jest went past here?"

The farmer bored him strangely a moment with his little gimlet eyes,
snorted out a laugh, clapped his reins, and started on.

"I heard ye was a joker!" he shouted back, his beard trailing over
his shoulder as he turned his head.

"There ain't no joke to this!" roared the skipper. But the man kept
on.

Another patron emerged from the bridge, digging from his trousers
pocket.

"You spoke it, didn't ye?" demanded the skipper. "Chain lightnin'
on wheels. Who is he?"

The man grinned amiably and appreciatively.

"Quite a hand to hector, ain't ye, toll-keeper? He was goin' so fast
I didn't know him, neither." He drove on, though the Cap'n hobbled
after him, shouting strong language, in which the parrots joined.

"You needn't try to make me think that there ain't nobody who don't
know the Kun'l," was the retort the man flung over his shoulder.

"Nice and accommodatin' class of paternage that's passin'," growled
the Cap'n, kicking an inoffensive chair as he came back to his
platform. "They talk about him as though he was Lord Gull and ruler
of the stars. Jest as though a man that had sailed deep water all