"Laws-a-massy, Adelaide!" cried her husband, in a tone of expostulation and alarm, with a quick glance over his shoulder, "what ails ye ter say sech ez that—ez ef it war gospel sure?"
Her eyes came back reluctantly to him; the question had jarred upon her reverie. "Ye air 'bleeged ter know that," she retorted, with a slighting manner. "The sun strikes through the gap an' teches the Leetle People's buryin'-groun' a full haffen hour an' better afore it reaches the graveyard o' the mounting folks down thar in the shadder o' the range."
He listened ponderingly to this logic, his chin resting upon the muzzle of his rifle; then, with a noiseless shifting of his posture, he looked again with a cautious gesture over his shoulder. He was a hardy hunter, of a vigorous physique and but scantily acquainted with fear, but this eerie idea of a thousand or so adult pygmy Tennesseeans astir on the last day, forestalling the familiar mountain neighbors, robbed immortality for the moment of its wonted prestige.
The oppressive influence even laid hold on his strong frame, and he extended one powerful arm at full length, with a futile effort to yawn.
"G'long, Adelaide! G'long an' milk the cow!" he exclaimed, with the irritation that was always apparent in his manner when perplexity seized upon his brain—a good organ of its kind, but working best in the clear air of out-of-door contemplation. He was a man of sound common-sense, but with no endowment for furtive speculation, and purblind gropings, and tenuous deductions from flimsy premises. He heaved a great sigh of relief to remember the cow—the good, homely cow—at the bars.
Adelaide had slowly taken up the piggin. "Ye hain't told me why that thar valley man sets so much store by the Leetle People. I'll go arter I hear that word."
"Waal, I ain't a-goin' ter speak it," retorted her husband, with a threatening conjugal frown. "I ain't a-goin' ter let leetle Mose be kep' up hyar till midnight a-waitin' for you-uns ter milk the cow. It's cleverly dark now."
"Leetle Mose" was a name to conjure with; even the wife denied herself the luxury of the last word, so lost was she in the mother. She put the piggin hastily upon her head, and went, with the erect, graceful pose that the prosaic weight fosters, down the winding path beyond the spring to the bars where the red cow stood lowing.
The household idol, sitting upon the step with a grave, inscrutable countenance, silently watched her departure, then suddenly set up a loud and bitter wail of desertion. It was in vain that she paused and called back promises of return, albeit he understood well the language which so far he refused to speak; in vain that his father came and sat beside him on the step, and patted him with a large hand upon his limited back. It was a good opportunity for the lamentation in which "leetle Mose" was prone to indulge. He had a reputation that extended far beyond his ken—for the fence bounded his world—not, however, that he would have cared. He was known throughout many a cove, and even in the settlement, as the "wust chile ever seen, an' a jedgmint, ef the truth war known, on Stephen an' Adelaide Yates fur hevin' been so fly-away an' headstrong in thar single days—both of 'em wild ez deer, an' gin over ter dancin' an' foolishness." It was with a certain grim satisfaction that the settlement hearkened to the fact that they were "mighty tame now." Thus Dagon's filial exploits lacked no plaudits. His mental capacities, too, received due recognition. "He be powerful smart, though; he won't let 'em hev no mo' comp'ny 'n he can help. I reckon he knows they wouldn't 'tend ter him ef they hed ennything else they could 'tend ter. Sometimes that chile be a-settin' on the front porch sorter peaceable, restin' hisse'f from hollerin'," his maternal great-aunt Jerushy chronicled to a coterie of pleased gossips, "an' ef he see a wagon a-stoppin' at the gate, or a visitor a-walkin' up the path, he'll mos' lif' the roof off with his screeches. An' screech he will till they leaves; he hev mos' made me deef fur life. I useter spend consider'ble o' my time with that young couple"—and there was an ousted suggestion in Aunt Jerushy's manner. "It makes his dad an' mam 'shamed fur true, his kerryin's on; they air bowed down ter the yearth!"
The widespread strictures on their idol were very bitter to the parental worshippers. Often, with a troubled aspect, they took counsel together, and repeated in helpless dudgeon the criticism of his kindred and neighbors. It was powerless to shake their loyalty. Even his father, whom he chose to regard with a lowering and suspicious mien, unless it were in the dead hours of the night, when he developed a morbid craving to be trotted back and forth and up and down the puncheon floor, was flattered with the smallest tokens of his confidence.