in the road. On his
big square nose he wore a pair of curious spring-bowed glasses with
black rims. For a moment he looked at me through these glasses, raising
his chin a little, and then, deliberately wrinkling his nose, they fell
off and dangled at the length of the faded cord by which they were hung.
There was something almost uncanny about this peculiar habit of his and
of the way in which, afterward, he looked at me from under his bushy
gray brows. This was in truth the very man of the neighbourhood
portrait.

"I am a new settler here," I said, "and I've been interested in looking
at your wonderful hedge."

The old man's eyes rested upon me a moment with a mingled look of
suspicion and hostility.

"So you've heard o' me," he said in a high-pitched voice, "and you've
heard o' my hedge."

Again he paused and looked me over. "Well," he said, with an
indescribably harsh, cackling laugh, "I warrant you've heard nothing
good o' me down there. I'm a skinflint, ain't I? I'm a hard citizen,
ain't I? I grind the faces o' the poor, don't I?"

At first his words were marked by a sort of bitter humour, but as
he continued to speak his voice rose higher and higher until it was
positively menacing.

There were just two things I could do--haul down the flag and retreat
ingloriously, or face the music. With a sudden sense of rising
spirits--for such things do not often happen to a man in a quiet country
road--I paused a moment, looking him square in the eye.

"Yes," I said, with great deliberation, "you've given me just about the
neighborhood picture of yourself as I have had it. They do say you are
a skinflint, yes, and a hard man. They say that you are rich and
friendless; they say that while you are a just man, you do not know
mercy. These are terrible things to say of any man if they are true."

I paused. The old man looked for a moment as though he were going to
strike me with his stick, but he neither stirred nor spoke. It was
evidently a wholly new experience for him.

"Yes," I said, "you are not popular in this community, but what do
you suppose I care about that? I'm interested in your hedge. What I'm
curious to know--and I might as well tell you frankly--is how such a
man as you are reputed to be could grow such an extraordinary hedge. You
must have been at it a very long time."

I was surprised at the effect of my words. The old man turned
partly aside and looked for a moment along the proud and flaunting