a leetle yerb-tea on ye, ennyhow."

She started back into the room, and Rufe rose at once. This cruelty
should not be practiced upon him, whatever might betide him at the
tanyard. He set out at a brisk pace. He had no mind to be long
alone in the woods since his strange adventure down the ravine, or
he might have hid in the underbrush, as he had often done, until
other matters usurped his mother's medicinal intentions.

When Rufe reached the tanyard, Birt was still at work. He turned
and looked eagerly at the juvenile ambassador.

"Did Nate gin ye a word fur me?" he called sonorously, above the
clamor of the noisy bark-mill.

"He say he'll be hyar ter-morrer by sun-up!" piped out Rufe, in a
blatant treble.

A lie seemed less reprehensible when he was obliged to labor so
conscientiously to make it heard.

And then compunction seized him. He sat down by Tennessee on a pile
of bark, and took off his old wool hat to mop the cold perspiration
that had started on his head and face. He felt sick, and sad, and
extremely wicked,--a sorry contrast to Birt, who was so honest and
reliable and, as his mother always said, "ez stiddy ez the
mounting." Birt was beginning to unharness the mule, for the day's
work was at an end.

The dusk had deepened to darkness. The woods were full of gloom. A