The Great House Part 24

"Hatton's a great man now!" a ba.s.s voice threw in.

"But he's never lost his taste for tripe!" squeaked a shrill treble. The gibe won roars of laughter, and the back of the chairman's neck grew crimson.

"Hurrah for Banfield and the poor man's loaf!" shouted his supporters, as he mounted in his turn.

"It's little of the crumb he'll leave the poor man!" squeaked the treble.

It was the candidate's turn to mount next. "Hooray! Hooray!" shouted the crowd with special fervor. Handkerchiefs were waved from windows, the band played a little more of the Conquering Hero.

As the music ceased, "What's he doing, Tommy, along o' these chaps?" asked the treble voice.

"He's waiting for that there Samaritan, Sammy?" answered the ba.s.s.

"Ay, ay? And the wine and oil, Sammy?"

It took the crowd a little time to digest this, but in time they did so, and the gust of laughter that followed covered the appearance of the stranger. He was not to escape, however, for as the noise ceased, "Is this the Samaritan, Sammy?" asked the ba.s.s.

"Where's your eyes?" whined the treble. "He's the big loaf! and, lor, ain't he crumby!"

"If I were down there----" the Burnley man began, leaning over the side of the cart.

"He's crusty, too!" cried the wit.

But this was too much for the chairman. "Silence! Silence!" he cried, and, as at a signal, there was a rush, the two interrupters were seized and, surrounded by a gang of hobbledehoys, were hustled down the road, fighting furiously and shouting, "Blues! Blues!"

The chairman made use of the lull to step to the edge of the cart and take off his hat. He looked about him, pompous and important.

"Gentlemen," he began, "free and independent electors of our ancient borough! At a crisis such as this, a crisis the most momentous--the most momentous----" he paused and looked into his hat, "that history has known, when the very staff of life is, one may say, the apple of discord, it is an honor to me to take the chair!"

"The cart you mean!" cried a voice, "you're in the cart!"

The speaker cast a withering glance in the direction whence the voice came, lost his place and, failing to find it, went on in a different strain. "I'm a business man," he said, "you all know that! I'm a business man, and I'm not ashamed of it. I stick to my business and my business to-day----"

"Better go on with it!"

But he was getting set, and he was not to be abashed. "My business to-day," he repeated, "is to ask your attention for the distinguished candidate who seeks your suffrages, and for the--the distinguished gentleman on my left who will presently follow me."

A hollow groan checked him at this point, but he recovered himself. "First, however," he continued, "I propose, with your permission, to say a word on the--the great question of the day--if I may call it so. It is to the food of the people I refer!"

He paused for cheers, under cover of which Banfield murmured to his neighbor that Hatton was set now for half an hour. He had yet to learn that open-air meetings have their advantages.

"The food of the people!" Hatton repeated, uplifted by the applause. "It is to me a sacred thing! My friends, it is to me the Ark of the Covenant. The bread is the life. It should go straight, untaxed, untouched from the field of the farmer to the house of--of the widow and the orphan!"

"Hear! Hear! Hear! Hear!" Then, "What about the miller?"

"It should go from where it is grown," Hatton repeated, "to where it is needed; from where it is grown to the homes of the poor! And to the man," slipping easily and fatally into his Sunday vein, "that lays his 'and upon it, let him be whom he may, I say with the Book, 'Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn!' The Law, ay, and the Prophets----"

"Ay, Hatton's profits! Hands off them!" roared the ba.s.s voice.

"Low bread and high profits!" shrieked the treble. "Hatton and thirty per cent!"

A gust of laughter swept all away for a time, and when the speaker could again get a hearing he had lost his thread and his temper. "That's a low insinuation!" he cried, crimson in the face. "A low insinuation! I scorn to answer it!"

"Regular old Puseyite you be," shouted a new tormentor. "Quoting Scripture."

Hatton shook his fist at the crowd. "A low, dirty insinuation!" he cried. "I scorn----"

"You don't scorn the profits!"

"Listen! Silence!" Then, "I shall not say another word! You're not worth it! You're below it! I call on Mr. Brierly of Manchester to propose a resolution."

And casting vengeful glances here and there where he fancied he detected an opponent, he stood back. He began for the first time to think the meeting a mistake. Ba.s.set, who had held that opinion from the first, scanned the crowd and had his misgivings.

The man from Manchester, however, had none. He stood forward, a smile on his broad face, his chest thrown forward, a something easy in his air, as became one who had confronted thousands and was not to be put out of countenance by a few hisses. He waited good-humoredly for silence. Nor could he see that, behind the cart, there had been gathering for some time a band of men of a different air from those who faced the platform. These men were still coming up by twos and threes, issuing from side-streets; men clad in homespun and with ruddy faces, men in smocked frocks, men in velveteens; a few with belcher neckerchiefs and slouched felts, whom their mothers would not have known. When Brierly raised his hand and opened his mouth there were over two score of these men--and they were still coming up.

But Brierly was unaware of them, and, complacent and confident of the effect he would produce, he opened his mouth.

"Gentlemen," he began. His voice, strong and musical, reached the edge of the meeting. "Gentlemen, free electors! And I tell you straight no man is free, no man had ought to be free----"

Boom! and again, Boom! Boom! Not four paces behind him a drum rolled heavily, drowning his voice. He stopped, his mouth open; for an instant surprise held the crowd also. Then laughter swept the meeting and supplied a treble to the drum's persistent ba.s.s.

And still the drum went on, Boom! Boom! amid cheers, yells, laughter. Then, as suddenly as it had started, it stopped. More slowly, the hurrahs, yells, laughter, died down, the laughter the last to fail, for not only had the big man's face of surprise tickled the crowd, but the drum had so nicely taken the pitch of his voice that the interruption seemed even to his friends a joke.

He seized the opportunity, but defiance not complacency was now his note. "Gentlemen," he said, "it's funny, but you don't drum me down, let me tell you! You don't drum me down! What I said I'm going to say again, and shame the devil and the landlords! Free men----"

But he did not say it. Boom, boom, rolled the drum, drowning his voice beyond hope. And this time, with the fourth stroke, a couple of fifes struck into a sprightly measure, and the next moment three score lively voices were roaring: You've here the little Peeler, Out of place he will not go! But to keep it, don't he turn about And jump Jim Crow!

But to keep it see him turn about And jump Jim Crow! Turn about, and wheel about And do just so!

Chorus The only dance Sir Robert knows Is Jump Jim Crow! The only dance Sir Robert knows Is Jump Jim Crow!

For a verse or two the singers had it their own way. Then the band of the meeting struck in with "See, the Conquering Hero Comes!" and as the airs clashed in discord, the stalwarts of the two parties clashed also in furious struggle. In a twinkling and as by magic the scene changed. Women, children, lads, fled every way, screaming and falling. Shrieks of alarm routed laughter. The crowd swayed stormily, flowed this way, ebbed that way. The clatter of staves on clubs rang above oaths and shouts of defiance, as the Yellows made a rush for the drum. Men were down, men were trampled on, men strove to scale the cart, others strove to descend from it. But to descend from it was to descend into a melee of random fists and falling sticks, and the man from Manchester bellowed to stand fast; while Hatton shouted to "clear out these rogues," and Banfield called on his men to charge. Ba.s.set alone stood silent, measuring the conflict with his eyes. With an odd exultation he felt his spirits rise to meet the need.

He saw quickly that the orange favors were outnumbered, and were giving way; and almost as quickly that, so far as mischief was meant, it was aimed at the Manchester man. He was a stranger, he was the delegate of the League, he was a marked man. Already there were cries to duck him. Ba.s.set tapped Banfield on the shoulder.

"They'll not touch us," he shouted in the man's ear, "but we must get Brierly away. There's Pritchard's house opposite. We must fight our way to it. Pa.s.s the word!" Then to Brierly, "Mr. Brierly, we must get you away. There's a gang here means mischief."

"Let them come on!" cried the Manchester man, "I'm not afraid."

"No, but I am," Ba.s.set replied. "We're responsible, and we'll not have you hurt here. Down all!" he cried raising his voice, as he saw the band whom he had already marked, pressing up to the cart through the melee--they moved with the precision of a disciplined force, and most of their faces were m.u.f.fled. "Down all!" he shouted. "Yellows to the rescue! Down before they upset us!"

The leaders scrambled out of the cart, some panic-stricken, some enjoying the scuffle. They were only just in time. The Yellows were in flight, amid yells and laughter, and before the last of the platform was over the side, the cart was tipped up by a dozen st.u.r.dy arms. Hatton and another were thrown down, but a knot of their men, the last with fight in them, rallied to the call, plucked the two to their feet, and, striking out manfully, covered the rear of the retreating force.

The men with the belcher neckerchiefs pressed on silently, brandishing their clubs, and twice with cries of "Down him! Down him!" made a rush for Brierly, striking at him over the shoulders of his companions. But it was plain that the a.s.sailants shrank from coming to blows with the local magnates; and Ba.s.set seeing this handed Brierly over to an older man, and himself fell back to cover the retreat.

"Fair play, men," he cried, good humoredly. And he laughed in their faces as he fell back before them. "Fair play! You're too many for us to-day, but wait till the polling-day!"

They hooted him. "Yah! Yah!" they cried. "You'd ruin the land that bred you! You didn't ought to be there!" "Give us that fustian rascal! We'll club him!"

"Who makes cloth o' devil's dust?" yelled another. "Yah! You d--d cotton-sp.a.w.n!"

Ba.s.set laughed in their faces, but he was not sorry when the friendly doorway received his party. The country gang, satisfied with their victory, began to fall back after breaking a dozen panes of gla.s.s; and the panting and discomfited Yellows, thronging the pa.s.sage and pulling their coats into shape, were free to exchange condolences or recriminations as they pleased. More than one had been against the open-air meeting, and Hatton, a sorry figure, hatless, and with a sprained knee, was not likely to hear the end of it. Two or three had black eyes, one had lost two teeth, another his hat, and Brierly his note-book.

But almost before a word had been exchanged, a man pushed his way among them. He had slipped into the house by the back way. "For G.o.d's sake, gentlemen," he cried, "get the constable, or there'll be murder!"

"What is it?" asked a dozen voices.

"They've got Ben Bosham, half a hundred of them! They're away to the ca.n.a.l with him. They're that mad with him they'll drown him!"

So far Ba.s.set had treated the affair as a joke. But Bosham's plight in the hands of a mob of angry farmers seemed more than a joke. Murder might really be done. He s.n.a.t.c.hed a thick stick from a corner--he had been hitherto unarmed--and raised his voice. "Mr. Banfield," he said, "go to Stubbs and tell him what is doing! He can control them if any one can. And do some of you, gentlemen, come with me! We must get him from them."

"But we're not enough," a man protested.

"The man must not be murdered," Ba.s.set replied. "Come, gentlemen, they'll not dare to touch us who know them, and we've the law with us! Come on!"

"Well done, Squire!" cried Brierly. "You're a man!"

"Ay, but I'm not man enough to take you!" Ba.s.set retorted. "You stay here, please!"

CHAPTER x.x.xIV.

BY THE Ca.n.a.l.

It was noon on that day, the day of the meeting at Riddsley, and Mary was sitting in the parlor at the Gatehouse. She was stooping over the fire with her eyes on the embers. The old hound lay beside her with his muzzle resting on her shoe, and Mrs. Toft, solidly poised on her feet, on the farther side of the table, rolled her ap.r.o.n about her arms and considered the pair.

"It's given us all a rare shock," she said as she marked the girl's listless pose, "the poor Master's death! That sudden and queer, too! I don't know that I'm better for it, myself, and Toft goes up and down like a toad under a harrow, he's that restless! For 'Truria, she's fairly mazed. Her body's here and her thoughts are lord knows where. Toft, he seems to think something will come of her and her reverend----"

"I hope so," Mary said gently.

"But it's beyond me what Toft thinks these days. I asked him point--blank yesterday, 'Toft,' I says, 'are we going or are we staying?' And, bless the man, he looks at me as if he'd eat me. 'Take time and you'll know,' he says. 'But whose is the house?' I asks, 'and who's to pay us?' 'G.o.d knows!' he says, and whiffs out of the room like one of these lucifers!"

"I think that the house is Mr. Ba.s.set's," Mary explained, "for the rest of the lease; that's about three years."

"But you'll not be staying, begging your pardon, Miss? I suppose you'll be naming the day soon? The Master's gone and his lordship will be wanting you somewhere else than here."

"Yes, Mrs. Toft," Mary said quietly. "I suppose so."

Mrs. Toft looked for a blush and saw none, and she drew her conclusions. She went on another tack. "There's like to be a fine rumpus in the town to-day," she said comfortably. "The Squire's brought a foreigner down to trim their nails, and there's to be a wagon and speaking and such like foolishness at the Maypole. As if all the speeches of all the fools in Staffordshire would lower the quartern loaf! Anyway, if what Petch says is true, the farmers are that mad there's like to be lives lost!"

Mary stooped and carefully put a piece of wood on the fire.

"And, to be sure, they're a rough lot," Mrs. Toft continued, dropping her ap.r.o.n. "I'm not forgetting what happened to the reverend Colet, and I wish the young master safe out of it. It's all give and no take with him, too much for others and too little for himself! I'm thinking if anybody's hurt he'll be there or thereabouts."

Mary turned. "Is Petch--couldn't Petch go down and----"

"La, Miss," Mrs. Toft answered--the girl's face told her all that she wished to know--"Petch don't dare, with his lordship on the other side! But, all said and done, I'll be bound the young master'll come through. It's a pity, though," she continued thoughtfully, as she began to dust the sideboard, "as people don't know their own minds. There's the Squire, now. He's lived quiet and pleasant all these years and now he must dip his nose into this foolishness, same as if he dipped it into hot worts when Toft's a-brewing! I don't know what's come to him. He goes riding up to Blore these winter nights, twenty miles if it's a furlong, when this house is his! He's more like to take his death that way, if I'm a judge."

"Is he doing that?" Mary asked in a small voice.

"To be sure," Mrs. Toft returned. "What else! Which reminds me, Miss, are those papers to go to the bank to-day?"

"I believe so."

"Well, you're looking that peaky, you'd best take a jaunt with them. Why not? It's a fine day, and if there is a bit of a clash there's none will hurt you. Do you go, Miss, and get a little color in your cheeks. At worst, you'll bring back the news and I'm sure we're that dead-alive and moped a little's a G.o.dsend!"

"I think I will go," Mary said.

So when the gig, which was to convey the boxes to the bank, arrived about three, she mounted beside the driver. Here, were it only for an hour, was distraction and a postponement of that need to decide, to choose between two courses, which was crushing her under its weight.

For Mary was very unhappy. That moment which had proved to her that she did not love the man she was to marry and did love another, had stamped itself on her memory, never to be wiped from it. In Audley's company, and for a time after they had parted, the shock had numbed her mind and dulled her feelings. But once alone and free to think, she had grasped all that the discovery meant--to her and to him; and from that moment she had not known an instant of ease.

She saw that she had made a terrible mistake, and one so vital that, if nothing could be done, it must wreck her happiness and another's happiness. And what was she to do? What ought she to do? In a moment of emotion, led astray by that love of love which is natural to women, and something swayed--so she told herself in scorn--by Those glories of our blood and state, which to women are not shadows, she had made this mistake, and now, self-tricked, she had only herself to blame if Sceptre and crown Were tumbled down And in the dust were lesser made Than the poor crooked scythe and spade!

But to see her folly did not avail. What was she to do?

Ought she to tell the truth, however painful it might be, to the man whom she had deceived? Or ought she to go through with it, to do her duty and save him at least from hurt? Either way, she had wrecked her own craft, but she might still hope to save his. Or--might she hope? She was not certain even of this.

What was she to do? Hour after hour she asked herself the question, sometimes looking through the windows with eyes that saw nothing, at others pacing her room in a fever of anxiety. What was she to do? She could not decide. Now she thought one thing, now another. And time was pa.s.sing. No wonder that she was glad even of the distraction of this journey to Riddsley that at another time had been so dull an adventure! It was, at least, a reprieve, a respite from the burden of decision.

She would not own, even to herself, that she had any other thought in going, or that anxiety had any part in her restlessness. From that side of the battle she turned her eyes with all the strength of her will. Her conduct had been that of a silly girl rather than that of a woman who had seen and suffered; but she was not light--and besides Ba.s.set was cured. She was only unfortunate, and desperately unhappy.

As they drove by the old Cross at the foot of the hill she averted her eyes. Surely it must have been in some other life that she had made it the object of a walk, and had told herself that she would never forget it.

Alas, she had been right. She would never forget it!

The man who drove saw that her face matched her mourning, and he left her to her thoughts, so that hardly a word pa.s.sed between them until they were close upon the outskirts of the town. Then the driver, to whom the dull winter landscape, the lines of willows, and the low water-logged fields, were no novelty, p.r.i.c.ked up his ears.

"Dang me!" he said, "they've started! There's a fine rumpus in the town. Do you hear 'em, Miss? That's a band I'm thinking?"

"I hope no one will be hurt."

The man winked at his horse. "None of the right side, Miss," he said slyly. "But it might be a hanging, front o' Stafford gaol, by the roar! I met a tidy lot going in as I came out, a right tidy lot! I'm blest," after listening a moment, "if they're not coming this way!"

"I hope they won't do anything to----"

"La, Miss," the man answered, misreading her anxiety and interrupting her, "they'll never touch us. And for the old nag, he's yeomanry. He'd not start if he met a mile o' funerals!"

Certainly the noise was growing. But the lift of the ca.n.a.l bridge and bank, which crossed the road a hundred yards before them, hid all of the town from them save a couple of church towers, some tiled roofs, and the brick gable of Hatton's Works. The man whipped up his horse.

"Teach they Manchester chaps a trick!" he muttered. "Shouldn't wonder if there'll be work for the crowner out of this! Gee-up, old nag, let's see what's afoot! 'Pears to me," as the shouting grew plainer, "we'll be in at the death yet, Miss!"