Just how, Buck could not see with himself in the snow and _him_ back
there for life with her and the child, but some strange impulse made him
bare his head.

"Yourn," said Buck grimly.

But nobody on Lonesome--not even Buck--knew that it was Christmas Eve.




THE ARMY OF THE CALLAHAN


I

The dreaded message had come. The lank messenger, who had brought it
from over Black Mountain, dropped into a chair by the stove and sank his
teeth into a great hunk of yellow cheese. "Flitter Bill" Richmond
waddled from behind his counter, and out on the little platform in front
of his cross-roads store. Out there was a group of earth-stained
countrymen, lounging against the rickety fence or swinging on it, their
heels clear of the ground, all whittling, chewing, and talking the
matter over. All looked up at Bill, and he looked down at them, running
his eye keenly from one to another until he came to one powerful young
fellow loosely bent over a wagon-tongue. Even on him, Bill's eyes stayed
but a moment, and then were lifted higher in anxious thought.

The message had come at last, and the man who brought it had heard it
fall from Black Tom's own lips. The "wild Jay-Hawkers of Kaintuck" were