In Old Kentucky

by Edward Marshall; Charles Turner Dazey

Madge held back, but Layson hurried to the thicket, with gun raised ready for a shot.

Just then, from the carefully concealed cave-entrance, came Joe Lorey, rifle poised for trouble, eyes gleaming fiercely, evidently keyed to meet a raid by revenuers.

It was plain enough that he believed the noise which had disturbed, alarmed him, had been made by this young sportsman. Indeed, as he who really had caused the uproar was, now, well on a cautious backward way along the path by which he had come up, and the girl and Layson were the only folk in sight, the young moonshiner's mistake was natural.

Madge, almost as much disturbed as Lorey was by the crashing in the thickets, was looking in the direction whence the noise had come, and, at first, did not see him. When she did she smiled at him, and called to him, but, absorbed in study of the bluegrass youth who had so suddenly appeared there in his secret place among the mountains in company with the girl whom he, himself, adored, Joe did not answer her, at first. When he did it was with nothing more than a curt nod. He was astonished and alarmed to see her in such company.

After that curt nod he waited for no explanation, but, like a shadow, slipped into a thicket, disappearing instantly. No Indian from Cooper's tales could have more instantly obliterated all trace of himself, could have more quickly, noiselessly, mysteriously disappeared amongst the greenery, than did this mountaineer. His movements, made with the instinctive cunning of the woodsman and with muscles trained not only by wild life there in the mountains to speed, endurance and exactitude, but by many an hour of stealthy stalking of the "revenuers" sent to search out his moonshine still, raid it, take him prisoner, were almost magically active, cautious, furtive and effective.

For an instant Madge herself, accustomed to the native's skill in woodcraft, as she was, gazed after him, astonished by the magic of his disappearance, and, at first, piqued not a little by his scanty courtesy. Then realizing that the mountaineer was, possibly, quite justified in feeling grave suspicions of the stranger who was with her—of any stranger coming thus, without a herald to the mountains—she turned again to Layson, and, with her hand lightly guiding him by touch as delicate, almost, as a wind-blown leaf's upon his sleeve, led him to the nearest mountain path and on, toward a point whence she could clearly point out to him the way to his own camp.

And, suddenly, her own heart throbbed with worry. Had she not done wrong in bringing this unknown and, therefore, this mysterious stranger so close upon the heart of Lorey's secret? She had chosen the path thoughtlessly. She realized that, now, and much regretted it. The man had wholly won her confidence, but had it been considerate or fair to Joe, her lifelong friend, or to the other people of the mountains who had things to hide from strangers, to be quite so frank with him in her revelation of the byways of the wilderness?

Between the mountain-dwellers and the people of the lowlands never could exist real confidence or friendship. From her babyhood she had been taught to feel suspicion of all strangers: that was, indeed, first article in the creed of all folk mountain-born. Why had she so freely dropped her mantle of reserve before this stranger? That he had saved her from the bush-fire was excuse for her own gratitude, but was it valid reason for exposing her best friends to danger at his hands, if they proved treacherous? The revenuers, she had been informed, were men of devilish craft, unscrupulous cunning. Might not this youth with the fine clothes, the splendid manner, the great learning, the soft voice, the quick resource and the undoubted bravery, very well be one of them?

She had once heard a mountain preacher draw a picture of the devil, which made him most attractive and in the same way that this youth was most attractive. Certain of the sympathies of his rough hearers, the man had painted Beelzebub with broad, rough, verbal strokes, as a bluegrass gentleman intent on the destruction of the honor, independence, liberty of mountaineers. The mountaineer has never and will never understand what right the government of state or nation has to interfere with whatsoe'er he does on his own land with his own corn in his own still. Just why he has no right to manufacture whiskey without paying taxes on the product he really fails to comprehend. He regards the "revenuer" as the representative of acute and cruel injustice and oppression. When he "draws a bead" on one he does it with no such thoughts as common murderers must know when they shoot down their enemies. He does not think such killings are crude murder, any more than he regards feud killings as assassinations.

With such ideas Madge had been, to some extent, imbued. With feud feeling she was quite in sympathy—had not she lost her loved ones through its awful work? Could she ever have revenge on those who had thus bereaved her through any means save similar assassination?