"Huh!" he growled, drawing in the slack of his lash. "What do you want? You ain't been asked here. Clear off!"
Joe dropped from the rig and stepped a pace nearer. "I've come for Peter Strike's seeder," he said.
"Strike! Eh? You get off!" came the furious answer, for it seemed as if Joe's arrival had increased the anger of the individual. "You get right off, or I'll give yer strike jest as I'm a-going to do with this little rascal. Come you here, Tom; I'll learn you to leave the door of the stable open of a night and have all the cattle treading over the corn. You ain't coming? Then I'll have to fetch you."
The huge bully bore down upon the trembling lad he had addressed, and who seemed too scared to move. He cowered by the side of the rig till Hurley was upon him, and was then dragged towards the door of the shack.
"What! You ain't gone?" growled Hurley, seeing that Joe had made no movement, but stood beside the rig regarding him, and gripping the butt of his whip. "Ef you ain't away in a jiffy, I'll give you summat of the same too."
"You'll give me the seeder first," said Joe, keeping his temper, and showing an unflinching front, "and then you'll take your hands off Tom. Even if he did leave the stable door open, he's sorry, no doubt, and there's no excuse for treating him so badly. I'd be ashamed if I was a big fellow the same as you."
Hurley let his lower jaw drop with amazement, showing a set of irregular teeth which were all discoloured. He almost foamed at the mouth, while his eyes narrowed with anger and seemed to disappear within their sockets. Joe could see the fingers of his one free hand crushed into the palm, while the man's muscles hardened and stood out prominently under the skin of his arm. He bellowed when he answered.
"So you'd like to concern yourself with things that ain't got nothing to do with you," he shouted. "You're one of the green chaps from over the water that thinks things out here should be run as if the boys was dressed in silk, and every one of them mammy's darlings. I'm going to lick this kid, and when I'm done, if you ain't gone, I'll give you a hiding jest the same."
Joe began to gather the fact that he was in for trouble, and debated what he ought to do. There may be some who, under similar circumstances, would have clambered into the rig and driven off; but few, very few we imagine. Joe, at any rate, was not to be numbered with them; he clenched the hand not gripping his whip and watched to see what happened. And Hurley did not keep him long waiting. He took the boy Tom by the scruff of his neck, forced him against the doorpost of the shack, and proceeded to bind him to it with a length of cord.
"That'll do," said Joe curtly, walking towards him. "Let that lad go!"