The Thread Man was on his feet, and his eyes were no laughing matter.
He gripped his chair back, and leaned toward Jimmy. "You walked me into
that cattle-guard on purpose!" he cried.

Silence.

"You led me into that boiler, and fixed the oil at the end!"

No answer.

"You mauled me all over the woods, and loaded those sandwiches
yourself, and sored me for a week trying to chop down a tree with a pet
coon chained in it! You----! You----! What had I done to you?"

"You wouldn't drink with me, and I didn't like the domned, dinky,
little pleated coat you wore," answered Jimmy.

One instant amazement held sway on the Thread Man's face; the next,
"And damned if I like yours!" he cried, and catching up a bowl half
filled with broth he flung it squarely into Jimmy's face.

Jimmy, with a great oath, sprang at the Boston man. But once in his
life Dannie was quick. For the only time on record he was ahead of
Jimmy, and he caught the uplifted fist in a grip that Jimmy's use of
whiskey and suffering from rheumatism had made his master.

"Steady--Jimmy, wait a minute," panted Dannie. "This mon is na even wi'
ye yet. When every muscle in your body is strained, and every inch of
it bruised, and ye are daubed wi' soot, and bedraggled in oil, and he's
made ye the laughin' stock fra strangers by the hour, ye will be juist
even, and ready to talk to him. Every minute of the nicht he's proved
himself a mon, and right now he's showed he's na coward. It's up to ye,
Jimmy. Do it royal. Be as much of a mon as he is. Say ye are sorry!"

One tense instant the two friends faced each other.

Then Jimmy's fist unclenched, and his arms dropped. Dannie stepped
back, trying to breathe lightly, and it was between Jimmy and the
Thread Man.

"I am sorry," said Jimmy. "I carried my objictions to your wardrobe too
far. If you'll let me, I'll clean you up. If you'll take it, I'll raise
you the price of a new coat, but I'll be domn if I'll hilp put such a
man as you are into another of the fiminine ginder."

The Thread Man laughed, and shook Jimmy's hand; and then Jimmy proved
why every one liked him by turning to Dannie and taking his hand.
"Thank you, Dannie," he said. "You sure hilped me to mesilf that time.
If I'd hit him, I couldn't have hild up me head in the morning."

Chapter IV

WHEN THE KINGFISHER AND THE BLACK BASS CAME HOME

"Crimminy, but you are slow." Jimmy made the statement, not as one
voices a newly discovered fact, b