"Look y'ere!" said he again. "Why hast thou not sent t' medicine oop as
thy master ordered?"
Montgomery had become accustomed to the brutal frankness of the northern
worker. At first it had enraged him, but after a time he had grown
callous to it, and accepted it as it was meant. But this was something
different. It was insolence--brutal, overbearing insolence, with
physical menace behind it.
"What name?" he asked coldly.
"Barton. Happen I may give thee cause to mind that name, yoong man.
Mak' oop t' wife's medicine this very moment, look ye, or it will be the
worse for thee."
Montgomery smiled. A pleasant sense of relief thrilled softly through
him. What blessed safety-valve was this through which his jangled
nerves might find some outlet. The provocation was so gross, the insult
so unprovoked, that he could have none of those qualms which take the
edge off a man's mettle. He finished sealing the bottle upon which he
was occupied, and he addressed it and placed it carefully in the rack.
"Look here!" said he, turning round to the miner, "your medicine will be
made up in its turn and sent down to you. I don't allow folk in the
surgery. Wait outside in the waiting-room if you wish to wait at all."
"Yoong man," said the miner, "thou's got to mak' t' wife's medicine
here, and now, and quick, while I wait and watch thee, or else happen
thou might need some medicine thysel' before all is over.
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