“Hit’s a long time ago,” said Ross, philosophically. “I ain’t bearin’ any grudge till yet. I reckon if your uncle hadn’t ’a’ got my father, my father’d ’a’ got him. I aim to marry ye, here in Brush Arbor meetin’, an’ make friends with your daddy an’ put an end to the feud.”
As a spectacular conclusion to the storm, and apparently to Ross’s speech as well, there blazed through the woods a sudden greenish-white radiance of lightning. It flickered on the wet leaves, giving them a phosphorescent glow; it lit with an infernal illumination a face peering between those leaves, looking squarely into Adene’s own—a dark face, full of the strong beauty of age and courage, vivid yet with the zest of life. The young fellow’s hand went up to cover Vesta’s eyes, to press her head in against his breast.
“What is it?” she breathed.
“You said you was scared of lightning,” Ross answered close to her ear, as the thunder reverberated through a darkened, wet world.
Evidently she had not seen. Certainly he would not tell her. As the detonations died down, he stood rigid, waiting for the bolt of death, weighing with instant clearness the chance of whether old Jabe would kill only him, or slay as well the daughter who had proved treacherous.
Nothing came. A light wind sprang up and set drops pattering down from the boughs. The storm-clouds were rent, torn, scattered, rolling sullenly away to the north. A few drowned stars began to make the sky lighter.
All at once, as he waited for the death that came not, Ross remembered the shot they had heard as they ran through the woods. That was Jabe Turrentine’s gun. Turrentine had been the man standing with an empty weapon, without another cartridge to reload. When he was certain of this, Adene felt momentarily safe. The old panther had missed his spring; he would not try again to-night. Ross laughed a little softly to himself as he imagined Jabe skulking quietly between the dripping trees to the horse that must be tied somewhere near the timber’s edge, getting on the animal and riding down the river road to his store. Yes, that’s what the old man would do. And, after that, Ross Adene knew that the next move in the game was his.
“I reckon I’d better take you on home,” he said at length. “If we’re a-goin’ to be married to-morrow night, I’ve got some sev-rul things to do.”
Hand in hand they went through the drenched leafage, speaking low, Vesta trying feebly to remonstrate. When they came to where the lighted windows of the Minter cabin made squares of ruddy light in the blue-black darkness, Ross said his farewells.
“You put on whatever frock it is you want to be married in to-morrow night and go to meetin’,” he concluded. “For wedded we’ll shorely be at Brush Arbor church. I’ll speak to the preacher, an’ mebby your daddy’ll come to the weddin’ hisself.”