Mountain advocate. (Barbourville, Ky.) 1904-1935, 1916-02-11
There's One Thing I've Got TO Ask
You. Why Did You Swear You
Didn't Care for Me in Court?"

table. She even caught the glitter of
his teeth as a snarling smile parted
his lips.
Then a rifle spoke behind her-a
rifle in the hands of the man who had
dragged himself to the firing line, and
with his foot on the threshold Jim
Fletcher reeled backward and rolled
lumberingly down the steps to the
ground
You got HIM" she screamed. You
got him, Anse!"
1t had been perhaps five minutes
since she had called out to the men
in the road, but it seemed to her that
she had sustained a long siege. She
saw the man who had fed crossing
the fence and disappearing. Then
very slowly she rose and turned to
the room again.
Anse Havey was lying on his face
and the gun with which he had killed
Jim Fletcher lay by his side, but his
POSTURE was so rigid and his limbs
so motioaless that the girl caught at
her breast and reeled backward. She
would have fallen had she not been
supported by the table. Had the fight
been lost after all?
Slowly. and in a daze of reaction
and fright, she moved forward and
turned his body over and laid her ear
to his heart.
1t was still beating. The rife had
only jolted his weak and pain-racked
body into unconsciousness, and as she
held his head to her breast her eyes
went about the room, where the pal
lid light was stealing now, and by the
mantel she saw hanging the horn that
Jerry Everson had given her.
Why had she not thought OF that be-
fore? she asked herself accusingly.
Why had she not sent its call for
help out across the hills long ago?
Then there came back TO her mind the
words of the mountain man when he
had brought it over and had initiated
the Havey battle-call.
Don't never blow tibet unlcssen ye
wants ter start hell. When them calls
goes out acrost the mountains every
Havey tibet kin tote a guns got ter
git up an come"
IL ever there had been a time when
every Havey should come it was this
time. She laid Anse's head once more
on the cushions and went to the man
tel. Then, standing in the door. she
drew long breath.
She set the horn to her lips and
blew. Out across the melting vague
ness of the dim world fioated the three
long blasts and the three short ones.
She waited q little while and blew
again. That sigma could not reach
Anse Havey's own house, because the
ridge would send It echoing back In a
shattered wave Of sound. II would be
better heard to the east, and after a
time there came back to her waiting
ears, very low and distant, yet very
clear, an answer.
II came from the house OF Milt Nc,
Briar and Juanita's heart, torn and
anxious as il was, leaped. for she
knew that for the first time in the
memory of man the Havey call to
arms had been heard and was being
answered by chief of the McBriars,
and that as fast as horses could carry
them he and his men would bring sue.
cor.
An hour later. when the mountain
slopes were unwilling in miracles OF
iridescence and tender color, young
Milt McBriar and his escort flung
themselves from their steaming
mounts.
The girl was weeping incoherently
over an insensible figure and grooming
70 II as a mother sings TO quiet a
wskeful child. and on the noor ct her