“No, certainly not; the boy was merely left with Yancy because Crenshaw didn’t know what else to do with him.”

“Get possession of him, and if I don’t buy land here I’ll take him West with me,” said Murrell quietly.  Bladen gave him a swift, shrewd glance, but Murrell, smiling and easy, met it frankly.  “Come,” he said, “it’s a pity he should grow up wild in the pine woods—­get him away from Yancy—­I am’ willing to spend five hundred dollars on this if necessary.”

“As a matter of sentiment?”

“As a matter of sentiment.”

Bladen considered.  He was not averse to making five hundred dollars, but he was decidedly averse to letting slip any chance to secure a larger sum.  It flashed in upon him that Murrell had uncovered the real purpose of his visit to North Carolina; his interest in land had been merely a subterfuge.

“Well?” said Murrell.

“I’ll have to think your proposition over,” said Bladen.

The immediate result of this conversation was that within twenty-four hours a man driving two horses hitched to a light buggy arrived at Scratch Hill in quest of Bob Yancy, whom he found at dinner and to whom he delivered a letter.  Mr. Yancy was profoundly impressed by the attention, for holding the letter at arm’s length, he said

“Well, sir, I’ve lived nigh on to forty years, but I never got a piece of writing befo’—­never, sir.  People, if they was close by, spoke to me, if at a distance they hollered, but none of ’em ever wrote.”  After gazing at the written characters with satisfaction Mr. Yancy made a taper of the letter and lit his pipe, which he puffed meditatively.  “Sonny, when you grow up you must learn so you can send writings to yo’ Uncle Bob fo’ him to light his pipe with.”

“What was in the paper, Uncle Bob?” asked Hannibal.

“Writin’,” said Mr. Yancy, and smoked.

“What did the writin’ say, Uncle Bob?” insisted the boy.

“It was private,” said Mr. Yancy, “very private.”

“What’s your answer?” demanded the stranger.

“That’s private, too,” said Mr. Yancy.  “You tell him I’ll be monstrous glad to talk it over with him any time he fancies to come out here.”

“He said something about some one I was to carry back with me,” objected the man.

“Who said that?” asked Mr. Yancy.

“Bladen did.”

“How’s a body to know who yore talking about unless you name him?” said Yancy severely.

“Well, what am I to tell him?”

“It’s a free country and I got no call to dictate.  You-all can tell him whatever you like.”  Further than this Mr. Yancy would not commit himself, and the man went as he came.

The next day Yancy had occasion to visit Balaam’s Cross Roads.  Ordinarily Hannibal would have gone with him, but he was engaged in digging out a groundhog’s hole with Oglethorpe Bellamy, grandson of Uncle Sammy Bellamy, the patriarch of Scratch Hill.  Mr. Yancy forbore to interrupt this enterprise which he considered of some educational value, since the ground-hog’s hole was an old one and he was reasonably certain that a family of skunks had taken possession of it.  When Yancy reached the Cross Roads, Crenshaw gave him a disquieting opinion as to the probable contents of his letter, for he himself had heard from Bladen that he had decided to assume the care of the boy.