Zack, who had come in answer to the bell, was lingering inside the door with his eyes rolling and every nerve a-tingle. At this last expression of relenting from the man of law, he stepped out.
"Mawnin', Marse Jess," he bowed. "Ef you'se'll let me rest yoh hat, I'se gwine fetch sumfin good fer de heat. De Cunnel'd be proud ef you'd 'cept it, an' powerful outraged wid me ef I let you go home 'thout it!"
Jess left the porch to have a word with his man, and during the minutes he was away Dale watched him with serious interest. There was something more on the mountaineer's mind which had not been said; some further part of his duty lay before him; so, as the sheriff returned, and at the same moment Zack reappeared with refreshments, he announced:
"An' there was Tyse Brislow I killed on the raft goin' down to Frankfo't!"
"Good Lawd, Marse Dale," the negro exclaimed in terror, "is you still tellin' 'bout all dem mens you'se shot up?"
The sheriff poured his libation, swallowed it, and wiped his long mustache on the back of his hand. Then he said: "U-um! A-ah!" Whereupon Zack poured another and passed it to him. Old Zack did not understand the drift of things in the least, but he did know that this thirty-year-old bourbon of the Colonel's was a tremendously potent mollifier in all times of stress. Jess held the glass fondly up to the light, and was more careful now to brush away his mustache. It evidently dawned on him that the flavor of the first "three fingers" had been neglected through haste.
"I don't remember Tyse," he said at length, reaching for one of Zack's store cigars. "When was that?"
"Three years before," Dale answered.
"Three yeahs befoh Tusk?"
"No, three years before Bill."