We worried on about his fear of the over-taxation of Belfast and the industrial North. I tried to get from him some definite account of the exact taxes which he feared. I tried to get him to explain how he proposed to fight, against whom he intended to fight, who might be expected to fight on his side. I do not think he got angry with me for my persistency, but his contempt for me steadily increased. I am not a business man and so I could not possibly, so he hinted, understand how they feel about the matter in Belfast. "But do you think," I said, "that your workmen will go out and be shot in order to save you from paying an extra penny in the pound income tax? That's what it comes to, you know, and I don't see why they should do it. They don't pay income tax, or for that matter death duties." Cahoon looked me full in the face for nearly half a minute without replying. Then he took out his watch and looked at it. Then he took me by the arm and led me towards the yard. "Did you ever see the Green Loaney Scutching Mill?" he said. I had never seen any scutching mill. I have only a vague idea of what a scutching mill is. "It'll not be more than twenty miles from this," said Cahoon. "And in my car we'll do it and be back for dinner." I did not particularly want to spend the rest of the afternoon rushing about the country in Cahoon's motor car. I preferred to stay quietly on the Castle Affey lawn and talk about Home Rule. "But about the working-man," I said, "and the prospect of his fighting--" "You'll be better able to talk about that," said Cahoon, "when you've seen the man I'm going to take you to. Seeing's believing." I was, of course, quite willing to go with Cahoon if he would really show me a citizen soldier in a scutching mill. We got out the motor car and started. "He's a man by the name of McConkey," said Cahoon. "A good name," I said. "One expects something from a McConkey." Cahoon did not say anything for about ten minutes. Then he went on-- "McConkey is foreman in the mill." "The scutching mill?" I asked. It was, of course, the scutching mill. I only asked the question in order to keep up the conversation. The long silences were embarrassing. Cahoon did not answer me. At the end of another quarter of an hour of furious driving he gave me a little further information about McConkey. "He neither drinks nor smokes." This led me to think that he might be some relation to my friend Crossan, possibly a cousin. "I happen to know," said Cahoon a little later, "that he has upwards of L500 saved." Undoubtedly McConkey and Crossan are close relations, brothers-in-law perhaps. We reached the Green Loaney Scutching Mill at about half-past five o'clock. Cahoon, who seemed to know all about the establishment, led me through some very dusty purlieus. McConkey, when we came upon him, did not seem particularly pleased to see Cahoon. He looked at me with suspicious malignity.