sketched. The waters were still as the footsteps of the oncoming
twilight, and, floating in a pool of soft purple, Deadman's Island
rested like a large circle of candle-moss.

"Have you ever been on it?" he asked as he caught my gaze centering
on the irregular outline of the island pines.

"I have prowled the length and depth of it," I told him, "climbed
over every rock on its shores, crept under every tangled growth of
its interior, explored its overgrown trails, and more than once
nearly got lost in its very heart."

"Yes," he half laughed, "it pretty wild; not much good for
anything."

"People seem to think it valuable," I said. "There is a lot of
litigation--of fighting going on now about it."

"Oh! that the way always," he said, as though speaking of a long
accepted fact. "Always fight over that place. Hundreds of years
ago they fight about it; Indian people; they say hundreds of years
to come everybody will still fight--never be settled what that
place is, who it belong to, who has right to it. No, never settle.
Deadman's Island always mean fight for someone."

"So the Indians fought amongst themselves about it?" I remarked,
seemingly without guile, although my ears tingled for the legend
I knew was coming.

"Fought like lynx at close quarters," he answered. "Fought, killed