western sky still lingered in the mountain top, embroidering its edge with gold, it was fast fading, and already Night had spread her dusky mantle over the eastern slope. Already darkness had blotted out the lower reaches.

As Donald stopped, uncertain, there came the sound of measured, heavy footfalls on the beaten dirt path outside the cabin. The girl's face lighted up joyfully; she hopped to the door, flung it open, and a slightly stooping, but gigantic, form stepped in out of the darkness, caught her up in his huge arms and submitted with a quizzical smile while she pulled his face toward hers by tugging at his long beard, and kissed him.

Across the tumbled masses of her hair the newcomer's still piercing dark eyes, blinking a little under their shaggy brows as the fire leaped in the draft from the open door, caught sight of Donald as he stood back among the shadows. He straightened up suddenly, and his brows drew together in a suspicious scowl.

The city man knew enough of the primitive code of the mountain people to understand that the presence of a man,—especially a strange man,—alone in the house with a young woman, was fraught with unpleasant possibilities. But, before he could speak, the child-woman had launched into a vivacious, if ungrammatical, explanation and story of what had occurred. In substantiation she now raised her short skirt and lifted the bandaged foot, with utter freedom from embarrassment, and laughed deliciously until an answering smile crept slowly into the eyes of the old mountaineer.

With a simple courtesy, which seemed to hold something of innate majesty, he stepped forward, and extended a weatherbeaten hand, several sizes larger than Donald's, and boomed out in a deep voice that matched his physical proportions, "Yo're suttinly welcome, stranger. What happened warn't no fault o' yourn, and I'm plumb obleeged ter ye fer fixin' up my granddarter's hurt. Draw up a cheer fer the stranger, Smiles, he'll jine us in a bite er supper. The fare's simple, but I war raised on't, and 'pears ter me thet I top ye some."

"I should say that you did. You make me feel small, and it's not often any man does that ... physically, I mean."

The two clasped hands, and Donald winced as his own powerful fingers cracked under the crushing pressure of those of the older man, who seemed to take a boyish delight in this display of his tremendous strength.

"What a colossus he is," thought Donald, as he gritted his teeth to keep back the involuntary exclamation of pain, for, although the massive shoulders and Jovian head of the mountaineer were stooped forward, he towered fully three inches above the six foot city athlete, and his iron-gray beard, rusted with tobacco juice about his mouth, swept over his chest almost to his waist.

"Thanks for the invitation," he said aloud, as he covertly nursed his right hand. "It's mighty kind of you, but I don't want to impose longer, and, besides, I'd better start back to Fayville before it gets dark altogether. If you'll just tell me the most direct way, ..."

"Wall, I reckon the most deerect way air ter go straight through the woods thar a piece, an' then jump off'n a four hundred foot cliff," the old man chuckled titanically. "But I likewise reckon taint pra'tical; leastwise, not onless yo' happen ter be one o' them new-fangled aviationeers I've hearn tell on. However, here ye be, an' here yo're goin' ter stay twill atter supper. Come, child. Sot on another plate fer the doctor man."

"Donald MacDonald's my name, sir."

"Peers like yo'r paw stuttered when he give yo' thet name," laughed the giant. "Mine's Jerry Webb—'Big Jerry,' they mostwise calls me hyarerbouts." There was simple pride in the nickname evident in his voice.

"Of course, if you really want me to stay, I'd be glad enough to do it, Mr. Webb, although I don't like to cause any more trouble for Miss ..."

"'Rose' air the given name of my leetle gal, but folks gener'ly calls her Smiles, fer short." The old man spoke with a noticeable tenderness toning his big voice.

"And there's no need of explaining the reason," answered Donald in a low aside so that the child, who was busy over the stewing kettle on its primitive crane, might not hear. "I never expect to see another to equal hers."

His host sent a sharp glance at him, then, softening, it travelled to the graceful form of the girl silhouetted against the ruddy glow of the open fire, whose reflection outlined her warm flesh with a tint of burnished copper.

"Yes," he responded simply. "Seems like, when thet leetle gal's sweet face lights up with a smile, hit's like a sunbeam a-breakin' through the leaves an' playin' on a waterpool in the quiet woods."

"Oh," interrupted Rose with a cry. "I done plumb ferget ter git the milk from Uncle Perly's, but 'twon't take more'n a minute. Kin I take Mike?" she added, pleadingly, as she buried her slim fingers in the rough hair on the dog's neck, while he stood sniffing acquaintance with the huge boots and homespun pantaloons of the giant.

"Sure; that is if you're not still afraid that the neighbors' dogs will make a meal of him," smiled Donald, and the object of the conversation, who seemed to sense its meaning, sprang eagerly erect and placed his forepaws on the girl's breast.

"No dawg haint a-goin' ter tetch him whilst he's with me," she responded with quiet assurance. "Come, Mickey."

"Which air a fact," supplemented her grandfather, as girl and dog disappeared with a rush and a bark. "Dumb beasts an' children worships Smiles—an' hit haint scarse to be wondered at, fer she love 'em all. An' she's more rememberful than her grandpappy. Yo' see, we don't gener'ly hev milk fer our coffee, 'ceptin' when company comes."

In some distress at this frank announcement, Donald said, "But I don't like to have you put yourselves out for me. I wouldn't have stayed if...."

"Now, don't let thet idee disturb ye a mite. We're glad ter hev ye with us, an' what fer air friends ef hit haint ter be an excuse fer a leetle extry celebration? Set down, set down thar."

Donald obeyed, and, while his host moved ponderously about, depositing the contents of a bundle which he had brought, studied his surroundings curiously. It was his first experience within a real "feud country" cabin, and he was interested to see how closely its appearance coincided with what his imagination had painted from reading fiction woven about them. To his quiet delight he found that it might almost have served as an illustration for such a book, as, one by one, he mentally checked off the salient features. There were the hand-hewn timbers of wall and unsheathed ceiling; the yawning rough stone fireplace with its wrought iron crane, and, above it, a rifle whose unusual length proclaimed its ownership; the strings of dried herbs and red pepper pods—few, to be sure, and dusty with age—suspended from the rafters; and, in one corner, a crude ladder leading into the loft.

Only one thing was missing, the wall-beds or bunks, for the hand of civilization had pointed to one improvement, and doors, obviously not a part of the original simple structure, opened into a small addition, roughly partitioned into two sleeping rooms. They were of equal size, but there was no need of labels to proclaim their occupants, for one was so nearly filled with a bed which would have served for Golden Locks' biggest bear, that the rough clothing which was suspended from wooden pegs on the opposite wall hung against it, whereas the other contained, besides a narrow