Well, that seemed reasonable, and Jibby said what we must do. We must crawl up through the willows and investigate. The only trouble was Rover. I couldn’t tie him to a tree because he would howl, and, if I dragged him through the willows, he would see the shanty-boat and bark, and, if I turned him loose, he would probably jump all around and go to the shanty-boat and scare the Tough Customer and the Rat into fits. But Jibby fixed that. He said the thing for me to do was to take Rover and go back and get Orph Cadwallader and Wampus’s uncle. So I went. Jibby and the boys crawled as close to the shanty-boat as they could, Indian fashion, and lay in the willows, and they were in luck, because the Tough Customer and the Rat were talking. “No, sir!” the Tough Customer was saying. “I don’t stay on any island where caretakers go around with shotguns, shooting them off any time of the day or night.” “I don’t see that you’ve got any kick to make about shotguns,” the Rat said, in his whining voice. “I’m the one that got shot at.” “I don’t care who got shot at,” the Tough Customer said. “Four or five barrels of cider wouldn’t pay me for getting my hide full of birdshot, not if it was the hardest cider on earth. And you don’t know that they hid the cider on this island--you only think so. It may be on any island in the whole river. You just forget that cider, pardner, and let’s get to hunting that treasure I know about.” “Well, it ain’t playing me square,” the Rat whined. “A bargain is a bargain, and the bargain was that, if I paid my money and bought this shanty-boat, you would help me find that cider first, and help me get away with it and sell it. And I as good as know it was on this island them barrels of cider was hid. And, if so, on this island is where we want to be.” “And get shot full of birdshot or, maybe, buckshot,” sneered the Tough Customer. “Why, man alive! just now after these island folks is all roused up is no time to hunt around on this island for a few pesky barrels of cider. They’ll all be carrying shotguns for the next month or so. No, sir! Now is the time to stay away from this island. We can come back later on if you want to, but now is the time to be hunting that land pirate’s treasure.” “You don’t know how much it is, and you don’t know where it is, and you don’t even know if there is any,” complained the Rat. “All right!” said the Tough Customer. “Maybe I know more than you think I do. Maybe I ain’t told you all I know yet. Maybe I thought I would just wait and see if you was a reasonable cuss and willing to do the wise thing, or if you was a sort of idiot that would want to hang around an island and get shot full of buckshot and bullets for a few barrels of no-account cider. How about that?” “’Tain’t right! ’Tain’t right!” the Rat complained. “Pardners ought to be fair and square and tell all. Next thing you’ll be saying you won’t split half and half.”