That Lass O' Lowrie's Part 9

The tears ran down her cheeks and she whimpered like a child. The sight of the silk dress had brought back to her mind her lost bit of paradise as nothing else would have done--her own small store of finery, the gayety and novelty of London sounds and sights.

Anice knelt down upon the flagged floor, still holding the child's hand.

"Don't cry," she said again. "Look at the baby, Liz. It is a pretty baby. Perhaps if it lives, it may be a comfort to you some day."

"Nay! it wunnot;" said Liz, regarding it resentfully. "I nivver could tak' no comfort in it. It's nowt but a trouble. I dunnot loike it. I canna. It would be better if it would na live. I canna tell wheer Joan Lowrie gets her patience fro'. I ha' no patience with the little marred thing mysen--allus whimperin' an' cry in'; I dunnot know what to do wi'

it half th' toime."

Anice took it from her lap, and sitting down upon a low wooden stool, held it gently, looking at its small round face. It was a pretty little creature, pretty with Liz's own beauty, or at least, with the baby promise of it. Anice stooped and kissed it, her heart stirred by the feebly-strong clasp of the tiny fingers.

During the remainder of her visit, she sat holding the child on her knee, and talking to it as well as to its mother. But she made no attempt to bring Liz to what Mr. Barholm had called, "a fitting sense of her condition." She was not fully settled in her opinion as to what Liz's "fitting sense" would be. So she simply made an effort to please her, and awaken her to interest, and she succeeded very well. When she went away, the girl was evidently sorry to see her go.

"I dunnot often want to see folk twice," she said, looking at her shyly, "but I'd loike to see yo'. Yo're not loike th' rest. Yo' dunnot harry me wi' talk. Joan said yo' would na."

"I will come again," said Anice.

During her visit, Liz had told her much of Joan. She seemed to like to talk of her, and certainly Anice had been quite ready to listen.

"She is na easy to mak' out," said Liz, "an' p'r'aps that's th' reason why folks puts theirsens to so much trouble to mak' her out."

When he pa.s.sed the cottage on the Knoll Road in going home at night, Fergus could not help looking out for Joan. Sometimes he saw her, and sometimes he did not. During the warm weather, he saw her often at the door, or near the gate; almost always with the child in her arms. There was no awkward shrinking in her manner at such times, no vestige of the clumsy consciousness usually exhibited by girls of her cla.s.s. She met his glance with a grave quietude, scarcely touched with interest, he thought; he never observed that she smiled, though he was uncomfortably conscious now and then that she stood and calmly watched him out of sight.

CHAPTER VIII - The Wager of Battle

"Owd Sammy Craddock" rose from his chair, and going to the mantel-piece, took down a tobacco jar of red and yellow delft, and proceeded to fill his pipe with solemn ceremony. It was a large, deep clay pipe, and held a great deal of tobacco--particularly when filled from the store of an acquaintance. "It's a good enow pipe to borrow wi'," Sammy was wont to remark. In the second place, Mr. Craddock drew forth a goodly portion of the weed, and pressed it down with ease and precision into the top of the foreign gentleman's turban which const.i.tuted the bowl. Then he lighted it with a piece of paper, remarking to his wife between long indrawn puffs, "I'm goin'--to th' Public."

The good woman did not receive the intelligence as amicably as it had been given.

"Aye," she said, "I'll warrant tha art. When tha art no fillin' thy belly tha art generally either goin' to th' Public, or comin' whoam. Aw Rig-gan ud go to ruin if tha wert na at th' Public fro' morn till neet looking after other folkses business. It's well for th' toun as tha'st getten nowt else to do."

Sammy puffed away at his pipe, without any appearance of disturbance.

"Aye," he consented dryly, "it is, that. It ud be a bad thing to ha'

th' pits stop workin' aw because I had na attended to 'em, an' gi'en th'

mes-ters a bit o' encouragement. Tha sees mine's what th' gentlefolk ca' a responsible position i' society. Th' biggest trouble I ha', is settlin' i' my moind what th' world 'ill do when I turn up my toes to th' daisies, an' how the government'll mak' up their moinds who shall ha' th' honor o' payin' for th' moniment."

In Mr. Craddock's opinion, his skill in the solution of political and social problems was only equalled by his apt.i.tude in managing the weaker s.e.x. He never lost his temper with a woman. He might be sarcastic, he was sometimes even severe in his retorts, but he was never violent. In any one else but Mr. Craddock, such conduct might have been considered weak by the male population of Riggan, who not unfrequently settled their trifling domestic difficulties with the poker and tongues, chairs, or flat-irons, or indeed with any portable piece of household furniture.

But Mr. Craddock's way of disposing of feminine antagonists was tolerated. It was pretty well known that Mrs. Craddock had a temper, and since he could manage her, it was not worth while to criticise the method.

"Tha'rt an owd yommer-head," said Mrs. Crad-dock, as oracularly as if she had never made the observation before. "Tha deserves what tha has na getten."

"Aye, that I do," with an air of amiable regret "Tha'rt reet theer fur once i' thy loife. Th' country has na done its duty by me. If I'd had aw I deserved I'd been th' Lord Mayor o' Lunnon by this toime, an' tha'd a been th' Lady May-oress, settin' up i' thy parlor wi' a goold crown atop o' thy owd head, sortin' out thy cloathes fur th' wesh woman i'stead o'

dollyin' out thy bits o' duds fur thysen. Tha'rt reet, owd la.s.s--tha'rt reet enow."

"Go thy ways to th' Public," retorted the old dame driven to desperation. "I'm tired o' heark-enin' to thee. Get thee gone to th'

Public, or we'st ha' th' world standin' still; an' moind tha do'st na set th' horse-ponds afire as tha goes by em.

"I'll be keerful, owd la.s.s," chuckled Sammy, taking his stick. "I'll be keerful for th' sake o' th' town."

He made his way toward the village ale-house in the best of humors.

Arriving at The Crown, he found a discussion in progress. Discussions were always being carried on there in fact, but this time it was not Craddock's particular friends who were busy. There were grades even among the visitors at The Crown, and there were several grades below Sammy's. The lowest was composed of the most disreputable of the colliers--men who with Lowrie at their head were generally in some mischief. It was these men who were talking together loudly this evening, and as usual, Lowrie was the loudest in the party. They did not seem to be quarrelling. Three or four sat round a table listening to Lowrie with black looks, and toward them Sammy glanced as he came in.

"What's up in them fellys?" he asked of a friend.

"Summat's wrong at th' pit," was the answer. "I canna mak' out what mysen. Summat about one o' th' mesters as they're out wi'. What'll tha tak', owdlad?"

"A pint o' sixpenny." And then with another sidelong glance at the debaters:

"They're an ill set, that lot, an' up to summat ill too, I'll warrant.

He's not the reet soart, that Lowrie."

Lowrie was a burly fellow with a surly, sometimes ferocious, expression.

Drink made a madman of him, and among his companions he ruled supreme through sheer physical superiority. The man who quarrelled with him might be sure of broken bones, if not of something worse. He leaned over the table now, scowling as he spoke.

"I'll ha' no lads meddlin' an' settin' th' mesters agen _me_," Craddock heard him say. "Them on yo' as loikes to tak' cheek mun tak' it, I'm too owd a bird fur that soart o' feed. It sticks i' my crop. Look thee out o' that theer window, Jock, and watch who pa.s.ses. I'll punse that lad into th' middle o' next week, as sure as he goes by."

"Well," commented one of his companions, "aw I've gotten to say is, as tha'll be loike to ha' a punse on it, fur he's a strappin' youngster, an' noan so easy feart."

"Da'st ta mean to say as I conna do it?" demanded Lowrie fiercely.

"Nay--nay, mon," was the pacific and rather hasty reply. "Nowt o' th'

soart. I on'y meant as it was na ivvery mon as could."

"Aye, to be sure!" said Sammy testily to his friend. "That's th' game is it? Theer's a feight on hond. That's reet, my lads, lay in thy beer, an' mak' dom'd fools o' thysens, an' tha'lt get a chance to sleep on th'

soft side o' a paving-stone i' th' lock-ups."

He had been a fighting man himself in his young days, and had prided himself particularly upon "showing his muscle," in Riggan parlance, but he had never been such a man as Lowrie. His comparatively gentlemanly encounters with personal friends had always been fair and square, and in many cases had laid the foundation for future toleration, even amiability. He had never hesitated to "tak' a punse" at an offending individual, but he had always been equally ready to shake hands when all was over, and in some cases, when having temporarily closed a companion's eyes in the heat of an argument, he had been known to lead him to the counter of "th' Public," and bestow nectar upon him in the form of "sixpenny." But of Lowrie, even the fighting community, which was the community predominating in Riggan, could not speak so well. He was "ill-farrant," and revengeful,--ready to fight, but not ready to forgive. He had been known to bear a grudge, and remember it, when it had been forgotten by other people. His record was not a clean one, and accordingly he was not a favorite of Sammy Craddock's.

A short time afterward somebody pa.s.sed the window facing the street, and Lowrie started up with an oath.

"Theer he is!" he exclaimed. "Now fur it. I thowt he'd go this road.

I'll see what tha's getten to say fur thysen, my lad."

He was out in the street almost before Crad-dock and his companion had time to reach the open window, and he had stopped the pa.s.ser-by, who paused to confront him haughtily.

"Why!" cried Sammy, slapping his knee, "I'm dom'd if it is na th' Lunnon engineer chap."

Fergus Derrick stood before his enemy with anything but a propitiatory air. That this brutal fellow who had caused him trouble enough already, should interfere with his very progress in the street, was too much for his high spirit to bear.

"I comn out here," said Lowrie, "to see if tha had owt to say to me."

"Then," replied Fergus, "you may go in again, for I have nothing."

Lowrie drew a step nearer to him.

"Art tha sure o' that?" he demanded. "Tha wert so ready wi' thy gab about th' Davys this mornin' I thowt happen tha'd loike to say sum-mat more if a mon ud gi' yo' a chance. But happen agen yo're one o' th'