For their guide came up at the moment with a bottle in his hand. It was Laura who handed him the mug, and it was she who, stooping down, put the spirit to the lips of the fainting workman. Her mind seemed to float in a mist of horror, but her will asserted itself; she recovered her power of action sooner than the men around her. They stared at the young lady for a moment; but no more. The one hideous fact that possessed them robbed all else of meaning.
"Did he see it?" said Laura to the man's friend. Her voice reached no ear but his. For they were surrounded by two uproars—the noise of the crowd of workmen, a couple of thousand men aimlessly surging and shouting to each other, and the distant thunder of the furnace.
"Aye, Miss. He wor drivin the tub, an he saw Overton in front—it wor the wheel of his barrer slipped, an soomthin must ha took him—if he'd ha let goa straight theer ud bin noa harm doon—bit he mut ha tried to draw it back—an the barrer pulled him right in."
"He didn't suffer?" said Laura eagerly, her face close under his.
"Thank the Lord, he can ha known nowt aboot it!—nowt at aw. The gas ud throttle him, Miss, afore he felt the fire."
"Is there a wife?"
"Noa—he coom here a widower three weeks sen—there's a little gell——"
"Aye! they be gone for her an t' passon boath," said another voice; "what's passon to do whan he cooms?"
"Salve the masters' consciences!" cried a third in fury. "They'll burn us to hell first, and then quieten us with praying."
Many faces turned to the speaker, a thin, wiry man one of the "agitators" of the town, and a dull groan went round.