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Mayfield seemed to consider.

"'Bout a half-hour befo' that doe come out o' the swamp," he answered.

"How'd you spot me?"

Sandy Jim appeared to ignore this second question. "Ain't it funny, Sam," he said in a tone of utmost friendliness, "how fashions change? I was thinkin' about it while I was settin' down yunder by the swamp obsarvin' natur' an' listenin' to the birds a-singin'."

"What's that got to do with what I'm asking you?" growled the game warden.

"Well, you see, Sam, it's like this. A while ago everybody was smokin' them cigarettes that come in a brown paper—I dun'no what you call 'em, not bein' a smoker myself. Then, by an' by, white cigarettes got to be the fashion, an' now there's only two men in this part o' the county that smokes browns—you an' Pete Mason. Henry Harvey down at the store was tellin' me the other day that he wouldn't never sell any browns ef 'twarn't fer you an' Pete."

"Well?" snapped the warden.

"Well," Sandy Jim drawled, "I'm a old hound but I got a pretty good nose. I don't smoke myself, but I kin smell a cigarette 'most a hundred yards ef the wind's right. When I got a whiff of one of the old browns—they got a sweetish tang to