he
would have passed, when, as ill-luck would have it, the gleam on the
scales of the dead fish caught his eye, and he made a dead point at the
foot of the tree. He picked up the fish one by one; his eye and touch
told him that they had been alive and feeding within the hour.

Tom crouched lower along the branch, and heard the keeper beating the
clump. "If I could only get the rod hidden," thought he, and began
gently shifting it to get it alongside of him: "willow-trees don't throw
out straight hickory shoots twelve feet long, with no leaves, worse
luck." Alas! the keeper catches the rustle, and then a sight of the rod,
and then of Tom's hand and arm.

"Oh, be up ther', be 'ee?" says he, running under the tree. "Now you
come down this minute."

"Tree'd at last," thinks Tom, making no answer, and keeping as close as
possible, but working away at the rod, which he takes to pieces. "I'm in
for it, unless I can starve him out."

And then he begins to meditate getting along the branch for a plunge,
and scramble to the other side; but the small branches are so thick,
and the opposite bank so difficult, that the keeper will have lots of
time to get round by the ford before he can get out, so he gives that
up. And now he hears the keeper beginning to scramble up the trunk. That
will never do; so he scrambles himself back to where his branch joins
the trunk, and stands with lifted rod.

"Hullo, Velveteens, mind your fingers if you come any higher."

The keeper stops and looks up, and then with a grin says: "Oh! be you,
be it, young measter? Well, here's luck. Now I tells 'ee to come down at
once, and 't'll be best for 'ee."

"Thank 'ee, Velveteens, I'm very comfortable," said Tom, shortening the
rod in his hand, and preparing for battle.

"Werry well, please yourself," says the keeper, descending, however, to
the ground again, and taking his seat on the bank. "I bean't in no
hurry, so you med take your time. I'll larn 'ee to gee honest folk names
afore I've done with 'ee."

"My luck as usual," thinks Tom; "what a fool I was to give him a black!
If I'd called him 'keeper,' now, I might get off. The return match is
all his way."

The keeper quietly proceeded to take out his pipe, fill, and light it,
keeping an eye on Tom, who now sat disconsolately across the branch,
looking at the keeper--a pitiful sight for men and fishes. The more he
thought of it the less he liked it.

"It must be getting near second calling-ove