Page:Life Amongst the Modocs.djvu/52

 with a

quiet laugh as the boat touched the sand, and said, " Chalk that." These were the first words I had ever heard him utter.

The solemn-faced ferryman tied his boat in a second, and, stepping boldly up under the nose of the tall man, said fiercely :

"Look here, what do you play me for? Do you think I m a Chinaman? You high-toned, fine-haired gamblers don t play me not much, you don t!"

"Don t want to play you, my friend."

" Then pay me. Why don t you pay me, and be off?"

u Haven t got the tin. Can t come to the centre ! Haven t got the dust. Can t liquidate. That s the reason why."

And here the good-natured tall gentleman again tapped the sand with his boot, and looked down at the river and at the bullying ferryman under his nose.

" Then leave your coat ; leave your your pistol, till you come again."

The tall man shifted his cloak from his right arm to his left. The ferryman fell back toward his boat. Sailors know the signs of a storm.

" Look here," began the tall man, mildly, " I crossed here yesterday, did I not ? I gave you a whole cart-wheel, did I not ? a clean twenty dollar, and told you to keep the change and use it in cross ing poor devils that were out of tin. You don t know me now with no mule and no catenas