"What did he do?" asked Mac, hurriedly.
Buckhurst laughed in that hearty way of his. Said he,--
"I'll wager you a stack of hay agin them books yander you couldn't guess in a week now. What d'ye think it was? Ho! ho! Why, why, the little rascal shoved me into the canawl!"
"Shoved you into the canal!" echoed I, while Mac, looking first at him, then at me, finally burst into a peal of laughter, shouting the while,--
"Bravo! There's your 'experience' philosophy, Ned Blount! Catch me teaching milksops again! Go on, Buckhurst, tell us all about it."
"Yes," said Mr. Buckhurst, apparently quite pleased to see that we laughed with him. "It don't look like it was in the nature of things, somehow, does it? Fact, though, he did indeed. Shoved me right in, so quick I didn't know what the Devil was the matter, until I soused kersplash! and see him taking out over the drawbridge like mad."
"When was that, Mr. Buckhurst?"
"Jest inside of a month ago, Sir, one night."
"Sapperment, Ned! that was the time of the 'herb Pantagruelion'!-- Well, what were you doing on the canal at that hour?" asked Mac, slyly.
"No, you needn't, now,--I see you wink at him,--honor bright. I'd been up to town, to take a mess o' clams at Giberson's, with maybe a sprinklin' of his apple-jack,--nothing else,--and I was on my way home,--to Skillman's tavern at the dépôt, you know,--and I'd jest stopped a piece, and was a-standing there, looking at the moon in the water, when he tipped me over. I tell you, I was mad when I crawled out wet as a rat; and if I'd ketched him then, you may depend upon it, I'd 'a' given his jacket a precious warming. As I said, he run off, but jest as I turned towards the tavern, I see him a-coming back, kinder wild-like; so I slipped behind a lumber-pile, hoping he might come over the bridge, so I could lay my fingers on him. The moon was about its highest, so I could see his face, plain as day,--white,--skim-milk warn't a circumstance to it,--and his eyes wide open as they could stretch. I tell you, he was wild! He looked up and down a bit, mumbled somethin' I couldn't make out, and then what do you think that boy did? Why, he jumped in, clothes and all, bold as a lion,--plainly to save me from drowning, and me all the time a-spyin' at him from behind a lumber-pile! He was sarching for me, I knowed, for he swum up and down jest about there for the space maybe of a quarter of an hour. And when he give it up at last, and come out, he kinder sunk down on the tow-path, and I heard him say plain enough, though he only whispered it,--jest like a woman actor I see down to York oncet, playin' in Guy something or other,--she was a sort of an old gypsy devil,--says he, 'I am a murderer, then!' Thinks I, 'Sonny, all but the murderer!' And as he stood up again, he 'peared to suffer so, his face was so white, and his knees so shaky, that I says to myself, 'Dan, you've carried the joke far enough.' So I sings out to him, and comes out from behind the lumber-stack, but, Lord bless ye! he jest peeped round over his shoulder oncet, gave a kind of chokin' scream like, and put out up the road as if the Devil was after him. I knowed it warn't no use to follow him, so I got on a dry shirt and went to bed. The next day I went home, and I'd mighty near forgot all about it, only today I came to see Dr. Thorne for somethin' to do my cold good, and he wantin' to know how I ketched it brought the whole matter back again."