“Mose Carter,” said the youngest of the Brice brothers, striking suddenly into the conversation, “ye air a liar, an’ ye knows it!” He was a wiry, active man of twenty-five years; he spoke in an authoritative high key, and his voice seemed to split the air like a knife. His mind was as wiry as his body, and it was generally understood on Jolton’s Ridge that he was the power behind the throne of which Aaron, the eldest, wielded the unmeaning scepter; he, however, remained decorously in the background, for among the humble mountaineers the lordly rights of primogeniture are held in rigorous veneration, and it would have ill-beseemed a younger scion of the house to openly take precedence of the elder. His Christian name was John, but it had been forgotten or disregarded by all but his brothers in the title conferred upon him by his comrades of the mountain wilds. Panther Brice—or “Painter,” for thus the animal is called in the vernacular of the region—was known to run the still, to shape the policy of the family, to be a self-constituted treasurer and disburser of the common fund, to own the very souls of his unresisting elder brothers. He had elected, however, in the interests of decorum, that these circumstances should be sedulously ignored. Aaron invariably appeared as spokesman, and the mountaineers at large all fell under the influence of a dominant mind and acquiesced in the solemn sham. The Panther seldom took part even in casual discussions of any vexed question, reserving his opinions to dictate as laws to his brothers in private; and a sensation stirred the coterie when his voice, that had a knack of finding and thrilling every sensitive nerve in his hearer’s body, jarred the air.
“I hev seen ye, Mose Carter,” he continued, “in this hyar very still-house ez drunk ez a fraish biled owl. Ye hev laid on this hyar floor too drunk ter move hand or foot all night an’ haffen the nex’ day at one spree. I hev seen ye’, an’ so hev plenty o’ other folks. An’ ef ye comes hyar a-jowin’ so sanctified ’bout’n folks a-gittin’ drunk, I’ll turn ye out’n this hyar still-house fur tellin’ of lies.”
He paused as abruptly as he had spoken; but before Moses Carter could collect his slow faculties he had resumed. “It ’pears powerful comical ter me ter hear this hyar Baptis’ church a-settin’ of itself up so stiff fur temp’rance, ’kase thar air an old sayin’—an’ I b’lieves it—ez the Presbyterians holler—‘What is ter be will be!—even ef it won’t be!’ an’ the Methodies holler, ‘Fire! fire! fire! Brimstun’ an’ blue blazes!’—but the Bapties holler, ‘Water! water! water! with a leetle drap o’ whisky in it!’ But ye an’ yer church’ll be dry enough arter this; thar’ll be less liquor drunk ’mongst ye’n ever hev been afore, ’kase ye air all too cussed stingy ter pay five cents extry a quart like ye’ll hev ter do at Joe Gilligan’s store down yander ter the Settlemint. Fur nare one o’ them sanctified church brethren’ll git another drap o’ liquor hyar, whar it hev always been so powerful cheap an’ handy.”
“The dryer ez ye kin make the church the better ye’ll please the pa’son. He lays off a reg’lar temperance drought fur them ez kin foller arter his words. I be a-tryin’ ter mend my ways,” Moses Carter droned with a long, sanctimonious face, “but—” he hesitated, “the sperit is willin’, but the flesh is weak—the flesh is weak!”
“I’ll be bound no sperits air weak ez ye hev ennything ter do with, leastwise swaller,” said the Panther, with a quick snap.
“He is hyar in the mounting ter-night, the pa’son,” resumed Mose Carter, with that effort, always ill-starred, to affect to perceive naught amiss when a friend is sullenly belligerent; he preserved the indifferent tone of one retailing casual gossip. “The pa’son hev laid off ter spen’ the better part o’ the night in prayer and wrestlin’ speritchully in the church-house agin his sermon ter-morrer, it bein’ the blessed Sabbath. He ’lowed he would be more sole and alone thar than at old man Allen’s house, whar he be puttin’ up fur the night, ’kase at old man Allen’s they hev seben gran’chil’ren an’ only one room, barrin’ the roof-room. Thar be a heap o’ onregenerate human natur’ in them seben Allen gran’chil’ren. Thar ain’t no use I reckon in tryin’ ter awake old man Allen ter a sense of sin an’ the awful oncertainty of life by talkin’ ter him o’ the silence an’ solitude o’ the grave! Kee, kee!” he laughed. But he laughed alone.
“Wrestlin’! The pa’son a-wrestlin’! I could throw him over my head! It’s well fur him his wrestlin’s air only in prayer!” exclaimed Painter, with scorn. “The still will holp on the cause o’ temp’rance more’n that thar little long-tongued preacher an’ all his sermons. Raisin’ the tar’ff on the drink will stop it. Ye’re all so dad-burned stingy.”
“Jes’ ez ye choose,” said Moses Carter, taking up his empty jug. “’Tain’t nuthin’ s’prisin’ ter me ter hear ye a-growlin’ an’ a-goin’ this hyar way, Painter—ye always war more like a wild beast nor a man, anyhow. But it do ’stonish me some ez Aaron an’ the t’other boys air a-goin’ ter let ye cut ’em out’n a-sellin’ of liquor ter the whole kentry mighty nigh, ’kase the brethren don’t want a sodden drunkard, like ye air, in the church a-communin’ with the saints.”