A MERCURY OF THE FOOT-HILLS


It was high hot noon on the Casket Ridge. Its very scant shade was
restricted to a few dwarf Scotch firs, and was so perpendicularly cast
that Leonidas Boone, seeking shelter from the heat, was obliged to draw
himself up under one of them, as if it were an umbrella. Occasionally,
with a boy's perversity, he permitted one bared foot to protrude beyond
the sharply marked shadow until the burning sun forced him to draw it in
again with a thrill of satisfaction. There was no earthly reason why
he had not sought the larger shadows of the pine-trees which reared
themselves against the Ridge on the slope below him, except that he was
a boy, and perhaps even more superstitious and opinionated than most
boys. Having got under this tree with infinite care, he had made up his
mind that he would not move from it until its line of shade reached and
touched a certain stone on the trail near him! WHY he did this he did
not know, but he clung to his sublime purpose with the courage and
tenacity of a youthful Casabianca. He was cramped, tickled by dust and
fir sprays; he was supremely uncomfortable--but he stayed! A woodpecker
was monotonously tapping in an adjacent pine, with measured intervals of
silence, which he always firmly believed was a certain telegraphy of
the bird's own making; a green-and-gold lizard flashed by his foot
to stiffen itself suddenly with a rigidity equal to his own. Still HE
stirred not. The shadow gradually crept nearer the mystic stone--and
touched it. He sprang up, shook himself, and prepared to go about
his business. This was simply an errand to the post-office at the
cross-roads, scarcely a mile from his father's house. He was already