“‘What odds if I had, it wouldn’t have done you any good.’
“‘Did you have a quarrel with him?’
“‘Did the boys tell you I had? Because if so, it’s no use my saying anything.’
“‘But what do you say?’
“‘No! Dick and me never had no quarrel.’
“‘Is that true?’
“‘Gospel.’
“After this there was another silence unbroken save by the monotonous handling of the implements. Then I suddenly uttered an ejaculation and pointed at my cap. It was lying on the ground, some few feet from where we were working, close beneath a projecting block of coal, and it was moving—moving as if it were being violently agitated by something inside it.
“‘What is it?’ I demanded.