“What do you want of me?” demanded Kingman. “Keep off, or I’ll shoot you.”
“Wagh! wagh! You will, eh? Blaze away, if you can. Come, you might as well knock under and go ’long docile, for there’s no airthly help for yer.”
As he said this the canoe shot rapidly ahead again, almost upon him.
The latter again dove, and came up directly under the stern of the canoe, where he hoped he would not be discovered. He felt he would rather be shot in the water than fall into the hands of the renegade.
Hearing a movement in the boat, and fearing discovery, he closed his feet together to sink again; but, before his head disappeared beneath he was caught by the hair, and in spite of every resistance he could offer, was pulled into the canoe.
As he was pulled head foremost into the canoe, he fully expected to be brained upon the spot, and more than once his head rang with the expectation of the blow. He lay for a moment on his face, without moving. In his feverish, exhausted condition, what resistance could he offer to the herculean strength of the renegade? His clothes were wet, and clinging to his shivering body, and a more miserable being probably never existed than he was at this moment.
Astonished at the silence of his enemy, he raised his head and looked up. Instantly one of the loudest, heartiest, most ringing laughs he ever heard greeted his ears.
“Wal, Kingman, you’re the most doleful-looking rat I ever heard on! Why, who’d you take me for? Ha! ha! ha!”
“Why, Abram Moffat, is this you?”
“No, it’s me. How are you? Give us your paw for old acquaintance.”