a 
 most unlucky number of children descended from 
 the wagons and fell to; but still no man appeared. 
 The men, who were still standing around in the hope 
 of learning something of Marshall, peered into the 
 deserted wagons or did what they could to try to get 
 something out of the feeding herd by means of search 
 ing questions. But the children never ventured be 
 yond "I dunno," in answer, and the woman main 
 tained a discreet silence, or replied deferentially but 
 most unsatisfactorily. 
 
 "Why don t you go to your breakfast?" It was 
 Bearing who asked the sudden question, and the 
 lop-sided driver of the second wagon, whom he had 
 discovered sidling up to him, gave a violent start 
 and made off to the lumber pile as if he expected a 
 stone to follow him. 
 
 "Do you know," said Dealing to the man who 
 stood nearest, "if that boy wasn t greener than 
 grass, I d suspect him of trying to pick my pocket. 
 Do you suppose he could possibly have been up to 
 anything like that?" 
 
 In spite of the fact that a number of "the boys" 
 volunteered to help get John s bunch safe on board 
 the seven o clock local, Horton did have trouble in 
 the end. In the surprise occasioned by seeing the 
 hay at the bottom of one of the wagons rise up and 
 deliver itself of a man after the train had blown in
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 321 
 
 acknowledgment of the flagging, and the flurry of 
 getting the screaming half-dozen youngest on board 
 the train, something went wrong after all. 
 
 The train had scarcely steamed out of sight, and 
 the men turned their faces toward their delayed 
 morning meal, when something broke out of the 
 bushes and running, sidling after them, came close 
 up to Fred Dealing. 
 
 "Stand off!" exclaimed Bearing, with sudden re 
 pugnance, and the boy shied with a dodge. 
 
 He had got left. His name was "Tony." That 
 much their hurried questions developed and nothing 
 more, for the boy seemed little above an idiot. A 
 man had to be despatched to the nearest telegraph 
 station to wire reassurances to the parents of the 
 child. 
 
 At breakfast that morning, Bearing had the 
 annoyance of discovering the boy Tony crawling up 
 behind him on the grass. He drove the creature 
 off peremptorily, and finally as he hoped; for he had 
 conceived an antipathy for this apparently half 
 witted thing that seemed to be so mysteriously 
 drawn to him but all to no good. 
 
 Time and again all during that day he would find 
 the boy unaccountably near him. Threats availed 
 only momentarily; bribes were eagerly grasped, 
 but their terms promptly disregarded. The child 
 had conceived an idiotic fondness for him, Bear 
 ing decided, but he simply could not have him 
 around. 
 
 As he laid his head on his pillow that night, it was
 
 322 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 with genuine relief that Bearing remembered the 
 seven o clock local which, next morning, was to bear 
 the unfortunate child to his parents. 
 
 But relief did not bring sleep. Bearing was 
 troubled. It looked ominous that these people 
 should be moving away. Bid it mean that John 
 had succeeded in that scheme of his? And if it did, 
 was he, Bearing, glad or sorry? It was wrong, very 
 wrong it ought not to succeed he hoped it 
 wouldn t. But John 
 
 Suddenly Bearing sat upright on his cot. What 
 was that? Surely he couldn t be getting nervous! 
 But he could have sworn that he saw the opposite 
 edge of the tent lifted a little. The flap door was 
 fastened back, admitting the light of the dying camp- 
 fire. Any one who chose to enter could have free 
 access through that opening; why should any one 
 choose to tamper with the side canvas? 
 
 But yes, there it was again, lifted higher this 
 time to admit something something that crept and 
 crawled and writhed close to the carpet of grass. 
 Bearing sat very still in the shadow and watched the 
 figure wriggle in. It was coming toward him; it 
 was very near to him. 
 
 In a flash he laid a strong hand on the back of its 
 neck and dragged it the rest of the way. 
 
 "You little varmint!" he exclaimed. "What do 
 you want? Speak out!" 
 
 But the boy was too frightened to speak. He 
 fairly clung to the ground with all the length of him, 
 and whimpered piteously.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 323 
 
 Bearing relaxed his grasp until it was fairly 
 merciful. 
 
 "What do you want?" he asked again, and his 
 tone was almost patient. " Haven t you ever learned 
 to talk?" 
 
 "I I " the creature was speaking at last, but 
 its voice was little more than a breath, so frightened 
 was it, "I got sump n to tell you!" it said. 
 
 "What!" Bearing caught his breath with the 
 monosyllable. 
 
 "Ef, ef you don t git him way from thar quick, 
 they ll kill him!" 
 
 "Kill who? Marshall?" 
 
 "Uh-huh." 
 
 "When?" 
 
 "I dunno." 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 "I dunno." 
 
 "But do you know that he is in danger now?" 
 
 "Ye-ye-yes, mister." 
 
 "Are you sure?" 
 
 " Dead sure. Make him come away quick, quick." 
 
 "God! Why didn t you tell me before?" 
 
 "I tried to but you wouldn t let me git clost 
 nough an an I was feard for the rest to hear. 
 They might tell on me." 
 
 "Nobody is going to tell on you, Tony; we re all 
 your friends," but all the same he kept his hold on 
 the boy and carried him along as he rushed to the 
 tent door and shouted: 
 
 "Boys ! Boys, come here ! "
 
 324 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Again and yet again his voice rang out over the 
 sleeping camp, and something which it carried 
 startled every man to his feet. 
 
 "How did you come to pick me out to tell?" 
 Dealing asked, the moment he heard the camp spring 
 to life. 
 
 "I heerd the men call you what Mr. Marshall 
 called you when he told her how he loved you." 
 
 Bearing looked toward the distant hills John was 
 there in danger John !
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 IT was early Sunday morning, but the Davis 
 family had already breakfasted, and Mary Eliza 
 beth now stood on the end of the front porch and 
 looked along the distance over which her vision 
 could not carry, toward the Thaggin home. Last 
 night, late, she had stood just here with her eyes and 
 heart turned toward Melissa Thaggin. This morn 
 ing the first thing, she had thought of Melissa, and 
 now, she was here again with all her thoughts reach 
 ing out to her. 
 
 Then, as if drawn by a magnet, the girl stepped 
 from the low porch, and hurried along the path 
 where her thoughts led the way. 
 
 Melissa Thaggin knew that it was sin for a girl 
 to marry a man who was sinful Melissa knew be 
 cause she, Mary Elizabeth, had told her so. Now, 
 she wanted Melissa to say back to her just how 
 wrong it was she wanted that brave, good woman 
 to repeat it to her. The tune had come when she 
 had to have a woman s heart to lean upon, and she 
 was going to Melissa. 
 
 The way was long, longer through its dull famil 
 iarity, but the girl did not slacken her pace till she 
 reached the bars that divided the Thaggin premises 
 from the woods. It was then she discovered that 
 
 325-
 
 326 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 her skirts were wet to the knees with the heavy morn 
 ing dew and discolored with the stains of grass and 
 weeds. With only a passing impatience at her own 
 lack of care, she entered the field that occupied what 
 would have been the front lawn in another state of 
 civilization. 
 
 The bars were down it was unlike Mrs. Thaggin 
 to allow such carelessness. Mary Elizabeth stopped 
 and carefully put them up again, sliding each bar 
 into its socket. Then she turned toward the house 
 and took her way along the foot-path that led 
 through the springing corn. 
 
 Where were the children? And where where ? 
 Mary Elizabeth stopped still. It was all so quiet, so 
 deserted! 
 
 Then she walked slowly forward, looking to right 
 and to left and again at the silent house. Hogs were 
 in the field across to the left, rooting up the young 
 corn; the garden gate was open and cows were 
 battening on the early vegetables. Not at door 
 nor window, not from under the house nor from 
 any one of the various crannies about the place, 
 peered a single tawny-haired urchin. 
 
 The front door had dropped ajar and the expres 
 sionless windows stared blankly into the unseen. 
 It was as if the spirit had departed in panic, leaving 
 this, the shell, agape but dumb at the tragedy of the 
 leave-taking. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth hurried to the open door, and the 
 sound of her own footsteps in the entry, augmented 
 by the all-pervading quiet, startled her at first into
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 327 
 
 looking back apprehensively. On tip-toe now, she 
 pushed the door wide open, and stood bewildered 
 before the confusion there displayed. 
 
 The room was in chaos. Drawers had been turned 
 out, rifled, and left empty on the floor; boxes, 
 dragged from somewhere, had been pillaged of their 
 contents and left to block the way; the little pine 
 bedsteads in the corners were stripped of their 
 dignities and were hiding under the rubbish piled 
 upon them; the barrel chair beside the black and 
 yawning fireplace no longer interposed a padded 
 homespun covering between itself and the critical 
 world. 
 
 A pair of worn-out, mud-clotted, run-down shoes 
 lay right in the girl s path as she advanced, and she 
 stopped as at the hest of a familiar voice. Yes, they 
 were Tony s. Anybody could have told that, for 
 they looked just like the boy. Something tightened 
 in her throat as she bent over them for a moment. 
 Poor shambling, unguided feet! What of the way 
 they would take? 
 
 Aghast, confounded, Mary Elizabeth hurried to 
 the other apartments to the shed-room, back to the 
 front room across the entry, to the kitchen in the 
 rear of this, and then back to the big room again. 
 Everywhere was chaos, and everywhere that fright 
 ening, inexplicable quiet. 
 
 And then the truth dawned on her : The Thaggins 
 had sold out to John Marshall, and had decamped 
 in the night-time! 
 
 And almost as the thought seized her she spied a
 
 328 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 folded paper tacked to the mantel-shelf. It was the 
 work of a minute to unfasten and unfold its one page. 
 It said simply: 
 
 "Tell May lizbeth I jes had to sell. Merlissa." 
 
 A change came upon the girl as she read. She 
 stood up very straight, the delicate mouth hardened, 
 the violet eyes turned black. 
 
 Turning quickly, she ran down the back steps and 
 out to the lot. The mules were gone and so were the 
 wagons. But Shan s pony was there in his stall. 
 With mouth still cruelly tight and with eyes blazing, 
 the girl snatched down a bridle from the wall, forced 
 the bit into the pony s mouth, and buckled the bridle 
 securely. Then she looked all about, but no saddle 
 could she see. 
 
 Nothing daunted, she led the pony out to the 
 horse-block and mounted him bareback. An over 
 hanging elm limb gave her a good stout switch, and 
 she presently rode out of the back gate and down the 
 wood-road at an unsafe speed. Shan s pony was a 
 good traveller, and hardly needed the encouragement 
 of the whip, but the rider who sat him now had some 
 thing to take out on somebody, and her mount was 
 nearest at hand. 
 
 Down the wood-road she sped, skirting at a wild 
 pace the Golgotha where slept the conquerors of the 
 wilderness, and scarcely tightening rein past the iso 
 lated grave of the man whose patience had been tried 
 once too often. Up the west ridge she urged her 
 steed, then over the mountain crest and down the 
 other side past a little tumbled -down, deserted log
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 329 
 
 cabin that was clinging to and subsiding against the 
 gray, crumbling rocks of the hillside. Mary Eliza 
 beth turned her face away from this home of broken 
 promises as she rode, but the heaven- tree shoots and 
 pokeberry bushes tore at her skirts as she passed. 
 
 It was a very white but very spirited-looking girl 
 who slipped off the pony at the door of the old store 
 keeper s hermit home. 
 
 Uncle Beck was sitting just inside the door of his 
 cabin, reading something that looked suspiciously 
 like the Bible, when the light of the open door was 
 suddenly dimmed, and he looked up to behold what 
 seemed at the first glance, the ghost of a girl. 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth! Why, child, why, gal! Come 
 in, honey, an set right down thar in that rockin - 
 cheer. You look plum tuckered out." 
 
 But Mary Elizabeth did not sit down. She came 
 in and stood before the old man with her hands 
 clasped tight before her and her haunting eyes on his 
 own. 
 
 "Uncle Beck," she said, "I m desperate!" 
 
 The old man lowered the spectacles he had pushed 
 back, and regarded her through them, critically. 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth," he answered incisively, "you 
 ain t never took that dost o calomel." 
 
 The next minute, however, he was on his feet with 
 his old hands tenderly grasping her arms, for a look 
 had passed over the face of the girl that put joking 
 out of the question, and shook even his steady philos 
 opher s nerve. 
 
 "Set down thar, honey, in that good easy cheer,"
 
 330 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 he urged, "an 5 tell your Uncle Beck what s pesterin 
 you. Set down like I tell you, Ma y Lizbeth, you 
 look so white an tiredlike." And then, hi exaspera 
 tion "Set down this minute, miss! La, you done 
 got so you won t mind tell a body hollers at you!" 
 
 When he had carried his point, he took his seat 
 opposite the girl across the little centre-table, and 
 said firmly, but gently: 
 
 "Now, le s have hit. What s to pay? " 
 
 "We are ruined sold out! We " Her eyes, 
 black in their intensity, said the rest. 
 
 "Say that ag in." The old man had become very 
 quiet. 
 
 "Melissa Thaggin has betrayed us! They have 
 sold out to that man, and disappeared." 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth you don t mean that" 
 
 " I have been there this morning. The place was 
 literally torn to pieces, and they were gone. I found 
 this pinned on the mantel." 
 
 The old man took the note she handed him and 
 read it again and again. Then he folded and folded 
 it till it was little more than a slip. 
 
 "Hit looks black hit looks black!" the sunshine 
 had gone out of his cheery face, now. "Sump n s 
 got to be done!" 
 
 "What?" demanded the girl. 
 
 " What? what? " echoed the old man as if him 
 self in hopeless search of the answer. "Why, we ve 
 got to block him at another turn. We ve got to 
 I m a-goin to start to Montgom ry to-morrow 
 evenin !
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 331 
 
 I m a-goin to telegraph that lawyer feller to meet 
 me thar. But " 
 
 "But what?" demanded the girl again. 
 
 "But I ll have to leave Trav behind this time, I ll 
 never be able to fool him twict. Lord, ef somebody 
 would only cripple him tell I git back!" 
 
 "Uncle Beck!" 
 
 "Wa-al?" 
 
 "That man told me days ago that he had secured 
 titles to every foot of land in the valley except the 
 Thaggin farm!" 
 
 A groan escaped her listener in spite of himself, and 
 his withered face was ashen and drawn as he ran his 
 knotted fingers through and through his thin gray 
 hair and stared out at the pale sunshine. 
 
 "Hit ain t true, Ma y Lizbeth, hit can t be true! 
 An yet- 
 
 "And yet?" she echoed, her breath coming short 
 with suspense. 
 
 "An yet," continued the man, and he might have 
 been pronouncing a death sentence as he said it, so 
 solemn was his tone "an yet, hit may be. Hit 
 may be! Ma y Lizbeth, years an years ago, some 
 body told me that thar was a lot o gov ment land 
 hereabouts, an I d better look to my titles. I 
 looked, an shore nough, I found that I had to sign 
 up several papers an pay out a couple o fees to git 
 this here little place firm rooted to the spot. I 
 warned the others bout hit then the old folks 
 what s mostly dead an gone but none of em would 
 n t listen to me. They was mostly feard o signin
 
 332 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 papers, an them that wa n t, balked at the fees. 
 Some of em lowed they d tear the gov ment up by 
 the roots before they would pay for what was already 
 theirn. Wa-al, I done what the man at the land 
 ornce said do, an nailed my little corn-patch to the 
 map. Lord, but I wisht hit was over thar in the 
 valley whar hit could he p em out!" 
 
 "But, Uncle Beck," cried the girl, twisting her 
 hands in her impatience, "wouldn t you better go 
 to Montgomery, anyhow? There might be some 
 chance I ll help with the expense of the trip. 
 Please go!" 
 
 A touch of pathos stole into the old man s troubled 
 look, and then he said, tenderly: 
 
 "Yes, Blossom, I ll go me an you air so rich!" 
 And then, with a bitterness foreign to him "Me 
 an you an Shan Thaggin!" 
 
 The girl struck her little hands on the table be 
 tween with a force that hurt. 
 
 "That s the thing that I can t forgive in fate, 
 Uncle Beck. Here is that creature who has slunk 
 and cringed and ducked and lied he has gone scot- 
 free with no loss, no punishment!" 
 
 "Shan s stren th was in his pliability, Ma y Liz- 
 beth. Hit s them that won t bend that gits broke." 
 
 "And Shan Thaggin is a rich man to-day!" 
 
 "Shan Thaggin ain t no man a-tall, honey." 
 
 The girl looked at him as if for the first time dur 
 ing the interview. His eyes were grave and quiet, 
 and there was in the depth of them the look that be 
 longed to a blessed memory.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 333 
 
 "You," she said, "you believe that way too? 
 that character is all in all?" 
 
 "That s about hit, honey." 
 
 "Then," and her eyes blazed again, "then sin 
 against character is the unpardonable!" 
 
 "What you talkin bout, Ma y Lizbeth?" 
 
 "About that man Marshall and the price that he 
 paid for Melissa Thaggin s soul!" 
 
 "Poor Melissa!" 
 
 Mary Elizabeth was on her feet in an instant. 
 
 "You say that! that about a woman who could 
 sell her own people for a price ! A woman who would 
 barter the very soul of her for that man s money " 
 
 "Go slow, Ma y Lizbeth, go slow!" 
 
 "I won t go slow hasn t she sold that whole val 
 ley there?" 
 
 "Mebbe, but you don t know what s behind." 
 
 "I do know what s behind, John Marshall s money 
 was behind! No, I won t sit down, either; let me 
 alone, Uncle Beck! Oh, don t you see what it means? 
 It s not just that miserable little farm that has been 
 surrendered Melissa has traded her integrity, her 
 high ideals of duty." 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth," said he, and his voice sounded 
 old and tired as he said it, "when you git to be sixty- 
 nine you ll find out that people with high ideals of 
 duty air sometimes in much the same fix as the feller 
 that s walkin round on stilts they re high up in 
 the landscape all right, but shaky on their legs, an 
 they air liable to git their props knocked from under 
 em by the first feller that has his feet planted solid 
 on the earth."
 
 334 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The girl was facing him with head up and eyes 
 flashing with indignation. 
 
 "I m not going to talk to you," she exclaimed bit 
 terly; "I m going to talk to Bud Davis!" 
 
 The old man rose promptly and pushed back his 
 chair. 
 
 "No, you ain t, neither," he replied firmly. " You 
 ain t a-goin to Bud Davis in no sich a reckless fit. 
 Look a-here, Ma y Lizbeth, the responsibility for 
 these here people ain t all yourn. Git that into 
 your head, ef you kin. There s been a Saviour of 
 souls, but th ough all time, hit s been ever man s 
 individual business to take keer of his own hide. 
 No stop. Ef you ve got to be the one to carry 
 this here firebrand on, go to Babe with hit." 
 
 "Babe ! I can t even depend on Babe any longer. 
 Why, he once actually tried to get me not to say any 
 thing against that man and that, when he knew that 
 he was slowly choking the people into loosening their 
 grasp on what was their own! You ll be telling me 
 that there is something behind Babe, next." 
 
 "Yes, an you re a-thinkin right this minute that 
 thar s sump n behind with me too, you little spit 
 fire, but you dassen t say hit!" 
 
 The girl looked at him steadily for a minute and 
 then turned to the door, but the old man laid a firm 
 grasp on her wrist and stopped her. 
 
 "Air you goin to Bud Davis?" he asked. 
 
 "lam." 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth," he said quietly, and his voice 
 had lost all its impatience, "Ma y Lizbeth, ef you ll 
 set down peaceable an quietlike for a spell, I think I
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 335 
 
 kin clear things up for you a bit; then after that you 
 kin go to Bud with what you will." 
 
 He drew her gently to the arm-chair, and the girl 
 took her seat, wonderingly watching his changed face. 
 The deep lines of it had softened indescribably, 
 almost pitiably. He looked old and pained as he 
 leaned on the little table between them and studied 
 her face. 
 
 "Ma y Lizabeth, do you want to know what thar 
 is behind me an Babe? Do you want to know why 
 John Marshall let you tell that story ag inst him? 
 Why he stayed here after he thought he was done 
 licked in spite o bein twict warned to go? Do you 
 want to know why you oughtn t to go to Bud Davis 
 in the desp rate mood you air hi?" 
 
 "Why why yes!" 
 
 "Then look at me with Welchel Dale s eyes, child, 
 for hit takes courage to hurt you." 
 
 "WRat is it, Uncle Beck?" She was looking at 
 him with Welchel Dale s eyes, but the old man s gaze 
 gradually lowered before their blue purity till he sat 
 staring at his own knotted and seamed hands. After 
 a little he began slowly: 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, the people bout here have been 
 sayin the people bout here have been sayin 
 they ve been sayin bad things bout you an John 
 Marshall." He paused a moment, but he did not 
 look up, and only the tick of the little clock on the 
 mantel answered him. He cleared his throat vig 
 orously and then went on: 
 
 "Gran ma Thaggin told Marshall bout hit, an
 
 336 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Marshall raised the old devil with Shan. Melissa 
 told me he d a-kilt Shan ef she hadn t a-stepped in 
 between em. He told Shan he d beat him into a 
 jelly ef either him or his womenfolks ever opened 
 their mouth bout you ag in. The next mornin 
 he went to you at Aunt Millie s an told you you 
 might could repeat anything you knowed ag inst 
 him. Marshall told Babe all about hit so he could 
 put him on guard to not let nobody tell you, cause 
 he was skeered hit would shame you so hit would 
 break your heart. He told Babe, Marshall did, that 
 he give you permission to tell all about his reservoy 
 scheme so you could prove to the people that you 
 was their friend ag inst him. An he told Babe to 
 paint him black to the people so they would think 
 the more of you an so that they would would 
 stop sayin sayin " the knotted old hands were 
 holding their interest well "stop sayin that you 
 was his property. But Millie Davis an Bud has 
 been a-tellin em sence that you jes turned ginst 
 Marshall cause he had done got tired of you an 
 th owed you off, an that hit was all true bout 
 bout you an him." 
 
 It was only a faint little cry, but it went to the 
 old man s heart, and he started and looked up with 
 a hard pain in his throat as the girl sank with her 
 arms and head prone on the table. 
 
 Instantly one of the knotted and seamed hands 
 was laid on the brown curls. It was shaking, and 
 so was the old man s voice: 
 
 "Marshall lowed that you was too frail to stand
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 337 
 
 knowin bout their talk, but I knowed Welchel 
 Dale s sperit, an I knowed hit was tougher fibre 
 than that. I knowed hit could stand the truth 
 Uncle Beck knowed hit could stand the truth an 
 be brave in face of hit, he knowed hit" the old 
 man s fingers were wandering tenderly among the 
 tumbled curls 
 
 " Wa-al, wa-al " he continued with a deep-drawn 
 sigh " things have jes gone from bad to worse, some 
 how, an somebody told Marshall the other day that 
 Bud an Trav was a-goin to to oh, I disremember 
 the details now, but anyhow, Marshall come to the 
 store yistiddy an called out Trav an Bud an told 
 em right up an down that ef they made another 
 single move ag inst you, he was a-goin to kill em 
 both on sight." 
 
 A shudder ran through the girl s slight frame 
 from head to foot, but she did not look up, and the 
 old man continued: 
 
 "So you see, honey, this here thing o character 
 is many-sided, an we can t see all sides from jes 
 one stand-p int. Marshall th owed his own plans to 
 the wind to give you a chanct to win over your 
 enemies, an he has stayed here stubbornlike ever 
 sence to see that nobody didn t do nothin to you, 
 though me an Babe both have told him we wouldn t 
 give ten cents for his skin ef he didn t light out. 
 
 "That, honey, is the coin John Marshall has 
 bought me an Babe with. An we have decided 
 betwixt us two that although we air goin to fight 
 the feller to the last through the courts bout this
 
 338 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 here land business, we ain t a-goin to stand by an 
 see him butchered. 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth Ma y Lizbeth, brace up, gal! 
 Set up now set up that s hit, honey, that s hit 
 face the siterwation! Welchel Dale could face any 
 thing when he seen the way." 
 
 "But, but," she faltered "oh God, I ve lost the 
 way!" 
 
 There was a long silence between them, and then 
 the old man began to move about on tip-toe, as if 
 death had entered the cabin door and summoned 
 away something that was never more to return. 
 
 When he came back to the girl who still sat with 
 her face covered, he said in a half -whisper: 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, gal, here s a letter what your 
 guardeen sont me for you when you come home last 
 fall. He said for you not to have it tell you had 
 tried and failed. You don t feel equal to hit now? 
 Wa-al, Uncle Beck will jes slip hit in your pocket 
 here, an you kin read hit when when you re feel- 
 in more like hit. 
 
 "Hit s Uncle Beck s own brave little gal, that s 
 whose gal hit is!".
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 MARY ELIZABETH did not count the remaining 
 hours of that fateful day. When Uncle Beck 
 brought her home in his buggy and entered with her 
 to bespeak kindness toward her at the hands of the 
 Davises, she slipped into her own room at once, and, 
 throwing herself on her bed, lay with one white arm 
 across her eyes without thought of the passage of 
 time. 
 
 The family had already returned from church, for 
 she had been long at Uncle Beck s. The dinner 
 hour must have come in due course, for there came 
 a tune when Babe tipped to the door to ask her if 
 she wasn t "hongry," and if he couldn t fetch her 
 something to eat. 
 
 Then the long afternoon hours, too, must have 
 passed somehow, for now the day noises were gradu 
 ally sinking into a drowsy quiet, and the night 
 noises were stirring the forest. 
 
 Then Babe tipped in again to ask if she wasn t 
 hongry, and to receive again the same discouraging, 
 but perfectly quiet reply and then, bedtime sounds 
 in the next room and after a space, stillness. 
 
 There seemed to elapse a long period of stillness, 
 and then the girl struggled up to a sitting posture, 
 and caught up and fastened her dishevelled hair* 
 
 339
 
 340 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The atmosphere of the little room was very close, 
 too close to allow a body to think, or to care what 
 happened. Outside it would be better, and the 
 others were all asleep, they would not hear. 
 
 She opened the door cautiously. Yes, it was 
 black dark but lightning! And thunderheads ! 
 And the trees were beginning to stir. Over yonder 
 among the great swaying pines, under that piled-up 
 and surging blackness in the heavens, with now and 
 again the white lightning over all, one might hope 
 to shake off this killing numbness, one might hope 
 to think, to suffer, to live again! 
 
 Mary Elizabeth slipped off the little porch in an 
 interlude in the dense blackness, and hurried across 
 the yard space, across the washed and rolling clay 
 stretches, to seek inspiration of the now protest 
 ing pines. Yes, the wind was springing up, there 
 was battle in the air! Giant and Titan were op 
 posed to each other. And out of the South the 
 black wrack was being driven across the dim dark 
 sky. Oh, for the lightning! 
 
 The girl had flung herself down on the pine needles 
 now, in the midst of the struggling hosts, but where 
 she could watch the inky thunderheads boiling above. 
 Oh, for the lightning! the white lightning over all! 
 
 And oh, for the power to suffer again ! 
 
 But it was gone! Gone with all the rest with 
 the power to think, to hope, to laugh, to live; and 
 nothing was left but the memory of the exquisite 
 pain of it all, but this wild invocation to the spirit 
 of the storm to descend again.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 341 
 
 Suddenly, the girl flattened herself out on the 
 brown earth with the instinct of the wild life from 
 which she had sprung. She laid her ear to the 
 ground. There were sounds approaching sounds 
 that were not of the coming storm. Footsteps, yes, 
 heavy footsteps! 
 
 Some one something was coming right toward 
 her in the blackness! 
 
 As swift as a snake that glides to shelter, the girl 
 drew her lithe body across the pine straw to the foot 
 of a giant pine. She flattened herself against the 
 great trunk; she glided slowly round it, and lay up 
 against it as close as the clinging ivy might. Her 
 every sense was alert. She had been bred in the 
 hills and born amidst their wildness, and the little 
 more than a decade of higher civilization that had 
 been vouchsafed to her suddenly fell away from her. 
 She belonged to the hills, to the night, to whatever 
 of storm threatened from the black wrack driving 
 over, or from those heavy footsteps on the darker 
 earth beneath. 
 
 The footsteps ! They were coming nearer ! They 
 must be on this side the gully on this side the 
 fence they were here, here, right in this clump of 
 pines, now and now they were under this very tree 
 they were oh, God! something was on the 
 other side this very trunk to which she was clinging; 
 if she would but reach out her hand she could touch 
 what it was! 
 
 And now voices! Mary Elizabeth s heart stood 
 still to hear.
 
 342 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "What I want to know is, have you got enough of 
 sidin ag in your own an havin that feller Marshall 
 givin warnin to you an me? " It was Bud Davis s 
 voice that was speaking, and it sounded so near that 
 the girl started as if he had spoken in her ear. In 
 one of those moments of stillness that come just 
 before a storm, Trav Williams s voice was easily 
 recognizable in reply: 
 
 "I ain t been a-sidin ag in my own, I ve been 
 workin my might an main to settle this thing in 
 the way that would be easiest on us all." 
 
 "Wa-al, have you got enough of hit?" 
 
 "I ve got enough of Beck Login, all right, an I 
 lay I m goin to stop his runnin over ever body in 
 the settlement, an a-takin the part, underhanded, 
 of ever damned stranger that comes prowlin round. 
 But you needn t a-think we kin make way with that 
 devil on the hill as easy as we done with Welchel 
 Dale, an have nobody bother to ast questions bout 
 hit." 
 
 "Don t!" 
 
 "Don t what?" 
 
 "Don t call names don t call that name some 
 body might hear!" 
 
 The other s voice was grating and jeering as he 
 replied: 
 
 "You re skeered! You re skeered right this min 
 ute that Welchel Dale s sperit is hoverin near!" 
 
 "Don t!" 
 
 The other laughed "Do you know what tree 
 this is?"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 343 
 
 He was answered with an oath and the sound as 
 of a man springing to his feet. 
 
 "Yes," the jeering voice went on, "this is whar we 
 done hit, an ef ghosts could ha nt, Welchel Dale s 
 sperit would raise hell with us to-night! Set down, 
 Bud. Don t play the coward." 
 
 There was the sound as of the scraping of a man s 
 shoulders against the rough bark, and then Bud 
 Davis s voice again: 
 
 "An who s thar to ast questions about Marshall, 
 I d like to know? An Shan s done sold out to him. 
 Sold out to him! What you got to say bout that?" 
 
 "That John Marshall ll never live to set foot on 
 that place." 
 
 "Do you mean hit, Trav, do you mean hit? 
 What was thai!" 
 
 "Welchel Dale s sperit right behind you, Bud!" 
 and Trav laughed again. 
 
 A volley of oaths from the other was checked with: 
 
 "Now look a-here, Bud, ef you re a-goin to he p 
 settle this here business, you ve got to git your nerve 
 in better trainin . I was jes tryin you." 
 
 "My nerve s all right for business, ef that s what 
 you re up to, but I don t want no more foolin with 
 with dead an gone troubles. Now what s your 
 idea?" 
 
 "We must finish him to-night." 
 
 "To-night?" 
 
 "To-night." 
 
 "When?" 
 
 "Jes fore day long tween three an four o clock
 
 344 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 is a good time. He ll be soundest asleep in that 
 part o the night." 
 
 "How,Trav?" 
 
 "Shoot him like a dog." 
 
 "Which one of us?" 
 
 "You an me an Ri Slaton an Jim Haskins an 
 Eli Thornton, an ol man Slocum s boys ef we need 
 em. What you think?" 
 
 " Git the Slocums, of course." 
 
 "I knowed you was a-goin to say hit. Wa-al, 
 ef you think hit ll take seven of us to stop one feller s 
 breath, you kin go after the Slocums yourself an 
 bring em to my house." 
 
 "Will they all he p, you reckon? Beck Login s 
 got a powerful hold on em." 
 
 The fierce oath that answered was followed by: 
 "Don t you know the jig s up with us now ef we 
 don t pull together? An don t they all know hit 
 by now? Why, I could a-got ever man in the val 
 ley ef I d a-wanted em but I picked my men. Ri 
 an Jim an EH air a-goin to meet thar bout mid 
 night, an we ll have a little jamboree fore we start 
 out Lord Lord thar s Welchel Dale s sperit 
 right behind you!" 
 
 There was the instant shuffling of feet again, 
 and oaths, followed by the noise of a man breaking 
 his way through the bushes, and by a jeering laugh; 
 then later, slower, more deliberate steps and silence. 
 
 And then the lightning! The white lightning over 
 all! 
 
 The hovering, menacing storm came down. Out
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 345 
 
 of the south it descended. The soft and purring 
 south had waked to tiger fierceness. The primeval 
 forest roared defiance, and the fight was on! 
 
 Out from a dense group of the battling giants, 
 away from the sheltering trunk to which it had 
 clung, a slight figure sprang staggered, and recov 
 ered again and then, heedless of falling boughs, 
 heedless of the lick of the forked tongues of fire 
 across the black sky, went running down the wind. 
 
 Welchel Dale s spirit was abroad in the storm! 
 
 But only for a short space was that phantom-like 
 figure swept before the wind. The time came when 
 the opposing hill had to be breasted, and, with it, a 
 flanking movement of the blast that was now coming 
 cold down the narrow trough between the mountains. 
 There came a time when the open roadway had to be 
 abandoned for a pathless route through the crashing 
 forest where there was nothing to point the way but 
 the instinct of the woman of the hills and the white 
 lightning! 
 
 Alive, awake at last! Oh, the fierce joy, the fierce 
 pain of it! Oh, the wild ecstasy of heroic suffering 
 now, now that the storm had come down! 
 
 Blown panting against a jagged rail fence among a 
 tangle of blackberry bushes one minute, clinging to a 
 young sapling and bending with it against a sudden 
 blast at another, or prone on the ground with her 
 ear to the trembling earth, the girl was fightingly 
 awake. 
 
 She, Mary Elizabeth, could save him! She could 
 save him! 
 
 A sudden gust swept her against a huge bowlder
 
 346 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 and pinioned her to it, but she only lay against it, 
 lithe and ready to attack again. 
 
 Oh, those hours of death in life, where now was 
 their cruel significance now that the storm had come 
 down? As light as the pine needles now flying before 
 the wind those petty indignities, those petty slanders, 
 had been swept away by a descending storm that 
 stripped truth to a naked cruelty and left only the 
 great primal facts of life to survive. 
 
 They were going to murder John Marshall! And 
 the girl flung herself against the blast again. 
 
 For a hundred yards, perhaps, she prevailed, and 
 then a sudden gust caught her, twisted her around, 
 and flung her face downward among a wreck of shiv 
 ered boughs whose sharp projections tore her tender 
 flesh. 
 
 They were going to murder John Marshall! But 
 she could creep to him creep to him on her hands 
 and knees, even in the face of the wind. But it was 
 hard, desperately hard, and the wind must perforce 
 have conquered if the great raindrops had not come 
 to the rescue. 
 
 She could stand upright now, for it was rain against 
 wind, and she was forgotten in that mightier struggle. 
 But the rain brought hail a fierce, cold, pounding 
 hail that beat on her bowed head and arms till she 
 cried out with the pain of it. But 
 
 They were going to murder John Marshall! And 
 she struggled on. 
 
 John Marshall flung another log on his fire and sat 
 down again to listen to the storm.
 
 347 
 
 Heavens! but it was coming fast and furious now! 
 It must be tearing those trees limb from limb; but 
 they were dying hard, for the deep 1 and sullen roar 
 which they sent up was of the death struggle of all 
 wild things that fight to the last. 
 
 What a night to be out in ! and he punched up the 
 fire again. 
 
 Magazines and papers had been pushed aside. 
 His pipe lay unlighted at his elbow. Somehow, he 
 could not get down to reading to-night. His brain 
 was on fire with what he sighted beyond: The dream 
 city yonder on the plains the forge of another Vul 
 can and here, his mountain lake, his source of in 
 exhaustible power and future setting for costly sum 
 mer homes and club-houses for those who could pay 
 his price. 
 
 He had conquered he was lord of all he surveyed ! 
 He had won out against the cataclysm of opposing 
 odds. He could now push to a finish his demonstra 
 tion to the man within him he could do great things 
 as well as dream them! But 
 
 The girl in the firelight there, what did it mean for 
 her? 
 
 And when, in all the bitter season now almost past, 
 did the draughts through the crannies of this cursed 
 den ever run so cold? The haunted house ! haunted 
 by a something that shadowed the last of its race ! 
 
 Hail, now! And heavy lightning, and ripping 
 winds again! 
 
 Was she afraid to-night? 
 
 John Marshall stood up uneasily and looked about
 
 348 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 him. Something was getting on his nerves. Was it 
 that this weird and uncanny roost he had seized on 
 was at last fastening its influence on him, or was it 
 the wild night or both? Somehow the wind went 
 through him to the marrow to-night, and the cry of 
 the storm pierced him like a note of human anguish. 
 
 Was she safe to-night? Was she? She was such a 
 frail little body such a frail little spirit! 
 
 God knew that he had done what he could to pro 
 tect her! He had tried to remove her from the troub 
 les which compassed her about, but she had refused 
 to go. To save her from persecution, he had offered 
 up for sacrifice the ambitions of his manhood, but all 
 to no avail for her. When perils closed about him, 
 he had doggedly remained near her still to protect. 
 And here he was, and here he would continue as long 
 as she remained that much was settled ! 
 
 Yes, the devil was to pay with the whole situation, 
 but he had scored one against him yesterday when he 
 took the dilemma by the horns and warned that 
 Davis viper and Williams not to raise a finger against 
 the girl. 
 
 That he would have to take these two men in hand 
 before their persecution of Mary Elizabeth should 
 culminate in their dismissing her from her position, 
 he had realized ever since he had known of their 
 compact; but his unexpected acquisition of the 
 Thaggin farm had hastened the climax. The trade 
 accomplished, it had suddenly been borne in upon 
 him that the moment these men should learn by the 
 disappearance of the Thaggins of his triumph over the
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 349 
 
 valley, that moment would their wrath break over 
 the innocent object of their persecution, on account 
 of her supposed connection with him. So he had de 
 liberately sought these men in public and put them 
 on notice. But this forcing of the issue had been at 
 greatly increased risk to himself. 
 
 He ought to have had time to summon help before 
 hazarding general trouble with these fierce natives. 
 The Thaggin farm was his now, as so was every 
 other foot of land that he had coveted. It was only 
 a question of a few days before he would have here 
 some hundred men to do his bidding, in face of whose 
 overpowering force the little handful of hillites and 
 their petty hates would weigh as the pine needles 
 before the wind. 
 
 He had had to seize the Thaggin farm when it was 
 offered, but he had hoped that the news of the dis 
 appearance of the owners would not be noised about 
 until he got time to summon the workmen from 
 the camp. Still, in weighing the matter, he had 
 realized how frail was such a hope, and so he had 
 promptly delivered his ultimatum to Williams and 
 Davis. If the Thaggins should be missed at once, 
 he had reasoned, the chances were that Bud Davis 
 would turn on Mary Elizabeth for her suspected 
 alliance with him and drive her 
 
 God, what a night to be out in! 
 
 So he had given Bud his warning in order to fore 
 stall any act of violence from him; but, as he had said 
 to Babe, he was no fool he knew what it might 
 mean for himself. Trav Williams and Bud Davis,
 
 350 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 with a pack at their heels, had set upon Welchel Dale 
 in the night. Yes, he was up against it. 
 
 And he knew yesterday that he would be up 
 against it, if he should throw caution to the wind and 
 fling down the gauntlet to those two. He really 
 ought to have sent the boys at the camp word by the 
 Thaggins, but he had not, and all on account of Fred 
 Bearing. Yes, but he had done only the square thing 
 by Fred. If he had sent word that a crisis had come, 
 Bearing would have come to him he knew it. But 
 Bearing was unalterably opposed to his splendid proj 
 ect, and it would somehow have been taking an 
 underhold on the fellow to allow obligations of friend 
 ship to mix him up with the scheme in any degree. 
 Fred was leaving for home to-morrow and then he 
 could summon help against any concerted attack 
 incited by Bavis and Williams if the morrow should 
 come for him. 
 
 And, added to this unwillingness to involve Bear 
 ing in a scheme to which he was so bitterly opposed, 
 was the very flimsy but very human reason of want 
 ing to be able to drop in on the boys Monday night 
 with the news that the deeds to the last necessary 
 foot of land had been recorded that he had won his 
 fight for mastery, single-handed. The boys at the 
 camp had laughed, he hotly remembered. So, he had 
 sent his perfectly non-committal note by the Thag 
 gins, and here he was! 
 
 But he was not going to be caught napping ! The 
 haunted house presented impenetrable walls of logs 
 to the enemy, and the one small window and two
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 351 
 
 doors had been made strong with iron hooks and bars. 
 Besides, a repeating Winchester and a brace of good 
 pistols with plenty of cartridges were not to be dis 
 counted. He would make a night of it, and be ready 
 for anything that should come. 
 
 But such a night ! Surely even Trav Williams and 
 that Bud Davis would choose another and more 
 clement night in which to pay their respects to him. 
 Not even they would choose to face that storm. 
 
 It was coming even fiercer now, and with rain, and 
 hail a pounding, beating hail! Praise be to the 
 Lares and Penates of the haunted house for their 
 shelter from this cruel night! 
 
 Suddenly, Marshall grasped his Winchester a 
 knock, a very distinct knock, sounded on the door. 
 
 He waited some moments in dead silence, and then 
 called : 
 
 "Who is it?" 
 
 But only the echo answered him. 
 
 "Who is it?" he called again. The wind replied, 
 and the beating hail, and under and over and 
 through it all, the roar of the whipped pines like the 
 sound of many waters. 
 
 Marshall retreated to the wall at the side of the 
 door where the thick logs interposed between him 
 and whatever rifle message might shortly be sent 
 him. 
 
 "Who is it?" he shouted for the third time. But 
 still no answer came to him except from the raging 
 night. 
 
 With ear and eye alert he watched for some sign of
 
 352 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 disturbance at the door, and he moved closer and 
 looked at the crack beneath it expecting to see the 
 muzzle of a rifle, when his eye fell upon something 
 that looked like a wisp of hair long, dark hair 
 blowing through the crevice. 
 
 John Marshall never remembered how he got that 
 door open, and never did he forget the face of the 
 unconscious girl as she lay on his doorstep with the 
 wind and rain and hail beating down upon her. 
 
 The next moment, he was holding her high in his 
 arms and the rain was swirling in on the two of them 
 and the lamp had been blown out. 
 
 It was a quick struggle to shut and bar out the 
 storm again, and then Marshall was down on knees 
 before the glowing fire with his cold, wet little bur 
 den still in his arms. 
 
 It was well that there was only the wild night to 
 hear the torrent of wild things that he said to her, 
 and only the glowing firelight to see him press his 
 tortured face to her unanswering heart, while he 
 called, again and again, and all unconsciously, on the 
 God that even godless men keep in the unexplored 
 depths of them for the extremities of their need. 
 
 It might have been only a few moments or it might 
 have been many that he knelt there before the fire 
 with the unconscious girl in his arms; but after a time 
 he had his answer, for a little quivering sigh was 
 slowly drawn through her lips, she turned her head 
 slightly, and then her eyelids trembled and opened 
 slowly. John Marshall s face was very close to hers 
 and her first look was into his eyes.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 353 
 
 He called her by her name with the best show that 
 he could put up of calmness, but she did not answer. 
 She only looked at him wonderingly, then smiled a 
 slow, happy, meaningless smile, and fainted again. 
 
 Marshall got back his nerve somehow, and in a 
 few minutes had her laid on a pile of pillows before 
 the fire and was putting some brandy between her 
 lips. 
 
 When she again opened her eyes, it was in no 
 state of happy forgetting, for with the light of con 
 sciousness this time came instant understanding and 
 instant terror. 
 
 "Quick, they are coming to kill you!" she cried, 
 and she struggled to rise. 
 
 Marshall caught her and pushed her gently back 
 among the pillows. His face was drawn as he asked: 
 
 "But you, you! For God s sake, how is it with 
 you?" 
 
 "7? " said the girl, wonderingly, and then, as a sud 
 den wave of memory brought back why it was he 
 feared for her, she exclaimed: 
 
 "Oh, I am all right nobody has been unkind to 
 me. But you they are coming to kill you, I tell 
 you!" 
 
 "Has Bud Davis been saying anything cruel to 
 you?" he insisted; "tell me the truth," and he be 
 came conscious for the first time that he was hold 
 ing her against the pillows by both arms. 
 
 "No, no, on my honor, no! But they are coming 
 to-night Bud and Trav Williams, and Ri Slaton and 
 and there are seven of them. They are coming
 
 354 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 at three o clock to-night, and they are going to shoot 
 you! What time is it? Quick! What /iweisit?" 
 
 "Twenty-three minutes to eleven. Do be quiet. 
 I have nearly half the night to get ready for them. 
 Lie still, child; don t you know that you are half 
 dead!" 
 
 The girl sank back on the pillows with something of 
 relief in her eyes at the knowledge that the hour for 
 the descent of the murderous crew was not imminent. 
 
 "And you came through this storm to tell me! 
 You did this for me. You did this for me! " he kept 
 saying over and over again, as he busied himself in 
 spreading out her wet skirts before the glowing fire 
 and in arranging across the pillow the mass of limp 
 dark hair that was beginning to curl to life again un 
 der the warmth. 
 
 She was lying partly on her hair, and he tried to 
 lift her shoulder gently to free it, when the girl cried 
 out in pain. 
 
 " What is it? " he asked, startled. " Oh, your poor 
 little arm and shoulder how on earth did it hap 
 pen?" 
 
 She looked at the cause of the man s deep concern 
 and saw that the sleeve and shoulder of her dress had 
 been almost torn away and that her white flesh was 
 streaked with blood. So much of her little body 
 ached that she had not before realized how much 
 her arm pained her. 
 
 "I was blown down on something sharp once," she 
 answered, as she put one hand up to gather her torn 
 sleeve together, and turned her face away from the
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 355 
 
 sight of the fresh blood. "Just wrap a towel or some 
 thing about it, so I can t see it, please I " 
 
 Marshall hurriedly relit the lamp to examine the 
 arm by a steadier light than the leaping fire afforded, 
 and now came back and knelt beside her. 
 
 "You must let me see how badly it is hurt," he 
 said quietly. " It s all right for me to do it ; take your 
 hand away, now. My ! The flesh is torn a lit 
 tle and there are some splinters in it. Just lie still." 
 
 He stirred about the room for some minutes and 
 Mary Elizabeth s eyes followed him as he moved. 
 When he came back to her side, he had a basin of 
 water with him and a lot of white things. 
 
 "I am going to hurt you a little," he said, still 
 steadily, "but these splinters will have to come out. 
 Then we ll bathe it with an antiseptic and bandage 
 it up." There was so much of the quiet assurance 
 of the physician in his tone that the girl gave a 
 swift, curious glance up into his face. His lips were 
 set tight. She glanced down the long, strong hands 
 that were always so sure of themselves were shaking. 
 Then she shut her eyes again, and kept them shut 
 as the man laid back the tattered sleeve and min 
 istered to her wounded arm with infinite tenderness 
 of touch, but with voice held down to the dead level 
 of the scientific while he worked. 
 
 And in between the sharp pains that he inflicted, 
 Mary Elizabeth detailed to him the plot which had 
 been burnt into her soul by the white lightning. 
 She remembered every word that had been spoken, 
 and she repeated what she had heard.
 
 356 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 Once Marshall paused a moment for a swift, sure 
 glance into her eyes. It was at the mention of his 
 warning to the two men. But the girl looked away 
 and asked: 
 
 "What did you warn them about?" 
 
 He went back to his bandaging, but with a quick 
 hardening of feature as he replied, briefly : 
 
 "Told them to keep off my preserves." 
 
 The long lashes swept her cheeks suddenly, but 
 he was too busy to see. 
 
 When he had fastened the last bandage, he gath 
 ered up the torn edges of the dress sleeve and shoul 
 der in a business-like fashion and, somehow, pinned 
 them together again. Mary Elizabeth was strug 
 gling to help him now, and her cheeks were flaming. 
 
 Then he gathered up the white things that were 
 left, together with the basin, and carried them back to 
 the mysterious from whence they had been produced. 
 
 The girl followed him with her eyes quiet till he 
 began to take down the heavy bar that secured the 
 rear door, when she was on her feet in an instant. 
 The bar was a little difficult to remove, however, and 
 he had not succeeded in lifting it from its brackets 
 before the frightened girl was beside him, clinging 
 to his arm. 
 
 "Don t, don t!" she cried. "Oh, can t you see 
 that you ll be offering yourself as a target? How do 
 you know how many others are in this plot against 
 you? Don t!" 
 
 "But I ve got to see if the rain has stopped," he 
 protested.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 357 
 
 "What difference does the rain make to us?" 
 
 "Why why, I ve got to take you home as soon 
 as it holds up." 
 
 "But- 
 
 " But what? " He was looking at her very straight. 
 
 "But I m not going." Her hands had dropped 
 from his arm, but he did not shift his own position 
 a half-inch. His eyes were still on her face, still 
 intense. 
 
 "Why not?" he asked very quietly. 
 
 "Because" and the girl slowly raised her head 
 and answered his steady gaze with a gaze as steady 
 "because, if I stay I can bring those men to 
 their senses. I saved the life of Ri Slaton s sick 
 baby not long ago, and he knows it and is grateful 
 to me; and the two Slocums, poor fellows, are both 
 of them in love with me. Then Trav Williams and 
 Bud have confessed in my hearing to the murder of 
 my father I can hold that over them, if persuasion 
 fails. You must go you must ride for your life 
 to the camp, and I ll stay here and turn them back 
 or, even if the worst comes to the worst, I can 
 greatly delay them from following you." 
 
 "Go, and leave you, girl? Did you believe that 
 I would do it?" 
 
 He noticed that she shivered in the draught from 
 around the ill-fitting door, and he left the bar in its 
 place and hurried her back to the fire. 
 
 "The sooner you get dry, the sooner I can take 
 you back where you belong," he said, with a grim 
 touch of command in his voice.
 
 358 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "But I m not going." 
 
 "Yes, you are." 
 
 "Well if I let you take me back, will you ride 
 right on to the camp?" 
 
 "Mary Elizabeth," he began with tender impa 
 tience, and he took a seat on the edge of the table 
 and assumed an argumentative attitude, "this is 
 one time when you ve got to let me use my own judg 
 ment without a row. To begin with, Selim has been 
 wantonly lamed by some unknown fiend, and Donnie 
 is at the camp. There is absolutely nothing here 
 to ride on. To end with, there are reasons impera 
 tive reasons why I should remain here and let the 
 inevitable clash between Trav Williams and myself 
 come now. Bud Davis is out of the question, but 
 Williams is a man, and he and I have got to get 
 down to it, sooner or later. 
 
 "Then, if he attacks me here, I can kill him 
 without getting into trouble over it. Of course, I 
 don t enjoy the idea of the numbers he is plotting 
 to bring against me Why, child, don t you get 
 scared about that the pioneer Indian fighters never 
 had a better block- house than this, and I ve got 
 ammunition to burn. You see, as soon as I get you 
 home " 
 
 "But I m not going home. No, listen to me! 
 Let me stay here; and when I hear them coming, 
 I ll go out to meet them listen, I tell you, it s my 
 time to talk I ll take a lantern along to show them 
 who I am so they won t hurt me. And they won t 
 hurt me, not even Trav Williams would do that.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 359 
 
 Hush, and let me finish! I can turn the Slocums 
 back, and I can turn Ri Slaton back. Bud Davis is 
 wildly afraid of my father s spirit I ll give him the 
 scare of his life! And if Trav Williams is afraid of 
 the law, I ll scare him too. Don t you see what a 
 help I ll be to you?" 
 
 God ! But you are precious ! 
 
 His eyes had deepened to intensity as the girl 
 kindled before him, and the sudden exclamation 
 now burst from him all unawares. The next mo 
 ment, however, he throttled the mood that was 
 upon him, for the girl had drawn insensibly away, 
 startled by his vehemence. 
 
 "No," he said, slowly, and he picked up a maga 
 zine from the table and idly opened it in his attempt 
 to appear master of himself "it s a piece with 
 your coming here to-night, through this storm this 
 wanting to stay and help me fight it out. But it 
 can t be, girl, it can t be." 
 
 "It s going to be." There was a bridled some 
 thing in her voice, too, this time. 
 
 The man raised his eyes from the book that he 
 was fingering and looked steadily at her. 
 
 "Mary Elizabeth," he said, "there is a reason 
 an all-conquering reason why you must not be 
 found here even in the capacity of a messenger of 
 fate. I m going to take you home." 
 
 "I know the reason," she replied, "but it is not 
 all-conquering." 
 
 The man s restless fingers stopped still with a half- 
 turned page between them.
 
 360 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "I know the talk," the girl continued. "Uncle 
 Beck told me he told me all about it. I know 
 why" she was white to her temples, but she brought 
 her averted glance back to his own burning gaze 
 "I know why you let me jeopardize your dearest 
 interests and rouse these people against you. I 
 know why you stayed here after you thought you 
 had failed when Melissa Thaggin refused to sign 
 those deeds. Uncle Beck told me. He told me all 
 about it. He told me that you told Babe to paint 
 you black to the people, so they would think the 
 more of me for what I had done for them. Uncle 
 Beck told me that you went to Trav Williams and 
 Bud and told them that you were going to kill them 
 on sight if they made a move against me. I know 
 how you have" and the long lashes swept her 
 cheeks for a moment "how you have struggled to 
 keep me from hearing; Babe told Uncle Beck that 
 you said it would break my heart. But you didn t 
 know me. My father could face anything when he 
 saw his way. I am his child." 
 
 "You knew all this? Then you know what it 
 would mean for you to be found here to-night?" 
 
 "Yes, I know." 
 
 The next instant he had snatched her to his 
 breast. 
 
 "Don t!" she cried, struggling against his fierce 
 kisses as he bent her little body back till the lamp 
 light swept her white face "don t oh, don t! I 
 came here to-night because I felt that I could 
 come!"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 361 
 
 She staggered from the instant release of his sup 
 porting arms and caught by the big table. Marshall 
 dropped into a chair and covered his face with his 
 hands. 
 
 After a long minute he got up and crossed the 
 room to the rear door again. He unbarred it and 
 flung it open. 
 
 The girl s hands met in a spasmodic clasp, but this 
 time she did not interfere. She only stood still till 
 he should move again. And it seemed to her an 
 unconscionable time that he stood there with his 
 back to her and his face to the whipping winds, 
 but after that unmeasured time of fear, he closed 
 and barred the door again, and came back to the 
 fire. 
 
 "The clouds are blacker than ever," he said, as 
 he busied himself with the fire. "I am afraid 
 we ll have a good little wait before we can start 
 back." 
 
 "Yes, we ll have a good little wait before we start 
 back," she replied. 
 
 Marshall turned quickly from the fire: 
 
 "Of course you know that you are going." 
 
 "No, I know that I am going to stay." 
 
 "Mary Elizabeth, do you really understand that 
 it is your reputation which is at stake? " 
 
 "And your life yes, I understand." 
 
 "But the stakes are not of equal value." He was 
 as quiet now, as direct and simple as herself. In 
 the face of the fate overhanging, the veneerings had 
 dropped away and the two of them had got down to
 
 362 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 essentials. "The stakes are not of equal value," he 
 insisted. 
 
 "No," she replied, "a man s life is worth more 
 than a woman s reputation." 
 
 "And where on God s earth did you get your 
 standards? " 
 
 "Not from the men about me; from the woman 
 here," and she laid her hand on her breast. 
 
 "The woman there," he said, "the woman there, 
 Mary Elizabeth, is the truest woman in the world, 
 but she has lied to you!" 
 
 "She has told me only what is true." 
 
 "Not when the life is mine and the reputation 
 yours. Mary," he said, and his bronzed face paled 
 as he said it, "you are the only spotless thing that 
 has touched my life. I will not sacrifice you." 
 
 Suddenly, a terrific crash of thunder shivered the 
 momentary quiet; and then the four winds of 
 heaven seemed to gather themselves together and 
 hurl their combined strength upon the haunted 
 cabin in final reckoning of its evil accounts. The 
 heavens opened and the rains descended hi sheets 
 again; the thunders boomed along the sky; the 
 four winds of heaven, opposed now as to which 
 should drink deepest of vengeance, grappled in a 
 struggle for mastery in which the ghost trees that 
 sentinelled the haunted ground were torn from their 
 stiff, dead hold upon the accursed earth and flung 
 prone upon it, or left naked of whatever stark limbs 
 they dared to oppose to the avenging winds of 
 heaven.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 363 
 
 The man and the girl looked at each other a long 
 understanding look and then they returned he 
 with heaving breast to the glow of the red fire she, 
 with eyes dark with mystery, to the spirit of the 
 storm.
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 
 ANOTHER rending, shivering blast tore its way 
 through the dead forest, and the man turned to the 
 woman who had come to him through the storm. 
 
 Her head was up, and her dark, limp locks were 
 flung back. She was looking away, through the near 
 and visible, to the distant unseen. 
 
 "What are you thinking about?" he asked. 
 
 "That!" 
 
 "The storm?" 
 
 "Yes storm." 
 
 The man shifted his position a little uneasily but 
 his eyes were still upon her, trying to read through 
 the slightly averted face what lay beneath. 
 
 "It s like that," he said, "the breaking down and 
 tearing away of old dead and useless things by the 
 onward sweep of progress. It always seems cruel 
 and terrible, but old things must go down." 
 
 "Old loves old faiths?" she breathed. 
 
 "Yes, and resisting longest, old hates," the man 
 replied. 
 
 " The right of the strongest !" 
 
 John Marshall got up restlessly and changed the 
 position of his chair, but the girl turned a little away 
 from the new view he commanded of her face. 
 It was as if she were to be forever a little beyond his 
 understanding. 
 
 364
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 365 
 
 "Why, yes," he said. "The strongest must pre 
 vail. It is that way in nature. And it is that way 
 in society even all government is, in the last analy 
 sis, by the right of the strongest. Progress," he con 
 tinued, after a moment s pause in which the sound of 
 dead things being swept before the blast filled up the 
 interlude "progress is often accompanied by seem 
 ing cruelty, but since it is progress that must be the 
 justification of its agent." 
 
 The girl turned to him. 
 
 "That," she said, "is one of your mistakes. God 
 used Pharaoh to punish the Children of Israel to their 
 ultimate good, but He did not justify Pharaoh." 
 
 "Isn t it hitting below the belt to quote Scripture 
 to a man who does not subscribe to it?" 
 
 The dark eyes fixed his own for a moment of in 
 quiry, and then turned again to the unseen. The 
 man experienced a curious, sinking feeling of being 
 by himself, alone, unable to follow. 
 
 "And you are really going to take these people s 
 homes away from them? You are really going to do 
 this thing?" The desolate moan of a departing gust 
 interposed between question and reply. 
 
 "If you insist on putting it that way yes." 
 
 "I have always tried to believe that when the test 
 came, you would not do it." 
 
 The man rose quickly from his chair and began 
 walking up and down the room. 
 
 "Don t you see," he urged, with the old masterful 
 finality, "that if land belongs to the first who seizes 
 it, then, by the same token, it will belong to any
 
 366 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 other who can take it for himself? In urging the 
 claims of these people, you are but justifying me." 
 
 She did not look away as he paused before her in 
 challenge, but she was still immeasurably removed. 
 
 "I don t think you have ever been quite fair to 
 me," she returned steadily. "You have always had 
 the intellectual advantage, and you have never 
 scrupled to use it against me. You, somehow, won t 
 meet me with my own weapons." 
 
 Something swept the old dominating self of him 
 out of his strong face as he answered: 
 
 "Mary Elizabeth, you ll have to remember that I 
 have never known you before to-night that I do 
 not know you now. Speak to me in terms of your 
 self, and let me try to understand." 
 
 The look with which she answered reached out to 
 him across the space between. 
 
 "Why," she replied, "this thing that you have 
 wrought here is a tragedy as big as the human heart 
 is big. Ultimate good even if ultimate good had 
 been your motive could not justify or excuse it. 
 Progress is not something to be forced down the 
 throat of a people, it is something that must develop 
 from within them. Yes, I know the stimulus often 
 comes from without, but it should come as a stimulus 
 only, and not as a destroying force that outrages the 
 traditions of a people and leaves scars that never 
 heal." 
 
 She paused for his reply, but he only said: "Go 
 on." 
 
 The furious night interposed, and for a space the
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 367 
 
 girl listened with head up and lips apart. The man 
 was studying her face when she turned to him again. 
 
 "And it is not," she said, "as if this project of 
 yours were their one and only chance. Others would 
 have come, not to violate, to destroy but to inspire. 
 Oh," she cried in sudden passionate appeal to him, 
 "it is not just these few little mountain acres that 
 are in contest it s what they stand for! You 
 know you must feel what it would mean to take the 
 fight out of a man, to to show him up to himself as 
 incapable of defending, of proving, of justifying, that 
 which is in the deepest sense, himself. You must 
 know!" 
 
 The man suddenly put up his hand in a gesture of 
 defence: 
 
 "I don t believe that it goes that deep with them," 
 he protested. 
 
 "You know Babe Davis? You know the man hi 
 him? This thing that you have done is going to 
 destroy him! It makes little difference now how 
 Babe got his pitiful little plot of ground, his crude 
 traditions. The only thing that signifies now is, 
 shall he keep inviolate that which stands for the 
 achievements of his fathers? Shall his ideals be left 
 to him?" 
 
 " Ideals, " protested the man, "ideals themselves 
 are subject to change. How else could we progress? " 
 
 "To change, yes, but not to annihilation. Even 
 poor Babe could change from within he has 
 changed, grown, for your sake and for mine." 
 
 "Don t!"
 
 368 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "Oh, you don t like my weapons? Well, you are 
 going to show Babe up to himself in his pitiful inad 
 equacy. You are going to violate before his eyes 
 the temples of his faith and show him how powerless 
 he is to defend them." 
 
 "But, Mary, I I have long determined to make it 
 all right with Babe. I" somehow his voice lacked 
 the assurance that usually characterized it "I have 
 always intended to make him indepen " the girl 
 smiled bitterly and the man hastened to correct, "I 
 have always meant to give him to pay him for 
 what he lost through me." 
 
 "Do you know of any largess that would repay a 
 man for the right to be a man?" 
 
 "But you put things so cruelly. I m not deny 
 ing to Babe Davis the right to " 
 
 "Doesn t every man have the right to be a man in 
 his own way? On his own plane? " 
 
 "Every man but myself," he replied, with sudden 
 bitterness. 
 
 There was again the note of human anguish in the 
 cry of the storm outside, and the next moment the 
 girl was clinging to his arm. 
 
 "Say that you did it for their sakes as well as for 
 your own," she pleaded. "Say that you took this 
 step with their best good at heart!" 
 
 White to the temples, the man shrank under her 
 dinging touch, but he looked straight into her 
 eyes. 
 
 "I will not, I will not lie to you," he protested. 
 
 "Then then" her tight little hands would not 
 

 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 369 
 
 be shaken off, and she held his gaze by the power of 
 her own "then give it up!" 
 
 "Nof* 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "I cannot." 
 
 " Give it up for my sake." 
 
 "No, not for your sake. Mary, listen to me. My 
 word is pledged, my business integrity is at stake. I 
 have borrowed thousands of dollars for which I could 
 give no security except my word. This deal for gov 
 ernment lands I had to put through by myself, be 
 cause I was obliged to swear that there was no com 
 pany of men to be benefited by the use of the lands. 
 It was a case of colossal daring. I had to own the 
 whole scheme. Yesterday, I needed an immense sum 
 for the project down yonder to keep it from going 
 under. I wired to two friends of mine for financial 
 backing, offering nothing but my word as security. 
 They came to my rescue and saved the scheme. It 
 will take the success of this project here to meet 
 the obligations that I have incurred. Don t you 
 see " 
 
 " I see " slowly " that it has become a choice be 
 tween injustice to the rich and injustice to the poor." 
 
 He was still looking straight into her eyes. "I 
 can t hope to make you understand," he said, with 
 despairing impatience, "that on the one side there is 
 no legitimate claim to the property involved. But 
 you will know what I mean when I say that my word 
 is given." 
 
 "But," urged the girl, and her slight hands felt the 
 
 v v
 
 370 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 tightening of the muscles in the arm to which she still 
 clung "but, when the choice is between faith to 
 one s word and faith to an eternal principle what 
 then?" 
 
 "Few men are sure of eternal principles. It has 
 to suffice for most of us to keep the faith we pledge." 
 
 Suddenly the little clinging hands were laid hard 
 against the man s heaving breast and the eyes dark 
 with mystery were holding his own to themselves. 
 
 "If you love me, you ll give this up," she said. 
 
 "If I love you, I ll break my word?" 
 
 "Yes, if you put it that way." 
 
 The man looked into her eyes for a full minute, and 
 then deliberately took her hands from his breast and 
 put them from him. 
 
 "Then I don t love you," he said. 
 
 A loud knock at the door went through the two 
 of them like an electric shock, and the man wheeled 
 and faced the direction from which the summons 
 came. The girl was beside him in an instant, but he 
 caught her by her two arms and hurried her to the 
 side wall out of gun-shot range. 
 
 "Who is it? "he called. 
 
 "Babe Davis." 
 
 The two looked at each other. It was Babe Da- 
 vis s voice that had answered, unmistakably. 
 
 Marshall sprang to the door to open it, and Mary 
 Elizabeth leaned back against the wall, weak with 
 the sudden release to her taut nerves. The great 
 iron bar was quickly removed and the door flung 
 open. Sure enough, there, silhouetted against the
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 371 
 
 outer blackness, stood Babe Davis, towering, gaunt, 
 and wet to the bone. 
 
 Marshall s hand was stretched out instantly. 
 
 "Come in, Babe, come in!" he exclaimed. 
 
 But Babe Davis swept aside the hand that was held 
 out in welcome and strode past Marshall into the 
 room. His back was to the girl, who now stood 
 speechless with wonder, as he turned and waited in 
 grim silence while Marshall re-barred the door. 
 
 It was the work of a minute to replace the great 
 bar in its brackets, and then Marshall came directly 
 up to the man who had entered, saying steadily, and 
 not unkindly: 
 
 "Well, what is it, Babe?" 
 
 "You an me have got to have it out to-night!" 
 said the hillite. 
 
 "Oh," exclaimed Marshall and the girl who was 
 watching his face suddenly feared him to her very 
 marrow " so you, too, are in this murderous scheme 
 against me! You constituted yourself their enter 
 ing wedge because you knew that I trusted you! 
 You ll 
 
 A sudden commanding gesture of a gaunt, brown 
 hand stopped him with his sentence unfinished. 
 
 "No, I ain t in with Trav Williams an them. I 
 wouldn t go in with em. But I ve said two things, 
 stranger, that I m here to make good. I ve said that 
 I ain t a-goin to see you shot down thout a chance 
 to defend yourse f. So take notice: the crowd s 
 a-comin fur you before daylight. An while they re 
 plannin to call you outen bed an shoot you, you kin
 
 372 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 bet they will be ready to change their programme to 
 suit any siterwation they find. An further, stranger, 
 I ve said you wa n t a-goin to take a foot o my 
 father s land away from me while I lived. You didn t 
 b lieve me bout the land, stranger, b cause I didn t 
 cuss an bluster when I said hit; but I meant hit jes 
 the same. Now will you give up this land-grabbin 
 projec an leave these parts fur good? " 
 
 "I will not!" 
 
 With a steadiness of nerve that had in it a sugges 
 tion of fate, the mountaineer laid two long knives on 
 the table before him. "Then take your choice, 
 stranger. We ll settle this thing, man to man, fair 
 an square, before the others git here. Ef you kin 
 kill me, you ll have time to light out." 
 
 The girl in the background stole silently forward. 
 She was enveloped in shadow the shadow that 
 towered behind the mountaineer, reflecting more 
 nearly the bigness of his spirit than it did the gaunt 
 proportions of the grotesque figure. In one of those 
 moments of instantaneous photographic impression, 
 Marshall felt that she was at one with the man 
 of her people that she, too, was challenging. He 
 gave one quick, comprehending glance at her over 
 the other man s shoulder, then folded his arms and 
 addressed himself to the man: 
 
 " Davis," he said quietly, " I shall enjoy, in a 
 way, the chance to settle with Trav Williams and 
 your brother, but I have no intention of fighting 
 you. No, you are mistaken there! The fact of the 
 Business is, I have had first-class athletic training,
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 373 
 
 and I d have every advantage of you. Listen a mo 
 ment: I have always liked and respected you for 
 giving me my orders about Mary Elizabeth. I have 
 honored and trusted you for your faith in her and 
 your goodness to her. For this I want to be friends 
 with you." 
 
 The mountaineer before him and the woman in 
 the shadow that he cast did not move a hair s 
 breadth, and John Marshall continued: "Through 
 the carelessness of your forefathers you have been 
 worked a great injustice. I am the direct agent of 
 that injustice, and I m sorry that it had to be so. 
 If you will be friends, I ll promise to set you up in 
 life, ten times more comfortable than you have ever 
 been- 
 
 Again the gaunt brown hand went up : 
 
 "Never mind bout what you air a-goin to give 
 me, stranger, for I m not acceptin of charity. The 
 question between us is, air you a-goin to try to 
 take my land?" 
 
 The girl in the shadow started silently as John 
 Marshall, with subtly changed face, answered, grimly: 
 
 "I have already taken it." 
 
 "Then pick up one o them thar knives." 
 
 "I ll not do it." 
 
 "Pick hit up!" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Then, by God, I ll make you glad to!" The 
 infuriated hillite caught up the nearest weapon and 
 drew back with it, but his right arm was seized from 
 behind by the woman in the shadow, Not by main
 
 374 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 strength did she detain him, but by the sheer sur 
 prise of the move. 
 
 He turned and looked into her face: 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth, you here!" 
 
 The girl was looking up into his eyes appeal 
 ing first, then frightened, then with sudden heart 
 break. 
 
 "Oh, Babe, you too!" she cried, dropping her face 
 on the hands with which she still restrained him. 
 
 All the hate of which his race was capable gath 
 ered hi the dark face of the man as he looked for one 
 moment on the bowed head of the girl. In another 
 instant, however, his wrath broke, and he flung her 
 from him with an oath. 
 
 John Marshall caught and steadied her and was at 
 the mountaineer so quickly that the actions seemed 
 from one impulse. The next thing the sinewy native 
 knew, his arms were pinioned in a strange new 
 fashion, and he was as helpless as a child, in the 
 hands of his captor. 
 
 "It s no test of which of us is the better man, 
 Babe," Marshall panted; "it s a trick learned from 
 the Japs. Now, keep your temper and listen. 
 She s worth sacrificing for yet. It s a lie what you 
 thought then she came here through the storm 
 to warn me because she overheard their plan to 
 shoot me without giving me a dog s chance; and 
 she came knowing what they would think about her 
 if they found her here but she never could have 
 dreamed that you, Babe that you would misjudge 
 her."
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 375 
 
 The girl sank to the floor, and the next moment, 
 the two men were kneeling beside her. 
 
 "Ma y Lizbeth honey " one of them was say 
 ing tenderly, when all suddenly the night was filled 
 with voices voices calling, voices hallooing, voices 
 cursing! 
 
 For one moment of stunned silence the two men 
 looked at each other across the half-fainting girl, and 
 then one of them whispered, hoarsely: 
 
 "Tell em I fetched her here to try to git you to 
 give up" and then "You kin fight hit out with 
 them now; I ll not jump on you with the whole 
 crew agin you." 
 
 "Then take care of her," and he sprang for his gun. 
 
 A rifle-ball stung its way through the front door 
 and buried itself in a log of the wall beyond. Mar 
 shall quickly turned out the lamp, but a fitful blaze 
 flared from the end of a glowing hickory chunk, 
 threatening to play traitor to the stronghold. 
 
 At the sharp ring of the missile, the girl was on 
 her feet, and before the dull Babe could realize what 
 she was doing, she had darted to the centre table, 
 snatched up a pistol, and was beside John Marshall, 
 ready for fight. 
 
 But with one movement of his arm he swept her 
 behind him. "Babe!" he called desperately, as an 
 other and another rifle-ball cut through the thick 
 planks of the door at different angles. 
 
 The hillite, awake to the situation now, needed no 
 further summons; and when the girl protested, he 
 picked her up bodily and carried her to the deep
 
 376 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 recess between the front wall of the cabin and the 
 huge log-and-mud chimney that extended into the 
 room five or six feet. Here, for the time, she was 
 reasonably safe, for the wall opposite the chimney 
 was unbroken by aperture. 
 
 John Marshall was at work now. Three rapid- 
 fire shots from his Winchester, through an aperture 
 in the door attacked, silenced for a moment the bat 
 teries in front; and he sprang to the door at the rear 
 and sent a singing message through, only to re 
 turn as quickly to the front where the firing had 
 recommenced. 
 
 He calculated by the crack of their rifles that the 
 stormers were some distance from the house, and he 
 knew that he must keep them at a distance that 
 the moment the muzzles of their guns could be 
 placed against the crevices of the doors it would be 
 all up with him. If only the room were hi black 
 darkness ! 
 
 The girl, detained in her place of safety by sheer 
 force, was now almost frantic. 
 
 "Babe, Babe," she begged, "help him for God s 
 sake, help him for my sake, Babe! There s a gun 
 over there in the corner get it and shoot! I swear 
 I ll stay here if you only will Horrors, how they 
 are firing! Babe " 
 
 But the erstwhile gentle, docile creature of her 
 leading turned on her with savage vehemence : 
 
 "No," he blazed, "no!" 
 
 "Then let me go!" cried the girl; "let me fight 
 beside him! "
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 377 
 
 This time the man s powerful arm pinioned her 
 against the wall. 
 
 "Fight your own kind for him? for him that s 
 robbed em? By God, you won t! You ll stand 
 right here and see him take his medicine ! I ve done 
 give him his chance." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth cast a despairing look at the man 
 who was waging single-handed his losing fight with 
 death. He had stopped to reload now; the sweat 
 was streaming down his face. The grim lines about 
 his mouth, the quick, sharp movements as he re 
 turned fire or threw in the shells, spoke not less 
 eloquently than did the sinister patter of lead against 
 the front wall and splintering door, how desperate 
 were the straits of the cabin s sole defender. 
 
 Hugging the wall as best he might, but still dan 
 gerously exposed, Marshall once more half-emptied 
 his magazine of bullets, firing into the outer black 
 ness in directions fancied to correspond with the 
 latest flashes from tneir guns, and again the hostile 
 shots seemed discharged from farther distance. 
 
 The girl covered her eyes. If only the Hearer of 
 Prayer would hear! She was ready to compromise 
 now to trade with Him on any terms. But He had 
 turned His face away away from this spot that 
 was haunted by the tragedies and the violence of sin. 
 
 A cessation of the shots inside; the girl opened her 
 eyes wildly. 
 
 John Marshall was replenishing his magazine. As 
 he stood facing the fireplace, the blaze of the hickory 
 log seemed bent on having a critical view of him
 
 378 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 and shone vividly in the cabin for a brief moment. 
 Something red was dyeing his shirt-sleeve in spots! 
 The spots were widening! 
 
 The mountaineer caught the girl in the wild dash 
 that she tried to make, and, heedless of the pitiful 
 cry she uttered, forced her back to the sheltered 
 corner. 
 
 "Let him take his medicine," he hissed. 
 
 But Marshall had heard, and, dropping his rifle 
 on the table, was at her side in an instant. 
 
 "Mary, are you hurt? Are you hurt?" 
 
 It was with the loss of an all-important moment 
 that he stopped to be reassured of her safety, for 
 while he yet paused beside her, frightened, unbeliev 
 ing, the crisis came. One terrific crash against the 
 timbers of the rear door shook the very rafters of the 
 cabin, bending the bar-brackets and bursting the 
 hinges from the door. 
 
 Marshall sprang to regain his rifle, but it was too 
 late. The shattered door was thrown down across 
 his way, and he was facing a half-dozen gun-barrels, 
 while swarming, vengeance-seeking natives were 
 pressing into the room to witness a finale delayed for 
 their gloating enjoyment. 
 
 With the falling apart of a big log in the fireplace, 
 the flames leapt high, repeating themselves in weird 
 and fantastic fitfulness on the cold steel of the level 
 guns, and in the veiled glitter of the eyes of a man 
 who stood slightly apart, but who, Marshall knew 
 only too well, was the directing fate of that whole 
 grim company.
 
 379 
 
 The next instant, something had come between 
 John Marshall and death a slight, frail woman, 
 with arms stretched wide as if to further shelter 
 him, was offering her own breast to the threatening 
 guns. 
 
 A big man in the front of the mob knocked up the 
 menacing rifle-barrels in the same moment that 
 Marshall swept the girl aside. 
 
 Then, somehow, Babe Davis, stunned and bewil 
 dered at the way the girl had flashed away from him, 
 got mixed up in the scene. The astonishment and 
 curiosity created by his presence and by the presence 
 of the girl gave pause for a moment to even their 
 hungry vengeance. 
 
 In that moment Mary Elizabeth was pleading 
 with the man who had struck away from her breast 
 the levelled guns, js 
 
 "Ri, I gave your baby back to you," she panted, 
 "the doctor said I saved his life you said you 
 would do anything for me Ri, give me this man s 
 life!" 
 
 The room had become strange with men in whose 
 eyes was implacable vengeance, but action was for 
 a space delayed. They were men and not demons, 
 so this woman had to be dealt with, got out of harm s 
 way. 
 
 Ri Slaton stood before the pleading girl, his big 
 chest heaving, his hands gripping tight his own rifle- 
 stock. When she had finished speaking he reluc 
 tantly placed his gun against the wall and folded 
 his arms.
 
 380 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "I kin do this much," he said, "an no more. 
 He s got to die." 
 
 It was John Marshall himself who silenced her 
 taking her tight by both arms, he turned to Babe 
 Davis a face in which exasperation and desperation 
 were strangely mixed. 
 
 "Babe," he exclaimed, "Babe, it does look as if 
 you could hold her ! Take her out of this, can t you? 
 But he whispered, "My darling" as he forcibly 
 consigned her to Babe Davis s keeping. Then he 
 faced his enemies. 
 
 "Men," he said, making a play for one last des 
 perate chance, "for you are men I know it s all up 
 with me, and I accept the fact. You can easily 
 shoot me to pieces if you choose, for I am unarmed, 
 but I m here to tell you that it would be damned 
 unsportsmanlike. Anybody can murder in cold 
 blood, but it takes a man to kill like a man. Now, 
 come at me, but come one at a time. Let s be men 
 to the last. There are two knives there Babe 
 Davis brought them to have it out with me, man to 
 man, with no advantage, except that he brought his 
 second with him." He turned and looked deep into 
 the eyes of the girl whom Babe Davis was now hold 
 ing tightly by the wrists. 
 
 She was standing very straight and tall for her 
 and her eyes answered the last-stand courage of his 
 own. He addressed the men again, who were now 
 muttering ominously among themselves. 
 
 "Give me one of those knives and give one man 
 at a time the other, and we ll do this thing right."
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 381 
 
 "Hell!" snarled Bud Davis, "who ever heerd o 
 givin a viper like you a weepon! An I ain t a-goin 
 to be chose for no sech performance. / " 
 
 "No!" blazed Marshall at him so suddenly that 
 he jumped back. "A miserable, cowardly cur like 
 you is not worth fighting! I want a man!" 
 
 Somebody laughed a jeering laugh, and somebody 
 else echoed it, and Bud Davis fell back in the crowd 
 with all the demon in him roused and ready for the 
 demoniac. 
 
 "Who do you want?" Ri Slaton asked the ques 
 tion rather in whimsical curiosity than in any spirit 
 of accepting the challenger s audacious terms. 
 
 "Trav Williams," promptly replied Marshall in 
 shrewd pursuance of his desperate stratagem. The 
 girl with Babe Davis caught her breath with a 
 smothered scream. There was a ripple in the crowd 
 again this time of sheer admiration. 
 
 Trav Williams, who had so far held aloof like a 
 silent, overshadowing fate, now laid his gun aside 
 and came forward with a look of self-conscious pride 
 and satisfaction he had had the compliment of his 
 life. Between a desire to demonstrate how well he 
 deserved Marshall s subtle praise and the recollection 
 that he had not yet punished this foolhardy stranger 
 for daring to threaten him, and in the presence of a 
 whole storeful of men, Trav lost his head. Then, 
 too, the girl herself was looking on the girl about 
 whom Marshall had dared to give him orders and 
 the girl who had interfered between him and what 
 he most coveted. Here was a chance to even up
 
 382 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 with the stranger, and to punish, more terribly than 
 in any other way, that re-embodied spirit of Welchel 
 Dale s that had dared to cross his path again to 
 plague him. 
 
 With one long insolent look at Mary Elizabeth 
 he came forward and took his choice of the 
 blades. 
 
 "Don t do hit, Trav," urged one of the now ex 
 cited crowd. "Le s " 
 
 "Do you think he can t hold his own?" asked 
 Marshall with a subtle smile. 
 
 "No, but, Trav, he s jest a " 
 
 "Your friends seem to be uneasy about you," said 
 Marshall to the now thoroughly roused man before 
 him. 
 
 "Wa-al, I ain t oneasy," replied the man grimly, 
 and then to the protesting crowd: "Who s a-runnin 
 this here thing, I d like to know? No, I don t need 
 your advice an I don t need your he p. Stand back, 
 boys!" and the crowd widened. 
 
 The two men grasped their weapons and stepped 
 apart, but Marshall held up his hand against the 
 signal to begin. 
 
 "Men," he said firmly, but pleadingly, "that girl 
 must be taken out it s barbarous to let her witness 
 a thing like this. Make her go! Pick her up and 
 carry her!" this because he had caught the defiance 
 of her glance. 
 
 Two very young fellows and Ri Slaton moved to 
 ward her in spite of a growl of disapproval from Trav 
 Williams, but she somehow gave Babe the slip again,
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 383 
 
 and in a twinkling had snatched a pistol from a near 
 by shelf. 
 
 "Keep back!" she exclaimed. "Did Welchel Dale 
 ever play the weakling?" 
 
 The men of her people knew the type better than 
 did Marshall, and they turned their attention again 
 to him. 
 
 "Let me put her out that door," he entreated. 
 
 But at a signal from Trav, Eli Hawkins was al 
 ready counting, "One, two " and Marshall barely 
 had time to make ready for the spring of his adver 
 sary on the loud and ringing "three!" 
 
 The circle instantly gave back. But all that the 
 girl could see was two men locked together, so evenly 
 matched, so desperately opposed, that they seemed 
 for a long time scarcely to move at all, and only the 
 initiated could have guessed at how great a cost each 
 slight advance of foot or hand was made, could feel 
 how eloquent of tremendous force was every inclina 
 tion backward or forward of each powerful form. 
 
 Suddenly the circle closed in hi breathless excite 
 ment and the girl could see no more, but she could 
 guess how the struggle went, by the alternate cursing 
 and cheering of the excited crowd. 
 
 The sounds of struggle increased and then, a ter 
 rible, sickening fall, and savage cheer upon cheer! 
 Babe Davis clapped his big hand over the girl s eyes, 
 but there was no need of it, for her vision was swim 
 ming before her; but still in her ears were the sounds 
 of struggle terrible, tense struggle this time of two 
 bodies that were writhing upon the floor, and which
 
 384 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 was above and which beneath she knew only too well 
 by the tightness of Babe Davis s hand upon her 
 eyes. 
 
 Then all suddenly fell a silence a silence more 
 terrible than any sound of struggle could have been. 
 Babe Davis s hand dropped away. 
 
 The on-lookers seemed petrified as they stood in 
 a widened circle now, where all might see. A man 
 lay on his back with stark, wide eyes staring at the 
 shingles above, and another knelt above him with 
 something red in his weapon hand. The kneeling 
 man raised his eyes slowly 
 
 "Mary, I had to do it," he said. 
 
 Then out of the awed silence came one clear, sharp 
 sound, and John Marshall dropped back, wide-eyed 
 too, and staring at the shingles above. 
 
 "Bud Davis! Coward!" and Welchel Dale s child 
 was beside the man who had fallen, with her hand 
 over the ugly hole in his breast. 
 
 Then, amid the pandemonium that broke loose, 
 Bud Davis went creeping, creeping toward the girl. 
 Evil epithets were pouring from his lips, his great fist 
 was tight clinched. 
 
 But he did not reach her, for a long, gaunt, but 
 powerful man swung full upon him. 
 
 There were sounds of another fierce struggle, but 
 Mary Elizabeth did not heed this time. Her ear 
 was laid to the heart of the man who was staring as 
 Trav Williams stared neither did she realize when 
 brother and brother, in the death struggle together 
 because of her, staggered in the blindness of their
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 385 
 
 hate, and pitched out of the open door to have their 
 final reckoning together in outer darkness. 
 
 Mary Elizabeth did not heed, for her ear was laid 
 to the heart of the man who had fallen, and that 
 heart had not answered her. 
 
 And then somehow nothingness!
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 MARY ELIZABETH stared at the wall. It was just 
 the inside of weather-boarding, and was quite rough 
 but it was whitewashed that was very nice. 
 But some one was speaking speaking outside. 
 
 "Dead both of them," the voice said. " Brothers, 
 too, they say. Fought the life out of each other like 
 wild beasts there hi the rain and dark. It would be 
 an interesting story to know from the beginning." 
 
 Whom could he be talking about? And whose 
 voice was it that sounded so strange? Mary Eliza 
 beth sat up and looked about her, wondering. She 
 was in a little shed-room somewhere a perfectly 
 strange shed-room. Three sides were roughly boarded 
 up. To the left was a wall of logs the main house 
 was on that side. But what house? The strange 
 voice was speaking again : 
 
 "Ready, Felix? Take this and ride to the cross 
 roads store that Mr. Horton directed you to. Ask for 
 the storekeeper himself, and rent a team and wagon 
 from him at any cost. Tell the old man that John 
 Marshall was killed in an attack on his cabin last 
 night, and that his friends want to remove the body." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth sat still. 
 
 Primitive life lies ever close to tragedy, and primi 
 tive women have been bred through the centuries 
 
 386
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 387 
 
 to suffer supremely and be silent. Mary Elizabeth 
 sat still. Yes, she remembered, but the wild agony 
 of it all was past. Indeed, this could not be called 
 suffering at all this dead, unfeeling calm. 
 
 So this was the end, and she was facing that 
 whitewashed wall. 
 
 Then, by almost subconscious movement, she was 
 straightening out her dark locks and was braiding 
 the heavy mass of curls down her back. She stood 
 up it took an effort to do it, for her limbs ached 
 now, and now the whitewashed wall was threatening 
 to slip away. But, in a moment or two of steadying, 
 things cleared for her, and she turned to a door that 
 she found, and opened it. 
 
 One step, and she was out on a small back porch 
 and standing over two strange men who were seated 
 on the steps. In the next instant they were on their 
 feet facing her, and their hats were quickly removed 
 after a manner that was not of the hills. They had 
 on big riding-boots, she somehow took in, and one of 
 them had nice eyes. 
 
 "Why, why, you ve come to your sens you ve 
 waked up at last, have you?" he of the nice eyes 
 inquired with gentle solicitude. "I m afraid I make 
 a poor sick-nurse not to keep a sharper eye on my 
 patient." 
 
 "Yes," said the girl, in answer to his question, 
 "and this house ?" 
 
 "Is the haunted house." 
 
 "Where is he?" she asked, and she laid her hand 
 hard against the door facing.
 
 388 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "In here," he replied in a low tone, and he pointed 
 to a half -open door. "Do you want to see him?" 
 
 For answer she followed him into the darkened 
 room. His step was very quiet and he held his soft 
 wool hat hi his hand as he led the way to the bed 
 in the dim corner. The girl slipped past him and 
 paused by the form that was stretched out before 
 her. She lifted back tenderly a stray lock of hair 
 that lay on the white forehead, when John Mar 
 shall turned his head slightly and opened his eyes 
 full upon her. There was a moment of dead pause, 
 and then 
 
 "Is it life or death for me? say which," he 
 whispered. 
 
 The girl dropped on the floor beside him with her 
 head and arms on the bed. She was sobbing aloud 
 now from the shock of too great joy, and the wounded 
 man was struggling to quiet her. 
 
 "I saw you killed before my eyes," she cried franti 
 cally. "I saw Bud Davis shoot you!" 
 
 "John, Doc says you must lie still ! " The man who 
 had entered with her was speaking now, and with 
 authority. "My dear young lady, try to be quiet!" 
 
 "You said he was dead, yourself," she declared in 
 a wild whisper, while the desperately controlled sobs 
 shook her slight frame. "I heard you send word to 
 the store!" 
 
 "Oh, did you hear that ruse!" exclaimed the man. 
 "I sent that message to keep off other attacks till 
 we could get John safe away. I m so sorry, I m 
 so sorry," but stooping low over her he whispered:
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 389 
 
 "You must control yourself. John is very badly 
 hurt." 
 
 "Fred Bearing," said the wounded man in a piti 
 fully weak voice, "if you whisper to my sweetheart 
 again, I ll get up from here and knock the top of 
 your head off!" 
 
 Between the whispered warning, Marshall s at 
 tempt at lightness,and her own in herent heroism, 
 the girl got herself in hand again. 
 
 The threatened danger to the top of his head, or 
 something else, took Fred Bearing over to the mantel 
 shelf and busied him there. His back was turned 
 squarely to them as John Marshall gathered the 
 half-plaited curls that hung over the girl s shoulder 
 and pulled her face over very close to his own. 
 
 "You haven t answered my question, yet," he 
 whispered, looking deep into her violet eyes. 
 
 With one swift glance at Bearing s back, she 
 stooped and kissed him. And then her soft cheek 
 was pressed to his own, and he was whispering as he 
 held her to him: 
 
 "Life, girl, is so vastly bigger than any theory 
 of it!" 
 
 Fred Bearing was back again in a minute or two, 
 this time looking rather grim, the girl thought. 
 
 "John," he said, and Mary Elizabeth shrank at 
 what she felt was a touch ef hardness in his voice; 
 "John, Frierly is going to leave for camp in a few 
 minutes, and I want you to send that order." 
 
 "I ll not do it," answered the sick man, promptly, 
 in a voice that sounded like the ghost of his old voice 
 at its hardest.
 
 3QO THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The man at the foot of the bed looked grimmer 
 still. "You can t mean that," he said. 
 
 "Yes, I can, too." 
 
 Mary Elizabeth was bewildered at a steel-like gaze 
 that was exchanged between them, and more bewil 
 dered still when the man at the foot of the bed 
 promptly turned and left the room. On the thresh 
 old, however her eyes had followed him he paused 
 and signalled for her to follow. 
 
 It took something of finesse, and much of shameless 
 bribery, to enable her to get away from the sick man, 
 but Mary Elizabeth accomplished it at last and 
 joined Fred Bearing on the back porch. He drew 
 to the door behind her. 
 
 "You don t know what happened last night after 
 John was shot, do you? You ve been delirious, you 
 know." 
 
 "No," said the girl, and the dark pupils of her eyes 
 dilated suddenly. 
 
 "Well, about forty-five of us from the camp got 
 here just as John was plugged we had been warned 
 of his danger by a little hillite named Tony Thag- 
 gin, and came full -armed, so we easily surrounded 
 and caught nearly the whole gang. Of course some 
 were wounded on both sides, but we bagged the bunch 
 at last. When the fight was over, about half of our 
 men escorted the captives to camp with the inten 
 tion of keeping them prisoners there till they could 
 be turned over to the county authorities." 
 
 The girl, who had been listening with wild eager 
 ness, now interrupted, excitedly: 
 
 "And what what will that mean?"
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 391 
 
 "The penitentiary or worse, for the last one of 
 them." 
 
 "No, oh, no!" she gasped. 
 
 " You feel for them, too?" he exclaimed, passion 
 ately. "See here, those poor devils were fighting for 
 what they believed to be their own but I can t make 
 John see it right I can t move him. And he s so 
 sick, I m afraid " 
 
 "Was that what you and he were talking about?" 
 
 "Yes, I ve been trying to make him send an order 
 for those fellows to be turned loose before the sheriff 
 and posse get there his word is law at the camp 
 but he s like flint. He s 
 
 The girl turned to the door quickly, but the man 
 laid his hand on her arm. 
 
 "Are you going to John about it?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "He s awfully sick, you know a doctor who came 
 with us says it s a question it s bad to stir him up, 
 but- 
 
 "How soon would this message have to be sent to 
 save them?" she asked. 
 
 "Why, now, if at all." 
 
 The two looked at each other for a moment of 
 wavering, and then the girl made the decision. She 
 opened the door and re-entered the room, followed 
 by Bearing. The young fellow whom she had seen 
 with Bearing when she regained consciousness, now 
 came up the back steps and entered immediately 
 after them. 
 
 John Marshall s dull eyes lighted pitifully as the
 
 392 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 girl came to him and took her seat on the edge of the 
 bed beside him. 
 
 "Mr. Frierly is ready to go," she said very gently. 
 " Have you any message to send? Have you? Have 
 you? " She was leaning over him with her violet eyes 
 looking deep into his soul. 
 
 Marshall started and turned his head away. 
 
 "No!" he exclaimed, feebly, but passionately. 
 
 "Haven t you dear?" 
 
 But the hard look came into his graying face again. 
 
 "Yes, Frierly," he said, sharply and bitterly, to 
 the one who had entered last; "tell Horton to hold 
 those men " 
 
 But a small firm hand was promptly laid over his 
 mouth and a girl s fearless eyes were challenging 
 his own. 
 
 "You are too weak to talk," she said; "I am 
 stronger " with an accent that only he and she 
 understood. "Mr. Frierly," looking up at the man 
 who still awaited orders, "tell Mr. Horton that Mr. 
 Marshall says hold those men no longer that they 
 are hardly to be blamed for the step they took." 
 
 The little hand was pressed suddenly tighter over 
 the lips that were touched with cruelty. Fred 
 Bearing s eyes widened quickly. 
 
 "Tell him," continued the girt, "that Mr. Mar 
 shall says to assure the prisoners they shall be paid 
 a handsome price for their farms, and that no injus 
 tice or unkindness shall be done them. And . . . 
 and . . . get them to promise peace." 
 
 Fred Bearing was breathless.
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 393 
 
 Frierly stood with indecision. He was stupid at 
 best, but he had his grave doubts now. 
 
 The girl slowly removed her hand from John Mar 
 shall s mouth, but she still held his eyes with her own. 
 
 "You are too weak to talk much, just yes will do " 
 and then in a swift whisper "Do you love me?" 
 
 "Yes I" 
 
 Frierly departed with his astounding message, and 
 Fred Bearing considerately followed him out of the 
 room and closed the door behind them. 
 
 One of the men, who had been doing picket duty 
 since the fracas, came up to the steps for news. 
 
 "How s John?" he inquired anxiously. 
 
 "Very much better," said Bearing. 
 
 Bearing and Frierly had been gone some time and 
 John Marshall lay asleep in the quiet room, when the 
 front door opened softly, and a long, loose figure was 
 silhouetted in the doorway. There were deep 
 shadows in the erstwhile smiling old eyes, but a pale 
 morning sunlight rested on the thin gray hair. 
 
 He looked from the quiet figure on the bed to the 
 girl who sat quiet beside it. He stood irresolute till 
 she held out her hand to him, when he tip-toed across 
 the creaking floor to her side. 
 
 "Honey," he said, as his rough hands closed sym 
 pathetically over both her own, "honey!" 
 
 "Uncle Beck, I need you!" 
 
 "I lowed you did, Blossom, that s why I come. 
 The feller what brought me the message said you 
 was here."
 
 394 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 "It has been such an awful, awful night!" she 
 whispered, and she laid her white forehead down upon 
 the knotted old hands to which she still clung. 
 
 "A awful night, honey, but the sun rose on time 
 this mornin try to believe that." 
 
 "You heard?" she whispered, and her cold hands 
 tightened on his own as if never to let him go. 
 
 "I heerd, honey." 
 
 "You know how much there is in him you know, 
 Uncle Beck!" 
 
 "Yes, honey, I know thar was a great big man in 
 him." 
 
 "You saw you and Bitbe saw when even my 
 eyes were blinded " 
 
 "You seen only one thing at a time, Blossom, but 
 you ain t to blame for that hit s your sex that s the 
 fault of hit. Me an Babe knowed thar was a splen 
 did sperit in him. Me an Babe " the old man 
 turned his gaze to the long, straight form on the 
 bed, and started violently. 
 
 "Why why why Ma y Lizbeth is that thing 
 a-movin ?" he exclaimed in a startled whisper. 
 
 "Yes, but he s sleeping soundly. If we whisper, 
 we ll not wake him." 
 
 "In the name o God, gal, ain t he dead?" 
 
 "Why, no indeed, Uncle Beck!" in a tone that 
 was, for some unaccountable reason, perfectly in 
 dignant, and then "O-o-oh, I remember! the 
 message!" 
 
 The recollection of that message, as heard in that 
 strange, dim awakening, suddenly overwhelmed her,
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 395 
 
 and the next moment she lay sobbing against the 
 old man s shoulder at the remembered agony, telling 
 him, in wild and broken whispers, all that she knew 
 of the storm that had swept over, and of the wreck 
 age that it had left. 
 
 " Tell me that ag in, Ma y Lizbeth" the old man 
 was left saying to her, and the big hands that now 
 grasped both her shoulders were shaking as he spoke. 
 "Tell me that ag in! Them fellers was took pris 
 oner, and the sheriff an his posse sont for ?" 
 
 "Yes, but they will be turned loose before the 
 sheriff gets there I made him send the order. 
 Uncle Beck, I held him down and made him send 
 the order." 
 
 "But he s got their lands he s got their lands an 
 he s goin to keep em I" 
 
 "Yes, but if you ll believe me, he s going to 
 pay for them, and pay well. " Then, answering the 
 shadow of scepticism in his troubled eyes: "He has 
 promised me that he will, and he keeps the faith he 
 pledges. Tm going to see that he is not only just 
 but generous to every one of them. And I am going 
 to make him let me do for them and for their chil 
 dren." 
 
 The two of them turned and looked at the sleep 
 ing subject of their whispers as he lay before them, 
 the embodiment of aggressiveness and power. 
 
 There was a long period of silence between them, 
 and then the old man said: 
 
 "You ve got a handful, honey; he s a big proposi 
 tion."
 
 396 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 But the girl laid her slender hand on the powerful 
 breast of the sleeping man, and looked up at the 
 gray-haired doubter with the fire of Welchel Dale s 
 undying courage in her eyes. 
 
 "I m bigger than he is!" she said. 
 
 The long-banished smile returned slowly, wrin 
 kling the kindly old face into a semblance of its 
 wonted cheerfulness as he shook his head gently and 
 replied: 
 
 "Likewise John Marshall ain t goin to have no 
 bed o roses no siree! He ain t, to say, a-goin 
 to be bored to death for lack o bein poked up! 
 Wa-al, wa-al, an did I ever think I d come to bank 
 on that thar temper!" 
 
 Her eyes sought the face of the sleeping man again, 
 and their spirit softened. 
 
 "It isn t going to be so hard, after all," she said. 
 
 "No, kitten, he s got his good p ints but " 
 
 "But what, Uncle Beck?" 
 
 "Oh, no thin ; but I m glad hit s you instead o 
 me that s got to manage him." 
 
 "Why, why" indignantly "you said yourself 
 that he had a fine spirit that he had a great big 
 man in him." : 
 
 "Go slow, Ma y Lizbeth, go slow! That was 
 when I thought the man was dead. Them was post 
 mortem feelin s, so to speak, an post-mortem feelin s 
 never was designed to fit the livin man. You ll have 
 to let me take a consider ble tuck in em, honey!" 
 
 "No, Uncle Beck " but the old man went on: 
 
 "Sixty-nine year sixty-nine year, an then to
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 397 
 
 make the fool mistake o praisin a man while the 
 breath is in his body!" 
 
 There was a long silence between them in which 
 both their faces gradually became very grave. The 
 girl s gaze had sought the fire now she was strug 
 gling again with remembrance. All at once she 
 turned to the old man: 
 
 "Uncle Beck," she exclaimed in an awed whisper, 
 "Uncle Beck, where s Babe?" 
 
 He looked sharply at her white face for a moment, 
 and then replied, in a business-like, cheery tone: 
 
 "Babe? Why, Babe s all right, honey. Nobody 
 ain t never captured Babe! Yes, yes, honey, Babe s 
 all right. He was some done up by last night but 
 he s restin this mornin ." 
 
 The long hours of delirium that had mercifully in 
 terposed between the vivid terrors of the night and 
 that dim awakening to the pale day had left the girl 
 too dazed to fathom what the old eyes were saying. 
 She accepted what she heard with a sigh of relief, 
 and turned back to the sleeping man beside her. 
 
 After a little, she spoke again, and this time there 
 was a certain defiance in her tone: 
 
 "Uncle Beck," she said, "I m going to marry John 
 Marshall." 
 
 "I could a- told you that months ago, Blossom." 
 
 "It may be wrong," she ventured, "I know you 
 think it is wrong Of course it must be wrong 
 for the old man was looking away now "but life 
 life is so vastly bigger than any theory of it! You 
 see him here I couldn t leave him now I "
 
 398 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 He did not answer her, but sat with his face still 
 turned away. After a tense moment of waiting the 
 girl broke down completely. 
 
 "I need you, Uncle Beck!" 
 
 "I m here, child." 
 
 "But I shall need you always." 
 
 "Then I spec I ll have to keep in reach." 
 
 "I m afraid, Uncle Beck, I m afraid!" 
 
 "Honey!" 
 
 "What if if in the big new world he will lead me 
 into what if I should lose the way? " 
 
 "But you mustn t!" 
 
 "But if his paths prove alluring if I wander too 
 far from the hills Won t you call me back, Uncle 
 Beck, won t you call me back?" 
 
 John Marshall lay asleep asleep with the re 
 turning joy of life beating through his veins asleep 
 with the fulness of triumph and the peace of perfect 
 bliss written in every line of his strong face for 
 Life gives abundantly to him who asks neither great 
 nor greatly good things at her hands. 
 
 But the woman who watched beside him was look 
 ing away now now that the lids were closed over 
 his warm and all-demanding, all-absorbing, waking 
 gaze. The tide of life was running low for her. 
 Could it be that she was lonely? Lonely for some 
 thing that should be here and was not? 
 . And would a grave-eyed memory suffice? But he 
 was not here. He would never come again, for she 
 had failed of his high purpose, had compromised
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 399 
 
 with sin! Here, beside this man, this poor exponent 
 of power, that just spirit could never come; and here 
 was to be her place forevermore. 
 
 Then, as if in answer, her hand rested on the 
 pocket of her skirt, and she felt the folds of a paper 
 within. In a flash she remembered that Uncle Beck 
 had put it there, and had said that it was a message 
 from her guardian. 
 
 She took the envelope out with strangely mixed 
 emotions and read, inscribed upon it: "For Mary 
 Elizabeth, in her hour of failure." 
 
 The message for this hour! 
 
 She tore open the envelope, but at the first recog 
 nition of the familiar hand, the lines were sadly 
 blurred. It took her a minute or two to see them 
 plainly. The message ran: 
 
 DEAR CHILD: 
 
 I am appealing to you in this your hour of failure I who 
 have failed in what I hoped to do for you here. I am asking 
 that you come back to me and let me try again. 
 
 It is with great self-reproach that I let you go to-day, for 
 I am sending you out into the world to get the development 
 that I somehow failed to help you to. If I had been your 
 father I suppose that something of wisdom would have been 
 mine by virtue of parenthood, but we childless men are apt 
 to make mistakes with children. 
 
 It seems cruel to you to-day that I am sending you back 
 to work among your own people, but when you read this in 
 your hour of failure, you may forgive. 
 
 I do not hope great achievements from you. You cannot 
 work out the salvation of any people for them; you can, 
 with your very best effort, but touch their lives on the sur 
 face and hope for development from within.
 
 400 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 
 
 The great question is: How is it to-day with the woman 
 in your soul? 
 
 It is for your sake that I condemn you to this task. You 
 need something to sacrifice for, to work for, something to 
 awaken your Christian charity. Ask yourself when you read 
 this if you are a deeper, tenderer, braver woman than the 
 one I sent away. 
 
 You are temperamentally high-spirited, Mary Elizabeth, 
 self-sufficient and self-absorbed, and once or twice I fear I 
 have surprised ingratitude and even hardness in you. But 
 these are, after all, only unripenesses of character. It may 
 be that in this hour they have dropped away. 
 
 If so, my child, let us not call this a time of failure, but 
 rather a very blessed hour of triumph, for, believe me, the 
 only thing which it is given to you to surely direct is the set 
 of your own soul. 
 
 Just what you have attempted in the task to which I con 
 demned you just how far you have failed I have no way 
 of knowing. I rest secure, however, in the hope that you 
 have done your human best. 
 
 And I charge you not to despair. In a lifetime of trying 
 to help, I have rarely had a single plan of my making event 
 uate as I hoped; but I have never once failed to trust that 
 sometime, somewhere, good would come of even every mis 
 take that was made in the love of God. I absolve you now 
 from further effort at what I knew would, so far as you 
 yourself could see, ultimately fail ; but I urge on you this last 
 injunction : Accept compromise or defeat without bitterness, 
 knowing that the Hearer of Prayer can bring ultimate tri 
 umph out of our saddest failures. 
 
 I am hoping with all that is in me for a sweetening and 
 chastening of spirit for you; and fearing most of all a nar 
 rowing to bigoi y *hat dof- ! , not recognize all the universe 
 as God s. I wouk; uave you forbear to condemn. 
 
 And yet, I would have you hold fast to your ideals, even 
 though the best that the idealist can hope for now is to speed, 
 by a helping hand to whosoever stumbles, the coming of the
 
 THE RIGHT OF THE STRONGEST 401 
 
 far-off divine event. The command to be perfect was given 
 to the race as the Ultima Thule of its spiritual evolution. 
 It is your part to make a step forward. It is your part to 
 see that somewhere in your soul there burns always an altar 
 fire. 
 Come to me if you need me in this hour. 
 
 YOUR GUARDIAN. 
 
 And there, beside the man who slept in question 
 able triumph, even there in that spot that was 
 haunted by the violence of sin, Mary Elizabeth 
 turned back to her guardian spirit to receive at last 
 a perfect dedication a dedication, not only to the 
 uplift of her own scattered people, but to the best 
 that she could accomplish for the man beside her, 
 who belonged, like them, to the universe of God. 
 
 And when she gently laid back the dark lock that 
 made the white forehead of the sleeping man look 
 too much like death, there was no touch of bitterness 
 left within her soul only a secret sense of incom 
 pleteness. 
 
 She knew that she loved this man with all her 
 heart she knew that she would continue to love 
 him with all her heart, along whatever way they 
 should take together to the end. But she knew, 
 too, that within her inmost soul would be always a 
 Holy of Holies into which he could not come.
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
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