Our traveller
could not withhold the retort.
"Ay, indeed! and in some other respects too, not less important, if I am
to judge from your look and bearing. But you mistake your man, let me
tell you. I am not the person whom you can play your pranks upon with
safety, and unless you will be pleased to speak a little more
respectfully, our parley will have a shorter life, and a rougher ending,
than you fancy."
"It would scarcely be polite to contradict so promising a young
gentleman as yourself," was the response; "but I am disposed to believe
our intimacy likely to lengthen, rather than diminish. I hate to part
over-soon with company that talks so well; particularly in these woods,
where, unless such a chance come about as the present, the lungs of the
heartiest youth in the land would not be often apt to find the echo they
seek, though they cried for it at the uttermost pitch of the pipe."
The look and the language of the speaker were alike significant, and the
sinister meaning of the last sentence did not escape the notice of him
to whom was addressed.
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