A signboard over the door said “Atha,” the official name of the office, and a larger and almost obliterated board was painted “T. Ferrell, General Merchandise.” The store was a long, unpainted plank building of one story, with the end toward the road, finishing in a square, roofed “gallery,” whence steps led down. Farmers could drive up alongside this gallery and transact their business without leaving their buggy seat or saddle. Heavy plank shutters, now thrown back, defended the front windows that displayed a dusty collection of most miscellaneous articles.
Lockwood went in. There was something of everything in the dim recesses of that store. There were hardware and guns and ammunition; bananas, oranges, snuff, and tobacco; patent medicines and millinery; boots, shoes, plows, and harness, carpentering tools and cotton, silk, and ribbons. One corner was walled off by a partition with a wicket and a window. This was the post office, and here Lockwood found Ferrell slowly sorting letters, evidently for an out-going early mail.
“Why, yes, sir; I certainly reckon so,” he said in reply to Lockwood’s request for breakfast. “Sam! O-oh, Sam! Run up to the house and tell Mrs. Ferrell there’s a gentleman goin’ to eat breakfast with us.” He dropped the last of the letters into the pouch, came out from his inclosure, and looked the stranger over genially. He was a middle-aged man with a stubby beard, long, untidy, brown hair, and wrinkled, kindly, simple eyes.
“Come in on the boat last night?” he inquired. “I heard her blowin’. She was right late, wasn’t she? Where’d you stay all night?”
“They told me to come here,” Lockwood explained. “But it was close to morning then and I didn’t like to wake you up, so I sat by the road till daylight. It was only two or three hours.”
“Shucks! You oughter just given us a holler. Mighty glad to have you. Breakfast’ll be ready right directly. What did you say your name might be, sir?”
Lockwood stayed chatting with the merchant while they waited for the breakfast. He ate with appetite, and it occurred to him that this might be the last meal he would eat in safety for a long time. Afterward they went back to the store. Lockwood was eager to obtain information, but he hesitated to ask questions, and for some time they smoked on the gallery in the level, early sun, exchanging indifferent remarks.
“Reckon you’re a turpentine man, ain’t you?” Ferrell said at last.
“Well, I’ve worked in the turpentine woods,” Lockwood admitted. “There’s a big camp down this way, isn’t there?”
“Sure—Craig’s camp. I just ’lowed that’s where you were bound for. I reckon you’re the new woods rider that Craig’s expecting.”