For the moment the soreness of
bruised muscles, the biting pain in his crippled hand, were trifles
driven outward to the farthermost rim of his consciousness. His foot
was upon the first step of the long stairway which he must climb. He
had whipped Brayley in a fair, square, hand-to-hand, man-to-man fight.
He had done it through sheer dogged determination that he would do it.
He had set himself a task, the hardest task he had ever essayed. And
success had come to him as self-vindication.
But it had been to him more, vastly more, than a mere duty, although
from the outset he had looked upon it in that light. It had been a
test. Had the outcome been reversed, had he failed, had Brayley
worsted him, there was every likelihood that Conniston would have left
the range. But now, hand in hand with dawning regeneration, there came
confidence. There were many things which his destiny had set ahead of
him, and he was ready to face them with the same dogged determination
with which he had faced the big foreman.
Then, too, this morning he had received more than mere self-approval.
Brayley had indorsed his work in his consultation with Mr. Crawford.
And Mr. Crawford had seen fit to increase his daily wage. He had not
been worth a dollar a day a month ago, and he knew it. Now he was to
be paid a dollar and a half a day, and because he was worth that to
the Half Moon.
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