THAT evening after supper, as Paul sat writing in his room, his employer came to the door and looked in.

“Hello!” was his half-tentative greeting, as he slouched in and took a chair near the table. “I've just been talkin' to my sister. She's powerful tickled over the effect on Eth' of your trip over the mountain. She says she's actually astonished. It seems like the gal's goin' to quit 'er foolishness. I was gettin' powerful sick of it myself. It's hard enough to know your own end's got to come some time ahead without dyin' every time anybody else kicks the bucket.”

“I'm glad to know that Miss Ethel feels better.” Paul dipped his pen and continued to write.

Hoag crossed his fat legs and, reaching down to his right shoe, he began to fumble the string. “I want to see you about a certain matter,” he began, clearing his throat. “I don't know as you will consider it any o' my business exactly, but it is something that I thought you ought to be prepared for.”

“What is it?” Paul put his pen into the rack and leaned toward the speaker.

“Why, I was talkin' to Bob Mayburn this mornin'. You know his land joins mine on the west. He had a few acres to rent an' was afraid he wouldn't find a tenant; but he has hooked one at last, and who under the shinin' sun do you reckon he got?”

“I haven't the slightest idea,” Paul answered.

“Jeff Warren,” Hoag said, his eyes bluntly fixed on the young man's face in a groping stare of pleased curiosity.

“Oh!” Paul exclaimed. “I didn't know he was anywhere near Grayson.”

“He ain't got here yet,” Hoag went on, a note of vindictive harshness creeping into his voice. “The triflin' skunk has been over in Alabama with yore ma an' her sister tryin' to make a livin' farmin', but without any sort o' headway. He wrote May-burn that he was up to his eyes in debt over thar—plumb busted—an' that they'd all three got sick an' tired o' livin' among strangers, an' was anxious to git back here whar they are acquainted. May-burn's got a comfortable new frame cottage on his land that's empty, but knowin' that Jeff couldn't pay for it, he wrote 'im that it was already rented. Thar is an old log cabin close to the cottage, an' accordin' to the agreement Jeff an' his lay-out is to occupy that. It's tough on a feller of Jeff's high an' mighty pride, but it is as good as he deserves.”

Paul made no reply, a shadow lay across his sensitive face. He took up the pen again, but he did not begin to use it.

“I knowed you wouldn't like it a bit,” Hoag continued, unctuously. “Here you are risin' as fast as a dog can trot, gittin' the respect an' favorable opinion of the best folks in the county, an' it's tough to have a thing like that revived right when you ain't lookin' for it. I've no doubt you wouldn't have settled here if you had thought such a thing would happen.”

“Warren is a free man.” Paul's brows met, and his eyes held a far-off gleam. “He has as much right here as I.”

“Of course, of course,” Hoag admitted; “but he's got a nasty, quarrelsome disposition, an' accordin' to some o' his friends he still holds a big grudge ag'in' you. It was humiliatin' the way you plugged 'im an' left 'im to die like a pig in the woods. You see, whar I'm interested is this: I want you to keep on workin' without interruption, an' knowin' what a hot temper you've got yourself—well, I see that you an' him will jest have to hitch ag'in. I'm sorry he's comin' back myself. I never liked 'im. It is not often that I belittle myself by takin' notice of a triflin' clodhopper like him; but he's been in my way several times, an' may step in ag'in, for all I know.”

Paul drew a ledger toward him and opened it. “I'm glad you told me this,” he said. “I've got a lot of work to do before bedtime. I know you will excuse me if I go at it.”

“Oh yes, oh yes!” Hoag rose, staring in a puzzled, thwarted sort of way. “I don't want to hinder you. I'll be goin'. I just thought I'd throw out a hint about the matter. It is well to be prepared for trouble if it has to come, an'—an' a man like Warren is sure to pick a row.”

Hoag lingered a moment, but seeing that the young man was at work he left the room.