Page:Stanwood Pier--The ancient grudge.djvu/440

Rh he was running. He overtook one of them, hoping to find a friend, but the man was Caskey.

"What's the row?" Hugh asked.

"It ain't begun yet," Caskey answered with a grin, and he followed close behind Hugh, down the street leading to the mill entrance. There was assembled a great crowd, indistinct in the fog, motionless and quiet except for an occasional shout. Scattered along the street above were groups of men, hesitating and uncertain, and Hugh began to recognize faces of his allies. Passing in among them, he succeeded in leaving Caskey behind; he caught two men by the arms and said to them so that others might hear,—

"Just work your way through quietly; they won't stop you; it's just a bluff."

He spoke with a commanding reassurance that had its effect; as he walked on, some of the men followed,—but not all; and of those who started, some dropped out after they had gone a little way. Indeed, to pass through the mob that swarmed across the street from the company's offices on one side to the hotel on the other and was packed solidly against the gates of the mill inclosure, seemed impossible.

"The gates ain't open anyhow," murmured one of the men to Hugh.

"They will be at six; I've got Mr. Halket's word for it.—There; there's the gate-keeper on the bridge."

He pointed; the fog had lifted a little, and looking over the crowd they could see a man walking to and fro on the bridge behind the gate.

"Just mix in and work your way through easy," Hugh warned them.

They came straggling along, on both sides of him and behind. They drew near the outer fringe of the crowd, and then suddenly Caskey ran past them, shouting,—

"Look out for them! Here they come!"

There was a moment of silence. "Never mind," Hugh