“Yes, and likely to be. Valiant is dead long ago, but apparently there’s never been any attempt to let it. I suppose his son is so rich that one estate more or less doesn’t figure much to him.”
“I got a letter this morning from Dorothy Randolph,” said Shirley. “The Valiant Corporation is being investigated, you know, and her uncle had taken her to one of the hearings, when John Valiant was in the chair. From her description, they are making it sufficiently hot for that silver-spooned young man.”
“I don’t reckon he cares,” said Lusk satirically. “Nothing matters with his set if you have enough money.”
The judge pointed with his crop. “That narrow wagon-track,” he said, “goes to Hell’s-Half-Acre.”
“Oh, yes,” said Betty. “That’s that weird settlement on the Dome where Shirley’s little protégée Rickey Snyder came from.” It was all she said, but her glance at the girl beside her was one of open admiration. For, as all in the party knew, the lonely road had been connected with an act of sheer impulsive daring in Shirley’s girlhood that she would never hear spoken of.
Judge Chalmers flicked his horse’s ears gently with his rein and they moved slowly on, presently coming in sight of a humble patch of ground, enclosed in a worm-fence and holding a whitewashed cabin with a well shaded by varicolored hollyhocks. Under the eaves clambered a gourd-vine, beneath which dangled strings of onions and bright red peppers. “Do let us get a drink!” said Chilly Lusk. “I’m as thirsty as a cotton-batting camel.”
“All right, we’ll stop,” agreed the judge, “and you’ll have a chance to see another local lion, Betty. This is where Mad Anthony lives. You must have heard of him when you were here before. He’s almost as celebrated as the Reverend John Jasper of Richmond.”
Betty tapped her temple. “Where have Ah heard of John Jasper?”
“He was the author of the famous sermon on The Sun do Move. He used to prove it by a bucket of water that he set beside his pulpit Saturday night. As it hadn’t spilled in the morning he knew it was the earth that stood still.”
Betty nodded laughingly. “Ah remember now. He’s the one who said there were only four great races: the Huguenots, the Hottentots, the Abyssinians and the Virginians. Is Mad Anthony really mad?”