TEN POUNDS
Notwithstanding the call of 'On to Ely!' the mob was not at once in
motion. Something delayed it.
Zita went to the window and looked out. She saw that which excited and
angered her, and, turning her head to Drownlands, said—
'It is a shame! It is disgraceful! They have taken my ten pounds, and
yet they are carrying off my van. They have put Jewel into the shafts.
They might as well have harnessed the Archbishop! He's stiffening his
legs and setting back his ears. Look how he's cocking his tail. They
will have to drag on van and Jewel together. What a thing the general
public is! I never knew it in this mood before, and yet I thought I
knew it pretty well. I'll clear the public out of my van. There are a
dozen inside, and a score on the roof. They have no right to do this
after accepting my money.'
She left the window.
'Zita, where are you going?' asked Drownlands.
'Going to send the general public skipping,' she answered.
'You cannot do it. It is not safe to leave the house.'
'Trust me. I've swept the poultry off, and I'm not afraid of the
public. I know how to deal with them as I do with fowls.'
Before Drownlands had time to offer further remonstrance, she had
darted out of the office, run to her own room, taken a pair of fencing
foils from the stores, had descended the stairs two steps at a time,
had unbarred the door and was out in the yard, making for the van.
'Stand still—don't move,' she said to Jewel, as she passed his head;
and he turned one of his eyes at her and winked.
'Clear away at once,' she shouted to those around the van. 'You have
taken my money, and must let the conveyance alone.'
'Who are you? We've no money of yours.'
'Yes, you have. I sent out ten pounds to you. Go, ask your commander,
secretary, treasurer, or whatever you call him. He has pocketed my ten
pounds, and you are bound to leave my van alone. I am the Cheap Jack
girl.'
'Are you the daughter of the Cheap Jack who died here?'
'Yes, I am; and this is my van. Hands off. You have no quarrel against
me. What have I done to make bread dear and keep wages low? I do not
belong to these parts. Stand aside.'
She thrust her way to the back of the van where was the glass door.
This had been opened, and several men had ensconced themselves inside
on the benches.
Zita entered, a foil in each hand. Within it was dark, but she
nevertheless knew that the interior was packed full of men.
'This is my conveyance,' she said imperiously; 'you have no more right
to enter it than you have to occupy the house of the Lord Mayor. I have
got a sword in each hand. I cannot see any one in the dark, but I will
dagg with each hand, as you dagg for eels, and I will go on dagging
till I have got a man wriggling at the end of each.'
Down went the front of the van, and out tumbled a dozen lusty men, one
over another, stumbling, falling, sprawling, in the trampled snow and
straw.
Zita went through the van from aft to fore, and satisfied herself that
it was cleared of its human occupants. Then, standing on the platform,
which had been thrown forward by those who burst away from her foils,
she looked up at the roof. A score of men and youths was on it, their
legs pendent.
'Down with you at once,' she said. 'Do you see these rapiers? Do
you think I can't run a man through as easy as stick a needle in a
pin-cushion? It's not the running in—it's the pulling out is the
trouble. There's a button at the end of each blade. I have got only
two—so I can pin but two of you, and that shall be the last two that
leave the roof.'
She made as though about to scramble on to the top of the van, and away
went the men seated there, dropping like ripe pears from a tree.
Zita leisurely reclosed the front of the van, and went out at the back
and shut that door also.
'That's a good job done, Jewel,' said she. 'Now run the van backwards
into the shed, and you shall return to the stable. Roman candles,
Jewel—pop-bang! Roman candles at your nose.'
'Hold there, you Cheap Jack girl!' shouted a broad-shouldered man,
coming up and laying his hand on the bit. 'We have taken this
conveyance for the Union. It is confiscated.'
'Whether taken and confiscated I cannot say,' said Zita. 'But I know I
have paid ten pounds to have it untaken and set at liberty. Return my
ten sovereigns if you take from me my van.'
'We have no ten sovereigns of yours.'
'Yes, you have. And a shame it is that you should rob a poor Cheap Jack
girl. Not that she belongs to the general public, save and deliver
us!—but she is a working girl, and poor.'
'We have had no money of yours, and we requisition the van. We want to
load it in Ely. It will serve our purpose better than a waggon.'
'You shall not have it,' replied Zita. 'Fair trade is fair trade, and
he that will not deal honourably I will run through, and leave the
button sticking between his shoulders, and that will spoil a good
weskit.'
The man sprang back as she threatened him with one of the foils.
'I will tell you what it is,' said Zita; 'you will not believe me till
I have made an example of one of you.'
'Where is your ten pounds?' asked Pip Beamish, who had descended from
the waggon.
'Ay,' said several of those who stood round; 'that is what we should
uncommon like to know.'
'Where are my ten pounds?' repeated Zita. 'That is a fine question for
you to put to me, when I'll be bound you have them in your pocket.'
'Bring them out, Pip!' called one of the men.
'I have not got her money. I have not touched it,' protested the
commander.
'I gave it to Mark Runham along with the master's twenty pounds.'
'The twenty pounds has been put into the Union box—I never touched
your ten.'
'Come, come, Pip,' said a cluster of men, 'no shuffling. Mark wouldn't
have held back the money. You have had it, sure enough.'
'I have not had one farthing of it.'
'I paid ten pounds to have my van set at liberty. I did not wish to
have it sat upon, and the sides kicked, and the varnish scratched. I
gave ten pounds to save it from that.'
'What did you get, Beamish?' asked Aaron Chevell.
'I got just twenty pounds and no more—the twenty pounds that
Drownlands contributed, and that I put into the box with the rest.'
'And not my ten?' exclaimed Zita. 'That is a falsehood. My ten was with
his twenty. Thirty pounds in all, in gold.'
'There has been cheating,' shouted two or three.
'That is what comes of jaw and preaching.'
'Mates,' said Aaron Chevell, 'we must not let this pass. Let us have
judge and jury There has been robbery of the common fund. Mates, I vote
that we arrest Pip Beamish, and try him at once.'
'Have him up in the cart,' said Tansley. 'Comrades all! light some
more straw wisps. There has been a case of roguery. There has been our
chief officer taking the money that was contributed to the Union, and
pocketing it for his private use. I charge Ephraim Beamish, and vote
that he be deposed from his command, and be tried for felony.'
'I second it,' shouted Isaac Harley. 'And what I say is—like enough.
He who wants most has taken it. A chap as hasn't a house to call his
home, nor an honest employ in which to earn his living.'
'It is not what I calls respectable,' said one man, 'that we should
march under such a rascal.'
Then ensued a chorus of voices.
'Up into the waggon with him, and try him there.'
In vain did Beamish protest that he had not defrauded the Union, that
he had received no more than twenty pounds. The rest suspected him, and
were jealous of his assumption of authority.
'You Cheap Jack girl,' called Chevell, 'we want your evidence. Ay,
bring the swords along with you, if you're afraid of us, but we do not
hurt women.'
Zita allowed herself to be conducted to the waggon, and assisted into
it with rough courtesy.
A fen-farm waggon is a very massive structure, more massive, perhaps,
than one in other parts of England. It has its peculiarity, which
consists in the front board being unusually high and arched at top.
Often may women be seen going to market in the waggons, crouching
against this high board, which screens them from the wind.
There is much vermilion paint employed on the waggons, and the front
board usually blazes with colour. It was so on this occasion. The
waggon carried off by the rioters had recently been painted, and the
vermilion was of the brightest.
Isaac Harley cried from his place in the waggon, 'Mates, who is to be
judge?'
'We will have no judge but ourselves,' was the ready response.
'Then,' cried Tansley, 'choose your jury.'
'We will all be jury!' shouted the mob.
Then Aaron Chevell, standing forward, said, 'Comrades, the case is
this. This young gal—she is the Cheap Jack's lass, staying here—says
she gave ten sovereigns in gold to the labourers' cause, to have her
van let alone. And she gave it along with the twenty pounds of Tiger
Ki. Now we want to know what has become of this contribution of hers.
Ephraim Beamish swears he never received it.'
'I had the twenty pounds of Mark Runham,' said Beamish, 'but not ten
besides.'
'You stand by the front board,' said Chevell to Zita, 'and tell your
story. We will hold Beamish, and every one shall judge.'
'What? the general public?' asked Zita, looking round at the crowd of
upturned faces.
'Yes; it shall give judgment.'
'Then you'll have rare judgment,' said Zita. She went forward to the
place pointed out to her, and stood there, with her back to the scarlet
board, and leaned on her foils. Blazing straw wisps were held up,
brilliantly illumining the whole scene.
'I call to silence,' said Chevell, 'and let us hear what the Cheap Jack
gal has to say.'
'What I have to say is this,' said Zita. 'I saw that you had drawn out
my van, the house in which I was born and reared, the shop whence all
our profits came, and were treating it worse than did the poultry.
So I gave my savings to Mark Runham, ten pounds, all I had on me in
gold, at the same time that the master gave twenty pounds to save his
corn-stacks. Mark Runham took it to the man, Pip Beamish, who is your
captain.'
'No, he ain't! we have deposed him!' was shouted on all sides.
Then voices were raised for Runham, but Mark was not to be found.
'We want another witness,' said Chevell.
'There is one,' said Zita, pointing with a foil to Drownlands at the
window of his office. 'There are more if you desire them—Leehanna
Tunkiss, the girl Sarah, and Tom Easy. They all saw me give Mark the
money.'
Aaron called to Drownlands if it was so. Drownlands answered in assent.
'Summon the other witnesses,' commanded the self-constituted judge.
Whilst the men knocked at the house door and demanded the presence of
Mrs. Tunkiss and the girl Sarah, Beamish raised his voice in protest.
'I say, mates and comrades all, this is strange and unwarranted
proceedings. Am not I your leader?'
A shout of, 'You was—but you're a thief—we'll have none of you. I
vote for Aaron Chevell. Duck him; he's a turncoat. He's a cheat and
robs the poor men.'
'It is false!' shouted Beamish, between rage and disappointment. 'How
can I have acted as you say, when I am the man who urged you on,—I,
who have the cause at heart more than any of you?'
'Oh yes! that's how Judas talked!' shouted some one in the crowd. Then
there came yells of, 'Judas! Judas! Let him hang like Judas!'
The door of the house was not opened to allow the witnesses to issue at
the dictate of the mob.
'We must have more witnesses,' said Chevell. 'We don't lay much store
on Drownlands. He ain't taken the oath.'
Then Zita appealed to the master of Prickwillow to suffer the maids to
come forth. After some hesitation he agreed.
'I'll let 'em out if you'll hang Beamish,' shouted he from the window.
Presently the door of the house was cautiously opened, and Drownlands,
who stood at it, thrust forth the two women. Mrs. Tunkiss was white and
quaking; Sarah nigh upon a fit.
'Now, then,' demanded the judge, 'up into the waggon wi' you. And,
lads, hold up the torches that I may see if they looks honest and
truthful. You—Leehanna Tunkiss—did this Cheap Jack girl give ten
pounds for us into the hands of Beamish?'
'Oh yes! forty!' exclaimed the woman, who did not understand what was
being done, and thought she might be incriminating Zita, or doing her
some harm by the admission.
'She don't quite agree about the figure,—she says forty,—but she
establishes the fact,' said Chevell, addressing the crowd. 'You swear
to it?'
'Oh, I swear!' exclaimed Mrs. Tunkiss. 'Oh, gentlemen, let me down! I
shall faint.'
'Pass her down,' ordered Aaron. 'Now you other—Sarah Gathercole—did
she give him money? She shakes her head—I mean she nods.'
'She has the Vitus' dance,' protested the accused.
'She understands what's she's axed—eh?'
The poor girl nodded in her nervous fit.
'And you swear to it—the Cheap Jack girl gave ten pounds?'
Again she went into fits of jerking and nodding.
'She's mighty sure of it, that she be,' said Aaron. 'What say you,
mates and chums? Is it proved?'
A roar in response, in the affirmative.
'Now then,' said Chevell, 'it is for Pip Beamish to answer in his
defence.'
'I never had more than twenty pounds. Search me if you will.'
'You may have been too sharp for that,' said Isaac Harley. 'Mates, he
ain't got a defence. I vote for condemnation. This Pip Beamish has been
terribly stuck up, and has given himself the airs of a dook, and has
been ordering us about. I vote that he is a thieving rascal. What say
you?'
'Hear! hear! We say the same!' Then ensued shouts of, 'Kick him down!
Duck him! Chuck him into the Lark!'
In a moment Beamish was plucked out of the waggon, flapping his long
arms in protest and entreaty, was jostled, beaten, kicked, and finally
thrown into the dyke—the one honest and sincere man among the leaders
of the rabble.
'Now then, mates,' called Chevell, 'it is right and proper that we
should elect another commander.'
'We want no commanders!' shouted the mob. 'We know what we want! We
will all be commanders! Are we not the general public?'
'Then I vote,' cried Harley, 'that we lose no more time, but move on to
Ely.'
Zita was helped out of the cart. The improvised torches were set in
motion, forming a line of fire as the whole mob of rioters left the
farm, and marched along the dark embankment, whilst the waggon bounced
below on the drove.
As Zita stood by the van, which she had thrust back with the aid of
Jewel into the shed, a hand was laid on hers.
'Zita!'
The voice was that of Mark.
'Oh, Mark!'
'Zita, here are your ten pounds. I did not give them to Beamish.'
'Mark! and he has been deposed, and cuffed and beaten, for having
stolen it.'
'He has been thrown into the dyke, and I have helped him out of the
water. Do not be disconcerted. I could not have done him a better turn
than this, to get him out of association with men who are running their
heads into hangmen's nooses.'