The moment his employer was fairly out of ear-shot, however, a droll expression crept across the merry face of the Irishman.
“’Dade, an’ I’m glad the owld curmudgeon didn’t know I put it there mesilf. Sure, an’ the lake’s betther for ’em, but it’s a mile away, and the pond’s clane and handy. It’ll spile the fun for the byes, but ordhers is ordhers. Anyhow, I’ll have some fun of me own wid ’em. They’ll niver suspect owld Pat of layin’ a thrap for ’em.”
It evidently went to the heart of the miller’s foreman to spoil fun of any kind, but he went straightway to the grist-mill for a hand-saw, and then, after a sharp look around, to be sure that he was not observed, he made a deep cross-cut on the under side of the long pine plank which he had so carefully set for the convenience of the young bathers of Ogleport.
The cut was close in, towards the frame of the old flume by which the plank was supported, and, while no one would have noted or suspected it, the thin bit of pine remaining on the surface was not a great deal more than was required to sustain the weight and apparent “spring” of the plank itself.
“There,” said Pat, as he put away his saw, “I hope the first feller that puts his fut on that same’ll be a good swimmer. It’s twinty fate o’ wather he’ll drop in, not an inch the less.”
But Pat’s scrutiny of the “surrounding country,” keen as it was, had not been as complete as he imagined.
On the opposite shore of the deep and capacious mill-pond, where the bulrushes had grown so thickly up to the edge, and the willows had matted the sweeping boughs so very densely, every blackbird had left his perch some ten minutes earlier.
The birds had been better posted than Pat Murphy, and knew very well why they had winged it away so suddenly and unanimously, but Pat had failed to take the hint. Little he was thinking of those chattering loafers, the blackbirds, but every one of them had his own beady little eye on the stealthy movements of Zeb Fuller.
Not so very young or so small, either, was Zeb, only somewhat short and “stocky” in build, and the slight cast in one of his twinkling gray optics did not at all interfere with the perfection with which he squinted through the willows at what was going on at the spring-board.
“Going to saw it off, is he?” muttered Zeb. “Well, Pat Murphy never’d ha’ done that unless the old man made him. No, he’s just a-sawin’ under it. If that ain’t mean! Well, no, not exactly mean, but if Pat reckons he’ll catch any of our crowd in that trap, he’s a sold Irishman, that’s all. Soon as he clears out, I’ll cut around and give the boys the word. There won’t one on ’em set foot on that there plank—you see if they do.”