“You got a bite,” said Dan, but Chad did not move.

“You got a bite, I tell you,” he said, in almost the tone he had used to Snowball, but Chad, when the small aristocrat looked sharply around, dropped his elbows to his knees and his chin into his hand—­taking no notice.  Once he spat dexterously into the creek.  Dan’s own cork was going under: 

“Snowball!” he cried—­“jerk!” A fish flew over Chad’s head.  Snowball had run for the other pole at command and jerked, too, but the fish was gone and with it the bait.

“You lost that fish!” said the boy, hotly, but Chad sat silent—­still.  If he would only say something!  Dan began to think that the stranger was a coward.  So presently, to show what a great little man he was, he began to tease Snowball, who was up on the bank unhooking the fish, of which Chad had taken no notice.

“What’s your name?”

“Snowball!” henchman, obediently.

“Louder!”

“S-n-o-w-b-a-l-l-l”

“Louder!” The little black fellow opened his mouth wide.

“S-N-O-W-B-A-L-L!” he shrieked.

“Louder!”

At last Chad spoke quietly.

“He can’t holler no louder.”

“What do you know about it?  Louder!”, and Dan started menacingly after the little darky but Chad stepped between.

“Don’t hit him!”

Now Dan had never struck Snowball in his life’ and he would as soon have struck his own brother—­but he must not be told that he couldn’t.  His face flamed and little Hotspur that he was, he drew his fist back and hit Chad full in the chest.  Chad leaped back to avoid the blow, tumbling Snowball down the bank; the two clinched, and, while they tussled, Chad heard the other brother clambering over the rocks, the beat of hoofs coming toward him on the turf, and the little girl’s cry: 

“Don’t you dare touch my brother!”

Both went down side by side with their head just hanging over the bank, where both could see Snowball’s black wool coming to the surface in the deep hole, and both heard his terrified shriek as he went under again.  Chad was first to his feet.

“Git a rail!” he shouted and plunged in, but Dan sprang in after him.  In three strokes, for the current was rather strong, Chad had the kinky wool in his hand, and, in a few strokes more, the two boys had Snowball gasping on the bank.  Harry, the taller brother, ran forward to help them carry him up the bank, and they laid him, choking and bawling, on the grass.  Whip in one hand and with the skirt of her long black riding-habit in the other, the little girl stood above, looking on—­white and frightened.  The hullabaloo had reached the house and General Dean was walking swiftly down the hill, with Snowball’s mammy, topped by a red bandanna handkerchief, rushing after him and the kitchen servants following.

“What does this mean?” he said, sternly, and Chad was in a strange awe at once—­he was so tall, and he stood so straight, and his eye was so piercing.  Few people could lie into that eye.  The little girl spoke first—­usually she does speak first, as well as last.