“I’ll tell ’ee,” he whispered with his face working. “Bait it with a wheel-band.”
He roared with laughter again, and if I had had any doubts before of his understanding that I wanted a very strong man-trap, I had none now.
Chapter Sixteen.
Something for me.
Rash—cruel—unwise. Well, I’m afraid it was all those, but I was only a boy, and I was stung by the injustice and cowardly cruelty of the outrages perpetrated on us by the men who earned their bread in our works; and hence it was, that, instead of feeling any compunction in doing what I proposed, I was delighted with the idea, and longed for an opportunity to put it in force.
I was, then, very eager to begin, for the present calm, I felt sure, was only going before the storm, and after what I had found out I was anxious to be ready.
Pannell did not keep me waiting long.
Two days after I had made my plans with him I went into his smithy, and in answer to my inquiring look he said, in a heavy, unmoved way: