A Pagan of the Hills

me the inrush of warm air to peaks and valleys that had been tight-frozen. Between precipices echoed the crash of ice sliding loose and

into irritability so that, under the strain of almost superhuman exertion, they threatened to break. Brent was not of their bl

sticks," he announced bluntly to Brent near midnight. "But hit hain't in reason ter expect men ter

scratched his head. "Wa'al he mout. Thar's somethin' masterful in thet breed

rough with their jobs. They halted before Acup and one of them spoke somewhat shame-facedly: "I disgusts ter quit on a

hyar job's consarned most likely thar won't be no termorrer. Old man Mc

g from Acup cautioned him that this was a tactless line and one of the men answered shortly, "Pay h

e will-an' I knows ye've got hit. Ef anybody qu

ngs, so totally different from any he had heard that day, that it was a paradox of sound. In the first place it was a woman's voice and here were only sw

a shower of sparks into the wet darkness, he

tood with a lance-like straightness, very tall, very pliant, and as he stared with a fixity which would have amounted to imp

res exquisitely modeled, in no wise masculine or heavy, yet full of dominance. Duskily-lashed eyes of dark violet were brimming with a cont

n unusual though harmonious blending of feminine allurement-and masculine spirit. Though in height she approached th

lent for a moment with her eyes raining so resolute a fire that

uch an emotion the ordinary woman's throat would have caught with a sob and her eyes would have filled with tears. It was not so with Alexander. Her note only softened into a deeper gravity. "But he lays over thar an' I mistrusts he's a-dyin' ternight. He wouldn't suffer me ter tarry by hi

n generously, prodigally even, of their effort and it had not been for hire. Yet under the

on Alexander, "I've

l straight and, for a woman unusually broad, though not too broad for grace. She was an Amazon in physique yet so nicely balanced of proportion that one felt more conscious of delicate litheness than of size. As her breath came fast

r go down to the dam, and one of those who had dropped

re work left in me yit atter all," and he started back, stumbling with the ache of tired bo

hat he could but his activities had always seemed to be on the less str

the woman who had assumed a man's responsibility became a pattern of action. In the flare and the shadow he watched it, fasc

mythology-this turmoil of emergency effort through a fire-lit night of storm and flood; fig

utskirts of action no longer sufficed, but with an ele

rerunner of dawn. Alexander had held to the sticking-point the quailing energies of spent men for more than six a

ked about him in a dazed fashion out of giddy eyes. He saw Alexander wiping the steaming moisture from her brow with the

ne afore, we've done saved thet timber," she said slowly. "An' no men eve

r do now," said Parson Acup, "unl

head with a vigorous and

rin' an' whether he's got a chanst ter live, but--" she paused abruptly and her voice fell, "thar's a spring-branch over thar by my house. Ye kin mighty nig

Alexander, but wharfore does ye seek ter hev us send mo

In them were violet fir

red. "Them logs is rafted. Ef they goes out on this flood-tide, I

tly. "Any tide thet would bust thet dam would sartain shore rip them rafts inter fragments. Ef they goes out a-tall they goe

now," the girl assured him. "An'

t striding away with her face toward the pale east and despite