“Oh, shucks!” said Holton, trying to control his temper because of his great eagerness to get in to the mare.  “She would be safe with me; you know it.”

“I knows Marse Frank hab barred ebery window an’ sealed ebery doah but dis one, an’ gib me ohduhs to let no one in ’cept he is by.  I stan’s by dem ohduhs while dere’s bref in my ol’ body.”

Holton was infuriated.  “It’s lucky for you I’m not your master!”

“Dat’s what I t’ink, suh.”

“If you was my nigger, I’d teach you perliteness with a black-snake whip!  I’ll see what Layson’ll say to such sass as you’ve gin me.  Jest you wait till you hear from him.”

Neb was not impressed by the man’s wrath.  “Huhd from him afoah, suh.  Oh, I’ll wait, I’ll wait.”

He went up to the stable-door, unlocked it and stood in the open portal.  Holton would have followed him, but Neb began to close the door.

“You’ll wait, too, suh,” said the negro, grinning, “on de outside, suh.”

He closed and locked the door on the inside.

Holton was beside himself with wrath.  “Damn him!  Damn him!” he exclaimed.  “Damn him and damn his proud young puppy of a master!  I’ll ruin him!  I’ll set my foot on him and smash him, yet!”

Baffled, he walked down the drive.

“There’s a way,” he told himself.  “It’s bold and risky, but nobody’ll suspicion me.  I’ve kept straight here in the bluegrass.  The mountains and all as ever knowed me thar are far away!”

But all who had known him in the mountains were not as far away as he supposed.  Even as he spoke a dusty, weary figure in worn homespun, carrying a mammoth bundle, limping sadly upon bruised and blistered feet, came through the shrubbery, approaching the great stables from the far side of the big house-lot.  Holton looked at this wayfarer with amazement.

“Madge Brierly!” he cried.  “Gal, what are you a-doin’ here?”

“Don’t know’s I’ve got any call to tell you,” Madge replied, almost as much astonished at the sight of him as he had been at sight of her.  Then she smiled roguishly at him.  “Maybe you’ll find out, though.”

“I tell you this ain’t no place for you,” he admonished her.  “Lordy!  They takes up folks that looks like you, for vagrants.  Take my advice, turn back to the mountings.”

She looked at him with that same smile, still unimpressed.

For no reason which he could have well explained the man was almost panic-stricken in his keen anxiety to get the girl away from the old Layson homestead and the possibility of meeting those who dwelt therein.

“Here, if you’ll go,” he added, and thrust his hand into his pocket, “I’ll give you money—­money to help you on your way.”

Still she smiled at him with that aggravating, meaning smile; that smile which he could by no means fathom and of which she scarcely knew the meaning.  “No,” she said, “I don’t want your money.  You couldn’t hire me to leave the bluegrass till I’ve seen Frank Layson.”