ever know'd...."

The man Neely, who was from Virginia, consumed tobacco as steadily as a
dry soil takes in water.

"I've heerd of this Lovelle," he said. "I've seed him too, I guess. A
long man with black eyebrows and hollow eyes like as he was hungry. He
used ter live near my folks in Palmer Country. What was he looking for
in those travels of his?"

"Hunting maybe," said Boone. "He was the skilfullest hunter, I reckon,
between the Potomac and the Cherokee. He brought in mighty fine pelts,
but he didn't seem to want money. Just so much as would buy him powder
and shot and food for the next venture, ye understand.... He wasn't
looking for land to settle on, neighber, for one time he telled me he
had had all the settling he wanted in this world.... But he was looking
for something else. He never talked about it, but he'd sit often with
his knees hunched up and his eyes staring out at nothing like a
bird's. I never know'd who he was or whar he come from. You say it was
Virginny?"

"Aye, Palmer County. I mind his old dad, who farmed a bit of land by
Nelson's Cross Roads, when he wasn't drunk in Nelson's tavern. The boys
used to follow him to laugh at his queer clothes, and hear his fine
London speech when he cursed us. By thunder, he was the one to swear.
Jim Lovelle used to clear us off with a whip, and give the old man his
arm into the shack. Jim too was a queer one, but it didn't do to make
free with him, unless ye was lookin' for a broken head. They was come of
high family, I've heerd."

"Aye, Jim was a gentleman and no mistake," said Boone. "The way he held
his head and looked straight through the man that angered him. I reckon
it was that air of his and them glowering eyes that made him powerful
with the redskins. But he was mighty quiet always. I've seen Cap'n Evan
Shelby roaring at him like a bull and Jim just staring back at him, as
gentle as a girl, till the Cap'n began to stutter and dried up. But,
Lordy, he had a pluck in a fight, for I've seen him with Montgomery....
He was eddicated too, and could tell you things out of books. I've
knowed him sit up all night talking law with Mr. Robertson.... He was
always thinking. Queer thoughts they was sometimes."

"Whatten kind of thoughts, Dan'l?" his brother asked.

Boone rubbed his chin as if he found it hard to explain. "About this
country of Ameriky," he replied. "He reckoned it would soon have to cut
loose from England, and him knowing so much about Engl