When he was eighteen Beaut's mother fell ill. All day she lay on her
back in bed in the room above the empty bakery. Beaut shook himself
out of his waking stupor and went about seeking work. He had not felt
that he was indolent. He had been waiting. Now he bestirred himself.
"I'll not go into the mines," he said, "nothing shall get me down
there."

He got work in a livery stable cleaning and feeding the horses. His
mother got out of bed and began going again to the mine offices.
Having started to work Beaut stayed on, thinking it but a way station
to the position he would one day achieve in the city.

In the stable worked two young boys, sons of coal miners. They drove
travelling men from the trains to farming towns in valleys back among
the hills and in the evening with Beaut McGregor they sat on a bench
before the barn and shouted at people going past the stable up the
hill.

The livery stable in Coal Creek was owned by a hunchback named Weller
who lived in the city and went home at night. During the day he sat
about the stable talking to red-haired McGregor. "You're a big beast,"
he said laughing. "You talk about going away to the city and making
something of yourself and still you stay on here doing nothing. You
want to quit this talking about being a lawyer and become a prize
fighter. Law is a place for brains not muscles." He walked through the
stables leaning his head to one side and looking up at the big fellow
who brushed the horses. McGregor watched him and grinned. "I'll show
you," he said.

The hunchback was pleased when he strutted before McGregor. He had