"'Tain't healthy travelin' fo' men," that gentleman had volunteered languidly, "but I reckon a lady's safe 'nuff, 'specially ef yo' leave the jou'ney to the hawse. Jef'son Davis, he knows ev'ry inch of that thar trail. All yo' got t' do is t' give Jef'son his haid."
Jef'son Davis was having his head, and he had thus far been true to his trust. At a certain point on the trail I was to look for huge boulders in a strange position, with a big and lonely cedar standing guard near them. At the right of this cedar was an almost hidden trail, which, followed for twenty minutes, would lead me to the Moran cabin. I was not to be alarmed if a bullet whispered its sinister message in my ear. To kill women was no part of the Moran traditions, and a fatality to me would be a regrettable incident, due wholly, if it occurred at all, to the impulsive nature of Samuel Tyrrell, who had formed the careless habit of firing at moving objects without pausing to discover what they were. It was because of this eccentricity, I gathered, that the sympathy of the mountain people lay largely with Moran—who, moreover, though both men were the last of their respective lines, was a boy of twenty-two, while Tyrrell was well on in middle life.
I rode slowly along the trail, which, clear in the high lights of the noonday sun, was now widening and turning to the right. The ravine appeared to be growing more shallow. Flashes of red haw and scarlet dogwood began to leap out at me from the edges. Presently, beyond the turn, I discovered the boulders, silhouetted sharply against the soft October sky. Near them was the lonely cedar, and after twice passing it I found the side-trail, and rode peacefully down its dim corridor.
There was nothing to mark the Moran home, and that, too, I almost passed before I noticed it, a strongly built log cabin, backed against the side of a hill, and commanding from its three barred windows the approaches on every side. As I rode up, the door opened and an old woman in a homespun dress stood before me. Her shoulders sagged under the burden of seventy-five years, but the flame of an unconquerable spirit burned in the keen black eyes set bead-like in her withered little brown face. This, I knew, was Betsy Moran, who had helped to bury her husband, four sons, and a grandson, all killed by the Tyrrells, and who was said finally to have seized a gun herself and added at least one Tyrrell to the row in the family burial-lot.
"How do you do?" I asked, cheerfully. "May I come in and rest for a few moments?"
Her face did not soften, nor did she speak, but there was neither suspicion nor fear in her steady regard; it held merely a dispassionate curiosity. I slipped from the back of Jef'son Davis and hesitated, looking around for a post or tree to tie him to, and the old woman, stirred to a quick instinct of hospitality, looked uncertainly behind her into the cabin. At the same instant a young giant appeared behind her, pushed her lightly to one side, and strode toward me with a nod of greeting. Then, taking the bridle-rein from my hand, and still in silence, he led the horse away. Evidently the Morans were not a talkative family.
Wholly forgetting the old woman, I stared after him. Here, obviously, was young "Shep," the last of the Morans; and from the top of his curly black hair to the boot-soles six feet two inches below it, he looked extremely well able to take care of himself. He was powerfully built, and he moved with the natural grace of the superb young animal he was. He wore a rough homespun blue shirt, open at the neck, and a pair of corduroy trousers tucked into high boots. From the swing of his back as he strode off with Jef'son Davis I should hardly have been surprised to see him throw that weary animal across his mighty shoulders.
When he had disappeared I walked thoughtfully to the cabin door, meeting again the level gaze of my hostess. A sudden gleam in her eyes and a quick lift of her white head showed me she had caught my unconscious tribute to the strength and beauty of the young man, who was not only the last of her line, but, according to mountain traditions, the "apple of her eye."
"Come 'long in," she said, quietly; and she added as I crossed her threshold, "Ef yo' rid 'crost th' Gap, yo' mus' be mi-i-ghty ti'ed."