IV.

Since the knight-errantry of wolf and bear and catamount and fox has

scant need of milestones, or signposts, or ferries, or the tender

iteration of road-taxes, the casual glance might hardly perceive the

necessity of opening a thoroughfare through this wilderness, for these

freebooters seemed likely to be its chief beneficiaries. A more rugged

district could not be found in all that massive upheaval of rocks and

tangled wooded fastnesses stretching from the northeast to the

southwest some twenty miles, and known as Witch-Face Mountain; a more

scantily populated region than its slopes and adjacent coves scarcely

exists in the length and breadth of the State of Tennessee. The

physical possibilities were arrayed against the project, so steep was

the comblike summit on either side, so heavy and tortuous the

outcropping rock that served as the bony structure of the great

mountain mass. True, the river pierced it, the denudation of solid

sandstone cliffs, a thousand feet in height, betokening the untiring

energy of the eroding currents of centuries agone. This agency,

however, man might not summon to his aid, being "the act of God,"

to use the pious language of the express companies to describe

certain contingencies for which they very properly decline the

responsibility. Against the preemptions of the gigantic forests and

the gaunt impassable crags and the abysmal river might be enlisted

only such enterprise as was latent in the male inhabitants of the

vicinity over eighteen years of age and under fifty, thus subject to

the duty of working on the public roads. Nevertheless, the county

court had, in a moment of sanguine exuberance, entertained and granted

an application from the adjacent landowners to order a jury of view to

lay out a public road and to report at the next quarterly session.

Precursors of the jury of view in some sort two young people might

have seemed, one afternoon, a fortnight, perhaps, after the inquest,

as they pushed through the woody tangles to the cliffs high above the

river, the opposite bank of which was much nearer than the swirling

currents, crystal brown in the romantic shadows below. They walked in

single file, the jury of view in their minds, and now and then

referred to in their sparse speech.

"Mought make it along hyar, Ben." The girl, in advance, paused,

bareheaded, each uplifted hand holding out a string of her white

sunbonnet, which, thus distended, was poised, winglike, behind the

rough tangle of auburn hair and against the amber sky. She turned as

she spoke, to face her companion, taking a step or two backward as she

awaited his answer.

"Look out how ye air a-walkin', Narcissa! Ye'll go over the bluff

back'ards, fust thing ye know," the man called out eagerly, and with a

break of anxiety in his voice.

She stretched the sunbonnet still wider with her upreaching arms, and

with a smile of tantalizing glee, showing her white teeth and

narrowing her brown eyes, she continued to walk backward toward the

precipice,--with short steps, however; cautious enough, doubtless, but

calculated to alarm one whose affection had given much acuteness to

fear.

Still at too great a distance for interference, Ben affected

indifference. "We-uns'll hev the coroner's jury hyar agin, afore the

jury o' view, ef ye keep on; an' ye ain't got on yer bes' caliker

coat, noways."

He climbed swiftly up the ascent and joined her, out of breath and

with an angry gleam in his eyes. But she had turned her face and steps

in the opposite direction, the mirth of the situation extinguished for

the present.

"Quit talkin' that-a-way 'bout sech turr'ble, turr'ble things!" she

cried petulantly, making a motion as if to strike him, futile at the

distance, and with her frowning face averted.

"Sech ez yer new coat? I 'lowed 't war the apple o' yer eye," he

rejoined with a feint of banter.

She held her face down, with her features drawn and her eyes half

closed, rejecting the vision of recollection as if it were the sight

itself. "I can't abide the name o' cor'ner's jury,--I never wants ter

hear it nor see it agin! I never shall furgit how them men all looked

a-viewin' the traveler's body what I fund dead in the road; they

looked like jes' so many solemn, peekin', heejus black buzzards

crowdin' aroun' the corpse; then a-noddin' an' a-whisperin' tergether,

an' a-findin' of a verdic' ez they called it. They fund nuthin' at

all. 'T war _me_ ez done the findin'. I fund the man dead in the road.

An' _I_ ain't a-goin' ter be a witness no mo'. Nex' time the law wants

me fur a witness I'll go ter jail; it's cheerfuller, a heap, I'll

bet!"

As she still held her head down, her bonnet well on it now, her face

with its _riant_ cast of features incongruously woebegone,

overshadowed by the tragedy she recounted even more definitely than by

the brim of her headgear or the first gray advance of the dusk, he

made a clumsy effort to divert her attention.

"I 'lowed ye war mightily in favor of juries; ye talk mighty nigh all

day 'bout the jury of view."

"I want a road up hyar," she exclaimed vivaciously, raising her eyes

and her joyous transfigured face, "a reg'lar county road! In the fall

o' the year the folks would kem wagonin' thar chestnuts over ter sell

in town, an' camp out. An' all the mounting would go up an' down it

past our big gate ter the church house in the Cove. I'd never want ter

hear no mo' preachin'. I'd jes' set on our front porch, an' look, an'

look, an' look!"

She cast up her great bright eyes with as vivid and immediate an

irradiation as if the brilliant procession which she pictured deployed

even now, chiefly in ox-wagons, before them. She caught off her bonnet

from her head,--it seemed a sort of moral barometer; she never wore it

when the indications of the inner atmosphere set fair. She swung it

gayly by one string as she walked and talked; now and again she held

the string to her lips and bit it with her strong, even teeth,

reckless of the havoc in the clumsy hem.

"Then county court days,--goin' to county court, an' comin' from

county court,--sech passels an' passels o' folks! I wisht we-uns hed

it afore the jury o' view kem, so we-uns mought view the jury o'

view."

"It's along o' the jury o' view ez we-uns will git the road,--ef we do

git it," the young man said cautiously.

It was one of his self-imposed duties to moderate, as far as he might,

his sister's views, to temper her enthusiasms and abate her various

and easily excited anger. He had other duties toward her which might

be said to have come to him as an inheritance.

"Ben's the boy!" his consumptive mother had been wont to say; "he's

sorter slow, but mighty sure. 'Brag is a good dog, but Hold-Fast is a

better.' Ef he don't sense nare 'nother idee in this life, he hev got

ter l'arn ez it's his business ter take keer o' Nar'sa. Folks say

Nar'sa be spoiled a'ready. So be, fur whilst Ben be nuthin' but a boy

he'll l'arn ter do her bid, an' watch over her, an' wait on her, an'

keer for her, an' think she be the top o' creation. It'll make her

proud an' headin', I know,--she'll gin her stepmammy a sight o'

trouble, an' I ain't edzactly lamentin' 'bout'n that,--but Ben'll take

keer o' her all her life, an' good keer, havin' been trained ter it

from the fust."

But his mother had slept many a year in the little mountain graveyard,

and her place was still empty. The worldly wise craft of the simple

mountain woman, making what provision she might for the guardianship

of her daughter, was rendered of scant effect, since her husband did

not marry again. The household went on as if she still sat in her

accustomed place, with not one deficiency or disaster that might have

served in its simple sort as a memorial,--so little important are we

in our several spheres, so promptly do the ranks of life close up as

we drop dead from their alignment.

The panoply against adversity with which Narcissa had been accoutred

by a too anxious mother, instead of being means of defense, had become

opportunities of oppression. Her brother's affectionate solicitude and

submissiveness were accepted as her bounden due, as the two grew

older; her father naturally adapted himself to the predominant

sentiment of the household; and few homes can show a tyrant more

arrogant and absolute than the mountain girl whose mother had so

predicted for her much hardship and harshness, and a troubled and

subordinate existence.

It was with that instinct to guard her from all the ills of life,

great and small, that Ben sought to prepare her for a possible

disappointment now.

"Mought n't git the road through, nohow, when all's said," he

suggested.

"What fur not?" she exclaimed, bringing her dark brows together above

eyes that held a glitter of anger.

"Waal, some o' the owners won't sign the application, an' air goin'

ter fight it in the Court."

She put her bonnet on, and looked from under its brim up at the amber

sky. It was growing faintly green near the zenith, toward which the

lofty topmost plumes of the dark green pines swayed. The great growths

of the forest rose on every side. There was no view, no vista, save

the infinitely repeated umbrageous tangle beneath the trees, where

their boles stood more or less distinct or dusky till merged

indefinitely into shadow and distance. Looking down into the river,

one lost the sense of monotony. The ever-swirling lines of the current

drew mystic scrolls on that wonderfully pellucid brown surface,--so

pellucid that from the height above she could see a swiftly darting

shadow which she knew was the reflection of a homeward-bound hawk in

the skies higher yet. Leaves floated in a still, deep pool, were

caught in a maddening eddy, and hurried frantically away, unwilling,

frenzied, helpless, unknowing whither, never to return,--allegory of

many a life outside those darkling solemn mountain woods, and of some,

perhaps, in the midst of them. The reflection of the cliffs in the

never still current, of the pines on their summits, of the changing

sky growing deeper and deeper, till its amber tint, erstwhile so

crystalline, became of a dull tawny opaqueness, she marked absently

for a while as she cogitated on his answer.

"What makes 'em so contrairy, Ben?" she asked at last.

"Waal, old man Sneed 'lows thar'll be a power o' cattle-thievin', with

the road so open an' convenient. An' Jeremiah Sayres don't want ter

pay no road-taxes. An' Silas Boyd 'lows he don't want ter be obligated

ter work on no sech rough road ez this hyar one air obleeged ter be;

an' I reckon, fust an' last, it _will_ take a power o' elbow grease."

He paused, and looked about him at the great shelving masses of rock

and the steep slants, repeated through leagues and leagues of mountain

wilderness. Then seating himself on one of the ledges of the cliff,

his feet dangling unconcernedly over the abysses below, he continued:

"An' Con Hite,--he's agin it, too."

She lifted her head, with a scornful rising flush.

"Con Hite dunno _what_ he wants; _he_ ain't got a ounce o' jedgmint."

"Waal, one thing he _don't_ want is a road. He be 'feared it'll go too

close ter the still, an' the raiders will nose him out somehows. Now

he be all snug in the bresh, an' the revenuers none the wiser."

"An' Con none the wiser, nuther," she flouted. "The raiders hev smoked

out 'sperienced old mountain foxes a heap slyer'n Con be. He ain't

got the gift. He can't hide nuthin'. I kin find out everythin' he

knows by jes' lookin' in his eye."

"That's just 'kase he's fool enough ter set a heap o' store by ye,

Nar'sa. He ain't so easy trapped."

"Fool enough fur ennythin'," she retorted.

"An' then thar 's old Dent Kirby. He 'lows the road will be obligated

ter pass by the witch-face arter it gits over yander nigh ter the

valley, whar the ruver squeezes through the mounting agin. He be

always talkin' 'bout signs an' spells an' sech, an' he 'lows the very

look o' the witch-face kerries bad luck, an' it'll taint all ez goes

for'ard an' back'ard a-nigh it."

"Ben," said the girl in a low voice, "do you-uns b'lieve ef thar war

passin' continual on a sure enough county road that thar cur'ous white

light would kem on the old witch's face in the night-time? Ain't that

a sort'n spell fur the dark an' the lonesomeness ter tarrify a few

quaking dwellers round about? Surely many folks comin' an' goin'

wouldn't see sech. Ghostful things ain't common in a crowd." She moved

a little nearer her brother, and laid a hand on his shoulder.

"Some folks can't see the witch-face at all, noways," he replied

stolidly. "I hearn the coroner 'low he couldn't."

Narcissa spoke with sudden asperity: "I reckon he hev got sense enough

ter view a light whenst it shines inter his eyes. He 'pears ter be

feeble-minded ginerally, and mought n't be able ter pick out the favor

o' the features on the hillside, but surely he'd blink ef a light war

flickered inter his eyeballs."

The road was her precious scheme, and she steadfastly believed that

with the order of the worshipful Quarterly County Court declaring it

open, with a duly appointed overseer and a gang of assigned work-hands

and the presidial fostering care of a road commissioner, the haggard

old semblance must needs desist from supernatural emblazonment in the

awe-stricken nights, and that logic and law would soon serve to

exorcise its baleful influence.

Her mien grew graver as she reflected on the resume of objections to

the project. Her white bonnet threw a certain white reflection on her

flushed face. Her eyes were downcast as she looked at the river below,

the long lashes seeming almost to touch her cheek. She scarcely moved

them as she turned her gaze upon her brother, who was still seated on

the verge of the cliff.

"Waal, sir, I wonder that the pore old road petition hed life enough

in it ter crawl ter the court-house door. With all them agin it, thar

ain't nobody ter be fur it, sca'cely."

"Oh, yes," he admitted. "Them air fur it ez b'lieves highways improves

proputty, an' hev got land lyin' right alongside whar the road is axed

ter be run; them ez ain't got proputty alongside ain't nigh so

anxious. But that thar strange valley man ez they say hev got a lung

complaint, he won't sign nuther. He owns the house he built up thar on

the flat o' the mounting an' cornsider'ble land, though he don't keep

no stock nor nuthin'. 'Lows the air be soft an' good for the lung

complaint. He 'lows he hev been tryin' ter git shet o' the railroads

an' dirt roads an' human folks, an' he s'posed he _hed_ run ter the

jumpin'-off place, the e-ends o' the yearth; but hyar kems the road

o' civilization a-pursuin' him like the sarpient o' the Pit, with

the knowledge o' good an' evil,--a grain o' wheat an' a bushel o'

chaff,--an' he reckons he'll hev ter cut an' run again."

Narcissa's lips parted slightly. She listened in amazement to this

strange account of an aversion to that gay world in processional,

chiefly in white-covered wagons, which she longed to see come down the

county road.

"He be a powerful queer man," said Ben slowly, "this hyar Alan

Selwyn."

And she felt that this was true.

She sat down beside her brother on the rock, and together they looked

down meditatively on the river. It was reddening now with the

reflection of the reddening clouds. The water, nevertheless, asserted

itself. Lengths of steely brilliancy showed now and again amidst the

roseate suffusion, and anon spaces glimmered vacant of all but a dusky

brown suggestion of depth and a liquid lustre.

"Nar'sa," he said at last in a low voice, "ye know they 'lowed that

the traveler what war killed, some say by his runaway horse, war

a-comin' ter see _him_,--this Alan Selwyn."

The white bonnet seemed to focus and retain the lingering light in the

landscape. Without its aid he might hardly have made shift to see her

face.

"They 'lowed they knowed so by the papers the traveler had on him,

though this Selwyn 'lowed _he_ couldn't identify the dead man," he

continued after a pause.

She gazed wonderingly at him, then absently down at the sudden

scintillating white glitter of the reflection of the evening star in

the dusky red water. It burned with a yet purer, calmer radiance in

the roseate skies. She felt the weight of the darkening gloom,

gathering beneath the trees around her, as if it hung palpably on her

shoulders.

"Waal," he resumed, "I b'lieve ef that thar traveler had been able ter

speak ter ye when ye fund him, like ye said he tried ter do, I

b'lieve he would hev tole ye suthin' 'bout that thar valley man.

_He_'s enough likelier ter hev bed suthin' ter do with the suddint

takin' off o' the feller than Con Hite."

Her face was suddenly aghast. "Who says Con Hite-- Why?" She paused,

her voice failing.

"Waal, ye know Con be a-moonshinin' again, an' some 'lows ez this

hyar traveler warn't a traveler at all, but a revenuer,--strayed off

somehows from the rest o' 'em."

"Oh, how I wish he'd stop moonshinin' an' sech!"

She moved so suddenly on the edge of the precipice, as she lifted her

hands and drew down her sunbonnet over her face, that Ben's glance was

full of terror.

"Move back a mite, Nar'sa; ye'll go over the bluff, fust thing ye

know! Yes, Con's mighty wrong ter be moonshinin'. The law is the right

thing. It purtects us. It holps us all. We-uns owe it obejiunce, like

I hearn a man say in a speech down yander in"--

"The law!" cried Narcissa, with scorn. "Con Hite kin tromp on the

revenue law from hyar ter the witch-face, fur all I keer. Purtects! I

pity a man ez waits fur the law ter purtect him; it's a heap apter ter

grind him ter pomace. _I_ mind moonshinin' 'kase it's dangersome fur

the moonshiners. The law--I don't count the fibble old law!"

She sat brooding for a time, her face downcast. Then she spoke in a

low voice:--

"Whyn't ye find out, Ben? What ails ye ter be so good-fur-nuthin'?

Thar be other folks beside Con ez air law-breakers." She edged nearer

to him, laying her hand on his arm. "Ye've got to find out, Ben," she

said insistently. "Keep an eye on that thar valley man, an' find out

all 'bout'n him. Else the killin' 'll be laid ter Con, who never done

nuthin' hurtful ter nobody in all his life."

"The idee jes' streck me ter-day whenst I viewed him along about that

road. Whenst that thar dead man tuk yer han' an' tried ter find a word

of speech-- Why, hullo, Narcissa!"

With a short cry she had struggled to her feet. The gathering gloom,

the recollection of the tragedy, the association of ideas, bore too

heavily on her nerves. She struck petulantly at his astounded face.

"Why air ye always remindin' me?" she exclaimed, with a sharp

upbraiding note. And then she began to cry out that she could see

again the coroner's jury pressing close about the corpse, with a keen

ravenous interest like the vile mountain vultures, and then

colloguing together aside, and nodding their heads and saying they had

found their verdict, when they had found nothing, not even the poor

dead man; and she saw them here, and she saw them there, and

everywhere in the darkling mountain woods, and she would see them

everywhere as long as she should live, and she wished with all her

heart that they were every one at the bottom of the black mountain

river.

And the slow Ben wondered, as he sought to soothe her and take her

home, that a woman should be so sensitive to the mention of one dead

man, and yet given to such wishes of the wholesale destruction of the

harmless coroner's jury, because their appearance struck her amiss,

and they collogued together, and nodded their heads unacceptably, and

found their verdict.