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with an odd effect of being entirely alone. He looked like a wild thing at bay.

“No,” he said between his teeth. Baldwin half rose. “What's that you say, you young gutterspawn?”

“No. That’s not my work. The Boss wouldn’t tell me to do it. Take them off yourself.”

Baldwin sprang to his feet; for the moment he was really mad. He had not counted on being defied before all the station hands. He unsnapped the stirrup-leather from the saddle with one hand and gripped Tony’s shoulder with the other. “I’ll teach you who’s boss here, if I have to cut your heart out. Take that!———”

He struck blindly, with his full strength, again and again. Tony was silent under the first two blows, but after that he writhed fruitlessly, screaming as a horse does when it is caught in a wire fence—horrible gurgling sounds. Nobody dared to interpose, indeed Baldwin was not a safe man to speak to just then. It did not last long; the swinging stirrup-iron caught Tony on the side of the head and he fell “like a clubbed rabbit,” as one of the men said afterwards.

“’E’s killed ’im!” gasped Alf Bulstrode.

Baldwin dropped the stirrup-leather and stood uncertain for a moment. Walters, the stockman, came and stood over him. He was a big man, and he looked rather dangerous. “That’s enough,” he said briefly.

Baldwin smiled—an ugly smile, full and slow, which spoke of satisfied lust. “Yes, he’s had his lesson. He’s shamming now; you’d best leave him alone.”

He walked away towards the Quarters, and Walters picked Tony up and carried him to the Hut. The blood was pouring from the cut on his forehead; Walters washed it. It was three-cornered, just missing the temple and going down almost to the corner of the eye.