“All the points of the transaction are closed,” said Major Jeffrey, ungraciously. There was more than the flush of the waning western sky on his face. He had already dined, and he was one of those wine-bibbers whom drink does not render genial, “I want to hear no more about it.” He turned to the table, and with a skilful cue sent one ball caroming against two others. “But you must hear what I have got to say, Major Jeffrey,” protested Hoxer. “I built that cross-levee for you to join your main levee, and done it well.” “And have been well paid.” “But you go and say at the store that I deviated from the line of survey and saved one furlong, seven poles, and five feet of levee.” “And so you did.” “But you know, Major, that Burbeck Lake had shrunk in the drought at the time of the survey, and if I'd followed the calls for the south of the lake, I'd had to build in four feet of water, so I drew back a mite--you bein' in Orleans, where I couldn't consult you, an' no time to be lost nohow, the river bein' then on the rise, an'----” “Look here, fellow,” exclaimed Major Jeffrey, bringing the cue down on the table with a force that must have cut the cloth, “do you suppose that I have nothing better to do than to stand here to listen to your fool harangue?” The anger and the drink and perhaps the consciousness of being in the wrong were all ablaze in the Major's eyes. The two were alone; only the darkling shadows stood at tiptoe at the open windows, and still the flushed sky sent down a pervasive glow from above. Hoxer swallowed hard, gulping down his own wrath and sense of injury. “Major,” he said blandly, trying a new deal, “I don't think you quite understand me.” “Such a complicated proposition you are, to be sure!” Hoxer disregarded the sarcasm, the contempt in the tone. “I am not trying to rip up an old score, but you said at Winfield's store--at the store--that I did not build the cross levee on the surveyor's line; that I shortened it----” “So you did.” “But as if I had shortened the levee for my own profit, when, as you know, it was paid for by the pole----” “You tax me with making a false impression?”