The meeting, which was entirely unexpected, was a surprise to both of them. To tell the truth, Tom was more alarmed when the squatter emerged from the thicket than he would have been if the bear had made his appearance. Matt Coyle was very angry at the Mount Airy people on account of the indignities they had put upon him, and who could tell but that Tom Bigden himself was included in the list of those against whom he had threatened vengeance? The squatter seemed to read the thoughts that were passing in the boy’s mind, for as soon as he could speak he hastened to say:
“You needn’t be no ways skeary about meetin’ us. We ain’t forgot that you was the only one who said a kind word to us while we was down there”—here Matt gave his head a backward jerk intending, no doubt, to indicate the village of Mount Airy—“an’ of course we ain’t got nothing agin you.”
Tom drew a long breath of relief as he listened to these words. Matt wouldn’t do any thing to him, and neither would he injure any of his property.
“But as fur the rest of ’em, they had better watch out,” continued the man, in savage tones. “I shan’t forget ’em, an’ I’ll even up with them some day. It may be five year, an’ it may be ten; but I’ll even up with ’em.”
“What are you and your boys doing now?” inquired Tom. He did not like the way the squatter glared around him when he spoke of the village people, and he wanted to turn the conversation into another channel if he could.
Tom unexpectedly meets Matt Coyle.
“We ain’t doin’ nothin’,” was the surly reply, “’cause why, we ain’t got nothin’ to do with. We ain’t got a bite of meat in the house, an’ I was after that there b’ar when you fellers come up an’ skeared him away. So thinks I to myself, I’ll jest go down to the pond where their boats is, an’ I’ll take the best one of ’em an’ cl’ar out afore they gets back. Then I’d have somethin’ to do with.”
“Where would you go?”
“Up to Injun Lake. I’m the bulliest kind of a guide fur that neck of the woods, an’ so’s my two boys; but you see we ain’t got no boats, an’ we’re too poor to buy ’em.”