Lescott did not overhear the conversation in full, but he saw the old
man's face work with suppressed passion, and he caught Samson's louder
reply.

"When them folks gets hyar, Uncle Spicer, I'm a-goin' ter be a-settin'
right out thar in front. I'm plumb willin' ter invite 'em in." Then,
the two men turned toward the house.

Already the other clansmen had disappeared noiselessly through the
door or around the angles of the walls. The painter found himself alone
in a scene of utter quiet, unmarred by any note that was not peaceful.
He had seen many situations charged with suspense and danger, and he
now realized how thoroughly freighted was the atmosphere about Spicer
South's cabin with the possibilities of bloodshed. The moments seemed
to drag interminably. In the expressionless faces that so quietly
vanished; in the absolutely calm and businesslike fashion in which,
with no spoken order, every man fell immediately into his place of
readiness and concealment, he read an ominous portent that sent a
current of apprehension through his arteries. Into his mind flashed all
the historical stories he had heard of the vendetta life of these
wooded slopes, and he wondered if he was to see another chapter enacted
in the next few minutes, while the June sun and soft shadows drowsed so
quietly across the valley.

While he waited, Spicer South's sister, the prematurely aged crone,
appeared in the kitchen door with the clay pipe between her teeth, and
raised a shading hand to gaze off up the road. She, too, understood the
tenseness of the situation as her grim, but unflinching, features
showed; yet even in her feminine eyes was no shrinking and on her face,
inured to fear, was no tell-tale signal beyond a heightened pallor.