"Yes, John Graham. He was there, representing big interests in the
States. The foreman had objected to what happened; many of the men had
protested; a few of them, who knew my father, had thrown up their work
rather than be partners to that crime. But Graham had the legal power;
they say he laughed as if he thought it a great joke that a cabin and a
grave should be considered obstacles in his way. And he laughed when my
father and I went to see him; yes, _laughed_, in that noiseless, oily,
inside way of his, as you might think of a snake laughing.
"We found him among the men. My God, you don't know how I hated
him!--Big, loose, powerful, dangling the watch-fob that hung over his
vest, and looking at my father in that way as he told him what a fool
he was to think a worthless grave should interfere with his work. I
wanted to kill him, but my father put a hand on my shoulder, a quiet,
steady hand, and said: 'It is my duty, Alan. _My duty_.'
"And then--it happened. My father was older, much older than Graham, but
God put such strength in him that day as I had never seen before, and
with his naked hands he would have killed the brute if I had not
unlocked them with my own. Before all his men Graham became a mass of
helpless pulp, and from the ground, with the last of the breath that was
in him, he cursed my father, and he cursed me.
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