here where we are drawing up. But, say,
there's one bit of advice I'll give you before we part: If you're in
trouble in Vermissa, go straight to the Union House and see Boss
McGinty. He is the Bodymaster of Vermissa Lodge, and nothing can happen
in these parts unless Black Jack McGinty wants it. So long, mate! Maybe
we'll meet in lodge one of these evenings. But mind my words: If you
are in trouble, go to Boss McGinty."

Scanlan descended, and McMurdo was left once again to his thoughts.
Night had now fallen, and the flames of the frequent furnaces were
roaring and leaping in the darkness. Against their lurid background
dark figures were bending and straining, twisting and turning, with the
motion of winch or of windlass, to the rhythm of an eternal clank and
roar.

"I guess hell must look something like that," said a voice.

McMurdo turned and saw that one of the policemen had shifted in his
seat and was staring out into the fiery waste.

"For that matter," said the other policeman, "I allow that hell must be
something like that. If there are worse devils down yonder than some we
could name, it's more than I'd expect. I guess you are new to this
part, young man?"

"Well, what if I am?" McMurdo answered in a surly voice.

"Just this, mister, that I should advise you to be careful in choosing
your friends. I don't think I'd begin with Mike Scanlan or his gang if
I were you."

"What the hell is it to you who are my friends?" roared McMurdo in a
voice which brought every head in the carriage round to witness the
altercation. "Did I ask you for your advice, or did you think me such a
sucker that I couldn't move without it? You speak when you are spoken
to, and by the Lord you'd have to wait a long time if it was me!" He
thrust out his face and grinned at the patrolmen like a snarling dog.

The two policemen, heavy, good-natured men, were taken aback by the
extraordinary vehemence with which their friendly advances had been
rejected.

"No offense, stranger," said one. "It was a warning for your own good,
seeing that you are, by your own showing, new to the place."

"I'm new to the place; but I'm not new to you and your kind!" cried
McMurdo in cold fury. "I guess you're the same in all places, shoving
your advice in when nobody asks for it."

"Maybe we'll see more of you before very long," said one of the
patrolmen with a grin. "You're a real hand-picked one, if I am a judge."

"I was thinking the same," remark