“But the air of Cairnhope has not made you friends with the unions.”  She seemed to reflect a moment, then asked him at what time he had left Cairnhope.

“Eleven o’clock.”

“Ah!  And whom did you visit before you came to me?”

“You question me like a child, mother.”

“Forgive me, dear.  I will answer my own question.  You called on some one who gave you bad advice.”

“Oh, did I?”

“On some woman.”

“Say, a lady”

“What does it matter to me?” cried Mrs. Little, wildly.  “They are all my enemies.  And this one is yours.  It is a woman, who is not your mother, for she thinks more of herself than of you.”

CHAPTER VII.

Henry had now to choose between his mother’s advice, and Miss Carden’s commands; and this made him rather sullen and irritable.  He was glad to get out of his mother’s house, and went direct to the works.  Bayne welcomed him warmly, and, after some friendly congratulations and inquiries, pulled out two files of journals, and told him he had promised to introduce him to the editor of the Liberal.  He then begged Henry to wait in the office, and read the files—­he would not be gone many minutes.

The Constitutional gave a dry narrative of the outrage, and mourned the frequency of such incidents.

The Liberal gave a dramatic narrative, and said the miscreant must have lowered himself by a rope from the parapet, and passed the powder inside without entering.  “He periled his life to perpetrate this crime; and he also risked penal servitude for ten years.  That he was not deterred by the double risk, proves the influence of some powerful motive; and that motive must have been either a personal feud of a very virulent kind, or else trade fanaticism.  From this alternative there is no escape.”

Next day, both journals recorded a trade-meeting at “The Rising Sun.”  Delegates from the Edge-Tool Forgers’ Union, and the Edge-Tool Handlers’ Union, and some other representatives of Hillsborough Unions, were present, and passed a resolution repudiating, with disgust, the outrage that had been recently committed, and directed their secretaries to offer a reward of twenty pounds, the same to be paid to any person who would give such information as should lead to the discovery of the culprit.

On this the Constitutional commented as follows:—­“Although we never for a moment suspected these respectable Unions of conniving at this enormity, yet it is satisfactory to find them not merely passive spectators, but exerting their energy, and spending their money, in a praiseworthy endeavor to discover and punish the offenders.”

Henry laid down the paper, and his heart felt very warm to Jobson and Parkin.  “Come,” said he, “I am glad of that.  They are not half a bad sort, those two, after all.”

Then he took up the Liberal, and being young and generous, felt disgusted at its comment: