“He’s cut his stick, though, as far as we are concerned,” added a third, a dapper little fellow, who stood by Prosper’s chair. “I’m glad he’s gone before he learned too much.” “He knows enough now,” said the major, “but I don’t believe he’ll do us any harm. He isn’t any common kind of boy, and we never could have kept him in hand. I tell you, he’ll be bossing a crowd of his own before a great while.” “But I mean to have the use of him for a while first,” said Prosper, “if I can only lay my hands on him!” “Better not try,” said the major. “He may come back of his own accord,” said the third man. “You hold your breath till he does,” kindly remarked the major. It was a doleful sort of conference; and the high opinion of Barnaby Vernon’s, _alias_ Jack Chills’s, capacity in their peculiar line which that trio entertained was expressed in language decidedly too powerful to be reported. CHAPTER II AN UNEXPECTED DUCKING Just about the time that Barnaby Vernon sat down to his first breakfast at his hotel, old Gershom Todderley, the fat and crusty miller of Ogleport, stood, with his hands in his pockets, halfway between the dam and the sawmill, jerking wheezy, angry sentences at the head of his Irish foreman. “Mister Murphy, I say. Those rascally boys again. They’ve put up another spring-board. Twenty times I’ve forbidden ’em to bathe in my pond. Saw it off, sir. Close up. They’ll be here again this afternoon. So’ll I, sir. Saw it off. We’ll see, sir.” And the wheezy miller put on all the dignity that he knew how, as he turned away towards his own breakfast, although the only reply from the dusty-looking Mr. Murphy was a subdued and doubtful: “’Dade, an’ I’ll do that same, the day, sir.” The moment his employer was fairly out of ear-shot, however, a droll expression crept across the merry face of the Irishman. “’Dade, an’ I’m glad the owld curmudgeon didn’t know I put it there mesilf. Sure, an’ the lake’s betther for ’em, but it’s a mile away, and the pond’s clane and handy. It’ll spile the fun for the byes, but ordhers is ordhers. Anyhow, I’ll have some fun of me own wid ’em. They’ll niver suspect owld Pat of layin’ a thrap for ’em.” It evidently went to the heart of the miller’s foreman to spoil fun of any kind, but he went straightway to the grist-mill for a hand-saw, and then, after a sharp look around, to be sure that he was not observed, he made a deep cross-cut on the under side of the long pine plank which he had so carefully set for the convenience of the young bathers of Ogleport. The cut was close in, towards the frame of the old flume by which the plank was supported, and, while no one would have noted or suspected it, the thin bit of pine remaining on the surface was not a great deal more than was required to sustain the weight and apparent “spring” of the plank itself.