he hollered somepin’, too, but what it was I couldn’t jist make out, far the noise o’ the wheel; but he looked to me as ef he’d hollered somepin’ mean a-purpose so’s Steve wouldn’t hear it, and he’d have the consolation o’ knowin’ ’at he’d called Steve some onry name ‘thout givin’ him a chance to take it up.  Steve was allus quiet like, but ef you raised his dander one’t—­and you could do that ‘thout much trouble, callin’ him names er somepin’, particular’ anything ’bout his mother.  Steve loved his mother—­allus loved his mother, and would fight far her at the drap o’ the hat.  And he was her favo-rite—­allus a-talkin’ o’ “her boy, Steven,” as she used to call him, and so proud of him, and so keerful of him allus, when he ’d be sick er anything; nuss him like a baby, she would.

So when Bills hollered, Steve didn’t pay no attention; and I said nothin’, o’ course, and didn’t let on like I noticed him.  So we druv round to the south side and hitched; and Steve ’lowed he’d better feed; so I left him with the hosses and went into the mill.

They was jist a-stoppin’ far dinner.  Most of ’em brought ther dinners—­lived so far away, you know.  The two Smith boys lived on what used to be the old Warrick farm, five er six mild, anyhow, from wher’ the mill stood.  Great stout fellers, they was; and little Jake, the father of ’em, wasn’t no man at all—­not much bigger’n you, I rickon.  Le’ me see, now:—­Ther was Tomps Burk, Wade Elwood, and Joe and Ben Carter, and Wesley Morris, John Coke—­wiry little cuss, he was, afore he got his leg sawed off—­and Ezry, and—­Well, I don’t jist mind all the boys—­’s a long time ago, and I never was much of a hand far names.—­Now, some folks’ll hear a name and never fergit it, but I can’t boast of a good ricollection, ‘specially o’ names; and far the last thirty year my mem’ry’s be’n a-failin’ me, ever sence a spell o’ fever ’at I brought on onc’t—­fever and rheumatiz together.  You see, I went a-sainin’ with a passel o’ the boys, fool-like, and let my clothes freeze on me a-comin’ home.  Wy, my breeches was like stove-pipes when I pulled ’em off.  ’Ll, ef I didn’t pay far that spree!  Rheumatiz got a holt o’ me and helt me there flat o’ my back far eight weeks, and couldn’t move hand er foot ‘thout a-hollerin’ like a’ Injun.  And I’d a-be’n there yit, I reckon, ef it had n’t a-be’n far a’ old hoss-doctor, name o’ Jones; and he gits a lot o’ sod and steeps it in hot whisky and pops it on me, and I’ll-be-switched-to-death ef it didn’t cuore me up, far all I laughed and told him I’d better take the whisky inardly and let him keep the grass far his doctor bill.  But that’s nuther here ner there:—­As I was a-saying ’bout the mill:  As I went in, the boys had stopped work and was a-gittin’ down ther dinners, and Bills amongst ’em, and old Ezry a-chattin’ away—­great hand, he was, far his joke, and allus a-cuttin’ up and a-gittin’ off his odd-come-shorts on the boys.  And that day he was in particular good