Hoarse laughter from behind the Head told that the shaft had gone home. Fat George held a deprecating hand to heaven. "Now eark to that, my God!" he squeaked. "I risk my blessed neck for em. I'm the only man o the lot got the guts to stand up to him. I tells him straight, I says--'We've lost our leader and our lugger in your service, my lord,' says I, 'and now you got to--well square it.'" "'--well square it!'" snorted the giant. "That's a pretty way to talk to a gentleman, ain't it?" Fat George pointed a derisive finger at him. "Can't forget he was a gamekeeper!" he tittered. "Touch his at and all, didn't you, Red Beard?" "And wish I'd never stopped touchin it!" shouted the giant. "Blasted young fool that I were!--Thought I'd take a short cut to fortune, same as the rest.--And where's it landed me?" He swept his hand around. "Heark to Red Beard!" giggled Fat George. "Quite the Methody man, ain't he?" A gust of passion darkened the giant's face. He surged through the water towards the boat. "--well square it!" he foamed. "I'll--well square _you_, you lump o lard with the heart of a maggot!" He stopped, steadying down to a fierce scorn. "And he would ha--well squared it only for you messin about with that blasted knife o your'n be'ind him." "He would ha--well squared it only for you knockin the blasted knife up!" shrilled the fat man. "That's the best _you_ can do. Pretty set for a man to be 'sociated with." He bent over his hand; his locks fell about his face; and he rocked to and fro like a weeping woman. The sound of angry voices brought others trooping round the Head. Some slopped along in the water, others trailed along the edge. The eyes of all were down, hunting for prey. Kit, watching them with shuddering heart, recalled that passage in his mother's favourite Sunday book where Christian, at the mouth of Hell, heard a company of fiends coming to meet him. He found himself envying Christian. An honest fiend was an honest fiend; but these were men! It was their humanity, the sense of his kinship with them, that seemed to make his heart collapse. And their names! Toadie, the squat brute, with the front teeth; Whitey, the albino, peering and prying; One-eye, Humpy, Bandy and the rest--all labelled like dogs from some physical deformity. Once and for all they slew in the boy's mind the Romance of Crime. Now he understood what the old Book meant about the Wages of Sin. Death indeed; death in life. He read it in their faces. Yes; it was all true. These men _had_ done evil, and they _had_ come forth unto the Resurrection of Damnation. And not so very long ago he had wished to be one such!--a highwayman, a smuggler, a gentlemanly villain of some sort, very devil-may-care and gallant, robbing the rich, helping the poor, waving a scented handkerchief to the ladies as he rode to Tyburn, debonair to the last. Now he was face to face with criminals in real life. And what was their distinguishing feature?--_Filth_.