can't stay mad nine year."

"I'm madder now than I was then!" almost shouted the infuriated
mountaineer. "After they got your pap, I 'lowed I'd wait 'twel you was
fifteen. Then you'd be big enough to know how sweet revenge is. Heap
sweeter than sugar, ain't it?"

"Hark?" interjected Ralph, without replying. "Some one is comin' up
the road."

A trample of hoofs became audible, and presently a man mounted on a
mule, with a sack of corn under him, was to be seen approaching the
ambuscade.

Seated before him was a child of perhaps four or five, who laughed and
prattled to the man's evident delight. Old Granger's eyes shown with a
ferocious joy.

"That's him!" he exclaimed in tremulously eager tones. "He's got his
brat along. I wish ye could get 'em both, then there'd be an end of
the miserable brood for one while. Wait, boy--wait 'twel he gets to
the creek afore ye shoot. Think of your poor pap, when ye draw bead."

But Ralph's face did not betoken any kindred enthusiasm. He was tired
to death of hearing about the everlasting feud between the families.

If the Vaughns had fought the Grangers, it was equally certain that the
Grangers had been no whit behind in sanguinary reprisals. He
remembered seeing this same Jase Vaughn, now riding unsuspectingly
toward the loaded rifle, at a corn shucking once. Ralph then thought