“I'll try to take care of myself, Mel. But you'd better hurry up and get to him before he starts to town.”
“Oh, I'll git 'im all right,” said the farmer, and he went out to the hitching-rack, mounted his horse, and galloped away.
The group Jones had been talking to now drew near.
“It's all off, boys!” Pole said, with one of his inscrutable laughs. “Explanations an' apologies has been exchanged—no gore to-day. Big mistake, anyway, all round. Big, big blunder.”
This version soon spread, and a sigh of relief went up from all sides. Fifteen minutes passed. Pole was standing in the front-door of the store, cautiously watching Floyd, who had gone back to his desk to write a letter. Suddenly the farmer missed him from his place.
“He's tryin' to give me the slip,” Pole said. “He's gone out at the back-door and has made fer the spring. Well, he kin think he's throwed old Pole off, but he hain't by a jugful. I know now which road Jeff Wade will come by, an' I'll see 'im fust ur no prayers hain't answered.”
He went out to the hitching-rack, mounted, and, waving his hand to the few bystanders who were eying him curiously, he rode away, his long legs swinging back and forth from the flanks of his horse. A quarter of a mile outside of the village he came to a portion of the road leading to Jeff Wade's house that was densely shaded, and there he drew rein and dismounted.
“Thar hain't no other way fer 'im to come,” he said, “an' I'm his meat or he is mine—that is, unless the dem fool kin be fetched to reason.”