“Please sir aw couldn’t help it; summat cam’ ovver me, an’ mi legs seemed to ha’ nooa feel in ’em, an’ oh! aw wer so tired. Don’ beeat me, Sam, it’ll mak mi mother greet so, if ’oo sees th’ marks on me when aw doff missen to-neet.”
“Aw’ll mark yo’ nivver fear, aye an’ gi’ yo’ summat ’at ’ll keep yo wakken, too, yo’ idle good-for-nowt,” and Sam swung in with a piece of belting thicker and broader than a navvy’s belt.
Now it was at just this moment that Tom took the door. He had come from the dyehouse to match a cop.
“Hold,” he cried, and strode quickly up the room, “you won’t beat that child, Sam, wi’ that strap. Drop it, I say.”
“An’ who’ll stop me?” roared Sam.
“I will.”
“Then tak’ that for thi’ impudence yo’ d——d, meddlin’ workhouse bastard,” and Sam brought the stinging leather right across Tom’s flashing cheek.
Then, quick as lightning, sped a downright blow, straight from the shoulder true between the eyes, and Sam fell like a stricken ox, ignominious, into a skep of cops. There was the quick catching of breath from a score of throats as two score eyes watched the bully’s fall, and Tom, as he looked about him, felt prouder and gladder than all his life before.
“Eh! but aw’st catch it for this,” whispered Billy-come-a-lakin. “Aw’ll run for it whilst aw’ve th’ chance,” and he fled the place, and his billy knew him no more that week.
“Yo’n nooan heerd th’ last o’ this,” said Buckley, as he slowly picked himself up, dazed and scowling. “Aw’ll mak’ yo’ pay for this day’s wark, if aw swing for it, mind yo’r piecenin’, yo’ young limbs o’ Satan, an’ quit yo’r gapin’,” and the irate spinner stalked out of the “scribbling boil.”