"Thar in
the cabing behind those thar pines. Old Tantrum air my old man."
The man from the settlements thanked her and strode off. He was fairly
vibrant with youth and personality. As he walked along he whistled and
sang and turned handsprings and flapjacks, breathing in the fresh,
cool air of the mountains.
The air around the still was like wine.
Jemina Tantrum watched him entranced. No one like him had ever come
into her life before.
She sat down on the grass and counted her toes. She counted eleven.
She had learned arithmetic in the mountain school.
A MOUNTAIN FEUD
Ten years before a lady from the settlements had opened a school on
the mountain. Jemina had no money, but she had paid her way in
whiskey, bringing a pailful to school every morning and leaving it on
Miss Lafarge's desk. Miss Lafarge had died of delirium tremens after a
year's teaching, and so Jemina's education had stopped.
Across the still stream, still another still was standing; It was that
of the Doldrums. The Doldrums and the Tantrums never exchanged calls.
They hated each other.
Fifty years before old Jem Doldrum and old Jem Tantrum had quarrelled
in the Tantrum cabin over a game of slapjack. Jem Doldrum had thrown
the king of hearts in Jem Tantrum's face, and old Tantrum, enraged,
had felled the old Doldrum with the nine of diamonds. Other Doldrums
and Tantrums had joined in and the little cabin was soon filled with
flying cards.
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