for his nefarious enterprise was a
"master shut-in" between beetling walls of rock, fairly secure against
discovery and now both the moonshiner and his sentinel brought their
lanterns for an inquiry into this unexpected visit.

At first mute astonishment held them. These two figures were bruised,
torn and blood-stained, almost beyond semblance to humanity. In the
yellow circlet of flare that the lantern bit out of the darkness, they
seemed gory reminders of a slaughter-house. But much of the blood that
besmeared Bear Cat Stacy had come from his weltering burden.

"I hain't got overly much time fer speech, Dog," gasped Turner between
labored breaths. "We've got ter make Brother Fulkerson's afore we gives
out.... Strip this man an' bind up his hurts es well es ye kin.... Git
him licker, too!"

They staunched Henderson's graver wounds with a rough but not undeft
speed, and when they had forced white liquor between his lips the
faltering heart began to beat with less tenuous hold on the frayed
fringes of life.

"Ef he lives ter git thar hit's a God's miracle," commented Dog. He
passed the whiskey to Bear Cat, who thrust it ungraciously back as he
repeated, with dogged reiteration. "He's got ter last twell mornin'.
He's _got_ ter."

When the prostrate figure stirred with a flicker of returning
consciousness Turner's eyes became abruptly keen and his words ran
swiftly into a current of decisiveness:

"Dog, yore maw war a Stacy--an' yore paw was kilt from ther la'rel. I
reckon ye suspicions who caused his death?"

A baleful light glimmered instantly into the moonshiner's pupils; the
light of a long-fostered and bitter hate. His answer was breathed
rather than spoken.

"I reckon Kinnard Towers hired him killed.... I was a kid when he died,
but my mammy give me his handkerchief, dipped in his blood ... an' I
tuck my oath then." He paused a moment and went on more soberly: "I've
done held my hand ... because of ther truce ... but I hain't nowise
forgetful ... an' some day----"

Bear Cat leaned forward and laid an interrupting hand on the shoulder
of the speaker, to find it trembling.

"Hearken, Dog," he said. "Mebby yore time will come sooner then ye
reckoned. I wants thet afore sun-up ter-morrow word should go ter every
Stacy in these-hyar hills, thet I've done sent out my call, an' thet
they shell be ready ter answer hit--full-armed. I wants thet ye shall
summons all sich as ye hev ther power ter reach, ter meet f