The hero of the day! It was Andy Hayes, son of old Mr. Hayes of the Grammar School, _protégé_, for his stepmother's sake, of Jack Rock the butcher. He had nearly gone back abroad in failure; he had nearly taken on the shop. He stood now the winner in the fight, triumphant in a contest which he had never sought, from the idea of which he would have shrunk as from rank folly and rank treason. Into that fight he had been drawn unconsciously, insensibly, irresistibly, by another man's doings and by his own, by another man's character and by the character that was his. His conscious part had always been to help his adversary; his adversary unconsciously worked all the while for him. What his adversary had bestowed in ready kindness stood as nothing beside what he had given unwittingly, by accident, never thinking that the results of what he did would transcend the limits of his own fortunes, and powerfully mould and shape another's life. Whom Andy loved he had conquered; whom he followed he had supplanted. The cheers and applause which had rung out for him last night had, a short year ago, been the property of another. His place was his by conquest. So mused Belfield, father of the vanquished, as he sat silent while the merry voices sounded in his ears. A notable example of how each man finds his place, in spite of all the starts, or weights, or handicaps with which he enters on the race! These things tell, but not enough to land an unsound horse at the post before a sound one. The unsound falters; slowly and surely the sound lessens the gap between them. At last he takes the lead. Then the cry of the crowd is changed, and he gallops on to victory amidst its plaudits. Jack Rock had made no mistake when he entered his horse and put up the stakes. The hero of that day, the victor in that fight, yes! Against his wishes, without premeditation, so he stood. There was another day of strife, another fight to be waged, one that could not be unmeant or unconscious. Here the antagonism must come into the open, must be revealed to the mind and heart of the fighter. Here he must not only follow, he must himself drive out; he must not only supplant, he must strive to banish, nay, to annihilate. There was a last citadel which, faithful to faithlessness and true against desertion, still flew the flag of that loved antagonist. Would the flag dip and the gates open at his summons? Or would the response to his parley be that, though the faithless might be faithless, yet the faithful must be faithful still? Before that answer his arm would be paralyzed. "Well, I'm sure you'll deserve your success, Mr. Hayes," said Mrs. Belfield, rising and preparing to retreat indoors. "I hear you've worked very hard and made an extremely good impression."