"I kain't suffer ye ter go away without I tells ye suthin'," he said, "an' I fears me sorely when ye hears hit ye're right like ter withhold yore blessin' atter all."
The patriarch wheeled and stood listening, and Dorothy, too, caught her breath anxiously as the young man confessed.
For a time old Caleb stood stonily immovable while the story, which the girl had already heard, had its second telling. But as the narration progressed the gray-haired mountaineer bent interestedly forward, and by the time it had drawn to its close his eyes were no longer wrathful but soberly and judicially thoughtful.
He ran his fingers through his gray hair, and incredulously demanded, "Who did ye say yore grandsire was?"
"His name was Caleb Thornton—he went ter Virginny sixty ya'rs back."
"Caleb Thornton!" Through the mists of many years the old man was tracking back along barefoot trails of boyhood.
"Caleb Thornton! Him an' me hunted an' fished tergither and worked tergither when we wasn't nothin' but small shavers. We was like twin brethren an' folks called us Good Caleb an' Bad Caleb. I was ther bad one!" The old lips parted in a smile that was tenderly reminiscent.
"Why boy, thet makes ye blood-kin of mine ... hit makes yore business my business ... an' yore trouble my trouble. I'm ther head of ther house now—an' ye're related ter me."
"I hain't clost kin," objected Cal, quickly. "Not too clost ter wed with Dorothy."
"Ey God, no, boy, ye hain't but only a distant cousin—but a hundred an' fifty y'ars back our foreparent war ther same man. An' ef ye've got ther same heart an' the same blood in ye thet them old-timers hed, mebby ye kin carry on my work better than any Rowlett—an' stand fer peace and law!" Here spoke the might of family pride and mountain loyalty to blood.