They're laying for Harkless partly for revenge and partly because they daren't do anything until he's out of the way." The girl gave a low cry with a sharp intake of breath.

"Ah! One grows tired of this everlasting American patience! Why don't the Plattville people do something before they----" "It's just as I say," Briscoe answered; "our folks are sort of used to them.

I expect we do about all we can; the boys look after him nights, and the main trouble is that we can't make him understand he ought to be more afraid of them.

If he'd lived here all his life he would be.
You know there's an old-time feud between the Cross-Roads and our folks; goes way back into pioneer history and mighty few know anything of it.
Old William Platt and the forefathers of the Bardlocks and Tibbses and Briscoes and Schofields moved up here from North Carolina a good deal just to get away from some bad neighbors, mostly Skilletts and Johnsons--one of the Skilletts had killed old William Platt's two sons.
But the Skilletts and Johnsons followed all the way to Indiana to join in making the new settlement, and they shot Platt at his cabin door one night, right where the court-house stands to-day.

Then the other settlers drove them out for good, and they went seven miles west and set up a still.