of
negresses, who occasionlly passed back and forth between the main house
and another cabin apparently used as a kitchen.

The Deacon had almost made up his mind to march boldly down to the
house, snatch up a few of the chickens, and make his way back to the
woods again, before the old couple could summon assistance. Suddenly his
quick eyes caught a glimpse of something at a point where the road from
the ridge came down out of the woods. Then that something developed
into a man on horseback, who rode forward to a little rise, stopped,
and surveyed the landscape cautiously, and then rode forward toward the
house.

He dismounted and entered the house. In a few minutes there appeared
unusual bustle and activity, during which the man rode back again,
munching as he went at a piece of cornpone and one of meat, which he had
gotten at the house, and held in either hand, while his reins lay on his
horse's neck.

The old woman came out into the yard with some meat in her hand, and the
shrill note of her orders to the negresses reached the Deacon's ears,
though he could not make out the words. But he saw one of them go to the
spring and bring water, which she poured in a wash-kettle set up in the
yard, while the old woman prepared the beef and put it in, the other
negress started a fire, and the old man chopped and split wood to put
around the kettle and fill the stone oven near by.

"They're cookin' vittels for them rebels on the ridge." The Deacon
correctly diagnosed the situation. "By-and-by they'll come for 'em, or
take 'em to 'em. Mebbe I kin find some way to collar some of 'em. It's
a slim chance, but no other seems to show up just now. If no more'n one
man comes for that grub I'm goin' to jump him."

The Deacon looked at the caps on his revolver and began laying plans for
a strategic advance under the cover of the sumachs to a point where he
could command the road to the house.

His cheek paled for an instant as the thought obtruded that the man
might resist and he have to really shoot him.

"I don't want to shoot nobody," he communed with himself, "and it won't
'be necessary if the other fellow is only sensible and sees, that I've
got the drop on him, which I will have before I say a word. Anyway, I
want that grub for a work of necessity and mercy, which justifies many
things, and as a loyal man I ought to keep it from goin' to rebels. If
I've got to put a bullet into another feller, why, the Lord'll hold me
gui