"That's my spring, Nan Bryerson," he warned her dictatorially.

The girl looked up and scoffed. Hers was a face made for scoffing: oval
and finely lined, with a laughing mouth and dark eyes that had both the
fear and the fierceness of wild things in them.

"Shucks! it ain't your spring any more'n it's mine!" she retorted.
"Hit's on Maje' Dabney's land."

"Well, don't you muddy it none," said Thomas Jefferson, with threatening
emphasis.

For answer to this she put one brown foot deep into the pool and
wriggled her toes in the sandy bottom. Things began to turn red for
Thomas Jefferson, and a high, buzzing note, like the tocsin of the bees,
sang in his ears.

"Take your foot out o' that spring! Don't you mad me, Nan Bryerson!" he
cried.

She laughed up at him and flung him a taunt. "You don't darst to get
mad, Tommy-Jeffy; _you've got religion_."

It is a terrible thing to be angry in shackles. There are similes--pent
volcanoes, overcharged boilers and the like--but they are all
inadequate. Thomas Jefferson searched for missiles more deadly than dry
twigs, found none, and fell headlong--not from the rock, but from grace.
"_Damn!_" he screamed; and then, in an access of terrified remorse: "Oh,
hell, hell, hell!"