cle sharply, "and look me straight in
the eye."

Now, looking Uncle Aaron straight in the eye was far from being Teddy's
idea of pleasure. There were many things he would rather do than that.
There had been many occasions before this when he had received the same
invitation, and he had never accepted it without reluctance. It was a
steely eye that seemed to look one through and through and turn one
inside out.

Still, there was no help for it, and Teddy, with the air of an early
Christian martyr, was slowly coming to the front, when suddenly they
heard a shout of triumph, and, turning, saw Jed Muggs hold up something
he had just found on the floor of the coach.

"Here it is!" he cried; "here's the identical thing what done it!" And
as he came shambling forward he held up, so that all could see it, the
ball that had been only too well aimed when it had hit the gray horse.

Jed was a town character and the butt of the village jokes. He had been
born and brought up there, and only on one occasion had strayed far
beyond its limits. That was when he had gone on an excursion to the
nearest large city. His return ticket had only been good for three days,
but after his return, bewildered but elated, he had never tired of
telling his experiences. Every time he told his story, he added some new
variation, chiefly imaginary, until he at last came to believe it
himself, and posed as a most extensive traveler.

"Yes, sir-ree," he would wind up to his cronies in the general store, as
he reached out to the barrel for another cracker, "they ain't many
things in this old world that I ain't seen. They ain't nobody kin take
me fur a greenhorn, not much they ain't!"

For more years past than most people could remember, he had driven the
village stage back and forth between Oldtown and Carlette, the nearest
railway station. He and his venerable team were one of the features of
the place, and the farmers set their clocks by him as he went plodding
past. Everybody knew him, and he knew the past history of every man,
woman and child in the place. He was an encyclopedia of the village
gossip and tradition for fifty years past. This he kept always on tap,
and only a hint was needed to set him droning on endlessly.

Jed's one aversion was the boys of Oldtown. He got on well enough with
their elders, who humored and tolerated the old fellow. But he had never
married, and, with no boys of his own to keep him young in heart, he had
grown cra