"That's a purty way he's got of doin' business, I do think. He's a trifle the meanest feller I ever seed, Dave is, an' if I don't pay him fur it afore he's a great many weeks older, I'll just play myself out a tryin'. If me an' him works together we kin get them fifty dollars as easy as fallin' off a log; but he can't arn 'em by hisself, an' he shan't, nuther." This was the way Dan Evans talked to himself, as he trudged through the woods with his rifle on his shoulder, after his unsuccessful attempt to overhear what passed between his brother and Don and Bert Gordon; or, rather, after his failure to find out what it was that brought Don and Bert to the cabin. He _did_ overhear what passed between them, but he did not learn anything by it. Of course that made him angry. A good many things had happened that day to make him angry, and he had gone off in the woods by himself to think and plan vengeance. "Bein' the man of the house I've got more right to them fifty dollars nor Dave has," thought Dan, "an' if he don't give me half of 'em, he shan't see a cent of 'em hisself. Wouldn't I look nice loafin' around in these yere clothes while Dave was dressed up like a gentleman an' takin' his ease? I'll bust up them traps of his'n faster'n he kin make 'em. I'll show him that I'm the boss of this house now that pap's away, no matter if them Gordon fellers is a backin' on him up. I've larned a heap by listenin'. I heard Dave tell the ole woman that he's goin' to make three dollars a dozen outen them quail. I didn't larn nothing this arternoon, howsomever. Them fellers must a seed me lookin' through the cracks, kase they didn't tell him what they was agoin' to tell him when they fust come up to the fence." Dan walked about for an hour or more, talking in this way to himself. The squirrels frisked and barked all around him, but he did not seem to hear them. He was so busy thinking over his troubles that he scarcely knew where he was going, until at last he found himself standing on the banks of a sluggish bayou that ran through the swamp. The stream was wide and deep, and near the middle of it and opposite the spot where Dan stood, was a little island thickly covered with briers and cane. It was known among the settlers as Bruin's Island. Dan knew the place well. Many a fine string of goggle-eyes had he caught at the foot of the huge sycamore which grew at the lower end of the island, and leaned over the water until its long branches almost touched the trees on the main shore, and it was here that he had trapped his first beaver. More than that, the island had been a place of refuge for his father during the war. He retreated to it on the night the levee was blown up by the Union soldiers, and spent the most of his time there until all danger of capture was past.