"Law," announced Hiram, "has got more wrinkles in it than there are in a fake mermaid's tail. Do you know what kind of a game they've gone to work and rigged up on your friend, the human curling-tongs? The widder has got him to doin' chores again. It seems that she was always strong on keepin' him doin' chores. He's peckin' away at that pile of wood that's fitted and lays at the corner of the barn. He's luggin' it into the woodshed, and three sticks at a time make his legs bend like corset whalebones. Looks like he's got a good stiddy job for all winter--and every once in a while she comes out and yaps at him to prod him up." "Well, that gets him taken care of, all right," said the Cap'n, with a sigh of relief. "Yes, he's taken care of," remarked Hiram, dryly. "But you don't understand the thing yet, Cap'n. On top of that woodpile sets Bat Reeves, lappin' the end of a lead-pencil and markin' down every time old water-skipper there makes a trip." "Well, if it amuses him, it takes care of him, too," said the Cap'n. "Looks innercent, childlike, and sociable, hey?" inquired the showman, sarcastically. "Well, you just listen to what I've dug up about that. Bat Reeves has bought the strip of ground between the woodpile and the shed door by some kind of a deal he's rigged up with the widder, and with Alcander Reeves advisin' as counsel. And he's got a stake set in the middle of that piece of ground and on that stake is a board and on that board is painted: 'Trespassing Forbidden on Penalty of the Law.' And him and that woman, by Alcander Reeves's advice, are teaming that old cuss of a husband back and forth acrost that strip and markin' down a trespass offence every time he lugs an armful of wood." The Cap'n blinked his growing amazement. "And the scheme is," continued Hiram, "to have old law shark of an Alcander, as trial justice, sentence the livin' skeleton on each separate trespass offence, fine and imprisonment in default of payment. Why, they've got enough chalked down against him now to make up a hundred years' sentence, and he's travellin' back and forth there as innercent of what they're tryin' to do as is the babe unborn." "Can they do any such infernal thing as that in law?" demanded the Cap'n. "Blamed if I know. But I never see northin' yet they couldn't do in law, if they see you comin' and got the bind on you." "Law!" roared Cap'n Sproul, clacking his hard fist on the table rim. "Law will tie more knots in a man's business than a whale can tie in a harpoon-line. There ain't no justice in it--only pickin's and stealin's. Why, I had a mate once that was downed on T wharf in Bos'n and robbed, and they caught the men, and the mate couldn't give witness bonds and they locked him up with 'em, and the men got away one night and wa'n't ever caught, and the result was the mate served a jail sentence before they got his bonds matter fixed. It was just the same as a jail sentence. He had to stay there."