Amos James seemed to think an account of himself appropriate.
'I hev been a-huntin',' he said, his grave black eyes on the rifle and his face in the shadow of his big white hat. 'I happened ter pass by the house, an' yer granny said ez ye hed started down hyar arter a pail o' water, an' I 'lowed ez I'd kem an' fetch it fur ye.'
Dorinda murmured that she was 'much obleeged,' and relapsed into silent propriety.
Extraordinary gun! It really seemed as if Amos James would be compelled to take it to pieces then and there, so persistently did it require his attention.
Jacob, whose hearing was unimpaired, but whose education in the specious ways of those of a larger growth was as yet incomplete, got up briskly. Since Amos had come to fetch the pail he saw no reason in nature why the pail should not be fetched, and he imagined that the return was in order. He paused for a moment in surprise; then seeing that no one else moved, he sat down abruptly. But for her manners Dorinda could have laughed. Amos James's cheek flushed darkly as he still worked at the gun.
'I s'pose ez you-uns hev hearn the news?' he remarked presently. As he asked the question he quickly lifted his eyes.
Ah, what laughing lights in hers—what radiant joys! She did not look at him. Her gaze was turned far away to the soft horizon. Her delicate lips had such dainty curves. Her pale cheek flushed tumultuously. She leaned her head back against the rock, the tendrils of her dark hair spreading over the unyielding grey stone, which, weather-shielded, was almost white. In its dead, dumb finality—the memorial of seas ebbed long ago, of forms of life extinct—she bore it a buoyant contrast. She looked immortal!
'I hev hearn the news,' she said, her long lashes falling, and with quiet circumspection at variance with the triumph in her face.
He looked at her gravely, breathlessly. A new idea had taken possession of him. The rescue—it was a strange thing! Who in the Great Smoky Mountains had an adequate temptation to risk the penalty of ten years in the state-prison for rescuing Rick Tyler from the officers of the law? His brothers?—they were step-brothers. His father was dead. Affection could not be accounted a factor. Venom might do more. Some reckless enemy of the sheriff's might thus have craftily compassed his ruin. Then there suddenly came upon Amos James a recollection of the Cayces' grudge against Micajah Green, and of the fact that they had already actively bestirred themselves to electioneer against him. Once, before it all happened, Rick Tyler had hung persistently about Dorinda, and perhaps the 'men-folks' approved him. Amos remembered too that a story was current at the gander-pulling that the reason the Cayces had absented themselves and were lying low was because a party of revenue raiders had been heard of on the Big Smoky. Who had heard of them, and when did they come, and where did they go? It seemed a fabrication, a cloak. And Dorinda—she was the impersonation of delighted triumph.
'Agged the men-folks on, I reckon,' he thought—'agged 'em on, fur the sake o' Rick Tyler!'