"We need not quarrel, Phil," said he, after a short pause. "We have always been good friends; let us be so still. I saw a scuffle between you and Mr. Waterford over at the creek."
"And you thought I had the worst of it."
"I saw him pitch you out of the boat."
"If you had staid a moment longer in sight, you would have seen me pitch him out afterwards."
I defined and explained my position, and justified it as well as I was able. Miss Collingsby had appealed to me for help, and in rendering it, under the circumstances, I did not feel disposed to let the ownership of the yacht defeat my good intentions to save her from the wiles of a villain.
"Do you call Ben Waterford a villain?" he demanded.
"The dictionary does not afford me any better word to express my opinion of him. I wish he was the only one I knew."
"Do you refer to me?"
I explained myself more fully on this point, and the junior partner of our house mildly expressed his rage. I suppose his stinging conscience did not permit him to do so in a more determined manner. I told him that Mr. Collingsby was in possession of all the facts relating to his defalcations, both of the money and the notes of the firm. He bit his lip in silence for a few moments, as if arranging his mental forces for an assault upon me.
"Phil, you have made another stupid blunder," said he. "As I have told you plainly before, you are insufferably conceited. You think you know enough for two men, when you know just half enough for one. That's what's the matter. You have made a pretty kettle of fish."