"Wal, Matt'll go to jail knowin' that he's done a right smart of damage sence he's been layin' around loose in the woods, an' if I am busted up, I shall have the same comfortin' knowledge. Fly-rod has seed me afore. I captured his friend, the canvas canoe—"
"Where is he now?" I interrupted.
"Out there in the bresh, hid away so snug that nobody won't ever find him," was the taunting reply. "Them guns is hid out there too, but not in the same place. Matt come purty near gettin' you as well as the canoe. I heard him say that he almost overtook Joe while he was a runnin' through the woods with you in his hand."
"Yes; and Matt would have got me over the head if he had been able to run a little faster."
"An' Joe would have got a hickory over the back, I tell you," said the old scow. "How do you reckon that that skiff I sent to the bottom of the pond feels by this time?"
"You didn't send him to the bottom of the pond," said I, angrily. "You tried hard enough, but you didn't make it."
