s persistent gaze,
advanced towards him across the deck of the Jasper B. and down the
gangplank, hand on hip, and called out sharply:

"Well, my friend, you will know me the next time you see me!"

The tall man turned without a word and walked back to the taxicab, the
occupants of which had watched this singular duel of looks in silence.
In the act of getting into the machine he face about again and said,
with a lift of the lip that showed two long, protruding canine teeth of
an almost saffron hue:

"I WILL know you again."

He spoke with a kind of cold hostility that gave his words all the
effect of a threat. Cleggett felt the blood leap faster through his
veins; he tingled with a fierce, illogical desire to strike the fellow
on the mouth; his soul stirred with a premonition of conflict, and the
desire for it. And yet, on the surface of things at least, the man had
been nothing more than rude; as Cleggett watched the machine make off
towards an isolated road house on the bayside he wondered at the quick
intensity of his own antipathy. Unconsciously he flexed his wrist in
his characteristic gesture. Scarcely knowing that he spoke, he
murmured:

"That man gets on my nerves."

That man was destined to do something more than get on Cleggett's
nerves before the adventures of the Jasper B. were ended.

CHAPTER IV

A BAD MAN TO CROSS

The isolated road house on the bay was a nondescript, jumbled,
dilapidated-looking assemblage of structures, rather than one house.
It was known simply as Morris's. It stood a few hundred yards west of
the end of the canal which opened into the bay and was about a quarter
of a mile from the Jasper B.

The canal itself was broad, straight, low-banked, and about
three-quarters of a mile in length. The town had thrown out a few
ranks of cottages in the direction of the canal. But these were all
summer bungalows, occupied only from June until the middle of
September. The solider and more permanent part of Fairport was well
withdrawn from the sandy, sedgy stretches that bordered on tidewater.

At the north and inland terminus of the quiet strip of water in which
the Jasper B. reposed was a collection of buildings including
bathhouses, a boathouse, and a sort of shed where "soft drinks" and sea
food were served during the bathing season. This place was known as
Parker's Beach and was open only during the summer.

Morris's was of quite a different character from Parker's Be