Hammond held by inheritance from these rude mountaineers the fierce hate that made them such a terror to their foes, and caused among them such bloody feuds. In him Frank Merriwell had an enemy to be feared.
He had a purpose in playing a friendly part that day, and in staying with Frank’s party. He fancied that if Merriwell should be killed by a shot sent from the woods by an unseen hand, he might be suspected as the shooter, which could not be the case if he remained at Merriwell’s side.
“Hammond doesn’t seem so bitter as we’ve been led to believe,” declared Rattleton, speaking to Bart Hodge. “Perhaps he’s been painted a good deal blacker than he really is.”
“I hope so,” said Hodge, who more than once had been made uneasy by the accounts given by Colson and others of Hammond’s fire-eating and unforgiving spirit. “He seems pleasant enough to-day, at any rate.”
Without a thought of danger, Frank descended the mountain path, laughing and joking.
Bob Thornton was still stealing through the bushes, with the long rifle in the hollow of his arm.
But there was another stealing after him, with bated breath and shining eyes. Nell Thornton, his daughter, who, having observed his movements, suspected his evil intentions, and was now following to thwart them if she could.
When he reached the rocky point, from which he expected to send the shot, and from which he could dive into a jungly growth that would protect him from view and pursuit, Nell was close at his heels, though he was still unaware of it.
His face darkened as he dropped the rifle out of the hollow of his arm and inspected the percussion cap, when Merriwell and the others came into view around a bend in the path.
“He’ll never hunt anuther moonshiner!” Thornton grated, through his set teeth. “He’d better be a-sayin’ of his prayers when I pull down on him with this ole Bet!”