"By jocks," exclaimed a rude, half-grown fellow, "that clip would have felled an ox." "Do you think he's dead?" asked the slattern girl, now thoroughly alarmed at the consequences of the blow she had given. "Dead!" cried Haldane, catching the word, and, pushing all aside, he knelt over his prostrate foe. "Water, bring water, for God's sake!" he said eagerly, lifting up the unconscious man. It was brought and dashed in his face. A moment later, to Haldane's infinite relief he revived, and after a bewildered stare at the crowd around him, fixed his eyes on the youth who had dealt the blow, and then a consciousness of all that had occurred seemed to return. He showed his teeth in impotent rage for a moment, as some wild animal might have done, and then rose unsteadily to his feet. "Go back to your work, all on ye," thundered the foreman, who, now that the sport was over, was bent on making a great show of his zeal; "as for you two bull-dogs, you shall pay dearly for this; and let me say to you, Mister Haldane, that the pious dodge won't answer any longer." A moment later, with the exception of flushed faces and excited whisperings, the large and crowded apartment wore its ordinary aspect, and the machinery clanked on as monotonously as ever. Almost as mechanically Haldane moved in the routine of his labor, but the bitterness of despair was in his heart. He forgot that he would probably be discharged that day; he forgot that a dark and uncertain future was before him. He only remembered his rage and profanity, and they seemed to him damning proofs that all he had felt, hoped, and believed was delusion. CHAPTER XLI MRS. ARNOT'S CREED When Haldane entered the cottage that evening his eyes were bloodshot and his face so haggard that Mr. Growther started out of his chair, exclaiming: "Lord a' massy! what's the matter?" "Matter enough," replied the youth, with a reckless oath. "The worst that I feared has happened." "What's happened?" asked the old man excitedly. "I've been fighting in the work-room like a bull-dog, and swearing like a pirate. That's the kind of a Christian I am, and always will be. What I was made for, I don't see," he added, as he threw himself into a chair. "Well, well, well!" said Mr. Growther dejectedly, "I was in hopes she'd git here in time; but I'm afeered you've just clean backslid." "No kind of doubt on that score," replied the young man, with a bitter laugh; "though I now think I never had very far to slide. And yet it all seems wrong and unjust. Why should my hopes be raised? why should such feelings be inspired, if this was to be the end? If I was foreordained to go to the devil, why must an aggravating glimpse of heaven be given me? I say it's all cruel and wrong. But what's the use! Come, let's have supper, one must eat as long as he's in the body." It was a silent and dismal meal, and soon over. Then Haldane took his hat without a word. "Where are you goin'?" asked Mr. Growther, anxiously.