"Wot do YOU know about it?" interrupted her husband quickly, in
querulous warning. "Wot are ye talkin' about?"

"You leave me alone, Hiram! I ain't goin' to let that young feller
get popped off without a show, or without knowin' jest wot he's got to
tackle, nohow ye kin fix it! And can't ye see he's bound to go, whatever
ye says?"

Mr. Tarbox saw this fact plainly in Brice's eyes, and hesitated.

"The most that I kin tell ye," he said gloomily, "is the way the gal
takes when she goes from here, but how far it is, or if it ain't a
blind, I can't swar, for I hevn't bin thar myself, and Harry never comes
here but on an off night, when the coach ain't runnin' and thar's no
travel." He stopped suddenly and uneasily, as if he had said too much.

"Thar ye go, Hiram, and ye talk of others gabblin'! So ye might as well
tell the young feller how that thar ain't but one way, and that's the
way Harry takes, too, when he comes yer oncet in an age to talk to his
own flesh and blood, and see a Christian face that ain't agin him!"

Mr. Tarbox was silent. "Ye know whar the tree was thrown down on the
road," he said at last.

"Yes."

"The mountain rises straight up on the right side of the road, all hazel
brush and thorn--whar a goat couldn't climb."