Father and son walked away, one behind the other, like a man and his dog, and there was no word said between them. Across the Stony Bottom, Red Wull, scowling with bared teeth at David, joined them. Together the three went up the bill to the Grange. In the kitchen M'Adam turned. “Noo, I'm gaein' to gie ye the gran'est thrashin' ye iver dreamed of. Tak' aff yer coat!” The boy obeyed, and stood up in his thin shirt, his face white and set as a statue's. Red Wull seated himself on his haunches close by, his ears pricked, licking his lips, all attention. The little man suppled the great ash-plant in his hands and raised it. But the expression on the boy's face arrested his arm. “Say ye're sorry and I'll let yer aff easy.” “I'll not.” “One mair chance--yer last! Say yer 'shamed o' yerself'!” “I'm not.” The little man brandished his cruel, white weapon, and Red Wull shifted a little to obtain a better view. “Git on wi' it,” ordered David angrily. The little man raised the stick again and--threw it into the farthest corner of the room. It fell with a rattle on the floor, and M'Adam turned away. “Ye're the pitifulest son iver a man had,” he cried brokenly. “Gin a man's son dinna haud to him, wha can he expect to?--no one. Ye're ondootiful, ye're disrespectfu', ye're maist ilka thing ye shouldna be; there's but ae thing I thocht ye were not--a coward. And as to that, ye've no the pluck to say ye're sorry when, God knows, ye might be. I canna thrash ye this day. But ye shall gae nae mair to school. I send ye there to learn. Ye'll not learn--ye've learnt naethin' except disobedience to me--ye shall stop at hame and work.” His father's rare emotion, his broken voice and working face, moved David as all the stripes and jeers had failed to do. His conscience smote him. For the first time in his life it dimly dawned on him that, perhaps, his father, too, had some ground for complaint; that, perhaps, he was not a good son. He half turned. “Feyther--” “Git oot o' ma sight!” M'Adam cried. And the boy turned and went. Chapter VI. A LICKING OR A LIE THENCEFORWARD David buckled down to work at home, and in one point only father and son resembled--industry. A drunkard M'Adam was, but a drone, no. The boy worked at the Grange with tireless, indomitable energy; yet he could never satisfy his father. The little man would stand, a sneer on his face and his thin lips contemptuously curled, and flout the lad's brave labors. “Is he no a gran' worker, Wullie? 'Tis a pleasure to watch him, his hands in his pockets, his eyes turned heavenward!” as the boy snatched a hard-earned moment's rest. “You and I, Wullie, we'll brak' oorsel's slavin' for him while he looks on and laffs.” And so on, the whole day through, week in, week out; till he sickened with weariness of it all.