back with it an' store it in his barns a little while longer. 'No,' said
Mike, 'I won't,' an' he whipped his horses an' said, 'Git up!' But them
horses couldn't budge a inch. 'Turn back,' said ther leader. Mike jest
sot thar an' never moved. All ther time men was a-gittin' them rails off
that old rail fence an' a-pilin' 'em up in ther road. Still ther
stubborn Mike Donovan wouldn't turn back. They kivered him with a
forty-four Winchester, while one wagonload o' terbacker was piled on
ther rails. 'Will ye turn back, Mike?' they asked. Mike said never a
word. 'Nuther load was piled on ther rails, an' a row o' rails on top o'
that, an' they axed Mike agin ter turn back. He jest stood thar
a-sullen. Every load o' terbacker was piled on ther rails, one row o'
rails an' one load o' terbacker, an' still old Mike wouldn't give in.
Well, ye kin guess ther rest, Wade, cain't ye? No? Well, that was one o'
ther puttiest fires I ever seed, an' ther air was so full o' pure
terbacker smoke that some o' them told me they didn't have ter smoke
their pipes fer three or four days after that fire. All they had to do
was to git out on their porch, raise their head a little an' draw in a
good long breath, then spit her out, an' they was done smoking fer a
while. Mike Donovan--did ye ax what 'bout him, ther durn fool? Course he
turned back, but he didn't have no money, nur any terbacker ter store in
his barns."

Daylight was approaching and Peter, looking in the direction of Jack
Wade's cabin, exclaimed, "Thar's yer hoss now, Wade."

CHAPTER X

Is the longing of the human soul but a delusion? Does it catch the
fragrance of immortality, as the little honeybee catches the fragrance
of the dew-dipped mountain flowers, and reach out with a longing far
beyond human ken?

Jack Wade sighed as he sat out on his little porch gazing through the
sunlight to the eastward. Far away, yet not so far, loomed the outline
of the Cumberland, as a shadow rising out of the mist, towering above
the lesser mountains nearer. All round him in his own community men were
making silent and cautious preparation for some unknown deed. Beyond the
hills, where the agitation was greatest, men were making preparation for
terrible destruction. Orders were being sent hurriedly through the
country, the courier being unknown and unseen.

Wade knew that the messenger of destruction, if not death, was "the
Wolf, Night-Watch," the very person whom he had long been looki