Produced by Malcolm Farmer, Cathy Maxam and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
MRS BINDLE
SOME INCIDENTS FROM THE
DOMESTIC LIFE OF THE BINDLES
WHAT THIS BOOK IS ABOUT
Ever since the success achieved by _Bindle_, Herbert Jenkins has been
urged to write giving Mrs. Bindle's point of view. This book is the
result.
Among other things, it narrates how Mrs. Bindle caught a chill, how a
nephew was born to her and what effect it had upon her outlook.
It tells how she encountered a bull, and what happened to the man who
endeavoured to take forcible possession of her home.
She is shown as breaking a strike by precipitating a lock-out, burning
incense to her brother-in-law, Mr. Hearty, and refusing the armistice
that was offered.
One chapter tells of her relations with her neighbours. Another deals
with a musical evening she planned, and yet a third of how she caught
a chill and was in great fear of heaven.
_BY THE SAME AUTHOR_
BINDLE 2s. 6d. net.
THE NIGHT CLUB 2s. 6d. net.
ADVENTURES OF BINDLE 2s. 6d. net.
JOHN DENE OF TORONTO 2s. 6d. net.
MALCOLM SAGE, DETECTIVE 2s. 6d. net.
PATRICIA BRENT, SPINSTER 2s. 6d. net.
THE RAIN-GIRL 2s. 6d. net.
THE RETURN OF ALFRED 2s. 6d. net.
THE BINDLES ON THE ROCKS 2s. 6d. net.
THE STIFFSONS and other stories 2s. 6d. net.
MRS
BINDLE
SOME INCIDENTS FROM THE
DOMESTIC LIFE OF THE BINDLES
BY
HERBERT
JENKINS
HERBERT JENKINS LIMITED
YORK STREET ST. JAMES'S S.W.1.
[Illustration]
_Ninth printing, completing 104,643 copies_
MADE AND PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY
PURNELL AND SONS, PAULTON (SOMERSET) AND LONDON
TO
ARTHUR
COMPTON
RICKETT
M.A., LL.D.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. MRS. BINDLE'S LOCK-OUT 9
II. MRS. BINDLE'S WASHING-DAY 38
III. MRS. BINDLE ENTERTAINS 60
IV. THE COMING OF JOSEPH THE SECOND 89
V. MRS. BINDLE BURNS INCENSE 108
VI. MRS. BINDLE DEFENDS HER HOME 125
VII. MRS. BINDLE DEMANDS A HOLIDAY 150
VIII. THE SUMMER-CAMP FOR TIRED WORKERS 168
IX. MR. HEARTY ENCOUNTERS A BULL 188
X. THE COMING OF THE WHIRLWIND 209
XI. MRS. BINDLE TAKES A CHILL 237
XII. MRS. BINDLE BREAKS AN ARMISTICE 263
XIII. MRS. BINDLE'S DISCOVERY 283
MRS BINDLE
CHAPTER I
MRS. BINDLE'S LOCK-OUT
I
"Well! What's the matter now? Lorst your job?"
With one hand resting upon the edge of the pail beside which she was
kneeling, Mrs. Bindle looked up, challenge in her eyes. Bindle's
unexpected appearance while she was washing the kitchen oilcloth filled
her with foreboding.
"There's a strike on at the yard," he replied in a tone which, in spite
of his endeavour to render it casual, sounded like a confession of
guilt. He knew Mrs. Bindle; he knew also her views on strikes.
"A what?" she cried, rising to her feet and wiping her hands upon the
coarse canvas apron that covered the skirt carefully festooned about her
hips. "A what?"
"A strike," repeated Bindle. "They give Walter 'Odson the sack, so we
all come out."
"Oh! you have, have you?" she cried, her thin lips disappearing
ominously. "And when are you going back, I'd like to know?" She regarded
him with an eye that he knew meant war.
"Can't say," he replied, as he proceeded to fill his pipe from a tin
tobacco-box. "Depends on the Union," he added.
"The Union!" she cried with rising wrath. "I wish I had them here. I'd
give them Union, throwing men out of work, with food the price it is.
What's going to 'appen to us? Can you tell me that?" she demanded, her
diction becoming a little frayed at the edges, owing to the intensity of
her feelings.
Bindle remained silent. He realised that he was faced by a crisis.
"Nice thing you coming 'ome at eleven o'clock in the morning calmly
saying you've struck," she continued angrily. "You're a lazy,
good-for-nothing set of loafers, the whole lot of you, that's what you
are. When you're tired of work and want a 'oliday you strike, and spend
your time in public-'ouses, betting and drinking and swearing, and us
women slaving morning, noon and night to keep you. Suppose I was to
strike, what then?"
She undid her canvas apron, and with short, jerky movements proceeded to
fold and place it in the dresser-drawer. She then let down the festoons
into which her skirt had been gathered about her inconspicuous hips.
Mrs. Bindle was a sharp, hatchet-faced woman, with eyes too closely set
together to satisfy an artist.
The narrowness of her head was emphasised by the way in which her thin,
sandy hair was drawn behind each ear and screwed tightly into a knot at
the back.
Her lips were thin and slightly marked, and when she was annoyed they
had a tendency to disappear altogether.
"How are we going to live?" she demanded. "Answer me that! You and your
strikes!"
Bindle struck a match and became absorbed in lighting his pipe.
"What are you going to do for food?" She was not to be denied.
"We're a-goin' to get strike pay," he countered, seizing the opening.
"Strike pay!" she cried scornfully. "A fat lot of good that'll do. A
pound a week, I suppose, and you eating like a--like a----" she paused
for a satisfactory simile. "Eating me out of 'ouse and 'ome," she
amended. "'Strike pay!' I'd give 'em strike pay if I had my way."
"It'll 'elp," suggested Bindle.
"Help! Yes, it'll help you to find out how hungry you can get," she
retorted grimly. "I'd like to have that man Smillie here, I'd give him a
bit of my mind."
"But 'e ain't done it," protested Bindle, a sense of fair play prompting
him to defend the absent leader. "'E's a miner. We don't belong to 'is
Union."
"They're all tarred with the same brush," cried Mrs. Bindle, "a
good-for-nothing, lazy lot. They turn you round their little fingers,
and then laugh at you up their sleeves. I know them," she added darkly.
Bindle edged towards the door. He had not been in favour of the strike;
now it was even less popular with him.
"I suppose you're going round to your low public-house, to drink and
smoke and tell each other how clever you've been," she continued. "Then
you'll come back expecting to find your dinner ready to put in your
mouth."
Mrs. Bindle's words were prophetic. Bindle _was_ going round to The
Yellow Ostrich to meet his mates, and discuss the latest strike-news.
"You wouldn't 'ave me a blackleg, Lizzie, would you?" he asked.
"Don't talk to me about such things," she retorted. "I'm a hardworking
woman, I am, inchin' and pinchin' to keep the home respectable, while
you and your low companions refuse to work. I wish I had them all here,
I'd give them strikes." Her voice shook with suppressed passion.
Realising that the fates were against him, Bindle beat a gloomy retreat,
and turned his steps in the direction of The Yellow Ostrich.
At one o'clock he returned to Fenton Street, a little doubtful; but very
hungry.
He closed the gate quietly, Mrs. Bindle hated the banging of gates.
Suddenly he caught sight of a piece of white paper pinned to the front
door. A moment later he was reading the dumbfounding announcement:
"I have struck too.
"E. BINDLE."
The words, which were written on the back of a coal-merchant's
advertisement, seemed to dance before his eyes.
He was conscious that at the front window on either side a face was
watching him intently. In Fenton Street drama was the common property of
all.
With a puzzled expression in his eyes, Bindle stood staring at the piece
of paper and its ominous message, his right hand scratching his head
through the blue and white cricket cap he habitually wore.
"Well, I'm blowed," he muttered, as Mrs. Grimps, who lived at No. 5,
came to her door and stood regarding him not unsympathetically.
At the sight of her neighbour, Mrs. Sawney, who occupied No. 9, also
appeared, her hands rolled up in her apron and her arms steaming. She
had been engaged in the scullery when "'Arriet," who had been set to
watch events, rushed in from the front room with the news that Mr.
Bindle was coming.
"Serves you right, it does," said Mrs. Sawney. "You men," she added, as
if to remove from her words any suggestion that they were intended as
personal. Bindle was very popular with his neighbours.
"Strikes you does, when you ain't feeling like work," chorused Mrs.
Grimps, "I know you."
Bindle looked from one to the other. For once he felt there was nothing
to say.
"Then there's the kids," said a slatternly-looking woman with a hard
mouth and dusty hair, who had just drifted up from two doors away. "A
lot you cares. It's us wot 'as to suffer."
There was a murmur from the other women, who had been reinforced by two
neighbours from the opposite side of the street.
"She 'as my sympathy," said Mrs. Sawney, "although I can't say I likes
'er as a friend."
During these remarks, Bindle had been searching for his latch-key, which
he now drew forth and inserted in the lock; but, although the latch
responded, the door did not give. It was bolted on the inside.
"Well, I'm blowed!" he muttered again, too surprised at this new phase
of the situation to be more than dimly conscious of the remarks of those
about him.
"My sister's man struck three months ago," said one of the new arrivals,
"and 'er expectin' 'er fifth. Crool I calls it. They ought to 'ave 'em
theirselves is wot I say. That'ud learn 'em to strike."
A murmur of approval broke from the others at this enigmatical
utterance.
"It's all very well for them," cried Mrs. Sawney; "but it's us wot 'as
to suffer, us and the pore kids, bless 'em. 'Arriet, you let me catch
you swingin' on that gate again, my beauty, and I'll skin you."
The last remark was directed at the little girl, who had seized the
moment of her mother's pre-occupation to indulge herself in an illicit
joy.
Without a word, Bindle turned and walked down the flagged path to the
gate, and along Fenton Street in the direction of The Yellow Ostrich,
leaving behind him a group of interested women, who would find in his
tragedy material for a week's gossip.
His customary cheeriness had forsaken him. He realised that he was faced
by a domestic crisis that frankly puzzled him--and he was hungry.
As he pushed open the hospitable swing-door of The Yellow Ostrich, he
was greeted by a new and even more bewildering phase of the situation.
"'Ere, Bindle," cried an angry voice, "wot the blinkin' 'ell's your
missis up to?"
"You may search me," was Bindle's lugubrious reply, as he moved across
to the bar and ordered a pint of beer, some bread, and "a bit o' the
cheese wot works the lift."
"You was agin us chaps striking," continued the speaker who had greeted
Bindle on his entrance, a man with a criminal forehead, a loose mouth,
and a dirty neck-cloth.
"Wot's your complaint, mate?" enquired Bindle indifferently, as he
lifted his pewter from the counter, and took a pull that half emptied it
of its contents.
"Wot's your ruddy missis been up to?" demanded the man aggressively.
"Look 'ere, 'Enery, ole sport," said Bindle quietly, as he wiped his
lips with the back of his hand, "you ain't pretty, an' you ain't good;
but try an' keep yer mouth clean when you speaks of Mrs. B. See?"
A murmur of approval rose from the other men, with whom Bindle was
popular and Henry Gilkes was not.
"Wot's she mean a-goin' round to my missis an' gettin' 'er to bolt me
out?"
"Bolt you out!" cried Bindle, with a puzzled expression. "Wotjer talkin'
about?"
"When I goes 'ome to dinner," was the angry retort, "there's a ticket on
the blinkin' door sayin' my missis 'as struck. I'll strike 'er!" he
added malevolently. "The lady next door tells me that it's your missis
wot done it."
For a moment Bindle gazed at his fellow-sufferer, then he smacked his
thigh with the air of a man who has just seen a great joke, which for
some time has evaded him.
"'Enery," he grinned, "she's done it to me too."
"Done wot?" enquired Henry, who, as a Father of the Chapel, felt he was
a man of some importance.
"Locked me out, back _and_ front," explained Bindle, enjoying his mate's
bewilderment. "Wot about the solidarity of labour now, ole sport?" he
enquired.
Henry Gilkes had one topic of conversation--"the solidarity of labour."
Those who worked with him found it wearisome listening to his views on
the bloated capitalist, and how he was to be overcome. They preferred
discussing their own betting ventures, and the prospects of the Chelsea
and Fulham football teams.
"Done it to you!" repeated Gilkes dully. "Wot she done?"
"I jest nipped round to get a bit o' dinner," explained Bindle, "and
there was both doors bolted, an' a note a-sayin' that Mrs. B. 'ad
struck. Personally, myself, I calls it a lock-out," he added with a
grin.
Several of his hearers began to manifest signs of uneasiness. They had
not been home since early morning.
"I'll break 'er stutterin' jaw if my missis locks me out," growled a
heavily-bearded man, known as "Ruddy Bill" on account of the intensity
of his language.
"Jest the sort o' thing you would do," said Bindle genially. "You got a
sweet nature, Bill, in spite of them whiskers."
Ruddy Bill growled something in his beard, while several of the other
men drained their pewters and slipped out, intent on discovering whether
or no their own domestic bliss were threatened by this new and
unexpected danger.
From then on, the public bar of The Yellow Ostrich hummed with angry
talk and threats of what would happen if the lords, who there gloried
and drank deep, should return to their hearths and find manifestations
of rebellion.
Two of the men, who had gone to investigate the state of their own
domestic barometers, were back in half an hour with the news that they
too had been locked out from home and beauty.
About three o'clock, Ruddy Bill returned, streams of profanity flowing
from his lips. Finding himself bolted out, he had broken open the door;
but no one was there. Now he was faced with a threat of ejectment from
the landlord, who had heard of the wilful damage to his property, plus
the cost of a new door.
Several times that afternoon the landlord of The Yellow Ostrich, himself
regarded as an epicure in the matter of "language," found it necessary
to utter the stereotyped phrase, "Now gents, if _you_ please," which,
with him, meant that the talk was becoming unfit for the fo'c'sle of a
tramp steamer.
II
Left to herself by the departure of Bindle for The Yellow Ostrich, Mrs.
Bindle had, for some time, stood by the dresser deep in thought. She had
then wrung-out the house-flannel, emptied the pail, placed them under
the sink and once more returned to the dresser. Five minutes' meditation
was followed by swift action.
First she took her bonnet from the dresser-drawer, then unhooking a dark
brown mackintosh from behind the door, she proceeded to make her outdoor
toilet in front of the looking-glass on the mantelpiece.
She then sought out ink-bottle and pen, and wrote her defiance with an
ink-eaten nib. This accomplished, she bolted the front-door on the
inside, first attaching her strike-notice. Leaving the house by the
door giving access to the scullery, she locked it, taking the key with
her.
Her face was grim and her walk was determined, as she made her way to
the yard at which Bindle was employed. There she demanded to see the
manager and, after some difficulty, was admitted.
She began by reproaching him and ordering him to stop the strike. When,
however, he had explained that the strike was entirely due to the action
of the men, she ended by telling him of her own drastic action, and her
determination to continue her strike until the men went back.
The manager surprised her by leaning back in his chair and laughing
uproariously.
"Mrs. Bindle," he cried at length, as he wiped the tears from his eyes,
"you're a genius; but I'm sorry for Bindle. Now, do you want to end the
strike in a few hours?"
Mrs. Bindle looked at him suspiciously; but, conscious of the very
obvious admiration with which he regarded her act, she relented
sufficiently to listen to what he had to say.
Ten minutes later she left the office with a list of the names and
addresses of the strikers, including that of the branch organising
secretary of the Union. She had decided upon a counter-offensive.
Her first call was upon Mrs. Gilkes, a quiet little woman who had been
subdued to meekness by the "solidarity of labour." Here she had to admit
failure.
"I know what you mean, my dear," said Mrs. Gilkes; "but you see, Mr.
Gilkes wouldn't like it." There was a tremor of fear in her voice.
"Wouldn't like it!" echoed Mrs. Bindle. "Of course he wouldn't like it.
Bindle won't like it when he knows," her jaws met grimly and her lips
disappeared. "You're afraid," she added accusingly.
"That's it, my dear, I am," was the disconcerting reply. "I never 'ad no
'eart for a fight, that's why Mr. Gilkes 'as come it over me like 'e
'as. My sister, Mary, was sayin' only last Toosday--no it wasn't, it was
We'n'sday, I remember because it was the day we 'ad sausages wot Mr.
Gilkes said wasn't fresh. 'Amelia,' she says, 'you ain't got the 'eart
of a rabbit, or else you wouldn't stand wot you do,'" and, looking up
into Mrs. Bindle's face, she added, "It's true, Mrs. Gimble, although I
didn't own it to Mary, 'er bein' my sister an' so uppish in 'er ways."
"Well, you'll be sorry," was Mrs. Bindle's comment, as she turned
towards the door. "I'll be no man's slave."
"You see, I 'aven't the 'eart, Mrs. Gimber."
"Bindle!" snapped Mrs. Bindle over her shoulder.
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Spindle, my mistake."
Mrs. Bindle stalked along the passage, through the front door and out of
the gate, leaving Mrs. Gilkes murmuring deprecatingly that she "'adn't
no 'eart for a fight."
Although she would not own it, Mrs. Bindle was discouraged by the
failure of her first attempt at strike-breaking. But for her
good-fortune in encountering Mrs. Hopton at her second venture, she
might even have relinquished the part of Lysistrata and have returned
home to prepare Bindle's dinner.
It was with something like misgiving that she knocked at No. 32 Wessels
Street. This feeling was accentuated when the door was opened with great
suddenness by an enormously big woman with a square chin, fighting eyes,
and very little hair.
With arms akimbo, one elbow touching either side of the passage, as if
imbued with the sentiments of Horatius Cocles, Mrs. Hopton stood with
tightly-shut mouth regarding her caller. As soon as Mrs. Bindle had made
her mission known, however, Mrs. Hopton's manner underwent an entire
change. Her hands dropped from her hips, her fixed expression relaxed,
and she stood invitingly aside.
"I'm your woman," she cried. "You come in, Mrs.----"
"Bindle!" prompted Mrs. Bindle.
"You come in, Mrs. Bindle, you got the woman you want in Martha 'Opton.
Us women 'ave stood this sort of thing long enough. I've always said
so."
She led the way into an airless little parlour, in which a case of
wax-fruit, a dusty stuffed dog and a clothes-horse hung with the
familiarities of Mrs. Hopton's laundry, first struck the eye.
"I've always said," continued Mrs. Hopton, "that us women was too meek
and mild by half in the way we takes things. My man's a fool," she added
with conviction. "'E's that easily led by them arbitrators, that's wot I
call 'em, that they makes 'im do just wotever they wants, dirty, lazy
set o' tykes. Never done a day's work in their lives, they 'aven't, not
one of 'em."
"That's what I say," cried Mrs. Bindle, for once in her life finding a
congenial spirit outside the walls of the Alton Road Chapel. "I've
locked up my house," she continued, "and put a note on the door that
I've struck too."
The effect of these words upon Mrs. Hopton was startling. Her head went
back like that of a chicken drinking, her hands rose once more to her
hips, and her huge frame shook and pulsated as if it contained a
high-power motor-engine. Mrs. Bindle gazed at her with widened eyes.
"Her-her-her!" came in deep, liquid gutturals from Mrs. Hopton's lips.
"Her-her-her!" Then her head came down again, and Mrs. Bindle saw that
the grim lips were parted, displaying some very yellow, unprepossessing
teeth. Mrs. Hopton was manifesting amusement.
Without further comment, Mrs. Hopton left the room. In her absence, Mrs.
Bindle proceeded to sum-up her character from the evidence that her home
contained. The result was unfavourable. She had just decided that her
hostess was dirty and untidy, without sense of decency or religion, when
Mrs. Hopton re-entered. In one hand she carried a piece of paper, in the
other a small ink-bottle, out of which an orange-coloured pen-holder
reared its fluted length.
Clearing a space on the untidy table, she bent down and, with squared
elbows and cramped fingers, proceeded to scrawl the words: "I have
struck too. M. Hopton."
Then, straightening herself, she once more threw back her head, and
another stream of "Her-her-her's" gushed towards the ceiling.
"Now I'll come with you," she said at length. Without waiting to don
cloak or bonnet, she proceeded to pin the notice on the front door,
which she bolted on the inside. She then left by the scullery door,
locking it, just as Mrs. Bindle had done, and carrying with her the key.
Although Mrs. Bindle felt that she suffered socially from being seen
with the lumbering, untidy Mrs. Hopton, she regarded it as a sacrifice
to a just cause. It was not long, however, before she discovered that
she had recruited, not a lieutenant, but a leader.
Seizing the list of names and addresses from her companion's hand, Mrs.
Hopton glanced at it and turned in the direction of the street in which
lived the timid Mrs. Gilkes. As they walked, Mrs. Bindle told the story
of Mrs. Gilkes's cowardice, drawing from the Amazon-like Mrs. Hopton the
significant words "Leave 'er to me."
"Now then, none of this," was her greeting to Mrs. Gilkes as she opened
her front door. "Out you comes and joins the strike-breakers. None o'
your nonsense or----" she paused significantly.
Mrs. Gilkes protested her cowardice, she grovelled, she dragged in her
sister, Mary, and the wrathful Gilkes; but without avail. Almost before
she knew what had happened, she was walking between Mrs. Hopton and
Mrs. Bindle, the back-door key clasped in one hand, striving to tie the
strings of her bonnet beneath a chin that was obviously too shallow for
the purpose. In her heart was a great terror; yet she was conscious of a
strange and not unpleasant thrill at the thought of her own daring. She
comforted herself with Mrs. Hopton's promise of protection against her
lord's anger.
The overpowering personality of Mrs. Hopton was too much for the other
wives. The one or two who made a valiant endeavour to stand out were
overwhelmed by her ponderous ridicule, which bordered upon intimidation.
"'Ere, get a pen an' ink," she would cry and, before the reluctant
housewife knew what had happened, she had announced that she too had
struck, and Mrs. Hopton's army had been swelled by another recruit.
At one house they found the husband about to sit down to an early
dinner. That gave Mrs. Hopton her chance.
"You lazy, guzzling, good-for-nothing son of a God-damn loafer!" she
shouted, her deep voice throbbing with passion. "Call yourself a man?
Fine sort of man you are, letting your wife work and slave while you
strike and fill your belly with beef and beer. I've seen better things
than you thrown down the sink, that I 'ave."
At the first attack, the man had risen from the table in bewilderment.
As Mrs. Hopton emptied upon him the vials of her anger, he had slowly
retreated towards the scullery door. She made a sudden movement in his
direction; he turned--wrenched open the door, and fled.
"I'm sorry to interrupt you, Mrs.----"
"Bolton," said the neat little woman.
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Bolton," said Mrs. Hopton; "but we're going to break
this 'ere strike, me and Mrs. Bindle and all these other ladies." She
waved her hand to indicate the army she had already collected.
Then she went on to explain; but Mrs. Bolton was adamant against all her
invitations to join the emancipationists.
"I suppose we got to fight your battle," Mrs. Hopton cried, and
proceeded to drench her victim with ridicule; but Mrs. Bolton stood
fast, and the strike-breakers had to acknowledge defeat.
It was Mrs. Bindle's idea that they should hold a meeting outside the
organising secretary's house. The suggestion was acclaimed with
enthusiasm.
"Let's get a tidy few, first," counselled Mrs. Hopton. "It'll make 'im
think 'arder."
At the end of an hour, even Mrs. Hopton was satisfied with the number of
her supporters, and she gave the word for the opening of hostilities.
That afternoon, just as he was rising from an excellent meal, Mr. James
Cunham was surprised to find that his neatly-kept front-garden was
filled with women, while more women seemed to occupy the street.
Neighbours came out, errand-boys called to friends, that they might not
miss the episode, children paused on their way to school; all seemed to
realise the dramatic possibilities of the situation.
Mrs. Hopton played a fugue upon Mr. Cunham's knocker, bringing him to
the door in person.
"Well, monkey-face," she boomed. There was a scream of laughter from her
followers.
Mr. Cunham started back as if he had been struck.
"Want to starve us, do you?" continued Mrs. Hopton.
"What's all this about?" he enquired, recovering himself. He was a man
accustomed to handling crowds, even unfriendly crowds; but never had he
encountered anything like the cataract of wrathful contumely that now
poured from Mrs. Hopton's lips.
"Just 'ad a good dinner, I suppose," she cried scornfully. "Been
enjoyin' it, eh? Cut from the joint and two vegs, puddin' to follow,
with a glass of stout to wash it down. That the meenyou, eh? What does
it cost you when our men strike? Do you 'ave to keep 'alf a dozen
bellies full on a pound a week?"
There was a murmur from the women behind her, a murmur that Mr. Cunham
did not like.
"Nice little 'ouse you got 'ere," continued Mrs. Hopton critically, as
she peered into the neat and well-furnished hall. "All got out o'
strikes," she added over her shoulder to her companions. "All got on the
do-nothin'-at-all-easy-purchase-system."
This time there was no mistaking the menace in the murmur from the women
behind her.
"You're a beauty, you are," continued Mrs. Hopton. "Not much sweat about
your lily brow, Mr. Funny Cunham."
Mr. Cunham felt that the time had come for action.
"What's the meaning of this?" he demanded. "Why have you come here, and
who are you?"
"Who are we?" cried Mrs. Hopton scornfully. "He asks who we are," she
threw over her shoulder.
Again there was an angry murmur from the rank and file.
"We're the silly fools wot married the men you brought out on strike,"
said Mrs. Hopton, looking the organising secretary up and down as if he
were on show. "Creases in 'is trousers, too," she cried. "You ain't 'alf
a swell. Well, we just come to tell you that the strike's orf, because
we've struck. Get me, Steve?"
"We've declared a lock-out," broke in Mrs. Bindle with inspiration.
Back went Mrs. Hopton's head, up went her hands to her hips, and
deep-throated "Her-her-her's" poured from her parted lips.
"A lock-out!" she cried. "Her-her-her, a lock-out! That's the stuff to
give 'em!" and the rank and file took up the cry and, out of the
plenitude of his experience, Mr. Cunham recognised that the crowd was
hopelessly out of hand.
"Are we down-hearted?" cried a voice, and the shrieks of "No!" that
followed confirmed Mr. Cunham in his opinion that the situation was not
without its serious aspect.
He was not a coward and he stood his ground, listening to Mrs. Hopton's
inspiring oratory of denunciation. It was three o'clock before he saw
his garden again--a trampled waste; an offering to the Moloch of
strikes.
"Damn the woman!" he cried, as, shutting the door, he returned to the
room he used as an office, there to deliberate upon this new phase of
the situation. "Curse her!"
III
It was nearly half-past ten that night when Bindle tip-toed up the
tiled-path leading to the front door of No. 7 Fenton Street.
Softly he inserted his key in the lock and turned it; but the door
refused to give. He stepped back to gaze up at the bedroom window; there
was no sign of a light.
It suddenly struck him that the piece of paper on the door was not the
same in shape as that he had seen at dinner-time. It was too dark to see
if there was anything written on it. Taking a box of matches from his
pocket, he struck a light, shielding it carefully so that it should
shine only on the paper.
His astonishment at what he read caused him to forget the lighted match,
which burnt his fingers.
"Well, I'm blowed!" he muttered. "If this ain't it," and once more he
read the sinister notice:
"You have struck. We women have declared a lock-out.
"E. BINDLE."
After a few minutes' cogitation, he tip-toed down the path and round to
the back of the house; but the scullery door was inflexible in its
inhospitality.
He next examined the windows. Each was securely fastened.
"Where'm I goin' to sleep?" he muttered, as once more he tip-toed up the
path.
After a further long deliberation, he lifted the knocker, gave three
gentle taps--and waited. As nothing happened, he tried four taps of
greater strength. These, in turn, produced no response. Then he gave a
knock suggestive of a telegraph boy, or a registered letter. At each
fresh effort he stepped back to get a view of the bedroom window.
He fancied that the postman-cum-telegraph-boy's knock had produced a
slight fluttering of the curtain. He followed it up with something that
might have been the police, or a fire.
As he stepped back, the bedroom-window was thrown up, and Mrs. Bindle's
head appeared.
"What's the matter?" she cried.
"I can't get in," said Bindle.
"I know you can't," was the uncompromising response, "and I don't mean
you shall."
"But where'm I goin' to sleep?" he demanded, anxiety in his voice.
"That's for you to settle."
"'Ere, Lizzie, come down an' let me in," he cried, falling to cajolery.
For answer Mrs. Bindle banged-to the window. He waited expectantly for
the door to be opened.
At the end of five minutes he realised that Mrs. Bindle had probably
gone back to bed.
"Well, I can't stay 'ere all the bloomin' night, me with various veins
in my legs," he muttered, conscious that from several windows interested
heads were thrust.
Fully convinced that Mrs. Bindle was not on her way down to admit him,
he once more fell back upon the knocker, awakening the echoes of Fenton
Street.
At the sound of the window-sash being raised, he stepped back and looked
up eagerly.
"'Ere, wot the ----!"
Something seemed to flash through the night, and he received the
contents of the ewer full in the face.
"That'll teach you to come waking me up at this time of night," came the
voice of Mrs. Bindle, who, a moment later, retreated into the room.
Bindle, rightly conjecturing that she had gone for more water, retired
out of reach.
"You soaked me through to the skin," he cried, when she re-appeared.
"And serve you right, too, you and your strikes."
"But ain't you goin' to let me in?"
"When the strike's off the lock-out'll cease," was the oracular retort.
"But I didn't want to strike," protested Bindle.
"Then you should have been a man and said so, instead of letting that
little rat make you do everything he wants, him sitting down to a good
dinner every day, all paid for out of strikes."
There were sympathetic murmurs from the surrounding darkness.
"But----" began Bindle.
"Don't let me 'ear anything more of you to-night, Joe Bindle," came Mrs.
Bindle's uncompromising voice, "or next time I'll throw the jug an' all
at you," and with that she banged-to the window in a way that convinced
Bindle it was useless to parley further.
"Catch my death o' cold," he grumbled, as he turned on a reluctant heel
in the direction of Fulham High Street, with the intention of claiming
hospitality from his sister-in-law, Mrs. Hearty. "Wot am I goin' to do
for duds," he added. "Funny ole bird I should look in one of 'Earty's
frock-coats."
IV
The next morning at nine o'clock, the wives of the strikers met by
arrangement outside the organising secretary's house; but the strikers
themselves were before them, and Mr. Cunham found himself faced with the
ugliest situation he had ever encountered.
At the sight of the groups of strikers, the women raised shrill cries.
The men, too, lifted their voices, not in derision or criticism of their
helpmates; but at the organising secretary.
The previous night the same drama that had been enacted between Bindle
and Mrs. Bindle had taken place outside the houses of many of the other
strikers, with the result that they had become "fed up to the blinkin'
neck with the whole ruddy business."
"Well!" cried Mrs. Hopton as, at the head of her legion of Amazons, she
reached the first group of men. "How jer like it?"
The men turned aside, grumbling in their throats.
"Her-her-her!" she laughed. "Boot's on the other foot now, my pretty
canaries, ain't it? Nobody mustn't do anythink to upset you; but you can
do what you streamin' well like, you lot o' silly mugs!
"Wotjer let that little rat-faced sniveller turn you round 'is little
finger for? You ain't men, you're just Unionists wot 'ave got to do wot
'e tells you. I see 'im yesterday," she continued after a slight pause,
"'aving a rare ole guzzle wot you pays for by striking. 'Ow much does it
cost 'im? That's wot I want to know, the rat-faced little stinker!"
At that moment "the rat-faced little stinker" himself appeared, hat on
head and light overcoat thrown over his arm. He smiled wearily, he was
not favourably impressed by the look of things.
His appearance was the signal for shrill shouts from the women, and a
grumbling murmur from the men.
"'Ere's Kayser Cunham," shouted one woman, and then individual cries
were drowned in the angry murmur of protest and recrimination.
Mr. Cunham found himself faced by the same men who, the day before, had
greeted his words with cheers. Now they made it manifest that if he did
not find a way out of the strike difficulty, there would be trouble.
"Take that!" roared Mrs. Hopton hoarsely, as she snatched something from
a paper-bag she was carrying, and hurled it with all her might at the
leader. Her aim was bad, and a small man, standing at right angles to
the Union secretary, received a large and painfully ripe tomato full on
the chin.
Mrs. Hopton's cry was a signal to the other women. From beneath cloaks
and capes they produced every conceivable missile, including a number of
eggs far gone towards chickenhood. With more zeal than accuracy of aim,
they hurled them at the unfortunate Mr. Cunham. For a full minute he
stood his ground valiantly, then, an egg catching him between the eyes
brought swift oblivion.
The strikers, however, did not manifest the courage of their leader.
Although intended for the organising secretary, most of the missiles
found a way into their ranks. They wavered and, a moment after, turned
and fled.
Approaching nearer, the women concentrated upon him whom they regarded
as responsible for the strike, and their aim improved. Some of their
shots took effect on his person, but most of them on the front of the
house. Three windows were broken, and it was not until Mrs. Cunham came
and dragged her egg-bespattered lord into the passage, banging-to the
street door behind her, that the storm began to die down.
By this time a considerable crowd of interested spectators had gathered.
"Just shows you what us women can do if we've a mind to do it," was the
oracular utterance of one woman, who prided herself upon having been the
first arrival outside the actual combatants.
"She ain't 'alf a caution," remarked a "lady friend," who had joined her
soon after the outbreak of hostilities. "That big un," she added,
nodding in the direction of Mrs. Hopton, who, arms on hips and head
thrown back, was giving vent to her mirth in a series of
"her-her-her's."
A policeman pushed his way through the crowd towards the gate. Mrs.
Hopton, catching sight of him, turned.
"You take my advice, my lad, and keep out of this."
The policeman looked about him a little uncertainly.
"What's the matter?" he enquired.
"It's a strike and a lock-out," she explained, "an' they got a bit
mixed. We ain't got no quarrel with a good-looking young chap like you,
an' we're on private premises, so you just jazz along as if you 'adn't
seen us."
A smile fluttered about the lips of the policeman. The thought of
passing Mrs. Hopton without seeing her amused him; still he took no
active part in the proceedings, beyond an official exhortation to the
crowd to "pass along, please."
"Well, ladies," said Mrs. Hopton, addressing her victorious legions;
"it's all over now, bar shoutin'. If any o' your men start a-knockin'
you about, tell 'em we're a-goin' to stand together, and just let me
know. We'll come round and make 'em wish they'd been born somethink wot
can't feel."
That morning the manager at the yard received a deputation from the men,
headed by Mr. Cunham, who, although he had changed his clothes and taken
a hot bath, was still conscious of the disgusting reek of rotten eggs.
Before dinner-time the whole matter had been settled, and the men were
to resume work at two o'clock.
Bindle reached home a few minutes to one, hungry and expectant. The
notice had been removed from the front door, and he found Mrs. Bindle in
the kitchen ironing.
"Well," she demanded as he entered, "what do you want?"
"Strike's orf, Lizzie," he said genially, an anxious eye turned to the
stove upon which, however, there were no saucepans. This decided him
that his dinner was in the oven.
"I could have told you that!" was her sole comment, and she proceeded
with her ironing.
For a few minutes Bindle looked about him, then once more fixed his gaze
upon the oven.
"Wot time you goin' to 'ave dinner, Lizzie?" he asked, with all the
geniality of a prodigal doubtful of his welcome.
"I've had it." Mrs. Bindle's lips met in a hard, firm line.
"Is mine in the oven?"
"Better look and see."
He walked across to the stove and opened the oven door. It was as bare
as the cupboard of Mrs. Hubbard.
"Wot you done with it, Lizzie?" he enquired, misgiving clutching at his
heart.
"What have I done with what?" she snapped, as she brought her iron down
with a bang that caused him to jump.
"My little bit o' groundsel."
"When you talk sense, perhaps I can understand you."
"My dinner," he explained with an injured air.
"When you've done a day's work you'll get a day's dinner, and not
before."
"But the strike's orf."
"So's the lock-out."
"But----"
"Don't stand there 'butting' me. Go and do some work, then you'll have
something to eat," and Mrs. Bindle reversed the pillow-case she was
ironing, and got in a straight right full in the centre of it, whilst
Bindle turned gloomily to the door and made his way to The Yellow
Ostrich, where, over a pint of beer and some bread and cheese, he
gloomed his discontent.
"No more strikes for me," said a man seated opposite, who was similarly
engaged.
"Same 'ere," said Bindle.
"Bob Cunham got a flea in 'is ear this mornin' wot 'e's been askin'
for," said the man, and Bindle, nodding in agreement, buried his face in
his pewter.
Meanwhile, Mrs. Hopton was explaining to a few personal friends how it
all had happened.
"She done good work in startin' of us orf," was her tribute to Mrs.
Bindle; "but I can't say I takes to her as a friend."