“That ain’t funny,” the other rumbled.  “If I thought you meant to call a member of my family a heifer—­”

“You’ve called your wife worse ’n that.  I’ve heard you.”

“I meant everything I said.  She was an old catamount and—­”

“Prob’bly she was a fine woman.”  Jerry had a discourteous habit of interrupting.  “No wonder she walked out and left you flat—­she was human.  No doubt she had a fine character to start with.  So did I, for that matter, but there’s a limit to human endurance.”

“You don’t have to put up with me any longer than you want to,” Linton stormed, under his breath.  “We can get a divorce easy.  All it takes is a saw.”

“You made that crack once before, and I called your bluff!” Jerry’s angry face was now out-thrust; only with difficulty did he maintain a tone inaudible to the sick girl.  “Out of pity I helped you up and handed you back your crutches.  But this time I’ll let you lay where you fall.  A hundred dollars a dozen for lemons!  For a poor little sick girl!  You ’ain’t got the bowels of a shark!”

“It was your proposition!”

“It wasn’t!”

“It was!”

“Some folks lie faster ’n a goat can gallop.”

“Meaning me?”

“Who else would I mean?”

“Why don’t you call me a liar and be done with it?”

“I do.  It ain’t news to anybody but you!”

Having safely landed his craft below the rapids, ’Poleon Doret hurried back to his tent to find the partners sitting knee to knee, face to face, and hurling whispered incoherencies at each other.  Both men were in a poisonous mood, both were ripe for violence.  They overflowed with wrath.  They were glaring; they shook their fists; they were racked with fury; insult followed abuse; and the sounds that issued from their throats were like the rustlings of a corn-field in an autumn gale.  Nor did inquiry elicit a sensible explanation from either.

“Heifer, eh?  Drowned my own child, did I?” Tom ground his teeth in a ferocious manner.

“Don’t file your tusks for me,” Jerry chattered; “file the saw.  We’re goin’ to need it.”

“You men goin’ cut dat boat in two again?” ’Poleon inquired, with astonishment.

“Sure.  And everything we’ve got.”

It was Linton who spoke; there was a light of triumph in his eyes, his face was ablaze with an unholy satisfaction.  “We’ve been drawing lots for twenty minutes, and this time—­I got the stove!”

CHAPTER XVI

Once again Tom and Jerry’s skiff had been halved, once again its owners smarted under the memory of insults unwarranted, of gibes that no apology could atone for.  This time it had been old Jerry who cooked his supper over an open fire and old Tom who stretched the tarpaulin over his stove.  Neither spoke; both were sulky, avoiding each other’s eye; there was an air of bitter, implacable hostility.