her words.

"I've thought of that, too," the Scratch Hiller answered seriously.
Betty glanced toward the squire and Mr. Crenshaw. They were standing
near the bars that gave entrance to the lane. Murrell had left them
and was walking briskly down the road toward Crenshaw's store where his
horse was tied. She bent down and gave Yancy her slim white hand.

"Good-by, Mr. Yancy--lift Hannibal so that I can kiss him!" Yancy swung
the child aloft. "I think you are such a nice little boy, Hannibal--you
mustn't forget me!" And touching her horse lightly with the whip she
rode away at a gallop.

"She sho'ly is a lady!" said Yancy, staring after her. "And we mustn't
forget Memphis or Belle Plain, Nevvy."

Crenshaw and the squire approached.

"Bob," said the merchant, "Bladen's going to have the boy--but he made
a mistake in putting this business in the hands of a fool like Dave
Blount. I reckon he knows that now."

"I reckon his next move will be to send a posse of gun-toters up from
Fayetteville," said the squire.

"That's just what he'll do," agreed Crenshaw, and looked disturbed.

"They certainly air an unpeaceable lot--them Fayetteville folks! It's
always seemed to me they had a positive spite agin this end of the
county," said the squire, and he pocketed his spectacles and refreshed
himself with a chew of tobacco. "Bladen ain't actin' right, Bob. It's a
year and upwards since the old general 'died. He let you go on thinking
the boy was to stay with you and now he takes a notion to have him!"

"No, sir, it ain't right nor reasonable. And what's more, he shan't have
him!" said Yancy, and his tone was final.

"I don't know what kind of a mess you're getting yourself into, Bob,
I declare I don't!" cried Crenshaw, who felt that he was largely
responsible for the whole situation.

"Looks like your neighbors would stand by you," suggested the squire.

"I don't want them to stand by me. It'll only get them into trouble,
and I ain't going to do that," rejoined Yancy, and lapsed into momentary
silence. Then he resumed meditatively, "There was old Baldy Ebersole who
shot the sheriff when they tried to arrest him for getting drunk down in
Fayetteville and licking the tavern-keeper--"

"Sho', there wa'n't no harm in Baldy!" said the squire, with heat. "When
that sheriff come along here looking for him, I told him p'inted that
Baldy said he wouldn't be arrested. A more truthful man I never knowed,
and if the damn fool had t