"They say how feelin' run consid'ble high in the settlement that year, but hit was only surmisin' like, for there was no evidence that would hold water afore a jury of any crime havin' been committed; and hit all ended in the valley folks avoidin' Jo-siah like his other name was Cain—and that sort o' treatment 'peared to suit him mighty well. Leastways, he went on with his plowin' and sowin' and stillin' his crap, and whistled at the neglect of his neighbors, who never came to the clearin' any more, and in that very year he built this bridge, with or without the help of the other one.
"When the bridge was first seen, hit was stained by the weather, and moss had come to grow on the poles, and rotten leaves filled the chinks of the slab floor as if hit had never been new, and no one cared to ask any questions of Jo-siah, who kept his own counsel and seemed to live more alone than ever. The bridge was only another mystery connected with the life of this man that everybody shunned, and nobody suspicioned that hit had anything to do with the disappearance of the other one, who was counted for dead.
"Now when day comes," said Andy, "you-all will see for yourselves that there is no timber on the other side o' this here gully tall enough to make string-pieces for a bridge of this length, and so the two string-pieces must have been cut on this side so as to fall across the chasm pretty much where they were wanted. Well, that was how it was; and the story goes that the man who first saw the bridge reported, judging by the stumps, that the right-hand timber had been cut six months or more before the other one, which might have been just about the time Jo-siah brought the stranger home with him, and would easily account for his disappearance onto the summit of the mountain, for of course you understand he was not dead, and Jo-siah the Silent had no stain of blood on his conscience.
"The mountain folks, however, thought different at that time, and looked cross-eyed at the painted cart drawed by the two slick critters on hits way to the low country. They was quick to take notice, too, when Jo-siah come back, that the cart carried more kegs than what hit had taken away, besides some mysterious-lookin' boxes and packages. Now this havin' continued endurin' several half-yearly trips, hit was the settled idee in the valley that Jo-siah was a-furnishin' of his cabin at a gait clear ahead of the insolence like of drivin' two steers to his cart when honest mountain folks couldn't afford but one. Hit was suspicioned, moreover, that he was a-doin' this with the ill-got gold of the old man he had murdered, and the gals shrugged their shoulders as he passed, for no one of the gals as knew his goin's-on would set a foot in his cabin. It leaked out some way that Jo-siah had been investin' in books, which was the amazin' and crownin' extravagance of all, for hit was knowed that he could scarcely read a line of print or much more 'n write his own name.
ANDY TELLS THE STORY OF THE OLD MAN OF THE MOUNTAIN.
"These unjust suspicions of murder and robbery against an innocent man continued to rankle in the minds of the valley folks for more than two years, until a most surprisin' event took place on the mountain, to the great disappointment and annoyance of those gossips who had been loudest in their charges against Jo-siah Woodring. Hit happened that two bear-hunters from the settlement found themselves belated in the neighborhood of this very bridge one September night, and, bein' worn out with the chase, they sat down to rest in the shadow of an old chestnut, where they soon fell asleep. They awoke just before mid-night, and were about to start on down the mountain when they heard footsteps coming up the trail, and presently, dark as the night was, they saw a man with a keg on his shoulder a-walkin' toward the bridge. The man was Jo-siah; and after restin' his burden on a stump and wipin' the sweat from his forehead, he shouldered hit again and tramped on over the bridge.
"The hunters were bold men and well armed, and, having had a good rest, they followed the man at a safe distance until he came to the ledge of rocks which you-all will view for yourselves by sun-up, and there he was met by a man with a ladder, who stood out on the rocks above. The hunters noticed that the stranger was a small man, and just then the moon came out from behind a cloud, and they knew him for the little old man who was supposed to have been murdered.
"When the hunters told what they'd seen on the mountain, you may believe," said Andy, "there was right smart excitement in Cashiers, and some disappointment to find that Jo-siah was neither a murderer nor a robber. They went on hating him all the same for driving two steers to his cart and for having deceived them so long about the man on the mountain, and then they started the story that he was feedin' his prisoner on whisky, and that it was only a slow murder, after all. After that, one day, when Jo-siah had gone away to market, half a dozen of the valley men, with the two hunters to guide them, went up the mountain for the purpose of liberating that poor prisoner o' Jo-siah's.