“Don’t talk to me about him!” snarled Davis suddenly. “He’s one of the bunch I’ve got it in for, all right. A detective! Why, he couldn’t detect anything.”
Rodney Grant could not help feeling a slight bond of sympathy between himself and these lads who bore a strong dislike for the very fellows who had accorded him such unfair and shabby treatment. True, there was something about them which gave him a sensation of distrust, yet they also were outcasts in a way, and he could not help thinking that their misfortune might not be wholly merited. Of a generous nature, he believed every person had redeeming qualities, and nothing irritated him more than the common impulse of the masses to jump on a fellow who was down.
“You’ll have to come over and see my old hang-out sometime, Grant,” said Lander. “If the stove is still there, I imagine the camp might be chinked up a little and made pretty comfortable for some fellers who wanted to sneak off and have a little quiet fun. Of course everybody around here is watching me, and I’ll have to make a bluff at walking a chalk-line; but I’m going to be careful, and any lobster who sticks his nose into my business will stand a chance of getting it pinched.”
“That’s the talk!” cried Davis. “I don’t blame you a bit.”
Although he wondered what all this sort of conversation meant, Rod, following the true Texas code of manners, refrained from asking questions. If they wished to take him into their confidence, well and good; but, if they did not, he would not pry.
After a time they resumed their skating, and Rodney, still further elated, found that he was making decided progress. He even ventured forth from the cove in the direction of Bass Island, but Spotty skated after him and warned him to keep away from the southern end of the island, where there were always “breathing holes” in the ice.
“There are currents come round both ways and meet there,” said Davis, “so it’s never really safe, even in the middle of the winter. Eliot broke through all by his lonesome last winter and come mighty near drownding.”
“Which would have been a terrible loss to the community,” laughed Lander, skating backward near at hand.
“What have you got against him?” questioned Spotty. “He didn’t have anything to do with handing you that swift poke you got.”
“Oh, no; but he always seemed to think himself too good for association with common people. Just because his father happens to have the dough, he has a way about him that I can’t stand. You know what he did to you.”