nd
brambly and impracticable that it was hardly likely to be espied by
"revenuers." The rock house opened on space. Beyond the narrow path at
its entrance the descent was sheer to the bottom of the gorge below.

In this stronghold, one night, Con Hite sat gloomy and depressed
beside the little copper still for the sake of which he risked so
much. It held all it could of singlings, and it seemed to him a cheery
sight in the shadowy recesses of the rock house. He regarded it with
mingled pride and affection, often declaring it "the smartest still of
its capacity in the world." To him it was at once admirable as an
object of art and a superior industrial agent.

"An' I dunno why Narcissa be so set agin it," he muttered. "But for it
I wouldn't hev money enough ter git a start in this world. My mother
an' she couldn't live in the same house whenst we git married." He
meditated for a moment, and shook his head in solemn negation, for his
mother was constructed much after the pattern of Narcissa herself.
"An' _I_ wouldn't live a minit alongside o' Ben Hanway ef I war
Nar'sa's husband. Ben wouldn't let me say my soul's my own. I be
'bleeged ter mak the money fur a start o' cattle an' sech myse'f, an'
hev a house an' home o' my own."

And then he took the pipe from his mouth and sighed. For even his care
seemed futile. It was true that the fair-haired young stranger was
dead, and he had a pang of self-reproach whenever he thought of his
jealousy, as if he had wished him ill. But she had worn a cold white
unresponsive face when he had seen her last; she did not listen to
what he said, her mind evidently elsewhere. She looked at him as if
she did not see him. She did not think of him. He was sure that this
was not caprice. It was some deep absorbing feeling in which he had no
share.

The moon, like some fair presence, looked in at the broad portal.
Outside, the white tissues of her misty diaphanous draperies trailed
along the dark mountain slopes beneath the dim stars as she wended
westward. Afar down the gorge one might catch glimpses of a glossy
lustre where the evergreen laurel, white with frost, moved in the
autumn wind. He lifted his head to mark its melancholy cadence, and
while he listened, the moonlight was suddenly crowded from the door as
three men rushed in, half helping and half constraining a fourth man
forward.

"Durn my boots ef I didn't furgit the password!" cried Nick Peters
with his little falsetto laugh,