CHAPTER 3.  A “BLAB SCHOOL” ON KINGDOM COME

Chad was awakened by the touch of a cold nose at his ear, the rasp of a warm tongue across his face, and the tug of two paws at his cover.  “Git down, Jack!” he said, and Jack, with a whimper of satisfaction, went back to the fire that was roaring up the chimney, and a deep voice laughed and called: 

“I reckon you better git up, little man!”

Old Joel was seated at the fire with his huge legs crossed and a pipe in his mouth.  It was before busily astir.  There was the sound of tramping in the frosty air outside and the noise of getting breakfast ready in the kitchen.  As Chad sprang up, he saw Melissa’s yellow hair drop out of sight behind the foot of the bed in the next corner, and he turned his face quickly, and, slipping behind the foot of his own bed and into his coat and trousers, was soon at the fire himself, with old Joel looking him over with shrewd kindliness.

“Yo’ dawg’s got a heap o’ sense,” said the old hunter, and Chad told him how old Jack was, and how a cattle-buyer from the “settlements” of the Bluegrass had given him to Chad when Jack was badly hurt and his owner thought he was going to die.  And how Chad had nursed him and how the two had always been together ever since.  Through the door of the kitchen, Chad could see the old mother with her crane and pots and cooking-pans; outside, he could hear the moo of the old brindle, the bleat of her calf, the nicker of a horse, one lusty sheep-call, and the hungry bellow of young cattle at the barn, where Tall Tom was feeding the stock.  Presently Rube stamped in with a back log and Dolph came through with a milk-pail.

“I can milk,” said Chad, eagerly, and Dolph laughed.

“All right, I’ll give ye a chance,” he said, and old Joel looked pleased, for it was plain that the little stranger was not going to be a drone in the household, and, taking his pipe from his mouth but without turning his head, he called out: 

“Git up thar, Melissy.”

Getting no answer, he looked around to find Melissa standing at the foot of the bed.

“Come here to the fire, little gal, nobody’s agoin to eat ye.”

Melissa came forward, twisting her hands in front of her, and stood, rubbing one bare foot over the other on the hearth-stones.  She turned her face with a blush when Chad suddenly looked at her, and, thereafter, the little man gazed steadily into the fire in order to embarrass her no more.

With the breaking of light over the mountain, breakfast was over and the work of the day began.  Tom was off to help a neighbor “snake” logs down the mountain and into Kingdom Come, where they would be “rafted” and floated on down the river to the capital—­if a summer tide should come—­to be turned into fine houses for the people of the Bluegrass.  Dolph and Rube disappeared at old Joel’s order to “go meet them sheep.”  Melissa helped