had long since broken away from the School Committee, which was condemned
in prayer as licentious and ungodly, and left to its wickedness when it
exhibited a determination to stand by Joel Ham, a scoffer and a drinker
of strong drinks, as against a respectable, if comparatively unlettered,
nominee of the Chapel and the Band of Hope. His presence at the committee
meeting to-night was noted with surprise, although it excited no remark;
and his offer to interview the widow was accepted with gratitude as a
patriotic proposal. There was only one dissentient--Rogers, a burly
faceman from the Silver Stream.

'Don't send Shine to cant an' snuffle, an' preach the poor woman into a
fit o' the miserables,' he said.

Ephraim lifted his patient eyes to Rogers's face for a moment with an
expression of meek reproof, then let them slide back to his boots again,
but answered nothing. The enmity of the two was well known in Waddy.
Rogers was a worldly man who drank and swore, and who loved a fight as
other men loved a good meal; and Shine, as the superintendent, must
withhold his countenance from so grievous a sinner. Besides, there was a
belief that at some time or another the faceman had thrashed Shine, who
was searcher at the Stream in his week-day capacity, and for that reason
was despised by the miners, and regarded as a creature apart. Ephraim, it
was remarked, was always particularly careful in searching Rogers when he
came off shift, in the hope, as the men believed, of one day finding a
secreted nugget, and getting even with his enemy by gaoling him for a few
years.

As Ephraim passed out from the bar he again allowed his eyes to roll up
and meet those of his enemy from the dark shadow of his thick brows.