about the cowardly trick done in
the shops?"

"Ay, I heered on't," he cried, as he battered away at the steel on his
anvil.

"Who did it?"

"Did it!" he cried, nipping the cherry-red steel in a fresh place and
thrusting it back in the fire. "Don't they know? Didn't they hear in
the night?"

"No," I said; "they heard nothing, not a sound. The dog did not even
bark, they say."

"Would he bite a man hard?"

"He'd almost eat a man if he attacked him."

"Ay, he looks it," said Pannell, patting the black coal-dust down over a
glowing spot.

"Well, who do you think did it?" I said.

"Someone as come over the wall, I s'pose; but you'd better not talk
about it."

"But I like to talk about it," I said. "Oh, I should like to find out
who it was! It was someone here."

"Here!" he cried, whisking out the steel.

"Yes, the sneaking, blackguardly, cowardly hound!" I cried.

"Hush!" he whispered sharply; "some one may hear again."

I stared at the great swarthy fellow, for he looked sallow and seared,
and it seemed, so strange to me that, while I only felt annoyance, he
should be alarmed.

"Why, Pannell," I cried, "what's the matter?"

"Best keep a still tongue," he said in a whisper. "You never know who
may hear you."

"I don't care who hears me. It was a coward and a scoundrel who cut our
bands, and I should like to tell him so to his face."

"Howd thee tongue, I say," he cried, hammering away at his anvil, to
drown my words in noise. "What did I tell thee?"

"That some one might hear me. Well, let him. Why, Pannell, you look as
if you had done it yourself. It wasn't you, was it?"

He turned upon me quite fiercely, hammer in hand, making me think about
Wat Tyler and the tax-gatherer; but he did not strike me: he brought his
hammer down upon the anvil with a loud clang.

"Nay," he said; "I nivver touched no bands. It warn't my wuck."

"Well, I never thought it was," I said. "You don't look the sort of man
who would be a coward."

"Oh, that's what you think, is it, lad?"

"Yes," I said, seating myself on the bench and stroking the kitten. "A
blacksmith always seems to me to be a bold manly straightforward man,
who would fight his enemy fairly face to face, and not go in the dark
and stab him."

"Ah!" he said; "but I arn't a blacksmith, I'm a white-smith, and work in
steel."

"It's much the same," I said thoughtfully; and then, looking him full in
the face: "No, Pannell, I don't thin