half-sister, Molly, became a distinct and potent factor in his life; one with which he must reckon. Going to the rock on a certain evening to bury his share of the day's profit he wearily raised the stone, deposited the money and turned to go home, when he encountered Molly peering at him with elfish and menacing eyes from behind a bush.

"What you doing there, yo' Sandy?" she asked half coaxingly, half threateningly.

"Nothing."

"I seen you—a-hiding something. I'm going to look!" She made a movement forward.

"Hyar! you Molly!" Sandy clung to her. "If you raise that stone 'twill be the last of you. I've got a horned toad there and—a poison sarpint."

"Then I'll—I'll tell Dad." Molly shrank back, though not wholly convinced. It was time for compromise, and Sandy, with a sickening fear, recognized it and blindly fell upon the one thing that could have swayed the girl.

"I'm a-training and taming them," he lied desperately, "and when they are ready we-all can make money out of them, but if you tell—Dad will kill 'em! I tell you, Molly, if you don't say a single thing I'll—I'll give you a cent every week. A cent to buy candy with!"

The promise was given, and from that day Sandy paid his blood money, hoping that greed would hold the child to her bargain, but with always a feeling of insecurity. He changed his box to another rock, but a certain uncanniness about Molly gained a power over him and he never felt safe.

Things went rapidly from bad to worse in the Morley cabin. Martin forgot his prayers and ambitions; he grew subservient to Mary and never strove against her, even when her wrath and temper were directed toward him and Sandy. Discredited and disliked by his neighbours, flouted by the woman who had used him for her own gain, the man became a detestable and pitiable creature. Sandy endured the blows and ratings that became his portion, in the family disturbances, with proud silence. He was making ready and until the hour of his departure came he must bear his part.

It was during the probation and preparatory period that Marcia Lowe, the Cup-of-Cold-Water Lady, came up The Way one golden afternoon and stopped her horse before the post office, General Store and County Club of The Hollow, and, leaning out from the ramshackle buggy, gave a rather high, nasal call to whoever might be within.

CHAPTER II

Tod Greeley, the postmaster, was sitting on his cracker box contemplatively eying the rusty stove enthroned upon its sawdust platform, in the middle of the store. Every man in The Hollow had his own particular chair or box when the circle, known as the County Club, formed for recreation or business. No one presumed to occupy another's place: Tod Greeley's pedestal was a cracker box and its sides were well battered from the blows his heels gave it when emotions ran high or his sentiments differed from his neighbour's. Greeley was not a Hollow man; he had been selected by Providence, as he himself would have said, to perform a service for his country: namely, that of postmaster, storekeeper, and arbiter of things in general. He was a tall, lean man of forty, good looking, indolent, and with some force of character which was mainly evinced by his power of keeping his temper when he was facing a critical situation. While not of The Hollow, he was still with The Hollow on principle.

When Marcia Lowe paused before the store and emitted her call, which flavoured of friendliness and the North, Greeley was vacantly looking into space, hugging his bony knees, and listening to an indignant fly buzzing on the dirty glass of the back window, protesting against any exit being barred to its egress.

It was three o'clock of a late July day and, while the sun was hot, the breeze gave promise of a cool night.

"Ooh! ooh!"

Just at first Greeley thought the fly had adopted a more militant tone.

"Oooh—ooh!"

Greeley pulled himself together, mentally and physically, and stalked to the porch; there he encountered the very frank, smiling face of a rather attractive youngish woman who greeted him cordially with a high-pitched but sweet:

"Good afternoon."

"Good evening, ma'am," Tod returned.

"I just came up from The Forge; your roads are really scandalous, but the scenery is beautiful. I want to see if there is any place near here where I can get board? I've come to stay for a while, anyway; probably for years, at least."

The young person seemed so eager to share her confidence that Greeley was on his guard at once. He did not approve of the stills back among the hills, but he did not feel called upon to assist any government spy in her work, no matter how attractive and subtle the spy was.

It was two years now since a certain consumptive-looking young man had caused the upheaval of a private enterprise back of The Hollow and made so much unpleasantness, but Norman Teale had served his term in prison and had got on his feet once more, and Greeley had a momentary touch of sympathy for the Speak-Easy magnates as he glanced up at this new style of spy.

"Nobody stays on in The Hollow lest he has to," he said cautiously, "and as for boarding-places, there never was such a thing here, I reckon. I certainly don't expect they would take any one in at the Walden place, not if they-all was starving. Miss Ann Walden is quality from way back. The Morleys couldn't entertain, and what's true of the Morleys is true of all the others."

"Couldn't you folks take me?"

At this Greeley collapsed on the one chair of the porch, and actually gasped.

"I ain't got what you might call folks," he managed to say, "unless you call a brace of dogs, folks."

"Oh! I beg your pardon." Miss Lowe flushed and gave a nervous laugh. "You see I just must manage to find a home here, and—and I've heard so much of Southern chivalry and hospitality I rather hoped some one would take me in until I could look around. The place at The Forge, where I've been for two nights is—impossible, and the darkies have their hands stretched out for tips until I feel like a palmist, and a bankrupt one at that!"

A merry laugh rang out and in spite of himself and his grave doubts Greeley relaxed.

"If you don't mind doing for yourself," he ventured, "there's a cabin over to Trouble Neck that you might get."

"Do for myself?" Miss Lowe cried energetically. "I'd just favour that plan, I can tell you! I could get all the furniture I need at The Forge, I am sure. The name of the place isn't exactly cheering, but then I've waded through trouble and got on top all my life long. Who owns the cabin over at Trouble Neck?"

Property rights in and around The Hollow were rarely discussed; it was a delicate question, but what was not actually held down by another generally was conceded to a certain Smith Crothers and to his credit Tod Greeley now put the Trouble Neck cabin.

"Oh! He's the man who owns the factory a few miles from The Forge? I drove past it yesterday at noon time. I thought it was an orphan asylum at first. I never saw such babies put to work before. It's monstrous and the law ought to shut down on your Smith Crothers!"

At this Greeley had a distinct sensation of pain in the region known as the pit of his stomach. That Smith Crothers should fall under any law had never been dreamed of by mortal man or woman in Greeley's presence before. The right of free whiskey was one thing; the right of a man to utilize the children of the district was another!

"He ain't my Smith Crothers!" Greeley inanely returned, feeling in a dazed way that he did not want to put in any claim for Crothers with those apparently innocent eyes upon him.

"Well, I'll try to buy the Trouble Neck place from Smith Crothers at once. You see I've been very sick; they said I'd lost my health, but I know I've only misplaced it."

Again the cheerful laugh set Greeley's nerves tingling.

"They-all say that when they-all come up