His enjoyment of the spectacle I furnished, as he sat with his arms folded on the table, shaking his head at me and hugging himself, had a malignity in it that made me tremble. As I watched him in silence, he put his hand into the corner at his side, and took up a gun with a brass-bound stock.

     "Do you know this?" said he, making as if he would take aim at me. "Do you know where you saw it afore? Speak, wolf!"

     "Yes," I answered.

     "You cost me that place. You did. Speak!"

     "What else could I do?"

     "You did that, and that would be enough, without more. How dared you to come betwixt me and a young woman I liked?"

     "When did I?"

     "When didn't you? It was you as always give Old Orlick a bad name to her."

     "You gave it to yourself; you gained it for yourself. I could have done you no harm, if you had done yourself none."