“Look out for the bulldog and the bear!” he warned. “They consumed two river-men last week! The bulldog tears ’em down, an’ the bear eats ’em!”
“What kind of a menagerie is this?” began the visitor, but Alex. gave the bulldog a touch with his foot, and the dog and the bear were in the middle of the space between the table and the stove, snarling fiercely, before the startled intruder could open the door. “Call the brutes off!” he added as Teddy began boxing the empty air.
“Don’t stand in the doorway!” Alex. warned, while Clay Emmett turned his face away so as not to betray his enjoyment of the situation. “It makes ’em mad to keep the door open! What do you want?”
The visitor stepped outside and beckoned to the boys through the glass panel. Alex. went out on the deck and stood waiting. The visitor was evidently a riverman, tall, muscular, heavy of hand and sullen of face. He wore rough clothing, neither clean nor whole, and his face was well covered by a bushy beard, light in color except around the mouth, where it was stained with tobacco. Alex. noted that he looked away whenever their eyes met for an instant.
“I’m Gid Brent, the riverman,” he said, in a moment, “and I’ve come to warn you boys against starting out alone, on the river in this boat.”
“That’s kind of you,” Alex. replied. “What’s the matter with the boat?”
“It is the river there’s something the matter with,” replied the other. “The water is high, and is pouring into all the old channels and ditches from Cairo to the Gulf. If you start out without a pilot, you’ll run into some bayou and end in a swamp, a couple of hundred miles from the main channel.”
“You’re a pilot, eh?” asked Alex., with a provoking grin.
“Yes; and I’m called the best on the river,” was the boasting reply.
“And you’re looking for a job?” Alex. continued, insinuatingly.