Green Fancy | Page 5

blamed old fool knows what he's doing, hitting it up like that over a wet
road. There'll be a double funeral in this neck of the woods if anything
goes wrong," he reflected. Still shaking his head, he faced the closed
door of the Tavern.

A huge, old-fashioned lantern hung above the portal, creaking and
straining in the wind, dragging at its stout supports and threatening
every instant to break loose and go frolicking away with the storm.
The sound of the rain on the clap-board roof was deafening. At the
lower end of the porch the water swished in with all the velocity of a
gigantic wave breaking over a ship at sea. The wind howled, the
thunder roared and almost like cannon-fire were the successive crashes
of lightning among the trees out there in the path of fury.
There were lights in several of the windows opening upon the porch;
the wooden shutters not only were ajar but were banging savagely
against the walls. Even in the dim, grim light shed by the lantern he
could see that the building was of an age far beyond the ken of any
living man. He recalled the words of the informing sign-post:
"Established in 1798." One hundred and eighteen years old, and still
baffling the assaults of all the elements in a region where they were
never timid!
It may, in all truth, be a "shindy," thought he, but it had led a gallant
life.
The broad, thick weather-boarding, overlapping in layers, was brown
with age and smooth with the polishing of time and the backs, no doubt,
of countless loiterers who had come and gone in the making of the
narrative that Hart's Tavern could relate. The porch itself, while old,
was comparatively modern; it did not belong to the century in which
the inn itself was built, for in those far-off days men did not waste time,
timber or thought on the unnecessary. While the planks in the floor
were worn and the uprights battered and whittled out of their pristine
shapeliness, they were but grandchildren to the parent building to
which they clung. Stout and, beyond question, venerable benches stood
close to the wall on both sides of the entrance. Directly over the broad,
low door with its big wooden latch and bar, was the word "Welcome,"
rudely carved in the oak beam. It required no cultured eye to see that
the letters had been cut, deep and strong, into the timber, not with the
tool of the skilled wood carver but with the hunting knife of an
ambitious pioneer.

A shocking incongruity marred the whole effect. Suspended at the side
of this hundred-year-old doorway was a black and gold, shield-shaped
ornament of no inconsiderable dimensions informing the observer that
a certain brand of lager beer was to be had inside.
He lifted the latch and, being a tall man, involuntarily stooped as he
passed through the door, a needless precaution, for gaunt, gigantic
mountaineers had entered there before him and without bending their
arrogant heads.

CHAPTER II
THE FIRST WAYFARER LAYS HIS PACK ASIDE AND FALLS IN
WITH FRIENDS
The little hall in which he found himself was the "office" through
which all men must pass who come as guests to Hart's Tavern. A steep,
angular staircase took up one end of the room. Set in beneath its upper
turn was the counter over which the business of the house was
transacted, and behind this a man was engaged in the peaceful
occupation of smoking a corn-cob pipe. He removed the pipe, brushed
his long moustache with the back of a bony hand, and bowed slowly
and with grave ceremony to the arrival.
An open door to the right of the stairway gave entrance to a room from
which came the sound of a deep, sonorous voice, employed in what
turned out to be a conversational solo. To the left another door led to
what was evidently the dining-room. The glance that the stranger sent
in that direction revealed two or three tables, covered with white cloths.
"Can you put me up for the night?" he inquired, advancing to the
counter.
"You look like a feller who'd want a room with bath," drawled the man
behind the counter, surveying the applicant from head to foot. "Which
we ain't got," he added.

"I'll be satisfied to have a room with a bed," said the other.
"Sign here," was the laconic response. He went to the trouble of
actually putting his finger on the line where the guest was expected to
write his name.
"Can I have supper?"
"Food for man and beast," said the other patiently. He slapped his palm
upon a cracked call-bell, and then looked at the fresh name on the page.
"Thomas K. Barnes, New York,"