"Only one jib down-haul left of all the riggin'," he groaned, and
then grabbed it and surged on it.

The horse swung out of the road, the wagon careering wildly on two
wheels. Sproul crossed the corner of some ploughed land, swept down
a length of picket-fence, and came into his own lane, up which the
horse staggered, near the end of his endurance. The wagon swung and
came to grief against the stone hitching-post at the corner of the
porch. Cap'n Sproul, encumbered still with buckets and bag and
trumpet, floundered over the porch rail, through a tangled mass of
woodbine vines, and into the arms of his distracted wife.

For five minutes after she had supported him to a chair she could
do nothing but stare at him, with her hands clasped and her eyes
goggling, and cry, "Aaron, Aaron, dear!" in crescendo. His sole
replies to her were hollow sounds in his throat that sounded like
"unk!"

"Where have you been?" she cried. "All gurry, and wet as sop? If you
are hurt what made 'em let their Chief come home all alone with that
wild hoss? Aaron, can't you speak?"

He only flapped a muddy hand at her, and seemed to be beyond speech.
There was a dull, wondering look in his eyes, as though he were trying
to figure out some abstruse problem. He did not brighten until a team
came tearing up to the gate, and a man with a scoop fireman's hat
on came running to the porch. The man saluted.

"Chief," he said, with the air of an aide reporting on the field of