The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Cumberland Vendetta, by John Fox, Jr.

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Title: A Cumberland Vendetta

Author: John Fox, Jr.

Release Date: January, 2002 [Etext #3022]
Posting Date: October 9, 2009 [EBook #3022]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A CUMBERLAND VENDETTA ***

Produced by David Reed

A CUMBERLAND VENDETTA

By John Fox Jr.

TO MINERVA AND ELIZABETH

I

THE cave had been their hiding-place as children; it was a secret refuge
now against hunger or darkness when they were hunting in the woods. The
primitive meal was finished; ashes were raked over the red coals; the
slice of bacon and the little bag of meal were hung high against
the rock wall; and the two stepped from the cavern into a thicket of
rhododendrons.

Parting the bushes toward the dim light, they stood on a massive
shoulder of the mountain, the river girding it far below, and the
afternoon shadows at their feet. Both carried guns-the tall mountaineer,
a Winchester; the boy, a squirrel rifle longer than himself. Climbing
about the rocky spur, they kept the same level over log and bowlder and
through bushy ravine to the north. In half an hour, they ran into a path
that led up home from the river, and they stopped to rest on a cliff
that sank in a solid black wall straight under them. The sharp edge of a
steep corn-field ran near, and, stripped of blade and tassel, the stalks
and hooded ears looked in the coming dusk a little like monks at prayer.
In the sunlight across the river the corn stood thin and frail. Over
there a drought was on it; and when drifting thistle-plumes marked the
noontide of the year, each yellow stalk had withered blades and an empty
sheath. Everywhere a look of vague trouble lay upon the face of the
mountains, and when the wind blew, the silver of the leaves showed
ashen. Autumn was at hand.

There was no physical sign of kinship between the two, half-brothers
though they were. The tall one was dark; the boy, a foundling, had
flaxen hair, and was stunted and slender. He was a dreamy-looking little
fellow, and one may easily find his like throughout the Cumberland-paler
than h