He proceeded still more gently.  “The owners of the land which you’ve been using as your own in this town, have written to inquire about it, and have put the business in my hands.”

Ganew was silent for a moment.  Then trying to speak in an indignant tone, he said,—­

“Using as my own!  I don’t know what you mean, Mr. Parson.  I have paid my taxes all regular, and I’ve got the title-deeds of the land, every acre of it.  I can’t help whoever’s been writing to you about it; it’s all my land.”

But his face twitched with nervous excitement, and the fright and anger in his serpent-like black eyes were ugly to see.

“No, Mr. Ganew, it is not,” said the Elder; “and you know it.  Now you jest listen to me; I know the whole truth about the matter, an’ all the time you spend fightin’ off the truth’ll be wasted, besides addin’ lyin’ to havin’ been a thief.  The owners of the land’ll be here, I expect before long; but they’ve put it all in my hands, an’ I can let you off if I choose.”

“Let me off!  What the devil do you mean?” said Ganew.

“Why, you don’t suppose there’s goin’ to be nothin’ said about all the thousands o’ dollars’ wuth of sugar you’ve carried off here, do”—­

The next thing Elder Kinney knew he was struggling up to his feet in the middle of the road; he was nearly blinded by blood trickling from a cut on his forehead, and only saw dimly that Ganew was aiming another blow at him with his heavy-handled ox-goad.

But the Frenchman had reckoned without his host.  Elder Kinney, even half stunned, was more than a match for him.  In a very few minutes Ganew was lying in the bottom of his own ox-cart, with his hands securely tied behind him with a bit of his own rope and the Elder was sitting calmly down on a big boulder, wiping his forehead and recovering his breath; it had been an ugly tussle, and the Elder was out of practice.

Presently he rose, walked up to the cart, and leaning both his arms on the wheel, looked down on his enemy.

The Frenchman’s murderous little black eyes rolled wildly, but he did not struggle.  He had felt in the first instant that he was but an infant in the Elder’s hands.

“Ye poor, miserable, cowardly French,—­sinner ye,” said the Elder, struggling for an epithet not unbecoming his cloth.  “Did you think you was goin’ to get me out o’ yer way’s easy’s that, ’s I dare say ye have better folks than me, before now!”

Ganew muttered something in a tongue the Elder did not understand, but the sound of it kindled his wrath anew.

“Well, call on your Master, if that’s what you’re doin’, ’s much’s you like.  He don’t generally look out for anybody much who’s so big a fool’s you must be, to think you was goin’ to leave the minister o’ this parish dead in a ditch within stone’s throw o’ houses and nobody find you out,” and the Elder sat down again on the boulder.  He felt very dizzy and faint; and the blood still trickled steadily from his forehead.  Ganew’s face at this moment was horrible.  Rage at his own folly, hate of the Elder, and terror which was uncontrollable, all contended on his livid features.