Page:Hugh Pendexter--The young timber-cruisers.djvu/432

 participate in them again. It will be printed over your signature.”

“Now, hear me!” roared Nace rising. “I don’t know what your game is, but your city bluff won’t go. I don’t know what you mean by my stealing school timber. It is just another cause for a slander suit—”

“Tut, tut, man. Cease being foolish,” impatiently advised Thaxter. “We have the very workmen you employed when you cut over that lot.”

Nace licked his dry lips in silence for a few moments, and then hoarsely announced, “If I’ve got over a line I’ll pay the shot. But you talk in riddles. I came here to discuss my Flat-Top ridge holdings.”

“I don’t want to buy your holdings,” said Thaxter. “Your timber is sparse and too high up the ridge. We have all we care for on that watershed.”

“But my eighty acres,” muttered Nace.

“If you mean the timber you have claimed against us, the courts will settle that title if you do not relinquish your claim within a day or so.”

“Never!” shouted Nace, now thoroughly enraged and bewildered. “You talk like a crazy