ndy. All his jokes were like
that, their playful hectoring ending in kindness. He was too
kind-hearted to enjoy causing pain.

What wonder that such a hero had his satellites?

On the other hand, he had his enemies too--scores of them--for a
justice dealer is never without opponents. As a rule these persons were
the victims of his various avalanches of wrath, those to whom at one
time or another he had meted out punishment and denounced as cowards.
For the disapproval of these cravens Hal Harling did not care a button.
He much preferred they should be numbered among his enemies rather than
his friends and he said so frankly. Nevertheless, his mother, timid by
nature and of a peace-loving disposition, shook her head.

"You can't afford, Hal, to antagonize folks the way you do," she would
protest. "The time may come when you'll be sorry."

For answer the giant would shrug his shoulders.

"I'm not afraid of anybody," he would reply proudly.

The statement was not made in a spirit of bravado; rather it reflected
the self-respect of one consciously in the right.

"But you to be more careful. Such people are capable of working you
harm."

"Let them try."

"But they are. They can do all sorts of underhanded things you would
not descend to," whimpered Mrs. Harling. "It worries me all the time to
see you so regardless."

"There, there, Mother! Quit fussing about me," pleaded the big fellow
kindly. "I'm all right and can look after myself."

"I know you can when the fight is a fair one," agreed his mother. "But
you never can tell what weapon a coward will use."

Hal laughed contemptuously and, realizing that her counsel had failed
of its aim, Mrs. Harling said no more.

Up to the present the calamities she periodically predicted had not
occurred and as those who loved her son rallied round him with
ever-increasing loyalty, and those who disliked him kept their
distance, she gradually ceased to protest. What was the use of wasting
her strength on conditions she could not help? Poor soul! She needed
every atom of energy she possessed to meet the trials that beset her
own path.

For Mrs. Harling was a helpless invalid and together with her bedridden
father lived day after day imprisoned in the small tenement overlooking
the rushing, hurrying world of which she was no part. Each morning
Louise, Hal's younger sister, made tidy the house, packed up a
luncheon, and the two started for Davis and Coulter's spinning mills