iedly, "What things?"

Jim, as if forgetful of the boy's presence in his fitful mood,
abstractedly half drew a glittering bowie knife from his bootleg,
and then slowly put it back again. "Thar's one or two old scores," he
continued, in a low voice, although no one was in hearing distance of
them, "one or two private accounts," he went on tragically, averting
his eyes as if watched by some one, "thet hev to be wiped out with blood
afore I leave. Thar's one or two men TOO MANY alive and breathin' in
this yer crowd. Mebbee it's Gus Gildersleeve; mebbee it's Harry Benham;
mebbee," he added, with a dark yet noble disinterestedness, "it's ME."

"Oh, no," said Clarence, with polite deprecation.

Far from placating the gloomy Jim, this seemed only to awake his
suspicions. "Mebbee," he said, dancing suddenly away from Clarence,
"mebbee you think I'm lyin'. Mebbee you think, because you're Colonel
Brant's son, yer kin run ME with this yer train. Mebbee," he continued,
dancing violently back again, "ye kalkilate, because ye run off'n'
stampeded a baby, ye kin tote me round too, sonny. Mebbee," he went
on, executing a double shuffle in the dust and alternately striking
his hands on the sides of his boots, "mebbee you're spyin' round and
reportin' to the Judge."

Firmly convinced that Jim was working himself up by an Indian war-dance
to some desperate assault on himself, but resenting the last unjust
accusation, Clarence had recourse to one of his old dogged silences.
Happily at this moment an authoritative voice called out, "Now, then,
you Jim Hooker!" and the desperate Hooker, as usual, vanished instantly.
Nevertheless, he appeared an hour or two later beside the wagon in which
Susy and Clarence were seated, with an expression of satiated vengeance
and remorseful bloodguiltiness in his face, and his hair combed Indian
fashion over his eyes. As he generously contented himself with only
passing a gloomy and disparaging criticism on the game of cards that
the children were playing, it struck Clarence for the first time that a
great deal of his real wickedness resided in his hair. This set him to
thinking that it was strange that Mr. Peyton did not try to reform him
with a pair of scissors, but not until Clarence himself had for at
least four days attempted to imitate Jim by combing his own hair in that
fashion.

A few days later, Jim again casually favored him with a confidential
interview. Clarence had been allowed to bestride