at the very feet of
Connor. Slowly David turned the iron, the steady shower of blows bending
it, changing it, molding it under the eye of the gambler. This was that
clangor which had floated through the clear mountain air to him when he
first gazed down on the valley; this was the bell-like murmur which had
washed down to him through the gates of the valley.

At least it was easy to understand why the servants feared him. A full
fourteen pounds was in the head of that sledge, Connor guessed, yet
David whirled it with a light and deft precision. Only the shuddering of
the anvil told the weight of those blows. Meantime, with every leap of
the spark-showers the gambler studied the face of the master. They were
features of strength rather than beauty from the frowning forehead to
the craggy jaw. A sort of fierce happiness lived in that face now, the
thought of the craftsman and the joy of the laborer in his strength.

As the white heat passed from the iron and it no longer flowed into a
shape so readily under the hammer of the smith, a change came in him.
Connor knew nothing of ironcraft, but he guessed shrewdly that another
man would have softened the metal with fire again at this point.
Instead, David chose to soften it with strength. The steady patter of
blows increased to a thundering rain as the iron turned a dark and
darker red.

The rhythm of the worker grew swifter, did not break, and Connor watched
with a keen eye of appreciation. Just as a great thoroughbred makes its
supreme effort in the stretch by a lengthening and slight quickening of
stride, but never a dropping into the choppy pace of unskilled labor at
speed, so the man at the anvil was now rocking steadily back and forth
from heel to toe, the knees unflexing a little as he struck and
stiffening as he swung up the hammer. The greater effort was told only
by the greater ring of the hammer face on the hardening iron--by that
and by the shudder of the arm of the smith as the fourteen pounds went
clanging home to the stroke.

And now the iron was quite dark--the smith stood with the ponderous
sledge poised above his head and turned the bar swiftly, with study, to
see that the angle was exactly what he wished. The hammer did not
descend again on the iron; the smith was content, and plunging the big
angle iron into the tempering tub, his burly shoulders were obscured for
a moment by a rising cloud of steam.

He stepped out of this and came directly to them.