For Toppy, in that agonised second when he glanced up at the unsupported roof and knew what those loose rocks meant to any men working beneath, realised that he could not drive his men in there to certain injury for many, possibly death for some. It wasn’t in him. He wasn’t bred that way. The unfeeling brute had been removed from his big body and spirit by generations of men and women who had played fair with inferiors, and by a lifetime of training and education. He understood plainly the significance of the thing. Reivers had done it; no one else would have dared. He had lifted Toppy up to a tiny elevation above the other men in camp; now he was knocking him down. It was another way for Reivers to show his mastery. The men who had begun to look up to Toppy would now see how easily the Snow-Burner could show himself his superior. Miss Pearson would hear of it. He would appear in the light of a “nice boy” whom the Snow-Burner had played with. These thoughts ran through Toppy’s mind as he stood outside the pit, with his white-faced men looking up to him, and groped for a way out of his dilemma. Within he was sickened with the sense of a catastrophe; outside he remained calm and confident to the eye. He stepped farther out, to where he could see the end of the dam where he had secured the props for the roof. It was as he had expected; the big pile of timbers that had lain there was gone to the last stick. He turned slowly back, and then in the grey light of coming day he looked into the playfully smiling face of Reivers, who had emerged, it seemed, from nowhere. “Looking for your humanitarian props, Treplin?” laughed the Snow-Burner. “Oh, they’re gone; they’re valuable; they served a purpose which nothing else would fill—quite so conveniently. I used them for a corduroy road in the swamp. Between men and timbers, Treplin, always save your timbers.” His manner changed like a flash to one hurried and business-like. “What’re you waiting for?” he snarled. “Why don’t you get ’em in there? Mean to say you’re wasting company money because one of these cattle might get a broken back?” They looked each other full in the eyes, but Toppy knew that for the time being Reivers had the whiphand. “I mean to say just that,” he said evenly. “I’m not sending any men in there until I get that roof propped up again.” “Bah!” Reivers’ disgust was genuine. “I thought you were a man; I find you’re a suit of clothes full of emotions, like all the rest!” He seemed to drive away his anger by sheer will-force and bring the cold, sneering smile back to his lips. “So we’re up against a situation that’s too strong for us, are we, Mr. Humanitarian?” he laughed. “In spite of our developed intelligence, we lay down cold in the face of a little proposition like this! Good-bye to our dreams of learning how to handle men! It isn’t in us to do it; we’re a weak sister.”