"Oh! is that so!" jeered the party threatened, cheerfully; "well, make your mind easy about that, for I'm to be found any old day, and I know the boss place to adjourn for a fight. Frank, shall we go on our way? That errand of yours in Clifford is important, and we've got no more time to waste with these duffers."
"Huh! talk's cheap, with some fellers," shouted Lef, angrily. "Make up your mind you've just got to pay me the full value of that boat. I'll go and see your father about it. My word against yours, and Bill here will back me up against Frank. You did it on purpose! You hated my boat because it beat you every time last winter, that's what."
"You wouldn't dare," replied Lanky; for like every one connected with a lawyer's household, going to law was the last thing he wanted to do.
"Won't, hey? You just wait and see," declared Lef, bitterly. "My word's as good as yours, and there ain't no witness, you know!"
"Oh, yes there is," said a voice just then; and the boys turned to survey with some surprise a figure that stood close by, near the shore of the island.
He was apparently a tramp, though his bearded face just then bore a smile, and did not look unprepossessing at all.
"I happened to be fishin' right here, through a hole in the ice," this party continued, as he advanced, "and I saw all the racket. That feller Lef deliberately swung his boat across the bow of the other. He done it on purpose. He saw he was gettin' beat, and wanted to bust everything up higher than a kite. I'm right glad he was the only one to get it in the neck."
Lef scowled at the speaker as though he felt he would like to spring upon him, and do some hammering with his fists. But the fisherman seemed to be quite a husky chap, although privation had stamped a look of hunger on his bronzed face.
Lanky stared at him, too, a puzzled expression coming over his countenance, as though he could not for the life of him tell where he had seen this stranger before.
"And who are you?" demanded Lef, still glaring at the other as if he considered him an interloper. "I don't ever remember meeting you before. Guess you must belong in Clifford. Better keep there, and not come nosing around Columbia where you ain't wanted."