A LAST PROPOSAL.
Affairs grew more unsatisfactory at Dallory as the weeks went on. The
strike continued; the men utterly refusing to return to work except on
their own terms, or, rather, the Trades' Union refusing to allow them
to do so. Supplies became more scanty. If not actual famine, something
near to it began to reign. North Inlet, once so prosperous, looked
like a half-starved place out at elbows. Oh, what senseless folly it
was! What would it end in? Mrs. Gass had grown tired of going amongst
the men to reason with them and try to bring them to their senses; but
Miss Dallory still went. Miss Dallory could make no impression
whatever. The men were moody, miserable, almost starved. They would
gladly have gone back to work again almost on no pay at all, only as a
relief to the present idleness; but they belonged to the famous
Trades' Union now, and must obey its dictates. Mary Dallory grew angry
sometimes, and asked whether they were men, or cravens, that they had
no pity for their poor helpless children.
One day Mrs. Gass and Miss Dallory went forth together. Not of
premeditation. One of Ketler's children was ill and weakly, incipient
consumption, Dr. Rane said; she was a sweet little child, mild and
gentle; and Miss Dallory would sometimes carry her strengthening
things. It was a terrible shame, she would tell Ketler, that he should
let even this poor sickly child starve: and Ketler humbly acknowledged
to his own heart that the child _was_ starving; and felt it keenly. The
man was as well-meaning a man as Heaven ever sent into the world;
anxious to do his duty: but he had signed himself a member of the
Trades' Union, and was helpless.
Miss Dallory wore a print gown, and was altogether a great deal less
fine than Jelly. She carried a small basket in her hand, containing
fresh eggs. As she passed Mrs. Gass's that lady was standing at her
open parlour window, in all the glory of a gorgeous green satin robe,
and white bonnet with bird-of-paradise feather. She dearly loved fine
clothes, and saw no reason why she should not wear them.
"Where be you bound to, my dear?" asked the grandly-dressed lady, as
Mary stopped.
"I am taking these eggs to little Cissy Ketler. Mrs. Gass, what is to
become of all the poor children if this state of things should last
much longer?"
"I'm sure I don't know. It goes again' the grain to see 'em want; but
when we give 'em food or helps it's just so much premium offered to
the father's incorrigible obstinacy and idleness, my dear."
"But the child is ill," said Mary Dallory. "And so are many other
children."
"They'll be worse before long. My dear, I was not talking at you, in
saying that. But I don't see where it's all to end. We can't set up
hospitals for the women and children, even with the best will to do
it. And the will, I, for one, have not. Once get their wives and
children took care of, and the men would lead the lives of gentlemen
to the end o' the chapter. Here; I'll walk with you, my dear; and we
can talk going along."
She came forth, drawing on her lemon-coloured gloves: and they went
towards Ketler's. North Inlet looked deserted to-day. Not a man was
lounging in it. The few stragglers to be seen were walking briskly in
the direction of the works; as if they had business on hand, and were
without their pipes. Mrs. Gass arrested one who was passing her.
"What's up, Dawson?"
"We've been called together, ma'am, to meet Mr. Richard North. He have
som'at to say to us. Happen, maybe, he's a-going to give in at last."
"Is he!" retorted Mrs. Gass. "I don't think you need worrit your
inside with that idea, Dawson. It's a deal more likely that he's going
to warn you he'll sell the works out and out--if he can get any fool
to buy 'em."
The man passed on. Mrs. Gass, as she turned to Miss Dallory, gave
a flourish with her small white lace parasol and a toss to the
bird-of-paradise.
"Had anybody told me men could be so obstinate, in regard to thinking
themselves in the right, I'd never have believed it: but seeing's
believing. My dear, suppose we just step on to the works, and learn
what matter Mr. Richard has in hand."
The men, going in at the iron gates, branched round to their own
entrance. Mrs. Gass took Miss Dallory to a private one. It led at once
into what might now be called the audience chamber, for Richard North
was already haranguing the men in it: a long and rather narrow room,
with a counter running across it. It used to be the pay-room of the
men: perhaps some of them, entering now, recalled those prosperous
days with a sigh. Richard North did not see the ladies come in. He
stood with his back to them, in his usual everyday attire, a plain
black frock-coat and grey trousers. His hands rested on the counter as
he talked to the men, who faced him on the other side; a crowd of
them, all with attentive countenances. Mrs. Gass signed to Miss
Dallory to halt; not to conceal themselves from Richard, but simply
lest their advance should interrupt what he was saying. And so they
remained listening, Richard unconscious that he had any other audience
than his workpeople.
The matter was this. A contract had just been offered to North and
Gass. It was a very large one, and would certainly, if accepted, keep
the men employed for some time. It was offered at a certain price.
Richard North made his calculations and found that he could accept it,
provided the men would work on the former terms: but he could not if
the rate of wages had to be raised. Considering the present hopeless
condition of the men, imagining that they must have had very nearly
sufficient experience of idleness and empty cupboards to bring them to
reason, he determined to lay the proposal before them--that they might
accept or reject it. In a clear and concise manner he stated this, and
the men heard him respectfully to the end. One of them then advanced a
few steps before the rest, and answered. Answered without the smallest
deliberation; without so much as a pretence of inquiring what the
feelings of his fellows might be.
"We can't do it, sir."
Richard North raised his hand for silence, as if the man had spoken
before his time.
"Do you fully understand the case in all its bearings?" resumed
Richard: "if not, take time to reflect until you do understand it.
Look at it well; take into consideration the future as well as the
present. Listen again. This contract has been offered me: it is a good
one, as you must know. It will set our works going again; it will be
the means of bringing back the business that seems to be drifting more
hopelessly away from us day by day. It will provide you with,
employment, with wages that you not so long ago thought liberal; and
will place you again in what may be called prosperity--great
prosperity as compared with what exists at present. Your homes may be
homes of plenty again, your children have sufficient food. In short,
both to you and to me, this contract offers just the turn of the tide.
I wish to accept it: I see nothing but ruin before my father and
myself if I cannot do so: what I see before you I do not care to speak
of, if you are not wise enough to see it for yourselves. The decision
lies with you, unfortunately; I wish it lay with myself. Shall I take
it, or shall I not?"
"We couldn't return at them rate of wages, nohow," spoke up a voice
from the crowd.
"It is the last chance that I shall offer you," proceeded Richard.
"For your sakes I would strongly advise you to take it. Heaven is my
witness that I am honest in saying 'for your sakes.' We have been
associated together for many years, and I cannot see the breaking up
of old ties without first using every effort to re-unite them. I must
give my answer tomorrow, and accept this work or reject it. Little
time is allowed me for decision, therefore I am unable to give much to
you. Virtually the acceptance or rejection lies with you; for, without
you, I could not fulfil it: but I cannot help a remark in passing,
that for such a state of things to exist argues something rotten at
the core in the relations between master and men. At six o'clock
tomorrow morning the great bell shall be rung, calling you to work as
formerly. My men, I hope you will all respond to it."
No, not at the terms offered, was the answer gathered by Richard North
from the buzz that rose around.
"I cannot offer you better. I have said that this is the last chance,"
repeated Richard. "I shall never give you the option of working for me
again."
The men couldn't help that. The fact was, they only half believed it.
One ventured a supposition that if the works were sold, the new firm
might give them work on new terms.
"No," said Richard North. "I am very different from you, my men. You
see work at your very hand, and will not do it. You look forward to
the future with, as I must suppose, easy apathy, giving neither care
nor anxiety as to how you and your families are to live. I, on the
contrary, am only anxious to work; at a reduced rate of profit, on a
smaller scale if it must be; but, any way, to work. Night after night
I lie awake, tormented with lively apprehensions for the future. What
seemed, when you first turned out, to be a mere temporary stoppage,
that reason and good sense on both our sides could not fail to
rectify, has assumed gigantic proportions and a permanent aspect.
After some time I gave way; offering to split the difference, as to
wages, if you would return----"
"But we wanted the whole," came an interruption. "And you didn't give
way as to time."
"I could not do either," said Richard North firmly. "I offered all I
was able. That is a thing of the past: let it go. I now make you this
last and final offer; and I think it only fair to tell you what my
course will be if you reject it. I shall go over to Belgium and see if
I cannot engage Belgian workmen to come here and take your places."
A dead silence fell on the room. Ketler broke it.
"You'd surely not do that, sir!"
"Not do it! Why, you force it upon me. I must either get a new set of
men, or give up the works entirely. As I do not feel inclined to the
latter course, the former alone is open to me."
"We'll have none o' them Belgiums here!" cried a threatening voice
from the crowd.
"Allow me to tell you, Thoms, to tell you all, that the Belgians will
not ask your leave to come," spoke Richard, raising his head to its
full height. "Would you act the part of dogs-in-the-manger? I offer
_you_ the work; offer it _now_; and I heartily wish you to accept it;
but if you do not, I shall certainly endeavour to get others here who
will."
"Who be they Belgicks that they should snatch the bread out of honest
Englishmen's mouths!"
"What are the honest Englishmen about, to give them the opportunity?"
retorted Richard. "Listen, my men," he continued, as he leaned forward
and raised his hand impressively. "If you (I speak of the country
collectively) refuse to work, it can practically matter very little to
you whether the work goes to Belgium or elsewhere to be done, or
whether strangers come and do it here. _It must end in one or the
other_."
"It shan't never end in them frogs o' foreigners coming here," spoke
Thoms again, vexed that his voice should have been recognized by
Richard North. And this second interruption was hissed down by his
more sensible comrades; who sharply bade him hold his tongue, and hear
the master. Richard put up his hand again.
"We will take it, for the moment's argument, at what Thoms says--that
strangers would not, or should not, come here. In that case the other
result must happen--the work of the country would pass away from it.
It has already begun to pass; you know it, my men; and so do your
rulers the Trades' Unions. How it affects their nerves I don't pretend
to say; but, when once this tide of desolation has fairly set in as a
settled result, there will not be much need of their agitation. As
truly as that I live, and now stand here speaking to you, I believe
this will come. In different parts of the country whole places are
being dismantled--the work has left it. Do you suppose North Inlet is
the only spot where the provision shops may as well be closed because
the men have no longer money to spend in them? Any newspaper you take
up will tell you the contrary. Read about the ship-building in the
East of London; how it has gone away, and whole colonies of men are
left behind starving. Gone to Scotland; to the banks of the Tyne;
anywhere that men can be found to work. It is the same with other
trades. Whose fault is this? Why, the men's own."
Murmurs. "No. No."
"No! Why, here's a present illustration of it. Whose fault is it that
my works are shut up, and you are living in idleness--or, we'll say,
starving in idleness, if you like the word better? If I am unable to
take this contract now offered, and it goes elsewhere, whose doings
will it be, but yours? Don't talk nonsense, my men. It is all very
well to say that the Trades' Unions don't allow, you to take the work.
I have nothing to do with that: you and the Unions may divide the
responsibility between you."
"The fact is, sir, that we are not our own masters," said Ketler.
"Just so. And it seems that you cannot, or will not, emancipate
yourselves from your new slavery and again become your own masters.
However, I did not call you together to go over this old ground, but
to lay before you the option of returning to work. You have the day to
consider it. At six o'clock tomorrow the call-bell will ring----"
"'Twon't be of no use ringing it, sir," interrupted Ketler, some
sadness in his tone.
"At six o'clock tomorrow morning the call-bell here will ring,"
authoritatively repeated Richard North. "You respond to it and I shall
heartily welcome you back. If you do not, my refusal must go in, and
the contract will lapse from me. If we part to-day it is our final
parting, for I shall at once take measures to secure a fresh set of
workpeople. Though I gather but ten together at first, and the work I
undertake be insignificant in proportion, _I'll get them_. It will be
something like beginning life again: and you will have forced it on
me."
"And of all pig-headed idiotics that mortal master ever had to deal
with, sure you men are the worst!"
The undignified interruption came from Mrs. Gass. Richard looked
round, in great surprise; perhaps all the greater when he also
saw Miss Dallory. Mrs. Gass came forward; talking volubly; her
bird-of-paradise nodding time to her words. As usual she told the men
some home truths; none the less forcibly because her language was
homely as their own.
"Is this true?" asked Miss Dallory in a low tone, as Richard went back
to shake hands with her. "Shall you really reopen the works again
with another set of men?"
"Yes--if these do not return. It will be better, however quietly I may
have to begin, than going out to seek my fortune in the world. At
least, I have lately been thinking so."
"Do you think the men _will_ return?"
"I am afraid to give you my true opinion. It might seem like a bad
omen."
"And now you have given it me. It is also mine. They are blind to
infatuation."
"Not so much blind, I think, as that they are--I have just said so to
them--in a state of slavery from which they dare not emancipate
themselves."
"And who would do so--under the specious promises of the Trades'
Unions? Don't blame them too much, Mr. Richard North. If some strong
body came down on you or me with, all sorts of agitation and golden
promises for the future, we also might believe in them."
Richard shook his head. "Not if the strong body lived by the
agitation: and took our hard-earned money to keep themselves and their
golden promises going."
Mary Dallory laughed a little. "Shall you ring that great bell in the
morning?"
"Yes; certainly."
"Ah, well--the men will only laugh at you. But I dare say you can
stand that. Oh dear! What need there is that the next world should be
great and good, when this is so foolish a one!"
The meeting had broken up. Richard North and a few of the more
intelligent of the men--those who had filled the more important posts
at the works--remained talking yet together. Mrs. Gass, and Miss
Dallory with her basket of fresh eggs, went away together.
Women stood about with anxious faces, watching for the news. They
were tired of the strike: heartsick, as some of them feelingly
expressed it. Nothing teaches so well as experience: the women were as
eager for the strike at one time as the men could be, believing it
would bring them a tide of prosperity in its wake. They had not
bargained for what it had really brought: misery, and dismantled
homes, and semi-starvation. But for being obliged to keep up as others
did--as we all have to do, whatever may be the life's struggles, the
heart's bitter care--there were those amongst them who would have laid
down to die in sheer hopelessness.
Mrs. Ketler stood at her door in a tattered black net cap--the once
tidy woman. She was shading the sun from her eyes as she looked out
for her husband. It prevented her noticing the approach of the ladies;
and when they accosted her she backed into her house in her timid way,
rather startled, attempting a few words by way of apology. The little
girl who was sick--a wan child of seven years old--was being nursed by
one somewhat older. Miss Dallory looked round to see that there was a
chair left, and took the invalid on her own lap. Almost all the
available things the house once contained had been parted with; either
pledged or sold. Miss Dallory gave the eggs to the mother, and a
half-pint bottle of beef-tea that lay at the bottom of the basket.
"How is Cissy to-day?" she asked tenderly of the child.
"Cissy tired," was the little one's answer.
"Has Cissy finished the strawberry-jam?"
Cissy nodded.
"Then let your big boy come to Ham Court for some more," said Miss
Dallory, turning to the mother.
The "big boy" was the eldest. He had been employed at the works, but
was of course condemned to idleness like the rest.
"Aren't you pretty tired of this sort o' thing?" demanded Mrs. Gass,
who had come to an anchor on a wooden bucket turned upside-down.
The woman knew what she meant by "this sort o' thing," and gave a
groan. It was very expressive, showing _how_ tired she was of it, and
how hopeless were any prospects of a change.
"I've heard about the master's offer, ma'am; but the men mean to
reject it," she said. "Smith stopped to tell me as he went by. The
Lord above knows what is to become of us!"
"If the men do reject it, they'll deserve to starve for the rest of
their lives," retorted Mrs. Gass. "Any way, I hope they'll have it
upon their consciences for ever."
"It's the Trades' Union," said the woman in a low tone, giving a
frightened look around. "The men can't do as they would."
"Not do as they would!" echoed Mrs. Gass. "Don't you pick up their
folly and retail it to me again, Susan Ketler. If the men was fools
enough to be drawn into joining the Union at first--and I wouldn't
blame 'em too much for that, for the best of us gets led away at times
by fair promises that turn out in the end to be smoke, or worse--they
ought not to be so obstinate as to keep there. Now that they've seen
what good that precious Trades' Union is doing for 'em, and what it's
likely to do, they should buckle on the armour of their common sense
and leave it. Mr. Richard North has this day given them the
opportunity of doing so. Every man Jack of 'em can go back to work
tomorrow morning at the ringing of the bell: and take up again with
good wages and comfort. If they refuse they'll not be so much fools as
something worse, Susan Ketler: they'll be desperately wicked."
"They are afraid," murmured the woman. "They have yielded themselves
by word and bond to the Union."
"Then let 'em break the bond. Don't tell me, Susan Ketler. Afraid?
What of? Could the Union kill them for it? Could the men be hung,
drawn and quartered for leaving it? Who _is_ the Union? Giants that were
born with thunderbolts and power from the Creator to control people's
wills?--or just simple men like themselves: workmen too, once, some of
'em, if reports are true. You'd better not try to come over me with
your fallacies. Facts is facts. If these men chose to do it, they
could send the Trades' Union to the right about this very day, and
return, with one accord, to work and their senses tomorrow. Who's to
hinder them?"
Mrs. Ketler ventured to say no more. She only wished she dared say as
much to her husband and the men. But, what with common sense, as Mrs.
Gass called it, on the one side, and the Trades' Union sophistries on
the other, the steering in North Inlet just now was difficult in the
extreme. Mrs. Gass rose from her uncomfortable seat, and departed with
Miss Dallory.