The horses pricked up their ears, and the leader of the party awaited the onslaught with a pistol in his hand.
The old woman, glancing out of the window, observed this demonstration.
'He'll kill one o' our dogs with that thar shootin'-iron o' his'n!' she exclaimed in trepidation. 'Run, Mirandy Jane, an' tell him our dogs don't bite.'
The filly-like Mirandy Jane made great speed among the hounds as she called them off, and remembered only after she had returned to the house to be afraid of the 'shootin'-iron' herself.
The old woman, who had come out on the porch, stood gazing at the party, shading her eyes with her hands, and a long-range colloquy ensued.
'Good-mornin', madam,' said the man at the trough.
'Good-mornin', sir,' quavered the old crone on the mountain slope.
'I'm the sher'ff o' the county, madam, an' I'd like ter know ef——'
'Mirandy Jane,' the old woman interrupted, in a wrathful undertone, ''pears like I hev' hed the trouble o' raisin' a idjit in you-uns! Them ain't raiders, 'n nuthin' like it. Run an' tell the sher'ff we air dishin' up dinner right now, an' ax him an' his gang ter' light an' hitch, an' eat it along o' we-uns.'
The prospect was tempting. It was high noon, and the posse had been in the saddle since dawn. Dorinda, with a beating heart, remarked how short a consultation resulted in dismounting and hitching the horses; and then, with their spurs jingling and their pistols belted about them, the men trooped up to the house.