Chad
scanned the horses and the strange vehicle and the old driver and the
little pickaninny who, hearing the boy's voice, had stood up on his
seat and was grinning over one of the hind wheels, and then his eyes
rested on the Major with a simple confidence and unconscious appeal
that touched the Major at once.

"Are you goin' my way?" The Major's nature was too mellow and
easy-going to pay any attention to final g's. Chad lifted his old gun
and pointed up the road.

"I'm a-goin' thataway."

"Well, don't you want to ride?"

"Yes," he said, simply.

"Climb right in, my boy."

So Chad climbed in, and, holding the old rifle upright between his
knees, he looked straight forward, in silence, while the Major studied
him with a quiet smile.

"Where are you from, little man?"

"I come from the mountains."

"The mountains?" said the Major.

The Major had fished and hunted in the mountains, and somewhere in that
unknown region he owned a kingdom of wild mountain-land, but he knew as
little about the people as he knew about the Hottentots, and cared
hardly more.

"What are you doin' up here?"

"I'm goin' home," said Chad.

"How did you happen to come away?"

"Oh, I been wantin' to see the settleMINTS."

"The settleMINTS," echoed the Major, and then he understood. He
recalled having heard the mountaineers call the Bluegrass region the
"settlemints" before.

"I come down on a raft with Dolph and Tom and Rube and the Squire and
the school-teacher, an' I got lost in Frankfort. They've gone on, I
reckon, an' I'm tryin' to ketch 'em."

"What will you do if you don't?"

"Foller'em," said Chad, sturdily.

"Does your father live down in the mountains?"

"No," said Chad, shortly.

The Major looked at the lad gravely.

"Don't little boys down in the mountains ever say sir to their elders?"

"No," said Chad. "No, sir," he added gravely and the Major broke into a
pleased laugh--the boy was quick as lightning.

"I ain't got no daddy. An' no mammy--I ain't got--nothin'." It was said
quite simply, as though his purpose merely was not to sail under false
colors, and the Major's answer was quick and apologetic:

"Oh!" he said, and for a moment there was silence again. Chad watched
the woods, the fields, and the cattle, the strange grain growing about
him, and the birds and the trees. Not a thing escaped his keen eye,
and, now and then, he would ask a question which the Major would answer
with some surprise and won