out of order up there.
Four o'clock! Ah, here was a fellow coming! And instinctively he crisped
his hands that were buried in his pockets, and ran over to himself
his opening words. Then, with a sensation of disgust, he saw that the
advancing laborer was that incorrigible 'land lawyer' Gaunt. The
short, square man with the ruffled head and the little bright-gray eyes
saluted, uttered an "Afternoon, Sir Gerald!" in his teasing voice, and
stood still. His face wore the jeering twinkle that had disconcerted
so many political meetings. Two lean fellows, rather alike, with lined
faces and bitten, drooped moustaches, were the next to come through the
yard gate. They halted behind Gaunt, touching their forelocks, shuffling
a little, and looking sidelong at each other. And Malloring waited. Five
past four! Ten past! Then he said:

"D'you mind telling the others that I'm here?"

Gaunt answered:

"If so be as you was waitin' for the meetin', I fancy as 'ow you've got
it, Sir Gerald!"

A wave of anger surged up in Malloring, dyeing his face brick-red. So!
He had come all that way with the best intentions--to be treated like
this; to meet this 'land lawyer,' who, he could see, was only here to
sharpen his tongue, and those two scarecrow-looking chaps, who had come
to testify, no doubt, to his discomfiture. And he said sharply:

"So that's the best you can do to meet me, is it?"

Gaunt answered imperturbably:

"I think it is, Sir Gerald."

"Then you've mistaken your man."

"I don't think so, Sir Gerald."

Without another look Malloring passed the three by, and walked back to
the house. In the hall was the agent, whose face clearly showed that he
had foreseen this defeat. Malloring did not wait for him to speak.

"Make arrangements. The strike-breakers will be down by noon to-morrow.
I shall go through with it now, Simmons, if I have to clear the whole
lot out. You'd better go in and see that they're ready to send police if
there's any nonsense. I'll be down again in a day or two." And, without
waiting for reply, he passed into his study. There, while the car was
being got ready, he stood in the window, very sore; thinking of what he
had meant to do; thinking of his good intentions; thinking of what was
coming to the country, when a man could not even get his laborers to
come and hear what he had to say. And a sense of injustice, of anger, of
bewilderment, harrowed his very soul.

CHAPTER XXVIII

For the first tw