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“Over at Ted Budd’s yard – the Black Horse.”
“Budd again,” said the vicar. “Is everybody here named Budd?”
“Well, no,” said the woman, “not ivery body; but there’s a straange sight of ’em all ower the town, and they’re most all on ’em cousins or sum’at. But there, I must get to wuck.”
The woman seemed galvanised into a fresh life by the duties she saw before her; and almost before the strange visitor had done speaking she was putting on a print hood, and preparing to start.
“It will make a very comfortable place when I have got it in order,” said the vicar to himself, as he passed down the front walk. “Now to find some chairs and tables.”
This was no very difficult task, especially as the furniture dealer received a couple of crisp bank-notes on account. In fact, one hand-truck full of necessaries was despatched before the vicar left the shop and made up his mind to see a little more of the place before returning to his future home.
Perhaps he would have been acting more wisely if he had sent in a load of furniture and announcements of his coming, with orders for the place to be put in readiness; but the Reverend Murray Selwood was eccentric, and knowing that he had an uncouth set of people to deal with, he had made up his mind to associate himself with them in every way, so as to be thoroughly identified with the people, and become one of them as soon as possible.
His way led him round by the great works of the town – Glaire’s Bell Foundry – and as he came nearer, a loud buzz of voices increased to a roar, that to him, a stranger, seemed too great for the ordinary transaction of business; and so it proved.
On all sides, as he went on, he saw heads protruded from doors and windows, and an appearance of excitement, though he seemed in his own person to transfer a good deal of the public attention to himself.
A minute or two later, and he found himself nearing a crowd of a couple of hundred workmen, who were being harangued by a tall thin man, in workman’s costume, save that he wore a very garish plaid waistcoat, whose principal colour was scarlet.
This man, who was swinging his arms about, and gesticulating energetically, was shouting in a hoarse voice. His words were disconnected, and hard to catch, but “Downtrodden,” – “bloated oligarchs,” – “British pluck” – “wucking-man” – “slavery” – and “mesters,” reached the vicar’s ears as he drew nearer.
Suddenly there was a movement in the crowd, and the speaker seemed to be hustled from the top of the stone post which he had chosen for his rostrum, and then, amid yells and hootings, it seemed that the crowd had surrounded a couple of men who had been hemmed in while making their way towards the great gates, and they now stood at bay, with their backs to the high brick wall, while the mob formed a semicircle a few feet from them.
It was rather hard work, and wanted no little elbowing, but, without a moment’s hesitation, the vicar began to force his way through the crowd; and as he got nearer to the hemmed in men, he could hear some of the words passing to and fro.
“Why, one of them is my friend, Mr Richard Glaire,” said the vicar to himself, as he caught sight of the pale trembling figure, standing side by side with a heavy grizzled elderly workman, who stood there with his hat off, evidently bent on defending the younger man.
“Yow come out o’ that, Joe Banks, an’ leave him to us,” roared a great bull-headed hammerman, who was evidently one of the ringleaders.
“Keep off, you great coward,” was the answer.
“Gie him a blob, Harry; gie him a blob,” shouted a voice.
“My good men – my good men,” faltered Richard Glaire, trying to make himself heard; but there was a roar of rage and hatred, and the men pressed forward, fortunately carrying with them the vicar, and too intent upon their proposed victims to take any notice of the strange figure elbowing itself to the front.
“Where are the police, Banks – the police?”
“Yah! He wants the police,” shouted a shrill voice, which came from the man in the red waistcoat. “He’s trampled down the rights of man, and now he wants the brutal mummydons of the law.”
“Yah!” roared the crowd, and they pressed on.
“Banks, what shall we do?” whispered Glaire; “they’ll murder us.”
“They won’t murder me,” said the foreman, stolidly.
“But they will me. What shall we do?”
“Faight,” said the foreman, sturdily.
“I can’t fight. I’ll promise them anything,” groaned the young man. “Here, my lads,” he cried, “I’ll promise you – ”
“Yah! You wean’t keep your promises,” roared those nearest. “Down with them. Get hold of him, Harry.”
The big workman made a dash at Richard Glaire, and got him by the collar, dragging him from the wall just as the foreman, who tried to get before him, was good-humouredly baffled by half-a-dozen men, who took his blows for an instant, and then held him helpless against the bricks.
It would have gone hard with the young owner of the works, for an English mob, when excited and urged to action, is brutal enough for the moment, before their manly feelings resume their sway, and shame creeps in to stare them in the face. He would probably have been hustled, his clothes torn from his back, and a rain of blows have fallen upon him till he sank exhausted, when he would have been kicked and trampled upon till he lay insensible, with half his ribs broken, and there he would have been left.
“Police! Where are the police?” shouted the young man.
“Shut themselves up to be safe,” roared a lusty voice; and the young man grew dizzy with fear, as he gazed wildly round at the sea of menacing faces screaming and struggling to get at him.
As he cowered back a blow struck him on the forehead, and another on the lip, causing the blood to trickle down, while the great hammerman held him forward, struggling helplessly in his grasp.
At that moment when, sick with fear and pain, Richard Glaire’s legs were failing him, and he was about to sink helpless among his men, something white seemed to whiz by his ear, to be followed instantly by a heavy thud. There was a jerk at his collar, and he would have fallen, but a strong arm was thrown before him; and then it seemed to him that the big workman Harry had staggered back amongst his friends, as a loud voice exclaimed:
“Call yourselves Englishmen? A hundred to one!”
The new vicar’s bold onslaught saved Richard Glaire for the moment, and the men fell back, freeing the foreman as they did so. It was only for the moment though, and then with a yell of fury the excited mob closed in upon their victims.
Volume One – Chapter Six.
Mother and Son
Matters looked very bad for the new vicar, and for him he had tried to save, for though the foreman was now ready and free to lend his aid, and Richard Glaire, stung by his position into action, had recovered himself sufficiently to turn with all the feebleness of the trampled worm against his assailants, the fierce wave was ready to dash down upon them and sweep them away.
Harry, the big hammerman, had somewhat recovered himself, and was shaking his head as if to get rid of a buzzing sensation, and murmurs loud and deep were arising, when the shrill voice of the man in the red waistcoat arose.
“Now, lads, now’s your time. Trample down them as is always trampling on you and your rights. Smite ’em hip and thigh.”
“Come on, and show ’em how to do it,” roared a sturdy voice, and Tom Podmore thrust himself before the vicar, and faced the mob. “Come on and show ’em how, Sim Slee; and let’s see as you ain’t all wind.”
There was a derisive shout at this, and the man in the red waistcoat began again.
“Down with them, boys. Down with Tom Podmore, too; he’s a sneak – a rat. Yah!”
“I’ll rat you, you ranting bagpipe,” cried Tom, loudly. “Stand back, lads; this is new parson, and him as touches him has to come by me first. Harry, lad, come o’ my side; you don’t bear no malice again a man as can hit like that.”
“Not I,” said Harry, thrusting his great head forward, to stare full in the vicar’s face. “Dal me, but you are a stout un, parson; gie’s your fist. It’s a hard un.”
It was given on the instant, and the hearty pressure told the vicar that he had won a new ally.
“As for the governor,” cried Tom, “you may do what you like wi’ him, lads, for I shan’t tak’ his part.”
“Podmore,” whispered the vicar, “for Heaven’s sake be a man, and help me.”
“I am a man, parson, and I’ll help you like one; but as for him” – he cried, darting a malignant look at Richard Glaire.
He did not finish his sentence, for at that moment the man in the red waistcoat mounted a post, and cried again:
“Down with ’em, lads; down with – ”
He, too, did not finish his sentence, for at that moment, either by accident or malicious design, the orator was upset; and, so easily changed is the temper of a crowd, a loud laugh arose.
But the danger was not yet passed, for those nearest seemed ready to drag their employer from his little body-guard.
“You’ll help me then, Podmore?” cried the vicar, hastily. “Come, quick, to the gate.”
The veins were swelling in Tom Podmore’s forehead, and he glanced as fiercely as any at his master, but the vicar’s advice seemed like a new law to him, and joining himself to his defenders, with the great hammerman, they backed slowly to the gate, through the wicket, by which Richard Glaire darted, and the others followed, the vicar coming last and facing the crowd.
The little door in the great gates was clapped to directly, and then there came heavy blows with stones, and a few kicks, followed by a burst of hooting and yelling, after which the noise subsided, and the little party inside began to breathe more freely.
“Thanky, Tom Podmore, my lad,” said Banks, shaking him by the hand. “I’m glad you turned up as you did.”
Tom nodded in a sulky way, and glowered at his master, but he pressed the foreman’s hand warmly.
“I’d fight for you, Joe Banks, till I dropped, if it was only for her sake; but not for him.”
Meanwhile Harry, the big hammerman, was walking round the vicar and inspecting him, just as a great dog would look at a stranger.
“Say, parson, can you wrastle?” he said at last.
“Yes, a little,” was the reply, with a smile.
“I’d maybe like to try a fall wi’ ye.”
“I think we’ve had enough athletics for one day,” was the reply. “Look at my hand.”
He held out his bleeding knuckles, and the hammerman grinned.
“That’s my head,” he said. “’Tis a hard un, ain’t it?”
“The hardest I ever hit,” said the vicar, smiling.
“Is it, parson – is it now?” said Harry, with his massive face lighting up with pride. “Hear that, Tom? Hear that, Joe Banks?”
He stood nodding his head and chuckling, as if he had received the greatest satisfaction from this announcement; and then, paying no heed to the great bruise on his forehead, which was plainly puffing up, he sat down on a pile of old metal, lit his pipe, and looked on.
“I hope you are not hurt, Mr Glaire?” said the vicar. “This is a strange second meeting to-day.”
“No,” exclaimed Richard, grinding his teeth, “I’m not hurt – not much. Banks, go into the counting-house, and get me some brandy. Curse them, they’ve dragged me to pieces.”
“Well, you would be so arbitrary with them, and I told you not,” said Banks. “I know’d there’d be a row if you did.”
“What!” cried Richard, “are you going to side with them?”
“No,” said Banks, quietly. “I never sides with the men again the master, and never did; but you would have your own way about taking off that ten per cent.”
“I’ll take off twenty now,” shrieked Richard, stamping about like an angry child. “I’ll have them punished for this outrage. I’m a magistrate, and I’ll punish them. I’ll have the dragoons over from Churley. It’s disgraceful, it’s a regular riot, and not one of those three wretched policemen to be seen.”
“I see one on ’em comin’,” growled Harry, grinning; “and he went back again.”
“Had you not better try a little persuasion with your workpeople?” said the vicar. “I am quite new here, but it seems to me better than force.”
“That’s what I tells him, sir,” exclaimed Banks, “only he will be so arbitrary.”
“Persuasion!” shrieked Richard, who, now that he was safe, was infuriated. “I’ll persuade them. I’ll starve some of them into submission. What’s that? What’s that? Is the gate barred?”
He ran towards the building, for at that moment there was a roar outside as if of menace, but immediately after some one shouted —
“Three cheers for Missus Glaire!”
They were given heartily, and then the gate bell was rung lustily.
“It’s the Missus,” said Banks, going towards the gates.
“Don’t open those gates. Stop!” shrieked Richard.
“But it’s the Missus come,” said Banks, and he peeped through a crack.
“Open the gates, open the gates,” cried a dozen voices.
“I don’t think you need fear now,” said the vicar; “the disturbance is over for the present.”
“Fear! I’m not afraid,” snarled Richard; “but I won’t have those scoundrels in here.”
“I’ll see as no one else comes in,” said Harry, getting up like a small edition of Goliath; and he stood on one side of the wicket gate, while Banks opened it and admitted Mrs Glaire, with Eve Pelly, who looked ghastly pale.
Several men tried to follow, but the gate was forced to by the united efforts of Harry and the foreman, when there arose a savage yell; but this was drowned by some one proposing once more “Three cheers for the Missus!” and they were given with the greatest gusto, while the next minute twenty heads appeared above the wall and gates, to which some of the rioters had climbed.
“Oh, Richard, my son, what have you been doing?” cried Mrs Glaire, taking his hand, while Eve Pelly went up and clung to his arm, gazing tremblingly in his bleeding face and at his disordered apparel.
“There, get away,” cried Richard, impatiently, shaking himself free. “What have I been doing? What have those scoundrels been doing, you mean?”
He applied his handkerchief to his bleeding mouth, looking at the white cambric again and again, as he saw that it was stained, and turning very pale and sick, so that he seated himself on a rough mould.
“Dick, dear Dick, are you much hurt?” whispered Eve, going to him again in spite of his repulse, and laying her pretty little hand on his shoulder.
“Hurt? Yes, horribly,” he cried, in a pettish way. “You see I am. Don’t touch me. Go for the doctor somebody.”
He looked round with a ghastly face, and it was evident that he was going to faint.
“Run, pray run for Mr Purley,” cried Mrs Glaire.
“I’ll go,” cried Eve, eagerly.
“I don’t think there is any necessity,” said the vicar, quietly. “Can you get some brandy, my man?” he continued, to Banks. “No, stay, I have my flask.”
He poured out some spirit into the cup, and Richard Glaire drank it at a draught, getting up directly after, and shaking his fist at the men on the wall.
