ore to ingots of steel, a
false step meant instant death. But they had known this so long that the
knowledge had lost its terrors.

There are many moments of enforced idleness for the vesselmen as they
stand on their raised platform in front of the crucibles; but, even
during these moments of inactivity, alertness of mind is required. One
morning their minds were not alert, and one of the workmen, Abe Verity
by name, seated on the railing which separates the platform from the pit
in which stand the ingot-moulds, had snatched the cap from the head of
one of his fellows. The latter, in response to this, had raised his
crowbar, as if he meant to strike Abe on the head, and Abe, lurching
backward on the railing in order to avoid the blow, had lost his balance
and fallen backwards. Under ordinary circumstances this would have meant
nothing worse than a drop into the pit below, but, as ill-luck would
have it, one of the cauldrons of molten steel was being swung along the
arc of the pit by a hydraulic crane, and, at the very moment when Abe
lost his balance, it had reached the point beneath which he was sitting.
There was an agonised cry from the vesselmen on their platform, a
hissing splash with great gouts of liquid fire flying in all directions,
a sickening smell, and then, a few minutes later, a clergyman, hastily
summoned from the adjoining church, was reciting the burial service over
the calcined body of Abe Verity.

Blank terror gleamed in the eyes of the men who had been witnesses of
this grim holocaust. All work was suspended for the day, and Job Hesketh
was led home, dazed and trembling in every joint, by his two eldest
sons, who worked in another part of the forge. Huddled together in his
chair by the kitchen fire, perspiration streamed from his face. He was
in a state bordering on delirium, and the answers which he gave to the
questions put to him were wildly incoherent.

Abe Verity was his friend. They had been boys together in the little
wold village where they had been born, and it was at Job's earnest
entreaty that Abe had quitted farm work and joined his friend at the
Leeds Steel Works. Their tastes had been similar, and the Veritys had
often joined the Heskeths in their summer holiday at the seaside. And
now, in one fell moment, the lifelong friendship had been severed, and
Abe, the glad, strong, heart-warm man, had plunged from life to death.

Job refused to go to bed that night, but sat in his chair by t