Chief among the last mentioned was the well-known establishment of Mayhew & Floyd. It was a long, frame building, once white but now a murky gray, a tone which nothing but the brush of time and weather could have given it.
It was only a week since Captain Duncan's talk with Pole Baker, and a bright, inspiring morning, well suited to the breaking of the soil and the planting of seed. The village was agog with the spirit of hope. The post-office was filled with men who had come for their mail, and they stood and chatted about the crops on the long veranda of the hotel and in the front part of Mayhew & Floyd's store. Pole Baker was in the store talking with Joe Peters, the clerk, about seed potatoes, when a tall countryman, in the neighborhood of forty-five years of age, slouched in and leaned heavily against the counter.
“I want a box o' forty-four cartridges,” he said, drawing out a long revolver and rapping on the counter with the butt of it.
“What! you goin' squirrel huntin'?” Peters laughed and winked at Pole. “That gun's got a long enough barrel to send a ball to the top o' the highest tree in these mountains.”
“You slide around behind thar an' git me them cartridges!” retorted the customer. “Do yore talkin' to somebody else. I'll hunt what an' whar I want to, I reckon.”
“Oh, come off yore perch, Jeff Wade!” the clerk said, with another easy laugh. “You hain't nobody's daddy! But here you are. Forty cents a box, full count, every one warranted to make a hole an' a noise. Want me to charge 'em?”
“No, I don't; do you hear me?—I don't! An', what's more, I want to know exactly how much I owe this dern house. I've been to a dozen moneylenders 'fore I found what I wanted, but I got it, an' I want to pay what I owe Mayhew & Floyd.” Just then Pole Baker stepped up to the man's side, and, looking under the broad brim of his hat, he said:
“Looky' here, Jeff Wade, what you shootin' off yore mouth fer? I 'lowed at fust that you was full, but you hain't drinkin', at least you don't seem to have no bottle on yore person.”
“Drinkin' hell! No, I'm not drinkin', an', what's more, I don't intend to let a drap pass down my throat till I've done my duty to me an' mine. Say, you look good an' see ef I'm drinkin'! See ef you think a man that's in liquor would have as steady a nerve as I've got. You watch me! Maybe it'll show you what I'm able to do.”
Turning, he stalked out of the store, and Peters and Pole followed, watching him in wonder. He strode across the street to the court-house, loading his revolver as he went. Reaching the closed door of the building, he took an envelope from his pocket and fastened it to the panel by thrusting the blade of his big pocket-knife into it several times. The spectators heard the hollow, resounding blows like the strokes of a carpenter's hammer, and then Wade turned and came back towards them.