At the sight of the guns, young Caddles blazed into anger.

He remembered the sting of the Wreckstone farmers' shot guns.

"You going to shoot off those at me ?" he said, pointing, and it seemed to the officer he must be afraid.
"If you don't march back to your pit--" Then in an instant the officer had slung himself back over the wall, and sixty feet above him the great electric standard whirled down to his death.

Bang, bang, bang, went the heavy guns, and smash! the shattered wall, the soil and subsoil of the garden flew.

Something flew with it, that left red drops on one of the shooter's hands.