“Keep back, can’t you?” he exclaimed while the young keeper approached his side; “who ’s going to catch fish with your lanky shadow across the water?”
Will was up in arms instantly.
“Do ’e think I doan’t knaw my business? Theer ’s my shadder ’pon the bank a mile behind you; an’ I didn’t ope my mouth till you’d fished the stickle to the bottom and missed two rises.”
This criticism angered the elder man, and he freed his tailfly fiercely from the rush-head that held it.
“Mind your own affairs and get out of my sight, whoever you are. This river’s not what it used to be by a good deal. Over-fished and poached, and not looked after, I’ll swear.”
Thus, in ignorance, the sportsman uttered words of all most like to set Will Blanchard’s temper loose—a task sufficiently easy at the best of times.
“What the hell d’ you knaw ’bout the river?” he flamed out. “And as to ’my affairs,’ ’t is my affairs, an’ I be water-bailiff, an’ I’ll thank you for the number of your ticket—so now then!”
“What’s become of Morgan?” asked the other.
“He ’m fust, I be second; and ’t is my job to take the license numbers.”
“Pity you’re such an uncivil young cub, then.”