CHAPTER I.
JUNE FEVER.
The firm of Minot & Doane sat on the doorsill of its store on Lake Miwasa smoking its after-supper pipes.
It was seven o'clock of a brilliant day in June.

The westering sun shone comfortably on the world, and a soft breeze kept the mosquitoes at bay.
Moreover, the tobacco was of the best the store afforded; yet there was no peace between the two.

They bickered like schoolboys kept indoors.
"How many link-skins in the bale you made up today ?" asked Peter Minot.
"Three-seventy-two," his young partner answered in a surly tone that was in itself a provocation.
"I made it three-seventy-three," said Peter curtly.
"What's the difference ?" demanded Ambrose Doane.
"Seven dollars," said Peter dryly.
"Well, you can claim the extra one, can't you," snarled Ambrose, "and make an allowance if it's found short ?" "That's not the way I like to do business!" "Too bad about you!" The older man frowned darkly, clamped his teeth upon his pipe, and held his tongue.
His silence was an additional aggravation to the other.

"What do you want me to do," he burst out with an amount of passion absurdly disproportionate to the matter at issue, "cut it open and count it over and bale it up again ?" "To blazes with it!" said Peter.

"I want you to keep your temper!" "I'm sick of this!" cried Ambrose with the wilful abandon of one hopelessly in the wrong.