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When he left the train at Sunkhaze station he was still worrying as to whether the assistant traffic-manager would be able to beat the O. & O. road on the grain contract. In thinking it over about a month later it occurred to him that he had dropped all outside affairs right there on that station platform. In the first place the mosquitoes and black flies were waiting.
The hoarse cries rang out on the crisp night wind, and at the close one of those queer, splitting, wide-reaching, booming crackles, heard in the winter on big waters, spread across the lake from shore to shore. "Even the old lake's with us!" a woodsman shouted. Connick and his men had finished what they had come to Sunkhaze to do. They climbed aboard the huge ice-craft.
Then the great idea locked in Parker's head became apparent to the population of Sunkhaze. "Gorry!" said the postmaster. "If that young feller hain't got a horse there that'll beat anything that even Colonel Gid Ward himself ever sent across Spinnaker Lake!"
"I understand everything better than I did, Parker," returned Colonel Ward, feelingly, turning away wet eyes. The astonishment in Sunkhaze settlement when the doughty ex-tyrant was borne through to the "down-country" train, accompanied by Parker and Joshua, was so intense that only the postmaster recovered himself in season to put a few leading questions.
All we'll git out of it hereabouts is a black eye in the newspapers it bein' held up that Sunkhaze ain't a safe place to settle in. And all that truck you know! Furthermore, from things you've dropped to me, Mr. Parker, I knew you were playin' kind of a lone hand and a quiet game here.
"That they are, sir. A good many of us own houses here in Sunkhaze and there's more than one way for Colonel Gideon Ward to get back at us. Several of the boys came to me last night and wanted to quit. I understand that the postmaster has been talking to you and he must have told you some of the things that the old man done and hasn't been troubled about, either by his conscience or the law.
"Your client doesn't seem to be in an especially amiable and lamb-like mood this morning," said Parker. The lawyer dusted the snow from his garments. "Beautiful disposition, old Gid Ward has!" he snarled. "Left me here to walk sixteen miles to a railroad-station, and never offered to settle with me." "You forget the 'Poquette and Sunkhaze Air-Line," Parker smiled.
"Land, ain't he a savage one?" he gasped, as he hastened back into his realm of pots. He transferred his news to the amazed cookee. "They tell me," he magnified, so as not to be outdone in sensationalism, "that this feller has licked every man that they've turned him loose on between here and Sunkhaze, an' now is just grittin' his teeth a-waitin' for the colonel."
Connick," said Parker, dryly, "I thank you for the evening's entertainment, and now that you have done your duty to Colonel Ward I suppose I may return to Sunkhaze." His heart sank as he thought of the poor Swogon weltering in the depths of the lake. "Oh, ye've got to come along with us!" beamed Connick. "Colonel Ward has sent for ye!"
He swung his ax menacingly. "My name is Parker," replied the engineer. "That is my property yonder. You will have to let my men pass to it." The giant looked squarely over the engineer's head into the crowd of Sunkhaze men. "You all know me," he cried, "an' if ye don't know me ye've heard of me! I reckon Dan Connick is pretty well known hereabouts. Wal, that's me.
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