“Oh, 'bout one whoop an' a holler.” If he had spoken Greek the Blight could not have been more puzzled. He meant he lived as far as a man's voice would carry with one yell and a holla.
“Will you help me catch some?” Buck nodded.
“All right,” I said, turning my horse up to the fence. “Get on behind.” The horse shied his hind quarters away, and I pulled him back.
“Now, you can get on, if you'll be quick.” Buck sat still.
“Yes,” he said imperturbably; “but I ain't quick.” The two girls laughed aloud, and Buck looked surprised.
Around a curving cornfield we went, and through a meadow which Buck said was a “nigh cut.” From the limb of a tree that we passed hung a piece of wire with an iron ring swinging at its upturned end. A little farther was another tree and another ring, and farther on another and another.
“For heaven's sake, Buck, what are these things?”
“Mart's a-gittin' ready fer a tourneyment.”
“A what?”
“That's whut Mart calls hit. He was over to the Gap last Fourth o' July, an' he says fellers over thar fix up like Kuklux and go a-chargin' on hosses and takin' off them rings with a ash-stick—'spear,' Mart calls hit. He come back an' he says he's a-goin' to win that ar tourneyment next Fourth o' July. He's got the best hoss up this river, and on Sundays him an' Dave Branham goes a-chargin' along here a-picking off these rings jus' a-flyin'; an' Mart can do hit, I'm tellin' ye. Dave's mighty good hisself, but he ain't nowhar 'longside o' Mart.”